Convergence

Chapter 5

Jodi had quickly spiraled into a panic and couldn't bring herself back. She gasped for air, trying to reel in her emotions while doing her best to ignore the sting of her fresh cut. It didn't help that she could feel the blood slowly oozing down her arm. She still couldn't see and she couldn't hear anything over the roar of her thundering heartbeat and it only worked to fuel her panic.

It's not that bad, she told herself. C'mon, it's not that bad, you've had worse, you've survived worse.

At some point the lights had been completely turned off and they had been abandoned in the black abyss that was the cellar.

"Jodi?" Sam's voice pierced through the void, clearly concerned and giving her a point of focus. "Jodi, talk to me, I can't see a damn thing. Come on, you got to talk to me to let me know you're alright."

Can't see.

Can't see.

Jodi's mind snapped back into sharp focus and immediately she tried to get her breathing under control enough to speak clearly. "Optic override: Jodi Hunter. Passcode: delta, echo, seven, four, two."

PASSCODE ACCEPTED. VOCAL COMMAND SYSTEM ONLINE scrolled across her vision in bright green text even as Sam gave a startled "what?".

"Engage night vision."

NIGHT VISION ENGAGED.

In an instant the black illuminated, painting the world in monochromatic green. It was bizzare and slightly dissorienting, but she could see Sam still tied to his support beam, expression caught between worried and cautious, but it did wonders to calm her. She could handle this.

She twitched her fingers and was grateful to find she was still clutching her little folded pocket knife. With a practiced flick, the blade was out and Jodi carefully went to work on the ropes binding her wrists together.

"Jodi . . ?"

Realizing she hadn't actually answered him she shifted her attention to Sam as she continued to saw away. "I'm okay. Sorry for freaking out, but if you give me a minute I can cut you free. How long was I out of it?"

"Only about five minutes." His expression hardened into straight suspicion. "What was that just now?"

"That's classified." Jodi had always wanted to say that line, and she couldn't help the little smirk that crept onto her face. The bitchy face he gave her in response was well worth it.

"As a Federal Agent-"

"And I'm gonna stop you right there. Let's just cut the crap, okay? I already know you're not a Fed, so don't even try pulling rank." She sighed as her bonds finally gave, allowing her to drop her arms to rub at her raw wrists. She grimaced when she smeared blood, her whole arm tacky with it. "I also know that you're not one of the bad guys, and I take it your partner isn't either."

Jodi carefully got to her feet, wary of making too much noise and half-numb limbs. When she was sure she was steady, she scurried over to Sam to get to work on freeing him too. He jerked hard when her fingers touched his forearm. "Chill out, it's just me. You need to keep still or I'm gonna cut you on accident."

She couldn't see Sam's face from here, but his fists clenched as he held himself still. "How can you see what you're doing in the first place?"

"Give me a real name and I'll give you the abbrieviated version." And extremely edited, but he didn't need to know that.

"Sam Winchester. My partner is my big brother, Dean."

Well, crap.

"I have an experimental implant in my blind eye, over the iris," Jodi said shortly as her mind worked overtime when she realized Barricade was probably trailing Dean. She swiftly attacked the ropes, having a much easier time of it now that she could see what she was doing. "And we need to get back before 'Cade beats the crap outta your brother under false pretenses." When the last of the rope fell away she flicked her blade closed and helped steady Sam as he rose. She hoped that he was steady enough to keep his feet on his own. There was no way whe would be able to drag him out if he went down.

"Dean can hold his own."

"Dean could be fucking Rambo and still not have a snowball's chance in hell." She grabbed his sleeve and tugged. "Come on. Let's see if I can find us something to wrap our arms with. We're still bleeding."

She led them to the work table and promptly began to rummage for something to use as bandages. Finding squat, she improvised. She removed her overshirt and cut one of the sleeves into long strips. She wrapped her own arm first with practiced ease, and then shoved at the sleeve of Sam's shirt to tend to his cut. She supposed that his jacket had been confiscated at the same time hers had.

"You don't know my brother." Sam's jaw twitched when she tugged a bit too hard before tying it off. "I don't suppose you see my gun with that super vision of yours."

"I'm not an X-man. It's tech, not a superpower." Jodi muttered, and then started to recheck the shelves, being a bit more thorough this time. When the bottom shelf yielded a few scraps of stiff wire, she pocketed it and moved to the next one. "I'll look around, but I don't think they would be that stupid."

"Then look for anything else that's useful. You are a hunter, aren't you? You and your friend?"

She froze for a beat, caught in a momentary panic, but then it dawned on her that he might mave meant "hunter" as a lable and not a surname. She finished scouring the shelves and moved back to the work-bench, leafing through the papers and trying not to look too closely at the two bowls still smeared with their blood. "What makes you say that?" she asked cautiously, fishing, and hoping Sam would give her something more to go on.

"Your calm under fire for one. It's never happened to us before, but it wouldn't be that shocking to find another set of hunters on the same case. Especially after photos of the first body were leaked to the public. I told Dean that the carvings were distinct enough to point to a case."

Okay. Clearly the two of them were on very separate pages. Possible a whole different books.

"Okay, apparently you're confused." She put the papers down and moved to a second set shelves a little past the workbench. "We didn't even know about the murders until we stopped for dinner at the diner. Whatever you're definition of 'hunter' is, we're not it."

Sam looked like he wanted to argue the point, but the two of them froze when the screaming started, muffled through walls and at least one set of floorboards. The voice was distinctly female. Jodi felt like someone poured a pitcher of ice water over her.

"Oh god. That's Renee, isn't it? What are we gonna do?"

"We can't do anything for her right now."

"You promised her you would get her out of here!" she hissed back.

Sam groped in the dark for the back of Jodi's shirt, as if he was worried she was going to charging off without him. "We need weapons and a plan. If we go up there half-cocked and unarmed we're no help to anyone."

It was a very Prowl thing to say, and it set her focus back to the task at hand. She ground her teeth and asked, "Besides weapons, what am I looking for?"

"Anything that might give us information on what we're actually dealing with. Normal bullets had no effect, so anything that might tell us how to kill it."

What Jodi wouldn't give for Riley's shiny new plasma rifle right now. That would do the trick. If it didn't then they had much bigger problems.

No firearms, but Jodi did manage to find a ceremonial-looking dagger that she had a sneaking suspition had been used on the two of them. She quickly handed that off to Sam and continued her search, trying to ignore the muffled screaming, as well as the twisting mass in her gut it was giving her.

There was a book lying by itself, bound in worn leather and a piece of dark cloth tucked between the pages. Curious, Jodi opened it to the marked page, noting that today's date was scribbled at the top. "I think I found something."

"What is it?"

"Some sort of journal." She flipped back to the first page, and then leafed briefly through random entries. "A lot of crazy crap mixed with some sketches. Weird symbols. Pretty sure the creep was writing in this after taking our blood."

"Grab it."

Jodi handed that off as well. It was too thick for her to carry easily and she was still acting as their eyes. It probably wouldn't be a good idea to hinder her too much.

After that it didn't take long to realize that there was nothing else that she considered useful, and began to walk the perimiter of the room looking for another way out. There was no telling how long their kidnappers would be occupied with Renee, and they had wasted a lot of time as it is. Sam kept a light hand on the back of her shirt as she moved, letting her lead him around like a two-legged service dog. And to top it all off, an ache was starting to develop behind her eyes, telling her she couldn't use this mode of vision for much longer without risking a full blown migraine.

They found a door tucked under the shadow of the stairwell. The wood was decaying, but thick and sturdy, with an old padlock holding it closed.

Renee's screams hit a new pitch and fell silent, a muffled thud following not long after.

"We're out of time," Sam hissed. "Move and I'll try to break the door."

Jodi swatted at him in the same way she swatted at Riley when he was being stupid, and hissed back. "If you do that then they really will know we're loose. Lemme see if I can pick the lock brfore you start breaking shit." She pulled the folded wire from her pocket and set to work, praying the internals weren't rusted together.

"Your friend teach you that too?"

A wide smile and a wry, breathless laugh escaped her. "He did actually." The lock gave with a sharp click and the door swung open on surprisingly quiet hinges. A long empty tunnel lay before them, although Jodi was the only one who saw it. "Now, what say we get the fuck outta here?"

"Lead on."

Only pausing long enough to swing the door shut behind them, Jodi led them through the tunnel and hopefully to freedom.

Author's Note: Super short, I know, but the next one is gonna be long, I can feel it. Thank you to all my readers! Wether you actively review, or just lurk, I'm glad you've stopped by! I write for myself, but it's always a good feeling when others are enjoying the story too! Until next time, Happy Reading! - Shadow