Chapter 11: All Hell Breaks Loose.
Three months have passed since the trickster case in Ohio and, after saving Dean from a djinn, Jean decides to ride in the Impala with her brothers, since the two can't seem to stay out of trouble without her.
Currently, Dean is driving with Sam sitting shotgun and Jean in the backseat. Jean let's out a loud yawn then asks her older twin, "Do you mind turning the music down? I'm gonna try to get some sleep."
Dean mutters something under his breath, but does as she asked and turns down the volume. Jean playfully smacks Dean on the back of his head because, even though she may not have heard what he said, she's 95 percent sure it was a smart-ass comment. After all, that is her twin brother's specialty.
Yawning once again, Jean lays down in the backseat and curls up on her side, making sure her feet are hanging off of the edge of the seat; the last thing she wants to hear when she wakes up is Dean griping at her about having her feet on the seat. She mumbles a quick "Goodnight," to her brothers before nodding off to sleep.
Jean is having the dream again. Or at least she thinks it's the same dream...The surroundings are the same: darkness so thick surrounding her it almost feels like it's trying to suffocate her and the heat is beyond scorching. Jean knows that somewhere within the darkness the man with crimson orange eyes is waiting for her. She sees something moving in the darkness, but it doesn't appear to be the man...it's much too large to be him. Not to mention it doesn't appear to have a human shape: it's unbelievably tall and slender with six huge shapes behind it. A quiet "huh," slips out of her mouth and the creature's head instantly snaps around to look at her. Large crimson orange eyes meet her emerald ones and Jean knows that, somehow, this creature is the strange man. There's an ear-piercing high-pitched screeching sound and the massive form rushes towards her.
Jean is suddenly shaken violently awake, "What?" She mumbles, "What the hell do you want? I'm tryin' to sleep." Jean rolls over to try to go back to sleep.
"Sammy's gone! Wake up, Jean! Sam's gone!" Dean shouts.
"What do you mean Sam's gone? How do you lose somebody in a moving vehicle, Dean?" She asks, her mind still groggy from sleep, and she reluctantly sits up, but both of her eyes are still closed. She opens them and blinks owlishly at her twin brother, who is leaning into the car from the open back passenger side door.
"Because we're no longer moving, we've stopped at a small diner. Sammy went inside to get us something to eat, but now he's gone."
Jean is now fully awake as worry for her little brother consumes her. She climbs out of the back of the Impala, shuts the door behind her, and follows Dean into the Sunnyside Diner. When they enter the diner the first thing the twin Winchesters notice is a dead man at a table with his face laying in a pool of his own blood. Both Dean and Jean pull their guns out from the waistbands of their pants before cautiously proceeding farther into the diner.
"Sam?" Dean calls out while Jean inspects the dead man.
Jean looks at Dean, "His throat's been cut."
Dean walks past her and looks behind the counter, where he sees two more dead bodies. "Yeah, same over here." He opens the back door of the restaurant and looks around outside. "Sam?" As he starts to close the door, his hand runs across some yellow powder. He looks at his hand then at his sister, "Sulfur."
The siblings quickly leave the diner and begin calling out for their little brother. "Sam? Sam! Sammy!"
Dean turns to Jean, "What do we do? Why did demons take Sam?"
Jean shakes her head, "I don't know why they would take Sam. I think we should call Bobby and Ash...maybe they can help us track Sammy down."
Dean nods, "Yeah, good idea." He reaches into his pocket and removes his cell phone. While Dean calls Bobby, Jean takes out her own phone and calls Ash. Ash is a computer genius with a mullet that works and lives at Harvelle's Roadhouse with Ellen and Jo. Jean has known him almost as long as she's known Ellen and Jo. After filling him in on what has happened, Ash tells her he'll keep his feelers out and see what pops up. Once she hangs up her phone Dean tells her, "Bobby is going to meet us in Iowa. Let's go."
They drive for the rest of the night and arrive in Iowa at dawn. They pull over into the parking lot of a boarded up gas station to wait for Bobby. Twenty minutes later, the Winchester twins and the Impala are joined by Bobby and his truck. While Dean and Bobby are talking by the hood of the Impala, Jean's phone rings and she answers it on the first ring. "Ash, please tell me that you found something."
"Okay, listen, it's a big negatory on Sam." Ash's voice says from the other end of the line.
"Damn it!" Jean exclaims.
"Listen, Jean...I did find something."
"What is it, Ash?"
"I can't talk over this line, Jean."
"I'm sorry, Ash, but we really don't have time for this."
"Make time," Ash shouts. "Okay, because this," Ash pauses then continues in a quieter voice, "Not only does this almost definitely help you find your brother, this is...It's huge. So get here. Now." He then hangs up on Jean.
"Did Ash find anything?" Dean asks her.
"Yeah, we're going to the Roadhouse. Let's go." All three get into the Impala and Dean starts the engine and drives off.
A few hours later, they turn onto the byway that leads to Harvelle's Roadhouse and as the little bar comes into view Dean, Bobby, and Jean are shocked by what they see. "What the hell?" Dean exclaims as he stops the Impala in front of the remnants of the Roadhouse, which has been clearly burnt to the ground.
The three get out of the car and begin to make their way through what little remains of the Roadhouse. As Jean passes by the charred remains of a couple of human bodies she says, "My God...Please don't let Ellen, Joe, and Ash be in here."
"You see Ellen?" Dean asks Bobby and Jean.
Bobby shakes his head, "No. No Ash either."
Jean pauses then bends down to examine a familiar watch on the wrist of a blackened body. "I found Ash."
Dean walks up beside her and looks at the corpse, "Oh, Ash. Damn it." He looks over at Bobby and Bobby looks at Jean as she slowly stands up straight.
Jean walks out of the smouldering ruins with Bobby and Dean following behind her. "This is..." Bobby starts to say, but Dean interrupts him.
"What the hell did Ash know? We got no way of knowing where Ellen is or if she's even alive." The three come to a stop beside the hood of the Impala and turn to face each other. "We got no clue what Ash was gonna tell us. Now how the hell are we gonna find Sam?"
"We'll find him," Bobby assures Dean.
All of a sudden, Dean shuts his eyes and places a hand on his head. "Are you okay?" Jean asks her brother.
"No." Dean grunts and shakes his head.
Bobby and Jean are watching Dean closely in concern and a few seconds later the same thing happens again, only this time it seems much more intense. "What was that?" Bobby asks Dean.
Dean shakes his head one last time before answering, "I don't know. Headache."
"You get headaches like that a lot?" asks Bobby.
"No. Must be the stress." Dean grunts before continuing, "I could have swore I saw something." He puts a hand over his eyes.
"You mean like a vision? Like what Sam gets?" Jean inquires.
Dean looks at her, "What? No. Come on, I'm not some psychic."
Dean grabs his head again then he collapses against the hood of the Impala. "Dean? Dean!" Jean and Bobby shout as they rush to his side.
"Dean? Are you with us?" Bobby asks from beside him as Jean kneels on Dean's other side and carefully wraps her arms around him and helps him to stand.
Dean nods his head a little and then pats his twin's arm in a silent gesture to let her know that he's all right. "Yeah, I think so. I saw Sam. I saw him, Jeanie."
"It was a vision," Bobby states.
"Yeah. I don't know how. But, yeah. Hoo." Dean looks over at Bobby, "That was about as fun as getting kicked in the jewels."
"You said that you saw Sammy, did you see anything else?" Jean asks her brother.
"Uh. There was a bell."
"What kind of bell?" she asks.
"Uh, like a big bell with some kind of engraving on it, I don't know."
"Engraving?" Bobby asks at the same time that Jean does.
"Yeah."
"Was it a tree? Like an oak tree?" Bobby questions Dean.
"Yeah. Exactly."
Bobby and Jean look at each other, "Cold Oak?" Jean asks him and he nods.
"Cold Oak? What does that mean?" Dean asks them.
"It means that we know where Sam is." The three of them get into the Impala and begin to drive towards Cold Oak South Dakota.
They drive for nearly seven hours straight only stopping to refuel. It's a little past 10 at night by the time they reach the outskirts of Cold Oak, where they're forced to come to a stop by several large trees that have fallen across the road. "Well it looks like the rest of the way's on foot." Bobby says.
Dean opens the trunk and they each grab a shotgun, some ammo, and flashlights. "Let's go," Dean says and walks off into the woods. Bobby and Jean follow closely behind him.
After about an hour of walking, they arrive at the ghost town and start to call Sam's name. They walk around a corner of a nearby building and spot Sam walking towards them. Dean and Jean are relieved to see their little brother is mostly okay. Sam is holding his arm like his shoulder has been dislocated, but that's an easy fix; painful, yes, but easy. "Sam," Jean and Dean call out to their little brother.
"Dean. Jean."
"Sam. Lookout!" Dean and Jean shout as a man appears behind Sam. Jean instantly takes aim at the man but she can't shoot him without hitting Sam as well. The man stabs Sam in the back, twisting the knife and severing his spinal cord. "No!" Both of the twins yell, Dean runs towards Sam while Jean keeps her shotgun aimed at the man. The man pulls the knife out of Sam's back and Sam falls to his knees. As soon as she has a clear shot, Jean begins firing at the man, but she misses and the man takes off running towards the woods. Jean drops her, now empty, shotgun and sprints as fast as she can after him.
Jean continues to chase after the man even as he enters the woods; her hate and rage consuming her and turning her eyes a brilliant crimson orange. She begins to run faster and soon she catches up to him. She tackles him to the ground and starts to savagely beat him. He blocks a couple of her punches then manages to shove her off of him. Jean gets to her feet quickly then begins to kick the man in his ribs until he rolls over onto his back. She then sits on his chest, places her hands around his throat, and begins to strangle him. Gasping for air and becoming increasingly desperate, the man reaches down to the waistband of his pants then removes the knife he used to take Sam's life. He takes a wild swipe at Jean's head and the blade slices into the flesh over her left eye. She screams in pain and presses both of her hands over her injured eye. The man quickly shoves her off of him again and takes a couple of deep breaths before getting to his feet and running deeper into the woods.
Jean stays on the ground for several moments, clutching her hands over her left eye in a useless attempt at stopping the heavy flow of blood pouring from her wound. Slowly, she gets to her feet and looks around for Sam's murderer, but with only one eye, she's having trouble seeing. She takes off her flannel over shirt and, after finding a clean area, presses it over her eye. She then proceeds to stumble back to the abandoned town where her brothers are. As she re-enters the ghost town, she can hear a man sobbing loudly. She walks towards the sound and soon she sees Dean clutching Sam while crying. "Sammy? Sam!" she shouts and then drops the shirt she's pressing against her bleeding eye as she rushes over to her brothers. "No! No, no, no! Sam!" She falls to her knees beside Dean and begins running her fingers through her dead little brother's hair. "Please...No." She starts to weep hysterically and begins to blame herself for what has happened. "I'm so sorry, Sammy. I was supposed to always protect you, but I've failed. I've completely failed you as your big sister and I'm so sorry, Sam."
Bobby walks up beside the grieving twins, his own eyes tearing up. He looks at Jean and notices that she's covered in blood. "Jean? Are you hurt?" He pulls his flashlight out of his pocket where he put it when he was chasing after Jean. Bobby turns the flashlight on and shines the light on Jean's face. Immediately, Bobby's breath catches in his throat and he whispers, "My God." The entire left side of Jean's face and neck is covered in her own blood. Bobby moves closer to Jean in order to examine her injury better and he sees that there's a deep cut that starts just above her eyebrow and ends at about the middle of her cheek. "This is bad...this is really bad. Dean, we need to get Jean to a hospital. Now."
For the first time, Dean looks away from Sam's body and at his twin sister. Through his tear filled eyes, he takes in Jean's bloody condition before he reaches into his pocket, removes the keys to the Impala, and tosses them to Bobby. "Go," he clears his throat. "I'm going to take Sam's body into one of these buildings. You take Jean to the hospital."
"No! I'm not leaving Sam!" Jean protests.
Dean turns to her, "Just go, Jean...I've already lost Sam, I don't want to lose you too." Dean tells her, sounding really depressed and he takes off his jacket and then takes off his own flannel over shirt. He tosses the shirt to his sister, who presses it against her wound, then he slips his jacket back on.
"Come on, girl. Let's get you out of here." Bobby says and starts to lead her out of the abandoned town. By the time they reach the Impala, Jean is feeling dizzy and light-headed, but she's too consumed by her grief to even think of mentioning anything to Bobby. They climb into the car and Bobby starts the engine. They haven't been on the road for twenty minutes when Jean passes out.
When Jean regains consciousness, she finds herself lying in a hospital bed with a bandage wrapped over her left eye. She hears voices coming from the left of her bed and she turns her head to see who's speaking. She notices Bobby standing just outside of the doorway talking with a male doctor. Listening carefully, she overhears the doctor tell Bobby, "She's stable, but she's lost a lot of blood. We'd like to keep her for a couple of days for observation."
"What about her eye? Will she be able to see?"
"We won't know for sure until it heals enough for her to be able to open her eye, but it's not looking very good. There's an 80 percent chance that she'll never see out of her left eye again."
The reality of what has happened washes over Jean and she becomes depressed. Jean doesn't care about her eye, not really, it's the loss of her little brother that has her depressed. As a matter of fact, if it would bring Sam back she would gladly give both of her eyes...and a whole lot more. At least she still has Dean and as long as one of her brothers still lives, Jean refuses to give up on life, but that doesn't mean that she's going to stop grieving the loss of Sam anytime soon. Jean begins to sob. Apparently, Bobby and the doctor must have heard her because they rush into the room and to her bedside. "Miss, are you in pain? We gave you something not too long ago, but I think we might be able to give you a little more."
"I'm fine, go away."
The doctor nods, "I'll check back with you later." He then leaves Bobby and Jean alone in the room.
"Jean," Bobby begins to tell her something but she interrupts him.
"Take me back, Bobby. Right now." Jean says and starts to get up out of the bed.
Bobby pushes her back down, "You need to rest. You've had a stressful night and you're badly injured. You need time to recover."
"No. I need to be with my brother," she tries to get up again, but Bobby refuses to let her.
Bobby sighs, "Rest. I have to get back to Dean, but I'll keep in touch."
Once Jean realizes that Bobby isn't about to cave on this, she grumpily relents. "Fine. Just go."
"Jean..."
"Leave me alone," Jean tells him then turns her back to him.
"I know you're in mourning, so I'm just gonna ignore your attitude," he tells her and then walks to the door. "Stay here and recover. I'll send Dean your way later." He pauses slightly before continuing, "I'm glad we didn't lose you too, Jeanie." He leaves the room and Jean silently cries herself to sleep.
Darkness surrounds Jean as she seems to be standing on nothing but air. 'Oh man...not the dream again. I do not need this right now,' she thinks to herself, running a hand over her face and feeling a large scar over her left eye. Behind her a male voice begins speaking to her in a language she can't identify or understand; and Jean has learned to speak many different languages over the 27 years that she's been alive. Jean turns around and the first thing that catches her attention is the pair of glowing crimson orange eyes. Through the darkness, Jean can make out the vague shape of the owner of the eyes, which appears to now be human-like except for the six dark shapes behind him. The next thing she notices is something that she doesn't remember ever seeing in the dream before; there appears to be thick bars surrounding the man to form a cage-like structure. Surrounding the cage is a raging inferno of flames, but even with the fire Jean's eye is having difficulty seeing through the thick darkness. The voice begins speaking again, the volume raising when Jean doesn't respond to whatever he's saying. As the volume reaches a pitch that starts to hurt Jean's ears, she presses her hands over her ears. Then she decides to try something she's never tried before; talking to this strange man. "Please could you tone it down a little? I'm already half blind, I don't need to be deaf as well." As the man falls silent, Jean removes her hands from over her ears before continuing to speak to the man. "I don't understand what you're saying. Do you speak English?" He seems to tilt his head to the side, but because of how dark it is Jean can't tell for certain. "I do now. My apologies, I should have realized that you wouldn't be able to understand Enochian...Jean Winchester." "Okay, you know who I am, but who are you? And why do I keep dreaming of you?" The six massive dark shapes that are behind him rise towards the top of the cage in a gesture that seems familiar to Jean, but she can't quite put her finger on why it seems familiar. "You dream of me because you and I are connected, my dear." He moves closer to the bars and motions for Jean to do the same, "Come closer and let me see your eye. I can not fully heal it from here, but I can make sure that you'll at least be able to see." Jean cautiously moves forward until she's a couple of feet away from the flames. Even this close, she still can't see the man very well. "It doesn't matter. I don't want the scar to be gone; it will be a reminder of my failure to protect my little brother." She pauses, "You didn't answer my other question: who or what are you?" "Sam will be fine and Jake, the one who injured you, will pay dearly for doing so. I have big plans for Sam as well as for you. Sam Winchester will not be dead for long. As for who I am...I go by many names, my dear. Now come closer. You need not worry about the flames, we haven't bonded yet so the fire will not harm you." Jean does as he says, hesitating for only a moment before stepping into the fire and up to the cage. "I can not reach very far out of this infernal cage, so I need you to get as close as you can." Jean does as she's told and stands about an inch away from the bars. When something ice cold presses against the left side of Jean's face she gasps in surprise. A jolt of electricity goes through her body at this man's touch and the hairs on her arms seem to stand on end. "Sorry if it's a bit chilly. Most people think I burn hot, it's actually quite the opposite." A tingling sensation travels through the left side of her face and she closes her good eye in pleasure at the feeling of his touch. He takes this opportunity to intensely examined her face taking in every detail. He sniffs the air, "You smell wonderful, my dear." The six large dark shapes flare open and rise towards the top of the cage once again. The man reluctantly removes his hand from her face and she opens both of her eyes. To her delight she can see from her left eye and she turns to the man. "Thank you, but why did you do this for me?" "Because you are mine. Once I am freed from this cage, I will claim you as my mate." He manages to grab a hold of one of Jean's hands and a jolt goes through her body again. He turns her hand over so that the inside of her wrist is facing upwards then places a kiss to the pulse point on her wrist. She starts to ask him something, but doesn't get the opportunity as she is pulled out of the strange dream only to be forced back into reality.
