Last of the Breed Chapter 2
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Chapter 2
Vultures Circling
Mssrs. Dean and Sam Winchester, said to be of Lawrence, Kansas, have returned to Carson City after a 15-year absence and are staying at the house of Mrs. Lisa Braeden. This reporter trusts that they are enjoying the salubrious winter climate of our fair city and are pleased with the modern amenities present even here. Carson City is the jewel of the Nevada frontier, and Mrs. Braeden’s house is a jewel in its own right, so the Winchesters should find it most comfortable and restful, which surely even the most hardened of shootists must need after so many years in the wild country.
A reporter by the name of Dobkins turned up at Lisa’s house the next morning. Sam had volunteered to go talk to Hostetler about medication and bills, which left Dean to deal with the reporter. He found the vain younger man examining his hair in the parlor mirror, and after an awkward introduction, Dean invited him to sit down.
Dobkins sat down and mentioned that the newspaper had run an article on the brothers’ presence in town that morning. “Have you seen it?”
“No.”
“Well, it’s Page 1, I assure you.”
“We’ve had Mrs. Braeden bring us a copy of your paper the last couple of days. Old habit. Just haven’t gotten today’s yet.”
“Oh.”
“Well, what can I do for you?”
“Well, sir, that’s what I came to talk to you about.”
“Well, that’s what I figured.” Dean wondered idly how many times they could start a sentence with ‘well’ before Dobkins noticed.
“Yes. You must appreciate, sir, that you and your brother are the most celebrated shootists extant.”
“Extant?”
“Uh, still existing. Alive.”
Sam should have taken this interview. “Thank you.”
“Yes, and your reputation is nationwide. My story went out over the wires this morning, and every daily of consequence will run it, but they’ll want more. The papers in the East, in particular. Between us, Mr. Winchester, we can really put Carson City on the map.”
Well, since Sam wasn’t here, Dean would have to try to throw Dobkins for a loop with some Shakespeare. “More matter and less art.”
It didn’t quite work. “Yes, sir. Well, sir, I would like tremendously to do a series of stories on you and your brother.”
Dean frowned. “A series?”
“Yes. How long will you be with us?”
“Not as long as we’d like to be.”
“Oh. Well, we could start today, right now, and then get together again tomorrow. You see, there’s been so much cheap fiction about gunmen. I want to get down to the true story for once, while you’re still available, before anything happens to you.” Dean frowned, and Dobkins faltered. “I... I mean, uh... I hope nothing does....”
“Go on,” Dean rumbled.
“Yes. I wanna cover your career factually. The statistics, you might say. Then I’d delve into the psychological aspects—what turned you to violence in the first place? Are you by nature bloodthirsty?” Dean made a face at that, but Dobkins didn’t notice, his eyes closing as he kept pondering aloud. “Uh, do you, uh, brood after the deed is done, or have you lived so long with death that you’re used to it? The death of others? The prospect of your own?”
It had been forty-two years since someone last dared to psychoanalyze Dean to his face, and he still occasionally had nightmares about that hunt, the wraith poison that had pushed both brothers so close to the edge of sanity. He was not going to let this sissified idiot get anywhere near the question of whether or not he and Sam were dangerously codependent or anything else equally cockeyed that came nowhere near the whole messed-up truth. And he was damn sure not going to let Dobkins anywhere near Sam; the last thing Sammy needed now was to scratch the Wall and send himself into a seizure that could kill him faster than the cancer would.
Dobkins wanted musings about death-dealing? Dean had been Death for a day. He’d give this twit something to chew over—and choke on.
He got up, cocked his revolver, and stuck it in Dobkins’ face. When Dobkins opened his eyes and stared at him open-mouthed, he shoved the end of the barrel into the reporter’s mouth, who semi-instinctively closed his lips around it. “The Chicago-style pizza I once shared with Death probably tasted better,” Dean said, “and I know the bacon hot dogs did, but you’ll have to make do with gunmetal. One fit or fidget, and Mrs. Braeden is going to be scrubbing your brains off the wallpaper. On your feet.”
Dobkins made a scared noise and complied.
“Back up.”
Dobkins did so, and Dean kept his gun in Dobkins’ mouth as he backed Dobkins into the front hall.
Unfortunately, Lisa happened to come downstairs at that moment. “Mr. Winchester! What in heaven’s name are you doing?”
“Ma’am,” said Dean, “we have a touchy situation here. Out,” he ordered Dobkins.
Dobkins squeaked and backed toward the door.
Once they were out on the porch, Dean took his gun out of Dobkins’ mouth and ordered him to turn around and bend over. When Dobkins did so, Dean stated, “Dobkins, you are a prying pipsqueak, and if you ever come dandying around here again”—this he punctuated by kicking Dobkins down the stairs—“I know a Reaper I could introduce you to.”
Dobkins picked himself up and ran off without so much as a glance behind him.
“That was a savage thing to do,” Lisa scolded.
Winded, Dean slumped against the porch door’s frame. “Maybe.”
Lisa hurried up to him. “Dean?”
Dean pushed off the doorframe and tried to head inside on his own steam, but Lisa quickly caught up to him and supported him all the way back to the room.
Meanwhile, Sam had ridden the streetcar into town and was settling into Hostetler’s office. “First things first, Doc,” he said. “We almost forgot to ask you. How much do we owe you?”
Hostetler grinned. “You’re a man after my own heart, Winchester. Most of ’em ask that last, if at all.” Then he dug in a cabinet and pulled out two large, flat bottles of dark liquid—about the same size and shape as the bottles they’d used for the phoenix ash all those years ago. “Well, let’s see... we’ll make it $4 for the two visits, $2 for today, plus $2 for that.” And he handed the bottles to Sam.
Sam handed him $8 and looked at the bottles. “What’s that?”
“They call that laudanum, a solution of opium and alcohol.”
Sam didn’t want to think about whether any of the pills Dean had occasionally taken when he first got back from Hell had been opiates or whether they’d been more than occasional. At least with both of them on this stuff, they should be able to keep the nightmares to a minimum. And maybe he wouldn’t give in to the temptation to scratch the Wall—it had held admirably the entire time they’d been here, but it still itched, and he really didn’t want Dean to be on his case about that, of all problems, here at the end of the road.
“How does it taste?” he asked, studying the liquid.
Hostetler shook his head. “Just, just awful. Terrible. But it’s the most potent painkiller we’ve got.”
And probably mixed in the right proportion to prevent either of them from pulling a Jimi Hendrix if they overdosed... not that it mattered, but they wouldn’t want to do that to Lisa. Sam nodded. “How much of it do we take?”
“Well, as much as you need, when you need it. I think a spoonful would be all right to start with.”
“Later?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know, but I think one morning you’re just going to wake up and say, ‘Here I am in this bed, and here I’m gonna stay.’”
Sam leaned forward. “Hostetler, I wanna know. For Dean’s sake.”
“Well, unless you insist, I’d rather not talk about it.”
“We’ve been through Hell, Doc, both of us. It can’t be worse than that. I want to know.”
Hostetler shifted uncomfortably. “All right. There’ll be an increase in the severity of the pain in your lower spine, your hips, your groin. You... d’y—d’y—do you want me to go on?” Sam nodded tightly, and he sighed. “The pain will become unbearable. No drug will moderate it. If you’re lucky, you’ll lose consciousness, and until then, you’ll scream.”
The mental image of Dean dissolving into hallucinations of Alastair ripping his guts out suddenly jumped to the front of Sam’s mind. Disturbed, he pushed himself to his feet, panting a little from the effort.
Hostetler jumped up and gently took Sam’s elbow to steer him to the door. “I-I—I’m sorry. I-I-I didn’t mean to be specific like this. Now, the next time I’ll come to Mrs. Braeden’s. You just telephone. You just telephone,” he repeated, handing Sam his hat. Sam started to open the door, and Hostetler continued, “There’s... there’s one more thing I’d say.”
Sam paused. “Yeah, Doc?”
“The three of us have had a lot to do with death. I’m not a brave man, but you two must be.” Sam scoffed, but Hostetler went on. “Now-now-now—this is not advice. It’s not even a suggestion. It’s just something for you and your brother to reflect on while your minds are still clear.”
“What?”
“I would not die a death like I just described.”
“No?”
Hostetler shook his head. “Not if I had your courage.”
“Oh.” Sam nodded. “Thanks.” And he left.
Suicide and fratricide were both out of the question, Sam decided as he tucked the bottles of laudanum into his jacket. Neither of them was willing to risk Hell again. But he had to be honest... those weren’t the only options.
He and Dean had been discussing the Dobkins situation and Hostetler’s non-advice and each taken a swig of laudanum straight from the bottle when Lisa knocked. Dean called for her to come in.
“Hey,” she said. “What’s going on?”
“We were talking about Queen Victoria,” Dean replied—not quite truthfully, but Sam could see where Dean was headed with the idea. “She’ll die here in a couple of days. Maybe she’s outlived her time; maybe she’s a museum piece. But she’ll never lose her dignity. She’ll hang onto her pride and go out in style.”
Sam suddenly thought of Ellen and Jo and Pamela and had to look away so he wouldn’t cry.
Lisa sighed. “Listen, I came in to see what you can eat, if you can have what I’m serving tonight.”
“No, you didn’t. And you know I can always eat your cooking, Lis.”
“I wish you’d stop contradicting me.”
“And I wish you’d say what you mean,” Sam interjected.
“Sam....”
“Sorry, Lisa. Forget I said anything.”
“You know I’ll do whatever I can for both of you.”
“Thank you. All our lives we’ve been too proud to accept much help from outsiders—even from each other, sometimes. Guess we’ll have to learn.”
Dean nodded thoughtfully.
Sam pulled out one of the wooden chairs. “Would you sit down for a moment? Please do.”
Lisa did so just as Dean pulled the stopper out of his bottle of laudanum. “What’s that?”
“The good stuff,” Dean replied wearily and took another swig, then grimaced at the taste and put the stopper back. “Laudanum.”
“That’s addictive, isn’t it?”
Dean shot her a look, and she grimaced in apology.
Sam leaned forward. “Lisa, I think it’d do Dean a world of good to go for a drive in the country tomorrow. Would you go with him?”
Dean looked startled, but then he looked at Lisa hopefully.
Lisa shook her head. “Oh, I—I couldn’t, but thank you.”
“I wish you’d reconsider,” Dean said; evidently the laudanum was making him a little less hesitant about showing Lisa that he’d never really gotten over her (and the less said about the Amazons, the better). “It’d only be for an hour or two.”
She got up and started to leave. “No. I appreciate the invitation, but no.”
“Is it that you don’t want to be alone with me now?”
She turned back. “Oh, no. It’s just that it might not jibe with my being a ‘widow’—people would....”
Dean scoffed. “People! If I have to work on your sympathy, I will. You know what our life’s been like—I can’t take one last road trip like I want to, but I want to get out and see the trees and the lakes, the hills and the sky. And I don’t fancy seeing it alone.”
“You could go with Sam.”
“There’ll be time for that later in the day. But we’ve been in each other’s pockets for close to 70 years. I want to go with you.” He paused. “There’s never been anyone else since I left. Not really.”
She smiled. “Okay, Dean. I’ll go with you.”
Dean grinned. “Good. Tomorrow at 10?”
She nodded.
“Well, will you get ‘Please, Mr. Ben Braeden’ to trot down to the stable and get us the best horse and buggy they have?”
She chuckled. “I will.”
“I appreciate it, Lis.”
Their smiles grew, and as Lisa left, Sam settled back in his chair, satisfied that he’d given his brother one last chance at that taste of happiness and normalcy Dean would never admit he’d always craved.
That night, a lone gambler left the New Hotel Carson and made his way across the street to the Metropole, a gambling parlor and saloon. He edged past the throngs of men drinking and gambling until he got to the faro table at the far end of the long room, where stood a dealer with an Irish accent and preternatural good luck. The dealer was known in town as Jack Pulford, but unbeknownst to even the man himself, the Winchesters had met him in 2009 under his right name, Patrick. His faro game wasn’t the perilous magic that his poker usually was, but he did enjoy taking as much money as he could from the sore losers who could be provoked into allowing him to build his reputation as a gunman rather than as a witch.
“Pulford,” said his informant. “Sam and Dean Winchester over at Mrs. Braeden’s.”
“That was yesterday’s news,” Patrick replied.
“Yeah, but I just heard they’re dyin’.”
“Dying?”
“Friend of mine got it from Marshal Thibido himself. The Winchesters are cashing in.”
“That’s hard news,” Patrick mused. “They were men I could have taken.”
The sore loser Patrick had been needling scoffed.
Patrick looked at him coldly. “You have two ways of leaving this establishment, my friend: immediately or dead.”
The sore loser left the table and started to leave the saloon, but then he came back in with his gun drawn and started shooting from the door. Patrick calmly pulled his own pistol and fired one shot, hitting the man through the heart although he was over 80 feet away. The other patrons cheered.
Patrick smirked a little as he holstered his gun. Foolish bloodthirsty Americans... as bad as the Romans, some of them. But no one needed to know that his gun was charmed never to miss a human target. Let them all think it was skill or simply the fabled luck of the Irish.
While Dean and Lisa were out driving the next morning, Sam went to the library and the newspaper office to do some research. He saved his findings for the drive he took with Dean that afternoon.
Dean began the conversation, however. “Ran into Mike Sweeney, Albert’s brother, on the way back,” he said as soon as they were out of town.
“Albert Sweeney—the dragon?”
“Yup.”
Sam sighed. “Well, that’s great. Jay Cobb’s a werewolf, and you’ll never guess who the faro dealer at the Metropole is.”
“Who?”
“Patrick, the Irish witch.”
“No kidding. Huh. If I didn’t know better, I’d suggest we try gettin’ him into a poker game.”
Sam snorted. “Won’t surprise me if we start seeing more monsters drifting into town. If word gets out that we’re going down....”
Dean sighed. “Yeah. I know.”
They drove in silence for a while before Sam finally asked, “Is that what you want?”
“Hell, Sam, I don’t know. We’ve done this dance before.”
“But not with cancer.”
“I know.” Dean looked at Sam. “Is it what you want?”
“I want not to go back to Hell.”
They looked at each other for a long moment before they drove on, Dean humming Metallica under his breath.
Neither of them could sleep well that night, however, and about the time Dean gave up and grabbed the laudanum, Sam sensed something outside the window. The room was pretty well warded, salt under the windows, and it was the new moon; but that didn’t preclude intruders of a more human sort. After a brief exchange of hand signals, Dean grabbed the Colt and Sam grabbed the knife; then they arranged the pillows under the covers to look like they were still in bed and hid in opposite corners of the room.
Sure enough, a humanoid silhouette blotted what little ambient outdoor light there was at each window briefly. Then one window broke, and a gun barrel poked through the curtains. Dean fired, and the assailant, lit up with blue fire from the inside, crashed through the window and onto the floor. Seconds later the other window broke, scattering the salt line, and a second gunman shot at the bed before stepping through. Sam threw his knife, and the demoniac gunman sparked and fell, though not before letting off a stray shot that hit the kerosene lamp beside the bed. Sam rushed to put out the fire with water from the washbasin while Dean retrieved the knife; when the fire was out, both brothers sank down to sit back to back at the foot of the bed.
“Dean! Sam!” Ben called from the hall. When they didn’t reply, Ben carefully opened the bedroom door and surveyed the scene. “Dean? Are you hurt?”
“No,” Dean replied. “But they are. Call the marshal.”
“What... um....”
“Dunno what that one was,” Sam reported, nodding to the assailant Dean had shot and wheezing a little. “Other was a demon.”
Ben swallowed hard and ran off to call the marshal. When he’d done that, though, he went to the kitchen, where Lisa was preparing to make coffee. “They got both of ’em,” he reported breathlessly. “They musta come in through the window, guns blazing ’cause they knew Sam and Dean would have salt lines....”
“Close your robe,” Lisa scolded.
“... but they’re so damn fast, they killed ’em both. The Winchester Brothers in a hunt-slash-shootout right here.” Then he excitedly used one of Dean’s favorite profanities.
“Ben!”
“Mom, I’m sorry, but this is a great day. Our house is a part of history now. You’ve gotta know that.”
“That’s nothing to be proud of. Our house in Cicero was part of history, if anybody’d cared about the world not ending.”
But he didn’t heed; he hugged her happily. “I love Dean! And Sam, too!”
She sighed and took him by the shoulders. “Ben, it’s time you knew. They’re dying.”
Ben sobered. “Who?”
“Sam and Dean.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“They both have prostate cancer. And it’s advanced enough that even if we got them home, it couldn’t be cured.”
“You’re lying. Dean would have told me.”
“He didn’t tell you because he didn’t want you to worry. You know how he is. He didn’t even tell me; Sam did.” She turned away to hide the tears she was fighting. “He’s dying, Ben. He’s dying, and Balthazar never warned us.” And finally she broke down.
Ben pulled her into a hug, but he was too stunned to let his own tears fall.
Mrs. Lisa Braeden received some unwelcome callers late last night when Mr. Ben Shoup and Mr. Alec Norton, no fixed abode, sought to surprise the Winchester brothers in their room. Our famous guests ensured that neither Mr. Shoup nor Mr. Norton shall attempt such a surprise ever again. Let no one think that age or illness has slowed the Winchesters since their appearance at the Acme Saloon!
The other lodgers moved out first thing in the morning. Thibido identified the two assailants as individuals neither brother had ever heard of, “no-goods not from around here.” Sam had sneaked a look at the first assailant’s corpse, however; he’d been a wraith.
Thibido promised to post a man outside at night, and Lisa thanked him, but Dean snorted. “Lotta good that’ll do against monsters. There’s no need of anyone else getting killed on our account.”
Sam sighed. “Mrs. Braeden, we can’t tell you how sorry we are about last night.”
“That doesn’t help,” she replied and took the damaged bedding outside to the wash house.
Thibido started needling Dean and suggesting that he bring Patrick over to speed up the dying process. Then he turned to Sam and started carrying on about how the world had changed but the brothers hadn’t changed with it. “To put it in a nutshell, you’ve plain plumb outlived your time.”
“To put it in a nutshell?!” Dean retorted as Sam reached into his vest pocket. “You couldn’t put it in the TARDIS.”
Sam pulled out his old Blackberry. “Ever seen one of these, Marshal?”
Thibido blinked. “No. What is it?”
“A telephone. A Blackberry, to be precise—has a personal digital assistant, email and Internet access, MP3 player, games, instant messenger, the works. Holds more information than the Carson City Public Library. First came on the market when I was a sophomore at Stanford University.”
Thibido scoffed. “Stanford’s barely been open for ten years.”
“I know that. It was 110 when I started the pre-law program.”
Dean leaned forward. “We’ve seen buildings destroyed that you’ll never live to see built. We’ve driven horseless carriages that make Mike Sweeney’s Oldsmobile look like a Tinker Toy. The tools we used every day before we got stranded in Sunrise would have blown your mind. You want to talk about outliving our time, Marshal? We outlived the damn Apocalypse.”
Thibido scoffed again. “You’re cracked and ornery, the both of you. When my time comes to die, I won’t drag it out. I’ll just do it. Why the hell don’t you?”
“We’ve died more times than you can count,” Sam growled. “This time we’ll do it on our own schedule, not Hell’s.”
Dean drew his revolver and aimed it at Thibido.
The marshal backed up a bit but stopped. “I don’t scare anymore.”
“Neither did those other idjits,” Dean replied.
“You wouldn’t gun down a police officer.”
“What’d stop me, fear of dying?”
Thibido looked at them both scornfully and left.
Later, Sam took the streetcar over to the livery stable and arrived to find Moses (who sounded an awful lot like Scatman Crothers) brushing Dollar while singing a takeoff on “John Brown’s Body” featuring Sam’s name and the punchline “But his horse keeps gallopin’ on!”
Amused, Sam called, “Moses, would you care to do business with a voice from the grave?”
Moses startled, but seeing Sam smile, he burst into smiles himself and grandiosely ushered Sam into his office. Then he counted out five twenty-dollar bills and handed them to Sam.
“What’s this for?”
“What’s it for? For your horse!”
“My horse?! I want to sell my horse, but this wouldn’t buy my saddle.”
“Aw, but Mr. Winchester, you done agreed.”
“When?”
“When you sent Benny—I mean, when Mr. Braeden said this morning that $100 would be just fine with you.”
Sam grimaced; he had sent no such message with Ben, and neither had Dean. “I’ll have to have a talk with Mr. Braeden. As far as Dollar goes, it’s three.”
Moses stared. “Three hundred?!”
“Three hundred.” Sam knew he was insisting on the equivalent of what Impala might sell for in the 21st century if she were still a car, but he had a good reason for doing so.
Moses shook his head a little. “I might maybe can go $200.”
“You might maybe go more than that, because you’ll get more than that because he’s mine. And if you have any ideas about Impala, forget it. She’s a unique horse, and you couldn’t afford her even if Dean were willing to sell. He’s giving her to Ben—but don’t tell Ben that.”
“I won’t. But—”
“Three.”
Moses sighed. “Two fifty.”
“Three, and I’ll throw the saddle in for cash.”
“Well, what about my bill?”
“You throw that in.”
“Aw, Mr. Winchester, I ain’t made of money.”
“Moses, are we gonna stand around here and haggle all day?”
Moses started laughing. “Mr. Winchester, you’re the most famous man I ever seen and the second-best haggler.”
Sam raised an eyebrow at that. “Who’s the best?”
“Here I stand,” Moses said proudly.
Sam liked this guy, he really did, and he wanted to cut him a deal, but he needed to get the best price possible to have a decent amount to leave to Lisa. So he smiled and said, “Well, let’s get to haggling.”
“Let’s get to hagglin’,” Moses agreed and eagerly counted out enough bills to bring the total to $295.
“No.”
Moses’ smile faltered. “Ninety-six?” he asked, adding a dollar to the pile.
“No.”
“Ninety-seven?”
Sam just smiled.
“Ninety-eight?”
“Sold.”
Moses spluttered for a moment in delighted disbelief before crowing, “Mr. Winchester, that makes me the best haggler!”
“The best in the world, Moses,” Sam agreed with a grin.
But his good mood was gone by the time he got back to Lisa’s house and filled Dean in. Dean promptly burst through the back porch door yelling for Ben. “Where’s Ben?” he asked as Lisa came out of the wash house.
“In the woodshed,” Lisa replied.
“That’s appropriate.”
“Why?”
“You stay out of this.” Dean stormed into the woodshed and found Ben. “You want to explain?” he demanded.
Ben blinked. “Huh?”
Dean handed him the bill of sale for Dollar. “You were trying to cheat Sam, and Moses was trying to cheat you.”
Ben looked over the bill of sale. “I’m sorry.”
Dean snatched it back. “Well, I’m glad of that, but it doesn’t—” He broke off as a flare of pain in his abdomen made him double over and stumble back to sit down. “It doesn’t tell me very much,” he continued once he was seated and could speak again.
Ben sighed. “She cried on my shoulder this morning because of what happened. And then the lodgers moved out. Your room is a mess. And now she’s worried about losing the house ’cause Balthazar took out a loan before he built it for us. Well, I just thought that maybe you might want to do something to try and make it up to her. I know you’d never part with Impala, but I thought Sam might be interested in selling his horse since you’re...” He stopped.
“Since we’re what?”
“You’re dying.”
Dean grimaced. “How’d you find that out?”
“Mom told me. Guess I’m the last one in town to know about it.”
“Ben, don’t you think you should have talked to Sam before you tried to sell his horse?”
Ben nodded. “Yeah, I suppose so. But I just wanted to see first if Moses would buy it, that’s all. I’m not a horse thief.”
Dean huffed. “Son, I know you better than that. I’ve been operating on the raw edge lately, but I never thought you were trying to steal Dollar. Guess I just jumped too far, too fast. And I hope I can hang around long enough to make it up to you.”
Ben bit his lip. “Dean, do you think... would you give me a shooting lesson?”
Dean started to refuse, but Ben wasn’t a kid anymore, and in a town like this, he might need to know how to handle a gun even if he wasn’t hunting. So he agreed, and they had a pleasant chat about gun safety, the dangers of facing amateurs in gunfights, and the importance of being willing to pull the trigger when split seconds counted. He also gave Ben some caution about trusting Cobb and the advice Cobb had relayed from Bat Masterson, as well as about mixing alcohol with guns.
The final straw came that night, however. Dean was in the kitchen with Lisa; Ben had gone to bed; and Sam was in the brothers’ room building the fire when he heard a quiet knock and a woman’s voice asking, “Sam?”
Sam would have known that voice anywhere. “Yes?”
“May I come in?” When he didn’t answer, the door opened and a petite blonde came in hesitantly. “Don’t... don’t you remember me?”
“Serepta?” he replied with a smile.
She nodded and ran to him. He’d fallen for her in the ’70s, but she had run off with someone else just before he’d planned to propose. Dean never had liked her, but he’d consoled Sam at the time by pointing out that at least she hadn’t ended up like Jess or Madison.
He held her close now, happy to see her alive and whole. “Sera, I can’t tell you how glad I am you’re here.”
“I came the minute I heard.”
They sat down and chatted for a moment, catching up on times and loves past and holding each other. Then Serepta brought up the question of getting married now; her own husband had left her. Sam confessed that he didn’t see the point.
“I’d have your name.”
“How far would that take you?”
“Long ways, maybe.”
“How?”
She shrugged. “Sam, you’re too modest, y’know. Everybody knows who you are. I’d be Mrs. Sam Winchester; I’d be somebody.”
He chuckled. “That wouldn’t buy you any bacon.”
“Well, it might.” At his confused look, she explained that she’d been contacted by a reporter who wanted to write a book on the brothers using her name. “He said, in the East, that it would sell like hotcakes and he’d split it with me.”
The longer she went on, the more disgusted he was. “And his name is Dobkins.”
“That’s right. How’d you know that?”
“Because Dean kicked him out of here a few days ago for the same reason.”
“Sam, what harm is there in a marriage certificate, a piece of paper?”
“I don’t object to that. It’s the book. We’ve had better books written about our lives, though they’ll never be published now—and the author of those wasn’t any great talent. Dobkins is no prophet. What does he know about my life or Dean’s? As a matter of fact, what do you know?”
“He says what he doesn’t know, he’ll make up, and you know, gory things, shoot-’em-ups and midnight rides and women tearing out their hair. Sam, it will be a corker, I promise you.”
“And when I was six months old, our mother burned on the ceiling of my nursery with her stomach sliced open because she interrupted a demon who was placing a spell on me with his blood, a spell intended to make me the one true vessel of Lucifer.”
She frowned. “Why would he say that? That’s crazy. Nobody would believe it.”
“But it’s the truth. Sera, I still have some pride. A man should be allowed his human dignity.” And he took a swig of laudanum, trying not to be disturbed by the fact that he’d gotten used to the taste already.
Serepta turned away, shaking in disappointment. “I spent $3 on the train here, one way.”
“You and Dobkins are two sides of a counterfeit coin. I’ll pay you back. I’ll pay you both ways.” He pulled his wallet out of his jacket and retrieved $6.
“What’s wrong about a book?”
“I’ll not be remembered for a pack of lies.”
She snatched the money out of his hand and started a stream of tearful invective that made Sam remember why Dean hadn’t liked her. Then she stormed out.
Sam had just slumped back in the leather chair that had become his by default when Dean came in. “Was that Becky?!”
“Serepta.”
“Same difference—crazy-eyed Sam-girls. What’d she want?”
“My name to put on the cover of the book Dobkins is going to write whether we want him to or not. Chuck was one thing; he couldn’t help it. This Dobkins cat is something else.”
Dean swore and sank down on the bed. “Sammy, we gotta do something.”
Sam sighed. “Yeah. We do.”
Next
Vultures Circling
Mssrs. Dean and Sam Winchester, said to be of Lawrence, Kansas, have returned to Carson City after a 15-year absence and are staying at the house of Mrs. Lisa Braeden. This reporter trusts that they are enjoying the salubrious winter climate of our fair city and are pleased with the modern amenities present even here. Carson City is the jewel of the Nevada frontier, and Mrs. Braeden’s house is a jewel in its own right, so the Winchesters should find it most comfortable and restful, which surely even the most hardened of shootists must need after so many years in the wild country.
—item from the Carson City Morning Appeal, January 19, 1901, written by Dan Dobkins
A reporter by the name of Dobkins turned up at Lisa’s house the next morning. Sam had volunteered to go talk to Hostetler about medication and bills, which left Dean to deal with the reporter. He found the vain younger man examining his hair in the parlor mirror, and after an awkward introduction, Dean invited him to sit down.
Dobkins sat down and mentioned that the newspaper had run an article on the brothers’ presence in town that morning. “Have you seen it?”
“No.”
“Well, it’s Page 1, I assure you.”
“We’ve had Mrs. Braeden bring us a copy of your paper the last couple of days. Old habit. Just haven’t gotten today’s yet.”
“Oh.”
“Well, what can I do for you?”
“Well, sir, that’s what I came to talk to you about.”
“Well, that’s what I figured.” Dean wondered idly how many times they could start a sentence with ‘well’ before Dobkins noticed.
“Yes. You must appreciate, sir, that you and your brother are the most celebrated shootists extant.”
“Extant?”
“Uh, still existing. Alive.”
Sam should have taken this interview. “Thank you.”
“Yes, and your reputation is nationwide. My story went out over the wires this morning, and every daily of consequence will run it, but they’ll want more. The papers in the East, in particular. Between us, Mr. Winchester, we can really put Carson City on the map.”
Well, since Sam wasn’t here, Dean would have to try to throw Dobkins for a loop with some Shakespeare. “More matter and less art.”
It didn’t quite work. “Yes, sir. Well, sir, I would like tremendously to do a series of stories on you and your brother.”
Dean frowned. “A series?”
“Yes. How long will you be with us?”
“Not as long as we’d like to be.”
“Oh. Well, we could start today, right now, and then get together again tomorrow. You see, there’s been so much cheap fiction about gunmen. I want to get down to the true story for once, while you’re still available, before anything happens to you.” Dean frowned, and Dobkins faltered. “I... I mean, uh... I hope nothing does....”
“Go on,” Dean rumbled.
“Yes. I wanna cover your career factually. The statistics, you might say. Then I’d delve into the psychological aspects—what turned you to violence in the first place? Are you by nature bloodthirsty?” Dean made a face at that, but Dobkins didn’t notice, his eyes closing as he kept pondering aloud. “Uh, do you, uh, brood after the deed is done, or have you lived so long with death that you’re used to it? The death of others? The prospect of your own?”
It had been forty-two years since someone last dared to psychoanalyze Dean to his face, and he still occasionally had nightmares about that hunt, the wraith poison that had pushed both brothers so close to the edge of sanity. He was not going to let this sissified idiot get anywhere near the question of whether or not he and Sam were dangerously codependent or anything else equally cockeyed that came nowhere near the whole messed-up truth. And he was damn sure not going to let Dobkins anywhere near Sam; the last thing Sammy needed now was to scratch the Wall and send himself into a seizure that could kill him faster than the cancer would.
Dobkins wanted musings about death-dealing? Dean had been Death for a day. He’d give this twit something to chew over—and choke on.
He got up, cocked his revolver, and stuck it in Dobkins’ face. When Dobkins opened his eyes and stared at him open-mouthed, he shoved the end of the barrel into the reporter’s mouth, who semi-instinctively closed his lips around it. “The Chicago-style pizza I once shared with Death probably tasted better,” Dean said, “and I know the bacon hot dogs did, but you’ll have to make do with gunmetal. One fit or fidget, and Mrs. Braeden is going to be scrubbing your brains off the wallpaper. On your feet.”
Dobkins made a scared noise and complied.
“Back up.”
Dobkins did so, and Dean kept his gun in Dobkins’ mouth as he backed Dobkins into the front hall.
Unfortunately, Lisa happened to come downstairs at that moment. “Mr. Winchester! What in heaven’s name are you doing?”
“Ma’am,” said Dean, “we have a touchy situation here. Out,” he ordered Dobkins.
Dobkins squeaked and backed toward the door.
Once they were out on the porch, Dean took his gun out of Dobkins’ mouth and ordered him to turn around and bend over. When Dobkins did so, Dean stated, “Dobkins, you are a prying pipsqueak, and if you ever come dandying around here again”—this he punctuated by kicking Dobkins down the stairs—“I know a Reaper I could introduce you to.”
Dobkins picked himself up and ran off without so much as a glance behind him.
“That was a savage thing to do,” Lisa scolded.
Winded, Dean slumped against the porch door’s frame. “Maybe.”
Lisa hurried up to him. “Dean?”
Dean pushed off the doorframe and tried to head inside on his own steam, but Lisa quickly caught up to him and supported him all the way back to the room.
Meanwhile, Sam had ridden the streetcar into town and was settling into Hostetler’s office. “First things first, Doc,” he said. “We almost forgot to ask you. How much do we owe you?”
Hostetler grinned. “You’re a man after my own heart, Winchester. Most of ’em ask that last, if at all.” Then he dug in a cabinet and pulled out two large, flat bottles of dark liquid—about the same size and shape as the bottles they’d used for the phoenix ash all those years ago. “Well, let’s see... we’ll make it $4 for the two visits, $2 for today, plus $2 for that.” And he handed the bottles to Sam.
Sam handed him $8 and looked at the bottles. “What’s that?”
“They call that laudanum, a solution of opium and alcohol.”
Sam didn’t want to think about whether any of the pills Dean had occasionally taken when he first got back from Hell had been opiates or whether they’d been more than occasional. At least with both of them on this stuff, they should be able to keep the nightmares to a minimum. And maybe he wouldn’t give in to the temptation to scratch the Wall—it had held admirably the entire time they’d been here, but it still itched, and he really didn’t want Dean to be on his case about that, of all problems, here at the end of the road.
“How does it taste?” he asked, studying the liquid.
Hostetler shook his head. “Just, just awful. Terrible. But it’s the most potent painkiller we’ve got.”
And probably mixed in the right proportion to prevent either of them from pulling a Jimi Hendrix if they overdosed... not that it mattered, but they wouldn’t want to do that to Lisa. Sam nodded. “How much of it do we take?”
“Well, as much as you need, when you need it. I think a spoonful would be all right to start with.”
“Later?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know, but I think one morning you’re just going to wake up and say, ‘Here I am in this bed, and here I’m gonna stay.’”
Sam leaned forward. “Hostetler, I wanna know. For Dean’s sake.”
“Well, unless you insist, I’d rather not talk about it.”
“We’ve been through Hell, Doc, both of us. It can’t be worse than that. I want to know.”
Hostetler shifted uncomfortably. “All right. There’ll be an increase in the severity of the pain in your lower spine, your hips, your groin. You... d’y—d’y—do you want me to go on?” Sam nodded tightly, and he sighed. “The pain will become unbearable. No drug will moderate it. If you’re lucky, you’ll lose consciousness, and until then, you’ll scream.”
The mental image of Dean dissolving into hallucinations of Alastair ripping his guts out suddenly jumped to the front of Sam’s mind. Disturbed, he pushed himself to his feet, panting a little from the effort.
Hostetler jumped up and gently took Sam’s elbow to steer him to the door. “I-I—I’m sorry. I-I-I didn’t mean to be specific like this. Now, the next time I’ll come to Mrs. Braeden’s. You just telephone. You just telephone,” he repeated, handing Sam his hat. Sam started to open the door, and Hostetler continued, “There’s... there’s one more thing I’d say.”
Sam paused. “Yeah, Doc?”
“The three of us have had a lot to do with death. I’m not a brave man, but you two must be.” Sam scoffed, but Hostetler went on. “Now-now-now—this is not advice. It’s not even a suggestion. It’s just something for you and your brother to reflect on while your minds are still clear.”
“What?”
“I would not die a death like I just described.”
“No?”
Hostetler shook his head. “Not if I had your courage.”
“Oh.” Sam nodded. “Thanks.” And he left.
Suicide and fratricide were both out of the question, Sam decided as he tucked the bottles of laudanum into his jacket. Neither of them was willing to risk Hell again. But he had to be honest... those weren’t the only options.
He and Dean had been discussing the Dobkins situation and Hostetler’s non-advice and each taken a swig of laudanum straight from the bottle when Lisa knocked. Dean called for her to come in.
“Hey,” she said. “What’s going on?”
“We were talking about Queen Victoria,” Dean replied—not quite truthfully, but Sam could see where Dean was headed with the idea. “She’ll die here in a couple of days. Maybe she’s outlived her time; maybe she’s a museum piece. But she’ll never lose her dignity. She’ll hang onto her pride and go out in style.”
Sam suddenly thought of Ellen and Jo and Pamela and had to look away so he wouldn’t cry.
Lisa sighed. “Listen, I came in to see what you can eat, if you can have what I’m serving tonight.”
“No, you didn’t. And you know I can always eat your cooking, Lis.”
“I wish you’d stop contradicting me.”
“And I wish you’d say what you mean,” Sam interjected.
“Sam....”
“Sorry, Lisa. Forget I said anything.”
“You know I’ll do whatever I can for both of you.”
“Thank you. All our lives we’ve been too proud to accept much help from outsiders—even from each other, sometimes. Guess we’ll have to learn.”
Dean nodded thoughtfully.
Sam pulled out one of the wooden chairs. “Would you sit down for a moment? Please do.”
Lisa did so just as Dean pulled the stopper out of his bottle of laudanum. “What’s that?”
“The good stuff,” Dean replied wearily and took another swig, then grimaced at the taste and put the stopper back. “Laudanum.”
“That’s addictive, isn’t it?”
Dean shot her a look, and she grimaced in apology.
Sam leaned forward. “Lisa, I think it’d do Dean a world of good to go for a drive in the country tomorrow. Would you go with him?”
Dean looked startled, but then he looked at Lisa hopefully.
Lisa shook her head. “Oh, I—I couldn’t, but thank you.”
“I wish you’d reconsider,” Dean said; evidently the laudanum was making him a little less hesitant about showing Lisa that he’d never really gotten over her (and the less said about the Amazons, the better). “It’d only be for an hour or two.”
She got up and started to leave. “No. I appreciate the invitation, but no.”
“Is it that you don’t want to be alone with me now?”
She turned back. “Oh, no. It’s just that it might not jibe with my being a ‘widow’—people would....”
Dean scoffed. “People! If I have to work on your sympathy, I will. You know what our life’s been like—I can’t take one last road trip like I want to, but I want to get out and see the trees and the lakes, the hills and the sky. And I don’t fancy seeing it alone.”
“You could go with Sam.”
“There’ll be time for that later in the day. But we’ve been in each other’s pockets for close to 70 years. I want to go with you.” He paused. “There’s never been anyone else since I left. Not really.”
She smiled. “Okay, Dean. I’ll go with you.”
Dean grinned. “Good. Tomorrow at 10?”
She nodded.
“Well, will you get ‘Please, Mr. Ben Braeden’ to trot down to the stable and get us the best horse and buggy they have?”
She chuckled. “I will.”
“I appreciate it, Lis.”
Their smiles grew, and as Lisa left, Sam settled back in his chair, satisfied that he’d given his brother one last chance at that taste of happiness and normalcy Dean would never admit he’d always craved.
That night, a lone gambler left the New Hotel Carson and made his way across the street to the Metropole, a gambling parlor and saloon. He edged past the throngs of men drinking and gambling until he got to the faro table at the far end of the long room, where stood a dealer with an Irish accent and preternatural good luck. The dealer was known in town as Jack Pulford, but unbeknownst to even the man himself, the Winchesters had met him in 2009 under his right name, Patrick. His faro game wasn’t the perilous magic that his poker usually was, but he did enjoy taking as much money as he could from the sore losers who could be provoked into allowing him to build his reputation as a gunman rather than as a witch.
“Pulford,” said his informant. “Sam and Dean Winchester over at Mrs. Braeden’s.”
“That was yesterday’s news,” Patrick replied.
“Yeah, but I just heard they’re dyin’.”
“Dying?”
“Friend of mine got it from Marshal Thibido himself. The Winchesters are cashing in.”
“That’s hard news,” Patrick mused. “They were men I could have taken.”
The sore loser Patrick had been needling scoffed.
Patrick looked at him coldly. “You have two ways of leaving this establishment, my friend: immediately or dead.”
The sore loser left the table and started to leave the saloon, but then he came back in with his gun drawn and started shooting from the door. Patrick calmly pulled his own pistol and fired one shot, hitting the man through the heart although he was over 80 feet away. The other patrons cheered.
Patrick smirked a little as he holstered his gun. Foolish bloodthirsty Americans... as bad as the Romans, some of them. But no one needed to know that his gun was charmed never to miss a human target. Let them all think it was skill or simply the fabled luck of the Irish.
While Dean and Lisa were out driving the next morning, Sam went to the library and the newspaper office to do some research. He saved his findings for the drive he took with Dean that afternoon.
Dean began the conversation, however. “Ran into Mike Sweeney, Albert’s brother, on the way back,” he said as soon as they were out of town.
“Albert Sweeney—the dragon?”
“Yup.”
Sam sighed. “Well, that’s great. Jay Cobb’s a werewolf, and you’ll never guess who the faro dealer at the Metropole is.”
“Who?”
“Patrick, the Irish witch.”
“No kidding. Huh. If I didn’t know better, I’d suggest we try gettin’ him into a poker game.”
Sam snorted. “Won’t surprise me if we start seeing more monsters drifting into town. If word gets out that we’re going down....”
Dean sighed. “Yeah. I know.”
They drove in silence for a while before Sam finally asked, “Is that what you want?”
“Hell, Sam, I don’t know. We’ve done this dance before.”
“But not with cancer.”
“I know.” Dean looked at Sam. “Is it what you want?”
“I want not to go back to Hell.”
They looked at each other for a long moment before they drove on, Dean humming Metallica under his breath.
Neither of them could sleep well that night, however, and about the time Dean gave up and grabbed the laudanum, Sam sensed something outside the window. The room was pretty well warded, salt under the windows, and it was the new moon; but that didn’t preclude intruders of a more human sort. After a brief exchange of hand signals, Dean grabbed the Colt and Sam grabbed the knife; then they arranged the pillows under the covers to look like they were still in bed and hid in opposite corners of the room.
Sure enough, a humanoid silhouette blotted what little ambient outdoor light there was at each window briefly. Then one window broke, and a gun barrel poked through the curtains. Dean fired, and the assailant, lit up with blue fire from the inside, crashed through the window and onto the floor. Seconds later the other window broke, scattering the salt line, and a second gunman shot at the bed before stepping through. Sam threw his knife, and the demoniac gunman sparked and fell, though not before letting off a stray shot that hit the kerosene lamp beside the bed. Sam rushed to put out the fire with water from the washbasin while Dean retrieved the knife; when the fire was out, both brothers sank down to sit back to back at the foot of the bed.
“Dean! Sam!” Ben called from the hall. When they didn’t reply, Ben carefully opened the bedroom door and surveyed the scene. “Dean? Are you hurt?”
“No,” Dean replied. “But they are. Call the marshal.”
“What... um....”
“Dunno what that one was,” Sam reported, nodding to the assailant Dean had shot and wheezing a little. “Other was a demon.”
Ben swallowed hard and ran off to call the marshal. When he’d done that, though, he went to the kitchen, where Lisa was preparing to make coffee. “They got both of ’em,” he reported breathlessly. “They musta come in through the window, guns blazing ’cause they knew Sam and Dean would have salt lines....”
“Close your robe,” Lisa scolded.
“... but they’re so damn fast, they killed ’em both. The Winchester Brothers in a hunt-slash-shootout right here.” Then he excitedly used one of Dean’s favorite profanities.
“Ben!”
“Mom, I’m sorry, but this is a great day. Our house is a part of history now. You’ve gotta know that.”
“That’s nothing to be proud of. Our house in Cicero was part of history, if anybody’d cared about the world not ending.”
But he didn’t heed; he hugged her happily. “I love Dean! And Sam, too!”
She sighed and took him by the shoulders. “Ben, it’s time you knew. They’re dying.”
Ben sobered. “Who?”
“Sam and Dean.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“They both have prostate cancer. And it’s advanced enough that even if we got them home, it couldn’t be cured.”
“You’re lying. Dean would have told me.”
“He didn’t tell you because he didn’t want you to worry. You know how he is. He didn’t even tell me; Sam did.” She turned away to hide the tears she was fighting. “He’s dying, Ben. He’s dying, and Balthazar never warned us.” And finally she broke down.
Ben pulled her into a hug, but he was too stunned to let his own tears fall.
Mrs. Lisa Braeden received some unwelcome callers late last night when Mr. Ben Shoup and Mr. Alec Norton, no fixed abode, sought to surprise the Winchester brothers in their room. Our famous guests ensured that neither Mr. Shoup nor Mr. Norton shall attempt such a surprise ever again. Let no one think that age or illness has slowed the Winchesters since their appearance at the Acme Saloon!
—item from the Carson City Morning Appeal, January 21, 1901, written by Dan Dobkins
The other lodgers moved out first thing in the morning. Thibido identified the two assailants as individuals neither brother had ever heard of, “no-goods not from around here.” Sam had sneaked a look at the first assailant’s corpse, however; he’d been a wraith.
Thibido promised to post a man outside at night, and Lisa thanked him, but Dean snorted. “Lotta good that’ll do against monsters. There’s no need of anyone else getting killed on our account.”
Sam sighed. “Mrs. Braeden, we can’t tell you how sorry we are about last night.”
“That doesn’t help,” she replied and took the damaged bedding outside to the wash house.
Thibido started needling Dean and suggesting that he bring Patrick over to speed up the dying process. Then he turned to Sam and started carrying on about how the world had changed but the brothers hadn’t changed with it. “To put it in a nutshell, you’ve plain plumb outlived your time.”
“To put it in a nutshell?!” Dean retorted as Sam reached into his vest pocket. “You couldn’t put it in the TARDIS.”
Sam pulled out his old Blackberry. “Ever seen one of these, Marshal?”
Thibido blinked. “No. What is it?”
“A telephone. A Blackberry, to be precise—has a personal digital assistant, email and Internet access, MP3 player, games, instant messenger, the works. Holds more information than the Carson City Public Library. First came on the market when I was a sophomore at Stanford University.”
Thibido scoffed. “Stanford’s barely been open for ten years.”
“I know that. It was 110 when I started the pre-law program.”
Dean leaned forward. “We’ve seen buildings destroyed that you’ll never live to see built. We’ve driven horseless carriages that make Mike Sweeney’s Oldsmobile look like a Tinker Toy. The tools we used every day before we got stranded in Sunrise would have blown your mind. You want to talk about outliving our time, Marshal? We outlived the damn Apocalypse.”
Thibido scoffed again. “You’re cracked and ornery, the both of you. When my time comes to die, I won’t drag it out. I’ll just do it. Why the hell don’t you?”
“We’ve died more times than you can count,” Sam growled. “This time we’ll do it on our own schedule, not Hell’s.”
Dean drew his revolver and aimed it at Thibido.
The marshal backed up a bit but stopped. “I don’t scare anymore.”
“Neither did those other idjits,” Dean replied.
“You wouldn’t gun down a police officer.”
“What’d stop me, fear of dying?”
Thibido looked at them both scornfully and left.
Later, Sam took the streetcar over to the livery stable and arrived to find Moses (who sounded an awful lot like Scatman Crothers) brushing Dollar while singing a takeoff on “John Brown’s Body” featuring Sam’s name and the punchline “But his horse keeps gallopin’ on!”
Amused, Sam called, “Moses, would you care to do business with a voice from the grave?”
Moses startled, but seeing Sam smile, he burst into smiles himself and grandiosely ushered Sam into his office. Then he counted out five twenty-dollar bills and handed them to Sam.
“What’s this for?”
“What’s it for? For your horse!”
“My horse?! I want to sell my horse, but this wouldn’t buy my saddle.”
“Aw, but Mr. Winchester, you done agreed.”
“When?”
“When you sent Benny—I mean, when Mr. Braeden said this morning that $100 would be just fine with you.”
Sam grimaced; he had sent no such message with Ben, and neither had Dean. “I’ll have to have a talk with Mr. Braeden. As far as Dollar goes, it’s three.”
Moses stared. “Three hundred?!”
“Three hundred.” Sam knew he was insisting on the equivalent of what Impala might sell for in the 21st century if she were still a car, but he had a good reason for doing so.
Moses shook his head a little. “I might maybe can go $200.”
“You might maybe go more than that, because you’ll get more than that because he’s mine. And if you have any ideas about Impala, forget it. She’s a unique horse, and you couldn’t afford her even if Dean were willing to sell. He’s giving her to Ben—but don’t tell Ben that.”
“I won’t. But—”
“Three.”
Moses sighed. “Two fifty.”
“Three, and I’ll throw the saddle in for cash.”
“Well, what about my bill?”
“You throw that in.”
“Aw, Mr. Winchester, I ain’t made of money.”
“Moses, are we gonna stand around here and haggle all day?”
Moses started laughing. “Mr. Winchester, you’re the most famous man I ever seen and the second-best haggler.”
Sam raised an eyebrow at that. “Who’s the best?”
“Here I stand,” Moses said proudly.
Sam liked this guy, he really did, and he wanted to cut him a deal, but he needed to get the best price possible to have a decent amount to leave to Lisa. So he smiled and said, “Well, let’s get to haggling.”
“Let’s get to hagglin’,” Moses agreed and eagerly counted out enough bills to bring the total to $295.
“No.”
Moses’ smile faltered. “Ninety-six?” he asked, adding a dollar to the pile.
“No.”
“Ninety-seven?”
Sam just smiled.
“Ninety-eight?”
“Sold.”
Moses spluttered for a moment in delighted disbelief before crowing, “Mr. Winchester, that makes me the best haggler!”
“The best in the world, Moses,” Sam agreed with a grin.
But his good mood was gone by the time he got back to Lisa’s house and filled Dean in. Dean promptly burst through the back porch door yelling for Ben. “Where’s Ben?” he asked as Lisa came out of the wash house.
“In the woodshed,” Lisa replied.
“That’s appropriate.”
“Why?”
“You stay out of this.” Dean stormed into the woodshed and found Ben. “You want to explain?” he demanded.
Ben blinked. “Huh?”
Dean handed him the bill of sale for Dollar. “You were trying to cheat Sam, and Moses was trying to cheat you.”
Ben looked over the bill of sale. “I’m sorry.”
Dean snatched it back. “Well, I’m glad of that, but it doesn’t—” He broke off as a flare of pain in his abdomen made him double over and stumble back to sit down. “It doesn’t tell me very much,” he continued once he was seated and could speak again.
Ben sighed. “She cried on my shoulder this morning because of what happened. And then the lodgers moved out. Your room is a mess. And now she’s worried about losing the house ’cause Balthazar took out a loan before he built it for us. Well, I just thought that maybe you might want to do something to try and make it up to her. I know you’d never part with Impala, but I thought Sam might be interested in selling his horse since you’re...” He stopped.
“Since we’re what?”
“You’re dying.”
Dean grimaced. “How’d you find that out?”
“Mom told me. Guess I’m the last one in town to know about it.”
“Ben, don’t you think you should have talked to Sam before you tried to sell his horse?”
Ben nodded. “Yeah, I suppose so. But I just wanted to see first if Moses would buy it, that’s all. I’m not a horse thief.”
Dean huffed. “Son, I know you better than that. I’ve been operating on the raw edge lately, but I never thought you were trying to steal Dollar. Guess I just jumped too far, too fast. And I hope I can hang around long enough to make it up to you.”
Ben bit his lip. “Dean, do you think... would you give me a shooting lesson?”
Dean started to refuse, but Ben wasn’t a kid anymore, and in a town like this, he might need to know how to handle a gun even if he wasn’t hunting. So he agreed, and they had a pleasant chat about gun safety, the dangers of facing amateurs in gunfights, and the importance of being willing to pull the trigger when split seconds counted. He also gave Ben some caution about trusting Cobb and the advice Cobb had relayed from Bat Masterson, as well as about mixing alcohol with guns.
The final straw came that night, however. Dean was in the kitchen with Lisa; Ben had gone to bed; and Sam was in the brothers’ room building the fire when he heard a quiet knock and a woman’s voice asking, “Sam?”
Sam would have known that voice anywhere. “Yes?”
“May I come in?” When he didn’t answer, the door opened and a petite blonde came in hesitantly. “Don’t... don’t you remember me?”
“Serepta?” he replied with a smile.
She nodded and ran to him. He’d fallen for her in the ’70s, but she had run off with someone else just before he’d planned to propose. Dean never had liked her, but he’d consoled Sam at the time by pointing out that at least she hadn’t ended up like Jess or Madison.
He held her close now, happy to see her alive and whole. “Sera, I can’t tell you how glad I am you’re here.”
“I came the minute I heard.”
They sat down and chatted for a moment, catching up on times and loves past and holding each other. Then Serepta brought up the question of getting married now; her own husband had left her. Sam confessed that he didn’t see the point.
“I’d have your name.”
“How far would that take you?”
“Long ways, maybe.”
“How?”
She shrugged. “Sam, you’re too modest, y’know. Everybody knows who you are. I’d be Mrs. Sam Winchester; I’d be somebody.”
He chuckled. “That wouldn’t buy you any bacon.”
“Well, it might.” At his confused look, she explained that she’d been contacted by a reporter who wanted to write a book on the brothers using her name. “He said, in the East, that it would sell like hotcakes and he’d split it with me.”
The longer she went on, the more disgusted he was. “And his name is Dobkins.”
“That’s right. How’d you know that?”
“Because Dean kicked him out of here a few days ago for the same reason.”
“Sam, what harm is there in a marriage certificate, a piece of paper?”
“I don’t object to that. It’s the book. We’ve had better books written about our lives, though they’ll never be published now—and the author of those wasn’t any great talent. Dobkins is no prophet. What does he know about my life or Dean’s? As a matter of fact, what do you know?”
“He says what he doesn’t know, he’ll make up, and you know, gory things, shoot-’em-ups and midnight rides and women tearing out their hair. Sam, it will be a corker, I promise you.”
“And when I was six months old, our mother burned on the ceiling of my nursery with her stomach sliced open because she interrupted a demon who was placing a spell on me with his blood, a spell intended to make me the one true vessel of Lucifer.”
She frowned. “Why would he say that? That’s crazy. Nobody would believe it.”
“But it’s the truth. Sera, I still have some pride. A man should be allowed his human dignity.” And he took a swig of laudanum, trying not to be disturbed by the fact that he’d gotten used to the taste already.
Serepta turned away, shaking in disappointment. “I spent $3 on the train here, one way.”
“You and Dobkins are two sides of a counterfeit coin. I’ll pay you back. I’ll pay you both ways.” He pulled his wallet out of his jacket and retrieved $6.
“What’s wrong about a book?”
“I’ll not be remembered for a pack of lies.”
She snatched the money out of his hand and started a stream of tearful invective that made Sam remember why Dean hadn’t liked her. Then she stormed out.
Sam had just slumped back in the leather chair that had become his by default when Dean came in. “Was that Becky?!”
“Serepta.”
“Same difference—crazy-eyed Sam-girls. What’d she want?”
“My name to put on the cover of the book Dobkins is going to write whether we want him to or not. Chuck was one thing; he couldn’t help it. This Dobkins cat is something else.”
Dean swore and sank down on the bed. “Sammy, we gotta do something.”
Sam sighed. “Yeah. We do.”
