Mary felt something crack inside of her as she stared up at John. He leaned down and carefully picked her up, taking care not to jostle Dean too much. She could feel him take a deep breath and that broke her, turning her head to bury into his chest as she shook and quietly sobbed.

"It's alright, it's alright Mary, I got you." John murmured to her. "It's going to be alright."

Mary shook her head, bringing it up to touch the glass once more. "There's Sammy." she whispered, feeling John's sharp intake of breath. "It's Sammy and he's there and-" her voice cracked and she clung to him once more. "Sammy is..."

"He's going to be fine." John told her, slowly carrying her away and back to where the rooms for the patients were. "But you need to look after yourself too."

"I don't matter right now, all attention needs to be on Sammy and making sure that he's okay."

"He's going to be okay." John repeated. "Mary, you're important too. Please, for Dean, he needs you too."

At the mention of Dean she looked down into her arms at her son and pulled him in closer to her, curling simultaneously into John's embrace.

John walked them back to her room and gently set her in the bed, bringing the thin covers up to cover her enough. He grabbed the chair at the side and picked it up, setting it next to the bed before sitting in it, just staring at her silently.

Mary swallowed hard, taking a deep breath. She procrastinated looking at him or talking by looking over Dean, shifting him so that he was a bit more comfortable on her and still asleep.

"If you had asked...I would've gone with you." John told her, making her close her eyes.

"No you wouldn't have." she told him. "You're too entangled with the Letters and everything else. I needed to get them out of there."

"And I would've gone with you." John repeated. "Mary, you and our sons take priority. Over anything else, over the Men of Letters, over everything."

"Well you had a very interesting way of showing it." Mary told him, trying to keep her voice leveled even when it shook. Her hand came up to wipe at her eyes. "You talked a big game about being with us, about being on our side, but the second you realized that Dean was going to be forced to be a Letter, just like you, you jumped on that and gave me a show about trying to be fair."

She took a deep breath. "This whole fucked up thing about forcing Dean to become a Letter. Forcing Sammy, who wasn't even born yet, to be a hunter. Not giving them a choice, not even giving them an option. And no one saw it like that, no one saw that forcing these children into this was screwed up and wrong."

"They deserve to live normal lives, they deserve to have the right to choose." Mary continued. "And I don't give a damn about what a bunch of old, stick up the asses, old-fashioned, fucks have to say or want. Who the hell are they that they get to decide what our kids get to do or not to do?"

"Just because they're your sons means that they have to be Letters? Just because they're my sons means that they have to be hunters? No. Fuck no, I refuse. I've hated all of this, I've hated hunting and being terrified. I've hated being shown how to make salt shotgun shells and learning Latin frontwards and backwards when I was four years old. I've hated my parents for putting me through this and I hate the idea that my children have to as well." she paused to take a deep breath, chest heaving. She stopped when John reached out to take her hand in his, squeezing it tightly.

"The one good thing in my life that came from hunting...was you." Mary told him, staring down at the sheets. "That I got to meet you. That we started a relationship of some kind and now we got them." her free hand went to Dean, stroking over his head. "I don't want him to be a Letter, I don't want Sammy to be a Hunter."

"Yeah, I've gotten that." John said softly, bringing his other hand up to hold one of hers between them. "For now, lets focus on you and Sammy, everything else can wait."

"For how long?" Mary asked, shaking her head. "Because as far as I can see, we're back at square one."

"For as long as needed." John said. "And besides, your parents want to see you too."

Mary looked up at that as the door opened and she felt like sobbing once more when her parents came into the room. John stood up, after squeezing her hand once more, and then let go so that Samuel and Deanna could come to either side of Mary and hug their daughter, which she returned. He watched them for a moment before he quietly left the room. Once he was in the hallway he hesitated but then slowly started to go back to the NICU window.

I do not own Supernatural.

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