When I was a sophomore, I had some trouble with one of the guys in my high school. The guy was an arrogant, over-confident pig. How Dean found out the pig had touched my ass and called me "baby", he won't say. But he and Sam showed up at school, in the middle of the day. I could have defended myself from the frat-boy-in-training, but my boys were having none of that. Sam walked up behind me and slung his arm around my shoulders. Dean was not taking such a gentle approach. He couldn't touch that dick, but he made it perfectly clear, in no uncertain terms, that I was to be left alone. The look of pure anger on his face promised pain, lots of pain, and that dick believed him. He never spoke to me again.

When I was a senior, and Sam was gone, and Dean and I were finally together, a more serious threat emerged. With it being common knowledge in our small Dakota town that my boys weren't around much anymore, I became a seemingly easier target. A local biker set his sights on me. It started small: showing up at my part-time job at the diner, parking by the school, drive-bys at the salvage yard. I tried to keep my cool and not start a big, public scene. I didn't want to tell Uncle Bobby - he had a hard enough time seeing me as the adult I thought I was. I didn't want him swooping in and acting like a concerned parent. Dean wasn't around as much as I'd like, and when he was, the biker seemed unimportant. The day that big, bad biker cornered me in the diner and told me in detail what he was going to do to me the minute my pretty boyfriend left town again, I decided it was a problem to share with Dean. I could have easily taken care of this Hell's Angel wannabe with all the training I'd had, but Dean saw this as his responsibility, and I stayed away from the biker. The police found him, broken into rattling pieces, two days later. Dean left town a day after that with bruised knuckles and a promise from me not to keep things from him anymore.

Not long after Sam came back, we were hunting a nest of vamps. I'm a good hunter, but the vamp was faster, and I was cut deeply. It hurt, so much, and I screamed loud and long before I could stop myself. It was the first time I'd been seriously injured, and neither Dean nor I took it well. When he was finished with the vampire, blood covered the walls.

At those times and so many more, I have seen Dean slip into his self-assigned role as my protector. But never have I seen so clearly his need to keep me safe as when Alistair called me little girl.

"Go," he grinds out, staring at me, through me. Immediately turning, offering no resistance to the order, I grasp and grab and paw at the door until I finally accept the only conclusion.

"I can't get out."

"What do you me-"

"Oh, Dean, she can't open the door. Can't you feel it? The angel's power? She's, uh, in here because someone wants her here. And she's not leaving. Why is that, little one?"

Dean bristles subtly,so slightly as to have gone unnoticed by anyone but me.

And Alistair. He sees it. And is delighted.

"Because she's yours, Dean? Could that be why Sweet Jane is trapped in here? Always putting those you love in danger, aren't you?"

It is revolting, nauseating, disgusting, unnerving to hear my name on his lips. It is horrifying to hear him sing it. I will never be able to listen to that song again. I have worked so hard to recover my strength as a Hunter since Dean's return. Just the sound of this demon's voice is robbing me of it again.

Dean's back is still to the demon, facing me. His eyes show how desperately he wants to touch me, cover me, shield me from the menacing gaze of the dangerous being behind him. But we are both too unsure of Alistair's reaction to move. Instead, Dean tries to gather information.

"How did you get in here, Jay?"

"Anna," I whisper. "She seemed worried for you."

He grimaces and balls his fists, needing so badly to hit something. He stomps over to Alistair and punches the still singing demon harder than I've ever seen Dean hit anyone or anything.

"Shut up! You get her name out of your mouth!"

Spitting blood and teeth, Alistair smiles. "Not even going to deny that she belongs to you?"

"How can I?"

"Smart, Dean. You're smart. Not letting me use that to needle you. You could never hide it. You changed the moment you saw her." His demeanor changes, becomes crueller still as he says, "How unfortunate for her."

"Enough," Dean growls, turning his back to the monster on the rack to face me. "You will stay there, by the door. Do not move this time."

That pisses me off a little, and he can tell, but he cuts his eyes at me to let me know now is not the time. He's right, but it's not my fault. It's not my fault.

"I still have a job to do before they let us go, Jay. I have to get the answers the angels need," he says softer, more gentle, more like the Dean I know. "Please don't get any closer to this than you have to."

"Okay. I'll stay out of the way."

"Thank you," he whispers, not touching me as he might normally do. Not giving the nightmare more fuel to use against us.

It doesn't matter.

"Oh, how sweet," Alistair intones in that eerie, unnatural voice he has affected. "He takes such good care of you, doesn't he, Jane? The whole time in Hell, when I made him think you were there with him, he tried so valiantly to shield you from what was happening, from what he was becoming. Tell me, how does it feel when you have a torturer inside you? When you make love to a man who caused so much pain? Does it make you-"

The rest is cut off when Dean runs a knife into the stomach of Alistair's host. I was so caught in the web of cruelty Alistair was weaving in my brain, that I never noticed Dean move. The demon roars, he screams, he unleashes dark sounds of agony. And then Dean removes the knife, and Alistair laughs. The monster laughs. I am shaking so hard that standing is difficult, and I fall back against the door. Dean hears and rushes to me, unsure of turning away from Alistair, but simply unable to let me fall.

"Those hands that hold you now, little Janie, have ripped souls to shreds, left them as nothing when he was done. Ripped skin from muscle, muscle from bone, and enjoyed it. He enjoyed it, little girl."

"Shut up! Shut up!" Dean whispers to me as I yell to be strong, to ignore the demon's words, to calm down. My hands cover my ears, and I close my eyes, whether to block out Alistair or Dean, I can't be sure.

"Alistair, I will make you pay for this!" Dean yells.

"Oh, I have no doubt, Grasshopper. I taught you well. You know, uh, Jane, that he was one of the best students I ever had. Quick, never had to told twice. He was already so skilled with a knife that when the first soul appeared on his table, he knew exactly what to do, where to start. Of course, he had thirty years of experience with torture. From the other side of the knife, obviously, but he knew the drill. Your man picked it all up so fast. Almost like he was born to do it."

"Dean, make him stop," I ask, only the second thing I have ever begged for in my life.

"I will. I promise, I will, damn it," he says as he turns away from me.

'He did all of that for you, in a way, little Jane. To keep me from showing your face in agony. To never have to hear you scream when I conjured you on the table beside him. You might say it was your fault, maybe. Would you, Jane? Would you say Dean became what he is because of you?"

Dean finally reaches his teacher and shuts him up with a funnel of salt down his throat.

The question still lingers.

"No," I whisper. 'No, no, no, no, no…."

He can't hear my answer. Neither of them.