Author's Note: So, this is my first attempt at a Supernatural fanfic. I've watched this show since the very first episode, and I love it to death, and when I came up with my own character to throw into the mix, I had to get writing. And here it is, the fic I wasn't sure I should post, but am going to anyway. Updates will be slow, I can tell you that now; I'm a busy girl. But I would love reviews, preferably lots of positive constructive criticism and none of the ever-useless flames. And, of course, I hope you enjoy : )

GRANITE FALLS, MINNESOTA

"So, you've met Serenity O'Leary at last." Bobby chuckled in the Minnesota diner, taking another bite of old-fashioned apple cobbler. "Good girl. Knows her stuff."

"Yeah, but..." Sam didn't know exactly what was bothering him about the girl, but there was something he just didn't feel comfortable with. "Who the hell is she, Bobby?"

Bobby pushed his cobbler away and Dean quickly scooped it up, grinning like the Cheshire Cat. The older hunter shook his head wearily, but ignored him to answer Sam's question. "She's just the best damn vampire hunter out there."

"Too bad her specialty isn't demons," Dean mumbled around a mouthful of cinnamon-encrusted apples and golden crust. He swallowed hard and added, "And since when do we pick specific monsters to hunt, anyway? I would've picked jackalopes or something if I'd known we could pick..."

Sam glanced at his brother. "Jackalopes?" he echoed wryly.

"Yeah, you know, Sammie. Jack rabbits with horns." Dean held his hands up to his head, fingers splayed, to represent antlers...just as the waitress walked over.

"Is everything...okay over here?" she asked warily in a soft, Middle American drawl, eyes darting between the exasperated Sam, the steadily-reddening Dean, and the amused Bobby.

"Just fine, sweetheart," Dean replied first, recovering quickly. He handed the empty cobbler plate to her, smiling brightly.

The waitress smiled back, a bit dazzled, and walked away giggling, and with a bit of a sexy swagger in her stride, leaving the trio to pick up their conversation again.

"She's got a history with vamps," Bobby continued, as if the interruption hadn't occurred. Sam was all ears; Dean was turned in his seat, winking at the young waitress, who beamed back and turned away, blushing. "Dean," Bobby spat sternly, and the older Winchester brother turned back.

"Right, sorry. Vampires, got it."

Bobby nodded. "She tracks all vampire activity across the country. Long story short, she wants to kill this one guy...real baddie..." He leaned over and dug around in a backpack, searching for something, giving Dean the chance to swat Sam's shoulder and gesture at the waitress.

"Hot, huh?" he mouthed, wiggling his eyebrows, while Sam shook his head in disgust.

"She's sixteen, dude," he muttered back, and Dean shrugged.

"No harm in looking," he replied smoothly.

"Ah! Here we go." Bobby turned back to the brothers, cutting off further discussion, and slapped a copy of an internet news article on the table. "Cane Tempest," he narrated, tapping the picture accompanying the article. Tempest was about fifty, but still handsome, tall and broad with silver hair and icy blue eyes. He wore a pinstriped suit and grinned directly at the camera, every inch of him groomed to be the epitome of a charming businessman. Bobby continued, "He's been parading around as a wealthy entrepreneur for almost five hundred years. He's strong, insanely powerful...and rich. He can drink his fill and make dozens of people disappear at once, and no one will ever think twice about it."

"So, he's about as close to a real Count Dracula as we're gonna get," Dean said, as he leaned back in the booth resignedly. "Great...really knows how to pick 'em, doesn't she?"

"Like I said, she's got a history," Bobby reiterated. "Ask her to tell you next time you see her. Maybe she'll tell you."

"Why can't you?" Sam asked. All Bobby had said so far had only made him more wary of Serenity.

Bobby shrugged and looked at Sam. "Not my story to tell," he replied easily, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. He leaned forward then, hands on the table, and asked, "Now, what happened at the warehouse last week?"

One Week Earlier

Dean and Sam crept up to the abandoned warehouse a little before dawn, armed with garlic, stakes, and various other weapons of destruction and dismemberment. If it were a smaller place, they'd just torch it and get the hell out of Dodge, but it was a hug building with soaring ceilings; they'd just have to decapitate every bloodsucker in the nest. More risky, more bloody...more fun.

The Winchester brothers paused just outside a side entrance into the factory, turned storage space, turned dilapidated eyesore. Dean glanced at Sam, who nodded in return, then kicked in the door.

Every window was covered with thick black fabric to keep out the hated sun. Even as morning began outside, it was eternal night inside the warehouse. Broken crates, old shelves and racks, broken down machines, torn packing paper and string, a few broken pipes, and shards of glass littered the massive room. Dean and Sam crept in silently, letting their eyes adjust to the darkness. Flashlights would help them see, but also alert the vampire coven to their presence, if they didn't already know.

"Maybe they're not home yet," Dean whispered, sounding let down.

"Sun'll be up soon," Sam noted softly. "They're here."

"Indeed," a third voice agreed, coming out of the darkness, and muffled laughter echoed around the old factory.

"Warriors...come out and play-ay!" another voice sing-songed, and fresh peals of laughter filled the room.

Sam and Dean stepped closer to each other instinctively, standing back to back. Dean slid a string of garlic and a wooden stake out of his coat, while Sam raised a large knife menacingly.

"Come on, suck on this," Dean mocked, pulling out his shirt collar to boldly offer up his neck to the waiting vampires. "You know you want it!"

Silence met his challenge. The older Winchester almost pouted as he muttered to Sam, "All bark and no bite..."

Sam nodded absently, eyes scanning the dark shapes on a black background for any sign of movement. He felt a hand on his shoulder, fingers trailing down his arm, and jumped. "Dammit, Dean., this is no time to screw with me!"

"What the hell are you talking about?" Dean snapped back. "I'm not doing anything. Now, shut up and let me listen."

Sam whirled on the owner of the hand, but he or she was already gone. Dean rolled his eyes at how jumpy Sammie was getting nowadays, and reached out a hand to grope for his shoulder. "Come on, man. If they won't come to us, we'll...go..." His voice trailed off as he felt hair, shoulder length and definitely not Sam's, and a neck without a pulse. He smiled, chuckling weakly. "Well, hi, there. Come here often?"

In a flash, his arm was twisted behind his back, another hand on his throat, cutting off his air supply. Surprised, he dropped the garlic and stake, the vampire holding him hissing as the garlic almost landed on her shoe. From the sounds of struggle in the dark a few feet away, Dean guessed Sam was contending with a vampire of his own.

"Can't we talk about this?" Dean gasped, the hand on his neck tightening. "I'll...I'll buy you a drink..."

The vampire laughed. "Why?" she inquired, voice teasing and almost musical. "I've got a free drink right here."

Dean laughed, really more a strangled gasp. "Ha, right, good one."

Sam, meanwhile, swiped blindly into the dark with his knife. He knew there was someone close, and others nearby. A vampire landed a kick to his gut and he fell to his knees. Oh, yeah...they were goners.

Sam could just make out Dean, struggling with a slight, but strong, vampire, and saw his own attacker step closer. A circle of vampires, about five others, tightened around them, grinning viciously, eyes hard and cold, obviously very excited and very thirsty.

Shit, he thought as another kick, this one connecting with his chin, knocked him over backward. Dean was gasping and struggling for air, unable to loosen the vise-like Vulcan death grip on his throat. The vampires stepped closer. They were screwed...

Glass shattered. Everyone froze. The vampire let go of Dean, and he collapsed, choking, to the stone floor.

"Another one!" one of the vampires snarled, enraged.

The one who'd attacked Sam grinned. "We feast today, my friends," he told his coven, and there were murmurs of delight and yearning to meet his proclamation. "Find the new arrival."

The vampires fanned out, the leader of the nest keeping watch over Sam and Dean. Suddenly, there was a cry of anguish from the other side of the warehouse, quickly followed by another. Dean dragged himself to Sam's side. "Whoever he is," he managed voice still rough, "he's good."

The leader roared in anger, stalking out into the darkness of the warehouse. "Find him!" he commanded in a howl. "There will be more for us to feed on..."

"You promise them a feast," a young woman's voice taunted, "but I bring them death."

The three remaining members of the coven, plus their leader, ran back to the brothers, eyes seemingly everywhere at once as they searched for the third hunter. Same and Dean exchanged a glance and slid out of the circle of vampires. None of the creatures seemed to notice.

Then, the girl seemed to drop out of nowhere directly into the small vampire crowd, wielding an axe. She swung the weapon, dispatching one of the surprised members of the coven with one blow, then stabbed another with a stake, paralyzing him. She leapt straight upward, graceful as a dancer, and kicked out to either side, landing heavy boots on the last two vampires' heads and knocking them aside. She slew the paralyzed monster, then flipped out of the leader's grasp at the last moment. Executing a perfect roundhouse kick to his chest, she slammed him up against a wall and severed his head, bringing the axe around to attack the remaining vampire. Unfortunately, she misjudged, and the blade ended up lodged in her chest. The vampire screeched, but didn't die, and the hunter planted a foot on her chest, kicking back and pulling her axe free of her flesh. "I need this," she told the vampire apologetically, then delivered the death blow.

The girl stood in the middle of the carnage, panting, as Sam helped Dean to his feet, studying her as she fought to get herself under control at the sight of all the blood. She was just under five and a half feet tall, slim, and pretty. She had hair a few shades lighter than chestnut brown, an almost caramel or sandy color, with natural golden highlights, and bright, turquoise eyes. She wore dark denim jeans, a muted pink peasant blouse, and black boots with thick heels, plus a long coat in black leather. She cleaned the axe idly on the shirt of one of the vampires, then turned to the Winchesters and smiled kindly, lighting up her entire face and almost erasing the odd, uneasy feeling Sam had about her. Almost.

Despite the damage she'd done, she seemed friendly enough as she told them gently, "You're safe now." She mistook them for terrified, kidnapped, vampire victims, and pushed, "Get home now."

"Where'd you learn to kill vampires like that?" Dean asked, gawking, though not only at her impressive handiwork.

"Around." She stepped closer, readying to shoo them out of the warehouse, and her smile faded. "Sam and Dean Winchester," she noted, frowning slightly.

"Why the hell does everyone know us?" Dean demanded of Sam in an angry mutter.

Sam ignored his brother and raised an eyebrow at the girl. "Do we know you?"

She shook her head and managed a small, but still dazzling, smile. "Nah. I'm just the girl who saved your sorry asses." With that, she turned and strode back into the darkness, exiting the way she'd come in.

"And I enjoyed that view," Dean added to Sam's story, grinning at the memory. "She's hot."

"Watch that one, though," Bobby cautioned. Sam was glad to see that he wasn't the only one with second thoughts on Serenity. "Cane Tempest is her main target, but...well, boys, she was after your dad for awhile. I'm actually damn surprised she didn't turn on you when you were vulnerable, once she realized who you were."

"She wanted to kill Dad?" Sam asked, shocked. Dean was stunned into silence, staring blankly at Bobby.

The hunter sighed. "Shouldn't be telling you this..." he muttered weakly, resistance fading fast as he stared down at his hands, before looking back and telling them, "You see, Tempest murdered a bunch of people up in Tee Harbor, where she grew up--it's near Juneau. In Alaska." Dean still looked confused, but Bobby pushed on. "It's not important where it is...anyway, he killed a few dozen townies, and John was lookin' for a new case. He caught wind of it and headed up that way, but Tempest heard about your dad first. He started leaving evidence behind, all subtle-like. He framed the only other vampire in Tee Harbor, Christian O'Leary, and your dad torched the house and killed him. Few days later, Deirdre O'Leary killed herself out of grief. Serenity's after Tempest for reasons other than that, too, but she's always kept an eye out for your father. Probably killed her to hear he'd died...

"She's a killer, boys," Bobby stressed in closing. Dean made to protest, to defend the girl he barely knew, but Bobby silenced him with a raised hand, adding, "She's cunning and strong and a bit wild; there's more to her than you know. Look after yourselves if you run into her again, but try to get the full story. If you ever find out, you'll understand why I'm warning you about her."

"If she's so dangerous, tell us more about her," Sam pleaded, ever the voice of reason.

But Bobby shook his head firmly, took out his wallet, and said nothing else but, "Now where'd that waitress go? I've got things to do..." The conversation was over. For now.

Eventually, the bill was paid and the trio walked outside, standing under mounting snow clouds. It was early March, but Mother Nature seemed to be ignoring that fact in the Midwest.

"Take care of yourselves, boys," Bobby said in parting, smiling fondly at Sam and Dean. 

"Keep up the good work. And, if I were you, I'd avoid meeting Serenity O'Leary again."

"We'll steer clear," Same assured him. "Bye, Bobby."

"Have fun with the poltergeist in Atlanta," Dean called after him, and the older hunter raised a hand in thanks. The brothers climbed into their black Chevrolet Impala, then wound down country roads until they hit Interstate 90, heading west towards new exploits.

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural, or any of the characters, plots, or places therein. However, Serenity O'Leary, including her entire backstory, is mine. Take her and she'll kick your ass. Seriously. Don't try it; it WILL get ugly.