About a boy (Part-11)
Word count: 2.8K
Warning: Suspense, feels, physical abuse, child-trafficking, kidnapping, child-violence, bullying.
Characters: Dean, Cas, Gabriel, Benny, Michael, OCs and… Sam?
Summary: Dean Winchester has a secret. A secret that could really land him in trouble. He never expected to connect with anyone when he walked into the ‘Blue Stone Orphanage for Boys,’ but even then, the walls he has put up are slowly coming down. Now, a series of strange events are threatening to expose him. When everything starts falling apart around him, will he still be able to save the one person that matters the most?
A/N: Okay, I really hope you all like this chapter! <3
Thanks to my lovelies @thing-you-do-with-that-thing and @deanssweetheart23 for beta reading this story <3
About a boy masterlist
“You know what would help? Lightsabers!” Will proclaimed.
Dean laughed and Cas gave Will an amused look.
“You guys think it’s funny, but we sneaked a Star Wars tape last year- you remember that, don’t you, Cas?- and those sabers could light up the whole place,” he reasoned.
“You know Lightsabers aren’t real,” Cas said patiently.
Will rolled his eyes at that. “Of course they aren’t real. I know that! But they must be using something similar during the filming. That’s what we need. We could light this whole place up. No need for dumb flashlights that give out in the middle of creepy staircases.”
Dean smiled indulgently. “That was one time.”
“And one time was enough,” Will said decidedly, his tone effectively dismissing the matter.
It sure had been a struggle, sneaking each night into the record room without letting anyone know. Even more, it was a task to smuggle and return Will from and back to the 4th floor. But if Dean was honest, Will kept them going. He had the sort of brightness and enthusiasm that never gave out… even on the dullest of nights.
It had taken Will a few days to come back to himself, but after that, Will was the driving force behind the ‘Sam search mission.’ In fact, he seemed too bright sometimes. Dean worried if somehow Will was overcompensating, thinking that it was his job to find Sam before he left with his adoptive parents at the end of the month. That was another thing- No one was to bring the adoption up. Dean wasn’t sure it was denial. It appeared more like Will was pushing it deep, deep down. His anxieties only surfaced sometimes in the dark when it was just him and Dean, with their backs to the grill. He would suddenly go quiet and Dean would just know.
“Found another!” Cas announced. “Matt Wilcox. It says he was transferred to Missouri, but no paperwork to prove it.”
“We have twenty-three now,” Dean said, grimly.
They hadn’t found many leads on Sam. Will had suggested that they go by the law of omissions. Eliminate those files that had no chance of being Sam’s. Like all kids who hadn’t been admitted around the age of 6 months, or whose physical descriptions were way off. It was time consuming, but it was still something. Meanwhile, Dean used the same idea to look into Stynes. In the past three weeks since Dean had actually started investigating the matter seriously, they had come across multiple instances of paperwork that wasn’t just shoddy but didn’t make any sense. Most of these were kids who had been abruptly displaced. Dean didn’t know if bad paperwork or a complete lack of follow-up would be good enough for Jody to make a case out of it, but if they found enough files, maybe some other link could be found.
It was serious work, and Will’s periodic complaints about the lack of good flashlights- which had become an essential commodity at this point- was the only entertainment.
Dean stashed his files away and checked his watch. It was just past 4 am.
“We should get back,” he suggested. “You don’t want to fall asleep in the class again, Cas.”
“It’s what the English Lit class is meant for,” said Cas, getting up anyway and stretching his arms. Beside him, Will nodded in agreement.
Dean smiled fondly at him.
Quietly, they made their way back to the left wing under the light of a single flashlight. It was little help, but too much light could attract attention. It was vexing to crossover from the barren left wing each night, but it was much better than risking being sighted.
Just as they landed on the fourth floor, a weird creaking noise came from the further left part.
“What the hell?” Dean scowled, pointing the flashlight. There was nothing there. Acting on an instinct, he shut the light off completely, gesturing with his hands for his other companions to stay put.
As if on point, a dark figure emerged at the very end of the corridor. Dean’s breath hitched; behind him, there were similar gasps of shock.
“Shhh…” he said, pushing them back into a deeper corner. The figure at the end was well-built and tall, and was looking straight at them in the darkness, as if suspecting their presence. After a few moments that stretched too long, the figure disappeared into the hallway ahead.
They stayed put like that afterwards for what seemed like ages just to make sure that they weren’t caught; then at Dean’s signal, took another flight of stairs and reached the 5th floor, opening the door and crossing over to the dorm side of the building.
Cas sagged against the rusted iron door, with his hand over his chest. “What. The. Hell was that?” he gasped, breathing heavily. Will was looking wide eyed, completely silently now, waiting for Dean to answer the question.
“I don’t know,” Dean finally said. “Whoever it was, wasn’t scared of being found, that’s for sure.”
“You’re thinking what I’m thinking?” Cas asked, brow sweaty and furrowed. Both Dean and Will nodded.
Neither of them said it out loud, but if whoever it was didn’t care about being spotted, it was because they thought they had the upper hand. Almost like… they owned the place.
The Stynes.
“Tomorrow,” Dean said. “We find out what the hell is happening there tomorrow.”
*****************************************
All through the day Dean couldn’t concentrate. It didn’t help that Cas kept falling asleep in every class. Maybe it was the complacency from staying in a place as dangerous as the bellstone orphanage for so long, but Cas was taking their impending adventure in stride. He was behaving ordinarily. In fact , he had even prayed like he usually did in the morning.
Cas’s calm energy gradually caught up with Dean and by the time they got back from school, his nervousness was almost ebbed. It was ticking in the back of his mind that Will and Barry hadn’t joined up with them after school as they usually did, but he didn’t pay much heed to it. Lately, the school was conducting weird psych analysis on Will to determine if he was all set for the adoption and subsequently the move to New York.
Dean couldn’t think about it without feeling a punch to his gut, so he pushed the thought out of his head.
“Hey,” Cas whispered as they reached the entrance of the boys home. “I’m going to go see if I can pick some more flashlights out of Garth’s supply closet. Meet you in the dorm room later?”
“Alright.”
They had put their heads together and deduced that there was no way Garth was involved in any of the stuff going around here. As Dean made his way to the shower room, he thought to himself that it may very well be possible that Garth was completely unaware. He lived down in the town, a good five miles away from the orphanage, and rode on his decrepit motorcycle every alternate day to do the essential maintenance or janitorial stuff that boys in the home couldn’t take care of. On occasions, he had stayed over late, but it was plausible that he didn’t know that there was something sinister going on here. Besides, anyone who had met Garth knew him to be absentminded. Good, but lost in his own tune.
Somehow the thought was uplifting for Dean. Not everyone in the staff was horrible. He hadn’t given the cook and the two henchmen like dudes that seemed to hang around with Andy the benefit of the doubt yet.
The shower did its work and Dean felt alert as he made his way back to the dorm room. As he reached the 5th floor main corridor, he saw Will.
Will was white. His forehead was clammy with sweat and his eyes were wide in horror.
Every thought abandoned Dean except for a nameless alarm over Will’s horror. Was he hurt?
Before Dean could utter another word, Will came barreling forward, almost tripping over his own shoes.
“Dean!” Will said, the name falling out of his lips like both a call for help and a prayer of relief.
“What happened?” Dean asked dreading the reply
Tears Swam in Will’s eyes. Tears of helplessness and fear. “They took him, Dean,” he sobbed. “They took Barry.”
With that, he collapsed on the floor, his knees completely giving out beneath him.
Dean rushed to him, falling on his own knees. “Barry?”
Will’s lips were quivering, but his voice was surprisingly strong. “I saw him at school in the morning, but he said he was feeling sick, so they let him go early. I-I just had a bad feeling about this so I skipped the class and came back here, but Barry was just gone.”
“Hey, maybe he’s just hanging around somewhere,” Dean tried to rationalise. “Maybe he went into town instead. It’s just 6 in the evening. You don’t know that he’s decided to play hooky and be somewhere else.”
“No-no,” Will shook his head. “Barry isn’t like that. You know him! I’m his only friend and he always sticks by me. Besides, I asked this other kid who had stayed back from school today, and he said Barry had definitely come back.”
“We need to ask Andy,” Dean said. “He’ll-...”
“I asked already!” Will cried. “He said Barry was transferred.”
Shit!
“I- I,” Will said, looking around wildly. “We need to go to the left wing. I know that’s where they are keeping him. They have to be!”
Dean didn’t think it was possible to be more horrified… but somehow he did.
“Will!” Dean shook his friend by the shoulders to get him to snap out of it. “Listen to me! We will find Barry. We will go there tonight and bring him back, okay?”
Will’s eyes stilled, the black pupils were so dark they overpowered the hazel around it.
“You promise?”
Dean cursed internally, but outside, he said, “I promise.”
So fast that Dean didn’t have time to react, Will flung his arms around Dean’s middle and hugged him hard. Dean’s own hand instinctively came to rest over Will’s head, his fingers weaving into the soft brown. He could feel Will’s sobs wracking his own body, the tears staining his shirt, but Dean held on, tightening his grip on the boy, as if by sheer willpower he could fix everything that was wrong.
A part of him did not want to let go. Something deep inside was just screaming at Dean to hold on to Will and make a run for it. Leave everything behind to just protect this kid. But there were lives at stake here. He could picture Barry’s crying face when that bully at school had raised his arm at him, then the absolute faithfulness with which he looked at Will.
Dean ran his hand over Will’s shoulders, over and over till his heaves subsided.
He moved back ever so lightly to look Will in his tear stained, anguished eyes. “You listen to me now, Will. Go back to your room and wait for us to signal you at night, okay?”
Will nodded,with implicit trust in his eyes and Dean wanted to kick himself for lying.
**********************************************
Dean sprinted all the way back from Will’s room, after having walked him down there, and skidded to a halt in his dorm room, almost banging into Benny. He let out a yelp of surprise at the intrusion but then gave Dean a brief, hesitant smile. Benny had been trying to be nice after his blow out almost a month ago. Sometimes Dean could see he was struggling to say the words, to make it okay, but hadn’t been able to.
Today, he actually tried. “Hey, Dean-,” he started to say but Dean cut it off quickly.
“Where’s Cas?”
“He’s not back yet.”
Dean turned around and kicked the foot of his bed. “Damn it!” he yelled.
“Dean!”
Behind him, Cas had just entered the room, slightly sweaty and breathless, two flashlights clutched to his chest.
“Barry-”
“I know!” Cas said, forehead crumpling. “A couple of kids were talking about it.”
Dean gave another frustrated yell.
“What? What happened?” Benny asked, vigilant now, all awkwardness gone.
Hurriedly, in a low voice, Dean repeated everything that had happened with Will. When he was done, both Cas’s and Benny’s faces were identical masks of horror.
“We have to go to the west wing, Dean!” Cas said decidedly, his voice grim.
“Yes,” Benny agreed.
Dean sank down on his bed with a thud. “You can’t come with us, Benny.”
“What? Why-” Benny started to protest but Dean cut him off. Again.
“You can’t come with us, because I want you here, standing by the door, making sure no one knows or follows us.”
“I don’t see the need,” Benny reasoned. “No one will be up at night.”
Dean exhaled, slowly. “We are not going to wait for nightfall. We’re doing it now, in an hour.”
“But Will? You just said that you promised him we’ll go after the lights go out...” Cas trailed off.
“This is because of Will,” Dean said through his teeth. “I lied to him. He’s just a kid. Sneaking into the record room at night is one thing, but dragging him into this? When even I don’t know what’s waiting there? I can’t do it. Better for him to be angry with me tomorrow than risk his life. Besides, he is in no shape to go anywhere. He’s scared out of his mind for Barry.”
Dean knew everything he was saying made sense, but the real reason behind lying to Will was that Dean knew he'd be himself paralysed with fear for Will, if he was to go anywhere near whatever crap was happening in the west wing. The mere thought of Will being in danger made Dean’s knees give out.
“In fact, Cas,” Dean said slowly, “I can’t ask you to risk your life for this either.”
“Oh, shut up, Dean!” Cas sais, exasperated. “How old do you think I am? 12? I can make my own decisions and I’m coming with you.”
Dean felt his body loosen slightly with relief. While thinking of Will in a dangerous situation filled him with dread, knowing that Cas was going to be with him, made him feel relieved. Friendship was unpredictable like that… you couldn’t guess how it would make you feel.
“Alright, then,” Dean said, “This is how we do it.”
**********************************************
It was as dark as it always was in the west wing, despite it being just over 7 o clock, and the lights in the compound still on. Both Dean and Cas had their flashlights throwing lights into the far end of the corridor as they made their way through the stinking, grimy passageway. Benny had deftly taken his place next to the door, without any hesitation. Dean had handed him the set of keys and decided on a certain knocking rhythm so he would know it was them when they returned and opened the door for them. The door opened easily from the outside, and unlike the long nights, today Dean didn’t have the luxury of trying all the keys in the dark till the right one fit.
With precise coordination that only came after weeks and weeks of sneaking around in dark decrepit places, Dean and Cas moved along the decaying wall towards the end of the corridor. From what Dean knew of the building footprint, having extensively inspected the form from the outside, the corridor should lead into something of a hallway. Even as they rounded the corner, a sense of foreboding gripped Dean. In all of their nightly excursions, they had never ventured this far into the west wing. The hallway opened up into another short corridor that swiftly made a left turn, blocking all view.
Dean quickly exchanged a look with Cas, confirming that they both agreed upon continuing further ahead. The swift left turn wasn’t in fact a turn, but a narrow, crooked staircase. What was more? There was light emanating from the bottom of the stairwell. It was dim and threatening, but there was definitely something going on there. With another cautious look, Dean started descending the staircase, now switching off the flashlight. Behind him, Cas did the same. Together they climbed down, clutching the wall for support.
The staircase led all the way down till what would be the first floor. The passageway ahead was lit with less wattage bulbs emitting a dull reddish light. It was menacing. The floor itself was like the dormitory wing he slept in. Rooms on one side, next to each other, all connected by a single, small passage. But unlike the dorm, the wall opposite the rooms didn’t have a line of windows; it was blank and solid.
Suddenly there was a banging noise. Without thinking, Dean dashed ahead, passing small rooms with grilled iron doors. His peripheral vision caught something and he came to a skittering halt.
One of the rooms was unlocked and the rusted, the metal door swaying off his hinges. Inside, hanging from the ceiling were long chains that ended in shackles. What was worse? There were dark splashes on the wall- dark brown in colour- of what suspiciously looked like blood.
Dean’s stomach turned and he looked away. If there had been anything in his stomach, it would have come out now.
“Is that… is that…” Cas was too disgusted to even complete the sentence.
The banging echoed again and Dean rushed towards the door it was coming from. That particular room was in darkness as the light within had been turned off. However, there was movement in the shadowed corner.
“Dean?”
The voice was muted and hopeless… but it was definitely Barry’s.
Dean banged against the door. “Barry! Oh thank God you’re okay.”
But he had said it too quickly. For Barry’s small figure dragged its way across the small room towards the door, and in the little light reflecting from the bulbs above, Dean could see the dark wetness of blood against his face. Barry’s spectacles weren’t on him, and his leg was twisted in a way that was anything but natural.
“My God,” Cas whispered, and fell against the grill, trying to shove his hand between the rod to get to him. “Barry!”
Barry broke down completely. His face was bloodied and bruised but the most horrifying thing was the hopelessness in Barry’s eyes. He had given up.
“Barry!” Dean reached out so the tips of his fingers touched Barry’s brown hair. “I’m gonna get you out of here.”
Barry just shook his head. “They’re coming for me, Dean. I heard them, the car is right outside,” he cried, in a dead voice. “You can’t help me.”
“I’m not giving up, Damn it!” Dean said fiercely. “I’m going to get out of here and inform the police. I have a pager stashed under my clothes. They’ll free you.”
They had to free him.
“Cas,” Dean said, “Stay here and raise a riot if you see any movement or hear anything, okay? I’m gonna head up and contact Jody.”
Cas’s chin jerked up in quick acknowledgement and he shuffled closer to the grill.
Dean turned to Barry, his eyes stinging at the corners. “You hold on, Barry. Cas is right here with you. I’ll be back in a moment.”
At long last, Barry nodded, a small light of hope in his pained eyes. With one last look, Dean bolted back towards the hallway, and up through the staircase. Nothing seemed real to him anymore. He banged three times as they had decided, and within seconds the door opened. Dean stumbled out and onto the floor.
Benny was next to him in a flash. Maybe it was the look on Dean’s face or Cas’s absence, but Benny stiffened.
“I- I need to get to the pager,” Dean heaved breathlessly.
Benny didn’t ask for an explanation or even what had happened. He moved quickly and helped Dean to his feet which were starting to feel like the bones were beginning to melt. Somehow, Dean managed to stand straight and reach his room. Once there, he hauled his duffel bag from under the bed and yanked the zipper, frantically digging into the base of the bag to find the rolled up wad of socks in which he had hid the pager.
Soon, his hand wrapped around the small plastic object and he pulled it free of the clothes. He hurriedly turned it on. It seemed like an eternity before the pager beeped to life and the small line blinked on. With shaking hands Dean typed-
EMERGENCY. COME NOW.
He hit send and the pager tumbled out of his shivering hands. It would take Jody at least an hour and a half to get here. And Barry had said that the car was already here to take him. Till then Dean had to do all he could stall them.
“Get a grip!” Benny said, laying a hand on Dean’s shoulder. His voice was gruff, but kind. Dean felt a welling gratefulness towards Benny.
“Benny,” Dean said, getting to his feet. “We have to hurry, but there is one more thing I have to do.”
“What?”
“Hide Will here!”
There was a sick feeling in his stomach that refused to go away, and it only multiplied whenever he thought of Will. “I’m going down to fetch him, and then we’ll lock him in our room. I know it sounds stupid but I just… I…”
“You don’t need to explain, brother,” Benny said. “I understand how you feel. I would have done the same for Jaime. I’ll go find Castiel in the west wing, you find Will.”
Dean quickly explained the location of Cas and Barry, and then Dean was running again. It was dinner time so he rushed to the dinning hall first, but in all the crowd, he couldn’t spot Will’s particular mop of brown hair. With rising alarm he looked in the library, the game room, even the godforsaken record room, but his friend wasn’t to be found anywhere. Finally, almost on the verge of nausea, Dean reached Will’s room. His sandy haired roommate was sitting on the bunk bed, shuffling through laundry clothes.
“Will?” Dean asked, throat parched. “Where’s Will?”
The kid gave Dean an odd look. “He’s not here,” he said. “Left with Andy a while ago.”
The blood in Dean’s veins seemed to go cold.
“Andy?”
“Yeah,” the kid shrugged. “Andy said his adoptive parents were here for him, for some urgent formality. That their car was waiting outside. Will wanted to say goodbye to you, but Andy said he could say it when he came back.”
The car was waiting outside.
Blood thundered in Dean’s ears, and without his mind directing, his body moved, taking him upstairs in a desperate numbness.
Outside, his body collided with Cas’s.
Castiel was crying. There was a thin stream of blood trickling down the side of his face, along his ear and neck.
“Barry is gone,” he said, voice completely hollow. “I was waiting there, but something hit me hard on the head and I clocked out. When I came to, Benny was standing over me and Barry w- was... gone.
From the grounds, there was a sharp sound of an engine revving, and all three of them turned to watch through the north windows as two cars drove away from the fence… their tail lights becoming pinpoints as they disappeared into the night.
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A/N 2: Man, I am soooo sorry for the cliffy! If it helps, the next chapter is written. I’ll post it within the week!
Please do tell me what you thought of the chapter? I live for comments!
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