Chapter 2

The first thing the Winchesters did when they got back at the motel was check the knife for EMF. When the meter didn't spike, Sam set Dean to work researching the Bohmesser knife company for gruesome murders and recent events at manufacturing plants. In the meantime, Sam looked into Camille Monroe.

While Dean's research uncovered no hits, Sam's was very fruitful. "Did you know that since Camille started working at that school in 2009, there have been at least four unexplained disappearances of teachers and students?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

Sam was starting to expect this reaction. "There were zero in the five years leading up to that."

Dean continued to refuse to consider that this teacher was not on the up and up. "So you think what, she's a serial killer?" he scoffed. "Did we meet the same Camille Monroe? Because I'm pretty sure she's the nicest, most mild-mannered woman in this town."

Monsters came in all shapes and sizes, but if Dean was in his right mind, he would already know that. Hell, he himself was a fairly innocuous looking monster. "You don't even know her, and she's already killed at least one person," Sam said slowly.

"In self defense, Sam."

"Okay, well, here's another thing; she claims she went to Penn State, but they have no record of her."

Sam thought that was pretty suspicious, but Dean apparently decided to ignore it. "So she made four people disappear, and then she leaves this guy bleeding on her floor and calls the cops? How does that figure?"

"Maybe she got in over her head because this one was a vampire." No, that still didn't explain how she killed him. "I've fought vampires, so have you. They're strong and they're fast. She said he was on top of her. How did she get away, get to the other side of the apartment, and get a knife without him taking her down again?"

Dean shrugged. "Adrenaline?"

"According to the coroner's report, she stabbed him overhanded." Sam thrust an imaginary knife down. "That's not exactly a defensive position."

"So what's your theory?"

He knew this would seem like it was coming out of thin air for Dean. "What if she's a siren?"

Dean gave him the you're-being-crazy look. "Based on what, one kid? And the last time I checked, sirens don't make people disappear, Sam."

Sam wouldn't be thinking this if it was just one kid. "But they do make them obsessed and oblivious to flaws or manipulations."

Dean smiled knowingly and nodded. "You're talking about me. I don't share your irrational suspicion, so I must be under her siren song. I think I would remember swapping saliva with her."

"Good point," Sam admitted. There was a lot about this siren theory that did not fit. "But why is it you're so quick to point out the holes in my theory, but you refuse to see the holes in her story?"

"Because there aren't any holes." Dean sound exasperated, the way Sam felt. He stood and grabbed his suit jacket off the back of the chair. "Tell you what, you have so many questions, why don't we just go back and ask her?"

Sam closed down his computer. "That's a great idea." Sam had other questions he hadn't even brought up yet. "But did you just suggest that because you wanted to see her again?"

Dean responded with, "Bite me." Not exactly a denial.

–

Camille was sitting at her kitchen table, ostensibly working on her computer. In reality, she was staring at the number that FBI agent had given her. She didn't really have any work to do anyway. After she killed that former student, she was placed on an administrative suspension pending counseling. She had already done one session where the therapist diagnosed her with post-traumatic stress disorder, which apparently explained all of her strange affects. She wondered what the diagnosis would have been if she told the truth.

Those FBI agents knew something was off in a way the police just hadn't. She held the number up in front of her face and wondered if they had been doing some kind of good cop/bad cop routine. Or flirty cop/bad cop. That was kind of the only explanation for someone that attractive coming onto her like that, if that was even what he was doing. She knew that she was no great beauty, and she was okay with that. She was fine playing in her league, but this Agent Anthony was way, way out of it. And he was a federal agent investigating her.

Whatever else was going on the night she killed Robbie, it had ultimately been self-defense. She kept coming back to that. Maybe if she just explained everything to the nicer FBI agent, he would see that. Or maybe that's what he wanted her to think when he wrote down this number. She tossed the notepad on the table.

Suddenly and with no warning, the door to her apartment was kicked in. As she reflexively ducked her head, her first thought was cops. They figured something out from the knife and sent a SWAT team.

A male voice spoke up. "We just wanted to see the bitch who got our brother so obsessed he-"

Camille lifted her head. Those weren't cops, which was probably worse for her. There were two people standing in her living room, a man and a woman. It was odd because she was pretty sure Robbie had been an only child, and neither of them looked anything like him.

When he saw her face, the man stopped talking. Camille took this as an opportunity to say something. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt anyone. I honestly, I-I didn't have a choice." Ugh, that was a horrible thing to say to his family. His scary looking family who had just busted into her place. She stood up. "I mean I know that there is always a choice, but-"

"You did what you had to," the woman finished with no discernible trace of sarcasm. She looked at the man. "I get it now. She's perfect."

"What?" Camille took a step back. "For what?"

"Robbie must not have explained it well enough." The woman began her approach. "We just want you to be a part of our family."

For every step the woman took toward her, Camille took another back until she realized she had backed herself into a corner. No knives or anything else within reach. "I'm good."

"But you could be so much better." The woman smiled, baring long, thin, sharp teeth.

–

As Sam and Dean were pulling up to the apartment, it was obvious that something was wrong. Sam had brought Camille's knife with him because she only really got rattled when they were talking about that, but he had been thinking he might leave it in the car anyway. At the sight of her door standing wide open, he grabbed up the knife and ran for the apartment with Dean right behind him.

They came in to see a female vampire smearing her own blood over Camille's mouth. Camille pushed her away, hard enough that the vampire fell backwards. Part of Sam wanted to wait and see how this played out. But if he was wrong about Camille, that would get her killed. Of course, with that vampire blood all over her face, it was probably too late for her anyway.

Dean had already jumped in, slicing off the head of the male vampire with the first blade. He carried that damn thing with him everywhere nowadays.

Sam looked at the knife in his hand. It was neither big enough nor sharp enough to take off a head in one swipe, and he wanted to test it out anyway. He went for the female vampire, who was still on the ground. Feeling stupid and reckless, he stabbed her in the chest with Camille's knife. No effect. The vampire knocked him aside easily.

In the time it took Sam to roll over, Dean was on top of the vampire, hacking and slashing with the blade. She was down, screaming; he had a clean shot at the head, but he just kept cutting and stabbing her. He was brutal when he fought these days. There were times when he seemed just like the brother Sam had always known, and then there were times like this where there was a rage in him that scared Sam. A rage that started with the mark, before he was a demon. The difference was that now he seemed to enjoy himself as he savagely rip things apart, more like a snarling animal than a man.

The woman's screams turned to pleas, but not for herself. "Just please don't hurt her!"

This caught Sam's attention. "What is she?"

The vampire turned her head to look at him. Her face was surprisingly serene considering that she was being tortured. "Perfect."

Dean pressed the blade to her neck and let it sink in slowly, savoring the decapitation. Then he popped up to his feet like nothing out of the ordinary had happened, back to just being Sam's hunter brother.

Throughout the fight, Camille had been on her hands and knees spitting out vampire blood. Sam was not sure how much of the fight she had actually seen, but she raised her head now to survey the carnage. Two bodies, one badly mutilated, and separately, two heads. She brought her hand to her mouth like she was going to be sick. "Oh, my god."

Dean nodded. "Vampires. Cutting the head off's the only way to kill 'em."

Camille lowered her hand. "Vampires?" She got up to her feet. "Yeah, that would explain a lot of the odder details. Please excuse me while I wash vampire blood out of my mouth." She stepped over a body and walked past the Winchesters to get to the kitchen. "I guess the main issue I'm having is the part where vampires are real."

Dean decided to fill her in. "It's all real. Vampires, ghosts, ghouls, angels, demons, werewolves . . ." Dean continued listing things.

Sam watched Camille's face to see if she had a reaction to anything on the fairly comprehensive list, but she didn't. He pulled a flask of holy water out of his pocket and handed it to her. "Rinse your mouth out with this. It'll help."

Camille took a swig, swished it around in her mouth, and spit it out in the sink with no apparent pain. Dean leaned in close to Sam and lowered his voice. "What was that supposed to prove?"

"That she's not a demon." Sam never really thought she was, but now it was settled. One down, everything else to go.

"Well, I am. So how long've you been carrying that around with you?"

For a majority of the last ten years, holy water or a rosary for making holy water had been pretty standard accessories. They hadn't seen many demons since this whole thing started—Sam had been purposely keeping Dean away from them when possible—but Sam was starting to wonder how this new Dean actually felt about ganking demons. "It's just part of the job."

At this point, Camille had rinsed her mouth out with holy water three or four times. She brought the flask back over to Sam, halting the conversation. "So, um, she said I was going to be part of the family and then she shoved her blood in my mouth." She let the obvious question linger. "But I didn't die. Don't you have to die to become a vampire?"

Dean fielded this one too. "No," he said somberly. "But we're going to figure something out."

She took a deep breath. "Something other than cutting off my head?"

"Definitely some other than that."

Sam did not weigh in on this. "We need to do something about the bodies." He gestured for Dean to come back to the living room with him.

Camille blanched. "I'm just going to wait over here. I don't really want to see that again."

Sam was not fully comfortable leaving her alone, but he went with Dean into the other room. Dean had apparently forgotten about the holy water in Sam's pocket, or he had more pressing concerns. "What about the cure?" he asked keeping his voice down. "The one Samuel gave me. Do you remember what was in it?"

That wasn't the clearest time period for Sam, but he could maybe replicate the cure. He did not know if it required the vampire who turned Camille to still be alive, but her blood was currently soaking into the carpet. "I wouldn't worry about the cure."

"Look, I know you don't like her, but we are not just going to let this woman turn into a vampire."

There was a lot of the old Dean in that statement, the one who put such a premium on saving people. "I mean that I wouldn't worry about it because she's not going to turn into a vampire. She's already something else."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Well, if you don't mind I'm going to keep working on plan b."

Sam had resigned himself to the fact that he would not be able to convince Dean there was anything off about this woman. At least not until he knew what she was. "Dean, if she was turning, there would be signs by now. She'd be complaining about the kitchen light. She'd be able to hear us." That was assuming she couldn't hear them anyway. "We agreed that it was either the knife or the teacher, and the knife didn't work."

Dean shook his head. "Let's just focus on the bodies." He looked down, thinking through next steps. "I'm going to get a tarp from the car. Don't kill her," he added as he headed out the door.

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