Title: Battle Plan
Summary: Dean is the general; Sam is the battlefield.
A/N: This is a random response to the events of "In My Time of Dying." I love the ep, but it brought out the rabid Sam girl in me and I had to try to explain why John didn't bother saying goodbye to his youngest son. And as you should all know, this is beta'ed by my friend and beta, geminigrl11, who makes all things better with her presence. And I dedicate this to Brenna for listening to me rant post-IMTOD.
Disclaimer: They own me, and I have no delusions otherwise.
Battle Plan
John is sorry for what he's done to Dean.
John can't be sorry for what he's done to Sam. Because Sam...Sam is different.
Dean is pure, Dean is innocent, Dean has been his savior.
Sam...
Sam has been a mystery. John knows his oldest son will always be pure and innocent and the savior. He's just not sure about Sam.
He loves both his sons, and he understands Sam's pain.
But there is something sinister in Sam that he can't deny any longer. He isn't sure if it's in his son or just after of his son, but it's all around him, and after this long, John is tired of splitting hairs. John's world is one of black and white and he doesn't know how to see Sam in shades of gray.
Because John loves his son--has loved him since the day Mary told him she was pregnant. But John also needs his vengeance. He hates to think that there may be a time when those two things are incompatible.
Somehow he's accepted both--that he can love his son, but not with the same blind love that he bestows on Dean. Because Sam and his destiny are the reasons they're in this fight at all.
Sometimes he wonders if he's fighting to save Sam or to save himself and when push comes to shove, which he'll put first.
He doesn't know anymore. He just wants it to be over. Mary died over 20 years ago and John has been so close, but never quite, and it has been hard.
Too hard. For all of them.
And he's tired. Tired of trying to save them all.
Because he can't save them all. One of them has to die tonight, and John's ready.
He's spent too many years hunting. Too many years trying to avenge Mary. Too many years sacrificing anything and everything for that single goal.
And he knows that there's nothing more motivating for a cause than a martyr.
His sons will fight for him.
He hates to leave them, but he trusts that Dean will follow his footsteps, that Dean will step up and be the soldier he always has been. He hates to ask that of Dean, to ask even more after everything, but he doesn't have much choice. Because this is a war whether they want to fight it or not.
Dean will fight for him, he will fight for Sam.
Sam will fight because he has no choice.
Dean is the general; Sam is the battlefield.
They all know this, though none of them will talk about it, but it is what he will leave his sons.
In so many ways, Sam is his son, more like him than Dean ever will be, but it's Dean he trusts, Dean he loves more purely than anything else.
Because he loves Sam like he loves himself--bitterly and with reservations. It's a love that teeters closely with hate, because he senses the fatalism that drives his son, and knows that Sam is chosen by the darkness. It's a love that understands that something dark lurks within all of them, sometimes by choice, sometimes by fate, but always there.
He doesn't want to fight with Sam, but he's not ready to make peace with him, no more than he's ready to make peace with himself.
The demon said that Sam was his favorite. And John doesn't know if that's true or not.
What he does know is that Dean's the one who will get his blessing.
Sam's the one who will get his pain.
Dean will get his final moments, his final words.
Sam will get the aftermath.
Dean will be encouraged.
Sam will be broken.
They will both keep fighting. John makes sure of that.