A/N This is the sequel to "Fellowship of the Nine". I don't think it's necessary to read that one first, this chapter will give you everything you need to know, but it can't hurt either.

Two Brothers

Ghosts were real. I had learned that lesson the hard way. Life shattering, three friends dead hard way.

Only four of us were still there, Eric, Andrea, Brenda and me, Luis, and every time we saw each other after that horrible weekend it reminded us of what had happened. Of how our normal little lives weren't that normal anymore. We had caught a glimpse behind the curtain and we had to live with that. We stayed friends but we didn't fight the forces driving us apart.

Eric and Andrea moved away, away from California, to different parts of the country. I saw them a few times but our visits became more and more infrequent until we stopped seeing each other completely.

I on the other hand couldn't just move on with my life like nothing had happened and neither could Brenda. We wanted, needed to know. Not necessarily about ghosts but about Sam Winchester who used to be our friend at Stanford and about his brother Dean.

Imagine our surprise when we found out that Dean was dead. Shot in a bizarre case of tortured and murdered young women.

Imagine our surprise when we found another familiar name. Becky Warren, Dean's last victim and the only one who had survived.

Becky hadn't been a close friend of mine but she and her brother Zach had been good friends with Sam and Jess.

Brenda and I paid her a visit. Becky was happy to see us but clammed up when we asked about Dean Winchester who had been shot in her living room, who had kidnapped and tortured her. At least that was the official version. A version I would have believed before that one weekend. Becky told us her story the same way I'd told the official version of my story a hundred times by then.

Brenda and I shared a look and then took the risk and told her our truth. Then Becky told us her truth. Apparently ghosts weren't the only evil things out there.

After that Brenda and I agreed to not dig any farther. I for my part didn't want to know what else was out there. I couldn't do what Sam and his brother did and I had no idea of how to handle the stuff I already knew.

What I knew was that I couldn't go back to my college life as if nothing had changed. Physics had been my thing, the unbreakable laws that define our universe, but after seeing those unbreakable laws easily been broken it had become a farce.

To be honest, I had been pretty useless back in that cabin. I'd been good at accusing Dean of horrible things but otherwise? Not so much.

But one thing was stuck in my head. The way Sam had put stitches in his brother's flesh, calm and concentrated, like it was daily business. For him it probably was.

I couldn't go out and fight ghosts and shapeshifters but if somebody asked "Is there a doctor in the house?" I could be the guy standing up with a confident "Yes!"

I switched to medicine and became a doctor. Doctor Luis Waiden, sounds good, doesn't it?

My life after that was … restless, I think. Never was with a girl longer than a few months, never stayed in one place longer than a few years. I stayed in contact with Brenda, more or less, but never really made friends with anyone besides that.

Do I hear you say trust issues? One of my closest friends had murdered his girlfriend who had been another good friend of mine. I'd believed him when he'd said he was innocent. Later she became a vengeful spirit and tried to kill all of us. Good thing another close friend of mine turned out to be a professional ghost hunter. Let's just say, I became careful with choosing my friends.

I kept an ear out for Sam, though. I was in shock when I heard he died in that gas explosion. Didn't believe in the blood thirsty psychopaths the news wanted us to think the Winchester brothers were.

Instead I bemoaned the loss of a good friend.

Years later both Winchesters were all over the news again. Two maniacs on a killing spree. Didn't believe that either. I thought of a shapeshifter buried with Dean's face under Dean's name in St. Louis.

When the news came that those things were dead, I breathed in relief but I doubted that the real Sam and Dean Winchester were still alive out there. They had been declared dead twice so far, Dean even three times, and c'mon how often can you fool the authorities? A part of me still hoped they were out there but when I didn't hear anything in quite a while I was convinced that my friend Sam Winchester was dead.

I didn't expect to see him again.

For sure I didn't expect him to die on my operation table.

tbc