Chapter Four.

"F.B.I?" the man repeated carefully, peering first at the badge and then at the young man standing across from him, staring over the counter-top at he and his wife.

Dean nodded, forcing a smile.

"That's right, Agent Di'Anno,"

The man stared back, more than a little dubious as he took in the jeans, thick boots and well-worn jacket.

"I thought you guys all wore suits," he offered hesitantly, drawing a reproachful look from his wife. Dean took back the badge easily, tucking it back into his pocket and offering up the wide, bright-eyed smile that had worked with many a-woman before.

"Only on TV," he grinned, letting his confidence lead the way. Honestly, nine times out of ten it was the suit that won people over, the badge on its own just didn't carry the same weight. Not that he usually used one without the other in the first place – not unless the circumstances dictated anyway. His last suit had been practically shredded on a hunt and although Sam's was probably neatly pressed and packed in the back of the Impala somewhere, putting it on would probably have made him more unconvincing than ever. Like a child trying dress-up in their father's clothes. Until he found Sam, getting a new suit was just going to have to wait. As was making up more fake . Mentally he cursed the constant updates made to official agency badges, grateful that at least the feds had held off on that for a little while.

The woman stepped forward, abruptly breaking his thoughts as she moved to place a placating hand on her husband's arm, at least for her part, won over by the badge.

"How can we help you?"

Truthfully? Dean wasn't sure. He'd been pounding the streets of the little town for nearly two days now, hopping from quaint little shop to quaint little shop, each time being met with looks of horror that something so awful could happen in their jolly little community, and then shaking heads that nobody knew anything that could help. He doubted the middle-aged pair in front of him would be any different. Which meant facing the fact that perhaps Sam just wasn't in that town at all – although that threw the question of where the hell he was wide open. Pushing those thoughts to the back of his mind, Dean cleared his throat.

"We're conducting some questioning in the area as part of on-going investigations."

The man blinked, sceptical but by no-means hostile,

"Investigations into what?"

The woman shook her head in amazement,

"Here? But we're such a quiet little spot."

Dean resisted the urge to snort; like he'd never heard that before, usually just before or after having been mauled by some ghost or ghoul stalking said 'quiet spot's' local vantage point and making dream catcher's out of the locals. He bit hard on the inside of his cheek and carried on,

"It's just routine at this point. Seeing if we can gather together any information that might help,"

The husband nodded slowly,

"Well what are you looking for exactly?"

"A truck," Dean replied, getting straight to the point, "Pick-up. Seen any of those around here?"

In answer to his question the shop-owner glanced over to the big store windows out onto the street, all of them turning to watch as at least three sailed past on the road outside. Dean grinned without a hint of amusement,

"Well this one would be red, kinda old, rusty," A heap of junk.

"No…I'm sorry - ,"

But Dean wasn't done,

"Okay, how about him?" fishing into the pocket of his jacket, he pulled out a small photograph of Sam, taken just before he went to college but enough of a likeness of him. In fact he'd barely changed, except he'd possibly grown taller – somehow. The photo had come from his dad's wallet when the hospital had given him their father's belongings, tucked into the back amongst the notes, a folded snapshot of both brothers sitting in the garden of some house they'd rented – briefly. Dean kept his fingers tight over the image of his own face, wondering as he did, why it was he'd shown the image to half the residents of some backwater town but, for some reason, never to Sam himself. He took a deep breath, "Twenty-three, tall – well, huge actually – probably complaining about how messy the place is?"

It was a joke utterly lost on the couple before him, but saying it made Dean feel better. Almost like it brought Sam closer. The woman frowned, bending closer to the image,

"Who is he?"

"Name's Sam Winchester, went missing from near here two days ago. He…We think he was taken from outside a motel."

"Oh, how awful," she tutted, looking up to meet Dean's gaze, "Does he have family?"

"A brother."

"How's he holding up?"

"Not so good."

"Well," pulling off his glasses and tucking them back into the pocket of his shirt, the man shook his head, rubbing his hand across a beardless chin, "I'm sorry, I really am. I wish we could help, but I just can't think of anything."

Dean's shoulders drooped visibly. He should've known.

"Yeah."

"I just can't believe it's happened again," his wife chipped in sombrely, wrapping her arms close about herself as if to give some comfort. Dean eyes narrowed,

"Again?"

"To another young man I mean…" she paused suddenly, looking up in confusion, "…but, then, you must know about the others, being FBI…otherwise why - ,"

"Oh, right," Dean interjected smoothly, laughing off his own mistake as his heart began to pound in excitement. There were more? More was good, more meant patterns and patterns meant clues – all of which were usually Sam's department but still… "Of course. The other cases," they were back to eyeing him curiously once more but Dean didn't care, suddenly he had somewhere else to be, "Hey, I don't suppose you good folks could point me in the direction of the library could you?"

They could, and they did, directing him a short drive away to a tall white-stone building opposite the main market area, full to over-flowing with stalls of local produce and bartering shoppers. Leaving the Impala in a nice space – one side against a wall, the other flanked by a nice looking Beamer, no dents – he trotted up the steps and pushed his way inside.

He was greeted with a delighted look from the woman behind the desk, liking to attribute it to his animal magnetism but knowing that it really stemmed from her surprise at seeing anyone under the age of fifty and not dressed in tweed striding in so determinedly. He flashed her a smile, watching her blush and smirking to himself in response. Perhaps it was animal magnetism after all.

He installed himself quickly at the one of the computers, settling down properly for the first time in months to what Sam did so well – and what was more, could do for hours too. Searching articles was a necessary evil for Dean, who had what he considered a healthy preference for pumping the paranormal full of lead rather than reading up on their likes and dislikes; Sam on the other hand was the bookish one. Ask him for one way to kill a spook and he'd provide ten, as well as the accompanying mythological narrative stretching back hundreds of decades and a quick synopsis of the various attempts past and present to vanquish whatever weird and wonderful creation they were up against. Staring at a computer screen for hours on end – without question – sucked.

Until you found exactly what you were looking for…

There were four of them in all – discounting Sam – stretching back a surprisingly short span of eighteen months and starting with a boy called Jacob Whittaker, the first to catch Dean's eye in that he was a local boy, reported missing by a neighbour whose house he had been helping to rebuild. Seemingly the guy had just vanished one day, leaving the small-town police department baffled and clueless. Next, a little further out, was Andy Cooper, who disappeared from a motel room that had been locked from the inside. Police suspected the open window as being his means of exit but whether he'd gone alone or not was apparently beyond their expertise, despite the fact he'd left everything he'd owned – including his shoes.

Dean rolled his eyes. Sometimes police incompetence was beyond belief.

The third victim was a Thomas Daniels, taken from the forecourt of a gas station as the attendant turned his back. Car door wide open, engine running, Thomas gone. Again the official line left little to be desired, no leads, no clues, and basically no hope in hell of finding him. A comforting thought. Finally came Greg Parker, whose car was found broken-down and abandoned at the side of the road, his bag – again containing all his stuff – was alongside it.

For Dean, looking with hunters' eyes, the connection between the men that the local law had missed altogether was instant and alarming. All the men were in their early twenties, all were alone and all with the exception of Jacob were unfamiliar with the area, a road trip here perhaps, or a missed flight there. He and Sam were on a road trip, a perpetual one. Then there was their demeanour, the men described in the same glowing terms by friends and family, 'friendly,' 'polite,' etc, etc. If those didn't all describe the way Sam was around people – people they didn't know anyway – then he didn't know what did.

Then of course there were the pictures, smiling photographs of young men Dean didn't know, candid shots from weddings, parties, graduation, shots that were never supposed to be on the front pages of newspapers under big 'missing' titles. Shots that were supposed to be laughed over in years to come, pointing out bad dress sense or the same floppy, dark-brown hair they all sported, because that was the other link – their looks. They were all boyish in that they could pass for younger than they were, they all sported shaggy mops in various states of disarray and they were all dark in features, hair and eyes.

They were just like Sam, or perhaps, more to the point, Sam was just like them.

Grabbing a local map from a dispenser at the desk – obviously the townsfolk were used to lost road-trippers calling in – Dean took out a thick-tipped marker and started drawing dots. One for the town he was stuck in, Jacob's point of disappearance, one for Andy Cooper's, one for Thomas Daniels, one for Greg Parker and one for Sam's, colouring the dots in wide circles before linking them all together and sitting back.

The pattern stared up at him like a firework, starting with the town he was sitting in and radiating straight up along the main road in. The equivalent to a few hours driving away the pen mark suddenly branched out like a flowering tree, forming a cluster around the other disappearances. Whatever was going on, it clearly all radiated out of the 'quiet little spot' the locals had all been so horrified to find the centre of the 'F.B.I's' focus. Which in some ways was a blessing. At least he was in the right place.

Folding up the map and grabbing up his printouts and articles, Dean shoved everything into his bag and swung the contents over his shoulder. Time to relocate back to base and try and work out what had taken five young guys in such quick succession and why. Various thoughts whirled in his head as he went, though he managed to break through the haze just long enough to throw the librarian one last roguish grin before heading out into the dull light of the day. What the hell had Sam got himself into this time? A cult maybe? Was that the kind of realm they'd stumbled into? He shook his head wearily, dropping his items onto the hood of the Impala and sighing. Never before had he actually missed good old-fashioned, pissed off spirits.

The library car park too seemed to have been caught up in the bustle of the market-place, and he watched absently as people crossed the tarmac carrying bags of groceries knowing for a fact that not one of them had even considered setting foot inside the tall white, and all but deserted building beyond.

"Get the truck started boy," came a voice to his side, making him glance up, thoughts briefly interrupted as a woman and her son passed by, about as backwater a couple of characters as he'd ever seen in his life and heading straight towards a battered red pick-up –

He paused suddenly, eyes widening in shock. A battered red pick-up? No way.

Instantly Dean dropped to a near-crouch over the hood of the car, pretending to be bent over the map but his eyes straining up to take in every inch of the pair in front of him.

These two? Seriously?

The woman was perhaps late fifties or early sixties, the grey hair on her head so dry and fine that it looked almost wild, standing out sharply against the thin, haggard frame, with eyes that shone steel-cold as she twisted back towards the market stalls as if to check for pursuers. There were none, except her son, who gave creepy a whole new meaning.

For a start the guy walked like an extra from Planet of the Apes, shoulders hunched upwards, arms swinging limply by his lanky sides. Like his mother, narrow eyes darted around in caution, although his lacked the harsh intelligence which was instead replaced by uncertainty. A tongue flickered periodically across his lips, serpentine in its motions, feeling along a thin moustache. Then there was the top of his head to worry about. Greasy hair was never much of a statement at the best of times, but teamed with curls and a healthy glow of ginger? Dean shook his head in disgust, the kid hadn't just been hit with the ugly stick, he'd been positively violated by it.

And suddenly the thought of these two anywhere near Sam sent shivers down his spine.

As the pair clambered into the rusty old truck, pulling the doors behind them with a solid creak on either side, Dean folded smoothly into the front seat of the Impala, his eyes never leaving the mirror. If they so much as sneezed he wanted to be aware of it. They had Sam and there was no way in Hell he was losing them this time. Which was why, as the battered engine spluttered into life and the heap of rust lurched from its parking space, Dean swung out coolly in their wake, letting them lead him through town and trying not to twist off the steering wheel as his fists clenched tightly around it, pouring out the anger he was itching to use on the occupants ahead.

They drove for perhaps another fifteen minutes, out of the town and deeper into the wide expanse of fields and farms Dean had passed on the other side – and where he'd found Sam's phone – pulling the Impala up short as the truck turned off down a track lined with trees, heading for a small house surrounded by a barn and out-buildings. He watched the dust-track through narrow eyes, tracing every line of the property and making a mental map, just as he had done a thousand times before. The only problem was this was not every other time, this, maybe more than ever before, really mattered.

It wasn't until the truck disappeared into the barn and out of sight completely however that Dean let himself sit back against his seat.

Time for a plan, he decided as he pulled out his shotgun and checked the clip. A good plan. Really good.

Unfortunately he didn't manage to get that far, for the next second there was a thud at the window and he turned to find himself staring down the barrel of a shotgun. Loaded, cocked and well and truly aimed at his head.

"Son of a – ."

He was screwed.

Just one tonight, but I hope it's long enough – don't want to over-post people into boredom!

Many thanks again to my lovely reviewers, and all those people on alerts. Please keep all coming!