Title: Missing Son
Pairing: none
Characters: John and Sam for now…Dean later on.
Spoilers: Season 1 is fair game
Summary: AU where instead of Dean showing up at Stanford, John show's up to tell Sam that Dean is missing…and has been for over four months.
A/N: Hopefully this is something new in the AU world of Supernatural, reviews are welcomed.
Sam's eyes opened sharply at the thump that came from the kitchen. He slowly got out of bed, spared a glance at Jessica who was still sound asleep, and then slowly started making his way down the hall. He paused at the living room entryway and waited; the shadow of a man…or thing appeared in the kitchen. Sam quickly made his way behind the kitchen French doors and waited for whoever had invaded his house to walk by. He didn't have to wait long; Sam jumped the man in the dark, but the guy had been prepared, he blocked Sam's punches and kick with ease, and before he knew it, Sam was on the ground.
John grinned ruefully, "Easy tiger."
Sam looked up into the man's face, "Dad?"
"You're out of practice." His father stated.
Sam proved him wrong as John found himself flipped around and on the bottom.
"Let me up." John growled.
"Dad, what are you doing here?" Sam asked annoyed.
"Well, I was looking for a beer." John answered offhandedly.
"Dad," Sam growled.
"Take it easy Sammy; I needed to talk to you."
"The phone?" Sam stated.
"If I had called, would you have picked up?" John asked.
Sam gave him a look. Before he had the chance to ask his father what it was he so desperately needed to talk to him about, the living room light flickered on.
"Sam?" came Jessica's voice.
"Jess," Sam stated as both him and his father turned their attention to her.
"What's going on?"
"Jess, this is John."
"Your father John?" Jessica asked.
"Yeah,"
John gave his son a look, things between them sucked…the kid didn't even present him as his father. What did you expect, John? You pretty much disowned the kid.
"I have to borrow Sammy here to talk about some personal family stuff." He told Jessica in a gruff tone.
John looked over at Sam and saw something flicker in his eyes, but then he walked over to Jessica, put his arm around her and faced his father with defiance written all over his face, "Anything you need to say, you can say in front of her."
John looked from Sam to Jess and then back to Sam, he took a deep breath and said: "Dean's gone."
As soon as the words came out of John's mouth he wanted to hit himself. The look on Sammy's face was agonizing; it looked like someone had sucker punched him in the stomach.
"What?" Sam whispered, about to come to his knees.
"NO! Not like that." John assured, "He's not dead…he's missing."
Tears came to Sam's eyes and Jess took hold of his hand, "What? How? Missing? How can he be missing?"
The questions poured out of Sam and John didn't even know where to start. Jess saw the agonizing look in John's eyes and said, "I'll go make some coffee."
Both men nodded and when she left the room, Sam's focus was on John, "How long?"
John frowned; Sammy wasn't going to like the answer, "For over four months."
Sam's eyes widened in horror, "And you're just telling me now?" He almost screamed.
"Sammy," John started.
"NO!" he shouted, "Don't make up some lame excuse; you should have told me when it happened."
"I wanted to keep you out of it." John said simply.
Sam looked at him, "He's my brother." He responded with anguish.
John nodded with sorrow in his eyes, "I know Sammy, I know."
Sam brushed away the tears that had formed in his eyes and composed himself, "Tell me what happened."
"Okay, Sammy."
John went over to the nearest couch and sat down; Sam noticed his father was walking with a limp. What the hell happened? Where are you Dean?
And John started his story…
"About a year ago I picked up a trail on the Demon,"
"Our Demon?" Sam asked, shocked.
John met his son's gaze, "Yeah, our Demon."
Sam nodded and John continued, "I pretty much ditched Dean while he was on a job in New Orleans," John paused and met Sam's gaze, "I was sure he'd come and get you, but he didn't, he went on and did his own thing while looking for me at the same time. It just wasn't safe for me to be around him…I was vulnerable when I was around him. Anyway, Missouri," John stopped at Sam's questioning eyes.
"She was a psychic back in Lawrence; she helped me figure out what it was I was after. Anyway, she called me out of the blue and said Dean was doing a job for a lady in our old house."
Sam's eyes widened in horror, "Was it the demon?"
John shook his head, "No, by the time I got there, Dean had taken care of everything, apparently a Poltergeist and your mom's, spirit were in the House."
"Mom?" Sam asked, bewildered.
John smiled faintly, "She saved his life and got rid of the Poltergeist, destroying herself in the process."
Sam nodded, understanding, yet wishing he had been there, "Did Dean see you,"
"No, I didn't want to take the chance." John answered, "A few months later he called from Chicago saying he thought he'd found the Demon. I drove like a maniac to get there and discovered it was a trap to lure me in. They were using him as bait. He got away, of course."
Sam smiled slightly, of course he had.
"I hid in his motel room and surprised him when he got back, he was glad to see me but angry just the same, I could see it in his eyes." John said sadly, "We didn't have much time to talk, some shadow spirits, controlled by the demons daughter attacked us. Dean said it would be best that we went our own way. So we did."
"About a month later I found out that had been killed by some vampires."
"Vampires?" Sam questioned, "They exist?"
"Yeah," John answered,
"Why didn't you ever tell us?"
"I thought they had all been killed," John replied, he stopped talking as he saw Jessica come back in the room with two cups of coffee.
"Here you go," she said and turned to Sam, "I'm going to go back to sleep."
Sam nodded, and gave her a quick kiss.
John waited for her to leave the room, "She's nice."
Sam met his gaze, "I want to marry her."
John smiled, "I hope it works out for you Sammy."
Sam nodded, "Tell me the rest."
"When I got to his cabin I saw Dean, apparently he had found out about 's death. There was a letter addressed to me regarding the colt."
"What colt?" Sam asked,
"Samuel Colt built a special gun during the . This gun was said to be able to kill anything." John explained.
"Even the demon?"
"Yeah, even the demon."
"Did you get the gun?" Sam asked, almost on the edge of his seat, yet scared about where his father's story was leading.
"Yeah, we got it. I told Dean to go free the vampires nest while I got hold of the colt and for him to leave town as soon as he was done." John frowned, "One of the vampires almost got me, but Dean showed up out of nowhere and took most of them out. We got the colt and shagged ass."
"Dean disobeyed a direct order?" Sam asked, stunned.
John met Sam's gaze, "Dean doesn't do much of anything I tell him to do anymore. Things got pretty rough when you left. Dean blamed me, rightfully so, and he kind of almost turned into you." John smiled with torment, "He said I didn't deserve you as a son and that he was ashamed of me."
John met Sam's gaze, "He was right, I should have never told you to stay gone, I was scared, and my anger got the best of me."
Sam nodded, but said nothing. Dean disobeying orders? Telling dad off? Jesus, Dean, did me leaving really change you that much?
"Anyway, we went off together to get rid of the demon, but they found out we had the colt, so I went to trade a fake colt with the demon's daughter and Dean went to save a family from the Demon."
"I got caught." John started, anger in his voice, "And Dean, he came after me. The demon knew he would, it was his plan all along, they knew Dean must have had the real colt, so they let him get me back…but the demon had taken over my body."
"Dean didn't notice, not at first anyway," John whispered, "The whole time I couldn't control my body, but I could see and feel everything my body was doing. He tried acting like me, but he slipped up a few times, and when he asked for the colt from Dean, it finally clicked that something was off."
"Dean pulled the colt on me and said that I wasn't his father." John said, "But he didn't shoot me, I don't think he could, he didn't want to take the chance."
John then looked into Sam's eyes with anguish, "I nearly killed Dean with my own hands, I may not have been in control, but it was still me…the things I said to Dean; it was awful, Sammy. There was so much blood; I thought for sure I had killed him."
Sam's eyes were round with horror, "Jesus, Dad, what happened?"
"I got control of my body for just a second, it was long enough for Dean to grab the gun and shoot me in the leg; he didn't hesitate this time. I fell to the ground and I heard Dean pass out. The demon left my body and disappeared."
John looked up and his eyes were full of tears, "I thought he was dead, I was sure Dean was dead. There was so much blood, some coming out of his mouth which indicated internal bleeding. I crawled over to him and he opened his eyes; the fucker asked how I was doing. He was dying right in front of me and wondering if I was okay."
"Dean's pretty selfless," Sam added, tears also in his eyes.
John looked into Sammy's eyes, "Yeah, he is, isn't he?"
John took a deep breath and continued, "I got Dean in the back of the Impala and I started heading for the nearest hospital," John paused and then looked straight into Sammy's eyes, "And then a semi t-boned us out of nowhere. It destroyed the Impala, I remember looking back at Dean, and it looked like he'd smashed his head against the window. I had enough time to call 911 and then I passed out. That's the last time I saw him."
"What?" Sam asked, confused.
"I woke up a week later in the hospital; the doctors said I was the only one who'd been in the car, even though there was evidence that there had been someone else in the back at the time of the collision." John explained, "He just disappeared, I went back to the crash site as soon as I could and there was no trace of him being dragged or anything, he was just gone."
"How?" Sam asked,
"I don't know Sammy, the demons disappeared too. There have been no possessions or anything since that day."
"But why after four months did you decide to come to me?" Sam asked.
John almost smiled, "See, I'd pretty much given him up for dead when I got a letter." John pulled an envelope out of his coat pocket, "It was addressed to you and it's in Dean's writing."
Sam looked at the letter hopefully, "Did you read it?"
"No," John had been tempted, but it was addressed to Sam for a reason.
Sam took the letter from his father, he quickly noticed that there was no postage stamp or return address, "He must have dropped it off in the box himself," Sam stated.
"That's what I thought." John replied. Sam sat and looked at the letter, "Jesus, Sammy, open it!"
TBC