Chapter 3
Dean broke the speed limit all the way to Kansas City. He made it to Independence Avenue in just over an hour, slowed down by some infuriating roadworks on I-435 that meant he had to take the scenic route through Blue Valley, and spent the whole drive doing his level best not to imagine what Sam's last 12 hours had been like.
The Impala pulled up by the curb in front of number 514 at about midday, and Dean grabbed a beaten-up old book from under the front seat before he got out.
The book was Sam's. Dean had never looked close enough to know, but it was an early edition of To Kill a Mockingbird - from the second print run. Sam had picked it up when he was thirteen, for 50 cents from a garage sale in some small town in the middle of nowhere. It had helped keep him occupied while John was off on a hunt and he and Dean were left on lockdown in the motel room, and he'd read it a couple of times a year ever since.
Dean checked the place out as he walked up the driveway. It was an old double-storey house from the early 1900s, made of white weatherboards with gables in the roof and stained glass panels at the top of all the sash windows. A veranda sheltered the length of the ground floor, enclosed by red and yellow roses growing in garden beds set under the railing.
As Dean walked up the steps leading onto the veranda, he noticed a variety of small plants growing among the roses. Sam could have named them all, but Dean recognised about half - yarrow and Devil's Shoestring among them - and they made him kind of uneasy; last time he'd seen all these plants in one place, he'd been standing in a witch's herb garden.
What the hell kind of psychic has a garden like this? Bobby didn't say anything about Pam's cousin being a witch! At least, Dean didn't think he had; after Bobby had said Mel could find Sam, and that Dean would have to go to Kansas City to make that happen, all he had been able to think about was getting on the road...
Dean put all witch-related thoughts out of his head as he approached the front door. It doesn't matter if she's a witch or not. She can find Sam.
As he knocked on the solid oak door, Dean noted the cat's eye shells in the windchimes, then the small Five-Spot decorating a pot of bloodroot sitting on the windowsill to his right. He tore his gaze away from the sigils and protection charms scattered around him as he heard footsteps on the floorboards inside, and his eyes went wide when he saw the young woman who opened the door.
Pam's cousin was a few years younger than she had been, but the two of them could have been sisters. Mel had porcelain skin, wavy chestnut hair that reached down to her waist, and when Dean looked into her emerald eyes he could swear it was Pamela looking back at him. She even had a Rolling Stones t-shirt on.
"You must be Dean Winchester." Mel smiled brightly, her eyes taking in every detail of the man standing on her doorstep.
"Uh - yeah," was the only reply Dean could manage. He was used to people looking him up and down, but it was going to take him a minute to get over the shock of coming face-to-face with Pamela's doppelganger.
"My name's Mel. I hear you need someone found?" she asked, stepping aside and ushering Dean in. She shut and locked the door behind them as Dean subtly checked out the interior of the house. The diffuse sunlight that filtered through the lace curtains fell on dark polished floorboards littered with antique furniture, hundreds of books in huge bookcases, and an oak staircase leading up to the second floor. To Dean, it felt kind of like Bobby's house - only, you know, tidy.
"I'm looking for my brother," Dean told Mel, distracted by yet more herbs and protection charms littering the entryway. "You expecting company?" he asked, eyebrows raised as he picked up a metal bowl that looked like it contained pot-pourri - Dean, though, recognised at least three different magical herbs in the mix.
Mel laughed, absently playing with the anti-possession charm on her necklace. "When you live in the world we do, you can never be too careful. When you have a house, Dean, you'll do exactly the same thing." She winked at Dean, who was trying to work out if this hypothetical house of his was Mel illustrating her point or telling his future.
"I suppose you noticed my little herb garden among the roses, too? You know, it's very difficult to grow Devil's Shoestring and Goldthread side-by-side like that. If I do say so myself." Mel smiled as she led Dean up the dimly-lit hallway, past oil paintings and sculptures depicting a variety of mythologies, into the contrastingly bright and modern kitchen. She'd evidently been making tea when Dean had knocked on the front door.
As Mel poured two cups of the sweet-smelling brew, Dean noticed more bloodroot and some sage growing in small pots on the kitchen windowsill. "Look, I don't wanna rush you or anything, but I'm kind of in a hurry here..." Dean trailed off as he took the cup Mel handed him, trying not to sound like a total ass. He didn't want to piss off the psychic, but he also didn't have time to waste standing around chatting over tea.
"I've already set everything up. I'm ready to get started." Mel sipped her tea, looking at Dean over the rim of her cup. She was suddenly much more serious - she didn't need to be psychic to know he was under a lot of stress.
When he'd called that morning, Bobby had warned Mel that Dean might be a little... raw. He'd told her to be as prepared as she could be when he arrived, because Dean wouldn't want to waste a second - apparently, his baby brother being in any kind of danger made him a little crazy.
When he'd turned up on her doorstep, though, Mel had actually been surprised how calm and collected Dean looked. He was hiding the stress well, so Mel had found herself being much brighter and more cheerful than she'd intended. Now, she was starting to see hints of what Bobby had warned her about: some real intensity was simmering just below the surface. But Dean looked like he had it under control - for now, anyway.
"The book is Sam's, I take it?" Mel asked, leading Dean through to the back of the house and into a huge room that had originally been a parlour. Now it was overflowing with candles, dried herbs, crystals and various ritual supplies, and one whole wall was covered in bookshelves housing a collection of occult tomes that would make even Bobby proud.
"Yeah, Bobby said you'd need something of his." Dean put his tea down on a side table, untouched, and joined Mel at a circular table in the centre of the room. "So how long is this going to take, do you think?" he asked, as he handed her the paperback. Dean really wanted to be back on the road.
"Don't worry, you should be out of here pretty fast," Mel assured him confidently, as she put the finishing touches on her ritual setup. The table was about 4 feet in diameter and covered with a wax-stained black silk cloth, upon which were arranged a brand-new white votive candle in a clear quartz holder, a beaten up brass bowl half-full of strong-smelling crushed herbs, and a detailed A3-sized map of Missouri.
As Mel put the book under the white candle, Dean found himself wondering where a psychic learned so much about witchcraft. "I was a psychic before I was a witch," she said, in reply to a question Dean was pretty sure he hadn't asked out loud.
"How did you... oh. Right." Dean got halfway through the question before he realised he already had the answer. You're talking to a psychic, genius! He gave himself a mental headslap for that one.
"So - witch, huh?" Dean went on, innocently. He was trying to suppress his natural reaction to witches - this one was obviously in his head, and he didn't want to offend the best chance he had of finding Sam.
"Again, Dean, you're talking to a psychic." Mel smiled knowingly. "It's okay, you know. I don't string up bunnies or anything." She chuckled, and Dean almost smiled before he realised that she'd pulled the bunny image straight out of his head - he'd never forget those witches who'd been working for the demon that Ruby originally sold her soul to...
"Okay, great. Look, I'm just going to sit quietly over here now and think about absolutely nothing while you do... whatever it is you do." Dean smiled the least-sheepish smile he could manage and sat down on a nearby chair, trying not to put his foot in his mouth again - verbally or otherwise.
Mel just smiled, obviously completely used to people's thoughts giving away their true feelings, and got on with the ritual.
She started by saying a short incantation in a language that Dean recognised as Latin, then lit the votive candle with a silver lighter. After another couple of sentences in Latin, she put the votive candle to the bowl of herbs and set them alight, before placing the candle - flame now burning azure blue - back on top of Sam's book.
The herbs burned away in seconds, giving off a 6-inch-high blue flame that almost immediately went out. Mel passed the map through the tendrils of white smoke rising up from the incinerated herbs, then touched the corner of the map to the votive candle's flame, placed it on the table and stepped back. Dean was surprised when the tablecloth didn't catch fire as the corner of the map began to burn.
As he watched the 1-inch-high blue flame creep across the map, Dean realised he knew what Mel was doing. This was how Ruby had found him when Cas and Uriel had spirited him away to torture Alastair - Sam had described the ritual in detail while Dean had been recuperating in hospital.
What happened next, however, had not been part of Sam's experience. The blue flame suddenly quadrupled in size and devoured the map with a whooshing sound, turning it to grey ash in seconds. Dean looked over at Mel, and she seemed just as shocked as he was.
Mel's eyes narrowed as she looked at the pile of ash that used to be the map, brow furrowed as she thought. "What the hell just happened?" Dean demanded, getting out of the chair and going over to the table - he knew from the look on Mel's face that something had gone wrong.
"It didn't work." She sounded puzzled as she stared at the pile of ash.
Suddenly, before he could say another word, Mel looked up from the ash and directly into Dean's eyes. "What took your brother?" she asked, her expression deadly serious.
"Not what, who," Dean told her, then paused. "A pair of hunters," he added, really not keen to elaborate further.
A look of understanding washed over Mel's face, and she nodded slowly. "That makes sense." She bit her bottom lip as she turned back to the table, more questions running through her head - mostly, 'Why?'
Mel couldn't imagine a reason for hunters to kidnap another hunter, but the look in Dean's eyes told her not to ask, so she didn't. It didn't take a psychic to see that it was a sensitive topic, and Dean had buried that whole subject deep enough in his subconscious that Mel couldn't get to it.
"How does that make sense?" Dean demanded. He was shouting now, the lid he'd been keeping on the fear and anxiety smoldering inside him threatening to fly open.
This is what Bobby meant, Mel realised. This was why he'd told her not to waste time. Suddenly, she was acutely aware that there was a real possibility Dean could lose control, and she had absolutely no desire to be the cause of that.
"Those hunters have done a ritual to mask their location. They obviously thought someone might go looking for them, like I just did," Mel explained, gathering her hair back into a ponytail.
"Can you find them?" Dean asked, simply but intensely. He was making a real effort to get the lid back on his emotions - Mel could feel him regaining control, and she let herself relax.
"Oh, yeah. These sons of bitches can't hide from me," Mel replied, a little smile on her face as she started clearing the table. I'm not going to be beaten by a couple of amateurs. Not this witch - not today.
"How long?" Dean just knew he wouldn't like the answer to that question, but he had to ask.
"Longer, now. I'd hope to be done before dark though," Mel told him, honestly. Dean definitely didn't like that, and it was written all over his face.
"Look, this is going to take some serious work now, Dean. These guys are well-hidden and it's going to take me some time to get a good result. I think you need me to be sure." She swept the ash off the table with one hand, right onto the floor. Dean sighed and scrubbed his own hand over his face, frustrated - she was right, but that didn't mean he had to like it.
"Any reason I can't get in my car right now and go back to Blue Springs?" Dean asked, seriously. The psychic/witch has Sam's book now. As far as Dean was concerned, his work was done.
"Actually, yeah. Two reasons." Mel stopped cleaning up and looked over at Dean. "Firstly, this other finding process will work better if the missing guy's brother is here with me," Mel began, looking at Dean like she expected him to have some sort of epiphany.
After a short pause, with Dean just looking back at her and waiting for her to go on, Mel sighed and continued. "Okay. How do you know your brother's anywhere near Blue Springs? What if you get back there and I find out he's five miles from my front door?" Mel pointed out what Dean immediately realised he should have known.
Apparently, Dean wasn't thinking as clearly as he'd imagined. Sure, there had been moments in the last couple of hours when he had almost let the lid get off the otherwise tightly-sealed panic, but he'd thought he had a handle on this. He thought he'd been objective and clear-headed.
"Okay, then." Dean sat back down in his chair and took a few deep breaths as Mel continued her clean-up. He really wanted to tell her to hurry, but he figured that probably wouldn't help.
"I know what's at stake. I'm going as fast as I can." Mel said, once again in answer to a question that Dean hadn't asked.
Dean hardly moved from his chair for the next seven hours. He watched Mel work her way through a series of rituals and - via her ouija board - several spirits as well. Just after 7:30pm, when it was almost completely dark outside, Mel stood back from the table and looked over at Dean.
"I know where he is."
Dean was standing next to her before she knew he'd moved. "Where?" He looked at the map on the table and Mel pointed out a small dot in Missouri.
"Odessa. In the industrial district, there's a big blue warehouse with a picture of a hawk on it. Start looking on Orchard Road," she said, and Dean could hardly believe his good fortune. She almost had a freaking street address!
"Thanks, Mel. When I get Sam, I'm bringing him back here to meet you." Dean promised, before he took off running out the door and down the hall. A few seconds later Mel heard her front door slam - Dean barely slowed down as he flung it shut behind him. She heard the Impala roar to life, then squealing tyres as Dean pealed away.
Mel left Sam's paperback among the mess from the day's work, and went straight for the collection of takeaway menus in her kitchen cupboard. She sighed as she slowly flicked through them, wishing she could see how it was going to turn out for Sam.
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It wasn't a long drive from Mel's place in Kansas City to the outskirts of Odessa, but the traffic around Blue Valley was terrible and it had taken Dean nearly 40 minutes to get back on I-435. From there, it had been a two-hour drive to Odessa - no great distance, especially when Dean broke the speed limit the whole way, but he would swear he's never taken a longer drive in his life.
By the time Dean arrived in Odessa, it was after 10pm and the industrial district was deserted. Judging by all the 'For Lease' signs, the place was probably pretty quiet during the day as well.
Smart. A little cinderblock room in the middle of one of these huge warehouses... well-hidden and basically soundproof. They might as well be on the Moon. The hunter in Dean could see why those mongrels would choose this area to hold Sam, but even briefly considering the reasons they might need seclusion like this turned his stomach.
Dean put those thoughts firmly out of his mind as he turned quietly onto Orchard Road - as quietly as is possible in a 7.0-litre V8 Impala, anyway. He drove slowly, leaning forward over the steering wheel and checking out every dark-coloured warehouse for an image of any kind of bird.
At that point, Dean honestly believed Orchard Road must be the worst-lit street in America. The streetlights – not all of which were working, mind you – were spaced so far apart that there were regular patches of almost utter darkness. To make matters worse, the road itself seemed to go on forever. "A street number would have been awesome," Dean said to himself, as he rolled over yet another cross-street.
Dean had driven almost a mile down the road and was starting to seriously doubt Mel's tracking abilities when he saw it: a cobalt blue warehouse that had, until recently, belonged to Hawkins Glass. There was a 'For Lease' sign hanging next to the hawk logo painted on the side of the building.
Well I'll be damned. A blue warehouse with a picture of a hawk on it. Apparently Bobby had been right - that cousin of Pamela's could find anything, masking ritual or not.
Dean's heart was pounding as he stopped the Impala well away from the streetlight outside the warehouse (naturally, when he wanted darkness, the streetlight was working perfectly).
This is it. Sammy's in there.
Dean leaned over and retrieved his Colt from the glovebox. He took a deep breath as he ejected the clip, checked it, and reloaded. He got out of the car slowly, watching for any sign of movement in the warehouse and shutting his door as quietly as possible. Can't let them know anybody's here - not yet. They'd know all about it soon enough.
On the drive over, Dean had tried really hard not to think about what could be happening to Sam in that warehouse, and he'd managed to keep a lid on his imagination. But now, as he ran through the dimly-lit carpark towards the small door set into the side of the building, Dean had to face the fact that he might break into this warehouse just to find out he was too late.
Well, Dean's mind tried to make him face it, anyway. In true Winchester fashion, he shut the door on the little voice in his mind that tried to warn him Sam might be dead already. Those thoughts weren't going to help. Instead, Dean pulled out his lockpick and set about getting into that warehouse.
It didn't take him long to get inside - Owen and Ray weren't expecting company, and the building's security sucked. Truth be told, there wasn't much in there worth securing: as he took a look around the huge, open space, Dean got the distinct impression that the battered red pickup parked nearby was the most valuable thing in the place.
When he was sure he was alone, Dean crept over and checked out the car, gun drawn and safety off, but found it empty. He reached in and snaked the keys from the ignition, stashing them safely in the front pocket of his jeans, even though he couldn't imagine a scenario in which these hunters would be driving away when he was done with them.
Dean was about to continue his search when a sound stopped him dead - a cry of pain like the ones he used to hear in Alastair's little corner of Hell.
Dean's breath caught in his throat as another cry reached his ears - muffled this time, like the person had been gagged. It was too late now, though; Dean would know that voice anywhere.
That was Sam.
*overly-dramatic TV voice-over*
"Next, in 'Taken': who has Sam, and what do they have planned for the youngest Winchester? Tune in next time to find out!" ;)
Thanks to all the lovely people reading this saga, but *hugs* for those of you that took the time to review! :p
Special thanks to spnrules1, EvilSquirre1 and mmmmmriley for all the love - and to EvilSquirre1 for not setting the lock-picking zombie squirrels/possums/koalas on me... :)