Title: Now I Know My ABC's
Author: Disasteriffic Kaz
Info: A hurt/comfort romp through the alphabet, one letter at a time from A to Z. Each chapter is a stand-alone one shot. There is hurt, comfort, angst, humor, feels and all around fun.
Author's Note: Heh. Go ahead. Look it up. I'll wait. :P This one is set after 2x15 "Tall Tales". This one's a little more light-hearted after the last chapter. Enjoy!
DC Convention. *Cuss warning* FUCKING AWESOME. Best SPN convention I've been to, to date. Not just because of the stars, who were as usual brilliant, witty, charming and hysterical; but because of the company. Along with all the other fans, I had the great honor of spending the weekend tucked up with four of my faves and boy, did we have fun. At times a little too much if my saturday morning hangover was any indication. Janice, I'm lookin' at you and those damn addicting blood bag drinks of yours. Lol The girls cut me off. XD Ahem.
Beta'd by the always awesome JaniceC678 :D– Friend and Muse's co-conspirator.
**Follow me on Facebook as "Disasteriffic Kaz" for frequent fic updates or just to chat!
~Reviews are Love~
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D is for Defenestration -
"Come on, kid." Dave huffed and hitched the teenage boy's arm higher over his shoulders as he all but dragged him down the hall of the abandoned mansion. "Just... a couple more flights." He pulled his radio from his vest pocket as he started down the stairs and rolled his eyes. "Only me, huh, kid? What kinda park ranger gets stuck in a damn mansion with a bear?" Dave snorted as he moved as quickly as he dared down the dusty stairs. "Bear on damn steroids. Kid?"
Dave sighed when he got no response and held up his radio, hoping the local police were still paying attention. "Hey, this is Ranger Mathews again. I found the kid but he's in bad shape. That bear... thing... mauled him pretty good."
There was a crackle of static and a voice responded. "Ranger, can you verify your location?"
"The old Givens mansion on Maiden Hill." Dave panted for breath and stopped at the landing. He leaned against the wall and the wide window beside him wearily. "Gonna need a chopper or something or this kid ain't gonna make it. I stopped some of the bleeding, but... it's bad."
"Understood, Ranger. Help will be there in twenty minutes."
"Twenty minutes?" Dave exclaimed and turned his head to look out the window. "Are you guys not paying attention? This kid's bleedin' out and there's a damn mutant bear up here tryin' to kill us!"
"That's the best we can do. You'll just have to hold on."
"Yeah, you try holding..." Dave broke off as the sound of a soft scuff filtered into the stairwell. He looked around frantically and up to the landing above but saw nothing in the shadows hovering there.
"Ranger Mathews?"
Dave lifted the radio and spoke softly. "I think it's stalking us." He shook his head. "This thing doesn't act like a damn bear. It's weird. It's... SHIT!" A massive shadow detached itself from the wall above them and flew through the air. The sound of shattering glass echoed inside the empty building, broken only by a lonely voice calling from the radio left lying on the landing.
"Ranger? Ranger, answer me!"
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Dean pulled open the driver's side door of the Impala and huffed a laugh, shaking his head when he found Sam where he'd left him, hunched over his laptop in the passenger seat. He barely twitched as Dean sat down with a thump beside him.
"Dude. Did you even hit the head?" Dean asked and waved a hand out toward the gas station.
"Huh? Don't have to," Sam answered absently. His eyes stayed firmly on the screen, scanning back and forth down the page.
Dean rolled his eyes and slapped the laptop closed. "Earth to Sammy!"
"Hey!" Sam protested and heaved an annoyed sigh. "I was researching while there's actually wifi."
Dean pulled up the bag he'd brought in and upended it on the seat between them in a shower of candy bars, lollipops, and small bags of chips. "Road munchies."
Sam snorted a laugh. "Really?" He brushed a hand through the candy haul and pulled out a bag of sour gummy worms.
Dean shrugged with a smiled and started the car. "Call it a homage." He pulled out onto the road and aimed them east again. "I'm kinda sorry we had to gank the trickster." His smiled turned wistful. "He had style for one of the monsters."
Sam shook his head and laughed. "He threw women in lingerie at you and they kicked your ass."
Dean's smile grew into a grin. "Can you think of a better way to go?"
Sam snorted and opened his laptop again. "At least a dozen."
"That's your problem, Sammy," Dean said sadly.
"Sam."
"Sammy," Dean smirked and pulled back out onto the highway. "You're too uptight."
"Because my brother's a jerk." Sam slapped his brother's hand away from his laptop and quickly bookmarked the pages he was using before they were out of range of the wifi signal he'd found.
"Badass, little brother. Your big brother's a badass."
"Older, not bigger," Sam said firmly and grinned at the disgusted look on Dean's face. "Who got his ass handed to him by a couple strippers." Sam laughed at the punch Dean threw at his shoulder.
"How far out are we?" Dean asked, changing the subject before it got more embarrassing. "And does Bobby even know what he's sending us after?"
"About seven hours, and he's sure it's some sort of monster."
"Well, that's real helpful."
Sam chuckled. "Hey, I was working on that at the gas station." Sam smirked and closed the laptop as his internet connection died.
"Whine, whine whine," Dean said and shot them down the highway with a smile. Somehow the hunt with the trickster a few days before had left them feeling lighter, as though some of the weight of Dad's death had lessened. Oh, it still hurt like hell, but Dean could see daylight around it now. He supposed it was maybe the time they spent luring the trickster in, acting like the children they had once been to make him think they'd fallen victim. Dean smirked. It had felt good to be that kid again with Sam, even if it had mostly been an act.
"You're smiling," Sam said from the other side of the car. "You're freaking me out, man."
Dean enjoyed the discomfort in his brother's voice and grinned even wider. "Eat your candy, bitch."
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Dean stretched back in the driver's seat and rolled his head around his shoulders as he drove in an effort to wake up. "Almost there, Sam." Dean looked over when there was no answer and chuckled. His little brother was asleep with his head leaned toward Dean and hanging at a funny angle. "That's gonna hurt when you wake up."
Dean eased back in the seat again and jumped when his phone started ringing. "Shit." He dug it out of his pocket while Sam stirred awake beside him with a groan. "hello?"
"Dean. Where the hell are you boys?"
Dean smiled at Bobby's gruff voice over the tinny speaker of his cell phone. "About ten minutes from an uncomfortable motel bed. Why?"
Bobby snorted. "You just couldn't pass up that diner with the fresh pie sign in the window, could ya'?"
Dean grinned. "Like I'm gonna miss out on... wait a minute." he scowled in confusion. "How'd you know about the diner and the pie?"
"'Cause me and my beater truck left you boys in the dust two hours back." Bobby laughed. "Moonlight Motel. You boys are in room twelve. The game's changed a little and you need backup. Get your asses in gear."
Dean stared at his phone after Bobby hung up and put it away with a fond laugh. "Hey, wake up, princess."
"Shuddup. I'm awake." Sam groaned again and tried to rub the ache out of his neck. "What'd Bobby want?"
"To tell us we're slow," Dean said with a chuckle. "He got here ahead of us."
"Huh." Sam straightened in the seat with a frown. "That can't be good."
"About to find out." Dean pulled in beneath the glowing blue sign of the Moonlight Motel and spotted Bobby's truck down at the end. He drove in, pulled up beside it, and parked.
Sam climbed out and stretched his arms over his head as the door to room thirteen opened and Bobby appeared. "Hey, Bobby."
"Nice of you boys to join the party," Bobby greeted with a smile.
"What's going on?" Sam caught the duffel Dean tossed him from the trunk.
"This is you," Bobby went to the door beside his own and used the key to open it. "What's goin' on is we got us a dead park ranger now along with the kid he was looking for."
"Crap," Dean groaned with feeling and followed his brother into the room. He stopped and groaned again more loudly. "Oh, hell no."
Sam chuckled. He hadn't turned the lights on yet, but the room was decorated in glow-in-the-dark crescent moons on all the walls and the ceiling; so many, they provided their own light. "This is..." Sam shook his head. "I may have nightmares."
Bobby laughed. "Bathroom's worse."
"Awesome." Dean reached over and slapped the lights on. The army of glow-in-the-dark stickers faded away to be replaced with light blue walls and silver trim, blue bedspreads with their own cadre of small moons, and on top of the little television stood a stuffed raccoon, posed as though it were a snarling bear on its hind legs and ready to make a kill. Dean laughed. "Hey, Sammy. You get lonely tonight, you can cuddle Rocky."
"Please grow up," Sam said wearily and ignored his brother's ridiculous grin as Dean went over to pat the raccoon's head. He tossed his duffel onto the far bed and looked over at Bobby. "What happened?"
Bobby sighed and pulled up a chair from the little table beside the television. He scrubbed a hand through his hair and resettled his ball cap. "Kid's parents realized he was missing and called the cops. The cops figured he was up at the house doin' the usual crap, went in on a dare or somethin'. Near as I can figure, about an hour after they went in, the local PD passed it off to the forestry service as soon as one of their rangers radioed in sayin' he saw a kid trampin' around this old mansion up in the hills. He radioed out for help that the kid was hurt bad and some kind of mutant bear thing was chasing them." Bobby nodded at the looks of surprise and wariness on the boys' faces. "Whatever it was caught up with him." he sighed. "With them both. They were dropped a couple stories out a window onto pavement."
"Well, so much for that witness statement." Dean kicked off his boots and opened his duffel to dig through for his trusty fed suit. "Hope they've got more info on file at the police station."
"Mutant bear thing?" Sam shrugged off his jacket and pulled his own suit from his bag. "I really need to see the bodies."
Bobby nodded. "Figured you'd say that. You head on over to the morgue. Me an' the princess'll hit up the local cop shop for their reports."
"Hey!" Dean protested and flicked his little brother his middle finger when he caught him chuckling. "I am not a princess, dammit!"
"Uh huh. Gear up." Bobby smirked and ducked out of their room for his own and a change of clothes.
"Shut it, Sammy," Dean warned and took his suit into the bathroom. "I hear one comment, just one!"
Sam raised his hands and swallowed hard around his laughter. "I'm just gonna... uh... yeah." He rubbed a hand over his face and quickly donned his suit. He tugged at the tie around his neck and stepped back out of the room to knock on the door next to theirs. "Hey, Bobby?" The door opened quickly and Sam smiled. "Can I borrow your truck to head over to the morgue?"
"Yeah, sure." Bobby reached in to the table beside the near bed and grabbed the keys, tossing them to Sam. "Try not to get in any trouble."
"Bobby, I always try," Sam said easily and backed away toward the Singer Salvage truck. "It just always seems to find me anyway."
Bobby rolled his eyes and smiled. "Yeah, I know it. We'll meet back here in an hour, pool our info, and get some sleep before we head out to the house."
"Got it." Sam pulled open the truck's door and stepped up into the cab. "Hey, you better let Dean grab some beer or something on the way back or you'll have to listen to him whine." Sam barked a laugh as a muffled shout of 'I heard that!' came from their room.
"Boy, you better run," Bobby said with a chuckle and watched Sam pull away hastily before his big brother could catch him.
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Dean and Bobby looked up as the motel room door opened. Dean sighed. There was no mistaking the grim look on his brother's face as Sam stepped inside, closing it behind him. "That bad, huh?"
Sam nodded. He took off his suit jacket and tossed it over a chair. "Mauled doesn't even cover it. Whatever this thing is, it's packing some serious claws." He sat heavily on the end of the bed across from his brother and Bobby and ran a hand through his hair. "It tore their tongues out. The M.E. couldn't be positive if it was pre or post mortem."
"Jesus." Bobby shook his head. "Sure as hell hope those poor suckers were dead before that happened."
"Could be a sasquatch," Sam said and then rolled his eyes when his brother grinned. "Shut up, Dean."
Bobby smirked and then frowned. "I dunno. Those things don't usually go for the tongues. Hell, they don't even usually go for people most of the time, unless they're stupid enough to shoot at 'em."
"What else could it be?" Sam kicked the leg of his brother's chair and then reached over, stealing his half-filled beer.
"Hey!"
"Knock it off, you chuckle-heads." Bobby laughed and stood. "I'm not sure, but I'll know when I see it. We're gettin' an early start." He rose and straightened his vest. "Get some shut-eye."
"Bobby, Sam stole my beer." Dean made a grab for it and missed as Sam headed to the bathroom with a laugh.
Bobby gave a fond laugh of his own, relieved to see his boys relaxed with each other still. "Night, boys."
Dean snorted as the room door closed and pulled a fresh beer out of the little refrigerator. "You find anything else interesting?" he called through the bathroom door as he yanked back the blankets on his bed.
Sam came back out and shook his head. "Not really. Although, I think Bobby's right and it's something other than a sasquatch. What about you? Anything new at the precinct?"
Dean blew out a breath and pulled his shirts over his head, tossing them aside before he sat on his bed. "Nah. The cops kinda blew the whole thing off. They figure it's just a bear, kid shouldn't have been up there, yada yada." He shrugged and drank down half his beer before setting it aside and worked at getting his jeans off. "They pawned the whole thing off on Fish and Wildlife and they're real sorry the ranger died, but they still don't think it's their jurisdiction."
"Awesome." Sam pulled his sleep clothes out of his bag and headed back to the bathroom. "At least we won't be dodging cops while we hunt this thing down."
"Yeah, about that." Dean kicked his jeans off and slid under the blankets. "The forestry service is sending in a team of rangers to find their so-called bear. They'll be here by tomorrow night at the earliest."
"Well, damn." Sam groaned and leaned on the bathroom doorway. "And we aren't going up to the mansion tonight why?"
"Because the locals said the road out there washed out about ten years back, so it's a three-mile hike through dense forest to get there." Dean grinned. "Hope you brought your bug spray, Sammy. You know how the bugs love chewin' on you."
"Wonderful. This just gets more awesome by the minute." Sam rolled his eyes and banged the bathroom door closed behind him. "I think I hate this job."
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The hot summer air was thick and heavy beneath the forest canopy. Sunlight dappled the ground from above and made Sam blink to clear his vision each time the light flickered in his eyes. It was a migraine waiting to happen. He slapped at yet another sting on the side of his neck and sent a dirty look to his big brother when Dean snorted a laugh.
"How much farther?" Dean asked with a grin, calling to Bobby a dozen feet ahead of them.
"Should be on it any time now." Bobby looked down at his GPS and back up to the screen of trees. "Friggin' technology. Where's the damn house already?" he muttered to himself. He ducked his head as he broke through the trees into bright sunlight. Bobby looked up once his eyes adjusted and stared. "Whoa."
Dean came out of the trees on Bobby's right and squinted in the sudden glare. He gave a low whistle. "You weren't kidding when you said mansion. Wow."
"Holy crap. No wonder you said we needed backup." Sam ogled the expansive mansion on the rise above them. Nature was slowly starting to claim the age-darkened stone walls with clinging vines, ivy, and moss. "How old is this place?"
"And who the hell builds something like this in the middle of nowhere?" Dean added and shaded his eyes for a better look. The mansion stretched up for four floors with a tower on each side. Half of the windows were open to the air, their glass long shattered, leaving them dark holes into the building's past. The rest glinted dully in the sunlight and gave the illusion of movement behind them. At least, Dean hoped it was an illusion.
They trudged up the rise until they reached the plateau the mansion was built on. Bobby wrinkled his nose when they reached the edge of what had once been a reflecting pond. It reached nearly to the base of the big house. He bent over to look at the water and grimaced. It was choked with weeds and a heavy layer of scum that stank and sent up an even stronger odor, making him cough when he kicked a rock into it. "Gah. Guess the pool boy quit too."
"Geez, Bobby. I think you pissed it off." Dean smirked and pulled his gun out at the same time, his humor fading in the face of potential danger. "How you wanna do this?"
"We should each take a floor," Sam suggested, drawing his own gun.
"That's what I figured." Bobby headed for the doors with his own gun out. "Otherwise, we'll be here all damn day, and we ain't got time for that shit before the rangers show up. I'll take the ground floor and the basement, assumin' there is one, and with my luck, there is."
Sam smirked and nodded. "I'll start at the top." Sam heaved one of the two tall leaves of the front doors open with his shoulder. The aging wood creaked and gave a loud, almost deafening squeal of protest that echoed through inside and out into the still air around them. Sam frowned and turned around to look back out over the stagnant reflecting pool and the forest. "Huh. You hear that?"
Dean quirked a brow and looked where his brother was looking and then he nodded in understanding. "Too damn quiet."
"So whatever it is, it's around," Bobby said with a grim smile and pulled out a flashlight. "And after that racket, it damn well knows where we are. You boys watch your backs."
"You too, Bobby." Sam smiled at him and walked into the mansion. He gazed around the entry hall and shook his head. "I can't believe someone built all this and then it just gets left up here to rot. It's beautiful, or it was." The entry hall was wide, like something you'd see in a castle or one of those really grand, old plantation homes in the south. A wide staircase swept up and curved away to the floor above while a balcony wrapped around the whole of the room, giving it a vaulted ceiling up through the second floor. Tall, narrow windows behind the stairs allowed sunlight to filter through the foggy glass in streamers that lit the vines and moss that had worked their way inside and clung to the crumbling plaster and curling wallpaper.
Dean shook his head and started for the stairs. "Check in on our phones every fifteen. Let's find this thing."
Sam followed him and tensed as the first few stairs creaked under their combined weight. "Uh... let's stay off the middle of the stairs." He moved quickly to the side, near the banister and saw Dean do the same on the other side.
Bobby started off toward the left wing of the mansion and sneezed reflexively as his boots churned up a heavy layer of dust from the floor. "Well, this is gonna be a barrel of fun."
Dean stopped when they reached the second floor and looked over at his brother as he headed for where he assumed the next flight of stairs would be, further down the hall. "You watch your ass, Sammy."
"I'll be fine," Sam said easily and gave his brother a smile.
"Famous last words," Dean grumbled and watched him leave and vanish further down the darkened hall. "I mean it, Sam! You get eaten, I'm gonna be pissed!" Sam's echoing laughter answered him and Dean rolled his eyes. "Jackass."
Sam chuckled as he climbed the next flight of stairs. Each landing had a tall, wide window letting in the early afternoon sun, lighting his way. He watched the stairs as he walked, staying close to the wall and frowned as his boots began to crunch on broken glass. There were signs that someone or something had moved through the layers of dust that coated everything. Sam reached the landing for the third floor and a sinking feeling started in his stomach. The moldy carpet was covered in shards of colored glass that obviously came from the now empty window above it. Spots of what could only be dried blood were splattered over the glass, the floor, the wall and, in some places, had dripped slowly from the window ledge until they'd dried.
"Damn," Sam whispered and knew in his gut that this was where the ranger and that teenager had died. He leaned into the window and looked out and down. More glass and grim pools of dried and spattered blood decorated the flagstones three stories below and he hoped it had been quick. He turned back to the stairs and started up to the fourth floor, now more wary than before. Sam took out his flashlight and balanced his gun with it as he reached the top floor of the mansion and stepped out into a long hall.
Sam startled slightly when his cell phone rang in his pocket and he rolled his eyes at himself. He backed up a step toward the stairs before exchanging his light for his phone and didn't even need to look at the display. "Dean, I'm fine. Just reached the top floor. No sign of the creature yet. Stop worrying."
"I'm not worried!" Dean protested and grimaced. He was worried but it was no fair Sam knowing that. "I'm sweeping the second floor now. Most of these rooms are empty, but something big's been through here. Lots of tracks."
"Yeah; here too," Sam said with a glance at the floor and the large, smudged footprints in the dust and grime. "Go call Bobby and worry at him."
"Shuddup, bitch."
Sam grinned and ended the call. He tucked it back in his pocket and took his flashlight out again. "Jerk."
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Dean rolled out the tension in his shoulders and pushed open another door. He shone his flashlight into the room, seeing nothing but a broken chair and tattered curtains over the windows. He sighed and moved on to the next. "It's like searching a damn castle," he grumbled. He checked his watch and saw it had only been ten minutes since he'd spoken to his brother and Bobby, yet somehow, walking the empty halls and bare rooms made it feel longer. He was heading back toward the stairs steadily and stopped as he heard a soft sound from somewhere ahead of him.
Dean frowned and aimed his light and gun down the hall. "Sam? Bobby?" he called, but there was no reply. His instincts told him it was neither of them, and he let a slow smile spread over his face as the familiar rush of adrenaline began to course through him. He started forward toward the stairs and kept his footsteps light and soundless, all his senses focused on the end of the hall where the noise had come from.
He stopped as he came abreast of the last door and used the toe of his left boot to nudge it open. Dean swung into the room, leading with his gun and the light. It was another nearly empty room with only the decaying frame of a bed against one wall and an old steamer trunk beneath the window on the far wall. He nearly turned and left before his eyes caught on a door to his right. It was tall and narrow and probably a closet, and as Dean watched, it shifted slightly. He brought his gun back up and aimed at the door. He took a step further into the room and froze as something wet splatted onto his outstretched hands around the grip of his gun. It was warm, and Dean watched it slide off the back of his hand with a sinking feeling.
"Crap," he breathed. Dean swallowed and jerked his gun up toward the ceiling as he spun and threw himself backward and, he hoped, away from the thing about to kill him. Something massive and dark dropped from the high ceiling above the door nearly onto Dean's head. He fired a round where he hoped the head was and gasped in a breath as it spun with a roar and vanished through the open door into the hall.
"Holy shit! No, you don't!" Dean scrambled to his feet and out into the hall. He heard Bobby's voice calling from downstairs. "I got it!" he shouted. He ran, following the sound of thundering steps down the hall. Dean skidded to a stop on the landing of the stairs just in time to see the thing, whatever it was, vanish up them. "Shit. Shit! Bobby! It's going up! Sam!"
Dean broke into a run, shoving his flashlight into his pocket as he dug out his phone and kept his gun pointed up in case the creature turned back on him. He dialed Sam's number as he reached the first landing and turned toward the third floor. "Where'd you go, you bastard?" He ran up the stairs to the third floor and moved out into the hall, looking both ways for any sign of it. "Sam!" Dean looked down and back to the stairs and saw clear marks in the dust where the thing had continued up.
"It's on it's way up to you! South side of the house!" Dean started up the stairs again at a run, lungs straining for oxygen as he moved and heard his brother's voice in his ear asking if he was alright. "Just get over here!"
Dean pocketed his phone and used his free hand to steady himself as he reached another landing and started up to the fourth floor. "Hey!" he shouted, hoping to draw the creature's attention to him and away from Sam. "Hey, ugly! Come back here!"
Sam turned a corner and sprinted back toward the other end of the mansion. He could hear his brother's voice yelling now as it echoed along the hall. "Dean!" He kept his gun up as he ran. It slowed him a little, but he wanted to be prepared if the creature made a run for him as Dean seemed to think it was going to. He couldn't see anything between him and the stairs, and Sam slid to a stop as Dean appeared thirty feet away. "Dean?"
"Where'd it go?" Dean panted and turned to check behind him. "You see it?"
"No. Are you sure it came up he..." Sam lurched back and away reflexively as something large roared out of the door a few feet away to his right. "Crap!"
"Sam, look out!" Dean raised his own gun and snarled, unable to take a clear shot without hitting his brother. "Dammit!" He moved to the other side of the hall and tried to get closer.
Sam watched the creature as it rose up before him to its full height. It stood at least eight feet tall, and what he'd thought at first was matted, dark red fur was actually some sort of scaled hide. Vicious, yellow eyes stared down at him, and Sam grimaced as two long fangs descended from its mouth while small drops of drool dripped to the floor. It flexed its hands and showed him long, curved claws, and Sam knew what had eviscerated the teenager. He saw Dean moving closer and to his left and took his shot now that his brother was out of the way.
Sam aimed at the beast's chest, hoping for the heart, and fired. The bullet struck where it should have, but rather than piercing the thing's hide, it ricocheted off and to the left. "Dean!" Sam yelled when he heard his brother yelp and saw Dean stagger into the wall. "Shit! Dean!"
"I'm ok!" Dean yelled and hunched over for a look. Sam's bullet had just grazed along the outside of his right hip; bleeding but shallow. He straightened and ducked under a swing from the creature to reach his brother. "Freak out later! Move!" He grabbed Sam's arm and gave him a shove down the hall. "Go! Go! Go!"
Sam let Dean pull him along but kept his attention on the thing behind them. It was pacing them along the hall, snarling and dragging its claws along the walls but making no effort to overtake them though it easily could. It was playing with them, he realized. "I know what it is," he gasped.
"Great! How do we kill it?" Dean looked briefly in each room as they passed and shook his head each time, seeing nothing to defend themselves with since their guns were proving useless.
"It's a... duck!" Sam pulled Dean's head down as the creature reached for him and they moved faster down the hall. "A mapinguari!" He coughed as a putrid stench filled his nostrils and turned to find the thing only a foot behind them suddenly. "Dean!" Sam caught his brother before he could go further down the hall. He yanked Dean into the room beside them and slammed the door closed as the mapingauri crashed into it with a thump that rattled the aging wood in its frame and sifted dust down from the ceiling. "We can't... can't shoot it," Sam informed him as he leaned against the door and tried to catch his breath. "Won't penetrate the hide."
"No kidding?" Dean said ruefully and used the light streaming through the hazy glass beside him to look at his hip again. It burned, but it was manageable. "Got any ideas?" He startled and pulled his phone out of his pocket when it began to ring. "Bobby! It's up here on the fourth floor!" he snorted and rolled his eyes as Sam was jolted by another attempt from the creature to break in the door. "Yeah, I'm sure. Watch your ass, man. Bullets just bounce off this damn thing. Sam says it's a mop... a moppin... a muppet."
"Mapingauri, moron," Sam said with a breathless laugh. He looked at his gun and then jerked away from the door when a long claw speared through the wood beside his face. "Um... Bobby know how to kill this thing?"
"Beheading," Dean informed him and put his phone away. He tugged Sam over to him and snarled down at his useless gun before putting it away. They couldn't risk shooting if they had to worry about their own bullets coming back to get them, especially not in an enclosed space like the room they were trapped in. "Bobby's coming up the south stairs. He's got the weapons bag and the machetes."
Sam glanced out the window beside them and saw they were somewhere over the entryway far below. "Well, we better come up with something. It's gonna be through that door any second."
"Yeah." Dean ducked a splinter of wood that broke off and shot through the air toward him as the mapingauri slammed into the door again. He went to a closet door across the room and pulled it open. It was empty, like the rest of the house, but he narrowed his eyes and nodded. "Ok." He took hold of a rusted, metal rod hanging in the closet. Dean tore it loose with a grunt and moved back out into the room. "This should..."
The door burst in with a deafening crash. It tore from its hinges and hung at an angle as the mapingauri shoved itself inside with a roar. Dean brought the improvised weapon to fend the creature off until Bobby could reach them and then could only watch in horror as it barreled straight at Sam. "Sammy!"
Sam had only time to gasp in a single breath before the mapingauri slammed into him. He felt something sharp slice into his right shoulder at the same moment the creature's weight struck his chest and knocked all the air from him. He felt himself lifted up as his brother's horrified shout filled the room. His back struck something hard and he realized it was the window as the glass gave way behind him and then he was falling, looking up at blue sky in a dizzying view as the air rushed past him.
"SAM!" Dean rushed the creature as his brother vanished out the window. He slammed the rod into the side of its head and drove it back from the window. Bobby arrived at that moment, brandishing one machete and holding another. "Bobby!"
"Here!" Bobby slid the second machete across the floor to Dean and turned his attention to the creature. "Oh, you are one ugly sum'bitch," he grunted and ducked under a swing from the mapingauri's claws and took a swing of his own. The blade of his machete bit into the side of its neck and pulled out in a spray of blood as the beast screamed a cry so loud it made Bobby's ears ring. "Where's Sam?"
Dean shook his head, unable to answer. He resisted the urge to simply leave and go find his brother. It had been drilled into him since childhood - neutralize the threat first. He ducked quickly and came up with the machete as the mapingauri turned on him. A snarl of protective rage escaped his lips as he advanced on the creature and met its eyes. He saw Bobby getting ready to take another swing, and Dean used his own blade to lunge forward, spearing the point into the creature's mouth between its fangs as it howled. He drove the blade deeper and had to rear back and away to avoid being skewered by its claws. His back thumped into the wall, and the mapingauri went to its knees, scrabbling clawed fingers at the blade holding its mouth open while blood poured out to pool on the floor under it.
Bobby used the advantage Dean had given him and swung his machete with all his strength at the creature's neck a second time. It bit into flesh and through bone, and he put his whole body behind it, turning with the effort. The razor-sharp blade emerged out the other side of the mapingauri's neck in a wash of blood and Bobby stood back, letting the head, now severed, roll free while the body collapsed. "Balls," he groaned with feeling and looked over to Dean. "You alright?"
Dean shook his head and went to the window instead. "No."
"What... where's..." Bobby trailed off as he watched Dean lean out the empty window frame and fear squeezed his heart hard. "Oh, no. Don't tell me."
"Sammy!" Dean leaned out the window and looked down, his heart in his throat. Expecting to see his little brother dead and smashed on the flagstones, he stared in surprise when he realized that the creature had launched Sam just hard enough to send him out far enough that he had landed in the reflecting pool. He was floating there face-down and still, and Dean jerked into motion. "Come on!" He tore himself from the window and ran with Bobby on his heels.
"Is he..."
"No, he's damn well not dead," Dean said firmly, grimly, and refused to accept anything else as they pelted down the hall to the stairs. He thumped into the wall at each landing, bouncing off to the next flight down in a refusal to slow down and quickly outpaced the older hunter. Dean burst back onto the second floor balcony and raced down the curving stairs, heedless of them collapsing under his weight.
Dean sprinted the last few meters out into the sunlight and slid to a stop beside the pool. "Sammy!" He dropped the machete and stepped into the water. Dean wrinkled his nose as the smell of rotting plants assaulted his nose and grabbed his brother's arm. "Sam! Dammit, come on. Don't be dead. Don't you dare." He pulled Sam through the bracken to him and turned his brother over, grabbing him under the shoulders. He dragged Sam out of the pool and onto the flagstones, laying him down.
"Sam?Sam!" Dean's voice was strained with barely controlled panic. He leaned down and couldn't hear if Sam was breathing. "Shit!" He fisted his hands and pressed them just under his brother's sternum hard, in and up. He did it again, and was rewarded when, a moment later, Sam suddenly gasped and then began coughing up mouthfuls of the disgusting water. "That's it. That's it. Better out than in, dude. Come on and breathe, Sam." Dean pulled him up and supported Sam against his shoulder while he continued to cough and gag. He looked up as Bobby appeared. "He's ok. He's... I got him."
Bobby ran a hand over his face and took a moment to lean on the open door and just catch his breath and watch. He let the fear that had been choking him slowly drain away as he watched Sam gasping, coughing, and very much alive hanging on to his big brother's arm like it was a lifeline. "Takin' years off my life, you boys."
Dean smiled and put his attention back on his brother as relief blew through him and made him weak. "Sammy?"
Sam managed a nod and brought a shaking hand up to wipe his face. His eyes were watering and his nose burning with the stench of whatever he'd landed. The smell of his own hand made him groan and put him dangerously close to throwing up. "S'that smell?" he slurred and began coughing again.
Dean snorted and thumped Sam's back a couple times to help clear his lungs. "You landed in the reflecting pool."
"Gah," Sam groaned more loudly and his blurry eyes slowly focused on the fact that he was covered head to toe in stinking algae and slime. "Gon'puke."
"Dude. Two feet to the right and you'd have been a Sammy pancake." Dean nodded as Bobby knelt beside them.
"Not... not helping," Sam gasped and coughed up more of the brackish water.
"You smell like something died." Dean wrinkled his nose, but he didn't move away or let go, just grateful that it hadn't been Sam.
"Hey, Sam." Bobby put a hand on Sam's shoulder and then yanked it back as he felt something slimy against his skin. "Yech. You need a shower, son."
"Need..." Sam coughed, swallowed against the urge to throw up and gagged as more of the water he'd breathed in went down his throat. "G-god."
"Crap. Here he goes. Move, Bobby!" Dean turned his brother as Bobby scrambled aside and held his little brother as Sam heaved and threw up across the flagstones. Bile and dark water spattered onto the ground for several breaths until Sam collapsed back against his chest. "Easy. Easy. I gotcha."
"Creature?" Sam asked in a hoarse voice. He spit, rather than swallow another mouthful of the foul taste.
"Dead," Bobby assured him and knelt beside him again. "Took its head off upstairs."
Dean's humor and relief faded somewhat and he looked up to Bobby. "We need to get him cleaned off and get a look at him."
"Shoulder," Sam said and pointed to his right side. He could feel the burning pain from where the mapingauri had gotten its claws into him before he went out the window.
"Shit." Dean turned Sam slightly to reach the shoulder and try to get a look.
Bobby swallowed his revulsion at the odor coming from Sam and managed to wrangle the kid's jacket away from his shoulder. Beneath, he found blood soaked and torn flannel. "Well, that ain't good."
"M'ok," Sam protested and had a go at sitting up on his own. His head swam and he'd have flopped over backwards if not for two solid arms suddenly at his back to support him. "Damn."
"Yeah, you're just peachy." Dean rolled his eyes.
"Dude." Sam scowled, annoyed at being treated as though he were helpless. He didn't think he was hurt that badly, just a little dazed and banged up. "Not staying here. Rangers are coming. I can walk."
"Boy, you can barely talk in complete sentences," Bobby said repressively but he smiled. "But, you're not wrong. Dean, you two get started out of here. I'll go burn fugly and catch up."
"You sure?" Dean wasn't too happy about leaving Bobby alone, even for a little while. "What if there's more than one of those things?"
Bobby snorted. "Not damn likely. Go on." He helped Dean get Sam to his feet and steadied the younger Winchester when he swayed. "You good, son?"
Sam nodded and managed a smile for Bobby. "Yeah. Hurry and..."
"Watch my ass. Yeah. Yeah. Go on. Git' outta here." Bobby waved them off and headed back into the mansion.
"Ok, here we go." Dean pulled his brother's left arm over his shoulders and started off around the reflecting pond at a slow walk for Sam's sake. "You sure you're up for this?
Sam nodded even as his head was spinning and stayed stubbornly upright. "M'fine. I can... I can do this." As he walked, each stepped seemed to pull on small points of pain all across his back and shoulders. He held his breath most of the way down the hill and into the trees.
"Dude, breathe already," Dean ordered. "We can wait for the rangers, make up a story, and get you airlifted out of here." He shifted his grip on Sam and scowled as his right hand slid through something warm and wet on his back. Dean stopped and tugged up the back of his brother's jacket. "Son of a bitch. Why didn't you say anything?" he demanded when he saw the first of what he was sure would be many open, bleeding cuts from the window. And combined with the disgusting, vile water, those wounds were an infection waiting to happen, and Dean found himself hoping that they still had a stash of the good antibiotics on hand.
"Not that bad. I can do this," Sam insisted and started walking again, pulling Dean along with him.
"Not that bad, my ass!" Dean snarled but he didn't force Sam to stop. The sooner they got back to the car, the sooner they'd be back at the motel where Dean could clean him up and get a better look at him to fix the idiot.
It was less than a half hour later when Dean heard steps behind them, coming fast. He leaned Sam against a tree and held a finger up to keep him quiet. Sam nodded and Dean drew his gun as he put himself in front of his brother. He was fairly sure he knew who it was, but he wasn't going to take chances. A few minutes later, Bobby emerged from the trees at a slow jog and Dean grinned. "Damn, old man. I didn't know you could still move like that."
Bobby jogged up to Dean and slapped him soundly up the side of his head. "Got enough left in me to beat the happy outta your ass, idjit."
Dean laughed and rubbed his head ruefully while he tucked his gun away again. "You set the whole place on fire?"
Bobby rolled his eyes and went to Sam. "Hell no. I rolled it out the window and set it on fire next to the pond. Might help clear the damn air around that thing." He leaned forward and sniffed at Sam before helping the boy ease stiffly up from the tree. "You still smell like the ass end of a latrine."
"Gosh. Thanks, Bobby," Sam retorted tiredly, but he smiled and didn't argue when Dean slipped under his left arm again. He was exhausted and everything hurt, even if he wasn't going to admit to that until he had to.
"Still can't believe you got that lucky." Dean shook his head as the three of them started back toward the car again. It would be a long time before he got that image out of his mind, his little brother crashing through a window before falling from his sight. It made him shiver just remembering it, and he tightened his hold around his brother's wrist even as he gentled the arm across Sam's damaged back.
"Think my luck's debatable." Sam turned his head and sniffed his own shoulder. He sneezed and coughed. "That's just... that's really bad. Wow." He looked over at Dean and smirked. "And now you smell like it too."
Bobby chuckled. He snapped a hand out and caught Sam's right arm when the boy swayed alarmingly in his direction and steadied him. "Easy, Sam."
"Good. I'm good. Sorry." Sam assured both men. "Can't tell if it's the smell making me dizzy or the... if I hit my head. Did I hit my head?"
Dean groaned. "Probably. You were out when I got to you." He let go of Sam's left wrist long enough to hold his middle finger up in front of his brother's nose. "How many fingers you see?"
"Asshole." Sam slapped the offending finger away with a soft laugh and let Bobby take hold of his arm again.
"Well, I can see you two are gonna be a barrel of laughs the rest of the day." Bobby watched them both fondly even as a quick shudder worked its way down his spine for how close he'd come to losing one of them today. He looked away for a moment and swallowed because the truth was, if he'd lost one, he'd damn sure have lost the other soon after. He couldn't imagine Dean not finding some fool way to check out if he lost Sam on top of his dad. He cleared his throat, pushing the frightening thoughts away and smiled again instead as Sam swayed into his side once more.
"Ow," Sam groaned as his right shoulder was jostled. "Stop pushing me."
"Stop smelling like Bobby's old shorts," Dean fired back.
Bobby rolled his eyes. "Boy, I don't wanna know why you're sniffin' my old shorts."
Sam was surprised into a laugh even as the pain hunched him over, but the older men kept him moving. "Don't... don't make me laugh. Ow. Ow."
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The End.
Next Chapter: E is for Elevator
