Supernatural and its characters are not mine.

Many thanks to purehalo, Phx, carocali, imbreena, Rachelly, bally2cute, emwonkuod, My heart beats only for you, friendly, charmed1of2, Dreema Azaleia Wingblade and Faye Dartmouth for the kind reviews.

----

Tired and Emotional 2

"You think I did this?"

Dean sighed and pressed the heels of his palms against his eyes. It was four-thirty in the morning, and Sam was doing his best to pace around the wasteland formerly known as Room 12.

"You do, don't you? You seriously think I did this."

Dean leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees and trying to think of something to say that would reassure his brother. The problem was, the only thing that came into his head was this is bad. This is really, really bad. And he was pretty sure that was not going to help the situation.

"No way," Sam was muttering. "No way did I do this. I couldn't have done this."

"Look, Sammy-" Dean started, and Sam whirled on him, eyes flashing.

"It's Sam. Jesus, Dean, how many freakin times do I have to tell you that?"

"Dude, chill," Dean said. "It's not that big of a deal."

Sam was looking more and more furious. "Not a big deal?" he yelled, and a lamp that Dean had righted fell off the night table and crashed to the floor. "You could have been killed!"

Dean jumped to his feet, grabbing his brother's shoulders. "I mean it, man. You've got to calm down. Unless you want the furniture to go postal on us again."

Sam eyes flicked nervously round the room and returned to Dean's. He clenched his jaw. Dean nodded, satisfied. "OK, breathe slow. Why don't you sit down."

They sat side by side on the bed, and Dean listened as Sam slowly got his breathing under control. Listening to his deep breaths was oddly hypnotic, and Dean was more than happy to concentrate on that and not think about the fears that prowled through his brain. After a long silence, Sam let out a shuddering sigh.

"Dean?"

"Yeah?" Dean turned to look at his brother, but Sam looked away.

"You really could have been killed, you know. I... I could have killed you."

Dean put his arm round Sam's shoulders. "It's not your fault."

Sam closed his eyes for a moment, and then flicked a glance over at the many tiny cuts that peppered Dean's forearm. "Does that hurt?"

"This?" Dean snorted. "I've gotten in worse fights with five-year-old girls." In truth, the thin, sharp wounds were sore as hell, like glass cuts always were, but there was no way he was letting on.

When the silence stretched too thin, Dean broke it. "I meant what I said, you know," he started. "This really isn't that big of a deal." You were lying then, and you're lying now.

"I have potentially lethal telekinesis that I can't control," Sam said tiredly. "How is that not a big deal."

Dean shrugged. "You'll learn. You've only had this extra value-added shining for two days. Bound to be a few bumps along the way. Plus, I'm sure there's some New Age mumbo-jumbo crap that'll help you out. You know, crystals and meditation or whatever."

Sam shot him a glance, looking about as convinced as Dean was by that argument. "And until then, don't get scared or angry, right?" He didn't say what they were both thinking: and don't go to sleep.

Dean shifted slightly. "Right. Think happy thoughts. I'll even let you sing along to Metallica."

Sam sighed, running his hand through his hair. "You're really not freaked out by this?"

Dean remembered the first time Sam had asked him that question, or one very similar. His answer now was not going to be any more honest than it had been then. "No way," he said, going for nonchalant though it came out more like constipated. "The only thing I'm freaked by is this mess, and the fact that we'd better get the hell out of Dodge before someone wants us to pay for it. Get your stuff."

He watched as Sam moved about the room, picking up his scattered possessions and shoving them into his bag. His brother looked the same; tired and worried, but still Sam. But somewhere in him was something different, something Dean couldn't understand, couldn't help him with, something dangerous that Sam had to go through on his own. Hell, yeah, he was freaked out. And, after a respite of only a few days, Dean felt a sense of helplessness descend on him once again like a curse.

----

They skipped town before dawn, and made sure they were several hours from Madison Falls before they stopped for coffee. Neither of them had said much on the journey, Dean gripping the steering wheel tighter than he needed to and feeling his thoughts circling endlessly around the image of suspended motel-room furniture, Sam staring at the road, his eyes open wide as if that could keep sleep away. Dean had put the stereo on, but Sam hadn't hummed.

As soon as Sam had disappeared through the door of the gas station, Dean was on the phone. It was answered on the first ring, and before he could speak, a woman's voice said "Dean, honey, I've been waiting for you to call."

Dean didn't bother to ask how she knew it was him. "Then you know what's happened?"

He could almost hear Missouri shaking her head. "No, sweetheart, just that something's wrong. You tell me what it is, now."

Dean covered the salient points as quickly as he could, and afterwards Missouri's voice was gentle and comforting.

"I'd been hoping Sam's full powers would come out gradually, but I guess someone had a different plan for him. Well, honey, you bring him on over to me and I'll see what I can do."

Dean felt relief wash through him. "Then you can help him?"

"No promises, Dean. But your brother has a strong will, I think he can learn to deal with this."

Dean saw Sam step out of the gas station. "OK, I've gotta go. We'll be there as soon as we can." He shut the phone and pocketed it, wondering if his brother had seen. Not that it was a secret, and he was going to have to tell him about it in a minute anyway. So why did it make him so nervous?

"Hey, man," Sam said, handing him his coffee as he clambered out of the car. "You look like crap. What's wrong?"

Dean occupied himself with the cup, not catching Sam's eye. Come on, Dean, this is ridiculous. You're only trying to help him. He was trying to think of a snappy comeback, something to distract Sam, when the left rear tail-light of the next car over exploded.

Dean was instantly focussed, and what he focussed on made his stomach lurch. Sam was staring at him without seeming to see him, mouth slightly open, a zoned expression on his face like he had fallen asleep on his feet. "Sam," Dean said, snapping his fingers in front of Sam's face. "Wake up."

Sam made no response, only swaying slightly on his feet. Dean grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him, and the other tail-light of the car blew outwards in a shower of plastic. And Dean was suddenly very aware of where he was, because OK, a motel room was full of heavy furniture, which was pretty dangerous, but this was a gas station, and that meant there were cars (his car) and, more importantly, there were freakin gas pumps, and God knew what Sam could do to those with his mind. So he did the only thing he could think of: he hauled off and punched his brother in the face.

"Jesus," Sam exclaimed, staggering backwards and covering his nose with both hands, his coffee cup flying across the forecourt. "God, Dean, what the hell was that for?"

Dean shook his hand, flexing the knuckles. "Sorry, man," he offered. "Couldn't be helped."

"Fuck, I think you broke my nose," Sam said, sounding like he had a heavy cold.

"I think you broke my hand," Dean countered, knowing he hadn't hit Sam with that much force. "When did your face get so damn hard?"

Sam glared at him and removed his hands from his nose, wiping at the blood that streamed over his upper lip. Dean felt a pang of guilt: maybe he had hit Sammy harder than he'd intended. He had other things to worry about now though. "Since when do you fall asleep with your eyes open, Sam?"

Sam looked disgusted. "I was having a vision, genius."

"Oh." Dean frowned in surprise. "But you didn't have a headache."

Sam looked surprised too, like he hadn't even thought of that. "No," he admitted. After a moment, he added, "I guess that's a good thing, right? Something good that's come out of this."

Dean waited before he answered, because he wasn't sure if it was a good thing or not, but he did know that it cranked the nervous feeling in the pit of his stomach up a notch. No reason Sam had to know that, though. "Yeah, it's good, whatever." He turned, reaching for the door of the Impala. "Time to get moving."

"Don't you even want to know where we're going?" Sam asked behind him, and Dean knew that the moment had come.

"We're going to Lawrence," he said, without looking back.

"Lawrence?" Dean could hear the confusion in Sam's voice, and knew that there was a danger it might turn into something else. He was going to have to face up to this if he wanted to avoid the whole gas station going sky-high. He took a breath and turned.

"I called Missouri," he said. "She said she could help you."

Sam stared at him, open-mouthed, but there was no anger in his face, only astonishment. "But Dean, my vision..."

"It can wait." That was the least of their worries right now.

"No, no it can't. People could die."

"Yeah, Sam, and your head could explode." Or worse, this damn gas station.

Sam shook his head stubbornly, and Dean knew that look, knew that there was a good chance he might not win this fight. "I can control it for a couple of days. Come on, Dean, you know I only have visions when they're connected to us, to the demon. This could be really important, and you think we should be off learning meditation techniques?"

Dean thought about it. Sam's new abilities were definitely dangerous, and something needed to be done, fast. On the other hand, Sam was right: if he had had a vision, it must have something to do with what they'd been chasing for twenty-three years. And if they left it long enough for Sam to take a self-help course in psychic damage control, God knew what could happen. He sighed. "Where is it?"

Sam didn't need to ask what he meant. "Drayton, near Cleveland."

Dean gaped. "But that's six hundred miles away." Six hundred miles in the wrong direction.

Sam shrugged, swiping at the blood that was still trickling out of his nose. "Drive fast."

As they got in the car, Dean wanted to ask Sam how he knew where his vision had taken place. But he didn't, because he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer.

----

Dean watched as Sam's eyelids drooped and then closed. With a sigh, he reached over to gently shake his brother by the shoulder. Sam's eyes shot open immediately, and he shook his head like a dog. "Sorry," he muttered.

Dean turned his eyes back to the road. "You need another coffee? There's a gas station in fifteen."

Sam shook his head again, tiredly this time. "I'm OK."

Dean nodded, but mentally made a note to stop at the gas station anyway. He had thought about just letting Sam fall asleep—after all, he could wake him if it seemed like he was having a nightmare—but the car was doing sixty with a half-full tank of gas, and Dean didn't want to think about what whatever it was that lurked in Sam's brain could do if it was let loose on that. It was only another hour to Drayton, and they had done OK so far.

But so far was fourteen hours of driving on three hours of sleep, and Dean had to admit that he wasn't feeling particularly alert himself right then.

"Do you know what to look for when we get there, Sam?" he asked, more to keep them both on the case than out of any sense of curiosity. Sam had already told him his vision three times—a werewolf and a little girl. That's all—and all Dean was really interested in looking for was a cheap motel where the mattresses weren't too lumpy and the furniture didn't move by itself.

"I'll know it when I see it."

And Dean glanced over at Sam and felt a weird creeping feeling at the look of stony determination on his younger brother's face. He was so sure of what he had to do. That confidence was just another thing that Sam had that Dean couldn't understand.

----

They pulled into Drayton shortly before dusk on the night before the full moon, and by then Dean had come up with a plan for how they could sleep. They would take it in shifts: Sam would sleep for an hour while Dean watched in case of nightmares, and Dean would sleep for an hour while Sam did whatever it was that Sam did when he wasn't supposed to be sleeping. It sounded like a good plan, like it would work, but all the same Dean collected everything small enough to carry from the motel room before they started and locked it all in the trunk of his car, along with all their weapons. It felt weird, not even having a knife to protect himself with, like he was naked, but in the end they were safer without them.

The plan worked great until it was Dean's turn to sleep, and he sank down into an exhausted, dreamless darkness at eleven and woke up at four in the morning with his hand groping at empty space under his pillow to find the room pitch black.

He sat up sharply. "Sam?"

"Yeah," came Sam's voice from the corner of the room. As Dean's eyes adjusted to the darkness, he realised he could just make out the outline of his brother's head against the faint light that filtered in through the blinds. It seemed to be bowed, concentrating on something.

"What are you doing?"

"Reading," Sam said. "Listen, man, I'm sorry I didn't wake you. I just didn't feel too sleepy."

"Reading?"

"Yeah, reading," Sam said, his voice sounding surprised, though of course Dean couldn't see his expression because it's really freakin dark.

"In the dark?"

Sam's silhouette shifted slightly. "It's not that dark. Are you OK? You're not mad at me for not waking you..."

"Never mind that now," Dean said, shooting upright. He flipped on the lights, and there, sure enough, was Sam with a book on his lap, blinking slightly at the sudden illumination. "What do you mean you're reading?"

Dean snatched up the book, glaring at it, and Sam stared at him in astonishment. "Christ, Dean, what's your problem?"

Dean ignored him. The book seemed perfectly ordinary, with normal sized type in ink that didn't appear to glow in the dark. He flipped forward a few pages from where Sam had got to, feeling the knot of nervousness jangling again in his stomach and disturbing thoughts surfacing in his mind, scanned a passage, then flipped the lights off again.

"Read this," he commanded, turning the book in Sam's direction.

"What is this, a test?" Sam groused. "I know you're not a morning person, Dean, but this is ridiculous."

"Just read it," Dean said, in a tone that brooked no argument.

Sam sighed. "'They were about to withdraw for a while into the charitable shade of a tree in the fence when Coggan saw a figure in a blue coat and brass buttons running to them across a field,'" he intoned in a sarcastic monotone. "Should I go on?"

Dean swallowed. Either Sam had memorised the damn book, which was unlikely because it was pretty long and looked damn boring, or...

"You're reading in the dark."

"Dean, seriously. It's not that dark."

"No, Sam, it is. It's dark."

There was a long pause, during which Dean considered switching the light back on but couldn't quite bear the thought of seeing the expression on his brother's face, and then Sam said, "Oh."

"Yeah."

Another pause. Dean found himself sinking down to sit on the edge of the bed, still clutching the damn book. What is going on with you Sammy?

After an age, Sam shifted in the darkness, and said, "Do you think this is because of what happened in Fremont?"

"What else could it be?"

Sam took a breath. "Do you think it's going to happen to my other senses as well?"

Dean remembered three days of Sam's enthusiasm over food and drink that had seemed to Dean bland at best. Even today, with all the strain of... everything, Sam had drunk his coffee like it was ten-year-old single malt. "I think it already is," he said quietly.

"Oh," said Sam again.

That was really all there was to say.

----

In the light of day, as they went about their research, things didn't seem so bad. Sam was quiet and withdrawn, but that wasn't an unusual state of affairs. Nothing had been thrown at Dean's head for over twenty-four hours, which he considered a definite improvement, and to be honest, what was so bad about being able to see in the dark and enjoying the shitty diet of fast food that their lifestyle required? OK, maybe it meant an early death from cholesterol, but it would be a lot less early than most of the deaths that Dean had ever envisaged for himself. In any case, sharpened senses were a lot less weird than the powers that Sam had been demonstrating recently. Still, despite all the reassurances he listed to himself, the ugly feeling in his stomach didn't go away.

The werewolf would strike in a thicket at the edge of town, Sam had declared after they had driven around for a while to see if anything looked familiar. It was pretty much the easiest research Dean had ever had to do, and he reminded himself again that Sam's new abilities could be an invaluable tool in the hunt. But after they had chased the girl away and the werewolf, alerted to their presence by their shouted warning, had raced off among the trees, Dean was not quite so pleased to hear his brother sniff the air and say it went this way.

"Dude," he said. "You can smell that damn thing?"

Sam shrugged. "It reeks," he said.

"That's just gross."

Sam's face was unreadable in the moonlight. "Yeah. It really is."

The hunt was over fast, the werewolf not standing a chance against the combination of preternatural tracking powers and silver bullets. And in the car, shortly after they had pulled away from the motel on their way to Lawrence, Dean put into words the question that had been bugging him the whole time.

"What about the demon?"

"What?" Sam asked, but his innocence was unconvincing. Dean knew he had been asking himself the same thing.

"The demon, Sam. You only have visions when it has something to do with the demon. Not some two-bit werewolf."

Sam shrugged, looking away, out of the window at the verge rolling away beside them. "I guess it's different now."

"So, what, you're just going to have visions of every Tom, Dick and Spooky? That sounds kind of excessive."

"Two-bit or not, we saved that girl's life."

There was no arguing with that. But all the same, Dean felt flat. He had agreed to wait before going to Lawrence only because he had thought the demon might be involved. Now it seemed like nothing was certain any more.

They were only forty miles closer to Lawrence when Dean heard Sam make a weird noise in his throat, and looked over to see his brother's eyes glazed and staring at nothing. Cursing, Dean pulled the car over sharply onto the side of the road. At least that was one danger mitigated. He wondered if he should pull Sam out of the car in case it exploded, but before he had time to put the thought into action, Sam blinked and Dean knew it was over. Except it wasn't, because twin trails of blood leaked out of Sam's nose onto his upper lip, and Dean suddenly knew that he hadn't hit Sam that hard the day before, it had been nothing but a tap, really, and if he hadn't done it in the first place then he might have realised sooner that something was wrong.

Sam put his fingers up to his nose, pulled them away, inspected them. "Dude, did you hit me again?"

Dean shook his head, not trusting his voice.

"Huh," said Sam.

Dean waited until he felt the twisting in his stomach subside a little, and cleared his throat, starting the engine again. "Sam, we need to do something about this."

"I know," Sam said. "I think it was a rawhead, in Fredericksville, Kentucky."

"That's not what I meant," Dean said. "I mean we have to do something about this." He gestured vaguely in the direction of Sam's nose, and the tissue he was currently using to try and staunch it.

"Oh." A pause. "What for?"

Dean almost drove off the road. "What for? Sam, you're turning into freakin superman, except even he couldn't chop vegetables from the other side of the room. This is just totally off."

"Yeah, but," Sam said, leaning his head back and pressing his tissue to his nose, "nothing that's happened so far has been really bad, has it? I mean, I know I need to get the telekinesis under control, but I've been doing OK at that, and everything else is just an extra advantage, right?"

"You're bleeding, college boy. You don't consider that bad?"

"Yeah, OK, but it doesn't hurt. People get nosebleeds all the time, it's nothing to worry about."

"People get nosebleeds from doing too much coke, Sam, not from seeing the future. Are you seriously trying to tell me you think this is normal?"

"Wasn't it you who was just telling me the other day how very normal I wasn't?" Sam asked, and then yelped and turned in his seat. "Hey! You missed our turn!"

"No I didn't," Dean said, glaring straight ahead at the road.

"Yeah, you totally did, man. Kentucky's that way."

"We're not going to Kentucky. We're going to Lawrence."

Sam stilled. "I don't need to go to Lawrence, Dean. I need to go to Fredericksville. People are in danger."

Dean didn't answer. Don't give me that line again, Sammy. I know people are in danger. You're in danger.

"Dean," said Sam again, his voice calm and soft as if he was trying to comfort a crying child. "I can handle this by myself. I haven't moved anything by accident since the gas station. I don't need Missouri's help just yet. We can go to Lawrence after Fredericksville."

Oh yeah? And when were you planning on sleeping, buddy boy?

Sam shifted in his seat. "Dean, are you even listening to me?"

Dean didn't take his eyes off the road. "We're going to Lawrence," he said.

Suddenly, the wheel spun in his hands and the car executed a sharp U-turn on the two-lane highway. Dean sucked in his breath, trying to grab the wheel, but the force that was controlling it was too strong. "Sammy," he yelled. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Sam was staring forward, his jaw clenched. "What does it look like I'm doing?"

Dean felt the tangle of jangling nerves in his stomach reach up through his throat, trying to choke him. A thought flashed suddenly through his mind. "Christo," he said.

Sam laughed. "I want to save people's lives instead of going after some New Age mumbo-jumbo crap, as you put it, and you think I'm possessed? That's really flattering, Dean."

"Sam, if you don't turn this car round right now I'm going to kick your ass, I swear."

Sam flashed a look at him, and the doubts that Dean had had about who was controlling his little brother fell away. The look was stony, determined and at the same time miserable and apologetic. It was a look that was all Sam. "Try me," he said.

And Dean did try, but something held him back, some force gently but firmly pushed him back in his seat, until he could do nothing but watch the wheel turn on its own in front of him. "This is all wrong, Sam," he said.

And Sam didn't say anything, but the look he flashed at his brother said I know.

----

Nightfall found them pulling in to a motel forecourt in Fredericksville. The drive had passed in tense silence after Dean had given up trying to convince his brother to turn round. Lawrence was just as far from them as it had ever been, and felt somehow a whole lot further.

Dean watched as Sam went to the check-in desk. The invisible pressure let up, and he considered his options. He could take the car and go to Lawrence on his own, but that was pretty pointless. He could try and knock Sam out, drug him maybe, but that might cause some problems if Sam had a nightmare. Or he could hope that this job went as quickly as the last one and believe the promise Sam had made that he would go to Lawrence immediately afterwards.

Sam came back to the car. "Room 8," he said quietly, his face pale and miserable.

Dean got out of the car in silence and went to fetch his bags.

Later Dean thought he should have just taken that opportunity to smack Sam round the head and take him away, nightmares be damned, should have just done what he thought was right just as Sam had been doing when he had taken over the wheel. But the truth was, Dean never had felt as sure about right and wrong as Sam, and most of the time that hadn't mattered too much, but now, walking into the dark motel room in the wake of the sweet kid brother who had turned into something else, Dean didn't even know what, he knew suddenly that this time it did matter.

The knowledge came too late, though, as Dean felt the lately all-too-familiar pressure of someone's will forcing him against the wall. It wasn't soft and forgiving like Sam—this will didn't care who got hurt for it to get what it wanted. He heard Sam gasp in the darkness somewhere in front of him, and then the lights flicked on and there was a man there, in the middle of the room, a perfectly ordinary-looking man with a beer-gut and thinning hair, except that his eyes were an unpleasantly familiar shade of orange and an unnatural smile tugged at the corners of his lips.

"Well hello there, gentlemen," he said.