Title: Just a Shadow of Myself

Author: Disasteriffic Kaz

Info: Dean has vanished and a shadow portrait is the only lead Sam and Bobby have to follow. Post 3x10 "DaLDoM and Tagged to "Stone Cold Crazy" the usual hurt/limp/awesome!Sam/Dean with a dash of awesome!Bobby for taste.

Author's note: I know I have rewards to write and I swear I'm getting to them but these two stories just caught my attention and begged to be told. Lol

Do please Review once you've read. :D Every comment and vote of support helps keep me writing. Not to mention if I've pooched anything, someone can always tell me. :P

Beta'd by the always awesome JaniceC678 :D – Friend and Muse's co-conspirator.

**Follow me on Facebook as "Disasteriffic Kaz" for frequent fic updates or just to chat!

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"She cursed the place," Bobby said and leaned back. "Somehow, that crazy old bat cursed the motel and her damn shadow portraits."

"This was over twenty years ago, Bobby." Sam looked up at him. "Right around the time Margerie's grandmother was still active. What are the odds?"

"Slim and none. Dammit." Bobby ran a hand through his hair under his hat. "Not a damn person left we can ask for information about her."

"Well there better be SOMEone you can ask!" Dean shouted. He stalked across the room and glared down at his portrait. "Crazy old bitch, what did you to me?" He slammed his hand down toward the portrait and reared back in surprise as it shook on the bed.

Sam and Bobby's eyes snapped to the bed in shock as the portrait shook where it lay. Sam rose slowly from the chair and limped over to it, looking down with wide eyes.

"Careful, Sam," Bobby warned him.

"No." Sam took the portrait up in his hands and stared at his brother's profile. "It's him. It's Dean."

"You can't be sure of that."

"Yes, I can," Sam whispered and looked up and around the room. "Dean? Are you here?" He gasped in a breath as the picture shook suddenly in his hands and felt tears sting at his eyes. "Dean."

"Right here, Sammy," Dean said quietly, keeping one hand on the edge of the frame as he watched his brother struggle with his emotions. "I'm right here."

CHAPTER 2

Bobby watched the portrait in Sam's hand shake and felt tears in his own eyes. He wiped irritably at them and looked around the room, as if expecting to see Dean. "Dean? You alright son?"

The portrait rocked wildly in Sam's hands and he smiled, then sniffed as he wiped at his own eyes. "Pretty sure that was Dean telling us to stop asking stupid questions." The frame moved again and Sam let out a heavy breath, staggering slightly in relief.

Bobby caught his arm and eased him back to sit on his bed. "Hasn't been twelve hours yet since you lost all that blood, idjit. Sit."

Sam nodded and eased his right leg out straight. The puncture wounds from the basilisk burned under the bandage and he rubbed a hand over his jeans. Had it really only been a half a day since then? It seemed longer since every fiber of his being had suddenly been focused on nothing but Dean and that damned portrait. "He's alive." Despite his weariness, Sam's eyes glowed with renewed hope.

"Now we just gotta figure out how to get him out of there." Bobby eyed the painting angrily. He looked back up with a frown. "Either of you boys have the EMF on at any point while you were in that motel?"

Sam shook his head. "No reason to." He got up and hobbled over to his bag.

"Dammit, Sam. Would you just stay down already?" Dean growled. It was hurting him watching his brother hurt and being unable to do anything about it.

"Sam, for cryin' out loud." Bobby rolled his eyes, watching Sam make his painful way to his bag and then back to the bed.

"I think my sore leg can take a back seat to Dean being missing, Bobby," Sam glared at him as he dropped back to sit on the side of the bed and turned on the meter. The needle twitched but otherwise made no movement. "Dean?" Sam put a hand on the portrait beside him and felt it shudder while the needle stayed stubbornly still. "Ok. He's not a ghost. That's something."

"He's registering, but barely," Bobby mused as he took the meter from Sam and watched it twitch. "We need a more sensitive meter. Hang on."

Sam watched Bobby walk out of the room and let his head sag forward once he was alone. He was exhausted. It was part stress, part blood loss, and part how rough the last couple days had been on him physically. The portrait shook again next to him and Sam smirked. "I'm fine, Dean."

"The hell you are," Dean growled and knelt in front of Sam and studied his drawn features with concern. "Little brother, you are one step away from passing out." Sam's face was even paler than it had been hours earlier at the motel. He was practically translucent now, and his eyes, when they were opened, were glazed with pain. Dean hovered a hand over where he knew the wound on his brother's leg was. "You're in a lot more pain than you're fessin' up to, dude." He stood in front of Sam as Bobby came back in. "Bobby, would you pay attention to this little idiot already?"

"This oughta do the trick," Bobby said and sat at the table with a small bag. He pulled a large meter out and set it on the table, flicking the power switch. "Gave this one's sensors a little boost on this job in Roanoke last year. Ghost was bein' cagey as hell." The needle climbed halfway up the scale and Bobby smiled. He picked it up and swung it slowly around the room. The needle went higher when he pointed it at Sam. Bobby moved to the bed and swept the meter slowly, smiling sadly when it buried itself while pointing to the air next to the kid. Dean was standing beside his brother, whatever state he was in.

"We need to go back to the motel." Sam pushed himself up and picked up Dean's portrait. "There has to be something there. We just need to look."

Bobby clicked off his EMF meter and shoved it in a pocket. "Alright, but we stick together. Whatever happened to Dean happened while he was alone. I'm not having a repeat and lose you too."

Dean growled in irritation. He wanted to be fixed, but Sam needed downtime and for some reason, no one but the invisible guy seemed able to see it. "Dammit." He followed them outside and growled again as Sam got into the passenger seat of the Impala and Bobby climbed behind the wheel. "Great. Stuck in the back seat of my own damn car." He climbed through the door and sat. "Whoa!" Dean shouted in surprise as he went through the seat to the ground and the car began to back out without him. "Aw come ON!" He jumped to his feet and felt something catch at his hip as the car moved through him. He looked down and saw the portrait on the seat beside his brother for a moment and then it was past him. He groaned and jogged to catch the Impala as it backed up and then stopped.

"This sucks!" Dean moved so he was in the center of the front seat and then sat, making sure to land on his portrait. It worked and he found himself sitting in the car and being pulled along with it as Bobby drove forward. He glanced down and jerked in surprise, finding his right arm half in his brother's chest. "Not gonna get used to this."

Sam stared at the motel as Bobby parked in front of it again. He couldn't understand how he hadn't seen it before; the whole building had a look of disrepair about it, more than motels usually did. It was dingy with the paint peeling on the walls. Whole sections of tile were missing from the long roof, and the windows were covered in a layer of grime that made the glass look more like cardboard than glass. Even the paving of the parking lot was crumpled up in places with time while grass grew up here and there.

"How did we not notice this before?" Sam asked.

"Has to be part of the spell," Bobby said and opened his door. "We were part of it until Dean was taken, and now…now it doesn't need to fool us anymore." He went to the trunk to get them each a shotgun.

Sam climbed out slowly, having to take a moment to steady himself on the door and saw the portrait of his brother shiver on the seat. "Shut up, Dean. I'm fine," Sam said softly and then rolled his eyes. "Ok; not great, but I'll be fine until we get you back."

"Sam?" Bobby rounded the car from the trunk and took careful stock of the younger Winchester and the almost dazed look on his face before he met his eyes. "You alright?"

"Yes, dammit. I wish everybody would stop asking me that. Come on." Sam shut the car door, leaving the portrait on the seat. "I don't want to bring it any closer to the building. No telling what could happen to him if it stays here too long."

"Good idea." Bobby stood and watched Sam limp out from the car, resisting the urge to take his arm. Given the mood he could clearly see on his face, Sam would likely snap at him. He shook his head with a fond smile as he followed; just like his big brother. "We should start in the office. Here." He handed Sam one of the shotguns loaded with rock salt.

Sam nodded. "I saw a little apartment off the back. That has to be where Josephine lived." He hefted the gun and tried to even his stride while ignoring the nagging pain in his leg. He knew if Dean were there…properly…he'd have had him flat on his back in the backseat on the way to Bobby's and mother him into a bad mood. He sniffed and swallowed back the tide of fear again. He'd gladly put up with Dean mothering him for days if he could just have him back now.

"Head in the game, Sam," Bobby nudged his arm as he saw him staring off at the length of the motel and frowned, just then realizing how pale the boy looked. Bobby looked around the empty parking lot and couldn't help imagining the disapproving look on Dean's face wherever he was standing, and Bobby knew, without a doubt, that Dean was shadowing them even with the portrait left in the car.

"Come on," Sam called and stepped into the rental office. He kept a hand on the counter, using it to steady himself as he walked around it and toward the door he'd only looked into earlier. He couldn't help the feeling that the shadow portraits on the walls were looking at him, following his progress. He shook himself and walked into the little apartment off the back of the rental office.

Unlike the rest of the motel, in here there was no dust. Everything was pristine as though it had been cleaned only moments before. There were little trinkets laid out on every available surface, and Sam stared, somewhat horrified, at the double row of shadow portraits hanging over a grossly over-stuffed wing-chair covered in purple lace.

Bobby came up behind him and held the EMF meter out toward the chair. The needle buried itself in the red. "Huh. I'm guessin' this is the old lady's comfy chair." He aimed a kick at it. "Maybe if we burn it, we can free all these poor suckers."

The room suddenly quaked wildly as Bobby's EMF screamed, and Sam was knocked to his knees by the vibrations. "Uh…you think pissing her off is the best way to start here?" He clamped a hand over his right thigh. "Crap."

Dean hovered over his brother and glared around at the shaking room. "You bitch! You leave them alone!" He shouted, shaking with the unfamiliar feeling of helplessness.

"Sam?" Bobby knelt beside him and scanned the room in case anything decided to come flying at them.

"M'alright," Sam managed between clenched teeth. Every sharp movement was a reminder that the basilisk's fangs had pierced muscle. He groaned softly. "Help me up."

"Sam..." Bobby sighed, resigned. "Alright." There was no point in arguing with him with Dean…whatever the hell he was. He'd known them all their lives, and if there was one thing guaranteed to make one of them single-minded, it was the other being in trouble. Hell, they'd do some damn stupid shit when that happened, and he scowled, once more reminded of Dean's deal with the damn devil.

Sam regained his feet with Bobby's help, clasping his free hand on his jacket. "So, she's a ghost and everyone else is just…trapped in her damn portraits?"

"I dunno." Bobby pulled Sam back to the door to the office while the room still trembled. "Maybe. There's gotta be something holding her here."

Sam mentally catalogued everything he could see in the room and through the door on the far side to the frilly bedroom beyond. His eyes roamed over the rows of portraits. "Wait." He narrowed his eyes, studying them. "Hang on. Wait here." He pushed away from Bobby and went cautiously across the little parlor to the bedroom, sticking his head inside and holding onto the door frame as the shaking began again. There were more portraits in the bedroom, hung with care on the pastel pink walls.

"Sam, dammit." Bobby followed him and took his arm. He looked behind them at the parlor and yanked Sam to the side as a book flew from a shelf to spin through the door where his head had been. "Time to go."

"Yeah. It's not here anyway." Sam let Bobby support him out of the little apartment, through the rental office, and into the parking lot.

"What's not in there?" Bobby asked once they were safe.

"Her portrait." Sam looked over at him. "The one she was holding in that old photo. I think it was a self-portrait and it's not in there. We need to check all the rooms."

"Alright; but you're waitin' in the car," Bobby told him firmly and started to pull him that way when Sam dug his feet in.

"Like hell!" Sam jerked his arm free, wobbling on his own for a moment. "So you can end up on a wall too? No. We stick together."

"Dammit!" Dean shouted. "I'm gonna look while you two argue." He spun and stalked to the first room, passing easily through the door. "Huh." He turned to look back at the door with a frown. Bobby had left them all open when they'd left a few hours before. He shrugged and went along the walls, eyeing each painting. He didn't see the one that had been in the photo and went back to the door, stepping through and came up short finding himself face to face with Bobby. "Aw, come on guys! We gotta work on our division of labor!" He stepped around them and tried to think of a way to communicate beyond shaking his damn shadow portrait which Sam had left in the car.

"The door's closed," Sam said and put a hand on Bobby's arm. "They were open when we left…weren't they?"

Bobby looked at the door and backed up a step. "Balls. Yeah, they were."

"Sam!" Dean waved a hand in front of his brother's face and shouted in his ear. "If there were ever a time for that shining of yours to be friggin useful, this is it!" He swiped a hand through his brother's head and his mouth dropped open as Sam shivered and staggered in reaction. "Whoa."

"B…Bobby." Sam stammered and staggered forward as a strange sensation swam through his head.

"Shit!" Bobby caught him and slid an arm around his shoulders. "Sam? That's it. We're outta here."

"Wait. Wait." Sam got his head up and shook it. "That was…weird. Dean?" For just a second, he had had an overwhelming sense of his brother.

Bobby ignored him and pulled him the rest of the way to the Impala. He opened the passenger door and frowned, watching as Dean's portrait shook on the seat. "Dean. Damn."

Sam eased down into the passenger seat and pulled the portrait into his lap. "Dean. What?"

"Be helpful if he remembered the Morse code I tried to teach him when he was a kid," Bobby grumbled and shut the door, going around and climbing behind the wheel.

Dean did his best to pull on the portrait as Bobby started the engine. "Put it back on the seat dammit!" Dean yelled. "I am not sitting in your lap!"

Sam frowned as the frame jerked to his left several times and got the distinct impression Dean wanted him to set it down. He slid the frame back onto the seat and it stopped moving. His eyes widened as he suddenly understood. "He's attached to the portrait."

"Kinda like a ghost." Bobby nodded. "Makes sense."

"So, the portrait is the only thing he can affect in his current…state," Sam mumbled, looking down at his brother's profile.

"And don't you forget it, little brother," Dean said softly, watching Sam beside him as the car pulled away and down the road.

Bobby glared out at the road as he drove to the other motel. They should have been long out of this town by now, chaining Sam to his damn couch for a few days to grump about being sidelined and Dean hovering and pissing him off. He snuck a glance across the seat at him and his glare deepened; he'd seen ghosts with more color than the kid had right now.

"Stop glaring at me," Sam looked over at Bobby with a roll of his eyes. "I'm fine."

Bobby snorted. "Wanna bet what you're brother's sayin' to that right now?" He laughed softly as the portrait rocked between them.

Dean stood as Bobby parked the car and shook himself, standing up through the center of the roof of the Impala. He hovered his hands over the sleek, black metal and sighed. "Aw baby, this is not right." He shook his head and followed the two men into the room and wished he could put a fist through the wall to relieve some of the helpless anger. He did not do helpless well.

Dean grinned when Bobby shoved his brother down on the far bed and took his portrait away. "Listen to the man, Sammy."

"You need sleep, Sam," Bobby said firmly. "You can stay down or I can tie your ass down." He pulled the portrait away and set it gently on the other bed. "I ain't blind. You're about to fall over."

"Bobby…" Sam stared angrily up at him for a moment and then flopped back on the bed, exhausted. "Fine, but just an hour."

Bobby nodded, determined to make sure Sam got at least two or three hours before they did anything else. "Just get some sleep."

Sam tossed an arm over his face and tried to ignore the incessant throbbing in his thigh. He really did want to sleep. His whole body felt worn out; just moving was a struggle and he was nauseous as well. He'd lost more blood last night than he'd thought between the basilisk, Margerie, and then wrestling his brother into the water. Sam's head pounded a tattoo at him behind his closed eyes and he sighed softly, trying to let sleep come claim him.

Bobby sat at the table and waited a good fifteen minutes until Sam's breathing evened out in sleep then stood. He scribbled a note to let him know he was going to look up Josephine's resting place. He figured Sam would be more likely to sleep if Bobby wasn't puttering around the room keeping him up.

Dean watched Bobby slip silently out the door and groaned. "Dammit, Bobby. He's faking it! You've known him since he was two! COME on!" He looked over and rolled his eyes as, predictably, Sam picked his head up and watched the door close. "Sammy, don't you do anything stupid." He went to the bed and shook his portrait, making Sam look over at it.

"Just doing research, Dean," Sam said softly and sat up, swinging his right leg gingerly to the floor. "I'll sleep when we get you back." He leaned his elbows on his knees and rested his head in his hands for a moment. "I can't do this without you. I don't know how to be…anything without you around," Sam's voice was a whisper clogged with emotion. "I have to find a way to save you, Dean. I have to."

"Sam." Dean knelt in front of his brother and suffered with him. "You'll be fine without me. You gotta believe that. You don't need me." He looked down and snorted at himself. "It's me that's always needed you, dude. Look what I did. Couldn't make it a week without you before I ran off and sold my damn soul." He looked back up at Sam's bowed head. "You're the strong one, Sammy. Not me. Saving you's the only right thing I've ever done."

"You can't leave me, Dean." Sam sniffed and wiped at a stray tear. "I need my big brother." He stood, wobbling for a moment and went to the table and his laptop. He dropped into the chair and looked across at the portrait on the bed. "Kinda hope you didn't hear any of that."

"Sammy," Dean whispered brokenly from where he knelt and had yet to move. His one consolation was that Bobby would be there to take care of him when he was…gone. Sam wouldn't be alone.

Sam dug into the city construction archives online. Wichita was big enough, metropolitan enough that they had scanned blueprints online years ago. It took him twenty minutes to find the one he wanted and finally he was looking at a detailed map of the motel. At first, nothing stood out. It was the same structure he'd been in, the rooms, laundry room, office and apartment. He frowned and leaned in, seeing a marker for a second page of prints.

"But it's only the one level," Sam muttered and scrolled along the page until he found a new link. He clicked on it and a second blueprint appeared for a sub level to the motel. "Shit." It was a cellar or boiler room, not too large but built just beneath it and connected to the city sewers on one end. "That's where she'll have it." He found the entrance to the cellar and nodded then looked up. Sam stood and went to the bed, looking down at the portrait.

"Don't even think about it, Sam." Dean glared at his brother over the portrait. "I know that damn look. You stay here! You wait for Bobby!"

"I know where it is, Dean. I can get it." Sam ran his fingers along the edge of the frame as it rattled on the bed and smirked. "You're yelling at me, aren't you?"

Dean growled in frustration as Sam went to the table and flipped Bobby's note over, writing his own. The smug little bitch KNEW Dean was yelling at him to stay there and was totally ignoring him just because he was invisible and powerless to stop him. As if that somehow made it alright. It was so NOT alright. Dean added it to his list of things to kick Sam's ass for once he got back.

"I can do this, Dean," Sam said firmly. "Besides, Bobby already pissed off the old woman's ghost. She might not react to me, and I can get into the cellar without having to go into the motel." He straightened and smiled at the profile of his brother. "I'll be fine and you'll be back in no time."

"Sam! Don't you do this!" Dean followed his brother out the door, stalking after him. "Hey! You forgot something, genius! Get my damn picture!" Sam got behind the wheel of the Impala, and Dean could only watch helplessly as the engine rumbled to life and his car eased out of the parking lot. "Dammit!" He ran back into the motel and spent an aggravating minute trying to pick up his portrait but, though he could move it, he couldn't hold on to it. He growled angrily and went back outside. "Fine. I can follow your ass down the damn block!"

Dean broke into a run after the Impala's tail lights. A hundred feet from the room, Dean felt as though he ran into a brick wall. He rebounded backward onto the ground and spent a moment letting his head clear. Dean scrambled to his feet and walked forward with his hands out, finding the invisible wall in the same place. He could do nothing but watch as the Impala turned far ahead into what he knew was the cursed motel.

"SAM! Dammit!" Dean slapped his hands into the unseen barrier in a fury, kept imprisoned by his shadow portrait.

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To Be Continued…

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