Chapter Text
Dean was really starting to love life in the bunker. He felt very content with how his life was right now, from when he woke up in the mornings to fresh-brewed coffee and a big smile from Castiel to start his day, to researching and talking with Bobby, to joking around with Charlie or annoying Sammy.
They rarely went on hunts anymore themselves ever since they had set up the bunker as a sort of headquarters for all hunters in the States. They met new people every week, some needing shelter or just someone to stitch them up after a particularly bad hunt. They had even had visitors who just wanted to meet the famous Winchester brothers and decided to stop by on their way through Kansas.
Dean loved the attention, and though he had never been so keen on research, he liked to know that he was helping other people who didn’t have access to the same knowledge that they did. They were literally sitting on all lore available on every monster ever caught, and it had taken them a while to figure out how to go about their new job.
Charlie and Sam had been the ones to spend almost every waking moment diving down in the archives, categorising all of the lore, and figuring out a way to make a system to easily access it all. Charlie had programmed a whole new type of search engine, almost like the ones they had in libraries, where you could type in any little keyword and it would tell you which book or chapter you could look in to find specific lore.
Mary and Bobby had been the ones answering phone calls on the most regular basis, and when they needed to find something, it was easy for them to type something into the database that Sam and Charlie had made to figure out where to look for the books in their library.
Jack had been standing by to help retrieve the books for them when they were extra busy, and when he didn’t help them he usually helped Castiel research weird cases to send hunters on that were currently not on a case.
Dean helped where he was needed, but most of his time he spent on cleaning the bunker and making it feel a home for them. He had spent a lot of time on cleaning out all of their extra rooms to accomodate newcomers who wanted to stay for a week or two. They were almost like a hunter hotel, spewing out knowledge and taking in stray hunters as they came.
Dean loved it. He always had something to do and he saw his whole family helping and taking care of other people. They had learned so much more about monsters he didn’t even know existed. Lately, Dean had actually been considering if it was time to officially retire from hunting and settle down into this life as a sort of hunter-helper.
Dean was passing by the library to go to the kitchen for a glass of water when Cas called his name. There was a flurry of activity in the room, what with their three guests who arrived yesterday helping with research for a case for another team they had recently sent off to Oklahoma to hunt a big nest of vamps.
“Come look at this,” Cas called again, not taking his eyes off of the computer screen as Dean approached him. Cas had seated himself as far away from the others as possible so as not to be disturbed, and had a notepad next to him with small notations that made no sense to Dean but he figured had something to do with the case Castiel was researching.
“Another case? You never tire, do you?” Dean said with a hint of a joking tone, putting a hand on Castiel’s shoulder, as he leaned forward to look at the computer screen.
“It sounds like there’s a djinn haunting down in Wichita, but the case seems a little more complicated than that. There’ve been sightings of blue light coming from the cemetery, but when the police have gone to investigate, they haven’t been able to find any of the missing victims,” Castiel explained, casting a glance up at Dean and finding him a lot closer than expected, leaning in to read the news article on the screen.
“It doesn’t sound like a regular djinn, so I’m not sure who would be fit to take on this case. What do you think?”
“We could take it. Just the good ol’ team, right?” Dean straightened up, clapping Cas on the shoulder before removing his hand. “It’s not too far and I’ve actually been getting a little restless. I’ll find Sam, see if it’s anything he’s interested in, and I’ll get Jack to round up some books on djinn lore we can look through before we leave. Sound good?”
“Yeah, it sou…” Cas began to say, but when he raised his gaze to look Dean in the eyes he found him already halfway across the room, on his way to find the others.
“Sammy!” Dean yelled, as he neared the table where there were beer bottles and papers scattered all around.
There was a sound of acknowledgement from a nearby bookshelf, and Sam stuck his head out, a book in hand, and looked expectantly at Dean.
“We have a case. Nasty djinn. Pack a bag, we leave tomorrow morning,” Dean said, almost in passing, as he looked around for Jack. There was a flurry of movement around the room, but Jack was nowhere to be seen. “Is the kid in his room?”
“Yeah, I think so. What’s the case about?”
Sam put his book down at a nearby table, clearly intrigued, and turned towards Dean.
“Cas found it, so he’s got all the info,” Dean said as he swerved through the tables, barely sparing Sam a glance before he headed for the hallway.
He knocked softly on the door to Jack’s newly-established room, the door opening under his hands since it had already been a bit ajar. Jack was sitting at his desk, writing in a notebook in front of him. “Hey, kid. You’ve been pretty good at finding your way around the library — you wanna help us with some research tonight?”
Jack, who had only turned slightly around to look at Dean, now almost flung himself from his chair out of pure excitement. His face lighting up, he answered, “I’ll be right there,” with a weird sort of pride in his voice, almost like he was honored to have been asked to help.
Dean closed the door behind himself and went back to where Cas and Sam were avidly discussing the points of the case. Mary was situated at the table nearby, clearly listening while she was researching a case herself on the computer in front of her. Jack emerged from his room only minutes later, having apparently finished his letter, and they both joined in silently. Jack kept retrieving books, talking about how he had just seen a passage in this book about that and that book about this. As Cas searched on the computer, Sam read through his notes to get an overview of what they were working with. Charlie had stepped in to help, though she didn’t do much more than laugh at Dean’s occasional jokes, make affirming noises, and pipe in with an opinion whenever one of them read something aloud to hear each other’s thoughts.
“So none of the victims have been found? Not even dead?” Charlie asked, raising her cup of coffee to her lips for the fourth time since she asked for more information. “That seems strange, even for a djinn case.”
“Maybe they’re being hidden very well. Not all djinns are stupid enough to store people bleeding out in the only abandoned warehouse in town. The djinn is probably a local, living in a suburban white-picket fence house, and we’re gonna be the mean detectives who show up to answer some questions,” Dean said.
“Can I come?” Jack asked, eyes expectantly big.
Sam seemed to not know what to say, but Dean knew how big his attachment to the kid had grown since he had moved in, and chose to interrupt his brother before he even opened his mouth to answer.
“Cas will look after you, seeing as you still can’t fully control your powers,” Dean said, casting a look at Cas. “Right?”
“Oh, I mean… I can, but I assumed I was going too. I was the one who found the case, after all.”
“It’s just a djinn, we’ll be fine. It’s not like we haven’t done this for, what, 30 years?”
He could almost feel Cas rolling his eyes at him, even though he wasn’t looking at him. Sam’s face showed his feelings and it had Dean sighing.
“I want to come. I’ll be helpful, Dean.”
For the first time since Dean had entered the room, Mary piped up from the other table. “I’ll make sure Jack doesn’t turn the bunker to ashes while you’re all gone.”
That’s how the three men found themselves shoving duffel bags in Baby’s trunk at 8:00 a.m. the next morning, Dean eager to get started.
Bobby was now in control of everything that went on in the bunker, and made sure no hunters went on cases they weren’t ready for. When Sam had expressed his concerns, Bobby did nothing but smile at him and say “Boy, I’ve got this. Go save some lives.”
Charlie had offered to keep researching the bunker’s lore to see if there was anything they had missed, and would call if she found anything. They were ready to get back out there, though Dean had mentioned, even before they started the car, that he was scared he might have gotten rusty from all of the time he had spent sitting around the bunker.
“Dean, I don’t think you, of all people, could ever forget how to hunt,” Sam had said, exasperation clear in his voice.
It took just under four hours for them to arrive in Wichita. The first thing they did was set up camp in a motel near the graveyard, where most of the missing people had last been seen.
They changed into suits and loaded their guns with silver bullets that would stun the djinn, just in case they ran into the sucker today. They had brought lamb’s blood to kill the djinn, but since Cas was still all angeled-up, he would be able to kill the djinn with a simple smite. Cas definitely took some of the fun out of the hunting, but Dean was getting old and creaky that he didn’t really mind that much. His body couldn’t take being flung across rooms anymore. All he wanted was for all of them to escape safe and sound after hunts. He didn’t want to lose his family, especially now, when they had all died so many times and come back to life. He didn’t want to take his chances anymore, because next time something happened to one of them it could be fatal and final. Dean wanted to die of old age, not from a fucking witch hunt.