The Whispers of John Winchester

The Sins of Bobby Singer Story

SPNFanFic 2017 Dawn Gray

I don't own the rights to John, Mary, the Boys, Bobby, I just write what they tell me to.

They say you see your life flash before your eyes when you're about to die, but I was very much alive, at least at that moment. It was what I was about to do that was sending me careening down that spiral into the past, but it wasn't my past, really. Or at least it wasn't my faults that was seeing, it was my truths and realizations. Something that really should have angered me but it didn't, something that should have changed my mind but I couldn't because no matter what, he was my boy.

Maybe I had known all along, maybe I had decided not to notice, at least not until that very moment. He was my soldier, Sam's protector, the sanity that kept me coming back to them, that kept me from joining her and there wasn't anything I wouldn't do for him, not now, not ever. Sam and Dean would always come first, even now, even as I was about to give up my life, but I wish I had time to tell Dean, to make him understand what I suddenly had. Blood doesn't make you family, love does.

I remembered the first time I held him in my arms, the look in his eyes as he stretched his small body, but the light that shined in them was almost angelic. He looked older than he was already, and he had just come into the world. He didn't cry, didn't make a fuss, just let me hold him and stared. I thought they weren't supposed to see far but this tiny thing was staring into my soul. I knew from that moment on that no matter what happened, I would move heaven and Earth to protect him. I didn't know that I would actually have to fight my way through hell to keep that promise.

He was a whip from the start, off and running before I could blink but always the protector, always the curious one that needed to explore everything and just as blond as his mother. He got his looks from her, at least the looks I could see. He moved like lightening, or crawled at a snail's pace, it was his choice, no matter the urgency and that was Dean through and through. Once the mindset was there, he had to have it his way or no way.

When Sam came into the world, I knew that I had been blessed a second time, and I watched as Dean stood by his brother from the moment he came home screaming and wailing. It was only Dean that could sooth him, only Dean that could quiet him down. Six months after his was born, that fateful night, I handed Sam to his brother, placed the car of the younger one into the hands of a four-year-old and felt the fire raging behind me.

"Take your brother outside as fast as you can - don't look back. Now, Dean! Go!" I know that little man held on for dear life, not letting go of Sam, never letting go of Sam, and as we watched the fire burn, as the house engulfed in flames and I pulled them both close, I knew that from that day forward, Dean would never be the same.

Dean stopped talking for a while, there wasn't much that would get him out of that mood, nothing much but Sammy. Doting on his little brother was everything to that kid, and I tried my hardest to be a father to them, but the revenge was just too much, still fresh in my heart, even as they grew. I watched him change, become a better man that I was, even at the tender age he was. He was all that Sammy needed, at least that's what I thought.

That was when I started meeting other hunters, others who wanted to track down the things that went bump in the night. That was when I meet Bobby Singer. He was a drunk from the jump and we never really saw eye to eye on most things, in fact the only things we ever agreed on was Sam and Dean. I had gotten his name from Ellen Harvelle, and the reason why was mainly because I needed parts for the Impala, but I remember the day that I pulled up through the Singer's Salvage Yard gates.

The cars were parked everywhere, haphazardly tossed about the yard, but there was a clear drive up to the bay and a wrecker with the logo printed on the side sitting right in front of the house. The boys were both in the backseat, and quietly watched as I got out. Neither making a noise, at least that was the rules, but that was when they decided it would be fun to carve their initials into the car.

As I approached the house, I thought of what I was going to say. "Hey, I'm John Winchester, I need parts" or "hey, I'm a hunter, I hear you have rock salt", neither one of them were good at all. Not to someone said to be as paranoid as Singer.

They were right, he was one paranoid bastard. He met me at the door with a loaded, pump-action rifle pointing the damned thing right at my chest, but when I looked up from the barrel to the man before me, I stopped dead. There was something about his eyes, something familiar. He looked past me at the car, at the boys that played around in the backseat and then his hard eyes came back on me.

"What do you want?" His tone was almost… it was as if we had met before, it had an attitude in it that I knew from somewhere.

"My name is John Winchester," I gestured towards the car, "my boys, Sam and Dean."

"Ah-huh," he didn't seem very interested, but then I watched the barrel move as he held the gun upright. "Wait, did you say Winchester?"

"Yeah, Ellen said you might have some parts that I could buy off you, need to do some repairs to the old girl." Singer looked past me again and nodded. I watched as he put the rifle down, step past me from the porch and headed towards the car. I just followed because, what the hell else was I going to do, but Singer stared at the two in the back of the car. "Boys, come on out."

Both Sam and Dean crawled out of the car, well Sam kind of feel, but Dean made his way over the door without bothering to open it, landing perfectly on his feet as he helped Sam off the dirt, brushing off his younger brother. I watched the strange look on Bobby's face as Dean stood straight, held Sam up by the collar of the shirt and gave us both a shit-eating grin.

"Wait, these are Mary's boys?" Singer questioned and looked at me, before looking back at the older of the two. "Mary Campbell?"

"Winchester!" I stated angrily. Did he not know who I was? "She was my wife."

"Yeah," he nodded, but his lips barely moved as he turned once again and headed away from the house, down the row of cars. "I know!"

The orders I gave to the boys were to stay with the car as I followed the older man into the maze of cars. Wherever the hell he was taking me, I was sure glad he had left that rifle behind because you could easily had gotten lost back there. That was it, that was what started the see-saw of a friendship that Bobby and I had. It wasn't always good, in fact usually it was pretty bad, but he was insistent when it came to the protection of the boys, not something I could argue with.

I left them there more than anything, I should have never left them alone, but as time went on, and I got to know Singer better, I started to notice the little similarities between him and Dean, the mannerisms, the facial expressions, the eyes. What exactly was I looking at? Why did Bobby keep take the childhood pictures of him and his mother down from the shelves? Why was he so pig-headed when it came to Dean getting some proper schooling, or Sam having some real toys?

Why was I making it such a big issue?

It came to a head when Dean was nabbed for stealing in 1995. I decided that he was going to stay where he was put so that I could finish the hunt that we were on, but I had to bring Sam to Bobby's, everyone else was busy.

I pulled up to the house, and again was met on the porch by Bobby, this time the gun was nowhere to be found but I was struck again by the familiar look on his face, one that I had seen when I drove away from Dean in New York. Sam went in, ran up to the spare room that Bobby had for them and let the two of us standing in the kitchen.

"Beer?" He asked as he walked past me, not happy with the fact that I had left my son in a home.

"No," it was the only answer I wanted to give. "I need to ask you a question."

"You already asked me to watch your kid while you take off AGAIN, what more do you want from me?" Bobby snarled and turned towards me.

"I want to know if you slept with my wife?" I blurted out, and watched the shock roll across his face. There was no gentle way to ask, no easing into a question like that but I knew by then that Mary had been hunting before she was pregnant with Dean, I knew she was hunting after she had him but there was something bothering me about the look on the man's face. Something like a realization, and we both had it at the same time. Bobby just swallowed but I…I just grabbed my keys and headed towards the door. "I'll be back in a few weeks, I've got some things to clean up."

The road was my savior, at least at that point in time, and I took every mile of it and let it wash away the thoughts that flew through my mind. Dean wasn't mine? Mary and Bobby? What the hell had just happened?

That was then, that was in the past and I never brought it up again, not even after the argument of me leaving Dean in New York, not even when he threatened to kill me for what I was doing for MY boys. No matter what, no matter how many times I looked at Dean in that mirror, there was one thing that wouldn't let me go. Mine or not, that boy was Mary's son, my Mary's flesh and blood and he had my heart from day one.

So here I was, lying down the spell, holding the Colt in my hand and everything, every little secret of Dean's life was flashing through my mind. I knew who my son was, I had raised him the best I could, but I wasn't the best father. I survived a war, I married the most loving woman in the world, I raised two sons that, despite my short-comings, were two of the best damn hunters in the world and I knew one thing with absolute certainty… Dean would never be anyone else to me except for my son.

As I sliced my palm, let the blood drip into the bowl, I turned, gun cocked and raised, and looked at the yellow-eyed demon.

"You conjuring me, John? I'm surprised. I took you for a lot of things, but suicidally reckless wasn't one of them." He just gave me a wicked smile

"I could always shoot you." Which wasn't my plan at al.

"You could always miss." He laughed, "and you've only got one try, don't'cha? Did you really think you could trap me?"

"Oh, I don't want to trap you." I said as I lowered the gun, "I want to make a deal."

I walked into the room, not knowing what to do next, and I sent Sammy out, this was the only way that it could happen. I had to tell Dean, I had to let him know.

"What is it?" I watched him sit up in the bed, as healthy as a horse and that made me smile, more than anything.

"You know, when you were a kid, I'd come home from a hunt, and after what I'd seen, I'd be, I'd be wrecked. And you, you'd come up to me and you, you'd put your hand on my shoulder and you'd look me in the eye and you'd... You'd say "It's okay, Dad" Dean, I'm sorry." I nodded, not even sure what I was spouting off, but I was bringing myself up to par, gathering the courage to say those words to him.

His face was full of confusion, "what?"

"You shouldn't have had to say that to me, I should have been saying that to you. You know, I put, I put too much on your shoulders, I made you grow up too fast. You took care of Sammy, you took care of me. You did that, and you didn't complain, not once. I just want you to know that I am so proud of you." Just a few words, Winchester, that's all I would have had to do to let him know the truth, Just a few more words.

"This really you talking?" Skeptic as ever, more like Bobby than he knew.

"I want you to watch out for Sammy, okay?" I smiled at him, and watched that face looking back at me, the face that I loved, that would always be mine and I smiled. I couldn't tell him. I couldn't break his heart twice because what was coming next was going to tear him apart.

"Yeah, dad, you know I will. You're scaring me." That little Dean voice that I hadn't heard in such a long time came flying back at me, and I tried to smile, tried to not let him see the pain of holding onto the secret that just wanted to slip out.

The last words I said to him, the last words I spoke to the boy who would always be mine, no matter who his father really was, it wasn't I love you, because that would give it away. It was simple and everything I ever wanted to tell him. It was cryptic and gave nothing away, but it was something I hoped he would do, because I wasn't leaving him alone, I was leaving him with Bobby. With a smile, I leaned over, looking into those bright green eyes and whispered.

"Don't be scared, Dean."