"Dad?" Sam asked in wonder.
"Sammy, it is you!" Sam was shocked to hear shakiness in his father's voice. "I…I saw the news…I…"
"No, Dad, I'm fine. It was a shapeshifter." Sam put his hand back on Dean's shoulder, squeezing it gently. Dean didn't even look up at the word "dad", his exhausted body leaning against the toilet for support.
"I figured it might be. That's…another reason I called." John's voice was still shaky, sounding unsure for the first time in as long as Sam could remember. "I've been hearing rumors about a gang of shapeshifters out where you are. I figured they could have had a hand in it."
"Do you have any idea what they're up to?" Sam asked, unable to believe he was so casually carrying on with this conversation, as if everything was normal.
"No, but it can't be good, so just watch your backs." There was silence and for a moment Sam thought his brother had hung up. Then John's voice came hesitantly through the line. "How…how's Dean?"
"Not too good," Sam signed, looking at Dean, who now had his back propped against the glass wall of the shower. "But we'll get through it. I'm not going anywhere." He added the last thought accusingly, his voice defiant.
"I know, Sammy, I know." Sam could hear his father's deep sigh, still so achingly familiar. "And I know you're mad, and someday we'll talk this out, but now is not the time. Just…take care of yourselves…and good luck with the shapeshifters. I know you two can handle them."
Sam's protests were met by a dial tone, and he angrily slammed the phone down. "Dad, huh?" Dean said, standing up slowly to gulp down water from the sink. He stopped, his mouth halfway to the tap. "Damnit! I should have called him! I should have told him you were ok."
Sam grabbed a cup and filled it with water, thrusting it at Dean. "Drink," Sam ordered. "And stop beating yourself up. Dad's not here, you don't owe him."
Dean glared at Sam, but drank the water. "Bitch," he muttered under his breath.
"Jerk," Sam gladly returned, and smiled broadly at the amused smirk that graced Dean's face. The doorbell rang, and Sam went to grab the pizza, sweeping a broken lamp off the table and laying the pizza down.
"Come and get it dear," Sam called out laughingly, grabbing a slice.
"Oh honey, you shouldn't have," Dean responded, taking a slice and plopping down in a chair. Sam's phone began beeping, a continuous strain of irritating noise that only halted when Sam picked the phone up and opened it.
"Oh wow," Sam said, gaping at the screen.
"What?" Dean moved over to look at the screen and whistled. "Jeez Sammy, fifteen messages is a lot. Who are they from?"
"They're all from my friends at Stanford." Sam scrawled through the missed calls. His eyes suddenly widened. "They must have seen the news."
"Must be nice." Dean leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, filling his mouth with pizza. Sam turned to him in confusion, and for a moment, it looked like Dean was going to refuse to add anything. Dean sighed, and opened his eyes, keeping them on the ceiling. "Must be nice to have people care enough to call."
"Dean…" Sam didn't know what to say, suddenly realizing what Dean was referencing. No one but their dad had called when the news had shown Dean as dead. Dean hadn't had any friends who would call.
"Are you gonna call them back?" Dean grabbed another piece of pizza, ignoring Sam's look. Sam stared at the screen for a minute, then shut the phone.
"Not now. I mean…what would I say exactly? Hi, this is Sam, a shapeshifter died, not me?" Sam threw the phone on the bed, his eyes remaining on it for a long time. Then he shook his head and turned back to Dean. "On to the shapeshifters then. Was anything off this morning, Dean? Anything weird?"
Dean rolled his eyes, and Sam rolled his right back. "Ok Dean, anything besides what we've already gone over?" Dean froze in mid eye roll.
"Actually, yeah," Dean said, standing up and moving over to the garbage can. "This morning, the shapeshifter wouldn't let me read the front page of the paper. He kept insisting I read the comics instead." Dean reached into the garbage can and extracted the front page, shaking it open and reading. "And this would explain it."
Sam got up, beginning to read over Dean's shoulder. Bank Robberies Continue the headline read. "Ok, so this article essentially says that there have been a ton of bank robberies in this area," Dean said, skimming the article. "Do you think that the robbers this morning were shapeshifters? Because judging by this article, what's being happening is that respected, well-to-do citizens have suddenly started robbing banks, and that sounds a little freakazoid to me."
"Then why kill the shapeshifter this morning?" Sam posited, righting a chair and sitting down.
"To get to me?" Dean answered, leaning against the wall, still skimming the article. "I mean, I wasn't exactly in hunting shape after…the incident." He refused to meet Sam's eyes, his eyes glued to the print in front of him.
"But then why not just kill me for real?" Sam asked. He suddenly remembered the nightmarish moment when he opened his eyes to see Dean with a gun pointed at his head. As if reading Sam's mind, Dean quickly spoke up before Sam could open his mouth.
"So maybe it was some kind of punishment. Maybe that shapeshifter was supposed to kill you, and he botched the job? So they took him out." Getting to the end of the article, Dean slowly raised his head, looking at Sam. "Sammy, looks like you might be getting to explain this all to your friends anyway."
"What do you mean?" Sam looked at Dean in confusion.
"Well, it says here the robberies started in California…at Stanford." Dean put the paper down on the floor. "Are you ready to go back?"