Song Remains the Same
Chapter 75 / Dust in the Wind
"All my dreams pass before my eyes, a curiosity… nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky. Dust in the wind... all we are is dust in the wind."
- Kansas
*** CONTENT TRIGGER WARNING: Suicide and Self-Harm mentioned ***
...On April 17th, 1912, Pier Nine in New York City welcomed the arrival of the RMS Titanic without any complications. Two-thousand and twenty-three passengers disembarked the luxurious cruise liner amidst enthusiastic onlookers, laughter, and flashbulbs from newspaper cameras. It was heralded as a success and the ship would go on to sail the Atlantic many times without incident. Oh, how things changed with that narrowly avoided iceburg and the twist of fate brought about by angels…
Present Day
Sam and Dean walked out of Bobby Singer's home with packed bags and chastened expressions. It wasn't often that Bobby kicked them out, but today was one of those days. The older man was depressed about Rufus dying and wanted space, telling the boys to get lost and leave him alone. It was odd behavior from Bobby, but grief did odd things to people, Dean thought. It had sure done an odd thing or two to him throughout the years.
At least he and Sam had a job to go get on and occupy themselves with if nothing else.
People were dying off fast in Pennsylvania and it looked sort of like a family curse, maybe—should be an interesting job to say the least. Dean tossed his bag into the backseat of the good ole two-door Mustang. Sam got into the car and had to struggle to cram his freakishly long legs in, as usual. When Dean got in and cranked the engine up, Sam had this look of deep concerned thought on his face. "You know, maybe we should wait 'til Ellen gets back."
"Dude, she just called from the road, said she'd be here in two shakes." Dean gave his brother a meaningful look. "You really wanna sit around and smell him stew in his juices?"
"Yeah, not really," Sam conceded flatly then paused, scrunching up his face in something like deeply disconcerted confusion as a thought seemed to occur to him. "Hey, do you feel like we're forgetting something?" He looked at Dean with this expression of confused bewilderment.
The question caused Dean to take a couple beats—were they forgetting something? He was suddenly wondering the same thing. He looked around the car and sat back with a hand on the wheel, quickly becoming as mystified as Sam was. In his head, he went over everything. Bags, weapons, lead on a job, Sam in the passenger seat… that was it. "What would we have forgotten?" he asked, even though he now really felt like they were forgetting something.
Sam seemed unsure about the answer, but was coming up with an uncomfortable blank. "Yeah. No. I dunno." He took one more second to think then visibly brushed it off. "Let's just go."
Dean thought a minute longer, trying to put his finger on the itch that was suddenly inside of his mind, but he couldn't. As such, he scoffed at was probably nothing. He put the car into drive and the Mustang pulled out of Bobby's. As they hit the road, Dean glanced into the rear view mirror, almost expecting to see someone in the reflection. He frowned at himself. Who? Who would be there in the back seat? He shook off the strange sense of déjà vu, figuring it was the the lack of sleep, and returned his eyes to the road ahead.
Twenty Six Years Ago
Blue Springs, Missouri
The year was 1986. John Winchester glanced briefly at his kids as he drank straight out of the bottle. Ocean of Dreams Bourbon—John's favorite whiskey in all of existence. It got him drunker and more numb faster than anything else. The impossibly dark whiskey had been invented back in 1915 by new immigrants to America and was a mean, high alcohol content liquor… he didn't let himself have it too often because it often made him think very bad ideas were good ideas. But tonight, he needed it. His nerves were fried, the kids were getting on his every last strand of patience, and he was so damn frustrated with everything that he could barely function. The alcohol made it easier. But just barely.
He sat hunched over a little motel table at night as he obsessed over countless newspaper articles in search of anything that he might connect to the paranormal or to his wife's death. It was like grasping at straws. He was coming up with infuriating blanks.
It had been two and a half years since that night when a fire and a monster had destroyed everything he loved. Since then, every day was more and more miserable for him. Every day it was a struggle not to put a gun in his mouth and end his existence.
The reason he kept going? Mary's memory and the need to avenge her. And his kids too, of course. He added that thought on automatically, guiltily. If he was being honest, the search for revenge was the biggest driving force of his existence. His kids made him feel nothing but guilt. They made him see nothing but his own failure. John was no fool, he knew how shitty their lives were turning out to be because of him and his procrastination, denial, and his messed up priorities. Dean wasn't even in school yet and should have been a year ago, Alex was going without any kind of therapy or assistance for her mutism. Sam was the only one John hadn't fucked up yet but he was sure the day would come. It felt too late to fix what he'd done and yet he knew it wasn't. But he still didn't step up to the plate.
They were good kids, too. They didn't deserve a useless, sad waste of space dad like him… this father who always sat in the back of the room being too overwhelmed by his fear and grief to parent. This father who only interacted with his children when he was angry with them… which was more and more often the more time went on. He looked at them and saw his own failures and shortcomings, he looked at them and hated himself for all number of reasons. He wished he could just love them right, he wished he could just let this monster hunt go. He'd tried a couple times. But he just couldn't. Life had lost all meaning except the hunt. John downed another swig of his poison of choice and felt the sting burning away everything—the feelings, the sadness, the pain.
At seven years old, Dean sat cross legged on the floor of the motel room as he held his little sister. Alex, tiny and three years old, was sitting in her big brother's lap and smashing Lego blocks together with great amounts of concentration on her little face. Sitting in front of Dean and facing his siblings, Sammy was constructing some kind of wall out of Lego.
"What're you building, Sammy?" Dean asked in that curious, kind big brother voice he used so often.
"Mo-tel," Sam replied in a sing-song voice.
John felt guilt at his son's proclamation. Most kids would build a house. The twins didn't probably even know that families lived in houses. All they knew about were motels and the Mustang and always being on the move.
Alex abruptly made to snatch Sam's wall, trying to steal his pieces—in the process, the structure broke in half. "No no no, Allie—" Dean said, grabbing her arm even as Sam got mad and snatched his wall bits back. "Those are Sammy's pieces—we have to share."
"Broke my thiiiiiinnnnnng!" Sam wailed at his loudest volume, clutching two halves of a very easily-repaired block wall to himself in very sudden and ardent petulant anger. "Broke it, Elks!" He couldn't pronounce 'Alex' yet.
Grated by the outburst—the tantrums from both the twins were at an all time high right now and he didn't even know what he would do if both of them were capable of making the noise that Sam was—John snapped at both of his sons in turn. "Hey—no crying, young man!" he told Sam roughly. John stared hard at his oldest. "And Dean, for the last goddamn time: don't call her that." He said it more sharply than he needed to.
Contrite and mildly hurt by the tone his father had just used, Dean nodded and visibly swallowed his feelings away. "Yes sir. I forgot." Allie was what Mary wanted to call her. And John couldn't stand the reminder. The nickname was too sweet. Too soft. John hated it.
"Broked my thing," Sam said again, trembling dramatically with short, impassioned breaths. He hadn't paid much mind to his father's reprimand and was seething about his broken Lego wall.
"It's okay, you can rebuild it Sammy, here… lemme show you," Dean said, trying to pacify the situation.
But Sam was indignant and refused Dean's help. He stood up, clutching the two halves of his little wall hard. "Broke my thiiiing! Ahhh!" He threw his blocks at his sister's face in a fit of crazed toddler rage. Alex promptly got just as upset and jumped at her twin to pull his hair and smack him in the face with her hand. Sam went prone and screamed bloody murder. "Hitting me, ahhhh!" Dean tried to pull the two apart and Sam's screams only grew louder as he tried to hit his sister back.
John, unable to take one more second of the chaos, shot upwards to stand. "Enough!" he shouted. The room went silent. His children all looked at him with wide eyes at his loud, thundering tone—and John felt guilty for being so gruff. Sam's little fit of rage was over—he stared at John and then whimpered, inching toward Dean before he began to cry from fear as he clutched his big brother—his silent sister was clinging to Dean, too, and all three of them looked at John like he was scary. Ashamed of himself and his lack of self control, his inability to know how to talk to his kids or get them to calm down, John was miserable. "Jesus Christ," John commented to himself, jamming a hand through his hair and going back for more whiskey. Mary had been the better parent. Three kids was just way too much for one dad to handle.
He swallowed another flaming mouthful, trying to think, wishing for some sort of reprieve he knew he was never going to have. Mary was supposed to have been here with him for this. "Dad, they're just babies," Dean reminded nervously, cautiously. "T-they don't know—"
John whirled around, incensed. "I know that Dean, just everyone be quiet!"
His children, again, were visibly taken aback and frightened at his strong tone. John stared at those three beautiful, innocent kids and felt so much utter despair. He didn't know how to do this. This wasn't what he'd signed up for, and this wasn't what a kid needed either. Back when Dean was just a twinkle in Mary's eye, John had pictured the white-picket fence ideal: his loving and faithful wife at home… his children running to him and adoring him and seeing them as his hero…
And instead he'd ended up with this. A brutally murdered wife whose death had yet to be explained. Three kids who were more scared of him more than anything else. A life on the road in miserable setting after miserable setting. Never quite knowing where the money for the next meal would come from… often times choosing selfishly to get himself whiskey instead of real, good food for the kids.
John knew, he knew that if someone saw the things he dragged these kids through, they would be taken away from him. And maybe they should be taken away. Especially Alex, who needed things he didn't know how to give. He'd blamed himself for her mutism since Mary's death and he always thought if he found the thing that killed Mary he could save Alex somehow from what had happened to her. But the trail was cold. He was useless. And he was doing his kids more harm than good. Things were getting worse, not better. He was trapped in this life and had nowhere to go but deeper in. And what about them? What about them? The boys could hack it, but her…? Little mute Alex?
The whiskey he'd been nursing all night long burned in his stomach and inclined his mind to dark considerations. He looked at his boys and his girl and hated himself and wanted to smash something.
"Shh, Sammy, it's okay," Dean was saying, trying to get Sam to calm down. He was holding onto both of his siblings despite his small form. "It's okay, Al. I got you. I'm right here, okay? Mwah." He kissed her noisily on the cheek and she hugged him around the neck strongly. "Ouch, Alex, not so hard, okay?" Dean chuckled, patting her back.
Most dads would probably see that sight and be proud. But to John, it broke his heart. Dean, a seven year old boy, was more of a parent than John was and it killed him.
I can't do this anymore. I can't.
He'd felt this way for awhile, but that night he felt it so strongly that it sent him into a state of panicked stupidity. Instead of taking some time to calm himself down and think, John took another huge pull of the liquor and lurched over to his children, reached for Alex, and picked her up. She didn't hug his neck like she did with Dean. She clutched her hands to herself and looked at him with a vexed expression, like a child might look at a person they weren't sure how they felt about. Maybe it was the strong smell of alcohol on him, but she was stiff in his arms and mistrustful.
If she had reached for him and hugged him, maybe he wouldn't have done what he did next.
In his drunken state, his emotions were very close to the surface and John looked his pretty baby girl's soft round cheeks and long dark lashes, the sweet curling baby hairs that framed her face, those impossibly large hazel eyes. He loved her so much he could burst. She needed better than this shit life in dirty motels with a drunken dad. She deserved more than he was apparently able to give. And all of it be damned if he didn't do the right thing for her while it was still possible.
John decided to do what he had thought of doing for a very, very long time now. "You want an ice cream, baby girl?" He asked kindly, so that her last memory of him would be a good one.
That question seemed to alarm the oldest one. "I-isn't it kinda late for ice cream, dad?" Dean asked, very keen even at seven. He knew something was up.
"No," John said, and for a moment he reconsidered—he doubted. Then he darkened and made himself follow through. "It's not. I'm taking your sister for a little walk to the gas station, boys." He turned to go out into the chilly night air, holding a confused Alex up high in his arms.
"We want ice cream toooo!" Sam said, jumping up to follow.
"No, just me and Alex," John said firmly.
"Dad, wait, her jacket!" Dean said, running with the little jacket. It was a boy's jacket. Alex wore mostly hand-me-downs and Sam's clothes. John had a hard time with bows and lace and pink, all things Mary had been so excited about. She had wanted a little girl so badly. And John didn't know what to do with one.
He took the jacket and maneuvered Alex into it with a little trouble. Knowing that she was going somewhere, Alex clutched onto her dad and looked back at Dean, who was her security object—she reached for him with an expression of straining. Dean was worried and anxious, and he was visibly having to hold himself back from reaching out for his sister, too.
"Dad, are you sure? I… I don't think she feels like going…" Dean said uncertainly. He got no reply.
John's chest constricted. He told himself this was the right thing for his little daughter, the girl who was supposed to have been a princess and instead was an afterthought. In a rare gesture of fatherly affection, he leaned in and kissed his daughter on the head. Dean watched as his father carried his sister away from him and out of the motel, and in the years to come he would curse himself for not listening to his brotherly instincts, for not telling his dad no, she can't go with you, she has to stay here. Just before the door closed, John could he heard asking a soft question. "We'll be right back, won't we, Alex?"
But Sam and Dean never saw their sister ever again.
Many hours later, a very worried Dean was still awake and making himself sick with concern. He was alternating between peering out of the motel room blinds and watching his sleeping brother. Sam was hugging a pillow to himself—he'd had problems falling asleep without his sister there. As much as the twins fought, the end of the day always came and they would curl up to each other without fail. But not that night.
Dean's little mind was harrowed—why did Dad take Alex for ice cream? Alone? Dad never separated them like that. And it had been so long—too long. Dean wasn't used to being away from either of his siblings for more than a few minutes at a time. He had a pit of fear lodged in his stomach that wouldn't go away.
When his father's familiar shape finally approached on the sidewalk outside, Dean felt relief—but then just as fast as he felt relief, he felt fear. Dad wasn't carrying anyone, and no little Alex silhouette walked beside him. John Winchester came into the motel room alone and Dean's little face was slack, his eyes were wild with fear as he looked around for his sister. He didn't understand where she could be or what had happened and he looked at his father for explanation.
John shut the door loudly, his expression foul and stormy. His eyes were red like he'd been crying.
"Dad, w-w-where's Alex?" Dean asked breathlessly, little face scrunched up in too much worry for his age.
John stopped mid-step, staring stonily ahead of himself. "Gone."
Fear for the worst hit Dean like lightning and his voice wavered, going high and tight. That wasn't right. 'Gone' wasn't right. There was some kind of mistake. "What do you mean, gone…?" he asked, needing to be told it was okay, she was fine, everything was all right. But instead, Dean got some of the worst news of his life.
"I mean gone!" John shouted, brushing past his panicking son. His scent—strongly alcoholic—wafted past. "There was an accident and she's gone," John reiterated in a slurring, angry voice. He looked back at his son darkly. "Dead, Dean, you hear me?"
Dean looked like he was on the verge of passing out, like he barely had the strength to stand, like he couldn't believe his ears for even a second. "Dead?" he echoed in a soft whisper, and then his voice suddenly escalated into a scream. "Dead?!" He began to have a near panic attack, breathing in and out in shallow gasps as he looked around the room and gestured with frantic arms at Alex's things laying around. "NO! She was here! You had her with you!" Dean's voice was a shout. "She can't be gone! No!" When John just looked at his son with an unreadable gaze, Dean's demeanor turned to utter rage and he rushed his father and began to beat him in the legs with little fists. His voice screamed out of him so hard that his throat felt torn. "You liar! Where is she?! What did you do to her?! She's not dead!"
John seized Dean by the shoulders hard and held him away with fingers like steel. His breath was hot and sour the the stench of alcohol. "People die, Dean! Your mother, your sister—now get away from me!" He shoved a sobbing, screaming Dean hard—too hard—and Dean fell to the ground. John's dark expression fell in favor of shock and concern and he tried to help his son up. "I'm sorry Dean, buddy, I didn't mean—"
"She's just a baby!" Dean shouted, shoving his father away as tears glittered in his eyes. "Just a little, helpless baby!" His voice broke and he was choking on loud sobs. "How could you let her get hurt? How could you let my baby sister get hurt!?"
John stood back, set his jaw and looked away, eyes dark. His voice was low and emotionless when he spoke. "We're leaving this town and never coming back, get your stuff."
"You let my sister die!" Dean sobbed, jumping up and attacking his dad again and beating uselessly at John's stomach. "I hate you I hate you!"
"Goddammit Dean!" John roared, shoving his son away again, hard. Dean hit the dresser and huddled there in a quivering, tearful mess. He moaned his sister's name in despair as he smashed his face into his own hands and grieved. John didn't apologize that time for shoving. Instead he sank down at the foot of the bed and wept bitterly and brokenly in great choking sobs.
On the bed, awake and silent and clutching the covers to himself, Sam didn't understand what was happening. He only knew he'd woken up alone, without the familiar weight of his sister beside him. "Elks? Elks?" Sam asked over and over in a sad, scared voice. After a minute his big brother came to him and hugged him tighter than usual as their father cried at the foot of the bed.
If that family hadn't been broken before, it certainly was then.
For the next few months, life would be hellish for the boys as they struggled to cope with the loss of their sister. But in a few years, Sam forgot her. Or at least, he never remembered her how Dean did. After all, Alex was an off-limits topic. John did not allow them to speak of her, and the few times Dean accused his father of various things concerning their sister's death and unexplained, strange disappearance, his father made him regret it.
As the years went on, Dean would come to barely ever speak of his sister.
But every day of his life, he remembered her. And he wished he had never let her go out that door.
Present Day
Chester, Pennsylvania
Sam rubbed at the little tinsel-like strand of gold he and Dean had found at the scene of a very bizarre crime earlier that day. It was the second little string of gold they'd found on the scene of a brutal, strange 'accidental' death and it was mystifying him completely.
Dean was paging through Dad's journal trying to find anything about gold. Or that's what he was supposed to be doing. Instead, he was sitting on the edge of a motel room bed with the journal on a knee as he stared off into space.
"You okay?" Sam prompted, noticing his brother's strange, unwavering expression.
Dean was frowning deeply, seeming to wonder the same thing. "I can't…" he started, wet his lips, then shook his head. "Something's not right here." He took a second to think, then gestured at the gold thing with a 'forget it' motion. "I mean, with us." He peered at Sam as if he were wondering if he'd lost his mind. "Is it just me?"
Sam shook his head, just as disconcerted. In the car, at lunch, on the job, here at the motel room… Dean was right. Something was off. The room felt too big, the car felt too small, there was something not right. "No, I know, me too," Sam said, trying to figure it out and failing. "I feel… weird. Like—like something's missing and I can't figure out what."
Dean seemed to feel the same. "…What would be missing though?" he asked, aggravated with the lack of answers.
Sam shrugged, frustrated too because he felt like he knew what was missing, only when he tried to put his finger on it, the answer eluded him completely. "I dunno," he said, scratching the side of his head briefly. "It's kind of driving me nuts." He paused, thinking, trying to pinpoint when this weird feeling had started. That's when he noticed the connection. "Hey, is it just me, or did we start feeling like this about the same time this job came up?"
Dean sat back slightly, letting his eyebrows shrug up. "Yeah, maybe." He thought a minute more, coming up with nothing, which obviously bothered him. He shook his head and gave up. "Lemme call Ellen and Bobby, see about any more leads on this gold string thingy." He stood up and dug his phone out. With it came a small wallet-sized photograph. It fluttered to the ground and Sam bent to pick it up for his brother.
In the wrinkled old faded photo, three small kids looked into the camera—on a motel room floor, Dean smiled and held onto the twins as Sam gaped at the camera and Alex looked off in boredom. The sight of the photo stilled Sam. "You… still keep this, huh?" he asked quietly, a little sobered by the sight of the picture he hadn't seen in forever and the sister he didn't really remember.
Dean took it back, his expression suddenly engulfed in emotional duress. "Yeah." His voice was soft, tense. "'Course I do." He carefully put the picture back into his pocket and Sam looked around the motel room, sad for a reason he couldn't name. Where are you? He wondered. And then he frowned. Where was who?
July 19, 2006
John Winchester had his arm in a sling and his eyes on his twenty-three year old son who was walking off down the hospital hall. Sam's retreating form was incredibly lanky and tall and John wondered where his son had gotten that remarkable height from.
Unbidden, he wondered how tall his daughter would have been now. Like always, the thought of her made him go still inside.
It had been twenty years since he made one of the hardest choices he'd ever faced… taking his daughter out of this life and hopefully leaving her in a better one. He still thought about her every damn day of his life. But especially this one. His last.
Ambient hospital noises filled his ears and distracted him. Even though they were all a little worse for the wear from the car accident they'd been in a couple days ago, John was just glad Dean and Sam were alive. Dean had been as good as dead until last night. To save him, John sacrificed the only thing he had left. He'd traded his soul to Azazel in exchange for Dean's life. And today was the day John had to pay up.
This is the last day of my life. A strange thought to think.
Aware of his impending end, John accepted it. Hell was where he belonged, or at least he felt that way—and at least he was dying doing something right for once. Saving Dean. As he contemplated the death that was so quickly coming his way, John thought of his daughter. What would she look like now? What kind of person would she have grown up to become? Would he recognize her if he saw her on the street? These thoughts made him somber and quiet. He remembered the last time he'd seen her. She hadn't known what was happening, she'd screamed and cried silently for him not to leave her. And still he had, even as tears drunkenly streamed down his face. He'd walked away and hadn't looked back. He saw her crying face countless nights. She haunted him and kept him awake, kept him wondering if he had done the right thing. He told himself he had, because he couldn't face the alternative.
Dean laid on the hospital bed, sore, tired, beaten to hell. He'd just been in the car crash of the century, after all—the doctors didn't seem to know how he was even alive right now, but here he was by some miracle. He looked at his father, noticing that anguished way he stared off into far distance. "What is it, Dad?" he asked softly, and John came out of his trance.
Dad was in his fifties, but his eyes were wearier than that—he looked like a man who'd never known sleep or rest, like a man who'd been running too long and was tired, too tired to go on. Shocking Dean, John Winchester began to speak to him gently, kindly, emotionally. "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," he said softly, voice drenched in regret and pain. "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…" John struggled against tears, which only stunned Dean further. "You'd say 'It's okay, Dad.'" He paused, and the way his eyes were glinting with tears had Dean transfixed in horror. Dad never talked like this. "You were a better dad than I ever was, to both of them. Dean, I'm sorry."
Dean stared at his dad in quiet shock, especially at the sudden mention of her. They never spoke of her—it wasn't allowed.
John tried to smile through the tears but his smile was faltering. "You shouldn't have had to say that to me, I should have been saying that to you." Dean could have cried—he'd been so hungry to hear these words his entire life and now that they were being said, he was afraid at why they were being said at all. "You know, I put—I put too much on your shoulders, I made you grow up too fast. You took care of Sammy, you—you took care of Alex while she was there, you took care of me. I should have been the one who took care of everyone. I wasn't. Dean... you were all the man I never was," John said, further stunning his son. "I just want you to know that I am so proud of you."
Dean looked at John incredulously and faltered, his stomach clenched up in disbelief. "T-this really you talking?" he breathed in a shell-shocked voice. His dad had never done anything but tell him he was second best.
"Yeah, it's really me," John confirmed quietly. He hesitated, then went closer to his son.
Dean tried not to show how scared he was to hear his dad talking with such emotional vulnerability. "W-why are you saying this stuff, Dad?"
John looked at Dean through tear-filled eyes. "I want you to watch out for your brother, okay?"
"Yeah, Dad, y-you know I will," Dean said, voice shaking even though he was trying to be strong outwardly. "You're scaring me."
"Don't be scared, Dean. Just listen. I have to tell you some things." John leaned closer, growing serious, quiet, his voice low in a whisper. "You have to save Sammy. From himself, from what that demon did to him. And if you can't save him—Dean, you'll have to kill him." Dean drew back, eyes wide in shock.
Kill Sam? "Dad—I don't—" he almost pleaded, eyes wide, begging John for a reason, an explanation. "What are you talking about? What did the demon say to you?"
"Forget the demon, Dean," John said wearily, and Dean stared with an aghast face—the tone in his father's voice seemed to indicate there was more heaviness coming. How could there be more? "You—you remember that night when—when I told you your sister had an accident?"
Dean's expression went cold. How could Dad even ask that? Of course he remembered. He remembered that night every day, he blamed himself for not keeping his sister safe, he carried a picture of the three of them with him wherever he went. Dad's question made a lump of emotion choke him. "…Yeah I remember."
Dad's dark eyes looked into his long and careful. "There was no accident," John confessed, and suddenly there was no air in the room. "She didn't die."
The world had shattered that night when Dad said she died. And it shattered all over again when he said she didn't.
The color drained from Dean's face and he fought the sudden feeling of numb shock overtaking his body. "…What?" Was she alive? What did Dad mean? Every sense Dean possessed was focused on his dad and finding out what the hell that meant. "W-what are you saying to me?" he asked in quickening urgency, a thousand half-thought-out explanations spinning through his mind. "W-what happened to her?"
John sat down on the edge of the bed beside Dean and answered with quiet caution and guilt. "I didn't want this life for her. She wouldn't have survived it, you know she wouldn't have. No being so small, so vulnerable. So I put her somewhere better. Where a nice family could take her. Keep her safe." Slow horror began to crawl up Dean's spine. No—Dad… Dad gave her away? "I know it was the coward's way out, Son, but Dean—aren't you glad she wasn't part of this?" John gestured at them both—broken, beaten, hunted by demons. But Dean could make no reply—no! No he wasn't glad! "Maybe someday you can go find her, see her," John said, attempting a sad little smile through tear-filled eyes. "Tell her I'm sorry it had to be like that, tell her I'm sorry for everything." Dean stared, absolutely confounded into silence. John managed a smile as a tear fell out of his eye and rolled down his face into his thick beard. "But at least she probably turned out a lot better than us three saps, huh?"
Dean was processing it, trying to figure it out and reason through everything he'd just been told, but he felt sluggish, every sense he owned had been flipped on its head and he was reeling. "S-she's been alive this whole time and you kept it from me?" He felt so impossibly hurt. "From Sam?" It was crashing over his head like an outpouring of sudden, unexpected rain. "You lied to me, for years!" he accused, so appalled at the realization that he could barely function. John nodded, quietly confirming. Dean was absolutely beside himself and looking at his father in new, horrific light. "I—I… Sam and I were devastated, we thought she died and it was… a lie? You gave her up? Dad… how could you?"
John stood up and walked off a few steps, putting his back to Dean. "I saved her from this life, Dean. I saved her. I would do anything for you kids. I lost sleep over this—I've struggled with it every day and night since I did what I did."
"Oh well how difficult for you," Dean snapped, imagining what Alex had gone through—she had just been three, a baby! The thought of her suddenly alone made him spiral into a pit of despair. Dean was fighting tears as he thought of her and how he remembered her: so tiny, always wanting to hold someone's hand, always wanting a hug from one of her brothers, scared of the dark, a thumbsucker, a tender little sweetheart who was attached to him and Sam twenty-four seven. And John had just carried her off into the night without a word, uprooting her from her life and leaving her fate to luck? Dean's blood was boiling and he couldn't even think—if he had known, he would have gone to find her years ago. He was abruptly sick with fear for her. Where was she now? Was she okay? How hadn't he known this?
"How could you?" he asked again of his father, truly not understanding, so upset that the blood pressure monitor beside his bed was spiking and turning red. "Send your own kid off like that? Scared, alone, mute—to strangers? She was just a baby, Dad! A baby! She needed us and you just… what, dropped her off on a street somewhere, three years old!? How could you know if she was safe? How could you just take her from us like that? How could you think that was okay? It wasn't!" His voice was rising and getting louder and louder, more and more enraged. "She wasn't a goddamn goldfish, she was your daughter! You don't get to just, just hand her off! If you didn't want her to have this fucking life, you should have left it all behind!"
His fists balled up against his legs as he shook his head, gritted his teeth, and tried to control his temper. But he couldn't. He was mad enough to spit. "You—goddamn coward!" He abruptly sat up and shoved the little cart of medical instruments that was beside the bed hard, knocking it over and sending metal instruments clattering to the floor loudly. His legs hung over the bed and his rage suddenly gave way to grief as he remembered the last time he saw his sister—reaching out for him with a look of fear on her face as Dad carried her away forever. She'd needed him and he'd failed her and how could Dad have done what he did? "I can't believe you, I can't believe you!" Dean said, choking on his own tongue as he put his face into his hands, so upset he was almost in tears. John said nothing and Dean fought to regulate his heavy, sharp breaths. "Did… did you ever go check on her?" he finally asked, looking at his dad and not knowing what to think at all. "Do you even know where she is?"
Shame and guilt showed on John's face. "No, I—it was for the best, Dean," John insisted, and the look on his face seemed final. "We'll… we'll talk about this later, son."
"Like hell we will!" Dean exploded, standing up even though his entire body was weak and ailing. At the moment, he hated his father. Hated. "I don't ever wanna see your face again, you hear me?" He meant it, at least in the heat of the moment. Dean was breaking, everything was crashing around him and his father was suddenly the villain. "I did everything you ever told me, everything," he accused, anger flaring like an inferno in his veins. "I trusted you, I believed in you! And you did that."
John was stricken, but didn't deny the claims or defend himself. "Dean—please. I know. I know all I ever did was make mistakes. But please... believe me. I loved you kids. I loved you the best I could." He had the nerve to look solicitous, like he wanted to be told it was forgiven. "I'm sorry my best wasn't good. But I did try. Please believe that."
Dean's fists were tight at his sides and he couldn't even speak to his father any longer without risking hitting him. He didn't want to hear excuses or 'I tried.' Because that couldn't change anything. And it was crap. "Get out," he growled at his dad. "Before I do something I regret."
John hesitated, looking at Dean one last time through a tight, pinched expression. Then he nodded and without any grand fanfare, left the room. And that was the last time Dean saw his dad alive.
At 10:41am that day in July of 2006, John Winchester was pronounced dead after being found on the floor in a random room of the hospital.
He died believing he'd saved his daughter… when in fact, he'd done the exact opposite.
Two Days Later
Jackson County DHS, Missouri
Grieving the loss of their father amidst confused feelings and uncertainty, Dean and Sam gave their father a hunter's funeral before immediately going in search of the sister who they'd believed to be dead for twenty years. Dean led the search with a frenzied determination and an urgency that Sam had never seen before. The idea that she was alive out there somewhere was a candle in the wind for them both. Even though they had mixed feelings on their father, he had still been their father, and his death devastated them. The idea of finding Alex gave them something to put all their hopes into, and hope they did.
Using Dad's journal, they figured out the city they'd been in the night she disappeared back in 1986 and went to the Department of Family and Children Services in that city hoping they would be able to track Alex down somehow or get leads on her whereabouts.
"She would have been three years old when she showed up," Dean was saying to the sort of befuddled front desk worker. "It would have been nineteen eighty-six. She, she would have been mute, tiny. Here's a picture of her when she was like two."
He held out the little wallet photo he carried and the desk worker shook her head after squinting at it briefly. "I'm sorry, that case doesn't sound familiar—but I've only worked here for three years, so lemme ask—"
"Sam and Dean?"
The brothers turned to see a plump, dark-skinned Black woman in her fifties looking at them with an expression of dawning surprise. She was in a whimsical floral-print dress, had closely cropped natural hair, and wore beautiful statement earrings. She carried a stack of folders and was leaning into the lobby halfway from a door that went further back into the office section of the building.
The brothers glanced at each other then Dean replied to her. "Yeah…"
She nodded slowly, eyes going back and forth between them for a moment in thought. Then she walked out to greet them, seeming to be quite surprised and mildly guarded. "Marigold Tucker," she introduced. Then she gestured for them to follow her. "Please, this way." She escorted them further into the building and into her small office where pictures of kids of all ages and races dotted the area, as well as some of her own personal family photos.
"Please. Sit." She smiled ruefully as she took a seat at the desk across from them. "Well. I have to say, after all these years… I never thought I would see you two." She had a kindly face and the look of someone who cared a lot and didn't miss much.
Sam and Dean looked at each other briefly, confused. "I'm sorry, but I don't think we don't know you…" Sam said slowly. "How do you know us?"
Marigold had a quiet, sad look on her face and she hesitated, then turned in her office chair and bent to pull something out of the lowest drawer in her filing cabinet. "…She used to draw you and write your names," she said and Dean sat back in shock, suddenly understanding. "That's all she drew for years, in fact. Sam and Dean, and the black car." Marigold showed them a stack of childish drawings on construction paper which she pulled out of the filing cabinet.
In the top drawing, a girl with tears the size of bowling balls raining down from her face to the ground was on one side of the paper—her stick arms reached out to the other side of the paper on which there were two male figures. Sam end Deen the picture said, and there was a very poorly drawn heart which was then crossed out in black. Dean looked at the drawing and set it back down with a tense, pained expression on his face. Alex had been waiting for them and they hadn't had a single fucking clue. Imagining his sister's pain, even though he hadn't seen her in twenty years, devastated him and made him feel so much. He could see another picture peeking out of the stack—it had a stick-figure man with a beard and many tears raining down his face. Dad.
"I was the one who found Jane," Marigold explained gently, very aware of how affected the boys were. She studied them closely, shrewd. "I'm guessing you two… brothers? Her brothers? I can see the resemblance—especially you. You have her eyes." She nodded at Sam, looking his face over thoughtfully.
"I… I'm her twin," Sam said quietly. His color was pale. He seemed utterly shocked and touched that someone who had seen his twin sister's face was saying he looked like her.
Dean frowned at the name she'd used for Alex. "…Jane?"
"Oh—yes, she couldn't tell us her name, you know," Marigold said regretfully. "She was only two or three when she came to us and totally mute. We weren't even sure how old she was, to be honest. We called her Jane Doe. And when she was old enough to write her name… I guess maybe she didn't remember her name. She never wrote it, anyway. Not ever. She… only wrote your names." Her dark eyes looked at them in sorrowful curiosity.
Dean's heart was a tight, knotted mess in his chest, beating pain into him relentlessly. "Her name was Alex," he said brokenly, looking at the drawing with a strained expression. "And my mom wanted to call her Allie." He saw nothing but a broken, ruined life staring him back in the face from the kiddy drawing and he cursed his father all over again. How could you?
"Y-you were her caseworker," Sam supposed, beginning to put together the pieces of the puzzle as his more emotional brother sat beside him and struggled to maintain composure. "She was in foster care."
"That's right," Marigold said. "Until she was about fifteen or so."
"But… I thought kids didn't age out until like eighteen," Sam said, his tone becoming worried. "Did—did she switch caseworkers?"
Marigold's hands were clasped on the desk and she looked at them sadly. Dean recognized the look of bad news coming. No. No. No.
Tell me she's fine. Tell me she was taken in by a nice family and grew up in a normal, painfully boring life. Tell me she works as a secretary and has a yappy little dog and a 401k, tell me she's happy now and is adjusted to life. Tell me I get to see her again, tell me after losing her so long ago I get to hug her and see what she looks like smiling, tell me I get to say I'm sorry to her for all the years she waited to see me again. Please, please, please! Don't tell me bad news. I can't take any more bad news, not now. Not fucking now.
But Dean's inner pleas were not answered. "She… didn't age out," Marigold told them in utmost, telling gentleness. She was bracing them for the bad news, and Dean realized he wasn't breathing. "Your sister—Alex—I'm so sorry to have to tell you this. But she died. About fourteen or fifteen years ago now I guess."
Utterly defeated, Dean's shoulders sagged and he let out a grieved sobbing breath of air as he bowed his head to a hand. No. No.
"I'm so sorry, boys," Marigold said in quiet, earnest sympathy.
There was a thick silence. Dean's heart was beating so loudly with agony in his chest that he thought he'd go deaf. He sat there and the world spun around him as sounds rang strangely and his veins turned to useless liquid. Died. She died.
Sam's face was working oddly. He didn't know how to react—he'd thought she was dead for all of his memory, then been told she wasn't, now she was again. He wet his lips, brow working inwards as he tried to process. "Just—please tell us everything about her and what happened," he requested after a moment. Even though he was holding himself together more than Dean was, his voice wavered and the expression on his face made him look younger and more vulnerable than he actually was. "Please."
Marigold nodded, drew in a deep breath, thinking back. "You know, maybe it's because I was the one who found her all those years ago. But I always had a special place in my heart for that girl. I always saw the best in her when others could see nothing but the worst. She was placed in several homes for foster-adoption when she was younger, but she sabotaged each placement… she just refused to let people reach out to her." There was a heavy, sad pause. "She got worse over time. Jane—excuse me, Alex, never applied herself in school, never made friends. She didn't learn to write well. She refused to sign. Well. The only sign she liked to make was the middle finger." She smiled bittersweetly as the brothers listened in deep emotional anguish. "Some people said she was feral, had mental disorders, was crazy." Marigold shook her head with sad certainty. "No. None of that. I just saw a hurt little girl who lost too much and had too little to begin with. Sadly, we see that a lot around here." Her eyes drifted down to the drawings on her desk that Alex had made. "So much got taken from that child. She didn't know what to do. Who would?"
Dean stood up, turned away, and ran a hand down over his face. Marigold looked up at him and then to Sam for a cue. "It's okay. Keep going," Sam said, even though his eyes were shining with the onset of tears.
Marigold did. "Well… let's see. She was living in a group home for highly troubled young women toward the end," the social worker explained quietly. "There had been problems for years—always was trying to run away, especially when she first came into care. And around ten she started to get into things no girl of her age should have been messing with—alcohol, self harm, drugs, stealing, promiscuity… she had to be moved to an institutional setting when things kept getting worse when she was fourteen or so. We still don't know where she got them, but… unfortunately, she purposefully overdosed on sleeping pills."
Dean let out another ragged, grieved breath of air as so much sadness filled his insides that he wanted to shatter. Suicide? He couldn't take this. He couldn't. He leaned against the wall with a hand, still facing away from the other two people in the room.
"W-was anyone with her?" Sam asked.
Marigold shook her head somberly. "She was found alone."
Dean was trying not to crumble, but mostly failing. "S-she leave a note?" Sam asked, grasping at straws.
"Well, in a way… but…" Marigold looked in the same folder she'd gotten Alex's drawings out of, fishing out a photograph. She hesitated to show it. "I'm afraid it wasn't much at all."
Dean turned around, distraught, needing to see what final message she left. It was a photo of a starkly and clinical bedroom. On the wall, crudely carved, was a sloppily written suicide note. Fuck the world and everyone in it.
Dean took the photograph from Marigold, staring with half-blind eyes. He was trying to swallow everything he'd just been told, but he couldn't. This was a nightmare, this was unthinkable, he didn't want this and yet it was what he was being given. All he could do was go through the motions like a robot, ask questions and get answers. Nothing could change what had happened, but he thought there should have been a way to take it all back and start over because this wasn't right. "When?" he asked blankly. "When did she… when did she die? What date?" He wanted to know, because from here on out, they'd dedicate that day to her, they'd raise a glass to her memory and kill a few evil sons of bitches in her name.
Marigold rustled around in the folder, pulled out a certificate of death, read from it. "May the second, ninety-eight."
Dean and Sam looked at each other at the exact same moment in mutual shock and disbelief. May second was the twin's birthday. And the one in 1998 had been one Dean would never forget. Sam either.
It had been around ten in the evening. Sam's fifteenth had been uneventful. Dad was gone on a hunt and the brothers were watching TV in a motel room. And then for no reason whatsoever Sam had suddenly sat up and clutched his chest, beginning to gasp as though he couldn't breathe, began to panic—he said he couldn't see, he said he was scared, he felt like he was dying. He'd been dizzy, lightheaded, short of breath, his heart had been racing at insane levels, he had spontaneously began to cry. Dean had rushed him to the emergency room, scared shitless. But the panic attack and breathing issues went away shortly after they got there. The doctors could find nothing wrong with him whatsoever. For two weeks afterward, Sam had been lethargic and quiet, deeply disturbed without knowing why or by what. There had never been another incident like that before and there never was again.
And now it made sense. Only, it didn't, not really. "How?" Sam asked Dean, staring up at his big brother for an explanation. They both saw the connection immediately—Alex dying and Sam feeling like he was dying.
"I—I dunno," Dean said, hardly able to respond at all. "Twin stuff?" He'd never really believed it before… that twins were connected like that. But maybe they were. Maybe they were. Sam looked frightened and deeply stricken, mystified.
He shut his eyes briefly, realizing that when Sam had been having that inexplicable panic attack, Alex had been dying. Alone. Scared. With the mindset of fuck the world and everyone in it. He remembered a sweet little girl with wide doe-like eyes and a shy, sort of devilish smile, a penchant for getting into trouble and climbing on things, a love of cuddling, a love of being held by him. He'd wanted the best for her, he'd blamed himself all those years for her 'death' and now he blamed himself for the real thing. Dean opened his watering eyes and looked at Marigold. "Y-you got a picture of her?" At least let me know what she grew up to look like… at least give us something to prove she existed past what we knew.
Marigold hesitated. "Just two." She pulled out two small, old photographs from the folder where she had everything of Alex's. "This is from her RYDC files." RYDC—aka, Juvenile Detention. It was a mugshot basically, and showed a young, pretty girl who looked thuggish and angry—a scar ran down the side of her face from a knife, her dark hair was bedraggled. Her chin was raised up in defiance, her hazel eyes were cold and staring into the camera hard as if to say yeah, take my picture bitch. But to Dean, she looked afraid and pained. And god help him, she did look like Sam. She looked like both of them. He took the picture in a daze. "And this one is from the group home she lived in back in ninety-seven," Marigold said, handing over a four-by-six photo. It was a picture of about ten girls lined up on some bleachers outside in some kind of park area. Most of them looked sullen and unkempt, unhappy, and uninterested. Alex stood off to herself at one end of the group and with arms crossed across her lanky body in a defensive stance. She looked into the camera with a ghostly, vacant, sullen expression. Sam was standing now too, peering at the pictures and trying to understand that this stranger in the photos was his twin sister.
Dean didn't bother to hide his emotions anymore, or maybe he just couldn't. Quiet tears were streaking his cheeks as he looked at the sister he hadn't know about. Two of the only three pictures of her in existence. "C-can I keep these please?" he asked Marigold, almost at the point of just breaking down in front of this stranger.
She inclined her head in a gracious nod. "Of course." Marigold's aura of peace and gentleness was helpful in that moment to the two floundering, shocked brothers. "You know, she was a very beautiful young woman," Marigold said, and there were great depths of kindness and thoughtfulness in her rich voice. "I always thought… she had so much potential." Marigold smiled in fond sadness at the pictures Dean held. "Seeing her give up on herself… it's been more than ten years. But every May second I think of her and I wonder." She hesitated. "I'm sorry, but if you don't mind me asking… what happened? Everyone always wondered where this pretty little white girl came from and what her story was. We found her in this building, see. Someone broke in and left her in here alone all night all those years ago. No explanation, no nothing. No one knew who she was, police had a case open on her for a year plus. When no one came forward to claim her, she became a ward of the state. Everyone always thought someone would come from her… and, well. I think she thought so too."
Dean shook his head in utter misery. She thought someone was coming for her. And no one ever had.
"Our dad," he said. "He thought… I dunno what he thought. Guess he didn't want her."
He looked down at this girl in the pictures and he wished to hell and back he had stopped this from happening. If she hadn't been taken away, maybe she wouldn't have ended up like the way she had. "I'll never forgive him for this," he said, mostly to himself. And he wouldn't. "Ever. We—we didn't even know until two days ago. We thought she died when she was three." Not that this lady needed to know that or not.
Marigold nodded tensely, looking at them carefully. When she spoke, she was cautious and open, honest. "She's buried not far from here, if you'd like to go visit. I… raised a little money around town, you know, and at church to get her a proper headstone and funeral because…" she trailed off, suddenly getting emotional. "Every child should be recognized," she said, voice wavering a little bit. "Every child should be loved. Even the ones who are determined as hell to be unlovable." She smiled sadly, and there were so many untold stories, pains, and triumphs shining in her deep brown eyes. "In fact, I think maybe those children are the ones who need love most of all."
Dean bowed his face into his hand as his shoulders shook—he couldn't help it, her words impacted him more than almost anything ever had. Someone had been there for his sister and looked out for her as and laid her to final rest with respect and dignity. It was enough to move him to tears, this act of compassion Marigold Tucker gave without needing to… this kindness she had shown simply because she had cared.
Not long after, Sam and Dean stood in a quiet graveyard at Marigold's church in silence. Shaded by grand old oak trees, the headstones dotted a serene little plot of land. The one Sam and Dean stood in front of belonged to Alex, only no one had known her real name. Not even her.
Jane Doe
Entered Into Rest on May 2, 1998.
Step softly, a dream lies buried here.
There were fresh flowers leaned against the marble, no doubt from Marigold, and Dean fought tears again, losing the battle. The compassion shown by a stranger, the reality that he was standing at his sister's final resting place, the thought of her being so hopeless and desperate that she would take her own life… he didn't know how he could cope with this. He was gonna make sure to do something for Marigold in return, somehow.
Beside him, Sam was silent and harrowed. A soft breeze blew across the land, rustling the quiet, reverent trees. Birds sang happily from branch to branch, and it didn't fit, it wasn't right.
"She was here Sam, all those years, and she needed us and I knew Dad's story was bullshit, why didn't I listen to my instincts?" Dean asked it in a hollow voice and went silent for a long moment. His face hurt from the strange, grieved expression he had been wearing for the past few days. "I could have saved her. This didn't have to be the way it ended."
"You don't know that, Dean," was Sam's quiet, anxious reply.
"I do know that," Dean replied immediately, vehemently, in a wavering voice driven by the passion of grief. "She wouldn't be in the ground if Dad hadn't sent her away."
There was another silence in which the breeze made tree branches dance in a great sigh of wind. For a minute, the brothers were silent. Then, Sam spoke. "You know, sometimes…" he stared at his sister's grave with an expression of grief that reminded Dean of when Jess had died. "I dunno. I feel like I'm missing something. Maybe it's that twin connection you hear about. I dunno. I barely remember her. But what happened on our fifteenth birthday… it, it makes me think…" he swallowed and he suddenly sounded as stricken as Dean was. "Why didn't I know she was out there, Dean?"
Dean shook his head, because he wanted to know the same thing. He felt like he should have sensed or known too. "I don't know," he said softly. He thought about the few memories he still had of Alex and he looked down at the silent headstone. "I wish you could remember her, Sam. I wish you remembered."
Sam nodded, fighting some internal battle with himself. "Me too." For a moment longer, the brothers were silent. Abruptly, Sam announced, "I'm—I need a minute," and quickly headed for the car. Dean didn't blame him, and was glad for the solitude, because he couldn't hold it in any longer.
Dean looked at his sister's gravestone, her only lasting impression upon the world. And it wasn't even the right name. She would fade into obscurity, and no one had ever really known her he didn't think. Least of all him. And that was the part that tore him apart the most.
He crouched down and touched two fingers to the gravestone, not even knowing why or what for. He wished he could have been fifteen years earlier and helped her see that she wasn't alone. Guilt ate him alive. "I wish I woulda known," Dean murmured to the slab of marble in the ground. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't know. I didn't know he took you away. Why did I believe him? Why did I believe him?" Dean bent his head and screwed his eyes up, letting the weeping tears come. He cursed the sky for being blue and the sun for shining bright, he cursed the world for being cruel, he cursed Dad for thinking this had been the right choice to make, he cursed the thing that had killed Mom and muted Alex, he renewed his vow, the vow Dad had been obsessed with: Find it, kill it, make it pay for the things it had done and the lives it had taken.
Back at the car, Sam was leaning heavily. Tears squeezed out of his eyes and he grieved his sister internally like he'd known and loved her just as much as Dean had. But he couldn't remember her. He couldn't remember. And now he'd never know.
Present Day
Chester, Pennsylvania
Azazel was dead now, but his death hadn't changed much. It was supposed to have evened the score but all it had done was lay another miserable son of a bitch down. It didn't bring back a lost mother, a lost sister, or a lost father. It didn't erase the decades of chasing and fighting and struggling to get by.
It had been nearly six years for Sam and Dean since Dad had died and they had been to Alex's grave for that first time. They went once a year to visit the grave ever since, and now every May the second was cause for mourning and remembrance, not celebration.
They had lived their entire life without Alex practically, and as such maybe it should have been easy to continue on after they discovered the truth. But finding out what happened left a scar. A pain that never fully went away. However, they had come to accept it. Dean was the one who had struggled the hardest and longest. But even he stowed it for the most part. Still, Sam thought Dean hadn't forgiven himself for what happened. And maybe Dean never would.
They didn't talk about her much. Just like that very day when the picture of the three of them had fluttered out of Dean's wallet, they ignored it and didn't speak of it. Instead, they focused on what they always did: the job.
The accidental deaths and the strings of gold showing up everywhere were beginning to add up into a lead—it appeared that all the victims of these strange deaths were descendants of people who had traveled over to America in the early 1900s on some boat called the Titanic. Upon further research, the boys found a photo of the first mate—I.P. Freely—and his picture bore striking likeness to Balthazar. As in so striking that it was him.
Determined to find out the angel's connection to the deaths and the Titanic, they set to work summoning him. They were both pretty suspicious of the guy. After all, he'd been selling chopped-up heavenly weapons not long ago in exchange for souls. He didn't seem to be the most savory guy in the bunch.
When Dean dropped the match into the bowl to complete the summoning spell, the lights in the motel room flickered and one popped completely. Behind them, a sudden gust of air prompted them to turn. "Boys, boys, boys." Balthazar sounded un-enthused. "Whatever can I do for you?"
"We need to talk," Dean said impatiently, giving the angel a warning little look.
"Oh, you seem upset, Dean," Balthazar said, feigning concern. He had always shown a deep dislike for Dean for whatever reason.
Dean sneered briefly. "The hell with the boat, Balthazar?"
"What boat?"
"The Titanic," Sam said in a hard, demanding voice.
Balthazar made a bit of a face like he was thinking ah yes—that. "Oh. Yeah… the Titanic." He rubbed two fingertips to his brow briefly in thought. "Yes, well, uh, it was meant to sink… and I saved it." He spread his arms humbly. The brothers looked at each other in confusion. Balthazar sighed and explained himself with an air of disinterest. "It was meant to bash into this iceberg thing and plunge into the briny deep with all this hoopla—and I saved it." He ceased to speak and gave them an expectant look. "Anything else I can answer for you?"
"Yeah, why?" Sam asked, mystified.
"Why what?" The angel asked impatiently.
"Why did you un-sink the ship?" Dean clarified testily.
Balthazar got dramatic. "Oh, because I hated the movie!" He looked between them both as if in solicitation of support of his stance.
Dean narrowed his eyes. "What movie?"
Balthazar pointed at Dean with a huge grin. "Exactly!" He laughed easily.
Dean was utterly confused. Sam's face crunched into a confused frown. "Wait, so you saved a cruise liner because—"
"Because that god-awful Celine Dion song made me want to smite myself!" Balthazar replied, as if that settled it.
Sam's look of confusion intensified. "Who's… Celine Dion?"
"Oh, she's a destitute lounge singer somewhere in Quebec," Balthazar explained casually, "and let's keep it that way, please."
Again, the brothers exchanged an annoyed little glance. "Okay, I didn't think that was possible," Sam said, clearly disgruntled at Balthazar's attitude and action. "I thought you couldn't change history."
"Oh, haven't you noticed?" Balthazar gave a coy little shrug of the eyebrows. "There's no more rules, boys."
Sam looked at him in disbelief. "…Wow. The nerve on you. So you just, what, un-sunk a giant boat?"
"Oh come on!" Balthazar was slightly indignant and surprised. "I saved people! I thought you loved that kind of thing."
"Yeah, but now those people and their kids and their kids' kids, they must have interacted with, with so many other people, changed so much crap and now the descendants are all dying off!" Sam exclaimed. "You totally Butterfly-Effected history!"
"And?" Balthazar asked, not concerned about it either way. "I don't see the cause for fuss. You still averted the apocalypse, there're still archangels, up's up and down's down… everything's basically the same. Unwad your panties, won't you? I expect some small details have changed, however minimal—I haven't exactly flown round looking to see what's shifted around but it can't be all bad like you're making it out to be." He adjusted his blazer, glanced around the room, and seemed to grow faintly curious. "Hm, by the by, where's that feisty little sister of yours?"
The brother's glares faded into surprise and their crossed arms loosened in shock. "What?" Sam asked. "How—how do you know about her?"
Balthazar took a pause, confused. "Pardon?"
"She died when we were fifteen," Dean said angrily.
The angel was visibly taken aback and then he winced as he quickly seemed to figure it out in his own mind. "Ooh… blimey. Well. That complicates things."
"What do you mean, it 'complicates things'?" Sam asked incredulously, ready to get angry.
There was a long pause, then a careful: "Well let's just say, before I un-sunk the ship… she was very much alive and well and, you know, not dead at all." Balthazar looked at the Winchester brothers' expressions and he smiled sarcastically. "I wish I could show you two a picture of how stupid you look with your mouths hanging open like that."
Dean's anger was returning. "Okay—no," he said, shaking his head and talking with a hand. "No. Our dad abandoned our sister when she was three and she died alone at fifteen—I swear to god, Balthazar, if you're making crap up to try and be funny—"
"Oh put a cork in it, will you?" Balthazar rolled his eyes at Dean dramatically. "Your sister grew up with you and was just fine and dandy and oh yes, very much involved with Cas until I un-sunk that little boat."
"What?" The brothers chorused in wide-eyed shock.
"With Cas?" Dean asked, seeming to find that idea utterly preposterous.
"Oh yes," Balthazar confirmed, then tapped his chin in thought, beginning to speak to himself. "This won't do, will it? He finds out and he'll go ballistic. Might as well go break the news so he doesn't find out the hard way and do something rash." He looked at the boys with a deeply chagrined, false smile on his face. "Wish me luck, won't you?"
"Wait, Ba—" the angel had already disappeared. Sam huffed in aggravation. "Dammit." He looked at Dean, who was silent and staring into nothing with a physically ill expression. Sam's anger faded. "What he said about… about her, that can't be true, Dean. Right?"
"I—I dunno." Dean looked at Sam in a strange mixture of hope and despair. "D-do you think that's why we've been feeling… weird?"
Sam wasn't sure. But it was the only thing that made some semblance of sense… still, he didn't know. He shook his head slowly, trying to put the pieces together. "Maybe…"
Dean was starting to hope against hope. Was she the missing piece? Was that the strange feeling he couldn't shake? Was this really what it felt like: a nightmare, a perversion of reality? Would he wake up tomorrow and find out this had all just been a crazy dream?
After Balthazar did a bit of fact checking, he went to go find Castiel with some quite unfortunate news. They met in a heaven that was a mountaintop covered by a thick blanket of fog. Here, they would not be seen or spied on. When Balthazar spotted Cas's familiar trench coat through the haze of grayish fog, he headed that way. "Hello Cas."
"Balthazar." For once, Cas didn't look as tense and drawn as usual. In fact, he almost seemed to be feeling optimistic. He was holding himself more confidently than before, he looked less burdened and wearied. "Fate has already begun to reap the souls you created," he told Balthazar, and he sounded glad about it.
So he didn't know about his little toy and her untimely, unplanned demise. Well. That was awkward. Balthazar cleared his throat. "Yes, good, well—as glad as I am that the people you and I generated are being violently maimed and murdered… we have a bit of a problem."
Cas's expression changed slightly into the faintest frown. "What?"
"Your little twist of fate's resulted in… a few changes."
The frown deepened and suspicion darkened Cas's voice. "What changes?"
Balthazar spoke in an airy, casual voice and he shared what he'd learned, but started in easily, carefully. "Well, I went 'round to see just what, exactly, changed, you see. Took me a bit, but… well, Ellen and Jo Harvelle, for one, are still alive."
Castiel looked confused, as though he didn't know why Balthazar thought that was a problem. "That is… a pleasant surprise."
"Ah, yes, well—Alex Winchester… is not." He paused, watching how Cas's expression registered sudden intensity and dangerous confusion. "Alive," Balthazar clarified, a bit nervous.
Cas's expression became dark and foreboding. "…What do you mean?" he demanded, stepping closer, intimidating Balthazar without even meaning to.
"She, ah, she died, Cas," Balthazar explained, backing up a step. "Fourteen years ago. I found the date and everything, went to see with my own eyes. Dead as a doornail, my friend."
Balthazar's information seemed to take several seconds to sink in. Cas appeared unable to even process it at all—it seemed unthinkable and incompatible to his mind. He blinked rapidly and looked down in a struggle to understand—he seemed to doubt it, scoff at the very idea, then he looked at Balthazar with an intense and demanding gaze. "Don't lie to me," he accused, suddenly seeming vengeful. "She had a guardian angel her entire life—her death isn't conceivable."
Balthazar raised his hands in mild surrender. "Look, Cas, I don't know what to tell you. She's dead."
Cas's eyes were confused, but slowly becoming filled with realization that Balthazar was telling the truth. "Take me there," he said falteringly, seeming to wrestle greatly with what to think. "Now."
Balthazar hesitated. "Oh, Cas, I don't think—"
Cas bristled and fury made his voice thunder—he seized Balthazar by two fistfuls of shirt. "Take me there, Balthazar!"
And so Balthazar did.
May 2, 1998
Castiel's actions—un-sinking the Titanic, changing the past, reaping the souls—had all been done to give himself leverage over Crowley and a way to win the battle he had waged for what felt like an eternity now.
If he didn't win this war, Raphael won. If Raphael won, the apocalypse would come. And if the apocalypse came, most if not all of the people on earth would perish. Including her. So, for Castiel, it seemed the lesser of two evils, it seemed the better way. And for five earth days, it had been working. He had even felt a rising hope and gladness as he saw that his plan was succeeding. The new souls he'd generated were slowly sifting into Heaven as Fate killed them. Castiel had known she would kill the people… in fact, he had regrettably counted on it.
He had known some things would change here and there throughout history because of the alteration made, but he had been willing to sacrifice those things so that he wouldn't be indebted and enslaved to the King of Hell. Even though creating new human lives only to allow them to be destroyed once again was reprehensible, Cas had been prepared to do it so that he could take the souls and become more powerful—powerful enough to defeat an archangel. He was prepared to do nearly anything for the cause. The war. But at his core, it was all for her. The one he loved past capacity or reason.
So when the two angels ported into a small, bare bedroom that was unremarkable and quiet, Castiel's heart clenched tight at what he saw. Carved into the wall crudely was the following message: Fuck the world and everyone in it.
Underneath the wall on the floor, a small teenage girl slumped against the end of a tiny metal bed in a pathetic attempt to sit. She seemed in a state of shock, and Cas recognized her immediately. That was what stunned him and terrified him the most. It was Alex… but it also wasn't.
She had the same face, the same body, but both were younger than he had ever seen her with. She wasn't her full height yet, her features were less sharp and defined—she was smaller, thinner, built differently, not filled out. Her skin was pale and drawn, her face bore a long white scar. Her youthful features were haggard and gaunt in a way that they shouldn't have been, her eyes were glassy and fading away. Beside her was an empty bottle of pills, a butter knife she'd used to carve up the wall, and a flask of some kind of liquor. She was wheezing in and out slowly, shallowly, and her eyes were half-lidded. She was dying. Overtaken with horror, Cas went to her and dropped to kneel in front of her, taking a gentle hold of her as he was quickly lost in shocked grief. How was she dying? How did this happen? Samandriel had said Alex was fine at Bobby's, that she hadn't left in days—but somehow she was dying here in the year 1998?! Nandriel was supposed to have been her guardian—how was this transpiring? Cas fumbled for understanding and comprehension and could find none.
He could barely even recognize the girl in his arms. Alex looked up at him in a drugged, dying stupor and her eyes held no recognition—those hazel depths that had gazed at him a thousand times before were foggy and sluggish, dull—they belonged to a stranger. Cas thought he felt his heart breaking as he held her small body in place, drawing her to him so that he cradled her against himself like a child. She was a child. Only fifteen. Cas noticed a strange pattern on her forearm and gently took her wrist and pulled her arm up to look. In rows from wrist to inner elbow, she had long white, raised scars. His heart tightened miserably. Were these from self-harm? Cas looked at her again in silent agony. "Alex…" he breathed anxiously, holding her lolling head up with a hand. His heart raced, his veins burned with a feeling of shock and horror, his mind churned, he couldn't accept this as being real. How did this happen to you?
The use of her name rendered her face confused, but her features didn't or perhaps couldn't move much. Her eyes just looked into his with unknowing consternation. He thought if she had clarity and strength she might have fought him. But she had the look of someone who had given up to the pull of a strong current. She was waiting to die. Why hadn't he sensed this? Alex just looked at him in a drugged, dying stupor, seeming mildly confused but largely unaffected—her gaze was fading, drifting away.
"How did this happen?" Cas asked hollowly, realizing in horror that this Alex was not the Alex he knew at all and that she was miserable, broken, beaten, ruined. Beyond repair. Beyond salvage. Beyond bearing—he couldn't take it, he thought he would break too.
"Like dominoes, my friend," Balthazar said quietly, somberly. He stood further back, watching with a perplexed look on his face—he didn't understand the way Cas held this girl or why he cared so much. "One little change sets off a string of others. She grew up separate from the boys, it would seem. And now, somehow… this."
Castiel had banked everything on this—the plan for the souls would afford him to escape from his partnership from Crowley, would gain him victory in the war. But at the sight of Alex like this he knew he couldn't go through with it—not even for a second. "We have to change it back," he declared, looking back at his brother urgently. He had to erase this and undo the damage done, now.
Balthazar shrugged, smiling easily. "Oh, I don't know about all that. Why can't you just fix her? Save her from whatever overdose she's given herself just now, restore the voice, wait a few years so you're not a raging pedophile, then on with the show?"
Castiel was offended and incensed. "She's broken, Balthazar! Can't you see? How could I ever fix…" he trailed off, looking at this girl who he loved more than anyone or anything and he mourned. There was no hope or love in her eyes, there was no bright curiosity or sweet girlish shyness, there was no brazen stubborn, insightful, and endearingly impish confidence. There was only pain and anguish and deep sorrow. He felt those things she was emanating and he wanted to weep from seeing how agonized and alone she was. There was no other choice. He had to set it right and change it back now.
Balthazar didn't understand his brother's deep emotions for even a second. "Blimey, you're quite the sentimental, aren't you?"
Further riled, Castiel looked at his brother with deep accusation—he held Alex tighter to himself protectively and he spoke slowly and stiltedly in an effort to control himself. "This human girl—is the single most important thing in all of existence—that ever has been—or ever will be." He looked at Balthazar hard. "Now go, re-sink the Titanic."
Balthazar's eyebrows shot up. "Just like that? W-what about the war, what about the souls and—"
"All of it be damned, Balthazar!" Castiel all but shouted, losing his mind slightly in that moment. He heaved several deep, impassioned breaths as he clutched the small body of Alex to himself and felt how close she was to fading away forever. "If she's gone, none of this was worth anything!" His words reverberated in shocked air. "Go! Now!"
Chastened, Balthazar took a beat, nodded agreement, and disappeared into the past to do what Castiel had commanded.
Cas struggled to regulate his uneven, upset breathing and he looked back at Alex, who was laying slack in his arms, half-conscious. He touched her face, smoothed her hair. His hand trembled despite his best efforts. In a fading stupor, she looked at him in confusion. Her eyes slowly followed his hand as he trailed his fingertips against the side of her face. He saw how she was wondering who he was and why he was holding her like that, touching her so gently. "I'm so sorry," he whispered, stricken to the point of near-tears, so engulfed in grief that he could barely function. "I'm so sorry."
Their eyes met and her eyebrows moved in together slowly. Who are you? She seemed to be wondering. His fingertips traced down the long, white scar down the side of his face. "You won't remember this," he promised her in a hoarse murmur. He loathed himself for causing this, for having any small part in this horrible outcome. "The pain. The loneliness. I'll take it from you, you won't have to remember." He wanted to beg her forgiveness, yet she had no idea who he was. "I'm so sorry."
Her eyes moved to traverse the area beyond his shoulder, going up and following an arc, and Cas froze, realizing she could see his wings in her lessening state of consciousness. Miracle of all miracles, her eyes took in his darkly feathered wingspan and the softest little ghost of a smile came over her chapped lips—her tense features relaxed, she appeared more like herself, she looked younger and freer and more alive. His heart went out to her. His Alex. Did this version of her believe in angels, he wondered? Did she think he was there to take her to Heaven? Her fingers twitched as if she wanted to reach out to touch, feel, and contemplate the sight she had just discovered. But she was too weak. At that moment her shallow breathing became even more labored and her eyes abruptly became despaired and frightened, she looked into his eyes silently and her fingers weakly curled into his trench coat. With a deeply knit brow, Castiel let his wings settle down to wrap around her gently and he took her hand and held it to himself, leaning close and pressing his lips to her forehead in a kiss that lingered, a kiss she wouldn't understand but he had to give.
She was Jane Doe, another forgotten ward of the state. She had lived a horrible, pained, lonely existence. She had fought against everyone who ever tried to love her and tame her, she had screamed internally for someone to hear her and come rescue her, to take her from this life she had never belonged in. She had raged and fought and tried to destroy herself. Hope had died a long time ago when they never came for her.
But there in that room as she laid dying, she suddenly felt a peace she had never known before. This stranger, this handsome man with angel's wings and eyes she swore she recognized and knew—he held her with so much care and gentleness, he kissed her forehead and her tired eyes fell closed in inexplicable relief. Soft feathers whispered against her and she was safe. She was left feeling beautiful things instead of agony. Her weak and unresponsive limbs sagged, her ear rested against the man in the trench coat's chest. She could hear his heart beating, and it was the last sound she ever heard. Here you are… at last… her soul itself breathed, knowing this man somehow in her last moment. She was home. She could finally, finally rest.
And then everything faded to white and that timeline was erased and destroyed, a mere imagining and distant dream.
Present Day
Sioux Falls, South Dakota
Dean Winchester woke up with a start in the front seat of the car and at nearly the same moment, Sam did too. Disoriented and confused, they both took a couple seconds to frown around at the car and each other. "What the…" Sam muttered, just as disconcerted as Dean felt.
Dean stared at the steering wheel of the Impala. Wait. The Impala! Everything rushed his mind and then at the exact same moment, the brothers got the same idea. With marked urgency and fear that the back seat would be empty, they twisted around to look.
There, asleep peacefully, their sister, like she'd never been gone at all. She was using her bent arm as a pillow and her mouth sagged open as she snored and drooled. Sam and Dean both let out soft little sighs of relief—then looked at each other in suspicion. "What?" They asked each other at the same moment, unsure why the other was twisting around in alarm to check on Alex.
Dean went first after Sam gave him a well? look. "Nothing, I—I just had this… this insane dream," he said, letting out a heavy whoosh of air as he stared out of the windshield in confusion. He still felt upset and weird from it, deeply unsettled. "Felt so real, man."
Sam was mildly taken aback. "Yeah, me too—crazy dream, like, mentally scarring," he said, sounding just about as traumatized as Dean felt.
Alex smacked her mouth as sleep continued.
Dean scoffed and got out of the car in an attempt to escape the weird, real feeling of that dream. Sam followed suit. "No way was yours worse than mine," Dean told his brother across the top of the car, running a hand through his hair as he tried to tell himself to chill out, it was just a wacko dream. But it had felt so real. Why would he dream something so specific, so vivid, so detailed? It left him feeling violated almost. "I dreamed Dad got rid of Alex when she was three—"
Sam's expression showed stunned confusion. "—and she died when she was fifteen?"
The brothers stared at each other briefly and Dean was confounded. "…How'd you know that?" he asked dubiously.
"That's what I dreamed," Sam said, sounding worried and suspicious.
"No… that's what I dreamed," Dean argued, getting worried too as he stared his brother down. "…Why're you having my dreams, dude?"
Sam hesitated anxiously. "I… I dunno. Do you think—"
"What time is it?" came a sleepy voice.
With hair that was sticking up at the back of her head from laying on it wrong, Alex was stiffly getting out of the back seat on Dean's side and stretching as she squinted groggily. She let out a squeak of surprise when Dean scooped her up into a really tight hug and didn't let go. Grumpy and confused, she flailed, resisting. "Hey, uggh, what…?" she trailed off and her vague annoyance faded away as Dean hugged her close like that like he hadn't seen her in years or like there had just been a close call. She hesitated then pushed back and studied Dean in slight worry. "You okay?" she asked, frowning a lot, seeming totally uncertain about why he seemed so glad to see her.
Dean cleared his throat against thick emotion—he'd felt like she was gone forever and now she wasn't. "Yeah, I'm—"
"Ow, Sam!" Alex protested when Sam abruptly bear-hugged her too. She gave up, patting him cajolingly on the back as he squeezed her so tight she wheezed a little. "Jesus, who died?" she joked when he'd let go, looking at them both with a lopsided little grin. When they got hurt looks on their faces she fell into more seriousness and confusion. "…What's wrong with you two?" Slight fear grew in her eyes. "Did—did something happen?"
Sam found his voice first. "No, but did you, like, have any weird dreams or…?"
"Dreams?" she repeated skeptically, looking between her brothers in turn with staunch confusion. "No…?" She sounded really lost, and it was obvious she was aware something was getting to them both. "You guys okay?"
The brothers exchanged a brief look and both understood neither wanted to tell her about it, not even briefly. It was too insane and too painful, too much. "Fine, we're fine," Dean said, even though he had no idea what the fuck had just happened. He chalked it up to craziness and decided he didn't wanna know. His brother was here, his sister was here—everything was normal. He'd have to ask Cas or Balthazar about it later, that was for sure though. But maybe it had been just a dream. How could it be anything else?
Alex was frowning shrewdly at him, then Sam. "…You sure?" she prompted.
Dean let out a long, tense breath and nodded, realizing everything was fine. "No. Yeah. Everything's great." He put an arm around her shoulder, then looked at Sam and gave his arm a little punch. "Everything's just like it's supposed to be." He realized he had everything in the world at that moment, and he felt pride and affection welling up in him. This was his family. No one else in the world like them, ever. "You know what?" he asked, realizing it had been too long since they just spent time together and did nothing. "I wanna just hang out with you two. Pop some corn, drink some booze, watch a movie, play some games, smoke a bowl, shoot some targets… whatever. Forget the research for a little while. Just… family time."
Sam looked touched and his face worked to hide it—he nodded. "Yeah. Okay. Sounds good."
Alex was smiling faintly through her still-there suspicion. "Uh… okay…?"
They ambled inside, Alex sandwiched between her hovering brothers.
Castiel stood there invisibly and watched with wretched relief as the little family went into Bobby's home safe and sound. Things were as they had been before he attempted to change fate. The Winchesters could never know that he was behind what had happened, what they would from here on out suppose to be a strange dream. But he would know. And it tore at him. He wondered: what am I becoming? He couldn't face these humans he cared about. Not so soon after holding a dying and miserable Alex in his arms. That had happened to her because of him. And even though she didn't remember it, he did. He wanted to go to her and hold her and tell her everything. But he held himself back. He was an angel working with a demon. If Alex knew… what would she say? He didn't want to know.
Alex would remain slightly confused the rest of that day. When Dean randomly hugged her again in the middle of the kitchen and asked if she knew that he loved her, she didn't know why. When Sam suddenly got teary eyed for no reason and put his arm around her, squeezing hard, she didn't know why. When she flipped through the channels and Titanic was on and Sam and Dean both demanded she turn it off, she didn't know why. She just thought they were being weird.
That Night
It was the dead silence of night. Alex woke abruptly and sat up in bed, looking around the room in disorientation. No one was there, but she thought she had heard him, or felt him maybe. A strange feeling settled in the pit of her stomach and she blinked into the dark shadows of the attic in confusion. "…Cas?" she asked in the quietest little whisper. There was no reply. "You there?" Silence. There was no one.
Only, there was. She just couldn't see him. Very close to her, Cas remained silent and invisible, too ashamed to go to her but needing to be close to her. He was too appalled at what he had caused to happen. He felt like he couldn't let her look into his eyes or she would see the monster he felt he was becoming.
So he remained in the dark, cloaked by the weakening shroud of secrets he hid behind, trapped in the shrinking world of lies he had created for himself.
Author's Notes: This has to be one of the most sadistic chapters I ever wrote…? It's up there with chapter 20! I got so depressed writing it. We always knew John considered giving Alex up but thanks to a strong whiskey invented by a Titanic passenger who would have otherwise died and never invented said liquor, John went through with the idea he toyed with. In SRS canon he didn't go through with the idea because he was able to hold back long enough til Alex was six—and when he told Bobby about his thoughts concerning letting her go at that time, he got his ass handed to him. Thanks Bobby.
This chapter/episode was quite different than the show, because on the show, Cas was going to let Fate keep killing those people so that he could use their souls. However, he was backed into a corner when Atropos said she and her sisters would kill Sam and Dean if Castiel didn't re-sink the Titanic and make history/fate right. It didn't get that far in this version of the episode for obvious reasons: Alex being involved changed everything. Cas realized what his actions had set into motion for the one he loves and seeing her ruined life and bitter end propelled him to set things back the way they were.