November 2, 1983

It's nighttime. We're in a street, in a residential area. We zoom on a house. It's painted green with a white trim on the windows. There's a chimney and a front porch. The lawn is green and looks well cared for. Everything seems normal. Suddenly, a scream pierces the air. Female, by the sound of it. And scared. Terrified. All is quiet until light burns through the cracks in the curtains in one of the rooms. It's as though someone turned on a few lights inside. You'd think that... until flames start eating at the curtains holding the light in. It wasn't electrical, artificial light filtering through the flaming curtains. It was fire.

The view zooms inside the house. We're in a nursery, one for twins. The room is decorated with various shades of blue and pink, with sprinkles of white and silver. One boy and one girl. The crib, which the twins share, only holds one baby. It cries while lying on the white blanket embroidered with blue clouds and a black and red airplane, a yellow and green plaid quilt. The baby is wrapped in a soft blue blanket with navy blue ducks sewn in the corner. There's a blood splatter next to the baby's head.

A man is on the floor, a heartbroken look on his face, his tortured hazel blue-greenish eyes glued to the ceiling. The view pans to the ceiling. A woman, blonde and with icy blue eyes riddled with pain, is pinned to the ceiling. Her stomach is cut, dripping blood. She tries to gasp out something, anything. But it wasn't meant to be. As though spurred on by her efforts, flames were erupting from her body, swiftly covering the ceiling and making its way down the walls.

A particularly loud wail from the remaining baby, a boy, broke the man out of his nightmarish trance. He stood as quickly as he could, grabbing the baby in his arms and rushing out of the quickly collapsing nursery. He sees his oldest son in the hallway, awoken by the screams of his mother, the yells from his father, and the cries of one of his younger siblings. All babies sounded the same to a child his age. His parents seemed adept in the art of telling whether the cries belonged to the boy or the girl.

"Daddy!" The eldest child yelled as he saw his father, fear flickering through his green eyes. The older boy stood in shock as his father shoved the bundle wrapped in a blue blanket into his hands. He froze, not knowing what to do. This was the first time one of his parents had allowed him to hold one of the babies unassisted.

"Take your brother outside as fast as you can! Don't look back!" The boy hesitated, looking at his father, green eyes filled with alarm, swimming with tears. Seeing his son's doubt, the older man felt his patience ran thin. "Now, Dean! Go!"

Spurred by his father's harsh voice, one that he would come to be well acquainted with in the coming years, the boy- Dean- ran down the stairs, careful not to jostle his younger brother, supporting the baby's head. His father, meanwhile, ran back towards the nursery, his mind desperately trying to keep up with the fast-paced and life-changing events of the night. He needed to save his family.

When he got there, he was too late.

The nursery was in flames. Nothing was salvageable. Not the crib, not any of the stuffed animals, nor the bookshelf that he and Mary had painstakingly filled with children's books, half of them filled with the knights and trains for little Sammy, the other half with fairies and princesses.

Not the body pinned to the ceiling.

Denial ripped through the man like a wildfire. (heh, i'm funny)

"Mary!" He screamed, choking on the smoke that was quickly filling the room. "Mary!" He repeated, hopelessly hoping against all hope for some sort of reaction from the body of his wife that was completely engulfed in flames, though he wasn't completely sure that that was what he wanted. He coughed again, shielding his face with his arms against the almost not natural flames currently engulfing the nursery of his two youngest children. He frantically glanced around the room, searching for his youngest child amid the overflow of the orange blaze, yet she was nowhere to be found. He let out something that sounded like a sob, a dry one that did nothing but make his throat feel worse in the smoky haze. His eyes watered, his throat burned, his chest ached, though he didn't think it was from the smoke. His heart ached.

The flames roared around him, the sweltering heat burning his very soul. His heart felt like it was being torn in half as the flames roared and he stumbled backward to avoid getting the front of his body charred beyond recognition. Fire now covered everything that could be covered. The toys, the bookshelf filled to the brim with children's books, the crib. Everything.

Back outside, Dean had reached the front lawn, his younger brother in his arms. Looking down at the crying face currently snuggling into his chest, small fists twisting in his shirt, Dean rushes to comfort the infant.

"It's okay, Sam." The eldest child says, looking up at the window of the nursery, where flames were currently licking at the window frame. His face furrowed in confusion. Where was his daddy? Suddenly, his feet left the ground as strong arms wrapped around him, carrying him off the lawn. Dean tightened his grip on Sam as flames exploded out of the window, shattering the glass and making it rain down on the remaining members of the family.

Minutes later, firefighters were trying to extinguish the flames licking at the sky. Water was spewing out of the long, heavy-duty hoses the firefighters were using to try and drown out the heat of the flames. The heat was great, even from ground level. There was a gaping hole where the nursery was, the fire's embers and sparks rising to the night sky.

The man from before was leaning against the hood of a black 1967 Chevrolet Impala, hugging the remaining infant- Sam- to his chest. One arm was draped around the shoulders of his oldest son, who was shivering with a blanket wrapped around his little body. Dean's green eyes were watery with unshed tears. He knew something had happened. He didn't know what happened, exactly, but he knew it was bad. His Mommy was missing, his sister was nowhere to be found. Correction, really bad.

The man looked up from looking down at his second-to-youngest child (who was really the youngest now), moving his mournful gaze as it turned to anger and pain. He glared at the burning window, resent settling in his stomach and making bile rising up in his throat. He'd been cleared by the paramedics' examinations, thankfully. The fact that he was still able to breathe and talk without too much trouble was the only reason he wasn't sitting in the back of an ambulance right now, instead of holding his only remaining infant child. A single tear escaped his eye as he thought about his wife and his missing daughter. Dean would only have vague memories of his mother, probably even less of his little sister, whose eyes were already shifting from that undecided, clear infant blue to her mother's icy blue with flecks of Dean's brilliant green. Remembering the tuft of wavy, dirty blonde hair that sat atop his daughter's head pulled at his heartstrings and he once again glared at the flames consuming the top portion of his house. The house that had his and Mary's name on the lease. He had to look away from the sight of the house that held so many happy memories for both him and Mary, the most recent ones holding Dean, Sam and Scarlett.

That was one of the last moments that John Winchester had in Lawrence, Kansas. Glaring hatefully at the flames encompassing his home, holding his two sons close.

The neighbors that the Winchesters had made friends with never saw John or the boys again. Mary was dead, her body was burnt beyond recognition. The baby girl was assumed dead... though they never did find her body.

July 4th, 2006

Maya Gonzalez bolted upright, eyes wide in fright. She took many heaving breaths, gulping down greedy amounts of air as though she had just run a marathon. This dream seemed more vivid than the last.

She must've drunk too much at her family's yearly festivities for Independence Day. She blamed the multitude of jello shots her sister brought.

Sweat was coating her entire body, making the tank top she was wearing stick to her like a second skin, the urge to vomit that normally came with a hangover strangely absent. She leaned forward, putting her head in her shaking hands, her light hair falling forward. This was the second week in a row that she's been having these weird-ass dreams. The first week, her dreams were short, only showing snippets of the Winchester's life as a family. How they celebrated birthdays, when Sam was born. The second week had been about the boys as teenagers, in a high school where Sam was bullied and often picked on for his smarts. Maya could relate. She always felt that she didn't fit in because of her intelligence, which was significantly higher than the other kids her age. Dean, however, was the popular one. Getting with all the hot girls and having all the friends. Maya thought it was cool that Dean still looked after Sam even though they went to the same school and Sam was considered the "nerd". Maya had an older brother as well, and an older sister. Unfortunately, they weren't as close in age as Maya would've hoped. She was practically an only child.

Her brother, Ricky, was 10 years older than her and had graduated high school when she was in third grade. He never finished college, having dropped out in the second semester of his freshman year. He used to work two jobs. One at a restaurant in their local mall, and another in a shipping company that had bases of operations all around the country. Now, he was a driver for that shipping company. He barely had time to spend sleeping, much less with his family. Unfortunately, almost all his free time went to his friends and his addictions. Alcohol and drugs, being the most prominent. They'd even had a legal scare when he had to turn himself in to the police for yet another DUI. Now, don't misunderstand. Maya loved her older brother, looked up to him. Ever since she was young, she and Ricky had a bond. Still, she had been disgusted when her mother had told her that Ricky used to suck the boogers out of her nose when she was a baby. She still cringed at the thought, almost 19 years later.

The oldest Gonzalez child, however, no longer lived with the Gonzalez family. She had a house in Camarillo, about an hour and a half away from her family in Los Angeles. She lived there with her husband, Alex. Her father was starting to get impatient, as well as her brother. Even her mother was dropping hints that she wants grandchildren. Maya couldn't care either way. To her, Alex was family. She always referred to him as her brother-in-law to people outside the family, even before the couple tied the knot. They both shared a passion for video games, as well as action movies, comic books, and sci-fi films. His job got him into all the cool Comic-Cons and first access to the newest video games. Her older sister, however, worked at the university that she had graduated from almost 24 years earlier, as a specialist in financial aid. Since she worked at the university, she could get her Masters degree for almost nothing, but despite her family's recommendations, she still was putting it on hold.

Maya herself was studying to be a lawyer. She had just graduated from Stanford University in her home state of California. She had originally wanted to go to NYU. She didn't know why. All she knew was that she wanted to get as far away from her controlling family as humanly possible. She didn't want to study abroad so the other side of the country would have to suffice. Her next choice was MIT, though she knew that it would be hard. MIT was mainly geared towards engineering or robotics majors. As a law major, she would have trouble. After that, it was DU in Colorado. She had family there and when she was a freshman, her cousin would've just graduated. She was really close to that particular cousin and his 3 older brothers, so that worked. She had gotten accepted everywhere she had applied to. Stanford had even offered her a full ride. Still, her plans to go to NYU were at the forefront on her mind.

Unfortunately, her mom had to have surgery on her knees. She'd been a runner most of her life so her knees weren't the best. After complaining of pain in both her knees, the doctors concluded that her cartilage was breaking down too fast. They wanted to perform a chondroplasty. After putting it off for years, Blanca finally agreed to go through with the surgery when the pain became too much to bear while doing something as mundane as walking. Blanca was never really one to sit still, so she figured the surgery was her best option. Everything went according to plan, but Maya had to stay home to care for her parents, not to mention that the hospital bills were going to drive them into a hole for the next 15 years. NYU was expensive, they wouldn't be able to afford her tuition.

Still, she had planned on going. Nothing was going to stop her from getting what she wanted her whole life.

Her sister is the one that guilt tripped her to stay. She had said that even Ricky had stayed, even through all the rough patches he'd had with their parents. She said it would kill them if Maya left, especially since their Mom's surgery had just been completed. It was a low blow when she said that her leaving for NYU would drive Ricky further into his vices, as it had happened when the older female had left for CSUCI. In the ensuing argument, both sisters said things they probably shouldn't have said. Even now, four years later, they weren't on the best of terms. Maya still didn't regret the things she said. Those emotions had been pushed down for all her life and when her sister pressed her buttons, they all came flooding to the surface like Hurricane Maya.

Long story short, the eldest child point blank refused to move back home, Ricky didn't want to quit his job, her dad's feet were swollen, so he had trouble walking himself. So the responsibility of caring for their parents fell to the youngest child.

Blood is thicker than water, her ass.

It was with great reluctance that Maya had given up her dreams of going to NYU and live in a penthouse there with a husband, maybe a couple kids, and driving around a sleek, black Maserati. She gave that up, stayed home, took her full ride to Stanford, and got to studying. She graduated Stanford with highest honors. She applied to Harvard Law School, got offered a scholarship there, which was quite a feat considering both Harvard and Stanford generally don't give any scholarships. Her mom was feeling better so she was going to dorm there. She had a bright future. Her job at the diner could be better but that didn't matter. Last month, her most troubling customer, a really disgusting human specimen named Gabe Ugliano, moved away to Virginia to live with his son, yet another disgusting (not to mention perverted) specimen named Vernon. She had been saving up. With any luck, Maya would be out of California, out of the house, away from her family in 3 years. She could still move to New York, still work at a prestigious law firm there. Sure, she hit a few snags but everything could still work out.

She just wanted out. Out of this crazy, control freak family. Maya knew she had it better than most people but dammit, she wanted more than the life her family wanted for her.

On her sixteenth birthday, she remembered purchasing a bus ticket to Denver, Colorado and was literally inches away from stepping on the train, practically bouncing with excitement, until her sister had found her and dragged her practically kicking and screaming back to the house in Montebello.

She remembered the shock of seeing her sister, who was one of the last people she had expected to see. She had covered her tracks well, purchasing the ticket in cash. She even had her friend Emma purchase it for her, using her own ID. She had bought a ticket to a red-eye train, the departure listed as 1:30 am. She had left at 5, under the guise of going to her friend Sofia's house to study, never intending to return. She remembered wondering how her elder sibling found her so fast, especially with the false trail she had set up, having her friends inadvertently set her family on a wild goose chase. Maya hated lying to her friends, but it had to be done. By the time the rest of her family realized something was wrong, she would be halfway to freedom.

The plan was to meet up with her family in Denver, hole up there for a few days, then move on to Arkansas, then to West Virginia, then finally to Massachusetts. Thank God her ex-boyfriend was willing to let her stay at his place in Andover for a few days until she could get her own place. Worst case scenario, she would be at his place for a little over a month. It should have been easy.

Then, bam. Her sister found her. Months of planning down the crapper.

She still remembered the crushing grip of her sister's hand as it and its' owner pulled her towards the bus station exit, away from the freedom she so desperately wanted...

Stuffing her wild emotions down inside like she had taught herself to do at a young age (lest the light bulbs burst, again), Maya reclined back in her bed, not bothering to pull the blankets over her sweat-slicked body. (In this July heat, are you crazy?)

As she closed her eyes and began to drift off to sleep, she couldn't help but feel like she was being watched.

Little did Maya know that her life was about to be turned upside down. She would come to remember the summer of 2006 as one of the most important of her life in the years to come. The next day she walked into her job at Pauli's Diner and had met two men (brothers) riding around in a muscle car in mint condition, wearing too many layers of flannel to be normal.