Weaver, chapter 15

Sam would think twice about making fun of how fast Dean couldn't run again. His brother stayed with him stride for stride as they practically flew through the forest. Stopping by woods on a snowy evening had turned ugly faster than their hunts usually did; he hated when one supernatural sighting turned out to be something else entirely. Sam put his foot down wrong, ankle twisting slightly. He stumbled but managed to catch himself before he fell. Dean kept running, taking a very slight lead. Sam let him. Something told him it was getting closer, and he wanted his brother as safe as possible. The footsteps behind them were misleading, he knew. His sense of foreboding was from more than that. His breath came out in opaque puffs of mist, his lungs burned from the cold.

"You just hold on, Sammy. I swear I'll think of something," Dean said out of the blue. He sounded further away than the few steps he was. "All you have to do is not die on me."

"What?" Sam panted. His steps faltered, wondering if Dean knew something he didn't. "What are you talking about?"

"I didn't say anything. Less talking, more running. We're almost there."

Sam picked up his pace again, but he was filled with confusion and sudden fear and he had no idea why. Well, not no idea. Grey Men were infamous for fucking with a person's emotions. He tried to shake off the feelings. It worked to some extent, but they still seemed to chase him just like the footsteps. He saw the rise leading up to the road, but it seemed like a long way away. The trees were thick, branches heavy with snow. His lungs started hurting more, as if the air had become even colder than it had been only moments ago. Part of him thought maybe he hadn't recovered fully from the thing with the dream succubus, but he knew he couldn't voice that concern to Dean; Sam had insisted he was fine for this hunt.

Dean scurried up the rise, turning around with his weapon raised, like that would do any good. Sam didn't know how his brother had got so far ahead of him. He was still at least twenty feet from the incline. He watched as an indistinct dark blur descended, cutting off his view of Dean. Shit. The footsteps behind him drew closer. A loud crunching noise filled the air, sounded like a giant cat munching on bones. It made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up, a chill run down his spine. His foot slipped, and this time he couldn't catch himself. He went down on one knee. Pain rocketed up, rattled his teeth.

"Go," he said. Dean had to get to the relative safety of the car. "I'm fine, go!"

"I wish you could give me some kind of sign that you're in there fighting somewhere," Dean called, voice again strangely faint.

In where?, Sam thought hazily. He'd bitten his tongue. He ignored the pain and scrambled back to his feet. The dark shape hiding his brother from view was somehow bigger and darker now, some insidious black fog.

"Dean?"

He was so damned scared Dean had actually left him. Sam clambered up the slope, slipping and sliding. He didn't remember it being this steep when they'd gone down it before, didn't remember the snow being this deep and cumbersome. An icy gust of air enveloped him, brushing against his skin like a cold, damp hand. He almost threw up from the abject terror that sensation caused, and again tried to tell himself it was all in his head. He grunted, losing his footing again. What the hell was wrong with him? Sam continued up using both hands and feet, half-crawling until he reached the gravelly shoulder of the road. He could barely breathe. Darkness filled his vision. He was trapped in the fog, unable to move.

"I dunno, squeeze my hand or something," came Dean's voice through the solid-looking wall.

"What?" Sam rolled on his side. His whole body shook so hard from the effort that he thought he might fly apart. There was definitely something wrong with him, and up this close he should be able to see Dean.

"Sam!"

The darkness turned into more than grey fog, coming from his insides. His vision faded out as his lungs decided not to work at all, and Sam was sure he was dying. He couldn't let that happen Dean where was Dean? And then just like that there was a hand in front of his face, cutting through the shadowy blur. He recognized Dean's ring and instinctively reached up. Dean grabbed onto him and pulled hard, got him off his side and manhandled him upright. Sam sagged against his brother slightly, relieved that he was able to see him at last. He was going to be okay. Dean had sworn nothing would happen to Sam while he was around. Like so many promises Dean had made in his lifetime, Sam knew this one was going to be kept.

"Come on."

The words were said right in Sam's ear, an arm around his shoulder as Dean steered him toward and into the car. He felt warmer the second his ass hit the leather upholstery, though he knew the seat was actually uncomfortably cold. Sam shivered despite the warmth, or maybe because of it. Dean slid behind the wheel and started the car. As suddenly as it had begun, everything supernatural stopped. Sam no longer heard footsteps or bone crunching or the pervading fear. He relaxed into the seat, however, feeling completely wasted.

"Go? I'm fine?" Dean said, tone not exactly hostile but most definitely unhappy. He pulled the car onto the road. "You think I'd just leave you behind? Think again."

Sam blinked a couple times. Of the two of them, it was him who should be questioning the crazy things his brother had said out there.

"Dean…"

"Seriously, Sam, if I had kept on going, you'd have had a freaking heart attack or stroke or something."

"I was right behind you," he said and glanced at Dean.

"Shit." Dean clenched his jaw twice in a row. Sam thought he could gauge his brother's anger index just based on the number of times his jaw muscle worked spasmodically. "Sorry, I just…that thing was messing with my head. From where I stood you were at death's door."

"Déjà vu, huh?"

Sam was tired of things messing with his head. First it was the Black Dogs, and then the dream succubus. Actually, the succubus had probably come first, and his dreams about Max Miller's family even before that. Yeah, he was damn tired of things messing with his head. After they regrouped and came back to take care of the Grey Man, Sam hoped they found a case that was more related to finding their dad. Or maybe deal with a rogue band of wood nymphs. Something easy and less psychically involved.

"I'm getting a little tired of always running. If it's not us chasing after something, it's something chasing after us."

"It's the job, Sam. Think of it as a workout."

"Yeah. Workout. I'm serious, man, don't you ever get sick of it?"

"Nope."

"Not ever?"

"Not when I think about all the people we help, Sammy," Dean said.

"So, when we were in Vegas you were just pretending you wanted to gamble and objectify women as a vacation from our job," Sam said. Dean flashed him a grin and he could tell by the look in his brother's eye that something raunchy was going to come out of his mouth. "Never mind. So that was a Grey Man, not a sasquatch."

"Damned reports didn't mention anything other than a dark, looming creature lurking in the woods and the 'unrelated' disappearances of a couple of locals." Dean reached over and turned up the heat. "There wasn't anything about that high-pitched humming or the mindfucking."

"Humming? I heard crunching. And maybe the only people who experienced that are the ones who disappeared." Sam shivered. The heat was on, but that didn't help with the cool trickle of air leaking through the window. He hadn't really thought there'd still be snow up here, but apparently it had been a great year for it. Now that he wasn't running through it, it was pretty. White and clean even though the sky was dim blue with dusk. "Nobody knows. This is a hotbed for Bigfoot sightings."

"Near it, anyway. I think the hotbed is Canada, eh?"

"This looks like Canada," Sam said. "Damn, it's cold. How exactly do we beat a Grey Man?"

"First we need earplugs."

"Dean, I'm serious."

"So am I. We have to block out the crazy sounds," Dean said. "Or we'll go nuts. Sun's too low, though. We'll wait until morning."

Broad daylight wasn't their typical hunting time, but Sam couldn't disagree. Dusk and dark hours would only increase a Grey Man's psychological hold on them, which might be a reason none of the news stories had mentioned any of the local population's tendency for fear and panic. Sam flexed his fingers. They were stiff with cold. He stuck them in front of the vent, but the air coming out of it was lukewarm at best. He shivered and reached out to slide the heat gauge up. Dean darted out a hand quickly and stopped him.

"Anh. It's warm enough."

So driver got to control the music and the heat. Sam realized he wasn't really that cold anymore, though and didn't say anything. Dean's hand was cold as ice, contradicting his claim that it was warm. Sam frowned, fixing his eyes on a spot through the driver's side window. They were already at town limits, despite the poor road conditions. He started to get an uneasy feeling in his gut. He watched Dean watch the road.

"I don't know if you can hear me or not," Dean said. "I hope you can. She said this would help you pick up my voice, somehow. Whatever. I can't do anything if you're not hearng me. Everything's going to be fine, Sammy."

Only Dean's mouth didn't move, and the words sounded like they were coming from an old phonograph or something. That feeling in his gut moved up to his chest, then his throat. The way he figured it, he was either going nuts or it was something even worse.

"According to Missouri, this should help give you strength. God, I hope so, Sammy, because if it doesn't…shit. No. I can't get touchy-feely. You just have to wake up. If you wake up, I promise the next time you get all girly I won't make fun of you. Listen to me. I'm wasting time."

Dean…no, maybe not Dean…looked over at him. For a second, he swore his brother's eyes were black and Sam then knew. He remembered what something worse was and now he thought going nuts was really preferable. In a flash, Not Dean just looked like Dean again, and Sam remembered a motel room. He could smell it. He could feel it. Not Dean clenched his jaw, and got a suspicious expression on his face. It was a succubus, Sam remembered now, and he couldn't know that he knew, and apparently it couldn't hear Dean. He couldn't be sure he was really hearing Dean.

"You all right, Sam?" Not Dean said. "You look a little funny."

"Just leftover effects from the Grey Man, I guess. It was pretty intense."

"Yeah, it's never fun when something evil gets in your head and messes with you."

Sam held his breath, couldn't make himself respond for fear of giving himself away. It sounded like something his real brother would say, but it also sounded very Not Dean-like. He didn't know what he was supposed to do. He needed Dean to tell him, but Dean had gone silent. Actually, that might not be so bad until they got into a better place. Sam wasn't sure he could maintain a normal façade if he had Dean talking to him while Not Dean stared at him in the close confines of the car. Now that he knew he was dreaming, he tried to change the location.

"Yeah," Sam said. "Not fun."

It didn't work. This thing next to him was probably controlling everything that was happening, and feeding off it as well. He didn't know how he had anything left for it to consume. Knowledge of his situation seemed to make him aware that he felt like absolute crap. He didn't know how he had run, even dreaming, full out; his muscles felt like jelly.

"Well, it'll be over soon," Not Dean said cheerfully.

"Like I said before, Missouri says this should make you stronger," Dean said. Sam's head already hurt from the strangeness of the situation. He smiled at Not Dean awkwardly and listened to Dean cautiously. "I don't know what's going on in your dream. Probably something pretty shitty. So this isn't going to be easy, especially if the Weaver still looks like Jessica. No matter what it looks like, though, you have to fight it in there just like we'd fight it if it were out here. You have to kill it, Sam. It doesn't matter how. No magic bullets, no special tool."

Okay, well that was something. He hoped that stronger thing of Missouri's would hit soon. He closed his eyes in an extended blink, opened them again to find himself in a children's park. He wrinkled his nose, confused. Not Dean was on the monkey bars, hanging upside down with a grin on its face that looked macabre and intensity in its eyes. It didn't take Sam long to understand. He thought it was trying to determine if he'd figured out he was dreaming. He pretended they hadn't just been in the snow-capped mountains of Snoqualmie, Washington, that they'd been in this town with a name he couldn't remember but a park he remembered well, and fondly. He pretended he wasn't bothered by the fact it had somehow known he'd thought about this place before.

"Dean, come on, quit screwing around," Sam said, infusing as much nonchalance in the words as he could.

"Come on, Sammy, you used to love this kind of thing as a kid."

"We're not kids anymore. We've got more important stuff to do."

"Oh, do we?" Not Dean said. Shit. It definitely knew that he knew this was all wrong. It flipped off the monkey bars and walked over to him, eyes narrowed. "You're probably right."

"You should be feeling it now," Dean said. "Sammy, you have to hurry. I don't think I'll be able to keep this hoodoo shit up for long."

Sam almost laughed, imagining Dean using Missouri's more holistic approach to demon fighting. All at once he felt a rush of warmth go through him, and smelled cinnamon. No, it was cloves. Saffron? Something at once sweet and spicy and earthy, and there was also an underlying scent of molten wax. Maybe it was slightly more embarrassing to rely on the less tangible kind of weapon, but Sam had to admit he thought it was working. It had to work enough for him to accomplish his task. The warm feeling quickly turned into more than that, and it was as if he had been infused with energy. It wasn't much, but it was more than he had.

"God, I wish I could help you somehow. I don't think you'll be able to last for much longer." Dean made a small, choked throat-clearing sound, which was painful even though Sam didn't have the visual to go with it. "You, ah, you're not looking too shit-hot right now, little brother."

Sam lost the urge to laugh. If anything, though, Dean's uncharacteristic monologuing only made the energy build in him more. Dream adrenaline, he supposed. Not Dean stared at him, up close now, and though Sam knew it wasn't really his brother he was struck with a panicky feeling that he couldn't fight this thing because of its outward appearance.

"We do have more important stuff to do," Not Dean said with a flippant smile. "And I can see it's not going to be easy."

Its eyes turned black and though it still bore Dean's face, the change was enough to make Sam's hesitation fade. He didn't have to feign obliviousness anymore. He could do this. He could. Sam curled his left hand into a fist, dreamed he had a dagger in his right. He looked down to make sure it had happened, feeling shaky and scared and powerful. It was there. Sam brought his hand up quickly, arcing the blade toward Not Dean's midsection. The dagger disappeared before it breached skin.

"I told you it wasn't going to be easy, Sammy." Not Dean pressed himself into Sam's space, and Sam found he couldn't move away. "It could have been. See? I was letting you go out on a swing. Literally."

"Not quite how I intend on dying," Sam said. "Actually, I have no intention of dying at all."

"Good luck with that," Not Dean told him, smiling.

Black eyes turned back to hazel green. Sam took a deep breath, or tried to. Already the symptoms started showing. Some part of him retained an invigorated energy, though, and he swore he heard Dean speaking to him again, but the voice was too far away for him to be absolutely certain. Whatever Dean was doing or had done was keeping him going, that was all that mattered. Sam shoved Not Dean away from him, and made a gun appear in his right hand. He managed one shot before the succubus made it disappear. Real pain appeared in Not Dean's eyes. Sam was glad he'd hit a mark, even if it wasn't fatal, and yet those eyes. He looked at the succubus' shoulder, kept his gaze there.

"Sammy, what are you doing?"

"Don't call me that."

Sam re-dreamed the handgun, shot again and missed. Everything shifted and wavered in a very unpleasant way. He gasped shallowly, never getting quite enough oxygen. The world did several loops, jarred abruptly when he fell to his knees, with his free hand clutching at his chest like that would make him catch a solid breath. Not Dean towered over him.

"Shit, Sam. Sammy," Dean said, voice now clear and strong. Terrified. Angry. "Fight it, goddamnit." Then further away, not to him, "Can I get some damned help in here, please?"

Not Dean laughed and leaned down until its face was right in front of Sam's. He couldn't not look into its eyes. Sam shook all over. Dean had been right; his strength hadn't lasted long. Sam could barely see, barely feel anything, which he supposed was probably a good thing. But in its gloating arrogance, the Weaver had forgotten Sam still had the gun. Dean had told him to fight. Sam lifted the gun shakily and fired, point blank, nearly vomiting when the thing wearing Dean's face stopped laughing to stare at him in shock.

"You can't…" it said, and fell.

"Not easy, huh?" Sam said weakly.

And then he fell and fell until he was surrounded by intense white. Softness underneath him, and mechanical noise all around him. Sam tried to draw a breath and there was only confusion and choking and help, help. A face above his, familiar but wrong. Dean, tired and worried and oh, hell, that look in his eyes…it really was his brother. Sam was so happy to see him. He tried to focus, couldn't. Tried to sit up, couldn't. He couldn't breathe around the massive, painful object in his throat.

"Hey," Dean said. "You're okay. You're going to be okay. You have to calm down."

Sam did the next best thing. He passed out.