Summery: Hataya is a young PhD student at Stamford from England, stuck on the side of the road when Dean and Sam come to the rescue and take her into town to find a garage. Only… within a day, maybe two, of her arrivel people, college students, start dying horribly. Sam can't shake the feeling that it has something to do with Hataya, though Dean thinks otherwise and believes that Sam's paranoia only comes from the fact that Hataya has a psychic ability too. The solution? Keep an eye on Hataya and hunt down what ever is killing students.

No proper pairings. Set in the second season (I'm only up to the third personally so there might be some inconsistencies with the plot), just after 'Simon Said' and just before 'No exit'.

A/N: I'm from England and the last time I was in America I was sixteen, and not really paying attention. So my geography of America might be somewhat eschewed. Please please bear with them! Thank you!

Chapter One:

Hitch Hiking

She never had liked suburbia. Even when she was growing up in one. Admittedly suburbia in London wasn't all nicely cut gardens and tea parties, unlike the boarders of suburbia she was trapped in.

She laughed to herself as she popped the bonnet. An English woman in an America… even that wasn't technically true, but with her accent it felt like it.

She checked the oil, fine. Water- perfect. She had enough petrol to get her to Philadelphia and back to DC again. The battery was full. So why wasn't the blasted thing starting?!

She gave up, slamming the bonnet down hard. She knew enough about cars to pass a high school test… but she was no mechanic. It was probably something to do with the actual cogs and gears of the engine, and it had been about ten years since she had last taken one apart and put it back together.

Well she'd have to find a garage. But she was still out in the middle of no where… and it was probably too far to walk. Next best thing, hitch hike. So she shouldered her rucksack, put the strap of the satchel of her head, locked up the car, pocketed the keys and walked, her thumb out all the way.

But nothing… absolutely nothing. No one stopped, no one even looked at her. After half an hour, she simply gave up and sat on the curb. She was too tired to do anything else. Carrying several kilos of what should be in the back of a car and having been driving all night, tends to do that to a person. She had half a mind to call some form of directory and go to sleep in her home/transportation for the night.

As she mulled this over in her mind and car seemed to have seen her and slowed down to a stop near by.

A man leaned out the window.

"Hey! You need a lift?"

She looked up, and utterly beamed at him. "Yeah!"

"Where to?"

She grabbed her things and jogged over to the car. "Just into town there, I just need to find the nearest garage. My car broke down a mile or so back."

"We're heading that way, hope in, it'll be dark soon anyway."

She glanced up at the sky. He had a point.

"Hop in," he grinned.

"Thanks!"

Pushing her luggage in first, she clambered into the back and sat down, heaving a sigh. The guy revved the engine and took off. She frowned. "Uh… maybe you should get this heap checked as well."

"What! What do you mean heap-"

"I've been telling you that for ages," sighed the person sitting next to him. She guessed it was the driver's brother, maybe cousin. He was tall, slimly built, thick black wavy hair, dark blue eyes and fair skin. Sweet looking boy.

The driver on the other hand had short back and sides light brown hair with greenish hazel eyes, square jaw and thicker build. There was a cocky air about him. It reminded her of her own brother.

"She rattled when you revved her," she continued, "and the clutch is going."

"How can you tell that?" the driver frowned at her in the rear view mirror.

"I know my way around an engine… I'm just no good at making it work again. Oh I'm Hataya by the way, Hataya James."

"Dean," nodded the driver.

"Sam," said his brother.

"Well Dean and Sam, it was very nice of you to give me a lift… I thought America was more friendly… but apparently you guys don't like newbies in the country."

"What makes you say that?" asked Sam.

"Most took one look at me and skidaddled."

Sam cocked an eyebrow, and turned away.

"What?"

"I'm saying nothing."

"What?!" She looked at herself. She was dressed in jeans shorts, a t-shirt stained in engine oil and a loose shirt over that. The clothes she wore revealed a good many tattoos she had sprawled across her skin. She started laughing. "All right all right… fair point… I don't look all that clean cut."

"You're telling me you're an angel?" Dean snorted, "weirdest angel I've seen."

"I'm saying I'm a damn Stamford scholarship kid doing a PhD in anthropology."

Sam's eyes widened as he looked at her.

"You're shittin' me," Dean frowned, "seriously?"

"I am honest as I am… female," she laughed, "don't worry I get that all the time." She looked out the window, yawning. She needed a good night's sleep. Preferably on a bed. It had been a good long while since she had actually rented a room to sleep in. That night she had no choice. "So what are you boys doin' round here? Your accent certainly isn't East Coast."

"Could say the same for you," Sam replied, "British isn't it? English?"

"Yeah, Londoner. Born in NYC and brought up in the UK bad lands. Came back to get to know my Native roots."

"Native American?"

"Half. Hey hey hey- don't avoid the question."

"We're just road tripping to be honest. Needed to get away… taking a year out and all that."

Hataya smirked. "You might be, frat boy, but driver here certainly ain't."

"What makes you say that?" demanded Dean.

She looked out the window. They were entering suburbia. There were nice gardens, children playing on their bikes on the road, mother's calling out to them to come back in and do their home work. Hataya felt a little out of place with her doc martins supported by the bags beneath her ankles, a tattoo of an angel and demon locked in an eternal embrace on her thigh. Then again… she always had done.

"C'mon, I know your type, can't be bothered with the books, you gotta get out and do something. Hell I'd be that type if I wasn't so damn curious… and my parents weren't obsessed." She shrugged. "I know an academic when I meet one, and I know… your type when I meet one." She looked at Sam, her face unreadable. "Now you, Sam… I don't know your type…"

The two looked at each other. Almost nervously.

The young woman shook her head. "Besides the point, you guys are lucky goin' road tripping with family."

"Family?"

"Cousins right? No… brothers?"

"Yeah," Dean smirked, "how could you tell?"

"There's a family resemblance," she yawned and stretched, "I know there's a garage comin' up, but it's out in the middle of middle class rich land… you mind goin' a little further in? I'll never be able to afford that place."

The Sam glanced out his window. They were too busy being surprised by her to notice the garage they were going passed. Dean nodded, and started asking his own questions. Where she was from, her home back in England, little about her own family.

She answered briefly. Almost keeping her own answers in check. She had a two brothers and sister. Her mother was Native American and her father an Australian. She had lived the majority of her life in South London, but in later years moved to the North West. Which fundamentally meant… her parents earned enough money to move to a nicer area.

For them that wasn't all that much information. They knew no names, no details. Just vague outlines. And Dean was suspicious of her. That was enough. There was something about her that seemed to trigger their curiosity. And it wasn't just the accent.

They soon found a better, more affordable, looking place. They offered to wait with her just in case. She frowned, but nodded and thanked them, pulling her bags out of the car and leaving them beside the car.

They watched her talk to the mechanic, explaining her problem.

"Is she…?" began Sam.

"It seems like it… an empath most likely…" nodded his brother, "if she is… then she's in the very early stages of it."

"Might she be a problem?"

"She might turn out like Massouri."

"What?"

"Most real psychics start out as empaths. As their power progresses their empathy can also be used on ghosts and spirits, as well as humans."

"Most… but not all?"

Dean shook his head, "no not all."

Hataya was now gesticulating wildly, getting quite angry. She slammed her fists on the table. The man held up his hands, a sign of truce. He began talking, and Hataya listened. Then she sighed heavily. Nodded and headed back to the boys.

"They can't take a look at her today. It's going to have to be tomorrow," she lifted her bag to her back, "looks like I'm gonna have to find an affordable place to stay. Thanks guys," she shouldered her satchel and made to move.

"Uh hey!" called Sam, Dean looked surprised, "listen, we have to look for a place to stay too… we're kinda borderline broke so… we might as well look together, right?"

Hataya looked at him suspiciously.

"You know he's right," said Dean, "we might end up staying at the same place anyway… so it'll save you unnecessary hassle."

She looked between them. Then shrugged. "Sounds fair enough." She pushed the bags back into the car and jumped in. "Lets go!" she rapped on the hood, "it's getting dark! And I've got an early appointment with an antro professor. And they are assholes in the morning."

The two young men looked at each other and shrugged. The climbed into the car after her and set off. She seemed to be in a significantly less chatty mood than she had been earlier. Instead she sat at the back, almost ramrod straight, and looked out the front window, her eyes almost trained on something in the distance.

They found a motel towards the East of the city, on the boarders. It was a cheap place, with a lot of people simply living there because the daily coast was cheaper than a monthly rent at an normal place.

There were vacancies, but Hataya looked hesitant.

"It'll be fine," Dean said, having caught sight of Hataya's white knuckles, "it'll just be for the night."

"Hummm…" she still looked sceptical. But she followed them in. Sam could understand her hesitation, he didn't much like the look of the place himself. But it was a place to stay. A place to sleep.

At the desk they asked for two rooms. The owner looks between the suspiciously. The young woman sighed.

"We need a single room, for me," she stressed on 'me', "and a double room for them, preferably 2 single beds... considering they are brothers. Ok? Ok…" She rolled her eyes, the owner looked happier.

"All right then miss, now I have two rooms beside each other-"

"We don't care- we need rooms!"

"How long-"

"Are they booked for the foreseeable future?"

"No-"

"Then consider them booked, we'll pay at the end of the stay. All right?"

"Yes miss…" the owner handed over the keys, Hataya tossed a one set to Sam and Dean.

"Later boys," she waved at them, and walked away, to find her room.

The brothers looked at each other and shrugged. From what they could see, she was more or less harmless. She was certainly intelligent, and Dean was certain that she had psychic abilities, but she was fundamentally harmless. Besides, with her staying in the room next to them, if anything fishy happened, they'd be near by.

For Sam there was something more that was bothering him. The girl was as secretive as they were… if not more so. And she was a PhD student. She didn't look much older than he was. Twenty five at the oldest. That was too young to be working on something so advance d. Then there was the way she carried herself… looked at people. Like she could look all the way through them, study each part of them… and still not give a damn about what she found out.

The two went back to the Impala, grabbed their bags and found their way to their room. Inside was clean, if a little musty, with two large single beds, two night stands, a small tv in the corner, a sofa, and a coffee table. Not much else. It was a basic room. Though the walls were very thin. On one side they could hear someone cleaning, on their other side an already familiar voice was having trouble keeping her temper.

"Look, Akondo please- no- hear me out for God's sake!" she was shouting, a moment later her voice dropped and they could hear nothing until; "Well fuck you too asshole! What sort of brother- yeah well, this is my life…" she paused, then continued in a lower tone once again.

The brothers looked at each other and shrugged. Family disputes… never fun.

"Remind me… what are we doing here?" asked Sam, dropping his things at the foot of the bed.

"Stop off," Dean replied, "it's the biggest town until we hit DC, so I figure best place to find a few news papers, maybe something to hunt."

Sam shrugged. Dean was still in a strange mood.

Next door the voice had risen again, she was cursing in a combination of about four different languages. English, a dialect of native american and… strangely… ancient greek and latin. Though Sam wasn't surprised, he'd met a few anthropologists and and anthropology students since starting in Stamford, a lot of them had interests in linguistics too.

What got to him was when the lights flickered and the tv screen that Dean was watching started to fuzz. Now it seemed to be in time with her moods.

"Dean…" he started.

"Not a ghost- just en empath."

"Empaths deal with emotions, not physical reality."

"Weaker ones do. They dunno what they're doing to their power comes off them in electro magnetic waves effecting electrical objects. Once they advance- it stops. So stop worrying."

Sam sat up and stared at his brother. "We have someone with psychic abilities next door… and you're calm about it."

Dean turned around. "What are you so worked up about? Empaths are the mildest psychics out there! Telekinetics, teleporters and people like that, they're harder… even proper psychics like Missouri are harder to deal with. Empaths? They're fine. They're usually the most docile lot. I have yet to meet one that will actually fuck up your brain. Admittedly… I've only met two…" he added in a mutter.

Sam lay back down. Hataya didn't strike him as docile. Just then, with his instinct telling him to watch this girl, he almost wandered why Dean was so unfazed. His instincts were good, having lived the life of a hunter more fully than Sam ever had, he seemed to listen to what his gut told him. This time… he seemed almost turned off the idea.

Next door Hataya's calm broke entirely.

"Well fuck you too Akondo- I'll do this one on my own!"

"What- no Hataya! I'm just telling you to wait that's all! It might not be as bad as you think it is. Let me speak to their counsel- I've got talks with them in the morning all right? Don't do anything hasty."

"I'm not doing anything hasty… I just think this is going to be a very had idea. If we're right it leaves this entire area vulnerable to attack. I don't think they're even aware of what they're doing!"

There was quiet on the other end. "You're taking this too seriously. It's a superstition, A'ya, just a superstition, it's not like this old monster is going to come in and attack the place if-"

"I have to go, Akondo," she growled, "I'll speak to you tomorrow."

"But-"

She hung up.

She and her brothers were twins. And close siblings. Growing up they competed with each other for better grades in class, up till when they reached year twelve, they were turning sixteen. At that point they took their more specialised subjects, and still tried to beat each other in what grades they received. Even then, this competitiveness between the two was friendly, and simply a way of pushing themselves further. As children of a professor and a psychologist the two of them always felt like they had to do better. Always this was what united them. They would argue, make up, fight, patch each other up, confide in each other… for a while their mother worried constantly that the two would always be joined at the hip.

Hataya growled, digging her nails into her palms. So much for closeness and trust! Her brother still thought she was slightly mad believing in what she believed. He had yet to go as far as to say that she was simply believing in the superstitions of the people she was studying.

Slumping onto her bed, she leaned over and grabbed her satchel, pulling out a rumbled packet of cigarettes and a hip flask. She set the hip flask on the table beside her and flipped open the cigarette packet. She had five left. As she looked at the packet… battered… torn… stained with God only knew what… she seemed to feel like it summed up almost perfectly what her life had taken to in recent months. She had only taken up smoking again since she started her PhD because she was getting so stressed out. The evidence of hardship… those were other stories.

She pulled out one of the white sticks, put it between her lips and stood to fish out the lighter from her pocket. She lit up sat down again heavily and pulled the ash tray on the bed side table onto her lap.

Her attention then turned to the hip flask. It was there was brandy in it. She knew that. And she hated the stuff. But in recent months horrible horrible nightmares had been haunting her subconscious. She got the feeling it was something to do with what she was researching and studying. But that was pointless… she wasn't getting much sleep. And she could not be falling asleep behind the wheel.

She growled, in the back of her throat. Her cigarette was almost finished. She stubbed it out, angrily, and went off to the bathroom, to do the every night ritual of going to bed. It was early, but she hadn't slept properly for three nights.

Finally she got into bed. She looked at the flask. Heaved a sigh, and opened it, took one swig put it back down and turned over. The lights were still on, but that was fine. If she woke in the night after a nightmare, she'd rather be able to see everything in the room, not have to make out its shapes. The brandy only served to try and deepen the sleep. It worked to begin with… but now the dreams were getting more and more vivid… as her work became more and more interesting.

Half an hour later, she was sound asleep, awaiting the next day.