Happy Sunday everyone! I'm sure you're looking forward to this new chapter ;) I hope you're all keeping yourselves cool (it's been hot as hell where I live all week and not a lot of chances of it getting any better, my 12-year-old cat has stopped fighting with his younger brothers for ownership of the blanket, not that they want it either right now :)) ).

Anyway, your reviews were gold as usual (and I know some of you are quite impatient to see what happens next). Warning for some slightly creepier than usual and disturbing scenes at the end.

Chapter 9

Sam woke slowly. He tried to make sense of the world beyond the pounding in his head, but he could not seem to get himself to focus on more than one thing at a time. He searched his mind trying to piece the fragments of memories together.

He knew he was lying on some hard surface and his hands were bound. He struggled to break free, but whoever had tied him up seemed to have anticipated any move he might make to escape. Sam remembered the dream he had, with Dean about to bury him alive and wondered if that was what had happened. Had Dean done this to him? He knew Chris had the same dream, of his sister wanting to kill him, so maybe one of the ghosts was reliving their own dramas by possessing siblings and making them kill each other. After all, there had to be a reason why Rebecca was an only child in a family that usually had at least three kids.

Rebecca. Sam remembered now. He had been alone with Rebecca. Chad had slunk away somewhere, tail between his legs, after his duplicity had been revealed. Dean had gone to talk to Trisha. Then Sam had run into Rebecca. It got hazy after that.

Sam took a deep breath. He could not remember what she had hit him with, but she must have hit quite hard. He could hardly think. Then she carried him here, wherever here was, while Sam was unconscious. Quite a feat for someone Rebecca's size.

Possession increased one's strength. Sam knew that. Rebecca wasn't herself then. She was possessed, probably had been so since she had gotten trapped in the outbuilding. Sam should have thought that would be likely to happen. He and Dean should have checked Rebecca. Then Sam wouldn't have found himself in this mess.

"Maybe they're right," Sam thought, remembering Hector's quips when he had used Sam as bait and some of Dean's not so kind comments when Purgatory was still fresh in his mind. "Maybe I am getting soft. Maybe I can't be a hunter anymore."

Sam had not felt like a hunter in a long time. Maybe since Dean had vanished, maybe before, when the Wall had tumbled down. He had tried to go through the motions, but all he had managed was to react to what others were throwing at him. Until he could not do even that.

He shut his eyes tight against the pain battering his skull. The nausea told him he more than likely had a concussion. He chuckled ruefully. Dean was going to be so pissed when he got back.

The fog was threatening to engulf him once more. A small voice was warning him that he shouldn't go to sleep. That he should stay awake and try to fight this off. Whatever was coming, Sam knew he needed to be alert and ready for it. But everything was so strange and confusing that giving in was the easiest thing to do.

xxxXXXxxxx

Trisha looked slightly upset as if she did not really know if she could trust Dean with her secrets. Dean could not really blame her. Trisha knew him only as "Rebecca's friend" and probably suspected that he had no say in whether she got her great-grandmother's diary or not, at least not any more than Rebecca herself did. It was not that surprising that she would be hesitant to reveal her secrets to him.

"You called me," Dean reminded her. "You said you remembered something important."

Trisha bit her lips.

"I did. Something I overheard my great-grandmother say. My mother told me that under no circumstances I was to repeat it. That it was only proof my great-grandmother had lost it."

Dean eyed her carefully.

"But you don't think that's true. Come on, Trisha, I can tell that. If you thought for a second that was true, you wouldn't have called me."

Dean was feeling a sense of urgency that told him he should get this meeting over with and hurry back to the house. He did not like the idea of Sam alone in Harwood Manor. There had already been a death there, and Chad, Dean was beginning to suspect, was an unstable element. As for Sam himself, it was hard for Dean to determine what Sam felt these days or how he would react if he found himself alone and in danger. Sam was a survivor, Dean knew that, but lately he started to suspect there were times when Sam no longer wanted to survive.

Dean tried to put that thought out of his mind. It was not going to do anything while he was separated from Sam, other than drive him mad with worry. He would just have to tackle the matter with Sam later on – although he already knew that the chances of him gathering up his courage and actually having that kind of conversation with Sam were pretty much zero.

"What happened to your great-grandmother?" Dean asked. "Surely, you know more than you're saying. She told you something, didn't she? Trisha, I need to know."

Trisha's eyes flashed.

"Why?" she challenged. "Why are you so interested in something that happened a hundred years ago?"

Dean hesitated only briefly, then leaned forward.

"I think you know why, Trisha."

He sought her eyes and saw the horrified understanding in them.

"I think you've been keeping an eye on that house all your life. Maybe your parents had too. Listening to whatever rumors you could about it. Waiting for the moment something happened. You heard about the lawyer yesterday, didn't you?"

Trisha nodded curtly.

"They say it was an accident."

Dean smiled grimly.

"Trisha, I saw the body. Believe me, it was no accident."

Trisha shook her head.

"Then what was it?" she asked sharply. "You can't just sit here and tell me that it's the same…"

She stopped herself abruptly. Dean, however, had heard enough.

"The same thing that was killing people in your great-grandmother's time?" he asked knowingly.

Trisha got up abruptly and went to the window.

"My great-grandmother talked about sacrifices. To keep the Graystone family rich and in power. She said that they would have gone under otherwise. Their wealth was in danger, you see."

"And they struck a deal so that didn't happen."

Trisha huffed.

"I don't know what they did. But my great-grandmother thought they were enjoying the sacrifices. She said sometimes people enjoyed killing just for the sake of it. Can you understand that?"

Dean clenched his fists. He could almost smell it – the stench of Purgatory, the blood and smoke and something else that he could not quite place. There were moments in that place when he had thought he could live like that. He could live enjoying the hunt – the killing just for the sake of it.

"I've never sacrificed to evil house spirits," he said at length, and that much was true.

Trisha turned to look at him.

"Larissa Graystone was apparently against the killings," she said. "My great-grandmother found her body."

Dean frowned.

"She wasn't buried alive?" he asked.

Sam and Chris' dreams indicated that was how the Graystones killed their victims. What else did they do, though?

Trisha shook her head.

"My great-grandmother would repeat over and over how one stormy night in 1890 the servants heard Larissa scream. They got there too late to save her. Whoever had killed her was gone. Larissa was found with her throat slashed."

Dean felt suddenly cold. He remembered Chad threatening the biker by holding a knife to his throat. He remembered how much Chad had seemed to enjoy it, how accustomed he appeared. How many times had he done it anyway? And what would happen if he found himself in the same house with the ghost of someone who had been killed in that manner?

xxxXXXxxxx

When Sam woke up again he knew he was somewhere different even before opening his eyes. The ground was soft and he could smell fresh grass. Something hit him in the face and he opened his eyes in alarm.

He was still tied up and he was lying in some hole in the ground while someone was trying to shovel earth over him. His dream was coming true.

For a moment, panic was all Sam knew. He struggled to break free, the bonds digging into his skin, tightening instead of loosening. The frantic movement brought back the dizziness, and he lay still, fighting with it. He could not be sick, he reminded himself. Not now. He'd suffocate even before whoever was trying to bury him alive finished the job.

A shadow was moving above him. Sam squinted against the fog in his mind and found himself looking up at Rebecca's blank features.

Briefly, the only thing Sam could feel was relief. Because the dream had not come true. Because this was Rebecca and not Dean. Whatever happened, Dean would not have to live with the notion of being possessed – or that he had been made to kill Sam.

Then Sam had to admit this was the only good news he had. Because he was still in danger. And maybe it would have been easier to get Dean to fight the possession than Rebecca.

"Listen to me Rebecca," he began, "This isn't you. Stop and think about it…"

You shouldn't be doing this. The words were on Sam's lips, but Sam refused to let them out. He was not going to be used to re-enact some crime that had taken place a century ago. Sam had never enjoyed being used.

"Listen to me," he began. "Rebecca has no part in your conflict. And neither do I."

Rebecca stopped them. She looked thoughtfully at Sam, then shook her head.

"Rebecca does have a part to play, though," she said. "She is my flesh and blood, after all."

The voice did not sound like Rebecca. The accent was thick and the tone completely impersonal.

"Let me guess…Tabitha," Sam said. "You killed your sister."

Tabitha shrugged.

"Clothilde asked too many of the wrong questions. Just like you."

She clutched the shovel. Sam shook his head.

"Listen, whatever happened in the past, it's past. You don't have to do this now."

He looked into Rebecca's blank eyes and hoped he could somehow reach either of them – or at least buy himself enough time for Dean to get back. Either solution sounded good to him, as long as he remained on the ground and not under it.

"That's where you're wrong, Sam," Tabitha said. "We really have to do this. There hasn't been a sacrifice in years. And he needs one, or he'll bring the house down. I can't have this happen to my great-granddaughter, can I?"

Sam shook his head.

"He? He who? What are you talking about? What kind of deal have you people made?"

The look on Rebecca's face was one full of disgust.

"You ask too many questions. I don't have to answer them. You're the sacrifice. That's your purpose, Sam. Accept it."

She hit him over the head with the back of the shovel before Sam could try to move back. The explosive pain added to the pounding that had already been threatening to overwhelm him. Everything went dark once more.

xxxxXXXxxxx

Dean got back to the manor at the same time Chad did. Chad was still looking sheepish, like he did not know what to do with himself. Dean remembered the incident at the bar and Trisha's story about people dying at the manor with their throats slit. He was not sure he would ever be able to look at Chad as anything other than a liability.

"Listen," Chad began when he met up with Dean. "I know I handled things badly…"

Dean rolled his eyes.

"Badly as in you lied to our faces? Yeah, you did. You put us at risk, Chad. You could have taken us aside and told us you had information about what was happening. You could have talked to us alone if you didn't want your wife to know you've been using her."

He turned his back on Chad and climbed the steps to the house. Chad followed him.

"What, admit my marriage is based on a lie? I'm sure your oh-so-sanctimonious little brother would have judged the hell out of me."

Dean felt a cold stab of fury at the words. He stopped in his tracks and turned to face Chad. Something of his anger must have been seen on his face. He noticed with some satisfaction that Chad made to draw back.

"You listen to me," Dean said. "Sam spent more than a hundred years with the devil while you were topside advising douchebags in what shady company to invest. He's earned the right to judge you ten times over. Got that?"

He did not wait for Chad's reaction but walked inside the house. Chad brushed past him, heading for the stairs, probably intending to patch things up with Rebecca.

The minute Dean stepped foot in the house, he knew something was wrong. There was a silence that set his nerves on edge. True, there were only two people in the house, both in separate rooms so there was no reason to be any noise. But Dean was a hunter. And something had happened in Harwood Manor in his absence.

He heard Chad pounding back down the stairs. He was panting.

"I can't find Rebecca."

The feeling of something terribly wrong intensified. Dean all but ran to Sam's room. The door swung open, the letters were scattered on the bed. Sam was nowhere to be seen.

xxxxxxxXXXxxx

Sam woke up to darkness. He could not see anything. He could not move. He could hardly breathe. He shut his eyes tightly and tried to take several deep breaths. He opened his eyes again and saw that his situation was the same.

He lay still, his heart pounding in his ears. It wasn't the first time he felt like this. Often times he would wake up overwhelmed by the impression that he couldn't see anything and couldn't breathe. Usually, he found a way to center himself. Dean being there helped. But Dean wasn't here now.

Sam remembered his time with Amelia, and wondered if finding Dean and returning to him had not been a dream. He was still in Texas, still with Amelia, and the despair caused by his brother's death left him blind and breathless.

Or worse. He had never met Amelia. Dean had never disappeared in that explosion. He was still with Lisa and Ben and Sam was still in the Cage.

The thought made sense to Sam. Lucifer had done it often enough. Taking away his sight and his ability to breathe. He had often made Sam experience death by suffocation alone in the dark. After a while, Sam had come to realize this wasn't even the worst of it. The worst would come afterwards, when Lucifer would bring him back to life and would really start on him.

The memories invaded his mind and for a moment he was unable to distinguish dream from reality. He struggled, even though he knew there was no escape. He had willingly placed himself in a position from which he would never be able to escape. Still, his survival instinct had still kicked in plenty of times even in the Cage. It had amused Lucifer to no end.

"It's funny your need to survive, Sam," he would say. "You do know technically you're already dead. What exactly are you trying to hang on to, Sam?"

The words sounded so loud in his mind, Sam was sure he could actually hear them then and there. He froze, holding his breath. Was it actually true? Was this just another torment devised in the Cage?

Dimly, he searched in his mind, trying to piece together the confused pieces of his memory. He thought he remembered Chad and a ghost, and then he remembered Dean leaving to get more information. It all came back to him in a rush. Rebecca had gotten possessed by Tabitha's ghost. And Tabitha had made Rebecca reenact the murder of Tabitha's sister with Sam. He was underground, buried alive.

The thought gave Sam a new adrenaline surge. He struggled to get free, to try to dig himself out even though he did not know how far underground he was. If he was still alive chances were the grave was a shallow one, and there were probably air pockets to keep him breathing for a while. He did not know for how long, though.

He could not untie himself, although a sharp pain in his shoulder warned him he had probably dislocated it. He lay panting, spots dancing in front of his eyes. Dimly he heard his phone ringing in his pocket, but of course he could not reach it.

"Dean…" he muttered.

Sam's last thoughts before he slipped into darkness again was that maybe Dean had felt the same desperation in Purgatory, when days passed one by one and still Sam failed to come to his rescue.

It got a bit dark at the end, but you can't expect someone with Sam's past not to have issues when discovering he's been buried alive. And will Dean find him? We'll just have to wait until next Sunday and see ;)