THE NAKED TRUTH

Written for the spn_bigpretzel Spring Fic Exchange on Livejournal

Original Prompt: Nothing they do seems to stop him from sleepwalking... in the nude
Summary: Sam's determined to get to the bottom of Dean's latest problem. 'Bottom' being the operative word…

Disclaimer: I don't own them!

xxxxx

There were a hundred and one things Sam would rather be doing right now, than what he actually was doing.

Having a root canal; sitting his tenth-grade calculus exam; reliving the time he vomited over his high-school crush; having a prostrate exam…

Well, okay. Maybe that last one was a bit of a stretch, but seriously. Hauling his ass out of bed at two am to drive down to the local police station to collect his brother who had been picked up sleepwalking - sleepwalking, that is, by the side of a busy highway, butt naked apart from one blue sock - was never going to feature highly in his treasure trove of memories.

Walking into the police station with a hastily-grabbed armful of Dean's clothes, and stifling a yawn, he approached the bored-looking night deputy.

"Hi, I'm here to pick up the, uh, sleepwalking guy," he announced.

The deputy looked up; his blank expression suggested that rounding up weirdos in various states of undress in the middle of the night was an unremarkably regular occurrence for him.

"OK, yeah. We've given him a blanket to cover himself until you got here. He's damn lucky – he was about to become a Buick's hood ornament when our patrol picked him up."

Sam stifled a gasp, and made it sound like a sigh.

The deputy led Sam down to the cells and Sam got the first look at his shamefaced brother, sitting on the cot at the back of the cell and wrapped from head to foot in an unglamorous grey blanket.

"Take him home," the deputy sighed; "an' get him some therapy or somethin' for that sleepwalkin'. He might not be so lucky next time."

Sam didn't want to think about that possibility.

xxxxx

The following night, Dean went wandering again. This time, Sam was alert to the possibility and managed to intercept him as he was letting himself out of the bunker. For reasons beyond Sam's comprehension, Dean was naked again, although he had seemingly felt it necessary to put a hat on.

Although it wasn't foremost in Sam's thoughts at the time, Sam later reflected that he didn't even know Dean had a hat.

On the third night Sam didn't need to find Dean wandering naked around the bunker, as Dean wandered into his room in his sleep-addled state and climbed into bed next to him.

And yes, there was nakedness; sweaty, gropey nakedness. Sweaty, gropey nakedness that Sam really didn't want to think about.

Ever.

xxxxx

The following morning, the brothers sat in the kitchen drinking their coffee and making the kind of small talk which screamed 'giant great big pink sparkly embarrassing elephant in the room that neither of us emotionally stunted numbskulls are going to talk about…'

Except, eventually Sam did talk about it. "What the hell's going on Dean? You've never sleepwalked before, have you?"

Dean sighed into his coffee mug. "No, not that I know of."

"And what's with the, you know, the nudity?" Sam asked queasily; "I know us having our own rooms in the bunker gives us a lot more privacy, but since when have you slept in the raw?"

"I don't sleep in the raw," Dean snapped; "apparently I only sleep'walk' in the raw."

Sam stared down at the table. "What's changed then? Why has this whole naked sleepwalking thing only just started?"

Dean shrugged unhelpfully. "No idea." he grunted. "All I know is that apart from the whole 'flashing my junk' crap, I'm freaking beat, I haven't had any decent sleep for the last three nights."

Sam pulled in a long breath; "Yeah, well my nights haven't exactly been restful recently, either." He hesitated briefly; "anyway, I'm thinking more along the lines that it's only a matter of time before you get arrested, get run over, or get hypothermia."

"I really don't know Sam," Dean replied with a defeated sigh. "No goddamn idea."

"Well, something must have started it off, and with our lives that could be anything," Sam mused; "has anything unusual happened in the last few days?"

Dean paused in thought for a moment. "No, not that I know of," he eventually offered.

"Well, something must have … wait, didn't you have an accident or something while you were in the vaults last week?"

Dean hesitated. "well, not exactly an accident, but I tripped over some stupid box," he eventually offered. "Twisted my ankle, but nothing serious."

"Why was it on the floor?"

"It was originally high up on a shelf, but I moved it because I was looking for something."

"Something that makes you sleepwalk naked?"

"Fuck off!"

Sam grinned wearily. "So, what was in the box?"

"Nothing, it was empty."

Sam frowned; "The Men of Letters wouldn't have a box in the vaults with nothing in it, surely."

Dean shrugged. "I'm telling you Sam, after I stubbed my toe, I picked it up and checked it. It was definitely empty."

There was a brief silence between the two men.

"Hmmm," Sam mused; "can't hurt to have another look…"

"… and don't roll your eyes at me," he added.

xxxxx

Sam was silent as he closely examined the crumpled, cobweb-ridden wreckage of the old wooden box on the table in front of him.

"See," Dean announced triumphantly; "I told you, nothing in it. No packaging, or fragments or anything."

"Dean, is there a possibility that this box is empty because you smashed the toe of your stupid, clumsy great boot through the side of it?"

"What," Dean replied; "are you suggesting something escaped?"

Sam nodded hesitantly; "anything's possible in this place."

Dean warily prodded the eight-inch-wide box with his outstretched index finger. "Well, I'm guessing it's not a woolly mammoth."

"Hey," Sam muttered; "look at the padlock – there's an inscription on it. Really tiny, but… I've seen that symbol somewhere else in the MoL archives."

Dean leaned down and squinted intently at smashed box's extremely small and somewhat redundant padlock. He convinced himself that the inscription was just really, really, stupidly small – he absolutely did not need to start wearing reading glasses. Nope, Not at all. No siree.

"I want to get this resolved today," Sam snapped, rising from the table; "I don't wanna have to get dragged out of bed in the middle of the night and find you butt naked in downtown Lebanon again tonight."

"It's not exactly a blast for me either," Dean retorted with wounded indignation.

"Granted," Sam replied; "oh, and speaking of blasts, there's a lightning storm forecasted tonight."

"Yikes…" Dean grunted.

xxxxx

It took Sam all of ten minutes to check the archives and find the symbol.

"That's it," he announced triumphantly; "this glyph is used to protect against faeries."

"Faeries?"

"Yes Dean, faeries."

"Smurfs?"

Sam shot Dean a dangerous glare.

"I've just cross referenced the glyph against the letters' inventory, and it appears that this box used to contain a Kobold."

"Kobold? Wow!" Dean paused as the wheels in his mind turned. "And that's a type of faerie?"

"Yes Dean," Sam sighed; "it's a type of faerie, and it was contained in that box. Well, at least until you kicked a damn great hole in the side of it."

"So, apart from the fact that it's a faerie," Dean mused; "where is it?"

"Who knows," Sam shrugged; "it's a faerie. It's very small and it has the power of invisibility. It could be anywhere."

"Hey, do you think this little shit's got anything to do with my, um, you know …"

"Your nocturnal wanderings?"

"Well, yeah."

"Your NAKED nocturnal wanderings…"

"Sam, I WILL hurt you."

Sam grinned as he continued. "Kobolds are house faeries."

"What, like Dobby?" Dean positively beamed; "Dobby was cool, I could handle having Dobby around."

"Yeah, these guys aren't quite so lovable as Dobby," Sam sighed. "They originate from northern Europe, around Germany and that sort of area. If they are treated well and looked after, they'll work around the house and help out. But if they're treated badly, or disrespected, they'll play tricks which can be so malicious, they can even kill someone."

"Well, what's the little douchenut got to be so pissed at us for?" Dean asked indignantly.

"Dean," Sam snapped; "you kicked it halfway across the basement, then to add insult to injury, you ignored it."

"I freed it," Dean snorted. "It had been locked in that freaking box for years. The little dick should show a bit of gratitude."

"Well," Sam replied calmly, "it obviously believes that we should show a bit of gratitude to it. So if you want to keep your clothes on tonight, you'll have to swallow your pride and start giving our Kobold some love."

Dean huffed grumpily, nose wrinkling in barely-disguised disgust.

xxxxx

The Winchesters stood in the corner of the bunker's main hall, looking down at a cardboard box placed discreetly in a shadowy corner of the room. The box was lined with a cushion, beside it was a drizzle of cream in a small bowl and some cubes of bread and cheese on a plate.

"Okay," Sam announced; let's see if that does the trick."

Dean smirked. "I still reckon we should have put whisky in that bowl, not cream."

"Seriously Dean?" Sam groaned.

"Yeah, it's the perfect solution," Dean continued; "even if he didn't like it, he'd be too shitfaced to give me a hard time!"

"Go to bed Dean."

xxxxx

The following morning, Sam was delighted to be awoken by his alarm clock at 6.30 am, and not a call from a police officer in the middle of the night. He dared to hope that Dean had managed to sleep through the night.

At their breakfast table, and much to his relief, his hopes were confirmed.

"I slept through the night like a freaking baby," Dean enthused around an expansive yawn that displayed a gruesome mulch of half-chewed toast for the world – or at least Sam - to see. "Man, I would pay for a sleep like that every night."

"Awesome," Sam sighed; "it looks like we're forgiven. We've just got to remember to keep the cream stocked up."

xxxxx

Three weeks passed, and the Winchesters weren't sure exactly what had happened to the bunker. Throughout its depths, floors were polished, walls washed, doorframes dusted. Even the kitchen was thoroughly cleaned, and despite Dean being wary of someone else cleaning his beloved kitchen, he had to concede the little Kobold had done a sterling job.

"I haven't had to deep clean the kitchen once," he explained gleefully to Sam; "I can practically see my freaking face in the refrigerator door. He even managed to clean that pan with the burned caramel sauce welded to the bottom of it. We are so keeping this awesome little dude!"

Sam shook his head with a wry smile. The awesome little dude who was a little dick three weeks ago.

xxxxx

The following morning, Dean was woken up from another wonderful sleep by his phone ringing.

"Yeah, hello?" He groaned. His heart skipped a beat when he heard an automated voice announcing a collect call from Sam Winchester.

"Dean, it's me!"

Dean sat bolt upright in his bed. "Sam? What? What's wrong?"

"Yeah. Listen," Sam explained urgently; "I slipped on the polished floor in my new socks this morning and I accidentally knocked the kobold's bowl of cream over."

"Oh crap, you ok?"

"Yeah, I'm fi…" Sam hesitated; "well, bruised my knee, nothing I can't deal with. But, dude, I kinda need your help."

"What," Dean snapped; "what's wrong Sam?"

"Uh, well, I'm somewhere on the western edge of Kansas City."

"Huh? You mean, that freakin' Kobold sent you there just for spilling his cream?" Dean hissed furiously; "Hold on Sam, I'm on my way."

"Thanks Dean, hurry up though."

"Yeah, just getting out of bed," Dean muttered, trying to hold on to the phone as he pulled his T shirt over his head; "I'll be on the road in five."

"Thanks," Sam replied quietly; "Oh and Dean?"

"Yeah?" Dean replied.

Sam sighed. "Bring clothes…"

xxxxx

end