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Damage Control - 2x10 Hunted

Sam feels queasy, and not just because of the gory murder scene they just left behind.

Ava. What happened?

A demon was involved. That much is clear from the sulfur left on the window sill. But why did they find Ava’s engagement ring on the floor? Had she left it? Had the demon taken it off her? Why?

Uneasy questions rotate on a sick cycle in Sam’s stomach as he sits beside Dean in the Impala. They’d figured it was best to put some miles between them and the murder site after placing an anonymous phone call with the police. Don’t want to get caught up in an investigation that might target them as suspects. Even more so since they don’t have any answers, only questions.

“Hey, you good?”

Dean shakes him out of his thoughts, giving him a worried side-eye.

Sam wrinkles his nose. “No. Not really,” he admits.

On top of his uneasiness, Sam is feeling the after-effects of his vicious fight with Gordon catch up with him. The split in his lip stretches uncomfortably when he speaks, his face is swollen around the cut on his cheekbone, his nose hurts and his stiffening back is screaming for a heating pad they don’t have. None of his injuries are serious and he’s used to pushing on through minor hurts like these, but the day’s events weigh heavily on him and amplify his soreness.

“You’re worried about Ava,” Dean states, nodding in understanding. “I get it.”

“We need to find her, Dean.” Sam clenches his good hand into a fist.

“How? If the yellow-eyed demon took her, she could literally be anywhere.”

“And if she took off on her own?” Doubt laces Sam’s voice.

“You think she got away?” Dean’s brow wrinkles, but he keeps his eyes trained on the road. The lights of another small town wink out behind them.

“Maybe. She’s not a hunter, but she’s smart. Maybe she had a vision and saw it coming.” Sam’s heart does an anxious flip. “Or maybe…”

“Maybe what?”

From the look on Dean’s face, Sam doesn’t think he needs to say it out loud. Behind that stoic mask, Sam can see quiet horror lurking. And the same fear that tightens his own throat.

“What if…” Sam starts, then stops and has to wet his smarting lip to get the words out. “What if she’s the one who did it?”

Dean’s eyes look big in the shadowy car. “Kill her fiance? You really think she did it?”

Sam lifts his hands, lets them drop into his lap again. “I don’t know! I’m just- … What if he made her do it? The yellow-eyed demon. What if he made her… go darkside? Or forced her to slit his throat?”

“Sam!” Dean shakes his head. A muscle in his cheek twitches. “That’s some dark shit, man. Seriously! You said she was a nice girl. Why would she suddenly turn evil?”

“Why not?! You saw what happened with Max. How he flipped, just like that. And Ansem Weems? Andy’s twin brother? He was insane! A cold-blooded killer!”

Sam feels bile burning up his throat. As much as he’s clung to his conviction that they can thwart whatever the yellow-eyed demon is planning, he’s got to admit that things aren’t going their way.

Beside him, Dean does an unconvincing job of clinging to the same hope. “Come on, Ava isn’t like that,” he claims, although he’s barely met her. “You said it yourself - not every psychic kid turns into a monster. Andy didn’t! You didn’t!”

Sam looks at his hands.

“Not yet.”

Dean slaps the steering wheel. “For fuck’s sake Sam! I’m tired of hearing this! Of you saying that! Can we just stop expecting you to go Chucky the killer doll?! I’m sick and tired of it, man!”

Sam can tell that he truly is. Anger wafts from Dean in waves. He’s pissed at Sam, pissed at Ava and the yellow-eyed demon and the whole diaspora of psychic kids. He’s pissed because he’s scared.

“Stop pretending, Dean,” Sam tells his brother, glumness making him suddenly calm. “I know you’re thinking the same thing. I know you’re just as afraid as I am that all of us - Andy, Ava, me - will turn into supercharged monsters. That the demon wants us to. You’re just too afraid to admit it.”

“I’m not-” Dean breaks off and, instead, grips the steering wheel hard and stares ahead, fuming silently.

It’s all the answer Sam needs. He was right. His big brother is afraid - of what’s to come, of what he can’t prevent, of what’s going to happen to him.

A question has been churning in Sam’s guts, a feeling, and he lets it out into the brooding silence between them.

“What did Gordon say to you?”

Dean’s eyebrows knit together. “What?”

“Gordon. When he had you. I could hear him talking when I snuck in. Something about another psychic kid he’d found.”

Dean squirms in his seat. “You heard that?” He’s avoiding Sam’s eyes. “How much more did you hear?”

Sam feels his mouth go dry. Dean is clearly uncomfortable. Clearly wanting to hide something from him. For a moment, he considers not prying any further, to be left in ignorance, because whatever it is Dean doesn’t want to talk about - it’s certainly not going to ease Sam’s mind. But Sam’s never been one to stop picking at a scab, even if it means he’ll make himself bleed.

“I didn’t hear enough to make sense of it. So tell me - what else did he say?”

But Dean’s still deflecting. “Listen, Sammy,” he says, talking to the black tarmac stretching out before them into the night. “Do we have to talk about this now? I almost lost you today. Dammit, I thought I had lost you when that second grenade went off. I thought you were dead!”

He looks over at Sam, eyes glittering - with tears? Anger? “Can you just, for once, give me a friggin’ break?”

For a moment, Sam almost relents. The pain in Dean’s voice is visceral. It’s not just an act to shut down the conversation. But Sam can’t let this go.

“No, Dean,” he says determinedly. “No, I’m sorry, I can’t give you a break. If Gordon said something about the psychics - about me - I deserve to know. I have to know!”

Clearly upset, Dean shakes his head left and right, holding on to his composure. Sam hears him mutter a curse under his breath. Then the Impala slows down and, expression dark, Dean pulls the car over onto the soft bank of the empty interstate. He shifts the lever into park and kills the ignition. Silence settles in the car. Taking his hands off the wheel, Dean looks out the windshield, his profile stark and chiseled in the moonlight that seeps inside.

“You want to know what Gordon said?” he asks ominously, and suddenly Sam isn’t so sure anymore that he does.

He licks at the split in his lip, tasting copper. “Yeah, I do,” he says and sounds braver than he feels.

Still not looking at Sam, but out into the night, Dean begins to talk.

“Gordon said he’d captured a demon. Tortured him. Got him talking. The demon said there was talk of someone - something - forming an army. An army of humans, to fight on Hell’s side. Not just any humans. Psychics.” Finally, Dean turns his head to look at Sam. “Like you, Sam. You and the others.”

Cold sweat breaks out on Sam’s skin while his mouth goes dry.

“And Gordon said he’d found another of the psychic kids,” Dean continues, his voice eerily flat. “A guy who could electrocute by touch. Hadn’t harmed anyone so far, but he’d killed a dog. Don’t know if it was accidental. Gordon put him down. He said he was going to put all of the psychics down - including you. Said you’d all turn into killers eventually.”

Sam swallows hard. His heart hammers in his chest. For the last few months, he feels he’s been running a race against an obscure enemy, ignorant of its prize, only sensing that losing would be catastrophic. His visions, Dad’s death, the ominous warning he gave Dean, the discovery that there were others just like him, the yellow-eyed demon - the puzzle pieces are falling into place now, and what he’s looking at feels like one of those stark, terrifying oil paintings of the Apocalypse. Skulls. Horns. Blood. Death. And he’s supposed to be in it.

“Gordon’s an ass, Sammy.”

Dean’s voice pulls him back to reality.

“He’s insane, a sick maniac, and you know it. And he doesn’t know shit about you. About us.”

Somehow, Dean has found his way back to solid big-brotherness. His voice is certain, his gaze iron. And although Sam knows it’s a mechanism, all part of Dean’s default shit-eating way of dealing with the worst fears imaginable, it’s something Sam can grab and hold on to, like a lifeline.

“You don’t think what Gordon said was true?”

Dean arches a blue steel eyebrow. “Oh, I believe what the demon told Gordon was true. Mostly. With a bit of flourish, because all those black-eyed motherfuckers love to be drama queens.”

Taken aback, Sam just stares at Dean. This isn’t exactly the reassurance he was looking for.

“But what I don’t believe,” Dean continues, “is that you will be part of that army. Because as long as I’ve known you - and that’s been my whole fucking life - no one has ever been able to make you do what you didn’t want to do. Dad couldn’t. You certainly never listened to me. No demon - yellow-eyed or otherwise - will ever be able to recruit you against your own will.”

Sam’s shoulders sag. “Dean…,” he says dejectedly. “That’s not the same. We’re talking supernatural powers here. We’re–”

“We’re talking Winchester powers here,” Dean interrupts him, fiercely. He lifts a finger and points it at Sam, his gaze firm and intense. “And you, little brother, are the most stubborn Winchester ever created. That pig-headedness of yours is gonna bring that yellow-eyed sonofabitch to tears, I swear.”

Now that’s the reassurance Sam needed - steadfast, fondly annoyed and cocksure in the way only his big brother can do it.

In spite of everything, Sam can’t help smiling a bit. “You seriously think we can beat him?”

Jaw set, Dean nods. “I do. We’re gonna kick his demony ass into next Sunday.”

Encouragingly, he slaps Sam’s upper arm. “You with me?”

Sam’s wounds still ache, his back is still spasming, and the looming threat of the yellow-eyed demon and his army is still out there. Sam still doesn’t know what part he’s supposed to play in all of it, or how they’re going to find and kill the demon before everything goes to hell. And yet, with Dean at his side, so firmly in his camp against all odds, he feels better. He knows that his big brother is putting up a tough front and that Dean, too, is scared. But scared or not, Dean is going to be by his side - obnoxious, patronizing, overbearing. Protective. Nothing has changed. But Dean will be there. And that’s enough to give him hope.

The Damage Control Series - Masterlist

Read the entire series on AO3 here: