Enjoy The Ride 3b/6

[soncnica]

Title: Enjoy The Ride 3b/6
Author: soncnica
Rating: PG-13
Genre/Pairing: Sam, Dean, gen
Wordcount: cca. 3.000 words (this part)
Summary: Dean gets cursed, because he can't keep his paws to himself, when Sam says so. But Sam finds a cure, one which Dean will definitely not enjoy the ride on. So Sam has to play dirty.
Warnings: gross, icky, disgusting imagery (the usual from me, LOL), season 2, language and if you suffer from Chaetophobia, please do not read this!
Disclaimer: I seriously only own the grammar/spelling mistakes. Everything else is NOT MINE! ALL IS FICTION.
A/N: Can be found in part 1.

CHAPTER 2b:

A day ago

The motel they were staying at was called The Daisy Day motel, but there was nothing daisy about it. It had blood red bed covers, grimy windows, and a bathroom full of trees. Painted on the wall trees, but trees nonetheless. Colorful trees. If one would take some drugs and go hide in the bathroom, woooheeee, what a joy ride that would've been.

Dean had been stuck to his bed and the TV, while Sam'd been stuck to the table and his laptop throughout the two days they'd been in the room, both of them giving the bathroom sneaky glances, both of them freaked out by the trees in there. In the 'real' world – the one out there, behind the four walls of the room - trees could hide many a thing, and who was to say – with the crazy they've seen – that the trees on the walls couldn't hide many a thing as well.

They'd been all over the small town since they arrived in this god forsaken place, talked to the mother of the latest victim – Angie had been her name, with hair the color of strawberries – talked to some of the townsfolk, got so much information that at one point Dean's head started to spin and he thought he was having a brain melt down, printed out all the newspaper articles they could find, been to the morgue, been to the little police station, did all they normally do but what made them go eureka had been Sam's little sneeze fest he had in the car two days earlier. The smell of grass, yeah right … it had been a minor sneeze fest then that went and morphed into a big sneeze fest until they were forced to visit the little – archaic – pharmacy on the main street.

For something against the sneezing, because they needed sleep and sneezing every five minutes would not bring them that. And to stock up their first aid kit, because they were low on … basically everything.

"Hello there, fellows. What can I help you with?"

And that was all it took for Sam's eyes to widen in the eureka moment and for him to splutter something that sounded like 'uh nothing, gotta go, thank you, bye' and run out of the pharmacy like a clown had been on his ass.

All Dean could manage to say was 'uh' and point to his temple, making a circular motion with his finger and run after his brother.

He said it a million times already and he would say it a million times more, but his brother was just so weird sometimes.

"What the hell, Sam?"

They were standing on the sidewalk, getting dirty looks from the passerby's, because they were blocking their way. Whatever. They were here to save them, save their daughters, and that gave them the goddamn right to stand wherever they goddamn wanted.

"Dean, the pharmacist…"

"What?"

"It's him."

Sam's voice was a whisper; like he just shared the biggest secret to end all secrets to his brother, although by the way they were acting – all nervous and suspicious and shifty and standing there in front of the pharmacy like the idiots that they were, giving out all kinda signals and red flags to the pharmacist who was watching them from behind the counter – Sam could've screamed it at the top of his lungs, for all it mattered.

"Dude, we're not suspicions standing here at all, come on." he grabbed Sam by his shoulder and pulled him further down the sidewalk, giving the pharmacist a little wave and a grin; nothing to see here, buddy, we'll come kill ya a little later you son of a bitch.

They stopped by a little café, the smell of coffee wrapping itself around them, making Dean's mouth water, but … now was not the time for leisure and pleasure of the coffee kind, now was time to get down to business, because his little brother sniffed out a clue and a clue often turned into the case halfway done and that … meant Dean got to kill something.

Freakin' finally, because this dry spell of not killing anything had to end. He itched to grab his gun and squeeze the trigger, one, two, three times, or as many times as it would take. He itched to feel the handle of his favorite knife in his palm, chop, chop, slice and dice. He itched to do something, and to stop this sitting on his ass, he had been doing for some time now. He needed to kill something that wasn't his brother. Wanted to see death that wasn't his dad.

"Okay, how do you know?"

Sam huffed and leaned further down towards Dean, trying not to scare the people who were going in and out the café. Because talking about warlocks and red-headed little girls was a sure fire way to get noticed. And they couldn't afford to get noticed.

"I saw him on a picture. In one of the newspaper articles. Dude, a scar like that, I'd never forget it."

"So?"

"The article was from nineteen thirty-three."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Okay, but next time, don't go weird like that. You know better than to freak out like that, okay? You probably tipped him off. Idiot."

Sam rolled his eyes. He had no intention to argue. He couldn't. He didn't have the strength in him to argue with Dean right now.

He sighed and followed his brother down the sidewalk.

And here they were now. Sam behind the laptop and on the phone with Bobby, multitasking both and a cup of coffee and Dean on the bed staring at the picture of the guy – the same guy they saw earlier – in the article.

The scar, the hair, the nose, the eyes, his everything. Exactly the same. And the picture was from 1933, for Christ sake and the dude hadn't aged one tiny bit.

He wanted to go hunt down the son of a bitch. He could already feel adrenaline starting to build up in him, his eyes clouding over, the need to shoot or burn something so strong inside of him, that it scared him for a second, but just a second, because then he looked at Sam, looked at his brother who was hunched over the laptop, typing furiously while speaking with Bobby on the phone. His brother, who he was supposed to kill. The man who was trying so damn hard to save others, giving up everything, giving up sleep and food and ruining his eyes with the glow of the computer … how … how could he kill him? What the hell was his father thinking?

He could never … ever …

"'kay, thanks Bobby."

He took a sip of his too warm beer and shook his head. He could never kill Sam. If Sam would go dark side or whatever his father thought would happen to him … they they'd go down together. Drive off a freakin' cliff or eat a bullet, but he was not gonna kill his baby brother. No matter what and his dad can just …

Oh God, dad…

He cleared his throat, getting that pesky warm and choking feeling to go back down to the depths of his soul: "Found anythin'?"

"Yeah," he watched Sam stretch his arms up to the ceiling and move a little to the right and a little to the left, getting his muscles to unlock, "man, I found too much. This is just … this is just … disgusting, 's what it is, man."

Dean finished the bottle of beer and put it on the night stand. Disgusting? Disgusting was what they did. Disgusting, nasty, gross, weird, creepy … that was what they dealt with. They were like pest control – seen it all and more but still kept on going at it.

"Talk to me."

"Well, it is a warlock. And he's been, or well, is still, using red hair for spells, cures and by cures I mean ointments, syrups, creams, pills … you name it."

"Seriously?"

"Not kidding, man. Seriously."

The beer suddenly tried to make another appearance, but Dean swallowed it down.

"That's as nasty as it is disturbing. Why?"

"I don't know. Bobby send me some pages of a book … says here that red hair had been used in some healing processes and for certain spells and I guess the pharmacist … well, dude, he's a pharmacist. Do I need to explain more?

"Uhh, please don't."

He would very much love to keep that beer down. He would very much love to drown that beer in whiskey, but one couldn't always get what one wanted.

"Yeah…"

"Okay, so," he clasped his hands, "how do we kill it?"

"Well the book says to burn what holds the warlock's power, but, and Dean, I'm quoting this, do not touch, but do find a way to burn it."

"Burn what?"

"I have no idea. Something that's giving him power. Could be anything really."

"Okay, so we'll improvise."

"How?"

"Well it has to be something that he has on him or close to him at all times, right? Because he needs that power. So … when we get to his little pharmacy of horror, we'll see what he holds near and dear."

"Dean, that's …" suicidal.

"Sam…" I know, okay, but I need this asshole dead, no matter what it takes.

Sam nodded and looked down at the keyboard, seeking answers for what the hell to do with his brother. All the keyboard gave him was a jumble of letters in no order at all … just like his brother was at the moment. A mess of things out of order.

Damn it …

"Anything else?"

"No. Just burn the thing and don't touch."

"Okay, so burning yes, touching no. Got it."

"Dean…"

"What?"

"Promise me you won't touch a thing. Don't even look at anything, don't even breathe on anything."

"Dude, what am I? Five?"

"Dean, please …" I can't lose you, okay? I can't…

"I promise, okay? Happy now? Can we just…" he sighed, because he really didn't want to fight with Sam right now. He was this close to hunting mode and one step over the line and he'd hurt his brother and he didn't want that. They were both hurting enough without any physical pain added to it.

"… can we just get ready, go, burn, and leave?"

"Yeah, okay."

They were both so very tired.

"We leave tonight?

"Damn right we go tonight! I wanna burn me some warlock or well the thing that gives him power, although 'm hoping he'll burn too."

Sam chuckled, because damn right Dean wanted to kill/burn/slaughter something, and the warlock was just at the right place at the right time.

"So? Anything else about him?"

A freaking pharmacist of all things. Someone who hands out drugs for a living. Jesus Christ, but some assholes are cunning, Dean has to give 'em that.

The warlock had been alive for centuries, luring redheaded little girls into his secret labs all over the world for freakin' centuries. Centuries. Not just years or decades, but centuries. Seven to be exact, or so the book said.

Seven centuries of cutting off little girl's hair – and killing them - to use it for spells and cures; syrups (oh dear God but that one made him puke a little in his mouth) and pills and ointments (he gagged a bit with that one, because seriously?) and shit and that just had to end. You don't just go around cutting off little girls red hair and making syrup out of it and live to see another day. It had to end.

And ending it had been relatively easy actually, easier than most crap they faced in the past. Which of course should have been Dean's first clue that something was wrong. Wrong as in very, very wrong.

But moving among all the glasses of weird liquids and boxes of 'I don't wanna know what's in there' and more glasses in which red hair was swimming in, floating in, there was no time to think shit through. It was do, act and kill. Now, now, now, before the warlock could cast a spell on them or blast them into next year or a few years in the past, never mind the details.

"Seriously? A black robe? Imagination ain't your strong suit, huh?"

"Hunter, you mock me, but I can see … your soul … you are unwell."

"Oh God, a speech? Seriously?"

The warlock's head tipped to the side, thinking, contemplating, seeing: "You carry something on your soul, it is making you sick, making you hurt. I can help you with that."

He rolled his eyes: "Please, shut the hell up."

He wanted to shut the warlock up the old fashioned way – a fist to his face – but he had a plan and if he'd have to listen to the crazy to get the plan to work, then he'd do it. All part of the job.

"Hunter, I have been alive for seven hundred years, I have seen your kind kill and be killed, have seen it all, but you … you are something else, hunter. Your soul shines very bright, while his," he pointed at Sam who was lying very still by a wall, "shines very dark. I can help you with that too."

"Okay, let me guess. Gonna give us a potion, made of little girls hair, right? And that's gonna make us all okay?"

He needed just a few more minutes and then all this fucked up crap spilling out of the warlock's mouth would be gone.

"Of course. It is the best cure, after all, as it holds courage, passion, beauty, anger, fire. Blood. Sacrifice. All things you know best, am I correct, hunter? And people who came here in search for cures to aid their diseases, their illnesses got them. I was doing nothing wrong."

Dean wanted to puke. He really, really wanted to puke all over the dirty, cold cement floor.

"Oh so, killing little girls and scalping them was doing nothing wrong?"

The warlock grinned, the scar opening up and leaking something that looked like pus or blood, Dean had no idea, but it made him nauseas even more than he already was.

"The … stain … on both of your souls … it is sacrifice and anger. Martyrs, hunter? Really? The red you two share smells so … interesting. So strong. Especially in him. His … blood smells black. Fascinating."

He clenched his jaw and gritted his teeth, because goddamn it. Son of a bitch. He was starting to see red, anger flowing in his veins, a snake ready to attack.

"Oh, I know you two are brothers, hunter. I can smell red between you, the blood … it smells the same, yet not."

The warlock's teeth were sharp, pointy and black and he was close enough now that Dean could've grabbed that damn stick and burn it.

"'m glad we can entertain you."

The warlock squinted his eyes: "There is no need for a sharp tongue, hunter. I am just telling you the truth. You and he are blood, connected by fire, but he is danger while you are sacrifice and red can fix both of you."

What was the son of a bitch talking about? He had heard of crazy, hell he had seen crazy, but this was crazy with crazy on top and crazy on the side.

He had enough. It was enough. It was all enough. He rose up from the ground and charged at the warlock, knocking him down to the ground, grabbing the warlock's - staff?, stick?, twig?, branch?, he'll go with stick – and ripping it from the warlock's tight grip. They figured out very quickly that the stick was what stored the warlock's power – his magic – when the warlock raised it up and send Sam flying to the opposite wall.

"Ha ha, got it."

He flinched when he felt something sharp bite at his palm, but forgot about it a second later because the warlock was looking at him and smiling.

He looked at the stick; it was made out of wood, probably made of some ancient tree species that no longer existed on this world anymore, and when he light it up, it caught fire like it was made of gasoline. Which should have been Dean's second clue that something was horribly, weirdly, terrifyingly wrong.

"Huh …"

Was all he said when he dropped the burning stick to the concrete floor of the mad warlock's creepy laboratory under the pharmacy.

"Well would ya look at that crazy ass twig burn."

He looked at the warlock and how fire was starting to eat him from the feet up. The warlock's smile – that gross scar puking out even more blood or pus - should have been his third clue that something really was so wrong on so many levels.

And the fourth clue? The biggest one of all? The warlock laughing: "You touched it, hunter." just before the flames rose up his whole body and turned him into ashes.

But before he could get any deeper into the weirdness of it all, Sam came around with a groan and a feeble attempt to get from his ass to his feet. Dean just hoped that everything was okay with Sam's head, because they had to get out of here before the police would come snooping around and find them among jars of floating red hair.

"You 'kay, Sam?"

"'m fine, yeah …"

Sam's eyes were a bit huge, bigger than normal, but he seemed coherent which was okay in Dean's book and meant that they could haul ass and run.

"Okay, come on. We have to go."

He grabbed Sam's arm and pulled him up.

"You missed all the fun, man."

"Did you burn the stick?"

"Hell yeah. Burned like dried grass."

"You didn't touch it, right?"

Uh-oh.

"Umm, let's go."

Well shit then.

CHAPTER 2a _II_ CHAPTER 3

Comments

[soncnica.livejournal.com]

Woohooo, damn right me and plot! :-):-) lol :-)
Need me some plot to make the hurt hurt more! *licks lips*
*hugs you*
Yeah this is set summer of 2006, so right after John died, the Impala is fixed, but Sam hasn't broken his arm yet .. so everything is still so fresh in Dean's mind and he is (whenever he gets the chance) thinking about his dad and his death and what dad said about Sam and it is killing him, aww poor puppy! But he hurts so pretty!
Oh yes, Dean is amazing with kids, just amazing and while in S2 he was still young (not like now in S9, when he is older and connects with kids differently) he was awesome with kids and any case involving dead kids, would hit hard .. still does!

I will... next chapter is all hurt and Sam trying to comfort ... trying being the right word, because all he can do is be there and keep Dean from falling on his face *sigh*

Thank you babe! *huggles*
Xx

S.

[ferrous-wheeler.livejournal.com]

Okay, now I understand everything, and it is great!! Love Dean getting lost in his head about his Dad and that he might need to kill Sam, and Sam's own worries about Dean. Fantastic banter!
That pharmacist/warlock is super creepy, and, though we got a teaser of what Dean's in for, I'm dying to find out what's next :)

[soncnica.livejournal.com]

Hey! :-)
Lol, sorry for the time jumps, I know they can be confusing (well, they always confuse me) but I needed them to keep up the mystery and the case :-) but now all is revealed and phew, now I can move on to the hurt :-)
Thank you! Those two boys and their banter is what made S1, S2 soooo awesome! :-)
I hope you won't be disappointed by what comes next, because it might not be what you're expecting .... *bites nails*

Thank you for reading! :-)

S.