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The bar was called The Rusty Nail. Marc found it through a contact who knew a contact. The place definitely didn't have a liquor license and probably failed every fire safety inspection ever conducted. But reporting it wasn't an option. This was where his targets hung out, swapped information, decided who to trust. He couldn't afford a blacklist before he'd even started.
The hunter was already there. Older, gray beard, missing two fingers on his left hand. He didn't look up when Marc sat down.
Maxwell Hitch. That's what Marc's contact had called him. Allegedly been in the business for a few decades. Joined the life "like everyone else," according to the contact, which Marc had initially taken to mean tragedy. Loss. Revenge. The standard origin story.
When he'd asked if that was true, if everyone just joined from loss, the contact had laughed in his face.
"Some are raised around it. Some get pushed in by revenge. Some choose it. And some are just born into it."
Maxwell, apparently, was the second type. Pushed in. Marc didn't know the details. He wasn't going to ask.
"You the government guy?"
"Yeah."
"Figured." He took a sip of his beer. "You're not as subtle as you think."
Marc slid the folder across the table. "We're putting together a task force. Need experienced hunters. Pay's good. Benefits. Backup."
The hunter didn't open the folder.
Marc noticed the charm around his neck. A real one, he was starting to learn. Symbols carved into bone, worn smooth from years of touching. Not like the ones he'd been seeing everywhere else, cheap metal pendants from Etsy, misspelled sigils, stuff that wouldn't stop a papercut.
"You know how many times the government's tried this?" Maxwell asked.
"Never."
"Exactly." He pushed the folder back. "You want hunters to work with you? Find the Winchesters and put a leash on 'em. Then we'll talk."
Marc opened his mouth. Who are the Winchesters? He almost asked. The question sat there, half-formed, and he realized it was the wrong one. He didn't even know how hunters organized themselves. He'd pictured something like a military structure, commanders, lieutenants, and people who gave orders. He'd pictured finding one person who mattered, and suddenly everyone else would listen.
This wasn't that. The hunters were a rumor mill. A network of people who all knew each other somehow. And the name that kept coming up wasn't a rank. It was two guys who'd apparently done something that made everyone else stop and pay attention.
Or in his contact's words: A pain in the ass.
Marc opened his mouth. The hunter stood up.
"Don't follow me."
He walked out. Marc sat there, folder untouched. He noticed the hunter's jacket, too. A bulge at the hip. Open carry, no attempt to hide it. Three months since the world found out monsters were real, and everyone was armed now.
Marc found them at a diner outside Tulsa. Two hunters, late forties, sharing a plate of fries. He didn't know their names. Didn't need to. He could tell they were hunters from the way they carried themselves, shoulders loose, eyes moving, scanning the room without seeming to. Calm in a way civilians weren't anymore.
He sat down uninvited.
"You're the government guy," the woman said. Not a question.
"Marc Riley. I'm putting together-"
"We know what you're putting together." The man wiped his hands on a napkin. "Word travels."
"That's good. Saves us time."
The woman laughed. It wasn't friendly. "You think we're gonna sign up for a government leash?"
"It's not a leash. It's resources. Pay. Medical. People who notice if you go missing."
"We notice if each other goes missing." The man stood.
Marc glanced at their charms. Real. Well-worn. He was getting better at spotting the difference. Outside the window, a man was shouting at a woman in the parking lot.
Marc had heard about the burned corpse in town. Someone had found it in an abandoned house. The local rumor mill was calling it a cult sacrifice. Marc suspected different. Somewhere in the last few months, the word had spread, burning bodies kept ghosts from coming back. How much of that was true and how much was misinformation, he couldn't say. There was too much noise out there. Too many people claiming expertise they didn't have.
He'd stopped at a thrift shop earlier. The owner had mentioned "FBI agents" passing through. That was how Marc found them. The owner had been proud to share the information, like he was part of something bigger now. That was the other thing Marc was learning, everyone wanted to be involved. Everyone thought they had a piece of the puzzle.
He was starting to think he could spot the difference between real hunters and the fakes.
But that might just be his lucky streak talking.
"I swear she's a shapeshifter! I saw her face change!"
The woman wasn't changing. She was crying. A crowd was gathering, phones out. Some of them had guns.
Marc had been there. Three weeks ago. A different town, same scene. He'd been walking through the crowd, trying to figure out how to de-escalate without making it worse, when someone else stepped in.
A hunter. He was sure of it now, though he hadn't been then. They'd walked right into the middle of the circle, calm, unhurried. Said something to the crowd Marc couldn't hear. Something that made them lower their phones. Something that made the man with the gun hesitate.
Then they'd turned to the crying woman. Handed her something. Silver, maybe. Marc couldn't see clearly. She'd touched it. Nothing happened. They'd said a few more words, quiet, and the crowd had started to disperse.
By the time Marc reached the spot, the hunter was gone. The woman was still there, shaking, but alive and left alone.
The video went online that night. "Silver test confirms she's human!" the caption read. Within days, everyone was buying silver. Necklaces, rings, cutlery. People kept it on them like a shield.
Marc was pretty sure half of it wasn't pure. Didn't matter. People believed it worked. That was enough.
"Three months," the woman said, following Marc's gaze. "And people still can't tell the difference between a shapeshifter and a bad angle."
"Doesn't stop them from shooting," the man added and grabbed his partner's arm and throwing cash on the table. "We're not interested."
He ate the cold fries.
The warehouse was supposed to be empty. Marc had checked the intel twice. Three months into the job and he was still learning to trust his sources, still figuring out which ones were solid and which ones were just repeating rumors they'd heard at a bar.
He found the monster first.
It was a ghoul, he knew that in hindsight. But in that moment, all he'd known was that something was in the dark with him, moving too fast, too wrong, and his gun wasn't doing anything.
He'd fired three rounds. Missed two. The third hit but didn't slow it down. He'd backed into a corner, the thing was already lunging, and he'd thought- this is how it ends. Three months in and I'm dead in a warehouse in Cleveland.
Then the gun went off.
The ghoul shrieked, recoiling. Another blast. Marc scrambled sideways, found cover behind a stack of pallets. He heard voices, young, panicked, but determined.
"There! Hit it again!"
"I'm trying! It keeps moving!"
"What do we do?!"
"I don't know! I read the post once!"
Marc watched as three college kids, because that's what they were, he realized, three college kids with a homemade gun and a ghost hunting app with too many ads and a laggy interface, kept the ghoul pinned while he got his bearings. They weren't good. They were terrified, yelling over each other, almost hitting him twice. But they kept it busy.
He found his opening. Grabbed a piece of rebar. Drove it through the ghoul's chest.
It stopped moving.
For about three seconds.
Then it twitched. Gurgled. Started pulling itself off the rebar like it was nothing. The kids screamed. Marc backed up, heart pounding, because he'd read the file, he knew ghouls needed decapitation or head destruction, but reading and remembering in a dark warehouse with a thing crawling toward you were two different things.
"Hit it again!" one of the kids yelled.
"I'm out!"
"Reload!"
"I don't have more!"
The ghoul lurched forward. Marc dove, scrambled for anything, a pipe, a brick, something. His hand found a cinderblock. He threw it. It missed.
Then the girl, the one who'd been yelling orders, swung her gun like a bat. It connected with the ghoul's skull. Cracked. The thing stumbled. She swung again. The gun shattered.
"That was my brother's!"
The ghoul lunged. She fell. Marc was already moving. He grabbed the nearest thing, a rusted metal shelf, and brought it down. Missed. The ghoul turned on him.
The kid with the gun grabbed a loose pipe. Hit the ghoul in the back of the head. The ghoul turned again. Snarled. Swiped. The kid dodged. The ghoul's head connected with a concrete support beam.
Crack.
It went down and didn't get up.
Silence. Heavy breathing. The three kids stared at the body. Marc stared at the body.
"Holy shit," the girl said.
Marc nodded slowly. "Yeah."
He looked at the cinderblock. The shelf. The pipe. The beam. A chain of stupid accidents that somehow worked.
He turned to the kids. They were pale. Shaking. Still alive.
"You okay?" he asked.
"No," the girl said.
"Yeah," the one with the pipe said.
The warehouse went quiet. Marc was breathing hard. The kids were staring at him, then at the body, then back at him.
"Holy shit," one of them said.
"You okay?" Another one asked. Her voice was shaking.
Marc nodded. He was fine. He was also humiliated. "Yeah. Thanks."
He'd spent twelve years in the FBI. Counter-terrorism. Hostage situations. Active shooters. He'd walked into rooms that would make most people freeze and walked out again. He'd been calm. Competent. In control.
And then a ghoul had backed him into a corner and he'd fired three rounds, missed two, and the third hadn't even slowed it down.
They stood there for a moment. The ghoul wasn't getting up. Marc let himself believe it was over.
"Alright," he said. "Who are you?"
The kids exchanged glances. The one with the gun was still holding it like a lifeline.
"We're... hunters," he said. He didn't sound convinced.
Marc looked at them. Really looked. The gun was modified, maybe from a hardware store. The charms around their necks were cheap metal. The only reason they'd survived was luck.
Just like him.
"You're not hunters," he said.
"We are!"
"How long?"
A pause. "Three weeks?"
Marc closed his eyes.
"You're going to get yourselves killed."
"We just saved you!" the girl said.
He couldn't argue with that.
He walked over, took the gun from the kid's hands, and checked the ammunition. It was low.
"How much of this do you have?"
"Like... two more bags?"
Marc blinked. "Bags of what?"
"Salt." The girl said it like it was obvious. "We put salt in it. The forums said salt works on most things."
Marc stared at her. Then at the gun. Then back at her.
"Just... salt?"
"Yeah. Hunters have been using salt rounds for decades. Silver bullets too. The forums said it's like a secret they never told anyone." She paused. "We figured it out, though. From the posts."
Marc turned the gun over in his hands. Cheap. Modified. Filled with table salt and silver bullets apparently.
Decades. Generations of hunters just... not telling anyone. Letting the rest of the world walk around with normal bullets while they had the actual answers.
He handed the gun back.
"Alright," Marc said. "Lesson one. Salt works on some things. Not everything."
That much was true. He'd read that much. He was also a little embarrassed, three months into the apocalypse and a ghoul almost killed him, so he was grateful for anything he could say that made him sound like he knew what he was talking about.
"And table salt isn't the same as rock salt or blessed salt or whatever else you read on those forums."
He didn't actually know if blessed salt was a thing. It sounded right. The kids nodded like it was right. He'd check later.
"Oh," one of them said.
"Yeah. Oh." Marc rubbed his face. "Tell me everything you think you know. I'll tell you what's wrong."
He found a crate, sat down. Waited.
The kids looked at each other. Then the girl sat down across from him. The others followed.
"Okay," the girl said. "So, we read this post online..."
She trailed off. Maybe realizing how she sounded, listening to other people instead of doing the work herself. But Marc was in the same boat. Everything he had was secondhand. Thirdhand. Rumors passed between people who didn't trust him. Despite decades of monsters and hunters, the information was locked up tight. No databases. No archives. Just journals that never left the people who wrote them.
"We've got a team back at HQ," he said, filling the awkward silence. "Just for research. Monsters, weaknesses, what kills them."
He looked at them.
"Hunters keep journals. Pass them down, supposedly. Decades or centuries of knowledge. But as far as I know, no one's selling." He sighed, he didn't even know why he was telling them this. "And the people who have them aren't talking to us."
The girl frowned. "So you don't know anything?"
"I know enough to know you're going to get yourselves killed with half this stuff."
She opened her mouth. Closed it.
"Where'd you get the salt gun?" he asked.
"Made it."
"From what?"
The kid shrugged. "A YouTube tutorial."
Marc pinched the bridge of his nose.
The hunter was mid-thirties. Ex-military. Burned out, Marc could see it in his eyes.
They met at a truck stop. The hunter listened. Read the paperwork. He was quiet for a long time.
"The money's good," he said finally.
"It's good."
"And backup. Medical. I haven't had medical in years."
"You'd have it."
He looked at the folder. His charm was real. So was his gun.
"John Tower," he said, offering a hand. "Not Winchester. Just Tower's fine. Don't wanna risk whatever unlucky streak those sons of bitches have."
Marc shook. "Marc Riley."
The name hit again. Winchester. That was the fourth time it was brought up by someone else. Not a common last name. A few hunters, contacts, and rumor he'd followed, it kept coming back to the same two people.
Sam and Dean.
Coincidentally, the same pair who'd been on the FBI's most wanted list before they died in a police station bombing that took out the lead detective on their case. And apparently, the same pair who'd come back to life and gone on a country-wide killing spree a month ago.
It wasn't a pretty picture. Marc had to stifle a shiver at the thought, the most famous hunters in the were also the most infamous. And if the stories were true, they were also insane.
He wanted to ask. Wanted to know who they were, why people kept bringing them up, what they'd done specifically to make hunters use their name like a warning. But he couldn't. Asking would sound like an interrogation. And he had a feeling pressing people who'd spent their lives fighting monsters wasn't a good idea.
That was why he was here alone. Usually, recruitment like this was a two-person job. Backup, second set of eyes, someone to take notes. But they'd wanted a point of contact. Someone who could connect. Befriend people. Build trust. Apparently hunters were nice enough if you didn't push. They just didn't like the idea of a task force.
What bothered Marc more was how casual they were about the Winchesters' rap sheet. Most Wanted. Assult and battery. Police station bombing. Country-wide killing spree. Home invasions. Jail break. Kidnappings. A list of crimes that would put anyone else away for life. And the hunters just shrugged it off. At most, they'd grumble about the Winchesters bringing trouble, making their jobs harder. Some complained about the arguing, how the brothers took it out on everyone else when they were fighting, not physically, just snappy, short-tempered, unpleasant to work.
That was the worst part to them apparently. Not the murders. Not the wanted posters. Not the bombing that killed a detective.
They were annoyed that the Winchesters were rude.
Marc hated that. Hated how everyone seemed so calm about it. Like the crimes didn't matter. Like the body count was just background noise. Like the only real issue was whether the brothers were pleasant to be around.
He didn't say anything. Couldn't. He was here to build trust, not pick fights.
John nodded as he looked at the folder again
"The thing is," he said, "I've heard about you. The government guy trying to recruit hunters. Everyone's talking."
"What are they saying?"
"That you're looking for the Winchesters." He looked up. "That's the only reason you're here."
Marc paused. "Or just to know about it. We've heard a lot of names. A lot of stories. But no one's been able to give a straight answer. Or even a reliable one. Everyone's got their own version, different sources and different opinions. None of it matches."
At most, they had their own records. A dead mother, house fire, ruled accidental. A long list of schools the brothers had attended for barely a month each before moving on. CPS reports that John Winchester apparently left town the second he heard about them coming. That part had triggered an internal audit. The higher ups were convinced someone inside the system was a hunter, leaking intel, helping them avoid authorities, keeping them off the grid. They never found proof. But they never let it go either.
And then there was everything after. The police reports that didn't add up. The witnesses who changed their stories or took back their statements. The cases that went cold the moment the Winchesters' names came up.
None of it made a coherent picture. Just fragments. Just enough to know the brothers existed, but not enough to know who they really were.
John was quiet. "Yeah. That's how it is with them."
His partner walked in, younger, sharper, suspicious. She didn't have a charm. Marc noticed. Most hunters wore them constantly.
"You the government guy?"
Marc nodded.
"Great." She grabbed her partner's arm. "We're not interested."
"Wait-"
"No." She was already pulling him toward the door. "You don't know what you're asking."
They left. The hunter looked back once. Marc saw the regret.
He looked at his notes. Three months since the world found out the supernatural was real. Three months of panic, fake charms, open carry, and people shouting at shadows. Three months since a man calling himself God started smiting people before disappearing.
Marc only knew the name from hunters. Castiel. The "angel pet," they called him. The one who went feral and off his leash. The one the Winchesters were supposedly connected to.
Sam and Dean Winchester.
The Roadhouse was exactly what Marc expected. Dark wood, bad lighting, a jukebox playing something old.
Ellen was behind the bar. She didn't look surprised to see him.
"You Riley?"
"Word travels."
"Fast." She set a glass in front of him. "You're not gonna have much luck."
"I'm noticing."
Ellen wiped the counter. She wore no charm. Marc was learning that some hunters didn't need them, prefering instead to get tattoos of the sigils and marks inked into their skin. The ones who'd been doing this long enough that protection was just part of how they breathed.
"Hunters don't trust the government," she said. "You know why."
"I know." He paused. The conversation seemed over but he really couldn't afford that, Ellen was a wealth of information and he if he could somehow befriend her then maybe... "The Winchesters," Marc said. "Everyone keeps bringing them up."
Ellen smiled, a knowing glint in her eyes. "The Winchesters aren't the head of the serpent, if that's what you're thinking. They're just the most infamous pair out there. People love gossiping about them. It's like our version of Keeping Up with the Kardashians."
Marc blinked. "That's... not what I expected."
"Welcome to the life." She wiped the counter. "If you want to get anywhere, maybe try talking to the them directly. Government probably has the most files on them anyway. And somehow those boys keep getting in trouble with the cops."
"Do you think they'll be open to it?"
"As consultants, maybe." She shrugged. "Can't speak for them. But they're not impossible to find."
Marc was quiet. "You know them."
"I do."
"Will you introduce me?"
Ellen studied him. "I'll think about it."
It wasn't a no. Marc took it.
"Castiel," Marc said. "I've heard the name. From hunters. They call him the angel pet."
Ellen's expression flickered. Something tight around her eyes. "He's not a pet."
Marc raised an eyebrow. "I'm just telling you what I heard."
"He was a good man."
"Was he?"
"He was their friend. The brothers'." She paused, jaw tightening. "A lot of people in the community think of him as a pet. Some weapon the Winchesters kept on a leash. They forget he could smite them with a glance, even without whatever boost he got when he called himself God."
Marc didn't say anything.
"He's been a great help," Ellen continued. "Stopped Lucifer and Michael from destroying the earth. Pulled Dean out of Hell. He was a good friend." She met his eyes.
Marc wanted to ask about Hell. About what that meant, if it was literal, if people actually went there. He held his tongue. There was a time and place, and this wasn't it.
"What made him go off the rails?" he asked instead.
Ellen was quiet for a long moment. "I don't know. Haven't talked to Dean in about eight months. Thought Sam had died. Apparently Castiel brought him back from his own trip to hell. But the only person who knows for sure..." She trailed off. "There's someone. Closest to the boys. Surrogate father."
"Can I talk to him?"
She shook her head. "He's not going to talk to you."
"You know them," he said. "The Winchesters."
Ellen was quiet for a long moment.
"Yeah," she said. "I know them."
He waited. She didn't say more.
Then she reached under the counter, grabbed a napkin, and scribbled something down. Slid it across to him.
"My number. I can help consult, but I haven't been in the field in years. I'm not a hunter anymore." She paused. "Try not to come back to the Roadhouse. You're ruining the atmosphere. Hunters don't like the shiny suit and tie."
Marc took the napkin. "Noted."
Marc found him in a motel room outside Colorado Springs. The hunter was young, maybe twenty-five, covered in maps and notes.
"You're the government guy," he said without looking up.
"Marc Riley."
The hunter gestured to the mess. "I've been tracking them. The Winchesters. Two years."
"Find anything?"
"Rumors." He pointed to a map marked with red pen. "Sightings. Dead ends. They don't want to be found."
"Why are you looking?"
The hunter finally looked up. "Because everyone else is."
Marc sat down. "What's your name?"
"Jason." He handed Marc a photo. "This was taken six weeks ago. Outside Omaha. It's blurry, but-"
Marc looked at the photo. Two figures. One tall, one shorter. Both in profile.
The shorter one looked... short. But according to their file, that he was six-one. The taller was six-five. Dean looked short because his brother was a giant. Marc had to remind himself that both of them towered over most people. The file photos didn't capture it well. The perspective was off. But next to Sam, anyone would look small.
He studied the image. Blurry. Taken from a distance. But the height difference was unmistakable. Two men who'd been running for years, and still stood out in a crowd.
"That's them?"
"That's them?" Jason repeated it back. "I thought you would've done your research. This is a pretty clear picture if you ask me."
Marc looked at him. "It's blurry."
"It's a photo taken from a hundred yards away. Through a window. At night. What do you want, a selfie?"
Marc didn't answer. He looked back at the photo. Two figures.
"Can I keep this?"
The hunter shrugged. "It's yours."
Marc stood to leave. The hunter spoke again.
"You know people are saying the government wants to put hunters in camps? Lock us up? Experiment on us?"
"That's not true."
The hunter looked at him. "I know. We know. We're just humans. You're planning to do that to monsters, right? The actual things that eat people?"
Marc nodded slowly. "Yeah. That's the plan."
"Good." The hunter turned back to his maps. "Just making sure. Most people forget that distinction."