Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by J.K. Rowling; various publishers including, but not limited to, Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books; and Warner Bros., Inc. This story is also based on characters and situations created and owned by the writers, producers, et al of the television show 'Supernatural'. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any person, internet persona, or other being, living or dead, is completely coincidental and unintentional unless otherwise noted.
A/N: I know I mentioned to one of my reviewers that this wouldn't be posted until tomorrow, but I just got word that today is going to be uber-busy and I've not yet gone to sleep yet and I didn't want to sleep through the chance to update on time so here's the next chapter! Happy reading! And OMFG, I think I've had too much caffeine.
Once is Happenstance
11:15
pm, July 19, 2007
Wal-Mart
Knoxville, Iowa
If there was one non-demonic thing in this world that Sam Winchester truly hated, it was Wal-Mart. Strike that, there has to be some sort of demonic evil going on here. He hated the fluorescent lighting, the harder-than-concrete floors, the fact that he always managed to get a cart with a squeaky wheel… There was no doubt in Sam's mind – Wal-Marts were evil. However, he did have to concede that they were slightly less evil late at night. Must be something to do with the distinct lack of crying children and indecisive old people. Not that Sam had anything against old people or children – only that they grated on his nerves when he was trying to get supplies.
It took him what felt like forever to gather the supplies on his list. The rock salt had been hidden in a corner of the gardening supply area; regular salt was on the other side of the store, in among the groceries; and for some unfathomable reason, lighter fluid was hidden back in automotive. He was sure that some sort of malevolent supernatural force assessed the shopping list of all the customers and moved things around, just to make sure that the shopper had ample opportunity for impulse-purchases; the fact that the sporting goods department – cunningly located next to the automotive isle where the lighter fluid had hidden – was having a two-for-one sale on shells just the right size for the Winchester's shotguns was proof enough of that. That same force also ensured that a shopper randomly remembered needing the oddest items, as evidenced by the package of socks, new toothbrush, packet of pens, and half a dozen other odds and ends in the cart.
By the time he'd finally located the last item on the list, it was already a quarter past midnight. He'd been gone for a full hour. Approaching the front of the store, he groaned. There had to be fifteen people waiting at the only open register, and at least five of them had fully-stocked carts. The woman in front of him actually had enough mounded on her cart to have probably needed two of the damn things. I'm never getting out of here. Sam wanted to scream. He was tired, hungry, and wanted a hot shower. There was no helping it, though, he was pretty much stuck.
The woman in front of him looked almost as irritated as he felt. "Why can't they keep the self-check lanes open all night?" he heard her mutter.
"Because that wouldn't be evil enough," he answered.
The woman jumped a little and whirled around. She laughed, though whether at Sam's reply or at her own nervous reaction, Sam didn't know. "Ah, I suppose that in this case, it's a necessary evil." She wasn't very tall, and that wasn't just in comparison to Sam – she was positively tiny, barely tall enough to see over the mounded cart. Sam figured she was probably in her thirties, with only a couple of strands of silver marring her long, straight, black hair and the slightest indication of crow's feet wrinkles at the corners of startlingly blue eyes.
"Yeah… I suppose you're right," Sam smiled at her. "I'm Sam."
"Mackenzie," the woman returned the smile and then cocked her head to the side, "Damn… What did they feed you, Miracle-Gro?"
Sam snickered, "Oh, you know… Lucky Charms, Spaghetti-O's, and Happy Meals. The usual."
"Iknew my folks were full of shit when they told me that veggies were good for me!" Mackenzie's laugh caused several people ahead of them to turn and stare. "You in town for the races?"
Sam shrugged, "Not really. How'd you know I wasn't a local?"
She pointed to his sweatshirt. Sam glanced down. Stanford Athletic Department. "Oh."
"That and I've lived here all my life and haven't seen you before. Just thought I'd warn you about the track, though, if you were here for the sprint-cars."
"What about the track?" Sam asked.
"Well… The races were cancelled this weekend because a couple of kids went missing from the stands last weekend."
"What happened?" Sam knew that there had been a couple of disappearances that defied normal explanation – that was why he and Dean showed up, after all.
"A little girl – she was only six or seven – and her older sister disappeared between the stands and the bathrooms. All the police have been able to find so far has been the older girl's purse."
The line actually moved forward a couple of feet. "What about cameras? Wouldn't the track have CCTV security?"
Mackenzie nodded, "They do, but… It's weird as hell. My husband is on the local police force, and he said that the CCTV at the track shorted out at the same time the girls disappeared."
"Has there been any sort of ransom demand?"
"Nope. That's what has everyone all up in arms about it. The girls were from a rather normal family. Dad's a mechanic, mom's a waitress – so, unless the family's hiding something, which I highly doubt, there wouldn't be much money to finance a ransom."
"Were they from here?" Sam asked, mentally thanking god once again for the ease with which he could get people to talk to him, simply by projecting an aura of concern.
"Not Knoxville, but they were from the area. Small town just south of here by the name of Attica. Didn't know them personally, but my niece is in the same class as the younger girl." Mackenzie sighed, "And all this after that boy disappeared just ten days ago, too… Though, in that case, I'm inclined to believe he ran away."
"How's that?" Sam was almost ready to forgive the general evilness of Wal-Mart for providing him the chance to talk to a chatty local who, apparently, kept up on local gossip.
"My husband's been called to their house at least a dozen times in the last two years for domestic violence. I imagine the boy – he was sixteen, I think – got sick of it and set off for Des Moines. Maybe even Chicago or St. Louis." The line move forward another few feet.
"Do the police think the two cases are connected at all?"
Mackenzie shook her head, "No. The girls disappeared from the track. The last time anyone admits to seeing the boy, he was loitering with friends on the Loop."
"Pardon?"
"Oh… Sorry, hon. The Loop is the local cruising route. Hasn't changed since my mother was in high school back in the sixties, and I don't think anything short of an act of God would change it now. It's pretty easy to spot on a Saturday night – just follow the carloads of bored teenagers."
At that moment, a miracle happened. Another checkout lane opened. Sam was almost completely convinced his previous belief that Wal-Marts were evil was unfounded when he realized that it just had to be that malevolent presence trying to lull him into a false sense of security. Mackenzie, for all her small stature, did manage to beat three kids who were probably only just legal drinking age to the newly opened lane. Sam's long legs ensured he stayed precisely behind her. "Let me give you a hand, Mackenzie."
She brushed a couple of hairs out of her face and smiled, "Thanks, Sam. I'd appreciate that."
Between the two of them, it didn't take long to unload her overloaded cart. "So, what do you do?" Sam asked.
"I teach third grade. How about you?"
"I'm a freelance writer," he answered, altering one of his and Dean's most well-used covers. "On vacation right now, though. My brother and I are taking a road trip – just seeing what we can."
Mackenzie sat the last item from the cart – a package of granola bars – on the conveyor belt and chuckled. "My sister's in the same line of work. I'm sure you'll eventually use your 'vacation' in your work. Kylie is always saying how she ends up finding inspiration in the strangest of places."
"I'm sure that's true," Sam wondered if there was any way to change the subject back to something with which the woman would be less familiar.
He needn't have worried; Mackenzie changed the subject all on her own. "Since the track is shut down this weekend, there really isn't all that much to do here in town. If you like swimming or fishing, though, Lake Red Rock is only a few miles from here. And Des Moines is only an hour away."
"That's okay. I'm sure my brother and I will be able to find something worthwhile," Sam grinned.
Mackenzie nodded and set to writing a check for her purchases, "I'm sure you will at that, Sam. Thanks for the help, and for the chat."
"Did you want help getting all that to your car?" Sam couldn't help but offer.
She looked at the mound of plastic bags now piled in her cart. "Thanks, but I think I've got it covered. Have a good trip."
"Thanks, Mackenzie. And thanks for telling me about the race track; I'll make sure to mention the lake to my brother."
"No problem, hon. Take care."
Sam set to unloading his own cart, grateful for the first time ever that he'd done their supply-run at a Wal-Mart. It wasn't until he'd finished loading the bags in the Impala that he'd forgotten to pick up a new tube of toothpaste. Fuck it. I'll get it tomorrow. There's no way in hell I'm letting the Wal-Mart demon have another crack at me tonight!
12:45 am, July 20, 2007
Room 13, Sleep-Right Motel
Knoxville, Iowa
"Dude, you leave anything at the store?" Dean smirked, catching a glimpse of the ocean of white plastic bags sitting in the back seat of the Impala.
Sam, who had managed to knock his head on the car door frame on getting out, rolled his eyes. "I got what we needed. What's up with the room switch? Thought we were in fourteen."
"We are," Dean grinned, bounding forward and grabbing his brother's shirt sleeve. "Come on, Sammy," he said, sounding like an excited kindergartener, "I made a new friend!"
Glaring a little at his brother's use of the hated childhood nickname, Sam reluctantly allowed himself to be dragged from the car, expecting to meet his brother's latest female conquest. "Are you high?" Sam asked as Dean pulled him into room thirteen.
"Nope," Dean replied. "Sam, this is Harry. Harry, my little," Harry snorted, "younger – is that better? – brother, Sam."
Sam tore his gaze from his brother to the other occupant of the room. The man, who was standing near the room's small table, craned his head to look up at Dean's brother. "Bloody hell, does everyone in this ruddy country have to be taller than me?"
"Dean?" Sam's voice managed to convey a host of questions in that one word, but the ones that came through most clearly were: Who is this guy? What the fuck? Are you stoned or drunk?
"Come on, Sam. Play nice. Turns out Harry's probably here for the same reason we are."
"Huh?"
Addressing Harry in a stage-whisper, Dean commented, "And he's the one who went to college."
Harry smiled, "In that case, it'll probably catch up to him about this time tomorrow."
"You mean the disappearances, right?" Sam finally managed to get his brain to ignore the fact that Dean seemed to be genuinely fond of the guy.
Harry, still wearing a half-smirk, nodded. "Yeah, the disappearances. From what I've been able to find, I've ruled out the possibility of it being astral in nature. There just isn't an incorporeal entity out there that eats pets. However, I don't know what sort of creature it could be… Most of the creatures here seem to prefer hunting in secluded areas."
Comprehension finally dawned on Sam. In his defense, it had been a really long day. "Oh, you're a Hunter, too. Sorry. I think my brain is still trying to recover from the attack of the Wal-Mart demon. Let's try again, okay?" He held out his right hand, "I'm Sam."
Harry laughed and shook Sam's hand, "Harry, and I know what you mean. Those places are probably the most dishonest evil I think I've ever come across."
"I did talk to one of the locals while I was trapped there tonight," Sam mentioned.
"Why don't you have a seat?" Harry offered. "As long as we're all here, we may as well work together – unless you two have a problem with that?"
"Not at all," Dean jumped in before Sam could reply. Sam, who was in the middle of lowering himself to sit on the room's only chair, paused and took a closer look at his brother. There was something…off about Dean, but Sam wasn't sure what it could be.
Harry, who had been around the Weasley twins far too often, could easily read the mischief in Dean's expression and was pretty sure he knew what the other man was on about. When Sam had settled in the chair, Harry perched on the edge of the bed. "Well, that won't do," he said, palming his wand. Though he could do some wandless spells, advanced conjurations weren't among them. With a twirl and a flick, a short, squat blue armchair appeared.
Sam's reaction was more than Dean was hoping for. He jumped in surprise, knocking his knees pretty hard on the bottom of the table and very nearly falling out of the chair. "Thanks, Harry," Dean said, his grin conveying congratulations on a well-played joke, and sat in the new addition to the room.
"Don't mention it," Harry gave a nonchalant little shrug. "So… You spoke with a local? What did they have to say?"
Sam didn't reply; he was too busy trying to figure out what just happened.
9:30 am, July 20, 2007
Knoxville Public Library
Knoxville, Iowa
After Dean and Harry dropped Sam off at the local library, Sam spent several minutes wondering about the other Hunter. The story he'd told the night before was beyond belief, but then again, a normal person wouldn't believe the story of Sam's life, so he supposed they were even on that count. No, it wasn't Harry's story that Sam was having trouble digesting, it was more the fact that his standoffish brother had managed to make friends with him. Because, let's face it, if it doesn't have tits, Dean doesn't play nice… Especially since that thing with Gordon. When he finally got around to going into the library, he had to stop again, this time in shock. Holy hell. A small-town library that is not only well-lit and lacking in dust and must, but one with barcode readers, WI-FI access, and a bank of brand-new computers? What the hell?
"Can I help you, sweetie?" an elderly woman who all but had her picture in the encyclopedia next to the entry 'librarian' peered up at Sam through gold-rimmed glasses.
Sam smiled, "Yeah, actually. I was hoping to do some research on the history of the area. It just startled me for a moment that the library here isn't quite what I expected."
The librarian laughed, "We get that a lot from folks who've just moved to the area. The racetrack brings in a bushel of money for the town every year, and the library gets a portion of the profits off that. Local history, you said?" Sam nodded. "Well, we've got a voracious historical society who makes sure our books are well-stocked in that regard," she led him to a row of low bookshelves not too far from the row of computers near the door. "If you're looking for back issues of the paper, they're all stored on the computers."
"No microfiche?"
"Nope, we got rid of it two years ago."
Sam grinned, "I think I like this town already."
"If you need any more help, holler. I'm Mrs. Hardesty."
"Thanks, ma'am. I'll let you know if I need you," Sam waited until the librarian had returned to the check-out desk before folding his 6'4" frame onto a chair designed for someone much shorter than he. It's a world of freckin' midgets, I swear.
By the time Dean found him at almost eleven-thirty, Sam had several pages of notes, but no real answers.
9:30 am, July 20, 2007
Knoxville Sprint-Car Hall of Fame and Museum
Knoxville, Iowa
"I can't believe your brother made me take a drink of holy water," Harry grumbled good-naturedly, getting out of the car after it pulled to a stop in front of Knoxville's biggest – and only – claim to fame; the Sprint-Car Hall of Fame and Museum. The building was larger than the town's size would have indicated, and Harry's extensive research the night before indicated that it housed viewing rooms for the racetrack, as well as the museum, ticket office, and security office of the track.
"I can't believe you messed with my car without asking first," Dean retorted, his voice definitely on the pissed side of irritation.
"I told you, it's just a glamour – a holographic projection surrounding your car. I'll finite it when we're done here. It's not like I turned it into a horse or something – I could if I wanted to, you know." Harry crossed his arms and tapped his foot impatiently, "Are you coming with me or do I have to do this myself?"
"God, are all Brits as prissy as you?" Dean shut the door to the Impala, restraining the urge to slam the door. Even though his beloved car didn't look like her normal sleekly black and elegant self, he did know she was still his car.
Harry chuckled and dropped his arms, "English? Yeah, probably. Welsh? Definitely more so, and Scot? Well, we all know Scots are a bit rougher around the edges, even if they do take more pains to hide it than you Yanks."
"You still could have asked, first," Dean grumbled as he opened the trunk, his brain still having fits at the sight of his beautiful baby all decked out to look like a station wagon.
"You didn't have a problem when I transfigured your clothes into the uniform," Harry pointed out. "How was I to know that glamouring your car would be such a sore point?"
Dean grabbed a toolbox that contained, among other things, his newly repaired EMF. "Dude," he looked up at Harry and closed the trunk, "you don't disrespect the ride. I can't believe you've been in the US this long and haven't figured that out before now."
"What can I say? I tend to stick pretty much to myself, mate, what with the whole price-on-my-head thing." Deciding it was time to drop the topic; Harry shrugged and headed into the museum.
A bored-looking woman in her mid-twenties with Midwestern-bottle-blonde hair and overly pink lips was sitting on a high stool inside the information booth. She looked up from filing her nails and Harry smiled broadly. Dean caught up to him just as he began to speak, and it took all of Dean's willpower not to do a double-take when the voice that spoke wasn't in a lilting, British accent, but one more suited to the southeastern coast of the US. The Carolinas, maybe, or Georgia. "Hello, darlin'. I'm Jim Evans, and this is D. We're from Authoriscan. Heard about the trouble with the system last weekend, and the higher-ups thought it'd be best for us to check it out, what with those kids goin' missin' an' all."
The information-booth-girl couldn't believe her luck. Not only had her bastard of a boss told her to call these very people that afternoon, but they seemed to have gotten the message without her having had to do a damn thing – and they were two of the sexiest men she'd ever had the privilege to lay eyes on. She opened her mouth to say something and could only squeak. Dean plastered his best you-know-you-want-me smile on his face and leaned across the counter. The badge on her blouse said her name was Jenny. "So, Jenny, do you mind showing us to the security office, so we can get to work."
Though the taller man's voice didn't have an accent that screamedear-sex!, Jenny's imagination immediately latched on to the innuendo D had packed into his last word and she shuddered a little. "I'm not supposed to leave the desk… But the office is just through that door. There won't be anyone in there until five. The door's unlocked."
"Thanks, Jenny," Dean's smile morphed into a smirk. God, I'm good.
Once safely ensconced in the security room, Dean and Harry exchanged a look. "I think we just made her day," Harry said, his normal accent once again in place.
"Day? Hell, I think we made her year," Dean laughed.
"You might be right, mate. Let's see what we see, eh?" Harry started looking through the racks of VHS tapes lining one wall. Easily locating the tapes from the previous weekend, he handed them to Dean, who popped the top one, labeled 'Cameras 1-4' into one of the VCRs and hit play.
An hour later, and on the second-to-last tape, they finally found what they were looking for – at eight-ten in the evening, camera 23 stopped working just as a pair of little girls, age eight and twelve, came on the screen. Studying the tape frame-by-frame, neither Dean nor Harry could spot anything out of the ordinary. Flirting their way past Jenny once more, they headed out to the track itself, cutting across the dirt oval and worn grass infield to the portion of the stands the camera had shown – a short hallway area under the stands proper that led to the restrooms.
Looking up to where the camera was mounted to a support beam of the stands, Dean sighed. "I think we need a ladder."
Harry hadn't wasted any time after spotting the camera, and had already started climbing up the metal and concrete supports. "What was that?"
Dean shook his head, "Never mind, monkey-boy. I'm gonna check the area." He opened the toolbox and retrieved the EMF while Harry used a pocket multi-tool to unscrew the camera from the support beams. The pair worked in silence for a while, until the EMF spiked feebly while Dean was under some of the lowest seats of the stands. "Hey! I think I got something here," he called out.
Harry finished up his own scan of the camera and tucked his wand back into his hidden arm-holster. "Me, too," he shouted down to Dean. "Just lemme put the camera back." It was resecured to the support beam in record time, and Harry jumped down, landing lightly on his feet.
"Dude," Dean exclaimed. "What the hell – did you take gymnastics in school, or something?"
"No, I just played quidditch," Harry quipped. "What did you find?"
"Minor spike in the EMF just back here," Dean led the shorter man under the stands. "What's quidditch?"
"Major sport in the wizarding world – take the brutality of American football, remove the safety gear, add in three more balls – two of which are somewhat murderous – and two more goals, and put it all a hundred feet in the air on brooms and you just might come close to imagining it," Harry explained, retrieving his wand once more.
"Sounds fun," Dean commented. "What're you doing?"
"Checking for spell-residue. A simple confundus charm can short out a camera, and that's what happened up there," he jerked his chin in the direction of the faulty security cam. "Damn it… This happened almost a full week ago, right?"
Dean nodded, "Yeah… What's the problem?"
"Well, how long traces of a spell linger in an area is dependent on how strong of a spell was cast and the strength of the magic behind the caster – rather like how far a ball can be thrown depends both on how strong the person doing the throwing is and how much of that strength is used to throw it. Almost all spell traces dissipate within hours of being cast. The fact that I'm still picking up on this means one of two things – either we're dealing with a mage that could put Merlin to shame or this is a magical being."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning that it's not human. Humankind only sees a magic user of this magnitude once every millennia or so." Dean followed Harry back out to where the toolbox lay on the ground under where the camera was mounted. "What I don't really understand is why here? Why now? And, of course, what the bloody hell is it?"
Returning the EMF to the toolbox, Dean shook his head, "In answer to those, all I can say is – I don't know, does it really matter, and that's what we're going to find out."
"Let's see if your brother located any more information at the library, eh?"
11:55 am, July 20, 2007
Maggie's Diner
Knoxville, Iowa
The Winchester brothers and Harry sat in the corner booth of a bustling diner; their only neighbors a group of old men loudly discussing 'kids these days' and guzzling coffee. "So, did you find anything interesting at the library?" Harry asked, dousing his cheese-covered hash browns in Tabasco, something Sam wasn't sure even the bottomless pit that called himself Dean would have done, not even if money was at stake. Harry seemed to honestly enjoy it.
Dragging his attention from the nauseating and senseless culinary atrocity, Sam took a drink of his coffee. "Well, I didn't find much, locally. However, there were a string of similar disappearances in Des Moines – one or two people just up and disappearing without a trace every week for five solid weeks. All but one of the disappearances happened in places that weren't under camera surveillance; parks and the like. Like what happened with the Strady girls, the man that disappeared from in front of an ATM wasn't caught on tape because the camera shorted out. The week before the first disappearance in Des Moines, a camping couple disappeared from a place called Saylorville Reservoir. The week before that, a man from Lehigh disappeared. What I've been able to find is that every Saturday, for the past nine weeks, whatever this is takes someone. I also found that all the disappearances have been in or around places on the Des Moines River."
"Like those alien-mind-control slugs in 'The Puppet Masters'," Dean said around a mouthful of home fries, trying, but not quite achieving, a sage and knowledgeable tone.
Sam halted in his narrative as though hit by a beer wagon. "Dude,what?"
"Movie. Came out in… '94. Donald Sutherland, sci-fi and action. Spaceship lands in rural Iowa and the aliens traveled up the Des Moines River causing mayhem until the good guys won," Dean explained as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"How is it you can remember stuff like that, yet I have to research just about every job we do?" Sam asked. He actually wanted to know the answer.
Dean smirked, "Just trying to make you feel useful. Besides, you type faster than me."
"Oh, so I'm useless, am I? Who was it who saved your sorry ass from that wendigo?"
"I'll have you know my ass is anything but sorry. Chicks happen to dig my ass."
"Unless they're the thirteen year-old daughter of a psychotic hillbilly," Sam couldn't resist. "Then they just want to stab your ass."
"Oh, sure, throw that in my face again! See if I exorcize you the next time you get yourself possessed! Besides, it wasn't my ass, it was my leg. And I got her back, that little Wednesday-wannabe is probably still locked in that closet."
Just as Sam opened his mouth to retort, Harry cleared his throat. "Not to interrupt this fascinating lesson in brotherly love, mates, but can we please return to the job at hand?"
"So what do you think we're looking for? Because I know it isn't alien slugs," Sam tossed a glare in Dean's direction before turning to Harry.
"Don't knock the alien slugs, Sammy," Dean said, his voice somewhere between teasing and serious. "They were pretty cool at the time."
Sam rolled his eyes, "Still, I doubt that's what we're dealing with."
Before the brothers could get into another stunning example as to why the occurrence of only children was on the rise, Harry derailed the argument. "I'd imagine it's a magical being; the fact that it only blasted the one camera – that it even recognized it as a threat – means this isn't just some random creature. If you're right about the link to the water, though, I don't have a clue as to what it could be. Kelpies and other water creatures aren't exactly up there in the smarts department, not to mention most of them can't leave the water. The only creatures I know of that are connected to water and have human-level intelligence are merfolk, and though they can breathe air, they can't leave the water."
"Merfolk?" Dean asked, suddenly more interested in the conversation than his burger. "As in Darryl Hannah, seashell-bikinis, and all that?"
Harry snorted, "Ah… Not quite. They're considerably more fishlike than humanlike. Think of them as an exceptionally ugly breed of humanoid shark." Dean grimaced, not liking the mental images the comment triggered.
"So... Whatever this is, it's likely amphibious," Sam mused, taking a sip of his soda.
"Or owns a boat," Dean pointed out. "We still haven't completely ruled out the possibility that it's someone like you, stick-boy."
"Not so," Harry ignored Dean's jibe – he was just glad he wasn't being called 'shrimp' or 'midget' or 'short-stuff' because that would have required a practical demonstration on just how ruthless his hand-to-hand training had been, and seriously, Dean was no competition – and polished up the last of his hash browns before turning his attention to his toast. "I believe I told you that no wizard could cast a spell whose residue is still easily identifiable after a full week – especially since it was a bloody confundus charm and not a rite or warding or anything designed to linger." He paused for a moment, thumbing through the jam packets that were in a wire holder next to a napkin dispenser. "Why is there never any marmalade?" he complained.
"Because only children and old people waste their side-order of pancakes ontoast," Dean said, eyeing Harry like he'd grown a third nostril or something. "Seriously, dude… I mean, what the fuck? Is it just 'cause you're a Brit? 'Cause from where I'm sitting, it's like you're a whole other species."
"Plebian," Harry sniffed.
"I've been telling him that for years," Sam chuckled.
"Whatever. So… Back to the whatever-the-hell-it-is, do you think anyone's managed to see it?" Dean popped the last home fry into his mouth and washed it down with a large swallow of his iced tea. Harry scowled at the waste of good tea for the tenth time since Dean had ordered it.
"Possibly. We should see about talking to the families of the kids who disappeared… Maybe see if the police reports have anything to say on the matter," Sam drained the last of the coffee from his mug.
"If you two can talk with the families, I'll get the police reports," Harry offered.
"Sounds like a plan." Dean quickly finished off his burger and flagged their waitress for the check. "Do you want us to drop you off at the station, or do you want to go back to the hotel for your bike?"
"Don't worry about me – I can get back to the motel on my own," Harry replied, snagging their bill from the waitress before it hit the table and handing it back to her with his debit-card. "You two go on ahead. I'll meet you back at the motel this evening, yeah?"
"Yeah," Dean and Sam managed to reply simultaneously.
A/N2: Thanks for the reviews and have a great weekend! Next chapter up when Mom tells me to!
Reviews are definitely appreciated, but flames are used to roast marshmallows.
