Dean awoke to the soft clicking of keys. He groaned as he tried to sit up. The stiffness in his body however gave him the finger and he slumped back down. He did a silent inventory of his body. Headache, but thankfully it was bearable now, bruised ribs and his back hurt like a bitch. He vaguely remembered Sam telling him about splinters or something.
"Hey Sleeping Beauty." Sam greeted his older brother when the man was finally able to sit up and lean lightly against the beds headboard, "How you feeling?" he asked stopping his typing.
"What time is it?" Dean asked groggily while rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. Damn, his whole body hurt.
"Eleven thirty." Sam answered glancing at the small clock on his laptop. He had been up for the last three hours or so.
The youngest Winchester has been having frequent nightmares about when he had found Dean on the bathroom floor of that dingy motel room, one wrist bleeding freely and about to cut the other one a few months back. He kept waking drenched in a cold sweat, having to check his brother, make sure he was still there and alive next to him. In his worst nightmares he hadn't made it to Dean in time and had found his brother cold, covered in his own blood and dead. He figured it was just his subconscious working on what could have actually happened if he hadn't found his brother in time. His nightmares about Dean had replaced his nightmares about Jessica.
"Been up long?" Dean inquired as he got stiffly to his feet and shuffled into the bathroom to take a leak.
"Not long, a round an hour. Just been doing some research." He said hoping Dean wouldn't call him on the lie about his sleeping habits.
"Find anything?" Dean called from the bathroom.
"Yeah. A new family, the Pryor's, just bought the house. A father with his wife and two daughters. The new owner is rich and saw the old place as a perfect property, for renovations. Guess you were right about that whole latest craze thing." He paused and chuckled dryly as Dean stiffly made his way back to his bed, "It was supposed to be his new holiday house for when he wasn't in the court rooms. Apparently Mr Pryor is a notorious judge from New York who's starting to think about retirement. They started working on it a few days ago. The day before the murders." Sam finished.
"You find anything about the house?" Dean asked while trying to stretch his arms out in front of him while not aggravating his back and ribs. It was proving to be quite a task.
"Yeah that I did have some luck with that. It was built in the early 1900's by one Donald Rhodes. He owned and lived there with his family until about thirty years ago when the whole family just upped and went missing. No bodies, nadda. I found a few old rumors in some old newspapers from around that time. According to most people Donald and his wife were happily married. However I found whispers that he was abusing their daughter. I'm thinking maybe wife found out, went a lil crazy. I'm pretty sure we can rule out any demons at this point."
Dean looked pensive for awhile before he finally opened his mouth to speak, "Okay well if that's true the remains are probably still in the house somewhere. Makes sense, they start the renovations and wake up the spirits. We go in, find 'em, salt 'em and burn 'em. Simple."
"I don't know Dean. That spirit was pretty strong. I mean it gave us a run for our money, not to mention in the day time. I think we should be extra careful with this one."
"Still leaves the question of how it's freezing people and why. It's not like we're dealing with Frosty the Snowman here, there's gotta be something else."
"Dean, Frosty the Snowman?"
A small sly grin crept onto Dean's face, "Yeah that guy's just creepy. He's to happy to not be demonic or something."
Sam laughed. Leave it to Dean to be more afraid of a Christmas icon that a bad ass ghost, "Dude how's your back?" Sam asked suddenly, concern on his face when he saw Dean wince as the older man tried to lean back more against the headboard.
"It's fine." He said but it was clear to both of them that he was lying. Dean mentally pushed the pain down, got up and resisted the urge to wince when the movement pulled on his tight muscles. Nothing a few good stretches wouldn't fix. Besides, he'd been hunting when he was injured worse before. His father's voice floated through his mind telling to 'suck it up' and because Dean could rarely refuse his Dad's orders, that's what he did.
Dean went over to the wall, put his hands against it and made one leg back straight and the other bent at the knee and pushed, successfully causing more pain but loosening the muscles all the same. He switched legs and did the same thing again before he stretched his arms as best as he could without hurting his ribs or back any more.
Sam watched his brother stretch for around fifteen minutes before he finally spoke up, "Dean we can put this off until you're back on your feet a bit more. No use going in there if you're not in top form." He said hoping for once his brother would not be so stubborn.
"Nah I'm good." Dean said and made a show of grabbing his leather jacket and putting it on without wincing, "You coming or not?" he asked, pausing with his hand on the door knob.
"Dean are you sure-" Sam started but Dean cut him off.
"Sam I'm fine. I've hunted when I've been hurt worse before, this is no big deal. Now get your fat ass moving." Dean said and walked out the door.
Sam turned red in the face, closed the lap top and stood up to get his jacket. He took a quick glance in the mirror on his way out, "My ass is not fat Dean!" he called out indignantly before he followed his brother out.
Hey guys! Sorry this chapter was so short but to tell the truth I haven't really been up to writing that much since last Thursday. My dog Spike got hit by a car and died :'( I'm so sadbut I hope you'll forgive me for the shortness and long wait on this chapter. Anyway hopefully I will get back into the groove of things for the next chapter. This was just sort of another filler. Thanks to everyone who's sticking with this and thanks to mtuffy, vincesbabe, princesspeanut, SpookyClaire and Icewolfblackheart for the reviews. Next chapter will be up soon, until then please review.
Mishka xXx
