I handed Sam his beer settled back down in the recliner and focused on Roy. I didn't really need to pay attention to Sam, I lived it after all. What's behind the questions? As Sam went over Jessica's death and a very, very brief recap of the next few years; my trip to Hell, his walk on the dark side and the Apocalypse Roy kept glancing back and forth between the us. I don't think he could quite believe we were both still here, hell sometimes I don't. The few times he said anything his comments were aimed more at what we were feeling at the time, not the monsters or the resurrections.

Sam paused and took a drink of his beer so I decided to jump in again."Trust me, we should have been dead years ago. Well technically we were."

It was kind of odd that our various deaths weren't what he focused on, "Yet you're still a team, Dean, even with all of that."

"Who the hell else would put up with this crap? Not that we haven't had our moments, but yeah, we usually manage to muddle through somehow."

"Huh," Roy pulled his phone out and took a quick look at it. "It's pretty late and I need to work at the club tomorrow morning. Thea rented it out for some event, I should get going." It was weird because he cut things short, put his shoes back on and got ready to leave "Thanks for telling me all that."

That threw us both off, "Sure. Is something going on?"

Roy's face went blank but not fast enough, something was seriously bugging him, "Not really. Thanks." He bailed way too quickly for it to be casual, leaving Sam and I staring at each other.

We waited until the door closed then Sam set his beer down, "Okay, that wasn't odd."

"Did you talk to him at all before the ritual?"

"Not much, had other things on my mind. When we were prepping the basement he asked how we managed to keep doing this for so long and how we know what choices to make. He brought up how Oliver handled the whole League of Assassins thing, he didn't seem too thrilled with it. I got the impression that he felt Oliver was going a bit off the rails, not listening to anyone. Not that we would ever do that."

"Course not, we're the poster children for rational decision making." I caught myself rubbing at where that damn Mark had been, seems to have become a new thing. I kind of have to force myself not to do it. Weeks later and I still can't quite believe it's actually gone.

"I brought that up, but he said that I seem to think ahead and try to see consequences before picking a path."

"He's not wrong on that one."

Sam stood up, grabbed our bottles and tossed them in the makeshift recycling bin we'd made in the kitchen, then grabbed the last two cold ones out of the fridge and handed me one as he walked by. "I kind of get Roy though, Oliver's a lot like you and Roy sees him as a role model of sorts."

I opened mine, took a long drink. Why the hell they look up to me I don't know. "You both should have higher standards for who you look up to. We aren't exactly stable productive members of society."

"C'mon. What superheros are?"

"Superman was sane and Oliver and I are hardly superheros."

"Yeah, but he was an alien. I'm talking the human ones."

"Yeah, okay, point. Still though."

"I don't know, the whole group was pretty messed up when we got here. Maybe he's trying to figure out how to help them work past whatever happened."

"Maybe."

We stayed up for another hour or so then went to bed. Roy didn't show up again until the following week.

Waking up at Oliver's place is always a new experience, seeing the sunrise over the lake isn't something I ever seem to get enough of. I opened my eyes Thursday morning of the fourth week and watched as the wind caused random ripples on the surface of the lake. I knew if we stayed out here much longer we'd forget how to hunt. Even though I'd gotten restless there was definitely a part of me that wanted to take another week or two more, especially since the last time I held weapons I just about killed Sam. I know it's gone, I know I'm me again but still. I just can't trust it, I can't trust anything, not after the last few years. There's only one way to find . After we knew for sure that the Mark was gone Dig had returned our weapons stash and Sam had locked them in the trunk, not out of concern but more to make it very clear that we were on vacation didn't need to have all that crap lying around in plain sight.

I got out of bed, showered, threw on clothes, grabbed the keys and ended up staring down at the lid of the trunk. "It's not like they're going to jump out at me. I need to get a grip." I opened it, unlocked the compartment, propped the lid open with the shotgun and took stock of how I felt. No violent urges, no hate. I picked up my 1911, the weight of it felt good, like reconnecting with an old friend that I hadn't really paid attention to lately. I took that as a good sign. "Sorry darlin, haven't been myself lately." I told her. Out of sheer force of habit I checked the clip and the chamber, shoved the clip back in and set it back down. The knife I'd taken off of Cain glistened in the early morning light, the reflection from the sun hit me eyes and made me look away. Then all those fucked up memories started coming back and sent my adrenaline through the roof not from Mark induced rage or a desire to kill, but out of sheer disgust. My stomach twisted as faint hints of the things I'd felt came along with the images. That's when I decided to leave it there, I didn't even want to pawn it off. Who knows what crap was attached to it now.

Gravel and dirt crunched behind me, "Hey," Sam's hand landed on my shoulder, "You good?"

"Yeah." I pointed to Cain's knife, "Take that and toss it in the lake or bury it somewhere."

Sam didn't ask why, just grabbed the blade and some of the rope we always keep handy then started walking down the dock. I stayed by the trunk waiting, a few moments later I heard a rather large splash of water and Sam reappeared. "Done. Tied it to a rock. I'll tell Oliver it needs to stay down there too." Sam gave him a long look. "Ready to hit the road again?"

"If we don't leave soon we should probably start paying rent."

"True, and we don't make near enough to pay for that place. You want to have them all up here for dinner or something before we take off?"

"I hate long goodbyes."

"And?"

Sam knew me far too well to buy that as the reason. "Just want to get back to our normal again, I guess." And see if it really is gone.

"Hey, it's gone. Really." His face was full of hope and reassurance, as usual.

"Our track record for happy endings is pretty craptastic. I'll withhold actual optimism till after we do a few jobs if it's all the same to you."

"Well we should at least see them before we take off. I'll call Oliver let him know we're heading out in a few hours and that we'll drop by the club on the way out of town. He'll understand."

"Thanks. Let's get some breakfast."

We stalled over breakfast, as much as we wanted to get moving, I had to admit I wasn't all that thrilled to drive for thirty hours again. Oliver's place had made me soft.

The door bell rang, I looked at Sam who shrugged. "You're turn."

"Gee thanks," I walked down the hall, opened the door and was somewhat surprised to see Roy standing there, whole truckloads of resolve on his face, "What's up?" What the hell was he so worked up about?

"Oliver told me you guys were taking off today."

"Yeah," I stepped to the side to let Roy in.

"I, I sort of wanted to talk to you about something."

I shut the door, "Not really feeling nostalgic," I said as we headed towards the dining room.

"Not about that.."

"Roy?" Sam asked, "Something wrong?"

"No, well kind of." Roy shifted his weight, trying to hide his nervousness, "Look, I know this is kind of weird and awkward but I wanted to know if I could come. I'll take my own car so I don't crowd you guys. I'm guessing you two probably need to get your feet wet hunting again after everything that happened here."

I was stunned, he hadn't given any hints he wanted to hunt all of a sudden. He'd also been dead on with Sam and I needing to ease back into the job.

Sam set down the dish he was cleaning, wiped his hands on a towel and leaned against the sink. "Uh, what? Why?"

Roy opened the fridge, grabbed a beer, popped it open and took a long drink.

"Well at least you got the drinking part of the job down."

The look Sam shot me spoke volumes.

I shrugged "What?"

"Nothing," Sam replied then looked back at Roy, "How about you fill us in on why you're looking at a career change?"

"I'm not, not permanently anyway." He stopped. An awkward, embarrassed and slightly ashamed look crossed his face. "Uggh, not sure how to say this without sounding like I'm whining or bashing Oliver."

"Just talk," Sam said, "We won't judge."

"Okay, Oliver sucks at running a team," he blurted then stopped and winced.

"Well, that was blunt."

"Dean..." Sam sighed, "Go on Roy."

"It's not all the time, but he seems to forget that we all have strengths too. Felicity just does her thing whether or not he tells her what she should do, sometimes I feel like she's the one running the whole thing, not him. He shuts us out half the time and always seems to be making things up as he goes. He never really plans anything. So much of what has happened could have been prevented if he'd just listen to Dig or Felicity or even me sometimes. He's always reacting."

Sam and I stared at each other for minute, everything Roy was saying pretty much applied to us too. Most of it was all the things we'd decided to try to fix. "When you're in it, it's pretty hard to see three or four moves ahead sometimes."

"Especially dealing with shadowy things like the League or an expert manipulator like Malcolm," Sam added. "Trust me, most of the time we're just making it up as we go along too."

"But you handle it differently. I watched you. When Dean was too screwed up to see you he still worked at solving things, figuring it out. When you, Cas and Felicity were working on decoding that ritual thing you all respected each other, listened to each other."

"Do you think Oliver doesn't respect you? Or Dig? Or Felicity?" Sam asked.

"No, well.." His eyes said what he couldn't.

"Remember what I told you back in the basement? Oliver's not exactly going to tell you he's proud of you. Hell it took me almost dying the third time for Dean to come out and admit that."

"I do Sam, I just, I just think I can learn more from you two right now then him."

"Yup, need better role models, both of you." It was time to put an end to this whole thing or so I hoped. "Roy, look I appreciate the compliment that somehow you think we'd be the perfect Mr. Miyagi to your Karate Kid but we're honestly more screwed up then Oliver. At least here you have Felicity and Dig, they're level headed. Dig's the one you should be trying to learn from. That man is as solid as a rock and I'm not just talkin' about physically."

"Yeah he is, maybe if Oliver listened to him..." Frustration creeped into his voice. "He bailed on us, I know you understand why but I never will. He protected Merlyn of all people from the League, then was going to take the fall for everything. He wouldn't let us come up with other ways to handle it either. He made his choice and didn't even consider what the rest of us would go through because of it!" He'd been getting angrier as he spoke and his fist hit the table top as he said the last few words.

"Calm down, sit. All that aside, what do you think you'll learn from Sam and I?"

"How to talk to Oliver, make him listen. How to plan better, how to be better. Half the time I'm out with Oliver I feel like I have no real clue what I'm doing, not with the fighting. That I know, been doing that all my life, but how to think, see what he sees, pick up on what he does. We don't move like a team, hell he and Dig still don't even though they've been together longer. Oliver busts into places and moves so fast that I can't follow him and we never seem to get around to having time to talk about it later. I sort of got the vibe that maybe you two would be easing back into things and so you might have time to teach me."

"And Oliver doesn't now that Merlyn's gone? The best way to learn to think like Oliver is to be right next to him. Sam and I move and think completely differently than Oliver does, and hunting monsters is way different than taking on crooks."

Yeah, you're probably right." Roy dropped his gaze and started to turn away when Sam stopped him.

"Hang on. Give Dean and I a second will you?"

"Uh sure. I guess."He picked up his beer and left the kitchen.

"No, just no."

"All right Oliver.." Sam replied, his eyebrow raised in a bit of a challenge.

"Really? Fine. Why?"

"We wanted to go back to basics right? What better way to do that then to be teaching someone else?"

"We know how to hunt Sam. We don't need remedial hunting classes."

"It's not about the physical part of hunting, we could lop off heads in our sleep, hell we pretty much do. It's about everything else. Having him around will make us think things through, go slow. He said it wasn't going to be permanent. That and I don't want us to fall back into our old patterns. If we're responsible for Roy it will force us to do things differently."

"I can't babysit without knowing..."

"First off," Sam interrupted, "Roy is perfectly capable of taking care of himself and you know it so cut the babysitting crap. Secondly, ever think that having something other than that possibility to think about might help you? I know you're going over every little thing you think and feel searching for hints that it's still there. With Roy around, asking questions, being something different on a hunt it will take your mind off of it. What was the point of these last four weeks if you're just going to drive yourself right back to the dark side of things by being paranoid?" Sam took a few steps closer and something about the look on Sam's face brought up that night in the church when Sam chose to live instead of seal the Gates of Hell. "These last few weeks we've managed to be brothers again, not hunters, not brothers fighting some jacked up fate, just brothers. You know as well as I do that once we get back in Baby and on the road again we could lose that. When we're out there, hunting, we've always acted a certain way. We both agreed to change, but it won't happen overnight. What Roy thinks we can teach him, that's sort of how we agreed to try to be. Think about it." Sam backed away and returned to the sink where he picked up another few dirty dishes and started scrubbing them.

He had some good points not that I actually had to admit that. "All right, just so you don't call me Oliver again. At least I have a sense of humor. I'd never threaten to stick an arrow in some guy's tires just because of some worms."

"No you wouldn't, you'd just steal the guy's car or have it towed." Sam replied without even looking up from the sink.

"Well yeah, but not for worms. Maybe a snake or something."

"Nice to know you have a sense of scale when it comes to things you'd trash people's cars for. So Roy's in?"

"Sure, let's make it a field trip," I muttered.

"Let's hope Thea gave him a permission slip or things might get dicey before we even leave town."

"Oh hell. How about we tell him where to meet us, then split. Really don't want to face her, she might manage to kick my ass."

Sam laughed, "I'd pay to see that."

"Laugh it up, she'll be mad at you too."

"Crap. We'll do it your way."