Chapter Text
DEAN: Where are we?
...
DEAN: Is this Flagstaff?
...
DEAN: This is a good memory for you?
SAM: (laughing) Yeah. I mean, I was on my own for two weeks. I lived on Funyuns and Mr. Pibb.
DEAN: Wow.
SAM: What?
DEAN: Well, you don’t remember, do you? You ran away on my watch. I looked everywhere for you. I thought you were dead. And when Dad came home…
SAM: Dean, look, I’m sorry. I never thought about it like that.
DEAN: Forget it. Let’s roll.
Nine days.
It was nine days later, that John came back to the Flagstaff Motel, and had found his eldest sitting on the edge of a chair, rocking back and forth, fidgeting all over, the young adult he left behind looking like a lost six years old kid more than ever.
“I’m sorry, dad. I’m sorry. I’m sorry...”
John looked him over, the room, the mess, registering the empty Nerve Damage cans and the countless take-away coffee cups.
And the lack of his other son.
“..Dean.. where is Sam?”
But Dean just wouldn’t look him in the eye.
John repeated his question, this time - as a command.
A silent, pitiful “I don’t know.” was the answer. And that was all Dean could produce.
Dean looked awful, too pale to describe; his eyes red rimmed and blank, lips dry and chapped, hair all over and ever which way.
Methodically squashing his rising levels of concern, John threw his bags aside and opened one of them, taking out a little plastic bottle.
He approached, unscrewing the bottles' lid, shaking it, and offering Dean his palm.
A sleeping pill... Dean noticed, foggy and unbalanced.
“Take it.” And Dean did.
---
Nine days.
It was nine days already that Sam was on his own, surviving on junk food and accompanied by a stray dog. And he was running out of resources.
He began acknowledging the fact that he ran himself into a corner: he wasn’t self-sufficient enough. Yet.
His little endeavor of independence, was, well just that - he had no clear “after” and no clear “now”. He came to realize he had no objective, no definition. He wanted nothing.
Well that was a lie.
There was something.
Someone.
---
Dean was out within a second, his systems over-exhausted, his body slumping on the spot. He gently slid of the chair, legs first.
John caught Dean midway. He dragged his unconscious son to the nearby bed, the situation reminding him his time back in the army.
Except Dean was heavier.
Malnutritioned, caffeinated and probably dehydrated - he was still an impressive mass of fine muscle and as tall as John himself, not like most of his army buddies - the ones he had the misfortune to drag around injured were usually smaller, and much, much less muscular then he, or his eldest son - at any given age - were.
Carefully placing Dean on the bed (picking up his legs one at a time), John set by him and scratched his own three days old stubble.
He looked around.
Awareness, heavy and thick as tar, crept around him, engulfing him... Immobilizing him.
John had the tendency to drive himself crazy thinking about the worst the moment any kind of action was over - he literally could never rest.
Not since Mary.
He would think. Theorize. Come up with a number of solutions to the same goddamn puzzle, spin himself into a paranoiac mindscape. And then - get trapped in it. That’s when Dean would usually be shaking him out of it.
But Dean wasn’t exactly up to it right now, was he?
He was alone, and he had a task. A mission.
He took a deep breath and scanned the room over again.
The little they had could be categorized via three distinct piles of belongings: The ammo, the books and the personal crap.
Said personal crap could be divided in two and a half - his, Dean’s and Sam’s.
Since whatever was Dean’s - was usually also Sam’s, Sam had very little of what he could call “his own”.
And whatever could be called “little of Sam’s own” - was not in the room.
John sighed deeply and covered his face with the palms of his calloused hands, rubbing at his eyes - one third of him relieved that Sam wasn’t abducted (probably); one third furious at the fact that he probably ran off (most definitely), and one third numbingly terrified that he has very little to go on (definitely).
There were two distinctive problems about the situation: One, the fact being that Sam was good at hiding and covering his tracks. Well, he learned from the best - which were his father and brother. On top of that, Sam had a brilliant mind of his own, and that would make him that much more harder to find. The only person who ever, ever, had any chance at cracking up what’s on Sam’s mind was - well, lying behind him, comatose.
The second would be the fact that Dean was the first on scene.
And that was a problem, because, not like his father and brother - Dean didn’t keep notes.
He just didn’t.
Every time Dean was the one on “research duty”, it culminated in him storming out of a building, or a room, literally attacking his family in arms with something along the lines of - “We have to go now! It attacks at dawn, on Patrick’s Ave. every thursday, except tomorrow! And we need crocodile skin to counteract it!” - never providing any research notes or evidence. Dean could literally be storing tons of information in his head for any kind of later use and would be giving out only what was needed at the moment and nothing more.
In a sense, he was a genius: John knew that, Dean’s ability of sorting and storing all that information in his mind, not needing any notes or a board to solve a mystery - just to think the facts over and have the right decision, the right answer - it was beyond impressive.
Yes, a remarkable ability indeed - on a battlefield.
Horrible when it came down to leaving clues for others to chew on.
And that meant John had nothing to go on, as his only starting point and source of information was in a bad shape and very, very silent.
He had no other option but to wait.
To pace around, convincing himself over and over that Sam will be fine, and that he will be found, and that the thing after us after him didn’t caught our scent there are no omens around all seems quiet this is all just our little family drama our family business we can handle this -
- Dean... I need your help goddamnit!