When he woke to the doorbell, he thought at first that it was part of a dream. He rolled over in a vain attempt to fall back asleep, but it kept ringing until finally he groaned, rolling back to check the time on his cell phone. Half past four in the morning. He cursed and threw the covers back, storming down the stairs and through the main hallway to his front door. He paused for a moment to rub the sleep from his eyes before looking through the peep-hole, only mildly surprised to find an empty porch. After a moment's hesitation he hurled the door open, expecting a flaming bag of poop or something. What he found instead was no less alarming.

The spitting image of his brother at eight years old looked up through dripping, stick-straight blonde hair, eyeing him with an unwavering green gaze. For a moment he thought he was looking at a ghost. His breath caught in his throat, chest tightening in a way it hadn't since before he'd left for college, since before he'd left his family for what he'd thought would be a better life. Then he realized he was looking at a little girl. He gave her a quick once over, noting first the freckles peppered across her sharp nose, then the black eye and swollen lip she sported. She was wearing a suspiciously familiar leather jacket that was so big it shrouded her entirely. She held an oversized black duffel bag over one shoulder and a small pink backpack over the other.

He shook himself and cleared his throat. "Can I help you?"

She wiped her hair from her face with her free hand and sniffled.

"I hope so. Are you Sam Winchester?" When he went to answer he found his mouth had gone dry.

"Yes?" She set down the duffel bag and stuck a hand out which he hesitantly shook. The corner of her mouth curled up into a smile.

"It's nice to finally meet you. The name's Samantha Rose Winchester. I'm your niece." For a second he simply stared at her in open-mouthed shock.

"Excuse me?"

"I said I'm your niece. Can I come in? It's freezing out here." She hefted the duffel bag back onto her shoulder and pushed past him into his oversized house. He stood dumbstruck in the doorway until the heavy wind began to blow in the rain. He hadn't noticed until then that it was pouring outside. He snapped back into himself and shut the door against the cold.

"Wait, what do you think you're doing? And since when do I have a niece?" He turned to glare at her, flicking on the dim hall lights.

"Since nine years ago. Can't I explain later? I'm friggen starving." She muttered, setting off down the hall as if she knew where she was going. Sam scoffed.

"No you can't explain later! What are you doing here? And take your shoes off, you're tracking mud." She huffed, setting her duffel bag on the floor beside her.

"I'm here because I- we need your help. Me and my dad. See, we were on a hunt, and…and it went bad. Really bad." Sam's mouth dropped open incredulously.

"A hunt? You were on a hunt?"

"Yes. A hunt. We thought we were after a shapeshifter, but it wasn't what we thought at all." She was looking at the ground as she spoke. "It wasn't a shapeshifter, it was something else entirely. It looked human, but no human can do what it did. It got Dad, and, well…" She trailed off, struggling to find the right words. "I don't really know what happened, but Dad told me to make a run for it, to find you, and- and I uh…" She sniffed, wiping her nose on the back of her hand.

"He told you to- no way. There's just- there's no way. I haven't spoken to Dean in over a decade, sure, but if he ever had a kid, which if I ever knew Dean, he wouldn't, I'm sure he would've told me about it. And now you're trying to tell me that not only is he your father, but that you and he were hunting something- without even knowing what it was-and now he's in trouble and he needs my help because whatever it was "got him?" He punctuated this last with air-quotes and shook his head. "Do you really expect me to believe this?" Samantha wasn't looking at him. She was staring at the ground, looking a bit more pathetic than a wet mouse. Suddenly Sam's incredulity turned into sour guilt.

She sniffed again and wiped unseen tears from her cheeks with the back of her hand. "He told me you might react like that. He also said that you'd probably call the police on me or something, or try to get social services involved." Sam shifted uncomfortably, trying to pretend like he hadn't been thinking those exact things.

"And?"

"Here." She dug a wet letter from the pocket of her coat, retracing her steps to hand it to him. "He said I should give this to you if anything bad ever happened." He frowned, looking down at the limp envelope he held. His initials were printed on it in the somehow elegant chicken-scratch handwriting that could only belong to his older brother. "He told me not to read it until after I gave it to you." He looked at her for a moment as she sat down to untie her muddied boots, feeling slightly nauseous and entirely disoriented. He ran a hand down his face, blinking hard a few times to make sure she was really there.

"There's no chance this is just some twisted dream, is there?"

She looked up and cocked an eyebrow. "No."

He pursed his lips, pinching the bridge of his nose as a headache began to form. "What did you mean by 'it got Dad'? Is he- is he dead?" She flinched at his last word as if she'd been slapped in the face, swallowing hard before shaking her head no.

"I don't think so. There was no blood on the ground- I mean, it grabbed him and- well, it was before it grabbed him that he told me to go." Her voice had the thickness of repressed tears. He licked his lips and took a deep breath, looking back down at the girl as she neatly placed her shoes beside his own. "I've never disobeyed an order until then. I let off a few rounds, trying to distract it. I got in the shoulder but it didn't even hurt it, didn't even slow it down. It was so fast…it came at me and knocked me out." She motioned to her black eye. "I knew I couldn't fight it. I just wanted to get it away from Dad, give him a chance to get up and fight. Thing had a wicked backhand, sent me flying. I heard Dad scream but, when I came to, dad was gone, and the creature too. All that was left was Dad's jacket and the Impala."

"Impala? You mean the Impala?" She nodded and stood, stuffing her hands into the pockets of her dad's coat.

"I called Bobby before my cell died and told him to come and get it. He wanted me to wait for him, but I didn't want to. And besides, I couldn't ignore Dad's order." When she looked up at him her eyes held the same determination that he used to see in Dean's. "Dad wanted me to find you, and I did. And whether you believe me or not doesn't really matter, because Dad's in trouble and you're the only one that can help me find him."

Sam brought his hands to his face and groaned. Everything about this situation was irrational and ludicrous, yes, but it had to be true. Dean wouldn't make any of this up just to get back in contact with him, and he knew too much about the "family business" to just disregard her story, even as much as he wanted to. He looked through his fingers at his niece. She looked absolutely pitiful in the dim light of his entryway, and a small part of him couldn't help but believe every word she'd said. He took a deep breath and mustered all the courage that he could.

"Come on. Let's get some dry clothes for you, and then we'll get you something to eat. We have a lot to talk about. And you're dripping all over my floor." She perked up at that, looking up through her mussed bangs with brightened eyes.

"I have my own clothes-"

"Which are probably filthy, not to mention stuffed in a soaking wet duffel bag. Let me throw them in the wash for you. I have some shorts and a t-shirt you can wear until they're done." The corner of her mouth flicked up in an exhausted, yet relieved, smile.

"Thanks."