I'm back from camp! Camp was amazing, but I'm glad to be home and able to write. :) Here's the first new chapter, and I hope ya'll like it. I hope to hear what ya'll think soon! Thanks so much!

Chapter 17

The weather was warming in expectation of summer, but wasn't too stuffy not to be nice. The front steps of Bobby house were a welcoming place for Sam to escape to, for a few minutes at least, especially in the cooler evening air. The sunset wasn't a downer to look at, either.

He just had to get out of that house every now and then—escape Dean and Bobby's eyes watching every move he made, to make sure he was all right. He knew they were only concerned for both his physical and emotional well-being, but he was more than glad that they hadn't been voicing those concerns.

He had enough to do dealing with the reasons for them on his own. He didn't want to think about Ohio, much less talk about what had happened there.

When he came out here, they usually left him alone. Today, as the sun began to sink below the horizon, he heard the screen door smack behind him. Boots thumped across the porch, and the steps creaked as Dean settled beside his brother and held out one of the two beers in his hands.

Well…maybe he didn't mind company as long as the company brought beer. After all, no one had let him near one since…before.

Sam sighed and otherwise took the bottle silently, nodding in thanks. Dean shrugged in answer, opened his own bottle and took a long swig. Sam started out a little more slowly.

The brothers sat comfortably at first, not quite watching the late spring sunset.

"It's been more than a week this time, Dean," Sam said finally. He didn't want to ruin the moment, per se, but it had to be said.

"Yeah." Dean looked away, squinting into the dimming orange light. "I guess you want to get out of here."

"Yeah."

He sighed. "You know I still don't like it—really don't like it."

"We can stick with the compromise."

"We tried that, remember? You still got hurt," Dean scowled, shifting his angry gaze to his boots and dredging up with difficultly what he said next. "In your condition, those injuries could have easily been fatal."

Sam grimaced and stared at his own shoes. "I know, but…that wouldn't have happened at all if the shifter hadn't grabbed you. You and Bobby would have gone in, taken the thing out, and that would have been that."

"Maybe. But that wasn't that, and that could happen again. I could be compromised again, and you would go in, and next time—" He stopped abruptly, but Sam read the rest clearly. Next time you might not be so lucky.

"Something could always happen to one of us, on any hunt," Sam countered quietly.

Dean shifted uncomfortably. "Well what do you want us to do, Sam? There haven't been any signs of demon activity lately. No omens. No nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Bobby would have said something; no, nothing. I know what you want, Sam. You want that yellow-eyed bastard dead. So do I, but we have no leads. There's just nothing to follow."

"Then we find something else to hunt. Anything. We'll…be more careful this time, I guess. Whatever you want. We've been over this, Dean; I can't just sit here." He shifted on the steps, resisting the urge to wince. His ribs weren't in great condition yet, but he was okay—mostly. He just wanted to get back on the road again. Having time to think was dangerous.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. I'm not liking the sitting around so much myself right now." He took another pull of his beer and sighed. "Fine. But if I slip my cool and mother-hen you, you are not allowed to make fun of me."

The fact that Dean had actually said that aloud was plenty of incentive for Sam to feel amiable enough to agree.

"Deal."

Bobby had been obviously less than pleased when the boys had decided to go it on their own this time, but he'd let them leave without to much outward complaint and Dean was glad of it. He was sure Bobby had only let them go because he understood that the brothers needed some time to themselves, and none of them needed any vocal reminders of the many reasons why.

The togetherness, however, would apparently be waiting until later. Sam had fallen asleep in the passenger seat almost the moment they'd pulled away from Bobby's place and out of the salvage yard after lunch. He didn't wake up until they were halfway to Missouri. When he did wake up, he did it quickly, and didn't quite cover the grimace or stop the arm that went around his chest after the jerk to consciousness.

Dean chose to ignore it; he was sure the last thing Sam wanted now was more concern, no matter how much his throat burned to ask if his brother was all right.

"Welcome to the road trip," he said instead, smirking.

Sam pushed himself up carefully, scrubbing the sleep out of his eyes. "Where are we?" he asked groggily.

"Iowa. Home of the ever-melodramatic captain of the good Starship Enterprise. Yes, I do know a few things about geek shows."

His brother snickered lightly. "Good for you." Sam glanced out the Impala's window at the beginnings of a sunset similar to the one they'd seen the evening before. "We stopping soon?"

Dean shrugged. "We don't have to. You just got your sleep, so you could drive the rest of the way if you want," he answered, resisting the urge to put the option in terms of if you're feeling up to it.

Sam didn't wait long before nodding. "Sure."

The switch didn't take place immediately, and Dean cranked up the radio now that his brother was awake. The station went through two or three songs before playing the same one they'd heard in Bobby's kitchen before leaving for Ohio.

Dean laughed once. "Hey, there it is again."

"Huh," was Sam's only reply.

Dean was singing along almost before he realized he remembered the words. "Come on; it's not that hard to pick up." He never did get his brother to join in, but at least Sam was smiling. He sighed when the song was over, and turned down the volume to a background level.

"Okay, fine…I guess you're right. I'm glad we're back on the road, too." He still didn't like the risk to Sam, but that was his problem. "I was gettin' tired of watching you mope around anyway."

"Dude, I was not moping," Sam protested immediately.

"Oh yeah? Go press replay and try to tell me that again." Sam only huffed and stared out the window, and Dean hesitated before saying anything. "Hey…you gotta relax. Ash is still keeping tabs on the demon stuff, and Bobby's working on, you know, your thing. So are we."

Sam glanced back at him, probably wondering where he was going with this.

"Hey, with any luck we'll have you fixed up and back to Ohio in time to see Abby graduate," he offered hopefully.

"Maybe." The answer was noncommittal in tone, but Dean saw the hope in his brother's eyes, anyway. It was enough. As long as it was there somewhere, they would be all right.

Dean nodded affirmatively and went on, though more uncomfortably this time. "And I was thinking that even if we're still working on it then, maybe we should still go."

Sam frowned. "To Abby's graduation?"

"Yeah…" he shrugged.

"No."

"Why not?"

The answer came reluctantly. "I won't do that to her. I'll do what she wants—I'll keep her semi-posted—but I won't go back until we fix this," he answered, looking away through the glass again. "I won't do anything that might make it worse for her if…I don't make it."

Dean swallowed hard. "You'll make it." Then silence fell until he was the one to break it long moments later. "So uh…you wanted to drive?"

"Yeah. Sure."

He nodded absently and started looking for the next exit.

The case turned out to be your average, run-of-the-mill poltergeist—in a small aging shop in Festus, Missouri. The case took all of two days or so to solve, and Sam obediently let Dean shoulder any minor peril involved.

Sam still didn't like letting Dean go in on his own, but after worrying Dean and Bobby when he was injured in Ohio he figured he owed it to Dean not to protest the compromise for now. When getting rid of the thing went off almost without a hitch and Dean escaped with a few bruises, one safe family business, and one grateful girl, Sam wasn't sorry he'd trusted his brother this time.

He made sure Dean didn't feel bad about not making it back to the motel room that night, either. His ribs were still bothering him, so he took the chance to go to bed early without any questioning from his brother and woke in time to have his things packed by the time Dean showed up again somewhere around lunchtime. It was a good thing Sam had already found food down the street.

"We could always stay another night," Sam smirked, when he saw the genuine smile on his brother's face. It was good to see it there.

"Nah. We should get moving. Maybe all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, but too much fun makes zippo progress," Dean shrugged. With that he proceeded to lug the oxygen generator out to the car. When he returned he was holding a crumpled, typical sandwich-size paper bag. "Hey, this yours?"

"What is it?"

"I don't know; it was on the floorboard in the back. I musta knocked it down there getting that generator in here a few days ago." He shrugged and reached in, pulling out an old videotape. "What the—"

"What is it?" Sam came around the beds to his brother's side, and stared in confusion at the label on the side of the tape. It said Dean and Sammy 84-85, scribbled in John Winchester's handwriting.

"Holy crap," Dean said after a long moment. "I totally forgot about that stupid camcorder."

"What?" He was lost.

"Uh…yeah…they had like just come out, and dad decided to get one, I think. I don't remember when he bought it, actually, or however he got it. I just remember that eventually we just kind of had it. I don't think he ever used it much, but…"

"A tape recorder? Why would he have ever bought anything so…unnecessary?"

Dean shrugged, still staring at the tape. "I don't know. I mean, he wasn't always like you remember him, you know," he said quietly. "He went a little crazy right after the fire, looking for answers I guess, but after that there were two or three years where it wasn't so bad. He kind of…went back into dad mode for a little while, before he kicked into full on drill-sergeant mode and started leaving to hunt stuff all the time. I guess you don't remember."

Sam swallowed. "No…I don't." Then he blinked. "But…how did that tape in your car?" Dean looked up.

"Bobby," they said together.

"The son of a bitch has probably had it for years," Dean huffed, shaking his head. "I knew dad had left some of our stuff there in the past, but I didn't know he'd kept this at all…" He glanced around quickly. "Hey, is there a VCR in here?"

"No…" Sam answered, pretty sure there wasn't but glancing again anyway.

Dean set the tape gently on top of the television. "The come on; let's go find one."

"Ah, Dean, we're leaving anyway. Maybe there'll be one at the next motel."

His brother was already heading for the door. "Well I don't wanna wait until we've crossed two states and then there not be one. We might as well get one now."

"You're just gonna buy one?"

"Credit card fraud, dude. We're not paying a cent. Those things are apparently obsolete and dirt cheap these days anyway. No store's gonna miss the money for one of them."

"But Bobby has a VCR." It wasn't that he didn't want to see the tape, but someone had to be practical, and right now that wasn't Dean. Why was he so overeager?

Dean opened the door and leaned on the knob. "We're not going back to Bobby's right now, remember? He already called with a lead on another case for us. Now are you coming or not?"

Sam sighed and followed his brother out to the Impala.

When they managed to find a VCR cheap at a local pawn shop—without going to any chain stores or using any of the scam credit cards—Dean drove back to the motel without losing his good mood, paid for another night, and hauled the oxygen generator back inside so he wouldn't have to do it later before they went to bed.

"What happened to 'too much fun makes zippo progress?'" Sam asked as Dean hooked up the VCR.

"This is different," came the short reply. "Got it!" He pushed in the tape, picked up the remotes and dropped onto his bed to quickly press play. Sam, for the most part, was still baffled. As strange as it was to think that John Winchester had ever taken the time to record anything, it was even stranger for Dean to be so eager to watch whatever was here. He just wasn't the home movie type.

It took a moment for the static at the beginning of the old tape to fade and allow the picture to solidify into anything, and when it did there was only a dark shape, too close to the lens to be clear. Then the shape pulled back, and it was a younger John Winchester's face.

"Is the light blinking, Dean?"

"Yeah, daddy; I think it's working," said a small voice off screen. John backed up out of view, and half of the couch in an unidentifiable motel room could be seen. A five-year-old Dean sat on his heels in the middle of the cheap bright orange cushions, grinning at the camera and holding an arm around the year-old boy that sat back against him, staring up in bewilderment.

"You have no clue what's going on," Dean chuckled.

"Is it really recording us?" his younger self on the screen asked in wonder.

"It should be," John's voice answered.

Sam suddenly felt much more sober than his brother, and he wasn't sure why. "Give me a break; I'm like fourteen months old," he answered quietly.

The tape only held two hours of video, and Sam watched Dean more than he watched the tape. The tape he could always watch later, but this would be his only chance to see Dean's first reactions. By the time Dean—his tough, no-nonsense, older brother Dean—began turning his head surreptitiously every now and then to swipe at his eyes halfway through the tape, Sam understood why Dean had wanted to see it so badly. He understood why he himself felt so…well he wasn't sure how he felt.

Like Dean had said, he didn't remember any of this. He'd been too young. The tape seemed to be proving that there had been a good year or two, maybe more, and maybe he didn't remember but his brother did. Dean had just been looking for a better escape from reality than a meaningless one-night stand. Maybe this escape wasn't reality now, but it had been.

That meant so much more than anything else could. Things had been better once. Maybe they could be better again. Not with Dad…Dad was gone; but maybe the hope they were holding on to wasn't so unfounded. It couldn't be. They had to fix this…Sam didn't want to go anywhere.

He wanted to see Mom and Jess's killer dead, and…even if his way of life now would never allow him to be with someone like, Abby, or Sarah…he wanted to see them again. Sam wanted to be able to see them again without weighing them down with the burden of his condition now. He wanted to be whole again.

He had to believe it could still happen. He would believe it could still happen.

"Oh my god! Sam, hey; Earth to Sammy. Look, quick. Oh my god I can't believe he got this…" Dean was laughing again, and Sam focused on the screen to see himself at eighteen or nineteen months old, on his feet and bouncing and bobbing up and down and back and forth to the song Dean had told him about.

"Oh my god," he echoed, smirking despite himself.

"Dude, you had some serious moves for a kid."

"Shut up or I'm turning it off."

Dean's laugh was nothing compared to the higher-pitched squeal of a laughing fit coming from his younger self on the video, and after a moment the camera shifted and was set down on something, and John Winchester came into view for the first time in awhile on the tape. He crouched on the floor near Sam's younger self, arms out ready to spot if the boy fell.

John was laughing, too.

It strange, seeing Dad laugh like that…strange but good. Maybe it wasn't quite carefree, but it was a damn sight better than what they'd seen from him in those last years—especially once he and Sammy had started to butt heads. Dean knew his eyes weren't dry, but there wasn't much he could do about it. He liked to pretend he could hide those things from Sam, but he never could.

Sam always knew, just like he always new when there was something wrong with Sam. It had been something like that when they were kids, before the bad years, but it had never been as strong as it was now. They just knew.

That was how he knew that sitting here watching this was having an effect on his brother. Maybe it wasn't the same effect it was having on him, but he knew that thinking face. It was still there when the tape ended.

Dean climbed off the bed and went to pull the tape out. "You know, maybe Dad didn't use the thing much, but I know we had that camcorder longer than the six months or so this covers. I wonder if Bobby has any more of these tapes; if Dad kept any of the few others there were."

Sam hadn't moved from where he sat back against the headboard of his own bed. "Whatever happened to the camcorder anyway?"

"Ah, by the time I was nine or ten he'd gotten rid of it. It took up too much room in the trunk; those old versions were big."

"Figures," he smirked mildly.

Dean shrugged, slipped the tape back into its sleeve and moved to set it on the nightstand between the beds before perching on the edge of his. "What do you think, Sammy? I don't guess I'd mind finding a few more of those." He grinned. "You gotta admit; you were funny-looking as a kid."

"Maybe so, but Missouri was right—so were you," Sam shot back. The comment might have been accompanied by a grin of his own, but today it wasn't, and Dean still wasn't sure what was on his brother's mind.

"Oh come on; I was adorable. I'm still adorable."

"Dream on, Dean."

"Hey, just because we're in the state she's named after does not mean you have to agree with everything she said."

Sam snatched up the pillow beside him and tossed it in his brother's direction, but it was too obvious that he hadn't used his torso at all in the throw.

Oh.

Dean let the pillow hit him in the face, caught it and pulled it down into his lap. "So how you feeling? Yeah, I know you officially hate that question, but humor me."

"I'm fine, Dean. Just sore."

"You sure?"

He shrugged innocently and nodded once. "Yeah."

"Good. Great…well, it's too late to head out to Louisiana now, so we've got an evening to kill."

"Where in Louisiana did Bobby say the case was?"

"Somewhere south of Baton Rouge. I'll find the piece of paper I wrote the stuff on in the morning."

"Wherever it is, it'll take most of the day to get there."

Dean stood again and stretched. "Yep—so you'd better get some sleep. You are so not zoning out on me again tomorrow. I don't care how much you hate the music; it's damn boring driving around with you asleep."

Sam gave another distant smile. "Except when you're sticking spoons in my mouth, right?"

"Dude, I did that once."

"Yeah, and then you found other things to put there."

Dean sat back down, waved him off, and started flipping channels, wishing Sam would talk to him about anything other than cases and jokes…something he hadn't seemed very willing to do since Ohio.

Granted, ignore-the-problem or hide-the-thoughts were Dean's own games, but they felt out of place on Sam.

Too much movement still hurt, and Sam was careful climbing into the shower. Maybe he'd had one that morning before Dean returned, but the warm water helped ease the ache. Still, he knew he couldn't stay in too long before the steam made it a little harder to breathe—another pain-in-the-ass, annoying-reminder side effect of having a serious lung condition.

He'd only noticed it in the past week or so, and he wondered if that was normal for the stage he was in, or if he should be worried...but he didn't think it was bad enough to worry Dean about it.

The last thing he needed was another mother-hen frenzy. They'd finally gotten to the point, in the last few days, where Dean didn't nag him every day about taking his pills and treatments and trusted Sam to get it done himself.

Wondering about the tape and the past he didn't remember, Sam lost track of time and didn't notice how uncomfortable it was becoming to breathe until he started to pull in a breath and dissolved into a coughing fit that didn't help his chest at all. He dropped to his knees in the motel tub, turning the water off as he went and waving at the air around him to clear the steam as he pulled open the shower curtain.

He didn't need a vision to tell him that Dean would be hammering on the door within seconds, and a moment later hammering he was. "Sam! Hey, you okay in there?"

Sam cleared his throat painfully. "I'm okay," he called, scowling at the scratchy quality of his voice.

"Okay…" Dean didn't sound completely convinced, but at least he didn't break down the door. Sam heard his brother move away from the bathroom—in time, he hoped, to not hear much when he doubled over to cough a few more times.

Or hear the sharp intake of breath Sam gave when he saw the deep red that momentarily mixed with the water twisting its way down the drain.

Oh god.