new york wolves } { of phone trees and white whales

[beanchaointe]

Stiles: [looking up from his laptop and reaching for the phone, answering it] Hey Lydia...

Lydia: The defense attorney for killer of one of the bodies I found? Knows what I am.

Stiles: Wait... what? How?

Lydia: I don't know! I don't know, but he knows and he knows that I'm friends with you and that you live with the Hales.

Stiles: Okay, okay we can figure this out. I can talk to Laura. What was his name?

Lydia: Winchester. Sam Winchester

Stiles: Wait... did you say Winchester?

Lydia: ... Yeeeeeah?

Stiles: [rubs at his eyes] Well, the agent who helped us get back Cora and Malia was also named Winchester.

Lydia: ... So does that mean he's okay?

Stiles: I'll have to check, but if they are related, it could be that he's in the know.

Lydia: [she exhales slowly, shaking her head] His boss was trying to use me as an alternative theory for the crime.

Stiles: I'm assuming that you out-theory-ed him.

Lydia: Of course.

Stiles: Good girl. Well, let me... ah yes, okay I've got this guy's LinkedIn profile up... he went to Stanford. Huh. Okay, let me... yeah, yeah, looks like he's actually Agent Winchester's younger brother according to the Lawrence, Kansas newspaper.

Lydia: Is that a good or bad thing?

Stiles: Well, he's not running around killing werewolves, so that's a good thing.

Lydia: So we just ... ignore it for now?

Stiles: Did he threaten you? Say to watch your back?

Lydia: No. But he said someone would have to listen for my scream to find the next body.

Stiles: That's it?

Lydia: Yeah, I bailed pretty quickly after that.

Stiles: Well, I mean, he was probably letting you know he knew what you are. Most myths talk about banshees screaming to show who is about to die.

Lydia: Is that supposed to make me feel better? That this massive guy knows what I am after he spent the last half hour trying to find something that would make me look guilty of murder?

Stiles: I guess it depends on if he works at a law firm that defends evil non-human creatures.

Lydia: It was called Specter and Ross.

Stiles: [looking it up on the internet] .... Yeah, that doesn't look like an evil law firm of doom.

Lydia: [lets out a small sigh of relief.] That's a relief at least.

Stiles: But you may want to warn Elena. I'll see if I can ask Derek to call Dean and see what information I can get on this brother of his.

Lydia: I will. Just be careful. If he is bad news, he already knows where you live.

Stiles: Yeah, and I'm pretty sure Laura will rip his tall ass into very tiny pieces if he tried. But I'll text you when I find out something, okay? Just stay on campus until I text.

Lydia: I will. Thanks, Stiles.

Stiles: No problem. Call me if anything else happens. [and he is going to start making his way downstairs to try and find someone to call the big bad agent Winchester for him]

Lydia: [and she will head back to campus and just hole up in her dorm for the rest of the night]

Stiles: [and he will see if Laura is there, and if not, look for Derek]

Laura: [is in the entertainment room, watching a zombie movie]

Stiles: [and he is going to try and slowly move up behind her, intending to scare her in the middle of the scary part that is about to happen]

Laura: Don't even try it, Stiles.

Stiles: I'm going to learn how to do it eventually. [doing the whole suppressing his scent piece]

Laura: Eventually. But not today.

Stiles: [leans next to her on the back of the couch] Did Agent Winchester talk about having a brother at all?

Laura: I didn't really hang out with him much. You're better off asking Derek or Javi.

Stiles: Fair enough. We just better hope he is, otherwise we may have a problem.

Laura: What kind of problem?

Stiles: [tells her about his conversation with Lydia]

Laura: Mmmm. [she pauses for a moment] Well, "defense attorney" isn't usually one of the lines of work that hunters go into.

Stiles: And yet he was able to peg Lydia for what she was, and knew about me and the Hales.

Laura: Really.

Stiles: Yeah. So he's got to know a thing or two about a thing or two.

Laura: Well, it's ask, shall we?

Stiles: You know where Derek's hiding?

Laura: Kate's. But I can call him. [and she will pulling out her phone and placing it on speaker]

Dean: Winchester.

Laura: Hey, Dean, it's Laura Hale.

Dean: Laura. What can I do for my favorite alpha?

Stiles: [leans in because obviously he's not going to be quiet] Do you have a giant of a brother working as a lawyer in Manhattan?

Dean: [laughs] So you ran into Sammy, huh? Yeah, that's my brother. He's out of the game, though.

Stiles: Yeah, well he scared the shit out of one of my friends. She's afraid he's going to come hunt her down.

Dean: Nah, Sam's harmless. He's just too smart for his own good. He probably was trying to make her feel like she wasn't alone.

Stiles: Well he sucks at it.

Dean: Tell me about it. Want me to talk to him?

Stiles: Oh, you mean the whole talk about not freaking out the supernaturals in town making them think he's a hunter? Yeah, that is probably a very good idea.

Dean: You got it. Tell your friend I'll smack him upside the head for her.

Stiles; She may want to watch.

Dean: That I can't promise.

Stiles: Well, I'll let her know then.

Dean: Anything else I can do for you?

Stiles: [thinks] You don't by chance have any lore on Banshees at all? Your whole little family hunter archives or something?

Dean: That is something you should ask Sam. He's the brains in the family.

Stiles: Maybe I will. Thanks, Agent.

Dean: No problem. See you all around. [and with that he'll hang up and call his brother unless you want to go back to Laura and Stiles?]

Sam: [no, it's fine. Sam is in his little cubicle working on the stupid case notes after having gone over the statement with the partners and they were off making a plea bargin and he answers his phone] Dean?

Dean: Next time you decide to go around trying making friends with college co-eds, try not to scare the shit out of them?

Sam: Dude, I'm just doing my job.

Dean: Outing banshees is doing your job?

Sam: I didn't out her, alright? We were in private, and I was just trying to tell her I believed her in a way that didn't get me fired.

Dean: Yeah, well, all you managed to achieve is freaking her the hell out.

Sam: [sighs and rubs at his eyes] So what do you want me to do, Dean?

Dean: I'm just letting you know that you're on the Hales radar now and you're not as smooth as I taught you to be.

Sam: Damnit, Dean, I'm trying to work here, okay? You want me to end up at Wolfram & Hart?

Dean: Hell no. But I didn't put you on their radar, you did when you outted yourself to their friend. The only reason they aren't lurking outside your window right now is because I told them you were harmless

Sam: [just lowers his head] What do I have to do to make amends?

Dean: Say you're sorry for hassling her and dig around in the family archives and see if we've got anything on banshees.

Sam: Do I give the information to the alpha or the banshee?

Dean: [weighs for a moment] I'd go with the banshee. She's the one you have to make feel better.

Sam: Fine, I'll do it. Anything else?

Dean: I'm swinging through town in a couple weeks. Wanna get a beer?

Sam: Yeah, sure. If I haven't screwed up more and been skewered by the tanuki's mate down at the Freakshow.

Dean: [there's a beat] Isn't she a waheela?

Sam: That would be the one.

Dean: Play nice, Sammy. Or she may wear your liver as a hat

Sam: Only after she sewed on a few layers of lace. [smirks]

Dean: So how is the new law gig anyway?

Sam: Sometimes I think I'd be better off on my own, but then I remember that I'm human and need things like food and shelter.

Dean: Living in the real world is a bitch.

Sam: Yeah, tell me about it. [pushes back from his desk a bit. It's late now, and most of the other associates are gone] So what have you been up to?

Dean: Nothing much. Doing my job and actually recovering fugitives.

Sam: You find that Desert Wolf yet?

Dean: You mean Moby Dick? That would be a no, and I'm not holding my breath. Right now, I'm just trying to keep Braedan from going off the edge looking for her.

Sam: Yeah, well too bad you don't know how to speak coyote. You could interview the locals in the Mohave, see what they know.

Dean: Do not give her any ideas. I don't need to sit through another six hours of Rosetta Stone.

Sam: You know you can use Dulingo while on the road.

Dean: Either way, man, I need my music when I drive. She doesn't respect the shotgun rule.

Sam: Yeah, because your music will drive her to using the other shotgun.

Dean: Hey. She appreciates Zeppelin. Unlike some heathens I could name.

Sam: I don't want to know what you two are doing to Zeppelin 4.

Dean: [just going to let amused silence hang there in response]

Sam: Listen, I need to finish this brief if I want to actually get home to get some sleep tonight.

Dean: Alright, alright. I'll call you when I get to town and see where you're at.

Sam: Yeah, just remember if you bring Brae, you need to get your own hotel room.

Dean: Noted. I'll see you later, Sammy.

Sam: [and he hangs up with his brother and gets back to work, but in the back of his mind he's contemplating a way to be able to apologize to Lydia without letting his boss know because that wouldn't do him well at work]

Lydia: [probably best to wait until the case is over, just to avoid that whole conflict of interest.]

Sam: [well, it gets settled out of court with a plea bargain that night, so it's closed by the time Sam gets to work the next morning. And since he had the file, he had written Lydia's number on a scrap of paper and the next evening when he was home, he called her from the non-work cellphone he had]

Lydia: [and she will let it go to voicemail because she doesn't pick up numbers she doesn't recognize. Old habit]

Sam: [sighs. he figures she's in class] Hi, Ms. Martin, this is Sam Winchester. I wanted to call you and apologize for the other day. I've been made aware through the grapevine that you were scared by something I said, and that was not my intention. I just wanted to let you know that I understood your position better than you would have had with someone not in the know. I'd like to make it up to you. I've been asked to compile from our family library certain information that may help you in your path and I would like to be of service to find anything else you may need, and to deliver my research to you. Please feel free to give me a call back at [number]. This isn't my work phone, but one I have for more sensitive conversations, so it's safe. Anyway, I'll be waiting for your call. Thank you. [and he will go back to eating his street taco dinner as he works through the digital archive of the family library he made while in high school with their uncle Bobby]

Lydia: [she listens to the voicemail when he's finished and she'll ... weigh her options for like an hour and make silent faces at Stiles for implying that she was scared to someone else, but an apology is an apology and she should at least be gracious about it. So she waits until she's safely back in the suite that she's sharing with Caroline and Elena before closing the door to her room and calling him back]

Sam: [and he's absorbed in his research he's doing on a contract side gig - how do you think he can afford a one bedroom in Manhattan on his own otherwise (the Credit cards can't trace cash from cash advances after all) - and he doesn't look at the caller ID as he answers] I said I was working on it, Garth. I can't just pull information about a chupacabra out of my back pocket.

Lydia: From what I've ready they drink the blood of goats and are generally only found south of the border. What more do you need to know than that?

Sam: [yeah, not Garth's voice. He looks at the ID and then closes his eyes] Shit, sorry. I um... yeah, I don't normally give out this number. I take it you got my message, Ms. Martin?

Lydia: I did. Wouldn't this be considered a conflict of interest for you?

Sam: Only if I did it on my work hours. I try to keep my after work time separate. Plus the case was closed this morning. Confidential information, but it's closed.

Lydia: [that's a relief, she really wasn't interested in being put on the stand] Good to know.

Sam: I really am sorry that I upset you. I didn't mean to.

Lydia: It's fine, I just ... wasn't expecting it, and I've heard enough horror stories to be paranoid.

Sam: Yeah, I'm still learning my way around the city and the community here. It's been... interesting. A lot of people think my family are still hunters. Well, Dean's close but not really.

Lydia: Allison Argent is my best friend. That can be a bit of a double edged sword.

Sam: ... Chris Argent's daughter?

Lydia: Yep.

Sam: Oh good, she's from the sane side of that family tree.

Lydia: My point exactly.

Sam: My grandfather and hers were friends. I know that argument well.

Lydia: So I take it the Winchesters have been at this a while?

Sam: Well, it's my mom's side. Campbells. The Winchesters... um... kinda were a different story. You ever hear about Men of Letters?

Lydia: I've known about the existence of the supernatural for about ... a little less than a year. So I'm going to go with no.

Sam: Fair enough. Men of Letters are the historians of the supernatural. Sometimes they take a very active role in securing dangerous elements - usually magical items. My brother and I are the result of a Man of Letters falling for a hunter's daughter.

Lydia: Does that end well?

Sam: No, not really. [small sigh] But it's why you have one brother working to help law enforcement on cases that aren't as black and white as their world perceives, and the other moonlighting as an encyclopedia of weirdness.

Lydia: Does moonlighting pay well?

Sam: Depending on what's going on that month, yeah. It keeps me from needing a roommate.

Lydia: That's fortunate.

Sam: So um... I was asked to forward you the information that we have in our archives on banshees. It's a good deal of things from different cultures. Is there anything in particular you're wanting to know?

Lydia: ... Anything? All ... [there's a moment where she wonders if she should mention Elena, but decides she doesn't want to out the other girl] All I really have is what I've heard through word of mouth and that word of mouth wasn't exactly the most reliable source.

Sam: Well, the archives go back to the early part of the eighteenth century. At least, that's what I've got uploaded to the family database. Anything else I'd have to go home to Kansas to look at the physical manuscripts that date back a lot further.

Lydia: Whatever you have is fine, it's more than I had before.

Sam: Do you want me to just e-mail them to you, or we could meet for a drink? There's a club in town that we can talk freely in.

Lydia: Email is fine. [she's still not sure she trusts you yet, Sam, and as much as their demonstration proved that she could kill you under the right circumstances to protect herself she's not looking to test that theory]

Sam: Alright. What's the e-mail? [he's grabbing a pen and paper]

Lydia: [rambles off her school account]

Sam: Alright. Let me zip these files, encrypt it, and get it going. I'm putting your name with proper name caps and a dash in the space for the user name, and your phone number backwards as the password. got it?

Lydia: [twists behind her to reach her desk and scribbles that down before nodding] Got it.

Sam: Feel free to call me if you've got any additional questions.

Lydia: Is this number okay?

Sam: Yeah, this is my unlisted burner. It's a safe phone, but I don't take it to the office so during work hours it's in my glovebox and I can't answer.

Lydia: That's fine. If I have a question it's probably something that can wait. [but she'll know not to call it in case of emergencies]

Sam: And um... just so you know, not that you don't have your own resources but my apartment is only a few blocks from NYU. So if you need help... call either number and I can come help. I'm not completely useless in a fight.

Lydia: [her lips draw to the side for a moment, before simply, noncommittally, she replies] I'll keep that in mind.

Sam: And again, I apologize for any misgivings, Ms. Martin.

Lydia: Lydia. [Ms. Martin just ... sounds weird] And it's fine.

Sam: Lydia. Okay. Well, have a good evening.

Lydia: You too. [and with that she will hang up and get ready to go siphoning through that research when he sends it]

Sam: [and he will get that e-mail out to her, look at the stuff for Garth and yeah, he's going to go get a drink at the Freakshow because it's Friday and he's done with research for now]