AN: I cannot apologise enough for not updating in a long time! I could go on about my exams , and results, and loads of stuff changing in my life and writer's block and blah blah blah, but that's super boring so let's just get on with the story (which, by the way, I have the plot worked out for - it's just getting it down in writing that's the hard part).

I'll do a quick recap to jog your memories at the beginning!

Sam saw the spirit in Maggie's place, and raised his shotgun. As he did so, he took in the spirit's appearance: army garb; a few medals; helmet haphazard; a patch of red over his heart. Could have been worse – could have been a spirit with a facial or head injury. Those were hard to look at, for sure.

But his face . . . Sam recalled, just before his vision had given out, seeing that same look in his eyes as he picked him up: slight confusion, and consideration . . . But not outright malice.

"Wait," The spirit commanded him. He barely saw its lips move; its face was shrouded in stubble, and its brow line hard with grave thoughts. Its voice was gruff, yet somehow . . . Reasonable. It wasn't hysterical like other spirits. Maybe that was why Sam listened.
"Why?" Sam replied in turn.
"You don't know what you're doing,"
"Don't I?" Sam asked with a slight smirk, shifting his shotgun slightly. The spirit moved its hands up into a surrender-like position.
"I don't mean you don't know how to use one of those things – because clearly, you do. Takes one to know one," He explained carefully. Sam nodded once, encouraging him to go on, "I meant, you don't know what you'll be doing to this town,"
". . . How so?" Sam replied, watching Maggie from the corner of his eye. She was moving into a sitting position, leaning against the gravestone that had almost felled her, and biting her lip trying not to cry or make a noise. He noted that she was clutching her leg up to her chest, and it was bleeding.
"I'm the only thing standing between these people, and serious damage,"
"Looks like you're the one doing the damage, corporal. You just hurt my friend, and you tried to kill me,"
"That was before I knew you could help me,"
"Help you? . . . To do what?" Sam asked, narrowing his eyes. Somehow, he doubted the thing the ghost wanted help with was moving on.
"To kill a ghost,"

Though he didn't want to take his eyes off the ghost who was asking for his help, Sam couldn't resist a glance at Maggie. There were tears in her eyes but they weren't falling. She was still clutching at her wrist. Sam's throat felt bruised as he turned, and his anger at the spirit flared a little along with it. He calmed himself to ask another question of the spirit, though.

"So, there's more than one spirit in town? Someone other than you?" Sam asked, shifting his grip on the shotgun. He was uncomfortable negotiating with something supernatural again – it reminded him too much of Ruby, and the angels, and when Bobby went vengeful . . . It never seemed to end well for them.

. . . For him. It never seemed to end well for him. Dean was gone. He wasn't there to help Sam when this whole scheme inevitably went belly-up.

"Yes. I've been spending my time trying to protect the people here from harm, but the other guy's making it kind of difficult," The ghost replied icily.
"You know who it is?"
"No. But it's nasty. Blew into town a few months ago, out of the blue. It's stronger than I am – it's angrier,"

Sam doubted that. This guy looked livid; like fury was bubbling away just under his skin, and he was madly trying to contain it in order not to lash out at Sam. The hunter guessed the only way he could stop feeling so angry was by saving people around the town from horrible accidents.

Sam shivered as a breeze blew through the graveyard. It was a warm night, but the wind was icy, and he suspected it was nothing to do with the weather.
"So you'll help?" It demanded.
"How can I contact you again?" Sam changed the topic. If he agreed to help, he was agreeing to trust the spirit, which he wasn't ready to do yet. "I've got to leave now, you see – my friend's wrist needs medical attention," Sam added, his eyes stony as he emphasised the fact that the ghost had hurt them, and so didn't deserve anything from them yet.
"What's your name?" The ghost asked.
"Sam Winchester," He replied hesitantly.
"I . . . Regret hurting her, Sam. I will try to redeem myself," It replied, showing the slightest hint of an emotion that wasn't anger - remorse.

The ghost turned to looked at his grave, and held out a hand; with a look of concentration on his face, he pried the coffin lid open, after unfolding the flag from it. Sam thought to himself that this guy had some serious mojo that it would be pretty hard to go up against. Perhaps it was best to get him on their side, just because of that.

From the grave flew a set of dog tags, before the coffin lid slammed shut again. The ghost caught the tags, and threw them to Sam, whose expression was still baffled at the display of power.
"I might not be that old, but I'm a quick learner," The corporeal muttered by way of an explanation. Sam considered the dog tags in his hand, as the ghost continued, "Use these. Just call,"

With that final comment, James Spencer was gone.

Finally, Sam was able to run to Maggie's side, and have a proper look at her wrist. The limited light from the flashlight beside the grave was sufficient for him to see that though it had bled impressively, and looked quite dramatic, it wasn't debilitating. The skin was cut from where it had landed on what he guessed was a sharp piece of concrete, but it wasn't something he couldn't deal with.

"Hey. You okay?"
"No!" She snapped with a scowl.
"You want me to carry you or something?" He offered.
"No," She repeated, stubbornly.
"Okay, okay," Sam replied, holding his hands up in surrender with a small smirk, not at her expense, but at his own stupidity. "I need to get our stuff together, but I'll be back real soon, okay? The others can finish up filling the grave again. Keep pressure on that,"

She nodded, tugging off her jacket with hiss and pressing it to the wound. Sam thought to himself that she sure was tough – but rather that than breaking down. Save that stuff for later.

He quickly gathered all their stuff into his duffel, sweeping it all into the canvas with disregard, so as to quickly get back to Maggie. He noticed her camera clutched in her healthy hand; he realised that, despite the pain, she'd kept it angled at him and the spirit.
"You were filming?" He asked her, and she shrugged.
"I'm committed," She replied simply, "Gimme a hand,"

He continued holding the flashlight as she struggled to stand up with no hands free. He pulled her up eventually by her right arm, careful of jarring her left one.
"Thanks," She mumbled, and they began their journey back to the Impala.

When the car finally came into view, they both sighed in relief. Ed was in there, and Sam knew he was about to get yelled at for allowing his sister to be injured, but he didn't care: as long as they were back in the safety of the car, and could get to somewhere with better medical supplies and where they were less likely to be caught and convicted for grave desecration, it didn't matter.

As predicted, when they walked into the warm glow of the Impala's dipped headlights, Ed got out of the passenger side, hands on his head, eyes wide with shock and worry.
"Oh, God! What happened? Is she – are you – Sam! What the – you said you'd look after her!"
Either he kept starting sentences and not finishing them, or Sam's attention was waning because he simply didn't care about Ed's panicked ramblings right now. He helped Maggie into the backseat, making sure to lay down some blankets so as not to damage the upholstery that Dean had so lovingly restored after the crash, and had remained fairly pristine in the backseat come hell or high water.

"Ed," Sam cut in, interrupting the stream of abuse and questions aimed at him. "Listen to me carefully. I'm going to drive us back to the motel. I'll explain everything when we get back to the motel. But for now, stay in the back with Maggie. Help elevate her wrist, and keep pressure on it,"

Then, he wordlessly opened the driver's side door and climbed in, slamming the door against the Ghostfacer's protests and starting the car to try to get him to hurry up and get in. Fortunately, he did, and he stopped talking to Sam. He was more focussed on his sister as the last Winchester pulled out onto the road and towards town.

"What the hell happened?!" He hissed at her, but there was no real heat in it.
"Ghost," She replied plainly, "Threw me. Strangled Sam," She added, to let her brother know she hadn't been the only one to suffer.
"What?! You should have been more careful!"
"I was plenty careful! Stop worrying! Jeez, Ed,"
"You got hurt! This is his fault, we should have come here-"
"Shut up, Ed. We're Ghostfacers! We face ghosts!" She argued.
"Yeah, but-"
"Leave it, please," She requested with a death glare.
"Did you at least get rid of him?" Ed asked irritably, taking Maggie's camera from her and winding through the footage. Maggie continued to press down on her wound, and bit her lip.
"Not exactly," She admitted quietly.
"You didn't-"
"We'll talk about it later. We need the whole group," Sam interrupted gruffly, looking in his rear-view mirror to check they weren't being followed, and to look at his two bickering passengers.

The rest of the car drive went on in a tense silence after that. Strangely enough, it reminded him of every car journey where he and Dean had been bickering, until their dad had interrupted and told them to stop. Dean always stopped fighting immediately. Sam, despite fuming internally both at his father and his brother, always stopped too, in the end. He found the thought that he was having the same affect his father had had on him on his passengers rather uncomfortable. He shook himself, and turned back into the motel parking lot. They made the journey to his room in silence, too.

Sam entered first, dumping his supplies back beside his bed, and turning to Maggie.

"What – what happened?" Harry spluttered, wrapping an arm around Maggie at once when she entered the room. She rolled her eyes.
"We got jumped," She replied, stating the obvious.
"Sit down. I need to get a look at that," Sam pointed at her wrist. She sat on the bed, and Harry sat beside her in support.
"Aren't you gonna tell us-" Spruce asked.
"Triage first. Questions later," Sam recited. The rest of the group looked at one another for a moment, but they reluctantly agreed.

After a few minutes of careful manipulation of Maggie's wrist, and much deliberation, Sam determined that it wasn't broken: however, there was a long cut in it that needed tending to.

"Could someone get the first aid kit outta my duffel?" Sam asked without looking up. Spruce shot up at the opportunity: while he'd never invade Sam's duffel without his permission (he enjoyed his life too much to have it prematurely ended for trespassing), he jumped at the chance to look through it under legitimate circumstances.

A few minutes later, he retrieved the kit and handed it to Sam, who mumbled a quick 'thanks' and didn't seem to notice that Spruce had been nosing about in his bag for slightly too long.
"You're not – you're not gonna sew that up, are you?" Ed asked, going pale. Harry shifted where he sat next to Maggie, also looking a little green around the gills.

Sam sighed, and looked up.
". . . We'll see. It depends on how it looks once I've cleaned the area. It might look worse than it is,"
"Right. And where's your medical degree from?" Ed snapped, still angry at Sam in the first place.

Sam looked up and briefly glared at him. "I've sewn up more wounds than I can even count. I'll try not to add this one to the list," He disclosed.

Maggie hissed when he began to clean the wound.
"Sorry," He said softly, concentrating very hard on not making it worse.
"I got it on film . . . It's my own stupid fault, really," She ground out. She steeled herself, and told the rest of the group: "Sam was digging the grave when the spirit appeared and tried to strangle him. I swung at it with an iron bar, and it went away for a moment. I wasn't paying attention, and it came back, and threw me around. I threw my wrist out to stop my head from hitting a gravestone, and this happened,"
"So did you get it, then? Did you salt and burn it?" Spruce asked eagerly.
"No," Maggie replied, her eyes lingering on Sam for a moment, who was rummaging around in the bag, only half-listening to the story. "It started talking to Sam, begging him not to force him to move on,"
"So you let him go?!" Ed asked in disbelief.
"No, dumbass. It was more complicated than that. See, there's another ghost in town. A worse one,"

There was no reply from the Ghostfacers, whose faces were all the picture of shock and awe.
"What?" Spluttered Harry, his attention momentarily drawn from staring distractedly at Maggie's wrist.
"Thing is, the first ghost doesn't know who the second one is. Says he popped up a few months ago outta nowhere," She explained.
"Huh," Spruce said thoughtfully, his gaze drifting off into the middle distance.

"I think this is gonna require butterfly stitches at most. And a dressing over the top," Sam surmised at last.
"Is that – is that bad? Do you have to use a needle and thread or something?" Harry asked, receiving a jab in the ribs from Maggie, who cringed when she thought about getting the wound sewn up with household sewing fare.
"No. It's just sterilised strips that pull the wound together. No needles," He explained wearily, putting some gloves on.

Everyone in the room visibly relaxed. He shook his head: real hunters would understand that butterfly stitches meant it wasn't anything life-threatening, or even that bad. I guess real hunters wouldn't be afraid of using a needle and thread, though, he thought, remembering his and Dean's daring leap of faith from the top floor of a church, resulting in a dislocated shoulder for Dean and a hastily-self-stitched glass cut on the shoulder for him. Yup: he was certainly no stranger to the needle and thread method.

Then there was that time during the Trickster's time-loop, when he was stranded without Dean; he had to sew himself up countless times due to being stupid, and reckless, and violent, and not caring if he got hurt because Dean was gone and he wasn't coming back-

If only this time without Dean could be erased as quickly as that time had been, with the click of Gabriel's fingers. He sighed shakily, his amusement at the Ghostfacers' naivety gone replaced by sadness, and got on with the task at hand.

He fished the strips from the kit, and focused on putting them in place, before covering them with a dressing and finally, and bandage.
"Do not get that wet. At least, not for two days," He instructed, "And no heavy exercise for two weeks, either. Take a couple of these if you want, for the pain," He added, handing her a bottle of aspirin from the first aid kit.
"Thanks," She smiled, looking him in the eye. Harry also muttered his thanks quietly. Their gratitude was almost enough to clear away the thoughts of Dean he'd been having throughout treating Maggie's wrist. Almost.
He spared them both a small smile, before turning to address the group as a whole.

"So, two ghosts. One claims to be better than the other. Anyone figured it out yet?" He asked, surveying the group.
"The bad one would account for the near-deaths," Ed offered.
". . . And the good one – he would be the reason why they were 'near-deaths' rather than actual deaths, right?" Harry piped up, looking pleased with himself for working it out.
"Right," Sam confirmed, a small grin of pride on his face. Maybe these guys were getting it, after all. "So, the bad ghost starts a car and tries to run that businessman down-" Sam began.
"And Corporal Spencer reaches into it, turning the steering wheel and saving his life," Ed finished, a smile creeping slowly onto his face. They'd cracked it.

"Yeah, and the bad spirit made the chandelier fall down at the Greenbergs' house-" Maggie began.
"And the good spirit made sure it doesn't land on anyone," Harry finished.
"Looks like we've solved it, team," Sam said casually, though he knew how much of an impact him using the word 'team' to describe all of them, including himself, would have on the Ghostfacers. Indeed, they all seemed to brighten up – even Maggie, who was still a little pale from her injury. "All we need to do now is find out who our vengeful spirit is,"

The Ghostfacers nodded in agreement. He decided this would be a good time to head outside to the ice machine – his neck was beginning to throb, and he didn't want it to swell.
"Back in a minute," He mumbled, idly brushing his fingers against his neck and grabbing a handkerchief from his open duffel by the door.
"The vengeful spirit could be related in some way to all the victims?" Maggie proposed doubtfully, as he headed out of the door and into the quiet night.

The only noise out there was the chirrup of crickets, and the hum of the ice machine and vending machines: there was no one else around at this hour. He made his way to the ice machine, emptied some into his handkerchief, and pressed it to his throat. He leaned against the wall for a moment, and shut his eyes in thought.

He remembered the last time he'd been choked like it was yesterday. That tiny five-foot maid had tried - and almost succeeded - to strangle the life out of him while possessed, at the time, by Bobby. His adoptive father had lost it, and tried to kill him. He supposed it was karma, dealt up years too late, for him trying to choke Dean while high on demon blood, right before he broke the last seal of the Apocalypse. He hadn't managed to finish the job, thankfully: he'd left Dean on the floor of the motel's bridal suite, wheezing the immortal words –

If you walk through that door, don't you ever come back.

That time in his life – the demon blood, the detox, the fighting with Dean, and the worst mistake of his life – had been haunting him a lot recently. Perhaps now – what he was doing right now, helping the Ghostfacers – maybe this was his redemption.

"You lost a brother,"

He jumped, his eyes flying open in shock and surprise, as his hand went for the gun tucked into the small of his back. When he cast his eyes on who was addressing him, he kept his hand on the gun with a grimace. It was the corporal, ethereal and grey-tinted, looking at him with a painful level of understanding in his eyes. Though still angry, he looked much less furious than he had earlier on.
"Me too," Corporal Spencer added simply.

". . . I read about it," Sam replied eventually, after a period of time sizing the ghost up and assessing the danger to himself. He became aware of the dog-tags in his pocket as if they were burning him. He knew it was just his mind tricking him.
"You can't let go," Spencer stated (not a question, or an accusation). Sam bowed his head, staring at the concrete for a moment, and breathing steadily. He looked back up, and boldly replied, "It takes one to know one,"

The ghost didn't say anything for a moment, but looked Sam up and down.
"Aside from the war, Billy was my life, pretty much. Always looked up to me," He reminisced.

Sam nodded in silent understanding.
"He's not really gone. I'll see him again one day," Spencer insisted quietly. Sam felt sorry for him, clinging to that belief: it was the reason he couldn't let go, and move on. If he thought he'd see his brother's ghost, and be able to talk to him again, he'd stay around forever. But the chances were, if William Spencer hadn't shown up as a ghost and revealed himself to James already, he'd probably moved on long ago.

James was never going to see his brother again, dead or alive.
"Dean . . . My brother. I know he's gone forever. I'll never see him again," Sam admitted finally, looking the spirit dead in the eyes. It felt strange to say: while it was the most plain, deadeningly obvious thing in the world to have to admit to, it was at the same time heart-wrenching. His only solace was that his voice didn't break while he muttered it: it remained toneless. He wouldn't have even been able to say that two weeks ago.

Rather than agreeing with or contradicting him, Spencer jut gave him a sad smile, and disappeared.

Sam breathed out a sigh of relief, and held the ice back up to his neck. He made his way back to the room quickly, in case Spencer's ghost had somehow attracted the other ghost to their location. It was unlikely, but it happened occasionally.

He slipped back into the room, and approached the windowsill quietly. He took out the dog tag, and silently placed it behind the salt line there. He didn't really want the corporal in his room while he slept, and he seemed to just appear whenever he felt like it.

As Sam worked, he listened to the Ghostfacers' continuation of their earlier conversation:
"It could be connected to just one of the victims – I mean, it could be related to all of them somehow, but they don't seem to have a lot in common," Harry suggested.
"Right, and then, like – it gets super pissed off, and it attacks other people in the area as well as its intended victim, just cause it wants to watch the world burn," Ed theorised with enthusiasm.
"Could be," Sam encouraged, happy to sit back and let them do the thinking for once.

Most of them startled, having not noticed him enter through the open door due to being enthralled by their conversation. Sam shook his head at this: they still haven't learned to remain vigilant. Even after him surprise-attacking Spruce, they still hadn't learned their lesson when it came to being aware of their surroundings.

"Wait a second!" Spruce cried suddenly, grabbing his laptop and drawing the attention of everyone in the room. After some frantic typing and clicking, he laughed to himself, "I knew it! – I think we have a lead on which of the victims the spirit's related to-"

He spun the laptop around to the rest of the group, beaming at his discovery. "I read this a couple of hours ago, but I didn't think it would be relevant til now. It took me a while, but I remembered where I saw it eventually-"

It was an article in a local hobbyist magazine – some 'friends of the Earth'-style group for local citizens. The headline read, 'Notorious Animal Researcher Moves to SLO'. As Sam read it, his eyebrows raised gradually higher, as the author put their unique spin on the occupation of the man in question – referring to him as a 'torturer' and 'murderer' of animals amongst other things, for owning a controlling share in a pharmaceutical company that relied heavily on animal research.

The article named and shamed the shareholder: Jack Greenberg. It also mentioned that he and his family moved in around late May.
". . . Late May. They moved in a few months ago!" Spruce clarified when he found that the rest of the group weren't reading quite as fast as he'd like.
"Which correlates with the appearance of the ghost," Ed murmured, fascinated.
"Looks like we're gonna have to visit the Greenbergs again," Sam conceded, not too happy about having to talk to that confrontational woman again. The rest of the group didn't seem to mind, though: they were all high-fiving one another and smiling, proud that they'd managed to figure out the tough case. Sam laughed at them, but accepted a few high-fives incredulously.

"And scene," Ed cried, winking at one of the nearby cameras he'd rigged up to catch this moment on film.
Maggie rolled her eyes and punched him lightly on the shoulder with her good hand, laughing, "You're such a dork,"