Chapter 5

An hour later, they were no closer to understanding how or why Baby hadf gone from car to human, and though she really wanted to be, Baby was absolutely no help. She kept getting distracted by commonplace things, like the way the crappy-ass motel room carpet felt between her toes and the length of Dean's eyelashes. Sam kept getting distracted by even more ridiculous things like checking the bandage on Dean's neck every five minutes and nagging him to sit back down every time he stood for more than thirty seconds. If he didn't knock it off soon, Dean was going to have to clobber him. Frustrated, Dean sat on the bed, leaning back against the wall and watched as Sam interrogated Baby about her memories of being "born" for the umpteenth time. It always boiled down to the same thing. One second she was a car. The next second she was a girl. A very cold, very naked girl. No big revelations there. As Dean watched them, he was nagged once more by that eerie sense of familiarity that Baby engendered. Okay, she was his car. He was familiar with his car. But he'd never seen his car looking like this before, and he just could shake the feeling he'd seen her somewhere bef –

"Son of bitch!" Dean ejaculated as he sprang to his feet.

"What? What's wrong?" Sam demanded, jumping to his own feet. Baby just widened her eyes, looking back and forth between them like they were a particularly fascinating episode of Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom.

"I know who she is!"

"What? I thought you said she was the car. Isn't she the Impala?" Sam asked, clearly alarmed.

"Yes. No. I mean, yes she's the car, but I know who else she is too. I remember."

"Dean, what are you talking about?"

"Baby," Dean explained. "I've seen her before. At least, I've seen someone who looks like her before."

"Who?" Baby asked.

"That chick," Dean said, looking at her now and taking a couple steps toward her. "Last year, that chick at Lloyd's Bar, when we saved Evan Hudson from the hellhounds."

"What?!" Sam exclaimed.

"You mean the crossroad demon who offered to bring John back?" Baby said at the same time.

"How do you know about that?" Sam demanded, turning on her in anger.

"I was there. She was a bitch," Baby snapped. "I look like her, like a demon?" She didn't sound or look happy about it.

"Yeah, you do. Just like her."

"Dean, this is crazy," Sam insisted, grabbing him by the arm and pulling him further away from Baby. "You think she's your car, but she looks like a demon. She looks like a demon, but you don't think she is a demon. How does any of that make sense?"

"I don't know."

"If she's dangerous… " Sam began.

"She's not a demon, Sammy. You've done a hundred different tests. She's not a demon. She just looks like a demon for some reason."

"You don't think it's strange that your car just happens to look like an actual demon that you actually met who tried to buy your soul?"
"Of course it's strange! It's freakin' bizarre, but what in our lives isn't?"

"He has a point," Baby offered.

"You stay out of this," Sam growled.

"See, she agrees with me," Dean said, smirking at his brother in a way that he knew would drive the kid batty. But Sam was driving him batty at the moment, so it was only fair.

"Actually, I was agreeing with Sam."

"What?" they said in unison.

"Sam's right," she said, giving Dean an apologetic look. "It can't just be a coincidence that I look like her. We should check it out. At least we could make sure that she's still demon free."

"You mean like a hunt?' Dean said, startled.

"It is what we do."
"We?" Sam replied, sounding equally startled.

"Yeah… are you guys okay? You both look kind of confused." She looked worriedly from one of them to the other, chewing on her lower lip the whole time. "Maybe Dean should go back to bed."

"I'm fine," he grumbled. "If you two would stop cosseting me for five minutes – "

Sam ignored him, walking over to the nightstand and picking up Dad's journal. Dean had been reading through it last night before bed, and it was still lying open to the page about hoodoo and goofer dust. He knew he wasn't getting out of his crossroads deal. He wasn't even going to try, but Sam was bound to interfere and Dean wanted to find something to protect him in case the hellhounds got pissed off or just decided to go for a collateral target. He'd been seriously contemplating staining all of Sam's clothes with goofer dust, sewing it into the seams, sprinkling it in the pockets and gluing it to the insides of his shoes when he'd finally fallen asleep. "What are you doing?"

"Her name was Yadel, Aaminah Yadel. I remember writing her address in my journal after we took her home."

"So why don't you check your journal?"

"Because my laptop is in the car," Sam growled. "And I'm guessing that she wouldn't react very well to my trying to open the trunk right now." Dean grimaced at the image this invoked and darted a look at Baby. She was chewing her bottom lip again, clearly distressed. "I'm hoping you wrote it in the contact section of dad's journal." Sam flipped to the back of the book and rifled through the old receipts and odd slips of binder paper tucked in there. "And here it is." He held up a Post-It with Dean's handwriting scrawled on it. "Meena Yadel. Misspelled," he noted, giving Dean a dry look. "501 Payton, Ave. Greenwood, Mississippi. Let's go check it out."

"Whoa, whoa! Hold up for a minute there, Sammy. We're not leaving."

"Why not?"

"Why not?" Dean repeated, surprised despite previous experience that Sam wasn't seeing the obvious here. "You think I'm leaving before we're one hundred percent sure that the Impala isn't sitting in some chop shop or used car lot around here? Are you nuts?"

Sam rolled his head back and huffed out a breath as he glared at the ceiling. Then his eyes locked back on Dean's face. "I thought we'd established that she was the car."

"Maybe she is. Maybe she isn't. But I'm not setting one foot out of this crappy-ass town until I know for certain that my girl isn't here."

"But I – " Baby started, but then broke off when Sam began speaking.

"Dean, would you forget about the Impala for a minute and just – "

"No.

"Man, look, we need to – "

"No."

"Gah!" Sam howled, practically dancing in place. "This is so typical. We're in trouble and you're more worried about that damn car than about yourself. We need to get this dealt with and get rid of her so we can focus on getting you out of your deal."

"We are not looking for a way out of the deal, Sammy," Dean said, raising his voice to emphasize his point. "We are looking for my car. Now get on your computer and hack into the traffic cams so we can check and see if – "

"My laptop is in the car!" Sam shouted.

"Enough!" Baby yelled, and they both jumped. Turning, Dean saw that she had her hands over her ears and her eyes squeezed tightly shut. "How John put up with this for so long is beyond me!" Sam and Dean exchanged a baffled look. What was her problem? Walking over to Sam, Baby took the paper out of his hand and then shoved it at Dean. "Here. Call her. We don't actually have to go to Mississippi for you to at least check and make sure she's there." Then, turning back to Sam, she put her hands on her hips and fixed him with an icy stare. "I am not a damn car. I am a classic car, and Dean loves me. He's not going to stop worrying until he's sure that I'm safe, so just check the traffic cameras so he can relax."

"But my laptop – "

"Wasn't in me when I changed. Dean took it out, so it must be in here somewhere."

"He did? You did?" Sam asked, turning to his brother.

"Uh…" Oops.

"Dean, were you looking at porn on my laptop again?"

Dean flashed him a sheepish smile. "Is this a trick question?"