Chapter 37 Ductos Exemplo
"This will remain the land of the free only so long as it is the home of the brave"
~ Elmer Davis
Conway Springs, Kansas. Next morning.
Sam walked down the stairs slowly, rubbing the back of his neck. He'd looked around the house the previous evening a little, seeing not much out of the ordinary. The basement was a training room and armoury, that wasn't strictly the Griswalds, but the yard, the rest of the house … it had all looked normal. Ordinary. Peaceful. Standing in the upstairs hall, he'd indulged for a moment in a vision of himself living here, someone he loved in the bedroom at the end of the hall, children sleeping safely behind the closed doors. Shaking himself free of it, he'd thought that the house needed more protection, nothing ostentatious. Just the usual devil's traps and so on under the rugs.
The bedroom he'd been given was in the attic. The bed was comfortable, the sheets smelling coincidentally of the same fabric softener they used in Lebanon. At home, he let himself think with a slight inward smile.
Stopping in the doorway to the big kitchen, he looked around at the bustling activity in surprise … then shock.
"Morning, Sam," Krissy said, picking up two plates and setting them at the long table on their placemats. Josephine was sitting at one end, cutting through her waffle absently as she reviewed her trig notes. At the other end, Aidan sat, cutting up the waffle of the young child seated next to him. Sam looked at the little girl on the other side of him and the slightly older child sitting next to Krissy.
"Who are they?" he asked Krissy in a low voice, taking a seat next to her.
"Sam, you haven't met our little ones," Victor said, walking to the table. "This is David."
The little boy looked at him and waved his fork with a smile, his cheeks bulging with food.
"And Alissa," Victor continued, standing behind the chair of the little girl who picked up her cut-up waffle pieces fastidiously and glanced at him from under straight-cut bangs. "And that's Zachary, next to Krissy."
The boy was older, perhaps nine or ten. "Hi."
"Hi, Zachary," Sam said, feeling his stomach drop at the thought of Dean's reaction to these three.
"They were already in bed last night," Victor said, smiling at him with the slightest hint of a challenge as he came around the table to sit opposite. "David's seven, Alissa's five, and Zach's ten, this October."
"And they didn't have any other family to go to?" Sam asked, looking down as Aidan put a plate with a couple of waffles down in front of him.
"No, they didn't," Victor said, cutting into his breakfast. "Social Services were quite thorough."
Sam watched the breakfast play out, wondering how much of this was a show for him, how much was genuine behaviour. It all looked genuine, he thought ten minutes later, as the children picked up their plates, taking them to the sink where Krissy rinsed them before loading the dishwasher. Aidan and Zach made the lunches, handing out the boxes, Victor checking that homework was packed, pencil cases were remembered, fruit had been included in the lunches and snacks and everyone had everything they needed.
"Drive carefully, Josie," he said and she nodded, turning to look at the row of kids lined up behind her. The front closed with a bang behind Krissy and Sam looked around the empty room, blinking.
"Wow," he said to Victor as the hunter walked back into the kitchen, picking up the bottles of condiments and replacing them on the bench, going to the coffee pot and pouring out two fresh cups.
"Whirlwind right?" he said, passing a cup to Sam.
"Yeah."
"It's always like that with kids," Victor smiled. "You got any?"
"Me? Uh … no," Sam said, sipping at the hot, very good coffee.
"You want any?"
"Uh … I don't know," Sam said noncommittally.
Victor looked at him thoughtfully. "I was the world's most reluctant father, when I started," he said, looking down at the top of the table. "I was terrified, felt like it made me too old, freaked out on the whole responsibility issue."
"That's kind of hard to believe," Sam said, lifting a brow.
"Yeah," Victor agreed. "I saw my son and it all changed." He shrugged, looking away. "I think it was the moment when I finally grew up. I know how that sounds, but for me, at least, it's true. And I loved them so much."
Sam looked out the window, remembering what had happened to him, to them. "That why you're doing this?"
He nodded. "You know, these kids? They don't have to do it like we did. Crappy motel rooms. Always moving. No family. No friends … no life. It's not the only way."
"It's the job, Victor," Sam argued gently. "You have to go where the monsters are."
"But not all the time," Victor said. "I've met a few hunters with families, over the years. They were the happiest ones. And their kids, they were completely okay with what they did."
"Until their parents were killed," Sam said, thinking of his brother's arguments.
"You know how many people die in road accidents, Sam? Every day? How many mothers and fathers are taken from their kids through the vagaries of chance? We're a small percentage of a large population and yes, there are risks in this life. But it doesn't change the fact that without hunters, without careful, competent hunters, a lot more children would lose their parents to what hunts them in the dark."
He set down his cup and looked at Sam. "When the gate in Wyoming opened, hundreds of people were affected. Good, normal, ordinary folks. When Lucifer rose, and brought forth the Horseman, thousands were affected. Normal people. In their normal lives. And then there were the leviathan."
Sam looked down at his coffee. "What's your point, Victor?"
"What if there'd been no hunters when those things happened, Sam?" He leaned forward across the table. "That's what your brother is advocating, isn't it? No new generation to take over from us? How does he think the world will be then, if there's no one to fight the evil that is growing, every day. You read the papers. You've seen the jumps in crime. Do you think that's over-population pressure? Or more demons coming out of Hell, tempting, possessing, destroying? The vampires have been on the increase for the last three years. What happens if they reach the numbers they were in the Dark Ages? Where people never went out at night?"
"Even if this is a better life than we had, Victor," Sam said slowly. "The little kids, they're too young to make that choice. You're forcing them into becoming something they might not want to be."
Victor leaned back. "By the time children become teens, they've lost a huge amount of their capacity to learn easily, to learn thoroughly and quickly."
"That doesn't change what you're doing to them," Sam insisted. "Krissy, and Aidan, they're sixteen, seventeen. They have an idea of the risk. A five-year old doesn't. Doesn't even know what risk is."
"I would never let them hunt until they're sixteen, Sam, you should know that."
"But they've already been shown what the life is," Sam said, shaking his head. "They know that monsters are real. They're being told that hunting them is a valuable way to spend your life."
Victor frowned. "And you think it isn't?"
Dean pulled into the slot outside of the room at the motel, picking up his key and the receipt from the seat beside him.
He wasn't kidding himself, he thought, as he pushed the key into the lock and turned it. What Victor was doing was wrong. Kids didn't belong anywhere near the hunting life. They were vulnerable. Sam had been vulnerable, protected half the time only by his older brother. The memory slid close … a room much like the one he was standing in, a sound from the other room, a nightmare bending over Sam. He pushed it away.
Dropping his bag on the floor, he walked to the narrow bathroom, turning on the cold tap over the sink and splashing the water over his face.
Protecting one another. Protecting themselves. It was too much responsibility for a child, he thought angrily. That's what parents were for. To protect their kids. To make sure they stayed safe.
He dropped into the chair at the small table, staring at the wall. No one could grow up straight and clear under that load of responsibility. He should know. His failures to do what had been expected of him had chewed away at him every day of his damned life.
He remembered … trying to learn to cook … burning everything because he couldn't keep an eye on the food when he had other chores to do. He remembered … having no friends, because he lied to everyone, second nature to tell people what they wanted to hear and what was the point of telling anyone the truth about himself when he'd be gone in a few days anyway? He remembered … hating school, knowing what they wanted of him, but never having the time to do it, being singled out until a taciturn silence had been all that the teachers had ever gotten out of him. He remembered … being bone-tired after keeping watch and holding the flashlight for his father on night hunts, then getting up in the mornings and getting Sam ready for school, dragging himself there and barely able to keep his eyes open. He remembered … lying awake on the nights his father was supposed to have returned, listening for the key in the lock until his head was throbbing, wondering when he should call Jim or Caleb, wondering what to tell them. He remembered … motels and schools, towns and jobs, being scared, being lonely, being sick with worry that he was doing the right thing, in the right place, at the right time.
It wasn't a life for a kid, he thought tiredly. He got up and walked to the bed, pulling off his boots and looking at the bedspread, unable to summon sufficient energy to take anything else off and lying down, pulling the other side of the covers over him.
The warm-toned living room, with its walls of books and photos, came back to him and he wondered what that might've been like. Growing up in one place, having a home. Would it have changed everything?
It didn't matter, he told himself sourly. He hadn't. And that life was a pipedream.
"Like I told the police already, I'm not sure why Jimmy Day would do something like this," Connie told him, walking to the main desk to hand in her file.
Dean looked at her. "Jimmy Day? What, so you knew the guy that grabbed you?"
Connie signed the form and handed it to the nurse behind the desk. "Everyone in town knows Jimmy. He's a hero." She turned to him. "We had a parade for him, downtown, when he came back from Afghanistan."
Dean frowned. A war vet. "Ah … sorry, when was this?"
"A few weeks ago," Connie said, walking to the doors.
"So this … Jimmy Day guy … he just grabbed you and took you to the hotel?"
"No," Connie said, shaking her head. "I came from work, I was in the parking lot when this blue van pulled up. This guy asked me directions." She looked out through the glass doors. "That's all I remember until I woke up tied to that bed."
"You get a look at the guy?"
She shook her head. "It was really dark and he stayed in the van."
"In the room, was the guy, was he there too?"
"Just Jimmy," she told him. "And he was crying. Sayin' he was sorry, an' all."
"That he was sorry?"
"At first, I thought he was going to kill me." She shrugged again. "And then, then he just seemed scared." She looked out through the door. "Is that all? I want to go home."
"Yeah, that's all," Dean said distractedly. In his experience, vampires rarely apologised. And he'd never seen one cry in the presence of a ready-trussed victim.
But Jimmy wasn't the guy in the blue van. And the guy in the blue van had done the trussing, he thought. Back to the hotel.
Sam spent the morning looking through the house. Everywhere, there were the milestones of what he thought of as normal childhood. Finger paintings and artwork pinned along the walls. Bikes lined up in the garage, along with a variety of sports gear. Toys and picture books, models and Alissa had an elaborate doll's house in her room. The house reminded him in a lot of ways of the family shows he'd watched as a child and he wondered if he was thinking of it as a set, or if the thought of six kids living in a house that was neat and tidy seemed unrealistic. They were disciplined, he thought, looking at the list of chores on the fridge, each child having a set of things to do each week, gold stars and silver stars next to those that had been completed. A lot of families might do that. Discipline wasn't an exclusive to a hunter's family.
No, he realised slowly, remembering the Marine-style grade he and his brother had grown up with, but in this life, discipline was an essential to survival. Did that make for a bad life? He'd used that discipline to study. In Dean, it was ingrained to the point that his brother would turn away from what he wanted, from his dreams, if the job called.
And here, these kids had each other. They had a parental figure they obviously cared for. They had normal school life and friends … another thought occurred to him … did they lie to their friends? As he'd done? As Dean'd done? He supposed that they would have to, to a certain degree. If not lie outright, then omit the details of the extracurricular training they did. Did that make for a bad life? It made for a certain division, he thought. An 'us and them' mentality.
A soldier's life was little different. He'd met the Army kids, in the towns that lay close to bases. They didn't necessarily lie about their lives, but there was definitely an 'us and them' mentality. Their life was of necessity more disciplined as well. The difference was in the anonymity. There were thousands of soldiers. Few hunters. Hunters were easier to target, at least by the creatures they hunted.
Was that why Dean felt that anything other than complete isolation was an invitation? Lisa and Ben had been targeted. First by the djinn. Then by Crowley. But they'd been civilians, he thought. Would there be a difference if they hadn't been? He turned and walked slowly down stairs. What about the Campbells? And Ellen and Jo? And even Krissy and her dad. Josephine and Aidan's parents had been normal. They'd been targeted without even being in the life. Was there any point to pretending that everyone wasn't at a certain amount of risk, every day, no matter what life they led?
He thought of Aaron, and Charlie. Of Kevin and his mother. Of the hundreds of people whose lives had been touched by the things that did lurk in the shadows and hunt people. The ghosts who couldn't move on. The spirits whose time had come and gone. The monsters that had been people once, and had run into something they couldn't deal with. All those people, they were alive, with their families, their friends, because of what he and his brother could do. Had done. Would do. The job was the job, he thought. It would always be there and it would always need doing. Was it to be left to the broken victims who sought revenge? Or to hunters like them, brought up in the life and still alive because they'd been taught what to do and how to do it.
He remembered his brother, in the years when they'd all been together, at least most of the time. Dean crowing over some skill he'd learned, basking in the approval of the adults in their life, Jim Murphy and Caleb, Bobby or their father. He remembered feeling envious a few times when John had taken Dean on a hunt for something more dangerous than a ghost, staying behind with Jim or Bobby. He'd gotten over it, he thought with an inward smile, had realised that he'd never get what he thought he'd wanted in the life they lived. But he couldn't pretend those times hadn't happened.
Dean had lost his belief in this life when he'd lost his friends and their father, Sam thought. He shook his head. He'd known that at the time, but he'd managed to forget it over the intervening years.
They had a home now, of sorts. He felt like he had a way forward, with the enormous possibilities of the order and the ability to take the fight to the enemy, instead of always being caught unprepared and half-aware as they'd been over the last few years. He knew his brother didn't see that, didn't feel that … at least, not to the point where he could admit to it. It was kind of ironic that Dean needed people more than he did. He liked people but he could live the life of a solitary scholar without a problem. His brother was an efficient hunter on his own, but he needed the connections with people, not many, just a select few in whom he could put his trust, put his back against.
Sam poured himself another cup of coffee, glancing at the clock. Past midday. There was nothing to suggest that Victor was doing anything other than he said he was. Providing a home for children who had the misfortune to have been orphaned by monsters, providing the means to help them find their own justice in a world that refused to acknowledge what had taken their families.
He turned, hearing the front door open and close. Victor came into the kitchen, a manila folder in his hand.
"Found her," the older man said without preamble.
"Found who?"
"The vampire that killed Krissy's father."
The hotel looked less inspiring in daylight, Dean thought, parking the car on the opposite corner. He pulled out his phone, dialling Sam.
"You there?"
"Yeah," Sam said, his voice low as he walked away from the kitchen. "How did you go with the girl?"
"Strange," Dean said. "Might be that vampire wasn't lying. He was fresh-made, within a month at most, but I don't think he'd ever even fed before. Josephine's family was killed six months ago."
"So who killed them then?"
"I don't know," Dean said, looking around, his gaze scanning the area automatically. "I'd like to talk to whoever's driving that blue van. Other than that … you?"
"A lot," Sam said. "Victor's got another three kids here, for starters."
"What? Why didn't we see them last night?"
"They were in bed," Sam said, biting his lip. "They're all under ten."
The silence at the other end of the phone was as eloquent as anything Dean could've said.
"Their families were also murdered by vamps, over the last three months. Two from Kansas towns. One from Nebraska." Sam pressed the phone against his ear, unable to even hear his brother breathing. "You there?"
"Yeah."
"I spent the whole morning looking through this place top to bottom. There's nothing to indicate that Victor is doing anything other than what he's said he's doing. And I saw the kids, Dean, they're happy. They love each other," Sam said carefully.
On the other end of the line there was a noncommittal snort.
"But … something's definitely up," Sam said softly. "Victor says he has surveillance photos of the vamp that killed Krissy's father. The thing is … I'm not so sure."
"Why is that?"
"There's no time-stamp on it," Sam said, running a hand through his hair. "I thought he was on the level but … I don't know … I can't figure a why here."
"Okay, so you think he's lying?"
"Well, that … or he's just wrong. It's hard to say," Sam said.
"Yeah, I never trust a guy who wears a sweater," Dean said, frowning as he tried to see the advantages to the hunter of lying over not. "You want me to head back there?"
"No," Sam said. "No, I'm good. Let me do some more digging."
"Alright, I'm gonna talk to the hotel clerk, see what he knows," he said, opening the car door as he hung up.
The pieces were there, he thought as he crossed the street. All of them, or most of them. How'd they fit together? Freshly made vampires, more than one. Ergo … another vampire on the scene. Older. Making fledglings. But why? Why put them in positions where kids could hunt them? Six kids. Their parents killed. Victor taking them in. How'd that fit into this picture?
The pieces shimmered together for a moment, and he stopped in the street, a car horn blaring at him and breaking the train of thought as he waved irritably at the driver and walked slowly to the other kerb.
He went into the lobby of the hotel, still trying to pull back that elusive, almost-there image.
"Oh … nice to see you again," the clerk came to the counter as he stopped.
"Yeah, I bet," Dean said, pulling out his wallet and counting out another five twenties. "Listen, I need to know who checked into room 215, yesterday."
The clerk looked down at the notes in his hand, counting through them. "Some guy wearing a hoodie, so it was hard to make out his face. Dark eyes, kind of sleepy-looking, you know?"
"He driving a blue van, by any chance?"
"Do I look like a valet?"
Dean looked at him and the clerk dropped his gaze, thinking of anything else. Two hundred in two days wasn't bad.
"He took one of those," he said, looking at the wall of pamphlets beside the desk.
Dean walked to it, looking at the variety. "Which one?"
"One that says "Lodge" on it," the clerk said. Dean stabbed a finger into a pamphlet at the top of the rack and the clerk nodded.
"Conway Springs Lodge," Dean read.
"Yep, big during the summer season, but this time of year it's closed."
"How far away is from here?"
"Oh, it's a couple of miles down the road," the clerk gestured in the vague direction of the lodge.
Closed. Remote from town. Sounded like a good place to stash or make more vampires. He loosened his tie as he walked out of the lobby and crossed back to the car.
So … vamp makes more vamps. Possibly organises kills for them. Which means that these new vamps might actually be able to be saved, if they didn't feed before he could find them. His brows drew together a little at the off-track thought.
Vamp makes new vamps and organises kills for them. Coincidentally, however, the junior Fearless Vampire Hunters club is on top of where the vics are located.
Now, how was that possible, he wondered? Victor's security vigilance? That chick, Connie, had been tied to the bed for only a few hours before Krissy and her team had gotten there. How'd ol' Vic found it so fast, when he couldn't teach them to do a recon before they staked out a monster?
He started the engine, realising that he should've asked Krissy a hell of a lot more about how they were tracking these vamps last night.
Sam watched the children come in through the door, saw the older ones see Victor's face and immediately know that something had happened.
"Early dinner tonight, and bathtime and homework to be finished beforehand," Victor said, as they filed past him. He looked at Krissy. "We've got a job to handle."
Everyone had their snacks and David, Alissa and Zach were settled in the dining room to work on their homework, Aidan left with them to help out. Krissy, Josephine and Sam followed Victor down to the basement.
"You found it?" Krissy asked as they stood around the table in the armoury.
Victor nodded. "Picked up the footage and saw this," he said, handing her the photograph.
She stared down at it, her eyes immediately going to the necklace that was clearly visible in the shot.
"My mother gave him this," she said softly, her finger touching the image lightly. "For their ninth anniversary. I was eight."
"No chance he could've lost it, somewhere else, before he was killed," Sam asked, watching her face.
Krissy looked up at him. "No, he never took it off."
She held out her hand for the file and Victor glanced at Sam as he passed it to her. Opening it, Krissy began to read, her head bowed over the table.
"I'll get the gear bags ready," Josephine said, turning away. "We'll need more dead man's blood soon, Victor. We've got enough for tonight, but then we'll be out."
Victor nodded. "I'll take care of it."
"Who's running point and who's backup on this?" Sam asked Victor.
"That's up to Krissy," Victor said. "This is her hunt, her kill. She'll make the decisions."
Sam winced inwardly. An emotional sixteen year old girl? Chasing her father's killer? He was seeing Dean's arguments.
"But you review what she has planned, right?" he said. "Make sure it'll fly and minimise the risks?"
Victor smiled at him. "She'll be fine, Sam. Stop worrying."
Sam walked outside, dragging in a deep breath. He still wasn't sure about the photographs or the information Victor had gotten on the vampire. Krissy's dad's necklace was the kicker. Where'd the vamp gotten it from if not from the body of Lee?
He turned his head to look up the street, freezing as he saw the blue van parked a block up. He pulled out his phone, dialling Dean's number, his face screwing up in frustration as the call went to voicemail.
Turning around, he went back inside. The basement was empty when he reached it, and he came back up the stairs, looking in the kitchen. Victor was by the bench, chopping vegetables.
"Hey, where is everyone?" Sam asked. Aidan was still there, with the children.
"Krissy and Josie have gone to track the vamp," Victor said, looking up at him. "What's up?"
"I think we have a problem closer to home."
He turned and heard Victor's footsteps behind him, stopping as he reached the front windows.
"See that blue van? Dean saw it at the hotel last night. We think whoever's driving it is working with the vampire we popped."
Victor looked out the window, his eyes narrowing. He turned back to Sam. "Looks like we're going hunting."
Dean pulled up in front of the cluster of buildings, glancing at the sign on his left that advised him he'd reached Conway Springs Lodge, closed until next season. He turned off the engine and got out, drawing the machete from the sheath at the back of his hip as he walked to the largest building.
No cars but there'd been fresh tyre tracks in the black mud at the turnoff. He reached for the door, surprised to find it open. Pulling out his flashlight, he looked inside, opening the door wider and slipping in, out of the light behind him, pulling the door shut.
The lodge's décor was pretty much the usual. Stuffed deer and bear heads hanging on the walls, chairs and tables covered in dust sheets, looming at him as the flashlight's beam caught them. He stopped for a moment, listening. Breathing. He identified the faint sound after a moment, pinpointing the direction and heading toward it, the soft soles of his boots soundless on the wooden floors.
The dormitory lay at the end of the hallway, bunk beds and metal footlockers at the end of each. The soft whistling breath that had attracted his attention came from the bed against the right wall and he turned the beam toward it, lighting up a lower bed, blankets in a heap at one end, a woman partly wrapped in one, her skin white in the flashlight's glow, long dark hair snarled and tangled over her shoulders and down her back. He could smell the faint scent of rotting flowers, clinging to the damp air.
"Who're you?" he asked. Her eyes were red, but not from blood-lust, he realised, taking in the swollen and purple flesh around the lids. From crying, he thought, seeing them screw shut tightly against the light.
"It's too bright," she said, lifting an arm and holding it over her face.
He lowered the beam until the direct light was off her face and she lowered her arm, her eyes opening, blue irises, bloodshot whites.
"Got a name?" he asked her again.
"Sarah …" she said. Her face twisted up in pain and she leaned over, arms wrapped around her abdomen, a moan escaping. "Help me, please."
"Tell me what happened." He moved closer. She had a bloody scrape on her forehead, over her right eye. Cuts and bruises. He looked at her wrists, her hands clutching the thin blanket around her. Rope burns. And the same raw-looking grazes on her ankles.
"I don't know what happened," Sarah said, her breathing ragged as another spasm hit her. "I was walking through the park, near my house –"
"When?"
She shook her head. "Yesterday … I think?"
"And?"
"I woke up here," she said, looking around her. "My head hurt. Everything is too bright, too loud." She looked up at him. "I can hear … I can hear your heart, beating. I can hear so many things. Things I shouldn't be able to hear."
He stared down at her, watching her tears trickling down her cheeks as her shoulders began to shake. Turned.
"Have you fed?"
"What?"
She looked at him and her face spasmed again, the moan much louder now, coming out through her clenched teeth as the pain ripped her apart inside. Dean looked down at her fists, balled tightly in the blanket, at the slim muscles that were rigid with the pain she was feeling. Probably hadn't fed yet, the hunger getting bad. He blinked back the memories of how that had felt, claws tearing inside of him, as if the hunger had been a wild animal, trapped inside his body. And the smell of decomposition only came once a vampire had turned completely, he thought.
He waited until she gasped, her body relaxing as she sucked in a deep breath and a fresh fall of tears cut through the grime and blood on her face.
"Sarah, I need you to try and remember, anything else you can, about how you might've gotten here –"
"Dean!"
He closed his eyes.
Krissy. And co.
Sam slowed his pace to accommodate Victor's limp, the two of them approaching the van obliquely, from either side. The cab was empty, the back, visible behind the seats at the front, empty as well.
Victor looked at him. "The park?"
Sam nodded, his fingers reaching under his jacket to touch the sharkskin hilt of the machete that was sheathed against his back. Victor had a dart gun, one in the chamber, three more of the small, narrow darts in his pocket. They walked along the sidewalk and turned into the park, the wan, fall sunshine casting pale shadows on the grass to either side of them.
Sam let his gaze move continuously across the landscape, not searching for anything in particular, looking for movement, for anomalies, for shapes that didn't fit. He was aware of Victor, to his left, moving further out across the grass, but he ignored him, letting his mind look for the clues without interference.
Human accomplice to the nest, or another vampire? Had to be a vamp, his mind supplied effortlessly. Only a vampire can make more vampires. For what possible purpose would a vampire make fledglings that were then killed off by the teenage hunters? How could the master not notice that his makings were being decimated?
How was the information flowing? Vamp to human … or human to vamp?
The movement caught his attention and his eyes snapped around to follow the shivering of the evergreen bushes on the left side of the path. He glanced at Victor and nodded, lifting a hand to show the direction. The snick of the press stud holding the machete in its sheath was quiet, but not quiet enough for a vamp not to hear, he thought. Why would it be out now? Here? In the daylight?
The blade slid out and his fingers curled around the hilt, the grip tight and sure against his palm. Well, he told himself, no time like the present to find out.
He was moving quietly, but not silently, he knew. And the vamp was behind the tree, the base of the trunk surrounded by leaf fall, mostly dried and crackling now. There was no way he was going to be able to sneak up on it. It would smell him in another stride or two anyway. It wasn't moving. Victor would be on the other side, the monster would have to run by one or the other of them.
At the edge of the trunk, he could see the curve of the shoulder, a brown jacket almost the same colour as the tree, but a little lighter. He stepped close to the trunk.
The blow came from behind, hitting him on the back of the skull. Sam felt himself falling, darkness rushing toward him. Victor. He hoped the sonofabitch had been accurate with the butt of the gun, it was too easy to crack the skull at the back. The thought blew away as he hit the ground, the machete embedding itself in the soft soil, springing free from his unresponsive fingers.
Dean turned, holding out an empty hand and walking a couple of steps toward Krissy, keeping himself between the three guns and the half-vampire behind him.
"Put those away, and we can talk," he said to the sixteen-year old in front of him.
"Why are you with the vampire that killed my dad?" Krissy asked him, her voice eerily quiet and calm.
"You gonna listen to me?" he asked her, as her gaze cut away to the woman behind him. "Or just shoot first and ask questions later?"
Krissy's gaze flicked back to him. "You should talk about that."
"Right," he said. "She didn't kill him, Krissy. She was made yesterday. He died four months ago."
"How do you know that?" Josephine asked, her hands tightening around the grip of the gun.
"Because I've hunted vampires for six years now and I know the difference between a newly-made vamp and an old vamp," he snapped at her. "Same deal on the vamp you killed last night."
He looked back at Krissy. "He was a soldier, in Afghanistan, when Josephine's family were killed, Krissy. He might not even have fed before last night. This is stinking like roadkill in summer. You need to lock down your emotions and think about it."
Aidan glanced sideways at Krissy. Dean looked at him.
"Look, last time I'm gonna ask nicely, take those fucking guns off me or somebody's gonna get hurt."
"Big talk," Aidan said, lifting his chin.
Dean smiled. "I know, it is, isn't it?" He stepped forward, twisting the gun out of the boy's hands and removing the firing pin, handing it back to him as Aidan stood open-mouthed.
"Let's say this isn't the vamp that killed my dad," Krissy said sharply, lowering her gun and looking at him. "She's still a vampire. Are we supposed to let her walk?"
"She hasn't fed yet, Krissy," Dean said, feeling the tension easing slightly along the line of his shoulders as he recognised that she wasn't going to fight him. "We can save her. Turn her back."
"What?" Aidan looked at him disbelievingly.
Dean ignored him. "We can reverse the vampirism if we can find her maker and get his blood."
"And why should we care about her?" Aidan said belligerently.
Dean turned to him slowly, his face stony. "Because if you don't care about her, you shouldn't be hunting. Hunting is about saving people," he said, biting out each word as he looked back at Krissy. "It's not about killing and revenge at any cost. We save people." He looked back at Aidan. "Innocent people."
"I want the bloodsucker who killed my father to pay," Krissy said to him.
"And we're gonna find out who that is," he said to her. "But let's not be so blood-thirsty that just anyone will do."
"But Victor said it's her," Josephine said uncertainly.
Dean looked at her. "And I'm telling you, it's not."
He looked back at Krissy. "We're gonna pack her to go, and we're gonna go ask Victor ourselves. Okay?"
Krissy looked at the woman behind him. "Why is she wearing his necklace?"
Dean turned to look at Sarah. She lifted a hand to the pendant hanging around her neck and shook her head.
"It's not mine. When I woke up, it was here," she said, her breathing getting faster again.
Dean looked back at Krissy. "You think maybe whoever's setting this up might've planted it on her?"
"In the security photo, she's walking … awake and walking … and wearing it," Josephine said vehemently.
Dean smiled a little. "And a little Photoshopping is out of the question, right? Come on, you should know how easy it is to doctor a photograph. You're all supposed to be A students."
"She comes with us," Krissy said, her eyes fixed on his. "You promise?"
"Yeah, I promise," he said, glancing back at Sarah. "Whoever killed your father, I'm pretty sure it's the same vamp who's been turning these people and dangling them out as bait for you – all of you. We need to find it, and get the blood for her. And for you, if that's what it's gonna take."
Krissy thumbed the safety on her gun, tucking it back into her jacket pocket. "Alright."
"You got any of those darts with dead man's blood?" Dean asked her.
"Yeah, why?"
"She'll travel easier if we can put her out for awhile."
Sam felt the insistent pounding at the back of his head and pulled in a slow, deep breath. Victor. His stomach turned over lazily, nausea rising up his throat and he swallowed against it, opening his eyes a little and looking around the room. He was sitting in one of the dining room carvers, his hands bound tightly to the arms.
"Are you trying to blow this entire operation?!"
Victor's voice came from the dining room, the double sliding doors were almost closed but not quite and the words were clear.
"You used a goddamned soldier who was out of the friggin' country when Josie's parents were killed, you moronic beast!"
"They didn't notice," a man's voice said calmly.
"Not this time, but they will when there's less personal involvement," Victor said furiously. "Pull that shit again, Seth and I'll be coming for you."
"Don't threaten me, little man," Seth said. "Or it'll be you I come for in the night, and you won't hear me or see me until your dying breath."
Human accomplice, Sam thought tiredly. Just the wrong one. He lifted his head a little, hearing a familiar growl somewhere down the street.
"Get in there and kill him," Victor snapped. "We're running out of time."
Sam let his head fall again, eyes half-closing as he heard the doors pushed apart, the footsteps getting closer.
The front door opened and Victor pulled out his gun, holding it on Sam as Krissy walked into the living room, her gaze flashing between Sam, the vampire standing next to him and Victor. Behind her, Dean, Aidan and Josephine stopped and stared around the room. Sam lifted his head, looking at his brother.
"What is going on here?" Josephine asked him, her eyes fixed on the vampire standing between Sam and Victor.
"Victor has been trying to make a new generation of hunters," Sam said. "And in order to do it, he's been working with a vampire."
"That true?" Aidan asked, staring at the older man.
Dean looked at Krissy's face. It was smooth and expressionless, her eyes distant as she stared at Victor. The pieces had all dropped into place for her, he realised, as they'd done for him.
"Yeah, Aidan, it's true," she said quietly. "Victor didn't save us."
She walked past Josephine, stopping behind the sofa. "You killed them, didn't you, Victor. Our families."
Aidan and Josephine both turned to her.
"You killed them to get us, to make us into killing machines." She glanced at the vampire. "You set this vampire on them so that we'd be lost and alone."
"No," Victor found his voice. "No, Krissy, to make you into hunters, elite hunters who could have lives that were meaningful, helping others without sacrificing everything else to the cause. To make you into the best, the strongest hunters I could."
"You turned that monster onto our families?" Josephine asked him, her voice faltering.
"Josie, please, you have to understand –"
"I don't understand, Victor," Aidan cut in. "Why? Why me? Krissy's dad was a hunter, he was teaching her, but why me? Why Josie?"
"He saw your potential," Sam told him. "Saw that you could do it, with the proper motivation, and the right training."
Dean glanced at him, moving a little closer.
"What? How?" Aidan looked from Sam back to Victor. "Did you stalk us? Watch us?"
Victor's gaze cut away from him and Aidan swore softly. "And David, and 'Lissa and Zach? Them too? You had their families butchered so that you could do this to them?"
"You used us," Josephine said slowly. "You used us all."
Victor looked at her, his face paling a little. "I didn't – I was trying to –"
"And you killed them." She ignored him, her gaze turning to the vampire. "In their beds."
Seth grinned at her, the soft overhead light gleaming on the descended fangs. "Oh yes, and they screamed and they begged and I drank them dry."
Her scream was inarticulate, her speed driven by rage that had been fed and nurtured over the past six months. Dean shifted sideways, his knife in his hand, the rope sliced through and dropping from Sam's right arm and the blade in his lap as Josephine vaulted the sofa, slamming past Victor's arm, her machete blade slicing down toward the vampire's throat.
The gunshot was explosively loud in the room as the vampire disappeared from under Josephine's blade only to run into Dean's, his head falling backward at the same time as the slim girl fell to the floor. Victor stared down at the widening stain of red colouring her side in horror as Josie pressed her hands over the wound. Sam cut himself free and dropped beside her, taking his jacket off and lifting her hands, pressing the thick cloth against her side.
"Aidan, call an ambulance!" he barked at the boy.
"No," Victor dropped to his knees, the gun falling to the floor beside him. "That was – it was an accident, she knocked it –"
"There aren't any accidents, are there, Victor?" Krissy said, her voice toneless as she cocked her gun, the barrel aimed at his head.
He looked up at her, his gaze shifting to stare into the small bore. "No, no accidents."
"Krissy …" Dean said softly, taking a step closer to her. "Don't."
"He killed my father." She felt her finger tightening incrementally on the trigger, getting closer to the end of the resistance. "He killed all our families, Dean. He's a monster."
"No," Dean said, hating himself for the lie, unable to let her do it this way anyway. "He's just a person."
"He's a murderer," she corrected him. "Our families. Those people his pet turned. Even Hell isn't enough, Dean."
"You're right," he said. "But not this time. Not this way. Not for you."
"Why not?"
"Because you want a normal life, and once you cross that line, that's going to be impossible."
"I can't –" she said, her breath catching in her throat suddenly, her blood pounding in her head. She couldn't breathe. Couldn't hear. "I can't … let … him –"
"I know, but there's another way, okay?" he said, taking another step closer to her, thumbing the safety of his gun on and tucking it back through his belt.
"Dean –"
"You can let it go," he told her. "We'll take care of it."
The click of the hammer being uncocked was loud in the silence of the room and she dropped so suddenly he almost wasn't quick enough to catch her.
"Ambulance is coming," Aidan said, looking from Sam to Dean as he put Krissy on the sofa.
"What are you going to do?" Victor asked, as Dean yanked him to his feet.
"Take care of you," Dean said coldly. "So these kids don't have to."
Sam looked up uneasily, recognising the fury in his brother's voice. Dean felt the look and glanced down at him as he pushed Victor into the chair his brother had been tied to, his gun in his hand again, safety off.
"Don't move," he said. "Aidan, come here."
Aidan crossed the room and took the gun as Dean handed it to him. "What –?"
"Just cover him," Dean said. "Shoot him if he moves."
He turned to Sam, looking down at the girl on the floor. Under the darkness of her skin, she looked grey, sweat beading on her face and neck. "Gut shot?"
Sam shook his head. "Passed through the side, might've knicked something but it didn't hit anything in the centre."
"We've got a lot of cleaning up to do," Dean said quietly.
"What do you want to do with him?"
Dean looked down at his brother's hands, covered with Josie blood. "What I want to do and what I will do, two different things. But I want to make sure it's airtight."
Sam stretched out his back. Lugging bodies around was not as easy as it used to be, he thought. He looked up as Dean walked back from the phone booth across the street.
"All done?"
Dean nodded, sliding into the driver's seat of the Impala and starting the engine.
It'd taken Sam two hours to concoct the evidence he'd wanted and another hour to lay out Victor and Seth so that the security camera at Fuller's Point picked up enough of them to alert the cops. Garth had come through in record time, calling Martina and getting her to hustle in from Missouri. She'd be here before the cops showed up, he thought.
Victor hadn't been lying about the little kids, unfortunately. They didn't have any other family to go to and the thought of putting them into the public system was one he couldn't face. Garth was working overtime on hacking the databases to make sure that Martina's qualifications were bona fide enough to stop that from happening.
"I thought you'd just ice him," Sam said, looking over at him.
"I wanted to, no question about that. Still do," Dean said bluntly. "But a murder investigation with no body is going to hang around for a long time, and it seemed like a better idea to give them something that was cut and dried, keep the disruptions to the kids' lives at a minimum."
"You'd be a good father, Dean," Sam said, the side of his mouth lifting slightly.
Dean slid a sideways look at him and didn't answer. It wasn't a possibility. Would never be a possibility.
Martina Oroskaya was a friend of Garth's. They'd met her twice, both times when she'd bustled about the houseboat, attempting to do something about the state of hygiene and Kevin's health. Married to a hunter for thirty three years, she knew the life, knew the people, knew what she was doing when it came to lying to the police. Dean found himself watching in admiration as she waved her hands around, her accent atrocious and the local cops retreating in confusion.
"You two still here?"
He turned and looked down at Krissy. "Just making sure all the loose ends are tied up properly."
"Martina's pretty cool," Krissy said, turning her head to watch the woman scoop up Alissa and carry her past to the kitchen, her accent magically restored to comprehensible and soothing. "How long is she staying with us?"
"As long as you want," he told her. "As long as you need her, I guess."
"Josephine'll be eighteen in a few months."
"You think she wants to look after five kids full time?"
Krissy looked down. "Probably not."
Sam pulled the chain and pendant from his pocket. "Sarah told me to give you this."
She opened her hand and he dropped the necklace into it.
"Thank you," she said, swallowing against the sudden tightness in her throat. "It never really goes, does it?"
Sam's brow creased up questioningly and Dean shook his head. "No, it never really goes."
"I'm gonna … uh, wait in the car," Sam said, gesturing vaguely to the door. Dean nodded, watching him go out and looking back at Krissy.
"So you want to go to Cincinnati?"
She shook her head. "This is my family. I hate the way we came together, but … I don't think I'll get a chance like this again … what we've been through, together, that doesn't happen in normal life, you know?"
He did know. He'd felt the same way at Jim's, at Bobby's. He glanced past her, seeing Aidan drop his gaze. "So … what you're saying is that you like that boy over there, and you want to stay."
Krissy felt a flush of heat crawling up her neck. "What? Aidan? No … I mean … he's like … my brother," she said, too quickly. "It's nothing like that."
"Uh huh," he said. "What about hunting?"
"We won't go looking for it," she said, meeting his gaze. "But … if any monsters show up around here, they better look out."
He looked around the house, nodding. "Okay. Good."
Krissy looked at him uncertainly. "Really? I thought I was going to have to fight you way more on that."
"Well, you're right," he said, shrugging slightly. "You're not a kid anymore. You can make your own decisions."
"You're alright for an old guy," Krissy said, seeing his mouth twitch and hiding a smile.
"Really not that old," he said.
"You keep telling yourself that," she said, letting the smile out a little at his expression. "Take care, Dean. Tell Sam too."
She turned away, walking back into the living room and sitting down next to Zach.
"Yeah, goodbye, Dean," Aidan said from the other end of the hall.
Dean turned and looked at him, catching the kid's relief and hiding a smile. "Aidan."
"Yeah?" He walked slowly toward the hunter.
"Listen, there's something I want to tell you, about Krissy," Dean said, letting his hand drop on Aidan's back.
"Yeah, I know, I know," Aidan said, forcing a smile to cover his flinch. "You'll kill me if I ever hurt her, blah blah blah …"
"No, no. No," Dean said cheerfully. "She'll kill you."
Aidan turned his head to look across the living room at her.
"Your problem now, pal," Dean said, slapping the boy's shoulder. "Good luck."
He turned and walked out the front door, pulling it closed behind him. Sam was standing out on the porch and they walked up the path together, going to the car.
"This is good," Sam said.
"Is it?" Dean said shortly, stopping by the driver's door and looking at him over the roof.
"Could've been a lot worse."
"It will be if we don't shut those gates of Hell soon."
"What do they have to do with any of that?" Sam looked at him.
"They're hunters now. You don't just walk away from that," Dean said, nodding at the house. "There's only one way out of that and you and I both know it ain't pretty."
"Maybe they'll be different," Sam said, looking away.
"Maybe if we shut down Hellhole once and for all, those three can have a real life."
"Maybe they won't be the only ones," Sam muttered as Dean got in the car. "Or maybe we could try for it anyway."
The engine rumbled into life and he got in, looking at his brother's profile as they pulled out.
I-35 N, Kansas
"So let me get this straight," Sam said, turning to him. The car was dark, as dark as it could be, lit only by the dashlights, the headlights picking out the lines ahead of them. "You don't believe that what we do is worthwhile?"
Dean looked at him, frowning. "What? I didn't say that."
"Yeah, Dean, you did, a few times now," Sam contradicted him. "Lately, all I've been hearing is how this life sucks and you don't see any hope for anyone in it."
Dean chewed on the corner of his lip. "Just because I don't want a bunch of kids to get into the life, doesn't mean I think what we do isn't helping."
"Helping?" Sam repeated. "Saving people, you mean?"
"Yeah, that's what I mean."
"And you honestly can't see how you can do that, and have connections to people?"
His brother's exhale was audible and he waited impatiently.
"Why are we having this conversation again, Sam?" Dean stared at the road, feeling tension creeping up his neck.
"Because you haven't told me why you think that."
"It's self-evident," Dean said irritably. "Look at our lives."
Different approach, Sam thought, hearing the irritability. "Alright, so if everything – demons, monsters, ghosts, angels … everything, disappeared tomorrow, what would you do?"
"Sleep for a month."
"And after that?"
"I don't know, Sam," he said, flicking a look at him. "What about you? Back to college? What?"
"Maybe, sure." He dragged in a breath. "Even when we close the gates, Dean, there's still a lot of stuff that isn't going to disappear."
"Yeah, well getting the demon action locked down is a good start," Dean said sourly. "I like the idea of closing Heaven's gates as well."
"The monsters'll still be around. The ghosts."
Dean sighed. "Your point?"
"Do you think it's a good idea that there're so few hunters? You said that the Alpha Vamp was building an army," Sam reminded him. "Do you think that's changed?"
"And you want to have a family and raise your kids to be hunters? That right, Sam?" Dean asked, turning to look at him. "'Cause that's what it sounds like."
"I don't think it's the worst thing in the world to do," Sam said defensively.
"Good for you," Dean snapped. "Now, drop it."
"Fine."
Lebanon, Kansas
Dean leaned back in the chair, eyes closed, whiskey balanced on the arm. He couldn't concentrate on the books piled beside him, couldn't get his brother's words out of his head.
He didn't know what Sam was trying to say. That it was possible to be happy with hunting? He knew that. He'd been happy. But he'd been a kid, with few of the responsibilities that sat on him now. How could he think about … connecting … to anyone when one wrong move would bring death to them? Not even a wrong move, he thought bitterly. Hostages to fortune, to the whims of the creatures they'd spent their lives trying to get rid of, that's what a …connection … with other people meant.
He'd said it to Benny. Guys like them didn't get to have families. Ever. Sam'd been right about the gates. Shutting them got rid of one subset, not the whole enchilada. It would never be over, there was no retirement plan, just the crackle of the flames of the pyre when he got too slow, or his luck ran out.
And none of that mattered anyway, he thought tiredly. He'd tried normal and that hadn't worked. He'd tried cold-blooded. That hadn't worked either. He needed people, he knew that. At least one or two that he could put some trust in, be himself with. But no one had been able to hold up their end. And he couldn't take those risks anymore. There wasn't enough of him left to risk it anymore.
He straightened up, picking up the glass and tossing it back, leaving it on the table beside the books. Getting up, he walked out of the office, along the hall and up the stairs. Really not that old, he'd told Krissy, smarting at her comment. But he felt old. He felt like … this life would go on and on, and he'd never find any peace in it.
In the bedroom that was his, he pulled off his boots, looking down at the neatly made bed. He pulled back the covers, smelling the waft of the scent in the sheets and stripped off, sliding between the clean sheets with a long sigh. He had a home now. That was something, he thought, closing his eyes. And they had a job.
And he could think about the rest tomorrow.