A Distant Voice in the Darkness

by sailorhathor

Dean and Sam head back to Vermont to try to pick up the Mothman's trail, while Paul deals with his haunted apartment. People brush past each other, so close by, but all just out of reach.

3. A distant voice in the darkness

A Distant Voice in the Darkness
A Miracles/Supernatural Cross-over
by Laurel (Sailorhathor)

Chapters: Separated into 3 Parts; 3 of 3
Rating: Adult Supervision Suggested for those under 13 for bad language (including several uses of the F word)
Dates: Written July 2006
Summary: Dean and Sam head back to Vermont to try to pick up the Mothman's trail, while Paul deals with his haunted apartment. People brush past each other, so close by, but all just out of reach. A Miracles/Supernatural cross-over, which slashes Dean Winchester/Paul Callan. (But there is no sex in this story.)
Timeline: Happens after the Supernatural episode "The Benders" and before "Shadow," which moves the Miracles timeline up to 2006.
Warning: Contains spoilers for all of Miracles and Supernatural up to "The Benders."
Betas: Thanks to Meredevachon and KaijaWest for the excellent, helpful beta reads.

Part 3: A distant voice in the darkness

"Spadoodle." Dean punched Sam in the arm. A car with only one headlight, the other being broken, drove by.

"You're only supposed to do that when the headlight is lit," protested Sam. "It's the middle of the day."

"Who made up that rule?" Dean scoffed.

Sam spotted a VW Bug. "Slug bug," he said, and socked his brother one in the upper arm.

"We better find this road soon, or we're both going to have black and blue arms before dinnertime." Dean scanned the side roads as they passed them.

Sam pointed at a two-lane dirt road. "That's it! I recognize that mailbox." He indicated a mailbox shaped and painted like a pig.

Dean turned down the road. "When you see the area where the Mothman attacked, just yell."

The road was not well traveled, and so was fairly bumpy. Dean accidentally ran over a large rock, shaking Sam up and down so hard that he struck his head on the roof of the car. "OWW!" he howled.

With a nod, Dean stopped the car. "That was a figure of speech, dude."

Glaring, Sam responded, "I yelled because... nevermind. That grouping of trees up ahead does look familiar. Let's have a look around."

After several minutes of searching, Sam called to Dean, "I found something!"

Dean ran over. "What?" He looked at the small, partially evaporated puddle of slightly glowing green ooze on the ground. "Mothman blood."

"There's a trail leading off into there," Sam said, pointing deeper into the woods.

They tracked the blood trail as far as it would go. It led to a dilapidated shack someone was using for tool storage. The shack was on the property of a nearby out-of-the-way mansion, far enough from the house that the residents probably never heard a thing of whatever had happened here. Most of the decaying green blood was here, all over the floor of the shack in puddles here and there.

"How can the trail just end?" Dean wondered aloud. "Did it bandage its own wounds and then fly off?"

"I wouldn't think a Mothman would typically carry a first aid kit. Well, we know it was here, but..." Sam suddenly squeezed his eyes shut, put his fingers to the bridge of his nose, and groaned in pain.

"Sam?"

"Vis - ion," Sam managed to stutter, before the mental picture overtook him.

He saw two people, a guy and a girl, milling around the shack. Both were young, around their early twenties, and blond. She was seated on a pile of cement bags with one of her arms stretched out straight, fingers open and feeling at the empty air. Her eyes were closed. The guy walked aimlessly along the right wall of the shack, waiting for her to finish what she was doing. Finger running along the wood, scraaaaape... Sam could hear every sound like he was there.

"Are they okay?" the guy asked the girl.

"Yeah, the cop just said something about going back to find the gun. He and Sam are driving away now." She opened her eyes and brought her hand to them, rubbing at the inner corners. "We need to find a place for the day. I don't think this is... it..."

She stared at a figure in the doorway in absolute shock. It was hulking, huge, one wing flapping absently while the other bled lime green blood. The Mothman.

The girl opened her mouth to scream, but before she could get any sound out, the creature had moved swiftly to her brother's side. He started to turn to see what his sister was looking at that way (they're brother and sister) when the Mothman grabbed him by the neck and slammed him against the wall behind him. His eyes shot wide open, not only in reaction to being manhandled, but because of the sight of what was doing the manhandling.

The girl sprang up. "Eric!" (eric it's dean's eric not so lucky right now)

The Mothman's "voice" invaded her head like a dagger, like a ten-inch needle. FIX IT, it said, and it pointed to its wing. OR I SNAP HIS NECK.

Sam, suddenly torn out of the vision, stumbled across the floor a foot before Dean was there to catch him. "Sam! Sam! Are you alright?"

Sam had hoped that with the last vision, it meant the end of them causing him headaches, but the pain was back. It settled into a temporary, dull ache once the vision had released its hold on him. Sam took a deep breath and rubbed his temple. "That one hurt."

"I wonder why the last one didn't, then." Dean tried to lead his brother over to the pile of cement bags, to sit down.

Sam allowed himself to be led there, and took a seat. He could still feel the girl here. What some would call a psychic signature. "I think it may have to do with the nature of the vision. How deeply I go into it. This one, I was pretty deep. Right there with them, almost."

"Them?"

"I saw how the Mothman got his wing fixed. There were some people here, in this shack, for some reason. Dean, it was your friends, Eric and Savannah."

Looking doubtful, Dean narrowed his eyes and took a step back. "Huh? What would they be doing here?" Sammy's visions must be going haywire on him. "How were they dressed?"

"They were both blond. Her, a tight long-sleeve tie-dye shirt in dark colors, and jeans. Bell-bottoms. Him, layered shirts, a black t-shirt on top of a striped shirt with long sleeves. Looks like he's a little stuck on the grunge look. He could almost win a Kurt Cobain look-alike contest. Jeans were tattered," Sam described.

Dean folded his arms across his chest, pacing a few feet away and back. "That's them. Definitely them. Why? Why the hell would they be here?"

Sam realized that as he sat on the bags of cement, where Savannah had been sitting, he began receiving impressions from her, from the psychic residue she left behind. "They were here because I was here."

"They're following us?"

"Yeah." Sam started rubbing his eyes. "Because Keel asked them to."

Dean growled, "I know that, but when did he ask them to renew the spying?"

"Pretty recently, because I started hunting with you again," explained Sam.

"So Keel asked them to begin following us again way before we met SQ?"

"Yes."

"How do you know all this stuff, anyway? Seems like it was a pretty involved vision," confirmed Dean with a nod of his head. He wanted to understand as much as he could about his brother's new abilities.

Patting a bag of cement, Sam said, "Savannah sat right here. I'm somehow... feeding off these vibes she left behind. Because she's clairvoyant, like you said. They were here, and then the Mothman came in - "

"Shit, are they okay!"

Sam heard the concern Dean could not hide from his voice. "Yeah, they're fine. They did what the Mothman wanted - mended his wing - so he left them without doing anything to them." He purposefully left out the part about the Mothman threatening to snap Eric's neck; it would just worry Dean.

"But why did our friend the moth pick them to mend his wing? Because they were close by?"

"That, and..." Sam listened to something Dean could not hear for about ten seconds. "...people with psychic abilities shine in the dark to a being like the Mothman. They are platinum among human beings. Like beacons."

Dean raised his eyebrows, looking down, and nodded. "Explains why it went after you and Paul, too. So we're not going to find the Mothman dead by the road somewhere, huh?"

"Nope. He took off once his wing was taken care of."

"Damn."

Sam just made a face at his brother. He knew Dean never wanted to do the interrogation of the Mothman; they were always going to butt heads on it. "Savannah and Eric are still in the area. She's able to locate us by doing her thing, her clairvoyance. She feels out for people, but - " Pausing, Sam rubbed at his eyes, blinked, then looked up at Dean with confusion. A few seconds later, his eyes seemed to clear whatever was bothering them. "That was weird. For a few seconds, it was like... my vision grayed. I couldn't..."

"You couldn't see?" asked Dean.

"Yeah."

Dean made a noise of amazement. "You really are feeling Savvy's vibes, aren't ya?"

"What? Is she blind?" Sam asked.

"No. But when she uses her clairvoyance, it makes her blind for a while afterward."

Sam was stunned. "Really?"

"Yeah. The level of blindness, how long it lasts... all affected by how deep she goes in and for how long." Dean got down on one knee in front of his brother. "Sammy, don't take this the wrong way, but the intensity of your powers is starting to worry me a little."

"What, why?"

"You don't see it, dude. Your abilities are expanding. The more days go by, the more stuff you can do. This vision thing you've got; in the past, it was always about the future. Savvy and Eric were here yesterday."

Sam realized he was right. "Oh..."

Dean gave a curt nod. "Not only did you sense Savannah's vibes, but you just had an incident of retrocognition. You saw the past."

Trying not to make a big deal out of it, Sam didn't say the things he was thinking, but inside, he was stunned at the realization. It did seem as if he was just piling on the powers. Would there be an end to what Sam could do, or would the visions of the past and future eventually leave no room for the present? "Huh... I guess you're right."

Dean nodded again, standing up straight. "I don't think we should stay here too much longer. The property isn't deserted, and that could mean trouble. Come on." He helped Sam to his feet. "We'll get a hotel room for the night. You look worn out."

As they walked back to the Impala, Sam tried to shake off how tired and achy he still was, wondering if the visions were always going to cause him to feel like this. He wished he could achieve more control over his abilities. There must be ways. At least Sam didn't have to go blind to have these visions. "Why did Savannah originally come to you and Dad? Or did you guys contact her? Did she have information for you?" he asked Dean curiously.

With a small laugh, Dean replied, "No. Savvy and Eric came to us concerning their psychic abilities."

They had reached the Impala; Sam leaned against its side. "What did they want?"

Dean looked over the hood at his brother with quite the serious look on his face. "They wanted us to cure them."

advitd

"What did you call it again?" asked Sam, lifting the wet rag he had folded over his eyes and forehead so he could see Dean as he emerged from the hotel room's bathroom.

Dean was still shaving with a cordless electric razor; he hadn't gotten a chance to shave at Paul's. "Karmic displacement."

Sam put the rag back and rested on his pillow. "That's very rare. Didn't Dad describe it as, like, a magnetic field surrounding a person that influences the luck of the people around them?"

"That's the short story, yeah. Typically, karma works in a balanced manner. You get what you give; you get what you deserve. But then you have people like Eric, who throw off the balance of karma through no fault of their own. Karma gets displaced. Bad things happen to good people. Some seem to receive more than their fair share of good fortune. Evil goes unpunished. That's the theory." Dean turned off the razor and rubbed his hand over his chin.

Sam spoke to Dean with his eyes closed. "Does he have any control over who gets good luck from him and who gets bad luck?"

Dean almost shook his head, but realized Sam wouldn't be able to see it with his eyes shut. "No. None at all."

"That sucks."

"That's why he wanted to be cured." Dean blew hair off the razor, then tossed it into his bag. "As you can probably guess, she wanted to be rid of her powers because of the temporary blindness. Savvy has no control over that either. How long it lasts, or when it happens."

There was a long pause of silence from Sam. But eventually, he said, "You and Dad never found a cure, huh?"

Dean knew what he was thinking. "No. Unfortunately, no. There is no cure for a thing like that." Not even for you, Sammy.

A little bit of a pout came to Sam's lips.

Dean watched him, frowning himself. "How do you feel?"

Sam raised a hand and wiggled it back and forth to indicate he was so-so. "I've been better. But it's not so bad. Just a dull ache now. I liked the vision I had about Dad's journal. No pain there."

"Yeah, but that one was short. Real short. In fact, it was probably the shortest one you've had yet." Dean took out his wallet to count how much cash he had. "That probably has a lot to do with how much you hurt afterward."

Sam made an "mmm" sound.

"Well, I'm going to go get us some grub." Dean snapped up his car keys. "Get some rest. I'll be back soon."

Sam made that same sound, his arm draped over his head.

Once he'd gotten as far as the Impala, Dean did not get in; first, he took out his cell phone and looked through the list of stored numbers. Brandy, Lee, Stacy, Michelle, Caleb... I've really got to alphabetize this thing some - HE-llo. Savannah Coleman. He selected that one and pressed the CALL button.

She answered on the second ring. "John Michael Osbourne, huh? That could only be one person. Hey, Dean. About time you called. Did you get a new number?"

Yes, he had gotten a new phone number since they last talked. Anytime the name on Savannah's Caller ID belonged to a rock star, the odds were good it was actually Dean calling. Consequently, it didn't surprise him that she knew who was on the line. "I sure did."

"My God, Dean... we haven't spoken in a really long time. How have you been?"

He did his best to contain his anger for now. But that didn't mean he was going to pull any punches. "Oh come on now, Savvy. You know exactly how I've been. You just felt out for me with your clairvoyance."

She paused, like she was choosing her words carefully. "Sometimes."

"I think it was lots of times." Dean couldn't help it; an edge had crept into his voice.

Savannah put a shrug into her tone. "Why would I do that? You know how it affects me."

"Oh, I dunno... maybe because somebody was paying you?"

Dean didn't need to see her to know that she'd tensed up. "What are you talking about?"

It was at this point that Dean snapped. "Don't play dumb with me, you backstabbing bitch. I know about the file Keel hired you to help him make. I know about the photographs and how you played me to get the picture of the Impala's trunk. How much of it did you fake to get me to trust you?"

She sighed. "Dean, I - "

But he continued to lay into her. "That's a dangerous file for certain people to see, Savannah. If my dad knew about some of those pictures, I wouldn't hear the end of it for all of eternity and you know it. I can't believe you did this to me. From now on, you are no longer working for Alva Keel, do you hear me? If you ever do anything like this again, I don't care if you are a girl, we are going to throw down. You got that, bitch?"

"Come on, Dean, you know me. I gotta take care of me and mine first."

"Yeah, I know all about it, but this is a new level of greed, even for you. I trusted you. I taught you how to do the credit card scams. If I wanted to find you right now, I'd know exactly what name to look for in all the hotel registries. I even let you drive my car. But I guess I should've remembered that your primary loyalty is to money." Dean was so angry, he was practically spitting, but once he got on a roll, he found it hard to stop.

Something about what he said made Savannah mad right back. "Oh, so you're totally your own man, Winchester? Like you're not your father's bitch, always doing everything he says?"

"Hey, you can fuck off and die, Coleman! Don't even mess with me!"

A few of the hotel's other guests who were in the parking lot turned their heads and gawked. Dean didn't even see them.

Realizing that she had just about alienated Dean, Savannah quickly changed her tune, speaking sweetly. "Dean, Dean, wait. I'm sorry, okay? Let's not be like this. I want to make it up to you. What can I do?"

Dean tried to calm down, so he could tell her exactly what he wanted. He had already given this some thought. "You want to make it up to me? Here's what you can do. Like I said, you don't work for Alva Keel anymore. You work for me now."

"Whadda ya mean?" Savannah asked.

"I'm going to make a file about Alva Keel. You're going to get me pictures, lots of pictures of stuff that would make him uncomfortable. I'm going to put it all together and make sure he sees it. That guy's gotta know what it feels like, 'cause I'm sure no one's ever given him a taste of his own medicine. You start as soon as you can get to Boston," Dean ordered.

She couldn't help but laugh a little. "Can't I at least have the night off?"

"Whatever, just head over there soon."

"Are you going to pay me anything for this little job?"

"You get paid in my respect."

Savannah sighed. "Respect doesn't buy medical care for my little brother, Winchester. I can't use the fake credit cards for that. Just 'cause you're always flirting with getting caught doesn't mean I use the cards that recklessly."

"Fine, I'll pay you something. But remember, for the most part, you owe me here." Dean stopped long enough to take a breath. "How is Eric, anyway?"

"Kinda bad lately. Lots of abdominal pain. Lotsa cramps."

"You ever get a proper diagnosis?" Dean leaned against the driver's side door, hugging his chest with his other arm.

Savannah just laughed. "Like we can get a proper diagnosis from a free clinic."

Biting at his bottom lip, Dean let it go. He had enough to worry about with his own family. "Right. Well, you take down my new number and you call me as soon as you get to Boston, okay? I'm keeping tabs on you from now on."

She grinned to herself. "You missed us, huh?"

"Naw," Dean shot right back. "I just want to make sure you're working on my file."

Savannah almost frowned, but she knew Dean well enough to know how he hid his real feelings unless he desperately needed you to know how he felt. He cared. "Yeah, right. Talk to you tomorrow."

"Wait. Just remembered, there's some stuff I wanna ask you."

"What?"

"Keel asked you to start following us again when Sam rejoined me in the hunt, right?" queried Dean.

"Uh, yeah. Around January. Said he'd heard some stuff from his parapsychology friends about it. They've got quite the grapevine there," Savannah explained.

"Not a very fast grapevine," Dean chuckled with satisfaction. Took two months for them to pass the news on, ha ha to them.

"Yeah, well..."

"What were you doing in Vermont to begin with?"

Savannah paused a long time before answering. "I felt out for you and Sam a couple days before it happened. Um... saw Sam get taken by that thing. I'm really sorry I wasn't able to help you, Dean. You were real worried."

A chill ran up Dean's back. "You saw the Mothman take Sam?"

"Clairvoyantly, yeah," she replied.

"Then why didn't you tell me where he was? Do you have any idea..."

"Dean, you know my powers don't work as easily as all that. I don't immediately see big signs that say, 'Hey, this is the Mothman, and he's taken Sam here, and this is the number where you can reach Dean.' I see the events as an observer from many miles away. I wasn't even sure what city you and Sam were in to begin with. By the time I figured out where the Motel Cascade was, you were in your car and zip, gone! We don't even have a car; how was I supposed to catch you? It's not like I even knew your new number then, either. I did everything I could, but Eric and I are only human." Savannah sighed. "I can't watch you guys 24-7. I tried to figure it all out as soon as I could."

Dean sighed too. "I know. I know. Sorry. I just... wish you could have contacted me."

"Me too. It never even occured to me to try your dad..."

"Mm. Shit, that would have solved everything. He's got my new number on his voicemail message."

Shaking her head, Savannah scoffed at the irony of missed opportunities. "I'm sorry, Dean."

"It's okay. I don't expect you to keep watch 24-7."

"Damn near did anyway, while that creature had its clutches on Sam. I wanted to make sure he was all right. We got a lucky break when Sam passed by a sign that said, 'Welcome to Mountaineer, Vermont.' As soon as I saw that, Eric and I hurried out to the road and stuck out our thumbs. It's kind of easy to get a ride when you're blind; people feel sorry for you. I played it up and everything. Stood there with a cane and shit." Savannah giggled. "They don't know it's only temporary.

"I was so relieved when Sam called you. Our ride to Vermont got us there right at the end, just before the cop picked him up."

"Yeah, I know. We tried to pick up the Mothman's trail today, and Sammy, he..." How did Dean explain this? Savannah would probably know what he meant. But did she realize Sam had abilities now too? "...Sammy... felt you there, in the shack. He saw when the Mothman attacked you guys, through retrocognition."

Pausing to find the right words, Savannah said, "So Sam's developed some psychic powers. Or rather, he's discovered them. They've been there all along."

Dean looked at the ground. He wrestled with what he knew to be the truth. Sammy didn't want these powers; Dean wanted to help him be rid of them. But neither could have things their way. "Seems so."

"Sammy'll be okay. He just needs some time to get used to it." Savannah took a breath, to give Dean time to mull that over. "Where the hell did that thing come from, Dean? Was that really the Mothman?" she finally asked, stunned.

"Yeah. According to Keel, it comes from the fourth dimension," Dean replied.

"Yeah? Where the fuck is that?"

"I dunno," Dean shrugged. "Some intellectual shit that doesn't mean anything in the real world. We'll just call it Mothmanland."

They shared a chuckle.

"When that thing appeared in the doorway of the shack, I nearly shit," laughed Savannah. She shuddered all over. "I had stopped feeling out just before it swooped down, so I didn't see it coming at all. It starts screaming at me in my head - 'Fix my wing, beotch!' Only thing was, I was going blind. Eric had to do all the work, poor baby."

Dean chortled again.

"The last few days have been an absolute mess, me spending all my time either feeling out for Sam and sometimes you, or being blind as a result of it, and then what happened to Eric, oh man!" Savannah covered her face with her hand and shook her head back and forth slowly, chuckling to herself. "He got some of the Mothman's blood on him when he fixed the monster's wing. Eric tried to wash it off, but... the stuff knocked his ass out."

"Really!" cried Dean, trying not to laugh. It shouldn't be funny...

"Yup. We manage to get a hotel room, and we walk in the door, me blind as a bat by now, and all I hear is WHUMP! Eric's down for the count." She held the phone on her shoulder so she could slap her hands together at the time she cried "WHUMP," to accentuate it.

Her brother, sitting nearby and listening in on her end of the call, glared at her. "Not funny," he grumbled.

Not able to hold it back, Dean had a good laugh over that. "God, what a pain in the ass that must've been."

"Tell me about it. But we survived," Savannah said.

Biting at his bottom lip, Dean got control of the chuckles and told her, "Hey, thanks, Savvy. Thanks for looking after my brother. I know that must've been tough, all those hours of blindness, and watching everything happen from afar without being able to help. You did your best. I won't forget it."

She smiled. "Yeah, well... you talked so much about Sammy during the year you and your dad spent in Tampa, I almost felt like he was my brother too." Then she added, "Good lord, he's tall."

They made plans to talk the next day, and said their goodbyes. Dean hung up, sighed, and got into the car to go retrieve his and Sam's dinner.

Once off the phone, Savannah turned to her brother, who was sitting on the low dresser that held the hotel television. "Was that Dean Winchester you were talking to?" he asked.

"The one and only."

"It's been ages since we talked to him. Why did he call?"

Savannah told Eric everything Dean had said, all the things Eric hadn't been able to figure out on his own from what he'd heard of her end of the conversation. "We're supposed to head back to Boston tomorrow."

The dresser had a lip of overhang on the front; Eric gripped it with both hands nervously at the thought of possibly seeing Dean Winchester again. He'd admit to anyone who wanted to know that he was helplessly infatuated with the most gorgeous, buffest blond hottie he'd ever seen. "Are we really going to stop working for Keel?"

"Oh, Eric, Eric, Eric... silly boy. I'm going to get us the house, the car, and the cushy medical plan. We'll have it all. I can keep playing both sides against the middle and no one will know. How can anyone get hurt? It's just a bunch of pictures." Savannah stood and crossed the room to her brother, reaching out to mess up his hair, which she knew he hated. He batted her hands away. "Dean said I had to stop working for Alva Keel. That's all."

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Sam was feeling much better after the take-out that Dean brought back, especially since he had tried to get a few healthy things, like actual vegetables. "Where are we headed next, since we lost the Mothman's trail?" Sam asked.

What Dean said next surprised him. "We're going back to Boston."

"Really? You feel ready?"

"Yeah..." Dean sighed. "Yeah. I do. What we've got to do here is draw the Mothman out to our dimension again. It's the only way we'll ever capture him. If you're bound and determined to do this, then I'm going to make sure we do it right. But I could use everyone's mind on this. I want all ideas out there, all the pros and cons."

Sam started to nod, but their conversation was cut short when his phone rang. "Hello? Oh, hey Caleb. What's up?"

"Hi Sam, uh... your dad asked me to call."

"Okay, sure. About what?"

Caleb knew this was going to be a little awkward. "You wanted to know some things about the Goodwells and 'God is Nowhere'?"

It slowly dawned on Sam what was going on. He looked at Dean and frowned. "Dad asked you to call instead of him?"

"Uh... yeah."

Sam hardly heard Caleb making excuses for their father; he was too distracted by the feeling of his heart sinking, and the look on Dean's face. The disappointed, disheartened look.

But Sam listened to the story anyway. By the time the call was done, Dean was on the bed next to him, his ear to Sam's phone as well, so they could both hear as much of the conversation as they could. Lydia Goodwell had gotten in touch with John Winchester because a psychic she had gone to on a lark with a bunch of friends had told her that her then baby son, Chad, was going to do something horrible someday, something she would be powerless to stop. In fact, the psychic had collapsed to the floor muttering over and over about "the darkness" laying claim to Chad's soul.

"Your dad also wanted you to be careful around this Paul guy. He said he's not sure about Paul, whether or not he's one of the good guys. He's got something to do with the whole thing, that's for sure," said Caleb. "Remember, Chad killed a bunch of people over all this. It's some bad shit you're getting into here."

"That's just like any other day," Dean replied with a roll of his eyes. He knew exactly what side Paul Callan was on.

Although Dean was not the one on the mouthpiece, Caleb still heard him easily. "Your dad said it was an order. Watch your back."

"Always do," Sam added. "Thanks Caleb."

After Sam hung up, Dean seemed different. Glum. His father had snubbed him again.

Sam tried to find something that would cheer him up. "Dad didn't say we had to stay away from Paul altogether. Just to be careful around him."

"Yeah." There was a long pause. "I hope we can do this Mothman thing alone. Because if we try to get Dad's help, he'll just send Caleb."

Sam chuckled. "Yeah. Do you really think we can do this?"

Standing up, Dean walked over to the mirror hanging next to the television and checked himself out. He put on a winning smile, pumping himself up for what was to come. Getting even with Keel. Capturing the Mothman. Facing Paul with the truth. He could do it. He could do it all. He was Dean Winchester. "Definitely."

A Distant Voice in the Darkness (c) 2006 Demented Stuff
Miracles (c) 2003 Spyglass Entertainment & Touchstone Television
Supernatural (c) 2005 Kripke Enterprises, Wonderland, & Warner Brothers/The CW Television

Additional Notes: Again, Eric is not named Eric because of Eric Kripke. The name just fit him.

Thanks to Mere for helping me name this story. I mentioned to her that the theme of the story seemed to be about people passing each other, brushing close by, but always staying just out of reach. The theme is explored over and over. Dean's refusal to tell Sam his secret (although Sam already knows), Paul's empathic connection to Dean brushing his psyche, the ghosts in Paul's apartment not being able to see or touch each other though they occupy the same space, Paul's refusal to share his secret life with Alva and Evie, Savannah's clairvoyant visitations, Sam having retrocognitive visions of her right back, Savannah keeping a devastating secret from Dean, John's letter from the past, and John's self-imposed estrangement from his boys when he again refuses to make direct contact with them. In many cases, people are barely aware, or not at all aware, of these brief intersections. I wanted a title that embodied all of that in one phrase.

Mere found it for me in the poem included at the beginning of the story.