Mustering his resolve, Sam pulled himself together. He couldn't let himself be consumed with panic. Every second was precious and could cost Dean his life.

For all he knew, he could be panicking for nothing. Maybe Dean was alright and just forgot to text. It wasn't like him to forget but everyone slipped up now and then.

Picking up the phone, he checked his messages again just to make sure he hadn't missed a new one. Nothing had changed. He clicked the call icon next to Dean's name and again the call went straight to voice mail. His mind and heart were racing and the physiological symptoms of panic were preventing him from fully concentrating.

Stopping everything, he put the phone down, closed his eyes and took several long inhales in before holding and letting them out again. He did this several times until his racing heart started to slow.

Now think. If this were any other missing person. What would you do to find them?

Opening his laptop, he logged into the Arc Mobile Network and turned on Dean's GPS. He waited patiently for the circle to get smaller but it kept ping ponging across the map, expanding and decreasing.

Hitting his head against the headrest, he ran an impatient hand through his hair, gripping tight as he closed his eyes again. The slight pain helped him focus on the present. He was trying to think but all his mind wanted to do was give in to the panic.

The laptop made a sound and he immediately lifted his head to see what it was indicating. He let out a sound of triumph as it finally pinpointed Dean's phone. Copying the location into his phone, he turned on his navigation app and pulled away from the curb a little faster than was probably safe.

It took over an hour to drive through the rush hour traffic and navigate his way to the outskirts of the city. The further he went, the more desert-like his surroundings became. He reached as far as he could by car but the map was still suggesting further so he parked his vehicle and began his trek through the rocky terrain before him. It appeared that he would have to go about half a mile.

When he finally reached his destination, it took him a while of searching to find the phone, hidden as it were under a pile of rocks. It looked like it'd been thrown.

He had already known Dean wouldn't be there because there was nothing around for as far as the eye could see. This meant that someone had purposely come out there to dump the phone. Any lingering doubts he may have had that his brother was taken were gone. This act was deliberate, which also meant that Dean would be as far away from here as was possible.

He made a sound of desperation, planning to chuck the phone as far away as he could. He was no closer to finding Dean and the trail was getting cold. In an abortive move, he changed his mind at the last second. Cradling the phone to his chest, he sighed tiredly and started the trek back to his car, tripping over loose rocks on the way.

He sat in the car again and placed the phone in the glove compartment.

"So what now?" he asked no one in particular. The only thing he could do was try to retrace Dean's steps. The problem was that the list he'd given Dean had over forty names on it and he didn't know where on the list his brother had started or how he picked the witnesses he was going to interview. He also didn't know what Dean had found or how he came about this clue.

Did he start at the top of the list? The bottom? Was he going in the order the names appeared? Did he start with the closest witness? Did he pick witnesses based on their proximity to each other for a more efficient drive or did he pick them based on their relation to victims?

When this was over they would definitely have to re-think how they did things. He refused to allow himself the thought that he'd never see Dean again.

By the time he made it back to the motel, it was already dark. He would have to start his search in the morning. A feeling of impotent anger and frustration traveled through him. He was losing precious time. Clenching his shaking hands into fists for a moment, he took another calming breath and entered their motel room.

One thing was for sure, he wasn't going to get any sleep tonight. He pulled out a copy of Dean's list and spent the night trying to come up with a pattern to Dean's method. He knew Dean better than anyone else in the world. If there was ever a time for that to be useful, this was it.

It had been three days now. Three days since he'd lost Dean and Sam could feel hopelessness trying to set in. He didn't know what to do.

He spent the first two sleepless nights pushing himself tirelessly, constantly worried and unable to eat before he crashed, quite literally. He'd stood up to get something from his bag, last night when his vision dipped alarmingly and his balance tilted sending him to the floor in a twist of limbs.

Giving in, he let himself rest for a couple of hours before he planned to start all over again. He barely had four hours of sleep before he woke up shaking and perspiring from a vicious nightmare. The echoes of it mirroring his reality. Dean was gone. There was no relief in sleep or in wake. He just had to work harder to find him.

Save one old lady, none of the witnesses he'd spoken to over the last day and some since he started his search, had seen his brother and the woman couldn't remember what they talked about. He'd only managed to connect with twelve persons on the list. Some were at work or just not at home when he got there. It was like everything was conspiring against him.

The eleven others he did connect with, he tried interviewing them anyway to see if he could find the same pattern as his brother but maybe his heart wasn't in it because they weren't really giving him anything that could remotely be considered useful.

He found himself sitting in the car going over the list again trying to find a pattern.

Suddenly the guitar riff that was Dean's ring tone started to go off, somewhat mutely in the glove compartment. The sound doubled when he opened it up. Clearing his throat, he clicked answer. "Agent Page."

"Oh hello Agent Page. I thought I was calling Agent Plant," the male voice said confused.

"This is Agent Plant's number, may I ask who is calling," he asked abruptly.

"How rude of me. This is Tim. Tim Mason. Your partner visited me three days ago and it's been bothering me. He asked about the Providence Memorial Hospital in regards to my son. I just want to know if he found any more news."

A feeling of hope bloomed tentatively within him. A breakthrough, finally. It had to be the missing piece.

"The investigation is still ongoing. I assure you, you will be the first to know as soon as information becomes available."

After a few more words, he hang up and drove back to his motel room. He broke into the hospital's database and painstakingly went through several files looking for each Laelia victim and discovered that every single one of them had at some point before their disappearance visited the Providence Memorial Hospital, now called Memorial Campus.

Grabbing his jacket, he left the motel room. If Dean had gone to the hospital then someone had to have seen him.

Walking up to the in-take desk, he flashed his badge at the attendee.

"What can I do for you agent?" The young man said.

"I was hoping to speak to whoever was on shift three nights ago." He asked with as much authority as he could infuse into his voice.

Before the male nurse could reply, his colleague answered. "We both were. We work three twelve hour shifts 12pm-12am. One night off and then repeat."

"Great." He said unable to hide the relief in his voice. "Did you happen to see this man?" He showed them a picture of Dean. "He would have been here maybe about 4:30 to 5pm?"

Taking the picture, the male nurse looked closely at it. "No... he doesn't look familiar to me," he shrugged and made to hand the picture back but his colleague grabbed it from his hand.

"Wait Brady. Don't you remember? He spoke to us about the attending physician for a patient. Lucy was falling all over herself trying to help him," she added helpfully.

"Oh. Right. Now that you mention it, I do remember him," he turned to Sam. "Sorry about that. So many people come in here it's hard to remember all their faces sometimes. If I remember correctly he wanted to see Dr... Turner." He went through his files. "Unfortunately Dr. Turner is not in right now."

"When are they working next?"

"In two days time. Do you want to make an appointment?" He asked helpfully.

"No that's alright." He'd just find this Dr. Turner's home and get them to tell him what his brother wanted. "Thank you for your co-operation." Things were looking up. He didn't have time to waste. He still had the hospital database files open. He'd find the doctor's home address there.

Nodding, Brady stepped away from the main desk.

As Sam was turning to leave, he noticed the frown on the chatty colleague's face. She was eyeing Brady's retreating back with this confused look. Pausing, Sam turned back to her. "Hi," looking at her name tag he said, "Susan. Hi Susan. Is there anything your co-worker missed?"

Walking over to him she gave him a look. "He's usually really good with names and faces and details. I don't know how he got it wrong but the other agent did not speak to Dr Turner. He asked to speak to Dr. Holland and she's in right now."

Sam's warning bells were going off. It seemed that nurse Brady was deliberately trying to mislead him. "It's an easy mistake to make," he excused kindly. "Can you tell me where Dr. Holland is right now?"

Susan gave him directions and thanking her, he briskly walked down the hall, following the arrows on the floor.

Turning another of many corners, he quickly flattened himself against the wall as he saw Brady being pulled into a room by the forearm. The angry woman in scrubs and a lab coat whispering urgent words before closing the door on the two of them. Something was definitely off there.

Sneaking closer to the room, he listened at the door.

"-tell him about me did you?" She whisper-yelled.

"No I told him it was Dr. Turner and he left. I'm not stupid you know," he said in a petulant voice.

"Sometimes I wonder. Now head over to Three Woods and get those bodies out of there. I'm trusting you Brady. Don't mess this up," she said turning to leave the room.

Sam quickly rushed back to hide behind the corner he had just turned. He could hear her heels clacking away down the hall. Peeking around the corner, he looked to see if he could find Brady but he hadn't left the room with the doctor.

Rushing to the room, he saw that it was empty and there were two other possible exits. Making a rash decision, he picked one hoping it was the right one. He quickly made several turns without any luck. Brady was gone.

"Damnit!" he swore, startling two nurses walking down the hall.

Following the arrows, he found his way to another exit at the other side of the building. Brady was gone but he knew where he would be. Walking briskly around the building to find his car, he turned another corner and stopped when he saw the Impala parked in the secondary visitor's parking.

He couldn't believe it. Walking up to it he opened it with his set of keys. He could actually see his rental while standing besides Baby. He grabbed his laptop, the phones and bag of weapons from the borrowed car and brought them all to the Impala.

Baby would want to be there to save Dean.

He quickly did a search for Three Woods and got nothing. If it did not exist on the internet how was he supposed to find it?

It must be a local nickname for something people didn't use anymore. Pulling out his phone, he grabbed the business card on the dash and made a call.

"Detective Arias. Yes. This is Agent Page. I need your help with something," he said. Immediately the other man was on alert.

"No, I have a quick question. Have you ever heard of Three Woods," he asked hopefully.

"You have! Great. Can you tell me what you know." It seemed that he would get closer to Dean with the detective's help but Arias wasn't a detective for nothing. He was already asking questions.

"Yes it has to do with the case. I don't have time to explain. Just tell me what you know." He was getting impatient. He knew the detective was a good man who loved his job but he didn't have time for this. Arias wanted to know if it was urgent enough to need police assistance.

"No. I don't need any he-" Save him from heroes. This was possibly going to be a monster fight. He didn't need civilians caught in the crossfire. Arias was a stubborn man. He wouldn't give him the information if Sam didn't tell him what was going on.

He sighed. "Fine. My partner's missing and I believe that it has something to do with Three Woods. Now tell me-" Cutting him off, the detective insisted that he would go with him as backup since Sam didn't want police assistance.

"No. I don't have time to wait. Can you just tell me." The detective then threatened to head over to Three Woods without him.

In annoyance, Sam gave up his location. "I'm in the parking lot at Memorial Campus. Hurry."

"Five minutes. Look for a black 67 Chevy Impala." Sam didn't have time for this but it seemed like he also didn't have a choice. Detective Hardass held all the cards.

A sharp rap on the passenger side window let him know the detective had arrived. The large man opened the door and slid into the seat. He plopped his phone on the dash, the Navigation voice already already giving instructions.

"Follow those directions." The words weren't even out of his mouth before Sam was already pealing out of the parking lot.

"Fill me in," the detective said.

"We were looking into victims who had mentions of the Laelia flower-"

"Wait that strange flower was your lead?" he interrupted, incredibly. "I wasn't even going to include it in my report."

"We believed that some people in your city were being kidnapped and those flowers were the kidnappers calling card. Unfortunately like you said, not every officer mentioned it in their reports but we noticed that there were several reports with mentions of it so my brother and I thought we'd interview friends and family of the victims to see if there was a pattern on how the victims were chosen."

"Your brother?" the detective asked. "You mean your partner?"

"Yea... my partner," he'd have to be more careful with what he said. Exhaustion was making him slip. "We've just been in the trenches together for so long that he feels like family."

Manuel gave him a look but then nodded. "I feel you."

Sam swerved in and out of traffic smoothly though he was going at speeds over the limit. "There were a lot of witnesses so we decided to split up. He made a connection two days ago." He played Dean's message to him.

"He didn't really leave me anything to go with in that message, so I've been searching for him."

"Why didn't you call me or the police?"

"Because I know how police procedure works and I knew I could find him faster."

"The last place he was seen was the Memorial Campus. I went there and one of the employees tried to send me on a false trail so I followed him and overheard a conversation that suggests that my partner and other victims were at Three Woods. But not for long."

"I've been working the case for weeks with no clues and you found victims in three days. The FBI really know what they're doing."

Sam didn't say anything to that.

They were coming up on a decrepit abandoned factory. It was completely out of the city. Turning off his headlights, Sam drove the car at a slowed pace to not alert possible persons in there of his presence.

"You ready for what you might find in there?" he asked the detective.

The man pulled and reloaded his gun to show he meant business.

"Good." They got out of the car and Sam opened the trunk. He strapped his knife holster with the gold dagger to his thigh to make sure it was in easy reach and raising his gun and flashlight at the ready, the two of them took up standard two man building clearing position with Sam in the lead and made their way inside.

Most of the building was falling apart. Doors hanged off hinges, water dripping constantly somewhere and pieces of scrap and wood were scattered everywhere. It was damp and dark and smelled of mold and rot. The perfect home for a monster.

Manuel was surprisingly quick and efficient for such a large man. They made swift work of most of the rooms on the bottom floor.

At the foot of the staircase leading upstairs they could hear voices and shuffling sounds. Turning to the detective, he indicated for quiet when climbing the shambling staircase. When they made it to the top, he turned to Manuel and directed him to go left and he would go right. Nodding to show he understood, Manuel quickly took off in the direction.

Turning his flashlight off, Sam crept down the hall to where he could hear movement. He snuck a peek into the room and felt dread at the horrible scene unfolding.

An ancient man-like being was hovering over Dean and another young man. He had wrinkled dark skin. His ribs visible under the leathery, dried looking flesh. His hands were longer than a human's and though his back was bowed with what could only be age, Sam guessed that he was pushing eight or nine feet.

Both Dean and the victim were hanging from ropes, their toes barely touched the ground limply in their unconscious state. Dean had dried blood on his face that looked like it started far up in his hair line.

Brady was dragging the bruised and mangled legs of a woman, her lifeless body contorting in a way that suggested at least some bones were broken. Dr Holland seemed to be chanting some kind of spell. She didn't quite look as human anymore.

He made eye contact with Arias who was on the other side. He could see that the detective was freaked out but he didn't have time for "the truth is out there" speech, bursting into the room, he fired several shots at what he assumed was Yantho.

It let out an inhuman screech. Manuel also raced into the room shooting at the doctor, She roared a roar that dislocated her jaw and threw a blue fireball at him. In his periphery he saw the detective go down but he didn't have time to check on him. Yantho was the priority.

Brady, yelling out a battle cry, was running towards him, with a piece of metal he must have picked up somewhere. Sam fired a shot between his eyes and emptied the rest of his clip into the doctor while running at Yantho.

He grabbed his dagger and just as he was about to sink it into the monster, he was flung against the wall by a gigantic fireball, dropping the blade. He heard it fly across the room but didn't see where it went.

Grimacing at the pain, he placed a forceful hand against his skull as he tried to sit up. His ears were ringing from the force of the blow and his clothing was burnt. Luckily he was wearing layers.

The doctor walked up to him and placed her heeled foot against his throat. All pretense at being human was gone as her alien-like face distorted and glitched repeatedly.

"You hunters," she said in a double voice. "Always think you're better than us. Well die like the vermin you are."

Sam could see Yantho feeding on his unconscious brother as his vision wobbled.

Not like this, he thought as he tried to push her feet off his windpipe.

Suddenly both Yantho and the doctor exploded into dust. Manuel limped over to Sam, holding the gold dagger, his shoulder bloodied.

Giving him a hand, the detective pulled him to his feet with a grunt. They both immediately rushed to the tied up men. Sam to his brother and Manuel to the stranger. The stranger groaned a little as Manuel cut his bindings and laid down tiredly on the floor.

"Dean!" Sam said urgently, "Hey! Hey!" he grabbed the dagger from Manuel, cut him down and they both laid him on the ground. "Dean!" he called again. Dean wasn't breathing. "No-no-no-no-no!" he cried helplessly. "Dean!" his voice cracked.

Pushing him roughly out of the way, Manuel quickly pressed his ears to Dean's chest and started to perform chest compressions.

Undeterred, Sam just came rushing back to his brother's side. "Hey! Wake up Dean!" He shouted as he grabbed his face.

"...9, 10, 11, 12, 13..." Manuel was busy counting, adrenaline numbing the pain in his shoulder. He was not going to let this man die. The large man next to him seemed to lose all his cool as he begged his unconscious... partner? to wake up.

"Come on, wake up brother," Sam begged. He was starting to lose hope. Manuel had administered rescue breaths through three cycles already and still Dean was unresponsive. He could feel the tears starting to prickle his eyes. "Please wake up," he said, broken.

"Come on!" Manuel yelled as he started counting again. With a giant gasp, Dean shot up, his eyes wide open and confused, before sagging back down, only to be caught by Sam. "Hey! Hey! You're all right," he said as Dean continued gasped for breath, leaning against him. Body trembling, Sam sat on the floor, Dean between his legs. He wrapped an arm around his brother's chest while resting his other hand on his bent head.

"I got you. You're alright."

AN: Please leave a comment or fav to let me know what you think of the story so far! Thank you :)