Syzygy
By Alone Dreaming
Rating and Disclaimer: See first chapter.
Warnings: Mild language, angst, bad usage of the word "syzygy"
Dedication: To Steph and my reviewers
Author's Note: Six of twenty. Still unbetad. On the bright side, the chapters are being posted regularly.
His brother grew up to be like their dad which was weird because he, not his father, had frickin' raised the kid.
But there was no denying it. Sammy radiated John. His looks, his temper even the way he walked was screamed to John. When he was frustrated, his brow would crinkle in the same fashion and when he was very angry, he would demand for respect in the same tone. The way he held a gun when he was aiming at a demon was an imitation of John's way of handling a weapon and the way he slept in bits and pieces was similar to John's own nighttime patterns. It was as though he'd raised a clone of his father without even realizing it.
He was left being the odd man out.
He didn't look like his father really and consequentially, he didn't look much like Sam. When he was angry, he shut down and refused to talk and when he wanted respect, he used his posture and eyes instead of his voice. He had his own way of holding a weapon and his own style of fighting, developed through different hunts and his father's teachings. And anyone who'd watched him sleep knew he slept like a dead man and would continue to for hours if he wasn't woken up. In the end, it wasn't that he was nothing like his father or his brother. He was just so incredibly different that they couldn't be compared.
He was even different in the reason he hunted.
Their dad had lost their mother. Sammy was too young to remember John before the Demon ruined their lives but he could. He remembered their Dad taking him to preschool, to Little League, to the park, and he could remember how their Dad used to smile. John didn't do that after their mom had died. His spark, his light, had died in a puff of smoke and flames. When the flames were extinguished, all that was left was the shell of their father and a lot of vengeance.
And no one understood that better than Sam. His girlfriend, the girl he planned on marrying, had left the same way their mother had. She'd gone up in flames because of the Demon and she'd left Sam in agony just like their mother had left their father. Of course, Sam's solution would be the same as their father's solution was: kick Demon ass until it begs for the kicking to stop and then shoot it until the begging stops as well. He could see the vendetta in Sam's eyes that echoed the one that so long lingered in their father's eyes.
They were the same, his father and brother; related through the same tragedies and on the same path to destruction.
He hunted because it was what he did. Hunting was no longer the thing he was forced to do. It was a part of him, permanently, and he doubted he would ever be able to settle down and be normal. There would always be lives to save and things to dispose of. Unlike his father and brother, he fought to save, to make sure no other little boys would have to grow up without a mommy or a daddy. If he happened to get a chance to kill the bastard that had made him this way, he'd take it, but it wasn't the top and only thing on his list. It didn't come before everything else.
So in the end, even though he'd been raised by his father and in turn, had raised an imitation of the man, the only syzygy he had in common with them was that he was on the same road of destruction as they were.