A/N - Thank you for reading and please review!

Disclaimer - I don't own anything from the Supernatural universe.

Dean and Sam were excellent trackers. Their father had taught them well what to look for to find their prey. He explained to them that the places to look weren't necessarily right in front of you at eye level, they were lower and higher, out of the corner of your eye. They had started with animals. It didn't take long for them to learn the many different ways a path could be found. Had they the desire, they would have made excellent game hunters, but the idea of killing Bambi had no appeal to either of the boys. A fact they made clear quite loudly the one time it looked like their Dad might actually pull the trigger on one of those training exercises, allowing the deer to escape their father's sights. He hadn't minded, he had no intention of harming the animal.

It was different hunting monsters. The many different flavors of baddies they hunted came in various shapes and sizes and usually had the foresight to hide themselves. Not only did they have the intelligence to be cunning and unseen, they usually had other abilities that made them much harder to track. Some had inhuman strength and speed, some had the ability to fly, or even disappear. They could cloud your mind so you couldn't see them, or couldn't even react if you did. They didn't all hide in the woods; they hid in buildings, houses, plain sight. It was always an adventure, no doubt.

So it didn't take long for them to realize that the splatters and smears of blood, the bent and twisted underbrush were all just a little too convenient to be the results of something blindly running through the woods.

They were being led.

Sam hunkered down by another mound of dirt that had been pushed up by a foot digging hard into the ground and then moving forward. Dean shined his flashlight to the right of Sam's shoulder so he could better see his face without blinding him. Judging from the irritated twist of his lips, he had definitely come to the same conclusion.

"They want us to follow them. This is just nuts, Dean. Have you ever heard of this kind of intelligence from a wendigo? I mean, I know they aren't exactly stupid, but this is just off the charts," Sam asked quietly in confusion, shining his light around the general area to look for any additional signs of the creatures.

"I hear ya, Sam, doesn't make any sense. I'd say let's call Bobby, but our cell service abandoned this party a few miles back." Dean let his hands drop down, drawing the injured wrist into his chest, but maintaining the position he'd had with the gun and flashlight. If he let himself rest and baby the limb now, he wasn't sure he would be able to force himself to do it again. It was hurting like a mother and, while the sweet Mulder and Scully stance looked really cool and was pretty functional, it wasn't helping the pain at all.

Sam caught the motion, following it with concerned eyes. "How's it doing?'

"Peachy," Dean bit out with a pained smile, not quite up to his usual response of "Fine". Sam didn't take his tone personally. Dean was sure he didn't expect any different answer and there were no follow up questions for a change.

"Well, if they are leading us along, then we're walking into a trap. And based on the trail they've left, I'm thinking it could actually be a good one," Sam remarked, standing back up, eyes still warily moving around the darkness.

"Trap or no trap, it's the only game in town. At least we'll know where they are when they spring it, right? Bright side, Sammy, it's all about the bright side." Dean's cheer had faded along with the floaty bit of pain killing numbness the whiskey had given him and his voice came out strained and hoarse.

Sam eyed him with that look that said he was troubled about Dean's condition, but that he knew he wasn't going to get anywhere fast arguing with him. He was going to do it anyway, though, Sam could rarely resist making a point. "Bright side? We've never hunted wendigos plural at the same time, Dean! And never any that have shown the cleverness that these things have. This just doesn't feel right. It feels like we're walking right onto a missing persons poster," he expressed, moving closer to Dean so he could keep his voice low, even though he just wanted to scream it out.

"Think they'll use my "Blue Steel" mug shot?" Dean asked with the most winning smile he could muster up. Sam's face went from worried and anxious to irritated and done. No sense of humor, his little brother, none at all. Dean sighed, realizing it was time to get serious. "Look, I get what you're saying, I do, but this is our job, we have to wrap it up. We'll figure it out, we always do."

"Yeah, until we don't and we're dead," Sam interjected, lips tight with frustration. Dean's attempt at reassurance was once again a resounding fail.

"Listen to me Sam. We're not getting taken out by some skinny cannibals with a bad manicure. It's not happening. We are way too epic for that. So let's go show them what happens with you fuck with the Winchesters, huh?" Dean kicked Sam's ankle lightly since he still wasn't up to giving up the death grip he had on the gun and flashlight and hitting him in the chest like he normally would.

Sam looked down at the ground for a moment, still fighting with his instinct to take off. It wasn't a bad one, in fact, it just illustrated yet again that Sam was the smart one, but Dean couldn't walk away, and he knew Sam couldn't either. He finally looked up at Dean again, the slight upward slant of one side of his mouth telling Dean everything he needed to know. He was in.

"Epic, huh?" Dean just shrugged. "All right, let's do this then. For the record, I will say 'I told you so' if, and probably when, this goes into the crapper," Sam warned

"Noted," Dean replied with a nod.

They set off again, following the obvious path the creatures had left for them. It was almost insulting, a four year old could do it. The brothers were doing their part to acknowledge the threat level. Every step they took was purposeful and silent. They split the dense forest between them so that they could cover as much ground with their eyes as possible. They didn't speak, all conversation reduced to military hand signals and eye gestures. The only hiccup was Dean's fight to avoid upchucking when he almost stepped into the rotting carcass of something small and previously furry. Sam had his own battle on his hands trying not to laugh as his brother gagged.

After what felt like a small eternity, but was really only an hour, they realized that the signs had trailed off. They hadn't found any blood, busted branches or disturbed earth for nearly fifteen minutes. They had been finding some sort of marking every five minutes or so. Maybe they had been wrong, maybe the wendigos weren't leading them along. Maybe they had finally took to the trees or gone to ground.

Or maybe not.

Sam was abruptly jerked backwards with a shout, his arms flying up from the momentum, legs flailing and trying to keep his balance as the creature bore him down to the ground. Claws bit down into his shoulder as he was shoved down, blood blossoming over the fabric of his jacket. Dean saw the wendigo behind his brother, taking note that it was the one Sam had injured. It was clearly looking for some payback. Dean steadied his hand to fire the flare gun when he felt a disturbance in the air behind him, a movement out of the corner of his eye. He dropped down immediately, rolling to the side, barely escaping the claws that swished above his head. That would have done a number on his back for sure.

Without another moment of hesitation, Dean fired on the wendigo still looming above Sam. The flare caught it in the chest, a definite killing blow. Its high pitched scream drowned out the reassuring hiss of the flare as it caught, followed by the crackling of flames. He didn't wait to see any more, he rolled again towards Sam, figuring the other wendigo was pretty pissed at this point and was going to be coming for him. He ignored the screaming agony of his wrist as he jostled it and choked down the bile that decided to rise back up again. There wasn't time. He didn't think Sam was injured badly, but he didn't know for sure.

Once he reached Sam's side, Dean turned quickly to see where the other creature was. It wasn't where it had been and he didn't see it in his general sight range. His gun was empty and he didn't have time to reload right now. With his wrist, it would take too long. He either had to get Sam's or give Sam an opening to kill it. Sam was rising to his knees, flare gun still held steady in his hand.

"You okay?" Dean shouted to be heard over the flaming corpse on the ground next to Sam. His brother nodded, grimacing in pain as he clutched his bloodied shoulder. "Do you see it?"

Sam shook his head. "It saw its buddy light up and it took off. I didn't see where," he gasped out.

Dean wanted to get a look at Sam's wounds to make sure there wasn't anything life threatening that needed to be addressed right that minute. He didn't think the wendigo was done with them this time.

"Load this up, I'm going to take a look at that," he ordered, handing Sam his empty gun, who immediately started to pop in a fresh flare. Sam's eyes flicked up every few seconds, looking for their other pain in the ass. Dean moved Sam's jacket aside, inhaling sharply when he saw the shredded shirt underneath. It looked like the wendigo had dug his claws in, then raked them backward. Lifting the sodden material, he could see four parallel gashes that started at the top of his pectoral muscle and wrapped over the top of his shoulder. The wounds were bleeding sluggishly, so weren't deep, but the risk of infection was high. Wendigos didn't exactly use hand sanitizer.

"Well I've seen worse." It was true, but he still hated to see Sammy in pain. He knew his brother was tough, but he always wished that he had been the one to take the hurts, not Sam. "We'll make sure the other one has taken off then we'll get it cleaned and stitched, okay? You'll be all right," Dean promised with a smile.

Sam nodded and started to hand Dean back his flare gun when his eyes widened as he looked over his shoulder and he shouted "Dean!"

Several things happened at once. Sam reached out to grab Dean away when he saw the wendigo come up behind him, aiming the flare gun at the shape over his brother's shoulder. Dean saw the trajectory of Sam's gaze and started to twist to the side to give Sam a better shot at the creature and hopefully avoid it himself. Both movements were thwarted by a long fingered hand wrapping around Dean's throat, his back arching as he was pulled up and away from Sam. Man, not the throat again! He saw Sam taking aim at the part of the creature that wasn't blocked by Dean's body and he smiled, knowing that the son of a bitch was toast.

It must have known it too.

Dean would have shouted out in pain if its grip around his throat hadn't been so tight when he felt sharp nails pierce into the right side of his back, white hot agony exploding through his body as they pushed in as far as they could go. All he could manage was a gasping gargle as blood erupted into the back of his throat, filling his mouth with the hot, metallic fluid. It must have pierced his lung, he thought with a worrying detachment.

There was a woosh of sound and then screaming. He registered heat at his back. Sammy got him. That's his boy.

The fingers in his body were withdrawn, the hand around his neck releasing him as the creature fell to the ground. He dropped forward, face first into the dirt. He didn't even have the thought of bracing his fall, it was taking all he had to try and get oxygen into his lungs. He knew he should move, knew he had to tend to Sam's injuries and his own, but his body wasn't obeying his brain. His chest felt cold and wet inside, weak coughs expelling blood over his lips onto the ground.

Dimly, he heard Sam scream his name. He lifted his head and tried to focus on Sam hovering above him, his mouth still moving, but he couldn't make sense of what he was saying. There were two of him, no three, all jockeying for the position of real Sam. He felt numbness creeping over his body, the pain more distant, and he knew that wasn't a good thing. Pain meant you were alive. You may wish you weren't, but you were. Numbness was nothing. Numbness was an exit door. All she wrote. The fat lady is a'singin'.

Dean smiled slightly at his internal rambling. Yep, he was on the way out. At least he wasn't leaving Sammy alone with wendigos on his ass.

He wasn't sure when his eyes closed, only knew that when he decided he wanted to see his brother again, he wasn't there. Nothing was, just an unending black filled with shooting stars. It was too much work to open them again, they were so heavy. Too much work to breathe, someone was sitting on his chest. To move.

"S'my," he muttered. At least he could speak. Kind of.

"Oh God Dean, I don't…you're going to be okay. You'll be all right. Just open your eyes, okay Dean? "

He wanted to, he really did, he just couldn't. The dark was so nice. It was pulling on him, wrapping around him like a comfortable blanket. Synapses were firing in his brain urging him to fight it, to move, but he just couldn't.

Coulda, shoulda, woulda. Sam was going to get to say his "I told you so". Dammit.

"Please, you have to. Dean, please."

Choked off sobs, broken voice. His little brother. He was in pain.

The baby was crying. He had to get to the baby, Sammy needed him. If he could just get his eyes to open. Screw the dark, it was a lie. But the darkness was strong and his body was weak. It surged up and pulled him under.

TBC...