Title: The Curse of Bittersweet Kisses
Chapter 15
Notes: The quote is from the S5 episode ‘The End’.

~~~~~~~~~~

Five days after returning from their trip, Jo lounged on Bobby’s couch, texting Dean despite him being right outside only a few feet from the front door. She was feeling giddy and very happy, ignoring the sensation of being watched because she knew it was only her mother. Ellen was trying to read the paper and kept shooting curious glances her way. Each snicker Jo made at one of Dean’s comments garnered a shake of the paper and a glance, but she didn’t care. Jo was happy with her relationship with Dean.

The step Jo had been apprehensive about had been taken and neither she nor Dean had backed down after or had second thoughts. In fact, she was glad their bedsprings didn’t squeak and the headboard wasn’t right against the wall. They were having trouble keeping their hands off each other now when they were in the same room together. Upstairs, it didn’t matter. They could be all over each other. Everywhere else, they needed to show some restraint out of respect for everyone else. Her words, not his.

She was stifling a giggle at a raunchy text from Dean when she noticed Castiel. He stood at one doorway staring at her with a disappointed frown. She sent a text back to Dean, letting him know Castiel was there, and set her phone down. “Hi.” Something in his expression told her this wasn’t going to be a light and easy visit. He was here for a reason.

He sighed, head tipping back a fraction. “Hello.” His gaze found Ellen. “Ellen, would you excuse us please? Jo and I have a matter of disobedience to discuss.”

Slowly, Ellen closed and folded the paper. “Disobedience?”

“Yes. Leave us.”

Alarm lit Ellen’s eyes and she set the paper aside, going as far as the kitchen, where she stood and watched.

Castiel didn’t seem to expect her to move any further away, returning his attention to Jo as soon as Ellen got to the kitchen.

When he didn’t say anything right away, Jo shifted uneasily on the couch. “What disobedience,” she asked. It could be anything, any one of those matters she’d introduced to test her boundaries while still making him complacent. He could have figured out what she’d been doing because he wasn’t stupid.

“You went with Dean on a trip this past week.” He raised a hand, making a quick gesture in the air.

She opened her mouth to answer and discovered she had no voice. Jo’s throat was dry, the words she tried to loose not coming out. He’d taken her voice away. That didn’t bode well for the conclusion of this so-called discussion. It meant he wasn’t wanting discussion at all, but rather to tell her what she’d done wrong and punish her without allowing her to defend herself.

Where was Dean? He should be coming in any second. She looked at the doorway, hoping to see him walk though.

“You went into a cemetery, dug up graves, and disposed of two ghosts.” He said it all in a bored tone, as if relating what the weather had been the past few days. Beneath that tone was the sense that he was tightly wound and the wrong action from her would make him snap.

The hairs on her arms raised up.

It didn’t feel safe for her to remain stretched out on the couch and she stood, moving towards her mother and taking the chance that it might anger Castiel further. She didn’t turn her back to him.

Castiel strode slowly towards her, a step for each one she took, his hands clasping behind his back. “What did I say the day I raised you?” The flicker of anger in his eyes was growing.

It had to be a rhetorical question since he’d taken her voice away. Jo was beginning to feel like she might throw up, nausea rolling in her stomach.

“Do you remember? I do. I said you were to be Dean’s wife, not a hunter. You were raised to be a wife. Did you not understand what I meant by that? I’d thought you did. You’ve been performing that task well.” His jaw clenched, his left eye twitching twice.

Outside, the gentle breeze kicked up to a wind and thunder sounded.

Her heart kept beating faster and faster in her chest and she tried to breathe normally. If she started breathing too fast she could pass out and didn’t want to be unconscious in front of him. While awake she had the illusion of being able to fight whatever he was going to do to her somehow. If she passed out she’d be completely helpless.

“All of the tasks you’ve been doing. The adjustments. I thought you were forming a deep connection with Dean, attempting to create a life for the two of you.”

“Cas, don’t you think you should,” Ellen started, but an angry stare from him stalled her words.

“I’m not speaking to you, Ellen. Hold your tongue until you’re spoken to.”

She blinked, eyes narrowing. “She’s my daughter.”

“And she disobeyed. Did you never discipline her when she disobeyed as a child?”

“Of course I did.”

“I’ll do the same here…to all of you.”

Ellen opened her mouth like she was going to say something else, then closed it again. It had been a very long time since Jo had seen her mother this frightened.

Castiel shook his head, hands sliding into his coat pockets. He licked his lips, glanced at Jo and uttered what sounded almost like a sad laugh. “I’ve left you alone to connect, given you the privacy to be intimate. You told me you were getting along well. The steps you’ve been making towards a life with Dean have all been logical and you’ve been good for him, like I knew you would be. You even confessed to loving him.” He shrugged like he didn’t know what to say.

Jo edged away from him.

“Was it all a lie? A ruse?” His expression changed, sadness merging with the anger. He looked like he was going to cry at that idea, like she’d betrayed him. Did he think she’d betrayed him? Was he now equating her with Sam and thinking up imaginary betrayals to justify hurting her in some way? “Were you…playing me?”

Her legs felt weak and perspiration slicked her palms. She shook her head in denial, mouthing the word ‘no’, despite the fact that it was the truth. She had been playing him. Well, at first. Now, her relationship with Dean was something like what he’d wanted for them in the beginning.

Dean came through the door, took a second to notice each of them and placed himself between her and Castiel. “Stop!”

Castiel’s attention didn’t move from Jo and he blinked rapidly, peering around Dean. “So what do you do? You take the trip that was supposed to signify the twining of your lives together and use it to hunt. I don’t…. How could you hunt when you knew it wasn’t your place? How long has this been going on, Jo?”

“It was my fault,” Dean blurted, hands held up in a placating gesture. “I swear it, Cas. It was all me. Jo didn’t even know where we were going until we were there.”

His oddly emotional stare turned towards Dean. It looked like there might even be tears in his eyes. “I’m aware of your transgression as well, Dean. I fully expected disobedience from you at some point because when have you ever done what you were told after John died?”

“That’s free will for you.”

“I suppose it is. But why disobey on this matter? I mean, if you care for her, love her, and cherish her. Why take her on a hunt when you knew it’s no longer her place? When you knew you’d both be punished for it? Explain your reasoning to me. I don’t understand.”

Jo pressed against Dean’s back, feeling the solid strength of him against her. She laid her cheek to his back and prayed that he’d manage to cool Castiel down before Castiel did something rash.

“Okay. You said to take her on a honeymoon. I did. I found an activity I thought she’d like. It was supposed to be harmless fun. A spooky ghost hunting tour. Mock the amateurs, have a good time pretending. We didn’t know the site was really live. I’d had two hunters assure me it was dead.”

“And yet you stayed when you realized.”

“I should’ve just left two murderous ghosts running around? That’s a good plan.”

He made a noise of frustration. “Don’t turn this around, Dean. You should’ve called someone else in and taken your wife from danger.”

“Called in who? Sam, Bobby, and Ellen were out. Half the hunters I know are either dead, in jail, hospitalized, and the other half aren’t easy to get hold of. Those ghosts could have killed again and again before anyone got out there. We were there, they were there. Seemed common sense to take care of it.”

“You kept her in direct danger. As her husband, you’re to protect her. You weren’t protecting her.”

“You think I don’t protect her?” He snorted. “She handled herself just fine. Did you see that? Were you spying on us long enough to see that or --”

“We should all calm down.” Her mother edged closer in slow steps, like she was approaching a wild animal. Jo lifted her head from Dean’s back. She supposed the analogy could work. Castiel was like a wild animal at times.

“Tread carefully, Ellen,” Castiel warned.

“I can get you the names of those two hunters who confirmed the site was dead. Check them out yourself. Dean and Sam did their research, but unfortunately, the research was faulty through no error on their part. It happens. Jo had no idea where Dean was taking her, so she couldn’t have known.”

His eyes narrowed and he gulped in a breath.

Jo grasped Dean’s shirt. This emotional side of Castiel wasn’t one she wanted to see. He appeared almost more dangerous this way.

Ellen flinched, but forged on. “As for them staying, that might be my fault. Regarding Jo anyway. I tried to teach her to clean up messes when she found them or stumbled into them. They stumbled and…well, you know how Dean is. There was no other option for either of them in their minds but to stay and fix things. To save the civilians. You know that. It wasn’t their fault the site was live. I’ll bet they acted without thinking about the consequences here.”

Sam and Bobby came in, the door slamming behind them.

“It’ll happen again,” Castiel said in a sepulchral tone. “She’ll hunt and she’ll get herself killed and I….” He shook his head over and over. Right then, Castiel looked as desperate as Jo felt. “I have to remove her memories and knowledge of hunting for her own good.”

Dean whirled, crushing her to him and Jo closed her eyes tightly. It wouldn’t do any good to try to hold on to all of her memories, but she tried anyway, dreading the feel of Castiel’s touch to her forehead. She breathed in the mixed scents of Dean’s aftershave, laundry detergent, and oil from his work outside and waited for the world as she knew it to end.

Other arms encircled her and she opened her eyes to find herself surrounded. Dean and her mother made the inner protective circle and Sam and Bobby the outer one. Between them all, there was no opening for Castiel to get at her. She unclenched her hands from Dean’s shirt, laying her palms flat on his chest.

“You’ll have to go through all of us to get to her,” Sam told him.

“This…gesture…is temporary. You can’t circle about her forever.”

Dean’s voice was harsh. “Do you want to hurt me, Cas? Because if you do this, if you touch her, you hurt me.”

Hadn’t stopped him with Sam. Jo was curious where he was going to take this.

“It’s her mind, Dean, not yours.”

“Wrong. You…married us, joined us as one according to traditional thought on the subject. Two into one flesh, remember? By that definition, anything you do to Jo, you do to me. You hurt her, you hurt me. You take her memories, you’re taking mine.”

To Jo’s surprise, Castiel backed down. “You honestly believe that?”

Dean’s hands swept along her back and he took a long breath before saying, “I do.”

There was a lengthy moment of silence. “You’ve accepted her as a part of yourself.”

“I….” His cheek rested on the top of her head. “Yeah. I do.”

Jo could hear his heart in his chest, beating as fast as hers.

“I should still take her memories for her own protection, but you do have a point. I gave her to you to be as one….” The resolve in Castiel’s voice wavered. He sounded uncertain. “Very well. I won’t take those from her this time. Consider this a warning.” His next words were for her. “You’re a wife, Jo. Please remember that. Do you want to die again pursuing a hunting career, a thing that would leave Dean grieving for you once more? Your death would put guilt back on him. Do you want that?”

The words implied that he wouldn’t raise her again. Odd. He’d promised Dean that she’d be safe and he was reneging. He’d let her stay dead if she died on a hunt.

Castiel disappeared, but the embrace they all held her in didn’t lessen for a long time.

~~~~~~~~~~

Why couldn’t Jo be obedient? For that matter, why couldn’t Dean?

Desperation was what Castiel felt right at that moment. It was strong enough to bring nausea up and he swallowed in an attempt to tamp it down.

Things were starting to fall apart, really fall apart. He couldn’t fix Sam, couldn’t reabsorb the things that had been set free from inside him, and now….

If Jo died, he couldn’t bring her back. He knew because he’d been testing his abilities while he’d considered what punishment to use on them. He’d tried saving a few people who’d just died and failed to resurrect them. That ability was gone no matter what he did. Taking power from the souls had no effect. He’d binged on souls to test that. It was as if he’d overloaded his battery completely and lost the ability to get that power back. His inner battery was losing a charge and he was incapable of recharging. As an angel, getting power from souls had worked, yet as whatever he’d become, it wasn’t working anymore. Was it the souls from purgatory that had caused this shift? He’d been able to recharge for weeks after he’d been changed, so that explanation didn’t make sense. Why was it happening now? Why was he losing his abilities?

There was no making sense of it. Something crucial had shifted inside him and he was deeply afraid of what it meant in the long run. If he couldn’t recharge, he couldn’t continue in his current capacity as God and the idea of being without these powers nearly gave him an anxiety attack.

After all, he’d had…moments with many powerful creatures these past months, from pagan gods to the remaining Alphas. If it was made known that he was losing his powers, they’d come gunning for him.

Castiel’s mouth went dry and he stared at Jo.

Why? Why couldn’t she just obey like he’d asked of her?

He was broken and was thus unable to keep his promise to Dean to keep Ellen and Jo alive and safe forever. So how did he ensure that Jo remained safe and lived to have that life with Dean? He decided that the best thing to do was to take the knowledge from her. Without it, she couldn’t go traipsing around getting herself killed.

He wasn’t surprised when they circled her and tried to protect her. Jo was loved by them all in varying degrees and ways. She was one of them. It was almost heroic and he hesitated, taking in the tableau they presented. They’d all sacrifice to keep her safe.

Perhaps he should reconsider this action.

Dean was right. Marriage did mean the souls joined as one and intertwined. A good point.

It wasn’t that he wanted to take her memories. They were integral to who she was just as much as such memories were to Dean, Sam, Bobby, and Ellen. Taking them away would make Jo no longer herself, which would negate the very reason he’d raised her. He’d raised her because of who and what she was to Dean in the past, which certainly included the hunter part of her. Therefore, if he took her memories, he’d be taking away one of the connections Jo had with Dean, making her less than perfect for him and breaking the very bond he’d sought to encourage between them.

He paused again as Dean went on. Surprise worked through him. At no time had he truly expected Dean to accept Jo as a part of himself and yet here Dean was, admitting to that.

Perhaps he was being hasty.

By doing this, he’d have to go into the core of Jo to get all of her memories and knowledge. Her father had been a hunter. She’d grown up knowing about the life, seeing it around her. He’d be taking a chunk of her self away from her.

In a blink, he could see that his urge to do this to protect her would backfire. He’d be creating a sort of Lisa situation. They’d feel they had to protect Jo and it’d cripple them. With Jo unable to defend herself, they’d be left wide open to attack. She could be taken, used against them (like Lisa), and it’d end badly. Dean would regress and Castiel would have destroyed all of them. Taking this action would accomplish nothing. It'd give none of them peace or safety.

This is wrong, he told himself. It’s the wrong decision to take her memories.

He made it a warning instead, a threat designed to scare Jo into being safe. He even pleaded with her a little and laid on the certainty of Dean’s grief and guilt if she died again. Maybe if he scared her enough, she’d do as he asked.

Castiel left them, made it as far as the field down the road, and vomited up gray mist in agonizing heaves. His emotional moment at the house took a heavy toll on him. He sighed deeply as the mist fled. He didn’t want to hunt it down and knew he had to. The things needed to be destroyed before they could work on humans, but there was so much else he had to do as well.

Wiping his mouth with his sleeve, he shuddered. Everything was falling apart, but…. He had to keep it together. Had to. He couldn’t let any of them see he was weakening, though he was afraid it was already too late for that.

~~~~~~~~~

Nearly a month after Castiel had shown up with punishment on his mind, they found a doctor willing to look at Sam. The search had been a group effort of combing through all of their individual contacts, including the ones Sam had picked up through the Campbell family. Dean had expected it to take longer, like maybe months and months. A single month felt too easy.

He pulled into the parking lot and fought a sense of déjà-vu as he looked up at the structure. Jackson County Sanatorium. He remembered it from the future vision Zachariah had given him, though it was obviously not in the same condition that version had been in. This was a business in good standing in the community and still operating. He’d looked it up after Bobby and Ellen had found the doctor.

It wasn’t the most soothing location to meet, but the doctor had a hectic work schedule and asked them to come to him. Dean would feel lucky if Sam didn’t bolt. Hell, he was almost ready to bolt himself and they hadn’t even gotten out of the car yet.

Sam reached for the door handle. “Not going to commit me, huh?”

“Tell Lucifer to shut his pie hole.” Sam had relayed some of Lucifer’s worst comments and suggestions as they’d driven and he was sick of them. “Doc said he’d be back in the garden for lunch.” He led the way, knowing where to go. Zachariah had created this place pretty well, right down to the rose bushes.

In his nightmares, he still sometimes heard those words Lucifer had uttered: ‘Whatever you do, you will always end up here. Whatever choices you make, whatever details you alter, we will always end up here. I win. So, I win.’

And here they were. Sam, Lucifer, and Dean. It wasn’t 2014, but they were all here in some way.

Dean shoved that memory and thought aside.

Doctor Marcus Allen was a small man, skinny and with the sort of features a person could easily forget five minutes after meeting him. He greeted them with a tiny, welcoming smile. “Let’s chat, get a sense of what your lives are like.”

“Lives?” Dean jerked a thumb at Sam. “He’s the one we’re here for.”

“But you,” he glanced around the garden and leaned closer, lowering his voice, “hunt as a team. Give me the highlights so I have an idea what’s been happening before we talk about anything deeper.”

They met every day for six days and on the doctor’s day off they had a longer session. Throughout the time with him, they learned that he’d dealt with a few hunters in his day and that he’d had his own supernatural troubles, hence his willingness to see Sam even though they couldn’t really pay him. They left with a prescription and stern orders to keep him apprised of any side effects and changes in Sam’s symptoms. If one pill didn’t work, he’d prescribe another.

After procuring the pills, Sam poured the first one into his palm, glanced to his right, then at Dean. “Here we go.” He popped the pill into his mouth, washed it down with most of a bottle of water and sighed. “I guess we wait and see.”

An hour later, Dean’s phone rang. It was Ellen and he answered. “Hey, Ellen. What’s up?”

“You boys able to swing out to Oregon?”

Ellen’s voice had an urgency to it and Dean glanced at Sam. They could get there for sure. It was debatable if they’d be able to do anything once they got there though. Depended on the sort of side effects Sam had. “What do you have for us?”

“Something strange. The description bystanders gave is like a demon possession gone wrong. Smoke was gray, not black --”

Dean perked up. “Gray.” He sat up fast. “Got video?”

“A couple phone ones up on YouTube, but they aren’t real clear. I’ll send you the links. Reports say the stuff changed the guy physically, and drove him mad, that he started attacking his tour group members. Guy got shot, smoke jumped ship to one of the other members, hop scotched and finally fled. The people that were changed all got shot when they wouldn’t stop.”

The drive was uneventful and within hours, he and Sam were standing over the bodies in the morgue. Dean frowned, studying every detail, committing each to memory, while Sam made notes.

The bodies were hideous. They looked like something from a horror movie, with the white skin and dark veins standing out. There was even some facial reconstruction on two of the bodies where bones had shifted. He’d seen bodies like this before when he’d been out with Bobby, but these were a first for Sam.

“These bodies aren’t human,” the coroner, Michelle Lonergan, was saying. “They should be and they’re not. We’ve done test after test. I mean, that guy there, that’s Lonny Archer. I’ve known him for years, but tests confirm it’s not him. I’ve got video that shows it was him minutes before this.” She shook her head. “Can you explain that, agents?”

“We’re receiving similar stories from other states,” Sam told her. “Are you sure the samples you took weren’t contaminated?”

“We did multiple tests from each corpse.” Michelle crossed her arms. “What is this? I mean honestly. You guys know something, right?”

“No idea.” Dean circled the body. “Could I get a copy of your report?”

“Sure.” She glanced at the door. “I’ll do that.”

When she was gone, Sam put the notepad away. “She’s spooked.”

“Whole town is. Tell you the truth, I think I am too.” With a gloved hand, he touched one black vein. “Geez. It’s hard like wood shoved under the skin.” Grimacing with disgust, he took off the gloves and disposed of them.

“What the hell are these things, Dean?”

“These are what Bobby and I saw and Cas told me to look out for.”

“You going to tell him about these?”

Was he? Maybe. Maybe not. He hadn’t decided yet. “I don’t know. If I do, maybe he’ll take care of these, too. Then again, for all we know he’s hiding them somewhere to bring out later.”

Sam stepped to two of the other bodies, raised the sheets and looked at them. “Strange how we’re the only ones showing interest in these bodies. I’d think the CDC would be all over this. A strange mist that changes people into something less than human? The speed it works at? This area should be quarantined by now, no one in or out.”

Dean agreed it was weird. Like the last time with Bobby, no one on a federal level had arrived and while people were spooked, they weren’t on the sort of level these bodies should cause. “Castiel maybe?” It was almost like people lost interest as soon as the reports went live, which was definitely up Castiel’s alley. He’d done that with Ellen and Jo’s tv appearances. Even the comments on the YouTube video had tapered off right after it had been put up. If he was concerned about these things, he might have arranged this reaction somehow to keep people calm.

Soon they had the report in hand and were walking down the street to the parking lot. The evening was fairly quiet and chilly. He drew his coat closer against him. Maybe they should try the restaurant right down the street. It seemed lively and the smell of steak coming from it made his mouth water and stomach growl. He could hear the sounds of conversation and crunches of gravel from a car leaving that lot. “Man, am I ready for a hot meal --”

“Wait.” Sam grabbed his arm and pointed.

At the Impala was a gray mist, resting up against the driver door. Couldn’t be fog, as it was too concentrated and seemed to be alive in the way it shifted at the door. Dean was reminded, of all things, of a person standing there. “What the hell,” he whispered.

“Looks like a demon.” Sam released his arm.

“Demons aren’t gray, they’re black.”

“I know, but it still looks like one.”

The mist separated into two, but remained where it was, defying the wind that swept the parking lot.

“It’s waiting for us,” Dean said, studying it, trying to decide if they should turn and run or make some sort of stand.

“Then it’s self-aware and knows what it’s doing.”

“No, Sam, I mean it’s waiting for us.” He gestured down the street. “Parking lot of a busy restaurant right over there, so what’s it doing at my car?”

“Maybe we should back away real slow and go somewhere else for awhile.”

“Maybe you’re right.” He took a step back. “We’ll call Castiel this time.”

At the name, the mist charged forward. Dean had the impression it was suddenly angry. One gray smoky thing dove at Dean and he fell back, hitting the ground hard and knowing there was no way he was going to be able to evade it. He gritted his teeth and waited for the feel of it sliding into him and changing him forever. To his surprise, it stopped an inch from his lips. Damn, the thing looked so much like a demon! Perhaps they should call these things purgatory demons. Wasn’t as creative as Jefferson Starships, but was accurate. They were from purgatory and they looked like demons.

It circled him, seemed to churn in front of him, and rose sharply into the night sky. He got to his feet and turned. The same thing happen to Sam, the thing poking at him, then fleeing. Dean went to him, reaching down to help him from the ground.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. Why’d it stop?”

“Hell if I know. You carryin’ iron?”

“Not this time.”

“Silver?”

“Amulet Ellen gave me.” He drew it from beneath his shirt.

Dean went down a list of possible things that may have stopped the attack on them and came up with silver. It was the only thing they had in common. He was wearing a silver ring and had a silver bead on the bracelet he was wearing. “You think silver stops them from possessing someone?”

“Working theory. Maybe if it stops them from possessing someone, it could also hurt them?”

“How do you hurt smoke?”

Sam had no answer to that and they made their way to the Impala.

After a long, excellent dinner at a restaurant near their motel, where they rehashed the attack several times, Dean stretched out on the bed with a glass of whiskey while Sam was in the shower. He put an arm behind his head and sighed, his mental images straying to Jo.

Her wrapped in a towel combing her hair out. Her sitting cross-legged on the bed, head cocked while she listened to him. The welcome in her eyes when he and Sam returned to the house. He’d lay in bed with her and think about the indent of her waist and the curve of her hips beneath his hands and how perfect they felt to him. He’d close his eyes and remember her rolling over in bed to face him, hands reaching for him.

He took a sip from the glass. They’d had a close call with Castiel and she was playing it safe for awhile. It wasn’t what she wanted to do, but she was doing it because there was no telling what Cas would do if she wasn’t complying. They’d stopped him from taking her memories, but there were many other things he could do to hurt her. He’d accepted Lisa and Ben’s memories being taken away, but doing it to Jo would have destroyed who she was completely. Digging his phone out of his pocket, Dean dialed her number.

She sounded surprised, yet happy, to hear from him. “You don’t usually call. Is something wrong?”

“It was the same thing Bobby and I saw. The people were --”

He heard Ellen’s voice in the background. “Is that Dean?”

“Yes,” Jo answered her.

Ellen’s voice raised. “Will you talk to her, Dean? Tell her it’s a bad idea?”

“Huh? Ellen? What’s a bad idea, Jo? What’s she talking about?”

“Ignore her. She’s overreacting. It’s not a bad idea.”

“I’m worried. There’s a difference,” came Ellen’s reply, though a lot softer than it had been. “After Castiel’s blow-up….”

“What’s going on?” He heard a door close.

“I’m house shopping.”

“You’re….” The matter-of-fact pronouncement actually seemed to short-circuit his brain for a few seconds and he struggled for a reply, finally settling on a simple, “Explain.” House shopping didn’t sound like she was playing it safe.

“Little wifey trying to set up house for her man. Duh. It’s the next step. He’ll be expecting something along those lines.”

Since she was speaking frankly, she must be in the bedroom. He only hoped Cas wasn’t here with him listening. “Jo. House hunting?”

“Oh relax. I’m not about to saddle us with a rent payment and no one in their right mind would actually give us a mortgage. My list of housing requirements is extensive, improbable to find each item in any house in the state, and guaranteed to frustrate every realtor I talk to.” Her voice was amused. “I’m not poking the bear, okay? I promise. I actually don’t mind being nosy and going through house after house.”

“Be careful,” he told her.

“Of course I will. You be careful yourself. That smoke mist stuff sounds bad.”

“It is. It’s scary, Jo. What that smoke does is like nothing I’ve ever seen. The skin on the host gets really white, like albino white only with this weird sheen to it, and the veins darken under the skin and harden. Changes remain after death. On a couple, the facial bones had shifted and the coroner said the body isn’t human anymore. These things are a lot like demons, but at the same time, they’re completely different. They look like a demon, possess like a demon --”

“But they change the body like werewolves and a few other creatures do.”

“Yeah.” He heard the shower stop and the curtain rattle on the pole. “Sam and I came face to face with some of that mist stuff earlier coming out of the coroner’s office. It was at the car like it was waiting for us.”

“You mean like it recognized you?”

“Sense I got from it.”

“That’s…creepy. You think it knows you two from Castiel?”

“Maybe.” He sipped from the glass. “It came at us, jumped us, and stopped at the last second. Sam and I were both wearing silver and the stuff couldn’t touch us. The silver even seemed to piss it off a little.”

“Silver does hurt or repel just about everything out there.”

“Make sure you’re wearing some, okay? Just in case?”

“Always do.”

They talked awhile longer and Dean knew Jo would be writing down everything he’d told her and hitting Bobby’s library again, hoping and praying to find something that matched what they were seeing.