gavemea_45 | (no subject)

She's lying. She's got to be.

At least it'll be easy enough to check. Sam makes a list of names, drawing on both his own memory and the things John Winchester had recorded in his journal.

He waits until Dean's gone out before he starts making calls.

"Hi, this is Phil Jones. I needed to check some facts with your secretary... It was a fire that occurred on November 24, 2006. Lawrence, Kansas, that's right..."

One at a time, he starts crossing names off the list.

"I'm trying to get in touch with Steve Hardecker... oh. Could you, uh, tell me when he died?"

"This is police chief Phil Jones. Can you check the records for a Robert Campbell? July 19th, 2001?"

"Dead on arrival. Right. What I'm after is the cause of death. ... a heart condition? Wasn't he a cardiac surgeon? Shouldn't he have known about that?"

Slowly, steadily, the numbers of the dead increase.

"I'm looking for information on Mrs. Wallace's death. Two deaths. I see. Who was the other?"

"Ed Campbell. Uh-huh... were there any survivors? No, that's all I needed. Thanks for your time."

He disconnects the last call and drops the phone on the desk, then sits down on the bed and stares blankly into space for some time.

Eventually Sam digs a crumpled napkin out of his jeans-pocket and unfolds it. He looks down at the number written there for almost a full five minutes before reaching for his phone.

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The cell phone is mostly protocol.

She's a goddamn demon, after all. Getting in contact with Sam doesn't take much. It's the respecting of space that matters here.

She walks into the room, arms crossed.

"So."

"They're dead."

Sam's standing by the window, looking out at the parking lot, but as she speaks he turns to face her.

"All of them. Everyone who ever knew her."

"Yeeep."

She takes another couple of steps forward.

Pauses.

"You can blame Yellow Eyes for that."

"He's to blame for a lot of things."

Hard and unforgiving. Sam's watching her closely.

"So how are you involved in all this? What was he doing?"

"I'm pretty sure you can figure that part out for yourself," Ruby says.

The way she says it implies she believes he's a lot smarter than he looks.

"Think about it. Yellow Eyes killed your mother. Then he made sure every single person your mother knew followed after. He was covering his tracks. And damn good of him, too."

Yeah, there might be a barely noticeable smidgen of admiration there.

(Demon, remember?)

Noticeable enough. His expression flattens.

"Why do you care?"

She lets out a slightly disappointed sigh.

"Because," she says, "I want to help you, Sam. That's what I'm here for. To help you."

"Why?"

"I have my reasons."

She stalks across the room, pulling one of the cheap motel's chairs out and towards her.

No, she wasn't exactly invited to make herself feel at home, but she's been on her feet all day. And it sure beats standing around in the centre of the room like an idiot.

"And you do want me to help you with Dean, don't you?"

It stops him.

Silence hangs in the air between them for several long seconds. After a moment or two of frozen immobility, Sam slowly crosses the room and takes a seat on the edge of the bed.

"You said you could help me save him." He's searching her face. "How?"

"All in good time," she says easily. "There are a couple of things that need to be done first. This isn't just a simple matter of kicking a couple of demons' asses and claiming your victory prize."

She shakes her head.

"It could be," he mutters, stubbornly, but doesn't look too inclined to push it further than that.

"What things?"

"Getting yourself some workable weapons, for one."

She shrugs easily, glancing at him in a way that suggests she may or may not be sizing him up.

"Like that gun of yours: the Colt."

"Look, if you know so much about what happened, you've gotta know already that it took the last bullet to kill him," Sam points out, flatly.

Ruby is no longer amused.

In fact, she looks at him a little irritatedly.

"So, what? Now that you've used them all up, that's it? It's back to throwing a bit of salt around and babbling a couple lines of Latin? Come on, Sam. Things are only gonna get darker and more dangerous from here.

"You need that gun, and you can get it to work again. The gun is in tact, right?"

He can practically hear his teeth grind together as his jaw clenches.

"I don't know, maybe I was thinking I could find something like that knife of yours," he snaps back.

There's a taut beat of silence before Sam adds, grudgingly,

"Yeah. It is. More or less."

"Well, it's a start."

She's going to deliberately ignore his remark about her knife.

"Figure out what makes that gun tick, 'cause it'll be damned good to have around."

The added 'when I'm not there to save your ass' is more or less implied.

She condescends because she cares.

(Sort of.)

He's not going to tell her Bobby's got the Colt.

He's not going to tell her anything he doesn't have to.

He's not.

"You're right about that much, anyway." Sam looks pointedly at her. "It's already been useful."

Not yet.

Oh, it's still early days.

"Oh, I'll bet it was." Her smile is deliberately amused and a little daring. "But you're gonna want to save some of that anger and frustration for a better-suited target."

There's no missing her point.

Sam swallows, hard.

"... you can really do it? Help me save him?"

Try though he might, he can't keep the hope from threading through his words. Not entirely.

And that hope in his words? It's endearing, really.

She shrugs.

"If we all play our cards right - then yeah."

Training and instinct war with desperation and need inside him.

It's a short struggle.

I can do this. It's what I promised Dean: I'll do whatever it takes.

Sam lets out his breath in a quiet sigh, and acquiesces.

"I'll find out about the Colt."

"Great. I knew you had it in you, Sam."

Ruby says it like she's a proud mother hen. Then she straightens and makes her way to the door.

She's no fan of small-talk, and they've both got some work to do.

"We'll be in touch, I'm sure."

Sam stays where he is and watches as the door closes behind her.

(whatever it takes)

"I'm sure we will."