Summary: Between the disappearances, the deaths and, oh, yes, the demons, not to mention the beginning of some evil plan to end the world, their lives were never going to be quite so easy again.
AN: This is the first chapter of an ongoing story called SNAFU (Situation Normal, All Fucked Up). I hope to add one chapter a week, real life allowing. The chapters are tags, extra scenes and other moments in Series One which were not shown on screen and depict the lives of the Winchesters and their allies from October 2005 to October 2006.
Sara Lucian and the Atwood brothers are characters from my series of Supernatural stories. Reading those is probably not essential.
Reviews are hugely appreciated. This story is an experiment for me and I'd love any comments, constructive criticism or advice anyone would like to give.
xxx
New Orleans, Louisiana,
27th October, 2005
"I have come to the firm conclusion that voodoo sucks," Dean said, flopping backwards onto yet another motel bed. At least this one wasn't stained in an assortment of suspicious colours. "Those creepy little dolls? Completely unnecessary. And the whole zombie thing…"
"Those weren't zombies," came the reply from the bathroom. "They were manifest spirits. No reanimation of dead flesh, no desire to eat brains and a hell of a lot easier to get rid of!"
"They still sucked." Dean glanced over as Sara Lucian, his best friend and hunting partner, came out of the bathroom looking thoroughly exasperated.
"As always, your ability to state the blindingly obvious warms my heart," Sara said, rolling her eyes.
Dean grinned. Nobody else had such a way with insults. "Pizza came while you were plucking your eyebrows."
"I don't pluck my eyebrows. Ooh, ham and mushroom." Through a mouthful of pizza, she kept talking. "You heard anything from Papa Winchester?"
Dean shook his head, losing the grin. "He's probably just busy. Moved on, found another gig, something like that."
"Wouldn't be the first time," Sara agreed. "He'll turn up, Dean. Your dad's only a bastard to people he's not related to, remember?"
"Did you ever work out what the spat with Bobby Singer was about?"
"Apart from that it ended with a shotgun being cocked? Nope, not a thing. I asked, but Bobby just told me not to worry my pretty little head about it." Sara shrugged.
"Well, after three years, I guess people have finally figured out that you tell me everything." Dean grinned at the look Sara gave him, part annoyance and part fond exasperation. "Three weeks on the same job, that's… That's a little weird, right?"
Sara followed the change of topic easily, the result of too long spent with Dean. "Not necessarily. We spent two weeks on that cursed object thing in Texas only a few months back, not to mention that twenty-year-long quest for revenge you and your father have. Besides, we haven't spotted any more suspicious deaths in that part of Cali and nor has Will, so you're probably right."
"He's just moved on," Dean said and nodded, as if that would make him any more convinced. A lifetime of hunting gave you good instincts and he just couldn't shake the feeling that something was seriously wrong.
But Sara was looking at him worriedly, so he managed to smile. It didn't convince her for a second, he knew, but there were… formalities. Or at least, that would be how Sara put it. It was just the way they always did things.
xxx
The girl was screaming. Good.
Humans hands were so imprecise at this sort of work, but the shiny knife from the kitchen was more than good enough to carefully slice open the boy's stomach until the floor was covered in slick blood and his intestines were open to the air.
Hm. Boring now. But the girl…
Sara sat bolt upright, narrowly avoiding falling off the bench.
"You know, that's the third time you've done that in the last fortnight."
She turned to glare at Dean, who was standing in the doorway, looking like he was just innocently enjoying the sun on his face. It didn't convince her for a moment. "Shut up."
"Just saying-"
"Unless you're saying that you brought me tea, I'm not listening." She slid off the bench to sit on the decking.
He rolled his eyes, handed over the overlarge mug and sat down on the deck's railing. "This place is nice in the autumn. Peaceful."
"That's only 'cause Adrian isn't at home," Sara said. "God, Dean, you're the only American I ever met who can make tea properly."
"I'm the only guy in America who can put too much sugar to be healthy in your tea?"
"It is a rare gift. How's Will getting on with that message from your dad?"
"He agrees that there's EVP on it, but it's too mangled to make out at the moment. He's working on it."
"So why are you out here on the deck rather than bugging him in the basement?"
"Because he hit me with his cane."
Sara grinned. After a seriously disturbing message from John and a frantic drive from New Orleans back to Black Earth, she felt a little like that herself. They really needed to get their hands on some more portable technology.
Dean leant over to nudge her. "When are we going to talk about this? These nightmares since that last exorcism, all bad enough to leave you seriously freaked out."
"They're just nightmares. Just… Just my warped mind sorting out a kink or two." Sara shrugged. "Normal nightmares."
"But they scare you."
"Yeah, that kinda the point of nightmares." Sara put the mug of tea down, staring at it. "You ever had that dream where the monster's doing terrible things and you can't stop it?"
"Yeah."
"You ever had the one where you're the monster?"
A clang from the kitchen had them both stumbling to their feet before Dean could answer.
"Will?" Sara said, pulling open the door to the kitchen. "You okay, man?"
Will Atwood was a computer genius, an ex-Hunter only two years older than Dean who had been crippled in a hunt gone seriously wrong. He was also currently hopping around his own kitchen.
"Banged my leg." Another hop, narrowly missing the bin. "Oh, I hate those stairs."
"So, next time, don't build your supercomputer in the basement," Dean said.
"Bite me, Winchester." Will stopped hopping, steadying himself, and threw a small cassette-player on the counter. "There's your precious EVP. John's not showing up in any police reports, hospital reports or any other kind of report I could find. Have fun."
He walked past the pair of them, his cane clicking on the wooden floor.
Dean picked up the cassette-player, hitting the play button. There was no point talking to Will when he was in that sort of mood.
"I can never go home."
"What the hell does that mean?" Sara said, leaning forward.
"No idea. But maybe if we go to Jericho, we can figure it out and find my Dad." He paused. "How long does it take to get from here to Jericho?"
"Uh… thirty hours? Maybe a bit less, the way you drive." She turned away, starting to stack dishes in the sink. "Wouldn't take much longer to get to Stanford."
"What?"
"Well, I was just thinking…"
"Never a good sign."
"The first time we met, when both our parents went missing, nothing could've made either of us stay behind. You didn't even try to leave me out of it and I was greener than grass. John is Sam's father too, no matter what either of them might like to think about that fact."
Dean started fiddling with the cassette player. "He wanted out. We let him go. I haven't even spoken to him in two years. Any of this ringing a bell?"
"Yes, but... John sounded worried in that message. 'Something's starting, we're all in danger', I mean, it's hardly encouraging. Even if we can write that off as your dad being his normal, fun-loving self, Sam has a right to know John's in trouble. You can't do this hunt alone, Dean."
"At what point did we stop being partners?"
"I can't. I can't go with you this time. The crystals are lighting again, and it's only been two weeks since my last exorcism. I should've had at least another month of peace, maybe two. That isn't right and I need to keep an eye on it." Sara shrugged. "We've both hunted alone before."
"Yeah, and both of us hated it." Dean made himself put down the cassette player. He knew just how much it would cost Sara to even make such an offer and he'd be lying through his teeth if he said he wasn't just itching for a chance to see Sammy. "It's just one hunt, right?"
"Dean. Go to Stanford, meet Sam, convince him to go with you to Jericho. Find your Dad, probably in the middle of a terrible brawl, drop Sam off, pick me up. Simple."
Reluctantly, Dean nodded. "Promise you'll call me if you need help."
"Promise." Sara smiled at him, trying to look like she was fine with this, and managed to keep smiling throughout Dean's clumsy goodbye, right up until the Impala was pulling away from the Atwoods' isolated home.
Turning back towards the house, Sara leant against the porch railing and stared at the protective symbols carved into the wood.
"You know, you're one hell of a woman."
She blinked, managing to focus on Will. She hadn't even noticed him come out of the house. "Yes, and you should kneel down and worship me for it," she replied absently.
"Might pass on the kneeling," Will said, his cane pointedly tapping the floor as he walked forward to join her. "Fourth crystal just went haywire."
"That's just what I needed to hear. Thank you." Sara pulled the tie off her plait, running her fingers through her hair. "It's only been three days since the first one lit up, right?"
"Yeah. What's the significance?"
"The crystals light up when a demon tries to get out of hell. When all five are shining, it means the demon's out. But… normally it takes a week or more to get this far. I'll have to check the Diaries."
Will smiled. "Hell of a time to try and go solo, little Lucian."
"It's temporary."
"Alright, alright. I was just saying."
"Any word on Maxwell?"
"Adrian reached his house. No sign of him, but also no sign of anything panic-worthy. At least, not yet. Maxwell's probably just off avoiding people. Living in a city can be pretty rough on a seer. Too many signals, they get confused or something. Psychic overload."
"I did grow up with a psychic, you know."
"Yeah, but I like acting like I know more than you. It'd be nice if you let me get away with my delusions once in a while."
"Noted." With forced cheer, she nudged Will. "So let's go deal with our crystals."
xxx
31st October, 2005,
Palo Alto, California,
If he was very lucky, and very, very quiet, maybe he could get away with not going to this stupid party. But Sam knew better. Jess wanted to go, wanted him to go, and that was reason enough, even if all his memories, instincts and training were begging him not to.
Mind you, his reluctance to have anything to do with Halloween was just another useless throwback to his hunting days. All Hallows Eve was a bad time for Hunters, that was what everyone believed even if Sam had never found any real evidence for that. The belief was somewhere between paranoia and superstition, some old theory that some things were more powerful on such nights. His father had had a lot of training from some seriously old-school Hunters and, as a result, Sam had been busy barricading himself into various motel rooms while most of his age group had been out trick-or-treating.
Sometimes, he really, really wishes that leaving that life had been as easy, as clean, as simple as leaving his family. Not that Sam didn't have his regrets about how all of that happened, but walking away from Dad and Dean had been much more successful that walking away from Hunting.
But the only ex-Hunter was a dead Hunter, which was why there were these huge glyphs under the wallpaper of his apartment, why he had a knife hidden away in a compartment in a seemingly-innocuous drawer, why a friend of his brother broke into his apartment four times a year to put down wards and blessings.
"Sam? You coming or what?"
He grabbed his jacket, stuck his head out of the door and asked, "Do I have to?" even though he already knew that answer. And seeing the smile on Jess' face, he wasn't even that bothered anymore.
That old life might not be completely behind him, but he had a better one in front of him.
xxx
1st November, 2005,
Jericho, California,
Well, this was… awkward. And weird. But mostly, awkward.
Dean had thought he was ready for this, he really had. Sure, things would be awkward. Two people who hadn't spoken in two years, who had parted on way less than amicable terms, of course it would be awkward. But not this awkward.
God, Sara would kill herself laughing if she knew what he was thinking.
Mind you, at least she would've seen the funny side of breaking into an ex-Hunter's apartment. Damn it, this whole family reunion with monsters thing was just such a bad idea. Yeah, so he'd been waiting for this kinda opportunity to come around for years, but he'd always imagined Sammy being a little more… Sammy-ish. And by Sammy-ish, he'd been thinking of the Sammy who hadn't spent every waking minute arguing, even if that had also been the eight-year-old version of Sammy.
Well, there hadn't actually been an argument yet and it'd already been a good few hours. That was worth something.
Dean had improvised meals from just about every gas station in America and he could manage the selection of hugely inappropriate breakfast foods without even looking. Various foodstuffs, gas, fake credit card. It took him a moment to remember what name he was meant to be using, but he could probably have signed as Donald Duck and the guy at the register wouldn't have noticed.
Stepping out of the station, it was still a shock for Dean to see Sam sitting in the Impala. Three years of Sam's absence and Dean had gotten used to seeing a short redhead hanging around.
But still… it wasn't completely new territory. Dean was prepared to bet that even after three years, he could still wind Sam up as easily as breathing.
"Hey," he said, stepping around the car. "You want breakfast?"
xxx
1st November, 2005,
Black Earth, Wisconsin,
…Got the crystals today. JL wasn't happy about sending them over to America, but if she wants me to do my job properly, I'll need them. Turns out that their range is much larger than we'd anticipated – distance seems to have little effect on them, just salt water. I've got coast-to-coast coverage of America, not to mention Canada. Now the only problem is finding the omens to point me to the demon. It's not like that nail trick will work for something happening a thousand miles away.
"Get anything?"
Sara looked up to see Will watching her. "Nope. Well, I know that the crystals light up when a demons escapes hell, I know that the demon will be coming out somewhere in America, or maybe Canada, and I know that they have never activated so quickly since my mother brought them here in '85. But nothing to explain why they're doing this." She flipped the diary shut with a little more force than was strictly necessary.
"'85? I thought your mom came here in the seventies," Will said, sitting down and carefully stretching his bad leg out.
"She did. It was only meant to be temporary, but there's more to kill out here, you know?"
"Wonder why that is," Will said thoughtfully.
"No idea. Go research it or something." Sara pushed the book aside. She hated reading her mother's old journal. While the average Hunter's Journal remained impassive and impersonal, Lucians had always been more likely to emote through the written word. "To hell with this. I'm going to go and check for omens."
"Again?" Will asked, but cut himself off, grinning, when she glared at him.
Muttering about irritating trackers, Sara walked through the kitchen to the basement stairs. It took a four-digit code to get into the basement, a security feature not found in most houses, and Sara hit the relevant buttons on the keypad without really thinking about it. A short trip down some stairs and she was standing in Will's domain, the Hub, as he liked to call it. Sara was just grateful he hadn't tried to call it Cerebro instead.
But, silly names aside, Will's computer set up was one of the most useful things Sara had ever come across. In the twelve months since Will had been forcibly retired from active Hunting, he'd made a name for himself as one of the best trackers in North America, helped by a great deal of natural skill and a homebuilt network of computers specifically designed to dig out any facts a Hunter might need. For a price, of course. This kind of technology did not come cheap.
Sara spared the crystals a glance as she settled down in front of one computer. The fifth crystal was still relatively dim, but it definitely looked brighter than it had the night before. Anticipation was a bitch. The only time it didn't disappoint was when you were expecting badness. And Sara was more certainly expecting badness.
However, until the badness actually arrived, she had work to do. Even if she had a killer headache, which wasn't helping. One of Will's freaking machines must be humming or something.
Sara stood up again. It was probably the computer under the basement stairs; it was the newest addition to the Hub and was suffering from what Will called 'minor technical difficulties'. As far as Sara could work out, that meant the damn thing was about as likely to implode as to be any actual help.
But she had only taken three steps when she realised her mistake. It wasn't the computer at all. Sara turned back, crouching down so the worktable and the crystals on it were at eye-level. The damn things had never hummed before, she was sure of that.
"Hey, Will!" she called. "Can you come down here?"
Hearing Will start to move on the floor above, she turned back to the crystals. Five crystals, never perfect, but Sara knew them as well as her own face and there was definitely something wrong with what she was seeing.
She only spotted the cracks in the crystals when they lengthened and had barely started to turn away when they exploded.
xxx
2nd November, 2005,
Palo Alto, California,
You can get used to anything. Anything but your kid brother walking away from you, that is.
Dean had sometimes wondered if it would've made any difference if he'd taken Sam to Stanford himself, instead of going to get completely pissed on cheap tequila and letting the kid get the bus. It wouldn't have made Sam stay, he knew that. But maybe those few extra miles together might've made Sam look back once in a while. Might've given Dean a chance to say… oh, something, anything to let Sam know that they were still brothers. Would always be brothers.
But it wouldn't. This whole weekend, Dean hadn't managed to do anything different. They'd bickered, insulted, mocked and just generally been brothers, but they'd done that for eighteen years and Sam had left. Two extra days wasn't going to change anything this time around.
Hunters don't give up. Semper fi, stubborn as shit, whatever you wanted to call it, Hunters never gave up. Period.
So he leant slightly towards to the departing figure of his brother, making sure to keep one hand on the steering wheel – he wasn't going to be staying, he knew that – and said, slow casual, "You know, we made one hell of team back there."
Even in the shitty lighting, he could see the faint smile on Sam's face. "Yeah," Sam said, but didn't move, didn't say anything else, and Dean had to start driving before either one of them said anything else.
Hunters might not give up, but they didn't fight pointless battles either.
One weekend didn't change anything. Sure, they'd killed a Woman in White and Sam had got his chest nearly ripped open – good luck explaining those wounds to the pretty blonde upstairs – and they'd proved once more that, yes, John Winchester was a Magnificent Bastard, but… this wasn't going to change. Not ever.
God, he hated the silence, almost as much as he hated the sight of an empty passenger seat, and he reached forward to turn on the radio. Didn't matter what station or what song, noise was the main thing right now.
His cell beeped from somewhere in his jacket and it was just his heavily-ingrained habit that made him fish it out. Unless the world was fucking ending, he really didn't give a damn, but he still flipped it open.
The phone was dropped as soon as Dean saw the text message, both hands shooting back to the steering wheel. It was a damn good thing that the streets were nearly empty, otherwise the 180 Dean pulled off would've been deadly for somebody.
On the floor of the Impala, the cell's lit screen still showed the message.
From: Adrian
Received: 22.59
Message: 911 - Sam.