As promised, time to meet the beasty – I hope you enjoy.
Chapter 9: Silence Versus Violence
Bloomington, Indiana
John and Caleb had located Bobby's motel room, Bobby's stuff was there but Bobby wasn't. They were now following his last known lead of checking on the people closest to Officer Price for the next target. Bobby had presumably found the bad guy, the question was, what had happened next?
Throughout all of this, John kept pushing Caleb about what had happened on last month's hunt. Caleb really wished he'd change the subject. He understood that John was still furious about it. The anger was palpable whenever the topic came up and though John didn't scare Caleb, his anger did a bit. Caleb had seen the Knight go to town on various monsters, he held no delusions about what he would do if Caleb told him the truth.
John had been ready to kill Ian just because Caleb got hurt. If he knew about the threat to Sam and Dean nothing would stop him. And part of Caleb wanted that. He wanted to be there, to watch as those three assholes got what they deserved. He wanted to see the fear in their eyes, their blood on their faces, see them in the kind of pain that even the slightest movement sent it raging through every inch of their bodies. He wanted it, he did. He wanted to shatter the silence but he couldn't. So the best he could hope for was that the silence would shatter itself, that the three stooges would get their comeuppance through no action of his.
Because there were other things he wanted more.
He wanted acceptance. He wanted to be a hunter. And he wanted Sam and Dean to be safe.
Caleb had thought about it. With distance and reflection, he truly felt the best thing was to stick to the story Ian had told. There was no way he could watch over the boys constantly and who knew how many others Ian had ready to act on his behalf. Besides, if he spoke up, if John knew and reacted, it could cause infighting in the Brotherhood. The whole organisation could be brought down, just because of Caleb. He couldn't let that happen, he wouldn't.
If it came down to it, if there was no other choice, he'd quit hunting to keep Sam and Dean safe. But he wanted to believe this was the right place for him, that he could join those venerable ranks. Maybe if he just kept his mouth shut and his head down, the boys would be safe and he could still become a hunter.
The threat to the boys wasn't the only thing that haunted him. Mostly, he wanted what Ian said to have been lies. He knew what some people thought, what Elkins had thought, about what ran through his veins. Despite the reassurances of Mac and Jim, he even suspected it was true, at least in part. But being part-demon was nothing compared to the thought he was part that demon, the one that attacked the Winchesters. He knew the devastation that sonofabitch had caused. He knew what damage it had done to all of them, to the little four-year-old Dean. Caleb had experienced the same devastation himself.
He tried to reassure himself that if it was true, if that thing was a part of him, there was no way John would train him, let alone let him near the boys. But in the deep dark recesses of his mind, in the places where the spiders hid with only thin but strong threads of doubt stretching outwards to catch moments of complacency, in those places the fear lurked. What if it was true and John just didn't know it? What if it was true and John found out? Or worst of all, what if it was true and he, not Ian, was the threat to the boys?
"Did you hear me?" John's question pulled him from his brooding.
"What?"
"What did I say about having your head in the game? If you're not up to this you can stay in the car. I'm –"
"I am," Caleb insisted, sitting up more. "Sorry."
John eyed him for a moment but then nodded. "You're clear on the rules?"
"Stay away from the tongue eating psycho and get to Bobby."
"You do what I say when I say it. If I say run, you do it, understand?"
"What? No!"
"Junior." There was that warning growl in John's voice.
"But that goes against everything. Never leave a man behind. Brotherhood. Protection. All for one and one for all." Caleb seemed so genuinely outraged at the idea that John struggled not to laugh at his zeal.
"It goes along with the part about 'follow the orders of the lead hunter at all times and without delay'," he said severely. "If I tell you to run, it's for a good reason, so you run, got it?"
Caleb nodded but there was still some dispute on his face.
"This is where Gabriel said he was going," John recapped. Officer Price's partner's son had not returned home the night before. Given the argument they'd been having when he left, his parents had assumed he was hiding out at his best friend's house. They had not even started getting worried until he didn't return in the morning. When John spoke with them, they had just started calling nearby friends and family members, but sooner or later they'd report him officially missing. Then John wouldn't be the only one checking out the last place the kid had said he was heading.
Looking at the closed arcade, John's instincts were telling him they had come to the right place but he had no idea what they would find inside. He glanced across at the teen next to him, doubting the wisdom of having brought him. "I go in first, you only follow if I give you the signal, got it?"
Caleb nodded. All distance had left his eyes now they were here. "If it helps, Bobby's in there and he's alive," Caleb grinned. He couldn't help but enjoy circumventing his mentor's attempts to shield him from what might be inside. He had picked up the familiar signature. Though he couldn't get much else.
"And you're just telling me this now? What did I tell you about not keeping things to yourself in relation to a hunt?" John forced down an urge to throttle the kid, keeping that anger in reserve for what they might find inside. "I need everything you've picked up, now!"
Caleb tilted his head, stretching out with his extra sense carefully. "Something is in there with him, some other people too, but I can't get much." Bobby had been easy because he was familiar.
"And this thing?"
"All I can tell you is if people are like stars in the sky, this thing is more of a supernova, and one that is too close for comfort," Caleb grimaced.
"Keep your blocks up, your guard up, and your mouth shut in there. You get Bobby and any civilians out. Leave the supernova to me."
"Well, you can be something of a black hole," Caleb said, keeping his face as straight as possible.
"Enough of one to crush you into oblivion if you don't cut the cheek," John replied, hiding the joy it brought him to see Caleb be more his usual self, if only for a minute.
SPNBROAU
Try as he might, Caleb couldn't get much else on whatever was in the arcade with Bobby but he did confirm that whatever-it-was, presumably this Harpocrates thing, knew they were here. That worked for John. He always preferred a direct assault to sneaking in the shadows anyway.
He sent Caleb to a small delivery door around the side of the building while he used his foot let himself in the front, fully armed and bold as brass.
Caleb, picking the lock and letting himself in quietly, was fairly confident that Harpocrates' full attention was on Johnny. It was hard to think of anything else when a hunter of his calibre was throwing everything they had at you. Caleb glanced that way to see John knock a golden-coloured boy's head aside with his axe before ducking a retaliatory blow.
Caleb focused on his mission, get to Bobby. Far from needing to search though, he spotted the man almost immediately. There was a shimmering cage, completely out of place, front and centre in the arcade. Bobby was inside with two others. A young man, in his early twenties by Caleb's reckoning, and a small boy. Caleb knew he was about ten-years-old but at the moment he looked much younger.
Caleb rushed over, his lock-picking kit still in hand.
"Bobby, you hurt?" he asked, seeing the blood on Bobby's clothes and face. Bobby was a grumpy old jackass at times but Caleb felt a warm rush of relief at seeing him in one piece.
"I'm fine, what the hell are you doing here, Junior?"
"Don't you start."
"Did you stow away?" Bobby looked truly disturbed by Caleb's presence, even though he'd hunted with the boy before.
"Of course not, Johnny brought me." Caleb was running his hands over the bars of the cage, looking for a doorway or lock.
"What the hell was he thinking?"
"He's not the one trapped by Jill Masterson's illegitimate brat."
"You're not going to find a lock to pick, trust me I've tried."
Caleb held his hand still, against the bars. "What is this? It feels weird?" Some sort of energy seemed to come from the cage itself. Not negative exactly but immutable. "And how did you get in?"
Bobby was distracted from answering by a small explosion from the other side of the room. John had used something like a grenade, only with a small impact range, to knock Harpocrates off his feet. As Caleb and Bobby watched, the golden figure was blown into a Donkey Kong machine, which let out the falling blip-blob sound it plays when Mario dies. But, after shaking his head and giving the machine a confused look, Harpocrates was up again, his sights set firmly on the man trying to kill him.
John was twirling his axe with a 'bring it on' attitude and smirking.
There was a small whimper from the boy in the cage which recalled Caleb's attention to the other two people present.
"Anyone else hurt?"
Bobby shook his head no. "The kid's a little freaked, but coming face to face with a freak will do that to you."
The other man in the cage, Caleb guessed he was the trainee hunter Bobby was working with, nodded in emphatic agreement, his gaze fixed on Caleb.
"I have that problem every time I look in the mirror," Caleb smirked at him. Geoffrey looked nonplussed at the confession. "I'm just so freaking gorgeous." With a wink, Caleb turned away from the trainee and focused back on Bobby.
Bobby wondered if Caleb was just reacting to Goofy's expression or if it was worse and he had picked up something from his thoughts of what Ian and Fisher had been saying. "You know your Daddy has ordered that you get a clip around the ear every time you refer to yourself as a freak," he chided.
"Go for it," Caleb challenged. He had already worked out that despite there being gaps between the bars of the cage, nothing could pass through them.
From across the room, debris from another small explosion blasted their way and Caleb was forced to duck. He came back up to see Bobby grinning at him as he rubbed the side of his head, where something had hit.
Despite the fact the Knight was too far away and too focused on the battle to have heard the conversation, Caleb couldn't entirely dismiss the idea he'd done it on purpose, acting on Mac's orders,
John's axe was now buried in the back of one of Harpocrates' shoulders and John was weaving and dodging and clearly trying to get close to the golden figure. Caleb spotted another of the small grenade-like contraptions in his hand. The teen frowned. The earlier ones had blasted this thing back but didn't appear to have done any major damage.
John ducked under one of the golden arms, grabbed the golden head with one hand and with the other tried to force the explosive device into the golden mouth.
Harpocrates grabbed John's neck with both hands.
"Pick on someone your own size," Caleb yelled, desperate to do something, even if it was just to be a distraction.
Hands still on John's neck, Harpocrates turned his head towards the young psychic. Sure enough, the childlike figure was closer to sixteen-year-old Caleb in size than the knight who was taller and broader than both.
John's hand had dropped to the machete tied to his leg but as he brought it up, Harpocrates' head snapped back around. Releasing John's throat, he caught the machete wielding hand in his own. With a sickening crack, he twisted. The machete fell to the floor with a clatter as John let out a grunt of pain.
"So I guess you really are the golden child of the family huh?" Caleb called, taking a step away from the cage and closer to the fight. Harpocrates' attention was dragged back to the teen and he dropped John who collapsed to the floor. "I've always been more of the black sheep myself," Caleb grinned.
Harpocrates stayed silent but studied Caleb with an intense curiosity, his head tilted to one side. Caleb studied him back.
Behind them, John made it to his feet, pulling out a mace that he had tucked into his belt, he went at the silent figure again. The heavy spiked head of the weapon made contact with a clang. Harpocrates spun on the spot and John was thrown back, striking the wall hard, with an oof. Once more he crumpled to the floor, this time not moving.
"Hey!" Caleb was desperate for anything to get and keep Harpocrates' attention, he had to keep him away from John. But his attempts at psychic poaching weren't working. He wasn't able to get anything beyond what Harpocrates chose to share with him. He eyed the figure. Harpocrates may be ancient and powerful but it was the youthful face that gave Caleb an idea. The golden figure was a child, still. A child with powers and no voice. Caleb had been there himself. He had a strong suspicion of exactly what the kid would say if he could, and what he would never want said aloud.
"So let me get this straight, your mom took your voice so you couldn't tell anyone she was sleeping around?" He took another step closer, ignoring the quiet profanity that slipped from Bobby's lips behind him. "Wow, she'd rather spend time with all those other people than with you."
Harpocrates had returned his attention to Caleb. His expression changed, the calm curiosity shifting to pain, anger.
Caleb pushed his advantage. "Hey, I get it, your mommy was a whore and you weren't allowed to tell anyone. Sucks for you but we've all got problems. No need to take yours out on us."
Harpocrates looked devastated then furious. His eyes blazed, literally, and Caleb's smile of triumph suddenly fell. His breath caught. He staggered back, like he'd received a blow, and let out a cry.
"Junior?" Bobby cried, fighting again against the bars of the cage but they were as unyielding as ever. "Balls!"
Harpocrates glared with vicious pleasure as Caleb grabbed his head with a further cry and dropped to his knees.
"John, wake up damnit," Bobby yelled. He'd never felt so damn useless.
"No!" Caleb insisted loudly. "That's not true!" He let go of his head and glared at the golden figure who somehow seemed larger, yet more childlike.
Harpocrates moved a little closer to Caleb but not close enough to make physical contact.
There was fury in Caleb's eyes as he tried to get up, but then agony ravaged his face again. He gasped and squeezed his eyes tightly closed. After a moment however they popped open again. "Why would you tell me that?" He whispered, looking imploringly at Harpocrates. With a groan, his hands holding onto his head for dear life, Caleb fell.
Harpocrates stared at him. Satisfaction gave way to surprise, just a brief widening of the eyes, a slight O of the mouth. Then there was resignation, then sadness. The golden figure looked at the scared little boy who was crying in Goofy's arms behind Bobby. Harpocrates started to cry too. Silent tears welled in his eyes then overflowed. Glittering from the gold beneath them, they made streaks down his cheeks.
Caleb was down but was trying to get himself back up, one arm and one leg trying to push the rest of him from the floor. He looked back, his face devastated with the impact of whatever Harpocrates had revealed to him.
"Hang in there, Junior," Bobby urged. "WINCHESTER! Front and Centre!" he yelled in a desperate attempt to wake the unconscious Knight. He was somewhat surprised when he heard a groan in response.
Where Harpocrates' tears ran, they left cracks in the golden skin. Some tears fell onto his chest where more cracks appeared. He glanced down at them then lifted his eyes to stare at Caleb sadly. The golden boy seemed to have shrunk back to a size more fitting his young face. Making it look all the more impressive and yet disturbing when the large imposing figure of John Winchester rose behind him and, with a full-bodied swing of his mace, struck the child.
A loud unnatural knell sounded at the impact. The fractures on Harpocrates' skin spread rapidly, webbing out, until there was no smooth surface left. The knell was followed by a loud crack of warning. Bobby launched himself protectively over his cage-mates. Caleb covered his head with his arms, and John started backing away quickly. Then Harpocrates exploded into gold coins that bounced and rolled in every direction, scattering around the space.
When nothing further seemed to happen, Bobby looked up. John hadn't been able to back away far enough and had been thrown by the explosion but he seemed to be moving, at least a little. Caleb had scuttled back from the bouncing coins as if they would burn him. He was now huddled, staring blankly and not moving.
A moment later, the coins shattered into dust and an unnatural wind blew through the space, blowing all traces away.
"Whoa, how did he do that?" Goofy asked, drawing Bobby's eyes to him. But he was not looking at John, he was looking at Caleb. And it was fear, not awe, that laced his voice. It seemed at least some of Ian and Fisher's crap had stuck, despite Bobby's attempt to correct it.
"I don't know who did what," Bobby said. He knew a Hail Mary when he saw one.
"But Reaves used his mystical mojo and basically exploded that thing with his mind," Goofy whispered.
"Looked to me more like Shineybutt tried to use 'mystical mojo', as you call it, against Caleb and it backfired. Besides, it was John that dealt the blow that scattered shineybutt's carcass across the floor." Bobby thought whatever had happened with Caleb had actually led to Harpocrates' destruction but since he didn't know exactly what that was, and given Goofy's reaction, it was better to give credit to the Knight, at least for now.
Geoffrey screwed up his face, not in dispute, but as if he was rerunning what he'd seen against Bobby's explanation.
"Look Goofy, this is how this works sometimes. No matter what anyone tells you, the truth of the matter is, a lot of this game is improvisation and dumb luck."
"That's nuts," Geoffrey was shaking his head, some combination of shock and awe now on his face.
"Being nuts is a job requirement in this gig," John said, groaning into a sitting position, eyes scanning the room.
"Yep, sane people need not apply," Bobby grinned, glad to see the Knight was OK. Goofy seemed satisfied. Bobby's concerned gaze refocused on Caleb. "Junior?" The kid was still down, his arms wrapped around himself, his shoulders heaving.
John looked to Caleb too and struggled to his feet.
"What happened?" he demanded. Reaching the boy, he put a hand on his shoulder. Caleb flinched away from his touch. "Bobby?"
"I'm not certain but I think our resident smart-mouth got Shineybutt to break his own rule," Bobby said.
"What?" John asked, bending down to try and meet Caleb's eye. "Junior, talk to me, are you hurt?"
Caleb shook his head slightly. He was grey as a corpse. He took a couple of breaths, obviously trying to pull himself together.
"He told me a secret," he said quietly, his eyes looking anywhere but at the two senior hunters.
John's demeanour changed to confusion. Somewhat unsteadily, he crouched before the boy. "What the hell did he tell you?"
Caleb looked at him. There was a pause, then he shook his head. "It doesn't matter."
John didn't know what to do to help the infuriating teen and before he could think of something the moment was interrupted.
"Will he come back?" The terrified squeak had them all turning to the little boy. Gabe had uncurled himself somewhat but still looked like he really just wanted somewhere to hide.
"No," John became more certain and determined again. "He's not coming back, he's gone. You're safe now."
"A little too safe," Bobby pointed out. "You wanna get us out of here or what?"
"How did you get in there?" John asked. After another worried glance at Caleb, he stood and moved to the cage to inspect it. "If it was Hippo-whatsit, shouldn't it have disappeared with him?"
"It wasn't his trap," Bobby confessed reluctantly. He'd worked it out during the long wait before the cavalry arrived, watching Harpocrates pace outside trying to work out how to get to them. "Jim had me pick up an artefact last week. I still had it on me. Somehow, during the fight, something set it off."
"It would have been more useful to trap the bad guy in it, rather than using it to shut him out." There was amusement in John's eyes.
"Really, smartass? I never thought of that," Bobby groused sarcastically.
"So how does it work?" John asked.
"Damned if I know." Bobby pointed to the small box that had rolled under a nearby arcade machine which was tilted against its neighbour some way from the cage.
"Junior," John ordered. He knew Caleb would respond better to that than coddling and he wanted to get him moving before shock set in.
Caleb struggled to his feet and went to get it.
"Careful," Bobby tried to warn but Caleb had already picked it up and was turning it over in his hands. He wandered back towards the others, poking and prodding at the device. It looked a little like a puzzle box, except that none of the sides seemed to move or slide at all. The dull blacked coating was that of old, uncared for silver and as he turned it over again he noticed a slight glint. He grabbed the corner of his shirt and rubbed at one of the surfaces.
John moved closer to see what had caught Caleb's eye.
"Hey, isn't that the same symbol that is on the table in the," Caleb glanced towards Goofy and adjusted his comment, "library." It wasn't in the library, it was in the Tomb but he knew John would know what he meant. He held the small box up to John for a second opinion. Through the blackened coating it was hard to tell but there did seem to be some sort of symbol scratched into the silver.
"What?" It was Bobby that caught on first. "Give it here."
But the box would not be passed through the cage bars. The mystical block prevented it.
"Great," Bobby said, giving up on the effort to reach the box. "The only one of us that actually wears the thing needed to unlock it and I'm stuck in here."
"What are you talking about?" John asked, feeling insulted even though he wasn't sure how.
"That mark means this was created for or by the Brotherhood. So I'd guess the symbol of the Brotherhood is the key to opening it. But since Goofy here is too new, Junior is too young, and you are a stubborn sonofabitch, I'm the only one packing." Bobby held up his hand and wiggled his fingers.
John caught on. He was tempted to let Bobby believe he was right, just so he could leave him in there a while longer, but there was an innocent kid trapped too and Gabe looked like he really couldn't take much more.
"Caleb, get my bag," John said, with a hard stare at Bobby.
Despite the Knight's glare, Bobby felt relief. He had been worried they'd have to call in another hunter so even more people could witness his humiliation.
Caleb fetched John's bag and John winced as he crouched to rummage through it. He had his back to the others, so no one could see what he was doing but eventually he stood again, grasping the nearest arcade machine to steady himself as he did.
When he turned, in addition to the wedding ring he always wore, he had a silver ring on his index finger of the same hand. He frowned at it slightly, as if it, not the small box in his other hand, were responsible for the cage.
John moved the box to the same hand as the ring and grasped it firmly. It was small enough to fit in one hand but big enough that even John's large paws couldn't completely encompass it. As he tightened his grip, the box glowed slightly, the black coating giving way until the silver shined like new. Then the cage started to glow too.
John's focus remained on the box. He turned his hand over, so he could see his hunter's ring, feeling something through the silver band as it connected with the silver box.
When he looked back at the cage, the top was gone. Then the sides fell away, freeing the occupants. A moment later, all traces of the cage had vanished. The box stopped glowing and returned to its innocuous looking, unkept state. The overlapping circle pattern etched into it, once more hidden by the blackened silver sulfide.
As John turned the box over in his hand again, speculatively, Bobby watched him. He found himself musing whether any Brotherhood member could have unlocked it. Sure, he'd been able to activate the cage somehow but he suspected it might take the extra mojo of a Triad ring to deactivate it again.
John slipped the box into his pocket without offering it back to Bobby, then they set about clearing any traces of the supernatural and their presence from the space. Bobby and Caleb did most of it, with John barking out orders as he did his best to secure his broken arm. Goofy stayed with Gabriel.
The act of working out the box and the orders John gave him, seemed to have pulled Caleb from his post-battle stupor but Bobby could still see the haunted look in his eyes at unguarded moments. He glanced towards John. The Knight was functioning as if everything was business as usual, but Bobby doubted he was unaware. He was probably just waiting until they'd cleared the scene and got away from prying eyes to address it.
Goofy seemed to keep a distance between himself and Caleb as they packed up. Bobby and John shared a look over it and silently agreed.
"I know Jim named you Knight, Winchester, but wasn't the mace a bit much?" Bobby teased, a small smile of gratitude showing through the grumble as he handed the item back.
"The lore said to break his silence, and there isn't much that thing won't break," John shrugged. Bobby recalled he'd also had an axe slung from a belt around his hips as well as the small grenades. The man had come prepared for all sorts of armour.
"Your translation is off, it's shatter, not break, though it turns out that was more literal than I thought. But I'm not sure any regular weapon would have done it. Goofy here thought that Junior irritated the thing to death," Bobby grinned over at the psychic who, having lost his deer in the headlights expression, even managed a snort at the insult.
"That was pretty much Deuce's suggestion," he grinned.
"Why doesn't that surprise me," John said, turning to pick up his machete with his good arm. The two boys must have pulled another midnight pie raid, since he knew they hadn't had any other time together since the job came in.
As they headed out, Bobby turned his eyes on John. "'Course, bhañj has a lot of meanings, including to shine, to vanquish, to breach a fortress –"
A chuckle from Caleb interrupted him. "I'm glad Mac didn't get to that translation," he shuddered. "If I had to watch Johnny try to breach Goldenbutt's fortress I'd have been scarred for life."
The look Caleb received from John showed the Knight was neither amused nor fooled by the attempt at normalcy.
Sudden laughter made them all turn to Geoffrey. Noticing the look John was giving him, Goofy quickly stopped, swallowing hard and looking to Bobby for help. Bobby avoided getting involved by retrieving Gabriel's coat from the machine he'd be playing before the attack began and bringing it to him.
Once satisfied the new hunter had himself under control, John turned his attention back to Caleb who was still pale and had pain pinching his face.
"You're driving, Junior, or one of you is, maybe the middle one," he grinned, even as he tried to blink the extra Calebs from his vision and hold out the keys in the right place.
SPNBROAU
AN: Jill Masterson was the character painted gold in James Bond, Goldfinger. Caleb plays a little fast and loose with the story of Harpocrates in this chapter however, his goal is not to be accurate but just to goad Harpocrates.
Thank you for reading, only a couple of chapters to go, much love to you all xx