Previously: Dad's trying to rescue Sam, but it turns out a small handgun can't stop an angry purple people eater.

Dad empties his revolver into the quickly approaching monster. The bullets strike the monster with a dull thud, but they don't seem to bother it anymore. It just surges forward with purposeful strides until Dad's gunshots are replaced by the click of an empty chamber.

From across the room, Sam watches Dad's face shift from determined to alarmed.

"Get ready, boys," Dad shouts. "I'm gonna distract it and then we're gonna run like hell." He reaches to his side, grabs a lamp from an end table and hurls it at the monster.

The lamp flies through the air, power cord trailing behind it, and smacks the monster in the eye with a satisfying crash before falling into shards on the floor.

The monster reels backwards, wincing and blinking as it swipes awkwardly at its eye with fuzzy purple paws.

The three Winchesters realize the monster's weakness at the same time.

"Grab whatever you can," Dad shouts at Dean. "Aim for the eye."

Dean leaps to action, yanking a framed family portrait from the wall and flinging it like a Frisbee at the monster's one rolling eye, and following that with a barrage of VHS cassettes from the rack next to the TV.

"C'mon Sam! Blind it," Dean shouts, before grabbing another cassette.

From where he's standing in the doorway, Sam scans the room for something to throw, then looks down at his right hand, sticky with blood and purple fur. He is still grasping the knife he used to slash at the monster when it had him cornered.

Sam looks back up at the monster again. It has started a cowering and scrambling retreat from the barrage of lamps, decorative plates, and television controllers Dad and Dean have aimed at its one eye.

Sam knows what he has to do. He hears Dean shouting at him to stop, but he barrels toward the monster, the knife griped tightly in his right hand. When he reaches the monster he raises the knife above his head and slams it forward, driving the blade into the monster's eyeball with both hands.

The eye bursts like a water balloon and the monster flings Sam backwards, throwing him forcefully to the ground. It stumbles away, pawing at the knife still stuck in its head.

Sam's world is spinning. He watches the monster retreat to the kitchen, Dad follows after it a moment later, and then Dean is standing above him, wide-eyed and panting.

"You okay Sammy?" Dean kneels next to Sam, helps him sit up, then looks him over closely, like he's checking for broken bones.

"I'm okay," Sam shrugs his brother off.

Dad come back from the kitchen, his face white and grim. "It's dead," he says. He doesn't even look at Sam.

"Dad, I …" Sam starts.

"We will talk about it when this thing is burned," Dad says quietly.

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They salt and burn the monster in an old fire pit in the home's large backyard. The fur seems artificial but the rest of it is real enough, flesh and bone making the job unpleasant.

"What was it?" Dean asks as they watch the crackling and spitting fire with its thick plumes of black smoke.

Dad shrugs. "Probably some sort of shapeshifter or golem. I'll ask around." He looks over at Sam. "You think the girl was controlling it?"

Sam thinks about what Emily told him in the basement. "Kind of. She said it protected her."

"Yeah, I bet it did," says Dean.

Sam thinks for a moment. "She wanted me to touch it. She said if I touched it, it would make bad things go away."

"Bad things like her parents," Dad says. "And Sean Collins' parents, too."

"I wouldn't touch it," Sam says quickly.

Dad smiles tightly at Sam and ruffles his hair. "Good boy."

Let's all pretend that it hasn't been like eight months since I updated this story. The last chapter should be up tomorrow. Thanks for reading!