AN: I tried to resist. I really, truly did. But… Alec, man. I love the kid. This fic, if it ever goes beyond just one, is likely to be the first of a series of Oneshots. This was partially inspired by Vegakrist's Wellspring series (which is GREAT, but presently unfinished).
Note: This is a SPN/DA crossover, but you DO NOT have to have seen Dark Angel to read this. It should make sense without it, since it's written from SPN's point of view.
Disclaimer/Warning: I own neither Supernatural nor Dark Angel. Also – here there be swearwords.
Setting: Mid to near-end of S2 for Supernatural, pre-series for Dark Angel.
…
Carbon Copy
…
Dean really hates things that wear his face (I mean, sure – it is a gorgeous face, so he can see the temptation, but it's his face, damn it, and he never was good at sharing), and he's killed things for lesser offences before without even hesitating, but there's something different about this kid.
For starters, he's a kid; at least twenty years younger than Dean, so he's really missed the mark if he's hoping to be mistaken for the hunter, and usually monsters are more thorough about that kind of thing. But he looks just like Dean did at that age; right down to the slightly-left-of-centre tooth that will straighten itself out in a year or so, and the whole thing's really tripping Dean out.
He's done the maths already. The kid looks sevenish (eight, at a stretch?), so when he was born Dean would have been eighteen. Nineteen, at the most. And while he doesn't remember ever being a completely brainless idiot and doing his thing with a girl unprotected… with a kid who's got his face sitting right in front of him, he can't deny the possibility.
And fuck. Isn't that just terrifying. Dean's kind of hoping that the kid is a beastie of some kind, cause at least he knows how to deal with that.
Only… The kid's passed every subtle test he's come up against so far, and the monster theory is looking less likely with every second.
He stepped right over the line of salt hidden just inside the door, practically waltzed over the devil's trap hidden under the manky old rug, and casually shoved a silver crucifix over to make room for him to sit brazenly on the table (not the chair, which was perfectly available, but the table).
"So, uh, what's your name, kid?" Dean asks, leaning semi-casually against the wall, gun visible and within easy reach in the waistband of his jeans. Just, you know. In case the kid's not a human and is entertaining any thoughts of getting the jump on them. Sam's on the other side of the room, looking just as tense as Dean feels but failing to hide it as well as his brother is.
"Who's askin'?" the kid says in response to Dean's question, his challenging tone clashing with the apparently carefree way he's swinging his legs back and forth under the table.
Dean could respond with a "One of the two guys in this room who's got a gun, smartass," or a "the one whose motel room you've just invited yourself into," or any number of other responses, but he doesn't think that will get them vary far.
Under the arrogant, devil-may-care attitude and the carefree swinging legs, Dean can hear a thread of wariness in the kid's voice, his shoulders are tense as though he's ready to run at a moment's notice, and if Dean knows anything about kids it's that scaring them more does absolutely nothing to get them to open up.
Besides – the kid came to them. Dean would be lying if he said he wasn't curious.
"I'm Dean," he says casually, ignoring Sam's what-the-hell-are-you-doing expression. (If this is a cleverly disguised fugly, it probably already knows who they are – and if it doesn't, then telling it can't do any harm. Besides; Dean's really got the feeling that this is just a kid. Just a kid, with his face.) "This is my brother Sam."
He doesn't ask the kid for his name again; just falls silent and lets the boy feel like he's got some say in the matter, and it doesn't take long for his method of child-empowerment to work.
"… 'm Alec," the boy says eventually, after tilting his head thoughtfully and staring at them both through narrowed eyes, and Dean knows that expression well. It's the expression he himself uses when he's deciding whether or not he can trust someone.
"Alec," Dean echoes, nodding amicably. "So. What can we do for you, Alec? I thought we'd seen the last of you yesterday."
He had thought that. He and Sam had come back from the run down old house with a whole lot of questions and an intent to find out as much as they could about the miniature Dean who'd stolen Sam's wallet, but given how the kid reacted to their unexpected presence they'd thought he'd vamoose outta town as soon as the brothers were out of sight. When the knock on the door came this morning and the kid strolled in, brazen as anything, they'd been a little more than surprised.
"I was curious about you," the kid – Alec, apparently – says now. "When you tracked me down yesterday and took the wallet back. You… intrigued me."
"Yeah, well, I won't lie," Dean says, leaning more comfortably against the wall. "You intrigued us too."
The brothers had been taking a bit of a breather after a case and taken the chance to do a Wal-Mart run, stocking up on some much-needed socks, shirts and flannels (people in the hunting line of work tend to have a very high-turn-over wardrobe), and the theft had been swift and smooth.
There had been people everywhere and Dean's always hated crowds anyway, and they were just passing a particularly thick throng of people when Sam had felt a slight pressure against his hip. Looking down, he'd been just in time to see some dark-haired kid dashing away from him, wallet in hand.
The little brat had been quick, and the crowded shopping centre had only aided the tiny thief's retreat, and the brothers had lost him before they'd reached the doors.
They've got Sam's wallet back now, Dean's pleased to say. It took a couple of hours, but through sheer stubbornness and the use of more than one hacked security camera, he and Sam eventually tracked the kid back to some run-down house, just on the outskirts of town.
"So what's a kid like you doin' living in some filthy old house by yourself?" Dean asks lightly, and Alec stiffens.
"What's a pair of men doing chasing some poor lonesome kid all the way back to his 'filthy old house'?" the kid deflects.
"You're the one who stole his wallet, buddy," Dean says lightly, tilting his head in Sam's direction but not taking his eyes off the boy. "You don't want people to chase you, don't steal their wallets. 'S the only reason we tracked you down."
The kid frowns a little at that, vaguely thoughtful, and it's a very different face to the one that greeted the brothers when they'd waltzed into the run-down shack of a house yesterday.
When they'd arrived the kid had had the curtains drawn and had been sitting in the dark pawing through his stash of stolen goods, pulling out the cash and tossing the wallets aside, but at their unexpected entrance he'd jumped wildly to his feet, a snarl – an actual snarl – tearing out of his mouth.
Faced with a wildly vicious child who honestly looked like he would claw his way through them if they tried to catch or trap him, both brothers had immediately gone into their 'calm the unpredictable human down' mode, hands in the air and soothing voices working their magic to keep the boy from barrelling through them to get free.
When the kid had settled from 'wild raging animal' down to 'tense and ready to flee if anyone makes a wrong move,' Sam had stepped forward to pick up his wallet and the kid had stepped sharply away into a patch of light, and Dean caught sight of his face.
His face that – minus a few years, sure – matched Dean's right down to the last freckle.
The attempted conversation that had ensued was full of – for the Winchesters – shocked silences and gaping mouths, and –for the little look-alike – a stony face that yielded no information.
They'd tried asking him who he was, how old he was, where his parents were, who his parents were, where he'd come from. They'd received no answers, and when Dean had taken a step forward the kid had bolted, moving faster than Dean would have thought possible and barrelling through them and out the door. They'd searched, but found nothing, and figured that was the last they'd see of him.
Until this morning.
Alec – sitting on their motel table and swinging his legs cheerfully – has been silent for a while now, so Dean prompts, "You said you found us intriguing?" because the kid's clearly sought the brothers out for some reason, and Dean's keen (nervous?) to find out what.
"Yeah," the kid says, blinking and refocussing on Dean. "I do. And hey, what the hell are you guys, anyhow? I mean, you're clearly not feds or anything, but you've got a serious arsenal in that trunk of yours."
"In the…" Dean echoes, frowning, because he knows he locked his car last night, and then he takes an angry step forward. "You broke into my trunk?"
Alec's totally unfazed by Dean's mounting anger.
"Calm down – I didn't do any damage," he says cavalierly, waving a dismissive hand. "I'm an artist. Broken into way more secure things than that fossil's trunk and never made a scratch."
That fossil?
Dean's very nearly speechless with rage. Not totally – just very nearly.
"Now you listen to me," he snarls, pointing a vicious finger at the little brat. "You ever touch my car again, I will kick your ass, you hear me?"
Alec's eyebrows rise in amusement, and holy crap it's like Dean's looking like a de-aged mirror image of himself.
"I love that that's what pisses you off," the-boy-who-can't-read-warning-signs says, still kicking his legs cheerfully in the face of Dean's anger. "Not that I stole Giganto's wallet or followed you back here, but that I broke into your trunk. 'Sides – you didn't answer my question. What the hell are you?"
"None of your damn business," Dean snaps. "We could ask you the same thing. What kind of seven year old steals peoples wallets and knows how to break into cars? What the hell are you?"
"None of your damn business," the kid parrots, grinning impishly and sounding identical to Dean. "I have another question for you though, before we get stuck at this impasse. I've seen your stash, and considering how extensive it is I assume you know how to use all those guns?"
"We do," Dean growls, feeling rather tempted to show the brat just how well he knows how to use a gun.
"Then why…" and here the kid hesitates; glances down for a second and for the first time looks something other than brazenly cocky. "If you've got guns, and you can use them, why didn't you?"
There's a pause, during which most of Dean's anger fades away in a wash of confusion.
"…Huh?" he says, glancing at Sam, who doesn't look like he gets the question any more than Dean does.
"Yesterday. You had guns with you. I could see them under your jackets. But you didn't use them – you didn't even reach for them, even when I ran – and… and I want to know why."
The question is so absurd that it takes Dean a few seconds to realise he's expected to answer.
"You're a kid," he says eventually, incredulous that the question even needs to be asked. "As if we're gonna pull a gun on a kid. Why the hell do you think we would?"
Alec shrugs casually.
"Most of the people I've met haven't had a problem with it," he says mildly, and under the simple, factual tone there's another, mostly-hidden emotion that Dean can't quite pick out.
Dean raises an eyebrow.
"Well you can't have met many decent people," he says frankly, and a soft smile that is anything but happy tugs at Alec's lips.
"Guess not," he says, then takes a breath and stores that hidden emotion away in order to smile cheerfully.
"So," the kid says. "You guys got any food around here? I tell you what - I'd appreciate a bit of grub. Not eatin' for three days does something to a man."
"You haven't eaten anything for three days?" Dean asks, appalled, and the bungee-jumping his emotions are doing is kind of tiring. Surprised to curious to seriously pissed to confused to concerned to horrified... and all in ten minutes. "Why the hell not?"
"Not much time for leisurely lunches when you're on the run," the kid says lightly, jumping down from the table and making his way over to the tiny bar-fridge that's stuffed under the counter in the small motel kitchen.
"Oh, sure, help yourself," Dean says as Alec pulls out the previously unopened carton of milk and cracks it open.
"On the run?" Sam says, speaking to the kid for the first time since his unexpected entrance, and Dean mentally berates himself for somehow missing the most important thing the kid's said so far. "On the run from what?"
Alec lowers the milk carton and licks the milk-moustache from his lip, and he's silent for a long moment as he looks at the brothers with that will-I-wont-I expression again.
Then, apparently making a decision, he sets the milk down on the counter and leans against the bench, folding his arms and giving the Winchesters a stubborn look.
"I don't trust people," he says matter-of-factly, his gaze flicking between the brothers. "In fact, I find people in general to be supremely untrustworthy. So I'm takin' a huge leap of faith here, you got me?"
Sam and Dean trade a perplexed and slightly concerned glance.
"Uh… ok," Dean says, looking back at the kid, and Alec chews his cheek and ponders them again through narrowed eyes for a moment before steeling himself and taking the plunge.
"So, it can't have escaped your notice that you've got my face," he says to Dean, and the hunter blinks in surprise that bleeds quickly into vague irritation.
"I think you've got it backwards, kid. I had it first – it's you who's got my face."
The kid shrugs.
"Trivialities," he says simply. "My point is: I'm pretty sure you're my donor."
And then there's a long silence, because that is not what Dean was expecting to hear.
"I'm sorry, what?" he eventually manages, stepping forward half a pace.
"My donor," the boy says again, speaking purposefully clearly. "You know – I came from you, your blood runs through my veins, without you I wouldn't exist… all that crap."
Dean stares at the kid for another long second and then throws a wide eyed expression at Sam, who's looking at him in… well, there are too many emotions on the younger Winchester's face to be able to narrow it down, to be honest.
"Sammy, I have done a lot of things over the years to get money," Dean says earnestly, "but I've never … donated… I've never done that."
"Oh," Alec says, sounding honestly surprised at the conclusion the brothers have jumped to. "No – I don't mean that kind of donor. I mean, my DNA donor. The original me."
And... this conversation isn't making any more sense to Dean than it was a minute ago.
"Huh?" he asks, eloquently, and Alec rolls his eyes a little.
"You're my DNA donor," the kid says clearly, so that there can be no further confusion. "I'm your clone."
Yep, ok. This is officially not how Dean expected his morning to go.
"His clone," Sam says, in a clearly disbelieving voice. "You're telling us that you're Dean's clone. Right."
"What, you don't believe me?" Alec demands, looking belligerent. "Come on – how else do you explain the total identicalness going on here?"
Dean glances at Sam.
"He's got a point there," he says, and Sam looks exasperated.
"Dude, full on cloning doesn't exist outside of science fiction. The most that actual scientists have ever managed to successfully clone is a few bits of DNA – not even a full strand – and even that's at huge expense and not always successful. There's no way that they've progressed to cloning full humans when they can't even clone a full ear."
"They have, actually," Alec says lightly, reaching behind him and grabbing the milk, taking another casual swig. "I am living proof."
Dean's looking like he really doesn't know what the hell to think here, and Sam's looking like he thinks the kid's got a real good imagination.
"All those attempts at cloning – the failed ones that they publicise – are a front," the boy continues, a detectable seriousness under his light tone. "It's been going on for years, but it's all top secret. That's why no one knows about any of it."
Sam's trying not to look thoroughly amused now, like someone who's just been told an incredibly fantastical story by a young kid who totally believes in what they've just said.
"I see," he says, trying to hide his smile. "So it's a top secret government conspiracy, but a seven year old kid knows all about it."
Alec narrows his eyes and glares a little.
"Don't mock me," he says seriously, and even as the brothers watch they can see walls going back up all around the kid. "Look, if you don't believe me, whatever. I don't give a shit. I just wanted to see what you were like. I should have known that civilians wouldn't understand."
He pushes off from the bench and is clearly intending to leave, but he winces subtly as he twists around and Dean takes a half step forward.
"Woah, hey, what is it?" he asks, because he knows that expression – it's the expression he himself gets when he's trying not to let Sam see how bad he's been hurt.
"It's nothing," the kid says shortly, and turns his body away a little, but that's exactly what Dean would say and do if it was something. If it actually was nothing he'd look confused for a moment and then chuckle and tell Sam to calm down, Francis, it's just a scratch. It's when he gets all defensive and deflective that he's hiding something, and Alec's displaying all the classic signs.
And Sam's got his concerned face on too now because how did they not notice this before? The kid's totally favouring his left side. And sure, it's subtle and well hidden and maybe no one else would notice, but Sam knows Dean's mannerisms better than anyone, and from what he can see this kid not only looks like Dean but is acting like Dean. Like Dean when he's significantly injured.
"Here – let me see," Dean says, inching forward a little and using the gentle, coaxing voice that really only ever came out to play when little Sammy had a splinter that hurt too bad to touch, but that had to come out.
"Hey, back off, Touchy," Alec says, darting backwards out of reach. "Don't go getting your panties in a twist – it's nothing worse than I've had before."
"So you are hurt," Sam says, and Alec glares at him.
"I can handle it, Mopey. I'm fine."
"Kid," Dean says, a hint of sternness in his voice now. "If your personality matches mine the same way your face does, then you and I have a very off-base definition of fine. Let me have a look."
Alec's gaze flickers down to where Dean's got his gun tucked into his jeans, backs up another step, and Dean gets the message.
"I won't hurt you," he promises, pulling his gun out and tossing it underarm across the room to land on one of the beds, well out of immediate reach. "I just wanna help."
And something – the lack of a gun, the gentle voice, the raised hands and earnest expression – gets through to the kid, because he looks undecided and shifty, and then his lips press down into this thin, long-suffering line and he huffs "Fine, you girl," and lifts the corner of his t-shirt.
"The hell…" Dean says, looking at the red, puffy skin that's exposed. "Is that a bullet wound?"
Alec shrugs, looking down at the ragged wound unconcernedly.
"I told you that most of the people I've met have no problems pulling guns on a kid," he says, as though it's every day that seven (eight?) year olds go walking around with tears in their skin made by bullets. "It's no big deal – it only clipped me. And it was a few days ago too – it's pretty much healed."
"That looks pretty far from 'pretty much healed,'" Dean says sharply, and points at one of the beds. "Sit," he says sternly, and turns to rummage around in one of the duffles by the door to pull out their first-aid kit.
"What, you guys are field medics now?" Alec asks, but goes and sits where he's told, the wariness still present in his expression but mostly hidden now under cavalier bravado and a strangely bewildered curiosity. "Add that to the list then. Trunk full of guns, recognise bullet wounds on sight, feel comfortable treating said bullet wounds… you guys are serial killers, aren't you? I'd've picked it sooner, but the notable absence of human hearts in jars threw me off."
"You're a right smartarse, you know that?" Dean says, coming over with the kit and kneeling in front of Alec (who leans back a little, but doesn't back away entirely).
"Aleck," the kid corrects. "Smart aleck. Where'd you think I got my name?"
"Whatever," Dean huffs, and gestures impatiently. "Take your shirt off. That wound's infected, Mr I Can Handle It."
"It is not infected," the boy disagrees, looking affronted. "It's just been aggravated by my recent physical exertion."
"Right," Dean says, sounding sceptical. "And that's why it's got all that lovely yellow gunk in there."
Alec shoots a perplexed expression at Dean then cranes his neck down to inspect the wound on his side with narrowed eyes, and Dean's never seen anyone poke unflinchingly at a bullet wound before, but that's what the kid does.
"Aw, crap," Alec mutters after a few moments of scrutiny, then glances up at the hunter with a mildly irritated expression.
"It appears," he says grudgingly, "that this may be perhaps a little bit infected. But in my defence, that yellow shit wasn't there this morning."
"Yeah, well – it's there now, Dr House," Dean says, rummaging in the kit and pulling out a tube of saline and blinking away his vague surprise at the kid's language. "I can patch it up a little, but I reckon we need to get a hospital to –"
"No – uh uh," Alec interrupts, and he's scooted back and darted out of Dean's reach before the hunter's even had time to blink. "No hospitals – not gonna happen."
"Kid, that needs stitches," Dean says, a hint of sternness in his voice – because seriously, if left untreated, that tear could become a real problem. And then it occurs to him that maybe the kid's scared of getting his skin sown back together with a needle and thread (he remembers the drama of the first time Sam had to get stitches) so adds calmingly, "And stitches are nothing to be afraid of anyway – they're just –"
"I am not scared of stitches," Alec practically snarls, glaring viciously. "The only reason I didn't stitch it up is because I didn't have the necessary equipment to hand. You got a needle and surgical thread in your little box o' tricks, Doc?"
"What, you want me to stitch it up for you?" Dean asks, his tone sarcastic.
"No, Hawkeye*," Alec says long-sufferingly, and Dean's got to admire the kid's cultural references. "I'll stitch it. Your impressive medkit proves nothing to me about your abilities to use said kit, so I'll stick to what I know, thanks."
"You wanna stich up your own bullet wound?" Dean asks, eyebrow raised and voice deadpan. "Yeah, ok, not gonna happen."
"Why the hell not?" Alec demands crossly, folding his arms across his chest, and Dean's head spins for a moment because the inflection and the actions are exactly like his own, and it's like watching a home-movie of his reaction when his dad told him he couldn't go to the arcade when he'd spent the whole last week watching Sammy. Seriously – if it weren't for Sam's surety on the topic, Dean might actually believe this whole clone business.
The boy goes on speaking, his voice as belligerent as his expression.
"I can almost guarantee that I'm better at it than you are – I've been stitching myself up for years. It's one of the first things I was taught to do."
And Dean's amused expression morphs into one of concerned disbelief.
"You've been stitching yourself up for years?" he echoes, shocked, because even he didn't learn how to do stitches until he was nine, and seriously – bullet wounds, self-administered stitching, on the run… what the hell is this kid's story? "What the hell is your story, kid?"
And Alec looks at him with eyes that are at the same time so young, and yet far too old.
"You wouldn't believe me, if I told you," he says simply, his voice mostly factual but with a barely-there underlay of sadness.
Dean quirks a brow at him.
"You'd be surprised by the kind of stuff I'd believe, kid," he says flatly, but the look on Alec's face makes it clear that he's not gonna go into any more detail, so Dean decides to fight that battle later. Priorities, and all that. Stitches first, story later.
"Well whatever your story is," he says, pointing at the kid's torn side with one hand and holding the saline and suture kit in the other, "it's ended with you having an infected bullet wound that needs stitches. Now, either I can do them or a hospital can."
The effect of his words is immediate.
"You come any closer with that needle and I will break your nose, steal your medkit, and you'll never see me again," Alec half-snarls, expression deadly serious, and Dean pauses – not because he thinks the kid could actually break his nose, but because it's painfully evident that Alec feels extremely threatened right now, and that's the last thing Dean wants.
"Ok," he says calmingly, backing off a step. "So, a hospital then?"
"No," the kid says immediately, and seriously, Dean's getting a little tired of the circular argument. "No hospitals."
"Why not?" Sam asks, interjecting with his gentle voice and his wide-eyed, you-can-tell-me-anything expression, and Alec sends him a quick glare.
"I go to a hospital; I get caught. So the logical course of action? Don't go to a hospital."
"Caught?" Sam asks, a frown in his voice and on his face. "By the same people who shot you?"
"Give the man a prize," Alec barbs, and Dean chooses to chuckle under his breath instead of allow himself to think about the fact that this kid is being hunted and shot at by persons unknown for reasons unknown. He always has appreciated snarky humour, and reacting to that is easier right now than trying to work out what exactly they've landed in the middle of here.
"Ok," he says, swallowing further amusement that arises as Sam sends him an Extremely Unimpressed Expression. "Well, someone needs to stitch you up, kid. Got any suggestions, since you've shot down all mine?"
Alec holds out a hand by way of answer, an expectant expression on his face, and Dean outright laughs this time.
"So not gonna happen," he says, because he's not going to let a seven-year-old kid stitch himself up when there are two perfectly capable not-seven-year-olds available to do it instead.
Alec makes an angry noise in the back of his throat.
"Why?" he demands, and yep – the belligerence and irritation are back full force. "I told you; I've done it before. Look – "
And the kid lifts his shirt on the other side to show a thin pink scar, just above the waistband of his pants. It's neat and thin, a couple of years old at least, and whoever stitched it did an impressive job.
"Fourteen stitches," Alec says, using the expression Dean's been using for years when he knows he's right and is annoyed that he has to prove it. "Two and a bit years ago. Knife-wound, that one, so it was pretty clean, at least. And this one – " he rolls up his pant leg to show a neatly-healed semi-circle shaped scar on his calf – "was from a stake. That one was a bit of a bitch to recover from – took forever. Went right through the muscle and out the other side. Learnt my lesson though – I can jump way higher, way faster now. And – " he rolls his other pant leg up over his knee as high as it can go, and there's a zig-zaggy scar that goes from his knee and disappears under the pants again as it extends up his leg – "this one was from an anom—a… dog. My biggest one, too. Hip to knee. And I've got other more minor ones scattered around too, but those are the main ones. And I stitched all of them. So I think it's safe to say that I know what I'm doing."
Dean and Sam exchange wide-eyed expressions of near-horror, because even they didn't have that many big scars at fourteen, much less seven. They're so busy being amazed and disturbed that they don't even wonder what it was that Alec was going to say before he cut himself off and said 'dog' instead.
"I think now's a good time for you to tell us who the hell's chasing you and why, kid," Dean says, looking back at Alec seriously, thoughts of getting the story after dealing with the wound temporarily forgotten. "And feel free to include how on earth you've ended up with so many scars, and why the hell it wasn't someone else that stitched them for you."
Alec's lips press down again into that thin line as his too-old eyes flick from Dean to Sam and back again as he debates what to tell them, and there's a very long silence.
The brothers wait patiently, well used to victims of supernatural attacks needing time to work up the necessary courage to tell a tale that no one in their right mind would believe, and after a while their patience pays off.
"They're called Manticore," the boy says finally, settling his gaze on Dean. "And they're after me because I belong to them, and I escaped. Now will you pass me the damn needle already? I'd really prefer to have this conversation after I've got this – " he gestures to the vicious tear in his pale skin "– sorted out."
And oh, there are so many cans of worms in that little bit of talk that Dean wants to open right now (namely, who the hell Manticore is and why the hell Alec thinks he belongs to them), but glancing back down at the painful-looking wound, he has to acknowledge that the kid has a point.
Except that now they're back to their impasse.
Dean opens his mouth to say again that he's not going to let Alec stitch up his own freaking wound, damn it, but something in the kid's expression gives him pause.
It's a look he's been seeing on his own face for as long as he can remember – a look Sam's had as well since he turned twelve and found out what their Dad really did – and it's not a look that's passed through blood or genes; it's a look that a person will only get through experience.
It's a look that says, I've been through some seriously fucked up shit, and I had to harden the hell up because of it.
Dean's was cultivated through a constant and frequent exposure to things like burning corpses and blood-stained werewolves and dead children hanging from the rafters to dry. Sam's came from having his safe little world of normal destroyed by a brother who told him that monsters were real, and it's only been strengthened by bloodied ghosts and grieving families and howling wendigos.
Dean's not sure what it is that caused that same expression to be on Alec's face, but then – given what the kid's said about escaping and being hunted and shot at – Dean's not entirely sure he wants to guess.
"Ok," he hears himself say, and Sam makes a surprised sound of outrage from behind him.
Alec grins at him (and damn if that isn't the exact same grin Dean used on countless old-ladies-next-door to charm them into giving him pie when he was a kid) and holds his hand out for the suture kit, and Sam manages to find his way around his stunned tongue.
"Dean, what the hell?" Sam snaps, disbelief and outrage colouring his tone. "Are you insane?"
Dean ignores him entirely, instead remaining entirely focussed on the mini-him across from him, keeping the suture-kit still out of reach and pointing a stern finger at the kid.
"It looks like you're doing a hack job of it or that you know anything less than what you're doing, I say the word and you give me this needle back and let me stitch it up, deal?"
Alec scoffs.
"That's unnecessary," he says flippantly. "I know exactly what I'm doing, and even if I didn't, hack jobs are not something I ever do."
Dean's expression gets sterner and he pointedly pulls the kit back just that little bit further out of reach.
Alec rolls his eyes.
"Fine," he says, then gestures impatiently for the kit.
Dean hesitates for a moment longer, then finally clicks his teeth resolutely together and drops the kit into Alec's waiting hand.
"Dean!" Sam snaps, his voice an impressive blend of outrage, disbelief, shock and disapproval all blended into one. He looks all set to launch into an extended and detailed reprimand, but Dean cuts in before the younger man can continue speaking.
"Cool it, Sammy," he says, his eyes not leaving Alec as the kid sets about pulling everything he needs out of the kit. "I trust him."
The words are out of his mouth before he has time to think about them, but Dean realises with a minor jolt of surprise that they're totally true. And he shouldn't be trusting a mini wallet-thief who's wearing his face and who tailed them back to their motel room and invited himself in for a glass – whole carton – of milk, but for some reason… he does.
Well. He trusts the boy that he knows what he's doing with the suture-kit, at least, not that he won't attempt a second burglary the moment the Winchesters turn their backs. They're not quite there yet.
An unidentified expression flashes across Alec's face at Dean's words, but then it's hidden before Dean can decipher what it was (though if he'd had longer to study it, he would have described it as one of completely and utterly baffled shock) and the kid pulls up a smirk over the top of it and looks back down at the needle he's threading.
"Yeah, listen to the maker," Alec says cavalierly, sending his smirk in Sam's direction over the top of the needle. "Cool it, Sammy."
Sam bristles indignantly, his nostrils flaring like an angry rhinoceros. He opens his mouth to speak and then changes his mind, teeth clicking together crossly as his lips press into a thin line and he throws Dean a look that says When this goes wrong, it's all on you, then turns and stalks off to his duffle to paw through it for who-knows-what, pretending not to be paying attention and clearly waiting for the moment it will all go wrong.
Except that… it doesn't.
Turns out the kid wasn't lying when he said he was good with stitches. He's good with infections too, as becomes clear when he cleans out all the yellow gunk from the wound before getting started on the stitching, and Dean sits there and watches with no little amount of amazement as Alec treats and sews up his own side, doing so good a job of it that the oldest Winchester belatedly thinks they should have filmed the whole thing and handed it out to hunters around the world as a tutorial.
The stitches are so neat and precise that even a plastic surgeon would be impressed, and once they're done Alec smears some antiseptic cream over the top of the thin pink line that is all that's left of the wound, then straps a clear, sterile patch over the whole thing and when it's done Dean could almost believe that they'd taken him to the hospital after all.
"There," Alec says smugly, patting the top of the bandage proudly. "I hate to say I told you so… well, no – that's a lie. I love saying it. You ready? I told you so."
Dean barely even registers the kid's unrestrained sarcasm and pride, because that just now… that was impressive. And scary. No seven year old should even be able to thread a stitching needle, in Dean's opinion, much less use one, but, well, Alec's just gone and blown that concept to smithereens.
Dean turns to look at Sam, who gave up the pretence of not paying attention a good while ago, and the younger Winchester has an expression on his face that has to be similar to Dean's – all slack jaw and wide eyes and did I seriously just see that – and Dean turns back to Alec, who's dropping his shirt back down over the patched-up wound and bouncing a little on the bed.
"So what was the verdict on the food?" he asks, completely carefree, as though he hasn't just performed a complicated medical procedure on himself. "Cause I'm still pretty damn hungry."
There's silence for a moment.
"We can organise some food," Dean says, his mouth speaking without his permission as his brain rushes to catch up. "But first I want your story. You said you'd talk after you were stitched up. You're stitched. Start talking."
The kid heaves a sigh like he's just some normal boy whose dad has just told him to brush his teeth before he watches any more TV, and he sends a half-hearted glare in Dean's direction.
"You're not gonna let this go, are you?" he asks, and Dean raises a challenging eyebrow by way of an answer.
"Fine," Alec sighs, settles himself more comfortably on the bed, and starts talking.
He doesn't tell them everything, but he tells them enough.
About Manticore, and their genetically-engineered child-soldiers. Test-tube babies who's DNA has been spliced with various different things in order to give them heightened senses and better abilities (Alec's got three-percent cat DNA, and he was one of the ones for whom the splicing worked, thank God). Children who've been cloned from promising human specimens and trained from birth how to be the perfect soldier or assassin or whatever the hell the men in charge wanted them to be.
Alec's been stitching himself up for years, but he's also been able to hit a bullseye on any target within eyeshot for as long as he can remember. He could take apart any gun in the Winchester arsenal if he wanted, and put it all back together again in less time than either brother could hope to. He knows the best places to hit someone to break their bones or to disarm them or to crush their windpipe or to temporarily paralyse them or to permanently paralyse them.
He tells Sam and Dean how on one of their mass-training exercises he was paired with a girl who rolled her eyes at his sarcasm and hit him in the arm almost every time he spoke, but who also tried to hide her amusement at his sassy retorts and decided that he should be called Alec.
He'd been nothing but a number before then.
X5-494. That was what Manticore named him. He has a barcode to prove it, and he twists in place and tugs his collar down so the brothers can see the black markings tattooed into his neck.
X5-494 – a machine, made for a single purpose.
A purpose that he's filled, too, and on more than one occasion.
Alec's killed people. He's killed more people than he can count, but he doesn't tell the brothers that. He's killed anomalies too, but he doesn't tell them that either. He doesn't tell them about the anomalies at all, actually; about those poor souls who were early versions – prototypes from before Manticore's scientists perfected the cloning process – or who's DNA splicing went sideways and didn't quite come out right so they're kept in the basement.
He tells them how the escape plan was the girl's, and that they waited until they were all sent out into the woods on a mission before making their dash for freedom, but he doesn't tell them that Manticore worked out what was going on way faster than the escapees had hoped for.
He's already told them that he's being chased by men who have no issues using guns on kids, but he doesn't tell them that those same men chased them through the woods that night, firing with abandon and not giving a damn how much damage was doled out so long as no one got to the other side of the fence.
He tells them how he climbed that fence faster than he's ever done anything in his life and he hasn't stopped running since then.
He doesn't tell them how many children didn't make it that far.
Finally, Alec finishes speaking. He'd looked down not long into his tale and started picking absently at one of the loose threads on the stained bedspread, and he doesn't look up when he eventually stops talking.
There's silence for a long, long moment, and then Dean manages to drag his stunned eyes away from the kid on the bed to exchange a look with his brother.
There's a lot in that look.
Shock and horror and disbelief. Hesitancy. Outrage. Protective possessiveness, in Dean's – and in response – unsurprised resignation in Sam's.
They don't need to talk to know that they still don't know what to think of this whole thing – because, come on, it's pretty damn hard to believe… but there'd been no hint of a lie on Alec's face the whole time he'd been talking, and it was all a bit too detailed for a kid to just invent off the top of his head. That, and there's a freaking barcode tattooed onto the kid's neck.
And anyway – how the hell do they know it's not true? Government conspiracies and cover-ups… given the amount of evil the brothers know to exist in the world, the potential fact that a secret government organisation is breeding super-soldiers isn't actually that hard to swallow.
Disgusting to swallow, sure, but not hard.
Besides – Dean's said it before. Monsters, he gets, but humans? Humans are fucked up.
They also don't need to talk to know what's going to happen next, hence Sam's unsurprised resignation.
"Pancakes sound good?" Dean asks, looking away from Sam and back to the kid.
Alec looks up sharply from the bedspread, confusion and a complete lack of understanding on his face.
"Pancakes," Dean repeats. "Best thing anyone ever made out of flour, ever. Except pie, but that's in a league all its own. Pancakes, you know – smothered in maple syrup, a bit of banana if your name's Samantha and you're feeling particularly healthy… you following me?"
It's evident by the baffled look on Alec's face that he's not.
"I said we'd get food after you told us your story," Dean clarifies, and the confusion dials back one shade on the kid's face and he blinks blankly.
"You believe me?" Alec asks, surprised and still confused, and now Dean knows why the kid hadn't looked up from the bedspread just before. He'd probably expected disbelief and cynicism at best from the brothers in response to his story, and possibly an order to get the hell out of their room at the worst. It's what Dean would have expected, had their positions been reversed.
And he shouldn't be surprised, really. He knows himself better than he knows anyone except Sam, and if everything the kid said is true then Alec's a miniature Dean, and Dean's never been very good with emotions.
When feeling emotional, Dean tends to hide, and he can tell from the holes in the kid's story that there's a lot that's been left untold. Judging by how Alec very specifically didn't mention any of the other escapees after the getting over the fence part of the story, Dean doesn't have to think too far to guess what's been left out.
And – genetically enhanced super soldier or not, whether one admits to it or not – thinking about fallen comrades is bound to make anyone a bit emotional. That plus the uncertainty over how the brothers might react to the whole story, and Dean's fairly certain he'd be staring at the ugly-ass motel bedspread too.
"Jury's still out on that one," Dean says honestly, in answer to the kid's question. "But I'm getting there. What I do believe is that you've had a shit few days and you're hungry. I can't do anything about the shit few days, but I can do something about the hunger. So, take two. Pancakes sound good?"
Alec stares for a long moment, gaze flicking from Dean to Sam and back again, surprise and uncertainty still on his face, but then he grins.
"Pancakes sound awesome," he says.
Dean grins back at him and Sam's head spins for a moment, because it's like he's had too much to drink on top of some really trippy drugs and he's seeing double as a result, and this is going to take some serious getting used to.
"There's a joint up the road from here we were gonna try this morning," Dean says, flipping the medkit closed and walking over to stuff it back into his duffle – and then suddenly his face stones over as he thinks of something.
Alec's brow creases and he leans back just the tiniest smidgen at the expression, but Sam knows his brother so well that he knows what's coming.
"But before we go," Dean says sternly, his most serious expression in place as he points a finger at Alec. "Some rules."
Alec's looking decidedly wary right now, but Dean continues before the kid has a chance to think about whether or not he's misjudged these guys and actually does need to run from them after all.
"My car," Dean practically growls, and yep, Sam saw this coming. Alec, for his part, just adds a drop of bafflement to his already wary expression. "She is sacred, ok? She's the most important thing we own. The most important thing ever, actually, and that includes pie. So you gotta respect her. No kicking the seats, no scratching the leather. Unless we're dying we don't get inside her if we're gonna bleed on the upholstery. No scratching the paint. No breaking into her trunk. And no insulting her. Capiche? We'll drive to breakfast, but before we do you'll apologise to her."
"Dean…" Sam groans, half-heartedly, at the same time that Alec says (with an expression that's melted from wariness into scepticism) "You want me to apologise to your car?"
"Yes," Dean says in a voice that brokes absolutely no argument. "You called her a fossil. My car is a lot of things but a fossil is not one of them. She's a Goddess of a bygone age, you understand? If you're gonna be coming with us, you gotta learn to respect her. And that starts with an apology."
Alec tilts his head to the side a little, considering what he's just heard.
"If I'm coming with you?" he echoes, something in his voice that Dean can't quite peg down. "You make it sound like this is gonna be for longer than a trip to the nearest diner."
Dean shifts on his feet, jutting his chin out just the tiniest little bit in defiance of the resistance he suspects will be coming in just a moment.
"Well I'm not gonna leave a seven year old kid to fend for himself in the best of circumstances," the hunter says, and Sam's lip curls up a tiny bit because his brother is so predictable. "And you're a seven year old escapee-kid being hunted by government agents with guns. Hardly the best of circumstances. So you're coming with us. For longer than a trip to the nearest diner."
And there it is. That possessive protectiveness that was in Dean's expression after Alec's story, it's in his voice now.
Dean's a helper – he's always been a helper. He's a hunter because of Dad, sure, and because he wants to gank the thing that took both Mary and John, but Sam thinks that even after they get that bastard Dean'll keep right on hunting. Yeah, he loves the hunt – loves tracking the thing down and working out what it is and chasing it down and killing it – but Sam knows that the only reason Dean's still sane is because of the people they save along the way.
Hunters have gone mad before – it's not uncommon for someone in their line of work to wind up in a mental hospital, actually – and those that don't go certifiably insane certainly aren't the happiest, most well-adjusted people on the planet. Hunters see a lot of shit in their lives, and Dean and Sam have seen more than most, and Sam thinks that if hunting didn't actively help people – save people – that Dean might have given it up a long time ago.
So here and now, with a kid who's apparently their flesh and blood (if not in the traditional sense) Sam's totally unsurprised that Dean's decided to keep him. Dean's always had a soft-spot for kids as it is, but a kid who shares Dean's blood? Frankly, there was never a chance of this ending differently.
Sam wonders for half a second what Alec's reaction to this will be – he hardly knows them after all, and he did say earlier that as a general rule he doesn't trust anybody – but then Alec beams.
"Funny you should suggest that, actually," Alec says, grinning. "See – Manticore knows me well enough to know I'd never go to civilians for help. So the thought of me willingly travelling with a pair of civilians? It won't even cross their mind." The kid chuckles. "And here I was thinking that I was gonna have to convince you."
Dean looks surprised for half a second, and then he smirks.
"Well you know what they say about great minds," Dean says, and Alec mirrors his expression.
"That I do," he says, and Sam takes a moment to marvel at his brother's (and his brother's clone, apparently) ability to just package things up and store them away out of reach. Alec's just rehashed what for most people would be a beyond-traumatising thing to talk about and Dean's just been bombarded with enough information to sink the Titanic, but both of them are grinning at each other like they've just spent the last hour talking about nothing more stressful than pie and Impalas.
"Sammy?" Dean asks, twisting in his brother's direction. "You good to go?"
They'd been pretty much packed when Alec had waltzed in (was it really only less than two hours ago?) and helped himself to their milk, so there's only a couple of scattered things that still need grabbing, and Sam stands and grabs his laptop.
"I'll meet you by the car," he says, and Dean nods and walks to the door, picking up his duffle on the way.
Alec stays sitting where he is for a moment, looking like he's not sure whether he's expected to follow or not, and then Dean pauses in the doorway and glances over his shoulder.
"You comin' kid?" he asks.
In a few days, they'll get a DNA test done and it will turn out that yes, Alec's genes match Dean's practically one hundred percent (aside from that tiny bit that will make the DNA specialist think that the sample's been contaminated, because she's got no idea what cat DNA is doing in a human sample).
Sam will nearly pass out from shock at the confirmation, Alec will watch with a smug smirk that practically screams I told you so, and Dean will blink and quietly try to get his brain around the fact that he has a clone. Legit. Even science says so.
He'll try to get his brain around that, and the fact that Alec was telling the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth about the whole cloning thing… which kind of implies that everything he said about Manticore and genetically enhanced child-soldiers was true as well, and the brothers will have to sit down for a moment (because yes, sure, they'd suspected that there was more truth than embellishment to the kid's story, but it's one thing suspecting the truth in a story so wild and hard-to-believe, but it's another to have it confirmed) before they'll exchange a look that says everything without the need for words.
They'll be keeping Alec. There'll no doubt about that now (as if they were ever going to just send the kid off on his own anyway), because like Dean said – it's one thing to be a homeless kid on the run, but it's entirely another to be an escaped child-solder who's being hunted by an apparently unscrupulous government organisation that has no qualms about torturing children and turning them into tiny, deadly killing machines.
Once these revelations have sunk in, the Winchesters will argue – whilst out of the kid's hearing – about whether or not to tell Alec what they do, and they'll argue about it for hours.
Dean will be all for it, because he thinks the kid will be able to handle it and anyway, how are they supposed to hide from Alec the fact that they drive around America killing monsters when the kid's living with them, but Sam will vehemently oppose the idea and they'll still be undecided when Alec will walk in on them discussing whether or not they tell him that ghosts are real.
He'll laugh, then (since the cat's pretty much outta the bag anyway) they'll try to convince him that they're not joking and Alec will laugh some more. Then he'll realise they're actually being completely serious, and after a long pause where he'll stare at them blankly he'll loudly and extensively lament the fact that the guy he was cloned from is insane, and crap he really hopes it's insanity borne of some horrible experience and not because of hereditary reasons, because Alec quite likes being sane, thank you very much, and he doesn't want to go cuckoo just because he got landed with dodgy genes.
The brothers will shrug and deal with his cynicism like pros and they'll leave him at the motel that night while they go deal with a violent spirit, and then the problem of convincing Alec that they're telling the truth will be taken out of their hands.
It'll be taken out of their hands because (and they shouldn't be surprised by this, but they will be) they'll turn around half way through dealing with the ghost that's trying very hard to kill them and they'll find that Alec has followed them to the haunted house, and is staring at the beheaded spirit with Very Wide Eyes.
They'll put the ghost down as fast as physically possible and then get the kid the hell out of there, and Alec will be uncharacteristically silent for an hour or so before he'll quietly concede that maybe he had been a little too hasty in his accusations of insanity.
He'll deal with it quite well – Dean will be right about that bit – and once he's gotten his head around the whole concept he'll demand to be written in, "or whatever the hell it is you people do to initiate a new member."
The brothers will refuse, Alec will threaten to just follow them like he did to the haunting and a bit of a stand off later will find the three of them going off on a tame haunting (in the scheme of things) to introduce Alec to the world of hunting.
None of that's happened yet though - it will happen in a few days.
Right now, Dean's standing just inside the doorway of a cheap motel room with his duffle slung over one shoulder asking if Alec's coming.
Alec hesitates for one second.
And then he grins.
"Sure," he says.
…
end
…
* That's a reference to Hawkeye the Doctor from M*A*S*H, not Hawkeye from Avengers, just in case anyone was confused….
AN: There we have it! I hope you enjoyed – please drop me a line and let me know what you thought. It's my first crossover fic, and my first DA fic too, so I'd love some feedback.
Love Bundi