Days and Nights in the Forest.

By Patroclus76

A story in three parts.

Twlight and Supernatural end of Season three cross-over.

Edward Cullen comes across Sam Winchester somewhere in the Mid-West by accident. Edward is haunted by Bella, Sam by Dean's death and stint in hell. Despite planning initially to kill him, Edward senses the enormity of Sam's loss and is intrigued by him.

-------------------

Edward had been aware of Sam for some time, a week or two, perhaps even longer. He had come across his masculine, feral scent one evening in a deep verdant glade filled with silver translucent sunlight. Edward had been alone for so long that the smell of a human both alarmed and thrilled him, almost turning his head. It was a strong, exotic odour. And to come across it in such a remote location, and without any preceding signs or warnings struck him as unusual. Humans were, in the main, clumsy and loud, especially males. Puzzled, Edward had turned away from his southerly direction and wheeled back towards the high pines and aspens of the foothills to have a closer look. It was an easy decision to make. Eternity spread out like a flat, undulating plain to either side of him no matter what particular direction he took. And in a strange, disturbing way Edward had become lonely, melancholy, his grief suddenly unendurable. Finding the man would be a distraction. The idea that Edward might also kill him insinuated itself in the back of his mind almost immediately, not for food of course, not even for pleasure, but as a antidote to cloud his pain, to conceal for a while the massive hole at the centre of his being.

It was a good plan. It almost cheered him. Edward passed several cloudy, thunderous days moving swiftly and effortlessly through the trees, doubling back on himself, closing in on his potential prey. The landscape was vast and empty, an anagram of his own soul. With each day the summer was passing into the gilded, shortening light of the Fall. Edward could sense the change, the slow diminishing arch of the sun and the deepening shade. He thought of Forks, and how the darkness would be invading the ferns and stands of the forest with premonitions of snow and deep chill. He thought of Bella, for a moment, but deliberately out of focus like someone looks to one side to see a dim, distant object like a faint star or a remote galaxy. Or a ghost. He had been unable to articulate his pain. It was locked up in his cold, hard body. Edward watched the stars in their eternal, inscrutable mystery, impressed by the human's economy of travel, the way he almost left no trail of his passing, no fires, no litter; his own waste cleanly buried deep into the dark, peaty soil. Who was he? What was he doing here?

Then one warm morning, almost by accident, Edward came across the man preparing to bathe in a pool of cold, clear water. He was younger than Edward had expected, not much older than himself, tall and deeply tanned with long brown hair almost like a native American. Edward wondered if he was indeed a native of the woods, but the scent had been wrong and was still wrong. Despite himself and his chill nonchalance, the sight of the man spiked Edward's interest even further. He sat on a high cliff and watched as the youth discarded his clothes and left them on a rock, neatly folded in a pile and then waded out to swim. After floating face up and then submerging himself, the man washed with careful, almost cat like movements, and after a few indifferent splashes, clambered out to dry himself in the sun. He emerged sleek with water, a buffed, toned torso and strong elegant legs. He looked at ease in his nakedness, picking himself deftly over mud and shingles to finish cleaning himself. Edward frowned, narrowing his golden flecked eyes and snorting in cold amusement. It was altogether very odd.

The youth sat, long limbed and preoccupied, rubbing his feet with a stone, his face drawn in concentration. Edward had watched Inuit communities in the North scrape their skin in this way. The movements were slow and vaguely hypnotic. Eventually, satisfied with his ablutions, the youth stood and scanned the pool and then the surrounding trees. The man's beauty was pleasing to Edward's eye, appreciative as he was of quality. In a strange way the man reminded Edward of someone he had met long ago. The Vampire muttered to himself a soft ancient rebuke. He was growing sentimental in his old age. Or perhaps he was lonelier than he had thought. Or rather there was something about the setting, the boy near the water, his body drying in the sun, that gave Edward a sense of peace at last. That was it. Edward smiled a cold, dreamy smile and leaning forward, attuned his mind to read the man's thoughts.

To Edward's extraordinary surprise, he could sense absolutely nothing. The blankness was disconcerting, an affront to his own sense of superiority. Risking exposure, for the sun was now brilliant and intense, Edward sifted his weight and tried to concentrate his thoughts on the man again. Again nothing - a vast deep emptiness - just a name - Dean - a residual identity but almost infinitely remote and buried in raw red pain like a knife. Oddly it as not the youth's name but someone else's. Shocked, Edward moved awkwardly and loosened a small trickle of shale down the cliff and in an instant, like some startled deer, the man had leapt for cover, a flash of brown skin and then nothing but the glint of water and the soft endless lamentation of the wind. Angry at himself Edward left quickly, scaling up into a high pine and watched as the man, half dressed now, emerged cautiously and headed straight for the base of the cliff, tracking the ground with skill. He paused for a long time, kneeling, touching the ground and then examined the rock carefully before returning and putting his shirt on. Appalled at his carelessness, Edward worked his way around to the pool, leaping from tree to tree in a blur of movement. Perhaps the man was dangerous? Something was not right. He would be more cautious from now on.

Edward waited until dusk before he moved in again. Night was after all his element and he felt the need to use it to his advantage. With near perfect night vision, Edward soon found the man carefully concealed along side a fallen log, covered in leaves. Only his scent gave him away. Again no fire, no sense of camp or intrusion. With great stealth Edward closed in from above, but sensing at the last minute that the fallen tree would not bear his weight, he lowered himself monkey like to the ground besides the youth, feeling his blood heat now and hearing the slow thick beating of the human's heart. Close up, he seemed very young, his face curved and chiselled, one hand under his cheek. Through the top of the shirt Edward could see a smooth curve of neck corded with veins. He could kill him this boy without even thinking about it. Although recently fed, the temptation to eat proved suddenly strong and insistent, causing Edward's face to grimace and snarl. He snatched his pale cut glass face away from the smell and closed his eyes. Was he that lost? Was he really so spiritually abandoned? To his surprise, he wondered what Bella would think? Sensing some vague threat the young man shifted and turned but did not wake up. After a while Edward leaned forward carefully and put his face close to the boy's neck. With a long icy finger, the vampire almost touched the base of the throat; the heat was astounding: human heat never ceased to amaze Edward: 37.5 degrees centigrade, a roaring furnace of life. The boy - Sam - twitched slightly and murmured a name - Dean. Ws he looking for Dean? Whoever Dean was, he was not here. Such a mystery was in its way frustrating. Edward backed away, his hunger melting into a bizarre sense of concern and crouching down silently he waited for dawn. It was time he introduced himself.

------------------------------------