"Turn around, let's turn around… It's a dark road we've been heading down"

——————

"Charlie! Where?!"

Charlie could barely hear her behind the loud sound of the fast-speeding motorcycle on the other side of the phone, and that of her own heartbeats.

"Approaching in 600ft... 400–300ft... and—"

But she couldn't finish the countdown before Hanna's motorcycle collided with a forcefield in the middle of nowhere, in an abandoned part of route 66. The impact was devastating, sudden, sending the motorcycle one way and the girl the other.

"Did we lose her?!"

"No, still getting her signal. Hanna?! Hanna!"

"I'm here. I'm... really here..." On her side of the call, Hanna got up to observe the disrupted road ahead. The distortion looked like a bad TV signal, maybe she broke it? She tried to see past it, she was hoping to see someone.

She slowly approached, hands reaching to touch the air in front of her. And then she saw it: the gates of Hell.

Monumental, dark, made the burning desert feel cold, dank. It looked exactly like the Rodin sculpture — he has to have seen it.

"Are they there?" Charlie called her out of her trance. She still didn't reply at first.

"They'll be. He said he'd be..."

As if she'd summoned something from its depths, the doors started to shake open. Slowly, heavily, who knows how long it'd been since it opened last? The silence and darkness coming from inside were deafening and blinding. Had she not been waiting for so long, she'd have left, before the strength in her legs left her... but out they came! At long, long last...

Why aren't they moving towards her? She couldn't come to them either. Is Sam hurt? And...

"Dean..."

—————— 6 YEARS AGO (or what felt like it) ——————

Dean heard weak waves that died without ever hitting any surface, he wondered where he could be and how long he had been there, but couldn't bother checking just yet. He felt he was slowly regaining conscience, with something hitting against his back.

"Wake up boy! Not even the dead get to sleep on my shores! Come on now!" a rude voice yelled like a sailor.

Dean slowly opened his eyes but he could barely see. At first, he thought his eyes were still half-closed, then he realized it was a heavy, cold fog that blurred his vision of Hell. He got up, still weak, and stood there looking at a dark damp. A river of grey water on the horizon, moaning of lost souls all around him, some drowning themselves, some looking for a way out.

"Got any?!" yelled the stranger.

"Any what?"

"My boy! You don't expect to cross without giving me something of the least value!"

So that was the Ferryman…

"No offense… sir, but you don't look like a guy who gets a nickel every time someone wants to cross this river."

The ferryman looked deeply offended.

"Not everyone wants to go to the other side…"
"I thought that was the point."

"Precisely."

The ferryman waited defiantly.

"Why do you think I wanna cross?"

"Aren't you here to save your brother?"

"Yes… But I never told you that."

The ferryman moved so fast, Dean didn't even see when his paddle reached a desperate soul trying to get on his empty boat. It fell to the river and there it'd forever remain.

"I see all, young Winchester." The ferryman extended his ugly hand to receive his fee. Dean was now hesitant for not having anything to give. The ferryman indicated with a head gesture:
"The necklace." Dean instinctively touched it. "Your necklace."

—————————

The store still had a bell to indicate the customers going through its front-door. No one thought anything of it, hardly anyone ever came in anyway. But for Charlie that was sufficient proof that she'd come to the right place - finally!

"Hello young lady, I'll be with you in a moment." a nice old man assured her from behind the counter. The computer and hardware shop looked more like a museum, choosing to honor in display only equipment older than the early 90s. This would be fun… nope. no.Charlie, you're on a mission she corrected her train of thought.

"Yes, hello. How can I help you?" the old man's name-tag read simply "G", he smiled and stared at her with certain effort, through his thick spectacles.

"Hiiii, I'm uhh.." it occurred to her that she didn't quite anticipate this part of the plan "do you have a bathroom I could use?" and that was the best she could come up with.

G kept his sweet, heart-warming nature but apologized "I'm sorry, the one we have is not available. It's such a mess in here. You can try across the street, there's one of those coffee shops."

"We… Do you live here with someone?" she asked casually (but not really).

He dismissed it with a faint laugh "oh look at that, I'm too old to remember I'm alone here." and he laughed self-deprecatingly some more.

Nice one, Charlie, make the old man cry of loneliness why don't you "actually, I don't need to use it that badly. What I really want… more like need.. is a…" she spots the furthest items from the back door "oh my, are those vintage PC motherboards?! Wow! Yes, could I see one of those?"

The old man seemed entertained by her enthusiasm and hurried, as fast as he could, to show her a few. He went into detail, while she tried to discreetly look at the back of the counter. The lights were on in there, even though it was broad daylight.

"Wow… do you have more of those? I'd love to take a few, if you maybe.. have more.. in the back?"

"I'll go check. You have a great eye for this, young lady." He reached for a door next to Charlie's intended target, and climbed some spiral staircase, slowly, steadily. Charlie knew she had to take the chance, she had to be brave. For a few months now she wasn't able to contact the Winchester brothers, she knew something was up. This was beginning to stretch her hopes a little too thinly. She darted to the door, throwing all caution to the wind.

"Oh great, more doors…" she ended up in a corridor with doors left and right. How was this place so big? Too big for an unassuming vintage hardware store.

She opened a random door. It looked like a dark, medical lab. There were some medical equipment - familiar and wildly strange - a bed.. she couldn't see too clearly, the lights weren't on.

Oh, there it was. Wait… who turned on the lights? Charlie barely avoided a shot to her head when she turned. "I told you, the bathroom isn't available." the old man suddenly became much less affable with a gun perfectly pointed at her. She threw her hands up in the air.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't… I'm just gonna go now…"

He fired another two warning shots. Charlie closed her eyes in fear.

"GRANDPA!" she heard someone yell reprehensibly from the corridor. "Do you wanna break everything?!"

Charlie risked a sneak peek. And who she spotted was a sight for sore eyes.

"Hanna!! Oh my god! YES It's really you! I've been looking for you!" the redhead seemed to have completely forgotten about Grandpa's gun, or the fact that Hanna had no idea who she was, she just felt so much relief - this was the right place! - she just went for a hug. Hanna stops it with her own gun, now resting comfortably on Charlie's head.

"You've been looking for me? So has everyone in the country. Who the hell are you, and how did you find me?"

"Oh, that's right. You don't know me. Ugh. I'm—" she looked for the right words as her eyes wandered the room. She froze cold as she saw more familiar faces.

"Sam…? Dean?!" the bodies of the brothers were immersed in an eccentric-looking tube, like the ones Charlie had seen in evil lairs of sci-fi movies.

She felt the gun away from her head, but didn't bother to look until Hanna spoke:

"You must be Charlie."