Supernatural: Skin

A/N: Hello, everyone! Since we all have to wait until April 15 for the next episode of Supernatural, I've decided to update.

I know that it's been a while, but I've been busy with homework and work. Sigh.

Read, review, and enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything from Supernatural. I just own any and all characters that I just happen create.

CHAPTER ONE: TWO PLACES AT ONCE?

St. Louis, Missouri

The chair in the bedroom had seen better days, as had the girl who was currently tied to it. She was breathing hard through her nose and desperately pushing at the gag over her mouth with her tongue as the man in the shadows contemplated the knife in his hand.

Outside the house, a S.W.A.T team was making their way to the building; they reached the front door and shot the handle, unlocking it.

Back in the bedroom, the girl tried to scream, but the man covered her mouth to stifle the sound.

The S.W.A.T. team was now searching the house, discovering that the walls and furniture were smeared with blood. They came close to where the girl sat in her chair, but then they entered another room, allowing the man to leave the bedroom and make a bid for an escape.

After searching the rest of the house, the team entered the bedroom and found the blonde girl. One of the men immediately moved forward to untie her.

"It's okay," he assured her. "It's okay."

Gasping and crying, the girl immediately pointed to the room across the hall. "In there! In there!" she shouted.

The S.W.A.T team moved to the other room, and the man was there, trying to open a pair of doors leading to a balcony.

"Freeze! Don't move!" one of the S.W.A.T officers ordered, his rifle at the ready. "Drop the knife. Keep your hands where I can see 'em. Drop it! Hold it right there! Do it!"

The man raised his hands over his head, still holding the knife, and turned around, revealing Dean Winchester's serious face.

GAS STATION

One Week Earlier…

Sam, Liz, and Dean pulled into the station.

"Alright, I figure we'd hit Tucumcari by lunch, then head south, hit Bisbee by midnight," Dean said, getting a nod from Liz, but noticed that Sam didn't seem to be listening and was staring at the screen of his cell phone. "Sam wears women's underwear," he added, prompting Liz to slug him in the shoulder.

"I've been listenin', I'm just busy," Sam said, still staring at the screen and tapping it with an electronic pen.

"Busy doin' what?" Dean asked, curious.

"Reading e-mails," Sam answered.

Dean rolled his eyes, got out of the car, went around to grab the hose, and started to fill the tank with gas. "E-mails from whom?" he asked, wondering whom Sam could be possibly getting emails from.

"From my friends at Stanford," Sam responded, earning an impressed look from Liz.

"You're kidding," Dean said with disbelief. "You still keep in touch with your college buddies?"

"Why not?" Sam asked.

"Well, what exactly do you tell 'em?" Dean asked, skeptical. "You know, about where you've been, what you've been doin'?"

"I tell 'em I'm on a road trip with my big brother and my big sister," Sam answered. "I tell 'em I needed some time off after Jess."

"Oh, so you lie to 'em," said Dean, moving around to car to Sam's side.

Sam shook his head. "No. I just don't tell 'em… everything."

"Yeah, that's called lying," Dean stated, leaning against the side of the car. "I mean, hey, man, I get it, tellin' the truth is far worse."

"So, what am I supposed to do, just cut everybody out of my life?" Sam asked and Dean just shrugged. "You're serious?"

"Look, it sucks, but in a job like this, you can't get close to people, period," Dean stated.

"Dean, leave Sam alone," Liz scolded, frowning. "He can have friends if he wants to," he added.

"You're kind of anti-social, you know that?" Sam asked while grateful for Liz's words.

Dean scoffed. "Yeah, whatever. And you're just as anti-social as me," he threw at his twin. Liz just rolled her eyes.

Sam went back to reading his e-mails and paused at a certain one, reading the text. "God…" he whispered, his eyes going wide.

"What?" Dean and Liz both asked.

"In this e-mail from this girl, Rebecca Warren, one of those friends of mine," Sam said, frowning.

"Is she hot?" Dean asked, leaning through the window to look, but Sam ignored him.

"Focus, Dean," said Liz, annoyed with his attitude at the moment.

"I went to school with her, and her brother, Zack," Sam explained. "She says Zack's been charged with murder. He's been arrested for killing his girlfriend. Rebecca says he didn't do it, but it sounds like the cops have a pretty good case."

"That's horrible," Liz gasped.

"Dude, what kind of people are you hangin' out with?" Dean asked jokingly.

"No, man, I know Zack," Sam stated, now very concerned. "He's no killer."

Dean was skeptical. "Well, maybe you know Zack as well as he knows you," he commented, not seeing the point of all this.

Sam ignored that comment, his mind was made up. "They're in St. Louis. We're goin'," he declared, looking directly at Dean, surprising Liz.

Dean chuckled and shook his head, bemused. "Look, sorry 'bout your buddy, okay? But this does not sound like our kind of problem," he stated.

"It is our problem," Sam retorted. "They're my friends."

"St. Louis is four hundred miles behind us, Sam," Dean protested, but Sam gave him the "look", and Dean sighed.

A minute later, they pulled out of the gas station and started driving toward St. Louis.

Rebecca Warren opened the door to her parents' home in St. Louis and saw Sam, Liz, and Dean. "Oh my God, Sam!" she gasped happily, eyes lighting up from beneath her blonde hair.

"Well, if it isn't little Becky," Sam teased, smiling brightly.

"You know what you can do with that little Becky crap," Rebecca retorted, smiling. She threw her arms around Sam and hugged him tightly.

"I got your e-mail," Sam added.

Rebecca was relieved. "I didn't think that you would come here."

Feeling left out, Dean stepped forward and extended his hand. "Dean. Older brother," he said, introducing himself, and Rebecca shook his hand.

"Hi," she said.

"Hi," Dean echoed.

Liz rolled her eyes and pushed him aside. "Liz. Older sister and this idiot's twin," she said, shaking Rebecca's hand, too.

"We're here to help," Sam added. "Whatever we can do."

Rebecca was grateful and moved aside. "Come in."

They walked inside the house, and Dean shut the door.

"Nice place," he commented, looking around at the bright and elegant entry hall.

"It's my parents'," Rebecca explained. "I was just crashing here for the long weekend when everything happened. I decided to take the semester off. I'm gonna stay until Zack's free."

"Where are your folks?" Sam asked.

"They live in Paris for half the year, so they're on their way home now for the trial," Rebecca answered, and they entered the kitchen. "Do you guys want a beer or something?" she asked.

"Hey-" Dean began smiling.

"No, thanks," Sam interrupted, ignoring Dean's scowl while Liz chuckled. "So, tell us what happened."

"Well, um, Zack came home, and he found Emily tied to a chair," Rebecca began, running a hand through her hair. "And she was beaten up and bloody, and she wasn't breathing." She blinked a few times, but a few tears escaped. "So, he called 911, and the police they showed up, and they arrested him." She sniffed hard before continuing, "But, the thing is, the only way that Zack could've killed Emily is if he was in two places at the same time. The police… they have a video. It's from the security tape from across the street. And it shows Zack coming home at 10:30. Now, Emily was killed just after that, but I swear, he was here with me, having a few beers until at least after midnight."

"You know, maybe we could see the crime scene," Sam requested. "Zack's house."

Dean and Liz were surprised by Sam's forwardness. "We could," Dean echoed with a frown.

"Why?" Rebecca asked, surprised, too. "I mean, what could you do?"

"Well, me, not much. But Dean and Liz are both cops," Sam lied, and both Dean and Liz laughed nervously.

"Detectives, actually," Dean corrected while silently plotting several different ways to get back at Sam for doing this to him, and Liz just nodded, thinking along the same lines as her twin.

"Really?" Rebecca asked, impressed, and both Dean and Liz nodded. "Where?"

"Bisbee, Arizona," Dean answered. "But we're off-duty now."

"You guys, it's so nice to offer, but I just I don't know," Rebecca said uncertainly.

"Bec, look, I know Zack didn't do this," Sam said seriously. "Now, we have to find a way to prove that he's innocent."

Rebecca nodded, convinced. "Okay. I'm gonna go get the keys." And she walked away, down the hall and out of sight.

"Oh, yeah, man, you're a real straight shooter with your friends," Dean growled, and both he and Liz glared at their little brother.

"Look, Zack and Becky need our help," Sam insisted.

Dean sighed. "I just don't think this is our kind of problem."

"Two places at once? We've looked into less," Sam pointed out.

Liz sighed and looked at Dean. "I hate to say it, Dean, but he does have a point."

Dean sighed and hung his head, defeated.

Dean, Liz, Sam, and Rebecca parked the car outside of Zack's place and got out.

"You're sure this is okay?" Rebecca asked Dean and Liz.

"Yeah. We're an officer of the law," Dean assured her, and they walked to the house.

Rebecca unlocked the door and Sam, Liz, and Dean entered and looked around; the furniture and walls of the house were smeared with blood. Rebecca stayed on the porch steps, nervous.

"Bec, you wanna wait outside?" Sam asked, noticing her reluctance.

Rebecca paused, and then shook her head. "No. I wanna help," she stated, ducking under the police tape and entered the house.

"Tell us what else the police said," Sam requested.

"Well, there's no sign of a break-in," Rebecca explained tearfully. "They say that Emily let her attacker in. The lawyers they're already talking about plea bargain." She looked around the room, once again crying. "Oh, God…"

"Look, Bec, if Zack didn't do this, it means someone else did," Sam said reassuringly. "Any idea who?"

Rebecca shook her head, and then remembered something. "Um, there was something, about a week before," she said slowly. "Somebody broke in here and stole some clothes Zack's clothes. The police they don't think it's anything. I mean, we're not that far from downtown. Sometimes people get robbed."

Sam walked away, looking around and thinking; meanwhile, both Liz and Dean moved to the open front door and saw the neighbor's dog, barking loudly, having heard it earlier. Rebecca came up behind him.

"You know, that used to be the sweetest dog," she commented.

"What happened?" Dean asked, curious.

Rebecca shrugged. "He just changed."

Dean and Liz exchanged a look. "Do you remember when he changed?" he asked.

Rebecca shrugged again. "I guess around the time of the murder."

Dean and Liz both looked at her, and then walked away.

Sam was standing in front of the fridge and was looking at a picture of himself, Zack, and Rebecca; Dean and Liz both walked over to him.

"So, the neighbor's dog went psycho right around the time Zack's girlfriend was killed," Dean reported.

Sam nodded. "Animals can have a sharp sense of the paranormal."

"Yeah, maybe Fido saw somethin'," Dean agreed and Liz nodded.

"So, you think maybe this is our kind of problem?" Sam asked slyly.

Dean quickly shook his head. "No. Probably not," he declared and then sighed. "But we should look at the security tape, you know, just to make sure," he added.

Sam nodded since that was a good idea. "Yeah."

Dean and Liz both agreed. "Yeah." And then Rebecca walked over to them. "So, the tape. The security footage… you think maybe your lawyers could get their hands on it, 'cause Liz and I just don't have that kind of jurisdiction," he suggested.

"I've already got it. I didn't wanna say something in front of the cops," Rebecca confessed, and both Dean and Liz laughed. "I stole it off the lawyer's desk. I just had to see it for myself," she added.

Dean grinned. "All right." And all four of them leave.

'Zack' was sitting on a bench across the street from a house, watching an Asian man, Alex, coming out of the house with his wife, Lindsay.

"I'll be home tomorrow night," he told her. "I'll make it up to you." And they kissed. Alex then got in his car and drove away. 'Zack' watched Lindsay go back in the house; he smiled wickedly, and his eyes glinted silver for a moment, before returning to normal.

Dean, Liz, Sam, and Rebecca were watching the security footage in the living room of the Warren's home.

"Here he comes," she said, and the tape showed 'Zack' entering his house.

"22:04, that's just after ten," Dean remarked, noting the timestamp. "You said time of death was about 10:30."

"Our lawyers hired some kind of video expert," Rebecca explained. "He says the tape's authentic. It wasn't tampered with."

Just then, Sam seemed to notice something on the tape. "Hey, Bec, can we take those beers now?" he asked.

Rebecca nodded. "Oh, sure." And she got up to go to the kitchen.

"Hey," Sam said suddenly, and she turned around. "Maybe some sandwiches, too?"

Rebecca gave him a bemused look. "What do you think this is, Hooters?" and she left the room.

"I wish," Dean muttered, and then he and Liz walked over to Sam. "What is it?" he asked.

"Did you see something?" Liz asked.

"Check this out," Sam said, rewinding the tape, and then replayed it; one of the frames showed 'Zack' looking directly at the camera, and his eyes were silver. Sam paused the tape.

"Well, maybe it's just a camera flare," Dean guessed, but he didn't really believe it.

"That's not like any camera flare I've ever seen," Liz stated.

"A lot of cultures believe that a photograph can catch a glimpse of the soul," Sam said after a moment.

Dean nodded. "Right."

"Remember that dog that was freakin' out?" Sam asked. "Maybe he saw this thing. Maybe this is some kind of dark double of Zack's, something that looks like him but isn't him."

"Like a Doppelganger," Dean suggested.

Sam nodded, thinking along the same lines. "Yeah. It'd sure explain how he was two places at once."

"Certainly looks like it," Liz agreed.

Alex came home and entered the house, calling out to his wife. "Honey, it's me. The client cancelled at the last minute." He set down his briefcase and keys and looked around. "I called. Why didn't you answer?" he inquired, but Lindsay didn't respond. "Lindsay?" He looked around again. "Lindsay?"

Alex turned around and saw blood spattered on the wall. "Lindsay?" he shouted, moving to the nearest door and opened it to a nearby room and found Lindsay; she was tied in a chair, beaten and bloody. He rushed over to her and took the gag out of her mouth. "It's ok, Lindsay, it's me."

"Please, don't hurt me anymore!" Lindsay begged, leaning away from him and crying, almost scared to death of her own husband. "Leave me alone!"

Alex stared at her, confused, and then heard a noise in the other room and left. In the living room, the man looked around, not finding anything; suddenly, he turned and saw himself, standing there with a baseball bat. Alex was puzzled; the double's eyes glinted silver, and then he hit Alex over the head with the bat, knocking him out.

A/N: Oh boy, this doesn't look good for him. R&R everyone!