Thanks for your patience, folks; there are a lot of moving pieces in the last four chapters, and I'm taking my time to make sure I'm not missing anything. Plus, you know, holidays and work and whatnot; I probably won't finish this up until after the first of the year. Here's a nice long chapter, to make up for it!
"Do you want a broken nose!?" DJ demanded of his wriggling patient, adjusting the placement of the motel pen he'd jammed up the guy's left nostril. "Hold still!"
"I don't know why we're even bothering to fix it," Cass griped, flexing his fingers meaningfully on either side of the guy's head.
"Because," DJ ground out, nudging the little bones back into place with his thumb. "We don't know how long he'll be in there, and we don't want him to suffocate."
There was an unpleasant, crunchy sensation under DJ's fingertips; the hunter let out a muffled yell and his eyes started watering profusely.
"Maybe you don't," Cass muttered. "Are we done now?"
"Yeah," DJ sighed, tugging the pen free and tossing it in the direction of the trashcan. "He'll never be pretty, but at least he can breathe now."
"Great," Cass said, shoving himself up off his knees. "Come on, you ugly fucker."
Aside from replacing the gag, they hadn't messed with the duct tape; they'd simply tipped the chair over backwards and set to work on its unwilling occupant. Now, Cass roughly levered the chair upright again and started hauling it in the direction of the bathroom.
"Gimme a hand, Sammy," Cass grunted as one leg of the chair caught on on the doorjamb, nearly smashing the hunter's head against it. .
"Careful, Cass," Sam admonished, getting up to help his brother wrestle the awkward chair-and-captive arrangement through the doorway. "You're gonna re-break it, and then dad will be pissed."
In reality, Garth wasn't paying any attention to Cass' carelessness, nor to the ungodly amount of noise the twins made settling the chair into the bathtub; he was currently on the phone with DJ's dad. DJ had been otherwise engaged, so he hadn't heard much beyond the initial, "Hey Sam, it's Garth," but he could tell by his tone that Garth was bringing dad up to speed and asking for help.
"Uncle Garth," he whispered, getting the older man's attention. "Is he coming?"
Garth nodded, and DJ let out an involuntary sigh of relief.
"Thank god," he said, shuffling over to his duffle to dig for more comfortable clothes. "Tell him to bring pizza."
Dad did indeed show up with pizza—epic deep-dish from Rinacita's—some hours later. Garth pricked his thumb with a silver knife before letting him in, and dad dropped his bag just inside the door, the telltale thunk betraying the weight of the spellbooks inside.
"Where is he?" he demanded without preamble.
"Bathtub," Cass replied shortly, taking the pizza boxes off him without so much as a thank you.
"He's still alive," Garth clarified, as dad raised his eyebrows. "What's the plan?"
"I've got something," Dad said, nudging the bag of books with his foot. "But it's going to take me a little while to figure out how to tweak it so that it won't kill him."
"Everybody's so worried about that," Cass grumped, the words garbled by a mouthful of pizza.
"Don't talk with your mouth full," Bess chided her son; then, to dad, "It's good to see you, Sam."
"Huh?" Sam grunted sleepily, stirring a little where he lay facedown on one of the beds.
"Dude, food," Cass informed his brother, pushing one of the boxes in his direction.
"Fucking finally," Sam groaned, propping himself up on his elbows to drag the box closer.
"You're welcome," Dad snarked, rolling his eyes.
"Thanks, Big Sam," Sam mumbled around his own mouthful, ignoring his mother's exasperated sigh. "We've been a little busy."
"So I've heard," Dad responded, frowning as he looked over at DJ. "You okay?"
DJ nodded, reaching across Sam to get his own slice of pizza.
"I'm fine, Dad," he said reassuringly. "Things just got a little crazy."
"That's an understatement," Bess snapped, growling softly.
DJ felt bad for her; she'd been grumbling off and on all evening about heading back uptown to give Julian Duval a piece of her mind. For all Garth's earlier concern that she not discover that they were armed, Bess hadn't even batted an eye when her husband made a brief trip out to the station wagon and came back with his taser, his machete, and more silver-plated ammo for his Beretta.
"We'll figure it out, Bess," Dad soothed. "All right? I'm not going to let anything happen to your family."
He took over the room's small table, pulling stacks of books out of his bag and sorting them into piles. Garth hovered at his elbow, uncertain, until dad waved him off.
"Unless you can read Ogham Craobh or Gaoidhealg, there's not much you can do besides wait," he said with a grimace.
"Read what now?" Garth said, forehead wrinkling.
"Gesundheit," Cass joked; Sam smacked his sibling on the arm.
"Gaelic?" DJ tried, sucking grease off his fingers before wiping them on a napkin.
"Older," Dad corrected, though he seemed mildly impressed at the guess. "The spell I'm going to try is druidic; it's more of a curse, actually."
"You're going to curse him?" DJ questioned, a shiver running down his spine.
"Just a little," Dad shrugged, already intent on the spidery handwriting of the journal in front of him. "If I can figure out how to modify this sigil so that he doesn't forget how to swallow or breathe."
He pushed a large, black tome across the table towards DJ, tapping the illuminated page. It was covered in strong lines and concentric circles, runes within glyphs within sigils that made DJ's vision swim. He had to blink a few times before he could really focus on the one his dad had indicated.
"This sounds dark, man," Garth said, shifting uneasily.
"It is dark," Dad sighed, turning a page of one of the journals. "It's the Black Grimoire; but it's the only thing I could think of that might do the trick."
DJ snatched his hands back from the book as though it had burned him.
"Jesus, Dad," he hissed, scrubbing his palms against his jeans. "Warn me, next time."
"It's just vellum and iron-gall, bound in regular old leather, Dean," Dad said, chuckling a little and shaking his head. "A grimoire is only dangerous if you know how to use it, and there aren't many still alive who do."
"Guess that makes you pretty dangerous, then," Cass said, no longer amused.
Dad quirked one eyebrow in acknowledgement, but he didn't say anything more, absorbed by his stack of notes and translations.
"All right," Garth acquiesced, letting out a plosive breath. "We'll leave you to it, then."
They settled in for the evening; while the boys ate more pizza than they should have faster than was wise, Bess took their prisoner a bottle of water and Garth made one more trip out to the parking lot with dad's keys. He returned with a non-descript weapons bag, from which he produced a number of knives, a second machete, and two sealed containers of dark, viscous liquid that DJ was pretty sure was blood. He wasted no time dipping the silver knives into the first jar before slathering the contents of the second over both machete blades.
"Just in case," Garth said, smiling nervously when he saw DJ watching him.
Sam wrinkled his nose at the smell, but Cass' face lit up.
"Gross!" he said enthusiastically, bounding across the room. "What else have you got in there?"
Cass tugged the bag out of Garth's reluctant hands and began to root through it, taking out the guns and ammunition and laying them out in neat columns and rows.
"Ooo, pretty," he said admiringly, pulling the slide back to ensure that the chamber of the pistol he'd chosen was clear. "Here, DJ, this reminds me of your Ronin."
He extended it to DJ grip first, holding the muzzle in one hand while the fingers of the other danced across the array of ammunition to select the appropriate magazine. The Colt was a pretty gun, with its scrollwork and ivory, but not one that DJ had handled much; he could feel his dad's eyes on him as he took it from Cass and did his own safety check. Though a bit heavier than he was used to, it felt comfortable and familiar in his hands.
"Oh, yeah!" Cass uttered appreciatively as he picked up the Desert Eagle next, turning it over in his hands.
"No," Dad said gruffly. "I don't have anything silver for that monster."
Cass pouted about that for a while, but he cheered up considerably when Garth got out the MK23. Father and son sat cross-legged on the floor to check and prep their small arsenal, wincing and hissing occasionally; it was practically inevitable when werewolves were handling silver bullets. Dad sank deeper into research mode, hunched over the table as he squinted at his books and tapped at the keys on his laptop. Sam, for his part, seemed determined to go back to sleep; he'd never even bothered to roll over, so it was a simple matter of pushing the empty pizza box off the bed and letting his head drop back onto his pillow.
"You should try and get some sleep too, sweetheart," Bess said quietly, noticing when DJ cracked a yawn. "We can take it in shifts."
Another yawn killed any hope he had of protesting; it was late, and getting later, and it had been a long fucking day. He set the pistol—loaded now, but with the safety on—on the bedside table and flopped down on his back next to Sam, fully dressed with his boots hanging off the end of the bed. He closed his eyes and took deep breaths; he was dog-tired, but he felt too keyed up to actually sleep. He could doze, though.
"Merry fucking Christmas," Cass muttered, sometime after midnight.
"Wha..?" Sam slurred groggily when Cass socked his brother to wake him for his watch.
"Donna, hey," Dad kept his voice low as he answered a call in the wee hours of the morning. "Sorry I missed you earlier, I just… what? Shit. Hold on; where?" Papers shuffled, and a pen scratched. "Elk Creek? Donna, I can't. I can't leave right now; I'm kind of in the middle of something. Can you—? Yeah, yeah okay."
"Stubborn," Bess whispered affectionately, later, when Garth refused to leave his post.
At some point he must have dropped off more heavily, because the next thing he knew his dad was shaking him awake.
"Come on, Dean; wake up. Let's see if it worked."
Day was only just breaking; thin grey light peeked around the edges of the blackout curtains. DJ pushed Cass' arm off his chest and sat up, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
"What time is it?" he wanted to know.
"Early," Dad responded shortly, still tugging on him. "Come on."
Bess was curled up against the headboard of the other bed; Sam had flung himself across the foot of it and was dead to the world. Garth was propped up in the corner with his machete and pistol in his lap, head tipped back and mouth wide open. He was snoring like a freight train; DJ had no idea how anybody was sleeping through that.
"Were you up all night?" he demanded of his dad, stretching as he got his feet under him.
Dad didn't reply, towing DJ into the bathroom by his shirtsleeve. The shower curtain had gotten ripped down at some point, and its occupant was clearly visible, shivering where he sat in his soaking wet clothes. One of those dizzying sigils had been painted on the tile at eye level in what looked like blood; DJ frowned, noticing for the first time that dad had his left hand tied up in a handkerchief.
"Who is this?" Dad addressed the hunter directly, shoving DJ into his line of sight. "Do you recognize him?"
The man blinked stupidly at him, brow furrowed in concentration.
"Am I supposed to?" he asked thickly, a little out of it.
"Hey," Dad said loudly, snapping his fingers in the guy's face. "What's your name?"
"Wyatt," the hunter answered readily. "Wyatt Harris."
In his drowsy, pre-caffeinated state, DJ found the series of questions his dad put to the hunter—Wyatt—pointless at best. He asked him to name objects in the room, to describe his childhood, and to list off his preferences in food and music. Apparently satisfied by the responses he was getting, dad pulled out his phone and showed the man a picture of Julian Duval; DJ's interest peaked.
"What about him; do you know him?"
"Yeah," Wyatt said, looking at dad as though the question was a trick. "That's the boss."
"All right," Dad murmured, scrolling through his phone. "What do you remember about yesterday?"
"Uh…" that one seemed to trip him up. "Boss was pissed about some meeting; said I needed to clean up my mess."
"And did you?"
The man's eyes went a little glassy, and he shook his head from side to side, but not in answer; more like he was trying to get water out of his ears.
"I don't…" he began uncertainly, looking vaguely disconcerted. "I don't remember."
"Good," Dad said, clearly pleased.
"Good?" DJ questioned under his breath.
"What about her?" Dad ignored him and held up his phone.
The hunter refocused with some difficulty, scrunching up his face as he studied the photo.
"That's the Lassiter bitch," he said finally, scowling. "Why?"
"Do you work for her, too?"
"No," the hunter scoffed. "But the boss does; she's got something over him, I think. Or maybe they're banging; I don't know."
"What does she ask him to do for her?" Dad asked, glancing sideways at DJ when he snorted.
"Keep the weres in line, mostly. Provide the muscle, sometimes," the man shrugged expressively. "That's me."
"But you're a hunter," Dad said, tone carefully neutral even as his lip curled in disgust.
"Look, grandpa," Wyatt said, a bit unsteadily. "Some rich monster wants to pay me to kill all the rest, that's what I'm gonna do. And when the money runs out, I'll kill him too."
"Sure you will," Dad clapped him on the shoulder condescendingly. "Good talk."
He pulled a small paper packet out of his shirt pocket and held it in his palm as he unfolded it. He chanted a short incantation before blowing its powdered contents into Wyatt's face; the other man's eyes immediately rolled back, and his head lolled to one side.
"Whoa," DJ exclaimed, reflexively reaching out to check the guy's pulse.
"Sleep spell," Dad explained, unconcerned, crumpling up the paper and tossing it into the trashcan. "Totally harmless; it'll wear off in an hour or so."
"Okay," DJ allowed, withdrawing his hand. "So, did it work? The curse."
"Looks like it," Dad said, working out a crick in his neck and digging his knuckles into the sore muscles there. "He's still himself; he'll just have a blank spot where the kidnapping and interrogation should be."
"What about the word vomit?" DJ was dubious; the guy had been acting like he was drunk or high, totally uninhibited.
"That should wear off eventually," Dad said dismissively, pushing his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. "And if it doesn't, well. He'll just be an even more terrible liar."
DJ nodded, willing to let it go for now; he was more interested in obtaining coffee than in arguing with his dad first thing in the morning. He left him scrubbing the sigil away and stumbled back out into the main room, where his phone was chirping merrily on the nightstand. Cass was fumbling for it one-handed, using the other to stuff a pillow around his ears.
"Make it stop," he groaned, still half-asleep.
DJ rolled his eyes, slipping the Colt into his waistband and his keys into his pocket as he answered the call.
"Hello?" he said quietly, distracted.
"Is this Dean Winchester?" An unfamiliar voice inquired briskly.
"Depends who's asking," DJ grumbled, shrugging into his coat.
"Lieutenant Freddie Costa, Chicago P.D."
DJ pulled the phone away from his ear for a second and blinked down at the restricted number; he wasn't awake enough for this.
"Lieutenant Costa," he said slowly, pawing urgently at Cass. "I wasn't expecting to hear from you directly."
"If anyone asks," Costa said lowly, a heavy sigh crackling over the line, "You didn't."
"What!?" Cass snarled, awake at last.
"Costa," DJ mouthed, pointing at the phone; then, aloud, "Yes sir; what've you got?"
"I can't give you what Ennis asked for," Costa said haltingly, like every word cost him. "But I can tell you where Margo Lassiter and Julian Duval will be today at noon."
"That… that would be awesome," DJ sputtered, miming pen and paper at Cass, who scrambled to obey. "Thank you."
"Don't thank me yet," the older man muttered.
He read off the address and provided a timeframe, along with tips on arriving early, keeping a low profile, and staying downwind.
"Things aren't always what they look like," Costa advised cryptically. "Be careful, kid."
"Yeah, okay," DJ agreed, doing his best to jot everything down with Cass bouncing impatiently beside him. "Seriously, thank you."
"Are we going?" Cass demanded as soon as the call ended, snatching the motel pad and pen out of DJ's hands.
"Later," DJ said determinedly, patting the pocket containing his keys. "But first, coffee. Get your coat."