Author: Restive Nature
Genre: Crossover
Type: WiP
Shows: Dark Angel and Supernatural
Disclaimer: Neither show represented in this fiction belongs to me. Dark Angel is the product of Cameron/Eglee and Fox, whereas Supernatural is the product of Kripke and The CW. No profits are made from this fiction and it is intended for private enjoyment only.
Story Rating: PG-13 up to NC-17 for language, violence and sexual situations. (All higher rated material will be contained in its own chapter and clearly marked at the beginning of the chapter. PG versions of these chapters will also be available.)
Chapter Rating: PG-13 for language.
Timeline/ Spoilers: This story takes place predominantly in the Supernatural timeline. This means that the Dark Angel structure of post-pulse America does not fit in. The massive changes will be that Manticore is decades ahead of itself and the characters from DA are born much earlier than portrayed on the show. There is no Pulse occurring. Any other changes to the structures or episodes of the shows will be (hopefully) explained within the story itself.
Pairing: None at this time. (The pairing will become evident as the story progresses, but much further down the road.)
Summary: Change can be a choice and you never know where the road you choose to take will lead you.
A/N- Just to let people know, the bar in this chapter is made up, although the town of Biscoe does exist, just as Reed Gold Mine State Historical Site.
A/N2- This chapter is brought to you by the word SIMPLE. I know that may seem strange, but that word is the one millionth word that I have written since March of 2003. (And yes I am such a geek that I sat down and figured it out.) Of course, that includes both my fan fiction and original works. But then again, that doesn’t count everything that I wrote from 1987-2002, since none of that stuff is on my computer. Oh well, it still feels like an accomplishment for me!
When It Changes
Chapter Sixteen
Perfect People
Shorty’s Bar
Biscoe, North Carolina
“I still can’t believe those back flips,” Sam enthused as John pulled the Impala into the parking lot of the bar he was to meet his contact at. Max sighed and rolled her eyes. The demonstration that she’d participated in had been three days ago. They’d left the morning after, John having given in to all three children’s urging. All for varied reasons of course. But once they’d gotten on the road, her performance was all Sam could talk about.
At first, John and Dean had joined in, asking where Max had learned certain moves. How she’d thought to get out of a certain hold. In all, they’d been very impressed with her and her ability. They could see why Martin believed her beyond his ability to teach her anything new.
But the more Sam waxed poetic over each single movement that she’d made; they began to get tired of it as well. It was hard for them to figure out, on the surface why Sammy was all of a sudden in Max’s corner, until one took into account that he was a teenage boy. Little about him or the family was typical, but hormones seemed to be the great equalizer. So while Sam had been upset with Max for saving him from the water sprite in an undignified manner, and showing him up in front of the other kids at the seminar that he had no wish to attend in the first place; she was still his sister and he was damned proud of her.
“It was no big deal Sam,” Max sighed once again and she unlocked her car door, eager to get away from the droning annoyance that was her brother.
“Give it a rest Sam,” John warned. Sam dutifully shut his mouth. Even he knew that he’d just about pushed past the point of no return. The tension lining his family’s voices when they spoke to him was warning enough that they were tired of the subject.
But none of them quite as much as Max. Before the demonstration had begun, she’d tried to figure out how much she could get away with, while keeping certain skills and abilities to herself. She knew from her life before and from rescuing Sam that she had a preternatural speed. Thankfully it wasn’t from any dark entity possessing her, but from what she believed to be feline DNA. And when she’d displayed it before the gathering to rescue Sam, well she’d had no choice. But luckily for her, they’d collectively believed that they just hadn’t noticed where she’d run to the lake from.
Her abnormal strength, which was another thing to hide. Sure, her family knew how strong she was and she occasionally had made the pretense of working out with one of the boys, or John to create the illusion that she had some basis to the power strikes that she was capable of. But with strangers, she pulled back on the strength as much as she could. But the other things, the instinctive and deft way that she dodged attacks, she couldn’t explain. An eleven year old wasn’t supposed to have highly evolved senses yet. A simple statement to the teacher that so-and-so was telegraphing their moves was sufficient. And thank whatever Supreme Being that no one noticed her telescopic-like eyesight. Her night vision, was something she believed to be another by-product of the feline DNA
On all, it had turned out to be a nerve-wracking experience for her. She’d had so much to think about, and yet was determined to prove herself at the same time. In the end, she’d quickly knocked out a few of the shorter adults, the ones that were easier to reach, got hold of a fallen tree branch and used the weapon to take out the few remaining competitors. When Martin asked how she’d managed to knock the adults out with only one punch, she explained that there was a nerve in the face that ran underneath the jaw and a quick, sharp jab to it interrupted the blood flow, causing a temporary unconsciousness. She wasn’t about to tell him that she was able to hit hard enough that she knocked a person’s brain around their skull, which was actually how concussions happened.
And now, they were heading into the bar to meet John’s informant, who had the digs on another job in the area and to get them all some sort of refreshment. The kids found a table, towards the front wall of the building, knowing they might have to leave quickly, if John was in that sort of mood. Their father moved off to the bar, not even asking what the kids wanted to drink, since he already knew. Max sighed as her legs twitched. They’d been cooped up in the car once more and she wanted to get up and stretch her limbs a bit. But she knew that she had to stay put, unless of course she could convince Dean to walk with her. But that meant convincing Sam too, because Dean wouldn’t leave his little brother alone in a strange place when their father was preoccupied with something else, as he was now.
“What’s the matter Max?” Dean demanded, a little cranky himself. He just wanted his father to get the information and then find them a motel. He wanted a little down time to himself and if he had to lock himself in the bathroom on some pretense, he’d do it. It had annoyed him more than normally that he hadn’t been able to talk to John alone yet about what he’d noticed about Max and the other people gathered at Pastor Jim’s. He’d tried once, before they’d left, but Sam had interrupted them. And so, he’d been forced to sit in the car, listening to his brother yammer on about the one thing he didn’t feel free to discuss completely. He didn’t feel bad about that, the fact that he wanted to talk to his Dad behind her back. He was concerned about her, but knew from past experience that she’d blow him off or worse, freeze up, while that look of petrification came over her face.
All that time when he was sitting or driving, with certain thoughts whirling around his head had given Dean something of a headache. It wasn’t that he wasn’t capable of deep thought; he just preferred not to go there too often. It was almost as if he felt that he needed to save that hard thinking for when it truly mattered. He could coast through most of his life, but knew that when the situation called for it, he had to be at his sharpest. He had to be able to figure things out quickly and correctly. And knowing what was bothering Max and not being able to rectify the situation immediately, in this case, handing the problem off to John, really rankled at him.
“Too much car time,” she answered easily. Dean nodded. His little sister was never one to be able to sit still for too long. Kind of like him in a way. He liked action, but at the same time, it wasn’t like him. Sometimes there was nothing he loved more than to be in that Impala, with the roar of the engine thrumming through his body, the wind on his face, good tunes on the radio.
“Why don’t you walk around a bit,” he suggested. “Just stay in sight where someone can see you.” Max nodded and pushed back her chair. She stretched before she moved away. A few minutes after that, John caught his eldest’s attention and motioned him over. Dean hopped out of his chair and ambled over to the bar.
“Everything okay?” John demanded as he passed Dean three cans of soda.
“Just fine,” he returned. “Max is just stretching her legs.”
“All right,” John nodded once. He gestured to the man he was meeting. “We’re going to be a little bit, so you’ll have to amuse yourselves.”
“Will do sir,” Dean grinned. He glanced over at the pool table at the far end of the main area. But first, he needed to get Sam and Max’s drinks to them.
Max wandered around the bar for a few circuits. While it was a small town bar, it seemed larger than average and there was a good crowd filling it. There was plenty of seating, with tables, booths and stools at the bar. In the back corner by the restrooms, there were some arcade games. On the other side of the building there was a pool table. And it looked like they were set up for karaoke. Which was one thing that none of the Winchester’s were into. But the games could prove interesting. Max fished a quarter out of her jeans and commenced to playing a game of pushing a little chomping yellow disk around after flashing pellets with other little blobs trying to destroy her disk guy. After she got the hang of it, and realized how worn out the control was, she began to have fun with it. After that, she looked through the songs on the jukebox. It was noisy enough in the bar, that she didn’t think that added music was needed, so she just perused the selections. Finally, she wandered back to the table they’d chosen. She noted that John was still talking with his friend, both of them having moved off to a booth to get some privacy, but Sammy was alone at the table, nursing a cola.
“Where’s Dean?” she asked as she sat. Sam pushed her cola over to her and she popped the top and took a long swig.
“He’s over there hustling,” Sam gestured with a sharp jerk of his head. Max glanced in the direction that Sam indicated, to see a small crowd gathered around the pool table. Dean was there and funny enough, some guy was placing a small amount of cash in his hand. Max concentrated enough to be able to pick Dean’s crowing approval out of the rest of the crowd.
“He bet on his pool game?” she wondered aloud. Sam nodded, even though she hadn’t meant to say it aloud. She turned to her brother. “Why?”
Sam let a disbelieving smirk grace his face. “We gotta make money somehow Max. Or did you think it grew on trees?” Max didn’t bother to reply, except for a soft smack on his shoulder. Sam sighed, wishing he’d brought a book inside with him. He knew he could always go get one, but he didn’t feel like letting Dad or Dean know where he was going. “At least he’s winning this time.”
“Do we really need money that badly?” Max asked hesitantly. Again Sam looked surprised at her. But seeing that she was serious, he let go of the indignant snarky remark he was going to make.
“I don’t think we’re bad off,” he admitted. “But we’re about out of Dad’s last paycheck from the garage.” Max nodded slowly. Of course that made sense. However, even though John, Dean and Sam never shared this with her, she was well aware of John’s credit card fraud. Really, how many times could you see a man pull out a card and give someone a fake name without figuring that something was going on? She just had no idea that they worked other ways of making a little cash.
“Do you ever…?” she asked the open ended question, but gestured towards the pool table. Sammy shook his head.
“Dad won’t let me,” he admitted. “He only let Dean start a few years ago when Dean beat him at a game of pool. Boy, that pissed Dad off,” he chuckled at the vague memory. Max cocked her head to the side. “Dad hates to lose,” he expanded. Max grinned and nodded. From what she’d seen that was an understatement.
“But if you don’t play pool, can’t you do something else?” Max wanted to know.
“Like what?” Sam demanded. Max thought for a moment.
“Well, there’s gotta be something you could do that you could make some money off of,” she offered helplessly.
“Yeah well,” Sam shrugged petulantly, “if there is, then I’m sure you’ll be the genius that figures it out.”
Max stared at him, lips slightly parted as his words clicked in his brain. She was a genius, among other Manticore given traits. And some of those things, truths that she’d hidden away were awe worthy, weren’t they? Suddenly she lunged forward, wrapping her arms around Sam’s neck. “Great idea Sammy.” She let him loose and stood, grabbing at his arm. “Come on.”
Sam jerked forward and just managed to snag his pop as Max dragged him from his chair. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
They didn’t go far. Just up to the bar, where Max caught the bartender’s attention. He ambled over, a soft smile on his face. He obviously didn’t mind kids in his bar, as long as an adult was with them, which John had indicated to him that he was, by checking on them every ten minutes or so while he’d stood at the bar. “What can I get you kids? Another pop?”
“No thank you,” Max refused with a sparkling smile. “Actually, I need your help sir.”
The bartender, intrigued, leaned forward, resting his forearms on the varnished wood surface of the bar. “And what help would that be?”
“Well,” Max drawled sweetly. “My brother and I were having a disagreement.” She gestured to Sam who smiled sickly, unsure where Max was heading with this. “And I wondered if we could use your phone to settle it?”
“My phone?” The bartender, Jack by name, was not at all certain what the phone would prove. Max nodded enthusiastically.
“Yeah,” Max grinned. “See, Sammy said that there was no way that I could tell what number is punched into a phone just by listening to the beep tones. We even bet five bucks.”
Suddenly, the old-timer that was seated to Max’s immediate left, who had been avidly listening in, let out a bark of laughter, “That’s a sure bet little missy,” he chuckled, swiveling around to eye her and Sammy. “My old lady used to be able to do that.” He glanced up at the bartender. “Had to be careful who I was callin’, you know what I mean.” He ended his outrageous statement with a wink.
“Yeah,” Max nodded, but her entire stance, head up straight, shoulders back, and hands on hips and feet firmly planted, screamed confidence. “But I can do it on speed dial!” Three sets of eyes and more widened on that announcement.
“Pshaw,” the older man grunted, waving a hand dismissively. “No one can do that.”
“I can,” Max stated emphatically. She turned back to the bartender. “Sammy doesn’t believe me either. That was why I wanted to use your phone.”
Someone a little further along down the line of bar stools leaned forward to call out, “I’d pay to see that. I’ll take your bet little girl!” That started off a slew of bets, with not one single person backing Max. The bartender was hesitant though. Jack didn’t mind friendly wagers going on in his bar. But there was no way he was going to let a little girl like this get bilked because she was trying to show off.
“Hey guys,” he called out, garnering the group’s attention. “I don’t think this little girl can back that many bets.” A glance at Sam’s panicked eyes confirmed this thought. There was quiet for a moment and then someone called out.
“Hey, how about she does it, we pay up, she doesn’t, and then she’s gotta sing us a song off that damn boob tube thing-a-ma-jig?”
Jack let out a smile. No matter how many times he’d told Clint that it was a karaoke machine, the guy just refused to get it straight. He turned to Max. “How about it?”
Max looked thoughtful for a moment. “Well, I can’t promise that I sing real well, but okay!” There were a few cheers. They made room for Max and Sam to sit down and Jack pulled out the telephone. There were some suggestions about hiding the phone so that she couldn’t see Jack punching in a number, but he just waved that suggestion away. He was already planning on using one of the preset speed dial numbers.
He glanced at Max and held his finger poised over the telephone pad. “You ready?” Max nodded. Jack punched the Speed dial key and then let his finger fall randomly. It ended up hitting the seven, which turned out to be one of his brewery suppliers. And one of the employees, of said company happened to be sitting at the bar, happily getting in on the action.
The beeps played loudly, especially since the group seemed to be holding their collective breaths. Max eyes darted upwards once and then she confidently reeled off the eleven digit number, since the phone automatically dialed in the area code, since the suppliers were in a different city. And as Jack expected, Aaron Bedford leaned forward.
“Hey!” he called out. “That’s my number!” And sure enough, as soon as he’d said that, a pre-recorded message came over the line, since it was long past closing time. Jack put the telephone back in its receiver.
“I’ll be damned,” he whistled. “That was amazing.” But even as he said it, he moved down the line, collecting Max’s money for her. He was back swiftly and set the money into Max’s waiting hand, but not before pulling a fin from his own pocket. “Can you do other stuff like that?”
“Stuff like what?” came another voice.
*****
Dean was very happy to get away from the others, albeit for only a little while. He’d wandered over to the pool table and slapped down a couple quarters. The universal sign of asking for the next game. “I’ll play winner,” he offered to the two guys that were finishing their game. They glanced at each other, shrugged and accepted. Dean let one friendly game go on, continuing the winner plays next comer. He won, as he’d expected to.
Once he’d beaten his own father at this game, Dean had begun to hone his talent on the pool table whenever he had the chance. For some reason, the particularly tricky shots that stumped other players were easy as pie for him. And just to show off a bit, he fooled around with some trick shots, which suitably impressed the crowd around the table.
It was one such trick, the pool cue, behind his back and one arm over his shoulders, that brought out the disbelievers. Just like he’d been hoping it would. There were whistles and cat-calls as he began to line up the shot. And finally, while he played out the waiting game, someone called out that he would never make the shot. He pulled back and searched out the naysayer. His smirk almost did all the work for him and soon a small wager was set. And just as he’d planned, his pool cue flew gently towards the intended target, the cue ball. It neatly jumped the striped ball in its way to spin nicely against his ball, poised at the edge of the corner pocket. That same spin moved the cue ball around, keeping it from sinking as well, which would have lost him his turn.
There was applause and Dean happily collected the small sum. And that was the beginning of his betting streak. He loved small town barflies that had nothing better to do on a Wednesday night, than bet on a stranger’s pool playing abilities. He was glad to see that they recognized that he was hustling them a little. He took some good-natured ribbing about it. But they were just drunk enough, most of them, to piss their money away for the fun of it. But when he hit upwards of two hundred dollars, he figured he better get while the going was good. There was a fine line between friendly betting and a mob attack. Just to show he was a good guy, he offered to pay for a round of drinks to his new found friends. They happily accepted and moved towards the bar to give Jack their drink orders.
Dean followed after them, just in time to see Max collecting some money from the bartender. He thought at first that she was getting change, but the sum was too much for what she should have had in her pockets.
“Can you do other stuff like that?” the bartender asked, ignoring the customers for a moment.
“Stuff like what?” he asked. Sam whirled around, his eyes panicked and Dean knew immediately that they were up to something. Judging by the kid’s reaction, Dean knew that Sam probably figured it was lecture worthy. But the bartender saved either child from answering.
“Your little sister can tell phone numbers by the beep tones,” he told Dean with a smile.
Dean rolled his eyes. “So?”
“On speed dial,” he amended.
“Yeah, right!” Dean scoffed. He ignored the bartender for a moment, counting out his money.
“No Dean,” Sam interjected. “She really can.”
Dean glanced at Sam and then around at the rest of the group gathered around them. Most were wearing shit-eating grins and he knew, he just knew that there was something rotten in Denmark. He just had to figure out what. He nudged Max in the shoulder. “Is that true? I mean, you may be a genius, but nobody can do that.”
“There’s one way to find out,” Max replied evasively.
“And what’s that?” Dean was amused. Max held her hand up, rubbing her thumb against her fingertips, the universal sign for money. Dean held her gaze for a moment, and then slowly pulled a ten from his little wad of cash. He laid it on the bar and pushed it forward. The moment his finger left the cash, there were more whoops and hollers. One grizzled old man, seated on Max’s left was the loudest.
“I reckon’ she must be a genius,” he told no on in general. “Cause he shore don’t got no brains. They all went to her.” There was some laughing agreement and Jack brought the phone a little closer. This time he knew which number he’d choose. He waited until Max was ready, then hit Speed Dial one. While the phone rang, Max recited the number, even though it was only seven digits.
The crowd waited, some of the regular patrons, friends of the bartender knew exactly whom he was dialing. Once the phone picked up, it was obvious to everyone else what was going on.
“Hey Jack,” a woman greeted cheerfully. “Everything okay?”
“Just fine sweetie,” Jack’s smiling face softened. He glanced up at Dean and mouthed the words ‘my wife’ and Dean nodded mechanically. “Honey, we have a bet going on and I need you to give us our telephone number.”
“Our telephone number?” the woman sounded puzzled but amused. “Why can’t you say it?”
“Because I don’t want to be seen as biased,” Jack answered easily.
“Okay,” she drawled. “It’s 555-6849.” There was a pause as the crowd gathered around laughed loudly. Dean’s jaw dropped and he gaped at his little sister. She snatched his money from the bar and quickly shoved it into her pocket. “Jack? Jack?”
“I’m here darlin’,” he answered through his own laughter.
“You didn’t lose did you?”
“Only five dollars,” he confessed. “But I’ve got to go. I’ve got drinks to get. I’ll tell you about it when I get home.” He turned his back to the crowd and quickly finished the call.
“How did you do that?” Dean demanded finally.
Max simply smiled a Cheshire cat grin and rolled the money up that she’d collected. With relish, she slipped it into her jean pocket.
“I still wanna know what else she can do,” the old man interjected. “You said she was a genius. What else?”
“She’s really good at gymnastics,” Sam spoke up finally, pride over his little sister shining through. “And she’s good at math.”
“You are too Sam,” Max added, not wanting Sam to get on another jealousy streak, even though he was the one currently enumerating her selling points.
“Oh?” the guy asked. “Are you like, what do ya call them… idiot savants?” He glanced at Dean’s suddenly dark glare. “Oh settle down youngin’. I didn’t mean it like that.”
Max chuckled. “Not an idiot, no,” she explained. “Savants work more with patterns and facts. Some of them can multiply large numbers in their heads, I think. I can do that.”
“Oh really?” Jack asked, as he finished passing out the last beer. He turned to Dean. “$22.50.” Dean pulled out a couple twenties and handed them over. Jack busied himself counting out the change, but kept talking. “Can you do square roots and that type of stuff?”
“Sure can,” Max shrugged. Jack turned back and counted out the change for Dean and happily accepted the dollar tip back.
“Okay, let’s see,” Jack crossed both arms and legs as he leaned back against his counter as he thought out a problem for the girl. “What’s the square root of 36000?”
Slowly Max let the grin widen on her face. “What’s it worth to you?” she asked smartly.
Jack flashed a grin and thought it over for a moment. “I’ll buy you another round of drinks, you and your brothers.”
“189.73665961010275991993361266596…” Max reeled off. Jack started in surprise and then scrambled for the little calculator that he kept beside his till for figuring large sums.
“Hang on, hang on,” he groused. Max dutifully waited until he’d found the square root. She repeated the digits again.
“Would you like me to go on?” she asked after a pause. Jack, shocked looked up and shook his head. He held up the calculator.
“Mine doesn’t even go that far up the decimal point,” he announced incredulously. “Damn!” He dropped the calculator onto the bar, where it was swiftly grabbed for by several hands. There were more whistles and exclamations. Jack turned back with three more pops and passed them over to the kids.
“I’m Bogey, by the way,” the gnarled old man sitting to Max’s left introduced himself suddenly. He held out his hand for Max to shake, and then turned to Dean and Sam. Dean introduced himself and his siblings, giving first names only as was his family’s nature to do. “So what else can you do, little gal?”
“She’s an amazing hide and seek player,” Dean chuckled, throwing Max an amused glance. Max blushed and ducked her head, knowing that she’d never live down ending up on the roof, in what was, to her brothers, a simple child’s game.
“And you should have seen her one time,” Sam interjected. “She was doing a handstand up on the monkey bars for like, ever.” Bogey turned a steady eye to the girl and she shrugged.
“I have really good balance,” she remarked flippantly. But suddenly, all this attention that was now coming her way was starting to unnerve her. She didn’t know what she was thinking, allowing herself to show off as she had been doing. All it took was one chance remark about that strange girl, about eleven years old who was a mathematical genius, amazing with gymnastics, could do thing no other human could and Manticore would be all over her ass. She bit her lip, wondering how she could gracefully get out of this situation she got herself into.
“I believe that,” Bogey remarked humorously. “I seen kids that do some damn scary stuff. Mostly 'cause they don’t know better than to be afraid,” he added in Dean’s direction. Dean simply nodded. “So little gal, you ever play cards?”
“Dean taught me how to play poker,” she answered honestly. She didn’t see the harm in admitting that. Bogey let out another bark of laughter.
“She any good?” he asked the eldest boy. Dean glanced away, running one hand through his hair.
“Beat the hell out of me,” he admitted softly, with wry amusement.
“I’m sure she did,” Bogey nodded. He turned back to Max. “You ever play cribbage?” Max shook her head no. “I’ll teach ya, if ya want to sit a spell?” Max glanced at Dean but he had no problem with it other than the obvious.
“We might have to get going soon,” he explained, gesturing at their father. John was still speaking with his friend, but his eyes were on the kids at the bar. Dean knew there was no way all the commotion wouldn’t have attracted his father’s attention. He felt it was a mark of John’s belief in him to protect Sam and Max since he hadn’t come storming over to demand what was going on.
“Surely you’re gonna eat before you go?” Bogey demanded. He could see the kid’s hesitation. “Tell you what, my treat!”
The hesitancy turned into full-blown refusal right there. “We couldn’t let you do that,” Max protested. But Bogey was shaking his grizzled old head.
“Little girl, I got nothing to do and nobody to spend my money on,” he explained in a matter of fact way. “I end up most nights down at this bar drinkin’ the night away, tellin’ the same ol’ stories to the same pack of bums. Tonight I want to do something different. Nothin’ sinister. Just buy your family dinner and play some cards. Whaddya say?”
The three children glanced at one another. It wasn’t so much what Bogey had said, but the emotion behind those words. At his explanation, they could very clearly see that he was exactly as he said he was. An old, retired bar fly. It wasn’t like he was trying to get Max off on her lonesome to try unspeakable things with her. Dean and Sam were right there. Finally Dean took the decision from his sister’s hand.
“Max, go ask Dad,” he instructed. She nodded and slipped from her stool. Dean intended to get this dealt with quickly.
Max swept up to the tabled booth where her father was sitting. Politely, she waited for the men to finish speaking and as soon as they did, John swiveled his head to look at her, silently asking what she needed.
“Dad?” she began hesitantly. She didn’t know how upset John would be that a stranger wanted to buy them a meal. Normally John didn’t let the kids talk much to strangers. “That guy over at the bar, Bogey, he wants to buy us supper. And he wants to teach me how to play cribbage.” She waited for John to tilt his head back so he could take in the gnarled retiree who politely waved and nodded his head once in their direction.
“Old Bogey?” John’s friend asked in disbelief.
“You know him?” John asked softly. The guy nodded his head.
“Everybody does,” the man shrugged. “Poor guy lost his wife and his son in a car wreck a few years back. He got kind of quiet then. Ends up in the bar most hours of the day now.” The guy contemplated Max, and then turned back to John. “It’s kind of nice to see him enjoying himself. As I recall, he and my dad and some other guys used to play cards once a week.” He turned and appraised John’s concern with one discerning glance. “He won’t hurt the kids John and they’d be doing him more of a favor by eating with him than the other way around.”
John must have agreed with that assessment, because he gave Max permission.
“Did you want anything sir?” she asked carefully. John shook his head and sent her back to the bar, excused himself and followed after his daughter. He waited until Max was seated again before stepping into the cluster of his children.
“Can I get two more beers please,” he motioned to Jack, who nodded. And then John turned to the old man. He held out his hand. “John Winchester. I see you’ve met my kids.”
“Shore have,” Bogey held out his own hand and introduced himself. “Bogey Jenkins is what people call me.” He pulled his hand back and gestured at the bar. “So are we looking at some menus or what?” John smiled enigmatically.
“If you’re sure you don’t mind.” Bogey didn’t even dignify that with a response, other than to pull the slim sheaf of paper from its position between the napkin holder and the salt and pepper shakers. He passed them on down to the kids and glanced up at John.
“What’ll you have?” he demanded, but John shook his head.
“I’m fine,” he offered, and then collected his beer from Jack. He slid the money over and waited for change. He was waiting for Bogey to argue with him, but the old man stayed silent.
John collected both his change and his drinks, smiled at the kids and headed back to his seat. The kids seemed to breathe a collective sigh of relief and turned their attention to the menu. All three of them knew enough about manners that it would be insulting to Bogey to order the cheapest thing available. But neither did they want to order the most expensive, either. While they were thinking things over, Bogey leaned over to them.
“Order your Daddy something too,” he instructed. “You’ll know best what he likes.” He winked up at Dean. “Can’t complain much if it’s a done deal, right?”
Dean grinned. This guy obviously didn’t know his father. But what the heck. “No sir, he sure can’t.”
After a few minutes decision, they gave their orders to Jack, including a burger platter for John. Bogey ordered for himself and instructed Jack to get something for Little Joey Jr., the man that John was conversing with. Jack grinned and wrote the order down before sending it back to Luann, his short order cook.
“And wrassle up that cribbage board and some cards,” Bogey ordered. Jack just shook his head, pleased to see the old man doing something fun for once.
The kids and Bogey enjoyed themselves. Dean could vaguely remember the game, having seen his father and a few old Marine buddies play it before a few times, when he was small. It wasn’t hard to catch on to and after Bogey and Max played a few practice rounds, the game was on. After twenty minutes play, Jack brought their food out, and then swept over to John and Joe’s table with their order. Bogey turned as it was delivered and gave them a wide smile. John gave an exaggerated, resigned smile and saluted the older man with his beer. The two dug into their food with relish, just as the kids had done. In all it was a pleasant evening.
*****
“Good night!” Max called as the Winchester clan swept out the doors, near ten o’clock. The patrons who were still there yelled back and waved goodbye. It really made their evening such an entertaining one, to have new people to talk to, interesting deeds to brag on and relief that one of their own company was brought out of his gruff heartbroken world for at least an evening. Whether the Winchester’s knew it or not, the people in Shorty’s Bar really appreciated these strangers who did so little, but garnered so much from one pit stop layover in a little town.
“So what’s the scoop Dad?” Dean asked once everybody was in the Impala.
“Reed’s Mine,” he began immediately. “We’re gonna have to be careful since it’s a state historical site.”
Dean nodded. “Park rangers and stuff?”
“I suppose,” John replied. “There’ve been three suspicious deaths there in the last month. From what Joe said, they’d just unearthed an old mine shaft that no one knew about before.” He pulled the car out onto the street, heading towards the motel that Joe indicated should still have vacancies. “According to the police report, some boys were on a tour with their parents. Everyone admits that the boys were horsing around and fighting. Older boy got pushed too hard and was knocked back through some rotted up boarding and fell to his death in this unknown shaft.”
“So where’s the catch?” Max asked, listening just as avidly as Sam was.
“The younger boy swears up and down that he didn’t push his brother,” John declared. “And the mother doesn’t remember seeing him push her other son at that exact moment. Of course the kid is young enough; the police don’t think he was able to push his brother hard enough to cause the accident. So they ruled it an accidental fall.” The three children nodded.
“What else?” Dean asked. His father had mentioned three deaths.
“Second death happened a few days after the first,” John continued. “There was a surveying team out, to look over this new mine shaft. They were checking out the stress levels of the shaft supports and cataloging the dimensions, to see if they could send a team down there. Again, a man fell to his death. But everyone swore up and down that he wasn’t pushed by any of them. No one was near him when it happened.”
“What was he doing when he fell?” Dean asked. They needed as many details as they could get to solve these types of things.
“No one is sure,” John murmured. “The guy closest to him thought he heard him mutter something about gold in the new mine area.”
“What about the third death?” Max wanted to know. She was already formulating theories about this, but wanted more information before she blurted it out.
“Pretty much the same thing,” John informed her. “Only this time it was the actual surveyors that went down into the shaft. “One of them came up saying that there was a vein of gold in the mine that could be tapped. According to eyewitnesses, he was going on and on about what he could buy if he was the one to tap the gold, no matter that the mine is on state land. The next thing they knew, the guy was yanked backwards and straight down the hole.”
“So obviously we’ve got the mine in common and two mentions of gold,” Dean surmised.
“Uh uh,” Max muttered. Both John and Dean turned to see her face, although John of course used the rearview mirror.
“Whatcha thinking Maxie?” Dean smiled.
“I don’t think it was gold, because the kids couldn’t have known about it,” she thought out loud. “I’m thinking it was more about greed.”
“How’d you arrive at that?” John asked softly. He didn’t mind Max having a different opinion about these cases. For some reason, her reasoning usually turned out to be right on the money.
“You know how kids are,” she began with a deprecating grin. “And they were on a tour of a historical site. Is there like a gift shop or something there?”
Dean took the information on the area that his father had in a file folder and looked. “Yup,” he confirmed. “Of course there is. Always gotta be someone bilking people out of their hard earned cash.” He tossed a grin at his father, knowing what a cheeky little bugger he could be, since he’d been the one doing the bilking just a few hours ago.
“So it’s my guess that the boys parents probably bought them something,” Max continued to theorize, “and the boys were arguing over what they got, or the older boy wanted something the younger boy had.”
“Or maybe the younger brother was able to buy something himself and his older brother couldn’t and he was trying to get his younger brother to share,” Sam offered.
“Both of those would make sense,” John interjected. “We’ll maybe have to interview the kid and see if we can find out what they were arguing about. It’ll be better if you kids do that.” He glanced up at a street sign, and then turned the corner. “Let’s leave it for now, since we’ll be at the motel soon.” There was silence for a few minutes. “Did you kids enjoy yourselves tonight?” he asked curiously. At once there was a babble of voices, all telling John about what they did. He laughed heartily, unable to separate one voice out of the three and so let the words wash over them. Pretty soon they’d quiet down and he could question them individually. He really was interested in learning how much Dean had won at pool and what exactly Max had done to win money.
“Hey!” Sammy burst out suddenly, turning to Max. “I was going to ask you. Why didn’t you win that last game of crib?”
“What do you mean?” Max murmured evasively. “I just lost.”
“But you shouldn’t have,” Sam protested. He stared hard at his sister, who had ducked her head. “I looked at the cards you threw away Max,” he told her. “If you’d have kept them, you would have won.”
“I know,” she finally admitted.
“So why’d you throw them?” Sam demanded. Max shrugged helplessly. Sammy had that look on his face. Like a dog with a bone, he wanted answers. And it was amazing how much he looked like John right then.
“Oh fine!” she gave in disgustedly. “I lost because people don’t like other people who are perfect!”
“Huh?” Sam was mystified. John chuckled. He had understood immediately.
“I think what she’s trying to say Sam is that people are always envious over others who seem to have everything. You know the type. They’re rich and good-looking and have everything that everybody else wants. People get jealous of that and end up hating that person.”
“And usually it’s that rich good-looking person that’s the most miserable of all,” Dean added wryly. Sam and Max nodded along with their older brother.
“So you didn’t want Bogey to hate you?” Sam asked of his sister. She shrugged again.
“Well, I didn’t think he’d hate me if I won a hand of cribbage,” she sighed. “I just thought, you know, he was having so much fun playing…”
“You did a good thing sweetie,” John complimented. “Joe was telling me a little bit about him. Seems he’s turning into a bit of a recluse. He needed to do something fun and you let him do that by playing cards with him. He’s probably sitting there recounting every single hand he had with all of his buddies.”
“Probably,” Max smiled. She turned back to Sam. “See, I’m not perfect.”
“Oh I know that!” he crowed. “You snore!”
“I do not!” Max screeched indignantly. “It’s Dean that snores!”
“Don’t drag me into this,” their older brother warned playfully. “Or I’ll show you what a perfect ass-whooping I can give.”
“Yeah right!” Max sneered. “If anyone is perfect at that, it’s me!”
“’Kay fine!” Dean huffed, recalling his little sister’s prowess in that arena. “I’ll give you that. But I am the perfect male specimen.” He turned to present them with his profile. With a silly accent he continued on, defusing the fight with humor. “Note ze classic lines of mah perfect nose, and ze- OW!”
Sam and Max giggled as Sam had grabbed Dean’s proffered nose, jerking hard on it. Sam turned to his sister. “Doesn’t look so perfect now, does it?” She could only shake her head.
“Why you little shit!” Dean thundered as he turned in his seat to make a grab for his brother. The pair in the back was laughing so hard as Dean’s hand groped for a part of Sam to grab and yank in retaliation. Sam was weakly fending of those hands with ineffectual slaps and Max joined in when Dean’s hand accidentally grazed her shoulder. The fight swiftly decimated into a tickle fight, but when John had to duck his head to avoid a flying elbow, he put an end to it.
Two minutes worth of yelling didn’t have much effect, other than to get them to quit. But all three children were sitting with gleaming eyes, ready to begin again as soon as they got to the motel.
“You three are perfect all right,” John muttered under his breath. “Perfect jackasses.” The solitary comment, meant to be overheard, was and brought with it fresh new peals of laughter.
Chapter Seventeen
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