Disclaimer: I don't own "Supernatural." Honestly, can you even imagine anyone owning Dean? But a lot of Sam's charm is that everyone can own him
A/N: Thank you for continuing to read—I really appreciate that, and would appreciate your comments, too. This story's just about done…probably just one more part after this, and then I can get back to reading all the great stuff you published here!
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Ginny tore apart a flannel sheet, using wide strips of it to bind Dean's knee as tightly as he could bear it. His flesh was swollen and hot to the touch, and though he tried once to put weight on the knee, it would not bear him.
She also pulled out a small cardboard box, offering him the men's clothing it contained. Thermal long-johns, a turquoise-blue flannel shirt, an old pair of khaki work-pants, red woolen socks. Nothing matched.
"They've been washed," she said, when he looked at them dubiously.
Dean cocked a quizzical eyebrow at her. "Yours?" he asked. He'd meant the question to be facetious, but he thought she might have blushed.
"They're Joe's. I told you—he helped me build the cabin. Sometimes he needs a change of clothes."
Whoever he was, this Joe wasn't as tall as Dean, but he was definitely heavier, so the fit was short but loose. It was awkward and exhausting getting into the johnnies and pants, but both fit easily over his bandaged knee, and Dean was relieved to be dressed again.
"So Joe just happens to keep some of his extra clothes here," he prompted lightly, once he'd caught his breath and sagged back into bed, blankets wrapped around and over him until he could barely move, which was definitely a good thing. It seemed very likely that his shoulder had started bleeding again.
"He's not the baby's father," Ginny told him, and Dean there was a note of regret in her voice. "Anyway, it's not what you think, and he's none of your business."
He let the matter drop, not really caring about her personal life, just desperate for distraction from the pain, and from his growing worry about Sam. There wasn't much he could do about either one, not until he could put some weight on his injured knee. But, God, where was Sammy, and was he all right?
Man, Sam, you are such a pain in my ass!
They found some aspirin in the first-aid kit, and Dean swallowed a fistful with another slug of whiskey. He lost the battle over who should have the bed—there had suddenly been three of her insisting that he be the one to use it, and she'd seen the befuddlement on his face. Head muzzy with fatigue and drink, buried in blankets, he lapsed into a restless sleep, Ginny watching over him from a chair by the fire.
By their third holiday season with Pastor Jim, the young Winchesters had both seen some things no child ever should. That year, several days before Christmas, Sam had taken his older brother's hand and solemnly led him out of the parsonage to a spot where they could see the cemetery that adjoined the church property. Because the town was smallish, so was the cemetery, and while many of the gravestones were old and worn, several new ones stood in stark contrast to their surroundings. "That's where they keep the dead people," Sammy had informed Dean pensively, a troubled expression on his face, sober with the weight of his discovery.
On Christmas Eve, Sammy scanned the skies with a happy expectancy, eyes peeled for St. Nick and his sleigh full of toys. Later that night, however, long after Pastor Jim had performed the evening's special service and the last parishioners had wished them all a very merry Christmas, Dean had awakened to find Sammy shaking him frantically, tears of panic streaming down the smaller child's face. "Dean, what if something bad gets Baby Jesus?" he had wailed, and there'd been only one way to calm him. Pastor Jim found the brothers the next morning in the church chancel, huddled together for warmth beside the manger in the Nativity scene, a sawed-off shotgun Jim didn't know they had clutched in Dean's small hands.
That was the brothers' last Christmas in the pastor's care, although he remained a fixture in their lives for years to come. The next December, the Winchesters were on the road, driving cross-country, John single-minded behind the wheel of their old Chevy, seemingly possessed in his hurry to get somewhere Dean didn't, couldn't remember. The ten-year-old knew it was Christmas-time only when he spied the colored lights on the far-flung houses they passed during cold, silent nights, and six-year-old Sammy innocently slept through it all, snuggled against his big brother's side.
Dean woke with Ginny's hand on his arm, her voice soft and scared in his ear. "Dean, there's something outside."
He struggled up from sleep, reaching automatically for his gun, disconcerted not to find it, aware again of pain flaring everywhere. "What's going on? What time is it?"
"Almost midnight. I heard something moving around, something big, and there was, I don't know, a sniffing noise, but I couldn't see anything. There's no moon."
Suddenly an eerie cry sounded from just outside the cabin, wavering and unearthly, and Dean felt the hairs on his arms rise.
"Son of a bitch! Lock the door!" He flung back the covers and hoisted himself from the bed, moving as rapidly as possible on one good leg to shutter both sets of windows (big gray shape, stooped at the shoulders, what kind of werewolf doesn't need a full moon?) while Ginny followed his command and set the deadbolt.
"Dean!" she cried, thoroughly frightened. "What is it?"
"The thing that attacked me, the thing that's been killing the sheep! We need weapons…." He remembered something suddenly, and snapped his fingers. "Ginny, do you have salt? Anything silver, or iron?"
She looked at him as though he were mad, both hands held protectively on her belly, then crossed the tiny space to the stove and handed him a frying pan.
"Cast iron," she said, and he thought she was trying hard to sound calm.
Ignoring the agony tearing at his knee, Dean moved beside her, tucking the frying pan under one arm, frantically searching her tiny stock of provisions for salt or anything else he might use against the creature outside. Paprika, nutmeg, curry powder, (what the hell?) dried onion flakes--no salt. He grabbed a small butcher knife just as something heavy thumped against the door outside.
Ginny let out a shriek, and Dean hastily grabbed the fireside chair, tossing knife and pan into the seat so he could shove it against the door for added security, pain searing him everywhere, punishing him for moving. Spying the poker, he snatched it up, grabbed the knife with the same hand, took the frying pan in the other and turned to give it back to Ginny. Dean stopped short when he saw her.
She stood frozen beside the stove, eyes round in her pale face, lips quivering.
"What is it?" he demanded. "Ginny, what's wrong?"
He followed her shocked gaze to the floor at her feet, where liquid puddled around her.
"I think," she said, her voice hoarse, "that my water just broke."
Dean blinked once, a ghost of a laugh escaping him. "Come again?" he asked politely.
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For an hour Sam drove up and down the road, the same two-mile stretch over and over, using the turnout where they had originally parked the Impala as centerpoint, hoping to spot Dean, hoping Dean would spot him. When the gas gauge neared empty, he parked in the turnout and walked the route he'd been driving, carrying the EMF meter, a flashlight and his shotgun. Twice, three times he walked the road, but there was nothing.
"Dean!" His voice was lost immediately in the trees, but he called again anyway. "Dean!" God, he was Bo-Peep, Sam thought a little crazily, and Dean was his lost sheep. The idea brought the hint of a cheerless smile to his lips, helping to ground him.
You're overreacting, Sam, he told himself. Calm down and think about this rationally. It's dark, but Dean moves better in the dark than just about anyone you know. It's cold, but there's plenty of dry tinder and he's got a lighter if he wants to start a fire. He's armed, so what's going to get him? There are no bears, no mountain lions—you saw plenty of evidence of deer and rabbits for wolves to prey on. This sheep-killing thing—seriously, man, how hard is it to kill sheep? If it's some sort of chupacabra or Elmendorf beast…well, they're nasty, but small. Dean? Hell, he could take out a pack of those nasties in his sleep. Dean is Dean. He's going to be fine.
Six times Sam walked past the remains of the dead opossum, roadkill from the morning or night before, its blood dark on the asphalt even under the flashlight's beam. Frowning, he waved the EMF meter over it, as he had half a day earlier. Again, not a peep. Maybe the signal this morning had been a fluke, and there really was nothing supernatural on the mountain.
Sam took a deep breath. Okay. Better. Rational is good.
Images of the slaughtered sheep and its tiny fetus flashed before him, and Sam felt all the worry and fear rise up in him like a tidal wave, spilling from his mouth, out of his control.
"Dean!" he cried. "Dean! Dean!"
Of course there was no response. Nothing to hear but the wind in the trees, the panic in his voice, and the blood pounding in his ears. Nothing to see but the stars overhead, his trembling hands, and the blood on the pavement. Everything else was a big, black nothing.
Finally, his throat raw, his stomach in knots, Sam grabbed the duffel bag out of the Impala's back seat and hiked back down to the pasture where Joe and Mel had their flocks, leaving the Impala for Dean to find when he returned. When he returned.
It was Joe's watch, and Sam sat with him on one side of the campfire while Mel snored lustily on the other, wrapped tight in his sleeping bag. Sam had his shotgun across his knees, and Joe took note, resting his own rifle in the same position.
The sheep slept quietly, legs folded beneath them, night sky overhead. Where the trees allowed, Sam watched the stars wheel, found Orion, where Betelgeuse and Rigel twinkled brightly.
Joe looked up, too. "All those stars," he said, and Sam thought that the herder wasn't the type to stay quiet, not when there was company. "Which ones you looking at?"
"The Great Hunter, Orion," Sam murmured, indicating. "See that blue one right there? That's Rigel, the heel of his foot. Orion boasted that he could kill all the animals on earth, and the earth goddess believed him. So, she sent a giant scorpion to kill him. The scorpion stung Orion on the heel, and he died."
"Huh." Joe chewed on his lip for a moment. "You know, the ancient Sumerians saw something completely different in that constellation."
"Yeah? What?"
"A sheep."
Sam shot him a look, saw that the herder was completely serious, and laughed.
Joe smiled back. "I wonder what the ancient Sumerians would've thought of that one," he said, using his chin to indicate the sky again.
"What do you—" Sam spotted the satellite just before it disappeared behind the trees on the mountain. He hastily pulled out his cell phone, knowing that there was no way that satellite was going to give him reception. Seriously, how crazy would that be? But any port in a storm, man. He was checking the phone anyway.
Sam laughed again in surprise. For whatever reason, he had a signal.
Heart in his throat, he made the motions, but the call went straight through to voice-mail. Even so, just hearing Dean's voice made things easier. And harder. Dammit, Dean.
"You got Dean. Leave me a message and I'll get back to you when I can."
"Hey, man, it's me," Sam said softly. "Where are you? I guess you're out of range, or your phone's off. I've been looking for you. Call me. Please."
He closed the phone and sat quietly for a few moments, feeling old and tired, thinking about not thinking, then put the cell away and drew out the EMF meter, turning it over in his hands, examining it in the light of the campfire. Dean had jury-rigged it from some old Walkman, and the first time Sam had seen it, he'd scoffed. Damn thing worked, though--had swung to life, squealing, a hundred times since that first one, whenever a spirit (some evil sonofabitch, Dean's voice said in his head) was nearby. Not such bad craftsmanship after all.
"That one of those personal music player things?" Joe asked, and Sam smiled.
"Yeah, something like that," he said. "It, uh…yeah."
After a while, Joe tried again. "This isn't hard country, Sam. Really, your brother's going to be all right."
Done talking about it, Sam chewed a ragged nail on his left hand instead. "So, you buried that sheep until the feds could get here to see it?"
"They've got to know about any trouble they're causing with their wolf program. And what else are we supposed to do with the carcass?"
"I don't know. I guess I thought maybe you could salvage the wool, or the meat. Both."
Joe nodded. "It's hard to lose an animal like that, Sam. Expensive. But I'm okay with burying it until I can report it to the government boys. Couldn't leave it out in the open—too many predators."
"Yeah," Sam said, frowning thoughtfully. "Predators. Drawn to the smell of the meat."
"Blood," Joe corrected him. "They're drawn to the smell of the blood."
"Huh."
There was another long silence until Joe broke it. "Where you from, Sam?"
"Kansas, originally, but we moved around a lot. You?"
"I'm from Wyoming. Moved to Colorado about seven, eight years ago, invested in my own sheep." Joe stretched a kink out of his neck, wriggled his shoulders, grabbed at his rifle when it nearly slid off his lap. "We summer up north, mostly, in the high mountains, then come down here for the winter. Used to keep on going, on into New Mexico, but then I met Virginia."
His voice trailed off, and Sam smiled. "So she's the local one."
"Kind of. I met her in Stoner's Well, anyway. She was looking to build a cabin up here—somewhere she could get away, she said—and I was looking for some extra income. Always been good with my hands. Anyway, I helped her build her place."
"Guess I'd be considered a chauvinist if I said it seems a bit remote for a single woman up here."
Joe chuckled. "I said this country's not hard, but Virginia—well, let's just say she likes to have things her way, likes to be in control. If she was older, she'd be what they used to call a tough broad. There's a little picnic area for tourists another couple of miles down the mountain—even eight months pregnant, she leaves her little hybrid car there and hikes three miles in to the cabin. I offered to get her a four-wheel drive, but she refused. Said it would make things too complicated."
"As if the baby didn't complicate things enough," Sam offered gently.
Joe breathed in deeply through his nose. "You got that right. I thought I'd go crazy when she told me she was pregnant. We hadn't….I hadn't known she was seeing anybody. Hadn't made my interest clear enough, I guess. Anyway, I tried to make her tell me who the father was, was he going to do right by her? She just said it didn't matter. That he was gone and wasn't coming back, and the baby was hers. After a while, that's how I saw it, too."
"And now you're ready to marry her," Sam finished for him.
The herder reached out to toss another pine branch on the fire, nodding. "If she'll have me. When I--"
The cry seemed louder this time, although Sam was sure that it floated far down from the mountain. It was plaintive and menacing at once, sending a shiver down his spine as Joe stood up suddenly beside him. The sheep bolted to their feet all at once, an edgy, bleating wave, and Mel snorted to wakefulness.
"Wolf?" Sam asked, but Joe shook his head.
"Not like I ever heard. Not a coyote, either."
The cry came again, and this time there was nothing mournful about it—it was hostile, malicious. Sam thought there was also something triumphant in the sound, as though the thing making it had found what it was looking for.
"I think that's up by the cabin," Joe breathed before panic took him and he began running, across the road and into the forest before the creature's call had even died away.
"Mel, stay with the sheep!" Sam grabbed the duffel bag and followed Joe up the mountainside, into the utter darkness beneath the trees.
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"You're joking, right?" For a moment, the creature outside the cabin was forgotten as Dean gaped at Ginny. "You're in labor?"
"I think so." She gave him a nervous little smile. "I might actually have been having contractions since we got here, but I thought I was just tired and sore from, you know—everything." Ginny waved a hand aimlessly, grappling with comprehension and then catching a firm grip. "The book says that walking and standing shorten the first stage."
"Then sit down!" Dean took her by the shoulders and gently but firmly steered her to the bed, gritting his teeth hard when the injured knee shrieked in protest, compelling her to sit beside the tangle of blankets where he had slept and pulling them around her.
"This is so not happening!" he groaned, flustered, and her smile this time was genuine.
"Oh, I think it is," she said, the joy in her voice reminding Dean again of what an angel must sound like when it sings. "It's all right, Dean. I know what to do—there's nothing more natural than this."
She winced suddenly, clutching her hands to her belly and drawing in a deep breath, just as the thing outside thudded heavily against the cabin. It made a hideous snuffling noise along the door, and something hard and sharp scratched down the wood slowly, as if measuring the effort it would take to get inside.
"Nothing natural about that," Dean growled, hoisting the poker in his right hand, torn between distractions of woman and beast. "All right, so we've got, what, eighteen, maybe twenty hours before the baby comes?"
Ginny looked up at him in astonishment. "Where did you get that idea?"
It took him a moment. "'The View'," he finally muttered, glaring when she put her hands over her mouth in surprise, then full-on giggled at him. "Women are always talking about how long they were in labor!" he said defensively.
Outside, the thing howled long against the door, its cry foreboding and desolate, and the temperature in the cabin seemed to drop sharply. Levity vanished.
"Will it get in?" Ginny asked quietly, and Dean shook his head.
"Not if I can help it."
She nodded, closed her eyes and inhaled again deeply, her face and body relaxing, becoming tranquil as she breathed.
"I trust you," she said simply.
There was a moment of nothing, of silence, of vacuum, and then Dean watched as Ginny breathed in deeply once again, her eyes still closed, lashes dark against pale cheeks. "I had a friend once who delivered her first-born in an hour and a half," she said, then randomly, "Childbirth is naturally stressful, but not for me; it's all just fine for me."
Her voice was melodic, and Dean realized she was talking more to herself than to him as she lay back in the bed, drawing her feet up after her, gently rubbing her belly. "I am calm. I am peaceful. I have no fear, and I am in control of all my emotions."
Ginny sighed, took another long breath, then opened her eyes and smiled gently up at him. And then her face just (contracted, he thought with incredulity) and she burst into sudden tears.
"Oh, Dean!" she sobbed, overcome by unanticipated distress, reaching out to him in sorrow and consolation. "You're bleeding again!"
Nonplussed, Dean looked down to see bright red patches blossoming through the turquoise fabric of his borrowed shirt.
"It's all right," he assured her, drawn to her, wanting to take her into the circle of his arms to comfort her (comfort him), knowing the pain it would cause (so many kinds of pain, Dean)—Dean stopped, hands clenched at his sides, steeling himself.
"It's all right," he said again, and it was an effort to keep his voice steady as she cried. "Don't be upset, Ginny. It's just a little blood."
There was an odd chuffing noise at the door, and then the thing outside howled again. This time the sound was full-throated, aggressive and exultant. Something heavy was hurled (threw itself) against the door, once, then a second time, and the wood of the frame cracked ominously.
Dean and Ginny looked at each other, certainty passing between them silently. The creature was coming for them, and would not be denied.
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