BLOOD ON THE TRACKS

- Chapter Eight -

"I can't smell the fish," Sam said, his voice barely above a whisper. He frowned and touched at the nasal canula that Dean had hooked up the moment they arrived at their motel, exactly twenty nine minutes after Dean had taken him off the hospital oxygen. It had passed in a pained blur, interspersed with a pitstop where Dean had injected something into the IV port in the back of his hand. It hadn't knocked him out, just made him sort of floaty, put a chemical block between his failing body and his panicked mind. It had helped.

He let his hand drift to the IV line where he fingered the twin plastic tubes, fluids and medication – a concoction that included IV Flolan. He remembered that one because it sounded like flowers. Thought Flolan's might be pink with purple centers and smell like lilac lavenders. Jessica would have planted them beside the petunias that bordered the outdoor entertainment setting.

Except Jessica was dead.

Sam blinked and squeezed the IV lines, pinched them closed, then released. Did it again, and again. Light sedation, Dean had said, to relax the muscles because the tenser he was, the harder it would be to breathe. It made sense, so he let his hand fall away and allowed the malleable plastic to recover as he considered the plight of the dead fish. The room had been locked up for well over a day, the weather warm. He longed to take the piped air away from his face and inhale the rotting aroma of Winchester pranking. It should stink by now. Reek something absolutely awful.

Sam wiggled his toes free from the blanket Dean had laid over his lower legs and turned toward his brother. Dean sat on the second bed, the one closest to the door – the one with the stinky fish tucked behind the headboard. No way in hell room service would have found it. The older boy had one leg pulled up and resting on the bed, the sole of his shoe facing Sam. Must have stepped in something, Sam thought idly as he noted a thick patch of green gum on the instep of his brother's shoe. Unless it was rotting fish innards. His lips pulled up a little as he contemplated that.

"Can you smell the fish?" he said, louder.

Dean's head ricocheted from its bowed position with enough speed and force to cause self inflicted whiplash. "Dammit, don't do that. I thought you were asleep."

"Fish?" Sam said weakly, realizing then that he sounded deranged. Thought he ought to explain, but a deep ache in his chest warned him of the danger of excessive vocalization.

"What fish?" Dean asked cautiously.

Sam blinked and winced. "Doesn't matter, didn't work." His gaze dropped to his bandaged hand as his free one scratched at his chest.

Dean rose and the bed creaked as his weight lifted. It pulled Sam's attention and he stared at the puce colored cover until Dean's denim clad legs blocked his view.

"Sammy?"

One name, so many questions and so much concern. "I'm okay," Sam said even as he wondered at the absurdity of such a statement. Truth be told, he did not feel okay. Sort of spacey, heavy and sore… and warm. He idly kicked at the blankets again to shift them further away. Even the hospital issue cotton top and drawstring pants added a slightly unpleasant balminess to his body.

"You sure you're okay? Are you in pain?"

"Hmm. No." He gave one final kick and one end of the blanket started a slow, graceful dive off the edge of the mattress. Satisfied, Sam looked up at his brother. "What you find in the.…" He winced and pressed the canula tighter to his nose. "Diary?" he finished, slightly breathlessly.

Dean studied him a moment longer then glanced down at the blanket. "Melanie was a Star Trek fanatic. Obsessive, delusional and psychotic." He paused and eyed Sam. "You sure know how to pick 'em."

"Hilarious," Sam said softly.

"So was the decomposing tuna."

"You found it?"

"I saw you put it there, Loki. You're losing your touch."

Sam huffed and toyed with the IV lines again. "What else you find?"

"The kid was a certifiable loony. One Spock ear short of a convention."

"That's helpful," Sam said sarcastically. "Anything else?"

"Lots. Strap yourself in, kiddo. The ride gets bumpy."

"You on something?"

"Dead fish. Snorting it actually."

Sam pushed himself up on the bed as he watched his brother with a touch of apprehension. "Dude?"

Dean caught his lower lip between his teeth as he ducked his head. He scrubbed a hand across his face and retreated to the bed. "Sorry," he muttered as he snagged the diary and flipped it open. "Only so much bad television I can take."

"It's not bad."

"They don't have cars, Sam. Just weird assed wigs, space ships and really bad scripts."

"It was… is a cult classic."

"Cult, see that right there is my problem. Cults are evil. Mind destroying."

Sam gently ran his good hand over the length of the bandages. His injured fingers sparked with an unpleasant sensation that defied description and turned his stomach. At least it took his mind off his chest, off what Melanie had done to him… of how screwed up everything had become. "What else is in the diary?" he asked tiredly.

"Emory Erickson was the creator of the transportation device that moved characters to and from the starship. Saved the television network a packet on fabricating a docking station for the various crafts."

"Yeah, I get that," Sam said as he scratched at his chest again. His hand stilled as Dean moved to him.

"Let me see." Dean had Sam's chest bared before Sam could protest. "It's the adhesive from the monitor pads. Don't scratch."

Disconcerted, Sam pulled the cotton t-shirt down as Dean returned to the second bed and sat on the edge. The elder hunter retrieved the diary and fanned it open. His hand stilled on the page and Sam could just make out a diagram of some sort.

"Rest Sam, we'll be cutting out of here in a few hours and I need you mobile." Dean glanced at him before looking back at the book.

Sam watched his brother and waited for further explanation. It did not come, instead Dean pored over the journal, his eyes flicking across the page as he scanned. Frustrated and confused, Sam touched at the nasal canula, turned his head to the side and took in the oxygen tank and IV stand that stood against the brick interior wall. The small digital clock on the bedside table showed six o'clock. PM he thought. It was getting dark.

Oxygen tank and IV. "How?"

"Borrowed," Dean said. "Ted helped."

Sam's head swiveled. He scanned the room, searching for Ted. Spotted him in the far corner, asleep in a chair, shadowed and unmoving. Clothed in the same attire he had worn on the train, though there looked to be something white beneath the stained overcoat. Hospital gown, Sam thought.

"The dematerialization is potentially reversible," Dean said more to himself than to Sam as he tapped at the diagram. "Flow chart shows how she thought it would work. It actually makes sense in a deranged sort of way."

"Quinn. Emory's son. He disappeared, transportation accident. Emory brought him back."

Dean's hand stilled and a sly smile curled one side of his mouth. "Knew you were a Trekkie geek. Late night research, my ass."

Sam braced himself with one hand and pushed away from the bed. His arm trembled as he forced it to take his weight. "That episode didn't air until last year, Dean. She's been dead ten years. No way she could have known about Emory. He hadn't been… thought up when she died." He finished and panted weakly, his chest tight and lungs burning.

"It's in here, Sam. She had conversations with him." Dean swallowed hard as understanding dawned. "You're telling me this chick dreamed up this Emory dude before he had even been… thought up."

Sam nodded.

"Oh." He scratched at his ear. "Okay, well, maybe that's good. So this isn't really Star Trek mythology then, it's a parallel thought stream."

"You're scaring me, man."

Dean chuckled. "Yeah, well work with me here. Melanie believed her own deranged fantasy to the extent that she withdrew from society. Locked herself away with her diary and imagined conversations with this Emory dude. Either she got really lucky with her warped imagination, or she had some kind of precognition that allowed her to see the future of the Star Trek series."

"Psychic?"

"Maybe, or just psychotic, but if she did have powers of the mind then it makes her a far more powerful spirit. Which could work in our favor, if this," he raised the book, "twisted reality followed her into death."

"But why?"

"Diary doesn't explain why. The later entries take weird to a whole new level. Her psychosis fast-tracked and she broke her self imposed isolation to go and search for Emory. I can't figure why she chose the subway though."

"Speed."

"It's hardly light speed, though she was searching for Emory so maybe she figured he was in a subway tunnel – maybe she figured he was disguised as a rat?" Dean grinned, seemingly pleased with his inappropriate humor.

"Why take people?"

"Don't know. She was a loner in life, why not be a loner in death?" Dean looked up again and his eyes softened. "You need to rest. We don't need to leave for another few hours, try to get some sleep."

"How did she do it?"

"Sam, you need to rest. I'll tell you more later."

"She dematerialized me, Dean. How the hell did she do it?"

Dean sighed and shrugged. "Dematerializing a living being defies the whole gamut of current scientific thinking. Physics, mathematics, quantum mechanics, Einstein's theory of relativity. You name it and they all say you can't do it. But she did, Sam. Anyway, who's to say that science has it all figured out? If it wasn't for Pythagoras we'd all still think the earth was flat."

Sam stared at his brother in bemused shock.

"What?"

"Pythagoras?"

"Oh c'mon dude, I'm not a total moron."

Sam raised an eyebrow.

"Fine, Larry and Sergey helped me out," Dean said, then added, "Larry Page and Sergey Brin."

"Who?"

Dean opened his hands in an are you dense gesture. Seemingly dissatisfied with Sam's lack of response, he exhaled heavily and said, "The founders of Google. Both guys went to Stanford." He waved one hand dismissively. "You know what, it doesn't matter. Melanie believed in her own madness with such voracious intensity that her spirit was imbued with the ability to defy all natural laws."

"Voracious? Imbued?"

"Yes, Sammy, I have a vocabulary too."

Sam smiled weakly. "So what's the plan?"

"Ah, you want to hear the plan?"

"Yeah, I do."

Dean teased his lower lip with his tongue, the playful banter dying as his gaze raked over Sam, lingering longest on the bandaged hand. He quickly looked down.

"Melanie believed that a transportation could be reversed to restore the original state – sort of like restoring a backup of a saved version of a file." He chewed on his thumbnail, then drew in a breath and continued. "If a transportation went wrong, she believed it could be reversed by putting the person back through and relying on the last known 'saved' version. So we'll go back into the subway. Summon the bitch and get her to put you back on the train. Simple."

Sam stared, chilled and confused. He thought he should speak but had no idea what to say. Dean eyed him and continued.

"We will go back tonight – in a few hours. It will coincide almost perfectly with the anniversary of her death. Seems the disappearances all occurred in the lead-up to her suicide so I'm guessing that once the anniversary passes she goes into dead chick hibernation for another year." Dean scratched at his temple. "Or something."

Sam's focus jumped between the diary and his brother, his mind spinning. "But the reversal has already happened. She's already put me back on the track."

"On the track but not in the train. When she took you through the metal wall of the train, she screwed up the process. She says in here that she can fix it."

"No she can't."

"She says in here that she can. If she takes you back through that train wall, it will heal you."

"No it won't."

Dean rubbed his hands across his thighs, his voice tight. "You got any better ideas, college boy?"

Sam huffed and lay back, exhausted. He had no other ideas at all. None. He eyed his brother. Dean kept his head down, shoulders hunched, poring over Melanie's diary. Clutching at straws, the very same way he had done after Dean had been electrocuted. But a faith healer to heal Dean was very different from going into a subway tunnel and cheating death. "Dean," he said quietly.

Dean's head came up, his eyes bright, hopeful. Sam swallowed hard. "It's okay. I'm okay with it."

Dean tugged on his lower lip, one hand palm down on the book, flattening the spine. "Okay, good." He sucked in a breath, snapped the book closed and stood. "We'll go in three hours, catch the 9:50pm train from South Central, it'll give us six trains to summon—"

"That's not what I meant. We can't go back into that subway. It's not safe and it won't work."

"Since when did you become The Amazing Randi?"

"You can't summon a spirit on your own, and even if you do, she is unpredictable and dangerous."

"So are all the other things we hunt, Sam. It's never stopped us before."

"We've never done anything like this before, and I can't help."

Dean's eyes sparked with a combination of fierce big brother protectiveness and denial induced insanity. "Ted is going to help."

"Ted?"

"Yes, whiny, sniveling stinky Ted." Dean waved toward the reclined and drooling figure in the corner. "The fruit of his loins did this to you, so he can damn well help to fix it."

Sam suddenly laughed, a tortured breathless sound that whittled through his screwed up defective lungs, snaked up his throat and bubbled over his lips like coppery blood. It hurt just the same. But he couldn't stop, and soon he was crying, because insanity drove that road and he was a lashed in passenger. No way out. No way in hell that Dean's demented denial driven plan was going to work.

"Sam, stop. Christ, Sammy, stop."

He couldn't, because it hurt so much and he had no control over any of it. Dean pulled him in, rubbed his back as though he was a child with colic. A colicky baby, he reasoned and that set him off again.

"Are you trying to kill yourself?"

Sam leaned into his brother as tears wet his cheeks and every exhalation came out as a starved, dry wheeze. He pondered Dean's question and realized that maybe he was. Because going back into that subway with a half assed theory that they could summon Melanie's spirit, communicate with her and then get her to put Sam back on the train in the hope that it would heal him, would get them all killed.

"Sam, calm down. This isn't helping."

He tried, really he tried, but as the insane laughter died, Sam could not breathe. Panic clawed at his chest, ripped through his lungs and closed his throat. In his agony driven stupor, Sam cast back to the pain of Professor Sandbaum's experiment and to the horror of breathing without air. Reality and memory blurred, gashed with confusion and fear. He felt a crushing embrace, a hand through his hair, another against his back, something else but he could not breathe and fire burned in his chest and it all made no sense and he felt too weak, too scared… too much. It was all too much.

He thought heard Dean swear, heard the fearful hitch in his brother's voice and that terrified Sam even more – made him struggle harder as his blood boiled and flames burst within.

"Ted. Dammit, I need you!"

Sam's eyes closed as he fisted his uninjured hand in Dean's shirt, then abruptly released and pushed away. He fell, pulled up short by strong arms and a scared, soothing voice. The fire inside reached combustible intensity and Sam fought with everything he had. Except that wasn't much.

"Christ, Sam. Stop!"

His fist hit something and a deep grunt sounded against the harshness of his own desperate gasps.

"Son of a bitch! Ted get the sedation. In the bag. Not that one. Yes. Yes. No, not that. Yes, that. Bring it over here. Now! C'mon!"

Sam rolled onto his side, jarred into stunned submission as pain bored through his injured hand, it stopped him cold. Just for a moment everything became still and complete: nerve endings electrified, every muscle tense and his lungs frozen. The fire vanished and ice invaded, hypothermic cold. His eyes jerked open, wide and staring as he gasped for air that would not come. He felt a pinch at the back of his hand, cool wetness, then a pushed flow against the iced blood in his veins. He choked on a breathless sob as the drug entered his system.

"Christ, Sammy." A cold trembling hand pressed against his cheek, palmed at the tears. "You're okay. It'll be okay."

Sam fought to focus as gentle warmth flooded his veins, erasing the pain, the fear. He gasped, pulled in air and shuddered as it hit his lungs and diffused. The oxygenated flow changed, turned in on itself and grew cold and sharp, tore up his throat and scoured his trachea. He whimpered and tried to pull the tubing away. A shaking hand stilled him.

"It has to be high pressure," Dean said, and he sounded woefully apologetic.

Sam's consciousness swirled, disconnecting body from mind. He thought he heard Dean promise him that he would wake up, that he shouldn't be afraid, that Dean would fix it all, then his eyes closed and he felt no more.