Unseen, Unheard

Chapter 3

Slumped in the stationary Impala, the brothers reflected in silence on the evidence so far. Eventually, Dean turned, sighing, to his brother with a question in his eyes. He shrugged, biting his lip in a gesture that plainly said: Well, I'm baffled, have you got any ideas?

Sam shrugged, frowning. The kid's words had set alarm bells ringing in his ears. I didn't mean to leave you, he said, and it was like he was begging.

I didn't mean to leave you.

The same words that he had found carved inexpertly into the damp bark of a tree. When he had first read them, they had seemed like his own words, words that he should have said, but never had. Now, he realised, they were not his words at all, but the words of the missing football player, Philip. He wondered where the first message had come from. 'What did you do?' Maybe they had been Philip's words as well, but he didn't think so. He suspected that they had been Louise's.

'We need to check the town records for… unpopular high school students who have died, I guess. Suicides, maybe,' Sam suggested, hating how calmly he could discuss the possibility that a teenager had felt so neglected that he took his own life. It seemed the most likely possibility, though: a student who felt overlooked by his peers, driven to death and now back to take vengeance on those who had never noticed him.

'Another library?' Dean asked, wrinkling his nose in disgust. Sam grinned brightly at him: there was nothing like one of his brother's sulks to improve his mood.

'Yup'

Dean gave him a look which was supremely unimpressed. Sam returned it with an innocent smile. Growling, Dean started up the engine, and reluctantly set a course for the library.

The size of the school became a disadvantage when it came to the records. Unhelpfully, the records were sorted only in alphabetical order, so there was no way of telling where to look first. The only option was to trawl through the records one by one, systematically, until they found one which was suitable.

'It's the 21st freakin' century! Shouldn't these damn things be on a computer?' Dean demanded in frustration, after half an hour's fruitless search.

'Apparently not,' Sam replied calmly. The work was dull, but it felt good to sit back and relax for a change, and he felt the heavy certainty of dusty books oddly comforting. He felt almost sleepy, slumped in the chair. The thought almost made him laugh: he imagined Dean's face if he found that Sam had dropped off when he was supposed to be working.

After another hour, however, when their search had still yielded no results, even Sam was beginning to wilt. His eyelids weighed twenty pounds each, he was sure. It would be so easy just to slip away into sleep.

'Come on, Sam. We've looked at all the relevant records. Maybe you're just barking up the wrong tree.'

'There's a load more we haven't looked at, Dean, sorry to break it to ya.'

'But these are like… 20years ago. No way were these people at school the same time as Louise and Philip.'

'It's possible that the spirit is associating them with people from its own time. It might not have known them personally, it could be… sort of assigning roles to them.'

Dean looked sideways at his brother, wondering if his lecture was just an excuse to stay in the goddamn library for another hour. He scowled fiercely. Sam blinked at him, and he realised that his brother was half asleep.

'Yeah, whatever, Sam. Still, we haven't had much sleep recently and it's late. This can wait until tomorrow.'

Sam opened his mouth to protest but found that he lacked the energy, and he was grateful for the escape clause Dean offered. However, even as he nodded and stood up, he felt a pang of guilt. What if there's another one that I can't help? he thought. Pushing the thought determinedly aside, he followed his brother out of the dimly lit, silent building.

As soon as Dean pulled away from the space outside the library, Sam was slumped in the passenger seat, leaning back, with his eyes closed. He was mildly impressed at the speed with which his little brother had dropped off. After a few seconds' thought, he glanced back at Sam, a worried expression in his eyes.

'Sammy, I swear, if you write on my car…' he left the sentence unfinished, as a vague threat. Still, he flicked his eyes over to his little brother whenever he judged it safe to take them off the road, and carefully scanned the immediate area to make sure that there were no pens available.

Sam raised an arm with exaggerated slowness, index finger extended. He traced letters with his finger in the condensation on the window. Wide eyed and intrigued, Dean watched his brother's actions so closely that the car swayed dangerously along the road, holding his breath in anticipation

'I'm not asleep,' Sam wrote.

His apparently sleeping face twitched, curving up at the corners into a self-satisfied smile.

Dean poked is brother hard in the ribs. 'Not cool, Sammy.'

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The next morning, the local paper proclaimed that a second body had been recovered: that of Philip Basing, high school football player and beloved son, brother, boyfriend. Sorely missed.

The body showed the same confusing signs as Louise's had done. Extreme pallor which indicated death from blood loss, but no sign of any serious wound. Bleeding from the mouth, as if something had been torn apart inside. Dragged out into the tangle of woods which clung to the edges of the town, and left to rot.

Sam was distracted when Dean came in, brandishing the newspaper and pointing out that they were right: Louise and Philip were both victims of the same thing. He had read halfway through the relevant article before he realised that Sam wasn't listening.

'Sam! Dead body, in the woods, ringing any bells here?'

Sam didn't answer, he was staring at his bed sheet with empty, haunted eyes.

'Sam!'

Dean walked round the bed to see what was holding his brother's attention, and inhaled sharply.

After an indefinite pause, he let out a long breath, hissing through his teeth. 'Again?' he asked softly.

Sam grimaced, half shrugged, then nodded. 'Do you think it's killed someone else?'

'Hmm?' It wasn't really the question that Dean had been expecting to hear.

'You didn't notice? The words I wrote on that tree… Philip Basing said them, before he died.'

Dean looked stunned. He hadn't noticed. 'How do you know?'

'That kid told us. "I didn't mean to leave you, he said, and it was like he was begging." That's what I wrote on the tree: "I didn't mean to leave you".'

Dean looked vaguely uncomfortable for a moment, and Sam wondered whether his brother's assumptions about the message had been the same as his own: that the words were Sam's, an apology.

'So, you think that… your night time graffiti… is the victims trying to contact you? Or the killer?'

'I don't know,' Sam replied, looking extremely dejected. 'I just wish I could remember what happened.'

'Sam, you don't know what happened. Don't blame yourself for something you can't help,' Dean instructed him, in an impatient, brusque voice which indicated clearly that, as far as he was concerned, the conversation was over.

Sam was silent for a few seconds, wondering whether to voice his thoughts or not. When he eventually spoke, his voice was soft and hesitant, reminiscent of the twelve year old he had once been.

'I dreamt about them… I think I dreamed their deaths. But as soon as I wake up, it just… slips away. I can't hold on to them. When we found the body, Louise was really familiar. I know I dreamed about her, but I don't know what happened. Or what killed her.'

Dean sat down heavily on his bed, looking at the carpet between his feet to avoid his brother's gaze. Eventually, he looked up, and his eyes met Sam's. They were filled with a strange mixture of resignation and determination.

'We'll find it. If you remember anything useful…' he shrugged. 'Let me know.'

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Michael Andover sat cross-legged on his bed, staring fixedly at his unadorned grey wall. The room was bare and Spartan, showing no sign of individuality. Anyone who saw it without its occupant would have guessed that it was a motel room, belonging to no one in particular. It didn't look like a room that was lived in.

And yet Michael had been here as long as he could remember, in this town, this building, this room. The woman who ran the institution had tried very hard to be a parent for him. When he had first arrived as an infant, she had consoled his endless wailing with the gentleness of her arms and the warmth of her embrace, and she had watched him grow, talking to him, providing for him, looking out for him. She had known him almost as long as his mother would have done, had she not perished when he was less than a year old.

And yet, she still couldn't really see him as a son. When he had arrived, his distress had been inevitable, and she wouldn't have expected any sign of affection from him. But as the years went on, and he still wouldn't connect with her, although he claimed not to remember the night he lost his parents, the weak explanation of his traumatic past seemed insufficient to explain his indifferent detachment from humanity.

It wasn't that Michael didn't appreciate her, he thought, as he sat bolt upright on the bed. He knew that a lot of orphanages would be far worse. But her kindness provoked no reaction in him, and he could see all too clearly that, despite her efforts, she had never come to love him.

Vividly aware of this lack of feeling, he grew up with a void in his life, and a bitter hatred of all those at school who had these comforts and failed to appreciate their luck. His cold detachment made him unpopular, and naturally this added to his feeling of isolation. It was a vicious circle, and one whose end would inevitably be in a spiral into misery and loneliness.

Nearly a year ago, he had found that he was quite right in his suspicion that he was different to other people. He was capable of things that other people thought of as fairy stories. The abilities were erratic, he could only control them on rare occasions, but he hoped that with practice, they could become very useful.

Then, only a month ago, he had been visited secretly by a young woman with short blonde hair. She hadn't given a name, but she had known his name, and used it intimately, caressing the sounds of his nondescript label with her gentle tongue. He hadn't trusted her initially: he never trusted anyone.

She confirmed his suspicion that he was special. She told him that she and her family had been looking for him for a long time, and that he could be a treasured part of their community. She offered him a home, a family, and the opportunity to bring his abilities under control and become still more powerful.

He was seduced, but a life of trusting nobody inspired him to check, nevertheless, for the catch.

'What do you want from me?' he had asked, humbly, breathlessly.

'Sam Winchester'

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At the high school, the brothers found Emma and her group of friends gathered in the same grassy spot that they had colonised the day before.

'Hey,' Sam asked breathlessly, addressing the forlorn young woman who had spoken to them the day before. 'Do you know where we can find that kid we spoke to yesterday? He didn't say what his name was… about this high, black t-shirt, skinny…'

'I know who you mean,' Emma replied hoarsely, in a voice shattered by suppressed misery. 'He's…not here.'

'What?'

'Nobody's seen him, since last night.'

'Nobody… at all?'

'Not even his parents.'

Stunned, the brothers walked away. Back in the Impala, they exchanged looks.

'Do you think it knows that he spoke to us?' Sam asked, his voice sounding awkward, his words half strangled in his tense throat.

Dean shrugged helplessly. 'I don't believe in coincidences,' he said.

Sam bit his lip, screwing up his face in frustration. They still had no leads which seemed likely to reveal the identity of the killer. The thing continued to strike, and they were still none the wiser. Even worse, for Sam, was the knowledge that he should know exactly who was responsible. He wondered whether he would recognise the culprit if he saw it, as he had recognised Louise.

Dean spoke hesitantly, as if reluctant to break the silence. 'So… do you reckon that what you wrote on the sheet last night… was something that the kid said, before it killed him?' He fixed his eyes on the steering wheel as he spoke, but swung his eyes up to meet Sam's when an answer was slow in coming.

Sam nodded; his throat was feeling too dry to speak. The untidy letters of the various messages reformed themselves in his mind's eye.

What did you do?

I didn't mean to leave you.

Did you kill them?

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I promise something more exciting will happen in future chapters. : ) At the moment I'm just setting the scene. Stay with me, it gets better!

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