Chapter Text
An explosion of color and sound sent Sam running upstairs. By the time he reached the top floor, the bedroom was silent and dark. A shapeless lump lay on the bed by Kelly’s leg, halfway rolled-up in the disheveled covers. Sam stepped closer and reached out for the wet and stained comforter. A small arm appeared, its fist clenched tight.
“Holy Christ. Dean!”
The yell was enough to wake the baby. As Sam drew the covers away, the little face screwed up on itself and its mouth opened on a howl. Sam stuffed his gun in his waistband (remembering to safety it by some miracle) and pulled the blanket down some more. The baby squealed, its arms flapping out to the sides. “Dean, get up here now!”
Sam sank slowly to his knees at the foot of the bed. Dean’s clomping steps up the stairs brought him back to reality. “Jesus. That’s a baby.”
Sam pulled the blanket down some more, and the baby drew its legs up in a defensive curl. “It’s a boy,” Sam said unhelpfully.
“I can see that, Sherlock. It looks cold. Pick it up.”
The baby was covered in a bloody, waxy smear. Sam kind of didn’t want to touch it, but it shivered and its cries grew louder.
“Dean —“ said Sam, noticing something wrong. A ropy cord ran from the baby’s rounded stomach toward Kelly’s body. “It’s got something coming out of its stomach.”
“Umbilical cord. Cut it off and tie it.”
Sam scoffed. “With what, dumbass? My demon knife?”
Dean grunted and bent down. He took an ordinary knife out of his sock and handed it to Sam. Then he resumed his firing stance. “Try that. But maybe we do want the demon knife.”
Lucifer’s baby. A powerful nephilim, if Cas was right. (Cas, still out there on the ground with his wing prints burned into the sand. Sam couldn’t even think about it.)
“Do you think we should...” Sam’s breath caught in his throat. Lucifer had just fallen through the crack in the universe with their mom. If Lucifer came back —
The baby’s cries grew shriller, maybe angrier. Its eyes glowed a bright yellow. It gnawed on its fist with toothless gums and a sudden gust of wind blew the curtains.
“It’s a baby, Sam. Cut the damn cord.” Sam went along with it since that was easier than fighting. He tied a knot quickly, though only a little blood oozed out. “Pick it up.”
“Pick it up?” Sam repeated dumbly.
Dean rolled his eyes. “Yes, genius. Pick it up.”
“Okay baby,” said Sam in an uncertain voice, “c’mere.” He took the infant gingerly in both hands, remembering almost too late that you had to hold a baby’s head up. He held the baby against his jacket. It turned its head and started to root around, snuffling. Then a sudden warmth flooded over the crook of his elbow. “Jesus!” He gave a shaky laugh.
“What the hell?”
“It pissed on me.” Sam was laughing, but still disgusted.
“Okay, I am never holding it.”
“That’s why they make diapers.”
Dean spoke softly. “Do you think... Kelly got any diapers?”
Sam’s heart ached. He knew that Cas had taken Kelly baby shopping, he’d seen all of the folded-up cardboard downstairs in the kitchen. “You look for diapers, okay? I think you can put the gun down.”
“You sure?”
“Dean, it’s a nephilim and if it wanted us dead, we’d be dead already.”
Dean swore and tucked his gun in his waistband, going into the nursery next door on a diaper hunt. Sam cradled the baby closer as it cried, jiggling it with his arm in an effort to get it to calm down. As he rocked the baby, the lights sputtered and flickered.
“Yahtzee!” Sam heard the sound of a wooden drawer being shoved closed. “Come on in here, it’s all set up for the little monster.”
Sam carried the wet and squirming baby into the darkened nursery, feeling unsteady with every step. On the wall over the crib, Kelly had painted a mural of a huge tree and an alphabet on a rainbow. The baby’s name was painted on apples on the tree. “Jack,” he said, addressing the baby for the first time.
“Lay him down on that table — the one with the pad on it.” Dean stepped closer. “Those look like butt wipes.”
“Here goes nothing,” said Sam nervously, cupping the back of the baby’s head in one of his huge hands and easing him down to the terry-cloth surface. He ripped open the butt wipes with one hand and used them all over the kid. Besides the pee, the kid was still covered in that gross slimy stuff. The butt wipes only took about half of it off, but Sam decided that was good enough.
Sam unfolded the diaper and stared at it. “Um,” he said to Dean, “any help here?”
Dean let go of an exasperated breath and pushed his brother aside. “It is not that damned hard, Sam. Remember Bobby John?” With competence if not tenderness, Dean got the baby diapered in a matter of seconds. “We ought to find it some clothes. Look in these drawers.”
Sam quickly came up with a stretchy one-piece thing with baffling snaps. Too difficult. He settled on a t - shirt with crotch snaps and a pair of tiny sweatpants.
When Jack was dressed, Sam and Dean stood there looking at him. He had almost given up on crying, just letting out some pathetic whimpers from time to time. His eyes drifted closed.
“He can’t sleep there,” Dean hissed in a loud whisper. “He’ll roll off. Put him in the crib.”
As soon as he slid his hands under the baby’s head and butt, his eyes snapped open and he howled even louder than before. The sound of lightning crackled in the room, and glowing yellow waves pulsed in the corners. Dean stuck his fingers in his ears. Jack kept shoving his face into the crook of Sam’s arm, and his little mouth was working.
“Damn it! I just figured it out!” Sam said. “We need to feed him.”
“I’m sure Cas... I mean, I’m sure Kelly bought stuff. It’s probably in the kitchen.”
Sam’s stomach ran cold at the thought of carrying Jack down the stairs. “How about you go look and I’ll sit here with him.” It was a statement, not a question. Sam uneasily settled in the large rocking chair holding a wailing Jack. Hopefully Dean would find formula and a bottle downstairs. If not, somebody was going to have to run to the Rite Aid they had passed on their way into town.
“It’s okay, baby. Um, I mean Jack. My brother is a jerk but he’s looking for some food for you.” Jack held Sam’s finger in a death grip as Sam rocked him, probably harder than a baby should be rocked for comfort’s sake.
Dean took the steps two at a time on the way back up. “Okay, I followed the directions on the can. I hope I got it right.” He handed the bottle to Sam.
Sam held the warm bottle awkwardly to Jack’s mouth. The baby didn’t seem to know what to do with it, but he stopped crying long enough to investigate. Finally, his tiny lips closed around the plastic nipple and he started to suck.
“Oh, thank you God. The silence.” Dean wiggled his fingers in his ears.
“So... I guess we’ve got things to take care of here, so we should stay the night.” Sam didn’t want to talk about hunter’s funerals for Kelly and Cas, but they had to do it.
“I’ll take the couch. When the kid falls asleep, put him in the crib.” Dean left the room, his heavy footfalls echoing down the stairs.
The baby stopped eating and started to grizzle. Belatedly, Sam remembered about burping a kid when you gave him a bottle. He put Jack on his shoulder and gave a few gentle taps. Jack let out a frog-like sound that made Sam laugh in spite of himself.
Rocking the baby in the dark room with only the moonlight shining through the window, Sam was drowsy. He got Jack laid down in his crib without waking him — a minor miracle — and crept to the third bedroom, probably Cas’s judging by its severe neatness. He stripped off his piss-wet shirts and flopped quietly on the bed, struggling with his boot laces until he was able to kick them off.
Sam thought he’d fall asleep right away, but he kept replaying the terrible events of the day. Cas and Mom. Not to mention Kelly. Sam could still see her smiling face as he closed her eyes. Lucifer stabbing Cas, helplessly watching him fall to the ground as the shape of his wings sizzled into the earth. Mom beating the shit out of Lucifer and falling through the portal after him. Even Crowley, who had, against all odds, sacrificed himself for them.
How would they ever get Mom back? They had no clue how to open the portal again. Sam felt his eyes burning. Thinking Mom was dead was easier than imagining her trapped in that hellscape with Lucifer.
Sam lay there in the dark, staring out the window into the moonlight. The baby woke up three hours later.