Near Seattle, Washington. 1992
“I’m bored.”
Nine-year-old Sam Winchester sat cross-legged on one of the two beds in the small motel room. His brother Dean— thirteen—sat in a vinyl-covered chair in the corner, feet propped up on the other bed. The TV was turned to what network executives liked to call a “daytime drama,” but which their father always referred to as a soap opera. Sam thought the name was weird. He knew what an opera was—a play where people in costume sang loud songs in another language—but no one sang in these shows, and he had absolutely no clue where soap came in.
He’d seen this particular one before—it was called Heartbreak Hospital—but he could never keep track of the various storylines. Characters cheated on their lovers with other characters—Sam wasn’t exactly sure what cheating entailed, but it seemed to have something to do with kissing—and they experienced different medical conditions, everything from unexplained pregnancies to amnesia. Currently, a man who was a doctor was in his office embracing a woman lawyer who, up until a week ago, had been his mortal enemy. They were both married to other people who were, ironically, at that exact same moment lying in bed with each other in a house on the other side of town.
Dean hadn’t responded, so Sam turned to face his brother and tried again. “Can we see if something else is on? I don’t like it when they start kissing.”
Dean didn’t take his gaze from the screen as he answered. “You will when you’re older. Now shut up. I want to see if Dr. Martin realizes he’s really with Alexis’s evil twin Anika.” He grinned. “Anika is so much hotter than Alexis.”
Sam frowned. Weren’t the characters played by the same actress? How could one be hotter than the other? Sighing, Sam faced the screen once more. Dean loved to watch TV. It didn’t much matter what was on, just as long as it had a story to it. Once he started watching something, he was practically hypnotized until it concluded. Sam was the complete opposite. He liked to watch shows he could learn from, like quiz shows or science programs. He hated this mushy junk.
They were in Pennington, Washington, a small town not far from Seattle. Although really, they could have been pretty much anywhere. The inside of one cheap motel room looked the same as any other to Sam. Their father had brought them here because he’d gotten a lead on a warlock living in Vancouver who supposedly had a mystic artifact that could track demons. John Winchester hoped to use it to track the yellow-eyed demon that had killed their mother. Finding and killing the yellow-eyed demon was an obsession with their dad, and Sam sometimes thought there was nothing more important to him in the whole wide world—including his sons. He’d never say this out loud, especially around Dean. Dean was always trying to explain why their dad left them alone so often and how the work he was doing saved people’s lives. Sam knew this was true, but he still couldn’t help missing their father, and sometimes—a lot of times—feeling abandoned by him.
At least he hadn’t left them alone this time.
There was a series of knocks on the door—three slow, three fast—then the sound of a key in the lock. The door opened and Bobby Singer stepped inside. He wore his usual baseball cap and khaki army jacket, both of which were wet, and he carried a pair of plastic bags full of snacks and soda. He kicked the door closed then put the bags on top of the dresser.
“Seems like it’s always raining in this state,” Bobby said.
Bobby locked the door, then went into the bathroom to dry off his face and hands. Dean got up to check out what Bobby had brought them. He pulled out a jar of peanuts, popped a handful into his mouth, and then offered the jar to Sam. Sam took a few, and as he was chewing, Dean took two bottles of pop from the second bag and handed one to Sam.
Bobby came out of the bathroom, tossed his wet cap on the small desk and hung his equally wet jacket on the knob of the door. He sat down and glanced at the TV. Dr. Martin and Anika were kissing so fiercely it looked like they were trying to eat each other’s faces.
“Is that Anika?” Bobby asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Dean said, grinning.
“Well, I hate to interrupt your afternoon Sex Ed., but I need you to turn off the TV,” Bobby said.
Dean’s grin fell away. He snatched up the remote and did as Bobby asked. Normally, Sam would’ve been thrilled to not have to watch any more of that show, but the tone of Bobby’s voice told him that something important had happened. Both boys put their pop bottles down on the nightstand and looked at Bobby expectantly.
Sam didn’t want to ask The Question, as he’d come to think of it, but he couldn’t stop himself.
“Is Dad okay?”
Bobby smiled. “Far as I know, he’s fine. He called the front desk and left a message for me earlier. He said he’s still working on the warlock case but he’s making good progress. He told me to tell you he loves you both, and he hopes to get back soon.”
Dean smiled. He always loved hearing from Dad, even if the message was passed along by someone else. Sam was relieved. It was hard knowing that whenever Dad went on a hunt, he might not come back, and if he did, he might not be altogether human. But Sam wasn’t sure that Dad had actually told Bobby to say the other part. Sam figured Bobby added the “Dad loves you” part whenever he passed along a message from their father, but he appreciated it. Bobby was like a second father to them, and when he told them their dad loved them, it was like he was saying it too.
“What I have to tell you boys is that I’m going to have to work tonight. Maybe all night. Will you be all right if I do?”
“Sure,” Dean said. “I’ve watched Sammy by myself lots of times. We’ll just watch TV until you get back.”
“And eat a ton of junk food while I’m gone,” Bobby said.
Dean smiled but didn’t say anything. Sam clenched his teeth. He didn’t like it when Dean called him Sammy.
“What are you going to do, Bobby?” Sam asked. He always worried when Dad was on a case, and he worried just as much—if not more—when Bobby was too.
Bobby looked back and forth between the brothers, as if trying to decide how much to tell them. Bobby once said he believed it was better to face an ugly truth than believe a pretty lie. Sam wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but it sounded cool.
“The clerk at the convenience store told me about a murder that happened last night. Might not be anything supernatural…”
“But?” Dean prompted.
“Could be the work of a werewolf,” Bobby said. “The attack occurred in the parking lot of the local hospital. The police think it was the work of a serial killer. They might be right.”
“But you don’t think so,” Sam said.
“Whenever you come across a corpse that’s been torn to hell and is missing a heart, you’ve got to check it out.”
“Especially if the murder happened during the cycle of the full moon,” Dean said.
“Bingo.”
Dean grinned as if he were in class and had just given a teacher the right answer.
“I’m going to stake out the hospital parking lot tonight. Werewolves are creatures of habit, like any animal. They return to the same hunting grounds as long as the food supply holds out.”
The thought of Bobby out there in the night, alone, with a werewolf lurking somewhere nearby, frightened Sam. Bobby gave him a smile.
“Don’t worry. I’ll have my gun, and I got plenty of silver bullets. I’ll be all right.”
Bobby’s words reassured Sam somewhat, but they didn’t relieve all his anxiety. Still, he gave Bobby a brave smile.
Bobby pulled a twenty-dollar bill from his wallet and handed it to Dean. “For dinner. There’s a pizza joint not far from here that delivers. Number’s in the phone book. I circled it earlier. You boys take care of each other while I’m gone, you hear?”
Sam nodded, and Dean said, “We always do.”
Bobby sighed and his shoulders sagged. He grabbed his cap and jacket—neither of which had dried much during the few minutes he’d spoken to them—and left. Once the door was closed, he turned the knob to make sure it had locked behind him.
Dean turned the TV back on, but Heartbreak Hospital was over—luckily—and he started surfing through the channels. Sam lay back on the bed and got comfortable. It looked like it was going to be a long night.
Finally, Dean found something that caught his attention. “Awesome!” he said.
At first Sam didn’t know what he was looking at. A woman in a thin floor-length nightgown was running barefoot across hilly terrain. It was night, and a full moon hung in the sky, casting the world in an eerie glow. The woman looked absolutely terrified—mouth open in a silent scream, tears falling from eyes wild with fear.
“What is this?” Sam asked.
“It’s a movie. I haven’t seen it since… well when I was around your age. It’s called Night of the Blood Moon. It’s a classic, one of a series of Italian horror films starring Paolo Mansetti. As far as I’m concerned, he played the best werewolf ever!”
Dean loved all kinds of movies—even mushy romance ones so long as they had pretty women in them. But his absolute favorite kind of movie was horror. He lived for scary movies, and he knew all about them. When they were made, who directed and starred in them, whether they were originals or remakes… Sam had never been able to figure out why. Given what Dad and Bobby did for a living, Sam would’ve thought Dean would get his fill of spooky stuff in real life. Dad had even taken them with him sometimes. Dad said he wanted to prepare both of them.
Sam knew Dean intended to follow in their father’s footsteps. It was obvious. Dean practically worshipped their father. If their Dad had remained a mechanic, Dean probably would’ve started fixing cars. But Sam wasn’t like their dad at all. He loved the man but sometimes found him a complete mystery. Sam wasn’t mechanically inclined or good with his hands. He liked to be by himself sometimes so he could read or just think. And he liked to plan things out instead of stumbling through a situation and hoping everything would work out in the end. He was more like Bobby than Dad or Dean.
Dad didn’t like horror movies as much as Dean, but they did watch them together on those rare occasions when John was at home. Dad and Dean would laugh at the on-screen monsters, and Dad would complain about how unrealistic horror movies were. Sam always tried to watch scary movies with them, but he hated horror movies. He always got scared watching them, and the thought that his father actually hunted things like the ones on the screen frightened him even more than the films themselves. Dad and Dean might laugh at a walking skeleton that was really a big puppet hanging from wires, but all he could think about was that his dad fought real ghosts—ones that were angry and could kill you.
But this movie, Night of the Blood Moon, bothered him more than usual. This movie was about a werewolf, the same kind of monster that Bobby had just left to hunt. Sam really didn’t want to watch the film, but Dean did. And Dean was older and bigger and in charge of the remote. Plus, he had the pizza money Bobby had given him. Sam wanted to stay on his brother’s good side. So he sat and watched the nightgowned woman run through the darkness. But when a wolf howl emitted from the TV’s speaker, he couldn’t help jumping. He was glad that Dean was too absorbed in the movie to notice.
“Watch this, Sammy. This is our first good look at the so-called monster.”
A man—or at least a creature shaped like a man—leaped in front of the woman. Terrified by his sudden appearance, she tripped and fell. She looked up into his eyes and screamed.
The camera moved in for a close-up of the monster, and Sam gasped in fright. The werewolf’s face and hands were covered with wiry black fur. The creature’s nose was an elongated canine snout filled with sharp teeth. The fangs were especially prominent, so large Sam didn’t know how the thing could close its mouth. A terrible, hungry intelligence blazed in its bloodshot eyes, and it raised hands with wickedly curved claws as it snarled and lunged toward the woman. She screamed again, louder and higher this time, and Sam imagined that instead of attacking the woman, the werewolf was attacking Bobby or Dad.
That was enough for him. He ran into the bathroom, slammed the door shut and locked it. Then he sat on the floor with his back against the tub, closed his eyes and pressed his hands against his ears so he wouldn’t have to listen to the woman’s screams anymore.
A few moments later, he heard a knock at the door.
“Sammy? You okay?”
Sam opened his eyes and lowered his hands. He didn’t say anything, though.
“Come on, don’t be such a baby! It wasn’t that scary!”
Still Sam didn’t respond.
After another minute, Dean spoke again, this time in a softer voice.
“I turned off the TV. It’s okay to come out.”
Sam sat there for several more moments before finally rising to his feet. He walked to the door, unlocked it, and Dean opened it.
“Sorry,” Dean said. “I guess a werewolf movie wasn’t a good choice, what with Bobby going off to hunt one.”
Dean turned away and headed back to the chair he’d been sitting in. Sam followed and sat cross-legged on the bed close to his brother. Dean made no move to turn the TV on again, and Sam was grateful. The boys sat in silence for a time before Dean began talking.
“You know how Dad says that one of the greatest weapons monsters and ghosts and stuff has is fear?”
Sam was unsure where Dean was going with this, but he nodded.
“Those things are dangerous, and you have to respect that, but if you let yourself be scared by them, you’ll hesitate when you see one, and then it’ll get you before you can defend yourself. That’s why it’s important to learn to control your fear—so it doesn’t control you.”
Their father had told them this numerous times. It didn’t make complete sense to Sam. Didn’t people have the option of not confronting monsters? Didn’t fear prevent them from putting themselves in situations where really bad things could happen to them? Not everyone was a hunter, after all, or wanted to be a hunter. Sam had never brought up these questions with their dad, and he wasn’t going to bring them up now. He wasn’t sure Dean would understand, and he didn’t want to disappoint his big brother more than he already had today.
Dean continued. “Werewolves are like any other monster. They’re a threat, but if you understand it, then you’ll be ready to face that threat. And you can beat it.”
Sam nodded, although he wasn’t sure he believed it.
“Good. Let’s dig into the snacks Bobby brought, and we’ll find something to watch on TV—something we both like. Sound good?”
Sam forced a smile. “Yeah.”
But no matter what they ended up watching, Sam knew he’d still be thinking about the werewolf from Night of the Blood Moon, and the way the woman screamed and screamed.