Chapter 2 Blood and Breath

September 2012, Lebanon, Kansas

The little town, now a fortress, wasn't surrounded by the flat, open plains that were the usual perception of Kansas. The land rolled gently, low hills and river courses dividing the farms and holdings from each other. The fields of grain, however, hip-high and golden, bending and bowing with every tremble of wind, did resemble the inland seas of the prairie. The oats had finished in August and the silos and sacks were safely filled and stored with that grain. The big barns held the bales of hay and straw that would go to feeding their stock over the winter months. Wheat hadn't been an option this year, but they would plant winter wheat and rye after the harvest for next season. Today and for the next few days it would be corn, then barley.

Jackson looked suspiciously at the bright sky, faded blue eyes narrowed in the early morning light. The run of good weather had held for an unseasonably long time, and it raised the hairs on the back of his neck to trust that it would continue. Farming wasn't ever easy, but it was the unpredictability of the weather that really broke the spirit. When Mother Nature decided to be capricious, an entire year's work could be ruined with too little rain at the right time, or too much.

The dew would have dried off the corn in another hour, he thought, feeling the heat in the sunshine even this early. He had twenty five combines, and drivers for all of them; sixty grain trucks and a dozen tractors pulling chaser bins, enough to let the combines run without stopping, and all of them waiting patiently along the edges of the first fields. And empty silos and barns, waiting to be filled.

A burst of laughter, from the shade of the young oaks that had regrown between the fields and the farmyard, drew his attention. Trestle tables had been set up since before first light, lines of them beneath the still-full, spreading canopies, and food was set out, loaves of bread and baskets of rolls, cakes and pies, casseroles and roasted meat as cold cuts, salads and bowls of sliced, fresh vegetables from the truck gardens, condiments and pickles and conserves from the early and mid-season fruit and vegetables. Everyone who wasn't old enough or strong enough or skilled enough to help in harvesting was working the tables and the trestles were groaning under the weight of dishes pre-cooked the previous evening and brought along to feed the men and women working the fields. The sight constricted his chest, just a little. It'd been a long time since he'd seen this kind of community activity on a farm. A long, long time. It'd been common enough when he'd been a small boy, but not in the years since.

He glanced around as Dean walked across the farmyard, followed by his tall, younger brother and Rufus.

"'Bout an hour," Jackson said, forestalling the question he knew was coming. "Gotta wait for the sun to dry off the dew, then we can go. Got time to grab some breakfast 'fore you get started."

Dean nodded. The drivers were almost all hunters, along with the few experienced farmers and contractors that had come out here from Michigan, most hunters having had experience driving just about anything. He'd spent a couple of hours the previous day running the combine, with Riley sitting in the narrow cab next to him. The innards of the complicated machines were fortunately being left to the farmers to handle.

"This going to be enough? For everyone here?"

Jackson gave him a dry grin. "We got a little under six thousand acres planted this year," he told Dean. "Oats, corn, barley. We'll see about twenty-five hundred tons per day, give or take breakdowns and the trucks running up fast enough to keep us on the go. Oats are in. Barley after the corn, and then planting again for the wheat and rye. Gives us variety, seed and stock feed." He cast a jaundiced eye at the sky again, careful not to mention the weather. "We'll do okay."

The glare of the bright sunshine from the fields, worse when they turned where they'd been and the short stubble caught the light. The roar of the engines. The thick dust and chaff that flew everywhere, infiltrating clothing and the tractor cabins and truck cabs whose rubber seals had been devoured and not replaced, sticking to the skin and hair as the day got hotter and everyone working in the fields sweated and burned and coughed. The dry smell of the grain and the thick fumes of the diesel motors. Keeping in straight lines and making wide turns, the truck drivers watching the mirrors and harvesters constantly as the grain was pulled by the augers and flowed down into the hoppers behind them. Not a cloud in sight and the wide, wide sky bleaching slowly out to white as the day progressed. The blessed cool of the shade under the trees and the bubbles of chilled beer washing out lips and tongues and mouths and throats and the thick sandwiches that were handed out to everyone as they came in and rested and got up and went back out.

Alex passed Dean a damp towel, smiling as he wiped the fine dust from his eyes and looked blearily around, his vision slow to adjust to the dimness under the trees after the painful glare of the stripped fields. His habitual plaid shirt had been abandoned in the cab of the harvester and the t-shirt he was wearing, that had started out a pale grey when he'd put it on in the morning, had darkened to charcoal, wet with sweat and dust and oil.

"How do you like farming?" she asked, taking the towel as she handed him a bottle of beer, condensation running down the cold glass when he tipped it up and swallowed half in a couple of gulps.

"I have a new respect for the man on the land," he told her sourly, finishing the beer and taking the roll she passed him. "S'alright for you wimmenfolk, sittin' around in the shade –"

"Alex, time's up, truck twelve," Terry called out from across the yard. "Riley's your loader."

"I'll take that apology when I get back," she said to Dean, smiling as she pulled the bandana around her neck back up over her nose and walked away toward the line of waiting trucks and hoppers.

"I'll make it a slow one," he yelled after her, seeing her hand rise briefly in acknowledgement. Taking a bite of the sandwich, he watched her climb into the truck cab and start the engine, the vehicle moving out of line and following the dusty track to the fields to the south.

"Where's the beer?" Sam said behind him, and he turned, gesturing to the barrel beside the table.

"Drink fast," Ellen told them, bringing another tray of thick sandwiches and packed rolls and setting it down in front of them. "You've got fifteen minutes off and then you're back into it."

"Slave labour," Dean remarked around his mouthful, reaching out to take another roll from the platter.

"All feeding you through the winter," she retorted, passing two more beers from the barrel and loading a tray with more for the rest of the table. "Haven't seen Bobby have this much fun since that turkey shoot in '08," she added, jerking her head toward the fields.

"I remember that," Sam said, swallowing quickly. "Wasn't that the time that you and Jo nearly set the roadhouse kitchen on fi–"

"No time for reminiscing, boys, got work to do," Ellen cut him off smoothly and headed down the table.

Sam exchanged a glance with his brother, one brow lifted. Looking at him, Dean was happy to see his brother's despair washed away, even if temporarily. He looked younger, he thought. Younger and lighter in spirit than he'd seen him for a long time.

Sam was thinking the same thing, glad to see laughter in his older brother's eyes instead of worry. For all that happened, for all that they'd fought for and won and lost, this life wasn't so bad, he thought, taking another bite of the doorstop sandwich in his hands and washing it down with a long pull of beer.

They finished the day's run a little after sunset, checking over the machines in the floodlit yard, looking for worn belts, leaking oil, dry bearings and replacing everything that looked even remotely suspect as the trucks lined up beside the silos and unloaded the grain.

Dean put down the grease gun, and twisted the nipple over the bearings, straightening up with a long exhale.

"Hot bath," Riley suggested as he stopped beside him, his gaze going over the combine carefully.

"Not sure I have the energy," Dean retorted, feeling his body creaking as he stretched.

The farmer turned to him. "Jackson said you boys'll be heading out, looking for other people?"

Dean nodded. "Sometime, after we're finished here."

"You stick around a few more days, help with the planting?" Riley's gaze cut to one side. "Not many keep a nice, straight line."

Dean considered it. "If nothing else comes up, yeah. Sure."

"Thanks." The older man turned away, lanky frame throwing an elongated shadow over the dirt yard as he passed under the floodlights. Dean watched him go, a faint smile lifting one side of his mouth. Those few words were, for the taciturn farmer, the highest of praise, and an offer of friendship, and he recognised it as such.

He walked out of the yard, heading for the lane, pulling the long-sleeved flannelette shirt back on as the evening began to cool. They'd be back here tomorrow, first thing, to finish the last thousand acres. And at least a couple of days next week to bring in the barley, he thought, only a little wearily. As jobs went, it was satisfying, at least. He could see the results straight away, the trucks filled with their loads of gold and the fields bare where they'd been. He liked the simplicity of it, liked the easy camaraderie of everyone working together with one goal.

"Alex," he called out, seeing her by the house talking to Jackson, loaded down with the now-empty baskets and dishes she'd brought in the morning. She turned and saw him, lengthening her stride across the lane to meet him.

"How're you feeling?"

He shook his head, opening the passenger door for her. "Don't ask."

"Hot bath," she told him as he got into the driver's seat. He smiled a little.

"Yeah, that's what Riley told me," he said. "You gonna help?"

"Ask me nicely, and I'll consider it."

Father Emilio walked up to the table under the shade of the trees, the brown robe over one arm, a once-white t-shirt and faded drill trousers coated in dust and darkened with sweat, showing a tall, lean frame, muscles clearly delineated under the clinging fabric. He dropped the robe over the back of a chair and accepted the glass of water Alex held out gratefully.

Behind him, Sam and Adam, along with a few of the hunter trainees and a dozen equally dusty and sweat-soaked civilians staggered into the cool darkness under the canopy and dropped into the simple wooden chairs, taking the big glasses of cool water as they were poured out, drinking them down fast.

The priest looked at Alex, sitting on the opposite side of the table, the ledgers for each hold and the order spread out around her.

"An' how did you get this job, Alex, cool and relaxed under the trees?" he asked her, sitting down as he set the empty glass down and leaning across the table.

"Wanna trade?" she asked him, pushing the books toward him. "I'll take the fields any day of the week."

He laughed. "No, no, I have nothing left for the calculations of bushels and tons per acre per day!"

"Have Jackson or Riley asked you to help with the planting yet, Father?" She reached for the jug of water and refilled his glass.

"Thank you. Yes, both of them," he said dryly, picking it up.

"You drive a mean straight line," Sam said, holding out his glass for Alex as he took the chair next to the priest. She filled it and watched him thoughtfully. Under the fine white dust and chaff, his skin was red and peeling, the flash of his smile bright against it. He looked better, she thought, a lot better. More relaxed, more … himself, maybe, although she didn't really know what he'd been like before Atlanta. Dean had commented on the change last night, his relief palpable as he'd relaxed in the hot bath she'd run for him. She watched Father Emilio grin at him, the uncomplicated and mutual liking between the two men obvious.

"Ah … so if I add a few wobbles," he said, waggling his hand from side to side in demonstration. "I'll be – what is the phrase? Off the hook?"

"Too late," Sam said, shaking his head in mock sympathy. "They've already seen your quality."

"Story of my life," Father Emilio said sadly. He looked at Alex, brow lifted curiously. "And Dean, he is planting as well?"

"So long as Rufus and Maurice don't find anything in the couple of weeks," she said, looking up as Billy brought her another dozen slips of paper from the silos. Taking them from him, she pulled the ledgers close to her again and started writing.

"If we get all the barley in by the end of the week, you'll be starting next week," she added, her gaze going to the horizon. The last two days there'd been a thin line of grey along the south-western line of low hills. Jackson had been muttering about it non-stop.

"You think the weather will break before tomorrow?" The priest turned around to follow her gaze.

"Riley does," Sam said, finishing his water and setting the glass down. "Thinks we'll get a storm tonight, maybe. Or tomorrow at the latest."

The humidity had been building slowly since the lunch break, the ground crumbling and dry.

"What does that mean, in terms of the food we're storing?" Father Emilio looked from Sam to Alex quizzically.

Alex tapped the open ledger with the end of her pen. "More stock feed, that's all. We've got enough to feed our population, and enough for seed for next year's planting now. If it rains tonight, the rest can be baled for hay, once it's dry again, or packed as silage."

"And the planting?"

"You'll be ploughing in the remains of the crops and ready to seed on time," Alex told him with a faint smile as she finished the entries. She tucked the slips into the back of each hold's ledger and closed them.

Litteris Hominae, Lebanon

Bobby groaned as Ellen's hands worked firmly over his back. "What happened to TLC?"

"You want pampering or you want to be able to get up in the morning?" she asked tartly, taking another handful of the paste Oliver had made up for her and rubbing it firmly into the muscles.

"You talk to Dean today?" he asked, changing the subject since he didn't want yet another conversation to end with the woman being right.

"Didn't even see him today," she said. "Why?"

"Rufus didn't check in on sked tonight."

"That's not too unusual, is it?"

"Sometimes not, sometimes it is," Bobby hedged, uncertain of how worried he wanted her to be – or how much he wanted her to see of his worry. "The check in, while they're hunting, was something we'd agreed on."

"Might be in a black spot?" she suggested, working back up his spine and over his shoulders.

"Yeah, might be," Bobby sighed. He wasn't sure if he should be raising an alarm about it or not. Anson was on a twelve-hour shift tonight, he could check with him to see if the hunter had tried a bit later.

The uncharacteristic behaviour of the skinwalkers in Kansas City and the ghouls in Omaha was worrying him more than he was ready to admit to, just yet. Dean had voiced the obvious question already – they were predators, why were they increasing their numbers when their prey had been drastically reduced? None of it made for good bed-time thoughts.

"Nightcap?" Ellen poured two glasses of whiskey and handed him one as he sat up. "Where was Rufus yesterday?"

"Amarillo."

She looked at him, brows shooting up. "Texas?"

"Know of any others?" he asked dryly, giving her a one-sided smile. "He wanted to check out the possibilities between here and Austin."

"But he hadn't found anything?"

Bobby shook his head. "No, Austin was empty, stripped clean of everything, he said. And Amarillo looked to be the same, at least it did yesterday."

"And everyone was okay then?" she pressed him, brow creased as she tried to imagine what could have happened between then and now. Amarillo wasn't a black spot. Far from it.

"Yeah, he said they'd do a sweep, and then head north." He shrugged, tossing the contents of his glass back.

"You want to see Dean now?"

"No, I'll see him tomorrow," Bobby said, putting his glass down and looking at her. "Nothin' we can do tonight."

"I'll argue that," she said, slipping her arm around him.

"Nothin' about Rufus," he corrected himself, shunting the worries and concerns he had aside. The hunter was more than capable and he had Mel with him, wasn't like he was out there on his ownsome with just the trainees.

Ghost Valley Farm, Lebanon

The cloud came racing north as the combines rumbled onto the last field, black and grey and white, covering the sky and forcing the drivers to turn on the headlights, the light vanished so quickly. Dean peered out through the first spatters of drops against the flat windshield, seeing the grain field lashing as the wind grew stronger, blinking as a bolt of lightning struck a few miles off, lighting the fields in front of him to a stark chiaroscuro. Glancing to his right, he saw Bobby roll down the window of the truck, leaning out, his words lost in the cacophony of the rising howl of the wind and the enormous hiss of the undulating crop, the basso profundo of the thunder's voice and the sizzling, deafening cracks of lightning bolts that were striking all around them.

The old man drew his hand across his throat as he pointed back toward the house, and Dean nodded, understanding that charade anyway. Slowing the harvester down to idle, he disengaged the thresher and waved Bobby away, unlocking the auger and climbing out to push it back into position.

In the time it took for him to push it back, lock it down and turn around, the heavens opened and rain bucketed down, the force bouncing the drops back up from the field where the grain had been cut and sweeping them off the long grasses where it hadn't, spuming out ahead of the wind like the spindrift of a storm at sea. Dean ducked his head and felt his way back to the cab, yanking on the door and diving in and dragging the door shut behind him. He had zero visibility to the front, the combine's wipers whipping back and forth across the glass, having no impact whatsoever on the water that sheeted down, turning everything in his headlights to a smeary and distorted mix of colours without definition.

He flicked on the overhead lights, the four powerful spot lamps that shone for thirty yards to the front and sides of the harvester, and pushed the machine into forward, trundling over the field at idling speed, uncertain of his direction. He couldn't see any other lights, not from the other machines, not from the house, and he twisted around in the cab, looking behind him as he tried to remember which way he'd been going when the storm had hit. South, he thought, away from the buildings. Turning the combine slowly, he was rewarded a minute later by a very dim glow in the right hand corner of the windshield and he let out his breath as he headed for it.

The yard was a quagmire by the time he reached it, and he could just see the figure in the yellow slicker ahead, tall but completely hidden by the rain gear, waving its arms to direct him along the grassed verge rather than risk the machine in the thick mud. He made the turn, just, and felt the huge tyres grip and lurch forward, seeing the big three-sided shed ahead of him, with the rest of the harvesters already parked inside.

There was a moment he thought he wasn't going to make it across the slippery morass of churned up dirt and gravel that divided the yard from the shed, but in first, the weight and torque managed to give the tyres just enough help to slide and stagger across, and he felt the change when the fronts rose up on the concrete floor of the shed, running a hand over his face as he nosed it up to the back wall and shut it all down.

Still have to figure out how to get back to the car, he thought, climbing down from the cab and walking to the edge of the concrete floor. The rain was showing no signs of letting up at all, not even easing, and the huge bolts of lightning were still striking to every quarter, filling the air with the burned-battery stench of ozone and crackling energy.

He swung around as he caught the movement in the corner of his eye, relaxing his grip on the Colt tucked into his belt behind his hip as he recognised Jackson, flapping in head-to-foot oilskins and carrying more bundled up in his arms.

The older man leaned close, half-shouting to be heard over the din of the rain on the metal roof above them.

"Get these on, they won't help much but you can pretend they do!"

Grinning, he pulled a long coat free of the bundle and dragged it on. He was already saturated to the skin, and a bit more water wasn't going to hurt him, but the slickers were an eye-searing safety yellow and he wouldn't get run over by a vehicle unable to see anything in front of it in the pouring rain while he was wearing it. Might blind the driver, he considered, shaking his head at the long pants Jackson held out.

They crossed the mud pond together, hunched over with the fierce drops drumming on the water-proof material almost as loudly as it had on the shed's tin roof and reaching the broad, stone-flagged porch of the house with forty or fifty pounds of the yard adhering to their boots.

"You seen Alex?" he asked the farmer, scraping off the thick, viscous mud on the boot scraper by the door.

"She left an hour ago, took the ledgers back," Jackson said, nodding.

"Who'd she go with?"

"Bobby and Ellen, I think."

Dean shrugged inwardly. If she was back in the fortress, he didn't need to worry about finding her and getting them both home through the storm. He dragged his soaked boots off and looked sourly down at his equally soaked and muddy socks. Wasn't much point to keeping them on, he thought. Peeling them off, he left them with the boots on the porch, turning to follow Jackson inside.

The farmhouses on the big farms had been protected by the order with Gabriel's sigil, Jerome sending out Aaron and Frances and Oliver to paint the symbols over them. At the time the legacy'd been thinking of requesting more people from Michigan purely to feed themselves, he'd told Dean later. Now, it was a godsend to have the farm buildings and houses, the barns and silos all intact and able to do their jobs. Jackson and Riley lived in Crows Nest, a keep and village within a high double wall built of stone and brick and filled with salt and iron slag and rubble, a mile to the north-west of the town. It had been built on the peak of the highest hill in the area, the name a gentle mockery of its height. Around fifty metres taller than the town centre, the outlook didn't give much advantage. Jackson had been pushing at Liev to fortify the houses on the major farms, though. Both the farmers wanted to be a lot closer to the stock and fields than they currently were.

The house held the furniture that had been there when a family had been in residence, most of it covered with dust sheets, but the living room and dining room had been opened up, a fire going in the hearth of the generously proportioned room, and a dozen people in various states of undress were attempting to dry their clothes in front of it. He lifted a hand to his brother as he passed by, following the scent of hot food and the old farmer to the kitchen.

Standing in front of the stove, a young woman with long, dark hair loosely braided in a sheaf that hung down her back, looked vaguely familiar, he thought, though he couldn't remember where he'd seen her. When she turned around to look at him, he saw dark blue eyes in a pretty oval face.

"The teacher, right?" he hazarded a guess, one brow raised. She smiled and nodded as she ladled out a bowl of the thick stew from the pot on the stove and gestured to the basket of bread on the heavy pine table.

"Rebecca, that's right," she said, handing him the bowl. "And you are?"

"Dean Winchester," he said, lifting a piece of bread and smearing a knifeful of butter over it. He looked up, catching her expression of surprise. "What?"

A flush of red rose up her neck and into her cheeks as she turned away. "Sorry, I didn't realise … I, uh, thought you'd be … um … older."

Dean paused in mid-chew, frowning slightly at her. "Older than what?"

From the mud-room door that led into the kitchen, he heard Jackson's snort. "Older than you are to be running this outfit," the farmer said, smirking as he came back through the door minus his wet-weather clothing.

"Don't you worry, Rebecca, what he lacks in age, he makes up for in recklessness," Jackson said, taking a bowl from her and sitting across the table from Dean.

"Hilarious," Dean muttered through a mouthful of bread. He glanced back at the young woman standing by the stove. Was that the uninformed view of him, some … wise and seasoned soldier, or statesman or leader? He wasn't sure if the idea was terrifying or ludicrous. Or both.

"You staying put 'til this passes over?" Jackson asked, looking up and past him as Riley came in, walking past the table to the mud-room to dump his gear.

"Not much point in sliding off the road," Dean said with a shrug.

Riley glanced at Jackson as he took the bowl Rebecca offered him, sitting at the end of the table and taking a piece of bread. "Still cats and dogs out there. Barley'll take a month to dry out."

"We can make silage," Jackson suggested mildly.

"Not enough plastic."

The older farmer laughed sourly. "The old-fashioned way," he clarified. "Dig pits and fill 'em and cover 'em over."

"What's silage?" Dean asked, pushing his empty bowl aside.

"Grain hay, packed tight. It heats up, solidifies into a solid mass. Keeps the nutrients that way," Jackson said, running his bread around the bowl.

"Will the stock eat that?" Dean asked, looking from one to the other doubtfully.

"Cattle will," Riley said. "Never tried sheep on it, probably not."

"We'll have enough feed anyway, just don't need to waste it."

Patrice came into the kitchen and looked at the three men, dripping onto the floor. In her early fifties, she'd been headmistress of a private and exclusive girls' school before the virus. Two years in Austin as a slave hadn't dimmed her spirit or her will, just turned her hair from ash blonde to silver. She made a noise in the back of her throat and walked to Rebecca.

"Rebecca, grab the clothes from the folks in the parlour, there's a perfectly good industrial dryer sitting in the laundry that will dry their gear a lot faster than the fire will," she said briskly to the younger woman then turned to the men sitting at the table. "You want to get out of those wet clothes; we can run them through as well. There're blankets in the upstairs linen closet that'll keep you modest until they're done."

Turning back for the door, she swept out and they heard the thumps of her feet going up the stairs.

"Heard she was sweet on you, Jackson," Riley said with a slight grin.

"Don't need a mother," Jackson said, giving him a sour look as he pushed his chair back and got to his feet. "Don't need a wife either."

He paused at the end of the table, looking speculatively at Dean. "Got a deck of cards," he said casually. "If you're staying might as well play some poker."

Dean caught Riley's expression as he considered it.

"He cheats," Riley confided, sliding a look at the older man. Jackson turned at the doorway, his mouth dropping open in outrage.

"This from the man who managed to get five queens last game!"

Watching them, Dean decided against it. Not the stakes were likely to be high, but he had the feeling the two of them were far too well-versed in working together to flatten an opponent.

"I'll pass," he said, getting up as Rebecca came back into the kitchen with an armload of wet clothes, heading for the laundry. "Coupla sharps like you two, be out of my league."

"Some leader," Jackson muttered derisively at him as he walked to the door.

Dean laughed. "Reckless was your description, not mine."

The bed was comfortable, he was tired, the sound of the rain on the roof was steady and soothing, awakening very old memories of lying snug and warm in a bed with that noise on the roof. But he couldn't sleep.

It took Dean almost an hour and a half of restless turning to realise why. He'd been listening. Listening for the soft whisper of breath that some part of him thought should've been there. He rolled onto his back, scowling at the ceiling.

It'd taken him about three months to get used to the fact that Sam's snoring was no longer a part of the regular night noises he could dismiss. It'd taken longer to get used to the sounds Lisa had made, the shift of her weight in the bed they'd shared and the occasional brush of her skin against his in the darkness. He hadn't realised that in a few weeks, when he was sleeping in a bed, he expected Alex to be there, expected to hear that soft whisper of breath in the silent dark, expected to be able to roll over and slide up against her. It hadn't affected him in Kansas City. On a hunt – even a hunt for supplies – it was an automatic difference, an automatic mental adjustment, but here … the mattress and soft sheets and light down quilt had fooled him.

Apparently, he thought, leaning on one elbow to thump his pillow into puffiness, there was no end to the ways he could be fucked over by the want he didn't even allow himself to acknowledge.

Litteris Hominae, Lebanon

Ellen slid the pan of eggs into a dish and pulled the biscuits from the oven, filling another plate with them as Aaron came to take the food into the dining room. Oliver lifted the strips of bacon from the broiler, nostrils flaring as he savoured the scent. Bacon, and ham for that matter, tended to be a delicacy, available at some times and not others. The small herd of free-range swine in Michigan had multiplied enough for a couple of boar and several sows to be relocated to Kansas, but it would be a couple of years before the meat was commonplace again. He loaded a platter with the strips and followed Aaron and Ellen into the dining room.

At the long polished table, the residents of the order sat in their usual chairs, loading their plates or sipping coffee. Looking around at them, Ellen thought she'd have to get Bobby out of here. The library was a marvellous resource, and she liked Jerome and Felix, Aaron, Oliver and Marla well enough, but the newest residents were not her kind of folk.

She looked up as Marla stopped at the doorway to the room, her eyes huge. "Bobby? I think I've got a transmission from Rufus."

Bobby, Jerome and Ellen got up immediately and followed her down to the situation room, the hiss and crackle of the radio audible from the library.

"Rufus?" Bobby picked up the mike, sliding into the chair at the same time. "You there, man?"

"Bob, got … here," Rufus' voice came across the airwaves through clouds of static, dropping out in chunks. " –rillo … nest …"

"Rufus, say again, all after 'here'," Bobby said, face screwing up as he fiddled with the tuner, trying to find a clearer signal.

"In Amarillo," Rufus' voice blasted out in a clear patch. "Vampire nest … down … west … Route Forty … can't … Mel … tra–"

"Amarillo, vampire nest," Bobby repeated. "You trapped there?"

"Yeah, need … now, goddammit!"

"We're on our way, Rufus," Bobby said quickly. "Stay put, we're comin'."

He put the mike back on the radio and swivelled around to look at Ellen. She nodded sharply and turned, half-running for their room and gear. He looked at Aaron.

"Get down to town and find Dean, we'll meet him at the gates as soon as he can get there."

Aaron nodded and raced up the stairs.

Jerome looked at Bobby, brows lifted in astonishment. "You're going along?"

Bobby gave him a sour grin. "Walking again, might as well see if I can run and fight as well."

Ghost Valley Farm, Lebanon

The big kitchen was bright with sunshine, the storm passed on in the night and the sky washed to a clean, bright blue again. Dean sat at the scrubbed pine table, fingers curled around the mug of coffee and his head resting on one hand.

"You have a big night?" Sam asked as he took in the shadows under his brother's eyes and their slightly unfocussed, baleful expression.

Dean ignored the comment. Sam smiled to himself and pulled down a cup from the shelf, pouring himself a coffee.

"Riley said we're off duty until everything dries off," he said, sitting down at the end of the table.

"I'm heading back to town, you want a ride?" Dean looked at him.

"Sure," Sam said. "So what happened to you last night?"

"Nothing."

"Uh-huh."

Dean tilted his head slightly, looking at Sam from under his brow. "Finish your coffee, we're going."

He drained the remains of his mug and got up, taking it to the sink and heading for the door, ignoring his brother's grin as Sam finished his and followed him.

The yard was still a mess but he'd left the 'pala down the lane a little, and after slopping through the mud, he and Sam got in, the double clunk of the doors and the sight of his brother stretching out his long legs in the well beneath the glove box tugging at him with familiarity.

"How's the research going?" he asked, turning the key and half-closing his eyes in gratitude at the deeply satisfying rumble of the engine.

"Slow," Sam said, leaning against the passenger door. "There's a ton of lore on the Watchers, but no facts. There's a lot of stuff that the Church might've buried, but we'll never see that now."

"Why?"

"Father Emilio says it's probably in the vaults under Vatican City," Sam explained. "Jerome thinks he can get Michel to contact the French hunters to go and look, but it'll take months."

"What about the other order chapters?" Dean frowned as he remembered the conversation about the tablets. "Uh … in Tibet?"

Sam sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Jerome lost contact with the Tibet chapter two days ago," he said. "The others said that they don't have anything like the tablets in their holds."

"Lost contact?"

"Well, it's Tibet, and apparently the place is in the middle of the mountains so it might just be a glitch but …" he trailed off.

"But maybe something else happened," Dean finished unwillingly. "Can they send someone to go look?"

"They're talking about it," Sam told him. "The Australian chapter is the closest. And it's five thousand miles from them."

Dean rubbed a hand reflexively over the prickle on his jaw. "So, best case, months."

"Yeah, best case," Sam agreed. "About half that distance is through the seas between the top of Australia and the mainland Chinese coast. No one has any idea of what survived there but it was never a safe place to travel through, so worst case, it could be a really long time."

Dean glanced sideways at him. "What about flying?"

Sam's brow creased up. "Travis, Marsh and Ernie are still at Tawas," he said slowly. "They can fly anything we could find – but not a lot of planes could've survived Baal. I wouldn't even know where to start looking."

Most of the airports hadn't been concerned about their aircraft being eaten, Dean thought. Even the planes that had been under cover, in the hangers, wouldn't have been safe from the swarms that had devoured everything not metal or stone or plastic. He let out a deep breath.

"Got a plan C or D?"

"Not even close," Sam said, with a shrug. "The distances are just too huge, Dean. And not even Michel has been able to find a satellite to hack into that can give us long-distance views. At least, not yet."

"Chuck's tame programmer – Mitch – anyone asked him?"

Sam shook his head. "He's good, but not that good. And not his field, apparently."

Grey concrete walls rose up alongside the road and Dean followed the curve around to the gates, stopping as the guard came down and checked their tolerance to salt, iron and silver. Liev had cast a devil's trap, perfectly drawn from the Key of Solomon, into the road between the two walls and the weapons of the guards didn't lower until the black car had driven over it without any ill effects.

"Dean!"

Both Winchesters turned to see Aaron running down the road from the keep toward them. Dean pulled over and stopped the car.

"We got a message from Rufus," the slender dark-haired man said as he leaned against the driver's door. "He's trapped in Amarillo, a vampire's nest."

Dean nodded, glancing at Sam. "You want to get a ride back with Aaron?"

Sam's expression hardened. "Hell, no, I'm coming with."

For a moment, Dean thought about arguing and Aaron gestured to the gate behind them.

"Bobby said to meet him and Ellen at the gates."

Repressing a desire to roll his eyes, Dean confined himself to a terse nod and started the car, heading for the western keep.

"You don't have to come, you know," he said, knowing he was wasting his breath. The silence from the passenger seat confirmed it.

"How long are you gonna be?" Sam asked, as they pulled around in front of the towering concrete and stone wall.

"Five minutes," Dean said, getting out of the car. "Your gear's still in the trunk."

"I know," Sam said.

West Keep, Lebanon

Dean looked over the equipment that was spread over the table. The herbs had been in the apothecary stores, dried and packed into small paper sachets, each labelled with their weight and uses. He added a small pot of creamy paste to the table, to mix with the ashes so that the scents would adhere to them. The thick, short blades gleamed menacingly against the wood. There was no mistaking their purpose, the hilts of sharkskin or cross-hatched wood, to prevent a damp palm from slipping at a critical moment. He checked everything as he loaded the gear into two heavy black canvas bags.

Slinging them over his shoulder, he walked out of the small apartment and closed the door behind him, heading for the stairs.

When he reached the main hall, he stopped as he caught sight of the dark-haired girl who'd been helping Alex out with the organisation of the holds, heading for the offices.

"Maria, you seen Alex?"

"Not since this morning," she said, turning to look at him.

"Can you find her? I've got – I'll be out the front," he said, shifting the weight of the bags, the urgency of the situation pressing down on him as heavily as the load.

"I'll try." She nodded and turned down toward the offices.

Walking out through the massive doors, he went down the steps, unlocking the trunk of the car and throwing the bags in, thinking of the quickest route to Amarillo. Through Dodge, maybe. Most direct route anyway.

He turned as Maria hurried down the steps toward him, her expression apologetic. "Sorry, I couldn't find her."

Hesitating for a moment, he wondered what message he could leave that wouldn't sound ominous. He shook his head. "Okay, thanks. Can you, uh, let her know I'll be back in a few days?"

She nodded and he walked around to the driver's door, getting in and starting the engine again. A few days ought to cover it, he thought uneasily. It would take about six to seven hours to get down there, depending on how the roads had held up.

Bobby's newly acquired pickup was waiting just outside the gate when he crossed the devil's trap again, a big SUV behind him. He pulled up alongside him.

"Dodge?"

Dean nodded. "Who've you got back there?"

"Peter and his trainees," Bobby said. "Adam, Zoe, Joseph and Danielle. You lead."

Dean put the car into gear and pulled out, increasing speed as they got clear of the smaller roads around the fortress. He should've let Riley know, he thought distractedly, then pushed it aside. They'd be back before the ground and everything else dried enough to worry about it.

Amarillo, Texas

Rufus looked around the small air-exchange room with a dissatisfied expression. There was only one way in or out, for anything bigger than a cat, but it was tight quarters, most of them would be forced into squeezing out of the way if it came to swinging machetes. It was a mess, he thought aggrievedly.

The whole damned thing had been a mess from go to whoa. The town had looked empty, as empty as all the others, the streets littered and strewn with automobile wrecks and broken buildings, the power lines lying like fat snakes across the roads where they'd fallen. Half the buildings had been torched, long before Baal had made his pass across the country, the scorch marks were still visible on the concrete and brick even after three years.

There hadn't been a single intact store they'd been able to find holding anything of use to take home, and after four days of searching, he'd set them up on the western side of town in a small church, heavily warded against demons and ghosts, thinking they'd have a good solid eight and head out the next day. In the middle of the night, the vamps had come and they'd spent four hours hand-to-hand fighting through neighbourhoods they didn't know, in the dark, being driven north and finally into the mall. And of course, the mall was also the nest, although he hadn't figured that out until yesterday.

And now … now they were stuck in a six by eight ventilation junction in the centre of the biggest nest of vampires he'd seen – scratch that, ever even heard of – their vehicles out of reach, no food and no way out. A mess.

The recce that had nearly gotten him killed yesterday had at least let him get word out to Bobby and he was hoping like hell that the cavalry was on its way. Mel was clawed up and the trainees were living on their nerves, although all of them had been good, had kept themselves together in the fighting and were looking after each other. Christine sat with her back to the wall, Mel's head cushioned on her lap, talking softly to him. Lee and Jack were leaning against the other side, watching the opening steadily.

"Alright, watches," he said, looking at Lee and Jack. "You two take first. Christine and I'll take the next. You see anything, chop its fucking head off."

"Got it," Jack said, shifting to the side of the single access hatch. Lee nodded and moved to the other side.

"Get some sleep," Rufus said quietly to Christine. He looked at Mel's face, paper-white and beaded with sweat in the cool room and swore inwardly.

"Talk to me," he said to the other man, crouching down beside him.

"Might've nicked something inside, boss," Mel said hoarsely. "Not feelin' too good now."

Christine lifted her gaze to meet Rufus', her mouth thinning out. Rufus looked back at his partner, gently lifting his hand aside from the blood-soaked jacket and peeling the shredded cloth back. Even through the man's shirt he could see the streaks of red that were beginning to edge out from the wounds. Medic kits were in the cars. Naturally. He eased the jacket back and Mel pressed his hand over his chest again.

"Get some sleep, Mel. Rescue team's on its way."

"Hope they bring some damned good drugs," Mel whispered, his eyes closing as another tremor shook through him.

Rufus' smile didn't quite make his eyes as he settled himself back against the wall, his machete close by his hand. He was hoping Dean would bring everything.

TX 70, Texas

"What'd Rufus say, exactly?" Sam asked, the CB mike in his hand.

"Amarillo," Ellen replied. "Said Route 40 and west. He said something about a nest and being trapped. Mean anything to you?"

"There's a Westgate Mall on Route 40, where it goes out of town to Highway 66," Zoe's voice came through as Sam was thinking. He glanced at Dean, one eyebrow lifted.

"You from Amarillo, Zoe?" Sam clicked the button on the mike.

"Yeah, I was heading east when I got picked up and taken to Austin," she replied.

"A mall would be a good location to hunt people," Sam speculated.

"We'll start there," Dean agreed, his foot going down a little harder. They'd had to make a wide detour around Dodge, and pick their way through some of the roads around the borders of the states – two had been impassable, graveyards of bumper to bumper cars lined up along all four lanes – but he was still fairly confident they'd make Amarillo before nightfall.

"Think the nest is in the mall?" Sam asked.

"I think that's the only reason Rufus would've gotten pinned down," Dean said thoughtfully.

"Sam, you still on?" Ellen said, her voice crackling a little.

"Yeah, Ellen," Sam picked up the mike again.

"Rufus said something about Mel – we didn't catch it, but it didn't sound good," she said. "I saw Merrin, brought everything I could think of."

"Alright, we'll start with the mall," Sam said slowly. "We'll take point, Dean, me, Adam and Joseph. Bobby, Danielle and Zoe got the rear. Ellen, you and Peter'll have to get them out when we find them."

There was a silence for a few moments and Dean grimaced, imagining the conversation in the car behind them.

"Right, we'll go with that," Ellen came back, her voice tense. "See you in there. Out."

"Out."

Sam put the mike back and slid a glance at his brother. "Think that was Bobby?"

"Yeah, pretty sure," Dean said disparagingly. "First time out, can't wait to get himself killed."

"Sounds like Ellen won the round," Sam offered hopefully.

Dean snorted. "Bobby's driving," he said. "Wait til we get there."

"You want to take Adam or Joseph?"

Dean licked his lips then shrugged. "Doesn't matter. We're going in fast and hard. Ellen brought dead man's blood, she and Peter can carry that in the projectors. Hopefully, the bloodsuckers'll still be sleeping soundly."

"Hopefully," Sam echoed softly.

Amarillo, Texas

Dean pulled into the huge parking lot from the frontage road, driving around the side of the V-shaped building as he and Sam looked for the loading docks. They found them on the southern side of the building, Dean slowing as he looked along the featureless brick walls.

"That'll do us," he said, pulling into drive through running past the smaller docks further west and stopping in front of the big white roller doors.

Behind the black car, Bobby stopped his pickup and Joseph parked the SUV.

Gear bags were pulled from the vehicles and weapons checked. Sam mixed the ashes of skunk cabbage, trillium and saffron into a tub of lanolin and daubed the mixture over his skin, passing the scent disguise on to his brother as he buckled the sheath holding a twenty-two inch machete around his hips. The ash mixture was strong, strong enough to hide their scents from the creatures whose senses were several times more refined than their own. Zoe's nose wrinkled up as she smeared it over her skin, her eyes watering as the odours filled her nose.

"Alright," Dean looked up at the sky. "Got about two hours of real daylight left. Joseph, you're with Sam, you take right flank. Adam, you and me'll be left. Peter and Ellen, behind us. Bobby, Danielle and Zoe, you're rear but if Peter and Ellen need help that's you, Danielle, right?"

The tall girl nodded, fingers tightening around the hilt of her knife.

"Pretty sure this is a nest and we don't know how big it is, but if they got Mel and Rufus pinned down, we're going to assume it's a big one. That means we stay together. No matter what. You watch your back and your partner's and you concentrate every fucking second," he paused and looked around them. "Vampires are silent and they're fast. The older ones are so fast you won't see them straight on. You use all your senses and you stay on high alert the whole time. To kill them, you take the head. And it's better to do it with one swing."

He looked around them, seeing the tension in their faces. Even Ellen and Bobby looked unhappy, he thought. Unsurprising. Neither had been in action for awhile and this was a helluva reintroduction.

"We go in as quietly as we can," he continued. "They'll probably hear us, can't help that, but if they are still sleeping, we might be able to get by." He looked at Sam. "As soon as we've got them, you take them, Ellen and these kids and head home. Peter, Bobby and me'll burn the place down and pick off the rest as they come out."

Sam looked at him mulishly. It was the first he'd heard of that end of the plan, yet Dean must've been thinking about it on the drive. He knew better than to argue about it in front of the others and his face darkened as he realised how neatly his brother had trapped him.

"Where do we start?" Peter asked, looking at Dean.

"If they got surrounded in there, Rufus would've picked somewhere defensible to hole up. Somewhere small, maybe, with a just a single way in and out. I'm thinking the ventilation system, somewhere in the building. The rest of the place, the stores … they'll be too open."

Peter nodded. "Makes sense."

"We got no way of pulling the schematics on this place, but most of the Westgate malls followed the rough same layouts – bathrooms, offices, docks and store-rooms, usually in the same areas," Bobby added, gesturing vaguely at the building beside them. "The aircon towers and central ventilation system is over this roof."

"Start there," Dean said, turning for the postern door that was set into the wall beside the big rollers.

There was no power on in the town and the emergency generators for the mall had long since died. Light filtered in through the filthy skylights and atrium, murky and dim and filling the long, wide corridors and open areas with shadows. The store they moved through had once been Sears. Now it was empty, the metal and plastic shelving twisted and fallen, creating a hazard to move through, everything else either gone or smashed to pieces. Their boots crunched over the fine debris that littered the floor, no matter how carefully they placed their feet.

A fucking maze, Dean thought, looking around uneasily. Corridors and dead-ends and alcoves and display corners were everywhere and there was no clear line of sight at all. He gestured to Adam to close up a little with Sam and Joseph as the space narrowed toward yet another corridor, shifting his grip on the heavy thirty-inch blade in his hand.

A movement in the corner of his eye snapped his head around and he saw his brother, machete gesturing to the locked steel door in the corridor just ahead. Nodding, he moved forward, flicking a sideways glance to make sure Adam was following and pulling the set of picks from his jacket pocket. The lock was a simple Yale and gave in thirty seconds but he was acutely aware of the sound of the pins as he forced them, and the click as the tenon withdrew.

The doorway opened outwardly, the hall beyond was completely black. Dean shoved the picks back into his pocket, fingers feeling for the round barrel of his flashlight at the same time, dragging it out and flicking it on.

In the split second he registered the white faces in front of him, his mind threw an image at him, from a film seen a long time ago, white faces against the darkness and he staggered back, the overlapping images acting on his instincts.

"Back!"

The vampires seethed out of the blackness of the hall, and all thought disappeared in the automatic responses, trained into muscle and nerve, drop, swing, cut, back and swing again. The first three vamps lost their heads to the machetes of the Winchester brothers in the first few seconds, but the weight of numbers pushed them back into the wider hallway, where the targets spread out.

They made a hissing sound, Adam realised remotely, his blade lifting and slicing off the hand as it reached for him without any volition, twisting aside as the hiss became a shriek of outrage. Falling backward, he lifted his machete in front of him defensively when his vision was filled with dead white skin, vivid, burning eyes and a bristling mouthful of fangs. There was a metallic singing and the head disappeared, hitting the wall opposite with a deep thud. Adam caught a glimpse of Dean turning away as he rolled back onto his feet, no time for thanks or even acknowledgement as the next monster sprang toward him.

Bobby winced as his foot slid out on the blood-slicked floor, twisting his knee savagely. He could feel the weight of the blade as it whistled through the air, not remembering feeling that before, back when he'd been three years younger and twice as fit. The edge bit into the side of the neck and he yanked it free when he realised he didn't have enough of his weight behind the blow, shifting back and getting his balance again as the creature swung around and came for him out of the shadows.

"Come on," Peter said in a low voice to Ellen, gripping her shoulder and dragging her toward the open blackness of the door. She nodded, shifting the weight of the medical pack on her back and ducking as a vampire leapt over her, impaling itself on Peter's thick blade, flung off as he spun around and strode after it, taking the head with a single, powerful sweep.

The corridor was filled with muted noise, the sing and whistle of the metal through the air, the hissing and snarling of the vampires still on their feet, the rasp of breath drawn hard in and out and the oddly muffled thuds when the long knives met dead flesh and sliced through and the heads fell and bounced along the floor.

Danielle pivoted in place, the cut back-and-single-handed, jarring on the bones of the spine without her weight behind it. She fell to her knees as the vampire dropped onto her, pulling out a second, slimmer knife without hesitation and plunging it into the creature's eye, freeing her machete as it reared back screaming and cutting the scream off with a fluid sweep that was backed up by her hundred and ten pounds of muscle and bone.

She looked across at Zoe, seeing the slim olive-skinned girl decapitate the monster in front of her with a shrill shriek of rage, and turned away, following Peter and Ellen into the darkness.

"Rufus!" Ellen shouted, the sound echoing furiously in the narrow, metal-lined corridor and making both her and Peter flinch at the noise.

"Yeah!"

They both heard the shout, distant but clear and Peter flashed his light down the corridor, seeing the turning ahead.

In the ventilation room, Rufus crouched beside the access panel, the small, battery-operated screwdriver whining as he freed the screws holding it in place and pulled it free.

"Dammit, Ellen, that you?" he said, crawling out as the light flashed around the corner and he saw Peter's big frame shadowy behind the beam, and Ellen's smaller one behind him.

Turning back into the room, he gestured to the opening. "Jack, Lee, Christine, get out and tell Peter I'm bringing out Mel."

The three trainees nodded and eeled out of the small opening, Jack twisting to get his shoulders through. Rufus refused to look at Mel's face, slipping an arm under his shoulders and pulling him toward the opening, stopping by the edge and peering out.

"Peter, you ready? He's pretty much a dead weight," he warned the Roman hunter, easing Mel through. He felt the weight taken on the other side, and heard Ellen's sharp wordless exclamation, then Mel was out and he could follow.

The corridor was lit by flashlights. "Christine, Jack, Lee, take point." Rufus instructed them as Ellen felt for Mel's pulse, her face tense in the reflected light. "Danielle, you and Ellen behind us. Peter, he's a heavy sonofabitch, take both us to get him out of here without making those wounds worse."

Peter nodded, looking at Ellen.

"Give me a second, Rufus," she said tightly, pulling a hypodermic from the satchel at her side. "He's running a raging fever. The ampicillin'll take it down; give him a better shot if we're dragging him through a running fight."

"Make it fast," he said, looking back at Peter. "Dean and Bobby buying us time out there?"

"Yeah, how big is this nest?" Peter looked up at him as Ellen finished the injection and tucked the empty syringe back in the pack.

"More than sixty," Rufus said, crouching by Mel's legs.

"Sixty?" Ellen froze at the words. "But – we only saw a dozen, outside, at most –"

"You think I'd get stuck for a dozen?" Rufus said, shaking his head as Peter took Mel's shoulders and they both lifted.

"That means –"

"Yeah, come on," Peter cut her off, forcing her to move as he started walking.

Dean turned, a second before the corridor filled, an instinct honed so sharply that he wasn't aware of the intention until his machete was swinging. The ceiling panels dropped to either side of him and the fangs fell onto the hunters, not a few but dozens. He caught a glimpse of Rufus and Peter, staggering out of the black doorway with someone between them, the gleam and thud of the knives of the people surrounding them as they pressed along the wall of the corridor, and he turned away, hacking at the horde of the undead, a remote recognition at the back of his mind that he needed to buy more time, needed to give them more time to get out and away.

Sam pulled the second blade from its sheath at the back of his hip as the narrow space seemed to fill with vampires, no longer aiming but swinging in short, deadly arcs, feeling the bite of the edge and the spray of cold blood as he cut his way across to Ellen and Peter and Rufus, trying to make a hole big enough for them to get through. He was dimly aware of his brother, behind him, the characteristic silence with which Dean fought underlaid by the occasional grunt as he took a blow or aimed one. He caught a glimpse of Bobby, swinging wildly, the old man's face slick with sweat, scratches painted a vivid red across one cheek, his breathing thickening.

"Bobby, stay with Ellen and Peter," he shouted, dropping to the floor and swinging his leg out wide, bringing down three vampires and rolling to his knees to take the heads as they flickered up past him.

"Worry about yerself!" Bobby grunted before he was thrown across the width of the corridor into the wall, his breath disappearing as he slid down to the floor. Sam lurched to his feet, slowing as a flick of blonde hair darted in front of the old man and Christine sliced at the back of the knees of the vampire, taking off the head as it toppled to the floor.

"Get him out of here!" Sam yelled, and twisted aside as he sensed the weight behind him, feeling the talons rake across his neck, drawing blood but going no deeper. He turned back to Dean and Adam and his eyes widened in horror.

The corridor beyond his brother was nothing but white faces and the bloodied gleam of long fangs. Sam's foot slid out from under him as he tried to move forward, seeing the arms reaching out for Dean, two vampires pinning the machete against his side, another four leaping to bring him down.

"Adam! Move!" he heard his own voice booming out of his throat as he caught a glimpse of Dean's face. "Don't let them take him!"

"Adam!" Dean's voice was muffled by the pack surrounding him.

Adam stood frozen, the machete in his hand raised but unmoving, blood dripping from the edge and tip and crawling down his hand and wrist. Stumbling forward, Sam slammed into him, knocking him sideways into the wall as the vampires closed around Dean and vanished into the blackness of the ventilation doorway.

"No!" He hacked at the remaining fangs, clearing a path to the doorway and racing down the short hall. At the turning, he looked toward the small ventilation room, the panel tossed to one side. In the other direction a grate was slightly askew on the floor, and he realised that the vamp's weren't using the mall itself for the nest, but the network of tunnels and subterranean passages underneath it. He felt a hand close around his arm and swung abruptly toward it, machete raised.

"Take it easy, it's me," Peter said, looking past him to the grate. "They went down?"

Sam nodded frantically. "You should go, take the others to safety."

"Bobby and Ellen will get them back to Kansas," Peter said tersely. "Jack and Rufus elected to stay."

Sam looked past the tall Roman hunter to the two silent men behind him. "What about the rest?"

"The trainees will go with them, it's enough of a guard to keep them from getting into too much trouble," Rufus said. "We going or what?"

"How many, Rufus?" Sam ground out, looking at the older man.

"There were at least sixty, when they drove us from where we were camping to here," Rufus said steadily. "There might be more. There might not."

"Why would they take Dean?" Jack asked, looking from Sam to Peter.

"No idea," Sam said, the muscle jumping at the point of his jaw. "Come on."

Dean struggled against the hands holding him, knowing it was futile, knowing he was only wasting his energy. There were at least ten surrounding him, and they weren't newly made, they were strong and hard to see and he thought he was in very deep trouble this time.

It'd come as a surprise when they'd pitched him headfirst down through the grate in the floor, though maybe, he thought, it shouldn't have. The mall, even powerless and dim, wasn't dark enough for vampires to rest without fear. The newness of the building had made it easy to forget about the underground possibilities, that kind of foresight was more obvious when you were dealing with the older cities, New York or Boston, Chicago even, with their miles of tunnels and sewer lines and subways. The tunnel was pitch black. His eyes were open and he couldn't see the vamps carrying him, let alone any details of where they were or where they were going. Was going to make getting back out an interesting exercise.

He felt the air movement first, sending a miasma of thick vampire scent over him, rotten flowers and decomposing meat and the sweetish-sour coppery tang of blood. He opened his eyes wider, choosing not to recognise that the level of light hadn't improved, his other senses were taking up the slack, telling him he was a wide space, an open space, and there were a lot of vampires surrounding him, a helluva lot. He could hear them, the rustle of the fabric of their clothes, could feel the avarice of their eyes on him.

"One human?" the sepulchral whisper came from his right as he was dropped to the ground, steel-like hands holding him down. A woman's voice, maybe.

"Not to feed," another voice, thickly accented, was to his left. Older, he thought, or stronger.

"We are starving, Raoul!" the first voice shrilled, getting closer. "There have been no fresh feeds in weeks!"

"And you would drink this one dry and have nothing else forever?" Raoul replied coldly. Dean felt a shiver slip through him at the prosaic tone. "There are people out there, these, this one, proves it. He will lead us back to them and we will fill ourselves with them."

"Why would a human do that?" a third voice said threadily, much closer. He could hear panting and felt the touch of the harsh breath against his temple.

"Because he won't be human. He will be one of us," Raoul said, his voice warming and dropping. Dean twisted his head aside as he felt a hand slip down the side of his face, the fingers icy cold. "So warm, so full of life. But a short life, human, just a short, sweet life that is over too quickly. With us, you can live forever."

"Pass," Dean snapped, locking his teeth together as he heard the whine of metal drawn from leather.

"That is not an option," Raoul said with a throaty chuckle.

Something cold dripped onto his face and Dean shut his eyes tightly, closing his lips at the same time, backing his tongue into his throat. The dripping became faster, became a drizzle, then a trickle and steely fingers dug into the muscles of his jaw, the inexorable pressure forcing his mouth open. The liquid filled his mouth quickly, coating his tongue, lapping around his teeth, spilling out along the corner.

"Seal his nose," Raoul snapped and he felt fingers close the only other airway he had. His lungs ached … and then burned … and he felt his awareness dissolving, dissipating as the oxygen was used up and no more was available to replenish it. A fist hit him in the diaphragm and he gasped, the last of his air forced out and reflex, the automatic reflex of the body, betrayed him as he sucked fresh air in, and with it, the blood that flowed from the vampire beside him.

"Better."

Coughing and trying to spit out the liquid that was spilling over his lips and chin, Dean twisted against the hands that held him rigidly, feeling the blood trickling down his throat, into his stomach, into his blood, changing him.

The blackness began to lighten and his eyes rolled back as a murmuring, not heard but felt, in the spaces of his skull, in the blood that pumped slower and slower through his veins, resolving into a voice. Into words. Into a message.