PART ONE: FAMILY VALUES
TEAM WINCHESTER, BERKITSVILLE, USA
"Pie, Sammy! I told you to get pie! Where is the pie?" Dean panicked, strewing the contents of their store bought dinner across the table of the motel. What he saw revealed only one thing - no pie. Dean looked up to his brother, or a Sasquatch- it was hard to tell the difference these days with his shaggy brown hair.
"They didn't have any." Sam responded, a blatant lie, he had forgotten the pie once again. Dean wasn't in the mood for Sammy's 'forgetful' nature, this whole healthy eating thing was becoming a bit much. He called him on it.
"What do you mean they have no pie? What kind of hick town is this? They have a giant orchard but no pies? I smell lies Sammy." Sam shifted uncomfortably, under the knowing gaze of his older brother.
"Alright, I forgot the pie. It's not good for you anyways." He responded, sliding out the chair opposite Dean. He gazed in slight disbelief at the food his brother ate on a regular basis, by choice. The leafy greens and chopped up vegetables, smoothies and god knows what else. Junk. There was no other way to describe it, to be honest there were days he wondered how his brother was even alive. He hurried to push that thought from his head. The pair knew all too well the extent they had and would go to, to revive the other from the dead. Visiting the realm of the shadows a few times himself, he was not to eager for either of them to have a reunion with Death anytime soon.
Dean peeled back the wrapper on his burger and took a large bite, the taste of grease and processed cheese hitting his tongue all at once. A godly combination of flavours, he thought, taking another large bite. "Food of the gods!" He exclaimed, holding the burger as if it contained the very essence of life. He pulled the piece of bacon that hung out with his fingers and dropped it down the hatch, savouring it's greasy taste.
Sam shook his head once more at Dean and popped the lid open on his salad, soaking in the sight of fresh vegetables and grilled chicken. "That stuff's for girls Sammy!" Dean stated, giving his brother a sorry look. Sam rolled his eyes and poured a small amount of dressing on before he dug in. He was still strong on his desire to keep healthy, despite his brother's best efforts to turn him to the dark side. Dean would get it one day, and when that day came he'd be laughing.
"Alright, so what did you find?" Sam asked, as Dean popped the last bite of the burger into his mouth.
"Other than the fact that orchard's productivity has gone down significantly since the last time we were here? Not much." Dean responded, a hint of bitterness to his voice. "And I am not going in that orchard again, couldn't eat apple pie for weeks!"
Sam should have known better than to leave his brother in charge of research, he had a tendency to overlook things. "Do you know how much it takes to ruin pie?" Dean asked, as if it was the true reason they were here. Pie, the strongest force in the cosmic universe! At least, that was the way Dean talked about it.
"The way you eat it? I'm sure it would take a lot to ruin pie." Sam had promised not to preach about his brother's eating habits... and exercise habits... sleeping habits... life choices. Despite this deal, he made a stab every now and then, hoping a subtle reminder might somehow lodge into his brother's thick head, though he knew his attempts were futile.
"I don't know, maybe it's just a coincidence? I mean, it sure looked like the same conditions as the others. Maybe we are looking at just some serial killer. That's not our field Sammy, we'll leave that for the feds and get the hell outta dodge before they come in. People are psychotic, I don't deal well with people."
Sam pondered the words as he took slow, deliberate bites of food, examining the pictures that sat strewn on the table before him. The conditions were all the same, the evidence was the same every time, as in there was none. Each of the four cases there was blood but no physical evidence of anyone but but the missing victim. It sure sounded like something right up their alley, so where were the signs? Local legends, stories, the ones parents passed on to their kids and passed on for generations. After their last visit here things had died down, the story died with the fugly scarecrow. Any stories they did hear all pointed towards another case. An old case known only to few to have been solved by the Winchester brothers. In other words, there was nothing new floating around Berkitsville.
"Maybe there was something else to that case?" Sam suggested, looking up to his brother once again.
"No. Absolutely not, this is something completely different." Sam stood, and wandered over to the bedside table, grabbing an old beat up, leather bound journal and bringing it back over to his seat. "I've already looked through there, the fact of the matter is, it could be anything. Windego, werewolf, vengeful spirit- whatever it was it splattered blood everywhere. Those people had to have been torn apart Sam."
"Find any connection between them? The people I mean." Sam asked, flipping through the yellowed pages of his Dad's handwriting. He remembered when this book had been their almanac, their bible, their saving grace- he remembered when every case could be solved by Dad's journal. Of course that had long since been the case and searching it's pages had become more of a tradition than anything.
"Of course I did, a town this size everyone knows everyone. Half of them went to school together, the other half worked together. If they weren't friends they were enemies with long forgotten feuds over missing lawn mowers." Dean stated, leaning forward in his chair. "Sometimes crazy shit is just that, crazy shit. Know why it's crazy? 'Cause people did it, people never make sense, I'll never understand people, they're psychotic."
"So what does that make us?" Sam asked, testing his brother's theory. "We deliberately hunt down ghosts and demons, we consider an angel our best friend. If they're psychotic what does that make us?"
"Realists Sammy, we hunters understand what's going on in this world better than most, we're just living with what we're given and taking help from where it's needed." Sam gave him a doubtful look, as his brother grabbed the remote and the TV flickered to life. "Alright, we're a little strange, but strange is good Sammy, strange is good." Dean leaned back in his chair and took a swig of his beer, the only thing that helped him keep his sanity in this crazy world. Sam didn't blame him one bit, not after everything he and his brother had been through. Sometimes it was just easier to drink it away than to remember.
"Well, let's stick around for a couple more days, see if we can catch a whiff of anything, then I guess we'll call it done and leave town." Sam agreed, heading to the small fridge and grabbing a beer out for himself. He cracked it open and tossed the cap aside somewhere, probably somewhere one of the duo would step on later. "What's next on our list anyways?" Sam asked sitting on the end of one of the beds.
"Well, there seems to be a lot of action showing up on the radar near Seattle. Looks like it could be something, probably a werewolf by the sounds of it, it's been stirring up quite a mess should be plenty easy." Dean responded, half distracted and searching the channels for something half decent to watch. Sam flipped through the pages of the journal slowly, remembering their encounters with the beasts that graced it's pages. They had came a long way since then and sometimes, just sometimes he almost wished things could go back to being that easy. Just him and his brother saving people and hunting things, the family business.
"Lots going on out there..." Dean muttered, as he let the television rest on some car show Sam knew little about. Sam continued to rifle through the journal, examining its supernatural contents as Dean became absorbed in the chrome of classic cars. He thought back to that life, the simpler version of things. He hadn't let himself think back that far in a long time. Dean breaking into his house and Sam dropping everything, just as he had his whole life to help his brother.
He frowned as he thought about it. "Hey Dean, do you remember that first case we did?"
"Sammy, do you really think I remember that? We were what? Ten?"
"No, not the first but the first we did together. Remember? When you came and got me at school?"
Dean frowned and took a slow sip from his beer, letting a silence hang in the air. He scratched at his scruff idly, as if it somehow had the power to help him think. The crease disappeared from his brow then as he turned to look at Sam with an 'oh come on!' look. "Woman in White, Sammy you're a genius!"