Stranger Than Your Sympathy
Part One - Freshmen Year
Chapter Seven
"I'm bored," Dean said from his position on his bunk, where he had been lying down, staring at the ceiling for what felt like an entirety. He had been in a foul mood since he got off the phone with his dad.
Benny, who was the only dormmate who hadn't fled from Dean's moodiness, looked up from his notebook he was doodling in absentmindedly. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. I'm not used to staying in one place for so long. I feel…itchy." It was more like he felt like he could crawl up the walls. Normally, if he were stuck in a motel for weeks like this with Sam, he at least had his little brother to take care of and worry about. "It's been weeks since I was attacked and we don't got jack shit."
"Don't sell yourself short, cher," Benny said. "I'm sure you'll hear from ole' Sinclair any day now."
Dean heaved a heavy sigh. More waiting. He wanted to do something.
"Unless you'd like to get a little revenge early?" Benny drawled, closing his notebook.
That got Dean's attention. He sat up. "What did you have in mind?"
"Well, when we were workin' on those hex bags a couple weeks back, Ash and I may have grabbed some…extra supplies."
That was almost enough to make Dean flop back on the bed, he was still lukewarm on using any sort of magic.
"Now, I know how you are cher, but magic don't always have to be bad. Look at what Cas did with that map. And this is just a little swamp trickery, anyway."
"Swamp trickery?"
Benny shrugged. "Yeah, we get bored down there on the bayou. Learned some tricks. And Prickolas is gettin' bolder and bolder. I reckon he thinks that's just gotten away with what happened on the stairway."
He wasn't wrong. For a little bit, the annoying kid had stopped taunting Dean so much, but the snide comments had resumed in the last couple of days of class.
"Alright. What'd'ya want to do about it?"
He grinned.
"Well, first things first, cher, we're gonna have to give those shadows of yours the slip. And I got just the thing."
Dean raised an eyebrow. Digging under his bed, Benny pulled out his suitcase and dug to the very bottom. He pulled out a bomber jacket. It was made of a rich brown leather with a soft-looking collar and with an American flag patch on the side. On the left side of the front, there were dozens of tiny bombs painted on and on the right, a name badge with flying wings overtop it.
Dean whistled, he recognized a military garment when he saw it. "Nice."
"Oh, it's way more than a jacket, brother," Benny said with a grin, "been in my family for generations. Mon père gave it to me before I left for school."
"What does it do?" To Dean, it looked like a standard-issue jacket. Sure, it was in great condition, but… Benny put it on and turned invisible.
"Ah!" Dean exclaimed.
Taking it off, Benny reappeared, a huge grin on his face.
"What the hell Benny?"
"Cool ain't it?"
"You get that off a witch?"
"Nah. It was given to an ancestor of mine hundreds of years ago when the family was still livin' in Vendée."
Dean gave him a blank look.
"France."
"They had bomber jackets hundreds of years ago in France?" Dean was pretty sure that Benny's family was full of shit.
Benny just chuckled. "Wasn't a bomber jacket back then – it changes shape every couple of decades. My grandpappy wore this one during World War II. Made him one hell of an effective pilot."
"'Cause it looked like no one was flying the plane?" Dean was very skeptical. This said demon-witch or cursed object all over it.
"'Course not. Here, just see," Benny climbed into his bunk and put the jacket back on. The entire bunk disappeared.
This time Dean managed not to shout. "Get that thing off of you," he hissed instead. "It could be cursed."
He chuckled. "Chief, glad to know you care so much," Benny teased, once again visible. "There's lottsa family lore on it. But that ain't the point. We can use this to slip outta here without anyone following us."
Dean eyed the jacket. "We're not both going to fit into that."
"Didn't think we would, I just need to hold your hand and we'll both be invisible."
"Aw, Benny, if you wanted to hold my hand man, you coulda just asked." Dean couldn't help but tease. Benny was Dean's type – good-looking and gregarious, but Dean knew that he was completely besotted with Jo. So, in the meantime, it was fun to flirt with his friend.
Benny didn't seem to mind either. In fact, he had turned it into a competition when they were out around other students - both of them escalating the sexual tension to try and make the other one laugh first.
"I know, cher," he said with a wink.
"And Cas and Ash? Should we wait for them?"
"Nah, I think you this would be better just you 'n me. We could all hold hands and be invisible, but it gets to be a bit much beyond two people."
It also meant that they wouldn't be met with Cas's disapproval or Ash's off-the-wall ideas. Leaving without being seen would also make it more difficult for anyone to accuse Dean of whatever they were about to do later. The whole school knew that Dean was under Gryffindor surveillance at almost all times.
He held his hand out.
III
As they made their way through the busy common room, Dean saw the wisdom of keeping this little adventure between the two of them. He had nearly run straight into one of the Campbells (another one whose name he hadn't bothered to learn the name of) when the guy had stepped into their path. Keeping silent had been even more difficult than the quick footwork.
Next, instead of attempting to weave down the stairs to the library, where the secret entrance was, the two of them pulled down the trap door to "heaven."
Holding hands while going up a ladder had also been quite the feat.
From heaven they could enter a secret staircase that wound all the way around the lighthouse, and, if the map was accurate, into a cellar. From there, they could either follow a secret passageway that looked like it might get them past the wards (Dean made a mental note to find out if this was Pam's secret way out of the school) or they could use a trap door that should put them just outside the teacher's building.
They had been watching this secret passageway enough that they were pretty sure that no one else in the lighthouse knew about it. Either that or Cas hadn't met them yet.
"This is gonna be a tight squeeze," Benny said from the entrance of the tunnel. Peering around him, Dean held his breath. There was exactly enough room for one person and even then, he thought that his shoulders may be a little too broad. The stairs were steep and made with slates of wood with large gaps in between them.
"You think it's safe?"
Benny shrugged, "Would it stop you if it wasn't?" There was an edge of a challenge in his voice.
"Hello no," he said with more bravado than he felt.
"Ladies first," Benny said, indicating that Dean should enter the stairwell ahead of him.
"You're lucky Jo ain't here to hear you say that," Dean muttered. "And if you were scared and needed your not-girlfriend to coddle you, you should'a just told me."
He hoped that the staircase was better looked after than it appeared from them looking at the map and that the wood wasn't rotten when he stepped on it. He tentatively put his weight on the top step. He let out a sigh of relief when it held and felt solid. This would be a lot easier, knowing that it was unlikely that he was going to plunge to his death.
Dean had just started going down the stairs, when Benny came behind him and closed the door, making the passageway pitch black.
"Well, that's not creepy at all," he said as he continued to move one step at a time, like a toddler going down stairs for the first time. "I can't see a damn thing. Would it have killed them to put in some windows?"
"What's the fun of a secret tunnel if it ain't a little spooky?" Benny asked behind him. Dean couldn't refute that point but he did wish they had brought a flashlight with them.
It felt like hours but, eventually, Dean moved his foot to go down another step and found solid ground. He tripped a little, which made Benny, who had been just half a step behind him, ram into him, nearly sending him crashing onto the floor.
He turned to glare, but it was still too dark to see, so it had even less effect than it would have if Benny could've seen his face.
"No more stairs – what now?" Dean asked.
"We should be in the cellar now – or close, keep moving forward."
Plunging into the dark, Dean proceeded ahead, a little faster than he had been on the stairs. He kept going for a couple hundred feet before he walked straight into a wall, banging his nose.
"Ouch!"
Benny chuckled, "And that's why I made you go first."
Dean ignored him. "How are we supposed to get outta here?" He had been hoping that there would be some sort of reprieve from the total darkness.
"Dunno, feel our way?"
"Didn't you bring a flashlight?" He hissed, annoyed.
"Didn't you?" Benny shot back.
"Cas woulda brought a flashlight," Dean grumbled as he reached his arms out in front of him to try and find the walls of what, on the map, had looked like a cellar.
"Cas wouldn't've risked goin' down those stairs."
"Maybe not if you'd've asked."
"Found it!" Benny exclaimed from somewhere in the room. There were sounds of metal clinking and then a flood of bright light that made Dean blink as it blinded him.
He took a deep breath – he didn't realize how stale the air had been until the fresh sea air filled the whole room. "Thank god," Dean said and headed toward the ladder that Benny was already half way up.
After getting to the top, Dean spent a couple of minutes basking in the cool Autumn sunshine. Even though he left the lighthouse to go to classes and occasionally down the school beach, it felt like it had been forever since he had been…out. Like he had some sort of freedom.
"Quick, we don't to be seen," Benny said, moving away from the cellar they had just emerged from.
For a moment, Dean had completely forgotten what they were doing. Benny disappeared underneath his bomber jacket and seconds later, he felt his hand get clasped once again.
The sun was just beginning to set as they headed into the lighthouse. On the grounds, there were a couple of groups of students who looked like they were making their way back from a day at the beach. Some were sitting out on the picnic tables on the lawn, studying, although it was soon going to be too cold for that.
They made their way inside and to the library. Which also had its fair share of students studying. Dean recognized a couple of the Ravenclaws that he saw here all the time when he was doing his research. Nerds, he thought.
They stopped just short of the door that had the secret entranceway into the Slytherin common room. Dean was about to mutter the password as quietly as possible when Benny stopped him with a hand on his arm.
"Wait a moment, cher," he said under his breath. It was difficult to do one-handed – since one was still on Dean, but Benny managed to pull out the map to take a look.
Dean couldn't believe that he hadn't thought of that.
He moved to peer over Benny's shoulder, but before he even could, Benny had started to move his arm up to pull him over to the stacks a couple of steps away from the entrance.
Sure enough, about ten seconds later, a student that Dean didn't recognize strode out of the room, not looking even a little concerned that he would be spotted.
"Anyone else in there?"
Benny glanced down.
"Don't think so, we should be in the clear."
The two of them, now linked arm in arm like a cheesy couple in a movie, were able to move as one as Dean said the password to a portrait that wasn't connected to the door that they had just seen the other kid walk out of. What looked like a normal wall of the library opened. Not wanting to waste any time, Dean and Benny slipped in.
The room that they entered wasn't much bigger than the barracks in Gryffindor Tower but it was still incredible. In the center, there was a wrought iron spiral staircase – with some sort of fancy design on the sides. Lining the walls were bookcases made of, if Dean had to guess, a deep brown walnut. But while most of the shelves were covered in books, there was one that had a large scimitar on display. Dean started inching towards it when Benny tugged him away.
"Not now, chief," he chuckled, "dinner is about to start in the mess, we best be getting up to the common room. We don't want to be too late ourselves."
Dean pouted for a second, but the promise of a little bit of revenge was too good to keep him from grabbing and playing with the sword.
If the map was right the Slytherin common room was basically the same as the Gryffindor. At least in layout. And this spiral staircase would take them to a hidden corner of the room, just tucked behind a bookcase.
The lanterns on the staircase were burning too low for them to be able to check the map before entering the common room, but it had been clear when they had been at the bottom of the stairs, so they assumed that it still would be when they arrived, even though they had to go up at a snail's pace.
"Woah," Dean said louder than he should have when they stepped into the room.
"Shh," Benny shushed him, before looking up and saying, "Well I'll be damned."
While it may be the same size and shape as the Gryffindor common room, that was where the similarities ended.
The entire room had a green tinge to it – like there was a film over all of the lights that made them glow green. The black leather furniture looked like it would be normally in some rich asshole's mansion, rather than a place for students to hang out.
The walls all appeared to be made of stone like they were in a castle or even…
"Feels like a friggin' dungeon in here," Dean remarked.
"Who knew Slytherins were so kinky?" Benny asked.
Dean barked a laugh and then slapped a hand over his mouth. They both looked around wildly to see if anyone was there or if they had heard that. There was no one in sight.
"Close one," Benny muttered. "Come on, let's find Prickolas' room."
It was easy enough to do. Each room had an engraved silver plaque that had the year displayed. The freshmen boys weren't located in the same room as the freshmen boys of Gryffindor but a door down. Underneath the plaque was a second one, that looked a lot newer.
Pureblood Revival
Dean silently pointed it out to Benny, who made a face.
Cool band name, Dean thought, even if the term itself was vile.
Carefully, Benny went to pull the door open. It was locked.
Benny looked disappointed, but Dean was nothing if not prepared. Running his hands around the doorknob, he felt to see if there was anything magical keeping the door locked. He didn't find anything, so he pulled out the lock pick he kept in his pocket and showed it to Benny, who grinned.
It took Dean less than five minutes to get the door to click open.
They practically tripped over each other trying to get into the room first. The adrenaline surge was almost better than a hunt for Dean – a Slytherin could come in any minute, but he couldn't wait to mess with this son-of-a-bitch's stuff.
The room wasn't anything like their cozy barracks in Gryffindor Tower. It was the same size, of course. But instead of the metal bunk beds, it looked as though two small lofts had been built so that in the place of each bunk were plush beds made of the finest wood.
"Well, this ain't fair," Benny said at full volume.
"No kidding," Dean said for a second and then felt bad, "Whatever, I'd take Gryffindor Tower over this place any day."
And he meant it. Somehow, everything here was cold. He couldn't imagine smoking pot in here with his friends or joking around in this space. The whole place was immaculate – not a sign that anyone actually lived there. He'd take Ash's dirty socks and Cas's books strewn all over the place just so that he could feel at home.
Dean couldn't help but wonder if his dad had slept in this room. Or his grandfather. He couldn't imagine John Winchester in this space. It was too comfortable. Too luxurious and plush.
"Which one do you reckon is Prickolas's?" Benny asked him, taking him out of his thoughts. His friend had removed his bomber jacket and held it draped over his arm so he was no longer invisible.
"Just look for the grease spot on a pillow," Dean only half-joked. Seriously – he had no idea how that kid's hair was so dirty all of the time.
"Nah, it's easier than that," Benny said, pointing to more small silver plaques. Vaught was neatly etched into it and placed on the side of one of the bottom beds.
"What'd'ya bring?" Dean asked. "Itching powder? Some super glue? Oh – you know, one time I replaced Sam's shampoo with Nair and it was…"
"Nothin' that Muggle, brother. Got something good cooked up." Out of his bag, Benny pulled several small sachets that Dean recognized as stolen from their Wards and Sigils class. Dean hated it. "Don't worry, I've got more than this planned, help me out here." He went to the opposite side of the room from where Prickolas' bed was.
"What are you doing?"
"Can't just hit the target – that would make it too personal. Hey, you got a knife on you?"
Of course he did. He pulled one out of his boot and handed it over to Benny, who climbed up to the loft on the opposite side of the room and cut a small hole into the bottom left corner of the bed, where he placed a hex bag. He quickly covered the hole with the sheet from above.
"Don't just stand there, I've got like six more of these to hide." He tossed two little bags down to Dean, who was trying his best not to think about the witchcraft that had to be used to make these and instead think about the revenge he was getting. He went over to one of the thick velvet curtains covering nothing and used the knife he kept on his hip to carefully place the small bag as high up as he could.
"What will these do?" He asked as he was looking for a hiding space for the next one.
"I was wonderin' when you were going to ask."
"Don't like this witchy bullshit."
"Yeah, we know, but this is all pretty harmless. Hey – put that one in Vaught's bed. It'll produce water so it looked like he wet his sheets. Cas added somethin' to make it extra special too. Best part is if he destroys it but even one fiber of that thing remains, it'll just keep happening."
"That's genius."
"I know. Can't even take full credit. Remind me to never get on Cas's bad side. That kid has some wacky ideas. You shoulda heard some of the other spells he thought up. Ash and I had to talk him down."
"I didn't think he had it in him," Dean admitted, thinking that there was a reason that it was just him and Benny on this rule-breaking mission. But, obviously, Cas had been on board.
"Yeah, well, you shoulda seen him after you were attacked. He looked ready to smite the mofos who messed up your pretty face. Think he's got quite the crush."
"Naw, he likes Lisa," Dean said absentmindedly as he worked harder to hide the bag. He had frequently seen the two of them together since she had walked up to his campaign table. It surprised him that Cas had gone out of his way to befriend someone other than the people in their dorm, but he could hardly fault the guy. Lisa was smoking hot.
"Lisa the Hufflepuff?"
"Yeah. Saw them the other day. He could do worse, honestly."
Benny just shook his head like Dean was an idiot.
"And now, the piece de resistance," Benny said with a strong French accent and a grin.
"What that?" Dean asked as Benny pulled out what looked like a small vial filled with a dark substance from his bag.
"Somethin' that will actually get Prickolas into some real trouble," he went into the closet space closest to Vaught's bed and practically cackled.
Dean moved so he could see. Inside, there was a respectable amount of clothes (certainly more than what Dean had), and in the center was a shelf that looked like a smaller version of the ingredient cabinet from their Wards and Sigils class.
"Knew that jackass would still keep something like this." Carefully, Benny placed the vial onto a stand with several other vials of similar shapes and sizes. With his fingernail, he scraped the top to remove a small sigil that Dean hadn't noticed before. "We best be getting out of here," he said, backing away slowly, "don't want to be caught anywhere near that."
"But what is it?"
"Tell you later," he pulled his jacket back on in a swift movement, disappearing underneath it. The door started to creak open but Benny grabbed Dean just as one of the other Slytherins from their year entered. Guy…something…Dean tried to remember.
He was muttering to himself and beelined straight for his bed (the one lofted over Vaught's) and grabbed his backpack quickly before leaving again, seemingly in a hurry.
Dean let out a breath.
"Let's go," he muttered to Benny.
"Yeah, I think we've done 'bout all we could here."
The two of them left as quickly as they could, walking together.
III
The worst part about secretly pulling a prank was that it was secret. All throughout dinner Dean had to pretend that he and Benny had not just done the coolest shit over. He wanted to crow to everyone, but a couple of warning glances from his friend stopped him. And Benny still refused to tell him about whatever it was that he had planted the night before. His friend had the audacity to claim that Dean wouldn't be able to keep his mouth shut about it.
After some consideration, Dean accepted that Benny was probably right. But he'd never let him know that.
The next morning, he woke up extra early, not wanting to miss a second of the fun. He tip-toed so as to not wake up his still-sleeping roommates and grabbed everything he would need for the day.
Dean was carefully closing the door to the room when he heard a voice.
"You know, it'll be hard to deny any wrongdoing if you show up to breakfast earlier than you have managed all semester," Cas said wryly.
He jumped. "We really need to put a bell on you or something," he muttered, as he pouted and flopped down on the sofa across from the armchair that Cas was sitting in, only slightly hidden from view. He couldn't deny the logic behind what the dark-haired kid had said. "You're determined to keep me from being expelled, aren't you?"
"As if I could prevent that inevitably," Cas responded, closing the book he had been reading. "I need something to look forward to. I can only imagine the peace and quiet the entire school will fall under once that happens."
"Ah, Cas, you'd be so bored without me. I mean, come on, the elections are comin' up in just a couple of days and you're in the lead for becoming class president."
"Yes, a job where I have to continue to socialize with the students in this school when I'd prefer to keep my head down and just make it through high school unscathed." His delivery was flat and sarcastic, but Dean thought that Cas was secretly enjoying the popularity.
"Uh huh. So, it wasn't you, when Benny was putting together those hex bags, that added the spell that would localize the water to make it look like Prickolas peed himself?"
Cas looked offended. "Of course not. I was responsible for the part that would make his clothes smell like urine. Really, Dean, do you think so little of me?"
Dean barked a laugh. "Oh, how the mighty have fallen," he chuckled, "it didn't take us even an entire semester to corrupt you."
He had learned the night before that during one of his marathon sessions in the library, his friends had not only planned the prank, but they had run a heist of ingredients to put the hex bags together. They claimed that they had just been spying on Mr. Sinclair to gather intel, but it had led to them taking a few choice items from his inventory.
Cas sniffed, but Dean could see the curl in his lips.
They sat and chatted idly for a little bit about nothing of any importance – they couldn't risk talking about real things in the middle of the common room.
The peace was disturbed when Jo came storming out of her room, looking quite disheveled and irritated.
"Harvelle! Benny's not even awake yet, what's with you?" Dean called after her.
She turned around and glared. "None of your damn business."
Before she could move to leave the room, Cas asked her gently, "What's wrong Jo?"
She sighed and her expression softened. Dean didn't know how Cas managed to have that effect on her, but he briefly wondered if it made Benny jealous.
"Nothing. I just – I need to go meet a friend."
Dean and Cas exchanged a quick look. As far as either of them knew, Jo was such a staunch Gryffindor that she didn't have friends outside their house. Ash had even commented that if he had been sorted anywhere else, he wasn't sure that she would have talked with him.
"I have friends that aren't Gryffindors," she said, correctly interpreting their look.
"Do you?" Dean asked.
"Fuck off, Winchester," she said, before actually leaving the room in a huff.
A couple of older years looked at them oddly, but only spared a couple of seconds before heading out as well.
"Does this mean we can go get breakfast now? I'm starving!" Dean said.
Cas sighed. "Yeah. Let me put my uniform on first. Do not leave without me."
He hadn't even noticed that Cas hadn't changed out of his casual weekend clothes.
It didn't take more than a couple of seconds for him to get antsy. Why is this taking so long? He wondered, jiggling his leg.
This is stupid, he thought, bounding up from the sofa. If he left now, Cas would catch up in a couple of minutes.
"Winchester," he heard as soon as he was up.
"Jody," he responded. "You're up early."
She cocked an eyebrow. "I'm up early? I rarely see you more than a minute before rollcall for breakfast. Usually, you're several minutes late. What are you up to?"
"What makes you think I'm up to anything?" He asked with a casual smile.
Her eyes narrowed. "Because we've not had any trouble from you in the last couple of weeks and I don't believe that you are reformed that easily."
"Reformed?" He asked with mock indignation. "You wound me. I am the model of a Hogwarts student. I'm top of my year in most of my classes, you know."
"Uh huh," she said. "Well, keep it up." Sean, who Dean learned was her boyfriend, came out of his room, and the two of them left for breakfast as well.
"I expected that you would have left without me," Cas said from behind him.
Dean jumped. "We talked about this Cas. Personal space."
Cas smirked and didn't back away. "Benny and Ash are stirring, but said to go on ahead without them. Also – thought you might want this." He held out Dean's backpack which had all of his books. He had honestly forgotten that they had class today because he was so excited to see the aftermath of their little prank the night before.
"Thanks, dude," he said, slinging it over one of his shoulders as they headed out of the common room and down the stairs. He was practically skipping every other stair in his excitement, which got him several odd looks from other students heading down to breakfast.
They were about to enter the mess when Cas put a hand on his shoulder. "Wait."
"Why?" He asked.
"Shh," his friend said, with a serious look on his face, "follow me."
God, Cas is strange, Dean thought and weighed just going in by himself, but he trusted Cas, so he followed his friend. They were only a couple of paces away from the mess when he heard the whispered voices that must have attracted Cas.
"I don't know what I'm gonna do," a guy was saying, he sounded like he had been crying, "my dad isn't just going to disinherit me, he might just have me murdered, and…"
"Prickolas?" He mouthed to Cas, barely able to contain his glee.
Cas nodded.
Dean hadn't expected their prank would make the asshole cry. This was great. The two of them followed the voices. Before this, he hadn't known that there was anything on the floor of the lighthouse except for the cafeteria, but Prickolas and whoever he was talking to were wedged in an alcove on the outside of the room, tucked away.
Backs flat against the wall so that neither the students going to breakfast nor the two in the alcove could see them, they listened in.
"Nicky," a girl's voice that Dean couldn't hear well enough to identify said, "it'll be alright. It didn't belong to you, did it?"
"No! Of course not. I'm not an idiot. Getting caught with something like that – it wouldn't mean just getting kicked out of the school, but at best I'd be blackballed from the registry, and at worse, a couple of year sentence in Azkaban."
"They're not going to send a fourteen-year-old to Azkaban," the girl scoffed.
Dean looked questioningly at Cas, who just shrugged. Neither of them knew what that meant.
"You don't know that!" He exclaimed.
"Shh," she shushed him. "We don't want to be overheard."
"You mean you don't want to be overheard. Can't let those perfect Gryffindor friends of yours know that you're slumming it with a lowlife Slytherin like me."
"You know I don't care what those idiots think of me," she responded, "you're my best friend, Nicky. I know you aren't like the rest of them. I know that you wouldn't have something so…disgusting in your personal stores. Look, someone obviously broke into your room. Just tell the teachers the truth. Mr. Cervantez is a good guy, he…"
"A good guy? Are you kidding? He…"
"Shh," she repeated, "be careful what you say in here. Look, we'll find a way to prove that you're innocent."
"My word against Winchester's?"
"You don't know that it was Dean…"
"Oh, is it Dean now?" he sneered. "Have you fallen under the same spell as the rest of the school and started to worship a Winchester of all people?"
Dean winced as he heard a loud slap.
"You ass. You know what happened. How dare you, after…"
"I'm sorry," Prickolas, sounding pathetic. "I know. I'm sorry, I'm just so worried, Jo…"
Cas grasped Dean's arm tightly and yanked him away so that they could no longer hear the conversation.
"Jo?" Dean whispered. "Jo is…"
"Don't say it," Cas said.
"Did you…"
"No."
"Does Ash…"
"He must," Cas said grimly.
"Does Ash, what?" Ash asked, coming up behind the two of them and slinging his arms around them casually.
"Nothing," they said at the same time.
Benny, who had been just behind him cocked his head in a question.
"We'll talk about it later," Cas said.
"But…" Dean started – he wanted answers now.
"Later," Cas insisted.
"Fine!"
The four of them went to breakfast. The very atmosphere of the room was tense. Dean wasn't sure why until he spotted the entire slate of faculty sitting at their table, all of them grim-faced. While there were always a couple of teachers present at meals, it hadn't been all of them since the beginning of the year feast. The room was also filled with whispers and people glancing around – not the usual sleepy Monday morning scene.
Dean did his best to ignore it and kept chatting with his housemates. "Did you get through that homework set by Turner, Cassie?" He asked the girl as he sat at the table with his food. "I gotta tell you that essay really…"
"Did you hear?" She whispered to him.
"Hear about what?" He asked, not whispering.
"There's going to be an expulsion hearing," she said, keeping her voice quiet.
"You don't know that!" Pam interrupted her, also keeping her voice low. "That's just a rumor."
"Where d'ya hear that?" Benny asked, looking super pleased, which made Dean feel uneasy. What the hell had Benny gotten them into?
"My friend Donna heard from Lisa who heard from a freshman Slytherin that there was an attack on the Slytherin common room last night during dinner. They called in the teachers to investigate and find out who did it but…"
"Do they know who did it?" Dean interrupted, his uneasiness increasing. Despite his conversation with Cas this morning, he did not actually want to be expelled from Hogwarts. Yeah, he'd love to get back to his dad and brother but he could never do what needed to be done out there. And his dad would be forever regarded as a screwup and…
"Of course not," Cassie said, "that's what all of this is about. The teachers didn't find out who it was, but they did find an illegal substance in one of the kid's stuff – something stolen and that kid is under investigation. She didn't know who though, guess we do now."
"Was it you?" Jo asked icily, surprising them with her sudden appearance and steely demeanor. "Did you do this Winchester?"
The accusation stung a little more than Dean had expected.
"Did I what?"
"You know what!" She practically yelled. "Did you frame Nic – Vaught?"
"When was I supposed to have done that?" Dean asked, trying to modulate his voice so that he didn't sound like he was denying it too much. "I was here at dinner last night. You saw me. We talked."
"You were late," Cassie said, looking at them with interest.
"Yeah, well I'm also followed by someone in this house at all times. How the hell do you think I managed to sneak off and do anything when the older kids are always watching me?"
"Lafitte," Jo said, turning her attention to the Cajun kid. "You've had it out for him since we started."
Benny held his hands up in a gesture of surrender. "I think you've got that wrong, cher," he said, "Vaught 'n I go way back 'n it wasn't me that started nothin'."
"Yeah – he's had it out for me since day one. It was him and his little sidekicks that attacked me on the boat," Dean jumped in to defend his friend, "If Benny hadn't've been there, I might have started my freshmen year in the infirmary."
"That was a misunderstanding," Jo said. "He didn't know…"
"You defending Slytherins now, Jo?" Dean asked, loudly enough for the entire house to hear him. "I thought you hated them all."
"I – I… I never said that, and most of them…"
"Leave Jo alone," Ash jumped into the fray. "She doesn't have to explain anything to you."
"She's the one accusing us!" Dean exclaimed, hardly believing that Ash was taking Jo's side in all of this. After all, he had helped plan the prank. "Framing Prickolas? That no-good, slimy, son-of-a-bitch deserves whatever comes at him…"
"Where do you get off defending Slytherins at all," one of the Campbell kids chimed in.
From there, Dean lost track because Cassie started yelling at the Campbell as he continued to try and get through to Jo and Ash and the entire Gryffindor table exploded into a cacophony of angry voices yelling at each other.
A sharp whistle sounded, making everyone stop yelling at lookup. Standing at the head of their table was Principal Cervantez with Bobby and Mr. Sinclair flanking him on either side. His armed were crossed and it was the most pissed off that Dean thought he had ever seen the man.
"That's better," he said, sharply. "Gryffindors – sit down. Shut up. And listen."
Everyone did, vaguely guilty looks on all their faces.
The entire school was now staring at their table.
"Principal Cervantez…" Jody started to address the man, standing from the middle of the table. She looked ready to go to war in defense of her house.
"Ms. Mills, sit," the principal snapped.
She glared. "If you're going to accuse our freshmen of something then…"
He sighed. "Your loyalty to your house is admirable. I'm not going to accuse anyone of anything. Please, have a seat."
The expression on her face was stormy, but she listened at sat back down.
"Everyone, listen up," Cervantez said, "obviously the rumor mill is as healthy as ever. Last night, a prank was pulled against Slytherin house. It was mostly harmless in nature. That is not what is of concern. While cleaning the mess, staff discovered a highly dangerous and illegal substance. At this time no one is being accused of anything. But if you have any information, please report it to a member of staff as soon as possible. Now, breakfast is over. Get to class."
Dean looked down sadly at his unfinished plate of food.
"Now," he barked. Dean grabbed his backpack and shuffled out of the mess with everyone else, grabbing a bagel from Benny's plate on his way.
III
As the last of the students left the mess, the whole lot of them quieter than was natural, Bobby came and stood next to Carlos. The other teachers had left with the students, leaving just the two of them standing there.
"Demon blood, huh?" He asked him.
Carlos sighed. "Yeah. What the hell was Sinclair thinking having it in here in the first place?"
"What were you thinking letting that jackass teach here?"
"You know I didn't have a choice, Bobby," he said tiredly, "I thought we had weeded his type out of the Council years ago. But he still had enough influence with HUCUSA to get in here."
"And you're sure the kid didn't do it? 'Cause I gotta tell you, there's no way Dean would even know how to identify the stuff." He didn't think, at least. John was on a dark path, but Bobby couldn't imagine that it was so dark that his fourteen-year-old kid would be involved in something so shady.
Carlos gave him a sidelong glance, "Missouri said that Vaught was telling the truth. Naturally, she's refusing to help with this investigation beyond that. Said that she wasn't a cop and that I should pull my head out of my ass. And that was the nicest thing she had to say."
Bobby chuckled. He may be a cantankerous asshole, but he admired the hell out of Missouri Moseley.
"I think she may be protecting the student who did it. And I've got to think that she has good reason."
"So, you do think it was Dean," Bobby surmised. It was no secret that both she and Bobby cared a great deal about him. "You know, the kid hates magic."
"Yeah, I know, Sinclair complains about it nonstop. Something about wasted potential. And I didn't say that. I'm more worried about the crowd this kid is running with."
"Lafitte? Ain't no family more firmly set the old set than that family."
"No, not his roommates. None of the Gryffindors. But you know that Sinclair is planning his gathering. I can't stop him, but he is required to give me a list of initiates."
"And Dean's on it?" Bobby would have thought that was impossible. After John's cock up in his time here and his subsequent complete rejection of the hunting community, he was still a little surprised that Carlos convinced the Council to allow Dean into Hogwarts in the first place.
"Yeah. I was surprised too. But the stuff he's looking up in the library…"
"You've been keeping a sharp eye."
"Not me. I'm the principal of the school, that would hardly be appropriate, Bobby."
Bobby snorted. "Latika, then?"
"Yeah, she pretends to be angry about being in the library but I know that she's secretly happy to be looking out for Mary's kid. And she did always love books."
"I just don't know what they would want with a Winchester at all. 'Pecially one that is half Campbell."
"Desperate times call for desperate measures. There are still people out there who, despite John's best efforts, respect the family name. Removing Dean from his influence for school and starting to indoctrinate Sam with their "homeschool curriculum" might be enough to let the rise where their dad fell."
Bobby felt a little sick. He should have taken the boys away from John years ago. On top of being dismissive and verbally abusive, he had clearly lost his sharp edge. If he had ever had one, to begin with. However, that could have been because of his own upbringing outside of the hunting community. Without Henry to guide his son, John likely had no clue about the bias bred into the homeschool curriculum. And Sam would take to those lessons like a duck to water.
"I don't like it," he grumped.
"No. Me neither. So, if you can, encourage Dean's connection with Lafitte and Novak. The two of them should be a nice counterbalance. See if you can't convince John to leave the boys with you some this summer, try to suss out how much damage has been done to Sam."
"Won't that be a little late?"
"I don't know. But with what we're facing – well, we better hope not. Now, I've got resumes to review and you have a class to prep for."
Bobby knew a dismissal when he heard one and he stormed out of the mess, throwing a few glares Carlos's way. If only he didn't love those boys so damn much. Too late now, Singer, he thought to himself. It was time for him to start making plans of his own.
Hi everyone! I am so sorry that this is a week late. Honestly, I wrote most of the beginning of this fic during Nano and then I decided to make major structural/plot changes which meant that I was rewriting instead of writing. This leads me to the bad news - this is the last of what I had even a little pre-written. I'm going to take the month of March off to try and catch up. I don't like the pressure of writing and immediately posting what I write, I prefer a dependable posting schedule of pre-written work. This story is a slow build into the main plot so these early parts are really important for the impact of later events and that, sadly, can't be rushed.
Kudos to those of you who picked up the not-so-subtle hints I was making about the Campbells.
Thank you to everyone reading still. This fic isn't as popular as my last one, but I'm having so much fun writing it that I'm not sure I care. I really appreciate every bit of support I get. If you want to keep up with me and possibly see some sneak peeks, you can find me on Tumblr under the same name.
See y'all soon!