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faye_dartmouthTitle: One of a Kind 1/8
Summary: Two Lorelais, Two Deans, and a Sam. Crossover with Gilmore Girls.
A/N: I know it’s been done before, but it was too appealing to not try myself. I think it’s a little different than most of the other crossovers between these two fandoms, at least of the ones I’ve read, so hopefully it works. I think you can read this without much more than a vague understanding of Gilmore Girls, though the more you know of both fandoms, the more you’ll catch.
A/N 2: Much thanks to Tyranusfan for the beta on this one. He was the perfect beta, and I appreciated him trying to make sense of all the Deans in this story. Also, thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sendintheklowns who always helps me plot and plan and provides constant cheerleading.
A/N 3: General FYI, this story deals with both Dean Forester and Dean Winchester--I think it’s fairly clear which one is which, but for those who struggle, keep in mind that I do a structured rotating POV in this fic. Each chapter starts with Sam, is followed by Dean Forester, and ends with Dean Winchester. Thanks to Tyranusfan, I think it’s pretty clear which is which. This is set preseries for Supernatural and maybe early S3 of GG.
Disclaimer: None of the Winchesters or any of the people in Stars Hollow are mine.
-o-
CHAPTER ONE
Sam ran.
His father was fond of making them run, told them that endurance was key to survival, that stopping to catch your breath just made you wide open to attack. After all, he reasoned, ghosts don’t have to stop to pant.
Sam was often loathe to admit when his father was right. The man was a self-righteous, self-centered, single-minded ass of a man, but even Sam had to admit that sometimes the man was just plain right about some things.
He owed his father a huge thanks at the end of all this. Because it was only for the incessantly obnoxious training that Sam was alive at all. And hell, if he survived this? Sam would hug him and train for a month straight without so much as a peep of discontent.
But he had to survive it first.
His feet fell hard on the uneven terrain as he did his best to navigate the unfamiliar territory on the fly. Trees flew by him and he couldn’t even hear the rustling of the late fall foliage as he continued his frantic run. No, all he could hear was the pounding of his heart, loud and fast and desperate in his ears.
At this pace, he couldn’t even feel the rest of his body. Which was good, Sam figured, given the injuries he knew he had sustained. A probable concussion. Blood loss from a gash on the arm. Some bruised ribs, maybe a broken one. A sprained wrist. A black eye so swollen that it skewed his entire field of vision. Likely broken nose. More bruises and abrasions than he could count, and the tree branches he was flying through certainly weren’t helping matters.
But none of it mattered. Not right now. He’d deal with that when he had the chance. His father was right about something else, too: get the hell out of harm’s way before you stop. Always. You can lick your wounds as long as you’re free. As long as you’re safe.
Sam just wanted to be safe. That’s all he’d ever wanted since he was eight years old and learned that safety was nothing more than a illusion most people got by locking their doors at night.
No, safety was guns and salt and exorcisms and silver bullets.
Safety was running as far and fast as he could and hoping like hell that for once in his life, it was fast enough.
Dad would come. Dean, too. No matter how pissed they were at him for disappearing, they’d come. Sam just had to stay alive long enough for them to find him. Alive.
Sam pitched forward, severely off-balance, foot snagging a rut obscured by the leaves. He didn’t even have time to panic as he went down hard. His entire world shifted, tilting nauseatingly as he tumbled, his leg twisting painfully at the ankle. He hit the ground with a bone-jarring velocity, propelling him head over heels.
The entire thing happened so fast that Sam didn’t see the incline until he was rolling down it. He felt rocks and sticks scrape against his already-battered body.
His mind went through a string of obscenities as he envisioned every possible conclusion to his descent.
He’d run far and fast, and Dean and his dad would come and he just had to stay alive and hidden and maybe the end of this wouldn’t be that bad.
Sam’s head connected painfully with something solid and everything went black.
-o-
“No, it’s okay,” Dean said again. “Really.”
“No, it’s not okay,” the girl on the other end of the line said. “I told you that you could come over, that we could hang out and eat ice cream and I even taped a little CSPAN--”
Dean laughed, his voice resounding in the empty streets. “Rory, I understand,” he said. “As appealing as CSPAN is, you have homework. And I had to work late anyway.”
“You are off late,” Rory replied. “Taylor working you too hard?”
“We might want to notify our senator. We could be looking at a violation of human rights.”
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” Rory agreed. “Taylor is a tyrant.”
“But I get a lot of extra money when I close the store.”
“Ah, silver linings,” Rory said. “Very half full of you. Where are you now?”
Dean glanced behind him at the retreating lights of the town square. “Just past Luke’s,” he said.
“So it shouldn’t take you long to get home.”
“Nope, I’ll be home in time for my mother to hassle me to do the dishes.”
“Well then, it’s a good thing you don’t stop by here,” Rory said. “Our water bottle is getting pretty low and we’ve both been avoiding the hall closet because we saw some suspicious movement in there.”
“Just keep the door shut and I’ll tackle it when I see you tomorrow.”
“Right after school,” Rory promised.
“I wouldn’t miss it.”
“Great,” Rory said. “Talk to you before school?”
Dean couldn’t help but grin. “My phone will be on.”
“Love you.”
“I love you, too,” Dean said. “Don’t study all night, okay?”
“I am at the mercy of mathematics.”
“Then at least keep yourself hydrated.”
“The coffee pot is going.”
“Remember water, too.”
“But the water bottle--”
Dean just rolled his eyes. “I’ll call you and make sure you’re still alive in the morning.”
“My knight in shining armor.”
“Goodnight,” Dean said.
“Goodnight.”
Dean disconnected the call, feeling more than a little content. Working all evening after a long day at school was never his idea of a good time, but the money was good, and he’d even managed to get his science homework finished on his dinner break. Taylor, despite all his bluster and gruff, was finally beginning to trust him, so as time consuming as closing was, Dean knew it was a good sign.
Besides, there were things to pay for. Car insurance, saving for college, Rory.
Rory.
He couldn’t help but grin. Even in all the hours at the store, in the chores at home, in the workload of school, in hockey practice and building cars, there was Rory. Rory who made Stars Hollow not feel like the middle of nowhere. Rory who made all the work worthwhile. Rory who made his life just that much better.
When he turned the corner toward home, the smile was still on his face. He was thinking of how he could get his English homework done and where he could take Rory this weekend when he heard a noise behind him--a scuffle of footsteps and a flurry or hushed whispers.
There was no such thing as privacy in a small town, after all, so it wasn’t so surprising. He just hoped that it wasn’t Kirk. He’d caught a peek of the guy on one of his sleepwalking escapades and Dean still hadn’t totally recovered.
He just shook his head and quickened his pace. Dishes at home were better than Kirk in the nude.
Then he heard it again, louder this time, and harder to ignore. He sighed. “Kirk, if that’s you, really, I’m not going to help you home this time.”
The noise quieted suddenly, which was enough to give Dean pause. The eccentric residents of Stars Hollow were quirky, no doubt, but this behavior was pushing it, even for them.
He paused, collecting his breath. “I swear, if you’re naked--”
He never finished his sentence. He never even managed to turn around.
The first blow came to the back of his head and a sudden weight came down heavily on him, sending him crashing to the ground. Stars exploded behind his eyes and the air was forced for his body.
By the time he regained his senses, he realized there was someone on top of him. Someone large, beefy. Someone not Kirk. Not Luke. Not anyone from Stars Hollow.
It was like a bad movie. Or a book. Or the news. Or something that happened to other people in other towns and ended up on 60 Minutes and if Dean didn’t do something, he had no idea what would happen to him. He could just disappear, he could die, he could leave his family, his mother, his sister, Rory--
That thought gave him a shot of adrenaline that propelled his tall body from under the man’s weight, bucking him successfully so Dean could roll away. When a second guy charged him, he lashed out with a punch. He felt the burn of skin on his knuckle and heard a curse and thanked his lucky stars for that much.
His victory, however, was as short lived as his run of luck.
The first guy was up and hit Dean with a punch that darkened Dean’s vision and made his teeth literally rattle.
He was in trouble.
No, he was in a lot of trouble.
Dean lashed out blindly again, this time with much less success. He was on his feet, but barely, and he was pretty sure he was bleeding now and if he could just cause enough of a scene, get someone’s attention--
“Help!” he screamed, because pride be damned. He just wanted to stay alive. He kicked and thrashed and the man grappling with him.
He opened his mouth to scream again when the other one got him from behind. His yell was squelched as he was pulled backwards, an arm anchoring him tightly against the larger body.
Panic flared anew. There was an arm around his neck, he was being strangled--oh, God, he was going to die.
His efforts diverted to survival, hands grasping frantically against the unyielding grip. He kicked, legs working desperately.
This stuff just didn’t happen. Not in Stars Hollow. In a town where everybody knew everything and why wasn’t anyone around to see this?
His vision was dimming around the edges and no matter how hard he tried, there was no way out.
Was this what it was like to die?
Dean didn’t know and he didn’t want to find out but he really didn’t have much say in that anymore.
His last thought was of Rory and her homework and Lorelai’s water bottle and the dishes at home and how Taylor would be so mad at him for missing his shift before school tomorrow.
-o-
The first thing he was aware of was voices.
Two of them, distinct voices, deep and rough and very, very unfamiliar.
“You think he’s close enough?”
“Build is a little less, I guess,” another replied. “But the hair and the face--they look the same.”
“The clothes are all wrong.”
He wanted to open his eyes, to move, to do something, but it couldn’t happen. He didn’t have the energy. Didn’t have the ability. Didn’t even know who these guys were, didn’t know who they were talking about, though he had a sinking suspicion they were talking about him.
“We can rip the shirt some more.”
If Dean were capable of feeling worse, that would have done it.
“Still, we’re talking about the guy’s son, I think he’ll know the difference.”
“We aren’t going to send him high resolution photos here,” the other said. “We’ll rough up his face a bit more, keep him dazed, and it’ll be enough.”
“You sure?”
“Have you met John Winchester?” he asked. “Nothing comes between him and his boys. That’s why we started this to begin with.”
Dean realized suddenly his eyes were open. His vision was still darkened and scrambled but his eyes were definitely open.
“Kid’s awake,” the first said and Dean heard movement and saw someone moving toward him as he tried to lift his head.
“About damn time,” the second said. “The other kid wasn’t nearly this slow.”
“Well, you did clock him a good one,” the first pointed out. “You didn’t need to throw him in the trunk like that.”
Slow, getting clocked, trunks. This had to be a nightmare. A bad, really awful nightmare. Even worse and more surreal than Rory’s nightmares. Even worse than the few he’d heard from Lorelai which, in all truth, the mere description of had from time to time haunted his own dreams.
He blinked, his vision clearing a little, and he finally was able to raise his head and focus on the scene in front of him.
There were two men, scruffy and older than him, but not as old as he might have thought. They were clothed in dirty flannel and well-worn denim and one of them had a baseball cap pulled low, shadowing an unshaven face.
They were both looking at him, the one with the baseball cap perched on the edge of a table, arms crossed across his chest. The other was standing over him, peering at him with an intent gaze that Dean found unnerving.
Just about as unnerving as the fact that he was tied to a chair, rope tight against his chest and wound thoroughly around his hands, which were anchored solidly behind his back. Even his feet were tethered tight to the legs of the chair he was in, and Dean tensed in a sudden need to move.
But he could do no more than twitch and the panic at being immobilized only increased when he cried out and found himself to be gagged as well.
The man standing over him chuckled a little. “There’s nowhere to go, kid,” he said. “Sorry ‘bout that. But we took too many shortcuts the first time and got screwed over for it. We need you to stay put and the more you move, the more you’re going to hurt yourself.”
Dean looked up, eyes wide and uncomprehending. What the hell was this guy talking about?
“Why bother telling him anything at all?” the guy with the baseball hat chimed in. “It’s not like we have much that we can tell him that’s going to help any.”
“Don’t you think he wants to know why?” the other asked.
Dean’s eyes flickered to the guy with the baseball cap who just grunted a laugh. “We kidnapped him off the street and we’ve got him tied to a chair in the middle of nowhere. What are we going to tell him that’s going to make him feel better? Come on, Ryan. Use your head. We lost the other kid because you were too damn stupid to cross your t’s and dot your i’s. That’s the whole reason we had to grab this kid. And I don’t know who the hell he is or what his story is or anything about him. And I don’t care. We can’t care. Because this kid is our new bait and if we’re going to pull it off, we can’t be buddy-buddy with him.”
Ryan, as Dean could only figure was the name of the guy standing, sighed. “But it’s not his fault,” he said. “He has nothing to do with this.”
Dean wanted to protest. To ask why. To beg. Anything. But the gag lived up to its name and his words were nothing more than muffled grunts that both men easily ignored.
“You’re right,” the baseball cap guy said. “Nothing at all. He just happens to look like the kid we lost. That’s all. But you forget something. This isn’t about the kid. It’s not even about the other kid. This is about Winchester. This is about getting Winchester here and taking from him what he took from us. It’s about making him pay. We decided before we hatched this plan that we’d do whatever it takes.”
Even through his swollen eye, Dean could see Ryan swallow a bit nervously. “Yeah, and I thought that meant Winchester’s kids. Not random kids.”
The guy with the baseball cap stood up and shook his head. “You’re a damn coward,” he said. “There was a reason Dad never trusted you with anything.”
“Oh, and like you’ve done such a bang up job so far,” Ryan spat back. “I’m not the one the Winchester kid knocked unconscious.”
At full height, Dean could see that the baseball cap guy was the taller of the two, and carried himself with far more weight and imposition than the other. “Yeah? Well, hell, Ry-no, who let the kid loose to begin with? Who the hell almost got taken down by some small town nobody? He probably would have gotten away if it wasn’t for me.”
Ryan’s face hardened and even with one eye, Dean could see him blanch. He wanted to think that the knowledge that he’d put up a decent fight would be some kind of solace. But as he twisted his hands in their bindings--he was beginning to lose feeling in them entirely--there was no solace in any of it.
“Yeah, well, it was your plan to begin with,” Ryan replied sulkily, and it was a look that Dean recognized. One that his baby sister so often gave to him.
They were brothers, it occurred to him suddenly. These were brothers.
Somehow that meager revelation didn’t exactly bolster his confidence.
“Yeah, my plan to avenge Dad. You know why we’re doing this. Because Dad’s nothing but ash right now and there’s only one person to blame. One person who could have saved him. One person who was supposed to be backing him up and let him die.”
Ryan seemed to swallow hard and Dean’s mind worked frantically to put the pieces together. This was a mission of vengeance, of revenge. Or something. Something about a guy named Winchester and his kids and these guys’ father and Dean had nothing to do with any of it.
Except that he was tied to a chair with a swollen eye and a headache that would not quit.
“I haven’t forgotten,” Ryan said. “And I want to get Winchester.”
“Then we need this kid,” the baseball cap guy, gesturing to Dean for the first time since he woke up. “This kid is our ticket to Winchester.”
At that, Dean’s heart skipped a beat and his breath hitched. He pulled uselessly at his bonds again.
Ryan sighed a little, scrubbing a hand through his hair, and Dean noticed for the first time a bruise on his cheek. The man looked at him for the first time, made eye contact with Dean’s good eye, and Dean’s stomach bottomed out.
There was a trace of compassion in the man’s face, but not nearly enough. Compassion not for what had happened. But what was about to happen.
Ryan pursed his lips, holding Dean’s gaze a second more before glancing back at his brother. “I’ll get the camera.”
The guy with the baseball cap grinned, patting his brother’s shoulder affectionately. “There you go, little brother,” he said.
“Just--just don’t do more than you have to, okay?” Ryan asked.
“Aw, come on, Ry-no.”
Ryan’s gaze was steady on his brother. “The kid doesn’t deserve to suffer. He doesn’t even know Winchester.”
“You’re trying to spoil all my fun.”
Dean knew all about spoiled fun. At this point, all he knew was spoiled fun.
Ryan just shook his head. “I’ll be back in five.”
Dean’s breathing stopped entirely as Ryan turned and left, shoulders slumped and eyes turned downward, like he knew what was going to happen.
Like he knew that Dean didn’t deserve to suffer. Like he knew that Dean didn’t know anything about anyone named Winchester, that he had nothing to do with any of this at all.
Like he knew that Dean was just a kid from Stars Hollow who worked at the market and watched his little sister after school. Who loved his girlfriend and liked playing with cars and who had even read Jane Austen under duress just because Rory wanted him to.
Like all of that was true, but that it didn’t make a bit of difference. Like Dean Forester was an innocent kid about to get the crap beat out of him and Ryan was just going to let it happen.
The guy with the cap made a noise in his throat, something deep and satisfied, and Dean turned panicked eyes back up to him.
The guy smiled. “This isn’t personal, kid,” he said. “I just want you to know that much.”
Dean couldn’t have spoken even if the gag wasn’t in his mouth. He felt sick and weak and terrified. Tears burned his eyes. He just wanted to go home.
He saw the punch coming but he had no way of dodging it. He braced himself as best he could, but there was nothing he could do.
Dean was just relieved when the first punch knocked him out.
-o-
Two days.
Two days was a long time for Winchesters. Two days could wrap up a hunt, could take them across country, could let Dean woo a girl and leave her with the fondest of memories.
Two days with Sam missing--well, that was a whole new way to measure time. That was two days where Sam could be hurt, where Sam could be bleeding, dying. Two days of torture, of Sam being alone, of Dean being alone, of his father not stopping to eat or sleep or anything.
Because Sam had been missing for two days.
The kid had gone to school one morning and just never come back. Traipsed off sulking about chemistry homework or something and bitching about the fact that they’d be up and moving in about a week but the damn kid just didn’t come home. That just pissed him off and then it freaked him out, which then just pissed him off even more.
Dean didn’t notice at first. He was, after all, working a little bit at a mechanic’s shop to earn a little extra cash, but when he got home and found that Sam wasn’t there? Well, it was more than a little odd.
Sam was sulky and broody and a pain in the ass half the time, but late? Not quite Sammy’s style. If he was going to be stupid and rebellious, he wanted people to know about it. Sam wasn’t disobedient in subterfuge these days.
By the time their dad got home that night, Dean had called the school, he’d called the library, he’d called the little old lady down the street who liked to watch Sam from the window (creepy, but a good source of mockery for Dean to draw from). He’d even called Sam’s ex-science partner and the other little geeks who were Mathletes with Sam.
Nothing.
The days after that had been nothing but full-on searching. All of their skills, all of their resources, all diverted to finding Sam.
His dad hadn’t said much, not that the guy was much of a talker, but this was a singularity of focus that Dean had rarely seen.
It was that stoicism alone that had managed to keep Dean from freaking out altogether. After all, Sam was missing and they didn’t know where the hell he was and Dean didn’t feel calm or collected or together--he just wanted his brother back.
His dad’s orders gave him purpose, though, gave him something to do with the pent up frustration that was building up inside of him. That was what he needed to focus on. Getting Sam back.
With a gulp, Dean drowned the rest of his coffee and refocused at the task at hand. Their first tack had been to check out the possible supernatural culprits. Looking for any trails of other missing kids, stories of hauntings, or strange creatures. Something or anything. A sign or a hint or some lead to work of off.
Turned out that Connecticut was about the least supernatural state in the entire freakin’ Union, at least since Dean and his dad had gotten rid of the poltergeist last week.
Nothing on record that would have taken Sam.
So now they were following up on the human angle. They’d scoured the podunk town they were staying in and no one knew anything. Or so they said so far. They’d done a preliminary combing of the surrounding area but it was a needle in a haystack. They needed more to go on than, well, nothing.
Which was why they were here.
The sign on the town said something utterly hokey like Starry Haze or Twinkly Grove and the downtown was full of damn quaint buildings and people milling down the streets like they were actually happy there.
His dad was checking out the excuse for the police station. Dean had promised to try to rustle something up out of some of the locals. After perusing the greeting card streets, he’d picked the diner as the best place to start. Nursing a cup of coffee, he’d gotten the lay of the land to try to figure out who to talk to that might actually be helpful in finding his brother.
A lot of people had come in and out; a gaggle of little old women had holed up at a table and gossiped loudly about the latest make-ups and break-ups. Some freaky gangly guy had parked at the counter and persisted in bothering the help with an endless barrage of questions that had culminated in a pencil very nearly being gouged in an improper location.
And that--Dean could work with that. That guy was the guy he needed to talk to. Not the gangly guy, but the worker. Sour faced, scruffy, clad in flannel. Dean’s kind of people…if Dean ever wanted such a mind-numbing existence.
But more than that, the guy saw people come in and out all day. He knew them. He knew their kinks and idiosyncrasies. Plus, he knew all the news. How could he not, waiting on this crowd?
When Flannel Guy came back, coffee pot in hand, he said, “More coffee?”
Dean nodded holding his cup out. “So, quite a town you folks have here.”
“Yeah, it’s one of a kind,” Flannel Guy said with an unabashed glare at the crowd in the diner.
Dean rustled in his pocket and pulled out Sam’s photo. The thing was two years old, something Sam had talked him into taking at a mall photo booth one afternoon while they were killing time. Their dad had been gone on a hunt and Sam had been insufferably gloomy, so Dean had agreed. Luckily they’d managed to take one on the strip without an obscene gesture. The quality wasn’t great, but it was Sam, and the closest thing he had to a modern snapshot to show around. “Have you seen this kid?”
Flannel Guy looked skeptically at Dean for a second before looking at the photo. Then he really seemed to see it and looked closer, forehead crinkling. “What about him?”
“You know him?” Dean asked, a little shocked. He had been hoping for a lead, but so easily?
“That kid? Sure. Dean Forester. Works at the market. Dates Rory Gilmore.”
So much for an easy lead. “No--no, his name’s Sam.”
“Really?” Flannel Guy asked, looking closer. “Huh. He’s a dead ringer for Dean.”
Well now that just sounded weird to hear. And was completely not helpful.
“You talking about Dean Forester?” the gangly guy suddenly cut in. “I hear his missed his shift this morning.”
“Eat your breakfast, Kirk,” Flannel Guy said.
“Well, I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation. And it seems sort of coincidental, don’t you think? Someone flashing a picture of Dean Forester when Dean Forester missed his shift at Doose’s?”
“This isn’t Dean Forester or whoever you’re talking about,” Dean emphasized. “Look closer.”
Flannel Guy just shook his head. “Man, the similarities are kind of creepy,” he said.
Dean sighed, trying to hide his exasperation. “But have you seen him?”
Flannel Guy shook his head. “Can’t say that I have.”
“But have you seen Dean Forester?” Kirk prompted.
“Who the hell is Dean Forester?” Dean interjected.
“The kid in the photo,” Kirk said.
“No, this is my brother, Sam.”
Kirk scooted a few seats over, peering intently at the photo. “Wow, the likeness is remarkable,” he said. “But Dean Forester has better groomed hair.”
“Never thought I’d hear anyone say that,” Flannel Guy snorted.
“So no one has seen this kid?” Dean prodded.
“Unless they are in fact the same kid suffering from a case of multiple personality disorder,” Kirk conjectured. “One day, he’s Dean Forester. The next, this Sam kid.”
Dean just glared. “Dude, Sam’s my brother. He has nothing to do with this Dean kid.”
“Your brother?” Kirk clarified.
“Pain in the ass and all.”
“And he’s missing?”
“I just want to know if you’ve seen him,” Dean gritted out.
“So he is missing.”
“Kirk, leave the man alone,” Flannel Guy muttered.
“I’m just noting how very creepy this all is getting,” Kirk said more to the guy than to Dean. “Dean misses his shift, this guy’s brother missing.” He turned back to Dean. “Have you considered the possibility that this is a conspiracy?”
“Have you considered shutting up before everyone around you before everyone realizes that you actually don’t have a brain?” Flannel Guy asked, like he didn’t know the answer, which everyone there clearly did.
Kirk actually seemed to consider that. “The shutting up part has been suggested to me in the past, and I tried it once but it didn’t work out.”
The Flannel Guy didn’t even crack a smile. “Imagine that.”
“It was quite traumatic, actually,” Kirk said. “My vocal cords seized up from lack of use and I nearly had a panic attack trying to get them working again. Mother had to take me to the ER where they prescribed some kind of muscle relaxations that made me sick. But once the throwing up stopped, I was able to talk again. However, now that I think about it, maybe the apparent absence of my brain is because it has taken on the appearance of a long-hair teenager that has gone missing as well. There seems to be a rash of those lately.”
“Yeah, that seems likely,” Flannel Guy said.
Dean just rolled his eyes. Another dead end. “Look, if you see him, just tell him I was looking for him.”
“Who, Dean?” Kirk said.
“No, Sam,” Dean clarified.
Kirk looked perplexed. “And who are you?”
“I’m Dean.”
“Forester?”
“Winchester.”
Kirk furrowed his bushy brows. “So if I see Dean Forester I’m supposed to tell him that Sam Winchester is looking for him?”
Dean scowled. “No, if you see Sam tell him that Dean is looking for him.”
Kirk’s confusion seemed to deepen. “But why is Dean Forester looking for this Sam Winchester?”
“You know what?” Dean said, plunking a few bills on the counter. “Just forget it.”
As he walked out into the street, Dean could hear Flannel Guy arguing with Kirk about pod people and long lost twins, which might have been funny were it not so damn disappointing.
Two days and still no Sam. Two days, a freaky-ass quaint, small town and still no Sam.
Next
Summary: Two Lorelais, Two Deans, and a Sam. Crossover with Gilmore Girls.
A/N: I know it’s been done before, but it was too appealing to not try myself. I think it’s a little different than most of the other crossovers between these two fandoms, at least of the ones I’ve read, so hopefully it works. I think you can read this without much more than a vague understanding of Gilmore Girls, though the more you know of both fandoms, the more you’ll catch.
A/N 2: Much thanks to Tyranusfan for the beta on this one. He was the perfect beta, and I appreciated him trying to make sense of all the Deans in this story. Also, thanks to
sendintheklowns who always helps me plot and plan and provides constant cheerleading. A/N 3: General FYI, this story deals with both Dean Forester and Dean Winchester--I think it’s fairly clear which one is which, but for those who struggle, keep in mind that I do a structured rotating POV in this fic. Each chapter starts with Sam, is followed by Dean Forester, and ends with Dean Winchester. Thanks to Tyranusfan, I think it’s pretty clear which is which. This is set preseries for Supernatural and maybe early S3 of GG.
Disclaimer: None of the Winchesters or any of the people in Stars Hollow are mine.
-o-
CHAPTER ONE
Sam ran.
His father was fond of making them run, told them that endurance was key to survival, that stopping to catch your breath just made you wide open to attack. After all, he reasoned, ghosts don’t have to stop to pant.
Sam was often loathe to admit when his father was right. The man was a self-righteous, self-centered, single-minded ass of a man, but even Sam had to admit that sometimes the man was just plain right about some things.
He owed his father a huge thanks at the end of all this. Because it was only for the incessantly obnoxious training that Sam was alive at all. And hell, if he survived this? Sam would hug him and train for a month straight without so much as a peep of discontent.
But he had to survive it first.
His feet fell hard on the uneven terrain as he did his best to navigate the unfamiliar territory on the fly. Trees flew by him and he couldn’t even hear the rustling of the late fall foliage as he continued his frantic run. No, all he could hear was the pounding of his heart, loud and fast and desperate in his ears.
At this pace, he couldn’t even feel the rest of his body. Which was good, Sam figured, given the injuries he knew he had sustained. A probable concussion. Blood loss from a gash on the arm. Some bruised ribs, maybe a broken one. A sprained wrist. A black eye so swollen that it skewed his entire field of vision. Likely broken nose. More bruises and abrasions than he could count, and the tree branches he was flying through certainly weren’t helping matters.
But none of it mattered. Not right now. He’d deal with that when he had the chance. His father was right about something else, too: get the hell out of harm’s way before you stop. Always. You can lick your wounds as long as you’re free. As long as you’re safe.
Sam just wanted to be safe. That’s all he’d ever wanted since he was eight years old and learned that safety was nothing more than a illusion most people got by locking their doors at night.
No, safety was guns and salt and exorcisms and silver bullets.
Safety was running as far and fast as he could and hoping like hell that for once in his life, it was fast enough.
Dad would come. Dean, too. No matter how pissed they were at him for disappearing, they’d come. Sam just had to stay alive long enough for them to find him. Alive.
Sam pitched forward, severely off-balance, foot snagging a rut obscured by the leaves. He didn’t even have time to panic as he went down hard. His entire world shifted, tilting nauseatingly as he tumbled, his leg twisting painfully at the ankle. He hit the ground with a bone-jarring velocity, propelling him head over heels.
The entire thing happened so fast that Sam didn’t see the incline until he was rolling down it. He felt rocks and sticks scrape against his already-battered body.
His mind went through a string of obscenities as he envisioned every possible conclusion to his descent.
He’d run far and fast, and Dean and his dad would come and he just had to stay alive and hidden and maybe the end of this wouldn’t be that bad.
Sam’s head connected painfully with something solid and everything went black.
-o-
“No, it’s okay,” Dean said again. “Really.”
“No, it’s not okay,” the girl on the other end of the line said. “I told you that you could come over, that we could hang out and eat ice cream and I even taped a little CSPAN--”
Dean laughed, his voice resounding in the empty streets. “Rory, I understand,” he said. “As appealing as CSPAN is, you have homework. And I had to work late anyway.”
“You are off late,” Rory replied. “Taylor working you too hard?”
“We might want to notify our senator. We could be looking at a violation of human rights.”
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” Rory agreed. “Taylor is a tyrant.”
“But I get a lot of extra money when I close the store.”
“Ah, silver linings,” Rory said. “Very half full of you. Where are you now?”
Dean glanced behind him at the retreating lights of the town square. “Just past Luke’s,” he said.
“So it shouldn’t take you long to get home.”
“Nope, I’ll be home in time for my mother to hassle me to do the dishes.”
“Well then, it’s a good thing you don’t stop by here,” Rory said. “Our water bottle is getting pretty low and we’ve both been avoiding the hall closet because we saw some suspicious movement in there.”
“Just keep the door shut and I’ll tackle it when I see you tomorrow.”
“Right after school,” Rory promised.
“I wouldn’t miss it.”
“Great,” Rory said. “Talk to you before school?”
Dean couldn’t help but grin. “My phone will be on.”
“Love you.”
“I love you, too,” Dean said. “Don’t study all night, okay?”
“I am at the mercy of mathematics.”
“Then at least keep yourself hydrated.”
“The coffee pot is going.”
“Remember water, too.”
“But the water bottle--”
Dean just rolled his eyes. “I’ll call you and make sure you’re still alive in the morning.”
“My knight in shining armor.”
“Goodnight,” Dean said.
“Goodnight.”
Dean disconnected the call, feeling more than a little content. Working all evening after a long day at school was never his idea of a good time, but the money was good, and he’d even managed to get his science homework finished on his dinner break. Taylor, despite all his bluster and gruff, was finally beginning to trust him, so as time consuming as closing was, Dean knew it was a good sign.
Besides, there were things to pay for. Car insurance, saving for college, Rory.
Rory.
He couldn’t help but grin. Even in all the hours at the store, in the chores at home, in the workload of school, in hockey practice and building cars, there was Rory. Rory who made Stars Hollow not feel like the middle of nowhere. Rory who made all the work worthwhile. Rory who made his life just that much better.
When he turned the corner toward home, the smile was still on his face. He was thinking of how he could get his English homework done and where he could take Rory this weekend when he heard a noise behind him--a scuffle of footsteps and a flurry or hushed whispers.
There was no such thing as privacy in a small town, after all, so it wasn’t so surprising. He just hoped that it wasn’t Kirk. He’d caught a peek of the guy on one of his sleepwalking escapades and Dean still hadn’t totally recovered.
He just shook his head and quickened his pace. Dishes at home were better than Kirk in the nude.
Then he heard it again, louder this time, and harder to ignore. He sighed. “Kirk, if that’s you, really, I’m not going to help you home this time.”
The noise quieted suddenly, which was enough to give Dean pause. The eccentric residents of Stars Hollow were quirky, no doubt, but this behavior was pushing it, even for them.
He paused, collecting his breath. “I swear, if you’re naked--”
He never finished his sentence. He never even managed to turn around.
The first blow came to the back of his head and a sudden weight came down heavily on him, sending him crashing to the ground. Stars exploded behind his eyes and the air was forced for his body.
By the time he regained his senses, he realized there was someone on top of him. Someone large, beefy. Someone not Kirk. Not Luke. Not anyone from Stars Hollow.
It was like a bad movie. Or a book. Or the news. Or something that happened to other people in other towns and ended up on 60 Minutes and if Dean didn’t do something, he had no idea what would happen to him. He could just disappear, he could die, he could leave his family, his mother, his sister, Rory--
That thought gave him a shot of adrenaline that propelled his tall body from under the man’s weight, bucking him successfully so Dean could roll away. When a second guy charged him, he lashed out with a punch. He felt the burn of skin on his knuckle and heard a curse and thanked his lucky stars for that much.
His victory, however, was as short lived as his run of luck.
The first guy was up and hit Dean with a punch that darkened Dean’s vision and made his teeth literally rattle.
He was in trouble.
No, he was in a lot of trouble.
Dean lashed out blindly again, this time with much less success. He was on his feet, but barely, and he was pretty sure he was bleeding now and if he could just cause enough of a scene, get someone’s attention--
“Help!” he screamed, because pride be damned. He just wanted to stay alive. He kicked and thrashed and the man grappling with him.
He opened his mouth to scream again when the other one got him from behind. His yell was squelched as he was pulled backwards, an arm anchoring him tightly against the larger body.
Panic flared anew. There was an arm around his neck, he was being strangled--oh, God, he was going to die.
His efforts diverted to survival, hands grasping frantically against the unyielding grip. He kicked, legs working desperately.
This stuff just didn’t happen. Not in Stars Hollow. In a town where everybody knew everything and why wasn’t anyone around to see this?
His vision was dimming around the edges and no matter how hard he tried, there was no way out.
Was this what it was like to die?
Dean didn’t know and he didn’t want to find out but he really didn’t have much say in that anymore.
His last thought was of Rory and her homework and Lorelai’s water bottle and the dishes at home and how Taylor would be so mad at him for missing his shift before school tomorrow.
-o-
The first thing he was aware of was voices.
Two of them, distinct voices, deep and rough and very, very unfamiliar.
“You think he’s close enough?”
“Build is a little less, I guess,” another replied. “But the hair and the face--they look the same.”
“The clothes are all wrong.”
He wanted to open his eyes, to move, to do something, but it couldn’t happen. He didn’t have the energy. Didn’t have the ability. Didn’t even know who these guys were, didn’t know who they were talking about, though he had a sinking suspicion they were talking about him.
“We can rip the shirt some more.”
If Dean were capable of feeling worse, that would have done it.
“Still, we’re talking about the guy’s son, I think he’ll know the difference.”
“We aren’t going to send him high resolution photos here,” the other said. “We’ll rough up his face a bit more, keep him dazed, and it’ll be enough.”
“You sure?”
“Have you met John Winchester?” he asked. “Nothing comes between him and his boys. That’s why we started this to begin with.”
Dean realized suddenly his eyes were open. His vision was still darkened and scrambled but his eyes were definitely open.
“Kid’s awake,” the first said and Dean heard movement and saw someone moving toward him as he tried to lift his head.
“About damn time,” the second said. “The other kid wasn’t nearly this slow.”
“Well, you did clock him a good one,” the first pointed out. “You didn’t need to throw him in the trunk like that.”
Slow, getting clocked, trunks. This had to be a nightmare. A bad, really awful nightmare. Even worse and more surreal than Rory’s nightmares. Even worse than the few he’d heard from Lorelai which, in all truth, the mere description of had from time to time haunted his own dreams.
He blinked, his vision clearing a little, and he finally was able to raise his head and focus on the scene in front of him.
There were two men, scruffy and older than him, but not as old as he might have thought. They were clothed in dirty flannel and well-worn denim and one of them had a baseball cap pulled low, shadowing an unshaven face.
They were both looking at him, the one with the baseball cap perched on the edge of a table, arms crossed across his chest. The other was standing over him, peering at him with an intent gaze that Dean found unnerving.
Just about as unnerving as the fact that he was tied to a chair, rope tight against his chest and wound thoroughly around his hands, which were anchored solidly behind his back. Even his feet were tethered tight to the legs of the chair he was in, and Dean tensed in a sudden need to move.
But he could do no more than twitch and the panic at being immobilized only increased when he cried out and found himself to be gagged as well.
The man standing over him chuckled a little. “There’s nowhere to go, kid,” he said. “Sorry ‘bout that. But we took too many shortcuts the first time and got screwed over for it. We need you to stay put and the more you move, the more you’re going to hurt yourself.”
Dean looked up, eyes wide and uncomprehending. What the hell was this guy talking about?
“Why bother telling him anything at all?” the guy with the baseball hat chimed in. “It’s not like we have much that we can tell him that’s going to help any.”
“Don’t you think he wants to know why?” the other asked.
Dean’s eyes flickered to the guy with the baseball cap who just grunted a laugh. “We kidnapped him off the street and we’ve got him tied to a chair in the middle of nowhere. What are we going to tell him that’s going to make him feel better? Come on, Ryan. Use your head. We lost the other kid because you were too damn stupid to cross your t’s and dot your i’s. That’s the whole reason we had to grab this kid. And I don’t know who the hell he is or what his story is or anything about him. And I don’t care. We can’t care. Because this kid is our new bait and if we’re going to pull it off, we can’t be buddy-buddy with him.”
Ryan, as Dean could only figure was the name of the guy standing, sighed. “But it’s not his fault,” he said. “He has nothing to do with this.”
Dean wanted to protest. To ask why. To beg. Anything. But the gag lived up to its name and his words were nothing more than muffled grunts that both men easily ignored.
“You’re right,” the baseball cap guy said. “Nothing at all. He just happens to look like the kid we lost. That’s all. But you forget something. This isn’t about the kid. It’s not even about the other kid. This is about Winchester. This is about getting Winchester here and taking from him what he took from us. It’s about making him pay. We decided before we hatched this plan that we’d do whatever it takes.”
Even through his swollen eye, Dean could see Ryan swallow a bit nervously. “Yeah, and I thought that meant Winchester’s kids. Not random kids.”
The guy with the baseball cap stood up and shook his head. “You’re a damn coward,” he said. “There was a reason Dad never trusted you with anything.”
“Oh, and like you’ve done such a bang up job so far,” Ryan spat back. “I’m not the one the Winchester kid knocked unconscious.”
At full height, Dean could see that the baseball cap guy was the taller of the two, and carried himself with far more weight and imposition than the other. “Yeah? Well, hell, Ry-no, who let the kid loose to begin with? Who the hell almost got taken down by some small town nobody? He probably would have gotten away if it wasn’t for me.”
Ryan’s face hardened and even with one eye, Dean could see him blanch. He wanted to think that the knowledge that he’d put up a decent fight would be some kind of solace. But as he twisted his hands in their bindings--he was beginning to lose feeling in them entirely--there was no solace in any of it.
“Yeah, well, it was your plan to begin with,” Ryan replied sulkily, and it was a look that Dean recognized. One that his baby sister so often gave to him.
They were brothers, it occurred to him suddenly. These were brothers.
Somehow that meager revelation didn’t exactly bolster his confidence.
“Yeah, my plan to avenge Dad. You know why we’re doing this. Because Dad’s nothing but ash right now and there’s only one person to blame. One person who could have saved him. One person who was supposed to be backing him up and let him die.”
Ryan seemed to swallow hard and Dean’s mind worked frantically to put the pieces together. This was a mission of vengeance, of revenge. Or something. Something about a guy named Winchester and his kids and these guys’ father and Dean had nothing to do with any of it.
Except that he was tied to a chair with a swollen eye and a headache that would not quit.
“I haven’t forgotten,” Ryan said. “And I want to get Winchester.”
“Then we need this kid,” the baseball cap guy, gesturing to Dean for the first time since he woke up. “This kid is our ticket to Winchester.”
At that, Dean’s heart skipped a beat and his breath hitched. He pulled uselessly at his bonds again.
Ryan sighed a little, scrubbing a hand through his hair, and Dean noticed for the first time a bruise on his cheek. The man looked at him for the first time, made eye contact with Dean’s good eye, and Dean’s stomach bottomed out.
There was a trace of compassion in the man’s face, but not nearly enough. Compassion not for what had happened. But what was about to happen.
Ryan pursed his lips, holding Dean’s gaze a second more before glancing back at his brother. “I’ll get the camera.”
The guy with the baseball cap grinned, patting his brother’s shoulder affectionately. “There you go, little brother,” he said.
“Just--just don’t do more than you have to, okay?” Ryan asked.
“Aw, come on, Ry-no.”
Ryan’s gaze was steady on his brother. “The kid doesn’t deserve to suffer. He doesn’t even know Winchester.”
“You’re trying to spoil all my fun.”
Dean knew all about spoiled fun. At this point, all he knew was spoiled fun.
Ryan just shook his head. “I’ll be back in five.”
Dean’s breathing stopped entirely as Ryan turned and left, shoulders slumped and eyes turned downward, like he knew what was going to happen.
Like he knew that Dean didn’t deserve to suffer. Like he knew that Dean didn’t know anything about anyone named Winchester, that he had nothing to do with any of this at all.
Like he knew that Dean was just a kid from Stars Hollow who worked at the market and watched his little sister after school. Who loved his girlfriend and liked playing with cars and who had even read Jane Austen under duress just because Rory wanted him to.
Like all of that was true, but that it didn’t make a bit of difference. Like Dean Forester was an innocent kid about to get the crap beat out of him and Ryan was just going to let it happen.
The guy with the cap made a noise in his throat, something deep and satisfied, and Dean turned panicked eyes back up to him.
The guy smiled. “This isn’t personal, kid,” he said. “I just want you to know that much.”
Dean couldn’t have spoken even if the gag wasn’t in his mouth. He felt sick and weak and terrified. Tears burned his eyes. He just wanted to go home.
He saw the punch coming but he had no way of dodging it. He braced himself as best he could, but there was nothing he could do.
Dean was just relieved when the first punch knocked him out.
-o-
Two days.
Two days was a long time for Winchesters. Two days could wrap up a hunt, could take them across country, could let Dean woo a girl and leave her with the fondest of memories.
Two days with Sam missing--well, that was a whole new way to measure time. That was two days where Sam could be hurt, where Sam could be bleeding, dying. Two days of torture, of Sam being alone, of Dean being alone, of his father not stopping to eat or sleep or anything.
Because Sam had been missing for two days.
The kid had gone to school one morning and just never come back. Traipsed off sulking about chemistry homework or something and bitching about the fact that they’d be up and moving in about a week but the damn kid just didn’t come home. That just pissed him off and then it freaked him out, which then just pissed him off even more.
Dean didn’t notice at first. He was, after all, working a little bit at a mechanic’s shop to earn a little extra cash, but when he got home and found that Sam wasn’t there? Well, it was more than a little odd.
Sam was sulky and broody and a pain in the ass half the time, but late? Not quite Sammy’s style. If he was going to be stupid and rebellious, he wanted people to know about it. Sam wasn’t disobedient in subterfuge these days.
By the time their dad got home that night, Dean had called the school, he’d called the library, he’d called the little old lady down the street who liked to watch Sam from the window (creepy, but a good source of mockery for Dean to draw from). He’d even called Sam’s ex-science partner and the other little geeks who were Mathletes with Sam.
Nothing.
The days after that had been nothing but full-on searching. All of their skills, all of their resources, all diverted to finding Sam.
His dad hadn’t said much, not that the guy was much of a talker, but this was a singularity of focus that Dean had rarely seen.
It was that stoicism alone that had managed to keep Dean from freaking out altogether. After all, Sam was missing and they didn’t know where the hell he was and Dean didn’t feel calm or collected or together--he just wanted his brother back.
His dad’s orders gave him purpose, though, gave him something to do with the pent up frustration that was building up inside of him. That was what he needed to focus on. Getting Sam back.
With a gulp, Dean drowned the rest of his coffee and refocused at the task at hand. Their first tack had been to check out the possible supernatural culprits. Looking for any trails of other missing kids, stories of hauntings, or strange creatures. Something or anything. A sign or a hint or some lead to work of off.
Turned out that Connecticut was about the least supernatural state in the entire freakin’ Union, at least since Dean and his dad had gotten rid of the poltergeist last week.
Nothing on record that would have taken Sam.
So now they were following up on the human angle. They’d scoured the podunk town they were staying in and no one knew anything. Or so they said so far. They’d done a preliminary combing of the surrounding area but it was a needle in a haystack. They needed more to go on than, well, nothing.
Which was why they were here.
The sign on the town said something utterly hokey like Starry Haze or Twinkly Grove and the downtown was full of damn quaint buildings and people milling down the streets like they were actually happy there.
His dad was checking out the excuse for the police station. Dean had promised to try to rustle something up out of some of the locals. After perusing the greeting card streets, he’d picked the diner as the best place to start. Nursing a cup of coffee, he’d gotten the lay of the land to try to figure out who to talk to that might actually be helpful in finding his brother.
A lot of people had come in and out; a gaggle of little old women had holed up at a table and gossiped loudly about the latest make-ups and break-ups. Some freaky gangly guy had parked at the counter and persisted in bothering the help with an endless barrage of questions that had culminated in a pencil very nearly being gouged in an improper location.
And that--Dean could work with that. That guy was the guy he needed to talk to. Not the gangly guy, but the worker. Sour faced, scruffy, clad in flannel. Dean’s kind of people…if Dean ever wanted such a mind-numbing existence.
But more than that, the guy saw people come in and out all day. He knew them. He knew their kinks and idiosyncrasies. Plus, he knew all the news. How could he not, waiting on this crowd?
When Flannel Guy came back, coffee pot in hand, he said, “More coffee?”
Dean nodded holding his cup out. “So, quite a town you folks have here.”
“Yeah, it’s one of a kind,” Flannel Guy said with an unabashed glare at the crowd in the diner.
Dean rustled in his pocket and pulled out Sam’s photo. The thing was two years old, something Sam had talked him into taking at a mall photo booth one afternoon while they were killing time. Their dad had been gone on a hunt and Sam had been insufferably gloomy, so Dean had agreed. Luckily they’d managed to take one on the strip without an obscene gesture. The quality wasn’t great, but it was Sam, and the closest thing he had to a modern snapshot to show around. “Have you seen this kid?”
Flannel Guy looked skeptically at Dean for a second before looking at the photo. Then he really seemed to see it and looked closer, forehead crinkling. “What about him?”
“You know him?” Dean asked, a little shocked. He had been hoping for a lead, but so easily?
“That kid? Sure. Dean Forester. Works at the market. Dates Rory Gilmore.”
So much for an easy lead. “No--no, his name’s Sam.”
“Really?” Flannel Guy asked, looking closer. “Huh. He’s a dead ringer for Dean.”
Well now that just sounded weird to hear. And was completely not helpful.
“You talking about Dean Forester?” the gangly guy suddenly cut in. “I hear his missed his shift this morning.”
“Eat your breakfast, Kirk,” Flannel Guy said.
“Well, I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation. And it seems sort of coincidental, don’t you think? Someone flashing a picture of Dean Forester when Dean Forester missed his shift at Doose’s?”
“This isn’t Dean Forester or whoever you’re talking about,” Dean emphasized. “Look closer.”
Flannel Guy just shook his head. “Man, the similarities are kind of creepy,” he said.
Dean sighed, trying to hide his exasperation. “But have you seen him?”
Flannel Guy shook his head. “Can’t say that I have.”
“But have you seen Dean Forester?” Kirk prompted.
“Who the hell is Dean Forester?” Dean interjected.
“The kid in the photo,” Kirk said.
“No, this is my brother, Sam.”
Kirk scooted a few seats over, peering intently at the photo. “Wow, the likeness is remarkable,” he said. “But Dean Forester has better groomed hair.”
“Never thought I’d hear anyone say that,” Flannel Guy snorted.
“So no one has seen this kid?” Dean prodded.
“Unless they are in fact the same kid suffering from a case of multiple personality disorder,” Kirk conjectured. “One day, he’s Dean Forester. The next, this Sam kid.”
Dean just glared. “Dude, Sam’s my brother. He has nothing to do with this Dean kid.”
“Your brother?” Kirk clarified.
“Pain in the ass and all.”
“And he’s missing?”
“I just want to know if you’ve seen him,” Dean gritted out.
“So he is missing.”
“Kirk, leave the man alone,” Flannel Guy muttered.
“I’m just noting how very creepy this all is getting,” Kirk said more to the guy than to Dean. “Dean misses his shift, this guy’s brother missing.” He turned back to Dean. “Have you considered the possibility that this is a conspiracy?”
“Have you considered shutting up before everyone around you before everyone realizes that you actually don’t have a brain?” Flannel Guy asked, like he didn’t know the answer, which everyone there clearly did.
Kirk actually seemed to consider that. “The shutting up part has been suggested to me in the past, and I tried it once but it didn’t work out.”
The Flannel Guy didn’t even crack a smile. “Imagine that.”
“It was quite traumatic, actually,” Kirk said. “My vocal cords seized up from lack of use and I nearly had a panic attack trying to get them working again. Mother had to take me to the ER where they prescribed some kind of muscle relaxations that made me sick. But once the throwing up stopped, I was able to talk again. However, now that I think about it, maybe the apparent absence of my brain is because it has taken on the appearance of a long-hair teenager that has gone missing as well. There seems to be a rash of those lately.”
“Yeah, that seems likely,” Flannel Guy said.
Dean just rolled his eyes. Another dead end. “Look, if you see him, just tell him I was looking for him.”
“Who, Dean?” Kirk said.
“No, Sam,” Dean clarified.
Kirk looked perplexed. “And who are you?”
“I’m Dean.”
“Forester?”
“Winchester.”
Kirk furrowed his bushy brows. “So if I see Dean Forester I’m supposed to tell him that Sam Winchester is looking for him?”
Dean scowled. “No, if you see Sam tell him that Dean is looking for him.”
Kirk’s confusion seemed to deepen. “But why is Dean Forester looking for this Sam Winchester?”
“You know what?” Dean said, plunking a few bills on the counter. “Just forget it.”
As he walked out into the street, Dean could hear Flannel Guy arguing with Kirk about pod people and long lost twins, which might have been funny were it not so damn disappointing.
Two days and still no Sam. Two days, a freaky-ass quaint, small town and still no Sam.
Next
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-03-31 08:11 pm (UTC)I can't wait for more! and I love the last few lines between Kirk and Dean ;D
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Date: 2009-04-04 06:50 pm (UTC)Thanks!
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Date: 2009-04-05 07:26 pm (UTC)you're welcome!
no subject
Date: 2009-04-01 01:48 am (UTC)The last pov with Dean W. is hilarious. He perfectly conveys that down the rabbit hole feeling that strangers must feel as they wander into Stars Hollow.
Flannel Guy. *snorts*
no subject
Date: 2009-04-04 06:51 pm (UTC)(but never more fun than a choke out....)
:)