Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The sound of the hotel room door banging open wakes Sam from a sound sleep. When the lamp between the beds comes on, he rolls over with a whimper and pulls the covers over his head, chasing dreamland, until a muttered curse drags him back to consciousness. “Dean?” he murmurs as he pulls the covers down and rubs his eyes. “Wha’s goin’ on?”

“Shh, it’s okay, Sammy,” his brother says in a low voice. “Go back to sleep.” Nodding, Sam dutifully lets his head fall back against the pillows, but another muffled curse in a much deeper voice, followed by Dean saying, “Hold still!” has him jerking fully awake and sitting up in bed.

“Dad?”

His father is lying on the other bed. They hadn’t expected him back for another few days. Sam shoves away the covers, wanting to get up and run to him, but the sight of Dean kneeling on the floor between the beds with the first-aid kit next to him stops Sam cold. As his eyes adjust to the light, the scene before him falls into place, and a deep chill steals across his heart.

“Dad? Are you okay?”

His dad looks up at him with a tight smile. His face is white as a sheet. “It’s okay, Sammy,” he says, his voice steady even as his mouth twists in pain. “Go back to sleep.” Sam nods distractedly, but doesn’t do as he’s told. His eyes are drawn instead to his brother, who has just finished using scissors to cut apart the left leg of Dad’s jeans. There are dark stains all along the shredded cloth, and a darker line running down his bare leg. Sam swallows hard, his stomach churning.

“Is that… blood?”

“It’s okay, Sam.” This time, it comes from Dean again. “Dad just got a little hurt, but I’m gonna fix him up, and he’ll be good as new before you know it. Don’t watch, okay? Just go back to sleep.”

Sam wants to go back to sleep—he wants to rewind time so that he’d never woken up, in fact—but he can’t tear his eyes away from his brother’s hands as they pour peroxide along the deep gash in Dad’s leg. The blood trickles down his calf in dark lines, staining the dingy white hotel towels protecting the bed’s comforter a deep crimson. Dad hisses in pain and closes his eyes. Sam is clutching his pillow to his chest now, his breathing shallow as he watches Dean thread a needle from the suture kit and start stitching up the wound. It feels like it takes him an eternity to finish, and Sam doesn’t begin breathing normally again until Dad’s leg has been wrapped in bandages and he has been tucked under the covers and given pain pills.

Dean shoves everything back into the first aid kit, closes it, and stands. His face is paler than usual, and his hands are shaking and covered with blood. He practically runs to the bathroom, and the water in the sink runs for a long time before he comes out again. It isn’t until he’s pulling back the covers to climb into bed next to Sam that he notices that Sam is still awake. “Sammy? Thought I told you to go back to sleep.”

“Couldn’t,” Sam says, on the verge of tears as he curls up next to Dean and pulls the covers over both of them. “What happened, Dee? Is Dad gonna be okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dean soothes, pulling Sam into his arms, though it sounds like he’s trying to convince himself as much as Sam. “Dad’s gonna be fine. A monster caught him by surprise is all. But I fixed him up, and he’ll be all better soon. Now, try to get some sleep, okay?”

“Okay,” Sam says, turning away from Dean and letting his brother roll to the other side of the bed. But he can tell Dean isn’t sleeping, and as he watches the rise and fall of his father’s chest, the terror that has been hovering around the edges of his mind sinks in and takes root. Dean had promised him just a few months ago, when he’d found out about monsters for the first time, that nothing was ever going to get Dad. Dean had been wrong. A monster had gotten Dad, which means that other monsters can get him too. They can hurt him, and maybe even kill him, and there is nothing Sam can do to help.

He’s only nine years old, and he already knows exactly how his father’s going to be taken away from him for good.

Chapter Text

He drops the crowbar, heart pounding. Blood rushing through his ears, so loud he can’t hear anything else. His chest heaves. Deep breaths: in, out, in, out. He counts the beats—one-two, one-two, one-two—until they start to slow. He is alive.

He is still alive, and his father is dead.

He is still alive, his father is dead, and he knows those two facts are not unrelated.

His heart shouldn’t be beating that strongly. It had almost failed him once, months ago; would have failed him if it wasn’t for Sam, and that faith healer. A man named Marshall Hall had died to save him. Marshall Hall was a swimmer, a teacher, a gay man standing up for his civil rights. Dean doesn’t know anything else about him, but he’s never going to forget what he does know, because, whoever Marshall Hall was, he didn’t deserve to die so that Dean could live. He doesn’t blame Sam, because the poor kid had no way of knowing what would happen, but he swore after that day that he’d never let anyone else die to save him.

And then his father, the stupid, self-sacrificing asshole, had to go and make that decision for him. He never said as much, but Dean knows the truth. The doctors called it a miracle, his recovery, and less than an hour later, his father was dead. It doesn’t take a genius to connect the dots, especially with the Colt missing too. Dad’s dead and gone, salted and burned, and Dean has to find some way to go on without him. Has to find some way to live with the knowledge that he is alive because his father is dead.

He could forgive Sam for unknowingly allowing someone else’s life to be sacrificed to save his, but he doesn’t think he’s ever going to be able to forgive his dad for knowingly sacrificing his own life to do the same.

The healing wound across his forehead throbs in time with his still-beating heart. The wound within his soul feels like the hole he just beat into the trunk of the Impala: dark and raw, with jagged edges, torn open all too easily, and—though he’d tried—impossible to hide.

He crouches down, fingers brushing the crowbar where it lies in the dirt at his feet, but he resists the urge to pick it up. He reaches instead for a wrench, and starts removing the damaged trunk lid from the car. He can’t fix himself, or Sam, and he can’t bring his dad back, but he can fix his Baby. He can bring her back, and, for the moment, maybe that will be enough.

Chapter Text

“Dean, are all monsters evil?”

“What? Of course they are, Sammy. They’re monsters.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure. They’re. Monsters.”

“But, like, couldn’t there be nice ghosts, like Casper? Or a monster that didn’t know it was a monster, and when it found out it decided that it wanted to use its monster powers to help people instead of hurting them?”

“No, Sam. Stuff like that only happens in stories. Real ghosts are always vengeful spirits, and real monsters aren’t human. They can’t control their instincts. It’s not what they do, it’s what they are. And the only way to stop them, the only way to protect people from them, is to hunt them. Understand?”

“Yeah, I guess so. But, Dean, how do you know? I mean, if there were good monsters, they wouldn’t be hurting people, so you wouldn’t know to find them and hunt them, right?”

“Sam, just go to sleep. It’s too late to be talking about stuff like that.”

The conversation comes back to Dean as if it had happened yesterday instead of almost twelve years ago. He looks over at Sam, who is passed out in the passenger seat, and thinks back over the last twelve hours, then over the last twelve years. His father’s last words are still pounding through his head like a steady drumbeat, but he has to have been wrong. Because Sam is not a monster. Sam has never been, could never be something evil, something worth hunting. Hell, his little brother’s almost too good to even be a hunter, and hardly a day goes by that Dean doesn’t feel guilty for letting Sam be raised in this life, or for dragging him back into it after he’d gotten away clean.

Sam had been right, all those years ago. Not all monsters are evil, and the only reason why Dean had never seen it before was because the good ones had never made it onto his radar. He and Sam are hunters, sure, but they’re in this to save people, so they only hunt the things that people need to be protected from. That thought allows some of the guilt that he’s feeling over the possibility that he may have killed things that didn’t deserve killing to fade a little bit. And the revelation has a silver lining too. Because, no matter what Sam’s freaky visions make him, no matter what their dad’s predictions about Sam’s future, Sam isn’t evil. He hasn’t hurt anyone, and he never could, so maybe Dean doesn’t have anything to worry about after all.

He wonders, though, how many miles he’s going to have to drive before he really starts to believe that.

Chapter Text

“Sam... You and Dad... You’re the most important people in my life. And now... I never should’ve come back, Sam. It wasn’t natural, and now look what’s come of it. I was dead, and I should have stayed dead. You wanted to know how I was feeling? Well, that’s it. So tell me… what could you possibly say to make that all right?”

There’s nothing he can say. He’s seen this coming for days, maybe even weeks. He’d connected the same dots that Dean had, after all. Once the grief and the guilt had faded a little, he’d begun to suspect that Dad might have made some sort of deal to make Dean better. Dean’s miraculous recovery, Dad’s unexpected death, and the Colt going missing all within an hour of each other… Given the life they lead, there was no way he was going to chalk that all up to coincidence. He’d tried to deny it for a while, but as he’d watched his brother spiral deeper and deeper down into a depressive funk, he’d just started to get angry.

What right did Dad have to make that kind of decision for them anyway? And without even trying to talk to them about it? Sam remembers how guilt-stricken Dean was after he’d found out that another man had died to save him in that case with the faith healer. Hell, Sam himself still feels guilty about that one, though that’s more over the fact that, even knowing that someone else would have to be sacrificed, he would still do it all over again if it meant saving his brother. And that’s almost what he’s feeling now, too. He’s not angry at Dad for sacrificing himself to save Dean. If he could, he’d probably thank the man, because as big a hole as losing his father had left, it would have been nothing compared to what he would have felt if he’d had to burn his brother’s body in that field behind Bobby’s house instead. No, he’s angry because Dad making that sacrifice alone, without even trying to let his sons know what he was doing or had done, is tearing Dean apart.

Sam would like to think that, if Dad had just tried to talk to Dean, to tell him what was going on even if it was too late to do anything about it, that it would have made things better. Because Dean is right; there’s nothing Sam can say to make Dad’s sacrifice all right. Those words need to come from the one who made the sacrifice in the first place, and Dad obviously passed on the one chance he’d had to say them. That makes Sam just a little more angry at him for a moment, but then he pushes that anger away. Being angry at the dead never accomplished anything.

He might not be able to say anything to make things right for Dean, but he knows what he wants to say. “Dean, I don’t care what Dad did. In fact, a part of me is glad that he did whatever he had to do to save you. Because losing him hurts, but not as much as losing you would have. And no matter what you do or say, you’re never going to make me feel bad about you being alive. Dad sacrificed himself so you could live, Dean, so how about you make the most of it?”

But he’d deserve the ass-kicking Dean would give him if he said any of that out loud, so he keeps his mouth shut. Instead, he sits next to his brother on the hood of the Impala, looking out over the forest and pretending not to see Dean wiping his eyes, and when they finally get back into the car, he doesn’t say a word when Dean turns up the music as loud as it will go. He eats diner food and helps Dean hustle pool and look for cases for the next two weeks without complaint, until his brother yells at him to “stop being so damn accommodating; I’m not some fragile, grief-stricken little girl!” and goads Sam into kicking his ass at sparring practice. Sam knows in that moment that, while things may still not be right inside his brother’s head, Dean’s finding a way to deal with it, and that is good enough for him… for now.

Chapter Text

He’s there the day the kid’s power manifests for the first time. Sees him begging, pleading with his boss not to fire him, sees the words start to tremble with power. “You can’t fire me,” the kid declares, and, just like that, the man’s face goes blank and still. “I can’t fire you,” he repeats, almost robotically, and the kid stumbles back, mouth open. “I’m going to go home now,” he says after a moment of heavy silence. There is no power behind those words, though, which leads to another five minute lecture from his boss about him trying to get out of his shift two hours early. The kid goes back to work, chastened, but it doesn’t escape his notice that he is not fired.

When the kid quits two months later, after gaining just enough control over his powers to keep debt collectors off his back, it’s time for the next phase of the plan to begin. Only the kid is not the least bit receptive to temptation. He’s perfectly content to live in his van, smoking pot and reading philosophy all day and charming meals and any other creature comforts he desires out of every pretty girl in town while barely stretching the use of his powers. The kid has so much potential, and absolutely no drive. He would throw up his hands and move on to the next prospect, but he doesn’t want to give up on this one that easily. Maybe it’s because the kid’s twin brother was so receptive to his manipulations, or maybe it’s because bringing someone this naive and innocent over to the dark side would be good practice for when he goes after his real prize. Whatever the reason, he’s not willing to let this kid waltz off into the sunset with mind control powers and a happy-hippy-stoner view of the world, so he goes to the twin, tells him about his brother, and plants all the necessary seeds of dark purpose to bring Andy into the fold.

But Ansem (and he’s almost certain ninety-nine percent of the kid’s anger problems stem from his name alone) turns out to be exactly the loose cannon that he was trying to avoid when he started this whole plan. Stupid kid decides the best way to get his twin brother’s attention is to start murdering everyone who appears to be coming between them, which, of course, draws the Winchesters’ attention. By the time the dust has settled, all he’s got left is one dead hopeful and another potential who is more determined than ever not to use his powers for anything useful.

He wants to be angry about it, but what’s done is done, and he’s not entirely convinced it wasn’t a bad thing anyway. Because he can see how the uncertainty surrounding his powers is eating at Sam, and how the last words his daddy said to him are tearing Dean up inside. It’s only a matter of time before big brother is going to have to decide whether Sammy is a monster or not, and if Dean falls the way all Daddy’s training says he should, Sam will be exactly where he needs him to be, no mind-control required.

Chapter Text

She was her daddy’s girl, no question; at least, that’s what her mama always told her. Whenever he was home, she’d be hot on his heels, wanting to do everything he was doing and asking him a hundred questions about what he did when he was away, and when he was gone, she’d sit on the front porch for hours, straining her ears to hear the first rumbling sounds of his truck driving up the road. Whenever he came back, smelling of blood and gunsmoke and leather, she would run to him as soon as his feet hit the ground, and he would sweep her up in his arms and hold her so tightly she thought he’d never let her go. She didn’t want him to let her go. When he was home, Mama smiled and laughed and everything was good and happy.

But then, one day, he left and never came back, and Mama stopped smiling for a really long time. At some point, she figured out what it meant that her daddy was dead, that she would never see him again, and then she was sad for a long time too. But life went on, and she went to school, and Mama kept working, and every day she spent less time sitting on the porch, listening for the rumble of an engine that would never return. It helped a bit that, slowly, without her really even noticing it, the bar that they owned began to fill up with people who reminded her of her daddy. Grizzled old men who smelled of blood and gunsmoke and leather would gather around the bar, shooting pool and playing poker and talking about the monsters that they hunted.

That was how she found out that monsters were real, and how she figured out that it was a monster that must have killed her dad. From that moment on, despite her mom’s best efforts, she became obsessed with learning everything there was to know about hunting the supernatural. She badgered the hunters that came into the bar to tell her everything they knew about ghosts and shifters and demons, she snuck off to learn how to shoot a gun and use a knife and handle herself in a fight, and she learned how to cheat at poker and hustle pool with the best of them. Her mom wouldn’t let her go on any hunts, but to keep her from putting up too much of a fuss, she let it be known that the Roadhouse was friendly to hunters as not just a bar, but as a place to network and find help with research and lick their wounds in understanding company when things went south. In return, she humored her mother by staying in school, and even going on to college for a few years, before the boredom and the awkwardness of trying to act like she’d lived a normal life got to be too much to deal with.

She’d been home for less than a month when she woke up one morning to the sound of a rumbling engine pulling into the Roadhouse’s parking lot. Still half-asleep, she almost imagined that it was her father, finally coming home after all these years, until the sight of her mother grabbing a shotgun and sneaking down the back staircase brought her to her senses. When she confronted one of the intruders and found herself face-to-face with the youngest, handsomest hunter she had ever laid eyes on, though, it took her a moment—and a fist to his face—to convince herself that she wasn’t still dreaming. The guy smelled of blood and gunsmoke, and he wore an old leather jacket just like her dad’s, and there was suddenly nothing that she wanted more in the world than to be a hunter.

Even finding out the truth about her father’s death and his connection to John Winchester didn’t entirely change that. Because, despite what her mother thought about hunters, and the Winchesters in particular, Dean had opened her eyes to more than just the dangers of the life. He’d showed her that the risks were worth it; that if you could walk away at the end of the day knowing that you had saved an innocent civilian’s life, it didn’t matter how much blood and pain and fear you shed in the line of duty. As much as it hurt to know how and why her father had died, she had never been prouder of him, and she wanted nothing more in this life than to make him proud of her as well. She wouldn’t go running off to hunt with Sam and Dean—she’d promised her mother that much—but that wasn’t going to stop her from doing whatever she could to follow in her father’s footsteps and save as many people from the supernatural evils of the world as she could.

Chapter Text

October 5, 1989

Male suspect, age 10, detained for unlawful entry of a residential home. Suspect was caught watching a Pay-per-view boxing match on the residents’ television when the residents returned home from a weekend trip out of town. Residents declined to press charges.

“What were you thinking, Dean?”

“Donny Weller promised me, Dad! He said I could watch the fight with him, but then his grandma died and he was gonna be out of town, so he told me I could go by while his family was gone for the weekend and watch it. I even paid him the money in advance, and he told me where the key was! It’s not my fault they came back early!”

“I know that, son, but the only reason you’re not sitting in a jail cell right now is because Donny told his parents the truth. Did you even stop to think what could have happened if he hadn’t? Or if I had been out of town?”

“Wouldn’t have done it if you’d been out of town, Dad. ‘M not stupid.”

“I know you’re not, kiddo, but you’ve got to have a little common sense. You gotta help me look out for Sammy, remember? And you can’t do that if you get arrested, right?”

“Right. I’m sorry, Dad.”

“I know you are, kiddo. Now, come on. We’ve gotta hit the road.”

July 22, 1993

Male suspect, age 14, detained for trespassing and grave desecration. Suspect was caught alone in the cemetery by a grave that had been recently disturbed, in possession of a flashlight and several shovels. Suspect claimed that he had been accompanied to the cemetery by several older children, but declined to name any of them. The suspect was released into the custody of his father to await a hearing in juvenile court on Friday.

“You okay, Dean?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry I didn’t keep a better lookout.”

“That’s okay, son. I should have been more prepared too. I’m proud of you for standing your ground, though.”

“Was my story about the other kids good too?”

“Yeah, that was some pretty quick thinking. It’ll keep them looking for someone else to blame when they can’t do anything else to you.”

“Dad? Will I get in trouble for leaving before court?”

“They’d have to catch us first, Dean, and in a small town like that, they’re not going to be looking very hard. Don’t worry about it.”

“Okay. …Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“Did you get the ghost?”

“Yup. Went back to the gravesite after the cops had left, dug up the bones, and salted and burned them. That ghost won’t be bothering anyone else who moves into that old house. Now, get some sleep. We’ve got a long drive ahead of us.”

“‘Kay. Thanks, Dad.”

March 10, 1995

Male suspect, age 16, detained for shoplifting. Suspect was caught in possession of peanut butter and bread, with no means to pay for it. With the approval of the primary caregiver, the suspect was remanded to Sonny’s Home for Boys pending arraignment and trial. Charges were later dropped after Sonny vouched for the suspect’s character and the suspect made suitable restitution to the shopkeeper.

“Dean? You okay?”

“Yeah, Sammy. I’m okay.”

“Where were you? Did a monster get you?”

“No! Why?”

“That’s what Dad said. Said you got lost hunting a monster, and that’s why I had to stay at Bobby’s while he went to find you. Did you get it?”

“Huh? …Oh, yeah, of course I got it. It just took a long time to track, was all. Now, aren’t you supposed to be asleep?”

“Not tired. Why’re you dressed so nice?”

“Monster ripped up all my other clothes. These were the only ones I had left.”

“Huh. That’s funny.”

“What’s funny?”

“Don’t remember you having those clothes before you left.”

“Whatever, Sammy. Stop going through my stuff.”

“Dean?”

“Hmm?”

“Next time you go hunting on your own, can I come too?”

December 25, 2003

Male suspect, age 24, arrested for public intoxication. Suspect was found to have several fraudulent credit cards in his possession, and is being detained at the county jail pending trial. If convicted, suspect faces a minimum of six months in prison.

You have reached Sam Winchester’s cellphone. Please leave a message after the tone. …BEEP

“Alw’s so polite, Sam’y. Where’d ya get that from anyway? Couldn’t’a been Dad… or me either, ah guess. Jus’ callin’ ta wish ya Merr’ Chr’s’m’s, ah guess. Oh, an’ ta letcha know ‘m in jail. Wish you were here… well, not here, here, but… Tried Dad’s cell already. He ain’t answerin’ either. Figures, ah guess. Ah jus’ thought, maybe, since it’s Christmas an’ all… Well, hope ya spendin’ it somewhere nice, maybe with a girl or somethin’. Don’t worry about me… Like a cat, ‘member? Alw’s lan’ on mah feet…”

You have reached the maximum length for a voice message. To continue your message, please hang up and dial your call again.

“…Miss you, Sammy. Merry Christmas, bro.”

Chapter Text

“Dean? When you were trapping that demon, you weren't... I mean, it was all a trick, right? You never considered actually making that deal, right?”

He could answer his brother, but he probably doesn’t need to. Sam wouldn’t be asking that question if he didn’t already know the answer, on some level at least. Yes, he considered making the deal, and he’s probably going to regret not doing so for a long time. The only problem, of course, had been the possibility of unintended consequences. Because his dad’s deal had not been a crossroads deal. He hadn’t gotten ten years, he’d traded the Colt along with his own soul, and it was almost guaranteed that the yellow-eyed demon had been involved somehow. Breaking a deal like that—assuming it was even possible—was likely to go badly for everyone involved. Dean was more than likely to drop dead on the spot, never mind the crossroads demon’s promises, and if he didn’t… well, he wasn’t exactly willing to look his dad in the face and have to explain what he’d done. Plus, without the Colt, it was probably not the best idea to do anything that would draw Yellow Eyes’ attention back to them. Getting involved with Jedi-mind-trick Andy and his evil twin a few months back was the closest Dean wanted to come to anything having to do with the demon at the moment… Sam’s freaky visions notwithstanding, of course.

All the logic in the world wasn’t going to make him feel any better about giving up his only chance to set things right, though. He knew Sam didn’t understand, couldn’t understand the weight that he was carrying right now. All he’d ever wanted when he’d gone and gotten his brother from school was to put his family back together; how had everything gone so wrong? First Dad hadn’t wanted to be found, then Sam hadn’t wanted to stay, and now… now Dad was dead because of him, and Sam… There were days where he couldn’t even look at his brother, not after what his dad had told him. Not after the promise that he’d been forced to make. It was a promise he had no intention of keeping, but just the fact that his dad had planned for it in the first place…

And that was the real reason why he couldn’t take the deal. Because if his dad did come back, whether Dean was there or not, Sam would not be safe. He doesn’t doubt that Dad loved Sam, but Dean knew his dad well enough to know that the mission always came first. He wouldn’t have asked Dean to make that promise if he hadn’t been planning to follow through with it himself. In fact, he’s almost certain that that was the only reason why his father chose to trade his life for Dean’s; because he knew that Dean had a much better chance of finding a way to save Sam than he did. And as long as everything is about Sam, maybe things would be okay. If the only reason he is alive is to protect his little brother from the evil that has been stalking him their entire lives, maybe that’s enough to keep him going for another day.

Chapter Text

“You know I'm gonna ask you why.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“So why? Why didn't you do it?”

Dean looks up at his brother and wishes that there was an easy explanation. That he could put into words the war that had raged inside him as he’d stood there holding his gun on that sobbing, terrified young man. There had been a feeling of righteousness, of destiny in his actions at first—Sam had seen it happen already, seen it in a vision, and who was he to argue with that? But Sam himself had begged him not to kill Duane, and was still shouting from behind the locked door at the other end of the hall, pleading for Dean to reconsider. Sam and his oh-so-reasonable arguments about conscience and free will, was a much better person than Dean could ever hope to be. Sam could never know, should never have to know what it was to make the truly hard choices… except Dean had already failed to protect him from that. Dean had failed to protect his baby brother from everything, in fact… well, everything except this. And maybe this was the moment that all of Sam’s visions and Dad’s warnings had been leading them to. Maybe this was the moment of truth, where he managed to save his brother or lose him forever…

Or maybe this was the moment when Sam lost Dean instead. Because this kid, tied up and helpless and crying like a baby… what if, some day, that was Sam? What if, on that day, Dean isn’t strong enough to do the right thing? It would be so easy to pull the trigger, to eliminate the possibility of a threat before it ever has the chance to manifest and threaten the only thing he has left. But if he does that, what’s to stop him from doing it again when the stakes are higher? If he kills this kid now, without absolute proof that he is infected, the question might haunt him for the rest of his life. Even worse, it might make it harder for him to give anyone else the benefit of the doubt later on, including Sam.

But how can he explain any of that to Sam now, when there’s so many other things to worry about? With a sigh, he opens his mouth and says the first thing he can think of to diffuse the tension in the room.

“We need more alcohol.”

He tells himself that he’ll explain everything later, once they’re out of this shitty town and this shitty situation. He ignores Sam’s huff of frustration as he gets up and heads into the dispensary to get more explosive chemicals, and he keeps his eyes on his work, lest Sam catch a glimpse of something in them and chooses to press the advantage. He hears a door close a moment later, but it isn’t until the sound of a scream echoes through the clinic from the room that Sam just entered that he realizes his mistake.

Screwed up again, Dean. Can’t you do anything right?

Chapter Text

Scott Carey had promise.

Oh, sure, the kid was a bit of a whiner. “I think I’m going crazy, please, someone help me, I can’t take it any more,” and all that crap. But I had managed to convince him to fry the neighbor’s cat just to prove to him that his powers were real, which pretty much guaranteed that no shrink in the county was going to see him as anything other than a psycho. Plus, they always say that cruelty to animals is an essential first step, so…

But then, a goddamn hunter who thought he knew a little something about something went and stuck a knife in the kid’s gut, and, just to add insult to injury, it set Sam Winchester on my trail again. At first, when he rolled into town all on his lonesome, I couldn’t have been happier. Had big brother followed daddy’s example and kicked the freak of nature to the curb? And then, like a cherry on top of a sundae, little Ava Wilson showed up, hot on Sammy’s heels! I hadn’t been keeping close tabs on her; I didn’t have much use for another psychic, and she was a little too sweet and innocent for my taste, but now it turns out she has a hero complex, just like my golden boy. And, to make things even better, instead of showing her the first road out of town and back to Podunksville, little Sammy sat her down and spilled the beans on everything.

And Dean played his part beautifully too, popping in just in time to keep that stupid hunter from blowing his little brother’s head off. Gordon Walker was a mixed bag in this whole misadventure. On the one hand, he did a pretty good job of convincing Dean-o that baby brother is days away from going dark side, but, on the other hand, he was a little heavy-handed in his efforts to convince Sam of the same thing. Plus, there’s the fact that he’s been going around trying to off all my special kids. He didn’t get very far, but it’s the principle of the thing, you know? Still, he might have his uses later, which is why he’s still breathing oxygen rather than grave dirt and sulfur. In another couple months or so, when Sammy’s a little riper for the plucking, maybe I’ll see about busting him out of jail and setting him on the kid’s trail again. Every little incentive helps, right?

But, there is still the problem of his hunter connections. The fact that anyone knows about what my kids can do could get problematic as we get closer to the big day, so it might not hurt to start putting a few of them on ice. Think I’ll start with Ava. Now that she knows that what she can see and do is real, and dangerous, she is ripe for a little incentive. Wonder how fast I can turn her? Sam’s been a little too adept so far at tracking down his closest rivals; if she holds as much promise as I think she does, this is one enemy that he’ll never see coming.

Chapter Text

As Dean sat there watching Sam sleep, he wished he had never opened his mouth. But what choice had he been given? This was all too big; Sam was going to find out one way or another. And what had Dad been thinking, anyway? Sam’s relationship with their father had always been fractious, but to think that Sam would ever be capable of going dark side, or that Dean would be capable of killing him… had the man known either of them at all?

**********************************************************************************

It’s the glass of water that does it. One minute, Sam is shouting at him, and he is shouting back. Same shit, different day, nothing to distinguish it from the hundreds of other fights they’ve had since Sam hit puberty… but then a glass full of water flies off a table at least a foot away from either of them and shatters on the hospital floor, stopping the argument cold. Sam looks at the glass, John looks at Sam, and in that moment, his son’s thoughts are written across his face as clear as day: did he, in his anger, move that glass with his mind?

The dreams were one thing. John had been terrified when he first found out about the other children, about their powers and what the demon’s plans for them were. But Sam… Sam just had dreams. Prophetic dreams, sure, but dreams never hurt anyone, and it sounded like he’d been trying to use them to do some good, so maybe there was hope for him yet. But this… it could mean that he was escalating, or that the demon had gotten his hooks even deeper into Sam’s psyche. He’d given the demon plenty of chances, after all; first in Salvation, and then in that cabin when he’d been possessed. He never should have left his boys behind to face that thing alone, he should have protected himself better, he should have told Dean about Sam’s connection to the demon when he’d had the chance…

While the list of regrets he could write about how he’d handled his children and the situation they found themselves in right now was long, it wouldn’t help anything. All he knew—he could see it in his son’s eyes when the alarms started in the hallway—was that he stood no chance of keeping Sam from his destiny. He and his youngest son were like oil and water; you could mix them all day long, but they would never come together, no matter how dire the circumstances or how great the need. Sam was too strong-willed to just fall in line and follow orders, and there was too much history between them. All John could think of as he watched his son rush out of the room to check on his brother was that, if Dean died in that hospital bed, the demon would have his perfect opening, because the loss of his big brother would break Sam.

So as soon as Sam is out of the hospital, running some errand, John drags himself out of bed and heads for the most secluded place he can find around here. There’s a spot in the basement he had scoped out earlier that should do the trick. He hadn’t even decided himself what he was going to do when he’d had Sam get those summoning ingredients from Bobby, but now he does. He has the Colt, he has one bullet left, and he has only one chance to save both of his sons. And, at this point, nothing else matters.

Chapter Text

“And then, they took me out of the vault and dragged me upstairs to one of the offices. I thought they were going to kill me. But there was this girl up there, lying on the floor with her… with her throat, just, you know… and, and she looked exactly like me! How is that even possible? I don’t really remember what happened. I was just so scared, my heart was racing so fast. I screamed, and then everything went black. And when I came to, the other girl was fighting with Dean. That’s what he said his name was, anyway. I thought he was so brave at first, trying to protect us from that psycho. I don’t know what that freak said to Dean to get him to start helping, but he really was just one of the hostages at first, I’m sure of it. Oh, sorry, yeah. So, the girl was fighting with him, and screaming, but there was no way she could have been doing that. I mean, her throat was… and there was so much blood! But she was alive, somehow, and Dean held her off and shouted at his brother—Sam, I think he called him—to get me out of there. Sam helped me up, and we both ran into the hallway, and then he told me to get everyone out of the vault and to get out of the bank as fast as I could. That’s where I was going when the cops found me. Did you find them yet? Do you know why they did it?”

Henriksen stopped the tape, pondering Sherry’s final question for the hundredth time in the last week, at least. He’d be lying if he said that the story that was taking shape around the bank heist made any sense at all. For starters, there was the fact that nothing had been stolen. All the witnesses said that the man who had initially come into the bank with the gun had said it wasn’t a robbery, that he’d been extremely surprised to see the Winchesters—though they’d seemed to have a passing familiarity with one another—and that he’d been going on about government conspiracies and ‘mandriods’. That first suspect—Ronald Resnick, a former security guard for a different bank that had been held up as well a little over a month ago—was obviously a round-the-bend PTSD case. It was almost a shame that the cops had taken him out, because his story likely could have cleared a few things up, but it was also possible that he had just been at the wrong place at the wrong time. It was what the Winchesters were doing there that mattered, and that was where things started to get really confusing.

The security guard that they released said that he had let them in earlier that day, that they were posing as technicians doing a routine check of the bank’s security camera system. They’d seemed like nice young men, he said. Others had echoed the sentiment, saying that, even after Resnick had been killed and the Winchesters had taken over the situation, they’d seemed very concerned about the hostages’ safety, that they seemed to think they were doing what they were doing for the hostages’ protection.

And Henriksen would have been inclined to believe them, but for the fact that there were three bodies tied to this case: two of them at the bank itself. One of the patrons had been found in an upstairs office, stripped of all his clothes, his throat slit, and it looked like someone had tried and failed to hide the body in the ceiling. The second body had been the twin of the young woman whose statement he had listened to a dozen times over in the last few days: Sherry, the bank teller, who swore up and down that she didn’t have a twin and had never seen her doppelgänger before that night. That woman—as of yet unidentified—had also been missing most of her clothes, and, in addition to sustaining both a gaping neck wound and a letter-opener to the heart—the latter being the wound that had killed her, though Henriksen was at a loss to explain how the former hadn’t done the job—had also had most of the skin ripped from one of her arms in a surprisingly gruesome manner. Add that to the two unexplained piles of liquifying skin, clothing and hair that had been found in an upstairs office and in one of the stairwells, and the body of the bank manager that had been found a few hours later at his home—cause of death was apparently suicide a few hours before the hostage situation took place, though several other bank employees swore that he was at the bank at the time of the robbery—and it was enough to give anyone a migraine.

But Henriksen had spent enough time tracking down the Winchesters to know that all of this was nothing but smoke and mirrors. Never mind that there were elements of it that rang remarkably similar to the Saint Louis case, or that the true criminal in the Baltimore case had been the now-deceased Detective Sheridan. The truth of the matter was that strange, unnatural death followed these two young men wherever they went, and, if his research was correct, had followed their father as well. From coast to coast, whenever the Winchesters showed up in a town, something horrific was bound to happen, and if they weren’t stopped, the killings would never end. The rest of it didn’t have to make sense, as long as Henriksen remembered what truly mattered: seeing the Winchesters brought to justice. He would see this case through, no matter the consequences, and if it was only because some part of his mind really wanted the answer to that question too—why did they do it?—well, no one but him needed to be any the wiser.

Chapter Text

Jim finds him in the sanctuary, sitting quietly in a pew, just staring up at one of the stained-glass windows—the one of the angel Gabriel bringing the news to Mary that she was chosen to be the mother of God’s son.

“Hey there, Sam. Everything alright? Dean’s been looking for you.”

He keeps his voice soft and level. He doesn’t know exactly why John came blazing through here and dropped both his sons off with hardly a word a couple of days ago, but ever since then, Sam hasn’t quite seemed like himself. It could just be early-onset teenage angst, though the boy is only nine, or it could be that the lifestyle he has been subjected to has started catching up to him. Jim knows he isn’t the first to voice his concerns about how John is raising his sons, but given that he’d like to stay in their lives and be a positive influence for as long as he can, he picks his words with care.

“Pastor Jim?” Sam’s voice is rough and shaky when he finally speaks. “Do you know about the monsters?”

Things start slotting into place then. “I do,” Jim answers honestly. “When did you find out?”

“Christmas.”

So, it’s been a few months, then. “What did your daddy tell you? Or was it Dean?”

Sam shakes his head, then shrugs. “I found Dad’s journal. Dean got mad, said I wasn’t supposed to know, but then he told me stuff. I’d read most of it by then, already. I know monsters killed my mom, and that Dad hunts them. Dean says he’s a superhero, that nothing will hurt him, but… but I think he’s just saying that to make me feel better. And Dad…” He reaches down and pulls up his shirt, and Jim almost recoils when he sees the gun tucked in the waistband of Sam’s jeans. “I got a nightmare last week, thought something was going to get him. Forgot he was home. I told him about my bad dream, and he gave me this to protect myself.”

Mentally, Jim growls at John. He’d curse, but he remembers where he is. “I’m sure your daddy thought he was doing right, Sam, but when you’re here, you don’t need that kind of protection, so why don’t we take that gun downstairs and put it in my safe for now, okay?”

Sam nods and hands the gun over to Jim without protest, and Jim is pretty sure he isn’t imagining the tension that bleeds from the boy’s small form as soon as the gun is out of his hands. He gets up to leave, to put the gun away until John shows up again—and he won’t be keeping quiet about this concern, that’s for sure—when Sam speaks up again.

“Pastor Jim, can you teach me how to pray?”

That stops him in his tracks, and he sinks back down into the pew. “I can answer any questions you may have about praying, Sam, but it’s not really something you can teach. Prayer is very personal; it comes from the heart, and it says and does whatever you need from it.”

“Do you pray a lot?”

“Yes. I pray every day, often many times a day.”

“And what do you pray for?”

“Lots of different things. I pray for the health and peace of my congregation, for the protection of my family and friends, I thank God for his blessings and ask him to bring comfort to those in need, and sometimes I just pray because it’s nice to know that there is someone out there who will listen to my problems without judgment and absolve me of my faults and failings without asking anything in return.”

“So you think God is real? And angels too? Just like the monsters?”

Trust Sam to ask the hard questions. “I believe in God and the angels, yes. It isn’t quite the same as with monsters, because I have never seen an angel, or know of anyone who has, but I believe that, if demons and Hell are real, then there have to be angels and a Heaven too. There must be good to balance out evil, or else the world would not exist at all.” He almost holds his breath after that last sentence, waiting for the next difficult question, reluctant to elaborate further without one. Sam has seen a lot of terrible things in his young life, but he is still just a child, and it wouldn’t be good to overwhelm him with any of this.

“So, praying is just talking to God and hoping that he’s listening?”

That isn’t at all what Jim had been expecting, and he can’t help but smile. “Yes, for the most part.”

“Do you think that God could help me not be scared of the monsters anymore? Because I know Dad gave me the gun so I wouldn’t be scared, but it didn’t work, and I’m afraid to tell him ‘cause he might get mad, and I can’t tell Dean ‘cause he might laugh at me and call me a baby.”

“But you told me, and nothing bad happened,” Jim reminds him gently.

“Yeah,” Sam agrees, “but I knew you wouldn’t get mad or laugh at me, and I know I’m safe here because it’s hollowed ground, Dean says.”

“Hallowed,” Jim corrects with a smile. “That means that it is holy, and under God’s protection. Plus a few other things I added, just to be extra careful.”

Sam nods, and Jim can tell that he’s filing that knowledge away for later. Kid’s as sharp as a tack, and will be an amazing hunter one day… an amazing anything, to be honest, though Jim can’t see John being happy with anything except both his boys following in his footsteps. “But we can’t stay here forever,” Sam says, “and sometimes Dad leaves, and sometimes Dean does too, and I don’t want to be scared even when I’m alone. So, if God can protect this place, can he protect me too if I pray to him?”

Jim swallows the lump in his throat and reaches out to gently ruffle Sam’s hair. “He protects you whether you pray to him or not, Sam, I promise you that. But if you need more from him, all you ever have to do is ask.”

“Thanks, Pastor Jim.” This time, when Jim goes to stand up, Sam stands up with him, follows him down to the basement, and watches him put the pistol away in his gun safe. Then, he smiles. “I’m gonna go find Dean.” As Sam descends the church steps and runs across the yard in the bright sunlight, Jim can’t help but send up a little prayer of his own for the faith and innocence of a child who is growing up too fast, for the protection of the young man that he will soon become, and for the strength of the warrior that he will undoubtedly be molded into. Sam Winchester is a good boy, and with faith and love on his side, Jim knows that he will always be okay.

Chapter Text

Sam was digging into the books on demon possession in Bobby’s library before the ringing in his head from Dean’s punch had fully dissipated. Dean grumbled invectives at him as Bobby tended to both their wounds, and Sam felt bad for ignoring him and for not helping Bobby clean up the mess he had caused, but this was too important to put off for one more minute. He had to do something to make sure that he could never be possessed like that again. His insides felt like they were covered in black slime, he kept getting flashes of memory that made him sick to his stomach, and when he thought too hard about what Meg had done with his body… Nothing good could come of dwelling on any of that, though. In fact, it was best that he try to forget it ever happened, lest he spend the next month curled up in a ball on the floor, crying. He’d be no good to anyone like that, and he could not afford the weakness.

It wasn’t until Bobby handed him and Dean the anti-possession charms that the idea truly came to him. Over the next few weeks, while Dean drove from town to town, hustling pool to replenish their dwindling funds and searching for a case and doing his best not to let Sam out of his sight, Sam did research. It turned out, in the end, that there was nothing particularly special about the symbol carved on the charms that Bobby had given them. It was just one of a dozen run-of-the-mill occult symbols of protection that happened to specifically ward against demon possession. Dean liked the idea of the charm—he’d never been opposed to jewelry—but Sam was thinking of something a little more permanent. Something that couldn’t get lost, or go missing, or be taken from him.

“Seriously?” Dean said with mock exasperation when Sam made the request for money. “I’m the one that earned that money, Sam. I’ve been working hard over here to keep food on the table and a roof over our heads while you’ve been up to your ears in books. What could you possibly need that much money for, anyway?”

So Sam told him.

Dean lost the attitude in a hurry after that. “Hey, that’s not a half-bad idea,” he said. “I think we might even have enough for two. Do we have to go to anyone special?”

Sam shook his head. “The local shop will be fine. I even called them yesterday and made an appointment for the day after tomorrow. I can call them back and see if they can fit both of us in, if you’re sure you want to do this?”

Given their lifestyle, it was a bit surprising that neither of them had done this before. Sam guessed it had just never come up, and a lack of identifying marks went a long way towards protecting their anonymity. But, in this case, the risk they were protecting themselves from was more important that the risks they faced by doing this. Dean’s only concern, apparently, was whether or not it was going to hurt.

“So,” the shop’s proprietor looked them up and down after confirming their request. “Matching tats, huh? Where you boys want them?”

Sam looked over at Dean. Under his brother’s two layers of shirts, Sam knew the starburst of the bullet wound that Meg had left on his brother’s skin with his hands still shone a pale white on Dean’s left shoulder. “Here,” Sam said, meeting Dean’s eyes and touching his own left shoulder, just below the collarbone.

Dean looked down and understood immediately what Sam was thinking. Running his fingers thoughtfully over the location of the scar, he nodded in agreement. “Good idea.” They both ignored the odd look the tattoo artist was giving them. “Want me to go first, Sammy?”

Sam shook his head. “Not this time, Dean.” He stripped off his shirt and settled into the chair while Dean retreated back into the waiting area. As the needle touched his skin, Sam actually let out a sigh of relief. Destiny or no destiny, from this moment onward, his actions would be his own. He wasn’t going to let anyone else use his hands for evil without his consent ever again.

Chapter Text

“Uncle Bobby! Uncle Bobby! Dean stole my car! Make him give it back!”

He had a headache already, and it wasn’t even nine o’clock. He had no idea how to do this. John was an idiot for leaving his kids with a near-stranger. Or was he the idiot for saying he’d keep an eye on them for a few days?

“Whaddya mean he stole your car, Sam?”

The little boy tugging on his shirt stopped, looking suddenly sheepish. “We was playin’ in the old cars, and I said I wanted to drive the big black one ‘cause it looked sorta like our car, and Dean ran over and took it and now he won’t let me get in it, or drive, or nothin’!”

Bobby rubbed at his temples again. “I thought I told you boys to stay outta the junkyard,” he scolded, though his heart was barely in it. “There’s lotsa dangerous stuff back there, and you don’t wanna get hurt. You could get tetanus.”

“What’s tetanus?”

“It’s when you cut yourself on rusty metal and get sick,” Bobby said without thinking.

Sam’s eyes suddenly went wide as saucers. “You can get sick from cuts? But I get cuts all the time, and so does Dean, and so does Daddy!” He looked like he might be about to cry. Cringing inside, Bobby opened his mouth to try and say something comforting, but before he could get a word out, Sam was off like a shot, running back towards the field of wrecked cars, shouting at the top of his lungs. “Dean! Dean! Uncle Bobby says you better stay away from the cars! They could give you tetanus, and you could die!”

Bobby couldn’t help the smile that tugged at the corners of his mouth. As annoying as they could be, John’s kids were pretty darn cute at times, and they were both smart as tacks. It was possible that he would survive this weekend after all… he just needed to get a few more cups of coffee in him, first. He started another pot and watched it drip down slowly, savoring the peace that had miraculously descended…

“Uncle Bobby! Uncle Bobby! Dean won’t listen to me!”

* * * * * * * * * *

“Uncle Bobby, make Dean stop kicking my chair!”

“Uncle Bobby, make Dean stop kicking my chair!”

“Stop imitating me, Dean!”

“Stop imitating me, Dean!”

“Hey, give me that back! Uncle Bobby, make Dean give me back my books!”

There wasn’t enough liquor in the world to get him through the next four days, much less the next four months. “Will you boys shut it!” Bobby found himself shouting in the direction of the kitchen. “Sam, go upstairs to do your homework if Dean’s such a distraction. And Dean, if you can’t find anything better to do with your time than annoy your little brother, I’ve got an engine out back in the garage that could use a good cleaning.”

There were a few muted grumbles, the sound of feet climbing up stairs and the door to the back porch slamming, and, finally, silence descended. With a sigh of only mild frustration, Bobby returned to the lore translation he had been working on. He had thought it would be good for Sam and Dean to have a few months of stability, to spend at least one semester of not having to change schools every few weeks, and, surprisingly, John had agreed. A little too easily, Bobby had thought, and now he knew why. The boys had been at each other’s throats from the moment they had arrived. It seemed like Dean had made it his mission in life to annoy his brother as often and as continuously as possible, and Sam was more than eager to rise to every bait. So far, Bobby had broken up ten screaming matches, half a dozen ‘mimic’ sessions, three escalating prank wars, and one actual fist-fight. If he had to spend one more week like this last one, he was going to call John up and demand that he come back early. He had never wanted to be a father, and these boys about had him down to his last nerve.

Several hours later, Bobby looked up from the translation at the smell of something delicious wafting through the house. Getting up from his chair, he wandered curiously into the kitchen to find Sam mixing up spaghetti and meat sauce for dinner. “I finished my homework,” he said, “and you looked busy, so I thought I’d cook.”

Bobby couldn’t help but smile a little. “That’s much appreciated, Sam. Thank you.”

“Can you go get Dean? The food’s almost ready.”

Bracing himself for the inevitable mess that would follow once the boys were back in the same room, Bobby went out to the garage. He found Dean elbow-deep in the engine that he was restoring for one of the cars in the lot, covered in grease and looking happier than Bobby had seen him in a long time.

“Dinner’s ready,” he said as he walked up and inspected Dean’s work. “Sam cooked tonight.” He let out a low whistle as Dean stood up. “Damn, boy. You do good work.”

“Really?” Dean positively beamed as he wiped his face and hands on a clean shop towel. “Does that mean I can help you fix the cars sometimes?”

“We’ll see,” Bobby said has they walked back to the house. “Long as you don’t let your schoolwork suffer.”

Much to Bobby’s surprise, dinner that night was pleasant. Dean complimented Sam’s cooking, and Sam asked Bobby about the book he had been translating, and Bobby talked to Dean about cars, and Sam and Dean smiled when they poked at each other under the table instead of frowning. There was no fight over the movie they picked to watch that night before bed, and no complaints about anyone stealing anyone else’s shirt or pillow, and they went off to school the next morning without any fuss either. Bobby knew the peace wouldn’t last, but he also knew that it could, and would return. Maybe this whole parenting thing wasn’t so bad after all.

If nothing else, he was starting to like the sound of “Uncle Bobby”.

* * * * * * * * * *

“Hey, Uncle Bobby. It’s Sam.”

“Well, hey there, Sam. What’s up? You boys doin’ okay?”

“Yeah, we’re alright. Could use your help with a case, though.”

“Sure thing. What can you tell me?”

“Um, well, actually, would you mind meeting up with us? I can’t really talk about this over the phone.”

“Sure, I guess.” He knew Sam wouldn’t be calling him if it wasn’t important. “Where are you?”

“Springfield, Ohio. King’s Lair Hotel, room 12. Thanks so much, Uncle Bobby.”

He was a bit surprised at them asking him for help, but he was glad of it. He knew they always had each other, but with the loss of John still so fresh in everyone’s minds, it wouldn’t hurt for him to be there for them every once in a while. There might be more than a few years of estrangement between him and the Winchester boys, but as long as he was still ‘Uncle’ Bobby, they were still his family. “Not a problem, Sam. See you soon.”

Chapter Text

Molly looks towards the rising sun, an expression of peace and acceptance on her face, and she slowly disappears, evaporating into light until Sam can’t tell where her spirit ends and the sunrise begins. It is so beautiful. He might have tears in his eyes, but he doesn’t dare let on, lest Dean notice and say something to break the silence.

He’s never seen a ghost accept her death before, but maybe it isn’t surprising, because Molly had been unlike any other ghost he’d ever met before also. Starting with not knowing that she was dead: most ghosts were in denial, sure, but that wasn’t the same thing. Molly had her full personality intact, for one, and she had thought she was picking up where the accident left off. There was no vengeance in her heart yet, only love and concern for her husband, and Sam supposes that it is love that allowed her to accept her death and move on to whatever awaits her beyond that golden light without a fight.

He can’t help but think about Dean, though, fighting for his life in that hospital. A reaper had come for him, his ghost had said. If Dad hadn’t sacrificed himself, would Dean have evaded his reaper and eventually become a vengeful spirit, like so many of the others that they had hunted? Or would he have eventually been able to accept his death and move on? And what about Dad, looking straight into death and accepting that torment likely awaited on the other side, if Dean’s theory about what had happened to him was true? John Winchester had spent his life cheating death, and fighting against losing what was left of his family, and doing anything and everything possible to get justice for his wife’s death, and he had given it all up for love.

Maybe love is the key to finding peace in the next life, then, Sam thinks. He doesn’t know about Heaven, though he likes to believe that it exists (because if Hell does, that doesn’t Heaven have to?), but even if it doesn’t, he hopes that there is something better in the next life for people like Molly. He says as much to Dean, then, when his brother finally decides to break the silence, but there is more to the hope that he speaks of in his heart. Because alongside the hope that peace can be found on the other side of death is also nestled the hope that he will be able to face his own death with courage when the time comes, so that he may be welcomed into that light and have all of his sins, the stains he feels deep in his soul, washed away.

It’s a faint hope, and one that fades a little bit every time he feels his powers stirring inside him, but it is all he has left, and without it, he fears what he could become.

Chapter Text

They leave the room, and she sinks to the floor, her shaking legs unable to hold her up any longer. She wipes at the tears streaming down her cheeks, but the effort is futile; they won’t stop coming. Then, it truly hits her, what she is asking them to do, and the tears dry up quickly as grief is replaced with pure terror.

She looks towards the front door; she might be able to make it out before they notice… but what good would it do? She is a monster now. Anyone who takes her in will be dead in a few weeks when the next full moon rolls around, and if she tries to keep to herself, complete strangers will be slaughtered instead. She already has blood on her hands: her boss, a cop, Kurt… he was a creep, but that didn’t mean that she’d wanted him dead, especially not by her hand. And there could be others, people that she hurt or killed without knowing it. Even worse—her stomach churns at the very thought—she might have unknowingly inflicted this curse on someone else. Someone that Sam and Dean would also have to kill.

No, the choice she’d made had been the right one. But it was so unfair! She would control this condition if she could. For five nights out of the month, a monster took over her body and used it to do unspeakable things, things that she couldn’t even remember. Why does that mean she has to die? Why isn’t there some cure, some other way to fix this? Why isn’t Sam doing more to save her? Why isn’t she doing more to save herself? It’s all just so damn unfair.

She’s crying again when she hears the sound of voices in the other room cease. There are footsteps, and she looks up to see Sam standing in the doorway. He’s absolutely wrecked. He has his gun raised, but his hands are shaking, and his eyes are red and swollen and full of unshed tears. It brings her some small measure of peace to see him as torn and broken by this decision as she is. It means that all of her fears and uncertainties are genuine, are human. It means that she isn’t all monster. And the fact that he’s here, despite his devastation, means that she’s made the right decision. It means that she’s doing the right thing. She will no longer have to live with the knowledge that she has killed innocent people, or the fear that she will do so again.

She manages to get to her feet as Sam crosses the room. He lowers his gun, holds out his arms, and she goes to him one last time. “I’m so sorry, Maddie,” he whispers as she buries her face in his shoulder. “I wish there was another way.”

“I know, Sam.” She holds him tight for the barest of moments, then forces herself to push him away. “This is for the best. I can’t live with myself, knowing what I did, what I could do again. Please, just… make it quick.”

He nods, tears falling from his eyes, then leans down and kisses her on the forehead. “I will never forget you, Madison.” Two steps back, and he raises the gun again. “Close your eyes.”

Chapter Text

“So… best job ever, or best job ever?”

Sam laughs at the grin on Dean’s face and admits, if only to himself, that being a PA hadn’t been all that bad. Dean had certainly taken to it like a fish to water, and there was something pretty cool about spending time on a movie set, even if it had been nothing but gofer work and following orders from a lot of extremely entitled people. Easy money, decent cover, and no prior experience needed… “Told you it doesn’t hurt to do an honest day’s work every once in a while.”

Dean scoffed at that, as Sam had known he would. “But that wasn’t really an honest day’s work, Sammy. That was a pretext.”

“True, but how often do we get paid for pretexting?” Sure, it was a pittance for a week’s pay, and Sam had had to do some real finagling of the paperwork to get them into the system in time for payday, but it was as honest a day’s pay as they’d ever gotten playing cards or hustling pool in some dive bar, and it was a hell of a lot more honest than credit card fraud.

And Dean, all caught up in the job and making eyes at Tara Benchley, had apparently missed the part where Sam had explained the scheme to him. He practically swerved off the road, his eyes wide and staring at his brother. “Paid?”

“Yeah, didn’t I tell you?” Sam pulled the envelope of cash out of his pocket and waved it at Dean. “While you were… saying goodbye to Tara, I went and picked up our checks for the week and cashed them at a bank down the street from the studio. We got paid for this job, Dean. Feels good, doesn’t it?”

“Hell yeah, it does,” Dean said. “How does a steak dinner and a two-star hotel sound tonight, Sammy?” Then, he frowned. “Wish you’d said something sooner, though. We coulda stuck around until filming wrapped, made ourselves some real dough.”

That was a bit surprising, coming from Dean. “You wouldn’t have lasted that long,” Sam joked, keeping a shrewd eye on his brother’s face as he said it. To his relief, Dean considered that statement for barely a moment before nodding his head in acquiescence. “For all I know, that’s the first time you’ve ever been paid for doing a real job.”

“Hey! That’s not fair! Remember those three months in Akron, your sophomore year of high school? I had a job down at the local garage the whole time. Kept a roof over our heads while Dad was out on a hunt. First time he trusted me to.”

That got Sam’s attention. He’d always wondered why Dean hadn’t left him behind to take care of himself that time. “Yeah, I do remember that. Sorry.”

Dean shrugged it off. “So, what about you? What’s the longest job you’ve ever held down?”

“Well… I worked as a receptionist at the college library when I was at Stanford,” Sam said, scowling in advance at the smirk that he knew was about to grace Dean’s face. “It was part of my financial aid package. Student employment.”

“Huh. Cool.” Sam turned towards Dean, shocked at the sincerity in his voice. “I mean it, Sammy,” Dean said with a grin when he saw the disbelief in Sam’s face. “You were always spending time at the library as a kid, you were great with research… it’s cool that you were able to get paid to do something you enjoyed doing already.”

“Sort of like you at the mechanic’s.”

Dean nodded, his eyes going wistful as he gave the Impala’s dashboard a pat. “Dad taught me everything I needed to know, but without those three months of hands-on experience, this baby wouldn’t be with us today. So, I guess there’s a little something to be said for holding down a steady job every once in a while, isn’t there.”

“Probably,” Sam agreed, “but it would make it awfully hard to do our real job.” He missed school, and that job at the library, and the promise of a normal life that it had brought him, but he was more and more certain that it had never been anything more than a dream. “Speaking of which, where we off to next?”

“Well, you’re never going to believe who gave me a call,” Dean said in response, tossing his cellphone into Sam’s lap, “and something tells me this pretext isn’t going to be nearly as fun as being a PA…”

Chapter Text

This is, without a doubt, the dumbest plan that Dean has ever had.

Sam tosses and turns all night on the narrow, too-short bunk inside his cell, listening to the snoring of his cellmate above him and thinking about Dean down in solitary. He’s still not sure if Dean got himself in trouble on purpose—Sam’s pretty sure that the solitary cells are located in the old cell block, but he doesn’t remember if Dean knew that, so it’s really a fifty-fifty chance as to whether Dean was working on a secretly genius plan to check out the assumed location of the haunting, or if he was just being… Dean. But that’s not really what’s got Sam worried. He doesn’t trust Deacon quite as readily as Dean does, but he’s still pretty sure the guy won’t let anything too nasty happen to either of them. Henriksen, however… that’s a wrinkle that even Dean hadn’t seen coming, and if they don’t pull this thing off exactly right, there’s a good chance that neither of them will be breathing free air again for a very long time.

And that’s what’s really causing the knot in Sam’s stomach that won’t go away no matter how hard he tries to ignore it. Having to run from the local cops has always been one of the risks of the job, and Sam had always known somewhere in the back of his mind that sacrificing Dean’s criminal record in order to take care of that shifter in Saint Louis had the potential to come back and bite them in the ass somewhere down the line. But their dad had done this job for more than two decades without ever running afoul of the FBI. Even if they get out of this—especially if they get out of this—the Feds are going to have their pictures plastered in ever post office and police station from New York to LA. And though he obviously doesn’t know it, Henriksen is not only making the Winchesters’ lives harder, he’s putting other people’s lives at risk.

For not the first time, Sam really wishes that he could sit down and have a reasonable discussion with the man. Because if Henriksen knows them as well as he had indicated to Dean that he does, then he has to have noticed the massive discrepancies in the cases against them. For one, how does he think it’s possible for Dean to be alive when he had been declared dead in Saint Louis? Not to mention, he had to have talked to Detective Ballard from that crooked cop case up in Baltimore—assuming she still had her job, which makes Sam wince a little at the memory of the turmoil they had caused in that woman’s life—and how does he explain the aftermath of the bank robbery in Milwaukee, given that they’d killed the shifter in that case before it’d had the chance to cover its tracks? The man has to have questions by now; it likely won’t take much to get him to see what’s really going on, and how much of a boon would that be? To have a hunter with a badge, a real contact with the FBI that could provide them with cover stories when they needed it, or feed them cases, or take charge of cleanup with local law enforcement?

Sam sighs and rolls over, but the mattress is no more comfortable from this angle than it had been from any other. He knows he’s getting ahead of himself, but this isn’t the first time that he’s thought about how much easier things would be if hunters could be just a little bit more organized. The Roadhouse is a promising glimpse into a future where that’s possible, and Sam supposes that there’s a chance that there are organized groups of hunters out there somewhere that he and Dean just haven’t heard about because of their dad. But, given everything he’s seen and heard about hunters up to this point in his life, that seems highly unlikely. For one thing, the type of person that, upon being confronted with evidence of the supernatural, decides to take up a gun and dedicate his life to hunting the things down rather than going to see a shrink is not likely to be a particularly well-adjusted person anyway, and there’s probably a good argument somewhere in there for discouraging those types of people from organizing. Especially when some of those people could be like Gordon Walker, who, despite his dedication to hunting, definitely belonged in jail.

Dean, however, does not, no matter how well he tries to act like he fits in around here. Sam has some doubts about himself—he’s still not entirely sure he trusts Dean to do what he might need to if Dad’s predictions about Sam going dark side come true, and he might be better off being locked up somewhere where he can’t hurt too many people. But Dean is the best hunter Sam has ever known. His heart is in the right place, he knows right from wrong and good from evil, and he and Sam don’t just kill monsters, they save lives. And if Henriksen gets his way, all of that will be over, for both of them. So, no matter how stupid this idea of his brother’s was, Sam is going to support him, and get him out of this, and do everything he can to keep Dean out of Henriksen’s clutches, because, no matter what the FBI thinks, they have definitely done more good in the world then bad.

Chapter Text

“Naw, I'm sure it's nothing. I just wanna take a look around.”

Dean hangs up the phone, and Sam almost bites his tongue to keep from screaming into it. For one thing, Dean’s logic is totally flawed—if it’s nothing, why go look?—and for another thing, Sam still hasn’t figured out how to kill the Djinn yet, so if Dean does find something there (his brother’s instincts are right more often than not, after all), he’ll be going in basically defenseless. Sam considers calling Dean back and telling him all of this, but Dean probably won’t pick up, and it’s not like Sam has any new information to offer him either, so he sets the phone back and returns to the books. He’ll give Dean an hour. That’s plenty of time for him to check out whatever place he’d seen and either call back wanting information if he finds something, or make it back to the hotel room if it turns out to be a bust.

The sound of an alarm blaring causes him to jerk upright, heart racing. Under his head, on top of the books he’d been reading, lies a piece of paper with the words ‘silver knife dipped in lamb’s blood’ scrawled across it. He’d fallen asleep doing research again. It shouldn’t be that much of a surprise, given that he hasn’t been sleeping well since their second escape from Henriksen and the FBI, but when he realizes that the reason why he hadn’t awoken sooner is because Dean still isn’t back from his trip to the warehouse district, the frantic beating of his heart takes on a whole new dimension of panic. Sam scrambles for his phone, and is not in the least bit reassured by the fact that he hasn’t received any calls since he last spoke to his brother.

Sam allows himself ten seconds of panic, taking deep breaths and counting backwards from ten. On “one”, he breathes out, closes his eyes, and thinks back on everything he knows:

• Dean was hunting a Djinn.
• Dean was alone.
• Dean was driving around the warehouse district on the south side of town.
• Dean doesn’t know how to kill the Djinn.

Then, he catalogues all of the things he doesn’t know:

• He doesn’t know exactly where Dean is.
• He doesn’t know if Dean was picked up by the cops.
• He doesn’t know if Dean found the Djinn, or if the Djinn found Dean.

So what can he do about each of those unknowns? The most important thing, obviously, is finding out where Dean is and determining exactly what kind of peril he is in. That means that Sam will need to find a way to get to the warehouse district and start searching for the Impala. Though Dean getting picked up by the cops is a possibility, it is one that Sam can do very little to prepare for in advance. Dean being attacked by the Djinn, however… Sam still doesn’t really know what they do to their victims, only that they leave the desiccated husks behind, and the thought of finding his brother like that starts his heart pounding painfully hard again. “Damn it, Dean,” he mutters to the empty room. “Why couldn’t you have come and picked me up first?”

He’s not going to steal a car from the hotel parking lot, that’s for damn sure. Instead, he walks into town and heads for a local butcher shop (thank God for the trend towards locally-sourced, specialty grocery stores, despite the chunk of change it’s going to take out of his wallet). He never feels like as smooth of a liar as Dean in situations like these, but he manages to come up with a reason to buy a pint of lamb’s blood without getting too many strange looks from the butcher or any of the other customers. On his way out, he slips the lamb and mutton chops that he had also purchased in order to complete the ruse into a fellow shopper’s bag, just so that they won’t go to waste.

Their only silver knife is still in the Impala’s trunk, but since the car should be wherever Dean is, that is less of a concern than the next thing on Sam’s list. Another two hours pass before he tracks down a vehicle that he can ‘borrow’ without drawing too much attention from the cops: an old van parked in the far corner of the grocery store parking lot. From the dust on the windshield and the trash piled inside, it’s been abandoned for some time, so Sam doesn’t have many qualms about cracking it open, hot-wiring the engine, and driving off towards the warehouse district on the far side of town. He keeps his hands at ten and two, though, and drives at exactly the speed limit, and holds his breath every time a cop car passes him. He’d always been aware of the fact that his and Dean’s line of work led them to bend or break a lot of laws, but it had never seemed quite as dangerous as the actual monsters they hunted before their run-ins with the FBI and that little taste of prison. The thought that their lives could end behind bars rather than on a hunt gone wrong seems disturbingly likely now, though, and Sam’s honestly not sure which is worse. Of course, if he can’t find Dean, the cops are going to be the least of his worries…

It’s almost dusk when Sam finally spots the Impala, tucked away in the shadows between two nondescript, abandoned buildings. Trying not to panic, Sam leaves his stolen car on the other side of the block of warehouses and runs back over to the Impala. He whispers apologies to the car as he picks the lock on the trunk and pulls out the silver knife. He coats it liberally in lamb’s blood, grabs a gun for backup, and heads inside the closest building. It’s empty, and looks like it’s been that way for a long time. Cursing, Sam tries the other building. It also appears long-abandoned, but on the far side of a large room near the back of the warehouse, Sam finds two desiccated corpses. His heart in his throat, Sam starts searching every shadowed corner of the warehouse, whispering his brother’s name.

“Dean?”

“Dean?”

“Dean!”

“DEAN!”

He’s there; hanging from his wrists in a small alcove in the darkest corner of the room. His body is so still and pale that Sam is sure he is dead. Abandoning all caution, he practically screams his brother’s name as he shakes him, searching for some signs of life. Just as he’s about to give up hope, Dean gasps for breath and opens his eyes. Sam could almost cry as his brother looks blearily at him and mumbles, “Auntie Em, there’s no place like home.” Instead, he tries, with shaking hands, to remove the needle that is draining blood from Dean’s neck.

“Thank God,” he breathes as he feels life begin to return to Dean’s body. “I thought I lost you for a second.”

“You almost did.”

Sam’s heart skips a beat at Dean’s reply, and for a moment he just wants to carry his brother out of here and never go hunting again. They’ve had so many close calls over the last year, and now, with Dad gone… he doesn’t know how much more of this he can handle. Of course, that’s when the Djinn decides to attack, and by the time it’s over, Dean has managed to finish freeing himself and is the one saving Sam’s life instead. And then they discover that another one of the Djinn’s victims is still alive, and in the ensuing chaos of getting her out of the warehouse and safely to a hospital, Sam forgets for a moment that the thought of giving all this up had ever crossed his mind.

At least, he forgets until Dean explains exactly what the Djinn had done to him, how it had shown him a world in which Mom was alive, and they had never become hunters, and had instead just been normal brothers—brothers who weren’t particularly close to one another. And Sam can see in Dean’s eyes how much it hurt him to think that—even though it had only been in his mind—in order to have something he had always wanted, he would have been forced to give up something else that meant so much to him. Sam knows that feeling because he had tried it once. He had given up this life to go to college, and as happy as he had tried to be there, it never felt as right as his life does right now, saving people from monsters with his brother by his side. He isn’t quite sure how to tell Dean that he understands the crisis of faith that Dean had gone through, but maybe he doesn’t have to say it in words. Maybe just being here, having Dean’s back and knowing that Dean has his, is enough.

Though if Dean thinks he’s going to be able to use the whole ‘split up to get the job done faster’ argument again any time soon, Sam might just have a few things to say about that.

Chapter Text

Sam has the metal bar raised, ready to end it all, but as he looks down at Jake’s unconscious body, he can’t bring himself to do it. Jake is as much a victim here as Ava was, or Lily or Andy, or any of the dozens of other ‘special children’ who have died in this fight. Jake is as much a victim as Sam is, and Sam will not give the demon the satisfaction of winning today. He drops the bar, then almost crumples to the ground himself as the adrenaline leaves him and the pain of his broken arm, cracked ribs, and other injuries begins to assert itself.

“Sam!”

He would know that voice anywhere. Dean is alive! Relief floods through Sam at the sound of his brother calling his name. Turning towards the sound, Sam shouts back—“Dean!”—and begins to stumble towards the silhouettes and flashing lights that are coming towards him from across the field. Dean has found him, and everything is going to be okay.

“Sam, look out!”

Sam hears his brother shout again, but before he can fully process the words, he feels a sharp pain in the middle of his back. Something warm is trickling down his spine, banishing the chill of the wet shirt sticking to his back, but it is followed by a chill so deep in his bones that he can’t even shiver. His legs go numb, and he feels himself collapsing back into the dirt. He hits hard, on his knees, and dimly thinks that it should hurt, but he feels nothing below the waist. Just as he starts to fall forward, though, Dean is there, holding him up.

That’s okay, then.

Dean is saying something, but Sam can’t quite make out the words. He sounds like he is very far away, but Sam can feel Dean’s arms around him, so he knows that he is close. He wants to tell his brother not to worry, but he’s too tired, and his mouth isn’t working right at the moment. The pain in his back feels like fire, even though the rest of him is getting colder. When Dean touches him there, he wants to scream, but he doesn’t have the breath.

But everything’s fine. Everything’s going to be okay, because Dean is here. Dean found him. Dean will protect him and keep him safe, just like he always does.

Dean is here.

Everything…

Will be…

Fine.

Chapter Text

Everything is not fine.

The drive back to Bobby’s house from the cemetery is twelve hours of near-total silence. Dean flips on the radio every one in a while, fiddles with the dials, and pops in a cassette tape on occasion, but he doesn’t make it more than a song or two before flipping it off again. Sam takes a turn driving every few hours, but most of the time he sleeps, or stares blankly out the window. His back aches, his temples throb, and there is a weight on his shoulders and in his heart that he doesn’t think is going away any time soon.

He was dead. Honest-to-god, well and truly gone from this world for two days. Shouldn’t he remember it, at least? Though, he supposes, Dean doesn’t remember fighting off a reaper for those two days he spent in the hospital a year ago, so maybe that’s just what happens when you come back from the dead. Maybe it wipes your memory to keep you from ‘spoiling the ending’, as it were, for others. He’d ask someone, but it’s not like the newly-resurrected are commonplace or anything. He wants to talk to Dean about it, but, well…

He doesn’t know what to say to Dean. He’d said plenty, back at the cemetery, and the lost, befuddled look that Dean had given him when he’d said he was going to look after his big brother for a change had damn near broken his heart. He still wants to scream at Dean, though, and pound him into the dirt, and hug him tight and never let him go… all in equal measure. How dare he sell his soul! And for only one year? Sam doesn’t know how he’s going to get Dean out of this deal yet, but he knows that he’s going to. He thinks of the library of lore books back at Bobby’s house and there’s a phantom itch in his fingers at the thought of getting his hands on them. There has to be something in one of them that will save Dean, and if not? Well, a year may not seem like a long time, but it’s all he’s got, and he’s damn well going to make the most of it. He has no choice, really. He’s not going to let his brother die for him. He’s lost so much already—Jess, Dad, even Mom—but he knows that Dean’s death is the one he really won’t survive.

So, he wants to tell Dean that everything is going to be fine, that they’ll find a way out of this, but he doesn’t quite know how to say it again without sounding lame, and he doesn’t know how to say anything else without bringing up the deal, and then there’s those looks that Dean keeps giving him when he thinks Sam isn’t looking—like he can’t believe Sam’s sitting next to him in one moment, and that he’s a little bit scared of Sam in the next—so Sam sleeps, or pretends to sleep, or drives in silence. He soaks up the feel of his brother in the seat beside him, doing the same, and thinks about how he almost lost this, and how he doesn’t quite know how to deal with the consequences of having it back, and what will happen if he loses it again. He’s a little scared sometimes of how much he loves his brother, and of how much Dean loves him. It’s more than fair to say now that they would die for one another, and sell their souls for one another, and that they can’t live without each other. Normal people would say that’s unhealthy, Sam’s sure, but to face what they do every day, to put their lives on the line for others against a world that most people don’t even know exist… maybe it was inevitable. Maybe this is the consequence of not being able to give up the life.

Maybe this is what Yellow Eyes wanted all along.

That thought makes him shiver. Dean notices and reaches for the heater, but Sam stops him. “Not cold,” he almost whispers, wary of breaking the silence between them. “Just… thinking.”

“What about?” The words feel pulled from Dean like taffy, but Sam is grateful for them all the same, even though he knows his answer will be unsatisfying.

“Nothing important.” It’s a lie, of course, and Dean seems to know it, but he lets it stand, and Sam resumes his chilling train of thought. Yellow Eyes killed Jess to get Sam back into hunting. Sam was Yellow Eyes’ favorite to win in that sick little death match with the other special children, but he hadn’t won after all. And what Jake and Ava said about the power… Sam knows it’s true. He could feel it bubbling right under the surface of his skin when he was facing Jake down, and he can’t deny that something dark inside him took a stomach-churning amount of pleasure in unloading his gun into the man that had murdered him. He wants to believe that the power and the plans all died when the Colt’s bullet destroyed the demon forever, but something inside him just won’t let him.

Yellow Eyes might be dead, but Sam’s gut is telling him that the wheels the demon set in motion have only begun to turn, and he isn’t sure if he and Dean are the cogs in those wheels or the clods of dirt about to be ground to powder by them. Either way, the only thing he knows for certain right now is that everything is not fine, and he doesn’t know if it ever will be again.