Title: Roll the Dice

Author: Disasteriffic Kaz

Info: A collection of Stand-Alone One Shots, each chapter prompted by a literal roll of the dice. See each chapter for details. Hurt/comfort/awesome/bamf!Sam/Dean/and many others.

Author's Note: My brother-in-law got me a box of 'Rory's Story Cubes' for Xmas. Dice with pictures meant as a tool for combatting writer's block! Jenjoremy challenged me to use them to write fic and so here we are! Each chapter will be a stand-alone one shot inspired by a roll of the story dice; Three dice rolled for each chapter.

*You can see pics of each roll on my Facebook page if you're interested. Lol

Beta'd by the always awesome JaniceC678 :D– Friend and Muse's co-conspirator.

**Follow me on Facebook as "Disasteriffic Kaz" for frequent fic updates or just to chat!
~Reviews are Love~
Disclaimer: They're not mine. The world's not mine. But Kripke is my, er, Chuck? And I worship at his altar. Heh.

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Roll the Dice:
1: A labyrinth/maze
2: A wolf, howling at the moon.
3: A bindle or hobo's knapsack on a branch.

Setting- Takes place after 1x05 "Bloody Mary"

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Dean imagined the Impala was eating up the road as the blacktop flew beneath her a mile at a time. He leaned back in his seat feeling the comforting thrum of the engine and vibration of the seat under him. He tapped his fingers on the wheel to the beat of the rock music coming from the stereo and glanced to his right to find his little brother slumped down in his seat with his head hanging over the back. Dean snorted a laugh and shook his head fondly. He checked the road, finding it still empty of all but them, and looked back at Sam more carefully this time. Whatever his brother said, there was no way Dean would accept that he was just fine after bleeding from the eyes not once but twice thanks to that Bloody Mary bitch. And there was another thing nagging at him - just what secret was it that had allowed the spirit to attack Sam? His little brother, who had never done well at keeping secrets from him in the past, was having no problem at all keeping this one. The fact that he was so determined to not share, even after the fact, set off warning bells in Dean's mind that it must be a real doozy. And that was worrisome.

Dean looked back to the road with a long sigh and figured it would have to have something to do with Jessica. He knew Sam was still broken up from her loss. Dean could see the sorrow in his eyes like a flashing neon sign that said tears were never far away along with something darker. He'd seen it in their father's eyes after mom had died. He felt sure that, back then, when the loss and the horror were still fresh, his dad had wished he could have died with her. That same dark wish was in Sam's eyes sometimes and it tore at Dean.

His eyes flicked back to his brother as Sam began to twitch in the seat, lost in yet another nightmare. Dean shook his head for a little brother who had apparently grown up too much to confide in him anymore, and he slapped a hand out into Sam's chest, bringing him awake with a lurch and a gasp. "Hey."

"What?" Sam jerked upright in the seat and rubbed at his chest where his brother's hand had connected with a thump.

"Stop droolin' on my upholstery, bitch," Dean said and grinned as Sam whipped a hand up to wipe at his mouth.

Sam glared at him, finding his face dry. "Funny."

"I'm hilarious." Dean pointed to a sign along the highway as they passed. "Got eats comin' up. You hungry?" He held up a finger as his brother opened his mouth. "The correct answer is 'Yes, Dean.' You haven't eaten since yesterday."

Sam rolled his eyes as he pushed himself fully upright in the seat. "Fine, yeah. Food." He wasn't hungry. He hadn't really felt hungry since Jess, and he knew that without his annoying big brother to 'mother' him, he would likely have lost twenty pounds already. It annoyed him to be reliant on Dean, and he knew his brother was aware of that, though Dean likely had no idea of the real reason why. If Dean knew it was because Sam felt guilty over how much of Dean's life had been subsumed raising him, he'd earn himself a big-brotherly beat down for raining emotions all over him. The thought made Sam smile and he coughed, looking out the window to avoid letting his brother see. "Where are we?"

"Ass end of middle-America." Dean shrugged and took the exit ramp, regretfully easing off the gas as they turned into a small town and traffic, such as it was. "Somewhere in Oklahoma. I wasn't paying attention."

Sam chuckled, knowing that Dean had lost himself in the pleasure of simply eating up the open road in his car. "Find a place with WiFi so I can find us a job."

Dean ground his teeth together but said nothing. He loved the hunt better than anyone he knew, but that was different from the single-minded obsession of their father… and now his little brother who had tried so hard to run from it. "We could take a few more days. It's only been two days since crazy Mary tried to pop your eyeballs in your head."

"Dean, I'm fine." Sam resisted the urge to rub his forehead and the headache that had been centered there for two days. "And she got you too, you know."

"Not twice, dude." Dean spotted a Biggerson's and cut across traffic to pull into the lot. "I'm surprised I didn't have to carry your sasquatch ass outta that antique store."

"Shut up. Please?" Sam smiled as his brother laughed.

Dean parked and rolled his eyes as they got out and he saw the stiff way Sam held himself. The idiot was clearly hurting. An hour later, Dean watched his brother pushing a salad around his plate with a fork while he focused on the screen of his laptop instead of his food. "You know, that works better if you eat it."

"Huh?" Sam looked up at his brother and then down at his plate. He set his fork down and pushed the plate away. "I ate enough. I think I found us a job."

Dean sighed and sat back, resigned. "Alright. Whatcha got?"

"So, get this. I found a website with reports of people going missing in…"

"What kind of website?" Dean interrupted, interpreting the look on his brother's face. "Is this another one of your screwy conspiracy sites?"

"What? No." Sam shook his head and tugged the laptop a little closer to him because it was a conspiracy website but he didn't need to give his brother any ammo. "They were all last seen at or near an abandoned house. It's in Watonga, about two hours north of here."

Dean scowled. "How did you even find this case? If it is a case." He watched Sam clear his throat and focus on the laptop and kicked him under the table.

"Ow! Hey!"

"Spill it," Dean ordered.

Sam groaned and closed the laptop. "Fine. While you were in the bathroom, we got a call from someone looking for Dad." He pushed his brother's cell phone across the table to him. "The guy runs the homeless shelter in Watonga, and some of his regulars have gone missing. He said some of the others were talking about a house outside town where some of them squat." He tapped the laptop. "And I found a website with articles going back over ten years about the house and how it's supposed to be haunted."

"Huh." Dean pulled the laptop over before Sam could grab it and opened it. He looked at the website and snorted. "Harry's House of Horrors dot com? Really?"

Sam laughed. "Forget the website. Father Waverly's on the level. He needs help."

"Alright. Alright." Dean closed the laptop and pushed it back so his brother could put it away. "Let's go talk to the good father and see if this is actually a job." He tossed cash on the table and stood. "And not just a bunch of hobos deciding to go train hopping without telling him."

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Dean eyed the cheerfully painted sign above the doors of the homeless shelter and quirked a brow at his brother. "The Aloha Shelter? Seriously? It's a crash pad for bums, not a cabana on the beach."

"Dude. Empathy?" Sam hissed as they passed two men in the doors and received matching glares. The interior of the shelter was cleaner than Sam had expected, though he could tell it was a veneer. The walls and floor may have been clean, but he could see the marks of age and abuse under the shine - chipped paint, cracked tiles in the ceiling, a flickering overhead light, and linoleum so old it had literally worn through to bare concrete in some spots. He wrinkled his nose at the smell of industrial grade detergents and body odor combined and strode up to the single desk and its occupant. The man was somewhere north of fifty, if Sam had to guess, with wavy, salt-and- pepper brown hair, and thick glasses over blue eyes, wearing beat-up, green work overalls. "Excuse me. We're looking for Father Waverly."

The man looked up, and up at Sam before smiling. "I'm Father Waverly. What can I do for you?" He tugged at the neck of his overalls and his collar appeared.

"I spoke to you on the phone this morning. I'm Sam Winchester. This is my brother Dean." Sam waved a hand at Dean beside him while the Father's eyes widened.

"Oh. Oh! Of course! Um… let's go somewhere… my office." Father Waverly rose and quickly led them down a hall. He nodded at each man they passed. "You've got good timing. Another hour and there wouldn't be room to walk. Lunch time, you know. We serve anyone in the community so it gets a little hectic."

"I can imagine." Sam glanced in one room as they passed and was surprised to see it was a school room, complete with the alphabet ringing the top of the walls. "You have children here?"

"Oh, we get all ages." Father Waverly turned a smile over his shoulder. "If we had more room, more money, we could so much more but…" he smirked as he opened the door to his office. "Faith manages."

Sam stumbled to a stop and then barked out a laugh. "I think I like you, Father; quoting a Minbari. Very nice."

Father Waverly chuckled and waved the boys to the two empty chairs in his cramped office. "Wisdom comes from surprising places."

Dean rolled his eyes, realizing he was now trapped in a cramped office with two nerds. "So, Father." He dropped into one of the two plastic chairs facing the desk and heard it creak under his weight. "What makes you think you need our kind of help?" He shrugged as Sam sat beside him and bumped his elbow meaningfully. "I mean, homeless guys aren't exactly known for staying in one place."

Father Waverly shook his head and sat behind his cluttered desk. "You're wrong there, actually. They may be homeless, but they're still human, Dean. People find a place they like and they tend to stay with it, either through hope or hopelessness. Walk around any city for a week, and you'll notice you see the same faces on the same corners begging for pocket change. It's in our nature." He picked up a thick file folder and slid it across the desk. "These men have never been gone longer than a week, and they've always come back." He sighed. "Until now. No one here knows what happened to them. The only common thread I can find, talking to some of my other residents, is that they all spent time in the Wheeler ranch house. It's been abandoned for more than thirty years, and the local police routinely roust homeless out of it."

Sam opened the file and started flipping through the pages. "You keep personnel records on them?"

"No one should be forgotten." Father Waverly let out a breath, forcing his temper at the broken system down and met the elder brother's eyes calmly. "These people are displaced and destitute. And, frankly, the police couldn't care less. As far as they seem to be concerned, these are just a few less problems for them to worry about. I'm trusting you to do better. Your father would."

Dean's mouth thinned into a tight line at that but he nodded. "So will we." They had spent most of their lives as itinerants, little better than the men and women who lived in the shelter, after all, always moving from one place to another and most times having nowhere but the car to call a home. "We'll check out your mystery house. If there's something there, we'll find it."

Sam gathered the file up and stood, reaching across the desk to shake the father's hand. "We'll let you know if we find anything. In the meantime, see if you can keep anyone else from going out to that house until we've had a look."

"I'll do my best, but…" Father Waverly spread his hands wide. "Taking charity from the shelter isn't always easy for prideful people. Sometimes they'd rather squat in a rundown house." He followed the brothers to the door. "They're good people who don't deserve this. Please find out what's happening to them."

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"This house has an interesting history," Sam said and glanced up to find Dean loading the shotguns with rock salt rounds.

Dean grunted and chambered another round. "Define 'interesting'."

"It was the first actual house built outside the original tent city that founded Watonga. You know, it used to be a Cheyenne reservation, and then it was opened to white settlement."

Dean groaned. "Right. And I bet the Cheyenne were totally happy about that. Are we gonna find honked off Native American ghosts in here?"

"Doubt it." Sam looked back to the research the father had collected for them. "If there were burial grounds disturbed anywhere, they aren't mentioned. No, I think it's something else. Says here the Wheeler family who built the place were mostly your average farmers except for a Gerald Wheeler who came back from World War II with all kinds of treasures from Europe. Claimed he was a collector and had papers of authenticity for everything, but I'm betting most of those were fake."

"So, he served?"

"Army. Yeah." Sam flipped through the pages. "He came back with art, statues, jewelry." He set the file down and grabbed his shotgun from his brother to load it himself. "Sounds to me like his unit found a Nazi storehouse and raided it."

"No way a grunt comes home with that much loot." Dean shoved his gun into the weapons duffel and checked his EMF meter and Sam's. "Something's hinky. So, cursed object maybe?"

"Could be. The Germans stole things from all over, from Egypt to Russia. Who knows what the guy brought into that house." Sam added his loaded gun to the duffel and ran a hand through his hair. "But the house is empty now, according to the reports. Most of Gerald Wheeler's collection was either repossessed or donated to a museum. I think ghost is still the likeliest candidate." He pulled his jacket on, pocketing the EMF meter his brother tossed to him.

"Let's boogie." Dean hefted the duffel and headed out to the car. As he drove, he felt a cold feeling wash over him. His gut was telling him something bad was going to happen, and Dean squashed that feeling as best he could. Since Jessica's death, that feeling was almost ever-present, that something big and bad was stalking them. He shook his head and turned down a narrow road between cornfields long gone to seed. He heard dirt and dust clattering along the undercarriage of his baby and grimaced as they reached the top of a low rise and got a first look at the house. "That is one lonely, damn house," he muttered.

Sam nodded. The ranch house was only a single story but it sprawled across the little valley floor. It was going to be a nightmare to search. Most of the windows were black, the glass gone from weather or vandalism over the long years. In the scraps of moonlight, the house looked gray, though he knew from the picture in Father Waverly's file that it had once been a bright, cheerful redwood. A broad cupola in the center of the roof drew his eye for a moment before Dean turned and parked. "Think there's anyone in there right now? Living, I mean."

Dean huffed a laugh as he turned the car off and got out. He stood for a moment, taking it in, and shook his head. "I dunno. Feels like something's payin' attention in there."

Sam looked over at his brother in surprise and smirked. "Using the force, Dean?"

"Shut the hell up," Dean snarled and stalked to the trunk.

Sam grinned, but glanced at the house again, his face sobering. Despite his teasing, he knew his brother's hunter instincts were seldom wrong. If Dean sensed something lurking, he was willing to trust that there probably was.

Dean turned back and handed Sam his shotgun, took his own, and gave the weapons bag to Sam. "Let's go see if ol' Gerry is still around trying to protect his ill-gotten bootie."

Sam chuckled softly, shouldering the bag, and stepped up onto the porch. The wood creaked and groaned beneath his feet. "Stay near the walls. There's a cellar, and these floors don't sound too sturdy anymore."

"Awesome." Dean took hold of the partially open front door and gave it a push. The hinges creaked loudly as though announcing their presence. "So much for being stealthy." He clicked on his flashlight and stepped into the entrance hall. It was wide and empty with four doorways leading off, two on either side. "You take right and, you know, try to stay out of trouble for five whole minutes. We'll meet in the middle."

"Whatever." Sam flipped Dean off and headed to the right, picking the far door. Once he was out of sight of his brother, he gave in for a moment and pressed his left hand to his forehead and the headache pounding there. He was fine, he knew he was, but he wished the lingering headache would go away. He was relieved that the pounding seemed to be his only price of having a vengeful spirit nearly clean his clock. He rubbed his forehead a last time, took a deep breath, and put his mind on the job where it needed to be.

Dean played his light over the peeling wallpaper and fading graffiti as he walked. Every step he took sent a creak or groan into the stillness of the house and made him twitch. He began to second-guess whether splitting up was a good idea or not. It was colder inside the house, and he shivered slightly before tugging out his EMF meter to make sure it wasn't a ghost dropping the temperature, but the meter stayed stubbornly quiet. "Where the hell are you, Casper?"

He found evidence of squatters in what had probably been a living room - blankets piled in a corner and trash from food along with empty beer bottles. Dean stopped in the next hall and listened. There was nothing except the faint sounds of his brother moving on the other side of the house. The creaking floorboards were good for something after all, he mused with a smirk and crossed into the next room. He found more blankets and a ratty sleeping bag but still no sign of life. Dean swung around toward an interior door at the soft sound of something rustling.

"Sammy?" Dean called but there was no response. He brought his shotgun up and tucked the EMF into his pocket where he could still hear it. Moonlight glowed in the door to the next room, and Dean moved cautiously into it to find himself in a wide, octagonal room beneath the cupola. The windows above let the glowing, silvery light filter down onto a strange dais as high as his chest. He moved closer and realized it was made of wood and built directly into the floor. Dean leaned over and his eyebrows flew up. "Huh." Inset into the top of the dais was an intricate maze that looked to be in the shape of some sort of tree, well-oiled and seeming to glow on its own. "You get my vote for most likely haunted object in this place."

Dean spun around as the meter in his pocket began to whine, growing in volume. "Sam! Center of the house!" he shouted and waited for the spirit to show itself. "Come on. Show me your ugly face. Soon as I know who you are for sure, buddy, I'm'a go find your grave and roast your ass." He heard the creaking of the floors that meant Sam was heading toward him and gasped as a spirit appeared before him.

"Holy crap!" Dean fired on instinct and threw himself backward, fetching up hard against the maze. He grunted and shifted to move around as the spirit, a man he recognized from the father's research, screeched angrily and disappeared. "Sam! It's the Wheeler dude! Let's…" He didn't get to finish the sentence as Gerald Wheeler screamed back into sight and Dean was picked up from the floor and thrown.

He crashed headfirst into the maze and slumped over the side to the floor while his head spun. "Ow." Dean raised a hand to his forehead and felt blood under his fingers. "Now you're just pissin' me off." He dragged his shotgun back up and eased up so he was sitting against the base of the maze.

"Dean?"

Sam's voice echoed and Dean smiled with relief. "Here!" Dean stared as drops of blood drifted into his vision. He could actually feel it being pulled from the wound on his head, and he scrambled to his feet as it floated up toward the maze. "What the hell is this?" He watched the drops float lazily down toward the maze, and a sinking sensation overcame him. "Aw, this can't be good. Sam! Get in here!" He reached a hand out, trying to catch his blood before it could touch the wood but wasn't quite fast enough as the first drops fell thickly onto the maze and slid down into the intricate paths. Dean felt a spinning, pulling sensation in his gut and shouted as he fell.

Sam burst through a door, following the sound of his brother's voice and stared in confusion. The sound of Dean's shout still echoed in the room but his brother was nowhere to be seen. Sam eased around a tall wooden dais in the middle of the room and found his brother's flashlight still spinning on the floor. "Dean? Where are you?" He looked over at the dais and then leaned over the top, peering down at the maze. His eyes followed the paths and he reached a hand out, letting his fingers brush into the dark, wet drops he spotted near its center. He brought them up and knew that it was his brother's blood.

"Dean? Answer me!" Sam's EMF meter began to scream in his pocket as he studied the maze and felt sure he had seen it somewhere before. "I know this. Why do I know this?" He spun with his shotgun raised as the meter screamed and fired into Gerald Wheeler's spirit before it could do anything. Sam dropped back a step and stared down at the maze, thinking furiously and the tumblers in his mind clicked into place. "Ok. Ok." He shoved his flashlight into his back pocket, tucked the shotgun under his arm, and drew his knife from the small of his back. "You can kick my ass for this later, Dean. Assuming I'm right." Sam drew the blade in a shallow cut across his left palm, re-sheathed the blade, and held his hand out over the center of the maze. He took a firmer hold on the shotgun with his right hand and tipped his left palm, letting the blood dribble out.

Sam held his breath as the first drops splattered onto the wood. He reeled back as a spinning sensation began in his head, and he felt as though some invisible force was tugging from his gut. The floor seemed to go out from under him, and he closed his eyes, falling. He felt air rushing around him and a peculiar sensation as though something was pressing around him, crushing the air from his lungs. Sam strained to breathe without effect and could not even cry out as he slammed down into a hard surface and came to rest. The crushing sensation dissipated, and he wheezed a long breath into an aching chest that set him coughing. He curled into a ball with his arms wrapped around his chest. He startled badly, feeling a hand land on the back of his head, and then all the tension seeped out of him with his brother's voice in his ears.

"Jesus, Sammy. Bastard got you too." Dean knelt beside his struggling brother and offered what comfort he could. He had felt the same way after his landing and had only just managed to compose himself when he had seen Sam come in for a landing. "Easy, buddy. Breathe through it."

Sam coughed a last time and forced his eyes open. "D-Dean."

"Yeah. Right here. And we are screwed, little brother." Dean looked up and was still having trouble wrapping his mind around what he knew had happened. Somehow, they had both been shrunk down and dropped into the strange maze. The moonlight was no longer the only source of light. The wooden walls themselves glowed with a soft, golden illumination. "I don't know what the hell's goin' on, but I got no clue how we get outta this one without some help."

Sam slowly uncurled himself and managed to sit up with his brother's help. "Yeah, about…" He coughed again and shook his head. "About that. I, uh… I think I know."

Dean looked at him and then saw the blood on his brother's left hand and scowled. "Sam. Did Gerry toss you down here like he did me?"

"Uh, not really." Sam gave his brother a weak smile and held up his bleeding hand. "I think I know what this is, and, uh, the only way out is from in here."

"You think?" Dean all but yelled and took a calming breath when Sam raised a hand again in warning. "You got yourself tossed in here on purpose, and you only think you know what this is? What the hell, Sammy? You get hit with a stupid stick when I wasn't lookin'?"

"Would you calm down?" Sam hissed. "I'm sure, alright? And we're not alone in here."

"Alright, genius. What the hell is this?" Dean demanded and got to his feet, pulling his brother up with him and giving him an angry shove into the wall of their narrow corridor. He pulled his bandana from his pocket and grabbed Sam's bleeding hand, wrapping it up quickly. "Talk."

"Yggdrasil's labyrinth. Yggdrasil was the tree of knowledge. Well, depending on who you ask it was a lot of things, but…" Sam shook his head at himself and stopped before he wandered off into a lecture. He looked at the walls around them in wonder. "I took a comparative religion class at Stanford, and the professor had a real hard on for Norse mythology. There was this legend about a renegade sect of, well, monks, basically. They created a mystical labyrinth that was supposedly used to train Viking warriors to fight Fenrir at Ragnarok." He met his brother's eyes. "This maze is in the shape of Yggdrasil. And I saw a couple artist's renderings of what it was supposed to look like, and this was it."

"Fenrir? Are you kidding me?" Dean stared up and down the corridor worriedly.

"Well, not the actual Fenrir, or Fenris." Sam took his now-bandaged hand back and bent to pick up his shotgun. "A mystical representation of him."

"So, what you're telling me is we're stuck in this damn maze with a giant, evil, world-eating, wolf wannabe? Fenrir light?"

Sam huffed a soft laugh and shrugged. "Basically, yeah. We have to kill it and reach the center of the labyrinth to be released."

"And if we don't?" Dean asked, knowing full well what the answer would be, but he wanted to hear it.

"The legend said Yggdrasil's labyrinth was littered with the bones of Vikings who failed the test." Sam pulled the weapons bag off his shoulder and handed the strap to his brother. "Let's not fail."

Dean groaned. "Son of a bitch." He took the bag and dug out fresh shells for his shotgun. "We need silver for this thing?"

"I don't know. It's not a werewolf, and the ancient Vikings would have only had, you know, swords."

"Good thing I packed the machetes then." Dean knelt down, rethinking, and shoved the shotgun into the bag. He pulled out their machetes instead. "You got your Taurus on you?"

"Of course," Sam said with a roll of his eyes.

"Here." Dean handed him one of the machetes and took his shotgun, putting it away with his own. "We'll try bullets. If those don't work, we'll take its damn head." He stood again with the bag on his shoulder and took a minute to thread the machete's sheath onto his belt, seeing Sam do the same. "We stick together in here. I am not losing you in this maze."

"No argument from me." Sam drew his Taurus, settling the gun in his grip and looked at his brother. "How exactly did you get in here anyway? I saw your blood."

Dean picked a direction and started walking. "That asshole Wheeler slammed my head into the thing." He turned and pointed to the cut above his eye. "Next thing I know, my blood's floating up to land on this thing."

"Wow." Sam looked up above them to the cupola he could see far, far above. "That has to be what's happened to all the people who've gone missing in this house. Gerald's forcing them in here. Wonder why."

"Does it matter? Crazy'll wreck your day every time, you know that." Dean reached an intersection and slowed. He eased up to the corner and looked out. "You sure super-wolf's in here?"

"Probably. I mean, if the labyrinth is real and it is, it stands to reason." Sam rolled out the tension in his shoulders and caught Dean's elbow before he could cut straight across the four-way intersection. "Left. Follow the left wall."

"Why?" Dean asked but changed direction anyway.

"Read it somewhere, that you can reach the center of any maze by always following the left or right wall." Sam smiled when Dean looked at him. "Not like we have a better idea. So, we pick a side and stick to it. It's not the shortest route by a long shot, but it gets you there." Sam took his knife out again and used it to scratch an 'x' into the corner before he followed.

"We end up going in circles, I'm kicking your ass." Dean picked up his pace, feeling a need to reach the center as quickly as possible. "Gonna kick your ass anyway for pulling this stunt."

Sam smiled. As annoying as Dean could be, it was nice to have his big brother there again, watching his back and caring enough to kick at him. "Like you could still kick my ass. I'm bigger, remember?"

Dean snorted. "And slower, princess. I can still own you."

"In your dreams." Sam chuckled and stopped instantly when Dean slapped a hand back into his chest. He moved closer, keeping his gun ready.

Dean listened and heard something moving around the curve ahead of them - heavy footfalls. He drew his machete and motioned Sam across to the other side of the hall. He would let his brother have first crack and hope bullets were enough to stop it.

Sam inched ahead of his brother with his gun out. He forced himself to breathe evenly as he squeezed his finger onto the trigger, ready as the sound grew closer. He felt a bead of sweat inching down his forehead just as a figure lumbered into view, and he pulled the muzzle of his gun up in surprise before he could fire. "Holy crap! Dean, it's not the wolf. Hey!" Sam jogged ahead and caught one of the man's arms before he could stumble into the wall. "Hey, you alright?"

Dean followed Sam and took in the man's shaggy, dirty brown hair and his ragged clothes – dingy, ripped jeans, and a dirty, faded red, tattered shirt. "Must be one of Father Waverly's missing guys."

"Grab the water out of the bag," Sam said and leaned the man against the wall, steadying him. "I'm Sam. This is my brother Dean. Can you speak?"

The man nodded, staring between them in confusion. "Where…" His voice was hoarse and he grabbed greedily at the water bottle Dean held out to him. He drank in big gulps until Sam pulled it away from his mouth.

"Small sips, man," Sam urged before the man could make himself sick. "What's your name?"

"Uh, Bran. I'm… what's going on? I don't understand." Bran drank more of the water, closing his eyes to savor the moisture. "I've been in here for days. I can't… I was in the house, and there was… I don't know what I saw. And there's something in here, man. It's… it's big."

Sam glanced over at his brother and got a shrug. He sighed. "We have to get to the center of the maze. Then we can get out." He tried to sound hopeful and smiled for Bran who only stared bleakly at him.

"We're gonna die in this crazy place," Bran whispered. "If we don't… don't starve, that thing's gonna eat us!"

"Hey. No, it's not." Dean stepped in and held up his machete. "If it comes for us, we're gonna give it indigestion. Got it? You just stay with us and you'll be fine." The last thing they needed was the guy panicking and getting them killed, but they couldn't very well leave him behind. "I'll take point. You keep an eye on him."

Sam nodded and turned Bran back the way he had come with Dean leading the way. "We do this kind of thing all the time." He gave Bran a nudge until the man started walking. "Have you seen anyone else in here?"

Bran shook his head. "Not… not alive. There's, uh, like bones and… and worse just kinda lying around. That thing…"

"Yeah." Sam didn't need to hear anymore. "Just stay close to me."

"Why a freakin' maze?" Dean asked abruptly from ahead and glanced back at his brother. "I mean, what the hell?"

Sam grinned. "The ancient Vikings believed walking a maze would give them good fortune at sea. I guess this is just an extension of that; good fortune at fighting in Ragnarok. If you had to face a world-eating demon, you'd want a leg up too."

Dean snorted and turned back. "Should'a just knocked on wood for all the good it did them." He flicked a look at their civilian. "Where's the last place you saw it?"

Bran shuddered. "We're heading toward it. Are… are you sure we shouldn't turn around?"

Dean wanted nothing more than to turn around, but if Sam was right, they had no choice but to find and kill the wolf before they could escape. And Sam was rarely wrong about this stuff. "Just stay calm and let us handle it. And no more talking."

Sam followed along, keeping Bran safely between them as they went deeper into the maze, always following the left wall. He worried that he had picked the wrong direction, that he was sending them the long way around, but there was no way to know where they were in relation to the center. The walls were too impossibly high to reach and climb. He looked up and gasped, staggering to a stop in shock. "Dean," he hissed. Far above them, the massive spirit of Gerald Wheeler peered down at them.

"Crap." Dean wondered if the rock salt in their guns would do anything, tiny as they now were. He waited for the ghost to do something, to attack, but Wheeler simply disappeared from sight. "That guy is gettin' on my last nerve," he muttered. "Keep moving." Every turn of the maze made his teeth itch, wondering when the monster was going to jump them. He reached another intersection and crossed to the left, peering around the corner. An eerie, echoing howl went up and Dean hugged the wall, exchanging his machete for his pistol.

"Shit. Shit. Oh, shit!" Bran squeezed his arms around himself and dropped to his knees. "It's coming for me."

"Bran! Get up!" Sam bent and grabbed the man's shoulder, trying to pull him back up. "You've gotta keep it together. Bran!"

Dean risked a look back at his brother, hearing his raised voice, and saw a dark shadow rise up behind him. "Sam! Look out!"

Sam let go of Bran and spun, firing before he even had a clear look at the thing behind him. It was huge, taller than him. Sam saw red puffs of blood from the midnight-black fur as its jaws opened impossibly wide and fetid breath made him choke as it roared. He fell back from the wolf, hearing Dean's gun begin to fire from behind him and grunted as one of Fenrir's huge paws slammed into his side and knocked him into a wall.

"No you don't!" Dean fired a round in the beast's face before it could snap its jaws down on his helpless brother. Fenrir reared back, clawing at its own eye, and Dean fired again aiming for its heart. The massive wolf let loose another howling cry and suddenly rushed at Dean. "Shit!" He slammed sideways into the wall and all the air rushed out of him as Fenrir's shoulder impacted his chest as it ran past him. Dean locked his knees, refusing the slide to the floor they wanted to do, and took a last shot at the wolf's back before it vanished around the curve.

"Son of a bitch," Dean groaned. "Sammy?" He looked over, finding his brother where the wolf had left him, and then it dawned on him; they were alone. Bran was gone. "Aw fuck!" he shouted. A trail of blood sprays led in the direction Fenrir had fled. He rubbed a hand over his chest and staggered to Sam, dropping to his knees beside him. "Sam. Hey." There was a worrying spatter of blood on the wall beside him, and Dean cautiously pulled his brother over to his back while Sam moaned softly in protest. "Shit." Sam's flannel had been torn open, and the t-shirt beneath was a mess of bloody rips. "Sam. Come on, sasquatch. Gimme a sign here."

Sam scowled and fought to get his eyes open. When he did, he was rewarded with his big brother's face peering worriedly down at him. He closed his eyes again and indulged in a deep groan. "That… hurt. Let's not do that again."

"Yeah. You sit up?" Dean took Sam's shoulders and pulled, gritting his teeth in sympathy with each hissed breath Sam let out until his brother was sitting against the wall. "How bad is it?"

Sam knew Dean meant internally and he took stock for a moment. "Uh, think maybe some cracked ribs. Right side. And, shit, my right shoulder."

Dean saw matching rips in the shoulder of his brother's jacket and shook his head. "Fido got you good, little brother. Get that jacket off and what's left of your flannel."

Sam nodded and started slowly easing the jacket off his bad arm while Dean stood and jogged down the corridor to where their bag had fallen. He looked around and froze with the jacket half off his arm. "Where's Bran?"

Dean knelt beside him again and dug out the first aid kit with a grim face. "Fenrir took him. Sorry, buddy. Bastard face-planted me into the wall on his way past."

"You alright?" Sam reached for Dean only to have his hand knocked away and his brother took over dragging his jacket and flannel off. "Quit it. I can do it."

"Today?" Dean snorted, trying to find some humor before the dire nature of their situation suffocated him. However badly Sam was hurt, there was no doctor and no hospital until they finished the job. "Gotta get you patched up, then I figure we can follow the trail."

"Trail?" Sam asked and followed his brother's hand. He swallowed as he saw the blood trail Bran had left behind. "There's no way he survives losing that much."

"No." Dean pulled his brother's t-shirt up once he had the jacket and flannel off and gave a low whistle. The right side of his chest was already turning blue from the impact, and four, long furrows crossed from his right shoulder, across his chest, and nearly to his hip on the left side. "You're gonna have a couple new scars for the ladies, dude."

"Great." Sam groaned. It had ached before, but now that he could see the damage, it went from 'ache' to a burning pain that threatened to take his breath with every inhalation. "Hurry up."

"Yeah. Yeah. Keep your pantyhose on." Dean quickly bandaged his brother's chest and shoulder. A quick run of his fingers down Sam's chest proved that his brother was right and he had two ribs that shifted when Dean touched them. He set about wrapping their biggest bandage all the way around his brother to support them. "You gotta try not to move too much, man. I'm serious. You hang back and put holes in it while I get its head. Got it?"

Sam gave another nod and let out the breath he had been holding once Dean was finished. "Yeah." He didn't want to puncture a lung so hanging back was just fine with him, so long as Dean didn't need him, but he wisely kept that to himself. "Get me up." Getting to his feet took nearly more energy than he had, and he slumped into his brother, breathing heavily while he waited for the floor to stop spinning beneath him.

"Take it easy." Dean held on to Sam and kept his ears attuned to the maze around them for any sign Fenrir was coming back to finish the job. He caught Sam's head in his head and pushed it up until he could see his pale, sweaty face. "You with me?"

Sam managed a nod and got his eyes open again. "Yeah. Yeah." He wrapped his left arm over his chest, holding his ribs loosely over the bandage. "Where's my gun?"

Dean carefully leaned Sam against the wall and recovered his Taurus from the ground. "Here." He dragged the weapons bag back onto his shoulder and took Sam's elbow when he wobbled away from the wall.

"I'm good. We need to move fast." Sam started down the hall, following Bran's blood, with Dean at his side. "If we're lucky, Fenrir dragged him to the center of the labyrinth. I mean, that's got to be its nest."

Dean let Sam set the pace, remaining at his side this time. He was not going to let the giant wolf get the drop on his little brother again if he could help it. The blood trail led them on through twists and turns, sometimes taking paths that led back parallel to where they had come from.

Sam managed a decent pace in spite of his injuries. Some small voice in the back of his mind was vainly hoping that they would reach the center of the maze and find Bran somehow alive, though he knew there was no hope for the man. He stumbled to a stop at an intersection and braced his good arm on the wall. "Dean," he whispered.

"Yeah, I heard it." Dean moved ahead of Sam and cautiously looked out around the wall to where wet, crunching sounds carried on the air. The noise was a little stomach churning as there was only one thing it could be - something eating messily. The hall continued for perhaps thirty feet and then opened into a large chamber beyond. He turned back and motioned Sam to follow him. Dean looked up and could just see the cupola centered above them.

Sam raised his gun as he followed his brother and propped his right hand in his left to steady his aim. His right shoulder sang with pain, and he ignored it as they neared the opening. His nerves twitched warningly as Dean stepped through first and slipped to the right and out of his field of view. He resisted the urge to call for him and give them away. He followed and, to his left, saw the dark bulk of Fenrir huddled over the remains of Bran. Sam saw a leg poking out around the beast's feet and swallowed. He flicked his glance to the right and saw Dean moving away toward the center of the chamber with his gun trained on Fenrir. The floor at their feet was carved with an intricate representation of Yggdrasil that spread out across the circular chamber. It glowed softly with the same eerie warmth of the walls, and Sam could feel power thrumming up through his feet as he moved. Dean caught his eyes, nodded, and started toward Fenrir.

Sweat trickled in a cold line down Dean's spine as he stalked closer to the beast. He raised his gun slightly, sighting at the back of the creature's head, let out a little breath, and fired. The bark of the gun sounded louder than it should and made his ears ring. He heard Sam firing along with him as sprays of blood erupted from the back of the wolf's head. Dean hastily shoved his gun behind his belt and drew his machete. Fenrir whirled drunkenly and dropped Bran's torso, emptied of viscera, to thump wetly into the floor.

"Aw, that is just nasty," Dean groaned and gave his machete a practice swing while one of Sam's shots exploded the wolf's miraculously healed right eye. "Come on, ugly. Let's go." He dodged to his right as the wolf lunged for him and spun back, watching it collapse to its belly. "Get the other eye!"

Sam walked quickly to the side, waited for Dean to move out of his line of fire, and took the shot. Fenrir's left eye exploded like the other and it roared, enraged and blinded even if only for a few moments while it healed. "Dean, be careful!" he yelled while the wolf slashed blindly through the air.

Dean danced away from the deadly claws. He brought the machete back and swung as hard as he could toward Fenrir's neck. The beast twisted at the last second, and his blade bit in and glanced off its shoulder. "Shit!" He reeled back and yelped as one of the wolf's elbows connected with his knee and knocked him to the floor.

"No!" Sam moved closer. "Hey! Here I am! Come on!" He drew Fenrir's attention and squeezed the trigger again and again as it reared up with its jaws wide.

Dean rolled to his feet and nearly went down again as his left knee protested. "Sam, dammit!" he muttered. It pissed him off that Sam was deliberately putting himself in harm's way for him, but he wouldn't ruin the breathing space he had given him. He tightened his grip on the machete as Fenrir snapped dangerously close to his brother's chest.

"That's it! Come get me!" Sam gasped and stumbled backward, landing painfully on his back to avoid the gnashing teeth that had nearly caught his hands and the gun. He aimed at the beast's chest and realized he couldn't fire; he had no idea where Dean was. Instead, he scrambled backward on the floor with his hands and feet as Fenrir followed his noises. He coughed as the wolf's breath flooded his face. "Yeck! Your breath stinks!"

Dean swung for the wolf's neck again, and this time his aim was true. The razor-sharp blade sliced cleanly through fur and muscle, sliding halfway through only to be stopped and caught in the creature's spine. "Son of a bitch. Come on!" He wrenched the blade, trying to free it while blood poured and splashed onto the carved floor, and instead had it torn from his hand when Fenrir tried to swing around for him.

Sam slid his own machete from its sheathe. "Dean!" He put it on the floor and slid it toward his brother with a strong shove and had to scramble again away from those jaws. The wolf's right paw landed heavily on his lower leg and Sam shouted, feeling claws bite into his calf.

Dean took two running steps, stooped, and caught Sam's machete in his hand while the wolf focused on his brother. He swung underhand, coming from underneath when Fenrir drew its head back to bite his brother. Once again, the blade cut cleanly through the wolf's flesh, and, this time, Dean felt the momentary hitch when he reached the spine and then was through. The blade emerged on the other side, and Dean spun away. His own machete came free and clattered to the floor while Fenrir's head wobbled on its massive neck and then toppled to the side, rolling away to land in the center of the room.

"Holy crap," Dean gasped and bent, resting his hands on his knees while the wolf's body slowly went still. "Sammy?"

"Uh, yeah." Sam waited to be sure the beast was dead, and then laid back and let his head drop to the floor with a thump. Its claws were still in his calf, and at that moment, he didn't care.

Dean limped over to him and gave the wolf's head a parting kick on his way past. He lowered himself to the floor and looked around for the weapons bag finding it twenty feet away where Fenrir's thrashing had launched it. He blew out a breath. "Dammit." He decided the first aid kit could wait for a minute. He looked around the room and then down at his brother. "Wasn't killing the fugly supposed to get us out of here?"

Sam nodded and struggled up onto his elbows. His ribs screamed at him for the movement, and he dropped to his back again with a groan. "Uh… might take… minute." He opened his eyes and smirked up at his brother. "Plus, you know… mostly guessing here."

Dean rolled his eyes with a soft laugh and patted his brother's chest before knee-walking down to his leg. "Great." He grabbed Fenrir's foot and had to hug it to his chest to lift it off his brother. He heard Sam hiss in a breath as the claws emerged from his leg and then tossed it aside. "You were supposed to stay back, idiot."

Sam laughed lightly and raised his head to look down at his leg while Dean tore his jeans open. "Should have let it eat you." He dropped his head again and snorted. "Probably give it… give it indigestion."

"Dude, stop talking." Dean grinned fondly and was relieved to see the claws had only punctured the outside of his calf; painful, but not life-threatening.

"We do get out, there's still Gerald's ghost." Sam looked up out of the labyrinth worriedly. "Probably gonna come… come after us again."

Dean sighed and patted Sam's knee. "We'll shag ass for the car. Deal with him another day. Hang on." He groaned his way back to his feet and went for the weapons bag. He grabbed the straps, sliding the bloodied machete inside and pulling out his shotgun instead before he went back to his brother. He stopped in surprise and stared down. "Uh, Sammy? Something's up. Check out the disco floor!"

Sam leaned up carefully on one elbow and looked over. "Whoa." The carving of Yggdrasil along the floor ran with light in flickering golds and reds. They flickered bright and brighter as he watched until he had to look away and cover his eyes. "Hope this is a good thing!" The falling sensation began again but this time, rather than feeling as though he were being crushed, he felt like his body was expanding and would fly apart at any moment. Just when he thought he couldn't take anymore, he felt his back thump into something solid and gasped in a breath, opening his eyes to find himself on the floor of the Wheeler house beside the labyrinth. Dean groaned beside him and Sam smiled. "I was right."

"Shuddup." Dean sat up, though all he wanted to do was curl up in a ball. "Gotta get outta here. Come on." He thumped Sam's good shoulder and got a grip, pulling and dragging his mostly boneless brother up. "Nope. Not touchin' that again," he said and tugged Sam forward to lean on him rather than the base of the labyrinth. "Gotta get you vertical."

"M'workin' on it." Sam pulled his uninjured leg in and held on to Dean as his brother pulled him to his feet. "Oh, man. Crap." He staggered and would have gone back down if not for Dean's arm supporting him.

Dean shoved the strap for the weapons bag higher on his shoulder and ducked down to grab the shotgun while Sam balanced precariously. "Gerry's gonna figure out we escaped any minute. Winchester luck, dude."

"Yeah." Sam slid his arm over his brother's shoulders again and limp-hopped beside him away from the labyrinth. "I'll find where he's buried…" Sam coughed and wrapped his left arm across his ribs again, feeling them shift painfully as he moved. "… when we get… motel."

"Nu-uh, little brother." Dean led their way into the hall with his shotgun. "You're gonna spend some quality time in that sad little hospital we passed on the way out here."

"I don't…"

"Again. Shut up." Dean heard the EMF meter in his pocket start to whine. "Here he comes."

Sam took his arm off Dean's shoulders and braced himself on the wall instead. "He's gonna be pissed."

"Good. So am I." Dean put Sam at his back as the meter reached a fever pitch and was ready the moment Gerald's ghost began to coalesce. He fired both barrels into the spirit. "Hope that stings, you asshat. Come on." He pulled Sam back into his side and headed for the front of the house as fast as he could with both of them gimping along. "We're gonna torch his ghost and then I'm really gonna enjoy roasting that dust catcher back there."

"Not sure setting it on fire is a good idea." Sam hunched a little further, trying to relieve the pain in his chest. "Might… be bad. Crap."

"How about you focus on breathin' instead of yappin'," Dean said and pulled his wheezing brother into a faster walk.

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Dean pushed open the door with his hip and grinned at his brother's disgusted face in the hospital bed. "Got food and one of your frou-frou coffee things."

Sam scowled and managed to lob his pillow into his brother's face with his left arm. "I do not need to stay in here."

Dean kicked the pillow under the bed and set the bag of burgers and Sam's coffee on the table beside it. "Two cracked ribs and one hundred and three stitches, bitch. You lost enough blood they had to transfuse you. Yeah. You're stayin' in another day."

Sam settled back into the bed and scowled some more at the blanket. It irritated him that Dean was right. "Fine. How'd the salt and burn go?"

"Gerry showed up just in time to go up in a satisfying ball of flames." Dean grinned. "Man, that felt good. And I still wanna go torch the crazy maze thing."

"I did a little research." Sam pulled the laptop out from under his blanket and rolled his eyes at the look on Dean's face. "What? I got bored. So, the labyrinth, I think you can actually set it on fire."

Dean's eyes went wide and a grin spread across his face. "Really? You're not just teasin' me?"

Sam laughed. "It was created by Vikings. They were pretty big on the whole flaming burial thing. Turns out that wasn't the only labyrinth, and I found a couple references online to them being burned in big funerary rites."

Dean sat in the chair by the bed and chuckled. "Hell, yeah. Best news I've heard all day."

Sam sipped his coffee and quirked another smile. "How about the news I beat your record for stitches?"

"What? Bullshit." Dean kicked the side of the bed. "You're not counting internal stitches. Remember that ghoul hunt when you were sixteen?" He patted his left hip and then pointed firmly at his brother. "One-twenty-seven. And that's one record you don't ever beat."

Sam smiled while his brother bit into his burger with gusto. Every moment since losing Jess was a struggle, but knowing his big brother was there to worry about him and annoy him made it a little easier every day. "You're such a jerk."

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The End.
A/N: Fenrir's many names in mythology of which our show used only one—Fenrir, Fenris, Fenrisulfur, Hroovitnir, and Vanagandr,

Rolling the dice…