Hi guys! It's that time of the week again so a new chapter is here for you all! It's not as long as I would normally do it, but there is a lot of explanation and back story in this one and I didn't want to cram it all in her and not make it important, seen as we are building up to the end now. Anyway thanks as always to everyone who is reading, faving, following and reviewing. I know not many check out crossovers so I appreciate everyone one of you. Cheers! D.S x

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural or The Walking Dead. Any OC's are mine though.

Crossroads

Part Fifteen

"Dad," Dean said, it was whispered, almost as though he couldn't believe what was in front of him. For the young hunter it was a little surreal, his Dad, the one in his reality was dead. Had been for a year, sacrificing his life, just as Dean had, for the sake of one of his sons. So seeing him again, even in the context of all he had heard of the man named Negan. Dean couldn't help but feel happy. Negan said nothing, only came further into the room so he was looming over Dean. He reached out, Dean letting him grip his chin, tilting his head to the side.

"You look so much like her," Negan, John, his Dad muttered, examining Dean's face with fascination. "I never thought you'd look so much like her. Though the blonde hair seems to have grown out." Negan's fingers moved from his jaw to his cheek, Dean watched him, not sure how he was going to react. Finally Negan pulled away, taking a step back to the desk to lean up against it. "What do you know about me?" Dean was surprised by the question, but answered it all the same. The ingrained response he had to his Dad making him react.

"You're John Winchester," Negan smirked.

"Not so much any more," he said. Dean frowned.

"You married Mary Winchester."

"What was her last name?" Dean stalled a little. The question was probing, searching, Dean could tell he was being tested for answers.

"Campbell."

"Where were you born?"

"Lawrence," Dean answered easily. "Kansas.

"What happened the night your brother was born?" that made Dean flinch. He hadn't been expecting that. But the way Negan was watching him, perched on the edge of the desk, staring at him with dark eyes, making his leather jacket creak. Dean swallowed.

"The house burnt down," Dean answered carefully. He wasn't sure how much this man knew, or what he knew for that matter. Negan shook his head, though he didn't move.

"Why?" Dean shivered, the look levelled at him was so familiar. One that had been used on him when his old man was probing for information when Dean was hiding something.

"A demon," Dean said, being careful with what he said. "A yellow eyed demon." Negan stilled, body tensing as he looked at Dean. Suddenly he stood, stalking across the small distance between them, pulling Dean to his feet. The young hunter wasn't sure what was going to happen, whether what he knew had happened in his own reality, had happened here. He guessed it had, but he could never be sure and it made him question himself. However all that disappeared when strong arms embraced him, wrapping around his shoulders to pull him in close. Dean gasped, as though all the breath was being squeezed from his lungs, but the grip was no where near tight enough for that.

"Dean," Negan whispered. The hunter could feel the man's hot breath on his ear, along with the scratching of the scruff like beard that covered the man's jaw.

"Dad," Dean's hands came up, resting on his Dad's back, returning the embrace. His Dad's shoulders relaxed at the gesture, though he pushed back a little to look into Dean's face.

"I thought I'd never see you again," he whispered. Dean didn't answer, letting his Dad laugh, hands on his shoulders. "Look at you, all grown up."

"That happens," Dean said.

"Yeah," his Dad said softly, a look of sadness crossing his features, though it was wiped away quickly. A grin that Dean found strange to be on his Dad's face taking it's place. "But who would have thought? Father and son reunited, even when the world has gone to shit." Dean smiled a little at that, it was typical of the Winchester's to find each other, even when everything was falling apart around them. He and Sammy had done it. His Dad slapped him on the shoulder, shaking him from his thoughts. "Something must have been looking after you, I would have been devastated if Lucille had wanted a taste of you." That shook Dean from the pleasant route his thoughts had taken. He had been so caught up in the moment, of seeing his Dad, of reuniting with a family member, one that knew him in this strange world he had been thrown into that he'd forgotten what the man he called his Dad had done. Dean took a breath, stepping back, away from his Dad, as though being out of his close range would give him room to think.

"Dad, what's going on?" The man watched Dean, letting him step away from him, the he ran a hand though his hair.

"Ah, figured you wouldn't know much," he said. In a smooth movement he threw himself onto the bed, sprawling over the mattress like a lazy cat. Dean was tempted to sit down himself, he would have done, but he wanted to be able to think clearly and it had already been seen that he couldn't when he was so close to his Dad. He sat on the desk, knocking the tray out of the way, so that he was facing his Dad, whose dark eyes watched him. Dean was a little unnerved by the scrutiny, his Dad had never really paid too much attention to him, to focused on hunting and leaving the rest to Dean.

"You know what happened to your brother," Dean startled, it wasn't a question. The hunter swallowed and nodded.

"He died."

"Do you know why?" Dean didn't, but he could hazard a guess.

"The demon."

"It had already killed Mary, your mother, by the time I made it to the nursery. The room caught on fire. I was to slow, I couldn't reach the crib, the fire it just ..." he stopped, took a breath. Dean saw his eyes flicker as memories came back. "I was able to get you out, but Sammy ..." he trailed off and Dean felt despair run through him. Sammy, his baby brother had burned to death, in the house that had once been their home. It was a sobering thought. The same situation could have easily happened in his own reality, and where would he be? "The cops investigated, said it was an accident. I ... I was mess," his Dad shook his head, his leather jacket squeaking. "I couldn't cope with you. After what I saw, I didn't know how to handle it. I started drinking. You were only with me six months before they took you away." Dean tried his best to keep his shock from showing. This was the first he had heard of what had happened to his alternate self. Or himself, seen as he was now living this life. It shocked him, was this how things could have been for him? "I looked for answers. Hunted for a while," he shot an amused look Dean's way. "Maybe I should have kept it up. We might have run into each other." Dean smiled a little in return. He wasn't so sure about that. "It just became too much. The constant moving, being alone. Then I met someone." A fond look crossed his Dad's face and Dean felt a little spike of anger. In his own fuzzy memories of his time with his Mom, he could only remember his Dad looking at her that way. "She pulled me out as best she could. Fixed what she could. We were happy, stable."

"Why didn't you try to contact me, then?" Dean asked, his Dad shrugged.

"I didn't know where you were. I wasn't in Kansas anymore. I never went back there. You were only thirteen when I finally managed to get some of my shit together. And I thought ..." his Dad stared at him and Dean was shocked by the despair there. "I thought maybe you'd have found a family. I didn't want to ruin that for you. I hadn't been a part of your life since you were three years old. I didn't want to ..."

"Rock the boat," Dean answered for him. He sighed, it was a thing he could see his Dad doing. Hadn't he run off, separated himself from his sons when things had gotten difficult in his old reality? Leaving them to try their best to track him down with only a phone and a journal. Dean took in the man before him. The man that could and was his Father. He could see him walking away, thinking it was best for Dean, after all he'd sacrificed himself for him once before.

"I stayed with her, settled down. Then the dead started walking," his Dad laughed. "I probably don't have to explain much from there."

"Why do they call you Negan?" Dean couldn't help but ask. His Dad frowned, then shook his head.

"I took the name after I stopped hunting."

"You went by John Winchester then?"

"Just John," he said. "I didn't want to draw attention to the Winchester name, not after ..." Dean nodded in understanding. "Again, looks like I messed up, if I had gone by Winchester you might have found me sooner." His Dad fixed him with a searching look. "How long have you been a hunter?" Dean didn't answer right away, should he tell this man the truth? He was a hunter, or ex hunter at least. Surely, out of anyone, the man that was, should, is his Father would understand what he was saying. But the image of Glenn's smashed in head came to his minds eye, along with Abraham's. Dean shivered, he couldn't risk it, no matter what his memory wanted him to do. He took a breath, glancing away as though nervous, taking the time to come up with a story that utilised all that he had just been told. Luckily he was good at bullshitting.

"Since I was sixteen," kind of the truth, it was when he was allowed to hunt on his own from his old reality. "I was looking into the fire. Mom, Sammy. Came across a woman, Missouri Moseley." Again, not a lie. Dean and Sam had met the physic when they had gone to investigate their old house that had been rebuilt. "She told me what happened."

"She opened my eyes too," his Dad admitted. "After everything, she was the one that explained it to me. What had happened, how. It was after that I started to hunt for the yellow eyed demon."

"You ever find him?" Dean asked. He was curious, he knew how things had played out in his own reality, but here, he had no clue. His Dad smirked.

"Oh yeah, I found him. Don't worry son, I made him pay for what he did to us." Dean held in a flinch. It was in that moment that Dean could not see the man that had raised him, instead it was that man that had strutted around his group. Wire wrapped baseball bat in his hand, swinging it down to smash someone's head in.

"How?"

"I don't think I need to tell you that," his Dad said. "After we found such an interesting knife on you." Dean gaped, but his Dad just laughed. "Don't worry, we'll look after it. Hell, you might even get it back. How'd you get it anyway?"

"I ... I had a run in with some demons. One of them had it," true, it had been Meg's knife, before he and Sammy had claimed it. "Killed them and took it."

"You've killed demons?" Dean nodded and his Dad grinned. "That's my boy."

"You have demons here," Dean said, making sure not to phrase it as a question.

"Ah."

"Why?"

"That's complicated, Dean," his Dad said, sitting up from his sprawled positon, to sit on the edge of the bed.

"No it's not," Dean denied. "It makes no sense. Why do you have demons working for you? What are you doing? Why are you ...?"

"I take it you don't know what happened to most of the hunters," his Dad said. Dean stilled, then shook his head. "I'm surprised, then again you're young, not been in long enough to make the kind of deep connections that are made in the hunter community." Dean was pinned under a dark gaze, one that made it difficult to look away. "Most of the hunters were wiped out in the first wave. They sunk everything into stopping this thing before it could spread, but that plan failed and now we have no way of fighting back."

"But, the demons I met said you were gathering hunters."

"You've ran into some of my demons?" Dean choked. He shouldn't have said that. His Dad must have took his shock for fear though because he said. "Don't worry, I'm not to bothered about them. They need me, more than I have to keep them close."

"What do you mean?"

"I've barely managed to scrap together some hunters," his Dad said instead. "Since everything fell apart I've found three others, I don't expect there'll be more. But here's hoping."

"What do you want with hunters?" Dean asked. He shifted so that he was almost stood, tension thrumming though his system, putting him on edge and making him twitchy and unfocused. His Dad sighed, sliding to his own feet to cross to him. He placed a hand on his shoulder and squeezed.

"To protect them." That had Dean clicking his mouth shut. That had not been what he had expected.

"I don't ..."

"Dean, you've been trying to find a cure for all this, haven't you?" the young hunter flinched, but his Dad just smiled. "It's ok, I did in the beginning. So did the other hunters I've gathered here, along with even the demons who got trapped."

"Trapped?"

"But there's nothing that can be done. See Dean, all this, it's not the will of the supernatural," his Dad gestured with a hand around them. "They didn't plan for this to happen. You think they wanted their one and only food source to become the walking dead out there?" Dean gaped.

"But, how?"

"Humans, Dean," his Dad explained. "We did this to ourselves." The young hunter could say nothing. No, his brain denied, that couldn't be right. Nothing man made could do something like this, it just wasn't possible. But you weren't able to check out the CDC, a voice whispered in the back of his mind. It was gone by the time you got there, after that you just assumed. That was true, Dean had assumed after he couldn't confirm anything with the CDC that the cause of the walking dead had to be supernatural. But was that wrong?

"How do you know?" Dean asked, desperately trying to clutch at straws. "How can you know it's not supernatural. Or some demon didn't do it to try and take over the world and things just got out of hand? Why?"

"Because the hunters tried to stop it Dean," his Dad said. "They tapped into every supernatural source that they had available, and believe me, those people that have spent their lives hunting have sources that you would not believe. They couldn't find anything, and any cure they could come up with failed." Dean shook his head.

"No, it can't be ..."

"There is no cure Dean. We're all infected, we'll all turn and it wasn't the demons, or some spirit that did it to us. It was ourselves." Dean wanted to deny it again, but the more his brain mulled it over, the more he started to see it. He'd never seen anything like the Walkers back in his own reality. Never come across something similar in all his years of hunting. Maybe that was because there was nothing like this in the supernatural world. Plus it was true. Why would the demons, creatures and monsters want their food source, the world they craved to conquer to become a shell in habited by flesh eating monsters? It made no sense for them to do this, so that only left the other option. That humans did this, be it by accident or design, humans did it. A supernatural cure would not work on something that was done by humans. Sure a sprit could lift a gun, or make a plan crash, but they needed to possess someone in order to effect the word around them. Dean's mind went back to the demon in Bobby's basement, how she had said the higher class demons were retreating so far into Hell that they couldn't answer any summons. Then the wendigo spoke of the demons fear. Dean finally understood why they were so afraid. They couldn't stop this, they couldn't cure it. They probably couldn't posses the Walkers with them being rotted shells. The realisation almost had Dean falling to his knees, if it wasn't for his Dad's hands he would have collapsed.

"How though? What could humans have even been doing to cause all this?"

"We'll probably never know the answer to that," his dad said with a sad smirk. "Best guess? They were trying to cure something else. Cancer? Dementia? There's plenty of options available. Or it could have all been a new type of bio weapon." His dad was so calm. It was such a familiar thing, that it was so natural for Dean to lean a little into the man's frame. Seeking reassurance for something he had not seen coming.

"What are we supposed to do?" Dean whispered.

"We control it, kid" Dean jerked his head up, the smiling face of his Dad staring down at him. A wash of dread filled his stomach and the relaxed sensation he'd just had faded to nothing.

"What?" his Dad laughed.

"We take this thing by the balls and we do what we have to do," he said. "We can't cure anyone, even if we did they'd probably drop dead anyway. So we have to control it, make people fall in line so that we can survive this shit storm." Dean blinked, he wasn't sure it was because of the shock, or if he was just that confused, but he didn't get what his Dad was trying to say.

"What do you mean?" he asked. "We can't control this thing, it's not possible."

"Really? Then how do you explain all the survivors, the communities that have popped up? They learned how to control this thing Dean, it's weaknesses. Now we just have to get the survivors under control." The grin on his Dad's face sent a shiver down Dean's spine, it made him want to step back, but the desk blocked his way. Luckily the man seemed to sense his discomfort and moved away, though he still kept his gaze fixed on Dean's green eyes.

"Control the survivors?" Dean muttered. "Is that what you were doing when you killed Glenn and Abraham?"

"Ah now, don't be pissed at me," his Dad said, adopting a mock hurt look. "I needed to put those people in their place. You saw what they did to my compound." That had Dean flinching, oh yes, he remembered the compound. "Were you there?" the question caught Dean off guard and his Dad was able to see the recognition in his face. "I see. I'll have to punish you for that. You might be my son, but there's something you got to understand." Suddenly a hand shot out and fingers wrapped around his throat. Dean didn't have time to react, too stunned by the attack to really be able to counter it. His Dad, Negan, leaned in close, so that they were still looking at each other, but Dean felt an uncomfortable feeling run through his body. "What I say is law. Everyone here is Negan, and Negan is me. You do anything to fuck this up, then I'll make sure you feel the years worth of punishments you missed at my hand." Dean was frozen, so he didn't really register when Negan pulled away. His brain was having a hand time comprehending. This was still his Dad right? John Winchester? "I know it's hard, I had to hurt your friends. Hell, I might even have to burn down that place they call home." Dean's mind caught on to the last words, and his thoughts were filled with Kid.

"No!" he yelled, which caught Negan's attention.

"Oh, you fond of that place?" Dean fumbled, not sure how to respond. He was off balance and he couldn't think, he always messed up when he couldn't think things through. "Or is it a someone?" The smirk on Negan's face was enough to tell Dean he had seen how his shoulders stiffened. His fingers twitched, wanting to reach for a gun or a knife. "Ah, I see. Who is it? A pretty girl maybe? You're good looking, Mary was a stunner after all, but I'll take credit for the ruggedly handsome look you have going on."

"There's no one," Dean lied. Even though this man was his Dad, there was something about him, something that made him want to keep Kid as far away from him as he could. "I just stayed in that place for a while and kind of got settled. There's nothing there for me." Dean tried to force his brain to believe it, so that the lie wouldn't show in his body language. If this version of his Dad was anything like his own, then he was a master at reading people. Negan hummed, but didn't bring it up again.

"Well, who cares. I think I've spent enough time here, being the boss waits for no man," he winks, and starts to move towards the door.

"Wait, what's going to happen now?"

"Now?" Negan paused at the door, sending a smirk Dean's way. "You're going to rest up, boyo. After all the shit that's been going on, we better all take a break. Don't worry about you little community friends, your old man will take care of them."

"What about Daryl?" Dean asked, desperately. "What are you going to do to him?"

"Daryl? Oh you mean the hard case who punched me in the jaw," Negan's grin widened. "I said we don't kill that, waste of talent. He'll be inducted into the Saviours." The hunter could think of nothing to say to that. But he got the feeling that Daryl's induction wasn't going to be as simple as his own when he came to Alexandria. "Eat up and take a nap or something. You'll have your own meet and greet soon." Before Dean could say any more Negan, his Dad, was out of the door, pulling it shut behind him, sliding a lock into place. Trapping Dean in the room once more. The hunter stood there a moment, his confusion, rage, happiness, disgust and a well of other emotions he couldn't comprehend right then swirled inside him. Finally he took in a shaky breath, turning he kicked the bed harshly, so that it jerked a little in place.

"Son of a bitch!" Dean yelled, the pain in his foot giving him something to focus on, seen as he didn't know what to fix his own thoughts on first. Negan was his dad. Fine he could deal with that. But they weren't the same man. Hadn't he seen that from the first time he had set eyes on him? Wasn't that why he had hesitated to speak his thoughts aloud, not just because he doubted them. He's still your Dad though, the voice mumbled. Dean shook his head, not willing to admit part of him agreed with the voice. No, he couldn't get stuck on that, he had other, bigger things to think on. Like the Walkers. That was a revelation he was not expecting. All that work, those days, trying to figure out how to fix things in this reality. All to be told that there was nothing he could do? That the Walkers were a human made disaster, that not even the demons could combat. That made them so frightened that they were running as far as they could get. Dean remembered first landing in this world. Convinced it was Hell until the damn Gatekeeper had said otherwise. "That bitch," Dean muttered, rage engulfing him as he thought of the demon, being, whatever the hell she was. "That fucking bitch," he said. He clenched his fists, looking up at the ceiling above him. "Bet you're laughing your ass off now, huh? Tricked the stupid hunter that you would send him back if he save the universe, only to find out there's nothing that can cure the thing that's destroying it in the first place." A prick of tears came to his eyes, Dean squeezed them shut. He wouldn't let that bitch have his tears. "What was the point? You should have just let Hell have me. What was the point in bringing me here?"

"I told you, it would be a waste of talent if I let you rot down there. Though at the minuet I'm starting to question if I should have let you stew there a while longer." Dean's eyes snapped opened, he jerked to look at the bed, only to find the Gatekeeper, still in the guise of a young girl. A black satin dress with big red flowers, with a skirt that flared at the waist covering her form. The rage in Dean swelled and he reacted. Charging he pulled back a fist a drove it at the girls face. Just as he was sure he was about to make contact he fell forward, not connecting with anything so that he over balanced. He dropped to the bed, almost banging his head against the wall. "Oh now there's no need to be rude." Dean snarled, pushing himself back up to fix his furious gaze on the Gatekeeper, who had taken up a spot near the barred window.

"You lying bitch," Dean growled. The Gatekeeper frowned.

"I did not lie."

"Oh really? So you didn't leave out that there was no way to cure the Walkers. That there was nothing to stop them?"

"I never said you had to cure the Walkers," the Gatekeeper said, her calm, cool tone just riling Dean up all the more.

"No, you just said I had to save the world, stop it from spreading, make sure life wasn't wiped out. How the hell am I supposed to do that without being able to cure this?!" Dean shouted, loosing his grip on his already volatile temper. He clenched his fists once again, digging into his skin hard enough that blood welled up from where his nails cut the skin. The Gatekeeper sighed, arms crossing over her chest.

"I didn't figure how stubborn hunters could be."

"Oh you have no idea. If I had a way to kill you I would," Dean snarled. "Was this all some joke to you? Trick the hunter into thinking he has a chance of going home? Back to reality when really you just trapped him here in a place that might as well be Hell?"

"Oh you have no idea what Hell is like, Dean," the Gatekeeper said slowly, a hard look crossing her face.

"I think I've got a pretty good idea," Dean snapped back. "The dead are walking, everybody has to kill anyone that crosses them because no one trusts anybody anymore. My Dad ..." Dean trailed off, not sure what he wants to say about that. "He's ... well I don't know what he is. I don't know if he's even the same man I grew up with."

"He's not," the Gatekeeper said. "He is not the man who raised you. In fact he didn't even raise you here. He's had a different life, one you don't know about and that has shaped him to be a very different person than the one you knew." Dean swallowed, unsure how to take the Gatekeepers words. It was nothing he hadn't thought of himself. It had been so easy to ignore when they had just been talking. Dean easily slipping back into old ways, trusting the man that had the same face as his Dad, that was his Dad, but was more of a stranger than any other person Dean had ever met.

"What the hell do you want from me?" Dean muttered, his rage finally being over run by confusion and loss. He closed his eyes and pushed his face into his hands, as though they could block out the world. "I don't know what to do anymore." There was silence for a moment and Dean thought that maybe the Gatekeeper had left him to his despair.

"I never knew you would give up so easily," she said quietly. "At least I figured you'd have considered the other options, apart from the obvious." Dean lifted his head, fixing the Gatekeeper with a glare.

"What do you mean?"

"Dean," the Gatekeeper pinned him with her own hard stare. "Do you think I would have needed you if what was happening here was supernatural?" Dean stilled, mouth opening to argue, but the Gatekeeper didn't give him the chance. "If it was supernatural I would have left it to the hunters here, they would have come up with a counter, a way to ward it off. But human messes," she shook her hair. "You ever think why I didn't stop any wars? There were two that were pretty big, you know, almost ended the world right there and then, yet I couldn't stop them. Do you know why?" Dean's fingers twitched, making his palms ache as they disturbed the wounds that marred his flesh.

"I don't ..."

"Why does a crossroads demon have to do a deal? Why do spirits have to possess people that have similar feelings to their own? Why can't they just use anyone, with all the humans in the number of worlds across the universe, why can't the supernatural elements make humans do what they want them to?" Dean paused a moment, as realisation bloomed.

"Free will," he mumbled. "Humans have free will. Nothing can interfere with that."

"That's right. Humans chose to make this virus. Even if time was reversed and we got to do this all over again, those same humans would still choose to make the virus. Even if you went back and talked to them, tried to convince them, heck even killed them, it would only create another reality, another world, and this scenario would be played out in another in time. Nothing would change." The Gatekeeper breathed out a sigh. "But we can still save this world."

"How?" Dean said. "How can it be saved? There's nothing I can do to stop this, nothing." A tear finally escaped Dean's eye. "I'm trapped here."

"I didn't lie to you Dean. I will return you to your own reality, because you can save this world."

"But ..."

"People are still here," the Gatekeeper said softly. "Life is still here. You only have to preserve it, fight for it." Dean was surprised when a small hand clasped his. It was so cold, almost as though the Gatekeeper was made of ice. "And you have the best skill set for taking this on."

"What?" but when Dean blinked again the Gatekeeper was gone, leaving him alone once more. "Damn cryptic bitch," Dean muttered, flopping down on to the bed, exhaustion over coming him. "How am I supposed to figure anything out when you word it like that?"

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