Just a short piece set in either season one or two... enjoy.

In too Deep
Chapter 1: Sinking Like A Stone

When Dean regained consciousness, all he could focus on was his pounding headache. Every heartbeat hit like a hammer and each time it did, he could feel it in the back of his throbbing head. It was the sound of distant engines roaring through the woods that brought him back to his senses; a small comfort to know that the men who'd done this to him, were finally gone. He didn't know for sure how long he'd been out, but assumed it had been no more than a few minutes if he could still hear them speeding away into the cold, damp night. What had just happened wasn't quite clear, but what he did know without a doubt, was that he was in over his head. He let out a groan as he tried to straighten out, but the ropes and rusty barb wire wrapped around his wrists, held him firmly in place. He swore under his breath, frustrated that everything was a haze inside his pounding head... he couldn't even remember what had led to the situation he currently found himself in. With his hands bound tightly together around an old fence post behind his back, he couldn't really move at all, let alone reach for the flip blade in his pocket to free himself. His mind started to race as he tried to think of a reason why they'd tied him up and left him there... what if they weren't done with him, what if they intended to come back and finish him off?

"You alright Sam?" Dean quietly started, pausing for only a moment as he once again tried to straighten out. "We need to get the Hell out of here before those sons of bitchs come back, any ideas?" He continued, assuming that his younger brother would be tied to one of the other fence posts nearby. When he didn't get a reply, he took a quick glance around, only then realizing that Sam wasn't there with him; something that only added to the worries circling inside his pounding head. The sight of a tall grassy field in front of him was somewhat unsettling, for a moment, he wasn't even sure where he was anymore. Last he remembered, he was in a dirt lot or a clearing of some kind. "Sammy?" He repeated, his voice the only thing he could hear now that the roaring engines had faded away. He listened intently but there was still no reply, only the constant sound crickets & frogs in the night, and a distant knocking that he couldn't quite place. He shivered as the cool air slithered across his face, reminding him of the gash in his cheek and the moment the butt of a pistol had dropped him to his knees in the dirt. The events of the night were a blur, but from what he could remember, things had gone downhill fast.

It had all started with a simple hunt, a small town dealing with as many as twenty missing people spanning the last two decades, all vanishing without a trace from the same stretch of road. Since they were all last seen driving away from a bar just on the outskirts of town, that's where he and his brother had ended up... Didn't take much digging around to figure out that there was nothing supernatural about the job they were working, just a questionable Sheriff with a shady past, an even shadier entourage and a string of botched investigations. As far as they could tell, witness accounts had been ignored, reports had never been filed and ground searches along that stretch of road, had never even been conducted. There was a secret linking all these cases together and the further they went into their own investigation, the more apparent it became that the Sheriff was involved. The man knew much more than he was telling them and when Sam asked if divers had ever been brought in to search a nearby lake, his tone took a drastic turn and their simple hunt went straight to Hell.

Dean put his head back against the old wooden fence post behind him, as bits and pieces slowly started coming back to him. Though the fine details were still just out of reach, the night's events were beginning to get clearer, and the more he remembered, the worse it got. He couldn't recall what Sam and the Sheriff had argued about at the bar, but it was a heated exchange of words that resulted in a string of threats, followed by a menacing order to get the Hell out of town. To diffuse the explosive situation, they did as they were told; but when two old trucks pulled out of the parking lot behind them, it became obvious that they wouldn't be able to just walk away from what they'd stumbled into. He had his foot to the floor and the Impala was quick to respond, but he wasn't able to leave them behind, that's when he realized that he and his brother weren't being followed down that dark winding road, they were being chased. Refusing to become one of the many who were last seen driving down that curvy stretch, he had taken a sharp turn off the main road, hoping to evade the men that were running them down. It didn't work, and before he knew it, the paved road had turned to washed out gravel and Sam couldn't find it on the map he was desperately trying to read with nothing more than a flashlight. When they suddenly emerged from the woods, crashing through a closed gate in the process, he had been forced to hit the brakes and bring the car to a skidding stop. In front of them; a steep slope overlooking the lake, behind them, a handful of men ready to make sure their secret wasn't going to surface any time soon. The last thing he remembered was stepping out of the car as the two old trucks came racing out of the woods behind them. The Sheriff was there, but he couldn't even remember if there had been another exchange of words or if maybe this time, it had been gunfire.

When a strange sound caught his attention, breaking him from his scattered thoughts and scarce memories, Dean turned slightly to take a glance behind him; swearing under his breath as the simple movement brought something else to mind. The sharp pain that pulled at his left shoulder suddenly put into focus the very moment the Sheriff's bullet had torn through his flesh. He had been shot... How he could have forgotten such a thing was beyond him, but now that the searing pain was there to remind him, he could remember turning away as the other man stepped out of the truck, a loaded gun in his hand. It had all happened so fast, next thing he knew he took a hit to the face and he was down for the count. He swallowed hard, ignoring the pain as he craned his neck to see around the fence post he was tied to. Barely able to see what was behind him, his eyes were instantly drawn to the only source of light; the red glow of the Impala's tail lights down at the bottom of the steep slope. The sight of the car's back end sticking out of the dark water made his heart skip a beat and his breath catch in the back of his throat, that's when all of the missing pieces suddenly fell into place.

What was missing from his thoughts only moments ago, was now so vivid it made his stomach turn. It was the startling conclusion his brother had reached, that had left him in his current predicament. The cars hadn't vanished along that stretch of treacherous road, they'd been dumped into the lake from a lookout nearby; and all of the people who'd been reported missing over that last two decades? They had been murdered at the hands of that small town's Sheriff and his cronies. There wasn't a shred of doubt in his mind that all those victims were still sitting behind the wheel of their cars, in a watery grave some sixty feet below the surface of the dark murky water. That's why the Sheriff flew off the handle when his brother had asked about the lake, and mentioned that local fishermen had reported seeing oil and gas residue floating on the water. The murders had been random but now it was personal, and the second he took that bullet to the shoulder, he knew they were the next to go 'missing' along that dark stretch of road. The only difference was that this had been done in haste, and the men would surly be back to cover their tracks and finish him off.

When that strange knocking sound caught his attention once again, his heart sank like a stone. Now that all the missing pieces had finally fallen into place, he knew exactly what that sound was and it chilled him right to the bone. It was Sam, desperately trying to break his way out of the sinking Impala's trunk.