Thomas and I raced out of the Nevernever, taking a flying leap through the portal I had opened with a horde of pursuers hot on our heels. The first lot had been sent after us by Queen Mab, the rest had apparently joined in for the hell of it. Some of our pursuers were after the pair of snacks on two legs that had been stupid enough to dash into their territory as we fled from Mab's forces.
"Close it! Close it quick!" Thomas yelled as I moved seal the portal behind me.
The portal snapped shut the instant before our pursuers could get through. Yet another in a long line of close calls for the Wizard Dresden.
"And, that is why you don't try to seduce one of the queens of the Faerie!" I yelled at my brother. This little incident had oddly enough been Thomas' fault rather than mine. Usually when I run for my life, it was because of something I had either poked my nose into or had done. I had a bad habit of interfering in the plots of evil beings - be they men, wizards, faerie, or other - and that had made me a number of enemies over the years.
"I didn't! I didn't...well, not intentionally." Thomas said, protesting his innocence in the matter.
I soon started coming down from my adrenaline high when a new danger didn't immediately present itself, relieved that Mab had been amused enough to send several creatures of the Nevernever after us rather than chase us down and deal with us herself. If she'd really been pissed, we would already have been dead. Dead and buried, possibly with Thomas' head on a pike as a warning for the next White Court vampire who tried anything, intentionally or otherwise.
Looking around myself, I found that Thomas and I were by the side of an isolated country road, instead of in Chicago, which I had been aiming for. While that in itself wasn't entirely unusual, as we had taken a highly irregular detour through the Nevernever - which frankly could have spat us out anywhere from rural Illinois to Czechoslovakia - something about the situation felt slightly off...
"It's the magic." I finally decided as I called up a light, since it was the middle of the night and a new moon to boot (though I could have sworn the moon had been three-quarters full when Thomas and I had set out into the Nevernever). There was something just a tiny bit off about the magic that I had called to myself, and I couldn't exactly describe what it was. The...well, I guess that the best way to describe it would be that the flavor of the magic I had called up was slightly off. It's almost as if you ordered a Coke, and the waitress hands you a glass of Pepsi instead. Some people wouldn't even notice the difference, but...
Thomas gave me an odd look after I made my statement, probably hoping I would clarify. He could clearly feel it too, and it was causing him a great deal more distress than it was causing me.
"The magic around here feels different." I said, explaining my seemingly random comment.
"No shit Sherlock! Of course the magic feels different!" Thomas snapped. "We're in another freaking world, and we'll probably never be able to get back!"
I found myself staring at my brother, somewhat stupefied by shock. There had been stories of such things happening before, stories of wizards who had vanished never to be seen again, and even rarer stories of wizards who got back from places where magic followed different sets of rules, and therefore had to be relearned before the wizard could even try to get back. The most recent account that had been making its rounds through the community had been about a German wizard that had vanished for nearly a century, and had started burning every Harry Potter book he could get his hands on upon his return. I had taken that story and every other tale of its ilk to be the wizarding version of an urban legend, much as most of my kind generally do.
I promptly turned around and tried to create another portal into the Nevernever. I failed. I failed the next seventeen times I tried it as well. While it seemed after some testing that I could do almost all of my usual spells, albeit a little more slowly, and after thinking about them more carefully as there seemed to be an odd and somewhat ominous leftward twist to the magic in this world, making a portal into the Nevernever so Thomas and I could get home seemed to be a bit beyond my current abilities. This could be simply because I was too tired to do so since the chase and the experimenting with my powers had taken alot out of me, or it could be because of a rule of magic that my own world didn't have, such as "Doors to the Nevernever only open on alternate Thursdays at 10pm sharp". It would take time to find which out however, as I would need a while to rest up and recharge if it were the former, and find a local practitioner to help if it were the latter. Finding a local practitioner would be difficult and time consuming, as true practitioners are rare, and the field was full of wannabes who may or may not have some small measure of power.
As Thomas and I were walking in the direction we hoped held a nearby town and therefore food and rest, a black muscle car blew past us. I probably wouldn't have noticed the car, except for the fact that it seemed to be the only car on the road tonight, illustrating how isolated my half-brother and I were in this strange new world that - besides the difference in phases of the moon and the odd twist to the native magic - may be nearly identical to the one we had just left. At least the cars here were similar to the ones back home, since I was reasonably certain that the car that had passed by was a Chevy.
We reached the town that lay in the direction we had chosen by the flip of a coin after two hours of walking. We would have gotten there about an hour sooner if I hadn't twisted my ankle in a gopher hole on the side of the road fifteen minutes in after my light went out. Fortunately for us, a motel was one of the first things we saw when we reached something that approached civilization. As Thomas got us checked in - since he wasn't as bad at frying technology by standing next to it as I was - I noticed that the car that had blown by us - or at least one that looked very much like it - was parked in the lot.
After several hours of rest, Thomas went out into the early morning and got us some supplies, including a newspaper so we could see what was going on in the world we had found ourselves in. As it turned out, we were in rural Illinois, just not our rural Illinois. The front page of the paper contained the story of a third child to have gone missing from the local community in the last month. After seeing the picture and reading the article, and re-reading the article - careful to take note of what appeared to be between the lines - there was only one thing I could do.
Despite the fact that I wasn't going to get paid for this, the fact that I was in an entirely different world where the rules probably weren't quite the same, and the fact that getting home should be my first priority, Harry Dresden was on the case.
&!&!&
Dean had been going out to the car to retrieve his suit for his FBI routine from the spot in the trunk where he usually kept it carefully folded when not in use after he'd learned that Sam had forgotten it when the two men walked past, engaged in a loud argument.
One of the men was taller than Sam, which was saying something as Sam was about 6' 4", and the other was around his height, maybe a couple inches taller. Both men had dark hair, and there seemed to be an easily overlooked resemblance between the two, as the shorter of the two was far more attractive and muscular. Not that the taller guy looked to be out of shape or anything. The shorter of the two men was dressed in jeans - and just about nothing else - and the taller one looked like he'd gotten his clothing out of a western wear catalog. The leather trenchcoat he had thrown over his clothing made the coat Castiel wore look stylish in comparison.
"We don't even know if things work the same here! It could simply be a mundane problem that just looks a little bit like it was done by something supernatural. Let the local authorities handle this. Our first priority is to get back home!" the half naked man who looked like what most male models wished they could be with his well sculpted muscles, curly dark hair, and intense gray eyes shouted at the slightly taller of the pair.
"You saw the article yourself! It's got all the earmarks of troll activity, and there's no way in hell I'm going to let another kid get eaten if I can help it!" the other man yelled back.
Dean smirked at the pair of Hunters. Apparently he and Sam hadn't been the only Hunters who had noticed what was going on around here, and been drawn in to investigate. What made the guy think it was a troll that was doing this though? The research he and Sam had done had indicated that it was more of a ghost problem.
He just hoped that the new Hunters who'd turned up wouldn't get in their way, as they'd had bad experiences when they'd run into other Hunters recently. Maybe if he offered to join up with them, he would be able to keep an eye on them and be able to get the drop on them if they turned out to be trouble later on. He'd been too burned by the whole thing with Gordon Walker to even come close to implicitly trusting another Hunter, especially a Hunter he didn't know.
One thing he could say for certain about the two men was that they most definitely weren't shape-shifters, as he could see that both men were wearing silver necklaces. The half naked one had a pentacle on his, which was rather odd for a Hunter, even though they were supposed to ward off evil. He wasn't sure what was on the other one's, as it was tucked into his shirt.
Coming to a decision, Dean walked up to the two men before their argument could turn violent.
"So, I couldn't help but overhear that you're looking into the recent disappearances." Dean said when the two men fell silent upon noticing him.
"What's it to you?" the half naked man asked.
"Well, me and my brother Sam are looking into them as well, and if we teamed up, we'd get the job done faster." Dean replied, noting that the taller - and leaner - of the two was eying him suspiciously.
"There, see Harry, somebody's already looking into it. Now you can focus on getting us home." the half naked one - whom Dean had begun to notice smelled real nice - said.
The argument started up again from there, with the added topic of whether or not to accept Dean's offer of assistance if they did indeed decide to investigate the situation. Dean however didn't really notice because he was trying to find a way to get alot closer to the half naked guy without him noticing. As the argument progressed, Dean inched his way towards his target, until he was standing so close to the guy that they were practically touching. The man didn't really react to this, opting to give Dean an odd look before going back to his argument with the other man.
It was at that point that Sam came out of his and Dean's room, wondering exactly what had been taking Dean so long. They both should have been dressed, ready, and on the road by now.
"Dean, are you alright?" Sam asked upon spotting his brother, causing Dean to jump, suddenly realize exactly what it was he had been doing, and swiftly back away from the very attractive half naked man.
"Uh, Sam, this is...uh." Dean said, gesturing at the two men helplessly.
It was at that moment that Castiel appeared, stopping the two men's argument in mid-sentence. Castiel gazed at the two men with that intent look he had when he didn't understand something, and wanted clarification. Both men stared back at the angel warily.
"You do not belong here." Cas finally said.