THE END OF THE WORLD || 𝚜. 𝚠𝚒𝚗𝚌𝚑𝚎𝚜𝚝𝚎𝚛 ✔️

18. Long Way Down

season 4, episode 18; the monster at the end of this book

"Uh... can I help you?" The cashier at the front of the store asked us.

"Sure hope so," Dean replied. "Agents DeYoung, Shaw, and Prentiss." I smiled to myself as I went this long with Criminal Minds aliases. We showed the man our badges and Sam and I remained quiet, allowing Dean to keep going. "Just need to ask you a few questions."

"Notice anything strange in the building, last couple of days?" Sam asks.

"Like what?" The man questions.

It was my turn to interrogate. "Some other tenants reported flickering lights."

"Uh... I don't think so. Why?"

"What about noises?" I asked again. "Any skittering in the walls? Kind of like rats?"

"And the FBI is investigating a rodent problem?"

"What about cold spots?" Sam interjected. "Feel any sudden drops in temperature?"

The man suddenly smiled and leaned back in his seat. "I knew it!"

Oh.

"You guys are larping, aren't you?"

"Excuse me?" Dean questioned.

"You're fans," the man continued.

"Fans of what?" Sam said.

"What is "larping"?" Dean asked.

I looked over at him, "Stands for "Live Action Role Playing," I said.

"How do you even know what that is?"

I stared at him blankly and then back at the man. "You were saying? Fans of what?"

"Like you don't know," he grinned. We stayed looking at him. "Live Action Role Playing," I looked up at Dean and grinned, "and pretty hardcore, too."

"I'm sorry," Dean apologized, "I have no idea what you're talking about."

"You're asking questions like the building's haunted. Like those guys from the books," he explained. "But I don't remember them having a girl tagging along. Then again I haven't read them all," he trailed off.

I nodded, "Okay..."

"What are they called? Uh..." He looked up at us in realization. "Supernatural." When we didn't reply, he kept going. "Two guys, use fake I.D.s with rock aliases, hunt down ghosts, demons, vampires." Me and Sam exchanged a look. I had to keep from laughing, actually. "What are their names? Uh... Steve and Dirk? Uh, Sal and Dane?"

"Sam and Dean?" I questioned.

"That's it!"

"You're saying this is a book?" Dean asked him.

"Books. It was a series. Didn't sell a lot of copies, though. Kind of had more of an underground-cult following." He stood up and motioned for us to follow him. We took a few steps to a small bookshelf thing in the middle of the store and I watched as he looked for the said books. "Ah. Yeah." He handed us a book. Supernatural written in bigger letters over the cover. "That's the first one, I think."

I took it and felt myself cringe at the men on the cover. ""Supernatural" by Carver Edlund," I read aloud. I flipped over the book and read over the summary quickly. Pilot. ""Along a lonely California highway, a mysterious Woman in White lures men to their deaths... a terrifying phenomenon that may be Sam and Dean's first clue to their father's whereabouts.""