Disclaimer: I own nothing you recognise; the original concept of this story was inspired by 'To Hell & Back' by EventRider87, but I've added my own spin to things and have received EventRider87's permission to use their idea for this
Feedback: Much appreciated
AN: For the record, I considered looking at the events of "Fallen Idols", but while that was a good case for Dean and Sam to rebuild their old bond, it felt like a relatively superfluous episode when I'm sure people would prefer to see Dean reaffirming his bond with Bela, or at least see Bela back on the road with Deanna. Add on my sudden idea for another plot element regarding Sam's future in this series, and I thought this would be a good time to do an original hunt; hope you enjoy the results
The Corrupted Innocent
Ever since the four of them had taken down War, Bela hadn't been sure what she should expect when she next made contact with the brothers. She and Dean had each accepted that their chosen hunting styles were fundamentally incompatible, Dean favouring a direct approach of confronting the monsters directly where Bela was coming to appreciate the more indirect method of identifying potential 'hotspots' before they became a danger, but they still enjoyed it when circumstances brought them together, and Bela knew that she and Dean could always call on each other if a hunt escalated. The idea that Dean and Sam had parted company had worried her for a time, but last week she'd received a call from Dean that he and Sam had resumed their old 'road trip' hunt. Both Winchesters and those allies they trusted were essentially all in agreement that none of them were entirely ready to go up against Lucifer directly yet, as even the Colt didn't offer any guarantees if they couldn't be sure of hitting the target, but they were still dealing with comparatively minor hunts to keep their instincts fresh for when the time came.
At the moment, while Bela regretted the fact that she hadn't been able to catch up with Dean directly yet, she'd made it clear to the elder Winchester that she and Deanna would be available if he and Sam needed back-up on short notice, and in the meantime she and Deanna were focusing on their own individual hunt. The last she'd heard, Dean and Sam had already dealt with an unusual apparent haunting and a case involving something strange in a small town that neither brother liked to discuss. The two groups were making arrangements to meet up to follow up a couple of unusual disappearances in a week or so, but since everything they'd found so far suggested that the hunt didn't sound too dangerous, Bela had decided to accept Deanna's request to follow up an old case the time-displaced woman had found in her husband's family records.
The hunt in question was simple enough to be nothing more than a coincidence, but remembering the hunt described in one of Chuck's books, it was enough to capture Bela's interest. According to records made by the Campbell family, a series of art collectors had died in twenty-one year intervals, each victim essentially aging overnight. As forensic science advanced, tests of the bodies had demonstrated that the victims seemed to be suffering from various diseases, ranging from drug addictions to STIs, but amazingly enough, there was nothing to suggest that any of those diseases had killed the victim, and they had always been completely free of infection in prior medical check-ups even if one had taken place just days before they died. The art collectors covered a wide range of social levels, with some having an entire house filled with statues and paintings while others just had a few pictures, but they had always died near their pictures. The Campbell records strongly suggested that this pattern had some root supernatural cause, and the available evidence hinted that a painting of some sort was the key as that was the only type of art every past victim had collected, but there was nothing that could help them clearly define what painting could have been in all of those collections in the public records. With no obviously better ideas, their best option at the moment was to examine the auction-house responsible for selling the latest victim's collections and take it from there.
Wandering around the auction house, she and Deanna covering separate parts of the building, Bela didn't take long to confirm that there wasn't that much here worth their interest. The paintings, furniture, and other items weren't without their charm even to a casual browser, but so far nothing here struck Bela as distinctly supernatural…
Rounding a corner, Bela's eyes fell on a distinctive-looking picture of a tall man wearing a Victorian suit, with swept-black dark hair and a solemn expression on his handsome face. There was nothing about the painting that said 'supernatural' in itself, but there was something about it that was causing a twinge in her arm where Castiel had left his handprint…
"You seem to be very interested in that piece."
"Mmm?" Bela glanced back at the speaker, revealing a woman about her age in a stylish black dress, looking between Bela and the painting with a critical eyebrow. "Just… assessing the style; interesting blend, all things considered. There are elements of the Grant Wood style, but there's some adherence to more classical styles of painting beyond just the outfit…"
"You know your art," the woman nodded.
"It's… been a passion of mine for a while."
"You're in the art business?"
"Professional amateur only," Bela shrugged. "It was a hobby for a while, but these days I work with… well, a close friend, assessing antiques of a certain type."
"Like this painting?" the woman asked, a certain tone to her voice that raised questions in Bela's mind even if she was reluctant to commit herself to anything.
"Among others," Bela said, deciding to offer this woman something more personal. "Bela Talbot."
"Sarah Blake," the woman replied, holding out her hand with a smile.
"Nice to- hold on; Blake?" Bela looked more urgently at the woman, mind flashing back to the Supernatural novels they'd poured over when they'd first learned of Chuck's existence. "You did say you were Sarah Blake?"
"Yes," the woman looked curiously at Bela.
"Out of idle curiosity," Bela said, a slightly teasing smile on her face as she looked at the other woman, "what if I were to ask you about the painting of Melanie Merchant?"
"And… if I were to ask you about Sam Winchester…?" Sarah asked, a tentative tone to her voice.
"I'd be able to tell you more about Dean," Bela shrugged, pretending not to register the brief expression of relief that crossed Sarah's face at that statement. "Look, I'm sorry to drag you into this-"
"If I learned anything from when I met Sam and Dean, it's that we can't choose when this kind of thing will get into our lives," Sarah cut Bela off, smiling slightly at the other woman before her expression became more serious. "So what's the situation here and how do you know the Winchesters?"
"Both can be a long story," Bela replied solemnly. "Let me just get my… partner… and we'll talk about this."
"Your partner?"
"She's…" Bela looked around the room for a moment before smiling and waving as her eyes finally fell on the older woman, raising her hand to wave. "Deanna?"
"Bela?" the older woman said, walking over to join the younger women before looking curiously at Sarah. "Who's this?"
"Sarah Blake," Bela smiled. "She knows Dean and Sam."
"Really?" Deanna smiled at Sarah, her manner quickly shifting from tense to relaxed. "You know my grandsons?"
"Grandsons?" Sarah looked at Deanna in surprise.
"That's… complicated," Bela said, shooting a brief but half-serious glare at Deanna before looking at Sarah. "The point is, we think there's something about one of the paintings in this latest auction that might be dangerous…"
"Say no more," Sarah smiled in understanding, even as she continued to shoot confused glances at Deanna. "Just give me a few minutes to get the provenances together, and we can talk things over once I'm finished for the day."
"Sounds like a plan," Bela smiled back at the other woman, already relaxed at this turn of events. It might have been a while since Sarah had met the Winchesters, but from what Bela remembered of Chuck's books, she had handled herself well enough against a psychotic ghost, so hopefully she could still be an asset.
"So," Sarah asked, sitting opposite Bela in the small coffee shop that the two women had chosen for this talk while Deanna looked over the offered provenances back in their room, "care to fill me in on what Sam and Dean have been up to since that mess with the Marchants… maybe starting with how their grandmother can be here looking that age?"
"That's… an interesting question," Bela noted. "Let's just say it's a long story involving angels taking Dean back in time and me dragging Deanna into the future by accident."
"Angels are a thing now?"
"That's not even the weirdest thing we're dealing with at the moment," Bela smiled. "Would you believe that I've literally been to Hell and back with Dean?"
"Hell?" Sarah repeated, looking apprehensively at the other woman. "Actual Hell?"
"It involved demonic deals that had more behind them than any of us expected at first," Bela clarified grimly. "Believe me, ghosts are actually a minor problem compared to some of the stuff Sam and Dean have found themselves dealing with since they last saw you."
"Right, but… Demon deals? Are we talking like Faust here?"
"Basically a good analogy," Bela nodded. "You have to summon them in specific locations most of the time, but the rules are fairly straightforward; you contact the demons, they give you whatever you asked for, and then, ten years later, you get taken to Hell to suffer for all eternity."
"Ah," Sarah nodded. "So… not a good way to get ahead, really?"
"Not really," Bela said. "Dean only made his deal to save Sam's life, and my deal… well, we learned last year that there were people out there who wanted me to make a deal, but that doesn't make up for me making the choice in the first place."
Sarah simply sat in silence for a moment as she stared at Bela in a contemplative manner, before reaching over to give her hand a comforting squeeze.
"I know the Winchesters," she explained, as Bela shot her an inquiring glance. "If they didn't approve of your reasons for making a deal like that… well, I doubt you'd be travelling with their grandmother."
"It was… easier for her this way," Bela explained, even as she returned Sarah's squeeze with one of her own. "From Deanna's perspective, she went from a married woman with a grown daughter to a widow with two grown grandchildren in a world that have moved on forty years essentially overnight; we all felt that it was better for her to spend time adjusting to me rather than have Sam and Dean basically forcing her to face what she's lost."
"Lost?" Sarah asked, before nodding in recollection. "Oh yeah, Sam mentioned that his mom was dead; was that Deanna's daughter?"
"Good memory," Bela nodded in approval before she looked at Sarah in surprise. "They told you that?"
"Sam… brought it up," Sarah nodded.
"Congratulations."
"Congratulations?"
"It takes a lot for Winchesters to open up about anything; the fact that Sam told you that much about his life says a lot," Bela smiled.
"Sam only mentioned that his girlfriend had died a few months earlier and their mom was dead; I didn't really feel like prying for anything more…"
"That's fair enough," Bela nodded at the other woman in understanding. "Anyway, if we're talking about the past, I'm guessing Sam didn't tell you that both of those women were killed by a particularly powerful demon that had an interest in him for reasons we all only just learned about this year."
"A demon?" Sarah repeated, her discomfort at personal disclosure forgotten in favour of this new information.
"The demon's dead now, but that was one of the main reasons he never got back in touch with you," Bela clarified. "Shortly after the hunt where they met you, they got strong leads on both the demon that killed their mother and a weapon that could kill the demon in question, and then a few of their father's hunting contacts were killed by that demon's associates."
"Oh," Sarah said, looking at Bela with new sympathy.
"It… wasn't an easy time for any of them," Bela noted, her tone grim as she reflected on how the Winchesters must have felt at that point. "Add in the fact that the demon got away with their only viable weapon and their father died because he made a deal to save Dean, and…"
"Oh God," Sarah said, eyes widening at the thought. "And Sam already had all that guilt…"
"Yeah," Bela acknowledged grimly. "After all those losses, he probably decided it would be safer for you if he just stayed out of touch."
"That's Sam," Sarah nodded in sympathetic recollection as she took another sip of her coffee. "He was so worried about my safety even before I knew what we were dealing with…"
"That's Winchesters for you," Bela corrected the other woman. "They try to keep us all safe from everything their world has to offer, and just can't acknowledge how we might think they're worth the risk."
"They let you stay in their lives."
"Because I was part of this mess before they even met me… and, to be blunt, I was more of an enemy than an ally to them when I met them, so they weren't entirely concerned with my safety at that point," the former thief admitted.
"You were their enemy?"
"It wasn't like I killed people, but I did steal a few things they needed to save people and just sold them on for myself," Bela acknowledged grimly, deliberately avoiding looking at Sarah as she admitted her own past actions against the brothers that had come to mean so much to both of them. "And then Dean and I were dragged back out of Hell by the same angel, I ended up spending time with them while we figured out what was happening to us, and then…"
"And then you realised they weren't the illiterate, uncultured idiots you thought they were?"
"You thought that?"
"My dad did, but to be fair, they'd shown up for an art auction in leather jackets and Dean was just stuffing his face while talking."
"Dean all over," Bela smiled wistfully before she looked at Sarah firmly. "But if we're talking about maintaining a relationship with the Winchesters, you need to understand one thing if I'm reading you correctly."
"What?" Sarah asked, her body shifting to a more alert posture as she looked at Bela uncertainly.
"The thing about the brothers Winchester…" Bela sat in silent thought for a moment, turning over her answer before she looked at Sarah. "You need to make it clear that you'll be there for them."
"Make it clear?"
"Make a clear and distinct effort to stay in touch with them," Bela clarified. "I'm not blaming you for failing to do it the first time around, considering that they had a lot on at that point in their lives that you had no way of knowing about, but if you want to get back in touch with them… you have to be sure you think they're worth it."
"That's… difficult," Sarah said, sighing as she stared at her coffee. "I mean, I like Sam, but I just… I don't want Sam to feel like he'd have to protect me if I go with him, and I'm not sure if he'd want to stay with me…"
"The challenge of life with the Winchesters," Bela smiled. "I mean, Dean and I only see each other every couple of weeks at best with all the travelling we do in this work; the important thing is that we're doing what we can to make that time. I'm not saying you need to make a decision now about whether you want to get back in touch with Sam, and I'll leave you my number when we go if you haven't come to a decision by then, but you do need to think about what you want to do where he's concerned."
"I'll… keep that in mind," Sarah replied, looking at Bela with a brief smile. "And… thanks."
Looking at the other woman, Bela was suddenly struck by the notion that, if her thoughts were correct, she and Sarah may eventually have a lot more in common than just a shared strong attraction to one of the Winchester brothers…
Of course, before we deal with that, we've got to find whatever's been killing people right now…
