This is the fifteenth story in my series.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own or have the rights to anything of the Supernatural universe. I am just playing in their sandbox.

Quietly making his way down the hall of the old, abandoned home, Sam clutches Ruby's knife hard as he listens for movement. She may have been a conniving, evil, lying bitch but her one weapon of choice has come in quite handy for years now. And when you're after a demon… a demon-killing-knife seems to do just the trick.

He hears a couple soft footsteps from the end of the hallway and he pauses to strain his ears for more sound. Looking towards the room with an open door ahead of him, once a bedroom he thinks, Sam carefully and silently makes his way. When he reaches the doorframe he peeks his head in. The walls are peeling with old, yellowed wallpaper and there's debris and leaves everywhere. The broken glass pane of the window across the room allows for the sound of the squealing wind to come through when it blows and he thinks maybe that's what he heard. The room is empty as far as he can see.

Just to be sure he whips open the closet door on a silent three count, aiming the knife in front of him. Inside is just some more leaves and disappointment.

He's at a dead end. Hopefully Dean's had better luck once they split up to cover the house more quickly and he found some sign of the bitch in the basement. They know she's here. They tracked her down with Bobby and Bobby hardly ever fails them.

Turning to leave, he abruptly stops. The door to the small room slams shut before he can even get close to it and reveals the demon standing behind it, dark black and smiling eyes boring into him.

Behind the damn door, Winchester! Fuck! He's so much better than this!

"Hello there, Sam," she smiles, black studded leatherjacket-clad arms crossed as she sizes him up. Her confident body language shows no fear nor worry. Sam takes a ready stance and aims the blade at her. "Oh, put the damn blade down, would you? I don't want to hurt you. You can calm down."

"Yeah right. Dean!" Sam shouts while staring right at her. "Up here!"

The demon sighs with instant frustration. "Guess we have to move this along then, huh? I mean God forbid you leave your insane dependence on your bother out of something just once…"

She quickly rattles off some Latin words and holds a hand palm-out to him. Before Sam can do anything about it a bright white light pushes forth from her hand and hits Sam square in the chest out of nowhere. He flies backwards through the air and hits the wall behind him hard, back first. He then crashes onto the floor. He can hear heavy-booted footsteps running up the staircase frantically once the loud crash could be heard.

"Sam!?"

He can hear his name called with panic along with heavy pounding on the door.

"Dude! Open up!"

Sam shakes his head a bit to clear the clouds settling over him with the blow as he lies on his back. When he looks up he watches as the demon walks over to stand by him, her form unfocused. She smiles down to him, suddenly looking a whole lot bigger than he remembers her being just seconds before.

"I'll be seeing you real soon, little Sammy," she says with sheer adoration as she touches his hand. "I promise you." She then places the palm of her hand on his cheek, looking at him with such love that it freaks him out.

With that she smokes out, the black cloud filling the ceiling, swirling in circles before leaking out through the broken window. The now lifeless body the demon had been riding drops to the floor like a sack of potatoes, the woman's form in a crumpled heap.

The second the black fog is gone Dean busts down the door as it finally gives way. The unmoving girl in the middle of the floor blocking his way is what he can quickly assess first. He bends down and checks the pulse at her neck but she's gone. Fucking demons. They're so wasteful.

Dean then stands to get to his brother but when he looks over at him he stops short with shock.

When he looks at Sam with horrified eyes the younger hunter gets worried. Very worried. His brother never does that unless something is very wrong. It's rare these days the Dean's Sitting up on the dirty floor, Sam has to ask, "Dean, what is it?"

The sound scares the life out of him. His voice is not his own. It isn't the heavy, deep booming it usually is. Instead it's higher, smaller, and it echoes in his ears very oddly. As if to test it Sam speaks again. "Dean?"

"Holy shit," Dean whispers mostly to himself as he gawks at his brother with the sudden change in him.

The continuing fear Sam reads off of Dean makes him truly fall into a real panic… the kind that hunters don't let consume them while on the job. Sam does much better than this usually but not right now.

Sam looks down at himself and inhales sharply once before huffing out a panicked breath at what he sees.

"Oh… wha… uh."

Words fail him when he gets a look. The sudden urge to cry... or maybe scream… hits like a freight train.

What he sees is not his body. Sam's a big dude, coming in at six foot six and being a wall of muscle. He's used to being of a certain intimidating stature, something that comes in handy while being a hunter… but right now he's looking down at the body of a small child cloaked in the clothes of a giant. He lifts his short, skinny arm and the weight of his heavy canvas jacket pulls it right down. He drops his limb into his lap that he can't see under the tent of massive fabric and looks back to Dean, his eyes about to pop out of his head.

"That's not…" Dean shakes his head with eyes still glued on his little brother. "This can't happen."

"What the fuck is this!?" Sam shouts in his childish tone, looking for his all-knowing older brother for answers like he always has when this frightened. Dean will make this better. He always makes it better… right?

"I..." Dean tries to start but he just can't speak. The little kid in front of him is his brother. He's seen him like this before, when he was about five. This is exactly how he looked, shaggy hair and all. "This, uh, this is... fuck, man. I don't know what this is." He washes a hand down his jaw with shock and confusion.

"I'm small," Sam states too calmly amidst the current situation.

"Yeah," Dean breathes out in still running disbelief.

"Am I a fucking kid!?" Sam flips a switch and screams with fear in his young voice as Dean thinks in any other situation a kid saying that would be hilarious. But right now it's not funny at all. It's the scariest damn thing he's seen or heard in a long time.

Shaking off the initial shock, Dean heads back into hunter and big brother mode when the icy stab of fear really hits him. If Sam's this small he's also weak… and very, very vulnerable. That realization alone puts him into action.

"We gotta get the hell outta here," he says while marching over to Sam swiftly and with sheer determination. "There could be more on the way."

"Maybe we should wait," Sam theorizes quickly, hugging his clothing into him closely when they no longer fit him at all. They're huge.

"You freakin' nuts?" Dean says with shock at the idea as he closes the space between them. "We'd be sitting ducks."

"But they might have answers for us."

"No way. You're in no shape to fight. We gotta tuck tail and run on this one… not taking any chances," Dean immediately denies as he bends down to pick up his small brother.

"The hell are you doing, Dean!?" Sam asks with anger as Dean tries to bundle him up in his far took big clothing.

"We gotta move and your freakishly long legs aren't freakishly long anymore " he quickly explains as he hoists Sam up and tucks him under his arm like he used to do years and years ago. "Now's not the time to bitch."

Sam instantly concedes, knowing Dean can move faster than him and he couldn't keep up right now. They head for the bedroom door and Sam shouts, "The knife! Dean!"

Backtracking a step, Dean ducks down and scoops up the knife in his hand that isn't clutching his little brother. He tucks it into his jacket before grabbing Sam's Taurus off the floor. He puts it in the back of his pants next to his own Colt and they then book it out of the house, Dean's arms too tightly around Sam as the panic hits. This suddenly feels a lot like the fire when they were children, Dean carrying his Sammy to safety. He was completely frightened then and he's completely frightened now.

That thought disappears when the unreality of the situation smacks him in the face. What the fuck just happened? He's holding his little brother that's normally bigger than him easily in one arm. Fuck! This is so not good.

Once outside they head for the Impala. Dean finagles his keys from his pocket while still clutching his precious little cargo. He unlocks the driver's side back door and shoves Sam into it.

"The back seat?" Sam complains instantly while wrapping his humongous jacket around his frame. His jeans fell off the second Dean let go of him and they lay on the floor of the car so he needs to cover up somehow.

"Kids can't ride in the front. Unsafe," Dean simply logics without really thinking, his fatherly instincts already running, as he jumps behind the wheel. He revs the engine and peels out of the driveway, ready to ditch any possible threat still lingering there.

He just needs to get Sam somewhere safe. They can figure out the rest after that.

It took about twenty minutes of barreling down the highways towards Bobby's before either brother had the balls to speak first.

Dean just simply doesn't know what to say. There is nothing he could do or tell Sam to make this seem alright. As he drives he just keeps peering into the rearview mirror at his tiny brother, trying desperately to come to terms with the situation, while Sam repeatedly studies himself.

It's instinct. When something's happened, something new presents itself, something unfamiliar is at hand, Sam always researches and scrutinizes and over-thinks. This situation is no different, even if he is the thing to be studied.

He looks at his hands that are just so small. He could never hold his Taurus with one hand at this point… probably not with both hands either. He feels his face, his cheeks suddenly chubbier. His features had thinned out and sharpened as he grew older but that's all gone now. He can feel that his hair is shorter now too. It's still longer than his father liked him to keep it but it isn't to the length he's been at for years now. His arms and legs are no longer lanky. Instead they're shorter and without any muscle tone at all… just leftover baby fat and skin and bones.

At one point Sam shed the heavy brown jacket that was absolutely weighing him down and wrapped himself up in the blue flannel he'd put on that morning. Curled up in a ball inside the billowing fabric, he finally looks up and meets Dean's eyes through the rearview mirror for the first time since he'd been thrown into the Impala.

"This is fucked up."

"I know," Dean nods right back.

"No, seriously, Dean," he repeats in his child-like voice. "This is so fucked up. I've never seen anything like this."

"Right there with ya'," Dean assures him. "But don't panic yet. We've been down roads like this before and we found our way out."

"When have we ever been down a road like this before!?" Sam challenges right away.

"Dude, I was a chick for, like, two days," Dean reminds him, hoping to calm his nerves a little. "And I got through it. We'll get back and get on this. I'm sure there's an answer." He pauses with uncertainty. "Bobby'll know what to do."

"Unless he doesn't," Sam answers right back with anxiety in his tone.

"He will."

"But what if he doesn't?" Sam keeps challenging, his uncertainty and fear killing him. "The man knows a lot but he doesn't know everything."

"He might know about this," Dean keeps his voice calmer. "Let's just get back and find out before we freak out over this."

"Too fucking late," Sam grumbles. Sure, he's not raging out and yelling. That's always been Dean's immediate way of freaking out. Sam kept it more contained. Just because externally he seemed fine enough didn't mean that internally his heart wasn't racing a mile a minute though. He's frightened to the core by this.

"Hey," Dean calls out when he can see the anxiety steadily rolling through Sam's brain. He can read his brother like a book and he's losing it. "I'm not letting whatever this is get you. I got your back. Like always."

Sam nods, swallowing hard as a lump in his throat forms. Why did that just happen? With all Sam has seen in life he's never defaulted to sadness and crying so easily. He feels like sobbing over this when the fear becomes so strong.

"You hear me?" Dean asks as Sam never answered him.

"Yeah," Sam manages out just barely and the tone worries Dean. When he looks back be catches his suddenly small brother wiping his eyes with the oversized sleeve of his shirt.

Dean's heart drops when he sees that. Sam's truly scared this time and there isn't much he can do about that. All he can do is reassure him and drive faster to their safest place on Earth.

"We're gonna figure this out, Sam," he says once more. "Me, Bobby, Lizzy... We're on your side. You're gonna fine just like always."

Dean prays that he isn't lying to his brother.