The Following Week

After more explanations and training, they decided to take Victor on a vampire hunt. They grabbed their machetes and headed out to where Dean thought there might be a nest.

"You and Sam go around back and I'll go to the front," Dean whispered when they arrived at the abandoned house. He wanted Victor and Sam to get used to working together and covering each other's backs.

Sam and Victor went around back and snuck in the back door. They thought they had gone unnoticed, but they were wrong. A vampire came in from the other room and tackled Victor. Sam was unable to swing his machete without possibly hitting Victor, so he tried to grab the vampire off of him. The vampire flung Sam against the wall. Without thinking, Victor went for the gun he kept on him and shot the vampire. The vampire turned to him, unfazed and threw him into the other wall, making Victor drop the gun.

Dean heard all this and had been making his way towards the noise. However, the noise woke the rest of the vampires and Dean had four of them to contend with. He dispatched the first two, and the other two began to circle Dean when they heard the gun shot. They had heard about a gun that killed vampires and couldn't imagine any other reason that hunters would shoot at them, so they ran to the other room to see what had happened. Dean followed closely on their heels, thinking it odd that a vampire would shoot Sam or Victor, but knowing they didn't have the Colt, couldn't imagine another scenario for what had happened.

The first vampire into the room saw his buddy attacking Victor, and Sam attempting to sneak up behind him with a machete. The vampire saw the gun on the floor and scooped it up. He aimed and shot Sam in the leg. He immediately went down. Dean burst into the room and hacked off the head of the third vampire, leaving only the one attacking Victor and the one that had shot Sam. That vampire was still aiming the gun at Sam and turned his head to look at Dean when he heard a thud behind him. "Drop the machete, or I'll shoot him again," he said.

The vampire attacking Victor straightened up and watched the proceedings in front of him. He loved it when humans felt powerless, and it was always interesting to see how much they cared for each other, or if they were just out for themselves.

Dean hesitated only a second before he placed the machete on the floor and held his hands out. "Take it easy," he said.

"You're the ones who came in here to kill us," the vampire pointed out. "Now, you're telling us to take it easy."

Victor was taking the whole scene in and he saw how distracted one of the vampires was. He was just watching what was going on. Victor slyly reached over for the machete he had dropped during the struggle and quickly reached up and decapitated the vampire before he had known what hit him. The vampire with the gun swung his gun towards Victor and Sam took the opportunity to lunge at his legs and knock him off balance. Dean grabbed up his machete and swung it, lopping off the final vampire's head.

"Are you OK, Sammy?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. I think it just grazed me," he answered, slowly making his way to his feet.

Dean went over and looked at it. "Yeah, you look like you'll be fine," he said, relieved.

"Wow, we really worked like a well-oiled machine," Victor said.

Dean gave him a dark look as he picked up the gun the vampire had. He thought it looked familiar. "Is this yours?"

"Yeah," Victor answered.

"What were you thinking, bringing a gun on a vampire hunt? Did you try to shoot a vampire?" Dean asked, incredulous.

"It was instinct. It was attacking Sam, so I pulled out my gun to shoot it."

"You never bring a gun on a vampire hunt. They're useless against the vampire and if they get it away from you, they just have that much more," Dean said annoyed. "And another thing, what was with the John Wayne move at the end?"

"What do you mean?" Victor asked. He couldn't believe he was getting a lecture, or whatever, from this guy who he had been after just a couple of weeks ago. Who did he think he was?

"Vamp has a gun on Sam, you don't take out a different vamp. It could have just as easily shot Sam as turned towards you," Dean pointed out angrily. This was the guy he was going to trust to watch Sammy's back.

"Dean, that actually worked out. If he hadn't done that, we'd probably all be dead, or turned, now," Sam said. This was hard to watch. This was how his Dad used to treat him and he didn't like watching it on someone else.

"Maybe I shouldn't hunt with you guys," Victor said, huffily.

"Maybe you shouldn't," Dean retorted.

Sam didn't know if he should intervene or not. He knew that Dean was blowing things way out of proportion and that Victor was just probably feeling insecure, since he was new at this and was used to being a seasoned FBI agent, but he didn't really want Victor around, because then they could concentrate on breaking Dean's deal.

Victor got up and left. He was so mad. Who did Dean think he was? He had been an FBI agent for ten years and had many commendations and no reprimands. He knew what he was doing. And he had saved Sam. If it weren't for him, they would be dead right now. He would go hunt on his own. He knew enough to get by.

Dean watched Victor go. He was glad. Victor had almost gotten Sammy killed. He looked over at Sam wrapping up his leg. He had to keep Sam safe. That was the number one priority. He had either just kept him safe from an incompetent hunter… or he had just let go a potential hunting partner who might save Sam in the future. Dean realized that he couldn't know which, and because of that, Sam was right. They had to break his deal so that Dean could watch after Sam. Because that was his job and he was good at it.

The End