Disclaimer: I own nothing. I am to a spiritual level beyond material possessions. Therefore, I must borrow everyone else's.

The Ponderosa Experience: Chapter 4 – The Hunt

The sun was peaking over the horizon as Cesar and Dean stumbled from the house toward Cesar's truck. Hearing the kitchen door squeak, Cas emerged from the barn to see them off. Cesar waved as he tossed a duffle bag in the back and got in the truck. Dean, eyes half open, with a steaming travel mug in one hand grunted and tipped his mug to Cas in greeting. He opened the passenger side door, but hesitated to enter. Eventually he turned around and called to the barn, "Hey, Cas. There's more coffee, inside, if you want some." Cas nodded but didn't reply. Dean shrugged and hopped in the truck.

It was a short ride to the Letón's property. Their kids were getting ready for the long drive to school, their father had his hands full cooking breakfast and double-checking the eldest's geometry homework, so Cesar and Dean waited for the matriarch to return from some early morning chore. She led them out to one of the outbuildings.

"We managed to keep our herd safe last night with the patrols and the lights, like you suggested, but I found a pile of barn cats this morning," she pointed as she stepped around to the back of the building. There were at least four bodies, stacked on top of each other. The bodies were drained with slits revealing dried blood and moist inners.

"I've never seen anything like it. Is Jesse sure it was a rabid coyote?" she asked.

Cesar shrugged. "What else could it be, Lia?"

She shrugged. "Aliens?"

Dean snorted, but Cesar knew better than to laugh. "It'll be a new one to hear that aliens are going after cats and avoid bright lights."

Lia laughed at herself. "Silly, I know. But living a couple hours from Roswell… you hear some things."

Dean wandered away from the shadow of the building. He knelt down and pointed to some broken branches and impressions in the dirt. "Unless their U.F.O. got a flat, and they walk on all fours, these aren't aliens." He paused. "Or fairies." [1]

"Fairies?" Cesar and Lia looked at him skeptically.

Dean opened his mouth, but snapped it shut and shook his head. "Inside joke," he mumbled and stood up. "The tracks are recent. We should be able to track them easy."

Cesar thanked Lia for her time and encouraged her to get back to her chores and family. Once she left, Cesar repeated, "Them?"

Dean nodded and raised his eyebrows. "There are two sets of tracks."

"Could it have come and gone twice?"

Dean shook his head. "That's not where I'd put my money."

"But chupacabras hunt alone."

"I've never heard of more than one either." Dean shrugged. "Maybe it was date night?"

Cesar walked over to get a better look at where Dean had pointed. "Those are definitely two sets of tracks," he agreed. Cesar looked out on the horizon where the tracks led. He jerked his head in that direction. "Let's get a move on."

The two followed the tracks rather easily to a small bridge over a seasonal creek with a trickle of water. Cesar pointed to a small burrow in the bank, hidden in a shadow. "Armadillo burrow."

"Looks like it has new owners," Dean said as his eyes followed the chupacabra tracks to the hole where the entrance looks to have been recently enlarged.

Cesar took a long look at his surroundings. "It seems a little odd for a chupacabra den. They are usually more reclusive."

Dean nodded in agreement. "Right next to a road, nothing hiding the entrance… Hell, we could come back with lawn chairs, set-up right here, have a few beers, and boom, right when we see the whites of their eyes."

They paused trying to rationalize the unusual behavior. Cesar broke the silence: "Armadillos can have more than one entrance to their burrow, maybe it tunnels to a burrow in a quieter area."

Dean shrugged; he didn't have a better guess. "So, we should probably search for other entrances and block them. Funnel them out through this one."

Cesar nodded. "Let's get to work." Cesar took a step then paused and turned back to Dean and raised an eyebrow. "Fairies?" [1]

"So like this?" Castiel moves the currycomb in small circles across Dorothy's side. She was the first of Cesar and Jesse's horses due for grooming that day. It was mid-morning, and they had already finished feeding and cleaning of various animals.

Leaning against the paddock fence, Jesse nods. "Yeah, but start at the neck and work your way down and back."

Castiel repositioned he comb close to her cheek. Dorothy swung her head around and nipped at his jacket.

"Not her face," Jesse snapped when he realized what was happening. Castiel nodded and moved the comb down. Dorothy stomped her hoof approvingly and sniffed her lead tied to the fence.

"So now that you'd have a look at the smelly, dirty part of ranch life, what do you think?" Jesse asked.

"Spending time in the service of others is very gratifying, even if you don't communicate in a spoken language." Castiel worked his way down Dorothy's flank. "Analogous to Hunting, but with less of the imminent danger"

Jesse raised his eyebrows. "I never thought about it like that before." He snorted. "Guess it kinda is. Honestly, I thought I'd be bored. When we moved here, I gave it six months before I'd be itching to go find a vampire nest or ride an ambulance somewhere. Then one day I was out working on the chicken coop, and Cesar came out with a small fancy cake he bought in town and congratulated us on 1 year in retirement." Jesse shakes his head. "You've been doing the Hunter thing for a while. You ever thought about retiring?"

Cas paused and looked up thoughtfully before continuing grooming. "No. I've felt Hunting or helping the Winchesters as a natural fit for my skillset to make the most impact to amend my past transgressions. At least on Earth. I'm not sure I could ever redeem myself for the destruction I inflected on Heaven and the subsequent damage I made trying to fix it."

"Past transgressions?" He snorted. "I have trouble picturing you forgetting to return a library book."

Castiel raised his eyebrows but didn't look from the horse. "Oh, I assure you, a former warrior of Heaven with delusions of grandeur upon his second resurrection and desperate to prevent the relaunch of the Apocalypse he rebelled to stop, can achieve great offenses."

Jesse cocked his head, only catching half the story and not really believing it. "Still not seeing it. I'll need an example."

Castiel sighed as he moved around Dorothy's other side, dragging his fingers along her backside so she'd know it was Cas in her blind spot and not kick him. "I do not want you to think different of me. I am not the same as I was then."

"Aww, come on," Jesse prodded. "I could use some good gossip."

Castiel sighs again. "Very well." He took a minute to compose the words. "I devoured souls to give me god-like power. My first stop on Earth was at the Lady of Serenity Church to make a pastor choke on his own tongue for his homophobic and hypocritical rhetoric." [2]

Jesse smirked. "That doesn't sound like a transgression that needs amends to me. Sounds like he had it coming."

"Humans are flawed, but it was not in my place to be judge, jury, and executioner. For him or the many, many that followed."

Jesse took another look at Castiel in his signature outfit and his eyes grew wide. He snapped his fingers. "You were the Trenchcoat Inquisition?!"

"That is what people called it?" Cas groaned. "So embarrassing."

"Cesar and I had biggest arguments about that…I thought we were going to break-up at one point."

"You were going to break-up over my actions?"

"It started a philosophical discussion of sorts. He's all about Catholic forgiveness and giving people second chances, and I was more about the karma of it all and how many second chances do you get? At least for dickbags like homophobes and white supremacists." Jesse shrugged. "I conceded after the whole motivational speaker thing. You probably could have used a second opinion before smiting all of them."

"Yes." Cas stopped brushing and looked to the ground. "'It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels.' [3]" Dorothy snorted in approval. Jesse notices that the horse somehow unsecured her lead from the fence, but since she was behaving with Cas, he didn't move to do anything about it.

Jesse felt bad about pushing the topic after noticing Cas's change in posture and demeanor. He tried to perk up the former deity. "But the leper colonies, that was nice."

"No one remembers the leper colonies."

"I –", Jesse stopped. He pushed off the fence and squinted in the distance. The Angel turned. "What do you see?" Near the flat horizon a cloud of dust was kicked up heading across his property from the federal lands to the main road.

"Trespassers. Maybe poachers." Jesse grabbed his crutches and started heading for his jeep. "Hurry, I don't think we'll catch them on the road if they turn south, but hopefully they'll head in our direction, and we can cut them off."

Cas surveyed the situation, placed one foot on the lowest crossbar of the paddock fence, and launched himself onto Dorothy's bareback. "Dorothy and I can delay them until you catch up in the vehicle."

Jesse's jaw dropped. "Uh, okay - " Cas and Dorothy were off before he finished, "I guess I'll meet you there."

By the time Jesse pulled up, Cas and Dorothy were standing firm in front of a brown van with the driver's side door open. A red-faced man yelled at the Angel in the trenchcoat, "Would you get out of the road already, you blockhead!" He reached in the van and pressed down on the horn. Cas made no reaction. Not even a head-tilt or eyebrow raise. "What are you deaf and dumb?" the man shouted and waved his arms.

As Jesse hobbled forward from the Jeep, the man turned toward him and his face changed. "I'm glad you're here, Jesse. This dipshit thinks its funny to block the road."

"I didn't realize we were on a first name basis, Mr. Stoneman." Jesse looked up to Cas on Dorothy. "You think it was funny, Cas?"

Cas reluctantly nodded. "I did find the various attempts at insulting my intelligence and gender-identity from a perfect stranger amusing. My favorite was the comparison to feces hanging from an animal's anus. I hadn't heard that one outside of early 20th century novels."

Jesse smirked. "If I had known how much fun you were having, I wouldn't have hurried. My leg got jostled more than I'd like on the ride over."

"You two know each other," Stoneman stated.

Jesse grinned and nodded. "He's helping out at the ranch while I'm lame. We saw someone trespassing, and he was eager to play cowboy while I caught up."

Stoneman's tone was low and threatening. "I wasn't trespassing. I had a verbal easement with –"

"I don't care if the last owners didn't mind you acting like you were King of the County!" Jesse interrupted. He pointed his thumb at himself. "We do."

Stoneman's eyes narrowed. "Why do you have such a problem with me? Is this about the fag joke at the Commission meeting? That was years ago. I didn't mean anything by it. It was just a joke."

Jesse's face reddened. Before he could explode, Cas guided Dorothy between them. He glared down at Stoneman. "It doesn't matter what it's 'about'. You need to respect their wishes." Cas continued to look down upon the man, eyes unyielding, until Stoneman looked away and slumped. Dorothy snorted and stomped the ground to emphasize whom was at the top of the hierarchy.

The man gulped. "Okay. Fine. I'll get going."

Jesse stepped around Dorothy and held up his hand. "Not so fast. What were you doing on our property?"

Stoneman half-turned back toward Cas and Jesse. His eyes darted, and he paused before he spoke. "Caught a family of 'coons messing with my feed, my trash. Thought I'd dump them at the Park and make them their problem." He snorted. "Figured you'd hippie-dippy libtards would be happy about that, but I forgot nothing is good enough for the likes of you."

Jesse walked toward Stoneman, finger pointed. "You, backwards hick –"

Cas swung off Dorothy and landed behind Jesse. He put a firm hand on his shoulder. "Name calling will not improve the situation." Jesse lowered his finger. "Whatever," he pouted and turned his head away. "But if he live-trapped raccoons to release them somewhere else, I'll –"

"You don't believe me?" Stoneman sneered. "Go ahead and check the van. The cages are in the back."

Sure enough, Cas and Jesse counted ten empty cages in the back of the van, each large enough to fit an adult raccoon.

"I stand corrected," Jesse spoke through grinding teeth as he slammed the back doors to the van.

Stoneman smiled. "Now if you'll move your horse out of my way, I'll get going."

Cas returned to the front of the van and lead Dorothy off the road. "Next time we catch you on our property without our permission, we'll call the Sheriff," Jesse threatened.

Stoneman shrugged, but the smile never left his face. "That would be nice. It's been awhile since I had a decent chat with Jeb." He swung himself into the driver's seat.

Jesse and Cas watched the cloud of dust stretch out behind the vehicle. Cas spoke first: "He was…unpleasant."

Jesse snorted. "Understatement. I can't wait until all these old, assholes in power kick the bucket."

"I can relate," Cas stated but didn't explain. After a short silence, he said, "He was lying about the cages, but I don't know the circumstances of his lie."

Jesse nodded. "I thought the same thing."

As the retreating dust cloud grew smaller and further away, Cas asked, "Do you mind if I take Dorothy on ride before heading back? She seemed to enjoy letting loose."

Jesse raised a skeptical eyebrow. "She did?"

"I enjoyed it as well," Cas confessed.

"Sure. Watch the temperature. It won't be good for her to work as hard in the heat." Jesse raised his hand in a half-salute. "See you back at the homestead."

The sun was beating down, but well positioned box fans and the shade provide by the few trees at the south side of the house kept the lower levels tolerable. Cesar pushed the squeaky screen door to the kitchen open and held it for Dean. Spread on the counter was a collection of fruit and sandwich fixings. Jesse sat at the kitchen table with his bum leg on and empty chair. Jesse greeted his husband, smiled, raised his eyebrows, and made attention-getting noises until Cesar put down his plate and pecked Jesse on the cheek. Dean ignored them, grabbed his own plate, fixed his sandwich, and, once the couple separated, settled down in the same seat he was in last night.

"You're in a cheery mood," Cesar remarked to his husband with a hint of suspicion to his voice.

Jesse swallowed a bite of his sandwich and smiled. "You missed an excellent show." Jesse related his and Cas's encounter with their neighbor Stoneman to an eager audience. "You should have seen his face! When Cas glared at him, I thought he was going to piss himself. Cas was all stoic on Dorothy, wearing like 5 layers of clothes and not a drop of sweat. The douchbag didn't know what to make of him."

Cesar laughed and even Dean couldn't help but smile sheepishly at his plate. "I know that face," Dean said. "The first time, I can't even remember what I said, but Cas was like, 'You should show me some respect. I dragged you out of Hell. I can throw you back in.'" [4] Dean shuttered slightly, then chuckled and took a bite of his sandwich.

"What happened next?"

Dean pushed his sandwich to one side of his mouth and talked out the other. "Nothing. He popped out of there. The next time I saw him, he zapped me back to 1973 with no explanation." [5] Dean looked up, recalling his adventure, and barely registered the looks of disbelief on his friends' faces. "It was a little hellish. Especially the hair."

Before the retired Hunters could ask any follow-up questions, hoof beats galloping toward the ranch announced Castiel's return. All three went to the paddock fence to meet him. As Cas and Dorothy rode closer, Dean's gaped slightly, and then his head dropped and a blush spread across his cheeks as he shuffled the dirt at his feet. Jesse saw it all out of the corner of his eye. "Are you serious?" Jesse remarked, leaning across Cesar.

Back to reality, Dean's head snapped up. "What?"

Jesse opened his mouth for a smart reply, but Cesar elbowed him. They whispered hastily in Spanish for a few seconds. The only words Dean could make out were "gilipollas" and "Narnia" from Jesse and "crítico" from Cesar. Their spat ended with Jesse rolling his eyes and pulling out his phone.

Dorothy slowed and came to a halt in front of the three humans. Cas almost leapt off as soon as Dorothy stopped, but Jesse called out. "No wait! I want to get some photos. Who knows if Dorothy will let anyone else ride her."

Cas sighed and slumped. "Must I?" Dorothy shook out her mane and snorted. That brought a half-smile to Cas's face and he patted her neck. "At least one of us enjoys our photo taken."

"Really? She told you that?" Jesse asked.

"She specifically likes the praise that usually comes with photos. Of which she's getting irritated that she has not yet received."

Cesar laughed and obliged verbally while Jesse rubbed her nose after putting his phone away. Dean watched Cas dismount and leaned over the fence. With his eyes on his own hands, Dean said to Cas, "You looked good up there." After hearing a snort of Jesse, Dean added, "I mean, I haven't seen you smile like that in…in a while."

Cas paused to find the right words. "I haven't felt the occasion."

Dean looked up, a sympathetic expression on his face. Their eyes locked for a second, but Cas broke it when he cast his head down and to the side. "It was the closest I've felt to flying in a long time." He paused and a small smile spread across his face. "Abet very, very slowly." His head snapped up and caught Dean's eyes again.

Dorothy interrupted their gaze: She trotted over, snorted at Dean before turning toward Cas and whipping her tail inches from Dean's face.

Cas brushed her face. "I didn't mean to insult you. It was a very pleasant ride." When he felt her sweat and skin under her mane, his face turned serious. "Cesar, Jesse, is there a way to cool her down? I don't think we properly heeded Jesse's advice about riding under the hot sun."

Cesar nodded and gestured toward the barn. "Come this way. I'll show you."

Dean's eyes followed the trio as they disappeared into the barn before turning to Jesse, leaning on his crutches and swiping through his phone. Dean walked over and glanced over his shoulder. "Did you get any good ones?"

"Uh-huh," Jesse nodded and quickly locked his phone before Dean could take a look.

"Would you mind sending me and Sam one?"

Jesse raised an eyebrow. "You… and Sam?" He recognized these games and shook his head. "Cas didn't seem to want his picture taken. I don't want to go spreading them around." Jesse paused as an idea formed into his head. "I'll send them to Cas, and if he wants you to have one, he can send one to you."

Dean scowled. "Fine. Whatever." He squinted at the horizon before he glanced back at the barn. "Will cooling the horse down take a while? Should we finish lunch without them?"

Jesse shrugged. "I say we eat. I'm do for some more painkillers and a nap soon." Dean nodded and headed back to the house with Jesse.

As the sun fell beyond the horizon, one pair of orange eyes shone reflected light near the creek. When a second pair of eyes emerged from the hole, two shots rang out. Two figures rose. One headed closer to the prey. Two more shots rang for double taps.

"Are all cases post-retirement this easy?" Dean asks as he picked up one of the dead chupacabras, the size of a Great Dane but leaner.

Cesar finished his beer and tossed the can in the back of his truck before retrieving his camping chair. "I hope so."

"Huh," Dean reflected then shared, "One of the things I used to like about hunting was the thrill of the hunt" He shrugged. "Tonight, I didn't miss the adrenaline as much as I thought I would. Easy is nice. Relaxing even."

Dean dragged the carcasses one by one to the truck while Cesar loaded the rest of their gear. He shined a flashlight on the bodies. "I've never seen chupacabras this small."

Cesar walked over to take a closer look. "Perhaps they are juvenile. I don't know much about chupacabra family structure, or life before adulthood for that matter. Lost their mother?"

"Huh. Maybe that is why they were hunting together." Dean shined the light away from the bodies.

"Dean, can you bring the light back?" Cesar asked as he knelt next to one of the bodies.

Dean obliged. "What do you see?"

"It has unusual scarring…" He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pen. "Can you show the light on its mouth?" Cesar used the pen to raise the lip of the dead chupacabra. Its gums were black, misshapen, and several teeth were missing. He poked one with the end of his pen, and they heard a snap as the tooth bent inward. "Its teeth are rotting out of its head."

"Have you seen this before?" Dean asked.

Cesar shook his head as he stood, eyes not leaving the monster's body. "Not in chupacabras." He turned his head toward Dean. "But it does remind me of the condition of some of the animals in the hording situation we rescued Dorothy from."

"Do you think they were at the same place?"

Cesar shook his head. "They were pretty thorough when investigating. There weren't any animals resembling chupacabras on the list." He looked up at the sky. "Of course, I could see someone unfamiliar with the supernatural deciding to let these guys out the back door instead of think about what they could possibility be."

Dean nodded. "In a couple days, they probably wrote it off as a dream or something."

The pair loaded the bodies. Cesar closed the back tailgate. "Well, as the retiree, I vote we head back to the ranch, take care of the bodies, have another beer, maybe a game of cards."

Dean agreed. "Sounds like a plan." He glanced back at the truck where the bodies lain. He felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise. There was some connection here he wasn't making. He shook his shoulders and let go of the idea to join Cesar in the cab. "Weird."

[1] Fairies were abducting people while playing into the alien abduction stereotypes in episode 6x09 "Clap your hands if you believe". Dean was abducted, but he hasn't talked about it on-screen.

[2] Episode 7x01 "Meet the New Boss"

[3] Quote attributed to Saint Augustine.

[4] End of episode 4x02: "Are You There, God? It's Me, Dean Winchester"

[5] Episode 4x03: "In the Beginning"

Next Chapter: The Showdown – Celebration is cut short when tempers run hot. In the commotion, unexpected visitors arrive.