Men In Black - complete

Chapter 11

Dean was not in a good mood.

John was not only gone by the time they had reached the area he was last in, but the bastard was still running scams and Dean had almost gotten arrested.

Fortunately he only used fake ID's when he was pretending to be someone else...he made no bones that he was only there because he wanted to know what the hell his estranged birth father had done this time to screw things up.

The fact Dean had a car licensed properly, a real ID on him (he kept his fakes in his mole-skin wallet, one enchanted to be invisible from anyone but the magical authorities which these backwoods hicks were NOT) and wasn't impersonating any authorities meant legally they had nothing to hold him on.

All Dean got out of it was John's journal, something he viewed with open distaste.

"Well?" asked Sam at the car.

"Dad skipped town. Last message from him said that he had a lead on whatever killed Mary, right before it cut off without warning. He did leave behind his journal, and I've never known that ass to leave a hunt uncompleted," said Dean.

"Yeah... and why leave the journal behind? Something about this stinks," said Sam.

Neither of them relied on the journal before, and they preferred to make their own indexed books instead. John's journal was extremely out of order and it made looking for things a pain in the ass. The fact he left behind his journal and left a hunt unfinished?

Something was definitely wrong.

"What time is it?" asked Dean.

"About noon, why?"

Dean calculated the time. Bobby should be up about now. He took out his cell phone and hit the second number on his phone. The first was always Sam, and the third and fourth were Ellen and Jo.

"What?!" said Bobby gruffly. He was busy researching something.

"John's gone off the grid. He's left a hunt unfinished and his journal behind, not to mention he actually called me a few days ago," said Dean flatly.

"What."

There was no mistaking the hint of incredulity in Bobby's voice. The fact John would dare call Dean personally, not to mention leave a hunt unfinished along with his journal behind...there was something very wrong with that picture and it didn't take a paranoid hunter to see it.

"Has he called you to ask for information? The last thing he said was that he had a lead on Mary's killer," said Dean.

"Haven't heard from him in six months, and you know he's never dared call the Roadhouse. I'll start asking around and if I find anything more I'll call you or Sam. Dean, be careful," said Bobby.

"I have a furry protector with me. I'll be fine."

Dean hung up, but his attention was immediately on something else. Something that had Bear growling in warning.

Mort looked rather... confused.

"Where in the Pit did you find one of his breed?"

"You know what he is?"

"A very rare breed of canine not often found outside of monasteries. They're known as very fierce guard dogs and they can even scare demons if trained properly. Where did you find him?"

"Rescued him from a dog-pit fight after the pound said they couldn't pay for his vet bill. He seems to like me well enough."

Mort nodded. He knew Dean had a soft spot for abused creatures. It would stand to reason he would step in and save a dog, even one as big as Bear...even if it meant he had to go the extra mile to help the animal recover from the trauma.

"Now we have a new question. Just who or what is manipulating John Winchester? Because there is no way in hell that this is normal by any means."

"That's actually why I'm here. I came to inform you that the events I warned you about before you were reborn have finally started. Soon the demon that killed your birth mother and tainted your brother's magic will reveal himself, and it will lead you and your brother through a long painful road."

And as usual, there is nothing you can tell me about what we're facing or why this is happening because events have to unfold naturally without your help. At least we know something bigger is up, said Dean.

He was used to Mort being unable to tell him everything he needed to know. He had come to accept that Mort couldn't solve everything for him.

It was why they were able to get along so well.

"Mort here?" asked Sam.

"Yeah. He said that Dad's disappearance is a part of something big, but outside of that he can't tell me anything else."

Sam was used to Mort's silence, and the hunters respected it. Just as they couldn't demand Dean kill Mort, they also knew that sometimes finding information out themselves was better than having everything handed to them. The 'reaper' was usually better for moral support and as a sounding board.

Something any lonely teen growing up could always use.

"So something is up?"

"I think the demon that killed her is coming back. At least that's what Mort's hinting at. Which means we better start keeping an eye out for signs... but first, let's gank us a white lady," said Dean.

Dean quickly found out what Mort had meant when he said Bear was descended from some sort of supernatural guard dog when his paws sliced right through the ghost woman trying to kill Sam in the car. Sam drove her right into the house and they watched as Bear kept her occupied long enough for her murdered children to deal with her.

As promise, Dean drove Sam back to Stanford.

However he was exhausted from the drive back since he hadn't stopped except for something to wake him up and allow Bear to stretch his legs. He was about to crash in the Impala when he saw the fire in Sam's window and raced up the fire escape to find his brother staring at the ceiling.

Clearly the demon that killed their birth mother was gunning for Sam now. And he had just made it very personal.

Death watched sadly as events began to unfold, wishing he could do more. His 'master' had been dealt a bad hand twice, but at least this time he had an actual support base to work from and something resembling a childhood. And he now had a very powerful familiar, one more capable of defending itself from the things they hunted unlike the first one he had.

Bear was an oddly appropriate name for such a large dog. Especially one of that breed.

Still, he did visit Dean when he could and Dean respected their usual agreement of him not asking outright what they were hunting. Yes, Death gave Dean little hints, but that was usually to speed things along.

It was because of this unspoken agreement that Dean didn't ask Death which demon they were hunting. He didn't want to risk their strange friendship by forcing Death to give him information he couldn't.

However this was one time he could ignore that little rule they had between them, if only because Dean could actually get the information himself if he knew where to look.

The thing was Dean had no interest in hunting down the demon that killed Mary originally, so he had never bothered to try and find it in the magical libraries. Magicals had an extensive list of things not to mess with, including demons. It wasn't self-updating, but new ones were added every fifty years.

And the yellow-eyed one was pretty high up that list.

So if Death just happened to knock over a book referencing the list itself right before Dean entered the room and disappeared, there was no one to call him on it.