Hey guys! I'm so sorry for the delay but I was super busy last week and didn't get a lot of time to write. Hope you enjoy!
Chapter 14: Hunting the Hunter
The Road So Far...
Dean took a deep breath, he knew what he had to say next was going to be tough. "Sammy, before Dad died he told me something; something about you."
"What? What did he tell you?"
"He told me to take care of you, and watch out for you," Dean replied, refusing to meet his brother's eyes.
Sam raised an eyebrow. "Dean, he must've said that to you at least a thousand times."
"No, this time was different… He told me that, I had to save you," Dean continued.
His younger brother took a step closer to him. "Save me? Save me from what?"
"He just said to save you, that was the most important thing, and he said if I couldn't save you, then… He said I'd have to kill you, Sammy."
Sam was completely bewildered by their father's last words. "Kill me? What the hell what he say that for?"
"I don't know," Dean replied as he glanced downwards.
"I- He must've had a reason for saying that. Did he mention anything else? Anything about The Demon's plans for me? Am I supposed to go to the Dark Side?" Sam prompted desperately.
"No. He didn't say anything else, I swear," His brother shook his head.
Sam narrowed his eyes at him, "You know, you had no right to keep this from me."
"I promised Dad-"
"You are such a hypocrite! Mia promised Dad something too and look how pissed you were that she kept it from us. Why couldn't you just man up and tell me? This is my life at stake, Dean, not yours!"
Dean turned defensive, "You think I wanted this secret in my head? God, I wish he never told me…"
Sam glared at his brother, infuriated. He took a few steps away to calm himself down before returning to the conversation, "We need to figure out what the hell this means, and what happens next."
Dean, who was eager to change the subject, jumped in. "I think we should lay low, and figure things out-"
"Yeah, figure out if I'm not a psycho killer!"
"I never said that, okay! You're immune to some demon virus, and I don't know what to even think anymore! I get it, you're mad at me and you have every right to be. But you gotta understand that this is freaking me out just as much as it's freaking you out. Please, let's just lay low until we come up with our next move, okay?" Dean pleaded.
"Forget it," Sam snapped.
"Please! Just give us some time to think, Sammy."
Sam reluctantly agreed and followed his brother back to the Impala. Dean told him that they were going to drive to a nice motel and hang out there until they decided what to do next.
As they drove, Mia woke up. She sat up in the backseat and stretched herself out.
"Where are we going?" She yawned.
Neither brother answered her.
The girl frowned and stared at the brothers. Sam's position was angry. His facial expression was twisted into a mixture of hatred and fear. Dean's expression looked grim. Both brothers were angled away from each other, but every so often, Dean would glance over at his brother who was determinedly staring out the window.
Great, Mia thought to herself. They probably had some stupid fight.
She knew enough about the Winchesters to understand that trying to get them to talk about it would prove to be pointless, especially for Dean, so she decided to keep to herself. She popped in her earbuds, cranked up the volume on her iPod and listened to Coldplay until she fell back asleep.
They got to the motel by nightfall. Dinner was snacks from a vending machine. Once they finished eating they prepared for bed.
Mia, out of habit, walked over to the cot in the corner of the room where she normally slept, but Sam stopped her.
"I don't mind taking the cot, tonight. You can have my bed, He said to her.
The brunette lit up in excitement. "Really? That whole bed for me!?"
He nodded and smiled.
She cheered loudly and sprinted towards the Queen bed before doing a high jump and landing on her back. She began bouncing up and down happily.
Dean, whose bed was close beside hers, shot her an incredulous look.
"What? I haven't slept on an actual bed in months," She retorted as she bundled the sheets around her tired body.
Dean muttered something that sounded like 'annoying,' before turning out the light.
Unsurprisingly, Mia fell asleep in under ten minutes, Dean took a longer time but eventually, he too, joined her in dreamland.
Sam lay in the cot and felt his sympathies go out to Mia, as he realized how extremely uncomfortable it was. Once he saw that both she and his brother were fast asleep, he climbed out of bed, still dressed, and grabbed his bags. He then quickly scribbled a note and put it beside Mia in her bed so she would be sure to find it when she woke up. He nicked the keys to the Impala from his brother's pocket before taking off in the middle of the night.
A couple of hours later, Mia sat up in bed with a nagging hunger pain. She groaned as she got up to grab something from the vending machine outside their room but before she could climb out of her comfy bed, she felt something beside her crinkle.
She frowned and turned on the light beside her bed and saw a note in Sam's neat writing on the pillow next to her.
Mia,
I'm sorry I haven't been talking to you at all today. This afternoon, while you were sleeping in the car, Dean admitted something to me that I can't believe myself… He told me that before my dad died, he told him that he would have to save me and if he couldn't save me, he'd have to kill me. I guess you weren't the only one that Dad confessed something to before he died. I'm thinking that he had more to hide than he let on, and knows what's happening to me, and what The Demon has in store for me, and all children like me. Dean made me promise to stick with him until we figured something out but honestly, I'm so pissed, I can barely look at him let alone plan my next move with him; so I'm leaving. I know you're gonna be mad that I left you with Dean, and you have every right to be, but I just need to be alone right now. I'm gonna track down the other kids like me and figure out what it is we have to do. Please understand that I need to do this alone. I'll touch base with you soon.
-Sam
P.S. If Dean's giving you a hard time; you know you're always welcome at Bobby's.
Mia read and re-read the note a few times in an effort to decipher where the hell Sam was planning to go to find the other children like him, but found nothing. She glanced over at the empty cot and realized why Sam had offered to switch beds with her; the cot was closer to the door so he could get up without making a sound.
She was utterly shocked by what the note had revealed to her. What else did John Winchester know about the fate of his youngest son? What the hell was the matter with Sam? And what the hell had Dean been thinking, keeping this a secret? Then he had the audacity to call her out for lying about his father's death.
Mia was shaking with fury. She quickly jumped out of bed and over to where Dean was lying, fast asleep.
"Hey, wake up," She yelled as she shook him violently.
He didn't stir.
Mia groaned and decided she needed to take action. She backed into the furthest corner of the room and took off in a running charge. She sprinted to the empty side of Dean's bed and leaped onto it. The momentum she'd gained caused the bed to bounce Dean onto the floor. He hit the ground with a loud THUD!
"WHAT THE HELL?" He grumbled as he sat up. He rubbed his head and noticed Mia, sitting in her short nightgown on his bed, arms crossed and glaring at him furiously.
"Good, you're up," She said to him, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "Would you like to tell me exactly what you said to Sam earlier today?"
Dean stood up, towering at 6'1, over Mia. "What the hell are you even talking about? And why the fuck did you wake me up for?"
"This!" Mia held out the note that Sam had left for her.
Dean snatched it from her and quickly scanned it. His eyes widened in shock as he read and by the time he finished, he glanced up at the cot in the corner that was empty.
"I can't believe this… he left," Dean exclaimed in disappointment.
"Your dad said you would have to kill him? What the hell does that even mean?" Mia demanded.
He ignored her questions and walked over to fish through his jacket pockets.
"He took Baby!? Oh, he's in for it," Dean muttered to himself as he began packing up.
Infuriated that Dean refused to acknowledge her existence, Mia walked over to him and stepped right in his path, forcing him to confront her.
"What do you want?" He asked in utter annoyance.
"Why did your dad say that?"
"I don't know, okay! Now leave me alone, I gotta find Sammy," Dean snapped back before moving to grab his things.
"Not without me you're not," Mia shot back.
Dean turned and glared at her. "No. You are going to Bobby's. I'm going to find my brother and talk some sense into him before he does something stupid."
"I care about Sam too! We need to find him before something terrible happens and whether you like it or not, we're gonna have to work together!" She insisted.
Dean took a deep breath. As much as it pained him to admit it, he did need her to come because it seemed that she might be the only person who Sam might listen to.
"If you're not outside in five minutes, I'm leaving without you," He told her before heading outside, having finished packing.
Mia was quick and finished packing her things in minutes. She met Dean in the parking lot and watched as he tried to break into a nice-looking mustang using a wire hanger.
"What the hell is this? Grand Theft Auto? Just call Bobby, he has tons of cars we can borrow," Mia exclaimed.
"Bobby runs a junkyard, not a car rental place, stupid," He shot back as he disabled the alarm system and unlocked the doors. "Besides, I'd take this car to a rusty old van any day."
Mia rolled her eyes but threw their gear into the trunk of the car and climbed into the passenger seat. Dean made short work of hotwiring the car and getting them onto the road.
He glanced over at her with a self-righteous smirk on his lips.
She crossed her arms, irritated by his cockiness. "What? Am I supposed to be impressed?"
"Not like you have the skills to break into a car," He stated.
Mia frowned. "Whatever. Now, let's think; where would Sam go if he needed help tracking someone?"
"Bobby?"
"No."
"How do you know?" Dean snapped.
"Because he probably would've mentioned it in the note since he suggested that I go to Bobby's," Mia shot back.
Dean thought hard for a moment, then lifted his head in realization. "The note said he wanted to find the rest of the kids that were like him, right? Who do we know with the technology to track down people like that?"
"Ash! He went to the Roadhouse!" Mia exclaimed in realization.
The eldest Winchester boy smiled for a moment before gunning the engine. At their rate, they'd get to the Roadhouse by the afternoon.
Meanwhile, Sam walked into the Roadhouse. He spotted Ellen who was clearing up for the night and headed over to her.
"Hey, Ellen," He grinned.
The older woman smiled back. "Hi Sweetie, what can I do for you?"
"Do you know where Ash is? I need his help."
She nodded. "He's in the back. He'll be out in a few minutes. In the meantime, why don't you sit down and make yourself at home?"
Sam sank into one of the bar stools. He glanced around the nearly deserted bar as Ellen continued to wipe down the counter.
"Where's Jo?"
Ellen stopped wiping and sighed. "I don't know."
"What?"
"Ever since her father died, she's been wanting to become a hunter. I've always been able to talk her out of it saying that she was too young, too inexperienced, that most girls aren't hunters, but when Mia showed up with you and your brother, Jo saw that I was wrong. Mia is younger yet she's been on more cases than Jo has ever even heard about. She wouldn't stop talking about it, and one day a group of young hunters about her age came in and asked her to join them on a hunt. I refused, and told her 'not under my roof', so she left with them. She still checks in from time to time, but I'm not too sure what she's up to these days," Ellen divulged sadly.
Sam felt sympathetic. He could tell that, although she didn't want to show it, Ellen was pretty broken up about her daughter going off to hunt. He had always noticed that Jo seemed to be interested in their hunts and every time they visited the bar, she would listen to Mia's stories intently. In fact, the two girls had become good friends. He wondered if Mia knew that Jo had run off.
"Of course, I don't blame Mia, it's not her fault," Ellen continued. "I just hope Jo knows what she's doing."
"You raised her right," Sam reassured the woman. "I'm sure she'll be fine."
Ellen nodded distantly as she resumed clearing up the bar.
Ash came in with a bottle of Heineken in his hands and grinned when he recognized Sam.
"Sam Winchester, what can I do for ya?"
"Remember that case I worked a while back, the Andy Gallagher one? Well, I need you to do that search again, but this time a nationwide search. Every baby born in 1983 whose mother perished in a fire that originated from the nursery on the night of their six-month birthday," Sam instructed.
Ellen frowned. "But I thought you said there was no way to track the kids like you because not all of their mothers' died in fires."
Sam shrugged, "I gotta start somewhere."
Ash wrote down the information and then headed into his room to search them on his supercomputer.
Mia snapped her phone shut and walked over to the bar counter. They'd pulled over during the route to the Roadhouse, upon Mia's relentless insistence, for something to eat.
Dean sat up at the bar, munching on a club sandwich. Mia climbed onto the stool next to him and took a sip of her beer.
"I called every one of your contacts like you told me to. Most of them haven't spoken to Sam in years, Bobby said he'll keep trying his phone, Ellen won't answer her phone and neither will Jo," She reported.
Dean chewed slowly then swallowed before he spoke; "Did you try calling Sam again?"
"Multiple times, went straight to voice mail."
"Try him again," Dean told her as he continued to chew his sandwich.
Mia glared at him and snatched the sandwich out of his hands. "How about I eat MY food and you call him for the tenth time?"
Dean smirked. "I don't think you want it, I licked the bread."
She immediately dropped the sandwich and groaned loudly. "Why can't you ever just eat your own food?"
He picked up the sandwich and took a large bite of it while he made eye contact with her.
"Don't you chew your food at me like that," Mia glowered at him angrily.
He continued to chew his food passive-aggressively at her, finding amusement in her growing irritation.
"God, you're like a fucking goat!" She cursed.
Suddenly, her phone went off and she flipped it open, hoping it would be Sam. "Hello?"
"Hi, Mia! It's Jo. Sorry I missed your call earlier, I was busy. What's up?"
Mia grinned and mouthed the caller's name to Dean who was gazing at her questioningly. "Hey, Jo. Has Sam been over there? I've been calling your mom too but she won't pick up."
Jo's voice turned serious. "No, but there's something I have to tell you…"
She went on to tell Mia about how she'd met a group of young hunters at The Roadhouse who asked her to join them on a case. She agreed and snuck out to hunt with them and liked it so much that she decided to run off with them to become a hunter.
"I just wanted to tell you this because your story really inspired me. All my life, I've been living in a hunter's world and wanting to be a part of it but my mom would always say that I needed to go to school, get a real job, and live in the real world, and that a young girl like me wouldn't be able to pull off hunts. But seeing you, and learning how you were brave enough to leave your home and your family to become part of something… it finally gave me to courage to follow my dream. I realized that school and jobs aren't for everyone, and people like us know there's more to life than what most people believe."
"Wow, I'm-I'm touched… I'm so happy for you Jo! I know you'll be a great hunter!" Mia beamed into the receiver.
Jo was ecstatic to hear the pride and happiness in her friend's voice. "It means so much to hear that from you, but I gotta go, we're tracking some werewolves in LA. I'll call Sam for you if you want."
"That would be great, thanks, Jo. Take care of yourself, okay?" Mia told her.
"Oh I will," Jo promised. "Bye!"
Mia hung up the phone and smiled to herself. No one had ever told her anything like that before. She'd never been anyone's inspiration, and to hear Jo thank her for being brave was enough to make her happier than she'd been for ages.
"What happened?" Dean asked as he licked the crumbs of Mia's sandwich off of his fingers.
Mia told him that Jo had run off to become a hunter, having been inspired by her story.
Dean stared at her incredulously. "Why would she do that? Ellen must be worried sick about her, and she throws her life away to hunt. How is this life better than being able to live, go to school, have a family and parents that love you?"
He paused then snorted sarcastically. "Oh wait, I forgot who I was talking to…" He then reached over to his soda and took a long sip.
By then Mia was absolutely fuming. Why was it that every time she felt happy, Dean had to ruin everything? Jo had made her feel like she was special, that her friendship and her existence actually meant something, and Dean had to ruin it but insinuating that she was selfish and immature.
Mia threw up her hands in exasperation. She missed Sam more than anything and wished he was here so he could say something to get his brother to stop being so obnoxious.
"I got it," Ash announced as he stepped back into the bar.
Sam and Ellen glanced up.
"I tracked them just as you asked and I got four results for babies born in 1983, nursery fires on their six-month birthday, blah blah blah. So there's Sam Winchester, Max Miller, Andrew Gallagher, and Scott Carey."
"Only four?" Sam asked in disbelief. He was sure there had to be more.
"Yep," Ash replied as he slammed the papers down on the counter in front of him.
Sam glanced over at the papers, "Is there an address for Scott Carey? I've already met Max and Andy."
Ash flipped through the papers and handed Sam one with Scott's address: "The Arbor Hill Cemetery in Lafayette, Indiana. Plot four-eighty-six."
"He's dead?" Sam exclaimed.
"Yep, stabbed or something. The fuzz doesn't really have any suspects…"
Sam gathered up the papers and stood up. "Thanks, Ash. I'd better get going."
"To where?" Ellen called as she came out of the bar.
"Indiana," Sam replied. "I need to find some answers."
Ellen nervously twisted her fingers. "Sam, you know your brother and Mia have been calling here non-stop. I'm gonna have to call them back to tell them where you're going…"
Sam became worried. "Please, don't. My brother and Mia can only protect me from so much, and this is something I need to do on my own."
Reluctantly, Ellen agreed not to tell them where he was going and watched Sam leave. She sincerely hoped he knew what he was doing.
"Hey look, a New Mexico license plate," Mia exclaimed as she pointed at a car that passed by them.
Dean made an indifferent noise.
They'd gotten back on the road towards the Roadhouse and besides the sound of Dean's music, Mia was sick of the silence. Determined to strike up a conversation, she turned back to him. "Did you know that even though I grew up in Texas I was born in-"
"Did you know that I don't really care?" Dean retorted.
Mia clenched the armrest to resist the urge to punch him in the face. But luckily, a distraction came in the form of a phone call from Ellen Harvelle.
"Hey Ellen, thanks for calling back," Mia greeted before putting the phone on speaker.
"Sam was here but he just left a few hours ago," Ellen informed her.
"Where did he go?" Dean demanded.
"Dean, you know you can't protect him forever… but you know what? Screw it. He's going to Lafayette, Indiana looking for Scott Carey."
"Thanks," Dean replied before she said goodbye and hung up.
Sam walked out of Scott Carey's house. After conducting an interview with the boy's father, he'd learned that Scott seemed to have nightmares, and visions before he died. His psychiatrist had prescribed antidepressants and sleeping pills. He had a strange collage in his room made of various pictures of dark creatures with yellow eyes. It seemed that another psychic had been affected by the yellow-eyed demon.
As he walked towards his motel room, he noticed a short girl in her mid-twenties with light brown hair running towards him with a determined expression.
"You!" She approached him, eagerly.
Sam squinted at her, "Do I know you?"
She sighed in relief. "My name is Ava, Ava Wilson and I know this might seem really strange but trust me-you're in danger!"
"What are you talking about?"
"I know this seems insane but… I get visions, they come in the form of dreams; well, nightmares really, and I've seen your death. Oh gosh, I hope that sounded better than I think it did," The young woman exclaimed in a worried tone.
Sam put his hands on Ava's shoulders to steady her. "Ava, it's okay. My name is Sam Winchester, and I believe you. Now, please tell me more about these dreams."
Reassured, the young woman nodded. "Right, well, about a year ago I started getting these really bad headaches and then I'd see things in my dreams. I never really gave it much thought until I saw a guy get stabbed in a parking lot about a month ago, and then I saw this,"
She pulled a newspaper clipping out of her pocket. The headline story detailed the murder of Scott Carey who had, just like Ava's vision, been stabbed in a parking lot.
"My visions come true! Then I saw you, I saw you standing in front of some cabin, then you walked inside, and got blown up!" Ava told him anxiously.
Sam was shocked. "How did you find me?"
"You were holding a piece of stationary with the name of your motel on it, and I googled the place, and drove down here to give you a warning."
"Wow, that means… That means you're one of us!" Sam declared with a mixture of disbelief and dread.
Ava was confused, as the words 'one of us', sounded much more sinister than Sam had intended them to. "What the heck does that mean?" She demanded.
Sam launched into an explanation, "You're a psychic. Listen, Ava, I'm just like you, I get visions too. I think we're all connected!"
"You're nuts," Ava laughed nervously. "That's just wonderful…"
"No, no. Ava, did your mom die in a house fire?"
"My mom lives in Palm Beach! And what does she have to do with any of this?" She narrowed her eyes at him.
Sam frowned, deep in thought. It seemed that just like Andy's twin brother, Ava didn't fit the pattern either.
"Look, I have no idea what you're even talking about, but can you please just leave town? You seem like a nice person and I really don't want to see you blow up," The young psychic pleaded.
Sam shook his head. "I can't. There's something going on here, Ava, something bigger than us. There are more psychics like us, and we're all connected for some reason. I'm not going to rest until I figure out how and why."
The brunette groaned in exasperation. "Screw that, I'm a secretary from Peoria. I'm not a part of anything! You want to blow up, then that's your own business. You see this ring?"
Ava held up her hand for him to inspect it.
"I am getting married in less than eight weeks and instead of mailing invitations, which I'm behind on by the way, I'm over here talking to you and trying to save your weirdo ass! You wanna die trying to figure out if we're part of something, you do that. I'm going back to reality."
She moved to walk away from Sam but before she could, he spoke; "But don't you want to know why this is happening? Aren't you scared of your visions? If you leave now, you'll never know what's going on. Please, stay. I could use your help."
Against all of her better judgment, Ava took a deep breath and turned back to face Sam.
"What do we need to do?"
Sam told her that they needed to steal Scott Carey's files from his therapist's office, so they could understand what kind of powers he had and what his obsession with yellow eyes was. He told Ava that he needed her to pose as a distraction and ask for a therapy session with the town's therapist, Dr. Waxler, while he broke into the man's office to steal the files.
Surprisingly, Ava was up to the challenge and performed remarkably well. She managed to distract the therapist who heard Sam trying to sneak into his office by pretending to think that she'd attempted suicide by ingesting both pop rocks and coke as a child.
Once they pulled it off, they went to Sam's motel room and sat in front of the windows to listen to the tapes Dr. Waxler had recorded during his sessions with Scott.
"How are you doing?" Sam asked to make sure that Ava wasn't freaking out about assisting with theft.
"Are you kidding? I just helped you steal a dead patient's confidential files from a doctor's office… I'm awesome!" She beamed.
Sam smiled. He liked the girl's cheerful attitude.
He pressed play on the voice recording and both of them listened to the session. They learned that Scott had migraines, just as they did, but he also had the ability to electrocute objects with his mind. He confessed to electrocuting the neighbor's cat as well as seeing visions of a man with yellow eyes who claimed that a war was coming and all those with powers like him would be soldiers in the war.
"Does he mean us?" Ava asked in disbelief.
Sam glanced down, worriedly. "I think so…"
"There's got to be dozens of motels in this town, how are we supposed to find the one Sam's staying in?" Mia groaned as Dean drove down the main street of Lafayette.
Before Dean could retort, he rejoiced when he recognized his cherished Impala parked in the nearest motel, which was called The Blue Rose Motel.
He parked their car beside his and got out to inspect it.
"Baby, I'm so sorry! I'll never let anyone take you away again," He promised the vehicle as he stroked the car's door.
"Oh brother," Mia rolled her eyes as she got out of the car as well. She glanced across the lot and grinned when she recognized Sam standing in front of the window of one of the motel rooms.
"Hey! Sam's okay!" She exclaimed in delight.
Dean sighed in relief then chuckled to himself when he spotted Ava. "He's more than okay, the sly dog!"
Mia smacked his arm. "Stop being gross."
"Make me," He hissed back irritably.
She released a frustrated groan and glanced over at Sam and the mystery girl who seemed to be listening to some sort of tape player. She wondered what they were doing and if it had anything to do with Sam's investigation of his powers.
Suddenly, a loud series of shots rang out and the glass window Sam had been standing in front of was shattered. Luckily, he and his friend had managed to hit the floor before bullets started to whizz at them.
"Where the hell is that coming from!?" Mia exclaimed, trying to find the origins of the shots.
"Up there!" Dean shouted, pointing at a man with a sniper rifle who was standing on the roof of the building.
The two of them darted for the stairs to the roof of the building and made it up just before the man could take another shot.
"Is that-" Mia wondered, realizing how familiar the man in front of them looked.
"Gordon!" Dean finished for her before jumping and attacking the rogue hunter. He kicked Gordon hard, managing to knock him over. He continuously punched him in the face while Mia watched, wanting to punch Gordon in the face as well.
Dean grabbed the man by the collar. "YOU DO THAT TO MY BROTHER, I'LL KILL YOU!" He promised.
"Dean, wait!" Gordon pleaded, and then proceeded to knock Dean out with his sniper rifle.
He got up, wiped the blood off of his face, and turned to Mia. "Look, I'll make this simple for you, we don't have to fight, all you need to do is-"
But Mia took his moment of hesitation to kick him in the balls. Gordon released a string of expletives in agony.
"Well that's too bad, because I want to fight!" Mia retorted before slamming her elbow down on the back of his neck, a move she'd learned from watching wrestling as a kid.
Gordon groaned. "That's it. No more being a gentleman."
He pulled out his gun to smack her in the head with it but Mia dodged it by taking a step backwards. Unfortunately, she had stepped back and tripped over Dean's unconscious form. As a result, she fell hard, on her head and knock herself out.
Gordon chuckled to himself, "Well, I guess that saves me the trouble."
Dean and Mia awoke in some deserted cabin. Both of them were tied to chairs that were facing each other.
"Gordon! What the hell is this?" Mia shouted angrily as she fought against her restraints.
Gordon sneered. "I'm working on a new case, and this time, the two of you are going to help me with it whether you like it or not."
Suddenly, Dean's phone rang. He attempted to reach for it but realized that he couldn't. However, Gordon saw him struggling and pulled the phone out for him.
"Sam Winchester," He read the caller's I.D. with a smirk.
He then aimed his gun at Mia's head before turning to Dean. "You are going to answer the phone and you're not going to tell him anything. All you're going to say is that you're in Lafayette and staying at 5637 Monroe Street and need him to come see you, otherwise, I'm going to blow her brains out."
Mia groaned, "Don't tell him that! Now he's going to do it just to spite me."
Dean shot her an amused look, as though he would warn Sam, before leaning towards Gordon who had answered the phone and placed it by Dean's ear so he could talk.
"Hey, Sammy," He spoke levelly.
"Dean! Hey! Look, I'm sorry about taking off like that… The reason I called is that I'm in Lafayette, Indiana, and-"
"I know, Sam. Ellen told me and I'm here too with Mia, she says 'hi', by the way. Lafayette is a really funky town like that song I love," Dean chuckled nervously.
At the words, 'funky town', Mia's head snapped up. She suddenly recalled a conversation between the three of them a few months back;
"So you're telling me, you never liked any disco songs from the 70s?" Mia asked in disbelief as they all sat in the motel room listening to September by Earth, Wind, and Fire.
Dean shook his head. "No way. Disco is overrated. Screw the Bee Gees, Earth, Wind, and Fire, I'll take Led Zeppelin any day over them and their stupid afros and polyester."
Sam frowned, "What about Lipps Inc?"
"Who?"
"You know," Mia insisted before breaking into song, "won't you take me to, Funkytown!"
At the recognition of the tune, Dean released a loud groan. "I especially hate them. God, I hate that song so much my head hurts just thinking about it…"
Sam laughed, "I think you secretly like it but you just don't want anyone to know."
"Yeah, that's his guilty pleasure," Mia giggled. "Every time we fall asleep in the car he pulls out his secret disco tapes that have Funkytown, September, Stayin' Alive, and Let's Groove."
"His favorite movie is probably Saturday Night Fever too," Sam joked to his brother's fury.
"I hate disco! I hate John Travolta in that movie and I especially hate Funkytown! The day I say that I like that song is the day I die or one of the first signs of the apocalypse," Dean exclaimed.
"Mark it down; the day we hear Dean Winchester admit to liking Funkytown, we'll know something has gone terribly wrong," Mia teased.
Sam grinned. "Alright."
Dean had used their 'codeword' to alert Sam. She silently hoped that Sam understood the message.
"Look, Dean, someone's after. I don't know who it is, but I'm in trouble and I need your help," Sam informed him.
Dean reassured his brother that everything would be all right before giving him the address Gordon had mentioned earlier, and telling him to swing by.
Sam hung up and Gordon put the phone away and took the gun off of Mia. "Now, was that so hard?"
"Bite me," Dean retorted angrily.
Sam told Ava that his brother and his friend were in trouble, having deciphered the hidden meaning behind 'Funky Town'. He wrote the address on a piece of hotel stationary, told Ava to go home, and thanked her for her help.
"Is there anything else I can do?" She asked hopefully as they walked out of the motel room.
The boy smiled at her. "You've done so much already. Go home to your fiancé, you'll be safe there. I'll take care of things here."
Ava nodded, worriedly and moved towards her car. "I wrote my number on a piece of stationary in your motel room, please call me when you get your brother and your friend, so I know you're safe."
"I will," Sam promised before she drove off.
Mia grew bored. They'd been tied up for hours now and there was nothing but the sound of Dean humming and Gordon putting away his weapons. He refused to explain anything to them, forcing them to remain in silence. Mia couldn't take any more of it.
"WILL YOU STOP HUMMING!" She exploded at Dean, "It's annoying!"
He seemed surprised by her outburst but nevertheless, he yelled back, "Oh really? And you singing all the time isn't?"
Mia glared at him, "At least I know when to shut up!"
"Is that so?" He questioned sarcastically. Dean hated it when Mia was constantly singing some stupid pop song during their cases.
"Yeah! It is so!" She yelled back.
By now, Gordon appeared to be mildly irritated by their arguing but he didn't make any attempt to quiet them.
"Look," Mia began in a softer tone. "I'm sorry that we argue all the time over the stupidest things, and if Gordon butchers us tonight, then I just want to let you know; if I've ever hurt your feelings or offended you in any way, then you need to know that from the bottom of my heart-"
Her voice dropped to a monotone, "I don't care," She finished.
Dean released a frustrated sigh. "God! Could you be any more irritating!?"
She thought about it for a second then nodded. "Yes, yes I can. Do you want me to be?"
"I want you to shut the hell up! How my brother ever saw potential in you, I'll never know. You're a worthless, unreliable, helpless hunter!"
Outraged by his words, Mia shouted back. "You know what? You are a violent, hypocritical, masochistic piece of crap!"
"Well, you know what? If I was a bird, you'd be the first person I'd crap on!" Dean shouted at her.
Mia was appalled. "YOU TAKE THAT BACK RIGHT NOW!"
"ENOUGH!" Came Gordon's booming voice.
The two hunters stopped bickering long enough to look up and see their captor rubbing his temples in irritation. "You two sound like an old, married, couple, shut the hell up!"
"Say, Gordie," Dean began, taking his interruption as an opportunity to gain some answers. "This seems like a pretty far way to go just to get revenge on us."
Gordon smirked as he sharpened his blades, "Oh, this isn't for revenge, Dean. Sure I was pissed that the three of you left me tied up in my own mess for three days, I'll whup your ass for that soon enough, but I'm no killer. You and her can live, your brother, however, is my kill."
Dean and Mia exchanged horrified looks.
"Wait, are you trying to tell me that you're hunting Sam? As if he was a vampire?" Mia inquired, trying to make sense of what Gordon was doing.
"That's right," He replied. "A few months ago I was faced with a demonic possession case; I did the usual stuff, holy water, exorcism- but then the demon started talking. It mentioned some sort of war, I don't think it meant to, but naturally, it spiked my interest and you can make anything talk if you've got the right tools."
Dean frowned. "And what happened to the person it was possessing?"
Gordon's lip quivered upwards in a sneer, "She didn't make it."
"You son of a bitch," Dean shook his head.
His captor turned and slapped him across the face. "Hey, you watch your mouth. That's my momma you're talking about."
"Well, your mom should have swallowed you!" Mia yelled, enraged by the man's apathy.
"Anyway," Gordon continued, giving her a deadly glare. "The demon talked about some upcoming war, and there would be humans fighting against demons, but get this; there would be humans fighting with demons too! A group of psychics and this part was the real kick in the pants- he told me that I knew one. Our very own, Sammy Winchester."
"Let me get this straight," Dean sighed. "You hear from some random demon that there's some sort of war, where psychics are going to fight, and you believed him?"
"I'm not a nutcase, Dean, I did my homework. I know Sam has visions- you've got your Roadhouse connections and I've got mine. Besides, that's how I found him in this town. Then I ran into another freak, he could deep-fry a person just by touching them. He never killed anyone though, just some cat, but I got rid of him. We have to before they all turn into monsters."
Mia lolled her head back in frustration. "I'm sorry, did your parents play a game of croquet with your head as a baby? Did you spend your childhood drowning little puppies? What the fuck is the matter with you? Hunting people... You are a sick bastard and you need help."
"They're not people," Gordon hissed, "they're monsters."
"Really? Because the only monster I can see here is you," She shot back.
"You really think you're gonna catch my brother like this?" Dean asked him after a moment of silence.
Gordon cocked his rifle. "Of course, after you slipped him that warning-yeah, you didn't think I noticed? He's gonna scout the front entrance, see me with the gun and go around the back where I planted a tripwire attached to a grenade."
"You think Sam is going to fall for a tripwire?" Dean scoffed.
"No, but that's why I put two," Gordon replied.
Mia groaned. "Well, shit."
Gordon went to double-check his traps and then walked back over to Dean and Mia who were silently wracking their brains to think of a way to save Sam.
"I'm surprised at you Dean, you always came across as a professional. I mean, look at it this way, what if little Hitler was riding shotgun with you, and this is back when he was a goofy little artist, and you knew what he would become, would you take him out?" Gordon smiled.
"That's not Sam," Dean replied.
Gordon fixed his attention to the other hunter. "Mia? What about you? I thought Dean said that you claimed the hunting life was your calling, why don't you understand what I'm trying to do?"
Mia glared at him, "I want to protect innocent people; not kill them."
"Well, that's enough out of the two of you," Gordon sighed as he pulled out a pair of bandanas to gag them. He started with Dean first.
"Look, I understand, he's your brother and you love him so this must suck," Gordon said as he finished gagging Dean who glowered at him.
He moved to Mia. "But you need to understand that, Sam is-OWWW!"
Gordon withdrew his hand from Mia's mouth after realizing that she'd bitten him.
"You little bitch!" He exclaimed before slapping her with his good hand.
Mia continued to glower at him, "Go to hell."
Her captor took a deep breath, steadying himself. "Let me put on the gag, or I will kill Dean and make you watch."
She raised her eyebrows, pretending to contemplate the deal.
"For fuck's sake," Dean mumbled through his gag.
Mia resolved to let him put on the gag and winced when he tied the bandana ridiculously tight around her head.
"You make a sound and I'll shoot you, this time," Gordon promised her before moving into his position.
He turned back to Dean and shook his head in disapproval. "If your old man was around, he would've had the stones to kill Sam."
Dean glared at him furiously.
A little while later, Sam turned up at the address. He saw his brother and Mia bound and tied and Gordon guarding the front door so his instinct was to go through the back.
He found that the door was locked and pulled out his lock pick to open it.
Meanwhile, inside, Dean and Mia could hear him trying to come in. Gordon took their fearful faces in stride and walked towards the back of the house to watch Sam. This left his back to Dean and Mia.
Mia instantly began rocking herself back and forth in her chair, she pushed off from the ground as hard as she could and teetered back on the chair. Dean watched her in confusion.
Eventually, she managed to get a good push and knocked herself backward, landing on the ground and managing to break the fragile wooden chair she'd been sitting in.
Luckily, her fall was in sync with the sound of the first grenade going off and Gordon wasn't alerted to her movement.
Dean cried out for his brother through his gag but Gordon put up a hand without looking back. "Wait!" He realized that Sam had set it off purposely.
Mia freed herself from her binds and ripped the bandana from her mouth. She crawled on her belly towards the back room, dragging pieces of the wooden chair along with her.
"IT'S A TRAP!" She cried as loudly as she could manage and before Gordon could even turn around to shoot her, she picked up a broken piece of the wooden chair and chucked it at the second tripwire. It set off the explosion before Sam could be blown to bits.
"THAT'S IT!" Gordon shouted at her, cocking his rifle and aiming it at her head as she lay on the ground. "I've tried to be nice to you, I've tried to be understanding, but you just won't listen to me, and now you've cost me my hunt. I'm going to kill you!"
But before he could pull the trigger, Sam came up behind him and knocked him out with the butt of his shotgun.
Gordon fell to the ground, unconscious, beside Mia.
"Sam! You're okay!" She cried out in relief as her friend pulled her to her feet and scooped her into a hug.
"More than okay," He replied with a friendly smile, "you saved my life! If you hadn't warned me, I wouldn't have seen that second tripwire."
She grinned and then cried out in pain when she felt something stabbing in her back.
Sam turned her around and gasped when he saw that a large piece of the wooden chair was sticking out of her back. "Uh, it's not too bad. We can pull it out now if you'd like."
She took one look at her bloody injury, which she hadn't noticed due to her rush of adrenaline from earlier, and fell forwards in front of Sam in a dead faint. He ensured she was all right before running over to his brother and cutting him loose.
Dean held his brother close, "I'm glad you made it, Sammy."
His younger brother smiled sheepishly but their tearful reunion was cut short when Dean grabbed his brother's gun from the ground and walked over to Gordon.
"Dean, no," Sam insisted.
"I let him live once, I'm not making that mistake again," Dean told him.
"Dean, trust me, let him go," Sam replied as he scooped up Mia's unconscious form and flipped her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
They walked out of the house together and saw sirens flashing in the distance. A bunch of police cruisers stopped at the scene. Dean dove into the bushes for cover with Sam as they watched the cops pull Gordon out of the cabin in handcuffs.
"Is this your doing?" Dean questioned.
His brother ginned. "Anonymous tip. Ash told me the police didn't have any leads for Scott's death, and I found one for them."
"You're a fine upstanding citizen, Sammy," Dean joked.
Mia began to stir and Sam gave his brother a worried look, "We should get her to the hospital."
After a painful removal and thirty-two stitches later, Mia was feeling a lot better. Her back was patched up and she enjoyed a cherry lollipop, given to her by one of the nurses in the hospital.
She sat in the hallway while Dean and Sam spoke to the doctors.
"She's doing fine, she's very lucky the piece didn't get any closer to her spinal cord or she'd be paralyzed," The woman told him. "But her injury has been cleaned out; all the debris and the splinters, so she should heal fairly quickly but make sure she keeps a gauze strip on her back for the next few weeks and she can come back to take the stitches out in about two weeks. As for now, she should avoid sleeping on her backside and any strenuous activities."
Sam thanked the woman for her help and turned to his brother who was watching Mia enjoy her lollipop.
"I told you she was valuable," Sam smirked.
Dean rolled his eyes, refusing to admit that Mia had done well in saving his brother's life.
"Yeah, whatever. So, where are we going next?"
Sam shrugged.
"I was thinking Amsterdam," Dean grinned.
"Amsterdam," Sam snorted. "Dean, we can't go to Amsterdam or California, or the Caribbean. Running away isn't going to solve our problems, trust me, I learned that a while ago. I appreciate that you want to stick with me, and I know you want to protect me from my destiny or whatever but if you wanna stick around, we're still gonna hunt, okay?"
Dean smiled, "Fine, bitch."
"Jerk," Sam huffed in an amused tone. He smiled and pulled out his cell to call Ava again.
"Are you calling that girl again? Geez Sammy, I'm starting to think you're sweet on her."
"She's engaged, Dean."
"So?"
Sam shook his head and smiled but became alarmed when he heard the answering machine again. He was fearful that Ava never made it home.
"Dean, how far is Peoria from here?" He asked.
They drove for three hours until they got to Ava's house where they found her fiancé dead in a pool of his own blood and the bedroom window open and lined with sulfur.
"A demon killed him," Dean affirmed.
"It must've taken Ava, too," Mia added, holding up an engagement ring she found on the floor.
Sam stared out the open window fearfully. What was going on?
A/N: Thanks again for all of your continued support! Honestly, your reviews make my day! Please keep on sending them! As for the storyline, next chapter will answer a lot of questions you may have about Mia and her background story. Also, she's finally going to confront Dean and call him out.
Next Chapter: Dean, Sam, and Mia investigate a haunted inn, and many secrets are revealed concerning Mia's past.