Oops, almost forgot to post this week. Thanks MalicMalic for reminding me. We don't want Amy stuck out there longer than she needs to be!

When the lights came back on, it was exactly like that. There was no slow climb back to consciousness, lights just snapped on and they were suddenly sitting at a rough hewn table on a pair of rickety chairs. Two crudely potted earthenware mugs sat in front of them, their contents steaming. The room around them seemed to be a small log cabin. A fire burned low in the fireplace. There was a single door on one wall and the only other furniture seemed to be an overstuffed armchair and a single bed against the opposite wall.

"What the hell?" Sam asked looking around.

A noise to their left had them looking over.

"Ah, my guests have arrived!" A small, crooked man standing by a bench slicing what looked to be bread. "I have been waiting for you. I heard you out there, so much fun and merriment! I knew you would be worthy opponents!" He clapped his hands together gleefully.

"Der Einsame." Sam whispered.

"Son of a…" Dean stood and reached back for his gun, drawing it and pointing at the grizzled old man. "Where is she?!" He yelled.

"Your guns will not hurt me." The Der Einsame said waving an unconcerned hand in their direction. "Put it away and eat. Eat." He encouraged, pointing to the mugs of stew in front of them.

"Our guns might not hurt you, but this will." Sam said laying a bronze dagger on the table beside his mug as Dean sat back down beside him.

The Der Einsame flicked his eyes to the dagger.

"Yes, that will, but then you will not learn the whereabouts of your little friend." He replied smugly. He picked up the plate of bread slices and carried it to the table, placing it in front of the brothers. "I'll do you a little wager. You play me, defeat me and I'll tell you where she is."

"She's still alive?" Dean queries.

"Is possible." Der Einsame shrugged. "She was best opponent I have for very long time! Until then she cry. Boo hoo." Der Einsame scrubbed his fists into his eyes. "'I want to go home'." He mocked in a falsetto voice. "She would no longer play so I put her to be forgotten." He waved a hand in the air.

"Tell me where she is!" Dean demanded.

"Do we have deal?" Der Einsame asked as he sat in the armchair and interlocked his hands across his stomach.

"Deal." Sam said.

A grin spread across the creatures face.

"So let's begin." He grinned.

Amy awoke in the dark. From what she could determine, she was in some sort of hole, although it gave her a strange sense of vertigo as she traced her way around it. It was cold, dark and damp.

"Help me!" She screamed. "Derek! Derek! Help me!"

She screamed herself hoarse. Calling for Derek over and over, praying that he was safe. She tried to climb out over and over but made no progress and just kept falling back to the bottom of the pit. Fatigue and helplessness washed over her as she collapsed to the ground. Huddled against the wall she cried to herself. Clasping the letter A that hung around her neck, a birthday gift from Sam and Dean, she turned her tearful face skyward.

"Dean, please…please, Dean." It was one final prayer to the one person she knew that could and would save her.

They'd been going back and forth for hours…days…years for all Dean knew. What he did know was that they were getting nowhere and Amy was still missing.

They had been trying every joke and riddle they new, from the most intelligent to the most lamest.

Sam was currently rapid firing them at Der Einsame.

"I have four sister across the sea,

Each sister sent a gift to me,

The first sent a chicken that had no bones,

The second a cherry that had no stone,

The third sent a book that couldn't be read,

And the forth a blanket that had no thread.

How?"

Der Einsame paced back and forth across the room mumbling to himself about chickens and bones and threads and stones. Dean tried to hold his hope down but the more the creature paced the more it rose until finally it turned to them.

"I have it. A chicken with no bones is still it the egg, the cherry was still a blossom. The book was still in its press and the blanket was fleece yet to be spun." He grinned in triumph and the brothers slumped in their chairs.

"Right." Sam sighed. "Okay, try this one;

So beautiful and cold,

So young yet so old,

Alive but dead,

Always hungry even when fed,

Will die if it is bled,

Or you cut off its head."

The monster scoffed.

"A vampire." He said with a wave of his hand.

"Good one." Dean nodded at his brother.

"Not good enough." Sam sighed.

Back and forth they went, one to another, pulling out the lamest dad jokes 'what do you call juice with no ice? Ju.', to the most in-depth either of them could think of.

"This is ridiculous! Tell me where she is!" Dean yelled, standing and pointing his gun at the gnarled little man standing by the fire.

"Tut, tut, that is not a riddle." He said.

"Fine." Dean snarled and cocked the gun. "Riddle me this, what happens to supernatural fuglies that take people I love and don't tell me where they are?"

"Well, I would assume that you kill them, but that wouldn't work now, would it? Kill me and you'll never find your friend." The creature said with a malicious grin.

"Dean, it's okay, we can keep going. We'll beat this thing." Sam said calmly, using his hand to push the gun down. "We'll just keep going."

And keep going they did.

"I can break,

I can be clogged,

I can be attacked, I can be given,

I can be kept,

I can be crushed,

yet I can be whole at the same time. What am I?" Sam asked.

"A river? No! A tomato…no, no it's a heart!" The creature answered with confidence.

Sam slumped back in his chair. He had let himself hope when the Der Einsame initially gave the wrong answer. They had agreed on three guesses for each riddle, three the magic number, and Sam wasn't sure if the first two guesses had actually been wrong or if the horrible creature was just messing with them.

He looked at his brother and saw him staring at the monster. Dean was leaning back in his chair, arms crossed across his chest. To anyone else he would almost look relaxed but Sam knew different. Sam could practically see the gears grinding away in Deans head as he assessed the monster looking for a weakness. He tilted his head a little and squinted when Der Einsame fumbled another riddle, but then got the next few easy as breathing.

"I've got one." Dean said finally leaning forward and taking the lead for the first time since he exhausted all his elephant jokes.

"Proceed." The being said with a flourish of his gnarled hand.

"I can make people happy,

I can make people cry,

I can make people want me,

I can make people crazy,

What am I?"

The creature thought for a very long time.

"You are a…riddle." He said.

"No."

"A dog?"

"No." Dean said with a small amount of satisfaction.

The Der Einsame stopped to reconsider the riddle asking Dean to repeat it.

"It…is…a….elephant?" The creature looked hopeful, even knowing it's answer was wrong.

Dean laughed.

"It's love. You lose." He said in a low and even voice, not even bothering to show how happy and relieved he was.

Sam turned to look at his brother with open mouthed surprise.

"No. No!" Der Einsame stamped its foot. "Another!"

"Fine." Dean said with a small tilt of his head. "It is mine, but only you can keep it?" Dean gave the creature a bare second to answer before jumping in. "It's my heart. Another? I am a nine letter word that rhymes with perfection; I am yet another name for love, what am I?"

Again Dean waited just a beat before going to answering.

"The answer is affection." Sam jumped in looking darkly at Der Einsame.

"No!" The creature growled, screwing up its gnarled features in hate.

"How about this one?" Sam asked. "I can fill a room yet take up no space?"

"Hey, Sammy? Is the answer 'love'?" Dean asked sarcastically.

"Why, yes Dean. It is."

"I got one for you,

I hurt the most when lost, yet also when not had at all.

I am sometimes hardest to express, yet easiest to ignore.

I can be give many or just one.

What am I?" Dean had risen as he spoke and walked, with Sam following, both with their guns drawn, towards the creature now cowering on the floor.

The brothers look towards Der Einsame with twin looks of hatred.

"Well, we're waiting?" Dean prompted.

"Is it love?" He asked weakly.

"Yes it's love!" Dean shouted. "But you wouldn't have known that because you don't feel love, or affection." Dean crouched before the creature as he spoke, his gun hanging between his knees. "You don't even have a heart. You're just some soulless, bloodsucking fugly who must sees humans as playthings, a source of energy to suck dry until you're bored with them and leave them to die so you can move on to the next unsuspecting sucker. Well, I've got news for you," he said as he stood again. "Humans can feel love and you made the mistake of stealing one that is that is precious to us, who is loved. By. Us!" Dean gestured between his brother and himself with his gun then turned it on Der Einsame. "Now where is she?"

Der Einsame picked himself up from the ground and dusted himself off.

"Very well, you have bested me. I put her in the oubliette." He said with a wave of his hand.

"What's an oubliette?" Dean asked.

"It's where things get put to be forgotten." Sam said.

"Yes." Der Einsame replied.

"Where is it?" Dean asked.

Der Einsame let out a huff and walked to the wall. He pressed on it and a doorway appeared and swung open.

"Solve the labyrinth and you will find her, but be aware, time is running out for her."

"No! We had a deal! We beat you and you tell us where Amy is!" Dean growled.

"And I have. She's in the oubliette. You have thirteen hours." Der Einsame stepped away from the door and gestured with his hand. "Best you get moving, yes?"

Deans hand shot out to stop his brother as Sam stepped forward raising the bronze dagger.

"Kill him and the magic dies too, right?" Dean asked.

"Yes, and then what would become of your little friend? Tick-tock. Time is wasting."

Sam sheathed the dagger and glared at Der Einsame.

"I will kill you." He said as he stepped past and through the door.

"That is the best joke I have heard all day." Der Einsame teased. "I would wish you good luck, but I don't."