The wind moaned and Sam moaned along with it, though he didn't realize he was making a sound until he stopped. He opened his eyes. A flash of panic hit when he couldn't see a damned anything and he struggled to sit upright, groggy and aching, his lips cracked dry.
He'd been dreaming and the remnants of it tangled like smoke in his hair. There were peaches and the fruit grew teeth like barbs that stuck in his skin and they wriggled and turned into burrowing worms and Jesus, this was messed up. Sam touched his lip with a quivering finger and it came back wet, the blood turned almost black in the pale light of encroaching dawn. His wristwatch started beeping, confirming the early hour, unbearably loud in the near-silence.
Cave, thirst, alone, Dean? He couldn't finish a single thought before another crowded in.
He fumbled his alarm off and pulled himself up from the hard ground. His shirt stuck to the leaking blisters on his back; how he'd managed to avoid getting sun-poisoned was something of a small miracle. If not for his fevered skin, the cold in the cave would've sunk deep into his bones. As it was, he trembled numbly and went about the familiar process of breaking camp, ignoring the reawakened hunger pangs and tender skin. He kicked dirt onto the already-dead fire, stuck the paperback in his pocket again, and collected up his meager belongings. He missed brushing his teeth almost as much as the simple luxury of having water to spit.
Sam emerged from the cave's mouth, noting a razor of weak pink on the edge of the land. The wind kicked up and he shivered harder, but he forced himself to focus on the fact that shivering was preferable to sweating under these circumstances. He took a moment to piss; the urine was still normal in color, not dark from the lack of fluids. That was something, at least.
He was putting himself back in his jeans, scanning the horizon, when his eyes caught on a pinprick of orange. Trailing from it was a tendril of dark cloud. It was still a far piece away, but to see it from this distance meant it was a good-sized fire. More importantly, it meant civilization. So he hadn't been imagining things yesterday after all.
With a great draw of breath, Sam began walking toward it.
Those few hours of shut-eye, while hardly providing proper rest, did manage to improve his morale. He could appreciate how undeniably beautiful, surreal, the land was. Endless and uncluttered, it began in the ominous colors of night, surrendering those deep tones to lighter, more delicate pastels as Sam hiked on. The packed earth was merciless on the soles of his feet but at least it was stable and not shifting in tricky drifts, where a person could easily break an ankle. Staying vertical was challenging enough without the sand working against you. What were a few more blisters, anyway?
Periodically, he stopped, collected rocks and arranged large arrows on the ground in case someone else happened along this fateful way, or if a dust storm kicked up and Sam got turned around, the markers would help him regain his bearings. As much as it galled him to admit it, Dean had the far better sense of direction.
As the sun breached the horizon and the air warmed, Sam began to notice birds. At the orchard he'd hated seeing the things, damned harbingers of death. But here in the desert, where there were birds, there was water. The location of the birds seemed to correlate to the fire in the distance—still burning, still drawing closer—but still so very far away. The smoke became white as day filled the sky. Everything was starting to brighten and bleach. Sam resorted to pulling off his shirt and fashioning a sort of veil to keep the heat away from his head and the worst of his shoulders. He doggedly followed the beacon of smoke and the drift of large-winged birds circling overhead.
Occasional bouts of wooziness began flaring up after an hour, maybe three; he'd lost all judgment of time and the numbers on his watch swam too fast to read. Sam pinned it on the blood-boiling heat and lack of water. His hunger had dulled back to an ache, annoying but ignorable. He could not, however, pretend he wasn't thirsty. No amount of pugnacious willpower would trump dehydration.
He wasn't certain he was sweating any more, either. It was impossible to tell for all the grime that kicked up and caked on his skin, leeching away whatever sweat he might've been producing.
At several points his attention wandered, vision blurring against the harsh glare of pale sand and wind-shorn rock formations, and he stumbled to his knees, his palms searing against the ground. Was this what it felt like to be burned alive? Like mothers, like fiancées? Sam blinked the grime from his eyes and put a hand to his belly, found it hollow but whole. He hauled back up and kept walking, moving on auto-pilot, trudging, one foot dragging after the other until he was tumbling down again.
He was going to have to stop as soon as he found a wedge of shadow to rest in. Or sooner, if his legs kept giving out and if the whispers he heard on the wind started turning into phantom voices. It was like music, the wind, almost-birdsong that sporadically formed words because Sam was used to hearing things—beings—talking to him from nowhere. Desperately, he hoped it was birds, or maybe the papery flutter of wings. Sam wondered if this meant angels were watching out for him, not birds at all. Angels with holy water to slake his thirst. Or break his brain.
Stop it, don't be stupid, Winchester, the angels are crazy. Every last fucking one. And so are you if you think anyone's gonna look out for you in the middle of No Man's Land. If your brother can't find you, nobody can.
Sam laughed to himself and it sounded like a crow cawing. He could swear he saw a couch up there, ahead on the left thirty feet or so, behind a curtain of wavy heat. Bobby's couch? Whatever it was, it was big enough to provide shade and someplace to hide from the remains of the day. He shambled forward, saw pillows, great dusky green pillows with dark polka dots; but when did Bobby's couch turn green?
It isn't green, you idjit.
"Bobby? No, not Bobby. Bobby's dead."
Snap to it, boy. My couch is red. Dark red like old blood—
"Not … wait. Not your couch?"
Bingo. Always knew college did ya some good.
Sam was inches from falling onto the supposed couch, reckless for its musty smell and the puff of dust that rose from the sagging cushions, when he stopped himself and reared back. Scraping a hand across his brow, he blinked and the mirage became an outcropping of rocks curled around an enormous bed of prickly pear cacti.
"That woulda left a mark." Sam almost laughed but it wasn't funny. In his own defense, it did manage to look like a big couch if you squinted really hard.
Sam'd had prickly pear jelly when he'd lived in Arizona all those years ago. Much of the plant was edible, and this one still bore a few sad fruit.
Inspired, he pawed into his pocket and pulled out the Swiss army knife, extending the largest blade. Sam used a rock to hammer back a section of spiked paddles before managing to cut free one purple bulb, speared on the end of the knife. He narrowed eyes at the thing which was likewise pincushioned with smaller barbs. Smash it, a voice chirped in his mind, but the fruit was only the size of a plum; there would be too much loss. He turned out his pockets onto the ground and poked through the items with his left hand, the precious fruit held high and away from the dirt.
Insight struck like the voice of God, if He even existed anymore. Sam snatched up his Bic lighter, crawled over to the shady side of the rocks opposite the cactus, and began roasting the outside of the fruit with flame. He didn't care if it took the lighter's whole damn store of fuel, he was going to get to the life-saving middle of the berry. Finally, he could strip off the outer skin without puncturing his fingers, and he cradled the leaking mess in his palm with the greatest care. He couldn't spare a single drop of the bright pink juice, nor did he want it coated in sand. It was better than any peach and his lips came away stained and sticky. He cut another bulb free and repeated the process.
Sam absently remembered, from Plant Biology 101, the name of those annoying hair-like bristles that shed off and embedded into his skin. 'Glochids.' Exhausted and fingertips sore, he curled up in the scant shade of the rocks and fell, quite suddenly, asleep.
xXx
Movement, curling around his belly, tickled Sam awake. Sleep-muddled, Sam brushed at it before enough cognizance returned to remind him that when he'd fallen asleep, he'd been alone. Despite a sluggish hit of alarm, he still didn't have the energy to snap to it, which proved to be a blessing in disguise. He sat up slowly and blinked as the rattlesnake, which had sidled up to Sam's body heat, zig-zagged away across the cooling desert, its shadow dark and long in the hour of sunset.
He unballed his shirt, willfully ignoring how much it stunk, and put it back on. The blisters on his back split open yet again but he was numb to the pain. Almost didn't care any more.
Sam lurched to his feet and looked towards the place he'd last seen the fire and smoke. It was still there but seemed fainter, ebbing. After a quick scan of the terrain, it remained his only possibility of human habitation. He clung to it like a drowning man.
He took a moment to shake out his socks, prod with resignation at his tender feet and empty his boots of pebbles, then resumed his pilgrimage to the beacon on the edge of the land.
Night fell fast and Sam wrapped arms around himself, rubbing away the gooseflesh. The moon was still full and enormous in the sky, lighting his way. Tonight, the desert was not as quiet. It felt alive. The wind pushed the sand restlessly and nightbird song followed in its wake, often sounding far too much like a woman's cries for Sam's comfort.
It didn't help that he could hear his own heartbeat machine-gunning in his ears, and he was sure he was starting to run a fever.
Thanks, insult. Go ahead, add to my injury.
After the passage of an uncertain chunk of time, Sam was also pretty certain he was being followed. Something moved along the rises of hill, obscured by big dry tangles of weed and stone outcroppings. It wasn't just a wayward rattlesnake, either. It was far bigger than a fox, and fast. Sam caught a flash of glowing eyes, then they were gone. Or maybe they hadn't been there at all. He couldn't trust his own compromised senses but he trusted his instincts. Wolf, maybe? But didn't they almost always run in packs? It seemed to be a solitary creature, from what he could guess. Mountain lion? Hell, that was assuming a lot; he might not even be in the United States anymore. The stars looked familiar, but …
Sam drew out his pocketknife, snicked open the blade. It was still stained with cactus juice. He was in the broad wide open and when he tried to move towards cover, the shadows churled again. It was drawing closer, whatever it was, and the nightbirds had stopped singing. The wind shifted and Sam smelled something musky and sour. Distantly familiar.
"Shit, what are you," he mumbled, whirling when movement darted past the corner of his vision. He swept aside his greasy hair and shook off the dizzying buzz of fear. "Come on, you son of a bitch, show yourself."
The thing chuffed: part snarl, part chuckle.
Sam's blade flashed in the moonlight and a wall of thick dirty fur charged over the bluff, immense enough to be a half-dozen wolves combined. It was black and Sam saw a long snout, jaws cracking open in a brazen show of tongue and teeth. He swiped the pocketknife at the beast's face and only managed to hit a limb, but the blade stuck like a toothpick in the mass of muscle and hair. Made about as much impact, too.
Werewolf. Biggest fucking werewolf Sam had seen in his entire life. He just prayed it wasn't the last thing he ever saw.
It bayed, and a fresh jolt of panic shot up Sam's spine. He threw himself backwards as claws blew past his face, just barely nicking his cheekbone. His ass hit the ground hard, knocking the air clean out of his lungs.
The monster snapped its jowls and Sam flipped himself to his hands and knees, shoving off in a frantic sprint but the creature got a fistful of shirt. It stopped him cold. The collar of his t-shirt cut into his throat and the cloth started to rip. Sam gritted his teeth and strained, but he didn't have nearly enough strength. He was being pulled in, felt the werewolf's hot fetid breath, stinking of rotten meat, on the back of his neck. It exhaled, then slowly enclosed Sam's entire left shoulder with its massive maw. Playing with its food.
Sam froze. He heard a choked sound come from his throat. The fangs pressed until skin popped. The choke became a guttural scream and the crushing pain made Sam's knees give. He was being held aloft by the spears of tooth in his shoulder; his chest warmed with the spill of his own blood. As the dark closed in and Sam hung, helpless, in the werewolf's mouth, there was a sharp boom, a big twitch. And then nothing.