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You didn’t go on hunts. Sam and Dean had made it very clear that you weren’t trained, and it was too dangerous. No hunts, no going out alone, and definitely nothing at night. But after days underground in the bunker, they’d let you tag along on a daytime errand run. A hardware store, the post office, and one last stop at a convenience store for snacks. After that much time underground, even a quick trip out was literally the breath of fresh air you needed.
The convenience store smells like burned coffee and hot dogs that have given up on life.
Dean heads for the register, already fishing for cash. Sam is down the aisle from you, squinting at an ingredient list like it’s personally offensive. You’re closer to the door than he is, about 10 feet away, wandering down the snack aisle, half-heartedly scanning the shelves. Normal. Boring. Safe.
The bell over the door slams.
“Nobody Move!”
A man in a ski mask is just inside the entrance, moving for the register, gun out, hand shaking. Amateur hour. Behind him, a second masked figure slipped in, this one bigger, calmer: the muscle.
Dean turns just enough to see the first man and moves like water, smooth and efficient. His hand shoots out and knocks the gun from the first man's grip with a sharp crack. Before the weapon hits the floor, Dean's fist connects with the guy's jaw. The gunman crumples.
Chaos explodes. Someone screams.
The second man's head whips toward the sound. His eyes sweep the store, landing on you, then Sam. Sam turns his head.
It happened fast.
His arm locks around you before you can process it, the cold barrel of his gun pressing against your temple. Your heart hammers, but your breathing stays even. You've been in worse spots. Probably.
"Back off! Back off or I'll…"
For half a second, Sam’s brain doesn’t give him words. Just images. Distances. Timing. The gun against your head. The angle of the guy’s arm. How fast a finger can pull a trigger.
Too fast.
He forces his breathing slow. If his voice shakes, you die. That’s the rule. His hands come up because that’s what you do when someone has a gun, but every muscle in his body is screaming at him to move.
He doesn’t. He locks his eyes on the gunman’s face and burns everything else away.
The man's arm tightens. His breathing was ragged in your ear, panic and adrenaline making him unpredictable. Dangerous.
Your eyes meet Sam’s. They’re steady. That almost wrecks him.
Why aren’t you panicking?
No. Stop. Focus.
“Hey,” Sam says, and his voice is calm enough to fool anyone who isn’t him. “You don’t want to do this.”
The gun presses harder against your temple.
You don’t scream. You don’t fight. You go still on purpose.
"Just let her go," Sam says, taking a small step forward. His eyes lock on yours, worried and intense and calculating. "You don't want to do this."
"Stay back!"
You see it: the convex mirror above the aisle shows everything. Dean moving wide. Quiet. Controlled. Coming up behind the guy holding you.
You look back at Sam. Holding his gaze. Then, barely moving your hand, you point. Just your index finger. Down. Right.
Your eyes flick to the mirror. And back to Sam. He doesn’t look at the mirror but he saw you point. He understands.
Sam keeps the gunman’s focus locked on him and steps slightly to the side, drawing the man’s attention with him away from the mirror.
“Listen to me,” Sam says, steady, deliberate. “This place is full of cameras. Witnesses. You walk out of here with a hostage, this becomes the worst day of your life.”
The guy swallows. His eyes dart, trying to track everything at once.
Sam keeps talking. Keeps him busy. Keeps him looking anywhere but over his shoulder.
“You let her go,” Sam continues, “and this stays a bad decision. You keep holding her, and it gets so much worse.”
He realizes something then, sharp and sudden. You’re just a person. Ordinary. Human. Not even a hunter. And the thought of losing you feels like falling off a building.
Dean’s voice comes from right behind the gunman. Calm. Certain.
“Drop it.”
Sam doesn’t move. He won’t gamble. Not on almost. Not on pressure easing. He waits. Every nerve in his body screaming at him to go. The man jerks, but Dean's gun stayed steady. "I said drop it."
The barrel shifted away from your head. That’s it. Sam explodes forward.
He rips you out of the guy’s grip and shoves you back behind him without looking, trusting you’ll move where he sends you. His fist comes around in a brutal arc, connecting with the gunman's face with a sickening crunch.
The gun clattered to the floor.
But the guy didn't go down. He was big and Sam's punch had only staggered him. He roared and swung back, his fist catching Sam across the cheekbone. Pain flashes white. Sam staggers.
Dean sweeps the guy’s legs from behind. He hits the floor hard.
Sam is on him instantly. The first punch lands before the guy even processes he’s on his back. Then another. And another. Fast. Relentless.
"Sam!" Dean's voice cracked like a whip. "Sam, he's done!"
But Sam doesn’t stop. His fist drew back again, blood on his knuckles, whose, you couldn't tell.
A hand grabs his fist mid-swing. Hard. "Sammy!"
That gets through. Sam blinks. Breath ragged. Vision snapping back into focus.
She’s safe. That’s the thought that finally cuts through.
Dean drops a knee into the guy’s spine. He leans down, gun pressed to the man's skull, voice low and lethal.
"You put a gun to her head," he whispers, just loud enough for you to catch. "You're lucky I'm letting you live. You ever even think about her again, I'll find you. And my brother won't be the one you need to worry about. Understand?”
The man whimpers.
Sam is with you in two steps, reaching for you, hands hovering like he wants to check for injuries but doesn’t know where to start.
“Are you okay?”
“Did he hurt you?”
“Are you bleeding?”
You grab his wrist.
“Sam. I’m okay.”
He exhales like his lungs finally remembered how to work.
Sirens start wailing outside.
Sam doesn’t stop hovering once you leave the store.
“I think from now on one of us should stay between you and the door.”
"You should walk between us."
“Watch that corner.”
By the time you reach the car, he’s spiraling.
"When we go into places like that, you should stay in the car. Or if you have to come in, you should stay right next to one of us."
"I was ten feet away from you."
"Exactly." He turned to face you fully, jaw set. "Ten feet was too far. That guy got to you in seconds. If Dean hadn't been there…"
"Dean was there."
"Maybe we shouldn't take you on supply runs anymore. At least not until… I don't know. You've barely been here two weeks. You don't have the training for this kind of thing."
"Sam." You stared at him. "It was a convenience store. In the middle of the day."
"And you had a gun to your head."
"Okay, that's enough." Dean says. "Sam, you need to dial it back about ninety percent." He looks at you, then back at Sam. "She handled it. She stayed calm, she helped us take the guy down. She's fine."
Sam opens his mouth.
"And before you start," Dean continues, "she's not staying locked in the bunker. We bring her out, she learns to handle this stuff. That's how it works."
"Dean…"
You add quietly, “I’m okay, Sam.”
He looks away, then back, and you can see the war playing out behind his eyes, logic versus whatever had taken over when that gun pressed against your head.
He nods. But doesn’t look convinced.
You slide into the backseat, and Sam gets in the front beside Dean. As the Impala rumbles to life, Sam twists in his seat to look back at you, like he needs to check one more time that you're okay. His eyes meet yours, something unreadable passing across his face before he turns back around. But the tension in his shoulders didn't ease.
* * *
You’re in your room, door half-open, when you hear the low rumble of Dean's voice down the hall.
"...not being rational."
"I know." Sam's voice, rough. Tired.
"Do you? Because you lost it back there,” Dean continues. “And I get why, but you can’t lock her up like a prisoner because you’re afraid of what might happen to her.”
Silence.
"Sam." Dean's voice softened, just a fraction. "I know you want to protect her. But you can't… whatever this is, you gotta get a handle on it.”
"I just don't want her getting hurt."
"None of us do. But you're not thinking straight when it comes to her. You know that, right?"
Another pause. Longer this time.
"I know." Sam says finally.
You hear footsteps, Dean heading toward his room. Then quiet.
Not thinking straight when it comes to her.
You can’t help but replay those words in your head. And you try very hard not to think about what that means.
Later, when everything is quiet again, it sneaks up on you.
Not during the drive. Not when Dean makes bad jokes that don’t land. Not when Sam keeps glancing at you like he’s counting to make sure you’re still there.
It hits when you’re alone.
You sit on the edge of the bed and stare at your hands like they belong to someone else. They don’t shake. That’s the strange part. You keep waiting for it, your body catching up, fear flooding in late, but it doesn’t come.
Instead there’s this hollow calm. Like the echo after something loud.
You press two fingers to your temple.
You can still feel it there. The cold certainty of metal. The way the pressure didn’t hurt, just claimed the space. Like the world narrowed to a single point and everything else went distant and unreal.
You think about Sam’s face.
Not when he was hitting the guy. Not when he was barking instructions outside. But earlier, when he turned and saw you already caught.
That look. Like the floor dropped out from under him.
You didn’t scream. You didn’t freeze. You didn’t think about dying. You thought about him seeing you die.
You replay the moment in pieces: the mirror, Dean moving, the way Sam didn’t look away even once. How he trusted you without knowing why. How he moved the instant it was safe, not a second sooner, not a second later.
He waited. Because he was waiting for you.
Your chest tightens then, slow and heavy. You hadn’t realized how close it was. Not just the danger, but whatever this thing is between you and Sam. The way it keeps threading itself into moments that should be ordinary.
You’re not shaken because a man put a gun to your head.
You’re shaken because Sam looked at you like losing you would break something permanent. And because after, when he was checking you, hands hovering, voice rough, you had to stop him. Not because you were hurt. But because he was unraveling.
You lie back on the bed and stare at the ceiling. This isn’t a crush. Not really. It’s not light enough for that anymore.
It’s the knowledge that if it ever comes to it, if things go bad, Sam won’t hesitate. And you don’t know what to do with the weight of that.
Outside your door, you hear footsteps pause. Not knock. Just stop. Then move away again. Sam, giving you space the way he thinks he should.
You close your eyes.
You’re safe.
That’s what everyone keeps saying.
But what you can’t stop thinking is this:
Next time, you won’t be the only one in danger. And that scares you more than anything that happened today.