Brothers fight. Something about sharing everything with each other, always having someone looking over your shoulder, and comparing yourself to often leads to competition and childish bickering. That does not change with age.
.
Dean's face was stern, lips pressed into a thin line, despite the drums and guitars of Metallica spilling from the impala's speakers which normally relaxed him. Sam, still angry from their earlier argument, passive aggressively shot off the music and turned to give his brother a look.
"We've been over this Sam." Dean said flatly hoping his baby brother would listen to him for once.
"Do you honestly think Chuck is right?" Sam asked not believing Dean was going to take the word, or rather vision, of a stranger over him. "Really, me and Lilith?"
"He's been right about everything so far. You think he's just gonna ground out at first now." Dean answered. They had just left Chucks house after he gave them the rough draft for the next chapter of his book. Dean still had no idea what Chuck was, or why he was getting visions of what was going to happen in their lives, but he did know that he had yet to be wrong about anything.
And his latest vision put Sam in a motel room –in bed- with Lilith.
Sam scuffled at the accusation before taking the script of Chuck's latest chapter and began reading a line of the text out loud. "Dean slid behind the wheel of his beloved Impala and drove off, the plastic tarp on the rear window flapping like the wings of a crow." He said emphasizing each word to show how ridiculous it sounded.
"A tarp?" Dean questioned not believing what he was hearing.
"Yeah. On the rear window, and you drive it like that." Sam added as he slapped the papers against the dash.
If there was one thing more insane than him hooking up with Lilith it was Dean letting his back window get smashed and driving off like nothing happened.
"We'll he might be wrong about the details, but it doesn't mean he's wrong about the end result." Dean stated keeping his eyes on the road ahead.
"So we're just going to run." Sam said. It was as if they had completely changed personalities. Normally it was him who suggested a safer path while Dean charged in half cocked.
"Dude, we are a long way from ready to a face-to-face death match with Lilith." Dean shouted. He didn't care about anything else in this moment. He didn't care about the initial case that drew them to town, and he didn't care about chuck. All he cared about was getting Sam away from Lilith.
He just wanted to look out for Sammy.
Sam was about to protest but was cutoff by Dean's phone ringing.
"Hello." Dean answered on the second ring. "Wooo slow down, say that again." He added before putting the phone on speaker for both of them to hear.
"I said two FBI agents just showed up at my door looking for you!" Chucks hoarse voice shouted through the phone.
"Great." Dean said sarcastically as he gave his brother an I-told-you-so look. "That's just awesome, thanks for the warning Chuck." He added.
"Did they say who they were?" Sam asked ignoring Dean.
There was a long pause and grown from Chuck as the tired drunk tried to recall the names. "Jareau and Morgan, I think."
With that Dean ended the call and tightened his grip on the steering wheel.
"The Feds are here looking for us. That settles it we're getting out of town." Dean added as eased on the accelerator causing the Impala's engine to hum as they speeded down the road.
.
Unfortunately for Dean, the two bickering brothers were not meant to leave town anytime soon.
Seeing the roadblock approaching Dean slowed the impala to a gentle stop and rolled down the window as the officer approached.
"What seems to be the problem officer?" Dean asked politely.
"Bridge is out." The man answered simply.
"We're just trying to get out of town." Dean continued but the officer did not seem concerned by his statement.
"Yeah, afraid not." He stated with no apology in his voice.
"Is there a detour?" Dean asked doing his best not to look nervous.
"Nope." The officer said robotically as if he had already explained this to a hundred drivers already.
"There's not a side road that takes us to the highway?"
"To get to the highway, you have to cross that river. To cross the river, you have to take that bridge." The officer said mockingly.
"How deep's the river?" Dean asked seriously, but the officer must have taken it for a joke.
"Sorry. Afraid you boys are going to have to spend the night in town."
…
With no other options the two brothers pulled into a local diner.
"How did they find us?" Sam asked as the two of them sat down at a small table in the back of the room.
"I don't know maybe it's personal for them. I mean we did take agent Jareau hostage." Sam suggested.
"So this is my fault." Dean stated annoyed.
"If we had just left town and let some other hunter handle the case, instead of kidnapping an FBI agent, we probably wouldn't be in this situation." Sam pointed out.
"There were five missing kids we couldn't just bail." Dean reminded him.
"I know you're right." Sam nodded not wanting to aggravate his brother further especially with what he was about to suggest. "If we can't leave town then-"
"We are not discussing fighting Lilith that is not an option right now." Dean cut him off before Sam even had a chance to suggest his plan again. "Besides, according to Chuck these agents are going to be a problem." He added before picking up the large menu.
"Come on Dean, the guy is a hoax." Sam said still not convinced by Chuck. The only explanation the brothers could think of was that he was a psychic who was laser focused on their lives, but that did not mean Sam was going to let him dictate their fait.
"We better hope not because he's the answer to our problem." Dean stated smugly.
"What, how is Chuck the answer to our problem?" Sam asked.
"This manuscript he gave us details the path that brings us to Lilith, all we have to do is get off the path." Dean smirked.
"How do you mean?" Sam asked still not understanding what his brother was planning.
"It's a blueprint of what not to do. I mean, if the pages say that we go left-"
"Then we go right." Sam said simply. It was a good plan, assuming Chuck was a psychic.
"Exactly. We get off-book. We never make it to the end. It's opposite day. It says that we, uh, we get into a fight. So, no fighting. No research for you.."
"No bacon cheeseburger for you." Sam pointed out, enjoying the disappointed look that crossed his brother's face.
"Yeah, no problem. I'll just order something else." Dean shrugged dismissively, but it was clear he was already hating the plan.
…
Agents Jennifer Jareau and Derek Morgan were closing in on the Winchesters trail, JJ research proved to be invaluable in predicting the brother's movements.
A lot of what made JJ so good at following the Winchesters trail was what made each member of the team a good profiler- the ability to empathise with the unsub.
In her time held hostage she got to see a side of the Winchesters that very few were privy to; Handcuffed to the railing of the bed JJ had stopped being afraid as she watched the two brothers, forgetting for a moment that they were two hardened serial killers and saw them as nothing more than brothers.
They were arguing about a sandwich of all things. For a moment the threat of having an FBI agent held hostage, being suspects in the kidnapping of five locals, and their entire rap sheet was replaced with bickering over the quality of a peanut butter sandwich.
It was a trivial matter so insignificant that JJ bet that both brothers wouldn't even remember it if they were ever questioned about it, but JJ would. It was the first moment that she was able to look past the photos of mutilated women from St. Louis and see them as just regular people.
Most members of law enforcement, and the general public, saw them as murderous psychopaths. They were delusional, satan worshiping nut jobs, and it was that mentality that made it impossible for anyone to catch the Winchesters. If they didn't understand their motives and personality, they would never be able to predict what they would do.
Even the rest of her team, as talented profilers as they were, had no hope of ever catching the Winchesters because they profiled them as simply two co-dependent personality's suffering from multiple delusions. Lumping they in with other psychopaths when really the Winchesters were in a class all there own.
"JJ are you okay?" Derek asked
"Yeah I'm fine." JJ said shaking her thoughts away.
"What were you thinking about?" Derek questioned further.
"It's nothing. Did you get something on the case?" JJ quickly changed the subject.
"Garcia might have something." Derek nodded as he led her into a small conference room that the local police had set up for them.
When JJ and Derek had first arrived in town JJ was concerned with how the locals would respond to the two FBI agents, who were supposed to be taking time off, asking for favours. Luckily once the words Winchesters were mentioned every police officer was tripping over themselves to accommodate them. Everyone wanted to be the one to catch the infamous brothers, but at the same time no one wanted to be the ones to deal with the mess left behind whenever the Winchesters blew through town. In the end they were more then happy to let JJ and Derek call the shots (and more take the blame if the brothers escaped).
"You have something Garcia?" JJ asked leaning forward on the round table to speak into the speaker of the phone.
"First I'd like to say that credit card fraud is not an easy thing to get away with." The bubbly tech analyst started as she already sounded out of breath. "That being said these boys have practically made it their main profession.
"They stay off the radar buying mostly bullets, gas, and renting motel rooms. There are no big purchases for fancy hotels, restaurants or cars-"
"As if Dean would trade in the Impala for a Ferrari." JJ piped in humourlessly.
"Word." Garcia agreed momentarily swooning at the very attractive Dean Winchester and his gorgeous classic muscle car. "Anyway, with hundreds of credit cards issued it's nearly impossible to figure out which one they are using."
"So you couldn't find them." Derek frowned.
"Don't rush me I'm getting to that. As I was saying no mere mortal could sift through every credit card issued, but as we all know I am no mere mortal.
"We know that the Winchesters burn through credit cars quickly, getting another one before we can pin them down, but from my records they were due for a new one recently. Our pals at the IRS had identified a card most likely belonging to the Winchesters, which they disposed of last week. Now I cross-referenced all cards issued since that one card was cancelled, cross-referenced that with low purchase, cross-referenced that with aliases the brothers would likely use, and cross-referenced that with purchases made in the area near you and I got a hit for at Tommy Shaw at a local dinar last night." Garcia exclaimed triumphantly.
"Garcia you are a genius." JJ praised.
"Great job baby girl." Derek added.
"You can express your appreciation in either chocolates or flowers. PG out."
Racing to the local dinar JJ and Derek burst through the double doors, hands twitching for their holstered guns as they scouted the area. The two agents postures relaxed when it became clear that the brothers were not here.
"Excuse me." JJ said as she pulled a waitress aside. "Have you seen either of these men?" She asked as she pulled out Sam and Dean's mug shots.
"Yeah." The woman answered instantly as she glanced at Dean's image. "That guy ordered a veggie tofu sandwich." She recalled.
"Any idea where they went?" JJ asked.
"Sorry, no."
A small sigh escaped from her lips as JJ gave a brief thank you and turned to leave the building.
"Well get them JJ." Derek reassured but his words fell on deaf ears.