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Dean, Sam, and Kenzi take on a mysterious haunting in an abandoned building.
January 3, 2017
Abandoned Building, Sonoma County
Why do people only ever want to meet at creepy old abandoned buildings in the middle of the night? Kenzi got a text from Dean that surprisingly wasn't an inappropriate picture of his anatomy, which already puts him a step above most guys who've texted her at 2am. Why they think that works is beyond her... even if it sometimes does, Kenzi reflects. Dressed in a black hoodie with fishnet accents, her long hair is currently braided somewhat sensibly, but the corset, skin tight pants and stilettos kind of ruin the 'sensible' vibe she's got going. Bodega Bay isn't hard to get to, and the weather certainly sucks less than the unseasonable weather San Francisco is currently seeing! She parks Bo's car, a late 60's Camero, and swings her long legs out of the driver's seat, not even teetering for a moment as she stands on borderline weaponized heels, shooting off a text as she gets out.
"Sweet ride!" Dean's voice comes from near enough. It's like he was just waiting in the shadows to emerge dramatically. Except he doesn't really emerge so much dramatically as incidentally, ambling with his semi-bowlegged gait (why is he even partly bowlegged anyway?) over to the Camaro and around it. "Man, you keep it in good shape. I knew I liked you!"
The elder Winchester is all smiles and appreciation for the very capable career-sidekick. "Hey, Sammy! You remember Kenzi? From the hotel?" The wendigo one with all the zombies, not just any hotel.
Sam, shrugged into a heavier coat than usual and sporting a beanie given the day's weird weather, glances at Dean with a distinct air of "Well, duh." Then, turning to nod to Kenzi, he manages a polite smile and says. "Hey. Nice to see you again, especially without the whole plague of undead thing. Not exactly an ideal social setting." He glances over at Dean. "So. You're here to help us with the haunting?"
"I'll tell Bo-Bo you're in love with her wheels. I think she is, too, judging from the way she waxes it." Kenzi purses her lips a bit, eyebrows waggling just a little. Sam gets a big smile and a quick up and down. Hey, he's cute, he's tall, he's apparently the sensitive type. "I'm here to be the comic relief and hopefully not the damsel in distress or the impetus for the hero to go on an epic quest of vengeance after my... untimely demise... Also, I brought snacks?" She makes her way to the trunk, opening it and casually lifting away the false bottom, propping it up with a katana and lifting out a backpack that's clinking with what sounds like metal on metal. "Dibs on the katana!" She calls. The backpack is unzipped, and she pulls out Smith & Wesson 500, offering it to either of the boys, stock first. The gun looks huge in her hands, and if she were a man, someone would be accusing her of compensating for something.
Dean rolls his eyes at Sam, although he keeps an eye on his brother. Until the car distracts him again. He leans closer to it and his eyes widen. Whoever Bobo is, she does a great job waxing the car! He glances back into the shadows, where presumably he left Baby parked. Maybe he could...nah.
There might be jean shorts and a wax job on a certain Impala, later. When everyone is probably asleep. Probably.
The weapons attract his attention next. If there's one thing other than cars or his brothers that can get Dean's focus, it's weapons! He whistles and takes the gun, hefting it in his hands and giving it a weigh-in just by holding it. He swings it around -- and is careful not to point it at either of the others -- before nodding appreciatively and handing it back. "That's a good one. So you brought a katana too? That's pretty fancy gear."
Sam reaches into the satchel at his side and produces his trusty sawed-off shotgun. "Rock salt," he explains. "Better against spirits than bullets." He doesn't pretend to understand all the stuff with the car. He's never understood all the stuff with the car. But, he has the gear and he grins at Kenzi. "Hey, sounds good to me. Far as I'm concerned, it's Dean's turn to be the damsel in distress." His tone might be a little flirty, or he might just be dorky. With him, you never can tell.
"Dude, if I thought it would keep my ass out of the hospital, I'd bring a rocket launcher. I mean, like, genuinely. My cousin Dmetri could get us one, real cheap." She pulls a smaller handgun, a little snub nose number, out of the bag, checking the rounds with familiarity before tucking it into the back of her waistband under the hoodie. Then she straps the katana on, as if she's done it before, and pulls out extra rounds for both guns... and three baggies of trail mix. She wasn't kdding. Some sort of tropical fruit and nut mix, with M&Ms. "I hope nobody's allergic to peanuts, 'cause I left the epipens at home, boys!" She grins wide, swinging the backpack into the trunk, then shuts it. "So. What are we doing, again?"
"Oh right, Rapunzel." Dean immediately counters. "I'm somehow gonna be the damsel in distress."
Snacks, thankfully, are enough to keep Dean's attention from bickering. Brothers will be brothers! Especially these two. It's kind of a miracle how Adam never really participates in that sort of thing. "She brought snacks," he echoes, as if Sam hadn't heard Kenzi. "Oh, uh, we better not go for rocket launchers this time. But, uh, might wanna set me up sometime. We fight...all kinds of crazy things."
Reaching into his jacket, Dean pulls out a silver knife, probably with some sort of low-grade mojo on it, just in case. They don't know what they're up against yet, after all. Could be anything. "I'll take front." Then he's got his flashlight in his hand and on, and he leads the way into the dark building.
Sam manages a fair poker face at Dean's banter, instead flashing Kenzi a grin. "Y'know, that might come in handy someday. I'll let you know." Accepting a bag of trail mix, too, he says, "Okay, you are so definitely hired if you're looking for a job." Moving to follow Dean with his shotgun--complete with the Maglight duct-taped to it--in one hand and tucking the trail mix into his pocket with the other, he starts following Dean. Without looking back at Kenzi, he adds, "Not that it pays anything."
"Hey, I have got the hook UP. One rocket launcher for Christmas, bro." Kenzi grins, adjusting the fit of the katana a little as she smirks at Sam. "It's not like my current job pays! I came out here because it was literally snowing in my living room!" The Clubhouse is amazing during certain seasons... but the gaps in the plaster and slatboard walls... do leave some problems from time to time. "Our last paying job was like a month ago. Got an offer to hunt a werewolf pack, but that sounds like the beginning to an episode of a bad television series or something, where I die in the first five minutes and then you guys come and avenge me." For light? Kenzi has an iPhone.
Dean raises an eyebrow and turns back to look at Kenzi. "Uh, you might wanna kick whoever's ass was giving you that job," he calls in her direction. "You'd be doin' 'em a favor." He trains his flashlight back in front and takes a few more steps, looking around the big room opening the place, then shining the beam as far as it'll show down a couple of side hallways. "Okay, so Sammy...what did you say a ghost would be doin' here? We'll start at the most likely focus for the haunting and move out from there. See if this really is a ghost."
"None of the wolf packs around here are known to be hostile, anyway," Sam points out. He moves in, behind Dean and to one side just in case he needs a clear shot. "But yeah, the snow day thing was... weird." He shakes his head some. Glancing over at Dean, he gets back to business. "Pretty standard haunting from what I saw in the reports. Kids getting scared off by some kind of apparition, and it's really classic. Rattling chains, spooky shroud... almost like something out of an old cartoon."
"... Jinkies." Kenzi mutters after that, keeping her eyes open, wide and wary of the goings on around her. She usually gets by on scrappiness, and it's kept her going so far, but she also knows paying attention might just save her life, some day. "We turned it down, anyway. Guy gave me the creeps, couldn't explain properly why they needed brought down." She shrugs and draws the katana with her free hand, just in case, keeping it low and pointed away from Sam and Dean, lest she Hatori Hanzo one of them by accident.
"Yeah, uh, I'm gonna hook you up with the number of a buddy later, maybe you can send a message." Dean surveys the room, careful to keep plenty of distance between himself and anything that might move or hide something that could move or spring out at them. "Sounds like a real creeper." He starts to step towards one of the hallways, slowly and carefully, though he does listen to his brother as he explains the haunting.
"Rattling chains? For real?" Dean has to grin at that. "That's pretty crazy. I don't think I've ever done a haunting like that. It's like...super old school, right?"
Giving a slight shrug, Sam says, "That's what the news report said, anyway. Chains, shrouds, spooky moaning... the whole deal." He glances around, playing his light down empty corridors, and shakes his head. "Sounds like you've got good instincts," he offers to Kenzi. "That kind of 'job' sounds like way more trouble than it's worth. Some people don't get the difference between a hunter and a killer." Following Dean down the hallway, Sam rummages in his pocket with his free hand, taking out their mocked-up EMF meter to see if it'll get any hits.
"Uh. When you say 'hook up'...?" Kenzi asks, eyebrows raising a little, but then she's distracted because Sam has some sort of toy that looks cool. "The Ghostbusters want their equipment back." She teases, after getting a good look at the thing. She has a vague idea of what it is, anyway.
"I mean I'm gonna give you the guy's number and you can let him know." Dean gives his eyes a half-roll again. Sometimes Kenzi's just like Sam! Though at least the two don't dress the same. That would be kind of scary if they switched styles. Sam's tall enough, he doesn't need stiletto heels to bump him up another half a foot! He can barely fit under door frames as it is!
Dean sways the light from side to side and glances off into a room. He's been trying the doors as they go, though most of them are either jammed or there's nothing worth looking at inside, like collapsed ceilings and ruined interiors. But this room seems in good enough repair, and fairly empty. "Huh."
It's kind of Scooby Doo, kind of one of those midline-budget horror movies attempting to be charmingly retro to disguise the effects they can't use, but there's a weird kind of haunting in this place. Or something. Totally old-school, with kids getting scared off by someone with chains? Dean runs the flashlight around the interior of the one room they've found not fallen in on itself or with a jammed door. "Kinda...well-preserved here. Always kinda blows my mind, y'know? How one room'll be fine and all the other ones on the hall are wrecked."
"Why do they have to be wrecked? Why can't the whole house just be perfectly preserved, huh?" Kenzi asks, sounding just a touch skittish. "I like nice, well preserved houses, that have intact walls." Unlike the place she's staying with Bo, apparently. Well, at least it's free and keeps the rain off their heads most nights! "Like, why can't ghosts just haunt mansions and well appointed spas?"
"Lacks the ambiance," Sam quips, voice tense. He's focused on the situation, and despite the rock-salt-loaded shotgun, he's never really comfortable with these sorts of jobs. Ghosts are too dangerous, unpredictable... and, frequently, quite sad. He glances at Dean and says, more seriously, "Maybe the ghost preserves the room, somehow, without really knowing it. So, we have any idea what we're looking for... or are we torching the whole place?"
"Well you said it, Sammy. Some jackass with chains and--" Dean wanders into the room and then trails off abruptly as he wheels the flashlight around all of a sudden. "Did you hear that?" His brother might suspect he's joking or trying to lead him on, but then there's that sound of chains again, faint and distant.
"Oh you have got to be shitting me." Kenzi whispers, after the chains rattle again, her own gun held at the ready. And if she's figuratively shaking in her stilettos, who can blame her? Well. For shaking, anyway. Her choice in Hunting footwear might leave something to be desired.
Sam turns to face the direction of the chains, biting back the retort he'd been planning to give Dean. "Right," he hisses. "Do you think we'll have to salt and burn the chains, then, or do we have a better idea?" He starts cautiously in that direction, playing his flashlight across the area in front of him.
Dean snorts. "Hell if I know. This just seems more and more like a Scooby DooOOOOOOOH!!" Then he's flailing, flashlight dropped to the ground as it clatters and barely illuminates, in flashes, what appears to be Dean struggling with...whatever that is. It's not a ghost. It's probably someone in a large sheet. It's a miracle they're actually clinging to Dean like a koala or a spider monkey or something, and he's wrestling with them. "Get offa me, you freak!!"
It only takes the blink of an eye for Kenzi to be rushing forward, gun held at the ready... but the gun isn't the answer, here, and so Kenzi, using her wits, Kenzi launches a hard kick at the thing Dean is wrestling. This may end up a comedy of errors, however.
Sam whirls around, pointing the shotgun, and then lifts it up, aimed at the ceiling, when it becomes clear he doesn't need it. He draws closer, but he doesn't dive right in since Kenzi's already moving in to kick. Instead he waits a moment, looking for an opening, and then he moves in to try to grapple the mysterious assailant with his flashlight hand.
Dean grunts as he ends up randomly kicked, which was probably something everyone expected with the flailing around and turning going on. Whoever that is in the sheet is definitely not an expert fighter, and Dean's clearly trying not to hurt them too badly. But when he feels the kick, he turns a little more focused and ends up elbowing the "ghost" just as Sam hauls them off Dean.
There's obviously an actual person under a sheet. They must have rigged up a sound system or something.
"Son of a bitch!" Kenzi curses, but then she's raising her gun once more, the distinctive sound of a shotgun ratcheting as she does, bringing it into firing position as the boys get the be-sheeted figure under control. "Listen, Chuckles, I've got enough ammo in here to make sure you've always got the best accessability parking spots if you don't stop swinging at my friends."
Trying to keep a reasonable hold on the be-sheeted one without actually choking the life out of them, Sam says, "Can someone, uh... de-sheet this sheet-head, maybe?" Stress-induced puns. They're a thing. Glancing Dean's way, he asks, "You okay?" Then, to Kenzi, "Hey, by the way, you know you kinda... rock?" It's a Dean word, but it applies.
Dean gives Sam a curious but amused look as he pulls up his shirt to examine his ribcage. Well, that's going to leave a bruise, though at least nothing's broken. He's pretty sure. He'll have to see later. "Kenzi, you wanna do the honors?"
When the sheet is removed, it's basically...yeah, it's Old Man Withers or something. He visibly deflates as he's unmasked, sighing and just hanging limply in Sam's arms. "I'm...not much of a fighter." As if that weren't very obvious. "But what the hell're you people doing with all those guns? You believe in ghosts, at your age?"
Pulling off the sheet, Kenzi even has the line ready. "Old Man Withers!?" A pause, "Sorry, that was hurtful and I apologize for calling you old, grampy smurf." She swings her shotgun down on its strap, shaking her head. "Dude, you're running around in a sheet rattling chains, I don't wanna hear shit about what I believe in until you explain your weird... fetish." A pause, "Oh. Oh, I get it... This is some weird... Craigslist thing."
Sam relaxes his grip on the old guy when he realizes that he's not looking like much of a threat. "You don't have to believe in ghosts to have heard that something was going on here, something dangerous. People could have been hurt. What the hell are you even doing here in this getup?" He glances to Kenzi, brow furrowing, and asks, "Craigslist? Wait, is this some kind of sick hookup?" The bitch face isn't resting, but it's on full power right now.
"Sammy!" Dean huffs, waving a hand. "Why don't we let Grampa here tell us why the hell he's lurkin' around this ruin."
The old man shakes his head, holding up his hands. "Look, I don't even get on Craigslist. But you seem to know so much about this place anyway...you know this is a hangout for stupid kids, right? So I figured I'd just take up scaring 'em away. Seemed to work pretty well up to now. 'Course, they didn't have guns." He gives the trio a pointed look.
"HEY! We're NOT kids!" Kenzi objects, crossing her arms over her chest... which just makes her look childlike and petulent, despite the stilettos and goth girl make up. "Tee-Bee-Aych, I'm not even one hundred percent certain I've got a real gun here. I mean... Dimitri said it was, but I didn't test fire it. I should probably do that next time." she tells Sam, seemingly serious.
Sam gives the old man a look of pure disgust, then he just turns to go. "C'mon, Kenzi... Dean. We're not that far from the Roadhouse, and I suddenly really, really need a beer." He shoots Kenzi an exasperated smile and says, "And what the hell? I'm buying." Glancing back to Old Man Withers, he says, "You, man? Get a new hobby. Seriously."
But just as Sam turns to go, there's a decidedly weird sound from somewhere else in the building. The old man frowns and looks confused. "That...wasn't on my tape," he comments quietly.
Dean looks between the other two and the man. "...anybody ever die in this building? Like...anybody ever have a reason to haunt it?"
At first, the old man looks like he might scoff, but he sees Dean's expression is true. He sets his jaw, huffing a breath out, and shrugs his shoulders. "There was a legend. That's what I was going off of. Dunno if it was true, but supposedly some guy and his jilted lover had it out around here. Didn't come out alive. That was about when the place went abandoned, but it was so long ago..."
Dean turns to look at his brother. "You think...?"
Sam looks even less happy than before, and that's saying something. "Great," he mutters. "So now what do we look for?" He looks back to Dean. "Or maybe now's the time to burn the whole place down." No, it's not the best idea, and no, Sam wouldn't normally support it, but they've got almost nothing to go on, and the place is clearly condemned anyway... and the old guy has really soured Sam's mood.
"... Okay, listen, Jack Lemmonparty. I'm gonna need you to get running the hell out of here as fast as your walker wheels can handle, because right now, me and my stupid friends are going to go kick ghostbutt." Kenzi swings the shotgun into position again, and then she's moving toward the sound, too irritated to be scared, now.
Sam looks even less happy than before, and that's saying something. "Great," he mutters. "So now what do we look for?" He looks back to Dean. "Or maybe now's the time to burn the whole place down." No, it's not the best idea, and no, Sam wouldn't normally support it, but they've got almost nothing to go on, and the place is clearly condemned anyway... and the old guy has really soured Sam's mood. He gives Kenzi another nod. He's really starting to appreciate her style.
"I can't leave without the sound equipment! I'll just go get it." And the old man moves off before anyone can stop him, and then he's gone.
"...crap. Did the old guy have a secret passageway or somethin'?" Dean frowns, but he goes to grab his flashlight and waves it around the room. Whoever that guy was, he's not in the room anymore. "Well. Shall we, uh, try to find this ghost?"
"... Did Grandpa Pickles give you guys the slip?" It's not like she can talk, she was just going to let him walk off. Phone out, flashlight on, Kenzi moves to scout the hallway, moving with surprising stealth and grace in her impractical footwear.
Sighing, Sam says, "Fine. I guess we should--" He cringes as he realizes he was about to say "split up," so instead he just says, "--each take a room, and if we find anything, call the others over." He glances down the hallway, then looks back to the others. "Let's... check out the rooms up here. Maybe we should all take the cellar together." He too heads down the hallway, where he'll move to select a different room from Kenzi.
"We should definitely not split up for the cellar," Dean comments, a little huffily. He takes a third room, after checking some doors and doorways and finding them impassible, but there's nothing much he finds.
Sam won't find much either, though Kenzi will find a shred of a dress, quite old but distinguishable. But nothing else there...except a hole opening up to what must be the cellar.
Back to Sam and Dean, Kenzi blinks. "Dude. Sam. You look like too big a nerd to have never played DND. You never split the party! You especially never send the rogue off by herself unless she's searching for tra-..." She sighs. "I'm going to turn around, and they'll be gone, fallen down some weird twisty turny slide thing, leaving me alone with the creepy monster." Turning around just confirms this, and she whimpers. "Gulp." And then she goes to check the room indicated before, clutching the gun and cellphone.
Sam re-emerges into the hallway, coughing a bit from all the dust and general gloom, flashlight in hand and shotgun slung over one shoulder. He looks down at the others to wait for them to emerge from their own rooms and shrugs. "Naturally," he sighs, "I didn't find anything." Then, louder, he calls down the hallway, "Nothing in here! Guess it's on to the cellar, next?"
Dean returns to the hallway, looking around and waiting for the others. Once Sam arrives, he walks off towards where Kenzi was headed. "Hey Kenzi. You find anything?" Running the flashlight's beam around the room, he centers in on the hole and carefully walks towards it. "Careful! This kinda hole usually means the floors are pretty--"
He was going to say "flimsy" and look impressively knowledgeable, at least in his mind. Unfortunately for Dean, the floor chooses just that moment to give out, and he falls into the darkness, flashlight bouncing some distance away. Yep! They're headed for the cellar, for sure.
"I found a scrap off like a dress or something? Kinda pretty, in a 'maybe I could give Barbie a thong' kind of way." She returns into the main area just in time to see Dean fall, and she winces. "Um... Did you happen to catch where the stairs are?" She asks Sam, peering into the hole where Dean fell. "Dean... Buddy? You okay?"
Sam follows his brother into the room Kenzi was searching, and he gives a nod. "Keep the scrap, that might be--shit, Dean!" Before they can get in any witty banter, the elder Winchester has gone right through the floor and vanished below. Barely pausing to shoot Kenzi a look, Sam nods. "Yeah, they're back the other way. He shouts in the hole, "Stay put--we're coming down to find you!" Without further discussion, he turns to exit the room, barreling down the corridor until they can reach the cellar entrance.
In the cellar, it's a lot of fallen-in debris from the floor above, probably just what Dean expected. Of course, he didn't expect to actually fall in himself. It was enough to stun him, and he sits trying to clear his head as quickly as possible. Okay. He's okay, he's still breathing and can move. But as he shifts his leg, he winces. "Ssshhhhhhit!" Is it broken? He hopes it's not broken. The elder Winchester reaches down, then, to rub at his leg, from hip to ankle, and try to find where the problem is.
Meanwhile, the others will find that it's not the clearest path of how to reach Dean, though his flashlight does still shine through some of the scrap. And crap. They'll probably be able to pick out another shred or two of the dress, leading to what seems like a wall...but what surely isn't that straightforward.
The skinny mouthy scam artist follows after Sam, a half beat behind him by the time he hits the cellar door, keeping her gun low and to the side, but ready to raise it and fire in case anybody decides to mess with them, at the moment. "I heard him saying obscenities, he's fine!" She reports. "Or, well... conscious."
Sam glances at Kenzi, nods, and makes his way into the cellar. When he spots scraps of that cloth, he picks them up and pockets them--they may need to burn these later, for all he knows. When they reach the wall, he raises his flashlight and taps the butt of it firmly against the wall. "Dean!" he calls out, hoping to be heard. "We're trying to get to you, but this place is half-collapsed and full of every kind of rubble."
"Yeah, I kinda noticed!" Dean barks back. At least he's not that far away, although he's also not exactly a hop, skip, and jump off. Pushing to his feet, he hobbles a step or two, collapses, and there's another obscenity or two Kenzi can hear. "Look, I'll try to get to you, you try to get to me, we--" But he's interrupted again by a ghost.
Except this time, it's a real one, and he lost his gun when he fell. "Aw come on! Not now!"
"Crap, crap, CRAP." Kenzi groans, looking around at the wall, shoving at it. "Oh... this is gonna sting." And then she's racing back up the stairs and down the hall. Whatever she's doing, it's not smart, and she's going to regret it in the morning. But she also helped get Dean into this mess, and won't forgive herself for at least a month if anything happens to him. Much lighter than Dean, she scoots along the floor carefully toward the hole, trying to keep her weight better spread than his, so she can see down.
"Kenz--!?" Sam starts to ask, but then she's already gone. Hearing Dean's shout from the other side of the wall, he begins frantically trying to find a break in the wall that he can slip through. If he can't find one, then he'll go to make one, finding a weak-seeming place in the barrier that doesn't seem especially load-bearing--and getting started on kicking a hole in it. "Hang on, Dean!" he shouts. "We're coming to you!" Well, he assumes Kenzi is. He really has no idea what she's doing, but she seemed like she had a plan at least.
Sam gets a hole that he helps expand steadily. Good job, Sammeh! Meanwhile, Kenzi will see a luminous shape that is definitely not Grampa McSheetsy. Though the old man does turn up in the room.
"Hey," he calls out, "you okay? Did one of you crazy people fall down? This is why I've been scaring stupid kids away from this place! 's not fit for walking!" He has, it would seem, collected the entire sound system. He sets it down and carefully takes a step closer to Kenzi. "You need some help?"
Dean, meanwhile, looks around for his gun. Rock salt would be very helpful right about now. But it's so dark, he can't see it. When he spots Kenzi, he waves a hand towards the light. "Hey! Shine it around -- not in my eyes -- I need to find my gun!"
The ghost, however, flickers from sorrow to fury, every second that passes. Back and forth. One moment the feminine figure sounds like she's sobbing, and the next...she's seething. And she's drawing closer to Dean.
Once she's within a few feet, she actually can be heard speaking. "You left me...you betrayed me!!"
"Dude, you weigh like five times what I do, stay back before the floor collapses even worse! Um. No offense, Gramps." Kenzi scoots a little further forward, moving the flashlight... Not realizing that she's entirely overbalanced. She barely has time for a 'squeak' before she's tumbling ass over wig, her cellphone spinning through the air to land near Dean, the girl herself crumpled not too far from where he fell originally. "... Ow. I think... I broke something." She shoves herself up, wincing at the effort. She landed on her shotgun, at least, and not the katana strapped to her back. Reaching down, she lets out a low whimper. "I did... These boots were my favorite!"
That's when Sam busts through the wall like Kool-Aid Man, only he's carrying a shotgun instead of a sugar-saturated beverage. "Hey, lady," he calls toward the ghost, "I'm right here." Punctuating the last word, he fires off a blast of rock salt at the ghost. Then, whether she vanishes or not, he cuts to his right in a strafing motion, moving cautiously toward Dean. When Kenzi one-ups him on dramatic entrances, he spares a glance her way, too. "Aside from the boots, you okay?"
"I've got a good rope ladder--" The old man starts, and then Kenzi's tumbling down. He shakes his head. Kids! Young people. Whippersnappers, with their hula hoops and their rock 'n roll and stiletto heels and katanas and everything. "Listen, don't move! I'll go get that rope ladder for ya!" He turns and shakes his head. "Better pick up that first aid kit too..."
Dean is just about ready to throw dirt at this crazy ghost woman, but then Sam's crashing through the wall! And that's after Kenzi rolls down to join him. "Man." Fortunately, that's enough for him to spot his gun, and he moves for it, but Sam's already got one up on him. The ghost vanishes, leaving the trio where they are. "So, we got a real ghost here that this old dude somehow never ran into. Guess she's not into silver foxes. You okay?" The last two words come at almost the same time as Sam asks her, which gets Sam a look that is almost affectionate.
The girl groans again, then shoves herself to her feet, wincing. "I'm fine. My ribs broke my fall." She coughs, then spits a bit of dust out, holding her broken heel up. "Alas, poor Muerto." The silvery spindle broke off at an odd angle, but Kenzi doesn't seem to be having too much trouble balancing without the heel, at the moment, most of the weight on her other leg. "So... Gramps is getting a rope ladder... he's probably going to fall in and break a hip if we don't stop him... any idea where Lizzie Borden went?"
"She's discorporated," Sam explains, moving to stand beside Dean and offer him a hand up. "We've got to find what's anchoring her here and destroy it. Then she can move on and rest in peace." He frowns a bit, looking toward Dean. "Do you think it could be these scraps of cloth that we've been finding around here? I haven't noticed anything else that seems... likely. A dress could sure have belonged to a ghostly woman..." Well, it's not foolproof reasoning or anything, but it's at least passingly logical.
Dean reaches out for the hand, shakily getting to his feet but leaning hard on Sam, which he'll notice. Clearly, Dean was hurt. "She's off givin' somebody forty whacks," he comments, in a casual enough way, although there's a strain to his voice reflecting his pain. It must have turned his ankle to fall, or something like that. "So there's a dress...is there a body we can do anything about? Uh, Kenzi, you wanna grab Gramps before he takes a tumble too?"
"Or it could have been her crossdressing husband that drove her to murder." She hands the scrap of dress in her pocket to Sam, one eyebrow raised, then looks to Dean. "You want me to run... all the way back up those stairs. After I just fell down from up there?" She gestures at the hole in the ceiling, clearly peeved. "I will stand down here, and I will catch him when he falls. Maybe then he can break my other heel and I'll match." She hobbles over to grab her cellphone, muttering, then starts heading toward the stairs, cursing under her breath in Russian. "... drugoy gamburger budet takzhe vashego legkogo!"
"Well, unless we know what her name is," Sam says, "we won't be able to find her bones. Maybe we should take the fragments and get out of here, find who lived here and where they're buried..." He trails off, sighing. "Of course, with our luck, they're probably buried somewhere in the walls of this place. I dunno, Dean. We haven't got a lot to go off of, here. I should've done better research."
"Look, this place is comin' down around our ears. We might as well do a little knockin' around. The ghost was down here, right? So there's gotta be something..." Dean, still leaning on Sam with a hand on his shoulder, shines his light around again. "That's another scrap of dress, right? Maybe it's that way. That's where the ghost came from..."
He didn't want to ask Kenzi to go up the stairs, not after falling down the hole, but...it's better than Dean doing it. Dean knows, he wouldn't make it up two of them alone right now.
"Sure, send the beautiful girl off by herself in the creepy house. That always ends well. God, it's like they've never even seen a horror movie! If I die, I'm gonna haunt Dean so hard." Her steps upstairs are uneven, sounding a bit like something out of a horror movie due to her gait.
Nodding grimly, Sam says, "Great. We follow scraps of cloth and hope we find a body. I love what we do with our spare time, you know that?" Sarcasm aside, he helps Dean move that way. When they reach the scrap of cloth he pockets it along with the rest, shining his flashlight ahead to see where this new direction might lead. "But seriously, if another major part of this house gives way, we're getting the hell out of here. I'm not gonna let a house punch my ticket after all we've been through." He glances up at the sound of Kenzi hobbling around, sighs to himself, and silently renews his promise to buy the girl drinks later. She's definitely earned it.
"You're buyin'," Dean notes, as if on the same mental wavelength. Maybe he's just thinking about how good that's going to taste, to have something to dull his own pain. He can't dwell on it too long though, because pretty soon there's a demolished wall that is, for all the rest of the place's decrepit state, unique for its different construction. "Hey," Dean calls out, "looks like this shitty place falling down mighta made our work easier! You ever read that story about the Amon...til...ladillo?"
As if a ghost or some sort of monster himself, the old man pops up out of the darkness and nearly stumbles back in fright when he sees Kenzi. "Oh! Girl, you just about gave me an attack. I got your rope ladder! You okay?" He holds up the first aid kit in the other hand. "Where'd your boyfriends go?"
To her credit, Kenzi doesn't scream. She squeaks, though, taking a step back from the old man, carefully, without trying to look like she's keeping her distance. "Boyfriends? As in plural? Oh, god, no. They're..." her expression may be just sliiiightly spiteful, now. "They're together. I'm just their beard. The big one found a way into the cellar, and they're having a moment alone. You know male hormones and all. It's kind of romantic, really. Their parents would disown them if they found out, but theirs is a love that cannot be denied."
"Yeah, I know," Sam agrees, but truth be told, he's really looking forward to a beer, maybe even a couple of shots, himself. Unaware of the particular bus they're being thrown under just now, Sam nods to Dean and says, "Poe, right?" He helps Dean find a spot to lean against, and then he ducks down to examine the broken-down wall, shining his flashlight around the space to see what there might be concealed within.
The old man gives Kenzi an even look, as if unsure whether or not she's telling the truth. Ultimately, pragmatism wins out. "Yeah, sure. So who's the crazy broad in the glow-in-the-dark paint?" He passes over the kit, walking over to the room with the hole and starting to unroll the rope ladder. He's secured it on the far wall, which looks stable enough, along with the legs of a metal desk's remains.
Dean leans against the wall, shutting his eyes tight and trying not to let on as his breathing gets a little ragged for a second. "Yeah," he answers quickly. "Poe. You know what I mean?"
And it would seem that he's right, at least in a general sense: there's definitely a body behind the wall, although it's not only buried (badly), it was sealed behind this clunky wall that must have held for years...until the place started to fall down. But there's also an ominous greenish-blue glow.
The ghost won't be away much longer.
"Broseph! Get away from the hole before you fall in? Like, two people have fallen through there in the last fifteen minutes, and I don't think your Life Alert gets signal out here, okay?" Kenzi takes the first aid kit and shakes her head. "Broad in the glow-in-the-dark paint? Where did you see her?"
"Yeah, we're gonna have to dig," Sam says, and he wishes he'd brought a shovel. Fortunately, the dirt isn't hard-packed, so he can just start digging by hand. He sets the shotgun down beside him and the flashlight beside it, angling onto the grave, and starts to do just that. If he can figure out what that mysterious glow is, he'll definitely do so, but at the moment he's assuming it's probably ghostly ambiance. This ghost seems to like its ambiance.
"I'm old, I'm not blind," the old man tosses the other end of the rope ladder over the edge of the hole. "She was just down there, then she was gone." Dusting his hands off, he takes a step back and starts to collect his things again. "There. They can climb up. You want me to call an ambulance or anything?" He's a surprisingly down-to-earth person. Or maybe he's just not really that bothered about much. After hanging around an abandoned, haunted building for who knows how long, he might just have lost any concern for crazy situations.
Underground, though, the ghost is starting to take shape again. Dean purses his lips and cocks his gun, looking to make sure it's loaded, and how he likes it -- even if he doesn't have very much in the way of ammo, it's enough. They'll really have to make this count though, if she tries to attack again. "You're gonna ruin your manicure," he quips, grinning down at Sam. But digging in his jacket, he holds out his flask of lighter fluid. "Here. You got the salt, or you need some of that? I got some shells."
"Not yet, anyway. I mean, they're young and in love, but I don't think they're gonna be that vigorous... or did you mean for the fall?" Kenzi is just not going to touch the ghost question with a ten foot pole. So she'll distract the old man with gay jokes.
"I've got salt," Sam answers, scooping away dirt rapidly until the bones are all laid bare. Once that's done, he takes the flask of lighter fluid and quickly douses the remains. Pocketing the flask, he takes out a salt cartridge, opens up the end, and scatters salt all over the bones. Digging in his other pocket, he produces all those scraps of dress and tosses them in there, too. Finally, he breaks out a book of matches, glances up at Dean, and says, "Well, here goes." He strikes a match and tosses it onto the prepared remains, then reaches for his flashlight and shotgun to get clear.
Dean scrambles to help Sam, and also to lean on him. He keeps the gun on the glow as the ghost manifests, just in time to release a...sigh? It's a relieved sigh. A sigh of release, a sigh of being unfettered, at last, from this collapsing heap, surely a nightmare to be caught in the cycle of repeating emotions as if they were fresh and not knowing why, not ever being able to escape or move on.
Now, at last, she has been freed.
Dean continues to lean on Sam, hobbling along with a more practiced gait now. "Good job Sammy," he pats him on the chest, having put away his gun, carefully holding his own flashlight before stowing it in his jacket too. A holster for everything! "Let's get outta here and go get some drinks. But uh, maybe we should hit the motel and wash off the crud first."
Upstairs, the old man rolls his eyes. "I get the hint. Look, you three be careful. I'm gonna check back in the morning and if your cars are still here, I'm calling the emergency services, you got it?" He does smile a little bit, after that, and waves a hand. "Maybe if you could...make sure nobody can get in this place anymore, when you leave. That way I won't have to feel like I need to come down here every weekend and haunt it." And then, once he's gathered up his belongings, he's on his way.
"We'll be out of here by dawn, dude. Oh. And if anybody asks, we were a bunch of angry old Russian women who spoke no English, da?" Once he's gone, Kenzi picks up his first aid kit, frowning. She should probably give this back to him... But both she and Dean are pretty banged up, too. Well, it's meant to help people, so that's what she'll use it for! Limping toward the hole, she calls down, "Hey jerkfaces, make sure to get some of that fire on the baseboards, this place needs to go up like a match!"
Sam helps Dean to the ladder, making sure he's on his way up, and then calls up to Kenzi, "I'll take care of that once we're out! Help Dean up, and I'll be up right after him!" Once his brother's clear, Sam tucks away his flashlight and follows, carefully holding the shotgun so as to avoid any embarrassing rock salt accidents. Once he finally reaches the top, he flashes a weary, grimy smile and says, "But yeah, I'll second the motel idea. Kenzi can have first dibs on the shower if she wants."
Dean is pretty quick to climb the ladder, probably quicker than he would be to hobble up the stairs, even with Sam's help. Once he's up, he crawls a little distance -- safer that way anyway, given the floor's rickety state -- and finally pushes up on his better leg to limp out to meet Sam. "We, uh, may wanna hit the shower at the same time," he notes. And then, perhaps aware of how that sounds, he looks pointedly to Kenzi. "I dunno how long I can stand, and fallin' in the shower ain't exactly my idea of a crowning achievement on this evening, as thrilling as it's been." Just to head off potential comments.
Not that it will, of course.
"... Well, I'm not sure I can hold you up, but it'll be fun to try." She slips her arm under Dean's to give him a little support while walking... Plus, she's not 100% on her own feet, with the broken heel, so this should even that out. "I tend to get awfully slippery in the shower, though. You'll have to hold on tight. Both hands, even."
Sam supports Dean's other arm, and he does his best to help both of them out of that death trap of a house. Once they're all clear, he breaks out the accelerant and hits a few areas around the outside, dropping a few matches to ensure the whole place will go up. It might be a little bit excessive, considering how old the place is, but he'd much rather be safe than sorry. Then, as the flames are beginning to spread, he turns to the others and says, "Well, I'm sure we can sort out the shower situation when we get there." Not that he's going to get between those two. Dean's always the one to get (and usually lose) the girl, anyway. Looking wearily toward the Impala, he says, "Let's get the hell out of here?"