( NARCOTICS )
Sam is sitting at a motel desk, going through files with Elena. There is a knock on the door; he opens it to find Ballard; he hesitates, she shrugs and comes in. Ballard shows Sam her wrists. "These showed up after you saw it?" Sam asks.
"Yeah, I guess."
"All right. You're going to have to tell me exactly what you saw." Sam says.
"You know, I must be losing my mind. You're a fugitive. I should be arresting you." Ballard turns to Elena. "Not so much you."
"All right. Well, you know what? You can arrest me later, all right? After you live through this. But right now you've gotta talk to me. Okay?" Sam asks and she nods. "Okay, great. Now, this spirit. What did it look like?"
"She was, um, really pale, and her throat was cut, and her eyes, they were like, this deep dark red?" Ballard recalls. "It appeared like she was trying to talk to me. But she couldn't. It was just...a lot of blood."
Sam shuffles through some papers. "You know what? Here. We've been researching every girl that's ever died or gone missing from Ashland Street." He leads her over to a table, where he gathers up a stack of crime scene photos.
"How'd you get those? Those are from crime scenes, and booking photos." Ballard says.
"You have your job, I have mine. Here. I need you to look through these, tell me if you recognize anyone." Sam says.
Ballard sits and flips through the stack. On the third photo, a young woman's booking photo, she stops. "This is her. I'm sure of it." She says.
"Claire Becker?" Elena asks. "Twenty eight years old, disappeared about eight or nine months ago."
"But I don't even know her. I mean, why would she come after me?" Ballard asks.
"Well, before her death, she was arrested twice. For dealing heroin. You ever work narcotics?" Sam asks.
"Yeah, Pete and I did. Before Homicide." She says
"You ever bust her?" Sam asks.
"Not that I remember."
"It says that she was last seen entering 2911 Ashland Street. Police searched the place, didn't find anything. Guess we gotta check it out ourselves. See if we can find her body." Sam says.
"What?"
"Well, we gotta salt and burn her bones. It's the only way to put her spirit to rest." Elena says.
"Of course it is."
ASHLAND STREET
[ ☾]
Sam leads Ballard and Elena into a Dark And Creepy Warehouse. "So what exactly are we looking for?" Ballard asks.
"I'll let you know when we find it." They split up, Sam and Elena checking up a flight of stairs and Ballard continuing on the lower level.
She turns towards a window and sees Claire, standing by the window. The ghost struggles to talk. "Sam? Sam? Sam!" Ballard yells.
As Sam and Elena run down the stairs to Ballard, the ghost disappears. "Hey! Hey, I'm here, what is it? What happened?" He asks.
"Claire..." Ballard starts.
"Where?" Elena asks.
"She, she was here." Ballard says.
"Did she attack you?" Sam asks.
"No. No, she was just like, reaching out to me. She was over there by the window." Ballard says. The window is blocked by a shelving unit. "Here, help me move this."
"All right." Sam says.
They shove the shelves aside, revealing the window. It is labeled from the outside: ASHLAND SUP(plies)
"Our little mystery word." Elena mutters.
They turn to see a shadow on the opposite wall, casting the words into clear reflection.
"Now the extra letters make sense." Sam pulls out his EMF reader and approaches the opposite wall.
"What is that?" Ballard asks.
"Spirits and certain remains give off electromagnetic frequencies." Sam says and moves the meter everywhere.
"So if Claire's body was here, that would indicate that?" Ballard asks.
"Yeah. Well, that's the theory." Sam says.
The EMF reader purrs as he waves it over the brick wall. He turns. Sam starts breaking through the wall with a sledgehammer.
When he's knocked out a sizable hole, he pokes his flashlight inside. "Yeah. Yeah, there's definitely something in there." Sam starts breaking through the wall with elbows and fists. "You know? This is bothering me."
"Well, you are digging up a corpse." Elena points out.
"No, not that. That's, uh, that's pretty par for the course, actually." Sam says.
"Then what?" Ballard asks.
"It's just, I mean, no vengeful spirit I've ever tussled with wanted to be wasted, so why the hell would Claire lead us to her remains? It doesn't make any sense." He's broken open most of the wall. "All right, here. Give me a hand."
Together, they pull out a shroud-wrapped body and place it on the ground. Sam pulls out a pocket knife and cuts the ropes holding the shroud together, uncovering her.
Ballard holds out her wrists. "Her wrists. Yeah, they'd be bruised just like yours?" Sam says.
Ballard notices a necklace on the corpse and touches it cautiously. "That necklace mean something to you?" Elena asks.
"I've seen it before. It's rare. It was custom made over on Carson street." Ballard reaches into her neckline. "I have one just like it. Pete gave it to me."
Elena thinks real hard and begins pacing. "Now this all makes perfect sense." She says.
"I'm sorry?" Ballard asks.
"Yeah. You see, Claire is not a vengeful spirit, she's a death omen." Elena says and Sam nods, agreeing with her.
"Excuse me?"
"Claire's not killing anyone. She's trying to warn them. You see, sometimes spirits, they don't want vengeance, they want justice. Which is why she led us here in the first place. She wants us to know who her killer is." Sam says. "Detective, how much do you know about your partner?"
Ballard thinks. "Oh my god."
"What?" Sam asks.
"About a year ago, some heroin went missing from lockup. Obviously it was a cop. We never found out who did it. But whoever did it would need someone to fence their product." Ballard says.
"Someone like a heroin dealer." Sam says.
"Somebody like Claire." Elena says.
HIGHWAY
[ ☾]
Sheridan is driving an armored van with Dean in the back. "So I'm being extradited to St. Louis, huh? And you just decided to transfer me yourself, eight hundred miles? At two in the morning? This can't be good." He says.
Ballard is driving Sam and Elena down a similar stretch of road, finishing a call on her cell phone. "All right. Thanks." She says.
"What is it?" Sam asks.
"Pete just left the precinct. With Dean." Ballard says.
"What?" Elena asks.
"He said the prisoner had to be transfered, and he just took him. Dispatch has been calling but he won't answer the radio." She says.
"Radio? He took a county vehicle?" Sam asks.
"Yeah."
"Well, then they should have a lo-jack, you've just gotta get it turned on." Sam says.
The armored van pulls off the road and stops. "Pee break? So soon? You might want to get your prostate checked." Dean says as Sheridan gets out and circles to the back. "Son of a bitch." Sheridan opens the van. "Hey, I'm cool in the van, you go do what you gotta do."
Sheridan hauls Dean out and throws him to the ground. "You're a cocky son of a bitch. You think those people in St. Louis are gonna buy that crap you're peddling? Here's the thing. You're not gonna make it to St. Louis. You're gonna die trying to escape." Sheridan says.
He pulls out his gun and points it at Dean's head. "Wait! Wait. Let's, let's talk about this. I mean, you don't want to do something that you're gonna regret later." Dean says as Sheridan cocks the gun. "Or maybe you do."
"Pete! Put the gun down." Ballard says, just arriving with Sam and Elena.
"Diana? How'd you find me?" Sheridan asks.
"I know about Claire." She says.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Sheridan lies.
"Put the gun down!"
"Oh, I don't think so. You're fast. I'm pretty sure I'm faster." He says.
"Why are you doing this?" Ballard asks.
"I didn't do anything, Diana." He lies.
"It's a little late for that."
"It wasn't my fault. Claire was trying to turn me in, I had no choice." Sheridan says.
"And Tony? Karen?" Ballard asks.
"Same thing! Tony scrubbed the money, he got skittish, and then he wanted to come clean. I'm sure he told Karen everything."
Dean glances at Sam, who's giving him "How do we get out of this" looks. Dean shakes his head, Sam grits his teeth.
"It was a mess; I had to clean it up. I just panicked." Sheridan says.
"How many more people are gonna die over this, Pete?" Ballard asks.
"There's a way out. This Dean kid's a friggin' gift. We could pin the whole thing on him. Right? No trial, nothing. Just, just one more dead scumbag." He says.
"Hey!" Sheridan raises the gun; Dean backs off.
"No one will question it. Diana, please. I still love you." Sheridan says and she lowers the gun. "Thank you. Thank you."
As he turns back to Dean, Ballard brings her gun up and fires, hitting Sheridan in the stomach. He goes down; Dean rolls out of the way.
"Then why don't you buy me another necklace, you ass?" Ballard asks. Sheridan tackles her legs, knocking her down.
She loses her gun and Sam tries to go for it, but Sheridan gets there first. "Don't do it! Don't do it!" He says.
Ballard stares past Sheridan, who turns to see the ghost behind him, staring through her bloody hair. She smiles. A gunshot goes off: Ballard has recovered a weapon and shot Sheridan in the back. He goes down, more permanently this time.
Ballard is kneeling by the body of her late partner. She gets up and approaches Sam, Elena and Dean, standing nearby. "You doin' all right?" Elena asks.
"Not really." Ballard says. "The death omen Claire. What happens to her now?"
"Should be over. She should be at rest." Says Sam.
"So, uh. What now, officer?" Dean asks.
"Pete did confess to me. He screwed up both your cases royally. I'd say that there's a good chance that we could get your cases dismissed." She says.
"You'd take care of that for us?" Elena asks, surprised.
"I hope so. But the St. Louis murder charges? That's another story. I can't help you. Unless..." She pauses. "I just happened to turn my back, and you walked away. I could just tell them that the suspects escaped."
"Wait, are you sure?" Sam asks.
"Yeah, she's sure, Sam." Dean says.
"No, it's just, I mean, you could lose your job over something like that." Sam says.
"Look, I just want you guys out there doing what you do best. Trust me, I'll sleep better at night." Ballard turns to go. "Listen, you need to watch your back. They're gonna be looking for all three of you right now. Get out of here. I gotta radio this in."
"Hey, uh, you wouldn't happen to know where my car is, by chance?" Dean asks.
"It's at the impound yard down on Robertson." Ballard says and sees Dean's calculating look. "Don't...even think about it."
"It's okay, it's all right, don't worry. We'll, uh, we'll just improvise. I mean, we're pretty good at that." Sam says.
"Yeah. I've noticed." Ballard says.
Sam, Elena and Dean walk off down the road. "Nice lady." Sam says.
"Yeah, for a cop. Did she look familiar to you?" Dean asks Sam.
"No, why?" Sam shoves Dean playfully.
"I don't know. Anyway, are you hungry?" Dean asks.
"No."
"For some reason I could really go for some pea soup."