John Winchester was tired and hurting. That haunted house had really taken its toll on him. Five murder victims and all of them pissed off at anyone who even set foot in the house; yeah that was a hard job. At least the family had gone to Sam's website immediately when they knew something was wrong. It had taken days of research and then Bobby had to dig up the entire basement before he had found the graves. All the while the ghosts had been throwing everything not nailed down and a few things that should have been. He was lucky nothing was broken.
The fee was good too. The family had been rich and honest, a rare combination. The mother had been suspicious of them in spite of the fact that they were affiliated with the Watcher's Council. She had insisted on being there when they did the salt and burn. It was a good thing for her that she had guts. If she had been one of those who would freak out at the ghost activity Caleb probably would have let her take her own risks. He hated dealing with civilians. It had only been the fee and the fact that John was thinking about going in alone that had persuaded him to join in.
She had been more than pleased with their efforts and had granted an interview with the local paper on just what exactly they had done for her and the house her family was planning on turning into a bed and breakfast. John hoped that for her sake the customers came flocking to see and stay at the house. He always enjoyed kicking evil's ass, but getting credit for it (rather than being a celebrity for just doing his job) was nice too.
He got out of his truck and walked over to the administration building for his appointment with the Stanford University staff. Not only had quite a few students pestered Sam about him teaching them Hunting 101 as he liked to call it, the staff had been inundated with requests due to Sam's attending school here. John had talked with the school's Dean, a Mr. Howard, and had agreed to look through the classes they normally offered to see if any were of use to a Hunter. He had been pleased and surprised to find that quite a few basic and advanced classes fell under that category.
Now he was here to talk to the professors to see if any of them had the aptitude to take the lead in working with the students who wanted to take this kind of career track. He opened the door that led to the conference room he had been directed to only to see someone he had not expected. Small, red headed, gentle temperament and about his son's Dean's age, few people knew outside of the Hunting community and few inside at that, that Willow Rosenburg was the most powerful white witch in the world. It was she that had called all of the Slayers, turning a nearly impossible situation of just one Slayer at a time into the army that had turned the tides of more than one apocalyptic battle.
She was also the web mistress in charge of the web links that linked the supernatural hunting community together. Now a request for help, either of research or backup, went a lot smoother than it had just six months ago. "Willow, it's good to see you," John said as he hugged the small witch. In the short time that he had known her they had become good friends.
"Hey John, I thought I'd find you here. I've been asking the professors about their graduate students, trying to find out if any of them had an aptitude for becoming Watchers. We're a little short handed you know," Willow said. It was the look in her eye though, and the fact that it was her who was here, that told John this was more than just a 'let's see if we can find more translators' trip.
SUPERNATURALCSISUPERNATURALCSISUPERNATURALCSI
"OK, what have we got?" Grissom asked as he sat down at the head of the table. While this was a fairly straight forward case, in spite of what the mother, a Misty Baker, was trying to sell, Grissom wasn't about to leave any holes.
It was Nick who started off the roll of information. "There are no guns of any kind in the apartment. I didn't find any signs of a struggle, no broken objects, no tossed bedding, no blood pools or spatter. The most remarkable thing was how filthy the babies' room was. It didn't look like it had been cleaned since they were born. The sheets in the playpen stank, there wasn't a crib, no toys anywhere, there was a full garbage can of disposed diapers, Griss it wasn't the worst I've seen but it was really bad.
"I went and processed the rest of the apartment and didn't find anything connected to Winchester. I did, however, find the kids' birth certificates. Other than the stuff the hospital filled in, name of mother, hospital, attending physician, etc, it was still blank. She never named those kids. The father's name was blank. She never signed the certificate.
"There was barely enough formula in that apartment for one baby, much less two. There were no other foods for the kids, no baby cereal, no little jars of mashed veggies, nothing. All together, I'd say that Winchester has never been farther into that apartment than the front room and Misty Baker has been severely neglecting those kids." Nick had strong feelings about children and abusers but he did his best to remain impartial.
Grissom nodded and looked to Sarah. "We only got Misty's prints on the door. In fact, we couldn't find any other prints in the entire apartment. From what we could find, no one other than Misty and the twins was ever in that apartment before that night.
"Dean Winchester never touched anything. The only trace we could find of him was epiphylls on the carpet and a small amount of blood and hair. That corresponds with the uniforms story that he was on the floor where it appeared that he caught the little girl. All the physical evidence agrees with Winchester's story that he walked into the apartment, turned around and caught the baby as he dived to the floor. We couldn't find any other trace of him."
"Catherine?" Grissom asked, turning to her.
"I talked with Dean Winchester; he said that he had left his weapons locked up in the trunk of his car because his brother, Sam had told him too. He wouldn't have done it for anyone else but he trusts his brother. It's also a well known fact that his brother is a Seer. He has visions of the future and Dean said that Sam told him that someone in Vegas needed him to be here.
"He said that he thought that Misty was in trouble and was really asking him back to her apartment for a showdown with an abusive boyfriend. Either that or she wanted him to knock her up because he's famous."
"You're kidding!" Sarah laughed.
"Nope. The look on the guy's face was pure disgust. Apparently, he's had that offer before. He says he wasn't going to take her up on it if that was the case and I believe him. I also talked with her co-workers and her boss. The twins are hers, but she never talked about them and they all thought she had given them up for adoption because right after they were born she returned to her party ways. She stayed out late, drank, smoked, probably did drugs, the works." Catherine was disgusted and didn't bother to hide it. She only one child and she loved her daughter to death. She had fought hard to both raise her daughter and to keep her. The very idea of neglecting her child, much less abusing her was beyond comprehension.
Grissom turned last to Warrick. "There is no trace of Dean Winchester on the boy at all. There is no trace of him on the front of the girl and what trace I could find corresponds with him having caught her. I ran into Sam Winchester at the hospital. He says that the twins are Dean's kids, but Dean doesn't know it. The only reason he knows it is because he had a vision of Misty throwing the little girl. He could hear what she was yelling, but he didn't tell me what that was. He was too busy setting up wards and charms and stuff to guard both of the twins from demons and such.
"Now this is where it gets interesting. He asked me not to tell his brother that the twins were his kids until Misty goes to jail for what she did and his brother can get custody. Apparently the reason their family turned to Hunting in the first place was because their mother was killed by a demon. Because of that," he paused for emphasis, "They grew up with the idea that hurting a family member was the worst thing in the world you could do. Family means everything to them and that means that they won't protect Misty."
"What did he mean by that?" Grissom pounced.
"They're at war with the demon that killed their mom. Sam doesn't think there is any chance that the same demon won't go after Misty. He also said that no other demon hunter will protect her either after what she did." Grim glances were exchanged around the table. Had that been a threat, or a promise?