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: Just a quick reassurance – the girl Dean meets out at the lake isn't a love interest. I hope I made that clear. She's also not going to stick around longer than a single conversation, though she may or may not show up in the final installment of this trilogy (I just don't know yet). The whole interaction is loosely based on something that happened in my own life about three years or so ago – so don't try to tell me that meaningful conversations with strangers don't happen because it did to me (and does this sentence sound as bitchy as I think it does?)

Twice is Circumstance

6:13 pm, October 13, 2007
Singer Salvage Yard
Outside Pierre, South Dakota

"So, let me get this straight," Dean said, leaning back on the kitchen chair. "Not only are unicorns real, but apparently I had a conversation with a god?"

Remus grimaced a little, "Goddess, actually. Get it right. Diana isn't exactly known for keeping a cool head if insulted."

"So what did she mean by 'find the stag and find your answers'?" Dean glanced up at Bobby and nodded as the older Hunter handed him a beer from the fridge, "Thanks, man." Sam had a smug little grin on his face. Dean took a swallow of the beer, "Dude! What?"

"Nothing," Sam replied.

Dean glared a little at his brother. "What, Sam?"

Sam let out a little laugh. "It just… A couple of things, really. Mainly, it was Diana. You know, also known as Artemis – what better goddess for a Hunter than one who's a hunter herself?"

"And…?" Dean sighed, pretty sure he knew what else Sam had in mind.

"And… Well, I hate to say I told you so, but…" Sam shrugged as though to say, 'well, there you have it.'

"Hang on a tic," Harry said with a light smile. "You mean to tell me that you, Dean – Hunter of Evil-with-a-capital-E – didn't believe in the existence of the gods?"

Dean shook his head slightly, "I said it back when I first met you. I believe in what I can see. I've seen the badness in this world, therefore it exists. I'd never come across any sort of proof that there was another side to all that."

"Well you wouldn't, now would you?" Remus said, thinking, And just what would you call yourself? Dean threw the werewolf a 'WTF' look and Remus explained, "Evil is flashy, showy. It likes to announce its presence and show off. Evil feeds off of fear and it's impossible to fear something you don't know is there. The larger evils like demons also tend to be rather blatant about their actions. Not only do they feed off of fear and hate, but they also have the driving need to collect souls. It would be hard for demons to do that if they couldn't show people how powerful they are."

"And you're saying the 'good' side doesn't do that?" Dean was quite obviously skeptical.

Bobby knew where Remus was heading and jumped in, "Hell no, the good side don't need ta be flashy. How often do good things make the news, Dean? An airplane that didn't crash? A kid that decided not to shoot his bullies? Or, in our line of work, how 'bout all them spirits who don't linger? The folks who don't get possessed?"

Dean stared at his half-empty beer bottle for several minutes, the room mostly silent. Abruptly, he stood, "I'm gonna go for a drive. Back later."

Harry opened his mouth to say something, but Sam caught his eye and shook his head. After the front door banged shut, Sam said, "He just needs some time to digest all this. He'll probably be back in a couple of hours."

"Is he going to be okay with all of this?" Remus asked, concerned.

Bobby shrugged, "Either he is or he isn't. Personally, I'm guessin' that he'll be all right with it."

"Eventually," Sam agreed. "In the meantime, though… He's gonna be freaked."

"Ya know, I hate ta ask but it's been buggin' me – just what happened when me and Dean left you boys at the motel last night?"

Sam, Remus, and Harry exchanged innocent looks. "Nothing," Sam replied. "Why do you ask?"

"C'm on, Sam! I ain't blind, an' I ain't stupid. You three did somethin' and I wanna know what!"

"We talked for a bit," Harry said. "I showed Sam and Remus a couple of games on my computer."

Bobby glared lightly at his three guests. "And…?"

"It's the truth," Remus attested.

"I never said it wasn't. What else did you three get up to?"

"Nothing too serious," Harry smirked. "Just our job."

"Yeah," Remus echoed Harry's expression, "you know – the whole fighting-back-the-dark thing."

"You three are about one smart-ass comment away from bein' blasted with a load of rock salt."

"Is he serious?" Harry asked Sam.

Sam bit his lip and shrugged, "He usually is."

"That's it," Bobby grumbled, "where'd I leave my shotgun?"

"Now, there's no need to get violent," Remus said.

"Then tell me what the hell is goin' on!"

Sam chuckled, "Remus figured out a way to give Dean a fighting chance."

"How's that?" Bobby asked, calming significantly. "I been lookin' into things since that fool boy went and did what he done and ain't come up with anything."

"It all boils down to the fact that I'm going after a big bad – again – and this time, I refuse to do so for free," Harry grinned.

"What did you do?" Bobby pressed, trying to ignore the sudden tightening in his gut.

Harry's grin brightened, "Nothing you wouldn't have, had you not been in my position."

"Don't be too sure about that." Remus and Harry both laughed. "Damn it, what did you do? Make another damn deal?"

"Sorta," Sam admitted.

"God save me from bullheaded Winchesters," Bobby whispered and then said, "Don't you ever learn?"

"Don't get your knickers in a twist, Bobby," Harry interrupted. "This wasn't Sam's idea, and Dean doesn't know about it – I'd like to keep it that way, if it's all the same to you."

"What were the terms?" Bobby asked, scrubbing a hand across his face.

"Nothing I can't deliver," Harry reassured him.

"If it makes any difference," Sam supplied, "Harry didn't cut a deal with the crossroads demon – she cut one with him."

"I fail to see the distinction."

Remus shrugged, "It's simple, really. Instead of trading his soul for Dean's, as the first option would imply, he agreed to deliver Voldemort's spirit to the crossroads demon in exchange for her canceling her claim on Dean."

"And just how do you plan to do that?"

Harry shrugged a little, "I'm not too sure on that just yet; besides, I don't like plans. Plans have an annoying tendency to fall apart just when there's no hope for a backup. I need to reread a couple of spell books and verify some facts. Get a general idea as to how to go about things this time."

"But no plans," Remus nodded.

"Yeah, abso-fucking-lutely no hard planning – only soft. By the way, I've been thinking, Remus."

"What else is new?" Remus replied.

"Ha-ha. We'll likely want to see what else that gun of Dean's can do and see if Hagrid will give us enough unicorn hair to braid a string for the bow." Harry's eyes flicked to the still-open bow case on the table, "Dean's bow. Oh, and we'll need to stop by Minerva's office and pick up the Aroliantivashi when we head back to Europe."

Bobby blinked at the two British men sitting at his kitchen table. "You've lost me."

"Um, yeah," Sam nodded, "me, too."

"The Aroliantivashi," Remus explained, "is one of the few magical relics which pre-date Merlin. It's a stone bottle. An unbreakable stone bottle which was carved with the sole intention of imprisoning spirits until such time they could be properly disposed."

"'Properly disposed'? Somethin' tells me you don't mean a salt-and-burn." Bobby could tell that Sam had a little better idea what the wizards were talking about, but not much.

"Until the development of the evanesco series of banishing spells was developed, the only surefire way to be rid of a malignant spirit involved a long, drawn-out ceremony. The bottle was created to keep the spirit in one place until that ceremony could be completed. We – the Order, I mean – spent several months tracking it down, but the plan went more than a little awry the first time I went after Riddle and I ended up not needing the bottle," Harry said. "This time, I'm gonna fucking finish things and get it right this time, because I am not doing this a fourth time."

"I'm still lost," Bobby said.

"It's rather a long story," Harry replied. "But, if you really want to hear it –"

"It might be a good idea," Sam interrupted. "I could stand to hear it myself in a little more detail than what you told me and Dean back in July."

7:00 pm, October 13, 2007
West Shore Recreation Area
Lake Oahe, South Dakota

It was at times like these when Dean almost wished he'd taken up smoking. It would have given him something to do while he thought. As it was, he was merely lounging on the hood of the Impala, watching the colors of the sunset light up the lake and low hills on the opposite shore, tingeing a slowly approaching rainstorm's clouds in shades of gold and pink. A light wind out of the east, the same wind bringing the storm closer by degrees, blew into Dean's face.

"I don't get it, baby," Dean said, talking as much to his car as to himself. "All my life, all I've ever really seen was bad things happening to good people while assholes get all the breaks. And now… Now, I'm supposed to believe that some random god spoke to me." Dean let out a low laugh. "I don't think so. This is probably like that ghost of that priest who thought he was an angel. I don't know what happened to that bow, and I don't really care. I ain't touching it again." A stronger gust of wind rippled through Dean's hair. He pulled his brown leather jacket a little tighter. "I ain't touching it again.

"I mean, it's not like I haven't come up against… well, I guess they're demi-gods. Whatever. It's not like I haven't seen things like that before. The trickster springs to mind." Dean chuckled, "Hated to waste 'im – he had a great sense of humor – but we couldn't just let him go on killin' people. And then there was that whole situation with the tulpa in Texas." Dean pulled his knees up and rested his elbows on them, the heels of his boots caught on the front bumper of the Impala.

"I'll be the first to admit that there's a whole lot of freaky shit I know nothing about – it's one of the hazards of the job, I suppose. Sometimes things are easy, sometimes things get out of control, and sometimes it's stuff no one's ever come across before." Dean sighed and watched distant lightning flash in the approaching storm, the sunset tinting it shades of orange and pink. "But that bow… It could be a cursed object. I bled on the goddamned thing, so of course it'd affect me differently than it did the rest of the guys. Either that, or I am simply the least freaky of the freak brigade. Bobby's been doing shit like this for decades – so it's no surprise he could sense something from the bow. Remus and Harry both have that whole wand-thing going for them, and Sammy… Well, Sammy's Sammy. Visions, TK, and all that jazz. Me? What do I got goin' for me? I can play a mean game of straight-eight. Poker. A respectable tolerance for whiskey. I don't really have anything going for me that anyone couldn't do for themselves. So what if I heal fast? Last I checked, that wasn't all that uncommon." A tiny voice in the back of Dean's mind tried to speak up, tried to say How do you explain a hundred and seventy-nine stitches in that gash that you got on that Hunt after Sammy left for school that healed without so much as a twinge, let alone a scar? Dean pointedly ignored the voice. He was good at that.

"I shoulda brought a six-pack with me," he mumbled, groping for his hip-flask and trying to remember if he'd last filled it with whiskey or holy water. Finding the undecorated silver flask in his jacket, he spun off the top. "Damn," he took a drink anyway. "Water. I think I'm going to want to get a second flask. Keep whiskey in that one." He recapped the flask and put it away.

"Excuse me?" a woman's voice interrupted Dean's quiet monologue to his car. He looked to his left. An average-height girl, wearing jeans, hiking boots, and a light blue windbreaker stood about ten feet away from him. She had an expensive-looking Nikon hanging from a strap around her neck and a bulky backpack slung over one shoulder. Her medium-blonde hair was short and shaggy, likely having grown out from a punky spike haircut. She was remarkably ordinary-looking, with two exceptions – she had a lebret piercing, easily seen as the jewelry was neon yellow, and she wore a pair of vaguely cat's-eye shaped glasses with silver frames and pink lenses. "You got a light?"

Dean nodded, "Yeah."

The woman grinned, a small dimple forming in her right cheek. "Halle-fucking-lujah," she strode over to Dean, retrieving a pack of Camel menthols from her jacket pocket. "Worst string of bad luck I've had in a week. I damn well know I left the house this afternoon with three lighters on me and now I can't seem to find a single one."

Dean handed her his Zippo with a little shrug, "I know how that goes." She offered the open pack of cigarettes to him. Dean shook his head, "Don't smoke."

She quirked an eyebrow and cocked her head slightly to the side. "You don't smoke, yet you carry around a thirty-dollar lighter?" She chuckled a little, "You're a mechanic, aren't you?"

"How do you figure that?" Dean supposed that if he ever had to stop Hunting, his ability to repair stuff would likely be his main way of making a living, so the woman's guess wasn't totally off the mark.

"My dad and my brother-in-law are both non-smoking mechanics, yet both of them carry lighters, too. Neither one will tell me why. I have to admit, I've always wondered." She lit her cigarette and handed the lighter back to Dean. "I don't suppose you could let me in on the secret?"

Dean pocketed the lighter with a shrug, "Fire's a tool. You can heat your key in the winter if your lock is iced over or coax a stubborn ball-point into working. It'll also melt loose ends off of the nylon thread used in most car upholstery so that it won't fray." Not to mention the fact that it comes in handy fighting evil and putting vengeful spirits to rest. Can't do a salt-and-burn without the burn, after all.

She took a drag and laughed lightly, "I see. And here I was thinking that Dad and Ryan were closet stoners or something. I'm Frank, by the way."

"Frank?"

"Yeah, Mom and Dad didn't want to know if I was a boy or girl before I was born, so they picked a gender-neutral name. Francis. They pulled the same shit on my older sister. Her name's Kelly."

"How come you go by 'Frank' and not 'Fran'?"

Frank shrugged, "I've always been a tomboy. When I was little, I had to be wrestled into a dress, and all – both – dresses had long sleeves and were floor-length to hide the skinned knees and elbows. What about you? You got a name, or should I just call you 'dude with the kickass car'?"

Dean grinned. A compliment to his baby could always make him smile. "I'm Dean."

"Here on vacation or something?" she motioned to the Ohio plates.

"Visiting a friend."

"Oh? Who?"

"Bobby Singer."

Frank rolled her eyes, "Shoulda known. Any mechanic from out of state with a classic Chevy is bound to be visiting the local automotive Mecca. So how come you're staring at the lake and not using the last of the daylight to go pawing through the various piles of rust for spare parts?"

Dean shrugged, "Just thinking."

"Oh, is that all? You looked like you were suffering existential problems."

"Huh?"

Frank took another drag of her smoke, "Existential – in the context of existentialism, involved in or vital to the shaping of a person's self-chosen mode of existence and moral stance with respect to the rest of the world. Also known as depressing yourself on purpose, to quote a popular t-shirt."

"The fuck?"

Frank sighed, "Sorry. I suffer from eidetic memory, a low boredom threshold, and diarrhea of the mouth."

"No, I know what 'existential' means. I was just wondering why you thought so?"

"I know the look," Frank explained. "The whole 'what-the-fuck-does-all-this-really-mean' look. It had to come from somewhere, and I doubt it had anything to do with car parts."

Dean blinked, "You really are freaky-observant, aren't you?"

Frank laughed, "I'm a photographer – it's in the job description."

"That why you're out here with a storm coming?"

Frank nodded, "Yeah. I like photographing lightning."

"Why?"

"A single bolt of lightning is only around for a split-second. If I can catch it on film, I can make it last forever. A single moment in time, preserved for eternity – you can't tell me that isn't a cool thought. I suppose you could argue that all pictures are like that. But… there's something special about lightning. It's so… beautiful. Natural. Powerful."

"Not to mention dangerous."

"That too." Frank finished her cigarette and flicked the butt out into the loose gravel and dirt that made up the overlook road Dean's car was parked on. "So why come here to mull over existential issues?"

"Why not? Besides, I like the colors the sunset gives the clouds and this was the best vantage point." Dean was a little surprised at himself for admitting that. He wasn't sure if Sammy even knew how much he liked watching sunsets.

"It is beautiful up here, isn't it?" Frank agreed. "However, it's going to rain on us if we don't get going. And with it being the middle of October, I'm not hopeful that it'll be a warm rain."

"Where are you parked? I could give you a lift to your car," Dean offered.

Frank chuckled nervously, "Would you believe me if I said I hiked out here this morning? And that I didn't realize I left my cell at home until about an hour ago?"

"You really are having a bad day."

"Story of my life, actually," Frank replied, a fake smile plastered on her face. "You hungry?"

"Dinner in exchange for a ride home?"

Frank nodded, "If you're amenable."

"Hop in," Dean climbed off the hood of the Impala. Frank scurried for the passenger door and the two of them slid inside. "So where am I going?"

"You know that little trailer park at the corner of 1806 and fourteen?" Dean nodded. "The little diner across the street from that."

Dean started the car and Nazareth blared from the speakers. Frank jumped a little at the sudden noise, and Dean reached over and turned it down a little. "Sorry. Forgot I had it cranked."

"Don't worry about it – it just startled me is all."

Dean turned the car around and began heading back to the main roads. "What kind of music you like?"

Frank shrugged and dug into her backpack, coming up with a camera case. "All kinds, really. Every type of music has its place," she motioned to the radio. "I have to say I approve – classic rock in a classic car. It fits. Listening to modern music in this would be… Sacrilege. Like listening to rap in a rusted-out pickup or Mozart in a lowrider. The sad part is that you're going to have to eventually switch the tape deck for a CD player. I haven't seen a cassette for sale at a store in almost six years."

"I noticed," Dean replied. "My brother wants me to install an MP3 player. I don't think I want to do that."

"Why not?" Frank asked, taking apart her Nikon and putting it in the case. "You can get something like ten hours of music on a single CD if they're MP3s."

"I know, I know. But if I did put in an MP3 player, then my brother would think I approve of his crappy taste in music. He's hijacked the computer, so any disks made would be made by him and I'll end up being forced to listen to whiny emo-rock."

"You live with your brother?" Frank snapped the camera case closed and slid it into the backpack.

Dean nodded, "Yeah."

"You two must be close. Me and Kelly… I wish we were closer, but she's ten years older than I am. I only ever get to see her during Christmas. She took off for Chicago when she graduated high school, met Ryan, and settled immediately into a little Suzy homemaker lifestyle. Hell, I talk more with their oldest than I do with them. Charley is… Damn, now I feel old. Charley is coming up on seventeen already."

"Don't take this the wrong way, but how old are you?" Dean asked.

Frank chuckled, "Um… I'm almost positive I'm older than you."

"No way."

"Yes way, I think. How old are you?"

"I'll be twenty-nine in January."

Frank smirked. "I got you beat by three years, Dean."

"You're thirty-two?" Dean let out a low whistle. "Damn. You still look like you're only nineteen or so."

She nodded, "Scary, I know. I still get carded for my cigs if I go to a store that doesn't know me. A year ago, I was in Austin and got thrown out of a bar because they thought my ID was a fake. On the upside, if this keeps on, I'll only look forty or so when I'm eighty. All-in-all, not a bad deal." Frank turned her head and took a look at Dean. "And I just said something that upset you. Whatever it was – I'm sorry."

Dean shook his head and tried to push the sudden melancholia away. "No, don't be. It's not your fault." I just don't like being reminded that there isn't a chance in Hell I'll get to see thirty myself.

As Dean made a left turn into the parking lot of a small diner – so like hundreds of others Dean had visited in his life that he could almost forget where he was and who he was talking to – Frank studied Dean's expression. "If you want to talk about whatever it is that's bugging you, I'll shut up and listen."

"You wouldn't believe me, even if I told you," he said, shutting the Impala off.

"Try me. You'd be surprised what I believe." At Dean's skeptical expression, Frank continued. "Look, I'm a freelance photojournalist. In the last ten years, I've been all over God's green earth. I've seen just about everything. Covered stories from the local bowling alley all the way to Afghanistan to the jungles of the Amazon basin and back. I've been shot twice – once in Afghanistan and once in South Africa – mugged four times, all in New York, and I even pissed off a shaman in Brazil and got a paralysis-dart in the neck. There's nothing you could say that I would immediately dismiss."

"This isn't normal weirdness."

Frank laughed, "Is there such a thing? Come on, I'm starving. Let's go in and get something to eat. I've got some photos I want you to see."

"Is that a pick-up line?" Dean asked with a teasing smirk.

Frank leaned across the seat and whispered in Dean's ear, "Honey, you may be adorable, but you just ain't my type." Frank bounced out of the car before Dean could reply.

Following Frank into the diner, Dean understood what she meant when she was greeted enthusiastically by a pretty brunette in a clingy pink sweater and tight jeans. She had a tag on her sweater that indicated she worked in the diner. "Frankie!" the woman gave Frank a hug. "You left your cell at home."

"I know I did. Lisa, this is Dean. Dean, Lisa. Dean gave me a lift back from West Shore. Hook him up with some food, yeah?"

Lisa gave Dean a perfunctory once-over and ignored the appreciative smile. "Thanks. You look like a real meat-and-potatoes guy. The only question that remains is coffee or cola?"

"Coffee," Dean supplied.

"Will do," Lisa said and sauntered away.

Frank hit Dean's shoulder with surprising force. "Quit leering at my girlfriend."

"Sorry," Dean said, following Frank to a two-person booth that had a good view of both the parking lot outside and the door to the kitchen. Frank opened up her backpack and pulled out a laptop computer. She plugged the power supply into an outlet that was wired into the side of the bench she was sitting on and booted it up.

"Showing off your work, hon?" Lisa reappeared with a coffee pot and two cups.

"Of course. Oh, before I forget, Danny called this morning, wanted to know if you could cover his shift next Friday."

Lisa nodded, "Think so. I'll call him later."

"Better get back to work before Mike kicks me out again," Frank smiled.

"I know. I really don't want to sit through that whole lecture again," Lisa ruffled Frank's hair and headed off to refill napkin dispensers and ketchup bottles.

"It's kinda dead in here, isn't it?" Dean commented, gesturing to the rest of the diner. They were the only customers.

Frank shrugged, "It's coming up on eight, so it's past the dinner rush, but it's not late enough for the bar crowd to start showing." The computer made a series of tones to indicate it had finished booting. Frank sipped at her coffee as she pulled up a couple of files. Angling the laptop so that Dean could see the screen, she said, "Go ahead and have a look. The first file is some of the pictures I've sold of the places I've been. The names tell the date and location. The second file is pictures I haven't sold – mainly because… Well, you'll see."

Dean pulled the computer around completely and glanced through the first file. It was a little odd, because he'd seen some of the photos before in magazines and newspapers. "You're part of the Associated Press?"

Frank nodded, "Guilty as charged. Lemme guess, you know some of those pics?"

"Yeah. This one in particular," Dean tilted the computer to show her which one he meant.

"Ah, yeah. Everyone knows that photo. If I'd known how popular an image it would become, I would have asked for more money." The photo was a well-known image of the wreckage of the World Trade Center on 9-11. "It was sheer dumb luck that I was in New York that day. My flight had been cancelled because some moronic son of a bitch got caught trying to smuggle a kilo of cocaine on board – I was supposed to be on my way to Australia. The next flight to Sydney wasn't for another three days, so I thought I'd look up one of my old college buddies. I was on my way to his loft when the planes hit."

"Damn," Dean whispered and went back to looking through the photos. He finished up the first file and started in on the second. There were a lot of images of storms. The one he liked the best was a photo of a bolt of lightning behind a particularly vivid rainbow. He had just managed to get into photos of something other than the weather when food arrived. He looked to his plate then up at Lisa and back. "Dude… You rock."

"I'm just good at what I do," Lisa replied. "Give a holler if you need anything."

"Will do," Dean said, digging into his onion-slathered steak and gravy-swamped mashed potatoes. There wasn't a speck of anything green on his plate.

"It never fails," Frank commented around a mouthful of fried pickle spear. "Bring a guy here and they immediately fall for Lisa."

Dean shrugged noncommittally and went back to browsing through Frank's photos between bites of his dinner. Now that he'd passed the collection of lightning, he went a little slower. Frank had pictures from all around the world. Clicking slowly through them, he saw that her claim of having seen the weirdest of the weird wasn't unsubstantiated. She had several photos of things Dean knew more about than he cared to recall. There were photos of ghosts, orbs, and auras. Unexplained shadows. People with the all-too-familiar white retinal flare, instead of the normal red. He was nearly done with his meal when he came across a series of photos dated from just over a year and a half earlier. The pictures were labeled as being from Afghanistan and showed a lanky black man lifting a rolled-over jeep off another soldier.

"What is it?" Frank asked, not liking the expression on Dean's face.

"I know that bastard," he replied, turning the computer so that Frank could see what he was looking at.

"Jake Talley? He was one of the soldiers in the unit I traveled with in Afghanistan. Nice kid, too."

Dean snorted, "He isn't that nice."

Frank frowned and finished off the last two bites of her burger and pickles. "What do you mean?"

Dean swallowed the last of his potatoes and washed it down with the mostly cold coffee. "You've seen some weird-ass shit, I get that, really, I do. But…"

"Don't tell me I won't believe you or else I'll kick your ass."

"You would, too, wouldn't you?" Dean smiled. He was really starting to like Frank.

"Come on, Dean. Everyone needs someone to dump on every now and then. Look at it this way – I don't really know you. You don't really know me. If you come across as sounding like a nut, we never have to see each other again."

Dean had to admit, she had a point. "Okay. You get your girl to get us some more coffee and I'll see how insane I can make you think I am."

10:12 pm, October 13, 2007
Singer Salvage Yard
Outside Pierre, South Dakota

"And so, after months of planning out what we'd thought was every possible way it could play out, the plan got fucked to Hell. On the second-to-last day of the winter holidays, Draco Malfoy proved me, Hermione, and Ron right. We shouldn't have trusted the little ferret's claims to want to break from his family's support of Riddle. I didn't find this out until just before I left Europe, but he'd been feeding information to the Death Eaters about Order plans. That bastard was responsible for setting up the ambush that killed Ron and thirteen other members of the Light." Remus reached over and rested a supporting hand on Harry's shoulder. Harry covered the werewolf's hand with his own. "Hermione lost it. Blamed me for what happened to Ron."

"That hardly seems fair," Sam commented.

"Fair or not, it didn't much matter. Part of the issue was that, ninety percent of the time, when witches and wizards fall in love, their magic binds them together. She'd just lost Ron and a big part of herself went with him. She needed someone to blame and I was handy. In all honesty, I blamed myself for a long time, too." Harry closed his eyes and swallowed hard against the lump that had formed in his throat, willing away the echoing remains of the emotions of the times he was explaining. "After classes were reinstated, just about the only person who still really talked to me was Ginny."

"She's Ron's little sister, right?" Sam asked.

Harry nodded, "Yeah…"

"Bull," Bobby cut in. "She was more than that."

Harry sighed and smiled a bittersweet smile, "You are far too perceptive for my peace of mind, Bobby, but you're right. Ginny was my girlfriend. At the time, we all thought that Draco had been one of the casualties of the ambush – that his father had kidnapped him – so when he showed up when I was talking with Ginny at the top of the Astronomy tower we weren't as vigilant as we should have been. He caught us by complete surprise. Disarmed us both, and had us bound and silenced before we could retaliate. He cursed Ginny… Used the fucking cruciatus. All it does is cause pain. Total, pure pain. He held it on her for too long. It broke her mind." Harry took a deep breath and let it out slowly, "It broke her mind and made me angry. I took off that night. Did all but paint a fucking target on my head. Got myself taken by the Death Eaters and the rest, as they say, is history."

"Which is Harry's way of saying that he doesn't recall the details of what happened after," Remus supplied. "Not that I blame him any. From the stories I've heard, any reasonably sane person would have blocked most of what happened from their conscious memories. We didn't know for sure that Voldemort hadn't been completely destroyed that night because he pulled the same disappearing trick he'd done the first time Harry broke his power. It wasn't until about three years ago that it became obvious, but by then Harry had fallen off the map."

"So, you're going to go back and finish things for good this time," Bobby said.

Harry nodded grimly. "I will. I really don't want to spend the rest of my life fighting this prick every ten years."

"I don't blame you."

"Don't blame who for what?" Dean asked, appearing in the doorway to the kitchen.

"Harry and Remus were just filling us in on what happened before he left Europe," Sam replied. Dean's looking better than he did when he left. I hope his drive helped him sort things out.

Dean nodded – he'd gotten a fuller explanation than Sam had when they first met Harry. "So, what's the plan, Stan?"

Harry shrugged, "Shoot first, ask questions later?"

Dean grinned, "I like the sound of that."

Sam looked at Bobby as though to say, 'What did I get myself into?' and 'See what I have to put up with?' Bobby merely grinned and shook his head a little. Sam interpreted the motion to mean, 'They're your brother and friend – better you than me.'

"I think," Remus said, taking a look at his pocket watch, "that we might want to consider turning in a little early. It's been a very long couple of days."

8:43 am, October 14, 2007
Singer Salvage Yard
Outside Pierre, South Dakota

"Dean!" Bobby yelled from the kitchen, "Come get this damn bow off my table!"

"Dude! Gimme a minute!" the reply from the bathroom on the second story was slightly muted by the sound of the shower running.

"You have any flour, Bobby?" Harry asked, rummaging around in the cabinets.

"Um… I have no idea. Whatever I got, it's all in there," he gestured in a vague motion to the cabinets over the stove.

Remus chuckled from the safety of the doorway, "You may as well give up, Bobby. When Harry gets it in his head to cook, all you can really do is get out of his way. Or, you could show me to the nearest grocer."

"Cinnamon, cinnamon, cinnamon… Bobby, where the bloody hell is your cinnamon?" Harry grumbled, his head hidden by a cupboard door.

"Do I look like I keep cinnamon on hand?" Bobby retorted.

"Hell," Harry slammed the cupboard door shut. "I'll be back in fifteen minutes." He spun on his heel and disappeared with a flat crack.

"While he's gone, you might want to make your coffee. When he gets back, he'll likely hex you if you get in his way," Remus' tone was light, but Bobby could tell he wasn't joking.

A/N2: I know this chapter really doesn't further the plot all that much, but exposition and set-up have to happen sometime. With luck, I'll be able to get one more chapter posted before Nano's over with, then I will have achieved the stated goal of 50K words in a single story for the month (I had the first 3K of this written before the first, and though I've written about 100K words in other stories – all original stuff, not fanfic – during the month, this one is the closest to actually reaching the Nano goal).

Reviews are the beat to which I write.