Lessons Learned, Part 2, Supernatural - Keeper!Verse, PG-13

[phantisma]

Fandom: Supernatural, Keeper!Verse
Title: Lessons Learned, Part 2 (All Keeper Verse Here)
Rating: PG-13 (for this partl)
Word Count: 19,000 (total)
Pairings/Characters: Sam/Dean (long term established wincest), John, Dana (Dean's daughter), Scott (OMC), OCs
Summary: Dana deals (or doesn't) with the fall out of the attack, while the boys try to rally around her and still track down the bastard who did it.

A/Ns & Warnings: This story pics up shortly after Finally Home. There are four parts (I think), almost complete. I will be posting them over the next few days. There is some angst and some schloomp and Dana learning a few lessons, and a little bit of sex and a whole lot of schloomp at the end. As ever in Keeper!verse, thanks go to shotofjack for the beta of awesome and for keeping me sane. *loves*




Scott was slumped down in the chair across the room. Dean was pacing. Sam sat on the bed, his hand on Dana’s uninjured hand. He was trying to find something to tell him what had happened.

Suddenly, Dean was beside him. “We should have killed it.” Dean’s voice cracked a little. “We should have fucking killed it.”

Sam opened his eyes, reached for Dean. “It wasn’t Bellius Dean.”

It had been his first fear too. That somehow Bellius had escaped and attacked Dana because it couldn’t get to Sam. But there was no evidence of that, there were no tracks of psychic violence, no shredding of memory and mental defenses. There were no mental defenses at all. They were just gone, as if they’d never been there at all.

He still got no sense of her presence, or rather, he did…but it wasn’t Dana, it was…flat. Like Scott or any other person with no gifts. Nothing to interact with. It affected more than her extra senses too. From what he could tell, she’d been blinded and deafened at the very least. He wasn’t sure what or how, but something or someone had put Dana down, more effectively than anything he could have imagined.

“If not that thing, then what?” Dean asked. ‘What could do this to her?”

Sam squeezed Dean’s hand. “I don’t know Dean. But we’ll find out.”

“It was a guy.” Scott said suddenly. “Just…a guy. Solid, you know? I hit him.”

Sam turned to look at him. “Did you get a good look?”

Scott shook his head. “It was dark. He was…big, like you. He…was strong. I couldn’t stop him.”

Sam slid off the bed and went to Scott. “Would it be okay if I looked? If I tried to see what you saw?”

Scott blanched white, his eyes skipping to Dean, then back. “Yeah…I mean…it’s not like I can stop you anyway.”

Sam squatted in front of him. “I promise you Scott, I have never and will never enter your mind without permission except in an emergency.”

Scott nodded, but didn’t look any happier about it. “What should I do?”

“Just relax. Close your eyes and take a deep breath and let it out slowly.” He waited until Scott had let the breath out, and made his intrusion as gently as possible. Show me.

The memory spooled out, panic flooding through him as he realized something was wrong, the sight of the dark shadow on top of Dana. He wasn’t as big as Scott had recounted, the dark and fear playing together to make him huge in Scott’s mind. Sam backed out and up and stood.

“Thank you. That helps. Why don’t you see about getting some coffee. I have the feeling it’s going to be a long night.” He waited until Scott left to react, anger spilling into his veins as he turned to Dean. “He’s right. It was just a man.” He reached for Dean mentally, drawing him to him. “It wasn’t supernatural. What he wanted…”

Dean stiffened as he sensed where Sam’s thoughts went. “No. Dana doesn’t get put down like this by normal. Not Dana. Not my little girl.”

Sam wrapped his arms around him. “She’s okay.”

Dean shuddered, holding to Sam. Sam brought up the image he’d taken from Scott, held it where they could both see. There wasn’t much detail, all dark and shadow. It was straddling her, hitting her, touching her.

Dean pulled back, pulled away. “Stop. Just stop.”

There was a groan from the bed and they turned in unison. “Dana, honey?”

Her eyes weren’t open, but her hand fluttered to her head. She jumped when Dean touched her. “Dana, open your eyes.”

She did, but looked panicked, her eyes darting from Dean to Sam and back again. “Dad? Sam? I can’t….” Both hands went to her head. “I can’t feel you…why…” Her eyes caught on the splint on her right hand and she fought to breathe.

Sam reached for her, soothing her. I’m right here Dana.

She looked at him, squinting. He could tell she was trying to find their connection. “Easy, honey. You’re hurt. Don’t push.” She swallowed and lowered her hands. “Can you tell us what happened?”

She shook her head. “I…I don’t really know. I was walking, talking to Scott…then everything went dark and I couldn’t…” She looked up at Dean with tears in her eyes. “He was right there and I couldn’t sense him. He…he was right there…and he…grabbed me…and…”

Big tears spilled onto her cheeks and Dean gathered her up in his arms, stroking over her back. “It’s okay. You’re safe. I’ve got you.”


The dark was close, stifling, smothering. She reached out, but there was nothing there…no sound, no light…just the stifling black and the taste of blood. Then there were hands…falling and flailing and hands on her feet, on her thighs…heavy weight holding her down. She screams, but there’s no sound, no words…just endless silence and terror as those hands touch her.

Dana jerked awake, panting, gulping at the air. Her vision was still blurry, but she could make out the head laying next to her hand as her father’s. She started when she saw movement to her right, even more when the dark shadow moved toward her, but as he got close enough she realized it was Sam.

“Hey.”

She swallowed and looked away.

“Bad dream?”

She couldn’t feel him. It was disconcerting. It was too quiet without him there in her head. Without all of them. Only her own voice, her own thoughts.

“Scott chased the guy off. But he didn’t get a good look.” Sam said and she closed her eyes. He wanted permission to look inside her. That’s what she would want.

“I didn’t see him. Blind at the time.” Dana said, crossing her arms.

“I know.” Sam’s voice was gentle, but it grated, stung. She couldn’t even defend herself. She couldn’t have stopped him.

Dana licked her lips and looked at Sam. “What…what did he do? To my head?”

Sam pressed his lips together. “I haven’t figured it out. He turned you off somehow.”

“Well…turn me back on. I can’t feel anything.”

“If I could, you know I would.”

She paled, realizing he had probably already been in her head. He had probably already seen it all. He was probably in there right now, monitoring her. She started shaking. “I need to…I want out of here. It’s not safe here.”

“Dana, calm down.”

She started to pull the covers off, waking her father. “Get out of my head Sam…and get out of the way.” Her feet found the floor and her right ankle gave out. Sam caught her and she screamed involuntarily, pulling away and landing on the cold floor.

Nothing was right. Everything felt stilted and wrong. Her father knelt beside her, but she pulled away, covered her face. “Don’t….don’t touch me.” She was trembling. Weak. It disgusted her.

“Dana.” Her father’s voice was in her ear, too close.

She tried to pull it all inside, but it wasn’t the same. She couldn’t swallow the fear.

“Let me help.” Sam said softly, his hand on her cheek.

She shook her head, though it was hard to discern due to the shaking of her entire body. “I just…I can’t.” She looked up at him, through tears.

“Let’s just get you off the floor.” Dean said, looking meaningfully up at Sam. She knew they were connected, that they were sliding thoughts back and forth…thoughts about her.

She didn’t fight as he helped her up. Sam backed away, over to the door. She didn’t look at him, didn’t want to see the hurt on his face. Dana turned into her father, her face buried in his neck. “Please, Daddy…just take me home. I want to go home.”

“You have a pretty serious concussion, and broken ribs and a broken nose. You need to stay where the doctors can keep an eye on you,” he said softly, his hand stroking down her back. “We’re not leaving.”

She shivered, holding him tight. He didn’t smell like her father. His skin felt strange. She pulled back. Closed her eyes. Panic seized her. What if it wasn’t real? What if this wasn’t her father? Not Sam?

“I just want to be alone.” It was a lie. She was terrified of being alone. Terrified that it would come back. Whatever it was. At the moment, she was just as terrified that none of this was real.

Her father looked at Sam. Sam nodded a little. Her father stood, kissed her forehead. “We’ll be right outside.”

When the door closed, Dana doubled forward, clutching at her stomach. Her ribs hurt, and queasy waves of terror rolled through her. It didn’t make sense. None of it. She couldn’t see right, her hearing was muffled. What if it was all a lie? What if they didn’t feel like Dad and Sam because they weren’t Dad and Sam?

Or worse. What if they were, and she could never feel them again?



Dean closed the door and leaned against it, his eyes closed. Sam was a warm blanket over his back, physically and mentally holding him while he fought back the tears. Seeing his little girl like that…terrified. Dana was seldom even afraid.

He hadn’t wanted to leave her, but Sam gave him a good indication of what was going through her head, and their being there wasn’t helping. In fact, it was only making it worse.

He leaned into Sam, into the warm pool of Sam. I’ve never seen her so afraid.

Sam’s hands stroked over his back. She’s a strong girl, she’ll be okay…but being without her gifts must be terrifying. She’s never been without them.

Dean took a deep breath and stood straight. “So, what could do this?” Dean shifted back to verbal words, but held tight to the connection.

Sam sighed. “Honestly? I don’t really know. I mean…I’ve heard of gifts being repressed, and there’s a story or two about an adept being stripped of their gifts, but those are mostly myth…warnings about abuse.”

Dean froze, remembering Dana’s fear that she took the dark stuff far too casually…and Bellius, who had tried to strip Sam of at least one of his gifts. “You don’t think…”

Sam shook his head. “No, it’s all there…it’s just…dormant, or something.”

“How is that even possible?”

“I wish I knew. If I had to guess, it’s almost like some…spell.” Sam turned suddenly, looking at the door to Dana’s room. “Like a spell to suspend her senses.”

“You know a spell like that?”

Sam made a face. “Sort of. I remember reading about one. It was used for initiations, more complete than blindfolds and ear plugs I guess. Problem is, spells like that are notoriously hard to control. It takes practice to narrow the focus…and the slightest disruption of control, can leave a person alone inside themselves with no access to the outside world.”

“So…we’re looking for someone with practice?”

Sam shook his head. “No, I don’t think so. I think the bulk of the spell took out her gifts, and that’s why he didn’t blow out her other senses completely.”

Dean was trying to follow Sam’s thoughts, but they were jumping from books to stories to a newspaper story from the week before. Dean frowned. He remembered the story.

A young woman was found near the downtown post office. She’d been assaulted and left for dead. She was catatonic and eventually she died from complications to her injuries. Dean whistled low. “You think that’s our guy too?”

Sam shrugged. “I don’t know. It would explain why she was catatonic. She was conscious but had no way to interact with the world around her.”

That could have been Dana. The thought echoed through both of them.

“But it wasn’t.” Sam said softly.

Dean nodded. “What about her power? Will it come back?”

“Her eyesight and hearing did, but they took less of the blow. I really don’t know. This is new territory.”

“Well, you’re book boy, you better get started. When she’s ready to talk, she’s going to want answers.”

“You going to be okay here alone?”

Dean nodded. “Yeah, go. I’ll be fine. I’ll call Dad, fill him in.”

Sam kissed his cheek and headed down the hall. Dean sank into the chair outside Dana’s door and slowly slouched until his head was on the back of it. Daylight was coming, and a part of Dean wanted to be out there hunting down the bastard who had tried to…who had hurt his girl. A bigger part of him wouldn’t dream of leaving her, so alone and vulnerable.


Sam knocked and waited, smiling as he felt his father approaching the door. His smile faded when the door opened. John Winchester was not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination, but Sam hadn’t seen him look so rough in a long time.

“Over slept.” John grumbled, stepping aside to let Sam in. “Dean called, told me what happened.”

“We would have called last night, but she didn’t need four guys hanging out in her room.”

“We know what it was yet?”

“Who not what.” Sam corrected, watching John pad into the kitchen with his bathrobe half off one shoulder.

“Who?” John peeked back out of the kitchen.

“Yeah. Who.” Sam grimaced and turned to the giant bookshelves that dominated the west wall of his father’s apartment. “You have this ancient spell book…it’s hand written, black cover.”

“Top shelf, left side.” John said, returning to the living room with two cups of coffee. “What’s in it?”

Sam stood on his toes and ran a hand over the book spines until he felt it and pulled it to him. “If I remember correctly, a spell that could do what happened to Dana.”

He took the book to the couch and took the cup of coffee from his father.

“What exactly did happen?” John sat, holding his cup of coffee close to him as if needing the warmth that floated off the hot liquid.

Sam shrugged and took a sip before he opened the book. “Essentially, I think he used a spell to knock all her senses off line. It should be temporary. She’s already getting her vision and hearing back.”

“So witch? What?”

Sam shrugged again. “I don’t know.” And he was sick of having to say that. “I’ve called in a few favors, and I have people working on it…but I think that our best bet is going to be figuring out what spell he’s using and track it the next time he uses it.”

“Next time?” John glared at him. “What do you mean, next time?”

Sam put the book down and looked at him. Obviously Dean didn’t relay the whole story. “I think he’s a…he’s done it before. He’ll do it again.”

“Are you saying he wasn’t targeting Dana?”

“Not specifically no.”

They were both quiet for a minute. John didn’t look up when he spoke. “Dana…she’s…okay?”

Sam licked his lips. “Scott got there before he could…do much. Most of her injuries are from her struggle to get away, and when she hit the ground.”

“That’s twice that boy has saved her life.” John muttered. “You said there were other victims?”

Sam nodded. “Naomi Walnot. She was 19, dark hair. Found near her car downtown. She’d been beat up, raped, stabbed. She was unresponsive. Died from an infection in one of her wounds.”

“I’ll see if I can get my buddy to run the pattern, maybe…maybe he’s hit somewhere else before. Maybe start narrowing it down.”

“Good. You work from that direction, I’ll take this and see what I can do on the magical side of things.”

“Trap him in the middle.” John nodded. When he looked at Sam his normally warm eyes were hard and cold. “And then he learns what happens when you mess with a Winchester.”



Dana managed to get from her bed to the bathroom, though it was far more work than it should have been. Her depth perception was trashed, and her ankle screamed in pain. Nothing was where it should be…nothing felt right, normal.

The image in the mirror was worse than she’d anticipated. Both eyes were black and blue, her nose taped down. There were stitches in her chin, though she couldn’t remember why, and two small stitches on her cheek where she remembered his fist connecting at least twice.

Her ribs were taped up, her ankle wrapped. There was a splint on her wrist. There was a knot on the back of her head that the doctors were blaming for the loss of vision and hearing.

Still, she’d gotten off light. With no way of knowing who or what or where her attacker was, Dana could have gotten herself killed. He clearly liked causing pain. He kept hitting her even after she’d gone down. Though, she didn’t really feel it at the time. It was as odd, knowing she was going to die…and not being able to see or hear or feel or smell anything.

She knew though. Knew he would kill her…but not before he had his fun. Not before he made her bleed. Not before he touched her. Used her.

Dana shuddered and turned her back on the mirror. The movement rocked her and she nearly fell. Her balance was shot. She couldn’t even stand up like a normal person.

She felt alone. Scared and alone. Anyone could walk in on her and she’d be defenseless. Everything she was lay open and bare. Slowly, Dana closed the bathroom door, locked it, and slid down to sit on the floor against it.

It didn’t make her feel any safer.



“You look beat.”

Dean looked up at his father who held out a bag of take out and a cup of coffee. He sighed and nodded. “I am.”

“How’s our girl?”

Dean looked at the door, then up at his father. “Scared to death.” He took the coffee. “Doctor says that she can probably go home later today.”

“That’s good.”

Dean sipped at the coffee. “Yeah, I guess.” He hated how helpless he felt. “I’ve never been so afraid.”

“Has she given you any description of the guy?”

Dean shook his head. “Cops were here an hour or so ago. She barely spoke to them. She asked me to leave her alone again as soon as they were gone. Scott was here, but he had to get to class.”

John came to sit beside him. “What about Scott?”

Dean closed his eyes, the image Sam had gotten from Scott filling his mind. “He didn’t get a good look, he was focused on getting the bastard off of Dana.” Dean’s hand was shaking. He took a deep breath. His father’s hand touched his shoulder.

“Why don’t you go get some sleep? I’ll stay.”

Dean shook his head. “Not leaving her.”

The hand on his shoulder tightened. “Dean, you’re going to end up in a room down the hall yourself if you don’t sleep soon.”

“I know. But…I can’t, Dad. I can’t leave her.”

Screams erupted from the room, blood curdling, terrified screams. Dean dropped the coffee and was in the room before his father had even stood. Dana was sitting up, panting, her eyes filled with fear. Dean crossed the room and reached for her but she pulled away.

“Dana, honey. It’s Dad.”

She swallowed, looking from him to the doorway and back. “I-I thought…he was here…I couldn’t feel him.” She took in a deep, shaky breath. “I’m okay.” He wasn’t sure if she was trying to convince him or herself.

Dean sat on the bed beside her. “I’m right here, Dana. Not letting anything near you.”

“I know. I do.” Her eyes darted to the door again and she started, then relaxed. “Papa?”

“Right here, baby girl.” John said, coming to sit on the other side of the bed. “How are you feeling?”

“Pretty shaky.” Dana said, dragging her hand through her hair. “Kind of drugged. Really sore.”

“The doctor said he was going to let you go home soon.” Dean offered.

“Home?” She looked shaken at the idea. “With you?”

Dean nodded. “At least for now.”

“Yeah, okay.” She nodded, pulling her knees up to her chest. “For now.”