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The Sheriff swiveled in his chair. Castiel was annoyed by a hair sticking to his forehead, but couldn’t do anything about it, being handcuffed to the table and all. Not being able to do something about the hair annoyed him more than the handcuffs.“Why don’t you tell me the truth?”
“The truth?” Castiel’s eyes widened and dilated.
“Yeah. Your, ah, partner in the other room told me that I know the whole story, but I’m pretty sure that’s all BS. So, why don’t you try?”
Castiel blanked. What could Sam have told him? He cleared his throat. “Yeah, whatever he said is the total truth, Officer.”
Sheriff Bowman tilted his chair back and folded his arms.
Father, if you could move this hair, I’ll take it back. I’ll take it all back. Heaven’s Army Hoo-rah. “Ok. The truth.” Cas took a breath and gave the officer a well, you asked for it look. “The truth is, Sam, my “partner” and I, got to town yesterday.”
“And why is that?”
/…/
“Vampires?” Castiel clicked into the passenger’s seat of the Impala. “You don’t need my help with vampires.”
“You’re right,” Sam nodded, shifting the car into drive before Cas could rethink his participation. “But I’d like your help with these vampires.”
“Are these special vampires? Why not take Dean?”
Sam gritted his teeth. “I’m not taking Dean because Dean wouldn’t stop laughing. These vampires,” Sam sighed, “sparkle.”
/…/
“Sparkle?” The Sheriff leaned forward at his desk. “Like those books with that guy and the,” the sheriff gestured above his head, “the hair?”
Castiel nodded hopelessly.
“My step daughter was really into those books when she was little.”
/…/
“Sparkle? Castiel squinted disapprovingly. “That’s not a thing, Sam.”
“My sources swear by it.”
“What sources?”
“My sources at the New Bamford ESP and Paranormal Society.”
Castiel frowned, understanding Dean’s perspective.
Eight hours of mostly uncomfortable silence, punctuated by brief utterances of Enochian profanity and deepening self-loathing later, the pair found themselves at the New Bamford ESP and Paranormal Society. Which they found in a small office in the corner of a second sub-basement of the New Bamford Community Center.
“SAM!” A tall, over-thin man wearing a t-shirt that read Federal Boob Inspector, rushed to give Sam a hug. “I knew you’d come.”
“Hi, Ben. Uh, this is my friend Cas.”
“Oh rock on. Hi Cas!” Ben hugged the angel as if he’d known him his whole life. “Come, sit.”
Ben ushered the men to a small, wobbly desk with over-full files. The “Legalize It!” and “Let’s Trip Balls” posters behind Ben’s chair did not escape Castiel’s notice.
“So, uh, vampires?” Sam asked hopefully.
“I’m so glad you came. There’s like… a bunch of them.”
“How much is ‘a bunch’?” Cas prompted, already annoyed.
“I’ve seen two and Marty’s seen three, maybe four more.”
“And you know they’re vampires because…?”
“They Sparkle!” Ben leaned forward, conspiratorially, “But you can only see it if you eat these.” Ben looked over both men’s shoulders before dipping one hand into a desk drawer and sliding a small Ziploc bag of mushrooms across to them.
Cas slumped in his chair, pinched the bridge of his nose, and sighed heavily. Sam blushed before quickly stuffing the baggie into his coat.
“The vampires are the only people that sparkle.” Ben started eating from a party-sized chip bag.
“There have been murders, right? Attacks? Something?”
“Murders? Oh yeah! Murders.”
Sam breathed in relief.
“Cow murders. Bird murders. Mrs. Pickens’s Pekinese got attacked.”
“Ah,” Sam nodded slowly. “Cows and birds and a Pekinese. Uh…do you happen to have Mrs. Pickens’s address?”
“’Course! She lives in the big blue Victorian on fourth. Can’t miss it.”
Outside again, Sam pressed his head against the Impala’s roof. “Please don’t tell Dean.”
“I’m telling him every word.” Cas slipped back into the passenger’s seat.
The ride to 4th street took two or three quiet minutes and Sam parked across the street from the only blue Victorian-styled house on the block.”
“Ok. Ok. We’re uh, state wildlife officers investigating an animal attack. I’m, uh, Cabe and you’re Derlin.”
“Right.”
Sam knocked on the blue house’s blue door and a short, elderly, blue-haired woman answered.
“Mrs. Pickens? We’re –“
“Sam and his special friend Cas.” The woman interrupted him. “You’re friends of Ben. He called and told me you were coming.”
Sam literally bit his tongue. “Yeah. Ben told us about your dog and we’re big dog lovers ourselves,” he reached around Cas and pulled him close. “Aren’t we?”
“Oh. Yeah. Big.” Castiel forced himself to smile.
“Do you happen to know what attacked your dog?”
“No clue. Not a scratch on him.”
“Oh, then how do you know he was attacked?”
“The vet said he’d been completely drained of blood.”
/ … /
“Sounds vampiric to me.” The Sheriff shrugged and pushed a box of donuts to Castiel.
“Us too…unfortunately.” Cas was just able to maneuver his cuffed hands high enough to select a pink frosted donut. “So, we did the only logical thing we could do.”
/… /
“We have to consume the mushrooms, Sam.”
“Yeah,” Sam frowned into his phone in deep concentration.
Castiel tried to negotiate a look at Sam’s screen. “What?”
“I’m reading about psychedelic mushrooms.”
“I don’t think Wikipedia can tell you if they help you detect vampires.”
“No…it’s just that…I’ve never taken mushrooms before, ok? I don’t know what to do. How many. How do you know if they’re working?”
Castiel squinted at Sam skeptically.
“Seriously! Dean and I smoked pot in high school, but –“
Castiel took Sam’s phone. “Sam, the sooner we eat the mushrooms, the sooner we can go home.”
“Right. Right.” Sam pulled the small bag out of his pocked and eyed it distastefully. “Don’t tell Jack.”
“Nope,” Castiel agreed as he took a few specimens.
“…So then Bobby says ‘you idjits! The spell said Dog Wood not Wood Dog!”
Castiel belly laughed and tossed his tie on top of his coat on the back seat. “What happened with the spell?”
“Just as Bobby said that, the cauldron burst into these huge purple flames. It took months for our eyebrows to grow back.” Sam caught Castiel’s eyes and stopped talking.
“Sam?”
“Your eyes are blue. Really blue. With flecks of stars and…waves…I get why Dean looks at them so often.”
Cas cleared his throat. “Ah. So, we know the mushrooms are working.”
“Oh! Right!” Sam fiddled with his seat belt and door handle before spilling out of the car.
“Trippy,” Castiel quipped and Sam laughed loudly.
“Ok. Ok. Vampires, Cas, vampires.” The two walked into a town center crowded with bars and shops.
“Right. Sparkly humans. Humans always look kind of sparkly to me.”
“Do we? Your…friends never mentioned it.”
“My Friends,” Cas emphasized with air quotes, “couldn’t see the possibility of humans. They never took the time to find a sparkle.” Castiel was momentarily entranced by the moon’s reflection in Sam’s hair.
“Uh…” Sam swiped at his hair self-consciously, “I’ll take your word on that.”
Both men turned away from each other and started concentrating really hard on the people around them.
“I think I can taste her shampoo,” Sam remarked about one woman who walked close to him. She looked over her shoulder at his comment and quickened her pace.
“I think she heard you,” the stoned Angel of the Lord waggled a finger disparagingly.
Sam chuckled in his throat. “Oops.” He stopped and pulled on the sleeve of Castiel’s suit jacket. “Hey. Hey. Look at this guy. Is he sparkling to you?
Castiel turned his head to see a man in coveralls and a thick coat who appeared to be covered in glitter and illuminated by a mirror ball. “Sparkling like a dozen strippers in a very small bottle.”
Sam raised his eyebrow at the crudeness of the angel’s analogy. The pair watched the man enter into a store that appeared to be closed.
“Sam, I just had a thought,” Castiel whispered.
“Oh?”
“If we kill that man, we’re too intoxicated to drive and dispose of his body.”
“Oh. Ohhh! Ok. So, we watch, take pictures, and then kill them after I’ve had some sleep.”
“Right.” Castiel solemnly raised his iPhone and began filming the front of the store.
A woman’s voice caused them to turn on their heels. “You boys see something you like?”
She and a man standing beside her sparkled like a refracted tear on a flower petal on a foggy morning.
“Cas, that makes no sense,” Sam hissed.
“Now is not the time for sense,” Cas replied and let his Angel Blade slip from the sleeve of one arm and punched forward with the other. Sam nodded and lunged towards the woman. He got in one hit before he had to stop, bend over and vomit.
“Oh God, this sucks.”
/… /
Castiel’s eyes widened and he stopped talking. The Sheriff leaned forward in his chair. “It was just getting good!”
The angel shrugged. “That was it. We…fought them off and they ran away. Then your officer arrived.”
“And you don’t know anything about the big building fire that you happened to be standing in front of?”
/…. /
Castiel had to drop his blade because its shine caused the world to shiver too much. Punches, glass. There was a blur and he slid across a display case. Sam giggled as he chucked a hammer at one man.
Sam slammed the trunk of the Impala closed. “Ok. Three things. We park somewhere secluded until I’ve had some sleep. Then we dump the bodies. But first,” Sam laughed and pulled out his phone. “I’m updating Wikipedia.”
The sound of the patrol car’s siren behind them wiped the smile from Sam’s face.
/ … /
“Oh, absolutely, Officer, that’s the whole story. Nothing else happened.”
Sheriff Bowman scrubbed his beard thoughtfully. “That’s one hell of a story. You know what? After all that, I need a break.” He laughed and walked to his office door. “You hang here for a bit, ok?”
“Uh…yeah. I’ll just wait right here.”
Bowman walked out the door and shut it behind him. He paused to shake his head and take a deep breath before opening the door to the office just across the hall.
“Mister Winchester. I’m Sheriff Bowman,” he introduced himself as he sat down at the interview table.
Sam smiled faintly and fiddled with his cuffs.
“Now, your friend just told me quite the story, but I’d like to hear your version.”
“Oh?” Sam’s smile fell.