Author's Note: References made to episode And Then There Were None. Still don't own any of the characters with the exception of baby Winchester.

Chapter Inspiration: Here Comes Goodbye by Rascal Flatts

Chapter 18

For the next number of days, Bobby and Sam were out on a hunt involving a brand-new monster the "Mother of All" had created, leaving Dean with Hermione. Unfortunately for Hermione, he was a distant, almost downtrodden Dean. She'd caught him with a glass of whiskey in his hands a number of times, but never said anything. If he wanted to talk about whatever he was dwelling on, he'd do it on his own terms. Hermione contented herself with re-reading Bobby's lore books, curled up in Bobby's arm chair during the day, and while propped up in bed at night. When she wasn't reading, she was cooking or straightening things up for the elder hunter. She felt it was the least she could do.

On the third day Bobby and Sam were gone, Dean made the excuse that he needed to do an oil change on Baby. He spent the entire day in the salvage yard working on his car. He even cleaned her top to bottom, twice. It was nearing sunset when he tiredly made his way back to the house, the weight of everything crushing down on him. He felt restless not being on the hunt with Sam and Bobby, combine that with the grief he'd experienced in the alternate timeline Balthazar had created when Hermione and his daughter were dead because he'd been off hunting. It left him with a very sick feeling to his stomach. He felt trapped into making a decision he didn't want to make. A decision that would hurt everyone, himself included.

Wearily, he made his way up the front steps, pausing before he opened the front door. He absolutely hated what was coming next. Pushing the door open after a shaky breath, Dean entered Bobby's home, listening for a sign as to where in the house Hermione was, he was relieved when he heard her up in the bedroom. He climbed the stairs, wiping any trace of the pain he was feeling from his expression. By the time he reached the doorway to their bedroom, his heart was pounding.

"Hey you, get everything sorted with Baby?" She asked him, a gentle smile on her face. Despite his moodiness, she still greeted him with a smile. It left him feeling worse than he already did.

"Yeah, she's good to go." Dean commented roughly, clearing his throat to ease the tension setting in.

"That's good." Hermione replied, her smile growing, her eyes kind.

"We need to talk." Dean led with the most over used line, ever. It made him cringe internally.

Hermione froze, her hand instinctively going to her stomach. She'd watched enough crappy romance movies to know what that line was followed by. "What about?" She asked Dean trying to mask her panic.

"I can't do it." Dean started, picking a spot on the floor to stare at instead of looking at the woman he loved.

"Can't do what?" Hermione asked gently.

"I can't be a hunter and a father. I refuse to put my child through what my dad put me through." Dean pushed the words he didn't want to say out.

"So, what are you saying? You've got options, you know." Hermione replied, grasping at whatever she could to convince him not to do this to her, to them.

"I'm saying, I'm a hunter, and I can't do both." Dean said firmly. He hoped it didn't sound like he was trying to convince himself of that, even though he was.

"Dean…" Hermione gasped, her world starting to crumble beneath her.

"No, I've thought about this. I've spent a couple of days thinking actually. It's for the best." Dean tried for a tone of finality. He assumed it worked when he saw the tears streaking down her cheeks.

"You can't, or you won't?" Hermione asked, her tone suddenly going cold.

"Both." Dean replied simply.

Hermione nodded once, and cast her eyes to stare at the ceiling. "I guess we'll be going, again, then." She whispered.

Dean's heart broke a little more, though he found just enough resolve to say "I think that'd be best." He forced himself to turn from the room, and carry himself back down the stairs. Before he registered his actions, he'd grabbed a bottle of whiskey and ran out of the house as if it were on fire. Ten minutes later, the crack of her apparating away pierced the silence, and what was left of his heart. And for the first time since Sam had fallen into the pit, a tear streaked down the older Winchester brother's cheek.

London, England

Hermione apparated to the only place she wanted to go to. Her parents' house, even though it was no longer her family home. The tears were falling harder now, and she brushed them away as fast as she could while staring at the blurry outline of the house. Nothing about it had changed in any way, though the world around it had. Hermione made her way, with her duffle bag down the sidewalk, making for a magical bed and breakfast she knew of nearby. When she reached the door, the kindly proprietor granted her entrance, booking her into a room.

She took the stairs carefully, seeking the shelter of her new room. Once she got there, she let herself in, dropped her bag and wand in the middle of the floor, pulled back the covers on the large bed, and crawled in to lie down. Once she was horizontal, she pulled the covers over her head and bawled.

Sioux Falls, South Dakota

When Bobby and Sam returned to Singer Salvage in the morning of the fourth day they would have been gone, they returned to an oddly quiet house. Sam and Bobby looked questioningly at each other. Either the couple were still sleeping, or something bad had happened in their absence. Sam took the stairs, deciding he should be the one to investigate this development. He looked towards the bedroom Dean and Hermione had been sleeping in. The door was wide open, but the beds were different. Moving closer, he saw that the twin beds were no longer pushed together. He also saw his brother sitting on one with a bottle of whiskey propped between his knees.

"What happened here?" Sam asked.

"Go away Sam, that's what happened." Dean replied, his S's not pronounced as sharply as a sober person's would.

"Where's Hermione?" Sam asked curiously.

"She's gone." Dean replied.

"What do you mean gone?" Sam felt horror slowly crawling across his features. What had his self-sabotaging older brother done this time?

"I mean, I told her I can't be a father, and sent her home." Dean explained slowly, as if Sam were unable to comprehend. "Now go away."

"You did what now?" Sam really was horrified now.

"You heard me, I'm not saying it again. It's over, whatever it, was." Dean replied, punctuating his statement with a generous swig from the bottle.

"Why?" Sam asked.

"I'm a hunter." Dean replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"So?" Sam enquired, interested to know where Dean's head was at.

"It's like you said Sammy, I can't be a hunter and not turn into dad." Dean replied, a scoff following the mention of their father.

"Dude, that's not what I said!" Sam defended, mentally facepalming himself.

"It's what you meant." Dean shot back bitterly.

"What the hell brought this on? I asked you a question that was supposed to convince you to take the job in England!" Sam yelled, trying to beat some sense into the shell of his brother.

"Yeah well, I got a glimpse of what would happen to them if I stayed in the picture." Dean continued.

"What are you talking about, now?" Questioned Sam suspiciously.

"Balthazar, he temporarily altered history. Cas allowed me to remember what life was like in that world." Dean said quietly, before taking another drink from the whiskey bottle. Before Sam could interject, Dean continued: "They were dead, Sam. Hermione and the baby, killed by the demon Isadore, because of me. Hell, she was dead the minute I brought her back here from the cemetery."

"Wait, what cemetery?" Sam asked, not knowing that Dean had met Hermione in the cemetery where he'd dived into the cage with Michael and Lucifer.

"The day you belly flopped into the cage, that's the day I met Hermione." Dean explained simply.

"Oh." Sam replied. "Dean, Cas allowed me to remember the altered reality Balthazar created when he refused to re-sink the Titanic too."

Dean's eyes flashed to Sam. "What?"

"Yeah, he wanted me to remember who fate is. The only person here who has no memory of it is Bobby, and that's probably for the best." Sam explained.

"Figures." Dean scoffed.

"Dean, I remember how you were. I don't want to see you turn into the person that you were then. Just go to her, dude. You love her." Sam pressed.

"Sam, I'm not having this discussion with you. She's safer an ocean away from me, and my daughter is better off not having me as her father." Dean shut down completely. He was hiding behind his fears, willing to hurt others before he got hurt himself.

"You're being an idiot, Dean. You'd rather hurt others than risk yourself getting hurt!" Sam argued, attempting to press him into making a different choice.

"I'm doing this to keep them safe! Yeah, I hurt her, but it's better she be emotionally hurt than dead!" Dean exclaimed.

"You know what the road to Hell is paved with." Sam warned.

"You should know better than anyone." Dean shot back before another downing more alcohol.

"That was a cheap shot, and you know it." Sam admonished.

"Isn't there a job needing to be worked?" Dean asked, needing a distraction from his brother's meddling.

"Research actually, on how to kill said 'Mother of All.'" Sam replied. "Bobby and I were going to go raid Samuel Campbell's lock up."

"He'll shoot your ass." Dean mumbled, drunker than he had been when he started this exhausting conversation.

"He can't. He's dead." Sam replied.

"Can't say as I'm too broken up about it. Just sad I didn't get to do it myself." Dean commented.

"Yeah well, we're going to go raid his library. Sober up while we're gone, why don't you?" Sam suggested, returning to the ground floor where Bobby was sitting in his study.

"Hermione's owl is here, seems to be looking for her. There's no letter." Bobby informed Sam when he spotted the winged creature.

"Do you suppose her owl can find her friends? Maybe send a letter to them and explain she's probably back in England, and suggest they help the bird find her owner?" Sam replied.

"Yeah, that's actually not bad." Bobby commented, already grabbing a paper and a pen. He scrawled a hasty note, shoved it in an envelope, and addressed it to Harry Potter. The owl took off immediately in search of its addressee. "So why's she in England?"

Hogwarts

Harry and Ginny had a rare off day, and were spending it with Ron and Hannah just spending time together. They were currently in the Gryffindoor common room, a fire roaring in the fireplace warming the space from the icy draft of late December. Ron was in the middle of telling a joke he learned from George, when Hermione's owl flew right to Harry and relinquished the letter in its beak to him. Taking the letter, Harry broke the seal and pulled the paper out. Unfolding it, he recognized that the letter had not been written by Hermione. A chill ran down his spine as he read Bobby's words:

Harry,

Hermione's owl showed up here looking for her. Dean's probably gone and done something incredibly stupid. Sam says she's probably back in England. This was the only way I could think of to help the owl find her owner. Thanks, and be safe, all of you.

~Bobby S.

"Guys!" Harry exclaimed once he was done reading. "Hermione is back in England, but Athena can't find her!"

"What do you mean?" Ginny asked, her feet that had been draped across Harry's lap, swinging down so she was in a sitting position.

"I mean, Dean broke up with her, and she returned to England, but apparently not to Hogwarts." Harry deduced.

"So, where is she?" Ron asked, his face going red under the heat of his anger.

"We could always run a locator spell." Hannah suggested placing a calming hand on Ron's arm.

"Do it, the sooner we find her, the better." Harry said, standing and pacing.