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Jefferson tries to tranq him as soon as Sam steps through the door.
“What the fuck?” Sam spits, looking at the dart embedded in the wall where his shoulder was only a few seconds before and then sideways at Ruby, who as usual, has appeared from nowhere and yanked him out of the way. Mary’s shadowing the door behind them and she pushes through so she’s in front.
“Doin’ this for your own good, Mary,” Jefferson says and Sam realizes he’s leaning down for another tranq gun that’s all set up and ready to go on his coffee table. Sam snaps forward, fast and brutal and Jefferson’s on the floor before any of them realize what’s happening. Mary takes a few moments to stare at Sam before she balls her fists and hunkers down.
“Now,” Mary says, voice even and hard. “We can either take what we need after I stick this,” she continues, holding one of the tranquilizer darts to Jefferson’s cheek, “In you and incinerate myself when we try to do the ritual and get one of the symbols wrong or you can help.”
“You don’t know what you’re asking.”
“Actually, I do,” Mary says, tossing the tranquilizer dart behind her and offering Jefferson a hand up. “I’m asking you to help us kill a demon.” Jefferson narrows his eyes for a moment and then his gaze flicks to Ruby. She snorts and rolls her eyes.
“You wish.”
“And hey,” Mary adds. “While we’re working on the ritual you’ll have plenty of time to try and talk us out of this.”
“Any other time you threaten to stick me with one of my own darts and I’d kick your ass,” Jefferson says balefully.
“Any other time I’d let you,” Mary offers with a wry grin and Jefferson huffs at that but heads for his basement.
“You know what you’re looking for?” he asks.
“I’m looking to put a leash on a shark,” Mary says.
Jefferson does try to talk them out of what they’re doing, Mary first and then Sam, all the while casting narrow-eyed glances in Ruby’s direction. Sam suspects that he’s not really putting his whole heart into it because he knows Mary is too far gone for that. Maybe she’s gone crazy, Sam muses to himself.
“Stuff like this never ends well,” Jefferson is saying, etching a stylized sickle onto his floor with green chalk, dust up to his elbows. He sits back on his haunches and eyes his work critically, grunting and leaning forward to smudge out one line that looks a little wobbly to his professional eye and retracing it. “Good chance even with my help that it won’t do nothing.”
“I know that,” Mary huffs from the other side of the circle of red chalk that was the first thing they drew. “I just have to...do something.”
Jefferson takes a moment to look at Mary, hunched over and all her focus on the floor and their work and sighs. “I get that, I do but-”
“Please don’t,” Mary says, voice so low Jefferson almost misses it.
It’s strangely anti-climatic.
The man in the suit left in the middle of their etched circle with the creased face like he’s slept on some kind of funky bed linen looks mild enough. He stands with his hands clasped together in a strange parody of prayer and his head canted slightly, like he’s a waiter that’s about to take their order.
“Yes?” he inquires, his voice smooth and polite.
“We need a key,” Mary says and Sam tries not to notice the way Jefferson flinches on the other side of the circle.
“It’s not that easy,” the gentleman says, his folded hands starting to rub together. The dull black pits that are in place of eyes in the man’s skull turn in Sam’s direction and then Ruby’s. “What are you doing here, bottom feeder?” he enquires, sounding nothing but painfully polite and Ruby snarls.
“I need a key,” Sam repeats in place of his mother, emphasizing the I and Mary’s gaze also swings to him. “We lost-”
“Loved ones, I’m sure,” the gentleman says in a dismissive tone. “Yes, yes. They all do. Of course, not everyone goes the extra mile as you apparently have.” The man gazes about the room, although without pupils Sam’s not sure exactly where he’s looking but his skin prickles uncomfortably every time the black pits pass over him. “I’m assuming you won’t set me free until I give you what you want.”
“That’s about the size of it, yes,” Sam agrees and Mary is now openly staring at him. He’s always been resistant to the lessons and the training, craving normal like a starving man craves a burger. He supposes she doesn’t know what to do with this son of hers that’s taken charge, who is conversing with the thing they dredged up from the pit, hoping for a spare key under the doormat or a back entrance.
Sam isn’t sure why he’s doing it either, except that it feels right, like his place. The gentleman’s focus narrows to Sam and doesn’t stray again. Sam can feel Ruby at his back like always and he’s even less sure now than he’s ever been that she’s not just waiting to stick a knife into it, but right now he can trust that she needs him alive and that has to be enough.
“I’ve never really met anyone trying to get in,” the gentleman says with a small chuckle that raises gooseflesh on Sam’s arms. He looks curious now and Sam supposes that’s better than completely blank. The thing before them senses Mary’s desperation, he can almost feel it which in its own way is disturbing enough. It will wait them out unless they can appeal to its sense of… fun.
Appeal in some baser way.
“Why don’t you just buy your way via the traditional means?”
Sam knows what the gentleman means. There are many and varied ways you can score a one-way ticket to hell, but he’s not interested in a plan without an escape hatch. Trading his soul or committing one of the big sins would get him there but if he were a passenger rather than a driver for the trip then any chance of getting out would be gone.
He likes to still think that his mother wants him to survive this but as he looks across the circle at her, at the hunger and fervent desire in her eyes, he’s becoming less and less sure. The gentleman starts to swing his head in Mary’s direction and Sam clears his throat. The pitted gaze snaps back to him, shrewd and calculating.
“Just a thought,” the gentleman says with another chuckle that’s like fingernails down a blackboard. The gentleman reaches into one of his suit pockets, a noise like whispers arising when he pulls aside the coat, which dies when it settles against his body again. He unfolds the paper and holds it to the very edge of the circle.
“What’s that?” Sam asks, stepping forward but not enough that he could be reached across the chalk lines.
This isn’t his first hoedown as the saying goes.
“My dry cleaning bill,” the gentleman says and then grunts, snapping the paper up and down with his fingers. “It’s actually an address. You’ll have to figure out what to do with it.”
“What’s it an address to?” Sam presses, gesturing for the gentleman to set the paper down. He does with a small, uninterested shrug and Sam reaches out the toe of one boot and slides it carefully to himself, making sure not to smudge the chalk lines when he does.
“That would be the part where you figure it out for yourself,” the gentleman repeats. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind, I was in the middle of watching an episode of Bonanza, and I would very much like to see if Little Joe survives the mine collapse.”
“How do I know you’re not just sending me to some serial killers house?” Sam says, turning the paper right side up so he can read it. There is an address in Colorado on it but nothing else.
“You don’t, but if you happen to be unsatisfied with my help then you can always recall me, if you’re not dead,” the gentleman invites.
“Fine,” Sam huffs and this time he toes a line through the green chalk. The gentleman steps forward with a growl.
“Rookie mistake. You should have banished me boy, not released me.”
The gentleman skips backward when Sam puts a hand up. It’s brow furrows and then its mouth drops open. “No, wait, what are you doing?”
“What you suggested,” Sam says. “Banishing you. I just like the personal touch.”
The gentleman screams and gray smoke pours from the black pits of its eyes. The body slumps, nothing but bone and desiccated skin without a presence to animate it and Sam kicks it aside with a grunt of distaste. He grins and looks to Ruby who is beaming and then to his mother, but she’s looking stern.
“Don’t get cocky,” Mary snaps, dusting her hands off and heading for the stairs. “Cocky will get you killed.”
Sam’s smile falls off his face.
“No offence,” Jefferson says from a corner of the basement that he’d backed into. “But you ever darken my doorstep again and it won’t be a tranq gun I’ll reach for.”
“Yeah, whatever,” Sam sighs, balling the paper with the address on it tightly in his fist before shoving it into a pocket of his jeans and shouldering past Ruby to head upstairs.
Despite their misgivings, Sam heads for Manning without Ruby or his mother. They both try to insist and Sam even catches Ruby following him a couple of times but when he approaches the lopsided house on the hill he’s pretty sure he’s shaken her.
The house is no surprise. Sam’s seen hundreds like it and while it’s what most people would imagine a serial killer’s house would look like, Sam knows a hunter’s permanent residence when he sees it. He’s strangely reassured that this is where the demon they summoned sent him although he’s mystified as to why.
He’s not exactly sure what type of hunter will be able to help him break into hell.
He’s guessing he’s here for something specific rather than the hunter himself, a book or an artifact that this hunter has in their possession, possibly not knowing what it’s meant for. Sam knows Mary keeps a rented storage space for their most dangerous tools of the trade, somewhere he will retreat to if ever the need is great enough.
He just has to trust that whatever he’s here for will be obvious enough for him to spot it.
At least he hopes.
There’s no sign of life when Sam approaches the house, which doesn’t surprise Sam either. It’s helpful that most hunters, especially those that are good enough to survive to be older hunters, are paranoid souls and shun the trappings of a normal life. The house is isolated so even if he has to make a noise getting in, if the hunter isn’t home then he doesn’t have to worry about concerned neighbors dialing 911.
Sam approaches the house from the side, losing footing on the slope that runs up to the east wall on a stack of wet leaves. He finally gets to a window set high which should be a bathroom and uses an overturned garbage can to boost himself up. Sam uses a small knife to jimmy the lock on the top of the window and then pushes himself through the almost too-narrow opening.
Sam is grabbed by his jacket shoulders right before his hands would have hit the floor and is yanked forward. He lets out a grunt of protest and scrabbles for purchase but the force is relentless in pulling him forward and down. Sam’s forehead glances the side of what must be the bathtub and his vision swims for a few precious moments.
He’s pulled deeper into the house, tile giving way to thick carpeting and Sam uses the narrow hall to his advantage, throwing his legs out so he stops short. Whoever is pulling him along isn’t expecting it and stumbles with his sudden stop, losing the grip on Sam’s jacket enough that Sam can push his arms up and snake out of it, pulling backwards and getting his feet under him.
Sam stops in a low crouch, arms held down and out. The other person is just a figure in the hallway, a silhouette and nothing else because the only light is behind them. It’s definitely a man and Sam could kick himself thinking it would be easy to just break and enter into a hunter’s house.
His mother’s right;, he is just a dumb, inexperienced kid.
“Your name Sam?” the figure asks and Sam freezes.
“How did you know that?” Sam demands, edging backwards a little. The other man edges forward at the same pace. Sam is tempted to look behind himself because if he can make it to the bathroom he can maybe get back out the window he broke into, but he can’t risk it, can’t risk taking his eyes off this guy for even a second.
“You’re taller than me,” the man says, sounding surprised.
Sam stops his slow creep backwards and straightens, dropping his hands. “Do I know you?” he demands.
“Yeah, you could say that,” the man says and takes another step forward, into the moonlight thrown from the bathroom.
“I’m Dean.”
Sam is sprawled across from the makeshift coffee table piled high with a mountain of books. He has his legs kicked up over one arm of the couch. His head is bowed over the book resting across his thighs and Dean can’t see his face past the shock of shaggy brown hair.
“Uh, hi?” Dean tries and Sam holds up a finger for a second, his other hand flat on the book. He finally seems to finish his place, closing the book on his hand and looking up and dissatisfied. “That’s not it either.”
Now Dean is in front of him, he isn’t sure why he’d been expecting to find the kid he’d last seen. Sam has grown, a lot if his sprawl on the couch is any indication. When he speaks though, something shifts in Sam’s face and Dean for a split second sees the tag-a-long, scrappy kid Sammy in this older version’s face. Sam stands, unfolding impossibly tall and Dean finds himself having to look up, something he hasn’t had to do much since he’d hit his last growth spurt at sixteen and settled on six foot one.
Sam tucks his hands under his armpits, arms crossed high on his chest and Dean frowns at him. Dean sees Sam’s eyes skip over his shoulder and recognizes the glance for what it is, looking for an escape route.
“Long time no see,” Dean tries and wants to slap a hand to his face. He’d rehearsed what he was going to say on the whole trip over, mostly because he was afraid Sam might’ve been told he was abandoned or worse but now he’s here with Sam standing tall and real in front of him, he’s at a complete loss.
Sam nods, a quick up-down of his head. He’s looking spooked, jigging from one foot to the other like he just wants to run for it.
Dean says, “Look, I came because-”
“I killed you.”
Dean stops, mouth-dropping open. “What?”
“Mom told me. I didn’t mean to do it but the end result was the same. If Dad hadn’t been there you wouldn’t be here.”
“What are you talking about?” Dean asks, confused. This reunion isn’t going exactly as planned. Dean’s heart sinks at the very idea that Sam would’ve lived with something like that for so long. “I don’t care who told you that because it’s bullshit. I would remember.”
“We were asleep and you were snoring. I just wanted you to stop so I touched you and you did. Stopped snoring, stopped breathing, stopped everything. Dad revived you but you were sick for ages.” Sam drops his head into his hands and takes a shuddery breath. “He told you that you had the flu.”
“Sammy-”
“Mom did what she thought was best with someone like me.”
“What do you mean, like you?” Dean demands. He has to admit to himself that he’d come expecting that this had been all some huge mistake, Sam would be completely normal and they would ride off into the sunset together. He knew it wasn’t very realistic, but he’d hoped… “Just… what the hell are you saying?”
His head was hurting, felt like his brain was pushing against the skull.
“Look, I’m not really sure what’s happening here, why you’re here but I need to find… it can’t be you I’m here for.”
“What are you here for?” Dean asks.
“I’m not really sure.”
‘Well, that’s nice and vague,” Dean gripes.
“How’s… dad?” Sam asks, swallowing hard.
Dean’s not really sure that bald truth is particularly needed right in that instant. He doesn’t want to go into how the years had passed by and the trail went cold. How John let hunts fall by the wayside in his obsession, drank more and traveled less. How they holed up for months at a time in cheap housing with scavenged off-the-street furniture. How his dad did odd jobs and when he couldn’t find any new leads hired a host of progressively dodgier private detectives, spending what little cash he could accumulate, sometimes at the expense of their bellies.
As they got no closer to finding Sam and his mom, how his father had tipped ever more steadily into a dark place that he couldn’t see the way out of and how right at that moment Dean wasn’t exactly sure just where John Winchester was and how that was the norm and not the exception.
“He’s good,” Dean says, instead. “How’s mom?”
“Pain in my ass,” Sam says and Dean can’t help the chuckle he lets out. “She’s… driven.”
“So you going to tell me what’s going on?” Dean asks, trying to appear calm. Internally he’s freaking out. This is the elusive brother he’s been dreaming of finding for eleven years, impossibly solid and real in front of him. He’s only one degree away from finding his mother, the person that can either put to rest the fears and anxieties that have plagued him for most of his formative years, or confirm them. Sam’s words unsettle, alluding to the fact that in some way he was dangerous and as a consequence taken away but surely his father would have said something at some point.
Even if it was only accidentally in a drunken stupor.
When Dean had first arrived with Castiel, Daniel Elkins had been surprised to find two young men on his doorstep at three in the morning but had seemed to be convinced, with some gentle persuasion from Castiel, that it was in his best interest to leave the house. Castiel had then gone directly to a small room in Daniel’s house and had unearthed a box with an antique colt and five handmade bullets nestled inside that apparently, according to Castiel, could kill any supernatural being, demon and monster alike.
It is very important you keep this from your brother, had been the sum total of Castiel’s instructions before he’d left Dean to cool his heels in Daniel’s house. Castiel had disappeared between Dean looking down at the gun box in his hands and back up again.
“Look man, this place is a yard sale waiting to happen,” Dean says and then looks about himself slowly. “For very creepy collectors.” He makes an expansive gesture with his hands. “If you’re not sure what you’re looking for then I don’t think you’re going to find it.” The box with the colt digs into Dean’s ribs as he shifts for a moment and he fights the urge to wince.
Dean’s always been a creature of gut reaction and while he wants to trust this boy, no, man in front of him for the pure and simple fact that he’s his brother, he knows somewhere down deep and instinctual that he needs to do what Castiel suggested. Dean shifts again and the sharp and judgmental press of the box is gone.
“C’mon,” Dean says. “I don’t know about you but I’m starving. I saw an all-night diner down the road on my way here.”
“Why were you here?” Sam asks, finally getting to the real question that Dean can’t answer for him without sounding like a nut. The words angel spirit guide come to mind and Dean resists the urge to break into hysterical giggles.
“Explanation is best served with pie,” Dean says. “You go out front and I’ll grab the car from the back.”
Sam stands and makes a motion towards the front door but turns at the last moment, shooting a narrow-eyed gaze in Dean’s direction. “You’re not going to just disappear, right?” he asks, sounding painfully young and unsure.
“That’s your trick, remember?” Dean says, trying for levity that falls flat and Sam just nods and heads for the front door.
Sam is standing by the entryway when Dean drives the car up and around, hands dug deep into his jacket pockets and swinging back and forth like a kid. Dean feels something release, warm and real, in his chest. Sam eyes the Impala when Dean emerges. “Wasn’t that dad’s?”
“He bought a truck and gave this to me for my sixteenth,” Dean explains, dropping himself into the driver’s side of the Impala and watching Sam fuss around, unable to quite make himself comfortable in the confined space of the passenger side. If he’d been with them the whole time, Dean’s sure Sam would’ve gotten fitting his large frame into the seat down to a fine art.
Sam is left in the car as Dean gets gas. He feels around his feet for a moment, encountering a box full of tapes and a glass jar. Sam’s not sure whether to be more concerned about the faerie in the bottle kicking around angrily but futilely against the glass, or the presence of cassette tapes.
“Remind me to set that free next time we’re passing a large-enough field,” Dean says, sliding into the driver’s side of the car and leaning across to tap the jar in Sam’s hands. The faerie squeaks angrily.
“Do you keep one of these around for fun?” Sam asks. “They attract Lokies.”
Dean pauses and eyes Sam for a moment. A small, enigmatic grin touches his features for the barest of moments but is gone just as fast. “You know your stuff,” he says, a little awe in his tone.
Sam shrugs. “Third generation man,” Sam says. “All this stuff’s probably been hard-wired into our brains by now.”
“True,” Dean agrees, looking over his shoulder before nudging the car out of the gas station and onto the street. “So, what were you looking for at Elkins’ place again?”
Sam catches the very unsubtle way Dean asks him and rolls his eyes. “I told you I didn’t know. I was given an address but nothing else. For all I know, I was there to get you.”
“Who gave you Daniel’s address? Another hunter?”
“Nah, a demon,” Sam says and then slaps his hands on the dash when Dean slams on the brakes. Luckily, the street is pretty much deserted even though it’s the middle of the day. Sam feels the heat of Dean’s stare before he turns his face and sees it. Dean’s got his mouth ajar and his eyes wide.
“A what?”
“A demon,” Sam says, slower and sounding out the syllables but when Dean smacks him in the back of the head he says, “Ow, hey!”
“Don’t be a smart ass!” Dean snaps.
“Don’t hit me,” Sam snarks back, rubbing at his head. “Geez, I didn’t know the urge to smack me around was genetic.”
“You’re gonna tell me just what the hell is going on here, Sammy, I mean it.”
“Or what?” Sam demands, starting to get angry. This is his brother, he’s almost certain of it, but he’s not sure what he’s supposed to feel about that. Dean had kind of railroaded him and Sam, while not exactly used to having any say in his life’s direction, doesn’t like that there’s yet another person who thinks they can drag him around like inconvenient luggage. “Look, maybe you should just let me out here.”
“Oh no, I’m not having you run away again, not when I’ve just found you.”
“Dean, it’s not like I packed my juice box and teddy in a suitcase and hitched a ride out of state. Mom pretty much kidnapped me and I’m sorry as hell it happened but I had nothing to do with it. I haven’t seen you for a long-ass time and you’re asking me about… there’s just no way you’d understand.”
“Try me,” Dean says, all annoyance stripped away from his tone, leaving a naked plea that Sam finds almost impossible to resist. He’d never thought he’d have a normal life and his mother had only ever told him the bare minimum about his father and brother, emphasizing that they were separated out of necessity, and that he had been that necessity.
Sam has spent his life feeling like a burden, a cross his mother has to bear. Dean knows next to nothing about him, apparently not even about the whole killing him in his sleep incident and Sam…
He likes that.
He likes that Dean looks at him and doesn’t see something wrong, something off-center. As soon as he tells Dean what’s going on, what he’s meant to do, who he’s meant to be, that will be gone.
Dean will start looking at him like he catches his mom looking at him sometimes.
Like he scares the crap out of her.
In a twisted way, Ruby’s the only one who actually understands what he is and still wants to be around him. Sam thinks that speaks volumes about who he is, what he’s become.
The only real friend he’s ever had is a demon.
“Just… at least let me come with you to see mom,” Dean says in a small voice and this is something Sam knows he can’t deny him.
“We have to go to Wyoming,” Sam says and Dean raises an eyebrow.
“What’s in Wyoming?”
“It’s a Devil’s Trap. A hundred-square mile Devil’s Trap,” Mary says, awe in her voice.
“Where’d you get this?” Ruby asks.
“Some guy named Harvelle. Hunter and part-time history buff. He likes tracking lode lines and all that kind of crap. I don’t think he had any idea what he had.”
“What does he have?” Sam asks, leaning over the map. It’s an aerial shot of Wyoming with lines and X’s marked in what he sees is roughly a Devil’s Trap.
“Each of these,” Mary says, pointing to each X in turn, “Is one of those old frontier churches, the kind a community would slap together.”
“What are these lines?” Sam asks, tracing them with his finger.
“Private railway lines,” Ruby says and then clucks her tongue. “Sneaky bastard. They connect church to church, no broken lines. All made of iron.”
“What’s he trying to keep out of Wyoming?” Sam asks incredulously, rubbing at his forehead.
“It’s what he’s trying to keep in,” Mary corrects, laying her own fingertip at the very center of the map. It’s marked with a cross, which delineates a cemetery.
“Devil’s gate,” Ruby breathes. “Nice.”
“Doorway to hell.”
“So, all we need is a key, right?” Sam asks, starting to catch on to the enthusiasm. This is what they’ve been working towards, what they’ve been training him for.
What his life has been leading to.
“You don’t really need a key,” Ruby says and Mary glares at her.
“Ruby!”
“What? Wait, did I miss an argument? Didn’t you say a human couldn’t open a Devil’s gate without a key?” he asks, looking between them. Mary and Ruby are eyeing each other and it’s not friendly. Sam’s gotten used to, over the years, a hum of animosity running between them, forced to cooperate by sheer necessity. “Is there another way?”
“No,” Mary says and at the same time Ruby snaps out, “Yes!”
“Look, a human can’t open a Devil’s gate without a key, but a demon can,” Ruby says in a rush and Sam’s surprised Mary doesn’t launch herself at the demon and smack a hand over the mouth. He gets the very real impression that this is what she longs to do.
“A demon… oh. You mean-,”
“It’s not going to happen,” Mary grits out through clenched teeth. “I’m not giving you a loaded weapon like my son to possess, no matter how tame you seem.”
“Mom, I’m not a weapon, I’m a person,” Sam interrupts. “Maybe this is the best way.”
Ruby grins, triumph written across her features but Mary does something none of them are expecting.
Mary slaps her.
Sam knows that Mary’s probably wanted to do it for years but he doesn’t think even she was actually expecting to put palm to flesh. Ruby puts her own hand up to her face and prods at it like it’s an alien thing as vivid red floods her cheek.
Mary blinks a few times and then walks away from the table, hands kneading the small of her back. “Let’s just… exhaust every other avenue first,” Mary says in a hollow-sounding voice.
Ruby crosses her arms over her chest and her expression makes Sam want to slap her too. “So, all ready to march your baby boy into hell but you haven’t quite reached the place where you’ll willingly stand by while he opens himself up to a demon?”
“Ruby, shut up,” Sam snaps and she puts her hands up, leaving the room.
“What’s in Wyoming?”
“I haven’t exhausted every avenue yet,” Sam says cryptically and Dean looks at him, watching Sam’s profile turn down, hair hiding his eyes but set of his chin making Sam believe that he’s frowning.
“But I’m getting close.”
John listens as Jefferson Wilkes lays it all out for him. Demons are real, evil exists in a truer form than he had ever imagined and it walked among them, reveling in their ignorance. There were those that knew, some that fought against it.
Most because the dark things had taken from them.
Every hunter has an origin story, Jefferson tells him. Well, everyone except the rare second-generation kind that is. Then Jefferson’s eyes swing to Mary, sitting in a corner of the basement on a pile of hopefully clean blankets with Sammy on her shoulder and Dean sprawled across her lap.
Both dead to the world, finally.
“Mary had a twin brother,” Jefferson says and John’s mouth drops open at the same time that Mary barks, “Jefferson!”
“I told you to tell John the truth, not my life story,” Mary hisses and John rubs a hand over his eyes and then looks at the woman he vowed for better or worse with.
“How about you tell me then?” he presses and Mary sighs. There’s deep shadows under her eyes and she has some kind of awful home-made ointment on that John can smell across the room for the minor burns on her shoulders and neck she’d managed to not tell him about right up until she winced when stretching.
She looks exhausted and if he wasn’t so tired himself and sick with it all, then maybe he could care about that.
“I had a twin brother, Jamie,” Mary says, widening her eyes in a there, happy look. John gestures for her to go on and for a moment he thinks that’s all he’s going to get out of her but she takes a breath and surprises him by continuing. “Up until the age of ten, Jamie was just a sweetheart. Everyone loved him, mom called him her angel. He was the golden child, smart like I wasn’t, good like I wasn’t,” Mary explains, rubbing over Dean’s back when he stirs. He settles again with her gentle rubbing and Mary’s gaze wanders, focus turning inwards.
“His tenth birthday and bam, he changes. Up until then I’d been the one that they thought they’d have to worry about because I played up. All my report cards said the same thing, could be a good student if she would focus, blah blah blah,” Mary continues, raising one hand to open and close the fingers like a flapping mouth. “Jamie though, suddenly he was making my parents wish that all they had to worry about was my brand of misbehaving. Kids Jamie was friends with wouldn’t see him anymore and he just plain scared everyone.
“My parents took him to every therapist they could find and they all called it a stage, just growing pains and shit like that. They claimed he’d settle down, he was just acting out or whatever. Adolescents go through this type of thing all the time, or so they kept telling us. All the while Jamie had screaming fits and wouldn’t talk to anyone in turns. At school he bullied other kids and then… pets in our street started to go missing.”
John shudders a little, watching his wife, wanting to tell her she can stop, it’s okay because obviously reliving this is painful. He just can’t bring himself to do it though, because he knows he needs to hear this.
“No one wants to say it but everyone’s thinking it. My mom was digging in the garden when she unearthed a cat from across the road and the three bunnies from down the street. They were all pretty decomposed but she could see even with that something had been done to them, something awful.”
Mary swallows and looks up at John. “Jamie died on his tenth birthday and it took us two and a half years to find that out. A creature called a changeling slit his throat and then lived in our house with us and we didn’t know. We thought sweet Jamie had turned into a monster and really… I guess you could say that it’s exactly what happened.”
“Mary,” John says but he’s at a loss as to what to say, how to finish.
“My dad went a little crazy, found anyone that would talk to him about this stuff, anyone that could teach him anything. He started drifting, would be gone for weeks and then months at a time. My mother knew she was losing him and didn’t want to let it happen. If he needed something to fight to make it right, then she’d fight right alongside him. He didn’t want her to at first, tried to protect us from it but… there’s no protecting you from it once it touches you.”
“Was what happened…the fire, was that a demon?”
“Yes, I think so,” Mary says.
“What did it want?”
Mary looks him straight in the eye. “I don’t know,” she says and John knows, without a shadow of a doubt, that she’s lying to him.
A blonde woman in jeans and a thick checkered shirt is standing next to the falling-down fence at the edge of what looks like overgrown railway tracks. Even without being close enough for her features to resolve themselves and with the distance of years, Dean knows that this is his mother. As he watches, her hand flies up to her mouth.
“Hey mom,” he greets, hoping it doesn’t sound as choked as it feels.
“Dean,” she breathes and for a moment she smiles, but it falls off her face and she clenches her hands in the bottom of her shirt. “Wow, this really isn’t a good time.”
“Yeah, well, maybe you can give me your number and we can set up an appointment,” Dean snaps. He knows he’s got very mixed feelings where his mother is concerned but right now anger is at front and center. “Your people can talk to my people.”
“Dean,” Sam hisses, stepping forward and Mary looks between them, a deep furrow of concern etched between her eyebrows that makes Dean pause. He’s seen that furrow hundreds of times, in the mirror whenever he’s pulling faces when he’s shaving. He feels it in his face when his dad says something particularly awful when he’s really deep in the bottle.
Seeing just that tiny part of himself mirrored on his mother makes his heart clench. It doesn’t override the anger though and the steadily increasing feeling that Dean has stepped into the middle of something monumental. An angel appearing out of nowhere and basically telling him that he’s going to be his brother’s judge, jury and possible executioner was hint enough without the major wrong, wrong, wrong vibes he’s been getting off Sam.
“Now how about one of you telling me just what the ever-living fuck is going on here?” Dean demands, sick of Sam’s evasions and unnerved by his mother’s spooked eyes. She looks almost… guilty and that doesn’t sit right with him. Mary’s looking hunted, like she’s been busted doing something she knows she really shouldn’t and the bad feeling ramps up another notch until Dean almost feels nauseous with it.
“I’m going after the demon that killed our grandparents and started all this,” Sam says and Mary lets out a shocked gasp, her hand darting out like she can snatch the words out of the air before Dean can hear them.
“Oh, is that all?” Dean asks, sarcasm dripping heavily from his tone. “And just how do you propose doing that, wonderbread?”
“I’m going to break into hell,” Sam says with a half shrug. “Ruby?” he calls and a woman, nothing more than a girl appears from nowhere, stepping out of shadow and reminding Dean of Castiel. “Can we still do that thing we talked about?”
“No, Sam, wait!” Mary barks and Dean’s gaze snaps to her. Now she looks horrified and her hand is still up and out towards Sam.
“You have to let me in,” Ruby says. “Stupid rule but there you have it.”
“Okay, fine,” Sam says and closes his eyes. Dean looks from his brother to the girl and then hustles backwards when black smoke belches from the girl’s mouth, nose and eyes. He makes an abortive grab for Sam but the smoke clears the distance in seconds and seems to hover. Dean watches his brother’s body shudder and the smoke buffer up against it like the tide against rocks before pushing inwards.
Dean doesn’t know why but instinct makes him reach for Daniel’s gun, tucked in the back of his jeans. He’d loaded it with the bullets in the case and even though he thought the claim of it being able to kill a demon would prove untrue like most of those did, he still felt better having his fingers around the grip.
Sam stumbles backwards a few steps when the smoke tails off and then opens his eyes.
They’re yellow.
“No!” Mary screeches, hands flying up to her face, fingers digging in just under her eyes.
“What just happened?” Dean yells, gripping the gun tighter. Sam swings in his direction and the mottled yellow eyes look him up and down before returning to his mother.
“Long time no see,” Sam chuckles and Mary is looking wide-eyed and shaking her head back and forth. Sam stretches for a moment, holding hands out in front of him and making fists before he drops them again. “Well, finally.”
“What just happened?” Dean repeats in a smaller voice and Sam’s gaze finds him again.
“You are… unexpected,” Sam says and Dean is getting the impression that he’s no longer actually talking to his brother. “As the devil said, let me introduce myself. My name is Azazel and pardon the crassness, but I’ve been trying to get into your brother for years.”
“Why?” Mary barks and Azazel’s attention turns back to her.
“You flesh bags, always wanting to know why. You’re never satisfied with the only answer there is.” Azazel throws his hands out to the sides, palms up and facing the sky. “Why not?”
“Actually,” Azazel continues, tapping one of Sam’s fingers against his mouth. “There is rhyme to my reason. Sam’s been honed into such a lovely piece of useful meat and the power is a tasty side benefit. Little did I realize his potential when we made our little deal, what he could do.”
“What do you want?” Mary asks.
“What all good demons want, world domination of course. Legions of my loyal followers are just beyond the Devil’s gate and with Sam here,” Azazel says, raising one of Sam’s hands and gesturing. One of the railway struts bends up and away with an awful screech of protesting metal and Azazel grins. “It’s just so much easier.”
“You’re not going anywhere with him,” Dean says, pulling the colt from behind him. Azazel turns and grins, but the smile falls off his face.
“Where did you get that?” he demands, all the smugness leeching from his face.
“Does it matter? Looks like you recognize it, which makes me feel a whole lot better about holding it. I was thinking that I might be just standing here with my dick in my hand.”
“Dean, sweetheart,” Azazel says, smile creeping back up on his face. “Are you really going to shoot your baby brother right after you’ve just found him again?”
“Yes,” Dean says and shoots.
There’s a dull whomp sound and Sam falls sideways, clutching at his leg. Instead of blood, black and purple smoke oozes from between his fingers. “Dean!” he screams and Dean is to his side in an instant.
“Hey Sammy, that you?” Dean asks, risking a moment to look up at Mary. She looks frozen, horror paralyzing her.
“Yeah just… it’s still in me,” Sam grits out, tendons standing clear on his neck.
“Okay, Christ, does your mom happen to know the rite of exorcism off the top of her head?”
“No, you have to…” Sam breathes deep, a rattle that doesn’t sound healthy. “I’m holding onto him but he’s hard to… you gotta shoot me.”
“I already did!”
“No, Dean,” Sam says, voice suddenly eerily calm and level. “You’ve got to shoot me, heart or head.”
“Sam… I…”
“Dean, you can’t let this thing escape. I can… I’m getting some of its… it’s going to kill us all. We won’t be able to run far or long enough. I can’t… I can’t… it can’t happen like that.”
Dean steps up and away. “Sammy, I don’t think I can.”
“You have to,” Sam says, voice cracking at the end. More smoke leaks from out between his fingers and he lets out a groan. “I want you to. I haven’t… I don’t belong here.”
Dean raises the gun, still not exactly sure what he’s going to do. Before he can pull the trigger he hears his mother scream and everything stops.
“Are you really sure that’s what you want?” Castiel asks.
Mary stands in front of him in a field with long grass. The tops of the blades tickle her fingertips and yes, this is what she wants.
“It might not change anything. It might be worse.”
“It might be better. It might not be this,” Mary says, gesturing to her left. Standing in the field are her two sons. One is on the ground and the other stands over him, gun pointed at his temple. They’re frozen, unaware of what transpires here.
“Do you know what to do?” Castiel asks. His gaze too shifts to Dean and Sam and his head tilts. “You know...I get the feeling I’m going to be here again.”
“Yes, I know what to do,” Mary says with a nod. She blinks and from one close of her lids to the next,
she’s been transported. She now stands in a living room, dark except for the glow of the television. John Winchester is slumped in an easy chair, his head and shoulders off the chair.
It’s nineteen eighty-three and he’ll get a crick in his neck if he keeps sleeping like that.
There’s a noise from upstairs, nothing much but John stirs anyway and half-rises automatically. Mary darts forward and lays a hand on his shoulder. With the darkness John will not see the years etched deep into Mary’s face, he won’t realize that this is not his Mary at all.
“Shh, John. It’s nothing,” Mary murmurs, pressing him back into his seat. It’s that noise upstairs, the sound of Mary’s feet thudding into Sammy’s room that had brought John upstairs, just in time to yank his wife away from the wall, out of the fire.
Mary understands now that there were a few precious moments between John being able to save them all, and only being able to save his sons. “You look after them,” she whispers as John settles, pressing a kiss into his temple. “You keep them safe.”
Mary steps away, backs into the shadow of a corner as another noise makes John come more fully awake. Mary knows it’s herself, all those years ago being thrown into a wall, being scraped up its surface and onto the roof. She remembers the feel of the plaster against her shoulder blades like it had happened to her, can taste ash in her mouth.
John stumbles on the third step on his way up because the stair carpet is wearing in just that one spot. He kept telling her he would fix it.
He kept telling her later.
Later.
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It's weird, the ending is actually the first thing I wrote/thought about with this whole story. :)