A/N:
Thanks to Gayle for the review!
Bobby sighed heavily as he trudged up the stairs towards his room. The early morning had been filled with griping matches with his parents, and then an interview with the damn police, to describe the "total psycho" that had attacked him and his friends at their campsite. His mom had wanted him to go to the hospital to get checked out like Chase and Jacob, but Bobby refused.
It was all just so stressful, after all, and he'd rather just stay inside on his own for a while. He couldn't even face his friends, after running off on them like that.
They all bought it, of course. Some false tears at the edges of his eyes, a haunted look at his time lost out in the woods, and they knew he could have done no wrong. It was a trick that the demon had helped him develop. It was incredibly handy and it gave him a bit of a thrill to pull people's strings like that.
Even so, he was glad they left so he could finally focus on what actually interested him. He opened the door to his room and smirked at the tall jar still sitting on his desk where he left it. He ambled over, dragging the jar close to the edge of the desk so he could loom over the prisoners inside of it as he leered in at them. It was amusing to see how the lurching container knocked them off balance.
"You just missed the circus, guys. Too bad."
Sam sent Bobby a flat look back. His eyes were more haunted than they'd been the night before. Shadows lurked at the edges. Sleep was fleeting in a container like this, and the constant scent of vinegar around them didn't help.
He avoided a total glare, hoping to avoid antagonizing Bobby over something so stupid. Sam was pretty sure he was already going to piss the human off in some way just by existing, might as well try and tone down how much he pissed him off.
Sam wasn't a sprite, after all. How dare he waste Bobby's time.
None of that stopped Sam from sending Bobby a completely unamused smile that didn't reflect in his eyes. "That's too bad. I always wanted to meet the bearded lady."
Bobby snickered, just as unamused as Sam but playing along. He didn't bother to reward the quip with one of his own, and instead grabbed the edge of the jar and turned away from his desk, bringing Sam and Scar with him out of the room.
Scar winced as the abrupt motion knocked his injured wing against one of the glass walls around him. Thankfully, Sam's splint work held. His wing was held at a slightly uncomfortable angle, and the area around the wrist had swollen, but nothing came loose.
"Just what are you planning now?" he called up, before grimacing again and trying to brace himself as Bobby walked down the stairs. It felt like he made his steps as jostling as he could on purpose.
The jar lifted up a little so Bobby could look in at them. "Gotta find a better cage for you two," he told them. "And, while I'm figuring that out, I think some education might be in order. Don't want to repeat that wing, do we?"
"Yeah, if you're not careful we'll run out of limbs to threaten," Sam mimed back in annoyance as the burning on his neck increased. It was almost painful after being stared at by Bobby the last day.
Between both Jacob and Dean, not once had the sixth sense that Sam had discovered been dialed up to such a painful intensity. It left him realizing that it didn't onlyserve to tell him that he was being watched… it also told him that he was in danger. His friends would never hurt him, and Sam knew that with a certainty that only Rischa or Cerul could meet.
He knew it, just like he knew right now that Bobby didn't care if they got hurt.
"Did you already plan out all our lessons?" Sam shot up at the human.
At the bottom of the steps, Bobby's grip tightened on the rim of the jar. The whole thing vibrated with his nearly-fulfilled urge to shake the container back and forth. However, the sprite really could end up with more damage on that wing than Bobby wanted, so he decided to wait on his punishment for the little sprite lookalike.
He'd figure out how to crack them both. It shouldn't be too hard. They were small, and, despite all that defiance, everyone had a limit.
He arrived in the kitchen and the jar struck the table at an angle before Bobby finally tilted it over on its side once more. "Come on out," he demanded. "I'm guessing you gotta have something to eat and drink."
"How kind of him," Scar muttered, getting to his feet after falling onto the side of the jar. The thought of taking an order from the wretch made his skin crawl, but there were few other choices. Scar knew as well as Sam that the human seemed to favor the younger knight less. If there was anything Scar could do about it, he wouldn't let Sam suffer.
Sam followed Scar out, hating every step he took. If Bobby was planning on separating them, they were making it a thousand times easier for him by leaving the glass confines. As shaky as their situation was in the jar, Bobby had at least avoided hurting Scar more.
When they were both standing on the table, Sam took a deep breath of fresh air. Even if it was only for a few minutes, he enjoyed the lack of stinging vinegar against his throat. A new cage might trap them more effectively, but having a hard time breathing was no way to live.
Turning in place, Sam took a moment to assess the kitchen and search for good places to hide if they got a chance. It was a shock to see the towering appliances, but the warm sunlight was welcome. Strangely, it felt like he belonged on the outside world more than in this place of human things. He was as much of an outsider as Scar now.
Once they were out of the jar, Bobby lifted it back up and set it aside. He leaned down to stare curiously at them, still not over his fascination with his finds, no matter how much he'd wanted to find them for most of his life. He reached out a hand, aiming to brush it against Scar's injured wing as the briefest flash of concern darted across his mind, but the sprite stepped back, turned away to hide his wings, and held his hands up warily.
Bobby smirked, but drew his hand back. "Guess that lesson stuck," he said smugly, before turning to one of the cabinets in the room to rummage around for something to feed the pair of them. It wouldn't do any good to starve them.
Scar let out a disgruntled sigh once the human's back was turned to them. It was barely a relief, having him look away, but it was enough. Scar glanced around at everything, and nothing was familiar. Huge boxes with wide doors hung from the ceiling, and when Bobby opened them they were revealed to be some kind of hanging storage rooms.
A wide, eerily straight-edged counter ran along two walls, and Scar had no name or concept at all for the things littered atop it. The window let in the cheerful sunlight through curtains patterned with flowers, and below it was a silvery basin with one long metal arm reaching over it. A boxy contraption taller than even Bobby whirred in one corner.
"This blasted place doesn't even feel like earth," Scar admitted quietly, a frown deepening on his face.
A strange, crackling sound from above drew his attention. The human had retrieved a wrapped pile of what looked like round breads, and he opened up the strange paper around them to retrieve one. The first, he popped into his own mouth, and the next he lowered to the two prisoners before setting the package aside.
"That should be more than you even need," Bobby pointed out after finishing his own cracker, as if he'd given them their weight in gold.
"All part of a balanced meal," Sam snipped quietly as he reached out to take the cracker, sizing up how obnoxiously big it seemed after watching someone eat a similar cracker in one bite.
The damn thing was the size of his torso, at least.
Sam sat down on the counter and broke off a piece for him and a piece for Scar. "They're made from grains," he told the sprite as he bit off a piece of his own. The sprites of Wellwood were vegetarians, and he knew sometimes it could be hard to tell what certain foods were in the human world he was from.
As he ate through the salted snack, Sam's eyes flashed from side to side to observe the room around them. He did his best to avoid glancing at Bobby. Words from another life rose in his mind. Microwave. Refrigerator. Toaster. All objects that had no place in the sprite's worldview.
"It's been so long I forgot what it was like," Sam said softly to Scar. "And now I don't think I fit in with any of it anymore." He lowered his eyes. This was his brother's world, and he didn't fit in.
Scar stared dubiously at the food in his hand before taking a seat and nibbling at it. He hadn't realized that his stomach was pining for something, an empty feeling in his core since sometime in the night. Even now, with the sunlight shining into the room without any knowledge of how grim two of its occupants were, Scar's good wing was shifting to a better angle to capture some of the golden rays.
While they ate, Bobby crossed the room with unconcerned strides to retrieve a cup from another cabinet, the shortest one he could find. It was still almost up to Scar's shoulders. He crossed to the basin by the window and Scar's eyes widened briefly at the way water surged out of the long metal arm with merely a flick of a lever.
"Don't worry," Scar said back to him. "You're far and away ahead of me." Sam, at least, knew the names for most if not all of the things in the room. Scar felt as out of place as he could in a place like this.
Their sad musings were cut short when the newly-filled cup of water was set down roughly a few inches from where they sat. Bobby didn't even say anything. He merely stepped back and went to the fridge to find himself something to snack on, demonstrating that, even with all of his fascination with them, they were just oddities that he could put aside whenever he wanted.
Sam watched Bobby's movements, finding those moments when the human's eyes were off him a relief. It gave his neck enough time for some of the burn to wear off. Maybe if they were out of sight of Bobby for an hour, it would leave completely.
He could hope.
Taking a last bite of the cracker, Sam got up and brushed off his hands. He carefully scooped a drop of water between cupped hands and sipped at it. He paid no mind to Bobby, relying on his sixth sense to know when Bobby's attention turned back towards them.
"I'd love a chance to show it all to you," Sam said morosely he sat back down to finish off his drink. "It's not all bad. It really isn't."
Scar smiled grimly. "If nothing else, Bowman will want a tour of it all," he pointed out. Bowman had grown up with stories from Sam about the world beyond the woods. There were plenty of sprites that knew one or two things about the world Sam had come from.
Most importantly, Scar knew, Sam had come from a world far different from what was described in the Archives. They were out of date, even with Bobby's harsh treatment.
"We will get through it," he determined, standing to retrieve his own drink. It was awkward and cumbersome, reaching over the edge of the glass. He wasn't quite as tall as Sam, and his injury complained when he stretched himself out to complete the task.
Scar didn't even have a chance to back up more than a few steps from the cup before Bobby turned back to them and strode over. He picked up the glass and downed the rest of the water in a few gulps that nearly put Scar off the desire to quench his own thirst. If only I still had poisons with me.
Bobby set the cup down heavily and, with little warning, poked Scar right in the stomach. It was much harsher than expected, and he let out a huff of air while the remaining water in his hands splashed onto his jacket. Bobby snickered above them while Scar turned a glare reserved for stubborn predators towards the surface beneath his feet.
"Looks like you two got enough," Bobby quipped above them. He laid a hand flat on the counter. "Time to check the hall closet and see if my mom still has the birdcage from when she used to have a finch. Should be enough for you two. It even has a swing for the butterfly, here."
Sam's lips thinned at the thought of being placed in a birdcage like a pet, but he didn't say a word of protest. Just thinking of them sitting in a cage like that was cutting enough, but Sam knew it was possible to get out if they put their minds to it. Pet cages were good for animals, but when the animals were sapient it became a hell of a lot harder to keep them inside. If parrots could escape, Sam and Scar should be able to scrape something together between the two of them.
He'd learned a trick or two from his family before the curse. Their specialty was getting into places they weren't supposed to be. It would serve him well getting out.
Sam stepped up onto Bobby's hand, doing his best to not think about what he was doing. Putting himself willingly into a dangerous human's grasp… Sam held out his arms for balance and glanced over at Scar to make sure he didn't need any help, as off balance as he was with one wing bound.
Bobby raised an eyebrow at Scar. "You too, sprite," he told him, even curling his fingers upwards in an impatient beckon. He wasn't about to waste both hands on carrying them. He needed one free to open doors and prepare the cage before he dropped them in.
Scar, still seething and bristled with rage that he couldn't unleash in any way, stepped towards the hand haltingly. He didn't want to step onto it any more than Sam did. He didn't even know what a birdcage was supposed to look like, but their place had already been decided.
The surface of a hand was strange to walk on. After only being crushed and gripped in a fist, this was Scar's first time trying it. He nearly toppled over when Bobby lifted his hand abruptly away from the counter.
"Hey, don't go tumbling, now," Bobby warned. "I doubt that one wing will catch you."
"And whose fault is it I only have the one," Scar muttered, shifting closer to the palm of Bobby's hand while the human turned towards a huge archway out of the room.
"Watch it," Bobby said absently even as he ambled towards a hall closet door. He lifted his hand up to eye level to glare at both of them with icy blue eyes that held no remorse for his actions. "I can hear pretty well but, gosh, I wouldn't be able to help it if I dropped you. Think your wingless pal would last?" His thumb nudged at Sam pointedly.
Sam twitched away from the thumb in frustration. "That might actually be a threat if I was afraid of heights!" he snapped up at the human, wishing he had anywhereelse to go that wasn't in Bobby's hand.
He was of half a mind to just jump, but he already knew he'd get grabbed back up. Dean had proved that Sam couldn't even get far from a human before being snatched back up, and Scar would get jostled if that happened.
It pissed him off to no end that even the lighthearted teasing with Dean the day before now stung, remembering how fast a human could move. Sam clung to the surprised and worried look on Dean's face. Dean never meant to make them feel small like this. He was just trying to watch after Sam and didn't know how to do it.
That didn't change anything right now though.
Sam slapped at the thumb in annoyance. "If Scar's wing gets injured more you won't have much of a sprite," he growled, protective of his teacher.
Bobby's look was simply cold. There was nothing else to show he had a particular reaction to Sam's words, except for the frigid cold behind his eyes. Without further words, he turned to the hall closet and wrenched the door open.
Coats and boxes and knick knacks filled the space, and even a vacuum cleaner was tucked away behind the coats, its base showing on the dusty hardwood floor. Bobby swept aside some coats to reveal another object sitting next to it.
The birdcage was one of the old-fashioned, overly-ornate types. It had a tall domed top and metal bars painted in white that had chipped in several places. There was still some leftover straw lining from the bird that used to live in it at the bottom. Bobby leaned to grab the handle on top and dragged the cage out, nudging the door closed again with an elbow.
The door to the cage was already hanging open, so without further ado, Bobby stuffed his hand inside to dump Sam and Scar onto the floor of their latest prison. The sprite let out a grunt of pain, but thankfully didn't land on his hurt wing.
Sam, however, didn't even get a chance to get his bearings before a thumb and finger pinched around one leg and dragged him back out again, bringing him before those cold eyes. "Looks like you're relapsing, squirt. Lemme make it as clear as I can: you don't have a say here. Get it?"
Sam didn't say a word back. He hung in place, beyond thankful that his uniform was modified to catch him if he fell. The long, fluffy brown hair he was so proud of nearly covered his eyes completely, which was a good thing while he glared in place. His arms were crossed, but one hand clenched in pain. Bobby's grip wasn't gentle, and bruises on his leg would be joining the bruises on his chest.
Bobby scoffed, a smirk on his face. He moved his hand slightly, just enough to make Sam sway in his grip. That stubborn countenance still irked him. He wanted to know what made the little guy so bold when he had literally no power with Bobby or any human. He was too small and weak to make a real impact.
"Stop it," Scar spoke up, unable to watch the casual abuse any longer. He sat on the floor of the cage, wbraced on his hands, and his eyes were focused on the young man hanging by one leg for the simple amusement of a power-drunk giant. Scar's pride was not worth it. It asn't worth seeing the boy he'd kept watch over for so long get hurt. "Stop this, please."
Bobby raised his eyebrows. "Are you begging, hot shot?"
"Yes," Scar shot back, his resentment toned down. "I am. For his life and safety, I am begging you."
A/N:
Sam has that stubborn Winchester streak in him.
Next: April 12th, 2020 at 9pm EST.
Leave us a review to let us know how you're liking the story so far!