Vee had found her way home and curled up on the couch, pulling a wide knitted quilt over herself as she let her human form go, transforming back into her snake-like basilisk form to relax. She had fallen asleep earlier in the night after the Halloween candy had run out, but had been woken violently when Camilla shook her awake to keep Luz from making a terrible decision.
The events of the night still had her shaking, now that she was alone at home. She had watched Belos' monstrous form escape through the portal to the Demon Realm after he had attempted to kill her and her friends, and even temporarily succeeding at ending Hunter if not for his palisman, Flapjack. The aged, one eyed cardinal sacrificed what life he had left to revive Belos' ex-henchman and Vee had to watch them all walk through the portal to who knows what. She had promised to take Camilla's place while they were gone, though how she would explain the sudden disappearance of the six teens that had been living in the house as well, she had no idea.
She was still so on edge that even having nearly dozed off from exhaustion, she heard the light footfalls of two pairs of boots on the front porch. Her blue and yellow eyes snapped open, and she rolled off of the couch in a panic, knocking the bowl of cold popcorn that was beside her onto the floor with her tail as she attempted to transform.
Her skin darkened into a human tone from her scaled, pale green and her hair thickened and curled into Camilla's natural hairstyle. She could feel the magic she had siphoned off of Belos begin to dwindle as she slithered into the kitchen until her tail finally separated into legs.
There was no knock at the door. Just a loud crash and splintered wood as two men barged in, one armed with a large pistol and an intense look of determination, and the other taller man wielding a machete-like blade. "Get down!" the first man ordered, raising his pistol. Vee had managed to transform back into Camilla as well as she could despite her panic at the sudden and unexplained conflict, and instinctively dove to the floor before she heard the gunshot.
Six hours earlier…
Dean wasn't fond of animals. Dogs, cats, goats, horses. Sam seemed to think they could sense his repressed emotions or something but he had never had a Vulcan mind meld with a canine or been threatened by a pigeon. Besides, his little brother still had issues with clowns and Halloween, so who was the real sissy?
They were back in their FBI monkey suits, posing as Agents Scheuble and Adis, being lead through the Gravesfield Veterinary Clinic by a tired girl wearing a sports jacket and a dark red beanie. It had a few buttons on it for decoration; one of those LGBTQ flags and an eye design of some kind. "What sport you play, kid?" Dean asked, trying to make conversation. The kid was obviously latina as well; possibly a relation to Camilla. Sometimes the kids knew more of what was going on when there were monsters around than the adults did, and it paid to gain their trust.
"Hmm?" she asked, looking down at her jacket as if surprised to see she was wearing it. She fidgeted with the snaps wistfully for a moment before answering. "Grudgeby. You probably haven't heard of it."
This kid had seen some things, Dean thought to himself. Her expression was a dead giveaway that she had seen a few things she never should have, and probably lost a few people too. It was the same expression Dean saw in the mirror every morning. "Can't say that I have. You the Captain?"
"Uh, no. Not exactly. I only played once. This jacket is… was someone else's." she said. Dean nodded. Clearly the kid wasn't interested in sharing at the moment, but he'd have to file that away for later if needed. "Mom, there's some men here to see you!"
"One momento, mija!" a voice called back. "¡Estoy tratando de darle a esta tortuga su medicina!" The girl lead them into a small breakroom that smelled of animals of all kinds with an overweight cat lounging on top of the refrigerator. An open notebook was splayed open on a small round table, presumably the girl's homework, though the impressive sketches in its pages revealed she was likely distracted.
While Sam looked about the room, Dean leaned over the girl's shoulder. "Those are some awesome drawings, kid." he commented, noting some symbols she was drawing almost looked like sigils like demon traps or angel banishment glyphs. She was also drawing sketches of a big haired woman that looked like a Joan Jett groupie and maybe a pokemon?
She looked up at him uncomfortably. "Uh, thanks?" she replied, closing the notebook.
"Hola." Camilla said, entering the break room and giving both Sam and Dean a suspicious look over. "What can I help you with?"
"Hi, Mrs. Noceda." Sam began as the woman pulled a pair of latex gloves off with a snap. Dean pulled out his FBI badge for display and Sam did the same. "We'd like to ask you some questions about some of the local wildlife we've heard reports about."
"What does the FBI want to know about wildlife in Gravesfield?"
"Do you know a Jacob Hopkins that used to work at the local museum?" Sam asked.
"Hijo de puta." Camila blurted out, earning her a surprised look from her daughter. "Sorry, Luz." she added, placing a hand on the girl's shoulder before turning to Sam. "That man has harassed me and my daughter several times, set illegal traps in the area, and had cameras on private properties all over town! Why don't you take your federal butts back to wherever it is he's stashed himself and arrest him instead of harassing us?"
"Whoa, whoa…" Dean said, holding up a hand. "We're not here to harass or arrest anyone. We're simply looking into reports of strange occurrences around town that could be linked to another case."
"What kinds of strange things?" Luz asked, causing Camilla to step forward to put herself between her daughter and the fake agents.
"Jacob told us that you stole something of his. Some kind of evidence of something… out of the ordinary."
"Of course he did. Like I said, that man has been harassing us for months. We have nothing of his. So if you say another word to my daughter; a minor, I'm going to need a lawyer present."
Sam let out a breath and Dean took a step back. He was certain the woman was bluffing, but a lawyer definitely wasn't something they needed right now. Normally, people wanted to talk to their superiors, which is what they had Garth for, watching the phones with any number of identities they might need. Dean knew better than to challenge a momma bear protecting her cub.
"That's alright, Mrs. Noceda. If you do think of anything strange… smells of sulphur, cold spots, things like that; don't hesitate the call." Dean added, brandishing a business card with his burner phone number.
Camilla reluctantly snapped the card out of his fingertips and glanced at it before placing it on the table next to Luz, locking a death glare on Dean as he and Sam left the clinic. "Well that didn't go as well as we hoped." Sam commented, following the walkway back to the Impala.
"Does it ever?" Dean asked. "Both of them know something though. That kid was drawing sigils in her notebook. Nothing I recognized but definitely had to do with magic of some kind."
"Camilla was hiding something. What if Jacob was right, and she is holding kids hostage?" Sam asked. "You think either of them are monsters?"
Dean climbed into the driver seat and settled in before replying. "I don't know, man. We've seen some crazy stuff. Could be demons, angels, shapeshifters. Couldn't even get close to either of them to check."
"It might be time to find this abandoned house Jacob was talking about."
"What the hell is that?" Dean asked, staring at the door of the abandoned house. It wasn't difficult to find. A worn path through the grass past the tree line that had been well packed by size eights led right to it. Drawn on the door in what he hoped was red paint was some kind of round face with large eyes and a beak. The shack itself was old, though it looked like someone had been trying to repair it. Jungle-native vines were holding columns that held the roof over the porch together, the door had caught fire at some point, and the old shingles on the roof had been haphazardly patched. Sam pulled out his EMF reader, and it was screaming that something unnatural had been there recently.
Sam drew his PT92 pistol while Dean raised his double barrelled, sawed off shotgun with rock salt shells in case of spirits. They approached the door, gave it a tap to discover that it wasn't locked, and Dean poked the barrels of his weapon through the crack of the door before peering in. Inside were a collection of more modern, if probably recycled furniture that didn't fit the Cabin in the Woods aesthetic. Bean bag chairs out of the nineties, a scratched up arm chair out of the seventies, a pet bed and a cooler that someone was using as both a table and a seat.
A corkboard covered one wall, with pictures of stickmen families of various quality, a hole in the wall where something had torn it's way out, and more of the symbols that Luz Noceda had been drawing in her notebook. On the far end of the board was a sketch of a doorway with various notes on it on how someone could reach the Demon Realm. "What do you make of this, Sammy?"
Sam had been investigating a hole in the broken floorboards where it looked like something had been hidden and recently discovered. He stood, noting the door sketch pinned to the corkboard. "Demon Realm? Think that has anything to do with the Apocalypse or Monster World?"
"Could be Hell or Purgatory for all I know. Question is, why is some lady and a group of kids trying to get there?"
"Check this out." Sam said, bringing Dean's attention to the hole in the floor where a grey-green ooze appeared to have been scratched off on the broken floorboards. "Ectoplasm?"
"Not like any I've seen." Dean admitted, kneeling down to touch the substance. As he did, the substance pulsed and reached out toward his fingers and he pulled away out of reflex. "Okay, that is not ectoplasm."
"EMF is off the charts."
"I say we salt and burn, whatever it is."
As though reacting to the threat, the goo retreated into the floor with a sickening slurp and a moment later, the back door swung open and slammed shut. Dean sprung to his feet, raced into the hallway and turned to see the impromptu storm door swinging in the wind. He shouldered through it, hearing Sam was on his heels.
Outside the back door was a trail of shrivelled possum and raccoon carcasses leading toward the treeline. Some were momentarily still trying to breath as the oily green slime struggled to collect itself into a small humanoid form, roughly the size of a toddler. It had a deformed, skeletal frame, covered in icy blue eyes that were scanning all angles for threats before locking on to the brothers. It's head turned, stag-like antlers growing from its scalp through its scraggy grey hair. Blue glowing pinpoints of light were sunken into its eye sockets and its mouth opened impossibly wide to screech at them.
Without hesitation, Dean emptied both barrels of rock salt into the creature, causing it to stumble back from the force before it screeched again in rage. Sam fired his pistol, the silver bullets sizzling through the monster's body with dull white light. Another bullet, and another sizzled through before the creature retreated into the woods with an angry howl.
Both men were breathing heavily from the encounter. "What the hell was that?!" Dean shouted.