Katherine showed up to Charlie's house looking worse for wear. She barely had time to half-change into fresh clothes before she collapsed onto his bed and fell asleep. Charlie, needless to say, was shocked to find her in his house, let alone see her without announcement.

Not that he minded. He liked surprises.

He climbed into bed beside her and pulled her close. That's when she woke up with a sharp gasp, cold fingers gripping his wrist and squeezing as she pushed his hand away.

"Ow!"

"Charlie?" She pants. She sounds congested. Blue eyes are wide with terror, and an ugly bruise splotches across her temple.

"I'm sorry," he whispers.

"No—no, no—" she presses the heels of her palms into her eyes and a sniffs. "I'm sorry."

"Can I hug you now?"

A small sob wracks her chest, and hot hands reach for him. "I'm sorry," she whispers again.

"You're fine," Charlie murmurs, nosing her blonde hair. "You just...have kung-fu grip...nothin' new." He exhales, closing his eyes. Then his brows furrow, and he holds her a little tighter. "Jesus, Kit, you're burning up."

"It's freezing in here," she sniffs, burrowing into his chest.

"Are you sick?"

"I think so." She sighs. "I fell into a freezing river." Charlie frowns. 

"Why were you by a freezing river? It was, like, sixty-five the whole time you were in Texas."

She sniffs again. "We were in Wisconsin, too...all over the Midwest."

"You drove all over Middle America?"

Katherine exhales through pursed lips and scoots away from him. Her head hurts from the sunlight streaming through the crack in the curtains. The room feels like it's spinning. And she's tired.

"Did you find him? Sam?"

"Yeah," Katherine murmurs, sitting up on her elbows. "Yeah, we found him."

Charlie gnaws on the corner of his mouth. "So you were with his brother for two weeks," he begins. Instantly, his face turns into a wince. Not the must subtle, Taylor.

"Basically," Katherine hums, tightly crossing her arms, resting her head back on the pillows. "Nothing happened, Charlie. He's a dick."

"Yeah, well...you fell in love with him for some reason, right?"

"Yeah," she sighs. "I guess so."

Charlie looks at her with hard eyes. "What happened to your head, Katherine?"

She makes a whiney face. "Can we please talk about it later?" She whispers. 

"Have you at least been to the doctor—"

"I am a doctor," Katherine huffs, snuggling into the comforter more. "I am concussed, I am running a fever, and I probably have the flu." She opens one eye. Charlie sighs, burrowing down with her.

"Fine."

"Fine," she hums.

"If you're gonna be here, you're gonna give me the flu, too," he grunts, sticking his face in her neck. She yelps from the chill of his nose. "I ain't goin to work." Katherine laughs.

But neither of them sleep. Her eyes are burning behind her closed lids, and it's nice to lay in silence, but her brain won't turn off. She's suddenly very uncomfortable...like her skin is too tight and she's too hot and too cold at the same time. 

Charlie grimaces. "Your breathing—"

"How do I breathe?"

"Just...in and out, over and over again? It's not your fault." He squeezes her a little. A small smile twitches at the corner of Katherine's mouth. "Do you want some soup?"

She sniffs. "I think that would be nice."

He picks her up with minimal struggle and somehow navigates the corners of his house with her limbs wrapped all around him. He sets her on the sofa and tucks her into a blanket before going off into the kitchen. 

She's long asleep by the time he returns. So he sits beside her, turns on the television, and eats the soup.

She was out for a full twenty four hours before she opened her eyes again, just as disoriented as when he walked through the door. In her mind, only a few hours have lapsed. He's wearing a dark t-shirt and sweats, watching a movie, and eating a sandwich that undoubtedly has doritos in it.

"Oh, good, you're not dead," he chirps.

Katherine sits up on her elbow, squinting at the bright TV in the dark living room. "What time is it?"

"Seven."

She huffs and drops back down to the sofa before stretching. She's then reminded—painfully—of her stitches, and whimpers before slowly curling into herself. Charlie's dark eyes watch her in silence. They bug as she pulls her shirt to the side, and he sees an angry welt on her shoulder.

"The hell is that?" He sets his plate to the side and leans over to her.

"Don't touch it with your Dorito fingers," she scolds. Charlie frowns at her.

"Why do you have stitches?"

Katherine scoots up against the back of the sofa and stare blankly at the television. Rip off the bandaid. "I got shot."

Charlie, with skin on fire, can only blink at her. 

"I promised I'd tell you the truth," she continues in a murmur.  He still says nothing. "But...Charlie, I haven't told anyone what I'm about to tell you...not even Sophia." 

"Why?" He whispers.

"Because..." Why? "Because people could get hurt...and people don't always handle it the way you want them to."

Charlie is quiet for another few moments, his brain spinning as he tries to figure out what she's saying. What could be that bad? "What if I don't react the way you want me to?" He finds himself asking. He reaches for the remote and turns off the TV. They're sitting in complete darkness. 

"Then at least you know," Katherine murmurs. "I think I'd almost prefer it that way...then you wouldn't get hurt because of me." She smiles a little at him, but it's a half-hearted, sad thing. 

Katherine reaches underneath her shirt and produces a thin silver chain with a small pendant hanging from it. Wordlessly, she extends it to Charlie, and he analyzes it. 

It's a pentagram, and the rays around it are like that of a blistering sun.

Charlie's brow furrows. "You're...a satanist." It was defintely the last thing on his mind. She knew every hymn, every bible passage...for shit's sake, just the other week, they were talking about Catholic guilt and sex! It doesn't make sense. He raises a brow at Katherine, who just stares. "How were you able to walk into church?"

Katherine laughs loudly, clutching her belly. "I'm not—" She chokes. "I'm not a satanist, Charlie. It's protection."

"From...what?"

"From demons." Charlie looks up to her from the pendant, bewilderment widening his eyes. "Charlie...this is going to sound nuts, and I guess I understand if you never want to see me again, but...I need you to listen to everything I'm about to tell you."

And he does.

Ghosts are real—he knew that. His grandmother was one of the most spiritual people he's met. And maybe, too, he knew about demons...but vampires, werewolves, wraiths, ghouls...

She told him about what happened at the bank in Milwaukee with the Winchesters...Sam's possession, the bruise on her head, the stitches in her shoulder. 

And then he made her more soup.

✕

The sound of Dean's smacking lips are definitely not something to listen to when you're trying to research. It's distracting, and it's especially annoying when he's trying to be annoying, which he's very good at.

Katherine lets out a quiet sigh and sets her open book on her face, crossing her arms and ankles. Sam pinches his nose, first glancing to a passive Katherine Louise and then a very noisy Dean. "Dude," he says. "You mind not eating those on my bed?"

"Naw," Dean says, shaking his head, and drops a few more chili cheese fries into his mouth. "I don't mind. How's the research going?"

"You wanna know how it's going?" Sam snaps his book shut. "Slow. You know how it would go a a heck of a lot faster? If I had my computer." Katherine sucks in a deep breath, ignoring the stinging in her ribs, and her foot moves to the sound of James Gang playing through the radio. Music is a good distractor, right? She's been using it all week, since she can't pick up the phone to talk to Charlie without being picked on by Dean. Sam, however, doesn't appreciate the choice of music.

"Can you turn that down?"

"Oh, absolutely."

Katherine shakes her head as Dean turns the volume up. "Do you have to be an ass?" She questions, dropping the protective pendant to her chest.

"I have a nice ass?" Dean asks. Katherine lunges, switching the radio off, and he rolls his eyes.

"I'm going to knock your skulls together," she threatens, glancing between the Winchesters.

"Maybe Dean should just go somewhere and I could do my work," Sam quips.

"I would love to go somewhere," Dean says. "Unfortunately, my car's all screwed to hell."

"Dean, I told you, I had nothing to do with that!"

The brothers look to Katherine.

"Neither of you are touching my car," she says, holding a hand up. "After everything that's happened this week—" her phone starts ringing. "Oh, sweet relief," she sighs, turning on her toes to snatch her cell up.

"Yeah," Dean grunts. "Lover boy just can't seem to stop callin' you—"

"Shut up," she snaps, holding her phone to her ear.

"Hi," Charlie says after a moment.

"Not you," Katherine grumbles, shutting the hotel room door behind her. She leans against the wall with a sigh. "Sam and Dean are driving me nuts. Like, to the point of murder." Charlie laughs quietly. "Okay, maybe not murder, but if you know where I can get my hands on some chloroform, that would make my life ten times easier. Why did you let me go with them?" She glances up as a familiar figure appears around the corner. "Oh, Bobby," she sighs, hurrying forward. "Bobby, Bobby, Bobby, you are a wonderful sight," she greets, wrapping her arms around Bobby Singer. He laughs.

"Good to see you too, kid."

"Hey, Charlie?" She asks, leading Bobby down the hall. "I really hate to do this to you, but—"

"You're on a hunt," Charlie says. "No, I get it. It's fine."

She winces. "Call you when I can?"

"Yeah, of course. Stay safe."

Katherine smiles. "I love you too," she says, and hangs up. Bobby raises his brows at her. "What?"

"Who's Charlie?" He asks.

"Oh, not you too, Bobby," Katherine chuckles, opening up the boys' hotel room.

"Oh, thank God," Sam says. Bobby looks to Katherine, questioningly, and the woman shakes her head.

"Good to see you again so soon," the old man says instead, smiling at the Winchesters.

"Thanks for coming," Sam continues. Katherine leads Bobby over to the beds and pulls a chair up from the table to sit on the left side of Sam, between the two brothers. Bobby sits on the opposite mattress.

"So what didn't you want to talk about on the phone?" Bobby asks.

"The job we're working," Katherine answers in a sigh, pulling her leg up into the chair with her. "We weren't sure you'd believe us. We've never seen—or heard of—anything like this."

"Not even close," Dean interjects.

"So why don't you take it from the top?" Bobby asks. Katherine smirks, and before she can tell her unbiased version of events, Sam starts talking.

"It all started when we caught wind of an obit—a professor nosedived from a fourth-story window, only there's a campus legend that the building's haunted." Sam rubs his hands together and Bobby nods, signaling for the younger Winchester to continue. "So we posed as reporters from the local paper. Kat and I talked to a frat guy and his girlfriend, or chew toy for the week—"

"His name was Curtis," Katherine interjects.

Sam sighs. "Curtis and his girlfriend had the same lecture taught by the professor, ethics and morality. Kind of ironic—"

"Not the point of the immediate beginning," Katherine interjects.

"Right. So there's speculation that it was suicide, but it didn't make much sense. The professor had a wife and kids, his tenure...no reason for the suicide. Then the girl—"

"Jen."

"—Jen said that the building, Crawford Hall, was haunted, which Tony didn't buy. Jen told us a story about a girl who had an affair with a professor about thirty years ago. To make a long story short, the professor broke it off with the girl, and she jumped out of a window and killed herself. Nobody knows her name, but it was said that she jumped from room 669, and if you turn the 9 upside down, it's 666. It's said that now she haunts the building, and anyone who sees her doesn't live to tell the tale."

"Then how—" Dean begins. He's interrupted by Katherine's eyebrow. He huffs, and Sam continues with the story, which has been accurate thus far.

"At this point," Sam continues, not even bothering to suppress the smug smirk on his face. "We'd gotten what we needed, so Katherine and I went to the bar to find Dean. He had three shots in front of him, something called a...a purple nurple." Katherine snorts and rubs her nose, crossing her arms as she slouches down in her seat. Bobby's expression is bewildered. Katherine grins. "Dean. Was. Shitfaced. Katherine said, "Dean, we should go by the professor's office," and he put his hand over her mouth and said, "No, no, no. I can't right now, because I've got a feisty little wildcat on the hook and I'm about to—zz!—reel her in." Dean's jaw drops, looking positively appalled, and Katherine's brow knits together. "Then he introduced me as 'Major Tom,' didn't even introduce Katherine, and he said the blonde bimbo's name was Starla. She was practically vomiting in her mouth, she was so drunk—!" Katherine giggles.

"Now hold on!" Dean cries.

"What?" Sam asks.

"Come on, that's not even how it happened."

"No?" Sam crosses his arms. "So you never drank a purple nurple?"

Amused, Katherine looks at Dean. "Yeah, maybe that," he acquiesces. "But I don't say things like 'feisty little wildcat.'" Katherine nods in agreement. "And her name wasn't Starla!"

"Then what was it?" Sam asks at the same time Katherine bursts. "Oh, yes it was!" She's laughing, and then she stops, holding a hand to her ribs.

"I don't know, but she was a classy chick," Dean says, looking to Bobby. "She was a grad student—anthropology and folklore. We were talking about local ghost stories. 'My God,' she said. 'You are attractive.'" Sam and Katherine roll their eyes at the same time. "And I said thank you, but I was on a very important...case. She said, 'I'm sorry. I just can't concentrate,' and—she came onto me, Bobby." The old man has never looked more alarmed, or confused, in all the years Katherine has known him. "I mean, she just attacks, y'know? And then I just hear Katherine: 'Dean, what are you doing?'"

Katherine gawks. "I do not sound like that!" She cries.

"And, very politely, I asked her to give me just a few minutes, but Katherine being the hothead we all know her to be says, 'Dean! This is a very important investigation—'"

"I do not sound like that," she repeats, her voice more mellow, but the calmer she is when she's upset, the more dangerous it is for those around her.

"'We don't have time for your blah, blah, blah—'"

"Okay, hang on!" Katherine cries, throwing her hands up to both brothers. She stares at Bobby. "Let's set a couple things straight. For starters, I don't talk like that—"

"Katherine was drunk—" Katherine punches Dean in the arm.

"I didn't have anything to drink," she continues. "Sam and I were talking to Curtis and Jen, and when we were done, we went to go find Dean. Yes, he had three shots of purple nurples, but he wasn't any more drunk than he usually is. Anyway, Dean introduces us to Starla—both of us, and yes, her name was Starla. Like the Simpsons! And yes, she was an anthropology and whatever student."

"Folklore," Dean says, talking in the same voice he used to imitate Katherine

"Whatever. And stop talking like that!"

"That's what you sound like to me—"

Katherine groans, running her hands through her hair. "Okay," Bobby says. "What's going on with you three?"

"Nothing," Sam and Katherine chorus.

"You're bickering like an old married polygamous...few."

"No, see, with marriage, you can get divorced," Dean says, pushing hismelf up from his chair. "With him, it's like, a, uh...siamese twin."

Katherine gawks. "It's conjoined twin, you moron!"

"And Katherine's the worst," Dean calls over his shoulder, starting for the kitchenette.

"Look, they're having their usual sibling quarrel," Katherine explains to Bobby. "Tight quarters an' all that."

Bobby appraises her. "And what about you?"

"Dean can't seem to accept the fact that I took his advice a little too literally for his liking," Katherine loudly calls.

"Oh, Charles calls every five minutes—!"

"It's Charlie, and I haven't spoken to him in three days! Don't get mad because you couldn't deal with the thought of someone—"

"Guys," Sam loudly says, realizing that Bobby knows nothing about what happened over the course of the past year and a half. At least, the part about Dean and Katherine. And he's very confused.

Katherine crosses her arms.

"We figured it might be an open-and-close haunting, so we went to check it out," Sam says. "We talked to the janitor—he'd been working there for six years. He was the one who found the professor on the ground. He also said he saw the professor come upstairs with a girl. And while Katherine and I were investigating, Dean was stuffing his face with whatever was on the professor's desk —"

"I had one," Dean corrects, starting for the sofa. "Maybe two. And they were Gardettos," he pointedly says to Sam.

"He had four," Katherine monotonously drones.

"Just let me tell it!" Sam cries. "The janitor said he never saw the girl come out of the building, and he mentioned that he'd seen a lot of girls come up to his office before. And that room Jen mentioned before, 669? It wouldn't exist, because there are only four floors. We didn't find any EMF, sulfur, or cold spots. So we came back here to do some research, check out the building's history, and when I opened my computer, it was frozen on a page that only Dean would be on," Sam says. "And when I asked him about it, Dean said he hadn't been on my computer."

"It was Katherine."

Katherine laughs. "You caught me," she sarcastically says, holding her hands up, and starts away from the brothers.

"Bustyasianbeauties.com," Sam says.

"Too much information," Katherine tells him, shaking her head, and leans against the window.

"Anyway, I very politely asked Dean not to touch my stuff," Sam continues. "'Why don't you control your OCD?'" Sam imitates, using a voice comparable to Sylvester Stallone. 

"Did you dig up anything about the building?" Bobby asks. "Or the suicidal coed?"

"No," Katherine replies. "Everything's clean."

"Then it's not a haunting."

"Maybe not," Dean agrees. "To tell you the truth, we're not really sure."

Bobby frowns. "What do you mean you're not really sure?"

Katherine shifts on her feet. "Well, this next part...the thing is, we didn't see it for ourselves, but...it's pretty frikken weird." Bobby nods. "Like, even by our standards." He nods again. "Curtis said he was abducted by aliens in front of Crawford Hall—the same hall the professor was found outside of."

Bobby stares for a minute. Just when Katherine's about to start administering CPR, he speaks. "Aliens?"

"Yeah."

"Aliens?"

"Yeah," Dean says.

"Look, even if they are real, they're sure as hell not coming to earth and swiping people."

"We know," Dean sighs, sitting on the arm of the sofa.

"My whole life, I've never found evidence of an Honest-to-God abduction. It's all just cranks and pranks."

"Yeah, that's what we thought, too," Katherine hums, sitting down on the sofa beside Dean, and tosses a couple of painkillers into her mouth.

"So we went to Curtis to ask about what happened," Sam says. "He said he blacked out, and when he woke up, he didn't know where he was. Said they ran tests on him, probed him—"

"He doesn't need to know about the probing part," Katherine quietly interjects, glancing between Bobby and Sam. "He might have a stroke. They did, however, make him slow dance."

"If he doesn't need to know about the probing, he doesn't need to know about the slow dancing," Sam says, plopping down on the other side of Katherine. She sighs.

"You guys are exaggerating again," Bobby accuses.

"No," the three hunters chorus.

"Then this frat boy's just nuts."

"Well that's what we thought," Katherine says. "But when we went by Crawford, there was a giant circle in the grass—a perfect circle. It was all dead inside. Sam thought it was a jet engine, but nothing could've made it look like that. And what jet would be that close to the ground, huh?" Dean nods in agreement. "I mean, we didn't know what the hell to do. We thought it was all connected 'cause of the timing of it, so we just kept digging. We talked to one of Curtis' frat brothers. He thought Curtis was tellin' everyone a tall tale, didn't seem that affected by it, so genius over here—" she claps Sam on the shoulder. "—tried to hug it out with the frat guy."

"He totally creeped him out with the 'you're too precious for this world' thing," Dean says.

"I never said that!" Sam cries.

"He didn't," Katherine says, shaking her head. "But he did try to talk about feelings, which apparently, the frat guy does not have. Continuing off of that, he said whatever happened to Curtis was like karma." Bobby raises his eyebrows, prompting Katherine to continue. "See, Curtis is the pledge master of their house. Kinda sadistic, I guess. Anyway, Dean kind of found a connection between the victims."

"They're both dicks," Dean volunteers, moving to the kitchen. "Who else needs a beer?"

"Me," Katherine grunts, pushing herself onto her feet.

"And when we came back, my laptop was gone," Sam says.

"Sam accused Dean because of what he found on the laptop earlier," Katherine supplies, taking her bottle from Dean. "So these two go at it like they always do—"

"Always?" Dean questions.

"You two hash out more drama in a day than an entire season of a soap opera!" Katherine cries.

"You're not even spinnin' it straight here, sweetheart!"

"I told you to not call me that," Katherine growls.

"Sam said, verbatim, 'How would you like if I screwed with the Impala?'" Dean says, looking to Bobby.

"Did you take his computer?" Bobby asks.

"Serves him right, but no," Dean answers.

"Well I didn't lose it," Sam says. "Katherine didn't take it—she let me search her room."

"Yeah, can we just discuss the lack of trust there?" Katherine asks, sitting up on the counter. "He literally tore my room apart."

"Okay, okay," Bobby sighs. "Why don't you just tell me what happened next, Katherine?"

She smugly glances to the brothers and sits up straighter. "There was one more vic, but we didn't see this either. We just...put it together from the evidence, but this guy was a research scientist."

"Animal testing," Sam interjects.

"Ya know," Dean hums. "A dick?"

"We've established your pattern of dickish behavior is indeed the pattern, Dean," Katherine sighs. "Which is why I'm surprised nothing happened to you."

"What?"

"Nothing," she shakes her head. "Anyway, this guy—the cops didn't release a cause of death because they didn't know what caused his death, so we swung by the morgue to figure it out. The only parts of the guy that were left were an arm and a leg. He was mauled in the middle of a college campus. His office was in Crawford Hall—same location as the alleged alien abduction and the professor's swan dive."

"Katherine used a high tech magnifying glass to look at the limbs," Dean says. "And she said she found a scale from an alligator's belly embedded in the flesh." Katherine nods. "Alligator in the sewer?"

"Classic old wives tale," Katherine supplies. "Kid flushes a baby gator down the toilet, it lives in the sewers until it's huge. Dean said nothing like this has ever happened before, never been documented, whatever."

"I said we should call you," Sam interjects. "But we searched the sewer anyway. We each split up taking one end of the campus."

"Did you find anything?"

"I did," Dean scoffs. "Just not in a sewer. Baby's tires were deflated—all of them! And I found Sam's cash clip by the car!"

"So Dean comes in, all, "You can't let the air out of the tires, you idiot," Katherine says. "You're gonna bend the rims!" Of course, Sam denied it. And I believe him."

"What?!" Dean cries.

"If Sam was gonna do something, he wouldn't leave evidence!" Katherine defends. "So Sam and Dean get into it, brawling around the room, and I can't do anything because I've got two bruised ribs and a hurt shoulder—"

"Boo hoo," Dean grunts. "You know, I find it very suspicious nothing's happened to you."

Her eyes blow wide. "I'm ridiculed on a daily basis by you—"

"Okay, okay," Bobby calls over the two of them.

"Anyway, that was about two hours ago, and you showed up after that," Katherine grumbles, taking a swig of her beer.

Bobby looks between the three. "I'm surprised at you. Katherine, you most of all."

"What?! I've been a victim! I'm moderating these two!"

"First off, Sam, Dean did not steal your computer," Bobby continues.

"But I—"

"Hush. And Dean, Sam did not touch your car. If you bothered to pull your heads out of your asses, it would've been pretty clear."

Katherine's brows shoot up. "What?" She asks.

"What you're dealing with."

The three hunters glance between one another and slowly shake their heads. "I got nothin'," Katherine says.

"You got a trickster on your hands."

Dean spits his beer into the sink. "Come again?"

"A trickster."

"Loki," he deadpans.

"And you three," Bobby says, pointing to the trio. "Were the biggest clue. These things create chaos and mischief as easy as breathing, and it's got you so turned around and at each other's throats that you can't even think straight!"

"The laptop," Sam murmurs.

"The tires."

"Well nothing like that happened to me," Katherine says, pushing herself off of the counter. "If we discount Dean being a total ass."

"It knows you're onto him, and it's been playing you like fiddles," Bobby continues.

Katherine rubs her forehead. "Okay, so how do we get rid of a trickster?"

"They're immortal," Bobby says to them. "And they can create things out of thin air, things as real as you and me. He can make 'em vanish real quick, too."

"Like the angry spirit and the alligator."

"The victims fit the M.O., too. Tricksters target the high and mighty, knock 'em down a peg, usually with a sense of humor. Deadly pranks—things like that."

"Well what do they look like?" Dean asks.

"Lots of things," Bobby answers. "Humans, mostly."

Dean sighs. "And what human do we know that's been at Ground Zero this whole time?"

"The janitor," Sam hums.

Katherine was tasked with waiting in her car while the boys did the job, what with her not being up to fighting speed yet. Dean is still sustaining his claim that she's still rusty from taking all that time off. So she hacked into Crawford Hall's security system and monitored the situation, keeping a close eye on Sam and Dean while she talked in their ear, giving them direction, and promised to tell Sam if the trickster was headed his way.

And they argued. Right in Katherine's ear. A little too well of acting, if she does say so herself. He blood pressure is up, and she has a colossal headache. When Dean returns to the car, Katherine is massaging between her eyebrows and holdoing her earpiece just by her ear. She opens her eyes when the car door opens. Dean plops down and cranks the heater up. 

Katherine shuts the computer and drops her earpiece in her lap. "You sure he saw you fighting?"

"Yeah," Dean sighs. "I saw him in the window. He heard every word."

"So now we wait."

Night fell, and Katherine waited in the car while Dean snuck back into the building.

He searched upstairs and down until he heard music in the auditorium. Then he called Sam, who had just gotten back to the car with Bobby and the stakes.

Nothing could've prepared him for the confusion he faced when he opened that door.

Cheesy music, a disco ball, dimmed lights, two women, and one bed.

"We've been waiting for you, Dean," one of them says, and they both crawl to the edge of the bed. Dean's brow shoots up.

"You guys aren't real," he chuckles, scratching the back of his head as he saunters down the stairs.

"Trust me, sugar," the other one says. "It's gonna feel real." He chokes out a cross between a laugh and a surprised gasp. "Come on—let us give you a massage."

"You know, I'm a sucker for a happy ending—really, I am. But..." He claps his hands together. "I'm gonna have to pass."

"They're a peace offering," a new voice says, just behind Dean. The voice of the janitor. Dean turns to look at him. "I know what you and your brother do. And the pretty one, snoozing in the car?" Dean's jaw tightens. "I've been around a while, run into your kind before," the trickster continues.

"Well, then you know that I can't let you keep hurting people," Dean says with a smile.

The trickster rolls his eyes. "Come on. Those people got what was comin' to 'em. Hoisted on their own petards! But you, and Sam, and Katherine—I like you. I do."

"How come you went so easy on her anyway? And how'd you know her name?"

The trickster smiles. "I've kept an eye on her for a long time. We're practically, uh...family at this point." He grins wider. "Anyway, treat yourself." The trickster gestures behind Dean. "As long as you want. Just as long for me to move on to the next town. Oh, right! Your taste is quite singular now, isn't it?" Dean watches the janitor's eyes move behind Dean, and for a moment, the hunter is almost afraid to turn around. But he does.

Katherine sits on the edge of the bed in those teal pajamas, olive legs crossed. She has a soft smile on her face, chin resting in the palm of her hand.

Dean sighs, facing the trickster. "You know I can't let you do that," he says.

"I don't want to hurt you," the janitor says, peeling the wrapper of a Kit-Kat. "And you know I can."

"Look, man, I gotta tell you—I dig your style. Really, I do," he chuckles. "And the slow-dancing alien?" Dean laughs with the trickster.

"One of my personal favorites."

Dean's laugher fades into a smile. "But, uh—I can't let you go."

"Too bad," the trickster sighs. "Like I said, I like you. But Katherine was right—you shouldn't have come alone."

Sam opens up one door, Bobby on the other side, and Katherine slips in behind Sam. And then she sees what's behind Dean.

"Oh, what the hell," she murmurs, her cheeks turning pink.

Only, Dean didn't realize there were two of Katherine behind him. Not one. At least, not now, anyway.

The trickster looks to Dean with a smile. "That fight you two had outside," he says. "That was a trick?" Dean smiles, and the trickster nods, almost in appreciation. "Not bad. But, uh...you wanna see a real trick?"

A chainsaw revs behind Katherine. The creature wielding it pushes her forward, knocking Sam down, and she tumbles down the stairs, probably damaging those cracked ribs even more. She rolls to her feet with a groan, pulling her blood-tipped stake from inside her jacket.

"The hell is going on here?" She asks, fending off one of her two carbon copies. The other one is attacking Dean.

So Dean's got one Carbon Katherine, and Real Katherine's got the other one. Sam and Bobby are dealing with the Chainsaw Scarecrow. And the Trickster is laughing.

Carbon One throws Dean off of the auditorium stage and right into Real Katherine, knocking the both of them down. Katherine is certain her ribs are full-fledged broken now. She can hardly pry herself off of the pull-out chair. It's like stubbing your toe so hard you can't do anything but sit there and accept your agony, except it's in her rib cage, and the wind has been knocked out of her.

"Nice toss, Katherine!" The trickster calls. "Er...Katherine One." He stands up, just a few rows above Dean and Katherine. She presses her stake into Dean's hand and nods at him. "Dean, Dean, Dean," he sighs. "I didn't want to have to do this—" Dean jams the stake right between the trickster's ribs, and one by one, everything the trickster created disappears.

Including the lights.

"You guys okay?" Dean asks.

"Yeah," Bobby answers.

"I guess," Katherine wheezes from the ground. Dean carefully lifts her up, but it's difficult getting her to uncurl from that ball of hers. Even hunched over as she stands up, the pain is horrible. Getting shot, though, is worse in terms of immediate pain. This kind is constant. She can't sleep right, walk right, sit, without feeling it. "He, uh...sure had style, didn't he?" She asks, gesturing to the stage. Dean barely glances to it before he quickly starts for the auditorium doors, and Sam helps Katherine up the stairs. "Thanks a million, Bobby."

"Yeah, yeah," Bobby says. "We need to get out of here before someone finds that body." Sam scoops Katherine up and moves much faster, despite her grunts and winces from the jostling. She moves to her feet and quickly opens up her door.

"Hey, Dean?" Sam asks. "I just wanted to say...um..."

"Y'all are breakin' my heart," Katherine calls to them, starting up the engine. "Can we do this in the car?"