CHAPTER ONE

Day 1

'Understatement'

Sam and Dean Winchester walked cautiously into the ancient barn before them. Old and abandoned, they proceeded with caution. They were there to vanquish a demon, after all. Dean took the lead, as normal, his gun directed before him. With only the moonlight coming through the splintered roof to guide him, Dean headed deeper into the warehouse.

"What is it about demons and dark, empty places?" Dean whispered over his shoulder to his brother, trying to lighten the mood. But the look on Sam's face told him he was in no mood to make light of the situation.

Fair enough, Dean supposed. It had only been the day before that Dean had made a deal with the Crossroads Demon to save his brother's life. And, while killing the Yellow Eyed Demon, the brothers had inadvertently released hundreds of other demons from hell. Now, thanks to the deal, Dean only had one year to live. Or, in Sam's mind, one year to figure out how to save his brother. And this was on top of finding and destroying all the demons that had escaped.

That was half the reason they were at this abandoned bar. The other half being that Sam had had a vision of a young woman being attacked by a particularly gross looking demon. White skinned, bald and wearing a long flowing black cape. The sound of the woman's scream haunted Sam; high-pitched and terrified. He was determined to save her life.

Dean didn't get the brain splitting visions that his little brother did. And this one had been particularly nasty because Sam couldn't stop thinking about it. Dean continued to lead the way through the barn, which was surprisingly large to what it looked like from the outside. He had a good feeling about tonight. The barn was suddenly plunged into darkness. Both Sam and Dean stopped in their tracks, awaiting the sound of a scream or a crash, any of the tell tale noises that preceded a demon attack. But nothing came. Dean looked above and saw that the moon had been momentarily shrouded in a deep, dark purple storm cloud. They'd been gathering on the way over causing Dean to pray that it would fall and clean his car so he didn't have to. As much as he adored his Impala, cleaning it was a bitch. But then the clouds cleared and the moon shone once more. And as if on cue, a blood curdling scream rang through the ragged barn.

Sam turned behind him, recognizing the scream, gun ready with his eyes darting around wildly trying to pinpoint the demon's location. Dean was doing the same but in the other direction. He walked purposely forwards and was almost knocked off his feet as a woman came hurtling past him from his left. Behind her flew the demon, his tattered black cape flailing at his heels as he landed in front of the woman; right between her and the way out of the barn.

Sam and Dean, side by side, advanced on the demon, who had not apparently realized their presence in the barn.

"Hey!" Dean yelled at the demon, gun poised and aimed directly at the demon's forehead.

The creature's bald, scaly head snapped up at them looking somewhat confused. The terrified woman also looked around at the brothers, and equally shocked expression on her face. The demon screeched loudly, drew its arms tightly into its chest. The woman pushed one of her hands in front of her body, Dean assumed as a self-protecting measure, and the demon flung itself backwards through the wall of the barn, disappearing into the night.

Sam and Dean shielded themselves from the falling splinters that were raining down upon them and when they looked up, the demon was gone. The woman was staring at the large gap that exposed the empty, rolling fields that were behind the barn. Dean and Sam put away there weapons as Dean approached the young woman. He'd seen it all before. Young, hot chick gets attacked by a demon. She's scared, confused and usually alone. She needs to be comforted; enter Dean Winchester. This chick resembled the bulk of women Dean rescued. Young, pretty and scared as hell.

"Hey." He spoke as he neared her. "It's okay now."

The woman didn't turn around to see him.

"What did you do?" she mumbled under her breath.

"We got rid of that thing." Dean told her calmly, realizing she was not an American. "You're lucky to be alive." Dean reached out to put a comforting hand on her shoulder, but the young woman turned around before he actually touched her.

"What the hell did you do?!" She screamed at Dean, causing him to stumble back slightly.

Sam was taken aback just like his brother. "Take it easy." He said defensively as he went to his brother's side.

"Take it easy?" She asked. "Take it easy?! Do you have any idea of what you just did?"

"Saved your life!" Dean found himself yelling back. He was not accustomed to this reaction at all. And he was even more put off when this woman started to laugh.

"Oh, save my life? Well, thank you so much." She replied with heavy sarcasm. "You just let the demon I have been tracking for months fly out of here!"

Dean and Sam both looked confused. She knows about demons?, was Dean's first thought. That was also something new.

"You knew it was a demon?" Sam asked the woman, as if reading Dean's mind.

The woman gave them a withering look. "Its name is Nectron. It a demon that's consumed by vanity; that's why its victim's are always good-looking. It doesn't kill; it paralyzes and takes the victim with it so it can feed whenever it needs to. It feeds of the souls of the body to sustain life and gain power." She recited as though reading from a textbook. She was interrupted in her rant by a loud crack of thunder from above. Seconds later heavy rain began to fall through the cracks in the weathered barn roof. The annoyed woman cursed out loud and headed through the demonically made hole in the barn out into the night rain.

Sam and Dean looked at each other. "What the hell is going on?" Sam asked.

"I've got no idea." Dean admitted. "Maybe she's like us, like Jo; another fighter." He suggested.

"Then why was she running from a demon? And why did was she in my vision?" Sam reminded him.

Dean didn't get a chance to answer because the frustrated, and now dripping wet, young woman came back into the barn. "And now I can't track it because of the rain!"

"The rain?" Sam asked, bemused.

The woman rolled her eyes. "It was created in a hellish storm about three thousand years ago." She informed the brothers in condescending voice. "It appears one month every two years to gather more souls to add to its collection to tide it over. Because it was created in a storm, it can, in turn, create storms and disappear in them."

"Huh...I did not know that." Dean said with a slight grin. He wasn't sure why, but at that point in time he found this woman extremely attractive. She was slim, but not too toned, medium height with dark brown hair. At that moment she wore a terribly sour expression, but Dean had the feeling she had a gorgeous smile.

"Pray tell, what do you know?" She asked, tightly crossing her arms over her chest.

Even her attitude was turning him on. Dean shook his head slightly. "My brother has visions." He told her.

The woman looked to Sam. "Visions?"

Sam nodded. She wasn't having the same effect on him as Dean. Sam managed to keep his head, and hormones, in check. "I saw that thing killing you. We're here to...well, save you."

"Oh, save me?" she laughed again. "Is that what you call what that was? You planned on saving me with those?" she waved a hand at the guns both brothers were holding. "Nectron isn't corporeal, bullets wouldn't kill it; they'd go straight through it's body."

"Didn't know that either." Dean said out of the corner of his mouth to his brother.

"Well, that's just great, isn't it?" The woman stalked forwards and pushed between the two brothers, heading for the door. "You don't know what the hell it is and you come in all guns-at-the-ready anyway."

Dean followed her out into the rain, hearing Sam follow behind him, because no matter what she looked like, she was still being extremely rude. "Hey, we came hear to save you, the least you could do is show some kind of thanks for it."

"Yeah, I'll get right on that." The woman retorted as she head over to the side of the barn where a dark blue motorbike was leaning against the outer wall. Dean had been so pre-occupied with the demon he hadn't even noticed it when they'd arrived. "Do you have any idea how much you've set me back?" She told them bitterly as she slid onto her bike.

"How long have you been after that thing?" Sam asked, genuinely interested.

"Six months." She told him. "And now because of you two pretty boys, I have no idea where I'm going to find it."

"Ok, sorry." Sam told her. "We'll help you find it again."

"What?!" Both the woman and Dean yelled in unison.

She slid off her bike and advanced on the brothers. "I don't want or need your help. And I think you proved tonight that you can't help, not with this demon. If gun's is all you've got, you should be running in the other direction of this thing."

"Hey, we aren't the ones who almost got killed by it." Dean snapped at her, happy that his initial attraction to this woman was dwindling because of her attitude. At least, he made himself think that it was dwindling.

"I didn't almost get killed. That was my plan." She informed Dean with a scowl on her face. "There are other victim's and I was never going to help them by killing it."

"Didn't work so well, did it? That plan of yours?" Dean replied angrily. That seemed to really piss her off. Her jaw clenched as she directed her head towards Dean's beloved Chevrolet Impala. She through her hand towards the window and it shattered completely out of its frame.

Sam was unable to hide the yelp that emitted from his mouth in shock of what he'd seen. She was telekinetic as well? He thought to himself.

Dean was also completely distressed, mainly because his adored vehicle had just been attacked. His jaw dropped open as the shards of glass fell to the ground.

The woman turned on her heel, got on her bike, started it up and sped out of the dirt driveway so fast she was almost a blur.

Dean groaned, looking over the damage to his car. His gorgeous Impala was broken; it actually caused him physical pain. Dean looked over at Sam, hoping to see the same worry about his car on his brothers' face. But instead, he saw Sam staring in the direction the bitter woman had driven off towards. He turned to his older brother.

"Who the hell was that?"