Dean takes some extra precautions with his next murder, keeping out of the way and not staying long. Unfortunately, almost a week later, he's yet to hear anything from it, either in the news or from his phone. Maybe the dead guy's house was a little too out of the way.

So he decides to try again, down in Texas this time. He's always liked Texas, even if it's consistently a million degrees out. He knocks on a random front door, waiting patiently for someone to open it.

She looks like a sweet lady. She's fairly short, probably in her early thirties, and has a small smile on her face. He smiles back at her, because he's a civilized person, after all.

Then he pushes her into the house, slams the sit behind them, and slits her throat.

Because, you know, civilized.

"Hey!"

Dean looks over to see a man down the short hallway into the kitchen, and he isn't too concerned until he sees the guy pull a gun from his waistband. He's killed a lot of Southerners before, many of whom he's sure owned guns, but no one's ever actually pulled one on him. On the off chance they even have their gun with them, they're usually too shocked to do anything with it.

But the man shoots him in the shoulder, and Dean can tell he's not one of them.

"Ah, shit," Dean mutters, clutching his shoulder.

He runs to the guy, ready to slit his throat, too, but before he reaches him, there's a bullet in his leg. But before he can shoot again, Dean hits the gun out of the way, then glides the knife across his throat.

"Daddy!"

Dean follows the sound of the voice to find a young girl, not more than five years old, hidden in an adjoining room. When she sees him, she screams, and Dean smacks her upside the head, knocking her out easily. He slits her throat as well, and though he wants to write his message to Castiel, he can't. He can't even sign his little bloody heart.

Dean's leg gives out and he falls to the ground. He groans, lying flat on his back. With every passing second, it seems to hurt more and more, if that's even possible. He's heard of people passing out from pain, and he's starting to think he may get to experience that firsthand.

Except, he realizes with a frown, he can't. If he passes out here, there's no way he can bullshit his way out of this if the cops show up. Even without his signature, the three murders here is enough to put him away for a long time, and unless he admits to being the Bloody Valentine killer, there would be no chance that he'd ever speak to Cas again.

Dean pushes himself to his feet, and his leg feels like it's on fire. He can ignore his shoulder, but he kind of needs a leg to walk. Pulling out what very little medical knowledge he has, he takes his top flannel off and ties it around the bullet wound. He can't help but wonder how credible the advice to add compression to a bleeding wound is, because it just seems to hurt more, not to mention how painful it was on his shoulder to tie it.

But he doesn't have much choice in this. He needs to get out of here. So, despite every inch of his body screaming at him to stop, he walks out of the house and into hiding.