The box looked harmless enough: slightly battered cardboard neatly sealed with "Priority Shipping" tape. Jody Mills didn't think much of it, probably office supplies or the citation booklets the front desk ordered a week ago. She had every intention of passing it off to a deputy until she noticed the large stamp of "Fragile, Handle with Care." The shipping label was from London, England.
"Well, huh," she grunted. Then broke the seal and flipped back the flaps to reveal several ceramic lawn ornaments packed in foam pads. Garden gnomes? One dressed in red and another in blue. There were also some rabbits or something in there. "Why on Earth...?"
Then the smaller one in blue moved. It looked at her- It Looked At Her- and said, "We need your help!"
Jody slammed the cardboard folds back into place and pinned them closed with her entire upper body. Garden gnomes were not supposed to move or talk. She'd seen a lot of whack-a-doo since zombies started paying taxes in Sioux Falls. Hey, she'd even gone on a blind date with the King of Hell. But... seriously? Garden gnomes walking, talking, and... asking for help?
"Why couldn't I get mailed a pipe bomb like a normal sheriff's office?" Jody mourned.
"You want to be bombed?" a muffled voice asked from under her forearms, incredulous.
"Maybe its an American thing," another muffled voice offered.
With a groan, Jody cracked the box back open. Scowling, she told the gnomes, "Pipe bombs, I can explain to my deputies. Pipe bombs, I have procedures for! Pipe bombs-" Jody cut herself off. "What in the samhill am I supposed to do with talking garden gnomes!?"
"We need your help," both gnomes intoned solemnly.
"Yeah, I got that." Jody closed her eyes and tried to pull it together. "I don't suppose you used to be regular-sized folk that got... gnomed by a witch or something?"
The two gnomes looked at each other in surprise and consternation. Three previously unnoticed ceramic bunnies started clicking their ears together in what sounded suspiciously like Morse Code.
"Um... no. I don't think so," the second gnome answered hesitantly.
"Of course not." Jody closed the box back up and set several county ordinance statute books on top to keep it closed.
"Hey!" both voices protested.
"Shut up and stay put!" Jody commanded. "Unbelievable," she muttered, jerking her phone out of it case on her belt. "Un-freakin-believable." The tone rang. "Sam. Get your brother and get your asses out here. I've got a case sitting in my office, and I am not handling this crazy by myself."
On the desk, the box cheered.
.
It took the Winchesters about six hours to make the drive from Lebanon. Which meant that they didn't break many traffic laws getting there, but that they didn't waste any time coming either. When they asked what the case was, Jody pointed at the box.
Sam, curious and cautious, moved the books and opened the flaps.
"We need your help!"
Sam jerked back in surprise. "Jesus!" he exclaimed.
Dean's pistol all but lept to his hand so he could point it at the box. "-the hell?!"
"Yeah," Jody agreed. "That's why I called the big guns."
Two gnomes, three bunnies and a mushroom carefully climbed out of the box.
Dean's aim never let up.
Sam cocked his head. Reading the sender's address from the label, he asked, "Did you- mail- yourselves to Jody?"
The mushroom nodded its agreement.
"Uh-huh," the gnome with the red hat agreed.
"Okay. But why?" Sam asked.
"We need your help!" the gnomes chorused again.
"Yeah, we got that part," Dean growled. "Help with what?"
"Our people moved to a new house," the red hat told them.
"To a brand new garden," the blue hat added.
"There was a ghost!" Red squeaked.
"A REAL ghost!" Blue stressed.
"It throws things."
"Like garden tools."
"And the lawn mower!"
"It nearly shattered Gnomeo!"
"Because he jumped in front of Juliet!"
"Wait," Dean broke in. "Gnome-eo and Juli-. Never mind." He took a deep, centering breath. "You have a ghost; you need a Hunter. I get that part. You are talking garden gnomes, which, I'm not gonna lie, is kinda freaking me out right now. But okay, we'll deal with that in a minute. My real question is this," he paused for emphasis. "How did you know to mail yourselves here?"
The gnomes paused, flabbergasted that the question had to be asked. "We read your books!" they chorused.
"Books?" Jody repeated. "What books?"
The three bunnies hopped back into the box only to emerge a moment later maneuvering a dog-eared paperback between them.
Gingerly, Jody took the book. "Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid by Carver Edlund," she read. Opening up the novel to the bookmarked page, she read the highlighted dialogue. "Gentlemen, I'm Sheriff Jody Mills. (…) Here's what I know about Bobby Singer. He's a menace around here, ass-full of drunk-and-disorderlies and mail fraud." She looked up from the book. "What. The. Hell," she grated. "Boys, those were my exact words from the first time we met."
Sam winced. "Oh. Yeah. Our lives are a published book series. Didn't we ever mention that?"
"NO." Jody glared. "You did not."
"Yeah, its super-fun, having all the details of five years of our lives in print for the whole world to see." Dean flashed her a pained smile.
"Why-?"
"A Prophet of the Lord," Sam grimaced. "Tapped by God to record the Winchester Gospels."
"Except the prophet turned out to actually be God," Dean added. "Yeah, the Big Kahuna himself came down in disguise to write our autobiographies."
The gnomes gasped is shock and thrilled surprise. The humans ignored them.
"Which is probably why threatening to kill him if he didn't stop publishing didn't work," Sam huffed. "And believe me, I did."
Jody felt her jaw drop and could only blink for a moment. "You two. I- I can't- I can't even-"
"Yeah. You get used to it," Dean assured her.
"No, you don't," Sam denied instantly but calmly.
"No, not really," Dean agreed just as fast and calm.
Jody pinched the bridge of her nose. "Okay, I'm gonna shelve at that for later, and by later I mean never."
Dean nodded. "Fair enough."
Jody turned back to the lawn ornaments. "You used the books to find me?"
"We wanted the Winchesters," Red admitted.
"But Sam and Dean don't have an address," Blue elaborated.
"So we mailed ourselves to Singer Auto Salvage," Red continued.
"But we got Returned to Sender."
"Did something happen to Bobby?" After this, both gnomes and all the bunnies stopped to stare at the Winchesters with wide, sad eyes.
"Bobby, he uh-" Dean began, but couldn't finish the sentence. The old grief still hadn't left him.
Both gnomes teared up, understanding what Dean wasn't saying. One of the bunnies threw himself on his fellow and bawled his eyes out.
Red patted the bunny a bit before picking up the narrative. "Then we mailed ourselves to the Sheriff."
"After we Googled her, to make sure it was still Jody Mills," Blue added sheepishly.
"And that's how talking garden gnomes ended up on my desk," Jody drawled. "Yippee for me."
"Will you help us?" the two gnomes chorused in sync.
Jody snorted. "I have a day job and a county to take care of. I can't be flying off to London at the drop of a hat." She turned at smirked at the Winchesters. "I guess you two will be jetting off to merry ole London for a salt and burn. After all, if the poltergeist is tossing around lawn mowers, someone's gonna get hurt sooner or later."
Dean gulped. "Fly to London?"
The gnomes cheered.