Greetings. Long wait, but the climax is upon us. Nothing long-winded here except a thank you to my muse/partner in SPN fan fic crime, Agelade. Who remains awesome.
We begin the end of this little tale with a refresher back to chapter 1...and then...it's time.
-Caladrius
Then (from the end of chapter 1)...
"Uh, Sammy..." Dean's voice sounds funny even in his own head, "...either there are...two burgers here...or I was just roofied by my own brother..." He swings his head in a wide wobbly arc to look at Sam, but it's dark in the Impala. Super dark.
"I'm learning the lessons, Dean."
"You little...son of a bitch..." He feels his legs kinda just let go and he slumps a little. It doesn't hurt, no, but, goddammit Sam!
Sam's voice is closer to him as his vision gets darker.
"Dean, you probably won't remember this, and I swear, when I come back, you can punch me. A couple times. Hell, as much as you want. I won't blame you, but you need to know this..."
Dammit, Sam. Grab him. But Dean's arms are leaden.
"You're my brother and you sure do get your own way a lot, but I love you. And I know that you want me to blame you so you can get in on this, make it an us thing, but I can't. I can't blame you. It's my turn, Dean. Just this once, at least. This is mine, and I have to handle it. It's time, Dean."
Those words again.
"It's time."
Ah fuck, Sammy. I'm not letting you do this alone! Stay alive, do you hear me? Stay alive!
"I'm coming back, Dean. I can do it now. I'm ready. Wait for me."
Darkness.
Now...
May 1, 2007
Sam 23
Dean 28
It's now.
It's time.
Sam steps back and does a mental checklist. He's surrounded the Impala with every protective circle and sigil-obscure or not-that he knows. The forecast is calling for calm, clear skies and the salt circle surrounding his sleeping brother is thick and intact. Sam has strewn the impala with blessed mala beads, crucifixes, pentacles, and the rest of the collection he has been hastily procuring on the side for weeks.
Right now, though he doesn't know it, Dean is about to have probably the most protected night's sleep of his life.
And that's how it should be, because it isn't worth it if Sam can't protect his big brother for once.
He's going to kick my ass to the west coast when he wakes up.
Sam smiles, because imagining that is imagining a tomorrow where this is all done and the thing is in the past.
Sam picks up the duffel bag that has what he needs and walks towards room 23. He turns back one last time at the door. Dean is slumped down, his head resting on his right shoulder.
Sorry, Dean. I'm sorry, but if it comes-when it comes-it's only coming for me. And I have to keep it that way. No more mistakes.
He nods one last time to himself and turns to the door.
It barely takes any force to get the door open. The smell inside is like the smell of a dozen other old, damp, abandoned places that he and Dean have visited on their hunts in the previous two years. Odd how the smell of this place, though, still has something clinging to it of his past. It's faint, under a layer of rotting paint and wood, but it's there, and it calls strongly.
Sam sets to work with a large bag of salt. He lines the windows and doors. Demons told him to stop poking around the boogeyman, and demons might know exactly where he is, but they aren't getting inside tonight-they can't stop this. After a brief inspection that at least reveals no rips in what's left of the carpet that might undermine its effectiveness, Sam pulls out a can of red spray paint and redecorates with a devil's trap. Just in case.
Now, if only the room itself holds up for a few more hours. Dean hadn't totally exaggerated the dilapidated shape of the place that warned of serious structural damage. When it comes to how things are made and how things work, Dean has the far better understanding, and the creaks that reverberate from floor to wall with Sam's careful footsteps remind him that he probably shouldn't stick around longer than he has to.
Once the place is as secure as it's going to be, Sam turns his attention towards the interior.
Somewhere light is creeping in through broken blinds - a streetlight, the moon. It's enough to feel the shape of this place molding back to him. Sam steps gently across the boards of faded carpet. His eyes, invariably, are fixed on one point: that closet at the far end, near the door to the bathroom.
It's closed, but it's still a closet. It hasn't completely succumbed to time and wear and weather, and that means something.
It means that it could definitely come back.
Sam opens the closet. It's still there, the cot he lay on fourteen years ago. It's rusty, but Sam is strong, and he's able to pull it out. The inside of the closet contains a few scraps on ruined clothing, eaten by mice or rats. Twisted wires of ancient hangers make a muted clink as Sam bends down with the salt. Heart pounding, small flashlight clamped between his teeth, he carefully and methodically shakes a significant line of the purifying crystals around the inside of the closet. There is a rhythm in his blood pounding out the seconds, the minutes. He's going to finally make it right. He's going to finish it. He is afraid, yes, but he isn't going to run or hide behind anything or anyone anymore. The fear will bring it back to him, and then he has to end it.
When the trap is primed, Sam stands and closes the closet door with a note of finality.
The plan is simple. Ridiculously simple, actually-even more simple than ending a ghost...in theory: Lure the boogeyman back with Luciano's extremely easy candle ritual, keep it from getting out of the closet with the salt line, blow the shit out of it with the shotgun to stun it, end it with a special hot-burning molotov cocktail, and then get the hell out of the room.
Sam isn't entirely sure that the salt line will keep the boogeyman in the closet, not totally, but Dad thought it was the best bet to buy a little time. It might not matter, though because Sam is going to have the gun at the ready this time, and this time he won't hesitate to shoot the bastard in its shiny, scary eye.
The plan is simple, yes, but Sam's not going into this fight without a few precautions. He pulls out several things from his duffel and sets them on the bed closest to the closet.
The first two items are two shotguns. Dean himself had cleaned them and loaded them the night before thinking he'd be in this room doing this. They were as deadly as they'd ever be.
Next, Sam pulls out a familiar wooden pencil box. SAM WINCHESTER is still engraved deeply into the top. In the watery light from the small flashlight, Sam runs his fingers over the intricate design of old Winchester stock that took Dean weeks to finish-his 10th birthday present that he received almost on this very day 14 years ago, in this exact spot. Sam had kept it, used it, and whenever he slid it open at Stanford, at a random library in Anytown, USA, it never ceased to remind him of something he had to remember: at one point, Dean thought he was worth this work. It is a memento of their rocky but close childhood.
Dad's instructions are for Sam to make himself an anchor. Just in case. Something that will tie Sam to this plane to keep him safe, and that's why the pencil box has achieved a new level of importance now. John 's letter is vague about what form that anchor should take because Dad never knew Sam and admitted it. He didn't know him when he wrote the instructions, and he didn't know him when he was 23. But after all of the research he had assembled from his father's notes, Sam had a fairly good idea of what was needed for his anchor.
He and Dean have few personal possessions, and almost all of them are replaceable and have been replaced. There is no point in getting attached to things when they have to live out of a car and sometimes leave places pretty fast.
But this pencil box is a steady, ever-present thing because it has value beyond its use- it's symbolic of Dean in every carved line . Because of that, Sam has protected it, polished it, held it often. He told Dean about the plan, of course, because Dean had to believe he was in on everything or he'd have found a way to keep Sam from the precious six hour window that the boogeyman had to make his travel to the material plane. But Sam didn't tell him what he'd been putting into the pencil box or Dean probably would have been creeped out. At the very least it would have been an awkward conversation.
Dean's hairs from the shower drain, for example. Kind of weirdly fetishist-probably would have gotten an eyebrow raise. A few nuts and bolts from one of the bins in Bobby's garage of parts that had been collected from the Impala after its almost total destruction ten months ago. Dean wou ldn't miss these unless he had seen them in the box, and then he would have complained loudly . The fingernail clippings are probably overkill, but the fact of the matter is that unless it actually comes from Dean's body or his beloved car, it couldn't have a strong enough connection with his brother, and that's what Sam needs-an anchor to Dean. Dean who is here. Dean who is completely safe right out front, who will be waiting to kick his ass 100 ways from Sunday in the morning. Because Dean is all Sam has, too.
Sam sighs. He squeezes his eyes shut. He does feel guilty-that look on Dean's face when he had figured out Sam had drugged him. The betrayal.
"Dammit." Sam whispers. If he could, at any time, have convinced Dean that he could do this, he wouldn't have had to resort to some powder on his cheeseburger. But Sam gets it, in a way-Dean has been programmed to keep Sam out of danger, and John Winchester's programming had been effective if not completely unfair to his brother. To both of them.
Dad.
Sam reaches into his pocket and pulls out the letter that started out "Dear Sammy." It did. It actually said "Dear" in his father's handwriting next to his own name, and Sam had to believe that no one was holding him at gunpoint to do it, because he left it in a secret package of research for Sam to find.
In its own way, the letter is part of his protection-It gives Sam courage. There are things in this letter that are unbelievable because they contain words of explanation and contrition: two things his father was never known for giving. Ever. So, Sam has to read it one last time even though he's memorized it. Seeing the words there make it real. But it hurts because dammit, Dad. Why couldn't you have said any of this to my face?
Sam draws a breath, folds the letter back up and pushes it into his pocket where he's been carrying it every day since he opened it.
Finally, Sam reaches into the duffel and pulls out a small brown box with whittled marks of his own. Dean had never found out where Sam had stashed this, but Sam hadn't been dumb enough to think Dean would stop looking for it after the first night. He had a pretty careful system of moving it around to places Dean had already checked a hundred times, and it had successfully escaped his brother's good intentions.
Sam breaks the seal. He opens the box and turns it over. The ladybug hair tie drops into his palm-its glossy surface reflects the flashlight's beam as perfectly as if he had been handed this yesterday.
Amber.
It worked well enough once as an anchor for her. It had pointed her to him for nights, and Sam remembered her words. "Remember to call me, Sam, for our birthday."
She had given him the means to save her. If not her body, then her soul, at least. No matter what Dean thought, burning this wouldn't have ended it. She is fundamentally trapped wherever the boogeyman has taken her because her body is there. Somewhere. But if he could call to her when the gate was open. Maybe...
Sam places the hair tie next to the pencil case on the dilapidated bed in the crumbling room and pulls the last three essential things from the duffel: two small, white, candle stumps and a glass wine bottle he had prepared with a mixture of alcohol, a gel made from frozen diesel fuel, and a few added ingredients for extra heat. It's primed and ready to go.
Sam lights the two candles that he has ke pt in a pocket next to his heart for seven days and nights per Brother Luciano's instructions. He sets one on the floor next to the bed and places the other to the left side of the closet door. This isn't part of the trap-it's a summoning ritual. His beating heart and his unique aura are the bait for something that has already proven it wants him.
The youngest Winchester picks up the first shot gun and flips off the safety. His hazel eyes are level and he stares at the closet door with the same intensity of a nine-year-old boy.
1993
Sam - 10
Dean - 14
"Wait, Missouri. Wait. Just."
Dean's hand went to his forehead. His heart jumped into his throat and cut off his voice. The cold sweat broke out a split second later and Dean instinctively looked over to the table where Sam sat placidly, a spoon in his hand, eyes far away. Because this wasn't good. This wasn't fucking good news.
"Dean, you still there?"
Missouri's voice was concerned but unflappable. Yeah. Even delivering that news.
"Y-yeah. Um. Are you sure. I mean...are you sure?"
"Listen, Dean Winchester, I wouldn't call to make you jump at crickets in high grass. And if I could reach your daddy, he'd be on the phone with me right now, not you. I don't know exactly how much time you got, but you know what to do?"
"You're okay? I mean, it didn't...it didn't..."
"Spend less time worrying about the lady in Kansas, boy. I have my ways of encouraging those things to move on. But if it got to my doorstep, that means it's dogging you in better ways than a cop or a redneck with a chip on his shoulder because of a bad poker game. Where's your daddy?"
Dean swallowed. "Don't know. Said he was goin' to a library somewhere. Looking up stuff to help Sam. He didn't expect to be back for a couple of days."
"And what about that place you're in?"
Dean walked over to a window, staying out of the line of sight, and hastily closed the blinds.
"Some old farmhouse. We've squatted here before. It's out in the open but it's, like, eight miles to town."
"You got any kind of ride?"
Dean shook his head and wet his lips. He closed another blind and checked the lock.
"No. There's a beat up tractor, but I've already looked it over-needs one of everything and lots of time."
Missouri took a deep breath.
"It's angry, Dean. Real angry at your daddy. I saw some images-five bodies, heads all cut off."
Yeah. Fuck. That nest of vamps. The last job Dad had done before they had hopped into the car looking for answers to Sam . He was going to do one last sweep because vamps tended to pair up. Six in that nest, not five. One was out. Dad suspected it, too. Dammit, they should have waited.
Fuck. This was Dean's fault. He made Sam the priority that morning and now the last vamp in the group was on some kind of blood hunt. Jesus, if it had hurt Missouri after everything she'd tried to do for them...for Sam.
"Dean. Talk to me. I can't read you 800 miles away."
"I know about it, yeah. Anything else you can tell me? We're gonna have to bunker down and ride this one out."
His voice was steady, but inside he was shaking because vamps were a no-go ride along with Dad for good reason. And had it been with Dad, he'd have been fine. He'd have been excited and ready. But without Dad and with Sammy all gone, it was completely different-too much unknown. Too much exposure. Too little personal experience with the real deal.
Sack up, Winchester. Sam was depending on him to do this, and there wasn't a choice. Even if he could reach Dad, there was no guarantee he'd make it back in time.
"He was big. At least 6'2. Kinda rough looking. Probably not friendly even before."
Awesome.
"Moved weird. A little to the side. Maybe a limp, but it's an old one. He was plenty fast. You hear me?"
"Missouri, they're all 'plenty fast.'"
"You sassin' me now?"
Dean started to rifle through cupboards looking for things he'd need, but vampires had so few fucking weaknesses and so many fucking strengths.
"No. I mean. I'm not-"
But Missouri's voice didn't sound angry.
"Dean Winchester, you are gonna be okay. You boys are gonna beat this thing."
Dean paused.
"How do you know? Did you...uh...see it? Or something?"
"Would it make you feel better if told you I did?"
Dean made a face no one could see. "What? Yes! Of course it would."
"Well, I ain't gonna tell you. You think you just automatically win and you'll do some fool thing to get yourself killed."
Dean sighed. "Yeah, yeah. I got it."
"You boys be careful. Look out for each other."
Dean wanted to laugh at that useless sentiment. Sam couldn't look out for anything at the moment. Once upon a time, yeah. But now Sam was a small sack of meat to a vampire who wanted revenge.
"Right. Thanks, Missouri."
Dean pushed the end button. Sam sat at the table, not waiting for Dean to finish helping him eat. Not waiting for a vampire to bust through the door and kill him. Not worried that Dean hadn't faced a vamp yet and was mostly terrified that they weren't going to live through the night.
Dean tried his father's cell phone twice and got nothing. Probably in a deep dark basement of some library where there was no signal, looking for some way to save Sam when the greatest threat to Sam's life right now was stalking them in the cornfields.
Dean checked the horizon. Three hours to nightfall.
He had work to do.
Sam waits.
He waits and waits and he doesn't drop his sights on the closet to look at his watch but he thinks he's been standing here for an hour. Maybe longer. It's annoying, this wait, and concerning mostly because Sam has never roofied his brother before and isn't sure exactly how long he'll be out. And he has to do this, finish it, before Dean wakes up or things are going to go south real quick.
It's dark in the room-just the candle light and the ambiance from outside sneaking in through broken blinds. And Sam is nine again laying on the cot waiting for the door to click open. Waiting to see that glassy, shiny eye. Waiting.
Sammy...
Sam blinks his eyes. Had he fallen asleep just now? As impossible as that could have been, the air feels weird and his mouth is dry. His arms long ago locked, felt like lead holding up the shotgun. Nothing has changed. Nothing has moved so...
Oh, Sam...Sammy Sam Sam...better than birthdays. Better than Christmas.
Sam blinks again. Is it colder? Or maybe his blood has just stilled a bit with the wait. But, no, his heart is racing. He's sweating. But the door is closed. He takes a breath, lets it out. His jaw clenches. Is it here? He's got one shot. The salt inside the closet might keep it from coming out, but it might not keep it from sliding back to where it came from.
"Just gotta make it to one last birthday, Sam."
That's what the Yellow Eyes demon bitch had said.
I don't have seven more years...
Sam flexes his finger on the trigger.
Click.
Almost imperceptible except Sam is hyper aware of everything in the room right now. And he heard it.
Squeeze the trigger. Do it now.
And then his father's voice takes over. Reminds him he has to face it down. Has to know it's there. Has to know for sure. Wait for the eye. Wait for it. Sam sets his sights. He ignores the ache in his joints.
And then the closet door opens. Completely.
Sam isn't prepared for the rush of cold, but it's not like an actual arctic blast. It's not real wind, but it's freezing, and something quiet in the back of his mind remembers it. Not the context of it, but like a glimpse of a photograph he'd almost forgotten he saw as a child-blurred edges, dulled colors, until presented with the original again. And then.
Sam seizes. In his mind he remembers running in no direction and can't find a way and, my god, he's cold and where is he and what is he doing?
"Sam?"
Shit. Shit he was...he has to clear it out. Push it down. He has to do something here and it's more important than anything he's ever done ever.
"Sammy. Get it together."
An arm grabs his and Sam pulls back and away even though the voice is familiar. Because of the tone. It has his attention, but it's coming from far away. Very far.
Something slaps his face. Maybe. Maybe it's just in his head?
"Sam! Look alive, son."
"Dad?"
Sam's eyes snap open. The candlelight hurts. The air hurts. His chest hurts, feels heavy. What the holy fuck was that? And where?
But now he remembers.
His arms are lead but he holds up the shotgun and takes aim because it's here. Has to be here. It's here.
And then he stops.
Over the threshold of salt, standing in the closet seven feet away, is his father.
John Winchester.
Sam's eyes go wide.
John's eyes are John's eyes. His face is dark-at least a week's worth of stubble. He's in a black jacket, blue jeans, his boots. Those boots.
John Winchester. Dad.
"Hello, son."
Sam shakes his head.
"No."
Because this can't be. Or can it? It's hard to think again. He can remember not knowing the way out and trying to run, maybe, or running in place.
"No. No, because...because you're...we burned you." And that should be enough. It should have been enough unless. No. And Dad was. He was.
"Yeah, Sam. Yeah. But you can hear me, can't you?" His father's voice. Holy shit...god damn. His voice. And Sam's eyes fill with tears because Dad...
"Yeah. But. Why? How? You're...you made a deal."
"I'm in hell, son. You already got that much."
Sam looks around the room, blurred vision. It's the motel room in Osseo. It's broken and smells like mold and years and abandonment. He feels sick, like he's spinning around and around.
"Then...then how." He drops the shotgun. "Dad, how?"
"Only one way you could be hearing me now. It's almost done."
Sam breathes out. Thinks. No, nothing. "What? What's almost done?"
"You, Sam. You're changing. Only one way you could hear the voices of the damned in hell. It's almost over. He's got his hooks in you and that's gonna be the end."
"Who?"
But Sam knows who. His blood freezes. He wants to throw up. Why is he here?
"What do you mean, who? The damn demon!"
Sam flinches.
"A goddamn disappointment. Jesus Christ, Sam. Couldn't handle anything. Ran away from every goddamn challenge that would have toughened you up. Put us all in danger. Should have pulled the trigger, son. How many times. How many goddamn times."
This is a bad tone. This is a "Dad's gone on a bender" tone and there would be a fist in there somewhere. A hand. Dad's hand. Cold and calloused and scarred and now burning in hell because Sam...
"You...you never should have...you never..." But Sam doesn't know how to put his response to this together. Because his father sold his soul to save Dean and he's in hell and Sam can hear him. And he's cursed. He's always known it.
"There's no saving you now, Sam."
The words hurt. They physically twist him up. And Sam always knew that there was no saving him. Somehow just...knew. Whatever the demon wanted, it was getting served up on a silver fucking platter. Sam had been running in place all these years, chasing everything, getting nowhere, making Dean run after him. Running right into the monster's arms.
"Dad. Please...what...what do I do?"
Because this voice was the voice that knew everything, goddammit. And Sam hated it. Hated that it always knew everything. He had tried to reject it, but what was the point? He was guilty of everything: Amber, Jess, Dean, Dad. All their lives. And everyone after them. He had one chance. One. And he blew it when he was nine. Not fair, no. Wanted to be normal but couldn't. Wasn't ever going to be normal, no, just hurt hurt hurt and all he wanted was to save everyone.
"One place you can go, Sam. Only one. But it's a sure thing at least. Best chance."
Sam gasps. His hand is wet from so many tears. He looks up, hopeful. "What place?"
John holds out his hand.
"Come on, son." The voice is gentle, suddenly. "Come on, Sam."
He shakes his head, squints at his father's figure so real in the closet, in the doorway.
"Where?"
"You know where. You'll never lift a finger for a demon again. They'll be okay, Sam. Dean'll be okay. Come on, son. Let it go."
"Go..."
Into the doorway. Because he has to go there. For real this time. Dad says he has to. Dad knows everything...
A pain.
Words assail him. He sees them in his mind's eye.
"Dear Sammy."
He has it. The words. He has those words in his head too. Sam slaps his hand to his back pocket. His finger finds the edge of a piece of paper. Because Dad had written him a letter years ago. Because Dad had said...
He had said...
"Sammy, I believe you can do this..."
And Sam can almost hear his real father's voice say those impossible words. As impossible as the words from this vision in front of him are possible. But Dad had written Sam a letter and he remembers it. He remembers it all. In his head he lets them all out, the words in the letter. It explodes something. Shatters it. And the room twists for a second but he hangs onto them as hard as he can.
I'm here to kill the fucking boogeyman.
When Sam looks up again, his father standing in the doorway has shiny eyes.
It takes him a second to wrap the words from the letter around him, fix them there, and show him the truth.
Sam's breathing heavy. He stands up straight and looks the bastard thing in the eyes. Finally. All the warnings about the boogeyman, that it could take a person's fears, twist them around-he had almost fallen for it, maybe. The overwhelming confusion of a few seconds ago is almost completely gone now, leaving only the conviction.
"Need to update your files. Working on old intel. Kinda sloppy." Sam feels oddly empowered for the first time in never. And he needs it. Wants more of it because it's keeping the fear at bay more than anything else.
John-not-John sighs and shakes his head in a way that is, really, so Dad.
"No. I got the memo, son. Just a whole lot more history to work with. Gotta hand it to you. Didn't think the letter would take so well."
"Yeah? Well, then you don't know humanity as well as you think you do. You can drop the charade now. I know what you are."
Sam feels the gun in his hands. Solid. Real. The boogeyman is talking to him, and he has to play this carefully because Sam knows better than anyone else just how much he's afraid. All the time. Afraid to lose to his fate, afraid to be left alone, afraid to always be a failure in someone's eyes, and what the monster can do with all of that. But if the boogeyman rabbits, it might not come back. If it closes the door, then he can't call to Amber. Sam has to kill it while the door is open. The fact that it seems chatty means it thinks it could win, and Sam is okay with that. For this second.
"Do you, Sammy? Do you know what I am?" John's image smiles. "Go ahead. Tell me what I am."
"You're some kind of shapeshifter on top of everything else. Show me what you really look like."
John's image purses his lips, shakes his head sadly, almost compassionately, and then looks up at Sam.
"You don't like my face, Sammy. Don't you remember?"
Sam blinks. That cold breeze that's not really wind picks up again and the blurred picture of something truly awful starts to materialize...
He shakes his head, tries to make it go back because okay...something isn't...this isn't good. With all his might Sam fixes a picture he knows in his head: John Winchester in army green-also a faded photo, but real. From Vietnam. He saw it once, and he knows it exists.
"You want to know what I am, Sammy. You're all grown up and so damn smart. You read everything. You like that. Knowledge is power, that's what you think. You're good at it. It's how you protect yourself, isn't it? Well, I'll tell you all about me, Sammy. We'll have better talks. Longer talks. I'll tell you everything you ever wanted to know about everything and, bonus, you won't have to worry about anything ever again."
Sam laughs shortly.
"This...this is your new plan? You want me to walk in there with you, and you're gonna entice me with knowledge?"
"You think that if you kill me, that everything will be okay? But you know it won't be okay, Sammy. We've chatted about it before."
Sam shakes his head. "This is all..."
"Do you want to hear the voices again, Sammy? I mean, they can't keep anything a secret from you if you listen for them."
"What? Who?"
"The sighs in heaven, Sam. The cries of the damned. And all their masters and mistresses up the line. You can hear the entire damn thing from beginning to end, and they don't even know. And I can show you how. You think this ends well for you and your brother? It doesn't." John's image points a finger at Sam. "You told me that."
Sam stares. Because something is echoing just out of memory, and it's laced with fear and desperation. For Dean.
"Don't die, Dean!"
"See? It's there. You saved the world coming back here, Sammy. But not in the way you think."
Sam shakes his head.
"What...what what's wrong with Dean?"
John's image shrugs.
"Come in and find out. When you were ten, you had all the dominoes in your hand. I helped you get them. But I had to let you go, and you know why. I locked them up tight before I left because, well, everything's got a price, son. You pay mine, you'll save everyone. That's what you want, isn't it?"
In his head and heart, Sam agrees. He wants to save everyone. And in that instant he raises the shotgun and fires it.
The closet door slams shut.
Sam fires the other round on principle.
He lowers the gun, heart pounding, breathing hard. So hard. It was loud and now it's quiet. The closet door is riddled with buckshot, but the perforations leak nothing but darkness.
Nothing stirs. The candlelight flickers from the movement of the air, but eventually it settles.
Did I get it?
He has to be sure. When he fired it was at a moment when he couldn't help but want what the boogeyman had. Want it with his whole heart, honestly and genuinely. It was the only way to trick a monster that could read his mind. And maybe it had worked.
He turns to the bed and grabs the other shotgun and the wine bottle, one in each hand. The light from two candles is enough to see his way, and he takes a deep breath. Because this might be it. It could be over right now.
Sam's feet somehow make no noise on the old carpeted boards as he approaches the closet. The hand with the wine bottle reaches forward by inches. He doesn't breathe. He doesn't hope-he doesn't dare...
Sam throws the closet door open.
The back of the closet is riddled with buckshot and something else. Something dark and oozing.
Boogeyman blood...
But that's all there is. The salt line is intact but the monster is gone.
Sam's brain goes into overdrive. It's swearing, yes, loudly, but there's another chance. Five hours, maybe four and half hours left in the window. As long as he can get it to come out one more time...
The world suddenly goes flying over Sam's head as something grabs his legs out from under him.
Sam yells. It's not something he can stop. The sudden impact with the ground forces the air out of his lungs. He hits his chin and sees stars of blooming pain. Split seconds slow down as the adrenaline hits.
Sam drops the wine bottle and lifts himself slightly so he can see. But what he sees...
Two long arms. Too long. Too long for reality, in something like striped sleeves and gnarled, grotesque, clownlike huge hands have him around the ankles. Arms that go all the way back...
...to under the bed.
Under the bed! Fuck!
In all the boogeyman lore, the closet and under the bed. Under the bed! But because Sam only saw it from the closet...
He raises the shotgun.
At the first violent pull on his ankles, Sam's shot goes wide.
Oh shit. Oh no. Oh no!
It shouldn't work. It shouldn't be able to take him anywhere, but fear overwhelms reason completely and entirely. Sam drops everything and reaches up for the opening of the closet. He manages to get a grip there as the next violent pull stretches every muscle to its breaking point. The fatigue in his arms from holding the shotgun aloft for an hour, the gasps of breath he's only now able to draw, the pounding in his head, and the vision of five foot arms are too much.
Sam can't spare a breath to even grunt with the need to hold on. To hang in there. To not get pulled away forever and ever and die in some plane far away from Dean.
He puts every last ounce of his strength into his biceps and his fingers to pull himself forward an inch. He tries to kick, but the grip is so tight it feels like his feet will come off at the ankles first.
And then the rotting wood of the closet door finally gives.
When Sam loses his grip on the one side, it's too late and he knows it. His last thought as the boogeyman pulls him into darkness is "Dean, I'm sorry!"
(to be continued...)