It was dark, and beginning to rain a little. Sam sat on the ground, his arms folded over his knees.
The Mother and Cebrerus were standing a little way away, talking. Sam glanced up at them, then down. Should he make a break for it now? Should he wait? As soon as he moved he would be dead. As he watched, the Mother walked away, leaving Cerberus behind.
"Kid." A whisper from the trees. "Kid!"
"What the hell do you want?" Sam hissed.
"Oh, the gratitude." The Trickster grinned. "Sammy, I am here to save your skinny little arse."
"What?"
"Part of the deal, wasn't it? I said I'd get you back to your dysfunctional livelihood safely if we didn't happen to run into old Dean along the way. And so far we haven't. Deal still stands."
"Do I have a choice?"
"Sure. You could always go to Hell." He indicated Cerberus. "Come on!"
All their attention upon quickly fleeing the scene, both of them failed to spot Cerberus smile.
"You little bastard! You stitched me up."
"Worth a try. The old biddy still didn't give me what I wanted anyway, so it's pretty much a moot point by now."
"Is there anyone you don't double cross?"
Sam could see the Impala through the trees. The moonlight glinted off the chrome. It was then he noticed the driver's door was open, and as he watched, a dark figure stepped out. The half-light illuminated his face, and Sam stopped dead.
Dean looked over to them and waved.
"Uh oh." The Trickster whispered. He turned to Sam. "What now?"
Sam gave an insane and completely reckless grin. "Let's go say hello." He casually pushed aside plants to reach Dean and the Impala.
"And they call me crazy! Screw that, I'm staying here." The Trickster stubbornly sat down on an exposed stump to watch.
"Dean."
"Sam."
The two of them sized each other up. Dean was a little bit more lined about the eyes, a little bit shaggier, but otherwise seemingly the same man Sam had left all those years earlier. It was almost hard to believe that under that façade was a creature that was no longer human.
"How are you?"
"Not dead." Dean replied with a completely straight face.
"Well. Cool. That's always a good thing." Not a flicker of a smile. Sam frowned. "Why did you do it?"
"My reasons are my own." Came the answer.
"So. You come to see the car? I've been looking after it. Like I promised."
Not a flicker.
"What do you want?"
"I don't want anything, Sam." He finally growled. "That was taken off me. Along with everything else soft and humane. You know, there's something to be said about not being able to feel pain."
And in that moment Sam couldn't breathe. He sank to his knees, gasping. "You destroyed me, little brother. You alone reduced me to this. You all but killed me, and left me to die alone."
Spots danced before Sam's eyes. I tried. I tried so hard. I couldn't…
Dean's eyes were alive with an inner fire. Memories of complete resentment resurfaced in his mind, Dad always being softer on Sam, Sam getting away with being a complete ass because he was the youngest, Sam going off to college and leaving him alone with the hateful, obsessed father. And duty. Always that damned duty to protect his little brother.
He remembered it all, and felt nothing.
"You killed me. No one else."
BLAM!
Sam watched through watering eyes as Dean seemed to fall in slow motion. Slowly he found he could breathe again. Gazing up blearily, he saw the police officer, Gabriel Forsyth, reloading.
"Nice to see you again, Sam." He grinned.
Jo knelt down beside Sam, carefully not looking at the other body.
"What do we do with this one?" Gabriel nudged Dean's prone form.
"I have an idea." Jo fished her phone out of her pocket and dialled a number. The three of them waited in silence until the call connected.
"Deacon, it's JB. We need your help."
Sam was still groggy, so Jo took charge. She drove the four of them back to Minnesota, Dean and Gabriel in the back, Gabriel keeping his gun aimed on the still figure. Maybe she didn't like him, but he was right when he said that Jo didn't have all the hands needed for the job.
It began to rain, and the ground around the Impala soon turned to slush.
"What exactly was in that round?" She enquired.
Gabriel grinned. "My own recipe." But he didn't divulge anything more than that, and there was no more conversation, each of them left nursing their own dark thoughts.
Quite a while later, Jo pulled up at the deserted back entrance of Locke's Abattoir. The deserted factory was the site of her last hunt with her old partner Deacon Ridgeway, right before she was pulled into Sam's crazy world.
"You all right now?" She asked Sam.
"Super."
"Help me get this guy out." Gabriel demanded. "For a skinny dude, he's heavy."
Jo and Gabriel manhandled Dean over to the gates, Sam watching every move they made with an unreadable expression on his face. Jo noticed while he watched over his brother's body protectively, he never got close to him at any point.
"Deacon!"
"Alright, keep your voice down," A tall man with dark red hair hurried out of the factory, a ring of keys in his hand. Quickly he unlocked the chains and let them in, peering suspiciously at Gabriel, Sam and Dean.
"Looks like you got it all going on." Deacon remarked to Jo.
"Just open the doors for us, Deac."
There was one massive meat locker in the back that Jo remembered. It was reinforced and the door was three inches thick. Deacon had removed all the meat hooks, knives and other potentially dangerous instruments as per Jo's instructions. He even had enough foresight to leave a couple of ratty blankets in the corner.
Sam and Deacon watched as the other two deposited Dean not-so-gently on the floor. "So. You're this Sam JB was up in arms about. I can honestly say I'm not that impressed."
"Really. Why's that?"
"Haven't you heard the stories they tell about you?"
"Yeah. I'm supposed to have three heads and eat small children for breakfast. How much did she tell you?"
"What she wanted done. Care to enlighten me to the plan? What's with the unconscious guy? What about that creep over there?"
"Watch it." Gabriel said gruffly.
The door clanged closed behind them. "I'm not sure if we should tell you." Sam said. "Tell you both. It could put you both in danger."
Gabriel folded his arms. "Since when are we ever not in danger?"
"I'm with the cop." Deacon jabbed his thumb over his shoulder. "If we're going to be babysitting, at least tell us what's going on."
"I never asked you to-"
"Yeah, but we're here, aren't we? And there is only two of you." Gabriel said bluntly. "You dragged us into this. The least you can do is tell us what's going on. You told me that there's a new demon out there. Don't you think the rest of us deserve to be told?"
Deacon's eyebrows rose. "There's a new demon? What new demon?"
Gabriel glanced at him. "Some evil bitch that wants to take over the world."
"Again?"
"Again."
"Why can't we know?" Deacon's incredulous stare turned suspicious and nasty.
Jo reflectively stretched out her hands. "No, Deacon, it's not anything like that."
"Why the hell would we ever work for a demon?" Sam scowled, catching Deacon's thought.
"You tell me. I've been on the beat ten years, been a hunter a lot longer than that. And I know there's something you're not telling us." Gabriel snarled.
"Deacon, you don't believe this-"
"JB, you just locked some guy in a fridge. What am I supposed to believe?"
"You're supposed to believe me!"
"Even when you're not telling the truth?"
"STOP." Sam cut over the voices. "You want to know the truth? There's an army out there. Something none of us have ever seen before. They're going to win because this is exactly what happens when a group of hunters gets put in the same room! They don't have to kill us because sooner or later we'll kill ourselves!"
He took several deep breaths to steady himself. "As for the guy in the fridge, well. He's my brother."