Some day an answer will find us; quite a long shot, but anyway.
- Blues Traveller, But Anyway
The Winchesters pushed on.
Dean poured himself into fixing the Impala. Caden reread lore about demons. Sam gave up talking about what Dad would've wanted. They pushed on. Worked a case. Dean got angry and punched Sam in a parking lot. They pushed on. Another case. Saved a life or two. Caden yelled at Sam for the first time in months. He yelled right back, calling her a hypocrite for acting like she was handling things any better than he was.
Things were rough between the three of them. They couldn't talk about Dad, couldn't talk about college, couldn't talk about anything that mattered. Unless it was about a hunt, any word between them dissolved into bitter argument. It was hopeless.
They pushed on. But it wasn't working out.
Somberly, Caden watched the countryside go by as they drove from the latest hunt. The sun was rising over the hills, casting dramatic beams of light across the landscape. It was beautiful, glorious, and a jarring contrast to the solemn feeling that seemed to cling to her these days.
On their hunt, Sam had broken his wrist, forcing them on a detour to the emergency room before they could head home to Sioux Falls. Being back in a hospital had been… unpleasant. The smell of disinfectant wouldn't leave her senses alone, even an hour after the visit. Hospitals never used to bother her. Not until her family had been torn apart in one.
In the emergency room waiting area, while Sam was getting his wrist x-rayed, Caden and Dean had watched patients milling around and felt the ghost of what they'd gone through, the weight of the secret they shared still heavy on their shoulders.
'It's been a month,' she'd remarked.
'26 days,' Dean had replied immediately.
He's keeping count, Caden had thought to herself, tipping her head back against the white wall behind her and staring up into the ceiling. There was nothing else she could say.
In the Impala now, that silence still hung over them.
They were in the middle of nowhere, the only car on the road, but suddenly, Dean pulled over and got out. Caden watched him through the window, confused, as he stood a few feet away, gazing off at the hills in the distance.
Obviously, something was up, so she made the decision to follow him out. Sam was only a second behind her. 'Dean?'
He didn't turn around. His voice was low as he confessed, 'I know Dad's dead because of me.'
'What are you talking about?' Sam questioned, as if he didn't already know.
After Caden had brought it up back at the Roadhouse, she and Dean hadn't said a word to each other about the circumstances of their father's death. At ay given moment, it was on both their minds – how could it not be? – but discussing it was a pointless exercise. There was no solution that would undo the pain they been caused.
'It wouldn't take a genius to figure it out, Sam,' Dean said, finally turning around to face them. His green eyes were dull, exhausted.
'No, we don't know what happened,' disagreed Sam. 'Not for sure.'
'Don't we? Caden and I get healed, like some kind of miracle, then five minutes later, Dad's dead and the Colt is gone. You can't tell me there's not a connection there,' he pressed. 'I don't know how or if the demon was involved, or how any of it went down, but Dad's dead because of me.'
Her brother was right, of course, but the responsibility wasn't solely his. Caden spoke up: 'If you're at fault, then we both are.'
'No. You could've recovered in time, but I was dead and I should've-'
'Me for Dad and you for the Colt,' she went on. 'Or the other way around, whatever.' Caden knew he would put himself through whatever mental gymnastics were necessary to accept the blame alone – and had probably already done so – but she also had a hand in whatever cosmic force had exchanged their father's life for theirs, whether Dean wanted to believe it or not.
Sam frowned, shaking his head in objection. 'Even if that's true, you can't just take the guilt for something you didn't ask for.'
'Doesn't matter whether we asked,' Dean countered despondently, moving to sit on the hood of the Impala. 'We still have to live with it.'
There wasn't any argument to be made against that fact. We still have to live with it. Sam didn't try to convince them otherwise. With Caden, he sat beside Dean on the hood of the Impala, an act of solidarity. They stayed like that for a long while as the sun rose, the weight of their situation, although finally carried by all of them together, no easier to bear.
After today, Sam firmly believed broken wrists ought to be removed from the human experience. He'd had far worse injures, even life-threatening injuries, but none of them had seen him stand at the sink of a gas station bathroom like an idiot as he tried to figure out how to wash his hands around the cast on his arm.
Don't let it get wet. Keep it away from dirt. Don't do anything that could worsen the injury. Come back in six weeks so we can remove the cast.
Screw that. If it got wet, it got wet, and in six weeks' time, he'd cut the damn thing off by himse-
Oh no.
The headache struck fast, hitting him so hard it felt as if it would knock him off his feet. Sam gripped the side of the sink with his good hand, knuckles turning white as the first shocks of a premonition slashed through his mind.
A gun firing. A man clutching his bloodied chest. Another jolt of pain in Sam's head. A logo. Blue ridge? He caught his wide eyes in the mirror. Footsteps heading into a store. Loading a weapon. More pain. Dead clerk. Gunshot, again. Dead shooter.
The headache dissipated as suddenly as it had arrived, the imagery collapsing away. Sam heard himself gasp for air as reality came back around him. Visions were no longer an unfamiliar experience, but – fuck – they did not get any easier.
Plans for you and children like you.
That's what Yellow Eyes had told him when they last came face-to-face, and Sam had prayed it wasn't true. He was completely, wholly powerless against these premonitions.
No. No. Not powerless. He wouldn't give the demon that satisfaction.
These premonitions were the one guaranteed tie he and his family had to Yellow Eyes. It was not a lost battle; it was a lead, an opportunity, and Sam would not let it out of his sight.
Sam insisted they change course and head to the Roadhouse, where Ash could work his tech-genius magic and figure out exactly where Sam's vision would take place.
Dean, ever protective, wasn't so sure. He argued that letting other people, especially other hunters, know about Sam's psychic abilities was way too risky. Besides, they didn't necessarily need Ash to track down a location. It would take longer but, with Bobby's help, they were perfectly capable of doing it themselves. Going to the Roadhouse was an invitation for trouble.
Caden agreed that a target on their brother's back was the last thing anyone needed, but time was not on their side. They couldn't tell how soon the vision would come true; for all they knew, it had already happened and they were too late. Ash could figure things out in minutes, whereas, even with Bobby, it would take them hours.
'I'm with Sam,' she said. 'If we don't talk to Ash, we could lose Yellow Eyes all over again.'
Outnumbered, Dean muttered something under his breath and made a sharp turn, taking the Impala back in the direction they'd come. 'Fine! We'll go. But if this ends bad, don't say I didn't warn you.'
From the front passenger seat, Sam glanced over his shoulder at her with a grateful smile for being on his side, before awkwardly looking away again. To her surprise, Caden felt remorse seeping into her mind.
After the rakshasa hunt, when Sam had confessed that college was no longer his path in life, they didn't take the time to mend the rift that had opened in their relationship. With their father dead, cases to think about, Caden's own college plans thrown into uncertainty, and any conversation doomed to fall into disarray, it all just seemed… impossible. Not to mention that any time she looked at Sam, John's parting words were brought right back to the forefront of her thoughts.
She hated it. Hated not being able to talk to him anymore. Hated the hopeless feeling she got whenever she thought about her brother. But, most of all, she hated that they'd done nothing to fix it.
So, Caden steeled herself. Leaning forward to fold her arms over the back of the front seat, she told Sam, 'You should let me draw on your cast. It looks boring like that.' It was a silly, immature, roundabout way of saying what she really meant. But still, Caden hoped her unspoken message was understood: Truce?
'My cast looks fine like this.'
'I wouldn't draw anything dumb.'
'Yeah, you would,' objected Sam, but she caught a smirk on his face before he could hide it behind his usual pensive expression. It wasn't much, but it was all they needed. Truce.
They made it to Harvelle's Roadhouse late that afternoon, and Sam barged in to find Ash without allowing another second to go to waste, not even a pause to greet Ellen or Jo. Instead, Dean and Caden took care of the pleasantries, apologetically covering for their brother's lack of courtesy.
Only a short moment later and Ash had already set up his makeshift laptop while Sam furiously scribbled something on a napkin. Caden, sitting down at the table beside her brother and handing him a bottle of beer, recognised the drawing as the logo Sam had described from his premonition: a short stretch of road heading into the horizon, underlined by the words BLUE RIDGE.
Sam handed the napkin to a dubious Ash. 'I need you to find out where this logo is from.'
'Uh… okay,' Ash took the napkin, narrowing his eyes at the drawing. 'Can I ask why?'
'We might be onto a lead. Please, Ash.'
He shrugged. 'If you say so.' Fixed on his computer, he began to search, eyes scanning across the screen. Really, it took him about a minute, but as they watched, it felt like an age. Finally, he announced, 'Blue Ridge Bus Lines. Exact match. They're in Guthrie, Oklahoma.'
Oklahoma. Caden did the math: if they left soon, factoring in time to sleep on the way over, they'd arrive in the early hours of the morning. With some luck, they could have this lead on Yellow Eyes figured out by the end of tomorrow.
Sam sat forward intently. 'Search Guthrie for demonic signs, omens, anything like that.'
'You really think the demon's there?' Ash questioned, skeptical, but already typing away. Another beat later, he shook his head. 'Nothing. No signs, no demon. Sorry, guys.'
No signs? Caden furrowed her brow; that didn't make any sense. Sam's visions were always connected to the demon, or if not the demon, then-
Oh.
'Nursery fires,' she said suddenly. Sam met her eyes, experiencing the same lightbulb moment. So far, if not to Yellow Eyes himself, her brother's visions were tied to someone else the demon had visited as a kid, just like Max Miller, the telekinetic guy they'd encountered earlier that year. Caden went on, 'Or any house fire from 1983 starting in a baby's nursery, night of the kid's six-month birthday.'
'Okay, now that is just weird. Why the hell would I be searching for that?' Ash sat back in his chair, arms folded over his chest as he looked from Caden to Sam disbelievingly.
Sam weighed up his options for a second, then slid his unopened beer across the table. 'Because there's a PBR in it for you.'
That was all it took. 'Give me 15 minutes,' he told them, all hints of skepticism gone.
Andrew Gallagher. Same age as Sam. Survived a house fire starting in his nursery on his six-month birthday. Gallagher ticked every box. So, once Ash had compiled all the information they needed, the Winchesters hightailed it to Guthrie, Oklahoma.
'You really think the demon killed this guy's mom?' Dean queried, lowering his voice so as not to be overheard by other patrons of the café they'd stopped for breakfast in. It was early morning, and the three of them were already dressed in formal attire, ready to act as lawyers when the time came to find Gallagher.
Sam nodded in confirmation. 'Sure looks like it. Same thing with Max Miller, remember? If this Gallagher guy is killing people, it could be happening all over again and-'
'We don't know it's him,' Dean cut him off mid-sentence.
'Right,' Caden said, taking a sip of coffee, 'but the demon's involved either way.'
Across the table, Dean shot her an irritated look. 'Maybe.'
Maybe!? Caden met Dean's irritated expression, narrowing her eyes at him quizzically. Sam's premonitions were always connected to Yellow Eyes one way or another; it was literally their defining feature. What the hell did he mean maybe? She'd have argued that very point, but the conversation was forced to cease as a smiling blonde-haired waitress appeared to refill their coffee cups.
Their table fell into awkward silence until the waitress suddenly spoke up, 'I didn't mean to listen in, but did I overhear the name Gallagher? You three aren't looking for Andy, are you? I hate to say it, but you won't get anything out of him.'
Sam looked up at the waitress, confused. 'Sorry?'
'You're debt collectors, right? I don't know what Andy says to them, but they never come back.'
Well, that wasn't suspicious at all. Caden eyed her, trying to judge whether they never come back implied these debt collectors gave up on going after Andrew Gallagher or met an unfortunate psychic demise. Perhaps that would convince her eldest brother that something weird had to be going on.
'We're lawyers, actually,' lied Dean, reciting their cover story from memory, 'representing his Great Aunt Lita. She passed – God rest her soul – and left Andy a sizeable estate. If you could point us in his direction, that'd be great.'
There was a beat before the waitress bought their false excuse. 'Try Orchard Street,' she smiled. 'Just look for the van with a barbarian queen painted on the side.'
'Barbarian queen?' Caden replied, both horrified and admittedly curious at the notion.
'She's riding a polar bear. It's hard to miss.'
Sure enough, Andy's van wasn't hard to find. It stood out, to put it mildly. The mural was just as described: a barbarian queen riding a polar bear, painted in such elaborate detail that it was equal parts impressive and utterly ridiculous.
Across the street in the Impala, Sam studied the van, impatiently picking at the cast around his wrist, waiting for Andy to show up. Another person like him and Max Miller. How many more were there? How many more were killing people? And what, if anything, set Sam apart from them?
Beside him, Dean was wasting time joking around. 'I'm starting to like this Andy guy,' he grinned. 'That van is sweet.' He wasn't taking the situation seriously in the slightest, and it was getting on Sam's nerves.
'Yeah, if you're a Dungeons and Dragons nerd who's never met a real woman,' mocked Caden in response. 'Do you think he painted it himself? Did he pay to get it painted?'
Sam rolled his eyes, frustrated by how little his family seemed to care that this wasn't just some ordinary case. If it had been up to Dean, they'd never even have made it to Guthrie.
His brother glanced at him, still grinning and clearly expecting him to join in, but he faltered when he noticed Sam's pensive expression. 'What's up with you?'
'Nothing,' Sam answered flatly.
'Nothing?' Caden repeated disbelievingly. 'Dude, you look miserable.'
Sam looked between them both, astonished at their complete lack of understanding. He'd figured Caden, at the very least (and especially after she'd had his back on chasing this premonition down in the first place), would get why this case warranted some concern. Were his siblings blind!? 'Andrew Gallagher is the second guy like this we've found. Demon came to him when he was a baby and now he's killing people, just like Max Miller.'
'We don't know what Gallagher is,' replied Dean dismissively. 'He's probably innocent.'
'When have my visions ever been wrong?'
'What's your point?'
'My point is I'm one of them!' Sam shot back.
'Yeah,' his sister said sarcastically, 'because you're such a cold-blooded killer.'
Sam glared at her. 'I'm serious, Cade! The demon said he had plans for me and children like me. Maybe this is it.'
'What, so the demon wants you out there killing with your visions?' Dean scoffed. 'Give me a break. You're not a murderer, Sam.'
This was futile. His siblings were looking at it all wrong, through the rose-tinted glasses that reassured them he was the gentle one of the family, the kid who had run from hunting the first chance he got.
But Sam wasn't giving in on arguing his point. 'Last time I checked, I kill all kinds of things,' he bit back.
'We kill monsters. For the good of humanity,' Caden reasoned from the backseat. 'It's not the same.'
No, it wasn't the same, but maybe it was close enough.
Across the street, an apartment door opened and out from it appeared a dishevelled brown-haired man Sam recognized as Andy Gallagher. He looked a mess, wearing sweatpants, slippers, and an old t-shirt as he sauntered along the sidewalk.
'There he is,' Dean pointed him out. 'Told you he'd be normal.'
Sam ignored the comment. Briefly, Andy paused to say hi to someone, who cheerfully handed him the takeout coffee cup they were holding and went on with their day. The exchange was… weird. But nothing incriminating. Not yet.
Andy kept walking, casual as ever, then paused again to speak with an older man. The two of them shook hands like long-time acquaintances.
Sam's stomach dropped.
That older man was the one from his premonition, he was certain of it. Already rushing to get out the Impala, Sam said, 'That's him, that's the shooter.'
Suddenly, Dean shifted gears, finally seeming to take things a little more seriously. 'You two follow him,' he instructed. 'I'll stick with Andy. Call me if anything happens.'
Caden hurried after Sam, who was already several paces down the street. He didn't wait for her to catch up.
She was doing all she could to conceal it, but Caden was no less on edge about this than her brother. Sam wasn't dangerous. He just wasn't. But their dad had believed he could be, and if Andy Gallagher and Max Miller were anything to go by, Caden had to wonder how much John had known that she and her brothers were oblivious to.
Tying her mousy brown hair back into a ponytail to keep it out of her face, she caught up to Sam, and the two of them followed the alleged shooter. Her brother looked frantic, eyes darting every which way as he searched out the store he'd described from his vision; the man would walk into a gun store and murder the clerk before shooting himself, Sam had recounted on the drive over to Guthrie.
Caden understood that, for Sam, it was about more than just saving the man and the store clerk. Her brother was so relentlessly determined to incriminate himself that stopping the premonition from coming true was his version of redemption.
'That's the store,' Sam announced suddenly, quickening his pace toward a building a few doors down the street.
'Okay, go pull the fire alarm or something,' Caden told him as he stormed on ahead. 'I'll keep an eye on the shooter.'
He looked over his shoulder to acknowledge her plan before jogging away, no time to spare.
Ten or so yards from her, the shooter had paused to answer his phone, and Caden watched as his expression darkened like he'd just received devastating news. Solemnly, he put the phone back into the pocket of his slacks, setting his attention on the gun store.
Caden snapped into action, moving to block his path and mentally scraping together a spiel about saving the environment that would stall him long enough for Sam to get everyone out the store. 'Sir,' she stepped right in front of the shooter. 'Do you have a moment to talk about ending deforestation?'
He stopped and smiled down at her, eerily calm. 'Oh, no, ma'am. Everything's going to be just fine.'
'Wait, sir, but take a moment to consider the wildlife,' she continued stalling, stepping in front the man once again as he tried to walk around her. Hurry up, Sam.
'There's not a thing to worry about,' he smiled, but the peaceful expression dropped as the gun store's fire alarm finally went off behind them. With a troubled sigh, the man shook his head disappointedly. 'Now that is a shame.' He turned tail, heading back in the direction he'd just come. Caden watched him go, more than a little creeped out and still fully suspicious of his intentions.
A second or two later, Sam joined her again. 'Did he say anything?' he asked, pointing toward the man.
'Yeah, he-' she started, but in that moment – out of nowhere – the Impala sped past them, and she could've sworn the brown-haired driver was not her brother.
'Was that Andy!?' Sam said incredulously, matching Caden's alarm. 'Where's Dean?'
'I'm calling him,' she replied, grabbing her cell from her pocket. Frantically, she found Dean's number, almost dropping the phone in the process. 'Dean? Are you okay? Andy's got the Impala.'
On the other end of the line, Dean sounded several steps beyond freaked out. 'I know! He full-on Obi-Wan'd me!' he exclaimed. 'He asked me for it, and I just let him take it! It's mind control, man!'
'Hold on, mind control?' she echoed, eliciting a look of alarmed confusion from Sam. 'I mean, I guess that kind of makes sense, but-'
Sam held his hand out for the phone, wanting in on the mystery. Caden wasn't going to give it over, but out the corner of her eye, she spotted the shooter stop in his tracks. He was a fair distance down the street now, but just close enough that she could see him pause to answer another phone call, just like before he'd approached the gun store.
She handed her cell phone over to Sam, not daring to take her eyes off the man for a second.
He was staring at the road, right where Andy had just driven by in the Impala. Calmly, he began strolling toward it, ignoring the crosswalk only a few yards away. The cars speeding past didn't seem to faze him. It was as if he didn't even register that they were there.
Oh no. Caden's blood ran cold; what Dean had told her, the shooter's mysterious phone call, Andy Gallagher driving by, it all added up. The man was under mind control, and he was going to walk into traffic. He had no choice in the matter.
It was up to her to intervene. She took off with a sprint, hurtling past other pedestrians until the man was within reach. 'Stop!' Caden yelled, grabbing hold of his arm before he could get any closer to the road. 'The hell are you doing!?'
The man looked down at her, wearing that same eerily calm smile as before. In the tone of voice one would use to reassure a child, he said, 'Just like I told you, there's nothing to worry about.'
Abruptly, the man took a step and pushed Caden with all his strength. As she landed hard on the sidewalk, there was a cacophony of panicked shouts and screeching vehicle brakes. But it was too late. Caden raised her head just in time to see a Blue Ridge bus collide with the man at speed; nobody could have survived that.
Thankfully, the Impala had been easy to track down and, even better, Andy Gallagher had left the keys in the ignition. They'd changed back into their usual clothing, and now were at a minimart, Sam inside buying lunch, Caden and Dean waiting for him in the car. Caden was still a little shaken up over the man – Dr Jennings, the paramedics said his name was – walking right into that bus outside the gun store. That smile was stuck in her mind, how completely tranquil he had seemed.
She had no doubt that Andy was the killer, mind-controlling people through phone calls. No other explanation made sense.
And, yet, Dean was in the midst of trying to convince her that convicting Andy was a mistake. Not because he thought Andy was innocent, but because he was worried it would make things worse for Sam.
'We all know it's Andy,' Caden argued. 'If we act like we don't suspect him, Sam's gonna see right through it. He's not an idiot.'
'Yeah, I know he's not an idiot, but if we start assuming that Andy's a killer just because he's one of the demon children, it'll justify this complex of his.'
The last thing Caden wanted an excuse for Sam's self-hatred, but someone was actively murdering people, and she didn't think it was an overreaction to see that as the more pressing issue. Besides, it was already bad enough that they were hiding their father's warning from Sam; they didn't need more deceit. Caden pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration at Dean's short-sightedness. 'What do you want us to do? Pretend it's not Andy and just wait out his murder spree?'
'Okay, first, we don't know that Andy is on a murder spree, and-'
'That is not the point.'
Outside, Sam was leaving the minimart, forcing them to give up on the debate. He got in the Impala and handed them each a flat, sad-looking sandwich. 'Sorry, it was all they had.'
Dean drove them to the quietest spot they could find, in hopes they could figure out their next steps without catching unwanted attention. He pulled into a tiny gravel parking lot shrouded by trees, empty aside from a couple of abandoned trailers.
'So,' he began, satisfied that they were alone, 'you stop the premonition from coming true, but the doctor gets killed anyway?'
'Yeah,' Sam affirmed, 'but what I don't get is the motive.' He furrowed his brow, staring down into the file of information they'd scraped together about Dr Jennings. 'I mean, the guy was squeaky clean. Why would Andy waste him?'
Dean butted in, 'If it is Andy.'
'Dude, the doctor was mind-controlled in front of a bus, and Andy just happens to have the power of mind-control. You do the math.'
'I just don't think he's got it in him,' insisted Dean, shrugging like Sam was making a big deal out of nothing. 'He doesn't seem like the stone-cold killer type.'
Tired of the impasse, and with the realization that she had the power of tie-breaker here, Caden piped up from the backseat: 'All evidence points to Andy. I'm with Sam on this one.' She could practically feel Dean praying she'd shut up. In the driver's side mirror, he shot her an annoyed glare.
Bang!
Caden nearly jumped out her skin. Right outside the passenger-side window, with his fist on the glass, was none other than Andrew Gallagher.
'You think I haven't noticed you?' Andy shouted, hitting the window a second time for good measure. 'Why are you following me?'
Sam closed the doctor's file and slid it out of sight, rolling down the window with his free hand. He offered a nonthreatening smile. 'We're lawyers. See, a relative of yours has-'
Andy wasn't buying it. 'Tell the truth!'
Sam opened his mouth to repeat the lie, but was abruptly cut off by Dean, who blurted, 'We hunt demons.'
'What!?' Andy was flabbergasted, an expression pretty identical to Caden's own. What the ever-loving fuck was her brother doing?
Dean powered through. 'Demon and spirits. Things your worst nightmares wouldn't even touch. These are my siblings, Sam and Caden. Sam's the tall one.'
'Dean, shut up,' Caden urged, incredulous.
He shot her a strained expression. 'I'm trying!' he managed to say before he continued blabbering. 'Sam's psychic, kind of like you, Andy. Well, not really like you. See, he thinks you're a murderer and he's afraid he's gonna become one himself because you're all part of something terrible! I hope to hell that he's wrong, but I'm starting to get a little scared that he might be right. I'm trying to play it down for his sake, but my sister won't listen since she also thinks you're killing people.'
Andy's eyes widened in horror. 'Stop following me. Leave me alone.' He scrambled away from the Impala, but Sam and Caden went after him, leaving Dean to recover from – presumably – being mind-controlled into confessing everything.
With the realization that he was being chased, Andy's face drained of color. 'What the hell are you doing? I told you to leave me alone! Get out of here, all right!? Just start driving and never stop!'
Caden felt it that time, like a pull on her thoughts, bending them into a will separate from her own. She shrugged it off. It was uncomfortable, sure, but it wasn't controlling. 'Doesn't seem to work on us, Andy.'
'What are you talking about!?'
Sam kept after him. 'You can make people do things, can't you? You can tell them what to think.'
'That's crazy. You're out of your mind!'
'All started about a year ago, didn't it? After you turned 22. Little stuff at first, then you got better at controlling it.'
Andy's jaw dropped. He stopped in his tracks, staring at Sam in astonishment. 'How do you know all that?'
'Because the same thing happened to me,' explained Sam, taking the opportunity to get a step closer. 'My mom died in a fire when I was a baby, too, and I have abilities, too. We're connected.'
'Then what about you? Why doesn't it work on you?' Andy questioned Caden, then shook his head frantically. 'No, you know what? I don't care. Just leave me alone!'
He turned tail, ready to run, but Sam grabbed him forcefully by the shoulder. Towering over Andy, he gave up on building trust and went straight for the nerve. 'Why did you tell Dr Jennings to walk in front of a bus?'
'What!?' Andy exclaimed in horror.
Suddenly, Sam recoiled. His eyes squeezed shut, a grimace overtaking his face. Caden recognised what was happening. She'd witnessed it a couple time before: her brother would be struck with a crippling headache, immediately followed by a premonition. 'Sam?' she watched him, concerned, Andy forgotten.
Her brother pushed on, visibly struggling, but fighting to ignore the pain. 'Why did you kill him, Andy?' He recoiled again, knees buckling under him as he fell to the ground.
'Sam!' Caden rushed forward, kneeling by her brother. Beside them, Andy was freaking out, swearing he didn't do anything to Dr Jennings and had nothing to do with Sam's distress. Caden ignored him, instead taking the moment to wave Dean over from the car. There was nothing they could to do help Sam through this, but still, she put a hand on his arm to offer some kind of reassurance.
But the second she touched him, a jolt of searing pain shot through her head like a bullet. Dean, running over, might've said her name, but the headache was so blindingly intense that she could barely hear him; her senses weren't working right. A flash of… something passed her eyes and the pain worsened still. Another flash. A car pulling into a gas station. Dean was definitely yelling her name. A woman, liquid splashing. No, gasoline. There were hands gripping Caden's shoulders. Flames erupting, the heat intense enough to sting. The woman was silent as she burned.
Abruptly, the imagery ended, the headache vanished with it. She could hear Sam breathing heavily, stumbling over his words as he tried to say, 'A woman burning after she gets a phone call.'
The world was reappearing around her. The hands gripping her shoulders belonged to Dean, who was looking from her to Sam, green eyes panicked. A woman burning after she gets a phone call. Caden didn't understand. Everything was still blurry, off, but the flashes she'd seen were so vivid in her mind they were almost overwhelming. 'At a gas station,' she croaked.
Sam stared at her, taken aback, apparently having missed whatever the hell had just happened to her. 'How did you know that?'
'A woman burning herself alive at a gas station.'
'Was that your vision?' Dean asked Sam.
Still staring in bewilderment at his sister, Sam nodded. 'Cade, how the hell-'
His voice was drowned out as, on the road outside the gravel parking lot, a fire engine hurtled by, sirens blaring. Caden flinched at the noise, unsure whether it was real or sewn into the patchwork of imagery her mind had just thrown at her.
Beside her, Sam said, 'Dean, go after it.'
So, it was real. The sight of the woman burning flashed across her mind once more as the fire truck sped out of earshot. Were the two things connected? No, no. She didn't have visions. That wasn't what was happening. It couldn't be.
'I'm not going anywhere,' Dean refused.
'Dean, go,' urged Sam. His voice was still shaky. 'We'll wait here.'
Dean weighed this up for another moment before finally letting go of Caden's shoulders. 'Call me if anything happens.' He ran to the Impala and was away in less than ten seconds.
Caden dropped her head into her shaking hands. Her mind was spinning. This didn't make any sense. Sam reached out, helped her to her feet. A few yards behind them, Andy was standing, speechless. Honestly, Caden was surprised he hadn't taken advantage of the moment to escape.
Sam let go of her arm. 'I don't understand. You don't fit the Yellow Eyes pattern.'
With that, Andy found his voice. 'The Yellow Eyes pattern?' he sputtered. 'Is someone going to tell me what the hell is going on!?'
That snapped Sam back to the reason they were here in the first place. 'Why did you kill Dr Jennings?' he bellowed at Andy, tone deadly serious.
'I didn't do anything!' Andy yelled back, hands going up defensively. 'The worst thing I use my mind powers for is getting out of paying bills! You guys show up and start talking about demon-hunting, and I'm the dangerous one!?'
Caden leaned against one of the abandoned trailers as Sam continued threatening Andy. She couldn't get her thoughts straight. She'd never had any kind of psychic anything before, and now she was having premonitions? No. There was no way. This was just some freak event. Besides, Sam was right: she didn't fit the Yellow Eyes pattern. She was too young, she hadn't been in a house fire at six-months-old, and the visions started today, not a year ago.
Lost in trying to make sense of an impossible situation, Caden didn't even realize her eldest brother had returned until she heard the sound of the Impala's door slamming shut.
'Your premonition came true about a minute before I got there,' Dean filled them in, striding across the gravel, 'which means, unless Andy called the victim right in front of you, he's not the killer.'
Andy seemed thrilled by this revelation. 'That's what I've been trying to tell you!'
'The victim's name was Holly Beckett. 41-years-old, single,' Dean went on, looking at Andy expectantly. 'Who is she?'
'Never heard of her.'
'Well, I called Ash – friend of ours – on the way over, and he found out that Holly Beckett gave birth in 1983. Same day you were born, Andy.'
Still leaning against the trailer, Caden forced her thoughts to gather upon the discovery of this new information. Andrew Gallagher was… innocent. Probably. She looked over at him through the haze that was still hanging over her mind. 'Andy, were you adopted?'
'Yeah, I was,' he confirmed slowly, eyeing the Winchesters in suspicion. 'You think this woman was my birth mother?'
Dean moved over to stand by his sister but kept watch on Andy. 'Don't know for sure. I tried to get the birth records from Ash, but they're hard-copy only, kept in the county office.'
Andy mulled this over. Caden could tell by the look on his face that he didn't trust them one bit. And, really, who could blame him? Eventually, he queried, 'We are on the same page about me being innocent, right?'
'We're on the same page,' Sam answered, tone bordering on apologetic. Caden raised her eyebrows at him in surprise. The evidence no longer pointed to Andrew Gallagher, but still, after Sam had been so determined to convict him, she hadn't expected a change of view this readily.
'All right. I'll mind-trick us into the county office,' Andy decided. 'But I don't trust you guys.'
The long-awaited third chapter!
I hope you're having a lovely, peaceful end to this memorable (for better or worse) year. Thank you for reading and for sticking with me while I wrote this chapter - if you've been around since the original publication of chapter 1, you know it's taken a while to get here! But, dear reader, it feels great to be writing regularly again.
Chapter 4 will be here in about a month. As always, I post writing updates and musings about the story over on tumblr - you can find my blog at cadenwinchester dot tumblr dot com, if you'd like. See you in January, dear reader, and happy new year!
