Standing in the Storm

13. Shadow

"Yeah? What'd you find out?" Sam questioned.

Dean said dreamily, "Well, she's a Sagittarius. She loves tequila, I mean -- wow. Oh, and she's got this little tattoo-"

"Dean!" Sam and Tasie yelled.

"What? Yeah. Uh, nothin' we don't already know. Except for one thing they're keepin' out of the papers."

"Hm?" Sam hummed.

"Meredith's heart was missing."

"Her heart?" Sam and Levi repeated.

"Yeah. Her heart."

Tasie frowned. "So, what do you think did it to her?"

"Well, the landlady said it looked like an animal attack. Maybe it was -- werewolf?"

"No, no werewolf, the lunar cycle's not right," Sam said. "Plus, if it was a creature, it would've left some kind of trace. It's probably a spirit." Dean and Levi observed the blood on the carpet and noticed something.

"See if you two can find any masking tape around," Dean told them.

Sam found masking tape and Dean used the masking tape to connect each pool of blood. When he was done, the pieces of tape formed an unusual symbol.

"Ever seen that before?" Sam asked.

"Never," Dean replied.

"Me neither," Sam and Tasie said.

Levi looked curiously at the symbol and made a note of it.

The four exchanged a look.

---

That night, they made their way to a bar and Dean went inside.

Sam, Levi and Tasie, holding a sleeping Ethan, entered the bar and looked around. Dean noticed them and took one last drink, smiled at the bartender, and left.

"See ya," Dean said as Sam, Levi and Tasie found an empty table and sat down while Sam took out John's journal. He leafed through the pages and Dean sat across from them. "I talked to the bartender."

"Did you get anything?" Sam asked. "Besides her number?"

"Dude, I'm a professional. I'm offended that you would that you would think that." Sam and Sandra gave him a knowing look. "All right, yeah." He chuckled and held up a napkin with the bartender's number on it.

"You mind doin' a little bit of thinking with your upstairs brain, Dean?"

"Huh? Look, there's nothing to find out. I mean, Meredith worked here, she waited tables, everyone here was her friend. Everybody said she was normal. She didn't do or say anything weird before she died, so -- what about that symbol, you two find anything?"

Tasie shook her head. "Nope, nothing. It wasn't Dad's journal or in any of the usual clippings. We just have to dig a little deeper, I suppose."

"Well, there was a first victim, right? Before Meredith?"

"Right," Sam confirmed. "Yeah." He pulled out a newspaper clipping about the first death. "His name was, uh -- his name was Ben Swardstrom." He handed the clipping to Dean. "Last month he was found mutilated in his town house. Same deal -- the door was locked, the alarm was on."

"Is there any connection between the two of them?"

"Not that Tasie, Levi and I can tell -- I mean, not yet, at least. Ben was a banker, Meredith was a waitress. They never met, never knew anyone in common -- they were practically from different worlds."