Happy Saturday! Lol, here's another chapter for ya'll. I can't wait to hear what you think! Enjoy, and have a great day! Thanks!

NOTE: I'd like to thank skag trendy again for recommending this story in her last chapter update! Thanks!

Chapter 4

Dean woke groggy, unsure of where he was, or why his back hurt. It took a moment for all of it to come back—for the anger to seat itself in his gut again. His hands went out, caught on the concrete floor, and he realized he'd slumped over where he'd been sitting against the base of the stairwell. His back cracked as he sat up, and he blinked blearily out at the basement. He could make out the shape on the floor on in front of him that he knew to be Sam.

But for a moment, he thought he saw another shape hovering over his brother.

Dean blinked to clear his vision, and the other shape was gone. If it had been there at all. Still half awake, he shook it off and went on big-brother autopilot, checking to make sure Sam was still all right. He rested a hand on his brother's chest, but what he felt didn't make him feel any better. The rattle was still there.

So Sam was breathing, but it only sounded a little better than what he remembered last. When he saw his watch and realized that both of them had been out for almost eleven hours—which ticked him off right there; damn Leah for wearing them both out so thoroughly—Dean worried that Sam should have had time to rebound more by now.

It had been more than an hour or two after midnight when Leah brought him back last night, but it was past noon now. Shouldn't he sound better again by now?

And that was when Dean realized what had woken him up.

He didn't notice the scraping until it stopped, and his gaze snapped to the top of the stairs. "Oh hell no," he hissed. He was on his feet when the door opened, standing his ground at the bottom of the stairs.

Leah raised an eyebrow when she saw him. "Where's Sam?"

Dean glanced down at Sam, and realized that he was just enough out of the way that she couldn't see him. "He's still out cold, thanks to you," he snarled. "And I wouldn't touch him right now if you know what's good for you."

She clicked the safety off and aimed her pistol down at him again. "You're forgetting I'm the one with the gun."

"Oh yeah? Personally, I think you trust that thing too much. I bet you wouldn't last two seconds in a fight without it," he smirked.

Leah leaned against the doorway casually, gun still aimed at him. "Don't be so sure; making assumptions can be dangerous."

"Like the one where you assume you can do whatever the hell you want to Sam. Sorry, sweetheart, but I don't think so. Not any more." Did he know exactly how he was going to make that true? Not really. But Dean knew he couldn't let her hurt Sam again.

She gave a melodramatic sigh. "Well, I suppose you're right this time. I don't think I want to burn him out just yet." She smirked at him. "I am bored though."

Dean glowered and took the first couple of steps threateningly. "Then why don't you take me?"

Leah cocked her head at him, appraising how serious he was. "You don't really want that, do you?"

No. Not really. But…

"If it'll keep you away from Sam, I don't care," he snapped.

She studied him for another moment, and slowly her smile spread. "All right. Come up here, then."

Dean blinked in surprise, and glanced at Sam again. He was still sleeping soundly, dead to the world. But if he woke up; if he found out about this…he wouldn't be happy. Well...that was, if Leah actually managed to pull anything over on him. He fully intended to seize any chance he might be given to take her out.

Right now, he was faster than Sam. He could do this; he would take her down, and he could get Sam out of here—to Bobby. Hospitals, such public places were dangerous now, with the FBI on their tails, but Bobby would know what to do.

I'll be right back, Sammy, he thought hopefully.

Dean started up the stairs, but stopped when he realized that Leah wasn't in the doorway anymore.

"Keep coming, Dean. I'm waiting."

He cursed quietly. It would be harder to take her on if he didn't know exactly where she was when he got to the top of the stairs…but then again she probably knew that. He would just have to be careful.

Dean took the rest of the stairs gradually, listening hard for any clues as to where Leah was. Finally he thought he had her off to the right, but he wasn't sure how far back, and he had to assume the gun would be on him as soon as he crossed the threshold.

Damnit, this was stupid, dangerous…like a freaking game of cat and mouse. But he had no choice. He had to get Sammy out of here. He had to get him some help.

He paused at the top, and a slight movement out of the corner of his eye was enough to give him sufficient information about where Leah was. He ducked and rolled through the door, planning to come up under her arms and knock the gun away—then beat the crap out of her.

Instead, a maddeningly familiar sting pierced his shoulder, and then he was flat on his back. He didn't have to look to know she'd used the damn darts again.

"Bastard…" he muttered, as the world spun.

Leah appeared above him, expression smug, and he would have kicked her in the face if he could have moved enough. "I thought I was a bitch."

"That too…bitch." Then the darkness claimed him again.

This time the disorientation was all but nonexistent when he woke, and Dean was quickly wide awake and seething—but it still took him a moment to realize that he was chained to a slanting metal table.

Oh, god. No wonder Sam hadn't given him any details. Maybe he acted it sometimes, but he wasn't stupid, and Sam knew it. Metal. Electricity. Sam would have known that Dean would realize that had to be making it worse. That was why he hadn't told him anything.

Dean swore colorfully, and though he hadn't spotted Leah yet he didn't care if she was close enough to hear. This had to have something to do with why Sam was getting so much worse so quickly.

The door off to the right opened, and Leah sauntered in confidently, smirking again. "Hmm…I must say, Dean, I was hoping I would get this chance."

He snorted, pulling at the chains to no avail. "And just why is that?"

"I hate passing up a chance to give another hunter what they deserve."

His eyes narrowed. "What?"

She stayed near the door, studying him again. "Sam did tell you, didn't he? I fully admit to killing the people who died here—to lure you to me."

"Yeah, he mentioned it. I wholeheartedly agree with him, by the way: you're not a hunter."

"No, I'm not."

Dean stared at her, not sure how to respond to that.

Leah glowered suddenly, and came closer. "I know what hunters do. I know about everything you hunt, and I know how to kill them. Sometimes I hunt things, for kicks. It keeps things interesting. But I am not a hunter. Hunters…I hate."

And were Dean's senses fooling him, or did he detect maybe just the slightest hint of vulnerability in that statement?

Anything he knew, he could use against her—use to get Sam out of here. So he blinked at her curiously, trying to look vaguely interested. "Oh?"

"Hunters killed my parents," she snapped. "When I was fifteen, both of my parents were possessed by demons, and hunters killed them."

Oh, wonderful. A friggin' sob story. "Then you must not be as smart as you think you are, bitch; demons can't be killed." Well…not usually. But there was no reason to tell her that.

"They didn't kill the demons. They captured and exorcized them. My parents didn't make it."

Dean rolled his eyes. "That was hardly their fault. It happens."

Leah scoffed. "Of course it was their fault. My parents were no-one to them, civilians. I didn't know anything supernatural was real, until the week my parents started acting strange—the week they died. We were just another average American family, and the two hunters who came after those demons didn't bother to be careful. The hunters were the ones who shot my parents trying to capture them, who gave them the wounds they died from moments after the demons were gone."

He huffed. "I'm sure they tried to take them another way—but in case you haven't noticed, when it comes to demons sometimes the host can't be saved. It's not anyone's fault."

"Do I look like I care!" she snarled suddenly. She whipped around the table in three long strides, and bent to pick up—oh. Shit. Leah held two electrical clamps in her hands, trailing the wires that led down to a connected car battery.

"Hunters are hypocrites!" she shouted. She was nearly irate now, and he wasn't sure how she'd gotten there so quickly. Dean was willing to bet she was at least a little emotionally unstable—possibly just unstable period. He kicked himself for not noticing before. There had been so many signs…he realized now: The mood swings. The fact that she never made perfect sense.

Oh god what had they gotten into with this woman…

"The hunters that killed my parents? Fifteen minutes later they were trying to apologize for it, telling me they would find someplace safe for me to stay. I only went with them because I had no choice."

She sneered. "They left me with another hunter they knew—an older woman, semi-retired. She's…passed away, since then, but that's not important. I used my position to learn everything I could about hunting, about hunters—so I could make them pay. It gave me the advantage I needed, and when I was seventeen I left. I've been on my own since, and that's the way I want it."

Dean glared, covering the horror with disgust. "So that's the truth then? You're not a hunter; you're just some kind of sick freak?"

"I've been told I'm sick, yes—most of them tell me that at some point, before I kill them," she said, calmly now.

It all clicked into place. "That's why you want Sam. You think you can use him as some type of weapon—use him to further your twisted revenge."

"That's the general idea."

"Then what's with you knowing Gordon? What's all the crap about the greater good and you saying you buy into the idea that he needs to die?"

"Because it's all true." She leaned close. "I'm not completely off my rocker, if that's what you think. I care about the world, such as it is. I want to save people too—regular people, innocent people—from what's one there…and from people like you."

"We don't kill people on purpose," Dean spat. "But you did, to get us here. You killed three of those innocent people. Isn't that what you think those other hunters did to your parents? Isn't that what pisses you off? If you ask me, you're just as much a hypocrite as anyone else."

She glared. "The point is to save as many as possible in the long run. Aside from the possible personal gain, I did what I did to get Sam Winchester off the streets, to keep him from becoming a danger to any of those people. The hunters who let my parents die just weren't being as careful as they should have been. That is what I despise."

"That doesn't make what you're doing any more right," Dean bit back. "So excuse me if I don't buy into your shit."

Leah looked at him hard for a moment, and slowly the glare curled into a feral smile. "Fine. Enough with the commentary, then." She snapped one of the clamps onto a chain, just above his wrists, and circled to his other side. She squeezed open the other clamp and held it above his other wrist. Dean's chest tightened in apprehension, and he swallowed.

"Go ahead. See how much good that does you."

She actually laughed at that. "This isn't supposed to accomplish anything; it's only supposed to be fun."

Dean had suspected as much, but his eyes widened anyway, and then he was deprived of the opportunity to respond when she secured the other clamp.

The déjà-vu was immediate, but the searing pain wasn't what he remembered. To be honest, he didn't much remember what it had felt like, last time. It had been too much, too quick, and then blackness. This he really felt, and it really hurt, and it wouldn't stop.

Every muscle in his body seemed to seize at once, and he knew that was textbook. Dean heard himself grunting loudly, sputtering, gasping out a series of tense groans, but he couldn't stop it. He pulled, jerked, with what control over his body he still had, but he couldn't escape it.

And then it stopped, and he was gasping, and this time he moaned on purpose.

Then it began again.

You look so much like him…so much like him, the voice whispered, close to his ear this time. A cold, gentle hand caressed his chest, deftly avoiding the bruises, and then stopped and pressed in, just a little.

I couldn't save him, the soft voice wept. I couldn't save any of them. But perhaps…

The thin hand pressed in a little more, and there was just the slightest bit of warmth. For a moment, that was all there was, and then suddenly he could breathe just a little easier.

But it didn't last long, and Sam was left awake and staring at the ceiling, wondering if it had all been a dream. Once was just chance, a dream…could he have had it twice? Or was something more going on here?

Sam pulled in a breath carefully, noting that it wasn't much easier than it had been in the middle of the night before he'd fallen asleep. It still hurt. What time was it anyway…? Almost two…

Dean. Where was Dean?

He pushed himself up on his elbows and looked around, but he couldn't see his brother anywhere. "Dean?" he called. There wasn't much volume to the call, but it was enough to reach the rest of the basement. There was no answer.

Hooking an arm around his chest, he levered himself into a sitting position with the other, grimacing. His ribs still ached, too. "Dean…?"

Oh no…

He heard the door open, and he used the nearby stair rail to pull himself around so he could see up the stairs. Sam pulled himself up onto his knees and hung onto the rail so he wouldn't have to lean on the wall there.

By the time he was there, Dean was tripping off the bottom steps and dropping onto all fours on the concrete beside him.

"Dean!" Sam coughed and clamped a hand on his brother's shoulder as Dean sat like he'd landed—doubled over, gulping in air. "Dean?"

"'M okay, Sam." He gasped it, and yet somehow it sounded firm and final.

Not that it would stop Sam. Suddenly he felt nauseous, but he had to know. "She didn't—"

"Yeah," Dean breathed. Grunting, he pushed himself back up some, resting his hands on his knees now instead of the floor. Sam opened his mouth to offer some kind of apology, but Dean continued. "She was bored. It's okay…wasn't up there long." He moaned a little and leaned back on the steps, eyes clenching shut. "Ah, sh—"

Sam's jaw worked back and forth, and the hovering pain from his own injuries was temporarily forgotten in the sudden anger. "She said she wouldn't hurt you…"

Dean scoffed. "Yeah, if you actually cooperated…which you will not, by the way," he reiterated, holding up a finger for emphasis.

"I know that."

Dean sat up again, still breathing hard. "Sammy, I'm fine."

Sam felt the tears stinging his eyes, and cursed them. "I know…" Once didn't matter. He'd been fine after once, too. But he'd counted on only having to worry about himself, physically. He'd counted on being able to keep Leah away from Dean, as long he went with her when she wanted him.

But what if she wouldn't? What if she was 'bored' again? What if Dean ended up in the same shape he was in? He couldn't let that happen. He couldn't let Dean be hurt, and besides…one of them had to be healthy to get them out of here. The thought that Dean might be in more danger was too much, and he had to fight to keep his breathing from escalating. He couldn't get air any faster than the slow pace he was pulling it in at now, and if his body tried he would be left gasping, and Dean would worry.

He didn't realize Dean had moved again until he felt his brother's hands on his shoulders. He looked up, and Dean was right in front of him, looking at him intently through eyes that were now damp and green.

"Sammy? Sam."

He blinked and focused. "What…?"

Dean swallowed and looked away, fingers digging into Sam's shoulders. "Is that really what she's…been doing to you?"

He winced. "I guess so."

Dean swore and let go of him, wearily scrubbing a hand over his face. Slowly his head began to shake. "No. Not any more."

"Dean, what can you do?"

He shrugged. "You know…keep her occupied. I can do it for a while, at least, until we can get out of here. I hate it, but we might have to wait for Bobby. We'll keep trying, but somehow I don't think we're getting out of here until we have some help."

Sam scowled. "Dean for one, I don't want you to do that—take my place—and for another…how do you know she would even let you?"

"I just do," he answered tightly.

"Oh yeah? How?"

"Drop it, Sam. I won't let her hurt you again. Conversation over."

He snorted, ignoring the fact that it hurt like everything else. "No, it's not. It's me she wants anyway; you're not doing that."

"Yes I am."

"I really don't think she'll go for that."

"Yes, she will."

"Why?"

"Because she already did!" Dean shouted, pointing up the stairs. "She was coming for you again, Sam. You were still sleeping. You couldn't breathe well; you couldn't stand up on your own. You still can't. I couldn't just let her—" He broke off and looked away again. He grabbed the opposite rail and pulled himself to his feet, then paced shakily away from the stairs, shoulders hunched and tense.

Sam swallowed back the lump in his throat that was screwing with his breathing even more. "Dean—" he choked. "You didn't have to do that."

"Yes I did, and I'll do it again and again if I have to," he told him, stabbing a finger toward the floor in accent.

Now it was Sam's head shaking in denial. "Dean, no…" And he couldn't fight what was happening to his breathing any more. He felt his chest growing tighter and tighter as the argument dragged on, and his air came up shorter and shorter. He knew he should stop arguing, calm down so Dean wouldn't know. But he couldn't let this go. He wouldn't let Dean do it. He couldn't.

"You don't have a choice here."

"No," he protested again. But Dean had turned away again, and he sent back the same answer, over and over, and Sam couldn't protest anymore—he couldn't breathe for the panic that seized him.

Still holding onto the stair rail to keep himself upright—closer to hanging from it now—Sam's other hand fisted in his shirt over his chest as he tried to pull in air.

"Dean—!"

He only managed to gasp out the name once before his air was gone, and he still couldn't catch any more. He tried not to panic about that, too, but it was hard when everything was spinning.

"Sammy!" He heard the call faintly, and then he felt Dean beside him pulling his torso upright against the wall to give his lungs more room. He felt his cheeks being slapped as his brother demanded that he breathe, but he couldn't see anything now. He didn't know if his eyes were closed or if his vision had faded out.

Sam felt Dean's hands moving from his arms to his chest, to his face, and back again, sensed his brother's frustration in not knowing exactly what to do. Dean pounded on his chest a few times, not too hard—probably worried it would only do more damage—but it didn't do anything anyway. Sam only felt himself grunt…only felt it. He couldn't hear now, either.

I'm going to die. Dean, I'm sorry. It was the only coherent thought he had.

Then something pressed against his mouth, and air was pushed into his lungs—once, twice—and then they finally decided to do it on their own. Sam slowly, painfully, pulled in a breath, and everything began to fade back into place.

He heard Dean calling his name, a little less urgently now, felt another light slap to his cheek. "Sammy, come on."

Sam opened his eyes, somehow relieved that they had only been closed. He gradually focused on his brother, who heaved a sigh of relief when he realized Sam was looking at him.

"Thank god. Don't do that to me, okay?"

He nodded once.

Dean sputtered and rubbed a sleeve vigorously over his lips. "Seriously, dude, don't ever make me do that again."

Sam made an 'ick' face, spluttered once or twice himself and immediately brought an arm up to scrub at his own mouth. "Point taken."

"Yeah…" Dean sighed and stared at the ground. "I'm sorry. I didn't know you'd get that upset over it; I didn't mean to—"

"It's okay." Sam coughed, "—s not your fault I almost died because if it."

Dean just winced, and both of them fell silent for a while. Sam focused on breathing, but he didn't know what Dean was up to. When his brother finally looked up again, his face was set.

"Okay, listen. Maybe we don't have to argue about this anymore. I might have another plan."