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𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐞𝐧

𝘣𝘶𝘨 𝘰𝘧𝘧

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"So, you three are students?" The greying professor asked as he walked over to his desk and placed down the box the siblings brought to him down on the desk.

"Uh, yeah. We're all in your class. Anthro 101," Sam swiftly lied.

The professor nodded his head and acted like he knew that three were really in his class. It was almost comedic to Delaney to see that the professor lied about knowing them, when he didn't actually know them at all. Mainly because they weren't actually in his class, or even go to this college at all.

"Did you find anything about these bones, professor?" Delaney questioned, motioning to the box that held the bones they found. She really hoped that the professor could help them out in some way with this. She wanted to kick this hunt out sooner rather than later. Delaney was tired of dealing with bugs. She's seen enough bugs to last her a life time after this.

"This is quite an interesting find you've made," the professor stated, looking between the three siblings. "I'd say they are about one hundred and seventy years old, give or take. The timeframe and the geography heavily suggest Native American."

"Were there any tribes or reservations on that land?" Delaney inquired.

"Not according to the historical record," the professor responded with a shake of his head. "The, uh, relocation of native peoples was quite common at that time though."

"Right," Sam spoke up after a moment of long silence where both Delaney and Dean dug their brains to make sense of all of this. "Well, are there any local legends, oral histories about the area?"

"Well, you know there's a... there's a Euchee tribe in Sapulpa. It's about sixty miles from here. Someone out there might know the truth."

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Dean, Sam and Delaney drove an hour to the place the professor had told them about. There were so many people milling about that Dean had to ask about three people to point him in the direction of a Joe Whitetree. The reservation was about as a big as a city, so it took them a while to find the diner that Joe was rumored to be at.

Dean finally pulled up in front of the diner and stepped out with Delaney and Sam. He lead the way inside and scanned the room until his eyes landed on an older man sitting at a table right by the door, playing a game of Solitaire on the table. He stopped his siblings from walking in and gestured to the man they were looking for.

Sam slowly approached the man, as if not to frighten him. "Joe Whitetree?"

Joe nodded his head wordlessly, not bothering to look up from his game. Delaney didn't think she had ever seen someone so into a game of Solitaire before. She didn't think it was possible to be that invested in that game.

"Is it okay if we ask you a few questions?" Delaney politely asked, a soft smile on her face.

"We're students from the university not far from here," Dean added on in hopes that would get the man to open up to them.

Joe chuckled softly at the siblings. "No, you're not. You're lying."

Delaney exchanged a look with her brothers. How did this guy even know they were lying? Did he even actually know they were lying to him, or was he just saying that to throw them off?

"Well, truth is - " Dean began but was cut off by Joe holding his hand up to silence whatever Dean was going to say.

"You know who starts a sentence with truth is?" Joe asked and lifted his gaze from the card game he was playing. "Liars."

Sam sighed and a ran hand through his hair. Might as well just power through this since they've been caught anyways. "Have you ever heard of Oasis Plains? It's a housing development near the Atoka Valley."

"I like him. He's not a liar."

Delaney let out a small laugh at how seriously Joe had said it. However, when her eyes met Dean's she instantly stopped at the death look she was given. She mumbled a soft sorry and focused her gaze on the ground.

"I know the area," Joe concluded and motioned for Sam to continue speaking.

"What can you tell us about the history there?"

"Why do you wanna know?"

"Something, something bad... is happening at Oasis Plains. My brothers and I think it might have something to do with some old bones we found down there. Native American bones," Delaney explained.

Joe was silent for a long moment as he debated whether or not to actually tell the Winchesters anything. Though, it seemed he didn't see any harm with doing so as he stopped his card game. "I will tell you what my grandfather told me what his grandfather told him. Two hundred years ago a band of my ancestors lived in that valley. One day, the American cavalry came to relocate them. They were resistant. Cavalry, impatient. As my grandfather put it, on a night the moon and the sun shared the sky as equals the cavalry first raided our village. They murdered, raped."

Delaney's heart broke as she listened to Joe's story. It was sad to hear that their people had to go through so much turmoil because of the Americans. They were just minding their own business and going about their lives, and then the Americans just came in and terrorized these innocent people like it was nothing. It was actually disgusting to think about.

"The next day, the cavalry came again and the next and the next. On the sixth night, the cavalry came one last time and by the time the sun rose, every man, woman and child still in the village was dead."

Delaney placed a hand over her mouth in horror and she could feel both of her brothers' eyes on her, but she ignored them and continued to listen to Joe's retelling of what happened all those years ago.

"They say on the sixth night as the chief of the village lay dying, he whispered to the heavens that no white man would ever tarnish this land again. Nature would rise up and protect the valley and it would bring as many days of misery and death to the white man as the cavalry had brought upon his people."

Dean seemed to connect the dots as he perked up slightly. "Insects. Sounds like nature to me." He rolled his neck as if to let out any tension that was building up there. "So, you said six days?"

Joe gave a small nod before responding, "On the night of the sixth day, none would survive."

After another few minutes of talking to Joe, Dean excused himself and his siblings, claiming they had some work to do. He dragged Sam and Delaney out of the diner behind him.

"Wait, when did the gas company man die?" Sam asked as the three made their way back to the car.

"Well, we got here on Tuesday, right?" Delaney asked and waited for her brothers to give her a nod of agreement. "Okay, so then he died Friday the 20th."

"March 20th," Sam clarified with wide eyes. "That's the Spring Equinox."

"The night the sun and the moon share the sky as equals," Dean noted from what Joe had said in his story.

"So, every year about this time, anybody in Oasis Plains is in danger," Delaney concluded and lowly groaned. "This is a mess. How are we going to get everyone out? No one is going to believe that they're going to die by angry spirits."

Dean scratched the back of his neck. "Yeah, and the sixth night is tonight. So, we really need to get everyone out of there."

"Larry's family will be dead by sunrise if we don't," Sam agreed as he rounded the car and leaned his elbows on the roof of the car. "So how do we break a curse?"

"You don't break a curse. You get out of its way," Dean replied, pulling his door open. "We gotta get those people out. Now."

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"Yes, Mr. Pine, there is a gas leak in your neighborhood," Delaney said into the phone as Dean sped down the highway to get back to Oasis Plains as quickly as possible.

"God, really? And how big?"

"Well, it's fairly extensive. I don't want to alarm you, but we need your family out of the vicinity for at least twelve hours or so just to be safe," Delaney explained, praying to whatever god was out there that he would trust her and get out as soon as possible. It was only for the night and then everyone should be safe afterwards.

"And who is this again?" Larry questioned.

"Nancy Weaver," Delaney replied, shrugging her shoulders as both her brothers turned to look back at her. "I work for Oklahoma Gas and Power."

"Uh-huh. Well, the problem is, I know Nancy. She's worked with us for a year. So who is this really?" Larry demanded, clearly done with the lies Delaney spewed at him.

Delaney opened and closed her mouth like a gaping fish a couple of times before she quickly hung up. She huffed and banged her head against the back of her seat. Sam grabbed the phone from Delaney and quickly dialed a number.

"Matt, it's Sam. I need you to get your family out of that house right now, okay?" Sam ordered quickly, not even letting Matt say more than a few words. "Something's coming. A lot more bugs than what we've been seeing. I need you to get your family to safety. Make your dad listen, okay?"

Dean grabbed the phone from Sam in frustration, putting it to his ear. "Matt, under no circumstances are you to tell the truth, got it? He'll just think you're nuts. Tell him you have a sharp pain in your right side and you gotta go to the hospital, okay?" He then hung up and carelessly tossed Delaney's phone into the back seat. He gave both of his siblings a look that practically screamed seriously?.

"Make him listen? What were you both thinking?"'

The car fell into silence until they finally pulled up in front of Larry's house. Dean let out a growl when he saw the front porch light on still. "Damn it, they're still here. Come on."

Delaney climbed out of the car with her siblings and froze at the bottom of the steps when Larry stormed out, Matt rushing out after him to call his dad off.

"Get off my property before I call the cops!" Larry shouted at them, his face red with anger.

"Mr. Pike, listen," Sam quietly and calmly said, holding his hand up in defense.

Matt nodded frantically from behind Larry, who turned to look at his son. "Dad, they're just trying to help."

"Get in the house!" Larry yelled, pointing to the front door behind Matt.

Matt's expression was full of guilt as he said, "S-sorry. I told him the truth."

Delaney face palmed behind Dean who let out a heavy sigh. "We had a plan, Matt. What happened to the plan?"

"Look, it's twelve AM. They are coming any minute now. You need to get your family and go before it's too late," Sam stressed.

Larry scoffed and crossed his arms across his chest. "Oh, yeah, you mean before the biblical swarm."

"Larry, what do you think really happened to that realtor, huh?" Dean challenged. "And the gas company guy? You don't think something weird is going on around here?"

"I don't know who you are, but you're crazy," Larry snapped, and Delaney practically had to keep herself from attacking Larry. "You come near my boy or my family again, we're going to have a problem."

"Well, I hate to be downer, but we got a problem right now," Dean remarked, smiling sarcastically at Larry.

"Dad, they're right. We're in danger," Matt argued from the porch.

"Matt, get inside!"

"No!" Matt screamed at his dad. "Why won't you listen to me?"

"Because this is crazy!" Larry exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. "It doesn't make any sense."

Delaney pushed through her brothers and stood directly in front of Larry. Her temper finally flaring because this guy was being stubborn and annoying. "Listen here, bucko, this land is cursed. Yeah, cursed, okay? People have died here. Now if you claim to love your family so much, then why are you refusing to save them then, huh?"

"Wait!" Dean cut Delaney's ranting off. The sound of buzzing insects seemed to grow louder with each passing second. "You guys hear that right?"

"What the hell?" Larry whispered, looking around them. The sound of the bug zapper behind them caused all of them to look over at it. Its constant buzzing meant that bug kept flying into it. That was a bad sign.

"Alright, it's time to go. Larry, get your wife," Dean commanded, and he apparently didn't have to tell Larry twice as he rushed over to the door.

Matt looked over to the trees and stopped his dad, pointing in the direction of the tall trees across the way. A swarm of bugs, looking like a dark cloud, steadily flew towards the house.

"We'll never make it," Dean rasped behind Delaney. "Everybody in the house. Go!" He pushed Delaney quickly up the stairs and into the house, closing the door behind him once everyone was inside.

"Is there anyone else in the neighborhood?" Sam questioned as Dean locked the door behind him.

"No, it's just us."

Larry's wife stepped out from the kitchen behind them. "Honey, what's happening? What's that noise?"

"Call 911," Larry told his wife, not even bothering to go into detail about what was going on. "Joanie!"

Larry's wife seemed to snap out of her small daze at her name being called and she made her way over to the phone on the wall.

"I need towels," Dean said as he rushed over to Larry.

"In the closet," Larry responded as he lead Dean over to the closet.

Sam grabbed onto Matt and Delaney, pulling them with him. "Guys lock this place up, okay?"

Delaney nodded and quickly rushed up the stairs with Sam and Matt. She ran into as many rooms as she could and locked all the windows. In the middle of her locking the windows in the last room that Sam and Matt didn't do, the lights suddenly went out and she rushed in her mission of locking the two windows in the room. Just as she locked the last window, Sam and Matt showed up at the door and the three ran back down to the first floor.

Sam and Delaney both grimaced when they saw the number of bugs taking over the windows. The buzzing sound intensified more and more by the second. Delaney was half a second away from just torching the bugs until every last one left them alone. However, she knew that torching would do nothing considering this was a paranormal curse rampaging the house. No amount of fire would help them right now with the bugs.

"So, what do we do now?" Larry questioned, tearing his gaze away from the window and over to the Winchester siblings.

"We try to outlast it," Sam sighed, watching as more and more bugs took over the window. "Hopefully, the curse will end at sunrise."

"Hopefully?" Larry asked incredulously.

Delaney jumped slightly when Dean stumbled his way back into the kitchen where he had disappeared to while the others gaped at the window. She noticed the spray can of Raid in his hand and raised an eyebrow. "Bug spray, Dean? Really?"

"Trust me," Dean assured as a creaking sound came from behind Larry, his wife and Matt. All six members in the room turned their attention to the direction the creaking came from. The creaking grew slightly louder and the group was able to determine that the creaking came from the stone fireplace in the den behind them.

Delaney took a tentative step forwards, her brothers close behind her. Once she gave herself a quiet pep talk, she moved to stand right in front of the fireplace as she tried to figure out what was happening inside of it.

"The flue," Dean clarified as he stopped behind his sister. "Alright, I think everyone needs to get upstairs."

As if on cue, a swarm of bugs flew right out of the fireplace. Joanie and Delaney let out a scream before the group rushed in the opposite direction of the fireplace. There were too many bugs and were a lot faster than the group, so within seconds they were all swarmed by the bugs.

"Ew! Ew! Get away!" Delaney squealed as she slapped her hands around, trying to kill the bugs surrounding her head. She jumped back as Dean sprayed the bug spray around her to get the bugs away from her.

"Everybody upstairs now! Go! Go! Go!" Dean yelled, backing everyone towards the stairs as he continued to spray the bugs with the fire spray.

The group rushed up the stairs and right over to the attic stairs that were fortunately already pulled down from when Larry or his wife had gone up there earlier in the day. Larry lead the way up and everyone piled in. Sam grabbed the string as Dean was the last to crawl up and he quickly pulled on it to pull the stairs up as Dean sprayed the bugs to keep them at bay while Sam pulled as quick as he could.

Delaney leaned against the pole behind her as the stairs were finally up and let out a much needed breath. "God, I'm going to have nightmares of that for the rest of my life."

"What's that?" Joanie pointed up to the ceiling of the attic where dust fell through tiny holes. The holes slowly but surely grew bigger by the minute.

Delaney pushed herself off the pole and investigated the holes with her brothers. "Something must be eating through the wood."

"Termites," Matt noted as he watched more dust fall from the ceiling.

Dean walked around Delaney and examined the rest of the holes being made. Delaney could see the wheels in his head turn as his brain flicked through all the possible scenarios. "Alright, everybody, get back." He waved Matt, Joanie and Larry to move further back into the attic where there were no bugs chewing through the ceiling.

There was a loud creaking sound before a big hole was made in the ceiling as a part of it fell to the ground, more bugs flying into the attic. Delaney took a few steps back as Dean let the bug spray fly out once again, yelling in frustration that nothing was working on them. She knew no amount of fire would help them right now.

Sam rushed over to the side of the attic where there was a metal panel over what looked a vent and a plank of wood. He tossed Delaney the plank of wood while he grabbed the metal panel and stuck it onto the hole above them. Delaney pushed the plank against the metal panel, holding it in place so no more bugs can swarm into the attic.

Unfortunately, their plan did not work for long as the termites chewed right through another part of the ceiling and started swarming in from the newly made hole across from the other hole that got closed up.

"Now what do we do?" Delaney yelled to Dean, who used the bug spray again. To their left, Larry and his family were swarmed by bugs yet again and tried to fight them off. Delaney rushed over to them with the boys in tow as they huddled together, trying to think of what to do next.

The bugs continued to fly in and the contraption Sam and Delaney made didn't even hold that long as the bugs finally fought their way through it. Now they had two huge holes in the ceiling with bugs flying in from both directions. Giving up, Dean dropped to the ground by Delaney and tugged his jacket over their heads, Sam doing the same with Matt and his parents.

"Look!" Dean exclaimed and pointing to one of the holes that were made in the ceiling. It looked like the sun began to come up, the bugs that were originally swarming them now flew out instead of in.

The three siblings slowly stood up from their crouched positions and cautiously walked over to the hole and looked out of it, watching as the bugs flew off into the sunrise.

Thank God that was over.

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A few hours later, after the siblings went off to grab breakfast since they hadn't eaten in about a day and a half, Dean pulled in front of Larry's house. A moving van was parked outside with Larry putting furniture and their other belongings into the back of the van.

"What? No goodbye?" Dean teased as him, Sam and Delaney approached Larry.

"Good timing," Larry replied with a small smile. "Another hour and we'd have been gone."

"For good?" Sam asked as Larry shook all three of the Winchester's hands.

"Yeah. The, uh, development's been put on hold while the government investigates those bones you found," Larry explained, stuffing his hands in his front pockets. "But I am going to make damn sure no one lives here again."

Dean nodded his head and glanced over at the house that used to be Larry and his family's. Now it would probably never house a single soul again.

"You don't seem too upset about it," Delaney noted as she took in Larry's relaxed nature.

"Well, this has been the biggest financial disaster of my career, but ... somehow ... I really don't care."

Delaney glanced over her shoulder to see Matt walking over to the garbage with a cardboard box. She smiled over at him which he gladly returned. She excused herself from the men to walk over to Matt, who tossed all his insect stuff into the trash.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Delaney asked as she motioned to the garbage that slowly filled up with insects.

Matt chuckled softly and shrugged. "I don't know. Bugs kind of weird me out now. I think I'll be having nightmares for weeks."

"Yeah, me too actually. If I never have to look at a bug again, I'd be happy," Delaney agreed. She glanced back to her brothers who were now leant against the Impala waiting for her to walk back over to them so they could hit the road. "Um, I should probably get going. Just... promise me to be cool with your dad, okay?"

Matt glanced over to his dad who already smiled in his direction. "I don't think that would be too hard. This whole disaster actually brought us closer together. I hope you and your dad make up soon, too. I realize now how important my dad is in my life."

Delaney felt her heart weigh heavy in her chest. She gave Matt a sad smile before she said her goodbyes and walked over to her brothers. They both gave her a look as she leaned against the Impala in between to two of them. She watched as Matt and his dad joked with each other outside of the garage.

"I want to find Dad," Delaney spoke up after a long moment of silence.

"Yeah, us too, kiddo," Dean agreed, wrapping an arm around her shoulder and hugging her into his side.

"We'll find him, Delly," Sam assured her, rubbing a hand up and down her arm. "Promise."

"Yeah, but I just... " Delaney trailed off, trying to plot her thoughts together properly. "I want to apologize to him."

"For what?" Dean asked, still hugging her into his side and placing his chin on top of her head.

Delaney sighed as she stared off ahead of her. "All the awful things I said to him over the years. He was just doing the best he could for me. He didn't want me to be a hunter and just be normal, but it was hard to have that with a family being hunters. Dad didn't want me too far so that he could get to me if something ever happened while I was at school. I wouldn't have known what to do since I wasn't trained like you guys. I would have been defenseless and with where I was, you guys would have never made it in time if it escalated too quickly."

"Like Sammy said, we'll find him... together. Okay? Then you'll apologize and within five minutes you guys will be at each other's throats again."

Delaney giggled as she wrapped her arm around Dean's waist and leaned her head on his shoulder. "Yeah, probably. I can't wait for it."

Sam pat his sister on the back before leaning off the car. "Let's hit the road and find him then, shall we?"

"Let's," Dean and Delaney agreed before the three got in the car and Dean pulled off almost immediately. Delaney leaned back in her seat and let her mind race over all the things she would do once they found their father.

Honestly? Delaney couldn't wait. Matt was right, their dads were important to them and they needed to put differences aside. Her dad was one of the three family members she had left and she was damned if she was going to let anything get in the way of them reconciling.

authors note

HAI GUYS. SO WE FINALLY FINISHED EPISODE 8 OF SEASON ONE. WE ARE SLOWLY GETTING THROUGH THE SEASON AND WE'RE GETTING TO ALL THE GOOD STUFF SO I AM EXCITED TO GET TO THE LATER EPISODES.

DELANEY HAS FINALLY REALIZED HOW IMPORTANT JOHN REALLY IS TO HER AND THE BOYS. SHE NOW UNDERSTANDS THAT SHE WAS PUSHING AWAY ONE OF THE LAST FAMILY MEMBERS SHE HAD LEFT BESIDES SAMMY AND DEAN. SO YAY FOR CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT!

ANYWAYS, DON'T FORGET TO VOTE AND COMMENT YOUR THOUGHTS!

EDITED ON: OCTOBER 2ND, 2019