Sorry for the delay. Last chapter. Hope you all enjoy!
Chapter 3
Dean quietly made his way into the motel room expecting at least his sister to be asleep but stopped short when he saw the cuts on Sam's face and no Grace in sight. "What the hell happened?" He all but demanded, closing the door behind him and striding into the room.
Sam's face fell as he swallowed hard and motioned to the bathroom, "It's Gracie, Dean."
"What is?" Dean questioned, mentally kicking himself for leaving in the first place. The pieces started falling in place quicker than his mind could handle and he rubbed a tired hand over his face not wanting to accept the information. "No, Sam, she can't-"
"What do we do?" Sam cut him off, sounding more broken than Dean had ever heard him before. His brother didn't answer as he paced the small room. "Dean," Sam tried again.
Dean stopped short, his anger towards the situation suddenly all on his brother, "We figure it out!"
Dean felt guilty the moment he saw Sam startle at his outburst. Trying to compose himself, he ran a hand over his face again. "Sorry, man. I didn't mean to…" he trailed off.
"It's alright," Sam said softly. Dean looked up at him and he couldn't bear seeing the agonized look on his younger brother's face. There was only one question in his eyes.
What do we do?
Dean knew the truth as much as Sam did. If it all went too far, they wouldn't have any choice other than to –
"No," Dean voiced out loud. No way was he even going to think of it. He was supposed to protect his sister and brother. And that's exactly what he was going to do.
Sam looked puzzled and Dean sat down next to him at the foot of the bed. "We can still do something. We can figure something out. Maybe Bobby will have an answer."
All the anger came rushing back as Sam turned to Dean with a defeated expression. "Dean, I don't think-"
"No, Sam!" He cut him off before he had the chance to continue his statement. "She's our sister and she deserves a chance. She gets the benefit of the doubt. Once it's morning we'll head over to Bobby's. We'll figure it out."
Saying so, Dean got to his feet and walked over to his duffel. After rummaging about for a few minutes he got out their first aid kit and headed back to Sam.
Sam sat silently as Dean tended to his wounds.
Truth be told, he agreed with Dean. As much as his mind kept telling him there was no way out, his heart yearned with hope, just wishing and praying that there would be a way to save his sister.
SUPERNATURAL
Bobby looked out the window as he heard the familiar rumble of the Impala draw near. Pulling the curtains aside, he smiled seeing his three adopted kids climb out.
He'd been thoroughly bewildered when he'd gotten a call from Dean at around two a.m. asking if they could come over in a few hours. Bobby hadn't missed the urgency in Dean's tone and had replied saying that they could come over anytime they wanted.
As the three siblings walked towards Bobby's front door, Bobby frowned as he assessed them. Dean and Sam looked tired, bags under their eyes, worry etched into their features. The claw marks on Sam's face made Bobby's blood boil, wanting to kill the person that dared tried to hurt him.
And between them was Grace looking confused and out of place.
Trying not to think about what could have happened, Bobby walked over to the door and opened it just in time for Dean, Sam and Grace to enter.
"Hey, Bobby," Dean greeted as he walked in, Sam doing the same and Grace giving him a small hug.
Bobby smiled back and watched as the Winchesters made themselves at home, going to their usual rooms to freshen up. As he walked into his kitchen to start making coffee, he just hoped that everything was alright.
SUPERNATURAL
Sam and Dean sat across Bobby on the couch, waiting patiently for Bobby to understand what they were trying to get across. Obviously trying to tell your father figure that your little sister was a werewolf was not going to come across well.
"How?" Bobby asked after a few minutes of tense silence.
Dean shrugged, looking just as devastated as Sam and Bobby. "We're not sure. Bobby…it's like she doesn't know. When we got her out of the bathroom today morning, she looked…" Dean trailed off, trying to shake the memory from his mind.
Sam gave his brother a reassuring look before continuing, "She looked scared, Bobby. She asked us how there were scratches on the walls. She asked how I got this," Sam motioned to the still healing scars on his face.
"We don't know what to do. We can't just…" Dean got to his feet, running an agitated hand through his hair. "She's our sister, Bobby. We can't just put a silver bullet through her heart. There has to be something, right?" Dean asked, looking helpless.
Bobby's expression turned grim as he answered, "I don't know, Dean. I've never heard of something like this."
"So you suggest we just gank her?!" Dean yelled indignantly.
"Calm down, boy. I didn't say that. But we need to be careful. Grace is not human anymore, Dean. Even if she doesn't know, we need to take precautions. And first thing is telling her about it."
Dean immediately shook his head. "How the hell are we gonna tell her, Bobby?" he asked. His voice turned mocking as he said, "Hey, Grace. Guess what? You're a goddamn werewolf."
"I'm a what?" came a small voice from behind him that made his blood run cold.
All three men in the room turned around to spot Grace, shock written clear across her face as her hands hung limply at her sides.
"Gracie," Sam coaxed as he walked forward. But Grace held up her hand. Sam tried not to notice how it seemed to be trembling.
"What's going on?" Grace asked, making sure to keep her distance from the three of them. "I want the truth. Did I hear right? I'm a…werewolf?"
The silence in the room gave her the answer. She stumbled back a few steps, shaking her head.
"Grace," Sam tried again.
"NO!" she yelled, not wanting to hear how everything was going to be okay this time. There was nothing either brother or Bobby was going to say or do to make this better and she was just happy her father wasn't around to see what his daughter turned into. "How…but…oh my God, I did that to you," she whispered, pointing to the scars on Sam's face as her eyes shined with unshed tears.
"It wasn't you," Sam tried again to take a step closer but she mirrored his movement and took a step back.
Her eyes flashed over to Dean's for a second before landing back on Sam's. "Wasn't it? Were…werewolf," she stumbled over the word, "or not I did that. I could have…" she swallowed hard as a tear slipped down her cheek. "I could have killed you."
"But you didn't," Dean spoke up as he tried to keep his expression reassuring and not sympathetic. He moved towards her and this time she didn't take a step back. "What happened, Gracie? I think I would have remembered you wolfing out once a month."
Sam shot him a look for his dry humor but kept his mouth shut as he returned his attention to Grace and waited for her answer. She crossed her arms over her chest as she glanced down at the floor. "I got mugged."
"What? When?" Sam questioned as both brothers hackles visibly rose by the thought of someone hurting their sister.
She shrugged, "A couple months back. Idiot bit the back of my shoulder. I was so grossed out and pissed at myself that I let someone get the jump on me that I didn't really think about it." She looked past her brothers to catch Bobby's line of sight. "I'm sorry."
"We'll figure something out, darlin'," Bobby gave her a tight smile that was supposed to calm all her fears but she had been around the old hunter long enough to know that he was lying.
She cleared her throat, "Should…should I sleep in the panic room tonight?"
Dean shook his head, "Last night was the last night in the lunar cycle. You'll be fine to sleep in your room."
"You mean you guys will be fine," she frowned, giving them all one last look before heading up to her room.
Grace might have been in college but that didn't mean she had forgotten everything her father had taught her over the years. If there truly was some sort of cure then Bobby would have heard about it. She had no other choice but to take matters into her own hands, the thought of killing someone, of hurting one of her brothers, was too much to bear. She wouldn't be locked up in the panic room once a month like some prisoner to this curse because she knew that there would come a day that she got out. So instead she sat in her room for a bit until she got a plan sorted out.
Creeping down the stairs, she heard Bobby let out a long breath, "I just don't think there's a way to fix this one, boys."
She swallowed her emotions knowing it was true but Dean's words had her frozen in her spot. "You don't kill family just because they have one foot out the door."
There wasn't anything else to say or do. Dean wasn't going to let Sam or Bobby end her misery so she would have to do it herself. Stealing her emotions like the Winchester she was she entered the kitchen, pretending to not have heard anything that was just said.
X-X-X
This was it. She had to do it here because she couldn't stand thinking about her brothers hearing the shot go off. The old clunker she borrowed from Bobby was parked alongside the lake, music playing softly from the tinny radio, as she reached over to the passenger seat for the gun.
They say your life flashes before your eyes before you die but Grace tried not to think about. She tried to forget the little army men Sam stuffed into the ashtray in the backseat of the Impala. She tried to forget the first time Dean wore their father's leather jacket and the new sense of responsibility that came with it. She tried to forget her dad's constant pleas to stay safe, his foul words as she left for college, and the freedom she finally felt when she got there. She thought about Jackson the first boy she had ever kissed and the first boy Sam had thrown a punch at. She thought of her first day of middle school, mouthful of braces, and how Dean promised to kill anyone who made fun of her.
The memories of her life weren't all bad but her heart sunk as she thought about everything she would be missing out on. She would never graduate college. She would never meet the guy of her dreams, get married, or have children. Come to think of it, she would never see her brothers do any of those things either. She wondered if they had realized yet that she was gone.
Grace turned up the music, leaned back in the seat, and placed the cool metal against her temple. A single tear slipped down her cheek before she pulled the trigger.
Grace Winchester had been destined for greatness the second she was born. She was raised a hunter, raised with the notion that you did what was possible to save as many as you could. There was no way to save Grace but in taking herself out she might just have saved someone else and in her mind that made it all okay.
