Disclaimer: Not mine.

Author's Note: I know, I'm dreadful. I'm so sorry I kept you waiting for so long. Many thanks to everyone who reviewed, and to Cheryl for the beta.

And now for the final chapter.

Part VIII: Believe Me, I Know

Jed dragged Sam to within ten yards of the barn door, shoving hard enough that Sam knew he was being deliberately rough. They didn't go in, though; Jed stopped just short of a line made of some kind of fine grey powder. It began to fizzle and hiss when they neared it.

Jed yelled, "Mr. Crane!"

Ichabod appeared in the doorway. "You have him. Excellent."

"Can I bring him in?"

"Unless you want to suffer a horrific and painful death, stay on that side of the line. You'll need a talisman to cross it. Wait a moment."

He disappeared inside, coming back a few minutes later with two charms dangling on silver chains, which he tossed to Jed.

"Put one on, put one on him, and bring him inside," Ichabod ordered. "I need him to reset this to the precise year I need and make it permanent."

Jed scowled. "You said I'd –"

"You'll be able to leave," Ichabod snapped dismissively. "Don't worry. Help me with this and I'll get you out."

"Like you got Mark out?"

"Your friend Mark was turning into a threat. He had scruples. From what I understand of it, you haven't any. Now hurry up. I'll need some help."

Dean watched from the trees as a guy – presumably Ichabod; Dean had never seen him before – came out of the barn and spoke to Jed. He couldn't hear what was being said, but he didn't like Ichabod's sneer or the cool, calculating way he looked at Sam.

He scowled when Jed put some sort of something around his neck, and another around Sam's. If that was what they needed to get in, this was going to be harder than Dean had thought.

Then Jed shoved Sam over the line, and Dean's blood was boiling at the sight of the douchebag pushing his baby brother around. He was pretty sure the way Sam got knocked sideways into the barn door wasn't an accident, or the way Jed yanked him up by his bound hands, wrenching them hard enough to make Sam wince.

Then they disappeared into the barn and the door shut behind them. Dean's scowl deepened as he settled down to wait.

Ichabod had Jed tie Sam's hands behind him instead of in front, and then the two of them forced Sam to his knees in front of some kind of circular symbol he didn't recognize. There was a bowl in the centre of the circle, with a piece of paper in it, a bone that had probably come from some small animal, a bunch of pale green leaves, and a small rosary.

It looked like a spell awaiting the final ingredient.

Sam shivered. He had a feeling he knew what that ingredient was going to be.

He really hoped they hadn't made a mistake trusting Jed.

A few feet away, there was an altar. Probably what Ichabod was using for this thing, and that would be what they had to destroy to break the spell.

Now he just needed to get word to Dean. And give him the talisman somehow.

"Don't move," Ichabod ordered, cutting into his thoughts. "I'll shoot you long before you manage to do any harm."

"You have guns?"

Ichabod grinned unpleasantly. "I could have a Tardis if I wanted. But this is my weapon of choice…" He pulled a gleaming weapon out of his coat. "Nineteenth century. There's a certain elegance to this, don't you think?"

Sam bit his lip. There was, maybe, another way. He was here. There was the altar. He could upset it, if he could only reach it. It would flip the clock back to where it should be –

And Sam had taken a couple of precautionary measures. There was a little square of cardboard in his pocket, and he'd slipped one into Dean's. The writing and symbols on them were tiny, they had to be to fit, but they would probably be enough.

But that depended on Ichabod letting his guard down, even just a little. Right now, he'd put a bullet in Sam's head long before Sam got anywhere near the altar.

Ichabod must have sensed his thoughts, because he made an impatient face, hauling Sam back and shoving him into a chair. Sam landed awkwardly, and his arms ached as Ichabod wrenched them over the chair back and looped a length of rope between it and his bound wrists.

"Keep an eye on him," Ichabod ordered Jed.

Sam winced. Jed. He hadn't thought about him. He and Dean would come through it if Sam just wrecked the altar, but Jed almost certainly wouldn't. And it wasn't like Sam liked the guy, but…

Ichabod walked out purposefully.

Jed waited to hear the barn door close and then turned to Sam. "What now?"

Sam almost asked him to topple the altar, but he couldn't. He couldn't make Jed sign his own death warrant.

"Take the talismans and toss them out the window," he said. "Beyond the line we crossed."

"Don't we need them?"

"We're inside now. I don't think it matters. Do it."

That would let Dean come in, and then… Then they'd figure it out.

Jed slipped his own talisman up over his head before he reached out for Sam's. He pulled it up roughly, and it caught at Sam's hair on the way.

"Oops," Jed growled, not sounding sorry. "That's why you shouldn't have such pretty, girl hair."

Sam glared at him. "Just get them out."

Jed went to the window, drew back his arm, and flung the two talismans outside. Sam saw the glinting silver arcing through the air, landing in the grass several feet on the other side of Ichabod's grey line.

Perfect.

And that, of course, was when it all went to hell.

Dean was watching anxiously, and the moment he saw the glint of silver sail out the window and land on the ground, he nudged Johann.

"C'mon. Let's go."

"Oh, boys."

Ichabod's voice was mocking, but not surprised. Sam winced.

Crap.

Crap crap crap.

"I thought you'd try something," Ichabod said, walking into the room with his gun trained on Jed. "But I didn't think it would be so obvious. And honestly, you." He waved his gun at Jed. "Job or Jack or whatever you call yourself, did you honestly think I'd believe that you got the jump on a Winchester? Please."

"Winchester?" Jed grunted. "I thought his name was –"

"Johnson? Hamill? Yeti? Oh, he calls himself lots of things, but his name is Sam Winchester. And he's smart, but not as smart as me. So, Jeff –"

"Jed."

"Whatever. I'll make a deal with you. I know you're sore about your friend Mark. I can bring him back, send you both out of here. I'm only covering a fifty-mile radius with the spell. Once you're out, you're fine."

"You'll bring Mark back? How?"

"Let me worry about that."

After a moment, Jed said, "Fine. What do I do?"

Ichabod beamed. "I knew you'd see sense. Untie Sam – keep his hands tied, though, and you might want to drug him first to be on the safe side – and take him over there." He gestured at the symbols on the floor. "Cut his throat, and I need his lifeblood in the bowl."

Jed scowled. "I'm not saying I'm against killing the kid, but do we have to do this voodoo crap?"

"That depends. How desperately do you want to return to your own time with all your limbs intact?" Jed flinched, and Ichabod rolled his eyes and went on, "The box on that table behind you has some hypodermics from your time. Get one and plunge it in."

Dean forced himself to keep his gaze away from the window. If he saw Ichabod hurting Sam, he wouldn't be able to focus.

He snatched up the talismans, handed one to Johann, and slipped the other over his own head.

"You go to the front," he said softly. "I'll go round the back. First priority, make sure Sam's OK. Then kill Ichabod."

Sam's head was spinning. He tried to resist, but his limbs were heavy, and his attempts at shoving Jed off him only made the other man laugh.

He couldn't even entirely blame Jed. Ichabod had made him an offer that was going to be pretty damn hard to refuse.

He looked up, trying to read Jed's expression.

Jed laughed again. Unpleasantly. "What? You think those big eyes are going to work on me? I need to get back home, and one way or another you're going to help me do it." He shoved Sam to his knees and spoke again, to Ichabod this time. "This is it, right? I bleed him, he dies, and Mark and I are home free?"

"Precisely," Ichabod agreed. "Give me a minute." He held up a stopwatch. "Pick up that bottle. When I say go, empty it into the bowl. Then you have around two minutes to get the boy set up. I'll count down from ten. You kill him when I say zero and not a second before."

Dean cursed when his second attempt at kicking the door down just made his toe hurt.

Sam was on the other side, and Dean was supposed to be rescuing him, and now he'd have to pick the damn rusty ancient lock like they hadn't wasted enough time already.

He hoped Johann was having better luck with the front door.

The contents of the bowl bubbled unpleasantly. In front of him, Ichabod held a small phial, ready to break it and complete the spell as soon as –

Jed's heavy hand was on his neck.

"Another minute," announced Ichabod.

Sam felt cold steel on his throat. He tried to jerk himself away, but he could only manage a faint twitch.

The door crashed inward.

Johann was standing there, holding a rifle pointing straight at Jed.

"Let him go," he ordered.

Jed scowled, shifting around so Sam was between him and Johann.

"Like hell I will. He's my ticket out of here."

"Touch him and I will kill you."

"You will not." That was Ichabod's voice, and Johann turned to him with an expression of disgust. Ichabod just looked amused as he went on. "You will not attempt to stop me, because if I complete my spell, Wanda will live again. Wanda – and the child who never saw the light of day. You want that. I know you do."

"You lie," hissed Johann.

"Why would you think that?" Ichabod shook his head sadly. "That's ridiculous. Why have I gone through this entire process if not to bring Wanda back and give her the world she should have had?"

"You're crazy," Sam said, despite the cold steel against his neck.

"Maybe. But effective, don't you think?"

Johann's grip on his gun was wavering. "You truly expect me to believe you will restore Wanda to me?"

"Not to you. I'm going to kill you. Again. But I will restore her. And the child. You don't have to do anything. Just let me kill the boy." He waved a hand in Sam's direction. "It's a small sacrifice to make for Wanda's life."

Johann wet his lips.

"Don't," Sam said desperately, wishing his thoughts were clearer. As it was, he could just hope that Johann would understand why it was a colossally bad idea, one that would only make Wanda unhappy in the end. "Please… Trust me. Don't."

"He's begging for his own pathetic life," Ichabod growled. "You say you love Wanda. Doesn't she deserve another chance? And what about your child? The poor thing never had a chance to live."

Johann met Sam's eyes as he lowered his gun. "Forgive me, Sam."

Ichabod smiled in triumph. "Ready, Jake? Remember, do it on zero." Jed snarled wordlessly and pressed the blade to Sam's neck hard enough to draw a trickle of blood. "Ten."

Where was Dean?

"Nine."

Crap.

It took precious seconds, but Dean managed to get the door open. He slipped through it softly – might as well use whatever advantage he had – through a long row of stalls.

He could see the scene unfolding through the door. Sam on his knees, Jed behind him with a knife to his throat. Ichabod at his altar. Johann, rifle hanging loose from his fingers, looking horribly guilty and apologetic.

Dean didn't bother trying to figure things out. Ichabod had started to count down from ten, and Dean wasn't about to wait to find out what would happen when he hit zero.

He raised his gun and fired.

Just as Ichabod said, "Zero," the world erupted in chaos.

There was a series of bangs, and the knife fell away from Sam's throat a second before something heavy slammed into his back. He reeled under the weight.

"Dean?" he gasped.

"Sammy! You OK?"

"Forgive me." That was Johann, hauling Jed off him and heaving him onto the ground. Sam took a look at Jed's face and grimaced. He didn't have much of a face left; Dean had put at least three bullets in his head. "Forgive me, Sam, that was unpardonable. I do not know…" He wrapped an arm around Sam's shoulders to support him as he tugged him to his feet. "I am so sorry, though I know words can never be enough."

"Hey!" Dean snapped. "Apologize later. Is he OK?"

Johann's fingers were on his neck, wiping away blood to check the cut.

"A shallow wound," he said. "It will not even scar. Sam, you must sit."

"No – Ichabod –"

"Dean and I will handle him."

And then the ground began to shake.

Sam stared down, at the symbols at his feet, glowing blinding white, and it took a moment for him to register what he was seeing. The bowl was full of blood. Not Sam's blood. Jed's. Dean had shot him, he'd fallen forward onto Sam, blood pouring into the bowl –

Oh God. Jed's lifeblood in the bowl. That meant Ichabod's spell was working.

"Dean!" Sam said. "Altar!"

But Ichabod had a gun of his own, and he raised it, pointing straight at Dean. "Don't you dare," he hissed.

Dean dove for the altar, and Sam shoved Johann off him and dove for Dean.

Ichabod's gun went off, and the altar, even as it toppled, was spattered with blood.

Dean knew right away that the blood wasn't his. He twisted around, just managing to catch Sam before he fell.

"Sammy!"

Sam's wide hazel eyes met his, and Dean could read shock and pain. But there was no time –

He lowered Sam quickly to the ground, patting his arm in silent apology for the rough treatment, and turned around just in time to tackle Ichabod before he could fire again.

Ichabod flung him off, and the altar came flying at his head. Dean ducked out of the way.

There was another shot. Ichabod stopped moving, eyes wide and disbelieving as a red spot spread on his chest. He stood upright for a moment before he collapsed to his knees and then toppled forward onto the ground.

Dean stared across the barn at Johann holding a still-smoking rifle.

"That was for Wanda," he said simply.

Dean nodded. "Fair enough. He was a creep anyway."

They hurried back to Sam together, kneeling on either side of him. Johann looked around as Dean helped Sam sit up.

"It appears we broke the spell."

Dean glanced up. The barn was gone. They were in an empty field, a sign stuck in the ground a few feet away saying that there was going to be a new housing project there. Fortunately construction hadn't started yet, so there was nobody around. The Impala was where Dean had left her, now on the shoulder of the road.

He stared at Johann. "How are you still here? For that matter, how are we? That Mark guy didn't come back the first time. I thought we'd have to do something else to get back to our time."

"Just like Impala," Sam mumbled into Dean's jacket.

Dean frowned, and then his brow cleared and he thrust his hand into his pocket in sudden realization. His fingers encountered a rectangle of hard cardboard.

He slipped it out. One of Sam's – or rather Agent Roarke's – FBI business cards. He flipped it over. The back was covered with symbols and Latin in Sam's cramped handwriting.

"Probably slipped you one, too," Dean commented to Johann.

Johann fumbled in his coat, and found another of the cards. He turned it over in his hands, looking down at it for a moment, before he spoke to Sam. "I do not belong here as you and your brother do."

Sam nodded.

"So if I… relinquish this… I move on?"

"Yeah."

"What will happen to me?"

"I don't know," Sam admitted quietly.

"You were a ghost," Dean explained, to save Sam talking. "Nobody's really sure what happens to ghosts when they pass on."

"Will I see Wanda again?"

"I think so."

Johann nodded, looking away for a moment before turning to Sam again. He looked a little uncomfortable.

"Normally," Dean said, "I'd step away discreetly at this point. But I'm pretty sure Sam's going to faceplant if I do that. So just pretend I'm not here, OK?"

Johann smiled, half-amused and half-rueful. "Sam… You saved me. Thank you." He reached out to clasp Sam's hand briefly. "Whatever happens now, I am grateful to you." He clapped Dean on the shoulder. "And to you, Dean. Goodbye."

Dean nodded, shifting Sam into a more comfortable position as Johann took a couple of steps back and slowly, slowly, dropped the small white card onto the grass.

Sam tried to get comfortable. It was difficult, because the bullet wound hurt like a bitch, but the doctor had been nice enough to let Dean stay while she worked. He was sitting on a chair drawn up to the narrow ER bed, his hand on Sam's shoulder to ground him.

"Do you think Fred's OK?" Sam mumbled.

"I'm sure he's fine. Crane was too busy to go after him. But we'll check on him. As soon as you're on your feet again, so shut up and let the nice doctor do her job."

"Hold him down," the doctor told Dean. Sam could hear the amusement in her voice. "I think there's a fragment of the bullet still inside. It doesn't seem to be causing any major problems – yet – but it'll hurt when I pull it out."

Sam tried not to squirm, but he couldn't help flinching when she probed with her forceps. Dean whispered soothing nonsense that would have pissed Sam off at any other time, unyielding hands holding him still for the doctor.

"So how did this happen, anyway?" she asked Dean.

Sam thought vaguely that he should be annoyed at how they were talking over his head, but his mind was in a weird place where it couldn't decide whether to focus on the pain from the doctor's forceps or the relief of Dean alive, and he really couldn't spare enough neurons for resentment.

"Got it," the doctor mumbled, and the pain level ratcheted up.

Dean's hand was in his hair, stroking his head like he was a toddler. Sam was totally going to be mad about that, too, once they were out of the hospital and safe in some motel room somewhere. And he was also totally going to stop pushing his head up into the comforting touch.

Totally.

The doctor started to pull out the bullet. Sam winced, turning away and squeezing his eyes shut.

"Easy, kiddo." Dean's hand didn't still its gentle motion. "We're almost done. Maybe this'll teach you not to be a self-sacrificing idiot."

"There." That was the doctor's voice. Sam heard something clink into a tray. "Huh. That's… I've never seen anything like that before. Well. Not like I have to pull bullets out of people very often, but…"

"Shootout," Dean lied easily. Well, maybe it wasn't technically a lie. There had been guns and shots had been fired. "Guy had a thing for ancient weaponry."

"Have you filed a report?"

"Bureau'll handle it." Sam winced again when the doctor dabbed his back with something that stung. Dean squeezed the back of his neck. "It's OK, Sammy, I've got you. I'm right here. Go easy on him, doc, he's had a rough day."

"You're… partners?" the doctor asked, and Sam just knew she was raising her eyebrow.

Dean laughed. "Yeah. We've been partners since he joined the Bureau. But Sam's my kid brother, too. Works under a different name so the bad guys don't figure it out and use us against each other."

"Oh… Must've been hard to see him get hurt."

"You have no idea." Dean shifted, leaning forward, and the next words were whispered. "He jumped in front of a gun that was aimed at me. Idiot."

"That's one way of looking at it." The doctor pressed the gauze pad down. Dean rubbed Sam's head to distract him. "We don't all have people who are willing to take a bullet for us. You're a lucky man, Agent Adams."

"Yeah. I know." Dean's voice was suddenly trembling, fingers tightening in Sam's hair almost to the point of pain. "Believe me, I know."

Sam shook his head. He was far too tired to talk. But he couldn't help thinking, as he reflected on the events of the past few days, as he listened to the familiar cadence of Dean's voice and allowed himself to be calmed by the hand on his head and the knowledge that Dean would still be there in the morning, that he was every bit as lucky as his big brother was.

THE END

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