[h3] Anna [/h3]

Anna’s eyes began to slowly fade back to normal as she frowned so hard that it hurt her head. Sam’s begging tugged at her heart, somewhere behind her anger, but honestly, she was sick of being lied to. She was sick of not fitting in with the group, but being kept around as either some sort of weapon…or for sympathy. She was tired of being treated like a kid. Cason didn’t treat her like a kid.

“Why…does everyone around me feel the need to lie to me?”, she panted, taking a deep breath, before sitting down. The bus driver at the front of the bus continued to drive, his trance not broken, as if he was under a spell. 

She shuddered, and flexed her fists, the burns on her hands healing. She then wiped her hands on the back of the seat in front of her and turned back to Sam. “When I was high on demon blood, and I was scared and alone, you told me that you ‘used to’ have a problem. You made it sound like it was some thing in the past. You made me feel like it’s possible to not have this issue, while still being useful. You lied. And the worst question comes into my mind and makes me want to kill Ruby.”

Anna wiped her mouth with the back of her sleeve and thought about her next words carefully, before finally taking a deep breath, “What is she, to you? Obviously she’s…feeding you. I’m not going to jealous girlfriend you, here. I just want you to be honest with me. Don’t bring me back and keep lying to me. If that’s your plan, let me off the bus and I’ll take my chances with Max.”


[h3] Dean [/h3]

Dean wanted to shake his head and tell Nat to stop worrying about his feelings. While he was silently demanding that she acted less reckless and in his absolute best case scenario, Cason would be gone. But this wasn’t some perfect world, and Nat being in his arms was almost surreal, considering how much they had fought in the last few weeks. Cason held her down. Cason kept her alive. Cason protected her from herself, and without Cason, she likely wouldn’t be hugging him. The thought made him sigh.

“I won’t complain about that…” he responded to her declaration to be less reckless. Dean tensed slightly when Cason’s name popped up again and a bit more when she mentioned his time in Hell. He took a long and shaky breath, while holding her tighter. He wasn’t going to talk about Hell. He refused to discuss it, even with Nat. Eventually, everything that he had left out of the conversations would come to light. He just hoped that it would be on his own terms.

His thoughts were broken when Nat shifted and her eyes met his, softening any tension in his body. He smirked, and nodded, “Well, yeah. You’re that much like Sammy. Someone’s gotta keep you guys out of trouble, or you would kill yourselves. Unfortunately, as the big brother, that falls on me.”

A thought came to his mind, and he kept his smirk, to diffuse any thoughts of tension that might crop up from the question he was about to ask. He brushed his fingers across a very visable bruise on her neck and furrowed his brow, “Getting tangled up with demons isn’t safe, though. You know that…like physically.”

He was trying to carefully tell her that he knew about the night before, without opening the most awkward and heated dialogue of the day. As she had stated, he just wanted to keep her safe.

[h3] Cason [/h3]

Cason groaned at the words that left Mika’s mouth first. Of course they were coming back for advice. There was no way that Anna had managed to make it out of a solo trip without being hit up by demons. He just hoped that whatever her need was, it didn’t have to do with their time together before she reached the group. The tension in his head had been building for days, and it felt like something big was coming…and that something big was to do with demons - big ones.

Before he could get too lost in his thoughts, Mika brought up the bigger elephant in the room. Cason tried his hardest to think of a way to lie to her, but it was going to be nearly impossible, judging by the look on her face. The warning that came directly after caused him to roll his eyes. He was very aware that if Dean was to kill him, of course Mika would be on board with all of it. If anyone would understand Cason’s sexual restraint, it would be Mika, though. So, he brushed off her threat, just taking it as an extension of Dean’s blustering. That fight was for if…not when.

Shrugging his shoulders he nodded, “Yeah. We slept together. She was in a bad spot. So, we went out. She had an amazing night and for once, she seemed okay. One thing led to another, and when we got back, it just seemed…appropriate. I didn’t hurt her. I didn’t use any weird demon power on her. I did my best to be gentle, in fact. I don’t do these things with humans, for a reason.”

He stopped and then tilted his head, “You know that I can be safe…”, he almost whispered, bringing up their brief moment together at Bobby’s. He ended the conversation there, and took a deep and shaky breath. At least the revelation had gone better than he expected it to. There was no blow up. Hopefully, this was the beginning of an understanding between all of them, and he could settle here.

Cason followed Mika inside, and the second he made it in, he gestured to Nat, “Can we talk for a minute?”




[h3] Duke [/h3]

Duke relaxed at Esme’s reasonable tone, but the second she took the paper from him, the gasp from her throat caused him to flinch aggressively. He let go of the piece of paper, and grabbed both of her shoulders, leaning his head down to get on her level, as he stared into her empty eyes. 

“Esme! Hey! No no no…” he groaned, scanning between her eyes as she stared blankly ahead. And just like that, she came back to him, grabbing onto his shirt. Out of reflex, he wrapped his arms around her, his breathing now coming out in pants as he remembered how to breathe. “Holy shit…”

She echoed his own concern, meaning she had no clue what had just happened. It was like she had a seizure or a stroke, right in front of him. With all the stress from her powers, neither would have surprised him. He shook his head, trying to catch his breath as she blanked out, causing him to shake her one single time before she finally started to talk. “Honestly? As long as you don’t zone out again, I can take anything…”

Listening to what happened, Duke’s eyes darted around her face, trying to make sense of what she was saying. He had heard of this sort of thing before, but not from anyone he was close to. She was seeing the future. He didn’t know how to bridge that conversation with her, and break that news to her, but he had a feeling that he had to rip that bandaid off. The thought of Dean being broken and bloody, and not knowing when it would happen sent a shiver down his spine.

“I um…” he started but broke off. When he found the words for the question, he took his own shaky breath, “Was there any idea of when? Like time of day…anything? Any other faces you could recognize? I’ve only seen this kinda thing once or twice and this ain’t good…”

He frowned slightly and then shook his head, “I hate to tell you this, sweetheart, but you just saw the future or somethin’. Something is going to happen, and…I guess we have our answer on leavin’. We just gotta figure out how to handle this, and we gotta figure out how the hell that just happened…and what to tell the others.”

As much as his own emotions were drilling his brain into mush, he was moving into protective little brother mode. If Dean was going to be hurt, he would always be the one to jump in front of that bullet. Between Dean and Duke…Dean would survive. It had always been that way, and it would always be that way. Esme knew this…