Firefly – Chapter 12
Texas was friggin' hot. Sam unfolded out of Ellen's Hot Wheels Honda and the Austin summer slapped him in the face. Being crammed in that tiny car truly made him appreciate the gracious space of the Impala and he stretched himself backwards until his spine popped. Even under the weight of Texas heat, it felt good to be off the road and at his destination. He could get to work now instead of just thinking about it.
Dean was bugging the crap out of him, constantly calling. The last time, Sam had told him he was acting like a jealous boyfriend and hung up on him. Dean wasn't going to be stopped and replaced his calls with text messages of instructions on how to work the job. Sam was trying not to be too annoyed. Dean's vested interest in this job was incalculable and the fact that he couldn't be an active participant was a big hurdle for him to get over.
Sam tucked in his shirt and pressed the ignore button on another one of Dean's text messages before he went toward the fire station. He walked through the office door and was immediately eased by ice-cold air conditioning. Fire stations had always fascinated the Winchester boys when they were little. The equipment was huge and powerful and firemen got to bust up into burning buildings, hauling people out over their shoulders, looking like heroes. People actually thanked them for what they did, for saving them. Firemen didn't have to lie about their names and rarely did they get chased by the cops for saving people.
And best of all – chicks loved firemen. Dean had planted that idea in his head early on and he often represented them as firemen to pick up women. It worked surprisingly well.
"Hello?!" Sam called out into the empty room, his voice a bit louder than he intended.
A stocky man with thick black hair rounded the corner into the large office area and walked over to Sam, a friendly smile on his face. "Can I help you, Sir?"
"Uh, yes. I'm looking for Darryl Juarez," Sam said, extending his hand. "I'm Sam Winchester." He'd thought a long time about using his real name here at the fire station and decided it made sense. If they had Emily's real name, Winchester would get him an inroad fast.
The man shook his hand and said, "You got him. I was just on my way out. Double shift yesterday." He looked like a man who needed to grab a beer and a nap. "What can I do for you, Mr. Winchester?"
Sam was a little surprised at his luck. He didn't usually have much of that. "I won't keep you long, I wanted to talk to you a few minutes about a fire."
The dark-skinned man directed Sam to a couple of chairs and sat down and dropped a large backpack he was carrying to the floor. As they sat, Darryl said, "Okay, what fire and where?"
"A couple of weeks ago, you pulled my niece, Emily, out of a burning apartment. You saved her life and I wanted to thank you." Sam watched the man rewind his memory, trying to be more alert than he had been a few seconds ago.
After a few seconds, the fireman said, "Yeah, the little girl was under the bed. What a nightmare." He clicked through the details in his head, then he added, "Had smoke inhalation and some pretty serious burns. A real tiny little girl. I checked on her a few days later but someone had already taken her out of the hospital. Is she okay?"
"She's with her dad, my brother. Emily's pretty traumatized and she can't tell us what happened, but she's getting better. My brother wanted me to thank you, too."
"Nice to have a good outcome," Darryl said, obviously relieved to hear the good news. "When kids hide from a fire, sometimes we don't find them in time. Some lady pulled up outside and told us there was a little girl in there. Wouldn't have known to look if she hadn't."
"So you weren't even looking for Emily until someone said she was in the apartment?" This was the first kink in Lindsey's story. She'd told Ellen they were pulling Emily out when she got there.
"Well, we were going in, but I wouldn't have gone straight to the kid hunt from the window if I hadn't known."
"Kid hunt?"
"Yeah, that's what I call it. Usually, if you don't see them out in the open, they're in the closet or under the bed. I reached in the window and there she was, right there under the bed," Darryl said, smiling. Sam understood feeling the satisfaction of actually being able to save someone. It didn't come often.
"Mr. Juarez, can I ask you a few questions about the fire itself?" Sam leaned forward in his chair, getting a little closer to the man.
"Call me Darryl."
"Sure, Darryl. My brother and I really want to know what happened. We got a look at the report and it said arson, but we just don't understand all that 'report speak,'" Sam said, trying to sound clueless. "I know I got it wrong but it looked like it said the fire started inside one of the victims? That didn't make sense at all."
Darryl leaned back in his chair and rubbed a weary hand over his face. "No, that's what it said, but it doesn't make sense to me either and I've been in this business for fifteen years." He stopped, as if searching for the right words to continue the conversation. "The flashpoint of the fire was inside one of the victims but they couldn't find an incendiary device or accelerant."
"So they can tell where it started but not how?" Sam asked, clicking off one more confirmation. "No chemicals or anything?"
"The only other thing mentioned was traces of sulphur, but that's not what started the fire," Darryl said, still looking troubled. "Maybe you should talk to the investigator."
"I'd rather talk to someone there that night," Sam said, seeing that there was more information to be had from this man and he was struggling as to if he should give it up. "Just tell me what you think, off the record."
After silently resolving his hesitation, Darryl leaned closer and lowered his voice. "It's almost like they're describing it as that spontaneous combustion sci-fi crap. But there was some strange stuff in that place."
"Like how strange?"
"Now, I don't know what that lady was into," Darryl said, hesitating, "but there were weird things drawn all over the walls, on the door, all over the house. I could see them in the room before it burned. One of the other guys said there was one on the front door, behind a wreath."
"Like art?"
"No. Freaky symbols. You know, like unholy things." As if it were an unconscious reflex, Darryl crossed himself quickly but with a devout intensity. "Look, I don't mean to speak ill of the dead, or of your family but—"
"No, I wanted the truth." Sam felt a deep regret that he couldn't defend Calley Rail to this stranger who didn't understand what he'd seen. Calley was trying to ward off evil, not roll out the welcome wagon. "Do you think I could get inside the apartment, just to look around?"
"That would be up to the landlord and depend on if it was safe. Cops may still have it closed since it's a crime scene," Darryl said, getting up and grabbing his bag.
"I'll check with them first," Sam lied, standing up and shaking the man's hand once again. "We're very grateful that you saved Emily. My brother didn't even know she existed and they're getting to know each other now."
"Glad to help," Darryl responded, pumping Sam's hand once then letting go. "Hope your brother can keep little Emily away from whatever got her mom killed. It just didn't look like a safe place for a kid."
"He'll make sure she's okay. I can promise you that."
Sam left the fire station and headed for his next stop.
***
Dean stared at the cell phone in his hand. "Jealous boyfriend, my ass," he muttered then typed "bite me" into a text message and sent it quickly to Sam. He set the phone on the edge of the pool table and picked up a stick.
"Your Uncle Sammy has developed a 'tude," Dean said, winking at Emily, who sat on a barstool pushed up to the table.
Emily's response was silence, as usual. Cinderella Barbie was poised in her lap and had only been out of her hands during her bath last night.
Dean wracked the balls on the table and slid them to the appropriate spot. "Tonight, I'm going to let you hang out with Ellen because Daddy's got to separate some losers from their money at this very pool table. So, I've got to practice," he said, chalking his pool cue. "Wanna' help?"
The little girl nodded enthusiastically and paid close attention while Dean took a shot and scattered the balls around the felt.
He moved around the table, taking a few shots as he talked. "You see, I'm actually doing these guys a favor, Emily. They think they're good at this game and I just point out that they suck, for a small fee. They move on to a wussy game they can win like darts or quarters and Daddy gets a few of their dollars. It's a win win."
Dean knew she didn't have a clue what he was talking about, but it didn't matter. The past two days had been good ones. The nights were a little rough, but he'd spent the days being followed around by a kid who appeared to want to be close to him. She didn't speak, but she listened and smiled and that was enough. This afternoon might be a different story when they went to visit Dr. Wallace, but that was still a few hours away.
"Okay, kid, here's what I need you to do," Dean said, clearing away a few of the balls, leaving six scattered across the lower half of the table. "I'm going to pick one of the balls and you point to the pocket you want me to sink it into and I've got to stand right here to do it. Can you do that?"
Emily nodded and took a stick Dean held out to her.
"Great." Dean pointed toward the four ball at the center of the table. "Which pocket?"
Instead of picking a pocket at the lower end of the table, Emily reached the stick across the table to tap the pocket in the corner by Dean's right hand.
"Wait a minute," Dean said, shaking his head. "Are you sure you don't want one of those way down there?"
In response, Emily tapped the pocket again.
"You must have more of your Uncle Sammy in you than I thought, Cutie Pie," Dean said, setting up the complicated shot and doing pool table geometry in his head. Finally, he took the shot, banking the cue ball into the four and sending it into the correct pocket.
In response, Emily clapped and Dean took a bow.
"See? Your daddy is hot today! I smell a wad o' cash in our future, Emily."
He pointed toward the two and Emily directed him back to the same pocket. Dean shook his head. "You're killin' me, kid," he said, working out the next shot.
***
"Dean, how am I supposed to get anything done with you freaking calling me all freaking day?"
Sam snapped his phone shut and walked toward the burned out hull of Calley's apartment, looking every inch a true blue Texas Ranger. Badge, boots, and belt buckle. The works. If Dean saw this get up, there would be no end to the Walker Texas Ranger jokes. Sam decided it might be worth the ribbing to keep the boots. He liked the boots.
Sam had drawled through his conversation with the apartment manager, flashed his ID, and he was about to set foot in ground zero of Emily's nightmares. Stooping under the crime scene tape, he carefully stepped through the charred remains of what was once a home. Calley had another place but she'd rented this one only a week before her death. It was a hideout, now filled with burned furniture and the stink of death.
The blackened hunks of ceiling tiles crunched under his boots, and he moved further into the living room, pulling out his flashlight. This room had taken a lesser hit from the flames but the closer he moved toward the bedroom, the heavier the devastation. Soot covered the walls in a thick layer, obscuring everything underneath.
There was a stack of books sitting beside what was once a sofa. Sam crouched down and leafed through a few pages that were still intact. None of them were Amora's "How To Manual" but Calley had begun a collection on demonology that made him think of Bobby's piles and piles of dusty, yellowed volumes. Buried deep inside one of the toasted books, Sam found a piece of parchment. It was folded over and over, probably to make it less noticeable. Sam opened the paper, and found the specs and instructions for the mark Calley had used on her paintings. He stashed the paper in his pocket.
As he got up to move on, the pile of books toppled over and something shiny caught his eye behind the collection. It was only a corner of metal, poking out from under other debris. When Sam yanked the item free, he found he was holding a small lime green iPod that was surprisingly still intact. He flipped it over and found "Emily" engraved on the back. Sam slid that item into his pocket as well.
The bedroom was completely destroyed with very little remaining but piles of debris that couldn't be identified. He could make out the bed frame that had been Emily's hiding place. The crime scene photo couldn't possibly capture the horror of that demolished room. The familiar stench of burned flesh was floating around the room. Sam knew that scent intimately and he also knew that if he ever smelled it and didn't feel sad and sick, he'd need an attitude adjustment.
An outline marked the spot where Calley had met her death and the room was basically nothing but an enormous ashtray, offering him little information. Sam left the bedroom and was on his way out the wide open entrance when a large piece of white wood caught his eye. Picking his way over to it through the waste of Calley's apartment, Sam discovered the remains of the front door.
Recalling his earlier conversation with Darryl Juarez, Sam flipped it over and leaned down to give it a closer look. There were large slices gouged out of the wood from an ax, marking that side as the front. About two feet from the top, Sam found what he was looking for – an expertly painted repellant symbol. It was about the size of baseball, painted in black, with one corner of the paint scraped away.
Sam snapped a quick picture of the damaged symbol with his phone then dialed Dean's number. He was on his way back to the car when his brother picked up the call.
"Hey. I know how the demon got to her and what Calley meant when she said she'd been betrayed. Check out the picture I'm about to send to your phone. I'm on my way to Lindsey Deaton's place."
TBC