A/N: Nothing particularly interesting in this chapter. Just a continuation of "In the Beginning," and I know it's like exactly the same, nothing really new here, but things are gonna start changing. So yeah.

Holy hell. Yikes, this fic is so far behind. I have it postd on another site, about three chapters ahead. I'm such a bitch. I'll catch this story up, I swear. I love you guys too, promise.

So yeah. Another chapter, another dollar. Woohooo.

But remembering that with the flurry of the past day and a half, nobody had yet checked if Chase was possessed or not.

Feeling dazed, he whispered, "Christo" within earshot of Chase.

And dark eyes were turned on him.

.:~*~:.

Then:

Percy heard Sam whisper "Christo," and he had to hold back a laugh. He knew what Sam was trying to do. Three years hunting down demons, trying to rescue Annabeth, yeah, he knew the lore.

And he wasn't possessed.

He looked at Sam, a shadow covering the top half of his face.

Then he laughed. "Nice try, Sam, but I'm not possessed."

Sam looked at him accusingly. "Sure."

Percy saw Sam slowly reaching for the salt behind him, as if moving slow enough would ensure Percy couldn't see him.

Percy rolled his eyes. "Dude. Really. Hey, if it makes you feel any better, I'll cross a devil's trap for you."

Sam pointed to one on the floor and Percy walked straight into it, making sure so very obviously show that he was in the middle of it, before strutting out like he was working a catwalk.

Percy saw Dean fighting a smile.

He was struck by a thought. "How long have you guys been camping out at Bobby's? You ever heard of an overstayed welcome?"

Now:

Now Percy was sitting in the back of a 1980 Ford Pinto while Dean drove (and he had no clue where the damn car came from, seeing as they were camping out in 1973, a whole seven years prior) and fidgeting with his pen, getting restless.

He glanced out the window again, wondering for the millionth time what exactly was John Winchester, famed hunter extraordinaire, was up to today. And why whatever was going to happen couldn't just happen right now when he and Dean were totally prepared and not doing anything.

He began messing with the seat, scratching it with his pen and making squeaking noises.

"Are we seriously not gonna talk about this car?" Percy asked.

Dean looked at him with the corner of his eye. "Nope."

"But look at this!" Percy said. "1980!"

"Oh for—" Dean said. "Would you stop with the stupid little noises already?"

Percy ostensibly stopped fidgeting, although he kept tapping a finger against his leg.

He glanced out the window, and noticed they were in a neighborhood.

"Is this your dad's house?" He watched as a blonde woman who looked similar to Annabeth came running out of the house. "Is that your mom?" Percy asked.

Dean groaned. "What is with you? How much coffee did you drink?"

"It's ADHD." Percy said. "Keeps me alive, though."

"That's ridiculous. Next you're gonna tell me that dyslexia lets you read every language that exists."

"Unfortunately not." Percy sighed. "Just Greek."

"That's so random." Dean made a face.

"Not when you think about it." Percy said, his eyes glued onto the woman who had to be Mary almost-Winchester. Definitely had to be, based on the way Dean was watching her.

Dean was saying something else, but Percy wasn't really listening anymore. He caught the words, "theme" and "ducks," though, but most of his attention was focused on Mary.

He couldn't hear what she was saying to John from the distance he was at (several houses down was a bit much, and he was inside a car) but her body language spoke volumes.

Where's the van?

Percy thought the Impala was actually a marginal improvement.

Mary rolled her eyes and got in the car, looking at John again. She appeared to argue with him for a moment, before John started the car and drove off.

.:~*~:.

Percy had been watching John and Mary have milkshakes for way too long now. It was ridiculous.

He turned to Dean. "And, what are we supposed to be watching for, here? Those are your parents, right? We're not supposed to break them up or anything?"

Dean rolled his eyes. "No. "

"No, they're not your parents, or no, we're not supposed to break them up?"

Dean groaned. "Seriously, that is enough." He turned to face Percy. "I have absolutely no clue what we're looking for, because the angel was as clear as a bag of cats. Didn't we already go over this?"

Percy was about to say something else, but was interrupted by a shadow looming over his shoulder. He spun around, and—

Mary punched him in the face.

Percy startled, falling back, and pulled out his pen on instinct, uncapping it and turning it into a sword. Dean nearly kicked Mary, until he realized who she was.

Percy glanced back into the diner, seeing that sure enough, John was left alone. He pulled a box out of his pocket, and despite the distance, Percy recognized it.

The guy was planning to propose.

"Why are you following us?" Mary asked, antagonism clear in her voice. She was ready for a fight.

Percy looked at Dean, letting him take the lead because heck knows this wasn't his mother.

"What? Are you crazy?" Dean played innocent.

Mary glanced at Riptide, and Percy could only guess what she was seeing. Percy hoped it was a baseball bat. He shifted it to an angle that would work better for a baseball bat but was absolutely ridiculous for a sword. Dean glanced at it out of the corner of his eye, looking irritated, and Percy knew he could see the sword.

"You've been trailing us since my house." Mary asserted.

"I don't know what you're talking about –" Dean tried again.

Mary tried to kick him, but Dean caught her.

"Really?" She said.

"Okay, how about we talk about this, huh?" Dean tried.

Percy looked at her charm bracelet. "You're a hunter." It wasn't a question.

"Huh?" She looked at Percy, eyes wide. She stopped struggling against Dean.

Percy put away the sword (and he could only imagine how it looked to Mary) and gestured to the charm bracelet, which was decorated with a myriad of charms, including the Aquarian Star, a cross, and a pentagram. "Either you're a hunter or a Satanist."

Dean laughed, and tried to look at Mary's bracelet. She jerked her arm away, bracelet jingling, and directed her attention to Percy. "And you?" She asked.

"Well, I do my best to not die, so yeah. Think that counts." He said.

Mary seemed to relax a little, recognizing that Percy was like her. "But why were you following us?" She asked.

"We were tracking a monster here, from out-of-state, and you and your boyfriend, you're its type." Percy lied quickly. "You seem to be able to handle yourself, though. If we'd have known you were hunters, we would have left you alone."

"No, it's just me. John's…normal." Mary said, buying into the lie. She calmed down, and stopped fighting the two of them. "Hey, why don't you come over for dinner? My parents are hunters, too. Maybe we can help you find the thing."

"Um, sure." Dean said quickly. Percy elbowed him, but didn't say anything.

How on earth was he going to come up with a plausible lie that would hold up in the face of two seasoned hunters?

"Great. You already know where my house is, considering you've been stalking me all day. I'll see you later." She walked back into the diner and rejoined John.

"What were you doing?" Percy said. "We can't just make up a monster! Her parents are hunters!"

"Those are my grandparents." Dean said. "I never even met them."

"Why?" Percy asked.

"They died…" Dean trailed off. "Maybe that's what we're supposed to stop!"

"Because, you know, messing with the timeline is always a good idea." Percy snarked.

"Do have any better ideas? 'Cause, at the very least, that's a start!"

Percy rolled his eyes. "Just how hardheaded are you?" He rolled his eyes. "Don't answer that. Whatever. Let's go."

Dean looked nothing short of thrilled, and Percy wondered how badly he was going to come to regret that decision later on.

.:~*~:.

Percy knocked twice on the door, Dean standing several feet behind him on the front steps. He didn't hear anything behind the door, no motion, but it swung open suddenly and he was staring face to face with an imposing, very bald, man.

"Um, hi?" He offered. He held out his hand and tried his best to appear like he wasn't up to no good. "You're Mary's dad, right? She invited us here..." He trailed off when the man just stared at him silently for a few seconds.

"You the hunters?" Baldy asked, eyeing Dean. "What're you chasing?"

"An empousa." Percy said, having already planned out his story. He had picked that kind of monster because let's be honest, the snakey ladies were freaky, but also because it was practically a guarantee that none of them had ever heard of it before.

Dean had looked confused when he'd mentioned it, so it seemed like a fair bet.

Baldy still seemed suspicious of them, though. He appeared to think about his words for a long moment, and then, "You kill vampires with wooden stakes or silver?"

Before Percy could say anything (likely condemning), Dean cut in.

"Neither. You behead them."

Percy filed that away for later.

"Alright, good. So, tell me how to kill this empousa and get the heck outta dodge."

A sharp "Samuel!" Sounded out from inside the house, and after a few seconds, a woman appeared behind Baldy. She pushed him out of the way, and invited Dean and Percy in.

"I'm sorry about my husband." She said, smiling at them thinly. "Dinner's just about finished, would you boys like to stay for a while? You can tell us all about this...empousa." Her face screwed up like she'd just tasted a lemon.

Percy stepped inside hesitantly, looking around the warmly decorated house slowly. It was nice. It wasn't anything like his mother's apartment (and only now was Percy really feeling the full scope of the time difference) but it still felt like a home.

Mary was hanging out in the dining room, setting the table.

"Hey, Percy." She said, with a small wave. Her bracelet jingled, as if Percy needed yet another reminder of why he was there.

Baldy's wife extended her hand out to Dean, and he shook it. "I'm Deanna, and you've met my husband Samuel. Nice to meet you...?" She trailed off, waiting for Dean to give her his name. He answered absently, then turned to Mary.

"Samuel and Deanna?" He asked, sounding incredulous. "Really?"

Mary nodded.

Percy stood there for a moment, wondering what had got Dean so puzzled. It took him a couple of seconds, but he finally got it. Samuel and Deanna. Sam and Dean. Of course.

It would make sense that Mary would have named her children after them, if they had actually died, as Dean said. So, if they (they being Dean and Percy) changed that, there was no telling what would happen. It might be small, like Sam and Dean not being named Sam and Dean.

It might be huge, like the end of the world, because the boys weren't in the right place at the right time to prevent something happening. Heck, they might not even become hunters.

Percy couldn't risk it. He had to make sure that things were as they always were.

So now, instead of helping Dean with his heaven-sent job, he'd be secretly resisting him.

"Percy? Are you hungry?" Deanna asked, snapping him out of his reverie. "Food's ready."

Percy looked up, started, hand going to his pocket. He shook his head tiredly. "Yeah, I'm coming."

He sat down next to Mary, and looked at the food her mother had made. "It looks delicious." He complimented.

Deanna smiled warmly at him, and then spoke. "Is this your first time in Lawrence?" She asked.

Percy nodded, while at the same time Dean answered "No, it's just been a while."

Deanna nodded. Before she could say anything, though, Samuel cut in harshly. "Tell me more about the thing you two are hunting."

A quick look shared with Dean let Percy take the lead. "It's crossed several state lines already, which I imagine has already cause problems for lots of hunters. I'm kind of a specialist in it, though, and we've been following it for about two weeks now."

Samuel looked moderately interested. "Does it have a type? Mary here said that you mentioned it was targeting her and her boyfriend."

Dean looked hesitant to speak. "Well, the best we can figure is it's been going after young couples. And the last lead we had on it was in this area."

"Does it have anything to do with the Whitshire Farm thing?" Mary asked.

Percy turned to her, confused. "Whitshire Farms?"

Dean tapped his chin, thinking. "That sounds really familiar. Why do I remember that?"

"It's been all over the papers." Samuel said. "Tom Whitshire. Got tangled up in a combine a few towns over. Thing is, all his crops were dead. So why'd he be on it?"

"That sounds more like demonic omens than an empousa." Dean said. He stuttered over the pronunciation a bit, but nobody other than Percy seemed to notice.

"That's why we're looking into it." Samuel said. "We're going over to Whitshire day after tomorrow to investigate."

"We could go." Percy offered. "If the empousa is really there, we'll be able to take care of it. You guys don't worry about it."

"Yeah, right. Turn my hunt over to you? See, Deanna, this is why I don't trust other hunters." Samuel complained. Deanna rapped him on the knuckles.

"We'd be happy to let you look over it. We've got a few other leads to look into, anyways." She said, glaring at her husband.

Percy smiled. "Thanks."

"I'll go with you!" Mary said suddenly, as if she had been working up the courage for a while to say that.

"What? No!" Dean said. "You've got absolutely no experience with this monster, and I don't think your parents here would be too thrilled with receiving your corpse." Deanna nodded in the background, but Mary ignored her.

"I'm competent. I'll be fine!" Mary defended, crossing her arms and leaning back in her chair.

Percy rolled his eyes at all of the posturing, but decided to stay out of it. She wasn't his mother.

Dean sighed. "You can't come. Just don't."

Mary rolled her eyes and scoffed, but uncrossed her arms. "Ugh, fine. Whatever."

Dean looked mollified, but Percy couldn't help but think that Mary had given in too easily, if her disposition was anything like either of her sons'.