A/N: At this point I should probably just stop apologizing for being such a slow, bad person. I'm already a good ways into the next chapter though, so here you go. Hope you enjoy :)
Chapter 12: Special Children
We walk around the office, searching it for something very specific. I open the drawers of the large desk and rummage around through yellowed papers.
"I think I found something," Dean says after a few minutes.
He has pushed the file cabinet away from the wall. There is a thin space near the bottom of the wall, in the shape of a small square door. Before we can get a good look at the space, Sam fires his shotgun.
"Hurry!" Sam calls out.
Dean leans down and tries to push in the small door.
"It won't move!" he says, frustrated.
"Let me try!" Sam calls from the doorway.
Dean and Sam switch places, passing off the shotgun. I stand in alert, ready to pull the trigger on my own shotgun if anything happens. Sam tries the door again, to no avail. I look up from Sam to see where Dean is. As I spot him in the doorway, I also see a hazy figure form behind him.
"Dean, behind you!" I shout.
He turns around aiming his shotgun at the ghost of Henry Conway, but he is too late. The shotgun flies from his hands. I aim my shotgun at the ghost, but it too flies far from reach. I decide it doesn't matter, yanking my iron rod from my belt loop and rushing the ghost. I swing the iron rod through the ghost and it dissipates as the rod passes through.
"Damn, that thing is powerful," Dean says.
"I guess he is just very angry we found his secret hiding spot," I say, holding the iron rod up, ready for another attack.
Everything happens so fast, I barely have time to understand what is happening. I am forced to the ground and the iron rod slips out of my hand as I hit the floor, hard. I look up to see the ghost of Henry Conway standing over me, but his focus is not on me. He takes one look at Dean and sends him flying. Dean collides with the second floor balcony that overhangs the main lobby area. The ghost reappears in front of Dean and pulls him up off the floor. I struggle to get free of the ghost's hold over me, but I can't. Dean's eyes meet mine and the whole world slows around me as the ghost throws him over the railing of the balcony.
"Dean!" I scream, unable to do anything else.
I jolt awake, realizing my scream has carried over from my nightmare. I find myself far from the hospital, miles away, in my hotel room.
"Lara, what is it?" I hear beside me.
Hearing Dean's concerned voice brings me so much relief, but also confusion. I almost thought last night was a part of my dreams, of my vision.
"What happened?" Dean insists, sitting up in the bed next to me.
"Nothing. It was just a nightmare," I say, dismissing the danger of it.
"A nightmare? Are you sure it wasn't a vision?"
"I'm not sure. Sometimes my nightmares are as vivid as my visions. Comes with this line of work, I guess."
Dean nods, leaning back on the pillows. He obviously sees I am not okay.
"Lara...what did you see?"
I tell him about the vision I had, leaving out the part where the ghost threw him over the balcony. He may believe it, but this vision is not the real reason I am upset. I feel like I am lying to him, not telling him about the vision I have of Sam, yet I can't bring myself to tell him. I think of my brother, how the knowledge of my father getting killed made him put himself in danger instead.
"So, what were we looking for?" Dean asks after I finish.
"I didn't see it, but whatever it was, it was small. We need to talk to that officer."
I start to get up from the bed, but Dean grabs my arm.
"We will, hey...we will. Sam looked it up last night, his shift doesn't even start for a few more hours."
I turn to face him, smiling.
"Last night was great, really great," I say.
I lean toward him, giving him a short kiss.
"But I need to shower."
He laughs as I walk toward the bathroom door.
"Yeah, I guess I should do that too. Anyway, if we both showed up at my room together, Sam would ask questions."
"Really?"
"It's just the way he is, nosy," he says, pulling his clothes on.
"Alright, see you in a few hours, then," I say from the bathroom.
"See you."
It doesn't take me long to shower and get ready. With the remaining couple of hours, I find myself looking more into the case. Ella Conway, the great granddaughter of Henry Conway, was an orphan by the time she died in Ridgeview. Both of her parents' deaths were ruled "accidents." Her mother died in a mysterious fire no professional was really able to explain. Her father, the grandson of the doctor, died when she was six. She had been living with relatives ever since. Even in my line of work, that many accidents in one family seems oddly suspicious. Looking further into Ella's police file, I see that she was accused of arson multiple times, but the charges were later dropped. I turn to the other two victims and find they are not really connected to Ella or Doctor Conway. The two other victims were a couple just a little too attracted to the paranormal. There is not much else about the case that sparks my interest. Without the distraction of the case I am forced to face what I am really trying to keep my mind away from: last night. The thought first brings a smile to my face, but it fades as I realize how uncharacteristic it was of me. It sort of just happened. Sure, the alcohol was probably a factor, but I was by no means wasted.
"Stop it," I mutter angrily to myself.
This is what I always do, overthink things, overcalculate things that never need any calculations. All it does is end up ruining the memories I have, and I do not want to ruin the memory of last night. I close my laptop and head for the door when there is a knock on the door. I open the door, already knowing who it is.
"Perfect timing," I say to Sam and Dean.
"What?" Sam says.
"I was just about to come over there," I clarify. "You ready?"
"Yeah, Officer Owens should be at the station by now," Sam says.
The station is less busy than when I first arrived in the town. We are easily able to find Owens, he is still working the same desk.
"Officer Thomas Owens," Sam says, flashing his fake FBI badge. "We have a few questions."
"Okay, but make it quick, if you would."
"Sir, the questions concern the death of Ella Conway, it won't be quick," I butt in, tired of his dismissive attitude.
He seems to realize we aren't about to be pushed to the side or hurried away.
"I'm sorry, I didn't know it was about Ella, I would be glad to help."
We walk to one of the back rooms in the station, far away from the prying eyes and ears of others. Officer Owens closes the door behind us and the four of us sit down.
"So, Officer, your grandfather was Peter Owens, the lead prosecutor on the cases against Doctor Conway of Ridgeview, right?" I start.
"Yes, he was, but I don't see how-"
"Your grandfather supported the cases of the family members of patients who were being abused by Doctor Conway at the hospital..."
"Let's call it what it really is: an asylum. This town loves its sugar-coating, but there was nothing hospital-like about that place," Owens says with force.
"Okay, asylum, then," I say.
"My grandfather was trying to shut that place down for good and expose that doctor for the evil man he was. He could never get a case to stick, some issue always came up. The real reason was that Conway could afford the best lawyers in the state and he was too tied into the high-end community of the town. He always told me his greatest failure was never getting justice for those families, no matter how hard he tried. Now what does this have to do with Ella?"
"Well, I'm sure you're aware that Ella was the great granddaughter of Henry Conway..."
"I'm aware. Everyone in the town is aware of that."
"Do you know why Ella was in the...asylum the night she died?"
"Ella always has been a troubled girl, and who can blame her, really. I mean her mother dying in that fire when she was just a baby-"
"What?" Sam and Dean interject simultaneously.
"Yeah, she died in a mysterious house fire when Ella was six months old," I say.
Sam and Dean look at one another, as if they know something I have not been told. Something silent passes between them, some sort of understanding, and suddenly they seemed more interested in Ella.
"The poor girl's bad luck didn't stop there either. When she was six, her father died in a car accident. He was driving on the icy road, lost control and crashed into a tree. She lived with her aunt and uncle after that."
"Why do you say Ella was troubled? Besides her family, of course," Sam asks.
"The arson accusations, right?" I ask Owens.
"I see someone read the reports in detail," Owens says toward me, then turns to the brothers. "She was accused of three separate arson attempts. Personally, I think she was trying to help. She was training to be on the fire rescue team. I think after she found out about what really happened in that fire she never wanted it to happen to someone else."
"What happened?" Dean asks.
"The fire marshal determined that the fire started in Ella's nursery. Her mother most likely died in the flames, getting Ella safely to her father. It made Ella blame herself for her mother's death, but there was nothing anyone could have done. She only recently learned about this, it really got to her. She was looking for something to hold on to. She came to me, asking about her great grandfather. I told her the only thing left of his in this town was his record book and that it had been lost since before he died. My grandfather always told me those records were all the prosecution needed to lock Conway up forever, but they never could find them. I told Ella that it was more than likely still in the asylum, and she shouldn't waste her time, especially since it would be trespassing. She went anyway and I feel it was my fault she ended up falling off that balcony."
His words strike me the hardest, making me remember my vision of Dean.
"Balcony? I thought the reports said she was murdered."
"The second floor overhangs the first in a balcony in that place, but the railing is pretty high. Ella died from the fall...off that balcony. Her death was ruled a suspected homicide after the examiner found bruising around her neck. He said it looked like someone had tried to strangle her with one hand. He thinks she struggled against her attacker and that is how she fell over. I don't know what happened, I just know that if I hadn't told her-"
"You can't blame yourself, you did everything you could. You told her not to go, but she chose to go anyway. I'm sure she would have found out about that book anyway," I say, trying to be comforting.
We leave the police station quickly, without saying a word to one another. Once we get inside the Impala, the code of silence breaks.
"We gotta burn that record book," Dean says first.
"That's the only thing it could be," I agree.
"Guys, you're both missing the big point here. That book has been lost for around eighty years, how are we going to find it," Sam says.
"I think I know where to look. You got a crowbar back there?" I ask, motioning to the trunk.
"We've got everything back there," Dean says, pulling away from the police station.
On the drive to Ridgeview, I tell Sam about the vision I had. Dean, of course, acts like this is the first time he is hearing it too. As the road to this hospital comes into view, I hope this is the last time we will have to go inside. I look at the building, this time with a pit in my stomach. Standing by the trunk of the Impala, I resolve to do anything to stop my vision from coming true. Dean grabs a crowbar from the very back of the trunk before lifting the false bottom.
"You think it'll work?" he asks me.
"It has to, or else we have to burn the whole place down," I reply, smiling.
"Whatever works," Dean says resolutely.
"Yeah, Dean, we're going to burn that down," Sam says sarcastically, gesturing at the huge building.
Our footsteps echo through the dark hallway. This time the place seems more forlorn, now that I know more about its history. Even thinking about the history of this place is a welcomed distraction from the fear inside me. My visions are never wrong. I try to focus on my surroundings rather than my vision. Getting caught off-guard is the last thing I need right now. We make it to the lobby area without any problems.
"Once we get up there, it's going to get messy real fast," I say, looking up at the second floor. "We have to work fast or we're screwed."
"Okay," the brothers say together.
We ascend the staircase with more care than before, being sure to cover one another with each step. The office is empty, with no sign of ghost activity, yet.
"Here goes nothing," Dean says, pushing the file cabinet aside.
Sam stands in the middle of the office, I stand next to the doorway, my shotgun aimed into the hallway. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Dean wedge the crowbar into the small space in the wall. Sam fires his shotgun at the doorway at the exact moment I see the ghost of the doctor appear.
"Hurry!" Sam yells.
Dean puts his weight into the crowbar, but the small door doesn't budge. Fear grips me as I realize this may not be enough.
"It won't move!" Dean yells back at Sam.
"Let me try," Sam replies.
The spirit is right on me, but I am able to fire my shotgun before it does anything. Dean stands in the doorway, aiming his shotgun down the hall, I turn to face Sam, who is slowly prying the door open. I turn back and see Henry Conway's ghost right behind Dean. Without hesitation, I fire my shotgun.
"What the hell!" Dean exclaims in shock.
"You're welcome," I tease.
Suddenly, my shotgun is forced from my hands and flies out into the hallway. Fear grips me as my vision starts to line up with reality. A second later, Dean's shotgun also flies from his hands, landing far out of reach.
"Take this," I say to Dean, handing him my iron rod.
With a container of salt I grab from the duffel we brought, I lay a thick salt line across the office doorway. Dean stands in the office, watching me lay the salt line.
"What the hell are you doing!" Dean yells, realizing what I am trying to do.
"Help Sam," I say firmly.
I attempt to grab my shotgun from the floor. Just as I put a hand on it, I am forced to the floor. The door to the office swings shut on its own. I can hear Dean trying to force it back open, but it stays firmly shut. Confusion and fear hit me at once, I have no idea why Conway would trap them in with the only thing tying him here. Unless he is thinking he can easily take care of them before they get to the book. With no warning, I am thrown against the wall of the hallway. The impact knocks my breath from me and I land on the floor in a heap. I try to struggle to my feat, to raise my shotgun in defense. Before I can lift my shotgun, I am thrown down the hallway, toward the stairs. Conway's spirit disappears and in a split second reappears in front of me. He puts a hand around my throat, despite being mostly translucent. The fury of angry spirits allow them to do pretty much anything they could in life, if not more. I hear Dean yelling my name, but I am powerless.
What happens next is even hard for me to believe. Even though black spots are starting to dance in my vision, I clearly see another form appear behind Conway. It is a young woman, and not one of the patients, around her neck is a dark mark. With a silent scream, the young woman, even more faded in form than Conway, thrusts her transparent hand into Conway's form. There is a bright, orange light where their forms come together and both disappear. I am immediately released from the force holding me up. I fall to my knees, gasping for air. I hear a loud bang and wood snapping. I look up and see Dean running from the office toward me. Before he reaches me, I am on my feet, walking toward him.
"Are you hurt?" he asks.
"I'm okay, come on," I say, heading back into the office.
A metal creak fills the air for a few seconds, followed by a sharp snapping sound. We walk into the office to see Sam pulling the small door open from the wall.
"Got it!" he says, dropping the crowbar.
Sam reaches inside the uncovered hole in the wall and pulls out a thick, leather-bound book. He flips quickly through a few pages.
"This is it, it's the record book," he says.
"Great, Nancy Drew, get the salt and let's burn it," Dean says, pulling out a lighter.
Sam walks over to the duffel and pulls out another container of salt. The now-mangled door to the office suddenly slams shut again. The ghost of Henry Conway appears in the center of the room. He forces all of us to the floor simultaneously.
"Oh, come on!" Dean grumbles in frustration.
Conway's attention snaps away from us in an instant. The spirits of his patients and the young woman appear all at once, surrounding him.
"No!"
I hear the raspy, weak voice come from his spirit. The spirits of his victims close in on him, making him drop the hold he has on us.
"Sam, salt!" Dean calls.
Sam pours salt on the leather book and slides it across the floor to Dean. Dean flips open the lighter and holds the flame to the pages of the book. Fire quickly engulfs the book, casting bright yellow flames into the air. At the same time, the spirit of Henry Conway also seems to be engulfed in chaotic flames. The patients turn to face us, their faces now calm. All at once, their spirits are consumed by a blinding white light. The last spirit to be consumed by the white light is the young woman. In the second before she disappears, I recognize her. She is the spirit of Ella Conway.
The three of us stand in the empty room, silent after what we just witnessed. The book is now smoldering, the flames having already died. I am the first to move. I walk back over to the hole in the wall, reaching my hand in it. To my complete surprise, I pull out a few old, yellowed papers. I look the papers over, and even though the ink is very faded, I am able to make out some of the words on them. I smile, understanding what these papers mean.
"What?" Sam asks.
"These are- I can't believe it," I say, handing the papers to Sam.
He looks at them, taking in the words, "We have to bring these with us."
I nod, taking the papers back.
"What are we going to do about this?" Dean asks, nudging the burnt book with the toe of his boot.
"Bury it?" I suggest.
"Good idea."
Once we are outside, Dean gets a shovel from the Impala's trunk. He digs a small hole in the ground outside the building and puts the book inside.
"They saved us," I say as Dean is covering the hole up with dirt.
"What?"
"His victims, they saved us. The only reason Conway didn't strangle me to death in that hallway was because Ella Conway's spirit attacked him. And in the room, when we were about to burn the book. His patients, the ones he killed, they stopped him."
"Yeah, I guess they did. They must have been held there by their need for revenge or at least justice."
"So, that means, those patients' spirits didn't kill Ella Conway, her great grandfather's did."
"Damn, that's messed up," Dean comments.
"It makes sense, though, she was coming to find the record book. If she moved it, he wouldn't be bound to the hospital anymore. He must have wanted to stay there to...I don't even know," Sam says.
"I really don't want to think about why he wanted to stay there...with his patients' spirits," I say.
It isn't hard to tell that we are all relieved to put the hospital in the rear-view for the last time. Before heading back to the motel, we stop by the police station.
"I'll just be a second," I say, getting out of the Impala.
I walk up to the police station, happy to find Officer Owens still at the front desk. He sees me and for once, seems less in a hurry to be somewhere else.
"I think these belong to you," I say, placing the yellowing papers on the desk.
He picks the papers up and looks at them, reading them carefully.
"We found them while looking over the crime scene again. They were behind some file cabinets. I hope they help," I say.
His eyes move away from the papers and he looks at me. I see tears at the corners of his eyes.
"They're copies...copies of the records. They have evidence-against Henry Conway. We can close the cases, the ones against him..."
"I know they won't bring them back, his victims, but, it might help bring some closure."
"Thank you, thank you so much," Officer Owens says.
I smile, feeling happy that something good could come out of this case.
It is dark again by the time we get back to the motel. Exhausted from finishing the hunt, we all decide to stay another night before leaving. Sam and Dean invite me to stay in their room for a few "well-deserved drinks", an offer I gladly accept. Dean sits on the end of one of the beds, Sam in a chair by the desk and I sit in another chair in front of the other bed. Together, the arrangement forms an oddly-shaped circle.
"Well, go team," Dean says, slightly raising his beer in a toast. "We didn't die."
"That's always a nice bonus," I add. "You know, along with not being arrested."
The brothers nod in agreement.
A couple beers in, something I noticed earlier comes to the front of my mind. I meant to ask the Winchesters about it earlier, but there really hadn't been any time.
"You two seemed very interested in that nursery fire story. Seen something like it before?"
The brothers exchange quick glances at one another. They are so quick I can't judge the emotion behind them.
"Actually-" Sam starts.
"Sam-" Dean warns.
"We've seen a few cases like that," Sam says, despite Dean's tone.
Dean looks at his younger brother with admonishment. Sam does not back down under his stare.
"What? Dean, we can trust her with this," he says firmly.
"It's not about trust, Sam, it's about involvement."
"She's already involved, she just doesn't know it," Sam fires back.
They pause for a second, seeming to remember I am actually in the room with them.
"As the concerned party, I'd love to know what I've accidentally gotten myself involved in," I say in a light tone, trying to break up their argument.
There is silence between them for a noticeable few seconds. Sam shifts in his chair before finally speaking up.
"There isn't any easy way to explain this," he starts, his tone very cautious. "The nursery fires are connected to the demon that killed our parents. In each of the fires the babies were six months old and their mothers were killed, all in the same year, 1983."
"I'm getting more beer from the car," Dean says, abruptly leaving.
When the door closes behind him, I turn back to Sam.
"Your mother?"
"Yeah, she died when I was six months old. It wasn't just a nursery fire, though, it was the demon."
"I'm sorry," I say.
"I was too young to remember her, but Dean..."
I nod, understanding what Sam is trying to say.
As if on cue, Dean returns from outside, handing Sam another beer.
"Anyway, the children involved in these nursery fires have...abilities. As far as we know, they didn't have them until about a year ago. None of them have the same ability-"
"Wait, what kind of 'abilities'?"
"Psychic abilities, telekinesis, mind control. If I had to guess, I think Ella Conway was pyrokinetic."
"You think Ella was one of these children?"
"We had no idea until today, but, yeah, she was. That nursery fire was no accident."
I look at Dean, who seems to be trying to avoid eye contact with me.
"So how am I involved? Besides Ella...I mean, that's hardly getting involved."
"Another ability we know about is premonitions, visions."
"Visions? What, like mine?"
"And mine," Sam says.
It takes me a second to register what he is saying.
"You...have visions?"
"Yeah, and most of the time my visions have to do with the demon. Or, more recently, the other children. I had a vision about this case, but I didn't see Ella in it. Back in Florida I did have a vision about you."
I remember now, how Sam warned me right before a huge metal stake had flown over my head in that school. At the time I hadn't questioned it, but it was like he had seen it coming before it even happened. Of course it makes sense now.
"You think I'm one of the children?" I say with a little more force than intended. "My mother didn't die in a nursery fire."
"No, but the nursery fire isn't a clear pattern. We've seen a few of these people who didn't have nursery fires."
"I'm not even the same age a you. How-"
"I don't know. I wanted to tell you last time, but we weren't sure. You trusted us by telling us about your visions. I didn't want to just come out and say you got them because you were chosen by a demon."
I stare at the floor for a while, trying to take in what I have just heard.
"Chosen?" I finally ask. "For what?"
"We're not sure. The last time we saw the demon he told me he had plans for me and all the children like me."
"That sounds...great," I say sarcastically.
"You okay?" Dean asks me.
"Yeah, I think so. It's just-it's a lot to take in."
"I'm sorry, I didn't know how to tell you. I just thought you should know..." Sam says
"No, no, I'm glad you told me. I'd rather know than not know. It's just...wow."
I hardly sound convincing to myself with that, so I know Sam and Dean probably don't believe it.
"I think I'll turn in for tonight," I say, standing up.
Between the drinks and the less than great news, it takes me a second to find my balance.
"You sure you're okay?" Dean asks again.
"Yes, I'm just exhausted. See you," I say, heading for the door.
"'Night," Dean and Sam both say.
In the solitude of my own room, I am left with nothing but my own thoughts. Tonight certainly hasn't been the worst in terms of shocking news. I find it both sad and amusing that being chosen by a demon for some unspecific, likely nefarious, plan doesn't even top the list of crappy news I've received in my life. However unconvincing I sounded to Sam, Dean, and myself, I am glad they told me. Better for friends to tell me than the demon himself. I try to take my mind off of it so I can at least sleep a few hours. In light of the stress on my mind, I should realize how futile my attempt to sleep is going to be.