A Brother's Sacrifice

by ayosb2000

Completely AU. John really did want Dean to have a home and for Sam to go to school. At Sonny's, Dean saw the possibility of another life, but chose family. Sam is chafing under his father's thumb. An exploration of what might have happened if Dean stood up to his father and decided that normal and hunting could co-exist. A large re-write of a previous story I wrote years ago.

15. July 2001

A/N Mountains of angst. Physical confrontation between John and Sam. You've been warned. Enjoy.

/

They're eight and four.

"Daddy's gonna be mad."

Sammy's little rosebud mouth is pursed in a worried pout, his plump baby cheeks puffed out and pink as he watches his big brother meticulously pry the black cloth covering away from the shelf behind the backseat. Each tiny motion as precise and accurate as possible. At eight years old, Dean was already a methodical hunter in training.

"No, he's not, Sammy," Dean reassures him, determined with the certainty that only an already responsible big brother could summon. "He won't even know."

Dean continues using his silver knife to slowly wedge back the thin carpet-like fabric so that there are no noticeable tears. If they are very, very careful, the entire piece could be smoothed back and no one, not even their dad, would ever be the wiser.

A quiet Saturday in Jonesville, Michigan, their latest home of the week. Mid September and already beginning to feel the first real hint of approaching fall. You could smell it in the air. Dried leaves and the light essence of chimney smoke from chilly nights still hanging on the wind in the early morning hours. It wasn't cold enough outside during the day for coats just yet, but Dad liked to be prepared and had dressed the boys in thicker, long sleeved shirts to make sure they stayed warm while they were waiting in the car.

No school today meant that the brothers had to come with him while he worked the job. Not an ideal situation, but Dean wasn't quite old enough yet to be entrusted to watch Sam on his own, although the time for that was coming soon. Both of the boys were mischievous and energetic, and the possibility of unsupervised mayhem was still too great. It had been almost over half an hour since Dad went into the house to talk with the people that lived there, and Sammy was growing bored.

Already well schooled in Sammy-speak, Dean knew the signs of an impending tantrum level disruption, and he quickly realized that he was going to need to do something to keep his little brother occupied and preferably quiet until Dad was back. There were too many people walking past the parked Impala as they went about their Saturday errands, and the last thing Dad needed was to have some Nosy Nellie take issue with the two small boys left alone in a car, especially if one of them was crying.

Sammy loved his new preschool, and he wouldn't stop animatedly chattering, even for a second, about how much fun he had there with the other kids. Playing games and singing songs. Proudly, he had told Dean that he was the only one in his class that already knew all his letters.

Dean wasn't surprised. After all, he was the one that had been teaching his little brother how to write since the kid could hold a pencil. Whatever Dean learned at school, he made sure that Sammy did as well.

After another few minutes of meticulous levering, Dean is able to pull back enough of the cloth covering to reveal the press board panel behind the seat. He turns and leans over the foot well of the backseat on the driver's side and rummages in Dad's duffel until he finds the extra silver knife. With an impish smile on his face, he hands it, handle first, to his little brother.

"Let's practice those letters some more, Sammy."

It doesn't take much persuading to convince an antsy four year old to gouge his initials into the press board. With a fierce determination puckering his entire chubby face, the intense concentration on a task that he would exhibit his entire life, Sammy rakes the blade back and forth in jagged lines until his S and W are clearly etched next to his brother's D and W. While carving his own mark, Dean watches his little brother like a hawk, making sure that Sammy doesn't accidentally lose his grip on the blade and cut himself.

Dad might be willing to overlook some fairly well hidden gashes made to Baby, but there was no way he would stand for any injuries to his real baby.

Dean also keeps a sharp eye out for anyone taking extra notice of the boys with the knives. Fortunately, no one seems interested enough to look closely at what they have in their hands.

Once they are both finished, Sammy takes a deep breath, as much as his tiny lungs allow him to inhale, and he blows a small puff of air across the shavings, scattering some to stick and cling on the folded backside of the cloth covering, as well as the black cuffs of his own little shirt.

"Look, Dean," Sammy smiles happily. "It's you and me."

He looks up at Dean with a huge grin, hero worship and awe in his little hazel doe eyes, and Dean hooks an affectionate arm around his brother's tiny shoulders.

"Yep. You and me against the world, Sammy. Always."

"Always," Sam agrees.

/

They're nine and five.

"Watch me, Dean. I'm Batman!"

Sammy's high pitched childish squeal rings through the air, catching the attention of his big brother who had looked away just long enough to miss his tiny shadow scaling the wooden slots of Pastor Jim's equipment shed. It's not a particularly large shed. Only four feet high in some places. Just one of those little wooden structures that Jim uses for gardening equipment and extra cans of gasoline.

Before Dean can stop him, the tiny boy is confidently leaping off the slanted pitch roof. For a moment, time stands still as the older boy's heart surges up into his throat.

Realizing just a split second too late that his little brother would have taken Dean's earlier ill thought out Superman jump as something to aspire to and copy. Rambunctious and hyper, the sugar high from their breakfast of candy remnants leftover from Pastor Jim's community hall Halloween party last week still swimming in their blood stream, making quiet play impossible.

It's The Day today. That one day of the year the brothers make themselves scarce as much as they can. Dad is holed up in his room at the rectory, not talking to them or paying any attention to anything at all really.

Dean doesn't tell Sammy why they need to leave Dad alone and go outside and be quiet on this particular day, only that they have to.

Sam wants to pester Dad into playing with them like he usually does when he is home, not caring that playtime with Dad is some sort of preparation for training. All Sam knows is that Dad is spending time with them, and that's good enough for him, but Dean knows better for today anyway, and he scrambles to find an alternate activity.

Dean does sweeten the pot by assuring his little brother that they can put on the flimsy dime store plastic superhero costumes that somehow Dean had persuaded Pastor Jim to buy them for the party. Dad usually doesn't allow them to celebrate Halloween, and they are determined to get as much use out of them as they can before they have to leave them behind in Blue Earth.

Sammy doesn't have Dean's formal training yet. Dad is still keeping that part of their lives secret from his younger son, and would continue to do so as long as it was possible. Where Dean has the longer legs and the fallback knowledge of tuck and roll, poor Sammy flops off the shed, looking less like the Caped Crusader, and more like a clumsy silver and blue penguin.

With his overly large plastic mask blocking the majority of his vision and his stubby legs tripping on the long length of the flimsy costume, the cape fluttering behind him, Sammy stumbles and falls, toppling the four feet directly onto his left forearm. For a minute, Dean is almost convinced that his little brother won't cry, but then those huge puppy dog eyes flood with tears and his puckered pink mouth quivers threateningly.

Sammy's arm is curled under him in an unnatural position, and even Dean's novice eyes know a break when he sees one. Comforting his brother with one arm, Dean yanks off his own Superman costume with the other as he frantically scans the church property for signs that Pastor Jim is back from his errands.

Luck doesn't seem to be in the cards for the Winchester brothers that day, since Jim's truck is still missing from it's place by the Impala. Sammy's cries are only growing louder and more heart rending by the minute and Dean knows that he's going to have to do whatever it takes to get his little brother some medical help.

For a brief second, he gives consideration to getting his dad, but he dismisses the idea as quickly as it comes. Not that their father wouldn't rouse himself enough to get help for his youngest, but the scene it would cause would be unbearably tense and traumatic for all of them, and Sammy's already crying and scared enough.

Besides, watching out for Sammy is Dean's job, and if Dad is ever going to start trusting him to hold down the fort on his own, Dean knows he needs to take care of this himself.

He also remembers Pastor Jim once saying something about forgiveness being easier than permission. That sounds like good advice to Dean right about now.

It only takes a minute for him to dash across the lawn and snag the Schwinn bike that Pastor Jim allows Dean to use on their visits. Shiny blue with an extra long metallic silver banana seat and handlebars so huge that Dean sometimes pretends that he's really driving a Harley as he zooms around the neighborhood. He manages to hold the bike steady while he helps Sammy climb onto the handlebars, his broken arm tucked securely to his chest.

The hospital is only a few blocks away, and the big brother pumps for speed as they take off down the crush and run gravel path that leads to the street, praying that Jim is back in time to answer the phone when Dean has to eventually call him from the ER.

"It's okay, Sammy," he assures his now quietly sobbing brother. "I've got you. You and me, right?"

Sammy nods his curly little head and hiccups.

"You 'n me against the world."

/

They're twelve and eight.

The snow is still falling pretty heavily in Broken Bow, Nebraska. They've been in this crappy motel room for days with its musty odor and dingy off white walls in desperate need of a paint job. Ancient metal twin beds with lumpy, faded quilts and mattresses that have seen too much use to be comfortable, and an ugly pale gray plaid sleeper sofa that creaks in protest every time they sit on it.

When Dean isn't trying to comfort his devastated little brother, he's shooting furtive glances towards the motel room door and hoping that the craptastic weather doesn't mean that their missing father has been in an accident. There are protocols in place for the brothers if their father doesn't make it back within a certain window, but just because Dean doesn't have to stress about their next move doesn't also mean that he's not worried about never seeing his father again.

Dad has never missed Christmas before, and what if something bad has happened to him, or something bad has gotten him, because Sammy has snaked his journal? The journal that holds all of Dad's knowledge and defenses against everything supernatural.

What if he's hurt because he was caught unprepared?

Against his will, Dean finds himself feeling more than a little anger at his brother, but he tamps it down as best as he can because Sammy's still just a little kid who doesn't know any better.

Sammy's also trying to put up a good front, but Dean knows that the boy's heart is bleeding. They have tried to keep him innocent for so long, and that whole blanket of ignorant comfort and protection has just been ripped away from him with one harsh yank. It's a lot for an eight year old to process. Even one as scary smart as Dean's little brother, and it would be foolish to think that he's not completely freaked by the idea that monsters are real and their father spends his time away from them fighting the things that frighten them.

In his sadness and fear, Sammy hasn't touched a bite of his exotic Mac & Cheese, in spite of the fact that Dean's earlier foray to the convenience store down the street had really been for the sole purpose of buying the world's smallest, most expensive jar of Marshmallow Fluff.

He wasn't kidding when he told Sammy that he was out getting the kid's dinner, and he wasn't talking about the jerky and Funyuns either. Sure it would have been easier to get another pizza, but he had wanted something special to take some of the pain away.

The bribe hasn't worked though. The entire pot now sits unwanted and slowly congealing on the small electric single burner on the counter, and neither of them really have any kind of appetite.

There were better ways to spend Christmas.

The old television is showing another Christmas classic. This time it's Frosty the Snowman, and the forced cheerfulness is doing nothing for either brother as they sit on the creaky couch silently counting the minutes pass by without their father coming through the door.

Sammy's eyes are still red rimmed from crying himself to sleep last night, and then again after Dean's failed attempt at convincing him that Dad dropped off presents for them, and it's to the point that Dean can't even look at his little brother anymore without feeling anger at himself for spilling the beans about Santa Claus in his attempt to explain Dad's job to his little brother.

Sammy might have demanded the truth about what was in Dad's journal, but that didn't mean that Dean had to take away Christmas too.

He reaches up and thoughtfully rubs the heavy amulet that now sits in pride of place around his neck. It's an ugly little thing. Enough to give you nightmares just by looking at it, but Sammy swore that it was special and Dean believes him. Even if there is nothing particularly special about the amulet itself, Dean's little brother chose to give it to him instead of their father, and that makes it special in Dean's eyes.

He glances over at his bereft and brooding little sibling and silently swears that he will never take it off.

Ever

Poor Sammy hasn't had anything good to remember this Christmas by. Just an absentee father, stolen chick presents, a tree that is nothing more than a few branches that are as sparse and broken as their own family, and a dinner that could cause early onset diabetes.

He deserves better.

Determined now, Dean grabs one of Sammy's crayon nubs. Well worn and almost used up, the paper wrapper long gone, he goes over to the door they have been surreptitiously staring at and draws a target.

Dad will freak right out when he sees it, because it will probably cost them the deposit they have put down, but Dean is willing to wash it off later if he can, and if nothing else, it will give the slumlord that owns this dump a reason to paint the damn walls.

Sam watches as his big brother rips open the packaging of the Sapphire Barbie and grabs the sparkly tasseled baton as well. By the time Dean is done, the baton has been transformed into a slingshot and Barbie is now the slick blue projectile.

They spend the next hour taking turns practicing their aim, with Dean assuring Sam that the better he gets, the more skill he will have for helping Dad and Dean fight the monsters off.

With the day coming to a close, still no Dad in sight, and their arms and hands sore from target practice, Dean coaxes Sam onto the couch next to him and produces a rare bag of Gummi Bears that are Sam's favorite. Sammy practically curls up in his brother's lap as they share them, all but ignoring the television that is now broadcasting The Little Drummer Boy.

Sammy's eyes are wet again and his voice is watery, and Dean can feel his little brother trembling against his chest as he slowly chews his candy.

"You and me against the world, right Dean?"

Dean sighs heavily and rests his chin on the top of Sam's head as he rubs his brother's arm, trying to comfort them both as best as he can.

"You know it, little brother."

/

They're fourteen and nine.

It's spring break and Sam and Dean have been parked in a little motel in Racine, Wisconsin for the past month. Lately Dad's been making noise about them possibly staying there until the end of the school year. Usually Sam would be really excited about that prospect, but ever since he found out about what the real family business is, he has thrown himself into training so that he can hunt alongside his father and brother.

The hope is that he won't be left on his own anymore if he can prove himself as capable a hunter as his big brother. Not that he necessarily wants to hunt, but he does want to be with his family. It truly scares him to be left behind and not know whether or not they are safe.

Dean's been in trouble again at school, and Dad thinks that they need to put down some roots for a bit so that his firstborn can get a little stability in his life and get back on track. They don't need the extra attention from CPS right now either, and the school social workers have been hovering a little more aggressively recently. But there is a ghoul hunt in Milwaukee, not far away, and Dad could use Dean's help. So once again, Sam finds himself alone in the bizarrely farm themed motel room that is at least a little nicer and a little cleaner than their usual digs.

After telling Dad that he was worried that there might be a monster hiding in his closet, Sam is now considered old enough to shoot a gun and train alongside his brother, although sometimes he is still young enough and gets lonely enough to summon the comforting presence of Sully, his imaginary friend, once his father and brother leave.

Their absence leaves a deep painful ache in his stomach, and the fears that run rampant through his mind during the endless hours that he sits alone in the room make him fret and his body tremble. When Dean calls to check in, Sam begs, with desperate tears breaking up his words, to convince Dad to let Sam join them because the walls are closing in on him in his despondency and grief at being left behind again.

Sam knows that Dean will try his best to persuade Dad to reconsider. Reminding him that they are all Winchesters and they hunt. It's what they do, and Sam should be right there next to them while they do it. It's not as if Sam has never been on a hunt before, even if it was just to be kept safe in the car next to Dean while Dad did all the work.

But that doesn't happen anymore, because Dean is old enough now to hunt alongside Dad as a junior partner, and they've decided that it's safer for Sam to stay an hour away in a motel room than it is to have him vulnerable and alone in the Impala where a stray monster could possibly get to him when his family are engaged elsewhere. Sam doesn't like that development, and sometimes he suspects that Dean is in agreement with Dad on this, even if he tells Sam otherwise.

Sometimes Sam also feels that it would just be better if he ran away from this life. The world that his family lives in is dark and dangerous and it eats away at Sam during the frighteningly quiet times on his own in unfamiliar ever-changing motel rooms.

He doesn't necessarily want to leave his family, but they are always leaving him it seems, and maybe there is something different out there for him that is less fraught with worry and terror. Where he can be normal and safe and not the kid with the freak family for a change. He feels frustrated that he isn't allowed to help his father and brother, but is still forced to stress about them never coming back for him.

It might just be easier if he left first. That's what Sully tells him anyway.

Of course Sully is just a figment of Sam's imagination, so isn't it really just what Sam is telling himself?

He's not sure.

After Dean calls and confirms that Dad is still rejecting Sam's pleas to be included, Sam imagines that he and Sully lay on the beds in the crazy farm room and play games of wishes and desires that are too abstract in Sam's mind to really be obtainable. They are the hopes and dreams of a young boy who battles the harsh rejection of his father by thinking up a happier and brighter future for himself, and if his make believe playmate agrees with him and encourages him, all the better.

We all need some positive affirmation in life, regardless of where it comes from.

Sam's given a lot of thought to running away lately. It's only the knowledge of how terribly he'll miss his Dad, and especially Dean, that keeps him obedient and submissively parked in the motel. He can't imagine a life without his brother. Although Dean goes out with Dad to hunt occasionally, he's more often than not right at Sam's side, caring for him and watching out for him like he has all of Sam's young life.

If Sam left, he would miss his father, but he would ache for his brother.

Sully seems to think that Sam would be better off on his own, and the part of Sam's mind that has conjured Sully seems to agree with that sentiment. Enough that Sam makes a decision to go and leave his solitary sad life behind him. He's not sure where he will go, or what he will do. All he knows is that his family doesn't seem to want him with them, so he won't make them put up with him any more either.

Then, just as he's getting ready to pack his stuff, Dad calls and tells Sam that he can come along after all, and Sam is so incredibly happy that he is practically dancing with excitement when he informs his imagination that his family does want him as much as he wants to be with them. It's a soothing balm on his perceived rejection and hurt feelings and suddenly he can't wait to see them again.

Dad and Dean are only an hour bus ride away from the transit center a few blocks from the motel. Sam already knows the route and the schedule because Dean always makes sure that he knows how to get to them in an emergency when they are out without him. Dean also makes sure that Sam has the money to travel too, because his big brother always takes care of him no matter what.

As Sam runs around the room packing up his things, he seems to have a heated conversation with his thoughts as they manifest themselves into a projection of Sully. He doesn't remember exactly what he says to convince that part of his subconscious that this is for the best. That Sam is a Winchester, and he's off to go do what the Winchester family does.

Like Dad. Like Dean.

His thoughts nag at him until finally he snaps and banishes the idea of Sully from his presence and his mind for good. He doesn't need imaginary friends any more. He has his father, and he especially has his brother. They are his family and they are real and now they trust him to help them do their job.

It's all Sam has ever wanted.

Dean is waiting for him at the station in Milwaukee when Sam's bus pulls in, already smiling with the cock sure grin that defines his big brother's facial features. Sam bounds off the bus like an excited puppy, his overly large duffel bag swinging widely enough behind him that it practically knocks over an elderly woman who scowls her displeasure at his bad manners.

Sam doesn't care. He just runs over to where his brother is standing and throws his arms around Dean, happy and grateful that somehow his brother has managed to talk Dad into letting Sam come along. Dean rolls his eyes at the theatrics but he manages a few affectionate pats on Sam's back before he pushes the younger boy back, because he doesn't really want to be seen hugging the kid in public.

He has a reputation to uphold after all.

That doesn't mean that he completely pushes his brother away, and Sam smiles with all the dimples when Dean throws an affectionate arm around his bony little shoulders as they make their way towards the exit doors where Dad is waiting in the Impala at the curb.

"How'd you get Dad to let me come with?" Sam asks, with wonderment and awe in his eyes.

Dean smirks and hugs Sam a little tighter for a second as they lope along, weaving their way through the crowds that are streaming through the bus terminal.

"Told him that I needed my trusty geek boy sidekick to help with the research, of course," Dean states matter-of-fact, with a Duh look on his face. "We're partners, Sammy. You and me against the world, remember?"

"You and me, Dean," Sam agrees, pressing himself closer to Dean's side as they head outside into the sunshine.

/

They're sixteen and twelve.

Dean has tears in his eyes as Sonny heads back out to tell Dad that Dean is packing up and will be right out. Tonight has not gone as he had been hoping it would. Right now Robin is at the school waiting for her date to arrive, only Dean will be long gone from the Hurleyville area before she finds out that he's standing her up.

It makes him feel like a dick for hurting her like that.

He takes off the dress shirt that he paid real money for, after working some extra chores around the farm. He wanted to look nice for his girlfriend and after two months, he hadn't honestly thought that Dad was coming back for him. Now he decides that it's going to stay at the farm for the next kid lucky enough to live there. All it would do is remind him of what he is giving up tonight to go back out on the road if he kept it.

He looks around the bunk room and feels a pang of sadness clutch in his chest. It's not anything special, the room. A little on the shabby side, not unlike the usual homes of the Winchesters, but it was starting to become a real home for Dean. He doesn't actually have much to pack. It's not like the arresting officer allowed Dean to grab his duffel before taking him into custody. All he is leaving with tonight is what he brought with him.

The clothes on his back, a few dollars in his pocket, and nothing more. Sonny has his wrestling accolades already framed on the wall in the hallway, and as far as Dean is concerned they can stay there. He doesn't need anything from his time here to get in the way of his life as a hunter.

Dad honks again, clearly getting annoyed at how long his firstborn is taking to say his goodbyes to a place that has no prominence in John's mind, and to people that should mean nothing to his son. Dean knows that, to his father, this was a two month stint in custody and nothing more. You don't feel regret at leaving your jailer when you get released from prison after all.

Dean has made a choice tonight. Sonny offered him the chance to be a kid. Knowing only the responsibilities of a kid and not the heavy duty predestined obligations of a Winchester. No longer John's second in command, or Sammy's guardian and caretaker.

Just Dean.

Sixteen year old, good looking smart ass, with a smoking hot girlfriend and friends on the wrestling team. Honest hard work on the farm and a future that might not get him dead by thirty.

A person far different from a boy in The Life.

He glances out the window again and sees Sammy, still playing in the backseat with what appears to be a new toy plane. Young and innocent and so trusting, and Dean wonders how the past two months have been for his little brother. Whether or not he even thought about Dean at all. Or, worse, if he was as grief stricken at the loss of his brother as Dean was over him.

With a watery chuckle, tears threatening to escape once again, Dean draws back the curtain for the last time and racks his shoulders back. He immediately feels the weight of responsibility being lowered onto his shoulders again, and this time it doesn't feel quite as heavy. His shoulders are metaphorically bigger now that he has voluntarily shed the last vestiges of his own childhood.

As he leaves the bunk room, he softly closes the door behind him and walks boldly to the front door, reminded of a passage that Pastor Jim once quoted to him some years ago.

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

No words had ever seemed truer to him than those do at this moment. It is for Sam now that Dean leaves his childhood completely behind him, and he does it willingly, because there is no one in this world that he loves more than his kid brother.

Sonny is standing guard on the front porch, steady and firm and seemingly ready to intervene should Dad decide that a scene is going to be made here tonight. Fortunately, Dean's father seems content to sit behind the wheel, not even sparing his wayward son a glance as Dean nods a last goodbye at his caretaker before striding across the lawn towards the Impala.

When Sam sees his big brother walking towards them he throws his toy aside and pushes open the back door. A split second later he is running across the lawn as well, quickly closing the gap between them as he flings his arms around his missing brother and grips tight.

For a moment, Dean allows himself the warm comfort of hugging his little brother close, pressing his face into Sam's wild tumble of hair and fully realizes just how scared he was of never seeing him again. He clutches Sammy closer to himself for just a few seconds more, knowing that Dad's patience will start to wear thin very quickly, before grabbing Sam's arms and swinging the smaller boy up onto his back to carry him the rest of the way to the car.

Sammy's still so small for a very newly twelve year old, and his happiness at seeing his brother after a long two month separation has him giggling as he wraps his arms so tightly around Dean's neck that he is practically choking the older boy. Dean notices the large dangling cuffs of the flannel shirt that Sammy is wearing and smiles fondly. It's one of his own that's practically drowning his little brother.

Sam has a habit of wearing either Dad or Dean's clothing when he is especially missing them.

When they reach the Impala, Dean opens the back door and slides into the seat after his brother. There's a good chance that his father will relegate him back there as some sort of punishment exile anyway, so Dean beats him to the punch and doesn't even try to ride shotgun.

If he's honest with himself, he's also still pretty upset with his father for ditching him with no word for two months as well.

Dean's more than willing to shoulder the lion share of the blame for his time at Sonny's place, but that doesn't mean that he wasn't hurt and shattered by the deputy's words gleefully informing him that his own dad said he could rot in jail. Dad isn't normally that callous about his children, and Dean is ninety-nine percent sure that the statement was a fabrication made up by the petty man he gave a black eye to, but there is still that small insecure one percent that wonders if Dad did, in fact, say that about his firstborn.

In any case, it doesn't matter. Even if Dean was allowed to sit up front, Sammy is clinging to him like a spider monkey and for once Dean is going to allow his little brother all the physical comfort he thinks he needs. He doesn't know where Sammy has been for the past two months, or whether or not anyone was giving him the attention that he craves, and there's no denying that Dean was at fault, so he figures he has a lot of making up to do.

Dad is staring at him in the rear view mirror and Dean stares right back. They spend a moment holding a silent conversation where each of them both condemns and forgives the other for what has transpired. Wordlessly, they come to an understanding, nodding at each other and letting the matter drop for good. Dad puts the car in gear and a second later he is roaring down the road and leaving the farm behind them.

Sammy talks a mile a minute, catching Dean up on his time at Uncle Bobby's house. One second chattering about the new books he has read, and then the next scolding Dean for getting lost and leaving Sam alone. Then the very next worriedly fretting over whether or not Dean was okay or hurt from the imaginary hunt that Dad had apparently told Sam that Dean undertook.

With years of practice under his belt, Dean fends off each question and concern effortlessly until Sammy's attention is back on the toy plane that he informs his big brother was a birthday present from their father three days earlier.

Dean's gut clenches at the reminder that he wasn't with Sammy for his twelfth birthday earlier in the week. It had been a day of agony for him, the separation all too painfully and keenly felt. He had actually allowed himself to shed a few tears into his pillow that night, long after he thought that all his tears had dried up from the hurt of being separated from his family, possibly forever.

He forces himself to push aside a momentary harsh thought that Dad kept them apart on purpose as some kind of penalty to be used in impressing the lesson further onto his firstborn. Hoping against hope that their father wouldn't intentionally punish Sam like that for Dean's mistakes.

For his own peace of mind, Dean is going to choose to believe that Dad couldn't come for him any sooner than tonight.

When Dad eventually stops for gas, Dean jumps out of the car and dashes into the convenience store, crossing his fingers that they have what he wants. Thankfully, he's not disappointed, and he spends a few of the dollars he has in his wallet, not on after-dance burgers and shakes for himself and Robin, which is what he had planned for his cash, but rather on a little snack cake and a pack of birthday candles.

Sam has been watching him through the car window, a little panicked and unwilling to let his brother completely out of his sight so that they don't get lost from each other again. He only relaxes when Dean comes loping back towards the car, a plastic bag in his hand and a shit eating grin on his face. Dean slides back into the rear seat and Sam's face splits into a huge smile when he sees what his brother has brought with him.

It only takes a few seconds for Dean to unwrap the little Swiss Roll and stick a candle in the center, lighting it with the Zippo from his pocket.

"Make a wish, Sammy," Dean instructs him, his green eyes flooded with warmth and affection.

Sam shakes his head and takes the candle back out, extinguishing it by waving it in the air and then discarding it out the window.

"It already came true," he says, leaning against his big brother's chest as he splits the cake between the two of them. "You and me against the world, Dean."

Dean is too choked up to answer, but he wraps his arms around his little brother and nods his head, knowing that Sam can feel it, and neither of them speak as the sweet taste of chocolate in their mouths washes away all the fear and bitter feelings that they have swallowed down for the past two months.

He's also pretty sure that Dad's eyes are a little watery when he gets back into the car and watches his sons through the mirror.

/

They're eighteen and fourteen.

They are far away from Fairfax, Indiana and Truman High by the time Dad has them settled in their new temporary home. Sam has locked himself in the bathroom, unwilling to either see or speak to his obtuse, control freak father or to his stupid, idiotic martyr of a brother.

Sam's emotions are already riding on the hormonal teen angst roller coaster as it is at his age. Right now he is more than upset about being dragged away from Truman, just when he was finally starting to fit in. He's also still deeply worried about how his good friend Barry is going to make it there on his own, without Sam there to defend him from the asshole jocks that made the poor kid's life hell.

Sure, Sam had taken care of Dirk the Jerk, but there was still an entire school filled with merciless and heartless bullies who had nothing better to do than pick on the shier and weaker kids. Not for the first time Sam resents his father for their lifestyle of hauling the brothers around from place to place.

On top of that, Dean has just informed him that he wasn't planning on registering at the new local high school on Monday morning. He was simply done, he told his little brother. Tired of all the drama that came with the life of a student and tired of sitting on the sidelines while Dad went out and hunted on his own.

Something changed him at Truman. Dean was eighteen now and more than anxious to be out with their father full time instead of wasting his days sitting in a classroom when he had no desire to continue his education.

Sam is beyond angry and upset with both his father and his brother over this latest development for a number of reasons.

For one, every single day Dean becomes just a little more like their dad. Job obsessed and driven. Ready, willing and able to throw himself into the path of potential pain and destruction, without a thought to what it would do to the people that he left behind if something happened to him.

But it was actually worse with Dean.

Whereas Dad did the job as part of his quest to find their mother's killer, dedicated to, but not dictated by it, Dean enjoys the hunt. He loves the adrenaline rush and the euphoria of making the kill. Pleased from head to toe whenever he has the opportunity to gank some evil son of a bitch that would harm an innocent.

Secondly, and this was something Sam wasn't about to admit to, if Dean wasn't forced to go to school with him, that meant that his big brother was going to be gone just as much as Dad was, now that they would be hunting together.

Not that Sam needs to be watched over or anything, but he would be less than honest if he didn't at least acknowledge to himself that he doesn't want to be left behind all alone while his family was out doing who knows what, who knows where. It has always been bad enough when it was just Dad that was in the wind.

Sam isn't sure how he was going to be able to handle not knowing whether or not his brother was okay.

But the thing that really upsets him most of all was how easily Dad had agreed to Dean quitting school.

He hadn't even made a token protest when informed that his firstborn, so close to graduating, was just simply finished with academia. It wasn't as if Dean had ever expressed any interest in his schoolwork. Quite the opposite actually, and if Sam had been in a more charitable mood, he might have been willing to admit that, from his father's perspective, Dean's announcement was not wholly unexpected.

That didn't mean that Sam wasn't furious at his father for not even summoning up the barest of the commands that he was so quick to give on every other topic of their lives, to ensure that his oldest son at least had a high school diploma to fall back on when they were done hunting.

As Dad has continuously assured his sons that they would be one day, once Mom's murderer was found and justice had been delivered.

Of course, Sam isn't an idiot.

He has known forever that their family would never be free from the hunting life, no matter who they killed. Dad was a hunter until the end. You could see it in his eyes and the way he now viewed the world around him, and sadly, Dean was becoming the exact same way.

This was it for them. They were never getting out, and Sam absolutely refuses to follow down that same path because he wants more out of life than scars, nightmares and an early bloody death.

Sometimes, Sam wonders if he's the only one of the three of them that really sees just how whip smart his older brother is.

Dean is a damn genius, and there isn't anything he couldn't be if he chose to. To just throw away all of his natural intelligence for a life serving as second in command of the Winchester Army makes Sam sick to his stomach. Sam prides himself on his intellect, but he's at least honest enough to admit that his knowledge comes from endless hours of study and concentration.

When he actually bothered to do them, Dean had never needed to work as hard on his studies as Sam does. The older brother could pick up anything with enviable ease, and once he heard something or read something, it stayed with him always. The fact that he was settling for a hard and dangerous life when he could have the world at his feet makes Sam both devastated and nauseous.

Not only that, but he was pissed.

Well and truly pissed off, because Dean had God given talent and brains and he should be using them for something other than getting his head bashed in every time they went against an angry spirit. Dean should be out there inventing something that would save the world.

Curing cancer or building a better fucking mousetrap.

Anything other than wasting his life as cannon fodder for an unwinnable war that he was dragged into as a traumatized four year old.

Until he can see that for himself, Sam is content to sit on the edge of their new bathtub of the week and refuse to talk to anyone. More than happy to ignore the jerks he's related to until they pull their heads out of their asses long enough to come to their senses.

Dean lets him sit there and stew for almost an hour before Dad announces that he was going out to pick up dinner for them all.

John's already tired from the hunt he had just completed and the drive between picking up his boys and getting them settled down in the new town. All he had wanted was to have a quiet meal with his kids and enjoy their company, but once again Sam had to get a wild hair up his ass about something and the weary father just doesn't have the energy to take on the verbal battle with his youngest right now.

Once the Impala's engine fades in the distance, Dean takes a deep fortifying breath and barges directly into the bathroom without knocking. Startling and annoying his little brother who yelps and growls at the intrusion. Dean doesn't care if the kid is put off by his entrance. The little brat has been given enough time to pout already.

"Sammy, whatever is eating you, let it go. I'm not changing my mind."

Sam scowls and turns his back towards his brother. His arms crossed and shaking his head, not in the mood to talk for a change.

"Just get out and leave me alone, then," he snarls, drawing in a shuddering breath. In a quieter voice, one that sounds suspiciously close to him as a younger child, he finishes "You know you're gonna anyway."

Some of the irritation bleeds out of Dean hearing that. Sam might be a remarkably mature fourteen year old most of the time, but he's still just a scared little boy occasionally when it comes to his family. Monsters and evil, Sam can handle. His brother's disappearances and his father's disappointment, he still has trouble facing.

"I'm not leaving you, Sammy," Dean assures him gently, crossing into the room to sit on the lowered toilet seat lid and placing a warm hand on his brother's still small back.

"Yeah, I'll be hunting with Dad more," he continues, "but not all the time. I'm gonna work it out so I get a job whenever I can and stay behind with you as much as possible until you're done with school.

Sam doesn't say anything to indicate that he's a little relieved by hearing these words from his brother. He's not one to allow himself to show weakness to either Dad or Dean when he can help it. They already treat him like this tiny fragile creature that needs constant protection.

Still, it's nice to know that Dean is planning on sticking around even if he won't be going to school.

"It'll be better. You'll see," Dean promises. "Can't tell me you wouldn't be excited to see some more money coming in. We'll finally be able to do some of the things you've been dying to try. It'll be great, kiddo."

Sam finally turns around enough to see the plea for understanding in his brother's eyes. For whatever reason, Dean has made his decision, and nothing Sam either says or does is going to change that.

For a kid that is heavily contemplating Mr. Wyatt's words about the choices everyone should make in life for themselves, he grudgingly admits that he hasn't extended the same courtesy to his brother.

"Yeah, okay, Dean," he says, his voice heavy with resignation.

Happier, Dean grins as he ruffles Sam's hair, making his little brother pull back with an annoyed frown that only lasts for the obligatory second before he gives a small smile of his own.

"It's like I always say, Sammy," Dean says, hooking an arm around him. "It's you and me against the world."

"Sure," Sam answers, forcing a smile, even though maybe he feels it a little less right now than he ever has before.

/

They're nineteen and fifteen.

Normally Sam would be happy about spending some time in Lincoln, since that is where Caleb lived when he wasn't on the road, and both of the Winchester brothers enjoyed the company of the young hunter that was practically a member of their family.

But this time, Caleb was out in Maine on a job of his own, and pretty deep in it from what Uncle Bobby had said, so when there was a rash of killings in the general area, John and the boys had been called in to see if they could help.

At least they had the advantage of staying in Caleb's house, instead of their usual motel of the week. Sam had spent a lot of time there over the years, and it wasn't quite a second home, but it was a better option than another no-tell motel. That didn't mean that he wasn't still pretty pissed off at his dad for refusing to enroll him in a local school for a bit.

Sam had been to the school near Caleb's house on a couple of occasions, but Dad was adamant that their stay would only last as long as the hunt did this time.

His father's pig headed refusal was especially grating to the young teen. Actually, everything seemed to grate on Sam's nerves lately. It might have had something to do with all of the high octane coffees that he was guzzling down steadily during the day, figuring that if they were just here on a milk run, might as well get it over as fast as possible.

That meant that Sam was constantly feeling twitchy and irritable. The pressure on him from his father and brother to make headway on the research, which was his part of this particular hunt, increasing with each incoming phone call. It was getting to the point where Sam was having a hard time keeping a civil tongue in his mouth, even knowing that any insubordination on his part would only result in his father coming down hard on him.

Uncle Bobby had express mailed some books he had on the possible identification of the monster that the family was hunting. It would have been a much bigger help to Sam if the salvage man had sent some that were actually in English, for pete's sake. Maybe Bobby could speak Japanese, but it didn't mean that everyone else could in the hunter world.

Sam was still struggling to get a handle on Latin, and the last thing he wanted was to take on another impossible language.

Between Dad's decreasing patience and preponderance of orders, a rising body count without an end in sight, triple red eye shots of caffeinated adrenaline riding shotgun in his veins, five days running with too little sleep and lore books that were bourbon stained and written in gibberish, Sam was simply done with the world.

And it really didn't help that his brother was being a dick.

Ever since Dean started hunting full time with Dad, Sam's big brother has become more and more like their father as far as the family business was concerned. Where Dean used to have a better understanding of the stress that the demands on Sam's time took on him, the older Winchester brother was now less and less patient of the younger one's complaints and struggles.

Dean never came right out and said it, but Sam could tell that his older brother was acquiring the same irritation over their youngest family member continuously failing to pull his own weight on the jobs. It wasn't Sam's fault that, the older he got, the harder he needed to work to keep his grades perfect.

That was something that happened as you progressed through high school.

Just because Dean had never worried about class rankings and report cards, ultimately choosing to just bail on education altogether, didn't mean that Sam was about to follow in his footsteps.

So when Dean repeatedly calls for updates on the progress of Sam's work, he can't help it if he's a little short tempered and irritable with his brother. He tries to tamp it down, really he does, because the second time he snaps back an answer, Dean's voice, warm and concerned over the phone, asks if he's okay, and if he needs his big brother to come back and help.

Sam, a little shamefully now, waves him off, annoyed with himself that he's unnecessarily worrying his sibling, but the frustration and desire to do something other than track down obscure pieces of Japanese folk lore has the young boy at his wit's end.

Little did he know how interesting his life is about to get.

She's so beautiful, the first time Sam saw her. Graceful and willowly, her strawberry blond hair pulled off to the side, giving him full view of her pearlescent skin and slender neck. He catches a flash of her as she strides by where he's stationed at the coffee cart, but it's not until he's inside sitting at a table that he gets a better look while she peruses the magazine shelves.

He also blushes to the tips of his ears when she senses his stare and turns to give him one of her own, and Sam is instantly smitten by the strangely pretty girl.

A last minute plea to his big brother, the one that has guided him through all awkward parts of his life, gives him some less than helpful advice on approaching her, because Sam is an awkward nerd that has zero confidence around a girl and he's pretty sure that she can smell his loser-ness that permeates the air around them.

Sam isn't so blind that he doesn't see that he's not the smooth talker around the fairer sex that his brother is. All he has managed to do is trip and stumble over his own tongue as he less than skillfully initiates conversation.

In retrospect, he shouldn't have been surprised when he's initially rebuffed, because his pick up line isn't exactly the stuff of legends. But still, he does eventually manage to utilize his unsuspected martial arts skills to defend her honor outside the library. Something else that Dean has instructed him in.

So, in the end, score one point for the tutelage of his big brother after all.

At her invitation, he followed her home for a little first aid and hopefully something more, still astounded with his good fortune that this beautiful creature seems interested in him.

Of course, he should have known that his luck wouldn't be good enough to ensure that Amy wasn't actually a literal creature, which she most certainly turns out to be.

Only Sam Winchester would be unlucky enough to actually fall for the thing that he has spent days researching and that his father and brother are hunting. How do you explain to anyone, especially your gung-ho hunter family that your first kiss is with a Kitsune?

But Sam finds a real kinship with Amy.

They are both kids raised on the road, with a single parent that can be less than gentle at times. Uprooted from place to place.

Always the freak that Sam feels all too often, even without the supernatural reminder. How many times, under the cover of darkness while he sleeps next to his brother, does Sam get the chilling sensation that not everything is quite right with him?

And now Amy has killed her own mother to save him, so when push shoves, he can't find the wherewithal to end her life, or even tell his father or brother about her. She's still an innocent too, regardless of what Dad says about hunting being black and white.

Sam sometimes worries, without any real reason to think so, that he also has had the misfortune to be born something terrible that he has no say in. And having never hurt an innocent and, what's more, never feeling the desire to do so, he would have wanted the benefit of the doubt too.

Amy is packed and long gone while Sam sits in the now deserted cabin and desperately tries to come up with the best possible next move.

The body needs to be taken care of, and Sam is still green as a hunter, and after watching a kill be made to ensure his safety, maybe a little green around the gills as well. He knows without needing to be told that Dad is going to have to be given a believable reason to stop the hunt, now that the threat is gone, and it's not as if he's just gonna take Sam's word for it.

John Winchester would freak right the fuck out if he knew what his youngest had been up to this evening, and Sam's pretty sure that he won't be able to stand the level of disappointment that's coming his way once his father is privy to the multitudes of failures on Sam's part right now.

Knowing that there was only one thing he can do, he pulls out his phone and calls his brother.

They have a code between them when they don't want others to know what they're talking about. Dean's still riding around in the car with Dad, and Sam uses it because he can't risk his father catching wind of what was actually happening.

No one wants that level of heat.

Without skipping a beat, Dean goes into action immediately. Somehow convincing their dad that Sam needs help to finish with the research and he talks Dad into being dropped back at the motel while Dean meets Sam at the library.

After coming up with a reasonable plan, together they burn the body, fortunately without being noticed, and Dean's smooth tongue makes things square with Dad when they call to check in, spinning the biggest of tall tales about how the boys had seen the target and just gone for it. No time to swing back for their father when lives were at stake. Throwing Dad's words back at him without shame because at this moment it serves their purpose.

Dad does not like it, at all, and there's going to be some hell to pay for both of them afterwards for bucking the chain of command, but for all intents and purposes, they get away with what had really taken place.

Dean swears them both to secrecy once he presses upon his brother the importance of never ever ever doing shit like that alone again.

"It's you and me against the world, Sammy," he growls, as his finishes shoveling dirt over the burned body of Amy's dead Kitsune mother. "Don't you ever forget that."

And Sam promises that he won't.

/

They're twenty-one and seventeen.

Sam is in complete and utter shock as Dean drags him through each room of the little house. On some level, the younger brother is still slightly suspicious of the fact that maybe they shouldn't be in here in the first place.

But Dean actually has the keys, so it's not like they broke in, and eventually he decides that it's just because the idea of settling down for an entire year is hard to accept since it really is a dream come true for him.

It's not anything special, as far as houses go. Two small floors with a slightly scary looking unfinished basement. A real vanilla box with no personality to speak of. It could use some paint since Sam can see several places on the walls where the previous occupants used to have things hanging.

To Sam, it's the most beautiful place he's ever been in.

Dean is still talking a mile a minute as they take the tour, and when he triumphantly offers Sam the larger upstairs bedroom all for himself, the younger brother's heart swells with such love that he thinks he might just burst on the spot.

Sam isn't quite ready to be fully excited about it all just yet. He's not so selfish that he doesn't realize just how much of a lifestyle change this is going to be for his brother. Dean's not one for getting attached to a place, and Sam wonders how he's going to deal with not being able to pack up the car and move on if life here goes south.

It's not just the house either.

As Dean talks on and on, Sam comes to the realization that not only will he be attending the same school for the entirety of his senior year, an idea that he has only allowed himself to ponder in his dizziest of daydreams, but that the school itself is highly accredited and will go a long way into helping Sam get his pick of colleges next year.

It's almost too much and, for a moment, Sam pinches himself to make sure that he's not actually dreaming.

Only this morning he was debating the merits on actually finding a way to leave his family behind, never thinking in a million years that either his father or brother would even conceive of a life where Sam can have a little normal. Now that this option has been presented to him, he finds himself feeling more than a little ashamed of how he has underestimated their love for him and how easily he was planning on letting them go.

For the first time, he thinks that maybe he's never really gotten just how much of a two way street family life really is. Still young, and by definition a little selfish and immature, he knows that he has fought and struggled for his family to understand him a little more, but now he wonders just how much effort he has actually put into understanding them.

It's not that he hasn't always known just how willing his brother has been to do whatever he could to make Sam's life a little easier, but Dean's determination to step away from hunting full time just so Sam can have a little stability is absolutely mind blowing.

Maybe it has something to do with how scarily weird their father was last night. In the back of his mind is the troubling thought that Dad has agreed to this because of whatever happened to him on that hunt he refuses to talk about, and since not much scares the mighty John Winchester, it almost takes some of the joy away from exploring their new residence.

In the end, Sam decides to focus only on the positive. A year where he can be just a normal kid and not the perpetual new freak that skips from school to school, never being allowed to put down roots. The possibilities are endless when he thinks about all the clubs he can now join without worrying about getting committed to something, only to have to let others down when he has to inevitably leave as usual.

Once Sam has been given the entire tour, he and Dean stand in their new kitchen, and the look on his older brother's face is that of the young child, wide eyed with excitement, that Dean was scarcely given the chance to be. He hands a second set of keys to Sam, already adorned with a key chain that matches his own and sporting a customized engraving on it.

Just a simple silver cylinder that says You & Me Against The World.

Sam swallows hard when he sees it. Knows just how much Dean has worked and planned to make this possible for him, and this time, chick flick be damned, he's going to make sure that his brother knows how much he agrees with the little sentiment on the key ring he will hold onto forever. He throws his arms around his brother's neck and hugs him tight, willing all of his affection into his embrace.

"Always."

/

Whoosh...Thump Thump

Whoosh...Thump Thump

Whoosh...Thump Thump

After ten days of vigil by his brother's bedside, the noise of the ventilator has become ingrained in Sam's mind for eternity. A steady push and double thud reminding him every few seconds of Dean's continuing need for a machine to keep him breathing.

It's hard to try and concentrate on his thoughts when he's already emotionally wrecked, and the ventilator and the heart monitor are constantly competing for attention in contrasting rhythms. It's even harder for Sam to sit by and be forcibly reminded every day that his pure energy, larger than life brother, the guy that kicks in doors, kills monsters and goes through life with guns blazing, isn't even capable right now of the simple task of taking in air without assistance.

Of course there are other noises that made up the steady buzz of the hospital atmosphere.

The constant ringing of the phones at the nurses station. A never ending stream of announcements made over the PA system that alert the staff for each new emergency. Shoes clattering down the hallways, doors and drawers constantly being slammed shut.

The undercurrent of a hundred conversations being held that give you the impression that the people speaking are trying to keep their voices down, but they never really succeed.

In the Intensive Care Unit, where Sam's brother lay unconscious, the soft undertone of discussions were usually of the unhappy variety, and the sounds of tears and anguish were becoming all too common and unnerving.

Dean's doctors are trying to be reassuring about his condition. All things considered, Sam's big brother has vastly exceeded their expectations so far, and they are guardedly optimistic that he is on the verge of regaining consciousness at any time.

When phrases like Traumatic Brain Injury and Cerebral Edema are bandied about, loved ones tend to grasp for any positive they can as they sit bedside of a coma patient.

A veritable horde of various medical professionals stream in and out of Dean's tiny ICU room at regular intervals during the day and night. Sam's not sure how anyone can get enough rest to recuperate from their injuries with the endless prodding and poking and testing that is done so frequently.

He's not even the patient and the constant interruptions have him worn out and bedraggled.

At least they aren't worried about being kicked out at any moment, like they usually are when hospitals and fake insurance cards come into play. Pastor Jim has an emergency network set up for catastrophic injuries to the hunting community, and the paperwork that Dad filled out when they arrived, and the card he presented, are legit.

Dean will get all the treatment he needs and more for once. It's cold comfort when the reason is lying stock still and pale against the sterilized background of the ICU.

As each hour passes, it becomes more and more difficult for Sam to watch over his comatose brother. Dean's face is pasty white beneath the snaking tubes of the ventilator in his mouth. Even compared with the stark white bed linens, his pallor is obvious, his freckles standing out more than ever.

With his face calm and placid, his eyes closed with just the tiniest tinge of pink on his eyelids, Dean looks achingly young.

Hardly the tough hunter and protector that has watched over Sam and taken care of him all their lives.

Sam thinks, with real pain in his chest, that although Dean can act childish on occasion as part of his personality facade, he's always been this huge, strong presence that could make his little brother feel safe, no matter what their physical ages were.

Dean is not this small, sickly wan kid that is lying still and helpless in a hospital bed, and it's incredibly difficult for Sam to wrap his head around reality right now.

With every muscle and joint in his body stiff and protesting, Sam cracks his neck and stretches, trying to get some feeling back in his limbs. His entire back is knotted and tense from sitting hunched over at Dean's side for so many hours a day.

It's gotten a little better lately, once the doctors began to speak about his brother's condition with some semblance of optimism instead of fatalism.

Thankfully it is now generally agreed upon and accepted that Dean will regain consciousness on his own, sooner rather than later, and that all the tests are showing very little chance of any permanent brain injury.

In light of that development, Sam has actually been able to get a few hours sleep a day in the motel room across the street from the hospital that Dad rented for them. For the first few days, Sam had refused to leave his brother, no matter how much his father and the medical staff were forcing him. He was determined that Dean would neither wake up, nor worse die, without Sam by his side.

This was all his fault, after all.

Overcome with an exhaustion so extreme that Sam was on the verge of collapse himself, the mechanical respiration rang in his ears like a harsh accusatory reminder of his full culpability in his brother's physical state.

You...Did This

You...Did This

You...Did This

And he did.

It was true.

A simple matter of fact that Sam would not even think to try and deny, and a regret he will hold in his heart for eternity.

Because hindsight is twenty-twenty, he now fully realizes and admits that it had been a mistake of colossal proportions to get into Dad's truck with him for the six hour ride to the hunt in North Platte, Nebraska.

Common sense told Sam that he should just ride with Dean in the Impala, like always. That being in close quarters with his father after all that had gone wrong between them lately was just begging for trouble that none of them needed.

Dad wasn't even insisting on it, like he usually would when he was concerned about making sure that his youngest had all the orders and instructions that he felt were needed to carry out the job as swiftly and safely as possible. All John had done was suggest that he and Sam spend some time together, since it had been quite a while since they last hunted with one another.

Maybe it was because Sam was feeling determined that, if he was going to hunt, he was going to tackle it head on, like he usually did with everything else. That being on the job meant that he was accepting the chain of command, with his father's instructions followed and obeyed to the letter.

Like Dean had no problem doing.

Sam hadn't made his choice to stick with his family lightly, when it came at the cost of the dreams he had for himself for so many years. But he was nothing if not dedicated when he decided on a course of action, and once he had committed himself to The Life, he was going to be damned sure that he made a success out of it.

Not only for his brother's sake, but for his own.

Sam didn't like to do anything halfway. So he was going to make sure that he was in it to win it.

Unfortunately, Sam and John both have thick and stubborn blinders on when it comes to their ability to stow their crap. They hadn't even been on the road for thirty minutes before conversations on the hunt turned to sniping.

Then, like Dean was already suspecting in the car behind them, the sniping turned to heated words.

Then heated words into condemnations.

Condemnations to accusations.

And so on, and so forth.

Hurt feelings and disappointments were dredged up and enthusiastically flung about like paints on the canvas of modern art. Ranging in topics from the head butting of recent weeks all the way back to the early years of Sam's childhood.

With Dad's fingers gripping the wheel of the Sierra more and more tightly as he fought to keep control of his temper, and eventually losing the fight badly enough to throw out a few zingers of his own that knocked his kid back on his heels.

Any chance at professional conversation spiraled downward faster than either one of them could ever hope to recover from it. Verbal slings and arrows being throw back and forth across the cab of the truck with Winchester ingrained speed and accuracy.

No prisoners being taken and absolutely no quarter given.

If the job had been further away, or if the trip was expected to take longer than what the Winchesters considered a simple milk run, John might have pulled over and let his youngest out of the truck so that tempers could cool down and reasonable behavior could prevail.

Unfortunately for them, a six hour drive was just a drop in the bucket for a road trip, and the lives hanging in the balance always trumped a need for personal time and space for a hunter.

As they approached North Platte, all hope of a calm and professional performance had gone totally out the window.

To be fair, Sam realized that it was all on him.

Dad, once they were at the site, was all business. Never one to let his personal emotions get in the way of his responsibilities once he was actually on the job, John Winchester switched gears easily from annoyed and aggravated parent into hunter extraordinaire.

For Sam, still young, impetuous and harboring a bruised psyche from all of the latest tussles, it wasn't quite as easy to let go of the recent conflicts.

Dean had recognized, right away, that his father and brother had gone tripping merrily down the warpath, just from the twin looks of hostility and frustration on their faces. Knowing that Dad would get over himself once the job was started, without any need for interference from his firstborn, Dean had concentrated his efforts into talking Sam down off the emotional ledge, but to no avail.

Sam was firmly entrenched in his foxhole of self righteousness, and anyone getting in his path was in danger of having their head figuratively blown off, instantly becoming a war casualty.

If Sam had just kept his mind on his job, and not his lingering resentment over his father putting a hunt over being at Sam's graduation.

Or Dad's steadfast refusal to share the details of that hunt with either son, especially when it was crystal clear to all of them that something profound had happened.

Or even just acknowledged that both brothers had been sick with fear over seeing their father worked over so badly that it had been almost a week before he could get out of bed without assistance.

Then maybe, when he was supposed to, Sam would have been paying more attention to his surroundings on a hunt, and his brother wouldn't have needed to come to his rescue, and been hurt so critically in the process.

Not that any of the bad blood between Sam and Dad really mattered anymore.

Not with Dean lying comatose in the Intensive Care Unit. Head injury, fractured collarbone and a leg broken in two places. Hooked up to machines, with tubes crisscrossing all over his young body like some sort of life support superhighway.

Sam shifted again, twisting his lanky body into a position that was slightly less pretzel shaped than it had been for the few minutes he had allowed his eyes to close. Lifting his arms above his head, he took a tentative sniff of his shirt and his nose wrinkled in disgust.

It's not that Sam was unclean, having just had a shower that morning and donned clothes that Dad had seemingly laundered for him at some point.

It was the fact that he couldn't seem to divest himself of that odor clinging to him that was distinctively hospital. An unpleasant mixture of disinfectant chemicals, sanitizers, stale bleached linens, sweat and sickness.

Although he did appreciate the small blessing of having fresh clothing to change into now.

Since their arrival, their father had been equally splitting his time between the hospital room of his critically injured son, and somewhere else that he didn't bother to share with his youngest.

At first, Sam had been furious that his dad could be anywhere other than right at Dean's bedside, and when John had left initially, all his youngest son wanted to do was hunt the man down and drag him back to Dean, kicking and screaming if he had to.

But then he realized, after spotting the Sierra parked in the lot just beneath the windows of the ICU and never moving as time passed, that his father never actually left the hospital at all. Sam could only guess at first what he was doing with the rest of his time.

As the days went on, it became a little clearer.

Dad seemed to always be one step ahead of Sam in the information department when it came to Dean's condition, so the boy could only imagine that his tenacious pit bull of a father was spending his time haranguing the medical staff for updates. Dad was also regularly bringing Sam food and drinks that he usually rejected until he was ordered to consume them.

He also fought to have Sam allowed to remain after visiting hours were over. Not that Sam was going anywhere, regardless of what anyone said, but he had been more than grateful when Dad's powers of persuasion and intimidation had made it possible for him to remain by his brother's side without more of a fuss.

His father had also been insistent that his younger son sleep occasionally, and he was the one to badger the staff into getting Sam blankets and a pillow for the recliner next to Dean's bed that Sam had lived in for the first week. Dad stayed with them as well, but had insisted that he was fine with the less than comfortable hard chair that probably did nothing good for his back.

Now that Dean was relatively on the road to recovery, Sam had been persuaded to spend a few hours a day sleeping at the motel, where he found his duffel refilled with clean clothes and extra toiletry supplies. While he was away, he knew that their father had taken his place in the recliner. Neither of them willing to allow Dean to be alone even for a second.

Still, with all that had been done to get Sam away from the pungent atmosphere of the hospital, he still seemed to smell.

It stuck to him heavily. In his hair and his clothes. Seeping out of every pore until he was sure that he would never get rid of it again. With a pang of sadness, he yearned for their little house.

The fresh scent of orange that he and Dean used to clean the floors and counters. Almost floral clean linen scent of their laundry, not tainted by illness. The lingering aroma of vanilla and almond in his bedroom.

Something good cooking on the stove in the kitchen, while his big brother warbled out off key strains of mullet rock, screaming into an invisible microphone just to make Sam laugh.

Sam's gut clenched as a painful little whimper escaped his mouth without his consent at the memory.

Rubbing a hand down his face, he swallowed hard and then leaned over to take Dean's clammy right hand between both of his own. Gripping it tightly as he pressed it against his own forehead.

"Come on, man. Please just wake up already. Please."

Dad came back into the room just then. Posture still rigid in Marine stance, with his impossibly broad shoulders stretching the fabric of his shirt. His dark ringed eyes swept across Dean's motionless body first, visually assessing his firstborn's unchanged condition before doing a numbers inventory check of the vitals machines.

Only when he had assured himself that nothing was further amiss or declining did he turn his gaze on Sam, letting out the now regular deep sigh of what could only be a mixture of frustration and anger.

Sam was used to it by this point, it being his father's go-to reaction on first seeing his younger son every time he walked back into the room, so he simply turned his head away before the two of them got into it at the bedside of his unconscious brother.

Sam got it. He did.

Dad was laying this entire fiasco firmly at Sam's feet, and he was right to do so, to a certain extent.

Sam hadn't done his job like he should have.

Like he had been trained to for years, and the result was the very near loss of life of his big brother. Sam's lack of preparedness and attention to his surroundings and his environment had resulted in the very catastrophic outcome that their father had always feared.

Of course, he argued with himself, if Dad didn't force his sons to do these jobs in the first place, Dean wouldn't have been injured either.

Right now they would be back at home in Sioux Falls, perfectly safe and sound. Dean at the salvage yard, probably working on his next incredible rebuild, and Sam getting a head start on preparing for his first semester of classes.

Sam was willing to shoulder his share of the blame, and then some more besides, because it was his lack of attention to the job he had undertaken that was responsible for his brother putting himself in harm's way.

When, and it was when, not if, Dean woke up, no amount of absolution on his brother's part was going to make Sam feel any less than a complete failure as a hunter or brother when it came to his conduct during this gig.

Dad was right to be pissed at him as well.

How many times over the years had he impressed upon both of his sons that it was their job to watch each other's back? How many times were they told that they worked as a team? That each of them had a job to do, and they could only effectively do their own job if the other one did theirs?

Sam already knew that when his father wasn't entirely engulfed in worry over his firstborn's physical condition, he was itching to take his belt to his youngest, and Sam wasn't planning on fighting him when the time for that inevitably came either. More than feeling deserving of any punishment his father wanted to hand out.

Maybe, Sam thought with dark humor and more than a little dry sarcasm, he should push Dad into doing it, right here, right now, in the hospital room.

Knowing Dean, his big brother would probably rally and wake up, just to be able to try and talk Dad out of it.

If only it was that easy.

But, as usual, Dad didn't say anything to Sam. He simply pushed a bag with some lunch near Sam's clenched hands, the steady stern look in his eyes leaving no doubt that his son was expected to eat what was brought him. He also put a styrofoam drink container on the adjustable table next to the bed that gave off the pungent smell of the caustic hospital coffee that he and Sam had been living on.

"Thanks," Sam said quietly, looking up just long enough to see Dad's acknowledging nod.

John then sat down in his usual chair, leaning back a little as he crossed his arms over his chest and turned his attention to his deathly still son in the bed. Observing him a little more closely, it wasn't hard for Sam to realize that his father looked more tired and old than his youngest could ever recall seeming him. Even when John had been critically injured himself.

It was unnerving.

Sam wasn't expecting any conversation with his father. Except for the initial fight, John had barely spared him a dozen words in the almost dozen days they had been together. He simply spent his time in the room watching Dean with an unrecognizable look on his face. The younger son tamped down his hurt over essentially being ignored by his dad.

He knew what he was in John's eyes.

The disappointment.

The rebel.

The weakest link in their family chain.

The Achilles heel of Dean, the real hunter and golden boy of the Winchester clan.

All the more reason why Sam had made the phone call to Mr. Hopkins. Come September, the lesser son would be far away in California, where he could no longer be a drain on the family. Without him around, Dad and Dean could hunt to their hearts' content without having to repeatedly yank Sam's lame ass out of the fire.

He had just about convinced himself that it was true.

Whoosh...thump thump

Whoosh...thump thump

Whoosh...thump thump

Almost half an hour passed after Dad's arrival, with the two of them both mired in their own thoughts. Only after John noticed that Sam hadn't touched his food did he clear his throat and throw his youngest another pointed look.

Sam blinked quickly and looked down at the bag, not really feeling hungry, but knowing that he needed to keep his strength up if he was going to be of any use to his brother in the days to come. He nodded his assent at his father and opened the bag, pulling out a now cold grilled chicken sandwich, an apple and a banana.

Under his father's watchful glare, he managed to choke down most of the sandwich, ignoring the fact that it too seems to smell and almost taste like the pervasive hospital odor. The cafeteria seemed to be just as heavily imbued with the scent as everything else around him. But he needed the protein, so he endured it, finishing his meal off with the banana that was infinitely more appealing to what little appetite he had and saving the apple for later.

His coffee was almost cold as well by now, but he drank half of it anyway, because the caffeine was the only thing keeping him awake during the long hours parked by his brother's side. Tasting the burnt grounds on his tongue, slightly milky and sweetened, he wondered again, how his father seemed to know how he took his coffee.

He was pretty sure he had never told Dad, himself.

The rest of the day passes by slowly. Marked only with short bursts of interruptions of either Sam or John getting up to use the restroom. Or the frequent visits of medical staff doing what they needed to do to keep Dean clean and medicated. The doctors were even more guardedly optimistic today, and for the first time, the two conscious Winchesters allowed themselves to feel real hope.

Dad leaves again after a five hour vigil, not sparing his younger son a word regarding his plans or destination as was now the custom. He simply gets up, smooths a hand across Dean's head as he leans over to press a quick kiss to his son's forehead, shoots Sam one quick glance and then he's gone again.

Alone once more with his comatose brother, Sam feels his chest both tighten with hurt as well as loosen up from the dissolving tension. It's an odd feeling. One he can't quite explain or describe.

All he knows is that he feels more lonely than he ever has in his entire life. He also knows that it's a feeling he was going to have to get used to.

/

John's never been a man of religion.

An ironic problem considering how he spends the majority of his time. A job that requires him to believe in things that he has been told all his life are just old wives tales and made up stories to scare children into behaving.

A lifelong pursuit that demands that he have actual faith in the folk lore legends that instruct him on how to take down the things that go bump in the night. Where he relies on his credence in rituals and spells to aid him and protect him while on the hunt.

As a young boy in Normal, he has vague memories of going to church with his parents.

Henry dressed in a sharp, well tailored suit with a jaunty fedora that he would respectfully remove for services, even sometimes dropping it on John's own head as he was led out of the church, his small hand held tightly in Henry's larger one.

Millie wearing one of her flattering wide skirted silk dresses, belted around her fashionably tiny waist. Pristine white gloves holding her clutch that perfectly matched her precariously high stiletto pumps.

The picture perfect happy family.

Later, in Lawrence, John also went to church with his mother and grandparents for a while. Millie still beautiful and stylish, but so much more sad and withdrawn. Eventually she had grown tired of the gossipy whispers and rude stares of the other attendees exchanging scandalous conjectures about her marital status, until she and John stopped going altogether.

When she remarried, she had wanted none of the church, choosing the inn in town to hold the humble service instead.

John's stepfather was not much of a church goer either, and in the end the new little family eschewed organized religion entirely, with John's Marine dog tags very clearly labeling him as Non-Religious as a young man.

Mary also hadn't been one for religion, which surprises John now that he knows more about her life before him and the past of her family. Not that many hunters are fervent church goers, but there is a certain level of faith required to make your way in The Life.

As the little Winchester family in Lawrence, they had never bothered to take the boys to any sort of service. They hadn't even spoken of it, really. It just became one of those things that wasn't a part of their lives in any way, and since neither of them felt strongly on the matter, it just didn't come up in conversation.

Until one winter when Dean was three years old.

Somehow, the little boy had developed a bad chest infection which rapidly became a life endangering bout of pneumonia. John had known crippling fear before, as a civilian and especially as a Marine in the jungles of Vietnam, but nothing had prepared him for the abject terror of watching his child grow weaker and sicker.

Gasping and wheezing and fighting for every last breath.

While Mary had summoned the stamina to maintain a full time vigil at her baby's bedside, John had been crushed under the heavy depression of helplessness that engulfed him. Deranged and desperate in his inability to do anything to make his son better.

There was nothing worse than being a warrior with no way to win a battle, despite your willingness and desire to do anything and everything.

He supported Mary as much as he could. Fussing over her and running for tea and food when she allowed it, while she held her little boy's hand through the plastic isolation glove. But sometimes, the strength John needed to sustain him faltered, and it was then that he fled to the hospital chapel and began his relationship with any higher being that would listen to his pleas.

He would escape to the quiet confines of the small dimly lit room. It was non-denominational, so there were really no overt symbols of religion staring him in the face. Just some relatively comfortable long benches and warm wood everywhere. It could have been a meeting room for all that it lacked in stained glass and crosses.

It didn't matter to John.

All he had really needed was an out of the way place to gather his thoughts. To allow his inner mind the chance to say the things that he didn't permit to pass through his lips. Afraid that to actually speak of his all encompassing fears would be to give them birth and an opening to claim his child away from him.

In the small chapel, he unburdened himself, the weight of his terrors sliding off of him like water sluicing down his skin and, oddly enough, found that it helped him refocus, so that he was able to go back into Dean's room and be stronger for his wife and child when they really needed him.

He had even gone so far as to suggest to Mary once that she also take some time to compose herself and recharge, but he had been violently rebuffed.

John wasn't an idiot, so he let that particular sleeping dog lie after that.

He wasn't so egotistical to think that his pleas and mutterings had any direct influence on his boy's eventual recovery. After all, when you don't really give the concept of a deity any thought in your day to day life, it does tend to make one seem terribly hypocritical if you cling to prayer as the last act of a desperate man.

Which he certainly had been.

The day that Dean was declared well enough to go home, John had joyfully carried his son into the house, and if he was silently thanking anyone who might have been listening, he never again mentioned it.

Now here he was again.

Different hospital. Different chapel.

But the same reason.

A desperately ill son, whose recovery was a long way from being guaranteed, and the last act of a desperate father who had failed, once again, to keep his child safe from the things that could and would harm him.

This time, the chapel was a little different. A little more on the traditional side. Replete with a large crucifix over the alter, a stone statue of the Virgin Mary off to the side, and kneelers attached to the still comfortable long benches.

But that was okay, because John was different too.

No longer inclined to dismiss spirituality directly out of hand after all he had seen and done.

This time he got on his knees and prayed. Fully and completely. With no shame and no reservation as to his intentions. As a man who used holy water and rosaries on a daily basis, he had had his pick of them to choose from. Wrapping a particularly pretty onyx bead set around his trembling fingers as he sent up a plea for Dean's recovery.

Optimistically hopeful that someone was on duty answering the phone in the attic, because John's next call would be to the basement, and he had already made his peace with that decision.

No matter what, his children came first. Even if the price of their lives came at the cost of John's own. He didn't even flinch when coming to that conclusion, and fortunately for himself, he had the advantage of knowing how to go about it, unlike parents who were forced to endure the loss of a child.

John wasn't so blind as to think that this entire fiasco was not his fault.

As much as he wanted to be able to lay the blame at the feet of his youngest son for the boy's absolutely inexcusable lack of attention to his surroundings and disregard of the training he had been given for almost ten years, John knew that he needed to accept that it was because of his own continuing need to hunt that was the reason why his firstborn was fighting for his life.

During his more rational periods of thought, he embraced the reality of being the guilty party.

After all, regardless of what either one of his children had done on the job, as their father, and their leader, any failure fell directly onto his shoulders. That was the burden he accepted when he made the decision to allow his boys to hunt by his side, instead of keeping them safe in their home.

As John's thoughts became more fervent and increasingly intense, he found himself having to repeatedly banish the troubling, creeping suggestion that was forcing itself over and over again to find a fertile enough dark corner of his mind to plant roots. Like poisonous toadstools, spouting out toxic gases of suspicion and doubt, and leaving a black tar residue of distrust over his feelings about his little boy.

In the light of day, John knew with everything he had in him that his youngest son would never do anything intentional to harm his older brother. Sammy had practically worshiped the ground that Dean walked on since the day he was born. There had been more times than John was comfortable admitting that he himself had been jealous of the regard his baby boy had for his big brother.

More so than Sam had ever shown John in his eighteen years.

It's not that John didn't accept the fact that he wasn't exactly father of the year to his kids. That Sammy wasn't more attached to Dean than he was to his own dad simply because of how much John had chosen to be away from them and on the road hunting.

It had been a conscious choice, even knowing that he was harming his relationship with his boys in the process.

Maybe because Dean had always been so accepting and stalwart over John's absences. With Sammy growing colder and more resentful as the years went on, John had always had Dean's regard to fall back on when he felt himself unsure of a son's love.

Maybe it was because John had recognized early on that Sam was just more like John himself than Dean would ever be. Whereas John and Sam did what they felt they needed to, to suit whatever purpose lay in front of them, regardless of what the consequences might be, Dean allowed his heart and emotions for his family to dictate his actions.

John would never tell his firstborn how much he admired that about him.

That Dean's innate love and loyalty to Team Winchester was something so beautiful and pure in the nightmare of their family's history that it gave John real hope that somehow they might all survive this ordeal long enough to enact their revenge.

Dean was the very fabric of their existence. The glue that kept them together, when all else would force them apart.

Sam was always the rebellious one. From the time he could first speak he bucked against anything that his father and brother tried to make him do.

Sam could rebel because he had the luxury of never needing to worry about taking care of anyone else. Everyone had always taken care of him. He didn't really understand the concept of the worry that came along with being responsible for someone or something beyond his own desires.

But there was no longer any denying that there was also a very dark streak in Sammy.

One that ran so deep that it seemed anchored to his very core some days. In the past John had always dismissed it as a trait too similar to his own character flaws. Because he himself had led a less than honorable life during wartime, and still yet more during his years as a hunter when he might have straddled the line of good and evil on occasion to get the job done.

This past year of learning more than he ever wanted to know about his youngest child had forced John to take a good look at some hard truths. Ideas and concepts so troubling and so ridiculous that he hadn't wanted to give them any credence at all.

The father in him wanted to continue to believe that his little boy was simply just young and angry and dissatisfied with his life. Like many teenagers can be before they find their own footing as they grow up. Like John had been himself when he signed up and went off to war in the search for something with more meaning than a mundane existence as a small town mechanic.

But the hunter in him had been forced to face certain realities that shook him to his very roots.

There was a troubling real question about what the demon's influence over his son actually was already and, more disturbing, what it could eventually grow into.

John didn't want to believe that his son was in any danger of becoming something that he would be forced to hunt.

Couldn't believe.

He already knew, right down to his soul, that the day when he would raise a gun to his child could not be allowed to come.

It didn't matter what Sam did, or even what he could do in the future. John could and would be damned before bringing himself to take his son's life without first marching on Hell itself to keep that prospect from happening.

Unless it was to save the life of his other son.

A thought so perverse and terrifying that to even allow himself to contemplate it would be to go insane, because how does a loving father choose between his children?

Intellectually, he knew that Sam had not put Dean in danger in that house through any demonic or nefarious means. The boy was simply being careless, and Dean, faithful and loyal Dean, had done what he always did, and that was whatever it took to keep Sammy safe.

Even at the risk of his own life.

And there wasn't really anything John could say about it without sounding like the world's biggest hypocrite either, was there? After all, wasn't he the one that had told his firstborn, over and over and over again, to watch out for and protect his little brother?

What was he supposed to say now?

Oh, sorry kiddo. My bad. Don't worry about Sam anymore.

Yeah, like that could happen.

Or how about?

Hey, Dean? There's a chance that your brother is part demon. Keep an eye on that, okay?

At what point in that conversation would Dean take a swing at his old man, just on principle alone?

The day would come when John would be forced to tell Dean what he had learned about Sam and Mary and Azazel. A dark and dreary day when he would have to look his firstborn in the eye and confess that everything his son had grown up believing and having faith in was a lie.

John wrestled with that truth every minute of every day. He had started that conversation dozens of times.

On the phone.

In person.

And every single time he had dropped it, like a broken bottle of acid, before it really even had a chance to begin.

A more judging person would condemn John for keeping his son in the dark about things which very clearly and intimately impacted him. Telling him, quite correctly so, that Dean had every single right in the world to know every detail about his family's terrible secrets.

John trusted his firstborn more than any other person in the world, and if it wasn't for the fact that his biggest secret would be Dean's greatest pain, he would have confessed all to his kid the minute he found out.

He just simply couldn't bring himself to do it, and the weight of that decision was crushing his chest like a herd of elephants to the point where John could scarcely draw a full breath in his sons' presence anymore.

Dean would be destroyed emotionally in a million different ways. The boy existed for his family. Held his mother up to sainthood practically, and loved and protected his little brother with the fierceness of the strongest lion protecting his cub.

John wouldn't put it past his boy to stand against John himself if it benefited Sammy. And he might one day count on that.

How do you just dump these horrible truths on someone whose very survival depended on the passion and warmth of the family life that Dean wrapped himself in against the chill of the cold, cruel world around him?

John had lived with a greater degree of fear and unease for a few weeks now, and it wasn't getting any less painful for him to accept, so he knew that it would completely and utter annihilate Dean.

A long accomplished hunter, John had known right from the very start that the thing in Amherst was not a poltergeist.

Oh sure, it had all the calling cards of one. Enough so that any hunter paying attention would immediately come to that conclusion before tackling the problem. When you are in The Life, it starts to become second nature to read the signs and know at least the general realm of what you are about to step into.

A necessary sense to acquire if you are a hunter and want to keep breathing air.

What less seasoned hunters might not see, or at least ones who were not nearly as in tune with the demonic world as John was, were the subtle but very present omens of a demonic presence hovering in the same vicinity as the case. John wasn't the kind of man that believed in coincidences.

It had been sheer bravado and hubris on John's part that convinced him that he could handle things on his own, when he hadn't even had the full picture of what he was walking into.

At some point, over the past year, his desperation in protecting his children and saving his youngest son from an eternity of damnation had resulted in him becoming more careless on the job than he had ever been before. Even during his early years as an ignorant and novice hunter.

That mindset was purely the reason why he had drummed into his boys over and over again that they couldn't afford to let their emotions run wild on a hunt. That everything had to be seen in black and white when it came to the supernatural. No one could afford a second of hesitation, or indulge in any debate over gray areas when it came time to take down that things that didn't have a conscious or an ability to feel sympathy or empathy.

If it was a monster, you killed it. End of story.

But John needed answers. He needed specific information in his pursuit of Azazel, and real solutions as to how to take the demon out of their lives for good. Because John was fully and thoroughly convinced that it was the only outcome that was acceptable if he was going to save his little boy.

He knew that leaving for New York just at that particular moment was surely going to mean missing his son's graduation, but it was for Sam that he was going in the first place. His little boy would be hurt over his father's absence, more likely than not, but Sammy's future and safety far outweighed a high school ceremony.

No matter how much John ached to be there for his kid.

So he had tracked the demon down in Amherst, and with a skill that had only blossomed and grown over the years on the job, he had even managed to lure it to the relative safety of his warded lock-up a few miles away in Black Rock.

What John hadn't been expecting was the presence of two other demons as well. A mistake that nearly cost him his life when the sidekicks of the demon he had trussed like a Christmas turkey in his Key of Solomon approved Devil's Trap arrived to exact payback on the hunter that dared to take them on.

For three days John was held in his own storage unit, tortured to the point of death as three spawns of Satan used him as their personal chew toy. Why they didn't kill him outright, he didn't know. Although he suspected that Azazel knew that it would be more painful to let the distraught father live, knowing what the demon had done to his child, and fully expecting that there wasn't anything John could do about it.

During those three days, John had been subjected to pain and suffering like he had never imagined possible, but he endured it with a warrior's strength and resolve. Determined to keep himself conscious as much as possible if it meant that he could potentially glean even the tiniest scrap of information on how to win the battle he had been fighting for almost eighteen years.

If there was one thing to say about a demon, it was that they were overly confident in themselves, and as a result, they tended to be a little on the chatty side. By the time Jim, Singer and Caleb found him, barely clinging to life, John had been allowed to hear the full scheme regarding his child, and the other children like him.

Whether or not Azazel had wanted him quite that informed, John didn't know.

He did know, from years of experience, that demons lie. But the evilness and putrid rot that emanated from their words was too perverse and unholy to be discounted, as evidenced by John's frequent bouts of nausea and utter hopelessness every time he recalled them.

Recognizing the obscene truth from their confident sneers and the sickening pleasure that they took at his despair when sharing the details with him.

Taunting him that his training and teachings over the years were only serving to make their Boy King an even stronger leader for the darkness, once Sam had reached his full potential.

John wanted to discount their gleeful claims of being the one responsible for bringing Sammy closer to their anticipated fruition of his ascendancy. He wanted to be able to say, with complete confidence, that no child of his would ever fall into the path of evil.

That John's youngest child was a good boy. That Sammy was innately pure and would fight tooth and nail to stay on the path of righteousness.

He wanted that more than anything.

But too many times now, John had seen Sam's flashes of foreboding temper and streaks of maliciousness in his words and actions to be absolutely guaranteed the he would resist. After all, the powers of Hell were vast and aggressive, and over the years John himself had seen too many good men and women fall to the persuasion of evil.

John would fight, with everything he had in him, to keep his son on the straight and narrow, or he would die trying. He would remain firm in his confidence that his little boy only needed the care and love of his family around him to turn his back on Hell's plans for him, and John was going to hold onto his kid as tightly as he could for as long as he could.

But he also knew, when it came right down to it, he wouldn't let Sammy ever again have the chance to be the one responsible for getting his brother killed.

For both of their sakes.

/

Thirteen days after Dean was tossed over the second floor landing of a haunted Victorian house, he triggered his ventilator.

Sam had been fitfully dozing in the recliner when the alarms woke him up, and for a split second his mind flooded with panic, not knowing what was happening to his brother.

It took the combined assurances of two nurses, plus Dean's neurologist, to convince the weary, weak and sleep deprived kid that it was a good thing. Sam called his father's cellphone, surprised when Dad actually answered it on the first ring, and told him the news.

With the tests looking good, the horrible contraption and it's whoosh...thump thump grating rhythm are removed from Dean and his room, and Sam hopes with all his heart that he never hears anything like it ever again. Not that he's not grateful that it has kept his brother alive long enough to start the road to recovery, but still.

For the rest of the afternoon, Sam and John kept vigil until they were finally rewarded with the heart stopping sight of vibrant green eyes slowly opening and desperately trying to focus. John smiles for the first time in almost two weeks as Sam runs out to grab anyone he can find to give his brother assistance.

When he runs back in, Dad is holding Dean's hand in one of his own, while the other smooths the limp, straggly remains of hair that survived the procedure to drain the accumulated fluid out of the older brother's head. There's a joke in the making there at some point, years down the road when this is all a distant memory.

It takes a few minutes for Dean to focus long enough to get his bearings, but eventually his vision clears and it's immediately apparent when he recognizes his father and brother in front of him, because the petrified wild look he has had on his face since he first regained consciousness is gone. Replaced with a soft smile, and the wave of pinched tension around the bright green eyes flows away effortlessly.

Dean clears his throat of the accumulated gunk that has built up over time from the vent, and he has enough strength to give a tiny head shake of refusal when his father offers him a cup of water. He takes in a deep breath, centers himself after his long sleep and looks closer at the still worried faces of his loved ones. Quirking up a small smile and knowing that he needs to prove to them that he'll be okay, he manages to croak out a few words.

"You look worried, fellas."

/

It seemed like forever since they had last been at home.

Although, in reality, less than a month has gone by, the trauma of their time away made the familiar comfort of the white wooden two story seem years in the past. A place where they were happy and whole, and nothing had managed to hurt them in almost a year of living.

Dean was starting to finally get restless after the long drive, even as the waves of medically induced drowsiness were making him loopy.

He had barely fussed earlier when Dad and Sam had maneuvered him into the back seat of the Impala, since his leg and shoulder casts prohibited any idea he may have had of at least riding shotgun in his baby, but he clearly was more than ready to get out of the car now.

Steady at the wheel, Sam brooding and pensive, he passes his father's truck when Dad pulls ahead to park up the street and then maneuvers the Impala up the driveway to park her next to the Camaro. Smiling when a sound of contented relief reaches him from the back as Dean seems to relax upon seeing their home.

By the time John has jumped out of his truck and jogged up the drive and over to the Impala, his firstborn is already starting to squirm, futilely attempting to shift himself into a better position to facilitate his removal from the car.

"Easy, Dean," Dad scolds, pulling the door open wide, as Sam opens his own door to get out. "Let us do the work, kiddo."

Dean wants to gripe.

Every part of his body is screaming in agony from the road trip, and he could really use a couple more pain pills even though he wasn't quite due for them yet. Instead he grits his teeth and waits patiently for his father to get into position to heft Dean's banged up body out of the car. He knows that this part is going to hurt.

They spend exactly ten seconds trying to allow Dean to stand on his good leg and limp to the house with assistance, but with the immediate way his face goes as white as a sheet and a thin film of sweat bubbles up on his upper lip, John refuses to go any further with the charade that his boy can make the trip upright.

In the end, he just slips his arms under Dean's middle back and knees, careful not to jostle the tightly wrapped shoulder and arm, and carries his son bridal style up the driveway and towards the house. Dean blushes nine shades of crimson over being ferried like a child, swearing up a storm that gets him a sharp reprimand from his father that makes his ears burn, and he desperately hopes that none of the neighbors are getting an eyeful of this embarrassing spectacle.

Sammy has raced ahead of them, pulling his set of keys from his jeans pocket and making sure that the door is unlocked and propped open so there are no impediments to their progress inside. Dean's protests are growing weaker and are being met with a roll of his father's eyes as he hauls his firstborn up the stairs, across the porch and into the front door.

You would think that John has never carried his son before a day in his life by the way the kid kicks up a fuss, but John's annoyance is tempered by his genuine relief over bringing his child safely home again. Like he once did on a much happier day, at a much happier place in his life twenty two years ago.

With the strength of a father's care and love, Dean is gently set down on the couch as if he weighs nothing more than a feather. It's true that almost a month on a liquid diet has caused some weight loss for the young man, but John's arms are nonetheless sturdy, and the precious cargo of one of his children has never been too much for him to manage, regardless of their size.

Settling his son, John smooths a hand across Dean's slightly longer than normal hair, the bare patches combed over to hide them, and with his defenses lowered from exhaustion and encroaching pain, Dean's subconsciously leans into the touch, because it's not that often that his father is this demonstrably affectionate towards his eldest.

Before either of them know it, Sam is running back from the mud room with extra pillows and blankets, and they prop the pillows behind Dean's back and neck, taking great precautions to avoid any motion that would aggravate his injuries. When he is as comfortable as they are going to make him for the moment, Sam attempts to spread the blanket over him until Dean squawks.

"It's a thousand degrees in here, Sammy. I don't need extra fabric covering me, dude."

Blinking hard, Sam and John both realize that Dean is right. Summer in South Dakota can be just as hot as summer anywhere, and the house is suddenly stifling. Besides which, they can now clearly smell that particular odor of humidity and lack of use that a house can get when it doesn't have anyone living in it. As if the air itself has stood still from an absence of occupancy and human touch.

It's not a rotten smell, because Dean is house proud and had very meticulously made sure that nothing was left to decay or get old while they were on the job, but it is distinctly stale in the house at the moment.

Dad heads over to the window to turn on the A/C unit that keeps the living room fairly cool. The boys haven't used it a lot yet, since John frowns on too much pampering, preferring his sons to condition their bodies to endure mildly uncomfortable temperature shifts. There is a small film of dust on the filter that they can smell on the cold air that starts to pump through the room, but it soon clears out.

Meanwhile Sam has retrieved a bottle of water from the fridge and Dean accepts it gratefully, especially when he sees that his pain management cocktail is also on offer. He's less enthusiastic about the plastic cup of applesauce that his father presses into his hand, but he takes it anyway and forces down as much as he can.

When Dad is in papa bear mode, it's best to just go along with what he says, and Dean knows that pain meds on an empty stomach don't promise anything good for anyone. It's not often that his father fusses over him, so Dean's going to shut his cakehole and do as he's told for the time being.

Dinner time is fast approaching, and while Dean is sated from the water and applesauce, happily well on his way to riding the narcotic wave, Sam's stomach growls with all the impatience of a young body that hasn't been fed as well as it should have been for a few weeks. John takes the hint and announces that he's making a run out for supplies and that he'll be back soon.

While Dad is gone on the food run, Sam fusses over his brother until Dean finally shoves him away in annoyance. He's going to remember this for the next time that Sam is under the weather and accusing Dean of being all mother hen on him.

The kid is just as bad as his older brother when it comes to taking care of an injured or sick sibling.

The pain cocktail kicks in enough that Dean feels himself start to float away, and he lets it happen, because although he was well enough to be discharged this morning without even needing to go for an AMA as is their usual practice, he's not going to lie to himself about still feel like shit on toast.

Sam takes advantage of his brother's unexpected, but not unwelcome, nap time to run some cleaning products around the surfaces of the house, smiling happily to himself when the pleasant citrus-y scent of their orange based home care products swirl in the air and replace the staleness and the lingering vestiges of hospital odor.

Once the house is relatively under control, and a load of Dean's dirty clothes is churning merrily in the washing machine, Sam runs upstairs and takes the most wonderful shower of his life. He's a little greedy with the hot water, but doesn't think anyone will mind today, and when he finally emerges in a cloud of steam, he almost feels like a human again.

Donning fresh clothes that come from his closet and not his smelly duffel, there's a much more bubbly spring in his step as he lopes downstairs to check on his brother, happy to see Dean start to shift awake. Simply because, these days, Sam can't get enough of seeing his brother's eyes wide open.

It might be corny and sappy and chick-flicky in a million different ways, but sue him. He's missed his brother like oxygen.

Dean manages to grab the remote, even in his less than mobile state right now, and turns on an SVU rerun. Grinning from ear to ear when he sees his favorite lady detective on the screen. Sam laughs for the first time in weeks. A true full belly laugh that feels so damn great that it's contagious and Dean can't help himself from joining in.

Flopping down in the overstuffed chair next to the couch, Sam props his feet up on the coffee table, ignoring his brother's obligatory glare for bad manners, and for a while the two of them just enjoy each other's company while they watch the serial crime show on TV.

Happy and companionable, they don't even notice their father's truck pull in at the sidewalk next to their driveway.

And they certainly don't notice him juggling his shopping and takeout into one hand, so he can grab their large pile of accumulated mail from where it's laying on the side of the porch.

/

"What the hell is this, Samuel?"

There's a thick white envelope in Dad's hands, and Sam can see enough of it to clearly recognize the Stanford logo in the return address position.

Shit

All that careful planning. The secret phone calls and the emails and the surreptitious strategizing with Mr. Hopkins to avoid this specific confrontation.

Sam was promised over and over again that no correspondence from the school would be coming in hard copy.

The last time college letters made it into this house, it hadn't ended very well.

Sam's hands are trembling because he simply isn't ready for this.

The start of his fall classes is weeks and weeks away and he needed time. Goddamn it!

Time to figure out how he was going to break the news to his father and badly injured brother. Time to make them understand why he has chosen to go off on his own after all, despite all of the agreements they have in place between the three of them.

Realistically, he knew that his father was never going to be on board with any of Sam's ideas, but he had been hoping to get Dean on his side, once they were assured of his big brother's full recovery.

With Dean so hurt and sick for the past few weeks, talking about college wasn't even a blip on Sam's radar of priorities, and now here it was, staring him in the face and he just simply was not prepared to deal with the fallout.

The world as they know it comes screeching to a halt at his father's furious demand.

Heart speeding up in his chest, Sam feels like a trapped animal. Cornered and defenseless against two much larger and angrier predators.

Dad's face is full fury, the color of his skin darkening deep and red as his anger builds and surges like an active volcano preparing to erupt.

But it's Dean that Sam turns to, and the look of betrayal and heartbreak are so clearly etched in the pale skin of his still broken brother that Sam's stomach churns and he feels a wave of nausea begin to creep up his throat.

With his pulse fluttering like a guilty hummingbird, Sam desperately wants to apologize for his deception. Needing Dean's understanding and absolution like the oxygen that somehow Sam's body is forgetting to intake at the moment.

He lists against the door jamb between the living room and the stairs, clinging to the wood trim like a lifeline in rough emotional seas, while his legs go rubbery beneath him.

Somehow Sam manages to remain standing, if for no other reason than he's still convinced that if he falls, his brother will feel compelled to summon the strength to go to his aid.

Even betrayed and cast aside, Dean will never lay down the mantle of being his brother's protector.

Something that used to make Sam feel warm inside when the rest of his life left him cold and heartbroken, but now only fuels the shame that roils inside of him. Sam's intentions to leave for the good of his family may be noble on their face, but he knows that all his brother and father will see is a selfish child, too greedy for his own gratification to give back to the ones that have given him everything.

Sam tries to speak, his mouth opening and closing like a suffocating fish on land, but nothing he could possibly say will make his brother understand why he has chosen this path. Not after everything they have talked about and discussed.

Certainly not after Dean just spent the better part of a month fighting for his life after putting it on the line to protect his little brother, only now to be abandoned by him.

"I thought we settled this matter," Dad finally barks out, and it's clear where he stands as he shoots burning eyes at his youngest son that threaten to melt Sam with their intensity.

Still ignoring his father, Sam begs with his eyes for his brother to say something. Anything. But Dean just shakes his head in disbelief, as if he can't quite accept what it going on. Like the whole thing is possibly a figment of his pain med drugged up mind.

Behind him, Sam can feel his father's hot breath on the back of his neck as Dad slowly moves closer. Getting more irate by the second with Sam's unwillingness to address him in any way. Sam still concentrating solely on the battered older boy on the couch who now is looking down at his hands like a confused child that doesn't actually know what to do with himself.

It would be easier, better, if Dean would just start yelling.

Yelling, Sam could take.

Yelling, Sam could reason with and fight back against.

Silence is Sam's enemy.

Silence is kicking someone when they are down, because it's hard to mount a defense of righteous indignation when you don't actually have an enemy to fight. When there is no one calling you out on your inconsideration and overall bullshit behavior. Your casual disregard for anyone other than yourself.

Sam can't summon all the fury he needs to exert when he's not met with any resistance. He can't feel justified in making the choices that have been exposed today if he is not given the forum to air his grievances appropriately so that he's not the villain of this piece.

For a brief second, he senses his resolve faltering in the face of his brother's complete lack of interest in engaging him, but then he feels a sharp tug on his arm as Dad finally loses what little patience he has and swings Sam around to face him.

"You are NOT doing this to us, Samuel! I'm getting pretty sick and tired of reminding you of the obligation you have to this family."

And just like that, Sam has an opponent to fight.

Someone in the line of fire that Sam can unload his entire arsenal of frustration upon. Cartridge after cartridge. Magazine on top of magazine. All forged and filled with bullets of Sam's personal brand of self righteousness.

"Family?" he squawks, anger and hostility building as he seethes. "You don't want family, you want mindless grunts to fight your fucking imaginary war!"

The air grows still, then. Not even the tiniest mote of dust would have the nerve to move right now as Dean's eyes go wide on the sofa, while John faces darkens from rage red to pissed off purple.

"This is our war, Samuel," John snarls, grabbing a fistful of his son's shirt. 'You are every bit a part of it as the rest of us. And don't you ever fucking forget it."

With his father gripping him tight, Sam's unable to move further back, and being forced into such close proximity with his adversary, his fight or flight instinct kicks in and comes out guns blazing.

"Oh yeah? Tell me why, Dad!" he demands, panting heavily as his arms wave around. "Tell me why, hell, tell both of us why, we need to hunt and kill and bleed. Give us a fucking reason why we can't just be a normal family that grieves and moves the fuck on already."

Dad grabs him with his other hand now, and Sam's squirms a little when his father pushes him up against a corner of the living room wall. Penning him in like prey without an escape route.

"You know why, Boy. Your mother.."

"DON'T talk about my mother," Sam spits back, because this time he is unwilling to have that thrown in his face. Always a convenient reason when it suits his father, and a forbidden topic of conversation when Sam just wants to ask small questions so he can know her better.

"My mother wouldn't have wanted this for us."

John chuckles darkly and shakes his head. "You don't know a thing about her."

Now Sam fights back, twisting in his father's grasp, trying to force the stronger man to release him, but Dad has years of experience on Sam and his grip never falters. Not for a monster that he hunts, and certainly not for a mouthy belligerent child.

"And whose fault is that, Dad," Sam barks, still reeling with residual exhaustion from weeks of stress and fear. "Whose fault is it that I don't know anything about her?"

John looks like he's about to say something, but then changes his mind, and Sam can actually see the man almost bite down his tongue. It does nothing more than ramp up Sam's already out of control emotions. Knowing that if he wanted to, he could fight his way out of his father's hold on him, but it would come at a price that he wasn't willing to inflict just yet.

He's not quite at the point where he's a bad enough son to take a swing at his old man.

"I'm getting out of this train wreck of a family," Sam blurts out, unthinking. "If you two want to spend your lives getting the shit kicked out of you, be my fucking guest. But I'm done."

John pushes his son against the wall. Not hard enough to hurt the kid, but strong enough to make a point. It's taking every ounce of conditioned control in him to keep from throwing the kid through the sheet rock right now.

"Whose fault is it, that Dean's spent the last month in the hospital, Samuel? Who didn't do their fucking job that made that happen?"

It's a low blow, but not a lie. Sam actually grunts from pain at the words, and he throws his injured brother a guilty look, eyes roaming around the room wildly while he struggles to contain the despair inside of him.

And like it always does, his hurt manifests as hostility, and he finds himself pushing back without realizing what he's doing.

"I can't help it if my stupid idiot brother keeps trying to throw his life away! But I'm not sticking around anymore to watch him get killed the next time."

And like that, the room is silent again, and the glare his father gives him could melt the entirety of the polar ice caps. Dad shoots one quick look at Dean who has gone perfectly still on the couch while Sam reels with the realization of what has just spewed from his mouth like toxic sludge.

"This ends. Now." Dad snarls, shaking Sam hard and pulling him from the wall. "I'm ending it."

Knowing he has gone way too far, Sam doesn't struggle when his father drags him into the kitchen. He gives barely a passing thought as to why Dad doesn't haul him upstairs to his room to punish him. Probably because it's only right that Dean gets a front row seat considering how hurtful and callous Sam has just been to him.

As if, on top of all his physical injuries, Dean needs any more pain caused by his little brother.

Dad snaps his fingers and points to the kitchen table, and Sam knows the drill well enough after eighteen years of being John's son. He promised himself in the hospital that he wouldn't resist when the time came, and although it's not entirely all for the same reason, he's been figuring for a few weeks now that he has this one coming.

He fingers the button on his jeans and, although still enraged, gives his father a quick questioning glance, getting a short nod of instruction in return. Because usually Dad punishes his boys up close and personal anyway, and Sam can already feel his face flushing since his brother is just a few feet away on the couch, but he somehow manages to work his jeans and boxers down to mid thigh.

It's not as if he's never been whipped bare in front of his brother before. Not even as if they've never been punished together either, to be honest, because over the years they have caused plenty of mayhem as willing accomplices. Besides which, being a family of three guys that routinely share close quarters doesn't exactly foster any preciousness about modesty.

Still, it's been a long time, and Sam's not a little boy anymore, but Dean is the injured party in this equation, so if Sam has to suffer a little humiliation, so be it.

He leans forward, resting his forearms on the table and can't help the reflexive clench of his gut at the sound of his father's belt being worked free from the loops of his jeans. Years of conditioning have taught Sam to fear that sound more than anything they face in the wild. The clink of the belt buckle being gripped in his father's hand signals the part just before the first strike, and Sam tenses out of habit.

In an otherwise quiet house, the first smack echoes like the rapport of a gun against the walls, and Sam sucks in a deep surprised breath from the harsher than normal burn, because it's obvious that Dad isn't holding anything back right from the start.

Sam chokes and blinks back the tears that spring to his eyes long enough to throw his brother a quick look to see if Dean is just as shocked by the blunt force as he is, but his brother is holding his gaze straight forward and not acknowledging what is happening in the kitchen.

After that dismissal, Sam grits his teeth and resolves to take it all as stoically as possible. Knowing that he's in for a bumpy ride. His list of crimes and sins is long, and he knows that his father is going to make him pay for every single item.

What's more, Sam actually wants him to.

If for no other reason than for him to do some penance for both Dean's accident and Sam's lies about school. Sam's never been the kind of kid that doesn't expect to not have to pay the piper at some point.

Dad might think that what he is doing is going to change Sam's mind about leaving for school, but it simply isn't going to happen. While he's willing to accept some punishment for the things that he has done wrong, he won't be beaten into submission as far as his plans go.

Dad's just going to have to accept that.

With a high pain threshold, Sam manages to endure the whipping with minimal fuss. His fingers ache from clenching and unclenching against the wood of the table, and his breaths are coming out in the form of sharp, harsh bursts and the occasional grunt as the strikes echo around the room.

He can't help the tears that fall, because they are a natural reaction to the searing pain on his backside, but he has been able to avoid any shameful sobs or pleas for mercy.

Behind him, Dad is panting hard from the exertion as he lowers his arm. The usual sign that they are done.

Slowly Sam starts to push himself up, and is surprised when the hand his father has kept on his back to steady him during the punishment tenses and forces him to stay in place. It's not like his father to keep hold of him once it has come to an end.

"This ends right now, Samuel," Dad snaps harshly, still a little breathless. "Tomorrow morning you and I are calling that damn school and I will listen, with my own ears, while you tell them you are not coming."

An icy tendril of panic grips Sam by the throat and strangles him at hearing his father's words. Suddenly he's gasping for air and black spots appear in the periphery of his vision as the world spins.

Dad leans over closer to his ear and his breath is hot on Sam's neck.

"I want to hear you say that this is over. Right now. No more nonsense."

If Sam was wise, and less stubborn, and more loyal to his family, he would back down at this point and do what his father tells him to. But Sam's never been the kid that makes anything easy, especially when it's something that he believes firmly about, and he's never felt stronger about anything than his decision to go away to school.

Closing his eyes tightly, knowing what his defiance will cost him, he slides back down in position, with just a little shiver of fear running through his limbs.

"No, sir."

John's breathing picks up even more, coming in long and loud pulls of air as he contemplates the sheer nerve of his youngest.

This conversation isn't over.

Not by a long damn shot, and if it means he's got to take a firmer stand with his kid then so be it. Straightening back up, he grips the back of Sam's shirt with more force than before and raises the belt again.

This time, Sam doesn't manage to keep so quiet.

Less than a minute into the second round, Sam feels like the entire area from mid ass to mid thigh has been coated in a layer of hot, molten lava. Burning and singeing while his sweat slick hands repeatedly lose their purchase against the wood of the table. Strangled cries bubble up out of his throat, and a pool of mingled fluids builds up on the table underneath his face as tears, snot and saliva stream out.

His pride intact, Sam pushes back hard against the temptation to beg for leniency, but with every searing stroke, his determination slips a fraction of an inch further.

Still, he refuses to be broken.

Just when he thinks that he's about to lose the battle however, his father stops. Once again stepping back and giving Sam space to compose himself. Sam leans down against his now clasped hands on the table and rests his face against them, catching his breath as his legs tremble.

Dad's never doled out two whippings in one day to either of his sons before, and Sam would be less than honest if he didn't admit to how unprepared he was for the escalation in pain. Thinking that he wasn't a child anymore, and with his experience and training, he was a fairly tough person.

He was wrong.

The house is deathly still except for the combined heavy breathing of John and Sam, and the faint ambient noise of the daily activities of their neighbors outside. Dean is soundless and motionless on the couch, studiously ignoring both of his family members, his face an unreadable mask of tension.

John waits another moment before speaking again. His face doesn't betray the inner panic that is coursing through him over the very real possibility that he's about to lose his son to a world where Sam is not protected by his family full time.

The terrified father doesn't know what more he can do to force his child to forego these foolish plans of going out on his own, where it's not safe for him, and the unknown variables of negative influences is too great to be ignored.

Sam's always been a rebellious child, but he usually has been eventually reined back in once his father has taken him in hand. John doesn't really want to be so harsh with his little boy, but he's running out of time and options, since arguments, compromises and orders have all failed to dissuade his petulant son.

"This conversation is over, Samuel," he says, with threatening finality. "You will do as you're told. Do you understand?"

And in his mind, John begs to hear his son's acquiescence, because he really doesn't want to take this any further than it has already gone.

Sam slowly pulls himself upright, his face awash in anguish and pain as he scrubs a hand across his eyes and nose, taking in a shuddering breath before turning his head to look at his father's expectant glare.

"No."

John swears under his breath, cursing his own genetics for giving him a son every bit as bullheaded as he is himself. If he wasn't worried sick about keeping his kid safe, he would actually be incredibly proud of his son's commitment to his purpose and ideals.

But desperate times call for desperate measures, and as much as it will kill him, he can keep this up all night if he has to. Better to face Sam's hatred and ire from being whipped into submission than to have to burn his kid's body on a hunter's funeral pyre when he's still a teenager if the demons get to him first.

He's stuck between a rock and a hard place, knowing that a line is being crossed here today, but also knowing that telling his son the truth about his past will only drive him away even faster.

Maybe even further in the absolutely wrong direction as well.

Once they are done, Sam will either fall back into compliance where John can keep him safe and keep a watchful eye on him, or he will have to go and get out of The Life before something else happens to endanger John's other child. He loves his sons equally, with everything he has in him, but sometimes hard choices have to be made.

Sam's putting up a pretty good show of bravado as he gets in his father's face, and John pretends that he can't see the sudden flash of terror in his baby's eyes when he grips his belt tight again, ready to go a third round if necessary.

He reaches out and grabs Sam by the arm, enough to twist him fully back around to face the table again. Hardening his heart against the pitiful whimpers his son is making, and firmly pushing a now frightened and resisting Sam flat against the wooden surface as he racks his swinging arm back to start once more.

"Dad! Stop."

The soft but urgent plea from the other room stills John's arm before he takes the first swing. Under his other hand, he can feel Sammy's back trembling from the sobs that his youngest can't hold back anymore. He looks over into the living room, and can see the glassy sheen that tells him that Dean is crying on the couch, begging with his eyes for his father to put an end to the punishment.

"He's had enough, Dad," Dean pleads in anguish. "Please. You're hurting Sammy."

John lowers his belt hand, but he doesn't release his youngest from his position bent over the table. Dean doesn't understand why he's being as unyielding as he is. It's not like John wants to do this.

But Dean makes the decision for him. As usual, ready, willing and able to put his brother's needs and desires first, over everything else. After everything that has happened and been said, Dean will never be anything than what he is, deep down to his soul.

Sammy's big brother.

"Just let him go, Dad," he says quietly, turning away so that his father can't see the defeat take the light out of his eyes. "Let him go."

Just like that, John deflates like a popped balloon. He doesn't have the energy to fight both of his children, and the double meaning of Dean's words is not lost on him. He didn't want this, but as every soldier knows, sometimes you lose a battle, even if you end up eventually winning the war. Knowing that now he has to hope that by removing Sam from the hunter's world, he decreases the threat of it overtaking his child.

"Fine," he says tiredly, removing his hand from Sam's back so that he can thread his belt back into his jeans.

Sam doesn't move from his position on the table. Possibly too scared to engage his father at the moment. His sobs have quieted now into hiccups as he scrapes a hand over his face, and he flinches slightly when he senses his father leaning closer to him.

"You have a choice, Samuel," John rumbles darkly. "Get up to your room, right now, and you either stay there until you pull your head out of your ass and commit to this family, or you pack your bags and get out."

He waits until Sam responds with the barest of shaky nods before John storms out past both sons and out the front door.

It takes Sam another minute to collect himself enough that he is able to stand upright. Very gingerly easing his boxers and jeans over his inflamed skin as strangled gasps escape his throat. He staggers over to the sink and runs the cold tap of the faucet for a few seconds before scooping up handfuls of water to splash on the flushed and fluid soaked skin of his face.

While he really did need the time to compose himself, eventually he knows that he's going to have to face his worryingly silent brother in the other room. He spends another moment rinsing water over his red and swollen eyes before summoning up the courage to shuffle into the living room.

On the couch, still perched where he has been all afternoon, Dean stares out the window to avoid his little brother's searching gaze. It's all simply too much at this point. His defenses are laid bare, all the way down flat on the ground between his injuries and medications and the long hospital stay that have sapped the majority of his strength right out of him.

Idly, he wonders why an emotional pain like the one he's feeling inside his chest right now doesn't seem to be enough to actually finish the job of killing him outright.

It really should have been.

Sam stands nervously for a moment, leaning hip to wall and practically sagging from exhaustion. Not having the tiniest clue of how to breach this wall of silence between himself and his big brother. Dean's not a talker on the best of occasions, and considering how wildly everything has spun out of control since bringing him home from the goddamn hospital, chances are the other Winchester is going to keep his mouth clamped tighter than vise.

But, of course, Sam should know better than to underestimate his brother's concern for him.

"You okay?"

Sam shifts a little from his position against the wall, feeling the scorching burn of fabric scraping against his raw skin and sucks in a tiny breath between his teeth in a soft hiss.

"Not really," he admits quietly. "But I'll live."

Dean just nods, continuing his refusal to meet his brother's pleading eyes. It's easier this way.

"Dean," Sam starts, knowing that his time in the house is short. There's no telling when his father will storm back in and demand his departure.

From his place on the couch, Dean holds up his good hand in a cautioning movement and shakes his head.

"Just..don't, Sam."

Now that the time is here, Sam is suddenly acutely aware of the fact that he can't face leaving his brother behind.

That he's a selfish child who wants it all.

Stanford and his brother.

He thinks, for a split happy second, that if he just makes himself ask, Dean will agree to follow him out to California, like Sam once thought he would when this all started.

"Come with me," he begs. "Please."

Instead of the agreement he expects, or the outright refusal he fears, Sam is caught off guard when his brother laughs coldly.

"Nah, don't think so. Us stupid idiot grunts need to stay here and throw our lives away."

The flaming arrow of Sam's own thoughtless words comes shooting back at him with bulls eye accuracy, piercing his already bleeding heart with it's blazing fire. He recoils, like he's taken a physical punch to the gut, and knows that if just hearing the words repeated has hurt him so badly, what had they done earlier to his brother?

"Dean," he tries again, his face full anguish, "I didn't mean..."

When Sam's brother finally looks at him, his eyes are cold and there's no trace of the usual cocky grin that Dean will hide behind to mask his true emotions. He's just done.

"Yes. You did," Dean says with sharp finality.

An uncomfortable moment of silence passes while Sam's mind wars within itself. He never wanted this. Not at all.

Not like this.

"You better get upstairs," Dean says quietly, closing his eyes and leaning back against the couch as much as his injuries allow. "You got a choice to make."

And like the coward he is, Sam pushes away from the wall and drags himself upstairs as fast as his bruised legs can take him.

/

Sam's heart is racing a mile a minute after he closes his bedroom door and falls slightly to lean back against it.

This isn't happening

This isn't happening

This isn't happening

While his mind splits chaotically like the head of a sprinkler into ten different directions, he fights and struggles to make sense out of the last thirty minutes of his life. Wondering exactly how everything could turn to utter shit so fast.

It must be some new kind of land speed record in the How Quickly Can You Fuck Up Your Life Olympics.

Of which now Sam Winchester is the current gold medal holder and world champion.

Out of habit, he finds himself doing the calming breathing exercises that he was taught, ironically enough, by his father. A desperate attempt to regain some semblance of control over his emotions so that he can just snag even one tiny coherent thought from the shit storm jumble in his mind.

How had he even had the remotest hope that this was ever going to go well?

If anyone knew his father and brother, and their complete and utter dedication to the family business, it was him. So why had he allowed himself to believe that this wasn't going to end in bloodshed?

Maybe it was better this way. What do they say about just ripping the band-aid off? Is that what his life has now been boiled down to? A metaphorical bandage?

In a less crappy world, Sam would have been given time to smooth things over, at least with his brother. Dean was always going to take the news badly. Was never going to see it from Sam's perspective, because his big brother was simply incapable of understanding that a large part of Sam's reasoning for going off was to spare Dean the trouble of watching out for him in the first place.

That idea wouldn't even present itself anywhere near the realm of Dean's line of thinking.

As far as he was concerned, taking care of his little brother was etched into his DNA. Every bit a part of him as his freckles and allergy to cats.

It would be like telling Sam to stop being B positive for his blood type. He just simply couldn't do it.

Taking a beat, and clambering for rationality, Sam knew that one option allowed by his father was that he could just stop it all right now, before making a horrible situation unrecoverable. He could email Stanford and tell them that he had changed his mind.

Sorry, but my family has some pretty unhealthy co-dependency dynamics and I won't be able to attend after all. Thanks anyway.

He could flop down on his exceptionally comfortable bed, in the house he had grown to love over the past year, and wait obediently and patiently to be released from his paternal time out. Ready, willing and able to tuck his tail between his legs and fall in line when his father deigned to allow him to rejoin the mission.

Dad would probably still be pissed off, but he had already whipped his youngest good and proper, and as long as Sam showed the appropriate amount of submission and remorse, Dad would let their altercation go after a while. Sure, he would keep his youngest son on the shortest of short leashes until he was convinced of Sam's dedication and respect for the chain of command, but it would happen eventually.

Hell, Dad might even be happy about Sam staying.

As for Dean, he wouldn't be quite as quick to forgive and forget this particular infraction. Sam knew that his big brother was going to take this one personally for a lot longer than their father would.

And he would be right to do so.

After all he had done for Sam, this was a hurdle that wasn't going to be jumped any time soon. Dean didn't do anything halfway either, including holding a grudge. He gave everything he had to his father and brother. Loved them fiercely and unconditionally, even when they didn't deserve it.

Sam knew that.

It was one of the things he both admired about his brother and yet was still annoyed by. Although he was the usual recipient of that love, it irked him how easily his brother gave of himself when it wasn't deserving.

Especially when it was Sam that didn't deserve his forgiveness.

But Dean would forgive him eventually. Because he was also physically and emotionally incapable of freezing out his little brother, no matter how brutally he had been hurt, over and over, by Sam's actions.

Which is why Sam knew he had to go.

No matter how much Sam loved his family, and he did, he also knew that he was never going to be what they wanted him to be. That to even try, as he had thought he had been willing to, would just tear them all apart that much quicker.

Even as much as Sam wanted to, he simply didn't have it in him to keep his mouth shut and not question his father's orders and directions. He was always going to need to do things the way he thought about them and saw them, and Sam's way was never going to be Dad's. All it would succeed in doing is widening the gap between them.

Maybe this way, one day, Sam and his father would finally be able to see eye to eye on things, once a little time had passed to lower the level of hurt and resentment that neither of them seemed capable of letting go. When some time and distance would lower the waves of hostility between them.

What was that about absence and fonder hearts?

As for Dean, Sam wanted to give back to his brother everything that Dean had given to him, but he knew that it wasn't going to happen. That in trying to remake himself into something that he wasn't, solely for his brother's sake, Sam would only begin to resent Dean for forcing Sam's hand.

It would be like trying to remold Michelangelo's David.

Some people found the statue beautiful and loved it just like it was, while others merely saw a cold, stone man with overly large hands. The appreciation for what it is depends on the eye of the beholder and, once it's broken, it can never be reassembled into anything as wonderful and unique as the original was.

Sam's never been what his father and brother want him to be, no matter how hard they have tried to sculpt and mold him into a hunter, and in his continued effort to try, all it would do is break him into a million ugly pieces that no one, especially Sam himself, would love afterwards.

Maybe it was selfish to go.

No.

Scratch that.

It was selfish.

On a certain level.

Sam wasn't going to try and fool himself into believing that going off to school like he had been dreaming of for years wasn't a selfish move on a million personal levels, but he wasn't the first kid to leave home, and he wouldn't be the last.

Yes, it would have been nicer to go with his family's blessing, but since that wasn't apparently going to happen, Sam was just going to have to accept that and make his peace with it. It didn't mean that he wasn't going to miss them with every beat that his heart took from now on.

Their family had never had much, but at least they have always had each other, and now Sam wasn't even going to have that.

It was finally that reality that prompted the watery sob that wells up in his chest and bursts out of him as he sways slightly against the door. The knowledge that, in just the few minutes it was going to take him to pack, he was well and truly going to be alone in this world.

Moving as fast as his aching ass and legs would allow him to, he makes his way over to his laptop and checks bus schedules out of Sioux Falls. Finding the soonest departures and comparing them against the list he has mentally drawn up of Uncle Bobby's cabins.

It's already too late in the day for much choice, and the only feasible option is Des Moines, Iowa which, unfortunately, was the wrong direction for California, but it didn't really matter. Sam was now about to be homeless for the next five weeks, and he didn't really have the money to pay for a motel for the entire time.

The hunter cabins were his only option, since beggars couldn't afford to be choosers. Maybe Uncle Bobby wouldn't even want him there considering what Sam was about to do, but he would deal with that when the time came. For now, all he knew was that he had to leave, and leave immediately, if he was going to keep his resolve to get out of The Life.

As mad as Dean was at him, and as disappointed and furious as Dad was, Sam knew that neither of them would actually demand his removal from the house tonight if it came right down to it. They weren't cruel, after all. But he also knew that if he didn't put some distance between them and himself, he would never have the strength to go.

It wouldn't take much from either of them to persuade him to forget his plans, because he really did love them. It was killing him to walk away, but it was really for the best for all of them.

Mind made up, he begins to pack.

Leaving this house was going to be agonizing for him. Here he had made more happy memories in the past year than in the seventeen years prior combined. Every single memory that now flooded his mind was like another lash from his father's belt at ten times the pain.

Adding his school khakis to his duffel, because he was going to need some regular clothes on campus.

Finding plastic Easter eggs filled with money in his go-bag.

Gathering up the framed photographs of times before and after they arrived here last summer.

Deciding which books he could take off the shelves that Dad had built, because he only had just so much room for his things.

His high school diploma and awards day medals.

His souvenirs from DC that he couldn't bear to part with, but now felt guilty for wanting to bring them along.

It was an excruciating task deciding what tokens of his life would be allowed to come with him. Dad had always forced them to travel lightly, and so Sam knew how to rationally prioritize, but he had real emotional attachments to everything in his bedroom and the trinkets and pictures he had collected.

But he also knew that he couldn't take them all, and he couldn't afford to be attached to the things that he had to leave behind. Because without him, Dean would give this house up and go back out on the road where he belonged, and all remnants of the family life they created here would be scattered to the wind like so much garbage.

That thought broke Sam in a dozen profound ways.

It was quiet downstairs, and Sam wonders what his father and brother are doing, and if they could hear him walking back and forth around his room.

Did they know what he was getting ready to do?

Would they try to stop him?

God, he almost hoped so.

The closer he came to being finished with his task, the more his resolve was faltering. Just because the large part of him knew that it was time to go, that didn't mean that there wasn't still a part of him that secretly wanted his father and brother to hold him close and convince him to stay.

To tell him that it was okay that he didn't want the things out of life that they did, but it didn't matter because they were family and would work it out.

It's when he sees his key ring on the dresser that he loses his battle against tears.

The compact physical representation of all the happiness that this year has given him.

Keys to the first house that they were able to call home in his memory, as well as to the car that his father and brother have built just for him that he loved. The plastic tag that has his membership number for discounts at the coffeehouse, reminding him of happy, carefree hours spent with his friends. A braided loop that Alex made for him to match the one she had on her own keys.

The simple silver engraved cylinder that declared the close relationship that he and Dean have always shared.

With a realization so painful that Sam could literally feel his heart bleeding, he knows at this moment that he would have to leave it all behind.

There would be no coming back to this house, and Dean would have to turn in Sam's keys when he gave back his own to their eccentric but friendly enough landlady.

Sam might be allowed back some day to visit Uncle Bobby, if he is ever forgiven for leaving tonight, but without his friends, he wouldn't be frequenting the coffeehouse anymore.

He and Alex had already said their goodbyes the day after graduation when she left on a summer long trip to Europe with her parents. Both of them knowing a while ago that neither of them wanted a long distance relationship. They had parted as good and loving friends, but nothing more.

The keys to the Camaro have to go back to Dean. Sam's not going to starve in California, but there's no extra money built into his student stipends to pay for the parking and upkeep of a car. Sam had been hoping that his brother would figure out a way to keep Cherry for him somehow, maybe at Uncle Bobby's place, but after tonight, Sam knows that Dean will never want to see it again.

It's too valuable to keep lying around, and far too painful of a reminder of the betrayal of a little brother.

The engraved cylinder Sam could keep, but it would only serve as a harsh accusation of how much pain and damage he was inflicting on the sibling that had given him everything, only to have it thrown back in his face.

Sam wasn't afraid of much, but he was far too much of a coward to take the little piece of silver with him. His departure was breaking a lifetime oath between the brothers, and he had no right to try and cling to anything it symbolized.

The minutes are passing by far too quickly, and Sam grudgingly forces himself to gather up the meager possessions he allows himself so he can take his leave. It's a long ride from the stop for the city bus up the block to even get to the downtown bus terminal, and he's got to get going if he's going to make the bus for Des Moines tonight.

The idea of sleeping at the bus station isn't appealing right now after everything else.

Although, he supposes he better get used to the idea of being homeless as soon as possible.

Hefting his bags over his shoulder, he gives his room one last look before closing the door behind him, and feeling a little part of him die on the inside. For a kid that is used to moving around, it's excruciatingly difficult to put this particular home in his rear view mirror.

He's acutely feeling the painful aftereffects of his run in with his father's belt, but the physical aches of his body are running a distant second place to the one in his heart right now. Every step he takes as he ambles downstairs is the symbolic countdown for the end of the life that he has loved.

In the living room, Dean hasn't moved from his place on the couch, which shouldn't really be surprising. Sam's big brother is not only still battling the influence of his pain management cocktail, but he is also pretty immobile for the time being as well.

Even the mighty Dean Winchester has his physical limitations, and a busted leg and fractured collarbone are going to be an impediment to your motion, regardless of how strong your will is.

Sam stops just within his brother's line of sight. Allowing Dean to see him and his packed bags well enough so that he doesn't need to move, but still far enough away that he doesn't have to quite look his big brother in the eye.

He knows well enough that all it would take is the tiniest of flickers, the slightest hint of pleading in the depths of the vivid green irises, and Sam will give in. Submissively turning around and unpacking and never mentioning the word college again.

And he simply cannot allow that to happen.

As hard as it is right now, for the both of them, Sam is still convinced that this is all for the best. He needs to remain strong.

With his head down, and his eyes averted enough to avoid the danger, he quickly shuffles over and lays his key ring down on the coffee table in front of his brother, before pulling himself back like he's been burned and swallowing hard to keep the sobs choked down in his throat.

Dean takes a quick glance at the key ring, knows what it means, but his face betrays nothing. He simply nods, as if he's been expecting this, but Sam can see the death grip that his brother's good hand uses to claw the fabric of the couch, as if his entire world is spinning away from him and he's desperately clinging on.

"Guess it wasn't you and me against the world after all, huh Sam."

Sam, not Sammy, because Sammy is a sweet and loving little brother, and Sam is the asshole stranger that is breaking up their family. He swallows again, his mouth trembling as he struggles to keep a semblance of composure, but he can't stop his entire body from shaking under his brother's words.

The last minute reprieve that Sam had been secretly hoping for isn't forthcoming, and upon further consideration, Sam realizes that he was a fool to even think it was possible. Dean is a lot of things, but weak is not one of them, while proud certainly is.

Sam's big brother is not about to beg him to stay home when it's clear that Sam wants to be someplace else.

Not even to stay and help care for Dean when he's broken physically and emotionally, even though Sam knows that his brother would never in a million years dream of abandoning him if the tables were turned.

Maybe Sam really is just the selfish asshole that his family thinks he is after all.

Because Sam needs to run. He needs to get away. From all of it. Not another minute more where he can hurt and disappoint the ones he loves. He needs to run from this life to a new life. One without the pain and memories and the sadness.

Needs it like oxygen.

It's better for everyone, he convinces himself. Everyone will be happier.

There is a heavy moment of silence between them. A malignant air of finality that tells them both that life from this day forward is going to be far different than either of the brothers ever wanted. But like a runaway train, it's too late to pump the brakes now. Things have gone too far and have hurt too much and there is no return from here that doesn't leave scars.

"I didn't want it to be like this," Sam says quietly, and it's true. He's dying inside as the tears start to fall again.

He can see Dean's mouth working, as if his brother is chewing on the words that want to come spilling out, willy-nilly. Maybe ones that will offer some sort of comfort or compromise that would staunch the bleeding of them both before they're drowning in it.

But what he finally says hits like a punch to the gut and leaves Sam breathless and gasping for air.

"Goodbye, Sam."

Sam physically reels back, and it takes a few seconds to sink in as his body trembles and curls in on itself. There is a coldness and complete lack of emotion in Dean's dismissal, but maybe that's okay because it ruthlessly severs whatever hope Sam was harboring over this not being the end of their brotherhood.

He doesn't have the strength anymore to speak and his vision is completely blurred by the tears that are streaming down his cheeks. In his head he hears the buzz of hospital white noise as his mind takes shelter away from the pain he is feeling at the moment and, on autopilot, he grabs his bags and heads for the door.

With his hand on the doorknob, he hesitates for a few seconds, because it's taking all the will he can summon right now to take the next step and he can't do it because he knows that he can't leave things like they are.

But Dean is now looking out the window again, completely ignoring Sam and keeping his own emotions in check like he always does. Sam has now become one of the people that Dean puts his guard up against, and it's that knowledge that finally crushes Sam and prompts him to go. He turns one last time, takes one last look at the person that means more to him than anything else in the world.

"I love you."

And without waiting for a response that he knows will never come, to a phrase they don't vocalize to each other, he walks out into the world and closes the door behind him.

Sam makes it down to the end of the driveway before he sees his father leaning against the rear quarter panel of the Sierra. Dad sees him, and an unreadable expression crosses his face when he glances at the heavy bags hanging from Sam's shoulders.

Taking a deep breath, and hoping for no further conflict, Sam racks his shoulders back and strides over to his father, jaw firmly set in an effort to present a stronger front than he actually feels.

"You going?"

Dad's question is neither reproach nor censure. Just calm and indifferent, as if they are discussing the weather.

"Yes, sir."

A few seconds pass as they stand in detente. Eventually, Dad nods as if he's come to a decision and has made his peace with it.

"Bus?"

Sam swallows hard and blinks, forcing back another wave of tears that will do him no favors if he allows them to continue to spill. He jerks his head in the tiniest gesture of acknowledgment, knowing that anything more will destroy the little composure he is struggling to maintain.

Dad nods his head towards the passenger door, and Sam accepts the invitation for the ride. He needs to be on that Des Moines bound bus if he wants to get away tonight, and his farewells are sapping all of his strength and he's behind schedule.

They don't talk during the short ride to the station. Sam's jaw is working overtime as he chokes back the words that would betray him and leave too much of an opening for his father's persuasion to infiltrate and crumble what is left of his younger son's resolve.

Behind the wheel, John's knuckles grow increasingly white as he drives, gripping and tensing with every passing mile. Before either of them know it, John is pulling to the curb outside the station, where he puts the Sierra in park, but leaves the motor idling.

Sam sits in the passenger seat, not able to summon the nerve to look his father in the eye. Knowing that if he does, he will become undone. And it might all be for nothing if that happens, because there is no guarantee that his father won't just kick him out of the car anyway, after all that has happened today.

Yet, he can't seem to force himself to open the door.

John rubs a hand down the scruff of his right cheek. Still beaten and weary from too many days of worry and lack of sleep. His military surplus khaki green outer shirt damp with sweat and smelling like hospital disinfectant.

"Sam?"

His summons is quiet and lacking the hostility that his son was anticipating, and as a result Sam is able to force his gaze enough sideways to spare his father a tentative glance.

"If you go," Dad starts, pausing to take a deep breath. Just enough that it unintentionally gives his boy the tiniest spark of hope of reconciliation. "You should stay gone."

The quiet interior of the truck's cab makes Sam's sharp intake of breath resonate much louder than either one of them would have wanted. Sam's mouth trembles for a few brief seconds as he loses his battle with the stray tear that trails down his cheek.

But he doesn't allow his weakness to show for long, because he will be damned if he gives his father the satisfaction of seeing him cry anymore today. So he opens the door and slides out, pulling his bags behind him, and as he stands next to the truck, he straightens up to his full proud height and looks his dad right in the eyes.

Because for once, they are in complete agreement about something.

"Yes, sir."

Then he strides away, determined to feign a strength and confidence he doesn't feel. Never looking back to see the tears in John's eyes as he watches his little boy walk out of his life.

/

They're twenty-two and eighteen.

A chasm now separates them. A gaping hole so wide and so deep that it's unlikely anyone or anything will ever be able to bridge it again.

Sam sits on the bus as it slowly maneuvers its way out of the Sioux Falls city limits, heading far from his family and the life that he loved there.

On the bus he is no one.

No one's son.

No one's little brother.

No one at all.

He's just Sam. Homeless orphan and only child. Alone and already flailing and lost on his quest for independence.

His fellow passengers don't know who he is and, what's more, they don't care.

Each of them mired in their own world as the diesel fumes from the engine occasionally fill the cabin and threaten to make Sam's already queasy stomach rebel and flip.

He doesn't allow himself to feel any pity for his circumstances.

Knowing that he is the one that has chosen this life and this separation, and because of that he accepts that he has lost the right to deserve any sympathy, or to wallow in a self made pool of devastation. Bereft, he mentally builds a damn in his mind to keep the crushing thoughts from flooding over him like a tidal wave.

Even if he had a sudden charge of heart, it's too late to go back now.

Dad has made his position perfectly clear with his parting gift of the ultimatum that paired nicely with the painful punitive welts on Sam's ass. Sam vacillates between resentment and understanding of his father's actions, but because he needs a strong head of steam to push him forward, he chooses to focus only on the resentment.

It's easier that way.

A momentary desire to get off at the next stop and go running back to the house, to throw his arms around his father and brother and beg forgiveness for the sin of abandoning his family, passes as quickly as it comes.

Sam has too much pride to do that now. He's given his choice today enough careful consideration, even if it was made during a time of extreme emotional duress, but he is at least smart enough to realize that no matter what he does now, his bridges with his family are well and truly burned.

Smoldering in the distance as the bus rolls down the highway.

Back at the house in Sioux Falls, Dean's world crumbles around him. Overdue for his next dose of pain meds, he doesn't even bother to choke them down. He needs to feel something now other than the emotional wounds of abandonment and betrayal, and the pain of his physical injuries will do nicely.

He simply doesn't know what he could have done differently. How much more of himself he had to give to prevent this day from coming. What was it about him that was so terrible that his brother couldn't wait to run away? Didn't even have the guts to tell Dean to his face before it was too late to be honest?

A long lonely hour passes before his father returns to the house. John looks as wrecked as Dean feels. As broken and tired as he has ever seen his father over the years, and that is really saying something.

The two of them don't speak.

There is nothing that either could possibly say to the other to make this any less agonizing.

When John comes over and sits on the edge of the coffee table, Dean finally turns to look at his father, and the devastation in his firstborn's eyes is enough to bring the hardened hunter to his knees.

It is the look of a little boy, confused and hurting and failing to make sense of his loss, desperately needing his daddy to fix it and make everything better again.

John painfully recognizes it as the same look Dean had on his face the night Mary died, and he also knows that he feels just as helpless now as he did then.

Sam isn't the only one that drew his line in the sand today, and he's also not the only one to do it for Dean, and yet Dean is the one that is here on this couch, trying to understand why the only other family members he has seem to feel the need to rip them all to shreds.

John is every bit the coward that Sam is, only he doesn't have youth to blame for his shortcomings.

It's not the time or the place to try to make his firstborn understand why he did what he did today, because he knows that Dean would never agree with him in a million years. He could never understand that maybe Sam is going to be better off in the end, far away from the hunting life.

Far away from the evil that threatens to claim him.

But John can't think about that anymore right now. There will be time to secure Sam's safety in his new life, but he's out of time for taking care of his eldest.

It's Dean that needs him now. It's Dean, already battered physically by injuries that would defeat a lesser man, and who is now losing his fight against his emotions as he leans against his father and finally allows the gut wrenching sobs of despair and anguish escape his chest.

And like he did the night Dean lost his mother, John carefully wraps his arms around his damaged son and holds him as he breaks.

Two brothers.

Each facing an uncertain future that neither of them have the first clue on how to cope with in their new situation. It doesn't matter who else exists on the periphery of their lives because they are both profoundly changed after today.

There's a gaping hole directly next to each of them. Unnoticeable by anyone but themselves. It used to the be the place where someone very special could always be found.

Friend, teacher, student, protector, comforter, partner-in crime. Brother.

But that person is gone now, and their absence is so utterly devastating that the world itself should come to a grinding halt in protest. Sharing it's grief that two parts of the same soul have been cruelly yanked apart, and rending the halves into an unholy and unnatural state that they were never designed to endure.

All alone against the world.

/