Sam made a point of pissing Dean off nearly every morning for the next two weeks. Dean's nerves were so on edge it really didn't take much either. One snide word, one veiled threat, and Dean couldn't help but snap back with some nasty retort. It kept Sam fed, and stopped him from doing any more than soak up whatever negativity he happened across during the course of their jobs.

They worked three jobs in those two weeks, and aside from egging Dean into losing his temper on a regular basis, Sam acted no different than he'd been before his accident. In truth, Dean had to admit, they probably would have been bickering even if Sam had never changed. The subtle difference was that before, it probably would have been Dean getting Sam hot under the collar.

Each job came with its share of frightened or grieving people. Dean conducted the interviews, Sam soaked up the bad vibes, and together they dispatched whatever dark things they found. There was one small incident wherein Sam started a violent bar brawl in Tennessee, but other than that, things were relatively quiet.

At the end of three weeks they were on the way back through Iowa. They had no leads, they had not heard from their father, and Sam was getting tired of being cooped up in a car or a hotel room with just Dean at his disposal. Dean hadn't slept in days. He didn't trust Sam not to do something nasty to him, or some innocent victim picked up on the street. The tension between the two of them could be cut with a knife. It was halfway through their journey across the state when Sam decided to pluck at Dean's last fraying nerve.

"You have to sleep sometime," Sam said casually. "Not," he added a second later. "That I couldn't just leave while you were awake. You wouldn't be able stop me."

"Why don't you?" Dean guided the Impala swiftly around a slow moving pick-up. It honked as he passed. He flipped the other driver the bird.

"And miss the epic battle you're waging with exhaustion?" Sam shook his head. "It's not quite what I'm used to, but it's a nice little buzz."

"No matter how you put it, that's really disturbing, Sam."

"Yeah, whatever.What are the chances of me getting laid any time soon?"

Dean narrowed his eyes. "Slim to none. If you think I'd leave you alone with a girl for a second you're out of your mind."

"Well you could join us." With a wistful sigh, Sam leaned back in his seat. "I could tie you up, make you watch. I wouldn't hurt her - much - just enough to get you mad." He chuckled a little, low in his throat. "And probably horny as hell. A threesome could be interesting. You do still have handcuffs in the trunk don't you?"

"Jesus, Sam!"

"What?" Sam's eyebrows vanished beneath his bangs.

"Manny didn't make you a vampire, he made you a pervert!"

Sam ignored him. "Look, there's a town. We could pick up a girl..."

"No."

"You can time me, give me a half hour alone with her. How much damage could I do in a half hour?"

"A lot. No girls, Sam."

Sam's grin was nothing less than wicked. "A guy?"

Dean nearly wrecked the car. "What? No!" He shot his brother a nasty look. "A guy? Man, if Dad heard you say that..."

"Come on, Dean, give me a break. I'm craving pizza and you've got me on carrot sticks and celery."

As odd as that sounded, and as tired as he was, Dean couldn't help but laugh. Catching sight of Sam's scowl out of the corner of his eye made him laugh harder.

"You're not helping," Sam growled. He cracked his knuckles warningly.

"Sam, I don't recommend you try to hurt me in a moving vehicle. If we wreck, there's a good chance your head will come off your shoulders."

"Yeah, wait until we stop for gas."

"What, you gonna knife me in public?"

"No, I'm going to key the fuck out of the entire right side of this car."

"You do that and I swear I'll come after you with a chainsaw!"

"Hmm, that made you mad." Sam chuckled. "I should threaten the car more often."

"Sam, I'm warning you..."

The phone rang.

They both stopped and looked at it.

It was Dean's cell, plugged into the lighter to recharge, but Sam made a grab for it and with his longer reach he snagged it first.

"Dean Winchester's phone, Sam Winchester speaking. Your dime, my time."

Dean punched him. "Shuddup! Give me that!"

Sam smacked his grabbing hand away. "Hey! Yeah. It's nice to hear you too."

"Who is it?"

"No, actually we're in Iowa."

"Sam!"

"Dean's driving. Yeah, I know."

Exasperated, Dean turned his full attention back to the road. He blinked rapidly several times, trying to clear his head. Sam was right, he was going to have to sleep sometime. There were handcuffs in the trunk, maybe a little restraint was in order to keep Sam in line while Dean caught up on his sleep. It would be like catching a tiger by the tail though. When he let Sam loose there would be hell to pay. Dean had no doubt that price would be high too if his brother got pissed off enough. He might lose a body part, and Dean was particularly fond of having two eyes, two nuts, and ten fingers. He'd like to keep them all intact.

Leather creaked as Sam sat up straighter. Dean heard his voice go down an octave.

"What?"

"Sam?" Dean scowled, now alarmed, and hissed through his teeth. "Who. Is. It?"

Sam waved at him to shut up. There was a frown on his face as he listened to whatever the caller had to say. "No," he said softly. "It'll take a couple of days." He paused, listening again. "Yeah. No. Don't worry, we'll get there."

The phone beeped as he disconnected the call. Other than that Sam was silent, sitting in the passenger's seat looking out the window with an odd, almost serene expression on his face. When he failed to speak for nearly a minute, Dean couldn't stand it any longer and had to prod him.

"Are you gonna tell me who that was or not?"

"It was Missouri."

Dean's scowl deepened. "Missouri? What did she want?"

Sam hooked the phone back up to its charger and set it back on the dashboard. "She wants us to come to Lawrence as soon as possible." He anticipated Dean's what for? "Dad is on his way there."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Dad's headed for Lawrence? And you told Missouri we'd come?" Dean's eyes widened. "Now I know you're out of your mind, Count Chocula. You think you can hide what you are from Missouri and keep Dad from torching your ass? I don't think so."

"Dean."

"Look Sammy, if you swear not to hurt anyone, I'll drop you off somewhere and go meet up with Dad myself. If Missouri plucks anything out of my head I'll just..."

"Dean!" Sam snapped. His eyes narrowed dangerously as Dean shot him a look. "We're going."

"I don't think..."

"It's the thing that killed Mom and Jess."

Dean stiffened. "What?" he breathed. Another quick glance to his right revealed Sam still staring at him intently.

"It's on Dad's tail," Sam said coolly. "He's luring it back to Lawrence so we can kill it."

For a while there was nothing but the sound of the Impala's engine running and the faint bleat of the radio. Each of them fell into their own thoughts. Dean chewed his lip and tried to think through their options. Sam couldn't get anywhere near their father or Missouri. Either of them could easily pick up on what he'd become. John would kill him.

Losing Sam weighed heavily against losing the thing they'd spent so long hunting, the thing that killed their mother, Sam's girlfriend, and whatever lives they might have had otherwise. In a round about way it had also killed Sam. If they hadn't been hunting spooks they wouldn't have been out in that desolate field at night in the first place.

Images flashed through Dean's mind: Mary Winchester slain and burning, Sam's anguished cries as Dean dragged him away from the raging fire in his apartment, Sam's blood spilling out over Dean's hands...

"Don't do anything stupid."

"You told her we'd come," Dean said quietly.

"Yeah, I did." Sam ducked his head and sighed before raising a hand to worry at his fingernails. He'd not bitten his nails since he'd been resurrected.

"Why?"

"Isn't it obvious? Dad can't do this alone."

Dean sighed. "No, what I mean is, what's in it for you?" He squeezed the steering wheel. "Because you know I won't let you lay a finger on either Dad or Missouri."

Sam didn't say anything for a while, as if he were carefully thinking through what he was going to say and how to say it. "I may have changed, Dean," he said finally. "But I have a debt to pay. I made a promise to Jess, and I intend to keep that promise." Leaning forward, he flipped open the glove box and procured a road map. "Call it one last bit of unfinished business."

Dean wasn't sure he liked the sound of that. Unfinished business? What would happen when he finished it? Would it purge the last bit of the old Sam that remained in him; the gentle, caring Sam Dean sometimes felt still lurking beneath the surface of the monster's facade? That Sam was what Dean hung on to with tooth and nail, hoping desperately that his persona would once more prevail - some day. The thought of losing him completely...

"And if Dad kills you?" Dean asked softly.

There was another long pause, and when Sam replied his voice was very flat, void of any sort of emotion. "I won't let him, at least not until this thing is dead." He shook out the map. "Next gas stop, let me drive. You need to get some sleep before we do this."

Dean set his teeth. "Oh yeah, I want to be sharp for this son of a bitch."

It didn't occur to him that Sam needed to feed just as badly.

His dreams were filled with fire. It chased him from room to room, down endless hallways and spiraling stairs. It cut off every escape route, forcing him to turn back into the flames behind him again to find another way. The baby in his arms was crying, screaming.

"It's okay Sammy, don't cry. I'll get us out."

The fire was alive. It herded him into a room where a woman burned on the ceiling and his burden suddenly became too heavy to carry. He fell to his knees, holding his grown brother's body in his arms as blood pooled upon the floor. Somewhere in the darkness a baby still cried.

"Sam!"

Dean groped for a weapon and did not find one.

It took him a minute to realize he was lying in the back seat of his car where the scent of death still lingered despite his best efforts to eradicate it. Bile rose in his throat. He shoved the passenger's seat forward and wrenched at the door handle, staggering out into the darkness to throw up on the crumbling blacktop. With his hands on his knees he stood gulping fresh air for several minutes. The scent of death still clung to his clothing. His stomach lurched again, but successfully fought off another round of puking.

He straightened slowly. The car was parked in the short term lot of a hospital. Sam was gone.

"Fuck!"

Dean took off at a fast jog down a grassy incline toward the closest entrance, the E.R. entrance. He didn't stop to grab a weapon, he'd never have gotten past security with anything that would come close to stopping Sam.

Stopping Sam from what?

He really didn't want to think about the havoc a psivamp could wreak in a hospital, and Sam in particular. It was becoming increasingly difficult to figure out what was on his brother's mind anymore and what he might do at any given moment. Dean wished he did have some sort of weapon. No weapon meant he was going to have to play negotiator, and sweet talking psycho mutant vampires was not high on his list of achievements. Sam was the sweet talker. Dean just shot things and made wise cracks.

The nurses were startled by his sudden appearance at their desk, possibly because he banged on it to get their attention and he didn't look injured. He blurted out the first thing that popped into his head.

"Tall guy, scruffy lookin', dimples..."

Oh yeah, by the way, he's also not breathing.

One of the nurses nodded. "Yeah, I saw him. He asked directions to the chapel."

Chapel? Dean's gaze shot toward a clipboard bearing the name of the hospital. Saint Mary's. The hospital was called Saint Mary's.

"Down that hall, to your right," the nurse said, pointing. "Take the elevator to the second floor and the chapel is the first door to your left around the corner."

"Thanks."

Dodging around doctors, patients and visitors, Dean sprinted off in the direction she'd indicated. In the elevator he paced back and forth behind a man in a wheelchair. When the doors opened he shoved past quickly.

He resisted the temptation to burst through the swinging doors of the chapel bellowing for Sam at the top of his lungs. It would have been bad form. It would have made him feel better, but it would be in bad form, and John Winchester had tried to teach his boys better than that. Instead, Dean took a deep breath, steadied himself, and entered with barely a sound.

There were only a handful of people inside. A man and a woman sat up front, near the altar where a statue of Mary stood with her hands outstretched. Above the statue was a massive crucifix bearing a frighteningly realistic carving of Christ. Several rows back a woman weeped openly into her hands, and off to the side a group of five young people gathered. From the look of them they were related. They held hands beneath bowed heads, silently praying for a loved one's recovery.

Or for a loved one's departed soul.

Sam sat in the very back row by the door. He did not acknowledge Dean's arrival in any overt fashion, but tilted his head as Dean slipped into the pew beside him.

"Mrs. Donaldson," he said softly, nodding toward the weeping woman. "Her husband has cancer, the final stages. He's in terrible pain and she won't cry in front of him. She doesn't want him to worry about her."

"Sam..."

"Those are the Marcums," Sam continued, ignoring him. "They're siblings. Mom and Dad were in a horrible car accident just a few hours ago. Both are in surgery. The surgeon doesn't think their father will make it. Too much trauma. Too much blood loss."

Dean shuddered, recalling his dream. "What's your point, Sam?" he asked gruffly.

Sam gave him a sideways glance with a small, wry smile. "This place is like an all you can eat buffet. People are dying; I've counted five since I've been here. There are people in pain, suffering in mind and body. I sense anguish and despair. There's anger, too." He jerked his chin toward the couple up front. "They lost their daughter. He's angry, doesn't want to be here. He's angry with God."

"Okay, so dinner was a smorgasbord. Let's go..."

"Dean," Sam interrupted. "I feel all that but..." He shook his head back and forth, speaking slowly. "I was upstairs, in the maternity ward. I passed the nursery window where you can see the babies and I...I stopped to look. I just...they were so small and new. They're blank slates, you know, with their whole lives ahead of them. Little miracles." He turned to look at his brother with tears in his eyes, and a horrible stricken expression. "Dean," he whispered. "I can't feel joy anymore."

Dean had to look away quickly, to force the lump in his throat down. He could no longer trust his voice. On the first attempt it failed him. On the second it came as a wavering croak.

"It's overrated anyway."

He could feel Sam's gaze on him, but Dean would not look in his direction, keeping his eyes focused straight ahead. The chapel room was looking somewhat blurry, and he thought maybe he was catching a cold; his nose was running.

"You know," Sam said quietly. "I may not have been psychic enough to know what you were feeling before, but I am now. You might as well give it up."

Dean bit his lip. He turned his head away so Sam could not see his face. "I'm sorry, Sammy. I..." Again his voice failed him. He cleared his throat and continued more steadily. "I should have listened to you."

Sam's expression turned puzzled. "What are you talking about?"

"Your last words. You told me not to do anything stupid."

"I did?"

"Yeah."

Sam moaned. "And you took me to Manny anyway?"

"Of course," Dean said, feigning an attitude he did not feel in the slightest. "When have I ever paid attention to your sorry ass?" He stood up, surreptitiously wiping his eyes and nose as he turned to leave. "Come on. You've pigged out here long enough; it's time to go."

He didn't stop to check if Sam was following him, but he heard the creak of the wooden pew and as he pushed through the doors, his brother fell in beside him. Wordlessly Sam tossed him the car keys and they made their way back down to the parking lot.

Dean drove the rest of the way to Lawrence. Neither of them said much. Dean sat wrestling with his guilty conscience while Sam stared moodily out the window. He'd fed very well at Saint Mary's. Sometimes after a good fix Sam's new, warped personality gave way to that of the old Sam. In this case Dean wasn't sure if it werea good thing or not.