Chapter Text
“Where do we go next?”
“I dunno, man.” Sam picks a fry off of Dean’s plate, swirling it through a gloppy mixture of ketchup, mayo, and hot sauce that Dean’s crafted next to the pile. Dean swipes at him half-heartedly, muttering get your own. Sam grins, mouth full of potato. “No.”
He’s the brattiest brat to have ever bratted. Dean sighs. “We can find more of her friends…if she had any.”
“Her parents may have donated something of Sadie’s to the school?” Sam swallows, a smear of red staining his lower lip until his tongue darts out to catch it. Dean won’t focus on that – there’s nothing but the case, and cases get like this sometimes. Lulls and doldrums. It’s natural. Sam says, “I’m short on ideas here, but. I want to try calling Rosselini’s family.”
“Makes sense.” They only ever checked in with his friends here in Redwood Landing – but maybe his folks would know something the buddies didn’t.
Or maybe they won’t. Dean’s still not sold on Sam’s whole victimology angle helping, but he’s gotta be honest. He’s short on ideas too.
The restaurant they stopped in on the edge of Fitzroy smells heavily of garlic – the whole town does, actually. The place is known for growing and processing the stuff, and with the amount he and Sam are eating their hotel room is gonna reek later.
“If the family doesn’t pan out, what then? We move on?”
Sam frowns down at his kale salad and says, “Maybe. I know we don’t feel bad for ghosts, but…”
“You feel bad for this one?”
“Yeah, dude.”
“Same.” Dean’s fingers dig into the denim at his knees. “Doesn’t make a difference. We gank her, end of story.”
“I don’t disagree. But if we can’t gank her…Dean, we don’t have any other cases lined up.”
Dean snorts. “We’ve got mountains of trouble to deal with.”
“Yeah, trouble. Not anything we can solve. Unless you’ve figured out a way to keep the prize fight from going down?” Dean shakes his head, because Sam’s got nothing but points here. “We can abandon ship, leave Sadie to kill people, or not, but…If I spend another minute thinking about how to stop the apocalypse, I’m gonna scream.”
He can see it then. The threat of hell, in his brother’s eyes.
Not the memory of it, an echo of Dean’s time there, but the impending doom of his own future. Sam’s the one staring down the barrel of a gun. Sam’s scared, not for the world, or others, or Dean. For himself.
For once in his life, Sam isn’t just feeling his own mortality; he’s dreading it.
“Okay,” Dean says immediately. “We stay. We figure this out.”
What else is he going to say? He’s been soothing his little brother’s fears for well over two decades. He’s not going to stop now.
Almost a week later and Dean severely regrets his decision. He’s antsy as hell, nothing to kill, and nothing to do.
They’ve made zero progress on the case, although Sam did let him loose on a couple of the more famous local haunts. If nothing else, Dean’s been burning energy off just by digging up corpses that are more bone than anything else, watching the glint of firelight spark embers up into the low-hanging clouds.
But none of these ghosts did anything more suspicious than flicker at a few people, as far as Dean can tell, so permanently separating them from the earth isn’t as satisfying as he wants it to be. Plus, Sam declined to come along on these adventures, the siren song of research keeping him locked up in their hotel room, and Dean always performs better with an audience.
Now, he’s leaning against the railing of the exterior landing of the Mariposa. A towering fog bank is blanketing the ocean, which is such a deep, dark, stormy blue that Dean has no trouble imaging all kinds of monstrosities hiding beneath the surface. But then, he takes a sip of coffee and watches as a weak slant of sunlight hits a patch of yellow-green kelp, or a raft of sea otters. Farther back, a pod of dolphins slices through the choppy waves. The illusion of danger vanishes.
Everything scary is topside.
Sam went to a morning class, poking around to see if anyone else knew Sadie back when. Dean decided the history of Pakistan’s nuclear program wasn’t quite his bag, and skipped to sleep in because shit. Who knows how many more opportunities he’ll get.
When Sam finally comes back, the fog is burning off, wisps of white vanishing up into the truest, bluest sky, cloudless and vast. “I talked to Lana Rosselini.”
Dean props his elbows up on the splintered white rail. “Vic’s wife?”
“Sister,” Sam corrects, squinting through the sunshine. “But get this. Emilio has been to Redwood Landing before.”
“His friends said-“
“I know!” Sam nods, getting into the gritty drama of the case. “They either lied or they didn’t know. It was two years ago.”
“Of course it was. I don’t suppose the lady told you that Emilio was some kind of rapey criminal mastermind?”
“No.” Sam snorts, and Dean takes a second to appreciate it. As audience's go, his brother’s always been his best and favorite. “But, she said he came home different.”
“Different?”
“Quieter. When she asked if something had happened on his trip, Emilio told her he saw something.”
“Something?”
“My guess, given the timing, is that he might’ve seen what happened to Sadie.”
“Her falling down the stairs.”
“Or getting pushed down the stairs.” Sam shoves his hair off his forehead impatiently. “Dean, I really think this is it, because if it was an accident – why would she kill Emilio for that?”
“He didn’t save her?” Dean guessed, but he sees the soundness in Sam’s reasoning.
Everyone else Sadie Whitaker has gone after has wronged her. Sure, Emilio not stopping her death could have been the motivating factor, because ghosts don’t run on logic, but. Witnessing her murder was a hell of a lot bigger than just failing to catch a total stranger when she fell. If Emilio saw something, and never said anything?
Yeah. It fits.
“There’s more,” Sam continues. “I had a hunch – talked to Michael Cho’s dad. Michael was in therapy.”
“Well-adjusted of him.”
“Has been, for the last two years.”
“Okay, so what? Emilio and Michael see something, and they never ever say something. Sadie gets on with the murder, so…are we done?”
“Excuse me?”
“I mean, she’s killing people connected to her death. There can’t be that many more to go.”
“We don’t know that. And what if she decides to go after innocents next? She’s here, she’s pissed. She’s only gonna get more unstable as time goes by.” Sam shrugs, like he’s not about to make his concluding argument, and adds casually, “She attacked us.”
Fuck. He’s right. Dean switches tacks. “How was class?”
He hasn’t asked that question in nearly a decade, and Sam blinks at him like he’s a foot shorter and a whole hell of a lot younger, all open and earnest and vulnerable. Then reality sinks in. He squares his shoulders, says, “A couple of people knew Sadie, but not well. No leads there.”
He hesitates.
“What?” Dean demands.
“That Syed guy that Cristobel mentioned? He’s not in Japan anymore.”
“The one who was out with them the night Sadie died?”
“The same.” Sam takes a deep breath. “He doesn’t go to the Institute – apparently, he’s Turkish Navy. Enrolled in some kind of exchange program at the military graduate school down the road. He had an internship that ended a month back, so…he’s back.”
“Why are you saying all this like that?”
“I dunno, I guess he didn’t want Cristobel to know he’s in town. They had a fling.”
This place is so fucking messy. Tanked relationships everywhere. But whatever, not Dean’s problem. “You learned all that in a single class?”
Sam lifts one brow. “People like to gossip.”
“You like to gossip,” Dean accuses, the corners of his eyes crinkling with delight.
“Shaddup.” Sam swats at him, but immediately pivots back to the matter at hand. He’s so goal-oriented, it’s disgusting. “Problem is, getting in touch with the guy. I swiped a phone, stole his contact info off the girl I was talking to-“
“Sammy, I never! You little criminal.”
Sam ignores him. “But he’s not responding to my texts. We can’t get boots on the ground at his school – no, seriously, you need military ID, Dean, and the new ones have integrated circuit chips. Way harder to fake on short notice.”
“What about Dad’s?”
Sam gets that pinched look he wears whenever their dad is mentioned, now tinged with grief. “I thought about that, but there might be an easier way. Guy barbacks at the Eire.”
“No techno-hoodoo required.”
“Exactly,” Sam agrees. “Kind of fitting that he works there. Last place Sadie was alive, and everything.”
“Morbid, but sure.”
“C’mon, it’s not that bad.” Sam’s eyes narrow, a quick transition from wide and chromatic to dark, dancing pinpoints beneath his eyelashes. He’s making fun of Dean, but whatever, how can he even be mad when Sam looks so pretty doing it? “I’ll buy you a drink.”
“You’ll buy me a drink either way,” Dean shoots back, pointing one booted foot back towards their hotel room, with their mini-fridge, fully stocked with gas station beer. Then he shrugs. “But s’pose this way comes with a show.”
Bars feel as much like home as motels or leather seats. The sticky floors, the grimy walls…the overwhelming scent of strong perfumes, and cologne underlined by something rancid, body odor or puke or both.
Dean knocks open the heavy wooden door of the Eire and he’s greeted by all this and more. There’s a smallish dance floor and apparently Cristobel wasn’t lying – the local crowd likes to party. There are enough lushes crowding the place that Dean has to shout at Sam to be heard, and he can tell by the downward quirk to Sam’s mouth that his little brother already hates it. He’s never been a big partier, never liked the noise or the crush or the too-loud laughter that comes along with too many people in one tight, alcohol-sodden space.
“How ‘bout that drink?” Dean calls back to him, winking when a stranger sloshes beer on Sam’s shoe. Sam bitchfaces about it, but doesn’t say a word, shouldering his way up to the bar so he can order and poke around.
He returns with a highball of whiskey in each hand, finding Dean chatting up a cute blonde with a button nose and the perkiest breasts he’s had the privilege of seeing in a while, slotting himself neatly between them and saying, “Syed’s around, but bartender wasn’t sure where.”
The girl winks at Dean, retreating back into the swarm, and Dean isn’t too fussed about it. They’re on duty, so it’s not like he could have slid her into the backseat of the Impala anyway. Sam adds, “You’re insatiable.”
“Charming. The word you’re looking for is charming.” Dean cuffs him in the back of his neck. “Split up?”
“Probably a good call.”
Sam gives him an offhand grin before he slips into the fray, easy to spot even though everyone is packed in here like sardines in a tin.
Privately Dean thinks he could find Sam in the dark, in the middle of the ocean, in a cave at the center of the world. He raised that kid, and fuck, look at him. Just look.
Proof he did a great job.
Shit, proof he performed an act of god.
Sam is lean muscle, six feet four of pure sex, and for all those long, spidery fingers of his have been complicit in death, Dean knows how gentle they can be. He could trace those dimples of Sam’s by memory, lace his fingers through all that shaggy hair and make him-
Revulsion and want are all tied up in knots under Dean’s breastbone, but none of it matters, because Sam’s never gonna find out. The whiskey probably isn’t helping, but it doesn’t compel him to put it down before he starts his search. Instead, he lingers. Finishes it off, orders a second.
He knows what Syed looks like, helped Sam stalk him on social media, although most of Dean’s help came in the form of witty commentary. But it’s a lot harder to find a flesh and blood man he’s only ever seen in grainy Facebook pictures amongst the flashing, hypnotic lights of the Eire.
He weaves between tipsy college kids and rowdy tourists, looping the room fully twice before he decides it might be time to check the facilities or the back courtyard, lit bright with cigarette embers.
He's making his way towards the glaringly red neon sign spelling out Exit when a rough palm slips around his forearm, and Dean knows it’s Sam instinctively, the pressure and the touch as familiar as his own heartbeat. Except Mr. Not-My-Scene isn’t exactly acting Sam-like, his arm winding around Dean’s waist and his body – bopping? Jesus, yeah, bopping – to the beat of the music.
“Did someone roofie you?” Dean demands, the words slipping out before he’s fully assessed the situation.
But Sam’s not drunk, or drugged, evidenced by the sharp-eyed look he gets on hunts, now aimed entirely at Dean. He still sounds it when he exclaims loudly, “There you are!”
Dean doesn’t get it, doesn’t understand what’s happening at all, but playing along with whatever Sam says is second nature for him, and so he goes with it, adding a little shimmy back to match whatever the fuck Sam is doing.
He’s not exactly what anyone would call a good dancer.
Neither of them is, because when the fuck would they have had the time to learn?
It’s not like they went to prom, or homecoming, or any school formal ever. Dean picked up a few moves from MTV and VH1, which Sam refuses to recognize as dancing – that’s hair metal thrashing, mostly – and the one thing that they’re actually okay at is a good line dance.
Sometimes, when their dad was just the right amount of juiced, he’d tell his boys that even though country is trash, a real honkytonk move was the way to a woman’s heart. And then he’d show them one or two, while Dean pretended to vomit and Sam lost his shit, doing those high-pitched giggles he had before puberty hit.
Right now they’re doing little more than swaying, and the reason why reveals itself a few half-beats later, when a man Dean vaguely recognizes from the ghost trolley sidles up behind Sam. The guy doesn’t seem to realize Dean’s there, and he watches the man touch Sam’s hipbone, his breath stuck somewhere between his throat and the open air, not sure if it wants to become a huff or choke Dean out. That’s his baby brother, his baby, that he fucking– No.
“You slipped away, you little-“ the man’s voice cuts off as he notices Dean there. Whatever’s on his face makes him stop short and swallow. “Oh. I didn’t realize you already had company.”
“Sure do,” Sam bites out, reaching out to trap Dean between his arms, rock hard around his shoulders and bouncing like he’s anywhere near on-beat, and who gave Dean’s little brother permission to get biceps like that? Dean offers the man a sickly grin, trying to keep his own heart from jumping ship while Sam says pointedly, “Tell your wife we said hi.”
Right. It’s the swinger guy. Zero shame, but great taste in men.
Almost admirable, if it wasn’t Sam he’s after.
“No accounting for taste,” Dean tells him, turning in Sam’s arms as the guy slips back to whatever hellhole he crawled from.
“Or class.” Sam shudders and he does not let go. If anything, his arms get tighter, and he tells Dean, “I think he’s still watching.”
“Punching him in the face would be easier than all this,” Dean replies, shifting in Sam’s embrace.
He thought he’d passed on his aversion to hugs and PDA from other men to Sam, but Sam doesn’t seem to remember that, too close in Dean’s space.
He smells good.
It’s making Dean feel a little feral.
“This is less conspicuous.” Sam tilts a smile down at him, and it’s so unfair that he got so tall, but reassuring too. He’s here and he’s healthy, solid, incredible.
Petulantly, Dean retorts, “But my way has panache.”
“Your way means we can’t talk to Syed.”
“I haven’t seen him yet.”
“Me neither,” Sam says, “It’s wild, right? This place isn’t that big.”
Like an accident, Sam’s hips brush against Dean’s, denim against denim.
Except, it’s not an accident, because it happens again, and because Sam doesn’t do accidents like that, more in control of his own body than ninety nine percent of the human population. He has to be, because he’s a weapon, he’s a hunter, and Dean taught him never to make mistakes.
“What’re you doing?” He asks, and it’s low and guttural and sounds like it’s been torn straight from his chest. He doesn’t shove away from Sam, but it’s mostly because there’s a bridal party whooping behind him, and he’s worried the amount of effort it would take to wrench himself free would end up in wine stains and disaster.
Sam doesn’t answer. His fingers creep up Dean’s waist, under the leather of his jacket, making slow circles against the fabric of Dean’s shirt beneath. In the blue dark of the bar, his eyes are luminescent, sea-creature strange. Panic clogs Dean’s throat. “Sam. Stop.”
Sam’s hands still, but he doesn’t move, or back away. “What’s wrong?”
“You tell me.” Dean’s breathing harder than he means to, and he knows that Sam can feel it. They’re too close, and even if they weren’t - you can’t hide from family. They know you too well. He repeats, “What are you doing?”
“That guy-“
“Who cares about that guy? He’s gone.”
He watches Sam weigh his options – be sneaky, or ‘fess up? No one can accuse either of them of cowardice, but that doesn’t mean Sam will budge on a lie if he thinks Dean won’t force it out of him. And Dean…Dean doesn’t think he has the willpower to force this out of Sam.
Not when the answer may be one he’s actually scared of.
He’s surprised when Sam straightens his spine, clearly choosing the high road. He looks down at Dean, all challenge and heat. Dean stares up at him, trying to figure out if – somehow, some way, he’s back in hell, and this is all a trick. If Sam’s burning, if everything’s burning.
If Dean is on fire and bleeding and screaming, even while he stands numbly in the middle of strobe lights and a pounding backbeat.
But when Sam decisively leans down and kisses him, it’s sweeter and softer than anything a demon could fake. Sam tastes like whiskey and sea salt, the ocean bordering Redwood Landing pervading everything, even Dean’s baby brother. Corroding him.
Because Sam wouldn’t do this.
Dean shoves back from him, indifferent to the shriek of the closest woman he bowls over, sending her on her wobbly white heels into the arms of a stranger, whose beer sloshes all over everything, even Dean. Dean doesn’t care, rasping out to Sam, “Stop.”
“Dean-“
“What the fuck is your problem?” Beer guy growls out, while the girl fixes her tiara and grits out a string of curse words that barely permeate Dean’s brain. He tells Sam, “I don’t understand why you’re doing this.”
Sam’s face gets that bitchy slant it always takes on when he thinks Dean is being obtuse. “Don’t you?”
The words are gentler than Dean wants them to be.
Beer guy tries to shove Dean, but he dodges easily, only vaguely aware that he and Sam aren’t the only people in this room. He backtracks towards the red lit exit, the smoker’s alley, where he’s only really thinking about getting some air. He needs to breathe, because he can’t, he’s barely getting any oxygen and he’s going to black out right here in this fucked little bar, in this fucked little town, where his brother the antichrist apparent just put his mouth on Dean’s, and now…
Now, from the smallest, most chaste kiss he’s gotten since before his voice broke, Dean is so turned on he can’t think. His entire mind is in shambles, entirely because it was Sam who did it. Sam who kissed him.
He can’t do this.
Dean’s almost at the door, ignoring Sam’s plaintive, “Dean, c’mon, come back!” when he thinks that god must be real.
It has nothing to do with archangels or hell or armageddon, and everything to do with easy distractions – when Sam comes up short inches behind Dean’s back, he doesn’t need an excuse to brush him off, because he already has one. Dean drops his fists to his side. Curt, he says, “Just saw Syed.”
“Dean-“
“Stay on case, Sam.”
“You can’t just-“
“The case, Sam.”
“Fucking fine.” Sam reaches past him and pops the door open. “You coming?”
Dean is.
They find Syed fumbling with a cigarette and a lighter against the red brick wall in the courtyard. Small, pristine pathways branch out in four directions; left and right towards closed shops that sell luxury tea, hand roll sushi, and enough kinds of crepes to make a person’s head spin; up towards the street, and down towards the entrance way to the first floor of the parking garage they saw Sadie at. A crumbling stone fountain takes center stage in the courtyard, a handful of smokers occupying every corner. They look ghoulish, but some of them smell more herbal than smokey, which Dean snorts at appreciatively.
Sam cups his hand over Syed’s, blocking the wind enough that he can light up. He breathes in, the cherry of his cigarette reddening, and peers appreciatively up at Sam all the while.
Dean’s stomach turns.
“Thanks,” Syed says on his exhale. He’s a handsome guy, with excellent bone structure and a swathe of artfully tousled black hair. “Windier than I thought.”
“No problem.” Sam shrugs. “We wanted to talk to you.”
“Yeah?” Here, Syed’s gaze shifts, suspicion creeping in. They’re not wearing their suits, but it wouldn’t be the first time they’d been pinned as law enforcement without 'em. Something about the way their dad raised them, the way they hold themselves. The way they seem dangerous.
Dean likes that about them.
Sam straightens, fiddling his badge from his pocket and holding it out for Syed to examine. “I’m Special Agent Barker, and this is my partner, Agent Skiba-“
“He’s not special?”
“Special enough,” Sam replies with a smile, and if this guy recognizes the sarcasm he chooses not to comment on it, taking a long drag on his cigarette instead. “We understand you were there the night Sadie Whitaker died.”
Syed’s dark eyes grow wide, smoke streaming from his nose and his mouth in one great huff, followed by coughing. A prolonged amount of coughing. “That’s what you guys want to talk about?”
“What else?”
“I- dunno. No. Nothing. There’s nothing else. I just-“ Syed pounds a fist against his chest, trying to catch his breath. “Cops and brown guys, y’know? Sometimes there doesn’t have to be a reason.”
“I assure you, we have a good one.”
“Sadie. Fuck.” Finally breathing normally, Syed flicks ash of the end of the cigarette and watches it fall. “Her death was ruled accidental.”
There’s something in his voice. Something Dean recognizes. “You don’t think it was.”
“No. I mean, don’t get me wrong, she wasn’t like, the most graceful person in the world, and tripping down the stairs – that can happen to anyone, right?”
“Sure,” Sam replies, guarded.
“But I’ve got this friend over at county and – okay, this is brutal, maybe I shouldn’t-“
“Tell us. Off the record,” Dean prompts, doing his best to look genuine. Doing his best to squash down the small, quaking part of him that still tastes Sam on his lips. “You won’t get in trouble, we promise.”
Syed breathes out heavily, half-sigh, half-smoke. “Right. My friend – he poked around a little, and said he thought the velocity Sadie fell at was more consistent with her being pushed, but like. There’s no way to prove that, right?”
It’s consistent with Sam’s theory. Syed goes on, “She could have been running, or jogging, or gotten some air somehow before she went down and…I dunno. I get that accidents happen. But it always seemed weird to me – Sadie was so bummed out that night that I don’t think she was running, or jogging, or…anything. She wasn’t drunk.”
Dean glances at Sam. “That’s not what Cristobel Rodriguez told us.”
Syed makes a face. “Cristobel didn’t know Sadie like I did.”
“I thought you all had only known each other a few months,” Dean objects.
“So? She had a few drinks, okay, but she wasn’t sloshed. She was getting better.”
“Bette than…what?” Sam prods.
Syed ashes his cigarette on the wall and looks up towards the sky, low and cloudy and close enough to touch. “Sadie was – okay, she’d been down for a while about Tony. I know that. She got worse and worse. It was like she disappeared for a while. But those last few days, we’d been…I’d been hanging out with her. And she seemed…I dunno. Like she was bouncing back. Like she was pissed off, and wanted to flip off the world.”
“You liked her,” Dean says flatly.
Syed meets his gaze head on. “She was beautiful.”
“From everything we’ve heard, it sounds like she was in a very vulnerable place at the time,” Sam says diplomatically.
“That made her more beautiful.” He shrugs. “She wasn’t going to let anything keep her down. Nothing. Not for long. It was rad to watch that kind of determination.”
It’s a different version of Sadie than the ones they’ve heard before, but Dean thinks it matches better with the ghost they saw. All that rage and violence. Cristobel called Sadie a ghost before she died, but maybe Cristobel didn’t see Sadie as clearly as she thought.
Like it’s proof, Syed pulls out his wallet with one hand, flipping the cover back. He offers it to Sam, who takes it to squint down at the clear, plastic window.
It’s a black and white photo-strip picture of Syed and Sadie. She’s wearing the grungy sweatshirt, but monochrome colors smooth out the wrinkles and stains. It almost looks clean. Sadie’s smiling, her eyes on Syed.
And he’s watching her like she’s a star at the center of his universe.
Softly, he says, “That’s from the night she died. From the booth inside.”
"She looks happy."
"She was. And then she wasn't." Syed's face falls. "We had to drag her out. I got her to dance, to have fun, for a little while. And then, I don't know. Her mood just tanked out of nowhere."
Sam stares at the picture. Then he says, “Did Sadie tell you that she was assaulted by a teacher?”
“What?” Syed drops his cigarette on the ground, horrified. “No.”
“And his friend.” Carefully, Dean tamps down the glowing end with his foot, ashes gusting up around the edges of his boot. “Don’t worry, both guys are dead now.”
Syed turns the same horrified expression on Dean. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“No. But I bet it cheered Sadie right up.”
Syed looks aghast. Sam takes it as a sign to hand his wallet back and thank him.
As they retreat back towards the street – away from Syed, and Sadie’s memory, and her real-life spirit – Sam chides, “You didn’t have to tell him that.”
“What if he had something to do with it? He could’ve been next.”
“He’s clearly in love with her.” Sam grabs Dean’s shoulder, “Speaking of, I want to talk to-“
“No.” Dean shuts that down immediately, walking faster.
Sam pulls him back. The traffic from the main street reaches fills their ears, car tires and shouting college kids, laughter and waves and night sounds. Dean wants to go towards them. He wants to escape this, Sam saying, “Dude, don’t shut me out.”
But what else is Dean going to do? He can’t linger on what happened. They don’t get to do that, to stop, to live inside moments the way other people do.
They don’t get to, and Dean doesn’t want to.
He thinks of the picture of Syed and Sadie, of the way Syed’s eyes got all soft and sad.
Of the way that Sam’s, in the bar, went hot and molten.
He swallows and touches Sam’s hand with his own, delicate, like it might burn him.
Carefully, he lifts Sam’s fingers away and squeezes them, briefly. Then, unceremoniously, he pulls away. “I can’t talk about this. We’ve got work to do.”
Sam squeezes his eyes shut. But he doesn’t argue.
This is how they are; made of bruises and scars, something always bleeding internally – but somehow they always walk it off.
Like Dean said, they have work to do.