Roads Untraveled ~ Sam Winchester

Chapter Sixty-Six - For Dean

Whilst Sam had gone to check up on Rowena's progress with the Book of the Damned, Elizabeth had stayed behind with Dean. They'd decided that suddenly taking multiple trips out together and thus, excluding Dean was starting to make him suspicious, whether he wanted to press it or not. They were sat in the War room at the map table. Elizabeth had made him bacon pancakes; for which he was more than grateful.
"How the hell does someone who's never had to eat before know how to cook so well?" He asked through a mouthful of food.
"Just because I don't eat doesn't mean I don't know what tastes good." She chuckled, sitting across from him sipping at her blood. "I learned a fair few recipes in my time of being married to Samuel Colt and the evolution of it all went from there."
"Well, thank you Samuel Colt for being Human. These are the best pancakes I've ever had. And this bacon is cooked to perfection." The Winchester smiled.
"I've seen you crucify meat enough times to know how you like your fried pig strips." The Vampire retorted.
"Yeah. I guess you have."
"Plus, cooking is a kind of therapy for me. I don't get to do it enough." She added.
"Well, Vampy Pants, you can cook for me anytime you like if it's all gunna be like this." Dean smiled through another mouthful.

By the time Sam came back, it was passed sundown. He trudged down the Bunker stairs looking more than a little run down.
"Wow." Dean smirked.
"Hey." Sam huffed.
"Well, you look like crap on toast." The older brother commented, earning a light slap on the arm from Elizabeth.
"I just... Haven't been sleeping well." Sam replied.
"You two been going at it that hard, huh?"
"Maybe." Elizabeth commented, sipping her blood.
"Yeah, whatever." Sam gave a breathy chuckle as he walked over. "What are you doing?"
"So, those goons that were after the book; the Stynes? Well, the one that we killed said that he had a big family." Dean told him.
"So, we've been looking into it whilst you've been busy. Turns out, they've grown quite a bit since they were hunting me back in the day." Elizabeth continued.
"Yeah, so we figured, if there's more out there, we should probably get to know as much as we can about them."
"And?" Sam asked, flicking through the file the Men of Letters had on them.
"Well, pretty much what we do know is they screwed with financial markets, they helped Hitler get started along with God knows what else, probably disco, but you go back to the eighteen hundreds and the trail goes dead. There's nothing in research, there's nothing online - it's like the family just popped up one day." Dean finished.
"Families don't usually do that." Sam smirked.
"No, they do not. So, I was asking Elizabeth if she could fill in some gaps, so it hasn't been a total waste of time."
"Whilst they were hunting me, they got close a couple of times. So close that I even overheard a conversation between them. They mentioned something about 'harvesting', but what, I don't know. I suspected, back in the day, that they were using magic to enhance themselves, which is where Dean mentioned that he emptied a clip on the guy he killed before he went down. That led me to thinking about performance enhancement spells, so I looked through the books - there's absolutely nothing like what we've encountered with them in there. So yes, we have more questions, but I'm sure with their fingers in all the pies they have, it shouldn't be too difficult to track them down and ask them." Elizabeth told him.
"Now, that 'harvesting' thing brings me to my next point in the minutes - we think we've caught a case." Dean said, looking to his laptop. "There's a mention of a murder online in Omaha. Victim's eyes were cut out, janitor runs in just as the killer jumps out the window."
"That's it?" Sam frowned.
"Well, the window is on the third storey." Dean elaborated, but Sam still shrugged.
"Guy jumps from a third storey window and then runs off like he never jumped at all. That kind of enhancement sound familiar to you?" Elizabeth cocked a brow.
"You think it's the Stynes." The younger brother nodded.
"Ding, ding, ding. We have a winner." The Vampire pointed to him.
"Look, man, I'm just trying to keep busy here, okay? We think it's the Stynes, so let's go check it out. Unless you have bigger fish to fry with all these mysterious outings you don't want me involved in." Dean stood up.
"There's no..." Sam shook his head, trailing off. "Whatever, I'm sold. I'm in."
"Alright, well, I'm gunna hit it. You probably should to. We'll leave first thing in the AM." The older brother said, closing up his laptop and walking off towards his room.
"So..." Elizabeth started once he was out of earshot. "How did it go with Rowena? Any updates?"
"She's got nothing. Apparently Nadya's codex is also in code. She liked to keep her secrets to herself. So Rowena's working on cracking that before she can crack the book." Sam sighed, rubbing some of the tiredness from his eyes.
Elizabeth rose from her chair, wandering over into his awaiting arms.
"Alright. Well, come on. Let's get you some decent sleep." She mumbled, kissing his lips.
Sam shook his head.
"I can't I need to go meet up with Charlie. I think she can help." He said.
"Sam... You're exhausted." Elizabeth sighed. "You need to sleep."
"And I will. After I've done this." He replied. "Wanna come with me? You can drive."
"You bastard. You know me too well." Elizabeth smirked.