Part 20

Vermont was chilly. It had its surprises too. Like good coffee houses with patios and great views. John sipped his coffee black, zipped up his jacket and thanked whoever was listening that Dean hadn't asked about what had happened in South Dakota with Bobby. John was a little ashamed at his desperate bids to justify any of his actions. If they didn't work on Bobby, then John had no other excuse for the things he'd done and the lies he'd perpetuated to keep going back to that future world.

Speak of the Devil; Dean sat down with some calorie-laden, cavity-inducing treat from the café and a mug of black coffee. He pinched a chunk off and popped it into his mouth. "Now, is that a sunrise or what?"

"It is a good one." John agreed.

Dean rolled his words around in his mouth for a long moment. "Hey Dad?"

"What's up?" John didn't take his eyes off the view.

"I need to tell you something."

John tore his eyes off the view to take in his son. Carefree and confident and owning himself like John had never seen. "What about?"

"About the question you didn't ask me before you left the Catskills." Dean cleared his throat and took a sip of his coffee. "It's about me and the hunt and Liz."

"Well, tell me, son."

"I love the hunt. It's what I know. I'm good at it… like you were saying in Fitchburg. I have that advantage over you. I've done this my whole life." He took a breath. "I'm good at other things too. I'm good with my hands; with engines; building furniture and shit…" He looked to his father who nodded at him to continue. "I love Liz. She's… everything to me and… well, I'm thinking that I'm going to live there with her."

"Sounds like you got it all planned out, son."

"Kind of."

"What's left?"

"Liz is pregnant. You're… gonna be a grandpa." Dean flashed a wary smile at his father.

John nodded to himself. There it was. "Congratulations, Dean."

"I know my life isn't normal and that it won't even be safe but-"

"I know it, Dean."

"But I can still hunt sometimes."

"Maybe."

"Dad?" Dean cleared his throat.

"Yeah, Dean?"

"I expected more yelling."

"I know it." John nodded and lifted his coffee to his lips. "Liz is a great girl. Treat her right."

"You aren't going to disown me?"

"No." John shook his head and turned to face his son. "Never."

"I just…"

"I know." John nodded to himself again and met his son's eyes. "I made a mistake with Sammy and I lost him. I'm not going to make the same mistake with you. I won't lose you, too."

Dean's eyes welled with tears but they didn't fall. He took the moment for what it was. "Alright, then."

John took a long swallow on coffee that hadn't cooled enough. He cleared the sting out of his throat. "And you said I'd only get grandkids through Sammy. Dean, you dog."

Then Dean couldn't stop laughing.

--

Liz served them dinner and smiled wanly. Dean tugged her over when she passed next and whispered something that John couldn't hear. She shook her head but leaned into him for a moment. Then she was moving. The back door was closer than the bathroom and then she was puking into the back lot. Dean took another bite of his burger. "She gets morning sickness at night."

"It happens." John stared at Dean for the longest time. "Have you told your brother?"

"No." Dean started to say something else but clenched his jaw then took a huge bite out of his burger. So John left it alone.

--

Liz gave them the tour of the guestroom turned nursery. "I know it's early and everything but I get a little crazy when I'm alone and bored."

John saw what they didn't. Where she'd put a rocking chair, ready to be stripped and painted, he saw the finished product in a rich cherry finish and cushions worn flat through two babies. He saw the bunk beds in blue and pink where Liz had tacked a picture of a cradle. John already knew that Dean was going to design and build it with his own bare hands.

"What's that, John?" Liz turned.

"Just wondering if the crib is gonna match the shelf out there for a theme." John cleared his throat.

"What? You think that shelf was a one hit wonder?" Dean puffed out his chest. "I will build the hell out of the damn crib." He glanced around. "Where did you put my notebook?"

When he was gone to look for it, Liz stood there picking paint off the rocking chair. She looked up at him from under the fall of her hair. "Thank you, John… for letting me tell him myself and for… not making him go."

"He still went."

"But it was very much his decision and that's really important to me. I've dealt with one husband with family obligations. I can't deal with another one."

"You're getting married?"

"Not in the strictest sense but… yeah." She averted her eyes. "He owns me."

"Look." Dean walked in scribbling and talking. "This is going to be the baddest crib ever…"

John sat in the rocker and watched them squabble over the design of the thing. His eyes strayed to the window once or twice. To the woods.

--

Aching and tired and nauseous, John trudged up the stairs with the key to his usual room. The corner one with double beds. He yanked the bottle of whiskey out of his bag for a chug before he pulled out the pre-paid phone he'd just bought at the corner store. He slid his fingers over the keys before punching out 10 digits. The call went to voice mail and so he hung up and took another slug from the bottle.

He contemplated the bottle long and hard before making the decision to finish it. He was torn. He could cross the lot and be welcomed the traveling hero from his grandkids and Liz or he would cross the lot and find that his son was alive and well and raising a family. He would never speak out loud how torn he was between the two. It had been so long since he had the kind of life that he looked forward to in the morning. A woman who drove him to distraction and kids that looked at him like he was the best thing ever invented.

Fallen asleep on top of the covers in boxers and a T-shirt, he was roused by the sound of the key in the lock. He almost called out 'occupied' but he knew the form that had slipped inside. Knew the soft slide of hands under his shirt and pulling his boxers down. The fall of hair over his bare belly before the slick glide of tongue and lips engulfed him. Moaning her name, he gave up and pulled his shirt over his head before dragging her mouth up to his. Stripped the tank and jeans off to feel the warm skin. Listened to hisses as he claimed breasts, belly button and velvet folds.

Everything was the same but different. Everything was more… John just couldn't put his finger on it. Something about everything was off. It wasn't until he was on his back, arching up into her shifting hips that he began to zero in on the difference. Her hair was different. Still long but the cut framed her face differently. Her breasts felt… fuller in his hands. The ease of the strokes that caused her gasps was noticeable. Gripping her hips, he bucked and tilted her just right and that's when it hit him.

Jerking her down and beneath him, he finished because he was too far gone to do anything else despite what he thought he knew. Riding out the ripples, he framed her face with his hands and tried to make sense of the last time he'd been there and what had happened that time. Sam had come. There had been words and revelations but before that. There had been a moment where she'd looked like the world was coming to an end. He knew but he didn't know and he couldn't make himself ask the right question. "Liz… we didn't use anything."

Her eyebrows arched over closed lids. "There's kind of no point, now." Her eyes were moist when she opened them, waiting for his reaction. "I was going to tell you before you left but… you left so suddenly. I wanted to ask you what you wanted to do but you left and you didn't say when you were coming back." She swallowed down the lump in her throat. "There's a lot of risk because of my age but… I couldn't bring myself to consider alternatives."

"Liz…"

"And I know we said we would never let it happen because… because of everything but it did happen and I don't know what you're thinking and I need you to say something."

"You're running out of room in the apartment. You'll have to stick this kid in a closet or something."

"That's not funny."

"Three in that little room is going to be a tight fit." John pointed out while he tried to wrap his mind around the fact that he was 51 years old and he was being told he was going to be a father again… Holy shit and this Liz thought he was 67 years old.

"John, stop." Liz shoved at him to make him roll off her. She sat up and hugged her knees.

"I… won't see this one graduate high school."

"I thought about that."

"You'll have to tell her about me. She'll learn about me the way Jack and Deanna learn about Dean."

"I know." She turned to look at him over her shoulder. "She?"

"I dunno. I had my two boys…"

"Why'd you leave, John?" She stretched out beside him once more. "I thought we were having a good time. Jack's play and everything. I went to the bathroom and when I came out, you were gone and the kids were asleep."

"Had something to take care of."

"Demons are going to be the death of you." She chided half-heartedly. "You never did talk to Sam again after what happened. You think if he had called you when it happened that maybe you could have gotten to it before… what happened to Dean?"

"It's all maybes by this point." John shrugged, filing the information away. "He… come by again?"

"You're implying that he's ever been here. Changing the subject." She pulled a chest hair just hard enough to hurt. "You've got to forgive him for Dean." At his silence, she sighed heavily. "He couldn't have known that the thing that killed Jess was the same thing that killed his mother. Dean always said that the two of you didn't talk to him about it."

"I don't think it would have mattered."

--

John's search was quick. He had a location on Dean's death. Cold Oak, South Dakota. He had a location on Sam. Same farm, different story. Somehow, when John had let Dean save himself, the future had changed significantly enough that a whole series of conversations and encounters had never happened.

John scoped out the land on his walk to Emily Hardin's ranch. The woman who answered had a different look to her than the last time he'd been out. She didn't remember him. Her blond hair fell over one eye and when she brushed it away, John could see the bruising. Fading but there… just like the finger marks on her throat. When she poured him tea, he saw fresher bruising where her bracelets couldn't hide them.

"You say you're looking for a Sam Winchester?" She winced as she said the name.

"I heard there was one out this way."

"Can't say that I've heard of him."

"I was told that he worked your ranch in the heavier seasons."

Her eyes shifted to a darkened hallway but she shook her head. "No, I know all my ranch hands and their histories. Never had a Winchester. Dad might've hired one way back but um… he's gone now. So is most of his crew. Just have Mute Larry and he's… well, mute and a bit slow to boot."

John studied her closely. She wasn't the smitten girl she'd been when he'd last spoken to her. He stared at her. Even her beauty was a bit faded. He knew what she was hiding and who she was hiding along with it. "Sammy's daddy would be ashamed to see what he's done to you."

Her eyes went wide but she didn't move an inch. Her eyes slid toward the hallway once more. "I really don't know what you're talking about." Her eyes squeezed shut when the tea cups rose into the air. John drew his gun and aimed it down the hallway. "Please. Stop."

John rose and stared into the inky darkness. "Samuel Winchester, I ought to take you over my knee for what you've done to this girl."

He could feel the glare of the gun on him but he underestimated the resourcefulness of his youngest son. The click of the hammer being pulled was in his ear even though the shape in the hallway didn't move. Steel kissed his temple and John shut his eyes. He'd been on the killing end of the gun too many times to really care but he had to know what had happened with the demon and Sam's girl. The voice was deeper than he remembered. "What are you?"

"I'm a who, not a what." John answered without opening his eyes, the gun jerked against his temple. John set his gun down to the unspoken request.

"Shapeshifter?"

The voice made John's blood run cold. "Name's John. It's on your birth certificate."

"You might look like him but you're not. My father died a year and a half ago. Saw it happen with my own two eyes." The barrel of the gun jabbed into his head again.

"I'm standing right here." John opened his eyes slowly. "You leave your family and then you don't even welcome them when they come looking for you." He eyed his grown son, the form emerging in the shadows as John's eyes adjusted to the darkness. "Did I raise you like that?"

"You think you're cute?"

"Sam, please." Emily spoke up from where she cowered in her chair.

"Shut up." Sam ordered her and she curled up into a ball, exposing the bruises on her legs when her skirt fell away. Sam emerged from the hallway to look John over. "It's clever. Looking like him but too bad, so sad. Not going to work. I killed Azazel, I will kill you."

"Fine. I'm not John Winchester. I'm some other creature that looks like him." John nodded and took a seat, the gun followed him. "I was just checking up on you Winchesters and figured my second stop would be tense but didn't quite expect this."

"Second stop?" Sam snickered. "You've been fed wrong information. I'm the only Winchester these days."

"Looked pretty alive to me."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"A boy and a girl back east. Cute." John studied Sam as much as he could. Sam had acquired bulk and kept it into middle age, which said a lot about the life he led.

"Right… I'm just supposed to believe I've got what… cousins?" Sam laughed and collapsed into the chair next to Emily's, who had yet to uncurl herself. "I'm the only one of my bloodline left. The Winchester line and the Azazel line. I'm it, pal."

John raised his hand to gesture that he had something in his jacket. He used the same hand to pull a picture out of his pocket. Jack and Deanna. "You're a biological dead end but your brother wasn't."

Sam ripped the picture from John's fingers without moving an inch. He absentmindedly patted Emily's knee and plucked the picture from the air when it floated over to him. The blood drained from his face. "This could be any two kids."

John pulled out his wallet and rifled through it to find the one he'd stolen. Dean and Jack at Jack's third birthday party. That one went the same way as the first. "Took that picture myself."

Sam's face changed when he saw the smile on his brother's face. "Dean would have told me if he'd had kids."

"Would he? As I recall, he was pretty hot under the collar about you for a good number of years after you took off."

Sam studied the pictures and his face became unreadable. "Well, the pictures are real enough, I guess but you're still about ten years too young to be my father."

"What can I say, I aged well."

"Not that well."

"Well, I live hard."

"I live hard. I'm not even certain that you're alive."

Sam wore the mantle of ranch hand the way he'd worn so many other guises as a kid. Just well enough that anyone off the street wouldn't know the difference. He stood, walking around as he studied the pictures, the gun floating off and away from John's head. Emily seemed to relax as Sam traveled away from her in his pacing. Sam turned at the doorway. "Don't think about moving. I'll be right back."

John thought about comforting the girl but she seemed to be waiting for something, relaxing in the moment. Then Sam returned with a phone in hand. "Who are you calling?"

"Someone sane." Sam muttered then cleared his throat. "Hey Bobby? … No, I know but I got something here claiming to be John Winchester…"

John cleared his throat and settled into his chair. He remembered how he'd parted with Bobby and it was sure to make an impression. Of course, he didn't know what kind of relationship Bobby had with Sam in these days.

"Well, he's trying to tell me that Dean had kids but that's just not…" Sam paled a bit but didn't let another expression cross his face. "You knew and never told me? … Fuck, Dean. He's dead… I know… So, if we salted and burned Dad's body, what's sitting in my living room?"

"Who, not what." John corrected.

"Shut up." Sam bit out. He cleared his throat. "Bobby wants to know about the last conversation you and he ever had?"

"The one that ended with his shotgun pointed at me?"

"You hear that?" Sam's floating menagerie settled down and the tea cups clinked back onto their plates. Emily sat up and wiped her hands over her face. She sipped at her cup, her hands only shaking a little. "What was it about?"

"Well, that's between me and Bobby about the specifics but the topic was involving a hunt, a woman and my sanity."

"Bobby says it's close enough." Sam stared. "But if you're really him. What the hell did we salt and burn?"

--

Emily poured a couple of glasses of bourbon while Sam made a round of phone calls that he didn't want John to know about. "It's not what you think, you know."

"What's that?" John took the glass when she handed it out.

"He just doesn't know his own strength sometimes."

"Yes, he does. I raised him. Taught him to know exactly how strong he is."

She took a long sip of her bourbon and set the glass down carefully. "He's a good man."

"Some tips, give as good as you get. Cold the first night on a bruise, heat until the color fades." He tossed back his bourbon and made for the door.

He could hear them talking and yelling as he kept walking. He didn't have to wait long. Sammy's invisible force fields kept John from hitting the road. He was not in the mood for this. Not fully wrapping his mind around what had happened to his baby boy. Something had happened to him. Something not right. Floating tea cups. Telekinesis. All his research on the thing that killed Mary. All the pieces falling into place. When the younger man towered over him, John didn't know what to say except, "I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"For whatever's happened to you."

"This?" Sam gestured to himself. "There was never any escaping this. From day one, was there? Mom and her unholy pacts. Dean and his inability to accept that people die."

"What does your brother have to do with you and your very demonlike abilities?"

"Well nothing except that I was born second. I was the one with demon blood inside me the whole time and you never said a word. You knew when Jess died what I was going to become and you couldn't even warn me."

"You could have fought it."

"Fight my blood?"

"How long did it take you to give in?"

"I held out."

"How long?"

"Why are you even here?"

"To see if I could trust you to look after your brother's kids but obviously you're not the one for the job." John walked right up to him, nose to nose. "I don't want you anywhere near those kids. They don't belong to the world the way we did. I won't have you bringing it into their lives."

"Oh, I see. It was good enough for your sons but not for your grandkids."

"Hell no. We could fight it. They can't. They won't. They don't have to."

"Dean was always your favorite. Figures you'd let him out of the baggage that comes with being your blood."

"It's not about favorites, son. It's about doing what's right. There's only one thing left to do. You killed your mother's murderer. Good. Now live your life and do something about the evil running in your veins."

"You make it sound so easy."

"It's not. I expected you to try harder to keep that shit under control. Terrorizing a farm girl to make yourself feel good? Making her think she deserves it or you don't mean it when I taught you to spar with your brother without leaving a bruise?" Sam's head bowed. John gripped him behind his neck. "I taught you to kill with a touch and I'm supposed to believe those bruises were accidents?"

"What am I supposed to do?"

"If Bobby never told you about the kids, it was for a reason. You wait for him to tell you it's okay to see 'em. Clean yourself up. You tell Bobby that I'm fixing this. I'll fix it all." John turned and walked away, invisible barriers falling away.

TBC