A/N: Hey thanks for all of the support! This has been a great experience and I will definitely be writing more fanfiction in the future. Only one more chapter to go after this one...
I do not own Supernatural...
The Impala pulled up to the abandoned house, Jo pouting from the back. She couldn't believe that her dad was still sheltering her. At least Uncle Sam had convinced him to let her stay in the car. Even that was better than waiting in the motel. So she sat, stewing in the backseat while Sam and Dean grabbed their supplies from the trunk.
Jo took special care to note the things that they gathered. What did you need to kill a ghost? Jo thought as she glimpsed the boys gathering shotguns and special white-colored shells. Just as she thought they were finished she spied Sam slipping a bottle of lighter fluid into their bag. That was unusual. Now Jo was incredibly curious; there was no way she could just sit in the car while her dad and uncle got to gank a ghost.
As the boys entered the house, Jo quietly slid out of the open window, not wanting to deal with the noise associated with opening a car door. Without a sound she crept towards the decrepit building, fear and anticipation mingling in her heart. She entered the side door in an effort to avoid her caretakers. Picking locks was one of the strange skills she picked up from her dad, so Jo was able to easily unlock the door, using the bobby pins from her hair. She opened the door to find that she was in the kitchen of the ancient establishment. Carefully she made her way across the cracked tile and misplaced pots and pans until she reached the door.
Wow, this place is a dump. Jo thought as the door opened to reveal a long, dingy hallway. She crept along, past creepy portraits with eyes that seemed to follow her. Coming up to the door at the end of the hallway, she could hear voices and movement in the other room.
"Sam, you can stop talking now if you're saying what I think you're saying. She cannot hunt with us."
"Come on, she's eighteen. She can make her own decisions."
Shit. The voices were getting closer to the hallway. Quickly and without thought, she ducked into one of the rooms jutting off of the long corridor.
Immediately the smell of rotting flesh assaulted her nose and she had to cover her face with her sleeve to avoid gagging violently. As soon as her eyes adjusted to the gloom, she took a look at her surroundings. The room appeared to be normal, if not dirty, until her gaze fell upon the far corner of the room. Suddenly the source of the horrible stench became clear because in that corner of the room laid a grotesquely rotten corpse, hardly identifiable except for the clothing constricting the bloated body. At this sight she nearly fled the room but stopped herself when she heard another door open.
Through the crack in the door, Jo could see both Sam and Dean enter the hallway. Doing a sweep with their EMFs, they slowly made their way up the corridor. The boys had made it about halfway up the passage when suddenly, their EMFs began to wail and before any precautions could be made, a violent wind blew up the hallway. When the wing reached Sam and Dean, hands materialized, attacking them and leaving them knocked out cold.
"Dad," Jo screamed.
Without hesitation she left her hiding spot, running to her guardian's sides. Tears blinded her eyes but she wasn't stupid. Jo quickly took up her father's rifle and checked to see if it was loaded. It was.
Her dad had taken her to the shooting range before, making her practice on a wide variety of guns and targets, but this was different, this time she was scared.
Despite her fear, she was prepared when the ghost made its second attack. Before it could get within five feet, Jo had fired the shotgun, its salt round connecting with the ghost in seconds. The ghost disappeared and the sound of the shotgun blast ripped through the silence.
The noise seemed to be enough to shake Sam from his unconsciousness. Dazed, Sam looked around for the source of the explosion, his eyes resting on Jo.
"I thought you were staying in the car," Sam mumbled.
Jo huffed, exasperated, "No time for that now. How do you kill a ghost?"
Sam stared at her for a moment, trying to get his eyes to focus, "You have to um… salt and burn the corpse of the ghost. There's salt and lighter fluid in my bag."
Hearing this, Jo ran over to the duffle bag lying a few feet away and began rummaging for the things she needed.
"How did you get rid of the ghost?" Sam asked
"I shot it," Jo replied matter-of-factly.
Sam thought about this. Jo really is tougher than Dean gives her credit for.
Once Jo had the items she needed, she set out for her earlier hiding place. She knew the body she had to burn; she had been hiding right beside it. In her hands she carried a container of salt, a bottle of lighter fluid, and a lighter she had nicked off of her dad. Tucked into her jeans pocket was a handgun loaded with the special "ghost" rounds. Jo was determined to gank the ghost that dared to mess with her family.
Bursting into the door, Jo ran over to the corpse and set about salting and burning the cadaver. A burst of wind hit her back and without turning around, she drew her pistol and fired, once again dispersing the ghost. A flick of her wrist had a small flame coming from the lighter in which she wasted no time dropping onto the mess at her feet. She turned around just in time to see the figure of the ghost burst into flames.
"That's for hurting my dad," Jo spat, her eyes narrowed.
When she went back out to the hallway, Dean was still unconscious and Sam was hunched over him, trying to assess the situation, "I think he's got a concussion, but he'll be okay."
"Wonderful," Jo said without feeling.
Sam looked up and saw a change in Jo. She had changed from the innocent girl that had followed them on their hunt into a hardened, cold-blooded hunter. It was the same change he saw when he went on the hunt with the first Jo.
"Let's go," Jo breathed, her eyes growing weary.
Sam nodded and rose to help her grab their bags and Dean's limp body. Slowly they made their way back to the Impala, stashing the bags in the trunk and laying Dean's body in the backseat. The drive back to the hotel was silent.