A/N: This is based off of prompts my cousin gave me six months ago - and I finally came round to writing the story. I know the crossover is... unusual, but it worked out surprisingly well. I hope you enjoy!
Let me know what you think.
"Oi! You there!"
"Dean", Sam said warningly, grabbing his older brother by the arm, "I don't think we should –"
"You!", Dean repeated, carelessly shrugging off Sam's hand, "Is this your ship?"
The man he had been talking to – a big bloke with heavily muscled arms and a black beard who was doing something with a mass of ropes on the pier – stared at the Hunter with a blank face, blinked slowly and then answered in a gruff voice: "Do I look like this is mine?"
Dean shrugged and grinned, hoping to mask his annoyance with charm, "No harm in asking. We're here to speak to someone official."
"Why would that someone want to speak to you?" Muscle-man stood up, letting the ropes fall from his grip and blocked their way with crossed arms.
"We're FBI", Sam intercepted, stepping between his brother and the other man, pulling out his fake badge and holding it up. He could hear Dean move behind him and hoped he was pulling out his own ID instead of producing his hidden gun to threaten the man into compliance.
It had been a long day.
Lucky for him, muscle-man immediately stepped out of the way: "Can't be too careful 'round here", he mumbled while they passed him, "Boss's office is that way."
"Pull yourself together, man", Sam hissed as soon as they were out of earshot, "we're not here to kill innocent bystanders."
Dean snorted guiltily, but released his grip on his gun: "Let's just get this over with", he said.
They passed the yacht which wasn't muscle-man's and continued on – of course carefully avoiding the Boss's office.
The shopkeeper had said they would know the ship as soon as they saw it. Before Sam could inquire more about the mysterious ship's owner, though, the man had excused himself and had fled through the back door.
Dean had wanted to go after him, but Sam insisted that he had a feeling this man had nothing to do with his customers dying in freak accidents (other than selling them the items he'd purchased from the ship's proprietor which were definitely attracting some really angry spirits).
The shopkeeper had appeared out of his wits enough as it was, without Dean following gun blazing.
When the ship finally came in sight, Sam knew what the shop owner had meant. He whistled in surprise: "I really did not expect this."
Dean's face lit up in excitement, his foul mood forgotten while he stared at the ancient two-mast boat in front of them: "That is not your typical yacht to be sure. The millionaires nowadays...", he beamed. "This is going to be more fun than I thought, right, Sammy?"
"How old are you?", Sam quietly huffed in disbelief, "Five?"
"I heard that!"
The ship really was huge – huge and full of creepy junk. It belonged to an old and rather eccentric millionaire who must have collected, among absolutely useless stuff, something which attracted ghosts like crazy.
In the last few weeks there had been three freak deaths of people who had all bought items which had been stocked on the ship for years from the antique shop in town, and two other people had been attacked while being close to the brig (as Sam insisted it was called), claiming lunatics looking like they were going to a Halloween party had appeared out of thin air and had violently chased them away.
Having sorted out the last case, Sam and Dean had decided a ship haunted by several ghosts was definitely worth a trip to Maine.
They had actually already been on their way back to Bobby's when Sam got a call of a local sheriff telling him of yet another unusual death – burning the bodies of the ship's crew obviously hadn't been enough.
While the deck had been just as one would imagine an old ship's deck to look like, the larder and cabin were stocked with things which were all potentially ghost-worthy. The EMF was going nuts down here.
While Sam went through a pile of papers on a desk (dimly wondering if what he was looking at was supposed to be some kind of code or simply someone's bored drawings while taking a phone call) Dean rummaged through a big chest standing in the corner of the cabin.
"Ha! Look at that!"
Sam startled and knocked an ancient-looking ink-pot over and off of the table. It shattered on the floor and pieces of glass crunched underneath Sam's shoes while he hurried over to Dean, who finally turned around.
"Jeez!", Sam exclaimed and jumped back, "that's not funny, man!"
Dean laughed evilly and casually threw the Clown-mask he'd discovered back into the trunk: "I think it's hilarious", he said, "look, Sam – "
Both of them stopped dead when they heard someone moving above them on the ship's deck.
In unison, both the Winchesters grabbed their guns and slowly – Sam in front of Dean – they moved back toward the ladder back up, now scouring their surroundings much more careful than before. Their hunt for possessions of deceased people had to wait.
"Look at that, Eve!", they heard an exited voice, "this steering wheel is the original one! You can tell by –"
"Flynn", a female voice answered, "this really is not the time to fool around. We have to find the sextant and get out of here before someone..."
"You can't tell me you're not excited about all this. She's the Saint Lucifer – she was the most famous ship belonging to the well-known pirate...", the first voice interrupted the second, and somehow Sam had a feeling the person belonging to the voice was gesturing around wildly while beaming enthusiastically.
Dean raised an eyebrow and whispered: "Another know-it-all! You two would surely get along splendidly."
Sam shook is head in irritation and gestured to his brother to be silent.
There was a sigh, and a barely suppressed laugh: "Let's just get this over with, okay? We can have a look around later when we've stored the sextant safely in the Library."
"But Eve...", the man protested, lengthening and stressing the syllable pleadingly.
"Flynn."
The woman's glowering stare was almost tangible, even for Sam, who had not yet even had a glance at the woman.
The Winchesters stared at each other questioningly when silence fell above them. Before they had a chance to figure out what they were supposed to do with these two unwelcome intruders, Sam's torchlight began to flicker unsteadily and then went out. Dean tried switching on his, but it was dead as well.
"I have a bad feeling about this...", Sam managed, before there was a surprised yelp from the deck.
Dean motioned upwards and Sam, grabbing his gun firmer, nodded and climbed up, carefully checking for anything that looked remotely ghost-like.
In the end it wasn't hard to figure out which figures were ghosts and which Flynn and Eve – there was a circle of seven men, with various versions of beards, wearing lots of earrings (both golden and clinking, naturally). Their clothes looked like they had been stolen out of the general equipment of a near theatre. One of them even had a tricorne and long, black hair (parts of it braided) as well as a maniacal, distorted-sounding laugh. He seemed to be the one in charge.
The men were closing in on a blond woman and a man who were undoubtedly the two unwelcome intruders, standing back to back. While the one called Flynn was looking around aimlessly, the woman had her fists raised in a defending position that looked quite professional, Dean had to admit.
Sam didn't wait for Dean to catch up, raised his gun and shot the first ghost, which disappeared with an angry scream into nothingness, only to reappear directly in front of Sam, grabbing his shirt and lifting him up easily. While Sam struggled for both breath and ground, Dean reached the end of the ladder and started shooting at the other ghosts.
They began coming after the Winchesters rather than attacking the would-be treasure hunters.
Blasting away the ghost which had had Sam at his throat, Dean yelled: "I've got them, Sammy!"
"You sure?"
"Do I look like I'm sure?! Just hurry", Dean retorted, rose his weapon again and moved toward the couple: "You don't have any salt on you, by any chance?"
Sam hurried downstairs and back to the cabin as fast as he could, wondering how he was supposed to find whatever object seven damn souls could have been tied to.
He opened the door, gun ready should any of the ghosts follow him, and resumed his hurried search for something, anything, which might be the object he was looking for.
On the deck, Dean had his hands full. The ghosts were fast, really fast, and while the woman had taken his spare gun and was firing expertly at the men (who were looking, he had to admit, like this Flynn guy had been right about this ship having been a pirate's ship once, which was really a bit too much cliché for one day), the man wasn't any help at all.
He ran around, getting himself in danger, and was muttering useless stuff to himself while gesturing wildly. Sometimes his face lit up and he would cry out: "We knows!" only to have his face fell again when he realised he obviously still hadn't got... whatever.
The man was quite obviously absolutely insane.
Sam had gone through all the chests now, and had found nothing but useless junk. The only object left in the cabin was the desk, which looked like it actually was an original. He had gone through the papers already, so he discarded them and instead had a good look at the desk itself.
"Flynn – hurry up!", Eve yelled when one of the ghosts grabbed her arm and twisted it so she couldn't hold on the gun any longer. Dean had been relieved of his weapon, too, and the ghosts were closing in on them fast. The hunter vaguely wondered why they were so good at working as a team, it seemed quite unusual for vengeful spirits to be so... coordinated.
A hidden drawer slid out of the side of the desk and Sam couldn't suppress a relieved shout when he saw it wasn't empty. An old, worn book lay in it. When he opened it, he quickly discovered it must have been the Captain's log: It was as good a guess as any.
Pulling out his lighter, he set fire to the pages, which burned away slowly.
There was a moment of silence above him, and Sam had only just allowed himself to grin triumphantly when the sounds of fightings resumed. He looked around the cabin once more, but there was nowhere else he hadn't searched through yet.
"I've got it!", Flynn suddenly exclaimed victoriously. He had been doing something with the steering wheel for the last few minutes, and now he held up a shining, bronze object Dean identified as being a sextant.
"My, my", a new voice became audible from astern, where the shadows were thickest, "seems like you are different from the other hunters who come here every other day. I have a feeling the otherworldly decoy isn't working with you."
The voice was harsh and sounded like it belonged to a person who was used to being obeyed – but it was definitely a female one.
A figure stepped out of the shadows – wearing an out-of-place-loking black dress, but appearing absolutely solid and without the slightest signs of flickering. Dean had a bad feeling this was no ghost, especially when the pirate-spirits stopped their fighting and looked at the woman in awe, like really it was she who commanded them.
She was slender, with long, white-blond hair held back in a tight bun, striking blue eyes and a hard expression while she walked toward Flynn, who still held the sextant in his hand.
He smiled like the woman did not have a sharp-looking rapier pointing toward his chest and said: "I'm not a hunter. I despise the whole concept, to be honest."
Dean snorted angrily and wondered why this guy had ended up on this ship at exactly the same time he and Sam were there – and he wondered what kind of hunter this man thought they were talking about.
"I'm the Librarian", Flynn added and drew himself up to his full height, "and you and I know this", he cast a meaningful glance at the sextant, "belongs back in the Library."
"I've heard about the Librarian", the woman said and smiled nastily. "I suppose you know who I am. You don't really think you could harm me, do you?"
Dean blinked – and when he opened his eyes again, the woman was standing behind Eve, the rapier held against her throat. He wished he had some holy water on him – teleporting herself around like she was some sort of Demon there was at least the slight possibility it would harm her; and anyway, he would feel better just by trying.
Flynn's smile vanished and something in his face changed. His whole expression became darker, and somehow his posture shifted threateningly. He suddenly looked less like... well, a god damn Librarian, and more like an avenging angel (and Dean had seen some, so he knew the expression.)
"Let her go", Flynn commanded, "and we'll leave and only take the sextant with us. If you don't, we'll leave, take the sextant with us and I will kill you."
Eve wriggled around a bit, but stopped when a small trickle of blood ran down the side of her throat. Her eyes were wide while she stared at Flynn in surprise.
Dean caught a movement behind the woman: His brother was slowly, deliberately, climbing out of the ship's hold, holding his gun at the ready, but Dean could see he was unsure whether he could risk attacking the woman without her cutting Eve's throat.
Flynn, too, must have seen Sam, but he gave no sign of it and continued to stare at the woman's face intently. For a moment, it seemed like she was actually considering the offer of keeping her life, then she shrugged: "I'm afraid she", she squeezed Eve a bit firmer and a small sound of fear escaped the Librarian's companion, "won't make it through to the bit where you kill me."
Flynn nodded, a solemn expression on his face. Slowly he loosened the tie from around his neck, whistled once, and while he fastened the tie around his head (looking once more every inch as ridiculous as Dean began to feel the whole day had been), he said: "Do you know anything about the Arthurian legends?"
The woman stared at him in disbelief, her eyes narrowing while she tried to understand what he was talking about right now. She chose not to answer.
Flynn finished the knot in his tie and sighed: "That's the problem with you goddesses. You're not interested in anything beyond your own desires."
He raised his hand and, out of nowhere seemingly, something appeared at great speed, producing a strange, chirping sound. The Librarian skilfully grabbed it and smiled triumphantly: "Meet Excalibur, the famous weapon King Arthur himself wielded." He glanced down the shining blade: "Wounds caused by Excalibur never heal." His voice was mesmerizing and had deepened, now Dean came to think about it, and Flynn continued dropping his voice until it was barely audible, like he was letting the goddess in on a big secret: "It has been forged in a dragon's breath and was enchanted by a powerful warlock to do his wielder's every command, to protect his friends forever and utterly destroy his enemies..."
The woman stared at Flynn, leaning slightly towards him. It was obvious she imagined herself with the blade, becoming its wielder. So much power.
With every word that followed, the rapier moved a bit farther away from Eve's throat – before the woman had a chance to react, Eve threw herself backwards, against the woman, and then rolled away to the side, narrowly avoiding the sharp rapier's point.
The goddess let out a harpy-like, inhuman scream of rage and made a move like she wanted to go after Eve – but Flynn was faster than she was. Rapier clashed against sword, and the weaker blade splintered.
For a moment time seemed to come to a stop, then Flynn threw the sword forward, the woman stumbled back, crashed into the railing with force, the ancient wood sighed, bent, broke and both rail and goddess went overboard, disappearing in the sea with a splash and a few bubbles.
The wood came back up again.
The goddess's body did not.
"You okay, Dean?", Sam asked worriedly.
"Just a few scratches, nothing serious. No thanks to you, I think." Sam raised an eyebrow, and Dean grinned.
The hunters watched as Flynn hurried over to Eve, leaving the sword positively hovering in thin air, grabbing her shoulders and pulling her into a tight embrace.
"I thought I'd lost you", he whispered, his voice choking, "don't ever do something like this again."
"I won't", she promised, her voice soft, "I can't leave my Librarian alone, now, can I?"
Flynn snivelled, leant forward and kissed her lightly on the lips, a promise of more to come later. Pulling back, he resumed his former, jovial self and turned round to Sam and Dean, who had watched the tender moment between Flynn and Eve in some discomfort: "So – who exactly are you? And where has the sextant gone to, by the way?"
"You sure they won't come back?", Dean asked again, just to make double-sure.
"Nah", Flynn grinned, carefully wrapping the sextant in a handkerchief (which was a real one – Complete with monogram, as Dean couldn't help but notice). "They have been conjured up with the sextant's help, and won't be able to return without it. We know exactly how to deal with this kind of artefact", he added.
"Wait, didn't you say the sextant belonged back in the Library? Has it been there before?" Sam asked curiously.
"Did I say something like this?", Flynn asked and squirmed a bit, "I can't really remember that part."
"We've had a few problems, recently", Eve admitted, "but we're dealing with it. And there won't be any more deaths because of this artefact." She looked at Flynn, who still had his tie around his head and her features softened for a moment before she added, "Or the goddess, for that matter."
"I've called Jenkins", Eve said some ten minutes and a phone call later, "he'll open the Back Door for us. Apparently its working again."
"That means Good Bye then", Flynn smiled and extended a hand toward Dean, who shook it and said: "I'd say it was nice meeting you, but given the circumstances..."
"Thanks for your help", Eve said, "I didn't know about the many uses of Rock Salt before, but now I'll keep them in mind for the next time we run into crazy pirate-ghosts." Her face became thoughtful for a moment before she added hopefully: "It doesn't work against mummies, too, by any chance?"
Dean and Sam watched the Librarian and his Guardian walk down the ladder. They had claimed their way back to the Library was through the cabin door, and since they'd had a flying sword with them which moved around on its own accord, neither Sam nor Dean objected to that.
"So, tell me about this famous pirate captain then."
"Well, he was said to either have had a hook for a hand, or be a woman, the history books are a tiny little bit contradictory on that matter..."
A door was opened, then closed, and then there was silence again.
For a moment, both Winchesters stared at each other silently, then Dean shrugged awkwardly.
Sam asked: "Care for a drink?"
"Hell, yes."