Benjamen Isaac Braeden (mr_hero) wrote in spn_nextgen, @ 2011-07-25 17:05:00 |
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Entry tags: | 1x17 - dying to know |
Episode 1x17: Dying to Know (Part 1 of 2)
He could hear sobbing, somewhere in the house. The thing was, Ben knew that it wasn’t real, because they’d moved out of that house when he turned 13.
The hallway was dark and all the familiar sounds and smells assaulted him, but when he looked down at himself he was the same as he remembered currently being: tall, wearing street clothes, his hair swaying faintly against his neck and into his eyes as he cautiously followed the sound. It was masculine, that much he knew for certain.
It was also achingly familiar.
As he came closer to the door, he could hear a woman’s voice murmuring. His mother’s voice. Ben’s feet moved with more confidence, his hand pushing the door open. There she was, sitting in the bed, holding a man against her. His hands clutched at her back as he buried his face in her neck. His mother rocked the man gently, not too unlike Ben remembered her rocking him as a child after he’d woken from a bad dream.
“I’m here,” she murmured. “I’m here, Dean.”
“Sammy...” came the croaked response. It was deep and broken, full of unbearable pain. “He’s--”
“I know.”
Ben watched the scene with a horrible sinking sensation in his stomach. He remembered this. It had been the first night, after--
His mother’s eyes rose and met his, killing the thought in its tracks, her expression soft but stern.
Go back to bed, she mouthed at him. Instinctively he pulled back, but his chest clenched and he took a breath to speak. Before he had a chance to get the words out, everything faded away.
****
Jesse stormed through the beach house. It was small; a kitchen and living room on the first floor, an open bedroom and balcony on the second, the furniture sparse and clean. There was very little room to hide.
“Where are you?!” he snarled, slamming the balcony railing. “You fucking come here right now, you piece of demon shit!”
But there was no one around. Upon a closer inspection, there was a thin film of dust on the flat surfaces. Clearly the house hadn’t been occupied in a very long time. Five more minutes passed before there was a voice just behind him.
“Did you find the relic?”
Spinning, Jesse swung at the demon’s head, which whipped back hard with the force of the blow. He brought his face forward slowly, bringing a hand up to his mouth and pulling his fingers away with blood. Then he glowered at Jesse in rage, his eyes suddenly rolling back and staying there.
“Explain yourself. Now.”
Normally the white eyes would be unnerving, but Jesse was too angry for anything else. “What did you do to Ben?!”
The demon blinked at him, his eyes returning to normal. A contemptuous bark of a laugh escaped him. “I’ve done nothing to no one. Like I told you before: I’ve been working. Now where is the relic?”
Jesse’s expression hardened. “Somewhere safe. You’re not getting it until you undo what you did to Ben.”
The demon’s eyes narrowed and he took a step closer, meeting Jesse’s furious gaze. “Rest assured, neither I nor my people have been anywhere near your pet hunters. Don’t you think that if I wanted to hurt them, I would have done so by now?”
Grabbing the demon by the shirt, Jesse shoved him against the wall, holding fast. “Ben just touched your fucking amulet and he collapsed! Tell me what it does and how to undo it!” Out of habit, power poured from his voice.
Of all the thing he expected, genuine surprise on the demon’s face was not one of them.
“It isn’t supposed to do that,” he said. “As far as I’m aware, the only thing it’s capable of doing is alerting the wearer that God is near. You have my word; if I knew about it, I would have given you some sort of warning.”
It was a dangerous thing, believing a demon, but Jesse did. He didn’t want to, but he did. Shoving away, he swiped at his eyes.
“How can I get him back? How can I make him better?”
The demon was silent, hands moving into his pockets as he studied Jesse’s face.
“I can only heal a host, son,” the demon told him. “And only so long as I reside there; the body would naturally go back to the state it was left in. Even then, your boy has a lock on him. My powers, in that regard, are limited unless another deal is made.”
Jesse’s eyes narrowed, though his first impulse was to say yes. “No. Not yet. And you’re not getting your amulet either. Not until I find out what it did.”
Again the demon was silent. His jaw worked and he took a breath, then let it out.
“Do whatever you must.”
In the span of an eye blink, he was gone again. Jesse’s face immediately crumpled. He hung his head, breathing deep and trying to regain control. He had to get back and call Izzy and see Ben. His stomach twisted, but he shoved it down and disappeared.
***
Claire stared at the ghost of herself in the reflection of a thick piece of glass, the thing that separated her from the figure laying prone and still in the hospital bed in the room on the other side. Machines beeped, a Labcoat talked to another Labcoat at the foot of Ben’s bed, discussing things she’d already heard about ten times at that point.
Words like seizure and unknown variables floated around in the space between her eyes, which were dry. Red, and stinging--but dry. If she let them run, they’d erode what forced stability she had left, and Claire simply couldn’t risk crumbling.
Another reflection walked up to join hers but Jesse didn’t say anything. He couldn’t. He could only stare at Ben, an alien panic streaming through him. His breath grew faster, more shallow, and more than anything he wanted to run away from there. Instead, he gingerly touched Claire’s hand. She responded by naturally curling her fingers into his and pulling him close, but her eyes didn’t stray from the scene in the room through the window.
“He had a seizure,” she said somberly, swallowing the brick in her throat. “They don’t know why.”
Jesse’s whole body tensed. He couldn’t stand to look anymore, turning towards her instead. “You still have the amulet?” he asked quietly. Claire’s brows twitched downward toward her nose, an inculcated sign of confusion that turned back toward him.
“Amulet?” That was an odd term to throw out suddenly.
A voice floated toward them from down the hallway:
“You better get the hell outta my way if you know what’s good for you! So help me God, I’ll put you in one’a these beds yourself!”
Jesse looked up sharply to see Izzy looking ready to punch some poor nurse in the face. He opened his mouth to automatically tell them to let her pass, but hesitated. “Maybe you should help her?”
The look on Claire’s face was clearly not letting go of the subject they’d barely scraped before Izzy posed a security threat--that situation was much more pressing. She nodded and pulled in a deep breath, letting go of Jesse’s hand to intervene.
“She’s with me and room 348,” she told the frazzled orderly, easily winding herself between the two, ready to take Izzy’s arm with her own before there could be any formal protesting. The orderly balked, giving a weak smile and pulling aside.
“Sorry, I just hadn’t seen her name on the registrar and-- I’m sorry.”
Without another word the orderly rushed off to the lobby. Izzy relaxed for the briefest moment, then met Claire’s expression with worry and concern. Jesse had given her the basics, but so much was left unexplained.
“What’d the doctors have to say?”
Claire’s jaw set again, and her throat felt dry, but she kept her eyes forward. She could feel Izzy’s look burning into her own expression. “Grand Mal seizure, and he hasn’t come out yet. They’re all clueless.”
Izzy made the cross over her chest, her eyes lifting heavenward before she hugged Claire, who returned the gesture, albeit copiously distracted. It was brief, and when she pulled back her eyes were bright with unshorn tears. She looked sideways at Jesse.
“Can I sit with him?”
Jesse shrugged, his expression stiff. “I think so.”
“When they leave,” Claire added quietly, her voice once again going a bit monotone. Her head nodded toward the doctors still in the room. Izzy let her hands drop away from Claire’s shoulders, pulling back and moving to look through the plated glass. She stood there silently before a shudder worked its way through her body. Then her head bowed and her eyes fell closed, lips moving soundlessly with her hands clasped over her heart.
The look Jesse gave her was dark, and he turned away, running his hands through his hair. “I need...something. You two want coffee?” he said, his voice rough. Izzy shook her head, but otherwise didn’t answer him. Claire had caught that look, but didn’t react to it outwardly. She only hesitated, trying to figure out which path to take.
In the end, she looked down at Izzy, touching her shoulder lightly as she spoke. “Keep an eye on him? We won’t be long.”
Izzy’s head rose and she looked up at Claire. Her face was already tear-streaked. “Of course. Take your time. I’ll come get you the moment they come out.”
An irritation he immediately felt guilty for swept over Jesse. He waited until Claire was next to him before walking, though really, he had no idea where he was supposed to go for that stuff. A hall away, he said, “You have it, right?”
Claire looked at him sideways, but only for a moment, before her eyes moved ahead of them again. The sinking feeling in her stomach was only getting worse, and it was starting to tighten her shoulders.
“Yes, I have it,” she answered quietly. “I’ve already sent a picture of it to Lucas and set him on it.”
He looked at her sharply. “You touched it?”
“Not directly, no,” she hushed back, and returned the look she gave him by reflex. “The sooner we know what it is, the sooner we can fix it.”
“Exactly. Give it to me.” He held out a hand. Stopping on the side of the hallway, Claire looked at his hand, then quickly up at his face.
“What’s going on.” It was more a gentle prod for information than a question. Regardless of her concerns, her hand dug in her back pocket to pull out the pendant she’d stuffed in a stolen latex glove after snapping a quick picture.
Jesse scowled. “I want to find out what that thing did. I also want to keep you safe. It didn’t do anything to me when I touched it.” Claire didn’t look entirely convinced. There were alarms going off stemming from beyond this morning and this pendent, and she didn’t like what it was doing to his eyes.
Still, she trusted him. Without fully hiding the apprehension in her eyes, she set the thing in his hand, and they slowly started walking again. Jesse slid it into his pocket, though he hadn’t missed the look. He hadn’t missed a lot of the looks Claire had been giving him lately.
“If you want to say something, say it.”
Claire rolled her lips, but she couldn’t suppress the twist in her stomach, or the sudden sharper sting behind her eyes.
“I’m worried about you,” she said finally.
There was a long silence as Jesse kept walking, though his jaw tightened. “Worry about Ben. He’s the one who needs it.”
“I’m worried about both of you,” she shot back, almost indignantly. “And simply telling me not to isn’t going to change anything.”
“Anything in particular or just worrying about me in general?” he said, equally stiff.
Claire felt her throat tighten, adding to the tension in her shoulders. She swallowed around it and tried to think on whatever words would come out of her mouth. Unfortunately, none of the options sounded very good.
In the end, she was silent for a few more steps, watching the doors go by them until she spotted one with an Exit Stairs sign above it. Without a word, she leaned against it and directed Jesse into the stairwell with her. After the door shut, she pinned him with her eyes and an uneven breath that was supposed to make her feel better. It didn’t.
“Please tell me what is going on with you,” she half pleaded, half demanded. “And don’t tell me it’s nothing, or it’s personal, because those aren’t answers.”
Jesse met her eyes for a long moment before looking to the floor. The anger he’d been holding to like a raft dissolved, the pit of his stomach sinking. “It...it won’t make you feel better.”
Despite the ominous promise in his words, the tone sparked some breed of hope in her eyes. Without thinking, she grabbed both his hands and squeezed, running her thumbs along the thicker veined backs of his own. “Hey...” she started, dipping her head to meet his eyes. “It may not make me feel better, but I promise it won’t make me run away. I’m on your side here.”
The words touched the very heart of his fear, and though it didn’t make it better, it did make saying it easier. “I didn’t save those kids in Chackbay,” he said, swallowing, his eyes wide on her. “I killed them.”
Claire’s eyes switched back and forth between his, squinting slightly in her obvious confusion, which was the only thing holding the sick feeling in her chest at bay. “I don’t understand...” she said very quietly--nervous, but still urging him on.
He tried to swallow again but his mouth was dry. “The...the piper was controlling them, connected to them somehow. And when I shot him, the kids went down. Dead.” He leaned back against the door, his legs unsteady. “I wasn’t thinking. You always told me to think things through, but I just shot him and killed them all.”
That sick feeling was getting stronger. Claire watched him with an unwavering intensity, remembering how they helped six tired, but very much alive children back to their homes after the incident. Whatever had to have happened between when Jesse shot their kidnapper dead and when they all met up was still unsaid, but the possibilities were making her very weak in the legs.
She took a deep breath and chewed on her bottom lip. “Keep going, hon...” Her whisper was tight. She hadn’t wanted to say it.
He rubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands, unable to look at her. “I called the demon.”
Claire felt all the air suddenly disappear from her lungs, and the color drained from her face. She soundlessly clapped her palm over her own mouth, which rubbed hard at her face then dropped, along with her gaze. She couldn’t breathe, not for a second or two. When the ability finally came back, it was shaky and teetered on the edge of functional at all.
“...Jess, did you make a deal?” she finally uttered, looking at him with now-watery eyes.
“I couldn’t just let those kids stay dead.” His voice hitched. “I had to save them, Claire.” Claire couldn’t keep the water in her eyes from falling, especially when she closed them at the desperate, honest sound of his voice.
“I know you did,” she offered in a whisper, buried in his shoulder. It was all she could do to keep from letting the possibilities shake her to pieces.
“But it wasn’t anything bad!” His eyes sought hers as he grabbed her hand. “I have to come when he calls. That’s it. I don’t have to do anything, just hear whatever he says.” She squeezed his hand hard and drew him in for a tighter hug: one that belied the soft quiver deep beneath her skin, thanks to a terror that hadn’t made it to the surface yet.
“Jess--” She didn’t know how to continue without tripping all over her words, only to fall into what she was really thinking about thanks to all this: the end result, which she’d already been shown. “Demons don’t just offer up lives to be heard out. Especially not six lives... especially not that demon.”
Jesse pulled back, cupping her face to look her straight in the eye. “I swear, Claire. The deal was he brings back the kids, I come when he calls. And he doesn’t go after you and Ben when I’m with him. That’s what we agreed to.” But the demon was already pushing the boundaries of that, wasn’t he? Jesse’s mouth tightened; he’d have to remind the demon that he wasn’t going to be pushed around.
She looked at him for a moment of wavering silence, then rolled her lips. “I believe you, Jesse... It’s him I don’t--” she stopped herself, trying to breathe. She fixed her rhythm with a hard sigh. “They are experts at finding the fine print. He’s got you hooked--now he’s gonna devote everything into reeling you in.”
“It doesn’t matter, because I won’t let him,” Jesse said, heat behind his words. “I won’t do anything I don’t want to, and he knows that, too.”
“Baby, he will make you want to do it. He’s already trying, I can tell... by letting you think you’ve got him pinned.” Her own voice was tightening. Claire didn’t even bother to wipe the streaks of water falling down her cheeks. “How many times has he called you?”
Jesse stepped away from her, his expression strained with hurt. “Just once. And what exactly can you tell? You see me becoming more evil, is that it?”
Claire’s expression mirrored the sudden pain in his. “No! I mean by how he’s got you convinced that you’re the one on top of his arrangement. What did he say to you, this one time he’s called?”
“He wanted me to get something for him,” he snapped, though his face was turning red. The amulet felt heavy in his pocket. “But I’m not giving it to him, so it’s fine.”
His tone rang through her like a tuning fork. Claire continued to watch him from her heavy lean on the stair rail, her brows heavily furrowed, but her voice as tempered as she could keep it. “Jesse, remember that I only want to help you.” Don’t you see the slope you’re sliding on...
Then, with a wide look in her eyes, the thought struck her. “That necklace--that’s what he wanted?”
Jesse froze before nodding. “But he said he didn’t know it would hurt Ben,” he said quickly. “He doesn’t know how to fix it.”
Claire didn’t know how to react to that, except for another flip in her stomach. She looked down at the floor, trying to think.
“Well, what does he want it for? What does it do?”
“I don’t know. It can help him find God or something, but I don’t know why, I didn’t really care because I wasn’t going to give it to him.” Not entirely true at the time, but definitely not now.
Wonderful. Claire felt like the floor was slowly crumbling beneath her. An obviously very powerful demon was this close to something that could ‘find God’, and Jesse was--Jesus, help me.
“My guess is he’ll do anything, to anyone to get it, Jess... We gotta get rid of it. Does he know you have it?”
“...Yes. But we have to find out what it did to Ben first. I told him that, that he wasn’t getting it until Ben was better. And then I’ll throw it in the ocean or something.”
Claire’s first thought was and then what, but she bit it back. They had no clue as to a time window, and Izzy was still out there. She took a deep breath and wiped her face with the back of her sleeve.
“We’ll--we’ll work on it,” she said hopefully, but still terribly worried. She stepped up on her toes to kiss the side of his mouth and give his hand a quick, distracted squeeze. “Ben needs us right now...”
Swallowing, Jesse nodded. Part of him even felt better, now that he had gotten it all out. Well, most of it. He squeezed her hand back before opening the stairwell door and letting her through first.
****
By the thousandth memory, Ben knew what was happening. He’d tried to break away from the dialogue, to beg for someone to tell him what was going on, but it was almost like he was being possessed and forced to relive every detail he lost.
Dean, finally coming out of his room, watching him try and eat cereal -- “Sit down, kiddo. You’re not eating that sugary shit. A growing boy like you needs real food” -- and making him breakfast for the first time. Dean, pulling away from his mom in a not-very-subtle way when he’d come back from the bathroom while they were watching Zombieland. Dean, secretly taking him to a parking lot behind the movie theatre after it closed -- “Let’s keep this between you and me” -- and letting him drive for the first time. Dean, salting the doors and windows -- ”It keeps out tons of things.” / “Like what?” -- when they took a three-day vacation in Chicago, then taking him fishing the next day and telling him everything. Hundreds of other things he did remember were left unvisited, but these memories... they burned inside him, filling him with limitless yearning.
He didn’t want them to stop; he just wanted to relive them, over and over again. His mom was happy. He was happy. But he never saw the same memory twice, and as they passed him by, a sense of dread started pricking at his mind. They would run out eventually.
Presently he was sitting at the picnic table, his Nintendo DSi held loosely in his hands as he watched his mom and Dean bring out flatware and other food items for some barbecue, when he suddenly felt a distinct presence next to him.
“The human mind is an amazing thing,” the voice said. “So easily tampered with, but indestructible. They were never taken away from you, you know. Just buried.”
Ben turned his head sharply. He didn’t know what he’d expected, but he certainly hadn’t counted on seeing himself. Only, it wasn’t him; his hair was cropped shorter, his face a more cleanly shaven, something just a bit off about his eyes.
“Who are you?”
His doppelganger smiled faintly at him. “A guide of sorts.” Ben tensed up immediately, but his doppelganger’s smile only widened. “Don’t be afraid. I’m not a demon, or a djinn. This is not a trap of any kind. I’m here to make sure your transition is smooth and you wake up unharmed.”
“Forgive me if I call bullshit,” Ben retorted, his voice a little terse. “What the hell happened to me? Where am I?”
“Shady Grove Adventist Hospital. When you touched the amulet, the leftover energy signature of its last long-term owner -- along with your own memories -- broke through the walls in your mind.”
Ben blinked at him, trying to follow the explanation. Concern started itching its way through his blood.
“So I’m--”
“Comatose.” His doppelganger stood, hands clasped in front of him. “It’s safer than the alternative.”
Ben’s face twisted in agitation. “The alternative? Listen, I’m not Ashton freaking Kutcher. Wake me the hell up.”
“I can’t.”
His mother laughed in the background. Dean had grabbed her and thrown her over his shoulder, his shirt soaked from a pitcher of ice water she’d tossed on him unsuspectingly. He felt his body instinctively stand to go to the hose on the side of the house. When he turned his head to look at where his doppelganger had been, he was gone.
****
Claire didn’t always pace while she was on the phone--only when she was extremely agitated or worried. Right then, as she listened to the ring on the other end of her phone, she was damn near wearing a line in the tile floor of the hospital lobby: the only place she could get any good reception (and not be barked at by the hospital staff for having a phone in use around the machines).
“Hey Claire.” Lucas answered on the second ring. His voice was friendly, but not as easy as usual. “How’s he doing?”
Claire brought her hand to her brow, sighing into the phone regardless of how she tried to suppress it. “He hasn’t woken up...”
There was a short silence before, “Shit, Claire, I’m sorry.” She pinched the bridge of her nose for a moment, then stopped pacing. Claire had no idea how her voice was even working at the moment.
“Tell me you found something.”
“Not much,” Lucas said, his tone apologetic. “And nothing I would swear my life on. There are quite a few horned gods out there it might reference, and I’m not well-versed enough in art history to tell what time and place it might have come from. Could be Hathor, an Egyptian cow god all about protecting women, or a Bull-Man from Mesopotamia, an evil-fighting demon. Could even be just a regular Pan figure, although the style doesn’t seem to be that Western. Thing is, none of them would have anything to do with giving Ben a seizure, not as far as I can tell.”
Of course it wouldn’t be anything easy to find. Claire cursed herself silently for even daring to hope. She eased into one of the bland upholstered lobby chairs and held her head in her free hand. There was more she could tell him, but it had to be worded carefully. She just hoped she had the mental capacity for it.
“Try cross-referencing it with objects said to indicate the presence of a deity--” she paused, keeping her eyes focused on the tile floor in front of her. “The Deity, more specifically.”
There was a long silence before Lucas said, “Okay, will do. I swear it looks familiar, too, so I must have a book on it here somewhere.”
Claire’s breath shortened. “It looks familiar?”
“I think,” he added quickly. “No idea from where. Just a bit of deja vu. Hey, you still looking for information on Clifton?”
“Clifton...” Claire blinked away a little of her momentary daze. “Oh. Yes, anything and everything.”
“Apparently there’s a Hell’s Gate there. Nasty one, too, like something out of a Greek myth. Path to Hades kind of thing.”
“Jesus,” Claire breathed without thinking, rubbing the back of her neck. The muscles there were tied in knots. “And our Ruth came from it, I’m sure. You find anything else on her?”
“Nothing yet. I got into the pool hall’s digital security and got a good shot of her face, but nothing came up under missing persons or deaths. Not that I could find anyway. I’ll keep looking, maybe float things around to other hunters. If she isn’t on the level, someone could’ve come across her before.”
Claire sighed quietly, nodding to the phone even though Lucas couldn’t see it. Fatigue was setting into her bones, but her mind was as far from sleep as possible, and every time she looked out into the hallway, she caught the sight of Ben’s sleeping body across the hall and into his room. She closed her eyes and leaned back in the chair. “Right. Thanks, Lucas. Just--keep looking, I guess.”
“I will.” A short pause. “Hang in there. And call me if there’s news on Ben.”
“Will do,” she replied. “Phone’s always on me.”
After Claire hung up, she stared blankly at the phone as it idly twirled in her fingertips. Amitiel’s helpful images floated like ghosts on the back of her eyelids; always there, unrelenting, and grew sharper every time she tried to make them fade.
***
The constant beep of the heart monitor, the hiss of the saline drip on its timer, even the murmur of people wandering back and forth in the hallway had already faded into the background for Claire--and he’d only been there for six hours or so. She hadn’t been logging the time.
All her concentration was torn between her ears and her eyes; watching the rise and fall of the blanket over his chest, listening - straining - to hear anything besides breath. Occasionally, her fingers would tighten around his hand, caught between her two, just to see if there’d be a reaction. Of course, there hadn’t been one yet.
“You’ve got horrible timing,” Claire uttered flatly, and mostly to herself in some vague attempt to inject something other than excruciating worry into the still atmosphere. The triple-shot espresso she’d gotten after talking with Lucas sat on the tray near Ben’s bed, forgotten. She’d barely taken three sips.
Claire swallowed the thick knot in her throat and looked down at his hand, carefully avoiding the IV taped to the back of it. Nearly dwarfing her own, it was warm and relaxed, like he was sleeping. The stark difference between her stress-tightened and cool skin made her squeeze again.
“I know that whatever this is, you’re fighting it tooth and nail... I just hope you can hear me.” She looked on his face, the clear breathing tubes drawing her attention first--so alien and out of place there. “I hope it somehow helps...”
The burn in her eyes wasn’t the lack of sleep, at least not right then. Claire didn’t even bother wiping away the tear that fell--that would require letting go of his hand, which she wasn’t willing to do.
“Come back. Follow my voice back here...” Her voice fell below a whisper, tight around her vocal chords. “I don’t know what else to do, Baby...”
A nurse slid through the sliding door and closed it behind him silently, wordlessly moving to the foot of Ben’s bed to pick up the clipboard before he brought it over to the machines off to the left. Claire tracked him briefly, but dropped her eyes to Ben’s hand again, going silent. Her thumb moved over his in a thoughtless rhythm. After the nurse finished writing down the notation, he hung the clipboard back on its hook.
“I need to run the GCS tests, miss.”
Claire didn’t look up or even move right away, but eventually she nodded, giving Ben’s hand another squeeze before easing back to give the nurse some room. The chair creaked as she shifted weight on the well worn pad, reaching for her cardboard cup--both out of necessity and for something to do with her hands. The nurse moved efficiently, lifting Ben’s hand in his and pinching the end of his pinkie finger while watching his face. There was no response. Once Ben’s hand was returned to his side, the nurse moved to the head of his bed, pulling out a small flashlight and lifting each of Ben’s eyes in turn. His pupils contracted, but other than that there was still no response. The three other tests came and went with no change, and the nurse once again moved to pick up the clipboard in order to write down the results.
“He’ll be having his CAT scan in the next hour,” he told Claire, returning the board.
“Thank you,” she murmured quietly, twisting the cup in her hands as they rested between her knees. Her eyes were unfocused, moving on their own accord from the coffee to Ben, then to the nurse when peripheral movement drew them up. Someone was walking by the window out in the hall; Someone who looked more like something. Their skin was angry red and purple, so bright it seemed to be reflecting the fluorescent lights, run through with patched of charcoal black. They had no hair that Claire could see, and as they walked, burned streamers of what might have once been a dress flowed behind them in an unnatural breeze. Claire stared, every muscle frozen in deep instinct and too many years of experience.
The thing’s head turned, eyes meeting Claire’s, almost burning white against the rest of their mutilated body. She felt the tangible wave of general hatred and agony in its stare, and the hairs on the back of her neck and arms stood to full attention. Before she realized it, Claire put her cup on the side table and stood, shooting toward the hall with a muttered ‘excuse me’ for the nurse.
But when she rounded the corner, the thing was gone.
“Hey,” came a voice behind her. She turned to find Jesse walking up, paper bag in hand. “Got you a sandwich.” Claire forced a hard breath out through her lips, her eyes were a little wild when they met his. Jesse’s face fell.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
Claire swallowed hard and looked behind her again, in the direction where the thing would’ve been. Despite the setting--a place ripe for ghosts of all kinds--that one was just jarring.
“Just saw something out of a horror movie,” she huffed, though quietly and with a mind to their surroundings. “A ghost--a very nasty one.”
Letting out a hard breath, the panic went out of Jesse’s expression. “Alright. So. I mean, I bet there’s lots of ghosts around a hospital.”
“Usually,” she agreed, trying to filter the extra dread out of her system. Her instincts were already flaring. She really didn’t need any more. “It just--caught me off guard. They’re usually just echos or wanderers... they don’t usually look at you.” Not like that, anyway.
He raised his eyebrows, reaching out to take her hand. “I can look into it, if you want. Make sure.”
This time Claire’s eyebrows lifted, though the gesture put the faintest smile on her face. “Are--are you volunteering to do research?”
His smile was a little stronger. “One time offer. You might want to take me up on it while it’s still there.” Claire’s grin warmed into a much more recognizable smile. A lot of her stress showed up in her eyes at that moment, but it was still a small, needed release. She squeezed his hand and curled into him, just needing to be close.
“We’ll look into it together. I could use the distraction.”
Wrapping his free arm around her, he nodded. “Sounds good to me. You take the sandwich,” he said, handing her the bag. “I’ll grab the laptop.”
An hour later, Claire was leaning heavily on her own hand, braced on the speckled cafeteria table. The caffeine wasn’t working, and the sandwich Jesse bought for her was sitting like a sedative brick in her stomach. They were running Ben through tests, and sifting through newspaper articles and hacked hospital records on the laptop weren’t quite the distraction she’d hoped for.
After watching part of a grieving family talk amongst themselves in the ICU lobby, another thought had come into her head, added to the mix of worry that darkened her pale eyes. She would’ve been able to put it off a little easier, having faith that Ben would pull out of this any second, but she’d been put into the perspective of a grieving mother very recently. The question of calling Lisa Carter simply would not leave her head.
Jesse’s eyes were still focused on the computer screen, blocking away the rest of the hospital. It was good to pretend he wasn’t there.
“Hey. Got something, maybe,” he said, looking up from the article he’d been reading. “A fire a couple of months ago.”
Claire looked up, repositioning her chin on her hand. “How bad?”
“Two deaths, five injuries.” He frowned at her. “Not sure why they’d haunt the hospital, though.”
“Maybe some of the injured died later.”
“Ah, yeah. Sounds like a place to start at least.” He pulled a pad of paper over, scribbling down a list of names. “Here’s the dead and hurt. I’ll search and see if there were any follow-up articles.” Claire took the list, turning it in her fingers with a lingering glance.
Rolling her shoulders back, Claire sat a bit straighter in the plastic chair, lifting her eyes to Jesse. “I need to ask you something.”
Jesse looked at her, his stomach twisting. “Go ahead.”
She looked up at him, meeting his eyes, imploring him. “I want to call Lisa...” It didn’t come out as a question, but it was still clear in her eyes.
“Oh.” He rubbed his forehead. “Yeah. Shit. Hadn’t even thought of that.”
Claire sighed lightly, partially relieved that the idea wasn’t met with a horrified face, though she wasn’t even sure why that came up in her mind as a possibility. Still, it was a terribly delicate situation. “Ben wouldn’t want me to, I don’t think.”
He looked a little surprised. “Why not? We’d want to know. She’s his mom. If--” He cut himself off, a lump springing to his throat. He finished quietly. “She’d want to know.”
Claire went quiet for a moment, feeling the same constriction in her chest. Her only argument was keeping her grounded, that Ben would wake any minute and bury the issue. “I know he wouldn’t want to worry her--but... I don’t know.” She looked down at the table, finding the subject harder to speak about than she even anticipated. “Maybe we should table it--talk about it again if he... if we still need to.”
Jesse nodded, not wanting to talk about it anymore. Besides, Claire probably knew best on this. “Yeah. Let’s just see what we can do about this ghost.”
***
Claire had finally managed to fall asleep. On the one hand, this was a good thing, because she needed it badly. On the other, it meant Jesse had to stay in Ben’s room because someone had to be ready if he woke up. Jesse hated Ben’s room. It was too quiet, with the two of them sleeping there and just the beeping of the machines. He was trying to research, but they had done about as much as they could do. Which only left him sitting there, staring at Ben and thinking.
He’d said before he wished he could do more. Healing and transporting himself was well and good, but when the people he cared about were hurt or trapped, it meant exactly dick. He wanted to be something better, someone better.
But maybe he could settle for knowing someone better.
He knew Claire would object to Ruth coming around to help, and that Ben would probably agree with her. But Ruth wasn’t a demon, he knew that much. And if she could help, he didn’t really care if they didn’t like it.
Feeling a little ridiculous, Jesse closed his eyes. “Ruth?” She’d said he was her master, so he hoped she was listening. “Ruth, could you come help me?”
At first there was no answer; just silence, resounding in his head. Then he heard it, the whisper-soft feminine echo:
[ Shouldn’t be here they’ll see me they’ll see me can’t let them see me ]
The same nagging sensation from the bar expanded in his chest, and then he heard a deep inhale from behind him.
“Hi.”
He opened his eyes, his stomach twisting as he turned around. An almost kind of relief swept over him. She hadn’t been in his imagination.
“Hi,” he said, getting to his feet.
Just like before, he could feel the thrumming heartbeat of her emotions pouring into him: fear, concern, anxiety, adoration, and devotion twisted around her like living things. Her expression was tight.
“I shouldn’t be here.”
[ They’ll see me they’ll see me shouldn’t stay run and hide and run and hide anything you ask anything you want always yours always always always ]
“It won’t take long,” he said quickly, wishing he could get her words out of his head. “I...you healed me before. Now I want you to heal my friend, Ben.” He gestured at the bed. The blonde looked at its occupant as though registering there was another person in the room for the first time. Then her eyes settled on Claire, whose head was propped against the nearby wall, her hand clutching one of Ben’s loosely. Ruth rolled her lips and swallowed, her eyes meeting Jesse’s apprehensively.
“Okay,” she whispered. She moved over to the side, bending over Ben’s unconscious body, her hands moving to his head. Her eyes fell closed and the very air around her felt as though it grew brighter.
Jesse held his breath as he watched, his heart aching with hope. “Please please please,” he whispered under his breath, hardly aware he was saying it. It could have been seconds or years, but finally Ruth pulled her hands away.
“Nothing’s broken,” she whispered at last. “But... he’s locked himself up inside his head. I tried to get to him, but he won’t come out.”
Looking at her, Jesse’s face twisted, but he nodded. “Okay. Thought...thought it was worth a try.”
[ Don’t be sad don’t be sad don’t want you to be sad ]
Her hand went out to his, finding it and giving it a weak squeeze. “He’s not in pain. He’s just looking for something and doesn’t want to leave until he’s found it.”
His breath caught. “What do you mean?”
Ruth took a step closer, letting go of his hand and bringing both of hers up to his temples. This time when he heard her thoughts, they were much more smooth and intentional.
[ Others have been in his head before, ] The whispered voice said. Ruth kept her eyes open, meeting Jesse’s as if she were speaking aloud. [ I could feel the remnants there. They were very powerful. There are scars on him, like someone cut pieces away, but he’s healing now. And the other one... ]
Jesse’s eyes went wide. He stared at her, forgetting to breathe, before glancing back at the bed. “Claire?”
Ruth shook her head. [ No, there were two there. The last one hurt him. They both did, but the last one was more recent. Burns, not cuts. Meant to hurt. Very different. ]
The horror was clear on his face. “Who? Who hurt him?”
[ I can only see the damage, not the cause. ] Her hands slid away from his face, but she didn’t pull away completely. [ Can’t stay can’t stay they’ll see me can’t let them see me gotta run hide run hide run hide-- ]
He wanted to stop her, but he’d gotten all he could. “Go. Seriously, you can go any time you want. Don’t stay because of me.”
Ruth’s eyes filling with need and longing. A tremble shook her from head to foot, and she found his hands again.
[ Would stay with you forever if I could meant to stay should stay want to stay can’t stay they’ll see me gotta hide -- ]
“I wish you could understand,” she whispered, emotion in her voice. “I want to stay. So badly.”
[ Made for you born to follow anywhere you go always yours always ]
“But I know shouldn’t, and I only stayed before because you wanted me to stay. I’ll do whatever you ask me to.”
Jesse felt his face burning up and he swallowed hard. “Go. Y-you need to go, so you can go.”
She nodded and pulled away again, the thrum of devotion and adoration swelling again before she blinked out of existence. He gasped as the emotions faded with her. Maybe drunk he hadn’t been as aware of it, but the constant bombardment of everything she felt, everything she felt for him, was a dizzying high. Looking around the room brought him right back down again, though.
She hadn’t been able to help Ben. He’d done everything he could think of, and it wasn’t enough.
***
“Where the hell were you!?”
He’d taken the long way home after getting in a fight with his friend Aaron at school. They’d gotten permission slips to go on a field trip, and their teacher had pointed out that they were looking for additional chaperons. Aaron had suggested he “ask his dad” to come along. Ben had shouted at him that Dean was not his “fucking father.” Luckily, it had been the first time he’d ever used profanity in class, and the principal had let him off with a warning. Rather than wait for his not-father to pick him up in front of all his friends, he’d walked. Dean was livid.
“Dude, chill. I walked. It’s no big deal--”
Dean tried to touch his face but Ben jerked back, feeling a complicated twist of emotions rush up from his gut and into his throat. Some of the anger had faded from Dean’s eyes, but he looked scared. Honest to god scared, like his mom did the first time he’d gone biking alone without telling her.
“I waited for half an hour,” Dean nearly shouted. “After going in and checking every single classroom tryin’ to find you. You can’t just up and leave me like that without letting me know where you are! What if something had happened--”
“You’re not my dad!” Ben shouted over him, shaking with rage. Dean stared at him open-mouthed in shock, and before he found his words again Ben shoved past him, running into the house and slamming the door to his bedroom shut. Angry tears filled his eyes as he sank to the floor with his back against the door. His doppelganger sat on the end of the bed facing him, his eyes deeply empathetic. A few moments later he heard Dean’s heavy but familiar footfall on the stairs, which stopped just outside his door.
“Ben...”
“Go away!”
There was a sigh, and Ben swiped furiously at his eyes as the tears spilled over.
“Ben, I’m not tryin’ to be your dad.” Ben felt a twist in his gut, like gratitude and regret at the same time. Beneath all of it, the part of him that knew it was just another memory felt his heart breaking. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t care what happens to you. I just... don’t want you gettin’ hurt.” There’s a breath of a laugh on the other side of the door before Dean adds, “Your mom would kick my ass if anything happened to you.”
In spite of himself, Ben felt his lips lift in a smile.
“Listen, Sa--” Dean’s voice suddenly cut off, and while Ben had felt confused at the slip when he was a kid, now he just felt more heartbroken. He wished he had opened the door, but he’s a slave to the memories and unless his memory self did it, he couldn’t make it so.
“I’m sorry I yelled at you. Just... please don’t do that again, okay?”
Then the footsteps moved, fading as they went down the stairs again.
TO BE CONTINUED...