CHAPTER
TEN
Nothing
Brings Me Down
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Sam knew something was wrong when he woke up and realised he was on the floor. It all came back to him quickly after that. He sat up, grimacing at the pain Dean's sucker punch had caused, but it was nothing compared to the pain of what his brother had done. Sam got up and went to the window, but suspected Dean was already long gone. True enough, the Impala was no longer in the car park.
Sam's reached for his phone, fury flowing through his veins. He dialled Dean's number and hoped his brother had neglected to turn it off. After a few rings, it was answered.
"You selfish asshole," Sam spat, before Dean could say anything.
"Hey Sam," came the succinct reply.
"'Hey Sam'!" Sam repeated incredulously. "That's all you have to say!"
"How's your head?" Dean asked, his voice unreadable over the phone.
"Pounding," Sam replied irately. "Where are you?"All he wanted to do was rage and scream, but for fear of losing his coherency, he toned it down and settled for clenching his fist so hard his knuckles turned white.
"I left some aspirin on the side."
"Where are you?" Sam repeated, slower and with a hint of warning. He was in no mood to be ignored.
"Can't tell you that, Sammy."
Sam lost it. At that moment all he wanted to do was punch something, even it was Dean, to knock some sense into him. "Damn it, Dean, tell me where you are!"
There was a long pause.
"I gotta go. Goodbye Sam."
The finality in his voice sent a chill down Sam's spine.
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Dean switched off his cell and dropped it on the passenger seat. Truth be told, he had forgotten to turn it off in the aftermath of the Braken's second attack. He should have anticipated Sam's call, but instead it caught him off guard. He had barely kept it together, every word threatened to be the last before his voice cracked and he broke down.
Leaving Sam like that hurt more than Dean imagined, even knowing it was with the best intentions. He wondered if this was what Sam had felt when he left for college, or what their father felt when he took off. If he felt anything at all, Dean thought darkly. The rush of unnatural hatred passed swiftly when he realised that he was starting to experience other effects of the demon's attacks. The brief loss of control scared him, but at the same time served to prove that he made the right decision to leave Sam. He was as dangerous to be around as the Braken.
Dean had been driving solidly since leaving the motel and soon the darkness was gently washed away by the sickly glow of the approaching city. People went missing all the time in cities. It seemed all too appropriate that Dean should lose himself in one.
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Sam almost threw his phone across the room in anger, but held onto it to dial Dean's number again. The attempt failed; Dean had switched off his cell. Sam kicked the bag near to his feet. He furrowed his brow when he realised what was inside. The bag contained all the weapons from the back of the Impala, along with his father's journal. Sam couldn't believe this was happening. Dean had given up. All he knew was hunting, and here were the symbols of his life, lying in bag by Sam's feet, discarded.
For a moment Sam was at a loss. How was he supposed to find his brother now? Everything had gotten so out of hand, and Sam felt the familiar pang of guilt when it occurred to him that maybe if he'd handled things differently, it would have been better. Sam had his part to play in Dean's actions. Leaving to go to college must have done his brother more damage than he'd thought; certainly more damage than Dean let on. Leaving again in Burkitsville had severed the trust that Dean had put back in Sam.
Sam stopped himself from analysing the past. There was no time. Dean was in trouble and Sam needed to find him. But he couldn't do it alone. He looked at the cell phone in his hand and kicked himself for not thinking of it sooner. He dialled John's number.
Sam listened to the ringing tone and still felt a twinge of anger when there was no answer, just the same voicemail message he must have heard a hundred times. Sam didn't know what else he had expected. Maybe that John would somehow instinctively known that Dean was in trouble and pick up the phone. Given Sam's recent 'developments' in wasn't entirely laughable. Sam wondered briefly what John would have to say about that particular matter, if he ever got around to telling him.
The tone sounded and Sam took a deep breath, realising he really didn't know where to begin. "Dad. It's Sam...I know you don't want us looking for you, and this isn't about that," he started, suddenly remembering their last 'conversation' on the phone. "Dean's in trouble. Serious trouble. I think it's the Braken demon you and him dealt with two years ago. It marked him, and it's attacked him at least once. He's taken off. I don't know where he went, but I'm afraid he's gonna…"
Sam ran his hands through his hair and sighed again. "He didn't even take the weapons with him. I think he's given up. I need your help, dad. Please call me back."
Sam hung up sat for a while before starting to gather his things together. He would have to steal a car and guess where Dean was headed. He was about to take some aspirin when his cell rang. Sam took it from his pocket and stared at it for a moment before answering with cautious hope.
"Hello?"
"Sam."
"Dad?" He had to ask to be sure, even though that voice was unmistakable.
"It's me, Sammy," came the reply. "Where are you?"
"In a motel just outside Penn's Creek," Sam told him, unable to believe the conversation was actually taking place.
"Tell me everything," John ordered. "I'm on my way."
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Dean found a multi-storey car park to leave the Impala in. He had sat in it for a while when he realised it might be the last time he would see it. He could have stolen a car himself and left Sammy the Impala, but he hadn't been thinking straight when he'd left the motel. Maybe Sam would find it later. After...
Now Dean was stalking the streets. It was late but there were still quite a few people about, getting ready for a night out, or just coming back from one; Dean wasn't sure of the time. He found himself resenting them. They were so blissful in their ignorance. They had no idea of what went on, and they didn't want to know. They denied it all, denied it until it came looking for them. Then it was all cries for help, and never a sorry for doubting. Never a sorry. They didn't deserve help. Why bother saving people who didn't deserve saving?
Dean shook himself out of it. They weren't foreign thoughts, but the passionate loathing with which they came to him this time was worrying. He needed to do something, to numb the empty space in his soul and take away the hate that was slowly filling it. As he turned the corner, he happened upon a solution, albeit a temporary one.
Dean entered the bar and ordered a drink. Alcohol had always helped quell the hurt in the past, so he figured there was no harm in trying it now. The liquor burned as it slid down his throat. The next few went down a little smoother.
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John Winchester had always seen the speed limit as more of a suggestion. When he had listened to Sam's message, it became meaningless. Dean was in trouble, and it wasn't just from the demon. John remembered the case quite clearly, but now he was reliving it, the memories his only company as he sped along the highway.
The Braken was a nasty piece of work and a bitch to research. Very little documentation existed. Most of what John had managed to gather back then was via word of mouth, through his personal sources. It fed upon souls, and had an acquired taste for tortured ones. The more pain the victim was in, the better. John remembered the state Dean had been in before and after the Braken case. It was entirely likely that the demon would focus on him. But something didn't sit right. One source had told John that the Braken couldn't take a soul, that it had to be offered. Surely that information had been incorrect...Dean would never...
John didn't like where these questions were taking him, but they wouldn't stop. Dean had always been good at keeping things inside, and there was no debate as to where he picked up that particular trait, but he had obviously been keeping things to himself about what happened back in Bridgestone. John wasn't entirely sure what the details were yet, but he would get to the bottom of it. He had to. All he had left were his boys, and there was nothing he wouldn't do to protect them. Sometimes they didn't see it that way, and it hurt, but it was the truth.
Leaving Dean hadn't been an easy decision, but he didn't regret it. When John had picked up the trail of the demon that killed Mary, he knew things would get dangerous, too dangerous to risk anything but himself. He knew Dean would look for him, and he knew it would hit him hard. Maybe even as much as Sam leaving hit him, and that had been very, very hard.
John had never seen Dean behave like it before or since. After Sam left, he was a different person. John had watched him helplessly as Dean drank himself to sleep and hunted with fury and hate. And John watched with guilt, because it was his own doing. Dean didn't know how to deal with his pain because there had been no-one to show him how.
Dean had been in a bad way, but was it enough to do something stupid? John didn't want to believe it, and told himself that he shouldn't assume anything until he knew the facts, but it was difficult. His mind kept going back to the case in North Adams, before the Braken. The arguments they had had still rang in John's ears.
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North Adams - May 30th 2003 - 11.52pm
John made his way back from a town meeting in the church hall which he had been spying on. It was definitely looking like the church was the key. Someone, the priest in all likelihood, was brainwashing the townsfolk. With the new intel he had gathered, John headed back to Grave's Inn where he had left Dean. His heart fell when he arrived back to see his eldest son semi-conscious in the corner of the bar, an empty glass in his hand - one of many on the table.
Peter looked at him apologetically from behind the bar when he entered. "I'm sorry, John. We had the new girl behind the bar earlier. Dean was in this state when I got here."
"It's alright," John told him. It wasn't his fault, or the new girl's either. If Dean wanted to drink himself unconscious, he would find a way.
Dean stirred when John approached. "Come on, Dean. Time to go upstairs."
Dean groaned in protest.
"We have work to do tomorrow. I need you sharp so you're going to get some sleep. That's an order," John told his son, aware that his words were probably falling on deaf ears. There was so much he wanted to say, but all that would ever pass his lips seemed to be orders. He couldn't make this right with orders, and he knew it. But still they came…
"An order?" Dean suddenly said, sitting upright. "Well, I guess I better get going then, if it's an order. Anything else you want me to do, sir?"
His words were soaked in bitter sarcasm, but John didn't rise to them. "Just get up, Dean."
"What does it get me?" Dean asked, lazily slurring his words. "Sam followed your orders, what did it get him?"
John sighed sorrowfully. He couldn't speak to Dean when he was like this, but it seemed like the only time Dean would ever really talk. John sat down opposite Dean. "Fine, you don't want to go upstairs? What do you want, Dean? Tell me."
Dean glared at him for a while, a glassy sheen over his eyes. "I want you to call Sam and tell him you're sorry," he finally said. "And I want you to ask him to come back."
"I know you want your brother back," John replied. "But he made his choice."
Dean got angry. "What choice did he have? Stay, or leave and never come back!" he exclaimed. "You dared him to leave, and now you're pissed that you lost."
John wanted to explain himself. He wanted to apologise. He wanted to tell Dean that he could leave too if that was what he wanted, that he wasn't mad at Sam, that he was just one man trying to do what was best and evidently failing miserably at it. But the words wouldn't come, and even if they did, they would be wasted on a son that had to drink to escape his father's failings.
"I didn't make him leave," John said, trying to convince himself more than to Dean. "Sam was the one who walked out the door."
"Yeah," Dean bit back, getting up from the table. "And you're the one who slammed it shut."
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After the Braken case, Dean had changed again. He had stopped drinking, and stopped arguing. John wanted it to be because he had accepted Sam's leaving, but deep down he knew it was because of something more disturbing. It was almost as if Dean had just shut down, closed himself off from everything. It was a convincing mask. John eventually started to believe that Dean was over it, maybe even that he had forgiven him. Now, two years later, it seemed that things were more complicated.
John was sure Sam hadn't been entirely truthful with him on the phone. He'd explained that the Braken hadn't been banished two years ago, and that it held a grudge against Dean for trying to destroy it. But John suspected there was a lot more to it. The banishing ritual should have worked, for starters. Then there was that nagging story that one of John's sources had told him. A soul can't be taken. It has to be offered.
John knew the situation was serious for Sam to call him in the first place, and John wouldn't have called back if he didn't agree. He knew any contact with his boys was dangerous, but it was a case of debating one risk over another. The threat of the demon that killed Mary and its allies was constant, but he had taken care to thrown them off his scent for the time being. For now there were greater concerns.
John looked at the clock on the dashboard. He was still a few hours away from Penn's Creek. Sam had rightly said that he couldn't hang around to start looking for Dean, so he was heading to the nearest city, and John would call him when he got there. It was going to be strange seeing Sam again. Last time they were together hadn't exactly been a pleasant experience. But with the common goal of finding Dean and saving him from himself, there was no room for arguments, and if John had to open the door that he had closed on Sam two years ago, that was what he would do. It was about time anyway.
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End
of Chapter Ten
Next
Chapter: Broken Silence