EPOV

Things were... tense. That was blatantly obvious. Dean and Sam were not exactly the type of guys to speak their feelings. So as the last couple of weeks had gone by Sam was avidly trying to find a way to save Dean, but Dean was determined to find Bela, and I'd been somewhat stuck in the middle.

Most of me wanted to leave Bela alone and focus on saving Dean. But at the same time, I was getting less and less hopeful that we would find some kind of free pass that might save his ass. Yes, I wanted a way. But it really felt like there might not be one.

I was sitting on a bench next to Dean, the two of us enjoying a hotdog each while he was on the phone. Movement caught my eye as Sam headed over towards our bench.

"Yep. I got it. Okay, bye," Dean spoke into the phone before hanging up.

I reached over for a can of soda, tossing it to Sam who effortlessly caught it. We both smiled at each other as Dean stood and shoved the last of his food in his mouth before speaking again.

"So?" he asked his brother, with a mouth full of food.

Sam sighed. "So, the professor doesn't know crap."

"Shocking." Dean's sarcasm was so obvious. He walked past his brother, ready to get out of there. "Pack your panties, we're hitting the road," he told both Sam and I.

Sam frowned, turning to watch his brother with a confused look on his face. "What? What's up?"

"That was Bobby," Dean explained, stopping to turn to face us. "Some banker guy blew his head off in Ohio and he thinks there's a spirit involved."

"So, you two were talking a case?" Sam asked.

"No, we were actually talking about our feelings. And then our favourite boy bands." Dean was not holding back the attitude today. "Yeah, we were talking a case!"

I quickly stood and moved to the brothers, hoping to get the conversation on track before they started arguing… again. "So, what are we looking at? Spirit?

Dean eventually nodded as he dragged his gaze from Sam to me. "Yeah, the banker was talking about some sort of electrical problems at his pad for like a week. Phone was going haywire, computer was flipping on and off."

Sam still didn't look too fond about this idea. "Dean, we're already on a case."

"Whose?"

"Yours."

"Right. Yeah. Well, you coulda fooled me." Dean turned to leave again.

"What the hell else have we been doing lately other than trying to break your deal?" Sam called to him, causing Dean to stop and face us again.

"Chasing our tails, that's what. Sam, we've talked to every professor, witch, soothsayer and two-bit carny act in the lower 48. Nobody knows squat! And we can't find Bela, we can't find the Colt. So, until we actually find something, I'd like to do my job."

"Well there's one thing we haven't tried yet," Sam started.

But Dean wasn't having any of it. "Sam, no."

"We should summon Ruby," Sam insisted.

Dean shook his head at him. "I'm not gonna have this fight with you."

"She said she knows how to save you."

"Well, she can't."

"Oh really, you know that for sure?"

"I do." Dean really did seem sure.

Sam was sceptical. "How?"

"Because she told me, okay!"

Both Sam and I paused as we looked to Dean.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't believe Ruby. Part of me had known not to believe her, but then the other part of me had gripped on to a single sliver of possibility. If I had to make a deal with a demon, or owe her a favour, no matter what the strings attached might have been, I was willing to do it all to save Dean's life.

Strange, isn't it? After all these years, despising the fact my mum had made a deal to save me that ended in her death. Then Dean had made the deal and I'd been so mad with him. Yet here I was, and even though I'd probably never say the words out loud, I was willing to do what they'd done, in order to save Dean.

Sam was the first to break the short silence that had fallen over the three of us. "What?"

"She told me. Flat out. She can't save me, nobody can."

"And you just somehow neglected to mention this to us?" Sam gestured to me and then himself.

Dean gave a slight shrug. "Well, I really don't care what that bitch thinks and neither should you, so..." He turned to leave.

"So, what, now you're keeping secrets from me, Dean?"

"You really wanna talk about who's keeping secrets from who?" Dean still hadn't forgiven Sam for not telling us about Lilith.

I stood there, awkwardly trying not to look at the brothers as they stared at each other, angry, hurt, betrayed. All these feelings and so much more, just bubbling at the surface. But neither of them were willing to say how they felt, not really.

Goddamn Winchesters.

Sam moved first, walking to pass Dean without saying another word.

Before he could get far, Dean called out to him, "Now where you going?"

"Guess I'm going to Ohio."

Like I said, things have been tense.

DPOV

"I found him there." Mrs Waters, the wife of the victim, directed us to the study in her large house.

"Why don't you tell us everything you saw, Mrs Waters."

She turned to me, exasperated. "You mean beside my dead husband?"

"Just everything else you saw. Please," Sam told her.

Mrs Waters sighed, looking around the room. "Blood. Everywhere. The phone was ripped from the wall, his favourite scotch on the desk, what else could you possibly want to know?"

"The phone was ripped from the wall?" Liz asked, hands in the pockets of her long coat. "Do you know why?

"I don't know." Mrs Waters shook her head.

"You mind if I take a look?" Sam gestured to the desk.

With a nod from Mrs Waters, he walked over as she continued to talk to Liz and myself. "I already went over this with the other detectives."

"We'll be out of your hair in no time, ma'am," I assured her.

Sam was by the phone, pressing a few buttons before looking over to Mrs Waters. "Ma'am, what time did your husband die?"

Mrs Waters sighed again, as if this were all a big inconvenience to her. "Sometime after eleven."

I looked over to Sam who gestured to the phone display, having found something on it. Turning back to Mrs Waters, I asked, "What about strange phone calls? Receive any of those lately, weird interference, static, anything like that?"

"No," she answered defensively. I simply raised an eyebrow to her. "No!" she insisted, more harshly this time.

"Mrs Waters, withholding information from the police is a capital offence," I warned.

Sam noisily cleared his throat. I looked over to see both him and Liz lightly shaking their head at me, silently explaining that that was wrong.

I rolled my eyes, speaking under my breath. "In some parts of the world I'm sure."

Mrs Waters sighed once more. "A couple of weeks ago, uh... there was this..."

"This what?" I pressed.

"I woke up one morning, I heard Ben in his study. I thought he was talking to a woman."

"What made you think that?" Sam asked.

"Because he kept calling her Linda," Mrs Waters answered, going on. "The thing is, I picked up the other line and nobody was there, Ben was talking to nobody."

Liz moved to stand next to me, looking to the widow. "There was nothing?"

Mrs Waters nodded. "Just static."

"Did you ever speak to your husband about this phone call?"

"No. I should have but...no."

"Did he ever say who Linda was?"

Mrs Waters was getting upset with all of Liz's questions. "What difference does it make, there was nobody on the other end!" she snapped, making it clear we weren't getting any more out of her.

EPOV

I sat on Dean's bed, leaning against the headboard while he sat at the foot, on his computer. Sam was at the table. We were all trying to find information on the case, which was leaving us all stewing in a silence that was not as comfortable as it usually was.

Being on the road with the guys, it meant we'd all built a bond, a connection. They may not care about me like they did each other- they were brothers after all- but we were all still very close. So, when things got tough and we were left in situations like this- meaning the awkwardness- it literally made me feel sick.

I loved the brothers. They were family. Seeing them at odds to even the slightest degree, it didn't sit right with me.

"Linda's a babe. Or, was."

Sam sat up straighter, turning to his brother. "Did you find her?"

"Yeah, Linda Bateman. She and Ben Waters were high school sweethearts."

Moving down the bed, I knelt behind Dean, looking over his shoulders to the screen. "You know what happened to her?"

"Drunk driver hit them head on. Ben walked away."

"So, what then? Dead flame calls to chat?" Sam asked, the case seeming closed.

But Dean simply shook his head. "You would think, but Linda was cremated. So, why's she still floating around?"

Sam sighed. "You got me."

Dean pulled away from the computer, leaning back into me absentmindedly as he looked over at his brother. "What about that, uh, caller ID?"

"Turns out, it's a phone number."

I frowned, having seen what was on the phone display. "I've never seen a phone number with letters, Sam."

"Yeah, 'cause it's about a century old, back from when phones had cranks," he explained.

"So why use that number to reach out and touch someone?" Dean had a good point.

Sam shrugged. "Got me there too, but we should put a trace on it."

Dean shook his head. "Well how the hell are we going to put a trace on something that's over a hundred years old?"

DPOV

Sam, Liz and I followed Clark, a suited man that works at the phone company, as he led us down some hallways.

"We don't get many folks from HQ down here," he noted, smiling politely at us.

"Yes, well the main office mentioned that there would be a lunch." I grinned lightly, until I saw Sam give me a disapproving look. I simply shrugged as Clark responded.

"Well I'm sure we can arrange something. The man you wanna be speaking to is right this-" He stopped once he noticed Sam shooing a fly away. "I know, sorry. We've got something of a hygiene issue down here if you ask me." Continuing to walk, he entered a room filled with computers, a man sitting in the middle of it all. "Stewie? What did I tell you about keeping this place clean?"

Stewie sat at a large console with multiple screens and keyboards. Empty and half eaten packets off food littered the place, explaining the flies and smell

Stewie jumped at the sound of Clark's voice before he started to desperately try to close down the many screens in front of him, which all showed various advertisements for porn sites. "Spam mail..." He clicked quickly. "Spam mail..."

"Stewie Myers. Mr Campbell. Mr Raimi. Miss Williams," Clark introduced.

Still facing the computers, Stewie continued to fail at getting rid of the porn. "I don't know how all this got here..."

Reaching forward, Clark flicked the back of Stewie's head, making the guy jump again. "From headquarters."

Spinning around in his chair, Stewie quickly crossed his legs and placed his hands together on his lap, trying to hide the obvious lump in his pants. Liz shifted next to me, looking everywhere but at the guy, clearly uncomfortable.

It was both amusing and annoying to me. Knowing how much she wanted to leave but couldn't. But at the same time, I didn't want her to have to see this.

"Give them whatever they need," Clark told Stewie before he began to leave.

I nodded to him as he left. "Thank you."

"So..." Stewie started, trying to play it cool. "Can I help you?"

I checked to make sure Clark was gone before I gestured to the computers, a grin on my face. "Is that, ah, ?"

"No," Stewie answered too quickly.

As if on cue, a woman on the screen started speaking. "Oh, me so horny." A shot of the screen showed that it was in fact .

Turning back to the computer, Stewie tried to get rid of the image again. "Maybe."

"A word to the wise? Platinum membership? Worth every penny." I nodded knowingly.

Sam shook his head. "Right, anyway. We're here to trace a number?" He handed Stewie a piece of paper.

Stewie took one look at it, and was instantly confused. "Where did you get this?"

"Off caller ID," Liz answered, still trying not to look at him.

Stewie shook his head. "Oh no, that's impossible."

I nodded. "It hasn't been used in a few years, we know."

"A few years? It's prehistoric. Trust me, nobody is using this number anymore."

"Sure. Could you run it anyway?" Sam pressed.

"Sure. Why don't I just rearrange my whole life first," Stewie responded sarcastically.

Sam and I glanced at each other seconds before Liz turned to look Stewie right in the eyes, not amused at all.

"Look, Stewie. Just in this short meeting I've noticed a handful of employee code violations, and that has got nothing to do with the sickening porn that is no doubt infesting the system with various viruses. Oh, and I won't even get into the sexual harassment issues you created by being in such a compromising position. So, unless you want us to report all of this back to HQ, I suggest you run the damn number."

Stewie looked genuinely terrified of Liz as he quickly turned back to the computer and got to work.

Liz straightened up and softened as she smiled at Sam and me. We both nodded and smiled back at her, impressed. She was usually the one to take the softer approach, but having a reminder of how tough she could be, was always a nice change.

"Holy crap."

We all turned to Stewie, Sam speaking first. Sam "What?"

"I can't tell you where the number comes from, but I can tell you where it's been going." Pushing print, Stewie then got up and moved to the printer, grabbing whatever he'd just printed and handing it over to Liz. "Ten different numbers in the past few weeks, all got calls from the same number."

SPOV

I made my way up a footpath before coming to a stop in front of a door which I then knocked on. A moment later, a man middle-aged man answered the door, his young son standing beside him.

"Yeah?"

"Hello sir, I am with the phone company?" I lied.

"We didn't call the phone company."

"Oh no sir, we're calling you. We've had a lot of complaints from the neighbourhood lately."

"Complaints?"

"Yes sir. Dropped calls, static, maybe even strange voices on the other end of the line?" As I spoke, I noticed a teenage girl stepping into the hallway looking slightly startled.

The man shook his head. "No, we haven't had any of that here."

"Nothing?" I asked, my attention back on him.

"No."

"Okay. Great, just thought we'd check. Thanks. "

"No problem." He gave me a short nod before looking down at his son. "Come on, Simon."

As they turned to close the door, I watched the girls staring at me, scared. But before I could do or say anything, she turned and walked away just as the door closed.

Sighing, I turned and walked back down the footpath, heading for my rental car. Dean, Lizzie and I had split up to go through the list of homes that had been receiving calls from the number Linda had been using to call Mr Waters.

As I opened my car door, the girl appeared. "No way you work for the phone company."

I paused, shrugging at her. "Sure I do."

"Since when does a phone guy drive a rental or wear a cheap suit?"

I huffed a laughed. "Yeah, well. Maybe we're both keeping secrets."

"Why did you ask my Dad if he's hearing strange voices on the phone?"

"Why, did you hear something?"

"No."

"My mistake, I thought maybe you did."

"Well I didn't, okay?"

"Okay. Sorry to bother you." I smiled. But when she didn't move and continued to look uncomfortable, I sighed, looking down at my keys in my hands as they rested on the roof of the car. "Because you know...if you did...then I would have told you that I've been right where you're standing right now. Hearing things, even seeing things that can't be explained. Maybe I would have been able to help out a little bit. Anyway..." I went to get in the car.

"Hey wait. Maybe...maybe I've been talking on the phone...with my mum."

"Well that's not so strange."

"She's dead. Like three years now."

Well, that's definitely not, not so strange. "How often does she call you?"

"A few times. It started a week ago. I thought I was like, crazy or something."

"Well I can tell you one thing for sure, and you're going to have to go with me on this, okay? You're not crazy."

DPOV

"Yeah," Sam answered the phone as I called him.

I was walking down the street, Liz next to me- both of us finished with our lists. "Dude, stiffs have been calling people all over town," I told him.

"Yeah, tell me about it."

"I just talked to an eighty-four-year-old grandmother who's having phone sex with her husband, who died in Korea!"

"Eww."

"It redefined my understanding of the word 'Necrophilia'."

A woman walked past, overhearing me. She gasped and gave me a disgusted look before hurrying off. Liz grinned, watching as I grimaced and turned to look at the young woman.

"So what the hell's going on here, Dean?"

Shaking my head, I sighed as I reached Baby. "Beats me, but we'd better find out soon. This place is turning into spook central."

"Yeah. All right, I'll call you later."

"Yeah." I hung up, opening my door as Liz slid into the passenger seat. Before I could join her, my phone began to ring. "Yeah, what?" I was met with nothing but static. "Sam?"

"Dean?"

Everything in me froze.

"Dean, is that you?"

"Dad?"

SPOV

"Dad? You really think it was dad?" I looked up at Dean, confused and slightly amazed.

I sat on the couch, watching Dean. He'd come back moments after me. Liz wasn't with him, I guess she knew the news Dean had for me was something the two of us had to talk about alone. Plus, whenever we mentioned our dad, or mum, she got kind of quiet...

Dean shrugged, pacing the room. "I don't know, maybe."

"Well what did he sound like?"

"Like Oprah." Dean turned to me. "Like dad, he sounded like dad, what do you think?"

"What did he say?"

"My name."

"That's it?" I wasn't too sure now.

"Call dropped out."

"Why would he even call in the first place, Dean?"

Once again, Dean shrugged, continuing to pace the room. "I don't know, man. Why are ghosts calling anybody in this town? But I mean, other people are hearing from their loved ones, why can't we? It's at least a possibility, right?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I guess?"

"Okay, so what if..." Taking a breath, Dean moved to sit on the bed. "What if it really is dad? What happens if he calls back?"

"What do you mean?"

"What do I say?"

"Hello," I suggested.

Dean didn't look too impressed. "Hello?" he asked, earning a simple shrug from me. "That's what you come back with. Hello?"

"Uh..."

Before I could go on, Dean grabbed his jacket and headed for the door. "Hello." Shaking his head, he walked out.

EPOV

I sat with Sam doing some research. After I heard Dean leave, I snuck over to make sure the youngest Winchester was okay. Which he was, but I was still concerned about the two of them.

I personally had never actually met John- well, I was pretty sure I hadn't. But I understood how the brother's felt about their father. He'd been someone they both looked up to and someone they both didn't exactly like all the time. He'd been hell bent on avenging their mother, which led to him taking away their childhood. But at the same time, it gave all of them a sense of family and purpose. He was a strong, independent, stubborn man, just like his sons.

No matter how hard, bad or complicated their lives might have been because of this one man, I knew one thing for sure. Sam and Dean loved John.

The door to the room opened as Dean walked in, looking to Sam and me as we sat on the couch, my head on his shoulder, looking at the screen he was focused on.

"You two look comfy." Dean's tone was drowning in jealousy.

I sighed, pulling away to stand up. "We were researching."

"Find anything?" Dean asked, as if he knew the answer.

"After three hours, we have found no reason why anything supernatural would be going on here," Sam sighed.

Dean came to stand next to me, shrugging at Sam with attitude. "Well, you know, you think a Stanford education and a high school hook up rate of zero point zero would produce better results than that."

Sam gave him an unamused smile. "Hilarious."

Grinning, Dean reached into his jacket. "Sammy, you're just looking in the wrong places, pal."

"And what are the right places, Dean?"

"Motel pamphlet rack." He dropped a pamphlet onto the coffee table in front of Sam. "Milan, Ohio. Birthplace of Thomas Edison."

Flicking through the papers, Sam gave a shrug. "Yeah, right. So what?"

"Keep reading."

Sam scoffed slightly but kept looking with a sigh. As he did, Dean moved closer to me, wrapping his arms around my waist as he pulled me to him so my back was pressed against his chest. I wasn't too sure what Dean was doing with the obvious displays of affection, but I sure as hell wasn't complaining.

Watching Sam, I noticed when his eyebrows went up in surprise, right before he looked up at his brother. "You're kidding."

"What?" I reached forward, snatching the pamphlet which I then read. "No way."

...

A young female guide was leading a group of people- including the brothers and myself- through a museum in town.

"And we're walking." She came to stop by an exhibit. "And, here we have one of the museum's most unique and treasured possessions. Thomas Edison's 'spirit phone'. Did you know that Mr Edison, as well as being one of America's most beloved inventors, was also a devout 'occultist'? Ooh!"

Dean leaned closer to me, whispering in my ear. "What's with the quote-y fingers?" he asked, causing me to grin.

The guide went on. "He spent years working on this, his final invention, which he was convinced could be used to 'communicate' with the 'dead'. Pretty spooky, huh?" She checked her watch, before twirling her fingers in the air and began to lead the group into the next room. "And we're walking. We are walking. We're walking. And we're not touching that. And we're walking. And stop."

We didn't follow the others as we instead moved closer to the 'spirit phone'. Sam pulled out his EMF, holding it close to the phone.

"Anything?" Dean asked, the two of us keeping an eye out.

Sam shook his head, pulling back. "Nothing."

I sighed. "What are we thinking then?"

"Honestly?" Sam shrugged, looking down at the phone. "It kinda looks like an old pile of junk to me."

"It's not even plugged in," Dean noted.

"Maybe it didn't work like that," Sam suggested.

"Okay." Dean thought about it a moment longer, examining the phone. "Maybe it's like a radio tower, broadcasting the dead all over town."

Sam shrugged. "Could be."

"You know, this caller ID is a hundred years old, right? Right around the time this thing was built."

"Yeah, but why would it all of a sudden start working now?" it seemed not matter what Dean said, Seam wasn't buying it.

"I don't know. But as long as the mouldy are calling the freshers around here it's the best reason we've got."

"Yeah, maybe."

"So maybe it really is dad."

But as I'd been standing there, thinking through the case, trying to figure out how the phone could be linked to it all, I was beginning to wonder if that really was the case. Was John calling Dean from beyond the grave, or was something else dialling the numbers?

Bamby