Trigger warning: Rape (implied)

"And I need you now toniiiiiiiight...and I need you now foreverrrrrrrrr."

"Dean, I don't think you're hitting all the high notes."

"What's that, Sammy?" he replied, shouting over the Impala's stereo. "Can't here you over the music!"

Sam snorted and turned his face back toward the window, taking in the dusk-greyed, snow-dusted plains of the middle of Kansas with tired eyes. "I'm not twelve. Don't call me Sammy."

"Bitch."

"Jerk."

"Whatever."

"Aww, are you pouting now, Sammy?" Dean turned the radio down a couple of notches. "I can put in that cassette of Metallica you like so well."

"Look at that car."

"Pulled over to the side of the road. So what?" He scanned his eyes over the vintage Volkswagen Bug, painted a shade of rust red that did no favours for the banged up vehicle as the Impala roared past. The passenger side door was hanging open, and luggage was spilling out of the trunk.

"Dammit, Dean! Pull over," Sam ordered.

"No can do. We have that job in Hays. You do remember the spirit that's been terrorizing that old woman and her children? It's just an abandoned vehicle, Sammy."

"Whatever."

Silence kept the brothers company through the long miles across Kansas' flat, uneventful back country. The sun set and snow began to fall lightly, flying at the windshield and creating a dizzying tunnel effect.

"What's that?" Sam asked suddenly, his eyes snapping fully open and his voice concerned.

"See another car?" Dean mocked.

The headlights illuminated a limping figure, hunched over against the wind and walking west, the same direction Dean was driving. The figure started, and jerked into a staggering run, before stumbling over its feet and sprawling face-first into the snow. As the car drove by, Dean switched his gaze from the rode, to the sprawled figure, and back to the road again. Glancing at his brother, he saw a look of alarm on his face.

"Fine, Sam!" He slammed on the brakes, bringing them to a skidding halt. With an impatient sigh, he threw the car into reverse.

Pulled off onto the shoulder, he shut the car off. "Alright. What now?"

"Don't get pissed at me! You're the one who always wants to save everyone!"

Dean slammed his door open at the same moment Sam did. The brothers glared daggers at each other before Sam easily slid out of the Impala, stretching his lanky frame to it's full 6'4" height in one easy movement. "Hey, are you alright?" he called out to the limp figure in the snow.

The person let out a muffled cry and tried to make it to their feet, only to fall again. "Get away from me!" she screamed, her voice roughened like a pack a day smoker, crawling on her knees and forearms to get away.

"Stop! We're not going to hurt you, okay?"

"Stay the fuck back from me!" She turned back to Dean and Sam, her wide eyes all pupil in the light from the Impala's headlights. Her clothes hung from her impossibly skinny frame; her collarbones and ribs stuck out starkly from her pale, bruised skin above the ripped neckline of her shirt. A massive blackened bruise coloured her the left side of her face from jaw to forehead. The skin over her left cheekbone was split open and leaking a thick stream of blood, and her nose was clearly broken. "Don't..." her voice trailed off in a strangled sob.

Dean tried on his best friendly smile. "We won't hurt you, kid."

A faint smile tugged at the corners of her split upper and lower lips, causing more blood to spill out of the wounds and down her already blood encrusted chin. Two silver piercings glittered on her lower lip, while a ragged wound showed where another stud had been worked through her nose. "Not a kid, asshole. I'm 19."

"You look 16. Hell, you look 15," he snapped.

She flinched, crossed her arms over her chest, pulling the torn remains of her shirt together and trying to zip up her puffy polyester jacket, her trembling fingers resisting her every move. Sam noted that chunks of her hair had been ripped out, and the button on her worn pair of jeans was missing, ripped off with great force. She stumbled a step backwards, favouring her left leg. "Fuck you."

"Dean! Stop being an ass." Turning to the girl, no- the self proclaimed woman, he asked gently. "What is your name?"

"Malachi."

"That's a guy's name," Dean interrupted.

"And 'Bitch' is a girl's name, but it fits you just fine," she shot back.

Sam grabbed Dean's arm when he started to walk back to the car. "Calm it down."

"People call me Mal, if that makes you feel better." A tremor racked her body and she began to shiver uncontrollably, to the point that she dropped to her knees. "So...cold..." she stammered.

"Here, take my coat," Sam offered. "And my name's Sam, by the way." He started toward her to give her his heavy denim jacket, but she began to panic anew.

"Stay...back..."

"Fine, fine." He tossed the jacket to her and she climbed inside it eagerly, all the while keeping her frightened gaze on the brothers. Sam's white button up shirt began to stick to his chest as the snow that was falling from the sky hit him and melted. Malachi's jaw dropped when she saw the outline of a tattoo begin to appear through the suddenly sheer material. She shed Sam's coat and her own in one easy roll of her shoulders and grabbed the neckline of her shredded v-neck, pulling it down until it almost revealed her breasts.

"What're you...?" Dean demanded before his eyes latched onto the two round black tattoos, each a hand's-breadth below her collarbones. One was almost an exact match to his and Sam's anti-possession tattoos, while the other was a much more stylized version, done up in grey ink as well as black, with a hint of orange and red to illuminate the flames.

"You're one of us."

"A Hunter. Yeah, I am." Mal readjusted her shirt, covering herself back up. "You have the tat, as well?" Dean showed her his ink and she let herself relax. "Did you pass my car earlier?

"If it was a red Volkswagen, then yeah. What happened to you, kid?" Dean let his expression soften, and he dropped the air of sarcasm he normally used as his defense.

"My car died on me and I tried to hitch a ride..." she broke off with a muffled cry. "I'm so fucking stupid..." Her eyes rolled back into her skull and she began to seize, her spine arching so far off the ground that Dean wondered if it was going to snap. Her teeth dug into her lower lip so far that he began to worry she would bit part of it off.

Sam picked her up in his arms; she seemed to barely weigh anything, and he was easily able to keep a grip on her, in spite of her frenzied thrashing. "We're only twenty miles from Hays. We have to get her to the hospital!"

A/N: Hope you enjoyed it! I'll try and have the next chapter up ASAP. Please leave a review and give me your thoughts- good, bad, meh, whatever.