Chapter Text
The problem with Wisconsin in December, Dean decided, was that it committed to the whole winter thing with an enthusiasm that bordered on offensive.
He flexed his fingers on the steering wheel, willing warmth back into joints that had gone stiff somewhere around the Illinois border. The heater in the Impala worked fine, better than fine; he'd rebuilt the damn thing himself two years ago. But there was cold, and then there was Midwest cold. The kind that seeped through metal and leather and got into your bones like it had a personal vendetta.
"Three victims in two weeks." Sam's voice cut through the low rumble of the engine and the bright guitar line of Thin Lizzy’s "The Boys Are Back in Town." He had that tone, the one that meant he'd already made up his mind and was just waiting for Dean to catch up.
Dean turned the music down. Not off; he had standards. But low enough that he wouldn't miss whatever rabbit hole Sam was about to drag them down.
"And?"
"And they were all found in or near Brussels." Sam shifted in his seat, laptop balanced on his knees, the screen casting a pale glow across his face. "Small town on the Door County peninsula. Population just over a thousand."
"Sammy." Dean shot him a look. "People die. It happens. Sometimes in clusters. It's called probability."
"Not like this." Sam’s jaw tightened in that stubborn way that meant he’d come prepared long before Dean had pulled the Impala onto the highway. He tapped the laptop with one finger, eyes still on the screen. "All three were crushed. Massive internal trauma, broken ribs, collapsed lungs. But no external marks. No sign of a fall or a hit. Nothing."
Dean’s fingers curled a little tighter around the wheel. "Fantastic. A ghost with a gym membership."
Sam didn’t look up. "If it were a ghost, we’d probably have external signs. Bruising, pressure marks, something." He scrolled down the report, jaw still set. "First victim was a farmer, found in the middle of an empty field at dawn. Second was a bartender, died on her way home from work on a road with no traffic. Third was a retired teacher walking his dog near the woods." He angled the laptop just enough for Dean to register the image without really taking his eyes off the road. "No equipment. No vehicles. No explanation."
He took in the photo in a blur. The body looked normal at first glance, skin untouched, clothes intact. But the shape of the chest was wrong, like something had pushed in hard and kept pushing. His instincts didn’t like it.
"Could be demons," Dean said after a beat. "Possession doesn't leave marks. Neither does telekinesis if you're creative about it."
"Maybe." Sam's tone said he'd already considered it. "Could be a dozen other things too. We need to see the scene before we know anything."
"So we check it out." Dean eased into the right lane behind a slow-moving livestock truck. A couple strands of straw tumbled off the back and caught in the wind. "Talk to locals, poke around. If it's demons, we'll know soon enough."
Sam closed the laptop with a quiet snap. "Cas is meeting us there."
Dean glanced over, caught off guard. "He is?"
"Called him this morning while you were still asleep." Sam shifted, tucking the laptop into his bag at his feet. "Figured an extra set of eyes wouldn't hurt. Plus, you know how small towns are. Cas has that whole... innocent face thing going on. People trust him."
Dean snorted. "Yeah, until he starts asking if they've been possessed by demons lately."
"He's gotten better."
"Has he?"
Sam let out a tiny puff of air that wasn’t exactly a laugh, but lived in the same neighborhood. "Okay, he's gotten slightly better."
Dean grunted. It wasn’t a bad call, not really. Cas had pulled their asses out of the fire more times than Dean cared to count, and if this thing ended up being angelic or demonic, having him close made sense. The guy knew that world better than anyone. Still, Dean caught himself bracing whenever Cas got involved. Not because he didn’t trust him. He did, more than almost anyone. But Cas had this way of looking at him like he could see straight through every excuse Dean had ever polished up and used to keep people at arm’s length. And Dean had plenty of those.
Dean exhaled through his nose. "Fine."
The highway stretched out ahead of them, flat and gray under a sky that couldn’t decide whether to snow or just brood about it. Fields rolled past on either side, brown and stubbled with the remains of whatever crop had been harvested months ago. Every few miles a farmhouse broke the monotony, white siding, red barn, a lone silo holding its ground against the horizon. Dean turned the music back up.
Brussels, Wisconsin, population 1,128 according to the faded green sign at the town limits, slid into view a few minutes later. Dean slowed as they passed it.
"Great," he muttered, watching the sign disappear in the rearview. "Figures you'd drag me to the one town named after a vegetable you actually like."
Sam didn’t dignify that with an answer.
Christmas lights drooped between the poles along the road, trying hard to look festive and mostly failing.
The main drag was little more than a stretch of road lined with practical brick buildings. A post office. A hardware store. A diner with a hand-painted sign that read De Vrolijke Koe, letters curling around a cartoon cow that looked way too cheerful for December. Dean frowned at it.
"De Vrol… whatever," he said. "Looks like someone mashed the keyboard and called it a name."
Dean pulled the Impala into a parking spot in front of the diner and cut the engine. He stepped out and the air bit at him in a way that made him rethink his life choices. He pulled his jacket tighter and made a mental note to dig out the heavier one from the trunk before Sam dragged him anywhere.
The parking lot was a collection of salt-stained pickups and SUVs with rust chewing at the wheel wells. Except for one figure standing between a Ford F-150 and a Chevy Silverado, both of them towering over him in a way Dean tried not to find funny.
Cas stood there, perfectly still, hands shoved deep in the pockets of his trench coat, squinting at the diner's sign like it had personally offended him. His hair was doing that thing where it looked like he'd styled it with a ceiling fan, and his tie was crooked. He looked like the world's most confused tax accountant.
"Cas," Dean called, slamming the Impala's door shut.
Cas lifted his chin in acknowledgment and walked toward them, boots crunching on the gravel and patches of ice. "Dean. Sam." He stopped a few feet away, squinting slightly against the pale winter light.
"You've been here long?" Dean asked, making his way around the front of the Impala. His breath fogged in the air.
"Approximately twelve minutes," Cas said, like the precision mattered.
"Right." Dean gestured vaguely at the lot. "You know, most people wait inside when it's this cold."
Cas tilted his head. "I wasn't cold."
"Yeah, well." Dean cleared his throat and jerked his chin toward the diner. "Come on. Let's get some food before we figure out what’s doing the chest-flattening routine."
Sam fell into step beside Cas, already talking through the details. Dean caught the rhythm of Sam’s voice without the meaning and let it fade into background noise. His attention snagged on the diner itself.
Up close, the place looked older than it had from the road. The bricks had that sagged-in look buildings got after enough winters tried to knock them down. The windows were fogged from the heat inside, silhouettes moving behind the glass.
Sam murmured, "Looks cozy."
Dean knew what that meant and snorted under his breath. Cozy was Winchester-code for "everyone inside is gonna stare."
He pushed the door open. Warm air rolled over him, thick with coffee, frying grease, and something sweet that made his stomach pay attention. A bell jingled somewhere above his head. It felt unnecessary, like the building already knew they were here.
The inside matched the outside. Vinyl booths with red cushions, a couple patched with duct tape. A row of stools fixed along the counter. Behind it, a woman with dark hair pulled into a tight bun moved between the coffee pot and the register like she owned the place and everything in it. Dean figured she was mid-thirties, give or take. She had the look of someone who'd been running this diner long enough to know exactly how annoying people could be and didn’t have the patience to pretend she enjoyed it.
Conversation didn’t stop when they walked in, but it dipped. Dean felt the looks slide over them before slipping back to plates and newspapers. It wasn't hostile. Just small-town eyes doing what they did.
Dean ignored them and made for an empty booth near the back. The vinyl groaned when he sat. Cas slid in beside him, spine straight enough to pass a military inspection. Sam dropped into the seat across from them, eyes already drifting around the room as if he was mentally mapping exits and potential blunt objects. Dean clocked the empty mugs on the table. Good. Warm drink first.
The waitress showed up almost immediately with a coffee pot in hand. Same woman from behind the counter. Her name tag said Mia in sharpie that had given up on being bold years ago. She looked like she could toss out a drunk farmer without losing her grip on the pot.
"Coffee?" Mia asked, already tipping the pot toward Dean's cup before he could answer.
"Yeah, thanks." Dean watched the steam rise, dark and promising. He wrapped both hands around the mug and let the heat sink in.
She filled Sam's cup, then Cas's, though Cas made no move to touch it.
"You boys passing through?" she said, matter-of-fact, like the answer was obvious in a place this small.
"Something like that," Dean said. He added a smile, the one that usually worked. "Heard you've had some trouble around here lately."
Her eyes narrowed the tiniest bit. "Trouble’s a word for it."
"We're with the FBI." Sam flashed his badge with the kind of smoothness that made Dean want to roll his eyes. "We're looking into the recent deaths."
Mia glanced at the badge, then at Sam, then back again. She didn't look impressed. "FBI. For three people dying in a town this small." She set the coffee pot on their table with a sharp little clink. "Must be a slow month in Washington."
Dean bit back a grin. He liked her already.
"We take all cases seriously, ma'am," Sam said, sounding every inch the fed he wasn’t.
"Mm." Mia pulled a pad from her apron pocket. "What can I get you?"
Dean flipped the menu open and squinted at a section full of words he didn’t recognize. Vlaams Stoofvlees. Konijn met Pruimen. It looked like someone had dropped a handful of consonants and hoped for the best.
"Uh… what’s good here?" he asked Mia.
"Everything," she said, in a tone that dared him to disagree.
"I’ll take a cheeseburger. Fries if you got ’em."
"We got 'em." She turned to Sam.
Sam hesitated, scanning the specials again. "Uh… what’s the ‘stoof… something’?"
"Stoofvlees," Mia said. "Beef stew. Flemish-style."
Sam nodded. "I’ll try that, then." He put the menu back neatly, because of course he did.
"And you?"
Cas blinked. "I don't require—"
Dean cleared his throat, quiet but pointed.
Cas hesitated, recalibrating. "Pie. Apple pie."
Mia scribbled something on her pad. "Alright." She tucked the pad back in her apron and disappeared into the back.
Sam leaned forward, elbows on the table, voice low. "So. Three victims, no visible cause of death. All found outdoors, isolated locations."
"Right."Dean took a sip of coffee. It scalded his tongue, but in a good way. "Any witnesses?"
"Sort of." Sam pulled out his phone, scrolling through notes until he found what he wanted. "Police report mentions a guy named Bram Vandenhouten. Lives out near the woods. Claims he heard something the night the last victim died."
Dean raised an eyebrow. "What kind of something?"
Sam’s mouth pulled to the side. "He wasn’t clear. Just said it was big. Heavy. Moving through the trees."
Dean set his mug down. "And?"
"That’s pretty much it. He got spooked and went back inside." Sam’s brow furrowed. "But he did mention one weird detail."
Dean waited.
"He said he saw… light. Like a blue-ish glow."
Dean huffed. "Fantastic. Love cryptic locals. Really sets the mood."
Cas finally spoke, voice low and thoughtful. "People often struggle to articulate what frightens them. It may not be intentional."
Dean blinked at him. "…Thanks, Dr. Phil."
Cas looked mildly confused but didn’t respond.
Dean rubbed a hand over his jaw. "Alright. We eat. Then we go pay a visit to Mr. Vanden-whatever. Get his full story. See if he left anything out."
The food arrived quicker than Dean expected.
Dean took one bite of his burger and let out a noise that probably shouldn’t happen in public. "Okay. Points to the cow-happy town."
Sam was already halfway through his stew, spoon clinking steadily against the bowl. "It’s good," he said, like the food required a review.
Cas hadn’t moved. Fork in hand, eyes on the pie like it was some sort of theological puzzle.
"You gonna eat that," Dean said, "or just glare at it until it confesses something?"
Cas glanced up, confused for half a second. Then he looked back down at the plate. "I am… considering it."
Dean rolled his eyes and polished off another fry. "Cas, it’s pie, not a moral dilemma."
Cas looked at him, earnest in that way that should’ve been illegal. "I thought you might want it."
Dean looked away, suddenly very invested in his burger. "Fine. I’ll take it when I’m done."
Sam pretended not to see the entire exchange, which was generous of him.
They wrapped up the meal in easy silence, just the scrape of silverware and the low chatter of the diner around them. Dean snagged Cas’s pie like it had always been meant for him and finished it in a few quick bites while Sam handled the bill.
They stepped into the cold, and Dean’s breath turned to fog instantly. The sun was out but not doing a damn thing, just hanging there like it was phoning in its shift.
Sam zipped up his jacket and matched his pace."Mia gave me Bram’s address. Ten minutes out. Dirt road off County Highway T."
Dean climbed in the car, waited for Sam and Cas to settle, then pulled back onto the road.
The town fell away fast, brick and storefronts giving up to stretches of pale, frozen fields. Sam guided him onto a dirt track cut between two stands of trees, branches clicking together in the wind like bones. A downed tree lay half in the ditch, the root ball jutting close enough to the track to make drivers swing wide. Fresh tire marks curved around it.
The house came into view after a bend. A small farmhouse, paint peeling, one porch light burning even though it was daytime.
Dean killed the engine. "Alright. Let’s hope Bram’s got more than spooky noises and mood lighting."
The porch steps creaked under their boots, loud enough to warn anyone inside. Sam barely lifted his hand to knock before the door opened.
A man filled the doorway, boots planted wide, shoulders solid. His hair was thinning, his beard patchy like he’d been too busy to care for it. "Help you?" he asked. His accent turned the word into something closer to yew.
Sam stepped forward, badge ready. "Mr. Vandenhouten? I'm Agent Hammett. This is Agent Hetfield, and our consultant, Agent Gilmour. We're with the FBI. We'd like to ask you a few questions about the night Mr. Janssens passed."
Bram’s gaze flicked to the badge, then to Dean, then to Cas, who was standing just still enough to look wrong if you were paying attention. Bram definitely was.
"FBI." He said it like he was testing whether he believed it. He glanced past them toward the tree line pressing against the back of his property. "I already told the sheriff."
"We know," Dean said, keeping it easy. "But sometimes reports leave stuff out. We figured we’d hear it straight from you."
A long beat. Then Bram stepped aside and pulled the door wider. "Fine. Get in here. Heat’s running and I ain't paying to warm the whole damn county."
The inside of Bram's house smelled like wood smoke and stale coffee. The furniture looked like it had been handed down through three generations, none of whom had believed in replacing anything that still technically functioned. A faded path in the carpet ran from the front door to the kitchen.
Bram waved a hand toward a couch that sagged in the middle. "Sit."
Dean let himself fall onto the couch and the thing dipped so far he half expected it to swallow him whole. Sam sat beside him, posture perfect, as if respecting the structural integrity of old furniture might somehow help.
Cas sat at the far end of the couch, hands on his knees, managing to look almost normal about it. Bram’s eyes flicked his way once, then moved on.
Bram lowered himself into an armchair across from them, the springs complaining. He didn’t offer coffee. He didn’t offer anything. Just settled in and stared like he wanted all this done five minutes ago.
Sam pulled out a notebook, pen already poised. "We appreciate your help, Mr. Vandenhouten. Can you walk us through what happened that night?"
Bram’s jaw worked, like he was chewing over whether it was worth saying out loud. His eyes drifted to the window, to the line of dark trees beyond it.
"Heard it first," he said at last. "Around midnight. Storm the night before knocked the power out. I was up dealing with the generator when I heard something moving out there." He jerked his chin toward the woods. "Heavy. Like something big dragging itself around."
Dean leaned forward. "How big?"
"Big enough." Bram's hands curled on the armrests. "Had the weight of a damn horse crashing through brush. But the steps were wrong. Not four legs. Two."
Sam's pen stilled. "Two legs?"
"Yeah." Bram's voice went flat. "And chains. Could hear ’em rattling. Metal on metal."
A cold prickle crawled down Dean’s spine.
"You're sure it was chains?" Sam asked.
"I know what chains sound like." Bram snapped. "Worked a farm my whole life. That was chains."
"Did you see what was making the noise?" Sam pressed.
"I told the sheriff." Bram's tone hardened. "I saw light. Blue. Like fire, only colder. Moving between the trees."
"Cold fire," Dean repeated, trying to keep it neutral. "That what you said to the sheriff?"
Bram's eyes locked onto him, irritation flaring. "You think I'm making this up?"
"No sir," Dean lifted a hand slightly. "Just trying to get the full picture."
Bram grunted but didn’t push it.
Cas spoke for the first time since they'd sat down. "You were afraid."
It wasn't a question. It was a statement, delivered with the kind of blunt certainty that should've pissed Bram off. Instead, the older man just looked at Cas. Really looked at Cas. Whatever he saw softened something in his shoulders.
"Yeah," he admitted. "I was."
Cas nodded, like that made perfect sense. "Fear is a rational response when the natural order is disrupted."
Bram blinked at him, thrown off just long enough for Dean to catch it. Then he let it slide and went on.
"I’ve lived here forty years," he said. "Seen every damn animal this county’s got. Bears, coyotes, even a cougar once. This wasn’t that." He rubbed a hand over his mouth, eyes fixed on something far away. "This was something else."
Sam cleared his throat. "Anything else stand out? Smell, cold spots, anything unusual like that?"
Bram frowned at him like it was a weird thing to ask. "No. If there had been, I’d have said so. Just the sound. And the light. That was enough."
Sam closed his notebook with a soft snap. "Thank you, Mr. Vandenhouten. You’ve been very helpful."
Bram got up with a grunt and walked them to the door. He opened it, shivering when the cold barged back in.
Dean stepped out, only to feel Bram’s hand clamp onto his jacket sleeve, grip surprisingly firm.
"Listen," he said, eyes flicking to the tree line, "I ain’t crazy. Something’s out there. And it ain’t done."
Dean paused on the threshold. "Didn’t say you were crazy."
Bram sized him up one last time. "Good. ‘Cause folks around here don’t spook easy." He released Dean, and shut the door before any more heat escaped.
Dean climbed into the Impala, the cold vinyl biting through his jeans for a second before the engine rumbled to life. Sam slid in beside him, already pulling up a map on his phone. Cas took the back seat without a word
He let the engine idle, warm air creeping into the cabin little by little. He stared through the windshield at the line of trees behind Bram’s house. The branches shifted in the wind, just enough movement to look like something out there knew how to stay hidden.
"Alright," Dean muttered, dropping the Impala into reverse. The gravel crackled under the tires as he backed out. "Motel first. We regroup there, figure out what the hell this thing is."
Sam nodded, eyes still scanning whatever he’d pulled up on his screen. "Yeah. We’ll go over Bram’s timeline, cross-check it with the sheriff’s reports."
Cas didn’t say anything. He sat with his hands folded, his gaze fixed on the dark wall of trees like he was waiting for them to slip up.
Dean caught his reflection in the rearview. Cas had that look again, the one he got when the universe wasn’t behaving the way his rulebook said it should.
"Don’t suppose you recognized any of that?" Dean asked.
Cas blinked slowly, still watching the trees vanish behind them. "Not yet."
"Great," Dean muttered. "Love ‘not yet.’ Always real comforting."
Sam huffed a quiet breath that might’ve been a laugh, or just steam escaping from how hard he was thinking.
The dirt road smoothed out under the tires as they rolled back onto asphalt. The sun was already sinking, bleeding a pale orange across the horizon. December didn't bother with long afternoons; by four-thirty the sky was already thinking about calling it quits.
Dean kept his eyes on the road. Trees pressed in close on both sides, bare branches clawing at the sky.
He caught it in his peripheral vision first. A flicker. Blue, cold, hovering between two trunks maybe thirty yards off the road.
His hands tightened on the wheel. He didn't turn his head, not yet. Just let his eyes slide toward it, careful, like if he looked too fast it'd disappear.
Two points of light. Faint but distinct. Not the warm glow of a porch light or the white beam of a flashlight. Something else. Something that looked like it shouldn’t be out here.
Dean's pulse kicked up a notch.
He looked again.
Nothing. Just a tree catching the last of the dying daylight, bark twisted into a shape his brain had momentarily turned into eyes.
He exhaled through his nose and loosened his grip on the wheel. Barely.
Sam glanced up. "You good?"
"Yeah." Dean's voice came out steady. "Fine."
Sam didn't look convinced, but he didn't push it either. Just went back to whatever he was reading.
Dean checked the rearview. The woods were already swallowed by dusk. The road stretched ahead, empty and gray.
He turned the music up just enough to fill the quiet.
But his hands stayed tight on the wheel, and he didn't look back again.