Numb3rs/Supernatural Fic: Doubt, Chapter Two/3

[aleo_70]

Title: Doubt
Author: ALEOaleo_70
Genre: Gen
Characters: Don Eppes, Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester
Fandoms: Numb3rs/Supernatural - crossover
Rating: PG 13+
Warning: violence, supernatural themes, horror
Spoilers: nil
Summary: A graveyard on Halloween?  Not the safest place to be.

Status: Chapter 2 of 3
Wordcount (this chapter): 2712
Total wordcount: ~7330

A/N: written for Clue Challenge #4, October 2009 athurt_don. Prompts: Who? - Don. What? - Magic. Where? - Graveyard.  Crossover from a Numb3rs POV.  Third in a series starting with Unexplained and followed with Explained.

Disclaimer: I don't own them, I just borrowed them. Numb3rs, Supernatural and associated characters are the property of those that created them. No copyright infringement intended. No financial reward gained. All real places and organisations are used in a fictional sense. Original characters and the storyline are mine however.

 

CHAPTER TWO

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“What are you doing?”  Don finally demanded.  Dean’s sudden attack was completely at odds with how the encounter tonight had started.  It had seemed as if the Winchester had been inclined to talk or at least to keep things reasonably civil just as he had last time.  Instead though, he’d reverted to when they’d first met, attacking him violently and holding him at gunpoint.

Just as in the warehouse Dean ignored him, speaking to his brother.  “Tell me it’s not too late, Sammy.”

“I don’t know.” 

“What’s too late?”  Don interrupted but the brothers continued as if he wasn’t even there.

“Have you still got the stuff?”

“Of course I do.”  Sam sounded annoyed as he knelt next to the agent’s wounded arm.

“Then do it.”

“Damnit, answer me!”

“Shut up, Fed.  We don’t have time to stop and explain everything to you.”  Dean growled.  “Not tonight.”

The look in Dean’s eyes along with the slight shift of the gun silenced the agent.  Don could only watch on as once again Sam took some items out of his bag in preparation of performing some strange ritual that made sense only to the two wanted murderers.  He was no longer unsure just what the two men were.  They’d made him doubt himself and the bureau after their last meeting had ended with some kind of uneasy truce, prompting his re-read of all the evidence against them.  He’d come to a half-crazy conclusion that he’d kept carefully to himself but he realised now that he’d been duped, his understanding twisted by Dean’s careful words and strange actions.  The man had played his frazzled nerves against him and had secured this advantage that they immediately used against him.

Now he was helpless once again, secure in their hands as the younger Winchester laid out the objects he’d taken from his bag on the ground in front of him.  There was a jar of dark, oily looking liquid, a small bottle containing more of the same, the battered diary Don had seen before and a wicked looking short bladed knife in a sheath.  The final items made Don’s mouth turn dry, a large container of salt, a container of gasoline and most dangerous of all, a lighter.  He’d seen those before as well and his eyes followed them as they were placed away to one side.

“No-“ The denial was drawn from his lips in a sudden return of the horror he’d felt all those months ago.  He knew what the Winchesters did with salt, gas and a lighter.  Before he could form any more words his left arm was grabbed and pulled out straight. 

Jerking back with all of his strength he pulled it out of Sam’s grip.  It wasn’t to last though, the younger man capturing his wrist and once again pulling his arm out straight.  This time he shifted and placed his knee against Don’s wrist, pinning the arm in place.  In a quick movement Sam reached for Don’s shoulder and gripping the fabric there yanked firmly down, ripping the stitching.  With both hands Sam twisted and tore the sleeve down its length, ripping it from his arm and exposing the bite wound.  Then the younger Winchester reached down and picked up the knife, pulling it from its sheath.

Don couldn’t help but remember the last body he’d seen Sam working over, Candice Wells, a young mother violently murdered.  He remembered the blood being everywhere even if he never got a close look at the wounds that caused her death.  Seeing the faintly pinkish sheen of the silver knife being raised over his arm Don had had enough.  Even as Sam flipped open his diary and started to read some gibberish he turned away.  It was obvious he was now going to die the painful death he’d somehow escaped the first time, his body to be burned when they’d finished, all to satisfy some sick urge of the brothers Winchester. 

He looked back up at Dean, flicking his gaze pointedly at the gun as he spoke.  Surprised that his voice was steady he managed to keep his tone almost neutral.  It was a plea nonetheless.  “Use that.  Make it clean.”

“You still don’t get it do you?”  Dean argued.  “We’re trying to save your fed ass.  You should understand that by now.”

Somehow his snark hadn’t abandoned him.  “Hard to, right at the moment.”

“This?”  Dean shrugged, the gun shifting slightly as he indicated the items Sam had laid out and in the same motion the gun he held.  “I let you up what will you do?”

“Not let you cut me.”  Arrest you, Don thought.  Run away, his more primitive mind overruled.

“Exactly.”  Dean’s foot ground harder against his chest even as the gun remained steady.

His plea rejected Don had to force Dean’s hand, there was no guarantee he would be dead before they burned him if he let them play the game their way.  If he won his escape, all to the better.  He brought his free arm up and wrapped it around Dean’s ankle but he didn’t have enough strength or leverage to unbalance the man holding him down.  Abandoning that attempt he tried to reach across to knock Sam’s hovering knife away but with Dean’s foot pressing his body down he couldn’t get the distance he needed, his hand flailing helplessly too short.  Giving up on that he brought his hand up sharply but even though Dean had short legs Don was unable to reach high enough to do any damage.

“Enough of that!”  Dean ordered, drawing back the hammer on his gun as he shoved firmly downwards with his foot.  “We don’t want to kill you.  Now, I’m going to let up a bit and you are going to slide your right arm under your back.  Understand?”

Don stared up at the man, understanding all right but determined not to do as ordered.  He would have nothing left.  The hammer was back on Dean’s gun, it was a start.  The gun suddenly moved closer but the aim abruptly shifted to the side, to his right shoulder.

“I’m not telling you again.”

Closing his eyes briefly in frustration he nodded, having failed in his attempt there was nothing left but to wait it out, suffer whatever they were about to do to him with only the last hope that every moment he remained alive gave his backup time to arrive on scene.  He didn’t believe Dean’s reassurance that they didn’t want to kill him even if his struggle had resulted only in the threat to disable him further by shooting him in the shoulder instead of a clean death.  Being realistic about his circumstances he could save himself some pain by obeying the order and keep the possible later use of his arm if the situation changed.  The pressure against his chest eased and he worked his right arm under his lower back.  As expected Dean re-applied his weight once the agent had followed the instructions and his arm was trapped.

“What are you going to do to me?”  It was a question, he had no power to make any demands.

“You won’t understand.  Just call it magic if you want.”

“Magic doesn’t exist.”

Dean laughed at that as if it were a great joke.  “Neither do werewolves.”

“Were-?“  What the hell?

“Wolves.  Were-wolves.”  Dean repeated, annunciating each word clearly.  “Jeez!  They teach you nothin’ at FBI school?”

They were completely off their rockers, Don decided.  One hundred percent mad and he was their latest play toy.

“You read our files, right?”

“Crazy.”  Don breathed to himself.

Dean suddenly lunged, grabbing the side of Don’s head by the hair.  Jerking the agent’s head to one side he pointed at the body of the dog with his gun.  “You call that crazy?  Huh?”

Against his will he looked, trying to breathe around the extra weight on his chest.  All his discomfort disappeared as his eyes widened and he stared in shock.  There was no dog, it was a man.  It was Andrew Regan, lying in the same pose that he’d last seen the dog, naked and very dead.  The body was marked with the unmistakeable signs of fresh bullet wounds, including a cluster in the center of his chest right where Don had fired point blank into the dog.  Other wounds in the man’s side were ringed with black bruises, tendrils leading away as if he’d been injected with black dye.

Don’s mouth worked but nothing came out.  The fresh assault on his reason leaving him speechless.  Abruptly a short cry of pain forced its way past his lips just as he realised Sam’s chant had stopped.  Tearing his head free of Dean’s grip he watched helplessly as Sam continued to slice open his lower arm, cutting through the bite mark there.  Automatically he tensed struggling once again against the men restraining him.  Just as before he failed and lay panting before something new intruded on his senses.  His arm felt like it was on fire.  He’d been cut before but it had never felt like this.  Looking closer at the wound he could have sworn he saw wisps of steam or smoke rising from his abused flesh.  As he watched, dark tendrils appeared on his skin and slowly started to spread outwards from the deep cut, following a pattern that looked very much like a tracery of veins.  He’d seen this before; the marks were the same as those surrounding the bullet wounds in Regan’s body.

“What the?”  He gasped.  The burning pain followed the path of the dark tendrils.

“He’s infected.”  Sam announced, his voice sad.

“Hurry before it’s too late.”  Dean ordered. 

“I think it is.”  Sam continued.  “All Hallows Eve gives it more power.  You’re going to have to do it.”

“No.  Keep working.  There’s still a chance.  I don’t want to-“ 

Panting sharply against the slowly spreading pain Don looked up at the cut off words.  “Don’t want to what?”

Dean’s hands flexed on the grip of his gun.  It was no longer aimed at the agent’s shoulder.  “Kill you.  Although I suppose the correct term now would be ‘put you down’.”

“What?”  He demanded in confusion, surprised at the reluctance in the elder Winchester’s voice.  Dean was repeating what he’d already said earlier but Don still didn’t believe him.  Surely their goal was to kill him once they’d had their fun even if Dean had stopped the dog from finishing him.  Even now he found it hard to allow himself to acknowledge that the still form lying a short distance away was the dog.  He’d hallucinated, he must have and he wasn’t going to look back to check. 

It certainly couldn’t have been a werewolf.

“You’re infected.  That means you will be just like him next full moon.”  The gun flicked sideways for a bare instant, to the body the agent refused to look at, before returning to its deadly aim.  “We can’t let that happen.  This is loaded with silver, you won’t come back.”

The concept of anyone coming back from close range bullet wounds to the heart, the current trajectory of Dean’s weapon was laughable.  He sobered quickly, he’d just emptied a whole clip of law enforcement ammunition into an animal without any notable effect.  In a moment of sudden clarity he wondered if it really could be true.  Looking back at his arm he saw that the dark marks had spread, following the lines of his veins up his arm in a slow crawl across his skin.  He’d seen a lot of strange wounds in his time but nothing that looked like this.

What he was seeing made no sense, in fact, much of what he’d seen tonight had made no sense.  Not unless he believed what he’d been told, then it actually did.  He’d heard the stories, the folk-lore about werewolves and their allergy to silver.  The pinkish tinge to the knife now made sense, it was pure silver and he’d reacted to it, reacted in the same way that Regan had to Dean’s bullets.  If he really had been infected with, he struggled to find the right term, with something, how long would it take for it to reach his heart and then be pumped around the rest of his body?  Was it already too late?

“You,” Don started, his voice low as he couldn’t believe he was even entertaining this.  The dark marks and the accompanying burning sensation continued their slow spread up his arm giving him the strength to continue.  “You can stop it?” 

“I don’t know.”  Sam answered even as he worked, slicing a second time across the wound causing the agent’s back to arch against the pain.

“Yes, we can.”  Dean insisted.

Biting back on a cry of pain Don swallowed against that comment as new fire spread across his arm.  Dean’s voice was final and, given the gun aimed at him, silver bullets or not he could believe the infection or whatever the hell it was would be stopped one way or the other.  The tombstones rising around them took on a more sinister feel.  If he were to allow himself to believe what he was seeing and hearing he found himself hoping that the Winchester’s magic was real.  Otherwise he would instead experience the reality and finality of bullets to his heart.

Sam resumed his chant as he uncapped the jar drawing the helpless agent’s attention back to him.  The jar was slowly tilted up and the dark contents were allowed to splash across and into the wounds he’d created.  Don couldn’t help the scream of agony, it was as if molten fire had been poured onto his arm.  Taking a deep breath he clenched his teeth together so hard he was sure they were about to crack as he panted sharply though his nose, trying to stifle his reaction.  The pain was intense, working its way up his arm as a moan escaped him.  As he watched none of the liquid spilled onto the ground beneath his arm, it was as if it were being sucked into his body.  The dark tendrils on his arm lightened slightly, taking on a more bluish tinge as they spread rapidly, making his arm look very much like one of those detailed tribal tattoos favoured by some.  The intensifying pain reached his shoulder and started to spread across his chest.  Soon it would reach his heart.

“Stop!”  Don managed just as Sam’s jar ran dry.

“Is it working?”  Dean demanded.

“It looks like it might.”  Sam responded even if he sounded unsure.  Putting the jar aside he reached for the small bottle, uncapping it and holding it up in the latest patch of moonlight.  It was as if a cloud had passed just in time to allow the silver light to fall upon it.

Don’s heart clenched as the fire reached it and he once more cried out in pain.  He didn’t know how much more of this he could take.  His back again tried to arch against the weight holding him down and he opened his eyes in time to see the small bottle being lowered towards his lips.  It must have been a trick of the light but it almost looked as if it were glowing with a silvery tinge.  Desperate to avoid more pain from whatever poison they were about to force onto him next Don jerked his head aside.  A hand curled into his hair and forced his head back even as a second hand pinched his nose closed.  With his mouth pursed shut he couldn’t breathe but it was pain that forced it open, not the need for air.  His heart clenched again and he screamed. 

The mouth of the bottle was shoved between his teeth and tilted upwards, its foul contents running quickly onto his tongue.  The bottle was pulled away just as he snapped his jaw shut.  Sam’s voice rose again.  Unable to spit the liquid out with his jaw held firmly shut and nose still pinched he swallowed convulsively.  Almost instantly new indescribable agony flared through his body from the inside out.  All thought fled and he was aware of nothing more.

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