Chapter 5
The return to consciousness was slow at first. Later he would blame that on the dream he had been having. It was so real that it had been strangely surreal; that was the only word he could think of for it. A feeling of de ja vu about having de ja vu. It was entirely messed up and made him feel uncomfortable, like he was missing something important.
He dreamed that he had been dozing, watching 494 sleep, and being both worried and pleased by this. It was strange that 494 had slept so long. Good because he needed the rest, but worrying because it just wasn’t normal.
Sam snapped fully awake when he realized that he shouldn’t know 494’s sleep patterns. He had only ever seen the guy mimic Dean’s habits. He hadn’t done too bad of a job at it, if Sam had felt like being honest. Honesty was not his predominant feeling at the moment. It was nausea. An intense wave of nausea slammed into him with all the crushing force of a steamroller.
He bolted upright with enough force to carry him from laying down to on his feet, intent on making it to the bathroom before he lost everything he had eaten in the last year. He slammed back into the bed with almost as much force as it became apparent that he was strapped down to it. His mind took in two facts at lightning speed. (There was a reason he had been given a full ride to Stanford.) The first was that something was very wrong. The second was that if he lost his cookies now, flat on his back with no way to move, he was going to choke to death like some druggie rock star. He didn’t want to die like that.
He lay there for along moment with no other thought but to try and gain control over his body. His jaw clenched tightly, eyes squeezed shut as he sucked in a slow deep breath through his nose, trying to keep his dinner where it belonged. Wherever he was, it smelled like hospital and terror. It was Dean who had first discovered that some emotions had a smell that wasn’t a smell. It clicked somewhere deeper in the brain than smell, but scent was the only viable explanation either of them could come up with. Once Dean had managed to point it out, Sam never forgot. Their father was never as good at picking up on it, but he was more than smart enough to trust his boys, Dean especially. Sam had never minded. Dean had better instincts. It was a fact of life.
Another bout of nausea slammed into him before he had gotten control of the first and he made a small gagging noise. Suddenly he was being freed, sort of. There were firm, nearly painful hands gripping him and rolling him over onto his side. He would have much preferred being allowed to sit up, but he wasn’t given a choice. He took what he could get and figured if he was lucky he had just ruined someone’s shoes, because none of these people were his brother. Or his father or, God help him, 494.
As soon as his stomach had emptied itself, he was pressed back down flat, none too gently, and restrained again. He finally managed to open his eyes and he didn’t like what he saw. He was being watched intently by three people whose identities were completely hidden behind scrubs and surgical masks. He was feeling less safe by the second. He let his eyes dart around the room, taking in everything he could. The place reminded him of a cross between an emergency room and an autopsy room. His heart rate picked up a bit and that was about when he noticed that he was being monitored. He could hear the heart monitor’s beeping pick up to match his rising pulse. He felt the tug of sensors against his head as he turned to find the heart monitor. Apparently they were monitoring his brain waves too. He was somehow both completely baffled and frightened.
Whatever he had been sedated with was making him feel very disconnected. He knew he had been sedated. He didn’t remember getting there and nothing but sedation made him toss his cookies the way he had just done.
“What the hell do you want? Where’s my brother?” Sam’s tone was demanding, betraying none of his nervousness as he tugged on the restraints, trying to gauge their strength. His arms were pinned at the wrist and elbow. He couldn’t get enough leverage to even tug at them. After that, he stopped to take real stock of his own body. He was pinned to the bed – he used that term very loosely – at ankles, knees, waist, and chest, along with wrists and elbows. Not even a contortionist would be escaping from these bonds. He would not be escaping until they let him free from the bed. They were monitoring his brain waves, heart rate, and most likely a few other things. There was an IV taped into the back of his right hand. He wondered how long he had been out. Sam looked up at the masked blank faces with cold clinical eyes and was starting to understand where that feeling of terror came from.
Sam tried to calm himself and take firm stock of his situation. He had been in tight spots before. He knew from experience that the trick was to not lose your head. That all went out the window when a faceless voice announced that they had established a baseline Alpha wave pattern and one of the others injected something into the IV. He wondered in something approaching panic what they had just given him.
Moments later it invaded his brain and he wished he had never even thought the question.
XXXXX
494 handed his mission report to Colonel Lydecker a little worriedly. It had some holes in it. At least, that was what they could be called if the Colonel was feeling polite and kind. Grossly incomplete felt more accurate to 494’s personal assessment.
He stood stiffly, waiting for Lydecker to pass judgement on his performance. “At ease, soldier,” the Colonel said as he adjusted his glasses to read. He noted that a little of the X5’s tension eased while he skimmed the report. It started out well enough, even chronicling 494’s misgivings about his performance as Dean, the apparent ‘investigation’ that they worked on and how 494 had planted the information to make Samuel go willingly with him in the direction of Gillette, Wyoming.
Lydecker read through the entire report. Twice. “There are noticeable blank spots, son.” He gave the X5 an inquiring look.
“Yes, sir.” That really wasn’t the response Lydecker was hoping for, but he supposed he should have expected it.
“Would you care to explain or maybe fill them in?”
“No, sir.”
Lydecker sighed, and looked over the missing time again. This was the sort of behavior 494 exhibited during the disastrous Berrisford mission. Parts of the reports just simply vanished when he thought that they were simply personal and none of the business of his handlers. The Colonel had hoped those tendencies had been stamped out during 494’s heavy reindoctrination after he was returned to base against his will. Apparently the programming only had a limited success with the X5.
That he was keeping information from Lydecker was indicative of the fact that he had, in fact, become attached to the subject, which was exactly what he had been afraid of. X5-494 would have to be watched carefully, kept well clear of Samuel and Dean, and occupied to divert his attention, and hopefully his guilt. Lydecker knew it would do him no good to push for the missing time. 494 was surprisingly stubborn on occasion. He thought that it might be genetic, recalling 494’s description of Samuel’s steadfast refusal to speak or react in any way until he had gotten what he wanted.
The colonel’s best option now was to send 494 back to his unit. That would settle him to some degree. He took his responsibility as their commanding officer seriously. Lydecker had made sure of it, by continuing 494’s officer training when other means of controlling him seemed to fail. X5-494 was an emotional creature, and Lydecker used it as a tool and a leash, but it wasn’t necessarily easy.
At times, his X5s were a little too human for his liking.
XXXXX
It was the clicking, 494 finally decided. It wasn’t what made her frightening, but it was part of why being in her presence was so alarming. You could always hear her clicking before you saw her. Her nails against her desk, or her heels on the floor. It was the anticipation. You could hear the clicking long before you could see her.
So of course you were already terrified when you laid eyes on her. He stood at stiff attention in front of her desk, and for a long moment she didn’t even bother to look up from what she was reading. The fingers of her left hand tapped against the glass. She made people wait on purpose. It drove home the fact that she was in charge and if you were an X unit, then you were there merely by her sufferance. 494 understood the mind games and figured that it wasn’t so bad. At least she acknowledged that he had a mind to mess with.
“I’ve read your report.” She still didn’t look up.
“Yes, ma’am.” He didn’t move a muscle, nor did he look away from the empty spot on the wall that he had taken such interest in.
“It was an interesting account. If a bit sparse in places.” She did look up then, eyes wide, inviting explanation. 494 chose to remain silent. It was a verbal trap. If he answered with a simple ‘yes, ma’am’, he was admitting fault. If he stated that it was good enough for the Colonel, she would only state that she wasn’t the Colonel and he would have to come up with something else. He certainly couldn’t tell the truth. How bad did, ‘so, see, there really was a ghost. She was hot in a totally creepy-ghost-like way. She tried to kill Sammy, you know, the point of the mission, with his own car.’ sound? That would be sort of like saying ‘which Psy-Ops table do you want me strapped to? I’ll just head on over.’ No. There would be no full disclosure here. “I see you do not care to elaborate, 494. That’s fine. You’re here to wrap up a few loose ends on the mission. Namely Dean Winchester. Dispose of him. You’re dismissed.” She looked back down at whatever it was that she had been reading.
“Yes, Ma’am.” He shivered ever so slightly at the thought of killing his human template. It was rather convenient that Deck had shared that bit of information with 494. The X5 saluted sharply and then left as quickly as he could without actually running. His back was turned when the small, self-satisfied smile appeared on Madame Renfro’s lips. For an X5 who was so difficult to manage, he sure was easy to manipulate.
XXXXX
Dean was doing sit-ups again. Some day he would get out of here and he would have abs of steel. Women would love it. But for now he really didn’t really care about women. He wanted to know if his brother was safe. Somehow, he thought that with their Winchester luck, Sam was in trouble. Or maybe that was just his big brother radar. Either way, he occupied himself with trying to come up with a workable escape plan. He was working on getting a couple of the springs free from his mattress, but it was slow going bare-handed.
He paused as he heard talking outside his cell door. It was another of those young guards and someone who sounded strangely familiar.
“Scram, kid.”
“Sir?”
“You heard me. You’re dismissed.”
“But, sir.” The young voice didn’t seem to be doing very well at questioning authority. “Colonel Lydecker assigned me to guard duty, sir.” The second ‘sir’ was tacked on for good measure.
Dean heard the first voice sigh. “You’re X6-239 correct?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What’s your name?”
“X6-2 – ” He was interrupted.
“I know your designation, kid, I asked what your name was. What do your sibs call you?”
“Jax, sir.”
“Have they sent you on any missions yet, Jax?” X5-494 knew that there was at least one unit of young X6’s that had not left base yet. Lydecker was being careful with them after the trouble that came from moving the X5’s along too quickly.
“No, sir.”
“Have they turned you loose with your unit to hunt, Jax?” 494 remembered when Lydecker had turned his unit loose to hunt. They were hunting death row inmates, and Lydecker had known just how to wind them up so it wasn’t humans after another human, or even X5’s after an ordinary. He had keyed them up and left them hungry and eager and when he had set them loose it had been a pack of jungle cats after a deer.
The colonel had tapped into that feral DNA that had been built into each and every one of them. It became apparent to his unit that day that some had more than others. They had hunted as a well organized pack. It had been one of the most exhilarating experiences he had ever had. The loss of control horrified him.
“No, sir, he hasn’t.”
“Then scram. I’m not going to be the one to teach you this lesson. You don’t need to learn things Madame Renfro’s way.” Dean wasn’t sure he wanted to learn things Renfro’s way either, because it sounded like it was going to hurt a lot. He eased to his feet and made his way to the bed and gave his half free spring a vicious yank, with little concern for his hands. It didn’t budge very far. He kept working at it as he listened.
Dean thought that this guy sounded like him when he had been trying to shield Sammy from something he was still too young to see. Dean thought that there were going to be things that Sam should be too young to see forever.
“But, sir.”
The voice took on a hard edge, similar to John’s when he was barking commands. “You are dismissed, soldier. That was an order, not a request.”
“Yes, sir!” The sound of retreating feet.
Dean heard the door unlock and gave up on the wire spring except to shove it back out of sight. He settled into a fighting stance with his back to a wall, but not a corner to be trapped in. Amazingly, he didn’t falter when the door eased open and he looked himself in the eye, and the door closed again. “What the fuck?”
“Well, that was eloquent,” 494 said with raised eyebrows. Dean looked his double up and down. He had the same hair cut, but hadn’t spiked it, not that Dean had taken any care with his personal appearance since being locked up. They had the same face and eyes, same hands and height, but Dean had more muscle and Dean knew he just didn’t hold himself in quite the same way. This guy was also in the same uniform of gray T-shirt and camo pants he had seen the other young people wear. Dean would never wear gray again.
“Who are you?” Dean finally asked. But he knew already. At least he knew in that way that had nothing to do with conscious thought or logic. This was his brother. Just as surely as Sam was. It had nothing to do with 494’s physical appearance. It was the soul behind it. Dean knew family when he saw it. And what the fuck was that about, because he knew that he didn’t have a twin, and that he had never seen this kid before in his entire life. Unless you counted in the mirror every morning. Dean wasn’t counting that at all. Nope.
“Who? Not what? Sammy started by asking me what I was, not who.”
“Yeah, well, sometimes I’m quicker on the uptake than him. And don’t call him Sammy.” Relations made no difference. That was Dean’s name for Sam, no one else’s, except maybe their father’s. Dean had felt his heart plummet as soon as this guy spoke of Sam. That meant that these people had his baby brother.
“He was quick. He had me dead to rights by the end of the second day. Honestly, to give him credit, I think he had it figured by the time we had stopped on the first night. He’s a smart kid, but he should stop second guessing himself.”
494 watched as Dean’s jaw clenched tight. He hadn’t come here to torture the guy. He never was one to play with his prey. It just seemed needlessly cruel. “Look, it was nothing personal. I had my orders. I have my orders.”
“Yeah. You seem real eager. You even got rid of my guard, who sounds like he’s about twelve, by the way. So if you’re going to torture or kill me, could you just give it a go so we can get on with things?”
“He’s sixteen, actually. I just thought I’d let you know that Sam’s alive. And no one has any plans to have that change any time soon. That and he cares an awful lot about you.” 494 shrugged. “I hope that helps a little.” He really did, because Dean was making him feel pretty damned guilty with the well-concealed look of utter horror. It didn’t help that he was also remembering the look of quiet determination when Sam had calmly packed up his things and agreed to be kidnapped so he could just get near his brother.
Suddenly Dean smiled at 494. “He got to you, didn’t he? Dude, you didn’t stand a chance.”
“Which foot do you put your sock on first?”
“What?”
“Which foot do you put your first sock on?”
“I don’t fucking know,” Dean said, but he did a mental check anyway, sort of automatically. It seemed strangely important to this freaky copy of him. “My left?”
“Your brother is totally obsessed with you, you know.”
“He knew that, did he? Yeah, he is sort of a freak like that.” Dean was trying to work out what the hell was going on here, since he wasn’t dead, but strongly suspected they weren’t here to talk about his dressing habits or Sammy’s memory for details. It was just a hunch.
As Dean watched, 494 cocked his head a little to the side almost like an animal would, trying to catch a distant sound, and then his face went expressionless. Set to stone. Dean wondered if this was how Sammy felt when he decided they were done talking and plastered his perfect ‘a-okay’ smile on. Like a wall had been slammed down between them.
He didn’t like it. Didn’t like knowing how Sammy felt and didn’t like what it meant about the situation. It meant that something had changed drastically. Because he had been getting somewhere with this kid. Sammy had started it. Nailing him with whatever hoodoo baby brother magic he had. Dean was going to finish it. He knew he could. He didn’t know who or what (because Sammy wasn’t often wrong even though Dean hated admitting it) this kid was, but he wasn’t heartless. He had already proven that, both by sending the guard away to avoid the kid seeing or hearing anything, and by offering Dean the knowledge of Sam’s efforts and continued existence.
Dean watched as something passed through 494’s eyes. Some sort of resolve, which shifted out to his stance and the set of his shoulder. “Time’s up.” He pulled a gun from the back of his pants and leveled it at Dean’s head in a steady, two-handed, military hold, and thumbed the safety off. And then Dean heard what 494 must have heard almost a whole minute earlier. The clicking of a woman’s heeled shoes over linoleum and cement floors. The kid flinched and started to squeeze the trigger.
Dean knew that there was no way he could cover the distance to 494 or get cover in the time he had left. So he blurted out the only thing he really had to pass on if he died. “Tell Sammy I love him.” Winchesters never said love. Saying it meant you couldn’t show it, and that meant you were dead.
Somehow Dean was still standing when the heels stopped outside the door and 494 was suddenly giving him a look that could only be described as desperation. He had seen the look in Sammy’s eyes. He had seen it in his father’s. He knew at some point he must have worn it himself. With the life that they led, the things they had been forced to see and do.
He looked the kid square in the eyes, because he had always promised himself that he would face it down and take it like the man his father had raised him to be. “Promise me you’ll tell him.” He needed that promise. Even if it was a lie.
“I can’t. I . . . I can’t.” At first, Dean thought the kid was refusing him, and then the gun lowered. Right then, those words became the most beautiful words Dean had ever heard. He prayed they would be followed up by, ‘You and your brother are free to go’, but God wasn’t in the habit of answering Dean.
The door behind them opened and a woman with bleached, short white hair stepped in. She was dressed like a business woman and was wearing sharp heels. Dean would have sworn on a stack of Bibles held out by Pastor Jim that he had seen eyes more human in some of the monsters he had shot. “You were given an order, soldier.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He brought the gun back up and sighted on Dean, but still didn’t squeeze the trigger.
“You know what happens if you don’t.” Her tone was casual, but the threat, whatever it was, was clear to Dean.
It must have been more than clear to 494, because Dean watched that look of desperation turn to one of terror and the gun shifted from pointing as Dean to pointing at his own temple. “I’m not going back there.”
The woman sneered. “Fine. You want to be spare parts, that’s fine with me, soldier.”
Dean officially hated this woman. “You’re fucking creepy, you know that, lady?” He could hear running footsteps and then someone else barged into his cell. “Hey, if you guys want me to leave . . . give you some privacy . . .” The new guy calmly aimed a gun at him. “Or not. I’m cool with that too.”
The new guy, an older, blonde man, gave the woman such a look of loathing that Dean was wondering why the gun was pointed at him and not her. Then the man’s attention went to the kid, whose eyes had opened as soon as the man had entered the room, even before he spoke.
“I can’t do it, sir. I can’t.” It sounded like an apology to Dean, and he wanted to know who this guy was to rate that.
Dean watched as an expression of hatred spread over the blond man’s face as he turned to the woman. “What have I told you about fucking with my kids? I told you I would handle him.”
Dean didn’t much care about the gun pointed at him at the moment, but the man didn’t seem like he was going to shoot him from breathing, so he figured he also wouldn’t shoot him for going and sitting on the bed. He almost asked for popcorn, and would have, too, except the kid with his face was still standing there with a gun to his own head, and that was more than a little worrying in a few different ways. “Dude, you two think you could stop bitching at each other and deal with the suicidal kid? Just a thought, ‘cause you know, if he kills himself it’ll be traumatizing in more ways than I want to count right now.”
Dean hadn’t known anyone but his father could look that irritated. The blonde man followed the look up by promptly and firmly shoving the woman out the door and closing it behind her. Which was a relief, really. Even if they were all locked in now.
Having this kid blow his brains out really would be traumatizing. And that woman would have pushed him into it. Dean didn’t even want to think about what ‘spare parts’ really meant. All he knew what that anyone who wore his face was not allowed to look that terrified. It was against the Winchester code or something. He was about to open his mouth when the other guy beat him to it.
“Give me the gun.” Dean watched as he held his hand out for it. “I’m retracting the order. You answer only to me, son. She doesn’t command your unit. I do. Give me the gun.” His voice was steady and calm, like he expected to be obeyed but had all the time in the world. Dean noticed that at no point did he promise that the kid wouldn’t have to go wherever it was that he was afraid of. The man was classified immediately under ‘asshole’ in Dean’s mental filing system.
“I won’t go back there. I won’t. I’d rather die.” Dean didn’t doubt it in the least.
“Come with me.” The words just tumbled out of Dean’s mouth before they had even registered in his brain. “You’re armed. He isn’t. I say we leave. Find Sammy and then shag ass outta this dump.” Unfortunately, not only was God not listening to Dean, Dean suspected that there was some sort of vendetta in play here. His statement startled the kid and the blond man swept in and swiftly disarmed him.
Dean had already bounced off the bed and onto his feet, instinct telling him to intervene on the kid’s behalf He didn’t get more than two feet though before coming up against the gun aimed at his chest, safety off. “Do not test me, son,” was all the man said before taking a hold of the kid’s arm with the other hand and moving to the door. The kid followed like a well trained and plenty beaten puppy.
“You hurt him, you answer to me.” Dean ground the words out, cold and dangerous.
“He doesn’t belong to you,” was the man’s cool response.
“He does now.”
XXXXX
494 sat huddled into the corner of the cold room, shivering convulsively. They would have to watch him carefully. This unit was always far more prone to seizures than many of the others. Lydecker idly wondered if 493 was as susceptible to them. Could the untreated chemical imbalance be part of the cause for his psychosis? It was an interesting question. They had never run a study on what the long-term effects of not treating the seizures were. He was unwilling and unable to sacrifice this unit just to allay curiosity.
494 was clearly trying to preserve body heat and therefore to hold off the inevitable. He was sitting in the corner of the room with his knees drawn up to his body. He had his head down and his arms covering as much as he could. Most people, when literally freezing, would tuck their hands close to their bodies, trying to protect extremities from damaging frostbite. 494 clearly had chosen to retain his core body temperature as long as possible, knowing that the most heat left the body through head and feet. 494’s feet were bare but the colonel noticed that he had tucked the cuffs on his pants between the naked soles of his feet and freezing steel floor.
“How’s our little Popsicle doing?” Renfro asked as she approached and then stood next to him, looking through the small one-way observation window. The small steel room really was a large seamless refrigerator. The walls were made of steel instead of the more typical aluminum, to contain an angry X unit. One exactly like 494.
“He’s still copesetic and angry. It’s going to take another few hours for him to be manageable.” The best way to handle something as dangerous as an X5 for things like reconditioning was to nearly freeze them. The cold slowed their metabolism, making them physically slower and weaker, and much easier to drug. Chemical interference had always been part of the reconditioning processes. Many of the more docile X5s, if there was such a thing, didn’t require much. Just something to take the edge off their anxiousness, and maybe a hypnotic to ensure that you had their absolute full attention. X5-600 for instance, was easy to manage that way. Which had been a startling discovery, given that he had been designed to be a leader unit.
X5-494, however, was not. Any reconditioning with him required a full team of workers and doctors from both neuropsychology and medical. It was a time consuming and costly affair with only mixed results. By mixed he meant entirely temporary. The X5s eidetic memory and strong will required heavy chemical tampering. This in turn required the medical staff because of his apparently delicate and finicky neuron-chemical balance. It didn’t take much to send him into seizures, and if left untreated, because that was tried once, they progressed in to complex full grand mal seizures. Those were not just an inconvenience. Those were a treat to the X unit’s life.
That was unacceptable on a number of levels. For one, after the loss of the baker’s dozen from Alpha Unit, X5-494 was one of their best. That may have been true even before the others had escaped. He and his twin were similar in many ways, but 493 had never had the same leadership capabilities or grace under pressure that 494 had. 493 had been content to let 599 run the show, to be Unit leader. 494 took second place to no one. That was a beautiful thing in the field. He could take command of any situation, but his own ego didn’t get in the way of objective. If a job needed to be done, 494 would get it done. Even if it wasn’t by the book.
Secondly, 494 was one of Sandeman’s special kids. Sandeman had been there in the beginning. Manticore had been his project more than anyone else’s. Lydecker had been startled when Sandeman had left, and very displeased when Renfro had been appointed in his place. Even more startlingly than Sandeman’s departure though, were his brief and sudden reappearances. He had only returned twice. The first time had been twenty-one years ago, when he had picked out two embryos, one he selected seemingly at random. Choosing the first of a forced twin set that Lydecker was most interested in. She had been lost in that dozen escapees.
The second he had been much more selective with. The man had stayed up for days, reading through the genetic assays of all the available twined male embryos. He had been very specific on that point. When he had finally chosen his twin set, he set to work on the second twin. He had been most insistent on that as well. It had to be the second embryo. Not the original.
The colonel now stood beside Renfro and wondered just what Sandeman had done to make 494 so special. Was it all about to be ruined with yet another ill conceived attempt to get 494 to conform? As he watched, the X5 listed a little to one side as he began to lose consciousness in the cold. That wouldn’t matter; they had drugs to force the mind awake and aware. “What the hell were you thinking?” he finally bit out at the woman.
“I wanted to know how damaged he was.” She spoke as if Lydecker were a deficient child. “Pretty damaged, by the looks. Suicidal behavior, Deck? You call that mission worthy? Your standards have lowered a bit, don’t you think?”
“I told you I would handle him after this mission.”
“You weren’t handling it, Deck.” She turned away from the view of 494 falling to sprawl sideways onto the freezing cold floor, her hand on her hip. “You were coddling damaged goods. Have you forgotten that they aren’t really your kids? They are objects, Deck. Weapons. And if they don’t perform up to standard, they need to be repaired. Immediately.”
“This never works on him. We’ve proven that in the past. He has to be controlled and managed in a different manner.” Lydecker could feel his jaw tighten in irritation at this harpy of a woman. “They may be weapons, but they still think, and that can’t always just be wiped clean like a computer hard drive. If this kills him, you are explaining it to the Committee. Not me. And you’re explaining it to his Unit. Not me. Nor will I help you when they revolt. Because we don’t have the resources to reprogram all of them.” With that, he turned and left.
Otherwise, he was going to wipe that sly smirk off her face with his fist.
XXXXX
The collection of novels that Dean had been given could be called eclectic if one was feeling generous. Dean wasn’t feeling generous in the least, and he called it pretty fricken pathetic. Some moron had clearly picked these out based on size alone. He thought that maybe they were trying to actually torture him. War and Peace, Collected Novels of Hemmingway, Anna Karenina. War and Peace didn’t even bear thinking about, and Hemmingway he had been forced to read in high school. He was surprised that there hadn’t been a rise in the suicide rate afterwards. The Stephen King wasn’t too bad, but how many times could one man read It. He had cleared through Lord of the Rings in the first two days. Now he was on Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. So maybe they weren’t actively trying to torture him. If they had been, they would have given him the Order of the Phoenix. A person could only take that much teenaged angst caps lock rage once in a lifetime.
So he sat on his bunk and read while he waited. He could be patient. He had bided his time, learned the layout of the place as best he could, and finally worked that stubborn damned bedspring free. It was far stiffer than he would have liked, but it would do. After twisting it free from the crappy cot mattress, he had quickly straightened it and folded one end to resemble a paper clip. It was currently on the inside of his thin shirt, clipped to the neck line and resting against his spine. Not the best of secret weapons, but it would do in a pinch. This was one hell of a pinch.
He’d had a plan since his first day in this cell. All he had needed was an opportunity. That had walked into his cell yesterday wearing his face. What the hell was the deal there? Because he didn’t care how much their faces matched, they weren’t the same, except where it counted. At least, that was what instinct told him, and he had learned to listen. He was leaving and he was taking Sammy and that kid with him. Done deal. That was the way it was going to be.
He just had to find them. How big could this dump really be? He tried not to think too much about it because honestly, the place could be pretty big. He hadn’t really had a chance to see it from the outside, so he had no real sense of scale. It wasn’t like they would give him a map if he asked.
He figured he would need a map, though, because his way out had just arrived. It was yet another one of those youngish soldier who had been escorting him to and from the shower room and bringing meals. As usual, they were armed with a tranquilizer gun, but for a brief moment it wasn’t pointed at him, and that was all he needed. He snapped the book closed and threw it with a very calculated amount of force. It banked off the wall behind the guard’s head with a slap and landed in the path of the closing door. His guard blinked at it for just a second, most likely wondering what the point of that badly aimed attack had been. Dean launched himself at the young man, taking him off guard.
The guy was quick. Dean would give him that. Animal quick. Just like his kidnappers had been. But that was all they were. They were animal quick. Not monster. Dean knew how to fight monsters. He used his shoulder to catch the other guy under the chin and slam the poor sap’s head up and back into the cement wall. Any normal human would have gone down in a heap of limbs after having one hundred and seventy pounds of muscle slam into them like that, but it only dazed the young man. That was all Dean needed. He pulled the wire out from under his shirt, quickly bent it into a passable curve, and looped it over the kid’s neck and pulled tight. Dean was grateful that the gauge was too large to cut through flesh, both for his hands’ sake and for the kid, who really wasn’t passing out quite as quick as Dean would have liked.
Dean had no desire to kill his escort. He was a killer, yes, but only of the supernatural. Sometimes he would cross the line into human when there was no other way, but he hated it. And these guys? They weren’t human. He knew that, but they weren’t monsters either. They weren’t supernatural.
It took another couple of minutes of cramping hands and screaming muscles, but the guard eventually passed out. Dean held on for another few seconds to make sure it wasn’t a ruse, then let the wire go. He checked to make sure the kid was still breathing, which he was, and then hauled him over to the bed. He quickly stripped the guy of his uniform T-shirt and pants and after the brief inspection decided the boots would fit well enough. He set them aside too. He then stripped out of his own clothes and yanked on the uniform. After a minute of thought, he put his old clothes on the guard and rolled the guy onto the bed, facing the wall.
Dean took a minute to settle his clothes into the military precision he had seen on the kid wearing his face yesterday, and went for the door. Harry Potter was mashed between the edge of the door and the doorjamb, effectively blocking it from closing and locking. He bent and picked it up with a grin. He tossed it onto the bed before stepping out into the hallway and closing the door behind him. Who the hell would have thought that a talent for pool would break him out of prison?
He met very few people in the halls as he walked with purpose. Those dressed in a similar uniform gave him a small nod of respect or a ‘Sir’ as he passed. Older people in normal clothing or jungle green camo let their eyes slide over him as if he were an object to be ignored. It was an interesting combination, and one he didn’t like.
It was a bit hard to scope things out when he had to walk quickly enough to look like he knew where he was going. He had learned at about the age of ten that looking calmly purposeful gave people the impression that you both knew what you were doing and had the right to do it. He wasn’t sure exactly what he was looking for, to be honest, but he couldn’t think of any other way to find his brother than simply look.
Uncomfortably, he thought he might be onto something when he had traveled through several halls and passages leading in a jagged path away from his cell. The number of young people in the grey uniform had dropped off nearly completely, and the plain clothed older people had increased. Many of them were wearing lab coats and looking pretty geektastic. He didn’t like the feel of things, not that any of this had been what he would call a picnic, but here he could smell fear like it was a living thing.
Then he heard the clicking of heels. The same heels that had caused his baby twin such terror. He tried to remember that when he pasted the same blank look over his face as she approached. She stopped directly in front of him and looked up with a stone cold expression. “State your designation number, soldier.”
There was a short silence and then her mouth curled into a slight sneering smirk. The jig was up. “Uh . . . I forgot?” Dean gave her his most disarming grin.
She wasn’t disarmed in the least.
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