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Chapter Text

Chapter One

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The agents of the BAU sat at the round table in the meeting room with a new case. Pontiac, Illinois had seen 4 young adults go missing and turn up dead 2 days later within the last month. The most recent victim’s body had only been found a the previous evening. They had been called in to investigate by the local law enforcement after the 4th body was discovered, being the second one that week. The acceleration in the cooling off period pushed Pontiac’s police department out of their depths.
“In the last month Pontiac, Illinois has had four murders, all college students home for the midterm.” Penelope Garcia pulled up photos of the victims and proceeded to go into more detail about the murders. They had all been stabbed and beaten, then left in different semi-public places, behind the bushes in the park, in an alleyway, etc.
“The weirdest thing about the case, however, is that they had suspects for each of the murders, video footage that implied that Debbie Flynn killed her daughter Grace, was caught on their home security camera.” Garcia paused. “But her alibi is solid. Like rock solid. She was on a business in Chicago for the two days when Grace was missing. The hotel confirms it. Credit cards, security footage, eyewitness. There is no way she killed her daughter.” Garcia finished the presentation and sat down.
“It’s unlikely any of the original suspects. The MO is too consistent. Not to mention that these are pretty solid alibis.” David Rossi noted.
“Maybe our unsub edited the footage?” Jenifer Jareau suggested. “Make it look like someone close to the victims committed the murders to throw us off.”
“Whatever the case, we’ve been called in to investigate. Wheels up in thirty.” Aaron Hotchner dismissed the meeting, and the team split up to prepare for the flight and the case ahead of them.
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The team set up in a spare meeting room in the precinct and were running through possibilities of what could have happened, and hypothesising about this unsub’s psychology. They were barely on the ground an hour before they had gotten the word that a new missing persons’ report had been filed that matched the victimology. They had already ruled out the possibility of a team or partner of any sort. The crime scenes didn’t point to that, in fact the struggle that appeared at each crime scene suggested clearly that it was a one-man job.
“He’s accelerated, almost like he has a goal or a deadline to reach” Derek Morgan pointed out.
“Or maybe he knows we’re catching up to him. He feels the heat and wants to kill as much as he can before we catch him.” Emily Prentiss suggested.
“It’s a possibility. But the clock is ticking on Alex Carter, if he sticks to pattern, we have less than two days to find them alive.” Dr. Spencer Reid said.
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Unfortunately, it wasn’t 2 full days later when they found Alex dead in an abandoned building on the other side of town, but a mere 24 hours. What stood out to the BAU more than the bigger acceleration in the timeline, was the presence of a second, unidentified body at the scene. The new victim didn’t fit the victimology, he was too old. The MO didn’t match either. He had been shot.
The house showed signs of a struggle. Some of the few items of furniture that were still in the house had been broken, like there had been a fight. There was a blood stain and trail that led out of the room where the bodies were, and stopped before it reached the stairs. It couldn’t have been either of the victims, so their unsub had been injured in said fight.
“we’re definitely dealing with a second unsub here.” Morgan said, looking around the room. “No way that bloods from either of our victims.” He looked again at the second victim, who had a knife in his hand. “I think he was our original unsub.”
“We can rush DNA analysis on that blood over there.” Reid said, pointing to the mystery blood splatter. “I’ll ask Hotch.”
“So what do you think happened here Kid?” Morgan asked.
“I might have said a partner who betrayed him, but we profiled there wasn’t one.” Reid paused for a moment, thinking. “Maybe it was a revenge killing, or perhaps a vigilante kill? It could have been someone who saw or heard what was happening and then tried to stop it.”
“Maybe. Someone will have seen something hopefully. And once we get the DNA analysis back, we might get lucky. They might be in the system already. JJ and Rossi are already looking for witnesses. We just have wait and see.” Morgan told Spencer.
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JJ knocked on what was probably the 10th door she and Rossi had gone to. They needed to see if anyone had spotted anything suspicious around the times of the murders, but only about half of the houses had answered the door, and no one had seen anything.
When the door opened, she and Rossi both held up their badges and JJ went through the same introduction that had gotten them nowhere so far. It was an older woman who had opened the door.
“Well, I don’t know if this will be helpful, but I saw a car parked there yesterday around then.” She pointed towards the abandoned house across the street. “I hadn’t seen it before, so I noticed it. I like to people watch, you see.” She explained.
“Well, you have a good spot for it.” Rossi commented. “Could you describe the car, or did you happen to get a plate number?”
“Sure. It was an older car, a nice car. Chevy… Impala, I think. Black. I saw two men get out of the car at around half past 8. They went into the old house there. They came back out about 20 minutes later. The shorter one was limping. Hang on, I wrote down the license plate number because I thought it was weird. I’ll go grab it for you.” The woman disappeared into the next room and came back a moment later holding a small black notebook. She rifled through the pages a moment before tearing one out and handing it to JJ.
“Thank you” JJ said, glancing at the paper. “You wouldn’t happen to have gotten a good look at either of their faces?”
“I couldn’t make out their faces at all, it was too dark. But one was quite a bit taller than the other. She stopped and thought for a moment. “They were both white. And they both wore denim jeans and flannel” she told them.
“Thank you Ma’am, you’ve been very helpful.” Rossi said.
“No problem, glad I could be of use.” The woman closed the door as the two FBI agents turned and walked towards the gate.
JJ pulled out her phone. “Garcia, we need you to run a plate, CNK 80Q3.”
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The whole team met back at the precinct.
“No word on the results of the DNA analysis yet, but we should know more by the end of the day.” Hotch told the rest of the team.
Garcias voice could be heard through Morgans cell phone. “We may not need to wait. I ran the plates JJ gave me and it’s registered to a “Dean Anderson”.
“What did you find on him?” Hotch asked.
“Nothing, zip, zilch, nada. Almost as if he doesn’t exist.” Garcia took a breath before continuing. “So, I ran facial recognition on his license, and my oh my does Mr. Dean Anderson have some skeletons in the closet. Or should I say Dean Winchester does. Yes indeedio, ladies and gentlemen, the car is registered to a fake name.”
“Dean Winchester? As in serial killer, faked his death successfully 3 times, mass murderer, FBIs most wanted with his little brother two years ago, Dean Winchester?” Emily asked, sounding slightly shocked.
“The woman told us she saw two men. One must have been Dean the other Sam.” JJ told the team. “She also said the shorter one came out of the house with a limp so one of them is injured.”
“Sam is 6 foot 4 inches tall, but Dean is only 6 foot 1. It must be Dean’s blood we found at the house.” Reid said.
“We need to look back at their profiles from two years ago.” Hotch stated. They may not have been an active part of the investigation, but the BAU was consulted to build a profile of the Winchesters when they went on that murder spree two years previous.
“We profiled Dean to be a dominant personality, him being the older sibling and having a more extensive criminal history. Sam seemed to join him after his girlfriend died, despite him having a promising career as a lawyer. Dean may have killed her and convinced Sam to join him.” Reid recalled their past profile, missing no details.
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“The men we are looking for are Sam and Dean Winchester. They are known to be skilled at evading law enforcement, so we need everyone to keep a sharp eye out for them.” Hotch began the presentation to the local police force. They needed all-hands-on-deck if they were to apprehend the brothers.
“We should canvass local motels and be on the lookout for a black 1967 Chevrolet Impala, license CNK 80Q3” Prentiss noted.
“We believe that the brothers may believe that they are helping people by killing the ‘monsters’ of the world. They are vigilantes. They could also be suffering from folie au deux, where they feed into and strengthen each other’s delusions and beliefs. It will be difficult to convince them to disregard these beliefs.” Reid cited.
“What about the mass shootings from two years ago? That doesn’t seem very vigilante to me.” One of the local officers noted.
“Since we haven’t interviewed either of them, we can’t know the real reasoning driving their crime sprees.” Rossi answered.
“We may have a very limited time to apprehend them since they tend to skip towns quickly, leaving little to no trace behind. It’s important to prioritise this search.” Morgan said.
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As luck would have it, the Winchesters had not yet skipped town. Hotch, JJ and Reid were in one of the patrol cars canvassing local motels.
"Hotch! Thats the car." Reid pointed towards the motel they were passing.
"You're sure?" Hotch asked.
"Positive." Reid said.
They had to proceed very carefully. If they tipped the brothers off in any way, they might lose them. Fortunately, they didn’t even need to ask the desk clerk for the room number. Dean was walking away from the ice machine when they pulled up outside.
The trio got out of the car and walked casually behind Dean as he headed back towards his motel room. Dean put the key in the door as Hotch drew his gun. The three closed in on Dean.
“Dean Winchester! Put your hands up, you’re under arrest on suspicion of murder.” Hotch pointed his gun at Dean, who turned around, dropping his bucket of ice.
“Son of a bitch.” he muttered.
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Chapter Text

Chapter 2

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It had been a clear-cut case. A shapeshifter in Pontiac, Illinois. Dean had been sure once they had seen the glare on the shifter’s eyes on that security footage. Damn shifter had sliced his leg in the tussle before Sam managed to get the drop on it and shoot it.

Right now, though, Dean sat in the back of a police vehicle with two FBI Agents in the front, wondering where it had gone wrong this time. Getting arrested now was an inconvenience, to say the least. They already had Abaddon to deal with, and not to mention Metatron.

Thankfully, Sam had been out to grab lunch from the place across the road from where they had been staying when Dean was ambushed by the Feds. Sam had insisted Dean rest his leg. Dean took this as a good sign, Sam wasn’t angry at him anymore, or at least not as angry. And besides, who was he to argue with a lunch delivery after a successful hunt?

The Feds had used his real name, which meant they knew who he was. And they knew who Sam was. They’d be looking for him, Dean was sure of that. Sam hopefully would’ve copped on to the situation, and gotten away quick before the Feds could find him.

The abandoned house. That must be how the feds found them so quick. They hadn’t bothered to clean up because the house hadn’t been used by anyone other than the shifter for years. They’d been certain that no one would find the scene before they skipped town. Apparently, that hadn’t panned out.

This wasn’t his first rodeo, but it wasn’t looking good for him. Last time they didn’t have the major issue of the leviathan murder spree to contend with. And they wouldn’t have anyone on their side time ‘round, not since Agent Hendricksen died. He’d have to convince the FBI of the truth, or find a way to escape. Neither would be easy.

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The interrogation room felt eerily familiar. He’d been in many a room like this in his time, on both sides of the investigation. Dean tried to keep a calm and level-headed façade. That didn’t stop the internalised anxiety of the situation creep its way into how Dean tapped out the tune of ‘Enter Sandman’ on the table, or how he glanced at the clock he was thankful was on the wall every so often. He hoped that it came across as boredom to the feds.

The creak of the door opening startled him slightly. Two agents walked in. One of them he recognised from the car, Agent Morgan. The other was a dark-haired woman he didn’t recognise at all. She spoke first.

“Dean Winchester? My name is SSA Emily Prentiss, this is SSA Derek Morgan, we’d like to ask you a few questions.”

“So which one of you is the good cop?” Dean asked, somewhat smugly. Taunting the real FBI was a talent of his he only got use on rare occasions like this.
“Do you know why you’re here Dean?” Agent Prentiss asked.

“Not specifically, no. Is getting motel ice illegal now or something?” he mocked.

Morgan folded his arms. “Dean, you’re in some serious trouble here. We’ve linked you to several murders and abductions in in the past month, and that’s not even scratching the surface. You’re probably looking at life without parole at a minimum. Probably even the death penalty.”

Dean didn’t have any snarky response for this just yet. He also had more important things to do than go to prison for crimes he didn’t commit. If the FBI knew the truth, they’d be funding what he does, not locking him up for it.

“You see… I’d actually have to commit those crimes in the first place.” Morgan shook his head before laying out several photos on the table in front of Dean.

Dean paused. The photos were of the kids that the shifter killed.

“Recognise them?”

“Nope. Why?” Dean tried to lie, but he was very aware that the agents could probably tell.

“No? We hoped you would.” Prentiss said. “You see, they were all murdered within the past month here. You know anything about that?”

“I might’ve… heard- something about…” Dean tried to play it off casually., but the look he caught from agent Prentiss confirmed that they knew he was lying. “Ok. Fine, yes, I recognise them. But I didn’t- I wouldn’t- “. He took a deep breath. “I didn’t kill any of them. That I’m not lying about.”

Agent Morgan added another photo to the line-up. “What about him?” he asked.

Dean stared at the photo of the dead shifter and shook his head “Uh-uh. Nope. Never seen the guy.”

“Really? You didn’t shoot him?” Morgan said.

“Actually no. I didn’t.” Dean snapped back.

“Lying won’t do you any good here Dean. We traced the gun, and yours was a match. Who even uses silver bullets anyway?”

“Just because I had the gun does not mean that I shot him with it.” At this point, Dean was just getting fed up of being accused of things he didn’t do.

“So Sam did, then? Where is he anyway? He was with you, no?” Morgan challenged.

Damn these guys were good. They had Dean backed into a corner now. His Plan A of acting innocent was out the window now, and he probably couldn’t convince them they had it wrong.

“Genuinely, I have no clue where Sammy is. He’s smart though. He could be anywhere by now. You won’t find him, not if he doesn’t want to be found.”

“Oh, I’m sure he won’t have gone too far. He’ll try and help you, won’t he? I meant that’s what a co-dependent little brother would do.” Agent Prentiss said.

“Not if he’s smart. And he is smart.” Dean replied. They were trying to agitate him, and even though he wouldn’t admit it, it was working. The silence in the room now was deafening.

“What about your leg? What happened to it?” Prentiss finally spoke up again.

“Oh, nothing. It’s fine. I’ve had worse.”

“So, when DNA analysis comes back, we’re not going to find that it’s your blood on the carpet in that house?”

“You see, what I think happened,“ Morgan leaned on the table, trying to intimidate Dean. “-is that you and your brother went to that house with the intention to kill this man. He fought back and slashed your leg with his knife, am I right? Then Sam shot him, and you both left.”

Shit. They’d hit the nail right on the head, and now he had to act like they hadn’t. That could prove difficult. He decided not to risk incriminating himself further by staying silent.

“We have a witness who can place your car at the crime scene at the time of the murders Dean.” Dean didn’t like how much evidence they had against him at this point. Realising there was no talking himself out of this now, and he was running out of options. Deciding to risk it, Dean spoke up.

“I’d like my phone call now.”

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Sam casually strolled out of the fast-food place across from the motel he and Dean were staying at. He’d insisted on getting lunch before hitting the road, as much as he didn’t like the fast food.
That’s when he saw all the cars. Shit, the Cops. And the Feds. He walked a bit closer before seeing that it was their room that was being searched. Shit.

He had limited options now. Going back to the motel was out of the question. So was trying to hijack a car - he’d be found faster than he could say ‘Poughkeepsie’. They’d connect the dots on who Dean was sooner or later, if they hadn’t already, and they’d come looking for him.

He thought about calling Cas, but he hadn’t exactly been very social lately. Well, sending a text couldn’t hurt, but getting out of dodge was priority. Pulling out his phone from his pocket, Sam turned on his heel and walked away from the motel as fast as he could without drawing attention.