An hour later, Sam was sitting impatiently, waiting for Dean to wake up, which Dean sensed as he lay there, still on his stomach. The pain was gone (), but his body was awash in the exhausted aftermath. He forgot himself for a minute and groaned as he stretched.
"Dean, you okay? You awake?" Sam practically pounced.
"M'fine, Sam. Better." Dean turned his head to look at Sam, staying flat on the mattress.
"So…how long has this been going on?" Sam's voice was tentative, the way it always was when he posed questions about things that had happened while he was in college.
Dean yawned. "Last year…for about a month. Hasn't happened since."
"Was dad with you?" Sam's eyes darted toward the floorboards, as if he wasn't sure he should be asking, as if he wasn't sure he'd like the answer he was going to get – no matter what the answer was.
"Yeah, he was. Stuck to me like glue, too." Dean couldn't help feeling like he was trying to prove a point to Sam. That their dad cared.
"Why didn't you tell me, call me? I mean, you stopped hunting for-"
"We didn't stop hunting, Sam." Dean interrupted. "We just adjusted. And if this is the start…" God, he didn't even want to think about that. "We aren't stopping hunting, either. I need you with me on this. We can't stop looking for dad."
Sam stayed silent, neither agreeing or disagreeing.
"Look, Sam…I…you….," Dean took a deep breath and finally sat up fully. "Last night is probably as easy as it is gonna get. It gets…bad."
"I read some accounts. Still doesn't really prepare me, though." Sam paused for a moment and then huffed a laugh.
"What?"
"Well, not really that funny, but the one person who'd be able to help me out, give me pointers, is dad. Can't exactly get ahold of him, though." Sam quirked a rueful smile which Dean returned.
Sam grinned a bit wider. "The worst pain in human perception, huh? I guess I can't complain about anything anymore."
Dean chuckled softly. "Yeah, I would've gone for second worst, but no bragging rights."
"So, how we gonna deal with tomorrow?" Sam asked, his tone a bit more serious. "You want to stay here, see what happens, if this is another cluster cycle?"
"Honestly?" Dean scrunched up his nose. "I'd rather not. If I sit around this dump all day thinking what if…"
"Yeah," Sam nodded "I get it. So, we'll stay tonight, map out a route that'll give us plenty of time to hit a motel before it hits? What time was it…2200 hours?"
"Thereabouts." Dean said lightly. "Let's not get ahead of ourselves, okay? Maybe it was fluke. They stayed away for a whole year."
"True." Sam said slowly. "But from what I was reading, changes in season can trigger the cycle. Was it the end of fall last time, too?"
"Possibly."
"Possibly?!" Sam's eyebrows raised enough that they were completely obscured by his hair. "You're telling me you don't remember the time you first began to have fireworks explode in your head?"
"'Course, I remember, Sam!" Dean snapped. "Can you understand how maybe I don't want to think about it starting all over again?" Dean stood up and began pacing angrily back and forth. "I mean, I felt like I just got my life back!" He caught Sam's deer-in-the-headlights look at Dean's sudden burst of anger and sat himself back down again and calmed his voice. "I'm sorry. It sounds horribly cliché, but you wouldn't understand." Dean even winced as he said it. Hell, he hadn't even heard Sam say the classic teen sulking "You wouldn't understand" line since the kid was sixteen.
Sam leaned forward towards Dean, resting his hands on his elbows. "So, explain it to me then."
Dean let out a long drawn out sigh, but he knew that this was part and parcel of having to tell Sam – the part where they talked about the feelings and had a drum circle or a circle jerk or whatever the hell. He rubbed a hand down his lower face, the day's worth of stubble scratching audibly against his calluses. "Our whole lives, we drive where we want, we hunt what comes along. We drive across five states without sleep if we have to. Nothing stops us. Then this comes – and suddenly my brain imposes a friggin' curfew on me. And believe me, there's no sneaking in the window five minutes late, Sammy. There's no begging to stay out for one night only because Metallica is playing at the Garden. So, tell me, what happens to the people who are getting attacked between nine and midnight or whenever? Tough luck, ma'am, sorry, tell the angry spirit to re-schedule?"
"Well, what did you guys do when that came up before?"
"Dad went on his own."
"So, I could -" Before Sam could even finish the sentence, Dean cut him right off.
"- Sam, no offense, you aren't dad. Hell, neither am I. We don't have his experience, his knowledge. And you've never gone without someone to back you up before. Besides, dad earned a couple of broken fingers out of the deal himself."
Sam rolled his eyes. "Dean, c'mon, we get beat to shit all the time. You don't know that you being there would have prevented it."
Dean chose to ignore the logic. "It's more than just that. I'm supposed to be there to back up dad. I'm supposed to be there to watch your back. That's just how things are. If I can't do that…" Then what am I good for?
"If you can't do that…then what?" Sam prompted, eager for Dean to finish the thought.
"Then not much use keeping me around, huh?" A maudlin smile played around Dean's lips for a moment.
Sam's jaw dropped while Dean continued. "For all we know, maybe Dad paired up with another hunter. He always thought the headaches would come back. Maybe he found someone he wouldn't have to take care of."
"Are you even fucking listening to yourself?!" There was anger in Sam's voice and he didn't know quite who or what it was for. "Dad pair up with someone….as if you didn't call Caleb and Pastor Jim the moment dad was gone, as if there is anyone he's on speaking terms with right now that'd he trust enough." Sam wouldn't go any further with that train of thought, and Dean didn't really expect or want him to. He knew what kind of parent Sam thought their father was, he knew Sam probably thought it was possible their dad ditched him on purpose. Sam wasn't finished with either his frustration or his argument, however.
"Shit, Dean, no use keeping you around?! You're not just a hunter to me, you're my brother. You think the moment you get sick or hurt I'm going to shoot you like a lame horse? Ditch you? Head back to my burned out apartment? I know we barely talked for a couple of years, but give me some friggin' credit!"
Dean had the good grace to look genuinely sorry, which could be because he was. Sam sighed, feeling a stab of guilt for snapping. "Look, man, it's how you feel. I'm not trying to tell you that your feelings are wrong….except that, they sorta are, so maybe I am. But still, sorry…"
"S'okay." Dean shrugged. "We should get going to bed soon if we're going to be on the road tomorrow."
Sam nodded, glad that the conversation was over, maybe glad that he was still under Dean's umbrella of endless forgiveness. "I'm gonna stay up for a little bit, map a route." The younger brother settled himself against the headboard, pulling the laptop back onto his legs, stretching the full length of his legs down the bed, his toes shooting over the end.
"You gonna watch the TV, Gigantor?" Dean asked.
"No. Why, too much noise? I can go to the lobby with the laptop if it is gonna bug you." Sam stopped what he was doing and held the screen of the computer in his hands, ready to close down the laptop on his brother's say-so.
"Sam, I told you, my head is fine right now. You walking on eggshells, that's gonna bug me. Anyway, I just figured maybe I'd stay up for a little while longer, see if something good is on."
"Oh. If we have that tri-state station as one of the channels there's a Twilight Zone block on right now." Sam tossed the remote over onto Dean's bed, his long fingers immediately returning to the keyboard.
"Dude! You let me sit here talking feelings when Rod Serling is talking dimensions of sight, sound, and mind?" Dean curled his lips inward, doing his best vocal imitation of the television narrator.
"That was more Don Adams than Rod Serling," Sam snarked, not even looking up from the map that was currently showing on his screen.
"Eh, close enough." Dean shrugged, flicking through the channels until the old black 'n' white show popped on the air. "Shatner! Nice!"
Sam raised his eyes in interest. "This the one with the creature on the plane?"
"Exactly, Sammy. Nightmare at 20,000 Feet. Super-creepy-episode." Dean wasn't about to say that it was more the plane than the creature he had an issue with.
"Do you think the storytellers were going for some kind of gremlin mythology?" Sam pondered aloud.
"Clearly. And, Sam, the old rules still stand – you don't get to ruin the Zone for me with shop-talk until the episode is all the way over."
Sam snickered. "Sorry. It's been awhile since we've watched it together."
Too long, man. Dean thought.