A/N: Next chapter. Still in Dean's POV and time is slipping by. But there's a bit of drama at the end this time.
Howlround (Chapter VII) by frostygossamer
Timeline: Kevin's rented office unit - One year later
Project development takes a little longer than Dean hoped. In actuality, it takes Kevin the better part of a year to get a prototype up and running in their new lab. During that time the project eats up Dean's liquid funds and he is forced to sell two of his repair shops to a rival garage chain.
Dean spends less and less time at work. Carmen and the crew at head office begin to wonder about his mental health. If they had any inkling of what he is really up to they would be calling in the white-coat brigade and suggesting they bring a straitjacket along.
Exactly why is he selling his assets? Fortunately, they have no clue what those assets are being liquidized for. As far as Dean is concerned, those cheques he writes for Kevin are his prescription against despair. After all, who has he left to leave his money too? Sam was all he had.
~O~
Early one morning about six months on, Dean is woken by an urgent call from Kevin. He reaches a weary hand out from the bedclothes and picks up his cell phone from the nightstand.
"Uh, whozat? Kevin? Whassup?" he yawns.
Young Tran is breathless at his end of the line. "Dean? Dean, I've just now gotten in and there's a bunch of angry-looking flies in the apparatus."
Dean vaguely wonders why the youth feels the need to inform anyone about some six-legged trespassers he could easily take care of himself.
"Bugs. Seriously? You phobic or what? Get yourself a rolled up newspaper and bat their tiny asses outta there."
Kevin responds impatiently. "Dean, they didn't come in the window. They're in a JAR. They came THROUGH the apparatus."
Dean sits up straight. "You're saying we sent them back? From tomorrow maybe?"
"Maybe tomorrow. I dunno. Only not today, not yesterday. So, yeah, tomorrow. Or the next day."
So the implication is the buzzy critters travelled back through time from some test they have yet to do? Dean rubs his hand through his hair. Not exactly dramatic results, but baby steps. He jumps out of bed.
"Awesome! I'll be there in five."
He puts down his phone and whispers, very quietly, to himself.
"Hang in there, Sammy. I'm coming."
~O~
Baby steps was right. It is NOT a fast process. Setbacks follow setbacks. It takes almost three months before they can reliably reproduce the fly experiment.
"It's no use," grumbles Kevin.
He scrapes a board duster through the scribbled formulae on his whiteboard yet again.
"There's no way I can pinpoint the date and time with the accuracy we need. The chronometry is overly unstable at that range, the time stream is simply too erratic, and the angel feather refuses to completely stabilize and act like the precision instrument it isn't."
Dean stops working on the feather assembly framework he has been fixing up.
"Dude, I WAS counting on making the day of my backyard cookout. You saying we can't hit that?" He sighs. "The whole previous year, I got no clue where exactly Sam was at. But, hey, any time before the guy leaves for Antarctica works for me. Wasn't expecting the thing to land on a dime."
Kevin huffs and flops into a chair.
"Sorry, Dean, but we gotta go for a date way more recent. As recent as we can. Even then it's gonna be touch and go we get this machine and its payload there without any damage. The turbulence alone could shake it apart."
Dean leans against the workbench and looks thoughtful for a second.
"So you're saying we should go for the day, uh, the day of the, um, explosion?"
Even now he finds it difficult to speak about the events of that fateful day that took his brother from him.
Kevin nods. "Yeah. That's our Event Horizon. I'm confident I can get it there with maybe a couple days leeway at most, but it'll have to be close."
Dean considers. "We'll be cutting it damn fine. But that'll have to do, I guess."
Turning back to his work, Dean cheers a little inside. For one awful moment he thought Kevin was going to say it couldn't be done at all. He isn't sure his heart could take it if they had to call the whole thing off after all their work, dashing his last hope.
He hasn't told Kevin he means to be the payload in their machine. If the kid knew, he would surely try to talk sense into him, and Dean doesn't need to be lectured on the perils of time travel. He is already more scared of NOT going. No matter what, he has got to get to Sam, even if that means freezing his nuts off in Antarctica. And at least his brother will be there for certain.
Dean has seen photos - photos of Huge Attraction, a cold and lonely outpost now blasted into matchwood - with the smiling faces of strangers indistinguishable in their heavy-duty winter gear. Indistinguishable aside from that one guy, real tall, unmistakable. Sam.
He subdues the wistful daydream and applies himself to his work. They still have a chance. It should be hard to miss as big a target as Sam. As long as the time device gets Dean there sometime BEFORE the place is wiped clean off of the map, he still has a chance.
And he is more than ready to take any chance he can get.
"Kid, you work that whiteboard. You hear?"
~O~
Timeline: Kevin's rented office unit - Another two months later
It takes another couple months, two more auto shops sold off and a long series of bench tests later before they even think about getting the apparatus out of the laboratory and building an actual time vehicle. Dean, a keen fan of the 'Back to the Future' franchise, suggests they build it into his Impala, the perfect power source.
He decides to install the rig for the power booster in the Impala's trunk.
"What's all that crap you have in there?" Kevin stands beside Dean as he lifts the lid.
"Uh, tools?" Dean scoffs as he gets down to unloading everything into a plastic crate he has brought down for the purpose.
Kevin kicks the crate. "Old shop tools? Not exactly cutting-edge, huh?"
He wonders why Dean has been dragging around a trunkload of dirty old mechanic's tools. Doesn't he have newer and better at his shop?
Dean stops unloading and shoots him a look. "They're my DAD'S tools."
Enough said. Kevin gets it. He has almost nothing of his own father's. Stuff like that he couldn't throw out either.
While Kevin tinkers with the feather assembly beneath the hood, Dean connects up the power leads so he can make the delicate adjustments to the temporal regulator.
"She's not exactly a DeLorean," comments Kevin, archly. "But I guess she'll do."
Dean immediately jumps to the defence of his car.
"My baby could wipe the floor with that freakin' DeLorean. Not gonna chance time-hopping in anything I'm not one hundred percent comfortable with. I trust my baby."
He pats the Impala's hard top. Kevin puts down his screwdriver and steps back from under the hood.
"Dean! Tell me you are NOT thinking of time-travelling in this thing yourself. Because I've never been in favour of human testing, and I'm not starting with my friends."
Dean does an eye roll. "Kevin, I gotta go back and save Sammy. You know that was ALWAYS what this was about."
Kevin sort of knew but he shakes his head nonetheless.
"Sure. But wasn't the idea we use the machine to warn him somehow, send him a message, spares, supplies, whatever. YOU don't need to ride along. This machine is only a prototype. We don't know what it would do to human cells. You'd be beyond crazy to risk it."
Dean isn't listening. He was in this thing for the full ride right from the start. He isn't going to try mailing his brother some bits and pieces with a covering letter and hope it works out. He needs to run to Sam and grab him out of the path of danger with his own hands. Every drop of his big brother instinct demands he do it.
"I AM crazy, Kevin. Gotta do this. I know it'll be a one-way trip and there's no guarantee I can even get to him, but if there's ANY chance I gotta take it." He shrugs. "At least I'll get to see him one last time."
Kevin has always suspected Dean would pull this. He guessed the guy was close to suicidal when they met, but hoped he had gotten over it. Now he realizes working together on their project may have lifted Dean's spirits a little but it hasn't affected his single-minded determination to save his brother, or die trying.
He considers for a minute and relents. He could try to convince Dean to give up his stupid plan, and he badly wants to, but the guy has been getting increasingly unstable lately. He really doesn't think Dean is capable of changing course anymore.
"OK. I guess there's no point tryna talk you out of it."
He knows by now just how mulish Dean can be when he has set his mind on something. He sighs resignedly.
"Then I guess, while I'm working on the tachyon-regulator, you'll wanna spend some time reinforcing the safety cell and making it as impact-proof as possible?"
That is not so much a suggestion as an order. He hopes Dean doesn't mean to ride this thing bareback, but he wouldn't put it past him.
"If we're gonna get you there you wanna be more than an icky stain on the upholstery."
Dean is surprised he caved so easily. "Don't worry, kid. Gonna have this thing safe as a freakin' baby's crib."
Kevin smiles. He prays what they are building here doesn't wind up less of a cradle, more of a casket.
~O~
Converting the Impala into a one-man time-vehicle becomes a literal labour of love for Dean for the next few weeks.
First up, he knows he is going to need something specialized to absorb the shock of what promises to be a big dipper ride through the fourth dimension. He hits the internet. After a spot of net-surfing, he orders an inflatable rubberized impact capsule filled with a breathable fluid to form a womb-like protective bubble.
Yes, you can get almost anything on the net if you don't care what suspicious quasi-military web site you use.
The squashy, rubbery pod that arrives by courier the next day soon sits wedged in the Impala, in place of the ripped-out front seats. Dean admires his handiwork.
"Kinda looks like one humongous, sun-kissed bazonga squished up tight in a steel corset. You sure you don't wanna come with? Make it a perfect pair?"
Kevin, standing beside him, grimaces at both concepts.
"Oh no, Dean. I'm planning on staying right here and documenting the whole fiasco, thank you."
Dean scoffs. "Fiasco phooey. Got my life riding on this perfecta. She's gonna make it right to the finish line."
"Let's hope you're right." Kevin gets back to his calculations. "Just don't let your breast fixation get in the way of your work. OK?"
Dean laughs. "Don't worry, kid. I'm on it."
He grins wide as he pulls a black and yellow two-piece wetsuit out of a shipping box. Mindful of the harsh climate of Antarctica, he kitted himself out with top-of-the-line insulation against the cold. The suit comes complete with yellow insulated bootees. Although he despises them, he can't wear his regular heavy boots inside the bubble without risk of ripping its membrane.
"Well, this baby oughta keep the icicles out of my shorts."
Which is sensible. However Kevin notices him pick up a pistol and start to load it. Not so sensible.
"You're not gonna need THAT," the younger guy points out, waving a pencil in his general direction.
Dean protests. "Cranky-ass polar bears? Duh."
"That's a common misconception, Dean, but there are no polar bears in the Antarctic. Worst you're gonna run into where you're going is a grouchy seal or maybe a cranky penguin."
His friend pouts, disappointed. Kevin swaps him a box cutter for his gun.
"This'll be more use to you."
The cutter is a red plastic thing with a thumb-operated, very sharp, retractable metal blade. It may help him escape from the inflatable pod but it won't be much use against any kind of a bear.
Dean accepts it with a sneer. It somehow offends his masculinity. As a true-blue American, doesn't he have a God-given right to carry a gun if he wants too? Not in Antarctica apparently.
"Oh, sure. Now I'm totally tooled up."
He stows it away in the little pocket of his wet suit designed for, well, a PROPER knife. Then he pats the hood of the Impala.
"So, Kevin, what're we gonna call her?"
His friend chews that over for a second.
"I'd go with something like Temporal Speedwagon. Or, uh, Chrono-Chevy?"
"Wha-? Hell no." Dean grins broadly. "Got it. We'll call her the-" Dramatic pause. "The TEMPALA."
He leans in and checks out her updated dashboard with a critical eye.
"Shouldn't she have, I dunno, a row of brass tumblers and maybe one humongous lever?"
Kevin laughs. "You talking Rod's machine or Guy's? H. G. Wells meets Hollywood, huh? Nuh-uh. The temporal coordinates will be locked in. All she needs is-" He points out a big red push button. "THIS is the Time-slip Actuator. One push and vroom, vroom, vamoose!"
Pretty soon afterward they are finally all set for a definitive live trial. Dean is totally hot to go but Kevin points out they need to wait for the Tempala's definitive live trial to show up before they actually do it for real.
Dean sits around grumbling while Kevin scans the local fishing supplies store's website for something that doesn't look too cute to act as test pilot. The flies that survived the bench testing seem to have wised up, and after bumping the paper cover off of the glass jar Kevin was keeping them in, skedaddled someplace in the night.
Despite Dean champing at the bit, they do manage to wait two whole days.
~O~
The following Friday about noon, Kevin shoulders open the lobby door and awkwardly pushes his way in. Both his hands are occupied with his lunch order - burgers, fries, onion rings, today's special pie - and coffee in a cardboard tray. He and Dean have been getting through a LOT of junk food lately and this waiting around has been making them hungrier than ever.
He gets in the elevator but is only half way to his floor when the lights flicker and the car violently jerks. Kevin picks himself up from a corner and utters a mild curse. The coffee slopped all over him.
When the elevator car does reach his floor, the young man jumps out and hurries down the passageway to his lab, leaving his spilled purchases in the car. He quickly opens the door and runs inside, where he stands horrified.
The room is filled with a bright blue swirling light. A deafening screech makes him clap his hands over both ears.
"DEAN!" he yells into the din.
But it is too late. The munchies were a ruse. Dean suckered him, sending him for take-out. He got tired of waiting, gave up on the live trial and went for the live run. The parrotfish Kevin bought is still swimming around in its jar on the shelf but the Tempala has gone. Dean's protective gear has gone. Dean has gone.
Dean has STOLEN the Tempala! One way or another, he won't be coming back.
"You let him go," Kevin accuses the fish, pointlessly.
It stares back popeyed. After a second, he notices a hastily scribbled Postit note stuck to his whiteboard.
It reads:
SORRY, KEVIN
HAD TO GO
SAMMY NEEDS ME
BYE & THANKS, DEAN
~O~
Timeline: Somewhere in The Time Vortex
He is someplace in the temporal vortex, crammed inside his safety bubble, crammed inside the Tempala, folded into himself like the whorl of leaves inside an unopened bud, a foetus in a dayglow rubber womb.
"Wouldn't you know it," Dean thinks. "Time travel is a cranky BITCH."
He is unsurprised to find the experience very far from 'The Terminator' or 'Doctor Who', or any other CGI depiction of time-travel, he has ever seen. No fake lightning flashes here, no synthesized radiophonic sound, no howlround, only pitch black endless silence, boundless nothingness.
Only THIS nothingness roils and moils and flings the Tempala every which way.
Curled up in his rubber egg, arms wrapped tight around his knees, reality is left behind as he gets sucked down and down through the giant invisible maelstrom of time. He falls, falls, falls, choking liquid air in his mouth and nose, the taste of vomit in the back of his throat, on a cosmic big dipper.
This should be terrifying, but crap, it is MIND-BLOWING. More than mind-blowing, this is WOW!
He has been a speed-freak ever since he was a teenager, barrelling down the blacktop in his dad's muscle car. Who would ever have guessed his Impala would someday power down THIS lonesome highway? Jeez, he could ride this wild road forever.
"Baby, we are AWESOME!"
But the chronoscope bleeping in the dashboard is already going crazy. The feather assembly shudders, ready to burst apart. Then, right before everything gets REALLY hair-raising, it all stops.
Stops DEAD.
~O~
Timeline: Site 43, Antarctica - Three days ago
OOH OOH WOE OH... WOE OOH OH...
The eerie groaning of the interminable gale. The wind speed was unusually high three days ago.
The Tempala suddenly IS at Site 43, several miles north-west of Huge Attraction ice-station - not too bad - but some ten meters BENEATH the surface of the permanent ice sheet - definitely not good. Nothing more than a weak pulse of microwave radiation, a faint and disregarded blip on the station radar, signals her arrival.
Dean's chronoscope was out a couple surface miles and several meters depth. And those meters are crucial. Kevin knew this could happen, but Dean didn't give him the chance to properly calibrate the sucker. Now it is too late.
The distortion effect of the time apparatus greatly disrupts the local magnetic field, something only migrating birds would notice. The growl of ice undergoing unnatural compression causes a couple concerned penguins to hurry up their waddle a mite, but otherwise there is no indication that anything unusual has happened.
South polar wind blows across the desolate surface as before. A wolf-howl over the lonesome snow dunes.
WOE OOH OH... OOH OH WOE...
Dean has been torpid since the nanosecond he hit the Big Red Button. Now, inside his protective sphere of oxygenated liquid, he remains suspended, seemingly lifeless, like the worm submerged in a bottle of tequila. He may stay undisturbed until the Tempala, and his body, become one with the ice-pack, caught like some prehistoric insect in a piece of ancient amber. Forever.
But then they find him.
Physical vitality won't return until he thaws. The destruction of the Tempala around him does little to hasten the process. Only the relative warmth of the tractor garage can do that.
Before long, it does.
TBC
A/N: I notice not so many people are reading this one. I hope your not put off by Sam's apparent death. Because you should know I like happy endings.