this is a round robin fic written by a conglomeration of authors, please see the profile for more information
pls enjoy -surelysilly
.
.~.~.
The locals warn them off of the mansion, that unearthing Packers memorabilia isn't worth it. Isn't worth their still young lives.
But, the townspeople are waved off, dismissed. Because, really?
They're only there to get rid of the ghosts.
.~.~.
The marble structure looms over them, columns and spires menacing in a way that inert stone should not be able to convey.
Hairs begin to stand straight on the back of their necks as they walk up the gravel pathway, swing open the iron gate, wonder why they feel the need to make the knocker thud against solid wood when no one has lived here for years.
But the EMF meter, flipped on from the moment the approached the grounds, remains silent.
Both brothers freeze when they hear the giggle. High pitched and light, they can tell it's from a younger female just from the sound. No sane little girl would be around these grounds willingly, though.
At least no living little girl.
Stepping out from the marble entry hall, they find faded green and gold carpet filling their vision. Faces of long dead football players stare them down; trophies gleam out from behind shards of glass and layers of dust.
The ill-fated memorabilia they have no interest in.
More to their concern is the lack of sound or light from Dean's old walkman as laughter echoes around them.
"Oh, Danny, thank you!" The giggling voice said, snorting a few times before she seemed to catch her breath, "It was getting lonely around here," her grin seemed to coo, "I'll take good care of him."
The brothers paused, their breaths held as they realized how close the voice was—just down the hall, through two double doors set slightly ajar… and was that a green glow emanating from the crack?
There was no response from whoever 'Danny' was, as the girl laughed again—and the sound was accompanied this time by happy little barks.
A dog?
Sam and Dean move forward in tandem, sliding into place on either side of the doorway, hoping to learn more from their new vantage point.
Little girls laughing and a dog are supposed to be happy things in the real world, they know, but apparently there is a disconnect between their lives and reality, because neither of these things set their minds at ease.
Especially when the locals said their lives are worthless as soon as they enter the mansion.
A male voice now joined the female one—just as young, a bit cracked and awkward as if right on the verge of puberty.
"And hopefully he'll rip up some of Vlad's old stuff," the voice chuckled mischievously, "It's better than using my inventions as chew-toys. But honestly, how can you stand it around here? It's creepy."
"Yeah, well, even if he was a fruitloop… I was raised here. It's kinda like my home—except much better since he's gone." The girl replied with a soft sigh, her giggles dying down—just in time for the dog's rumbling growl to reach their ears.
The conversation abruptly came to a stop, and only the dog could be heard, barking angrily toward the door.
"What is it, boy?" The boy asked, an edge of worry in his voice.
The dog barked aggressively again, and it sounded like it was getting louder, deeper… The sounds of shuffling meant that whoever was inside the room was getting up to check.
"Someone's here? Geez, I thought all the ghost stories would've scared them away!" The girl whispered back in frustration.
"It's probably some teenagers here on a dare," her companion replied. "Want me to get rid of them?"
A mischievous giggle echoed over the dog's protective growling.
"Hey, I can do it myself."
There was a beat, deafening silence, and.
it stepped through the varnished wood like the it wasn't even there.
The temperature dropped so that delicate tendrils of white frost grew on the door through which it had come. Sam and Dean huffed out breaths that hung heavy and visible in the air.
Looking across the hallway, they caught each others' eyes, but didn't know what to make of the conversation they'd just heard now that there was a ghost in front of them to deal with.
It was small. A little girl with black hair and a threadbare hoodie. But they knew not to trust appearances, especially once it realized where they were. Sure enough, human breathing couldn't be quiet enough to escape detection and the thing snapped toward them, eyes blazing an unnatural green.
Sam flinched backwards instinctively, and at the back of his mind he was glad Dean was on the other side of the little girl because she hadn't caught sight of him yet. Just Sam—though he wasn't sure if that was better or worse.
The girl's toxic green eyes narrowed at him suspiciously, and she opened her mouth to say something when she caught sight of the gun in his hands. Her lips twisted into a frown and her stance shifted more defensively—with a practiced ease, as if she were used to fighting.
"Definitely not teenagers," she mused almost nonchalantly, more to herself than her eavesdroppers. And then like a provoked animal, she lunged forward to attack him, and he instinctively raised his gun to shoot.
She shifted her weight (did ghosts or whatever she was have weight?) in mid-air, landing slightly to his right and twisting with the momentum to deliver a kick to his abdomen—before suddenly crying out in pain as a gunshot rang out.
The girl stumbled back, clutching her arm in pain, her eyes—now blue—wide with surprise as she turned to her attacker.
Dean didn't lower his smoking gun, though his eyebrows raised in surprise—if she was a ghost, she should have disappeared from that salt round. But she was—bleeding? Something dark was seeping through her hoodie sleeve.
"Crud, there are two of them!" she suddenly cursed loudly, falling back into a defensive stance with both brothers clear in her vision. Like a seasoned warrior, cautious of enemies from all sides. "You—you shot me?!"
Dean motioned to his brother, and Sam nodded, looking toward the door of the room she had stepped out of, where the dog's barks and growls could still be heard.
"Sorry, kid. But you attacked my brother. No one messes with my brother." Dean replied to the girl, who narrowed her eyes angrily. They were green again.
And in his focus he didn't notice the black-haired boy next to him, grabbing the barrel of the gun and shoving it upwards as his own electric green eyes met Dean's natural green, a snarl on his face.
"What the f—"
"You attacked my sister," the boy echoed his words, clearly having been listening. "No one messes with my sister."
The temperature plunged, and Dean let go of the rifle with a hiss, the metal so cold it burned.
It fell from the ghost's hand in the next moment, shattering against the stone floor and into chunks of brittle metal.
Dean gaped at the ghost in front of him. If it could freeze metal to the point that his gun shattered, they were seriously in over their heads with the light-weight arsenal they'd brought in on this opening run.
He whipped out his revolver from beneath his jacket, though, the only option left to him now. And backed away from the ghost's deadly touch.
He breathed easier when Sam turned back toward the fight, covering the ghost with his piece so that it had to divide its attention between them. "Hey, hey, hey!" the younger Winchester shouted as he rushed to the rescue. "Back off!"
"Forget about me?" The girl's voice whispered into his ear, and Sam was suddenly hitting the wall, hard, as a foot met his ribs.
"Augh!"
"Sam!" Dean's attention fluttered to the small girl before going back to the boy, who had his eyes on the revolver warily, his muscles tense and a deep frown on his face.
Those otherworldly green eyes darted to their counterpart's, and for a moment, they softened.
"Elle, you okay?" He asked, and the girl—still clutching one bleeding arm—nodded as she backed away from Sam, regarding him like a dog would an intruder.
Oh, right, speaking of dogs…
"Cujo, here boy!" He called, and through the door once again came another ghost—a very large, very teethy, angrily growling, glowing green dog.
Dean swore as he looked between the smugly smiling ghost boy and the hulking smoking form padding out through the doorway.
It may not be a hell hound since the thing was visible and he was pretty sure that this kid wasn't working directly for Hell, but that didn't assuage any of his fears. It was just as big as a hell hound and looked every bit as nasty. With the drool falling off of its fangs and claws longer than his fingers…
And it was only a few feet away from Sam now, who was still trapped up against the wall by the smaller ghost girl.
"Sam!"
Both children froze suddenly, the boy's eyes darting around, blue and wide with surprise, anxiousness, and—hope?—before his gaze turned back to the two hunters and the steely cold green was back—though not without a little disappointment.
He glanced pointedly at the taller hunter, and then put a hand on the green dog's side. "Cujo, guard."
His only response was a low growl and glowing red eyes turning between Sam and Dean, and if it was possible, the dog seemed to be glaring at them. Cujo, apparently (and that was an ironic and extremely fitting name at the moment, Dean thought), didn't seem to know who to focus its attention on, but it stayed put.
The boy left its side, walking slowly across the hallway and keeping his eye on Dean's gun—still wary, but it didn't seem like he was too worried about the fact that it could hurt him, ghost or not (whatever he was). In fact, except for the glow in his sweeping gaze, he seemed like nothing more than a normal teenager, his hands lax at his sides and his posture deceivingly slouched.
"Not your usual visitors, huh, Elle," he quipped almost casually, though there was a seething anger to his green eyes that spoke a different story. "What was that about handling it on your own?"
The little girl scoffed, rolling her eyes—they were blue again, the hunters dimly noticed. "They don't normally have guns… or shoot kids." she growled, glaring at Dean.
Dean tensed when he kicked Sam's gun away from him, and the dog apparently decided to focus its attention on the elder brother, seeing as he was still armed. That was good—he had to keep the attention off Sam. But now the boy was sizing up the younger Winchester, something calculating in his eyes, so Dean finally spoke again.
"I don't know what you are, but you sure as hell ain't kids," he said accusingly but cautiously, and when he looked to the little girl again, the boy's muscles wound up as if on instinct, breaking the illusion of the lazy teenager he had seemed to be putting on.
Sam stood up slowly, rubbing his side to try soothing the pain from the impact of that girl's foot. He eyed her appraisingly, knowing better than to keep underestimating her—and to forget about her again. The boy moved closer to her when he saw Sam looking, but Sam didn't look at him—he was looking at the blood on the girl's sleeve, seeping through slowly and soaking her blue hoodie dark.
They certainly weren't dealing with ghosts like they had planned—but he wasn't sure what these two kids were, and bleeding red blood like that made him wonder if they were dealing with something that was more human than not.
"Dean," he began, to voice his thoughts on the matter, when the black-haired girl interrupted.
"Who are you?" she asked them both, "And what are you doing in my house, toting real freaking guns?"
Sam blankly realized that the girl nor her brother had actually denied being "not kids".
And she had said her house. Not theirs. Just hers. "It was getting lonely around here." They'd have to destroy an entire mansion of stone and brick just to get rid of one of them.
Dean licked his lips, shot Sam a quick glance. "We're hunters," he said, letting the barrel of the gun list downward
The boy opened his mouth, but Dean cut him off, swinging the revolver around, and pulled tight on the trigger.
The dog only had one moment for its face to melt into confusion before it collapsed with a howl and a spurt of green blood.
"Cujo!" the girl shrieked, the boy screamed, and.
it's like the entirety of Winter landed on their shoulders, fingers digging into their human skin as the air turned bitter and cold.
Sour wind swept down the long hall as the younger Winchester lunged for his gun.
The boy was closer and reacted quicker, the sudden winter of the room coating the floor in solid ice before Sam could make a grab for the gun now frozen to the ground. The boy shot two quick glares at each hunter before his green eyes met his sister's blue ones, and somehow they both simultaneously knew what to do, fading into transparency at the blink of an eye.
Dean cursed and raised his gun to shoot at them, but the boy had grabbed the girl's hand and vanished from the spot with a faint green mist, and his round splintered the wall behind where they had stood instead.
"Dean, the dog!" Sam shouted, and the elder Winchester swiveled around just fast enough to see the pair of ghostly children reappear next to the dog, who seemed to be shrinking in size.
The boy had been in the middle of saying something rapidly, "—dangerous, that's our cue—" when he ducked down to dodge another salt round, simultaneously scooping up the now regular-sized dog, who whimpered in his arms.
He squeezed his sister's hand tight, and with one final glare at the hunters, they vanished in that green mist again, just before Dean could get a clear shot at them.
Dean cursed again, looking around on alert, waiting for them to reappear—but they didn't. Sam had pulled out a knife, looking around to do the same, but after several minutes, when it was apparent they wouldn't be attacked again, he was the first to lower his weapon. "I think they're gone."
Dean sighed in frustration. "What the heck even were those things?"
Sam shrugged, crouching and using his knife to try and pry his gun from the ice. "I don't know… but they didn't seem to actually want to hurt us. They never attacked back—just defended. They seemed like those types of creatures that just wanted to be left alone."
If the fact that the girl consistently scared off visitors was any indication at least.
"Whatever they are though, they're not human, and they could be dangerous. We gotta gank them," Dean said, and frowned. "But… they're definitely not ghosts either, like the reports said. They had those weird ice powers, and were, y'know, solid."
"Corpoeral," Sam corrected, "Though they don't seem to be attached to their haunt—or at least, the girl wasn't, even though she said this place was hers—they did walk through the walls… and could turn invisible, apparently."
"No, that was like, teleportation or something. Or that thing ghosts do where they look like they're flashing from place to place," Dean said, making a face. "Let's just look around and clear the perimeter—see if they're not hiding somewhere further in, or if there really are ghosts somewhere in here we gotta deal with too."
Sam sighed. "Right then…"