Season Two

Episode Seventeen: Forget Me Not

by Irismay42

Story by Grkgrl88 and Irismay42

Part Three

Rest Stop Motel, Phoenix, AZ

She was burning.

Up on the ceiling, looking down at him.

“Don’t be scared, baby.”

“Take your brother outside as fast as you can.”

Looking up at the man holding the baby.

The man with the yellow eyes, looking down at him.

Contempt. Hatred.

Pinning him to the cabin wall. Hurting him.

“What, you’re the only one that can have a family?”

“They don’t need you. Not like you need them.”

The same eyes, but a different man.

Women dying.

So many of them.

Dying because of him.

He was killing them.

Because of him.

Give in. Let go. Have peace.

Resist. Hold on. Stay strong.

“Don’t be scared, baby.”

Yellow eyes everywhere… Everyone dead… All his fault…

“They don’t need you…”

“NO!”

He could hear the shower running.

Dean took three short, shuddering breaths before he was finally able to gasp out the word, “Sammy?”

It sounded more like a plea than a name.

He cast about himself, blinking cold sweat out of his eyes, slowly adjusting to the early morning sunlight filtering in through the narrow chink between the badly-fitted curtains over the grimy window.

Heart hammering, he reminded himself that he could hear the shower, could see the open duffel and some of its contents strewn across Sam’s empty bed.

Rationally, Dean knew that Sam was only a few scant feet away taking a shower, but that didn’t stop him repeating his brother’s name like an early morning benediction.

Not alone. You’re not alone. He hasn’t left you here…

He rested his elbows on his knees for a second, leaning forward as he tried to catch his panicked breath.

Just a nightmare…

The words sounded familiar, as if he’d had cause to repeat them too many times to himself of late.

Just a nightmare…

So many dead.

The woman on the ceiling was his mom, Sam had told him that. But the others… And always that yellow-eyed freak laughing out of different faces.

Why did that face at the cabin, the one looking down at him with undisguised hatred and contempt in his yellow eyes, the one looking down at him as if he was nothing, worthless; why did that one hurt so much?

“Sam? He’s clearly John’s favorite. Even when they fight it’s more concern than he’s ever shown you…”

Hurting him. Making him bleed…

…Holding the baby out to him, flames behind him. “Take your brother outside as fast as you can.”

Dean fisted his hands against his eyes, gritting his teeth as he prayed to remember… And ached to forget.

At the edge of his hearing he suddenly began to hear music, and for a second he wondered whether that stupid nursery rhyme song was actually causing him to have aural hallucinations.

Then – somehow – he realized he recognized the guitar riff – Jimi Hendrix’s Voodoo Child (Slight Return)– and noticed an accompanying buzz was vibrating through the chair next to his bed on which his jacket had been hastily slung the night before.

Jimi’s wailing axe got steadily louder as Dean fished about in his jacket pocket, eventually pulling out a juddering cell phone whose front cover was currently illuminated with the word “Dad.”

He hesitated for a second, fairly sure that this was his cell phone, and, by extension, his dad calling – the crazy almost-psycho demon hunter Sam had told him so very little about – but he wasn’t entirely sure how to answer. “Hey, Dad, I don’t remember you but Sam tells me we have some DNA in common, so thanks for that…”

He glanced nervously at the bathroom door, the sound of running water still audible over the screeching ringtone, realized he wasn’t getting out of it that way, took a deep breath and flipped open the phone.

“H – Hello?” he said tentatively, not realizing he was holding his breath until his chest began to hurt.

“Dean? Dean, is that you?”

The voice – that voice.

Dean felt icy fingers play a concerto up his spine.

It was the voice from his nightmares.

The voice of the yellow-eyed man.

“They don’t need you. Not like you need them…”

Unable to take another breath due to the sudden constriction in his chest, as if invisible hands were squeezing him from the inside out just as they had when he’d been pinned up against that cabin wall in Missouri, ears buzzing and heart hammering so loud he could swear he heard the blood circulating in his veins, Dean could do nothing but open and close his mouth mutely, not a single sound escaping his lips as that voice – that same voice – resounded insidiously in his head.

"…Not like you need them.”

The phone bounced when it hit the murky carpet, but Dean could still hear it – still hear that voice, the voice of the yellow-eyed man as he gazed down at him, pinning him to the wall.

“What, you’re the only one that can have a family?”

“Dean? Dean! Are you alright…?”

The tinny voice issued from the phone’s speaker, and Dean could still hear it, even from six feet away with one hand unconsciously covering his right ear.

“Dean! Dean, answer me, boy!”

Dean started as the bathroom door opened, Sam entering the room scrubbing at his hair with a limp gray towel that looked like it had seen several hundred too many washes.

He stopped when he caught the terrified expression on his brother’s face; saw the cell phone abandoned on the carpet; heard his father’s agitated voice, “Dean! Son, are you hurt? Talk to me, dammit!”

Sam met Dean’s wide-eyed stare uncertainly. “Dean, it’s okay. It’s just –”

“That’s him!” Dean cut him off, pointing urgently at the phone with a shaking hand. “That’s the – the yellow-eyed guy. The one from the cabin. The one who – who –”

Suddenly, Sam understood completely.

He held out a placating hand to Dean, reaching down for the phone and putting it cautiously to his ear.

“Dean! Dean!”

“Dad, it’s okay. It’s Sam.”

Dean looked up at his brother, the confusion obvious in his eyes.

His brother was talking to the demon…

“Yeah, Dad,” Sam continued, not breaking eye contact with Dean. “It’s okay. Dean’s fine. We’re both fine. Dean’s just having some – uh – memory issues. No, it’s okay, we’re handling it. No, we’re – Dad it’s fine. Really. I’ll – I’ll call you back later. I swear, I’ll explain everything. But right now I gotta go okay? Okay. Yeah.”

Sam closed the phone, for a second just standing there, eyes locked with Dean’s.

“That was him,” Dean reiterated finally, scooting back a little on the bed, as if to put some distance between himself and Sam. Or between himself and the voice on the other end of the phone. “From the cabin. From my dream –”

“Dean.” Sam took a breath. “Listen to me. Back at the cabin – what happened… It wasn’t just a bad dream, okay? That really happened. And, yeah, that was the yellow-eyed demon – Haris – doing that to us. But the form he took – when he was – when he was hurting you? That was our dad. That was our dad possessed by Haris. You understand the difference? He kidnapped him – drugged him. Waited for us to rescue him while all the time he was inside of him, just waiting for his chance. Waiting for his chance to get to us. You understand what I’m saying?”

Dean just blinked at him.

“That was our dad on the phone just now.”

“He – he’s the demon?”

Sam shook his head, momentarily wrong-footed by Dean’s confused question. “God, no!” he burst out. “Haris got out of Dad when I shot him with the Colt. Remember?”

Dean frowned, clearly not remembering at all. “You shot our dad?”

Sam shrugged. “Coulda been worse. Dad wanted me to kill him.”

“Confused” didn’t even begin to describe the expression on Dean’s face. “So – so it wasn’t really our dad,” he said slowly, as if trying to work the whole story out for himself. “It wasn’t our dad who – who said that stuff to – to us? Who hurt us? It wasn’t him. It was the demon inside of him?”

Sam nodded.

“So – so he wasn’t a demon when you were a baby? When he told me to take you outside, to get you away from the fire?”

Sam shook his head. “No. He was just our dad then.”

“He was different.”

“Before he was possessed? Well, yeah, of course he was –”

“No.” Dean shook his head, eyes drifting off into the middle-distance. “Before the fire.”

Sam hung his head a little and stared at his uncomfortably shuffling feet. “I don’t know, Dean. I never knew him before the fire.”

Their eyes met, and a difficult silence followed.

“I need to remember that,” Dean said finally. “For both of us.”

Sam nodded slightly.

“I –” Dean continued awkwardly. “I dreamed that that yellow-eyed bastard – Haris? I dreamed he killed women – lots of women – because of me. Because I wouldn’t do something maybe…?”

“Yea-ah,” Sam said slowly, lowering himself down onto Dean’s bed until he was sitting shoulder to shoulder with his brother. “You kinda got possessed too.”

Dean’s eyes widened to such an extent he wouldn’t have looked out of place in a Japanese cartoon. “By Haris?”

“No,” Sam shook his head. “By one of his ‘kids.’ But it couldn’t possess you. Not completely.”

“Why not?”

Sam inclined his head toward Dean’s amulet. “Because of that thing. It protected you. Haris wanted you to give it to him but you wouldn’t.”

Dean looked down at the charm hanging unassumingly around his neck. “What’s so special about this thing?”

Sam scratched his head, shrugging. “Dad was never too clear on that,” he said. “But he – uh – ‘volunteered’ you to this old geezer by the name of Shadrack Mann to be the amulet’s ‘Guardian’. Crazy old coot. He said he kept an eye on artifacts like the amulet. Made sure they were protected, that they didn’t fall into the wrong hands.” He looked up from the amulet to Dean’s slightly disbelievingly face. “He said as long as you protected the amulet, the amulet would protect you.”

“Protect me from what?”

Sam shrugged again. “Possession. I guess. For starters. Although you almost died once when someone tried to steal it.”

“This thing?” Dean glanced down again, the look of disbelief on his face in danger of becoming permanent. “Why would anyone want to steal this ugly ass thing?”

Another shrug. “You got me. Never really did get to the bottom of that one.”

“And I nearly died?”

“Er, yeah.” Sam looked up quickly. “So – uh – don’t take it off. Like ever, okay? That would be bad.”

Dean nodded earnestly, fingers unconsciously straying to the amulet, and it was one of the few times Sam could ever remember his brother speechless.

“All I know,” Sam continued, “is that Shadrack Mann chose you to be Guardian of the amulet, and it was a really big deal as far as he was concerned.” His brow furrowed slightly. “It’s kind of unusual, I guess. From what I’ve read, artifacts like this usually get passed down within families, although the old codger did make some comment about your ‘lineage’ which didn’t really seem to make much sense at the time…”

“Family heirloom,” Dean suddenly muttered, his eyes unfocused and distant, almost as if he was looking at something inside of himself, fingers still wrapped tightly around the amulet.

Sam arched an eyebrow quizzically. “No,” he began to explain slowly. “Not from our family anyway…”

“That’s not what I mean.” Dean shook his head. “That’s not –” He frowned, gazing so intently at the carpet Sam thought it might instantaneously burst into flames right there in front of him. “I remember…” He trailed off, wiping the back of his hand across his eyes uncertainly.

Sam edged a little closer. “What? What do you remember, Dean?”

Dean looked up. “I’m not sure,” he admitted, focus returning to the here and now, to his brother. “A voice. In my head, maybe? Someone – something– complaining. About ‘that damned family heirloom’…” He looked down at the amulet, fingers still clutching at the warm metal. “I think maybe – maybe it was talking about this thing.”

Sam frowned, inclining his head slightly so that he could better look at his brother. “Who was talking about it?”

“I – I don’t know.” Dean rubbed at his forehead with the heel of his hand in frustration. “In my head. It was a voice in my head. Wouldn’t leave me alone. Kept telling me to give, to give up, to let go. And I – I wouldn’t.” It was suddenly as if a lightbulb came on behind his eyes. “That’s why that yellow-eyed freak was killing those women. Wasn’t it?” Dean fixed Sam with a hard stare. “Wasn’t it?”

Sam swallowed, nodding reluctantly. “That was when you were possessed. Half-possessed.” He shrugged. “That must be the demon’s voice you’re remembering. What it was thinking maybe.” He met Dean’s uncertain gaze, intrigued. “It was pissed off with you. You wouldn’t give it what it wanted – you wouldn’t give it control. It could hear what you were thinking, but probably didn’t realize it was a two-way street.” He put an encouraging hand on Dean’s shoulder, squeezing slightly. “This could be it, man. This could be the whole reason this is happening.”

Dean squinted sideways at him. “How d’you figure that?”

“Well,” Sam reasoned, “you’ve always said you don’t believe in random coincidences. What are the odds of Haris not being responsible for your losing your memory just as we’re investigating two people who were possibly killed by him or one of his minions? What if Haris planned this? What if this was a set up all along? What if he wanted you to lose your memory? Wanted you to forget something?”

“About the amulet? What the demon let slip when it didn’t think I could hear it?”

Sam shrugged. “Who knows?”

“But – ‘family heirloom.’ What the hell does that mean anyway?”

“I don’t know. Maybe nothing. Maybe that’s not what he wanted you to forget. But it’s significant. Somehow. I know it is. I’m almost positive of it.”

Dean sighed heavily, rising to his feet and beginning to pace restlessly. “You’re reaching, Sammy,” he said at length. “And don’t think I don’t appreciate it ’cause I do –”

“Dean –”

“But you can’t always make sense out of everything. Not everything happens for a reason. Maybe this was just random bad luck on my part and I’m gonna be Mr. Swiss Cheese Memory for the rest of my life –”

“No.” Sam jumped purposefully to his feet, stilling Dean’s pacing by placing a firm hand on either of his brother’s shoulders. “This is progress. I’m sure of it. You’re getting somewhere. It’s just a matter of time –”

“– Until I Leap outta here?” Dean grinned sheepishly and Sam raised an eyebrow.

“Sam Beckett. You remember Sam Beckett and you don’t remember Sam Winchester?”

Dean matched Sam’s expression perfectly. “Captain of the Starship Enterprise, right?”

Sam sniggered, slapping the back of Dean’s head as he pulled away. “Ass.”

“Hey I’m pretty sure that little maneuver’s a patented Big Brother Only privilege, kiddo,” Dean groused, batting Sam’s hand away playfully.

Sam turned, suddenly snagging his jacket from over the back of the chair near the door. “I lied,” he said, a definite glint in his eye. “I’m actually the older brother.”

“Bull,” Dean replied shortly. “These boyish good looks might fool most people, but no way you changed my diapers, Junior.”

Sam wrinkled his nose. “Okay, you got me,” he admitted. “And – ew! Thanks so much for that mental image. I think I’m scarred for life.”

He began shrugging into his jacket and Dean frowned. “We going somewhere?”

“Library,” Sam replied decisively. “Can’t find squat on the Medinas here. And if Haris really was involved in all of this somehow – killing them, zapping you – then I’m starting to get a really bad feeling about Alyssa’s involvement in all of this.”

Dean nodded. “Like maybe she’s not the damsel in distress we initially thought she was?”

“Exactly,” Sam agreed. “Haris has turned his ‘kids’ before.” He dipped his head slightly. “I think that’s kinda the plan, actually.”

He averted his eyes from his brother’s, and Dean returned Sam’s earlier gesture, placing an encouraging hand on each of the younger boy’s shoulders. “Your head starts spinning any time soon I’ll be sure to let you know.”

Sam laughed hollowly. “Gee, thanks man.”

“That’s what big brothers are for, right?”

* * * *

“So what’s wrong?” Sam asked as he pointed the Impala in the general direction of Phoenix’s main public library and hit the gas.

Dean glanced sideways at him. “You mean aside from not knowing who the hell I am and what I’m supposed to be doing with my life?”

Sam sniggered caustically. “Some might say you had that problem before you lost your memory, dude.”

“Hilarious,” Dean grit out. “I’d obviously forgotten my geek kid brother was a comedian.”

Sam grinned brightly before continuing. “What I actually meant was that every time we’ve gotten in the car since your – er – mishap, you’ve been singing that weird song. But not this time. So what’s wrong?”

Dean shrugged. “I dunno. Weird dream I guess.”

“Wanna talk about it?”

The look on Dean’s face clearly indicated that no, he did not want to talk about it, but the look on Sam’s face clearly indicated he did.

Dean might not remember much about Sam, but he had enough of an autonomic response to the puppy dog eyes currently blinking appealingly in his direction to know that there was no way he wasn’t talking about this right now.

Dean sighed – loudly and obviously. “Some of the dreams I’ve been having – y’know, since? They’ve been kinda whacked.”

“Whacked how?”

“Pretty lady on the ceiling on fire whacked.”

“Yeah. Kind of a running theme in our family.”

“Well, in the middle of all that, there’s been the yellow-eyed guy at the cabin –”

“Dad.”

“– And the same guy, only younger, giving me a baby and telling me to run away from the fire.”

“Me.”

“And then her.”

Sam cast Dean a sidelong glance. “Her?”

Dean swallowed. “Mom, I guess.”

“On – on the ceiling?”

Dean looked down at his hands. “Did I see her like that?” he asked awkwardly, studiously looking anywhere but at Sam. “Did I see her on the ceiling?”

“I don’t – I don’t think so. At least, you never said…”

“But I’m dreaming it,” Dean insisted. “And then – when she’s looking down at me – from the ceiling – she’s – she’s singing.”

“Singing?”

“That song. Like – like a lullaby.”

“So that’s what you meant before? When you said you thought she used to sing that to you?”

Dean nodded minutely. “I think maybe she used to sing me to sleep with it.”

Sam stared straight ahead for a good few seconds, barely even aware of the road in front of him. “Sometimes I forget,” he murmured eventually. “That you were just a kid once.”

“I don’t remember.”

“No,” Sam said, a trace of regret in his voice. “I don’t think you ever did.”

Dean just looked at him, not sure what to make of that.

“Anyway,” Sam seemed to mentally shake himself. “The lullaby. You remember any of the lyrics? I mean, I thought I heard you singing it in your sleep earlier, but I couldn’t make out any of the words.”

“I sing in my sleep?” Dean asked incredulously.

Sam nodded. “Oh yeah. Even before all this happened.”

Dean shook his head. “I must be one weird puppy.”

“No argument here. So. The lyrics?”

Dean scratched his head thoughtfully, closing his eyes for a second as he tried to remember. “I dunno. Something – something about a – a cowboy. Maybe. Riding off into the sunset or the night or something.”

“You know,” Sam began, suddenly breaking off to swear under his breath as he almost missed the turn for the library, “that’s the second time you’ve mentioned a cowboy since your – since you got –”

“Whammied?” Dean supplied.

“Exactly,” Sam agreed. “You said something about a cowboy yesterday too.”

Dean frowned. “Maybe I just watched one too many John Wayne movies when I was a kid.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Sam smiled slightly, a sudden nagging memory beginning to tug at the edges of his consciousness.

“I think this is it,” Dean said suddenly, indicating the large copper-colored building helpfully labeled “Phoenix Public Library” that Sam had just driven straight by.

Sam swore again, abruptly swerving the Impala into a nearby parking space, much to the annoyance of the guy in the white van behind him who chose to make some rather obscene hand gestures out of his window to register his protest at Sam’s lack of signaling.

“Wow, people are testy around here,” Dean observed as Sam threw the car into park and shut off the engine.

“I think you’ll find that’s pretty much a global phenomenon,” Sam replied, snagging his laptop bag and notebook from off the back seat and shoving open his door. One long leg was out onto the pavement before he noticed Dean wasn’t moving.

“Hey,” he said, gently nudging his brother with a bony elbow. “You with me?”

Dean shifted uncomfortably, glancing over at the bustling edifice of the library, at the steady stream of people flowing in and out of the main doors. “Mind if I sit this one out?” he asked. “Feeling kinda claustrophobic. Or anti-social. Or some damn thing.”

Sam nodded understandingly. “No problem. I could be a while though. Think you’ll be okay?”

Dean shrugged, inclining his head down toward the radio. “I got entertainment.”

Sam nodded again, making sure he left the keys in the ignition. “Don’t drain the battery,” he instructed his brother, before laughing at himself ironically. “Jeez, I sound more like you than you do right now.”

Dean threw him a sideways grin. “That’s a bad thing?” he asked, mock offence in his tone.

Sam snorted as he hauled himself up out of the car. “You have no idea.” He straightened, before suddenly bending down again and looking back in at his brother. “Listen, you call me if you need anything, huh?”

Dean smirked. “Don’t forget to wind down the window a crack, Mom.”

“Wind down your own damn window,” Sam returned, slamming the door shut and casting one last look back over his shoulder at his brother before making for the library, the strains of Hawkwind’s Silver Machine blasting from the Impala’s radio before he’d even made it to the doors.

It hadn’t taken Dean long to reacquaint himself with his music, Sam thought to himself, shaking his head in something akin to relief. Maybe everything else would come back soon too. Dean just needed time. Everything would be fine. Dean would be fine. It was just a matter of time.

He smiled as he entered the cool, blessedly air conditioned library, pausing for a second just to breathe in the familiar smell of old books and wood polish that always seemed to permeate such places.

Glancing about himself to get a lay of the land, he made quick work of using the library’s signage to guide him around the building, in next to no time settling himself at a computer terminal in the Arizona Room, old family records displayed on the screen in front of him and a pencil hovering above an open notebook lying next to the keyboard.

The Medinas were, in every way, unremarkable, and although Sam could find no direct link to confirm they were related to Captain Ernest Medina, their respective relatives had enough places of births, deaths and marriages in common for it not to be the reach he had initially thought it might be.

Flora and Victor Medina had been childhood sweethearts, both born in Phoenix, both attending the same schools, the same local college. They had married at twenty-two, right after graduation, and Alyssa had been born three years later, their only child.

Sam had often wondered about that: about how most of Haris’ “Special Kids” they had so far encountered had been only children, Sam himself being the exception.

Of course, that was always assuming Alyssa was one of Haris’ little science projects. Even if the Medinas were from one of the cursed families, it didn’t necessarily follow that she had popped up on the yellow-eyed scumbag’s radar.

But the more Sam thought about it, the more it seemed to make sense.

Alyssa had been first on the scene of her parents’ murder; she had access; she had opportunity. But did she have motive? Why kill her own parents? Or had it been Haris who wanted them dead? But for what possible reason?

Unremarkable.

The story of Victor and Flora Medina’s lives.

Sam’s eyes drifted tiredly away from the computer and he found himself gazing at shelves filled with various local high school yearbooks going back several years. Suddenly it occurred to him that in all of his research – even after having visited the Medinas’ house – he had yet to see a single photograph of Alyssa Medina.

He stood, stretching his legs and his back as he ambled over to the stack, easily locating Alyssa’s high school and running his fingers over the spines of the books until he found the correct year.

So far so good.

He pulled the book from the shelf and carried it back to the desk he’d been using, wincing slightly as his phone chose that moment to belt out Switchfoot’s This Is Your Life and cursing himself for forgetting to switch it to vibrate when he first entered the library.

He ducked his head in mute apology as several pairs of eyes suddenly bored holes into his skull, abruptly picking up the call with a quick flick of his finger.

“Dean?” he half-whispered, reclaiming his seat and hunkering down over Alyssa’s high school yearbook. “You okay?”

“Dude, I am so bored!” Dean’s voice sounded halfway between his usual non-amnesiac self and an antsy ten-year-old. “I know you said you’d be a while, but man–!”

“I’ve been here less than an hour, Dean,” Sam cut him off, beginning to flip idly through the yearbook. “And if you think you’re bored out there, you’d have been fifty times as bored in here… Although I guess I could have always stuck you in the corner with a nice picture book to keep you occupied. I think I even saw a poster for storytime in the kids’ section…”

“Oh, that’s funny, Sam,” Dean huffed. “Make fun of the amnesiac’s mental capacity.”

“Dude, your mental capacity is exactly the same as it’s always been.”

There was a slight pause while Dean tried to figure out whether he’d just been insulted or not. “College boy,” he finally muttered under his breath, as if that were the ultimate rejoinder, and Sam couldn’t help grinning, if only because Dean had actually remembered he’d been a college boy once.

“You think you can occupy yourself a little longer?” Sam asked at length.

“Aw man, the radio reception here sucks,” Dean whined. “I’ve played every dumb game on my cell phone until my eyes feel like they’re bleeding, and people keep looking at me like maybe I’m a perv watching little girls going in and out of the library.”

“Are you?”

“Watching or a perv?”

“Either.”

“I think they were university students.”

“Nice to see you’ve remembered some of your favorite pastimes there, Dean.”

“Saaaaaam! C’mon, man! You nearly finished or what?”

Sam smiled to himself, trying not to let himself get too hopeful as more little pieces of Dean gradually began to surface. His big brother had always been the impatient one, even when they were kids. “Yeah, yeah. I’m nearly done.”

“Thank God, ’cause I think I’m gonna die of boredom if you leave me out here much longer, I swear!”

“Um-hmm.” Sam was only half-listening to his brother’s ceaseless chatter now that he had assured himself he was alright, flipping through the photographs of hopeful, smiling teenagers, all gazing into the camera with their whole lives laid out in front of them like a Sunday picnic.

Sam had never gotten to see his yearbook photo…

“Oh hey, it’s Maisie!” Dean said suddenly, drawing at least a little of Sam’s attention back to his brother. “I wonder what she’s doing here? Maisie! Hey, Maisie!”

Sam pulled the phone away from his ear as his brother shouted the girl’s name, shaking his head as he reflected that even without his memory Dean was still just a little bit slutty. “How do you even remember what she looks like?” he asked casually, flipping through another couple of pages.

“I don’t know,” Dean replied, sounding genuinely nonplussed. “Maybe because she was the last thing I saw before… And, y’know, ’cause she’s hot… Hey Maisie!”

Sam yanked the phone away from his ear again, pleased that Dean had a distraction, even as his eyes lit on the name beneath a photograph of a rather plump blonde girl wearing big purple glasses and a smile containing more metal than Metallica’s tour bus.

Maisie Malone.

“Wait a second…” Sam double checked, triple checked, suddenly sitting bolt upright, his phone jammed right up against his ear. “Dean, is Maisie with you right now?” he demanded, voice trembling in time with the sudden loud thudding in his chest. “Dean!”

Maybe Dean hadn’t caught the urgency in his brother’s voice over the tinny phone line, or maybe he was just too busy flirting. Whatever the reason, he merely murmured, “Yeah, she’s right here,” before directing his attention to the girl in question. “Hey Maisie! Remember me? ’Cause I actually seem to remember you for some reason…”

“Dean, stay in the car,” Sam ordered firmly, as he feverishly continued searching the pages of the yearbook. “Dean? You hear me?”

“Huh?” Dean replied, obviously distracted, the unmistakable creak of the Impala’s passenger door swinging open squeaking down the phone line.

“Dean, stay in the car, okay?” Sam was half-yelling now, oblivious to the disapproving glares of the library’s other users.

“Sam, it’s just Maisie –”

“She’s not Maisie.”

Sam stared down at the photograph, eyes locked with those of the girl looking back up at him from the page, dark brown curls falling around her shoulders, full lips drawn into an alluring smile.

Alyssa Medina.

Sam felt simultaneously hot and cold all over, gooseflesh prickling up his bare forearms. Alyssa wasn’t staying with relatives in New Mexico: Alyssa had never left Phoenix.

Means and opportunity: there were no signs of forced entry into the Medina house because Alyssa had been there all the time, already inside when her parents had been killed. Alyssa had been right there because it had been Alyssa who had killed them – Alyssa who had slaughtered them – Alyssa who had attacked Dean.

Alyssa who was outside with Sam’s unsuspecting big brother right now.

“Dean, say in the car and lock the doors!” Sam yelled, forgetting the yearbook, forgetting his notes, forgetting his laptop as he almost knocked the desk over in his urgency to get to his brother. “Dean!” Running for the stairs, boots pounding on metal and concrete. “Dean! Don’t let her in the car!” Two flights down and running for the exit. “Dean! You hear me? Don’t let her touch you, Dean! Don’t let her near you! She’s Alyssa! Dean, she’s Alyssa, she’s the one who hurt you! And I think she’s come back to finish the job! Dean! You hear me? DEAN!”

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