Ragdoll
By, BROXA
Disclaimer: You know the drill, peeps.
Authors Note: This is the first truly evil cliffhanger I've ever given before, I think…FEELS GOOD!
Summary: It should've been a run of the mill hunt: pissed off, revenge seeking spirit. But when the tables are turned, and Sam finds himself the target of a deranged ghost, things take a far more sinister turn...
.xxx.
December 1st, 2004
"Small town America's finally grown a brain, Sammy," Dean grumbled, after a third motel owner turned them away. "We've been blacklisted."
Sam cast a half amused, half frustrated glance at his brother. "Tubby must've called his friends."
Even without looking at his brother, Sam could tell that Dean was grinning. The Impala was silent except for the throaty rumble of the engine; for the first time in a long time, the radio was off, and the cassette box was untouched. He smiled lazily; the silence was relaxing.
Without warning, Dean swung the Impala down a turn, and Sam was startled out of his reverie. "Dude! What the hell!"
"No destination; no directions, man," Dean replied, without missing a beat, as if that answered the question. Sam, unable to come up with a suitable comeback, leaned against window and followed the scenery distractedly.
After ten minutes of not-so-silent driving (Dean had put in a Metallica tape, and turned the volume up as far as it would go), the Impala purred to a halt in front of a shabby looking house. For a minute, the brothers just sat in the car, looking at the tiny house; it wasn't much to look at.
The house, which was painted a garish shade of blue (the paint, however, was horrendously chipped), had only one floor, and a tiny front porch, on which a rickety rocking chair sat. There were only two windows, which looked uncannily like eyes, especially with the tattered curtains that could be glimpsed through the grimy glass-'eyelids'. The house exuded an aura of loneliness, like the Bucks County Playhouse, and, although it would've been quite beautiful fixed up, it seemed almost sinister.
Dean turned to Sam and grinned roguishly. "No steam shower, but hey…we'll rough it," he commented, getting out of the Impala.
Sam didn't answer; he a sneaking suspicion that he had seen this lonely house before. It was only when his duffle bag "conveniently" collided with the side of his head that he unbuckled his seatbelt and got out of the car. Dean, grinning, thrust the bag at him; Sam caught it with an odd mix between a scowl and a laugh.
Belatedly, he recalled Dean's comment. "More like, no plumbing," he said casually, willing Dean to ignore the five minute conversation lapse. Luckily, Dean did.
"Piss in the woods, Princess. 'Less you're scared a squirrel or something would bite your…," Dean replied, but was cut off by Sam. Looking a bit disappointed, Dean slung his duffle bag over his shoulder, and led the way up the path.
Sam almost missed the next comment.
"'Course, it's not like you've got anything that could be bitten off…so you'll be safe, Samantha," Dean said quietly, in a super-casual tone, almost like he was talking to himself. Sam gaped soundlessly at Dean's back as the older Winchester fiddled with the doorknob, shocked into silence.
"You think so?" Sam struggled to find a comeback. "Yeah, well…," nothing was coming, and his search for something witty was made more difficult when Dean turned around and grinned, Cheshire cat-esque, at him. Behind him, unheeded, the door creaked open ever so slightly.
"Fuck! Look behind you!" Sam cried suddenly, and Dean arched an eyebrow, laughing.
"Dude, that hasn't worked since…man, that's never work—," the rest of his sentence was cut off, because a large, heavy baseball bat slammed into the side of Dean's head. Dean's eyes flew open, and for an instant, it looked like he was going to say something, but before he could, his eyes rolled up into the back of his head, and he dropped to the floor, crumpled on the porch like a forgotten doll.
"Fuck…fuck…," Sam said frantically as the bat dropped to the floor: no one was holding it; it had been floating independently. But he had a good idea of who had been making it move…
He dropped to his knees next to Dean, but before he could say or do anything, the door flew the rest of the way open, and his brother's body was sucked into the pitch black recesses of the house, amid loud bangs and crashes.
His mind whirling, Sam all but ripped open the weapons bag. He snatched a rock salt gun, and half stumbled, half ran into the house. The instant his foot touched the interior floorboards, a booming voice that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once filled the house.
"You're early…Audrey, escort our guest to the waiting room so he may join his brother in the sewing room when we are ready," roared a voice that was undeniably Talon's; with a loud pop, the gruesome specter of Audrey Tine materialized in front of Sam. It was the second time he'd seen her, but this time, she didn't seem nearly so reasonable, or even sane. Her sunken eyes had a horrid, maniacal glint to them, and when she spoke, her voice was frantic and excited.
"Reunited at last…reunited! And—you—will—help!" The ghost shrieked, her last sentence alarmingly staccato. She began to float towards Sam, eyes glinting; it was then that he remembered that he had a gun.
He pumped off rounds of rock salt, one after another, but the ghost was always one step ahead of him; she kept vanishing, and rematerializing closer to Sam. After six minutes of frenzied shooting, two things happened simultaneously: the gun made a loud clicking noise that could only mean one thing, and the ghost appeared right in front of Sam.
As he held the empty, useless gun, Audrey Tine clicked her two remaining fingers. A tiny bottle of bluish sand appeared in it, and, quick as you please, she thrust the open bottle at his face. Sand caught in his eyelashes, went up his nose, in his mouth, in the corners of his eyes…everywhere. As the power worked itself in, Sam felt all of his individual thoughts and opinions melt away…instead, they were replaced with a single, reiterated thought.
Obey.
.xxx.
December 1st, 2004
Even though he had been hit extraordinarily hard with that damn bat, Dean woke up less than ten minutes later. Slowly, rubbing his head, he stood up, and took in his surroundings.
All right. He was in a creepy ass basement, lots of stereotypical horror movie shit: dripping walls, flickering light bulbs swinging from fraying cords every ten feet or so, watermarks on the floor, no windows. No doors, either, from the look of it…but then again, it was pretty fucking dark, even with the light bulbs.
A loud pop echoed suddenly off of the walls, and Dean found himself face to face with Audrey Tine. Instinctively, he reached for his gun, but there was nothing there. Scowling, he satisfied himself with giving the specter his most malicious glare. However, Audrey merely smiled slightly.
"Whaddya want, Audrey? Conversation? Distraction? Entertainment?" When none of these struck a cord, he brought out the big guns. "Sex?"
Her sudden change in personality thoroughly alarmed Dean: she went from passive, and smiling vaguely, to violently scowling, her mutilated face contorted with rage. She opened her mouth hotly, but before she could say anything, Dean beat her to it.
"Struck a nerve, have I? Sex is exactly why Talon killed you, isn't it?" Dean said sleekly. Sam had told him all about the visions, every last detail, in the car, and the knowledge made him confident. Unbidden, a phrase from some kids TV show he'd watched years ago came back to him: 'Knowledge is power!'
As much as he hated to acknowledge it, it was true.
"Talon—he, I—he didn't do it!" She answered stubbornly, with the air of a child clinging desperately to a lie: Mommy and I still love each other very much…friends forever…I'll never leave you…
I'll never leave you, Dean. I'll always be with you.
Forcing his mother's words out of his mind, Dean narrowed his eyes and shook his head deliberately. "No, that's a lie. Your creepy-ass boyfriend killed and halfway dismembered you. And, sweetheart, it shows," he added, almost as an afterthought.
"I—no, he loved me! And I loved him!" She cried desperately, liquid brown eyes shimmering: the ghost was crying. But Dean refused to be dissuaded; he had to make her see the truth…
"Yeah, loved him enough to fuck another guy. Nothin' says 'baby, I love you' like your tongue down someone else's throat," he countered immediately. "Doncha think that would've made him just a little bit jealous? Hmm?"
"No! When he found us, he said…he said he'd make it all better…he said we'd get another chance…," she trailed off.
"And then…? Lemme guess. He pulled out gun and shot you," he finished, meeting her eyes.
"No, shot him—oh! He was on top of me—" Dean winced, having no interest in her sex life, especially now that she was dead "—and the bullet hit him in the back…"
"And it traveled through him, right?" He said patiently, although in his mind he was screaming 'hurry, hurry, hurry!'
"I remember…," she said, looking quite shell shocked. "The bullet went through him. Right into my heart—" she scrabbled at her dress; right over her heart, there was a ragged bullet hole. The ghost gave a dry sob, and continued. "He…he pulled him off of me, and held me. He said, 'baby, I'm sorry. I'll make it better. We'll get a second chance'. He killed me! Talon killed me!"
"And then he—" inspiration suddenly struck; "This was your old house, wasn't it? He killed and dismembered you right in this very house!"
"My—my body is probably here somewhere," she murmured, swaying slightly in midair.
"We need to—"
"I don't wanna be with him anymore! He's a—a—fuckin' murderer!" She hissed, and darted to what Dean had thought was a stretch of differently textured wall, but was in fact an electric blue door. The same one from Sammy's visions, he realized, with a thrill of terror.
.xxx.
December 1st, 2004
For the last fifteen minutes or so, Talon had been hopping experimentally in and out of Sam's body. Sam, being tied up hand and foot, blindfolded, and still extremely disorientated, couldn't really do much but weakly acknowledge the foreign, much stronger entity in his body. After yet another possession –the fifty fourth, he noted idly–, the door burst open, and someone who could only be Dean burst in.
Sam felt an eerie shiver of happiness that was definitely not his; seconds later, the ghost manipulated him, using his mouth like a sick puppeteer: "Dean! Help!"
Heavy footfalls hurried across the 'sewing room' (although it was, in fact, the room with the body parts, jars and shelves), and he felt Dean's hand on his forehead. "Sammy, you okay? It didn't hurt you, did it?"
Stupid question, Dean, Sam thought.
With an extremely unpleasant expulsion of force, the ghost threw itself out of Sam's chest, and hovered in front of Dean, eventually coalescing into the form of a tall, pale teenaged boy with a pentagram around his neck, and wearing black from head to toe: Talon.
"No, just me," it replied pleasantly. "I expect you've come to witness the reunion?"
Although he had started violently when the ghost showed itself, Dean remained calm; the only indication of his worry was the fact that his eyes flickered back to Sam, ¾'s of the way unconscious on the floor. Forcing himself not to take his eyes off of Talon, he said as calmly as he could, "Audrey. Now."
Audrey floated through the doorway, her eyes bright with tears. In her palm, there was a swirling nimbus of blue magic, which lit up her face eerily. "Talon, how could you kill me?"
"You know I had to, Audrey, baby—"
"So you admit it!" She shrieked. "Vado tergum ut abyssus , quod may vos nunquam reverto iterum!"
The magic hurtled out of her palm, right at Talon. A split second before it was about to sink into his chest, however, the ghost threw itself back into Sam, taking refuge within his body. The magic dove right after the ghost, into Sam—
"Sammy! Audrey, you bitch!" He yelled; her reply was drowned out by Sam's reaction to the magic.
His brother stiffened, every muscle taut as a drawn bowstring. As Dean watched, horrified, Sam screamed. It was an ear shattering, vein throbbing howl, held for at least a minute. Faintly, he registered Audrey's moan of "I'm sorry," and the loud pop that signified her disappearance, but he ignored it.
Just as quickly as they had stiffened, his muscles went limp; Sam fell against the gurney, flaccid as a dead fish.
Dean was at Sam's side in a flash. He got on his knees next to his brother, feeling his heart constrict in his chest at the sight of Sam's pale face…pale as a corpse, a voice whispered in his mind. Doing his best to ignore the cynical side of his mind, he rested two trembling fingers at the pulse point below Sam's right ear. He held his breath, feeling for a pulse.
There wasn't one.
.xxx.
Ha! This was definitely a fun one to write. Don't kill me—patience is a virtue!
Latin translation: Go back to hell, and may you never return again!
Review responses:
rozzy02: Plenty of angst now, I'd say! Hope you like this one as I do…heehee!
imbreena: Lol! Hopefully, you didn't have to cover your eyes too much this time…XD.