A/N: Over 300 reviews. Okay. I'm sitting here trying to think of something all witty to say. Can't think of anything except "Thank you." So that's what I'll say: "Thank you." Thanks for confirming my belief that boycotts are wrong, and that everyone out here is not a troll or a Nazi. I feel like babbling, so I won't. Chapter title taken from the song Amazing Grace.


Chapter 16 - was blind but now I see

"Should I shoot 'em all, Pa?" Lee whispered softly. He squinted as he put his right eye to the scope. Lee slid his finger smoothly around the trigger, and he waited. The crosshairs sighted perfectly, right in the middle of Gabe's broad back.

Damn good shot. Only thing was Gabriel blocked the path to the three other men: the one holding him and the two that just walked up the hillside.

Pa scowled fiercely. "Hell no, you damn fool. You'll hit Gabriel."

Lee sighed and shook his head. He could squeeze off a shot anyway. He could.

And Pa would probably gut him for it.

Missy crouched beside Pa. She quivered all over, intense and eager, like a hound dog straining on a leash. Her yellow dress was spotted with blood from that lady cop, and her eyes were bright and focused on Gabriel. She actually growled when the man in the water ran his hand down Gabriel's back.

Not worth it. Not yet. Lee relaxed his trigger finger.


The hillside directly opposite the back gate of Sweetbriar Hospital gently sloped down towards the road. Bobby had a clear view of the pond and he could see part way into the brush.

He saw enough.

He lowered the binoculars just in time to see Emmett and Clyde Fletcher move across the road towards the back gate in a running crouch, with their rifles in their hands.

They separated. Emmett went left; Clyde broke right into the bushes.

"Lord, what a mess," Bobby muttered to himself.


Dean stared at John for a lingering moment.

My boy, John thought to himself. Dean. He looks like Mary…

That sandy blond hair was a little darker than hers had been. The eyes were what did it. They stopped John dead in his tracks. They were wrong. Not bright green, but a darker, deeper green. No recognition in them; something dark flitted just underneath the surface.

"Come here, baby," Beck murmured softly. He brushed his mouth over Dean's lips.

John's right hand tightened into a fist. He couldn't breathe. He was fairly certain that his game face was in place, but it was frozen there.

Dean blinked. Those impossibly long, dark eyelashes of his flickered once, then twice, and he settled down with his forehead against Beck's chest. Dean stared blankly at something only he could see.

Ignore this.

That was a hard thought, one that matched how John was feeling. A part of him was made of stone, heavy and dense. If he thought about this, if he allowed himself to really feel what the sight of Dean, long lost after all this time, brought out in him, John felt he would crumble.

Ignore this.

That would have been the smart play. Pretend none of this bothered him. Pretend it was okay. Come to work tonight, get the lay of the land, figure things out, and then get Dean out. Middle of the day like this, the odds were against them for a clean getaway.

Ignore this...

And leave Dean here for another eight hours, at least.

Beck put his hand on the small of Dean's back, pushed him snug and tight against him.

Ignore this...

And leave Dean here for eight more hours of drugs and shock therapy.

Dean didn't pull away, didn't resist as Beck's right hand moved from his buttocks up his back.

Ignore this...

And give Dean eight more hours of being fucked and claimed by this sonofabitch....

"Now, working here does have its perks, gentlemen," Beck announced smugly. John stared at his face and imagined Beck screaming and sobbing for his life.

John smiled a little, and Beck misread the expression.

Sam looked blank.

Beck misread that too. He supposed that Sam Wesson was thinking to himself that he wanted to be where John Doe 317 was now.

There was a part of Sam Winchester that imagined blood and murder when he looked at Nathan Beck's smug expression.

"I expect you to be smart about it. This one?" Beck looked at Dean fondly, the way a dog owner regards his pet. "He's mine. Off limits at all time." Beck looked at Sam and winked.

Dean lifted his head, stared at Sam again, then looked at Beck.


Dean needs a haircut, Sam thought dazedly. First thing he's gonna do when he gets back is cut his hair. I know he will.

The hair was all wrong. It wasn't Dean. Dean was dark blond and spiky. This was sandy blonde, bleached by the sun. Bleached by being in the sun for the last four years at least. Lost all that damn time…

The look on Dean's face sharpened, but it still wasn't Dean. The eyes were too dark, too wrong. Dean (or whoever was driving now) barely blinked as Beck continued to run his fingers through that long hair.

Sam recognized the look. It was the same one, the Other one that stared at Sam in that motel room that night, when he'd thought that Dean hated him for leaving him.

John's cell phone went off. Sam flinched.


Beck looked pissed, as though he resented the fact that the show he was putting on was being interrupted. He pursed his lips as he stared at John. The look was shrewd, calculating. Maybe hiring this MacGillicuddy wasn't such a good idea after all, even if Grissom did vouch for him.

"Yeah?" John drawled.

"You got company," Bobby rumbled. "Back gate. Straight down from the pond. Two trucks. Three men, two women. Saw a cop car pull up back there too."

John turned back towards Beck and smiled at him.

"Five minutes," Bobby said and then the connection went dead.

John smiled. It was cold and bright and absolutely terrifying, the accumulation of four long years of searching, come down to this very moment. "You son of a bitch. You get your damn hands off my boy."

Beck frowned. "Your boy?"

John moved towards Beck, and Sam moved with him.


Dean came out.

Light eyes.

Beck smiled. "Hello, Dean."

"Bastard," Dean whispered. "You keep your fucking hands off my brother!"

Dean drove his fist into Beck's face. Dean kicked out with his left foot, swept the man's feet right out from underneath him. The water churned to a froth as Dean straddled the man and struck him in the face repeatedly.

Dark eyes.

Gabriel drove his fist into Beck's face. "Just me, you hear me? Just me, not him!"

Light.

Another blow to Beck's midsection. "You sonofabitch," Dean growled. "I'll kill you…"

Beck laughed, even though his left cheekbone was broken. Blood dripped from his nose, stained the skin around his mouth and his teeth. His left eye was almost completely swollen shut. "That what this is, Dean? You mad because dear old Daddy finally sees what a worthless freak you are?"

Dean hit him again.

Dark.

Beck laughed again. He could see fine. Even with one eye. "You afraid of the competition, John? I know you are, baby. You're just my little bitch, that's all. My little drug ho---"

The other man, the older one, the dark haired one, splashed into the pond. Gabriel snarled when he reached out, put one hand on his shoulder.

"Dean, come on, we gotta go ---"

Gabriel turned from Beck and smashed the older man in the face, and that felt good, he felt like himself again. Gabriel blinked and Dean was gone, pulled down, swept away by Gabriel's rage and red murder. Dean was weak, always had been. This might have been his body before, but it was Gabriel's now. His now, his always.

He felt strong and powerful and he was going to kill them all…

The young shaggy one came up from behind and wrapped his arms around him. "Dean! Dean, don't ---"

"That's not my damn name!" Gabriel bellowed. He bucked and jerked and nearly threw him off.

Close enough only counts in horsehoes.

Beck rose up from the water. There was murder in his one good eye, and Gabriel didn't care. Gabe could kiss those red pills goodbye, he knew he could. They were going to drag him back into Sweetbriar and drug him and shock him and beat the hell out of him, and he didn't care. For the first time in six months he didn't care.

He was a Bender, and he'd finally gotten his head on straight. Finally, after all this time. He was a Bender, and that was his place in the world. I hunt you bastards, Gabriel thought fiercely, as he struggled against the one who held him. I take what I want, when I want.

Gabe smiled a little as he watched the father get up again. Dean's father. Huh. Beck was closer to him, though. Gabriel bared his teeth at him, even as Beck's right hand curled up into a fist.

The crack of the gunshot echoed in the clearing, ruffled the leaves on the trees.

Beck jerked backwards. Blood spurted from this hole that suddenly appeared in the meaty part of his right shoulder.

Gabriel didn't get it for a brief moment.

The older man ducked down, and Gabriel suddenly understood as the younger one holding him, did the same, pulled him deeper down into the water.


"Seems to me you boys have a problem here," This voice called out from the bushes straight ahead. The voice was deep and gravelly. Sam could imagine the eyes in that face: cold, flinty and merciless.

You're the bastard who took Dean, all those years ago, Sam thought to himself. It was you. You came in the night and you took my brother. You took him and twisted him all up…He tilted his head back so that his nose cleared the water, but he still gagged a little as it tried to surge into his nose and mouth. He could feel the bottom of the pond with his feet. He bent his knees a little.

"Abraham." Dean laughed. He strained against Sam's arms, but he couldn't break the hold. Sam didn't know whether to thank the drugs that still must have been in Dean's system, or the fading of the adrenaline rush.

"You stick your heads up, we'll blow them off, but there's no need for all that. All we want is what's ours. You let him come home to his family, and we'll be on our way. We'll leave you be, let you live. That boy belongs to us. "

John chuckled. Sam stared at his father as though he'd lost his freaking mind. "How fucking stupid do you think we are?" John called out. "We're his family, you bastard!"

"Not any more. You lost him. You lost him four years ago. We took him in. Made a place for him." Sam could hear the smile in this Abraham's voice. "So you're his daddy, huh? Thought so. You got to move on, fella. His name's Gabriel now. You must not have been living right, 'cause if you were you wouldn't have lost him in the first place."

Dean turned his head just enough to look at Sam. That sly smirk on his face, malicious and cheerful, was terrible to see.

The look Sam gave him was curiously blank. You're not Dean. Dean's asleep in there. Hold on, dude, Please. Hold on.

Dean's eyes narrowed.

John spat water out of his mouth and shook his head. "Hold him, Sam."

Sam nodded. He'd hold onto Dean until hell froze over, and beyond.

Nathan Beck floated on his back nearby. His eyes were closed, but it was hard to tell whether he was alive or dead.


"Gabriel?"

Gabriel turned in the direction of the voice.

Her voice.

He turned his head as much as he could. He spat water out of his mouth, snorted it out of his nose. The shaggy bastard behind him had a tight grip, but Gabriel turned towards the sound just the same.

Missy stood there, right out in the open. Gabriel's eyes widened at the sight of that bright yellow dress of hers. It was spotted with blood.

"No," he whispered out loud. "Please, no…"

He couldn't see any bruises, or cuts. Aside from the blood, she looked beautiful. Bright and clean, just like she'd looked that last night he saw her, six months, a lifetime ago.

"I missed you, Gabe."

"Missy," Gabriel breathed.

"I knew that God would bring you back to me. I did." There was no one else in the world right then. Dark green eyes locked onto brown eyes. Gabriel ignored everything else, and so did she.

Missy put her right hand out, palm up. Her left hand was behind her back. She was ambidextrous. Gabriel knew that.

"Come home with me, Gabriel," Missy said softly. "Please."

Gabriel jerked his head backwards in a head butt. It was a good solid hit. He saw stars for a brief moment, but he heard more than felt the solid thunk of his skull against jawbone. The grip around his chest and arms loosened and he turned in the water, lunged for the shore, knowing full well the boy and the father would follow him.

Then Missy could carve them up.

Gabe could see it. He wanted to see it. The shocked look on the tall boy's face, as his blood flew up into the air, bright red and red. Gabriel could see the glazed look in the father's eyes as Missy dug his heart out of his chest.

One foot away. Then two.

Things went wrong.

Another shot rang out, but it came in a different direction, off to the side. Missy ducked, and then there was another, from the opposite side.

Something came roaring through the trees. Engine noise, a heavy motor, turning and revving itself up, and for a second Gabriel thought it was the truck, that's right, Pa had gotten the truck and he was going to bull his way through, right up to the pond.

He was wrong.

It wasn't the truck, it was a car, an old one, dull blue, with a large, finely tuned engine under the hood, from the sound of it. The rear end fishtailed as it ran over the line of bushes, and for a brief moment Gabriel saw Pa as he raised up and dived out of the way. Lee and Jerry were already on the ground as the car sped past.

Fucking cowards.

"No!" Missy screamed, and her eyes flashed as she pulled her right hand out behind her back. She slashed at the air, and the man behind the wheel of the old car ignored her. He looked a little like Pa, trucker's cap, flannel shirt and all, but he wasn't.

Gabriel smirked a little to himself as he threw himself forward. He heard splashing in the water behind him. Someone's fingers brushed against his back, then his ankles. They were almost on him.

The gunfire continued. It kept Pa, Lee and Jerry down. They were the targets, so apparently whoever this was thought they were the bigger threat.

They didn't know Missy.

She ran towards him in a crouch. She was parallel to the car now, right next to the driver's side.

Gabe was knee deep in thick wet mud. Wet grass slipped and slid between his fingers, his nose filled with the smell of exhaust from the car's engine.

The driver in the car opened the car door in a snap. Missy turned sideways to face him and jsut as she did the door hit her with a solid thump, knocked her sideways off her feet.

Gabriel made a deep throated sound that was somewhere between a moan and a growl.

He was only a few feet away from the car's grill. The man in the car stared him right in the eyes, steady and unwavering. He wasn't afraid.

Gabe thought he sure in the hell should have been.

Trucker's Cap was a dead man. Gabe was going to wring his neck, and those other two were next. He was going to kill them with his bare hands and piss on their corpses.

No.

That one word filled Gabriel's head, made his muscles shake and his knees buckle as he tried to lift himself out of the mud. Every muscle in Gabriel's body cramped up, hard and tight. He couldn't breathe. He was caught fast, frozen inside the flesh he'd taken over for the last four years.

You're not hurting my family. Dean whispered inside Gabriel's head. You're not.

Can't do this. You can't…

Hell I can't.

Dean held Gabriel tight and dragged him down into the black.


A/N: Yep. That's it for now. Anyone who's read my stories knows I'm evil and I love cliffies. So here ya go. Next post will be next Monday. I believe that extreme Gabriel/Dean, John and Sam angst deserves a chapter all by itself. Regular posting schedule from now on is still Monday and Friday. Hope everyone has a safe and Merry Christmas.