A/N: Things start to go a little more downhill for Sammy in this chapter. Enjoy!

I also forgot to mention, I have cover art for this one up on my profile. It's not the best, since it cut the picture off on Sam's side, but just imagine the face he made when Mary touched him in the panic room and you've got it.

Thanks so much also, for all the wonderful reviews. I will respond to every one of them but I thought you'd want an update first, and I'm on a bit of a time crunch since I took my afternoon and went for a walk. So between cooking supper and getting my husband off to work at 2 a.m. on the day to come, I figured I'd just post.

Chapter 3: Push On a Shove

"Dean. What'd Bobby say?"

Dean sighed. "The Catalina was stolen from Upstate New York three months ago. You said you saw it a couple days ago, I saw it when Sammy…" He ran a hand back through his hair, spinning away from where he leaned on the table. "There's nothin' else on it." He pulled back a fist and punched the motel wall, a spider web of cracks forming around his knuckles where they rested against the drywall. "Nothin!"

"Listen to me Dean." Joshua said, his big hands closing on the younger hunter's shoulders and turning him. "Hey!"

Dean met his eyes on the tone. "We'll find it and we'll find your brother." Dean nodded, his eyes finally shifting away from Joshua's.

"I gotta find him." Dean murmured. Skirting Josh, Dean sat down at the table again, pulling the notepad to him. He left the pen rocking on the table top, the clatter of plastic on wood as the pen rolled was loud in the sudden silence of the room. Finally snagging the pen, Dean overlaid some of what he'd written with a bolder layer of ink. He stopped, looking at the design of the motel's name at the top of the notepad.

"Josh, you see this?"

"See what, Ace?"

"The logo for the motel." Dean outlined the sun's rays with his pen, turning the orange edges black. He filled in the tips, following the slight double curve of the longer rays, keeping the small points sharp tipped. The Sunset Inn logo soon was obscured as he drew a hasty pentagram beneath the curved inner ring of the sun.

"Devil's trap?"

"Not just any." Dean yanked the collar of his black tee aside, revealing a still new tattoo. The skin around it was slightly dry, peeled back around the edges of the ink to reveal new skin. The same symbol on Dean's chest was reflected back at Josh from the motel notepad.

"The sulfur, the possession. Five-two, the room number…Nineteen eighty three. The year Sammy was born. The day. The crack about the furthest bed from the door and not being broken. The tats. It all adds up."

"What are you talkin' 'bout, Dean?"

"Demons." Dean all but whispered. "Demons have Sammy."

***

Sam woke with a groan, his head throbbing. Memories of being assaulted in the pitch black surfaced and he fought his way to sitting, his abdomen burning, stomach roiling as he kicked his way in an awkward crab crawl to the wall. The rustle of fabric greeted his ears as his back smacked into the mildewed wood.

"Why are you doing this? What do you want?!" He was answered by silence. "Please!"

The feeling of being watched from the abyss around him making him feel like he was wearing a bulls eye.

"It's time for the next part of father's plans for him."

"I know that."

"Stop dallying then."

The voice came out of the darkness, making Sam jump. Gruff. Familiar.

"Sammy." Sam straightened, wanting to believe so bad that it was his brother. For real. His head felt like it was under pressure, like he was going down a steep hill and his ears needed to pop. The voice held a muffled resonance echoing around the chamber, bouncing off things in the dark.

"Dean?"

"Yeah."

"Dean, I can't see anything. Too dark for too long. What…where are you?"

"Right in front of ya Sammy."

"Thank god. Get me outta here man. I think I'm goin' crazy." Sam stood on shaky, weak legs, the heat of fever blazing through him and making him sag against the wall. Sam reached out a pleading hand, stretching it into the darkness, reaching for his big brother.

"You're not going anywhere." A foreign voice rang out in the chamber, making Sam jump. A muzzle flash blinded Sam completely. He heard Dean's voice pained cry, heard something slam into the wall beside him before he heard fabric sliding down the wall.

"NNOOOO!" Sam turned in the direction of the sounds, halos of light dancing in front of his useless eyes as he sank to his knees. "Dean! No, no man!" Sam reached out, fingers sliding over familiar leather, wide shoulders. He brought his hands together towards center, the leather parting. Sam's long fingers tangled in a small leather cord, nails catching on bronze horns he didn't have to see to know very, very well. "Dean, talk to me. Are you hit?"

"S-sammy?" The voice came from in front of him, from the blackness that kept him from seeing his brother. Sam's hands played over Dean's chest, what he guessed to be Dean's ever present black tee. He felt Dean's ragged intake of breath when Sam's fingers brushed over something sticky and warm.

"Oh god. No, Nono!"

"S'm." Dean fell into Sam's arms and he caught him, running blind fingers over his brother's face, through his hair. Sam lifted his head, trying desperately to see through the darkness. "HELP! SOMEONE HELP ME!!!" Sam turned his attention back to his brother. "No, Dean! Hang on. Please hang on. Don't leave me." Sam pressed Dean back to the wall, applying pressure to the gut wound.

"S'mmy."

"Shh. Shh."

"M'okay."

"You've been shot. We're god knows where, held by who knows what. I can't see shit and I'm starting to get a little nuts here, man. I think we're far from okay." Sam said, his voice getting higher and slightly hysterical as he ended on a choked giggle.

"'M here now. 'Sgonna… beokay." Dean slurred.

The dark eyes watched from the corner of the chamber as his captive sat shoulder to shoulder with the hitchhiker claimed by the Catalina's bumper in the trip south. The man's face was torn to the bone, one eye gone. Road rash had burned holes in the man's shirt, in his abdomen. Breath was long gone from the corpse that the youngest Winchester was talking to, listening to responses in his head and even huffing a tense laugh before answering his brother's jibe with the usual "Jerk." The dark eyes sparkled with both mirth and disdain before he turned and left the room.

The man walked through an open doorway, into a room flickering with candlelight from a table along the wall. A chalice rested in the center of a circle of crimson, nearly overflowing with the same liquid. A woman stood facing the alter, her voice lilting in a melodious chant. She turned as the man walked up to stand beside her, black eyes meeting his own.

"He's pathetic. So easy to ruin. And yet still father's favorite?"

"It's time for the next phase." The woman turned and left the man standing in front of the blood covered alter.

She stood in the darkness, watching Sam as he still carried on a conversation in hushed tones and silences. The illusion had full hold and she smiled. It was time to break Sam Winchester into pieces too small to ever pull together.

She moved forward silently, unfailingly grabbing Sam by the hair. She yanked him to his feet, slamming him into the wall. Her other hand clasped his throat and picked him up, feet kicking at her as he tried to fight, gasping for air. The door opened, blinding him and shocking him enough to make him stop fighting. The door slammed and plunged him into blackness again. He grasped the wrist at his throat, trying to dig in as the rings of light danced in front of his eyes and began to dim as his air was cut off.

Suddenly he was released, propelled across the chamber as he was thrown. He landed hard, the wound in his abdomen splitting open again. He felt hands on him as he coughed, trying to stay conscious. His eyes cleared, the black going back to just that…black. No stars, no rainbows of light, no shadows. Pressure built between his ears again, and he heard Dean cry out in pain, hearing the unmistakable sound of a fist smacking off flesh.

"Gah! No! D-DEAN!" Sam cried, body racked with pain, writhing as he lifted his head, turning in the direction of the sound, hand clutching at his burning abdomen. He listened helplessly as the fist continued to pummel his brother in the darkness.

"S-stop!" Sam tried to push himself up, his back screaming in pain, his wounded stomach burning. "Guh…unh… Dean! Stop hurting him! Tell me what you want! I'll do it. J-Just stop hurting us!!"

"Oh, Sammy. We don't want anything from you we don't already have." Sam heard just before his head was lifted by the hair and slammed into the floor once again.

***

Dean's phone rang and he strode across the motel room from where he was pacing, snatching it on the second ta-tadada-tadadum of Back in Black.

"Yeah Bobby? Tell me you got somethin'?"

"Demon sign Dean. Shreveport, Louisiana. Plotted 'em on a map. It's a pentagram, center of it is a church where a priest raped and killed thirteen nuns a hundred years ago. It's the sign we're lookin' for. Priest's name was Samuels. Makes just enough sense for the friggin' demons."

"We were headed to a hunt in Shreveport. What the hell?"

"There's violent electrical storms goin' on now. News says power's out, roads closed. Past six days, there's been three thunderstorms, roads flooded…"

"Don't care. I'm gettin' him back!"

"Dean, we need a plan." Joshua said, reaching out for the phone to talk to Bobby. Dean handed it to him, pacing away from the hunter. He reached for the pistol on the bed and began systematically breaking it down, his hands moving on their own, every move long memorized. He could have done it in his sleep. He glared at Josh.

"Yeah, you know what the plan is? Go in hot, send some demonic sonsabitches straight back to hell and get Sammy away from them!"

Josh turned his attention to the phone. "Okay Singer, tell me everything you know 'bout what we're dealin' with."

"Ya mean besides a hot headed Winchester?" Bobby snarked. Josh looked at Dean, watching as the young hunter stared at the motel wall, his hands still roving over the pistol.

***

Sam made his way through the darkness, head aching, back to where he thought his brother was. He felt for the wall, finally brushing it with his finger tips. He crouched, reaching blind into the obscurity. His hands brushed short hair and he sat, feeling leather brush his shirt. "Dean?" Hearing nothing he reached out, feeling along his brother's face, feeling wet skin, rough patches like abrasions, a bit of skin hanging loose over his cheekbone. "Dean, wake up!" Still not getting a response, Sam's hands roved blind over his brother, feeling damp slime on his jacket, his shirt, his jeans. "Okay, okay." Sam soothed, wrapping an arm around Dean's shoulders and pulled his brother to him. "You're gonna be alright. Just hang on, you're gonna be alright."

Just what is Sammy seeing? And is it enough to break him? And is hotheaded Dean going to get himself into more trouble? Leave a review! I'll try to update again on either Saturday or Monday since I have those two days off work.