Under Glass
AN: I'm thinking a Supernatural/White Collar crossover would be fun. Sam and Dean met Neal on one of their many…adventures. Sam and Dean catch Neal, in the act, of course. Neal gets a tiny glimpse into the world of the hunter. They go their separate ways, but they still cross one another's paths from time to time. This is one of those times….
I am a huge Stephen King fan and I am writing this with the story about the monkey's paw in mind. I cannot remember the name of the story. And I probably need to reread it, it's been many, many years.
"Sam! Dean!" Neal said, answering the knock at the door.
"Man!" Dean said as he and Sam came in and looked around.
"Awesome place you have here, Neal." Sam said.
"Killer view." Dean said heading out to Neal's patio.
"Yeah, well…." Neal said smiling.
"You must be the best damned CI in the history of CIs for the FBI to afford you this place."
"I am pretty good, actually. But the place is only $700 a month."
Both Sam and Dean looked at him in surprise.
"You serious?" Dean asked.
Neal nodded.
"You conned that sweet lady." Sam shook his head. "That's bad, Neal."
Neal shook his head. He smiled. "She knows I'm a con. She knows I wear an anklet. She how much she should charge for this place, and she knows I'm working off my time."
"Speaking of time…" Dean said as he and Sam looked at each other. "…we don't want to add to yours. But…."
Neal waited for them to continue.
"What we need you to help us with is a little…south of legal." Sam confessed.
Neal started to speak.
"We don't need you to steal anything. We'll take care of that." Dean explained. "We just need you to…duplicate it."
Neal nodded. "Not a problem, you've come to the right guy." He looked at them. "Where is it? What is it?" Neal asked, noticing for the first time the boys had arrived empty handed.
"That's the…problem." Dean said as he sat down at Neal's table, Sam and Neal followed suit. "It's a, for lack of a better term, cursed item."
Neal shook his head. "There's no such thing. Pharaohs knew their people were highly superstitions. They just told their people that stuff, put curses on the buried items to keep people from stealing their treasures, robbing their graves."
"That may be." Sam admitted. "But we've followed the story in the paper."
"Everybody who touches this thing…people are dying. It's…evil." Dean stated.
Sam added. "The reports are that people have died, their marriages fail. Their kids run away. They lose their jobs. One article said that this thing is preying on these people's worse fears." Sam paused. "It was said as a joke. But we think that is exactly what it's doing."
"Anyway, we don't actually have the item, for obvious reasons. And we don't have pictures." Dean replied.
"Guys, I'm good, but I'm not that good. I need a picture. I have to see it myself, something." Neal stated.
"There are not picture of it that we've seen. The papers never included a picture. The last person who had it decided to donate it to a museum." Dean explained. "Our FBI alter egos talked to him. We found out he had already donated it. We followed it from Kansas to here, New York."
"I'm lost here. You still haven't told me what it is you want me to duplicate." Neal eyed them suspiciously. "What else aren't you telling me?"
"It's…" Sam stammered a little bit. The very idea unnerved him. "…it's believed to be a human hand. The right hand of King Ramses II."
Neal shook his head and stood up. The very idea repulsed him a little. But he was still impressed. "Wow! I am not a whiz at the human anatomy. There is a great deal of precision and know how needed to get the aging correct. You can't just make it out of plaster of Paris you know."
"Actually…you can." Dean said. "We just need the outside to pass visual inspection." He continued. "The original is being authenticated right now by museum officials. That is why there are no pictures. They won't allow any until the item is proved to be authentic. Sam and I will wait until the item is ready to display and steal it. We have jobs as museum security. Then we will just replace your duplicate with the original."
Sam picked up the tale. "We don't care if the fake is discovered. All we want to do is destroy the original. The donator doesn't care what happens to it. He said he would have destroyed it himself if he wasn't afraid of more bad juju coming after him."
Neal shook his head. "You're wrong. There are people out there who would pay millions. It's just like the other Egyptian artifacts." Neal explained. "You and I might find it repulsive. But there are people out there who would display this thing on their mantle like it was a basketball trophy."
"That is just…sick." Sam replied.
"What do you say, Neal?" Dean asked.
"Why destroy it?" Neal asked. "It's going to be behind glass, nobody can touch it. How can it harm anybody that way?"
"It…moves." Sam replied.
Neal just stared at him. "What do you mean it moves! Like…on its own?"
Both Sam and Dean nodded. Neal looked at the he both of them. He had not known them very long. But he knew they were telling him the truth.
"The man said when he got up in the morning; it was never where he left it." Dean said, almost matter-of-factly.
"The fact you said that without it freaking you out tells me you guys have been doing this for way…way too long." Neal observed.
Neither Sam nor Dean said anything.
"Are you sure the man didn't have a cat?" Neal asked.
The brothers shook their heads.
"…a dog?"
They shook their heads, no.
"…a very large suicidal rat?" Neal asked.
No, again.
"So it's gonna…what…come out of its display case at night and roam the museum?" Neal asked, scared of the answer.
"Well, not that exactly." Sam paused. "From all the research I have done…it…it has something…attached to it."
"A ghost?" Neal asked, only mildly perturbed. He didn't really believe in ghosts.
Sam shook his head.
"A demon?" Neal asked. This concerned him. He was not a religious man, but he knew demons and angels existed.
"Not exactly." Dean said, hesitantly. He knew Neal would not at all like what he was about to hear.
"Than what, exactly?" Neal asked. He could think of nothing else it could be.
"Lucifer." Sam replied.
Neal looked from Sam to Dean for a moment in open-mouthed shock.
"Satan! The big guy…with the horns and the pitchfork?" Neal managed to say.
"The horns only come out when he's pissed." Dean replied.
"And he doesn't use the pitchfork…that often." Sam added.
"Very reassuring." Neal said. He went to his door and opened it. "You're on your own. I don't know a lot about Hell, Satan and all that stuff. But I really, really don't want to end up on Satan's Shit List."
"All mankind is on Satan's Shit List." Dean replied.
"Well, in that case, wherever I am not the list, I don't want to be moving up." Neal replied, his door still open.
"Neal, you know we wouldn't come to you unless we needed your help. We know how you feel." Sam stated, pleading with Neal. "Trust me, we do. But we need you on this. You're the best. We'll bring you pictures. You never had to touch the hand. You never have to be near it. We just need to fool these people long enough to get the hand out do the ritual and destroy it. That's all."
Neal didn't look convinced.
"Look," Dean said. "…we'll leave you these." Dean placed an amulet and a small bottle of water in Neal's hand. "It's a blessed medal and holy water."
Dean and Sam then left. Neal waited until they were gone before he took the Bible off the shelf in his apartment and began to read.
TBC