I don't know where I'm at
I'm standing at the back
And I'm tired of waiting
Waiting here in line, hoping that I'll find what I've been chasing.
I shot for the sky
I'm stuck on the ground
So why do I try, I know I'm gonna fall down
I thought I could fly, so why did I drown?
Never know why it's coming down, down, down.
Not ready to let go
Cause then I'd never know
What I could be missing
But I'm missing way too much
So when do I give up what I've been wishing for.
BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK
Impala
Beth's POV
Sam and Dean had been arguing for the last twenty miles about this new demon who had shown up. Not only had she helped us out in Nebraska when we took on the Seven Deadly Sins, she had turned us on to the strange information about Mary's family and friends all being systematically killed for some unknown reason. I sighed, leaning my head up against the glass of the window. Dean had a point, but so did Sam, she hadn't done anything to us yet.
"Because demon, that's why, I mean the second you find out this Ruby chick is a demon you go for the holy water, you don't chat!" Dean lectured Sam.
"No one was chatting, Dean," Sam said, rolling his eyes and looking angry.
"Oh yeah? Then why didn't you send her ass back to Hell?" Dean snapped.
"Because... because she said she might be able to help us out," Sam said hesitantly.
"How?" Dean asked, frowning at him. Sam paused, looking around at me, and then over at Dean.
"No really Sam, how? How could she possibly help us?" Dean asked.
"She told me she could help you, okay?" Sam said. I sat up at the sound of this, suddenly all ears. Dean threw Sam an incredulous look.
"Help him out of the crossroad deal?" I asked, leaning forward. Sam nodded at me.
"What is wrong with you guys, huh?" Dean said, looking back at me. "She's lying, you gotta know that, don't you? She knows what your weakness is, it's me." He paused, and I looked down. He was right, we didn't consort with demons, in fact normally I was first in line for sending them back to Hell. But then, things changed, and I had a countdown going on in my head like a ticking time bomb, I owed it to all of us to explore every option.
"What else did she say?" Dean asked. Sam was silent, refusing to talk. "Dude?" Dean pushed, still frowning.
"Nothing," Sam said, pausing. "Nothing, okay? Look I'm not an idiot Dean, I'm not talking about trusting her, I'm talking about using her. I mean, we're at war right? And we don't know jack about the enemy; we don't know where they are, we don't know what they're doing. I mean, Hell, we don't know what they even want."
He was right too. Half the problem was that all these arguments were making sense on some level, we were in deep, and the normal rules just didn't seem to apply any more.
"This Ruby girl knows more than we will ever find out on our own," I mused, thinking about our options. I didn't like it any more than Dean, but maybe Sam had a point.
"Yes, it's a risk," Sam interjected. "I know that, but we need to take it," he said, looking directly at me. We had been searching for weeks for a way out of this demon deal and come up with nothing. If Sam, research extraordinaire was saying we needed to take this risk, then maybe there was something to it.
"You're okay right? I mean, you're feeling okay?" Dean asked suddenly, looking at Sam.
"Yes I'm fine, why are you always asking me that?" He responded, a little annoyed.
The sounds of a ringing phone started to trill through the car. We all reached for our phones, I don't know why, it wasn't a ring tone any of us were currently using.
"It's not mine," Sam said.
"Check the glove compartment," I said suddenly. "It's Dad's."
"Dad's?" Sam asked, confused.
"Yeah, we keep it charged up in case any of his old contacts call," I said. So far it hadn't happened since he died.
Sam hurried to open the glove compartment before the phone stopped, grabbing and answering it.
"Hello?" He said, listening to the other end. "Yes... this is Edgar Cayce..." I smirked, good one John, Edgar Cayce, I shook my head at the name. He and Dean were as bad as each other with these names.
"No, no, no, no – don't, don't call the police, I'll handle this myself. Thanks. You know, can you just, can you just lock it back up for me?" I frowned, glancing at Dean who shrugged at my look. "Great. Uhm, I – I uh, I don't have my book in front of me..." Sam said gesturing for a pen, I grabbed one out of my journal and passed it to him. "...do you have the address so I can... sure, okay. Go ahead." Sam jotted down an address and hung up the phone, thanking the person on the other end.
"What was that all about?" I asked.
"Dad ever tell you he kept a container at a storage place?" Sam asked, looking first at me and then Dean.
"What?" Dean asked, looking confused.
"Outside of Buffalo?" Sam said.
"No way," I said, looking intrigued. John had never mentioned any such thing. We'd often used them to store things temporarily, like my motorcycle, but he'd never mentioned anything in Buffalo.
"Yeah, and someone just broke into it," Sam said. Well, that was interesting.
Buffalo, New York
Next Morning
Dean's POV
The storage facility had several levels to it. We took the elevator down to the basement level, it whirred and moved slowly, I saw Beth take a few steadying breaths; sometimes the claustrophobia was there, sometimes it wasn't. Today it seemed to be pretty good, she smiled at me weakly and I reached out to squeeze her hand.
"Man..." I muttered impatiently as we waited to get to the next floor.
"What?" Beth asked, slipping her arm through mine and giving me a concerned look. I smiled at her and shook my head.
"Just Dad. You know him and his secrets. Spend all this time with the guy and it's like we barely even know the man," I said quietly. I knew that she understood, possibly even more so. I still couldn't get over how Dad had ordered Beth to keep quiet when she'd seen him in Lawrence while he was missing; and then there was the whole relationship with Cole, I didn't even want to touch that with a ten-foot pole, the man was a Pandora's box full of secrets.
"Well, we're about to learn something," Sam said, getting out and wandering down toward the container that had been Dad's. I unlocked the padlock and opened the sliding door. Beth shone her flash-light into the dark room, trying to light it up a bit. My eyes were immediately drawn to the big red devil's trap drawn on the floor in red – it covered the entire entrance.
"No demons allowed," Sam said, curiously. I'd also noticed something else.
"Blood," I said, pointing to bloody footprints that were crossing the floor. "Check this out," I said, crouching down and running my finger along a tripwire. It was attached to a shotgun, hidden inside a large animal skull.
"Ouch, whoever broke in here got tagged," Sam said.
"Dear old Dad," I said with a grin as I looked around. "I got two sets of boot treads here, looks like it was a two-man job. And our friend with the buckshot in him, looks like he kept on walking," I pointed to the footprints that were scattered around the container.
"So what's the deal? Dad would do work here or something?" Beth asked, looking around the container, venturing a little further inside.
"Living the high life, as usual," I commented, gazing at the dusty contents. I aimed my flash-light at the shotgun in the skull and shook my head with a chuckle. Who on earth would hide a shot gun in a skull? I was trying to decide if it was a joke or not.
Beth looked over a shelf near her, picking up a dusty trophy. "1995," she commented, reading the plaque on it.
"No way!" Sam exclaimed, coming over to grab it off her. "That's my Division Championship soccer trophy. I can't believe he kept this." His eyes softened at the sight of the trophy, and the new-found knowledge that Dad had kept that trophy all these years.
"Yeah, about the closest you ever came to being a boy," I said with a chuckle.
I turned around to a table and spotted a familiar sight. "Oh wow!" I exclaimed, reaching forward and grabbing the shotgun. "It's my first sawed-off. I made it myself. 6th grade." I said to Beth with a smile. I grinned and pumped the shotgun, she still worked like a charm. Sam wandered further into the container while Beth reached out for an item on a shelf.
"I remember that," I said, coming to stand next to her as she flipped through a scrapbook she'd put together of our first year together. "Man you were always taking photos of us all," I chuckled, looking at the photos as she flipped through them. Beth smiled at a couple where we were all sitting out the front of the country's biggest ball of twine. There was one where I was pretending to carry it on my back, she'd taken it from a distance. I laughed softly, that day coming back to my mind, fresh and clear.
"You sure took a lot of me..." I commented slyly, leaning behind her and wrapping my arms around her waist as I kissed the back of her neck. "What's with all the ones were I am sleeping?" I asked with a cheeky grin.
Beth laughed and leaned back into me, turning to kiss my cheek. "Well it's the only time you weren't annoying me," she said with a grin.
"Oh yeah... was that it?" I asked as I squeezed her a little tighter and kissed the crook of her neck, she laughed softly. I smiled, running my fingers over one of my favourite photos; it was of her and I standing with our sawn off shotguns in a hunting pose, getting ready for some shooting practice – we had to be barely sixteen and eighteen. Beth sighed a little sadly.
"What's wrong?" I asked, holding her tight.
She glanced back at me with a sad twitch to her mouth. "Ten years have passed since I made this scrapbook, ten long years, and yet in the same breath it's as if they've flown by," she said quietly. I didn't know what to say to that, I knew what she meant. We both stood there a little longer in silence. Then she pulled away as she started going through the shelves again. I noticed she kept the book with her as we continued looking around.
My eyes caught sight of a book, sitting on the shelf above where all our items had been. Leaves of Grass. I frowned, I had seen that book somewhere before, hadn't Dad carried it around with him for a while? I couldn't quite remember. It seemed like such an odd choice for Dad. I picked it up, flipping through it and a couple of photos fell out.
"What are they?" Beth asked as I leaned down to pick them up.
"Photos..." I said, looking at them. She joined me, glancing at the photos then the cover of the book.
"Oh, I know this book." Beth said. The photos were older, one of John and Cole taken on college campus somewhere, the other of her smiling broadly at him. "It's Cole's favourite," she commented quietly. I raised an eyebrow then shook my head. I opened the book, Cole had handwritten a note in there, "Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all." I smirked, seemed like something stupid that she'd say.
I had always thought it was a stupid sentiment, that quote. Especially now, with only eleven months to go before we'd have to test out that theory. Right now I couldn't think of anything worse than loving Beth like I did, and losing her. I had a feeling Cole would also argue with her point given the loss she'd experienced with Dad's death. I might not like to admit it, but the pair of them had a connection, that much was clear, possibly more than him and Mom had experienced. It was still weird to me though, she was my age after all.
Sam had reached a door which led into a back room enclosed in wire, there was a chain on the door and it had been cut using bold cutters. I joined him and we both exchanged a look over the cut chain.
"Holy crap!" I exclaimed, stepping into the room. "Look at this, he had land mines... which they didn't take. Or the guns." I shone my flash-light around at the table and wire rack holding all these items, everything way covered in a thick layer of dust. I looked around the room, frowning. "I guess they knew what they were after, huh?" I said, looking back at Beth.
She nodded and walked into the room, placing the scrapbook on a shelf near the doorway. Her eyes were drawn to another shelf against the far wall, it had a collection of different shaped wooden chests, all locked with padlocks and covered in symbols inscribed on the outside. Sam was already looking at them.
"Hey, guys, check this out," Sam said, pointing at the chests. We walked over and looked at the symbols, most of them were unfamiliar to me. Beth pointed to one in particular.
"See these symbols? That's binding magic. These are curse boxes," she said in awe, I'd never actually seen one before.
"Curse boxes?" I asked. "They're supposed to keep the evil mojo in, right? Kind of like the Pandora deal?"
Beth nodded. "Yeah, they're built to contain the power of the cursed object," she answered.
"Well Dad's journal did mention a whole bunch of stuff, you know? Dangerous hexed items, fetishes, he never did say where they ended up," I said, and she nodded.
"This must be his toxic waste dump," Sam commented, looking at the boxes. He pointed to a spot on the shelf where the dust was disturbed. "One box is missing... great."
"Well maybe they didn't open it," I said hopefully. We all knew as soon as I said it how unlikely that was.
We looked around the container a little more, but it was pretty clear that for the most part, the box was what these thieves had been after. A quick look at the security footage also proved useful. Beth smirked at me as we watched it.
"Should've blacked out their plates before they parked in front of the security camera," I said with a shake of my head, how stupid were these guys?
Beth grinned at me, and started toward the car. "Must be our lucky day!"
Apartment Complex
Sam's POV
Dean pointed at the plates of the car we pulled up next to a short while later. "Connecticut. Last three digits 880," he said.
"That's them," I confirmed.
We headed up to the apartment registered as the address for the car, and I picked the lock, letting us in quietly. Dean stalked ahead, gun in the air, and Beth and I followed with our guns lowered to the floor as the hallway was narrow.
"Royal Flush. Grossman, that's the second Royal Flush in eight hands!" A man said from the living room.
"Yeah, this is a lot of fun," Grossman replied grumpily.
"I can't lose. I mean really, I – I can't lose!" The man said. "Maybe this thing really works? You know what I'm saying?" He slapped an item down on the coffee table, a metallic ring echoing down the hallway to where we were standing. "I tell you something, there's no way in Hell we are handing it over to the stuck-up bitch now, not after all we've been through. Uh uh. Let's go, huh? Let's get out of here, let's go have some fun!" I looked over at Dean and he nodded, taking the lead.
"Freeze! Freeze! Nobody move!" Dean shouted, advancing into the kitchen with Beth and I behind him, guns now raised.
"Don't move!" Beth ordered them, and I found myself looking a pair of petty criminals, they were dressed in worn out clothes, and they looked like they couldn't pull together enough sense to make it to next Tuesday, and yet they'd known exactly what they were looking for in John's container. Middle men, I thought with a grimace. Hired to do the dirty work.
"Don't move!" Dean shouted at them as they started to back away, hands in the air. Dean and I moved into the living room from the kitchen, Beth covered us from where she was standing.
"What is this?" One guy asked.
"Stop!" I ordered them.
"All right, give us the box," Dean said, "And please tell me that you didn't..."
"Oh they did," I said, looking at the table near me, the curse box was open and empty.
"You opened it?!" Dean shouted, shoving one of the guys up against the wall.
"Are you guys cops?" He asked Dean suddenly.
"Huh?" Dean asked, shoving his gun against the guy's chest.
"Are you guys cops?!" The guy asked again.
"What was in the box?" Dean asked. The guy looked over at the coffee table, and I followed his gaze to a rabbit's foot lying on there. Dean saw it too.
"Oh was that it, huh? It was, wasn't it?" He said. Dean looked back, talking to Beth and I. "What is that thing?" He asked. The guy used Dean's distraction to act, knocking Dean's gun clean out of his hands to the floor. The gun fired a single shot which ricocheted off a radiator, hitting my gun, and I was forced to drop it. Beth stared at me and then flinched as her own gun was hit with the same bullet as it zinged off a metal section on the ceiling. What the? Beth's gun slid across the room and we stared in amazement as the bullet finally stopped, hitting a lamp and breaking the light. I and the other guy who we'd heard called Grossman acted at once, both moving for my gun.
Grossman shoved at me, pushing me straight into Dean, we both stumbled back, and my arm swung around to elbow Dean in the chin, knocking him back into the coffee table, which collapsed under his weight. My eyes followed the rabbit's foot as it flew through the air from the impact.
"Sorry!" I said to Dean who was struggling to get up. Grossman launched himself at me and we both hit the floor, Grossman getting the upper hand and punching me a couple of times in the face. Beth started moving for her gun and tripped on a rug that was underfoot, head-butting the floor.
She looked up, shaking her head a little and scrambled toward something she spotted on the floor, but the other guy got to it first, swinging it up and around to point Dean's gun at Dean, hitting Beth square in the face during the process as she tried to stand. She stumbled back, falling to the floor again. If this were a cartoon, you'd see stars spinning around her head.
Grossman had been watching this whole thing unfold as I was – it had all happened in a matter of thirty seconds; when Beth hit the floor he resumed his attack, strangling me as I struggled to get a grip on him. Dean was standing with his hands in the air, the other guy finally managing to get the gun pointed at him. I vaguely saw the item we were after just out of arms reach. I stretched, trying to grab it finally feeling the soft fur within my hand. I grasped it tight and then threw my arms out to break free of Grossman's grip. I brought my feet up to kick at the man, sending him flying across the room, clear into the kitchen.
I stood up and looked at Dean. "Dean! I got it!" I cried out triumphantly. The guy pointing the gun at Dean moved and cocked the gun straight into my face.
"No, you don't," he said menacingly.
I looked on in horror as Grossman got his hands on Beth's gun, which he'd landed next to, standing up at the same time as the other guy pulled the trigger.
"No!" Beth screamed, but the gun never fired. I looked on in shock as the gun jammed; Dean sprung into action as the guy tried again to empty the gun into me, cursing when it stopped working. He stumbled back, surprised, and tripped over the broken coffee table; he stumbled and flipped over the back of the couch, knocking himself out. I stared at him, shocked, my mouth hanging open a little.
Grossman panicked and started to point Beth's gun at me.
"Sam!" Dean shouted at the movement. Beth moved to intercept but didn't need to because as Grossman took a couple of steps toward me before he stumbled into the partial wall beside him, the bookshelves behind him collapsed clear off the walls, knocking him out cold. Beth's gun flew out of Grossman's hand as he fell, and I caught it mid-air, looking down in surprise. I stared again, what the hell was going on? Dean and Beth both looked astounded, I imagined I did as well.
"That was a lucky break!" Dean said with surprise. "Is that a rabbit's foot?" He asked, looking at the item I was now holding. I held it up for us to see and Beth walked closer to get a better look.
"I think it is," I said with a curious look.
"Huh..." Dean said, taking in a deep breath, looking completely shocked at everything that had just happened.
Biggerson's Family Restaurant
Beth's POV
Sam and I were looking through John's journal trying to find any kind of notation about the rabbit's foot. So far, we'd come up empty. Dean climbed into the driver's seat carrying a paper bag in his hands, I glanced at it curiously, wondering what he'd been up to.
"I'm not finding anything on it in Dad's journal," Sam muttered, completely missing whatever Dean was up to.
I didn't have to wonder for long as he reached in and pulled out a handful of scratch cards, holding them up in front of Sam.
"Dean, come on," Sam said with an exasperated tone.
"What?!" Dean asked, surprised. "Hey, that was my gun he was aiming at your head, my gun don't jam so that was a lucky break. Not to mention them taking themselves out, also a lucky break." He held a card out to Sam. "Here, scratch one." Sam gave him a frustrated look. "C'mon Sam! Scratch and win!" He handed Sam a coin along with the card. Sam scratched it.
"Dean, it's gotta be cursed somehow, otherwise Dad wouldn't have locked it up." Sam said, handing the card back. Dean ignored Sam and was busy inspecting the scratch ticket.
My phone rang and I looked at the display, it was Bobby returning my call. "Hey Bobby," I said, climbing out of the car, half listening to Dean and Sam, but focusing on the call.
"$1200..." Dean said in amazement. "You just won $1200! Wooooo!" He laughed and looked excitedly at his brother. "I don't know man, doesn't seem that cursed to me!" He laughed again and handed Sam another card.
I explained what had happened to Bobby while Dean continued to ply Sam with scratch tickets, each one apparently yielding some kind of win.
"He touched it?!" Bobby exclaimed on the phone. "Dammit Sam!"
"Well, Dad never told us about this thing Bobby. I mean, you knew about his storage place at Black Rock?" I asked him.
"His lock-up? Yeah, I knew. Hell I built those curse boxes for him," Bobby replied, and I frowned. How was it that he never told us about that place? Sam and Dean got out of the car, Dean spread the scratch cards on the hood of the Impala, a concentrating look on his face as he calculated the winnings in his head. Sam frowned and looked over at my feet.
"Listen, you have got a serious problem," Bobby said to me. I didn't like the sound of that, but then, when didn't we have a serious problem? Our entire lives seemed like a serious problem. "That rabbits foot ain't no dime store notion," Bobby said as Sam walked over toward me. I watched, he bent down and picked up a gold watch, holding it up for Dean to see. Dean gave him two thumbs up and mouthed Awesome at him, I shook my head, I swear the blood was draining from my face.
"It's real hoodoo, old world stuff," Bobby continued. "Made by a Baton Rouge conjurer woman about a hundred years ago."
I was marvelling at the gold watch, which Sam was admiring now. "It's a hell of a luck charm," I commented.
"It's not a luck charm, she made it to kill people, Beth!" Bobby said. I froze, switching the phone to speaker and waving Sam over.
"See, you touch it, you own it. You own it, sure, you get a run of good luck to beat the Devil. But you lose it, that luck turns. It turns so bad that you're dead inside a week." Bobby said.
Sam shrugged and looked at me. "So I won't lose it Bobby," he said.
"Everybody loses it!" Bobby yelled down the phone at us. I grimaced.
"Well then how do we break the curse?" I asked him.
There was the sound of Bobby sighing, and I knew that was not a good sign. "I don't know if you can," he said. Sam looked uncomfortable and tucked the rabbit's foot into his jacket pocket.
"Let me look through my library and make some calls," Bobby said resignedly. "Just sit tight." He ended the call and I looked up at the boys. Dean was holding the scratch tickets in one hand, still standing by the Impala and waving them at us.
"Dude! We're up fifteen grand!" He said excitedly. Sam and I looked at each other with a sigh.
We decided to go into the restaurant and have something to eat while we waited for Bobby to get back to us.
"Don't worry," Dean said as we entered the fast food chain. "Bobby'll find a way to break it. Until then, I say we hit Vegas, pull a little Rain Man," he said with a chuckle. I had to laugh, same old Dean, always playing the odds. Only the odds were slightly stacked in our favour at the moment. "You can be Rain Man," he said to Sam.
"Look, we should just lay low until Bobby calls back, okay?" Sam said, turning to the seating host. "Hi, uh, table for three please."
"CONGRATULATIONS!" He yelled out and an alarm sounded while the guy started to grab something.
"It's exciting, I know," Dean said sarcastically to the man.
"You are the one millionth guest of the Biggerson's Restaurant family!" He said, pushing a plastic board toward us. Staff all around us started singing and taking photographs as balloons and streamers fell from the ceiling. I looked down at the board that was sitting in front of us, it was a fake check declaring we would have free meals for one year.
I glanced over at the guys and Dean was smiling broadly, looking thrilled with the whole situation, Sam just looked embarrassed and miserable.
An hour later and Dean was digging into his third bowl of ice cream, I shook my head at him.
"Babe, don't you think you're taking this whole one-year-to-live thing a little overboard?" I asked. He chuckled and shoved a spoonful of ice cream at me.
"I say from now on, we only go to places with Biggerson's," Dean declared and I shook my head at him. Well I suppose it would save on the food bills for a year, mind you, not that we paid for our food anyway – at the moment David Hasselhoff was on one of our fake cards.
"C'mon! It's free! You know you want some," he said, raising an eyebrow at him. I glanced down at my meal, it was mostly untouched. I'd lost my appetite thinking about how messed up our lives were. I had Dean who was looking at eternity in Hell in less than twelve months, and now I had Sam who stood to die within a week if he lost that damn rabbits foot. It was pretty ironic that no matter what we did Sam just didn't seem to be able to keep out of harm's way. I thought about sending him back to college, not that he'd go, because damned if things hadn't seemed a lot easier and safer when he was off studying to be a lawyer rather than chasing demons with us.
Dean was staring at me, noticing the troubled look on my face. He shoved the spoonful of ice cream in his own mouth, swallowing and then leaning over to kiss me.
"Cheer up, it'll all work out, you'll see," he reassured me. I wasn't so sure.
Sam looked up from his laptop and sighed. "Bobby's right. It's lore goes way back. Pure Hoodoo. You can't just cut one off any rabbit. Has to be in a cemetery, under a full moon, on a Friday the thirteenth."
Dean was struck with brain freeze from the ice cream all of a sudden, clutching at his head and groaning. Sam laughed at him as a waitress came up to the table with more coffee.
"Can I freshen you up?" She asked Sam, I raised an eyebrow at the attention she was giving him, but was busy giving Dean some tender loving care for his brain freeze.
"Here, have some coffee," I said to him, "It's hot, it'll help."
The waitress poured fresh coffee into a couple of our cups, but on the last one she spilled it on the table with a frustrated gasp.
"Oh! Let me mop up here," she said quickly, pulling out a cloth from her apron.
"No, no, don't worry, it's okay. It's okay.. I got it.. uh.." Sam stuttered as Dean drank down the last of his coffee.
"It's no trouble, really," the waitress said with a charming smile.
"Okay," Sam said, looking uncomfortable.
"Sorry about that," she said, when she was done wiping up the spill.
"It's all right," Sam said with a smile. I raised my eyebrow and elbowed Dean in the side, he chuckled, giving the waitress an appraising look as she finished cleaning up and walked away, looking over her shoulder and smiling back at us. Sam turned to look as well.
"Dude, if you were ever gonna get lucky..." Dean said with a shake of his head.
"Shut up!" Sam said with a smirk, reaching for his cup of coffee. He knocked it over and the coffee spilled all over the table and himself, causing him to jump out of his seat.
"Oh! Oh Geez.. uh.." he panicked and turned, walking straight into a waiter carrying a full tray of meals, food went flying everywhere. Dean and I looked in on shocked horror while Sam gave the waiter a mortified look. "Sorry!"
He turned to look back at us and I was struck with a sudden uneasy feeling.
"How was that good?" I asked, looking at him and pointing to the mess surrounding us.
Sam reached into his pocket and then his expression turned panicked, he pulled out his hand, frantically searching the rest of his pockets, and then looking under the table. The expression on his face said everything, the rabbit's foot was gone.
"Son of a bitch!" Dean exclaimed as our situation started to sink home.
We raced out of the restaurant, looking about frantically for the waitress. Sam tripped over his own feet, hitting the pavement face first. Dean and I turned to stare at him.
"Wow! You suck!" Dean said, reaching down to help Sam up.
"Ow..." Sam complained, pouting a little.
"So what, now your luck turns bad?" Dean asked, we looked at our little brother, his jeans were torn at the knees and I could see the skin broken, bloody and raw.
"Looks that way," I said with a grimace.
"I wonder how bad?" Dean said thoughtfully, looking at Sam. That was a scary proposition, but then, Bobby had said this thing led to death, so I was certain it wasn't going to be a simple ride on a carousel.
"So what do we do now?" Sam asked, looking at us both. I sighed, and looked at Dean.
"Well, those guys said something about giving the rabbits foot to someone, maybe they might know something?" I suggested, it was a long shot, but the only thing we had to go on.
Wayne & Grossman's Apartment
Dean's POV
We'd learned that the guy who'd had the rabbits foot initially was called Wayne, we also learned he was dead from one of the neighbours, he'd died most peculiarly by tripping backwards and skewering himself through the back of his head on a roast fork. How the hell does that happen?
I opened the door and walked into the apartment, the others were right behind me, or so I thought. Beth had followed me, but Sam lingered back and I glanced at him, he shrugged, looking very nervous.
I shrugged back at him and wandered further into the apartment. Grossman was on a chair with a photo in one hand, a bottle of tequila in the other. He looked up as we came into the room and rolled his eyes, throwing his hand up in the air.
"Oh man. What do you want?" He asked.
"Heard about your friend, that's bad luck," I said to him.
"Piss off," Grossman snapped back.
"We know someone hired you to steal the rabbit's foot. A woman," Beth said to him.
"Oh yeah? How do you know that?" He asked.
"Because I heard you saying something earlier," Beth said simply, frowning at him.
"And... because she just stole it back from us," I added, grimacing at her.
Grossman looked at us both and laughed. Sam started to move toward him urgently.
"Listen man, this is seriou...!" His sentence never got finished. I watched in mild horror as Sam tipped on a wire that was across the floor, pulling a CD player that was attached to it off a shelf. He tried to catch it, the momentum causing him to lose his balance as he reached his free hand to grab a lamp to try and stop himself from falling; he failed and ended up pulling the lamp to the ground with him, hitting the floorboards with a sharp thump. I rolled his eyes and Beth grimaced at him.
"You ok Sam?" She asked, concerned.
Sam groaned from where he'd landed behind an armchair. "Yeah, I'm good!" He reached a hand up over the back of the couch and slowly pulled himself to his feet. Grossman smirked at him.
"I want you to tell us her name," I said sternly, taking a threatening step toward Grossman who simply smirked.
"Screw you," he said quietly to me.
"It wasn't a freak accident that killed your partner," Beth said to him, looking from Sam to Grossman.
"What?" Grossman asked, looking confused.
"It was the rabbit's foot," I explained.
"You're crazy man," Grossman said with a chuckle, looking at us incredulous.
"You know I'm not. You saw what happened, what it did. All the flukes, all the luck. When you lose the foot, that luck goes sour. That's what killed your friend. And my brother here is next. And who knows how many more innocent people after that?" I said.
"If you don't help us stop this thing that puts those deaths on your head," Beth added, and to his credit, the man actually started to look worried.
"Look, I can read people," I said, playing the good cop. "I get it. You're a thief, a scumbag, that's fine. But you're not a killer. Are you?"
Grossman shook his head. "No," he said quietly.
Outside Apartment Block
Sam's POV
Beth's phone started ringing as soon as we left Grossman's apartment.
"Hello?" She said answering the phone, "Bobby hey, hang on I'll put you on speaker." She and Dean stopped walking and she hit a button on the phone, handing the phone to Dean because he was gesturing for it. I felt a squish under my shoe and looked down to see that I had just stepped in a big piece of pink bubblegum. I groaned, really? I listened to the call as I looked around wondering what I could wipe my shoe on.
"Guys, great news," Bobby was saying. "Wasn't easy but I found a heavyweight cleansing ritual that should do the trick."
"Bobby, that's uh, great," Dean said, "except Sam... uh..." He looked over at me and grimaced as I was standing there, one foot in the air, pink bubblegum on the bottom.
"Sam lost the foot," Beth said, looking sympathetically at me. At least someone felt sorry for me, which is more than I could say for my dear brother who looked like he was barely managing to contain his laughter.
"He what?!" Bobby yelled over the line.
"Bobby, Bobby, listen this uh, this hot chick stole it from him," Dean said, looking over at me. "I'm serious! In her mid-20's, and she was sharp, you know, good enough at the con to play us."
I saw the grating of a storm drain and started trying to get the bubblegum off my shoe, scraping it back and forth.
"She only gave the guy she hired a name, probably an alias or something... uh Luigi or something?" Dean said.
"Lugosi," Beth corrected him, and I nodded.
"Lugosi? Lugos – aw crap, it's probably Bela," Bobby said.
I pushed my foot a little harder and suddenly my shoe pulled off my foot, dropping into the storm drain. I sighed, and knelt down, reaching in to retrieve it.
"Bela Lugosi?" Beth asked with a grin. "That's cute."
"Bela Talbot's her real name. Cross paths with her once or twice," Bobby said.
"Well she knew about the rabbit's foot, is she a hunter?" Dean asked. I couldn't reach the bottom of the drain so I lay down on my stomach to give myself a little further reach.
"Pretty friggin' far from a hunter, but she knows her way around the territory," Bobby said. "She's been out of the country. Last I heard she was in the Middle East someplace."
"I guess she's back," Beth said, glancing over at me and frowning. I shrugged, still reaching into the drain.
"Which means seriously back luck for you," Bobby said, I wondered if he was being ironic or making a joke.
"Great," Dean muttered.
"But if it is Bela... at least I might know some folks who know how to find her," Bobby said.
"Thanks Bobby. Again," Beth said with a smile. I couldn't reach the shoe, I gave up and stood up to face Dean and Beth, dirt and leaves on my jacket and pants.
"Just look out for your brother, ya idjits!" Bobby said in response, hanging up.
Dean looked back at me as he hung up the phone, I sighed at them dejectedly.
"What?" Dean asked, looking at me confused.
"I lost my shoe," I said with another sigh and shrug of my shoulders. Could this day get any worse?
Dean and Beth both looked down at my feet, one foot was wearing nothing except a sock. Dean looked up at me and sighed, clearly annoyed. He walked off, shaking his head while Beth looked on sympathetically, coming to wrap her arm around me. I hung my head, I was such a failure.
Motel Parking Lot
Beth's POV
Dean had pulled the Impala into the motel's parking lot, stopping just inside the entrance while I jumped out to register us for a room. I had the phone to my ear again, talking to Bobby.
"All right Bobby, thanks. We owe you another one." I hung up and got into the back seat of the car, looking at the boys. "All right, Bobby's got it on pretty good authority that this Bela girl lives in Queens."
"It'll take us about two hours to get there," Dean said, nodding back at me.
"So what are we doing here?" Sam asked, confused.
"You, my brother, are staying here because I don't want your bad luck getting us killed," Dean said to him, pulling the car into the main parking lot.
"Room two," I said to him, and he nodded and parked at the door. I got out and unlocked the door to the motel room while Dean led Sam inside, turning on the light.
"What am I supposed to do Dean?" Sam asked, his voice vaguely reminiscent of the time we'd had Dean on lockdown because he'd made the FBI's most wanted list.
"Nothing, nothing. Come here," Dean said, grabbing his arm and leading him to a chair. "I don't want you doing anything. I want you to sit right here, and don't move! Okay?" He ordered Sam, who seated himself in the chair with a sigh.
"Don't turn on the light, don't turn off the light. Don't even scratch your nose," Dean said for extra emphasis. I looked at Sam, worried.
"Dean, maybe I should stay?" I asked, frowning.
"No, no... I might need you to take down this Bela chick," Dean said, shaking his head. "It'll only be a few hours, he'll be fine." He looked back at Sam who was staring at us both with his puppy dog look. Dean grabbed my arm and pulled me with him, locking the door on our way out.
Bela's Apartment
Queens, New York
Dean's POV
It was just coming up dawn when we reached Queens. I grinned at Beth and thought about a quick romp in the back seat of the car, but she had that whole pensive 'I'm worried about Sammy' look on her face, so I didn't like my chances of scoring right now. I turned my thoughts back to the case, we had to get up into this fancy high rise apartment building and take back the rabbit's foot, simple.
Security cameras dogged our every move as we made our way to the lift. Chances were she had a link up to them if she was as good as Bobby said she was, and I didn't doubt Bobby on this one. Good, let her see us coming, maybe it would make her a little sloppy.
Beth picked the lock when we got to the apartment and stepped back to let me enter, she was scrawling something on a post-it note and chuckling to herself, I looked at her curiously. When we didn't encounter Bela right away, I figured maybe she hadn't seen us coming. Beth grinned again and stuck the post-it to the alarm pad. It read Turn around. I grinned and nodded at her, we separated, Beth entering the bathroom on one side of the hall, me heading down the hall toward the living area, avoiding the woman who was talking on the phone.
Beth made a noise and get her attention. I waited until I saw her pass the room, heading for the door. A slight intake of breath indicated she'd seen the note and spun around just as Beth stepped out with her gun pointed at the woman. Bela drew her gun and pointed it back at Beth, I grinned at the sight and slipped into the kitchen.
"You left without your tip," Beth said, deadpan. Bela smirked, all attitude. This was about to get interesting.
Motel Room
Sam's POV
I was bored out of my mind, I'd just been sitting here for hours, doing nothing. The least Dean could have done was turn on the TV for me. I rocked back and forth on the chair a little, then thought better of it, what if I fell and broke my neck? That was a sobering thought, so I put all four feet of the chair on the ground.
There was suddenly a clunking, grinding noise that came from the air conditioner unit, and smoke started pouring out the front of it into the room.
"Oh come on! I didn't … I wasn't..." I sighed, looking at the unit. Unbelievable!
I stood up and took a few cautious steps toward the unit. Suddenly the whole thing burst into flames as I stared in disbelief. I grabbed the comforter off the bed and attempted to use it as a fire blanket and smother the flames. I finally got it out, and with a sigh of relief, stood up from the near calamity.
My arm felt hot and I looked down to see that instead my jacket arm was now on fire! I panicked, flailing my arm around and trying to put out the fire with the curtains nearby. I got the fire out only to have the curtains tear and I fell over backwards, then everything went black.
Bela's Apartment
Beth's POV
"You're gonna give it back," I said to the woman. I knew Dean was in the kitchen searching for the rabbit's foot, I just had to buy him some time. Bela advanced slowly on me, her eyes locked with mine, our guns pointed at each other in a Mexican standoff... minus the Mexicans. I backed up a few steps keeping my gun trained on her.
Bela laughed. "Sweetie, no I'm not."
"Yeah, we'll see. Bela, right?" Dean asked, stepping down the hallway and standing behind me. Bela looked over at him, her eyebrow raising slightly.
"That's right, Dean," she answered.
"You know the thing's cursed don't you?" I asked, I kept my shoulders relaxed, my mind on the job at hand, I'd shoot her if it came right down to the wire.
"You'd be surprised what some people would pay for something like that," Bela said, seemingly not concerned at all what the consequences of her actions might be.
"Really?" Dean asked, curious.
"There's a lucrative market out there. A lot of money to be made. You hunters with all those amulets and talismans you use to stop those big bad monsters. Any one of them could put your children's children through college." Bela answered.
"So you know the truth, about what's really going on out there and this is what you decide to do with it? You become a thief?" Dean asked her.
"I procure unique items for a select clientele," she said.
"Yeah, a thief," I muttered.
"No," Bela said, looking directly at me. "A great thief." I narrowed my eyes at her, I didn't like her in the slightest.
Bela's Apartment
Dean's POV
"Look, Bela, our brother, he touched the foot," I said. "And when you took it from him, his luck went from..."
"I know how it works," Bela said with a smirk.
"So then you know he's gonna die unless we can destroy it," I said, realising as soon as it had left my mouth that this woman wasn't like to help us out.
"Oh... you can have the foot," Bela said insincerely.
"Really?" I asked, I could hardly believe our luck, which of course, meant that it probably wasn't happening.
"For one point five million," she said with a grin.
"Nice, yeah, I'll just call my banker." I said, not very amused.
"How'd you even find the damn thing? Stuck in the back of some stage place, middle of nowhere." Beth asked, she'd backed up as far as she was going, I was directly behind her, and she could feel me pressed against her.
Bela looked over her shoulder at the mantle piece, there was a ouija board and planechette sitting there.
"I just asked a few of the ghosts of the people it killed. They were very attuned to its location," she replied with a grin.
"So you're only out for yourself, huh? It's all about number one?" I asked.
"Being a hunter is so much more noble?" She asked, looking sceptical. "A bunch of obsessed, revenge-driven sociopaths trying to save a world that can't be saved."
"Well aren't you a glass half-full," Beth said with a smirk.
"We're all going to Hell, Beth. Might as well enjoy the ride," Bela commented.
"I actually might agree with you there," I said, chuckling. "Anyhoo, this has been charming but uh, look at the time. Oh, and this?" Beth turned to look over her shoulder and I was dangling the rabbits foot from my bare hand.
"Dammit Dean!" She muttered, giving me a look like I was trying to get myself killed.I was looking at Bela and she looked pissed off.
"Looks like you're not the only one with sticky fingers," I said with a laugh. "If it's any consolation, I think you're a truly awful person."
Bela moved to fire the gun and I stepped in front of Beth. The bullet flew wide, missing us both completely. She looked stunned and fired again, this bullet ricocheted around breaking several expensive looking items before finally hitting the ouija board.
I laughed, pulling Beth with me, as I taunted Bela with the rabbits foot, dragging Beth out the door. There was a final sound of a shot being followed and the splintering of wood as it hit the door.
"See ya!" I called out as we started running for the car.
Motel Room
Sam's POV
I woke up to a big guy with black military-style short hair cut and a beard duct taping me to a chair.
"Oh, he's awake!" The guy said when he saw me shake my head to clear it.
"Back with us, eh?" Said another guy with strawberry blonde hair and a narrow, elongated face smiling at me.
"We didn't even have to touch you," The bearded man told me. "You just went all spastic, and knocked yourself out? It was like watching Jerry Lewis try to stack chairs!"
I grimaced, this curse thing was getting out of control. Who were these guys? What did they want?
"Who are you? What do you want..." I was rudely interrupted by the blonde who snapped his fingers in front of my face.
"I used to think your friend Gordon sent me," he said.
"Gordon?" I asked, incredulous. Wasn't the man in prison?! "Oh come on!"
"Yeah, he sent me to track you down, and put a bullet in your brain," he said.
"Great. That sounds like him," I said to him, nodding.
"But as it turns out, I'm on a mission from God," the blonde said to me. I looked at him, confused, and then he hit me again.
Motel Room
A few hours later
Beth's POV
We'd made exceptional time, I had to admit it, the rabbits foot made sure that we made every green light and any other circumstance that ensured we were back from Queens to where we'd left Sam in record time.
"I still think you're absolutely insane Dean! Are you in a hurry to die and speed up your trip to Hell?" I asked him, a little angry about the devil-may-care attitude. It had been scary enough when he wasn't on a one-way trip to Hell, now it was terrifying.
"Of course not! But I'm not going to lose this thing!" He said, frowning at me.
"I think we've already established that everyone loses it!" I muttered, leaning back in my seat and staring out the window. Dean pulled the car into the motel and I breathed a sigh of relief, we could grab Sam and go do this damn ritual and be rid of the thing.
"What's this?" Dean muttered, nodding toward an RV that was parked to the side, the interest had come with the sight of the motel room; the curtains had been ripped from the window. We got out of the car, and crept up on the window, careful to hide either side so we weren't seen.
I glanced in from my side and I could make out Sam tied to a chair, a couple of guys talking to him. I signalled this to Dean, who nodded.
"You were part of that demon plan to open the gate weren't you?" A man with red hair asked Sam, the question vibrated through the thin motel walls to us.
"We did everything we could to stop it!" Sam answered.
"Lie, lie, lie! You were in on it. You know what their next move is too, don't you?!" The guy asked Sam.
"No, I don't, okay? You're wrong about this," Sam said, shaking his head.
"Where are they gonna hit us next?" The guy asked. Sam remained silent, seething at the question. Red struck out and hit him, I flinched at the contact.
"Where?!" He yelled at Sam. "Gordon told me about you Sam. About your powers. You're some kind of weirdo psychic freak?"
"No, not anymore, no powers, no visions, nothing, it just..."
"Liar!" Red yelled at him again, this time punching him. "No more lies, there's any army of demons out there pushing at a world already on the brink. We're on deck for the endgame. So maybe, just maybe you can understand why we can't take chances." What the hell did that mean?
Red drew his gun and pointed it at Sam's head. Dean frowned and started to pick the lock to the motel room.
"Whoa, okay, okay, no don't – hold on a minute!" Sam said, starting to look worried.
"Hey, Kubrick... just..." the other guy in the room started to look concerned at his partner's actions.
"No, you saw what happened Creedy, ask yourself, why are we here? Because you saw a picture on the web? Because we chose this Motel instead of another? Luck like that doesn't just happen." I glanced down at Dean and he shook his head, opening the door to the motel room and smirking. They'd been looking for us and our luck had given up at precisely the wrong time.
"Look I can explain all of that if..." Sam's explanation was cut short.
"Shut up!" Kubrick yelled at him before turning to Creedy, "It's God Creedy, he led us here for one reason. To do his work. This is destiny."
"Whoa..." Sam said as Kubrick turned to point the gun right at Sam's forehead. Dean moved at the sound of that, slipping inside the motel room, I stayed outside, gun drawn ready to act as back up while Dean inched up behind Kubrick. Sam had his eyes squeezed shut, waiting for the inevitable, but it never came. Instead, Dean cocked his own gun, the sound echoing in the room.
"Nope," said Dean. "No destiny, just a rabbit's foot." Creedy put his hands in the air right away, looking from Dean to me.
Kubrick didn't panic, simply looking back at the pair of us and smiling. "Put the gun down son, or you're gonna be scraping brain off the wall."
"What, this thing?" Dean asked smugly.
"Yeah, that thing," Kubrick said.
"Okay, but you see there's something about me that you don't know," Dean said, and I saw him put his gun down, looking smug, and pick up a pen sitting next to it.
"Yeah, what would that be?" Kubrick asked him, turning to point the gun in his direction.
"It's my lucky day," Dean said with a grin, and I rolled my eyes. He tossed the pen toward Kubrick, and it lodged itself in Kubrick's gun – a million to one chance. Sam looked impressed and I had to chuckle.
"Oh my God, did you see that shot?!" Dean asked to the room, smiling to himself, his arms spread in the air.
Creedy lunged at Dean with a punch, I watched from the doorway while Dean side-stepped the attack and Creedy ran right past him into a wall, falling backwards and hitting the floor. Kubrick was staring at the pen in the barrel of his gun and then he pulled the pen out.
"I'm amazing," Dean said proudly, grinning at me. I couldn't help but smile back, forgetting that I was supposed to be angry with him.
Dean picked up the TV remote from the table and threw it hard at Kubrick, hitting him right between the eyes, knocking him out cold. Kubrick fell to the floor like a sack of potatoes.
Sam was bloody and tied to chair with what looked like entire roll of duct tape, but he was at least safe. Dean looked at him, then over at me, his arm still extended out from the throw.
"I'm Batman," he said suavely. I raised my eyebrow at him.
"Yeah... you're Batman," I said sarcastically, shaking my head.
Cemetery
Dean's POV
Sam and Beth were dealing with the ritual aspects. I'd just gone out and purchased a bunch of scratch cards, I was currently checking them over.
Beth sprinkled something on to the embers of a small fire we had built, and looked up at me. "All right. Bone ash, cayenne pepper... that should do it," she said to me.
"One second..." I said, waving her off.
"Dean, you..." Sam started to hassle me. I sighed at him.
"Hey, back off Jinx. I'm bringing home the bacon," I said, scratching another ticket. Sam and Beth looked at each other with identical sighs. I smirked and put the cards in my jacket, hanging over a gravestone nearby.
"All right, say goodbye wascally wabbit!" I said with a grin, pulling out the rabbit foot.
"I think you'll find that belongs to me," Bela's voice said behind me, along with the tell-tale sound of a gun being cocked. "Or, you know, whatever. Put the foot down, honey."
"No. You're not going to shoot anybody," I said, turning to her. "See I happen to be able to read people. OK, you're a thief, fine, but you're not..."
Bela ignored me, turning the gun on Beth and firing, hitting her in the shoulder. Beth recoiled with the impact, Sam catching her before she hit the ground.
I spun on the bitch, making a move toward her. "Son of a …!"
"Back off, tiger! Back off! You make one more move and I'll pull the trigger," she threatened. "You've got all the luck Dean, you I can't hit. But your sister? Your brother over there? Them I can't miss."
"What the Hell is wrong with you?!" I yelled at her. "You don't just go around shooting people like that!" I said, glancing over at Beth worriedly. I noticed it was the same shoulder I'd shot her in a while back, whilst under mind control. She was going to be pissed.
"Relax," Bela said. "It's a shoulder hit, I can aim. She'll be fine," Bela said. "Besides, who here hasn't shot a few people? Put the rabbits foot on the ground, now."
"All right! All right. Take it easy," I said, giving in. I bent down to put the foot on the ground, and then had a sudden idea.
"Think fast!" I said, tossing the rabbit foot directly at her.
She reacted without thinking, catching the foot with her hand. She looked down, realising what had happened and cursed.
"Damn!"
"Now, what do you say we destroy that ugly-ass piece of dead thing?" I asked her smugly.
Bela sighed, dropping her gun to her side. She walked over and dropped the rabbit foot in the embers of the fire with a sigh.
"Thanks very much!" She said, watching as the foot sparkled and burned before disintegrating altogether. "I'm out one and half million, and on the bad side of a very powerful, fairly psychotic buyer."
"Wow," I said from beside Beth, where I had my arm around her waist and she was leaning heavily into me, looking a bit pale. "I really don't feel back about that. Babe?"
"Nope. Not even a little," Beth said, glaring at her.
"Hmmm. Maybe next time I'll hang you out to dry," Bela said, turning to lean on the gravestone nearby.
"Oh, don't go away angry," I said to her. "Just...go away."
Bela smirked at me, then turned to walk away. "Have a nice night, guys."
I turned to Beth, worried. "Are you okay?" I asked her, looking at the shoulder she was clutching with her other hand.
"I'll live," she replied, rolling her eyes.
"I guess we're back to normal now, huh? No good luck, no bad luck. Oh! I forgot, we're up $46,000, I almost forgot about the …" I turned and started going through my jacket pockets. "...scratch tickets." When they weren't in the pocket I had put them in, I checked the others, just in case, while Sam and Beth looked on. They were gone. Bela's car roared to life in the distance and I glanced from her car to Sam and Beth, watching the woman drive away.
"Son of a bitch!" I cursed, I'd just been robbed, again!
Hospital ER
Sam's POV
Beth was sitting in one of the cubicles having just had the bullet removed from her shoulder, and then been sewn up. I watched her sitting with Dean, they were talking and laughing with each other, cursing their bad luck in having those scratch tickets stolen. Dean had been saying how they could have retired on that kind of money, and they'd been talking about all the places they wanted to go visit from their to-do list.
I sighed, leaning against the wall, this wasn't the way things were supposed to be. They weren't supposed to be planning a list of things to do, especially since we all knew we weren't going to get around to them. They should have their whole lives ahead of them, and yet they didn't. They had less than a year. Less than a year and they'd find themselves separated, Dean in Hell. I closed my eyes, not even wanting to think about it. If only I'd had a chance to do some research while holding that foot, maybe I'd have been lucky enough then to find the right contact, the right ritual, the right something to get Dean out of this deal.
I started to think about Ruby and what she was offering. The deal had to be bad, but what if she really could help us? Didn't I owe it to Dean and Beth to look into it? They were too stubborn to do it, although, I was starting to have my doubts about Beth, she was looking as if she'd jump at any opportunity if it meant getting Dean out of this deal, just like me.
Dean leaned in to take Beth's cheek in his hand, kissing her softly. She smiled back at him and I felt a stab of sorrow, mixed up with guilt. This was all my fault. I had to do something to save him, I just had to. I couldn't fail on this task, I couldn't let them down like that, not after all they'd done for me.
Hospital ER
Beth's POV
I flexed my shoulder experimentally and regretted it almost immediately. Groaning, I fell back against the pillow looking over at Dean next to me.
"One more shot to that shoulder and I'm going to lose use of it," I complained.
"Oh come on, it wasn't that bad," Dean said, his eyes twinkling as he reached out to stroke his hand along my face. I huffed at him, trying to be mad, but it was no use; I simply couldn't stay mad with the man, it wasn't in me.
I cupped my hand over his and held it in place, leaning in to his touch with a smile. My mind wandered to more pressing matters.
"So, we have Gordon pulling strings from inside, you know it's only going to be a matter of time before he gets out of there," I said to Dean, feeling the weight of responsibility in looking after Sam starting to shift and settle on my shoulders.
"Yeah, I know," Dean said quietly, looking over at Sam who was standing out in the hallway talking to a doctor. "We just have to keep low for a bit, he hasn't had anyone find us yet, and you heard it yourself, it was just bad luck that they found us this time – and that rabbit foot is gone now."
"Just the same, it worries me," I said to him, meeting his eyes as he turned them back to me. I swallowed hard, looking at him. How was I going to do any of this without him?
"Why don't we take a few weeks off?" Dean asked suddenly and I looked at him with a raised eyebrow.
"And do what?" I asked.
"I don't know, anything we want to, we could go see the grand canyon, hit Vegas, have a little fun for a change," he had that pressing worry in his eyes, like he didn't know if I was going to survive another round of hunting in the current mental state I was in. It had been a rough couple of days, first finding out he had a son, then hunting down a changeling that took him for food, and now this with the rabbit foot and Gordon sending someone to hunt Sam. Maybe he was right, maybe we did need a break.
"Yeah, maybe," I said and saw the need for a break in his eyes. "Vegas sounds good," I said with a grin. He chuckled and leaned in to me.
"I totally get it," he said, kissing me lovingly.
"Get what?" I asked when he pulled away.
"Why you're my one and only," he said with a smile. I blushed a little, I'm sure, I always did when he did things like that, even after all these years. I kissed him again, leaning my forehead against his and smiling back.
"I love you, you're my everything," I confessed to him, trying to keep the tears out of my eyes, he didn't need that right now. He pulled me into his arms and kissed my neck. After a few minutes he shifted, suddenly all energy again.
"We're still going to Vegas, right?" He asked. I laughed and nodded, pulling away to look at him.
"Of course, so long as I get a sexy dress to wear at the craps table," I bargained and he nodded.
"Wouldn't have it any other way," he said, grinning at me. He looked up at Sam out in the hallway and held two thumbs up. Sam looked confused at us both, but held his own thumbs up in response. Sam hated Vegas, I laughed thinking the poor guy didn't know what he'd just signed up for.
AUTHOR'S NOTES
Song for this chapter is: Down by Jason Walker
Hope you enjoyed this chapter and I did it justice. I don't think you can possibly put the hilarity of this episode into text, it's just way too funny to watch on the screen.
There's some fun little fanart pieces for this over at the Facebook page. I couldn't help myself, especially the "I lost my shoe" shot :D If you search for Dean & Beth Supernatural Fanfic you'll find the fan page. Some people have said they'd like to follow but are concerned about anonymity. I suggest just making a new account to sign up for it, that's what I did! (I don't need my whole family in my fanfic business haha)
Short piece next, we'll get a peak at Dean when he's sick, and also what really happened in New Orleans when Beth got hit by that "Hoo doo flu doo". If anyone has any other suggestions for little short pieces (questions about their past, their present, their relationship, or anything else), feel free to ask and I'll likely get around to answering them in a one-shot at some point!
Please leave a review :) You know how much I love it!