Spirit Fall, Chapter 5
A/N: I think I've found my new high. Who needs life when you've got crazy awesome reviewers? Seriously, thanks for reading. This chapter is probably the one you've all been waiting for, so enjoy. :)
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Chemotherapy, John decides after reading every pamphlet he could find on it, is something akin to throwing a live grenade into a crowd and hoping to take out only a few select individuals.
He'd watched the poison drip into his son's blood stream this morning. Watched Dean distract Sam with goofy grins and jokes; and even goofier flirtations with the attending nurse. He watches now, back in the motel room, as they wrestle over the remote, Sam being so freakishly careful with his brother that Dean easily wins.
He's waiting for that grenade to go off, has the countdown in his head since he got up that morning, but it doesn't happen. Sam and Dean are watching some old sci-fi movie marathon on cable and after awhile, Dean just slides down in the bed and drifts into a deep sleep. Maybe, for once, they've gotten off easy. The dang chemo, of all things, gave them a break.
He waits a few more hours; just to be sure Dean is well and truly asleep, before gathering his things and heading for the door.
"Where are you going?" Sam asks from the bed.
"Watch your brother," John says in way of an answer. "I'll be back."
They have unfinished business with a certain ghost in town and John isn't about to let this one go. He can take care of it now while Dean is asleep and never having known the better. While Sam had successfully gotten the spirit out of his father that night, it's still attached to the house, which leaves them right back where they started. This time, he's prepared with the proper charms to prevent possession, rock salt in the rifle, and the banishing spell. All he has to do is trap the ghost in part of the house and read the spell.
And get some answers.
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The house is quiet and still when he enters, sagging gray wood not even creaking in the wind, but he knows it isn't empty; he made that mistake before and won't do it again. He salts across each doorway upstairs and across the bottom of the stairs first, with no sign of the ghost, before repeating his actions on the first floor. He works his way back toward the front door, salting off the last doorway between the dining room and the foyer when he feels it again, icy hot fingers pressing at the back of his neck. He twists around and brings the shotgun up in one fluid movement, drops the salt canister to steady his aim, and gets one fleeting glimpse of a cross faced farmer before he blows the apparition to pieces.
There isn't much time now. The salt line is finished hastily and he steps over just as the spirit begins to reform. It's something like watching dust gather in slanting sunlight, the features are vague and dim, but this is a powerful spirit and what he lacks in physical presence he makes up for in volume.
"Jo-ohn," it drawls, dragging his name out into two bouncing syllables. "Win-ches-ter." He can almost hear the smile in its voice, like that was the punch line. It's never comforting when they know your name, but this one's been inside his head and that's a violation that will not be repeated. John fumbles in his bag for the banishment spell.
"I've lost my ax," the spirit drawls on. "And you've lost the children. Where are they now? I'll care for them like I did mine own. They shouldn't suffer no longer, Johnny."
"Shut up," John rants dryly, firing the rifle again and breaking up the ghostly figure. The pause gives him the chance to pull the incantation out of his bag, written in Sammy's tiny chicken scratch on an old notebook. He needs the ghost in front of him though, for it to work.
Salting and burning would have been so much easier, but there was no record of what was done with the body and searches of local cemeteries turned up nothing. This is plan C. Plan C, take two, John thinks wryly as the dusty light particles begin to take shape again, now nearer the front door.
"They shouldn't suffer no longer, Johnny." His voice comes before his head is even visible and the words hang heavily in the thickened air. John begins to read, speaking over him. The spell is short, but the spirit talks louder and angrier until his words force John to pause. "Children shouldn't so know any pain," it rants. "Children shouldn't so know any illness."
"What?" John forgets about the spell for a moment, lost in the spirit's ramblings. "What did you say?" The spirit of Arthur Wellington smiles, a bizarre effect on its grimy features.
"Your child is ill, as was mine, Johnny. Won't you bring them to me?" John doesn't bother to answer, focused on readying the rifle again. "Bring them to me," it sings. "Better with me than you." John steadies the gun against his shoulder, only one question lingering in his mind.
"What did you say to them?"
The spirit's smile stretches unnaturally wide, longer than his face.
"Nothing they haven't known. Nothing you haven't had in your mind."
"Bastard," John curses, knowing that's all the answer he'll get. He pulls the trigger again and the man is gone. The foyer is empty.
He breathes deeply and lays the shotgun on the rotting floorboards next to his feet, readies the spell. It takes longer this time and the air becomes increasingly chilly as the old farmer reforms yet again. This time, he's right in the doorway, toeing the salt line, ghostly features twisted in caricatured fury.
"Your child is ill, Johnny," he roars. John begins the spell anyway, focusing solely on reading steadily, despite the ghost's frantic rages. "Bring them to me. They shouldn't suffer no longer. Your child is dying, Johnny." He falters at this, but reads on, finishes it out, and as the old ghost burns away his final words are only a gust of wind through the hall.
"Hurry home, Johnny."
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John drives the Impala back to the motel like it's a dying mule, alternately speeding up in a panic and slowing down as he convinces himself that the spirit was only messing with him. They always play off your fears. Everything is fine.
His worst fears are brought to light though when the motel room door is flung open as soon as he steps out of the car.
"Dad!" Sam yelps, throwing the door open so hard it bounces back off the wall. "Dean's sick!" John makes it to the door in five leaping steps. He reaches out to steady his youngest, eyes immediately going to the bed where he'd left his son sleeping peacefully a few hours prior. The space is empty now, rumpled sheets pushed back and the comforter missing.
"Where?"
"The bathroom," Sam supplies quickly. John moves past him and across the room. The bathroom door is partially closed, but he doesn't bother with knocking now. He pushes it open and steps in. The room is small; closet sized and not the walk-in kind.
Dean is in the corner with his back against the tub, opposite a toilet full of vomit. The missing comforter is draped around his hunched shoulders but he shivers still, not even lifting his head to see who's entered.
John's stomach drops. So much for getting off easy.
"Dean?" he asks, kneeling next to him on the tile. "How're you doing?"
"Peachy." He has to lean in just to hear the gasping word, which makes it all the more apparent that Dean is anything but. He twists to see Sam, dancing nervously in the doorway.
"He took the medicine?" John asks, referring to the multitude of prescriptions they'd been given to fight the nausea, among other things. Sam nods jerkily, wide eyes not leaving his brother's shivering form. John turns back, eyeing the toilet with disgust. He reaches over to flush it.
"Seems to be working well," he comments softly.
"Oh, something's working." Dean tries to sound light, but he hangs on to the first word a few beats too long and by the end of it he's hunched over even further, forehead inches from the cool tile. Sam stiffens in the doorway, ready to bolt, fingernails digging into the wooden frame. John rests a light hand on his son's back, reaches another around his front to sit him back up, but Dean is wound tight, sweating and shaking, and he folds over into his father's lap.
Your child is dying.
For a moment, John is lost. He forgets who this sick person is and what he's supposed to do about it. He can't recognize his own child in this weak shell, too pale features, and flat, tired eyes, mouth tight with pain. It's so ridiculously unlike the person he knows is in there, for a moment, he can believe the spirit's words.
"Dad?" Sam's shaky question is echoingly loud in the tiled room.
"I got him," John reassures quietly, automatically. He glances behind him. "Sammy, go put the trash can next to the bed and straighten out the sheets. Get some water." Sam nods silently, eyes still round with fear, and slips out of the tiny room. John leans closer to his son.
"Dean?" he whispers, glancing toward the toilet again. "You done in here?" Dean heaves a breath, licks his lips like he wants to say something more when all that comes out is a simple yes.
"Okay," John nods, watching as Dean's eyes don't open. "Okay." He pulls the blanket tighter around Dean and shifting carefully, slides an arm under his shoulders and another beneath his knees. He knows how bad it is when Dean doesn't complain about being carried, but John swallows his fear and focuses on maneuvering the limp body out of the bathroom and onto the straightened bed. Dean curls over immediately as he's placed on the mattress, arms wrapped around his middle.
"Sam, get the other blanket," John commands, sitting down on the edge of the mattress. Sam yanks the comforter off the other bed and throws it over his brother, the material billowing in John's face like a magician's cloth.
Your child is dying.
"Dad?" Dean's voice is little more than a choked whisper, rasping in the back of his throat. His eyes are red and glossed, blinking up at his father slowly.
"What? Dean, I have to call the doctor." Concerns of cost and money were thrown out the window long ago. John Winchester can have a debt. Dean licks his dry lips again and John reaches for the water glass Sam put on the table. He holds it out for his son to take, but Dean's eyes have slid closed again and he looks frighteningly still against the starch white sheets, like a black and white photo, a still frame. John blinks harshly against the image and slams the cup back onto the table. Turning, he stands swiftly and moves toward the door. Sam gapes at him, panicked eyes now holding disbelief.
"What?" he exhales.
"Watch him," John barks, avoiding the figure in the bed. "I'll be right back."
"What?" Sam breathes again, but his only response is the closing of the door after his father.
John stalks out into the hallway, his steps gradually weakening from a stomping march to a strong walk, to a stumbling gait. He makes it around the corner, out of view of everyone, before slumping against the wall, desperate for some kind of support. He slides to the floor.
Your child is dying.
A car door slams in the distance and he lifts his head, shaking it purposefully against the spirit's prediction.
"No," he mutters aloud. Dean isn't dying. He can't. He can't. "He can't!" he yells it aloud, to make it all the more true. He cannot die, for so many reasons it makes John ache. He cannot die, because they aren't done yet. There's too much left to do and see and live. Damn it. He exhales slowly, latching back on to that crumbling edge of control, and drags himself up to his feet. There are too many things to do. He starts back for the room, flexing his fingers. Dean can't die. Dean won't die. They aren't damn well done yet.
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