Dean regarded the flattened and bloodstained grass in silence, recalling the terror, the grief and the pain he'd felt as Sam bled to death in his hands. He barely remembered how he got Sam into the car, nor the first part of the nightmarish drive to Manford's house. The second half was more memorable, but no less horrific. He'd had to cover the body when Sam's face became unrecognizable, and the smell...

So caught up in the memory he didn't hear Sam come up behind him until he spoke.

"I found the trail."

"Jesus," Dean flipped his flashlight up to Sam's face. "Don't do that!"

Sam regarded the spot where he'd died with an almost serene expression. "You do realize I was probably dead seconds after the attack. It only takes the loss of a few pints before irreversible shock sets in."

"Thank you Doctor Carter, that doesn't make me feel any better."

"There wasn't anything you could have done, Dean," Sam said softly, his voice sympathetic. "You couldn't have saved me."

Dean sighed. "Yeah, I know." He cleared his throat. "So what did you find?"

"You definitely hit it. There's a blood trail leading back into the woods. It stops in the neighbor's field, along the side of an access road."

"Whoa, wait. It just stops?" Dean followed Sam as he made his way through the tall grass toward the strip of woods separating the Nelson's land from the neighboring farm.

"At a road. What does that tell you?"

"Either it morphed back, or..."

Sam looked back over his shoulder. "It had an accomplice."

Dean put a hand on his arm, stopping his progress. "Then let's not waste any more time searching out here. I say we go interview the neighbors."

"You sure you want to do that now? It's nearly midnight, and we don't know exactly what we're dealing with. If it's not cyclical it could morph the minute we step into its parlor."

With a grin, Dean waggled the gun he held in his hand. "That's what silver bullets are for, Sammy."

Sam rolled his eyes and shrugged. "Suit yourself. You're the one taking the risks here. I'm already dead, remember?"

"No! Really?"

"Asshole." Sam gave him a shove as they turned back toward the Impala.

"Jerk."

Their joshing made Dean relax for the first time in days. It was so habitual, so normal, that he could almost forget what had happened. All his fears, all his doubts melted away. He had done the right thing, hadn't he? This was his Sammy with him, whole and alive.

More or less.

He fell in behind Sam, noting once again that he moved faster than what Dean was used to among revenants. There was a fluid grace to his walk and that suddenly struck Dean as odd. Sam had never been clumsy as his gawky height might have suggested, but he wasn't exactly graceful either. Another niggling point: Manny had indicated Sam's wound would take time to fully heal, given that revenant flesh healed at a markedly slower rate. He'd repaired it as best he could, he said, but it would still leave an ugly scar.

It had healed in a day, and there was barely any mark on Sam's neck to indicate where the killing bite had landed.

It's the new serum. Even Deborah said the revenant Manny created after her was far superior. Sam's just stepped it up a notch.

"Do you remember it?" he asked, as they got back into the car.

"Remember what?"

"The attack, dying." Dean turned the key and the Impala rumbled to life with a low roar.

"Some of it, why?"

"I was just wondering. Deborah told me she remembered drowning. It's made her afraid of water."

"I'm not afraid of werewolves if that's what you're worried about, and Deborah shouldn't be afraid of water. She can't drown again." Sam snorted derisively. "But given how much of her brain is oatmeal, it doesn't surprise me."

"She communicates with Manny telepathically. Did you know that?" Dean had noted the mocking tone Sam used when talking about Deborah. That would have never happened when Sam was alive. If anything he'd always been overly sympathetic toward the underdog.

"Yes. We all can, if we want to," Sam replied quietly. "And with each other. The one Manny created after Deborah, Duncan, he's dead you know."

Dean pulled out onto the paved road and turned toward the dirt access road belonging to the Nelson's neighbors. The navigation required to steer the big Chevy down the narrow farm road hid his surprise, as did his smart ass reply. "Isn't that a given?"

"He's dead as in destroyed, Dean. Manny didn't tell you that did he?"

Sam's eyes were on him, Dean could feel his gaze. "No. He didn't. What happened?"

There was a soft snort of laughter. "Manny tried to control him, like he does Deborah, but it didn't work. Duncan left, went to Reno and just last year dropped out of contact."

"Manny tell you?"

"No. I picked it up from Deborah." Sam said. "Neither Manny nor Deborah know what happened to him, but I do. Duncan was shot and decapitated. His head was buried out in the desert just outside of Las Vegas."

"How did you find out about that?"

There was a long pause, and Dean really didn't need him to answer. The story was just as familiar to him as it was to Sam.

"I read it in Dad's journal."

The Impala glided to a stop halfway up the farmer's driveway, where it would be out of sight from the house. Dean put it in park and turned to face his brother. Sam looked away out the windshield.

"You do realize," he said. "What will happen if Dad sees me like this, don't you?"

"He wouldn't."

Sam shook his head. "Since when have you gotten to be so naive, Dean? Of course he would. You know how he feels about Manford Dubois. The man is combining science and necromancy, black magic and medicine. He is a modern Frankenstein, and what he creates..."

"Are monsters?" Dean asked archly. "Look, Sam, where life begins and ends is always going to a point of contention. Centuries ago if a person had been brought back to life after their heart stopped it would have been considered miraculous. Now we have difibulator machines on public transportation so anyone can do it. Maybe Manny really is just ahead of his time with this."

"Do you sincerely believe that?" Sam demanded. He reached out and grabbed Dean by the wrist, drawing his arm forward until Dean found himself with a palm pressed to Sam's chest. Beneath his hand he felt no heartbeat, no rise and fall of breath, and a body void of natural warmth. "This," his brother continued, "spits on the laws of nature. Stuff like this, it's why we do what we do, why we're here tonight."

Dean tried to pull away but Sam's grip was like iron. "Sam..."

Sam leaned across the seat. His eyes narrowed. "It's a warning, Dean," he said softly. "Don't ever forget what Dad taught you." Abruptly he released Dean's wrist.

He was gone before Dean even saw him reach for the door handle, gone before Dean could even focus on the fact that Sam had left in the first place.

"Shit!"

Scrambling out of the car, Dean stood up and looked off down the driveway. Sam was nowhere to be seen but a quick sweep of the flashlight revealed a set of sneaker tracks in the soft dirt leading up toward the house. He followed quickly, gun held ready. If the creature attacked him it would get a chest full of silver.

He made it around the bend without incident, coming up on the house from behind a parked car. All the lights were on inside. There was no trace of Sam anywhere.

Dean crouched behind the junked car, growling low beneath his breath. The barnyard lights were more than enough for him to see his way so he tucked the flashlight into his pocket and took up the gun in both hands. A noise made him jerk his head back around toward the barn.

There was a light there too, and a man's voice humming.

Cautiously, Dean edged out from around the car. He quickly scanned the barnyard before making a dash toward the wide open doors of the barn. With one wall pressed flat against his back, Dean slid toward the opening, eyes and ears tuned to the slightest motion, the slightest sound. A quick glance around the corner revealed a dark haired man in coveralls working on an ancient tractor.

Dean came around the side of the door and barked, "Freeze."

Instantly the man stopped what he was doing.

"Drop the weapon!" Dean growled.

"It's just a wrench..."

"Drop it!"

There was a clatter of metal on metal. The wrench slid off the fender of the tractor to the dirt floor. Dean reaffirmed his grip on the gun.

"Turn around, slowly."

"Are you a cop?"

"Turn around NOW!"

The man turned to face the barn doors, to where Dean stood holding gun on him. Dean took in his dark scraggly beard and thick brows, his large size and structure, and knew he had found the lycanthrope. If that weren't convincing enough, the sling on his right arm would have been. One of the bullets Dean had fired at him that night had evidently found a home in his shoulder.

"You!" the man gasped. His face twisted in fear. "I recognize you."

"You should," Dean spat. "I'm the one who put a bullet in you."

That it had been a silver bullet had not gone unnoticed.

"You know what I am!"

"Damn right I do. You killed my brother, you mangy bastard."

There was a groan, and the man's face crumpled. "Oh, God," he breathed. "I had hoped...

Dean cut him off. "You're cyclical?"

Nodding, the man rubbed his tearing eyes with his fingers. "Yeah. It's just every other month, the third week. I'm a farmer, just a poor farmer. I didn't mean..." He shook his head again, his voice wavering. "We live so far out...I've never hurt anyone before. You have to believe me!"

Dean cursed. A werewolf in wolf form was easy to kill, not so one in human form, especially one that blubbered like a fucking baby. He cracked his neck and shifted his weight, trying to visualize the wolf thing as it sank it's teeth into Sam's neck, to bring back the anger he'd felt that night. That had to be enough because this guy was obviously not going to morph and give him an easier target. A cyclical werewolf couldn't change outside his time.

The lycan moaned miserably. "I'm so sorry..." Tears welled up in his large blue eyes and ran down his cheeks into his beard. He buried his face in his one good hand. "I'm so sorry."

Dean hissed angrily through his teeth.

"Shut up, just shut up!"

Fuck. I can't do it. Not when he's fucking crying. Jesus...

"You have every right," the lycan raised his head. "Until now, I've never hurt anyone. We were always so careful..."

Dean was about to inquire as to the "we" situation when the question was answered for him. Both he and his intended target flinched as the high pitched wail of a woman's scream cut through the night. For a split second Dean took his eye off the man in his sights, glancing over his shoulder toward the house. In that second the lycan was moving past him, crying out with fear.

"Connie? Connie!"

Whirling, Dean fired, but the lycan ducked around a tree and his shot did nothing but take out a chunk of bark. The guy was fast even in human form

"Damnit to hell!" Dean bolted out of the barn. He should have shot the thing when he had the chance.

There was another shout. "Connie, what..."

A gunshot rang out from inside the house, followed by another scream and the sound of something heavy falling against wooden floorboards. Dean staggered a few steps in surprise. Recovery was quick, and in another few strides he was over the picket fence and into the front yard. He took the steps two at a time, literally leaping up to the front door where he skidded to a halt. Reflexes made him twist aside, out of the doorway, in case a second shot was fired.

The body of the lycan lay sprawled half in, half out of the screen door. Blood stained the front of his coveralls, spreading out from a wound in the center of his chest. It trickled from his mouth, which was wide open in an expression of shock. So were his eyes. Dean winced as he noticed they still glistened with tears. Somewhere inside the house a woman was crying.

Cautiously Dean stepped over the body. He cracked his neck again before moving silently through the house, following the sound of muffled sobbing. It was coming from the kitchen. He peered around the corner, and then scowled. With a breathy curse he lowered the gun and entered.

Sam stood in front of him, holding a pistol to the head of a blonde haired woman. She stood there sobbing, barefoot and clad only in a t-shirt and boxer shorts. Her lip was bleeding, and an ugly red mark graced the side of her face where she'd been struck. As he saw Dean, Sam pressed the gun harder against her head and grinned.

"What took you so long?"

"What the fuck are you doing?" Dean raged. He waved his gun hand toward the front door. "That was the target!"

"Yeah, I know," Sam's voice was infuriatingly nonchalant. He actually shrugged. "He made it too easy." A split second later he was frowning. "Why didn't you shoot him outside?"

"He hadn't morphed," Dean grumbled. "He claimed it was an accident."

"It was!" The woman, Connie presumably, faced Dean with a horrified expression, her voice broken with tears. "I swear! He's never hurt anyone before!" Her grief turned angry. "You shouldn't have been there!"

Sam gave the woman a shake. "Shut up!" She cried out in pain and Dean saw that he held her by a handful of hair. Sam's expression was cold as he regarded his brother. "You've gone soft, Dean. You were going to let him get away with murder weren't you? And not avenge me? Your own flesh and blood?"

Dean's chest tightened with a surge of guilt. He shoved it away angrily. "Let her go, Sam. She's not like him, she's human."

There was a long pause, before Sam smiled pleasantly. "Oh, I know she's human. Right now she'd kill me if she could, but dog-boy over there beat her to it. She's scared too, can't you feel it?" He moved his hand, drawing the gun down the side of her head to a spot just under her chin. Connie rolled her eyes toward him in terror as he leaned close to her face. "Fear, grief, hatred..." he said softly. "She's afraid we're going to rape her you know." His teeth tugged at his bottom lip, let it go again as he closed his eyes and inhaled. "Maybe we should."

"Sam!" Dean raised his gun, leveling it at his brother's forehead. "Let. Her. Go."

Sam straightened. He looked at Dean in silence for a long, nerve-wracking moment before simply shrugging. "Okay," he said agreeably. "If you say so."

The gun went down, and Sam released his whimpering hostage. She sprinted away toward the body of her companion, her anguished cries reminding Dean uncomfortably of those he'd uttered himself just a few nights before. Slowly he lowered his own weapon as Sam crossed the room. They met just inside the doorway. Dean stared straight ahead, but he could feel Sam's eyes on him.

"Next time," Sam hissed. "Don't hesitate."

He brushed past, leaving Dean standing there shaking and wondering if "don't hesitate" referred to him shooting the lycan...

Or shooting Sam.