A CHILL IN THE AIR
Chapter 5
Sam enlists help from a familiar source.
xxxxx
Pacing up and down the hospital's brightly lit corridor like a caged animal, Sam let out a sigh of relief as his phone eventually picked up.
"Sam?" the gruff voice on the other end of the line huffed breathlessly, suggesting that Bobby had had to run to catch the call.
"Oh thank God," croaked Sam; "Bobby please, how the hell do I kill Jack Frost?"
There was a long moment of hesitation between the two men.
"Well, it sure beats 'Hiya Bobby, how ya doin?'"
Sam stopped pacing momentarily and shook his head in resignation, almost managing to rustle up a wry smile; "Sorry Bobby," he sighed; "but we need some help. I'm at the central hospital in Vermont and Dean's in a real bad way."
Sam could practically feel the older man bristle at his words.
"What's happened?" The question was asked cautiously, almost as if Bobby was scared to hear the answer.
Sam took a deep breath in an attempt to compose himself. "I think Dean's pissed off Jack Frost," he stated quietly, well aware that he was probably about to embark on the weirdest conversation he was ever likely to have.
"Well, what? … wh-who? … how?"
Sam dropped heavily into a chair and began to explain the chain of events that led them to this point; Dean's fury at the sudden ice-storm, the crippled Impala, Dean's tirade at their chilly nemesis, Sam's blue visions, Dean's sudden inexplicable and unstoppable temperature drop, and finally their terrible dash through a snowbound armageddon which tested the aged Doctor Benson and his fine, shiny SUV to their limits.
Bobby listened without interrupting to every word the younger man said.
"And so, we ended up here," Sam began to conclude; "when we arrived, they took his temperature; it's gone down even more to 89, and it's not showing any signs of stopping there." Sam could hear himself start to gabble, but couldn't stop; "he should be in a coma Bobby; his body should be shutting down through massive hypothermia, but he's not. He's wide awake, shivering uncontrollably and in agony, it looks like this vindictive blue dick wants him to feel every joyous moment of slowly freezing to death."
"Dammit to hell …" Bobby sighed. It seemed to fit the moment in the absence of anything more constructive.
"They tried putting him on a heated IV, but the bag froze the minute they attached it to the canula," Sam explained wearily; "they put hot water bottles around him, but they froze up as well."
There was silence on the end of the phone and Sam knew the wheels would be turning frantically in Bobby's head.
"The medics haven't got a clue – well, why would they? I don't s'pose they teach supernatural curses at med school. All they've been able to do is give him a strong sedative so he won't be in pain any more."
Eventually Bobby found his tongue; "what'ya found?"
"Bobby, I don't know what to do, Sam pleaded; "I've been checking the internet, but all I can find on Jack Frost is a bunch of kids fairytale crap."
There was another pause.
"Jack frost?" Bobby confirmed smartly, as if his mind was still trying to digest Sam's first question; "Jack Frost as in fluffy snowflakes, frost on window panes, cold, red noses …"
"S'gottabe," Sam replied, urgency muddling his words; "Dean badmouthing the blue freak yesterday, my visions and Dean's symptoms, what else could it possibly be?" He continued; "I've had three medics in the last hour tell me that Dean's condition is physically impossible, how can that be anything but supernatural?"
Somehow, Sam heard Bobby's nod of agreement.
"That face Bobby," Sam shuddered at the thought; "you should have seen it; vindictive doesn't start to describe it. It was just like if you gave malice and spite a face, and painted it blue, that's what it would look like."
"All this sugary shit I've been reading on the internet is complete trash," he sighed.
"Okay Son," Bobby took a deep breath as he spoke; "gotta say this is a new one on me!"
"Me too," agreed Sam, "whatever next? I'll end up getting pasted by the sugar plum fairy?"
Bobby snorted a humourless laugh; "you stay there, help ya brother. I'll get straight onto it an' call ya back as soon as I've got something."
Sam closed his eyes and took a deep breath, partly from relief, partly from fear of what he was going to find when he walked back into Dean's room.
"Thanks Bobby," he murmured.
There was a click as the line closed the other end, and Sam slipped his phone back into his pocket.
xxxxx
He carefully closed the door to Dean's room behind him, and took up his usual seat by the bed.
Dean lay on the bed, his drug-glazed eyes half-closed, swaddled in blankets which, although originally heated, were now as chill as a winters day. Despite the sedative, his ivory-pale face was still taut with discomfort, and Sam could still see a faint trembling racking his body.
He pressed the back of his fingers against Dean's cheek and cringed; his skin was cold as marble.
"Hey dude, hang in there," he whispered, hoping desperately that Dean could hear him; "Bobby's on the case, we'll get this fixed - somehow."
Dean's numb, grey lips moved fractionally as if he was trying to say something but no sound came.
Sam lost track of time as he sat hour after hour, through daylight and falling darkness, watching over his brother; trying with all his might to offer reassurance and comfort when he, himself was very slowly unravelling inch by inch.
Dean's unseeing, glazed eyes stared glassily from under lashes lowered by the drugs coursing through him.
The constant shiverling was always there; an endless and debilitating vibration under Sam's fingertips; the only sound in the room was the quiet rattle of chattering teeth, interrupted by violent shudders which gripped Dean's whole body, snapping him into a sudden and painful rigor, but through it all Sam's steadfast presence remained unfaltering, a reassuring, familiar touch amongst the madness and the endless, unbearable cold.
Doctors came and went. They poked and prodded, tutted and drew in long breaths. They talked about bringing in the CDC; they talked about heated blood transfusions; they talked about a load of crap as far as Sam was concerned.
Dean's heart was listened to by innumerable ears, his pulse measured from just about every point on his body that Sam was aware contained a pulse (and a few others he wasn't), his temperature monitored and plotted on a graph showing an inexplicable and depressing downward gradient.
Through it all, Sam would have been prepared to swear there was a morbidly curious glee among the learned Doctors as they cogitated and puzzled over their mysterious patient.
Nurses came and went with more hot water bottles, warm blankets, warm drinks, and warm smiles.
But nothing could offer a hint of relief. Nothing warm could touch Dean's skin before it cooled to near freezing level instantaneously. Even Sam, maintaining his comforting touch, had begun to check his hand at regular intervals with frostbite in mind.
xxxxx
Sam couldn't leap up quickly enough when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket.
"Bobby?" he lowered his voice to a whisper so as not to disturb Dean who, pumped full of a fresh dose of sedative, had finally fallen into an uneasy, tortured slumber.
"Hey Sam," the voice sounded weary, and Sam realised it was the middle of the night, some twelve hours since his call to Bobby this morning, and he was willing to bet the older man had worked without a rest or any refreshment since then.
"Okay," Bobby began, "found out what I can. Our friend Jack Frost is what you or I would call a faerie; a damned powerful one."
"Faerie?" Sam repeated, his voice loaded with disbelief.
"Don' know too much about faeries, never dealt with them - hardly anyone has," Bobby explained, "they're elemental beings, mysterious and impulsive and like nature, they can good or bad, gentle or violent, kind or cruel."
"A goddamn faerie has done all this?" Sam's mind still hadn't quite caught up.
"Personally," Bobby added; "I think they're friggin' vindictive, sly, nasty little sonsofbitches. Ain't never heard nothin' but trouble about 'em."
"Yeah," Sam pinched the bridge of his nose, glancing down through eyes watering with fatigue at Dean who had just succumbed to a fit of shivering so strong the bed frame creaked. "I get that."
He took a deep breath as his mind fought to process what he had just been told.
"I couldn't find anything about Jack Frost specifically," Bobby continued; "except that he's what's called a Winter Sprite. The lore describes them as creative, proud and capricious."
"Capricious?" Sam frowned, frustrated at his rapidly diminishing brain power.
"Temperamental," Bobby replied succinctly; "up their own ass. Jus' cause they can create a few friggin'snowflakes they think they're cat's whiskers and one thing they don't appreciate is being insulted."
"Yeah, I get that too," Sam replied, glancing round again at his suffering brother.
"So," he sighed; "how do we waste the sonofabitch?"
"Yeah, well this is where it gets complicated," Bobby replied, sounding weary again; "we don't; there's no proven, theorised or anecdotal way for a human to kill a faerie, but …"
"But we've got to help Dean," Sam pleaded, cutting in.
"But," Bobby repeated sternly, "there are plenty of ways to repel them, and fend them off."
Sam nodded dumbly; "okay, I'm listening."
"I've been talkin' to an old contact of mine, someone who knows a lot about this sort of stuff; he's a seventh son of a seventh son."
"Aren't they supposed to have some kind of magical powers?" Sam mused idly.
"Not supposed to," corrected Bobby, "do."
"Specifically, magical powers like the ability to commune with supernatural beings," he added.
"Supernatural beings - like faeries?" Sam asked hopefully.
"Exactly," Bobby replied.
There was a brief pause.
"So what ya got?" Sam asked.
"Well," Bobby began; "Winter Sprites are powerful things an' there's only one thing strong enough to see 'em off, and it does so on a regular basis."
A knot of hope tightened in Sam's chest; "what?" he asked.
Bobby hesitated before answering and when the answer came it was the last thing Sam expected to hear, and yet at the same time it was painfully obvious.
"Springtime."
xxxxx
tbc