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Chapter Text

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

The Road So Far (This Time Around)

Season 2: Chapter 70

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

Gordon was escorted from his holding cell at the Tippecanoe County Jail where he was awaiting arraignment for the weapons charge while Detectives at the LPD continued pressuring him for information concerning the photographs on his phone. The prison guard led him to an empty room, usually reserved for visitations but currently occupied by only one other person. Likely a cop from the Lafayette Police Department. Oh, sorry, detective. Gordon resisted the urge to snort. He had been less than impressed or intimidated by the Lafayette Police Department's performance so far. He hardly doubted another interview would change that.

The guard pushed him another step further into the room (and he was lucky Gordon didn't want to deal with an assault charge on top of everything else, or he would have decked the guy just to teach him a lesson about keeping his hands to himself), and then closed the door, leaving Gordon alone with his newest interviewer. Holding back a sigh – this really was tedious – Gordon crossed over to the empty chair plastic chair across the table from the guy, waiting just for him. He reached for the back of it with handcuffed wrists, flipping the thing around so he could straddle the seat, arms over the back and metal cuffs clinking loudly on the table in front of the detective.

No, Gordon realized as he stared at the guy across from him with ever so slightly narrowed eyes. The clean, pressed white shirt, but not so clean or so pressed that it wasn't the shirt of a working man. Tie around his neck, loose enough that he wasn't a pencil-pusher or a stickler for rules. An air of authority behind the tight-lipped, grimace of a smile he presented the prisoner in front of him. That and the manila folder sitting just off to his right – a pretty thick one, Gordon noted, so unlikely to be his own – all suggested more than a detective.

A federal agent. Gordon wondered what about an illegal weapons possession charge and a couple of headless vamps could possibly be of interest to the FBI.

"Mr. Walker," the agent began with a small nod, but that little smile playing at his mouth reeked of condescension. Gordon ignored it. Feds were worse than cops. They didn't do their job any better, but they certainly had the attitudes that would make you think they did. "I hear you're in a tight spot."

Gordon resisted rolling his eyes, but it was a close thing. He tilted his head to the side, staring right back at the guy with the same smile mirrored on his face. "You gonna get me out of it, Fed?"

"Agent Henrisken," the man corrected. That tight-lipped smile got a little tighter. "And that depends."

"On what?" Gordon leaned forward into the back of the chair, cuffs scraping against the tabletop as he let his shoulders slump and settled his chin onto the plastic lip. Not a care in the world, really. At least, not one this Fed could do anything about.

"Dean Winchester."

Gordon picked his head up, for once actually surprised by something that had come out of a law enforcement official's mouth in this town. So, the FBI was here for the Winchesters. How did the Feds know about the brothers? Had they managed to get caught before they could get away? Didn't sound like the pair of hunters he'd dealt with.

Henriksen slid his little folder across the table until it rested in front of him, flipping it open and peeling a photograph off the top page. He spun it around to Gordon, pushing it towards his side of the table. The hunter sat up, actual interest piqued, and grabbed the photo with wide spread fingers, pulling it towards himself with the clink of chain links.

His intrigue immediately flat-lined. It was the photo he'd taken of Dean at the gas station, sprawled on the uneven cement. The green were eyes lifeless, blood pooled on black asphalt, single bullet to the head and resulting damage to prove it. Gordon pushed the glossy print back, returning to his bored slump, staring at the agent if only to dare him for something more interesting. Something better.

"You want to tell me where you got this photo?"

"I took it." Gordon shrugged his shoulders with every ounce of nonchalance in his body. No point lying about that; photography wasn't a crime. Not reporting a dead body was a slap on the wrist, at best, and his lawyer – a sleaze of a man he'd saved a couple years back from a female vamp posing as a prostitute to score her next meal – would easily get it dismissed.

"Where?"

The hunter stared at the Fed, contemplating why he wanted to know. So the FBI was after Dean Winchester, specifically. Sam remained only a maybe at the moment. Gordon was hardly surprised, although he did itch to know why. What was it in particular that this Fed was after? Agent Henriksen didn't seem particularly pleased Dean was dead. Ego, perhaps? Not being the one to catch the criminal himself? Well, there was still plenty of time for that, it turned out, because Dean wasn't dead.

He thought about lying, leading the guy on a goose chase, but it didn't feel like the right play. There was something about this that Gordon was sure he could spin to his advantage, something about the dark glint in this agent's eyes. Obsession maybe? Or just that deeply seated, self-righteousness stick cops – sorry, law enforcement – always had stuck up their ass. No, lying wasn't the right angle to play here, Gordon just wasn't sure what was. Yet, at least.

"Gas station off 25, just past Shadeland road."

Agent Henriksen jotted that down on one of the papers in his little folder and Gordon's fingers twitched, wondering what else was in there. "And I'll find a body there?"

This time, he couldn't stop the snort. He shoved up off the table, sitting in his chair with his wrists resting against the back. The Fed looked less than amused at the physical power play Gordon was keeping up, but then, he'd looked like that since Gordon walked into the room. The hunter would look like that too, if he had to spend eight hours a day investigating the Winchesters.

"Oh, there's no body."

Henriksen's eyes narrowed and he leaned back, tossing his pen onto the open file. He looked annoyed, more than anything. Like he knew he was going to have to go through the steps of a game when he'd rather skip to the end. "What did you do with it?"

"Me? Nothing. Far as I know, Dean Winchester got up and walked away."

The Fed let out an exaggerated sigh, emphasizing his exasperation. Yeah, he definitely thought Gordon was playing a game. Probably the I-didn't-kill-that-guy-honest-he-walked-away-unharmed game a lot of cocky killers played with him. He gestured with his chin to the photograph, still lying in front of Gordon. "He looks pretty dead there."

"Yeah," Gordon agreed, letting some of that insincerity and sarcasm slide away, sounding pretty damn honest. His honesty had never been particularly endearing to others, though. Most people labeled it smug at best. He wondered what Agent Henriksen would do with it. "He looked pretty dead to me too when I took it."

The man across from him stared in silence, head falling a little to the side as he clearly contemplated Gordon's words. His angle, whatever it was. (At the moment, his angle was actual honesty. Go figure.) Finally, the Fed sat up, folding his hands on top of the table, over that open file and his forgotten pen. "Are you saying he faked his dead? And, what, someone helped? You, maybe? That the whole point of these photos?"

Agent Henriksen spread out several more of the photos the LPD had recovered from his phone. Gordon barely even looked at them.

"Oh, it wasn't me." Gordon shook his head, letting all his disregard and disdain for Dean Winchester show openly. He didn't care if this Fed knew he wanted the man dead. In fact, he was pretty sure it was his 'in' with this particular agent. He just had to play it right. "But he's got someone on his side, alright."

A real monster, in Gordon's opinion. One that needed to be taken out right alongside Sam and Dean Winchester.

Henriksen appraised him again, looking him up and down as he took his time. Finally, he glanced around the interrogation room, making a play for detachment, but Gordon already had his number. "You got intel on any of this?"

Gordon smiled, all teeth and negotiation. "Depends. You gonna get me out of here?"

The FBI agent huffed, clearly amused in a not-good way. He closed the folder, capping his pen and setting it back on top. "You got yourself into this. Best I can do…minimum security prison, if your intel is good."

Oh, Gordon very much doubted that was all Henriksen could do. Big bad Fed like him? He could offer so much more. And he would. To catch the Winchesters, Gordon had no doubt. How convenient that their goals lined up so prettily.

But Gordon was nothing if not patient. The best hunters always were. You had to let your prey come to you.

The hunter leaned forward on his chair again, arms crossed, handcuffs jingling against the plastic backing. "Well, when you change your mind, you know where I'll be."

Henriksen let out a harsh laugh, head shaking in disbelief. He stood, gathering up the file and tucking the pen in his pocket. They were clearly done here. "What makes you think I need your help to do my job?"

Gordon just watched him, dark eyes glittering. "Because I know how the Winchesters think. I know how they work. I'm one of them."

The Fed stilled. He didn't quite pause and he hid it well, but Gordon knew he'd sunk that hook in. It wasn't time to reel in the fish yet, because he knew this one would come swimming to him freely. The Winchesters were too good at what they did for this man to ever catch them. Not without help.

"So. You're one of these so-called 'hunters,' I take it?" It was obvious from the derision on his face that Henriksen had no idea who it was he was actually chasing. Who it was he stood in a room with. Probably thought they were crazy. Not that it mattered. Most people did. They were all idiots, lucky Gordon and others like him – even the Winchesters, regardless of whether or not they now needed to be taken out – were around to save their useless asses.

The hunter smiled widely, this time all teeth and charm, Ted Bundy charm though it may be. Gordon had lured plenty a pretty vamp girl to their deaths with that smile, playing their game right back at them. He could play Agent Henriksen's game too.

The agent smiled back, a biting, bitter thing. He shook his head again, tapping the edge of his folder on the table with another disbelieving laugh. Then he headed for the door back out of the prison without a word.

"Be seeing you, Agent." Gordon nodded, completely confident in his words, and that clean-shaven head turned his way, half a glance over a rigid shoulder. Then the Fed was gone, replaced with the guard who would escort Gordon back to his cell. But the hunter wasn't worried. He knew he was right. He would be seeing Agent Henriksen again. It was only a matter of time.

-o-o-o-

Dean scrambled out of the hospital bed the minute he realized that the light filtering in through the closed blinds of Bobby's guest bedroom was a hell of a lot lower than it had been when he'd first brought Angela and Cas in here. Which meant he'd been asleep for a lot longer than the hour he'd planned, and that meant they were already late meeting Jo in Cold Oak.

Climbing out of the bed wasn't as easy as he thought it'd be. Whoever had hooked Angela's body back up to the machines had done it around Dean, leaving the hunter in a weave of tubes and wires that he had to extricate himself from before he could be free (he'd already been paranoid enough about messing up all that technology keeping Angela alive, and that was before he'd tried playing cat's cradle with it). Needless to say, it was several minutes before he was actually standing on his own two feet.

He took a moment to double check Angela was still breathing on her own – or, uh, well, the machines were breathing for her, at least – before he headed into the hallway, pulling the door mostly closed behind him. Figuring Sammy must have overslept as well (otherwise his brother would have come and woken him up), he headed for what they largely considered 'their' room in Bobby's house. The older hunter had warned them Andy had taken over one of the beds, but Dean figured Sam was probably catching z's in the other one.

Only the door was three quarters of the way open when he got there and there wasn't much inside except two empty beds; one neatly made up, the other one clearly Andy's. With a frown pulling between his eyebrows, Dean turned and headed for the stairs at a decent pace. Maybe Sam had slept on the couch in the Den.

Bobby's study was empty when he got to the bottom of the stairs and Dean started looking around with less certainly and more wariness. Nothing in his gut was screaming at him and he usually trusted that. But Sammy hadn't woken him up and obviously hadn't overslept himself, and Bobby wasn't at his desk surrounded by books. Which was weird enough to raise alarm.

Noise from the kitchen – the splash of water and clatter of dishes, along with the low background din of someone trying to keep their voice down – drew Dean to the kitchen. He was surprised to find Sammy, perfectly fine and upright, doing dishes at the sink with an energetic Andy waving his phone practically beneath the Winchester's nose trying to show him something.

Sam looked better. Rested, at least, not dead on his feet and pale from recovering blood loss. There was a new square of padded gauze taped across the skin just above the shoulder blade, peeking out of the neckline of his t-shirt. Dean assumed there was a matching one on his front, around his collar bone. Bobby had patched him up proper, at least, so that was good.

Still, though.

"What the hell, Sammy?" Dean groused, crossing his arms over his chest, because it was still way past the hour either brother had agreed upon for sleep. They needed to be on the road toward Cold Oak, not playing Susy Homemaker in Bobby's kitchen.

The sudden interruption was enough to make both kids jump, Sam smacking the plate he was holding against the rim of the sink with a sharp clack (luckily not breaking it) and Andy spinning around with the kind of jitter that suggested a lot of caffeine and not a whole lot of sleep.

(Which, to be fair, was probably Sam and Dean's fault. Waking up in the middle of night to an angelic vessel – not the angel, but Angela – raising hell for a cell phone, followed by radio silence for hours would be enough to keep anyone up worrying.)

"Jeez, Dean, did you have to sneak up on us?" Sam whined right back even as Andy broke into a wide grin beside him while less-than-subtly hiding his phone from view behind his back.

"I'm not the one sneaking. Or letting people over-sleep while playing maid!"

Sam gave his brother a narrow-eyed look, which Dean only felt slightly bad for. Yeah, yeah, cleaning up after themselves in Bobby's house was a given (one they, uh, weren't always the best at) so he probably shouldn't be digging into his brother for doing the dishes. But seriously, what the hell! The clock on the oven said it was after four pm, which meant he'd slept a hell of a lot longer than just an hour. More like six.

"Relax, Dean," the younger Winchester went back to the dishes petulantly (okay, maybe only petulantly in Dean's version of events). "Jo called hours ago."

Dean frowned immediately, dropping his arms to his side. "She did? They alright? What'd they find?"

Sam put the last plate into the drying rack and turned off the water. The stillness in his shoulders despite all that movement was a dead giveaway that Dean wouldn't like the answer any more than Sammy had.

"Nothing."

Dean pulled his head back. "What?"

Sam turned around, shrugging his shoulder helplessly, and Dean could see the mix of anguish and anger in his brown eyes. "They didn't find anything, Dean. There was no one at Cold Oak. They searched the whole town; it was empty."

"But, that doesn't-" Dean shook his head. That didn't make any sense. "Then where's Ava?"

His brother sighed, head dipping down until his chin practically rested against his chest. He shrugged again, and Dean could just picture that helpless look, even if he couldn't see Sam's face. Helpless and angry. "She's missing."

Just like last time. His fingers curled into fists by his side and Dean clenched his jaw till his teeth creaked in his mouth. They'd changed nothing. Again.

Beside them, Andy, who'd so far stayed out of the conversation, having been caught up by Sam on the events in Lafayette as well as having been in the room when Jo called, now waved his arms to get their attention. He made a series of motions with his hands that meant absolutely nothing to Dean, though Sam at least followed the gestures like he was maybe picking up one or two here and there. Andy didn't wait for the two of them to tell him they didn't understand (that much was obvious pretty much from the get-go) and switched over to mental images almost in tandem.

Flashing red and blue lights, police tape, and a newspaper article about the bodies found at Cold Oak.

"Yeah, you're probably right, Andy." Sam nodded, crossing his arms over his chest with slumped shoulders. "The police activity could have tipped the demons off that we'd found their dumping ground. They know Cold Oak is compromised now."

Andy hid the flinch well, but Sam winced regardless, realizing all on his own how the words had likely affected Andy, who'd lost two friends to that graveyard. He sent an apologetic look his way, but their resident Jedi waved it off.

"Which means they'll have picked somewhere new. Somewhere we don't know about." Dean said it through teeth that were still creaking and Sam met his gaze briefly – half in assessment, half in warning –but it didn't matter. His anger still boiled over and Dean lashed out, knocking the nearest thing – a heavy book lying open, little post it notes acting as bookmarks – off the kitchen table and onto the floor with a thud. "Damnit! We should have burned that town to the ground, Sammy."

"We don't know what that would have done, Dean. What it would have changed. We stilldon't!"

"If yer gonna be destroying things, better do it in your own damn house, boy."

All three boys turned to find Bobby standing behind them at the entrance to the kitchen with two armfuls of groceries and a narrow set to his eyes beneath the ever-present ball cap. He very pointedly looked at Dean and then down to the book still lying on the floor. The older Winchester looked away guiltily, sighing as he bent over to pick the tome back up and replace it on the table.

"Sorry, Bobby."

The old hunter harrumphed, but apparently deemed the apology and fix good enough because he pushed past the boys to set his grocery bag full of food on the counter next to Andy. The kid started digging into it immediately. It earned his hand a swat and glare from Bobby, at least until Andy glared right back and gestured with the box of butter sticks towards the fridge.

"Use your words, kid," Bobby growled, already pulling the rest of the stuff from the bag.

Andy glared and set the butter down on the counter a little harder than necessary to use both hands to tell the old hunter off. Dean had no idea what was said, but by the way Bobby nodded in concession and started handing the kid more stuff to go in the fridge, it was clear Andy's intention had been to help put things away the entire time.

Well, those two seemed to be getting along like two old hens in a henhouse. Which was a terrifying thought, really. At Least they hadn't killed each other.

"That's enough food to feed an army, Bobby," Dean commented on the two stuffed bags for lack of something better to say in a kitchen filled with tension (that he'd more than helped put there). "You expecting company?"

Bobby huffed. "Your brother didn't tell you?"

Green eyes shot over to Sam, narrow and accusatory. The younger Winchester just shrugged as Andy tossed him two bags of potato chips that he tossed into the upper cabinets over the fridge.

"You didn't exactly let me get there." Sam turned back to his brother, one arm still closing the open cabinet door, and gave him a minor bitchface. Not strong enough to make the numbered charts, but a bitchface all the same. "Jo, Asa and Bucky are headed this way."

Dean straightened in surprise. "They are?"

"I told them we'd still meet them at Cold Oak, but they were pretty insistent it was a waste of time. I, uh," Sam pulled a sheepish look, gigantor shoulders twitching, "I think Ellen might have told them we were trying to catch some sleep, because they said they'd come to us rather than meet halfway."

Well, Dean would definitely be having words with Ellen about that shit, because it was so not okay (and total bull). He and Sam would have been fine on an hour of sleep (only, no, they really wouldn't have and Dean knew it) and this was their case, their responsibility, so they would have handled it (only it would have sucked and been potentially dangerous on that little sleep, and Dean had been the one to argue for acting responsibly here in the first place since they couldn't afford any more careless slip ups to the timeline).

"They'll be here in an hour or two," Bobby picked up the stream of conversation since it had died off. He handed the last of the groceries to Andy to put away, folding the bag up all neatly and sliding it under the sink. Too neatly. Dean's eyed the three of them suspiciously. "Asa says he owes you boys a drink, so he's bringing the beer and we're providing the grub."

How…strangely domestic, Dean thought with a blink. Bobby and the boys, having friends over for dinner. That hadn't happened…uh, well, outside of 'last night on Earth' gatherings, Dean could probably count on one hand the number of times he could remember company in the house.

(Jody didn't count. Half the times she'd been over, even after she got in on the hunting gig, it had been for half-assed attempts to arrest Bobby on something or other that they all knew she'd never actually follow through on.)

If they didn't have a missing woman to find, proof Azazel was starting to gather his special kids, and hadn't just lost their only leg up in this whole damn thing, Dean might even be excited about a little get-together. Unfortunately for them, they were Winchesters, so this was going to be all business. The fun would have to wait until after they stopped the Apocalypse.

-o-o-o-

It was halfway through Bobby cooking up dinner (a couple racks of ribs out on the barbeque with some potato salad he'd picked up from the store (and regular old salad at Sam's insistence that there be a least one vegetable present (ugh))), that Andy finally made the mistake of leaving his phone unattended. Dean, who hadn't forgotten the scene he'd walked in on earlier and how the kid had conveniently put the device away only once Dean was in the room, swiped it off the counter while Andy was busy helping Sam cut vegetables (to put on the salad. Vegetables…on top of vegetables. His brother wasn'thuman. He was a rabbit possessing a human. Dean was sure of it).

Andy made an aborted swipe for his phone the moment he realized what was happening, but by then it was way too late. Dean was into the device (and, really, Apple kind of had a point about lock screens being standard. He'd never have been able to do this so easily in 2016), pulling open the kid's camera app. He had a pretty good idea of just what Andy had been so gleefully trying to show his brother.

Yep. Sure enough, the last photo taken was one of him and Cas in that hospital bed, snoozing away, curled up all honkey-dory beneath Bobby's old quilted blanket, before any of Angela's equipment had been put in place. They looked like a snuggly, happy, sleepy little couple (god. Friggin'. Damnit. Dean was gonna murder someone. Anyone. Probably everyone at this point. But most definitely Andy). The hunter glared his truly scary glare at the kid, who shrunk beneath it, ducking physically behind Sam. The Sasquatch arched a particularly amused-but-still-very-judgemental-and-just-why-do-you-think-that's-going-to-save-you look over his shoulder at the kid.

Dean got a flash of the board game Sorry across the inside of his skull, a fairly familiar image by now (one of Andy's go-to's for sure), but since there was most definitely an after image of the word 'not' stamped all over the damn thing, flickering in and out like a ghost of a thought Andy had no hope of controlling, the message didn't exactly ring out with sincerity.

The older Winchester deleted the photo with a series of key strokes that the phone was lucky to survive. Andy winced with each one even as he made a valiant attempt to steal his phone back before the deed could be done. Said valiant attempt ended with Andy on the floor in a partial headlock, Dean now manipulating the device literally in front of his face while he pinned him to the ground (kid should have known better than to tackle a Winchester. Even a former Jedi).

"Don't bother," Sam said to Dean at the same time as the older Winchester cried out triumphantly, photo gone forever. That death glare transferred from the phone in his hand (and the top of its owners head) to the beanstalk still cutting up carrots like there wasn't a wrestling match going down on the linoleum behind him.

"What do you mean, 'don't bother'?" Dean growled. This photo was an attack on…on…well, on his person! (His manliness. It was an attack on his manliness, let's be honest). Such an attack warranted – no, demanded – retribution. His reputation would stand for nothing less! He tightened his grip around Andy's neck and the kid let out what could probably pass for "meep!" through his damaged vocal chords.

For a guy stuck in a headlock, pinned to the floor by his much larger (and stronger, and more experienced, and far, far more dangerous) surrogate brother, Andy was still way too smug for his own good. Sam looked utterly unsurprised by that fact, or by the series of images that assaulted both Winchesters shortly thereafter.

There was a flash of the standard digital icon for e-mailing and texting, then a smiling shot (like a polaroid that moved along the edges; a not quite still photo, but the nanoseconds of captured time just before the picture was taken) of Sam, one of Andy himself curtesy of the reflection of the upstairs bathroom mirror, and a third of Bobby, definitely less than smiling and all grump and gruff.

Dean, reeling from the rapid fire images, lost his grip on Andy and the kid scrambled away (making sure to 'accidentally' deliver a good kick to the solar plexus in his mad dash for freedom). Now wheezing as well as reeling, the older Winchester wasn't in the best of states to play Pictionary, so Sam did the translations for him.

"He already e-mailed the photo to himself, as well as me and Bobby." Sam swept all his chopped carrots into the large bowl of salad with a quick scrape of his knife along the cutting board. Because he was a rabbit in the shape of a man. Dean just glared and wheezed. "Texted it to us, too."

That glare transferred to Andy even as a sixth image came through. This one was a flash of memory, not unlike the bathroom mirror clip of Andy. It probably came from the kid exploring the house since it was an old but familiar picture in Bobby's den, one of the few photographs sitting on his many bookshelves. He, Ellen, and another man Dean could only assume was Jo's dad, were all smiling, standing close enough for arms to be slung over shoulders, in front of the Singer house. Between their hair, clothes, and Ellen's baby bump, the photo was clearly from the eighties.

Sam glanced over at the former Jedi, who was leaning against the counter now, victorious smile firmly in place despite the fact that he was breathing like he'd just taken on the best WWE had to offer (and barely escaped with his life). The Samsquatch had his Samsquatch eyebrow game going strong. "Ellen too?"

Andy nodded, all proud of himself, and Dean sat upright, all wheezing one hundred and ten percent in the past, replaced with a growing redness that could only be described as apoplectic and the sudden need to choke on pure air.

"You sent that photo to Ellen?"

In the blink of an eye and the span of one very angry question, the former Jedi was once again hiding behind Sam, cowering for his life. He was kind of wondering if he should make a run for it (and just how far he'd make it) when Sam asked how he even knew Ellen Harvelle. Andy shrugged, miming a phone to his ear with one hand, the other pointing to Bobby's row of phones from behind the safety of Sam's very broad shoulders.

Both Winchesters followed the gesture, staring at the bank of phones and then back at Andy. Dean blinked at them, then their Jedi, while Sam frowned curiously. Ellen must have called using one of Bobby's 'supervisor' aliases for some reason or another, and Andy had been the one to pick up.

Which…

"How the hell did that even work?" Dean groused, climbing off the floor with a grunt. He was getting old, and that was coming from a body ten years younger than he'd gotten used to.

Andy made some quick gestures with his hands that meant absolute squat to Dean, but Sam's frown turned into mollified surprise.

"Huh," the younger Winchester said with a tone just shy of indifference, turning back to his vegetables. "Ellen knows Morse Code."

Andy smiled, Dean glared, Sam chopped. Then Dean chucked the kid's phone at his head (the delay had come as Dean decided whether to throw it at Sam, who was way to calm and unaffected by this, or Andy, who had started it. Starting it won). The kid managed to fumble-catch the device with minimal damage done to his face (pity, Dean thought) and the older Winchester dusted himself off and cracked his back, satisfied by the way Andy ducked back behind Sam in an abundance of caution and fear at the mere motion.

Dean decided heading out to the grill to see if he could help Bobby was a better use of his time than staying in the kitchen with Mr. Doesn't-Care-About-the-Destruction-and-Mortification-of-his-Brother's-Reputation-as-a-Manly-Man and the One-Who-Started-It. Both of whom he might just murder if he thought any further on the fact that there was no recovering from Ellen Harvelle having a picture of him and an angel cuddling in a home hospice bed. At least she didn't know Cas was an angel. Although…honestly, that might make it worse because it would bring up a lot more questions on just who that woman was that had gotten Dean all soft and snuggle-tastic (all accusations and word-choices that Dean would be firmly, firmly objecting to. People would be hearing from his lawyers. Just you wait). Not to mention that if Ellen had the photo, it was a damn downright certainty that Jo had seen it by now too. Jo, who was on her way to Bobby's house right that very minute. So, yes, he was going to go help Bobby outside with the grilling so he didn't go to federal prison for patricide.

Dean and Bobby made small talk about the weather and sports games neither of 'em actually knew or cared that much about (because Dean knew Bobby had been the one to put that blanket on him and Cas. Any other blanket and Dean might have had reason to think it was Andy, acting on that soft heart that actually did exist beneath the pranking, evil, underhanded little brother persona. That or he'd just been properly set dressing his blackmail scheme. But no, that blanket in particular meant something to Bobby. He was the only one who ever dragged it down from the top of the linen closet. Dean suspected why, but he'd never asked. Just knew it meant something over the years when he or Sammy or the both of them together woke up tucked under that old, hand-made quilt. (He was trying not to think about it meaning anything now. Nope. Not at all. He had enough of that going on in his head thanks to Angela Garrett. He did not need to add Bobby's opinions or hints into the mix.) So, Bobby had definitely seen him and Cas sharing a bed and was probably the one who'd gotten Angela set up on the machines. Which meant he'd gotten an up close and personal view of the angel, curled on her side, spooning Dean with her hand tucked up under his shirt. And that was why they were now making small talk about the weather) until the ribs were declared done. They were just pulling them off when the sound of two cars – engines rumbling and tires crunching packed dirt and small rocks – came from around front.

Jo and her entourage had arrived.

"Good timing," Bobby said neutrally. Dean liked to think it was neutral because hewas feeling anything but, trying not to moan and groan about having to face Jo Harvelle when she'd most definitely seen photographic proof of him cuddling with a mystery woman. She would definitely not be making small talk about the weather.

The older Winchester picked up the platter of ribs – an old ceramic dish that looked like it'd survived from the eighties right along with that picture of the Harvelles – and headed for door to the kitchen. "I'll, uh, get these cut up. You and Sammy go greet the invaders."

The plate of meat was lifted off his hands faster than Dean could blink, Bobby holding it and the back door open already, leaving Dean to stare and wonder how the hell he'd moved that quickly (or smoothly). The expression on the old hunter's face wasn't letting him off easy, either. Bobby easily saw through that magnanimous, 'oh, but you first, sir!' bullshit like he hadn't been born yesterday (which, he hadn't, thanks very much). He gestured with his ball-capped head for Dean to get his butt moving inside. "You can go mingle since they're here for you, ya idjit, and I'll serve up dinner."

Dean definitely went for a frown, though given the raised, unimpressed eyebrow he got in return, it was probably closer to a defeated pout. Still, the hunter headed inside, already hearing his brother's deep voice coming from the front of the house. Accepting his fate (bracing for it, more like), Dean headed for the front door, walking into the narrow foyer of the Singer house in time to reel back at the nothing-short-of girly-ass squeal.

"Andy!"

Jo had the kid pulled down into a hug. The girliest friggin' hug Dean had ever seen. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, smothering his face into her shoulder. Mother frigign' hell, she even had one leg tucked right up off the ground, bent at the knee like a goddamn damsel in distress as she hung off him like arm candy. Dean could only stare, wondering if he should get the holy water, because there was no way that, in any way, shape, or form, Joanna Harvelle. None. Not any version Dean had ever gotten to see.

(Although that wasn't entirely true. Dean had seen that same look in her eye before. That teasing smile like she'd found a puppy to take home and spoil rotten. It was the same look Jo had after she'd been introduced to Cas and gotten over the 'yeah, right, an angel' phase. It was that look that had taken over her face when Cas downed about twelve shots and thought he might finally feeling a tingle. It was the look of a woman who had got their manicured claws around something they found adorable.)

(It was a scary look. A look to be feared by sane men everywhere.)

Andy, meanwhile, flailed in her arms with meagre fight, largely for show, but otherwise was doing absolutely nothing to free himself from Jo's octopus arms. He actually looked like he was enjoying himself. Which meant Dean was gonna murder him, soon as he figured out how to detach the two from their newly merged hips.

"My favorite Jedi! It's good to see you," Jo announced with a wide smile as she finally pulled away, leaving Andy to gasp a breath of free air and grin right back, still half bent over to make up their three and a half inch height difference. Jo's smile, though, started to turn down at the corners when Andy didn't say anything back. He just kept smiling wanly, straightening up with a self-conscious shrug when Jo's grin turned into a confused frown and she unfurled from him, stepping back. Her eyes flickered down to his neck, ever wrapped as it was these days in several layers of clean, white bandaging. "What's wrong? What happened?"

The last question was directed at Sam and Dean, both standing to the side, with increasingly somber expressions. Andy drew her attention back to him with a shrug of his shoulders and a larger, more confident swipe of his hand across his neck; a pretty standard symbol for muteness. And, as it turned out, one that also worked as an explanation for his injury. At least for Sam and Dean, who knew that the kid's throat had been slashed.

Though, given the stormy look taking over Jo's eye as she glanced between the three men again, she'd picked up the gist of it. After all, she knew what Andy could do with his voice. It wasn't a giant leap to assume someone – or something – might have been interested in taking that away.

"Bad hunt," Dean answered, though, since the silence stretched and he knew Andy couldn't actually do it for himself. He kept his voice stoically neutral, more than aware of Asa Fox and Bucky Sims standing just inside the front doorway. They'd come in behind Jo, jovial enough, each with a bag slung over one arm and a case of beer tucked under the other, but they'd quickly noticed the shift in mood.

Jo was frowning worse, now, but Andy bumped her in the shoulder with a loosely clenched fist and smiled widely, delivering two thumbs up. He was alright. Everything was alright. He followed it up with the actual words, signed messily, but with growing confidence at least. He didn't expect the blonde to understand, but he was starting to get (and, oh-the-horror, even agree with Bobby) that learning ASL was important.

To his surprise – and that of at least three other people in the room – Asa Fox signed back.

'Dude!' Andy all but exclaimed with his hands, eyes wide and grin ear-to-ear. He had to spell the word out, since after three hours of searching on the web, it had become depressingly obvious there wasn't a dedicated ASL sign for one of his all-time favorite words (which was, frankly, unacceptable in Andy's book. He was currently thinking up his own, but such an awesome word required an awesome sign, so he was taking his time). 'You sign?'

Asa pointed at himself with his free hand, then raised it to his forehead, palm curled, and tapped his fingers against his skull twice. That same hand lowered, intent to form another word, but with a grimace, Asa floundered, forgetting the sign for what he was trying to say. He ended up waving his hand side to side, which was definitely not the official way to tell someone you only knew a little ASL.

If Andy had a voice left to do it, he would have laughed. He liked this guy already.

Asa shrugged sheepishly and said to the group, "I only know a couple words. Dated a girl a while back who had deaf parents. She taught me a little. It sorta stuck with me, don't know why."

Even as he spoke, Asa's dominant hand was running through the ASL alphabet almost absentmindedly. It was clear most of the movement was muscle memory now. He screwed up every couple of letters and had to actually think to get the sign right. It was something he'd probably run through the motions of when bored, lying in bed trying to fall asleep. Or maybe he'd done it with his lover, curled up against her warm, naked body as she giggled into his neck, tickling the sweat-cooled skin there with every breath as she fixed his hand positions, again and again, for many nights until his muscles remembered every slide of her fingers against his skin, ever position they had formed with her assistance.

(Or, it was possible, Andy watched way, way, too much television and far too much of that much was trashy romance flicks and teenage dramas.)

Andy left Jo's side to clap the guy on the shoulder. Asa had himself a new fan. Which was ridiculous, Dean thought, watching from the sidelines. Because everyone talked legend of how Asa Fox could win anyone to his side in the span of about six heartbeats – usually with a smile alone – but seeing it in person was something else. (It was not fair, is what it was. No one should be that charismatic and cool and stupidly perfect.)

(And Dean's inner fanboy was losing its shit right about now. Seriously, the older Winchester was fighting a smile, pulling his face repeatedly back down into the serious frown that this serious discussion about a serious, devastating injury deserved. Given the way Sam was looking at him with distorted concern and Jo was giving him the unimpressed eyebrows, he probably just looked constipated.)

Then Andy tugged Jo's bag off her shoulder like the gentleman he was and, with a sweeping gesture, beckoned them further into the house. (Also not fair. If Dean had tried to pull that move with Jo, she'd have elbowed him right in the belly and called him a chauvinist. But Andy got away with it because he looked like a kicked puppy that was physically incapable of hurting a fly let alone judging it based on gender.)

(Andy. Their Andy. The Sith Lord and punk little brother extrodiare, who could fry your brain with his mind. But yeah, no, he was totally harmless. Uh-huh.)

As Jo entered Bobby's Den, Asa and Bucky following behind (they'd clearly been in the Singer house before given the confidence with which they navigated past the piles of books and clutter of occult), Andy turned to the Winchester brothers. He waggled his eyebrows suggestively Dean's way and the older Winchester rolled his eyes on default. He stepped into Andy's space, the kid tilting his head up to stare at the taller hunter, eyebrows still going, and Dean took the strap of Jo's bag from where he held it over his shoulder like some suave suit jacket or something.

"Dude. She thinks of you as a puppy."

Sam walked past them with a head shake and nothing to say. Andy's face fell momentarily, digesting the words, then it scrunched up in thought. He tilted his head back and forth, like he was debating his options. Then, with a shrug, the kid's face spread back into that wide, open grin and he gave Dean two thumbs up, eyebrows back to waggling.

'I can work with that.'

Dean rolled his eyes with a grunt – why did he bother?! – and walked away shaking his head too, leaving the Sith Puppy Lord to follow, grinning like an idiot.

-o-o-o-

They made it as far as the kitchen when the doorbell rang. Bobby was serving up the ribs, sides, and salad (ugh, Sam) onto an assortment plates while Asa got the beer in the fridge and Bucky, Jo, and Andy started rounding up chairs and extra table-slash-any-surface-will-do space. They all paused briefly at the noise, but no one but Sam and Dean looked surprised, glancing at each other and then Bobby. It became clear by the fact they were the only ones to do so, that everyone else had been whatever new company had just shown up.

Dean deadpan glared at his surrogate family, Bobby pointedly not looking and Jo busy taking a sip of her beer, before he stomped his way to the front door. He wasn't entirely surprised to find Ellen standing on the other side of it, a twenty-four pack in one hand and a grocery bag of what looked like pretzels and snacks in the other.

"What is this, an intervention?" Dean growled somewhat low in his throat. Cuz it sure wasn't a hunter's picnic. Those weren't a thing.

"Jo called me." Ellen shrugged one shoulder. "Seemed important."

"Nice of you to give us the heads up." Dean stepped aside to let her in, though the pointed look he leveled her way was returned with nothing but a 'mom' smile.

"Would you have stuck around if I had?"

Dean frowned, all narrowed eyes and affronted brow, because yeah, he would have. Probably. Maybe.

The older Winchester grunted as Ellen bodily handed him the case of beer as she walked past, right to his stomach. He dutifully followed with a grimace once he 1) was sure he wasn't going to drop the case and B) could breathe into his stomach again.

"Hi, mom," Jo called from the kitchen. Asa was pulling another two beers from the fridge – presumably for Ellen and Dean, since everyone else already had one. Andy was doling out the plates of food, passing it over shoulders as most of the crew settled in seats around the table or kitchen. Asa passed Ellen her beer with a charming smile and a wink.

"Ellen."

"Asa."

Dean set the case of beer on Bobby's desk and did not think about those two together. Asa was only a handful of years older than him (less than a decade), which, in comparison, put Ellen closer to his mom's age, a connection Dean did not want to think about. So he decidedly did not. Bobby apparently agreed with him, making a harrumphing sound of sheer disapproval and 'best watch yourself in my house, boy' that had Asa laughing. Ellen swatted the old flirt with her free hand, then took an offered plate loaded with ribs and chips and multiple salad types (only one of them actually consisting of lettuce). She decided to settle in a chair next to Bobby (conveniently vacated by Bucky only seconds earlier, who happened to like living and knew better than to get on Ellen or Bobby's bad side in any way, shape or form. Unlike his idiotic best friend). Bobby seemed all sorts of pleased with this, if you knew where to look past the gruff and the grump and the glare.

Dean actually had to look away for a moment, eyes dropping to the rug in the den as he remembered another timeline for those two – one with a happier ending for them both – that would never exist because, last he checked, the Titanic had hit an iceberg and sunk in the middle of the North Atlantic. Which was a stunningly depressive thought for an entirely different reason than the hundreds of souls lost at sea.

A beer popped into his vision and Dean's head snapped up. Asa was standing in front of him with that friendly smile of his. The older Winchester cleared his throat and took the beer with an appreciative nod, stowing his crap as far back in his head as he could manage.

"Thanks, man."

"Sure thing. Gonna join us?" Asa tilted his head back to the kitchen, and Dean realized that he'd been hovering on the edge of the room, still in the den, note quite joining the congregation of hunters as they started chowing down and clinking bottle necks like it was a regular family together with beer and grub and maybe even a ballgame later.

Not that the Winchesters had much experience with those sorts of things.

Sam was watching him from the table, his gigantor frame hunched over in a chair half his size, sitting kitty corner with cricket legs bunched up around the leg of the table. His look said something comically caught between, 'I understand your plight and sympathize,' and 'Don't you dare leave me in here alone with them, Dean, I will murder you.' The older Winchester huffed, shook his head, and took a swig of beer.

"Course," he answered casually, Winchester smile back in place as he sauntered into the kitchen behind Asa Fox. He tried (and failed) to shove down the dread knotted tight in his stomach over what this was probably all about.

(There were only so many possibilities, really, and almost all of them pointed right back to him and Sam. Given the way Sam kept glancing to him, the younger Winchester knew it too.)

Ellen rapped the back of her hand against the table beside her, a clear indication for Dean to take the only empty seat left, right next to her. Dean glanced over at Asa, thinking of offering it to him (maybe as an out for sitting next to the woman who was clearly about to interrogate the hell out of him, but more so just because turnabout was fair play and Ellen had made the first move). But Asa was already settling himself against the kitchen counter beside Andy, who'd jumped up and was now sitting cross-legged beside the stove (ignoring Bobby's pointed looks to get down. Dean realized this likely a common battle). So, reluctantly, the man from the future took the corner seat across from his brother, Bucky stuck between them, and accepted a plate of food passed over his shoulder rather precariously by Andy, who hadn't moved from his spot on the counter, just leaned really far forward.

It sat completely untouched in front of him. Those knots in his stomach hadn't exactly left much room for an appetite.

"So." Ellen decided to take the reins of this intervention (it was really more like a battle charge: infantry in first, cavalry on reserve, ready to flank on their general's orders). She'd gotten a call from Jo once they were back on the road out of Cold Oak, updating her on the situation and their new destination of the Singer Salvage yard. The single mother had had a choice to make; whatever was going on, she knew it was bigger than Dean or Sam were letting on and now her daughter was a part of it. Which left Ellen with a decision to make. And she'd chosen to show up. "You gonna tell us what the hell's going on, boys?"

There was a long beat of silence, filled mostly with Sam and Dean exchanging a silent conversation held entirely in worried looks, dark eyes, and raised eyebrows. Occasionally, they included Bobby in the chat. He seemed as talkative as ever, face hardly moving, and yet he got his meaning across, clear as ever.

"Before we get into that…" Dean purposefully turned away from Ellen to nod at Bucky, Asa and Jo, his eyes settling on the last of the three. Jo straightened a little under the attention, game face pulled on. Asa had likely taken lead on the hunt, but it was Ellen they'd called for help and her daughter she'd picked to do the job. Besides, Jo was his friend and deserved the recognition. "Cold Oak was empty?"

Her pretty brown eyes glanced towards Asa and Bucky, but they both gave her the lead and with that her confidence was sufficiently bolstered. She met Sam and Dean's gaze each in turn before nodded solemnly at the older of the two. "We searched the whole town, Dean. Found nothing. Well, nothing living. Some old police tape, what looked like blood stains in a couple places." No one missed the way Andy rubbued absently at the bandage around his neck, but most didn't see the reaction for what it was. "That was it. We searched the woods too. Nothing. No girl, no psychic kids. Just, a lot of restless spirits and that Acheri demon."

"Thanks for the heads up on that, by the way," Asa piped in, tipping his beer in the boys' direction. "Ran into that bastard about fifteen minutes into our search."

"Red ribbon 'round the neck worked like a charm," Bucky added with a smile, lips stained with barbeque sauce from the rib in his hand.

On top of the counter, Andy smiled bitterly, dropping his hand from his neck, but only Bobby and Ellen were facing him well enough to notice. Bobby gave the kid a sympathetic nod, which Jo caught, following over her shoulder to her cross-legged friend. Her eyes dipped down to his neck and then snapped back to his face in shock. She turned fully around in her chair, white-knuckled fingers gripping the back of it.

"The Acheri did that?" Her gaze darted down again and Andy raised his hand almost self-consciously, fingers barely skirting the edge of the bandages once more before he dropped his hand. He still didn't like to touch it, not consciously, at least. He couldn't shake the expectation of pain every time he did, even if it was healing well enough and only hurt on the bad days.

Andy shook his head, gaze locked on his lap, even as Dean said, "It's a long story."

"You got somewhere else to be?" Ellen challenged, all heads snapping her direction at the sharp words.

Dean ground his teeth, biting back his own retort. Because yeah, he did. Out looking for Ava Wilson (although he knew they'd never find her). Or the new haunt Azazel was using for his battle royale (they'd never find that, either. Not without help. Not until it was too late). Or trying to stop Hell, in general, from unleashing the goddamn apocalypse. Or, shit, how about just letting everyone finish a nice meal with some halfway decent company for once instead ofruining everyone's appetite and the almost-pleasant evening?

But he couldn't come out and say any of that, now could he?

Sam shared a sympathetic look with him, but neither Winchester answered her question, or her daughter's. Ellen glanced between the two of them, then turned her head to the left to look expectantly at Bobby. The gruff hunter, friendly as the two of them might be, just shrugged his shoulders.

"Not my story to tell."

Ellen huffed with (admittedly fond) annoyance, but loyalty wasn't a fault she'd hold against anyone, especially Bobby Singer. So she turned those mama-bear, demanding eyes back on John Winchester's boys and tried a different tactic: some tough love. "Look, we know something's happening. Something big. A demon kidnapping psychics, dropping them in a ghost town in the middle of nowhere? That's not your everyday hunt, boys. And you know more than you're letting on. Now, far as I knew before showing up here, we were all on the same side."

She speared each of them in turn with that terrifying Harvelle look, daring them to tell her that had changed or she was wrong. No one spoke a word.

"Which means it's us versus them and far as I can tell, there side holds all the cards. 'Cept for whatever you've got that you're playing close to the chest." She didn't miss the way Dean winced and tried to hide it, or absently rubbed at his chest before dropping his hand once he caught his brother's eye. She didn't understand it, but damnit, she didn't like being on the outside of a bunch of secrets. Secrets got people killed in their business. She said as much, sharp and bitter, with a throat that was too closed up and water too close to her eyes, thinking of a husband and father long gone.

Jo's gaze lowered to her food, now left untouched. So did Dean's and Ellen knew they were both in the same headspace with her.

The barkeep cleared her throat, pulling on that shield of badassery that had let her keep her bar for so many years after Bill had passed on. "So spill. We got questions and we're not leaving without answers, boys."

Dean's eyes tracked to his brother and it was obvious that, despite him being the older one and, as Ellen suspected, the ringleader of all those secrets, they were in this together. Sam shrugged one shoulder, picking at his salad with a plastic fork. His food was barely touched either. Still, even with the obvious trepidation about this, he looked like the more optimistic of the two. Which wasn't hard, really, since Dean looked like a man on Death Row.

Damn, but did he not want to do this again. He didn't want to drag them into it. Not Jo and Ellen. Not when he'd promised he'd keep them out of it.

(An empty promise. One he'd always known had nothing backing it. There was no way he could keep them out. No more than he'd been able to keep out Sam or Bobby or Cas.)

"You said they were like family, Dean," Sam spoke quietly, well aware everyone could hear him, but there was no other way this conversation would – or could – go down. Of course, Dean had been talking about Jo and Ellen. Neither of them knew Asa or Bucky from Jack, regardless of what legend and hearsay had to say about their character.

Dean had thought well enough of Roy Dabb and Walter Loflin, at least as far as hunters and reputations had gone. (They were, arguably, idiots, but that was neither here nor there.) And those sons of bitches had deposited a shotgun round each to his and Sammy's chests when they found out about the Apocalypse. So, yeah, Dean was sure as hell playing those secrets 'closer to his chest' this time around.

"Hey, man," Asa interrupted, raising his hands, one holding his beer. He was clearly picking up on the elephant in the space that existed between the two brothers. "Bucky and me can peace out. It's no big deal, we'll grab a hotel in town and meet up tomorrow."

Bucky looked put out by his buddy's offer. He was obviously curious about what was going on and probably had more than a passing opinion on what sticking their necks out by going to Cold Oak ought to get them in return. But Dean had the feeling Bucky was the type to follow Asa's lead, no matter what.

True to form, the guy didn't speak up and Asa continued with his offer. "This seems like a family thing and we only got an invite because we were escorting a pretty lady here."

He winked Jo's way. She rolled her eyes but also looked over to Dean, opening her mouth to protest. But those lips thinned into a line before she said anything, realizing that Asa had a reason to say what he had. She knew him well, him and Bucky, but the Winchesters didn't. Asa was just nice enough – nicer than the rest of them – to bow out tactfully. Jo looked down for a second, rethinking her words. She'd go into a firefight with Asa Fox any day, and she thought Dean would too, if he got to know him.

Jo looked up, locking onto Dean's gaze with a steadfast promise of her own. "They're good people, Dean. You can trust them."

The older Winchester wanted to fold to those soft eyes, the only part of Jo that wouldn't be hardened in the future by her dreams of becoming a hunter. But Dean didn't know if he could – if he was ready to – risk his brother, risk the angel sleeping upstairs or any of their friends, on a pair of hunters he didn't know. Even if they had been keeping Jo safe for months now.

Sam met his eyes, but the younger Winchester was deferring to him. His story to tell, his call to make. No matter how much of a role Sam had to play in that tale. He did, however, glance at Bobby for support either way, and Dean followed his gaze.

The older hunter mirrored the same shrug Sam had given when it came to the Harvelles, one of the only ones at the table still eating the meal he'd bothered to cook. He tugged on the cap of his hat with the hand not covered in barbeque sauce, pushing it a little further back on his head. His gaze met Dean's with a mix of support and 'it's up to you.'

"I trust 'em," is what he said aloud, nodding towards Asa and Bucky. "Besides, you two are gonna need all the help you can get."

Green eyes shuttered closed, not completely sure that's the answer he'd wanted. It was probably the answer he and Sam needed, but it meant this intervention train was going right on ahead, full steam.

Dean ran a hand over his face, then scrubbed it through his hair. Damnit, Bobby had a point. And his gut (and inner fanboy, admittedly) wanted to trust Asa Fox. He didn't know much about Bucky, other than that the pair had always been just that – a pair – but his hunter instincts weren't screaming to run away, either. His head sure was, but since when had Dean Winchester ever listened to that? No, he would trust Bobby and Ellen and Jo's word over his own brain any day of the week.

"Alright," Dean muttered on the release of a deep breath. He nodded, head bob jittery but decision already made. He met Sam's eyes first, then pinned a hardened look – the one not quite made in Hell but definitely influenced by it – on each of the hunters gathered in Bobby's kitchen, one by one. "Alright, but nothing that's said here tonight leaves this house."

Jo and Ellen exchanged glances. Asa held his gaze despite Bucky checking his way. But Dean wasn't playing here, and he wasn't about to spill ten years of secrets, some quite literally out of this world, to anyone who thought he might be.

"I'm serious. You're gonna hear some crazy shit and you don't have to be in – you can walk away from this at any point – but you don't breathe a word of what you heard here, either way. Everyone agrees to that right now or we're done."

There were plenty more glances exchanged, some of them hesitant, some suspicious, but no one moved. No one called it quits or opted out. That might have been because Bobby's glare was enough to pin them all in place, daring them to walk out on hunters in need. But mostly it was because hunters were damn near suicidal to start with and loyal sons of bitches to boot.

"Think we're all alright with that," Asa finally said, if only because no one else was saying it. The guy even smiled in the middle of what was clearly about to be a shit show. "Gotta say, I owe Mary Winchester everything. So I'm in."

"We're not our mom," Dean countered immediately, and his tone might have sounded like a challenge, but his words were an out for a promise Asa didn't even know the details of.

Though he appreciated the offer as much as his brother, Sam added quietly, "You don't owe us anything, Asa."

"Maybe not, but you're her kids," Asa replied with a wide grin, one that said there was no way in hell one of Mary Winchester's boys was ever gonna talk him out of something he'd made his mind up about, years and years ago. Dean could relate. That smile slipped a little with his next words, though. "I'm too late to repay her – by years, it sounds like – so paying it forward to you is the next best thing I can do. I'd be proud to help, whatever you need."

"I won't hold you to that," Dean muttered, not loud enough for most to hear, because it was highly unlikely Asa had any clue what he was volunteering for. But Dean took in a deep breath at the lack of argument from anyone else, regardless. Because now he had to follow through, and he didn't want to. The breath he let back out wasn't shaky by sheer force of will alone. "Okay."

Now where to start. He'd really been hoping people would argue – flip the metaphorical table – so he didn't have to start anywhere. But when was that ever his kind of luck? Guess he'd tackle it like he had with Bobby: at the beginning. Only problem was, which beginning? Ah, hell. Probably the lie that had started all this and would need to be fixed before they could tell the rest.

'Okay, here goes.'

"Sam and Andy are psychics."

That statement hadn't even settled in the room before Ellen was jumping on it, spotting the lie it uncovered faster than a honey bear on a bee's hive.

"Just Sam and Andy?" she interrupted immediately, eyes narrowed.

Dean met her stony stare, hard as it was. In for a penny, in for a pound. "Yeah, Ellen. Just Sam and Andy."

-o-o-o-

She woke with a gasp, completely surrounded by darkness and a smell that reminded her of cleaning out her grandmother's house last year, only hours after the beloved woman's funeral. Ava sat upright with a jolt, but smashed her nose into a paneled surface right in front of her face. Not that she could see it. Everything was pitch black around her. Ava hissed, rubbing at the sharp sting of physical trauma, and reached out with her other hand to define the space around her.

It was small. Really small.

Oh god. She was in a closet. A closet with no light, given the dangling string she finally found that did nothing but make infuriating clicking noises every time she tugged it in desperate, near-hyperventilating panic.

"Okay, okay, breathe. Just breathe. You can do that." Ava Wilson searched every wall for a hint, an exit, a weapon, a light, anything. She found the latter, which was her last choice out of all of the others, but she'd take it. It was the hunting knife Sam had given to her, sans the leather sheath. It had been in her purse when she…. Her purse that she had dropped in shock when she'd come home to a dark house, no lights, and yellow eyes waiting for her in the shadows. She'd reached for the knife, even managed to unsheathe it, but that…that was the last thing she remembered.

"Oh god," Ava whispered, pressing her back to what she assumed was the back of the closet, though she couldn't exactly tell in the darkness. She clutched the knife to her chest and it felt like an untethered flotation device in the middle of the ocean. A life-saver, maybe, but how temporary of one?

Shaking, Ava reached out and started her search again. Sitting there clutching a knife wasn't going to get her out of this. Wherever this was. There were no nobs or handles to indicate doors, no lines of light to define an exit. Everything was just so dark.

So, naturally, her brain went right back to panicking.

"Let me out of here!" Ava screamed, not thinking enough to worry about who might be on the other side of any one of these walls. At best, maybe someone would hear and rescue her. At worst, at least she would give her kidnapper a headache. Ava banged on every surface she could find, kicking out once her hands started to hurt from hitting and slapping the sturdy, wooden surfaces.

"Hey, hey, hold on!"

Ava stilled at the other voice in the darkness, muffled by one of walls. She faced that one, hoping it was the way out. "Hello? Hello! Get me out of here! I'm trapped!"

"Yeah, I can see that," came the slightly huffy, annoyed voice of another woman just on the other side of what Ava prayed was a closet door (it was possible, after all, that this wasn't a closet but an upright coffin or, or…something else equally terrifying and horrible and not worth thinking about right now, she had enough to panic about, thank you very much!) "Hold on, I'm trying to get it open. It's dark as shit out here."

Ava didn't really care about the quality of 'out there' just so long as it was not 'in here'. Although, once the woman currently rescuing her did get the door open after a loud thud of something heavy toppling over and the horrible creaking and splintering of wood that had been nailed shut, Ava stumbled out into almost equal darkness to what had been the interior of the closet. Then, and only then, did she care about the quality of 'out there' and wish that it was not, as it indeed was, dark as shit.

"Oh god," she whispered into the jacket of her rescuer, who had caught her as she stumbled out of the closet. The woman was stiff as a board while Ava clung to her, arms held up and out wide to the sides, like she couldn't stand the fact she was being touched. Ava was too busy being relieved to be properly offended, though she did manage to upright herself and step away from the clearly uncomfortable woman. "Thank you. Thank you for getting me out of there."

"Uh, yeah, sure. No…no worries." The woman, no older than Ava herself, had blonde hair, or what Ava thought was probably blonde. It was really hard to tell in the dim lighting. In fact, the only light source seemed to be coming from a phone clutched in the woman's hand, the flashlight component on the back shining towards the ground.

"You have a cell phone?" Ava asked rather dumbly. Hers had been in her purse. It had been one of the first things she realized while trapped in that darkness, searching for a light or a way out. Now Ava turned around to the space she'd come barreling out of only seconds ago. It was a closet, and looking at it now, she was surprised it had held her at all. The door was old, the wood splintered and paint peeling, the hinges rusty. The walls surrounding it were covered in old, dirty wallpaper that was peeling back in some places and missing entirely in others.

They…they were in a house of some sort and it had seen much better days. More of it was falling apart than wasn't and the furnishings that were left were few and far between (as were any signs of life other than Ava and her new friend).

"Where are we?" Ava asked, spinning around to complete a little tour of what was quickly becoming the world's least fun funhouse. Everything was old and dark, windows boarded up so that the only light came from the phone clutched in her rescuer's hand. Ava darted forward for a light switch as soon as she saw one. It was an old style one, probably installed in the forties or earlier, like the rest of the house. It flipped up with a loud, sharp click, but nothing happened. Ava tried not to let the disappointment drown her and she clutched that flotation device – Sam's knife – tighter to her chest as she backed away from the wall and its useless light switch.

"There's no electricity," the huffy woman spoke up from behind her, though she sounded mostly scared, despite the attitude. "I already tried."

"Have you tried calling for help?" Ava asked instead, taking deep and even breaths to keep from hyperventilating. Brady had always encouraged her to breathe through her panic attacks. Lord knew they'd had plenty of practice while trying to plan a wedding.

Oh god, Brady. Her fiancé would be panicking right now. He hadn't answered when she'd come home, but in the dark Ava hadn't even been sure he'd been there. He'd be so worried when he realized she was missing.

"No signal," the other woman answered, glancing down at the phone with a glare that was probably regret and terror, but mostly looked like moody anger. Ava tried to ignore all that. This woman had rescued her from a closet. She was right up there with Jesus and Taylor Swift right now.

Except…. Except hadn't Sam warned her about being kidnapped and waking up somewhere with other people like her? That's why he'd insisted she take the knife. Because those other people…those other people were going to kill her.

Ava took about six immediate and hasty steps away from the woman, even though she was the only light source in the creepy old house. She…she didn't look like a killer. Heck, Ava was the one with the knife. And if this lady wanted to murder her, wouldn't she have just left her in the closet? Or done it when Ava had been clinging to her like a drowning woman?

She eyed her supposed rescuer cautiously, realizing she was getting an equally wary look in return. Well, she had just leapt across the room like realized the lady had fleas or something. Ava cleared her throat and tried to clear her panicking mind. "Uh…I'm, um, Ava."

"Lily," came the simple reply, filled with suspicion and something Ava wasn't sure what to make of. Attitude, for sure, like an angsty teenager.

Ava swallowed, fingering the knife she was still clutching to her chest. "Um, do you know how- how we got here?"

Lily shook her head, looking away and shining the light from her phone around the house. There really wasn't much to see. It looked like a pretty big house. They were in a hallway of sorts, the closet Ava had been trapped in was the under-the-stairs sort (no wonder she'd smashed her face on the angled, low-hanging ceiling). There were at least three rooms visible just from where they stood, along with an upstairs, obviously. The whole place looked like one of those big mansions from that TV show Brady liked to watch. The one about hunting ghosts.

Oh god. Ava shoved that thought as far from her head as she possibly could. There was no such things as ghosts, she reminded herself and then said it two more times just for good measure. There was no use in putting that kind of thought in her head right now. She and Lily clearly had enough to worry about.

"I don't know," Lily answered the question Ava had already forgotten she'd asked. "I woke up over in that room."

She gestured with the light to what might have once been a parlor. There was only half a chaise left now, and the windows were boarded up behind incredibly sorry excuses for curtains. "I was in my house, alone last night. I have no idea how I got here."

The woman sounded both petulant and pissed about that, and Ava took some heart in their shared predicament. Maybe that meant Lily wasn't here to kill her (oh, she hoped not, but she also kept that knife close. Sam had been pretty adamant).

"The only doors I can find are locked and I bounced a fucking chair off one of the windows once I got a couple of the boards off. They're, like, safety glass or something. I don't know." Lily turned in a slow half circle, light catching on holes in walls, threadbare rugs and crooked sconces that wouldn't light anyway. Ava didn't like this place, wherever they were. "I was trying to find another way out when I heard you scream."

Ava blushed slightly at that but quickly put her embarrassment aside. She'd been terrified (fairly, in her opinion) and there was no shame in that. She was still terrified. "Well, maybe we should try-"

There was a flickering of light – Lily's phone suddenly cutting out, then blinking back on, then off and on again – and a shift in the air, like the room wasn't as big as it had been a minute ago. Or maybe they were suddenly smaller? Ava didn't know. All she knew was that one minute she was turning towards Lily, staring wide-eyed at the phone and praying the battery wasn't dying, and the next there was a third person in the house with them.

Lily screamed and Ava raised Sam's knife on instinct, scrambling back from the man who'd literally appeared out of nowhere between the two women.

He was older, middle aged, dark-haired and…kinda dirty. His coat was rumpled and stained. He swayed back and forth, like he was trying to keep himself up right. The guy looked…drunk, staring unseeing, not even looking at either woman that he stood less than five feet from.

"H-Hey," Ava tried but it came out weak and quiet. She was still holding the knife out in front of her but the thing was shaking as badly as she was. Realizing that was hardly going to save her if this man was a threat (and, honestly, he looked more likely to fall over all on his own than do any real damage attacking them), Ava stiffened her grip and steeled her nerves. "I said, hey!"

She practically screamed it, sourcing all that fear and terror, trying to funnel it into confidence. Mostly it came out sounding like anger, but she'd take it. The guy, however, didn't even move. Was he deaf? Well, Ava supposed that wasn't entirely accurate; he did keep swaying like a drunken fool.

"What the hell…?" Lily asked, phone raised to light the guy. The sudden sound of a train horn blaring in the distance caused all three of them to jump. The man in front of them spun around, looking far beyond them with red-rimmed, bleary eyes.

"Did you hear that?" Ava asked, suddenly hopeful. Train meant tracks and tracks meant a road to civilization. If they could just get out of here-

"What the-!" the sharp intake of Lily's breath and abrupt cut off of her words turned Ava back around. The guy in front of them was lit up like he was standing in front of a damn searchlight. Like, right in front of one. Lily checked her phone around, twisting it around until the beam of her flashlight lit up her own face, then back to the guy who was still lit up like a Christmas tree (in more ways than one). It was very obviously not her flashlight doing it. For one, he seemed to be the only thing lit up by it.

"What-" Ava took a step forward when the man's eyes suddenly went wide and that train sounded again, only a hell of a lot closer. Close enough to shake the house and deafen the two women. They clapped their hands to their ears.

And then the guy went flying. Flying back like he'd been hit by something traveling a thousand miles an hour, his face pancaked and front blossoming with blood. Then he was gone and the house was back to near pitch black and a terrible, awful silence.

Lily screamed. She dropped the phone, the beam of the flashlight bouncing in the fall, landing on its side and blinking out permanently with a shatter of plastic and glass.

"No, wait!" Ava tried to stop her, but Lily was already gone, bolting down the hallway they were in and disappearing into the darkness that filled the rest of the house. Ava tried to breathe through the panic that was building its way up and out of her stomach, overtaking her lungs and chest, clawing up her throat. "Oh god."

Oh god. Oh god, oh god, oh god oh godohgod.

She stared at the space where the man had been, the space where he'd gone…flying. After…after being hit…by a train. In the middle of a house. An invisible train in the middle of a…a…haunted house.

"Oh god," Ava whispered, staggering back in the darkness, knife clutched to her chest, utterly alone. Only not really. Because that…that had been a ghost. She'd just seen a ghost. Oh god. She was locked – trapped – in a haunted house and very, very much not alone.