Return to Lakeport

Brian Moore, Jessica's father, learned about monsters over a decade ago. Now, one has shown up in his town, and Brian reaches out to the only hunter he knows: Sam. The Winchesters must find the monster before the locals do, and Sam re-unites with a family he thought he would never see again. Sequel to Summer Job.

Chapter 1 Death in the Water

The water glimmered in the sun, the light reflecting off of the rippling surface. It beckoned all with a promise of a quick cool-down and relief from the sweltering heat. The lake was full of people making good on that promise. Boats, canoes, jet-skis, the residents of Lakeport took to the water as if they had fins and gills. Nothing would stop them, short of a lighting strike.

Not even the string of grisly corpses that had been found in and near the water.

Brian Moore didn't care for water sports or fast motor boats. He much preferred a leisurely day of fishing, with a cold soda in one hand, a book in the other, and the pole propped up against a rock, Huck-Finn style. The lake house was his oasis, an island of calm in an otherwise hectic world.

He didn't know what led him away from his usual fishing hole today. He was following some sixth sense honed during twenty years in law enforcement. Even over a decade after he'd left his Sheriff's badge behind, old habits died hard. Possibly, it was the silence. An invisible message filling the air, warning that something had gone wrong. The birds weren't singing, there weren't' even any squirrels digging around under the trees. All was still.

Brian picked his way along the lakeshore, hopping from one rocking outcropping to another, searching. He didn't know for what, until he found it.

It was the smell that hit him first, feces and rotting meat mixed in a potent combination. Then, the buzzing of flies filled his ears, guiding him like a beacon. There, washed up in a tide pool, was something that had once been a human body, now mangled beyond recognition.

Brian emptied the contents of his stomach into a nearby bush. He'd investigated few murders in his time, and killed only one man. A day that would be forever branded in his memory. Next to this one. Even on highway patrol, he had never seen a body as bady disfigured as this one.

There was no need to check for a pulse. The skin was mottled and blue, long dead. Something sharp had ripped the flesh to ribbons, except for one expanse of skin. This was clearly marked with a circular pattern, lines weaving in and out of each other with no clear beginning or end; a cletic knot, scratched into the skin.

Brian pulled out his cell phone. The lake had once been without service, a fact Brian had never minded. Recent upgrades to the cell towers had changed all that. Today, he was glad of it. Within half and hour, the Sheriff had arrived, and a team of deputies and forensic experts were combing the scene.

Sheriff Mann was a big, beefy man, very proud of the badge he had won in the last election. He'd been on the force for nearly fifteen years, and no one could say he didn't have the experience to do the job.

What he lacked was the temperament.

The Sheriff approached Brian with a broad stride and nodded a cordial greeting.

"Mayor."

His tone was respectful, but resentment bubbled under the surface. He had been happy to stop into the role that had once belonged to Brian, but was more than a little disgruntled that the 'old man' still out-ranked him. Sheriff Mann liked to be at the top of the heap, and Brian's presence at the head of city government was a constant reminder that he still held more authority than the younger man.

"Sheriff." Brian's greeting was short and without warmth. He had a sneaking suspicion about the mess he'd found, confirmed by the lack of surprise evident in the crime scene team. They had seen something like this before. "Glad to see your team responded so promptly. Excellent drill work, that."

Sheriff Mann puffed up with pride. Always, he had cared more for the opinions of others than anything else. "Beat your best time by half a minute."

He'd never quite caught on to Brian's first rule of discipline. If possible, pay a compliment before handing out a reprimand. With his children, and his employees, he'd found is the most effective way to nurture improvement.

Mann had grown up over the years, Brian had to admit. He was no longer the blustering young buck, full of swagger and stoked with the power his badge and gun gave him. But he still had a long way to go. He liked to be in charge far too much, and his fragile ego did not handle criticism well.

"It looks like your team have seen something like this before." Brian kept his voice cool, just gathering facts for now.

"Yep, looks just like the other two. Entrails ripped out, body barely recognizable as human."

"Hm." Brian pursed his lips. So, he was right. "The papers called it a bobcat mauling. You've got everyone on alert looking for a wild animal."

Mann was starting to catch the warning tone in Brian's voice. He nodded defensively. "Looks like a wild animal's leftovers, don't you think?"

"Did an animal decorate that victim, Sheriff? Did an animal carve a celtic knot into the skin of its dinner before chowing down? What did the coroner's assessment conclude?"

Mann's black look was all the answer Brian needed.

"No bobcat would do that, and you know it. You didn't even inform my office of the real evidence." Too many pieces were falling together, and the picture they painted was anything but good. Rumors of sightings of a 'loch-ness' style creature in the lake. Strange accidents, swimmers received strange scratch marks in open water. Three deaths, but no wildcat sightings worthy of mention. It was too much. "You need to evacuate the lake. We don't know what we're dealing with."

"Now, Mayor, you don't have any jurisdiction to tell me how to do my job." Mann tapped the gold star pinned to his chest. "I'm Sheriff now, and I control how this department is run. I don't want the public to be worried until we are certain what we have on our hands."

"I am responsible for the well-being of all Lakeport and her weekend guests." He gestured to the water, where motor boats whizzed across the surface. "How long until another one dies?"

"I have all of our resources devoted to this investigation, Mayor. Wildlife control is out in force. Whatever this thing is, we'll catch it."

"Thing?"

"They all have the same symbol, yes, but they've also been chewed on by canine incisors. Could be a serial killer using wild dogs or wolves to hide his tracks. Could be a group of folks who got tattoos together who all ran into the same bad luck. We don't know yet. All I do no is, it doesn't make any sense and there is no sense scaring folks." No sense telling people information that would only make them ask more questions, questions the Sheriff couldn't answer. No sense getting people scared, scared enough to call State Police or the FBI, who might take the investigation away from the local yokels.

Eaten by animals, but marked by humans. Brian felt a chill run down his spine. Could it be? There were things in this world, he knew. Things that straddled the line between man and beast, between the natural world and something…else.

"Yes, I'll expect the coroner's report within the hour." Brian gestured meaningfully to his phone, which had become a sort of mobile office in the past few years. "In addition to everything else you have in the case file." Mann scowled, but nodded. Brian couldn't interfere with his investigation, but as Mayor he had the right to access any records held by the Sheriff's dept.

Brian retrieved his fishing pole and made his way back to his vacation house, perched between a stand of trees and the shimmering water. Once, it had been his retreat, the safe haven from the world. Nothing could touch his family at the lake house. Until a hit-man intent on murdering his perspective son-in-law blew a hole through one of the walls with a grenade. The damage to the structure had been repaired long ago, but the illusion of safety had taken some time to regain. Just when the world was feeling right again, it collapsed.

There were four figures splashing in the water by the dock, Brian's daughter Jenna and her three children. The youngest wore water wings and kicked happily at his siblings, dousing them all with. They obligingly splashed back. They were fearless, carefree, happy.

Brian paused, taken aback by the sweet innocence of the scene, the swimmers completely unaware of the dangers lurking around them. Dangers Brian could no longer ignore. He marched forward and waved his arm to get Jenna's attention.

"Get them out of the water, now." Brian knew his tone was sharp, even rude, but he didn't care. There was death in the water, and a cold feeling spreading through his guts. "We're closing up the lake house for a few days."

Jenna frowned, an unusual sight in her tan, cheerful face. Her hair was bleached nearly white by the summer sun. She and the kids played here every day when school was out. "What? Dad, why?"

"Just do as your told." Those were words seldom used in the Moore household. They were a family that prided themselves on honesty, and open discussion. Explanations always followed rules.

"What? Dad! What's happening?" Jenna stared at her father, waiting.

Maybe he was panicking. Maybe, it was just a wild animal. Maybe, there was nothing out of the ordinary going on.

But maybe, it was something else. He couldn't take the chance.

Brian didn't answer, just scowled and reached toward his oldest grandchild. The little girl was named after her aunt, who had died long ago in a fire. Jessica. He grabbed her hand and hauled her to the dock. "I need you to trust me, Jenna. Get them out of the water."

00 Lakeport 00

Life was good. Sandy breathed deeply, inhaling the scent of fresh basil before sprinkling the herb into the bubbling pan in front of her. The promise of a savory meal made her mouth water as she stirred the sauce, then checked on the rest of the pots. Cooking was like a dance, there was a rhythm to the flow of chopping, stirring, waiting while the heat worked out its chemical reaction and a pile of meat and vegetables became a meal. Cooking was creation, joy, and nourishment wrapped into one.

When her daughters were young, Sandy had rarely cooked. Not real, from-scratch, fresh-herbs-from-the-garden cooking. She had been to busy watching them learn to crawl, to walk, to talk, to play. Many of their meals had started in boxes, packaged ingredients quickly thrown together. Or they had been bits of this and that tossed from freezer to crock pot. She had cooked, yes, but never like this.

Sandy hadn't allowed a box of Hamburger Helper in the house for nearly a decade. After her daughter Jessica died, darkness had fallen over their home. It was a shock, the ending of a life that should have continued far beyond hers. Dreams and plans snuffed out by chance. None of them had known how to move forward from that, and for what seemed like an eternity they walked through life on auto-pilot. But light slowly crept back into their lives. Healing came in the small things. Brian took to fishing again, and reading. Sandy went out to her garden, and learned to compose deliciousness from the things she grew there. Slowly, each of them found their way back.

But something was wrong today. Sandy could sense it in the air, a hint of bitterness caught in the back of her throat, throwing off the taste of everything. She ladled pasta and sauce into bowls and went in search of her dinner partner. Half the joy of cooking was watching another eat her creations.

Brian sat on his computer, where he had landed as soon as he came home from the lake house half a day early. He was hunched, neck bent, eyes fixed on the screen as if looking away might cause some great catastrophe. His face was line with stress, a look Sandy hadn't seen for several years.

After retiring from his first career, she'd been more than a bit surprised at his choice of a second. But he had needed a focus for his life, after the fire, and she hadn't complained. Brian rarely brought his work home, and it never, ever interfered with his dinner. Usually, he was circling the kitchen, begging for a sample, eager for Sandy to fill his plate.

Today, he just stared at the computer.

"Dinner!" Sandy called.

Brian's face turned toward her, and he blinked, surprised. "What? Already?" He stared at the clock, then rubbed his eyes.

Sandy came over to see what was on the computer screen, but he quickly closed the program. All she caught was a flash of skin and red blood. A dead body? "What's got you so wrapped up today?" She frowned, then asked more pointedly. "What happened at the lake?"

Brian let out a long sigh. "They found another body. It's not a bobcat. Sheriff Mann kept key details out of his reports to the public, and to me."

The delicate dance of power between the Mayor and newly elected Sheriff had been a source of entertainment for the entire town for several months now. Usually, it involved a lot of blustering and posturing. Usually, something this serious wasn't at stake.

"You think it's a murderer?"

Brian nodded. "Yes."

"Honey, Mann worked under you as a deputy for a decade. He's been with the Sheriff's office for over fifteen years. He knows how to do the job. He doesn't have to do it the way you did."

"He has no idea how to handle this type of case."

The last killing in town had been over twelve years ago, and Brian had been the one to pull the trigger. Sandy squeezed his hand. "You retired. It's not your job anymore. Meddling in his investigation isn't going to help. It'll only make him mad, and he'll dig his heels in just to spite you."

"I know." Brian grimaced. "The truth is, this is beyond both of us. I think I need to call in a private investigator for this."

"I thought P-Is investigated cheating spouses, or figure out where teenagers go when they claim they're sleeping over at a friend's. Shouldn't you call the FBI?"

Brian shook his head. "No, this isn't a case for the FBI. We need a special type of investigator."

Brian's mouth was set in a line. There was something lurking behind this conversation, something he wasn't telling her. Sandy was used to not knowing much about his work. It was often a matter of safety and rules of confidentiality that all professionals had to adhere to. Of course, there were the secrets he chose to keep. The ones he could speak of, if he wished to. She wondered how much he'd spared her over the years, by simply not talking about something. Brian could be the master of silence, holding onto thoughts he knew others wouldn't like.

Today, she suspected his silence was motivated by the latter. There was something else going on here, something he simply refused to say out loud.

Clearly, this conversation would go nowhere further tonight. Sandy pointed meaningfully at the electrical socket where the computer was plugged in. "Well, then, there's nothing more for you to do today. Come eat your dinner, or else I'm cutting you off."

Brian leaned back, looked up at her, and smiled. That was what she wanted to see. After nearly forty years of marriage, she still lived for that grin. He reached for her cheek, and she met him halfway, melting into a long kiss.

Yes, life was good.

000 Lakeport 000

There are things in the world, things that don't obey the natural laws. Things that most people don't know about. We teach our children that the world is a certain way, we teach them that all things obey the same laws of science. Anything that doesn't fit this paradigm, we teach them to dismiss. Monsters have been in the world for thousands of years, but its only in the last few hundred that humanity has decided to ignore them.

Except a few of us. We call ourselves hunters. We kill the things that kill people. Ghosts, demons, werewolves. We know how to find them, and how to end them. Most of the cold cases in police files, unsolved mysteries, the X-files type of stuff that people can't explain. Well, when the strange happenings stop, that's usually because a hunter came to town.

If there is ever a mystery you can't explain, you call one of us. We'll come, and we'll take care of it.

The conversation was as fresh in Brian's memory as if it had happened yesterday instead of over twelve years ago. He had expected a belief in things 'not of this world' from a priest, but never something like this.

Brian had carried the knowledge of the supernatural quietly for the past decade. He had never spoken of it to anyone since the fire that took his daughter's life. The fire that had been set not by a human, not by accident, but by a demon. It was the rotten egg smell left behind, Pastor Jim had told him. There was nothing to be done about a demon. If it had left the area, there was no way to identify it, and no way to kill it.

It was the last time Brian had spoken to the priest. He'd stopped calling, not wanting to know more. The knowledge of the supernatural was the door to a dark world that Brian wanted no part of. That world had taken his daughter from him, and the boy she had brought into the family. The boy she had planned to marry. The boy who had become like a son to him and Sandy. The boy surrounded by the supernatural.

Sam Winchester.

Brian had made a decision the last time he saw Sam. They had all been at a crossroads of sorts, that day at Jessica's funeral. Sam's brother waiting by his side, ready who whisk him away in their rumbling old car to parts unknown. To a life of hunting. Sandy, welcoming Sam with open arms even after Jessica's loss, inviting him to stay part of the family.

Sam had gone with his brother, and never spoke with any of them again.

Except for one drunken phone call, which Brian thought may have been a sort of suicide note. Sam had been getting ready to do something dangerous, that was all he knew.

Hunting. It was a lifestyle best kept far away from Lakeport. The last time Hunters came to town, they'd brought monsters in their wake.

But the monster was already here. Brian had reviewed the reports over and over again. He examined the celtic mark, found on every body. He'd read the coroner's report, unable to match the claw and tooth marks to any known wildlife. It was clear that whatever was happening, it lay outside the realm of normal human experience.

This was a job for a Hunter.

Brian waited until Sandy went upstairs to bed before making the call. She didn't know anything about the dark side of the world, and he didn't want her to learn. Jessica had taken the knowledge in stride, but then, Brian wasn't sure she'd entirely understood what it meant. She hadn't seen what he had seen. Knowledge and experience are not the same.

There were four contacts in his phone, four Hunters that Brian could call.

He tried the priest first.

The cheery voice on the other end of the line suddenly went grim when Brian asked for Pastor Jim. It seemed he had died over ten years ago, found in a hidden room full of illegally-gotten guns and satanic lore. He'd kept the hunting world secret even from his own parishioners.

Next was Caleb, the gun runner and FBI informant. A practical man, and quiet. Brian had not spoken with him much. Caleb's phone was answered by a pizza parlor in New Hampshire.

Which left the Winchesters. Sam's father, John, had left a number with instructions to call if anything odd happened.

John's phone went to voicemail. Brian left a message.

Which left him staring at the last name on his contact list.

Sam.

Brian's stomach clenched. What had happened to the hopeful college student he'd known? He could be dead. He could be an entirely different person. Brian had seen young men coming back from war, he knew what that kind of work did to a man.

I should have checked on him.

It was his one regret. His choice to leave the world of the supernatural alone meant that Brian let Sam go his own way. He could have called, checked in, invited him for a holiday. But Brian didn't want more death in his family. Life had resumed a familiar pace. He had another daughter, and grandchildren to think about. The monster's in Sam's life didn't care about collateral damage. The Moore's had learned that from Jess.

But the supernatural had come to his town, whether Brian liked it or not.

Sam's message told him to call another number. The voice on the new phone was older, deeper. It asked him to leave a message.

What to say?

Brian sucked in a deep breath.

"Sam, this is Brian Moore. Jessica's father. I know we haven't spoken for awhile, but I've got a problem here. I think it might be the kind of thing you can help me with. Please call me."

Brian closed the phone with a sigh. Now all he could do was wait.

NOTE: So much has changed since Brian and Sam's last meeting! What will Sam's reaction be when he hears the messages?

Please review!