Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Lynyrd Skynyrd blared through the speakers of the Impala, overtaking the growl of the engine as the car roared across West Texas. 

Andrew Minyard could feel his twin, Aaron, grow more and more agitated in the passenger seat. It had already been five hours since they passed through El Paso, and Andrew could tell that they were nearing the end of Aaron’s patience with being ignored. For the entirety of the trip so far, he’d only had one suggested line of conversation. And Andrew wasn’t interested in it.

He turned the volume up a few notches. They’d argued on the way out of California. And halfway through Arizona. And then again at the rest stop in Las Cruces. 

And apparently again in the barren wasteland Andrew was convinced would never end. There’s no justifiable reason for a state to be this large.

“We have to have this wrapped up by Thursday.” Aaron seemed to feel the need to repeat himself. “I need to be back in LA by Saturday because I only took off through the weekend. And I’ll need to go grocery shopping.”

Andrew grunted. 

“Andrew, I need your word that it’s only this job. Don’t do that thing you always do where one job turns into two, turns into three, turns into six months on the road. I have a life. I have Kaitlyn.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know. I already told you I’d get you back to your picket fence wet dream. If it wasn’t Nicky, I wouldn't have even asked.”

Their cousin, Nicky, had called up Andrew out of the blue, asking for help. “I know you’re probably busy, but I have some friends who are in trouble. Your kind of trouble. I know Texas is pretty far, but you can crash on our couch if you need. Erik won’t mind. I just… The cops aren’t any help.”

Andrew had been in Oregon at the time, working on clearing out a werewolf den that was causing trouble for a dairy farm. “I’ll be there in three days.”

It took him two hours to track down and eliminate the last werewolf, and he was on the road, heading south to pick up Aaron from UCLA. If he had to deal with Nicky and his abrasive happiness, he was going to need backup. And it would be a good chance to prove to Aaron that he had made a mistake.

It had been more of an issue to get him to go than Andrew had expected. But then again, Aaron had been doing his best to avoid his brother’s chosen profession: Saving people. Hunting things. The family business. 

“You showed up out of nowhere, Andrew. What, was I supposed to drop everything and just jump in the car with you?”

“You said you’d be there any time I needed help.” Andrew said. “Well Nicky needs your help.”

“You mean you need my help. Andrew, this has nothing to do with Nicky. I don’t know why you have to keep dragging me back. I made myself very clear that I don’t want to be part of this world anymore. I never did. I did it for you. I kept my promise. But I’m done now.”

Andrew didn’t have anything to say to that, so he didn’t.

Aaron reached up to turn the dial back down, but Andrew slapped his hand away. 

“Look if you don’t want to talk, can you at least play something a little less grating?” Aaron said, practically shouting over the sound. 

“What’s grating is this fucking conversation.”

“Andrew.” 

Andrew looked over at him. Aaron wore an expression of twisted irritation. Not for the first time, Andrew was struck with how strange it was to see expressions played out so clearly on his own face. 

He ejected the tape and reached around to rifle through the box behind his seat to find something else. 

Oh good, Journey. Aaron would hate that even more. He shoved in the tape and definitely didn’t grin when Aaron groaned loudly as the first guitar notes played. 

---

By the time they pulled into the driveway of the quaint South Austin two bedroom that Nicky and his husband Erik live in, the sun was making a spectacle of the few clouds. Reds, oranges, and heavy pink light painted the horizon. Andrew stepped out of the car, slamming the door, and took a deep breath of the heavy, humid summer air. He wanted a cigarette. And someone to fight. Or something.

Instead, he was greeted with Nicky busting through the door, a frilly apron tied around his waist, and a grin brighter than the sunset plastered across his face. “You’re here! It’s been so long! Come in, dinner’s almost ready. Thank you again for coming on such short notice. I’ll let you get settled before I get into the gory details.”

He roped each of the twins into a hug, which Andrew only allowed because it was easier than taking him to a hospital for the stab wounds. 

He did not let Erik hug him when they got inside, though, sending him a glare that would have rivaled the sharpness of a knife. 

The four of them settled in to eat some pasta dish Nicky pulled out of the oven. It was the first home cooking Andrew’d had in months. He ate so fast it burned the shit out of his mouth. But luckily that left Aaron to respond to most of the questions.

“I should be hearing back soon from the med schools I interviewed with,” Andrew said.

“How soon?” Nicky asked. He glanced over at Andrew, something heavy in his look.

Andrew affected indifference, but this was something he hadn’t known. Med school had been Aaron’s dream for years. But to hear that it was actually something he was pursuing… 

“Hopefully by the end of this week—”

“So what is this job?” Andrew interrupted, changing the tone of the conversation dramatically. 

“Yeah, of course. It’s why you’re here…” Nicky said, and then trailed off. 

“Andrew didn’t give me any details, other than it being his line of work.” Aaron said to try to get Nicky going again.

His. Not ours. At one point, it had been both of their jobs, at least part time. 

Nicky looked down at his plate and then pushed it away, even though he hadn’t finished. “A few friends of mine, people I knew from college, were down in San Antonio for a spring break trip. One of them, Seth, is a bit… much. And he thought it would be fun to go visit a local ghost spot, the Donkey Lady Bridge, just south of town. If I had known what he was planning, I would have stopped him. I would have told them not to mess with stuff like that. You never know when it’s real and when it’s bullshit—”

“It’s usually bullshit,” Andrew interjected.

“Yeah, but not always. And I don’t think it was in this case. Seth took his girlfriend, Allison, and another friend, Matt, just for a fun scare.” Nicky looked like he was going to be sick; Erik reached across the table to put his hand on top of Nicky’s. “Apparently they saw something. And there was screaming, but it was so dark. And then Seth and Allison disappeared. We haven’t seen them since.”

Andrew got up. His plate was empty anyway. He went to grab his heavy leather-bound journal out of his duffel in the hall and dropped it in front of Aaron, who gave him a scathing look. But he opened it to a blank page anyway and started taking notes about what Nicky had said. 

This was their dynamic. Aaron took notes, did research, and backed Andrew up when things got dicey. This was what worked. Until Aaron decided he was done. There was a big fight, heavy accusations thrown from both of them, and the twins, having only been in each other’s lives for five years, had gone their separate ways again. 

Andrew had been hunting all on his own for two years now. It just wasn’t the same. 

Nicky kept talking, and the page in front of Aaron gathered important information. Who these people were, if they had any supernatural predilections that Nicky knew about, who might have more information about that night.

Andrew didn’t need the notebook, really. His memory was good enough. But it was a habit he had picked up from David Wymack, his adoptive dad. And Kevin, Wymack’s son, was a sort of supernatural historian, so keeping these things documented helped him with the archives he was building. The "crazy shit vault" Andrew always called it. 

“Dan and Matt are still down in San Antonio for the investigation, but Renee came back yesterday. You should start with her.” Nicky said. “And again, thank you. Both of you. I just know you’ll find them.” He looked at Andrew and Aaron so earnestly, tears welling up in his brown eyes. 

Andrew had to get up. He didn’t do crying. “Dibs on the guest bed,” He said, not looking to see the irritated glares that were sure to be pointed in his direction. He simply didn’t care. Sure he had pulled the “family” card on Aaron to get him to join. But it was still a job. And he needed his beauty sleep in order to fight ghosts. 

---

They planned to meet Renee at a coffee shop just south of the river that cut through downtown Austin. It was the kind of place where you couldn’t just get a black coffee, which seemed to piss Aaron off. Andrew, on the other hand, ordered the most complicated milkshake-disguised-as-a-coffee he could find on the menu. 

“That’s ridiculous. I can’t believe you ordered that.” Aaron looked almost embarrassed to be seen with Andrew, who had taken the domed cap off his drink and was licking the whipped cream and caramel drizzle off the top. They took a seat at a table in the corner next to a window, so they would have full view of everyone who came and went, but wouldn't be overheard.

“I can see that college has sucked all the fun out of you, as expected.”

“That is not fun. That’s a diabetic coma waiting to happen.”

“Get your pre-med shit out of my face. I’m perfectly healthy.” Andrew watched the door, waiting for someone looking traumatized but hopeful to walk through. It was the same look on all the witnesses and family members he talked to.

“Tell that to that cut on your shoulder. Yeah, I saw it. You should wash your flannel, by the way. There’s still a blood stain. And you should let me clean that wound up. You never use enough antiseptic. It’s going to get infected.”

“It’s fine.” Andrew pulled his jacket collar up higher, not that he cared what Aaron thought. 

A woman with short blond hair, dyed a rainbow of pastel colors at the ends, pushed through the door and looked directly at Andrew. She smiled, and he stood up. This couldn’t be a coincidence. 

“Natalie,” he said as she walked up to him. “Small world. You working a job out here?”

“No, I’m not working. And it’s not Natalie anymore. Now I’m Renee. It’s good to see you, Andrew. I didn’t realize it would be you showing up to save the day when Nicky said he knew someone who could help out.”

“Wait,” Aaron looked between the two of them. “You know her? Our lead? Where the hell…”

“Renee used to be one of the best hunters in the business. We crossed paths here and there.” Andrew looked her up and down. She still had that hard edge in her eyes, and still looked like she could probably take him in a fight, but there was something different about the way she carried herself. A softness that had not been there before. Then he noticed the cross necklace. “I hadn’t heard from you in a while, but I didn’t realize you’d left the gig.”

Renee nodded, and then gestured for them to sit. “Yes, I felt that my time as a hunter was done, and I moved on. I’m back in school now, working on a masters. That’s how I came to be involved with this incident. I’m Allison’s roommate.”

Aaron had pulled out the journal and was already jotting down notes. If he had been impacted by hearing about another hunter leaving to go to college, Andrew couldn’t see a sign of it on his face. “If you’re a hunter—sorry, ex hunter—why didn’t you just find them yourself?”

Renee shook her head sadly. “I tried, at first. I wasn’t with them at the bridge, I was at the hotel with Dan. But I went searching as soon as Matt came back alone. Unfortunately, I…” She trailed off, her hand grasping absently at the cross around her neck. “I no longer feel like it’s my place to fight these kinds of dangers in the same way. So when Nicky said he knew someone, I decided to defer to the experts. And now that I know it’s you two, I’m glad I did. You are our best hope.”

“So this is legit. Is it really a ghost? Or something else.” Andrew didn’t feel the need to grill Renee about her life changes. It’s not like this was the easiest line of work, and everyone got tired of it at some point. Everyone except him.

He was glad that they would at least have more details, and more relevant information, than he’d normally get on a job like this. Renee would be able to parse out what was important and what was fanatical fluff.

“My best guess is a ghost. That’s what the legend says is out there, and there are enough stories that corroborate the suspicions. Teens, drunk college kids, all the usual. But I don’t know where they could have been taken. There was no sign of anything when I searched, and the cops haven’t found anything helpful yet.”

“No surprise there. Cops are a waste of oxygen.” Andrew sucked down the last of his drink and set it to the side. “What’s this legend? Who’s the donkey lady? And why does she care so much about this damned bridge?”

Renee looked thoughtfully out the window. Then she launched into the story.

“As with any legend like this, there are lots of different versions of backstory. Some say it’s a woman haunting the area after a stranger burned down her barn full of donkeys. Some say it’s a tale of scorned love, that the donkey lady seeks revenge against men after tragically killing herself. 

“But the most common tale, the one that I personally believe, is more tragic. They say that her husband burned down their house around them, killing both himself and their two children. She is supposed to have been horrifically burned, and her fingers fused into stumps that look more like hooves. Hence the donkey title. It’s horribly cruel. She is said to terrorize anyone in the area, but especially that bridge that led to their house.”

“So not quite a La Llorona type, but close?” Andrew said. He had dealt with many ghosts of tragic mothers, trapped and tortured by their loss. 

“Exactly.” Renee said. “Apparently to call her, you honk three times while on the bridge. But it’s all blocked off. You can’t even drive on it anymore.” 

“Somehow I don’t think that stops people.” Aaron muttered, finishing up what he was writing. 

The bell above the door to the coffee shop chimed, and Andrew looked up. He caught the eye of a man in a long coat with a flame of auburn hair and a startlingly beautiful face marred by a few freshly healed scars across one cheek. He wasn’t tall, maybe only a few inches more than Andrew, and he looked like he was searching for something. He caught Andrew’s eyes and blinked, then turned back toward the counter. 

Something was raising flags in Andrew’s mind. He looked the man over. Sure the coat was annoyingly long, especially for October in Texas, when the temperatures barely got below 60. But he just looked like a normal guy. Andrew couldn’t spot any suspicious lumps that might be weapons, and the man ordered a scone with his coffee, so clearly the purchase wasn’t a front. But there was something about him that Andrew couldn’t pinpoint. Something that made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

“Andrew? Are you listening?” Aaron flicked his shoulder, and Andrew whipped his attention back to the table. 

“Is it supposed to rain today?” He asked, looking straight at Renee. 

“Rain? What are you talking about? We were just saying—” But Andrew waved off Aaron impatiently.

Renee narrowed her eyes at him. “No.”

“Didn’t think so.” Andrew looked back toward where the long-coat man had just been picking up his coffee, but there wasn’t anyone there. The chime of the bell rang out again, and he just caught the tan edge of the coat swishing through the door and heading off in the other direction.

“What is it?” Aaron asked. “Andrew, what the fuck did you see?”

The feeling hadn’t left, even with the man’s departure, but Andrew had nothing other than a bad vibe and poor wardrobe choice to justify the feeling. “Nothing. It must have been nothing. Just a sugar rush probably.”

Aaron scoffed, “I warned you didn’t I? Those drinks are so bad for you.”

“You sound like Kevin.” Andrew ripped his eyes from the door and looked back at the notebook. He could think about the strange man later. “Where were we?”

Chapter Text

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.” Aaron stared down at Andrew’s plate that the waiter had just set down. It was piled high with three waffles, all in the shape of Texas, and slathered with butter, whipped cream, and syrup. 

“Don’t even think about trying to steal any,” Andrew said, knowing full well that one bite might send Aaron into actual cardiac arrest. “You ordered those sad eggs, you have to eat them.”

Aaron gagged, and held a hand up to shield his eyes from the sight of Andrew stabbing into the stack with his knife. “I can’t believe we are related.”

“You and me both.”

They sat in a dingy booth of a roadside diner in San Antonio. It was still early, because Andrew had decided by seven that spending one more minute under the fretting watch of their cousin and his hulking husband was going to end poorly. 

Andrew made short work of the waffles, and slung back three cups of coffee before Aaron had even started his home fries. They sat in an easy silence, carried over from the drive. Andrew could feel something warm stirring just below his sternum, but he refused to look at it head-on. Admitting that he had missed this was a surefire way to fuck everything up. His relationship with Aaron was best held at arm’s length. It was balanced too precariously, and Andrew would not be dragged down if it collapsed. Nobody could have that much control over his life.

Aaron’s phone pinged, and he flipped it over to read the text. Then he turned the phone so Andrew could see the address. They wouldn’t have to look it up again later. “Looks like they want to meet at a burger place at noon. That should work. We can find a library in the meantime. Or maybe they have an archive somewhere.”

“Don’t let them hear you calling Whataburger a burger place.” Andrew gestured vaguely to the sleepy diner around them. “Pretty sure it’s a protected state monument. Like the Alamo. Speaking of which—”

Red hair. 

Just a glimpse, through the window. Someone walking up the street toward them. It couldn’t be… But it was. That same man. That same damned coat. The same scars. What the actual fuck was going on here?

“Don’t tell me you want to see the Alamo. I don’t think we’ll have time for touristy detours. Plus, isn’t it supposed to be super disappointing? I heard it was really small.”

“Shut up.” 

Sure enough, the man entered the diner and was pointed to a booth on the opposite end of the building. Not a straight shot, but clearly within eyeline of where Andrew and Aaron sat. 

Aaron looked up at the tension in Andrew’s voice. “What—” 

“What part of shut up do you not understand? What the fuck do they teach you in that place?”

The man had not looked at them. Not in a he was trying not to look at them way, but none of the muscles in Andrew’s hand, clasped around the syrup-soaked butter knife, relaxed. 

There was no justifiable reason for this man to be here. San Antonio, sure. Lots of people made the commute for a variety of reasons. The man was young, likely around Andrew and Aaron’s age, so he could work in one of the tech companies that had been popping up like weeds. He could even be a student, coming back from a weekend in the capital.

But he wasn’t. Because they were nowhere near a business center. Or a college. Or anything. They weren’t even near interstate 35. They were on the outskirts of the city, closer to the nearest oil refinery than anywhere half hospitable. 

“Andrew?” Aaron’s voice was quiet, barely more than a whisper. 

Andrew couldn’t move. Everything in him was frozen, waiting for the man to do something that he could gauge his response on. He needed to know what kind of threat this mystery man was before deciding whether to kill him or run.

Then the man looked right at him. 

Blue. 

His eyes were so god damned blue. And it wasn’t just any blue. It was a color Andrew had burned into his brain. How had he not seen his eyes in the coffee shop?

“Get up. Get up right fucking now. We are leaving.” Andrew ripped several bills from his pocket and dropped them on the table, shoving Aaron out the door. He couldn’t bear to look and see what the man was doing. He felt like he had been lit on fire. 

They got to the car and Aaron hadn’t even closed his door before Andrew was tearing down the road. He needed space between him and those fucking blue eyes.

The car was silent, but Andrew could feel his brother’s watchful gaze. Thankfully, he said nothing, at least for the first few miles. Andrew took back roads, then jumped on the highway. Then took a turnaround and went down the opposite way along the service road for a while. He watched the rear view mirror more than the road ahead, but it didn’t show him anything. There were no cars following him.

They were on the opposite side of San Antonio when Aaron spoke up. “One to ten.”

It was a code they had created when working together. How bad were things. How much danger were they in. 

The problem was, Andrew didn’t know. He gripped the steering wheel and then turned off the road into a gas station. 

“Undetermined.”

Aaron blinked. It was very unlike Andrew not to know the scope and scale of the threat they faced. Andrew could take one look around a room and know how many band aids he would need for the cracks in his knuckles after knocking out every single person there. And even when he didn’t know, he acted like he did. Undetermined wasn’t in Andrew’s vocabulary.

“So determine it.” 

Andrew couldn’t look; he knew what he was going to find in his brother’s face, and he couldn’t face it yet. The Chevy hummed pleasantly under his hands, and Andrew closed his eyes. He needed to think.

He’d seen that man before. More than once. It was more than 10 years ago, but there was no mistaking those eyes. Andrew couldn’t forget them if he tried.

---

The first time Andrew had seen the red-haired man, they were both kids. 

Andrew was eight years old. It had been a particularly rough day in his foster home, and Andrew had slipped out his bedroom window onto the roof to get away from the yelling. It didn’t stop his skin from crawling. 

He knew he would have to go back inside. He knew he would regret getting caught disobeying the order to go to bed. But everything in him screamed to get away.

He slipped off the roof, using a rosebush trellis to climb down with minimal scratches, and ran to a park down the street. Crickets sang in the darkness, their shrill voices adding a layer of depth to the heady scent of night that clung to Andrew like dew. He sat on a swing without pushing himself into motion. 

If he closed his eyes, he could almost pretend he was somewhere else. He could almost imagine someone, maybe his mother or father, driving past and seeing him. Rescuing him. Taking him away. Taking him home. 

Almost.

He knew it was useless. Nobody cared enough about him to give him a real home, especially not his parents, whoever they were. They had made their opinion of him clear the moment they had given him up. But that hope, small and slowly dimming out with every new house he was shuffled between, was all he could cling to that night. 

Until he opened his eyes and saw another young boy his age standing at the edge of the park. He wore a ratty pair of jeans and a teenage mutant ninja turtles t-shirt, and Andrew jumped to his feet. Where there was another kid, there was usually an adult, and he didn’t want to get caught. 

“Wait,” the boy said, when Andrew turned to book it out of the park.

Andrew stopped. He couldn’t say why. But he waited, and the boy approached him slowly. 

“I won’t tell on you or anything,” the boy said. 

His eyes were bright blue. His hair was a rusty color, hard to pin down in the meager security light by the street.

“I haven’t seen you out here before.” It wasn’t a question, so Andrew didn’t say anything in response. 

The boy sat on the swing next to Andrew and pulled out a candy bar from his pocket. A Twix. 

“I didn’t mean to scare you, I’m sorry if I did.” He fiddled with the edge of the wrapper, folding it back, but not tearing it open.

“I’m not scared,” Andrew said. He wasn’t. He was cautious, but that was a force of habit.

“You look sad.” Again, not a question. But Andrew shrugged anyway. Then he sat back down again. Clearly there was no parent coming to find this kid.

They were quiet for a while, Andrew stone-still and staring at the boy’s hands folding the candy wrapper. The boy gently pushed himself back and forth a few inches, his toes never leaving the wood chips. 

Every so often, the boy opened his mouth, as if to say something, but then he closed it again. So they sat in silence. Andrew didn’t mind. It was the first time he could remember when he didn’t feel uncomfortable around someone else. Words generally didn’t make things better, in his experience.

Finally, the boy tore open the package and pulled out one of the bars. He held it out to Andrew, looking up at him. He didn’t smile, but the gentleness of his blue eyes made something deep inside Andrew relax. Andrew took the candy and tried not to eat it all in one bite. It was a treat, and it deserved to be cherished. The boy ate the other half and then pocketed the wrapper.

They listened to the crickets and the wind rustling the papery eucalyptus trees behind them. Eventually, far longer than Andrew knew was smart to be gone, he got up. 

“Thanks,” he said, hesitating. 

“Yeah,” The boy said. “See ya.”

Andrew didn’t see him again. But the taste of the candy bar and the vivid memory of the unexpected companion that evening became a sort of internal shelter for Andrew. A safe place that couldn’t be desecrated or taken away from him. Year after year, through cruelty after unending cruelty, Andrew could send his mind back to that night. He clung to it desperately, until he wore the scene down to its barest frayed threads. 

Just a touch of caramel on his tongue, the whispering sound of the leaves, the heady scent of night, a kind presence by his side.

---

Andrew opened his eyes, the haze of the gas station simmering up past his memories. 

“Five,” He said, and Aaron looked over at him again. Apparently Andrew had been thinking long enough that his brother had turned to reading some textbook pulled from his bag.

“Okay. We can deal with that. Will you tell me what it is? Or do I just have to keep losing out on finishing my meals cuz it’s time to drive around aimlessly?” 

“Try eating faster.” 

Aaron sighed and muttered something to himself as he shoved the textbook between his seat and the door.

Andrew looked at the clock on the dash. They had two hours until they had to meet Dan and Matt. 

“Let’s go find a library so you can do your nerd shit.”

---

The second time he’d seen those same blue eyes, he was too scared to recognize them. 

He was fourteen and had run away from his foster home at the Spears’. He stood outside the greyhound station with only the clothes he wore and an empty backpack—he should have brought more things, he knew that. But he wanted to delay any search for him, and an empty dresser was as damning as a note. 

The thing he really needed was money, and he sure as hell didn’t have enough for a bus ticket. 

He stood, staring at the sign with the upcoming routes, wishing he could stop the spiraling feeling. He couldn’t do anything. This had been his last shot, and it had failed. There was no escape. And he couldn’t live in that house anymore. Fear throbbed in his chest. 

“I have an uncle in Columbia. Is that where you are going?” The voice that appeared beside him was quiet, but Andrew still jumped. 

“What?” He looked up and saw blue eyes. Those look nice. He caught the memory of a scent, cold and heavy and earthen, laden with significance. There and then gone. He could have imagined it. 

“Columbia. That’s the bus route you’re looking at, right?” The boy held something in his hand. A ticket. 

Andrew thought for less than a second that he could push the kid down and take it. It didn’t matter where it was going. As long as it wasn't here. “Uh…”

“I was supposed to go. To my uncle’s. But I can’t anymore. I was here to return my ticket, but it’s too late to get my money back, apparently.”

Andrew just stared at him. He could barely follow the boy’s words, the ringing of his disappointment still crowding out almost everything else. 

“You should take it. If that’s where you’re going. I don’t want it to go to waste.” The boy held out his hand with the ticket. He had an earnestness that Andrew had never seen before. Except… something felt familiar in the way his arm stretched out. And offer. Those eyes.

“I don’t have any money.” Andrew couldn’t just take this kid’s ticket. He didn’t know where Columbia was, but it had to be a lot of money. 

“Doesn’t matter. I wasn’t going to get it back anyway.”

“Won’t your parents be mad?” Andrew’s tone hardened. It was cruel for the universe to dangle a getaway this close to his face. It was literally a foot away from his nose. But it had to be a trap. There was no way.

The boy shrugged. As if it didn’t matter. As if he could just get away with handing away a bus ticket without risking a beating, or worse.

“I can’t—”

“Just take it.” The boy shoved the ticket into his hand, somehow not touching his skin. “The bus is leaving soon. You should hurry.”

“I—” Andrew couldn't form words. His heart was slamming into the back of his throat. 

“There’s a country store, right across from the bus station.” The boy said. A country store? What the hell was that? “My uncle would always take me when he picked me up. It has really good macaroni and cheese. You should stop there. Get some food or something.” The boy was frowning, as if this store was the most important part of the conversation.

“I don’t—” but the boy grabbed his shirt sleeve and turned him so he was pointed in the direction of a bus. The bus he was supposed to be getting on. Passengers were stowing luggage and filling through the door.

“Hurry up. And don’t forget about that store. You’ll like it. I promise.”

Andrew took a step forward, the bus ticket already damp from his sweating palms. He turned to look back, and the boy nodded encouragingly, a smile starting to show in the corners of those blue eyes. 

This couldn’t be happening. Andrew looked down at the ticket again. This was happening.

“Thanks, I don’t know how I can…” But when he looked up again, the boy was gone. Disappearing seemingly out of thin air. 

Andrew turned and ran to the bus. 

He spent most of the drive, which turned out to be nearly three days, thinking about that boy. He could have sworn he’d seen him before. It wasn’t until the bus stopped to fill up for the last time before reaching Columbia, and Andrew wandered through the gas station trying to figure out what he was going to get with his last three dollars, that he spied the Twix bars. 

The park. It had been that boy from that park. He couldn’t be sure, even with his memory, both encounters felt tilted in a way that was hard to straighten out. But those eyes were hard to forget. 

Andrew did stop at the country store when the bus finally arrived in South Carolina sometime around ten-thirty at night. But he didn’t go in. Instead, he stood at the edge of the sidewalk and looked through the windows at the people inside. 

He had no money. He had no friends. No family. Not even a change of clothes. 

But he was free, for the first time in his life. 

He turned and sat on the curb to the side of the doorway. He had nowhere to be, and he couldn’t think of anywhere that seemed better than right here. 

“Kid.” A man, tall and built with two full sleeves of flamed tattoos, was walking up to the restaurant from his truck. “You waiting for someone?”

Andrew didn’t have to answer, but he did anyway. Nothing mattered anymore. He could make his own decisions. And he’d seen enough predators to know that this man was not one. “No.”

The man looked at him more closely. “What are you doin out here? It’s late. You should be heading home.”

Andrew shrugged.

“What’s your name?”

“Andrew.” 

“Andrew…?” He was looking for a last name, but Andrew didn’t have one he cared about. Doe wasn’t going to brand him as a reject anymore.

“Just Andrew.”

The man looked at his watch, and then sighed. “I’m David Wymack.” He pointed at the door of the country store. “You hungry, Andrew?”

You’ll like it. I promise. He could still hear the words as clearly as if the boy was speaking them into his ear.

Andrew stood. “Sure.”

They went inside, and Wymack told him to order whatever he wanted. Andrew ordered the mac and cheese. Then when Andrew admitted to having nowhere to go, he took him back to his house and let him crash on his couch. 

Three months later, Wymack forged adoption papers, and Andrew began to learn how to hunt monsters. 

---

They found a library, and Andrew spent his time aimlessly wandering around, occasionally stopping by the table Aaron had piled high with local history books, articles on missing persons and deaths, and a few more cryptic looking tomes. They bounced ideas off each other, Andrew committed a few maps to memory, and Aaron took extensive notes. 

It felt normal in a painful way that Andrew chose not to think about.

There was no further sign of the man.

“We should get going soon.” Aaron noted, shutting a book and grabbing a stack to pile onto the return cart. 

Andrew followed him out to the car. “There’s a pawn shop I want to stop by on the way. See if there’s anything good to add to our toolbox.” 

“Do you really need another gun?” Aaron glanced at the trunk as if it was going to start spitting out sawed-offs. 

“When in Texas…” Andrew trailed off. 

He liked to build his arsenal at pawn shops and auctions, and even the odd garage sale when he was in the right part of the country. There was usually less paper trail and more interesting items. Once, he’d found a cursed bowie knife that burned hotter than an iron if you cut yourself on it, and another time he found a cane with a pure silver sword inside the handle. That had come in handy a few times when he’d been tracking down shifters. 

This pawn shop, however, didn’t have anything more interesting than a taxidermied rabbit with antlers glued on. It was like they didn’t even know what Jackalopes looked like. 

Andrew bought it anyway. It would be fun to leave at Nicky’s, placed upon the mantle like a fucked up calling card.

Aaron held it on the drive to Whataburger. “It’s missing the fangs. And the claws. You think Erik would notice if we left it at the house?”

Andrew had to physically stop himself from smiling. Then the thought slid through his head, what it would take for him to stay with me, and it suddenly took every ounce of effort not to yank the steering wheel toward the freeway median. 

The drive through for Whataburger wrapped around the building and seemed to be moving at the speed of a dead armadillo, but the inside was practically empty. Andrew and Aaron spotted Dan and Matt immediately, since they were the only other people besides employees. 

“Hi. Andrew, right?” Dan reached out to shake the correct twin’s hand. 

Andrew nodded and wondered what Nicky had told them to tell him and Aaron apart. Aaron will be dressed like an American Eagle ad and Andrew will be in black. It was probably something closer to, Andrew is the one with murder in his heart and a distinct lack of regard for your person plastered across his face, and Aaron will smile and say hello. 

“And you must be Aaron. Thank you both so much for helping out. I know how weird this all is. Though I guess not for you.”

“Absolutely,” Aaron said, “We will do everything in our power to find your friends. I’m so sorry this is happening.”

Point proven.

“We already ordered, so y’all can get some food and then we can go over it all.” Dan said, and sat back down. Andrew was pleased that there was, as of yet, no blubbering. It was a good sign for the conversation.

He and Aaron went to the counter, waited for their food to get ready, which didn’t take very long considering how many cars were in the drive through, and then returned to sit down on the other side of the booth.

“Should we really be talking about this here?” Matt was absolutely massive, but he sat stooped in the shoulders and peered around suspiciously. The look on his face held equal parts shame and sadness.

Maybe Andrew shouldn’t have dismissed blubbering so quickly.

Dan wrapped her arm around Matt, supporting his massive frame as he leaned against her. “It’s probably not the weirdest conversation to happen in this place this week. It’s fine.”

“We can keep this quick.” Andrew said. “We got a lot of information from Nicky and Renee, but we wanted to hear from you firsthand, Matt, since you were there that night. What did you see? What did you hear? Any weird smells? Every detail will be helpful.”

Matt sniffed, and then spoke, his voice hitching here and there. “Well, Seth always does shit like this. He thinks it’s funny to scare people. He’s an asshole, simple as that. We drove down to the bridge, and he tried to pick the lock on the gate so we could actually get onto the bridge, but it didn’t work, so we all got out and walked across. I told him it was a bad idea, but Seth doesn’t listen to anyone. 

“Anyway, it was dark, even though I left the car running for the headlights. We couldn’t really see anything, and we walked across the bridge. There’s nothing out there but trees and shrubs, and I tried to convince them to go back. Even Allison was over it after a minute. But Seth was determined. He started to call out to the donkey lady. Started taunting her.”

Matt stopped. Andrew took the opportunity to shove the rest of his burger in his mouth. It was… disappointing. He really wasn’t sure what all the fuss was about. 

Part of him hoped that Aaron would feel the same way and say something disparaging about it in public. Watching that fight would quite possibly be the highlight of his life. And then he would get to beat someone’s ass.

But Aaron had barely touched his food. Instead he watched Matt with a sickly sort of expression. Maybe he had food poisoning from his shitty breakfast.

“I didn’t see her. The donkey lady. It was too dark. But I heard her. At first I thought it was Allison. It was this keening sound, like an animal. And I thought the wind picked up, but something was rushing toward us, and the keening got louder. And louder and louder, until it was all around us. It was… I can’t describe it. And then I heard the laugh. And Allison screamed. There was a sound like someone getting hit, and then there was nothing. They were gone. I ran back to the car, trying to find a flashlight, but I didn’t have anything stronger than my phone. But even with that… They were just gone.”

“You called the cops?” Andrew asked.

“As soon as I had service. It took me a while to leave. I kept thinking they would just pop out of the brush, that maybe Seth was staging an elaborate prank.” Matt shook his head and wiped away the tears that had begun streaming down his cheeks. 

Andrew nodded. He looked over and saw Aaron, who held the pen poised over the journal, but wasn’t writing. He just stared absently somewhere around Matt’s shoulder. 

Andrew pulled the pen from his hand and snagged the journal, taking notes himself. He didn’t want to hang out here longer than he had to, and Aaron having a moment was taking too long. He asked a few more questions, what time it had been, how Seth had learned about the place. If he had been seeing any apparitions since. When he thought he had the scope of the thing shaped out, he closed the journal. 

“Thanks. We have a little more research we need to do, but you’ll be hearing from us as soon as we have something. From what we know so far, our best shot is to go out there tonight. So if you don’t hear from us by tomorrow, maybe call in another hunter.”

It was supposed to be a joke, but the look on Matt’s face was all horror. But it did seem to snap Aaron out of whatever trance he had been in.

“He’s joking. And also an asshole. You’ll hear from us one way or another tonight. Thank you.” He shoved Andrew out of the booth and they made their goodbye, depositing the orange trays by the trash cans on the way out. Andrew made sure to pocket their plastic number card. He may not like the food, but he could respect the traditions of the establishment. 

This time, when Andrew spotted the red hair, he was ready. The man was standing beside a shitty Ford Ranger three spots down from where the Chevy waited, almost as if he had just exited the car, but he wasn’t moving. It wasn’t as convincing as the other two times he had appeared.

Andrew didn’t reach for the gun tucked into his belt at his back, and he kept his eyes trained on the car, keeping an eye on him through his peripherals. But he did speed up slightly to keep between Aaron and the man. 

They got into the car without incident and Andrew put the car in reverse as quickly as possible without alerting Aaron. As they passed the Ranger, he looked out and locked eyes with the man. He hoped the stranger could see the recognition in his look. Andrew knew. Andrew was watching. Andrew was not going to be surprised again. 

“Hey, have we seen that guy before?” Aaron had followed Andrew’s gaze. “He looks kinda familiar.”

“No. I have no idea who he is.” It wasn’t a lie.

---

The third time Andrew had seen the blue-eyed man, he’d recognized him, but had been too shocked to say anything. 

He, Wymack, and Kevin were picking up a few things at the grocery store before heading out for a job. They each held their preferred car snacks. Wymack had sunflower seeds and an Arizona green tea. Kevin had an apple, a bag of celery, and a water bottle because he was and has always been an absolute monster in Andrew’s eyes. Andrew had a bag of animal cookies, Bugles, and two Monsters. He was fifteen, and Wymack was teaching him to drive the Impala so he could get a license. He needed to stay up, likely all night. 

Andrew was ridiculing Kevin for his ridiculous snack choices while they walked up to take their place in line for the only open check-out. But when he looked up, he saw him. Red hair. A baggy shirt and jeans, nothing that would stand out. And those same blue eyes. Trained right on him.

Andrew had frozen in place, but Wymack had stepped up right behind the boy. Kevin was still talking, and bumped into Andrew. “What are you doing?”

Andrew couldn’t speak. The boy just watched him. He didn’t smile, didn’t say anything. It would make sense for him to be here, Andrew tried to assure himself. He’d had an uncle here, remember? But it felt like seeing a ghost, and by this time, Andrew had seen enough of them to recognize the feeling. 

The boy looked away from him and at Wymack.“You can go ahead of me. You don’t have a lot. And I’m in no rush.” 

Andrew looked in the boy’s cart, still too dumbstruck to move or speak. It was filled nearly to overflowing and was piled too chaotically. Two loaves of bread peeked out from under a case of Dr. Pepper, and there were three dozen eggs and a bag of deli meat on the bottom shelf below the basket. 

“Thanks kid. C’mon boys, put your stuff on the belt.” Wymack waved Andrew and Kevin forward, and when Andrew didn’t move, Kevin pushed him. 

Andrew dropped his things on the conveyor and watched the boy pull his cart slightly back so he was in line right behind him. He still made no move that he recognized Andrew.

When the person checking out was done, the employee looked at Wymack indifferently, then back at their screen, and then pushed a button next to the register and spoke into the little announcement microphone without an ounce of enthusiasm.

“Attention everyone, we have just hit out one-millionth customer here at Food Lion. He will win two tickets to the upcoming Gamecocks baseball game. Congratulations and thank you for shopping at Food Lion.”

Andrew had to look at the employee, who had started checking out Wymack with the same apathy he had used to announce their winning. Andrew whipped his head around, determined to say something to this boy. Enough was enough. 

But the boy was gone. The cart was left at the end of the nearest aisle, abandoned.

Andrew deflated. Something he hadn’t realized had risen up in him upon seeing the boy again fell flat, and he followed Wymack and Kevin out to the car, got into the driver's seat, and said nothing. This wasn’t abnormal, but Wymack still slid a look his way as he backed the Impala out of the spot and creeped it out of the parking lot. 

“Which one of you wants to go to the game with me? Or would you rather go together?” Andrew knew he was trying to cheer him up. He knew Wymack could always tell when he was in a mood. 

“Ew,” Kevin said. “It’s baseball. I might actually be bored to death if I had to sit and watch baseball for two hours. Take Andrew.” 

Wymack nodded, and Andrew didn’t say anything. In fact, he didn’t say anything for the rest of the drive, silently following Wymacks directions.

Two weeks later, Andrew and Wymack went to the game. It was fun, or as fun as watching a sports game could be for someone who didn’t give to shits about it. There were hot dogs, and Wymack kept sneaking him beer. 

On his way back from the bathroom, though, Andrew caught a glimpse of red hair, just the right burnished shade, weaving through the crowd. He darted after it, trying to catch up, but never quite making it. He caught glimpses of those eyes as he pushed through the crowd, making it halfway around the stadium before the boy slipped through a door marked “employees only.”

Andrew ran up to it and yanked on the handle, but the door was firmly locked. He cursed so loudly and verbosely that a woman told him to can it or she was going to call security. 

By the time he made it back to the section where they were sitting, it was a new inning. Wymack was probably going to be worried. 

Sure enough, he could hear Wymack calling his name up ahead. He went where he heard the voice, but Wymack already had his hand on the shoulder of someone who looked exactly like him. The other blond boy was also wearing a black long-sleeve shirt and a bewildered expression as he said something Andrew couldn’t hear to Wymack. 

“Aaron. What are you doing?” A woman, short and thin, and looking three sheets to the wind, approached the situation, and Andrew watched her snatch the wrist of his look-alike, Aaron, and drag him away from Wymack. She said something sharp, but then looked Andrew’s way, and jumped nearly out of her skin.

Andrew stared. The boy didn’t just look sort of like him. It was like looking in a mirror. 

Wymack turned and saw the real Andrew. Then he looked back at Aaron, and the woman who still gripped his wrist. 

The resemblance was irrefutable. 

This was Andrew’s birth family. 

---

Andrew dropped Aaron off at the library again, and drove out to the donkey lady bridge. He needed time to think away from the curious eyes of his brother. Aaron was too smart for his own good sometimes, he asked too many questions. And Andrew didn’t have nearly enough answers this time.

Plus, like he told Aaron, it would be good to get the lay of the land while there was still light to see by. 

Matt was right, he thought when he pulled up to the location that had been marked on the map. It was barely anything. Not quite a bridge, not quite a road, just a spit of asphalt with a small dried up creek that flowed through a drainage pipe underneath. Maybe it had been a bridge once, years ago when the woman had been alive. Not anymore.

Andrew parked the Impala at the gate and fished his lockpick set out of his glove compartment. He was a good lockpick. He didn’t have to meet the guy to know that he would succeed where Seth had failed. 

Sure enough, it was just an old padlock that only took a medium width turner and a few jabs with his rake. The gate swung open, but Andrew didn’t move his car yet. He just wanted to get a look around, see if there was any clear path. He knew the signs to look for better than Matt or the cops. These kinds of kidnappings left marks.

Sure enough, he picked up a few scuff marks in the dirt below the “bridge” and followed them into the trees. He regretted it immediately. 

“Fuck!” Andrew yelled, as the thorns of the mesquite trees that were everywhere caught and snagged on his jacket. They scraped at his face when he ducked under to follow a crack in the soil, and he soon had scratches all over his hands from trying to push them out of the way. 

He only made it ten or so feet into the brush before turning back. Andrew had fought all different kinds of monsters, but thorns the size of his fucking fingers were too much. There had to be a different way.

He made it back to the bridge when something caught his eye. There was something moving in the trees on the other side of the road. Something large, and gray. 

Andrew pulled out his pistol, wishing he had thought to grab his shotgun from the car, and stepped slowly toward whatever it was. 

The trees were so thick, the green leaves blocked his view until he was nearly there, and when the thing lifted his head, Andrew’s whole body tensed, and then relaxed.

It was a donkey. Just a regular old donkey. It looked at him, one long ear flicking to dislodge a fly. Then it opened its mouth and let out an obnoxious screeching bray that made Andrew want to shoot it anyway. 

He didn’t. There was no point. It was just a regular donkey, even if it had chosen an ironic place to hang out. This was Texas. There were probably more donkeys—and horses and cows—than republicans, and that was saying something. 

He tucked the pistol back into his belt and turned to go back to the car. He was tired of this place already.

But as he looked back across the bridge, he startled so badly he slipped and nearly fell off the bridge.

The man was standing by the driver’s door of the Chevy. 

Andrew scrambled to his feet and put his hand back on his gun as he walked closer. He stopped a few feet away and stared. 

He had been thinking about this moment for years, mulling over who this man was, what he was. And now there was no reason to run. No Aaron hanging around in harm’s way to complicate things. No reason why this man should be here, now, with no obvious means of transportation out to the middle of nowhere. 

“Who the hell are you?” he asked, his voice catching despite his best intentions. “Why have you been following me?” He meant for his whole life, not just the last few days, but he didn’t clarify.

The man looked at him and seemed like he was trying to smile, but it didn’t quite make it past the corner of his mouth. 

“My name is Nathaniel. I’m an angel. I'm your guardian angel, Andrew. And I need your help.”

Chapter Text

“You’re my what?” 

“Your guardian angel.” 

Andrew shook his head. His hand was still resting behind his back on the grip of his pistol. “No, you’re not,” he said. 

Nathaniel frowned. “Yes, I am. I was assigned to your case and have been help—” he stopped and cleared his throat, then changed his wording. “Guiding you through critical crossroads of your life. I know you remember me Andrew.”

Andrew didn’t have anything to say to that. So he addressed the other, slightly less fucked up part of what Nathaniel had said. “And now you need help.”

“I—Yes. I lost something. A weapon. And you’re the only one I think might be able to help me find it.” 

Andrew looked the angel up and down. His trench coat was muddy at the bottom, and he had on a black suit underneath that looked worse for wear. The tie hung slightly off center and the dress shirt looked like a crumpled up tissue. 

And the expression on his face, Andrew had a hard time looking directly at it. 

At this point, Andrew was used to people looking at him like he was their only hope. He was used to mothers of missing children and husbands of missing wives. Of siblings and friends and coworkers who rested the lives of their loved ones on Andrew’s broad shoulders. But that hope was always abstract. It was the same look someone might give a police officer (if they didn’t know any better) or a firefighter. It was hope placed in the uniform. In the title. Hunter.

Nathaniel looked at him with recognition. With knowing. Nathaniel looked at him and saw Andrew, and that gave him hope. 

“What’s chasing you?”

Nathaniel opened his mouth and then closed it again. Andrew knew the angel had purposefully made no mention of something chasing him, but people who needed weapons this badly had a good reason to use them. 

“It doesn’t matter.”

He was wrong, but that was neither here nor there. “What’s the weapon?”

“A sword. Kind of. It’s unique, at least I think there’s only one out there.” 

“How do you think something is unique?” 

Nathaniel ran his hand through his mop of red hair. “Well… It’s an angel killing sword. And only angels carry them. It's… rare for an angel to be without one.”

Andrew could have laughed. Of course his guardian angel was a fuck up. Figures. 

“Have you checked your pockets?”

“Have I—That’s not funny.” Nathaniel glared at him. It was refreshing. The frown made him look younger, more like the boy who had followed Andrew around. “Andrew, I wouldn’t have bothered you if I had anywhere else to go. But you’re a hunter. You’re my only option.”

“There are other hunters.”

“Not like you.” There was that look again. It made Andrew want to wipe it off him with the sharp edge of a knife.

Andrew had two options. He could say no. He could turn Nathaniel away, refer him to another hunter and wash his hands of it. But really, that wasn’t an option. Because Andrew needed answers more than he needed most other things in life. And Nathaniel was one giant question mark in a trench coat.

Andrew took his hand off his gun and walked around Nathaniel to the drivers’ side door. “I’m not calling you Nathaniel. It’s too many god-damned syllables.” He opened the door and looked at the angel over the top of the car. 

The look on Nathaniel’s face was too full of emotion. A complicated smear of relief and pain and something that looked a little like guilt. 

“Neil. You can use Neil. That's the name of my vessel.” He gestured down at his body like Andrew would have at his car: equal parts ownership and affection.

The corner of Andrew's eye twitched. “You know, I usually kill the creatures that ride around in human bodies.” He expected Nath—Neil to shake his head or start protesting how this was different, he was different.

But Neil just looked at him. “Yes, you do.”

Andrew didn’t get into the car yet. He had to keep pushing. “What’s stopping me from killing you right now?”

Neil smiled. It was a slow thing, a sharp slant that crept across his face. “You’d have to find the angel killing sword first.”

It was ballsy. Andrew dropped into the seat of the Chevy and slammed the door shut. He didn’t look to see if Neil was getting in, and turned the car on.

Sure enough, Neil appeared in the passenger seat as soon as Andrew shifted into reverse—one second he was standing on the gravel, the next he was sitting in the seat. It was a close thing, but Andrew didn’t flinch. “The door works perfectly fine, you know.”

Neil didn’t seem surprised at his own teleportation, but Andrew got the feeling that it took quite a bit to phase him. “I’m still getting used to this. It’s been a while since I last had a body.” 

He guided the car back onto the road and headed toward the library. He was quiet, turning over the situation in his head, though the shape of the last few minutes didn’t become any more discernible. There were too many gaps in the story, and too many things that Andrew refused to accept. And he didn’t have long to learn more before Aaron would be tossed into the fray to mess things up even more. He had to choose his words carefully, which was easier when he didn’t have to look at Neil’s face.

“Why me.” It was the biggest one, with too many layers to it for a single response to suffice.

Neil didn’t answer right away, and Andrew refused to look over. He caught enough of the man in his peripherals to know he hadn’t gone all mystical and zapped away. 

“It doesn’t work the way most people think it does,” Neil said, then he was quiet again.

“Most things don’t.” Andrew didn’t mean it graciously, and his voice carried the appropriate edge to it.

“I was assigned your case when you were young. Just before our first meeting. I was… instructed… to be there when you had important decisions to make. I was supposed to push you one way or another.”

“So you’re just a mystical social worker.”

“In a way.”

“That doesn’t answer my question though.”

Neil turned in his seat. “It wasn’t self-serving, if that’s what you’re thinking. I didn’t point you toward hunting back then so you could help me now. Guardian angels like me, we aren't all knowing.” 

He was still avoiding the question. “Stop avoiding the question. Why did you help me?” Andrew looked over at Neil finally and then immediately had to look back at the road to avoid throwing a punch. 

Neil was watching him with eyes that knew. Neil saw him. Knew every bad thing that had ever happened to him. So much for not being all knowing. 

“Did I? Did I help you?” 

Andrew could feel his world crashing down around him. It was all his worst fears and darkest memories all at once. He stared out the window, silent while he picked up the broken pieces of his mind and shoved them into a small box to bury deep inside himself. Andrew was far too old and had been through far too much to let things long-dead and gone get to him like this. 

The past didn’t matter. He had a job—two jobs actually—to focus on.

“If you don’t tell me who or what you’re running from, I can’t protect you.” 

Neil accepted the change of subject without comment. “The less you know, the less risk you’re in if they get their hands on you. You’re just helping me find a sword, you’re not picking sides in this.”

“Sides? What, is there a war going on up there in heaven?”

Neil slumped down further in his seat. For someone with so many secrets, he sure had a bad poker face. 

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Andrew.

“No, it’s not a war. Nothing like that. Really. It’s not important. Just help me with the sword and I’ll be out of your hair.” 

Andrew wanted to keep asking. But instead, he began doing time-zone math. It was his least favorite part of having connections spread out across the country, and even a few across the globe. 

By the time they pulled up to the library, Andrew had three numbers queued up in his head, ready to dial when he was done making introductions.

---

“He’s you’re what?”

Neil stared, deadpan, at Aaron across the table. “His guardian angel.”

Andrew had already pushed one of the chairs around so he could prop his feet up. He was ready to face one of Aaron’s two sides. It would either be Academic Aaron—who would rain down a never ending deluge of questions raining down on Andrew, half of which he couldn’t answer, and the other half of which he didn’t want to—or it would be Antagonistic Aaron—who would bristle and clam up and turn into a larger ass than Andrew had found at the donkey lady bridge. 

Neil was a tasty combination of the two, since he was both a fancy new monster type for their collection, and he was a major part—arguably one of the most major parts—of Andrew’s past.

Sure enough, Aaron looked at Andrew, and a war was waging behind his slack-jawed expression. 

“You never said anything about having a guardian angel.”

Andrew shrugged. “Didn’t know.”

“I…” There was the clamming up.

Andrew looked at Neil. “I’m assuming you don’t need an introduction to Aaron? You seemed to know him well enough the last time you showed up.”

Aaron stood, but looked as if he didn’t know why. “He’s met me? I haven’t met you. What do you mean he knows me? Do you know me?” He looked back and forth between Andrew, seated, and Neil, who was still awkwardly hovering a few feet from the table. 

“Met is a strong way to put it. But yes. I am acquainted with your brother,” Neil said.

“How? When was this? Also, why is he here? What’s happening?”

Seven questions. Hell, he’d nearly hit the five W’s. Aaron had officially met his quota, and Andrew had phone calls to make. He stood and grabbed the stack of books that Aaron had clearly set aside to return. “Let him tell you. I sure as hell don’t understand it.” He turned and had to pass Neil to leave.

“What should I tell him?” Neil asked, as if they had secrets. As if he wanted to respect Andrew’s privacy. 

“Whatever you want.” Andrew left, shoving the pile of books onto a return cart nearby and stomping out of the library with no effort to respect the peaceful quiet of the place.

The air outside was muggy. Because Andrew has never caught a break in his entire life. 

He flipped open his phone and smashed Kevin’s number in, stalking off without a direction in mind. His adopted brother picked up after the third ring, which was practically instantaneous, with Kevin’s history of losing his phone under a pile of books. It was a wonder he and Aaron didn’t get along better, considering they were both the biggest nerds Andrew had ever met. 

“You finish the job already?”

“No.”

“Then why the hell are you calling me? It’s just a ghost right? I looked it up once you sent me the location. Simple haunting. People disappear after acting like idiots or getting lost. Should have been an open and closed book.”

“Yeah we are getting there. Aaron is being Aaron about it.” Andrew meant this as an insult, but the words rolled off his tongue with a softness that sounded affectionate, at least to the Andrew-trained ear. “Sentimental jackass.” 

“Well hurry up. Dad has another job and he said you should call him about it. He’ll probably try to get you and Aaron to work it with him.”

Andrew hummed. He didn’t want to get into what would happen with Aaron when he was done with this job. “Monster question for you. Not about this job.”

“You found another monster down there? What the hell are they growing out in Texas?”

“Will you shut up for one second?” Every time he talked to Kevin, he regretted making the call. 

“Will you ask your fucking question?”

“What do you know about angels? Like real ones. Fly down from heaven and possess some poor bastard. Fly away once they are done doing whatever holy shit they do.”

“Andrew, did you piss off God enough for him to send down a literal angel to smite you?”

“Worse.”

“How the fuck can it be worse?”

“I have a—” he could barely grit out the words. “My guardian angel showed up. Apparently. And he needs help finding some special sword.” 

Kevin’s laugh was so loud that Andrew hung up. He resisted the urge to fling his phone into the street. The other calls could wait. He needed to down a bottle of whiskey. And to kill something. Ideally both. So it was time to collect his brother and get started on the latter, so he could do the former.

---

Neil was gone when Andrew made it back up to Aaron. Andrew read through the notes that Aaron had collected, none of them surprising him or changing their plan, and they headed down to the car so they could make it out to the bridge before it got too dark. 

“He didn’t tell me anything.” Aaron said as they slid into the Impala. 

Andrew looked over at him. “I didn’t ask.”

“Well, he was very cryptic. He wouldn’t tell me anything about your past, or how you know each other.”

“You know about my past.”

“Yeah, I mean sort of. But I wanted to know more about how he knows your past. Plus, you’ve always been dodgy with the details.”

Andrew knew better than to fall for that trap. It was the same way Kevin treated him. Like one day he was going to unhinge his jaw and spout a whole sad story about his time in California. That wasn’t how he worked. If they asked him a direct question, he would answer. But these passive aggressive intrusions were not his style.

He glanced at the rearview, and then blinked, and then turned to look into the back seat, the car veering dangerously into the next lane. 

Neil was in the backseat. And had been for who knows how long. Andrew looked back at the road and corrected their path, but Aaron was just catching up. 

“What the FUCK?” he yelled and grappled for the pistol that lived in the glove compartment. But Andrew still had that particular gun tucked into his jeans. “How the fuck did you get here?”

“Sorry,” Neil said, not sounding particularly sorry.

“Andrew!” Aaron exclaimed, as if Andrew had any better explanation. 

“Where did you have to flit off to?” Andrew asked Neil. 

“Are you not going to address the fact that he was definitely not in the car when we got in?” Aaron scoffed.

No, in fact, Andrew wasn’t.

“I needed to lay a false trail for where I was going to be. I don’t want them following me here.” Neil looked at Andrew through the rearview. Andrew noticed, but didn’t meet his gaze.

“Is someone following you? Andrew, what the fuck have you gotten us into?”

“This isn’t Andrew's fault. It’s mine. He’s the one helping me.”

“Speaking of which.” Now that Andrew knew the ghost case would be over soon, as long as there weren’t any complications, he wanted to get going on the sword. The sooner he could find it, the sooner he could send Neil off on his angelic way. “Where was the last place you had it? The sword.”

Aaron opened his mouth and then closed it. He was learning that nobody was going to give him any sort of direct response. 

“Heaven. I dropped it when I was trying to…” he stopped. “I dropped it. All I know is it’s somewhere in North America. And I can tell it hasn’t been used, at least to kill an angel.” 

“That narrows it down a lot. Thanks,” Andrew said, sarcasm dripping.

Neil shrugged, and the car was quiet. Aaron, apparently, had started taking notes and flipping through Andrew’s journal. 

They reached the bridge soon after that, and Andrew left the car running while he fished out his lock picks. He wanted to back his car in so he would have an easier time peeling out of here once he ganked the ghost. Remote location or not, this wasn’t somewhere he wanted to stick around any longer than he had to. 

“Plan? Contingency plan?” Aaron asked when Andrew got back into the car to move it into position. 

“I saw the trail where it took them, but I couldn’t get to the lair, so I say we find the bones, get rid of the ghost, and then hack our way out to the house you found on the maps. Contingency plan, assuming one of us gets snatched, we raise hell. No offense to our holy friend.”

Aaron nodded, looking down at the seat between them at the sketch he had drawn of the relative location of the donkey lady’s decrepit house. It was in the right direction, and was the only real place that she could have taken Seth and Allison, if they were still alive. “That sounds good.” He looked up at the rearview at Neil and then back at Andrew. “What’s he doing while we work?”

Neil was looking out the window at the edge of the bridge. Something churned behind his eyes. 

“Staying here,” Andrew said. “Neil,” he added so the angel would look up at him. “You’re staying here.”

Neil looked back out at the bridge, which Andrew took as an affirmative. 

“Let’s get this over with and find a bar.”

They didn’t get it over with. In fact, nearly an hour later, they were still trying to track down the donkey lady’s bones while also fighting her ghost. It turned out that they didn’t need to honk three times to summon her. They just needed to take a shovel to the dirt under the bridge. 

“This has to mean we are getting closer!” Aaron shouted, firing off two rounds of salt into the shrieking apparition. 

Andrew grumbled to himself and kept digging. It was slow work, since the sand of the creek bed kept refilling his hole, and a ghost kept trying to rip her sharper-than-reasonable hoof hands through his ribcage. 

“Keep her further away!” He yelled back at Aaron. “I can’t do anything if I have to keep dodging!”

“I’ll trade you jobs if you’re so upset with how I’m doing this one,” Aaron slung back at him.

Andrew heard a branch shift behind him and flung himself down right as the donkey lady took a swipe at him, and from the ground, with his ear pressed into the sand and a clear view under the bridge, he caught the echo of something that sounded a lot like a young woman screaming. At the same time, he saw a steel manhole cover in the sand, with only a light dusting of grit covering it. 

“Aaron!” He shouted, and jumped to his feet when he felt the swish of the iron crowbar Aaron carried swing over him and through the ghost. “They aren’t at the house. They’re under the bridge.”

“Are you sure?” Aaron handed Andrew the crowbar and ducked to look under the bridge.

“Of course not. But it’s worth a—” The donkey lady rushed at him and he reared back for a swing, but he was too slow, and he got one last glimpse of the tree line before the gaping jaws of the donkey lady took him.

Except they didn’t. Instead, there was Neil. He was standing directly in front of Andrew, and he had one hand on the face of the donkey lady, which his thumb pressed between her scarred brows, and the other band braced against her sternum. 

Andrew froze and watched as the donkey lady vibrated and stared with empty, long-dead eyes. Under Neil’s touch, the violence died from her, and she slowly faded from the transparent horror to something that was likely much closer to her original form. She was no longer a ghost, she was just a person, tortured by pain and suffering and trapped between worlds.

Then in a flicker of blinding light, she was gone.

Aaron and Andrew stared at Neil, who dropped his arms and ducked his head, his lips moving in a silent chant. It was probably a prayer, Andrew thought to himself. 

“Uh, thanks.” Aaron said, looking around as if he expected the ghost to appear again. She didn’t.

Neil turned and looked at Andrew. “She wasn’t a monster. She was a person. She just forgot.”

Andrew still held the crowbar, but it suddenly felt too heavy. He gave the solid metal a squeeze and then placed it down in the sand at his feet. 

There was a layer to Neil’s words that Andrew couldn’t bring himself to face. Once he opened that door, once he shifted his worldview from the stark black and white he could deal with to the grayscale hellscape other people live in, there would be no going back. He couldn’t do that. Too much was already in flux for him to be questioning his moral code.

“Let’s get these idiots,” was all he said in response.

The good news was, Allison and Seth were tied up in an open section of the sewage system below the bridge. The bad news was, Seth was already dead. His chest was ribboned by slashes from the donkey lady, and the back of his head was much softer than a skull should have been. 

Allison was incoherent at first, and then silent with dry, wracking sobs, but she refused any help getting up out of the sewer. She sat next to Seth’s body and cradled his bloody head in her lap. Neil had disappeared somewhere by the time they’d made it to the car with Seth’s body, so she had the entire back row to mourn. She also refused any sort of trip to a hospital, and insisted they go straight to Dan and Matt. 

“I don’t think the hotel is going to like it if we drag a dead body through the lobby,” Andrew said.

Allison just glared at him. 

Andrew huffed, and elbowed Aaron, who was dissociating out the front window. “Call them.”

Aaron jumped, and then pulled out his phone and dialed.

---

“I don’t know how we can thank you,” Dan said. Allison was wrapped up in Renee’s arms near the car at the far end of the hotel parking lot. “Once Matt comes back with his truck, we will let you get back to… whatever you have next.”

Andrew admired how solid Dan seemed under pressure. Even in the face of one dead and one traumatized friend, she still stood solid as a rock and directed the others into action. She was a woman who could manage a situation. Andrew respected that more than most things. 

“Just stay away from ghosts next time,” he said. 

“I have a feeling that won’t be an issue from here on out. But if it is, we know who to call.” She gave an empty smile and waved her phone at Andrew. 

Matt’s truck roared into the lot and pulled up as close as possible to the Chevy, and Andrew helped shuffle Seth’s body from one car to the other. At least that was one less thing to deal with on this job. He hoped they weren’t stupid with how they reported Seth’s death, and then he thought that he didn’t really care after all.

Aaron had not moved from the passenger seat since getting into the car. It was just a mood, Andrew assumed, or maybe he was in shock. Not unheard of, even if it would have been very out of the ordinary. 

Andrew shook hands and gave final half-hearted condolences and then got back into the driver's seat. Aaron still stared out the windshield.

“What’s your deal?” Andrew asked.

Aaron was silent. Andrew waited two whole minutes before shifting the car into reverse and pulling out of the parking lot.

He was twenty minutes up the highway before Aaron spoke.

“Take me home,” was all he said, and Andrew knew that his brother didn’t mean Nicky’s or Wymack’s. 

Andrew couldn’t respond past the lump in his throat. He caught sight of Neil, who had appeared again in the backseat, and settled in for the long drive back to California.