XXXXX

"So the two of you are hunters, huh? Well, tell me, Mr. Big-Shot-Hunter, how do you kill a vampire?" Mary's father, Samuel Campbell inquired with a sneer that hadn't left his lips since Mary had introduced them. He was tall and most likely in his early fifties. Bald and gruff, he appeared to be a fierce and overprotective leader of the family. He hadn't been quite as accommodating as Dean had hoped. Old bastard was downright hostile to him and only slightly better to Buffy. Grudgingly, Dean had started to respect the man.

"Buffy here is the real vampire expert, so I'll let her answer that one, won't I, babe," Dean said as he smiled smugly to the seething slayer next to him at the dining table. She hadn't been happy when he had told them she was his "little lady" while making the introductions. But she had gone along with it, though the icy glares she gave told him he would pay, one way or another, for that. And a perverse part of him looked forward to it, even if it might get his butt kicked.

"Well, most people know about a stake to the heart. Beheading works too, enough holy water, sunlight, dead man's blood. Sla-Hunters pick, really," Buffy said nonchalantly, the tension in her body noticed only by Dean. Her next words held a bitterness not mistakable

. "Do I pass? Get a little cap and gown?"

"Yep. Now get out of my house." Samuel pointed at the door, unapologetic in his manner. He was glaring at Dean, clearly blaming him for the intrusion into his family's domestic tranquility.

"Dad!" Mary cried out at his rudeness, looking to her mother, Deanna, for help. Deanna narrowed her eyes as she glared at her husband, a silent warning passing between them.

"I don't trust other hunters, Dean, Buffy. Don't want their help, and don't want them around my family. Y'all seem like good people but you see where I'm coming from, don't you."

"Knock it off, Samuel," Deanna scolded, having had enough of her husbands rude attitude toward their guests. She prided herself on judging the characters of people and she liked what she saw in the two newcomers. "They passed your little test and now we are all going to sit down to dinner. You two hungry for some lasagna?"

"Starving," Dean answered, a huge grin on his face. Buffy couldn't help the small smile that tugged at her lips at his boyish enthusiasm. Why did he have to be so damn cute?

"Good. Now, go wash up in the kitchen there while Mary and I set the table."

XXXXX

Dinner was good. It had been the closest thing to a real family meal Dean recalled having. Growing up, his dad had often missed holidays. And until today, he had never meet any other real family. Conversation though had been tense, and he and Buffy were careful not to raise any suspicion that would cause the wary, older hunter to doubt their story that they'd just arrived that morning on a hunt.

"So, um, why were you following me and John?" Mary asked him, changing the topic from the semantics of the various Latin exorcism rites to one Dean would have preferred to stay away from.

"Oh, we thought something might be after your boyfriend. But, um, we were mistaken, I think," Dean said to his mother. All during dinner, he had done his best not to stare though it had been hard. He just couldn't help himself from trying to memorize her features. She was different then he remembered though he could see the beginnings of the woman she would become.

"John Winchester, mixing it up with the supernatural. Can you imagine that?" Deanna laughed, earning a scowl from Mary and Dean. He wondered if her parents didn't approve of John. Was that why he had never meet them before? There must have been some kind of relationship since both his and Sammy's name came from them. He had never given much thought to the family they never knew. Why waste emotional energy on that when there was nothing he could do. But now, he wished he had known more.

"So, what are you tracking that you thought John Winchester was involved? That boy is as mundane as anyone I've ever seen," Samuel said, slight distain crossing his face before he tried to cover it.

"Stop it Dad. There is nothing wrong with John. Would you rather I be involved with someone like Dean?"

"Of course not, I'm just saying..."

"That's enough. We have guests," Deanna cut in sternly. "Buffy, Dean, perhaps you can tell us about your job? We've been here for a while; we could help you. Maybe this even has to do with Samuel's hunt."

"No one said I was was working a job, Deanna," Samuel scowled at his wife who just brushed him off. Mary leaned forward conspiratorially, her eyes alight with mischief and Dean couldn't help but smile back at her.

"He's working one down by the Whiteshire Farm," Mary said, laughing as her dad glared at her.

"Whiteshire Farm. Why does that sound so familiar?" Dean asked, looking to Buffy who only shrugged her shoulders in bewilderment. She was much better with the killing than with the remembering. She had stayed quiet through most of the meal, trying to let Dean connect with his lost family. Instead she had been observing.

"Well, it's been all over the papers, that's probably where. Tom Whitshire. Got tangled up in a combine a few towns over."

"That kind of thing happens though, right? I mean, you see it in all those old movies. Tractor flips, blades slice. What makes that a job?" Buffy asked.

"Well, for one, what was he doing there when all his crops are dead?" Samuel asked, he enjoyed having the upper hand in the conversation.

"Demonic omens?" Dean asked as he shot a look at Buffy. Was this why the angel had sent them here?

"Could be. I'm checking it out tomorrow."

"What about other parts of the town? Have you checked the web...of information you have assembled?" Dean asked, stumbling but recovering from the time travel faux pas he almost committed. His brain tried to keep from slipping up as he calculated what he knew from years of his dad's research. "Any other odd happenings? Cattle mutilation? Electrical storms?"

"Actually, yes on the odd storms. The weather service graphs should be here by Friday to know for sure. No cattle mutilations though."

"By mail?" Dean asked, the thought foreign in his head after years of modern computers. Was this how it used to be? Waiting days for information that he would have had at his fingertips.

"No, I just push a button and it teleports here. How else, boy?" Dean tried to ignore the insult. It wasn't the time or place and so far this man was their only lead on why they'd been hijacked through time.

"You know, it sounds like you're hunting the same thing we are." Dean said. He was about to suggest that they work together but was quickly cut off before even commenting more.

"What part of 'we work alone' do you not know get, son?"

XXXXX

"Dean, you can not be serious about this," Buffy exclaimed when he parked the stolen car outside the convent. She hadn't believed him when he first told her his plan. "We are not breaking into there! That is a serious Karmakazi move."

"Stop being such a baby. I'm sure you've done worse than steal a few habits in your day, Slayer."

X

"If I didn't think you'd enjoy it, I'd have let those nuns wack you with their rulers, Dean," Buffy griped as they drove away with their stolen garb. They had barely made it out of the laundry room before they were discovered. Not having any real sort of back up plan, they had taken one look at each other and did the only possible action. Run. Buffy had made it back to the car first only to discover she didn't know how to start a hot wired car. It had been a close call, those sisters and priests were faster than she would have thought.

"Hey, if your Super Slayer hearing had been working, we never would have been caught in the first place," Dean replied. "I thought you had all these spidey senses or something."

"There were a billion washers and dryers going off in that room! And those nuns were pretty stealthy."

"Sure they were," he said, sarcasm rolling off him. "Forget it, we got what we needed. Look at the map and get us to Eudora."

"Why am I always stuck as navigator?" Buffy pouted as she pulled the map from the glovebox and unfolded it.

"Bobby told me about the time you wrecked his old Buick. Ain't no way in hell you're driving."

"Take 59 to 10," Buffy said grudgingly. There wasn't much defense to her side of that story. She still couldn't work out how she had managed to hit the one tree in a hundred yard radius. And the damage wasn't that bad. Looking for a change in topic, Buffy brought up a subject she had been curious to know more about.

"So, do you think we're here because of this job your grandpa has? Or, do you think ass-butt sent us here because of your mom and dad?" She watched him as he drove, the lights from oncoming cars illuminating his face before plunging it back into darkness. He didn't answer right away, and for once she didn't press for answers.

"It's too much of a coincidence that we are here," he said finally. "But I have no clue what's going on. Hell, I just found out Mom was a hunter. I don't even know if Dad knew that."

"What do you think the Whitshire farm has to do with this? Was this in your dad's journal? Oh, you didn't happen to bring that, did you? 'Cause right now we could use all the Dear Diary help we can get," Buffy rambled as she tried to make herself comfortable. It was only thirty minutes to the small city where the Whitshire farm was. They had decided it was best to head out there that night rather than wait for morning.

"I don't know what any of this means. But if there is a chance of me stopping my mom from going into that room ten years from now, I'm going to do it."

"Why didn't Castiel just take us to that night? Why a decade earlier?" Buffy spoke the question they were both wondering.

Dean shrugged his shoulders in reply. Neither one of them had answers, and until they did the both of them were stuck grasping at straws.

"Pretty surreal meeting your family like that," Buffy said quietly. Being the girl that she was, she couldn't do silence for long stretches of time. When there was too much quiet, her mind went to all kinds of places. The time her mother and all the other adults in Sunnydale regressed back to teenagers thanks to tainted band candy. The look on her mother's face when she told her not to come back if she left and the feel of her arms around her when Buffy had returned. She knew she hadn't had her mom long enough and hadn't always appreciated her when she did. But she had known her mom. Her heart broke as she thought of Dean and Sam growing up without knowing a mother's love. Was there a chance to change that? And what were the consequences if they did?

"Even before she died, it was just us. No grandparents, no cousins," Dean said into the darkness. "I didn't even know she named us after them."

"They seem like good people," Buffy said. "I like your mom. Though your grandpa is a bit of an ass. I see where you get your stubbornness issues."

"What are you, my shrink?" Dean said.

"No, but I doubt you'd talk to anyone else about this. You may as well talk to me. I was councilor at one time. Come on, let out all those girly feelings we both know you're hiding inside."

"Shut your pie hole, Slayer."

XXXXX

Sunlight streamed through the glass windows of their borrowed car. Buffy stretched away the tightness in her muscles from sleeping in the cramped backseat. They had made it into Eudora just after 2 a.m. and parked in the woods only a few miles away from the Whitshire Farm. The sky was still tinged with the blush of sunrise as Buffy quietly exited the car. Deciding the present, even if it was a hellishly early hour, was the perfect time to do some much needed and neglected training, she took off at a fast run into the woods to warm up. It wasn't long before the trees stopped abruptly and nothing but open farmland spread. Buffy was going to turn and start back when the figure of a young man stopped her.

He was young, still looked in high school. He was in the dusty field staring at one spot. Knowing how close they were to the Whitshire Farm, she suspected him to the son. Deciding to take the chance, she continued forward, slowing down to a walk. The closer she got, the more his face showed the anger and not the sadness she had expected.

"Hey there," Buffy said softly, the concern tempering the wariness she felt. Bright blue eyes looked to her and held her gaze. "I was on a walk and saw you standing there. Everything ok?"

He nodded and then turned his sight back to the mound of dirt. Now that she was closer, Buffy could see the ruts and tire tracks.

"Did something happen here?" She asked. He shook his head yes, his anger making the movement jerky.

"My father died. Right there." He pointed but she didn't look. "The bastard got what he deserved."

And with those words he dropped to his knees.