AN: I hope everyone is enjoying their fall (or spring, for those of you like Shazza who are on the other side of the world). It is very beautiful here, even if it's getting cold a bit quicker than I'd like. If anyone is dealing with Hurricane Ian or loves someone who is, please know I'm thinking about you!

Since this story is progressing so slowly, I'll spare you the cliffies for a while. (Maybe.)

Janice did her usual stellar beta work, including lots of encouragement. Thanks, Janice!

* * *

He clasps the crag with crooked hands;

Close to the sun in lonely lands,

Ring'd with azure, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;

He watches from the mountain walls,

And like a thunderbolt he falls.

– "The Eagle," Alfred, Lord Tennyson

* * *

Dean stared up at the ugly creature diving for him, feeling a little like a mouse spying a hawk. His instinct was to shoot the thing, but he remembered the mothman hunt he'd done with Dad in Indiana while Sam was at Stanford.

"Holy crap," Dean panted, leaning forward with his hands on his knees. His arm was dripping blood, but it wasn't too serious and, besides, he was too high on adrenaline to really feel it yet. "Those suckers are real bastards to kill." He chuckled breathlessly. "Kinda fun though." He and Dad had managed to sneak up on and trap the pair that were using the attic of an abandoned farmhouse as a temporary aerie. They had emptied their guns to no avail and ended up having to fight tooth and nail to finally hack the things to pieces.

"We were lucky they were stupid," Dad grumbled, but Dean could tell he wasn't really angry, just pulling his Hunters-are-serious routine. He was right, though. The creatures could have made it to the window and jumped to safety if they'd really tried, but they refused to give up the fight. "Let's bandage that arm, then we can torch these assholes."

Dean nodded, still grinning. In the heat of a good, hard fight was one of the only times he didn't feel like he was missing an appendage with Sam gone off to school. He and Dad had hunted plenty of times without Sam there, so it didn't feel as weird as it could have.

Dean's smile fell as he took in Dad's stance. "You hurt?" he said, not really a question.

"Damn ricochet grazed me," Dad admitted, sounding put-out and embarrassed. "No big deal." He pulled an ACE bandage out of the small kit they'd brought up with them and started to wrap Dean's arm right over his shirt. They'd take it off later to clean, disinfect, and probably stitch the slashes.

"Where?" Dean asked, having a suspicion that it was a Forrest Gump situation. Dad glared and muttered something about it being none of Dean's business, which confirmed it.

The poorly-placed wound hadn't stopped Dad from climbing into the guano-filled belfry where he'd had his run-in with an overly friendly bat.

The memory, and Dad's disgruntlement at being relegated to lying down in the back seat for the next few days never failed to bring a smile to Dean's face, even when he was wracked with grief over his father's loss.

Never, until now, when he was facing two more of the lapsae. In the split second before the first one reached him, Dean mentally reviewed the things he'd learned from the first fight: bullets bounced off, claws were very sharp, bastards were fast, they couldn't really fly, just glide, and they were bloodthirsty, unwilling to leave a battle.

With all of that in mind, Dean knew he had to fight them with blades and do whatever he could to limit their mobility. He rose to a crouch, knife in hand, and prepared to dive out of the way of the claws at the last second.

Except the monster suddenly veered off almost awkwardly, like an invisible force had pulled it sideways. With a shriek, it floundered. Unable to catch enough air to move upwards, the enraged creature landed on the slope close to the top. Perfect.

Dean moved like lightning, throwing rocks at it from his hiding place. He altered his direction each time and hoped that the monster's location ruined Linda's shot. The lapsae batted away the first two missiles but struggled to keep up with the barrage. It shrieked, more angry than hurt. After his fifth throw, Dean flattened himself below the little shelf that he hoped would protect him again and covered his ears.

He was just in time. As he'd thrown the last rock, he'd also tossed a second, more deadly, item. The grenade that he'd liberated from the trap below had landed perfectly in a little dip in the rock just behind the lapsae. Yeah, maybe it wasn't the most prudent thing in the world to throw a grenade uphill, but "prudent" no longer really applied when Sam was in danger. Or at least, that was Dean's reasoning.

He was pretty sure he heard a scream or two after the vintage weapon exploded even more vigorously than he'd expected, but it was hard to tell over the sound of half the cliff falling down around him. By the time things settled, Dean had to push aside a wall of stones to get out. His ears were ringing slightly but not enough to disorient him.

He stayed low, surveying the much-changed landscape. The top section of the path was basically buried, and one side of the cave opening had collapsed in. Linda and the second lapsae were nowhere to be seen, but there were smoking piles of flesh littering the area that were no doubt the remains of the mothman who'd been at the epicenter of the explosion.

Knife in his right hand, Dean used his left to help him climb the rest of the way as fast as he could. He couldn't exactly afford to dawdle. The shadow of the non-incinerated lapsae passed over him as he climbed, and he had no idea where Linda was, not to mention Chet.

The cave was absolutely massive. You could have fit a nice three-bedroom ranch in the entryway alone, or you could have before a monolithic slab of rock had slid to cover about half of it. Seeing and hearing nothing of Linda, Dean thought it was pretty likely that she'd been in its path.

As he took this in and pulled his gun, the lapsae that was still circling around landed, growling and drooling. It was huge. It regarded Dean, flat nostrils twitching. He backed up slowly, knife held at the ready, getting his back against the wall.

The monster moved as suddenly and rapidly as Dean remembered from the earlier hunt, but stopped short before making contact, snarling. It was staring at him with something that looked like fear or hatred. "Do I stink or something?" he asked, not complaining but seriously wondering why the lapsae wouldn't attack him.

The monster hissed and made another abortive movement forward, then backed off and launched itself back out of the cave mouth, spreading its weird wing flaps and catching the wind to rise quickly beyond Dean's sight. He didn't have time to wonder about that because he heard new sounds, rustling and running footsteps – someone was moving in his direction. His ears weren't completely back to normal, and he couldn't tell what direction they were coming from. Swearing to himself, he turned his head back and forth, trying to figure it out. He saw a shadow and spun that way, knocking away the long gun the figure was raising. He shoved whoever it was backwards and followed them down to the floor, knife raised in preparation.

A second figure crashed into Dean, knocking him off the first and sending the knife flying. Humans, he realized as he grappled with his second attacker, who turned out to be Chet. The older man was strong and a smart fighter, but Dean was better. He knocked the man's gun completely away and got one arm wrapped partly around his neck. The man he didn't know was getting back to his feet and moving to retrieve his gun.

Dean wasn't going to have Chet choked out before his accomplice would have the weapon in hand. He pulled his own gun, but Chet stopped fighting the arm at his throat and pushed on the wrist holding the gun, preventing Dean from turning it far enough to aim it at the other dude. The other guy picked up his rifle and started to turn. At the same time, Dean saw the lapsae land in the cave again out of the corner of his eye. He made a split-second decision and wrenched his gun hand in the opposite direction he'd been trying to go and got it free, then shot it at the lapsae instead of the man.

Despite all the moving parts, Dean's calculations were correct and the bullet ricocheted cleanly off the lapsae and the man with the rifle made a noise like the breath had been punched out of him. Blood appeared on the stomach of his shirt and, almost in slow motion, he dropped the rifle and collapsed to the cave floor. Dean could tell at a glance that it was probably a fatal wound.

"Archie," gasped Chet. No matter what Dean might have felt about shooting and possibly killing a human being, maybe fatally...they had attacked him, sided with the monsters, and worst of all, taken Sam. He didn't let it distract him, though, wrestling Chet onto his face and sliding a zip tie that he'd stolen from the guy's own SUV around his wrists. Though the man was no longer struggling, Dean put the barrel of his gun against the back of Chet's neck.

Keeping an eye on the mothman, which was looking back and forth from Dean and Chet to the ailing Archie, Dean growled, "Tell me where my brother is and I'll try to help your buddy."

Apparently taking that as an invitation, the lapsae rushed past the first two with supernatural speed. "Please!" Archie begged before screaming as a swipe of wicked claws cut him from shoulder to hip. He screamed once more, weakly, and fell silent. The huge monster, satisfied that its prey was dead, hooked its claws into the body's midriff and dragged it out of sight, following the cave to the right.

Dean stayed still for a moment until he could no longer hear the sounds of dragging and the clicks of claws against the rock. He felt slightly sick, despite all that these people had done. Dean hardened his heart. He could drink or cry or whatever he needed to do later to deal with this; for now, he had to be cruel. "Help me out and, as long as Sam's in good condition, I probably won't feed you to your pets." He stood and pulled Chet to his feet.

"I must face the ngueneavis some day," Chet answered, far too calmly for Dean's liking. "It is my birthright and destiny, as it was for Archie. As it was for our father."

"Our father?" Dean demanded. "You're this calm after watching your brother get torn apart by that thing?" He wished he'd put a bullet in this guy instead of the other one.

Chet flinched, then smoothed out his expression. "There is always a chance to lose your life to the ngueneavis. We all accepted the risk in exchange for the right to live near them." He leaned forward, his words getting more intent. "They aren't like us. They are Pillávitae, beyond us. Almost...god-like. How can you not see that?"

"Accepted risk?! God-like?! It just killed your brother!" Dean spit out. Not much surprised him anymore, but this level of zeal-inspired cold-heartedness caught him off guard. He ground his teeth together and raised the muzzle of his gun a little higher. "Your wife and brother are dead thanks to your crazy obsession." He paused. How do you threaten someone who was so blasé about death? "Take me to Sam now, or I'll shoot your head off and bury you where your precious mothmen can't even get a taste."

"I will show you where we brought him," Chet said. Dean definitely noticed the wording the older man had chosen, but didn't comment because if he didn't keep a lid on himself, he'd end up yelling at the guy...or beating the shit out of him, and either option would just make it longer before he saw Sam.

Chet moved confidently despite his bound arms, leading Dean to a passageway to their left. It quickly narrowed so they couldn't walk side by side, and Dean's penlight did little to illuminate the way forward as they walked beyond reach of the sun. Twice, Chet stumbled over the uneven ground and Dean grabbed his arm to keep him from face planting. The second time, he didn't let go immediately.

"Try anything – whistling for those things or calling out or anything – and you'll regret it," Dean reminded him softly. Chet didn't answer, perhaps sensing just how deep Dean's disdain for him went and not wanting to antagonize him any farther.

They wended their crooked way deeper and deeper with Dean keeping special care to count the openings they passed. If Chet thought he could get him lost, he had another thing coming. Just when Dean was about to ask just how much farther they had to go, he heard a sound that didn't come from either of them. He flicked the ineffective light up over Chet's shoulder and grit his teeth when a pair of eerie silver eyes lit up in the beam. For all his big talk about "facing" the monsters, Chet sucked in a startled breath at the sight.

A new sound, this one behind them, caught Dean's attention. He swung the light in that direction only to see another pair of inhuman eyes. "You wanted to get up and close and personal with these things, right?" he muttered to Chet, mostly occupied with trying to figure out how they were going to get out of there. "Now that they've come to the party, any thoughts about what we do next?"

"Probably..." Chet paused and swallowed audibly. "Probably get eaten."

WINCHESTER * WINCHESTER

"Stop playing with the damn magic fingers," Sam muttered, annoyed. He was trying to sleep, but Dean must still be feeding his bed quarters, because even Sam's bed was shaking. He groaned softly. It must have been a hell of a hunt, because everything hurt. "Just let me slee –"

Sam broke off his complaint at the sound of an inhuman scream and a loud but distant boom that shook him and made what felt like small pebbles and sand rain down on him. Without even thinking about it, his muddled brain still managed to instantly supply an explanation for the explosion – Dean. Nothing else helpful, but he smiled grimly, feeling absolutely certain that, whatever was going on, his brother was out there somewhere and alive enough to be causing chaos.

He remembered with sudden clarity being grabbed in the motel parking lot and hung like an offering for the lapsae. He shifted slightly and sharp pain shot through him. He only kept from crying out because he didn't know exactly where he was or if he was in danger. When he moved, his arm fell so it was hanging down and he heard something small falling and pinging off hard surfaces. Sam froze and focused on what he could feel. He was lying on something hard, uneven, and small. He slowly opened his eyes to see a swatch of light above him revealing a cave roof far above.

The fight with the small lapsae, "Murdoch," came back to him. It took him a second, but he found her. She was on a ledge maybe ten feet above him and on the other side of the crevice. She was crying out softly over and over, sounding far more human than she looked. He could see that one of her "wings" was badly torn in addition to the bones that he'd heard break when they'd landed. He swallowed hard at the sounds she made and her futile writhing. Yes, she'd been trying to kill him, but she was suffering badly. Even if she hadn't been human once, he would have hated her pain.

Unable to do anything for the suffering creature at the moment, Sam looked around better. He had landed on a frighteningly small ledge on the opposite side of the fissure in a spot where the sides were only about five feet apart. He couldn't see how far he would have fallen if he'd missed his perch, but he knew things could have been a lot worse.

Not that they were great. His shelf was small enough that not only was his right arm dangling, the bottom half of one leg was also hanging down. His arm was almost certainly re-broken and hitting his head hard so shortly after getting knocked out by his kidnappers was less than ideal. Maybe even worse, Sam's entire left pant leg was wet with blood, probably the cause of the weakness he felt. On top of all of that, the side of his neck was burning like he'd put on too much Icy Hot. Moving carefully and looking for signs of more lapsae (or humans, for that matter), he lifted his left hand to touch it. Sam's skin was coated in something thin and stiff. It reminded him of dried out taffy. It must be whatever the lapsae had spit on him and it was really starting to burn.

Sam tried to peel the stuff off. At the same time, he looked for hand- and foot-holds that he could use to climb out of there. Sure, it was probably impossible with all his wounds, but "probably impossible" rarely stopped a Winchester from trying. He hissed as pulling on the substance on his neck pulled at the skin too, like it had adhered. He pulled harder with no luck, feeling like he was close to tearing his own skin off. He gave up with a curse. Though the burning was spreading now, he stopped his efforts, since there was nothing else he could do about it right now. His focus had to be on getting out of there.

Huffing a breath out, Sam pulled his broken arm up onto his chest. The pain was intense, but not overwhelming. He needed to secure it to his chest before even attempting to climb. More importantly, he needed to get some kind of bandage on his leg. Moving carefully, he used his good hand to help push himself back a little so he could try to sit up. Instantly, dizziness washed over him. He took long, deep breaths but it didn't abate until he laid his head back down. Blood loss? Concussion? Shock? All of the above? he wondered.

This was pathetic. He needed to get a grip and start doing something about his injuries before anyone came around to see where he was. He could feel that the knife he wore at his back was still there. They either hadn't found it or figured he wouldn't be able to get to it anyway. He could use it to cut bandages from his shirt. Assuming he could move around without falling from his precarious perch.

Moving in tiny increments, Sam managed to maneuver himself to a more or less seated position. Just that made his head swim and black spots dance at the edge of his vision, but he made it and even got his knife free. Great. Now all he had to do was get his thigh bandaged – one-handed – and his busted arm secured against his body, all without passing out. Then maybe he could grow some wings of his own and fly out of there. After he rested.

He breathed slowly but his head didn't completely settle. He closed his eyes, trying to fend off nausea and weakness. Once they were closed, his eyes didn't want to open again. Even his pain couldn't keep him totally alert, though the burning had spread over the side of his jaw and across the front of his throat and he could feel every heartbeat in his arm.

Against his will, Sam drifted a little. He was sort of half-awake, just aware enough to hold onto his knife and not roll off his little shelf. Huh, he thought blearily. This isn't good. I need to stay awake. Don't want to fall. Need to let Dean know...something. I wonder where he is?

There was a shout and Sam forced his eyes open in case it was Dean. After a few seconds of work, he got his eyes to focus enough to see the man crouching on the edge of the crevice across from and above him looking down at the wounded lapsae. To his great disappointment, it was not Dean. Sam opened his mouth, then shut it again, trying to remember where he'd seen the man and focus on the furious yelling coming out of him.

"...do to her? Oh shit! How could you?! Now they're going to eat her! You murdered her!"

"She wanted to eat me," Sam said back, deducing that the guy was upset over the flailing lapsae he was watching. From this angle, Sam could see that one of her "wings" was caught on a protruding rock and she was injuring herself more the more she struggled. He winced a little, also at the implication that her compatriots would make a meal out of her.

The guy – the bartender who'd threatened to call the cops after the setup in the bar, Sam realized – looked over at him and blanched. "Oh, hell no," he hissed, if anything, even angrier than before. "No, no, it can't be." His mouth twisting in anger, he pulled a .44 Magnum worthy of Dirty Harry. With murder in his eyes, he pointed it directly at Sam. "You're gonna die, Hunter."

* * *

AN: What? Those are cliffies? Oops.

The poem at the beginning of the chapter is there because I have had it in my head ever since I first pictured the area where the mothmen hang out, especially when I wrote about the one diving at Dean. No reason other than that...and I like it.

Forrest Gump is a 1994 movie in which the main character got shot in the butt.

Ngueneavis is an amalgamation of Mapudungun (a language spoken by indigenous Mapuche peoples in Chile and Argentina) and Latin for something like "god bird." Pillávitae is the same idea, and I used it to mean ancestral spirits, treated almost like deities in the Mapudungun cosmology.

Timelady66: Oh, you'd probably get it right, knowing you! Thank you for the lovely kudos. I figured that I was aging myself referencing the A Team, but I couldn't help myself.

ncsupnatfan: Thank you! More action in this chapter, too, though maybe not quite as much. Yup, I couldn't have Sam get away too easily.

Natylop: Thank you for your understanding about the last chapter taking so long! I'm glad that the cliffies don't bother you too much...since I'm kind of addicted to them. LOL. You'll definitely find out later why the lapsae didn't just eat Sam. I do remember that you gave me a lovely prompt and it's on my docket, after this story and a quick chapter of Bewildered, so hopefully not too long to wait. I love including Bobby wherever I can, too, so that part sounds great too.

Trucklady53: I tried to make the monsters pretty nightmarish. I promise the guys will get out of this, but it's going to take a bit of work on their part. (Can't have things too easy, right? LOL)

muffinroo: I never saw Deliverance, I'm afraid. I just made the monsters as creepy as I could! The guys are, sadly (or happily?) in yet another mess now. Not getting canned exactly, which made me laugh like crazy! As I'm responding to you, there are two stockpots of spaghetti sauce simmering on the stove waiting to be canned. Much yummier than soylent green...I assume.

stedan: Oh, wow, I love your ideas so much! Of course I'm not giving stuff away, but you gave me a great idea for another story.

waitingforAslan: I love that you're feeling indignant! So, we're down a couple monsters and a few bad guys too. Does that make you feel any better? *g*

Colby's girl: Right? Even the baddest of badasses fall sometimes. LOL about being in a jam. We are done canning jam for.the year. In fact, the only thing left is apple pie filling. Mmmmmm.