JustAnna

"From out of Nowhere" - SPN

Anya

Anya shrugged in a joking but sweet gesture when Sam asked her if she really thought he was sappy. Obviously the answer was ‘yes’. Sam seemed sweet, and he seemed like the type of person that could love deeply when he got to know people. If he wasn’t into the idea of a love story, Anya would have been super suprised.

Her face dropped its smile for a moment when he mentioned heading to his room. On one hand, she trusted him explicitly. He hadn’t given her any reason to feel otherwise, yet. On the other hand, getting close to someone, in their space, on their terms was risky. She knew a little bit about the life, and the job. She also knew that, at the moment, she wasn’t exactly safe in the world. Getting close to someone…just wasn’t high on the agenda.

But after Sam went into a long explanation, letting her know that he was fine moving to another room, Anya’s face settled into a bit of pity, and adoration as she smiled at him and shook her head. She tapped her hand on the table and then typed on her phone.

“Your room is fine, Sam. Just…keep your hands to yourself.”

As the phone read the message, she stood from the table and stepped over close to him with a giggle, shoving at his chest. He seemed to be treating her like she was a breakable thing that he had to be super careful around, which she appreciated. But she also just wanted him to relax. As they stepped into his room, she stopped just over the threshold of the doorway and looked around the room. If she could speak, she would have uttered an unsurprised “wow”. But instead, she leaned against the doorway and smirked, typing on her phone.

“Why is this exactly what I expected for you? You’re easy to read, Sam Winchester.”

Dean

Dean shrugged his shoulders with a ‘hmph’ at Lexi’s turning down his idea for passing time. Who knew how long this guy would take to get back to them?! But he didn’t know what he was trying to keep his mind off of more, the fact that they were in the bunker, after the kiss in the car…or Sam and a mute girl they didn’t even know galavanting around the bunker. But Lexi responded to that just as quick as it crossed his mind and he raised an eyebrow.

“Sam’s also a softie when it comes to helpless women with big blue eyes. If you haven’t noticed, there’s one with him, right now.” He explained, trying to justify his own bored paranoia. After a moment, he dropped the idea, and glanced around, as if he was looking for Anya and Sam. Then the computer pinged and Dean sat up straight, gesturing toward it.

“These internet nerds…”, he started as Lexi opened the computer and he chuckled, “I wonder if he thinks you’re one of those mysteriously sexy girls in a chat room full of dudes. Let’s roll the dice on whether you’re a forty year old man in a basement.”

He chuckled at his own joke and scooted close to Lexi so he could read the message on the screen as she read it off. Furrowing his eyebrows, he read it again, just to make sure he read it right and brought a hand up to his mouth. If the guy was too eager, this could be a trap. Or he might be eager because he was stupid, which was the more likely case. He was probably some teenager who was in way over his head in things he couldn’t possibly understand. Sighing, Dean fanned his fingers out nonchalantly and pointed to the computer.

“We can just send him a scan of the journal entry. I mean, it’s not like it gives him much info about us…where we are or anything else about the gun. All it says is that some dude had the gun and then obviously we had it…and it was given to another human most likely. If he knows anyone who has talked about the gun, we can shake him down for a name, follow the name to the next and so on.”

But after he finished his sentence, he sighed again with frustration, “But what if this is just some kid that doesn’t know what he’s getting into. Will he have a name or is he just a gun nut who wants the Colt, and thinks it’s a myth? Shaking him down might turn up nothing…or it’s a trap.”

"From out of Nowhere" - SPN

Anya

Anya’s face lit up a bit when Sam agreed that watching movies with her sounded like an actual fun idea. Even though she was pretty sure he was just excited to have someone to hang out with that wasn’t just his brother. She didn’t care. She was just excited to get to know him, and it’s not like she had anything better to do in the near future. She was “stuck”.

She couldn’t help the laugh that escaped her chest at his description of Dean’s movie taste, but she also shrugged as if to say ‘it could be worse’. His question of her taste caused her to glance up at the ceiling with a thoughtful frown, and she chewed at her lip for a moment, before coming up with a few things. She furiously typed on the phone, and then pressed the send button causing the phone to read out her thoughts.

“I’m honestly into whatever shows up. I like the old horror shows of the 90’s and lovey dovey movies. I’m down with anything where the guy gets the girl against all odds, especially if they seem perfect for each other but are from completely different lifestyles and all that. So, I guess…horror and romance? Nerdy stuff mostly includes Star Wars and super hero movies. You know, the usual. So, I’m literally good with whatever. You seem sappy enough to relate.”

As the phone finished reading, she chuckled and scanned his face.

Dean

Dean sighed in relief that Lexi seemed back on task as she typed out her message. He read the message over before she sent it and tilted his head to the side, impressed by how simple her take was. The guy did seem a little too eager. So, the simple message was probably for the best and the odds of him responding and giving them everything they wanted were pretty high.

“And waiting means…sitting here…”, he muttered awkwardly. He ran both his hands down his face and looked around the room, before awkwardly stretching his arms above his head. As he settled, he turned his eyes back toward Lexi. “So, what do we do while we wait for him? I mean, in any other situation, I would say strip poker, but we’re on a job so…that might not be best…”

At that moment, he realized he was leading himself right back into trouble, teasing Lexi when he was barely calm, himself. Knowing that she was attracted to him not only felt wrong, being in the bunker, but it also made it incredibly hard to keep his hands and his eyes to himself. He cleared his throat, and brushed his hands through his hair before smiling.

“Or we can both cool down before I have a stroke. Work. You know…we gotta work. I wonder what Sam’s up to!”

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Anna and Cason

Anna glanced over as Nat and Cason spoke, sighing to herself. She knew that Cason was the most careless of all of them, due to him being extremely hard to kill. But with her limited knowledge of demons, she also knew that demons definitely knew how to take each other out. The thought made her nervous, and she turned her head away from them, toward the open field and the barn of chaos they were about to walk into.

Cason tilted his head to the side, not quite convinced by Nat’s words, but her request stuck with him and he took a deep breath through his nose, turning his eyes from her to nod his head. He couldn’t promise her that he wouldn’t come out of this worse for wear. He was already a target to most demons that he knew, and from the smell of things, he knew at least half of the assholes inside that barn.

“I will do the best I can.”, he answered bluntly, with a soft smile, reserved only for Nat. He resisted the urge to pull her back to him, as she stepped away, a gut feeling telling him that she was safer with him, than not. He had to remove whatever this human worry was, and focus. She would either be okay, or she wouldn’t. At this point, there wasn’t much of an option to change any minds.

As she came back, with her weapon of choice, squared up and ready to go, he once again took a deep breath through his nose, part frustration and part concern. But instead of stopping her, once again, he nodded with a fake attempt at a confident smile, “I’ll see you on the other side. Be smart. Don’t get yourself killed.”

——-

At the base of the hill, Cason stepped up in front of the building, in plain view of the demons there. At first they didn’t notice him, and Anna reached out a hand, grabbing his arm and hissing at him, “Don’t. Follow the plan.”

Cason glanced down at her hand, and smirked with a nod, stepping back out of their eye sight, until he turned to look around the side of the building and saw Nat land a good shot against a demon, drawing attention to herself. With gritted teeth, his eyes turned black and an unnatural panic settled in his chest.

“Hey boys! How’s it goin’?! Pretty night we got here!” He called out to the distracted demons in the front. To his surprise, they didn’t immediately attack. Instead, they stood, their knees slightly bent as they watched him closely, waiting for him to attack, or do something. “I think you got a real nice place here. Party? Wake?”

He fake pouted, as he joked, and one of the demons recognized him, growling a little more audibly. Anna, though momentarily frozen in place by Cason’s stupidity, slipped away from him, and behind a tractor nearby. She walked as gently as she possibly could, before jumping onto one of the demon’s back. She covered his mouth and with both hands, wrapping her legs around his waist as he fell onto his back, directly onto her body. The fall knocked the wind out of her, and she saw stars, but she didn’t loosen her grip, as his skin melted and eventually, he wilted into nothing but bones and boiling blood.

She laid there, relaxing her body for a moment as she tried to regain the breath that was knocked out of her. As she laid there, she hadn’t realized the chaos that was beginning to unfold around her. A body entered her field of fuzzy vision, and she reached her hands out to try and defend herself, but the body slumped and fell to the ground, smoke flowing out of its mouth and into the night sky. Cason stood there, nudging Anna’s leg with his foot, “Get up. C’mon! I can’t do this on my own, and neither can your boyfriend…”

Anna growled in frustration and shoved herself off the ground, standing to her feet to get back into the fight. She didn’t even have time to attack anyone, as she was tackled, right back onto her back again.

“What a pretty little thing Cason has picked up and you can melt demons?!” The demon teased her as he wrapped his hands around her throat. His palms began to smoke and he growled in anger, pulling his jacket sleeves over his hands and going right back to the grip around her throat, tightening down to the point that she couldn’t even begin to feel breath trying to enter her lungs. She slapped at his face, trying to make contact with her bare hands, but her arms weren’t long enough as he pressed her harder into the ground. Before she passed out, she felt a glove being placed on each hand, and then everything went black.

Dean

Dean reached a hand out, as Nat pulled her bow string back, ready to tell her to wait until they were all in position. When the arrow made the sickening thud, Dean winced, but lifted an eyebrow. It was a good shot. He would have to tell her about it later, as he didn’t want to yell out to her across the barn. Much to his dismay, several demons turned at the sound. The farm was super quiet, and so even the sound of a body dropping onto the gravel was enough to echo throughout the barn.

“Dammit.” Dean groaned, and then heard Cason’s voice echo through the night, like another arrow piercing the air. Dean closed his eyes tightly, having known it would be Cason that would ruin everything. He waited a moment, hiding behind a wall, and a demon passed him, right on cue. “Hey…dickhead.”

And before the demon could even get a good look at him, he reached into his jacket pocket and tossed a handful of salt into the demons eyes. The demon backed up, pawing at it’s eyes while groaning, and Dean stepped forward, pulling another handful of salt. He wrapped his arm around the demon’s neck and shoved the handful of salt in his mouth, holding his mouth shut as he fought like hell.

After a moment, Dean removed his hand, and the demon smoked out, running like a coward. The body fell to the ground and Dean ran toward the girls, not even sure where they ended up. It was then that he remembered he had Ruby’s knife in his hand, as he was tackled to the ground by a large demon. This demon had to have been a football player in a former life. No matter what Dean did, wiggling his body around, he couldn’t free himself from the weight that held him to the ground, until the demon pushed off to draw a punch and Dean acted quick, shoving the knife through his heart. He twisted the knife with his teeth clenched together, as the demon sparked out, and luckily landed to his side, an arm draped over Dean’s chest.

Dean groaned again, hearing the chaos on the other side of the building, and shoved the demon’s arm off his body. But when he stood up, there were two demons standing in front of him, and no sight of anyone else. Most everything around him was quiet, and a sinking feeling began to settle in the bottom of his gut that something wasn’t quite right.

Duke

Duke felt relatively confident as he followed Esme behind the rest of the group. All he had to go with was an iron bar, but as long as he was quick on his feet, that wouldn’t be an issue, it never was. As Nat killed the first demon they came across, Duke smiled ear to ear. Maybe this would be successful.

Just as the thought ran through his mind, a female demon ran up and swiped across his face, out of nowhere with a knife. “Holy shit. Jesus…”, he gasped, taking a few steps back from her, before swiping back at her with his iron bar. The woman turned and took a swipe at Esme, which Duke attempted to catch with his hand. The knife slashed Duke’s palm, and he cried out, pulling his hand to his chest with a growl. “Hey! Me and you, sweetheart…me and you!”

The demon woman turned to him, and sneered, her creepy smile sending a chill down his spine as a larger demon speared Esme out of Duke’s eye sight, making it impossible for him to help her with her own battle. He dug his feet into the ground, his heart fluttering as the woman lunged forward with the knife, barely missing his face, and they began a dodge and weave battle of wit.

“That was close…a little slow…but…”, Duke teased as he continued backing up, dodging all of her slashes and attempts to kill him with the knife. He swiped at her hand, a sparking gash forming against her elbow as she growled and stopped her slashing for a moment, “And we found the weak spot.”

“You’re so cute, cowboy. You’ll be even cuter all bloody and yelling my name…”

“Sweetheart…you ain’t my type. I like my girls alive and a little less forward. I’m also not the yellin’ type.” Duke chuckled, but his smile dropped as she screamed and lunged at him with the knife once again, barely missing his chest. The swiping continued until Duke backed up against the side of the barn, and like clockwork, the knife plunged into his abdomen, wedging itself into the wood behind him. The demon, with her strength, pulled the knife from him, and turned, without saying a word, toward Esme. “Esme! Ah…dammit…RUN!”

Duke was reminded mid sentence that he had a gaping hole in his stomach, placing his hand over it, to try and stop some of the bleeding. It was then that Sarah caught onto what was happening, and pounced on the female demon, causing her to scream out, piercing the quiet night air. After a few moments of thrashing her around (which Duke could only see the poor demon’s body flailing and ragdolling) Sarah bit the woman’s head, causing it to implode, and dropped her sparking body on the ground below her, before returning to help Esme.

Duke leaned his head back against the side of the barn, his vision beginning to fade as he stared at the tree tops, trying to count each one. The last thing he could remember seeing before he lost conciousness was Cason’s face, the demon’s voice seemingly far away as he screamed at him.

“C’mon! We gotta group up. Come on. Dammit, that looks bad. You’re alright. Let’s go group up.” Cason shouted at him, before hoisting him off the ground, and attempting to run toward the others with him.

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Dean and Anna

Dean nodded his head at Sam, thinking at first that his brother was agreeing with him to send Cason in, whether on his own or with Anna. But then it hit him that Sam was wanting to protect the feelings of pretty much everyone, regardless of how good Dean’s idea was. He placed his hands on his hips and held out a hand toward Mika, acknowledging that he was giving her idea some thought.

“Fine. We can split into groups. But the groups have to be smart. They have to play on strengths. Nobody gets left behind.” He grumbled, and then nodded with a sigh at Mika’s repeat of the plan, but with specific groups. He preferred her idea of keeping herself, Dean and Nat together. Both girls would be able to back each other up, and would have Dean as a buffer.

Anna furrowed her brow, a little nervous to go with Cason. He was absolutely careless with his own body, and she didnt particularly trust him to protect her, even if she was a powerful weapon against the demons. She started to speak up, but Nat began to ask about which group was going to take which demons. Anna turned her eyes up to study Sam’s face, wondering if he would be okay with letting her go, or if he would want to come with them.

When he spoke up, she breathed a sigh of relief and finally nodded her head, “I’m okay with that plan. I feel better having Sam with us. We could use the muscle and knife skills, in case someone gets taken out.”

Cason and Dean both winced at her words, but Dean reluctantly nodded as well. “I don’t like any of this, but the plan does sound like it will work. Let’s get moving.”

Cason

As the group began stepping away from each other to prepare and grab their respective weapons, Anna approached Cason, who shook his head at her immediately, “You are plently juiced up. Any more and your head won’t be in this. You will be more interested in eating them than you are killing them. Keep your head on, and I’ll give you more after we are finished here. Alright?”

Anna opened her mouth to speak, but Cason shook his head again. Anna grumbled under her breath and walked over to Sam to prepare together for what was coming. Cason turned to Nat and scratched the back of his head in annoyance, holding his arms out after, as he brought forward his humor, “Well, it looks like I’m going into this with a pig sticker, a giant idiot…no offense, and a demon melter. Hopefully, they didn’t screw me, here…again.”

Duke

Duke sighed as Esme stepped off the tailgate. It seemed that they had finally come to an agreement and honestly, he felt as if he was mostly there for hunter backup anyway. He was a capable hunter but he now had a distraction again. With Esme in the fold, and with her not having full control over her powers, around demons, he was concerned. He glanced up at the sky, the stars seemingly taunting him with how peaceful and clear the blackness was. After a moment, he slipped off the tailgate and began rummaging through his bag in the back of the truck.

He slipped a couple of knives, a pistol, a flask of holy water, and another flask of salt into his pockets of his jeans and his jacket. The last thing he pulled out was an iron pole, that he twirled around in front of his chest like a baton.

He then turned to Esme and gave a mischevious smirk, “You ready to go play with some demons? Might as well get this overwith…”

————

About ten minutes later when everyone was grouped and ready.

Dean

“Alright. Nat…Mika, we’ll take the back. We can ambush them faster that way. Sam, you, Cason and Anna take the front. Duke and Esme can…” Dean barked orders, before Duke held up his iron bar and smiled.

“We’ll roll in to assist whichever group seems to need it. Just like the old days, eh?”

“Just like the old days. Let’s go.” Dean muttered with a smirk. He nodded to Cason, urging him to say his goodbyes or whatever he felt the need to do, giving his sister at least that much respect, while holding his arm out for Mika to join him as he stepped into the tall grass on the side of the hill, with Ruby’s knife clenched tight in his hand.

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Cason, Dean and Anna

Cason picked at his fingers, lazily leaning against the side of Nat’s car as the rest of the group scouted the farm across the way, from them. He was rather annoyed that they weren’t working efficiently. But he was the one who made the whole ‘be careful’ thing happen. So, he had to do ‘be careful’ their way. Becoming fed up with standing around, staring at the demons, he stepped up next to Mika, and placed his hands in his pockets.

“Want me to take care of the guys in the front? It could give you an in…” He offered, pulling his favorite knife. After looking at the knife, he sighed. “Actually, I need a weapon. I need someone or something that can kill demons.”

He turned, and raised an eyebrow to Anna, who was standing as close as possible to Sam, her arms folded and her expression disassociated. However, when Cason turned to look at her, she shook her head.

“I don’t want to burn them.”

“Look. I can cover their mouths. You can burn them out. My burns will heal within a few seconds, and we will have a quiet in. What do you say?” Cason explained to her, but Dean cleared his throat, shaking his head.

“I don’t like it.” Dean muttered.

“Then what is your plan, hm? Run in their with guns and knives that won’t touch these guys? We have one person here that can take care of them…quickly…” Cason started, but Dean spoke up again and interrupted him.

“You go and smoke them out. Take some salt. Kill their meatsuit and take care of it. It will take a while for them to come up with another body.” Dean explained and Anna also shook her head.

“I don’t like that either. We shouldn’t kill anyone.”

“We don’t have a choice right now! Sam? What do you think?” Dean turned to Sam and held out his hands, desperately wanting his brother to agree with him. Cason’s ability to disappear and reappear anywhere he wanted made him a good weapon for at least expelling the demons, and if he did it the right way, he could take care of them quietly.

Duke

Duke sat on the tailgate of his truck with Esme and Sarah. He didn’t know what to say to her, knowing that she had fallen apart after the situation in the room with the others. He hadn’t done the best job of taking care of her after the fact, as he had to be the even head that helped bring the conversation to a close. But they were together, now. His job, at this point, was to help her hold it together, and to keep her safe.

“They’re arguing about who the sacrificial lamb is going to be in this one. I can’t imagine that Nat’s going to be very happy with the idea of it being Cason. But there’s no way that Sam is letting Anna go. I’m tempted.” He admitted. He then sighed and shook his head, “But I’m just a human. I don’t know how much damage I could do against four demons on my own. And here I was hopin’ this would be a quick one.”

He chuckled and placed a hand on Esme’s thigh. As good as he was at getting rid of demons, and as outnumbered as the demons were, with all the hunters coming after them at once, Duke had a feeling that they weren’t the ‘main show’ and that a bigger bad was waiting, hoping that the group would tire themselves out so it could attack.

Seeing the rest of the group fighting, Duke called out to them as quietly as he could while also making sure they could hear him.

“I agree with Mika. We outnumber them. We take small groups and we take out as many as we can at once. If one of us is better off than the rest, then you kill as many of their meatsuits as possible…but keep energy.” Duke rambled with a shrug, tilting his head to Mika to silently agree with her, by tilting his hat.

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Cason, Dean, Duke, and Anna

Dean growled softly under his breath as literally, everyone in the room seemed, in his mind to take Cason’s side. If this was just demons, and he was the only one who was seemingly in danger, that was a risk he was willing to take. He glared up at Sam, as he randomly chimed in on behalf of Natalia, but as they continued, he began to see their point. In the past, they hadn’t exactly taken their time. And in that same past, they lost people…good people.

Taking a deep breath, he turned to look at Mika and scanned her face to see if she was just trying to appease his worry. But he saw nothing there except logic and reason. Of course, Mika was showing logic and reason. She was the second most logical person in the room, after all this time. He dropped his hand on the table in a fist and shifted to stand closer to Mika, as Nat reasoned exactly what he expected Mika to say. Maybe they were more alike than he originally thought.

“Alright.” He conceded with a grumpy shrug. Cason’s shoulders relaxed and Duke mirrored him, rubbing his sweaty hands on his jeans as the tension diffused. But then Anna shifted in her seat and spoke up.

“If this has to do with me, then they are there for me, right? Like at the airport? You could just drop me off.” She said flatly, honestly exhausted with all of this, at this point.

“That’s not an option.” Cason suddenly snapped at her, shaking his head. “Demon blood or not, whatever this is maybe bigger than you could handle on your own.”

“And if they get what they want, they’ll leave you guys alone.”

“Or they will have exactly what they need to kill us all. We don’t know why they want you. We have a hunch to go off of, and even the hunch is vague. Even if you could take them all, a hundred more will come, and if you’re some sort of contingency plan, giving you up will just play into their hand.” Cason explained the strategy of demons perfectly, almost reaching over and patting her arm, before reminding himself that she could fry him in an instant. “You’re going. But you’re not going alone. I think everyone will agree with me.”

“I agree,” Dean muttered reluctantly. Agreeing with Cason made him want to vomit. But Cason was right. “For all we know, you could be a weapon against the angels. You’re not a weapon. You’re…you. If we can keep them away from you, we’ll do the best we can for as long as we can. No more playing into their hand with the demon blood…”

Anna quickly glanced at Cason as Dean finished his sentence. Dean noticed but said nothing, simply watching their silent interaction, as Cason shook his head, his eyes locked with hers. Dean wasn’t sure what it meant, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to imagine what they were saying with their eyes. He had a feeling Cason was already feeding her. Little did he know, he was right.

“So we pack up and roll out?” Cason finally asked, looking around at every member of the group.

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Cason, Dean, Duke, and Anna

Duke stepped a little closer to Esme as he watched her body language change with the questioning. He didn’t say a word for the time being, deciding that he would step in to fill in gaps if it was needed. But the second she started talking about the note Bobby gave him, he tensed. He had no idea how Dean, who was on edge already, would react to the news. Or Anna, who seemed so on edge that her tension was palpable in the room.

Dean simply tilted his head, his eyes narrowed, as she explained the situation. He didn’t see this as any sort of weird situation. It was a farm…crawling with demons. With the right preparation, they would be in and out within a few hours. But then she mentioned Anna, and he turned to look at her, along with everyone else.

Anna breathed in, tensing and balling up her fists as the entire room seemed to focus on her. She didn’t remember anything about her childhood, or any connections in her life outside of Cason. She opened her mouth to speak but decided against it as the room still seemed focused on her. If Esme continued, maybe they would shift focus.

Cason and Dean echoed one another, turning their heads toward her and raising their eyebrows, when Esme said that she had seen the future. That was new. Even for Cason, that was surprising and opened up a whole new level of ‘what is she?’ in his mind. They both listened intently until she mentioned Dean’s name and he sat up a little straighter.

“Well, I um…It can’t be seeing the future. I mean, what demons do we know that can do that much damage with this big of a group? We have a demon on our side. We have Anna, who seems ready to rip throats. No offense, Anna.” Dean spoke up, rubbing his hands on his pants uncomfortably.

“But you don’t think we should take this seriously?” Duke chimed in, annoyed with how Dean was dismissing what seemed like a very real premonition of his demise. There was no way that Esme was just having some sort of fever dream that detailed.

“Of course, we should take it seriously! But we have nothing to go on. Esme might be able to see the future, which should freak me out, but considering…things, it doesn’t. I say we go and we see what’s there.”

“There’s something bigger there,” Cason grumbled with a sigh. Anna placed her hand on the table near his and he moved it, not wanting to accidentally be burned again.

“What is the connection to me?” Anna randomly chimed in, causing Dean and Cason to turn and look at her. “I mean, I know I’m the weird one here that’s high as a kite. I know everyone is afraid of me but what does a demon-infested farm in Western Missouri have to do with me?”

“We don’t know,” Duke spoke softly to her. He didn’t know Anna, but he knew that she was scared and on edge. He knew that she felt like the ‘other’ in the room, a feeling he knew very well. “But we could um…we could go look.”

“I don’t think we should just go look. We need to find out what we’re walking into.” Cason corrected but Dean slapped the table in front of him and shook his head.

“No. Because every single time we do that, especially when it’s your idea, everything falls apart. We go. We find out what’s going on. We take care of it…kill it.” Dean snapped, but Cason growled and turned to Nat.

“Please talk sense into him. Please!”

“I don’t need my sister telling me anything. And don’t tell her what to do. Don’t forget that you’re only alive because of her!” Dean raised his voice, making it clear that this wasn’t going to be a case that was cut and dry. Working together was already proving to be easier said than done, and with what was coming, they were screwed if they couldn’t fix this.

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Cason, Duke, Anna and Dean

Anna sighed, her knee beginning to jump aggressively as the arguing went on for what seemed like hours. With every word that Cason said, and with his back turned to her, she struggled not to jump on him. But she had made a deal with him. She had promised, silently, not to hurt him as long as he was willing to work with her. She wanted nothing more than to yell at Dean that she was fine, along with Cason, but the truth was, she wasn’t sure if she was fine. She was struggling not to murder her ex boyfriend, while the rest of her little family seemed scared to death of her. They truly thought she was dangerous…again.

Dean turned to Mika a bit unwillingly, and frowned, staring at her. He followed her breathing and growled, his emotions so heightened that he felt like they would never regulate. He was tired of demons getting to every single member of their group, and as innocent as she looked, Anna seemed to be the problem, to him. She brought Cason to them. She brought demon blood to the surface of the issue. She was high right now! But Mika was right. If he was aggressive, Anna would run, Nat would hate him, and everything would just blow up again.

He took a deep breath, and turned his eyes down. He couldn’t help the chuckle, and the glare that he shot Mika as she called him her classic ‘brozilla’ nickname. He turned to Duke, who was already shaking his head.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m just tired of…”

“Don’t worry about it bub. I get it. We got a lot to get to, and a lot to get through. Let’s just figure this shit out, alright?” Duke explained softly, his blue eyes wide and convincing as Dean sighed once again and nodded, placing his hands on his hips. “Now, let’s go inside and see what we can come up with.”

Duke placed a gentle hand on Esme’s back and led her into the room behind Dean and Mika as Nat turned to them. He cleared his throat, and leaned against the wall by the door with his arms folded, “It might.”

Cason didn’t quite like that answer, and he tilted his head, turning his eyes from Duke to Esme, who seemed on edge. He didn’t know Esme as well as he would have liked to, but he knew that she was different. She could feel emotions and was horrible at hiding her own. He narrowed his eyes and tilted his head back, “It might? Esme, what do you know?”

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Duke

Duke uncovered his eyes, and glanced over at Esme with a raised eyebrow. Sam and the little one coming back with baggage couldn’t be good. Sam on his own coming back with baggage was scary enough. He sighed, and turned back to look at the ceiling, just as Esme leaned over him. He thought she was going to wrap up on him, and tell him to just stay in bed and let the others rest for a while. Instead, she kissed his cheek and sat up, almost pulling an audible groan from him.

He followed her movements, throwing his legs over the side of the bed. “I’ll go break the news to Dean at least. Maybe he’ll be more…accepting of information if I can calm him down first.”

Duke began to get dressed, slipping into his jeans as he stared off into space, trying to reason with himself on what to tell Dean. He glanced over at Esme as he buttoned his jeans, and reached for a shirt. He could tell that Sarah was nearby, after Esme said her name. He still didn’t know how he felt about getting too close to the hellhound. So, he pulled his t-shirt over his head without approaching them.

After a moment, Duke stepped over to the dresser and retrieved his hat, shoving it onto his head with another sigh. He was dreading telling Dean anything. But he didn’t want Dean caught off guard. That wasn’t fair. Before he had enough time to tell Esme he would be back, he heard Dean’s voice and his fist pounding a door.

“No. That can’t be good.” He echoed Esme, grabbing his pistol off the dresser and shoving into the back of his jeans, before following her out the door. He protectively held an arm out, stepping in front of Esme as they approached the group. He was ready to help Dean, but he wanted Esme back and away from any danger that might be behind the door Dean was trying to get into. “Stay back here. If there is somethin’ going on in there, you need to be with…with Sarah.”

Dean and Cason

Dean continued to hammer at the door, ignoring all the bickering and chaos behind him. He just wanted to get to Nat. For all he knew, Anna had already ripped Cason’s throat out and had hurt Nat in the process. As Esme showed up out of nowhere, he turned his head, and almost echoed Sam.

“Nat’s stuck in there with…with Anna and if anyone’s killing Cason, it’s me!”

He stepped back from the door, and prepared himself to kick it in, when the door swung open, causing Dean to tilt his head to the side in confusion.

“What?” He asked, fully not understanding what Nat had said. They were just ‘chatting’? He glanced around Nat’s side, and saw Anna and Cason, casually sitting together at the table. The sight made him even more confused, and he squinted his eyes. “Did you know she was high? She looks fine!”

“Because she is fine!” Cason called out to Dean, causing Dean to grit his teeth in frustration. He scanned over Anna’s face, and she really did look…fine. She seemed a bit on edge. Her eyes were a little hollow and dilated. Her leg was bouncing on the ground and she seemed to be keeping her distance from Cason, but she didn’t seem on the edge of murdering the demon, or anything.

“Alright. Well…she’s fine.” Dean spoke flatly, turning on his feet to throw his hands up at Mika. She was the only one who would understand his frustration with being wrong. The last time Anna had access to Cason while she was high on demon blood, she had nearly killed him. He turned back to Nat at the door and sighed, awkwardly scratching the back of his neck, “So, what are you guys talking about?”

“Dean. That ain’t none of your business.” Duke groaned, trying to diffuse some of the tension for Esme’s sake. Dean simply shot him a dirty glare, and then turned to Esme.

“And what are you guys doing?” He asked, his annoyance beginning to spill into him attacking everyone, if Mika wasn’t able to pull him back in.

Supernatural - Hell On The Horizon

Anna and Cason

Anna winced when Nat spoke her own fears aloud. Cason was scared. Most likely, they were screwed. She folded her fingers into fists, and wiped them aggressively on her bare legs, anxiety flooding her, along with Cason’s heartbeat roaring through the room. But she had to continue, before something bad inevitably happened. It was like being fielded by the FBI. The demons could be anywhere.

“There’s more…unfortunately.” Anna started, pulling the empty vial of blood from her pocket and placing it on the table. She placed both her hands back in her lap as Cason stepped closer, reaching for the vial. “Please don’t come near me! Please…I can hear your heart beating.”

“I don’t have a heartbeat.” Cason muttered, confused. He narrowed his eyes at her, and Anna simply shrugged.

“Well, whatever that really loud buzz is…it sounds like a heartbeat. I can’t handle it anymore. So, stay over there and let me finish and then I need to go. I want to rip your throat out.” Anna snapped quickly, holding up a hand but not looking up at Cason. He took a few steps back, and sighed. The poor girl was in bad shape and there was absolutely nowhere to lock her down, or keep her safe. They were stuck with flimsy motel walls and picture windows…in the presence of a ticking time bomb.

“Go on. What happened next?” Cason urged her, shooting a worried glance over to Natalia. With Anna being able to burn demons alive, there was no way he could restrain her, if she did attack him. He realized, in that moment, that he had made a mistake, allowing Nat to stay. She was currently the only body in the room that could try to handle Anna unless he could disappear from the room, and then Dean would kill him for leaving Anna alone with Nat.

“W-we got on a bus. And when we were getting on the bus, there was this demon that was watching us. He ended up on the bus with us, and literally the second the bus started moving, he and every other person riding, held Sam down and forced me to drink demon blood.”

As she finished explaining, Cason stopped his pacing and held out a hand in confusion, “How exactly were they able to force feed you? Your hands are like acid, right?”

“Only when I’m high. Like…I don’t even know if I can microdose like S-….like others. I have to be high before it works. After the guy was basically drained, I was able to burn all of them. I turned him to ash. That was a new one.”

Anna seemed genuinely confused and scared of her own powers, but also cynical. Cason could only assume it was how high she was, that was causing her to behave this way. But Sam was still drinking demon blood? Sam was using his powers…without drinking from demons. That was the big take away that Cason wouldn’t speak out loud until he and Nat were alone. He nearly flinched when Anna started talking again.

“Then at the airport, a woman followed me into the restroom, and gave me that. It was given like an anxiety pill before I got on the plane. She told me ‘the cowboy has the address’ and ‘it’s either you or one of them’. Sam doesn’t know. They just want me…”

“They’re not getting you.” Cason snapped quickly, cutting her off.

“What other choice do we have?! She made it clear that Sam is to stay alive. They don’t even want Sam. They just want me. I won’t let anyone get hurt for me…not anymore. Sam will just have to deal.” She snapped at him, picking up the vial and fidgeting with it. But Cason wasn’t going to budge on this. His annoyance and frustration with trying to keep humans alive was reaching a boiling point. The last thing they needed on their hands was Sam Winchester, high on demon blood, mourning the girlfriend he had just flown a thousand miles to retrieve. She was making it out of this.

“Give that to me.” He ordered, almost like a father or a big brother. He snatched the vial from her hand, her finger sizzling against his skin as their hands brushed. He unscrewed the lid, and pulled his pocket knife with his free hand. Flipping it open, he jabbed the tip into his wrist and quickly pulled the vial up to drip his blood into it. “This is probably a horrible idea, but whatever they are wanting you to do is going to take a lot out of you, and we need you to be able to kill…every…single…demon that is there.”

“I don’t want to.” Anna whispered, but Cason held the full vial of his blood out to her, and nodded at it. “I don’t want to kill demons.”

“You don’t have a choice, darling.”

Dean

Dean sat down at the table, as Mika answered the knock at the door. He figured it would be Sam and Anna, pregaming the group on her plans to meet with Cason, but to his surprise, it was just Sam. As Sam walked in, he could tell that his brother was exhausted, stressed and upset. He looked disheveled and honestly, it was unnerving, to see Sam this way, after what should have been a simple retrieval. Mika took the words out of his mouth, when she urged Sam to speak and Dean leaned back in his chair a bit, waiting for the bomb to drop.

Hearing that they were tailed by demons from the beginning caused Dean’s hair to stand up. Of course they were. The two were magnets.

“Of course they knew where you were. You were separated. It’s the perfect opportunity to get to you both separately…”, Dean groaned. But he waved Sam on and when his brother got to the ‘weird’ part, Dean nearly groaned again. Weird, for Sam, was dangerous. That meant they were both lucky to be alive. Anna hearing voices wasn’t exactly surprising for Dean. She was a little off, and possibly not even human. He would never voice this out loud, for fear of his very tired brother punching his lights out. But the thought was in his mind, until Sam began to talk about the bus. Dean instantly sat up straight. The name Alastair caused a bit of tunnel vision to set in, and his heart began to hammer in his chest.

“So wait. Anna is being targeted by Alastair?” He almost whispered, his voice shaky as he stared off into space. If that was the case, there wasn’t much of a way to protect Anna. Alastair would get what he wanted. He always got what he wanted. Dean wasn’t even 100% sure that there was a way to beat him, even if they had the weapons they needed.

He almost didn’t hear the rest of the conversation between Sam and Mika, but the second Mika scolded Sam for leaving Anna alone with Cason and Nat, Dean’s protective nature flared and he came back to reality.

“She’s high?! Sammy do you remember what happened the last time she got high and was within ten feet of Cason?” He scolded him, standing from his chair. His legs were shaky and his hands were quivering, but he had to push that down. There was a real possibility that Nat could be in danger, and he wouldn’t even have to kill Cason for it. Anna would do that for him. “I’m going down there. If she tries to kill Cason, Nat will try to stop her.”

Without another word, Dean stomped toward the door and then out onto the sidewalk, his heart hammering so hard in his chest that he could hear it in his ears. He had a small hope that Mika and/or Sam would follow him, for some sort of backup. Anna was terrifying when she was high, and unhinged. He knocked frantically on the door of Nat’s room and took a deep breath.

“Nat?!”

Cason hurried and took the empty vial from Anna, as soon as she finished drinking his blood. He capped it and shoved it into his pocket, as Anna wiped her mouth. Taking a chance, he sat down at the table and gestured for Nat to get the door. “I think we’re good, for now. We have a deal, little one?”

“We have a deal.” Anna whispered. She had struck a deal with Cason, similar to the deal that Sam had with Ruby. In return? She had to tell him if she was thinking of draining him, and he would provide.