02: No, I Can't Take a Holy War Again.

Once Jenna and Amara were safely in the care of Jenna's grandmother, the Impala was back on the road. After a while of silence, Katia spoke up. "I don't generally care to be the bearer of bad news, but we should probably discuss the immediate problems that have arisen."

"Let me make a grocery list," Zarya muttered sarcastically. Dean chuckled.

"Truthfully, that is rather accurate. The Darkness was released, that is a given. It caused an infection of the human race in the vicinity. There is someone who would take that opportunity for their own gain - Saskia."

"How would this benefit Saskia?" questioned Dean.

"The infected humans are already weak. They could be easily turned into whatever horrendous monster Saskia is toying with until she perfects the creatures she desires. She could also find a way to siphon the infection to heal herself. And it's plenty of souls ripe for eating."

"You think she's somewhere in the area then?"

"I believe it could be likely. Remiel is also another possibility since Runa was beginning to burn out. I have this disturbing feeling that with the collapse of the Other Side and the release of the Darkness she may have been able to snatch up another Vasile."

"Nova?" came Zarya's voice softly. "Could she have broken through…?"

Katia's expression turned solemn. "Nova actually was on track to regaining her humanity despite Remiel frying it. I'm certain she finally succeeded, but what it cost her was far too great… Not even Remiel could convince her to say 'yes' right now…"

Finally, Zarya looked away from the window. "What did Nova lose…?"

"Damon…"

As Zarya started to process that kind of loss for her ancestor, Dean's phone rang. Jenna was frantic; something had happened with Amara. Suddenly the Impala was whipping around in a U-turn and heading back to her grandmother's. When they made it, Jenna was waiting outside for them. She told them that her grandmother is "real Catholic" and called a priest who sent over an exorcist. Katia's lips immediately downturned which prompted Zarya to ask what her visible distaste was for as they headed inside.

"Exorcists are extremists," she replied quietly. "That's a story for another day." Her voice dropped so quiet that only Zarya would be able to hear with her enhanced hearing. "Perks of being half human still - you don't need to be formally invited into a human's home."

As soon as the trio laid eyes on the 'priest' they were all ready to just pummel him. "Crowley," Dean half snapped.

"Father Crowley." The King of Hell corrected as he sipped his tea with a smirk.

"Yeah, and I'm Mother Mary," Zarya muttered as she pinched the bridge of her nose.

Dean and Crowley went outside to talk while Zarya and Katia remained inside with the women. Jenna's grandma came out with a couple of cups of tea for them while Jenna went upstairs to check on Amara. As soon as Katia lifted the cup to sip, she smiled at the scent before sipping it calmly. "Vervain won't affect us, ma'am," she informed the grandmother. Zarya choked on her sip of tea from the shock.

"I had to be certain. You both clearly aren't human, so if you're not vampires, then what are you?"

"Hybrids, actually. Dhampirs. Vervain wouldn't work very well on our lineage anyways. I have this feeling that you've heard of vervain resistant vampires because you've ran into a portion of our family before then."

She nodded slowly. They both ignored Zarya's flabbergasted expression. "Her name was Lena Vasile. A young hunter named Daniel Clarke was out this way on a case. Lena was my babysitter; always a sweet girl. We ran into Daniel in town looking a mess and being chased by something. As soon as Lena saw the creature she snapped a thick branch and staked it. Daniel was beyond lost until Lena explained that there were more than just the vampires he had been used to. It just wasn't so common to find them. They hit it off right away, married, and moved down south."

Zarya's eye twitched a little. Everything seriously comes full circle to the fuckin' Vasiles, doesn't it? She thought. A thud upstairs caught their attention suddenly, but especially the attention of the two dhampirs. Zarya set her cup down slowly and stood. "I'll go check on Jenna - you two stay down here. Keep chatting about the weirdness of our freakish family, by all means."

She crept slowly up the stairs, careful as to not make a single sound. Something was setting her on edge. When she made it to the second floor she actually shivered. There was something cold and dark infecting through the walls. Jenna emerged from the nursery with no expression on her face at all. She charged at Zarya and the two started going back and forth. Zarya was only trying to defend herself without attacking back since she didn't know what was wrong with Jenna suddenly. She also wasn't trying to show her excessive strength which got her tossed down the stairs. Katia jumped up from her chair, shouting to Jenna's grandma in the kitchen to stay put. Katia had gotten Jenna restrained for only a minute before Jenna was able to toss the small framed girl over her and onto the coffee table, breaking it into several wooden shards.

Katia let out a cry from the amount of wooden pieces in and through her body. It didn't completely incapacitate her, but she had to get every piece out carefully. Zarya tried to help her but she insisted that Zarya protect grandma instead. She rushed into the kitchen to find Jenna holding a knife. She heard the front door burst open and knew then that she couldn't risk using her speed to get the knife away. It severely hindered her ability to protect Jenna's grandmother, which caused Zarya to have to watch Jenna stab her grandmother. She had nearly made it around the kitchen island when Dean ran in and Jenna turned the knife on Zarya.

You're making this really difficult to protect anyone and maintain my humanity, she thought bitterly as Jenna came at her with the knife.

The ravenette danced around the slashes Jenna threw at her until Dean came up behind her, trying to restrain her. Zarya's hands had been up defensively and Jenna got one more slash in before Dean made her drop the knife that looked as if it cut right across Zarya's palm. Her greener than blue eyes widened. Before Dean could notice any blood coming from an already closing wound, Zarya dashed over to the grandmother. She was already dead, but Zarya had to make it look like the blood on her hand was from checking her wound.

"Thought wood didn't do damage to your kind," Crowley commented before taking a large chunk of coffee table out of Katia's back for her.

She frowned as she finished picking the smaller pieces out of her. "Wood will harm any vampire created of the Originals' line. It's merely the amount of damage it does. You can drive a normal wooden stake through one of the Mikaelsons and all it will do is dessicate them for a few hours. It will kill a Vasile vampire as far as I know. Dhampirs it just causes extreme pain to. Kind of like if a demon were to be dunked in a vat of holy water."

Jenna burst out of Dean's grip when he thought Zarya had gotten injured and dashed back upstairs. Dean immediately rushed to Zarya's side, asking if she was alright. She nodded and wiped her bloody palms on her jeans to show him she wasn't hurt. "Yeah, it was her grandma's blood. She didn't touch me. She did chuck Katia into the wooden table though."

"I'm fine!" Katia yelled from the living room. "Just kind of like being stuck with a cactus or porcupine over here!"

"Dhampirs are somethin' else," Dean muttered which made Zarya gulp. "Come on, we gotta figure out what happened to Jenna."

"She doesn't have a soul," Crowley told them nonchalantly as they headed for the stairs.

"What are you talking about? How is that even possible?"

Zarya's eyes widened suddenly. "Amara," she breathed. "What if Amara is the Darkness and she took Jenna's soul?"

As if on cue, all four darted for the stairs trying to push past someone and get through first. Zarya felt a hand on her back suddenly, one that was much smaller than Dean's or Crowley's. She looked back to Katia who gave her a small nod before using her dhampir strength to shove Zarya onward through them. She sped right up the stairs with the other three in tow to find Jenna smashing little porcelain trinkets. The ravenette approached slowly.

"My grandma collected these things, but I always thought they were so… Blah. Don't worry. She won't care."

Zarya nodded slowly. "I'm sure she won't since she's dead on her kitchen floor."

"Amara's hungry. She's a growing girl."

"So it was Amara who did this to you?"

Jenna nodded and smashed another angel. "She made me better. I like the new me; she's a ball."

Suddenly, Jenna was tossed up to the ceiling and dropped to the floor where her neck snapped loudly. Zarya immediately whipped around, glaring daggers at Crowley who shrugged. "You're welcome."

"You killed her!" She yelled. "You had no fucking reason to do that!" Katia approached her quickly in an effort to tame the anger before it became rage and exposed her dhampir half. "Where the fuck do you think you're going?" She shouted as Crowley walked towards the door.

"To see the child that eats souls," he replied simply.

"You don't get what that thing is," Dean argued. "And Zare is right - you had no reason to kill Jenna."

"Please. Even if you could murder a baby, you couldn't murder that baby. I saw the way you looked at her. Me, on the other hand, it's not like it'd be my first."

"It could very well be your last," Zarya hissed.

Crowley met the ravenette's greener than blue eyes and stiffened. Her soul had… warped. It was no longer a normal shine with Lucifer's mark engraved, but there was something more to it that Crowley couldn't quite figure out. The worst part, however, was how much deeper Lucifer's mark had grown on her soul. His eyes cut the longer he stared at her, a disturbed chill creeping up his spine. "Perhaps it should be your first then, princess. Squirrel certainly wouldn't have the guts to do it, but why do I feel as if you would?"

"Probably because you're mistaking my desire to kill you instead."

"I want that child, and I get what I want. You kids don't seem to understand. I'm not your bloody sidekick! We've had some good times. So I'm gonna give you one chance - just one - to walk out that door, or I'm gonna take you each apart atom by atom. Do you understa- Aah! Bastards!"

It was a three way take down that couldn't have been more perfect for being completely unplanned. Dean sneakily slipped out his angel blade in sight of just Zarya. When he tried to strike Crowley with it, the King expected it and grabbed Dean's wrist. That was when Zarya jumped in and pushed the blade through Crowley's hand. To finish it off, Katia rushed forward to push him against a wall so Zarya could impale his hand there. All while they were doing that, Amara had aged a handful of years. She exited the crib, put on a dress, and walked out completely unnoticed. Only when the front door slammed shut did Katia's ears pick up on it.

The dark eyed dhampir rushed down the hall to the baby's room with Dean and Zarya in tow. When she saw the crib empty, she sped downstairs and around the perimeter quickly before returning to the hunters with a grim expression. "She's gone."

"How the hell is that possible?" Dean exclaimed.

Knowing Crowley was secured temporarily in the other room, Katia ushered the pair outside. "There are certain creatures who are known to… grow rapidly, as part of their DNA."

"What kind of creatures?" asked Zarya. "I don't even think I've read anything like that in the Men of Letters' files."

She sighed. "Dhampirs do when they're born with the blood… like myself."

[Flashback; Bulgaria, 1861]

"I thought you said that child was three," one of the orphanage's nuns whispered to another.

"She is," the latter replied affirmatively. She even took out a piece of paper and put it in front of the other nun. "Her birth date is February 19, 1858. Poor mother was brutally raped and then had to birth in a snow storm. I do not know why she is so big; how much does she eat?"

"No more than the other children, I swear to the Lord. Sometimes less! And it is not just that she is large for her age, she is much more articulate. She had already begun basic arithmetic and the alphabet with the older children. She no longer uses nappies, nor does she wet the bed."

"Does she speak?"

"She refuses to. She will sign rather than speak. And she signs fluently."

Katia knew the nuns didn't think she could hear them across the room, but she could. She sat at a small desk, her feet dangling just above the floor, writing perfect cursive on a piece of blank paper. She may have only just turned three actual years old, but she looked as if she were at least six or seven. Her raven hair was in pigtail braids all the way down her back and limbs much too lanky for a toddler. Three times, written in perfect cursive, was her name: Katia Marin Vasile.

[Present]

"I grew so rapidly my first few years that I was passed to several different orphanages in Bulgaria. The first Cursed Twins who were born dhampirs - Mireia and Claudia - it was expected at least. Mireia grew quickly, but not Claudia. Mireia was born with the gene active like me, but Claudia was born with it dormant like you, Zarya."

"If you're trying to convince me that Amara, the Darkness, is a dhampir-" Dean started.

"Absolutely not," Katia cut in quickly. "I'm suggesting that Amara's power grants her the same thing that happens to born dhampirs - the rapid generation until you're at your maximum age growth. If she keeps eating souls, she keeps growing faster so she can get to her max power."

Nobody wanted to admit the accuracy her theory held. If it were true, and Amara ate enough souls quickly, then they were already running out of time.