A/N: I'm sorry for the delay again. And, just so everyone knows, I will not abandon this story. I have it all planned out. Also, I would like to thank everyone for reading and reviewing and whatnot. I really appreciate it. :)

Chapter 3: An Alien World and How Sam Got There

As he drives down the road, Dean just listens to the Impala's engine rumble. He had decided that it would be best not to have any music playing in case Sam needed to talk to him. So, here he sits in silence, feeling his little brother squirm around in his pocket. He had noticed the squirming had increased ever since he got in the car.

Dean rests his elbow up on the window ledge and rubs his head. "Sam, what are you doing in there? Do you have ants in your pants? Or maybe fleas would be more suitable for your size," Dean mutters, glancing down at his pocket.

"I can't get comfortable," Sam replies with a slight squirm.

Dean rolls his eyes and looks out the window for a second before looking back at the road ahead. "Really? I didn't notice." Dean sighs and decides to flip open the lip of his pocket. "What's wrong?" he asks, looking down at his brother.

"The seam is digging into my back… and other places," Sam adds, shifting his weight closer to Dean. "And there's lint getting in my hair… And it's stuffy in here."

"Hey, I told you that you would be warm," Dean reminds him of what he said before they left the motel room.

"Yeah, but you didn't say it would be hard to breathe," Sam complains and secretly hopes that Dean doesn't close the pocket any time soon.

"Fine." Dean grabs the wheel with his other hand and fishes his brother out of his pocket with the other. Barely looking at his brother, Dean gently carries him over to the passenger side of the bench and sets Sam down. "Better?" Dean asks, glancing down at him, but Sam just stares.

The all too familiar surroundings seems alien to him now. Sam had practically grown up in this car and yet he feels lost just sitting there, looking up at the enormous dashboard and wide windows. The door handle that once disappeared in his grasp is far too out of his reach and not even small enough for him to hold with one hand. In fact, he doubts he could even move it with two hands if he was given the opportunity.

"Sam?"

He turns around and looks way up at his brother. Again, the setting was familiar, but now it was totally different. He was used to looking Dean in the eye when they sat in the car, but now Sam was craning his neck back just to look at him.

"Is that better," Dean repeats. He can tell that Sam is taking everything in, but he still wants to make sure that Sam's comfortable.

"Yeah," is all that Sam says as he stares at his larger-than-life brother. Everything about Dean was huge. His fingers were about as long as he was tall. More like small, Sam thinks as he looks at how thick Dean's arms are now, and how wide his torso is. Even if Dean was a giant, he would have a hard time hiding behind buildings, because his body was so big.

Sam slumps back against the old leather seat in one of the grooves, and stares straight ahead, but there's nothing there. He's too small to even look out the windshield. All he can look at is the glove box with Impala spelled out in fancy metallic, silver cursive embedded into the tan dashboard. And, he has to lean back to even look up at that.

As Sam looks at the tape deck and radio, he notices the car slow down after making a left turn. The slight incline tells him that they pulled in to some driveway.

"Alright," Dean says as he turns off the engine and stuffs the keys into his pants pocket. "I know you don't like being in my pocket, but I can't risk somebody walking by and seeing you in my hand." Dean holds out his hand, laying it down on the seat next to his brother, who climbs on without arguing.

After he slips out of Dean's hand and into the dark and stuffy pocket again, Sam listens as he hears his brother's boots thump across the pavement and onto what Sam believes are wooden panels of a porch. Next he hears his brother knock three times on a wooden door, and it doesn't take long before he hears the lock click and the door creak open.

"Thank you so much for coming over, man. You have no idea how much I appreciate this," Sam hears a young male voice say.

"Hey, don't worry about it," Dean assures the kid. "Where did you say she was?"

After the sound of the door clicking closed, Sam feels movement and hears Dean thump across a hardwood floor. He can tell his brother is following the kid.

"Well, she was in my room, but Timmy said he saw her run into her bedroom."

Dean follows Ryan up a set of stairs. "What if she's not there anymore?"

"I left Timmy in there to keep an eye on her. So, if she did leave, he'll let us know." At the top of the stairs, Ryan takes a left turn and walks over to the door at the other end of the floor. "Besides, I doubt she'll leave her room. She's always felt safest in there."

Dean nods, understanding what it's like to know everything about your younger sibling. At least, I used to, he thinks as he glances down at his pocket.

Inside the pocket, Sam feels a pang of guilt. He knows that Dean can relate to the kid, and he knows that Dean knows Sam is keeping something from him. But, at the same time, he knows that Dean wouldn't understand what he's doing with Ruby, so he pushes the feeling aside… for now.

Ryan opens the door and Dean follows him inside the room. There's a bed up against the far corner of the room, right next to a dresser. There's a dresser on the opposite wall holding a TV set with some book shelves hanging over it, and a computer desk next to the door. Upon entering the room, they both automatically watch where they are stepping, something they've both become accustomed to over the past week.

"So, where's Timmy?" Dean asks as he walks up to Ryan. But, before the kid could respond, Dean hears a tiny and excited voice come from behind him.

"Dean! Behind you!"

When Dean turns around he sees the very tiny boy jumping up and down on top of the TV, waving his arms to get Dean's attention.

"Hey, Timmy," Dean gives a little wave before he quickly looks at Ryan. "How much sugar did you give him?"

"I swear I didn't give him anything. Apparently, he thinks that this is the coolest thing in the world."

Dean turns back to the tiny kid, who just grins up at him. "Isn't this awesome?! It's like I'm a superhero! Like Mighty Mouse! Only cooler, because I don't have to wear tights! I can totally win at hide and seek now! AND, I don't have to go to school!"

And now Dean understands why the boy is so excited. Dean gives the little boy a smile. "Yeah, that's great, Timmy. But you better be careful. I don't want you to accidentally…" Dean trails off remembering there's a scared, tiny girl hiding somewhere in the room, and suddenly decides against saying the words out loud. "Just be careful, okay?"

"Sure thing, Dean!"

"Good." Dean turns around already feeling worn out from listening to the little ball of energy.

"Hey, Timmy," Ryan crouches down in front of his little brother. "Is Shay still under her bed?"

"As far as I know she still is," he says with a shrug.

Ryan frowns. "What does that mean? I thought you were going to watch her?"

Now, Dean's looking around the floor, worried that he might accidentally step on the tiny girl.

"I was! But, she could have ran under her dresser, too," Timmy argues in his defense, pointing out that the dresser was right up against the side of the bed.

"So, you haven't actually seen her leave is what you're saying, right?" Dean asks.

"Exactly. See? Dean gets me."

"Yeah, once he actually understood what you were saying." Ryan rubs his finger in his brother's hair, messing up the mop on his head.

"Hey!" Timmy complains as he tries to swat his brother's giant finger away.

At that moment, Dean decides it is time to get his brother. He slips his hand inside his pocket and carefully grips his brother, slowly pulling him out of the fabric. As soon as he places Sam in his palm, Dean notices his brother sighing in relief.

"Oh, come on. You weren't even in there that long!"

Sam looks up at Dean and scoffs. "Like you would understand what it's like to be stuffed in a pocket." But Dean says nothing in response. Sam was so used to his brother's silence ever since Dean came back from Hell that he just got used to ignoring it altogether. But now that Dean was a giant in comparison and Sam was completely dependent on him now, the silence seemed to weigh down on Sam. As Sam looks up at his big brother, he could have sworn that he saw a flash of hurt in Dean's eyes. Has he felt like this before and I've never noticed? Sam wondered. All he said was that Dean wouldn't understand how Sam was feeling. That couldn't have been it… Could it?

Dean bites his tongue at his brother's remark. He wants to tell Sam what he really thinks, but Dean knows that starting a fight now would be a bad idea. After all, they had a job to do at the moment and Dean didn't want to scare the tiny siblings. Besides, he never really liked yelling at Sam, he just used it as a last resort. And, if Sam just TOLD him what was going on instead of lying or thinking Dean wouldn't 'understand' him, then Dean wouldn't HAVE to yell at Sam.

Both brothers keep quiet as Dean carefully sets Sam down next to the bed. Dean watches as Sam disappears underneath the frame.

Before he gets any further in, Sam asks Dean for some light. Dean brings out his flashlight and shines it down the end of the bed, where Sam spots the girl huddled up against the wall, directly in the middle of the two legs of the bed. As he walks towards the girl, he notices the cobwebs hanging above his head. He thought for sure one would get caught in his hair like it did when he walked through an old doorway in an abandoned house. But he wasn't tall enough to even reach up and touch them. Sam slowly approaches the girl, glancing up at the 'ceiling' every now and then, disturbed by the fact that his head doesn't even come close to touching the metal frame of a bed.

"Shayla?" Sam asks gently. He remembers the girl better than he thought, and not just from their encounter in the park. Vague images flash in his mind of him spending time with both Shayla and Timmy, but they feel more like dreams than actual memories. He can't even remember having a conversation with her besides the day at the park.

Sam walks up to the tense girl and his confusion about what just happened with his brother buries itself in the back of his mind. Right now his instincts tell him to help the girl and keep her calm. "Listen, I know you're scared right now, but you're going to be okay. They're not going to hurt you. Dean and your brother are just trying to help."

"No," she shakes her head and closes her eyes. "This isn't right. They grew. I SAW him grow!" Shayla pauses. "At least I think I did… No, I did… Didn't I? Why can't I remember?"

Sam finally decides to sit down next to her. As he sits he looks at Dean and motions for his brother to give them some privacy. Sam sees his brother place the flashlight on the floor before Dean stands up, out of view. "I'm sorry. I wish I knew what was going on, but the truth is, I don't even remember how I got like this," Sam admits. "I woke up this morning thinking I did, but once Dean told me what happened, I just…"

"Forgot?" she guesses.

"The same thing happened to you, didn't it?" he asks and she nods.

"So, now what? We're stuck like this?" she says breaking into tears.

"No," Sam lies, not knowing if what he was saying was actually true, but he was going to do whatever it took to get this girl to come out from hiding. "Dean remembers what actually happened to us. He can help. He's going to find a way to fix us. All of us."

"But it's been a week, Sam. Don't you think if there was a cure that they would have found it by now?"

Sam doesn't know what to say, because deep down he was wondering the exact same thing himself. And Shayla doesn't fail to notice the look on his face.

"Oh, god. We really are stuck like this." Shayla sinks further down against the wall and whimpers. "Oh, no. I can't live like this. I can't."

"Well," Sam begins as he thinks it over. "You can't live under a bed. You are right about that." Sam smiles a little to try and lighten the mood, but Shayla only shakes her head in response.

"What? You want me to go out there?" She shakes her head again as Sam nods. "No. Uh-uh. No way."

"Dean's not going to hurt you, I prom-"

"It's not your brother I'm worried about," Shayla interrupts him, staring at the end of her bed.

"Who-? Ryan?" Sam glances at the socked feet standing near the far end of the bed. "Why would he hurt you? Right now he's worried about you."

"Sure. Now he is. But he won't once he knows the truth."

Sam pauses. "The truth about what?"

"I… I can't say." She shifts fidgets her hands nervously. "No. He can't know what I did or what I've been doing. He'll squash me like a bug."

"Shayla, I'm sure whatever it is he'll forgive you." Again, he doesn't know if it's true, but he really wants to get her out of there so he can go back to the motel and learn more about what happened from Dean.

But the young girl scoffs at him. "Let me guess," she says turning to Sam. "You get along with your brother? Have a close relationship where you tell each other everything?"

Sam swallows, looking down at his hands, and thinks, we used to.

His inner voice fights back, and whose fault is that? Because, Sam knows that his brother only lied to him about not remembering what happened to Dean in Hell. And, that was nothing compared to what Sam was keeping from Dean.

"Well, my brother and I, we don't get along." Shayla proceeds to explain, "He's popular, I'm not. We hang out with two different sets of crowds. He's always been the good son. Perfect grades, perfect girlfriend, perfect everything. And he's never been in trouble. Not once. You just don't understand what it's like. If he finds out what I've been doing, he will kill me."

"Shayla, he may not be your best friend, but your brother isn't going to kill you. He's your family."

"I'd rather stay under here for the rest of my life than face him and find out if you're right."

Sam sighs and leans back against the wall. It's going to be a long day.

Standing at the end of the bed, Dean waits for his brother to come out. He sighs and glances at his watch. Come on, Sam. What's taking so long, he wonders.

"She always was stubborn."

Dean looks down to his left at little Timmy, who was sitting on a stack of CDs looking surprisingly bored for a change. "Hey, what happened to Mighty Mouse?"

"He got bored," Timmy groans, resting his head in his hands.

Ryan chuckles to himself. "That's new."

"Shayla's room is so boring," Timmy whines. "Can I go to my room?"

"No," Dean and Ryan both say in unison. They had learned their lesson on day one when Ryan let Timmy into his room, while Ryan talked things over with Dean. But, Ryan didn't realize just how messy his brother's room was at the time. It took Dean and Ryan three hours to find Timmy passed out next to his secret candy stash, covered in chocolate. When the kid woke up he said he thought he was in a chocolate factory, which is what he believed his giant brother and Dean used as shelter. So, now that they were in Shayla's room, everyone was pleased to find out that it was much more organized than Timmy's.

Ryan looks around Shayla's room for something to keep his brother occupied. He sighs when he doesn't see anything besides a few books here and there, and some candles. "Can't you just wait a few more minutes?"

"Ugh. A few minutes to Shayla is like half an hour!"

Dean smirks and looks down at the kid. As Timmy plops backwards onto the CDs he was sitting on, Dean gets an idea. "Hey, Timmy, could you get down from there for a second?"

The tiny kid doesn't say anything, but he climbs down anyway. He backs away as Dean's big hands come down, picking up some of the albums and start setting them on their sides, arranging them at different angles. Timmy can't see the rest of what Dean was doing, because Dean had placed two albums next to each other, making a wall in front of Timmy. The tops of the CDs were a few feet above his head, so he can't even look over them to get a peek at what Dean was doing. From his spot all Timmy could see were the shadows of Dean's hands and arms. Timmy turns around and looks up at his brother, who is now smiling and pointing at something.

"Hey, what if you put one there?"

Dean smiles at Ryan's suggestion and makes a few adjustments before Dean stops to look everything over. He nods in satisfaction and then grins down at Timmy.

"What?" the tiny boy asks suspiciously and backs away when Dean goes to grab him. He turns around to run, but he ends up hitting a wall of flesh that easily wraps around his body. His world goes dark as he feels himself being lifted into the air. "Hey!" he shouts, pounding on the flesh. He's quickly set down in front of a different set of CDs that make an opening. "What is this?" He looks up at Dean.

"Why don't you tell us? We can't fit in there." Dean nods towards the opening, lightly nudging Timmy in the back with his knuckle.

Timmy walks in without saying anything else, and Dean and Ryan sigh with relief.

"That should keep him occupied for a while," Dean says as he looks over the impromptu maze that covers the entire dresser.

Ryan chuckles as he, too, looks at the maze, "I hope you are right about that."

At that moment, Dean spots Sam on the floor, waving his arms to get Dean's attention. Dean walks over at once, crouching down in front of his brother. Dean spots Shayla walk up behind Sam.

As soon as Dean had walked over to the bed, Ryan immediately followed him. He stands behind Dean, hunching over to get a better look at the two people on the floor.

Dean holds his hand out for the two, and Sam walks on first. Sam notices Shayla's reluctance and reassures her that it'll be okay. She finally climbs on and sits down next to Sam, and once she feels the hand rise into the air she turns to Sam and closes her eyes.

Sam looks up at Dean, ready to tell him to slow down or stop, but he sees Dean's other hand come down on top of them, creating a little cave of flesh.

"I'm going to take these two to the dollhouse," Dean tells Ryan. "Do you want to wait for the kid?"

Ryan looks at the maze and at his brother's progress. He knows Timmy isn't even close to figuring out how to get out of there, so he shakes his head. "Nah, he'll be fine." But, before he follows Dean out of the room, he makes sure that there isn't any possible way for his brother to get off of the dresser. "Timmy, I'll be back in five minutes to check on you, okay?"

Timmy nods and stops when he comes to a fork in his path. He looks to the right, and then to the left, and then back to the right again. He folds his arms and holds his chin. A grin appears on his face and goes left for about two albums, before he wheels around and goes down the other path instead.

Up above Timmy, his older brother laughs and shakes his head before leaving the room.

Dean had walked across the hallway and was now in Ryan's bedroom, where an old dollhouse was sitting in the middle of the floor. Ryan had dug the old toy out of the basement and placed it in his room, figuring it would be safe place to keep his brother and sister. It definitely made it easier for him to watch them at night.

Dean gets down on one knee, carefully lowering his hands inside of the house, where he finally opens them up. Shayla gets off first, breathing a sigh of relief.

"I really hate heights," she mumbles, and Sam now understands why her eyes were closed.

Sam's about to climb off, but Dean stops him and lifts him up instead.

"We need to talk to about something," is all Dean says before he places Sam in his pocket again without waiting for a response.

Dean walks towards the stairs, passing Ryan on the way there. "I'm going to tell him what happened. I think you should do the same with Shayla."

Ryan nods and heads off to his room, as Dean goes downstairs and into the kitchen. Once he's there, he walks straight to the table and fishes his brother out of his pocket. Again, Dean carefully lowers his brother down to the wooden table top and waits for Sam to climb off of his before Dean takes a seat.

"So," Sam starts, knowing what Dean was going tell him. "What really happened?"

Dean keeps quiet for a minute, gathering his thoughts. He finally looks at his brother. "After we went to the hospital, you and I went back to the motel," Dean explains. "You were already dry by then, so you were going to wait to take a shower in the morning. You ended up going to get us something to eat from that dinner in town."

*~*~*~*SN*~*~*~*

Dean was watching the local news, looking for something helpful on their hunt when he heard the Impala pull up. He turned the TV off, hearing the door of his car creak closed. The motel door opened and Sam walked inside, carrying a plastic bag in his hand.

"Did you ask for extra bacon?" Dean asked, snatching the bag from his brother's grasp and peered inside.

"Yeah, and some old lady behind me warned me that I was going to have a heart attack if I keep eating like that."

Dean unwrapped his burger, checked for the bacon and grinned before he looked up at his little brother. "You know, you really should watch what you eat, Sam."

Sam shook his head and pulled his sandwich out of the bag. "Did you get the drinks?" When Dean didn't respond right away, Sam looked up and saw his brother's mouth was already full.

Dean swallowed and walked over to the kitchenette. He grabbed two beers from the fridge and walked back over to the table, handing one over to Sam.

After he untwisted the cap, Sam took a big gulp of his drink. He set the bottle down on the table, fished Dean's keys out of his pocket, and set them down on the table. He was about to grab for his sandwich when he started to feel a little dizzy.

Seeing his brother sway and hold a hand onto the table for support, Dean asked him what was wrong. Sam just shook his head, causing him to hold it with both hands. "Don't tell me you're drunk already. You just had one sip! That's hardly enough to give you a buzz!" When his brother didn't say anything back, Dean got worried. Dean set his burger down and was about to go to Sam's side when it happened. His little brother was rapidly getting shorter. No, not shorter, Dean thought. He's getting smaller. In no time, Sam was up to Dean's shoulders, and then mid chest. Pretty soon, Sam was as tall as the table and he wasn't slowing down.

Sam looked up at Dean, confused and looking just as worried as Dean was. The nausea caught up with him, and he had to close his eyes again. "Sam?" he heard his brother's alarmed voice come from above him, sounding slightly louder than normal.

Dean quickly got down on his knees and stared at his brother in horror as he helplessly watched Sam shrink down. By now, Sam had sunk below the seat of the chairs and soon reached the one foot mark, and he still wasn't slowing down. Dean was worried that it wouldn't stop and his brother would disappear altogether, but then it suddenly stopped.

Dean swallowed hard as he looked at Sam. For the first time since they were in high school, Dean was looking down at his brother. But, instead of being a foot or so shorter than him, Sam wasn't even a foot tall. In fact, Dean figured Sam must have been about three or four inches tall now.

"Son of a bitch," Dean whispered.