Lebanon, Pennsylvania

Killian pulled into the parking lot of the first motel he came to in the city and killed the car's engine. "Wake up, Liam," he called out cheerfully, reaching over to shake his brother's shoulders.

Liam grumbled something that sounded like a mild threat before finally prying his eyes open. "Where are we?"

"The Star Motel. I'm sure it will be wonderfully cozy."

"And why are we here again?"

"Because the best way to find out if something supernatural is going on in the city is to be in the city," Killian replied slowly. It was something their father had taught them both years ago, and clearly, just another thing to add to the list of life-lessons his brother had conveniently forgotten.

"Let's go then," Liam sighed, reaching behind him for the small bag of clothes he had stashed there before they'd left. Killian was already out of the car and headed towards the small office before he had the door closed.

After checking in under fake names with a fake credit card, the brothers retired to their room. But instead of getting some sleep as Liam had hoped, they settled down at the small table by the window to begin researching recent events in the city. They were looking for anything that could possibly fall into the category of unexplained that would have drawn their father's attention.

It didn't take long for Liam's searches to turn up some results.

"Hey, Killian… I think I've found something," he said, as he turned his laptop around to show his brother the news articles that he'd discovered. There were a number of different local outlets reporting on the sudden murder spree that had recently taken place in a nearby town. A local priest had snapped and killed six before he'd finally been caught.

"It says here that he claims he was possessed?" Killian flicked a look up to his brother that clearly communicated his disbelief on that subject.

"Did Dad ever mention anything to you about possession before?" Liam asked.

"Nope. He talked about spirits, vampires, and a few different beasts, but never possession. Do any of the articles say what they think he was possessed by?"

Liam pulled the laptop back over to his side of the table and quickly skimmed through each of the articles that he'd managed to find. Most wrote the priest's claims off as a symptom of psychosis, but one small town paper detailed some of the exact ramblings the man was quoted as giving to the authorities.

"He says he was possessed by a demon," Liam said, his own tone reflecting his skepticism on the matter. "It can't be true though, can it?"

"Either way, I think we need to do some digging," Killian pointed out. It could just be that the man was seriously ill and truly believed that the voice inside of his head was that of a demon. But Killian had seen many unbelievable sights throughout the years, and he wasn't willing to write this off without giving it further investigation.

"And how do you plan on doing that?"

"The same way we always do," Killian told his brother. "We find out who the victims were and see if we can get close to anyone they knew. Someone in that town has to know something about what happened, even if it is just to tell us that he displayed signs of mental illness long before he snapped."

Liam sighed as he jotted down the names of the victims and then pulled up a new browser window to start his research on them. He'd always been better at the nerdy side of their investigations, while his brother was more adept at the more practical issues that arose on a hunt. But it had been years since he'd last dug into the lives of other people, and Liam was finding his skills in that department a little rusty.

"Do you really think this is what brought Dad to the city?" he asked after a moment of strained silence.

"I dunno, but it's worth looking into, even if it wasn't. If there really is something in this town that can possess humans, then a lot of people are gonna end up dying if we don't find it and take it out."

Killian pulled his father's journal from his bag and began thumbing through the different cases that Brennan had detailed inside of it. He couldn't ever remember his dad mentioning possession before, but that didn't mean that Brennan had never encountered it himself.

When the journal proved to be of no use to their case, Killian opened up his own browser window and typed Demonsinto the blank field before hitting search. There were thousands of links to articles involving the word 'demon,' but the more that Killian read, the more his stomach twisted itself in knots.

While Brennan had always maintained that the internet was full of lies and misdirection when it came to the supernatural world, Killian didn't quite support his father's beliefs. Sure, there was a lot of bullshit on there that he fully blamed movies like Twilight and Hocus Pocus for, but buried amongst that shit was some truly helpful information. You just had to know where to look for it.

And Killian had become an expert at knowing where to look for it.

The first few pages were full of hits that linked back to popular songs or movies, but as he made his way further through the results, Killian found more and more sites discussing the origin of demons and detailing their attributes. While those were definitely in the minority, the information they carried seemed to be similar from site to site. In Killian's past experience he knew that was either because the same person had written each piece, or it was because every individual had experienced the same situations with that particular creature.

"What did you find?" Liam asked, flicking a glance over his own screen at his brother's pale face.

"A whole lot of… something." Killian took a moment to finish skimming his way down the page he'd been reading before he lifted his own eyes to meet his brother's concerned gaze. "I think this might worth investigating, Liam. There are a lot of the usual sites reporting demonic possession in recent years. And all of it sounds similar to the case with our priest here in town. They all seem to share a common theory too."

"Which is?"

"There's a much higher purpose involved in all of this." Killian turned his own screen around to show his brother the map that one of their fellow hunters had uploaded to his website, and the accompanying theory about what those demonic possessions could mean.

"You don't actually think someone's trying to open a door to hell, do you?" Liam scoffed.

"Well… stranger things have happened."

Thanks for reading and reviewing.

For the guest reviewer asking – yes, I have switched the brothers around for this one. (I figured if I could ever do that, it would be for a supernatural inspired story).