THSS 3
Master Post
Part One | Part Two | Part 3 | Notes and Acknowledgements (possibly spoilery)
***
John sat in his car in front of this kid Zack's house for almost two hours. Then a slightly overweight lady with a flowery dress and curly blonde hair escorted the boy to his bike waiting on the front lawn, handed him a bag of cookies and warned him to be home by the time it got dark.
John waited until the boy had pedaled off into the distance and the woman had shut the door firmly, then he started the car and found his way to the nearest pay phone. He fed a couple of quarters into the slot and punched the numbers in from heart. With every ring, John could feel the tension in his belly building, and it was a relief to hear his eldest’s slightly breathless “Hello?”
“Hey dude,” John greeted him, “Can you put Lance on the phone?”
“Yeah, sure,” Dean said, sounding distracted. Someone scratched along the receiver, and John could hear a faint, “It’s for you”.
“John?” Lance said as moment later.
“Why is my kid answering your phone?” John demanded to know.
“Is there something I can help you with?” the other man asked after a slight pause, his friendly tone suddenly sounding forced.
“I have a lead,” John told him. “I won’t be back today.”
“Oh… okay,” Lance murmured. “What should I tell the boys?”
“Tell Dean,” John answered, “he’ll handle Sammy.”
“I can-“ Lance started. John cut him off.
“If this thing goes south, you have to be prepared to get my boys the hell out of here. Dean knows what to do.”
“I-“ Lance began again, startled, but John didn’t have time for that.
“Have Dean tell you Pastor Jim’s number.”
The commanding tone worked even on the usually astoundingly resilient Lance, John noted with satisfaction. There was mumbling in the background, and then Dean’s voice as he spooled off the number, sounding bored.
“Good,” John told Lance when the man was on the line again. “Dean knows everything that needs to be done, and when to do it. Listen to him. I’ll check in as soon as I can. Clear?”
“Yes,” Lance murmured hesitantly.
“Good,” John told him, “Oh, and Lance? If I come back, and there’s a single hair out of place on my boys’ heads - you can bet your ass, by the time I’m through with you? You won’t be able to remember your name.”
He hung up with a certain satisfaction at the silence at the other end of the line and headed back to the kid’s house to scout out everything he needed to know.
***
It was appallingly easy for John to scale the side of the house in the cover of the approaching darkness. The roof was cold under his hands and the flimsy trees in the backyard offered no protection at all from the wind that was starting to pick up. His perch was right next to the kid’s bedroom window, however, if the Spiderman bed sheets were anything to go by, and perfect for keeping watch without being spotted by some overzealous parent.
He stayed out of sight while the kid was being tucked in, first by his mother, then his father. He waited patiently while the kid read under the covers until Daddy came back to tell him off. Then he found a spot where he could see inside and out equally well, and waited.
***
John lost track of time. The wind wormed its way under his coat, seeped into his skin and wrapped itself around his bones. Snapping twigs and rustling leaves made him jump. The scratching and mumbling of animals made him reach for his gun.
Inside, the house stayed quiet, silent. No one moved. Certainly no one broke in. When the sun rose over the horizon, John cast a long look at the still peacefully sleeping boy and collected his things.
He slipped away silently and strolled across the street like he hadn’t spent the entire night crouched on someone else’s roof.
He knew he looked fine. A little bit ruffled, maybe, but fine. And God help anyone who got in his way.
***
By the time John made it back to the manor, he felt like he was being held together by no more than a few measly strands of self-control. His head throbbed, his bones ached, and even he could tell he was about to lose his temper. He needed a shower and some coffee, preferably with a liberal shot of whiskey in it. When he opened the door, however, he was greeted not by soothing calm and quiet but by excited squealing.
“Daddy, look at my shoes!”
Not that John could, the way Sam was bouncing around like a Tasmanian devil. Dean was grinning quietly. Lance was watching him with a proud smile, and that in itself was not exactly helping John’s mood. Sam, apparently not noticing his glower, tugged on his hand.
“Look, Mister Lance got us shoes!”
“Stop bouncing, Sammy,” John said, “Let me see.”
Sam stilled obediently, letting John get a good look at his feet. At his feet, and his brand-new, store-bought sneakers without a single scuff mark or smudge. They looked nothing like the shoes John always got his kids from the thrift store. And they made him want to throttle something.
Very slowly, he turned and fixed Lance with his most threatening glare.
“Take them back,” he snarled.
Lance’s look of utter surprise would have been funny if John had felt at all amused. Dean was tight-lipped but hard to read. Sammy’s indignation, on the other hand, couldn’t have been clearer.
“Daddy-“ he protested. John’s finger aimed straight at his nose shut him up.
“Not one word,” John growled. “Lance, you hear me?”
Lance folded his arms in front of his chest. He looked more confused than defiant.
“I don’t understand why-“
“We don’t need your charity!” John exploded. He dimly registered Dean’s stricken look, the way Sam shrank back into the couch, but that just made him want to hit Lance even more.
“It’s not charity, John,” Lance protested, “I just wanted to do something nice for the boys.”
“I don’t care,” John hissed at him, “you take those fucking shoes back, right now, or there will be hell to pay, you got me?’
Dean grabbed hold of Sam’s hand and pulled his brother to him, inching both of them towards the door with wary eyes. Lance apparently saw it too, and his jaw hardened.
“You need to get some sleep. How about you go upstairs and take a nap and then we can-“
“There is nothing to talk about,” John interrupted. “You’re taking those damn shoes back and that’s final.”
He saw the look Lance gave Dean, the nod towards the stairs, but he let his boys scuttle away without protest.
“Do you always have this much pride, John?” Lance asked wearily, “Or is that just when you’re being especially insufferable?”
“And what’s wrong with pride, huh?” John sneered at him. “Doesn’t fit into your ideal of the poor souls that need saving?”
“It’s hurting your children, John,” Lance snapped, but it sounded a good deal softer now. John hoped that meant he was going to give up soon.
Lance looked at him like he was expecting an answer. When John didn’t say anything, the cross expression just seemed to slide off his face and he sighed.
“Go to sleep, John,” he said.
John made his way across the deserted hall and up the stairs - his boys were nowhere to be seen - and dropped into bed, clothes and all, just wishing for this day to be over.
***
He didn’t fall asleep, of course, just dozed for a while until faint scuttling brought him back to full consciousness. John cracked his eyes open just in time to see Sammy’s head pop up beside the bed.
“Hi Daddy,” the boy chirped. John winced.
“Hi Sammy,” he whispered. He waited for a moment, but his son stayed uncharacteristically silent. “What’s wrong?”
Sam chewed on his lip, looking thoughtful. He had snot on his upper lip like he had been crying. John didn’t quite manage more than a boneless flap of his arm, but Sammy didn’t waste any time scrambling up on top of the bed and snuggling against John’s side. Silence settled around them while the boy fiddled with the covers, his hair catching in John’s beard.
“I really liked the shoes,” Sam finally said.
John closed his eyes.
“Yeah.”
“I don’t like it when you yell,” Sam told him. His small hands rested on John’s muscled forearm. His hair smelled soapy and clean, like a shampoo that John hadn’t gotten him.
“I wasn’t yelling.”
Sam shrugged, wiping his nose on his sleeve.
John let his eyes drift shut and just concentrated on the boy’s breathing, in and out, nice and even and alive. He blinked when Sam turned his head and rested his cheek against John’s chest.
“You wanna read to me?” he asked.
John sighed; watched the fine hairs on top of Sam’s head quiver.
“I have to go do something for work, Sammy,” he said.
Sam twisted in his arms until he could look John in the face. His eyes were gleaming.
“I wanna come!”
John sat up and swung his legs over the edge.
“You can’t,” he said wearily.
“But I wanna,” Sam said, already pouting, his hands scrabbling for John’s leg. John tried to pry them off.
“No, you don’t, Sammy,” he said.
“Do too,” Sam protested. He let go of John’s pants only to latch onto his arm.
“Fine,” John finally conceded, pushing the boy away when he made to hug him, “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
With a cheer, Sammy leapt off the bed and trampled down the stairs. John followed at a more leisurely pace, taking a moment to rinse out his mouth in the bathroom. It couldn’t hurt, taking Sam to the library with him. John was fairly certain that he wasn’t going to find anything anyway, not with the way this day - hell, this hunt - was going.
It was fairly easy to follow the noise Sam was making to the kitchen. The kid was bouncing around the kitchen table were Dean sat, carefully sorting the toaster into its individual pieces. John wasn’t surprised; it was the way Dean calmed down. The only reason he wasn’t meticulously cleaning the guns was that he wasn’t allowed to do it where Sammy could see.
“Daddy’s taking me to work with him,” Sam informed his brother, half hanging over the tabletop. Dean gave John a questioning look. When John nodded, he bit his lip and concentrated on the toaster again.
John snapped his fingers, drawing Sam’s attention.
“Get ready to go, kiddo,” he said. “Put on your shoes.”
“I already have!” Sam protested, pointing. John couldn’t help noticing that he was wearing his old pair again - Dean’s doing, no doubt.
“Get in the car, then.”
Sam nodded and scampered off. Seeing Dean follow his departure with his eyes, John reached over and ruffled his son’s hair.
“You gonna be okay, dude?”
Dean nodded. He was paler than usual, his smile strained, but he waved them off without a word of protest. Thankful, John offered him a smile in return. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.
***
The library was calm and cool and soothing, and surprisingly quiet. Getting rid of Sam had been a matter of showing him the more advanced books in the kid’s corner. Sam had practically scrambled from his arms and John had been free to hunt down a librarian and make her haul out all the old newspapers, microfilms, and family chronicles she could find.
Not that it helped. John spent an hour or two breathing in age-old dust, found about a dozen or so people who died violently but no one who even remotely fit the description, and earned himself stern glares from the librarian in charge on two different occasions when he lost his patience and started to curse.
He was so engrossed in his research that it took him a while to notice the limpet clinging to his knee.
“Daddy?” Sam finally asked.
John sighed. He stopped staring at his book, which was admittedly neither interesting nor helpful, and turned to look at his kid.
“Yes, Sam?”
“What are you reading about?”
John turned back and flipped a page.
“Local legends.”
“Why?”
“Work.”
“Are you gonna take a lot longer?”
John pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Ask me an easier question. Something like, ‘Why is the sky blue?’”
“Why is the sky blue?” Sam echoed obediently.
“Because light has different frequencies that have different colors, and something about air molecules that I don’t remember.”
John half expected Sam to protest, or to keep asking, but the kid just slumped over John’s lap with a sigh.
“I want Dean,” he complained into John’s thigh.
“I told you that you didn’t want to come,” John reminded him mildly. He pushed his son upright. “Why don’t you go read a little bit more, hmm?”
“I don’t wanna read anymore,” Sam grumbled, “I want Dean.”
Normally, John would have probably blown a gasket by now, but he was feeling surprisingly mellow as he detached Sam from his leg and stood.
“Where are we going now?” Sam asked, grabbing hold of the fabric of John’s denims.
“To make a phone call.” John held out his hand for Sammy to take. “Come on.”
***
Sam scowled when John passed him over to Dean.
“You’re mean,” he told John. Dean tried to take his hand, and, glaring, Sam let him.
“You’re bothering me,” John retorted, “I need to focus.”
“Taking a break could help,” his oldest offered. He hadn’t said anything so far, not when John had called and not when Lance and he had pulled up in Lance’s rust bucket of a car. John tilted his head. It sounded logical - and definitely like something Dean would say when he was starting to get worried about something.
“A break,” Sam cheered, “I wanna go to the playground.”
He started to drag Dean down the street by his hand while John’s oldest shot him a shrug and a grin. John waved them off. He leaned down so he could talk to Lance through the open window.
“We’re going to the playground, apparently,” he said, “You gonna wait here?”
There seemed to be the hint of a smile on Lance’s unusually stern face.
“I have a friend who lives close-by and whom I haven’t seen in a while. Shall we meet back here in, oh, say an hour?”
John nodded.
“Enjoy yourself,” Lance said and drove away before John could say anything else.
***
The playground John remembered was easy enough to find. Sam took off running for the swing with an elated war cry, Dean trailing after him. It wasn’t until they were on the other side of the playground that John realized who else was here, and his heart sank.
Leah hadn’t spotted him yet. She was watching the few children that occupied the playing area with hollow cheeks and eyes. Her skin was grey and her clothes seemed to sag off of her as if she had lost ten pounds in three days.
Before he could back away, she seemed to notice his stare and looked up. John sighed and walked over, sitting awkwardly next to her.
“Are those your boys?” she asked with a raspy voice, nodding her head in the right direction. John was grateful for it, it meant that he didn’t have to ask something ridiculous like “How are you?”
“Yeah,” he said, “the loud one over there, that’s Sam.”
He pointed at his five-year-old that had already managed to befriend an equally tiny, curly-haired beauty and was now wooing her into giving him her shovel. John wouldn’t have been surprised if she punched him in the nose.
He looked around for Dean and found him trotting towards them, sand coating his knees and an aloof air about him that clearly said he was too old for this kind of thing. John pulled him between his knees.
“This is Dean,” he said.
“Hi Dean,” Leah offered, forcing a thin smile. “How are you doing?”
Dean edged closer, keeping on hand on John’s knee for support, and tilted his head at her.
“Are you okay?” he finally asked. Leah started but managed a shaky laugh.
“No, Dean. I’m not okay.”
“Why not?”
Leah gave John an unreadable look over the top of John’s head before she met his son’s eyes again.
“It’s because I lost my daughter last week, Dean,” she said, her voice shaking, “And I’m very upset about that.”
Dean nodded. He slid up on the seat between John and Leah and turned fully towards her.
“When my mom died I was really upset too.”
Leah carefully avoided John’s eyes that time.
“When was that?” she asked quietly. It struck John as an odd topic for small talk, but hey, anything you could connect with people over.
“A long time ago,” his son told her, “I was four. I was sad for a while, but I needed to be strong for Sammy, you know?”
“That’s nice,” she said shakily, “I mean, that you had someone to take care of.”
“There’s always someone to take care of,” Dean told her. “Don’t worry, you’ll find someone.”
Leah smiled brokenly.
“Dean, I don’t really want to find someone. I had someone. I just want my daughter back.”
Dean nodded knowingly, a veteran to loss. John swallowed around the sudden lump in his throat.
“She’s not coming back,” his son said mercilessly, “You know that.”
She nodded, looking torn between hysteria and loathing, and Dean belatedly softened his statement with a smile.
“But I have a friend who’s a pastor, and he told me that we will see the people we love and lost again when we go to heaven.”
“Do you believe in heaven?” Leah asked in reply.
“No.” Dean shook his head. “But if there is, I know that your daughter will be there, and that you’ll see her again.”
Without warning, Leah started to cry. It wasn’t hysterical sobbing, just quiet tears streaming down her face. Dean dug out a clean tissue that he had learned to keep around for Sammy and handed it to her.
“You’re an extraordinary boy, Dean,” she said quietly.
Their conversation was cut short when Sam’s new girlfriend chose that moment to push Sam over, grab the shovel and run triumphantly back to her mother. Sam didn’t cry - though he looked like he wanted to - but he did come over, sand on his shins, elbows, and butt, and crawled on John’s lap.
“I wanna go,” he mumbled.
John didn’t sigh.
“In a minute. Sammy, this is Leah.”
“Hi,” Sam said with a short wave, “Daddy, can we go?”
John did sigh this time, but he arranged Sam’s legs around his waist and stood.
“Come on, dude,” he said, “Leah…”
She nodded, like she understood everything he wanted to say but couldn’t. She smiled thinly.
“Maybe I’ll see you around.”
John didn’t meet her eyes when he nodded.
“Dean.”
Dean slid off the seat and lightly touched his hand to Leah’s knee.
“I’m sorry for making you cry.”
Her smile was startled but real.
“Don’t be, Dean,” she said, “It wasn’t a bad thing.”
Dean nodded. He seemed lost in thought all the way back to the library, hardly noticing the hand John kept on his shoulder.
***
When they reached the large building, Sam suddenly struggled to be put down.
“I gotta show you this book, Dean, it’s about trains, it’s supercool.”
“Oh no.” John caught his youngest by the shoulder. “I made Dean come out here because you didn’t want to be in the library anymore, and you’re going to go home with him now, you got that?”
Switching gears, Sam stalked off with a huff, pulling Dean along with him to Lance’s waiting car, and John headed back inside, ready to solve this case.
***
Three hours later, John was more than ready to set the next family chronicle of the Smiths or the Jacksons that he found on fire. With a sigh, he began shoveling papers and microfilms back into the box. It was getting late, anyway, already approaching dusk. He hadn’t checked on his boys in a while; he just needed to see them for a minute, to make sure they were still all in one piece.
Leaving the files on the table for the librarian to sort out, he snagged his coat off the back of his chair and headed out.
***
John broke just about every speed limit in Montana on his way home, but the knot in his stomach didn’t dissipate until he’d parked his car next to Lance’s and pushed open the door.
“Dean?” he called, “Sammy?”
“Daddy!” Sam came running from the next room and flung himself into John’s arms. “You’re back!”
He giggled when John heaved him onto his hip; John reveled in the feeling of the heavy, warm body in his arms.
“Dean’s hurt,” Sam announced right by his ear.
John fought back the urge to drop Sam and go running for his eldest. He’s fine, he told himself, willing his heart to stop hammering away in his chest, Sam wouldn’t be this nonchalant if he weren’t fine.
“How did he get hurt, kiddo?” he asked calmly. Sam squirmed in his firm hold.
“He walked into a door,” the boy giggled, “Mister Lance cleaned him up.”
He was fine. Dean was fine.
John hugged Sam a little tighter and walked into the kitchen with cool, controlled steps. Dean grinned at him. He sat majestically before a gigantic plate of cookies and a large glass of milk, swinging his legs. Lance pushed away from the chair he had been leaning on to give the new arrivals a smile. Sam twitched and John put him down.
“Hey buddy,” he said tightly, “you okay?”
“Fine, Dad,” Dean waved him off with what looked like mostly eaten peanut-butter-and-chocolate-chip, “Just hit m’head.”
“I’m afraid I opened a kitchen cabinet at a rather inopportune time,” Lance added with a sheepish smile.
John nodded at the plate of cookies.
“Did you give Sammy any of those?”
“Of course, Dad,” Dean replied indignantly, “Until he started to feel sick.”
John caught Sammy by a shoulder and peered at him closely.
“You doing okay now?”
Sam bit his lip.
“Can I have more if I say yes?”
“No.” John slid his hand under the boy’s armpits and settled him against his chest.
“Come on, boyo, time for a nap. You’re looking a bit green around the gills.”
He ruffled Dean’s hair on his way to the stairs and could almost feel his oldest sit up a little straighter.
***
“People don’t have gills,” Sam informed him primly over supper that night.
John sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. He had half been hoping he could have a drama-free dinner for once.
“I know that, Sam,” he said.
Sam frowned at him, like he couldn’t quite figure out if John had been lying earlier or if he was lying now.
“But you said my gills were green.”
John rolled his eyes at the ceiling and took a deep, fortifying breath.
“It’s just an expression, Sam,” Lance quickly chipped in.
“But it’s silly,” the boy protested. Dean tried to take his arm and pull him down in his seat, but Sam shook him off. “It is!”
John pushed his plate away.
“Yes, it’s silly. Expressions aren’t always accurate.”
“But then why did you use it if you know it’s not true?” Sam pressed, and John lost his feeble grasp on his temper.
“Damn it, Sam, I am not having this argument with you!”
“Why?” Sam asked peevishly, “Because you know you’ll lose?”
“Enough!” John thundered. He brought the flat of his hand down on the table with a sharp noise, scowling at his youngest. Sam burst into tears. Lance put his fork down quietly and stared at the wall somewhere to the right of Dean’s head, looking nauseated.
John pointed at Sam’s plate.
“If you’re not going to eat that, then you can go to bed now.”
Sam slid off his seat without a word even though it was still way before his usual bedtime. Dean waited for John’s nod, then he was off like a shot, catching up with his brother somewhere on the stairs. Sam’s crying increased in pitch for a moment and then tapered off as the two disappeared upstairs.
John put his head in his hands. Lance rose without a word, collecting their plates - even John’s - and rinsing them off in the sink. Then he turned and headed towards the hall.
“Lance,” John said. The man stopped in the door, resting one hand against the frame, and met his dark gaze without backing down.
“Yes?” he said, as politely as ever.
“Don’t judge me,” John growled at him, his heart tight in his chest. He wanted to smash something. To fix something. To make everything okay again.
Lance blinked slowly at him. His expression softened a little, but it remained as carefully neutral as ever.
“Good night,” he said calmly. His slippers made soft sounds on the floorboards, a slight drag-and-thud that crept up the stairs and along the hallways above.
John groaned. He was so tempted to just sit there for the rest of the night, just him and a bottle of whiskey. No hurt feelings, no little boy tragedy. Tempted, but he had work to do.
With a sigh, he put his still empty glass in the sink and found his stack of notes. He set a pot of coffee to brew and started spreading out his files, print-outs and newspaper articles on the kitchen table. He began arranging them into chronological order first, Dead Kid Number 1’s picture, obituary, parents’ statement, then Dead Kid Number 2, then Number 3. There had to be a pattern, he just had to see it. There was always a pattern.
The clock ticked steadily forward as he worked, arranging and rearranging files, circling things that jumped out at him, taking notes. He first heard the shuffling footsteps after about an hour. He tracked Dean’s movements almost automatically. To John’s bedroom, to the bathroom, to John’s bedroom again. Dead Kid Number 7, Amber Olstenberg, five years old, younger brother called Daniel; parents young and happily married. The footsteps were on the stairs now, across the hall, but John didn’t look up.
Dean slid into the other chair and pulled a stack of newspaper clippings towards him. He didn’t say anything, and John didn’t comment. He pulled out a photocopy from a book of urban legends. There was a cheery little drawing of a girl with sparkly wings and a wand, and a dazzling smile.
“Apparently, the Tooth Fairy used to be an evil witch,” John said. Dean looked up.
“Says here that medieval witches would burn your teeth to gain power over you, and that you should salt and burn it in order to keep it away from them. And to have to avoid looking for it after death.”
John grinned at his kid.
“Naturally, that version isn’t too popular nowadays.”
“Legends change,” Dean said quietly. John nodded.
“They do. But they usually keep on some of the facts.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know.” John scratched his chin.
“So the tooth fairy comes when someone loses a tooth,” he mused, “that’s the way the story goes.”
He spread out the pages of notes before him, all those pictures of grinning little children.
“And they all did,” he said quietly, “Mickey and Kevin and Lauren, and the other five, they all lost teeth. But Zack was the only one who didn’t get hurt.”
“Maybe their families had something to do with it?” Dean offered. He was watching John intently.
“No, no, their family backgrounds are all over the place. Mickey’s parents are poor, Melanie’s are loaded, Zack is an only child, Kevin has three younger sisters, Sharon is divorced, it just doesn’t add up.”
Dean blinked at him, but John hardly noticed. He picked up a grainy photograph of a gap-toothed, grinning boy, Dustin Coleman, 9 written underneath, and moved it to the side.
“Unless… Dustin lost his tooth because he hit his face on the bathroom sink, that’s bound to be painful. Kayla fell on the playground. Mickey got in a fight. Lauren managed to get on the wrong side of her pony.”
He waved another photograph at his son.
“Kevin and Amber, they lost their teeth in some brutal way too. In fact,” he concluded triumphantly, “The only kid out of all of these who didn’t get hurt? His tooth just fell out. So what if it’s not just attracted by the teeth - what if they have to be combined with blood?”
John was so lost in this revelation that he didn’t notice his son’s silence until the boy spoke.
“Daddy.”
Dean’s voice was strangled and, when he looked up, John could see he was white as a sheet.
“What is it, dude?” he asked. Dean reached into his pocket. His knuckled were white as he turned over his hand and opened it with some effort to show John the small, red-smudged tooth resting innocently in his palm. John closed his eyes. Of course - the cupboard that had hit Dean in the head, the comfort food, Sam’s announcement that Dean was hurt.
Dean looked like he was about to cry. John could really understand the sentiment.
Well, fuck.
***
“Are you sure this will work?” Dean asked once again when he sat in his bed, covers collected protectively around him.
“We don’t really have a choice, Dean,” John told him, “We could try to leave here, but I don’t know if that would help. I’d rather face that thing here when I’m prepared than in unfamiliar territory after an hour-long drive.”
Dean nodded unhappily. John sat down on the bed with a sigh.
“There’s no other way, dude, you know that. It’ll be fine. Stiffen up that upper lip, okay?’ he said, stroking his hand over Dean’s hair.
He tried to pull away, but Dean’s hand tightened in his t-shirt, almost choking him. John gently eased it off.
“I’m going to be right over there,” he said, pointing at the chair positioned behind the door, “We discussed this, remember? I’m not going anywhere.”
Dean nodded but wouldn’t quite look him in the eye. John sighed. He reached into his shirt and fished out his dog tags, pleased when he saw his son’s eyes light up. Dean bowed his head to allow the chain to slip over his neck. John tucked the tags under the boy’s t-shirt.
“Remember what I told you,” he said.
Dean nodded and turned around, pulling the covers up to his neck. John switched off the light.
“Do you think Sammy’s okay in the other room?” Dean asked after a moment.
“He’s fine,” John answered, “Now sleep.”
He was surprised when the boy actually obeyed. Snuffling and sighing, he drifted off into an uneasy slumber, sitting up every twenty minutes or so with a half-whispered “Dad?”
“Right here,” was John’s unfailing answer and each time, the boy would nod, seemingly satisfied, and roll over again. Jon himself sat silently for what seemed like hours on end until his nerves were rubbed raw with tension and he could feel his heartbeat in his fingers. He was just about to screw waiting and go out and find the thing himself when he heard something out in the hall. Soft footsteps whispered closer and closer. John had already cocked his shotgun when he finally recognized the soft patter of bare feet against the floor.
God, and he’d thought this night was going badly.
The door squeaked open just wide enough for a small head to peak in.
“Dean?”
“Go back to bed, Sam,” John snapped. He could see the boy jump and whirl around, squinting at the shadows behind the door.
“Daddy?”
“Bed. Now,” John told him.
Sam pointed at Dean’s bed.
“No, your own bed,” John said. The sheets rustled as Dean sat up slowly, gathering the blanket around him.
“Sammy?” he asked.
“Can I sleep in your bed, Dean?” Sammy asked, already pulling at the covers. John could feel his grasp on his temper slipping.
“No, Sam, don’t-“
He reached for the kid but his son danced out of his reach.
“I want-“ the boy began, and then John heard it: quietly shuffling steps dragging down the hallway, a soft whisper that raised the hairs on John’s arms. He snagged Sam’s t-shirt and pulled the boy between his legs, clamping his hand over the defiantly opening mouth.
“Listen to me, Sam,” he said, his voice taking on the tone that even guys two, three years his senior hadn’t dared disobey, back in the jungle.
“I’m going to let you go, and you’re going to climb into the closet and shut the door, and you’re not going to come back out until Dean or me come get you. Is that understood?”
He lifted his hand from Sam’s mouth to hear the whispered “Yes, sir.” John let go of him and Sam scampered towards the closet, pulling it firmly shut after him.
John nodded. “Dean.”
His oldest was sitting ramrod straight, his eyes brilliant reflections in the darkness.
“Sir.”
John opened his mouth to give out last minute instructions, but whatever he had wanted to say was lost when the door creaked open and the tooth fairy stood in the room.
It was surprisingly tall for the whole ‘hiding under the pillow’ spiel, a little taller than Dean. It was hard to make out details in the dim moonlight, but John could see enough to know he wanted this thing nowhere near his kid. It stood like a tree battered by the wind, hunched and crooked, fingers more like claws, teeth like fangs. With its long, tangled hair and the tattered sleeves s trailing after its body like wings, it did look a little like the tooth fairy from hell.
John wasted no time contemplating the irony of all the children waiting for the tooth fairy, for this, to come. He raised his shotgun and fired a round of rock salt straight into its belly.
He hadn’t expected the thing to wither and die, but it didn’t even flinch. It batted John away with an outstretched arm, smashing him into the wall, and made a grab for Dean. John snatched the shotgun from the floor and fired another shot that, even if it didn’t actually help, at least focused the creature’s attention on John again.
He winced at the sight of sharp fingernails coming towards him, thinking fast, trying to figure out how to beat this thing. He hardly saw Dean jump the gnarled body from behind, the way he wrapped his arms around its neck and his legs around its waist, the way he sunk his teeth into its shoulder. He heard the wail, though, the pained cry as dark blood welled up and ran over its skin. Dean, as surprised as the creature at this sudden turn of events, loosened his hold. The fairy tossed its head and caught Dean in the nose; the boy squawked and fell back against the bed in a crumpled heap, and in the split second it took John to decide whether to check on his boy or take it down, now that he knew its weakness, the creature made a break for the door and disappeared into the darkness.
John followed at a more leisurely pace. He checked behind the door and up and down the hallway before he followed the shuffling steps down the stairs. They were surprisingly hard to maneuver down with a shotgun at the ready, but the creature’s footsteps were slow and interspersed with heavy breathing, so John took his time rounding the last turn. He lifted the shotgun again as everything became clear, like cogs clicking gently into place. If teeth were the only thing that could hurt this creature, that this thing was afraid of, then of course it would get rid of the kids’ teeth before it dragged them off to wherever.
Well, John would drag that thing to hell himself before he let it get to his boy.
The hall was dark and wide, a death trap if John had ever seen one. The only light came from the porch light that had been left on outside. John stepped forward carefully, jerked back when he saw the thing launch itself at him from out of the corner of his eye. He distracted it with a smack in the head with the butt of his shotgun, grabbed its arm and sank his teeth deep into its shoulder, right where Dean had gotten it before. It clawed at him with a howl, then whimpered and shuddered when John didn’t let go.
John let it drop on the floor and shoved his gun out of the way with his foot. The creature croaked pitifully. One hand scrabbled out, weakly rising in defense. John kicked it aside, reveling in the sound of breaking bones, the groan of pain. He dropped to his knees by its neck. One hand, he slid under the back of its head, the other under the shoulders and lifted, sinking his teeth into the tender skin in between.
Sweet copper filled his mouth. He could feel the veins pulsing underneath the skin, the gasps and groans music to his ears. He took a moment to smirk before he clamped his teeth into the leathery tissue again and managed to tear loose a piece of skin. He sank his teeth into the soft flesh, again and again and again until there was nothing there anymore, no life, no danger, no threat.
He dropped the limp body and spat. He wiped his hand over his chin but only succeeded in smearing blood everywhere. He automatically found himself looking around for something else to kill, but there wasn’t anything.
“John?” he could hear someone asking through the roar of his own blood in his ears. He turned to find Lance standing a respectful distance away, a scarlet night robe wrapped tightly around his body. For the first time since John had met him, the man actually looked… young. He wasn’t even looking at John, just staring at the creature, at the bite wounds on its neck. His mouth had dropped open. There wasn’t even horror on his face, just disbelief. John spat again to keep from grinning. He couldn’t help but wonder if the man had known what he was inviting into his home when he had made that call.
Lance took a step forward, tugging his robe closer around him as if he were cold.
“Is it dead?” he asked quietly.
John looked around. Dean was standing at the top of the stairs, Sammy wrapped around his legs like an octopus. Even in the sparse light, Dean looked pale. The hand resting on Sammy’s head was calm and sure, but the other, the one hanging at his side, was shaking so badly John could see it from fifteen feet away. Sammy looked like he should be wailing his head off. His eyes and mouth wide open, snot and tears running down his face, but no sound came out.
“It’s okay, Dean,” John said. Dean nodded. He wiped his nose with his sleeve.
“What about the, the creature?” Lance asked, edging forward. John got to his feet. He gave the thing on the floor a kick.
“Taken care of,” he said. “Get Sammy back into bed.”
Lance started, blinking, but Dean was already moving away. John could hear him, the half shuffling steps that meant he was dragging his brother with him. He looked at Lance, at the half of his face he could see in the darkness.
“If I burn this, are people going to see?”
Lance blinked again, shook himself.
“They shouldn’t be able to, no. The trees around the house are tall.”
John knelt down, gathering the creature into his arms. It sagged against his chest like a child, its head lolling.
“Show me where,” he said to Lance.
Lance nodded and headed wordlessly towards the door, keeping well clear of John with the fairy creature and the large stain of blood on the floor. He pointed
John to the woodshed, filled with lots of medium-sized logs that would do nicely, then led him to a small cleared-off section in the garden, close to the tree line.
“The Sunday school comes to here to have bonfires sometimes,” the man said shakily. He bit his lip when he realized what he had said, wrapped his robe tightly around his body once more and fled.
John dropped the thing on the ground, pointlessly brushing at the stains on his shirt. He was still high on adrenaline, shaky and amped up. He wondered how his boys were doing.
It was tedious work, setting up a pyre by himself, but he managed to build up a sizeable pile and drape the creature on top. The sharp smell of kerosene rose up from the wood and he smirked to himself when he felt for his packet of matches.
“Bye-bye, Tooth Fairy,” he muttered and set the wood ablaze with a casual flick of his hand.
***
The light was on in the hall when John returned. Lance was on his hands and knees with a bucket and a brush, scrubbing at the last traces of blood on the floor. The water in the bucket was dark.
John shook his head at the frantic cleaning. It didn’t help, not really. It didn’t make the images go away, for one, and even if you managed to get all the stains out, you would still see them, bright as ever, every time you looked at the spot where they had been. He wished Lance had just gone to bed, instead of flooding the house with brightness. Some things should be left in the dark.
When Lance finally noticed him and looked up, there was an almost pleading expression on his face. One that John couldn’t read or fix, so he made his way to the upstairs bathroom instead.
He hardly bothered to inspect himself in the mirror. Half his face was a bloody mask anyway, and he could feel every bruise forming on his body. He cupped his hands under the faucet and splashed the cold water on his face, watched it turn pink as it swirled down the drain. He stared at it for a moment, distracted by his shaking hands in the water. Then he turned the temperature up as high as it would go and scrubbed his face again, the stinging helping a little to clear his head.
His boys, he had to check on his boys. He shucked his blood-stained clothes and pulled on a pair of pants and a t-shirt that he had haphazardly tossed into a corner a few days ago. The hallway was dark, mercifully dark, but he had no trouble finding his way down to Dean’s bedroom.
The two boys were in bed, sleeping from the looks of it. Sammy had curled in on himself as if he were cold, away from Dean, from his brother’s no doubt comforting touch. He whimpered and twitched; John had to admit that he was surprised that the boy had managed to fall asleep at all. He found his jacket somewhere in the wreckage and draped it over his kid, on top of the covers.
It wouldn’t do much, but it was the principle of the thing.
He set up shop in the armchair by the window, shotgun at the ready, and waited. What for, he wasn’t exactly sure. Maybe for the rush to fade. Maybe for another attack, but he doubted it. He just sat there, for what seemed like hours, listening to his sons, the way they would occasionally mumble and whimper in their sleep. Still, he had to have dozed off because he was as startled as either of them when Sam sat up, screaming, his eyes wide and white. John started but Dean got there first, scooting over to his brother and giving his shoulder a small pat.
“It’s okay, Sammy,” he soothed, “it’s okay.”
Sam sobbed something that sounded like “monster”, but Dean took it in stride.
“It’s okay,” he repeated, “I’m right here, okay, you’re fine, I’m fine, and Dad’s right there, see? And he’s got a big gun to keep the nightmares away.”
John made his way over to the light switch and flipped it, leaving them all blinking in the sudden brightness.
“See? No monsters here,” Dean announced good-naturedly. He smiled, resting his hand on top of Sam’s dark shook of hair. “That was just a whopper of a dream.”
“Just a dream?” Sammy repeated tearfully.
“That’s right.” Dean’s voice was firm and cheerful. “It was just a dream, and it’s all over now. It can’t hurt you anymore, I promise.”
With bright, hopeful eyes, so hopeful John couldn’t help but wince, Sam crawled into Dean’s lap.
“Promise?”
Dean nodded. Sam leaned against his chest, gazing at him in adoration.
“I swear on my dead grandmamma,” Dean pronounced solemnly, crossed his heart and spat on the floor.
“We don’t have a dead grandmamma, silly,” Sam giggled. John was absolutely sure he would hardly have been able to calm the kid down at all, but here he was, in Dean’s lap, actually laughing.
“Of course we have a dead grandmamma.” Dean crossed his eyes, and Sam laughed again.
“So how come I don’t know her?”
Dean shook his head in mock exasperation.
“Well, ‘cause she’s dead, you nut.”
His hands which had slowly crept down Sam’s back shot forward, digging into Sam’s ribs. Sam squealed and twisted away from the tickling fingers. Dean easily roped him back in, cradling his brother’s head against his chest.
“Sleep now, yeah?”
Sam peaked out at him, dark strands hanging into his eyes.
“Can I have hot chocolate, Dean?” he asked, and John had to stifle a laugh that was almost a sob. God, that kid really could milk any situation. He was going to be a pro at this when he was older.
Apparently Dean had come to a similar conclusion because he gave John an amused look over the top of Sam’s head before pushing the boy back into the pillows.
“Tell you what,” he said, “I’ll tell Mr. Lance to make you an extra big mug if you close your eyes, yeah? You can open them when he brings you the cup.”
“Okay,” Sammy mumbled. He closed his eyes obediently and managed to be quiet for an entire minute before he asked - eyes still tightly screwed shut - “Is Mr. Lance here yet?”
This time, Dean really did laugh.
“No, he isn’t. Go to sleep.”
***
To John’s surprise, Sam did exactly that not five minutes later. When Dean finally deemed it safe enough to ease out of the death grip his brother had on him, John flipped the covers over them both, rubbed Dean’s forearm in a gesture they both understood, and turned off the light again. He found his way back to his seat and kept on waiting. He watched the sickle moon slowly creep into view but he couldn’t relax, just couldn’t.
This time, when Sam moved, John instantly jolted upright. There was no nightmare thought, just a quiet, panicky, “Dean?”
“I’m right here, buddy,” Dean assured him. The sheets rustled when Dean draped his arm over his brother’s waist, “You can go back to sleep.”
It took Sammy a while to settle down, but when he finally did, so did John. Dean massaged the younger boy’s back and kept up a quiet monologue of nonsense until Sam’s soft sniffles turned into snores. Even then, Dean just kept going, like his words were the magic that kept Sam’s sleep deep and nightmare-free. Maybe they were. Checking once more to make sure that his shotgun was ready by his side, John settled back in his chair and let his son’s quiet rambling soothe him to sleep.
***
The next day brought clouds and a chilly wind that John didn’t mind; sun was hell on the black roof of the Impala, and clouds made stopping for breaks ever so much less tempting, all without the negative effects on driving that rain had. And it was always harder to leave somewhere when the weather was nice, he’d learned, even if unspeakable things had happened wherever you were.
He found a few snacks for the road in the kitchen and stuffed them into a plastic bag before turning to the coffee filter. God, he needed the caffeine. Sam had been clinging to Dean all morning, barely moving from his side to brush his teeth or get dressed. John had been unable to get him into the shower so Dean had finally persuaded him to take a bath so they could wash the sweaty stench of fear off him.
Dean had sat by the side of the tub the entire time, telling quiet jokes with the door half-open while John packed everything they’d taken out back into their bags, and nothing had told John more about the state his son was in when Sam allowed John to carry him out to the car and deposit him on the backseat without a single word of protest about leaving.
A quick check of the rooms, gathering up the last stray sock and toothbrush, and then it was time to go. Lance accompanied John to the door, looking like he’d been through hell with dark circles under his eyes and his cheeks sunken and pale. He held his robe tightly around himself like he was cold. There was a haunted look in his eyes, a sad proof of innocence lost.
“You should call pest control,” John told him, “Get rid of the mice. Just in case.”
Lance nodded, but John could see he hadn’t heard a word.
“You’re really leaving?” he asked softly. John nodded. He knew very well that Lance knew that, he’d even handed him Sam’s beloved wildlife book to keep, for God’s sake. But he knew why the man was asking. He wouldn’t want to be alone in this place right now either.
“Yeah,” he said quietly. To his surprise, he actually felt bad for the man now; he’d just never seen it coming.
“You could stay here for a couple of days,” Lance offered, with a self-depreciating smile like he knew exactly how desperate he sounded.
John didn’t reply. He took a look at the Impala where Dean was crammed into the backseat, much to his disdain, with yet another comic book, Sam plastered against his side, reading over his shoulder.
“Get off,” John could see Dean hiss good-naturedly. Sam made a grab for the comic and tore the brittle pages when Dean jerked it out of the way, but Dean just leaned over and rested his forehead against Sam’s, puffing out his cheeks in a would-be threatening manner and making his brother laugh. It was almost as if last night had just been a particularly nasty dream.
John looked back at Lance and somehow found a small smile to offer the man.
“We have to keep going,” he said. “This job doesn’t wait for us.”
Lance nodded. He unclenched one of his hands from his clothing and offered it to John.
“Thank you, John,” he said softly. “Take care of yourself.”
John looked up at the crumbling house, at the peeling paint and the invading ivy, then down at the extended hand, at the smooth skin and long, academic fingers. He gripped it tightly, allowing Lance to cling to him, if only for a moment, before he let go.
“Yeah,” he said. He turned away and walked briskly to the Impala, pulled open the back door on the driver’s side and stuck his head in.
“Hey, boys, ready to go?” he asked. He received only a distracted nod from Dean in response. Sam buried his nose in Dean’s sleeve, intently watching the page over Dean’s arm. John reached out to rub his son’s shoulder but the boy shied away from him, pressing even more into Dean’s arm.
“Ey,” Dean protested, but he didn’t even look up, just lifted his arm and let Sammy half-sprawl over his chest.
John closed the door quietly. His boys were okay - would be okay - and they would keep going. He got in and started the car, gently easing her around on the dusty road. He could see Lance in the rearview mirror as he drove away, standing lost and forlorn on his porch, and for a moment, he was tempted.
A day. Just a single day, no hunts, no monsters, no nightmares. For one day, he could have the illusion of a picket fence life, with his boys carefree and happy and nothing that was out to get them.
But John dismissed that thought as quickly as it had come. One day would turn into two, and then into weeks, and months, and years, until the thought of all the horrors out there was just an ugly memory that occasionally disturbed them in their safe little routine. And John couldn’t do that. He had a duty, an obligation.
He looked into the rearview mirror again, at his boys this time. Sam was still lying halfway in Dean’s lap, having commandeered the comic and turning the pages eagerly. Dean didn’t even seem to notice. The older boy was staring out the window, idly toying with John’s dog tags still around his neck. John would get them back tomorrow, but today, there was no harm in letting his son have the illusion of comfort that they offered.
Cold Rock Manor was silently disappearing between the tall pines, and with every foot that it faded into the distance, the urge to slam on the brakes and turn back grew fainter. He was John Winchester and this was his life. He was a hunter, his boys would be hunters. They were always going to be.
***
Notes and Acknowledgements
Part One | Part Two | Part 3 | Notes and Acknowledgements (possibly spoilery)
***
John sat in his car in front of this kid Zack's house for almost two hours. Then a slightly overweight lady with a flowery dress and curly blonde hair escorted the boy to his bike waiting on the front lawn, handed him a bag of cookies and warned him to be home by the time it got dark.
John waited until the boy had pedaled off into the distance and the woman had shut the door firmly, then he started the car and found his way to the nearest pay phone. He fed a couple of quarters into the slot and punched the numbers in from heart. With every ring, John could feel the tension in his belly building, and it was a relief to hear his eldest’s slightly breathless “Hello?”
“Hey dude,” John greeted him, “Can you put Lance on the phone?”
“Yeah, sure,” Dean said, sounding distracted. Someone scratched along the receiver, and John could hear a faint, “It’s for you”.
“John?” Lance said as moment later.
“Why is my kid answering your phone?” John demanded to know.
“Is there something I can help you with?” the other man asked after a slight pause, his friendly tone suddenly sounding forced.
“I have a lead,” John told him. “I won’t be back today.”
“Oh… okay,” Lance murmured. “What should I tell the boys?”
“Tell Dean,” John answered, “he’ll handle Sammy.”
“I can-“ Lance started. John cut him off.
“If this thing goes south, you have to be prepared to get my boys the hell out of here. Dean knows what to do.”
“I-“ Lance began again, startled, but John didn’t have time for that.
“Have Dean tell you Pastor Jim’s number.”
The commanding tone worked even on the usually astoundingly resilient Lance, John noted with satisfaction. There was mumbling in the background, and then Dean’s voice as he spooled off the number, sounding bored.
“Good,” John told Lance when the man was on the line again. “Dean knows everything that needs to be done, and when to do it. Listen to him. I’ll check in as soon as I can. Clear?”
“Yes,” Lance murmured hesitantly.
“Good,” John told him, “Oh, and Lance? If I come back, and there’s a single hair out of place on my boys’ heads - you can bet your ass, by the time I’m through with you? You won’t be able to remember your name.”
He hung up with a certain satisfaction at the silence at the other end of the line and headed back to the kid’s house to scout out everything he needed to know.
***
It was appallingly easy for John to scale the side of the house in the cover of the approaching darkness. The roof was cold under his hands and the flimsy trees in the backyard offered no protection at all from the wind that was starting to pick up. His perch was right next to the kid’s bedroom window, however, if the Spiderman bed sheets were anything to go by, and perfect for keeping watch without being spotted by some overzealous parent.
He stayed out of sight while the kid was being tucked in, first by his mother, then his father. He waited patiently while the kid read under the covers until Daddy came back to tell him off. Then he found a spot where he could see inside and out equally well, and waited.
***
John lost track of time. The wind wormed its way under his coat, seeped into his skin and wrapped itself around his bones. Snapping twigs and rustling leaves made him jump. The scratching and mumbling of animals made him reach for his gun.
Inside, the house stayed quiet, silent. No one moved. Certainly no one broke in. When the sun rose over the horizon, John cast a long look at the still peacefully sleeping boy and collected his things.
He slipped away silently and strolled across the street like he hadn’t spent the entire night crouched on someone else’s roof.
He knew he looked fine. A little bit ruffled, maybe, but fine. And God help anyone who got in his way.
***
By the time John made it back to the manor, he felt like he was being held together by no more than a few measly strands of self-control. His head throbbed, his bones ached, and even he could tell he was about to lose his temper. He needed a shower and some coffee, preferably with a liberal shot of whiskey in it. When he opened the door, however, he was greeted not by soothing calm and quiet but by excited squealing.
“Daddy, look at my shoes!”
Not that John could, the way Sam was bouncing around like a Tasmanian devil. Dean was grinning quietly. Lance was watching him with a proud smile, and that in itself was not exactly helping John’s mood. Sam, apparently not noticing his glower, tugged on his hand.
“Look, Mister Lance got us shoes!”
“Stop bouncing, Sammy,” John said, “Let me see.”
Sam stilled obediently, letting John get a good look at his feet. At his feet, and his brand-new, store-bought sneakers without a single scuff mark or smudge. They looked nothing like the shoes John always got his kids from the thrift store. And they made him want to throttle something.
Very slowly, he turned and fixed Lance with his most threatening glare.
“Take them back,” he snarled.
Lance’s look of utter surprise would have been funny if John had felt at all amused. Dean was tight-lipped but hard to read. Sammy’s indignation, on the other hand, couldn’t have been clearer.
“Daddy-“ he protested. John’s finger aimed straight at his nose shut him up.
“Not one word,” John growled. “Lance, you hear me?”
Lance folded his arms in front of his chest. He looked more confused than defiant.
“I don’t understand why-“
“We don’t need your charity!” John exploded. He dimly registered Dean’s stricken look, the way Sam shrank back into the couch, but that just made him want to hit Lance even more.
“It’s not charity, John,” Lance protested, “I just wanted to do something nice for the boys.”
“I don’t care,” John hissed at him, “you take those fucking shoes back, right now, or there will be hell to pay, you got me?’
Dean grabbed hold of Sam’s hand and pulled his brother to him, inching both of them towards the door with wary eyes. Lance apparently saw it too, and his jaw hardened.
“You need to get some sleep. How about you go upstairs and take a nap and then we can-“
“There is nothing to talk about,” John interrupted. “You’re taking those damn shoes back and that’s final.”
He saw the look Lance gave Dean, the nod towards the stairs, but he let his boys scuttle away without protest.
“Do you always have this much pride, John?” Lance asked wearily, “Or is that just when you’re being especially insufferable?”
“And what’s wrong with pride, huh?” John sneered at him. “Doesn’t fit into your ideal of the poor souls that need saving?”
“It’s hurting your children, John,” Lance snapped, but it sounded a good deal softer now. John hoped that meant he was going to give up soon.
Lance looked at him like he was expecting an answer. When John didn’t say anything, the cross expression just seemed to slide off his face and he sighed.
“Go to sleep, John,” he said.
John made his way across the deserted hall and up the stairs - his boys were nowhere to be seen - and dropped into bed, clothes and all, just wishing for this day to be over.
***
He didn’t fall asleep, of course, just dozed for a while until faint scuttling brought him back to full consciousness. John cracked his eyes open just in time to see Sammy’s head pop up beside the bed.
“Hi Daddy,” the boy chirped. John winced.
“Hi Sammy,” he whispered. He waited for a moment, but his son stayed uncharacteristically silent. “What’s wrong?”
Sam chewed on his lip, looking thoughtful. He had snot on his upper lip like he had been crying. John didn’t quite manage more than a boneless flap of his arm, but Sammy didn’t waste any time scrambling up on top of the bed and snuggling against John’s side. Silence settled around them while the boy fiddled with the covers, his hair catching in John’s beard.
“I really liked the shoes,” Sam finally said.
John closed his eyes.
“Yeah.”
“I don’t like it when you yell,” Sam told him. His small hands rested on John’s muscled forearm. His hair smelled soapy and clean, like a shampoo that John hadn’t gotten him.
“I wasn’t yelling.”
Sam shrugged, wiping his nose on his sleeve.
John let his eyes drift shut and just concentrated on the boy’s breathing, in and out, nice and even and alive. He blinked when Sam turned his head and rested his cheek against John’s chest.
“You wanna read to me?” he asked.
John sighed; watched the fine hairs on top of Sam’s head quiver.
“I have to go do something for work, Sammy,” he said.
Sam twisted in his arms until he could look John in the face. His eyes were gleaming.
“I wanna come!”
John sat up and swung his legs over the edge.
“You can’t,” he said wearily.
“But I wanna,” Sam said, already pouting, his hands scrabbling for John’s leg. John tried to pry them off.
“No, you don’t, Sammy,” he said.
“Do too,” Sam protested. He let go of John’s pants only to latch onto his arm.
“Fine,” John finally conceded, pushing the boy away when he made to hug him, “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
With a cheer, Sammy leapt off the bed and trampled down the stairs. John followed at a more leisurely pace, taking a moment to rinse out his mouth in the bathroom. It couldn’t hurt, taking Sam to the library with him. John was fairly certain that he wasn’t going to find anything anyway, not with the way this day - hell, this hunt - was going.
It was fairly easy to follow the noise Sam was making to the kitchen. The kid was bouncing around the kitchen table were Dean sat, carefully sorting the toaster into its individual pieces. John wasn’t surprised; it was the way Dean calmed down. The only reason he wasn’t meticulously cleaning the guns was that he wasn’t allowed to do it where Sammy could see.
“Daddy’s taking me to work with him,” Sam informed his brother, half hanging over the tabletop. Dean gave John a questioning look. When John nodded, he bit his lip and concentrated on the toaster again.
John snapped his fingers, drawing Sam’s attention.
“Get ready to go, kiddo,” he said. “Put on your shoes.”
“I already have!” Sam protested, pointing. John couldn’t help noticing that he was wearing his old pair again - Dean’s doing, no doubt.
“Get in the car, then.”
Sam nodded and scampered off. Seeing Dean follow his departure with his eyes, John reached over and ruffled his son’s hair.
“You gonna be okay, dude?”
Dean nodded. He was paler than usual, his smile strained, but he waved them off without a word of protest. Thankful, John offered him a smile in return. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.
***
The library was calm and cool and soothing, and surprisingly quiet. Getting rid of Sam had been a matter of showing him the more advanced books in the kid’s corner. Sam had practically scrambled from his arms and John had been free to hunt down a librarian and make her haul out all the old newspapers, microfilms, and family chronicles she could find.
Not that it helped. John spent an hour or two breathing in age-old dust, found about a dozen or so people who died violently but no one who even remotely fit the description, and earned himself stern glares from the librarian in charge on two different occasions when he lost his patience and started to curse.
He was so engrossed in his research that it took him a while to notice the limpet clinging to his knee.
“Daddy?” Sam finally asked.
John sighed. He stopped staring at his book, which was admittedly neither interesting nor helpful, and turned to look at his kid.
“Yes, Sam?”
“What are you reading about?”
John turned back and flipped a page.
“Local legends.”
“Why?”
“Work.”
“Are you gonna take a lot longer?”
John pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Ask me an easier question. Something like, ‘Why is the sky blue?’”
“Why is the sky blue?” Sam echoed obediently.
“Because light has different frequencies that have different colors, and something about air molecules that I don’t remember.”
John half expected Sam to protest, or to keep asking, but the kid just slumped over John’s lap with a sigh.
“I want Dean,” he complained into John’s thigh.
“I told you that you didn’t want to come,” John reminded him mildly. He pushed his son upright. “Why don’t you go read a little bit more, hmm?”
“I don’t wanna read anymore,” Sam grumbled, “I want Dean.”
Normally, John would have probably blown a gasket by now, but he was feeling surprisingly mellow as he detached Sam from his leg and stood.
“Where are we going now?” Sam asked, grabbing hold of the fabric of John’s denims.
“To make a phone call.” John held out his hand for Sammy to take. “Come on.”
***
Sam scowled when John passed him over to Dean.
“You’re mean,” he told John. Dean tried to take his hand, and, glaring, Sam let him.
“You’re bothering me,” John retorted, “I need to focus.”
“Taking a break could help,” his oldest offered. He hadn’t said anything so far, not when John had called and not when Lance and he had pulled up in Lance’s rust bucket of a car. John tilted his head. It sounded logical - and definitely like something Dean would say when he was starting to get worried about something.
“A break,” Sam cheered, “I wanna go to the playground.”
He started to drag Dean down the street by his hand while John’s oldest shot him a shrug and a grin. John waved them off. He leaned down so he could talk to Lance through the open window.
“We’re going to the playground, apparently,” he said, “You gonna wait here?”
There seemed to be the hint of a smile on Lance’s unusually stern face.
“I have a friend who lives close-by and whom I haven’t seen in a while. Shall we meet back here in, oh, say an hour?”
John nodded.
“Enjoy yourself,” Lance said and drove away before John could say anything else.
***
The playground John remembered was easy enough to find. Sam took off running for the swing with an elated war cry, Dean trailing after him. It wasn’t until they were on the other side of the playground that John realized who else was here, and his heart sank.
Leah hadn’t spotted him yet. She was watching the few children that occupied the playing area with hollow cheeks and eyes. Her skin was grey and her clothes seemed to sag off of her as if she had lost ten pounds in three days.
Before he could back away, she seemed to notice his stare and looked up. John sighed and walked over, sitting awkwardly next to her.
“Are those your boys?” she asked with a raspy voice, nodding her head in the right direction. John was grateful for it, it meant that he didn’t have to ask something ridiculous like “How are you?”
“Yeah,” he said, “the loud one over there, that’s Sam.”
He pointed at his five-year-old that had already managed to befriend an equally tiny, curly-haired beauty and was now wooing her into giving him her shovel. John wouldn’t have been surprised if she punched him in the nose.
He looked around for Dean and found him trotting towards them, sand coating his knees and an aloof air about him that clearly said he was too old for this kind of thing. John pulled him between his knees.
“This is Dean,” he said.
“Hi Dean,” Leah offered, forcing a thin smile. “How are you doing?”
Dean edged closer, keeping on hand on John’s knee for support, and tilted his head at her.
“Are you okay?” he finally asked. Leah started but managed a shaky laugh.
“No, Dean. I’m not okay.”
“Why not?”
Leah gave John an unreadable look over the top of John’s head before she met his son’s eyes again.
“It’s because I lost my daughter last week, Dean,” she said, her voice shaking, “And I’m very upset about that.”
Dean nodded. He slid up on the seat between John and Leah and turned fully towards her.
“When my mom died I was really upset too.”
Leah carefully avoided John’s eyes that time.
“When was that?” she asked quietly. It struck John as an odd topic for small talk, but hey, anything you could connect with people over.
“A long time ago,” his son told her, “I was four. I was sad for a while, but I needed to be strong for Sammy, you know?”
“That’s nice,” she said shakily, “I mean, that you had someone to take care of.”
“There’s always someone to take care of,” Dean told her. “Don’t worry, you’ll find someone.”
Leah smiled brokenly.
“Dean, I don’t really want to find someone. I had someone. I just want my daughter back.”
Dean nodded knowingly, a veteran to loss. John swallowed around the sudden lump in his throat.
“She’s not coming back,” his son said mercilessly, “You know that.”
She nodded, looking torn between hysteria and loathing, and Dean belatedly softened his statement with a smile.
“But I have a friend who’s a pastor, and he told me that we will see the people we love and lost again when we go to heaven.”
“Do you believe in heaven?” Leah asked in reply.
“No.” Dean shook his head. “But if there is, I know that your daughter will be there, and that you’ll see her again.”
Without warning, Leah started to cry. It wasn’t hysterical sobbing, just quiet tears streaming down her face. Dean dug out a clean tissue that he had learned to keep around for Sammy and handed it to her.
“You’re an extraordinary boy, Dean,” she said quietly.
Their conversation was cut short when Sam’s new girlfriend chose that moment to push Sam over, grab the shovel and run triumphantly back to her mother. Sam didn’t cry - though he looked like he wanted to - but he did come over, sand on his shins, elbows, and butt, and crawled on John’s lap.
“I wanna go,” he mumbled.
John didn’t sigh.
“In a minute. Sammy, this is Leah.”
“Hi,” Sam said with a short wave, “Daddy, can we go?”
John did sigh this time, but he arranged Sam’s legs around his waist and stood.
“Come on, dude,” he said, “Leah…”
She nodded, like she understood everything he wanted to say but couldn’t. She smiled thinly.
“Maybe I’ll see you around.”
John didn’t meet her eyes when he nodded.
“Dean.”
Dean slid off the seat and lightly touched his hand to Leah’s knee.
“I’m sorry for making you cry.”
Her smile was startled but real.
“Don’t be, Dean,” she said, “It wasn’t a bad thing.”
Dean nodded. He seemed lost in thought all the way back to the library, hardly noticing the hand John kept on his shoulder.
***
When they reached the large building, Sam suddenly struggled to be put down.
“I gotta show you this book, Dean, it’s about trains, it’s supercool.”
“Oh no.” John caught his youngest by the shoulder. “I made Dean come out here because you didn’t want to be in the library anymore, and you’re going to go home with him now, you got that?”
Switching gears, Sam stalked off with a huff, pulling Dean along with him to Lance’s waiting car, and John headed back inside, ready to solve this case.
***
Three hours later, John was more than ready to set the next family chronicle of the Smiths or the Jacksons that he found on fire. With a sigh, he began shoveling papers and microfilms back into the box. It was getting late, anyway, already approaching dusk. He hadn’t checked on his boys in a while; he just needed to see them for a minute, to make sure they were still all in one piece.
Leaving the files on the table for the librarian to sort out, he snagged his coat off the back of his chair and headed out.
***
John broke just about every speed limit in Montana on his way home, but the knot in his stomach didn’t dissipate until he’d parked his car next to Lance’s and pushed open the door.
“Dean?” he called, “Sammy?”
“Daddy!” Sam came running from the next room and flung himself into John’s arms. “You’re back!”
He giggled when John heaved him onto his hip; John reveled in the feeling of the heavy, warm body in his arms.
“Dean’s hurt,” Sam announced right by his ear.
John fought back the urge to drop Sam and go running for his eldest. He’s fine, he told himself, willing his heart to stop hammering away in his chest, Sam wouldn’t be this nonchalant if he weren’t fine.
“How did he get hurt, kiddo?” he asked calmly. Sam squirmed in his firm hold.
“He walked into a door,” the boy giggled, “Mister Lance cleaned him up.”
He was fine. Dean was fine.
John hugged Sam a little tighter and walked into the kitchen with cool, controlled steps. Dean grinned at him. He sat majestically before a gigantic plate of cookies and a large glass of milk, swinging his legs. Lance pushed away from the chair he had been leaning on to give the new arrivals a smile. Sam twitched and John put him down.
“Hey buddy,” he said tightly, “you okay?”
“Fine, Dad,” Dean waved him off with what looked like mostly eaten peanut-butter-and-chocolate-chip, “Just hit m’head.”
“I’m afraid I opened a kitchen cabinet at a rather inopportune time,” Lance added with a sheepish smile.
John nodded at the plate of cookies.
“Did you give Sammy any of those?”
“Of course, Dad,” Dean replied indignantly, “Until he started to feel sick.”
John caught Sammy by a shoulder and peered at him closely.
“You doing okay now?”
Sam bit his lip.
“Can I have more if I say yes?”
“No.” John slid his hand under the boy’s armpits and settled him against his chest.
“Come on, boyo, time for a nap. You’re looking a bit green around the gills.”
He ruffled Dean’s hair on his way to the stairs and could almost feel his oldest sit up a little straighter.
***
“People don’t have gills,” Sam informed him primly over supper that night.
John sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. He had half been hoping he could have a drama-free dinner for once.
“I know that, Sam,” he said.
Sam frowned at him, like he couldn’t quite figure out if John had been lying earlier or if he was lying now.
“But you said my gills were green.”
John rolled his eyes at the ceiling and took a deep, fortifying breath.
“It’s just an expression, Sam,” Lance quickly chipped in.
“But it’s silly,” the boy protested. Dean tried to take his arm and pull him down in his seat, but Sam shook him off. “It is!”
John pushed his plate away.
“Yes, it’s silly. Expressions aren’t always accurate.”
“But then why did you use it if you know it’s not true?” Sam pressed, and John lost his feeble grasp on his temper.
“Damn it, Sam, I am not having this argument with you!”
“Why?” Sam asked peevishly, “Because you know you’ll lose?”
“Enough!” John thundered. He brought the flat of his hand down on the table with a sharp noise, scowling at his youngest. Sam burst into tears. Lance put his fork down quietly and stared at the wall somewhere to the right of Dean’s head, looking nauseated.
John pointed at Sam’s plate.
“If you’re not going to eat that, then you can go to bed now.”
Sam slid off his seat without a word even though it was still way before his usual bedtime. Dean waited for John’s nod, then he was off like a shot, catching up with his brother somewhere on the stairs. Sam’s crying increased in pitch for a moment and then tapered off as the two disappeared upstairs.
John put his head in his hands. Lance rose without a word, collecting their plates - even John’s - and rinsing them off in the sink. Then he turned and headed towards the hall.
“Lance,” John said. The man stopped in the door, resting one hand against the frame, and met his dark gaze without backing down.
“Yes?” he said, as politely as ever.
“Don’t judge me,” John growled at him, his heart tight in his chest. He wanted to smash something. To fix something. To make everything okay again.
Lance blinked slowly at him. His expression softened a little, but it remained as carefully neutral as ever.
“Good night,” he said calmly. His slippers made soft sounds on the floorboards, a slight drag-and-thud that crept up the stairs and along the hallways above.
John groaned. He was so tempted to just sit there for the rest of the night, just him and a bottle of whiskey. No hurt feelings, no little boy tragedy. Tempted, but he had work to do.
With a sigh, he put his still empty glass in the sink and found his stack of notes. He set a pot of coffee to brew and started spreading out his files, print-outs and newspaper articles on the kitchen table. He began arranging them into chronological order first, Dead Kid Number 1’s picture, obituary, parents’ statement, then Dead Kid Number 2, then Number 3. There had to be a pattern, he just had to see it. There was always a pattern.
The clock ticked steadily forward as he worked, arranging and rearranging files, circling things that jumped out at him, taking notes. He first heard the shuffling footsteps after about an hour. He tracked Dean’s movements almost automatically. To John’s bedroom, to the bathroom, to John’s bedroom again. Dead Kid Number 7, Amber Olstenberg, five years old, younger brother called Daniel; parents young and happily married. The footsteps were on the stairs now, across the hall, but John didn’t look up.
Dean slid into the other chair and pulled a stack of newspaper clippings towards him. He didn’t say anything, and John didn’t comment. He pulled out a photocopy from a book of urban legends. There was a cheery little drawing of a girl with sparkly wings and a wand, and a dazzling smile.
“Apparently, the Tooth Fairy used to be an evil witch,” John said. Dean looked up.
“Says here that medieval witches would burn your teeth to gain power over you, and that you should salt and burn it in order to keep it away from them. And to have to avoid looking for it after death.”
John grinned at his kid.
“Naturally, that version isn’t too popular nowadays.”
“Legends change,” Dean said quietly. John nodded.
“They do. But they usually keep on some of the facts.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know.” John scratched his chin.
“So the tooth fairy comes when someone loses a tooth,” he mused, “that’s the way the story goes.”
He spread out the pages of notes before him, all those pictures of grinning little children.
“And they all did,” he said quietly, “Mickey and Kevin and Lauren, and the other five, they all lost teeth. But Zack was the only one who didn’t get hurt.”
“Maybe their families had something to do with it?” Dean offered. He was watching John intently.
“No, no, their family backgrounds are all over the place. Mickey’s parents are poor, Melanie’s are loaded, Zack is an only child, Kevin has three younger sisters, Sharon is divorced, it just doesn’t add up.”
Dean blinked at him, but John hardly noticed. He picked up a grainy photograph of a gap-toothed, grinning boy, Dustin Coleman, 9 written underneath, and moved it to the side.
“Unless… Dustin lost his tooth because he hit his face on the bathroom sink, that’s bound to be painful. Kayla fell on the playground. Mickey got in a fight. Lauren managed to get on the wrong side of her pony.”
He waved another photograph at his son.
“Kevin and Amber, they lost their teeth in some brutal way too. In fact,” he concluded triumphantly, “The only kid out of all of these who didn’t get hurt? His tooth just fell out. So what if it’s not just attracted by the teeth - what if they have to be combined with blood?”
John was so lost in this revelation that he didn’t notice his son’s silence until the boy spoke.
“Daddy.”
Dean’s voice was strangled and, when he looked up, John could see he was white as a sheet.
“What is it, dude?” he asked. Dean reached into his pocket. His knuckled were white as he turned over his hand and opened it with some effort to show John the small, red-smudged tooth resting innocently in his palm. John closed his eyes. Of course - the cupboard that had hit Dean in the head, the comfort food, Sam’s announcement that Dean was hurt.
Dean looked like he was about to cry. John could really understand the sentiment.
Well, fuck.
***
“Are you sure this will work?” Dean asked once again when he sat in his bed, covers collected protectively around him.
“We don’t really have a choice, Dean,” John told him, “We could try to leave here, but I don’t know if that would help. I’d rather face that thing here when I’m prepared than in unfamiliar territory after an hour-long drive.”
Dean nodded unhappily. John sat down on the bed with a sigh.
“There’s no other way, dude, you know that. It’ll be fine. Stiffen up that upper lip, okay?’ he said, stroking his hand over Dean’s hair.
He tried to pull away, but Dean’s hand tightened in his t-shirt, almost choking him. John gently eased it off.
“I’m going to be right over there,” he said, pointing at the chair positioned behind the door, “We discussed this, remember? I’m not going anywhere.”
Dean nodded but wouldn’t quite look him in the eye. John sighed. He reached into his shirt and fished out his dog tags, pleased when he saw his son’s eyes light up. Dean bowed his head to allow the chain to slip over his neck. John tucked the tags under the boy’s t-shirt.
“Remember what I told you,” he said.
Dean nodded and turned around, pulling the covers up to his neck. John switched off the light.
“Do you think Sammy’s okay in the other room?” Dean asked after a moment.
“He’s fine,” John answered, “Now sleep.”
He was surprised when the boy actually obeyed. Snuffling and sighing, he drifted off into an uneasy slumber, sitting up every twenty minutes or so with a half-whispered “Dad?”
“Right here,” was John’s unfailing answer and each time, the boy would nod, seemingly satisfied, and roll over again. Jon himself sat silently for what seemed like hours on end until his nerves were rubbed raw with tension and he could feel his heartbeat in his fingers. He was just about to screw waiting and go out and find the thing himself when he heard something out in the hall. Soft footsteps whispered closer and closer. John had already cocked his shotgun when he finally recognized the soft patter of bare feet against the floor.
God, and he’d thought this night was going badly.
The door squeaked open just wide enough for a small head to peak in.
“Dean?”
“Go back to bed, Sam,” John snapped. He could see the boy jump and whirl around, squinting at the shadows behind the door.
“Daddy?”
“Bed. Now,” John told him.
Sam pointed at Dean’s bed.
“No, your own bed,” John said. The sheets rustled as Dean sat up slowly, gathering the blanket around him.
“Sammy?” he asked.
“Can I sleep in your bed, Dean?” Sammy asked, already pulling at the covers. John could feel his grasp on his temper slipping.
“No, Sam, don’t-“
He reached for the kid but his son danced out of his reach.
“I want-“ the boy began, and then John heard it: quietly shuffling steps dragging down the hallway, a soft whisper that raised the hairs on John’s arms. He snagged Sam’s t-shirt and pulled the boy between his legs, clamping his hand over the defiantly opening mouth.
“Listen to me, Sam,” he said, his voice taking on the tone that even guys two, three years his senior hadn’t dared disobey, back in the jungle.
“I’m going to let you go, and you’re going to climb into the closet and shut the door, and you’re not going to come back out until Dean or me come get you. Is that understood?”
He lifted his hand from Sam’s mouth to hear the whispered “Yes, sir.” John let go of him and Sam scampered towards the closet, pulling it firmly shut after him.
John nodded. “Dean.”
His oldest was sitting ramrod straight, his eyes brilliant reflections in the darkness.
“Sir.”
John opened his mouth to give out last minute instructions, but whatever he had wanted to say was lost when the door creaked open and the tooth fairy stood in the room.
It was surprisingly tall for the whole ‘hiding under the pillow’ spiel, a little taller than Dean. It was hard to make out details in the dim moonlight, but John could see enough to know he wanted this thing nowhere near his kid. It stood like a tree battered by the wind, hunched and crooked, fingers more like claws, teeth like fangs. With its long, tangled hair and the tattered sleeves s trailing after its body like wings, it did look a little like the tooth fairy from hell.
John wasted no time contemplating the irony of all the children waiting for the tooth fairy, for this, to come. He raised his shotgun and fired a round of rock salt straight into its belly.
He hadn’t expected the thing to wither and die, but it didn’t even flinch. It batted John away with an outstretched arm, smashing him into the wall, and made a grab for Dean. John snatched the shotgun from the floor and fired another shot that, even if it didn’t actually help, at least focused the creature’s attention on John again.
He winced at the sight of sharp fingernails coming towards him, thinking fast, trying to figure out how to beat this thing. He hardly saw Dean jump the gnarled body from behind, the way he wrapped his arms around its neck and his legs around its waist, the way he sunk his teeth into its shoulder. He heard the wail, though, the pained cry as dark blood welled up and ran over its skin. Dean, as surprised as the creature at this sudden turn of events, loosened his hold. The fairy tossed its head and caught Dean in the nose; the boy squawked and fell back against the bed in a crumpled heap, and in the split second it took John to decide whether to check on his boy or take it down, now that he knew its weakness, the creature made a break for the door and disappeared into the darkness.
John followed at a more leisurely pace. He checked behind the door and up and down the hallway before he followed the shuffling steps down the stairs. They were surprisingly hard to maneuver down with a shotgun at the ready, but the creature’s footsteps were slow and interspersed with heavy breathing, so John took his time rounding the last turn. He lifted the shotgun again as everything became clear, like cogs clicking gently into place. If teeth were the only thing that could hurt this creature, that this thing was afraid of, then of course it would get rid of the kids’ teeth before it dragged them off to wherever.
Well, John would drag that thing to hell himself before he let it get to his boy.
The hall was dark and wide, a death trap if John had ever seen one. The only light came from the porch light that had been left on outside. John stepped forward carefully, jerked back when he saw the thing launch itself at him from out of the corner of his eye. He distracted it with a smack in the head with the butt of his shotgun, grabbed its arm and sank his teeth deep into its shoulder, right where Dean had gotten it before. It clawed at him with a howl, then whimpered and shuddered when John didn’t let go.
John let it drop on the floor and shoved his gun out of the way with his foot. The creature croaked pitifully. One hand scrabbled out, weakly rising in defense. John kicked it aside, reveling in the sound of breaking bones, the groan of pain. He dropped to his knees by its neck. One hand, he slid under the back of its head, the other under the shoulders and lifted, sinking his teeth into the tender skin in between.
Sweet copper filled his mouth. He could feel the veins pulsing underneath the skin, the gasps and groans music to his ears. He took a moment to smirk before he clamped his teeth into the leathery tissue again and managed to tear loose a piece of skin. He sank his teeth into the soft flesh, again and again and again until there was nothing there anymore, no life, no danger, no threat.
He dropped the limp body and spat. He wiped his hand over his chin but only succeeded in smearing blood everywhere. He automatically found himself looking around for something else to kill, but there wasn’t anything.
“John?” he could hear someone asking through the roar of his own blood in his ears. He turned to find Lance standing a respectful distance away, a scarlet night robe wrapped tightly around his body. For the first time since John had met him, the man actually looked… young. He wasn’t even looking at John, just staring at the creature, at the bite wounds on its neck. His mouth had dropped open. There wasn’t even horror on his face, just disbelief. John spat again to keep from grinning. He couldn’t help but wonder if the man had known what he was inviting into his home when he had made that call.
Lance took a step forward, tugging his robe closer around him as if he were cold.
“Is it dead?” he asked quietly.
John looked around. Dean was standing at the top of the stairs, Sammy wrapped around his legs like an octopus. Even in the sparse light, Dean looked pale. The hand resting on Sammy’s head was calm and sure, but the other, the one hanging at his side, was shaking so badly John could see it from fifteen feet away. Sammy looked like he should be wailing his head off. His eyes and mouth wide open, snot and tears running down his face, but no sound came out.
“It’s okay, Dean,” John said. Dean nodded. He wiped his nose with his sleeve.
“What about the, the creature?” Lance asked, edging forward. John got to his feet. He gave the thing on the floor a kick.
“Taken care of,” he said. “Get Sammy back into bed.”
Lance started, blinking, but Dean was already moving away. John could hear him, the half shuffling steps that meant he was dragging his brother with him. He looked at Lance, at the half of his face he could see in the darkness.
“If I burn this, are people going to see?”
Lance blinked again, shook himself.
“They shouldn’t be able to, no. The trees around the house are tall.”
John knelt down, gathering the creature into his arms. It sagged against his chest like a child, its head lolling.
“Show me where,” he said to Lance.
Lance nodded and headed wordlessly towards the door, keeping well clear of John with the fairy creature and the large stain of blood on the floor. He pointed
John to the woodshed, filled with lots of medium-sized logs that would do nicely, then led him to a small cleared-off section in the garden, close to the tree line.
“The Sunday school comes to here to have bonfires sometimes,” the man said shakily. He bit his lip when he realized what he had said, wrapped his robe tightly around his body once more and fled.
John dropped the thing on the ground, pointlessly brushing at the stains on his shirt. He was still high on adrenaline, shaky and amped up. He wondered how his boys were doing.
It was tedious work, setting up a pyre by himself, but he managed to build up a sizeable pile and drape the creature on top. The sharp smell of kerosene rose up from the wood and he smirked to himself when he felt for his packet of matches.
“Bye-bye, Tooth Fairy,” he muttered and set the wood ablaze with a casual flick of his hand.
***
The light was on in the hall when John returned. Lance was on his hands and knees with a bucket and a brush, scrubbing at the last traces of blood on the floor. The water in the bucket was dark.
John shook his head at the frantic cleaning. It didn’t help, not really. It didn’t make the images go away, for one, and even if you managed to get all the stains out, you would still see them, bright as ever, every time you looked at the spot where they had been. He wished Lance had just gone to bed, instead of flooding the house with brightness. Some things should be left in the dark.
When Lance finally noticed him and looked up, there was an almost pleading expression on his face. One that John couldn’t read or fix, so he made his way to the upstairs bathroom instead.
He hardly bothered to inspect himself in the mirror. Half his face was a bloody mask anyway, and he could feel every bruise forming on his body. He cupped his hands under the faucet and splashed the cold water on his face, watched it turn pink as it swirled down the drain. He stared at it for a moment, distracted by his shaking hands in the water. Then he turned the temperature up as high as it would go and scrubbed his face again, the stinging helping a little to clear his head.
His boys, he had to check on his boys. He shucked his blood-stained clothes and pulled on a pair of pants and a t-shirt that he had haphazardly tossed into a corner a few days ago. The hallway was dark, mercifully dark, but he had no trouble finding his way down to Dean’s bedroom.
The two boys were in bed, sleeping from the looks of it. Sammy had curled in on himself as if he were cold, away from Dean, from his brother’s no doubt comforting touch. He whimpered and twitched; John had to admit that he was surprised that the boy had managed to fall asleep at all. He found his jacket somewhere in the wreckage and draped it over his kid, on top of the covers.
It wouldn’t do much, but it was the principle of the thing.
He set up shop in the armchair by the window, shotgun at the ready, and waited. What for, he wasn’t exactly sure. Maybe for the rush to fade. Maybe for another attack, but he doubted it. He just sat there, for what seemed like hours, listening to his sons, the way they would occasionally mumble and whimper in their sleep. Still, he had to have dozed off because he was as startled as either of them when Sam sat up, screaming, his eyes wide and white. John started but Dean got there first, scooting over to his brother and giving his shoulder a small pat.
“It’s okay, Sammy,” he soothed, “it’s okay.”
Sam sobbed something that sounded like “monster”, but Dean took it in stride.
“It’s okay,” he repeated, “I’m right here, okay, you’re fine, I’m fine, and Dad’s right there, see? And he’s got a big gun to keep the nightmares away.”
John made his way over to the light switch and flipped it, leaving them all blinking in the sudden brightness.
“See? No monsters here,” Dean announced good-naturedly. He smiled, resting his hand on top of Sam’s dark shook of hair. “That was just a whopper of a dream.”
“Just a dream?” Sammy repeated tearfully.
“That’s right.” Dean’s voice was firm and cheerful. “It was just a dream, and it’s all over now. It can’t hurt you anymore, I promise.”
With bright, hopeful eyes, so hopeful John couldn’t help but wince, Sam crawled into Dean’s lap.
“Promise?”
Dean nodded. Sam leaned against his chest, gazing at him in adoration.
“I swear on my dead grandmamma,” Dean pronounced solemnly, crossed his heart and spat on the floor.
“We don’t have a dead grandmamma, silly,” Sam giggled. John was absolutely sure he would hardly have been able to calm the kid down at all, but here he was, in Dean’s lap, actually laughing.
“Of course we have a dead grandmamma.” Dean crossed his eyes, and Sam laughed again.
“So how come I don’t know her?”
Dean shook his head in mock exasperation.
“Well, ‘cause she’s dead, you nut.”
His hands which had slowly crept down Sam’s back shot forward, digging into Sam’s ribs. Sam squealed and twisted away from the tickling fingers. Dean easily roped him back in, cradling his brother’s head against his chest.
“Sleep now, yeah?”
Sam peaked out at him, dark strands hanging into his eyes.
“Can I have hot chocolate, Dean?” he asked, and John had to stifle a laugh that was almost a sob. God, that kid really could milk any situation. He was going to be a pro at this when he was older.
Apparently Dean had come to a similar conclusion because he gave John an amused look over the top of Sam’s head before pushing the boy back into the pillows.
“Tell you what,” he said, “I’ll tell Mr. Lance to make you an extra big mug if you close your eyes, yeah? You can open them when he brings you the cup.”
“Okay,” Sammy mumbled. He closed his eyes obediently and managed to be quiet for an entire minute before he asked - eyes still tightly screwed shut - “Is Mr. Lance here yet?”
This time, Dean really did laugh.
“No, he isn’t. Go to sleep.”
***
To John’s surprise, Sam did exactly that not five minutes later. When Dean finally deemed it safe enough to ease out of the death grip his brother had on him, John flipped the covers over them both, rubbed Dean’s forearm in a gesture they both understood, and turned off the light again. He found his way back to his seat and kept on waiting. He watched the sickle moon slowly creep into view but he couldn’t relax, just couldn’t.
This time, when Sam moved, John instantly jolted upright. There was no nightmare thought, just a quiet, panicky, “Dean?”
“I’m right here, buddy,” Dean assured him. The sheets rustled when Dean draped his arm over his brother’s waist, “You can go back to sleep.”
It took Sammy a while to settle down, but when he finally did, so did John. Dean massaged the younger boy’s back and kept up a quiet monologue of nonsense until Sam’s soft sniffles turned into snores. Even then, Dean just kept going, like his words were the magic that kept Sam’s sleep deep and nightmare-free. Maybe they were. Checking once more to make sure that his shotgun was ready by his side, John settled back in his chair and let his son’s quiet rambling soothe him to sleep.
***
The next day brought clouds and a chilly wind that John didn’t mind; sun was hell on the black roof of the Impala, and clouds made stopping for breaks ever so much less tempting, all without the negative effects on driving that rain had. And it was always harder to leave somewhere when the weather was nice, he’d learned, even if unspeakable things had happened wherever you were.
He found a few snacks for the road in the kitchen and stuffed them into a plastic bag before turning to the coffee filter. God, he needed the caffeine. Sam had been clinging to Dean all morning, barely moving from his side to brush his teeth or get dressed. John had been unable to get him into the shower so Dean had finally persuaded him to take a bath so they could wash the sweaty stench of fear off him.
Dean had sat by the side of the tub the entire time, telling quiet jokes with the door half-open while John packed everything they’d taken out back into their bags, and nothing had told John more about the state his son was in when Sam allowed John to carry him out to the car and deposit him on the backseat without a single word of protest about leaving.
A quick check of the rooms, gathering up the last stray sock and toothbrush, and then it was time to go. Lance accompanied John to the door, looking like he’d been through hell with dark circles under his eyes and his cheeks sunken and pale. He held his robe tightly around himself like he was cold. There was a haunted look in his eyes, a sad proof of innocence lost.
“You should call pest control,” John told him, “Get rid of the mice. Just in case.”
Lance nodded, but John could see he hadn’t heard a word.
“You’re really leaving?” he asked softly. John nodded. He knew very well that Lance knew that, he’d even handed him Sam’s beloved wildlife book to keep, for God’s sake. But he knew why the man was asking. He wouldn’t want to be alone in this place right now either.
“Yeah,” he said quietly. To his surprise, he actually felt bad for the man now; he’d just never seen it coming.
“You could stay here for a couple of days,” Lance offered, with a self-depreciating smile like he knew exactly how desperate he sounded.
John didn’t reply. He took a look at the Impala where Dean was crammed into the backseat, much to his disdain, with yet another comic book, Sam plastered against his side, reading over his shoulder.
“Get off,” John could see Dean hiss good-naturedly. Sam made a grab for the comic and tore the brittle pages when Dean jerked it out of the way, but Dean just leaned over and rested his forehead against Sam’s, puffing out his cheeks in a would-be threatening manner and making his brother laugh. It was almost as if last night had just been a particularly nasty dream.
John looked back at Lance and somehow found a small smile to offer the man.
“We have to keep going,” he said. “This job doesn’t wait for us.”
Lance nodded. He unclenched one of his hands from his clothing and offered it to John.
“Thank you, John,” he said softly. “Take care of yourself.”
John looked up at the crumbling house, at the peeling paint and the invading ivy, then down at the extended hand, at the smooth skin and long, academic fingers. He gripped it tightly, allowing Lance to cling to him, if only for a moment, before he let go.
“Yeah,” he said. He turned away and walked briskly to the Impala, pulled open the back door on the driver’s side and stuck his head in.
“Hey, boys, ready to go?” he asked. He received only a distracted nod from Dean in response. Sam buried his nose in Dean’s sleeve, intently watching the page over Dean’s arm. John reached out to rub his son’s shoulder but the boy shied away from him, pressing even more into Dean’s arm.
“Ey,” Dean protested, but he didn’t even look up, just lifted his arm and let Sammy half-sprawl over his chest.
John closed the door quietly. His boys were okay - would be okay - and they would keep going. He got in and started the car, gently easing her around on the dusty road. He could see Lance in the rearview mirror as he drove away, standing lost and forlorn on his porch, and for a moment, he was tempted.
A day. Just a single day, no hunts, no monsters, no nightmares. For one day, he could have the illusion of a picket fence life, with his boys carefree and happy and nothing that was out to get them.
But John dismissed that thought as quickly as it had come. One day would turn into two, and then into weeks, and months, and years, until the thought of all the horrors out there was just an ugly memory that occasionally disturbed them in their safe little routine. And John couldn’t do that. He had a duty, an obligation.
He looked into the rearview mirror again, at his boys this time. Sam was still lying halfway in Dean’s lap, having commandeered the comic and turning the pages eagerly. Dean didn’t even seem to notice. The older boy was staring out the window, idly toying with John’s dog tags still around his neck. John would get them back tomorrow, but today, there was no harm in letting his son have the illusion of comfort that they offered.
Cold Rock Manor was silently disappearing between the tall pines, and with every foot that it faded into the distance, the urge to slam on the brakes and turn back grew fainter. He was John Winchester and this was his life. He was a hunter, his boys would be hunters. They were always going to be.
***
Notes and Acknowledgements