The following is set after the third season in which Dean did not, in fact, perish at the fangs of the hellhounds, but was rescued by his brother, barely in time to save his life. Shortly thereafter, he rediscovered Tara, a woman with whom he had shared a few short weeks, and the child that she had borne nine months after that. With a son to look after, and still feeling Hell breathing down his neck, he retired from Hunting, leaving Sam to carry on without him.

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural. I do not own either Dean or Sam, though if either of them wants to stop by sometime, I have pie. :D

~~~~~*****~~~~~

The demon leaned over the game board and cackled. "It looks like you are trapped, my dear. Your pieces are dead or scattered, and your most powerful pawn will fight tooth and nail to stay trapped. You may as well concede the game to me."

The other player eyed the board thoughtfully, one slim finger tapping her chin. "Yes? Well, I believe it is my move, sir. And we shall see how long my knight stays in your little snare."

She chose a piece and moved it with deliberation. "Let the game continue."

~~~~~*****~~~~~

Dean wasn't sleeping. His eyes were fixed on his three children. Jamie had his back to the crib bars, curled protectively around his brother, one arm flung out to touch his sister. Dean regretted laying the burden of protecting John on his oldest, but he didn't know what else he could have done - James had had the baby and they had both needed to get out of the house. When he'd seen Tara there, on the ceiling, he'd had about three seconds to choose - save his children, or try and save his wife. In the end, he'd chosen the same as his father, putting his kids first. He hoped his hesitation hadn't hurt Mary, but the little six month old had been cleared by the paramedics. He doubted she'd gotten more than a few breaths of smoke, clutched as she was to his chest as he'd staggered out of the flaming house, screaming for Jamie.

Now, here he was. The police and fire department were speculating about an electrical fire, but Dean knew exactly what had happened. "It's happening again, Sammy," he'd said on the voice message he left for his brother. "The demon. It's back. And it's after my kids."

The Ackles' from a couple streets over had offered their hospitality for the night, and Dean had reluctantly accepted. After they'd shown him and his kids to their spare bedroom, the one they kept for visiting grandchildren, and gone to bed, Dean set about turning the place into a fortress, with demon traps painted on the floor, holy symbols set everywhere, salt three inches deep by every window and door, including the closet door, and hastily-blessed glasses of holy water on every flat surface. He'd borrowed a butcher knife from the kitchen and a solid silver knife from the display case of fancy dishes in the parlor; they sat ready to hand beside the chair he slumped in, strategically positioned so he had a good view of the door and window, but so that nothing out there could easily spot him or his children.

Despite the late hour and his own body's ache for rest, Dean couldn't sleep. He had to watch, he had to keep his family safe. His eyelids drooped.

It was quiet. The nursery was still. Tara had screamed, just the once. Just once. If it had been a spider, she'd still be shrieking. Mary....blood....Tara, fire....

"No!" Dean wrenched himself awake, sweating. He touched his little girl, his boys, reassuring himself that they, at least, were okay. He took a few deep breaths to steady his nerves. If he'd let himself get this jumpy in the old days, he'd never have lived to have the new days.

A floorboard creaked in the hallway. Thought didn't have a chance to intervene; Dean was on the intruder in a heartbeat, fists and feet flying.

To his shock, he found the other figure fighting back, slamming him into the floor. Dean hooked him, throwing him, following it up with a well-aimed swing that nevertheless went wild as his opponent ducked under his arm and pinned him flat.

"Dean?"

Dean peered up, and suddenly his brother's face was illuminated in a beam of moonlight.

"Sam? What're you doing here?"

A ghost of a smile crossed Sam's face. "Lookin' for a beer. What else?"

Some of the tension went out of Dean's shoulders as he pulled himself to his feet and embraced his brother. "Sammy. Thank God."

Sam's eyes went wide. "What, no wise cracks?"

Dean shook his head, reluctantly releasing his brother and pulling him into the kids' room, puzzled but grateful that no one had come to investigate the fight. "What took you so long?"

"That the best you can do?" Sam queried, a little worriedly.

His brother turned on him. "My wife's dead and my baby's been infected and you think I oughtta be crackin' jokes?!" He kept his voice low, but it was furious.

Sam bit his lip. "Tara's dead?" He asked the question, but the look in his eyes said that he already knew.

Dean's voice lost none of its rancor. "Yeah. Yeah, Sam, she's dead, same way as Mom, same way as Jess. You know what that means. The god-d- The demon's back. Old yellow-eyes, or something like him." His eyes flashed. "We killed that sonuva b- We killed him, and good. And now, on my babies' six month birthday, without so much as an omen beforehand, I find my wife dead on the ceiling over my daughter and all of a sudden she's on fire and my house - you remember my house, Sam, it's a frigging fortress - is nothin' but smoke and ash and all I can do is remember Dad's journal and think, my god, it's happening again."

Dean glared at Sam for another minute before slowly folding up, sitting wearily on the bed beside the crib. His eyes softened and he laid a gentle hand on Jamie's curls. Sam edged over and sat in the chair, not saying anything.

Silence filled the room and Sam was starting to think Dean must have fallen asleep when his older brother spoke, his voice choked. "I couldn't protect her, Sam. Everything we learned, everything we did, and when it all came down to it, I just stood there and watched her burn. I try and try to escape, but I just keep gettin' sucked back in." He looked up with pain filled eyes. "What am I gonna do, Sam? Is Mary marked now, too? Is the only way I'm gonna save my girl to start fighting again? God, it's the last life I ever wanted for my kids."

Sam winced. "It's not a...a bad life," he offered half-heartedly, but Dean shrugged him off.

"For two adult men, no, maybe not. But it's no life for kids, Sam, you know that. You cut off ties for a year and a half, remember? We had the world's worst effed up childhood; I swore I was never going to subject my kids to more of it than I had to. Heck, I set out to be normal. I'm on a friggin' softball team, for cryin' out loud. What sort of Hunter plays softball, huh? I got a job, Sam, a real, paying job. Even paid taxes last year."

"Really?"

"Well," Dean rolled his eyes, "I signed the form. Tara – she's the one did the math. I'm an upstanding citizen now, Sam, honest and up front, as far as anyone else can tell. I was out, I was done, my kids come first, and now it's pullin' me back in and I can't stop it, Sam."

He buried his head in his hands. Sam turned away, ostensibly inspecting the demon trap on the floor, ignoring muffled sounds behind him. When he turned back, Dean was looking out the window. Black smoke drifted across the sky. "We need better tools, Sammy," he said, softly. "I laid all the mojo I could find on my place; I did the protective spells monthly, there was hoodoo up the wazoo. It should've survived a friggin' demonic apocalypse. Not even a black eyed mouse should have been able to slip inside, not without a whole heckuvalotta fireworks. And now it's just a crater."

Sam laid a hand on his brother's shoulder. "I've got a cabin not far from here; couple hours, maybe. Built it on holy ground; a church used to stand there. If there's any place the kids'll be safe, it's there, at least until we can figure out stronger spells."

Dean swallowed hard, eyes still locked on the smoke. "I dunno, Sammy... Feels weird saying it, but I've put down roots here. Jamie's got friends. Hell, I've got friends, people I see every day. You know how freakin' weird that is? For the first time in my life, there's a lot of people I like who like me back. Took me thirty-three years, but I finally feel like a human being's supposed to feel. There's a woman in the church, Sera, who was pregnant the same time Tara was; Tara and I are her daughter's godparents, and she and her husband are the twins'. How can I pull everything up and go haring off on some adventure, Sam? How can I do that to them?"

"It doesn't have to be forever, Dean," Sam murmured quietly. "Just a few days, until we know what we're up against."

Dean laughed sourly. "Yeah, how much you wanna bet Dad thought the same thing? It was twenty years before he got a line on the demon, Sam."

Sam leaned forward, earnestly. "But we've got major advantages this time, Dean. We're not starting from scratch, we know what we're doing. We've got the tools, the experience. That's way more than Dad had, starting out."

But Dean wasn't paying attention to his brother. Mary was starting to fuss and he picked her up. In his arms, she settled back to sleep, curled warmly against her daddy's chest. He caressed her cheek gently. "They're so little, Sam. So much future, so much potential, right here. They can be anything. It's scary, you know? This little life, so dependent on you, but with the world open in front of them, if we don't close any of the doors. Mary," he looked at Sam, half laughing, "she's a little spitfire, you know that? Always knows what she wants. She was maybe five minutes old when the nurse handed her to me - she grabbed my thumb and looked me in the eyes and told me in no uncertain terms that she may be my baby, but I was her daddy." He ran his thumb through her light curls, remembering. "John, now, he's always been the quiet one. A watcher. He looks at things, figures 'em out. I never know what's going on behind those eyes of his. One minute he's looking at something, considering, and then he moves, and something happens. Not like Mary - she tries everything all at once and gets frustrated if it doesn't work. She's gonna be the one always in trouble, but John's gonna be the one getting her out of it."

"Or further into it," Sam smiled, but Dean didn't hear. He touched Jamie's back lightly. "This big guy, now, he's a special one. He's smart. More like his uncle than his dad. I want him to have every opportunity, everything we never had."

"Hey, we had 'em. Stanford, remember?"

Dean finally looked up at Sam. His eyes bore a haunted look. "Yeah. But you're still hunting, Sam. Because of me. Because I didn't have the rocks to go after Dad alone. You could've been happy in another life; you and Jess. But I wanted my little brother with me, and look where it got you. I don't want to force my kids into the same life."

Sam sat beside his brother, touching the little head. "You didn't force me into it, Dean. I chose this life. For some very good reasons, you'll remember. You can't say I'd be happy with Jess - Azazel would've killed her just the same as if you hadn't been there. And Dean, don't forget. You pulled me out. Seems like my whole life you've been saving my ass-"

"Hey," Dean warned.

"What?" Sam was bewildered.

"Watch your language. The kids. Don't want 'em picking up their dad's filthy mouth. Not this early, anyway."

"Oh." Sam smiled.

"What?" Dean glared.

"Nothing." But Sam was still smiling. "Anyway, seems like you're always saving my life. Jess and I never had a future, thanks to the demon. Now you say Mary's been infected by it too?" Dean looked down at the innocent child in his arms and nodded. "So now it's my turn to return the favor. You save me, I save her. I use my opportunities to make sure they have theirs."

Dean considered for long moments before looking back at his brother. "It's only for a few days, right? We figure out how the really strong protection mojo works and my kids get to live a normal life?"

"Yeah," Sam promised. "That's what we do."

"All right then," Dean laid the baby reluctantly back in the crib and nodded decisively.

"I'll head back to the house, see what I can salvage. There's a fire proof safe where I kept some stuff; I wanna see if it's still intact. Maybe a few of the weapons survived. And the twins're going to need to be fed here pretty soon – I'm surprised they aren't hungry yet. I'll find a twenty-four hour convenience store somewhere and pick up some formula. Need anything?"

Sam shook his head. "I'll stay here with the kids. You go do what you've got to do."

"Alright." Dean paused in the doorway. "And Sam? Thanks for coming."

Sam nodded, and Dean disappeared around the corner. Ten seconds later he was back.

"Uh, Sam? Could I borrow your wheels? Mine aren't exactly going anywhere. The car was in the garage when the fire…"

"Sure thing." Sam flipped his older brother his keys. "She's parked out front."

Dean caught them one handed and headed out. There she was. The black '67 Impala that had been his absolute baby for so many years before he'd gotten his real kids. He slid behind the wheel, feeling like he'd never stopped driving her, and turned the key.

He was halfway down the block before he realized that the radio was on, the notes of a fiddle accompanying a sad country crooner sliding out of the speakers. Dean's mouth dropped. "Sammy, what the hell have you done to my poor car? It's alright, baby," he soothed, fiddling with the dial. "I'll get some real music into you real soon."

But he couldn't pick up a good station and he finally just turned the radio off, making the couple block drive in silence.

~~~~~*****~~~~~

He pulled the Impala up to the curb next to the mailbox. The cheerful box was covered in Tara's artistic flair, painted-on ivy and climbing roses winding two dimensional tendrils around the post. Dean had teased her unmercifully about it, but when she had offered to paint over it, he'd laughed and staved off her brush with both it was the only thing left.

Dean sat and stared at his house. What remained of it. Black beams thrust rude fingers at the empty sky, thin tendrils of smoke peeling off like the banners of the damned. Charred was an inappropriate adjective; the word implied that there was something besides ashes left.

He picked his way through the ruins. It was exactly like the hundred other wrecks he'd explored in his career. Except that it wasn't. He could walk this layout in his sleep. He knew where each piece of furniture was supposed to sit; he had a picture in his mind of how it was Before, one that clashed horribly with the After.

He stepped cautiously around ashy black piles. His booted feet felt uncomfortably warm, and Dean was reminded that the fire had gone out only a couple hours before; it might even still be smoldering in places. He borrowed a knife from the Imapla's trunk and used it to turn over a few objects.

A little digging revealed a box; smoky, scorched, but still mostly intact. The door was heat-warped, and Dean was able to pry it open with the knife point. Holding his breath, Dean reached inside.

They were okay. He breathed a sigh of relief. Tara had laughed when he'd bought the safe: non-flammable, guaranteed to 5000 degrees, and as indestructible as mortal means might make it. Now, handling the intact - if brittle - copies of their marriage license, the kids' birth certificates, mortgage, and other records, he was glad he'd insisted.

He tucked the papers into his pocket and then pried up the bottom of the safe; the real reason he'd bought this instead of a cheaper one. He picked up his gun, the warm metal comfortingly heavy and solid as he wrapped his hand around it. He shipped it at the back of his jeans, armed and in control once again. He hesitated another moment, then pulled out his hunting journal, the one Tara didn't know about, the one that he used to track omens and sightings and hauntings for his brother. He hesitated a long time, looking at nearby piles with smoke still rising out of the top, wondering if he shouldn't just toss it under some embers, but finally tucked it into his pocket.

Dean was just standing up when a brilliant light hit his back and a voice yelled, "Freeze!"

"Put your hands up and turn around. Slowly!" a second voice ordered.

Dean turned, squinting into the light. "Bill? That you?"

"Dan?" The light dropped from his face. "Craig, it's Daniel Wincester; put your piece up."

Dean made his way out, stopping in front of the pair from the police department. Dean could've cursed himself. His senses were shot, if he couldn't hear Bert and Ernie sneaking up on him. "Hey."

"Sorry if we scared you, Daniel," Bill said. "We didn't know it was you. Thought it might've been looters."

Dean's mouth twisted. "Not much to loot, unless you're seriously into ash." Which reminded him, he and Sammy would have to bottle some of it before they left; ashes from a destroyed home had powerful magical properties. Sam would be set for a lifetime's worth of spells from this.

"What're you doing out here at this time of night, anyway?" the younger of the pair - Craig - asked.

Dean pulled himself back. "The twins're getting hungry. I was coming out to look for an all-night convenience store and I just thought I'd stop by, see what was left."

"I sure am sorry, Dan," Bill said, laying a sympathetic hand on the younger man's shoulder. "I wish there was something I could do that would help."

"It's okay, Bill," Dean forced himself to say. "It was a freak accident, there's nothing anybody could do. Best thing for it is to move on and take care of what needs taking care of."

Bill looked at him askance. "You're sure handling this well."

Dean barked off a short, abrupt laugh. "'Well'? Hell, I'm still in shock. I haven't even started to handle it yet. But I've got three very good reasons why I can't just go off and lose it. I'm not letting those kids down."

Silence stretched between them, with no one quite knowing what to say.

Finally, he said, "Well, I'll let you go. I've got two hungry kids to feed, and I'm sure you've both got better things to do than sit around chattin' with me."

Craig nodded. "The search party for Tara leaves at first light. If she got out, we'll find her, Dan, don't worry."

Dean exhaled in a half sigh, half snort. "She didn't have time. I've seen this type of house fire before; they're killers. The kids and I were lucky to escape alive."

He waved his goodbye's back over his shoulder as he stomped to the Impala, shaking the ashes off his shoes. Some morbid part of him wondered if some of the clinging blackness might have been Tara's corpse, and he shook his head to clear the image.

The two cops watched him go. "Odd," Craig mused.

"Leave off," Bill told him. "The man just lost his home, his wife. We all cope differently."

"Still..." There was a very odd look on Craig's face as the pair got in the police cruiser.

"Cool car, though," Bill commented. "Genuine classic, unless I miss my guess."

"Yeah," Craig replied. "I wonder where he got it?"

~~~~~*****~~~~~

It took a little driving, but Dean finally found a grocery store that was open. He bought formula, went back in for bottles, then went back again for diapers. It was nearly two hours after he left that he got back, and both babies were fussing by the time he'd gotten the formula mixed and bottled up.

"Hey, Johnny," he said, picking up his youngest son and deftly inserting the nipple into his mouth. The baby immediately clamped his mouth shut started to suck. "Here, Sam, catch." He tossed his brother the second bottle.

Sam circled the crying baby warily, looking from the little girl to his big hands. "Um....Dean?"

Dean looked up from feeding John. "Sam, come on, she's hungry. You gotta pick her up to feed her." Sam gave him a hunted rabbit look. A slow smile crossed Dean's face. "You gotta be kidding me, right? Sam, the great touchy-feely ethicist with a heart of gold doesn't know how to handle a kid?"

"Hey, gimme a break, alright? I've just never had to pick one up before. Now will you shut up and tell me how to hold your daughter?"

Dean grinned, but relented. "Here, you take Johnny. Cradle him like this, yeah, and don't let his head drop. You gotta hold him closer than that, Sam, he's not contagious. Oh, and you know that soft spot on the back of their heads? Don't press on it. Good, you got 'im. Now just hold the bottle like this and let him suck until it's empty or he doesn't want any more. Good." He deftly swept Mary up and had her quiet and eating in seconds.

Sam watched his brother, a smile on his face.

"What?" Dean asked. When he noticed.

"Huh? Oh, nothing."

"Oh come on, Sam, that's the second 'nothing' that's a something I've caught on your face. So, What?"

"I just never pictured you for the domestic type, you know?"

"Who you callin' domestic?"

Sam laughed at his brother's angry expression. "Dean, you're feeding babies and getting on me for swearing. It's not an insult; it's a compliment. Four years ago, I'd never have pictured either of us sitting here with kids on our laps, much less your kids." He cocked his head to one side, considering his brother. "I don't know if I ever told you, but fatherhood suits you."

"Huh." Dean snorted, but his face softened as Mary's fist closed around his pinky.

The babies fell asleep, and Dean followed soon after, stretched out on the bed beside the crib. Sam drowsed in the chair his brother had vacated, senses awake and watchful.

~~~~~*****~~~~~

Jamie woke up whimpering around four o'clock. Dean was there in an instant, cradling his oldest as the little boy shook. "What is it, Jamie? What's the matter?"

The four year old buried his face in Dean's chest, little hands wrapped in his shirt as tears poured out. "Fire," he cried. "Where's Mommy?"

Dean bit his lip and said, feeling like the biggest hypocrite ever, "Mommy's not here right now, Jamie. She had to go away for a little while."

He held his breath while the little boy considered this. His grip didn't slacken any, but he turned tear-filled eyes up to Dean's own. "Is the fire going to take me away, too?"

Dean hugged his son tight to him, heart breaking. "No, Jamie. The fire isn't taking you anywhere. I won't let them. I swear."

"But what if you can't? What if the fire comes and you're not here?"

"Here." Dean let go with one hand and pulled his amulet over his head. He draped the long sting around Jamie's neck and cinched up the knot so that it hung right over his son's chest. "There. That's Daddy's special necklace. It protected me for a long time, Jamie; now it'll protect you. You take care of it, you hear? And it'll take care of you, I promise."

It was a hollow promise, Dean knew, but Jamie nodded and wrapped his little hands around the charm. He was asleep in minutes.

"Isn't that what Dad told you?" Sam asked. Dean looked up sharply; he'd thought his brother was asleep. "About Mom," he clarified.

"Yeah, it is." Dean's reply was short, but Sam didn't take the hint.

"I thought you hated Dad for lying to you. I remember a big fight about it when we were teenagers."

Dean looked away. "Yeah? Well maybe I'm starting to understand what Dad went through." He swallowed hard. "Wish he was here, Sammy. Dad would know what to do."

Sam leaned back in the chair, eyes closed. "You know what he'd say, Dean."

"Yeah." Dean leaned against the wall himself. "Get that evil sonuva-witch."

"Right," Sam smiled, but Dean missed it, focused entirely on his kids. Sam felt a lonely pang. Things hadn't been the same between them since Dean had gotten married, and even now, even with Dean about to return to a life of Hunting, he wasn't the same brother he'd been five years ago. Dean had made a family for himself, and Sam had nothing but guns and memories.

~~~~~*****~~~~~

Meanwhile, Craig was following up his own hunch. Something about Daniel Wincester bothered him, and he was turning the resources of the police department to investigating it.

"Hmm," he muttered to himself, scrolling through records. Daniel Wincester was pretty clean. One or two minor traffic violations, one DUI a few years ago, and implication in a couple barroom brawls around the same time, but for the most part, he looked like a model citizen. Employed at a local garage as a mechanic, married locally four years ago, three kids ages four-and-a-half and six months - interesting tidbit there, he wondered if the older kid was Daniel's or some other fella's, mortgage, two cars, wife worked as a nurse at the local hospital, churchgoers, softball league...your typical, all-American family man.

Except that there was no record of Daniel going back more than four years. The first legal proof of his existence was the marriage license. There was no birth certificate, no old driver's license, no previous address, no tax forms, nothing. Daniel Wincester, as far as the government of the United States of America was concerned, had no history and frankly, didn't exist.

Craig sifted through the records once again, eyes crossing as he tried to find the one hidden thread in the Life of Dan. His eyes lit on a picture on his partner's desk of Daniel grinning at the camera while Bill, next to him, hoisted high the league trophy. "Hm."

Well, it was worth a shot. Craig scanned the Polaroid and enhanced Wincester's face, then sent the modified photograph to a friend who worked with the national database.

Would like any info you've got on this guy, he said in the clipped note that went along with.

~~~~~*****~~~~~

To be continued.....

(all reviews greatly appreciated!)