A/N's: Okay, obviously I did not make last week's post but I'm not making you wait till Sunday, either. Thank you all for your patience, understanding, and the many versions of "shut up, lady, we're here till the end, just post when you post and stop being such a worry-wart" (all versions of this were actually so much nicer than that but my internal comedian thinks self-deprecation is *hilarious*)

For real, though, thank you for all the support! It really keeps me going.

Chapter Warnings: We're checking out the quaint little town of Rivergrove, Oregon, which is about to get a whole lot less quaint. The boys have a plan - okay, the boys have *half* a plan - but Hell and a Zombie Apocalypse aren't gonna make it easy for them.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

The Road So Far (This Time Around)

Season 2: Chapter 41

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

Dean remembered the 2014 that was and never should have been. He'd had nightmares about the future Zachariah sent him to for years after he'd come back. Long after the apocalypse ended and with it the potential for that future. It wasn't until the actual year of 2014 had come and passed with no Croats in sight that Dean's mind was finally able to let go of that residual fear and the dreams stopped.

Now, the man from the future was once more facing the very real possibility. Yet again in his lifetime there was a not-insignificant chance of that world coming true. If they didn't stop Hell from starting the apocalypse, the 2014 that had caused so many sleepless nights would be back on the menu of potential ends, and here they were, walking into the very start of it all.

Dean had a feeling his subconscious would be starting those dreams back up again, not that he was planning on sleeping anytime soon.

Rivergrove was quiet as the three hunters hiked into the forest town. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary (but then, nothing ever did with these things). It was the standard fare of a late afternoon in small town America: a car passed down the main street now and then, a trio of older women stood chatting outside the local theatre, and a man on the porch outside the general store was cleaning a dismantled fishing pole.

"It seems pretty quiet," Sam commented, obviously going for calm and reassuring, given how tense Dean was beside him, eyes everywhere and hand a little too tight on the shoulder strap of his duffle.

"Yeah, that's how it starts," the older Winchester growled, but, at least for the moment, he didn't look like he was about to pull his gun on the as-far-as-they-could-tell innocent civilians. His eyes lingered on the clean-shaved, dark-skinned man polishing that fishing pole and Sam recognized the particular stink eye that meant Dean seen something just like it before.

The younger Winchester spared the man an assessing look. He was eyeing them with just as much suspicion, which wasn't all that uncommon in a town whose population size meant everyone knew everyone, and nobody knew them. But Dean turned away: away from the man sitting outside the general store, away from the center of town, and started in the direction of what looked to be residences. Andy and Sam followed quietly, Andy walking backwards a couple of paces, keeping his eyes on the fisherman fellow with about as much tension as Dean, but for entirely different reasons.

Dean had said these were smart zombies. Fast zombies. If Andy had learned anything from the remake of The Dawn of the Dead, it was that you did not take your eyes off of fast zombies.

Sam caught up to his brother, shouldering his own bag a little higher. He glanced surreptitiously around, but they were quickly getting away from the main drag and into houses set back in the woods. There were even fewer people milling about. Still, Sam kept his voice down as he asked, "Do you want to call Cas?"

The look on his brother's face said yes. Yes, absolutely, he wanted to call in Cas. But what he responded with was narrowed eyes and a straight-forward gaze. "Phones are out."

Not that thathad been what Sam was remotely talking about, but the younger Winchester still startled. He stopped walking long enough to pull out his phone and stare at the zero bars up in the left hand corner. Great. Yeah, you know what, if he was going to murder an entire town, that would probably be his first step too. The younger hunter took a deep breath, physically willing away the tension that pulled at his shoulders and neck. When he got moving again, Sam had to jog several steps to catch back up with his brother, who continued on up the road like he hadn't just dropped a major bombshell.

"You can still pray to him."

The side-eye Dean sent his way might been followed any other day with a comment on why was it always Dean's responsibility to contact Cas, considering Sam could pray to him just as easily. But, given the current situation, it wasn't really the right time to rehash that discussion. Dean was still too oblivious about his connection with the angel (particularly over Sam and Bobby's infant relationship with Castiel) to listen to his brother's reasoning anyway.

"No. If Azazel planned this whole thing, than he's got eyes here. I don't want him knowing we got an angel on our side any more than he already does."

He very specifically did not want that yellow-eyed bastard to know Cas's name. A speck of grace in his chest was one thing, but a live angel would become target number one on Azazel's to do list, and you could summon something once you had its name. Over Dean's dead body, of course. But the Winchesters already had one over-Dean's-dead-body problem coming up in the rapidly approaching future. They really didn't need another one. No, Dean was going to keep Cas out of this until he absolutely couldn't. Until it came down to life-or-death. Which, given what they were walking into, was a very real possibility.

"Like you said," Dean grumbled as they started up a hill to a destination Sam didn't know, "we survived this the first time around. We can survive it again."

The younger Winchester didn't exactly like his own words being thrown back at him – words that were intended to save three hundred lives, even at the risk of their own (a reality Sam was not blind too) – but it was too late to change their minds now. Not that Sam would. Sure, he felt a certain level of guilt having talked Dean into this, especially now that he was seeing firsthand how badly affected his brother was. But Sam chose not to respond to the curt words. Partly because he really did believe they would survive this again and partly because if they could survive it, then they owed it to these people to try.

"Not to rain on this already soaked parade and all, but where are we going?"

Andy had been surprisingly quiet on their trek into town, a worrying oddity that had the Winchesters exchanging more than the occasional glance. When they had finished concealing the Impala among the foliage on the side of the road, Dean suggested the kid stay with the car. And, as it was usually Sam making that particular concession, it was a big deal. He even tried for the angle of making sure they had a getaway vehicle warmed and ready to peel out of there. But Andy hadn't taken the bait. Honestly, Dean didn't even know why, anymore. Ever since Mississippi and the crossroads, he'd had a bad feeling in his gut that said to keep an eye on the kid. Dean was starting to worry that Andy's continued participation was more of a death wish than a sense of duty or even curiosity.

He didn't blame the kid. Dean had lived – and not lived – through more than one of those times himself, but he wasn't sure how to help him, either.

"This is the first place we went last time," Dean answered Andy's question, pointing up to a house on the right as they crested the hill. "The kid from Sam's vision lives just up there. Something Tanner. Don't remember the first name, but it was dorky."

"This is the kid you shot?"

Dean offered his brother a defensive look. "Considered shooting. And I didn't do it, alright? We thought he was infected."

Andy had to jog a bit up the hill to catch them, finally having given up watching the man outside the general store now that they'd rounded a bend, well past the point where visual range would actually do any good if the guy was a zombie. The three slowed as the incline evened out and they were left staring at a perfectly normal and seemingly calm house less than a hundred feet away. Andy thought the thing looked ominous just by default.

"And he lives here?"

"He's not home. Camping trip or something." Dean dropped his duffle, reaching inside for a gun which he tucked in his waistline, a Bowie knife that he hooked to his belt, and two extra clips of amo that went in his front pocket. Beside him, Sam and Andy took the cue to do the same. Andy still wasn't much good with handguns, faring better with the wider blast of a shotgun, but he tucked one under his shirt all the same.

Dean eyed the quiet suburban home, shouldering his bag once more as the other two finished arming up. "His dad and brother are in there. They've got the mom tied up. They were cutting her up, bleeding in the wounds."

Andy stilled, arm at an awkward angle halfway through getting his backpack back on. He swallowed, then shouldered the straps, clinging to them tightly. His eyes locked on the home. "Spreading the virus. They're infected."

"First ones we knew of." Which didn't mean they were the first – or only – ones in town, but given how Azazel had apparently set this all up, Dean was having all kinds of new doubts about just how orchestrated the events last time had been. Things that hadn't made sense on that insane, terrifying night – the two of them just happening to stumble on the first infected family right before the mom had turned, the nurse who'd been one the whole time, her patience in waiting to infect Sammy and only Sammy, and the way the whole town cleared out as soon as she'd gotten the job done – were all beginning to settle into startling clarity. An ugly, terrifying clarity.

Dean glanced over his shoulder, back towards the bend in the road and the main town beyond. If things went like they had the first time, they'd be back there soon enough. By then, though, it would be a ghost town. "The Master Sargent back there - the one with the fishing pole? Same spot, same action."

Sam straightened at that, catching his brother's eye. "You think this is the same day as last time?"

"Don't remember the date. Timing's about right, I think." Dean shrugged, glancing up at the grey sky as if reading a clock. He turned back to face the house and the Croats he knew were inside. A bullet to the brain would take them down, but something told the hunter stopping this town from becoming a repeat of the Roanoke colony wouldn't be so easy as killing two infected civilians. "But unless the Sarge does that every day, hours on end like some twisted version of the Truman Show – which I doubt, cuz he was clean last time – I bet Azazel figured out how to get us here right on time."

Sam fought back the second round of doubt over forcing the three of them to come, and instead turned that energy towards resolve. They had a job to do, the whole point of coming in the first place. He threw the strap of his duffel across his chest, game face on. "So what's our plan? How do we contain an entire town before the infection spreads?"

"I doubt the Brady Bunch in there is the only contingency Azazel has." Dean gestured with his chin towards the house. "We kill those people, Hell's probably got another three, four already infected, waiting for the cue to turn."

"We could evacuate the town?" Andy offered, but frowned almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth. "Course, then we'd have no way of knowing if we were sending the infected people out too."

"Or a way to do it, anyway." Sam wore an almost identical frown. "Evacuating a town takes time. Planning. Authority. We'd have to get a town council to agree, or a mayor if they have one. Even if we could talk them into it-"

"Or force them."

"-we don't have that kind of time." Sam ignored his brother's more violent suggestion, since the entire point they were arguing was moot to begin with

"They were more organized than that, anyway," Dean countered. "They had roadblocks, contingencies for anyone leaving town. This place didn't even make the news, even after everyone disappeared."

Which was weird, thinking back on it. Both the Sarge and the kid had made it out, and the Doc said she was heading for the next town over to get the authorities. But there'd been no report, and Dean didn't remember ever hearing about Rivergrove, Oregon again. Not that any of that mattered right now.

Dean shook his head. "Hell's too prepared; we're not going to be able to just sound the alarm."

"So what do we do?" The two turned to Andy, though they didn't have any answers for him. "What about some sort of quarantine?"

"Like a disease?" Sam asked, brow pinching in thought. "That might work. If we can't get everyone out of town, we keep them locked in. If people to stay in their homes, avoid contact with each other, then the virus can't spread."

But Dean was shaking his head for new reasons now. "No one with the authority to control this town will listen to will us without credentials, and we don't exactly have time to build a back story, here."

"Andy can do it," Sam interrupted, but Dean wasn't done.

"We can't just go knocking on every door, finding peopled one-by-one for the kid to talk to."

While the idea of Andy encouraging civilians to lock themselves up had some potential – it would at least buy them time to figure out their next step – the Winchesters didn't have the time it would take to find everyone individually. It might take an hour, if not more, and if Hell had more than one infected lined up, as Dean suspected given how quickly the virus broke out last time, they would just turn and start this thing well before they could get all the civilians contained.

Still, even if they only saved half the people of the town that way, it would be more than had survived last time.

"What if we could talk to everyone at once?" Andy reasoned aloud, rubbing at his chin. "If I could make some sort of blanket announcement, we could get to everyone in time."

"How do we get them all in one place?" Sam countered. "We could get a town meeting called, but again, it would take time to get the word out, time for everyone to gather."

"And we do not want everyone gathered in one place," Andy realized with horror, shaking his head as he thought about the chaos of an outbreak while everyone was essentially locked in a gymnasium or town hall. "Zombie apocalypse rule number one. Okay…what about announcing it through the streets, like cops used to for tornado warnings and hurricane evacuations? It's not a big town."

Dean glanced at Sam and Sam shrugged, those hazel eyes deep in thought. "It would still take time."

"Yeah," the older Winchester agreed, "but it would get people locked in their homes before any infected in the area could start something, right? We might not make it to everyone in the town, but we'd make it to some."

"And if the infected people are subject to Andy's powers, we might be able to keep them from turning," Sam reasoned, the first light of a plan taking shape on his face.

"Would that work?" Andy glanced between the two. "I've never exactly had a chance to test my powers on zombies."

"Well, now you're gonna get to." While said in jest, Dean's words didn't get a laugh out of any of them, the truth hitting far too close to home. "We might as well try. We tell people to stay in their homes and we tell the infected not to turn."

They would have no idea if that plan worked until shit hit the fan, but it wasn't like they had anything else better, either.

"We should tell the infected to lock themselves up," Sam changed course with a thoughtful look. "The virus may not be something they can consciously fight. Even if Andy's powers work on them while they're calm, the turn itself might break his control. So…If you think you're infected, tie yourself up."

"Or report to the local jail." Andy was grinning. "We'll lock 'em up ourselves, we just need to get them to come to us."

"That's not bad," Dean agreed. He eyed the house just down the lane from them and suddenly nodded, decision made. "Let's do a test run. See if a Croat will even listen to you."

Sam and Andy followed his gaze, and Andy, who up until that point had gotten lost in the ease of brainstorming, swallowed difficultly. He hadn't really thought about actually walking up to a zombie and telling him to listen. But, by then, Dean was already headed for the little suburban home, and Sam and Andy had to jog after him to catch up.

The hunter didn't go for subtlety this time. He approached the front door, gun drawn. Once all three of them were on the large porch, decorated in the glory of kitschy signs about fishing and small town life. Dean turned to Andy. "I'll cover you. If this doesn't work, it's gonna go down fast."

"Do we have a plan B?" Sam asked cautiously, casting a quick glance at Dean before refocusing on the house, drawing his own weapon.

"Plan B is we figure it out as we go," the older Winchester offered, which was less than reassuring, but what more could they do? It was what they'd done last time, and it worked out in the end (sort of).

Andy nodded, releasing a quick breath before raising his fist. With a slight tremor in his fingers, he knocked on the large glass pane of the front door. It took only a moment for someone to answer. It was a kid, a year or two younger than Andy himself, with a wide and friendly smile. Very Stepford Smile, if you asked Dean. But then again, he already knew this guy was trouble.

The look immediately disappeared when the young man took in the nervous psychic knocking on his door and, more so, the two taller, much scarier looking men standing just behind him, both with guns.

"Uh, can you do me a favor and knock yourself out?" Andy's voice was deep – commanding – but his body language was that of a prepubescent girl shying away from a spider. Again, not that Dean blamed him, but in better circumstances he certainly would have been holding it over the kid for hours to come.

The Tanner boy standing in the doorway blinked at the command, mouth twitching between a smile and a frown for several long, terrifying seconds, before he turned almost robotically towards the doorframe. He wrapped his hands around either side of the thick slab of wood and then slammed his head into it as hard as he could.

Andy jumped back with a yelp at the sudden violence. Dean definitely would have made fun of him for that if he wasn't busy watching the Croat's body slump to the floor in an unconscious heap. The older Winchester looked at Sam with raised eyebrows.

"Holy crap."

Dean couldn't believe it actually worked and, by the look of it, neither could Sam.

"Jake? Who is it?"

The brothers both raised their guns once more at the older voice calling from within the house, followed shortly by approaching footsteps. The dad. Dean gave Andy another nod, and as soon as Mr. Tanner came into view, the psychic yelled at him to do the same as his son. Mr. Tanner seemed able to fight it for a second more than Jake had, turning away only to twitch and switch back towards them. Dean was ready to fire a shot right between the man's eyes, thinking their luck had been too good to be true, when Mr. Tanner let out a garbled yell and charged head first into the hallway wall like a WWE wrestler going for the money shot.

Mr. Tanner's head went straight through the drywall, burying him up to his shoulders, and the rest of his body went limp, hanging out of the hole like some depressing marionette show gone very wrong. The three hunters stood on the porch, staring at the unmoving body.

"Heh," Dean turned to Sam, a grin in the corner of his mouth. "It's the Juggernaught, bitch."

The younger Winchester rolled his eyes, but even Andy, still trembling ever so slightly, cracked a laugh. That was before the woman in the dining room, tied to a chair, gagged and bleeding, started screaming her head off, of course. Or, well, as much as she could through the kitchen towel wrapped around her head and gagging her mouth.

The three hunters untied her, but Dean was eyeing the bleeding cut to her shoulder with worry and, mostly, suspicion. "Did they bleed on you?"

She was too shaken and confused to answer, so Andy asked her again.

"Yes," she whispered, eyes wide at the trauma of her husband and son tying her up and beating her. Or maybe it was from the unwilled compulsion to answer the young man's question.

"Damnit," Dean swore. They hadn't made it in time. What else was new? He caught Sam's gaze, turning away from the traumatized woman. His voice low when he spoke. "She's infected."

"What do we do?" Sam watched Mrs. Tanner, those eyes in full puppy dog mode over the poor woman. Andy was crouched beside her, using the same towel her family had gagged her with to put pressure on the wound.

"We have her go to jail with the others." It was Andy who answered, looking up from the woman who was too dazed at the moment to try and run (which would be futile, given the Jedi kneeling next to her, but she didn't know that). "And then we warn the rest of the town. We know it'll work now."

Even as he said it, Andy's eyes slid to the body of Mr. Tanner, foot just visible from where they were. Mrs. Tanner asked them several times about her husband and son, but Andy decided it was for the best she didn't worry about it. He told her not to, so she didn't. It wouldn't last forever, but considering she was infected, it probably wouldn't matter to her ever again, either.

"Alright," Dean conceded, not liking that they didn't have the second part of this two-part plan formed. But getting the infected into a locked up location was a good first step and they were on the clock. "Do it."

"I want you to go down to the police station and have them arrest you. Stay in lockup until, uh, dawn."

"What will they arrest me for?" Her eyes were still wide, almost unseeing.

Andy floundered for a second, glancing at the other two before just sort of making it up as he went along. It seemed to be the theme of the day, after all. "Just tell them something that will get you locked up, alright?"

"I can do that." With those words, Beverly Tanner rubbed at her freed wrists, turned almost robotically for the hall, and took three steps before Sam stutteringly called out.

"Uh, use the back door!"

Andy repeated the command quickly before Mrs. Tanner walked far enough to see her husband's body stuck in the wall or her son collapsed by the door. She might be infected and the hunters might have to kill her before it was all over (they weren't really sure), but on the off chance Mrs. Tanner survived this, that wasn't a sight any wife or mother needed to see.

"I can do that," Beverly said again before she turned on a numb dime, walking past the three men as though they weren't even there. She opened the screen door just off the kitchen and the three watched through the dining room windows as her bobbing head disappear around the side of the house.

Silence reigned.

"Alright," Dean tucked his gun away and slung his duffle off his shoulder once more. "Let's get to work on the rest of the town."

"What about those two?" Sam gestured to the unconscious, infected men in the hallway. "They could wake back up."

Dean grinned, elbow deep in his bag, and pulled out a coil rope and a roll of duct tape. He tossed one to Sam, who got to work pulling the husband out of the wall.

"How are we going to get the message out?" the younger Winchester asked as he tugged at Mr. Tanner's body. Bits of drywall crumbled around the man's torso. Sam's voice was raised so that Dean and Andy, hauling the youngest Tanner man towards the chair last occupied by the kid's poor mother, could hear him. "We can steal a car, but we're going to need a megaphone or something."

"We grab a cop car."

Dean stopped pulling just shy of the chair to stare at the kid across from him. Andy grunted as he suddenly found himself hauling all the weight alone, almost toppling atop Jake's body from the unexpected shift.

Sam's head poked in from the hallway. "What?"

Andy glanced between the two of them. "You guys definitely didn't grow up in a small town. Cop cars have megaphones? It's a great prank when you're, like, sixteen and drunk."

His grin was positively mischievous, and Sam turned both a concerned and amused expression to his brother. Dean just grinned back.

"Whose idea was it for him to tag along, again?"

-o-o-o-

They didn't even have to go find one. Two fine members of the local sheriff's office pulled up in a brown-and-tan unit seven and a half minutes later. It turned out that Mrs. Tanner showing up at the station with a story of Jake and Mr. Tanner tying her up and torturing her required a police response. Her follow up story that they needed to lock her up because she'd killed them both, well, that required a hasty police response.

Andy took care of the officers, one being the Sheriff himself. He told each of them to walk home and lock themselves indoors, no contact with anyone until morning, unless they were infected with a virus. The hunters weren't stupid; they'd have been surprised if there wasn't an infected among the police ranks. Both men took off at a decent clip down the hill, the Sheriff turning onto a side street, the other officer heading back to town. It wasn't clear if that was because he lived on the other side, or if he he was infected.

As soon as they were sure the men had listened, the three hunters climbed into their borrowed car. Andy took the passenger seat upon Sam's insistence, since they would need him on the speaker, and the giant of a man folded himself into the back.

"Attention citizens-" Andy oofed into the microphone as Dean elbowed him. "Attention town-folk."

Andy looked over at Dean to see if he was going to get hit again as the older hunter drove their new ride through the winding residential streets. Their plan was less likely to be noticed and therefore interrupted if they started outwards and worked their way in towards the main drag.

"Listen up, cuz we're cops, and you trust cops-"

In the backseat, Sam's head fell back against the headrest a little more dramatically than necessary as the kid's transmission broke off when Dean elbowed him once more.

"Lock yourself in your homes, in individual rooms, until dawn. Do not go out, do not let anyone else in. Do not interact with anyone." Andy glanced at Dean again, who just gave him the what-are-you-waiting-for-keep-going look. The kid raised the mic back to his mouth. "If you think you are infected with a virus, report to the police station straight away."

Sam watched the residents as they wound their way through the streets of the forested town, repeating the message again and again. Those out on the sidewalks or that he could see through screen doors and undrawn windows were first surprised or confused by the broadcasting police car, some even coming out of their homes at the message. But one by one, each person turned and headed indoors, drawing their curtains, or closing their windows and doors. Sam saw only one man turn and head down the street, away from the residential area and back towards town.

It looked like their plan might just be working.

Even rolling along at ten miles an hour, they covered each of the residential streets and the main drag in under twenty minutes. There were no surprises. No Croats suddenly flooding the streets, no zombie apocalypse as Hell opened the floodgates of their plan for this tiny little town. Nothing. The boys got to the main drag, which was quickly emptying of all people as the townsfolk heeded Andy's words without choice.

When they reached the police station a block past Main St, they parked their stolen vehicle in the empty spot between two more just like it. The three hunters climbed out of the car, not bothering to hide their weapons. There was almost no one left outside to see them, after all. They headed into the station to a truly bizarre dichotomy of chaos and calm. Having cut their broadcast before the station, the two cops inside hadn't heard any orders to go home and were still attempting to do their jobs as eleven civilians and one officer crowded within the limited space, demanding to be locked up. There were three uniformed cops in the building – a female desk jockey and two male officers – but only two of them were still operating under their own faculties, currently trying (rather frantically) to handle the confusing situation.

As it was a small office, just one large room with a front desk, waiting chairs, a holding cell in one corner, and a few rooms along the back wall, the chaos came more from the number of people trying to assert their personal need to be detained. The poor desk jockey was handling the civilians the best she could while the lone officer tried, probably for the tenth time, to tell the third cop – the one that had shown up at the Tanner residence – that he didn't need to be locked up. It was clear these two unfortunate souls were unequipped to handle eleven of their friends and neighbors suddenly turning up to be arrested.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" Andy called out as the three hunters entered the precinct, each man geared up like they were facing a zombie apocalypse. (Which they were.) The infected townsfolk quieted, though the several who had taken it upon themselves to fulfill Andy's command without police assistance didn't stop trying to lock themselves inside the one holding cell.

The two cops looked up, harried confusion clear on their faces until they took in the three men, armed to the teeth, standing in their office. Then the female officer was dropping her paperwork for the gun they kept in the desk drawer, while her far more prepared coworker pulled his weapon immediately. But Andy was way ahead of them.

"You don't need your guns, put them down, you don't want to shoot us. What you want to do is lock up those eleven – er, twelve – people. They're very dangerous and need to stay locked up till morning." Andy smiled congenially, standing back as the two cops stiffened, then moved on autopilot to herd the rest of the infected over to the holding cell. The infected already inside were milling about, trying repeatedly to close the barred door to the cell. Without the key to lock it, the door just slowly swung back open each time, and the infected tried again and again in a calm, dulled, and freaky manner that reminded Dean of Leviathan victims.

The man from the future shuddered, but didn't say a thing.

The desk jockey withdrew the ring of keys from her belt, sliding one into the lock while the rest of the infected were herded one after the other into the small cell. It was quickly becoming cramped in there.

Once he was sure things were under control, Dean walked back over to the main doors, sliding his duffle off his shoulder. He dropped the bag of weapons and amo next to the entrance, ready to grab it on their way back out. The hunter did a quick visual sweep through the glass portion of the station doors, looking down the street for any movement or change. It was all quiet as dusk fell on the little town. Dean tucked his gun into his waistline and headed back to the others, rubbing absently at his chest and the low ache there.

"Uh, hold up." Sam, who was overseeing those going into the cell, grabbed the elbow of one woman before she could dolefully put herself in with the others. Dean hurried the last few steps, coming up between his brother and the two Robo-Cops, but he didn't immediately see anything alarming. The lady in Sam's grip was clutching a handful of tissues, her eyes and nose were red and puffy. As she sniffled, Sam grimaced with realization. "Are you, uh, sick by chance?"

"Yes," the woman replied, wiping at her dripping nose. Her eyes had the blank, glassy quality of all Andy's puppets. "I have a virus, but I'm on antibiotics."

Dean turned towards Andy with the kind of look that had the kid immediately holding up his hands, asking how this was his fault. The older Winchester took the sick lady by the bicep, pulling her away from the holding cell and back towards the doors of the station. "You go home and lock yourself in the bathroom, kay?"

She continued resisting, trying somewhat tamely to get back to holding until Andy repeated Dean's words as a command. The lady went still, then turned and headed to the doors with the customary, "I can do that."

Once she had exited the building, Dean leveled the look at Andy again.

"What? We said anyone who thought they were sick!" The kid shrugged sheepishly, fingering the edges of his hoodie like a little kid. "We're lucky it's not full-swing flu season."

The hunter just rolled his eyes as Sam closed the cell door. The desk jockey locked the infected inside with a turn of the key while her partner stood several feet away, staring at them both with blank eyes. Upon Andy's request, she handed the jingling mass of keys to Sam, and their resident Jedi addressed their two uniformed helpers.

Dean rubbed at his chest as the ache got bad enough that he finally took notice of it. He cast a glance over his shoulder at the station doors.

"Alright, guys." Andy clapped his hands together, a grin of success spreading across his face. "Great job! Now it's time to head home. Make sure to lock yourselves in your houses, don't let anyone in, don't talk to anyone or come in contact with anyone. Sound good? Break!"

The woman turned on her heel with a nod and immediately headed for the station doors. She passed Dean on her way, the hunter momentarily distracted by the movement. He stepped aside to let her pass, eyes tracking her as he rubbed at the burn just beneath his sternum. The other cop, however, didn't move. He remained standing, staring at the three of them, more of a statue than the robot he was supposed to be enacting right now.

"Hey!" Andy complained with a frown, starting towards the man who wasn't listening. Sam looked up from the keys and Dean turned back from the station doors towards the apparent problem, worry spiking. "I said-"

A gunshot broke through the relative peace of the station and Andy cried out in shock, stumbling away from the cop who stood, gun drawn and eyes black. Andy's back hit the cell bars with a pained grunt, muffled through clenched teeth. His hand was curled around his shoulder where blood spurted between clenched fingers.

"Andy!" Sam started forward but a second gunshot had him jumping back, releasing the keys as they were ripped out of his hand by contact from a bullet. The ring of metal hit the floor in a jumble.

A third shot went off, fired wildly, as Dean tackled the demon to the ground, the two hitting the linoleum with force. Sam bolted for Andy, but the gunshot had done more than just injure the psychic; it took a bunch of peaceful, calm, obedient Croats and flipped the 'zombie' switch to 'on'.

Andy screamed in terror as hands grabbed at his backpack, hoodie, and arms, pinning him to the bars, pulling at his hair and clothing. Sam grabbed his good arm, trying to haul him away from the cell and the teaming bodies within, but he was too late. He saw the flash of metal before he could do anything about it. It was Mrs. Tanner, the woman they had first sent to the police station, taking a switchblade to her own hand, leaving the steel stained red. Andy cried out as she struck, slicing up the back of his already injured arm. More blood soaked into his sweatshirt, spilling down the bars as she opened a four inch strip of flesh with the bloodied blade.

Realizing they weren't getting him away from the Croats with force alone and that most of those grasping clinging hands were on the kid's pack, Sam brutally shoved Andy's good arm through the strap of his backpack and then pulled. The two stumble free of the Croats, the poor kid'ss bleeding limb ripped loose from the final strap with a strangled cry, and they hit the floor several feet away. The Croats hissed and screamed and thrashed, pulling at Andy's backpack like wild animals until it finally slipped through the bars and disappeared into the teaming mass within

Andy was shaking in Sam's arms. The younger Winchester could hear his brother struggling with the demon – a strained exorcism interrupted by grunts and fists striking flesh – and Sam flinched as a fourth gunshot went off, striking something at the other end of the room. He didn't have time to look; Andy was bleeding badly. He pushed the kid onto the ground gently as possible, rolling onto his hands and knees to assess the damage. Sam clamped his fingers around the bullet wound, not having enough limbs to cover the entrance, exit, and strip of shredded flesh in the back. Andy needed stiches and he needed them now. His skin was losing color at an alarming rate, but the med kit they'd brought with them had been in Andy's backpack.

Along with several guns and knives.

"Dean!"

"Little busy!" the older Winchester growled between taking a fist to his solar plexus and the next line of the exorcism. The possessed cop was leaking smoke left and right, but he just wouldn't let go of his damn meatsuit.

The jingle of keys and metal against linoleum drew Sam's attention away from Andy, and hazel eyes grew alarmingly wide as he took in the cell full of Croatoans. The keys that had been knocked from his grip lay only a handful of feet from the bars, and multiple Croats were scrabbling for them. Arms stretched through the bars, shoulders slammed into the barrier again and again and again, as nails scraped across the floor, fingertips just hitting the ring of metal.

Sam released Andy's bleeding shoulder in a mad dart for the keys before they got them, but he didn't make it.

"Oh shit," he whispered as the ring of keys disappeared into the undulating mass behind the bars. Sam scrambled back. The Croat nearest the door suddenly stuck his arm out, key ring jingling in his fisted grip, and shoved a key into the lock. There were a dozen possibles on that ring, but it was only going to be a matter of time. The younger Winchester pulled his gun and shot the man in the head. Even as he fell dead to the floor, another took his place, reaching her arm through the bars to grab the keys sticking out of the lock.

Sam shot that one too, but his aim was off as he scrambled to his feet and grabbed Andy by the uninjured arm. The kid hissed in pain, weakly keeping pressure on his own wounds, but made it to his feet. The hunter fired a third shot and this time the infected woman toppled, dropping the keys. Hands snatched at them from the bottom of the bars and they disappeared once more into the mass of men and women. Sam hauled Andy back behind him as he fired again and again. Another Croat went down, but two more took his place at the door, keys back in hand. The hunter was going to have to kill them all to keep them from escaping.

The click of the lock opening ended that decision before he could make it.

"Dean!" Sam fired again, killing the fourth infected madman, but then the tidal wave was upon them and Sam was running, dragging Andy behind him. He fired haphazardly across his shoulder, but a hit to the chest wasn't enough to take a Croat down. As the two hunters made it to Dean, still rolling on the floor in a struggle with the demon, Sam lowered his gun and shot his last two rounds into the black-eyed bastard's head.

It wouldn't kill the demon, but it was enough to make him release the older Winchester. Dean took the opening and jumped to his feet as Croats came screaming at them.

"Go, go, go!" he yelled, like Sam didn't already know that, and shoved his younger brother towards the doors, following just behind.

Dean made a grab for the duffel full of amo he'd left by the entrance, but the ghost of fingers across his back, snatching at his jacket and just barely missing a good handhold, was cause enough to abandon the attempt. He wasn't immune and couldn't risk getting caught. Dean burst through the doors a half dozen feet behind his brother, the Croats right on his heels.

The older hunter caught back up to Sam quickly, Andy slowing the long-limbed Winchester down, ducked under the ailing kid to take the other half of his weight. Andy screamed as Dean hoisted his arm up and over his shoulder, and the older Winchester almost tripped on his own feet at the sound. His hand came away soaked in red, and Dean stared at it in growing realization even as they ran.

Behind them, the Croats spread out. Only one maintained the chase as the eight split up and tore through the rest of the town. It wasn't long before they heard gunfire and glass breaking; the infected had the weapons they'd been forced to leave behind. One handed, Dean drew his gun, Andy's blood staining the ivory grip red, and took out the only one still following them. The body hit the ground mid-run, rolling over itself in a sickening tumble of dead-weight and limbs.

"Take a left. I know where we can go." Dean spoke forcefully as he faced forward again, doing his best to hold Andy up with only one arm and keep his gun in the other.

The three men rounded the next corner back onto the main drag and headed for the medical clinic Dean remembered well.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

A/Ns: So I'm now home from vacation (my little niece is beautiful and actually a really good baby), and catching up on sleep. But in the meantime, the muse took total advantage of my exhausted state to casually mention a couple days ago, "Hey, you know that Croatoan arc you have fully written up, finished all neatly with a bow and almost ready to post? Yeah…what if we doubled it in length? You only have to re-write the end of this chapter to make it happen! And, of course, the other seventeen pages of new material. What's the big deal, am I right?"

This is what happens when I take two week breaks. My brain thinks it has a whole extra seven days to make last minute, drastic changes.

And yes, I absolutely did re-write the ending of this chapter and the next seventeen pages after it in the last four days, because damnit, my muse is friggin' good at her job (the bitch).

Reviews! Thanks so much to everyone who commented on the last chapter. I will be trying to get around to you guys today, but I am terribly bad at this part. If you don't hear from me, please know that I read your comments several times while on my vacation and anytime I didn't feel like writing. You all really do help carry this story and give me all the warm and fuzzies. Especially those of you who just flat out yell at me. Warm, fuzzy, and laughing my ass off :D

Alright, we are totally picking up steam now and are getting in the thick of it! Let me know what you thought of the action this chapter. It's only going downhill from here, guys XD

Also, poor Andy…I'm really not nice to that boy.