Thanks to all who have reviewed so far...and sorry for the long update times...I got distracted by writing Sanctuary, but now that's done and I'm back on track. Please feed the beast and review...

The darkness was complete, so thick that Dean could almost taste it. He scrambled blindly backward, splashing in the ice-cold water until his arm brushed against Sam's body. Dean grabbed him and cradled him to his chest, lifting his face from the water. A split second of relief rolled over Dean when he heard Sam take a gasping, sputtering breath, and felt him clutch wildly at his hands.

But the relief was short lived.

Pain like a spear in his chest stole Dean's breath and he let out a groan, eyes tearing. The pain rolled outward, tearing at his guts, radiating out to his fingertips. He could taste blood boiling up in the back of his throat and he gave a gurgling cough. Out of the darkness there shimmered the specter of the girl, her eyes filled with angry tears. Her mouth was a tight line, lips quivering. She stared down at Dean, and she was all he could see in the blackness. He could feel the rage radiating off of her. "Stop!" gasped Dean, struggling to catch his breath. He could feel the hot blood spill down his chin as he spoke. "You have…to stop!"

The girl was practically on top of him now, staring down at him. A tear dropped from her cheek, disappearing into the darkness as it fell. "Bad man." Her voice was whisper soft, thick with childish hurt. "Bad man."

"No!" Dean choked. "No, we're not bad…men…" Another twist of pain gouged at him and he groaned, a half-strangled sob. "We're trying to…take you home…" Sam rolled his head against Dean's chest, moaning with his own pain, hands grasping blindly for Dean.

"Bad men lie." Her lower lip jutted out and another tear teetered on her eyelashes. She narrowed her eyes and Dean's pain increased threefold. It felt as though his eyes had melted in their sockets and were running down his cheeks, but when he passed his hand over his face he realized that the sticky wetness was blood.

"I'm not lying, I swear!" Dean cried, slurring around a mouthful of blood. "We want to take you home…"

The little girl looked down at him. In her eyes there flared a spark of hope, though dimmed by wariness. "You'll take me home?"

Dean ground his teeth around a scream of pain. "I promise!" he yelped, clutching Sam tighter. Sam moaned in response.

"Cross your heart?"

"Hope to die! Please!" Dean felt himself fading to unconsciousness, pulled down by the undertow of pain. And then, in an instant, everything stopped. The pain, the roaring in his ears, everything. He gasped out a curse and spat a mouthful of blood into the darkness.

Sam stirred against his chest, weakly calling, "Dean?" Dean squeezed the back of Sam's neck with his hand but couldn't find the strength to reply.

"Take me home." The little girl stamped an ethereal foot.

"We will…just hold on…" Dean took a shaky breath and pushed Sam into a seated position. He looked up at the girl, at her pale face. "What's…your name, sweetheart?"

The little girl paused, face still suspicious. "Anna."

"We're going to take you home, Anna, but you're going to have to show us the way out of here. You know how to play follow the leader?"

"Yes." A little smile played at the corners of Anna's mouth. "So I'll be the leader?"

"You're the leader, that's right." Dean struggled to his knees. "Don't go too fast now, make sure we can keep up." He reached back into the dark and found Sam's shoulder. "Sammy, Anna is going to lead us out of here. Can you keep up?" Dean kept his voice light, despite the fact that his heart was battering away at his ribcage.

Sam's shaky voice replied out of the blackness. "Yeah…I think so."

"You go first," ordered Dean. "We're going to have to crawl. Follow Anna." As he said it he gave a little shake of his head. "This is a new one." He reached behind him, groping blindly until his hands found Anna's curled corpse in the water. He gathered it up, slinging it awkwardly across his back and shivering as the cold water traced an icy path down the nape of his neck.

And so they began to crawl blindly into the dark, feeling their way along, following the wavering form of the ghostly girl. Dean lost count of the number of times he bashed his head against the rock ceiling, or ran face first into Sam's rear end. His frustration was growing, coupled with a sickening sense of claustrophobia. For all he knew, Anna was leading them deeper underground, where there was no hope of escape. Trusting a ghost, Dean, very stupid. He could almost hear his dad's voice.

Every once in a while, Anna's voice would drift back, as though from far away, in little singsongs. "We're following the leader, the leader, the leader…"

"How you feeling, Sam?" Dean called into the dark. He was fighting the terror that there was something creeping up behind him, reaching out to snatch his ankles, and somehow he needed the sound of Sam's voice.

"Been better…" Sam's voice was woozy and weak. "Head hurts."

"Hey Sam?"

"Yeah?"

"When we get out of here, I officially give you permission to say 'I told you so'." Sam's half-hearted laugh comforted Dean a little. They crawled on, knees aching, following the dim and fluttering light of Anna's ghost.

"We're following the leader, wherever she may go…"