Work Text:
The thumping on the other side of the door had Sam scared, but he refused to give into fear. There was just as much reason to assume it was Dean on the other side of that door, doing his best to pick the lock before giving up any pretense of subtlety. He scooted his chair as close to Jack’s as he could, reaching for his son’s hand. “You okay?”
“No. I hate being this useless,” Jack grumbled. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have run off like that.”
“No, you shouldn’t,” Sam agreed. “I get why you did, though, you were scared. I did that a couple times when I was younger. We’ll get you out of here, figure out a way to get rid of that mark without hurting you more, and things will be fi… holy CRAP!” Sam jumped as an axe came smashing through the door.
“Sam? Are you okay?” Jack asked.
“Yeah, just startled.” Sam took a couple deep breaths while the axe made a second hole in the door. “Okay. Axe. The door’s not gonna last much longer. Hopefully, that’s Dean…”
Jack swallowed hard. “Dean won’t be mad that I’m useless? He never liked me to begin with…”
“He doesn’t have anything against you, Jack. He’s just scared, because we’ve never seen a proper nephilim before…”
“Nephil.”
“What?”
“I’m only one nephil. Nephilim is plural.”
“Oh. I’m sorry. Anyway, we’ve never seen a nephil before, and while Kelly seemed like a decent enough person the angel who created you… isn’t.”
“Mom was a great person.”
“I believe you, Jack. I didn’t know her very well, Castiel knew her a lot better than Dean or I did, but I believe you when you say she was a great person. After all, she produced you, and chose Castiel to be your father. Anyway, the point is, Dean had just lost a couple people very close to him, and he was scared that you’d turn out to be more like your grace donor than your mother or your father. He was wrong, and even he admits that.”
“Not to me.”
Something Sam would get fixed as soon as he could. In the meantime, the hole in the door was big enough now. Dean peered through it. “HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERE’S JOHNNY!”
“Oh for... quit screwing around and get us out of here, jerk.”
“Who’s Johnny?” Jack interrupted before Dean could retort. “Aren’t you Dean?”
“That’s it. When we get back, you are getting taken to the Man Cave for movie time. I am not having Sammy’s kid go through life not knowing the classics like this.” Dean straightened up and reached through the hole to undo the deadbolts holding the door closed. He scowled when he saw the marks carved into Jack’s arms. “The hell are those?”
“They’re sigils that block his grace,” Sam explained. “Remember that thing you tried to use on Gadreel, when you realized he’d lied to you? Or the depowering sigil Rowena used on Lucifer? It’s like those, but apparently when you carve it directly into the angel or nephil, it works a lot better.”
“Damn.” Dean cut the ropes around Jack. “Will they heal, or do we need to find an angel to burn them off for you?”
“I don’t know,” Jack said. “They haven’t healed much, but then again, they came in and recarved them this morning. I hope they’ll heal.”
Dean nodded and cut Sam’s ropes. “We’ll figure it out, kid. C’mon, let’s go. First stop: ice cream, how’s that sound?”
On the drive to get the ice cream, Sam tried to figure out how to yell at Dean for letting Jack think he hated him still without Jack catching on and feeling even worse. He couldn’t by the time they were ordering. Dean didn’t say a word about Jack ordering a ridiculously complicated – and expensive – sundae at the Cold Stone. Once they were at the table, digging in, Dean cleared his throat. “Hey. Jack.”
“Yeah?”
“I heard some of what you and Sam were talking about while I was trying to get that door open. Look. I’m awful at this, so just kinda bear with me here, huh?” Sam resisted the temptation to roll his eyes. Here came one of Dean’s half-assed apologies. He wasn’t going to say anything, ruin this for Jack, but he had good reason to be skeptical.
Jack nodded. “Okay. What?”
“I owe you an apology. I never hated you. I was scared of you, sure. I blamed you for the rift that took Mom from us and let Lucifer in to kill Cas. It wasn’t fair, and I shouldn’t have done it.” For Dean, that wasn't half bad, really. Sam let himself relax.
“I appreciate that,” Jack said. “Thank you.”
“Hang on, I’m not done." Sam tensed back up and glared, but Dean just threw an arm around him. "Winchester way, when things like that happen, is to shove it all down and just get past it without comment, let it go, remember that family is everything and if you’re family, nothing’s unforgiveable, nothing’s so big it’ll stop us from loving each other. Putting each other before anything else.”
“But I’m not…” Jack started to protest.
Dean waved him off. “Your name may be Kline, in honor of your mom, but you’re a Winchester. That got decided the second Sam decided to step up and take what was supposed to be Cas’s job. So I handled things the Winchester way. Thing is, I forgot something. This ain’t something people just know, they have to be taught, and you’re not even three months old. I shouldn’t have expected you to just get it.”
“You really think of me as family?”
“You’re Sam’s kid, so yes. Someone came up to me and offered me Cas and Mom back, if I’d give you up? Not happening. We’ll find Mom. If there’s a way to get Cas back without giving up someone else, we’ll be all over it, but you are family. You’re one of us, and I may be stepdad instead of dad, but I’m not gonna fight any less hard for that.”
Jack nodded, but then he paused and stared hard at Dean. “What about what you said about killing me?”
“You go bad and it’s the only way to stop you? Yeah. I’ll kill you if I have to, but only because if I don’t, that puts it on Sammy to do, and I refuse to ask that of him. Pretty sure that’s not gonna happen, though. You’re not gonna go dark side on us.” Dean huffed. “Another thing that I really shoulda talked to you about before.”
“He’s said pretty much the same to me,” Sam added. “And we both tried to kill Cas at one point because we thought we had to.”
“Okay.” Jack took another huge bite of ice cream. “You prefer stepdad to uncle?”
“I always wanted to be a dad. I get it if you don’t feel comfortable thinking of me that way right now, but if you’re willing to give me a chance…”
Jack beamed. “Only problem I have with it is figuring out what to call you. Castiel is Father and Sam is Dad, so are you Daddy or Papa?”
“Better stick with Papa. Sam calls me daddy sometimes, and that would just get weird.” Dean winked at Jack, who tilted his head and stared at Dean in confusion.
Sam choked on his ice cream. “Dean!”
Dean’s shit-eating grin could have lit up a black hole. “Oh no, are you going to make me pay for that later?”
Jack looked back and forth between the two of them. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing, Dean is just… this is one of those times when you should pretend that Dean is incapable of speaking. Forget you heard anything and let’s just finish the ice cream before I melt mine through sheer embarrassment.”