Stage of Salvation

4.02 Don't Play With Dead Things

Dean pounds heavily on the door to Dr. Mason's office and he's very agitated. Sam tries to calm his brother down, with "Dean, take it easy, okay?"
Dr. Mason opens the door and a few moments later. "You guys are Angela's friends, right?" Sam and I nod.
"We need to talk," Dean mutters harshly. Dr. Mason lets us in despite Dean being pissed off. Once we're inside, Dean confronts him, demanding to know what the symbols are. He shows Dr. Mason the paper on which he's copied the symbols from the grave.
"They're part of an ancient Greek divination ritual." Dr. Mason explains.
"Used for necromancy, right? See, before we came over here we stopped by the library and did a little homework ourselves. Apparently they used rituals like this one for communicating with the dead. Even bringing corpses back to life. Full-on zombie action." The confused professor says that yes, according to legend, but Dean won't let it go, his own grief and anger obviously getting in the way. "Look, I get it. There are people I'd give anything to see again, but what's dead should stay dead. It's not your daughter anymore. Haven't you seen Pet Cemetery?"
"You're insane." Dr. Mason says.
"Where is she?!"
"Get out of my house!" Dr. Mason yells as Dean steps closer to him. He starts dialing the phone; Dean knocks it out of his hand.
"I know you're hiding her somewhere. Where is she?!" Sam and I reach out to stop Dean, who's so caught up in his own grief that he can't see what's right around him, his hunter instincts even blunted.
"Dean! Stop, that's enough! Dean, look!" Sam called out. He grabs Dean's jacket, points to a row of plants by the window. "Beautiful, living plants."
"I'm calling the police." Dr. Mason exclaimed. Dean pulls out of Sam's grip and storms for the door.
"Sir, we're sorry. We won't bother you again." I told him.

As soon as we're out of his office, Dean strides down the steps and along the sidewalk, Sam and I are following close behind.
"What the hell is the matter with you, Dean?" Sam said. "That man is innocent! He didn't deserve that!" I say.
"Guys, I know what I'm doing."
"No, you don't. I don't scare easily, but man, you're scaring the shit out of Toralei and I. You're on edge, you're erratic except for when you're hunting, because then you're downright scary. You're tailspinning, man. And you refuse to talk about it and won't let us help you." Sam remarked.
"I can take care of myself, thanks."
"No, you can't. You're the only one who thinks you should have to. You don't have to handle this on your own, Dean, no one can."
"Sam, if you bring up dad's death one more time I swear to—"
"Stop. Please, Dean, it's killing you. We've already lost dad, we've lost mom, I've lost Jessica, and now I'm gonna lose you too?" As upset as Dean is, that gets through to him. I realized that losing family is the worst thing in the world for the brothers just as much as it is for me.
"I hear you, okay? I'm being an ass and I'm sorry. But right now we've got a freaking zombie running around and we need to figure out how to kill it." Dean said. Finally, Dean acknowledges that he hears his brother, that Sam has gotten through to him, I watch the tension bleed out of the both of them.
"Our lives are weird." I mutter.
"You're telling me. Come on."

𓆩⚝𓆪 𖤐⭒๋࣭ ⭑* -⃝⃤ *⭑ ๋࣭⭒𖤐 𓆩⚝𓆪

Later, the boys and I are busy figuring it all out in our motel. Dean is pacing, Sam is sitting on one of the beds with John's journal, while I'm sitting at a table by the window scouring the internet on how to kill the walking dead on Sam's laptop.
"We can't just waste it with a head shot?"
"Dude, you've been watching way too many Romera flicks." Sam says.
"You're telling me there's no lore on how to smoke them."
"No, Dean, he's telling you there's too much." I responded. "According to the internet, there's a hundred different legends on the walking dead but they all have different methods for killing them." Dean joins me at the table. "Some say setting them on fire, feeding their hearts to wild dogs. I mean, who knows what's real and what's myth?"
"Is there anything they all have in common?"
"No but a few here said silver might work."
"Silver's a start."
"But how are we going to actually find Angela?" Sam asked.
"We've got to figure out the person who brought her back." I say.
"Any ideas?"
"I think if it's not her dad it might be that guy Neil." Dean suggested.
"Neil? How'd you come up with that?" Dean stands and crosses the room to pick up the pink diary.
"You guys have your sources, I have mine." Dean opens the diary and reads aloud in a female tone. "'Neil's a real shoulder to cry on, he understands what I'm going through with my boyfriend.' There's more in here where that came from. It's got unrequited Duckie love written all over it."
"Yeah, but that doesn't mean he brought her back from the literal dead." I mutter dryly.
"Did I mention he's Dr. Mason's TA? Has access to all the same books." Sam and I look at Dean speculatively. The three of us knew that Neil had access to all the same ancient Greek books that Dr. Mason has about necromancy that it could be very possible that he was the one who could bring Angela back from the dead. On our way out of the motel, I grabbed a metal cartridge box out of my black backpack and handed the small box to Dean. Dean opened it and there's six silver bullets with my family's crest on them inside.
"Silver bullets?"
"Yeah, enough to make her rattle like a change purse." I say with a small smile.
"Let's go test that theory, kid." Dean replied as I followed him and Sam out of our motel room.