Author's note: I think this is to make up for the fact that we haven't seen much of Adam so far in the series. I hope we do, he's interesting to watch. Also I'm in the process of getting a beta and might have one by the next chapter or so.
-a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break-
"Are you excited for your birthday?" Adam nodded, a wide grin splitting over his face.
Kate Milligan smiled at her son as she pushed a plate of eggs toward him. "Eat, or you'll waste away."
"Right like that's going to happen."
She laughed and turned back toward the stove. "You still haven't told me what you wanted for your birthday and it's less than a week away."
He sighed, pushing the eggs around his plate. "I don't think you'll like what I want, mom."
"Adam J. Milligan, I swear to god. I already told you that I'm not getting you that violent video game-"
"I want to meet him."
She stopped, her body frozen. "What?"
"I said I want to-"
"Meet him." All of the air goes out of her. There is only one him that her son could possibly want to meet. The only him that really matters.
His mom's been silent for a couple minutes and Adam is kind of worried that she's lapsed into a coma or something. "Mom?" he says wearily, his hand reaching toward the phone in case he has to call 911.
Kate stares at him and then shakes her head. "I-I'll think about it, okay kid?"
That's pretty much a yes compared to her other answers which have all been flat out 'No. Ask me that one more time Adam and I swear….'
Adam grins, a large bright and shiny grin that makes Kate's heart twinge. She loves her son more than anything but is this really what he wants. Adam doesn't fully realize what he's asking, doesn't fully realize the dangerous that come with John.
Kate's aware of this information firsthand so why didn't she say no?
Adam jerked awake and fell off of the bench. He looked around confused but the park was peaceful, aside from the occasional kid shrieking and bird chirping.
"And that is what you get for sleeping on a bench." he muttered, stretching out his aching bones. All things considered that had been a good change of pace from his usual nightmares. Dreaming about his mom, nice and whole and alive almost made him feel happy.
After making the call to John yesterday all Adam could really do was find some place to sleep and with no money whatsoever the only place left was the local park. In retrospect it would have been better if he wasn't longer than the bench and if it wasn't so cold outside.
Stupid rain, stupid growth spurts.
And John wherever he was still wasn't here, if he even was coming.
He looked around the park trying to ignore the suspicious looks people were giving him. He didn't exactly fit in afterall. He was covered in dirt and grim and he couldn't even remember the last time he had a shower. It also didn't help that nearly every other teenager was in school right now.
He just didn't fit anywhere apparently.
He was kind of curious about what he should do if John didn't show up (and that possibly was becoming more likely). Where would he go? He'd always want to travel, to see more places then Windom, Minnesota. Somewhere warm would be cool, like a vacation almost.
How would he even get there? He had no money and hitchhiking wasn't the safest option.
Why couldn't he just enjoy daydreaming without reality coming in? sometimes Adam thought his brain was trying to be too responsible.
What if John did actually show up? Adam held no fantasies about what it would be like. It'd be awkward because things with John (Even if they were having a good time) were always awkward. It'd be more awkward because of the fact that John had another son, Dean. And if Adam didn't know about Dean then what were the chances that Dean knew about him?
Did they look like siblings? Adam mostly looked like his mom. They both had blonde hair even if Adam's was darker and they both had the same face-aside from Adam's eyes which were something from John's side of the family apparently-and his mouth. Adam thought they wouldn't look like siblings. At least not in the way regular siblings did. With his friends he could see the similarities they had with their siblings, Matt and his older brother had the same nose and they acted similar-the way they moved and talked.
He wouldn't have that with anyone. He'd accepted that along time ago. It kind of sucked that he could have had that chance. To have a brother. It'd just be awkward now.
-a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break-
"Hey it's Adam, Adam Milligan. I need your help. I wouldn't be calling if this wasn't an emergency but I need your help as soon as possible. Fuck, shit I don't even know why I'm still speaking. Look I'm in South Dakota, some town called Carlton, and…This was a bad idea. You know what just forget about it I can handle this-" John listened to the message again, trying to make sure that it was actually Adam.
John's mind was in overtime trying figure out why Adam would be calling. Two things happened concerning phone calls, either he called Adam or Kate called him. There had never been an instance where Kate couldn't call and Adam had too. Almost a month ago he'd gotten a call from Kate but she hadn't left a message.
Something was wrong. It wasn't just what Adam had said but the way he said it. He sounded-scared, tired, terrified, panicked-like something was wrong. On edge, almost the way a hunter would be while on a job.
There was no reason for Adam to be in South Dakota. And he hadn't said anything about his mom being in trouble just himself. He'd said it was an emergency…
Adam was a fairly independent kid which meant something had to have been serious for him to call John. If something had attacked Kate or Adam, if Kate had been hurt and Adam was left alone.
Bobby was closer to Carlton than he was. But Adam didn't know Bobby and if John was right then he would react well to a stranger right now. And besides he hadn't talked to Bobby in years.
He was in the middle of a case; a women in white, basic almost. Something that could be left alone for a couple days if he went and checked on Adam. If it was necessary then Dean could do it solo.
"Damn it kid, you better be okay when I get there." John looked around his hotel room before grabbing his bag and heading outside. He'd have to work fast, if he needed to be in South Dakota soon.
It wasn't that hard to find Adam. Carlton was a small town, small enough that even teen like Adam would be noticed. John could see him now. He was sitting on a bench, almost hunched over with his arms wrapped around his stomach. Even from this far away John could see the bandages peeking out from under his jacket, his right arm was entirely wrapped in them. Looking closer he could see that there was also bandages on his left arm.
"Adam?"
Adam jerked his head up and then winced.
John frowned, head injury?
The teen stood up and walked over towards his father. "Hey." he said quietly, wondering what to say.
"How bad are you hurt?" bluish eyes widened in surprise for a moment but then he tried to look calm.
"Not too bad, most of it's healed over." John's frown deepened. Healed wounds meant that Adam had been injured awhile ago, if it had been a while ago then why was he still covered in bandages and moving slower than normal?
"I have a hotel room, I'll check it out for you." John wanted to ask him what the hell was going on but Adam was still injured and they were still out in public where anyone or anything could hear them.
Adam opened his mouth to protest, because it'd been a month and he was mostly fine but John sighed, "Adam."
It was amazing how much hearing some say your name could mean when you'd spent most of a month being paranoid about who you could trust and spending the rest of it alone. It was nice to hear some care about him.
"Okay." he said simply, not up to fighting.
-a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break-
"Take off your shirt Adam." John instructed, already having a first aid kit pulled out.
Adam sighed. "It's really not that bad anymore."
"It might be infected, take it off Adam or I will." Seeing that John wasn't going to budge on this, Adam slowly, carefully, pulled off his shirt trying not to hit any of injuries.
John looked over at his youngest, silently taking in the amount of wounds. Adam's stomach was wrapped in bandages and gauze. Some of the cuts (bites?) peaked out from behind the white wrap, angry and red. His arms were in better condition-with bits of gauze on both of them, and band-aids on the less serious bites. "Who stitched you up?" If Adam was in this condition then how was Kate?
"I did, but it looked worse a month ago."
John looked back up at him, anger evident. "You waited a month to call me?"
Adam frowned, pulling his shirt back on. "You waited nine to call me." he pointed out irritated.
"I'm sorry about that. Things have been busier than usual lately."
"It's fine. I get it."
"Adam, I need you to tell me what happened." it was pretty clear now that Adam had been attacked by something and had been lucky enough to escape with his life. John was almost sure that Kate hadn't been so lucky.
Adam closed his eyes-
"What the hell is going on?"
"Why won't he scream?"
"What did you do to my mom?"
"She's dead. She's dead."
"Adam?"
"You fucking bastard, this time I'm aiming for your jugular!"
"Adam?"
"Why else? Revenge, which you can blame your daddy for."
- and shook his head. He needed to do this. John could help him, could help his mom. "We were attacked. They got to mom first, and they made themselves look like her. I don't know how but they did. I came home and I didn't notice anything was wrong at first. I got knocked out and well it was two days before I escaped. I'm sure you can guess what happened during those days. Anyway they made themselves look like me, they said it was because they 'took a bite out of me.'"
Involuntarily John's eyes traveled towards Adam's stomach, remembering all the wounds jutting out from the wraps. "They didn't want me or mom. They were waiting for you, they kept saying they wanted revenge. We were just bait, and dinner. One of them got fed up with waiting. He decided to cut his losses. I didn't want to die though so I fought him. I don't know how but I killed him and escaped while the other two were gone. I packed up as much as I could and ran. I've been running since."
"I'm sorry Adam."
"It's not your fault John. I was really angry at first, like Hulk Hogan angry but not anymore. You didn't do anything those things did. They killed my mom and almost killed me. You weren't even there."
John wanted to point out that if he had been there then Kate would still be alive and Adam would be in such bad shape. He didn't though. "Still I'm sorry."
Adam nodded. "Do you know what they were? They seemed to know you."
"I think I might have an idea."
"Can you kill them?" Adam hated killing and pain, he'd felt like throwing up after killing the vampire but this was different. They'd killed his mom-his mom who hadn't done anything to anyone. Who selflessly helped people on a daily basis. His mom hadn't deserved to die like that. No one did.
John stared at his son and then very slowly nodded.
"What do we do now?" Adam asked sitting down on one of the beds. "I don't know what to do."
Million dollar question kid. John didn't know what his options were. He couldn't leave Adam alone, not without Kate and not now. But Adam had already been through enough. "You'll stay with me and then we'll figure things out from there."
Adam nodded. "Okay."
-a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break-
"Does he know?" Adam asked staring out the wind. God, he was growing tired of cars. He'd spent nearly all of the last month getting in one, staying in one or getting out of one.
John didn't look over at him but Adam knew from experience that that didn't mean he wasn't listening just that John was trying to concentrate on something else too. "Does who know what?"
"Does Dean know you're a hunter?" It wasn't too hard to connect the dots. John was a hunter, whatever the hell that was, and Adam kind of had a feeling about what being a hunter entailed.
The car swerved for a second and Adam was sure that was more because of the 'Dean' part then the 'hunter' aspect. "You know about Dean?" John asked after getting back control of the car.
Adam nodded. "From your answering machine."
"Oh." John paused. "And he does know, he's a hunter too Adam."
"Oh." Adam echoed. "Okay, umm anything else I should know? Besides the illicit brother or am I the illegal one?"
John sighed, damn it I wasn't expecting to tell him anything else right now. "You have another brother, Sam."
Two brothers? Two brothers and it had taken three years and a near life or death situation to find out about them. "Huh." Why couldn't he say anymore than that? Shouldn't he feel outrage or hurt or something like that?
"Do they know about me?" Did they want to meet him? Would he want to meet them?
"No."
Thanks for saying it so nicely, at least he's honest.
"Are they younger than me or older than me?"
"They're both older than you-Sammy's twenty-two and Dean's twenty-six." So he was the illicit bastard sibling, nice to know.
Questions kept popping up in his head. What were they like? Did they like the same things? What was their favorite colors? Stupid things but those were important questions kind of.
"Where are we going?" He was almost positive that this was the longest most awkward conversation he'd ever had with John.
John sighed, " Honestly? I'm not sure right now. I had a case in Jericho but Dean's probably handled that by now."
"Cool?" Adam debated telling John about the vampire but figured that one horror story per day was more than enough. "I think I'm going to get some sleep."
John nodded.
And then silence.
And so started the first of many awkward long road trips that Adam would have to endure in his life.
-a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break, a line break-
Author's note: It's about a page shorter than the last one but this one took less time to right. My potential beta didn't answer so I'll be looking for another one. I'm not sure how John went, he's John which means he's stuff and kind of strict but he cares about his sons so I tried to make it seem like that with Adam too.