INT. APARTMENT BEDROOM – DAY
"Sam!" a young woman called.
The young woman, Jess, came around a corner; Jess was wearing a sexy-nurse costume and adjusting her hat. The photo of Mary and John was on the dresser.
"Get a move on, would you?" Jess said. "We were supposed to be there like fifteen minutes ago." She walked off. "Sam! You coming or what?"
Sam poked his head around the corner. He was wearing jeans and three shirts, not a costume. "Do I have to?"
"Yes! It'll be fun." Sam came into the room. "And where's your costume?"
Sam laughed and ducked his head. "You know how I feel about Halloween."
INT. BAR – NIGHT
Classic's What Cha Gonna Do began to play.
The bar was decorated for Halloween, including a gargoyle with cobwebs and a baseball hat that said "GET NAKED". Someone poured someone else a shot. Everyone was in costume.
Jess raised a glass as a young man in a ghoul costume, Luis, came up to the table where Sam and Jess were. Sam was still not in costume.
"So here's to Sam—" Jess began, "—and his awesome LSAT victory."
"All right, all right, it's not that big a deal," Sam said.
Jess, Sam and Luis clinked glasses.
"Yeah, he acts all humble. But he scored a one seventy-four."
Luis drank his shot, as did Sam. "Is that good?"
"Scary good," Jess replied as she drank.
"So there you go. You are a first-round draft pick. You can go to any law school you want!" Luis sat next to Sam.
"Actually, I got an interview here. Monday," Sam replied. "If it goes okay I think I got a shot at a full ride next year."
"Hey. It's gonna go great," Jess reassured.
"It better."
"How does it feel to be the golden boy of your family?" Luis asked.
"Ah, they don't know," Sam said.
"Oh, no, I would be gloating! Why not?"
"Because we're not exactly the Bradys."
"And I'm not exactly the Huxtables. More shots?"
Jess and Sam spoke in chorus. "No. No."
"No," Sam repeated.
Luis went up to the bar anyway.
Jess spoke. "No, seriously. I'm proud of you. And you're gonna knock 'em dead on Monday—and you're gonna get that full ride. I know it."
"What would I do without you?" Sam wondered.
"Crash and burn." She smiled and pulled Sam in for a kiss.
INT. APARTMENT BEDROOM – NIGHT
Sam and Jess laid in bed, asleep back to back. Jess shifted position.
There was a sound outside the room, like a window opening. Sam opened his eyes.
INT. APARTMENT – NIGHT
Sam left the bedroom and looked around the apartment.
A window was open. Footsteps sounded. A man walked past the strings of beads at the far end of the hall. Sam moved to another part of the apartment and waited. The man entered the room. Sam lunged forward and grabbed the man at the shoulder. The man knocked Sam's arm away and aimed a strike at Sam, who ducked. The man grabbed Sam's arm, swung him around, and shoved him back. Sam kicked and was blocked, then pushed back into another room. Sam got his first glimpse of the man. The man elbowed Sam in the face; Sam kicked at his head. The man ducked and swung and Sam blocked. The man knocked Sam down and pinned him to the floor, one hand at Sam's neck and the other holding Sam's wrist.
"Whoa, easy, tiger," the man said.
Sam breathed hard. "Dean?" Dean laughed. "You scared the crap out of me!"
"That's 'cause you're out of practice."
Sam grabbed Dean's hand and yanked, slamming his heel into Dean's back and Dean to the floor.
"Or not," Dean stated.
Dean tapped Sam twice where he was holding him. "Get off of me."
Sam rolled to his feet and pulled Dean up. "What the hell are you doing here?"
"Well, I was looking for a beer." Dean put his hands on Sam's shoulders, shook once, and let go.
"What the hell are you doing here?"
"Okay. All right. We gotta talk."
"Uh, the phone?"
"If I'd'a called, would you have picked up?"
Jess turned the light on. She was wearing very short shorts and a cropped Smurfs shirt. "Sam?"
Sam and Dean turned their heads in unison.
"Jess. Hey. Dean, this is my girlfriend, Jessica."
Dean looked at Jess appreciatively.
"Wait, your brother Dean?" Jess asked, smiling.
Sam nodded. Dean grinned at her and moved closer. "Oh, I love the Smurfs. You know, I gotta tell you. You are completely out of my brother's league."
"Just let me put something on."
Jess turned to go. Dean's voice stopped her. "No, no, no, I wouldn't dream of it. Seriously."
Dean went back over to Sam without taking his eyes off Jess. Sam watched him, his expression stony.
Dean continued. "Anyway, I gotta borrow your boyfriend here, talk about some private family business. But, uh, nice meeting you."
"No," Sam argued, going over to Jess and putting an arm around her. "No, whatever you want to say, you can say it in front of her."
"Okay." Dean turned to look at the two straight on. "Um. Dad hasn't been home in a few days."
"So he's working overtime on a Miller Time shift. He'll stumble back in sooner or later."
Dean ducked his head and looked back up. "Dad's on a hunting trip. And he hasn't been home in a few days."
Sam's expression didn't change while he took the words in. Jess glanced up at him.
"Jess, excuse us. We have to go outside."
INT. STAIRWELL – NIGHT
Sam and Dean headed downstairs. Sam had put on jeans and a hoodie.
Sam spoke. "I mean, come on. You can't just break in, middle of the night, and expect me to hit the road with you."
"You're not hearing me, Sammy," Dean replied. "Dad's missing. I need you and Tasie to help me find him."
"You remember the poltergeist in Amherst? Or the Devil's Gates in Clifton? He was missing then, too. He's always missing, and he's always fine."
Dean stopped and turned around. Sam stopped too. "Not for this long. Now are you gonna come with me or not?"
"I'm not."
"Why not?"
"I swore I was done hunting. For good. Tasie's done hunting."
"Come on. It wasn't easy, but it wasn't that bad." He started down the stairs again.
Sam followed as he said, "Yeah? When Tasie and I told Dad we were scared of the thing in our closet, he gave us a .45."
Dean stopped at the door to the outside. "Well, what was he supposed to do?"
"Tasie and I were nine years old! He was supposed to say, don't be afraid of the dark."
"Don't be afraid of the dark? Are you kidding me? Of course you should be afraid of the dark. You know what's out there."
"Yeah, I know, but still. The way we grew up, after Mom was killed, and Dad's obsession to find the thing that killed her." Dean glanced outside. "But we still haven't found the damn thing. So we kill everything we can find."
"We save a lot of people doing it, too."
There was a pause before Sam continued. "You think Mom would have wanted this for us?"
Dean rolled his eyes and slammed the door open.
EXT. PARKING LOT – NIGHT
There was a short flight of stairs from the door to the parking lot. Dean and Sam climbed it.
Sam continued. "The weapon training, and melting the silver into bullets? Man, Dean, we were raised like warriors."
They crossed the parking lot to the Impala.
"So what are you gonna do?" Dean asked. "You're just gonna live some normal, apple pie life? Is that it?"
"No. Not normal. Safe."
"And that's why you and Tasie ran away." He looked away.
"We were just going to college. It was Dad who said if we were gonna go we should stay gone. And that's what I'm doing. Don't bring Tasie back into this."
"Yeah, well, Dad's in real trouble right now. If he's not dead already. I can feel it." Sam was silent. "I can't do this alone."
"Yes you can."
Dean looked down. "Yeah, well, I don't want to."
Sam sighed and looked down, thinking, then up. "What was he hunting?"
Dean opened the trunk of the Impala, then the spare-tire compartment. It was an arsenal. He propped the compartment open with a shotgun and dug through the clutter. "All right, let's see, where the hell did I put that thing?"
"So when Dad left, why didn't you go with him?"
"I was working my own gig. This, uh, voodoo thing, down in New Orleans."
"Dad let you go on a hunting trip by yourself?"
Dean looked over at Sam. "I'm twenty-six, dude." He pulled some papers out of a folder. "All right, here we go. So Dad was checking out this two-lane blacktop just outside of Jericho, California. About a month ago, this guy."
Dean handed one of the papers to Sam grabbed another one.
"They found his car, but he vanished. Completely MIA," Dean informed.
The paper was a printout of an article from the Jericho Herald, headlined "Centennial Highway Disappearance" and dated Sept. 19th 2005; it has a man's picture, captioned "Andrew Carey MISSING".
Sam read it and glance up. "So maybe he was kidnapped."
"Yeah. Well, here's another one in April." Dean tossed down another Jericho Herald article for each date he mentioned. "Another one in December 'oh-four, 'oh-three, 'ninety-eight, 'ninety-two, ten of them over the past twenty years."
Dean took the article back from Sam and picked up the rest of the stack, putting them back in the folder. "All men, all the same five-mile stretch of road." He pulled a bag out of another part of the arsenal. "It started happening more and more, so Dad went to go dig around. That was about three weeks ago. I hadn't heard from him since, which is bad enough."
Dean grabbed a handheld tape recorder. "Then I get this voicemail yesterday."
He pressed play. The recording was staticky and the signal was breaking up.
John spoke. "Dean... something big is starting to happen... I need to try and figure out what's going on. It may... Be very careful, Dean. We're all in danger."
Dean pressed stop.
"You know there's EVP on that?" Sam told him.
"Not bad, Sammy. Kinda like riding a bike, isn't it?" Sam shook his head. "All right. I slowed the message down, I ran it through a gold wave, took out the hiss, and this is what I got." He pressed play again.
"I can never go home..." a woman said.
Dean pressed stop.
"Never go home," Sam repeated.
Dean dropped the recorder, put down the shotgun, stood straight, and shut the trunk, then leaned on it. "You know, in almost two years I've never bothered you or Tasie, never asked either of you for a thing."
Sam looked away and sighed, then looked back. "All right. I'll go. I'll help you find him." Dean nodded. "But we have to get back first thing Monday. Just wait here."
Sam turned to go back to the apartment. He turned back when Dean spoke. "What's first thing Monday?"
"I have this... I have an interview"
"What, a job interview? Skip it."
"It's a law school interview, and it's my whole future on a plate."
"Law school?" Dean smirked.
"So we got a deal or not?"
Dean said nothing as Sam walked away.
INT. BEDROOM – NIGHT
Sam was packing a duffel bag. He pulled out a large hook-shaped knife and slid it inside.
Jess came into the room. "Wait, you're taking off?" Sam looked up. "Is this about your dad? Is he all right?"
"Yeah. You know, just a little family drama," Sam replied as he went over to the dresser and turned on the lamp atop it.
"Your brother said he was on some kind of hunting trip." She sat on the bed.
Sam rummaged in one of the drawers and came out with a couple shirts, which went in the duffel. "Oh, yeah, he's just deer hunting up at the cabin, he's probably got Jim, Jack and José along with him. I'm just going to go bring him back."
"What about the interview?"
"I'll make the interview. This is only for a couple days." He went around the bed.
Jess got up and followed. "Sam, I mean, please." He stopped and turned. "Just stop for a second. You sure you're okay?"
He laughed a little. "I'm fine."
"It's just... you won't even talk about your family. And now you're taking off in the middle of the night to spend a weekend with them? And with Monday coming up, which is kind of a huge deal."
"Hey. Everything's going to be okay. I will be back in time, I promise." He kissed her on the cheek and left.
"At least tell me where you're going."
INT. TASIE AND LEVI'S APARTMENT - NIGHT
A knock sounded on the door and Tasie grumbled as Ethan cried.
Levi opened the door and frowned. "Tase? It's your brother."
Dean gave a small smile. "Hey, Levi."
"What are you doing here?"
"Important business."
"It's late."
Tasie walked up with a crying Ethan. "Dean?"
"Tasie, Sam and I need your help," Dean told her.
"No. Dean, I have a family."
"A couple days. Please."
Levi took Ethan as Tasie crossed her arms. "What's the matter?"
"Dad's missing. Sam and I are gonna try to find him."
"Where you headed?"
"Jericho."
"Not far." She considered it and nodded. "Fine. So long as we get back by Monday."
"Cross my heart."
She kissed her husband and son. "I'll be back. There are bottles in the fridge and if you run out-"
Levi nodded. "I can do formula. Hope you find your dad, Tase. Ethan and I'll see you soon."
Tasie packed some stuff and kissed her boys again, then left.
EXT. CENTENNIAL HIGHWAY – NIGHT
Jericho, California
The Eagles of Death Metal's Speaking in Tongues played. A young man, Troy, was driving down the highway, talking on his cell phone.
"Amy, I can't come over tonight. Because I've got work in the morning, that's why... Yeah, okay, I miss it and my dad's gonna have my ass."
A high-pitched whine sounded. Troy looked over and saw a woman in a white dress on the side of the road. She was moving as though dancing; she flickered, and for a moment she was gone.
"Hey, ah, Amy, let me call you back?"
Troy tried several times to turn off the radio, which was flickering. Nothing happened.
Troy pulled up next to the woman, whose dress was torn in several places, and stopped, leaning across the shotgun seat.
"Car trouble or something?"
There was a long pause before the woman asked, "Take me home?"
The voice was the same one from the altered voicemail. Troy opened the passenger door. "Sure, get in."
The woman, who was barefoot, climbed in and closed the door.
"So, where do you live?" Troy inquired.
"At the end of Breckenridge Road."
Troy nodded. "You coming from a Halloween party or something?"
The woman's dress was very low-cut. Troy noticed, stared, and looked away, laughing nervously. "You know, a girl like you really shouldn't be alone out here."
She looked at him mournfully, seductively, and pulled her skirt up over her thigh. "I'm with you."
Troy looked away. The woman took Troy's chin and turned his face towards her. "Do you think I'm pretty?"
Troy nodded, eyes stuck on her cleavage. "Uh... huh."
"Will you come home with me?"
"Um. Hell yeah."
He drove off.
EXT. ABANDONED HOUSE – NIGHT
They pulled up to an old abandoned house at the end of a road. The woman stared at it sadly.
"Come on. You don't live here," Troy said.
"I can never go home," the woman replied.
"What are you talking about? Nobody even lives here. Where do you live?" He turned and she was gone. He checked the back seat, also empty, and got out of the car, nervous. "That's good. Joke's over, okay? You want me to leave?"
Troy looked around: no signs of life except crickets. He walked towards the house. "Hello? Hello?"
There was a picture of the woman and two children inside the house; the picture was covered in dust.
Troy peered through the hole in the screen door. A bird flew at his face, scaring him into falling over. He yelled, leapt to his feet, and ran back to the car. He got in and drove off.
EXT. CENTENNIAL HIGHWAY – NIGHT
Troy looked behind him—no one was there—then in the rearview mirror. The womam was in the back seat. Troy yelled again and drove straight through a "Bridge Closed" sign, stopping about halfway across the bridge. He screamed. Blood spattered the windows.
EXT. GAS STATION – DAY
November 1, 2005
The Impala was parked in front of a pump. Ramblin' Man by the Allman Brothers played.
Dean came out of the convenience mart carrying junk food.
Sam and Tasie were sitting in the shotgun seat and back with the doors open, rifling through a box of tapes.
"Hey!" Dean called.
Sam and Tasie leaned out and looked at him.
"You two want breakfast?" Dean asked.
"No, thanks," Sam and Tasie replied.
"So how'd you pay for that stuff?" Sam asked. "You and Dad still running credit card scams?"
Dean said, "Yeah, well, hunting ain't exactly a pro ball career." He put the nozzle back on the pump. "Besides, all we do is apply. It's not our fault they send us the cards."
"Yeah? And what names did you write on the application this time?" He swung his legs back inside the car and closed the door, his actions repeated by Tasie.
"Uh, Burt Aframian." He got into the driver seat and put his soda and chips down. "And his son Hector. Scored two cards out of the deal." He closed the door.
"That sounds about right. I swear, man, you've gotta update your cassette tape collection."
There were at least a dozen cassettes in the box on Sam's lap; some had album art, others were hand-labeled.
"Why?" Dean questioned.
"Well, for one, they're cassette tapes," Sam answered. "And two." He held up a tape for every band he named. "Black Sabbath? Motorhead? Metallica?" Dean took the tape labeled Metallica from Sam. "It's the greatest hits of mullet rock."
"Well, house rules, Sammy." Dean popped the tape in the player. "Driver picks the music, shotgun shuts his cakehole." He dropped the Metallica box back in the box of tapes and started the engine.
"You know, Sammy is a chubby twelve-year-old."
AC/DC's Back in Black began to play.
"It's Sam, okay?" Sam said.
"Sorry, I can't hear you, the music's too loud," Dean replied as he drove off.
Tasie rolled her eyes and the twins shared an annoyed look.
EXT. CENTENNIAL HIGHWAY – DAY
They drove past a sign that said 'JERICHO 7'.
Sam was talking on his cell phone. "Thank you." Sam closed his phone. "All right. So, there's no one matching Dad at the hospital or morgue. So that's something, I guess."
Dean glanced over at Sam, then back at the road. At a bridge ahead of them, there were two police cars and several officers.
"Check it out," Dean said.
Sam and Tasie leaned forward for a closer look.
Dean pulled over. They took a long look before Dean turned off the engine. Dean opened the glove compartment and pulled out a box full of ID cards with his and John's faces: visible ones included FBI and DEA. He picked one out and grinned at Sam and Tasie, who stared.
"Let's go," Dean told them.
Dean got out of the car.
On the bridge, the lead deputy, Deputy Jaffe, leaned over the railing to yell down to two men in wetsuits who were poking around the river.
"You guys find anything?" Jaffe asked.
"No! Nothing!" a man replied.
Jaffe turned back to the car in the middle of the bridge. It was Troy's, and the blood was gone. Another deputy, Deputy Hein, was at the driver's side looking around inside the car.
"No sign of struggle, no footprints, no fingerprints. Spotless. It's almost too clean," Hein commented.
Dean, Tasie and Sam walked into the crime scene like they belonged there.
"So, this kid Troy. He's dating your daughter, isn't he?" Jaffe asked.
"Yeah," Hein replied.
"How's Amy doing?"
"She's putting up missing posters downtown."
"You fellas had another one like this just last month, didn't you?" Dean questioned.
Jaffe looked up when Dean started talking and straightened up to talk to him. "And who are you?"
Dean flashed his badge. "Federal marshals."
"You three are a little young for marshals, aren't you?"
Dean laughed. "Thanks, that's awfully kind of you." He went over to the car. "You did have another one just like this, correct?"
"Yeah, that's right. About a mile up the road. There've been others before that."
"So, this victim, you knew him?" Sam inquired.
Jaffe nodded. "Town like this, everybody knows everybody."
Dean circled the car, looking around. "Any connection between the victims, besides that they're all men?"
"No. Not so far as we can tell."
"So what's the theory?" Tasie asked as she and Sam joined Dean.
"Honestly, we don't know. Serial murder? Kidnapping ring?"
"Well, that is exactly the kind of crack police work I'd expect out of you guys," Dean shot back, earning a stomp on the foot from Sam and Tasie.
"Thank you for your time," Sam said as he and Tasie started to walk away, followed by Dean.
"Gentlemen," Sam and Tasie greeted.
Jaffe watched them go. Dean smacked Sam on the head and glared at Tasie.
"Ow!" Sam cried. "What was that for?"
"Why'd you two have to step on my foot?" Dean questioned.
"Why do you have to talk to the police like that?"
Dean looked at Sam and moved in front of his siblings, forcing them to stop walking. "Come on. They don't really know what's going on. We're all alone on this. I mean, if we're going to find Dad we've got to get to the bottom of this thing ourselves."
Sam and Tasie cleared their throats and looked over Dean's shoulder. Dean turned. It was Sheriff Pierce and two FBI agents.
"Can I help you boys and girl?" Sheriff Pierce asked.
"No, sir, we were just leaving," Dean replied.
As the FBI agents walked past Dean, he nodded at each of them and said, "Agent Mulder. Agent Scully."
Dean, Tasie and Sam headed past the sheriff, who turned to watch them go.
EXT. STREET – DAY
The marquee on the Highland Movie Theater read:
EMERGENCY TOWN HALL MEETING
SUNDAY 8 PM
BE SAFE OUT THERE
A young woman was tacking up posters with Troy's face and the caption "MISSING TROY SQUIRE". Dean, Tasie and Sam approached.
"I'll bet you that's her," Dean said.
"Yeah," Sam and Tasie agreed.
Dean, Tasie and Sam walked up to the young woman.
Tasie offered a light smile. "You must be Amy."
"Yeah," Amy replied.
"Yeah, Troy told us about you. We're his uncles and aunt. I'm Dean, this is Sammy, and that's Tasie," Dean said.
Amy frowned. "He never mentioned you to me." She walked away. Dean, Tasie and Sam walked with her.
Dean continued. "Well, that's Troy, I guess. We're not around much, we're up in Modesto."
"So, we're looking for him too, and we're kinda asking around," Sam said.
Another young woman, Rachel, came up to Amy and put a hand on her arm.
"Hey, are you okay?" Rachel asked.
"Yeah," Amy replied.
"You mind if we ask you a couple questions?" Sam inquired.
Another poster that said MISSING: TROY SQUIRE flapped in the breeze.
INT. DINER – DAY
The five of them were sitting in a booth, Dean and Sam opposite Amy and Rachel, and Tasie between Amy and Dean at the end of the table.
"I was on the phone with Troy," Amy told them. "He was driving home. He said he would call me right back, and... he never did."
"He didn't say anything strange, or out of the ordinary?" Sam asked.
Amy shook her head. "No. Nothing I can remember."
Tasie smiled lightly. "I like your necklace."
Amy held the pendant she was wearing, a pentagram in a circle, and looked down at it. "Troy gave it to me. Mostly to scare my parents—" she laughed,"—with all that devil stuff."
Sam laughed a little and looked down, then up. Dean looked over.
"Actually, it means just the opposite. pentagram is protection against evil," Tasie corrected.
Sam nodded. "Really powerful. I mean, if you believe in that kind of thing."
Dean looked between them. "Okay. Thank you, Unsolved Mysteries."
Dean took his arm off the back of Sam's seat and leaned forward. "Here's the deal, ladies. The way Troy disappeared, something's not right. So if you've heard anything..." Amy and Rachel looked at each other. "What is it?"
"Well, it's just... I mean, with all these guys going missing, people talk," Rachel said.
Dean, Tasie and Sam spoke in chorus. "What do they talk about?"
"It's kind of this local legend. This one girl? She got murdered out on Centennial, like decades ago."
Dean looked at Sam and Tasie, who watched Rachel attentively, nodding.
Rachel continued. "Well, supposedly she's still out there." Sam and Tasie nodded. "She hitchhikes, and whoever picks her up? Well, they disappear forever."
Sam, Tasie and Dean looked at each other.
INT. LIBRARY – DAY
A web browser was open to the archived search page for the Jericho Herald. The words "Female Murder Hitchhiking" were typed into the search box. Dean clicked GO; the screen told him there were "(0) Result". DEAN replaces "Hitchhiking" with "Centennial Highway" with the same response. Sam was sitting next to him, watching.
"Let me try," Sam said as he reached a hand forward.
Dean smacked Sam's hand. "I got it."
Sam shoved Dean's chair out of the way and took over.
"Dude!" Dean protested, hitting Sam in the shoulder. "You're such a control freak."
"And you're behaving like a child," Tasie retorted. "Angry spirits are born from violent death."
"Yeah," Dean confirmed, glaring at Tasie.
"Well, maybe it's not murder," Sam reasoned.
Sam replaced "Murder" with "Suicide" and found an article entitled "Suicide on Centennial". Dean glanced at Sam. Sam opened the article, dated April 25, 1981.
'A local woman's drowning death was ruled a suicide, the county Sheriff's Department said earlier today. Constance Welch, 24, of 4636 Breckenridge Road, leapt off Sylvania Bridge, at mile 33 of Centennial Highway, and subsequently drowned last night.Deputy J. Pierce told reporters that, hours before her death, Ms. Welch logged a call with 911 emergency services. In a panicked tone, Ms. Welch described how she found her two young children, 5 and 6, in the bathtub, after leaving them alone for several [minutes]. She reported that their complex-[...]What happened to my children was a terrible accident. And it must have been too much for my wife. Our babies were gone, and Constance just couldn't bear it," said husband Joseph Welch. "Now I ask that you all please respect my privacy during this trying time."At the time of the children's death and Ms. Welch's subsequent suicide, Mr. Welch was at the Frontier auto salvage yard, where he works the graveyard shift as associate manager."Connie might have been quiet, but she was the sweetest, most caring girl I ever knew," said Deanna Kripke, a neighbor. "She just doted on those children."'
"This was 1981," Sam told them. "Constance Welch, twenty-four years old, jumps off Sylvania Bridge, drowns in the river."
There was a picture of Constance; it was the woman who killed Troy.
"Does it say why she did it?" Dean asked.
"Yeah," Sam confirmed.
"What?"
"An hour before they found her, she calls 911. Apparently her two little kids are in the bathtub. She leaves them alone for a minute, and when she comes back, they aren't breathing. Both die."
Tasie gasped softly. She couldn't imagine that happening to her son.
Dean raised his eyebrows. "Hm."
The article had a picture of Joseph next to a picture of Sylvania Bridge; it was the place Troy died.
""Our babies were gone, and Constance just couldn't bear it,' said husband Joseph Welch.""
Tasie pointed to the picture. "That bridge look familiar to you two?"
EXT. SYLVANIA BRIDGE – NIGHT
Dean, Tasie and Sam walked along the bridge, then stopped to lean on the railing and looked down at the river.
"So this is where Constance took the swan dive," Dean noted.
"So you think Dad would have been here?" Sam asked, looking at Dean.
"Well, he's chasing the same story and we're chasing him." Dean continued walking. Sam and Tasie followed.
"Okay, so now what?" Sam and Tasie wondered.
"Now we keep digging until we find him. Might take a while."
Sam stopped. "Dean, I told you, Tasie and I've gotta get back by Monday—"
Dean turned around. "Monday. Right. The interview. Her family."
"Yeah," Sam and Tasie confirmed.
"Yeah, I forgot. You're really serious about this, aren't you? You think you're just going to become some lawyer? Marry your girl? Live an apple-pie life, Tase?"
"Maybe. Why not?"
Dean continued. "Does Jessica know the truth about you two? I mean, does she know about the things you've done? Does Levi know?"
Tasie nodded, crossing her arms.
Sam stepped closer. "No, and she's not ever going to know."
"Well, that's healthy. You and Tasie can pretend all you want, Sammy. But sooner or later you're going to have to face up to who you really are."
Dean turned around and kept walking. Sam and Tasie followed, the latter further behind.
"And who's that?"
"You're one of us."
Sam hurried to get in front of Dean. "No. Tasie and I aren't like you. This is not going to be my life."
"You have a responsibility to—"
"To Dad? And his crusade? If it weren't for pictures Tasie and I wouldn't even know what Mom looks like. And what difference would it make? Even if we do find the thing that killed her, Mom's gone. And she isn't coming back."
Dean grabbed Sam by the collar and shoved him up against the railing of the bridge. There was a long pause before Dean said, "Don't talk about her like that."
Dean released Sam and walked away, closer to where Tasie stood.
Dean and Tasie saw Constance standing at the edge of the bridge.
"Sam," Dean and Tasie called.
Sam came to stand between Dean and Tasie. Constance looked over at them, then stepped forward off the edge. Sam, Tasie and Dean ran to the railing and looked over.
"Where'd she go?" Dean asked.
"I don't know," Sam and Tasie replied.
Behind them, the Impala's engine started and its headlights came on. Dean, Tasie and Sam turned to look.
"What the—" Dean trailed.
"Who's driving your car?" Sam asked.
Dean pulled the keys out of his pocket and jingled them. Sam and Tasie glanced at them. The car jerked into motion, heading straight for them. They turned and ran.
"Dean? Go! Go!" Sam and Tasie yelled.
The car was moving faster than they were; when it got too close, Sam, Tasie and Dean dove over the railing. The car came to a halt.
EXT. SYLVANIA BRIDGE – NIGHT
Sam had caught himself and Tasie on the edge of the bridge and they were hanging on. He pulled himself up onto the bridge, then pulled Tasie up, and looked around.
"Dean? Dean!" Sam and Tasie called.
Below, a filthy and annoyed Dean crawled out of the water and onto the mud, panting.
"What?" Dean asked.
"Hey! Are you all right?" Sam questioned.
Dean held up one hand in an A-OK sign. "I'm super."
Sam and Tasie laughed, relieved, and scooted away from the edge.
EXT. SYLVANIA BRIDGE – NIGHT, LATER
Dean shut the hood of his car and leaned on it.
"Your car all right?" Sam asked.
"Yeah, whatever she did to it, seems all right now. That Constance chick, what a bitch!" Dean yelled.
"Well, she doesn't want us digging around, that's for sure. So where's the job go from here, genius?"
Sam and Tasie settled on the hood next to Dean who threw up his arms in frustration, then flicked mud off his hands. Sam and Tasie sniffed, then looked at Dean.
"You smell like a toilet," Sam and Tasie commented.
Dean looked down.
INT. MOTEL LOBBY – DAY
November 2, 2005
A VersaBank MasterCard in the name of Hector Aframian landed on a handwritten guest ledger.
"One room, please," Dean said.
Dean was standing at the motel check-in desk, still filthy, with Sam and Tasie right behind him.
The clerk picked up the card and looked at it. "You guys having a reunion or something?"
"What do you mean?" Sam inquired.
"I had another guy, Burt Aframian. He came and bought out a room for the whole month."
Dean looked back at Sam and Tasie.
INT. MOTEL ROOM – DAY
The motel door swung open. Sam was on the other side, having just picked the lock. Sam hid the picks and stood. Dean and Tasie were just outside, playing lookout, until Sam reached out of the room to grab their shoulders and yanked them inside. Sam closed the door behind them. They looked around—every vertical surface had papers pinned to it: maps, newspaper clippings, pictures, notes. There were books on the desk and assorted junk on the floor and bed, including something with a hazardous-materials symbol.
"Whoa," Sam and Tasie commented.
Dean turned on a light by the bed and picked up a half-eaten hamburger sitting there. Sam and Tasie stepped over a line of salt on the floor. Dean sniffed the burger and recoiled.
"I don't think he's been here for a couple days at least," Dean told them.
Sam fingered the salt on the floor and looked up. "Salt, cats-eye shells... he was worried. Trying to keep something from coming in."
Deam looked at the papers covering one wall, joined by Tasie.
"What have you two got here?" Sam asked.
"Centennial Highway victims," Dean and Tasie replied.
Sam nodded. The victims seen on the wall included Mark somebody, William Durrell, Scott Nifong who disappeared in 1987 at age 25, and somebody Parks. Mark, Durrell, and Nifong were all white males, judging by the photos.
"I don't get it. I mean, different men, different jobs—" Dean began.
Sam crossed the room.
Dean continued. "—ages, ethnicities. There's always a connection, right? What do these guys have in common?"
While Dean spoke, Sam and Tasie looked at the papers taped to the other walls. There was something about the Bell Witch, two people being burned alive, a skeletal person blowing a horn at several scared people with the note "MORTIS DANSE", a column about "Devils + Demons", another about "Sirens, Witches, the possessed", a wooden pentacle, and a note that says "Woman in White" above a printout of the Jericho Herald article on CONSTANCE's suicide.
Sam turned on another lamp. "Dad figured it out."
Dean turned to look. "What do you mean?"
Tasie pointed to the article. "He found the same article we did. Constance Welch. She's a woman in white."
Dean looked at the photos of Constance's victims. "You sly dogs." Dean turned back to Sam and Tasie. "All right, so if we're dealing with a woman in white, Dad would have found the corpse and destroyed it."
"She might have another weakness," Sam guessed.
"Well, Dad would want to make sure." He crossed to Sam and Tasie. "He'd dig her up. Does it say where she's buried?"
"No, not that Tase and I can tell. If I were Dad, though, I'd go ask her husband." Sam tapped the picture of Joseph Welch. The caption said he was thirty; the article dated to 1981, so he would be sixty-four. "If he's still alive."
Sam went to look at something else. Dean and Tasie looked at the picture below the Herald article, of a woman in a white dress.
"All right. Why don't you, uh, see if you two can find an address, I'm gonna get cleaned up."
Dean started to walk away. Sam turned.
"Hey, Dean?" Sam called, causing Dean to stop and turn back. "What I said earlier, about Mom and Dad, I'm sorry."
Dean held up a hand. "No chick-flick moments."
Sam laughed and nodded. "All right. Jerk."
"Bitch."
"Morons," Tasie said with a smile.
Dean disappeared into the bathroom. Sam and Tasie noticed something, their smiles disappeared, and crossed over for a closer look. A rosary hung in front of a large mirror, and stuck into the mirror frame was a photo of John sitting on the hood of the Impala, next to a boy in a baseball cap who was Dean and with a younger boy and girl, Sam and Tasie, on John's lap. Sam took the photo off the mirror and held it, smiling sadly.
INT. MOTEL ROOM – DAY, LATER
Sam paced, holding his phone, and sat down on the bed. A voicemail message was playing.
Jess spoke. "Hey, it's me, it's about ten-twenty Saturday night—"
Tasie was smiling at a picture Levi had sent her of himself and Ethan.
Dean, clean again, came out of the bathroom and grabbed his jacket. He shrugged it on one shoulder as he crossed the room.
"Hey, man, Tase. I'm starving, I'm gonna grab a little something to eat in that diner down the street. You two want anything?"
"No," Sam and Tasie replied.
"Aframian's buying."
Sam and Tasie shook their heads. "Mm-mm."
EXT. PARKING LOT – DAY
Dean left the motel room. He got the jacket the rest of the way on as he crossed the lot. He looked over and saw a police car, where the motel clerk was talking to Deputy Jaffe and Deputy Hein. The clerk pointer at Deam, who turned away and pulled out his cell phone.
INT. MOTEL ROOM – DAY / EXT. PARKING LOT – DAY
Sam was sitting on the bed, still listening to the message. Tasie was still looking at her husband and son with a soft smile.
"So come home soon, okay? I love you."
The phone beeped. Sam looked at it and pressed a button, then put it back to his ear.
"What?" Sam asked.
Outside, the deputies were approaching Dean.
"Dude, five-oh, take off,"
Sam stood. "What about you?"
"Uh, they kinda spotted me. Go find Dad."
Deam hung up the phone as the deputies approaches. He turned and grinned at them. "Problem, officers?"
"Where're your partners?" Jaffe asked.
"Partners? What, what partners?"
Jaffe glanced over his shoulder and jerked his thumb towards the motel room. Hein headed to the room. Dean fidgeted.
Sam saw Hein approaching and darted away from the window, motioning for Tasie to move.
"So. Fake US Marshal. Fake credit cards. You got anything that's real?" Jaffe asked.
"My boobs," Dean replied with a grin.
Hein slammed Dean over the hood of the cop car.
"You have the right to remain silent—" Jaffe began.
INT. SHERIFF'S OFFICE – DAY
Sherifd Pierce entered the room, carrying a box. He set the box on the table at which Dean sat and went around the table to face Dean across it.
"So you want to give us your real name?" Sheriff Pierce asked.
"I told you, it's Nugent. Ted Nugent," Dean replied.
"I'm not sure you realize just how much trouble you're in here."
"We talkin', like, misdemeanor kind of trouble or, uh, squeal like a pig trouble?"
"You got the faces of ten missing persons taped to your wall." Dean looked away. "Along with a whole lot of Satanic mumbo-jumbo. Boy, you are officially a suspect."
"That makes sense. Because when the first one went missing in '82 I was three."
"I know you've got partners. One of 'em's an older guy. Maybe he started the whole thing. So tell me. Dean."
The sheriff tossed a brown leather-covered journal on the table. "This his?"
Dean stared at it. The sheriff sat on the edge of the table. He flipped through the journal: it was filled with newspaper clippings, notes, and pictures, just like what was on the walls of John's motel room.
The sheriff continued. "I thought that might be your name. See, I leafed through this. What little I could make out—I mean, it's nine kinds of crazy." Dean leaned forward for a closer look. "But I found this, too."
He opened the journal to a page that read "DEAN 35-111", circled, with nothing else on that page.
"Now. You're stayin' right here till you tell me exactly what the hell that means," Sheriff Pierce said.
Dean stared down at the page, then looked up.
INT. WELCH HOUSE – DAY
Sam and Tasie knocked on the door the window was in. An old man opened it: it's recognizably Joseph Welch.
"Hi. Are you Joseph Welch?" Sam asked.
"Yeah," Joseph replied.
EXT. DRIVEWAY – DAY
Sam, Tasie and Joseph were walking down the junk-filled driveway, Joseph holding the photo the twins found on John's motel room mirror.
"Yeah, he was older, but that's him," Joseph informed, handing the photo back to Sam. "He came by three or four days ago. Said he was a reporter."
"That's right. We're working on a story together," Sam told him.
"Well, I don't know what the hell kinda story you're working on. The questions he asked me?"
"About your wife Constance?"
"He asked me where she was buried."
"And where is that again?"
"What, I gotta go through this twice?"
Tasie smiled lightly. "It's fact-checking. If you don't mind."
"In a plot. Behind my old place over on Breckenridge."
"And why did you move?" Sam asked.
"I'm not gonna live in the house where my children died."
Sam and Tasie stopped walking. Joseph stopped as well.
"Mr. Welch, did you ever marry again?" Tasie questioned.
"No way. Constance, she was the love of my life. Prettiest woman I ever known."
"So you had a happy marriage?"
Joseph hesitated. "Definitely."
"Well, that should do it," Sam said. "Thanks for your time."
Sam and Tasie turned towards the Impala. Joseph walked away.
Sam waited a moment, then looked back up at Joseph. "Mr. Welch, did you ever hear of a woman in white?"
Joseph turned. "A what?"
"A woman in white. Or sometimes weeping woman?" Joseph stared. "It's a ghost story. Well, it's more of a phenomenon, really." He started back towards Joseph. "Um, they're spirits. They've been sighted for hundreds of years, dozens of places, in Hawaii, Mexico, lately in Arizona, Indiana. All these are different women." He stopped in front of Joseph. "You understand. But all share the same story."
"Boy, I don't care much for nonsense."
Joseph walked away and Tasie followed as she said, "See, when they were alive, their husbands were unfaithful to them." Joseph stopped. "And these women, basically suffering from temporary insanity, murdered their children." Joseph turned. "Then once they realized what they had done, they took their own lives. So now their spirits are cursed, walking back roads, waterways. And if they find an unfaithful man, they kill him. And that man is never seen again."
"You think... you think that has something to do with... Constance? You smartass!"
"You tell us."
"I mean, maybe... maybe I made some mistakes. But no matter what I did, Constance, she never would have killed her own children. Now, you two get the hell out of here! And you two don't come back!"
Joseph's face shook, whether from anger or grief it was impossible to tell. After a long moment, he turned away. Sam and Tasie sighed.
INT. SHERIFF'S OFFICE – NIGHT
"I don't know how many times I gotta tell you. It's my high school locker combo," Dean said.
Sheriff Pierce was still interrogating Dean over the "DEAN 35-111" page.
"We gonna do this all night long?" Sheriff Pierce asked.
A deputy leaned into the room. "We just got a 911, shots fired over at Whiteford Road."
"You have to go to the bathroom?" the sheriff asked Dean.
"No," Dean replied.
"Good." The sheriff handcuffed Dean to the table and left. Dean saw a paper clip poking out of the journal, pulled it out, and looked at it. Moments later, as the sheriff and deputy were gearing up to leave, was is out of the cuffs. Dean watched through the window in the door, ducked out of sight as the deputy approached the door, and waited.
EXT. SHERIFF'S OFFICE – NIGHT
Dean climbed down the fire escape, carrying John's journal.
EXT. HIGHWAY – NIGHT / EXT. STREET – NIGHT
Sam was driving the Impala and Tasie was in the passenger's seat when his phone rang. He pulled it out and answered it. Dean was in a phone booth.
"Fake 911 phone call?" Dean said. "Sammy, Tasie, I don't know, that's pretty illegal."
"You're welcome," Sam and Tasie replied with a grin.
"Listen, we gotta talk."
"Tell me about it. So the husband was unfaithful. We are dealing with a woman in white. And she's buried behind her old house, so that should have been Dad's next stop."
"Sammy, would you shut up for a second?"
"Tase and I just can't figure out why Dad hasn't destroyed the corpse yet."
"Well, that's what I'm trying to tell you. He's gone. Dad left Jericho."
"What? How do you know?"
"I've got his journal."
"He doesn't go anywhere without that thing."
"Yeah, well, he did this time."
"What's it say?" Tasie inquired.
"Ah, the same old ex-Marine crap, when he wants to let us know where he's going."
"Coordinates. Where to?" Sam and Tasie asked.
"I'm not sure yet."
"I don't understand," Sam said. "I mean, what could be so important that Dad would just skip out in the middle of a job? Dean, what the hell is going on?"
Sam looked up and slammed the brake, dropping the phone: Constance appeared on the road in front of him and Tasie. The car went right through her as Sam brought it to a halt.
"Sam? Tasie? Sam! Tasie!" Dean called.
Inside the car, Sam and Tasie breathed hard. Constance was sitting in the back seat.
"Take me home," Constance said.
EXT. HIGHWAY – NIGHT
"Take me home!" Constance repeated.
"No," Sam and Tasie retorted.
Constance glared and the doors locked themselves. Sam and Tasie struggled to reopen them. The gas pedal pressed down and the car began to drive itself. Sam tried to steer, but Constance was doing that as well. Sam and Tasie continued trying to get the doors open. In the back seat, Constance flickered.
EXT. ABANDONED HOUSE ON BRECKENRIDGE ROAD – NIGHT
The car pulled up in front of Constance's house and stopped. The engine shut off and so did the lights.
"Don't do this," Sam and Tasie said.
Constance flickered. Her voice was sad. "I can never go home."
"You're scared to go home," Sam realized.
Sam looked back and Constance wasn't there. He glanced around and back and saw her in the shotgun seat. She climbed into his lap, shoving him back against the seat hard enough to recline the seat. Sam struggled.
Tasie looked around the back for a weapon.
"Hold me. I'm so cold," Constance told him.
"You can't kill me. I'm not unfaithful. I've never been!" Sam said.
"You will be. Just hold me." Constance kissed Sam as he continued to struggle, reaching for the keys. She pulled back and disappeared, a flash of something horrible behind her face as she vanished. Sam looked around for a moment, then yelled in pain and yanked his hoodie open. There were five new holes burned through the fabric, matching to Constance's fingers: she flickered in front of him, her hand reaching into his chest. A gunshot went off, shattering the window and startling Constance. Dean approached, still firing at her. She glared at him and vanished, then reappeared, and Dean kept firing until she disappeared again. Sam managed to sit up and start the car.
"I'm taking you home," Sam told her.
Sam drove forward. Dean stared after the car. Sam smashed through the side of the house. Dean hurried through the wreckage to the passenger side of the car.
"Sam! Tasie! Sam! Tasie! You okay?" Dean asked.
"I think..." Sam and Tasie trailed.
"Can you move?"
"Yeah. Help me?"
Dean leaned through the window to give Sam a hand.
Constance picked up a large framed photograph seen when she brought Troy there: the woman was Constance and the children were hers.
Dean helped Sam out of the car. "There you go." He pulled Tasie out.
Dean closed the car doors. They looked around and saw Constance; she looked up. She glared at them and threw the picture down. A bureau scooted towards Sam, Tasie and Dean, pinning them against the car. The lights flickered; Constance looked around, scared. Water began to pour down the staircase. She went over. At the top were the boy and girl from the photograph.
They held hands and spoke in chorus. "You've come home to us, Mommy."
Constance looked at them, distraught.
Suddenly, they were behind her; they embraced her tightly and she screamed, her image flickering. In a surge of energy, still screaming, Constance and the two children melted into a puddle in the floor. Sam, Tasie and Dean shoved the bureau over and went to look at the spot where Constance and her children vanished.
"So this is where she drowned her kids," Dean said.
Sam and Tasie nodded as Sam replied, "That's why she could never go home. She was too scared to face them."
"You found her weak spot. Nice work, Sammy." He slapped Sam on the chest where he'd been injured and walked away. Sam laughed through the pain.
"Yeah, I wish I could say the same for you. What were you thinking shooting Casper in the face, you freak?"
"Hey. Saved your asses."
Dean leaned over to look at the car. "I'll tell you another thing. If you screwed up my car?" He twisted around to look at Sam. "I'll kill you."
Sam and Tasie laughed.
EXT. HIGHWAY – NIGHT
The Impala tore down the road; the right headlight was out.
Sam had the journal open to "DEAN 35-111" and a map open on his lap and waa finding coordinates with a ruler, a flashlight tucked between chin and shoulder.
"Okay, here's where Dad went," Sam said. "It's called Blackwater Ridge, Colorado."
Dean nodded. "Sounds charming. How far?"
"About six hundred miles."
"Hey, if we shag ass we could make it by morning."
Sam and Tasie looked at him, hesitating. "Dean, I, um..."
Dean glanced at the road and back. "You're not going."
"The interview's in like, ten hours. I gotta be there," Sam told him.
Tasie nodded. "I told Levi two days. It's been two days."
Dean nodded, disappointed, and returned his attention to the road. "Yeah. Yeah, whatever." He glanced at Sam. "I'll take you home." He turned to Tasie. "And you as well."
Sam turned the flashlight off. They drove on.
EXT. SAM'S APARTMENT BUILDING – NIGHT
They pulled up in front of the apartment, Dean still frowning.
Sam got out and leaned over to look through the window. "Call me if you find him?" Dean nodded. "And maybe I can meet up with you later, huh?"
"Yeah, all right," Dean agreed.
Sam patted the car door twice and turned away. Dean leaned toward the passenger door, one arm going over the back of the seat.
"Sam?" Dean called, causing Sam to turn back. "You know, we made a hell of a team back there."
"Yeah."
Dean drove off. Sam watched him go and sighed.
INT. SAM'S APARTMENT – NIGHT
Sam let himself in. Everything was dark and quiet.
"Jess?" Sam called, closing the door. "You home?"
Sam noticed a plate of chocolate chip cookies on the table, with a note that read "Missed you! Love you!", next to a National Geographic.
INT. IMPALA - NIGHT
Dean was driving. He glanced at his watch to see that it had stopped. Realization dawned on him and he turned around.
Tasie frowned. "We going back?"
Dean nodded. "Yeah. Something's wrong."
She noticed a message from her husband. 'Ethan and I are meeting you at Sam's apartment. Had to take a cab. House and car are gone. Had I not taken him out for air, we'd both be burned alive'
INT. SAM'S APARTMENT - NIGHT
Sam picked a cookie up and ate it as he snuck into the bedroom, smiling. The shower was running. Sam sat on the bed, shut his eyes, and flopped onto his back.
Blood dripped onto Sam's forehead, one drop, then another; he flinched and opened his eyes. He gasped in horror: Jess was pinned to the ceiling, staring down at him and bleeding from the belly.
"No!" Sam cried.
Jess burst into flame; the fire spread across the ceiling.
Dean kicked the front door open.
"Sam!" Dean called.
Sam raised one arm to shield his face. "Jess!"
Dean came running into the bedroom. "Sam! Sam!" Dean looked up and saw Jess, an expression of horror on his face.
"No! No!"
Dean grabbed Sam off the bed and bodily shoved him out the door, Sam struggling all the way.
"Jess! Jess! No!" Sam cried.
Flames engulfed the apartment.
AFTER THE FIRE
EXT. SAM'S APARTMENT – NIGHT
Tasie looked around frantically for her husband and son.
Levi pulled her into his arms. "We're okay, Tase. The house is charred. No one knows how it started." He looked up at the fire. "The hell happened here?"
"That's Sam's apartment," she said solemnly. "His girlfriend was in it."
"Did she-"
"I didn't see her leave, so no, I don't think so."
"God, that's awful."
A fire truck was parked outside the building, firemen and police keeping back gawkers. Dean looked on, then turned and walked back to his car. Sam was standing behind the open trunk, loading a shotgun. Dean looked at the trunk, then at Sam, whose face was set in a mask of desperate anger. Sam looked up, then sighed, nodded, and tossed the shotgun into the trunk. Tasie walked up to her twin and placed a hand on his shoulder.
"We got work to do," Sam said, shutting the trunk.