Slowly Zoë regains consciousness and opens her eyes. Not that it makes much of a difference, she still can't see a damn thing. The smell inside the moistly space she finds herself in is terrible, a mixture of rotten remains and a pile of dead bodies might come close. Disturbing, because she wouldn't be surprised if that's actually causing the smell. She rubs her face and moans, then pulls her hand back. Her fingers feel sticky, she recognizes the substance just by feeling it; it's blood. Where is she and what the hell happened? She explores her surroundings with her hands and finds three walls and eventually prison bars; she's trapped. Then she hears soft wailing in the distance.
"Anyone there?", she asks out loud.
"Yeah…"
Crap, she curses to herself. Her question is answered by a little girl. Zoë realizes it's probably one of Cliffer's kids.
"Hey little girl, are you okay?", Zoë asks friendly.
"No…", she cries.
"Who are you?", afemale voice asks, much elder than the young girl she was just talking too.
"I'm Zoë", she answers honestly. "Who are you?"
"Stella", she says.
She can hear the fear and hopelessness in her voice. Who knows how long they have been down here.
"Terry's wife?", Zoë asks.
"Yeah", she confirms softly.
Zoë sighs, this is even worse than she expected. They are trapped God knows were and if she herself doesn't even know where she is, the police sure isn't gonna find them. For a moment she curses herself for sending Sam and Dean away, they sure could have been a good help now.
"Are we the only ones in here?", Zoë asks.
"No", a manly voice answers.
Zoë is a bit startled by the dark voice, for some reason she didn't expect an answer from anyone else but Stella.
"Including the children, there are nine of us down here, but some haven't respond for some time now".
The voice is coming from the other corner of the space they're haven't responded? Zoë doesn't wanna know what that means.
"Let me guess; Middleton, O'brien, Brewer, Ford, Gibson, and the Cliffer family, right?", she folds her fingers around the iron bars and tries to get a view of the room.
"How do you know that?", a younger female voice asks.
"I was looking for you", Zoë chuckles, finding it ironical to be locked in her herself now.
"No offence, but good job", the male voice comments sarcastically.
"People are looking for us?", a hopeful voice asks she hadn't heard before.
"No, I just was", Zoë corrects honestly. "Are you Monica or Alisa?"
"Alisa", she answers. "But Monica is right here with me".
"Not much hope for us then", the guy concludes. "I'm Daniel by the way".
"There's always a way, Daniel. I'm gonna get us out of here", Zoë gets up determined.
Zoë's eyes start to get use to the dark, but she still can't make out faces in the other cells. She takes out her hairclip and folds it to a lock pick, then she starts messing around with the door lock.
"Did you see it?", the voice from the far corner of the room asks.
The fact that he uses the word 'it' indicates that he already realizes that their kidnapper is not human. She decides to tell them the truth.
"I fought it", she corrects, working concentrated.
"You know what it is then?", he asks.
"Yeah, I know what it is. What's your name?", she returns a question, as the lock opens.
"Neill O'brien", he answers. "What is it?"
Zoë kicks the iron door open and walks out. Thin fragile beams of moonlight falls through small holes in the ceiling, it almost looks like the lid of a sewer drain. Now that her eyes are use to the dark, she can make out shapes and shadows. The space is divided in five cages and the main area where she is standing in now. Three cells seem to be empty, but by the bars of the other two stand several people. She searches the walls, but she can't see anything that might indicate to a staircase or another way out. While she examines the place she ended up in, she answers his question.
"It's what we call a shapeshifter. A creature that is able to change into the forms of people, looking exactly like them", she explains.
"This is insane, it's not real", Monica mumbles.
"You saw it yourself", Daniel snipes.
"Hey, fighting won't help", Zoë breaks up the starting argument as she walks over to the cell across from hers.
She kneels down by the door and tries open the cage which beholds the Cliffer young girl with cute curls clamps her tiny hand around the bars while she watches her work. Tears sparkle in her eyes.
"Are you gonna save us?", she whispers.
"I'm gonna try, hon", Zoë answers softly and concentrates on one of the guys in the other cage.
"Daniel, you said there are nine people down here. Who's the ninth?", she asks, while picking the lock.
"We don't know, he was locked up here just before you were", he tells.
Then suddenly Zoë's memory comes back to her. She remembers Sam, right before he knocked her down. Not the real Sam off course, but it's just now that she realizes that. She should have known that the shapeshifter shed into Sam to trick her. God, she was cross with him for meddling in the case once again, she thought she had it all covered. But Zoë can conclude from the fact that the shifter was there in Sam's form, that the real Sam is here as well.
"Where is he?", Zoë asks directly, as the jail door opens.
"In the cell next to you, why?", Daniel answers confused.
Without answering she quickly moves to the cage next to hers and tries to open the barred door.
"Sam, can you hear me?", she asks, as the lock opens, but she doesn't get any response.
Zoë hastens inside and finds Sam on his back, unconscious. She checks his vitals, he's breathing. His head is bleeding, seems like she wasn't the only one who received a blow in the head.
"Sam, wake up, man. Hey, wake up!", she taps his face trying to get him back.
It takes a while, but then he moans and flutters his eyes.
"Zo?", he asks with raspy voice.
"Yeah, it's me", she creates some distance.
"Damn, I'm glad to see you", he sits up and coughs.
"Well don't be, I'm just as trapped as you are", she sighs.
"You two know each other?", Daniel asks from his cell.
"Yeah, we're sort of… colleagues, I guess", Sam declares.
He gets on his feet but has trouble keeping his balance and leans against the steel bars.
"You alright?", Zoë checks.
"Yeah, just a headache", he moans.
"So what are you, FBI or something?", Alisa asks.
"Whatever you wanna call us, dear", Zoë answers and turns to Sam. "Where's Dean?"
"At our motel, downtown", Sam sighs.
"Okay, good. He's still in town. You're missing so he will come and look for you in what, a few hours, right?", she says hopeful.
"Not likely", Sam steps out into the moonlight.
Zoë can see the blood has found a way down the side of his face and turned the collar of his shirt red.
"What?", Zoë asks for an explanation, already irritated, knowing something bad is gonna come up.
"I was gonna stay out because he had a girl over for the night", Sam admits.
Stunned she stares at him, a girl? She feels anger building and takes a moment to get things straight.
"You've got to be kiddin' me", she glares at Sam. "You're telling me that Dean is getting all lovey dovey with some chick while we're stuck in this stinky dark dungeon?"
Sam looks up at the lid and frowns.
"It's not really a dungeon, I think we're in the scepter tank", Sam corrects, annoyingly enough to Zoë.
"Let me rephrase that. You're telling me that Dean is getting all lovey dovey with some chick while we're stuck in this stinky dark CRAPHOLE!", she corrects pissed.
"Yeah, that pretty much sums it up", Sam admits.
"Great, just great", she walks back and forth, trying to think of a way to get out.
It's just now that she realizes the exact meaning if Sam's words. She looks down at her pumps, realizing all this time she has been standing, sitting and lying around in…
"Crap…"
It sure does explains the smell. She retches and coughs.
"This is disgusting", she whispers, as she starts to feel sick.
"It gets worse", Sam adds as he himself starts on the last lock to free the others.
"I saw him shift before he left", he tells and looks at her. "He shifted into you".
Zoë tilts her head slowly and stares down at Sam.
"There goes my reputation of a good civilian", she muddles.
During their conversation, the Cliffer family started to get out of their cage, afraid like hunted animals. The little girl, probably not even six years old, steps into the dim light. The poor kid looks like she's about to burst into tears. Zoë helps out Stella, who's weakened and scared. She has a younger boy by her hand, Zoë reckons he's about four years old. She looks over to Sam with a compassionate look on her face, something Sam hasn't seen in her eyes before. These people need to get out fast, they've been through way too much. Sam searches his pockets for his phone.
"You won't find it, he took mine as well as everything else I was carrying", she discourages.
He sighs worried as the others step out of their cell.
"Zo, I think the shifter went after Dean", he tells her.
She looks aside and straightens her back. If that's true, Dean might be in serious trouble.
"What makes you think that?"
"He said something about my brother being next and that he wouldn't let a bunch of hunters spoil his fun", he explains serious. "If it shifted to me, it also copied my thoughts and memories. It knows we're staying at the Deep Purple Inn, room number 301, everything".
"You're staying at the Deep Purple Inn?", Zoë asks surprised, but shuts up when she sees Sam's glare.
"Not the point right now, but you know what's even more disturbing?", he realizes. "If it showed up in female form, Dean might actually fall for it".
She bites her lip and ponders; he's right. She places her hands in her side and tries to think. This is bad, this is very bad. When she looks back at the youngest of the Winchester brothers, she detects the unpleasantly surprised look on Sam's face, staring inside one of the cells.
"What?", she asks, as she joins him.
In the cell lays a younger guy, half against the wall and his eyes closed. Without hesitation Zoë opens the door and kneels down next to the guy. As if she's a fully trained doctor, she checks if he still has a pulse, which he does.
"This is bad", she turns to Sam. "Give me your jacket".
He quickly takes it off and gives it to her. Zo folds it up as a pillow to support his head. He moans weak, but doesn't exactly wake up.
"Who's this guy?", Sam straightens his back and looks back at the others.
"It's Josh, he got here first", Monica answers.
"When was that?", he asks.
"I guess about two weeks ago, I got here second, ten days back", she tells him, while she leans on Alisa.
"Did it feed you or anything?", Sam wonders.
"Not exactly, but the place floods when it rains, it's all we have", Daniel explains.
Sam shakes his head frustrated and looks over to Zoë, who's comforting Josh Middleton, who seems to regain consciousness again.
"We're gonna get you outta here, Josh", she tells him with calm voice.
"Is this Dean going to get us out of here?", Stella asks Sam.
Zoë looks over her shoulder at the mother of two, then up to Sam. She knows he wants to give her a positive answer, but he wouldn't be telling the truth if he did. She decides to respond for him.
"I'm not gonna lie to you, I don't think so", Zoë admits honestly.
"So what, we're stuck here? What if it comes back?", Neill brings to mind.
"We're all together in this. No one knows", Zoë says annoyed as she gets up.
"Can't we just knock him down when he shows up? Three men like us can handle him, right?", Daniel proposes.
Zoë huffs insulted, but Sam answers before she can.
"No, you'd need a silver bullet to kill him, he doesn't show pain for anything else", Sam explains.
"We can't just wait and see what happens! I don't wanna die!", Daniel freaks.
"Could you keep it down? You're scaring Susie", Stella puts her arm around her daughter.
"No, I can't keep it down. I've been down here for over a week and I'm starving, and I…"
"Dude!", Zoë grabs his collar and shakes him back to reality, "Shut up!"
"Don't tell me to…", he starts, but she interrupts by hushing him and tilts her head to hear better.
Now that it's silent in the tank, they can all here an engine running in the distance, it's coming closer.
"I know that sound", Sam comments.
"It's my Dave", Zoë recognizes the typical Harley engine.
"Everyone back in their cell!", Sam commands quickly.
"That son of a bitch is riding my bike", Zoë muddles softly as she walks back, receiving a glare from Sam, as that is not the most important thing to be mad about right now.
They all close the doors as Zoë's Harley seems to come closer, then it breaks and the engine is turned off. Silently they listen to the footsteps above them, as they look up, Sam and Zoë curious and concerned, the rest full of fear. Then the footsteps stop.
"Sammy?"
It's Dean, at least it sounds like Dean. Zoë hopes to God that Sam keeps his mouth shut, but luckily he doesn't respond. Seems like he too realizes it might be the shapeshifter.
"Sam! Zoë!", his voice echoes over the terrain.
Then they all hear a soft cry of a little child. All heads turn to the little boy that Stella Cliffer is holding in her arms, desperately hushing him. Crap, Zoë realizes. She looks up tensed, he must of heard that. It better be the real Dean and not the shifter, cause if the last option is the case, it probably means that Dean didn't end up so well. Then the moonlight is intervened and it gets even darker in the tank. Then the lid is removed and they all see Dean's face through the round hole in the ceiling.
"I noticed the 'D' projected on the beautiful clear sky this evening, thought you might need some help", he jokes.
"Dean!", Sam says relieved.
Zoë huffs, he better be faking it. They still don't know anything for sure.
"How many of you are down there?", Dean asks.
"Ten", Sam answers.
"Okay, let me get the rope and a flashlight out of the trunk, be right back".
Dean disappears again.
"Sam, follow my lead", Zoë whispers, when she's sure he, or it, is gone.
It doesn't take long for him to get back, because a moment later a rope falls down through the sewer drain. He aims a flashlight down the tank and focuses on Zoë's face for a moment.
"Good to see you too, awkward, but good", he grins.
"I don't wanna know", Zoë comments. "Now get your ass down and free us".
"Yeah yeah, I'm comin'", he sighs and shines the light on the others down the tank.
"Don't worry, 'll be out in no time", he comforts, then lowers himself down into the scepter tank.
His feet haven't even reached the ground yet, or he feels Zoë's tight grip around his neck. She pulls him off the rope and throws him with his back on the ground, landing on top op him. Sam quickly picks up the flashlight and shines the bright light in Dean's eyes. They don't flash white; Zoë still stares down the pair of hazel eyes who glare at here.
"A simple 'thank you' would be enough", he notifies cynical.
"He's cool", Sam concludes and smiles. "Good to see you, Dean".
"Likewise. No you…", that last bit is meant for Zoë, who's still sitting on his stomach. "… get off, I already had you all over me tonight".
Zoë raises her brows, wondering what he means by that, but gets off him so that he can get up.
"You have a phone?", Sam asks.
"Yeah, but I already called 911", he informs and turns to the others. "Now lets get you people out".