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“We shouldn’t have came to New York, Dean,” Sam chided, though he knew Dean wasn’t going to take him seriously. He was never really the cautious type.
“And why the hell not?” Dean scoffed, focusing on his driving.
“Well, it’s crowded, and it’s bound to be full of the police. And we’re not exactly the most law-abiding people around,” Sam replied.
Usually, their cases were in small towns (where surprisingly, a lot of supernatural murders happened) where most police hadn’t even heard of the Winchester family, much less knew they were wanted ‘murderers’. Considering how the last time they were caught by the police (all thanks to their best friend, Bela) everyone was murdered by Lilith, including the man in charge of finding them, he thought maybe the bounty on their head was off. But one could never be too careful.
“So? Didn’t that all stop when Henriksen, you know…died?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. All I’m saying is…”
“Oh shut up, Sam. You worry too much,” Dean said, cutting Sam off mid-sentence. “Plus, all these people around? Maybe the cops won’t even notice us.”
“Yeah, maybe,” Sam’s voice trailed off. “So what’s this case anyway?”
“Two nights ago, man found dead in his apartment. Blood, organs everywhere, you know, the usual,” Dean explained.
“Let me guess, the door was locked, no sign of a break in?” Sam guessed, thinking back to the countless number of times when similar scenarios had happened. He wondered what it would be this time: vengeful spirit, daeva, or perhaps some other monster or supernatural being they hadn’t killed yet.
“Not exactly,” Dean said, perking Sam’s interest. “See, there was blood all over the window. The outside. Which seems like something came in, then back out through the window, and there was claws and weird footprints on the balcony, according to the neighbours anyway.”
This was different.
“What do the cops say?” Sam asked.
“The neighbours said they saw some kind of wild animal, but how could a wild animal climb twenty storeys? The cops, on the other hand, think it’s just a murderer.” As the older brother finished his sentence, he pulled up in the car park next to the motel of the week, this time named the CozeeToez Motel. With a tacky name like that, Sam dreaded what it was like inside. Six years ago, he would surely have turned his nose up at a place like that but now, he’d go wherever he could. Hunting didn’t exactly pay a lot, and they needed somewhere where you could just turn up.
“And what are we thinking it is? Werewolf?” Sam suggested, thinking back to the claws and imprints. Though whether or not such creatures were capable of climbing that high he had no idea.
“Honestly? No clue, better just to get there and see for ourselves.”
--
Unlike most cases, this victim didn’t live in a huge, grand house but merely an apartment in the centre of the town. Sam, as usual, had dug up some background information about the man. His name was Christopher Templesmith, 37 years old, lived a roommate named Derek, and he'd moved to the US just three months beforehand. Aside from that, nothing. It was like he'd lived on Mars before coming here. Sam was slightly suspicious of the fact there was little data for him, but that probably would concern the officials more than them. He doubted anything supernatural would murder him just for being in this country, though at this point nothing really surprised him much anymore.
Dean knocked on the door of his apartment, number 331c, and waited for the answer. They already had their usual back stories prepared: they were agent Tyler and agent Perry looking into Templesmith’s strange death.
The man who answered was tall, with dark, closely cropped hair and chocolate brown eyes. He was wearing a thick, navy jumper pulled down over his arms, like he was trying to cover himself. Perhaps he was shy. Or hiding something. He started at them intently for several seconds, as if he was trying to figure out who they were. When he eventually spoke, his voice was no more than a whisper. “What do you want?”
“Are you Derek Renn?” Dean enquired. The man nodded, prompting Dean to speak again.
“Derek. I’m Agent Tyler, this is here is my partner, Agent Perry . We’re here investigating the death of your roommate, would you mind letting us in?”
Derek hesitated. He peered shiftily back into the room behind him, then eventually nodded. It was clear that he probably wasn’t going to be much use unless he started talking. He opened the door and they followed him in.
The living room was spotlessly clean. Unless you saw the yellow police tape on the door leading to the balcony, you’d never guess a murder happened there only two days ago. Sam glanced over to the balcony, still red from where the blood hadn’t been cleaned away yet. It must be horrible for Derek, Sam thought, having to live at the crime scene where your roommate died, and not even being able to clean it up and put it out of your mind. The blood of his friend would just be an awful reminder of the whole thing, as well as the emptiness of the apartment. Sam put this to the back of his mind- he didn’t want to sympathise too much and let emotions get in the way of the case. After all, this Derek person could be a suspect.
Derek sat down on the couch, and gestured for the brothers to do the same. They both sat down, and began to talk. Sam was the first to speak, as usual. “So, Derek, I’m sure you’ve already been asked this before, but can you please explain to us what happened at the time of Christopher’s death?” Sam asked, trying to sound gentle and approachable.
“Like I told the others, I was out…” Derek began, before being cut off by Dean.
“Out where?” Dean pressed.
“Getting groceries. I came back and Christopher wasn’t there, so I just assumed he was in the shower or something, or maybe he’d went out. But then I smelt something weird and--”
“Weird like, I don’t know, sulphur?” Dean interrupted yet again.
“No, I mean like rotting corpse. I went to the balcony and found his body, well, what was left of it,” Derek looked down, avoiding any eye contact. Whether it was out of grief or because he was hiding something Sam couldn’t quite tell.
“And the doors were all locked when you went out?” Sam questioned.
“Yeah, I checked before I left the house. When I got back, the door was still locked, there was no sign of a break in or anything. It was like I hadn’t even left. Of course, the cops think maybe Chris went out and forgot to lock the door.” Derek explained. Of course they would; they didn’t know anything about spirits moving through walls or demons teleporting.
“So, Christopher, did he have any enemies, anyone who’d have it in for him, anyone like that?” Dean asked, trying to change the subject.
“None, we’d only been living here for a few months.”
“And the night of his death, you didn’t see or hear anything out of the ordinary?” Sam asked. Derek wasn’t giving them anything to work from. There were no signs of a break in, so currently it was looking like a vengeful spirit, but he didn’t know for sure.
“Nothing. Nothing at all,” Derek said quickly. Dean and Sam both glanced at each other, like they were both thinking the same thing, an occurrence that wasn’t uncommon between the two of them.
“Would you mind us having a little look outside?”
“Yeah, sure.” Derek stood up and walked towards the balcony, and the brothers did the same. He opened the door and ducked under the tape. Sam thanked him, and then Derek left to go back inside.
The scene was gory and bloody, but nothing they’d never seen before. The body, of course, had been escorted to the local morgue - there’s no way they’d let a two day old corpse still remain on a balcony - but the ground was still dry with blood. Dean crouched down and ran his finger over the crimson-stained floor. Nothing. Then, he reached into his pocket and retrieved his EMF meter, which would tell them if this was the work of a ghost. However, instead of beeping and flashing red, nothing happened.
“Huh, so no ghosts. Weird,” Sam said. He was confused; if it wasn’t a spirit, what was it?
“So that’s spirits ruled out, which is what I’d have put my money on. Now what? A werewolf, maybe?” Dean replied. It was true that the way the blood has spilled that it looked like an animal attack, but how could a werewolf climb twenty storeys if it wasn’t let into the house?
“Not sure. Guess we should check out the body,” Sam suggested. Then, they could see just how he was killed and maybe get a better idea.
“It’s just weird, man, no sulfur, no EMF, no break-in, no weird blood splatters. Nothing.”
They did a quick last check over the scene, but found nothing of interest. The only thing there was the blood stains and a dusty deck chair with a copy of The New York Times from last Tuesday sitting on it.
“Maybe it’s just not our sort of gig. Maybe the guy just killed himself or something,” Dean mused aloud.
“Yeah, maybe,” Sam said as he walked back into the house, disappointed that they couldn’t find anything. Hopefully they could decipher anything from the body, or get a hold of the security tapes and find out what happened, although the police had probably done that already.
The boys thanked Derek for his time and told them to call them if anything else strange happened, the usual procedures. Sometimes Sam got bored of doing the same old thing over and over. Every time there was a new case, it was always the same: they’d be FBI agent with classic rock aliases. He remembered a time a few years back when it would vary from place to place. Sometimes they’d be priests offering comfort in their time of grief, on many occasions they’d been students, and the odd time they were just regular, curious guys. He’d asked Dean about this once, during a long fourteen hour drive while investigating a Rugaru case, but he’d countered saying that their suits cost a lot of money and they might as well use them. It was probably intended as a joke, but he supposed it was a good point. Being a hunter wasn’t exactly a well-paid job. All their money went towards renting motels, gas for the Impala, food, and bribery.
The two brothers walked out of the building and towards their beloved car, ready to drive to the Morgue. Sam wasn’t quite sure what he’d be expecting, but not much really phased him nowadays. After all, once you’d stopped the Apocalypse and had Lucifer inside your brain, there wasn’t much else that could top that.
They drove mainly in silence, the only sounds (apart from those outside) being Dean’s AC/DC cassette. Sam wasn’t the biggest fan of the hard rock band, but he knew better than to argue with Dean about music. Sam rubbed his eyes and yawned; he hadn’t had much sleep the night before. Hopefully, the car journey wouldn’t last much longer.
Twenty minutes later, Dean parked the car in front of the Morgue. They went inside and did all the usual procedural stuff: the ‘why is the FBI interested?’, ‘can I see your paperwork?’, that sort of stuff. As usual, the coroner gave them funny looks, but let them in regardless. One of these days, they were gonna get busted for good for posing as agents, but today was not that day.
Dean pulled out the body. He didn’t look anything special: white-skinned, dark brown hair, a bit of stubble, nothing out of the ordinary. Of course, except for the huge gaping hole in the side of his stomach.
“Yikes,” Dean said, reaching out his finger.
“Don’t poke it, Dean,” Sam chided, rolling his eyes. Dean looked at his brother as if to say ‘really?’ but took his hand away anyway.
Sam crouched down and inspected the wound. There were definite teeth marks, but parts of the skin looked like they’d sizzled away, like they’d been eroded with acid. “Anything interesting?” Dean asked.
“Yeah, get this,” he said pointing at the skin around the wound. “Kinda looks like acid, doesn’t it?”
Dean bent down for a closer look, still resisting the urge to poke at the wound. “Yeah. But what kind of monster, or whatever this is, shoots freakin’ acid at its victims?”
“Beats me,” Sam shrugged, still scanning his eyes over the flesh. But then he caught sight of something even weirder. There was a faint silver lining of what looked like an old tattoo. Normally, it wouldn’t have been worth a mention, but he seemed to be covered in them. They weren’t ordinary tattoos either, but they looked like ancient symbols, all lines and curves. Some of them he even recognised, but couldn’t remember how or what they meant.
“Hey Dean, check this out,” he said, bemused. “What do you make of this?”
“Make of what?” he said with a frown.
“Those weird lines on his skin, mean anything to you?” he pointed to one of them and traced the pattern along with his finger. It resembled a ‘Z’ shape, with a line cutting across the middle.
“Never seen anything like that before,” Dean said, “what about you? You’re the nerd one.”
Sam sighed, but didn’t say nothing. Not for the first, nor the last time, he really wished Bobby were still here. He would’ve been able to figure this out.
“I think I recognise this one,” he said, pointing to a one that looked like a diamond, with two curling lines at the top. “Must’ve read it somewhere before. Looks like some kind of ancient rune.”
“I don’t even wanna know how you know that,” Dean said, turning around to face the door. “So, what’re we thinking now. Still a werewolf?”
“At this point, I have no idea,” Sam bit his lip. “Should probably just go back to the motel and do a little research, I guess.”
“You do that. I wanna check out whatshisface’s place again.”
“Why?”
“The guy there? Don’t know if you noticed, but he was looking pretty shifty, always trying to pull down the sleeves on his shirt. Kinda seemed like he had something he didn’t want us to see, something a bit like what his pal over there’s got all over him,” Dean explained, heading towards the door.
“You think he was all runed up too?”
“I don’t know, maybe. But maybe he can tell us they mean.”
“Want me to come with?” Sam asked.
“Whatever,” Dean said, and the two of them walked out of the building.
---
Later on, the two brothers found themselves outside Derek Renn’s apartment once more. This time, instead of looking mildly scared, the man appeared to be quite agitated when he opened the door. “What do you want?” Sam, remembering what Dean had said to him earlier, looked to his arms, and saw that he was pulling down on the sleeves, like he was trying to keep them from seeing his skin.
“Nothing major, just need to ask you a couple more questions,” Dean said in a serious tone, with an expression that read ‘if you don’t let me in right now I will murder you’. Derek gestured that he’d be two minutes, and then quickly ran back into his apartment. Sam and Dean looked at each other inquisitively, and then tried to hear what was going on in there. There was some faint talking, but they could only hear Derek’s voice. Before Dean could say anything to his brother, Derek reappeared at the door. He apologised for the delay and let them back inside with a fake smile plastered on his face.
They sat down on the couch and began to ask him questions. Sam couldn’t help but feel that this may be a bad idea. If there was someone -or something- else in the apartment, God knows what was going to happen next. Maybe it was nothing, but Sam knew better than to assume something was ‘just nothing’
“You mind telling us what that was back there?” Dean asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Oh, just heard the phone ringing, that’s all,” Derek said dismissively. Sam wasn’t the expert at reading people, but he could tell when someone was lying (most of the time), and Derek wasn’t very good at concealing himself. But he didn’t want to bring that up before they’d gotten any information out of him.
“Right,” Dean nodded, and Sam could tell he didn’t buy it either. “So--”
“Look, like I said before, I don’t have a clue what it was that got Christopher--” Derek interrupted, before Dean cut him off.
“Really? ‘Cause we never said a thing about anything getting him. Cops are saying it’s a murder right?”
Derek didn’t answer. “Look, cut the crap, we know you’re lying. You don’t have to make up some bullcrap story about you being all innocent and not knowing what happened, and definitely no bullcrap stories about running back into your apartment just cause your freakin’ phone was ringing. We just want the truth, no matter how crazy it sounds, ‘cause believe me, Derek, we’ve heard it all.”
Derek looked a bit stunned, to which Sam was surprised. That was quite tame for Dean actually. They all sat there without saying anything, while Dean glared at Derek.
“So, those marks on your friends’ arm,” Sam began, trying to break the silence, “ what do they mean?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about--”
“What did I just say before? Cut the crap, ‘cause that’s no use to us. We’re trying to figure out what the hell it was that killed your friend, something which you should really care about seeing as you know, you could be next.” Dean retorted, and it looked like that hit home to Derek.
He looked to the side, where there was a strange blue device on the table. It looked like a mobile phone, but it kept beeping and flashing red. Derek looked terrified, like he was staring at a bomb about to explode at any second. The noise grew louder and more frequent, and for a second Sam was worried that it would violently explode.
“Mind telling us what that is?” Sam asked, but before he could get an answer there was a loud SLAM behind him. He turned around, and there were four teenagers dressed head to toe in black standing in the doorway.
“You always have to make an entrance, don’t you? I don’t see what the harm is in simply knocking on the door--” said a tall girl with charcoal hair trailing down her back. Their bodies were covered in the same marks as Christopher's- only theirs were ink black. They hadn't even seemed to notice the Winchesters sitting on the couch.
"Who the hell are you?" Dean bellowed, itching for his gun.