Sam and Dean returned almost fifteen minutes later, and by then Kevin and I had formed a slightly rickety agreement. Work together. Survive together. He filled me in on bits and pieces of what he was doing, what it meant to translate the tablet and how it would send demons back to hell, permanently. I couldn't help but agree. Those sons of bitches needed a permanent lockup.
So while he translated and kept busy, I would play guardian. Keep watch. Keep updated. Go for food and drinks. Keep the prophet alive. Research if the Winchesters called on me, because apparently they did call for information sometimes.
"It's a huge nuisance." Kevin had said. "They'll call while I'm trying to translate, asking about something or other or needing me to pretend to be someone sometimes. Fake FBI. Fake CIA. I'll look up what I need to know when I need it, but it takes time out of translating, and the sooner I have this done the sooner I can go back to being normal."
So I was the girl for the odd jobs, more or less.
When the Winchesters came back to me and Kevin talking at relative ease, though, they seemed shocked. We were discussing fan theories about Doctor Who.
"Nope, I still firmly believe that he loved Clara." I argued with the Prophet, crossing my arms. He'd finished his beer by then, and moved to grab a water of his own.
"Eleven married River, though." Kevin pointed out. "And kissed her. And actively looked forwards to seeing her and going on dates with her and traveling the universe with her."
"He did the same with Clara!" I took a large drink of my water, now certain he wasn't going to drug me.
"He loved Clara as a sister, but no more." Kevin conceded as the secret weird-as-hell knock rang out behind me. "Come in!" He shouted, not even looking away. At this point we'd moved away pages and pictures to pull out blank paper and pens to write out and explain parts of our arguments, and I was writing out five points as to why 11 had most definitely loved Clara more than a friend.
"Look!" I held up the paper, using my pen to point to different things I'd written down. "Do you see this? He gladly went in to his own time stream, something that should've killed him, to save her. That's number one!"
"He also made out with River that very same episode."
"The GHOST of River."
"That he kept locked away for himself."
"10 did that, not 11."
"What the hell are you two talking about?" Dean asked. Neither of us turned around to answer.
"Doctor Who."
"Well, whoever the hell the doctor with the ghosts thing is, stow it so we can eat." He ordered, plopping a bag of takeout on the table. "Kevin, burger for you." He pulled one out for him and tossed it easily. "And Kai, you didn't really specify what you wanted on your burger, so I had them put the stuff on the side."
"Thanks." I took it and the fixings out and put them beside me, for now. I could eat later. I turned towards the brothers, ready to ask my questions. "So when do I start my training?"
"Tomorrow." Sam replied. "I'll take you out for shooting practice while Dean stays in with Kevin."
"Can I learn to shoot, too?" Kevin asked hesitantly. Dean and Sam looked at him for a moment, almost feeling sad, before Dean shook his head.
"No, kid. I'm sorry. It's important that this gets translated." Dean told him. "Besides, remember, the sooner you're done, the sooner you're done."
"Alright." Kevin agreed resolutely, nodding his head. From there, he proceeded to absolutely devour the burger like it was the first food he had seen in a while. Even Sam and Dean watched, definitely impressed. I pushed mine and the fixings towards him a few moments later, and he gladly ate those without questioning it. When Sam looked at me curiously, I shrugged.
"There's leftover Chinese, remember?" I whispered, just quiet enough for them to hear, but not Kevin. They both looked at me like I was crazy, absolutely crazy.
Once the food was gone, it was decided that I was going to sleep in the boat on the spare sleeping bag, while the brothers took the car. It was late, almost ten, when the brothers left the boat with a joke on no funny business.
I excused myself to the bathroom a few moments later, brushing my teeth and doing the whole nine. I didn't really have clothes to change in to for sleeping, so I settled for sleeping in what I wore.
"Aren't you going to sleep?" I asked when I emerged. It was as if we'd never been here. Kevin's table was back to being littered with pages, and he was scribbling on them again. The only difference was no headphones this time.
"I will in a few hours." He answered. "Dean is right, I need to get this done."
I didn't like it, but I let out a small and hesitant OK. I'd made enough waves today in forcing the brothers out to get food after they'd been pretty awesome to me, and then afterwards not really eating it.
Huh.
I hadn't really eaten at all since this morning.
I thought about it, trying to decide if I was hungry, and learned that I wasn't.
I really wasn't hungry.
Alright. Fair enough.
I grabbed the sleeping bag and picked a spot on the floor near the door. Kevin stopped writing then, looking at me confused. "I'm supposed to guard." I pointed out. "Can't really do that if you're awake and I'm not near the door."
"Fine." Kevin muttered, turning back to the rock and his notes. All the lights were off, now, except for the lamp by him. I watched, for a moment, and saw how studious he was. Writing, writing, writing. Double checking and triple checking. Pushing himself away for a few moments to rub at his temples, take a deep breath, and then go back to writing.
"Did you go to college?" I asked quietly. I was actually surprised he heard me.
"No. Not really." He answered, not looking up. "I was supposed to go, but then I got tapped to be a prophet. Kind of screwed everything up for me."
"You finished high school?" I asked next. That was when he stopped, looking up.
"Didn't you?"
"No. Homeless for three years, remember?" I asked, sitting up straighter. "Didn't make it past freshman year."
"Why didn't you go back? Try to figure out something with the system?"
"They had black eyes." I answered. "And they scared me. Something in my gut told me that if I went back, I'd be dead."
"Oh."
Oh.
That was all he said, and I really couldn't blame him. We were in a similar situation, with demons after us and our families, but so many things were different. The answer to why for Kevin was obvious in all questions except why he got tapped to being a prophet. The answer to why for me was unknown in all questions except why I was here. He finished high school, almost went to college, had had a shot at a great normal life. I'd never really gotten to go to college, never finished high school. His mom was still alive. Mine had run off, and the rest of my family was dead.
"Did your mom help you study a lot?"
"Yeah." Kevin answered with a smile, turning back to his work. "She never really let me stop doing it. If I wasn't studying, I was prepping. If I wasn't prepping, I was practicing cello or for an academic competition or something. She helped me out as much as she could, and pushed me to keep doing better."
"Cool." I whispered, settling in to sleep sitting up.
"Did yours?" He asked. I winced, remembering the sting of a slap over the kind words I had grown up hearing. It was still so vivid in my mind, to this day… I don't think I'll ever remember any happy time I had with her over that sudden 180 that she'd pulled when she'd walked out. I don't think I'll ever remember anything better than that smug look of pure hatred on her face, followed by my brothers crying and my dad just… Standing there, completely stunned as she left.
"She used to." I answered quietly, trying so hard to remember when I was younger, when I was in first and second and part of third grade, and mom would help me with my homework while dad was at work. "I ended up taking care of myself more after my brothers were born, and then after she left taking care of my brothers while my dad was at work."
"Why did she leave?"
"I don't know." I felt the urge to change the subject, quickly. "What about your dad? I haven't heard you mention him once."
"He died when I was little." Kevin answered, very point-blank. I looked up, and he was still working away, scribbling and scribbling and scribbling. "I don't remember a lot about him."
"Oh." I thought about that. Was it better to have known your parents and lost them, or not known them at all? "Do you wish you'd known him?"
"I don't know." He shrugged. "Mom didn't really talk about him much. Wasn't for any bad reason, but he was dead and she didn't really want to hang on to a dead husband when she had a living son right in front of her, you know?"
"Yeah." I understood that. After mom had left, dad had done his best to shake himself out of it and focus on the children he did have instead of the wife who didn't even stick around long enough to sign divorce papers; I had focused on being a good female influence instead of focusing on the one that had left. "I guess we all learn to focus on what's important instead of what's not there anymore."
And as I looked up at him, I saw him working so hard and fervently on translating, trying to split his focus between me and the tablet. I saw him focusing on what was right there, in front of him, instead of what was missing. Once he finished the task in front of him, he would get her back. He just had to finish, first.
If Sam and Dean had that same focus, I wondered what was missing from them that they were working so hard to not focus on.
"Good night, Kevin." I said, sitting up for sleep. I'd slept like this enough times where it was actually a comfortable position.
"Good night, Kai." He said absent-mindedly, going back to his work. I watched him through slitted eyes for a while, writing and writing and scribbling out pieces and all the world, for just a moment, looking like what I would expect a normal college student to appear like as they studied for their finals.
This was his final, and he was going to finish it to find his mom and get her back.
I hoped that I could guard him with the same determination and focus so that maybe, just maybe, I'd get a small amount of peace and closure about what had happened.
I hoped I could be just as good of a person as all of them, if I was going to be a hunter like them.
