The next few months went by quickly. Jack and Mary became leaders of the rebellion alongside Bobby. They knew strategy and planning, and Jack… Well, Jack could kind of just blast aside whatever angels got in our way.

It was agreed that I would stay in the shadows to the people. Jack originally wanted me to come out as saying I was from the other world as well, but I disagreed. I couldn't remember enough to make it worth it, and for a while I'd just been letting them run off the assumption that I was from here. Changing that now, and adding in that I used to be a witch that just so happened to forget all her memories?

Yeah. That sounds extremely bad, no matter what way you spin it.

So, I stayed in the shadows of the rebellion, going off on more and more missions when I could. I tended to go on ones that Jack wasn't on, or stayed back when Jack was definitely going to be needing his abilities. The kind of pain that I would feel… It scared Bobby, and terrified me.

I went off solo a lot, or with one or two people. Scouting and scavenging, mostly. If I went up against angels, it was out of bad luck. I told those who asked that angels recognized me because I tended to kill their kind. Nobody asked questions after that.

It was while I was out on a scouting trip that my head lit up in excruciating pain. I was alone, in the middle of almost a desert area. I collapsed in pain, screaming in isolation. I could… I could see gold. It was lit up in front of my eyes, bright and painful and angry. I could feel something ripping at the backs of my eyes, pulling my brain away.

"Did you hear that scream?" I could hear a voice ask. It was a masculine voice. Rough. Concerned, but rough.

"It can't be her." Another voice stated. It was a smoother male voice. More cautious. More calculating. But was that a hint of fear in his voice?

"It could be." The first voice argued. "Kylie?! KYLIE?!"

"We don't have time for this, Dean." The second man tried. "We only have 24 hours. If you want to find her and the others, we have to move."

"What if she's with them?"

"What if she's not?" I felt myself fading out from them, but I could still hear Dean shouting for me.

I faded back into somewhere else, on someone else's conversation. "Yeah, Cas. I need you to come here now. I… Something happened." There was a pause. This voice was also male, but different from the first two. It was tenser. His tones were different. It was… It was strangely familiar. I'd heard it before, but I couldn't remember where. "I'll tell you when you get here. Just… Just hurry, please."

I faded out from that one quicker, pulling myself back into nothing but gold. I could… I could feel it. I was almost certain I could grab it if I just reached out. The gold was all around me, with a consistency just a little thicker than water. I could still move through it, though. It parted around me as though held back by the thinnest of barriers. But I knew I could grab it. I could reach out for it. I just had to try.

I reached out, unable to see my own hand as I did it. I reached with a single finger, trying to break through the invisible barrier between me and the sea of gold. I could feel the tip of my index finger just barely skim the gold around me, past the barrier. I could see my hand, then, for just a single moment. It was lit up gold from the inside out.

Burning gold.

Gold like fire, racing its way through my body sooner than I could hold it back.

I was flung back into myself instantly. It felt as though everything that had just transpired had only happened in a moment, but that moment had lasted a lifetime. I looked around, breathing hard. I was on my knees. My hands were buried in the sand in front of me. My head… It hurt a little, but not as bad as it had a moment ago.

I cautiously removed my hands from the sand, half-expecting to see them frozen in solid gold or on fire or something. But no, they were fine. I thought I saw a fleck of gold in my fingertips, but it was gone before I could blink. I had to have imagined it. They were my normal hands. They flexed like normal hands. They gripped the sand and tapped along different places of my body like normal hands.

"What in the absolute hell?" I muttered, taking a look around at my surroundings once more. I must have fallen into a sand pit. The area looked scorched, but that was normal for this landscape. They were unnerving, though. Scorch marks like these usually meant angels had been here, and they looked…. Too recent for comfort.

For a moment, I remembered hearing the men talking about a scream. I had been screaming. I needed to leave before someone followed the scream. Chances of them being a friend weren't good.

So, I made my way back to base. I had to tell Bobby about what had happened. I had to tell Jack and Mary that I was pretty certain I'd heard Dean's voice. Maybe Sam's, too. The other one that had been with Dean, though… That I didn't know.

I was lucky. Nobody came. I could get away from the sand pit easily, and get back to the cover of trees. I was a few days out from where Mary, Jack, and Bobby were. If I stayed in the trees and kept my head down, I'd be fine.

I got back after maybe a day of walking. My head felt better after that.

Once I got back, I chose not to tell anyone what happened. I didn't know how to explain it, and people would only worry. I was fine, after all. No bruises. No injuries. Just a normal scouting mission with very little to report. I didn't even know what Sam or Dean or any of them sounded like. I had no proof that I'd even heard them.

I'd been doing good on being a normal fighter in this rebellion. I'd been good on not focusing on who I had been or who people were supposed to remember me as before. I'd been great at being just me, without worrying about any of this freaky other-dimension gold stuff.

So I kept my mouth shut. Nobody had to know.

I didn't tell anyone about how I kept seeing flecks of gold out of the corner of my eye, either. I figured they'd go away eventually.

Three days later there was a commotion in the camp. I was at Bobby's, working on getting the maps updated on different occupied angel encampments.

I stopped when I heard Mary shouting and screaming more insults than I'd ever remembered hearing before. Mary usually was an extremely calm and collected woman. She didn't shout words like "bloody fucking manipulative prick" or "goddamn asshole" or for Bobby to give her a gun to "shoot this son of a bitch right fucking now!"

I ran out from Bobby's at "manipulative prick" to see what was happening. Mary was being held back by four different men, who were absolutely struggling to do so. Bobby was standing off to the side, offering one of two newcomers a look of absolute hate. One of the two newcomers had long red hair. She was trying to explain something, but I couldn't hear her over the sound of Mary's indignant shouting. The red-haired woman was trying to explain things to Bobby also, but I doubted that she was being heard.

The other person was a man, and was the subject of Bobby's gaze. He just stood there, accepting everything Mary was saying to him. He had a gun across his back, and was dressed in all black clothes. His hair was cut short, close to his head, and his face was kind of square. He looked determined, but accepting.

Whatever Mary's problem was with this guy, he understood that he deserved it.

I walked up to Mary, keeping my blades sheathed but ready. "Hey," I grabbed her arm lightly, just barely diverting her attention. "What's wrong? Who is this guy?"

"Who is this guy?!" Mary asked me, outraged. She looked from me to him, as though I was expected to remember.

I didn't, though. I had no idea.

I could see that realization dawn on Mary's face after a few short minutes.

"Right." She muttered quietly. I nodded once at her.

"I don't know him." I explained to Mary. "Tell me who he is and what he did. If it's worth it, I'll kill him afterwards."

"No!" The red-head argued, fighting towards the two of us. "No, please don't kill him. I can explain. He's a good guy! He," she stopped when she looked over at me. Her eyes widened just slightly. "You're… You're her." She muttered. I took a step back, averting my gaze.

"I'm sorry. I don't know what you mean." I said. "I'm just here to help."

"But you're," she was starting to argue. She remembered me. What would the other me do?

I looked up quickly, ensuring that I made eye contact with her before I quietly, yet firmly, shook my head. She stopped what she was saying, her focus on my actions instead. "You're not who I thought you were." She said. I nodded.

"Sorry about that." I knew she was lying, but I was telling the truth.

I just also knew she wouldn't know that.

"Don't worry. Just…" She looked back at the other man. "Just don't kill my friend."

"He's not a friend, he's a backstabbing, lying, MURDEROUS," Mary's voice rose again, and she was shouting at the man once more. "GODDAMN TREACHEROUS SNAKE!"

"Mary!" I brought her attention back to me. "Who the hell is this guy?"

"He saved my life." The red-head said. "Him and the other guy, Dean."

Mary stopped at the mention of Dean. She looked back up at the other man, then back to the red-headed woman. "Who are you?" She asked.

"Charlie. The guy over there is my friend, Ketch." She explained. "They both saved my ass from the angels."

"Where's Dean now."

"Back in Oz." Charlie answered. "He went home." The way she said the word home, I was certain she meant the other universe. "The door closed behind him. Ketch stayed behind to make sure Dean could get through and to keep me safe."

"Dean was here?" Mary asked. She glanced over at me slightly. Me and Jack had told them. Of course, we'd told them. They needed to know. Mary had been hopeful for a little bit to see Dean, but when he hadn't come…

Now we knew why.

"Yes!" Charlie insisted. Mary looked back at me for a moment, making a decision.

"Sidebar." She muttered, pulling me away from Charlie. "We'll be right back." She walked over with me towards Bobby. As we moved, I looked over at the other guy, Ketch. He had been wearing a calm and accepting face as Mary and I walked. When I made eye contact, though…

It takes a monster to recognize another monster.

Ketch's eyes widened as he looked at me. I could see pain flash across his face. He…

He recognized me, and it hurt.

I looked away quickly, focusing back on walking towards Bobby. "Mary," I asked quietly. "Who is he?" She looked over at me, then back to him.

"Someone I thought was dead." She answered. I watched her pause, thinking for a moment. "You can't tell him that you're from our universe."

"Why?"

"He'll kill you." Her words were blunt and honest. They shocked me just slightly.

"He knew me?"

"Very well." She muttered. "It's not safe for you to tell him who you are. Lie." She looked up at Bobby. Jack had joined him at this point. "I'll tell them what's up, but you can't let Ketch know who you are."

"Why did he want to kill me?"

"He had orders to." She said. "But I don't think that was all. He's a monster. He destroys everything in his way. He tries to make," her voice caught a little. I could see a flash of a memory across her eyes; one that caused her a lot of pain. "He makes others into monsters like him."

"We killed monsters." I could hear this memory, and for a moment I saw a flash of the man, Ketch, sitting across from me. His voice was the same as what I'd heard before. He had been with Dean. He had come through the Rift. "We killed vampires and witches and other creatures that would've killed humans."

"No. We didn't kill monsters." I felt myself say. I was angry. I was pained. I was hurt. I was tired. I didn't care enough to live, but enough to make sure I could hurt Ketch somehow. "You became one."

I focused myself back on Mary, uncertain of what to say. She could see a change in my eyes, though. "You remembered something." She said quietly. I nodded. "What was it?"

"I remember calling him a monster, too." I said. "And I remember being in pain when I did." Mary let out a small sigh.

"We can't tell him." He repeated again. "It's not safe." I nodded with her.

"I trust your judgement." I said firmly.

So that was what we told Bobby and Jack. Don't tell them about me. Don't tell them about where I'm from. Run with the same lie we've been letting the angels believe – Kai's alive, and nobody knows how.

Charlie had known me before. I'd have to tell a small part of the truth. I'd have to say I didn't remember much of my past. I could get by enough on what Bobby and everyone had told me about the me from this world, though. That would be enough.

Bobby brought them over to a secluded area after we had finished making our decisions. Mary had told everyone simply to not trust Ketch. She looked a little pained as she talked about it. Nothing specific, just some vague things.

She wasn't comfortable talking about it.

Charlie pleaded Ketch's case next. She told us a new story about how angels had had her and were taking her to Michael. She told us about how Ketch and Dean had saved her and destroyed the angels. She told us that Dean had gone through a Rift, promising to be back again soon.

The Rift had closed behind him.

They hadn't seen him since. They'd just made their way here.

It was decided in the end that even though Mary didn't trust Ketch, we needed more hands. We needed fighters, and Charlie's reputation was strong.

We agreed that they'd stay, but Ketch's stay was extremely conditional.

Mary refused to talk to him. She refused to do anything with him.

I chose to just keep to myself. Whatever secrets I had to keep, I'd keep.

I still didn't say what happened in the gold. I still didn't remember who Charlie or Ketch were. I still didn't know what to do with all of this.

And as much as I wanted to ignore it, I still saw flecks of gold at the corners of my vision.