Reunited...Again

This guy is just walking into his apartment, which is filled with tons of toys. He's on the phone arguing as he walks in.

"How dare you? Lance. Yeah that's right, I'm taking to Lance, not....no we both cut corners to get close to her, but that wasn't cheating. Dude, it's just a game." He sighs and hangs up.

"It's just a game." He says to himself as he goes into his bedroom.

While he's getting ready for bed, a text come across his phone that says You'll Pay For This. Hours later, he's in bed sleeping peacefully, when all of a sudden a mark of a tree appears on his arm. Horse hooves and neighing are heard. He's then being stretches, rope burns on his wrists and ankles until his limbs are torn off his body.

Dean, Sam and I are currently on the road. Sam and Dean as usual in the Impala while I'm in my care riding behind them.

"Okay man?"

"We have the most powerful weapon we ever had against demons and we can't find a way to use it."

"Yeah well, Kevin's on it and when he finds something, he'll call. So we wait. Look we both have had a rough go over these past couple of weeks. And uh..I know what you gave up wasn't easy. Maybe we oughta take the night off. Go see a flick, hit a bar or two. Have some fun. You remember fun don't you Sam?"

Before he could answer, his phone rings .

"Kevin what do you got? Garth, hey. Really? Okay uh..yeah. Thanks man. Hey Garth...you there? How'd you know where we are? Look it's bad enough that you're tracking us but...even worse when you say we've been Garth'd. Yep." Sam hangs up.

"Alright, we got to lose the GPS on our phones. Because Garth has been tracking us and other hunters apparently to assign cases."

"That's smart. That's a total Bobby move. What's the deal?"

"Uh...well it's close. Farmington Hills, Michigan. Dude got ripped limb from limb inside of his locked apartment."

"That's not good."

"Working a case. As long as we're waiting on Kevin, that'll be our following."

"Well let me notify Brooke." Dean says, taking his phone out and calling me.

"Yeah?"

"We've got a case. Dude ripped limb from limb inside his locked apartment."

"Interesting. Gonna stop somewhere so we can change into our FBI disguises right?"

"Yeah. Just thought I'd let you know of the case."

"Right. Well I'm following you so, I go where you go."

"Motel first of course."

"Right."

With that we hang up and we're off to a motel for at least most of the night before having to get ready in the morning to go. First thing in the morning that is. We arrive at the apartment complex and head up to where the crime scene is, walking in.

"Sheriff. Special agent Tagger and these are my partners special agents Rosewood."

"FBI. You guys are quick. Haven't even got the body out yet."

"Well the FBI is all work, no play." Dean states.

"You know, why don't you give me the tour while my partners look around?" Sam asks.

"We work better together." Dean motions to me and him.

"Your world agent. Follow me." The Sheriff says and Sam follows him while Dean and I go scoping the place out for possible ghost activity.

"Vic's name was Ed Nelson, 31 years old. Insurance claims adjuster. He lived alone, which is a real shocker considering his place is full of toys."

"So what happened?"

"No sign of forced entry. All we could tell is that he was tied up and pulled apart. Died of the shock or massive blood loss. Viewers choice on that one."

Sam nods and looks over at the guy's bag, which had some sort of chain thing and costumes.

"So what about these chains?"

"That's actually chain mail."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah. We did find clear rope burn marks on his wrists and ankles."

Sam goes over to one of the limbs and lifts the sheet to see it and the tree mark on it.

"Huh. So...anything...missing from the body?"

"You mean aside from the arms and legs? Uh nope. All there twig and berries too."

"What about the neighbors? Did they hear anything weird?"

"Uh a neighbor downstairs said she got woke up in the middle of the night by the sound of horses. Stomping their feet and galloping. We didn't find any hoof prints. She probably heard a TV, or was having a bad dream, or she was high as balls. Fortunately we got a real lead off a cellphone. According to the phone records, Ed's last call was from a guy called Lance Jacobson."

Dean and I come back from checking the whole apartment, and Sam looks at us, we shake our head no.

"An accountant, also 30s, also lives alone."

"How's he a lead?"

"The two of them talked together for 15 minutes and then Lance sent Ed here all kinds of angry texts. Some of them were your typical threat stuff. Some were a little weird."

"Weird how?"

"Like uh...you shall bleed for your crimes against us. Followed by the emoticon of a skull. And uh this beauty, I am a mage, I will destroy you. These kids today with their texting and murder. My men just brought Lance into the station for questioning."

"Well we're gonna need to take a crack at the suspect."

"Like I said agent, it's your world."

"Thank you Sheriff." I nod. "Agents, let's go." I motion and we leave.

"So what does this all sound like to you?"

"I don't know, a witch maybe?"

"Possibly. Maybe we'll get more info out of this Lance guy. Could be a witch, could be a demon, who knows." I state getting into the car.

Once Dean and Sam get into the car we head to the police station where Lance is being held for questioning. He's locked up for now, but when we get there, he's let out and brought to the questioning room where we walk in.

"Lance Jacobson? We're with the FBI." Sam states as we all sit down in front of him.

"The FBI? I can't believe this is happening. I can't believe Ed's dead." Lance breaks out into tears.

"Lance? Lance..just breathe. Just breathe, you're fine."

"We're just going to ask you a few questions. Try to calm down."

"We want to know about the text messages you sent Ed last night." I add.

"I told them when they brought me in that those texts weren't from me."

"Your phone and Ed's phone says otherwise."

"No I mean they were from me, but they weren't from me me."

"Did you really think that sentence was going to clear things up?"

"I'm sorry. This is all a big misunderstanding. Those text messages were from Greyfox the Mystic to Thargrim the Difficult. Our characters in Moondoor. Moondoor is a game that Ed and I play. We're LARPers. Live Action Role Playing?"

"Right. LARPing. Good times."

"We play Moondoor every other weekend at Paradige Park. All the info about it is on our website."

"You guys have a website."

"Yeah one of the players designed it. In fact, if you log onto the site, they should've posted pictures from last night's feast, I was there all night."

"What does anything of this have to do with the texts?"

"I play a character called Greyfox the Mystic, I'm a very very powerful mage in the game."

"Okay. Very powerful go on."

"Ed is...Ed was...Thargrim the Difficult of the Elder forest. Son of Hargrim. He was Lancelot to my Merlin."

"Ah. If you guys were so tight, then why the threatening messages?"

"We were named the Queen's honor guard in anticipation of the coming battle of kingdoms this weekend. I thought he broke protocol so I called Ed after game hours and accused him of cheating. And then I challenged him to a duel."

"A duel?"

"Wands and swords at dawn."

"Now when you say wands, do you mean...magic wands?" Dean asks.

I roll my eyes because that was just a stupid question.

"Excuse my partner, he's not familiar with LARPing. But answer the question anyway."

"No unmagic wands idgit. Because what I really want in a duel is an unmagic wand. Yes, fake wands. It's a game. I can't believe it. Oh ye gods. Thargrim the Difficult has fallen!" Lance breaks out into tears again.

"Lance. Hang in there champ." Dean states and Sam motions for me to get up as he and Dean do and we leave the room.

"So?"

"What are we thinking here?"

"He didn't put a whammy on us. Those weren't crocodile tears man, that's not our guy."

"So what're we looking at exactly?" I ask.

"You saw the chain mail. He could be 50 shades of Greyfox for all we know."

"Alright well let's check out the Moondoor site. See if Lance's story checks out." Sam states as he heads over to one of the computers and we follow. He sits and logs onto the Moondoor site after looking for it.

"Welcome to Moondor, Michigan's largest LARPing game."

"And I thought we needed to get out more."

"There's our guy." Sam states as we watch a picture slideshow of Lance at that feast he was talking about.

"Huh. Actually looks kind of awesome."

"Alright there's a video."

"Moondoor, a world of intrigue, honor, passion. Four kingdoms, Follows Of The Moon, Elves, Warriors of YesterYear, and Shadow Orcs. All will fight in the fields of never at the annual battle of kingdoms. Pick up a sword or a mace, take control of Moondoor, defend the current ruler-"

"Wait is that..." Dean trails off as we recognize the girl.

"...Charlie." I state.

“-Queen of Moons.”

While we’re watching that, Lance in the meantime is in the questioning room and he starts itiching his arm. He lifts his sleeve up to reveal that same tree mark appearing on his arm that was on Ed’s.

“What the hell?”

And just then he starts coughing up blood, and his eyes start bleeding and he dies. That’s what causes us to spring into action and when we open the door, we find him on the ground. The coroner gets called and he gets put into a body bag and taken out.

“You’re gonna wanna see this.” The Sheriff says and we follow him over a computer and we see the security camera footage from the room where we see him freak out and cough up the blood.

“God forbid he was contagious. I’m gonna go dip myself in hand sanitizer.”

“What happened?” I ask as Sam sits down at the computer.

“No EMF, no hex bags, no sulfur, I got nada. You?”

“Watch the video again. There. See that? Sam as Ed’s. I don’t know, maybe they had matching tattoos. They were brothers in arms. You recognize it from anything?”

“Tim Burton movie? Aside from the mark of the creepy here, the only thing these guys have in common is LARPing.”

“Lucky for us we know the Queen.”

We then leave the police station and get into the car heading off to the park where the LARPing is taking place. It wasn’t really hard to find the place, what with all the tents and people dressed up and everything.

“Must be the place.”

“You think?”

“Stop being sarcastic Dean.” I roll my eyes and get out of the car.

Sam and Dean follow and we make our way into the grounds, coming to something that’s going on.

“I Boltar the Furious bind you to this stock so all of Moondoor shall see you for who you are. A thief.”

“My shadow orc brethren will emerge from the Black Hills. In the tents-” He stops when his teeth fall out.

“Halt!”

“Thanks Gerry. Sorry.”

“Yeah. No problem. Resume!”

“...in the tents of Moondoor will be bathed in blood as we unseat the Queen of the Moon throne, and it goes to the rightful heir, the shadow king.”

“Silentium! Serve your time with honor heathen. And if you need to use the chamber pot, stomp your feet thrice.”

“Excuse me, hi. Uh..you are a LARPer yeah?”

“I prefer the term interactive literaturist.”

“Right, uh...we are special agents Rosewood, this is special agent Tagger-”

“Hold! Uh guys we’re not doing the whole genre mashup this weekend. We only do that every third month.”

“Huh?” I ask confused.

“Your fake badges, cheap suits? It’s very cool, I get it. Your characters are FBI agents that somehow travel to Moondoor. But I’m telling you, it’s straight Moondoor this weekend.”

“These aren’t fake badges.”

“Uh yeah they are and they’re very good but uh...well the ID number’s shifted to 10 digits with two letters mixed into the end of the year and uh seals from last month. Not very good work. It’s just, it’s a tournament weekend okay guys? So you’ve got to follow the rules. There’s no rules, chaos. Resume! If you would like to join the Army of Moons, the queen is always on the lookout for new squires.”

“Yes. Right uh...we would like to see your queen now please.”

“Well the queen’s calendar is booked up months in advance. But if you wish to see what’s in store for you in her army, her highness is overseeing new squires on the pitch as we speak. It is that way.” He points.

“Thank you.” I state, motioning for Sam and Dean to follow and they do. We head to where there’s a huge crowd and make our way through to see a battle going on.

“Yield, I yield!”

The other fighter takes off their helmet and it’s revealed to be Charlie, or well the Queen to those around us.

“I love you.”

“I know. Take your leave to my medical tent and attend to your severed limbs. Greyfox and Thargrim are missing. We pray to the gods they have not fell victim to foul play. In their absence, the honor guards ranks are weakened. To join-” She stops when she sees us. “-oh blerg. Uh...the queen needs some royal we time. Talk amongst thyselves.” She finishes, going to her tent, Sam and I following while Dean picks up one of the swords.

“Nice balance.”

“Dean? Coming?” I ask him.

“Yeah.”

“Charlie..”

“Charlie Bradbury is dead. She died a year ago. You killed her. My name is Carrie Highline. Oh and guess what? Now you killed her too.”

“Okay, listen.”

“No, I buried myself. Then Dick Roman went down, his company belly up and I figure, hey it’s all good. And I was fine. I got my life back. Now you’re here, and if you guys are here, monsters are here. Why do I have such bad luck? What am I some kind of monster magnet? Is there such thing as a monster magnet? You know what? Don’t answer that. I don’t care. What I care about is not getting my other arm broken, or dying. So I’m dropping my sword, walking off the stage bitches.” She says, with her bag in hand and places the crown she had in her hand on Dean’s head.

“Have fun storming the castle.”

“Charlie, Charlie! Greyfox and Thargrim, Ed and Lance, they’re not missing, they’re dead.”

“What do mean dead?” She asks.

“I think it’s better if you sit down for this.” I nod.

She nods too and we all sit down.

“We believe he was drawn and quartered. Ed anyway. Lance was bleeding out.”

“Drawn and quartered? Bleeding out? Please stop talking again. So what do you think did this?”

“Well besides the mark and them both being LARPers, there’s really not much to go on.”

“Wait, I’ve seen this before. It’s a Celtic magic symbol. At least it was in my favorite video game. Does that help can I go now?”

“It’s a start but no. Um...listen. What can you tell us about Ed and Lance?”

“Good guys. Two of the best members of the Queen’s ever shrinking army.”

“Ever shrinking?”

“My kingdom has had a lot of bad luck lately. Probably because of me but...maybe it’s tied to this. A month ago, one of my guys had both their ankles broken before battle. Before that I had three people have hospital worthy accidents while in their home. You think there’s any connection there?”

“Maybe.”

“They have any enemies in common?”

“Real life, no. Everyone gets along famously. In the game though-” She trails off, getting up and walking over to this table which has a map and different colored figures.

“-they had tons of enemies. Red represents followers of the moon, my peeps. Green’s for elves, blue’s for warriors of yesteryear and black’s for shadow orcs. Total d-bags. This weekend is the battle of the kingdoms to see who wears the forever crown. This weekend each faction is definitely an enemy of me and mine.”

“You know if you move your archers back and brought swordsmen to the west-”

“Fight the warriors.”

“Yep.”

“Hey good call.”

“Thanks.”

“What about that southern wall?”

“Guys.” Sam stops them and I snicker.

“Yeah, right. Sorry.”

“So maybe someone from one of the other kingdoms got a hold of real magic and started using it to weaken your army.”

“But why not just come after me? And in what escalation?”

“Alright we’ll canvas the kingdoms, you should get out of here. Don’t want you getting hurt.”

“Whoa wait. Charlie knows Moondoor a lot better than we do, we need her.”

“Sam I think we can take care of a bunch of accountants with foam swords.”

“We need all the help we can get Dean, people are dying.”

“The point which is usually yours is she should get somewhere safe and get back to a normal life.”

“Hey I am right here and I want to leave.”

“Thank you.”

“But the Queen...she has to stay. Sam is right. People are dying. That can’t happen on my watch. And you know what? I am tired of running. I like my life here. I’m gonna stay and fight for it.”

Then Sam’s phone rings, breaking the tension.

“Yeah. Okay. Thanks. So the toxicology report came back on Lance. Nothing.But the medical examiner said his body showed clear signs he was killed of Belladonna.”

“The pornstar?” Dean and Charlie say in unison.

I raise my eyebrow as I give them a weird look.

“The poison.” Sam corrects them.

“Ohh.”

“Uh however, they couldn’t find a trace of it in his system.”

“Just like how they couldn’t find ropes in Ed’s apartment.”

“Exactly.”

“Charlie, I’m gonna need to borrow your laptop.”

“There are no laptops in Moondoor. What? There are rules. But there’s a tech tent four tents down.”

“Okay. How about you guys go canvas and I’ll dig into these accidents and this mark.” Sam leaves.

“Okay. I’m gonna need a full wiki on where you’ve guys been. But you’re both going to have to ditch the suits if you want to walk and talk with the queen.”

She goes off, leaving Dean and I by ourselves for a while, going off to get costumes for me and Dean.

"You know, I wonder what she's gonna get you to wear." I grin.

"I'm more focused on what she's going to get you." He smirks.

"Of course." I laugh.

Charlie comes back with costumes for both of us.

"Thanks. Where can I change?" I ask.

"Oh in there." She points to an area of the tent.

"Thanks." I say again, heading there.

Sam in the meantime has made it to the tech tent and walked inside, sitting at one of the computers, next to a blonde girl.

"Excuse me. Do you know if there's a directory of online players?"

"Yeah it's on the website. All you need is an account to access it."

"Um..thanks. Uh.."

"Maria. I mean Galondria, the Wicked."

Dean is busy putting the finishing touches on his costume, while I come out from changing into mine.

"This is actually really pretty and I love it." I grin.

"I knew it'd be perfect for you." Charlie nods.

Dean sees me in the mirror that he's looking at himself in and his eyes make their way to me.

"It really is." He says almost in a trance.

"You sent Sam a phantom text from his ex? Dick move sir." Charlie changes the subject.

"Yeah not my finest hour."

"So he found some normalcy with this chick and now it's gone. Again. Thanks to you."

"Yeah well now he's more committed than ever, so there's that. Trust me, this life...can't afford attachments. Brooke being the exception since she does what we do. You just gotta...let go."

"Are we still talking about Sam, or did you and Brooke break up too?"

"What?"

"Us?"

"Yeah."

"No."

"We're still gladly together." I grin as I walk to stand next to him, lacing my fingers with his.

"Right. Well let's get the info on this mark you guys found." She states and we nod, following her out of the tent. On the way out, Dean grabs one of the LARP swords and Charlie is greeted.

"Always been into LARPing?" Dean asks.

"Nah. For role play, I prefer table top. TNT, Gamma World, Car Wars. But a buddy of mine was into LARPing. If it wasn't for him, I'd stay for the chicks. 'But it's not just that. It's an escape. I mean here, I'm queen, a hero. Out there in the real world, I'm just chugging coffee all day long."

"Wait a second. If it wasn't for you, we would've never been able to take down Dick Roman. Out there in the real world, you are a hero. I'm seeing a lot of these maidens checking you out."

"What? I can't shut this down. It's good to be queen."

Sam in the meantime has gotten into the directory of online players, the ones that had been injured or killed.

"It's all just part of the game." Sam states when Maria looks at the screen funny.

"Genre mashup. Cool. Hey I know here, that's Phyllis. Heard she broke her ankles or something."

"Wow, looks like she got-"

"-hobbled. Oh and that's Jamie. He said somebody broke into his house, beat him with his own mace, but-"

"-no signs of a forced entry. Do you recognize this from Moondoor? I think it's Celtic?" Sam asks, showing her the tree marking on Jamie's arm.

"No..sorry, but I'll look it up."

"Thanks."

Dean, Charlie and myself started to question the groups of Moondoor if they've seen the tree marking anywhere before. After getting nothing on the first try, we asked an elf next.

"No, I haven't seen anything like it in my travels throughout the realms your highness."

"Alright, well if you think of anything, come see me in my tent. Anytime. Scratch the Elves off the list."

"This is getting nowhere." I sigh.

"Mace attacks, hobbling, medieval poisoning. Somebody's targeting the Queen's people."

"No, not only them. See those four are with the queen. But these two, they're elves. And these two are warriors. Only group not to get hit..."

"The Shadow Orcs. Last group on the list, impossible to find." Charlie states as that's the last group we have to ask about the mark.

"I know where we can find one. We met him on the way in."

"Perfect. Maybe he can tell us what the frack this thing is."

"It's the...Tree of Pain. If you are tagged with this mark, you'll be a victim of fairy magic." Sam states, kind of confused.

"Wait, fairy magic can be bad?" Maria asks.

"Death to the queen! Death to her man servant." The guy who was in the stocks state, and Dean takes out his fake sword and hits it against the stocks, making him shut up, Charlie giving Dean a look.

"What? There's no laptops in Moondoor, there's no Geneva convention either."

"Have you seen this?" I ask, taking out the picture of the tree mark and showing the Shadow Orc.

Dean gives me a weird look because I took the picture out of the top of my costume.

"What? I have nowhere else to put it. Have you seen this?" I ask the Orc again.

"Yeah of course."

"Really?" I ask, putting the picture back into the top part of my costume.

"No...nope. I haven't see it."

Dean takes the sword and holds it under the Orc's chin.

"Okay, it's the Shadow King's family crest. You'll never find him in the Black Hills.

"The Black Hills?" I ask.

"The forest behind the playground. Come on." Charlie states as she starts walking away, and we both follow.

"Alright well thank you very much Galondria."

"Anytime. I've never done genre mashup play before. That was fun."

"First time for everything right?"

"First time for a lot of things if you want to come find my tent later."

"Another time." Sam says, walking out.

"Your loss."

"My queen. There you are, I've been searching everywhere for you. Has this oaf and maiden attempted to harm you with their metal works?"

"Boltar, they're with me. They are my new handmaidens. We seek an audience with the shadow king."

"These hills are not safe, I beseech you my queen. You should return to camp."

"He's right....your worshipfulness, uh...may we have a moment before you take your leavings?"

"Handmaidens?"

"He was suspicious, I panicked."

"Alright. You take my phone, find Sam, we'll find the shadow dorks."

"But I can help."

"Yeah you are helping by finding Sam, go. Lead the way to the orcs bolty."

"Speak when spoken to handmaiden." He leads the way.

However, Charlie is on her way back to the camp, and she's being followed by a Shadow Orc. She knows this and is prepared, so when he tries to attack, she ducks the little bag he throws and she throws one of her own at his face.

"Dark magic."

"Oh! My eyes! This attack burns my very soul. Grrrrr." He goes away.

Charlie turns however and sees this other being with a skull mask over it's face, but also dressed in black like a shadow orc. She throws the red beanbag at it, thinking it's one of the players.

"Dark magic?" She asks and then gets captured.

Meanwhile, we're searching and searching, but we can't find the shadow king, so we head back to camp.

"Well that was a bust."

"No kidding." I sigh.

"Are you sure the shadow orcs are even out there?"

"For a handmaiden, you certainly ask many questions. Yes I am positive, they are just very good at hiding themselves. But a plan has sprung to mind that will draw the shadow king to us. We shall take the shadow orc held in stock and offer a prisoner exchange."

"Draw them out and beat them down. I like your style Voltar."

"I shall retrieve the prisoner, you tend to the Queen's laundry and chamber pots, and meet me back here."

"Laundry? No thank you." I shake my head, just as Sam comes up.

"Nice outfits."

"Charlie had us do it."

"You love it."

"Right. Well, while you were playing dress up, I found that the mark-"

"-belongs to the Shadow Orcs."

"Yeah, and they're using fairy magic."

"Tree of Pain?" I question.

"Awesome." Dean states sarcastically.

"Whoever gets marked, gets ganked."

"How do we stop it?"

"Find whoever cast the spell and take them out. No more whammy, no more marks, no marks, no more dead bodies."

"Okay well perfect. Our pal Boltar the Chatty, is getting the shadow orc prisoner and we're gonna do a little prisoner exchange, try to draw the king out of hiding. It was my idea. Where's Charlie?"

"She was with you two."

"No, he sent her to you."

Dean rolls his eyes as he heads to Charlie's tent, calling for her.

"Charlie?! Your highness?! Charlie?! You know what? She's got my phone. Try it."

Sam does so, but there's no answer.

"Nothing?"

"Nothing."

Charlie wakes up in this strange tent and comes face to face with what she saw in the forest.

"Uh...hi. I'm the uh...queen...of Moons. Nice to meet you. Great costume, BT dubs. Right. Well this has been a really great kidnapping but I got to get back to not dying so uh...good talk." She leaves, but comes back into the tent. She leaves again, and comes back.

"Wow, real magic. That is really cool, if not mostly terrifying. Well, okay. We can work this out can't we? Get you some gold, my crown, ritualistic sacrifice. Look I am not really a queen. I'm just an I.T. girl. Standing in front of a monster, asking it not to kill her."

And then it starts walking towards her.

"Great. Now the worst period of my life comes to an end. I see my boss get eaten by a Leviathan, broke my arm, lived my life on the run, finally got it all back. Now this skull mask is going to kill me. I just want my old life back!"

"That is all I want is well." The person under the mask reveals themselves as a woman.

Hours later, Dean, Sam, myself, Boltar and the orc prisoner travel through the Black Hills.

"I swear if anything's happened to her..."

"Dude we checked all the tents, we'll talk to these guys, we'll find her."

"Ca-caw! Ca-caw!"

"Ca-caw! Ca-caw!"

"Greetings heretics."

"You should kneel before me Cur."

"Alright, why don't you let me-"

"-silence! Now before we exchange a few announcements. There is a pee-wee league soccer playoff game tomorrow on the field. We don't want to freak out the Mundanes, we want to move the battle of kingdoms to the-"

"Okay. You know, I'm gonna do this the old fashioned way."

"Dean."

"No."

"I told you-"

"-shut up! Alright, I need real answers. This here is a real gun. See?" Dean says, shooting it at the ground, before pointing it at them.

"Dean!" I exclaim.

"Whoa whoa! Hold hold! Jeez!"

"Now start talking. Where's the queen!"

"I don't know!"

"Yeah well your little family crest there tells a different story pal."

"This?"

"Yeah."

"Uh...I got sick last month after this thing just appeared on my arm. I thought it looked really cool so I turned it into my family crest. I mean after my dermatologist said it wasn't malignent."

"Dean, he's not our guy, he's just another vic." Sam states.

"Yeah." I agree.

"My name is Max Hilby, I'm an attorney, I have no idea where the queen is, but if you let me go right now I won't press charges. I promise. Um...here, take them, please."

"Go. Go go!"

The four of us give Dean a look.

"What? What?"

"Is the queen really in danger?"

"Yeah." I nod.

"Okay I noticed something odd down by the creek. It's this weird tent. It's not one of ours, it's kind of creepy."

"Why are you being so helpful all of a sudden?" Sam asks.

"Look, I harbor an epic crush on the queen. Maybe you could put in a good word for me when you find her?"

"Uh...."

"I don't think you're her type." Dean states and he walks away, us following.

"What? You mean she's not into orcs?"

And speaking of Charlie, she's busy talking with the woman who captured her.

"My name is Gilda. I'm from the Hollow forest or Arcmore. I'm a fairy."

"Swoon. Uh I mean...how did you get here?"

"I was summoned here by a spell."

"By whom?"

"I don't know his name, but I was brought here to do his bidding."

"His bidding? That's never good."

"My...master he...he has me hurt people. He's forcing me to. I'd never hurt anyone, I'm a fairy. The good kind."

"No no, I get that. Why is he doing this?"

"I don't know. He started off with smaller commands but...he's become more violent. He had me kill two men this week."

"Man, someone is taking this game way too seriously."

"Game?"

"This...my outfit...all of this, it's just a game here."

"Why would you play such a game?"

"This world, not so much with awesome. The game is a way to get away."

"It's a lovely forest. But it's nothing like my home."

"Right. So how do we get you back there?"

"I can't break free from the spell myself. A hero must take my master's book of magic and destroy it. Breaking the spell."

"Gilda? My name is Charlie Bradbury. And I am here to rescue you."

It's been a long walk and we still haven't found the tent, and Voltar was becoming unwanted company.

"Do we really need him here with us anymore?" I ask Dean.

"No. Why don't you take off Bolty, we got it from here."

"Handmaidens and a time traveller rescue the queen? I think not kind lady."

"Look this isn't a game Boltar, the queen, our friend is in real danger, you can get hurt."

"I will not leave my queen in peril. Look there."

"We haven't checked that tent." Dean states as he storms towards it and we follow. When we walk in it's bigger than what we saw on the outside, it was a fireplace, everything. We find a bed and Charlie and that fairy making out.

"Oh...um..." I shield my eyes, and Dean clears his throat.

"Dudes! If the tent is rockin', don't come a knocking!"

"No it's him! My master, run!"

And that's when we look over and it turns out that Boltar is the master.

"Crap."

That's when Dean, Sam and myself pull out our guns.

"No guns in Moondoor. Gilda if you please?"

With a wave of her hand, our guns burst into feathers and we watch as it happens in awe.

"Well now what Jerry?"

"My name is Boltar the Furious! My plan was...after getting rid of all of my competition, to win the battle tomorrow. Convincing the queen that I should be her king. But then you three idiots showed up and I was forced to improvise. Rescue the damsel in distress from orcs, become king, kill you three. That'll work too."

"So why'd you go from hobbling to murder?"

"Greyfox and Thargrim became part of the honor guard. They got close to the queen. But they did it by breaking the rules. Paying off other players with real money other than Moondoor currency. They were cheating!"

"Oh and using magic isn't?"

"I say it is." I remark.

"Magic is a part of Moondoor."

"What is your problem? Why would you hurt people? This is just a game." Charlie retorts.

"There is no game!! There is only Moondoor."

"This guy is delusional." I roll my eyes.

"I came here to be different. To get away from my crappy life. To be a hero and guess what?"

"What? You were a loser in the real world and you're a loser here? Shocker."

"Would a loser track down a real book of spells and compell a fairy to do his bidding?"

"I think so yeah." I remark.

"And it depends. How'd you get it?" Sam asks.

"EBay?"

"Oh good lord. Can we kill this guy now?"

"Wait. Look. It doesn't have to be like this. Boltar. Just hand over the book of spells, we can work this out."

"This will all work out after I remove you from the playing field and wipe your memory. Gilda?"

She sighs and turns the fake sword into a real one. Dean, Sam and I rush to get weapons.

"Gilda the big one!"

With a wave of her hand, the knight armor near Sam grabs him. Charlie goes after Jerry first, but gets pushed back. I'm the next and I'm pushed back. Dean is next and his sword gets cut in half on the fake blade.

"I can't stop him. The book, you must destroy it."

Dean punches him across the face and we see a book fall to the floor.

"The spell book! Charlie!" I point.

"Hey Jerry. I'm the one who saves damsels in distress around here." She states, stabbing the spell book.

"Nooooooooo!"

His sword turns back into the fake foam one, the knight armor lets Sam go, the spell has been broken. He goes to hit Dean with it, but Dean grabs it and elbows him in the face, knocking him out.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm free of the spell. You saved me. The Hollow forest is forever in your debt. I must return to those green hills now. I will take my former master with me, he must face a fairy tribunal for his stunt."

"Wait." Charlie states, kissing her and then she disappears with Jerry.

"Call me? Maybe?"

"Come on Charlie. The queen must get back to her camp." I motion for her to follow Dean, Sam and I.

"Right." She nods and follows.

It took most of the night to get back, when we did get back, we crashed in the tent for the night. Dean and I really didn't have privacy so we couldn't do much more than kiss each other...this time around. By morning, though I had changed out of my costume and thanked Charlie for letting me borrow it. Dean had changed too, and we got back into our street clothes.

"So what's next for you Charlie? New town? New identity?"

"If the last 24 hours have taught me anything, escaping isn't what it used to be. No more replacement characters for me. I got to face reality for now on. Sadly, reality actually includes monsters but..what're you gonna do? If I can ever be any help to you guys, let me know."

"Will do. And you uh...are good."

"Apart from the fact that you blocked me from banging a fairy and I'm about to lose my crown thanks to my army being decimated? Yeah, totally good. Smell ya' later bitches."

"So, what's next?"

"Cause no fun, right?" Dean adds. "Look, before you say anything, I...I get it. No amount of fun is gonna help you get over what you gave up. You just....you need time. Right?"

"Yeah. Thanks. And you're right. Having fun won't help me. It'll help both of us. Shall we?"

Hours later it was time for the battle, which Sam and Dean insisted on being in. I went to watch, to see how amusing it was. Dean was all dressed up. Face paint, wig, everything.

"The dying in your beds, many years from now. Would you be willing to trade all of the days from this day to that for one chance."

"Is that the speech from-"

"-it's the only one he knows."

"Just one chance. To come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they will never take-"

"Hold!" One of the army members say as a frisbee comes flying into the battle field.

"Uh my bad. Sorry." He jogs away.

"-our freedom!"

And with that, the battle began and I couldn't help but stand back and laugh.