Part One: Down the Rabbit Hole

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Scene Four

~The small clearing again, June 18th, 2007~

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"Dude, and here I thought I've heard it all."

It was at the indecent hour of 7 o'clock in the morning that found Alec and the Winchester brothers on a small deer trail through the forest that, according to Sam anyway, led them directly to the monoliths where they had found Alec the previous day. Apparently the dirt track that Alec himself had taken to meet up with his supplier didn't exist yet.

"You just can't let that go, can you?" The transgenic couldn't decide if he was annoyed or amused by Dean's constant incredulous remarks concerning Alec's disclosure about Project Manticore. The older man had let Alec take his bed for the night, though, despite his earlier grumblings, so Alec supposed he could be generous about any snide comments.

"They stole my DNA! They made a clone from my DNA! I didn't give them any permission to do that!"

"Not like they ever asked for permission. You should take it as a compliment, you know?"

"Oh, and how's that?"

Alec turned his head to smirk at Dean, who was taking the rear of their three-men line and replied,

"They only used DNA of the most promising subjects."

"You mean, they specifically chose me over someone else to be the template of one of their super-soldiers?"

Alec's grin brightened a bit more, "Exactly."

"Huh. That's kind of cool, I guess. I'm the man!"

Looking forward again, the young man noticed Sam, who was walking in front of him, shaking with silent laughter. He couldn't help but point out, "I'm still better!"

"Guys!"

Sammy's voice rose above any come-back Dean was about to make. Alec was pretty sure the guy just wanted to nip the oncoming argument in the bud, but he actually had a good reason to get their attention.

"We're there."

True enough, the transgenic saw the trees clearing a few steps ahead, and that weird stone formation came into view. Frowning, Alec asked, "So, tell me again why we're here?"

"We've heard some stories about these rocks," Sam answered, "It's not what brought us here, and it just sounded like one of those tales people tell, you know. Nothing to corroborate any actual activity."

They stepped out of the tree line and fanned out, slowly approaching the presumable source of Alec's predicament.

"Anyway, we read up on the local folklore yesterday at the library. These stones are known as 'Devil's Gateway.' Now, usually, for a place to get a name like this, something's had to have happened. Something people couldn't explain. That doesn't necessarily equal something supernatural, but seeing as you're here now," he threw Alec a sideways glance, "we have pretty convincing evidence that that's what it was."

"I walked through that gap from both sides!" Alec protested. "Nothing happened."

"Maybe there's something else to it," Sam answered distractedly, carefully looking the first stone up and down. "That's why we're here. We couldn't find anything in the folklore as to what activates it. I'm hoping we find some clues here."

Alec watched him scrutinize the uneven surface, silently wondering if he had finally lost his mind after all for believing Sam's theory of an honest to God magic portal so easily.

"Maybe you did something the first time," Sam mused out loud, more to himself than anything else. "Something that you didn't do when you tried to get back."

"Or maybe the window of opportunity just closed." Dean had walked around to the second rock and was kneeling at its base, staring. "There's runes here. No, Indian symbols; some kind of Kekinowin. I recognize some of the lunar cycle. I mean, we did find you just after daybreak after the last night of the new moon. Sammy, you're better at this..."

The tall young man walked around Alec and perched down curiously next to his brother. Humming in concentration, he informed them, "Yeah, you're right, Dean. It's a warning, as far as I can tell. But it's too weathered to make out anything in particular. Here, let's see..."

He took his cell phone out of the back pocket of his jeans, slid it open and held it over the stone in front of him, looking at the display.

"What are you doing?" Alec asked, once again feeling like he missed something.

"Taking a picture. We'll run it through an image enhancing program back at the motel and see if we can come up with anything."

It was Dean who noticed his stunned silence, craning his neck to watch him stare at Sam and his cell phone in turn with round eyes.

"Dude, you're supposed to come from the future, and you've never heard of a camera phone?"

Well, heard of, yeah, but, "They're hard to come by back home."

Both brothers were staring at him now. Finally, Sam shook his head. "I really don't think I want to know."

"I do!" Dean turned to glare at his brother, looking like Sammy just told him they canceled Christmas this year. And after Logan had talked Max and, more importantly, Grinch-like Mole into going all out this Christmas – as much as their budget allowed at any rate – Alec finally understood the sentiment behind the saying.

"Dean," Sam sighed, a long-suffering expression on his face, "I really hate to pull a Chris Perry here, but you don't know what consequences it will have for Alec if we know too much about what will happen in the future."

"What, a butterfly farts in Peru and a Tsunami will crash over Taiwan?" Dean snarled, leaving little doubt as to what exactly he thought of the idea.

"Something like that." Sam's apologetic little smile only served to deepen his brother's scowl. But then, as if suddenly realizing something, Dean's face developed that certain evil expression that Alec had already recognized as him preparing to mock his younger brother.

"Wait, you watched 'Charmed'?"

Sam grimaced, sliding his phone shut and standing up. The other two followed suit. "It was one of Jessica's favorites. She owned the whole DVD collection. And, hey! You recognized the name," it sounded almost like an accusation. "How come?"

"I, uh..." The wide-eyed look that suddenly appeared on Dean's face was too much. Even though Alec didn't know the show they were talking about, he barely refrained from laughing out loud as he watched the older Winchester fumble through an explanation that didn't leave him completely emasculated. Figuratively speaking.

"Hey, those chicks were hot!" he finally came up with. A valid point if ever Alec heard one. "Worth overlooking any bad plot the writers could come up with."

Even Sam seemed to agree, if the the evaluating look on his face and the subsequent nod was anything to go by.

There was only one problem with the whole argument, as far as Alec was concerned. "Which Girls? And what's 'Charmed'?"

Once again something he said left people staring at him in disbelieving surprise. Then Dean chuckled, grabbed him in a headlock (that he totally could have avoided if he'd wanted to) and told him benevolently, "You have a lot to learn, young padawan!"

The insanity really was genetic. He was so screwed...

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to be continued...