Ben sat silently on the bleachers, overlooking a large lawn. It was a Friday – two days since he had left home. Two days filled with frantic phone calls from his mother and his friends. After listening to the pleading messages from his mother he had almost flinched when she started threatening. She threatened to call everyone from the police to the military down on him. He had ignored them all, opting in the end, to turn off his phone. Now he sat there. Enjoying what he would've normally called a nice Friday afternoon and watched the beginnings of a high school football game. The sun shone down from a lightly clouded sky.
The irony of the moment struck him and left a bitter taste. He had never bothered with football games at his old school. But now he was voluntarily sitting during one simply because he was hunting a monster. "Simply" his mind pointed out with stinging sarcasm. He frowned briefly and stuck a hand under his jacket to make sure the wooden stake was where he left it. Its coarse surface brushed against his calloused fingers and briefly reminded him of what he had left behind.
Then in a sudden shock the noise level rose. A small marching band walked onto the field, playing for all they were worth. This was apparently what made the town worth living in. Its high school football games and not much else. This town was so small that everyone actually knew everyone. The welcome sign had said welcome to Atalissa , Iowa; population 427. But looking around now, he wondered if that wasn't overdoing it slightly. He let his eyes travel over the crowd searching out suspicious faces. He found none. Out of everyone there he was the only one not smiling and laughing. He frowned briefly and took a drink from the blue Gatorade bottle sitting next to his knee.
"Hi."
He flinched and managed to spill some of the soft drink over himself at the surprise attack. A young girl stood beside him with a wide smile and intelligent, brown eyes.
"Hello." He sat the bottle down and cleared his throat uncomfortably as she took its place next to him. Her knee barely brushing against his.
"I'm Emily." She reached out a hand and turned the power of her smile up a few notches.
"Uhh… Hi. Ben." He whirred his head. "My name is Ben."
"Hi, Ben." She released his hand and returned to watching the game. "I haven't seen you before. You new at this school?" She didn't take her eyes off the game, but Ben still felt like he was being studied.
"Yeah." He swallowed and tried not to look at the girl. She was pretty. Obviously beautiful. Almost like she was too perfect. Her perfect hair flowed softly down her back. He wild, bright eyes shone with intelligence. Her clothes fit her like a hand in a glove. Her slim body curved in all the right places. "Just here for the game." He swallowed again.
"Liar."
He turned to her with a guarded frown and felt his fingers tighten around the stake hidden under his jacket, "What?"
"You're not here watching the game. The players have been warming up for the last ten minutes and you've barely glanced down. All you're focused on are the people sitting on the bleachers." She smiled as she felt him staring at her.
"Sounds like I'm not the only one watching the people instead of the game."
She shrugged and pushed her tan locks over her shoulder. "I've never really liked football. Only come to support the school, really." She glanced over at Ben. "Wanna give me a sip?" She gestured to the Gatorade.
Ben reached down without taking his eyes off the game. "Yeah sure."
She sipped and stared at his face. "You don't talk a lot do you?"
He glanced at her and back at the game. "No."
She smiled and handed back the drink. Unknown to her he had spiked the soda with a splash of holy water. She passed the test and he was able to relax a little more. He looked around the bleachers and noticed a group of beautiful teenage girls casting hidden glances and giggling at him and Emily. He frowned when they noticed him staring and turned. They were whispering and giggling to themselves. The light frown stayed on his face, but he turned and started scanning the crowd. He noticed another group of teens also staring. Albeit a little less conspicuous. They seemed more relaxed than the group of girls still giggling and gossiping. "Friends of yours?" He gestured to the group of perfectly dressed teenage girls.
Emily smiled and nodded. "Yeah."
"And how about those?" He gestured to the less conspicuous group.
"Hell no." She frowned so fiercely Ben found himself mimicking her for a second.
With a questioning frown he looked back at Emily.
"They're freaks." She bobbed her head towards them without hiding her distain.
Ben knew what kind of girl Emily was. The elite kind. The popular girl. The top of the hierarchy, if he had to guess. She was the one who got first dibs on all cute or popular guys. Her friends were her entourage, there for no other reason than to serve her.
"They seem nice enough." He smiled down to one from the outcast group and grinned as she smiled back. Her smile lit up her face like a supernova "Excuse me." He stood up and started walking towards the group of teens.
Behind him Emily stared with disbelief as he quickly made his way down to the renegade group. "Hello." He came to a halt in front of the girl who had smiled to him. She was pretty. Not in the same perfect way Emily was, but she had a glow about her. Her black hair hung loosely around her head. Her black clothes and dark makeup clearly made a statement for people to back off. But her smile told him all he needed to know. "Mind if I sit here?"
One of the guys in the group answered before the girl had a chance.
"Why don't you go sit with your little friend up there?" He gestured to Emily, watching them with a frown and matched it with a frown of his own.
"I'd rather sit with you guys." Ben said earnestly. He was rewarded with a handful of faces studying him.
"Why are you here?" The same guy asked again.
"Lucas!" The girl hissed. The same one who had smiled at him.
Ben just flashed a lopsided smile. "I'm just traveling through town and heard that the game was the place to be." Ben told the lie smoothly. He had always been good at bluffing. Always won at poker playing against Keo. The thought brought a frown fluttering over his face, but he quickly hid it with another relaxed smile.
"Dude, you're like the same age as us." Another guy from the group spoke up. "Don't you go to school?"
"Ignore them." The girl, who had smiled, answered. "I'm Karly." She reached out her hand and he shook it with a smitten smile. "Please sit down. I wouldn't force those harpies on my worst enemy." She nodded over to Emily who had joined her group and was watching them with a frown. Probably gossiping her heart out.
Ben sighed in relief – whether real or not he couldn't tell – and sat down. "Thanks."
The one named Lucas shifted in his seat and glanced at Ben. "Hi. Sorry for being a dick, but ya know, small town like this we tend to be a little careful who we let into our group." He grinned slightly and extended his hand.
"Don't blame ya." Ben glanced back at the popular group with a frown. "So you always come to the games?" He asked as casual as he could. He noticed that Karly tried her best not to get noticed. He thought for a second he saw her blush, but she hid it behind her thick, black hair.
Lucas answered. "Yeah. It's the best way to spend Fridays around these parts. Or – like some of the idiots like to do – go deer hunting in the forests around here."
"You hunt?" Ben asked a little more intrigued.
"No way dude!" The skeptical guy from before spoke up. "I'm Jim." He reached out a hand which Ben shook.
Their quiet conversation was interrupted by the football team suddenly hooting over a goal. Ben grinned and shook his head. He had never mixed well with jocks. He never really mixed well with anyone. He was a chronic loner which he had actually come to love during high school. He'd gotten to know Keo when they were just kids. Keo had never mixed well with groups either. Ben remembered the day he met him. They were about seven and Keo had managed to get into a fight with a very angry looking group of bullies. The guy Ben already hated from when he was younger. Ryan Humphrey and his gang. A sad smile pulled the corners of Ben's mouth up as he stared at the football teams fighting each other.
Unknown to him Karly was looking over at him with a focused stare. "For someone who doesn't like jocks you sure seem interested in them." She said wistfully.
Ben glanced over at her and tried to banish the sad expression, but didn't quite succeed. "Jus' thinkin' about stuff." He shrugged it off as he noticed a couple of the other kids glancing over at him.
"Where are you from?" Lucas asked and threw him a look that said let's change the subject. Ben returned a look of appreciation.
" Cicero , Indiana ."
"Long way from home?" Jim turned on his bench seat to be more involved in the conversation they apparently found more interesting than the game.
"Yeah I guess. Ben tried to shrug it off, but fretted when Lucas' face suddenly grew a shade paler with shock.
"Jesus. You're from that school." He looked at his two friends with wide eyes. "You're from the school where some guy got electrocuted. My parents looked into it because I have a cousin who goes to that school."
"Who?" Ben asked.
"Uh his name is Daniel Rayners." He scratched his neck.
"He's your cousin huh?" Ben's eyes narrowed at the thought of him. Ben knew perfectly well who that was because it was one of the reason's he didn't like jocks. Daniel was one of Ryan's closest friends.
Lucas noticed the cold look in Ben's eyes and smiled. "Now I know you're from where you say you are. No one with brains who's ever met the guy could possibly like him." He grinned when Ben unconsciously wrinkled his nose.
"This the guy that was once over at your house for the holidays?" Karly asked on a whim.
Lucas nodded and quickly moved onto another topic. "So who was the victim?" He asked softly.
Ben swallowed past a lump and blinked back the burning in his eyes at the thought of Jonesy and all the ugly memories his death brought up. "Uh Jonesy Mills, he was the janitor at the school."
"You sound like you knew the guy." Karly asked softly.
Ben nodded jerkily and released a relieved breath when their conversation was once again interrupted by hooting and shouts of joy. "Looks like we're winning." Lucas observed in a flat voice.
Ben couldn't bring himself to look at any of the kids casting cautious glances at him. He kept his eyes trained on the game he didn't really care about.
"You two were friends?" Jim asked unabashed.
"Jim." Karly corrected. He cast his eyes down in embarrassment as did Lucas. "I'm sorry. You obviously have feelings about this and if you don't wanna talk about it it's fine." She smiled quickly when Ben glanced over at her.
"H-He was…." Ben huffed. "… a really weird man." He snorted a laugh. "A real jerk. He didn't pretend to like anyone he didn't really like. He was… cool." Ben added as an afterthought.
Lucas smiled softly. "Sounds that way."
Ben grinned back. "Yeah. His wife gave me all his old records." His eyebrows shot up as he remembered the records he had brought with him despite having a record player.
"Oh yeah?" Jim turned with a raised eyebrow.
"All the greatest. AC/DC, Hendrix, The Stones, a couple of Kiss." He huffed again whilst smiling. "Great records."
"Sounds like it." Karly said, clearly taken away.
Ben smiled genuinely at her and reveled as she smiled back.
"So, no offence dude, but why'd you come here of all places?" Jim asked and earned a scowl from Karly.
"Just needed to some space." Ben's smile fell again and he felt himself sinking further into the depressing thoughts always lurking beneath the surface. "Felt it pulling at me to get out ya know."
"Yeah." Lucas said pensively and had Ben studying him with renewed interest. He prided himself in his ability to identify and befriend good people. It was a gift.
Suddenly a sound shocked him out of his silent reverie.
-
5 minutes earlier
Terrance reached in a paw and scratched his neck hidden under the heavy outfit. He was the Atalissa Cougars team mascot and usually enjoyed the gig. The cougar outfit was heavy and had developed a distinct odor of sweat over the years. He didn't really like school enough to get particularly involved in all the extra curriculum stuff. He would never even have tried out for the team if his principal hadn't threatened him to do so. The threat of 'too low grades and not enough spirit' had persuaded him. Well he had tried out and failed miserably like he knew he would. So as a sympathetic gesture the coach had given him the part as team mascot. He was quite content with it. He didn't really have to do anything other than clown around and he did that very well already. Before every game he would sneak out his little flask and take a few swigs of his father's secret stash. The stink of sweat drowned out the smell of whisky quite well.
He scratched his neck again and adjusted the cougar head. He was under the bleachers when he heard the team shouting in joy over a well placed kick, no doubt. He jumped a couple times in the same spot and prepared to get exited about the damn game. "Yeah you are…. C'mon…" The internal dialogue didn't stay completely internal as he hyped himself up. When another roar sounded he started for the exit under the bleachers.
Suddenly, without warning, pain shot through his body and all went black.
-
5 minutes before that
Sam and Dean were walking around the school, glancing up and down the halls. When their search of Ben's school and the cemetery didn't come up with anything they had widened their search for unexplained events. Sam had searched for schools built on Native American preserves and found Atalissa High. They believed that if the trickster had roots to Native Americans it would probably stick to the places it knew. Indian holy grounds seemed like the place to be. So the brothers had taken a shot in the dark and gone to that school despite any evidence. It had been Sam's freaky hunches that had brought them there, if Dean was being honest with himself. But then again, Sam's hunches usually turned out to be legit.
They walked down the vacant halls and flinched when they heard hoots coming from the football field. With a shared glance they knew they were both thinking the same thing. Friday afternoon, football game.
They each had a stake hidden under thin jackets, a gun filled with silver bullets, a pen light just in case as Sam had said. Sam also had a copy of the ritual to call forth the Great Spirit and ask it to trap the Hagondes. And if that turned out to be a dud, he'd even found a spell to trap the Hagondes without begging to the Great Spirit first. Both the rituals were purely speculator of course. The shotguns filled with salt had been left back in the car to avoid too much suspicion. Sam glanced down his barely hidden arsenal and huffed. Smooth wasn't the word he would've used to describe them.
Dean gestured to the double doors leading through the gym, the locker rooms and out onto the field. With a shared glance they both made their way through the doors.
-
Ben darted wide eyes up and caught sights of something he never imagined seeing in his life. Including changelings trying to eat him.
Across the field he suddenly saw a huge mountain lion sprinting towards a couple of players benched during the game. He heard Taryn's group of girls screaming as the lion went straight for the teens and tackled them both in one jump. He jumped out of his seat and started jumping down one row of benches after the other, never missing a step. From his back he pulled out the large stake, but just as he reached the final step a familiar yell stopped him dead in his tracks.
"BEN!!! NO!!!"
He flinched to a stop and turned his wide eyes in the direction of the shout. The voice was deep and gruff. It commanded attention like a general's would. Only one person that he could remember had that kind of natural authority. Dean.
Then suddenly Sam's voice sounded. "It's not the trickster!!!" He frowned first at the panicked voices coming from Dean and Sam suddenly standing there beside each other. Then the frown turned to confusion as the statement soaked in. Not the trickster? He looked out and saw the gigantic mountain lion looming over two dead running backs in a pool of blood. It's huge claws were ripping through tissue and bone as it mangled the two bodies.
No the trickster!? Then what the hell-
His thought was interrupted by the ear deafening sound of the lion's roar. "Ben!!" He heard his newly acquired friends shouting with pure terror in their voices. "What the hell are you doing??!!" He glanced back just in time to see Lucas' and Karly's eyes widening in fear.
Then he felt a mass of pure muscle crush down on his chest and knock him down. In a spray of dirt and blood he went down with the mountain lion looming over him.
"BEN!"
Dean's voice filtered through the haze of pain that spread out from his chest and into every nerve of his bruised body.
"NO!!"
Dean saw the person he last expected to see at this exact place, this exact minute in time, running towards the huge mountain lion with a blood tinged stake in his hands. Dean's yell succeeded in stopping Ben dead in his tracks and attracting the attention of the mountain lion for a few seconds. Ben's distraction was dearly paid for. The mountain lion looked at Dean and almost smiled before it suddenly lunged for the teen. The 1500 pound creature lunged at him with claws stretched out and teeth bared. Both Sam and Dean sprung into action and started sprinting towards the majestic creature with wordless roars of denial, pain and pure fear. Dean vaguely heard a couple of the teens, out of the dozens watching the game, shout out for Ben to stop, but the warning came too late. He saw Ben turn his gaze just as the creature lunged and sank its claws into his chest upon impact.
Lucas flinched when the creature sank into the new kid. He watched with horror as two men sprinted over to their newly acquired friend. He knew he had to do something, but the drive to put action behind the thought was hard to act on. For a second the world stopped. The lumps of torn flesh that had for a minute ago had been two tough football players were now nothing more than a spot on the ground. Two of the toughest guys he had ever met had been downed as simple as with the flick of the wrist. The two running backs were dead before they hit the ground. The entire football team had all frozen in shock and fear at the attack. The coach stood rooted to the spot and stared fixedly at the two young teens already killed by the wild creature.
Sam gained ground on his brother, stretching his long legs the best he knew. He sprinted towards the mountain lion looming over Ben with fear filling his heart. With the force of speed behind him he plunged into the cougar just as it was about to sink one of its giant paws into Ben. He swung the stake at the animal as he crashed into it, oblivious to his own safety. He heard Dean shouting in the back, but didn't stop even as he plowed into the creature, outweighing him with several hundred pounds.
He swung the stake like a bat and caught the animal over the head with a powerful swing. "Sammy!!" Dean shouted as he sprinted over to the flurry.
Sam pushed the cougar back and rolled past it. The creature recovered with an angry whirring of its head and bared teeth. "Sam!!!" He heard the panic in his brother's voice.
"Check on Ben!" Sam shouted without taking his eyes off the cougar.
"Call an ambulance NOW!" Dean shouted to the coach, but noticed that it was a young guy standing on the bleachers who responded.
"I need an ambulance to the stadium now!..."
He kept an eye on his brother dancing around the cougar making sure to keep just out of reach for its long claws. "Ben!" He yelled, but to his dread he got no response. "Ben! Open your eyes!" He was bleeding from several more or less severe wounds on his chest. What worried him the most was the fact that he might have hit his head. With gentle hands and an eye on his brother swinging at the cougar with his one stake, he shifted Ben's head and hissed when he found an open wound gushing into the ground. "Shit." The boy who had had enough sense of mind to call for an ambulance came down followed by a young woman.
"How is he? Is he alive?" The questions went ignored by Dean who constantly kept an eye on the wild animal who for all intense and purposes seemed scarily aware of the things going on around it. The kid kept out of Dean's way as he gently peeled back Ben's eyelids and checked the responses. He hissed another curse when Ben's irises didn't subtract fully.
"Is he alright!?" The guy demanded as a couple other friends came down.
"Do you know him?" Dean asked instead as he eyed his brother still dancing around the creature.
"No. N-No not really. He just came over and sat down not fifteen minutes ago. We started talking. He seemed nice, but I-" His voice drifted off when several yelps drew his attention to Sam.
The cougar had swung out and caught Sam across the left arm, leaving four deep, bleeding cuts. Dean jumped up with a command to the three teens sitting with Ben. "Stay with him!" He yelled without looking back.
He ran over to the mountain lion, grabbing a water cooler as he ran. He swung it towards the creature's head and hit with a satisfying hollow thump. The animal barely faltered as is turned and stared at Dean. If he hadn't been convinced it was more than a simple cougar before, he was now. The look in the creature's eyes was nothing but pure frustration as it eyed Dean and Sam before suddenly doing a 180 and running off. It headed straight for the cluster of jocks in the middle of the field and Dean panicked.
"Stop!" He hollered with his gun drawn. To his and everyone watching's surprise the creature skidded to a halt. It turned to him with a half grin before it turned fully and started stalking back. "Shit!" He hissed at himself as the creature stalked closer. Why do I always have to open my big mouth?!
"Shoot it!" He heard someone shouting. Sam was lying a few feet from him in a pool of blood that was quickly expanding. Ben was unconscious with a bleeding head injury, no doubt severe. Dean had a split second to ponder his options as the animal suddenly lunged forward in a dead on sprint. Coming directly for him.
He didn't even register pulling his finger back. He felt the jerk of the recoil and the flinch that traveled up his arm. He barely blinked before the bullet had hit its mark in the animal's shoulder. It tumbled to the ground in a heap of soil, loose tufts of grass and fur. Dean lowered the gun slowly as the creature started squirming. But not from the gunshot wound. It almost seemed as if it was seizing. Dean held the gun trained on the cougar's chest as he approached the writhing animal with caution. His suspicions from before were quickly confirmed as the creature started convulsing and its muscles started shifting under its skin.
As it started transforming back to its former shape he lowered the gun completely and hurried back past the two football players. He knew it was pointless, but reached down never the less to feel for a pulse. Their jugulars had practically been ripped to shreds. He found nothing to indicate they were alive. He rushed over and kneeled next to Sam just as the sound of sirens was heard in the background. "Sammy?"
Sam's eyelids fluttered as he tried to convey something to his brother. "I need you to open your eyes for me, buddy. C'mon." He glanced over at Ben who was now completely unconscious. He then started going over his brother's injuries. Besides a little bump on the head it seemed the worst was the four gashes running with the length of his arm. Blood was flowing quite freely, but they didn't look too deep. He knew vertical arm-wounds were serious if they were too deep. These didn't look like had ruptured any major veins. He flipped off his jacket and ripped off his grey shirt. He tied it around the wounds to stem the blood flow a bit. He knew enough to not tie the dressing too tight and risk cutting off the blood flow to Sam's lower arm completely. He lifted Sam's arms to rest on his stomach and jogged over to Ben.
"He's not all out of it, but I can't get him to wake up." The tall, dirty blonde haired kid from before, said without Dean having to ask.
"Alright. Gimme some space here." He said gently and pried Ben's eyelids apart to check his response again. "Damnit. C'mon Ben." He grumbled in a low voice just as the ambulance pulled up to the edge of the football field. Two paramedics stumbled out with a gurney held between them. Dean waved them over to him knowing Ben was worse off than his brother.
"Over here!"
"What about the other three?" One of the paramedics shouted back.
"Those two are dead and the kid has a shoulder wound. This one," He nodded to Ben, "is worse off than the other one." He finished and gestured to Sam.
They came over and quickly accessed Ben's condition. Dean stepped back with trepidation and watched as they lugged Ben's dead weight onto the gurney. They quickly wheeled the gurney out and Dean hurried over to his brother.
"Sam?"
"Dea…" His brother's voice was slurred and his eyes glazed.
"I'm right here, Sammy."
"Ben…?"
"He's gonna be alright-" The two paramedics returned with a second gurney and together the three men shuffled the larger and heavier man onto it. "Sammy. I'm right here. I'm gonna follow you two to the hospital. You're alright." He let the sentence hang as Sam was pushed into the ambulance and the doors were closed.
A second ambulance then showed up right beside the first one. "We don't have space to take the third one. We checked the two others and they're dead, but the third one is going to go with them." The paramedic gestured to the newly arrived ambulance. Dean nodded.
"I'll follow you to the hospital."
The paramedic offered a nod before climbing back in the ambulance and roaring out of there with the sirens blaring.
"Hey. Who are you? How do you know Ben?" The kid who had called the ambulance asked Dean in a rush. Dean was already moving back to the field to get a look at the kid who had just transformed from a mountain lion back into a teenager. "Are you his dad?" The teen pressed. "What the hell was that happening to Terrance back there?"
"Terrance, that's his name?" Dean asked without slowing down his stride.
The teen nodded. "And I'm Lucas." He kept up with Dean's long stride. "I wanna know what happened to him."
"Who? Ben or Terrance?" Dean asked without giving any indication he was slowing down.
"Both of them!"
"Well I can't do either. I don't know what the hell that little show on the field was and I have no idea if Ben is even still alive." He glanced back and with a single look stopped the teen in his tracks. Dean jogged the rest of the way over to the kid apparently named Terrance, cupping his bullet wound. Pitiful whimpering was all that could be heard from him. No one would come near him, including his supposed "friends". Dean strode straight up to the kid and flipped him over on his back. Behind him he heard the paramedics wheeling their gurney ever closer. "Hey, Terrance."
Terrance looked up with wide, frightened eyes.
"Do you know what happened?" Dean asked slowly. The kid shook his head and whimpered. "I know it hurts. I'm the one who shot you, Terrance." The kid started shaking violently, but Dean didn't let it faze him. He didn't know if the kid was a victim or the culprit. "Relax. I'm not going to do it again. Do you remember me shooting you?" He asked and saw the kid pale a little.
"N-No…" Terrance breathed out with a cracking voice.
"Do you remember anything?"
"I-I don't-"
Dean glanced back and saw that the paramedics were almost there. He needed answers before the kid was taken away. "What's the last thing you remember?" He rushed out.
"I-I w-was… I was on m-my way out h-here, in m-my costume an' everything went black." He was shaking so bad he could barely speak. His face was getting deathly pale. The two paramedics rolled up in a flurry of questions and orders for Dean to step aside. Dean pulled back and crossed paths with the teen named Lucas and his friends.
"Where are you going?" A beautiful girl with black hair asked.
Dean glanced at them without slowing down. "To the hospital."
"Then I'm going with you she said and Dean saw her, Lucas and another kid move to follow him. His steps never slowed or faltered.
"Then you're going in your own damn car, 'cause no way you're driving with me." He shot out with an angry, cocky tip with his head. He felt rather than heard the three teens stop and just watch him go.
He jumped in the car and gunned it out of the drive way towards the hospital.
-
Sam was slightly out of it, but soon cleared up when he noticed the paramedic fussing over Ben. "Is he alright?" Sam asked and tried to sit up.
The paramedic pushed him back down. "I'm sure he will be."
"I need to know that he'll be ok." Sam eyed the young man for a second.
The man huffed. "Are you family."
Sam swallowed convulsively. "Yeah. I'm his uncle-"
"Then you can wait at the hospital and come talk to him when he wakes up."
Sam swallowed and looked down at the young teenager. His limp body shifted with every turn the car made. Sam found himself wishing that Dean was there to tell him everything would be alright.
-
Dean had sped after the ambulance and pulled to a screeching halt outside the hospital. Now he was sitting in the hospital waiting room, getting more annoyed as the seconds ticked by. The wall clock hammered every second, mind-shattering in its monotony. Dean's jaw clenched with every hollow click.
His fingers hammered in rapid succession on his thigh.
Click.
The upholstery of the chair he was in scratched his back and arms. He kept reaching up and scratching his nails over his skin to make it stop.
Click.
The receptionist kept looking at him when she thought he wasn't looking.
Click.
He wondered how he would ever make this alright with Lisa.
CLICK!
He shot out of his chair and stalked to the reception desk with murder in his eyes. The plump nurse there shrunk as he approached. Fears of a repeat of an earlier scene made her want to run and hide. Dean had stormed into the hospital like he owned the place and demanded to see his brother. The woman at the desk had refused with what Dean clearly perceived as a superior attitude. He had growled something less decent at her and since then, the small, round woman had darted her beady, little eyes to check on Dean every five minutes or so. Dean was fed up.
"I want to see my brother. Now!" The woman jumped and Dean felt her decline seconds from emerging.
"I'll see what I can do." She mumbled and hurried behind a door out of sight.
His angry frown turned to two arched eyebrows as the woman shuffled away faster than he had thought possible. Behind him a doctor made an appearance out of nowhere. "Wow that was fast." Dean commented surprised.
"Excuse me?" The doctor asked softly.
"Nothing. I was looking for someone to tell me how my brother is doing."
"His name?"
"Sam Walters."
The doctor smiled briefly and reached out his hand. "I'm doctor Burns. He's doing fine. We gave him some sedatives and he should be right as rain very soon. The wounds on his arm are going to leave some scars, though."
"T's ok. Chicks dig 'em." Dean muttered under his breath.
"Excuse me?"
"Nothing. What about Ben?"
"Your son?" The doctor asked and was about to continue.
"What?"
"Well your brother, Sam, told me he was his uncle so I figured…"
"Oh yeah- no, right." Dean nodded. "How's he doing?"
"He has some severe lacerations to his chest, a couple of bruised ribs and a nasty bump on the head. We scanned him for possible skull fracture, but didn't find anything. He has a very bad concussion and will need to stay here for observation for at least 24 hours."
"When can I see him?"
"He's still in surgery patching up his chest, but as soon as he's done and settled I'll call you." The young doctor smiled. "Would you like to stay with your brother while you wait?"
Dean nodded eagerly. "Yeah."
"Right this way sir." The doctor buzzed them through two glass slide doors. He glanced back just in time to see the rotund nurse from before, eyeing him cautiously before he disappeared from view around the corner.
The doctor opened the door into Sam's room and Dean almost bumped into the man trying to get to his brother. The doctor arched his eyebrows but softened when he saw the worry clear on the older man's face. "I'll come call you when your son wakes up." The door closed softly as the doctor left.
Dean walked over to Sam and turned his bandaged arm. Sam eyed him with an almost amused expression. "13 stitches." He said and raised his eyebrows at Dean's frown.
Dean hissed and turned the arm gently. "Shit, Sammy."
"Could've been worse."
"Yeah, don't remind me." Dean fell into the chair placed next to Sam's bed with a sigh. He ran a cold hand over his warm face and frowned at the thought of him getting a fever on top of everything.
"How's is Ben?"
"They say he's going to be fine." Dean said gruffly as he stared at the wall behind Sam's head. Sam nodded slowly. "Did you tell them we were related?" Dean asked without taking his eyes off the pastel colored wall.
Sam swore he heard a flicker of hope in the question, but never saw anything to indicate that feeling on Dean's face. "Yeah. Told him I was his uncle and you were his father." Sam scratched his bandages pensively.
Dean slapped his picking fingers away. "Don't scratch. You'll get it infected." His voice didn't rise above a tired and worn out tone and Sam eyed his big brother for a second.
"You sound exhausted."
"Don't start." Dean bit off.
Sam sighed and turned his gaze to rest on his lap. "What do we tell Lisa?" He looked back up at Dean, expecting some miraculous solution.
"We don't."
Sam's jaw dropped and his mouth fell open.
"We hang here till the kid's better and then we take him back home. If we're lucky he'll had just about enough of this little hunt of his." Dean rubbed his face again and leaned back in the chair.
"We could take him with us, Dean?" Sam asked actually hoping a little himself.
"No."
"He was right about the trickster. He figured it out before we did."
"Sam, I said no." Dean's tone hardly changed and Sam kept pressing.
"You were the one who wanted him to come in the first place."
"I never said that, Sam." Dean glided his steely eyes to stare at his younger brother, daring him to object.
"You didn't have to-"
Dean swirled out of his chair and started pacing away from the bed. "Jesus, Sam! I can't win with you!"
Sam stopped before going into an argument. He looked at his brother and saw the black smudges under his eyes and the flushed color on his face. "I know you were right to want to get to know him." Sam said slowly.
"I never said that!"
"You didn't have to!" Sam shouted back.
Dean stood frozen for a second and huffed deeply. Sam eyed him stubbornly from his bed. He would get up if he had to. He just hoped he could keep from falling flat on his face if he did. He had an IV bag stuck to his arm and knew he had been given a blood transfusion while they had patched him up. "You're a stubborn ass." Sam said placidly.
Dean glared back and shrugged.
"What if this didn't change his mind?" Sam asked instead. He knew it was a low blow even as he watched his brother's intense and confident stare, flicker. He knew he had hit the mark. "Your plan to convince him last time didn't. Maybe he's stronger than we thought?" Sam finished.
Dean just stared at him. The insecurity from before had turned to annoyance because he knew his brother was right. "I can't, Sam." Dean's tone never wavered and his stance never weakened, but Sam saw clear as day the truth behind the words.
"We'll handle it together, Dean." Sam tried to convince him.
Dean shook his head. "No. I refuse to jeopardize his life like it doesn't mean shit."
"Is that what you think we're doing?" Sam asked shocked.
Dean shied back minutely and Sam could see him fishing for an excuse.
"Is that what you think we're worth? What our lives are worth?"
Dean lowered his head slightly and rubbed his eyes with two fingers. "I never said that-"
"How many times do I have to tell you – you don't have to!!" Sam leaned as much forward as he could without ripping out his IV. "I know you, Dean! I probably know you better than you know yourself."
Dean snorted and crossed his arms defensively.
"We can't just let him think that way about us." Sam begged to the best of his puppy eyed ability.
Dean's posture softened as did his face. "I don't know, Sam…"
"I won't let a thing like this happen to him again, Dean." Sam proclaimed in a dark voice. "I promise you."
"You watch out for me and I'll watch out for him." Sam finished in a tone full of confidence.
Dean's face settled to a more agreeable look and Sam leaned back against the bunched pillows propped up behind him. Dean started back to the chair, but stopped when the doctor returned and peeked his head through the door.
"Mr. Walters?"
Dean turned on his heel and frowned briefly over the interruption.
The doctor smiled and stepped fully into the room. "You wanted me to let you know when your son was awake?" He asked.
Dean turned back to Sam who offered a barely perceptible nod. Dean smirked and nodded back before he turned and headed with the doctor out of the room.
The doctor saw the older brother turn back to Sam and nod reassuringly.
Dean followed him down a few identical halls before entering a single room. The doc pushed back the curtain and revealed the young man Dean barely knew, but felt more connected to than he cared to admit. He sat down on the bed next to Ben and reached a hand up to touch his forehead softly. The doctor backed out of the room and gave Dean a moment alone. For that he was grateful. He would have to remember to call and thank the doctor for how attentive he had been.
"Ben?" Dean asked with a soft, warm voice. He saw the teenager shift slightly. "Can you wake up for me, kiddo?" He kept stroking Ben's spiky bangs back. Ben shifted again and Dean watched his eyes flutter open and roll slightly in their sockets.
"Hi, Ben." He smiled down to the boy and rested his hand next to his face.
"Your hands are cold." Ben squawked out. His throat sounded like it was filled with gravel. Dean reached over for a cup of water without another word.
"Here drink this." He held the little straw to the kid's mouth. Ben eyed him guardedly, but Dean's face stayed calm and placid. "How do you feel?" Dean asked. He frowned mentally when he realized the stupidity of the question. How could he be feeling?
"'M fine." Ben said in rolled away from Dean's hand. He made to sit up, but stopped in shock when his chest suddenly lit up as if on fire. "Jesus…!" He wheezed out.
Dean held a hand to his uninjured shoulder and pushed him back down firmly, but carefully. "Your chest was pretty clawed up. They stitched you up though." Dean cleared his throat a little. "You should be fine in a couple of days." He reached the cup forward again, but Ben shifted away from Dean. Dean glanced away and pretended he didn't notice the gesture that cut deeper into him that anything ever before.
"Your head got a little banged up, but that should be fine too. Just a concussion." He frowned mentally again when he thought how lame that statement really was to anyone but he and Sam. In the normal world there was no such thing as "a normal concussion". Dean was about to continue when Ben interrupted.
"Why are you here?" A sudden memory of Dean's panicked cry at the football field popped back into his mind.
Dean looked at Ben for a few seconds. Why was he there? "Sam is here."
"So? Why did you come to check on me?"
Ben shifted and Dean couldn't help notice the stiffness in his body. The wounds might not have been too deep, but they had to hurt like a bitch. And the concussion had to be killing him. Dean hardened his face. Damned if he would let something like this happen again. "I'm here to take you back."
Ben stiffened noticeably and held his breath for what he knew would come.
"Your mother called me, Ben." Dean's voice hardened as he thought how heartbroken she had sounded. "She cried telling me her son had run away." He saw Ben look down in shame. "She asked me if you were with me. I told her no."
He watched carefully as Ben glanced back up.
"But of course now that's a lie. 'Cause here you are." He sat back down on the chair and crossed his arms. "We're taking you back to your mother and you're going to apologize your sorry ass off until she believes you." Dean's hard voice testified to the anger he felt over the kid's moronic behavior.
"I'm not going to stay there." Ben said quietly.
Dean's eyes widened in disbelief. "The hell you're not!"
Ben looked up at the older and stronger man spitefully. "You can threaten all you want, Winchester, but you can't tell me what I can and cannot do."
"No, but your mother can." Dean declared in a steely voice.
"It's better this way." Ben suddenly deflated and eyed the worn hospital sheet draped over him.
Dean gazed at the young man and barely stopped himself from reaching out and shaking some sense into him. "You have no idea what you're talking about-"
"I damn well do-" Ben argued angrily.
"You have no idea what it means to really hunt. To gamble your life like that without any regards for yourself." Dean's voice was an angry hiss.
"I know what it's like to feel so alone you'd rather sacrifice yourself than risk someone else dying!" Ben's eyes burned as his defenses crumbled. "To want to do anything to save them if it means they can have one more day with the ones they love!"
Dean stilled and watched the young man struggle for control of his emotions. He felt his eyes burn at the raw pain mirrored on Ben's face.
"So don't you dare come here and tell me I don't know what I'm talking about….!" He hissed in conclusion.
Dean looked at him with sad eyes and figured they were two of a kind. The kid knew what real loss felt like even though he had never experienced it before. Unless you counted Dean and Sam leaving all those years ago? Or the changelings taking him when he was just a boy? Alright so maybe he knows better than anyone… Dean dreaded the thought for a second, but calmed himself with the notion that they weren't important enough to have been severely missed. That Ben's mother had been his comfort through the aftermath of being kidnapped.
"Ben, I have to take you home. I owe your mother that much."
Ben was shaking and barely managed to keep his tears from spilling over. His loneliness changed to confusion from one minute to the next. He had no idea what kind the person the man beside him really was. His words didn't match his actions.
"I'm not leaving until I kill this thing." He said with conviction. "If you dump me back home I'll leave again. You can threaten me all you want, but I won't stop until that bastard is dead."
Dean looked long and hard at him with a frown. He knew he couldn't win with Ben. He couldn't force him and he couldn't trick him. "You're staying with us until we kill it." Ben's face lit up, but Dean continued. "The second we get back to the motel we call your mother and explain everything to her." He got out of his chair.
"When can I leave?" Ben asked, but was brushed aside.
"You may not give a damn if you live of die, but we do."
"Dean…"
"I'll go see if we can't get you released." Dean said without looking back. The door closed with a soft click as he left the room. Ben sat back and winced as his stitches pulled. He picked at his chest absently and wondered if they were even going to let him come on the hunt? If Dean was just telling him what he wanted to hear?
Half an hour later had both brothers coming to check on him. And at the concerned looks on their faces he felt a sting of pride and calm. He felt like he belonged. And he felt like the brothers knew it too.