Sons of the Morning

Chapter 1

From the tomb of Paheri, an Eighteenth dynasty Egyptian

As translated by James P. Allen

"Your life happening again, without your ba being kept away from your divine corpse, with your ba being together with the akh…you shall emerge each day and return each evening. A lamp will be lit for you in the night until the sunlight shines forth on your breast. You shall be told "Welcome, welcome into this your home of the living!"

Bands of morning sunlight fell across Dean's face, waking him from a mild doze. He glanced at Sam's bed and was pleased to see his brother there.

"Hey Sam, wakey, wakey," Dean called. "Whose turn is it to go get breakfast?"

Sam rolled to his side and eyed his brother.

"I'll go. I haven't been asleep much. I went out walking late last night through the valley and there are things I want to see in the daylight."

"If you were walking last night, did you get your boots wet? Or were you doing your freaky spirit thing?" Dean asked.

Sam rolled back on the bed and threw an arm over his eyes. "I went out in spirit. Stop making fun of me. I'm going to go out now and see what it looks like in the daylight.."

"Alright then", Dean yawned, "Just bring back breakfast from the real world. I want real breakfast, not spirit bagels, thank you. And keep an eye out for the cops. They didn't look happy to see us yesterday, although they never did explain why they pulled us over. I bet they thought we were running moonshine. Do you think we were profiled? You know, smart mouth outsiders in a muscle car? Can we sue for that? Isn't that discrimination?"

"Right, shut up jerk." Sam answered with a roll of his eyes. "Did you get the feeling they didn't like me, or you, for that matter?"

"OK," Dean grunted "Just make sure you don't piss them off enough to shoot you."

When locked in the cage with Lucifer, Sam had endured the tortures, bathed in the Morning Star's overwhelming light. But behind it all there had been something else. Something the fallen angel was attempting to obscure, much like an illusionist's distraction: "No, don't look there, look at me!" The oldest trick in the magician's book, like Oz's Wizard's "Ignore the man behind the curtain. There is nothing there! Look at me!"

But Sam had seen glimpses of something hidden; something timeless and older and it had given him peace. A dream of floating on an endless quiet sea and that was what had saved Sam's mind. His soul split and he was given a gift. He could walk in spirit.

There were thoughts older than the angels. There were forms that were strong when HaShem was wandering in the deserts of the Fertile Crescent. Stories of life and death and rebirth, formalized and dreamed before the tales of the Western world and these were what sustained Sam in Lucifer's cage. Now he was out and these dreams stayed with him, a rebirth of his own.

Now he was capable of sending out his Ka to walk the earth, while the rest of his soul, as named by the ancients the Ib and Shent, the Ren and Akh, rested behind his eyes in sleep. The Ka called to other, wandering sprits and let him commune with them, console them and comfort them.

He had looked last night for the source of the violent spirit that was attacking people in the valley below. It rushed on them from out of the hills, blew through as a chilly wind and ripped their minds apart.

Some leaped to their deaths from roadside cliffs. Others threw themselves into oncoming traffic thereby creating a double tragedy. Any way that they could find to destroy themselves and escape the influence of the spirit they immediately set to effect. There did not seem to be one central location other than simply the hills.

Sam had felt a despairing spirit last night but he could not locate it exactly and so he had nothing to give to Dean to act upon. He had to further research the history of these hills and try to find a cause for so much anger. He had to identify the spirit and learn its' story so they could possibly set it to rest or destroy it. He would walk the valley in body today and see what he could learn.

He wandered to the village, walking the dirt road down the hill from the cabin they had been given as a base of operations. Their employer was the owner of not only the campground their cabin was built on but also the owner of the little gas station and general store in the middle of the village.

A regular one man band, Paul Kraft was very unhappy about the occasional body scattered around his scenic attraction. They were bad for business. Sam dropped in for coffee and muffins and engaged Paul in conversation about the history of the area.

Sam wandered back up the road to Dean. Armed with hot coffee and blueberry muffins he pushed open the cabin door.

"Hey Dean, I've got a lead on our vengeful spirit" he called out.

"Great. What is it?" Dean replied from the bathroom.

"Well, come out of there and I'll tell you. I've got muffins, by the way." Sam put his plunder on the table and sat down.

Dean appeared, drying his hair with a fluffy towel and sat down, making a grab for the bag.

"So spill, what have we got?" Dean bit into his first muffin and washed it down with the coffee. "Good stuff, by the way. You get this from Paul's store?"

"Yeah, I got muffins and info. It really is one stop shopping with Paul, just as advertised. Have you noticed those concrete slabs pushed up against the hillsides around here? There is one just down the road a bit." Sam went on munching his own muffin.

"Yeah, what are those things? They look like gigantic tombstones" Dean asked.

"That is exactly what they are," Sam answered "they are coal mine tombstones. That's how they seal off worked out or collapsed coal mines.

They keep the local kids from wandering in and getting killed. They lay a plinth and erect the wall against the hillside to keep it from sliding. Of course, the locals know what they are and they warn kids not to walk around behind them or up the hill because as the mine supports slowly rot away underground, sink holes form in the woods. Just a really unpleasant way to die and disappear forever is what that is. The locals also have been known to use them as garbage dumps. So, that's lots of fun, all the way around.

In the city they tell the kids to look both ways while crossing the street. Out here in the country they tell the kids to watch out for the ground crumbling under their feet. Another fun fact that Paul told me is that some of these mines actually have bodies buried in them from guys killed during collapses. Mine safety wasn't a high priority back in the day. A lot of times they didn't bother to dig the bodies out for fear of getting someone else killed. They figured, why dig up a body if you're just going to put it back in the ground, an unattractive piece of Appalachian history. There is a strong possibility our spirit is one of these miners."

"So how the hell are we going to identify our spirit and get it to stop getting people killed?" Dean responded, munching his way through another muffin "not to mention, how are we supposed to burn bones we don't have a chance to get at?"

"Let me work on that tonight" Sam responded "I'll try to get him to tell me what he wants. Maybe then we can figure out a way to put him down. Our only chance might be to try and give him what he needs."

"You know what scares me." Dean commented. "how do I keep you safe when you are wandering around communing with spirits? It gives me the willies."

"Just stand guard, Dean. You know how to call me back, if it gets to that. You've done it before. I trust you. You get to be my spirit lamp again. I'll follow you home."

"Great," Dean grumped. " I get to be a light fixture."

That night they went out on the porch with blankets and cushions. Dean also brought along a bottle of vanilla extract from the kitchen. They arranged themselves at the top of the stairs and looked out over the valley. Sam sat and leaned back onto Dean's chest and put his head against Dean's shoulder. Dean wrapped his arms around his brother and held on as Sam drifted off. His eyes closed and his breathing slowed. Around midnight for just a few minutes Sam awoke.

"I need a talisman; a coin, a feather, something of either value or beauty. Have you got anything on you? Even a penny will do. Just put it in my hand." He said to Dean.

Dean stuck a hand into his pocket and came up with a piece of green ocean glass he had been carrying around with him because it felt nice to touch. He put it into Sam's hand and closed his fingers over it. Sam smiled and went away again. Dean stayed on guard.