The Lightning Strike

Home.

It’s a strange thing to think of when you don’t’ really have a traditional one. When most people say that, they usually mean something like, ‘oh my mom is crazy!’ or ‘my dad collects odd things’. They may even mean that they live in a trailer with their family or something like that. Which, technically, if a moving box of a house could count as a home, then I guess my home was a Ford Gran Torino. It didn’t used to be. Only a year had gone by since that hot, sticky summer that changed everything. I’d just turned 18 and Misha was 20.

It’s odd but I don’t even remember why we weren’t at our homes, we lived next door to each other, and had gone out. Probably for ice cream or some other goody. Misha had been my best friend since before I could remember. We joked at one point that it was odd that our families lived in separate houses at all since we were all constantly over at each other’s places. Nisha Annette Marenda and Misha Raleigh Jones. Two peas in a pod. It’d been hot that day. I remember that. I don’t actually remember the date though. I know it was in July and I know it was ridiculously hot. I remember Misha pointing out on the way home that the air was practically saturated with the smell of wild flowers and grass. We kept the A/C blasting in her baby. It was the car her parents had finally helped Misha buy slowly. She’d finally been able to buy it the year before and had been ecstatic.

She treated that car like her child. Seriously. We were to be very careful with the interior, no one fucked with her radio without getting smacked and holy shit if you thought you could get away with touching her paint job. I rarely drive. I can drive in a pinch, I just get really freaked out over it so we avoid making me drive as much as possible. I do think that Gran Torino is gorgeous though. Wait, I think I do remember what we’d done. Misha had picked me up from college after work and we were on our way home. Just another typical day.

I’d gone to my house and she’d gone to hers. It’s odd. There’s a split second before you see the truth, right before the curtain is completely pulled aside. What happens in that split second, when you can see it but you can’t really see it? Your subconscious does one of a few things. The most common are shock/awe of how amazing it is, deflation from how you’re not really affected at all by it, or there’s the option I had. That moment of petrified disgust where part of you screams to just shut the door and turn around and walk away. It’s always too late to do that though. Your body is still following through with an order, so by the time that fear hits you, it’s just added to by the sight. I can’t remember if I screamed or sobbed or if I made any noises at all. I do remember the sight. So much red everywhere.

There were body parts slew over everything. I couldn’t even tell who they are. Body parts upon body parts, blood everywhere. It was like some sort of twisted horror show that I couldn’t wake up from. I couldn’t even think straight, but the second I could, all I could think about was Misha. I didn’t remember walking into the mess in my house, but apparently I had because I slipped in the blood as I ran out of my house frantically. Darting over to the other side, I ripped open the door and her house was like a dual picture. Same exact scene. Body parts draped over furniture and other objects, blood drenching the walls.

I’d always been protective of Misha, as odd as that sounded, but now even more so. It was odd to see Misha so…broken like that. After I’d made sure that Misha had no wounds or physical trauma, I’d called the cops and they’d come. We stuck around long enough for the cops to identify the remains of our loved ones and let us bury them. We’d wanted to stick around longer, but the cops didn’t have a clue and they’d basically given up. We’d looked into it also though and had figured out what had happened. Demons. No way could we tell the cops, so we’d started on our own little crusade. Hunt down whatever it was that butchered our families, oh and raise Hell along the way. We’d left our quiet lives and used odd information we’d gained before we’d even become full blown hunters to start on our way. Especially after we had let a little of our theory slip and the cops laughed us out of the station.

We started studying up on lore in our library and training. Pretty soon we were loaded up into Misha’s green baby and on the road. Now that I think about it, it was a good thing we’d left Missouri. It was also a good thing that that car became our home. We’d seen the aftermath of pure evil. It leaves a mark, not always one that can be seen or even touched or quantified, but it’s there. We didn’t belong in Missouri anymore.

And that suited us just fine.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“Misha?”
Misha finally looked over with some sort of recognition that I’d just spoken. It was dark and rainy, the perfect setting for the conversation we were having. Then again, we had conversations like this all the time. Unfortunately, me trying to keep Misha on task about cattle mutilations was harder than it seemed. The fact that she tried to look at me like she was actually paying attention was humorous, sweet, but humorous.

“Did you catch any of what I just said?”

I rolled my eyes as she shifted to look outside the window. She was trying to get out of this situation. I wasn’t upset with her for not really paying attention to me about this. After all, it was secretly very comforting. It was a schedule. I talked to her about shit I’d looked up, she’d ignore me and drive causing me to repeat it exasperatedly and her to roll her eyes. It was like clockwork. It was stable. It felt good. Plus it gave me the excuse to hit her sometimes.

“No, I didn’t. Something about cows, right?”
Nodding, I continued speaking.

“Mutilated cows. Some decapitations as well. As much as I’d love to believe it was some perverse cult, I’m guessing not. We’ve seen this kind of shit before, right?”

“Nevada I think” She replied vaguely. Another common thing between us. One of us would be specific, the other would give vague recollections. “What is this place called, Red Cap? Red Road?”

“Red Lodge, Misha. Red Lodge. Some random ass, middle of nowhere town that as usual is not equipped with decent bars or motels.”

I giggled as she grinned. She had an odd sense of humor, but then again, so did I. I wasn’t psychic by any means, but after knowing the girl for roughly 20 years, I could pretty damn well come close to figuring out what she was thinking about. Shitty motels. We somehow found the worst of the bunch and I always wondered how they ever met health code standards. I then realized that since we were in places so small that you couldn’t even take a shit without the whole town knowing, it was probably a safe bet that the stuffed shirts didn’t come down there that often. The bar we ended up in, I had to admit though, was probably in the top 10 of cheesy rating. Very obvious decorations, country rock flowing through on an old machine, stale beer and the slightest bit of urine in the air. We caused a bit of a scene as I pushed open the door. It was mostly occupied by men for one, and the women that were there looked more like men anyway.

I flat out ignored them though. I was used to the looks. I’m tiny and I’m fairly attractive. Misha’s blond, average height and beautiful. Needless to say, we got perverts wherever we went. We could make a fortune helping catch pedophiles just by being bait. Not that we were illegal by any means, but I looked fairly young and somehow we always got the really odd folk following us around. Luckily we got to the bar without problems. She ordered a rum, I ordered a simple beer. I’m not really old enough to drink, but I have breasts. Which means no one really cared how old I was when I ordered. I didn’t usually order beer though, it wasn’t my favorite thing to drink. I preferred more fruity drinks, but I just had an inkling this bar didn’t take too many specialized orders so I’d refrained. As we sat down at our table, I’d sipped my drink and spoken quietly to her.
“So, I say we ask around here, ask the barman and maybe some of these scruffy bastards if they know anything. Misha? Misha, are you listening?”

I blinked in surprise as she rose her hand to silence me. What the hell was going on? Leaning toward me, Misha cupped her hand around her mouth and gave me a pointed look. Leaning over toward her, I listened carefully as she spoke.

“Don’t look, but there’s some guy over there, he’s smoking. Black guy. He’s been staring at us something about what’s been going on around here.”

I couldn’t help it. I looked. The guy was a creepy bastard and he immediately got up and started walking toward us. I knew he was walking toward us since well, it wasn’t exactly a huge bar and plus he was staring straight at us. Speaking of which, someone needs to remind this son of a bitch to blink once and awhile. Glancing over at Misha, I gave her a sheepish look as she hissed at me through gritted teeth.

“I told you not to look! Now he thinks he can come and sit here with us.”

I glared back at Misha. Misha knew better than anyone that it was common knowledge that telling someone not to look somewhere automatically made them look there! I opened my mouth to point that out, but I had to shut my mouth quickly as the stranger reached his destination. He smelled oddly musty, with a hint of cigarette. It was a gross smell, or at least it was to me. I’m not a huge fan of cigarette smell at all. Now that he was here, he grinned and there was a moment of thinking of the Cheshire cat, but not the usual one. No, this was more like the insane asylum version from that one game. The one where Alice goes insane and so Wonderland goes insane with her. There was something very feral about him as he stared at us. Something about the way he looked at us made me think he was dissecting us, analyzing us…devouring us.

“Ladies.”

I looked at him oddly. I didn’t trust him. I could tell Misha didn’t either, we both had fairly good radar about creeps and criminals. When you live on the road, it was a skill you had to pick up one way or another. Otherwise you could get conned or miss out on opportunities. Both were bad, although getting conned was easier to figure out than missing out on good opportunities. I decided to be as direct as possible without causing too much attention to be drawn to ourselves as I spoke calmly but flatly to the stranger.

“We’re waiting for someone.”

“Oh? My names Gordon-”

“Gordon?” Misha cut off the man apparently named Gordon before he could finish. I was grateful though, I’d been ready to go a bit rude on him. “We really are waiting for someone, and there’s only three seats at this table, so if you’d be so kind as to…you know, get off of it, we’d be much obliged.”

“My mistake. I’ll catch up with you both later, I’m sure.”

Our luck has been pretty shitty, so stalker boy, I mean Gordon, could very well be right. Shaking my head, I turned back to Misha and we made plans about investigating the decapitations and the cattle mutilations. I’d made a few unpleasant remarks about our overly friendly neighborhood stalker. Mostly about how I was irritated that he’d tried to look down my shirt while talking to us. He was still staring at us but we ignored him as best as we could and after about an hour or so, Misha and I had made some plans. We knew we were going to have to bust into the morgue to look at the decapitation side of the case and ask around about the cattle mutilations. We just weren’t sure what was going to happen after that. It was still really new in the case though so I wasn’t ridiculously worried.

“Man, Sam, it’s good to be back on a case.”

Blinking, I looked over toward the door as two men entered the bar. The first one was wearing a leather jacket and had a smirk on his face. He was fairly tall, then again I’m a poor one to ask about that considering I’m only 5’1”. His sandy colored hair was cropped short and he was fairly attractive, but not my type. The second one after him was ridiculously tall. Like, freakishly tall. His dark hair fell in a mop in his face slightly. Chiseled features, but somehow still soft. He was in a comfy hoodie and I was guessing his name was Sam. I’m not even going to lie. He was gorgeous. Did I mention I could be an insufferable flirt? I can be. Especially with someone as overtly gorgeous as this Sam guy. It was almost enough to make me think of our recent stalker, who was still staring at us.

“I’m glad to be back but kind of wishing that people would be careful where they park their crappy ass cars. Did you see that rusted up Torino outside? It’s offensive.”

Oh. Shit. I closed my eyes for a moment and inhaled sharply before counting backward from three and looking at Misha. I’d vaguely seen the Sam guy roll his eyes and somewhat agree, but I was too busy eying Misha to care. She looked pissed. Oh, this could get pretty ugly. I was mildly offended too though. Our car was gorgeous and I knew nothing about cars but I knew what rust was. We didn’t have any so I’m not sure where he thought he saw some. Gently prodding Misha’s arm, I whispered carefully to her.

“Misha?”

Great. She wouldn’t even look at me. She just kept staring at Sam and the idiot who insulted her car standing by the bar. Glancing over, I saw Sam handing the bartender money before both men leaned in to talk to him. I was mildly interested in what had just gone down. It’d looked rather suspicious, after all, they’d ordered beers so it wasn’t like they were embarrassed by their orders. Besides, it was way too much money for beer. Apparently our staring didn’t go unnoticed though since the idiot actually noticed and took it the wrong way because he got a stupid grin on his face. Both of them approached us, the idiot grinning and Sam standing awkwardly like he didn’t want to be there. I tried not to be offended by that reaction.

“Helloooo ladies. My name’s Dean Winchester, that’s my brother Sam, but back to me. What are you two doing and alone too, this place is kind of a dive-”

Ah, so Sam’s last name was Winchester. Idiot’s name was Dean. Somehow the name suited him. Although he was using the cheesiest lines in the book, ever. What was with guys and feeling the need to approach us like we were some sort of lost puppies that needed saving? I opened my mouth to speak but Misha interrupted him first.

“What am I doing? I’m offending people, with my crappy ass rusted up Torino. I’m also now being badly propositioned by some asshat in a cheap and probably fake leather jacket. Any further details required there…Tex?”

I took another sip of my beer as Dean obviously started to look embarrassed. A grin spread across my face though as Sam snorted out a laugh. Ah, how was this gem related to such a pig like Dean? I really didn’t get it. Maybe I wasn’t getting the entire story, I knew that if Dean kept up his behavior though, Misha would probably run him over on principle alone. Dean glared at Sam though causing Sam to cough awkwardly and glance elsewhere. Shit, he was cute. Damn, I need a life.

“Well, aren’t you just a ball of sunshine?”

“Come on Dean, let’s just leave them alone,”

Dean had looked at Misha sarcastically, Sam had looked at me apologetically. I just smiled slightly back at him. In all honesty, I was mildly amused by the entire situation. It wasn’t the first, last or only time Misha had gotten into it with idiots trying to get into her pants. I enjoyed watching her crush them. It was an odd hobby of mine. One time I got a little tipsy and sent one her way just to watch him get turned down. Then again, that guy had spent time trying to play grab ass with me so I wasn’t in the mood to screw around with him. Especially since Misha always had looked more menacing than I have.

“Shut up. Lady, clearly you need to get laid or get a sense of humor, a combination of the two is likely. I’ll bet my ass it’s been a long time.”

My hand, out of an almost crazy reflex, reached out and grabbed Misha’s arm before she could throw her drink in Dean’s face. I knew her better than anyone in this world so I knew she was just absolutely dying to. Misha wasn’t promiscuous by any means, but she sure as hell wasn’t a prude either. This guy obviously didn’t know how to get himself out of a bad situation. He was just digging himself a deeper and deeper grave. Leaning back slightly, I raised my eyebrows while looking at Dean. Calmly, I spoke with a slight bite to my voice. I really wasn’t in the mood. Giving one last real smile to Sam, I turned back to Dean and gave him a few parting words before the group broke up.

“If you’re finished there, Princess? We’re kind of busy.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Misha and I were mildly irritated about the day in general. Gordon and Dean had been a creep and a rude bastard, although something still told me that I was missing something about Dean. I wasn’t ready to completely just mark him down as a creep. I was definitely more than willing to do that for Gordon though. Something about that guy just made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end and my stomach drop uneasily. Misha was more upset than I was though, possibly more so about the fact that we both lost sight of Gordon. Misha pointed out she was fairly certain the guy was a hunter like us.

I wasn’t so sure about his profession, but I knew he was twisted so being anything close to us was completely out of the question. There was a slight anguish behind Gordon’s eyes, but most of it seemed to be covered up with a…lust. I’m not sure what exactly the lust was for but something deep inside me told me to never trust that guy. Ever. I’d become much warier of strangers and much more reliant on my instincts after mine and Misha’s families were butchered. I’d had a slight feeling something was wrong on that day and I’d ignored it. Granted, Misha thought there was something off about him too, something too feral to be a true hunter. I just thought he was a complete maniac though.

It was a fairly cold night and I’d been a little lost in my own head thinking about the people we met. I didn’t trust anyone easily, but something told me that Sam was in no way a threat to me. That Sam was a good guy. There was a sense of sweetness about him that you just couldn’t really fake. Misha gave me a look though that snapped me out of my thoughts. She heard something and in that moment I heard it too. It was an odd snarling, I knew it wasn’t a wild animal by the normal means so I nodded to Misha to show I understood and prepared myself as she counted to three on her fingers. Turning around at the same time as her, I blinked in shock as I saw a pale woman with blood streaming down her chin. Although that wasn’t the first thing I noticed. First thing I noticed was her ridiculously sharp and jagged fangs. I got into a fighting position the same time the girl is, I just hadn’t been prepared for how damn fast she was.

I immediately ran to the car and popped the trunk before frantically searching for the machete we had. I grabbed one and slammed the trunk shut before running back to the fight to hear crunching bone and my chest tightened as I sincerely hoped that was the vampire chick and not Misha. If it had been Misha, there would be Hell to pay. I felt my heart drop as I saw the woman/thing punch Misha in the face and Misha’s head snapped to the side before she fell down and hit the ground hard. Gripping the machete handle hard enough to make my knuckles go white, I ran toward Misha while yelling to her.

“MISHA!”

Charging over, I got into my own fight with the woman. I had a slightly different fighting style than Misha. Misha’s was more offensive, mine was more defensive. I’d learned at an early age that I was too small to do much damage on the offensive. My parents had been very worried about me, even in a small ass town in the middle of Missouri. They’d made me take self-defense classes and I learned that the best thing I could do was have the element of surprise. So I’d been taught this style of ‘fighting’. Dodging hits and hitting the person when they weren’t on their guard. I was taught to keep moving.

Never stop moving. It’s harder to hit a moving target than one that’s standing still. Granted, this fighting style did take a lot more energy out of me than most did. Working with weapons always helped me too, I was much better at hitting things from a distance since I could be calm and concentrate but if I had to fight up close I liked the machete. I sliced her up a few times before I got hit and stumbled back. Misha joined me then and we were both fighting her. I hissed out in pain and sympathy as Misha got hit in the stomach, but all of us got distracted as we heard a familiar voice shout out.

“HEY!”

Sam and Dean Winchester came running out with guns. I wasn’t exactly sure they were doing here but they shot at her. I watched as one of the bullets tore into the vampire’s shoulder. I wondered why the Winchester brothers had bothered with guns anyway. They’d only succeeded in pissing her off and sending her running. Frustrated, I coughed and pinched the bridge of my nose while speaking.

“Are you frigging kidding me?”

Sam and Dean grinded to a halt as they reached us. The looks of shock on their faces were profound. Especially Sam’s. It was almost like he was disappointed to see me here. To see me holding some bloody knife in my hand. Sam came up to me though. He looked concerned also. Part of me knew he didn’t think I belonged here, for whatever reason. He just didn’t know that if I didn’t belong here, there was nowhere else for me. My place would always be with Misha and fighting this fight. I had nothing else.

“Are you alright?”

I nodded and let him check the superficial wounds on my face. It seemed odd but part of me was a little hurt that he didn’t think I was supposed to be there, like I was too fragile to take care of myself. Maybe I was just being too sensitive about it. Maybe I was just looking at it oddly because I wasn’t used to seeing Misha get hurt and was feeling odd. I jumped slightly as Dean spoke in disbelief, rolling his eyes.

“I don’t believe this.”

I blinked and looked over at Misha. Her arms were crossed over her chest and her eyebrow was arched defiantly. She didn’t appreciate being mocked and she definitely didn’t appreciate people doubting her skills. I knew Misha and I were still new to this game, but we weren’t idiots. We knew the risks and we knew the game. We knew how to stay alive and we knew the ways to kill the creatures. I’m fairly certain not all of their cases had run smoothly. I hadn’t spotted it right away, but now it was obvious. They were hunters. Probably had a lot of experience with this sort of thing.

“You two…You two are hunters?”

“That’s right, Tex…Don’t be too impressed or anything.”

I avoided Sam’s glance. It had a mild shattered look behind it, like he couldn’t believe I chose this life. I couldn’t look at him, not now. How was I supposed to explain to an almost complete stranger that this wasn’t just my choice to be in this life? It’d been chosen for me the moment demons decided to play games with my family’s insides and left them slew all over my house.

“Oh, I’m not, cupcake. If it wasn’t for Sam and I showing up when we did, you idiots would be stone cold dead right now.”

I glared at Dean. Misha glared also, her fingers curled angrily at her sides, itching to punch him. She didn’t need to threaten, I knew her and besides, it was a classic thing to do when irritated. There’s an itch there to strike, an almost primal urge that takes energy to suppress. Sam had turned to not looking at me too for a bit, so I was surprised when he did speak.

“We never caught your names.”

“I’m Nisha and that’s Misha.”
I spoke it carefully, although Misha didn’t seem thrilled with it. That was obvious when I pointed to her and she glared at me causing Sam to awkwardly smile. I hated this. Of course I got a crush on the hunter brother of a hunter who was currently practically mortal enemies with my best friend. Oh and of course the guy I liked seemed to have mild disappointment that I shared his career.

“Well, I guess we now know what we’re dealing with though, right? Vampires. There has to be a nest nearby with the cattle mutilations going on around here. That and the decapitations. It’s the only thing that makes sense, Dean. We have to figure out where the nest is and track it down. Take it out.”

“I know Sammy, but right now I need a drink. Saving young girls is thirsty work.”

I dislike assholes. I also dislike people bringing up my gender and the fact that I look young. I’m not an idiot and I’m not incompetent. Raising an eyebrow, I figured Misha wanted to speak but I spoke before she could. I was irritated and I was sick of dealing with this crap. I deserved better. Misha and I both deserved better.

“Dealing with obnoxious bastards is also thirsty work, so thanks, we’d love to have you buy us both a drink. You’re so considerate for asking.”

“We’re not buying either of you sh-”

“Sure, I think everyone could…use a drink.”

I smiled gratefully at Sam as he interrupted Dean from basically telling me to take a hike. Maybe Sam wasn’t completely against me being in this life. Dean was pouting like a spoiled child and Misha looked pissed that we had to go with them, but part of me thought it’d be good to have back-up on these cases. It wasn’t like we couldn’t handle ourselves, but safety in numbers? Right? Besides, Sam looked like he could handle himself in a fight. Either that or maybe I was just drooling over him again.

What I hadn’t been expecting when we’d gone to the bar with the boys was for Gordon to be there also. I also didn’t expect Dean to seem so friendly with Gordon. Something about it felt wrong, far past just the creepiness of Gordon. Something about the way Sam seemed stiff about the entire situation. The way he made sure to point out to Gordon that Dean was the only one allowed to call him Sammy. There was a sense of protectiveness to it. He really did care about Dean. This entire scene seemed so off.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Part of me didn’t want Sam or Dean alone with Gordon. I didn’t trust that slimy bastard any farther than I could throw him. Even if Dean had been a jackass to my best friend and me, he still deserved protecting. Sam cared about Dean, and I highly doubted Sam cared about every single person he met. He didn’t seem to think much of Gordon at all. So I’d offered up myself and Misha to go along, she hadn’t been really paying attention but when she found out I was sure she’d forgive me eventually. She had to. I was right about not wanting Dean to be alone with Gordon when we were hunting one night and we went to the dock. A vampire was there. The rain was tremendous, but that’s not why I’ll never forget this hunt.

The reason I’ll never forget it is because Dean just about lost it. He beat the shit out of this vampire. The vampire landed on this saw. You know one of those tables and it has the circular saw you can pull down? For the life of me I can’t remember what those are called and this one had a chainsaw on it but Dean used it to cut his head off. I watched the blood spurt and spatter all over Dean’s face, but his face was empty. He just looked hollow and I knew that something deeper was going on than vampires. I don’t know what Misha whispered to Dean, but Dean glared, pointed at her and spoke harshly.

“You mind your own damn business. I’m doing my job. That’s how you hunt.”
There was definitely something more going on.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

We spent the rest of the night in our motel. Misha spent the time sitting next to the window playing with a lighter she’d found. She was looking out the window and watching something. I was busy analyzing things inside my own head while pretending to watch old black and white horror movies and eating chips. I knew Misha had a lot of issues with Dean, but something inside me told me that he wasn’t all that different from me or Misha. Something told me that he was just a little broken at the moment. I had no proof, it was just a feeling.

“Hey, Nisha, the Winchesters are outside and they’re trying to hot wire a car.”

“Oh really?”

I sat up quickly and joined Misha at the window and peeked out with her. Sure enough, the boys were hotwiring an Impala. Wait, wasn’t that their car? Raising an eyebrow, I chewed on my bottom lip before dumping the bag of chips on the table. Grabbing my knife and gun, I turned to Misha and said three words.

“Get your keys.”

“What? Why?”

“Get your keys. They’re totally going after that vampire nest and we’re not missing out on this. So get your keys so we can follow them.”

Misha didn’t waste time grabbing her keys while we crept outside, being as quiet and as subtle as possible. We didn’t want the guys to know we were following them. Especially not Dean, as much as I still thought that Dean and Sam weren’t horrible people, I was fairly certain Misha was still angry with Dean. I don’t think she trusted him at all. Not sure what Sam thought either. We gathered weapons after getting out of the car and sneaking up to the house in the middle of nowhere. Misha and I weren’t on the same side of the house. I couldn’t help but feel anger at Gordon as he held a knife to Sam. My hands clenched tight and my jaw clenched as I saw that bastard cut open Sam’s arm. I desperately hoped that I could make that son of a bitch pay sooner rather than later. The vampire was rather surprising though, in a good way, she seemed to fight her own nature. She just kept repeating no.

“You heard her, Gordon? You’re wrong. These fangs aren’t monsters, they’re not hurting anybody. The monster here is you.”

I was behind Sam and Gordon as Dean gave the speech. Misha was standing behind Dean. My eyes met with his and his gaze hardened. My gaze just stayed the same. I didn’t hate Dean. I wish he’d stop keeping up whatever façade he had, because it was annoying, but that was it. I watched Misha closely for her signal though and as soon as she nodded, I raised my gun and shot Gordon in the back of the leg. He dropped the knife and Sam broke free before grabbing the vampire girl and exiting the room with Misha. I kept my gun trained on Gordon while Dean smacked him around more before tying him up. Slowly moving my way over to Dean, I vaguely listened as Dean talked about how maybe he was like Gordon and maybe he wasn’t before saying he was just going to let him sit there for awhile. As we walked toward the door, I put the safety back on my gun and spoke.

“You’re nothing like that guy Dean. Remember that.”

“What the hell would you know Nisha?”

Chuckling, I shook my head and arched an eyebrow before speaking.

“Monsters don’t jump the gun when someone so much as looks at their baby brother wrong. You care. Possibly too much. That’s all.”

Before Dean could retaliate, I went out of the house to be quickly followed by me. We hadn’t left that much loner after Sam and I immediately went over to Misha. She was waiting for me and seemed anxious.

“So?”

“So? So Dean strapped Gordo to a chair and beat the living shit out of him. We figured we’d leave him tied up, maybe a few days sitting in his own crap will be character building, you know? I’m all about dishing out these charitable lessons.”

She grinned and rolled her eyes before stepping back to lean against the Torino. I saw her looking past me and I turned around and shifted nervously as I saw Sam walking over to me. I turned to tell Misha that I’d be right back, but she’d stepped off to talk to Dean. Turning back around, I stuffed my hands into my pockets as Sam smiled at me. He’d wrapped cloth on his wound.

“Thanks for doing that back there. I’m curious though, why’d you and Misha follow us? I mean, I’m grateful, you did help out, but why?”

I leaned against the car, my arms crossed across my chest, a small smile on my face. Sam walked toward me and gave me a pointed look. Chuckling, I pushed off of the car and walked closer to him and spoke.

“And leave you big, strong men on your own to fend for yourselves? Not a chance.”

Sam chuckled, a smile spreading on his face while he nodded. He seemed incredibly amused by the fact that I’d said that. I guess he thought I’d be more upset with Dean or him about not telling us about the stuff or something. Shoving his hands deep into his pockets, Sam walked closer and looked deep into my eyes. It was almost poetic.

“About that, I know it’s crazy and it’s soon but you and Misha did a great job in there. It gets crazy out on the road and it’s hard to know who we can trust. I was just wondering if you two wanted to join us on the road? You could still use your Torino. We’ll just work the cases together. Well one in particular to test it out. It’s two states over? It’s pretty grizzly and it’d be great to have you two could join us. What do you think?”

Rolling my eyes, I laughed while keeping my arms crossed across my chest and making my way toward Dean and Misha. Sam easily walked next to me and gave me pointed looks. Rolling my eyes, I finally looked at him and smiled before nodding.

“Alright, we’ll talk to Misha and Dean. I’m all for it but I’m not sure how they’ll do with it. You know?”

Sam nodded and grinned. We walked over and as we stood beside Dean, he tensed up a little bit. Hell, I did too. I was worried about how Misha would react to my practically volunteering us to go almost cross country with two strangers, one of which being a man she hates with a fiery passion due to the fact that he insulted her baby. It was one of the things you just don’t do. That or be a republican or Margaret Thatcher. Misha probably pinned Dean as a republican though so he wasn’t going to rise up her in her ranks quickly.

“So, Nisha and I were talking. There’s a job that’s come up, it’s about two states over, something pretty nasty from what I heard on the radio of the local casualty reports. We, I mean, Dean and I could use an extra set of hunters. So, Nisha and I thought that you two could come with us. Help us out on that job, you know? We owe you for bailing us out on this one.”

I winced as Dean huffed and climbed into his car before slamming the door. Misha smiled a forced smile and I instantly knew she wasn’t happy. Especially when she shrugged. She was doing this for me. I knew she was and I felt horrible because this wasn’t what she wanted at all. I knew it was selfish but I just wanted to stick with Sam a little bit longer.

“Um, sure Sam. You go on ahead, we’ll follow you to the next job.”

Sam gave me a weak smile as Misha left to go back to the car. I handed a card with my number and info on it to Sam and he handed one to me also. I rubbed the back of my neck and Sam gave me a sympathetic smile before getting into the Impala. Shaking my head, I went over and got into the passenger seat of the Torino. I didn’t know what was going to happen to us. All I knew was that I was sick of being alone. No, I knew I had Misha and don’t get me wrong for a second. I adore Misha with every fiber of my being. She is the sister I always wanted. We’re not related by blood but nothing in this world can tell me we’re not family. What I want is a man in my life. I’d left home at the age of 18 to go kill demons and vampires and everything evil that went bump in the night. That wasn’t so wrong to want to be loved, was it? I mean, it wasn’t going to blow up in my face…

Right?