Chapter 3

Dean woke up suddenly, covered in sweat.

He sat up and looked around him. Sam and Stella were both asleep. It was still dark. He saw the clock on the opposite wall. Two thirty in the morning. He sighed and fell back down onto the bed. Soon, he fell back into a fitful, dreamless sleep.

"Dean..." He groaned, trying to ignore the voice.

"Dean!" Something hit his shoulder, hard.

"Ow, what the hell?" He sat up.

Stella was kneeling close to him on the bed, grinning.

"Good, you're up. Sam's gone to get breakfast." She stood and walked over to the mirror, picking up a comb and dragging it through her hair. "Get dressed, we got stuff to do, stuff to kill. The usual."

Dean sighed and pulled himself to his feet. Stella turned looked at him and, momentarily looked embarrassed. Then she looked away quickly, walking over to her bed and putting clothes away.

Dean was confused, looking down at himself, he saw only what he always wore to bed, his underwear. Unless he forgot and just slept in his clothes. Which he often did.

He shrugged it off and got dressed. He caught Stella looking at him several times but she always looked away when their eyes met.

"I need coffee. I'm dying here." She complained after a minute, flopping down onto her bed with a dramatic sigh.

Almost on cue, Sam walked in carrying bags of food and five cups of coffee.

Stella jumped up and took a cup in each hand. "Oh, thanks! You're totally my hero."

She sat down on her bed and drank both cups quickly.

Sam gave Dean a cup and a bag of food, tossing another one to Stella who caught it quickly and tore it open, casting her empty coffee cups aside. She pulled out croissants and bagels and donuts, eating them all.

"I had no idea you were 70% water and 30% caffeine." Sam said, grinning.

"20%," She said through a mouthful of bagel. She swallowed and continued. "I'm 10% alcohol."

They ate their food, well the brothers did. Stella had already finished and was drinking more coffee.

"How come you're not, like, 500 pounds?" Dean asked, amused.

"It's all the hunting. It burns a lot of calories, y'know. And... other things too." She nudged him with her hip.

Internally, Dean made a noise similar to a cross between an elephant on speed and a horse on crack.

This girl was a walking innuendo. She flirted like there was no tomorrow, drank coffee like a greedy cat drinks milk, ate like a starving wolf, fought like a... goddess. Looked like one too, Dean thought sighing. She'd come to him, ten years ago, drunk. And she'd used him. He was just one night. One night she didn't seem proud of. She'd barely even seemed to remember it, yet it had stuck in Dean's mind ever since. He had to talk to her, find out if she really remembered, why she'd done it, and why she'd been embarrassed about seeing him earlier. With all that she flirted, he thought she would have reacted differently.

With an effort, Dean pulled himself away from his thoughts as they stood up and prepared to leave.

"14... and 15 is just... there." Stella said, pointing forwards into the middle of the lake. "Your dad gave us coordinates to a bit of water." She said, condescension in her voice as she shoved the map into Dean's hands, taking out her camera.

"I've got some stuff about water related deaths here." Sam called, looking at his laptop. "Girl drowns in bathtub... man found dead in a swimming pool..."

"No, those aren't it... I don't think it's a spirit, I think it's a creature." Stella said.

Sam looked up, "What makes you say that?"

"Because I just saw it."

Dean and Sam looked at her. She turned away from the lake and showed them her camera. In the video, they could clearly see a large scaley creature skim the surface of the water for a second and disappear again.

"Why is it showing itself so obviously like that? Shouldn't it be more cautious, hiding?" Sam thought aloud.

"It's going to strike." Dean said suddenly. "I know it is."

Stella spun around just in time to see a little girl, no older than five or six, with an inflatable ring, jump into the water. "No!" She yelled but it was too late. The girl was already in the water, splashing around, looking up at her father who was sitting on the boardwalk above her, waving and holding a camera.

Stella took off her jacket.

"What are you doing?" Dean asked warily as she dropped her jacket on the ground beside her bag.

"I've got to go in after her." She said.

"But-" Dean stopped as Stella pulled her AC/DC t-shirt off along with her jeans, and ran for the water with a crossbow under one arm. Why was she always taking her clothes off?! Dean thought despairingly.

"Damn it." Sam muttered and hurried after her. Dean followed, still slightly dazed.

Stella did a surprisingly graceful dive into the water.

Her head appeared above the water, and both brothers' took off their jackets when she let out a small scream.

"Holy shit, that's cold!" She yelled.

Sam sighed, half with relief and half with frustration.

Stella swam over to the little girl and lifted her out of the water with surprisingly ease. She gave a hurried explanation to the father and he hurried his daughter away. Almost everything about Stella was coming as a surprise to Dean at the minute, he thought. He took off his jacket and shirt as Stella took a breath and disappeared underneath the water.

Dean jumped into the water.

"Ah, God!" He yelled.

"What is it?" Sam called, sounding alarmed.

"She was right, it's freezing!"

Sam rolled his eyes. "Just check on her."

Dean nodded and went underneath to see where Stella was.

He saw her, legs moving slightly to keep herself underwater, looking around with crossbow in hand. She saw Dean and waved her fingers at him. Dean nodded, dazed for a second, looking at her, then went up for air.

"Is she okay?" Sam called.

"She's, uh, she's fine." Dean said.

"Where's the thing?"

"No idea. We could use some light down here, got any flares?"

"Yeah." Sam said and threw one down to him.

Dean cracked it and tossed it over to where Stella was. She caught it and went back underwater.

Dean was just about to go under again when he saw the flare float to the surface of the water. He ducked underwater but Stella was gone. He raised his head out of the water.

"Dude!" He yelled at Sam. "She's gone!"

"Oh, for God's sake." Sam muttered. "Get that flare and look for her!"

Dean grabbed the flare and dove under. He looked around, swimming around. He saw a flash of blonde hair out of the corner of his eye and spun around. A creature had Stella pinned against the side of the lake, holding her in it's giant, scaled claws. It tightened it's grip and Dean saw Stella scream out with pain, hearing it faintly through the water, and blood clouded the water around her.

Dean aimed carefully and fired the crossbow. It hit the creature in the place where he thought it's heart might be and went straight through the other side of it. He freaked for a second when he thought that he'd also hit Stella but he saw, as monster let her go and slowly sunk down dead into the dark depth of the lake, that it had thankfully missed her. Dean swam over to her, carrying her against his shoulder and swimming to the surface.

He laid her on the bank.

"Is she-" Sam began.

Stella coughed suddenly, opening her eyes and sitting up, making Dean jump.

"What happened? Please tell me nobody got kissed, I mean killed, I mean kissed, I mean..." She trailed off, leaning her head in her hand. "Sorry, hit my head against a rock."

"It's alright. We're okay, it's dead." Sam said, bending down and handing her her clothes and a towel.

As Stella reached for her shirt, she winced.

"Oh, jeez." Dean said. "Your shoulders."

She had deep groves in the sides of each of her shoulders where the creature had held her.

"I, uh, forgot about that." She said, half smiling.

Stella got cleaned up and fell asleep in the back seat.

Sam got into the passenger seat. Dean started up the engine and drove onto the highway.

"Where next, Sammy?" He asked, glancing at his brother.

"It looks like Georgia. Missing person turns up at his family's house after exactly four years, kills them all except one, then himself. Same thing happened with a girl, 18 years old when she was kidnapped. Killed her brother and father but not her mother."

"Sounds suitably weird. It'll be a long drive though, especially at this time of year." Dean said knowingly, turning a corner.

"Okay."

There was silence for a minute or two.

"Hey, um, what exactly is the deal between you and Stella?" Sam asked, lowering his voice slightly just in case she was awake. "I mean, there's not much making out going on that I'm aware of. Unless you guys-"

"Look, I had a big crush on her years ago. She lead me on something crazy. We hung out a few times. Now she's here, and..." Dean sighed.

"What?" Sam asked.

"I don't know, man. She seems into me, but she seems into almost every guy she meets. How am I meant to know if I'm any different or just another loser she'll forget about in two minutes?"

"She remembered you after ten years, I don't think you're another loser to her." Sam said carefully. "I've noticed it. You look at her mostly when she's not looking, she checks you out for ages when you look away."

"Ages?" Dean asked, trying to keep the hope out of his voice.

"Yeah." Sam said, snickering a little.


Hey!

So I've started season 2. So Bobby will probably appear soon. And I'll include the whole John thing.

Ok bye

JAxxx