Author's note:As per usual thanks to Ghastly Eternity for the beta-work, I really appreciate your comments! Also thanks to everyone for reading/reviewing/adding this story to story-alerts or favorites.

4

The scene change had been anticipated. However, the person Sam had his arms around after the change wasn't.

"Now that's what I call a friendly welcome," the middle aged blonde woman commented before he even got a chance to let her go. It also didn't help that she was hugging him right back.

"That's how he greets everyone," Dean chipped in and patted his brother's shoulder. He had been able to assess their situation in the time that Sam needed to extract himself from the woman.

They clearly were in a kitchen and though Dean was pretty sure that they wouldn't be able to take anything knife-like with them to the next TV-show it still was reassuring to know that they'd have them at their disposal in case Martha Stewart decided to go all psycho-killer on their asses while they were there.

There was no shame in recognizing the woman as easily as Dean had. It wasn't like he was watching the show regularly or something, but sometimes it was on before Dr. Sexy so he'd catch glimpses.

Honest to God – or whatever higher power there was that'd actually give a crap – this was not another guilty pleasure to him. Really why should he watch the freaking Martha Stewart Show? They simply didn't have any use for arts and crafts as their lives went. The mental image of knives and guns adorned with glitter, tassels or any other arts and crafts crap alone was enough to make Dean shiver.

Most of the motel rooms they stayed in admittedly could use a good make-over but he had never felt the urge to do the redecorating himself. At least not if the redecoration entailed more than breaking things. He had felt like doing that more often than not however.

"You two brought an old-family recipe with you," Martha stated with a friendly smile looking at them both questioningly for a moment before turning her attention back to Sam.

The way she stood too close for comfort while staring rather intently suddenly reminded the younger Winchester a lot of Castiel. The only difference was that their angelic friend usually focused most of his attention on Dean, which Sam found a lot more amusing than having his own personal bubble invaded by Martha Stewart.

"Uh… yeah," Sam replied not feeling rather eloquent with the woman basically pressed up to him.

The Trickster was really going out of his way just to make him uncomfortable for all it looked like. Sam didn't know much about the Martha Stewart Show but he doubted that this was the usual behavior the woman displayed.

Actually if he thought about it the Trickster had been going out of his way to pick on Sam right from the beginning. Okay, Dean had had his fair share of annoying moments but they weren't piled up on him in quite the same way they were on Sam.

Then again maybe he was just imagining things because freaking Martha Stewart was basically molesting him.

"Trickster on a skewer," Dean explained in a dead serious tone, which brought a small smirk to his brother's face as well, even as their host was finding new and imaginative ways to make him very uncomfortable.

Next to this version of Martha Stewart, Becky the super-fan looked nearly tame. On second thought if Sam had absolutely had to choose one of those two to spend an evening with he'd have chosen Martha if only because she wasn't actually real and he could technically punch her in the face without harming a human being. And even though – again technically – he had beheaded Paris Hilton not too long ago Sam didn't think that these were signs for him either being misogynist or just plain psychopathic. Even he himself would not vouch for his mental stability seen as a whole though.

"That sounds very exotic" Martha stated with a thoughtful nod after a moment of consideration "I am not sure we have all the ingredients at hand." What she apparently had at hand – quite literally – was Sam's biceps.

"Ah, but there's not much stuff needed," Dean retorted with some malicious glee in his eyes at the thought alone "Just find the bastard and run him through with a very pointy stick… salt and burn for good measure. Voila."

Apparently the Trickster thought the joke had gone far enough at that moment however as one of the studio lights dropped from the ceiling right in front of Dean's feet.

Their host of course took the opportunity to throw her arms around Sam with a surprised shriek, snuggling up to him like her life depended on it.

Dean of course thought that was funny, Sam just felt violated through and through at this point. Really he had been touched against his will at many occasions but most of those had been in fight situations or had had something to do with being kidnapped and he'd take that over the overly affectionate attention he was receiving that very moment any day.

"Alright, so we should cook something, huh?" Sam stated quickly forcing Martha away from him by moving over to the part of the table where the food they had at their disposal was being displayed.

Grabbing a package of white bread, he threw it over to Dean who caught it easily. Taking two glasses from the table he went back over to his brother who frowned questioningly for a moment but he understood what Sam was up to quickly enough. It wasn't that hard to guess from the ingredients he had collected.

"Peanut butter and jelly, a classic," Dean commented with an approving nod taking two slices of bread from the package.

To tell the truth he'd have murdered for the chance to do something that'd even give them a remote chance of getting the upper hand on the Trickster and get back to their real lives but since no possibilities were presenting themselves there was nothing other they could do but go along.

Dean had been scanning every single scenario for any kind of mistake the Trickster might have made ever since they had found out what was going on but this far there had been nothing. Well, he could be patient if he needed to be while the Trickster clearly was a toddler on a sugar-high with a severe case of ADHS. Sooner or later he was bound to make a mistake!

"It's even healthy" Dean commented while coating one slice of bread with the peanut butter, "Peanuts count as fruit and the jelly is blackberry."

Sam didn't comment on that and just went on spreading the jelly on the slice of bread he was working on. Technically peanuts were not that easy to classify having characteristics of both fruit and vegetable, technically there wasn't much but sugar and chemical stuff in the jelly, technically calling a PB&J Sandwich healthy was close to blasphemy, but actually Sam just didn't give a damn at this point.

"Forgot the most important ingredient, Sammy!" Dean suddenly states quite theatrically, "Where's the beer?"

So this wasn't a chance to get rid of the Trickster, but it was a chance to get some alcohol into his system and Dean wouldn't pass that one up. Either that or the douche wouldn't want to give them the satisfaction and switch them to some other channel, which also would count as a win for them. New game – new luck and all that jazz.

After a few moments, Martha handed a beer-bottle over to the older Winchester. "And now you're going to make some sauce with that?"

"If that's what you want to call it," Dean shrugged lightly before taking a bite of the sandwich and a swig of the beer.

Sam's automatic response to that was a disbelieving and a little worried expression, after all Dean was just willingly ingesting food the Trickster had provided them with. Then again if the creature had wanted to see them dead they'd have been dead already, so they probably were safer than they were on any of their usual days.

"And what do you say?" Sam asked after watching his brother chew for a couple of moments. In all honesty he was surprised that they were still there. He too would have figured that the scene would change before Dean could take the first bite or especially the first drink.

"We're awesome cooks," his brother replied smirking slightly which made the younger Winchester snort in amusement as well.

By that point they had crossed the line where they could either laugh or cry about their situation and laughing just seemed like the better option. Of course the best option, namely murdering the Trickster until he was undoubtedly and irretrievably dead and gone, was not available to them at that very moment.

"As they say, always finish on a high note," Martha commented, a bright and content smile on her face "I'm saying thank you to Dean and Sam for being here and we'll be back after the commercials."

Both Winchesters looked a little unsettled and groaned heartily at that announcement, Martha however, took the last chance she'd get to pinch Sam's backside.