Losing Hope | {BOOK 4}

101| Preparing to Fight

We got to Jody's house, finding Jody sitting in the living room with an ice pack on her face. Alex was standing at her shoulder.

"Hey," Alex greeted us.

"Hey. Where is she?" I asked.

Jody just pointed and we looked over to see my mom tied up in a chair.

"Hello, Eleanor. Boys," she grinned.

Dean helped me into a chair and Alex got supplies to work on my knee.

"When she clocked me out of nowhere, I thought she was a demon," Jody explained. "I had no idea brainwashing could be so thorough."

"Jody, she..." I sighed deeply. "I'm so sorry."

"It's not your fault," she assured me. "Fortunately, Alex came home."

"All I did was buy you time," Alex said, dabbing at my knee. "You knocked her out."

I grimaced, wincing at the pain.

"I'll get you something for the pain," Alex stood up.

"Make it a double," I said, handing her the empty glass I'd just finished off.

Jody walked over, patting my arm in sympathy as I stared dully at my mom while leaning against a fist. I latched onto her wrist with my free hand, keeping my eyes on my mom.

"Aw," my mom cooed. "You wanna play mother to my daughter? She's all yours."

"Ellie," Jody whispered, "that's not your mom."

"What's the matter, Eleanor?" Mom asked. "Am I too different from the Emilie you know? Or too much the same?"

Sam came in with Lady Bevell, who was still in the handcuffs we'd put on her in the car. Maddie and Zep were trailing at his heels and went over to sit on the couch with Dean.

"Here she is. Do your thing," he said.

"Alright, you said you could fix her," I looked at Lady Bevell, "so fix her."

"I, um..." she stammered. "Well, I-"

"She lied," my mom said.

"What?" Dean asked.

"Emilie's programming... it's permanent."

"But you said..." I trailed off.

"Your husband wanted to kill me. The Emilie that you know, the good Emilie, she's hiding behind impenetrable psychic walls. And I'm afraid these walls..." she scoffed. "Well, they can't be torn down with grenades. Your mother can't be saved."

My mother smirked and I got up from the chair, pointing a gun at Lady Bevell.

"Alright, 'Lady', time's up," I snarled. "We only kept you alive for one reason."

"Hey, guys," Sam called over. "Listen, uh, Ketch keeps callin' Emilie's phone."

"I'll get it," my mom grinned.

"Let it go to voicemail," I snapped.

He reached over, rejecting the call as I shoved Lady Bevell.

"Let's take a nice short walk to the backyard."

"This is not going to stop. Soon enough, they'll find out you're alive, and then... Well, if you want my advice- run."

"We're not running," I told her.

"Well, then, you die."

"Or..." Dean piped up.

"Or what?" the Brit asked.

"Or we fight."

⁘

We got whatever hunters we could to come to Jody's house. I was leaning heavily against Dean, my knee wrapped in a bandage while Maddie and Zep stayed close to us. Walt and Roy, the two hunters who'd killed us way back before the apocalypse take one, were the last two to show up.

"You sure about this?" Dean asked Sam quietly.

"You gonna tell us what we're doing here or what?" Walt asked.

"Ah. Of course. Yeah," Sam nodded. "Um, so we- we, um..."

He sighed, shaking his head.

"No, you know what? I called you all here because people... um, our people, are being slaughtered. And we're next. The British Men of Letters, they came here because they thought they could do our job better than we could. And they hooked us with their flashy gear and their tech. Most of you had the good sense to turn them down. My brother and I didn't.

"They said they wanted the same thing we wanted, you know? A world free of monsters. That's not what they really wanted. They want control. They want to live in a world where they can sit in some office and decide who gets to live and who gets to die. And they've killed people. They've killed innocent people.

"They've killed innocent people just because they got in the way. They think the ends justify the means. But we know better. We know hunting isn't just about killing. It's about doing what's right, even when it's hard. So we go by our gut, right? We play by our rules, and it scares them. That's why they want us dead, 'cause we're the one thing they can't control."

"So what do you want from us?" Roy asked.

"I want you to follow me," Sam replied. "Take the fight to them. To hit them before they hit us. We go in fast and hard and we fight and we beat them down until they give up or until they're dead. Look, they're well-trained and well-armed. Some of us might not make it back. But we will win. We will take down the bad guys because that's what we do. They're scared of us. Yeah. Good. They should be."

Everyone headed out to their cars to gear up and head out. Alex agreed to take Maddie and Zep with her to where Donna was waiting at a safehouse.

"You ready?" Dean asked me.

"Ooh," I grimaced, standing with difficulty. "Oh, no. I'm not goin'."

"What?"

"No, my leg busted up the way it is, I'm no good in a fight."

"I-I'll take a jacked up Eleanor Dawson over any ten other hunters any day," he insisted.

"Okay, first of all- you put a ring on it, so it's Winchester, not Dawson. Second of all, you'll be fine without me. You got Sam to back you up. Or, you know, he's got you to back him up after that speech he gave. Go show those sons of bitches whose boss."

"What about you? What are you gonna do?"

"I'm gonna save my mom."

He nodded in understanding, but I pressed on anyway since he still seemed unsure about having me stay behind.

"Look, if she's in there, if my real mom is in there somewhere, then I'm gonna try and find her, bring her back. You got this."

He leaned in, kissing me gently, yet passionately.

"I love you," he said, pulling back and leaning his forehead against mine.

"I love you, too," I replied, smiling. "You come back."

"Promise."