OK here's the next bit... Should have mentioned at the start that this is set before Shadow... For obvious reasons that become clear at the end...!
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"You're not reading that thing again are you?" Jessica asked, indicating the thin manilla folder laying open across Sam's knees.

Sam started. He'd been sleeping. He'd been dreaming… about… someone. Dean. His brother? He shook his head to clear it, eyes trying to accustom themselves to the twilight surrounding him.

He'd been reading the file. Had dozed off. Had dreamed about his brother. Dying. Throat cut.

He shuddered. How could he trust that the young man in his dream had actually been his brother? All he'd seen were pictures. In the file. But the kid whose photograph was uppermost in the folder on his knee looked different somehow to the guy in the dream. More –

Haunted.

Sam looked up at Jess as she put a cup of coffee on the wicker table in front of him before sliding down into the seat by his side, pushing the porch swing with her foot so that the breeze blew gently through her hair.

She had beautiful hair, Sam thought to himself distractedly, catching one long, wavy lock between his fingers as he drew her close. As she kissed him, he thought, not for the first time, that he was the luckiest man alive. He had everything he'd ever hoped for – career, beautiful home, beautiful wife.

He sighed contentedly, looking out beyond the porch to where the kids played on the swing set in the garden. Jenna was laughing at Matthew, her little brother failing miserably to swing higher than she could.

Jessica followed his gaze, smiling, and Sam's attention was drawn back to her. She still looked as beautiful to him today as she had when they were twenty. The last ten years had gone by so fast…

Jess turned away from their children, a sad smile on her face. "So have you decided what you're going to do yet?" she asked.

Sam frowned, absently flicking at the paperclip holding the picture of the teenage boy to a few thin sheets of paper. A few thin sheets of paper that told the whole story of this poor kid's life. "Maybe," he said uncertainly, his previous decision crumbling as he tried to fathom the relevance of that dream he'd just had.

Jess shrugged. "You went to a whole lot of trouble to get hold of that file," she observed, tapping her fingers on the boy's photograph. "If you're not going to do anything about it."

Sam nodded. "I know," he said, looking up at her. "And honestly? I'd kind of decided to let it go – "

Jess raised her eyebrows in surprise.

" – Until I just had this weird dream."

"Dream?"

Sam shifted in his seat. "Yeah," he said, still trying to get his head around it. "I was with him someplace. He had his throat cut."

Jess recoiled. "Oh my god – your brother?"

Sam nodded. "I guess. Although I'm not entirely sure from this picture," he indicated the photograph on his lap. "He was older."

Jess frowned. "So you were reading your brother's file, you fell asleep, you dreamed about him?"

Sam shrugged. "I guess," he repeated. "It was so vivid. I remember – " he stopped suddenly.

"What?"

Sam shook his head. "Weird memories." He couldn't look at her then. "Of things that – that never happened."

"What sort of things?"

Sam looked deep into her eyes then and pulled her close to him. "It doesn't matter," he said, trying to get the image of Jess on the ceiling bursting into flames out of his head. Where did these horrific images keep coming from, he asked himself. Jess on fire; Dean with his throat cut. He shuddered. There had been nothing in his ordinary life that should cause such hellish scenarios to keep creeping into his brain. Sure, he'd always been afraid of fire, but he guessed that was down to the way his parents had died, even if he couldn't remember anything about that terrible November night.

He glanced down at the photograph once more. No wonder the kid had that haunted look about him. What those eyes had seen…

"I got his address this morning," Sam said quietly, stroking his wife's hair as she rested her head against his shoulder. "I'm going tomorrow."

Jess nodded, pleased. "Is he still in Kansas?" she asked.

"Wichita," Sam replied, nodding absently. Then, "I don't even know if he'll want to talk to me."

Jess looked at him. "Why wouldn't he want to talk to you?" she asked. "He's your brother."

"Yeah, but honestly? DNA's probably the only thing we've got in common…"

Jess brushed her fingers against his chin. "OK," she said. "So you ended up on opposite sides of the law. Considering what he's been through – the life he's had – it's hardly surprising."

"Jess," Sam burst out. "Jess, he killed someone. In cold blood. My brother killed another human being. Slit his throat like he was an animal…" he trailed off. Slit his throat. Like Dean's had been in his dream.

Jess shrugged, her face suddenly hard. "You ask me," she said. "He did every kid in that place a favour." Her jaw tightened as her attention drifted to her own children. "Someone ever did to my children what that – that – man – " she chose the word carefully, " – did to those poor kids?" She raised her chin. "I'd do more than slit his throat."

Sam followed Jess's gaze to Jenna and Matthew, still trying to one up each other on the swing set, and he couldn't really argue. "Yeah," he said at length. "I know."

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Sam had never been to Wichita. Hell, he couldn't even remember Kansas, but he knew he'd lived here for the first three years of his life. He didn't remember Lawrence much. His Mom and Dad had only lived a couple of miles from the house where – where his other Mom and Dad had lived. But he'd never had the urge to go back there.

Somehow, he couldn't bring himself to call them his 'real' Mom and Dad. Genetically, maybe, but he'd never known them. The names John and Mary Winchester were just that to him. Names.

He had a picture – his Mom said his brother had left if for him – of a happy couple, smiling for the camera in front of a big house, their little boy and baby son held in their arms.

Mom and Dad had given him the photograph when he was fourteen. Up until that point, he hadn't even known he was adopted, let alone that he had an older brother somewhere.

Of course, by then it was too late. Dean Winchester had already been in jail for two years by then.

Sam had left it. He had wanted to be a lawyer some day, and he was worried that if anyone got wind of the fact that his brother was serving time for Murder, certain doors might suddenly become closed, certain positions suddenly unavailable.

So he'd left it. And left it.

Even when he'd found out his brother had got parole, he'd left it. And that had been two years ago.

He didn't know whether it was hitting thirty or having kids of his own that had made him start to think about his brother again.

It had taken his former college roommate – who just happened to work for the District Attorney's Office – a while to get Sam Dean Winchester's file. And to this day, Sam wasn't sure it had been worth the wait. The more he read about his older brother, the less certain he was about seeking him out.

How would he react to Sam? When their parents had been killed, Sam had been adopted within weeks. People wanted babies. But four-year-olds with deep psychological trauma? They were a little harder to place…

So Dean had disappeared down that rabbit hole known as The System, and Sam had never seen him again.

Reading his file had been like reading a horror story. Sam had no idea what had happened on the night his parents died. All Mom and Dad could tell him was that there had been a fire, and that his older brother had gotten him out of the house while their father had gone back in to try and save their mother. Neither of them had come back out.

Dean had spent the next twelve years going from foster home to foster home, labelled a 'problem' kid, and moved on. His file said he ran away from almost every home he'd been placed in, one time getting as far as Arizona before he'd been picked up by a highway patrol. He'd been ten years old then.

Further labels were added; 'disruptive', 'disturbed'. He had 'behavioural difficulties', an 'inability to socialise' and an 'advanced distrust of authority'. In short, he was trouble, and he'd proved all the social workers right the night he slit his foster father's throat.

A murderer at sixteen.

The social workers had shaken their heads and moved on to the next case.

Sam wondered whether Dean would resent him. Blame him for the fact that while Sam had gotten new parents, a new home, a chance at a good life, Dean had got the short end of a very short stick that had wound up with his spending sixteen years in jail.

He was about to find out.

The door was probably supposed to be blue, Sam figured, as he tapped uncertainly on the dirty plywood. He could hear music blaring loudly from the inside of the apartment: Metallica, or AC/DC, or maybe Led Zeppelin. One of those rock bands that, to Sam at least, all blurred into one loud cacophony of sound.

A woman screamed somewhere, and Sam looked nervously down the dimly lit hallway before knocking harder.

The music stopped abruptly, and a few seconds later, the door cracked open just enough to reveal a rusty security chain stretched cautiously across the opening.

"Who's there?" a man's voice asked, as cautious and as rusty as the door chain.

Sam smiled nervously, pushing his glasses further up onto his nose. "Um. Hi," he managed, his voice high and strangled. He coughed, awkwardly, desperately trying to get a handle on some semblance of composure. "D – Dean Winchester?"

A pause. Then, "Who wants to know?"

Sam tried smiling again, not even sure the guy on the other side of the door could see him. "Um, my name's Sam Griffin," he managed. "I'm – I think – um – that is – I think – ". Spit it out, Sam, he ordered himself testily. He looked squarely at the crack between the door and the door jamb, hoping he was looking at least in the guy's general direction. "My birth name was Sam Winchester," he blurted at last. "I think I'm your brother."

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The apartment was, well, 'grimy' was the word that sprung initially to Sam's mind as he looked about him. While the place wasn't particularly untidy – the odd t-shirt thrown over a dining chair in the little kitchenette; a few fast food cartons on the rickety wooden table – there was a lingering air of grime hanging about the place that Sam figured would always be there, no matter how hard the apartment was scrubbed.

The walls were a dingy cream colour. No pictures. No photos. Completely bare. The furniture was sparse; a two-seater sofa and a mismatched armchair on which Sam currently sat. A small metal coffee table littered with CDs – the same music he'd heard when he arrived. A little stereo in the corner. Portable TV stuck on an upended packing case.

The kitchenette held a table and two wooden chairs, a dilapidated stove and a microwave oven that had obviously seen better days. When Dean opened the cupboards to get coffee, they looked pretty bare too.

Sam considered his brother thoughtfully. When he'd initially introduced himself, the door had closed immediately. And stayed closed for some considerable time.

Sam had been on the verge of leaving, convinced his brother didn't want to see him, when he'd finally heard the security chain rattle and the door had come open.

Dean Winchester had just stood there looking at him, an uncomfortable, uncertain look on his face.

Sam guessed that had Dean had any other life, he would probably have been a real ladykiller – handsome, if it hadn't been for that haunted look about his eyes. His pale face was thin and drawn, dark circles under his eyes suggesting he almost never slept. Although Sam knew he was still only thirty-four, he looked older, and when he walked his shoulders sagged, as if buckling under the weight of the world. He had trouble making eye contact, too, stealing quick glances at Sam before looking away just as quickly, eyes darting about the room, resting anywhere but on his brother.

"Come in," was all he'd said so far, besides, "You want coffee?" to which Sam had answered in the affirmative for want of anything better to say.

Dean put a mug of coffee on the table in front of Sam, before sitting himself down opposite, perched uncomfortably on the edge of the sofa.

If anything, Dean seemed more nervous than Sam.

"So," Sam managed, trying to think of an icebreaker.

Dean beat him to it. "Brother, huh?" he said, nodding. "You've sure grown since the last time I saw you."

Sam laughed, not expecting his brother to have much of a sense of humour. "Yeah," he said. "My Mom didn't think I was ever going to stop…" he trailed off. Dean had flinched at the word 'Mom'.

An awkward silence hung over them. Then Sam managed, "So, you lived here long?"

Dean shrugged. "Since I got out," he said, making tentative eye contact. "You – you know about – ?"

Sam nodded. "I'm a lawyer," he sounded like he was apologising. "I've read your file."

Dean smiled hollowly. "Yeah?" he said. "Mom always said you were gonna be a smart one."

That surprised Sam. "She – she did?"

Dean nodded. "Oh yeah. Used to call you her little Einstein."

Sam broke eye contact this time, unable to deal with the unbearable sadness in his brother's eyes.

"So," Dean said. "A lawyer? What sort of lawyer?"

"Criminal," Sam answered automatically. Maybe he shouldn't have said that.

A wry smile lifted the corners of Dean's mouth, and for a second Sam recognised the young man he'd seen in his dream. Despite the longer hair and couple of days growth on his chin. "So you checked me out, huh?"

Sam studied his feet some more. "I guess," he muttered. Then, looking up. "My parents – my adoptive parents. They didn't tell me I was adopted until I was fourteen," he explained. "They gave me a photo they said you wanted me to have."

Dean nodded, remembering. "Yeah," he said, a far-away look in his eyes. "Last time I saw you."

Sam was surprised at this. "When was that?" he asked.

Dean shrugged. "You were really little."

Sam decided to change tack. "Your file," he said. "It said you kept running away from your foster homes…"

Dean grinned, mirthlessly. "First time out, I only got as far as Topeka."

Sam nodded. "You were – what – seven?"

"Yeah," Dean agreed. "Seven. Got all the way to Arizona a couple years later…"

Sam frowned, interrupting. "Why then?" he asked. "Why did you suddenly want to get away when you were seven? Did something happen…?"

A ghost of a smile continued to play with Dean's lips. "How old were you when your folks left Kansas?"

Sam shrugged. "Erm, three I guess."

Dean nodded at him. "Do the math, Sam."

Sam frowned. Then it hit him. When he was three, Dean would have been… "You – you ran away because of me?" he burst out, unable to quite process that little piece of information.

It was Dean's turn to shrug, more in embarrassment than anything else. "They made a promise to me that they didn't keep," he said, his voice calm and neutral. "Said even though they couldn't take us both, they'd still let me see you."

"And – and they didn't?"

"A couple of times," Dean answered. "Used to come visit me – wherever I'd ended up – and let me play with you for an hour or so. Last time was when I gave you that picture. It was all I had left of Mom and Dad. I thought you should have it. In case you forgot."

Their eyes locked, and this time neither looked away.

"And then they left?" Sam's voice was hoarse.

Dean nodded. "Told me you were going to live in sunny California. Your – your Dad – " it was clearly difficult for Dean to call him that. " – had got a job out there, and you were leaving. They said they were sorry, but they couldn't bring you all that way to visit." He turned to stare out the window for a second, before looking back. "Hell, I didn't even know where California was," he said. "All I knew was I had to find you. Had to keep you safe."

Sam frowned at this. "Keep me safe?" he said. "From what?"

Dean carried on looking at him, as if measuring him up. "How much do you know about how our parents died?"

Sam shrugged. "Not much. I know they died in a house fire."

Dean nodded. "Yeah," he said. "House fire. Right." He was smiling that mirthless smile again.

Sam frowned, reaching out a hand and touching his brother's arm. Dean looked up at him. "It wasn't a house fire?"

Dean shrugged. "It was a fire," he confirmed. "It burned our house. Killed Mom and Dad…"

"But?"

Dean looked at him again. "Look, there was something else, something – ". He trailed off, as if struggling to put what he wanted to say into words.

Sam tried to push him. "Something – ?"

Dean was still looking at him, as if gauging how he would react, whether he could trust him with something… "You've had a pretty normal life, right?" he asked at length. "Nothing weird, out of the ordinary ever happened?"

Sam shrugged. "I guess."

Dean smiled. "That's good," he said. "I'm glad." Then, "OK, I guess the only way to say it is to say it." He took a deep breath. "There was something in the house with us. That night. I don't know what it was. I just know I felt it. Dad picked you up, gave you to me and told me to run. He went back for Mom. I didn't see him again. When I started to run down the stairs, I felt like something was following us. I could – I could feel it coming after us, like it was trying to grab onto us, keep us in that house. But we got out."

Sam was staring at him evenly, but didn't pass comment.

Dean appreciated the non-judgemental expression on his brother's face, and continued hurriedly, as if trying to get his story out in one quick burst. Like pulling off a Band Aid, maybe. "I don't know what it was," he repeated. "I don't know if it was after you, or after Mom, or after Dad. Or after me. I don't know. I just know I felt it. And I knew I had to protect you from it. That was why I kept trying to get to you. In California. 'Cause you didn't know. You didn't know it was out there. You didn't know it might be after you." Dean stopped abruptly, drawing breath while he stared down at his hands. He didn't speak for a minute, as if still trying to decide how much to tell his brother. After all, he didn't really know Sam any more than he knew the derelict who slept in the alley behind his apartment building; or the Indian guy who ran the deli across the street.

Eventually, he looked back up at Sam, and if it was possible, his eyes looked even more haunted than they had before. "I don't know if it was the same thing," he said, slowly, obviously struggling to maintain eye contact. "But I've felt something like that one other time…"

Sam frowned. "You – you have? When?"

Dean didn't seem to want to answer. He looked away again, down at his hands, his feet; the grubby beige carpet; the almost forgotten cup of coffee.

Anywhere but at Sam.

But Sam already understood. "Your foster father…"

Dean looked up at him then, nodding, slowly. This was obviously a painful subject for him, and Sam figured he'd probably not told too many people – if any – what had really happened that night. "Well," he said at last, absently spinning the silver ring on his right hand. "You're not looking at me like I'm a complete nut job yet. I guess that's a good sign."

Sam inclined his head and arched an eyebrow. "You've not told me the whole story yet," he returned.

Dean smiled weakly. "OK," he said, taking a deep breath. "Of all people, you probably need to know the truth." He ran his hand through his hair while trying to decide where to start. "I had this friend. Bethany," he began eventually, fingers unconsciously toying with his ring some more. "We were in a few of the same foster homes. She – she was the same age as you – " here he looked at Sam, "and I guess I kind of adopted her like a little sister. She was all alone in the world. Her Dad ditched her when her Mom died. In a fire," he added, almost as an afterthought.

Sam nodded. He understood.

Dean continued. "So we kinda had something in common. When I was sixteen, I got moved to this foster home just outside Kansas City. There were about ten kids in there, and Bethany was one of them. She got moved around almost as much as I did, so our orbits didn't always collide and we'd not seen each other for about a year. At first, I thought I was imagining it, but eventually I realised something had happened to her since the last time I saw her – she'd changed completely, as if she was a totally different person, you know? She was quiet and withdrawn, when before, she was like the total life and soul of the party – all the time. To be honest, she was hard to keep up with sometimes."

Dean studied the carpet some more, for a second lost in his own memories.

Sam didn't say anything, figuring it was better just to let his brother talk. He obviously wanted to get this off his chest, and Sam was more than willing to listen, if only to help him better understand why Dean had done what he'd done.

Finally, Dean picked up his story. "Anyway," he said, trying unsuccessfully to hide the catch in his voice. "It didn't take me long to notice that all of the kids in that place were like that. Like they were all terrified of something. Or, as it turned out, someone."

"Jim Donnelly?" Sam hazarded a guess.

Dean couldn't disguise a shudder at the mention of his name. "Yeah," he said quietly. "The foster father from Hell." He met Sam's gaze squarely. "Literally."

Sam frowned, but didn't comment on his brother's odd choice of words.

Scratching the back of his neck, clearly still struggling to relate this story even after all these intervening years, Dean eventually managed to continue. "I don't know everything he was doing to those kids," he said, carefully, voice straining with the effort. "Second night I was there, he locked me in a closet and left me there for two days 'cause I wouldn't…" he trailed off, clearly not comfortable sharing that part of the story with Sam, once more avoiding all eye contact. He shrugged, as if trying to shrug off the memory itself. "Anyway," he continued, "when I asked Bethany about it, about what was going on in that place, what Donnelly was doing, she wouldn't – or maybe couldn't – tell me. She just told me to do as he said or he'd hurt me, and then they'd all suffer. Never did find out what she meant by that. But then, they were all like that, like little zombies. No fight left in 'em. Spoke in riddles all the time, like if they came out and actually said what was going on, that'd make it somehow more real, you know?"

Sam didn't know. Just when he thought he understood what Dean was saying, he'd say something like that and Sam would start to wonder if he was really following any of the conversation at all. Talk about speaking in riddles…

Dean shrugged again, not looking up long enough to see the expression on Sam's face. "Anyway," he continued. "I'd been there a couple of weeks when one night, I decided to go downstairs. Don't know why. Something in my head told me I was thirsty, but I wasn't."

Sam frowned again.

"So I go down to the kitchen," Dean continued. "And when I get down there, I hear crying coming from the living room." Here he managed to look back up at Sam. "I swear to God, to this day I don't know why I did it," he said, earnestly. "But for some reason, I picked up the biggest kitchen knife I could find before I went to see what was going on. When I looked through the living room door, I saw that it was Bethany crying. Donnelly was with her. Touching her." Dean's voice caught again. "And that's when I went in there with the knife. Told him to get the hell away from her." Dean faltered again, shuddering, and not from the cold. "And that's when I felt it," he added, for the first time since he began his story, actually locking eyes with his brother. "When he stood up and turned to look at me. He just stood there. Just looking at me. And, I swear Sam, I don't know whether it was the thing that killed Mom and Dad, but I felt something damn similar coming off of him. Like – like he was evil to the very core of his being. That was how the thing that chased us out of the house had felt too. Like the total absence of light." He shook his head. "I don't really know what happened next," he admitted. "The next thing I remember, I was laying on the floor with a bloody knife in my hand, and he was lying right next to me with this – this huge hole in his neck."

Dean sat back slightly on the sofa, as if relaxing now he'd finally unburdened himself.

Sam just stared at him in horror, for a moment uncertain how to respond. He was uncomfortably reminded of that incredibly vivid dream, of his brother dying in his arms with a huge hole in his neck, just like the one Dean had inflicted on his foster father. Finally, he managed to drag his voice up from somewhere far away. "Did you tell anyone?" he asked. "The Police? Your attorney?"

Dean laughed that sad hollow laugh of his. "What? That I slit my foster father's throat 'cause he was possessed by a demon? The same sort of demon that killed my parents? Jeez, they'd have locked me up forever!"

Sam wasn't sure whether to feel relieved by Dean's story – perhaps he wasn't a cold-blooded murderer after all – or insulted. Demons? Honestly? Did he really expect him to believe that? "What happened to Bethany?" he asked at length, trying to ignore a niggling half-memory at the back of his mind that kept telling him he knew that name from somewhere.

Dean's eyes slid back to the floor. "The day they sentenced me," he said. "She found the tallest building she could and jumped off the roof."

Sam shut his eyes for a second. "Twelve years old?" he asked.

Dean nodded. "Yeah. Shoulda still been playing with Barbie dolls and dreaming about ponies."

Sam considered his brother carefully. Dean was looking at him expectantly, as if waiting for Sam to pronounce sentence on him. "So that's your story?" he managed finally.

Dean shrugged. "Pretty much."

Sam nodded. "Demons."

"Yeah." The tone in Dean's voice had become flat again, the light that had appeared in his deadened eyes for the briefest of instants gone just as quickly, as the realisation hit him.

Sam didn't believe him.

"Demons," Sam repeated, his voice neutral, his expression as blank as he could make it. "A demon took our parents," he said. "You killed Jim Donnelly because he was possessed – "

"I never said he was possessed," Dean interjected. "What I said – what I meant – " he trailed off, the disbelief in his brother's eyes finally defeating him.

He stood suddenly, walking angrily into the kitchenette where he stood with his back to his kid brother.

He was shaking.

"You should go," he said quietly, not turning round.

Sam stood then, taking a hesitant step towards him. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. This wasn't the reunion he'd played out in his head. OK, his brother had killed someone. He could get past that. Maybe.

But demons?

Sam took a deep breath. Somewhere in the back of his mind, the image of Jessica pinned to the ceiling surrounded by angry flames, her stomach ripped open, came unbidden, and he had to put his hand on one of the dining chairs to steady himself.

Demons.

"I didn't say I didn't believe you," he heard himself saying. "I – I want to help you – "

"I didn't ask for your help," Dean spat, more venomously than he'd intended. He didn't turn around, angry at himself for trusting a complete stranger with something so obviously crazy as the story he'd just related. He gripped the counter top so hard his fingers hurt.

Sam took another step forward, about to say something – anything, that would cushion the blow of his scepticism. But before any words came out, he suddenly heard a little boy's voice echoing in his head, "It's all right, Sammy," while flashes of memories from events he'd never experienced assaulted his senses: his tenth birthday. when Dean charmed a waitress at some dive of a diner into giving him a free piece of chocolate cake with a candle stuck in the top; looking at himself in a mirror with blood running down his face, knowing he was going to die until his big brother smashed the thing into a million pieces; lying on someone's bedroom floor with electrical cord around his neck, struggling for a last gasp of air, just as Dean appeared to cut him loose in the nick of time.

Standing over his brother as he lay injured on the floor, pointing a gun at his head and pulling the trigger.

This last image made his head ache. He didn't want to see any more. He didn't want to remember any more. None of that was real, none of that had happened. None of it. Jessica was real. Jessica, Jenna and Matthew. They were waiting for him back home, back in his real life. He needed to get back to his real life.

This wasn't his real life.

"Dean, I'm sorry," he said slowly.

Then he turned and left.

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Sam had the radio up full all the way home. He needed to drown out the thoughts crowding into his head. He needed not to think.

But he couldn't get that last memory out of his mind. As he'd turned to leave Dean's apartment for good, his brother had turned to look at him. One last look. One last look that Sam had seen before. Somewhere. But not in this life.

Although Dean never said the words, his eyes were saying, "Don't leave me here alone."

But Sam had gone. Just like he had the last time, the time he knew had never happened, when he'd told his brother he was leaving for college and had just gone, just left him.

As before, Dean hadn't tried to stop him.

His chest hurt with the effort of breathing. His head throbbed, a dull ache, as it tried to banish the half-memories assaulting his brain.

They weren't memories.

They were just random images.

Hell, he didn't know what they were.

But he would leave them in Kansas. With his brother. He was going home to Jess and his kids. He was going home to a place where he could forget all about demons; about evil; about shooting his brother in the chest with rock salt.

Those things don't exist, he kept telling himself. They never did. They never happened.

He had to get back to Jess. Everything would be OK then.

He pulled onto his driveway, head pounding even harder, but more relieved to be home than he could ever articulate. The kids' bikes lay across the lawn, wheels still spinning as if only just abandoned.

He got out of the car, the sudden cessation of the noise from the radio contrasting acutely with the silence all around him. Total silence. He couldn't even hear birdsong.

Anxiety tugging at his insides, he began to walk towards the house, quickening his pace as the aching in his temples threatened to make him keel over completely.

Something was wrong.

"Jess?"

He opened the back door, looking about the darkened kitchen for any signs of his family. A chopping board sat on the counter, half chopped carrots abandoned next to a large kitchen knife.

"Jenna? Matty?" Sam walked through the kitchen slowly, for some reason picking up the big kitchen knife as he passed.

"Jess?"

He walked into the lounge, where the TV played to an empty room, the sound shut off so that the images on the screen left only eerie shadows on the walls and the ceiling.

"Jess?"

Sam moved through the lounge into the hallway, hardly daring to look up the stairs as he began to climb, almost tripping on one of Jenna's sneakers, discarded with the laces still tied.

"Jenna? Matthew?"

Sam moved down the hall, peering first into Jenna's room and then into Matthew's. Both empty.

As he neared the end of the hallway, he noticed the door to the master bedroom was pulled shut and his stomach lurched. This was wrong. This was all so wrong.

Gripping the knife tightly, he reached out for the door handle.

It felt warm.

Hardly daring to breathe, Sam opened the bedroom door.

He didn't dare look up.

"Sam," he heard Jessica's voice from somewhere above his head. "Sam, it took the children…"

And then the flames engulfed him.