"The liver was surgically removed."

Katherine looks up from her computer as the brothers stroll into their Pennsylvania motel room. Sam is grinning as he closes the door. It lifts her spirits a little, seeing him so light and hopeful. She can only hope this doesn't blow up in their faces, as it undoubtely will.

Dean, however, looks absolutely pissed. "Kind of punches a hole in the zombie theory," Katherine hums, leaning back in her chair. He grunts and begins to remove his suit jacket. "Zombie with a scalpel? Dr. Quinn, Medicine Zombie." She flashes her fingers at Dean, who offers her a small chuckle.

"I told her all of this already," Sam says to Dean. "That's how we gound that other guy so fast."

"Oh, yeah," Dean grumbles, sitting on the edge of the bed, and starts to untie his shoes. "Kidney guy, room 344. Real jerk."

"He just had his kidney excised, Dean," Katherine lightly points out. Dean hums. "No painkillers, jumped while feeding the meter...you'd be pissed, too."

The dark part of her mind starts to wander. If this actually worked...if she could find some spell in her grimoire to mimic Benton...could they even go through with it? Dean's an asshole, but he still has a conscience. He wouldn't let Katherine or Sam cut into people to take things from them for him. He wouldn't let them stalk the transplant list and ambush the poor son of a bitch with the cooler.

Could she even do it?

"He was stitched up with silk," Sam says, dropping his notebook in front of Katherine. She closes her tab—baby stuff, too early to be Googling baby stuff—and turns her attention the notebook.

"He what?" Katherine glances to Sam and picks the notebook up.

"Why don't we keep silk in our kit?" Dean asks, undoing his tie, and rolls to his feet to stand near Katherine and Sam.

"Be...cause patients would literally always get massive infections." He raises an eyebrow at her. "Well, back in the early 19th century, silk was the material of choice, but they stopped using it because of all of the infections. Really problematic for the profession, ya know? The death rate was astronimical. So then they had to start using maggots to keep the infection from spreading." Dean, towering over her, slowly blinks. "Be...cause they eat the bad tissue, leave the good? It's actually not a horrible idea."

"Mister No-Liver was full of maggots," Sam chimes in.

Dean looks at his brother. "She's so goddamn smart. That was all off the dome, Sammy."

Katherine smiles a little. "Doctoring 101," she chirps, and looks to Sam.

Definitely on the right track.

"So let me get this straight," Dean sighs. He hangs his tie up on the hanger and undoes his belt. One hand. Katherine looks at his face. "People are getting ganked, right? A little Antiques Roadshow surgery, some organ theft...does this all sound familiar to anyone else?"

Sam sits back on his heels and looks at Katherine. She told him Dean would catch on quick!

"Did your dad write about something like it?" Katherine asks. "I remember reading it in someone's journal a long time ago." Dean chews on it for a second.

"Hmm, yeah, good thinkin' KD."

Dean forgets sometimes. KD is so habitual, natural. KD the smartass hunter. KD the doctor. KD the realist.

KT the paranoid, devoted wife. KT the dreamer.

"Did you change your last name, legally?" Sam asks as Dean moves for his duffle.

"Yeah," she quietly replies. Dean ignores it. While he looks through his father's journal, shirt half-buttoned, she sits at the kitchen table and does the same. She's sending flirty glances to her grimoire, itching to keep translating. She found her dad's journal entry on Benton thirty minutes ago but didn't want to raise any suspicion.

"Found it," Dean chirps after a while. She looks up from her dad's journal with a heavy sigh and puts her chin in her hands. "Doctor Benton...real-life doctor who lived in New Hampshire."

"Brilliant, obsessed with alchemy and the art of living forever?" Katherine yawns and holds up her dad's journal. His and John Winchester's look almost identical on this page. Same symbol drawn onto the pages. "In 1816 he abandoned his practice, nobody hears from him for two decades, and people start showing up dead or missing body parts."

"'Cause whatever he was doing was actually working," Dean murmurs. Katherine nods. Across the table from her, Sam sits in uneasy and eager silence. "He just kept on ticking. Parts would wear out, he'd replace them." Green eyes settle on Katherine. "I thought our dads hunted him down."

"Guess doc must've plugged in a new one," Sam hums.

Dean nods a little bit before looking back at the journal. "Where's he doing it?"

"Well according to the first gens," Katherine begins. "Benton likes dense forests with access to a water source."

"Why?"

Katherine purses her lips and speaks in segments. "Be-cause that is where...he likes tooooo dump. the bile and...intestinal...er...matter."

Dean frowns. "You're a doctor—can't you just say poop and not be weird about it?"

Katherine clears her throat. "He dumped the shit in the river, Dean."

Sam laughs.

"Well let's hop to it," Dean chirps, snapping his father's journal shut, and tosses it onto the kitchen table. "I'll let you nerds look for, uh...locale."

"You never do the grunt work," Sam complains.

Dean sighs, shrugging out of his shirt. "That's not grunt work, Sammy, that's nerd work. Seeing as you two are the only ones in this room who made it out of high school..." He smirks and shrugs.

Sam already found maps in their fathers' journals, but he couldn't very well say that. He skimmed John's journal first. Started "looking into it." Dean sat on either side of him and Katherine, slowly turning the pages in Clay Donovan's journal as Katherine clacked away on her keyboard to create a map of all of the places victims had been hit. Somewhere in the middle of it all, Charlie called. She talked to him alone for a few minutes before putting the call on speaker, then everyone joined in.

No, no plans for St. Patrick's Day. Yeah, the Winchesters are probably Irish somewhere way down the line, but probably more English than anything. Yeah Kit's all right, she's just hoarse. No...nothing exciting for a while. Side eye to Katherine. May be hunting some weird zombie doctor. No, we don't think he's feral like a real zombie. Yeah, we'll make our way down the east coast and see you in a week or two. All right, talk to you soon.

"I found a bunch of old hunting cabins not too far away," Sam finally chirps. "They've been mostly abandoned for years."

But he knew that already.

Dean nods, looking minorly impressed. "So what are we waiting for?"

Katherine's phone trills on the tabletop, where she left it after they talked to Charlie. Anxiety instantly floods her stomach. He definitely already got a bill. He definitely got it. Fuck fuck fuck.

She leans back in her chair, tipping it on the back two legs until Dean gets halfway to a coronary incident, and grabs the chairback. He presses his lips into a thin line at her, a scolding of sorts, as her fingers probe around for her phone.

She checks the caller I.D. before answering. "Hey Bobby," she says in her best voice.

"Jesus Christ, Kit. You sick?"

She smiles. "Sick of this shit," she says, and Bobby laughs. "Naw, just a hunt that went a little sideways yesterday."

"That aside, how've you been? Haven't seen y'all in a minute."

"Oh, you know," she hums, glancing down to her bloated belly. She looks up at the wall and shrugs. "We're gettin' by. What's goin' on with you?"

"Work and more work. Listen, kid—I think I got a bead on Bela." She steels up, and both Winchesters take note. Dean starts to pack up. Sam starts to panic. No, no, no, this can't be happening. We're this close!

"I'm listening," Katherine says.

"You know Rufus Turner?"

"You mean that forgetful old guy, used to hunt? Yeah, I met him once or twice. What about him?"

"Well you're right about used to hunt. He does a little selling, I guess. A couple months ago, I put out the word on Bela. He just called, said a woman got in touch wanting to buy some things."

"And he thinks it's her."

Dean stands up straight. "Bela," he says. Katherine nods. Sam's stomach drops.

God...dammit Bobby.

"British accent, went by the name Mina Chandler," Bobby says.

Katherine rolls her eyes. "Well that's kinda sloppy, ain't it? Using one of her names with a guy you know."

"Ah, well...I don't think she knows that I know him. Canaan, Vermont."

Katherine glances to Sam. He's got that panic-striken puppy dog look. "Thanks Bobby. I'm on my way." Sam and Dean look at her with a frown.

"Another thing," Bobby says. Katherine waits. "Take a bottle of Johnny Walker Blue with you," Bobby adds.

"I...all right," she chuckles, then closes her phone.

"What's the word?" Dean asks.

"I'm going after Bela."

"Let's get going," he says.

"Wait, guys, we...we should stay and finish the case," Sam says. Katherine rubs the back of her neck and sighs. Dean wheezes out a laugh and grabs his jacket.

"What are you, insane?" He asks. Rhetorically, of course.

Sam blinks. "Dean, there's no way she still has the Colt! That was months ago! She probably sold it the second she got it!"

"Then I'll kill her," Dean says with a shrug.

"Dean—"

"Sam. We're going."

Katherine swallows around her dry tongue as Sam shoots her a pleading look. "Dean, I can handle Bela."

Dean frowns at her and shakes his head. "After that little stunt you pulled in Wyoming? No shot."

"Dean, I said no." Dean stops at her raised voice.

"Why not?" He demands.

"She ruined my life," Katherine says. "I'm not talking teenage gossip ruined my high school reputation, she sent me into hiding from my own family. She took a book that has the potential to wipe out anything and everything on the planet. She took it from me. So no." She shakes her head. "You don't get to decide. This is my hunt. And if either of you try to stop me, I'll handcuff you to a rail in a very remote, very disgusting bathroom stall and pick you up on my way back."

"Dean...this is what's going to save you," Sam says. "This. Here, now."

"What, chasing Frankenstein?" Dean scoffs.

"Chasing immortality."

Katherine scratches her head and starts to gather her belongings. Dean blinks at Sam with a wry kind of smile. Huh?

"Look, Benton can't die," Sam continues. "We find out how he did it, we can do it to you!"

"Sam," Katherine cautions.

"What are you talking about?" Dean asks.

"Look, you have to die before you go to Hell, right?" Sam continues. "So if you can never die—"

"Wait, wait, wait a second." Dean looks between Sam and Katherine, eyes hard, expression generally annoyed. A little outraged. Katherine presses a hand to her turning stomach. Anxiety or pregnancy-associated nausea? I can't deal with this shit for nine months. "Did you know this was Benton the whole time?"

"No," Katherine quickly says. Sam shakes his head as well, and Dean raises a brow. Bull shit.

"Look, I was hoping—"

"So the whole time, you were just—you were lying to me."

"We didn't know the whole time," Katherine croaks. "We didn't want to say anything until we were sure."

Dean scoffs. "What, are you two conspiring now? Sam propagated the whole thing and you picked it up like baited fish!"

"Dean, you're being ridiculous!"

"I'm just trying to find an answer," Sam interjects.

"No, you're chasing Slicey McHackey—and to kill him? Noooo. No, you want to buy him a freaking beer! You want to study him."

"I was just trying to help," Sam murmurs.

"Well you're not helping."

"Dean," Katherine chastises. "You can't tell us you wouldn't be doing the same thing if it were Sam."

"I think you're both forgetting that if I welch on this deal, Sam dies! And you—!" Dean gestures to Katherine. "I don't even know what's gonna happen to you."

"Nothing, because Yellow Eyes is dead!" Katherine cries.

"No—no, we're doing this the way Bobby said. The only way. Kill the demon that has my contract and this whole thing wipes clean—that's our best shot."

"Even if you had the Colt, Dean, who are you gonna shoot?" Sam asks.

"Okay, this is not about the Colt!" Katherine cries out. The brothers look at her, and she swallows. "I'm getting Bela. Me. You two are staying here and hunting this guy."

"I'm going," Dean refutes, shaking his head. "And I'm not gonna let Sam wander around the woods alone."

"Let me?" Sam asks.

"Yeah, I'm not gonna let you," Dean repeats, stepping closer to his brother. Katherine sits against the nightstand, waiting for her nausea to pass.

"Look, Dean, we're both trying to do the same thing," Sam murmurs.

Slowly, Dean nods, and grabs his bag. "I'm going," he says, and looks up to his brother. "So if you wanna stay, stay." His younger brother crosses his arms and looks back at their papers. Dean starts for the door and waits for Katherine.

Katherine lets out a sigh. "Sam—"

"Just go, Kat," he murmurs. Katherine picks her backpack up and starts for the door. At the last moment, she stops beside him, and stretches onto her toes to kiss his cheek.

"Sammy, be careful," Dean says. After a moment, Sam turns around and nods.

"You too."