Phenomenon

When I opened my eyes in the morning, something was different.

It was light. It was still the gray-green light of a cloudy day in the forest, but it was clearer somehow. I realised there was no fog veiling my window.

I jumped up to look outside, and then groaned in horror.

A fine layer of snow covered the yard, dusted the top of Dean's Impala and whitened the road. But that wasn't the worst part. All the rain from yesterday had frozen solid, coating the needles on the trees in fantastic, gorgeous patterns, and making the driveway into a deadly ice slick. Oh God, as much as I hate snow, I hate ice even more. I was going to be slipping over all day.

"What's wrong?" Dean said, leaning on the frame of my bedroom door, towel drying his short brown hair. He was obviously on his way back from the bathroom

"Have you looked outside yet?"

"No why?"

I pulled him over to the window.

"Son of a bitch. You can walk to school today."

"Excuse me, you'd better be joking."

"I'm not taking my car out in that. I only just fixed her up."

"So you care more about your precious car than you do about your own sister." I asked sarcastically.

"Yeah actually I do." He said, smirking as he walked out the door.

"You're a friggin' jerk, you know that. Get dressed your taking me to school or I'll kick your ass, steal your keys and drive myself to school." I called down the stairs after him.

"Fine," he called back, "bitch."

"Jerk," I said again.

After my shower I went down into the kitchen, threw Dean a shirt and some jeans I had snagged for his room on the way, and poured myself some cereal. Dean was on his mobile. I started eating quickly. I knew it was stupid, but I was eager to get to school today. I wanted to see Edward again. I wanted to figure out was up with that guy. Whether he was the hateful boy I met on the first day, or whether he would stay the nice, but intrusive, guy that I had met yesterday. The curiosity was killing me. I hated mysteries that I couldn't solve. That was probably why this werewolf hunt was annoying me so much, we just couldn't work out what was going on.

"That was Bobby," Dean said as I was finishing my cereal.

"What did he want," I mumbled through my last mouthful.

"Well, you know that email he sent the other day?" I nodded. "Yeah, well now he definitely thinks that the werewolves are coming from La Push, and I agree."

"Seriously, again with the plural, one of them isn't enough? What are they congregating now?"

"Yeah, looks like. Here." Dean handed me today's paper. I glanced at the front cover. The headline read 'Local Man Sees Giant Wolves'. I read the story underneath.

I looked up at Dean as I finished. "Two giant wolves spotted in Seattle near the place where another body was found. Are we still sure these things are werewolves? I mean, one, werewolves don't usually hang out together. Two, it's not the right time of the lunar cycle and three, wolves? I mean come on, man. Werewolves don't change into wolves, they just change into crazy people."

"Are you done?" Dean asked, interrupting my rant.

I huffed out a sigh. "Yeah."

"That's what Bobby called about. He found some more information on those Quileute legends and apparently..."

"This fits in with the legend?" I asked incredulously.

"Yeah."

"That's totally nuts."

"I know," Dean said. We both started laughing. "We've got to go interview some La Push locals."

"Ok, well the beach trip is soon."

"Good, but in the meantime I'm gonna try and get a little looksee at the body."

"Why? If we know it's the werewolves... we don't know it's the werewolves?"

"Well this one might not be?"

"You think there's some other creature in town."

"I don't know what to think. But according to Bobby the Quileute wolves are there to protect the tribe." Dean shook his head slowly as if trying to clear it.

I put my hand on his shoulder. "We'll work it out, okay, we will work out what is killing these people and then we will kill it. But I have to get to school. So you might as well go upstairs, put on a suit instead, and get a look at the body after you've dropped me off."

Five minutes later we were in the car driving slowly to school. The ice was so slippery Dean was having a hard time staying on the road. He dropped me off at the gate and I walked slowly through the parking lot.

I was looking at the feet, trying to make sure I didn't fall over, so I didn't realise the van was coming until I heard the brakes squeal. I looked up, startled.

I noticed several things simultaneously. Edward Cullen was standing four cards down from me, on his face was an expression of horror. His face stood out from a sea of faces, all of them frozen into the same mask of shock. But of more immediate importance was the dark blue van that was skidding, tires locked and squealing against the brakes, spinning wildly across the ice of the parking lot. It was going to hit the back corner of an old Ford. Unfortunately, I happened to be standing between the skidding van and the Ford. I didn't even have time to close my eyes.

Just before I heard the shattering crash of the van hitting the other car, something hit me, hard, but not from the direction I was expecting. My head cracked against the icy blacktop, and I felt something solid and cold pinning me to the frozen ground. But I didn't have the chance to notice anything else because the van was still coming. It had curled around the back of the Ford and, still spinning and sliding, was about to collide with me again.

A low oath made me aware that someone was with me, and that voice was impossible not to recognise. Two large, white hands shot out protectively in front of me, and the van shuddered to a stop about a foot in front of my face. The hands made a deep dent in the side of the van.

Then the hands moved so fast they were a blur. One was suddenly gripping under the body of the van, and something was dragging me, swinging my legs around until they hit the tyre of the tan car next to me. A groaning metallic thud hurt my ears, and the van settled, glass popping, onto the asphalt exactly where, two seconds ago, my legs had been.

It was absolutely silent for one long second before the screaming began. In the abrupt bedlam, I could hear more than one person shouting my name. But more clearly than all the yelling, I could hear Edward Cullen's low, frantic voice in my ear.

"Sam? Are you alright"

"I'm fine." My voice sounded strange. I tried to sit up, and realised he was holding me against the side of his body in an iron grasp.

"Be careful," he warned as I struggled. "I think you hit your head pretty hard."

I became aware of a throbbing ache centered above my left ear.

"Ow," I said, surprised.

"That's what I thought." His voice, amazingly, sounded like he was repressing laughter.

"How in the..." I trailed off, trying to clear my head, get my bearings. "How the hell did you get over here so fast?"

"I was standing right next to you, Sam," he said, his tone serious again.

I turned to sit up, and this time he let me, releasing his hold around my waist and sliding as far as possible from me as he could in the limited space. I looked at his concerned, innocent expression and was disorientated again by the force of his gold-coloured eyes. Slightly darker than they had been yesterday. My brain was trying to work to link something together, but the whacking it had received was making it move sluggishly.

And then they found us, a crowd of people with tears streaming down their faces, shouting at each other, shouting at us.

"Don't move," someone instructed.

"Get Tyler out of the van!" someone else shouted. There was a flurry of activity around us. I tried to get up, but Edward's cold hand pushed my shoulder down.

"Just stay put for now."

"But it's cold," I complained. It surprised me when he chuckled under his breath. There was an edge to the sound.

"You were over there," I suddenly remembered, and his chuckle stopped short. "You were by your car."

His expression turned hard. "No, I wasn't."

"I saw you... by your car" I still couldn't get rid of the haze that was clouding my brain, I couldn't think properly.

All around us was chaos. I could hear the gruffer voices of adults arriving on the scene. I tried to get my brain to focus on our argument. I knew I was right and he was going to admit it.

"Sam, I was standing with you, and I pulled you out of the way." He unleashed the full, devastating power of his eyes on me, as if trying to communicate something crucial.

"No." I set my jaw.

"The gold in his eyes blazed. "Please, Sam."

"Why?" I demanded

"Trust me," he pleaded, his soft voice overwhelming.

I could hear the sirens now. "Will you promise to explain everything to me later?"

"Fine," he snapped, abruptly exasperated.

"Fine," I repeated angrily.

It took six EMT's and two teachers, Mr. Varner and Coach Clapp, to shift the van far enough away to get the stretchers in. Edward refused his and I tried to do the same, I really was fine, it was just my brain that was moving a little slowly. I had a concussion at the worst and I have had many injuries a lot worse than this. But then Edward told them I'd hit my head and they all but forced me onto a stretcher. I almost died of humiliation when they put the neck brace on. It looked like the entire school was there, watching soberly as the loaded me into the back of the ambulance. Edward got to ride in the front.

His family was looking on from a distance. The expression on their faces ranged from disapproval to fury, but none held a hint of concern for their brother's safety.

As they closed the ambulance doors the loud bang kicked my brain awake. Images that hadn't been processed before now were crashing chaotically around my head. The dents in the van where Edward's hand had been. The inhuman speed he must have used to get to me. The cold skin, the changing eye colour, the graceful movements. And then it clicked. I realised why Edward and his family had seemed so familiar. It was not because I had seen them before. It was because I had seen their kind before.

Memories of a hunt that Dean and I had been on a few months ago with Dad flowed through me. Daniel Elkins, body ripped, mutilated and drained of blood. Dad finding us and the letter Daniel had left for him. That was the first moment we found out about the Colt, a gun that can kill anything, even demons. And then finally...

The ambulance stopped abruptly and the EMT unloaded me. I saw Edward glide through the hospital doors under his own power. I also heard the roar of an engine, a faint hint of rock music and the squeal of breaks as Dean abruptly stopped the Impala outside of the hospital. He raced over to me.

"Sam, hey Sammy, are you okay?" he asked his voice panicked.

"I'm fine, Dean," I muttered as they wheeled my gurney through the doors. They put me in the emergency room, a long room with a line of beds separated by pastel coloured curtains. A nurse put a pressure cuff on my arm and a thermometer under my tongue. Since no-one bothered pulling the curtain around to give me some privacy I decided I wasn't obligated to wear the stupid-looking neck brace and longer. When the nurse walked away I quickly undid the Velcro and threw it under the bed.

There was a flurry of hospital personal and a stretcher containing Tyler Crowley was bought in and put next to mine. Tyler had bloodstained bandages wrapped around his head and looked about a hundred times worse than I felt. However, he was staring anxiously at me.

"Sam, I'm so sorry."

"I'm fine, Tyler. You look awful, are you all right?" As we spoke, nurses were unwrapping his soiled bandages and applying new ones. I could see that Tyler had lots of shallow cuts all over his forehead and left cheek.

Before Tyler could reply I heard Dean's voice coming in loudly from outside of the emergency room.

"Yes, I'm family, okay. I'm her brother. No you can't contact our parents because they're dead. Just let me in God damn it.

The door slammed open and Dean rushed to my bed.

A hospital worker entered after him, limping slightly. Dean must have pushed him out of the way to get to me. I chuckled quietly to myself.

"Excuse me, sir," the hospital worker said timidly, "we need your insurance."

"Here." Dean thrust a card at him without turning away from me. The hospital worker scurried away, afraid he was going to get pushed around again.

"Man, that kid that hit you, I'm gonna rip his lungs out," Dean said loudly.

"He's right behind you," I said. He turned, but before he could start to throttle Tyler I grabbed his shoulder. "But, Dean I'm fine. There isn't gonna be any ripping today." Tyler looked grateful as Dean turned his attention back to me. He pulled me into a hug.

"Sammy, seriously, don't ever scare me like that again or I swear I'll kick your ass." Then Dean, being the kind brother that he is, had to add, "Dude, you look like crap."

"Thanks so much, Dean. That makes me fell a hell of a lot better."

"Sam, I'm sorry," Tyler said again. "I thought I was going to kill you."

"It's okay, Tyler, you missed me."

"How did you get out of the way so fast? You were there, and then you were gone..."

"Um..." I looked up at Dean as the memories came flooding back again. I just couldn't admit to myself what they meant. "Edward pulled me out of the way," I finished.

Tyler and Dean both looked confused. "Who?" said Tyler.

"Edward Cullen, he was standing next to me." I had no idea why I was lying.

"Cullen? I didn't see him... Wow, it was all so fast, I guess. Is he ok?"

"I think so. He's here somewhere, but they didn't make him use a stretcher."

They wheeled me away then, to X-ray my head. I told them there was nothing wrong, and I was right. I didn't even have a concussion. Compared to how beat up I usually got when I was on a hunt, I felt great. I asked if I could leave, but the nurse said I had to talk to a doctor first. So I was trapped in the ER, waiting, harassed by Tyler's constant apologies and promises to make it up to me. Dean was sitting on a chair next to my bed. I had to be careful not to look at him. It was even harder to lie to him than it was to lie to Edward. I still didn't know why I was lying to him, I just needed time to think everything over before I came clean.

I heard someone enter the ER. I looked over to see Edward and I froze. He wasn't the same person anymore.

"Hey, Edward, I'm really sorry," Tyler began.

Edward lifted a hand to stop him.

"No blood, no foul," he said, flashing his teeth. I looked at them closely, I had to be sure. I didn't like what I saw.

"This the guy that saved you?" Dean asked.

"Yeah."

Dean stood up and shook Edward's hand. I flinched as they touched, but I don't think Dean noticed anything unusual. "Thanks for saving my sister, I owe you one."

"So what's the verdict," Edward asked me.

I paused for a second before answering him. "There's nothing wrong with me at all, but they won't let me go." I tried to talk to him as normally as possible. "Why aren't you strapped to a gurney like the rest of us?"

"It's all about who you know," he answered. "But don't worry, I came to spring you."

Then a doctor walked around the corner, and my mouth fell open. He was young, he was blond... and he was more handsome than any movie star I had ever seen. He was pale, though, and tired looking, with circles under his eyes. No he can't work here, I thought. That's not possible.

"I'm Dr. Cullen," he said. "You must be Miss Winchester. How are you feeling?"

I couldn't look away from him, I was in shock.

Dean nudged me. "I'm fine," I said, my voice breathless.

Dr. Cullen walked over to a light board on the wall over my head and switched it on.

"Your X-rays look good," he said. "Does your head hurt?"

"No," I replied.

I shied away as the doctor's cool fingers probed lightly at my skull. "Tender," he asked."

"Not really," I said.

"Well, I guess you can go home then."

"Can't I go back to school?" I really didn't want to be alone with Dean right now.

"Maybe you should take it easy."

"Is he going back to school?" I said, jerking my head in Edward's direction.

"Someone has to spread the good news that we survived," Edward said smugly.

"It sounds like you were extremely lucky," Dr. Cullen said.

"Lucky Edward happened to be standing next to me," I lied.

I started to make my way towards the exit, stopping in front of Edward. "I need to talk to you," I hissed. I was going to make him admit what had really happened.

Edward took a step back from me, his jaw clenched.

I turned to Dean. "I'll just be a second," I said. "You can go wait in the car." Dean left after a long look at me. I hope he didn't realise what was up.

I walked out of the ER with Edward close behind me. As soon as we turned the corner into a short hallway I spun around to face him.

"What do you want?" He asked coldly, sounding annoyed.

Again his personality had completely changed. I made myself reply calmly, I didn't have any weapons on me, I needed to be careful. "You owe me an explanation," I reminded him.

"I saved your life, I don't owe you anything.

"Why did you save me?" I asked. I couldn't think of a reason why he would have. It just didn't make sense, but of course he was not going to give me the answers I wanted.

"I honestly don't know," he said quietly before he turned his back and walked away.

I stared after him. I was so confused. But there was one thing I knew for certain. Edward and his family were vampires. For some reason though, I knew I couldn't tell Dean, not just yet anyway. Again I thought that this whole situation didn't make sense. Edward had saved me. His father, for want of a better word, was a doctor at the local hospital and the rest of his family went to school. Seriously, what the hell?

If Dean noticed my pissed off expression when I got into the car he didn't mention it. We started to drive home in silence when I noticed the suit he was still wearing. Dean had gone to check out a body that didn't seem to have been part of a werewolf attack and now I knew they weren't the only creatures in town. For some reason I felt worried. I didn't want Dean to know about the vampires just yet and I knew that if he had seen the body he would know. Vampire bites aren't exactly easy to miss.

"Um... did you get a chance to see the body?" I asked him.

"No. I had to race back here to make sure you were okay. I didn't get a chance."

I exhaled in relief. Maybe I would get a chance to keep my secret a little bit longer. I didn't really want to hide my new discovery from Dean, but I did want time to investigate. Something was off about the whole Cullen business and I know my brother, definitely a shoot first ask questions later type, and if he thought people were in danger there would be no chance for me to finish my investigation.

Thankfully Dean decided not to go back out today. Instead he decided to turn into a bossy douchebag.

"Alright, I want you to go upstairs and get some sleep."

"Who made you the boss?" I asked scathingly.

"No one. But I am the oldest, and that means I'm always right."

"What? No it doesn't."

Dean glared at me his full lips set in an ugly frown until I turned and slowly climbed the stairs, muttering all the while about what a jerk he was.

I slammed my bedroom door and slumped onto my bed, fully clothed. Even though I wasn't really tired I soon fell asleep. That was the first time I dreamt of Edward Cullen.