1.15 The Benders

In Hibbing, Minnesota, a boy named Evan is watching Godzilla vs. Mothra on his bedroom TV when he hears a noise outside. He goes to the window to check, and sees a neighbor, Alvin Jenkins, taking out the trash. It is night, and Jenkins has heard a strange noise. He looks around, and kneels to look under a car. He sees something, and stands up quickly. As Evan watches, Jenkins is grabbed and roughly dragged under the car and vanishes.

Dean and Sam are dressed as state police, and are asking Evan McKay to describe what he saw and heard. Evan says the noise he heard sounded like a monster. Mrs. McKay thinks is he imagined the noise as a monster, as he was watching Godzilla, but that he did not see it, only Mr. Jenkins dragged under a car. Dean bonds with Evan over Godzilla, but Sam wants to know what happens next. Evan describes the monster leaving as a scary sound - a whining growl.

That night, at Kugel's Keg, Sam and Dean discuss the case. Dean plays darts as he suggests it could be just a normal kidnapping. Sam suggests some kind of phantom attacker because their dad marked the area in his journal as a possible hunting ground as the county has a higher-than-average disappearance rate. It does not fit the normal type, so Dean agrees to ask around more tomorrow. Sam wants an early start, so even though Dean wants to have another round he gives in. Dean heads for the toilet while Sam heads outside. Sam hears a strange noise and checks under the car, but it is only a cat. As he waits by the car something approaches him from underneath. When Dean comes out a minute or so later there is no sign of Sam. Dean searches, but finds nothing - only their dad's journal that Sam was carrying. He spots a video camera but otherwise no clue.

The next morning Dean visits the Hibbing County sheriff's office posing as a state trooper named Greg Washington. He tells the on-duty cop, Kathleen Hudak, that his cousin Sam has been kidnapped and that he has a lead on the case. Kathleen checks Sam's record on computer and eventually agrees to help by getting the traffic camera footage. She wants him to sit tight, but Dean says Sam is his responsibility and he will bring him back. Outside of the county works department, Kathleen brings Dean some printouts of the camera footage taken outside the bar. A beat up truck with false plates apparently left the bar around the time Sam vanished. An old van passes by and gives off an odd noise that matches what the boy Evan described, so Dean figures the truck is probably what Evan heard when Jenkins was taken.

Sam wakes up inside a cage that is in a dark room in a barn. He looks around and spots another cage with a guy in who is either asleep or dead. Sam starts kicking at the cage to try and escape. The noise awakens the missing man, Jenkins, and they talk. Sam tells Jenkins he was looking for him, and now he has a brother looking for them both. Jenkins thinks this is a piss-poor rescue, and that no one will find them out in the middle of nowhere. Sam wonders what are they that grabbed them, which makes no sense to Jenkins, but as they talk, two hooded figures enter. Sam realizes his captors are not monsters, but just people. One feeds Jenkins, and they both leave. Jenkins is worried about them assaulting him, but Sam thinks that is the least of their worries, as he grabs a metal casing of wires and begins to pull.

Deputy Kathleen and Dean are following the route the truck took according to the traffic cameras. Kathleen gets a report through on her onboard computer, reporting on "Gregory Washington". It says Dean is not the cop he is pretending to be. He eventually confesses, but begs her to still let him look for Sam. Motivated by the disappearance of her brother years ago, she agrees to continue the search for "cousin" Sam, and then she is taking Dean in.

Meanwhile Sam pulls at a piece of conduit till it breaks from the ceiling and gets a bracket off it. Jenkins' cell door opens. Sam suspects something is up but Jenkins ignores him. After he leaves, the cell doors swing shut again and lock by remote. Outside in the rain, Jenkins finds a knife on the driveway and runs, but is ambushed by a guy. He keeps going but another man takes him down. Staggering to his feet, the two men drive him into a tripwire. Finally satisfied with their game, the men kill Jenkins as Sam hears his screams back at the barn.

In town the next morning, Dean asks Kathleen why she is helping him as they grab a coffee, and she explains her brother, Riley, vanished like Sam three years ago, and was never found. She knows what it is like to feel responsible for someone. They go back to their search on the highway and come across a muddy turn off on the road. Dean calls for Kathleen to pull over to investigate. As they prepare to follow on foot, Kathleen tricks Dean and handcuffs him to the cruiser's door handle saying he is a civilian. She heads on down the road to investigate. When Kathleen approaches the house, the door is answered by a young girl, Missy Bender. The girl, acting strange, says her mom is dead. Kathleen shows her a picture of Sam; Missy just smiles at her. She says, "That's gonna hurt." When Kathleen turns around, Missy's dad is there and hits her with a shovel, knocking the deputy unconscious. He demands Missy to get her brothers.

Dean tries to grab the car antenna to pick the handcuffs as the family truck approaches. He manages to unscrew it and pick his handcuffs just in the nick of time, escaping before they catch him. The two Bender boys arrive, spot the car, and take the car to hide it, all the while commenting on how mad Pa is.

Kathleen wakes up in a cell next to Sam, assuring him that his "cousin" was looking for him but was handcuffed to her cruiser. Dean sneaks in and finds Sam and Kathleen in the barn. Both brothers are relieved the other one is good; Dean telling Kathleen he knows a trick or two to get out of the cuffs. They exchange information - the family are just people, and Sam does not know what they want. Dean says there are a lot of cars out in the back of the house, and Kathleen asks if there was a Mustang. He sadly confirms that there was, so the Benders killed Kathleen's brother. Dean realizes the cages have to have a special key to open them, so he leaves to go find it in the Benders house.

In the basement Dean finds jars filled with the brothers' "trophies" as well as a wall of photographs of them with their victims. Going upstairs he finds grisly and gruesome human remains decorating the house. He hears a man cutting something while music plays on an old Victrola. He creeps around the main house when he spots some keys near a jar of human teeth. As he is looking at the teeth, the board creaks behind him and he spins to see Missy there. Trying to get her calm, Dean assures her he is not going to hurt her. Missy Bender surprises him and stabs at him, pinning his jacket to the door frame, screaming for her dad! This allows her brothers to attack. Dean is holding his own between the brothers, but Pa Bender sneaks up behind him and knocks Dean out with a frying pan over the head.

Later Dean awakens, tied to a chair to find the Benders watching him. The brothers want to hunt him; after all, he is a fighter and should be fun. Dean realizes they hunt humans for fun. Pa Bender boasts to Dean that his family has been hunting and killing humans for generations, claiming to give them a fighting chance and they only hunt one or two a year to not get sloppy. Dean claims the family is sloppy. The father wants to know if more cops are coming looking for him (Dean). Dean replies with sarcasm. Pa claims they will have a hunt, and for the boy (Dean) to name who gets to be the animal - the boy (Sam) or the cop. Eventually, Dean says no one else is coming, but Pa does not care, taking a red hot poker to Dean and burning his shoulder with it. He threatens next time to take an eye, if Dean does not choose. Dean chooses Sam, thinking his brother might have a fighting chance. Pa tosses the key to his son Lee and tells him not to let Sam out, but to shoot him in the cage. Then kill the cop too! Dean is upset - he thought Sam would be given a chance.

Sam hears someone coming, and Lee Bender unlocks his cage. Sam picks up the bracket that he pulled down earlier. Kathleen calls "Hey!" to try to distract Lee, as Sam throws the bracket, causing Lee to miss shooting Sam.

Back in the house Dean hears the shot and screams "You hurt my brother, I'll kill you, I swear. I will kill you all!" Pa ignores Dean, calling for Lee, who does not answer.

Sam overpowers Lee, knocking him out, and takes the gun. However, it jams. Since Lee does not reply, both remaining Bender men go to see what is happening, picking up their guns and leaving Missy with a knife to watch Dean. Pa and his son Jared find Lee, unconscious, and the power cut off. They separate to search better, when Jared hears the cabinet click open. He fires into the furniture three times. Suddenly Kathleen jumps him from above and tries to wrestle him down. Pa spots Sam, firing his gun, but Sam ducks and runs. Jared throws off Kathleen, and prepares to shoot her. Sam, who is continually being shot at by Pa, runs in and manages to distract Jared, and as he turns to fire Sam ducks, causing Jared to shoot his father in the shoulder. Sam knocks Jared out and locks him in the other cage. Kathleen takes one of the men's rifles, saying she will watch Pa, telling Sam to go get Dean. When Sam is gone, Kathleen asks Abraham why he killed her brother. He says, "Because it's fun." He laughs about killing her brother.

There is a gun shot. Then Dean and Sam exit the main house when Kathleen exits the barn. The three meet together between the buildings. The boys locked up the girl in a closet, and Kathleen claimed she shot Pa trying to escape. The three of them share a look, knowing what really happened with Pa.

Later the deputy calls for backup and they are on their way. She tells Dean and Sam to leave before more cops arrive. Dean says he is sorry about Kathleen's brother. It was hard not knowing what had happened to him, but knowing her brother's fate has not assuaged her grief. Dean and Sam head off down the road, arguing. Dean claims if Sam gets kidnapped again, he is not going to look for him. Sam says sure he will, and then laughs at Dean getting sidelined by a thirteen year old girl - Dean is getting rusty! Dean tells him to shut up and they vanish into the night, Sam laughing.