"There's been four deaths in the past two weeks, and just last night there were three more killed. Whatever this is, it's not stopping any time soon."

Dean fidgeted in his fed suit, glancing over at Sam in the passenger seat. "Anything to connect the vics?"

"Nothing that I can see, yet. It all seems to be random…" Sam mused, brows furrowed thoughtfully.

"Well, maybe there'll be something at the crime scene," Dean mused, guiding the Impala to a smooth stop at the curb in front of the two story suburban house sporting the bright yellow caution tape. As the engine's rumble came to a stop and the pair got out of the car, Dean frowned, a question coming to mind. "Hey, how did we miss this, by the way—that's a whole lot of weird in a short period of time."

"Well, we've been busy trying to find Dad, and there is a lot of weird stuff going on right now. Not to mention travelling from the other side of the country to get here-"

"I get it," Dean said shortly, cut him off with a roll of his eyes. Sam snickered softly under his breath, though in the next moment they'd sobered, turning their attention to the case at hand as they fished out their FBI badges to get their clearance.

"Your forensics coworker is already inside—I think she was in the living room the last time I checked," the officer told them as he walked with the pair to the door.

Forensics?

Shit!

There was actual FBI here—hopefully there wasn't going to be any real agents showing up any time soon. Maybe they could still play this off.

Sam gave Dean a sidelong worried look, but Dean simply gave him a confident nod and wink, stepping through the entrance.

They were already off to a bad start with the case, it seemed. Maybe, if they had some luck for once, it wouldn't get any worse than normal.

The officer stopped them before they could get very far down the hallway, sighing. "Living room where one of the victims was is the furthest door on the left, second victim is in the kitchen at the end of the hall, third is upstairs in the bedroom, second door on the right. I hope you haven't ate yet today, boys, cause this one is grisly."

Dean watched the man make his way towards the kitchen. "You got the bedroom?" Dean asked.

"Yeah, I'll check it out," Sam muttered before disappearing up the stairs. Dean headed for the living room, sticking his head around the corner and expecting perhaps a few large bloodstains on the floor and furniture.

Instead, it looked like an explosion had occurred, dark red bloodstains coating the walls and ceilings as well as every other surface in the room.

Well, every surface except for the woman crouching down at a spot of the room where a particularly large amount of blood seemed to be, looking around at the mess that had once been a person. Dean did a double-take when he saw the platinum blonde, wondering what a woman like her was doing in a place like this. Really, someone that beautiful didn't belong in the middle of something this…

...Dean accidentally kicked a stray finger entering the room…

...disturbing.

"I saw that," the woman said suddenly, drawing Dean's attention to her. "Try to watch your step, I don't think you want a piece of Mr. Joffrey hitching a ride on the bottom of your shoe."

At her warning, Dean couldn't help but check to be sure he didn't have a bit of—Joffrey, did she say—clinging to him. The woman stood up and turned to face Dean, ponytail swinging slightly as she pulled off her latex gloves and fixed him with a turquoise stare—well that was an eye color you didn't see every day, and it was pretty damn stunning. "Who are you?" she asked, eyeing the standard suit Dean was wearing.

Dean flashed her his fake badge, tucking it away before she had longer to look at more than the big FBI on it. If she was FBI, he really didn't want her to have enough time to notice something off with the badge. "My partner and I are here to investigate the murders, though I'm surprised you're already here," Dean said, studying the woman a little closer. She didn't so much as flinch, though her eyes never wavered from him.

"I was already here because of the last murder—the FBI does have state of the art labs, and this string of murders…well, obviously, the best is needed for this one," she said easily, gesturing to the mess around them. She held out a hand, giving Dean a surprisingly firm handshake. He was equally surprised by the fact he felt callouses, having expected soft hands and not hands that had obviously seen some heavy-duty work. "Lanna O'Hara."

Dean fought a smirk. "As in Scarlett?"

Lanna flinched and made a face, her nose crinkling like she'd smelled something foul. "Yes, yes, I've heard it before—an unfortunate coincidence."

"I'll bet."

Lanna's eyebrows rose as she gazed at him expectantly for a moment before Dean realized he had yet to give her his alias. "Ah, right. I'm Agent Morse and my partner—who is upstairs, at the moment—is Agent Greer."

Something sparked in Lanna's eyes, and despite the fact he'd be impressed, he really hoped she hadn't recognized the names. "Really?" She bit down on rosy lips as if fighting a smile before shaking her head and falling back to seriousness. "So, Agent Morse, what can I help you with?"

Dean nodded towards the large bloodstain on the floor, relaxing when she didn't make a comment about the names. "Well, what can you tell me about our vics?"

Lanna sighed, looking down at the bloodstain. "Mr. Joffrey here exploded…from the inside, based on the…splatter pattern and the fact that it's everywhere from this spot here, though there's no sign of any explosives. His wife's insides were liquefied and poured all over the floor…" Lanna shook her head, a dark look flickering across her face for a moment. "And their son upstairs, the best I can explain it is everything was liquefied but the bones. Nasty stuff."

"So, you've already seen all three scenes?" Dean asked, filing away the odd deaths in his mind under most likely a witch.

Lanna nodded. "Yeah, I was just getting ready to leave. Also, the time of death has been put down as the exact same for all three, and they've already started questioning friends and family about enemies and the like. If you want to know anything else, ask one of the others, most of them are in the kitchen with the wife."

As she spoke, she grabbed a small blue duffel bag Dean hadn't even noticed in a miraculously clean spot of the room, already making her way to leave. Surprised by her abruptness, Dean hurried to respond. "Hey, if we're both working this case, will I be seeing you around?"

Lanna paused at the door, mirroring the half smirk he was giving her. "Don't flirt—it's been a long day, and I had enough flirting from Mr. Overcompensating-I-Have-A-Gun-I'm-So-Suave. You're…well, more than cute, but I'm not in the mood." She paused. "But you might still see me later."

With that, she was gone, and Dean was left standing in the living room doorway where the remains of the exploded man were. Dean narrowed his eyes slightly at the now-shut front door. She'd been in a hurry to leave…

"Hey," came Sam's voice as he made his way down the steps. "Did you find anything?"

Dean pulled his thoughts away from Lanna's abrupt disappearance, turning his attention to Sam. "I just finished talking to the forensics agent. All of it sounds pretty witchy to me—mom, pop, all of it."

Sam shook his head. "I couldn't find any hex bags in the son's room—I don't think it's a witch. In fact, I didn't see anything out of place in that boy's room other than…him," Sam finished, looking disturbed. Dean frowned. Maybe he'd just missed something…

"Well, I haven't checked the living room or the kitchen yet—maybe we can still find something," Dean suggested.

"Hopefully. Otherwise, we're dealing with something worse than a witch."

*****************************

"Nothing! There were no hex bags anywhere in that house, no EMF, no out-of-place residue, nothing weird other than the dead people themselves. And I can't find anything in Dad's journal that would explain all the victims' deaths."

Sam glanced up from his laptop while Dean fumed, taking a sip of his drink. "Do you think it's just something we've never seen before, that Dad hasn't seen before?"

Dean swallowed another bite of his burger. They were in one of the local diners getting something to eat and quietly discussing the oddity that was their current case, Sam still trying to find some lore in some isolated corner of the internet that would match what they had seen at the house and the four prior murders.

"We'll just have to keep digging. Either it's something we haven't seen and we're going to have to tread carefully, or we somehow missed something back at the house," Dean mused.

"A little bit of all of the above," came a new voice. Dean didn't even have time to turn around before three pouches that were unmistakably hex bags were dropped onto their table and a chair squealed slightly in protest as it was dragged into place at their table between Sam and Dean. The brothers looked up in surprise as the forensics woman from earlier sat in the chair, changed into a black tank top and blue denim jacket and jeans instead of the federal suit she'd been wearing earlier.

Dean leaned back, sizing her up. "No way."

"Who's she?" Sam asked in confusion even as he picked up and inspected one of the hex bags.

"Apparently, another hunter," Dean said with a small shake of his head. "And your name is definitely not Lanna O'Hara."

"As in Scarlett?" Sam chipped in, amused as he looked at the woman. She rolled her eyes.

"Yes, as in Scarlett. I'll admit, it definitely wasn't my best alias, but I was tired and just spat out a name, I didn't really think it over. As for you two—really, Kansas? Do you always use rock band member names? What do you do if someone recognizes the name?"

"Happy coincidence," Dean returned with a tight smile, leaning forward. "What I'm more interested in is why you bolted with the hex bags if you knew we were hunters too."

The woman sighed, gesturing to the hex bags. "When I first came, I thought maybe it was just one witch, but these hex bags…I had to get away from the blissfully ignorant citizens to look at them and confirm my suspicions. What happened in that house wasn't something that just one measly witch could do. Either there's a very powerful, ancient witch in this town, or it's a coven. Either way, it's not going to be something I can do alone, and while I was surprised to find more hunters here, your arrival isn't unwelcome."

"And you couldn't have mentioned this back at the house? We've been digging through lore for hours thinking we were dealing with something new," Dean stated in irritation.

The woman rolled her eyes. "I had to check—like I said, I thought it was just one witch before that horror show. I had to do some research of my own and make sure I was right, first. The last thing I wanted with my first impression was to make a mistake," she said with a sly smile.

"Well, you still could have saved us several hours with a simple, hey, I'm a hunter, found these hex bags, have to check something out first," Dean grumbled. The woman shrugged.

"I'm not used to working with others—I've gone solo for…a long time," she said with a wave of her hand. "Anyway, I've already got all sorts of information and research back at my hotel, if you boys want to catch up with what's going on."

"We don't have your name yet and you're already inviting us back to your hotel—aren't you jumping the shark a little?" Dean asked, eyebrows raised and a slight smirk on his face.

Sam hurried to respond before the woman snapped back at him, which she looked ready to do. "I'm sorry for him, he's…" Dean gave him a look, waiting to see if he could come up with a word to describe Dean before he gave up and moved on. "What we mean is we don't know you and for all we know you could be—"

"Sabrina gone dark," Dean finished, studying the woman intently. She crossed her arms over her chest.

"First of all, I'm not a little girl—I'm twenty-four," she said flatly, and Dean was slightly amused that the first thing she took offense to was being compared with a teenager rather than being accused of being a witch. "Second of all, I don't know or trust you either, but we're going to need each other, so I decided to just suck it up and be the first one to ask before we crossed paths in a more dangerous way that costs us. Third, I can't do this one alone, I know my limits, and you need my info. I'm also an extra gun, blade, whatever, to give you more of an edge, and witches and demons are kind of my specialty. If we can put aside the I don't know you debate long enough to work together we can stop this before another mass murder occurs."

The two brothers glanced at each other, Sam giving Dean a she makes a good point look before Dean turned suspicious eyes on her once more. "You still haven't given us a name."

The woman glanced between them, her tone less harsh. "Deja. Floy."

"Deja," Sam repeated, testing out saying her name right. "I'm Sam Winchester, this is my brother, Dean."

Deja glanced at Dean, rising from her seat with a brief nod. "Nice to have real names this time. I'll let you two eat—we can head to my hotel when you're done." She rapped her knuckles gently against the table next to the hex bags. "You're welcome to keep those—I've already messed with them. They're harmless now."

She walked away in the next moment, making her way to a table in the far back where she sat down, opened her laptop, picked up a burger, then winked when she caught Dean watching her. "As much as I hate unknowns on cases…" Dean said slowly before turning back to Sam. "She's hot."

Sam looked thoroughly unimpressed, shoving the hex bags out of sight. "Dude, I'm pretty sure she'd shoot you first."

"Yeah, I got that impression earlier—you should have seen her at the house. Still…" Dean said biting his lip and momentarily getting lost in his thoughts.

"Do you think we can trust her?" Sam asked, his expression serious while Dean shook himself out of fantasy land. Dean debated for a few moments, eyeing where Sam had stashed the hex bags.

"I'm willing to give her the benefit of the doubt for now…but I wouldn't say I trust her, yet," Dean said pointedly. "Since we're dealing with witches, we have to be extra careful. It could be anyone…"

"So…work with her, but keep an eye on her?" Sam simplified.

"Well, you don't have to worry so much about keeping an eye on her—I can do that," Dean said slyly, and Sam's annoyed, unimpressed look returned.

"Again—she'd probably shoot you first."

"What? Sammy, a woman like that deserves to be appreciated, even if it's only from a distance."

*****************************

Deja finished her meal quickly, carefully slipping her backpack into her black messenger bag before she paid and left. She ran across the street to buy a case of cherry Dr. Pepper for herself at the gas station before she returned to the diner parking lot. There her precious 1974 Stingray Corvette sat, and as always, she couldn't resist running a hand along the car's sleek white hood before she reached the passenger side. She had the roof off the T-top at the moment, so it was easy to spot the dark red interior. There were a few modifications, like the modern stereo, but most of the car stayed true to its roots.

As Deja put the soda and her messenger bag on the passenger side floor, Dean's voice came from the driver's side of the car.

"This is your car?"

Deja looked up to see the boys standing side by side, Dean's vibrant green eyes showing that he was mentally taking apart the car and judging every piece while he twirled the keys of his own car in his hands.

Deja shook a finger at him. "Hey now, don't you go judging my car, boy. My dad and I rescued Rosanne from the junkyard and fixed her up ourselves. My mom was just mad it wasn't a '73 or '77 we found."

"You named your car Rosanne?" Sam asked incredulously.

"Hey, there's nothing wrong with naming a car," Dean said defensively. Deja chuckled.

"She's lucky she was named by me. My dad wanted to name her Fluffer Nutter or Ghost Buster—which would have been sadly ironic, now—but I talked him out of it. Not that I should've been surprised, since it was coming from the same man who wanted to name me Pink."

Dean grinned almost instantly. "I get it."

Sam smiled as well, though he moved right to business. "You said you had information back at your hotel room?"

Deja nodded, making her way over to the other side. "Yeah, just follow me and I'll lead us there...if you can keep up," Deja finished with a wicked smile. She was a speed junkie loved not only the sleek cars that gave her goosebumps hearing the engine idle, but ones that could go fast and whose revved engine made her heart pound faster.

Like Rosanne.

"Oh, I think Baby will do just fine," Dean assured her, nodding towards the Impala parked two cars over.

"Another Chevrolet...And an Impala...nice." Deja opened the door, getting in the driver's seat and starting the car. Avril Lavigne's "Freak Out" started blaring, but she turned it down enough she could speak normally. "I'll see you two at the hotel."

She started to pull the car away to idle at the exit in wait of the boys. As she coasted away from the diner, she barely managed to hear Dean tell Sam, "I like her."

******************************

True to his word, the Impala Dean drove stayed securely behind her Corvette, even when she accidentally went ten or twenty over the speed limit.

She had a bad habit of subconsciously speeding, not that she ever did anything to fix it unless there was a cop nearby. She couldn't help it—Rosanne just begged to stretch her legs every now and then.

Deja drove smoothly into the motel parking lot, easing to a stop in the parking space right in front of her motel room. Once the engine was off, she grabbed her case of soda, messenger bag, her keys, and one of her three separate journals that was stuffed in the pouches on the passenger side before she headed towards the door. Dean's Impala rumbled into place beside her Corvette, and she smiled just slightly at the sound of the car's engine as she fiddled with the motel door—she needed to jimmy the door a little to get it to open, pulling up and towards her as she tried to turn the key.

"All right…don't mind the mess of papers, like I said, I wasn't expecting any more hunters, and when I get going…well…it looks like there's no order, but I swear there is," Deja murmured as the boys got out of their car and approached her.

"Oh, I'm sure it's not that…" Dean started to say, though he trailed off when she finally managed to shove the door open and stepped inside to give them a clear view of the papers tacked along the walls, a few sorted in messy piles on the bed with a few books lying open, and stray papers thrown to the floor in frustration. "…bad. Yikes."

"Yet again, I know it looks bad, but there is order to this," Deja reiterated as she sat the case of soda and her keys on top of the empty mini fridge before turning the journal she was carrying. "So, those hex bags, they had some serious hoodoo in them—not literal hoodoo, just…it was some messed up stuff, really dark, and it required a lot of juice to pull of those three hexes, especially all at once. Hence my assumption we're dealing with one scary powerful witch or a coven."

Deja thumped the journal down on the table, the book open to the page with the spell for the hex bag that had melted the son. "The good news is, I've seen this one before, very rarely, and always involving the same damn witch. I haven't seen her or her husband in town, though, so it might be another member of her coven trying to recruit. On the bright side, it's easy to narrow down the suspects when it's someone who recently moved in. The down side…it won't be easy to neutralize this one—this witch only recruits the best, so members of her coven are no pushover."

"What is this…some witch's grimoire you happened to swipe on a case?" Dean asked, leafing through the journal with worry written clearly across his face—the book did have some dark stuff, spells that would make a demon's skin crawl. Deja shifted uncomfortably.

"No…that's my own personal studies, spells I've seen in the past. I figured if you know what's in it you can figure out how to combat it, in case you can't find the hex bag, or a hex bag isn't involved and it's not such a simple fix. Know thine enemy, right?" Deja said, eyebrows raised.

"Right…" Dean said slowly, though he still looked concerned, setting the journal back down and putting noticeable distance between him and it as he decided to look at her wall of suspect progression.

"This witch—coven—you suspect…you sound like you've run into them before," Sam said pointedly. Dean looked back at Deja, both boys expecting a story.

"Yeah, I have—back when I was in no way ready to be taking on anything supernatural, let alone her and her coven. It's been a while, but…we have a nasty habit of crossing paths. Unfortunately, ever since I've become more…capable, I only run into the other coven members, never the bitch or her husband." Deja gestured over to where she had case descriptions and victim pictures up on a wall. "They're a bunch of sadists to the core, and all their victims are completely at random—they take care to avoid falling into a pattern unless they're trying to send a message."

"Have you found a pattern to these murders?" Dean asked.

"No," Deja said with a shake of her head. "It's just a bunch of senseless killing, one after the other. Our witch recruiter is probably playing with new spells their priestess has given them or training some bloodthirsty new coven members—or both," Deja stated bitterly.

"I'm starting to see why this is going to be a team effort," Dean murmured.

"Do you have any leads for suspects?" Sam asked.

"These three," Dean answered immediately, having reached the end of her suspect progression and gesturing to the three that remained—a woman and two men. "It looks like you're focusing on finding the coven recruiter, right?"

Deja nodded. "The big fish, so to speak. I figured if I can pin them down, they'll not only lead us to the recruits, but I might be able to get information on the sadist coven if I can play this right."

"Seems like a reasonable goal," Dean relented, eyes scanning the information she had on the three suspects. "So, Rhonda Clarke, Victor Platts, and Trevor Grier…who gets who?"