Chapter 3
I dreamed I was missing, you were so scared
But no one would listen, 'cause no one else cared
After my dreaming, I woke this fear:
What am I leaving when I'm done here?
So if you're asking me, I want you to know
When my time comes, forget the wrong that I've done
Help me find some reasons to be missed
and don't resent me, and when you're feeling empty, keep me in your memory
Leave out all the rest
Don't be afraid, I've taken my beating
I'm strong on the surface, not all the way through
I've never been perfect, but neither have you
~Linkin Park Leave out all the rest
Sam wakes up in a cold sweat. He has to figure out how to get more demon blood and how to hide it from Dean. Just a little bit, just a sip, to keep the hallucinations that would soon to be coming at bay. He had tried calling for demons outside of the dank motel. It was in the middle of the night and it hadn't worked. Sam was strung out and almost mad and he knew the worst parts of the detox was coming soon. He knew his brother would force him to go off the demon blood cold turkey, and that could kill him. It damn near almost did the first two times. He needed some, just a little.
He knew it was rationalization, exactly what a junkie would be thinking, but at this point Sam didn't care. His body was shaking and dripping in sweat. He sits up in bed and looks to his right to see Dean sound asleep on the other bed. Dean was sleeping so peacefully and even when strung out on demon blood and a little bit of alcohol, he took solace in the fact that his big brother seemed happy and right. Sam smiled and then sighed. He might as well sleep a little more. It was barely 5:30 am and after pacing around outside and collapsing in the dirty pavement, Sam had barely gotten any sleep, certainly not deep sleep. He squeezed his eyes shut. He pushed his pain away, shoved it down, and drifted off to sleep again.
Later, Dean is awake and watching his little brother sleep. Sam was tossing and turning and screaming violently. He seemed to be having terrible nightmares. Dean sat at the table in the motel room sipping a cup of coffee. He wanted to reach for his flask of alcohol; it is hard for him to handle the fact that his little brother relapsed again. Would this ever be over? How would they hunt the ghost when his brother was so strung out? He briefly thought he could slowly wean his brother off of the demon blood, just temporarily, so Sammy could function. He cursed himself at the thought; the demon blood was more poison than any other drug someone could be strung out on. Cold turkey was the only option. Sam would have to deal with the debilitating pain of the detox. There wasn't a safe room, though, and who knew what the demon blood would make Sam do. Dean knew how much power it gave Sam, and he knew that that amount of power would be incredibly hard to control. It had flung Sam around the air at the walls in the panic room, BOTH times he was detoxing.
Dean's thoughts were interrupted as Sam shot awake and sat up straight, shouting.
"Where am I?" Sam muttered, confused. Dean wondered if Sam forgot what happened, but in a few short moments, Sam mutters, "Oh. I remember. Sorry."
Sam gets out of the bed even though his legs are shaking, and they barely support him.
"You okay man?" Dean asks.
"Of course I'm not okay," Sam mutters. "You know I need demon blood. Cold turkey sucks."
Sam looks at Dean. Dean has a death grip on his flask of alcohol, and Sam can't help but think that his big brother is a damn hypocrite. Alcohol was just as bad as demon blood, if less evil. Alcohol couldn't turn you into a monster. It could - but not that kind of monster. A human monster, angry and violent, the way that some drunks are. Bobby and Dean weren't really violent when they went on a drinking binge, but Sam knew that some alcoholics did. If Dean was allowed to drink that much alcohol, shouldn't Sam be allowed to have a little bit of demon blood every now and then? It made him a better hunter.
No, Same muttered to himself. He isn't even sure if he said it out loud. It made him a better monster.
Still. Sam watched Dean take a swig of his alcohol. Burbon, probably, or whiskey.
"What did you say?" Dean asked.
"Oh, um, nothing," Sam says.
"Okaaay," Dean says. Dean decides to ignore the situation, for now. "We have to go and interview the father of the little girl that was killed. It's important. You good?"
Sam wasn't good, not anywhere near. He tried not to tremble, the hallucinations hadn't started, which meant there was more demon blood still strumming in his system. It meant there was still raw power that he could use. He would focus on that power - that power that was darkness, or so he had been told by everyone he cared about millions of times - and use it to push down all the pain, all the trembling and the shakes. He was good at hiding his pain; he regrets giving in and telling Dean that he relapsed. But in the car, it had been so bad, he had no choice; he couldn't pretend that he wasn't suffering. Might as well come clean.
"Yeah, I'm good," Sam says. "Let's go."
Sam stands up and puts his stuff in his backpack.
"You want any coffee or anything? Dean asks.
Sam smirks. Dean knows what Sam wants.
"You know what I want," Sam can't help but say, glaring at his brother. He loves Dean, but the damn withdrawal is making him angry.
"Can't have that," Dean has. "Drink some coffee. Maybe it will help you keep yourself together until we find a safe place for you to detox. The case comes first, you'll have to suffer in silence for a while."
Sam decides that a little coffee might help him function. He goes over to the motel's Keurig coffee maker and brews himself one cup of coffee. He sets it at the table angrily and a few drops of hot liquid spill on the motel carpet. He drinks the coffee. Dean throws a donut at him.
"You gotta eat too," Dean says.
Sam slowly eats the donut. He drinks the rest of the coffee quickly, already realizing that it actually will help him hold himself straight. It gave him a surge of energy, and he still had that telekinetic, demonic power strung out inside of him. He hopes his eyes won't turn back. I'm not a demon, I'm just psychic, he thinks to himself, but he knows Dean and Bobby and most hunters they know think that his psychic powers make him more like one of the monsters they hunt than a human.
Then Sam and Dean threw their stuff in the Impala. They put their fake badges in their coat pockets and Dean put on the rock radio station. It was playing, ain't no mountain high enough, to keep me from getting to you babe. A girly song for Dean, but Sam can't help but enjoy the music. The coffee and food dulled the edge of the demon blood withdrawal a bit, enough for Sam to suffer in silence. He gave no outward signal that he was in pain. That, of course, was Sam's greatest superpower. To be breaking down at the force of a billion shooting stars, and still standing still like a statue, showing no signs that he is suffering.
There is still an hour drive in the Impala before they get to the little town where a ghost had killed a little girl. The vengeful spirit would probably try to kill other people, and the Winchesters had to stop it. A simple salt and burn, hopefully. Sam briefly wonders if the blood of a ghost possessed person would have a similar affect as the demon blood, but it most likely wouldn't, so Sam dismisses the thought and puts his hands idly in his lap.
The radio switches songs. Elton John is on. And I'm gonna be a high as a kite by then. I miss the Earth, I miss my wife, It's lonely out in space. And I think it's gonna be a long long time till touchdown brings 'round to find, I'm a rocket man.
Sam feels lonely, like he is in space, an alien. No one can understand him. In his mind he whines to nobody, angsty and mad because he can't get what he wants and because Dean doesn't know what it's like to be psychic. Dean doesn't get the damn twisting headaches and visions and powers, so how could he understand it? Sam feels so alone because he is neither human nor demon...okay, he is human, but right now he doesn't feel human. He feels like an alien.
It's a little bit funny, this feeling inside. I'm not one of those who can easily hide. The radio blares another Elton John song. Sam can usually hide, though, but somehow Dean always finds out anyways.
Sam decides to play with his power. It's fun, and why not have a little fun when he still had remnants of left-over power. He glares out the window of the shot-gun seat and tries to make a car in the other lane drive faster. He uses his mind to pull at the back truck and make it go faster. He focuses so much that his head starts to strum and ache, and then the black truck is driving faster. Sam grins, he did it! He is excited. He still has it! Using his gifts helps him to be distracted the fact that the horrors of detoxing will be slamming into him soon. It already was, damnit, but it would get much worse. It would last for weeks if Sam couldn't find a way to sneak in some more demon blood. He was determined that he would find some, and just drink a little bit, every few days. He told himself that he could handle it, and that he wasn't addicted, and that he could give into just a little bit. He could stop and detox whenever he wanted to. Right now he didn't want to.
Sam thinks of Castiel, and a stubborn part of him doesn't want Castiel to use his angel powers to just zap him clean. A part of Sam wants to hold onto this, to keep the power, the high of the demon blood, et cetera. He knows that he should wish for it to all ust be zapped away, but he wants it all, the high, the coming down, the pain, the power.
A secret voice deep buried inside Sam's subconscious whispers; you can have the power without the demon blood. But it is way too buried in Sam's mind for Sam to really hear it, though he gets a tingly sense. A sense of calmness, which Sam assumes is just a leftover wave of the high. For a moment Sam feels peace. Mind, consciousness, bliss. Everything would be okay, it had to be. Existence, consciousness, bliss.
There was an old saying, If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you. Joseph Campbell had said it.
Power itself, isn't evil. Using power for evil is evil. But Sam is trembling, remembering the voicemail of Dean calling him a vampire before Sam had downed two demons and went and killed Lilith with his mind. He started the apocalypse. If that isn't evil, he tells himself, what is? He negatively talks to himself, thinking that he is a monster, an abomination, someone that his own father had warned his own brother that he might have to kill Sammy someday. If he couldn't be saved, and a secret part of Sam feels way beyond saving.
The hours in the car draws on and on, feeling like days instead of almost two hours. Soon Dean pulls up in a small town and they get out of the car. They get some food at a local cafe and do some research before heading to the little girl's, who, ironically was named Cassandra, parents. Sam walks shakily but no one notices that he is shaking. They knock on the door and the mother, an elderly lady with white hair and bright green eyes, opens the door.
"We're agent Smith and agent Campbell from the FBI," Dean says smoothly. "We have a few questions for you about your daughter Cassandra's passing."
The old woman lets Sam and Dean inside and leads them to sit down on a faded green couch.
"Do you boys want anything to drink? Water, coffee, orange juice?" She asks, smiling with a wistfull expression on her face. There was kindness in her aura; Sam could see her aura, it was a glowy white color emanating around her body. Sam forces himself to smile as he sinks into the couch.
Sam wants to say, "Sure, some demon blood please!" but of course he doesn't say it. He thinks that more coffee would just make his already intense headache worse, so he decides on the orange juice.
"Orange juice would be nice, sure," Sam says, and Dean says that coffee and water would be just fine.
Dean does all the questioning as Sam sips the orange juice while trying not to spiral out of control. The elderly woman, who has now told the two hunters that her name is Elissa, is talking about her daughter Cassandra's cat, who had died three months ago. Cassandra had been very depressed after her cat died and had supposedly spiraled into darkness and committed suicide. Elissa's aura is pulsing violently and it is making Sam's headache worse. He is bombarded with both Elissa's bright aura and with psychic senses about the old woman's emotional state. Right now, Sam is feeling Elissa's emotions and the pain in her bones.
Sam realizes that this psychic information could help them with the case, and he nudges Dean a bit too harshly.
"Do you think it's the cat's ghost?" Sam asks Dean when they left the nice lady's house. He tells Dean the psychic, empathic senses he got off of Elissa and Dean swears.
"Damnit Sam, not your psychic shit now!" Dean says.
"But maybe the psychic information could help," Sam says, shrugging sheepishly.
"Fine, Sam. What did you see?" Dean asked, begrudgingly realizing that it might help them find out what ghost killed Cassandra and where its bones are.
"Well, it could have been the cat, and I sensed the lady was overwhelmingly sad, and she had a bright white aura, so bright that it made my head hurt more than it already was hurting," Sam says curtly.
"Of course, she's sad, Sam. Her daughter died," Dean says, and laughs a little. Joking was a part of his personality.
Just in case, they find where the cat was buried, and they salt and burn its bones. Then they do more research to see if there were any other strange deaths in the town or in nearby towns.
Sam is itching to get demon blood. The detoxing is getting worse, and he is starting to tire of being able to appear in a normal mind state on the surface. His control is collapsing.
"Dean, it's getting worse. I'm starting to see things," Sam admits. "And my head hurts so damn much and I can't stop trembling."
Dean hands him his flask of alcohol and suggests drinking some.
"You know alcohol won't help at all, Dean, very funny," Sam says angrily. "And you know that quitting cold turkey almost killed me last time. Please, you know what I need. Just a little, help me find some, please. Besides I know you like killing demons."
"Not yet, Sam," Dean said. Dean realizes that it might be worse this time and that he doesn't want his brother to die. If Sam needs a little bit of demon blood, he would get him the damn demon blood. But not yet. Let him sit in his misery for a while so he learns not to give into temptation next time he wants to give in. Let the boy learn his lesson. "Hold out for a little bit longer. If it gets worse, I might be willing to get you some. I know going cold turkey was hard for you. It obviously didn't work because you're back on the shit."
Sam suddenly feels so relieved, like a weight was lifted from him. His bones still ache, but he realizes his brother doesn't hate him, maybe Dean would let him have some of the demon blood. Just a little bit, to help take the edge off the detoxing. It isn't like Dean, but Sam shrugs. You can't look a gift horse in its mouth.
"When?" Sam asks, his voice sad and aching.
"Not yet," Dean says. "Hold on a little bit longer, okay?"
"Fine. I need to lay down then. I don't want to have a freaking seizure in public, Dean," Sam says.
"That would be a funny sight," Dean says.
"Shut up!" Sam says. "This is so not the time to be joking." He taps his feet and ironically starts seizing a little bit. His head is yanked to the side and his body almost falls off the chair. Dean decides not to laugh at his little brother's pain.
"Okay, fine, let's find another motel and you can lay down. We could always call Crowly and get a little bit of the stuff from him for you. Just a few drops, okay? I don't want the seizures to kill you," Dean says.
Crowly was the king of hell, so of course his blood would be more potent. Sam starts to get excited.
"Stop looking excited, damnit!" Dean says. "Just a few drops. And then you can lay down and ride out the pain."
They leave the cafe and find a motel. Dean does call Crowly and Sam is actually surprised that his brother gave in and is dealing with his addiction differently than he has in the past. Crowly agrees to give the boys a vial of his blood and Crowly drops it off at the motel. Dean goes down to the front desk and gets it while Sam sits up in bed waiting impatiently.
When Dean brings up the vial of demon blood, he lectures Sam that he is only allowed to drink half of it. He would get the other half in five hours.
Sam looks at it and frowns. "But that isn't anywhere near enough!" Sam protests.
"You're lucky I'm letting you have any," Dean says, and hands Sam the vial. Sam is tempted to drink the whole thing against his brother's advisement, but it is his only supply, and he will need it again later. He downs half the vial and throws the half-filled vial to Dean.
"You feel any better?" Dean asks.
It was barely any blood, but it was better than nothing, and power surges inside of Sam's body.
"My head still hurts, but I can feel the power," Sam admits. "It really wasn't enough, though," he said sadly, hating seeming so much like an out-of-control addict.
Dean locks the other half of the blood in a safe that Sam doesn't have the key to. Sam sighs as he sees Dean lock the blood away.
Dean pours himself a glass of alcohol and asks Sam if he wants any but Sam shrugs and says he is fine.
It was a very small amount of blood, but it was also the blood of the king of hell and it was more potent than Sam orginally thought it was. He starts feeling much better and allows himself to be happy even though there is only one dose left and once Sam is clean Dean won't let him have any more. But Sam likes the stuff, and realizes it isn't just his body that is addicted to the stuff. His mind - and maybe his soul - is very addicted to it too.
"Your loss," Dean says, but Sam is feeling the bliss of the high of the demon blood, so he leans back against the cushy pillows on the motel bed and starts meditating. He focuses on his breath and does some visualizations. It feels good and his pain washes away and all that is left is the buzz of the psychic high. He lets himself feel good, even though he knows it is not permanent. Nothing is, though, and Sam lets the bliss and consciousness be enough for now. For now.
He drifts off to sleep and has nightmares and one lucid dream and screams a few times. For now, though, even the nightmares are okay. He drifts off while his brother sits by his side watching over his beautiful little brother.
To be continued...
