DISCLAIMER: I don't own Supernatural or the company that makes Bowie knives. Title courtesy of the band Muse. Listen to them!
A/N: I'm proud of this fic :) I reckon it's good, but I won't be sure until you review and tell me what you think! What did you like, and what did you think I could improve on?
It was stupid to keep using it, really. The once broad, sharp, leaf shaped blade had been sharpened so much that it was really just a strip of metal set into a ragged wooden hilt. It was amazing that it still had a point sharp enough to pierce skin and flesh, and bone if he tried really hard.
Apart from its obvious crappiness, it was the fact that it was so easily connected to him. Well, not him, as such, but the nameless killer that was him. Whenever he killed someone with it, he might as well have been carving his goddamned signature into the victims' flesh. He always tried to mix up his weapons so the deaths wouldn't be so noticeable, but people still realised.
Another thing was its origins. It was the knife (well, dagger, really) that had been wielded against him time and time again. Shouldn't he be afraid of the weapon? Shouldn't he be terrified at the thought of touching a knife ever again? Shouldn't it bother him?
It was an old argument that led nowhere, and he had decided, a long time ago, to just stop thinking about it. The only thing he knew for sure was that he had what was probably the weirdest, creepiest case of Stockholm Syndrome ever.
---
The girl looked so innocent, so incapable of hurting anything. He leant back in the tattered drivers' seat of his van and just watched for a while, assessing her. She wasn't a threat – not right now, anyway. He twirled the knife lazily in his left hand, biting his lip as he considered his plan.
She would be a threat soon, if he didn't nip it in the bud.
It, huh? More like her.
Thinking was dangerous. He kept trying to stop doing it; kept himself busy, occupied, thought only about things pertaining to the job. He couldn't handle introspection. Couldn't face himself. He couldn't remember the last time he had looked himself in the eye. The last time he had smiled.
What had he just said? No introspection!
He took a deep breath and focused on the girl again, pushing all other thoughts to one side. She was wandering around her grandmothers' front garden, stroking the soft petals of the blooming roses, crouching down every now and then to sniff one. It was like looking at a walking, talking Hallmark card. On her face was a small smile, sweet and innocent and unhurried. He wanted to hurl.
But he had a job to do.
---
She lived in her mothers' house and visited her father in the weekends. Her family didn't like it – hated to see the sweet teenaged girl walking over to what equated as the slums of the small down every weekend, duffle thrown over her shoulder. Sure, nothing more dangerous than a mugging or two had ever happened to someone walking alone on those run down streets, but it didn't stop the paranoia from spreading.
It was such a small, peaceful town; no serious crime had been committed there for over sixty years, when a young boy had been beaten almost to death on his way home from school. The only way people died in that town was through accidents and old age.
He was sorry that he was going to change that. There were so few places left that were like this – places where people were friendly and helpful and not at all suspicious about someone who passing through town on a 'road trip.' By himself, no less. There was a dark irony about it – if it wasn't for those innocent civilians, he wouldn't have gotten enough information on the girl to kill her.
It was only a few meters from her fathers' house that she was found dead, curled on her side in a small clump of bushes by the roadside, a bullet imbedded into her brain.
---
He tried to sleep, but found himself staring unseeingly up at the ceiling. Introspecting, like he promised himself he wouldn't. Yeah, like promises mean jack. Easier broken then kept…
He felt strangely philosophical.
He felt like he wanted to hurl again.
---
The next job was better, easier. Killing a slovenly, obese middle aged man who spent most of his time either drinking or beating up his wife was a breeze. He didn't bother planning that one out – the small family lived out of town on a huge, overgrown, deserted farm. From his research (ten minutes chatting to the local men in the tavern quarter of an hour down the road) he had gathered that the wife was in the town an hour away, going to a proper doctor. He was ready to bet that she was getting injuries caused by her loving husband checked out.
It was easy, too easy, and there were no witnesses around. He pulled up on the road outside the farm, parked the rusty old van, and grabbed his knife from the seat next to him, shoving his pistol into the waistband of his pants and pulling his clothes down over it. It was a security measure he was sure he wouldn't need – if all went as planned (and it usually did) he wouldn't even have to make use of the gun anyway.
He strode down the gravel path, the small stones crunching underfoot and imbedding themselves into the tracks of his boots. He'd have to pick those out later – there was nothing like the sound of rock scraping against the ground to inform someone that you were sneaking up on them. Reaching the front door, he stood on the porch for a moment, arranging himself so that the knife clenched in his right fist was concealed behind his back. Pressing the doorbell and finding it to be broken, he knocked on the door, hard. It took a long few minutes for the handle to rattle and the door to finally swing inwards, the stench of alcohol and cigarettes slamming into his nostrils and tickling the back of his throat.
Before the man had the chance to say anything he lunged forward, knife plunging into the guys' throat with practised accuracy. The man choked, gurgling on blood, as he forced the knife further into the flesh of the neck. He had to lean his whole weight on it, fingers white knuckled on the hard hilt, before the now entirely blunt metal finally forced its way out the other side of the victims' neck. He stepped back, nose wrinkling in disgust at the mans scent (heavy BO, stale cigarettes and hard liquor) and watched dispassionately as he writhed on the floor, retching blood onto the wood of the porch as his eyes rolled back in their sockets.
When the guy finally gave up the ghost he stepped forward and wrenched the knife out of his neck, releasing the blood there in a gushing fountain which quickly added to the already large pool dripping down between the planks of the porch. For a moment he stood there, studying the man with something like pity in his eyes, before turning away, bloody knife clutched in one large hand.
---
The knife was crimson-slick and mottled with rust, and it had just performed its last kill.
He sat on the banks of a river, staring into the black rapids, spinning the knife idly in one hand. He didn't want to get rid of it; he felt vaguely like he was throwing away an old, loyal friend. What did that knife ever do to you, huh? What did it do to deserve this fate?
A lot, actually. He doesn't think of his childhood much; doesn't let himself. The memories are too vivid, too painful, and he doesn't like thinking. But it was a special occasion, really. The knife was important; it symbolised so much. His pain, his terror, his freedom. It once belonged to a man called George Bradley, a lonely middle aged slob who had, for some unfathomable reason, decided that he needed company in the form of a kid. Being that no woman would stray within ten feet of him, he had decided to adopt a four year old boy who had, back then, gone by the name of Samuel Winchester.
Sam. It was funny how his own name sounded, to him, so much like that of a strangers. He couldn't remember the last time he had told someone his real name. He did, however, remember the last time that the name had really been his, really meant something. One thing he knew was that it wasn't the name but the person who said it that counted.
Take care of yourself, Sammy. Be brave for me, 'kay? We'll see each other again someday, I promise.
He viciously scrubbed away the tears in his eyes, biting his bottom lip to stop it from trembling. Dean had broken his promise; left him all alone in the company of someone who was remarkably alike to the man that he had just killed. If you put him in the place of the wife and the knife he held in his hands in place of the fists, then you had an accurate picture of his childhood.
Don't think about it.
George Bradley had been the first person he had killed, and his knife the first weapon he had ever used.
Gritting his teeth, he stood and flung the knife into the rapids in one swift motion and strode away. Not once did he look back.
---
His new knife of choice was a Bowie one, brought from a hunting store. It was a long while before he had to use it, and he welcomed the break. The novelty of road tripping in the old, noisy van (not to mention the constant killing) had worn off ages ago, or perhaps it hadn't existed in the first place. For the first time in a long while he found himself hungry for companionship, and that bothered him. He was strong enough to get by on his own, right? He didn't need or want any company. If he couldn't do it alone, he was weak.
You're a weak little shit, you hear me! Suck it the fuck up! Take it like a man!
Who was he kidding? Of course he wanted company. It was just another human weakness, and one he couldn't afford to succumb to. What sort of company would enjoy going around killing people anyway? What sort of company would want to be around him? He hated himself; it was just logical that anybody else would hate him too.
He spent the majority of his vacation of sorts holed up in his shitty motel room, nursing a bottle of liquor as he browsed the net. The few books he owned he had read dozens of times, and he couldn't really stand reading them anyway. They were books he had gotten when he was a child, back in one of those brief periods when George Bradley had stayed sober long enough to attempt to be a good caregiver. They were mostly fantasy stories, about peasants or orphans who suddenly found out that they were destined to be a great warrior or that they were actually royalty, and were whisked away from their horrible lives to do great deeds and visit amazing new lands. Apart from the fact that they were children's books, he didn't read them because it was just too painful to remember his naivety, his innocent hope for a better life that was never fulfilled and never would be fulfilled. Reading them reminded him too much of what he had lost.
He spent all his 'holiday' a little drunk and a lot horny, and most of it browsing porn sites. He felt vaguely dirty, but he figured he deserved some small bit of pleasure. Hell, the first and last time he had gotten laid had been about two or three years ago; he couldn't remember which. Speaking as a healthy, well functioning twenty two year old male, it seemed totally insane. It wasn't like he was horribly ugly or anything; not on the outside, anyway. Even with his nonexistent seduction skills, scoring would be easy for him. He just felt like he was infected somehow; irreversibly tainted by the things he did and the things that had been done to him. He couldn't infect someone else with his sickness; couldn't drag some innocent girl down with him. That would just be cruel.
Hah, a murderer, worrying about being cruel?
God. Could he do anything right?
---
He managed to find his next kill before his drunken vacation really started to get him down. Justine Barker was a woman in her late thirties, living in the suburbs. She was well known around her neighbourhood for being very helpful and scarily wise; there were even those that said she was psychic. Psychic or not, he doubted she would see him coming. And if she was psychic… well, he could definitely use some answers that only one who was supernaturally inclined could give him.
It took him only an hour to find her house, knocking her out with a well placed punch when she opened the door. Hefting her over his shoulder, he walked over the threshold, shutting and locking the door behind him and thanking whatever deity that might look favourably upon murderers that Justine was so skinny, practically weightless. It was worrying, in a god-I-hope-she-doesn't-have-anorexia sort of way. Strange thing to be worrying about considering you're the one who'll kill her, not some disease, Sammy boy.
Ignoring the snide voice at the back of his mind, he searched the house for a suitable room to do this in. Luckily, she had an almost bare spare room; he grabbed a chair from the dining room, tied her to it with a length of rope, and then dragged the chair into the middle of the room. For a second he studied her face, pale and unblemished except for the slowly flourishing bruise on her chin, and then he stepped back and let himself collapse into a cross-legged position on the floor in front of her. Twirling his new knife in his hand, he leaned back until he was lying on the cool wooden floor, staring up at the ceiling and thinking about nothing.
It was half an hour before she started to stir, snapping him out of his near meditative state. He sat up once more, knife stilled in his grip, and watched closely as her eyelids fluttered. Pale blue eyes met his own without any hint of surprise or panic – it was almost like she had been expecting this, and her next words confirmed his suspicion.
"I was wondering how long it would take you to get here."
He stiffened, stared at her with eyes that were deliberately blank. Unfortunately, his poker face was let down by his stupid response. "Huh?"
"I dreamt you," she said, as though it explained everything.
"Oh." He coughed, clearing his throat, and tried to remember how to have a normal conversation. He couldn't. "So you are a psychic."
"As are you." She studied him for a long moment, her stare so steady it was unnerving, and he shifted in his seat. "What are you doing, Sam? Why have you got me tied up?"
No-one gets to call me that. "If you really are a psychic, I have some questions that I think you can answer for me."
"Interesting." She strained against her bonds for a moment as if wanting to lean politely closer, an earnest look in her eyes, as though they were having an in depth chat over a cup of coffee. It was extremely surreal. "Ask away, then."
He took a deep breath, nervous, before reminding himself that she was going to be dead soon anyway; what did it matter what impression he made on her? "I have visions. When I'm awake, I mean. Have you heard of anything like that before?"
She was silent for a long moment, and when she did finally speak it was slow and measured, as though she was being very careful not to startle a skittish animal. "Heard of it, yes. I've never met anyone who actually has them though." A pause. "What are they about?"
"You already know."
Her smile was smug and condescending, making his blood boil hot in his veins, and he clenched his fists, the hilt of the knife digging patterns into his skin. "Of course I do. I said I dreamt you, didn't I?"
"What did you see in your dream?"
"I saw you knocking me out when I opened the door and slitting my throat with that knife of yours. Why, Sammy? Why would you do something like that?"
Don't me call me that.
"Maybe there isn't a reason. Maybe you're just crazy. I bet your brother was glad to be rid of you."
"Stop it."
"He'll legally be an adult now; has been for years. He had eight long years, and he didn't bother to find you and rescue you from your father. Why do you think that is, Sam?"
He gritted his teeth, clenched fists shaking in anger as the blood rushed to his face. "You bitch. Don't you fucking dare dig around in my memories."
"What are you gonna do?" She was leering at him, pretty face stretched into an ugly mask. "You're already going to kill me; what have I got to lose?"
There was no arguing with the truth of that, and he didn't think he could stand this any longer either. He didn't know if she was a nosy bitch or if this was just some roundabout way to get him to face up to his denial, and he didn't care. All he knew was that if he listened to her any longer he would either start crying and never be able to stop, or strangle her to a slow death. Either option was unthinkable, and so he turned and ran like the coward he was.
---
This was bad. This was really bad.
He sat bent over Justine's living room table, forehead cradled in his palms as he rested his elbows on the wooden surface. He was being pathetic, letting his personal demons keep him from doing the job. A woman was tied up in that room, probably waiting for him to return or foiling an escape plan, when she had no business even breathing. She should have been dead an hour ago, and if that wasn't the case soon, it would be him who would suffer; him, and the family he didn't really know but still loved.
He hadn't really needed to ask her about the visions; he knew perfectly well the reason he had them. It hadn't been answers he was searching for; it was comrades, friends, people who were in the same boat as him. He couldn't be the only one that the demon contacted, but it was entirely plausible that he was the only one who had premonitions.
Stop it.
He was thinking again. With a sigh, he levered himself to his feet, grabbing his unsheathed Bowie knife from the tabletop before going back to the spare room. Before he entered the room he made sure his face was cold, expressionless, and tried to stop his heart from beating double time. When it continued to ring in his ears, he sighed in resignation and went in anyway.
She was slumped on the chair, dozing lightly, and his steps faltered. He didn't know whether to be impressed or worried at her apparent disregard for her own life. It unnerved him, made him hesitate, and before he totally lost his nerve he crouched down in front of her and slit her throat in one smooth movement, the knife slicing through flesh and skin as though it were no more substantial than paper.
It was a very good knife. He tried to think about that instead of the fact that he had just taken yet another life, and it was definitely not the last.
---
For the first time in a long time, he dreamed of the past.
He lay on the floor, shivering, curled into the foetal position. The night was cold, and the basement of George Bradley's house was damp and icy, the concrete of the floor hard and unforgiving on the bruises and cuts that littered his body. He was eighteen, a grown man, and yet he was still under his foster fathers thumb. Still so terrified, still so obedient.
He gave another shudder, trying to pull his limbs impossibly close to his body. He was naked, his bloodstained clothes in the hands of his foster father. Be it winter or summer, the basement was always freezing, and being stripped so roughly of his dignity and his warmth was never pleasant. He was used to the cuts and the bruises by now, well acquainted with the coppery tang of blood, but he doubted that he'd ever get used to this bone deep cold, to the numbing of both his body and mind.
When he was down here, it was always Before he thought of. Before was the time when he was safe, when he was loved, when he had nothing to fear but the supernatural. When he thought of Before, lost himself in the few good memories from that dark time, he could forget for a little while the nightmare he lived in now. When he remembered the nightmare, when he realised all over again the hopelessness of his situation, it hurt more than it did before. It was like coming off a high, like the hangover after the drinking. It was worth it, though; anything was better than reality.
He let out a breath that turned into steam in front of his half lidded eyes, and then frowned, peering into the darkness of the basement. Was it just his imagination, or were there two yellow dots of light floating above him? He tilted his head up slightly, brain slow from the cold, and found two yellow eyes glaring down at him. His sluggish pulse thumped a little faster, but he was too numb to react or to care; and so he simply stared back at the dark figure that towered above him.
"Hello, Sam. I'll make this quick, because I doubt you feel much like chatting. You don't look like you're enjoying yourself here; what say we make a deal? I'll free you, give you the means to get rid of George Bradley; but in return, you'll have to serve me. What do you say?"
Of course he wanted to be free, and so he gathered his strength to give a jerky little nod to the figure that something in his mind identified as a demon. He didn't care about the price of freedom; he was freezing, he could hardly think, and he would do anything to get away from George Bradley.
"You agree?" There was the flash of white teeth in the darkness, and his foster fathers' knife materialised in his clenched fist. He heard the lock on the basement door turn, and the air moved in a whuff of sound as a bundle of clothes dropped to the floor next to his head. "Wonderful. I will be in contact with you soon, Samuel Winchester. I'll see you in your dreams."
---
The first thought that passed his mind as he watched the man get out of the black Impala was: he tricked me.
The demon had sent him a vision of his next kill, as usual, and it had been the man who was in the same motel room as the guy in the Impala. But there was only one bed in the motel room and the man had definitely not looked like this. He watched in horror as Impala-guy unlocked the door and swaggered inside. They had a deal. He would do whatever the demon asked so long as the demon didn't do what he had threatened; hurt him or his family.
When you said I had to serve you, I didn't realise I had to killfor you!
You can't back down on our agreement, Sammy boy. And if you do, you and your beloved family will suffer for it.
Fuck. FUCK!
That yellow eyed bastard wanted him to kill Dean. Dean.
He couldn't.
If he had done what he was planning to do, which was knock on the door and slit his victims throat before they had even seen his face, Dean would be dead and he wouldn't have even known who it was he was killing. The demon had been relying on him to do that; what the demon hadn't foreseen was him arriving early enough to see who really resided in the motel room. It wasn't a haggard middle aged man as he had seen in his vision; it was Dean.
He had to do something; if he didn't do this job, another of the demons' henchmen would. The first and last time he had failed to kill someone, the demon had sent another to take care of them, though he hadn't been very pleased about it. He was under the impression that he was the demons 'favourite,' pretty much his right hand man, and that it was very embarrassing for the demon when he failed to do his job.
And his job was killing the family and friends of the gifted children. Children like him, whose mothers had died burning over their cots. He killed these people so when the demon contacted the gifted children, they would have nowhere to run to, no-one to turn to. The demon hadn't told him this, and still seemed to have no idea that he knew.
How naïve of him, to think that his own family wouldn't be targeted. Hell, it was probably amazing that they had been allowed to live for so long. It would seem stupid to anyone else that the demon wanted to make him kill his family, but he understood the reasons behind it. If the demon had gotten his way, he would have killed Dean and then been torn apart by the realisation. Despite everything, despite his own doubts and hatred for himself, despite all the murders he had committed, he had still retained some of his humanity. Killing the only person he loved, killing the only thing he strived to protect, would destroy that humanity. Would turn him into the killing machine the demon wanted him to be.
He had to do something.
---
His heart was in his throat, his hands clammy and clumsy as he knocked briskly on the white wooden door. He shifted from foot to foot, nervous and unsure, and then the knob turned and the door swung open, and he couldn't think.
It was Dean, standing there in the doorway, frowning at him in confusion. He opened his dry mouth, tried to say something, but all he could do was stare in amazement at the familiar features, changed and matured overtime, but still there, still Dean. Dean, whose eyes widened in recognition, whose mouth abruptly moulded into a surprised O. Dean, who stepped over the threshold, staring at him as though in a dream. Dean, who reached out to grip his arm so hard it hurt; but the touch made it real, brought tears into both of their eyes.
"S-Sammy?" It was breathed, just a faint whisper of air passing his lips, but he heard it and his heart jumped in his chest.
"Dean." He tried to blink away the tears, tried to compose himself, but his was really Dean. Dean, for the first time in seventeen long, horrible years.
It seemed his big brother was having the same problem. "Is it really you?" A broken little whisper, full of dread and hope. He nodded fervently, bangs whipping back and forth.
"It really is. You can tell me Christo if you want." His voice was rushed, breathy, but he didn't care how much of a dork he sounded. Dean gave a choked laugh, nodding his acceptance and joy, and tugged him closer, staring into his eyes as though searching for answers. "Would it be gay of me if I hugged you?"
That choked laugh again, and then Dean was wrapping his arms around him, leaning a forehead on his shoulder. "Nah. Don't tell anyone, though." And then in a smaller voice, "it's so good to see you again, little brother. I'm sorry I broke my promise."
Soon he would have to step out of the protective circle of Dean's arms, warn him about the demon, and tell him of his own sins. But right now, he was content to just stand here and let the world pass them by. He figured they deserved it.
Note: Lets just say that, in this reality, they learned about Christo at a young age.