"I still can't believe he came with you, just like that." Claire said as she followed Dean out of the store and to the Impala where it sat next to a gas pump.
"I told you he would." Dean mumbled under his breath.
"I'm aware, love." She rolled her eyes as she sat on the trunk's hood.
"Hey, you want breakfast?" He called louder, this time speaking to Sam who sat in passenger seat with the door wide open as he rummaged through the box of cassette tapes.
Seeing the junk food his brother was holding up, Sam turned away. "No, thanks." He said in slight disgust. "So how'd you pay for that stuff? You and Dad still running credit card scams?"
"Oh yes, Sammy. Let's talk about our theft right outside the shop." Claire said sarcastically from where she was now in the backseat, rolling her eyes as she spoke.
"Yeah, well, Hunting ain't exactly a pro-ball career." Dean replied as he put the gas pump back to its holder. "Besides, all we do is apply. It's not our fault they send us the cards."
"Yeah?" Sam scoffed and swung his long legs back into the car as Dean walked around to get into the driver's seat. "And what names did you write on the application this time?"
"Uhh…" Dean tried to recall the names.
"Aframian." Claire recited helpfully.
"Burt Aframian and his son Hector." Dean completed with a smirk, dropping his goods onto the bench beside him. "Scored two cards out of the deal."
"Sounds about right." Sam laughed over the creak of Dean's door shutting before returning his attention to the box in his lap. "I swear, man. You gotta update your cassette tape collection."
"Why?" Both Claire and Dean said indignantly, having similar tastes in music.
"Well, for one, they're cassette tapes. And two: Black Sabbath? Motorhead? Metallica?"
"Respect the classics, Sammy." Claire huffed, throwing herself back against the seat to slouch with her arms crossed while Dean snatched the tape Sam held in his hand.
"It's the greatest hits of mullet rock." Sam concluded.
"Yeah…" Dean popped the tape into the dash. "House rules, Sammy.
"Driver picks the music, shotgun shuts his cakehole." Claire rhymed along in time with him.
"You know, Sammy's a chubby 12 year old. It's Sam, okay?" Sam said over the rumbling of the Impala as it roared to life and the opening guitar riff for ACDC's Back in Black began to play.
"Sorry, can't hear you. The music's too loud." Dean replied smugly.
"ACDC is never too loud." Claire declared, earning a smile from Dean as he pulled out of the gas station.
It was only a couple of minutes later when they were just outside of Jericho Sam hung up and shut his cellphone that he explained his findings from the phone call. "Alright, so there's no one matching Dad at the hospital or morgue. So that's something, I guess." He said sullenly.
"It's everything," Claire mumbled sleepily from the back seat, her head lolling slightly. "It means he's still alive." At some point she had begun to fall asleep as they drove along, resulting in the lowered volume of the music. The funny thing was, along with the aging as if she had never died, she somehow was able to sleep as well and felt disastrous without it she and Dean had discovered early on. Yet again, however, what peeved the both of them was that sure, she was behaving and reacting as though she were still alive, but didn't have a physical form. Of all things.
Nodding slightly in agreement, Dean looked ahead to where a bridge was blocked off by police tape and cars. "Hey, check it out." He said, bringing everyone's attention to the scene.
"What the…" This made Claire wide awake as she sat up to lean forward between the two brothers and look at the scene as the Impala pulled over to the side of the road.
The three studied the scene for a moment before Dean leaned across Sam to reach the glove compartment and open it up. Inside was a box along with a bunch of other things underneath a jumble of wires, leaving Sam curious as to what else his brother had stashed in there, but never got a good look as Dean quickly shut the compartment and straightened up, obviously not wanting his brother to see what he was hiding. Opening the tin box in his hands, he began to shift through the fake badges and identification cards, then, finally settling on one, smirked at Sam and got out of the car.
"Let's go." Was all he said.
Together, the three made their way down the road and onto the bridge where police were scouring the entire area, especially the deserted Volkswagen in the middle of the road. There, two cops talked as they studied the vehicle, their words reaching the Winchester's ears. "No sign of struggle. No footprints, no finger prints. Spotless. It's almost too clean." One of them said.
"So this kid, Troy," His companion started. "He's dating your daughter, isn't he?"
"Yeah."
"How's Amy doin?"
"She's puttin up missing posters downtown." Amy's father said sadly.
"There's a lead we could use." Claire stood on her tip toes to whisper in Dean's ear.
"You fellas had another one like this just last month, didn't you?" He stepped forward and spoke, Sam trailing close behind.
The officer who had been leaning into the passenger side stood up and appraised them with a look of surprise and suspicion. "And who are you?" He asked.
"Federal Marshals." Dean flashed the badge quickly with a hint of practise before putting it away.
At this the man's surprise turned to one of confusion. "You two are a little young for marshals, aren't you?" He asked, still retaining his suspicion.
"Ha, thanks. That's awfully kind of you." Dean brushed it off. With that he moved to the car. "You did have another one just like this, correct?"
"Yeah, that's right. About a mile up the road." The officer said, getting down to business. "There've been others before that."
"So this victim," Sam took his turn to speak. "You knew him?"
Nodding, the officer said "Town like this, everybody knows everybody."
"Any connection between the victims," Dean called as he circled the car, watching Claire as she appeared in the car and started a closer sweep of the interior. "Besides that they're all men?"
"No, not so far as we can tell."
"So what's the theory?" Sam asked, turning away from the officer and to the vehicle.
"Honestly, we don't know. Serial murder, kidnapping ring…" The befuddled officer listed off.
"Well that's the kind of crack police work I'd expect out of you guys." Dean said, earning a pointless slap on the arm from Claire, her hand passing through him, while Sam's stomping on his foot had an effective result.
"Thank you for your time." Sam smiled stiffly before they made their exit. "Gentlemen." He nodded to the men on site.
As they walked away, Dean lengthened his strides to catch up with Sam who was ahead of him, then smacking him upside the head when he was close enough. "Ow! What was that for?" Sam hissed in protest.
"Why you gotta step on my foot?" Dean argued.
"Why do you gotta talk to the police like that?" Sam retorted.
At this the oldest Winchester looked at the youngest in disbelief. "Whoah, cummon! He moved to stand in front of him, not allowing Sam to walk any further. "They don't really know what's going on. We're all alone on this. I mean if we're gonna find Dad, then we gotta get to the bottom of this ourselves."
"That doesn't excuse your behaviour, though." Claire mumbled from the side, biting her nails as her hair hung like a curtain in front of her face as she looked down.
Sam however, didn't answer, instead looking past Dean with wide eyes and coughing, making Dean turn around. Behind him stood the sheriff and two FBI agents who stared at them evidently unimpressed. "Can I help you boys?" The sheriff drawled.
"No, sir. We were just leaving." Dean replied. "Agent Mulder, Agent Scully." He said to the two agents as they walked past, earning a snort of laughter from Claire which made the corners of his mouth turn up faintly.
An hour after they drove into town and started their search for the Amy girl, Claire came running up to Dean from across street, her eyes wide. "I just saw a girl down there putting up posters for Troy." She pointed down the street, having gone to scout ahead for him.
Dean tipped his head the slightest fraction to acknowledge her and was about to speak up when Sam beat him to it. "Aright, if we don't find her by the next couple streets, I say we take a break and try again later."
Giving him a dirty look, Dean was about to rebuttal this statement when Claire piped up. "There, by the movie theatre." She pointed.
"I'll bet you that's her." He pointed to a girl wearing a dark brown fringed jacket attaching a poster to the bricks of the building in front of her, his words holding an I told you so tone to them.
"Yeah." Sam's was sullen.
"Play nice boys." Claire mumbled under his breath.
"You must be Amy." Dean got to straight to the point as they approached the girl's side.
At the sound of her name, Amy spared them a glance.
"Yeah, Troy told us about you. We're his uncles. I'm Dean, this is Sammy." When Dean introduced Sam as Sammy, both Claire and Sam looked at him and smiled slightly while shaking their heads, remembering Sam's word's from earlier.
Amy looked at them in confusion before turning away to continue putting up her posters. "He never mentioned you to me."
"Well, that's Troy, I guess. We're not around much, we're up in Modesto."
"So, we're looking for him too, and we're kinda askin around." Sam beat around his brother, tired of the cover story and wanting to get to the point.
"Hey, are you okay?" A girl her age approached Amy and put a comforting hand on her arm.
"Yeah." Amy said softly.
"You mind if we ask you a couple questions?"
Her eyes darting between the two brothers, Amy nodded slowly. "Sure. There's a place we could sit and talk just up ahead."
"Sound's great." Sam nodded, gesturing for her to lead the way. With her friend, the two girls lead the boys to a diner where they sat at opposite sides of the booth, silent until they were all seated. "So what happened that night?" He asked, leaning forward with interest.
"I was on the phone with Troy. He was driving home." She explained after the drinks were served to them. "He said he would call me right back. And, uh... he never did."
"He didn't say anything strange? Or out of the ordinary?" Sam asked gently.
"No. Nothing I can remember." She shook her head.
There was an awkward pause of silence before Sam glanced down. "I like your necklace." He said, trying to make conversation.
Picking up the charm hanging off the leather cord, Amy smiled slightly. "Troy gave it to me." She laughed. "Mostly to scare my parents with all that devil stuff."
The boys smiled at this, Claire giving a small laugh as well. "Actually, it means just the opposite. A pentagram is protection against evil." Sam explained. "Real powerful. I mean if you believe in that kind of thing." He was quick to add.
"Okay. Thank you, Unsolved Mysteries." Dean said sarcastically, straightening up in his seat. "Here's the deal, ladies. The way Troy disappeared… something's not right. So if you've heard anything…" He left them hanging. However, when he noticed the two girls looking between each other uncertainly, it caught his attention. "What is it?" He was quick to ask.
"Well, it's just..." Amy's friend began. "I mean, with all these guys going missing, people talk."
"What do they talk about?" Sam and Dean said simultaneously, making Claire smirk to herself.
"It's kind of this local legend."
"Bingo." Claire breathed, perking up.
"This one girl, she got murdered out on Centennial, like, decades ago. Well, supposedly she's still out there. She hitchhikes. And whoever picks her up, well, they disappear forever."
After leaving Amy and her friend with a thank you, Sam and Dean were quick to make their way to the local library, crowding in front of a slow computer and pulling up the town's newspaper online database. Following a silent squabble for control over the computer, Dean knocked Sam to the side and immediately began typing into the search bar: Female Murder Hitchhiking. His search however, yielded no results.
"Try adding Centennial." Claire suggested, her quiet words filling his ear as she bent over his shoulder to watch.
Deleting the word hitchhiking from his search, Dean took her advice and added Centennial Hitchhiking to the bar and attempted the search again. Once more, however, there were no results.
"Let me try." Sam suggested, reaching for the mouse.
"Got it." Dean said in annoyance, slapping his hand away.
Sam however, was unwilling to back down and pushed his brother's chair away from the computer, making Claire jump out of the way in surprise as the younger Winchester wheeled himself in front of the computer.
"Dude!" Dean exclaimed in protest, punching Sam's arm. "You're such a control freak."
"So angry spirits are born out of violent deaths, right?" Sam squinted at the search bar.
"Yeah." Dean deadpanned.
"But maybe it wasn't murder."
At this suggestion, Claire nodded. "Things are always lost by word of mouth." She mumbled as she watched Sam replace Murder with Suicide, the simple change bringing up a single result.
"This was 1981." Sam cited as he opened the link. "Constance Welch, twenty-four years old, jumps off Sylvania Bridge. Drowns in the river."
"Say why she did it?" Dean asked.
"Yeah…" Sam trailed off as he continued to read the article.
Waiting for his brother to answer, Dean leaned forwards to read as well. "Why?"
"An hour before they found her, she calls 911. Her two little kids are in the bathtub. She leaves them alone for a minute, and when she comes back, they aren't breathing."
"The poor babies." Claire breathed sadly as she too scanned the screen.
"Both die." Sam concludes.
Humming thoughtfully, Dean nodded.
"Our babies were gone, and Constance just couldn't bear it. Said husband Joseph Welch." The caption under the picture of Constance's husband read, Sam narrating it aloud.
"That bridge look familiar to you?" Dean asked, studying the images from the investigation.
"In comes Troy." Claire declared, straightening up.
A/N: Not much here, but it's something to move ahead, right? I have lots for when I can post season 10, and I think that's the part I love, and hopefully, all of you will love too. X3 I'm hoping to do more over my break for this story, but I'm also entering a genre film contest, so we'll see what I get done. :) As always, thanks for your time and leave me with your thoughts.
-B