A Supernatural One-Shot
Title: New Béziers
Author: chasingtides
Beta: una___sola
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Coda to 3.16: The Winchester boys were supposed to be dead, one in St. Louis, both in Colorado, not slaughtering a small town in Indiana.
Jack Lloyd stepped out of his car and into New Harmony. “You sure it’s them? This isn’t another wild goose chase?” he asked the cop who had stepped away from the S. W. A. T. team to greet him. She moved stiffly and her pale eyes were red. The air smelled off like bile and rotten eggs. He gagged slightly.
The woman nodded sharply. “Susan Plodowski, sheriff. We haven’t gotten close enough to get a facial I. D., but we’ve got enough - it’s the Winchesters.”
“So why haven’t you moved in on them yet?” Jack had been given the Winchester case after the untimely and frankly mysterious death of the last man on the case, Victor Hendriksen. Rumor had it that the case was cursed - anyone on it too long went mad and died. Jack had met Hendriksen once and hadn’t noticed anything odd about the man; he’d been married to the job, but weren’t they all? One thing he knew from Hendriksen, from the file, from his superiors was that the Winchester brothers were dangerous and needed to be thrown someplace cold and dark for eternity. Some of the guys back at the bureau thought it was a pity that the brothers weren’t (yet) wanted in a state with capital punishment, back before their apparently faked deaths in Colorado. “This is a neighborhood. People could die.”
The Plodowski swallowed visibly. “They’re already dead.”
“What? Are you completely incompetent?”
“We didn’t know anything was wrong until one of my men was found dead by the side of the road. It looks like they killed everyone in New Harmony before they could get word out.” The woman looked as though she was going to be sick.
“Everyone?” Jack frowned. The Winchester case was supposed to be a closed file, the brothers killed in the same explosion that killed Hendriksen, never mind that Dean Winchester, the supposed dominant brother, was supposed to have died in Missouri in ‘06.
“We found the bodies. Stacked like cordwood.” Jack hadn’t realised that a person could actually turn that particular shade of white.
“Shot?” Jack asked, try to get a grasp on the situation and remember the file he’d only read briefly when it first crossed his desk. Their usually MO involved single woman, probably modeled after their father’s behavior and the murder of his wife. “Or,” Jacked paused, his stomach turning at the thought, “Burned?”
The sheriff stared at him as though he thought it up on his own. “Knifed. The bodies were just left in the street. Bleeding.”
Jack swallowed. These people… best not to think of it. “Anyone left alive?”
“We found a drifter in an empty house. He was on his knees, praying, when my men went in.”
“Did you question him yet? The Winchesters aren’t known for leaving witnesses.”
“He’s not saying anything. We figure he saw the bodies and hid in the nearest shelter.”
“Keep him talking. He could have seen something important when we bring these bastards to trial.”
Plodowski stared at him. “You don’t understand, Officer Lloyd. He’s not talking. At all. We found I.D. But -”
She was interrupted by an unholy wail issuing from the surrounded house. Jack shivered. It sounded like some kind of dying animal. It cut into the night like a knife.
“What the hell is that?”
“We’re not sure. That’s why we haven’t moved ahead, yet. Something - we think it’s one of the men - keeps making that noise. Just as we got here, it sounded like there was a fight and then screams, like someone was dying. Then silence. Now, every few minutes, screams.”
“Move in,” Jack said, sharply as the sound carried into the night. “If one of them is torturing some poor kid, I’m not going to be responsible.”
Just as the sheriff moved away to let the S. W. A. T. Team know, the door to the innocent-looking house opened. Jack recognised the younger Winchester from the pictures in his file. His shirt was covered in blood and in his arms was - it looked like the body of his older brother. Shit, Jack thought as he reached for his gun, as the S. W. A. T. Team moved into formation. And then as soon as they’d seen the man, he was gone. It wasn’t that he’d gone back into the house or stepped into the bushes. Sam Winchester, killer and grave desecrator and no doubt abused child to any agent who read his file, vanished in the blink of an eye.
“Out! Out! Check the house!” The sheriff ran with the team and Jack followed, gun in hand.
The inside of the house was as bad as he’d expected from the thick file on the brother - and the father’s own file - and Sheriff Plodowski’s ad hoc report. There was the body of an older woman in the entry way, looked to be a few days dead. An elderly man was dead, broken neck, in the dining room. A young blonde, typical Winchester victim, a cold voice in his head said, was dead in the first floor living area, with both a broken neck and bullet wounds. Upstairs, in a child’s playroom, was the mutilated body of what had once probably been a family pet. And in the basement, hiding and crying and praying, were the young owners of the house and their little girl.
*
Plodowski sat with the family out by her police car. The woman was rocking back and forth, holding her young daughter who was silently crying. Jack could hear the husband, the owner the of mutilated dog, the son of the murdered couple, talking to the sheriff. He refused to press charges. He did not believe that either Winchester boy had killed his mother or father, but he couldn’t say who did. They might have killed everyone else in town, but if they had, it would have been with good reason. The wife piped up then, still holding tightly to her daughter, saying that the Winchester boys were brave and should be rewarded somehow for their efforts. Plodowski looked as though she’d been hit by a fourteen wheeler when she made her way back to where Jack was standing by the house.
“I can’t figure out why, but they’re not pressing charges. Fuck, they want to pay them for the pleasure of having killed everyone.” She looked like she could do with a coffee, but there wasn’t anyone to make any coffee. “I told them that they should look into some kind of professional therapy. Shock. Trauma. Some kind of syndrome. Helsinki. Stockholm. Fuck.”
“Is the drifter saying anything?” Jack asked, grasping at straws. He needed to call his superiors and he needed something, anything beyond the fact that the Winchesters had, once again, given them the slip. “Maybe he witnessed something.”
The sheriff shook her head and swayed on her feet. “He’s praying a bit. Old school Catholic, Latin shit. Reminds me of my grandmother. He’s probably got shock, too. Hell, agent, I think we’re all rock bottom here. It’s like those boys salted the earth when we weren’t looking.” She turned. “I’m going to go find that family a place to stay, some place safe. Safer. Clean. Something. Someplace not here. If you need anything, you know how to contact me.” As she left, walking back to the road and her men he could hear her muttering about funerals and grave diggers and piece of shit killers who ought to burn in hell.
His cell phone rang and he flipped open. “Agent Lloyd, speaking… Yes. No. No. No, sir.” Jack drew his hand over his face tiredly. “No, the family refuses to press charges. They’re insisting that the Winchesters saved them from something awful,” he explained into the phone. “No, they can’t say what.” He paused and listened. “Neither the little girl nor the old drifter are speaking, except for the drifter praying sometimes. The couple seem to want to give the Winchesters some kind of reward.” He listened again and winced. “Yes, sir. Of course, sir. I’ll be on the case. God only knows what he’s doing with that body.”
Author: chasingtides
Beta: una___sola
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Coda to 3.16: The Winchester boys were supposed to be dead, one in St. Louis, both in Colorado, not slaughtering a small town in Indiana.
Jack Lloyd stepped out of his car and into New Harmony. “You sure it’s them? This isn’t another wild goose chase?” he asked the cop who had stepped away from the S. W. A. T. team to greet him. She moved stiffly and her pale eyes were red. The air smelled off like bile and rotten eggs. He gagged slightly.
The woman nodded sharply. “Susan Plodowski, sheriff. We haven’t gotten close enough to get a facial I. D., but we’ve got enough - it’s the Winchesters.”
“So why haven’t you moved in on them yet?” Jack had been given the Winchester case after the untimely and frankly mysterious death of the last man on the case, Victor Hendriksen. Rumor had it that the case was cursed - anyone on it too long went mad and died. Jack had met Hendriksen once and hadn’t noticed anything odd about the man; he’d been married to the job, but weren’t they all? One thing he knew from Hendriksen, from the file, from his superiors was that the Winchester brothers were dangerous and needed to be thrown someplace cold and dark for eternity. Some of the guys back at the bureau thought it was a pity that the brothers weren’t (yet) wanted in a state with capital punishment, back before their apparently faked deaths in Colorado. “This is a neighborhood. People could die.”
The Plodowski swallowed visibly. “They’re already dead.”
“What? Are you completely incompetent?”
“We didn’t know anything was wrong until one of my men was found dead by the side of the road. It looks like they killed everyone in New Harmony before they could get word out.” The woman looked as though she was going to be sick.
“Everyone?” Jack frowned. The Winchester case was supposed to be a closed file, the brothers killed in the same explosion that killed Hendriksen, never mind that Dean Winchester, the supposed dominant brother, was supposed to have died in Missouri in ‘06.
“We found the bodies. Stacked like cordwood.” Jack hadn’t realised that a person could actually turn that particular shade of white.
“Shot?” Jack asked, try to get a grasp on the situation and remember the file he’d only read briefly when it first crossed his desk. Their usually MO involved single woman, probably modeled after their father’s behavior and the murder of his wife. “Or,” Jacked paused, his stomach turning at the thought, “Burned?”
The sheriff stared at him as though he thought it up on his own. “Knifed. The bodies were just left in the street. Bleeding.”
Jack swallowed. These people… best not to think of it. “Anyone left alive?”
“We found a drifter in an empty house. He was on his knees, praying, when my men went in.”
“Did you question him yet? The Winchesters aren’t known for leaving witnesses.”
“He’s not saying anything. We figure he saw the bodies and hid in the nearest shelter.”
“Keep him talking. He could have seen something important when we bring these bastards to trial.”
Plodowski stared at him. “You don’t understand, Officer Lloyd. He’s not talking. At all. We found I.D. But -”
She was interrupted by an unholy wail issuing from the surrounded house. Jack shivered. It sounded like some kind of dying animal. It cut into the night like a knife.
“What the hell is that?”
“We’re not sure. That’s why we haven’t moved ahead, yet. Something - we think it’s one of the men - keeps making that noise. Just as we got here, it sounded like there was a fight and then screams, like someone was dying. Then silence. Now, every few minutes, screams.”
“Move in,” Jack said, sharply as the sound carried into the night. “If one of them is torturing some poor kid, I’m not going to be responsible.”
Just as the sheriff moved away to let the S. W. A. T. Team know, the door to the innocent-looking house opened. Jack recognised the younger Winchester from the pictures in his file. His shirt was covered in blood and in his arms was - it looked like the body of his older brother. Shit, Jack thought as he reached for his gun, as the S. W. A. T. Team moved into formation. And then as soon as they’d seen the man, he was gone. It wasn’t that he’d gone back into the house or stepped into the bushes. Sam Winchester, killer and grave desecrator and no doubt abused child to any agent who read his file, vanished in the blink of an eye.
“Out! Out! Check the house!” The sheriff ran with the team and Jack followed, gun in hand.
The inside of the house was as bad as he’d expected from the thick file on the brother - and the father’s own file - and Sheriff Plodowski’s ad hoc report. There was the body of an older woman in the entry way, looked to be a few days dead. An elderly man was dead, broken neck, in the dining room. A young blonde, typical Winchester victim, a cold voice in his head said, was dead in the first floor living area, with both a broken neck and bullet wounds. Upstairs, in a child’s playroom, was the mutilated body of what had once probably been a family pet. And in the basement, hiding and crying and praying, were the young owners of the house and their little girl.
*
Plodowski sat with the family out by her police car. The woman was rocking back and forth, holding her young daughter who was silently crying. Jack could hear the husband, the owner the of mutilated dog, the son of the murdered couple, talking to the sheriff. He refused to press charges. He did not believe that either Winchester boy had killed his mother or father, but he couldn’t say who did. They might have killed everyone else in town, but if they had, it would have been with good reason. The wife piped up then, still holding tightly to her daughter, saying that the Winchester boys were brave and should be rewarded somehow for their efforts. Plodowski looked as though she’d been hit by a fourteen wheeler when she made her way back to where Jack was standing by the house.
“I can’t figure out why, but they’re not pressing charges. Fuck, they want to pay them for the pleasure of having killed everyone.” She looked like she could do with a coffee, but there wasn’t anyone to make any coffee. “I told them that they should look into some kind of professional therapy. Shock. Trauma. Some kind of syndrome. Helsinki. Stockholm. Fuck.”
“Is the drifter saying anything?” Jack asked, grasping at straws. He needed to call his superiors and he needed something, anything beyond the fact that the Winchesters had, once again, given them the slip. “Maybe he witnessed something.”
The sheriff shook her head and swayed on her feet. “He’s praying a bit. Old school Catholic, Latin shit. Reminds me of my grandmother. He’s probably got shock, too. Hell, agent, I think we’re all rock bottom here. It’s like those boys salted the earth when we weren’t looking.” She turned. “I’m going to go find that family a place to stay, some place safe. Safer. Clean. Something. Someplace not here. If you need anything, you know how to contact me.” As she left, walking back to the road and her men he could hear her muttering about funerals and grave diggers and piece of shit killers who ought to burn in hell.
His cell phone rang and he flipped open. “Agent Lloyd, speaking… Yes. No. No. No, sir.” Jack drew his hand over his face tiredly. “No, the family refuses to press charges. They’re insisting that the Winchesters saved them from something awful,” he explained into the phone. “No, they can’t say what.” He paused and listened. “Neither the little girl nor the old drifter are speaking, except for the drifter praying sometimes. The couple seem to want to give the Winchesters some kind of reward.” He listened again and winced. “Yes, sir. Of course, sir. I’ll be on the case. God only knows what he’s doing with that body.”