When the Winchesters got to the crime scene, the body was gone but the blood was still there. The blood was everywhere: covering the walls, the desk, the chairs, the floor, and not just in basic splatter patterns. There were little handprints and footprints all over, small enough to be a child's. There was even a spot on the floor where the killer had made some kind of snow angel in the blood.

"Blood angel," Dean said, "Ain't that somethin'?" Whoever or whatever had done this had enjoyed it. Immensely. This wasn't their average, run-of-the-mill monster kill. Dean hadn't even seen a demon enjoy a kill this much.

"Hey, check this out," Sam said. Dean turned and followed his brother's gaze up to the ceiling molding. Just below it, hidden in a corner, was a carving of a triangle with an eye.

"Oh, come on," Dean said, rolling his eyes. He turned to Sam, who was giving him a look that said 'This could be something.'

"Seriously?" Dean said, in disgust and disbelief that his brother would think anything of a symbol like that.

"It's all we've got to go on," Sam said.

"All we've…? It's the freakin' Illuminati triangle, dude! The blood angel means more than that!" Dean said, making an annoyed gesture at the offending symbol, "Some asshole probably put it up there way before all this crap."

"There's blood in it," Sam said.

"There's blood in my shoes!" Dean said, "You wanna examine my toes for evidence?" Their bitching was interrupted by Sam's phone beeping. His brows furrowed when he checked it.

"There's been another blip," Sam said, "Same location." He showed Dean the phone.

"How the hell did you get it to do that?" Dean asked, taking it and raising an eyebrow at the blip and the coordinates on the screen.

"Charlie helped me set it up a while ago," Sam said, taking the phone back, "Let's check it out."

"Yeah."

As Dean walked out the door, Sam snapped a picture of the little triangle in the corner.

Mabel continued to scream as she and her grunkles tumbled to the ground beyond the portal, her eyes squeezed shut. She was so focused on her loud exhale that she didn't notice anything else going on around her until Stan unwrapped his arms from around her to put his hands on her shoulders.

"Mabel! It's okay, sweetie, it's over!" he said. She stopped screaming and opened her eyes to look around. They were in a wooded area and the sun was beginning to set. She was sitting on a patch of grass while Stan kneeled in front of her and Ford stood off to the side, an inquisitive glare focused on the space Mabel assumed the portal must have been. It was gone now, which meant that it was, in fact, over.

"Well, that was pretty crazy," she said, managing a shaky smile. It was all she could do to not burst into tears. Going through that portal had felt like drowning and being electrocuted at the same time. The chuckle from Stan helped a little.

"Crazy?" Ford said. Mabel and Stan looked over to see that he had turned his glare onto them, incredulous and angry now rather than inquisitive.

"Crazy? That was suicidal!" He threw his hands into the air. "What were you two even thinking? Or were you thinking at all?"

"What were we thinking?" Stan said, standing up and glaring at Ford in return, "What were you thinking?" He pointed an accusing finger at his brother. "Everything would have been fine if you hadn't pulled that little stunt!" As the Stan twins began to argue in earnest, Mabel realized that there was something they had all failed to notice: Dipper. He was nowhere to be seen. He was being controlled by Bill and he was nowhere to be seen.

This was her fault. She should have noticed back in the woods. She knew that he'd been acting strangely but she had just chalked it up to him hitting the tree. She'd brought Bill into the shack, had left Bill alone long enough for him to knock out Ford and turn on the portal, and now Dipper was gone. She didn't even know if his spirit was hovering around them or following Bill or if something worse had happened to it while they were in the portal.

Stan and Ford fighting wasn't helping matters.

"Stop it!" she shouted, her voice breaking and tears in her eyes. The Stan twins turned to her in surprise.

"You two are always so busy with your stupid fight! Do you even care what happened to Dipper? Did you even notice?" She went to wipe her tears away on the sleeve of her sweater but her face hit the skin of her arm, instead. Oh, yeah. The creature had ripped that sleeve off in the fight. It felt like ages ago. She let out a frustrated noise somewhere between a groan and a scream and balled her fists at her sides.

"I'm going to go find my brother. If you two dummies wanna keep fighting then go ahead! I don't care!" She turned and stormed away from them. She didn't know where she was going or where she should even start to look, but she couldn't just stand there listening to them bickering about nothing while Dipper was in trouble.

"Mabel." That was Stan's hand on her shoulder. She almost shoved it off and started running.

"I'm sorry," he said, "You're right. Whatever's going on with Dipper is more important than…this." He turned her around to face him. "We're gonna find him. Okay, kid? And then we're gonna smack some sense into him." Mabel nodded, not trusting herself to speak without bursting into tears. She really didn't want to cry, but Stan was smiling that rare, soft smile of his and rubbing her arm and Dipper was gone and the portal had hurt and she just couldn't hold it in any longer. She buried her head in Stan's shoulder, sobbing, and Stan switched to rubbing her back. She heard Ford clear his throat awkwardly.

"We, uh, we should set up a base of operations," he said. He didn't sound angry anymore. In fact, he sounded a little embarrassed. Had he known that Dipper—or, rather, Dipper's body—had come through? Probably not. He'd been unconscious when they'd found him.

"If he came through before us, he's probably been here for a while," Ford continued, "Time works differently when you cross through dimensions."

They waited a few more minutes for Mabel to calm down, then started walking. As it turned out, the woods were right on the edge of a small town. Stan suggested that they look for some kind of motel to set up their base in. Luckily, the money that Stan had on him was similar enough to the money used in this dimension that they were able to rent a room. He left soon after, saying there were some things he needed to get, leaving Mabel and Ford to settle in.

"Explain to me what happened while I was unconscious," Ford said, sitting on a bed. They hadn't spoken much on the walk to the motel. Emotions had still been running high and Stan and Ford hadn't wanted to risk another argument starting.

"Bill Cipher possessed Dipper and opened the portal," Mable said. Ford's eyes widened.

"Bill Cipher?" he said, "The dream demon?" He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Didn't he read my warnings? Doesn't he know how dangerous Cipher is?"

"Of course he does!" Mabel said, "But you know Bill. He's tricky."

"Do you know how he got Dipper to make a deal with him?" Ford asked. Mabel ducked her head.

"I didn't notice he was Bill until he was almost through the portal," she mumbled. Ford sighed.

"It's not your fault, Mabel," he said, "Like you said; Bill is tricky. It won't be easy finding him, though. Especially since he's got a head start. And getting him out of Dipper's body…"

"But we're going to find him!" Mabel said with determination, "We have to! Before he hurts Dipper." She remembered the aftermath of the first time. He'd been pretty banged up, and the doctor had said that he was lucky his arm hadn't been broken.

"Or someone else," Ford said. In the moment of silence that passed between them, Stan walked through the door carrying a paper bag in one arm.

"Yeesh, what is this? A funeral?" he said.

"Hey, Grunkle Stan," Mabel said, a small smile on her face. Today had been completely draining, both emotionally and physically. She didn't have it in her for a big smile and bubbly greeting. Maybe with some rest and Mabel Juice™ she'd feel better.

"Hey, sweetie. Got you something," he said. He reached into the bag and brought out a yellow ball of yarn and a pair of knitting needles.

"I figured, you know, you don't wanna be walkin' around with one sleeve or whatever," he said. She tackled him with a hug.

"Thank you so much!" she said. The yarn wasn't quite the right color and the needles weren't exactly the size she was used to, but it didn't matter. It was something familiar, something that made her happy. She needed that right now.

She spent the night knitting the sleeve until she fell asleep.

"I'm embarrassed to be in public with you." Dean had just come out of the diner's restroom and walked back to their table, catching the image of a triangle with an eye on Sam's laptop as he passed.

"Well, why don't you explain to me what else we have to go on and I'll start researching that," Sam said, not looking up from his screen. Dean just glared, because he knew they had nothing. They'd gone to the coordinates of the blips last night and had found nothing, he'd checked in with the police station about fingerprints only to learn that they had found noting, and he and Sam were going to the coroner later today, but Dean had already read the report and he had a feeling that they were going to find exactly nothing.

"At least my hope isn't hinging on internet conspiracy theorists," Dean muttered into his glass as he took a sip of water. Sam didn't respond, so Dean took to scanning the crowd inside the diner. Maybe he could find someone acting suspicious. He knew how desperate that sounded, but he figured it was less desperate than Illuminati bullshit.

He saw a family of three walk in: two older men and a little girl. She was sitting on the shoulders of one of the men, all smiles wrapped in a yellow sweater. Adorable, but not suspicious. A few tables across from him, a woman was reprimanding a teenage boy who was glaring anywhere but at her. On the other side of the diner, a young woman sat alone, looking nervously at her watch. Okay. That could be something…wait. Wait, another woman had just walked up and kissed her. She must have been waiting for her. Nothing unusual.

Oh. That first family had sat down across the way, just in Dean's line of sight. The little girl was munching on sugar straight from the packets. A little weird, yeah, but there was really no accounting for the shit kids did. Hang on, hadn't there been three of them? Where was the other guy?

Sam's laptop slammed shut.

"Hey!" Sam said. Dean turned to see the guy he'd been looking for glaring at his brother.

"What were you looking at that for? Who are you?" the man said, grabbing Sam's tie and getting in his face. Great. A conspiracy nut.

"Sir, you are interrupting a very serious federal investigation," Dean said, putting as much sarcasm as he could into the words. Sam sent him bitch face #5: Fuck you, Dean.

"Federal investigation?" The other old man had joined them. He and the first one looked very similar. They were probably brothers. In fact, they might be twins. The second man let out a sharp laugh.

"As if! I know a fed when I see one and you two ain't feds," he said. Dean had to admit, he hadn't heard that one before. He and Sam gave each other a look and pulled out their fake IDs. The second man took Dean's while the first watched with a raised eyebrow.

"Fake," the second man said after a moment. He folded it closed and handed it back to Dean.

"Don't try to con a con man, kid." This wasn't good. He and Sam still had nothing on this case. They couldn't get run out of town now. He tried to keep his expression neutral, but the little voice in the back of Dean's head—the one he knew was the Mark—telling him to just kill them both wasn't helping matters.

"Whoa, what's going on over here?" It was the little girl. She was still all smiles and, now that she was closer, Dean could see that one of sleeves of her sweater was a slightly different color than the rest of it. That wasn't as noticeable as the picture of a cartoon bee on it with the phrase "BEE URSELF" stitched around it.

"These two were just about to tell us where they found that symbol and why they were looking into it," the first man said. It was directed more at Sam than the girl.

"Symbol?" she said, but it was overpowered by Sam's "Why would tell you that?"

"That depends," the second man said with a smirk, "Do the cops know about this little scam you're pullin'?" Dean narrowed his eyes. This guy knew how to play the game, he'd give him that. Dean almost respected him. Sam sighed and scribbled the address of the crime scene down on a business card.

"We're looking into a murder, okay?" he said, handing the business card to the first man.

"Murder?" the second said, "The heck are you doin' that for?"

"None of your beeswax," Dean said. Sue him, he had that sweater on his mind, and it was kind of worth it when the little girl giggle-snorted.

"I like him. He says 'beeswax'," she said. Dean couldn't help but crack a smile at that. Damn if this kid wasn't a freakin' ray gun of happiness.

"What I mean to say," Sam said, "is that you could be putting yourselves into danger. Just… call us if you need help, okay? The number's on the card." The first man turned the card around and glared at the number.

"I know what I'm doing, son," he said, stuffing it into his pocket, "I'm not sure you do, though. If you were smart, you'd delete those pictures and forget about this." He turned around and stalked out of the diner. The other two didn't follow.

"What's he doing? We haven't eaten yet," the second man said.

"He's making a dramatic exit, Grunkle Stan. Just go with it," the girl said. She winked at Sam and Dean, turned on her heel, and strutted out while the man looked on in confusion.

"Kids," he said with a shrug and followed the two out.

As soon as they were gone, Dean said, "What do you think 'grunkle' means?"

"Really? That's what you're focusing on?" Sam said. Dean shrugged.

They had decided to 'head them off at the pass.' Sam had been right; it had all been too strange to be a coincidence. The small family had shown up after the second blip to confront them about something Sam and Dean had found in relation to the first blip.

They'd called Cas about their new discovery. He had already been on his way to Maine and was going to take a look at the coordinates of the blip, but Sam and Dean had figured that it would be better if they all met up.

Now the three were sitting in the impala at the address Sam had written on the card, waiting for the family of three to show up.

"I don't like this," Cas said, fidgeting in the back seat, "There's something…wrong here. I just…I can't figure out what it is."

"Hey, you okay, man?" Dean asked. Cas never fidgeted and it couldn't mean anything good. Before Cas was able to answer, though, Sam nudged Dean.

"They're here," he said. The trio got out of the car and walked over to them. The little girl noticed them first.

"Hey, it's the beeswax guy," she said and, again, Dean couldn't help but crack a smile. There was something about being known as 'the beeswax guy' by a sweet little girl. The moment didn't last long, though, as one of the men (the one who was not 'Grunkle Stan') squared up on them.

"Does anyone ever listen to me?" he said, "You have no idea what you're playing with here!" Dean almost laughed at that. He and Sam had stopped more than one apocalypse and he'd already lost track of how many times he'd died.

"You're not from around here, are you?" Cas said, and it wasn't just snark. If the way Cas was looking at them wasn't enough—as if he was trying to figure out what their existence meant—then the way they all paused for a moment after he'd said it meant that there was something more to that question. These people definitely had something to do with the blip.

"Look," Sam said, his conflict resolution face on, "we might not know what exactly this thing is, but we deal with crap like it all the time." Dean noticed that, for some reason, the little girl's eyes seemed to light up at that. "We can help each other."

"At least tell us what we're dealing with here," Dean said.

"Oh, that's an easy one." Everyone turned at the new voice. Dean's jaw dropped, because it couldn't be. Really, it couldn't, and he didn't want it to be either.

Leaning against a light post as casual as you like with a sucker in his mouth, stood Gabriel.

"My brother," he said.

A/N: MABEL AND DEAN ARE GONNA BE BEST FRIENDS YOU GUISE I CAN FEEL IT.