Chapter Three
The Winchesters: A fairy tale
Sam: Dean, tell me a story.
Dean: Aren't you a little old for that, buddy?
Sam: No.
Dean: You're eight.
Sam: Not for another week.
Dean: I don't know, Sammy…
Sam: Please, Dean. Please, please, please.
Dean: Well, okay. I guess, if you really want one.
Sam: Yay!
Dean: Calm down and get in bed or deal's off. Okay? Good. You ready?
Sam: Yeah.
Dean: Alright, Once apon a time-
Sam: Don't you need a book?
Dean: Nah, kiddo, not for this one.
Sam: Okay, keep going.
Dean: Gee, thanks. Now, Once apon a time, there was a family. A family of warriors.
Sam: Like knights with swords who fight dragons?
Dean: Yeah, sorta. They fight a whole bunch of bad guys. All the time, every day, they fight.
Sam: Why?
Dean: Well, because that's their job.
Sam: How come?
Dean: Because a long, long time ago, before the story even started, something really bad happened to the mom.
Sam: Like the something really bad that happened to our mommy?
Dean: Yeah, kiddo, just like that.
Sam: What happened?
Dean: Well, this really bad thing took the mommy, and made the daddy really sad –yes, just like how daddy's sad a lot.
Sam: I don't think I like this story.
Dean: But do you wanna hear it?
Sam: Is there a happy ending?
Dean: Yeah.
Sam: Then, Okay.
Dean: So this family of warriors, they spend their whole lives hunting evil things, saving innocent people. And the mom watches them, all the time. She protects them from Heaven, helps them fight.
Sam: Do they fight forever?
Dean: Come on, Sammy, what kind of happy ending would that be?
Sam: When do they stop being warriors?
Dean: Once they find the evil thing that took their mommy away. Once they get… once they find Peace.
Sam: Like Pastor Jim says you do by talking to God?
Dean: Yeah, a little like that. Only with more fighting, and not as much praying.
Sam: Is that what we do, Dean? Is that what all daddy's stories are about? The ghosts? The bad things he talks about? Are we the warriors?
Dean: Yeah, Sammy. This is our story.
Sam: Daddy never sounds happy when he talks about it.
Dean: Well, that's because dad doesn't know the end of the story yet.
Sam: But you do?
Dean: Sure. It ends like all fairy tales end. The family of warriors catch the bad guy, they kill him, make him pay for taking their mommy away, then the father and the sons all live happily ever after.
Sam: All of us?
Dean: Yup.
Sam: Happily ever after? Like, forever?
Dean: Yeah, that's the idea.
Sam: How come daddy doesn't know all that? I bet it'd make him less sad all the time if he knew.
Dean: Maybe, Sammy, but you can't ever tell him, okay?
Sam: Why?
Dean: You're not supposed to know the end of the story ahead of time.
"I'll protect you, Sammy."
A big brother made a pledge, a promise, a commitment.
Nothing was stronger than that.
I sought my brother…
"You still working that case? Your vision?" Dean asked, but Sam could tell by the pleading tone in his voice that he didn't really want to know.
Still, Sam couldn't lie to Dean, even if he wanted him to. "Yeah," he sighed. "I think I have it figured out, I just have to go torch some bones tomorrow."
"Yeah?" Dean sounded hopeful. "What was up?"
Sam took a seat on his own bed, across from his brother's, glad to see that Dean was up and about on his own merit, and not looking any worse for the wear.
"This blessed Dagger from an Irish cult," he repeated the legend Mitch had shared with him.
"So the girl in your dream was an immortal witch?" Dean sounded worried, and Sam didn't blame him, he had been too, when he'd first come to that same conclusion.
"Nah," he shrugged off the idea lightly, "Just a corporal ghost who thought she'd be able to bring herself back to life."
"Corporal? So she was a witch before she died?"
"Yeah," Sam admitted, "But not from the family whose magic originally made the thing. She just bound it to herself. Which makes my life easier, 'cause as soon as I burn the bones, the dagger'll lose power."
"And probably disincarnate," Dean added thoughtfully.
"Here's to hopin'," Sam said lightly.
"Where's the body?"
"A county over. The girl knew about the knife, knew what it could do, before she died. She bound it to herself then, that's why she's so powerful now."
"But she's been feeding off human souls, trying to contact demons?"
"Talking about demons," Sam clarified. "I don't know what her plans are – or were – but it doesn't matter. She'll be gone tomorrow."
Dean was silent for a while, and Sam studied him, wondering if it was too soon to dive back into the hunting. If Dean was still too sick, too emotionally vulnerable.
Eventually his brother asked, "So this witch, she knew she was going to die? Before hand?"
This really did hit too close to home, Sam realized now.
Way too close.
"Yeah," he swallowed thickly. "She had terminal cancer."
"Oh."
The Hospital
Sam listened from the doorway.
"I love you, son," John's voice was raspy, full of pain, each syllable an effort. "I know I don't say that enough. I didn't..."
"It's okay, dad," Dean interrupted, and Sam could hear him trying to be strong. "I know."
"I made a promise to your mother, Dean," John rasped, and Sam was glad he couldn't bear witness to the look on his brother's face, the one that was always present when their father talked about their mother. "They day you were born, I promised to protect you. She promised to love you. And the day... the day Sammy was born... Mary promised to protect him, and I promised to love him."
"Dad..."
"I had forgotten that until just now." Their father sounded as if he'd figured out something monumentally important. "And the day... the day she died... you promised to protect Sammy, and to love him. I think I get it now."
"Dad, what..."
"I love you, Dean." John repeated. "And I love your brother. But you boys don't need me."
"Dad," this time it was Dean and Sam whispering in unison.
Sam couldn't bear to play spectator anymore, he entered the hospital room, stood as a solitary figure in the doorway. Dean glanced to him, his eyes were pleading, and his entire body screamed defeat. John looked sad.
A moment later, the eldest hunter's throat was cleared, and his tone serious. "Listen to me, boys." He ordered. "I'm gonna die."
"... gonna die..."
Dean.
The doctor.
"Why, Sam?"
Jessica.
"Mary! No!"
Death.
"Dad," Both pleaded.
"...and I'm gonna be with your mother again."
"I love you, Mary," John whispered in her ear, sun setting in the background.
"We're gonna make such beautiful children together," she promised one cold winter day.
"I want a son," John told her that first night. "Two sons. So they can be brothers."
"Brothers are timeless," she whispered. And that night, Dean was created.
Life.
"Mary," he whispered to himself.
And far from giving them the last parting instructions both had - on some level - expected, John drifted away from them; a peaceful look on his face. He seemed not scared of death, but happy to embrace it's relief. The fight and fuel was not leaving his body unjustly, for it was his time to go.
"Love you,"
His least words were barely a breath, and Dean and Sam would never know if was talking to his sons or his wife.
Or both.
"I'm sorry for your loss." Sympathy.
"It was meant to be." Fate.
"We're gonna be okay, right Dean?"
I sought my brother...
And I found all three
End.
Author's Note: I had to do it. I had to write a post-season finale before season 2 started. I hadn't planned on doing this, I didn't even really want to, but there it is. Thoughts?
More things that don't belong to me:
I sought my soul, but my soul I could not see. I sought my God, but my God eluded me. I sought my brother and I found all three. Author Unknown
Sibling relationships - and 80 percent of Americans have at least one - outlast marriages, survive the death of parents, resurface after quarrels that would sink any friendship. They flourish in a thousand incarnations of closeness and distance, warmth, loyalty and distrust. Erica E. Goode, "The Secret World of Siblings," U.S. News & World Report, 10 January 1994
