Chapter 4
He looked at his brother. Sam seemed dead to the world. The morphine, pumping through his system should'a been enough to kill him, and yet it seemed like it was barely enough to keep him down. For some reason he was only barely unconscious. He was flinching and shifting too much for Dean's liking.
What had started as an uncontrollable rage in his brother was changing. Affecting him physically. Sam's lips were still blue, even after washing away Hephzibah's saliva, and Dean was getting worried it might be oxygen-related.
Dean himself was still shaking from his own ordeal, sitting in the temporarily occupied home. Now full of civilians, a hunter he didn't trust, a hunter he disagreed with half the time, and Bobby.
Bobby who had offered him a shot of morphine, like his brother, once they'd arrived. Dean had accepted which was admittedly a moment of weakness on his part, but he couldn't have imagined how the pain would've been after the comedown of adrenalin without the drugs. He'd be better off in la-la-land along with Sam. Looking at him now made emotions swirl inside him. Worry and anger, being the predominant two, though he didn't quite understand why.
Sam was sweating. His face was stuck in a pain-induced frown. His hands jerked occasionally, and he shook all over. Like his body was trying to fight off a massive infection whilst battling monsters in his dreams. He could only imagine the pain Sam would feel when he woke up. Only imagine how he'd feel himself if Sam woke up as something else.
When, a tinny voice taunted. "Shut up," he whispered into thin air. He'd tried calling Cass, but the goddamn angel was off doing who-knew-what. Hadn't returned Dean's calls in any shape or form.
"You say somethin'?" Bobby appeared in the open door.
"Nah nothin'," Dean turned. "Hey."
He entered fully. "Hey kid. How's he doin'?"
He sighed. "Dunno," Dean felt spent. Empty.
Bobby rolled over next to the bed. "You have Rufus check you over?"
"'M fine,"
He nodded. "How's the pain?"
"Fine,"
Annoyance flickered across his face. "And the verbal skills, how 'bout those?"
"What's wrong with my brother, Bobby?" Dean's own voice bore witness to just how tired he was. Like a paper towel, fluttering on the edge of a hook, just waiting for the smallest breeze to rip it along.
Bobby sighed. "He's fightin', but there's no guarantee he'll wake up," He thought about the statement for a second. "Well, he'll wake up no matter what, if we run outta morphine, but by then he probably won't be Sam."
"I thought you got it out."
A beat. "Yeah."
Dean turned to his friend who twitched his lips. "You hesitated," He narrowed his eyes. "Now, you hesitate? Now?"
Bobby rubbed a persistent itch on his nose and glanced up at the young man, hunched over by his brother's side. "Don't know if we got it all."
"What's happening to him?"
"I thought you had that figured by now?" Bobby's voice was kept low and gruff. Not wanting to agitate the young man further.
"No?"
"He's becomin' one a' them, Dean."
Dean's mind spun wildly for a second before connecting the sneer around Bobby's lips to recent events. "A ghoul?"
An exhale was all the answer he dared give.
Dean snorted right back and leaned forward, looking sick.
"You need the bucket?"
He inhaled with great effort, and closed his eyes. "Ahhh… No," Straightened back up. "I thought you said you stopped it. Got it all out."
Bobby didn't comment on the repeat. "I knew there might be a chance some of it'd infected his bloodstream."
"What about me?"
Bobby shrugged. "Might be we got it all out," Dean suddenly noticed the weary air around his friend. "Might be we missed some and it's takin' longer for you to turn."
Dean widened his eyes. He felt them doing it. Fear, mixed with shock, mixed with something else, making his lids peel apart and his eyes bulge. "Well, then what? Is it safe for me to be runnin' around?" He gestured vaguely to the living room of the house they were squatting in.
"We'll see the signs if they show up. Won't make it past Rufus an' me. Don't worry," The reassurance sounded hollow. We promise to kill you if you turn.
If, the little voice echoed.
If?
"What about the people they saved?" he asked to banish the little voice.
"We dropped most of 'em off at a local bus stop. Some of 'em wanted to stay."
"And you let them?"
"They said they had nowhere else to go," Bobby looked sternly at him. "That, and she took families, Dean. That's what Hephzibah killed. Starting with the youngest members and workin' her way up," He looked back at the youngest Winchester, flinching in his sleep. "Probably why she zoned in on Sam."
"Were any of them infected?"
"A couple. We got it out in time."
Dean nodded and released a deep sigh. "You sure?"
"Well-"
A clatter from the living room interrupted them. "Shit," Bobby rolled away in his chair, and Dean out of his crouch, and together they rushed through the door. In the living room a woman was being pinned to the floor by a big, black guy and Rufus, who was poised over her with a needle. He stuck the petite blonde and injected the high dose of morphine. She struggled for a few seconds, but the black guy held her tight.
Freddy was off to the side with a loaded shotgun. Dean pushed it down in passing. "What're you gonna do with that, Pop-n-lock, blow their freaking brains out trying to blow hers out?"
"She started showin' signs about an hour ago," Rufus called to Dean and Bobby. He straightened his back with a crack. "Didn't turn ugly until about fifteen seconds ago," He clapped the guy, who'd held her, on the back. He nodded to Dean. "Dean, this is Derek. He's the one who carried you outta there."
Dean and Derek shared a brief glance while Freddy and Rufus picked up the blonde and carried her into another room. Dean was about to follow when Rufus called back out. "Dean, get the cuffs in ma' duffel and bring 'em in here?"
He patted Bobby on the shoulder in passing, but didn't speak. The people they'd brought back were all watching warily.
He jumped at the chance of doing anything to help. Even the smallest tasks were a welcome change from staring at an unresponsive brother.
In the room was a bed without a mattress, placed strategically in the middle. Freddy was cuffing the blonde's feet to the bed whilst Rufus held out his hands for the cuffs, and chained her hands to the headboard. Dean couldn't help but stare as Bobby wheeled in behind him. Her eyes were half open and rolling in their sockets. She was twitching just like Sam and mumbling incoherently. "Who is she?" Dean hovered uneasily in the doorway.
"Stacy Addams. We found her with the rest," Rufus straightened and sighed. "I thought she was gonna make it."
"She still can though, right?" Dean suddenly felt his stomach plummet.
Bobby glanced at the crestfallen Rufus before turning to Dean. "I honestly have no idea if any of 'em are gonna make it or not."
Dean's heart was hammering and sweat was forming. Nononono, this can't end with Sam dying. He's gonna become one of those things. I can't let that happen- won't let it happen. No. Not ever.
Rufus injected the girl again and answered Bobby's glare. "It's a muscle relaxant. Just like I gave to Sam. Mixes fine with morphine," He straightened. "I checked," and vacated the room.
"Is it safe to leave her like that?" Dean asked quietly with an anxious glance out at the other victims.
"Yeah. She'll be out for half an hour before her metabolism burns through the drugs."
"Just thirty minutes?"
Bobby shrugged. "That seems to be the average time, yeah. Sam burned through it in less," He made a uey and headed for the ramshackle kitchen. There was no running water or electricity, but a box of bottled water and pizzas were stacked on the chipped counter. Dean grabbed a water.
Dean leaned his hip against the counter and stared in the direction he knew Sam to be. "You have a way to fix my brother, Bobby?" he asked into the floor.
The old hunter growled deep in his throat, and sent the young man a glance. "Maybe."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Rufus entered the kitchen, and glanced towards the living room which was just out of sight and earshot. "Dean, back at the church…" He thought of the young man's reaction when he told him the truth. "We didn't kill her."
"What?" He looked stupidly around for a few seconds whilst Rufus stared calmly at him. As Bobby made several aborted attempts at biting his thumbnail. Suddenly it dawned on him with a sickening feeling. No… "Don't tell me-"
"Dean-"
"Nononono, don't tell me that you walked outta that building without making goddamn sure the goddamn witch was dead!" he yelled the last words at Rufus.
"I got off a shot of consecrated iron, just after somethin' really strange happened,"
"What happened?"
"I haven't told Freddy this," He glanced at Bobby, "but it looked like her mind went right before I pulled the trigger. One second she's glarin' daggers at me and the next she's like a damn doll. No emotion. No thoughts at all."
"You don't think it was something else?"
"Like what?"
Dean glanced at Bobby before he huffed and scratched his head. "Shock?"
"No. You didn't see it, kid. And with all due respect to you and that brother of yours, I've been on this case a helluva lot longer than you."
Screw you. He ground his jaw and nodded before the primal response even registered consciously. "So whatta you think?"
"I read about her before I came up here. The history books know her as Hephzibah, and they claim she was burned at the stake over twelve hundred years ago. We're talkin' medieval here, Dean- alright. She was old school evil. Before the church stuck its nose in there and started going after them, she got fried for crimes too heinous to be described, even by past standards."
"So? She obviously survived somehow."
"Her powers, yeah. I don't think her body did, though."
Dean leaned closer. "How so?" He glanced again at Bobby, but the older hunter kept his mouth resolutely shut.
"I think she's trainhoppin'," His eyes lit up with a strange fascination. "I think her mind jumped ship at her execution and somehow learned to keep moving from body to body."
"So she could be anywhere?"
"Yeah. Possibly."
"Wonderful," Dean skimmed a hand through his hair. "Did you double check the locks?"
"Talismans and bottles of brimstone everywhere," He fired off as if knowing that would be Dean's first question. His expression softened. "She ain't gettin' inside. Don't worry."
"No. I won't worry about her, coming to kill him-" he ground out. "I'll just worry about him becoming a ghoul instead."
"Look, I know-"
"NOOAARRRHHHH!" The scream echoed through the house.
"Not again," Dean jumped and sprinted into his brother's room. "What's happenin'?" Freddy was already hunched over Sam, trying to hold him down.
"He's changing!"
The oddest cracking sound came from under Sam's skin while he writhed on the cot. "Jesus…" Bones were fucking traveling under his skin. Expanding, shifting, and changing positions. Just a hair's breadth or so every few seconds, but more than enough to cause massive pain and be freaking visible. "This is gonna kill him before he ever changes completely. Can his body even take this?"
Rufus had stormed in after him, with Bobby rolling in after that.
Blood vessels ruptured before their very eyes, resulting in huge, black and blue blemishes, blossoming across his skin. "Sam?" Dean knelt by his head and cupped a hand over it. He noticed Rufus delivering another shot in his periphery. "Sam, c'mon, man- I know you can hear me."
He felt Sam's collarbone shift under his arm and swallowed down a wave of vomit. Sam grunted in pain and arched his back, looking like he was trying to crawl out of his skin to avoid it, but to no avail. "Please-please h-help…me," His eyes rolled in their sockets, searching for something.
His breath smelled metallic and sickly sweet. "I'm right here, Sam. C'mon," He leaned in as close as he dared and whispered in his brother's ear. The drugs were pumping through Sam's system and he started to calm back down. He smelled horrible.
"D'n," he breathed out. His struggles faded until he passed out completely.
"Switched to Ketamine," Rufus supplied, stepping back with a deep breath.
Dean exhaled as well and sat back. "And how long will that last?"
"Hopefully longer 'an thirty minutes," He turned and left the room when another scream sounded. "What now."
TBC
AN: I have a friend. His name is Cliffhanger. Cliffhanger, meet Readers :) T
hat's it for tonight folks. Thanks for reading.