The last thing Dean expected when entering the bunker was to find the lights on. It meant either someone had made the mistake of leaving them on (highly unlikely) or someone was there. He gave Sam a quick signal, and they both moved through the place, guns at the ready.

But when Dean walked into the kitchen, he was blindsided. The real last thing he expected to find that night was a kid—what were they, fifteen? Sixteen at most? He called Sam over, and things took an even stranger turn. The kid rushed over to Sam and called him "Dad."

Awkward silence followed as they sat the kid down to explain. Their story was vague at best: a friend had stumbled upon a book—one they hadn’t thought was real, because why would they? The book had strange symbols, weird illustrations, but the friend was adamant they try something out. So, they went along with it, picked out a spell, gathered the materials, and bam, they casted the spell. It was an accident, they'd said.

And now here they were. Dean turned to Sam, exasperated. "Why wouldn’t you teach your friggin’ kid not to mess with creepy spell books, dude!" he hissed, shooting a glance back at the kid.

So, this was their so-called Uncle Dean? Way more paranoid than their dad had ever described. The first thing he did was throw water—holy water, they later learned—in their face. It took their dad—well, a younger version of him, apparently—dragging Dean away to make him stop.

Days passed, and while it was kind of cool to dig into all those lore books, realizing that all of it was supposedly real was mind-blowing.

"Put that away," Dean's voice cut through as he dropped a heavy pile of books in front of them. "This is what you should be reading." They gave him a questioning look. "Sammy's out running errands, so we're stuck with the research. We gotta figure out how to get you home, right?"

Maybe their uncle wasn’t so bad after all—especially when research was soon forgotten, and instead, they got to know him, listening to all sorts of hunting stories he had to tell.