Disclaimer: I don't own them and I suppose I'd have to queue.

Note: I'm not a native speaker. Please, don't shoot me in case you find mistakes.

It was hungry. It had been for a long time. Its little mind found it hard to remember a time when it had not been hungry, but snuggled up contently inside its lair, safe and warm. Those outside had come and fed it regularly and it had been grateful for that.

But then, one day, they had stopped the steady trickle of sustenance and its lair had grown dark and cold and lonely. Now, it just felt miserable. And hungry. It could do with a decent meal, or any meal at all. For a moment, it considered the option to just crawl out of its dark cave and take a look around outside. Maybe, it could find something out there to devour. The mere thought of food made it quiver excitedly. But then again, it remembered the outside world as a cold and harsh place. Its lair was so much better or at least, it had been better while they still fed it. And who knew what waited outside?

Finally, the instinct of survival won over the fear of the unknown. Driven by the sheer need to feed on something, it uncurled, sniffed the air cautiously and searched for a way to climb the steep, blackened walls of its abode.

Once it reached the exit of its cave, it was surprised to feel itself bathed in warmth from above. Cocking its tiny head, it looked up and into the blue sky above. Staring into the sun for a few moments, it decided that the outside world wasn't such a bad place at all. It wasn't the bleak and cold place it remembered and it certainly was an improvement to the cold walls of its cave. Taking heart by that, it started to look around and take in the world that spread out below it. Suddenly, it caught a faint whiff of a delicious smell. It cooed with pleasure and its tail twitched in anticipation. As fast as its tiny feet would carry it, it descended the steep slopes.

When it reached the ground, it lifted its head to pick up the trail, then made its way across the yard behind the empty sheds and over to the now deserted office building. It scurried under the car that had been parked in front of the building and scuttled around to examine the ground. There was a small puddle, created by the liquid that dripped down from the car. The delicious smell, that had lured it here, rose from that puddle and wafted over to it. It cooed again and darted over to the puddle to tuck into its first meal in what felt like an eternity.

–

"Okay, geek boy. Tell me again, why you think that's really our kind of gig." Dean picked up his second burger and glanced over to his brother who had shoved aside his salad to make place for his laptop. For a moment, he pondered whether Sam would notice if he pinched his dessert, but then decided against it. Instead, he took a bite out of his burger and waited for Sam to answer.

Sam studied the screen and scratched his ear. "Well, there have been over a dozen cases of arson in last couple of months." He looked over to his older brother, who shrugged in return and swallowed down before answering. "So? Some pyro on the loose." Sam looked up to see Dean taking another bite out of his burger. "Well," he started to explain. He had anticipated that kind of reply from Dean. "Police reports on the fires all state that there was no trace of accelerant. Then, there's no pattern when it comes to the targets of the fires. There's everything, from barn to family home." Dean had lifted a hand and was about to interrupt Sam to point out that the things that they usually were after actually always had some kind of rule that they followed. In general, no rules meant that some perfectly normal knucklehead was involved, which in turn meant that this was none of their business. However, when Sam mentioned family homes burning down, he dropped the hand again and kept his silence. Instead he popped the last bit of the burger into his mouth with a frown.

Sam raised an eyebrow at his brother, but didn't comment on what could be counted as emotional outbreak on Dean's part. He could guess what that deep frown was about and he knew that it was highly unlikely that Dean would want to talk about it. Leaving his brother to it, Sam turned the laptop around to show him the map that he had been working on for the last couple of hours. "And … who or what ever it is, it is moving in a straight line. It started in an abandoned steel mill about four months ago. From there, it moved down northwest. So, since then, there has been a fire every week or so," he finally concluded. Dean studied the map thoughtfully for a moment. "So, you wanna check it out?" He glanced up at his little brother. He still wasn't entirely convinced, but they had nothing better to do. They had finished the last hunt a few days ago with just a few scratches and bruises and hadn't found another good lead since. And before things turned from relaxing to boring, Dean was willing to follow up whatever it was Sam had found there. Beside, deep down, the thought of family homes burning down bothered him.

–

A couple of days later, a black car pulled into the disaster zone that once had been the central yard of a steel mill. Now all that was left were ruins from the devastating fire that had raged here four months earlier. The passenger's door opened and Sam unfolded from the seat to look around. Most buildings had burned down to the ground, including even the furnaces. Sam briefly glanced over his shoulders at Dean who had climbed out of the car himself and now was leaning on the Impala, arms on the roof, taking in the scene around him. "Dude … that gotta to be one hell of a fire to do this." Sam quirked his eyebrow at this brother, giving him his 'I told you so' look, and closed the door. Hands in the pockets of his jacket, he strode off. There was nothing much left, but blackened rubble and scorched earth. The fire had consumed everything, razed the buildings around the yard to the ground. Sam stopped and frowned as a shimmer caught his eye. Lowering himself, he retrieved his utility knife from his pocket, flipped out the blade and started to poke around at that particular spot on the ground. "Found something?" Dean had approached him from behind and now was watching him over his shoulder critically. It took a little blade work to loosen a patch of rock, but finally Sam picked it up and rubbed away the soot and dirt to reveal a piece of dark green, glossy rock. He held it up to Dean. "Glass," he stated.

As soon as, they were back at the room they had rented for the night at yet another cheap motel, Sam booted up his laptop, while Dean made a beeline to the old fridge. "So, glass?" he asked, opening the door and bending down to examine the content. Sam answered with an affirmative mumble as he continued to search the internet. Meanwhile, Dean straightened up again and turned around, a beer bottle in each hand. He closed the door behind him with a well-aimed kick. "And that's special how?" he asked as he walked over to the table on which Sam had set up shop. Sam tore his eyes away from the website that he had been studying and took the bottle that Dean offered to him. He opened his bottle, thinking for a moment. "It takes an inferno to melt sand to glass, you know? Something like 3900 degree." Dean couldn't help the grin when he noticed Sam slipping into his lecture mode. "There are only a couple of ways, in which natural glass is created," Sam continued. "Volcanic activity, meteorite impact, lighting striking the sandy ground, or an atomic explosion. Obsidian, tektite, fulgurite and trinitite." Dean pulled up the second chair, turned it around and flopped down on it. Leaning forward with his arms on the back of the chair, he nodded. "A'right. So, we are dealing with something really hot out there?" - "Yep." Sam took a swig from his bottle, before he placed it down on the table next to the laptop to continue his search. "And chances are," he added, "that it's not a woman." Sam grinned as he heard Dean mumbling something that sounded like 'too bad' into his beer bottle.