Return of Winchester

Chapter 9 A Bump In The Night

It was the slightest sound that woke her. Dani almost thought she had imagined it. If she was any other person she would have brushed it off and laid back down and gone to sleep, but years of hunting and living with a hunter had told her not to. She pulled the drawer of her bedside table open. Her fingers curled around the pearly handle of her father's gun. She slowed her breathing her ears straining to pick out anything. A faint smell seemed to fill the room all of a sudden. An earthy wheaty scent. Dani started to feel drowsy. A wave of exhaustion hit her. She lulled, her back hitting her headboard. She desperately tried to keep her eyes open. The last thing she remembered was the sound of the gun as it clattered to the floor.

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Sam and Cas sat in the library of the men of letters bunker. They had been pouring over everything they could find on missing souls. Sam had been flipping through articles for anything out of the ordinary that could lead them to his brother. It would make life a whole lot easier if they knew what they were looking for. Other than a few strange cases of adopted people going missing, weird but didn't fit what they were looking for. He had made a mental note to ask someone else to look into that. He looked up poised to ask Cas if he had found anything when his phone started to ring. Dani's name flashed on the screen. Sam's face brightened.

"Dani, Hey!"

"Jason?" Sam's face dropped. "Why are you calling me? On Dani's phone?"

Cas looked up from the book he was reading with equal parts interest and concern.

"What?!...Okay, okay, Jason. I'm heading over to you right now. Sit tight."

Sam hung up the phone. He got to his feet.

"What's going on?" Cas asked.

"Dani's missing I have to go. Just keep looking for anything on Dean. I just-I have to go."

Sam barely remembered the drive to Dani's apartment. His brain was running one hundred miles an hour. Once he actually arrived he didn't want to get out of the car. Jason hadn't told him much Sam hadn't given him a chance. Sam dreaded what he might find. He looked up to the second-floor railing. Jason and Hal were waiting at her door. Jason's usually calm demeanour was nowhere to be seen. His shoulders were tight and he was shifting from foot to foot. Hal on the other hand looked like he was ready to kill. Pure anger invaded every part of his face. Sam climbed the steps two at a time.

"We haven't touched anything. Just her phone." Jason said before Sam had even reached the door. "We just didn't have your number."

"It's okay Jason. Are you guys okay?" He asked looking from the boy to his grandfather.

"As well as we can be I guess." Hal's reply was clipped. He ground his teeth in a way that made Sam want to cringe. Hal wanted someone or something to blame.

"How long has she been gone?" He asked.

Jason spoke up.

"I came over when she got home from seeing you. She asked me...she asked me out on a date actually." The memory of Sam and Dani's deal flashed through Sam's thoughts. "When I didn't hear from her I thought she...well, I thought she wanted to back out."

"But then she didn't show up for work." Hal finished. "She always checks in if she's not going to be there. Always."

Sam nodded solemnly.

Upon entering the apartment Sam was both relieved and unsettled by the fact that the room looked as though nothing was wrong. Nothing had been scattered or knocked over. None of the usual signs of struggle. If Dani had been attacked she would have fought back. 

Something that made his stomach churn was Dani's pair of black Dr Martin boots placed neatly at the front door, newly polished. Red roses were embroidered up the ankle. They were her favourite pair and were barely ever off her feet. If she had left of her own volition she would have put them on. That paired with the fact that her phone had been left behind made panic start to rise in his thought. He made his way into her bedroom. An outfit was hung up on the front of the dresser ready to wear for the next day. As he moved through the room the shine of metal caught his eye. He recognised the gun. Dean's gun. It was just under the bed. Sam bent down to pick it up. This out of everything was the thing that made his blood run cold. She had pulled the gun from her bedside table. She had felt the need to defend herself and still left the gun behind. It puzzled him that there was nothing else touched except for the comforter that was folded back. He cradled the gun between his fingers. When he stood again he spotted something on the pillow. A small smudge of sut.

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Dani's head felt like it was full of cotton. She felt like she was strapped to a carousel on a kid's playground. When she opened her eyes the world was not in fact spinning. Cracked concrete filled her view from all sides. She groaned as she sat up a throb of pain shooting through her skull. Dani found that she was lying on a tattered old blanket on the right wall of what looked like a cell. The only light in the room was from a small clouded window to her right at the end of the cell. She had to use the wall to keep herself sitting upright. Drowsiness was still plaguing her. Her limbs felt like lead weights and everything ached. Dani drew in a deep breath. The spinny feeling was starting to slow but a wave of nauseous hit her. She scrambled to the corner of the room where a rusty tin bucket sat. She retched the little contents of her stomach from the night before spilling into the bucket. Dani spat a few times trying to get the bitter taste of bile from her mouth.

"Hey?" A voice came from behind the wall she was leaning on. Dani looked up above her head in the direction of the voice. She found a small vent there allowing sound to travel between the cells.

"Hey?" Came to the voice again. It was a nice-sounding voice gruff and low. "Are you okay in there?" A few knocks on the wall accompanied it.

"Uh..." Daniella rasped. "Yeah...yeah, I'm okay."

"Feels like the worst hangover in the world, right? Puked my guts out too when they first brought me here."

"I've never been hungover," Dani called.

"Lucky you."

Daniella tried to think back to the last thing that she remembered. Nothing had been out of the ordinary besides the smell that had filled the room and the feeling that ran up her spine.

"How long have you been here?" She asked moving back to the blanket when she felt like she wouldn't throw up again.

"Hard to tell...uh three weeks maybe four. Long enough to grow a beard anyway."

Dani scoffed. 

"That's just great." 

AN: Hey all sorry for the short chapter I'm battling writes block little by little. Trying to get more regular updates going. 

Write again soon.

Meg💙💋❤️