AN: Yup, I'm writing yet another chapter here. It's like I can't help myself. I promised this one to Janice approximately 1,000 years ago...and once I fianlly started it only took me like half an hour to get it down. Sorry, Janice. She proofed this really fast anyway.

By the way, all the lovely comments on the epilogue of Diaboli Cathedra made me feel all gezellig, so if you are one who did so, thank you dearly.

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"Sam and Dean are my allies," Ketch reminded himself, looking at the intriguing box sitting so innocently on the library table. Not surprisingly, the part of him that had spent years distrusting everyone and everything around him and thus collecting information about enemies and allies alike was louder than his sad little conscience.

The brothers were out of the bunker but intended to be back within the hour, which left Ketch plenty of time to explore what they'd been sent all the way from Australia. They'd apparently picked up the package from their post office box but hadn't opened it yet.

Ketch licked his lips, curiosity overwhelming him. Was it a weapon? Something of value? Who'd sent it and why?

Arthur carefully slit the tape. He'd be able to make it look untouched with very little work, and he had to know what it was and why Sam and Dean hadn't bothered to mention it.

Inside, the box was stuffed with brown packing paper, which Ketch moved around with the tip of the knife he'd used to cut the box open. There was no warding or protective lining in the box, meaning it was probably something boringly benign. There was no note or explanation, either.

Clink! The knife touched something hard, so Ketch used it to lift the paper out of his way, careful not to touch whatever he'd found. His upper lip curled when he got a look at it – actually, them. Lying innocuously in the bottom of the box were two kitschy, horribly ugly little ceramic statuettes. They (poorly) depicted an old man and old woman sitting on the toilet with expressions of effort on their crudely-molded faces.

Not a weapon, then, just a joke, and one that was in poor taste like so much that had to do with the Winchesters. Tossing the knife down, he picked up the figure of the man, looking at the bald, wrinkled head and seeing that there were holes on the top. They formed the letter "P."

"Salt and pepper shakers," Ketch realized. "Good lord, those are ugly."

He scowled at the aberration in his hand and went to set it back down when suddenly the thing started to melt. Ketch's eyes flew open and he let go immediately, but it was already too late. The world around him blended into a tie-dyed kaleidoscope, then re-formed into a totally new place. Ketch swore in Latin, then Polish, then Russian, the three languages he knew the most swear words in after English. He'd clearly screwed up touching the hideous relic. It had somehow circumvented the protective warding within the bunker and transported him elsewhere. He mentally kicked himself for not having known better than to touch ANYTHING being sent to the Winchesters, but the stupid things had been so ugly and so innocuous that he had foolishly let his guard down.

Ketch needed to find out where he was, and quickly. Then he needed to find a way back to civilization and all of his material things, because he hardly had any weapons on him. His Men of Letters instructors would kill him if they could see him now, and that wasn't just an expression.

He was in a dense jungle someplace tropical, judging by the humidity in the air. Probably Australia he thought glumly. He could hardly have been dressed worse for such a locale in his three-piece suit. He removed his jacket, rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, and chose the direction that he was fairly sure was north, assuming it was afternoon where he was. Something screamed in the distance – a monkey, perhaps? – and there were insects everywhere he looked. He'd have to keep a very careful lookout for snakes and anything else that might be venomous. If it WAS Australia, much of the local fauna (and probably some of the flora too) would be trying to kill him, never mind anything supernatural. He also needed to mark his passage. It would help him ensure he didn't backtrack, since it was difficult to navigate by the sun when you could hardly see it, and to help any sort of rescue effort find him. Not that he expected there to be any; nobody would have a clue where to look unless one of the Hardy Boys back home picked up the other salt shaker and ended up in the same place. Ketch picked a likely-looking tree and scored and "X" into the bark at eye level.

He took a few more steps and half tripped over a submerged root and fell hard into a tree. Serpentine vines fell across his back. No, the tree had grabbed him. Something high in its branches chittered as he propelled himself backwards out of its clutches and another monkey howled. "Cacas, gówno, dermo!" Ketch muttered. He backtracked as quickly as he could, holding out his knife defensively when it looked like the branches would come after him.

God, he wished that monkey would stop its screaming. It was making it impossible to hear the approach of any other dangers. The tree actually leaned toward him, knocking his knife loose, and Ketch cut his losses, turned and ran. He had to dodge around trees and hurdle a small stream. Rounding the trunk of one particularly large tree, he ran straight into an okapi. As it flailed back from the impact, the animal almost seemed to make a grab for the fleeing man.

Slipping and sliding as he went, since his dress shoes were stylish but very poor for running, Ketch saw a small cave opening and dove inside. He didn't know what was going on here, but it was nothing normal or natural.

Case in point: there were more simian sounds, just outside the cave this time, then a face peered inside. It wasn't a monkey after all – it was a gorilla. Ketch wasn't afraid of much, but he blanched at that, scrambling for anything he could use as a weapon. The gorilla backed up and, oddly, an okapi stood next to it. Ketch threw first one useless shoe then the other at them, then finally located the stiletto knife he kept strapped to his leg and –

– found himself crouched under a table in the bunker library.

Arthur sat back on his heels and laid the knife down, uncharacteristically at a total loss for words. Dean and Castiel stood a short way away, studying him intently. Dean's arms were folded across his chest, and he looked unamused. Sam was standing a little ways to the right, setting a box a little larger than a shoebox on a different table. That accomplished, he pulled off the gloves that he was wearing and turned toward Ketch, putting his hands on his hips.

"Better?" Sam asked dryly. "Or do you still think I'm a tree?"

"Uh, that is…"

Dean's lips twitched for a brief second. "I mean, he wasn't that far off with you, Sasquatch."

Ketch climbed out from beneath the table with as much dignity as he could muster, wondering just how much he'd talked. He collected his shoes without making eye contact with anyone.

"Sure thing, screaming gorilla," Sam snorted, rolling his eyes at Dean. To Ketch, he said, "You don't have any side effects or anything, do you? You're okay now?" He was being kinder than Ketch deserved.

Dean clearly thought so too, because he grumbled, "You couldn't help yourself. You just had to open the package even though you had no idea what was inside. What kind of Hunter are you? Besides a stupid one? Dude, you scratched an 'X' on the fridge!"

Ketch opened his mouth, but before he could find an answer (because what exactly could he say?), Castiel asked curiously, "Am I giraffish in some way, because Crowley –"

Dean spoke right over the angel. "And if that wasn't bad enough, you had to touch the daggers."

"They aren't daggers, Dean. They're minkisi," Sam explained. "They look like whatever you expect them to look like because they want you to touch them and get drawn into a hallucination."

"I bet you saw those little statue things with the huge boobs," Dean smirked at Sam, holding his hands out in front of his chest to indicate just how "huge" they might be.

Sam sighed and walked closer to Ketch, apparently deciding that ignoring Dean was the best course of action. "You're really alright? Maybe you should sit this hunt out."

"I am fine, just, er…" Ketch started.

"Or maybe they didn't have boobs, they had giant –" Dean started as Castiel tried again.

"I am not particularly tall, but –"

"I saw them as a couple different things," Sam snapped. "Because I really didn't have any expectations, I guess. Hex bags, then manuscripts, not anything weird. Then I realized what they were, and then I could see them as J-shaped wooden carvings."

"That is how they actually appear," Castiel interjected. He looked back to Ketch, who was looking for his jacket. "Is it my neck? I never noticed that it looked especially long or anything."

"What did you see, Ketch?" Dean asked, his tone full of innuendo. "I bet you have more imagination than my brother here."

Ketch had thought he'd lost the ability to blush years before and was horrified to discover that that was not true. He kept his mouth shut, preferring to let them come to their own conclusions rather than admit what he'd conjured up.

"Ha! I bet it was some kind of toy," Dean snickered.

"Actually," Sam said shrewdly, studying Ketch's face. "I bet it was something tacky. That's what he'd probably expect us to get in the mail."

"I think I'll sit this hunt out after all," Ketch said quickly. "We will reconnect at a later date." He hurried to the door, needing to escape the madhouse for a little while. Behind him, Dean laughed and made a crude suggestion that even Sam chuckled at.

Castiel called out, "Does it have something to do with the fact that they are ungulates? Or herbivores? Or –"

Ketch closed the door with relief. He'd send them an expensive bottle of Scotch as an apology...and hope that they had short memories.

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AN: So...yeah, I have a strange sense of humor! I hope you all at least got a smile out of this silly thing!

Minkisi (singular nkisi) are objects, sometimes statuettes, that are purported to have some kind of sacred power or function. They are most commonly found in and around the Congolese rain forest.

Cacas, gówno, and dermo all mean crap in Latin, Polish, and Russian respectively – Ketch's three swearing languages. That info comes from Google translate. Him choosing those languages in particular for profanity is canon in my head only.