I downed my drink as soon as it had been pushed in front of me. After all, who wouldn't? It'd been a tough day; having to find and burn the body of a hunter who'd been stupid enough to think he could take on a Wendigo alone, and clearing out a nest of twenty shifters that had made camp a few miles east from where I was staying. My head was pounding and I was exhausted, so I did what any self-respecting hunter would do; hit the nearest bar. I had to be careful though, as I wasn't exactly a typecast hunter, and not just because I was a young girl. If you think not many people considered my job the most honest work in the world, think how it would look to my family. Think how it would look to demons.
I ordered another soda and sighed heavily, just as two large shapes temporarily blocked out the light from the lamp on my left, sat down and ordered a couple of beers. I looked over, straight into the plaid clad chest of an extremely tall, extremely gruff man. I turned my eyes to meet his. They were startlingly green, almost as if someone had enhanced them on a computer. He looked down at me, smiled briefly, before putting his head in his hands and mimicking the sigh I'd released earlier.
"Long day?" I asked.
"Like you wouldn't believe," he replied. "Tough job, not enough beer."
I nodded, and glanced over to the other man. He was taller still, if that was even possible, but younger, with brown hair hanging round his chin and a tired look in his eyes. He threw me a respectful nod and similar smile. I couldn't deny the resemblance between them, marking them out as relatives.
"What'd you do? Your job, I mean," I inquired. Immediately I saw the two men exchange a silent conversation, and I didn't even need the lie before I knew what they did. Despite the older man passing off something about the FBI, I knew they were hunters. And they were on my patch.
"Yeah, we heard about that family who were killed," chips in the younger man, "so we thought-"
"Look, I don't need the deception. I know you're both hunters."
"I-what?" Their faces had both dropped simultaneously, almost comically in fact.
"Names?" I asked sharply. "Real ones, and I'll know if you're lying."
After another brief conversation without words, the older man turned back to me and replied.
"Dean Winchester. And that's my brother, Sam."
"Winchester…" I whispered to myself. The name was familiar to me, and I scanned my mind until I remembered. The name coming from the cracked lips of a tortured soul down in Hell. As I stood hidden in the back of the chamber, he cried out for someone to save his sons. I took that up. And I knew exactly who I was sat next to.
"You're John Winchester's sons?" I asked cautiously.
"You knew him?"
"Yeah. I heard he died a while back, I'm sorry."
"You're a little young to ever work with him, so what? He save your life or something?"
I bite my lip and hold in my laughter; the idea of man like John Winchester saving a creature like me was unthinkable. Luckily the boys didn't seem to notice.
"Not exactly, no," I replied.
"Who are you then?" Sam asked. He'd sat up straight, hanging on to every word I was saying. Not because he was interested; it was a form of interrogation, waiting for the subject to slip up on one tiny detail. It'd been tested on me before, by higher demons to see if it would work. I'd trained myself to look out for it.
"No one important," I said back.
"Well then, No one Important," Dean returned "This job is dangerous, and we can't be worrying about some kid, even if you did know our dad. So stay safe, and stay away. C'mon Sammy."
The boys downed their drinks and got up to leave. Sam shot me an apologetic smile as he turned away, which I returned.
"Kid, you gotta go. We're closing." The bartender pulled me out of my thoughts, so I slipped him $20 and left. Walking back to the crappy motel I'd bedded up in, I though on the Winchester boys. They were nice enough, and I knew Dean only didn't want me to get hurt.
But I didn't care. I had a case to work, and no one, no matter how protective, was going to get in my way. I unlocked my motel room door, checked the map spread out on the table one last time, snatched my machete from under the bed and exited via a window. If those vamps were out there, then it was my job to kill them. Winchesters or no Winchesters.