Summary: Dean meets Ben several years after he had Cas wipe the Braedens' memories. He and Sam take a case at Princeton University, New Jersey, and whilst there they meet an engineering student who seems somewhat familiar. A Dean and Ben story, also featuring lots of Sam and cameos from Lisa. (Rated for some swearing and a description of victims of a cursed object.)

Warnings: Some swearing (although nothing which isn't common in the show). Description of victims of a cursed object. Also I know nothing about engineering/mechanics so apologies for any glaring inaccuracies!

Disclaimer: Writing belongs to me. AC/DC and their songs belong to themselves and their music label. Star Wars belongs to George Lucas and the production company. Everything else belongs to Warner Brothers/CW/Kripke and co. For entertainment purposes only.

AN: I really liked Lisa and Ben, and whilst Dean's place is 'driving down Crazy Street' with Sam I do think he was a great father to Ben during his time with them. I was interested to see how the pair of them meeting again, with Ben obviously not knowing who Dean was, would affect Dean and his thoughts towards himself and that year of his life.

AN2: The story is completely finished, with ten chapters and an epilogue. I will update every day/every other day, real life permitting.

Hope you enjoy. Reviews are very much appreciated. :)

Fingerprints of a life

By Lanthiriel25

Chapter 1

Maybe today was the day, he mused, as he dropped himself into his chair at the kitchen table, picking up his fork, plate of scrambled eggs in front of him. Maybe today was the day he'd finally got it right and the eggs would taste like they should. One mouthful soon told him that no, his latest variation on the scrambled egg recipe was still not right. He'd tried adding more salt today; it was better but something was still off about them, like there was a secret ingredient or special combination that someone had forgotten to tell him about. Setting down his fork with a sigh, he frowned. Why did every plateful of scrambled eggs he tried always taste like there was something missing? He couldn't explain it. Nathan, his roommate, said it was just because he was missing his mom's home-cooking, being his first year away from home and all, but he knew that wasn't it; his mom's scrambled eggs never tasted right either. It had gotten to the point where he just assumed it was just one of the world's great mysteries – the Bermuda triangle, the construction of the pyramids, his scrambled eggs; there was simply no other explanation.

Glaring at his plate, as if he held the eggs personally responsible for the fact that they tasted wrong, he picked up his fork again, resigned to eating them to appease his growling stomach despite them falling woefully short of his inexplicably picky standards. Dragging his still-open text book across the table Ben flipped through the pages until he found the chapter on refining combustion engines and began to read.

"Ben, dude! No studying before eight o'clock, them's the rules!"

Ben was startled from his reading by Nathan stumbling bleary-eyed into the room, dressed only in his boxers and an open robe, brown hair sticking up and sleep-mussed.

"Bite me!" Ben retorted through a mouthful of breakfast, turning to glare at his roommate, not expecting to be confronted with the sight of a semi-naked Nathan, yawning and scratching his bare stomach. "Argh! That is so not something I needed to see first thing in the morning!" he groused.

"What are you talking about? I'm a fine specimen of a human being!" Nathan argued, burying his head in the kitchen cupboard, searching for some bread that wasn't green and growing things.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever you say," Ben muttered, turning back to his book, grateful that Nathan's quest for breakfast was keeping him quiet, for now at least. Nathan was great; Ben had been worried about meeting his roommate, scared that they wouldn't get along, but they'd hit it off right away. Sure, he could be loud and annoying, with a terrible taste in music, but he was a genuinely nice guy once you got past his quirks, and hey, scrambled egg preferences notwithstanding, Ben knew he had a few quirks of his own. Speaking of which…Nathan was looking for bread, and Nathan never ate bread unless it had been toasted within an inch of his life…Ben braced himself, waiting for the inevitable outburst.

"BEN! Dude, seriously, what the…?! We've talked about this!"

Ben cringed, before schooling his expression into 'innocent with a slight hint of bemusement' which he'd perfected over the past few months. Mask of feigned ignorance firmly in place he turned to face his now scowling roommate.

"What?"

"'What' nothing you douchewad! Don't you play innocent with me! It's like my Xbox all over again! You promised!" Nathan shouted, looking slightly alarming as he whirled in anger around the small kitchen space, pacing up and down, gesturing wildly in his frustration. "It's practically the middle of the night and I have to get up to listen to Professor Brokovitz drone on and on about his new relic for the university or some such crap, and all I ask is that I can get some butter-smothered toast to cheer me up and give me some fuel to burn, but no, my mad-scientist of a roommate decides to use the toaster for his crazy schemes of world-domination, and I've had enough! I hate you Ben Braeden , I really really do!"

Ben stared blankly at the kitchen door as it shook in its frame after the epic slam Nathan had just subjected it to in his dramatic exit. He smiled to himself at Nathan's tirade, used to his tendencies towards the melodramatic; he felt bad about upsetting his roommate but he knew he would come round eventually, especially when Ben put the toaster back together so it was better than new. He'd meant to have it reassembled, new and improved, before Nathan woke up, but his scrambled egg quandary had completely pushed it from his mind.

Last night Ben had become tired of reading about linear and differential equations and their practical application in experimental engineering, fingers twitching with the desire to do some experimenting of his own. He knew he had to study, understand the theory, but what he enjoyed the most was throwing himself right into it and using his hands, exploring and playing with the technology, figuring things out for himself. He loved tinkering away with anything from cars to games consoles, and everything in between, wanting to know how they worked, altering them and improving them. He'd driven his mom to distraction at times because of it and now it seemed he was doing the same to Nathan. He'd already had to apologise for pulling apart Nathan's Xbox; he was only trying to make it run faster but Nathan hadn't taken too kindly to not being able to play his classic version of Plants v. Zombies for two days whilst Ben put it back together. Ben wasn't sure what the problem was; it wasn't like it was a realistic, or even halfway logical game anyway, plants definitely couldn't kill zombies. Anyway, since Nathan was out partying with his football friends last night, Ben had cranked up the volume on his stereo, his old favourite, AC/DC, blaring from the speakers, and set to work on experimenting with the toaster, singing along to 'Thunderstruck' as he did so.

Glancing at his watch, Ben sighed as realised he wouldn't have time to fix the toaster before his first seminar, he was cutting it quite close as it was; instead he rushed next door with a couple of slices of bread to Annie and Stacey's apartment suite. Banging on the door, he hoped he'd remembered rightly and that they had to be up for lectures too, otherwise he was going to be in for a world of pain. Luckily, Annie opened the door, chestnut-hair scraped up into an untidy bun, loose curls haphazardly framing her face, fully dressed and in the middle of cleaning her teeth.

"Can I use your toaster?" Ben asked, holding up the bread. "Ours is…broken."

Annie raised an eyebrow at Ben, showing she knew exactly what Ben meant by 'broken'. Ben grinned sheepishly, "Please?"

Having a mouthful of toothpaste, Annie simply nodded moving back from the doorway to let Ben in, who hurried to the kitchen and slammed the bread in the toaster. Without asking he began rifling through their fridge for the butter; no point presenting toast to Nathan that wasn't completely saturated in fat, he didn't have a death wish, thank you very much! Annie shook her head in disgust and disappeared into the bathroom. Ben could hear her rinse and spit.

"Thanks Annie!" he called out, as he pulled the nearly blackened toast from the machine, drowning it in butter. "You're a life saver!"

He dashed across the room, toast in hand, nearly crashing into his friend as she emerged from the bathroom, before racing back down the hall to his and Nathan's place.

"You owe me one Braeden!" Annie called good-naturedly down the corridor, snorting in mock-derision at Ben's answering wave, before he disappeared inside his rooms.

Dumping the toast on a chipped plate, Ben rapped on Nathan's closed bedroom door before leaving the peace offering on the floor for him to collect when he deigned to come out.

"Breakfast is served!" he announced loudly, before racing around the living room, collecting up his books and tools, stuffing them into his bag.

He smiled as he heard Nathan's door open and his declaration of "Maybe I'll only seriously maim you instead of killing you."

"Thanks man, I'm honoured!" Ben laughed as he scraped his half-eaten eggs into the bin, no great loss there, and dumped his plate in the kitchen sink. He felt a twinge of guilt at not washing up; his mom would lecture him good and proper for that, but what she didn't know wouldn't hurt her he mused.

He jumped as 'For those about to rock' echoed from his pocket. Pulling out his phone his eyes widened when he saw 'Mom' flashing on the display. He glanced incredulously at the dirty plate taunting him from the sink; how did she know?! Shaking his head at the absurdity of the whole thing, he slung his bag over his shoulder and left his apartment, pressing the answer button on his cell as he locked the door behind him and set off down the seven flights of stairs.

"Hi Mom."

"Hey sweetie, how are you?"

"Fine thanks. Running late...again. You're up early."

"Wanted to go for a jog. Make the most of the weather while it lasts. How's Princeton?"

"Nice, bit cold but you know, it's all good." Ben reached the bottom of the stairwell and pulled open the door, striding across the campus green towards the Technology and Engineering block. "Not that I'm not happy to hear from you, but to what do I owe this pleasure? I'm on my way to my first seminar, so I can't talk long."

"Just wanted to check when you're home for the holidays. Sasha's wanting to book up a spa weekend away and I didn't want to say I'd go if that's the weekend you're getting back."

Ben smiled at his mom wanting to be there when he got home; he couldn't imagine Nathan's mom missing a weekend away with her friends because of him. Even as grown-up as he was it still made his heart swell when his mom did something like that for him. He waved silently at Matthew, one of his course-mates, as he let himself into the Technology and Engineering building, and began to take the stairs down to the basement, hoping the reception would hold, before thinking about Lisa's question.

"Um, I'm not sure. I have to check on a couple of project deadline's first. I'll see if I can find out today and give you a ring tonight to let you know?"

"Thanks Ben, that'd be great. I'll talk to you later, and I'm expecting a good long catch-up about your college misadventures young man. Are you eating ok?"

Ben rolled his eyes with a fond smile, well-aware that Lisa couldn't see him. "Yes Mom, I'm eating fine. I'll give you the full run-down tonight I promise; I've got to get to my seminar. Enjoy your run. Love you, talk to you later."

"Love you too. Bye Ben."

Snapping his phone shut, he quickly slid it into his pocket before pushing open the door to the underground workshop area. It was an amazing space, Ben's favourite on campus; it was definitely not one of the most high-tech, ironic considering its purpose, but to Ben it felt much more authentic, like an Aladdin's cave of invention and experimentation, rather than the soulless, pristine boxes that some of the other workspaces felt like. It was full of half assembled vehicles and electrical equipment, blue prints decorating the walls from floor to ceiling, often over-lapping with no discernible order, every piece of machinery or toolkits imaginable lining the workbenches and workstations around the room. Ben had spent many hours sequestered down here, busying away at one or other of his projects during their many independent study sessions. He did miss his mom from time to time, being away from home for the first time, especially with it just being the two of them for his whole life, but he loved it here. Lisa had encouraged him to apply for all the technology and engineering courses he wanted; when he was accepted here Lisa and his high school friends had thrown him party and his mom had tearfully told him how proud she was of him. Ben smiled, that was a good memory, but despite missing his mom he never regretted his decision to come; he belonged in workshops such as these, he just knew it.

He often wondered where he got his interest and skills from; it certainly wasn't Lisa who was a self-confessed technophobe who could barely change a light bulb on her own, so Ben was curious as to where his talent came from. He hadn't always been so interested in mechanics and engineering; it wasn't until his very early teenage years he remembered the obsession creeping up on him and really taking hold. He'd thought himself round in circles, wracking his brain to think of someone who had explained what different parts of an engine did, who had shown him how to rewire or recalibrate things, who had encouraged him and nurtured his interest, but he came up with nothing. He was sure there was someone though; the feeling of care and support he felt when he thought about it came second only to the love he felt surround him when he thought about his mom. It was a mystery, another one to add to the list. What he did know though was that designing and making things, it was what he was meant to do.

Chapter 2 of 11 coming soon! Reviews appreciated :)