Misery Business

Patience's POV

“Dean, do you see anything?” I asked as I raised the pistol in my hands to eye level. My partner of three years and best friend of eight, Dean stood against my back with an identical gun raised to the exact same position. Stepping around the room of the abandoned warehouse my flashlight was shining into the dust filled corners and discovering a whole lot of nothing.

“Nothing,” he replied, echoing my thoughts. Dean stepped away from me and lowered his weapon as we cleared another room.

“So far this mission blows.” I sighed and reached down to tuck one of the shoelaces back into my boots that had mysteriously come lose, again.

“You know,” Dean started with a smile creeping onto his face, “If you tied your shoes according to the new employee manual, you wouldn’t have them coming untied all the time.”

I rolled my eyes. “I can’t believe they put in, ‘Suggested Ways to Tie Your Boots’. That stupid book is going to be the death of me,” I groaned, shaking my head. Dean only laughed.

“Did you tie your boots the way they suggested?” He asked surveying the rest of the room as I stood off brushing the dirt off of my knee.

“When do I ever do as they suggest?” I asked in return as I started opening cabinets and closets surrounding the damp walls inspecting the resources.

“Well whose shoes keep coming undone?”

“Shut the hell up Dean.” At that response he started to chuckle under his breath and a smile even crept onto my lips, but both were short lived when the light bulb above out head was shot out, the glass sprinkling to the floor.

Automatically, my back hits the wall behind me and the thud opposite the room lets me know that Dean has done the same. Pulling down my night vision glasses I see him motioning towards the door before loading another clip into his gun.

With both of us equipped with raised guns Dean and I head for the open door to lead us back into the now enemy infiltrated hallway only to have a spray of bullets fill the room.



Beeeepp beep beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeepppppppppppppp!

Groaning, I sit up in bed as the incessant noise from my alarm clock insists on blaring into my ears. I pick up the cracked clock and check the time as I blindly hit around the top of the clock till I find the snooze button, broken.

Oops.

“Stoooop making noise,” I moan as I place the clock under my pillow and lay on top of it. I close my eyes briefly, now with the beeping safely in the background, only to have images of Dean float through my head from the nightmare I had just moments ago.

I sit up quickly and shake my head to clear the thoughts of him from my mind. My alarm clock falls to the floor and continues to blare. Seconds later my phone begins ringing, adding to the racket that's already filling my bedroom. Taking a deep breath, I pick up my cell off of the bedside table and answer it, half grumbling into the mouth piece.

“Agent Stone,” I report, unafraid of it being any civilian calling me on my personal phone to blow my cover. Even though it was against protocol, I would actually need friends for that to happen.

“Agent Stone,” I hear Commander Winchester growl. “How many times do I have to tell you to not try and blow your cover when you answer your personal phone... and what is that noise?” Cursing under my breath so that my captain cannot hear me, I pick up my alarm clock and chuck it at the wall where miraculously it stops beeping.

However, it also cracks into two pieces for the third time this month.

“What noise Sir,” I inquire. I can just hear him sigh on the other end of the phone.

“Did you forget about our meeting in five minutes, Stone?”

“Of course not Sir,” I say quickly rolling out of bed and landing on my feet before running silently to my closet and throwing on a pair of skinny jeans and tank top.

“Well good, Agent Stone, I have a surprise for you.”

Uh oh, a surprise could only mean one thing. Maybe I should change my mind and be late like usual.

“Oh, and Patience,” Commander Winchester begins, “If you’re not here in five minutes I’m putting you on training duty for the new round of recruits.”

“Rodger that Captain, see you in five!” And with that I hang up my phone and stuff it into my back pocket along with my ID and keys. Slipping on my shoes and throwing my hair up in a ponytail, I’m up and out the door within thirty seconds.

Skipping the elevator all together, I simply start running down the stairs and out the door into the brisk Wisconsin air. Running along the sidewalk towards the headquarters, I take out my phone and check the time.

Four minutes left.

Gripping onto my phone, I push my legs harder to propel me faster towards the building up ahead. Unfortunately, it also propelled me faster into the girl walking towards me which in turn sends her hot tea straight down my top.

“Oh my goodness!” She gasps as we both fall to the ground followed by an extensive list of profanities coming from my mouth.

“Are you okay?” I ask absent-mindlessly as I stand up and start wiping off some kind of her herbal tea crap off of me.

She stands up and looks down at her now empty mug.“Yeah, I guess so.”she replies a little solemnly. “But there went my morning pick-me-up!”

“Real sorry about that, but maybe next time you should look at where you are going.” And with that, I leave her standing in the middle of the side walk, dumbfounded, as I keep making my way to the headquarters with only two minutes left to spare.

I’d be damned if I was stuck training a bunch of noobs for next year.



“Captain this is unfair,” I yell standing up out of the chair but he just sits on the other side of the desk expressionless before slowly getting up and walking over to me.

“Agent Stone, it has been six months. You’ve healed completely; your physical scores are higher than ever... it’s time to move on.” Commander Winchester pats my shoulder. “You can’t continue to throw away perfectly good partners, and personally I’m getting sick of it. Agent Thatcher is an almost perfect agent, she scored high marks on everything she was tested on, and outperformed everyone in her class. Now you can either agree to this new assignment or I am going to have to be forced to demote you two positions. You have five seconds to make a decision.”

“But Sir, I don’t even know her!” I pout as I put my hands on my hips, refusing to take his threat seriously.

“Five,”

“This is ridiculous!”

“Four,”

“Really, am I six years old? Do you really need to count?”
“Three,”

“Fine, I’ll do it!” I yell as I fall back into the seat exasperated and I half expect for my captain to smile, but the smile never comes.

“I know you miss him, Patience. Hell, we all do, but it’s time to move on from this. It’s time for you to move on from this. Doctor Singer says you’ve skipped your last two sessions. Maybe, this will help you heal faster.”

“Yeah, whatever you say.” I reply crossing my arms and sulking deeper into the chair.

Sighing, Captain Winchester leans over and presses a button on his intercom. He commands the person on the other end of the tiny box to send in an Agent Thatcher.

Five seconds later the doors to his office open and I turn around just as the captain is talking.

“Agent Stone I'd like to introduce you to your new partner, Agent Aubree Thatcher; I think you two will make an excellent team.”

“Oh you have got to be kidding me,” I say out loud as I look at my new partner. Noticing the color drain out of her face, I knew that she wasn’t particularly happy with her first assignment either.

Fantastic.