Set during Season 6, Episode 1.
101: Mourning Regret
"Who was that?" Jane asked quietly, folding her arms across her chest as she stared down at Dean. He had come home a bit… odd. Actually, he had been acting odd lately period. Something was changing in their little domesticated slice of paradise, and it seemed she wasn't the only one feeling it anymore.
Dean leaned back in the desk chair, pushing away from both the phone and the computer. "Sid. Setting up a poker game with him, Landon, and some guys."
She had a feeling if she called Angie and asked about this poker game, it would be news to Angie. "Dean, it's 11:30."
"Really?" He was almost convincing, bending down to peer at the time in the corner of the monitor. "Huh. Well that explains why he was asleep."
"Sure it does." She smiled tiredly, reaching out with both hands. "Come on, come to bed."
"I'll be right up, sweetheart."
"Now, Dean."
He studied her for a moment, smiling in spite of himself and nodded, pushing himself out of the chair and taking her hands. "If that's your command, Mrs. Winchester."
"Indeed it is, Mr. Winchester." Whatever it was he had been planning, not tonight. She needed him up there with her, not checking the salt lines he didn't think she had noticed appearing everywhere, or the fresh devil's traps and satchels. He was staying out more, up later, and seemed a bit paranoid.
She was a bit paranoid too. Her radar kept going off at weird times, and while she hadn't seen anymore weird humanoid, shadowy figures since that day in the Impala, she still felt like they were being watched. Something was coming, and the dread in her grew heavier every day.
"You alright, Janey?"
"Yeah, just tired. Come on."
They could both play the game of evade.
All day something had been nagging at her, tugging, and Jane had finally caved and left work early. She did what she hadn't done in a year, she followed the sensation. The headaches were back to their pre-Lucifer screwing with her head, and still controllable. It was like riding a bike… sort of.
She felt silly, making her way down an alley in her stupid high heels and equally uncomfortable season appropriate skirt, blouse, and blazer. She was asking to be mugged, she knew it. She came to a halt, frowning when the headache that had been gently knocking at her temples suddenly stopped and turned towards the focus of her psychic drama.
"It's hard, having a normal life, when you're anything but normal. Isn't it?"
Jane took several steps backwards. This was either a hallucination and stress was getting to her or else something wearing Sam's face had escaped the cage. Either way, she reached for her purse. She carried a tiny little lady-type handgun, along with a permit, something she had possibly used fake information for.
"Jane, it's me."
"No. Because Sam is in Hell." Fake Sam was advancing and she had her little hand cannon out.
He halted, eyeing it for a moment before reaching out towards her. "Jane, you should be able to tell its me." He chided, letting his fingertips brush against her temple.
In the year he had been gone, Jane had not actively used her ability. It had flared up only recently and today she had only followed where it led. She had not purposefully dropped shields, or utilized the scanning thing she could do, none of it. The reason for that had nothing to do with their supposed retirement. It had to do with the fact that last year, Satan himself had planted a 'tiny piece' of himself directly into her head as a way to monitor Sam and to help Sam out. That had led to Satan literally shutting her down, she had been unconscious for the final confrontation, when Sam had gone into the cage along with the angels.
She let shields fall, expecting something horrible, and cringed as she waited. Nothing happened, nothing immediate, so tentatively she reached out with her mind, feeling Sam. It was Sam, and something inside of her, a dam, seemed to break. It was Sam, but… "There's something…." She whispered. There was something off with him, something not quite right.
Sam tilted his head, staring at her thoughtfully. "Are you still going to shoot me?"
The gun was lowered and shakily, she managed to put it back in her purse. "Why aren't you right?" She asked when she could speak without her voice breaking or something, feeling tears burning her eyes.
If that seemed worded poorly to him, he didn't let her know. He just stroked his chin thoughtfully, finally shrugging. "I was trapped in a cage with Lucifer and a pissed off archangel…" He said slowly. "I don't know what you considered right in those circumstances."
Which meant he had no idea, and she was going to have to take it as it was. This was Sam, there was no doubt, well… maybe minimal doubt. What if there was still a piece of Satan in her head? What if it had been hibernating or something all this time… too many what if's, and she didn't want to consider them. "How'd you get out?"
"No idea."
"How long?"
"Almost a year."
Jane's first reaction was to slap him silly.
Sam was holding out on her, that was obvious. Jane considered him as he drove the familiar road home, not even bothering to sort out why he knew where they lived. He had been back almost a year, and she was hazarding a guess that he had popped in on them, without them knowing, a time or two. Not often, and not close, or else he would have triggered her ability. Clever Sam. But there was something he was holding back on, and she wondered how best to pry it from him.
It wasn't whatever was… not right, was off, that wasn't it. He had spent time with two pissed off supernatural, angelic and demonic brothers in a cage. Obviously, there was going to be something… weird about him, weirder than usual. It was Sam after all and he had the market cornered on weird.
"What?" He didn't even bother looking at her, eyes on the road.
"What are you not telling me?"
He didn't seem surprised. "I'm not telling you for a reason, Jane."
"Sam…" She was glad and a bit disturbed that he was back, but already he was being evasive and annoying.
"Jane. One, it is none of your business. Two, you're a psychic snoop and I keep secrets for more than just myself. So butt out."
"Secrets you shouldn't be keeping?"
"I'd forgotten how…" He seemed to be searching for the right word, his brow creased in a slightly irritated scowl. "mom-ish you can be. Mom-ish and a nuisance."
"I kind of regret mourning you, Sam." She was guessing he had come back a bit harder, colder, because he didn't seem overly invested in being polite and nice.
"No, you don't."
Sam had been hunting djinn, djinn he had fallen victim to not so long ago, from the way he told it. He had come to town because they had, and it didn't take a genius to figure out why. Not after he had told her about the last djinn they had encountered. She vaguely remembered that, it had been a few years ago. Dean had been trapped in the little world the djinn and its poison had created and whatever he had saw, experienced, had hurt him on levels she hadn't understood at the time.
She wasn't surprised when they reached her house and found Dean in the middle of a hallucination and apparently an attack. Dean was passing out, slipping into unconsciousness when his eyes locked on Sam. She rushed forward to try catching him before his head hit anything, awkwardly lowering him to the ground. "He'll die." She said, the words tasting sour on her tongue as she stared down into her husband's face. "Sam, he'll-"
"He'll be fine." Sam crouched down before the pair, studying Dean. "There's a cure."
"Do you have it on you?"
"No… I'll have to take him to it." He began pulling Dean out of her arms, shouldering his brother with more grace than she had used to catch him. When Jane stood up, obviously prepared to go with him, he shook his head. "You're not coming."
"The hell if I'm not."
"I said no."
"And you can kiss my ass."
He dropped a kiss on her forehead, amusing only himself. "You're not coming. I told you, you're nosy, and it's not my call." He considered her once more, eyes searching hers. "He'll be fine, Jane. I'm sure he'll end up telling you about… everything, when he comes back."
Jane did not like this. She had just found out Sam was back from the supposed, sort of dead, and there was several things off with him. He was Sam, he was human, that she didn't have a doubt over. But there was still something, something she couldn't place, couldn't put her finger on.
Why was it, every time one of these boys died, the inevitable reunion was not what movies would have portrayed? The emotional aspect was generally overshadowed by whatever bullshit they tended to bring back with them.
She reluctantly disappeared into the house after Sam had hauled Dean away, wrapping her arms around herself as she debated grabbing the keys to Baby and following.
"Screw it."
"Jane… she's at the house right now…" Dean had sort of processed what Samuel had said, though he wasn't buying it. Sam was alive, his granddad was alive, and nobody could, or would, tell him exactly what had happened or what was happening. Not outside of a giant family reunion and hunting. "If that thing comes back…" He was pretty sure she would notice if she was in direct danger, her psychic crap, but maybe it wasn't working anymore. She usually was able to tell if he were in danger as well, and there had been no warning… nothing.
"She's fine, I already sent someone there to keep an eye on her."
Dean glanced at his brother, wondering how much Sam had told Samuel about Jane. Samuel looked somewhat amused, Dean wasn't finding this as funny. "You need to take me home, right now."
"Samuel, there's someone coming up the road." Gwen popped her head into the room, frowning slightly. "Woman in a black-"
"Jane." Dean didn't know whether to be relieved or upset. If she was here, it meant she had followed them and she hadn't done it in the traditional sense. "I'm just…" He tossed a thumb in the general direction of outside. "Yeah."
Sam and Samuel both watched as Dean made his way out, Sam not missing the speculating look he was getting from his namesake.
When Dean made it outside, he was greeted to the sight of Christian trying to unarm Jane, and Jane was not taking that very well. Normally, Jane wasn't so… feisty, to put it mildly, but she seemed tense. He didn't know whether to chalk that up to being sort of back on the horse without a saddle or because her psychic crap. Providing psychic crap was even working right. "Hey, hey!"
Christian shifted towards him and Jane took the opportunity to nail the guy she did not know right in the jaw.
Dean was kind of proud of that punch, she had put some weight into it. "All right…" He stepped forward to intervene before Christian could recover, putting himself in front of his wife. "Enough."
Christian was cupping the spot her blow had landed. "She-"
"Nailed you, deal with it." Dean shifted his weight, preparing to defend Jane if necessary. Though, he figured if she kept swinging like that, she'd be able to handle herself. He didn't know these people, he didn't care if they were related to his mother, and he sure as hell wasn't about to start joining in on their family venture. And it was obvious they felt the same way about him.
"Christian." Samuel was outside, and he sounded somewhat amused. "Why don't you go put something on that? It's already swelling." He was approaching them, eyes on Jane. "You must be, Mrs. Winchester."
She eyed him from behind Dean's shoulder. Jane did not like this place, she did not like how it felt, and she did not like the fact that there was something off about this guy too.
"Jane, this is Samuel Campbell." Dean said slowly, nudging her out from behind him, wrapping an arm around her when she was at his side.
"Your mom's… dad?" The obvious issue with that was the fact that Campbell was dead. "Are there anymore of you crawling out of your pine boxes?" She didn't care how crass that sounded, two resurrections, or whatever… in this family. Jane didn't believe in coincidences.
