Title: in the Wind
Author: Kira (kiraboshi)
Recipient: unhobbityhobbit
Rating: PG
Author's Notes: This fic wouldn't have been possible without the awesome prompts I was given. Thanks, as always, to my wonderful team of betas and cheerleaders. This was written for spnsummergen over on LiveJournal.
Summary: At seven, Sammy Winchester thinks he's got the world figured out, but when his flight of fancy turns real, he learns he really doesn't know anything at all.
--
At ten, Mary's a precocious child, an overachiever, and an avid fan of her father's stories.
She's also telepathic.
Before his foot even hits the first stair, Mary knows her father's home and leaps out of bed, covers flying onto the floor in a spectacle of fabric smoke. Tiny feet pitter-patter on the thick carpeting, and when her father reaches the top hallway, she's standing in her doorway, hands on her hips, blond hair curling at small, yet strong, shoulders.
He knows what she's going to say, and it doesn't take a psychic. "Not tonight, Mary, I'm tired."
"You promised. And promises are things you keep," she replies.
"Yeah, but sometimes…"
"Sometimes doesn't cut it, buddy. What would Uncle say?" Mary says, then her voice rises into that of a little child. "Please? It can be a short one!"
Her father considers this a moment, then turns down the hallway to his room. Mary runs after him and, even at her age, wraps herself around one of his lanky legs. "Daaaaaddy!" she whines.
"Alright," her father agrees. He bends over to gather her in his arms and plops her down in her own bed. "Short one."
Mary claps.
--
It was raining.
Sammy Winchester set his chin on the windowsill and watched as buckets of rain fell onto the cracked pavement of the hotel's parking lot. It danced on the roof so loudly, he could hear it over the noise of the television turned on to comfort him. It wasn't often that he was left alone, not when they were in some strange town on a hunt; in fact, he could count the instances on one hand. And he wasn't supposed to be alone now.
Stupid Dean, he thought in a huff as he turned from the window and flopped onto one of the made-up beds. Staring up at the stucco ceiling, Sammy crossed his arms and huffed again.
"You're going to be in so much trouble!" he shouted into the rumble of the room. His voice sounded small next to an infomercial on an amazing new cleaning product and the rat-tat-tat of the growing thunderstorm outside. A rumble of thunder silenced him, had him hug himself and shiver a little, not for being cold, but being alone.
He was scared. Dad was supposed to be back in a few hours, when he would discover the absence of his oldest son – he'd be angry, and angry Dad frightened Sammy even though he knew it came from a good place and not a bad one. Still, his dad had never been the most on-time person; if he said he'd be back at ten o'clock, he'd probably walk in an hour late, dirty and tired and full of sorrys.
Another bang of thunder drove Sammy to the space between the beds, the narrow little alley that ended at the end table, and he hugged his knees. It was raining and he was all alone and who knew where his dad was or his brother. His big brother who was supposed to protect him and did…
The third bang wasn't thunder, but a knock at the door like Dad did when you were supposed to be up early and weren't; big fist-pounding bangs. Then, "Is anyone in there?"
"There's a little boy. I saw him come back this afternoon looking something awful," a woman's voice rambled. Sammy recognized it as the nice front office lady and crawled down the space until his head was poking out the end of one of the beds.
A flashlight beam caught him square in the eyes.
Sammy let out a shout and covered them just as the big voice said, "It's okay," and the door clicked open.
"Oh, the poor thing," the front office lady said, "must be scared out of his wits in this storm."
"You okay, son?" the big voice asked. Sammy ventured a look – no one else called him son but Dad – and gulped. He recognized the pointy star.
A cop.
"Where's your parents?" he said. Sammy clenched his mouth shut. "Son?" asked the cop.
What was he supposed to say? That his Dad was off on a hunt and wouldn't be back for awhile? Or tell him what happened earlier down by the little creek in the woods when he and Dean went for a walk and pretended they were pirates?
Which was worse? And who would believe him when he said his big brother turned into a dragon and flew away?
--
The nice lady cop put a cup of water on the edge of her desk and sat with a sigh he knew from his Dad as the I'm-tired-but-can't-sleep-yet sigh. She was nice enough, and pretty even in her uniform, and let him play with her handcuffs while she went to check something. He'd almost bolted, but remembered the storm outside and decided to stay inside a bit longer until it calmed down.
Sammy peered into the glass of water – did they put anything in it, like a truth drug? – but didn't take it.
"I'm sure you're thirsty," said the lady cop. "I didn't do anything to it, promise."
"Promise cross your eye?" Sammy asked.
The lady laughed. "Cross my eye," and she made the motion.
She didn't look the kind to lie, so Sammy grabbed the cup with both hands and took a sip.
"My name's Monica," she continued. "Think you can tell me where your parents are?"
"Out," answered Sammy.
"Out. Out where?"
Sammy shrugged and took another drink of water.
--
"Wait!" yells Mary. Her father stops and turns to her, eyebrows raised. Mary frowns, trying to work out something that doesn't add up. "What do you mean your brother turned into a dragon? That isn't possible!"
"It's my story," he defends.
"I wanted a true story!"
Her father shakes his head this time and moves to stand. "If you don't think my story's real…"
"No no!" Mary says quickly, hands raised in the air to grab for him. "It's true! I won't interrupt again, promise."
--
Sammy finished his glass of water, eyes glued to the faded red sneakers on his feet; they were a bit too small, so the laces were tied in a loose bow – another hand me down from his big brother. The last of the water was gulped…would Dean be around to pass down another pair of shoes?
He sniffled, but quietly, and only for a second.
Monica was across the room, standing with a few other policemen around a computer – one sat typing quickly on the keys. Sammy was supposed to learn typing that week; Mrs. Welty, his first grade teacher said it might be a bit fun for them to use the computers. Sammy was just excited to play Oregon Trail, something Dean bragged about for days after his first – and each subsequent – time. Being there, sitting in an uncomfortable chair, sucked.
"Bingo," the seated cop said. He exchanged a high-five with another, but all Sammy saw was Monica's face, how the softness fled her features, kindness from her eyes. Both were replaced with weary pity, a look Sammy was all too accustomed to. The look, worn by so many throughout his life, made a small fire dance in his stomach and his uncomfortable smile flipped as anger spread through his tiny body.
Metal screeched on yellowed tile when Monica pulled out her chair, elbows thumped on pockmarked wood. Hard, sharp, detached movements. They sat there, containers barely holding emotions of a miscommunication, for a full minute.
The cop broke the silence. "Tell me about your dad."
The request surprised Sammy; you're never supposed to talk about family to the authorities, right? Keep your head down and mouth closed?
But this was a cop, and all through school, he'd been told they were good guys who never hurt anyone. Maybe they could even help him figure out how to change Dean back to Dean.
"Umm," he hummed, still trying to figure out the right answer. Play it safe, he decided. "Like what?"
Monica pursed her lips. "Does he have a job?"
"Kinda," answered Sammy. He thought hard, trying to answer like Dean would if he were here.
"Kinda isn't a job," Monica admonished. For a moment, she sounded like Mrs. Welty. Disappointed.
Sammy hated being a disappointment.
But he's pretending to be like Dean, and Dean wouldn't care.
Monica leaned forward and placed her hands on his knobby little knees. "Please, Sammy – "
"I didn't tell you my name!" he shouted, jumping up from the chair. The glass clattered to the floor, plastic jumping along the tiles, sound too close to gunshots for comfort. Officers turned, eyes on Sammy.
"Calm down," Monica tried.
Sammy shook his head and backed up, eyes wide – how did she know his name? Did they have his Dad already? Had they drugged him? He didn't say anything he wasn't supposed to, did he?
"Please, Sammy," Monica said. "The woman at the motel told us. She said your name was Sammy and you have a brother named Dean." She took a breath. "Where's Dean, Sammy? Did they leave you?"
His back hit the window with a thud. Leave him? Is that what they thought, that his family had left him? How could they? Families didn't leave each other!
Monica was coming at him from the front, other cops from the sides. He wanted to curl up and hide, to disappear, to escape back to the motel room where he could watch old movies and where Dad would return and fix Dean and they could all leave this place.
Working his tiny fingers under the wooden window frame, Sammy pulled it open, glanced behind him, and climbed out.
Shouts echoed behind him, a hand grazed his shoe, and he dropped to the alleyway below, feet, then knees, then a roll that had him thunk against a chipped green dumpster.
Thud. "Oww," he groaned, rubbing the back of his head.
He sat for a moment, then tried to gather his feet beneath him, but the storm was still raging and the ground was slick, and his head was spinning – he fell again and hit the ground with seven year old fists. They were going to come down and grab him and ask more questions and take him away and then he'd never get back.
"Sammy!" Monica's voice broke through the rumble of the storm.
"Crap!" he swore, and stood, legs shaky, and started down the alley from Monica the cop.
This was all so stupid! He just wanted to help Dad hunt; he's seven, older than Dean when Dad first took him along. Yes, Dad told them to stay, but…but…
Tears mixed with raindrops as Sammy picked up the pace down the never-ending alley. Why couldn't he have problems like the kids in school – skinned knees from learning to ride two-wheelers and being told to eat your vegetables?
Main street was deserted this time of night, and the streetlamps cast an eerie yellow light over closed shops. In that moment, Sammy learned what the term 'ghost town' meant, an image that stayed with him long into his teenage years.
Flashlights cut through the hazy glow – they were gaining fast.
Running, running, heartbeat loud in his ears, Sammy kept moving, crying, wishing. So focused on that, he missed the approaching flap, flap –
And suddenly, he was in the air, little feet kicking as he soared higher and higher. He screamed, craning his neck to see what the hell had grabbed him.
It was a dragon. With Dean's eyes.
--
He was no longer scared.
It didn't matter that Dean was…different. He was away from the cops, away from all that could have gone wrong, back with his big brother, so everything was alright. They flew for awhile, past town and the motel and the old farms with for sale signs planted on their lawns until there's a blanket of green under them, great trees of western forests, puffy, proud guardians.
When Dean-Dragon began to descend, it was only too soon, and Sammy sniffled up the remainder of his tears – it was like the real would melted away when they were in the air – and it came rushing back when Dean-Dragon found a break in the trees and landed.
Faced with his brother, tall, lean, colored with blue-green scales that caught the moonlight and transformed it into a brilliant silver, Sammy couldn't help but feel giddy.
"Oh my gosh, Dean, you look so cool!" he blubbered.
Dean-Dragon dipped his reptilian head and let out a huff of hot air that knocked Sammy off his feet. But he's still smiling when a claw gently propped him back up.
"Is it cool? Huh?"
Another, smaller huff.
"Oh, right, you can't talk," realized Sammy thoughtfully. "Okay, so that has to suck, but you can fly!"
Wings flapped.
Sammy leaned into the rough leg of his brother-turned-dragon and let out a sigh. "Thanks for rescuing me. They knew our names, Dean! We need to warn Dad…I was so scared – I didn't know what to say." There was no reply, so he kept talking. "I pretended I was you. Mrs. Welty said the police are our friends, but you and Dad say not to talk to them. I don't know what's true."
The leg urged him forward, push, push, like hey, kid, listen to me because I know everything. Sammy giggled.
Through his laughter, he heard a shout and the thwang of an arrow – he gasped and jumped to his feet.
He didn't know much about the hunt, just what he put together from Dad's hushed phone calls or conversations with Dean (who's become his sounding board whenever Sammy leaves the room). That something was snatching up first animals, then people, from the area and dumping them, all cut up and bloody, in the forest sitting at the base of the Rocky Mountains. It sounded like something they'd go after, and by the way Dad gathered them up in the car and zoomed away from their apartment, it was important.
And then he'd left and told Dean to watch out for his little brother (despite Sammy being in the first grade now) and not open the door unless he heard the knocking pattern they'd made up on a lazy afternoon when Dad was sleeping off a concussion. Sammy hated being cooped up in motel rooms all the time; at least at home, he could go out the back door into the little side yard fenced in around the same time as the building was built and read or play or talk with the landlady when she hung her laundry.
But in motel rooms, he couldn't do anything. Dean always took over the remote or would snap M&Ms at him if he tried to change the channel, and his books were old or too easy for him.
When Dean said Dad was probably fighting a dragon and didn't need Sammy to get in the way, well, that's when he made up his mind to go find the dragon and try to talk to it.
Standing in the forest with Dean-Dragon at his back, Sammy knew deciding to sneak out wasn't the best idea. Compared to hearing his Dad in danger, getting taken by the police was nothing. He turned to Dean-Dragon and planted his feet firmly on the mossy ground.
"Dean!" he shouted. "Dean, you're a dragon, you can help Dad!"
Dean-Dragon shook his head.
"Go! I promise I won't go anywhere. I promise, promise, promise."
--
"So I stayed," her father says, now stroking her long blond locks. "I let the dragon fly away and listened to everything. I made up all these stories in my head, stuff that could be happening."
Mary nods, eyes wide, mind craving more of the story. No one could tell stories like her dad, something she bragged about at school all the time.
She bounces in her bed despite being tired. "And?"
Her father sighs, but he's smiling. "I think our biggest problem was figuring out how to get back to the motel before Dad…and without being seen by any cops."
--
Sammy tucked himself against a thick tree trunk, between two large, gnarled roots sticking up out of the ground, knees pulled up to his chest. A few minutes ago, he'd put his hands to his ears and clenched his eyes shut, not wanting to listen to any more. If only he hadn't gone out of the motel room, if only he hadn't found the dragon and talked to it. If only…
He was pulled from his thoughts by a tug on his sleeve, and he popped his eyes open to see Dean – not Dean-Dragon – standing over him, covered in dirt and mud and muck, huffing and puffing.
"C'mon, Sammy!" he rasped. "Dad's going to be heading back to the motel. If he gets there and doesn't find us, there's going to be hell to pay."
"But the desk lady called the cops!" Sammy said. "They're going to be waiting for Dad or me because we're in trouble."
"In trouble for what?" Dean asked.
Sammy shrugged. "I don't know. They just came in and said I had to leave until Dad came back."
"Oh, those cock-suckers," Dean swore, straightening up. The storm was dying down, but the rain was still falling, and it started washing Dean off until he started to look normal again. He stomped around, then held a hand out to help Sammy up. "Don't worry; we'll tell Dad we skedaddled 'cause of the cops."
On his feet, Sammy nodded because whatever Dean said was right and he'd already made enough bad mistakes that day.
--
By the time they reached the outskirts of the town, both Winchester brothers were tired.
"Too bad you turned back," said Sammy. "Flying was cool."
"Wasn't it?" Dean smirked. "It was bitchin'."
"Totally awesome."
"Hell yeah."
"Are we there yet?"
"Jesus, Sammy, will you quit it? I'm tired."
"So am I."
"So shut up."
"You shut up."
"You first, nerd."
"Not fair!" Sammy cried. "I didn't call you any names."
Dean reached over and patted Sammy on the back, right between awkward shoulder blades already growing wider, a clue to how much taller he was going to be. It did enough to calm Sammy down; he locked his tired gaze on the line of the road in front of them and kept marching, pretending he was in a marching band playing an invisible set of drums. Soon, Dean joined in, the pair making rat-tat-tat sounds and the occasional boom of the bass.
They were into the next set when headlights swept over them, froze them in their tracks mid-drum. A rumbling engine, swing of the door – Dean and Sammy turned slowly, hands falling to their sides, caught with their hands in the metaphorical cookie jar.
"What the hell do you two think you're doing?" roared a towering, and angry, John Winchester. His steps were heavy, splashing water on his pants up to his knees, as he crossed the distance to his sons. "What part of stay in the room didn't you two understand?"
"But Dad!" Sammy interjected, stepping forward. He knew what would happen if he didn't say anything; Dad would blame Dean for everything even if Sammy was at fault. It didn't matter – Dean was responsible for him, was older, should have stopped him.
Dad shifted his gaze down to little Sammy, hands on his hips, brown eyes almost black with anger. "Sammy…" he warned.
"There were cops! They, they wanted to know where you were, if you'd left us."
Eyes hardened. "You spoke to them?"
Sammy gulped. "Umm, yes, sir? But I didn't say anything! I didn't tell them a thing! Even though Mrs. Welty says you should always tell the police the truth, I didn't!" The words came out in a hurried rush young children are known for, and when he finished, Sam had tears in his eyes.
But instead of yelling, John kneeled in front of his youngest son, kneeled in the rainwater, and grasped Sammy's arms with his big, calloused hands. "I know it's hard, Sammy, I do. But if we tell them the truth, they won't believe us, and then they will take you and Dean away from me. And I," – he paused, and years later, Sam swore his dad had tears in his eyes – "I wouldn't know what to do without you and your brother."
Sammy nodded. But somewhere in the back of his mind, he wondered, maybe, just maybe, Daddy was doing something he wasn't supposed to, and that was why he had to lie to the police.
Huddled in the back seat next to Dean, tattered blanket wrapped around their shoulders, Sammy grinned and laid his head on his brother's shoulder.
"You were totally less itchy with scales," he joked.
"Yeah, but totally cooler. Dragons guard treasure, you know?"
"Really?"
"Yep. Wish I could have found some. Wouldn't that be wicked cool?"
Sammy nodded, head rubbing the cotton of Dean's soaked t-shirt, then yawned and promptly fell asleep.
--
"Wow! Uncle Dean really turned into a dragon?" Mary asks through a yawn. Her father ruffles her hair and stands, bending to pull her blanket up to her chin and kiss her cheek.
"You really need to get to bed, Mary-Berry. You have school tomorrow."
She nods and yawns again, eyelids dipping towards dreamland. Her father pauses in the door, hand on the frame, smiling at the little angel he calls daughter.
Just as he's about to turn into the hallway, Mary calls for him.
"What, sweetie?"
Yawn. "Uncle Dean says he found his treasure. He had it all the time."
He's used to this, really. His daughter has many talents, more developing all the time, but this had been one of her first. They thought she was just talking to herself, humming and playing with an imaginary friend.
A friend, yes, just invisible.
"Does he now," he says, vision going a little…wobbly.
Mary nods. Her eyes slip closed, and his hand's on her light switch when she says, "And stop being a crybaby, Sammy. This is what happens when you go all soft and nerdy."
"Goodnight, Mary," he says, flicking off her light.
In the hallway, Sam Winchester looks up and smirks. "Night, jerk."
There's a whisper of wind when he opens the door to his room, a breeze that tickles the back of his head and almost, maybe, returns the words.