Please tell me what you think of this, I'm not sure if it's any good or not.

How the hell do we end up in these freaking situations?

Dean growled as he fought against the handcuffs that were chaining his arms above his head. The metal was cutting into his wrists, cutting off the circulation to his hands. His fingers were going numb. He glanced at Sam, who was in much the same predicament as he was. Sam's hands were cuffed above his head, his ankles tied with rope, just as Dean's were. The only difference was that Sam wasn't struggling. And that was because he had a bullet wound in his right shoulder and it still hadn't stopped bleeding.

Dean considered banging his head against the wall, but he figured it really wouldn't do much to help their situation or his growing headache. But maybe it would shake loose the answer to why he and Sam always seemed to end up in these horrible, bloody situations.

Crack

Maybe not. Now his head hurt more, and Sam was looking at him with worry. He rolled his eyes, wondering how they were going to get out of this horrible, bloody situation this time. Alexis sure wasn't making it easy to escape.

It had all started when they'd met Alexis. The cute young blonde at the bar who challenged a biker to a drinking match and was still sober three hours later. Who also happened to be a hunter. Or so they'd thought.

She'd taken a liking to Sam. Then, after she'd noticed Dean, she'd been all over him, and he could have cared less. But then Cas had come to drag their sorry drunk asses out of the bar before they did something incredibly stupid, and zing, it was like instant attraction. At least, for Alexis anyway. She had her tongue halfway down the poor angel's throat before Dean and Sam could haul her off and get Castiel the hell outta there.

Cas had been a little stunned. As anyone would expect of a socially-awkward angel. But no one could really have expected Alexis to come back. After all, she was just some girl they met at a bar one night; no one special, right?

Dean sighed, more to himself out of frustration. The damn bitch knew more about the Winchesters than she'd let on. In fact, she knew that they'd caused the Apocalypse. She knew that Dean had gone to hell and back, literally. She knew about Sam and the demon blood. She also knew that they had a little angel tag-along.

Which, of course, she'd decided to exploit. Being a conniving little bitch and all. She really reminded Dean of someone... A few someone's actually. He'd seen it all before, so why hadn't he seen it this time? How had he missed it?

Looking around the bare concrete room, what Dean really wanted to know was what had happened to Castiel. The last time they'd seen him he and Sam had been talking to the angel in their crappy motel room. Apparently someone had a lead on Lilith, and they were prepared to give up the information for a little something. Whatever that something was Dean didn't know, because at about that time someone had thrown something through the window. Dean had recognised what it was. All of them had. But by the time they had it had already detonated and a thick cloud of smoke was choking the room and its occupants.

Apparently angels were affected by smoke in their lungs, and before Cas could disappear out of there he'd collapsed. Sam hadn't been far behind, and the last thing Dean remembered was passing out as shadowy figures approached him, that familiar voice speaking with smugness.

"We got 'em."

Neither he nor Sam had seen the angel since. They'd woken up in this room, being handcuffed to rings in the wall above them. Dean had lashed out, kicking some biker-looking dude square in the gut. He could have made it out, but then the crazy bitch had to turn a gun on Sam and shoot him in the shoulder. Yeah, she really reminded Dean of someone he'd rather forget.

That had been an hour ago. What the hell was going on?

"Dean, calm down," Sam said, and Dean realised he'd spoken that last sentence aloud. He glanced at his brother, assessing the wound for the hundredth time. The bullet had gone straight through and it didn't appear to have hit anything major, but it was still goddamn trickling blood. Sam was going to die of blood loss if he wasn't fixed up.

Something clicked in his head. He wasn't sure where it had come from, or why it had suddenly made sense at that particular moment, but it didn't matter.

"Bela."

Sam looked at him curiously, "What?"

"Bela. That's who that crazy bitch reminds me of."

"Alexis? Now that you mention it..."

"Clever, aren't you Dean?"

Both brothers jumped and looked up. Alexis was standing in the doorway, a smug smile on her face. Her blonde hair was stained with blood and so were her grey t-shirt and jeans. Dean wasn't sure he wanted to know whose blood that was.

She walked towards them, and something caught Dean's eye. Stuck to a patch of blood on her t-shirt was something shimmering. He couldn't quite see it for long enough to get a grasp on what it was, but it glittered with every step Alexis took, the light refracting then shadows closing over it.

"Bela's dead," Sam said, confused, and Dean was shot back to the present.

Alexis laughed, "Yeah, that's right. But before she died, she taught me a thing or two. In fact, I learnt everything from her about the supernatural world and how to get by in it."

"Does thousands or millions count as 'getting by' to you?" Dean snarled.

"Hey, don't judge. Someone has to take advantage of this lovely situation, and I just happen to be that person."

"Where's Cas?" Dean glared at her, and the woman shrugged with another of her damn smug smiles. She noticed Dean's eyes wandering to the shimmering object on her t-shirt and she plucked it off, slightly surprised.

"Oh. Missed one. But it's broken anyway. Still, maybe I can get something for it. After all, how many times in your lifetime do you get to own one of these, broken or not?"

Alexis looked between Sam and Dean's confused faces and burst out into laughter. Apparently she found the situation hilarious. Dean growled as she got a hold of herself and straightened up. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a cuff key. She undid one of Dean's cuffs and held onto his wrist, handing him the shimmering object.

Staring, he rubbed it between his fingers. It was soft, silky, but there was a vibe about it that scared the shit out of him. He held it up to the light and suddenly it all fell into place. Sam watched as the light hit the object and lit up its glowing outline.

It was the broken shaft of a feather.