The Risen

SPN EPISODE(S): 4.2 Are You There, God? It's Me, Dean Winchester

"We're all of us haunted and haunting." - Chuck Palahniuk

The minute Jo Harvelle cracked open her eyes to the sunlight streaming in through the curtains of her motel room window, she knew immediately that something was wrong. The temperature in her room was far too cold for September, and her thinking was proven correct at the visible fog breath that escaped her mouth and the hairs on her neck and arms stood straight up.

Only one thing could cause such an anomaly: a ghost.

Luckily, she had gotten in late last night because of a previous hunt, so she was still dressed and had her beloved sawed-off shotgun (that never left her side) propped us next to her bed. Sitting up slowly and grabbing the gun, she checked to make sure that it was still loaded with rounds of rock salt – the ideal method to rid ghosts temporarily while finding the correct corpse to salt and burn. Seeing that her favorite weapon was indeed loaded, Jo clicked the butt end and the barrel together again and rose to her feet. The bed springs of the cheap motel bed squeaked as she shifted her weight forward. She brought the butt end to rest against her shoulder and started to scan the room, ready to fire as soon as her supernatural attacker appeared.

The voice of the ghost, however, was not one she expected.

"Miss Jo, why couldn't you save me?" Jo spun around and looked at the source of the small voice. Standing in the middle of her room was Timmy, the young boy she didn't save from one of her very first hunts on her own. A couple of years back, Jo had investigated a report that claimed young Timmy was seeing a scary man in his room when he went to sleep at night. At first glance, it would seem that this event was not even worth reporting, and could be deemed as a child's nightmare. But Timmy could recount the man and the times he visited in such vivid detail that his parents were forced to contact the police.

Sensing that the case may be supernatural, Jo headed to Creston, Iowa posed as an FBI agent to investigate before the "scary man" caused any harm to Timmy or his parents. Jo interviewed Timmy, secretly telling him her real name and promising to get the scary man that was troubling him. Timmy told Jo that the man had sharp, pointy teeth and was very pale. His description of the man matched a few men seen around town, and so Jo broke into the local police station to search for possible matches. She went to homes and interview suspects, keeping a machete in the inside of her FBI suit jacket.

But before Jo located the correct suspect, he attacked Timmy in the middle of the night. All this time Jo had tried to comfort herself after the young boy's death by telling herself that it was one of her first cases and that she was inexperienced. She repeated this fact over and over to herself for months after the accident, usually following her mantra with a few shots of whiskey. However the guilt still weighed on her heavily. She had broken her promise to him, and felt responsible for his death and his parents' grief.

Now, the boy who would remain five years old forever with black hair and the bluest of eyes stood in front of her. His skin was ashen, and a massive gash from his vampiric attacker marred his neck. "You promised," he reminded her at a near whisper, voice cracking a little. "You said you would get the scary man."

Lowering her gun slightly, she regarded Timmy with regret. "I'm so sorry, Timmy," Jo replied "I tried to get him for you."

"LIAR!" Timmy suddenly shouted at the top of his lungs, fists clenched at his sides and stamping his foot for effect.

"No, no Timmy. I really tried." Jo whispered in response, two years of guilt suddenly coming on all at once. Tears began to prick at her eyes. A massive lump formed in her throat and her mouth felt dry. This could not be happening. She could not think of anything to say that might earn this boy's forgiveness.

"Do you see what he did to me?" Timmy asked, becoming cynical. He craned his neck to show her the gaping wound that now marred the entire left side of it. The tendons and ligaments stretched as he moved his head, brownish blood dribbling out. He then pointed to it for emphasis, the blood stained the collar of his shirt. "That's what the scary man did to me."

Jo was left speechless for a moment. When she found her voice, all she could whisper again was "I'm so sorry."

"It's okay." he answered. "Because my mommy and daddy always taught me how to be fair, so now it's your turn to die."

The boy suddenly developed a frightening smile, and began walking towards Jo. She reacted quickly, pulling her gun up again to point at the apparition and began walking backwards slowly to buy herself more time. "Timmy, please," she warned, "I don't want to shoot you."

"You might as well have the first time." he shot back, suddenly seeming wiser beyond his years. Something was wrong. The Timmy she had met was a shy and caring boy. One who hugged onto his mother's leg while the reporters tried to interview him. Nothing like what he seemed now. This was different. No six year old would ever think something like that. Sensing no other option, Jo fired a round of rock salt square into Timmy's chest. The boy dissipated in a cloud of smoke and a burst of sparks. Jo wasted little time once he was gone. She grabbed her bag – a huge, hunter green duffel bag containing her clothes and weapons – and threw the strap over her shoulder, still clutching her sawed-off should Timmy reappear.

Throwing her bag into the bed of her old pick-up truck, she rounded the corner and made her way to the driver's side door. She climbed in and threw her shotgun down so that it was next to her on the bench seat. She started the car and pulled out, spraying gravel from the parking lot as she swung the truck around and headed toward Creston to find and burn the remains of Timmy. She made it onto the highway in record time, only having to dodge a few cars in the early morning light. Jo floored the accelerator and calculated how long it would take her to get there. It was 9:07 am now and she was in Fremont, Nebraska, meaning it would take her about… two and a half hours to get there. Sensing the urgency (she might not have that much time before Timmy came back) she gripped the steering wheel harder and pushed her foot down even further.

"Miss Jo, that wasn't very nice." The little voice next to her made Jo start and swerve the car a little, earning some angry honks from other drivers. She turned to look at him, balancing looking at him and at the road ahead. On one of her glances she caught something on Timmy out of the corner of her eye. A strange little red mark on the back of his hand, shaped like some kind of sigil.

"Timmy, listen to me. I'm very, very sorry for what happened to you. I tried my hardest, I really did." Jo's voice became thick near the end, the rush of guilt returning in a wave that made her head feel warm and flushed.

"My mommy always said it wasn't nice to lie. Why are you lying now?" He looked up at her with innocent eyes. They quickly changed darker as he said "You shouldn't have lied."

Damn. Timmy began to lunge for her again, but Jo had already grabbed her shotgun and fired another rock salt round into him, the kick of the gun slamming the butt into the side of her ribs. She bent over in pain for a brief moment before pulling herself back up to continue driving. She kept her left hand held over her ribs while her right continued to hold the wheel. That would leave a bruise. She bent over to the passenger side floor where an iron crowbar rested. She would use this instead, preserving her salt rounds and saving herself from having to shoot her gun in the cabin of her truck again. Her phone rang shrilly, causing her to jump again. The caller I.D. read Bobby Singer.

"Not now, Bobby." Jo said to herself through gritted teeth. He would have to wait. Right now, she had a corpse waiting that needed a good salting and burning.

As soon as the phone stopped ringing and the message 1 missed call appeared on her cell phone, the phone shrilled loudly again. The caller I.D. remained the same: Bobby Singer. Muttering a soft curse, she switched her hands around so that she could flip open her cell. This had better be an emergency. "Bobby, I'm a little busy right now."

"Jo! Oh, thank God you're there!" Bobby breathed a sigh of relief into the phone.

"Um, yeah, everything's just peachy on this end." Jo retorted. "Why do you sound so worried?"

"Why I'm callin' ya, kid. Listen, something weird's goin' on."

"Isn't it always in our world?" Jo interjected, still riding an adrenaline rush.

"This isn't the time for jokes!" Bobby disciplined, causing Jo to sit up straighter in alarm. "Hunters are gettin' killed right now because of vengeful spirits showin' up. You seen anything like that?"

That grabbed Jo's attention. "As a matter of fact, yes. What's going on?" Jo asked nervously as she sped down the highway. She scanned for cops and then pushed the gas pedal a little closer to the floor of her truck.

"We're not exactly sure why it's happening right now."

"'We'?" Jo asked. "You have someone there with you, Bobby?" Even though Bobby was a more experienced hunter than her, Jo always worried about him, especially as he got older. She was happy there was another hunter there with him.

"Yeah, it's me and Sam," Sam? Jo asked herself. Whenever she heard his name, she used to always hope that it would be followed by the older Winchester brother's name. Now, Dean was dead. In Hell nonetheless, from a soul deal to save his younger brother. Rumor around the hunter mill was that hell hounds had torn him to strips. Her hope had always been stupid and childish, and decided to focus on her predicament instead. "and…balls." Bobby's voice trailed in panic. Jo held her breath, worrying about him.

"Bobby, don't listen to them!" she heard someone who sounded a lot like Sam bellow on the other end of the phone. A few seconds after that, there was some loud crashing and a few rifle shots before the line clicked dead.

"Dammit! Bobby I'm coming!" she yelled, not knowing whether or not he had heard her. She snapped her phone shut and tossed it next to her in the seat. Sioux Falls was three hours away from where she was. Two hours away she corrected herself. She was going to break a few traffic laws to get to Bobby's. Jo took another look around for cops and other drivers. Seeing that neither were in her way, she drifted her truck around and started speeding in the other direction towards Sioux Falls.

"Do you know what's really not fair, miss Jo?" Timmy suddenly piped up, appearing in Jo's passenger seat again. "My mommy and daddy were so upset that I died, that they decided that they didn't want to be married anymore."

If Jo had felt any guilt before, it now doubled. Taking no more risks, she picked up the crowbar and sliced it through Timmy's torso.

Jo made it to Bobby's house in record time around an hour and a half later, and ran to the screen door, holding her shotgun with one hand. She took a moment deciding whether or not to knock. She didn't want to burst through the front door and startle Bobby and Sam and end up taking a round of rock salt to the chest as a consequence, but at the same time she wondered if Bobby and Sam would need her in there right away.

Jo finally decided to knock, knowing that they most likely wouldn't need help if there were two of them. They could probably handle it themselves. She knocked a few consecutive times and waited for any sign that someone was coming. It didn't take long for someone to answer, Bobby came and let her in. She stepped inside and began walking toward his office while telling him about her recent encounters. "Hey, Bobby," Jo began, "I've been seeing someone, or something, too. It's this little boy that-"

She was cut off by her own shock at the person she saw sitting on the couch. "Shit," she muttered to herself, and raised her gun to fire.

At this point, Bobby, Dean, and Sam had all received visits from the ghosts of those that they didn't save. Sam had seen agent Henriksen, Dean had seen Meg, and Bobby had seen the Miller twins. They were all gathered around Bobby's desk now, discussing why spirits were now seeking revenge on the hunters that couldn't save them. Dean was cleaning his shotgun, while Bobby and Sam scoured the shelves for books that may help them solve their current dilemma.

"I got a hold of Jo earlier this morning," Bobby told the brothers. "I think I heard her say that she was coming this way."

"Jo?" Dean almost balked. No, this couldn't be happening. Dean had told her he'd call her, and then had wrestled with himself later about whether to follow through with that promise. He wanted to call her desperately because he felt something inside of him whenever she was around. He became protective of her when she was around, and this in turn made him a sharper hunter. Maybe he had feelings for her. And when he had told her that he would call her that night after saving her from a possessed Sam, he broke his promise. Any other guy would have called her. But not Dean. Dean had told himself that he wouldn't call her. She deserved more than him. She also didn't need any more encouragement to join the hunting lifestyle. She was pretty, young, smart. A girl like her shouldn't throw her life away to hunt. Apparently, his avoided phone call had not changed her mind.

"Yep," Bobby confirmed, breaking Dean out of his reverie. "Said she's seen a vengeful spirit, too. Decided to come and see if she could help out. 'Sides, there's safety in numbers, right?"

"Right," Sam confirmed, studying the book that was now in front of him.

Dean said nothing more, just kept staring ahead of himself in a daze. This could not be happening. What would she say when she saw him? Did she know about his death, and now his mysterious resurrection? Was she still angry that he never called her? A million of these thoughts ran through his mind as a quick session of knocks sounded on Bobby's front screen door.

All three of the guys' heads turned toward the sound, and Bobby stood up to answer it. Dean gulped as he went, knowing who was at the door. Dean heard the screen door screech open, and the sound of her voice began floating his way, getting louder and louder as she approached. "Hey, Bobby. I've been seeing someone, or something, too. It's this little boy that-"

Dean's eyes met hers then for the first time in almost two years. He braced himself for whatever her reaction might be. Surprise? Anger? Joy? He expected that those three were a possibility, but he didn't expect her to raise her shotgun and point it square at his chest.

Jo could literally not believe her eyes. She stood transfixed, unable to process what, or rather who, was in front of her. Vengeful spirits? Sure, no problem. But please, not him. She replaced her sadness with anger and drew up her shotgun to fire at his chest. Dean, however, made no moves to put up his hands.

"Whoa whoa whoa!" Sam yelled, getting up from behind Bobby's desk and moving towards Jo. He put a hand up to her in warning "Jo, it's really him. We already did the holy water and silver blade routine. He just got back a couple days ago."

"What?" Jo barely whispered out, unable to believe that Dean was in front of her, alive and in one piece. She lowered her rifle. Her eyes stayed on Dean, even though she was talking to Sam.

"It's really me, Jo." Dean said back, his voice thick as well.

Jo finally broke her stare at Dean, turning to look at both Sam and Bobby for confirmation. Both offered her a shrug and a slight nod. This could not be happening. Here she was, just about over the fact that she and Dean would never have their chance when he suddenly and miraculously comes back. Was this too good to be true? Was there some kind of catch? It didn't matter. Without another word, she walked towards Dean.

Dean seemed a little unsure of what was she going to do. Shove him? Yell at him? Punch him (again)? She did none of those things. Instead, she reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck in a firm hug. The movement made her freshly bruised side a little sore.

Dean seemed apprehensive of the gesture. But then he too lifted his arms to wrap them around her torso. Dean shut his eyes, enjoying the feel of her small frame in his arms.

Sam and Bobby stood there in silence. Neither seemed sure of what to do. Bobby decided to take the bullet and said "I hate to break up this little reunion, but there are some pretty nasty spirits after us."

At his comment, both Dean and Jo seemed to suddenly realize what they were doing, and stepped back from each other. Sam seemed confused by the interaction, his quirked eyebrow and short huff of a laugh showing it. Jo nervously looked around herself, and sniffed a little. "Um, it's good to have you back, Dean. Bobby, Sam." Bobby and Sam both nodded to her in greeting.

"Yeah. It's good to see you, too, Jo." Dean smiled a little at how embarrassed she seemed, and Jo just nodded at the ground.

"Um, how are you back?" Jo asked him, as if she had just realized that she didn't know how one escaped hell.

"It's a long story," Dean explained. "But so far the only explanation we got – and I still don't know if I believe it – is that an angel brought me back."

"What?" Jo questioned. Angels wouldn't rescue Dean Winchester from the pits of hell just for kicks. Perhaps he was saved for all of the others he had saved, or maybe something much, much bigger than that.

"Yeah, we're still kinda workin' on it." Dean lamely explained with a nonchalant shrug. Jo, on the other hand, was left reeling.

"Okay, so the spirits we're seeing – they're all people we know?" Sam clarified, ready to get back to the case on hand.

"Not just people we know, people we couldn't save." Dean corrected, rejoining the current investigation. He walked back over to the couch, where he had been loading his rifle. "Hey, I saw something on Meg. Did she have a tattoo when she was alive?"

Shrugging, Sam replied "I don't think so."

"What did it look like?" Jo asked, appearing thoughtful and deciding to bring up the angel situation up again after the vengeful spirits were taken care of. That was no situation to write off.

"It was like a, uh, mark on her hand. Almost like a brand." Dean replied.

Jo thought back to her last encounter with Timmy. When he had been sitting beside her in the cabin of her pick-up she had noticed a little raised mark on his hand, like a tiny little burn. "Oh! Yeah, I saw that on…" she was about to say his name, but didn't want the Winchesters or Bobby to know about Timmy. "on the spirit, too."

"Same thing with Henriksen." Sam agreed, pointing at Jo to validate his claim.

"Well, what did it look like?" Bobby questioned the three of them.

Sam flustered for a moment, and asked Bobby for some paper. Bobby handed Sam a little tablet that had been sitting on his desk. Sam began sketching immediately, making circles on the paper. After a few seconds, he held up his work – a little circle with an intricate pattern inside – to both Dean and Jo.

"That's it." they both confirmed. Sam handed his drawing to Bobby, who also said he may have seen the symbol before. He turned to his bookshelf, looking for the origin of the symbol. Jo followed in his wake, walking to the desk to look over their research so far.

A sudden crackle in the radio froze all four hunters in the room. "We gotta move!" Bobby declared, hurriedly depositing copious amounts of heavy books into both Sam and Jo's arms.

"Hey!" Jo lightly protested.

"You come to help, you help. Now quit whinin' and follow me." Bobby retorted.

"Okay, where are we going?" Sam asked.

"Someplace safe, ya idjit!"

Bobby Singer was probably the coolest hunter ever. He built a panic room off of his basement. A panic room. And this wasn't your average panic room, either. This one was specialized to keep out ghosts and demons. Its walls were made out of iron that had been coated in salt. There was a variety of weapons and ammo lining one of the walls, a demon trap in the middle of the floor, and even food and a bed.

That's where Bobby, Jo, and the Winchester brothers all sat now. Sam and Dean were packing shells with salt to use against their vengeful ghosts, while Jo and Bobby combed through thickly bound books looking for the mysterious brand and any other clues that could help.

After a long silence, Dean spoke up. "You see, this is why I can't get behind God."

His sudden outburst had all three of the other hunters looking up at him in confusion. Jo was probably the most confused of all, having learned of Dean's resurrection and how it came to be only an hour or so beforehand. Her eyebrows knit together as she looked at him.

Before she could say anything, Sam spoke for her "What do you mean?"

"If he doesn't exist, fine. Bad crap happens to good people. That's how it is. There's no rhyme or reason – just random, horrible evil. I get it, okay? I can roll with that. But if he is out there, what's wrong with him?" He looked around to the other three before continuing, "Where the hell is he while all these decent people are getting torn to shreds? How does he live with himself, you know? Why doesn't he help?"

His rant trailed off, as he realized was going to get no answer. Sam, Jo, and Bobby all looked at each other, unsure of what to say to comfort him. Jo's heart ached for him. She desperately wanted something she could say to him that would help. She had an idea, but before she could speak her mind, Bobby muttered "I ain't touchin' this one with a ten foot pole!"

Jo smiled to herself. That would lighten the mood for now and get Dean off of the subject. Dean and Sam turned around to finish their rock salt rounds, but Bobby suddenly said "Found it."

"What?" Sam asked.

"The symbol you saw – the brand of the ghosts….Mark of the Witness," he explained.

"What do you mean 'witness'. Witness… to what?" Jo questioned, standing up and walking around the table to read over his shoulder.

"The unnatural," Bobby elaborated. "None of them died what you'd call 'ordinary deaths'. See, these ghosts? There were forced to rise. They woke up in agony. They were like rabid dogs. It ain't their fault. Someone rose them…on purpose."

"Who?" Sam asked. Jo wondered the same.

"Do I look like I know?" Bobby retorted. "But whoever it was used a spell so powerful it left a mark, a brand on their souls. Whoever did this had big plans. It's called the 'Rising of the Witnesses'. It figures into an ancient prophecy."

Jo stood up straight again from leaning over his shoulder and looked to the Winchester brothers to gauge their reactions. They seemed to be on the same page as her, wondering where this strange phenomena could be heading. Sam stood up and walked over to join her and Bobby in reading over this book.

"Wait. What – what book is that prophecy from?" Dean asked, standing to join everyone else.

"Well the widely distributed version's just for tourists. But, long story short – Revelations."

"Revelations?" Jo balked. "Like…" she trailed off, afraid to continue. She looked between Bobby and the brothers frantically, hoping someone would offer another explanation. However, Sam and Dean's response was to cock their heads to the side.

"Yup. This is a sign." Bobby added.

"A sign of what?" the brothers asked. They had not yet caught on to what Jo and Bobby had discovered.

She looked back up to both of them as Bobby said "The apocalypse."

"Apocalypse? The apocalypse, apocalypse?" Dean asked. Jo kept on staring straight ahead, willing her brain to process the new found information. Sam seemed to be in the same state of mind as her, but Dean continued on, somewhat angrily, "The four horsemen, pestilence, five-dollar-a-gallon-gas apocalypse?"

"That's the one." Bobby conceded. "The Rise of the Witness is a mile marker."

"Okay." Jo nodded, snapping herself out of her trance and getting back into the conversation. She put her hands on her hips, steeling herself and nodding grimly for whatever came next. "What do we do now?"

Dean scoffed. "Roadtrip. Grand Canyon-" he began spouting off a makeshift bucket list.

Jo would have none of it. Instead, she cut him off by turning to Bobby and demanding "No. I mean, what do we have to do? How do we stop this, right now?" She waved an arm towards the door of the panic room, indicating the ghosts that waited for them outside.

"There's a spell." Bobby turned back to his book. "One to send the witnesses back. I think it'll work."

"Should. Great." Sam added bitterly.

Jo ignored him, getting angry at the brothers. If this was a sign of the apocalypse, she wasn't going to sit in this dank room until her judgment day. She was going to fight it, going down swinging if she had to. "What do we need?" she asked, speaking over Sam.

"If I have it translated correctly, I think we've got everything we need in the house," Bobby said, sounding pleasantly surprised.

"Any chance you got everything we need right here in this room?" Dean snipped, pointing at the ground to emphasize his point.

"So you thought our luck was gonna start now, all of a sudden?" Bobby retorted. He shook his head, stood up to walk across the room, and added "Spell's got to be cast over an open fire."

"So then, the fireplace upstairs?" Sam asked. Jo walked over to the table and began gathering all of the rounds of rock salt the boys had finished, loading them into guns.

"Bingo."

"Well that's just not as appealing as a, uh, ghost-proof panic room, ya know?" Dean commented. Jo smirked, and handed him a loaded shotgun in preparation to face their battle upstairs.

AN: Thank you for reading! This is my first published fanfic ever. This story will soon have its own blog on Tumblr.