"What the hell are we doing here?" Dean asks, looking up at the old, immaculate hotel on 55th Street in New York City.
"Getting our help," Sammy explain quickly, backpack still slung over his shoulder as he peers into the front doors of the St. Regis Hotel. "A specialist. She's in there."
"She?" Sam questions.
"Yeah. Her name's Rowena," Sammy says, the disdain in his voice obvious.
"Rowena?" Dean echoes with confused dislike. "What the hell kinda name is that?"
"It was popular in the seventeenth century," Sammy remarks offhandedly, eyes still observing the building while internally planning. The way he says it makes it clear he's a wealth of information and that he's got a bit of his uncle, Sam, in him. "I'm gonna go out back and look for another way in. You guys take the front."
"Whoa!" Dean stops him, grabbing his shoulder and pulling him back when he tries to walk away. "Alone?"
"Dad…."
"Don't dad me," Dean bitches right away, falling into the role of father-with-an-adult-son all too easily. "If this chick can help us with a knight of Hell then I'm assuming she's pretty powerful."
"She is." Sammy shrugs.
"So, maybe going in alone wouldn't be such a good idea," Sam adds in, backing Dean up as usual.
Sammy sighs. He's getting sick of this. "Guys, look… you're good at what you do. Probably the best for your time. But things have changed in the past twenty years. I know a whole lot more than you both do. It's not a diss on you. It's just the facts. I can handle this alone."
"Sammy…."
"Don't Sammy me," Sammy smirks at his dad. "You saw what I did to that hoard of demons at the farmhouse. That was nothing. I'm fine. You two watch each other's' backs and I'll catch up to you."
Again, Sammy makes a move to leave but he's stopped.
"Wait," Sam rolls his eyes a bit as he side-steps Sammy and blocks him. "You mind sharing the plan first?"
Nodding, Sammy pauses. "We just need to talk to her."
"You want us to just tell some rich bitch in a five-star joint that we need her help killing a Knight of Hell?" Dean questions with doubt. "Yeah, I'm sure that'll go well."
"Stop… not kill," Sammy says while looking away from his family.
"You think we can save Lizzy still?" Sam asks his nephew.
Sammy doesn't answer. He knows the chances are slim but he has to hope. He has to or else this whole thing has been for nothing to him personally.
"There's a good chance that we're not gonna be able to save Lizzy," Sam spells it out, looking at Dean also. "We all need to understand that."
Neither answer.
"Guys. We need to do what we have to…."
"She's all I got left!" Sammy reminds his uncle. "All I got left is saving mom and… bringing her home." His voice grows quiet at the end, the emotions of everything still strong and crippling.
The Sam's have a stare-off for a moment before the elder speaks up. "We will try to save her. Try. There's no promise that it can happen though and you both need to be prepared for however this thing goes down." He isn't okay with it himself but someone needs to focus and accept fate.
Sammy can't deal with this now. "Whatever. She's in room 729. Meet me up there." He takes off running down the side alley.
"Great," Dean laments, looking around the busy New York streets and then back into the posh hotel lobby. He washes a hand down his face in frustration.
"So… what? We just walk in and head to the room?" Sam asks out loud what he's wondering.
"Yeah, and knock on the door and say, 'hey, we need your help with a Knight of Hell whoever-you-are'," Dean complains. "I mean, I guess."
Sam nods, feeling uncomfortable with this plan already. He then observes the people moving about in the upscale lobby and then looks down at himself. A hand pressed to the breast pocket of his torn, old canvas jacket and he knows this won't work. "We can't just walk in there."
"Why not?" Dean wonders.
"Look at us. We'd stick out like…."
"A hooker at a convent," Dean finishes for him. "Damn it. Fed suits?"
"Are they in the trunk?" Sam asks.
"Never took 'em out from the last case."
"Alright, let's go."
Suits on, Dean and Sam walk into the lobby with confidence. Their dad always taught them that if you act like you belong there, then you belong there. It's how a hunter fits in wherever the case takes them.
No one spares them a second look that they notice so they easily make their way to the lobby elevators. Pushing the up arrow, they stand and wait. Neither speak. They went over what they could at the car while changing. They're just going to pretext the specialist like they always do, nothing new.
Doors opening, they get into the elevator. Sam politely holds the door for two women running in their heels towards them and they get in.
"Thanks," the dark-haired woman, dressed in a couture dress and mink coat, tells him. She looks up at his height and smiles wider when she sees his face.
"Welcome," Sam nods once and steps back. The two women stand side by side, facing the gold reflective doors, the brothers behind them.
When the bell rings, indicating they elevator car has hit the seventh floor, the doors slide open. Dean smiles at the upper-class women.
"Excuse us," he winks and steps past them when they make room. Sam follows.
They hear the doors close behind them as they make their way down the long hall. Looking at the numbers on the room doors as they pass, Sam points ahead. "729 should be right up there."
The second they get to the door hit. The invisible force blows them into the hallway wall opposite room number 729. Backs slamming hard into the solid surface, both groan with pain as they remain pinned there.
"And where do you two think you're going?" they hear a feminine voice ask. Turning to the side, they see the two women from the elevator walking casually towards them.
"Ugh," Sam exhales hard as he tries to overcome the hit. "A friend."
"In room 729?" the woman with the mink coat asks. "I doubt that."
"We need to speak with her," Dean explains through a struggling voice, still pinned to the wall. "We need her help."
After a quick beat of silence both women start to laugh.
"Help you?" mink coat giggles patronizingly. "Rowena doesn't just help men."
"But… she's a specialist…" Sam tries to explain as he and Dean start to get very concerned about their situation but gets cut off.
"You could say that," one of the women nods as she waves her hand through the air.
Dean and Sam are let free, both released from the force keeping them against the wall.
Mink coat walks for room 729 and turns the doorknob. She pushes the door open and grins.
"Come on in, lads," a lovely voice, thick with a Scottish accent, calls out from inside. "Let me see who it is that came looking for me."
With wrinkled brows and confusion in their expressions, Sam and Dean look to one another before walking slowly and cautiously to the door.
The ornate room, the kind of room that neither Winchester assumed they'd ever step foot into, is huge with multiple rooms. Sitting on the upholstered couch, classical music softly playing in the background, is a petite red-headed woman. Her long, curled hair is half the size of her. The long, dark blue dress with long sleeves that hugs her perfectly looks expensive. The casual way she sips her tea, the china and sterling tea set places on the coffee table for her, makes her look like she absolutely belongs within the high society situation she's in.
"Well," she smiles wide, her lined eyes taking in the two men in front of her. "Aren't you two just the dapper pair. A girl could feel down right special getting a visit from the likes of you two."
"Are you Rowena?" Dean asks, jeebs running down his spine. This whole thing is jacked. It's unsettling as hell and just from the vibe he gets from Sam next to him he knows he's not alone in thinking it.
"Ah, you've heard of me," she smiles a little wider. "I'm flattered."
"We were sent here to ask for your help," Sam gets right down to it, hoping for a good outcome but not exactly expecting it.
"My word, the confidence on this one," she says with impressed glee as she stands up and walks a little closer. "What makes you think I want to help you, hm?"
Neither know exactly what to say to that.
"Boys, I'm guessing you must not know who I am since you're just walking in here like you aren't in the presence of greatness." Rowena's smile is proud yet kind… but the feeling she's giving off is frightening. "Who is it that told you to come and so rudely ask for my assistance?"
Again, they both say silent.
"I think we're going to have to try that one again, yes?" she asks lightly. She says something in a language the hunters have never heard before and in a blink, they're invisibly yanked up to the ceiling, once more having their backs slam into a hard, flat surface.
Suspended in the air, pinned to the ceiling, Dean's heart rate soars. Flashes of his mother appear in his mind and the sheer fright nearly topples him before he can regain control.
"Now, the last men I had up on the ceiling of my hotel room… well, let's just say they didn't walk out on their own two feet," Rowena tells them, her voice never straying from the lighthearted tone she's had the entire time. Her eyes darken. "Who sent you to me?"
"I did."
The whole room turns to look at whoever just walked in.
Sammy stands in the doorway, grinning. He holds a rounded, gold sphere in his hand, it resting in his palm, and he speaks a few words. Once again, the language sounds unfamiliar to the hunters. The sphere lights up and a blue glow envelopes the room. A sound, high pitched and almost piecing, emanates from the weapon.
Immediately everything stops. The force holding Sam and Dean to the ceiling disappears and the two fall from the high height, landing on their stomachs with groans of pain.
"What… what is that thing!?" Rowena yells out over the sound, her feet glued in place.
Sammy speaks a few more foreign words and the sphere stops. The room is set back to its calm previous state.
"It's the future of witch hunting," Sammy grins wide, pulling his backpack from behind him and stowing the item away. He them pulls out a contraption that looks intimidating as all hell.
"Witch!?" Dean tries to shout over the pain in his ribs.
"She's a friggin' witch?" Sam follows up with, huffing as he's trying to catch his breath after the wind has been knocked out of him.
"Yep… the best in the world, actually," Sammy answers, walking for Rowena triumphantly with a little bounce in his step.
"It's always nice to be appreciated," Rowena answers with a little sarcasm. She sees the contraption in his hand. The metal loop with terrifying spikes makes her nauseous with fear. "You go and get that away from me." She points at it.
Sammy just grins devilishly.
"I don't know who you are but trust me, laddie. You don't want to be on my bad side," she warns strongly. "You put that on me and the second I'm free you will wish for death!"
"Eh, I think I'll be fine," Sammy brushes it off and brings the loop over her head, locking it in place around her neck. "Comfy?"
"Screw you," Rowena spits out with eyes glaring with hatred at him.
"Hm, you know, with the witch catcher on… I could make you do that," Sammy gives her a snide warning.
"Pervert!" Rowena yells at him.
"Okay…" Dean huffs out, slowly getting to his feet as the sharp pain in his side flairs up. Sam follows him. They both look at what's happening. Two hench-witches frozen in place and one with a medieval device around her neck. "What the hell is going on here? She's a witch?"
"Former head of the Grand Coven," Sammy nods with pride. "She's the real deal. Real magic. Real power."
"And you've just put a leash on a great white, you wee little man," Rowena nearly growls.
"Oh, relax," Sammy rolls his eyes, walking away from her. He pulls out an old handgun, one that makes Dean do a double take. It's his. The formally shining silver metal is now tarnished but he'd know the unique carvings and ivory handle of his best and most trusted weapon anywhere. Time travel sucks. "And trust me… there ain't nothing wee about me." He winks at Rowena.
"Oh surprise, surprise. A man bragging about the hidden talents in his pants," Rowena bitches. "I'd bet my weight in gold that you have nothing to write home about down there…."
"Cluck like a chicken," Sammy asks with a gleeful tone.
They all watch as Rowena starts to make chicken sounds every time she tries to talk.
"Ha! It works!" Sammy delights when smiling at his dad and uncle.
They glare back.
"Oh, come on!" Sammy gets upset. "You have to admit, that's cool as shit." He points at Rowena's clucking face, it staring Sammy down with pure hatred.
Dean considers it for a second. "Huh. It is pretty cool," he admits, huffing a quick laugh before groaning in pain, his ribs killing him.
"They broken?" Sam quietly asks next to him.
"At least one," Dean nods, bummed out by his luck.
Rowena's voice starts clucking again as she attempts to speak to them in a panic.
"Oh, my God! Shut up!" Sammy annoys to her. Rowena tries to yell something back at him but her voice is gone. Just her mouth moves, no sound produced. "Shit. The witch catcher actually works. Pick your nose."
Rowena glares with fury at him as she tries to fight against her own body. No matter how hard she tries her hand, index finger extended, comes to her face. She inserts her finger in her nose.
"Ha! Awesome," Sammy cracks up.
"What, we came all this way to piss off a grand coven witch by making her a puppet?" Sam asks, getting impatient. "What's the point of all this?"
"The puppet thing is just a bonus," Sammy assures him, grabbing his backpack and slinging it over his shoulder. "We need her to deal with the knight of hell."
Rowena's eye bug out of her head with fear. She starts shaking her head no back and forth violently with terror when she hears knight of hell.
"Sorry, Glinda… but we need you," Sammy tells her, not willing to let her try and dissuade him. "Alright, ready to go?"
Dean's appalled as he looks at his grown son's grinning face. "You sent us in here as a distraction."
Sammy's grin becomes a patronizing one as he rolls his eyes. "No shit, Sherlock. Needed to catch her off guard or else catching her wasn't gonna happen."
"I broke a rib!" Dean yells, wincing with the sharp stab.
Sammy sighs impatiently and marches for his dad. He presses a hand into his side to check.
"Ow!" Dean gets pissed at the intrusion.
"Just one. Not that bad a break either. You'll live." Sammy walks back to Rowena and grabs the leather length attached to the catcher, using it like a leash for his captor. "You guys get the car and meet me out back. Go quick."
"What about them?" Sam asks, pointing to the two witches still standing stock still by the doorway.
Sammy glances at them, having forgotten about them. "Oh, yeah." He then without issue raises his handgun and fires twice, hitting each witch in the forehead with dead accuracy. The two dead bodies hit the floor and he nods, tucking his gun into the back of his jeans.
Dean and Sam stand horrified by what they just saw.
"Okay, problem solved. Go get the car!" Sammy points at them and heads for the door. "Come on, bitch."
Watching Sammy yank Rowena out of the hotel room, their feet just missing the growing pools of blood on the carpet, Dean and Sam are stunned. The witches look like people, hell… they are people. And Sammy wasted them without a care, a thought, or even a single emotion. It was all too easy.
"We gotta go," Sam quietly says, starting for the door as he knows they do need to move quickly before authorities are called in.
And Dean follows along, holding his side and trying to process who his son becomes in the future…
He's everything he hoped Sammy wouldn't be.
"He just shot 'em," Dean says with serious, deep-rooted concern and a touch of fright as he pulls out of the parking garage they stowed the Impala in. "Didn't even think about it."
Sam shrugs, making a face. "They were witches…."
"You and I both know witches ain't typical monsters," Dean tells his brother. "They're human."
"Using magic for evil," Sam plays back despite feeling the same concern and fear over Sammy as Dean is.
Dean sighs. "It's not just that they were witches, Sam," Dean complains, swiping his credit card at the pay station, then watching the arm move up and let them out onto the streets of New York City again. "You saw him. He didn't flinch. He didn't… he wasn't affected at all."
"Honestly? It was a little like me… when I was soulless," Sam concurs completely. He's seen that look of cold, uncaring determination. Sammy didn't feel a thing when he killed the two henchwomen. It wasn't a problem or a burden to him. It was nothing. Like eating a sandwich or farting. It's all the same.
"God, you don't think…"
"No way. He has a soul," Sam assures his brother.
"How can you be sure?" Dean airs his inner fear.
"You saw him when he saw Lizzy," Sam quickly explains as they head down a side street towards the hotel alley. "He was an emotional mess. He has a soul. He feels things… just not all things." He shrugs.
Turning a corner, they both see Sammy standing by a back door, a dumpster to his left, with a pissed off witch behind him. The witch-catcher is still on. So is her face a pure anger.
"God, what the fuck happened to him?" Dean wonders aloud, not looking for an actual answer as he pulls up and stops the car. He gets that with the history Sammy shared that his son could easily be this uncaring and cold. But still, it's disturbing to see firsthand.
"Get in," Sammy says after opening the passenger side backdoor. He pushes Rowena in like she's an arrested felon, not the most powerful witch on the planet.
"Ugh!" she disgusts when she falls hard into the backseat. "Is that any way to treat a lady?" She scoots over as Sammy shoves his way in next to her.
"Find me a lady and I'll tell ya," he smirks.
Fire in her eyes, Rowena catches Dean's attention in the rearview mirror. "Nice work you done here with this one, dad. Quite the proper manners."
"Shut up, bitch," Dean and Sammy say at the exact same time.
Rowena rolls her eyes. "Well, now I guess I can see why he's such a brute."
"How about you don't talk until I say you can, hm?" Sammy says all smartass.
Trying to speak, Rowena can't. Nothing comes out.
"Awesome," Sammy smiles and sighs. "Okay, let's get back before Lizzy finds them."
Dean shudders. Whether it from the fact that Sammy used his mother's first name or that he's concerned about the knight of hell catching up to his family before they can get back… he's not sure.
"I'm calling to check on them," he tells the groups, pulling out his phone as she starts to drive back to his family in hiding.