BUGS PART 2
Alice speedily climbed the stairs, skipping every other step on her way up. After rounding the corner, she noticed that steam was slipping through the cracks of the bathroom, the sound of rushing water behind the door as well. She bit down on her lips and took a simple breath, her eyes soon twitching with slight irritation. It was already a new day, the next morning to be exact and something already happened during the duration of the night. Another body dropped. They had to go. Naturally though, Dean was taking his sweet time with the shower and has been in there for over an hour. Alice doesn't even take that long. Sam doesn't take that long. Literally no one takes that long, so why does Dean have to be the exception?
She tapped her knuckles against the door and called out. "Quit falling in love with the shower, man. We gotta go!" She heard scampering on the other end.
"What?" Dean called back, not fully hearing her over the sound of the marvelous water pressure.
"Sam picked up a police call on the scanner. Someone was found dead three blocks from here." Alice impatiently tapped her heel against the floor and waited for Dean to respond, but instead, he opened the door just an inch to peek his face through, grinning ear to ear.
"This shower is awesome," he said with the biggest smile stretched across his face. Steam filled the bathroom behind him and he even had a towel over his head.
This may even bee the first time she saw a grown man so happy about a steam shower. It was childish. Yeah, Alice enjoyed it a lot since it was the first time she's even used one, but Dean's reaction to it... He's acting like he scratched off the winning lottery ticket to a Powerball.
He stared at her with a very flirtatious grin. "Sure you don't wanna join me?"
Alice stared blankly back before she leaned in very slowly, speaking in a low rumbling voice. "If you don't get out of the shower in the next 5 seconds... I'm going to walk in and scrub you down in a toilet brush." Her voice was threatening. A dare for him to push her further over the edge.
He didn't mind her walking in on him at all, though he didn't believe that part about the toilet brush. Ever since that case back in St. Louis, things...felt a bit different between them. Not much, but rather subtle. Dean was just as stubborn as she was, so he had no intention of giving up on her, willing to really try anything to make it work and see if that relationship can go anywhere, but Alice was such a closed-off person that it was so much more difficult than he anticipated. Yeah, the flirting was still there, but he felt like that was just a natural reaction she had to things. Hell, she even does it to Sam sometimes.
Five seconds went by in a blink of an eye and the moment it did, Alice's face dropped. She grabbed the doorknob and began to try and forcefully yank it open. Dean broke out in a panic when he realized she was very serious about that threat and braced the door, closing and locking it before she could bust in and scrub off his skin.
"Alright, alright! Just give me 10 minutes!" Dean called out from behind the safety of the door. He truly believed if she really wanted in...she would break down the freaking door. He didn't doubt her capabilities for one second.
Alice's lips curled up into a smirk before she turned around and joyfully strolled down the steps.
Alice sat in the back of the Impala and started out the window at the growing darkness that was happening outside, covered by a light rain shower. It was because of the weather that she decided to not ride her bike, hitching a ride with the boys instead.
"Hmm." Alice hummed a bit. The gloominess actually caught her off guard though, cause the other days it was bright and sunny. There was no indication at all that it was going to rain.
"Something up?" Dean glanced at her through the rear-view mirror.
Her lips turned down into a frown before shrugging her shoulders. "Nah."
The coroners were pulling the plastic-covered body out on a stretcher just as Dean drove up to the house and parked beside the curb. The boys got out with black umbrellas while Alice merely just yanked her hood up to cover herself from the light drizzle...which was still baffling her, really.
They spotted Larry, who was on the phone and walked up to him. Alice could tell that he was obviously and understandably a bit jarred by what happened, judging by the shakiness in his voice.
Larry turned around when the three walked up to him. He was a bit surprised to see them. "Hello. You're, uh, back early." He wasn't as professional this time around.
Dean gave a quick excuse. "Yeah, we just drove in, wanted to take another look at the neighborhood."
"What's going on?" Sam asked.
Larry bit down on his lips and gestured to the house. "You guys met, uh...Lynda Bloome at the barbecue?"
Alice could recall the name. "The realtor."
"Well, she, uh...passed away last night." Larry struggled to say.
Sam and Alice's eyes grew wide from the sudden striking news, choking on the humid air for a second while trying to absorb what he just said.
"What happened?" Dean asked.
"I'm still trying to find out. Identified the body for the police." He lowered his head. "Look, I'm sorry, this isn't a good time right now."
Alice held her hand up to stop him from talking anymore, noticing that it was becoming difficult for him. "Don't worry about it."
"Thank you." He shook his head and turned to leave. "Excuse me."
Dean waited until Larry was out of earshot before addressing the two, already knowing what they were thinking. "You know what we have to do, right?"
Alice sighed, groaning really. "Yeah...gotta get into that house. See if we have an infestation."
The window in Lynda's room slowly opened up and Alice was the first to climb through, followed by the boys. The inside of the bedroom had an outline of a dead body on the ground. Blood ran over the edges of the tape, and inside the bathroom was a broken shower with shattered glass all over the place. It honestly looked like she broke out from the shower and fell, getting cut up in the process.
Alice walked inside the bathroom and noticed a towel on the ground. She reached down and picked it up but only for a couple of dead but poisonous spiders to fall out of it. She dropped the towel immediately upon realizing the grim discovery, now fulling understanding what happened to her last night. "More bugs."
"From Spider Boy?" Dean glanced up at his brother
"Matt," Sam corrected. "Maybe."
Neither Sam nor Alice wanted Matt to be the cause of the wild insect killings. He was a kid after all, but there have been times in the past that a kid had been responsible for the supernatural, times that Alice was not proud of. It was like a hard slap across the face whenever it was a child, but she figured it out pretty quickly that anyone, no matter the age or history, could be involved.
The three Hunters waited patiently inside the Impala as a school bus pulled up to the side of the street. Matt was the only one to get out and began to make his way around the bus, away from his house.
Alice moved up in the back and rested her arms against the front seat. "Where the hell's he going? Ain't his house the other way?"
Sam's lips thinned out into a line. Things weren't looking bright right now for Matt if this was the first thing they caught him doing. "Yep."
They watched the peculiar kid walk straight into the woods that were right across the street. Sam, Dean, and Alice got out of the car the moment Matt disappeared from their sight and went in after him.
Alice was lowkey expecting a blood sacrifice or maybe even voodoo. Something that would've made the bugs move as they did. Like animals in a circus. Matt wasn't doing anything evil at all...just curiously examining a grasshopper he let crawl on his hand. Alice wasn't sure if she was relieved that Matt wasn't doing anything or disappointed that the case wasn't over yet.
Sam walked up to the kid. "Hey, Matt. Remember us?"
Matt turned around and could easily recognize Sam and Alice from the barbecue. "What are you doing out here?" he asked suspiciously.
"Well, we wanna talk to you," Dean said.
Matt stared at them for a second when it finally processed through his head. "You're not here to buy a house, are you?" The three shook her heads and Matt immediately became alarmed. "W-wait. You're not serial killers?"
The accusation made the logical part in Alice's head shut down immediately, firing back with this sly and sarcastic remark that was totally off the top of her head. "Yes, we're serial killers here to scoop out your brain with a spoon." She stared dead at the kid as Sam and Dean tried to stifle a laugh. "Who the hell would ask a question like that?"
Dean patted Alice's shoulder. "Don't mind her...she just happens to have a morbid sense of humor." He looked at Matt, trying to find a way to address the right question. "So, Matt...you sure know a lot about insects."
Matt cocked a brow. "So?"
"Did you hear what happened to Lynda, the realtor?"
"I hear she died this morning," Matt answered.
"Mm, that's right. Spider bites."
Sam spoke up to get straight to the point. "Matt...you tried to scar her with a spider."
The kid stood there frozen at what these strangers were trying to pin on him. "Wait. You think I had something to do with this?"
Alice tilted her chin up. "You tell us." She eyed him, still trying to search for any kind of lie or hesitation in his voice. The kid really just seemed baffled though.
"That tarantula was a joke," Matt said. "Anyway, that wouldn't explain the bee attack or the gas company guy."
Alice's brow slowly raised. "You knew about that?"
"There is something going on here. I don't know what...but something's happening with the insects. let me show you something." He picked his backpack off the ground and began to lead the way with the trio following close behind.
"So, if you knew all this bug stuff, why not tell your dad? Maybe he could clear everybody out." Sam asked.
Matt rolled his eyes. "Believe me, I've tried. But, uh, Larry doesn't listen to me."
"Why not?"
"Mostly? He's too disappointed in his freak son."
"I hear you." Sam scoffed.
Dean eyed his brother and was even was given a strange look from Alice. "You do?"
Sam ignored them. "Matt, how old are you?"
"Sixteen," he answered.
"Well, don't sweat it, because in two years, something great's gonna happen."
"What?"
"College. You'll be able to get out of the house and away from your dad."
Dean quickly chimed in at that. "What kind of advice is that? Kid should stick with his family." He noticed Sam giving him a side-eye glare. They both were saved though when Alice spoke up.
"Well since we're talking about family then maybe I should put my two cents in." She stuck her hands deep in her pockets and peered over her shoulder at the boys, a look of slight displeasure crossing her blue eyes. "College is still far away and people can change their minds and have a different perspective on life and what they wanna do with it. In the end...it's still his decision...and he has a hell of a lot of time to patch things up with his own family before he makes his final call. Give it some time. See what happens, and if nothing changes then...c'est la vie."
They may have irritated Alice a bit more than normal this time around, talking bitterly about family and all. Neither Sam nor Dean knew her to chime in and say her peace until now...and she definitely has a point. Matt's still young and they had to look at things a different way because of that fact.
"How much further," Alice asked.
"We're close."
They kept on walking through the thick brush of the woods until they came to a large clearing, the sounds of hundreds of insects bouncing off the trees. The scraping and buzzing noises were a bit eerie to listen to after a while.
"I've been keeping track of the insect population," Matt explained. "It's, uh, part of an AP science class."
"The hell's going on?" Alice said. This whole scene was just bizarre to her.
"From bees to earthworms, beetles...you name it. It's like they're congregating here.
"Why?" Dean said.
"I don't know."
Sam noticed something a few feet away from them. It was a dark patch of grass with something moving around in it. They walked over to it and saw that it was at least hundreds of worms all conjured in that one spot. Dean walked over and lightly stepped on it, the ground below falling away into a dark hole. He grabbed a nearby stick and started poking around inside until he taped against something hard and hollow.
"There's something down there," he called out. Dean honestly didn't want to stick his hand down in there, so he pleadingly looked up at Alice. "Sweetheart. Could you, uh..."
A deep sigh escaped her throat and she walked over. "What would you boys do without me," she said and kneeled down, rolling up her sleeve.
"I honestly don't like to think about it," he said honestly.
Alice cast him an uneasy glance before sticking her hand into the cold and wormy ground. She shoved away a couple of bugs before grasping hold of whatever was down there. She finally pulled it up and shook off the dirt, Alice's face soon becoming alert.
"Well...just damn."
In her hand was a human skull.
The old pile of bones was quickly covered by Alice's leather jacket the moment the Impala parked outside the local university. Sam got out of the car and grabbed the box of bones on his way out.
"So, a bunch of bones in an unmarked grave," Sam said and waited by the car for Alice and Dean to get out.
"Yeah. Maybe this is a haunting. Pissed off spirit? Some unfinished business?" Dean shot out an idea and looked to Alice. "Got anything?"
She shook her head. "Not really. But these bones here..." She patted the box Sam was holding. "They definitely lower our options. I'm pretty sure now with whatever's going on...it has something to do with these."
Sam nodded. "Yeah, maybe. Question is, why bugs? And why now?"
"That's two questions," Dean said and Sam ignored him. "Yeah, so with the kid back there...why'd you tell him to just ditch his family like that?"
Alice felt her heart plummet the moment she heard that. She began to walk a bit faster to avoid the coming storm that was about to hit in the next five seconds.
"Just, uh...I know what the kid's going through." Sam replied.
"How about telling him to respect his old man, how's that for advice." Dean shot back.
"Dean, come on." He and Dean stopped walking. Alice did too but she made sure to stand at least a few feet away, not wanting to get involved with this growing argument or hear it too. "This isn't about his old man. You think I didn't respect Dad. That's what this is about."
Dean notice that Alice was becoming more and more uncomfortable by the minute and decided to just drop the topic. "Just forget it, all right. Sorry I brought it up."
Sam didn't let up and kept on rambling, not noticing Alice's growing glare towards them. "I respected him. But no matter what I did, it was never good enough."
Dean looked confused. "Why would you think that?"
"Because I didn't wanna bowhunt or hustle pool. Because I wanted to go to school and live my life, which, to our whacked-out family, made me the freak.
His remark made Alice's chest sting a bit. She can't imagine what it was like at his age since their families were different. Aiden was a goofy idiot but with a good head on his shoulders, always looking out for his sister. Her mom, Charlotte was just as sarcastic as Alice is now, not taking crap from anyone and saying things as they were. But her dad though, she doesn't remember much and only hears stories from Aiden and her mother. Jackson was...a lot like Aiden and always seemed to have a smile on his face. He adored his wife and was a doting father to his kids.
But then they all died...slowly...one after the other...until all that remained was a single woman with fading memories and a reluctant title she carried on her shoulders. The freaking Cromwell line of Hunters. They were no different from your run of the mill family. They had good times as well as bad times. Yeah, they were different but at the time...it just felt really normal to Alice.
Hell, the comment about the whacked-out family even went as far as to offend her.
Dean looked over at Alice one more time and saw her face slowly become dejected. She began backing away from them and before head to the university by herself. "Alice!" he called out but she didn't look back at them.
"I'll be inside waiting when you girls are done with your hissy fit." Her voice was bitter towards them, waving her hand.
Dean bit down on his lips and took a breath, snapping his head back to Sam and was visibly angry now, grinding his words out through his teeth. "Sam, Dad was never disappointed in you. Never. He was scared."
Sam was actually taken back. "What are you talking about?"
"He was afraid of what could've happened to you if he wasn't around. But even when you two weren't talking...he used to swing by Stanford whenever he could. Keep an eye on you. Make sure you were safe."
Sam's smirk faded. "What?"
Dean gave an exasperated answer. "Yeah."
"Why didn't you tell me any of that?"
"Well, it's a two-way street, dude. You could've picked up the phone." He saw Sam's eyes cast sadly to the ground. "And another thing... About our family, this life. You think it's screwed up but...this is also Alice's life too. You might as well insult her and her family while you're at it."
Sam's eyes grew wide but the damage was already done. He looked to try and find Alice but she was already inside the building. "I didn't...I..." He bit down on his lips when he realized what he did.
"If you wanna apologize then you can do it later. Come on, we're gonna be late for our appointment."
The two hastened their pace and hurried to the university to catch up to Alice.
"This is quite the interesting find you've made." the professor said while taking the bones from Sam. "I'd say they're 170 years old, give or take. The timeframe and geography heavily suggest Native American."
Alice pulled her jacket back on when it finally clicked for her. "Ah...Indian burial grounds," she muttered. "Was there any tribes on that land?"
"Not according to historical records. But the, uh, relocations of native people were quite common at the time."
"Right." Sam nodded his head. "Well, are there any local legends? Oral histories about the area?"
"Well... You know, there's a Euchee tribe in Sapulpa. It's about sixty miles from here. Someone out there might know the truth."
Alice mumbled the name under her breath and felt something began to form in the pit of her stomach. Uneasiness started to take over as this thought crossed her mind, an idea that she's hoping wasn't the case.
Author's Note:
It's been a while. The last time I posted was on Halloween. Sorry about that. I guess my planning was a bit off. Oh well.
Man...Alice is DONE with Sam and Dean's constant bickering about this family. She's always stayed on the sidelines, but this time...she's done with their shit. But we all know that it ain't the end for the boys, so I wonder how she's gonna handle it next time around.
And I love the Idea of Alice just barging in on Dean while he's in the shower, threatening to scrub his skin off with a toilet brush. She doesn't care. When shit needs to get done...you better move your butt and get in the car before she finishes counting down from five. And I just love that Dean and Alice still kinda flirt with each other even though things are kinda complicated between them right now. It's just...sorta their thing now.
Thank you all so much for sticking with me during the growing story. We still got halfway to go until season 1 ends, but don't worry...I got an idea of what I'm gonna do with it.