Know how I know my life is bizarre? I get knocked out on the daily. OK, maybe not daily, but it's not an uncommon occurrence.

I even remember the first time it happened. I was ten years old and sitting in the backseat of the Impala by myself while my dad and brothers were digging up a grave twenty yards away. I saw something moving toward them in the dark and instead of shouting to them like I should've done, I acted on impulse and dove out of the car ready to tackle the whatever-it-was. But because I was a little girl and it was not, it got the jump on me, spinning around before I made it three steps away from the Impala and whacking me over the head with something super hard. I'm still kind of foggy on what it was, or what it had to do with the bones my family was trying to salt and burn. They didn't tell me anything back then. (Even less than they tell me now.)

I slid to the ground like a wet noodle and the next thing I knew, I was cradled in Dean's arms in the backseat of the car as Dad sped along a dark highway. Not toward the hospital, mind you. Dad didn't do hospitals. And, given the way he died, I couldn't really blame him anymore. No, we went back to the motel and they checked me for any signs of concussion and then Dad laid into me for disobeying them and getting out of the damn car in the first place. Sam jumped to my defense ("Dad, she's hurt. Can you go easy on her?") and Dean was annoyed ("Why the hell didn't you just yell for us, Callie; what were you thinking?"), but when Dad demanded that I get to bed and told me to expect a "reminder" in the morning of what happens when I don't follow the rules, Dean's jaw tightened and I knew he wanted to tell Dad to back off.

He didn't. But when Dad didn't follow through on the threatened spanking, I suspected that Dean had something to do with my reprieve. Dad wasn't one to make idle threats.

So being knocked out? It's a thing I do. And when I was leaving the motel the night I thought Sam had texted me to meet them at the diner down the street, and stupidly let my guard down to root around in my bag for my gun, I had come to terms with it, in a way, before I even hit the asphalt.

It was the waking up part I never could get used to. When you wake up, you never know what horror is waiting on the other side of your eyelids. While you were unconscious, you could've been dragged to the lair of some skeevy monster who's right that moment feeding on strips of your skin. Or dragged to Hell to be used as leverage so the King can lure your brothers into his trap. Or, UGH, kidnapped by a human perv whose intentions are even worse.

This time, my first thought when I came around was that it was that last thing, my personal worst fear. No matter what I've seen, what I know is lurking out there in the shadows, human creeps always scare me the most.

"Hey. Are you awake?"

I flinched away from the male voice, all of my instincts screaming at me that this was the enemy, that I had to get my strength back now so I could stand a chance against him.

"It's okay, I'm not gonna hurt you," the voice said.

It occurred to me with a twinge of surprise that my hands weren't bound together. There wasn't a gag in my mouth. I blinked a few times to clear my vision and realized that if I looked straight up I could see night sky, sprinkled with stars.

"I called 911; there should be cops and an ambulance on the way."

That got my attention. I snapped to and managed to focus on the face hovering over me a few feet away. It was a guy. A kid about my age, actually, with dark hair and really really blue eyes and an expression of concern etched into his features.

"Cops?" I asked in a horrified whisper. "You called the cops?"

"Well … yeah. Someone attacked you. He knocked you out, stole your bag, and ran off. I had to do something."

I was struggling to sit up now, and the guy reached out to help me but backed off when I jerked my arm out of his grasp. "I've got it!" I said. The back of my head was singing. "How long ago did you call?"

The boy looked taken aback for a moment, then pressed a button on his phone and looked at it as the screen lit up his features enough for me to notice that he was seriously cute. I refocused my attention.

"About fifteen minutes ago?" he said. "You've been out since then. I was on my way back from getting a drink when I saw him attack you." He held up an unopened Coke can as if to prove his sincerity. "He, uh, he saw me, he looked at me, and he had, um … black eyes. What the hell."

I realized then that I was lying in the middle of the motel parking lot, right where I'd been laid out. My mind reeled. Could you call and cancel a 911 call? Probably not, especially after fifteen minutes. But I couldn't very well sit here and wait for the cops to show. They'd take me into custody, and then when Sam and Dean showed up to get me, they'd be the ones in trouble. Winchesters did not get involved with law enforcement. That was law. That was Winchester law. I'd broken Winchester law. I cringed at the imaginary Dean face that flashed up on the movie screen behind my eyelids.

There was a big lump on the back of my head, sending daggers of pain shooting into my actual brain and making rational thought difficult. So when headlights washed over us, this guy whose name I didn't know and me, my first idea was that we had to run. I grabbed his arm and put all the urgency I could muster into my order: "Get me inside."

His own eyes widened, and he looked up at the approaching vehicle with almost as much apprehension as I was feeling. Then he took hold of my arms and helped me to my feet. The world spun but I managed, just barely, to stay in the here and now as he led me, hobbling, toward the door to his motel room, four doors down from ours. He pushed me in ahead of him and slammed the door behind us, throwing the deadbolt and latching the chain.

I sat down on the edge of the nearest bed and put my throbbing head in my hands. Jesus. The cops were sure to have seen us. I'd be lucky if I ever saw Sam and Dean again. I wanted to cry, but I was too wound up, waiting for the inevitable pounding of authority on the flimsy motel room door.

It came scarcely a minute later, but not in the form I had anticipated. It came in the form of my brothers' voices.

"Callie! It's me; open up if you can!"

That was Sam.

There was a brief scuffle, a barked order, and then the door flew open so hard the hinges splintered and the interior knob buried itself into the plaster of the adjacent wall.

The next thing I knew, Sam was hauling me up by the arm and pulling me toward the open door as Dean descended upon the boy with the blue eyes.

"Did you touch my sister? Look at me, you sonofabitch, DID YOU TOUCH MY SISTER?"

"NO! No, man, I promise! I saw her get knocked out and I was trying to help! I was trying to—"

"Callie, are you okay?" Sam asked me, turning me forcefully away from the scene of our brother harassing the guy who had maybe just saved my life. "Look at me, sweetheart, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, I'm FINE. Dean! He didn't do anything! But the cops are coming."

"What?" Dean glanced at me from the other side of the room, where he had blue-eyed boy pinned against the wall and looking like he might pee his pants at any moment.

"He called 911; I was unconscious. We have to go!"

My brothers exchanged a look and then I was once more being hauled away with no choice in the matter. Sam deposited me in the backseat of the Impala with a sharp command to stay put before he followed Dean into our room to gather our stuff. Three minutes later we were peeling out of the parking lot and I was feeling sorry for the guy with the blue eyes who had done nothing but try to help and had gotten nothing in return except to be scared shitless by my terrifyingly overprotective big brother.

"Start talking, Callie," Dean demanded once we'd turned onto a brightly lit, fast-food-joint-littered highway, heading God knows where. "What happened?"

"I got a text from Sam to pack up and meet you guys at the diner. I was on my way."

"And what, you got jumped?"

"I didn't text you, Callie. Did you use our code before just blindly heading out by yourself?"

I bit my bottom lip. "No," I answered truthfully. "I just figured it was really you."

"You just figured?" Dean interjected, his voice raising and betraying his anger. "What is THAT? Is that what you've been taught, Callie? Is that how we raised you? To just figure you're not stepping out into a trap? Huh? Answer me!"

"No."

"What was that?"

"No!" I said, louder. "No, I should always check."

"Damn straight you should always check. I'm driving your ass right back to Bobby's where you belong. You've proven nothing but that you can't follow even the simplest orders."

"That's not fair!" I said, stung by his words.

"No? Tell me how I'm wrong."

"I follow your stupid orders all day every day, so much so that I spend most of my time sitting in a nasty motel room watching daytime TV and wondering if I'm ever going to see you guys again! I wait and I worry and I obey like a good little soldier, but all I ever get from you is shit. I can't be good enough, Dean, there's no such thing with you."

"Watch it," Dean said in a dangerous tone. "You're crossing the line."

"What line? The line where I can't say what's on my mind because I might actually bring up a good point?"

"Callie…" Sam said quietly, trying to intercede. "This isn't the time for this."

"The hell it's not!" I yelled. "He clearly doesn't want me here and I can't do anything about that except to appease him. Next time we stop, I'm out."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Sam asked, clearly exhausted by the whole scene.

"I'm done with this shit. I'm done with Dean and you and Bobby and hunting and the whole deal."

"Oh, you gonna hop on with the first trucker you see at the next gas station?" Dean asked sarcastically. "Give me a break."

"That's exactly what I mean. Then you'll be rid of me and I can go off somewhere and have a normal life. It's a win-win."

"Cal, don't be ridiculous, this is—" Sam started, but Dean talked over him.

"You get out of this car at the next fuel stop, you're riding the rest of the way to Bobby's in cuffs," Dean said more directly.

"Fuck you."

"Say that again, we're going to have a problem."

I almost—almost—had the guts to say it again. Instead, I muttered under my breath. "Fine. I'll keep my mouth shut till we stop and I can find my next ride."

And Dean, always wanting the last word, said, "Over my dead body … and yours."

We continued to ride along in angry silence.


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