Echo on the wind chapter 3
New idea's weekly meeting
Nathalia pov
A week, I've been here for two weeks and already I'm going nuts, we're not allowed outside these walls, there's a curfew in the village. Sam is in such a depressive state that all he does is mope around, he attends some meetings according to Mary but other than that he stays in his cabin drunk.
Of course Anna being the woman she is has decided that she's going to bring him out of this state, she's a kind hearted woman who's somehow managed to befriend me. Something Dean has found isn't an easy task, him I spend most of our time fighting and arguing rather than trying to work together.
On the topic of Dean, when he isn't arguing me he is always busy trying to gather complaints from everyone and figure out how to fix them before winter hits full force. Instead of telling them to suck it up and focus on things that are important.
Meanwhile I stay at Dean's cabin with paper and pens trying to work on drawing up blue prints to get this place up and running better than it is. According to the one weather scientist in the camp we have maybe two weeks tops for a hundred and thirty people to get their heads together and get this place up and running.
"Nathalia. We've got a meeting let's go." Dean says poking his head into the cabin, I glance up and frown deeply but gather the pages of blue prints and head out the door after Dean.
Dean pov
"Alright, so…the only thing that's changed this week is the fact we have more supplies, we're still at shortage to supply for everyone. But it's better than nothing, Nathalia made a good point that we have to get that wall demon proofed. Anyone come up with any ideas, obviously the idea of salt and spray paint wards isn't working." I explain to everyone here, I have assigned Anna as the official Mom to all displaced children in the village, giving her the largest of the cabins here in the village to help with that task.
Nathalia, missing god help me, is my second in command, Sam is just here I guess to look good, dad and mom are in charge of weapons and ammunition stocks. Casstiel, and Gadriel just kind of do what they can where they can help, other than that it's still looking like we're screwed.
"Actually, I do have some ideas." Nathalia announces as she gets to her feet, it's time's like this I'm glad that she punched me at the back gate otherwise we'd be officially completely royally screwed. Her brain is always working and she's always on high alert.
Temple decides at this time to grace us with her presence for once, she's the leader of the guards, and no one likes it, not even me but she's the only one that the guards will listen to without getting their teeth beat out.
"Okay, what are the ideas?" Mom asks when Dad is about to tell Nathalia to sit down. "This isn't just a stack of papers pertaining to a damn wall; there is so much wrong in this village I had a hard time figuring out where to start, but for right now what I have are blue prints for several things that will help all of us survive this winter." She explains setting the first paper down on the center of the table but directly in front of me.
"What am I looking at here?" I ask her, I understand the concept of the wall but it appears she's placed two different walls up in this virtual reality she's created with a pen.
"Where the X's are is where the wall is right now. Obviously I've placed a secondary one outside the original, now the idea for this is very simple, in fact it's better than what we have now because as the emperor of China found out. If you build a wall, your enemies will go over it, or around it." Nathalia says sarcastically, and she has a point, we only have a partial wall in place, we ran out of items to use to finish the wall so we just left it and put up a gate.
"Instead of assigning some slackers to repaint demon wards on the wall you, why don't you etch the symbols into heavily salted adobe clay and mix the adobe with holy water. Did anyone else here ever get the memo on Crystal Quartz and demons?" Nathalia prompts looking around the table at the hunters and angels amongst us.
"Uh, what?" Mom asks seeming very lost at this point.
"There's a common theory among hunters that crystal quartz is like…a fly trap for demons. Once their soul's ghost out of their host, the crystal is then capable of trapping the demon inside. Of course I've tried that and it doesn't work-
"Course not; it won't work unless you have the correct spell which Gadriel was nice enough to provide me with as well a few tons worth of crystals. So here's the basic plan, finish the wall we started, that'll take about twenty men to accomplish, meanwhile we'll send some other's out to do some gathering and hunting. We need, meat, lots of it, as well as fur, bone anything that can be found out there on a hunting trip needs to be brought back here…
Nathalia pov
"So we're all agreeing to put these into motion?" I confirm placing my hand on the stack of papers that I've already gone over, heating features for the cabins, extensions on the cabins so when Bobby leaves again to collect more survivors we actually have a place for them. As well as alarms that Charlie is going to graciously help build to track demon activity around the village.
"Yes." Everyone says with genuine interest. "This is only half complete, Dean interrupted me to come over here." I explain pointing to the last page, I'm not really accusing with the comment just letting everyone know I'm not done with this particular plan.
"So, this idea just came up at Random but it proves to be a good idea considering during summer we would have to walk outside the village to get fresh water. That crater I created out in front of Dean's cabin? If we can dig that about ten feet deeper, and about twelve feet wider in diameter and then dig down at an angle and continue on through the village with a six by twelve ditch. Gadriel would be able to use his abilities to reform the river water to flow this direction. We'd have a fresh water source immediately in the village. With some water wheels we'd be able to pump running water into all cabins. In the spring we'd be able to plant fish and other animals, plus herbs that Anna could use for medicinal causes, a lot of benefits would come about from this idea." I prompt as the page is passed around the table.
"That's a little extreme considering we are working on putting everything back to the way it was before Croatoan." John says, and I shake my head completely disagreeing with her.
"Dean, Sam, how many years have you two been trying to put hell back in its place?" I ask. "Our whole lives basically." Dean replies, I throw my hands up now as if proving a point. "Okay, so how long do you think it's gonna take to I dunno, find the first blade, kill Abaddon and steal back the tablet and the prophet? Especially since Donner Pass is gonna close over with snow here any day?" I ask sarcastically looking at John with a very accusing glare.
He takes into consideration what I'm saying and is still about to say the fresh water thing isn't a good idea but Mary interrupts.
"She's right babe, even when spring hits who knows how long it'll take that snow to melt off so we could pass through." Mary says to her husband, Dean smacks the paper getting everyone's attention back to him.
"I'm approving this; we have the resources here to get this at least roughly outlined and started. On a final note, Cass…Nathalia found this, thought she might return it." Dean says sliding Casstiel's grace across the table, the angel catches it and looks at the vial.
"Thank you." Cass says to me though he's very perplexed as he stares down at the vial, I smile at him but say nothing more as I watch the angel break the vial I've worked so hard to protect, I'm left awed as the white magic trapped inside shoots straight up and then dives back down into Cass's body.
The angel is suddenly powered up, a few battery operated lanterns in the room flicker, for a brief few moments I can almost see the outlined shadow of wings against the back wall.
A huge and venomous grin spreads across my face, I've just powered up an angel. Cool.
Dean pov
"Ya know, at first I didn't really like that woman. But, I'm starting to see what you do." Dad says walking up to me; I glance over at him as I'm puffing on a cigarette.
"What do you mean?" I ask him, he scoffs at me clearly amused by my false sense of hate towards Nathalia who's down by the crater she created explaining to ten or so young men on what they need to do.
"Come on son, you're just like me, like it or not. You don't just see this woman for the beauty she is, you are actually seeing a woman for her brain, her nerve, and your looking right through the fact she's completely uninterested in you, and the fact that well…she's a little bit of a bitch." Dad says just as Nathalia turns back and points to the portion of the wall that will be cut into to make way for water to run in from the river up above us but still down in a small valley.
"Alright, so what if I have a thing for her. She's leaving in the spring anyways; she doesn't seem the type to change her mind easily once she's set her head on something." I reply crushing out the cigarette only to pitch the butt into a terracotta pot nearby on the porch.
"As I've found out you and Sam can manage to achieve the seemingly impossible so, why not achieve the impossible with Nat?" Dad says using the pet name everyone has taken to using, mostly because though she does some useful things she's a little pest.
I shake my head, this is one thing I can disagree on my father with, we're watching the sun rising up over the village just trying to make sense of the mixed feelings of blame and achievement. Yes his two sons managed to destroy the world over the course of five years, but we also worked to save as many humans as we could and we're still trying to figure out how to fix what we broke. And he's trying to get me to make a play for Nathalia, but I really do not want her, she's gorgeous, she's badass, she's incredibly more intelligent than a hundred percent of the women I've gone after, not to mention she has quite the dirty mind. But I don't want her.
"Dean!" I hear Nathalia call out, I glance down to where she is, just as the sun finally breaks over the hillside, her hair that is now officially clear of the blood stains is shining under the dawn light, the slight chill of a breeze is slightly pushing her hair in all directions, her vivid dark green eyes are also sparkling with excitement…she's a vision of a goddess right about now. Okay maybe my father is a little bit right to say I have a bit of a crush on Nathalia.
"Got it!" I hear Dad's phone exclaim, glancing over I see he just clicked off a picture of Nat. "Yeah?!" I call back to her shaking my brain free of the haze she brought in.
"You and I are going out on a hunt here in a few! And Anna has Sam going around fixing things on the complaint list!" Nat calls back up to me, I give a thumbs up, I still cannot believe that Anna is able to get through to Sam. He really see's something in that strange woman, her hair is naturally black but she bleaches the bangs and they turn orange, it looks good but still she's….odd, that and she's five foot even compared to my brother's six foot six. Though they do make the cutest couple, I really find them to be quite odd together, she's a mixture of punk rock and Hollywood glam, but loves kids, but be prepared to get your ass beat down if you cross her, but at the same time she loves helping people. Then there's my brother who's a drunken mess, hasn't shaved in months, and has really let himself go. But there she is telling him to shave or she's gonna do it for him and making him get up at five in the morning skip the alcohol, eat breakfast go jogging then get to work on tasks around here. I really do believe that those two will end up together, if they don't I will be completely shocked.
Nathalia pov
TAK! The sound of my arrow striking the head of a deer brings Dean to attention, he quickly fires off a second arrow taking down another deer that's looked up, in a matter of seconds the heard of five are dead. pelts can be stretched and made into everything from bags into shoes and furniture, the bones can be used for sewing needles, combs and a variation of other things, the innards can feed the dogs and that damn barn cat. Plus the meat can be dispersed to everyone in the village.
"Nice. Don't you think we've gone a bit overboard though?" Dean asks. "We'd have more than this if someone wasn't so distracted with how tight my pants are." I reply sarcastically to Dean, who instantly took note of the new pair of black leather pants that Charlie brought up to me as well as a ton of other more gothic rock clothes that no one in the village would lay claim to.
"Says the woman who fell off the porch this morning when I came outside shirtless." Dean teases right back, I can't help but genuinely laugh at that. He does have a point, I was sitting on the porch banister earlier resting my feet on the banister as well and then Dean comes walking out shirtless with his sweats riding a bit to low….yeah, I fell right off that porch.
"Hey what can I say, I've been deprived of male attention my entire life. And let's face the facts here you're not exactly Al Bundy." I reply stepping out of our hiding place to drag two of the five deer down towards the pile of wild game that's been building up all day. "Then who am I?" Dean challenges. "You're Dean Frigging Winchester." My response earns me an eye roll as we double back to the secondary pile of creatures we've struck down in order to survive this winter, it looks like our other groups have fared well. There's a few dead Elk, some deer, doves, quail, and other animals piled up here.
"So, I've got a question for you….How is it, a woman such as yourself becomes a loner? I would think you had a team before all this?" Dean says waving his blood soaked hunting knife around the forest, in general he means the virus outbreak.
"Heh, no. I've always worked alone, I ran away from my foster home when I about fifteen or so, got attacked by a rugaru one night, some hunter named Samuel took me in for a while taught me to hunt then turned me loose on the world. Been on the run since, hunting things, saving people, drowning my sorrows in a bottle, then last year this happened. I ran for shelter, when the initial shock wave went away I came out and started traveling, a month later is when I found Casstiel grace hanging around the neck of a rather pathetic angel, so I took his life, took the grace and that charm you're wearing. I already had the colt. I decided it would be my last case to find the notorious Winchesters and return the grace of their beloved angel. I of course figured that meant my life would end sometime in the process, but I stumbled across Bobby." I explain to Dean as I flop down on a log to rest for a few, it's only eleven in the morning and I feel like I've been running for a week straight.
"So you would have risked you life to get that stuff back to us?" Dean asks, clearly perplexed.
"What reason do I have to live? I have no family, what friends I did have are probably dead and yeah…alone, one hundred percent." My explanation to Dean has him frowning.
"You're useful now, and as far as I'm concerned we are family. Course I wouldn't know where to label you as a family member. Maybe a crazy, sexy aunt, twice removed from my fifth cousins side?" Dean says, it's a joke but I can clearly see he means it about the family thing, that he does care if I'm alive or dead. Which to me isn't something I appreciate, I don't get close to people, and whenever I take a chance to get close to someone they die.
"Whatever, I'm gonna head back to camp and make sure everything is running smooth, when you're done here, have the team bring this kill back to camp. We've gotta figure out how to pack it and keep it fresh till everything freezes." My last order brings Dean to grimace.
"Alright." He grumbles, not really upset with the order, or being ordered around but more upset with me changing the subject and running.
Sam pov
"Sam it's good to see you doing so well today. Looking good." Nathalia amends as she approaches me, she has a quiver of arrows on her back and is carrying four blood coated arrows in one hand with two papers in the other.
I move away from one of the many heaters that we're salvaged to see what she wants. "Thanks, you're looking…axe murderish." I reply beckoning to her blood spattered form.
"Yeah, it's a slaughterhouse up there right now. I just came to check in on things in here, and see if you would be able to build this?" She asks handing me the two pages, looking them over I realize one is a water pump and the other is a very industrial water proof heater.
"Yeah, I could but how would we power them?" I ask. "Well that's what I was wondering, there are a bunch of solar panels down in the barn, I know how to fix those. So if I fix those can we place them up there on the hill, both items are for the water. We could get this working sooner with these two items, the heater would act as a warming method for plants and would help to thaw out the river when the last snow fall hits." She explains. "And the pump?" I ask. "It's another security feature that would be installed during winter, I was thinking on the inner wall we could run lines at the top and actually put up platforms. Get this running so it's filled with holy water minus the salt, that can be added later, but if we have demons bust in we can let them get in between the two walls and just spray them down with holy water. It'd buy enough time for all hunters to get everyone into lock down and then get into the walls as well to start taking down demons." Nat suggests pointing around us to the wall in different sections as she explains her ideas.
"Did you run this by Dean?" I ask her. "Not yet, I'm gonna tell him tonight so he has time to help work out any bugs in the plan. Then I can present it Monday at the meeting." She says.
"If everyone approves it and you can get the items needed to do this, I will build it." I confirm to her, she smiles wide.
"Okay. Wonderful news, so everything is running good down here then I don't have to crack the whip on anyone?" She asks with a teasing tone.
"Nope, everyone is working as they should be. Dad, Bobby and their team is up there working on starting the frames for some more cabins. So we're good, however you may want to inform Gadriel that the slaughter shack doesn't need to be a castle…dad told him to build a stone structure that would be sturdy enough to hold up quick a few big animal carcasses." I say pointing to the small enclosed gully that we set Gadriel to work in. As of right now he's built a very small castle looking structure.
"Okay then. Let him have at it, just don't let him get out of hand." Nat says with a very curious tone to her voice, she isn't quite sure what to make of the angel. He hasn't completely humanized yet like Cass has, so when we set him to a task he still has the mentality that it must be built to appease God….