Echo on the wind chapter 12
Luck has run out
Nathalia pov
"Dean!" I yelp, he's just run up behind me and dumped a bucket of water on me while I was petting one of the puppies that was born a month ago.
"The river is running!" He announces as he pitches the bucket and starts running. "Winchester that is not funny!" I shout with laughter in my voice, the chase is on now, I run after him narrowly avoiding crashing into Sam who's busy digging his own little pond that extends over to Anna's house.
"Nat! Would you watch where you're running?!" Sam shouts at me as I leap over his now ducked down form and over the small trench he's dug.
"If it's not funny then why are you laughing?" Dean calls after me as Anna goes over to Sam to kiss him and tell him to calm down.
Dean leaps over onto one of the rocks by the water fall that feeds the rest of the village thinking that I won't continue after him while he's standing there.
"Nathalia no!" Mary yelps as I launch off the grassy bank onto the floating wood platform then from there to Dean.
"NATHALIA!" Dean shouts looking panicked as I tackle him off the falls, both of us plummet straight down into the water below.
Once we've bubbled back to the surface Dean is looking at me with wide eyes and I start laughing. "Woman! That is not funny!" He shouts, I just splash him and start swimming off towards the upper bridge, that was something none of us thought about, the water way goes through three of the streets in the village, how are we supposed to move things from one end of the village to the other.
"Hi Jerry! You seen Gadriel?!" I call up to the bridge where Jerry is standing talking to one of the other peacekeepers and Temple.
"No but you have company." Jerry replies rather confusedly, I glance up to see Dean now has his shirt off and is swimming after me.
"No, no, Dean I surrender!" I yelp as he swims towards me every intent of throwing me back a few feet.
"Ha! I Win!" He exclaims lifting me completely out of the water as if I we're a trophy. "Yeah, yeah you win!" I laugh as he lets me drop back down but catching me before I go under the water completely.
"Okay Children, should I remind you that you've got work to do?" John snaps, his stern voice is off to the right, I look his way to see a very pregnant Mary smiling down at us.
"Ease up John, they've both earned a brake just as much as Kevin has." Mary says as John helps Dean out of the water, Dean reaches back and lifts me out.
It's so warm out today I don't even think that we need to change; I'll be dry in no time, so will Dean.
"Gadriel is looking for you, Nat, he's finished with demon and angel proofing all the cabins. Both Cass and Gad have angel approved the demon walls and the extension of the village." Mary says with a smile on her face.
"Alright, Mary, I have a simple task for you. Go back to the cabin, and start righting out the calendar for this month, we have a gathering tonight so everyone that's new can learn all the ropes and be placed in their groups." I ask of the motherly Winchester who's come to adopt me as her daughter.
"Okay, will do. You just keep giving me these seemingly important tasks and see what happens." She warns before strolling off towards the cabin.
"John can you get the hunting party together and send them down to the north fork? Maybe lead them or send Bobby out?" I suggest to John, I've found rather quickly that you don't order John Winchester around, he doesn't listen very well. He's still to used to being in charge.
"Sounds good, I'll go and bring Bobby along." John says, like I said, I made that sound to much like an order so now he's gonna do as asked but do it his way.
"Jerry, can you get the peace keepers together and go inspect the new cabins, make sure everything has the basics?" Dean asks, he gives a curt nod then bids Temple good day.
"Temple, go have the guards get those shacks cleaned? It smell like…hell in there. And they are not allowed to eat inside the cabins anymore. I now have to waste supplies to get those floors and walls sanded and stained." I inform the woman, she glares at me but does as asked.
"Gadriel! Casstiel!" I call out, I really don't want to go chasing after the angels today. They appear directly in front of me looking eager to be put to work.
"I have a simple task for you two today. Jerry and peace keepers cannot leave to go duck catching. So I need you to figure out how to get this river filled with fish and everything else that goes in a river, as well as ducks, geese, and all of that. The seeds that are planted in the cement break, I need those growing, as well as some trees, we really need more trees around here." I say beckoning around the village in general.
"Why do you keep giving us the easy stuff?" Gadriel asks. "Because we're humans and to us the task's I give you are not easy ones. And because you're angels and you know what belongs in that water, we don't." I reply to them sucking up just a little.
"Dean, take your brother and Anna down to the gathering area with a team, get that cleaned up. Make sure that the kids are getting on their chores. Can I have a puppy?" I say quickly. "Okay." Dean replies.
"YAY!"I exclaim then turn tail running for the litter of puppies that are kept up with Rachel and Kellie, they pretty much over sea everything that is not yet placed with someone.
"Wait what?! Nathalia…damn it!" Dean shouts after me…
Dean pov
One o'clock, damn, we've all been up since four, when will all of this building and settling in end? BANG! BANG! BANG! Three gun shots ring out within the village, both Sam and myself turn and run out of the tree's back towards the village.
Nathalia is already standing out in the grazing field having jumped five fences to get where she is instead of running around the corrals for the different live stock animals we have around here.
"What's going on?!" She demands of Temple who's holding the gun that just fired the shots, looking ahead of the woman I can see four people on the ground bleeding badly, as well as a very large bear, Charlie is among those on the ground.
"Charlie!" I shout out for the red head I consider a sister, running up to her with Sam and Nat behind me I realize Charlie is the least injured of the four.
"RACHEL! SOMEONE GET RACHEL DOWN HERE!" I shout back to Temple who's already running in the doctor's direction.
"Sam give me your shirt, Dean you to." Nathalia orders, we both do as asked as Charlie sits up, in a few moments our shirts are being used to stop the bleeding of the three men laying here.
"Jerry? Jerry can you hear me?" Nathalia asks as his body jolts. "He's going into cardiac arrest, I need…
Nathlia pov
"How did that bear get in here?!" I shout at the guards, even Temple who's looking really scared right now, of me, Dean, Sam, and John.
"None of us did, the gates have been closed all day. Ask John, they never even got out of the village." Temple tries to reason.
"Bullshit, we have two dead men and one still in urgent condition. Now, here's how this is going to work…Temple is being placed on watch, John will be here personally babysitting all of you until someone owns up to leaving that gate opened, or unattended. The boys will be looking into who fucked up, when they find who did it, you're dead. If you step forward and speak now, I'll go easy on you." I snarl, Temple objects.
"Are you kidding me?! Who the fuck do you think you are Nathalia?! Ever since Dean put you in Second of command, you've taken over this damn village. I refuse to be reprimanded by you!" Temple says getting right in my face.
"Dean?" I ask. "Be my guest babe." Dean replies, in a flash I slam my fist into Temple's face, she fumbles to ground but recovers and comes after me again throwing punch after punch but missing with every swing except one. I grab her by the collar of her shirt and slam my fist into her cheek bone a few times then pound one hit to her stomach before throwing her to the ground heaving, the wind knocked out of her and bleeding.
"Sam, escort her to Rachel, please?" I ask of him, he moves forward helping her up. But I grab her chin making her look at me.
"Let that go as a warning to you, this is my village as much as it is Dean's, what the superiors say…goes…and Dean is mine." I sneer at her before pushing her face away; she spits blood to the ground.
"This isn't over Nathalia Colt. You will regret this." Temple threatens but I don't believe her, not even she's that stupid.
"Would anyone else like to say anything?" I ask looking at the new men and two women amongst the guards, everyone looks at one another then shakes their head no.
"Nathalia, might I speak?" One of the younger girls asks. "Sure." I reply to her. "In the few weeks I've been here, I've noticed some rather strange things." The gal says.
"Sorry dear what's your name again?" I ask her. "Alison. My post is up by the power washer, over the last weeks I've noticed that the water pump has been losing screws, the hose fell off yesterday. I reported it to Temple but she said that it's always been that way. I know it hasn't, then I noticed a decent sized hole in the wall early on this morning, again I told Temple. She did nothing." Alison explains.
"Has anyone else reported to Temple and been ignored?" Dean asks feeling it's time for him to step in.
"I have, I sighted that very same bear sniffing at the nutty pine over there, I figured we should chase it away or in the very least warn John. She said it was fine and would leave on its own, I've reported all of this to her on a log sheet." One of the senior guards says handing a page to Dean, he reads over the mass list.
"None of this has been reported to us, do you think she's doing this on purpose?" John informs reading over Dean's shoulder.
"Nathalia?" Dean says when I abruptly turn to walk away, all of this leads back to a conversation I had with Temple a while back, before we left to get Kevin. We we're actually kind of friends at that time, I didn't trust her because of one thing she said. She said that the day she put eyes on Dean she swore she would stop at nothing to have him, and that meant murder if all else failed.
"Nathalia!" Dean shouts after me. "Hey, what's the deal?" Dean asks getting in front of me. "Temple is trying to frame me." I say outright.
"What?" Dean asks. "She's trying to frame me, we had a conversation a while back and she told me that she swore to herself the moment she met you that she would stop at nothing to have you, even if that meant murder. Now over the last few weeks she's been putting blank envelopes in the kitchen right before I'm due to walk in the cabin. She only does that when people are near the cabin to notice her doing this. I'll bet you she's up there bullshitting Sam right now." I explain to Dean who opens his mouth to speak but it's Sam's voice I hear.
"Actually she did, she said that you threatened her because you we're worried about her stealing Dean from you…of course I am smart enough to realize it's all lies. But now I'm wondering what else she has done?" Sam informs.
"It doesn't matter right now, we need to get to the funeral. We say nothing about this until we figure out how to handle the situation." Dean gives the final word, both Sam and myself nod in approval.