PHANTOM TRAVELER
Dean laid on his stomach fast asleep in the darkly lit motel room that harbored total silence. His eyes snapped wide awake when the sound of the front door creaked open with two pairs of footsteps walked in, looking through the stained glass wall blocking the entrance to the room. The door slammed shut as Dean slowly reached under his pillow for a weapon. He whipped his head around to face the intruders but realized that it was only Sam and Alice, both of them carrying a cup of coffee and pastries.
"Morning, sunshine," Sam said sarcastically.
"Remove your hand from the pillow before you shoot your eye out," Alice spoke dryly and walked over to the desk-side table to set two cups down.
Dean groaned loudly and looked up at Alice with his groggy eyes. "What time is it?"
"Uh," Sam took a glance outside. "It's about five forty-five."
"In the morning?"
"Yep." Both Sam and Alice said.
"Where does the day go?" Dean reluctantly sat up in bed. "Did you get any sleep last night?" he asked.
"Yeah," Sam said. "I grabbed a couple of hours."
Dean rolled his eyes. "Liar. Cause I was up at three while you were watching a George Foreman infomercial. Alice was searching the web too...if I remember." His mind was still a bit groggy from last night so he only had faint memories of what Alice was doing. Something then came to mind though, cause he doesn't actually recall Alice even getting some sleep either. He had a habit of staying up late and she was always up too with him when he did. He usually falls asleep before she does. "Alice, when was the last time you got a good nights sleep?"
Alice sat on the bed opposite from Dean and popped open the pastry box. "Ah...I actually have mild cases of insomnia a couple of times a week, so it's hard for me to sleep sometimes." She shrugged her shoulders and stuck her hand into the box to pull out a blueberry donut.
Dean stared at her when it clicked in his head. "Did this start to happen around the time Aiden passed?"
Alice's eyes shifted a bit before she frowned. "Yeah..." she said in a small voice and reached for her cup of black coffee. "Like Sam, I have nightmares about Aiden every so often." She took the drink to her lips and fell silent.
Sam sat down beside Alice and looked at his brother. "Does this never keep you up at night?" Dean only shook his head when he was handed a cup. "Never? You're never afraid?"
Dean shook his head. "No, not really?"
Sam scoffed. He reached over to Dean's pillow and pulled out a large hunting knife and held it up for everyone to see.
Dean took the knife back. "That's not fear. That is a precaution, and besides, Alice does the same thing." He gestured to her.
Sam eyed Alice before reaching over and lifting her pillow that had a fully loaded gun underneath. An HK VP9 with scary accuracy, especially if Alice was the one using it. Sam laughed when he saw it since he was expecting just a bigger knife, but no, she just had to take the extra mile and used a gun instead. "Really?"
Alice shrugged and placed the pillow right back over the gun. "I survived this long and the last thing I need is some dumbass jumping me when I'm trying to sleep."
Dean looked at Sam and gave him a 'told you so' look. He suddenly began to hear his phone ran and looked down. He cocked a brow and picked it up, sharing a look between Alice and Sam who were also wondering why someone would call. He answered it with a skeptical and confused tone. "Hello?"
Alice and the boys later met up in a hanger with the guy who called Dean so abruptly in the morning. His name was Jerry Panoski, a guy that Dean and John helped a while back with a poltergeist case.
"Thanks for making the trip so quickly," Jerry thanked them. "I ought to be doing you guys a favor, not the other way around." He looked back at Sam. "Dean and your dad really helped me out."
Sam nodded. "Yeah, he told me. It was a poltergeist?" he said.
"Damn right it was a poltergeist, practically tore our house apart," he said grimly. "Tell you something, if it wasn't for you and your dad, I probably wouldn't be alive. Your dad said you were off at college. Is that right?"
"Yeah, I was. I'm—taking some time off." Sam stuttered and got a raised eyebrow from Alice.
"Well, he was really proud of you. I could tell. He talked about you all the time." Jerry said.
"He did?" Sam generally looked surprised because that sounded like the last thing his dad would say about him, especially after their big fight.
"Yeah, you bet he did. Oh, hey, you know I tried to get a hold of him, but I couldn't. How's he doing, anyway?" He looked to Dean.
Dean quickly explained a cover story. "He's, um, wrapped up in a job right now."
"Well, we're missing the old man, but we get Sam. Even trade, huh?"
Alice snickered and patted Sam hard on the back while he stifled a smile.
They quickly moved into his office where a CD was waiting. "I listened to this. And, well, it sounded like it was right up your alley." He placed it in the drive. "Normally I wouldn't have access to this. It's the cockpit voice recorder for united Britannia flight 2485. It was one of ours."
The CD was played and the panicked sound of a pilot was heard. "Mayday! Mayday! Repeat! This is United Britania 2485—immediate instruction help! United Britania 2485, I copy your message—Maybe experiencing some mechanical failure..." The voice was cut off when this loud and ominous whooshing sound blasted into the recording. Alice and the boys listen quietly as it played when the line went dead and the recording stopped.
"Took off from here, crashed about two hundred miles south. Now, they're saying mechanical failure. The cabin depressurized somehow. Nobody knows why. Over a hundred people on board. Only seven got out alive. The pilot was one. His name is Chuck Lambert. He's a good friend of mine. Chuck is, uh...well, he's pretty broken up about it. Like it was his fault." Jerry explained.
Alice nodded slowly. "Okay. I think we're gonna need passenger manifest and list of survivors."
Dean then spoke up. "Ah, uh, anyway can we take a look at the wreckage?" He asked.
"The other stuff is no problem. But the wreckage...fellas, the NTSB has it on lockdown in an evidence warehouse. No way I've got that kind of clearance."
Dean frowned and glanced to Alice but she gave him a hand gesture that said that she would handle it.
It felt like hours now since Alice dipped inside a Copy Jack store and had Sam and Dean wait outside beside the Impala. They wondered what she was doing that took so long, but soon enough she finally walked out. She had a cocky smirk on her lips and waved around three laminated cards.
"You've been in there forever," Sam said to her.
Alice gave him a raised eyebrow but her smirk didn't fade. "I'll remember to say that to you when we get caught with horribly made fake badges." She said dryly and handed two over to Dean.
Dean snickered when he looked over the badges that looked almost to good to be true. "You can't rush perfection, Sammy." He handed one to Sam.
Sam looked at it while reaching inside the Impala to grab his laptop. "Homeland Security? That's pretty illegal, even for us." He placed the laptop on the hood of the car.
"Yeah, well, it's something new. You know? People haven't seen it a thousand times." Dean said.
Alice walked up beside Sam and stared at the laptop at what he found when she was away. "All right, so, what did you boys get?"
"Well..." Sam opened his laptop to a voice recorder page. "There's definitely EVP on the cockpit voice recorder. Listen." He played the recording and a new voice was heard.
"No survivors!" A scratchy voice said.
Alice felt a chill run down her spine when she heard the voice. "'No survivors'? Weren't their seven survivors?" This got her confused and she rested her chin on her hands.
Dean glanced at her. "So, what are you thinking? A haunted flight?" He asked Alice.
"Hmm..." Alice signed and leaned her head back. "There's loads of history on spirits and death omens on planes and ships."
"Like phantom travelers?" Sam pointed out.
Alice clicked her tongue and pointed to him. "Exactly. Remember flight 401? Where there was a crash and they used the parts of that plane and placed it other ones, then the spirit of the pilot and copilot haunted those."
"You think we're dealing with that?" Sam asked but Alice only shrugged her shoulders.
Dean cut in. "All right, so, survivors, which one do you want to talk to first?"
Sam brought out the list he was given. "Third on the list. Max Jaffey."
"Why him?"
"Well, for one, he's from around here. And two. If anyone saw anything weird, he would." Sam said, sure of himself.
Alice looked up. "Why do you say that?"
"Well, I spoke to his mother. And she told me where to find him. "
They were led to a local psychiatric ward, Riverfront Psychiatric Hospital that Max himself checked himself into. This raised a red flag for Alice and immediately told her that Max, without a doubt, saw something on the flight before the crash.
They walked beside a limping Max through the garden of the hospital and tried their best to get anything they can out of this young man who didn't seem that eager to relive the horror story.
"I don't understand," Max said and gave them a perplexed look. "I already spoke with Homeland Security."
Alice rivaled his suspicions with her professionalism, keeping her voice firm and unshaken. "Well, some new information has come in. So if you could answer a couple questions for us, then that would be much appreciated."
"Just before the plan went down, did you notice anything...unusual," Sam began.
"Like what?" Max asked.
Dean followed up to see if he can narrow down the monster list of what caused it. "Strange lights weird noises, maybe. Voices."
"No, nothing."
The four of them sat down at a table.
"Mr. Joffey-" Dean began but Max quickly corrected him.
"Jaffey." Max corrected.
Alice internally rolled her eyes. "Could you answer this for me. You," she pointed to him. "You checked yourself in here, right? Why?"
The young man scoffed. "I was a little stressed. I survived a plane crash." Alice gave him a long stare as she could see right through him. His shivered in his skin at her hard stare. "I...I don't want to talk about this anymore."
Alice cut in firmly. "You saw something or you think you saw something. No matter how strange it might be..." She took a breath and locked her icy eyes with him. "What was it that gotten you all shaken up?"
Max swallowed hard and looked away from a moment as memories, not from the crash, but before came rushing back in. "There..." he struggled to begin. "There was this man...and he, he had these black eyes. I thought I saw him."
That caught Dean's attention, catching a glimpse towards Alice, he saw her expression change severely. "What?" he spoke.
A look of horror stormed Max's eyes. "He opened the emergency exit," he spoke, color literally draining from his face. "But that's impossible, right? I mean, I looked it up. There's something like two tons of pressure on that door."
Just imagining what Max might have seen gave Alice a pit in her stomach. He had a point. Opening the door at the speed the plane was going was, as he said, impossible.
"This man," Sam began. "Did he seem to appear and disappear rapidly? It would look something like a mirage?"
Max gave him a look "What are you, nuts? He was a passenger. He was sitting right in front of me."
After what felt like hours of digging, Alice and Sam figured out at that the man sitting in front of Max Jaffey was a married man of the name George Phelps. And after a little more digging, they drove off to the house of the now-widowed woman. They parked outside the house and got out. Dean and Sam got out of the Impala and Alice turned her bike off, pulling her helmet off her head.
"Man, I don't care how strong you are," Dean said with a puzzled look and gave a glance to Alice. "No way you can open up an emergency door during a flight."
Alice shared his confusion followed beside them. "Not with that pressure. That's damn well impossible, even if you're high as a kite off of PCP."
Dean gave a short laugh at her comment and was literately two seconds away from saying the same. "I was thinking the same thing." They shared a snickering smile before Sam snapped his fingers.
"Not if your human. Maybe this guy George was something else. Some kind of creature, maybe, in human form."
Dean glanced at Alice when yet again, they were thinking the same thing. "Does that look like a creature's lair to you?" he gestured to the perfect ordinary house.
Once they were inside, Alice took a look at the picture that was on the table of the now decided man. George did look the part of a normal suburbian man, besides his grieving widow in front of them.
Alice frowned. "You said...he was a dentist?" she asked, making sure she heard her right.
Mrs. Phelps nodded. "Yes. He was headed to a convention in Denver." Alice and the boys exchanged looks. "Did you know he was petrified to fly? For him to go like that..." She swallowed hard.
"How long were you married?" Sam asked.
"Thirteen years."
"In all that time, did you ever notice anything...strange about him, anything out of the ordinary."
She looked puzzled. "Well...he had acid reflux if that's what you mean."
After they left the house they were met with more questions, cause clearly, George wasn't the man they were supposed to be looking at.
"A middle-aged man with an ulcer is not exactly evil personified," Dean said while walking down the road beside Sam and Alice.
Alice nodded. "What we really need is to get inside that NTSB warehouse and check out the wreckage." She then suddenly stopped. The boy paused and turned around to face her, noticing her studying them hard with her blue eyes."But...you boys are gonna need to look the part."
The boys stepped out of a suit rental shop and were dressed in new black suits that gave them a completely professional appearance, not to mention it makes them look extra handsome despite Dean's clean displeasure. He let out an exasperated sigh and adjusted his necktie.
"Man," Dean looked down at himself. "I look like one of the Blues Brothers," he complained.
"No, you don't." Alice's voice came from behind them. "Look at you boys. You guys clean up nicely."
Dean spun around, ready to make his annoyance noted to Alice but he froze with his mouth open. She wore a very form-fitting black suit and tie. Her hair was pulled up in a messy bun and her makeup was very natural and a little dark. Dean almost forgot to breathe while staring at her in utter disbelief. Alice gave him a look and walked up to him. She gave him a slight pat on the cheek to snap him out of his awe daze while she proceeded to adjust his tie.
"You should really dress like that more often," Dean said.
Alice let out a small laugh. "You would like that, wouldn't you?"
"I would," Dean said instantly, not even trying to hide the clear attraction he had for her right now. "I really would, whole-heartedly." He stared her dead in the eyes.
Being this close, Alice could see all the details in his face and he really was attractive. Her hands moved to adjust the tie while her eyes burned into his for what felt like the longest time. Alice broke her hands away and reality finally returned to them. A world where people have died and they have to figure out why. That was what she had to set her mind on right now, despite...how hard it was to stay focus on anything with Dean around. It was easy with Sam since they both were very work-oriented when it came to a job, but with Dean, it felt hard.
Alice's plan worked flawlessly with a single flash of their fake badges. The Security guards unlocked the door for them and they quickly strolled inside the hanger. and had the doors unlocked for them. Once they were in the clear, they laid their eye upon the wreckage that barely looked like a plane anymore if not for the outline at their feet.
"Door handle, door handle..." Alice mumbled and walked ahead to look for the handle that George Phelps miraculously opened during the flight.
Dean pulled out a device and placed earbuds in.
Sam eyed it. "What is that?"
"It's an EMF meter. Reads electromagnetic frequencies."
"Yeah, I know what an EMF meter is, but why does that one look like a busted-up walkman?"
Dean grinned like the geek he was. "'Cause that's what I made it out of. It's homemade."
Sam eyed him. "Yeah, I can see that. Don't let Alice see that or she'll probably disown you."
Dean's grin disappeared and even looked a bit concern. He glanced ahead at Alice to make sure she wasn't looking but it seemed like she found the door handle.
Alice lifted her finger and beckoned them over to the emergency handle. "Boys, come check this out."
They walked over to her and saw her standing by the handle that was covered in this strange yellow rust. Dean brought out his EMF, hiding it from Alice's view, and scanned over it. It immediately started to spike red hot.
Alice ran her finger's across the dust and looked down at it, puzzled. "What is this stuff?"
"One way to find out." Sam scraped some of the yellow rust off the handle and into a bag to analyze later.
Alice lifted her head and heard the distant sound of the front door open up with multiples footsteps running in. She knew right away that their cover was blown. "Crap..." She tabbed her boys on the shoulders and yanked them hard. "We gotta go. Now."
They swiftly turned around and made for the back door without the watchful eyes of the security. Once outside, they tried to calmly walk out of the building but once the alarm went off they started to run for the gate. Dean threw his suit jacket over the barbed wire and they speedily climbed over in less than 5 seconds.
"Well, what do you know Alice," Dean grabbed his jacket. "These monkey suits do come in handy."
"Yeah, yeah. You can thank me later. Come on." She pushed their backs and they quickly got the hell out of there.
They fell back to Jerry's office, Alice took the strange yellow rust and looked at it under a microscope. It reflected on a replicated screen for the boys to see as well.
"Ah, crap..." Alice frowned when she recognized what it was. "It's freaking sulfur."
"You sure?" Sam asked.
Alice looked mildly offended. "You second-guessing me, Sammy? Not many things like this are left behind, and when it does it means..."
"Demonic possession?" Sam figured.
Alice looked grim but nodded.
Dean shrugged. "That would explain how a mortal man would have the strength to open up an emergency hatch."
"If the guy was possessed, it's possible," Sam said.
"This gives way behind floating over a bed or barfing pea soup. I mean it's one thing to possess a person, but to use them to take down an entire airplane?"
"Alice. You ever heard of something like this before?" Sam looked at Alice for answers.
Alice sighed deeply. "Yeah, my mom and dad said to have handled one in my journal. Maybe they wrote down the instructions on how to stop a plane from taking a swan dive." She grumbled in frustration and stormed out of the room to grab her journal.
They were full in research mode at this time and totally riddled the motel walls with all kinds of lore dealing with demonic possession. Alice had isolated herself and buried her head in her journal, going over all her parent's entries about demonic possession.
"So every religion in every world culture has the concept of demons and demonic possession, right? I mean Christian, Native America, Hindu, you name it." Sam said while staring at his laptop.
"Yeah, but none of them describe anything like this," Dean said grimly.
"Well, that's not exactly true. You see according to Japanese beliefs, certain demons are behind certain disasters, both natural and man-made. One causes earthquakes, another causes disease."
"And this one causes plane crashes?" He sighed deeply and got up. "Alright, so what? We have a demon that's evolved with the times and found a way to ratchet up the body count?"
"Yeah. You know, who knows how many planes it brought down before this one?" Sam sighed with frustration.
Deans scoffed and turned away. "I don't know man. This isn't our normal gig. I mean, demons, they don't want anything, just death, and destruction for its own sake." He looked troubled. "This is big. And I wish Dad was here."
"Yeah. Me too."
Alice lifted her eyes from her journal but said nothing. She rolled her eyes and fell back down to the book when Dean's phone suddenly went off.
"Hello?" Dean picked it up.
"Dean, it's Jerry." His voice came through but it sounded grim.
"Oh, hey, Jerry."
"My pilot friend...Chuck Lambert is dead."
Dean was taken back by that. "Jerry, I'm sorry. What happened?"
Alice lifted her brow and finally pulled herself away from her book after hearing the alarm in Dean's voice.
"He and his buddy went up in a small twin about an hour ago, The plane went down," Jerry told.
"Where'd this happen?"
"About sixty miles west of here, near Nazareth."
"I'll try to ignore the irony in that."
"I'm sorry?"
"Nothing. Jerry, hang in there, all right? We'll catch up with you soon." He hangs up and Alice spoke up.
"Another crash?" She asked.
Dean nodded. "Yeah. Alice, why don't you head to the crash site and see if you can find anything. We'll meet you back at Jerry's place."
Alice nodded and closed her Journal to get up. "Sure. Where is it?" She grabbed her helmet and keys.
"Nazareth."
Alice paused and eyed him. "The hell's with that Irony?" She shook that strange coincident off and headed for the door. "See you boys in two hours."
Alice stared down at into the microscope and her face turned sour. "Dammit." she sighed and pulled away.
"Sulfur?" Dean asked.
Alice nodded. "Yeah. So that makes two plane crashes involving Chuck Lambert. Sounds like the demon was after him.
"If that was the case, that would be the good news," Sam said and shared a concerned look with Alice.
"What's the bad news?" Dean said.
Alice sat on top of the desk. "Chuck's plane went down exactly forty minutes into the flight and so did flight 2485."
Dean finally understood the tension that was forming between Alice and Sam. "Biblical Numerology."
"Bingo." Alice snapped her fingers. "But that ain't all we've noticed."
"I went back, and there has been six plane crashes over the last decade that all went down exactly forty minutes in," Sam said.
"Any survivors?"
"No. Or not until now, at least, not until flight 2485, for some reason. On the cockpit voice recorder, remember what the EVP said?"
"No survivors.'" Dean paused for a moment before suddenly realizing. "It's going after all the survivors. It's trying to finish the job."
Dean and Alice broke the speed limit while driving down the long stretch of highway. Darkness was enclosing in on them fast and the clock ticked away with every second they couldn't begin to spare. Sam already did his end and made sure that Blaine Sanderson and Dennis Holloway were not flying anytime soon. The only one left was the flight attendant, Amanda Walker.
"Right. Her sister Karen said her flight leaves Indianapolis at eight pm. It's her first night back on the job."
"That sounds like just our luck," Dean said.
"Dean, this is a five-hour drive, even with you behind the wheel and Alice on her bike." Sam was grim with every second that passed. They were cutting it close. Way to close.
"Call Amanda's cellphone again, see if we can't head her off at the pass."
"I already left her three voice messages. She mustn't turn her cellphone off. God, we're never going to make it."
"We'll make it." Dean pushed down the gas and sped up to catch Alice who was almost nothing but a bright burn in the distance.
They shoved by everyone while running inside the airport. They looked up at the departure board that was station above their heads that listed all the flights and when they were going to leave. It took about five seconds before finding the flight Amanda was going to be on.
"Right there." Sam pointed up. "They're boarding in thirty minutes."
Alice's face contorted with worry. "Thirty minutes? Are you serious?"
Dean tried to consul her. "Don't worry we still have some cards to play. We need to find a phone." His eyes scanned around the area and narrowed in on one mounted to the wall, a courtesy phone. He picked up. "Hi. Gate thirteen... I'm trying to contact Amanda Walker. She's a flight attendant on flight, uh..." He looked to Alice and she quickly whispered the flight number.
"4-2-4." She said.
"Flight 4-2-4." Dean waited around for a moment as time slowly moved on by. "Come on." He muttered impatiently.
Her voice finally broke through. "This is Amanda Walker."
"Miss Walker. Hi, this is Dr. James Hetfield from St Francis Memorial Hospital. We have Karen Walker here." He made up a lie on the spot.
"Karen?"
"Nothing serious, just a minor car accident, but she was injured, so-"
"Wait, that's impossible. I just got off the phone with her."
That caused Dean to freeze and Alice noticed the rising panic in his eyes. "You what?" Dean repeated.
"Five minutes ago. She's at her house, cramming for a final. Who is this?"
"Uh, well..." The color drained from his face. "There must be a mistake."
"And how would you even know I was here?"
Sam and Alice move around Dean to hear what was going on.
"Is this one of Vince's friends?" she suddenly said.
Dean gave a sly smile to play off his mess up. "Guilty is charged."
"Wow. This is unbelievable."
"He's really sorry.
"Well, you tell him to mind his own business and stay out of my life, okay?"
"Well, but...he really needs to see you tonight, so-"
"No, I'm sorry. It's too late."
"Don't be like that. Come on. The guy's a mess. Really. It's pathetic."
"Really?"
"Oh, yeah."
"Look, I've got to go. Um...tell him to call me when I land."
"No, no. Wait, Amanda. Amanda!" The line was disconnected. Dean slammed the phone back on the wall. "Dammit! So close."
Alice walked back over to the departure board to see how much time they had left. They had about 20 minutes left to spare before the flight took off. If they leave now then they might just make it. They "Hey," she called out to them. "We're getting on that flight."
Dean's eyes go wide and his voice showed to crack. "Whoa, whoa, now just hold on a minute, sweetheart."
Alice looked at him like he was insane. "Wait a minute? Are you serious? Dean, that plane's gonna go down."
"I know."
"So why are you hesitating? Look. We're getting on that plane. We're gonna find that demon and exorcise it. Sam will go and get the tickets while you and I will go back out to the trunk and bring anything that will go through security. We'll meet back here in five minutes." She saw the color evaporate from his face while he squirmed around. Alice slowly began to cock a brow at his odd behavior. "What's wrong? Are you okay?"
"No, not really." He admitted weakly.
"What? What's wrong?" Sam said.
"Well, I kind of have this problem with, uh..."
"Flying?" Sam eyed his brother who he knew to be fearless, so this took him by surprise and Alice just looked baffled by this new discovery.
"It never really been an issue until now." Dean's voice cracked and he generally looked nervous.
Alice's mouth dropped open. "You serious? Are you screwing with me?"
"Do I look like I'm joking, Alice?" He explained in a hushed tone. "Why do you think I drive everywhere."
Now it was starting to make sense. Alice rolled her eyes all the way to the back of her head. "Fine. If you're to chicken shit to go on that flight then Sam and I can do it instead."
Dean looked taken back cause he honestly didn't want either Alice or his own brother to go on that plane. "What are you, nuts? You said it yourself, the plane's gonna crash."
"Dean," Sam spoke up firmly. "Alice and I can do this together or you come with us. I'm not seeing a third option."
Dean frowned and stomped around a bit but reluctantly agreed. "Come on! Really? Man..."
After what seemed like the most stressful 20 minutes of their life, they miraculously made it abord the flight with 5 minutes to spare and finally took their seats. Dean, while still frightened and pale, took the aisle seat, Alice beside him, and Sam by the window.
Sam picked up on Dean humming something to himself. "You're humming Metallica?"
"Calms me down," Dean whispered quickly and continued to hum.
Sam shook his head. "Look, man, I get you're nervous, all right? But you got to stay focused."
"Okay."
"I mean, we got thirty-two minutes and counting to track this thing down, or whoever it's possessing, anyway, and perform a full-on exorcism."
"Yeah, on a crowded plane. That's gonna be easy." He spat.
"Just take it one step at a time, alright?" Sam tried to speak calmly to his brother. "Now, who is it possessing?"
"It's usually gonna be somebody with some sort of weakness, you know, a chink in the armor that the demon can worm through. Somebody with an addiction or some sort of emotional distress." Dean said.
"Well, this is Amanda's first flight after the crash. If I were her, I'd be pretty messed up."
Alice frowned and looked across the long row of seats to see the back of the plane. She spotted a flight attendant back there. "Think that's her over there," she gestured with her head and sat back down.
Dean took a glance. "All right, I'll go talk to her, and, uh, I'll get a read on her mental state."
"What if she's already possessed?" Sam said.
"There's a way to test that." Dean reached into his bag and pulled out a bottle of holy water in the shape of the Virgin Mary. "I brought this."
"No." Sam reached across Alice and snatched the bottle from Dean's hand, tucking it inside his hoodie. "I think we can go more subtle. If she's possessed, she'll flinch at the name of God."
"Oh. Nice." Dean got up to leave when Sam suddenly called him back.
"Hey."
"What?"
"Say it in Latin."
"I know." He turned to leave again.
"Okay. Hey!" Sam called him back yet again.
"What!?" Dean snapped back.
"Uh, in Latin, It's 'Christo'.
"Dude, I know! I'm not an idio-"
"Would you just go back there already so we all won't die!" Alice snapped at both of them.
Dean lifted his hands and slowly began his shuffle through the row of seats that headed to the back. The plane then suddenly hit a bit of turbulence and jolted. Dean stopped, rooted to the floorboard. He slapped his hands against the seat and carried on.
Alice slowly cranked her head over to Sam and gave him a dumbfounded look at what she had just witnessed. Never did she thought would she see such a vulnerable side of him.
Sam immediately placed his hands up to defend himself. "I swear I never knew he was afraid of flying."
"So you guys really just drove around the whole freaking country?"
Sam paused for a moment and slowly nodded. "Yeah, now that you mention it."
Alice looked away and rolled her eyes. There were a few times in the past that she had the fly to get to the place she needs to be, but this was just silly.
Dean came back a few minutes later, still as pale as ever. "All right, well, she's got to be the most well-adjusted person on the planet," Dean muttered and sat back down.
"You said 'Christo'?" Sam asked and he nodded.
"Yeah."
"And?"
"There's no demon in her. There's no demon getting in her." He confirmed rather confidently. Suddenly the plane gave a hard jolt. "Come on! That can't be normal!"
"Hey, hey, it's just a little turbulence." Sam tried to assure him.
"Sam, this plane is going to crash, okay? So quit treating me like I'm friggin' four." he hissed.
"You need to calm down."
"Well, I'm sorry I can't."
"Yes, you can."
"Dude, stow the touchy-feely, self-help yoga crap, it's not helping."
Alice finally had enough and moved up in her seat, turning her body to face him. "Okay. You really need to calm the hell down. You're wide open for demonic possession and I don't really feel like kicking the bastard out of you. So, if you wanna hold my freaking hand then fine, as long as you calm down." she seethed at him with venom in her voice. Dean stared wide-eyed at her before actually taking her hand into his. "Oh, God. You actually took my hand."
"Hey, sweetheart. You offer it, I'm taking it." he justified his reasons with a sly grin, despite how pale he was and how bad his hand was shaking.
Alice rolled her eyes and leaned back in her chair. She patted him on the shoulder. "Okay. Now, I found an exorcism in my journal that I think gonna work." She reached into her pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper to hand to Sam. "The Rituale Romanum. It's in two parts. The first one expels the Demon from the host. It makes it manifest, which actually makes it more powerful."
Dean looked at her like she was crazy. "More powerful?"
"Yup. And don't give me that look. It does become powerful enough to wreak havoc on its own, but...the second part sends it back to hell." She looked over to Sam. "You think you can do it?"
Sam scanned through the writing. "Yeah. Yeah." He sighed and faced her. "We just to find the bastard first."
Alice looked grim. "Yeah..."
Dean slowly walked up and down the aisles, scanning it with his EMF meter and also getting odd looked from the passengers. No readings at all. The who plane was radio silent. He suddenly felt a hand grab his shoulder that caused him to jump. It was only Alice and Sam. "Don't do that."
"Anything?" Sam asked.
Dean shook his head. "No, nothing. How much time we got?"
Alice frowned. "Fifteen minutes."
"Maybe we missed something." Sam though but Alice only shrugged her shoulders.
"Hell, maybe. It's probably not even on the plane."
Sam cocked a brow. "You believe that?" he asked.
Alice may be good at her job but even she had times where she messed up. "I don't know. What do you boy-" She stopped herself when the EMF meter started to spike. "What the..."
They looked up and saw the copilot coming out of the bathroom and heading into the cockpit.
"Christo," Alice called out and the copilot flinched. He slowly turned his head over and looked at them, eyes a completely solid black. He said nothing and staggered into the cockpit. Alice narrowed her eyes. "Found you."
Amanda was in denial and only looked at them like they were crazy, having the whole situation explained to her in a whole. It was honestly just too much to comprehend for her, but Alice and the boys had no time either to be gentle. The plane had only twelve minutes left until it crashes.
Sam began to try and explain it once more to her. "Look, there was something wrong with 2485. Now maybe you sensed it, maybe you didn't. But there's something wrong with this flight, too."
Amanda shook her head as these memories began to resurface. "On...on 2485, there was this man. He...had these eyes."
Alice snapped her fingers. "That's what we're talking about. We hate to drag you into this but things are going to get dangerous."
"I don't understand, what are you asking me to do?"Amanda looked bewildered.
"The copilot, we need you to bring him back here."
"Why? What does he have to do with anything?"
"We don't have time to explain. We just need to talk to him." Alice insisted.
"Do you know that I could lose my job if you-" Amanda began but Dean cut her off.
"Okay, well you're gonna lose a lot more if you don't help us out," he said urgently.
Amanda was hesitant at first before she sheepishly nodded in agreement. "Okay." She left the back room and headed towards the cockpit.
Alice narrowed her eyes. "Get ready." She took a step back and reached into her bag to pull out some duck tape while Sam got the exorcism ready with the holy water.
They waited in silence for Amando to being back to copilot but the moment they saw him, Dean slugged him across the face as soon as he entered the back. Alice quickly duck-taped his mouth close while Dean pinned him to the ground. Sam began to splash holy water onto copilot and his skin started to burn with steam coming off it.
"Wait. What are you doing?" Amanda was horror-struck. "You said you were just gonna talk to him."
"We are gonna talk to him," Dean said while wresting to keep the demon down.
"Amanda," Alice spoke up and guided her away. "We need you to stay calm. Everything's gonna be fine, we just need you to stay outside the curtains and make sure no one gets in." Amanda only looked stunned. "Hey! Can you do that?" She grabbed her shoulders and forced her gaze. "Can you?"
"Okay. Okay." Amanda complied and left.
"Hurry up, Sam. I don't know how much longer I can hold him." Dean struggled against the demon who tried to break free from his grip.
Sam began to read from the slip of paper. "Regna terrae, cantate Deo, psallite Domino-"
The demon broke free from his hold and struck both the boys. Alice moved in fast and jumped on its back, locking her arms around his neck and held him down. He rolled on to his back with Alice beneath him, struggling and gasping to get this crazy woman off.
"Sam! Hurry up." Alice hissed while holding him down.
Sam quickly recovered more so from his shock that Alice is choke-holding a demon and winning. He began to read once again and after it was done, help her and Dean in holding the demon down. Black smoke erupted from its mouth and hovered in the air like a cloud before disappearing into the vent.
Sam looked around. "Where'd it go?"
Dean was pale. "It's in the plane. Hurry up. We gotta finish it."
Suddenly the plane dipped down harshly and caused Dean and Alice to crash into each other. Sam lost the paper and it flew out into the aisles. The engines blazed in their ears and they felt their heart up in their throats. Alice was splayed up in the corner with Dean and they screamed through the madness. Sam crawled his way through the panicked people and down the aisles and finally grabbed the paper like it was a lifeline. He unfolded it as the plane rocked back and forth with the lights going in and out. He screamed out the rest of the exorcism when an electronic charge ran through the whole plane and balanced it out. The lights stopped flickering and the plane road smoothly.
Alice took a breath and looked down, frowning. "Dean...you still alive on me?"
Dean's face was white and his eyes were wide. He had one arm holding himself up and the other latched around Alice's waist. "Yeah...just give me a moment." He dropped his head into her shoulder.
Paramedic, FBI, FAA all came to the airport and were getting the story about what happened on the flight. The copilot, though sore around the neck was just fine even though he had no memories of ever getting on the plane. Amanda was being questioned too but said nothing about what really happened upon the flight. She looked towards Alice and the boys and mouth the words 'Thank you.'
Alice gave a small wave before they headed out. "Friggin finally. Let's just get out of here." She can still feel her heart pounding in her chest.
"You don't even have to tell me." Dean joked and got a smile from Alice. "Come here." He wrapped an arm around her shoulder and they all walked out of the airport.
"Nobody knows what you guys did, but I do." Jerry thanked them profusely. "A lot of people could have been killed." He shook each of their hands. Alice was already outside by her bike, waiting. "Your dad's gonna be really proud."
"We'll see you around, Jerry," Sam said with a smile.
Dean turned to head off where Alice was waiting outside when he stopped. "You know, Jerry. I was meaning to ask you, how did you get my cellphone number, anyway? I've only had it for like six months." This baffled him.
"Your dad gave it to me," Jerry stated, which puzzled the boys since they haven't heard from their father in a very long time now.
"What?" Sam said.
"I mean, I didn't exactly talk to him, but I called his number. His voice message said to give you a call." Jerry said before leaving. "Thanks again, guys."
Alice and Sam looked over Dean's shoulder as he dialed their father's number into his phone.
"This doesn't make any sense, man." Sam was left speechless. "I've called Dad's number like fifty times. It's been out of service."
Alice crossed her arms. "It must have come back online during the last time you called."
Dean held his phone up for both him, Sam, and Alice to here and like usual, it went straight to voice message. "This is John Winchester. I can't be reached. If this is an emergency, call my son, Dean. 785-555-0179. He can help." End.
Author's Note:
My God! I am so, so sorry for not posting this story at all last week. For some damn reason, I found this episode really dang texting to write for, and it was especially hard since I had no motivation at all to do it. I can already tell that this story is gonna be a hard one to post for, but don't worry, I will never abandon a story if people read it, review it, favorite and follow it!
I'll see you when next time I post!