SPN Reversebang fic: Times We Have Lost (PG13)
I was really excited for spn_reversebang this year. Then I was, like, a minute late claiming and 100 people go in ahead of me and I despaired (*angst*). Unnecessary - I got one of my first picks, and it was this great piece bringing Mary into time with her boys. So glad I could explore it in fic, and that twisted_slinky agreed we needed Mary forward in time this time. Hope you enjoy!
Art Title: Her Boys
Prompt Number: 1069
Artist: twisted_slinky
Fic Title: Times We Have Lost
Author: brutti_ma_buoni
Fandom/Genre: SPN, time travel
Pairing(s): none, gen with Dean, Sam and Mary Winchester
Rating: PG13
Word Count: 4755
Warnings: only for language
Summary: As if keeping a lid on Lilith and the seals wasn't enough fun for Dean and Sam, who should turn up in their lives but Mary Winchester, large as life, out of time, and on a mission from a very familiar demon. Except, it's not like Sam remembers her. And not like Mary recognises him. Which leaves Dean with twice the headache. Exactly what is he prepared to do for family - and which family does he choose?
Go and see twisted_slinky art post here, and tell her how great it looks!
Dean likes a nice ass on a woman. But in this particular case, it is not by any measure good news. Partly, because she's resting that high, tight butt squarely on the Impala's hood, and he doesn't like to see anything potentially denting Baby without his permission.
But mostly because this ass belongs to his mother. Which is wrong on more levels than Dean has brain space for just now. There are angels on his tail and Sam on a path to doom, and the younger-than-him mom he left in the past months ago has no place here, messing with his attention. Timetravelling mothers have no part in Dean's current pains in the ass.
Apart from any other issues, like why or how or what the fuck, Sam is bare moments away from here, and he does not deserve to meet Mary Winchester without warning. Mary Winchester? She looks maybe a little older than when Dean met her, but is she married yet? He can’t tell.
Shit. Thinking of Sam what makes Dean hurry over, so he's breathless when he reaches Mary's side. (He made a decision, moving, that he's not going to think of her as Mom. Too weird. Too weird, though if she hadn't burned up twentysome years ago, he'd still be calling this woman that exact word in this world. It's weirder and harder than when back in the past, when Dean was out of time and expecting the weird.)
"What the fuck," he spits at her, and regrets it immediately. It's hardly Mary Winchester's fault he's her son. It’s not like she has any idea, even. "I mean, shit, sorry, but what are you doing here? I wasn't expecting-"
Her chin is up, and she never was a pushover. "So, you really are from the future. And how I know that? Long story," she says. And there's no time for that now, not with Sam interviewing witnesses three stores along. So Dean butts in before she gets past, "There's a demon-" She's hunting. It's enough.
"I have a partner. I mean, he's my brother, but we don’t- Anyway. He'll be here any moment. We should think of a cover for you." He doesn't ask, yet, why she's here, specifically here, with him, as opposed to generically decades out of time. Because that is a big, big issue that Dean's brain is screaming. Does she even know who he is? Shit, come to that, he needs his own cover. What name was he using in the past? He temporarily can't remember.
"We're going by Addison and Hayes, here," he says, relieved, and has a needless frantic mental scramble to remember when Moonlighting started. It’s not like that piece of character name info would wreck the present if Mary takes it back to the past. "You got an alias? You don't want to be on the grid here. These days, we have these machines, computers, that share information all over the world. If you set alarms ringing- Well, that would be bad. You're Smith. Or Jones. Maybe Johnson." Things Dean did not expect to do today: play twenty-first century translator for his time travelling dead mom. Things he never expected to do, really.
"Even to your brother?" She says it with a curious tilt of the head, like that’s not unexpected. Dean thinks of her with family, hunting, and how she hated it and didn’t let on. Maybe family secrets aren’t so much
"Especially to my brother," says Dean, decades of Winchester boys' trust melting in the urgency of telling Sam nothing. Especially nothing that can make its way to Ruby and the demons. Because he doesn’t know if he can trust Sam anymore. He makes a mental note not to tell Castiel anything, either, assuming the angel mojo doesn't have that covered. This is just Dean. And Mary. Crap. That doesn't actually sound good.
"I get that," she says. And he remembers she probably hasn't told John Winchester anything at all about how he died, was resurrected, how her parents died - anything. It has just been Mary, on her own, on her knees in the dark among her dead. With Azazel’s kiss on her lips.
And to add to the mix, here is Sam arriving on cue, ignorant of just what he's stepping into, and about to stay that way if Dean has his way. Sam giving Mary the stink eye, the way he's done with every girl Dean has had in the last three years, and- hello, uncomfortable. And yet, as far as cover goes… Dean can think of worse.
"Sammy-" always start with aggravating someone if you're trying to get sneaky "- meet Mary. She's a hunter. A real, nice, hunter. From- uh, Nebraska, right?" Don’t say Kansas. Don’t say from way back. Please Mom, don’t fuck this up.
Maybe his look warns her. Maybe Mary never was dumb enough to tell too much to a guy she’d just met, that even his brother didn’t trust. “Mary Andrews,” she says, shaking hands firmly. “I met Dean a while back. Got a few questions ‘bout a mutual friend.”
“Sam Hayes,” says Sam. And isn’t that nice? Dean’s family all together for the first time since before Sam could talk. Except for Dad. And just for a moment Dean expects to see John Winchester there in the corner of his eye. Who knows what age or how, but Dad should’ve been here. Everyone else here has come back from the dead, in their own way. Why not John? Dammit.
“Me and Mary, we’re gonna go get a drink, Sammy,” he says, trying to cram enough 'potential date' message into his body language that Sam will back off. Because that ‘mutual friend’? Aren’t too many living souls that could be, given Dean skipped town as Mary’s family died. Dad, maybe, but far more likely that Yellow Eyed Demon Dean failed to kill for her. And Azazel, even after death, is nothing to fuck with. He needs to talk with Mary, fast.
“Yeah? Something come up?” says his damned oblivious little brother. “I didn’t spot anything in the papers, but there’s enough demonic activity just now I’d believe anywhere could be a hotspot if-“
“A drink, Sammy. Me and Mary. I’ll see you later,” says Dean, more meaningfully.
Sam at least takes the hint now, though it isn't so much a hint as an engraving by this time. Backs off, rolls his eyes. “Yeah. Sure, Dean. See you later.”
Dean drapes an arm over Mary’s shoulders, trying to remember what you do with a girl you like on a first date, when she’s not your time-travelling mom. Fifteen years of muscle memory, and they desert him now. He feels awkward as a teen.
“I’m your date?” she asks. “Because, no offence, you’re not my type. But, for a cover story, I guess-“
She leans towards him, and Dean shies away in horror, leaving her looking puzzled and embarrassed. “Sorry,” he says, helplessly. It freaks me out when my mom comes onto me, even for a disguise. “I don’t think Sam’s watching, or anyone else. No need for PDAs.”
“What?” she blanks. Oh. Yeah. Time travel. Vocabulary. Isn’t this fun?
*
It is a dark and grimy bar, but the wings are good and the music loud enough that Dean and Mary can talk.
“What brings you here?” he starts. “And, seriously, I mean what? And how and why?”
“Take a guess,” she says, bitter-sharp suddenly, and Dean remembers how Mary Winchester is a lot more than a nice girl with a tragic future. "Things aren't so cool back in 1975. Surprised? I thought I was free, but guess who came calling?"
So time really has passed for Mary, too, since they last met. More so than for Dean. She looks pretty much like he remembers. He wonders what she sees on his face, of the last few months. Of denying hell, and starting the Apocalypse; of angels and destinies and seals and Lilith and Sam. But that’s less important right just this minute than, a couple of years on, who can possibly have been causing her Dean-related problems? “Azazel?” It’s not even a question. That's who. Always who, fucking with Dean and his whole family. And Mary still lives in that world. Or did. Dean's getting his tenses scrambled.
Mary tilts her head, considering. “That his name? I never knew. Your Azazel, my Yellow-Eyes - said he liked me, you know. Guess that means he’s going to keep on dropping by.”
“What did he want?”
She sighs, fiddling with a beermat, avoiding his eyes. “Me, here. With you, for some reason. Seemed to think you’d help me.”
“Sure I will. But not to help him. That's not the way this works. You know that, right? Hunters and demons, not mixable things.”
A nod. Mary, quiet and reflective. “Yeah. That’s what I told him. Okay.” She makes to leave.
There is something - hell, a lot of somethings - Dean isn’t understanding here, but Mary giving up just like that reads all kinds of wrong. “What does that mean? What happens if I don’t help you?”
“Mmm? Oh, he kills me. Obviously.” She shrugs, calmer than she has a right to be after that line. “He likes me, but not that much.”
“Shit. Uh, sorry, M- Mary.” Fuck, why not swear in front of her? He doesn’t have a memory of Mom telling him off for swearing; four year olds mostly don’t, in Dean’s limited but guess-based experience. But still, thinking of her as Mary isn’t easy, though she is still years off being Dean’s mom. “But you had a deal. Demons don’t break deals.” Dean remembers that. Remembers the deals they offered him, and John, and the deals they refused Sam. Yeah. They stick to the rules, mostly.
But apparently Mary doesn't have that kind of experience with demons, because she rolls her eyes, with serious snark Dean recognises from Sam's pissier faces. What a damned weird thing to inherit from your mom. "Since when do you trust demons? And he’s no crossroads demon, your Azazel. I can tell. Maybe his rules don’t work like your standard demon deals. But what does it matter? I got eight years, tops. Yellow Eyed Demon's coming for me and we both know it. He told me no one gets hurt if he's not interrupted… but I think we all know how demon deals end."
“Okay.” Dean’s heart is pumping hard, listening. Dead Mom in ‘75 equals no Dean and no Sam. And maybe there are people (angels) who would see that as a bonus just now, but Dean isn’t about to not exist to oblige a damn demon. Or an angel. And he doesn’t want his mom to die. Even though she will. And even though she did. “What do you need?”
She said, very plain spoken, “I have to do a thing. A ritual, in a sacred place. A cave. He gave me a map.”
“Demon magic? You even do that?” She doesn’t vibe like a magic practitioner, but nothing would surprise Dean now.
“No. It’s just a ritual. Candles and herbs and… dead birds, okay, it’s gross. But if it’s me that does it, and you or your family that helps, it works for Azazel. Something gets unlocked.”
Super. Sam’s snarky voice in Dean’s head. That will be a seal, then. Figures that Dean’s line gets another starring role in breaking seals. How many are needed now? Couple dozen they are sure have broken. Couple dozen they know are saved. Odds are not with the people fighting against Lucifer’s rising. Will this be the last one? Dean Winchester started the Apocalypse, now gets to crack it wide open onto the earth, holding his Mommy’s hand?
“Okay,” he says. “I’ll do it.” It is absolutely the wrong choice, and he makes it without thinking any more, even though he doesn't know till he says it that there isn't even a contest. Azazel always did know how to push buttons. Dean’s is right there, opposite in the booth. His mom, younger than he is, living her life of peace for too short a time, and currently trying not to look scared to hell and back.
“Cool. Tomorrow, though,” says Mary. She sounds brittle, edgy as hell and trying to cover. “It needs a new moon. So we have time." She drank a sip or two of beer, trying to look at ease. "And since we have time, you want to tell me about the future? Are there jet packs? I haven’t seen any. What do I do if I meet my future self, like they do in sci fi?” And she pauses, looks him very directly in the eye.
“I-“ he chokes. “I don’t think that’ll be a problem.” She looks at him, quirked of brow, waiting for him to break bad news. She already guesses she is dead here, he realises. Maybe it’s just a gut feeling; maybe his poker face doesn’t work so well without cards in his hand. But he doesn't want to tell her so. “Big place, America. Lots of people. And you won’t be here long, right?” That tense moment passes, in a breath. Maybe she doesn't want to hear it either, even though she asked. Dean grasps the easy part of the subject. Let it go, at least for tonight. “No jetpacks. Sorry. But seriously, computers are the shit. Anyone ever offers you shares in a company called Microsoft, you buy them, okay?”
“Yeah, okay,” she says, rolling her eyes. “That’ll be top of my list in the real world.”
So, yeah. Dean in fact does spend some time explaining the twenty-first century to his dead mom. It isn’t even a bad evening, if you ignore everything unsaid on the table between them. And she takes out a drunken bum who tries to cop a feel by the bathrooms in a way that makes Dean honestly proud to be her son.
*
Back at the motel, Dean ignores Sam’s snippy questions and heads for the shower. Under the pounding water, he tries to work it out. What he can say, what Sam may do. What the consequences of one more seal opening might be. What will happen if they fail and Mary dies. Probably no hell this time. Probably no anything. No Dean, no Apocalypse. Maybe that's worth Mary dying…
He steps out of the shower more confused than he went in, and walks straight into a trenchcoated angel.
“Fuck, Cas, just-“
“You cannot help your mother to break a seal, Dean.”
“Yeah, well, hello and fuck off,” he responds. So much for Mary flying below the angel radar, anyway. "If we don't help her, she'll be killed. We'll never exist."
The angel looks as damn smug and calm as ever he has, even with Dean's shower steam condensing on his trenchcoat. "No. I told you. Destiny can't be changed. All roads lead to the same destination. You will have been born. All things will come to this point, and if you unlock the seal-"
“Dean?” Sam’s voice, fuzzily through the bathroom door. "Is that Castiel? What's going on?"
Half a truth. He can tell Sam half a truth, can't he? And Castiel won't tell, because the truth would make Sam more likely to help Mary. Probably. That's logical, right? Dean is starting to feel like he's juggling fifteen balls while skating on thin ice and doing a couple of other dumbfuck confusing things all at once because this is just too much.
Important stuff he needs to hold onto: Mary lives. Sam doesn't find out who she is and tell the demons. Mary doesn't find out who Dean and Sam are and know that her entire world will be destroyed and her kids will live the life she hoped they'd never even hear of. Less important: the world, the Apocalypse, Lucifer, time-travelling Mary getting onto some fucked up database, Castiel's habit of turning up while Dean is in the shower.
Okay then. Dean briefly contemplates getting back into the shower and just crying for a year or two. But this isn’t hell, so he knows he can survive worse. So.
"Sam, we need to talk. About Mary." He says it quickly. Mary. Just another girl.
It works. Sam squints, pissed. "I don't wanna know, Dean," he says, with a flash of teen memory Dean can't ignore.
"Hey, this isn't about sex, baby bro," he says, patting Sam's arm. "Though I know that's all new and strange for you." Sam, briefly, goes from pissed to familiar amused/weary of Dean. How things used to be, way back. It stings, because they so aren't there now. "She's here on a case. Being blackmailed by a demon. She needs our help to do a thing."
"A thing? A thing a demon wants?" Sam isn't too far in old brother-muscle-memory to let that slide. "You mean she's possessed? Or working for evil? Or- Dean? What the hell is going on? You never even mentioned this Mary to me. Why would you even be considering this?"
Dean hates lying to Sam. Even if there's been a lot of the flipside, lately. So he doesn't, quite. "I know her from way back. And we met up, a couple months back. When you took off."
Castiel eyes Dean, hard. Like he can see what Dean is doing, and doesn't like it. Like Dean guesses a Catholic priest might face down a squirmer in the confessional. Then he blinks and is gone, with a rush of wings that shivers the motel room.
Sam blinks too. "Uh. What? What does Castiel think? He can't possibly be okay with helping a demon. Right?"
"Nope," Dean says. Far too cheerfully. He sounds insane, to himself. "Nope, he thinks I'm all wrong. Just like you. Does that make you happy? I'm still gonna save- uh, help Mary." Mary can't be saved. Not really. He needs to remember that.
"Doesn't that tell you something?" Sam is looking awful big, and between Dean and the door. Looming with intent, and Dean's head isn't anywhere near prepared for him.
So Dean ignores him, and started preparing for bed. The usual. Like he knows what the hell is going on with his world, and how he can fix even one tiny little bit of it. Mary's ritual isn't till midnight next day. He has time. And, hell, at least it wrongfoots Sam, who expected Dean to be hurling himself into action. It's hard to beat on a guy who's brushing his teeth and taking an evening piss before turning in for the night.
*
Dead birds, check. Candles, check. His mom, looking worn in yesterday's clothes, and thirty years younger than she should? Oh yeah. A big check there too.
It's a nice cave that they are violating with this ritual. Very homey. Especially the dank dripping sounds, and the way the air is so bad the candles flicker almost to nothing, over and over.
"You're sure?" Mary asks him again.
"Yes." What else can Dean say? No, Mom. I changed my mind. These demon deals never end well. They killed you already. And me. So really, who are we kidding?
Yeah. No.
He waves a dead pigeon in her direction. "See? All set."
"Sam didn't make it?" She hasn't asked, before now. Maybe she's stalling.
"Nope. He… had other views." As in, Dean didn't tell him where he was going, and Sam didn't ask.
He isn't really expecting this to go well, though. Why would he? When Sam busts in through the cave entrance just before they light the herbs, it isn't even a shock. And Ruby? Is that even worth raising a brow over?
Somewhere down inside, Dean is relieved. And terrified, but there was a part of him that really wants someone to stop him opening a seal. It can't be right. And yet he can't see another way.
"I can't let you do this, Dean." Yeah. Sam looking ready to face down hell to prevent this, whatever the hell he thinks this is. "Some girl, against the fate of the world? You know this isn't how it has to go." Dean watches as Ruby's mouth curves at those words. Little Sammy never used to talk that way. Dean's death changed him, and Dean now watches that working its way through Sam's instincts. Watches Sam's confusion and sense of betrayal, watches him flick a glance at Mary that makes Ruby smile a little more.
"She's not a demon," says the demon, close at Sam's side. "She's-"
"Don't," Dean blurts. But the demon has no time for Dean. Dean hasn't been fucking her all summer, taking lessons soaked in demon blood; this demon’s all about Sam. "She's out of time," says Ruby. "I can smell it."
Sam's brow creases, the big lummox. Isn't often Dean sees Sam fuddled, but the level of unspoken here is enough for anyone to get confused. "What?"
"Out of time. She's of the past. Shouldn't be alive here." Mary doesn't flinch, but Dean can sense her congealing chill as what she suspects is confirmed. Ruby's mouth keeps flapping, spilling secrets. "Someone brought her forward. Someone who can't travel-" She sniffs, hard, in Mary's direction, walks towards her. "-Weeellll, never thought I'd smell Azazel on someone in this time."
And then Sam's behind Mary, knife at her throat, and Dean's watching the worst Oedipal horror two inches from unfolding. "Azazel?" Sam's shouting. "He sent you here? Why? From when?"
And Mary says, "1975, but-" A little puzzle piece, added to the pile, and sometime soon someone will realise-
Ruby's eyes flicker black. "Seventy five? That's early. He was only just on the path then…" She sounds puzzled. But of course Dean only broke the first seal months back. So how did Azazel know to send Mary now? He's almost pleased when Ruby shrugs, gives in for a second. "Guess it was just a hope? Or maybe a prophecy, that'd be his style. But why are you special, little blondie?"
She looks at Sam, knife still at Mary's throat, blade digging in so their skilled hunter mom can't begin to get purchase to try to flip or slip out of Sam's grip. He's learned well, these past years. John would be proud. And now Sam might kill Mary. Oh God. Dean's torn between all the stupidity of how much he's not in control here, and the stupidity of the dead birds and a ritual that clearly he won't perform because what the hell was he thinking, and Sam still has the knife at Mary's throat and he might actually have to choose between them, and then Ruby says-
"Holy fuck! I just worked out what this seal is. Sam, you definitely ought to off her. Do it, and this seal is safe."
Sam doesn't. Because Sam isn't a throat-cutter, still - and Ruby knows it. Which is basically good. But he doesn't slacken his hold, and Mary stays still, paralysed, because she doesn't know Sam. She looks okay, considering, but a stranger's knife at your throat isn't ever a party.
And still Dean stands, clueless, as Ruby says, "Because Sam? You might want to meet Mary Winchester."
The knife falls. Luckily, to the cave floor, and not into any critical body parts. And Sam spins Mary around, shouting, "What? What the fuck? How can you be my mother? You're not-"
And Dean is shouting too, and it's mostly just, "No," and pleading noise without words, but it's way, way too late. The dead birds, flowers and ritual are forgotten, and this is just a trainwreck of pretty much all that Dean loves or has loved.
Sam is on his knees. Mary is paler than pale. Ruby's eyes are black, her mouth speaking silent tales of blood and evil.
Suddenly, narrating thirty five years of technological change to his blissfully unaware dead mother seems like the most fun thing Dean has ever done. In comparison to, say, this.
"I had to," is all he can say. "He'll kill her. Azazel will kill Mom if we don't open the seal. I'm sorry, I didn't want you to find out this way-"
Sam looks sort of betrayed and horrified, and yet maybe there's a little understanding there. Mary does a spectacular spit take over the word 'Mom’. Probably the first time she’s ever been called it. Worlds of sorrow in the air, silent.
Till Ruby tilts her head and says, "How will he know?"
There's a tiny part of Dean that wants to kiss her, as he starts to process that. Another then wants to smack himself upside the head for never, ever asking that. Mary looks like she's feeling the same. In fact, Sam is now looking between the two of them like he's recognising something. (Which, Dean sort of hopes he does look like Mary, up to a point, but maybe not sharing a Derp face?)
"I'm guessing Azazel can't travel in time?" Sam says, and he's talking to Ruby, which burns.
"Nope," she says, "Or not forwards. I mean, he'll burn her till he's sure she's telling the truth, but he's not gonna be checking up on her in person, you know."
Which apparently gets them no further forward. Dean has an idea of how the next part of the night goes. There's a lot of family angst, and then they have to unlock the seal anyway. Or maybe today's the day Ruby snaps and guts them like he's always kind of expected? Whatever way it is, it's not good.
And then there's a great rushing of wings, and all their problems go away. Fuck, Dean's never been so glad to see an angel before.
"Cas! Fix this!"
“How?” Sam doesn’t see it. But Dean does.
Angels can time travel. Angels can wipe minds. Suddenly, Dean is so damn glad he has a pet angel. Or Castiel has a pet human, whatever. “Make this not be real. For us. For Mo- Mary. Send her back, and let her believe she did it. Or-“ He looks at Ruby. “Azazel, will he smell angel on her?”
She waggles a hand. “Not likely. Angels, not a big hazard back in the seventies. And that kind of wipe, that doesn’t take big holy mojo, you know? Shouldn’t leave a mark.”
Okay then. Mary nods. "Sounds like a plan. Thank you." She steps up to Castiel. But then she stops. Looks at Dean, looks at Sam. "You're hunters?"
"Yes."
"You're… you're my kids?" She wobbles on the words.
"They sure are, sweetie," says Ruby, inappropriate and breaking the moment. Mary stands alone, slack, string-cut puppet.
Someone should do something, but Dean and Sam just stand.
In the end it's Castiel who moves, who says, "You will forget." He places a thumb between Mary's eyebrows, and they see the glow of angelic power engulf her briefly. She blinks and is almost a different person.
"'Kay, thanks guys. Got to make my rendezvous now. Don't wanna be stuck in the future forever. Thanks for the dead birds." She waves, and leaves.
Dean half flaps a hand. Sam doesn't. They watch their mother walk out of their lives, and don't dare do anything that could remind her of what this is.
"Do Sam, now," says Dean, finally.
Sam blinks, shakes his head. "What?"
"Dude, it's not fair. You don't need this memory. She's gone. I never wanted you to-" Dean stops, choked. Ruby snickers. He doesn’t give a fuck, right now.
"But you recognised her. You knew." Sam shakes his head, trying to clear it. "You didn't tell me-"
"Let Cas fix this," Dean says, and he's close to begging. Why this matters so much, compared with Lucifer and the fact Sam lost his mother before his first birthday… Hell, he doesn't know why. But Sam seems so far away now, and the furthest he's ever seemed from Dean is with his knife at Mary's throat, Ruby urging him to cut. Maybe Dean wants that gone too.
"I can't wipe you all," says Castiel, quietly. "Some mark needs to remain. These events happened."
"'S okay," Dean responds. "I can remember. Me and the demon." He jerks his head at Ruby, who wrinkles her nose but says nothing.
In the end, Sam just nods, and closes his eyes. Dean watches as his brother is allowed to forget.
Winchesters always have their burdens. Sam has Azazel's legacy. Dean remembers what others can't bear.
***
Art Title: Her Boys
Prompt Number: 1069
Artist: twisted_slinky
Fic Title: Times We Have Lost
Author: brutti_ma_buoni
Fandom/Genre: SPN, time travel
Pairing(s): none, gen with Dean, Sam and Mary Winchester
Rating: PG13
Word Count: 4755
Warnings: only for language
Summary: As if keeping a lid on Lilith and the seals wasn't enough fun for Dean and Sam, who should turn up in their lives but Mary Winchester, large as life, out of time, and on a mission from a very familiar demon. Except, it's not like Sam remembers her. And not like Mary recognises him. Which leaves Dean with twice the headache. Exactly what is he prepared to do for family - and which family does he choose?
Go and see twisted_slinky art post here, and tell her how great it looks!
Dean likes a nice ass on a woman. But in this particular case, it is not by any measure good news. Partly, because she's resting that high, tight butt squarely on the Impala's hood, and he doesn't like to see anything potentially denting Baby without his permission.
But mostly because this ass belongs to his mother. Which is wrong on more levels than Dean has brain space for just now. There are angels on his tail and Sam on a path to doom, and the younger-than-him mom he left in the past months ago has no place here, messing with his attention. Timetravelling mothers have no part in Dean's current pains in the ass.
Apart from any other issues, like why or how or what the fuck, Sam is bare moments away from here, and he does not deserve to meet Mary Winchester without warning. Mary Winchester? She looks maybe a little older than when Dean met her, but is she married yet? He can’t tell.
Shit. Thinking of Sam what makes Dean hurry over, so he's breathless when he reaches Mary's side. (He made a decision, moving, that he's not going to think of her as Mom. Too weird. Too weird, though if she hadn't burned up twentysome years ago, he'd still be calling this woman that exact word in this world. It's weirder and harder than when back in the past, when Dean was out of time and expecting the weird.)
"What the fuck," he spits at her, and regrets it immediately. It's hardly Mary Winchester's fault he's her son. It’s not like she has any idea, even. "I mean, shit, sorry, but what are you doing here? I wasn't expecting-"
Her chin is up, and she never was a pushover. "So, you really are from the future. And how I know that? Long story," she says. And there's no time for that now, not with Sam interviewing witnesses three stores along. So Dean butts in before she gets past, "There's a demon-" She's hunting. It's enough.
"I have a partner. I mean, he's my brother, but we don’t- Anyway. He'll be here any moment. We should think of a cover for you." He doesn't ask, yet, why she's here, specifically here, with him, as opposed to generically decades out of time. Because that is a big, big issue that Dean's brain is screaming. Does she even know who he is? Shit, come to that, he needs his own cover. What name was he using in the past? He temporarily can't remember.
"We're going by Addison and Hayes, here," he says, relieved, and has a needless frantic mental scramble to remember when Moonlighting started. It’s not like that piece of character name info would wreck the present if Mary takes it back to the past. "You got an alias? You don't want to be on the grid here. These days, we have these machines, computers, that share information all over the world. If you set alarms ringing- Well, that would be bad. You're Smith. Or Jones. Maybe Johnson." Things Dean did not expect to do today: play twenty-first century translator for his time travelling dead mom. Things he never expected to do, really.
"Even to your brother?" She says it with a curious tilt of the head, like that’s not unexpected. Dean thinks of her with family, hunting, and how she hated it and didn’t let on. Maybe family secrets aren’t so much
"Especially to my brother," says Dean, decades of Winchester boys' trust melting in the urgency of telling Sam nothing. Especially nothing that can make its way to Ruby and the demons. Because he doesn’t know if he can trust Sam anymore. He makes a mental note not to tell Castiel anything, either, assuming the angel mojo doesn't have that covered. This is just Dean. And Mary. Crap. That doesn't actually sound good.
"I get that," she says. And he remembers she probably hasn't told John Winchester anything at all about how he died, was resurrected, how her parents died - anything. It has just been Mary, on her own, on her knees in the dark among her dead. With Azazel’s kiss on her lips.
And to add to the mix, here is Sam arriving on cue, ignorant of just what he's stepping into, and about to stay that way if Dean has his way. Sam giving Mary the stink eye, the way he's done with every girl Dean has had in the last three years, and- hello, uncomfortable. And yet, as far as cover goes… Dean can think of worse.
"Sammy-" always start with aggravating someone if you're trying to get sneaky "- meet Mary. She's a hunter. A real, nice, hunter. From- uh, Nebraska, right?" Don’t say Kansas. Don’t say from way back. Please Mom, don’t fuck this up.
Maybe his look warns her. Maybe Mary never was dumb enough to tell too much to a guy she’d just met, that even his brother didn’t trust. “Mary Andrews,” she says, shaking hands firmly. “I met Dean a while back. Got a few questions ‘bout a mutual friend.”
“Sam Hayes,” says Sam. And isn’t that nice? Dean’s family all together for the first time since before Sam could talk. Except for Dad. And just for a moment Dean expects to see John Winchester there in the corner of his eye. Who knows what age or how, but Dad should’ve been here. Everyone else here has come back from the dead, in their own way. Why not John? Dammit.
“Me and Mary, we’re gonna go get a drink, Sammy,” he says, trying to cram enough 'potential date' message into his body language that Sam will back off. Because that ‘mutual friend’? Aren’t too many living souls that could be, given Dean skipped town as Mary’s family died. Dad, maybe, but far more likely that Yellow Eyed Demon Dean failed to kill for her. And Azazel, even after death, is nothing to fuck with. He needs to talk with Mary, fast.
“Yeah? Something come up?” says his damned oblivious little brother. “I didn’t spot anything in the papers, but there’s enough demonic activity just now I’d believe anywhere could be a hotspot if-“
“A drink, Sammy. Me and Mary. I’ll see you later,” says Dean, more meaningfully.
Sam at least takes the hint now, though it isn't so much a hint as an engraving by this time. Backs off, rolls his eyes. “Yeah. Sure, Dean. See you later.”
Dean drapes an arm over Mary’s shoulders, trying to remember what you do with a girl you like on a first date, when she’s not your time-travelling mom. Fifteen years of muscle memory, and they desert him now. He feels awkward as a teen.
“I’m your date?” she asks. “Because, no offence, you’re not my type. But, for a cover story, I guess-“
She leans towards him, and Dean shies away in horror, leaving her looking puzzled and embarrassed. “Sorry,” he says, helplessly. It freaks me out when my mom comes onto me, even for a disguise. “I don’t think Sam’s watching, or anyone else. No need for PDAs.”
“What?” she blanks. Oh. Yeah. Time travel. Vocabulary. Isn’t this fun?
*
It is a dark and grimy bar, but the wings are good and the music loud enough that Dean and Mary can talk.
“What brings you here?” he starts. “And, seriously, I mean what? And how and why?”
“Take a guess,” she says, bitter-sharp suddenly, and Dean remembers how Mary Winchester is a lot more than a nice girl with a tragic future. "Things aren't so cool back in 1975. Surprised? I thought I was free, but guess who came calling?"
So time really has passed for Mary, too, since they last met. More so than for Dean. She looks pretty much like he remembers. He wonders what she sees on his face, of the last few months. Of denying hell, and starting the Apocalypse; of angels and destinies and seals and Lilith and Sam. But that’s less important right just this minute than, a couple of years on, who can possibly have been causing her Dean-related problems? “Azazel?” It’s not even a question. That's who. Always who, fucking with Dean and his whole family. And Mary still lives in that world. Or did. Dean's getting his tenses scrambled.
Mary tilts her head, considering. “That his name? I never knew. Your Azazel, my Yellow-Eyes - said he liked me, you know. Guess that means he’s going to keep on dropping by.”
“What did he want?”
She sighs, fiddling with a beermat, avoiding his eyes. “Me, here. With you, for some reason. Seemed to think you’d help me.”
“Sure I will. But not to help him. That's not the way this works. You know that, right? Hunters and demons, not mixable things.”
A nod. Mary, quiet and reflective. “Yeah. That’s what I told him. Okay.” She makes to leave.
There is something - hell, a lot of somethings - Dean isn’t understanding here, but Mary giving up just like that reads all kinds of wrong. “What does that mean? What happens if I don’t help you?”
“Mmm? Oh, he kills me. Obviously.” She shrugs, calmer than she has a right to be after that line. “He likes me, but not that much.”
“Shit. Uh, sorry, M- Mary.” Fuck, why not swear in front of her? He doesn’t have a memory of Mom telling him off for swearing; four year olds mostly don’t, in Dean’s limited but guess-based experience. But still, thinking of her as Mary isn’t easy, though she is still years off being Dean’s mom. “But you had a deal. Demons don’t break deals.” Dean remembers that. Remembers the deals they offered him, and John, and the deals they refused Sam. Yeah. They stick to the rules, mostly.
But apparently Mary doesn't have that kind of experience with demons, because she rolls her eyes, with serious snark Dean recognises from Sam's pissier faces. What a damned weird thing to inherit from your mom. "Since when do you trust demons? And he’s no crossroads demon, your Azazel. I can tell. Maybe his rules don’t work like your standard demon deals. But what does it matter? I got eight years, tops. Yellow Eyed Demon's coming for me and we both know it. He told me no one gets hurt if he's not interrupted… but I think we all know how demon deals end."
“Okay.” Dean’s heart is pumping hard, listening. Dead Mom in ‘75 equals no Dean and no Sam. And maybe there are people (angels) who would see that as a bonus just now, but Dean isn’t about to not exist to oblige a damn demon. Or an angel. And he doesn’t want his mom to die. Even though she will. And even though she did. “What do you need?”
She said, very plain spoken, “I have to do a thing. A ritual, in a sacred place. A cave. He gave me a map.”
“Demon magic? You even do that?” She doesn’t vibe like a magic practitioner, but nothing would surprise Dean now.
“No. It’s just a ritual. Candles and herbs and… dead birds, okay, it’s gross. But if it’s me that does it, and you or your family that helps, it works for Azazel. Something gets unlocked.”
Super. Sam’s snarky voice in Dean’s head. That will be a seal, then. Figures that Dean’s line gets another starring role in breaking seals. How many are needed now? Couple dozen they are sure have broken. Couple dozen they know are saved. Odds are not with the people fighting against Lucifer’s rising. Will this be the last one? Dean Winchester started the Apocalypse, now gets to crack it wide open onto the earth, holding his Mommy’s hand?
“Okay,” he says. “I’ll do it.” It is absolutely the wrong choice, and he makes it without thinking any more, even though he doesn't know till he says it that there isn't even a contest. Azazel always did know how to push buttons. Dean’s is right there, opposite in the booth. His mom, younger than he is, living her life of peace for too short a time, and currently trying not to look scared to hell and back.
“Cool. Tomorrow, though,” says Mary. She sounds brittle, edgy as hell and trying to cover. “It needs a new moon. So we have time." She drank a sip or two of beer, trying to look at ease. "And since we have time, you want to tell me about the future? Are there jet packs? I haven’t seen any. What do I do if I meet my future self, like they do in sci fi?” And she pauses, looks him very directly in the eye.
“I-“ he chokes. “I don’t think that’ll be a problem.” She looks at him, quirked of brow, waiting for him to break bad news. She already guesses she is dead here, he realises. Maybe it’s just a gut feeling; maybe his poker face doesn’t work so well without cards in his hand. But he doesn't want to tell her so. “Big place, America. Lots of people. And you won’t be here long, right?” That tense moment passes, in a breath. Maybe she doesn't want to hear it either, even though she asked. Dean grasps the easy part of the subject. Let it go, at least for tonight. “No jetpacks. Sorry. But seriously, computers are the shit. Anyone ever offers you shares in a company called Microsoft, you buy them, okay?”
“Yeah, okay,” she says, rolling her eyes. “That’ll be top of my list in the real world.”
So, yeah. Dean in fact does spend some time explaining the twenty-first century to his dead mom. It isn’t even a bad evening, if you ignore everything unsaid on the table between them. And she takes out a drunken bum who tries to cop a feel by the bathrooms in a way that makes Dean honestly proud to be her son.
*
Back at the motel, Dean ignores Sam’s snippy questions and heads for the shower. Under the pounding water, he tries to work it out. What he can say, what Sam may do. What the consequences of one more seal opening might be. What will happen if they fail and Mary dies. Probably no hell this time. Probably no anything. No Dean, no Apocalypse. Maybe that's worth Mary dying…
He steps out of the shower more confused than he went in, and walks straight into a trenchcoated angel.
“Fuck, Cas, just-“
“You cannot help your mother to break a seal, Dean.”
“Yeah, well, hello and fuck off,” he responds. So much for Mary flying below the angel radar, anyway. "If we don't help her, she'll be killed. We'll never exist."
The angel looks as damn smug and calm as ever he has, even with Dean's shower steam condensing on his trenchcoat. "No. I told you. Destiny can't be changed. All roads lead to the same destination. You will have been born. All things will come to this point, and if you unlock the seal-"
“Dean?” Sam’s voice, fuzzily through the bathroom door. "Is that Castiel? What's going on?"
Half a truth. He can tell Sam half a truth, can't he? And Castiel won't tell, because the truth would make Sam more likely to help Mary. Probably. That's logical, right? Dean is starting to feel like he's juggling fifteen balls while skating on thin ice and doing a couple of other dumbfuck confusing things all at once because this is just too much.
Important stuff he needs to hold onto: Mary lives. Sam doesn't find out who she is and tell the demons. Mary doesn't find out who Dean and Sam are and know that her entire world will be destroyed and her kids will live the life she hoped they'd never even hear of. Less important: the world, the Apocalypse, Lucifer, time-travelling Mary getting onto some fucked up database, Castiel's habit of turning up while Dean is in the shower.
Okay then. Dean briefly contemplates getting back into the shower and just crying for a year or two. But this isn’t hell, so he knows he can survive worse. So.
"Sam, we need to talk. About Mary." He says it quickly. Mary. Just another girl.
It works. Sam squints, pissed. "I don't wanna know, Dean," he says, with a flash of teen memory Dean can't ignore.
"Hey, this isn't about sex, baby bro," he says, patting Sam's arm. "Though I know that's all new and strange for you." Sam, briefly, goes from pissed to familiar amused/weary of Dean. How things used to be, way back. It stings, because they so aren't there now. "She's here on a case. Being blackmailed by a demon. She needs our help to do a thing."
"A thing? A thing a demon wants?" Sam isn't too far in old brother-muscle-memory to let that slide. "You mean she's possessed? Or working for evil? Or- Dean? What the hell is going on? You never even mentioned this Mary to me. Why would you even be considering this?"
Dean hates lying to Sam. Even if there's been a lot of the flipside, lately. So he doesn't, quite. "I know her from way back. And we met up, a couple months back. When you took off."
Castiel eyes Dean, hard. Like he can see what Dean is doing, and doesn't like it. Like Dean guesses a Catholic priest might face down a squirmer in the confessional. Then he blinks and is gone, with a rush of wings that shivers the motel room.
Sam blinks too. "Uh. What? What does Castiel think? He can't possibly be okay with helping a demon. Right?"
"Nope," Dean says. Far too cheerfully. He sounds insane, to himself. "Nope, he thinks I'm all wrong. Just like you. Does that make you happy? I'm still gonna save- uh, help Mary." Mary can't be saved. Not really. He needs to remember that.
"Doesn't that tell you something?" Sam is looking awful big, and between Dean and the door. Looming with intent, and Dean's head isn't anywhere near prepared for him.
So Dean ignores him, and started preparing for bed. The usual. Like he knows what the hell is going on with his world, and how he can fix even one tiny little bit of it. Mary's ritual isn't till midnight next day. He has time. And, hell, at least it wrongfoots Sam, who expected Dean to be hurling himself into action. It's hard to beat on a guy who's brushing his teeth and taking an evening piss before turning in for the night.
*
Dead birds, check. Candles, check. His mom, looking worn in yesterday's clothes, and thirty years younger than she should? Oh yeah. A big check there too.
It's a nice cave that they are violating with this ritual. Very homey. Especially the dank dripping sounds, and the way the air is so bad the candles flicker almost to nothing, over and over.
"You're sure?" Mary asks him again.
"Yes." What else can Dean say? No, Mom. I changed my mind. These demon deals never end well. They killed you already. And me. So really, who are we kidding?
Yeah. No.
He waves a dead pigeon in her direction. "See? All set."
"Sam didn't make it?" She hasn't asked, before now. Maybe she's stalling.
"Nope. He… had other views." As in, Dean didn't tell him where he was going, and Sam didn't ask.
He isn't really expecting this to go well, though. Why would he? When Sam busts in through the cave entrance just before they light the herbs, it isn't even a shock. And Ruby? Is that even worth raising a brow over?
Somewhere down inside, Dean is relieved. And terrified, but there was a part of him that really wants someone to stop him opening a seal. It can't be right. And yet he can't see another way.
"I can't let you do this, Dean." Yeah. Sam looking ready to face down hell to prevent this, whatever the hell he thinks this is. "Some girl, against the fate of the world? You know this isn't how it has to go." Dean watches as Ruby's mouth curves at those words. Little Sammy never used to talk that way. Dean's death changed him, and Dean now watches that working its way through Sam's instincts. Watches Sam's confusion and sense of betrayal, watches him flick a glance at Mary that makes Ruby smile a little more.
"She's not a demon," says the demon, close at Sam's side. "She's-"
"Don't," Dean blurts. But the demon has no time for Dean. Dean hasn't been fucking her all summer, taking lessons soaked in demon blood; this demon’s all about Sam. "She's out of time," says Ruby. "I can smell it."
Sam's brow creases, the big lummox. Isn't often Dean sees Sam fuddled, but the level of unspoken here is enough for anyone to get confused. "What?"
"Out of time. She's of the past. Shouldn't be alive here." Mary doesn't flinch, but Dean can sense her congealing chill as what she suspects is confirmed. Ruby's mouth keeps flapping, spilling secrets. "Someone brought her forward. Someone who can't travel-" She sniffs, hard, in Mary's direction, walks towards her. "-Weeellll, never thought I'd smell Azazel on someone in this time."
And then Sam's behind Mary, knife at her throat, and Dean's watching the worst Oedipal horror two inches from unfolding. "Azazel?" Sam's shouting. "He sent you here? Why? From when?"
And Mary says, "1975, but-" A little puzzle piece, added to the pile, and sometime soon someone will realise-
Ruby's eyes flicker black. "Seventy five? That's early. He was only just on the path then…" She sounds puzzled. But of course Dean only broke the first seal months back. So how did Azazel know to send Mary now? He's almost pleased when Ruby shrugs, gives in for a second. "Guess it was just a hope? Or maybe a prophecy, that'd be his style. But why are you special, little blondie?"
She looks at Sam, knife still at Mary's throat, blade digging in so their skilled hunter mom can't begin to get purchase to try to flip or slip out of Sam's grip. He's learned well, these past years. John would be proud. And now Sam might kill Mary. Oh God. Dean's torn between all the stupidity of how much he's not in control here, and the stupidity of the dead birds and a ritual that clearly he won't perform because what the hell was he thinking, and Sam still has the knife at Mary's throat and he might actually have to choose between them, and then Ruby says-
"Holy fuck! I just worked out what this seal is. Sam, you definitely ought to off her. Do it, and this seal is safe."
Sam doesn't. Because Sam isn't a throat-cutter, still - and Ruby knows it. Which is basically good. But he doesn't slacken his hold, and Mary stays still, paralysed, because she doesn't know Sam. She looks okay, considering, but a stranger's knife at your throat isn't ever a party.
And still Dean stands, clueless, as Ruby says, "Because Sam? You might want to meet Mary Winchester."
The knife falls. Luckily, to the cave floor, and not into any critical body parts. And Sam spins Mary around, shouting, "What? What the fuck? How can you be my mother? You're not-"
And Dean is shouting too, and it's mostly just, "No," and pleading noise without words, but it's way, way too late. The dead birds, flowers and ritual are forgotten, and this is just a trainwreck of pretty much all that Dean loves or has loved.
Sam is on his knees. Mary is paler than pale. Ruby's eyes are black, her mouth speaking silent tales of blood and evil.
Suddenly, narrating thirty five years of technological change to his blissfully unaware dead mother seems like the most fun thing Dean has ever done. In comparison to, say, this.
"I had to," is all he can say. "He'll kill her. Azazel will kill Mom if we don't open the seal. I'm sorry, I didn't want you to find out this way-"
Sam looks sort of betrayed and horrified, and yet maybe there's a little understanding there. Mary does a spectacular spit take over the word 'Mom’. Probably the first time she’s ever been called it. Worlds of sorrow in the air, silent.
Till Ruby tilts her head and says, "How will he know?"
There's a tiny part of Dean that wants to kiss her, as he starts to process that. Another then wants to smack himself upside the head for never, ever asking that. Mary looks like she's feeling the same. In fact, Sam is now looking between the two of them like he's recognising something. (Which, Dean sort of hopes he does look like Mary, up to a point, but maybe not sharing a Derp face?)
"I'm guessing Azazel can't travel in time?" Sam says, and he's talking to Ruby, which burns.
"Nope," she says, "Or not forwards. I mean, he'll burn her till he's sure she's telling the truth, but he's not gonna be checking up on her in person, you know."
Which apparently gets them no further forward. Dean has an idea of how the next part of the night goes. There's a lot of family angst, and then they have to unlock the seal anyway. Or maybe today's the day Ruby snaps and guts them like he's always kind of expected? Whatever way it is, it's not good.
And then there's a great rushing of wings, and all their problems go away. Fuck, Dean's never been so glad to see an angel before.
"Cas! Fix this!"
“How?” Sam doesn’t see it. But Dean does.
Angels can time travel. Angels can wipe minds. Suddenly, Dean is so damn glad he has a pet angel. Or Castiel has a pet human, whatever. “Make this not be real. For us. For Mo- Mary. Send her back, and let her believe she did it. Or-“ He looks at Ruby. “Azazel, will he smell angel on her?”
She waggles a hand. “Not likely. Angels, not a big hazard back in the seventies. And that kind of wipe, that doesn’t take big holy mojo, you know? Shouldn’t leave a mark.”
Okay then. Mary nods. "Sounds like a plan. Thank you." She steps up to Castiel. But then she stops. Looks at Dean, looks at Sam. "You're hunters?"
"Yes."
"You're… you're my kids?" She wobbles on the words.
"They sure are, sweetie," says Ruby, inappropriate and breaking the moment. Mary stands alone, slack, string-cut puppet.
Someone should do something, but Dean and Sam just stand.
In the end it's Castiel who moves, who says, "You will forget." He places a thumb between Mary's eyebrows, and they see the glow of angelic power engulf her briefly. She blinks and is almost a different person.
"'Kay, thanks guys. Got to make my rendezvous now. Don't wanna be stuck in the future forever. Thanks for the dead birds." She waves, and leaves.
Dean half flaps a hand. Sam doesn't. They watch their mother walk out of their lives, and don't dare do anything that could remind her of what this is.
"Do Sam, now," says Dean, finally.
Sam blinks, shakes his head. "What?"
"Dude, it's not fair. You don't need this memory. She's gone. I never wanted you to-" Dean stops, choked. Ruby snickers. He doesn’t give a fuck, right now.
"But you recognised her. You knew." Sam shakes his head, trying to clear it. "You didn't tell me-"
"Let Cas fix this," Dean says, and he's close to begging. Why this matters so much, compared with Lucifer and the fact Sam lost his mother before his first birthday… Hell, he doesn't know why. But Sam seems so far away now, and the furthest he's ever seemed from Dean is with his knife at Mary's throat, Ruby urging him to cut. Maybe Dean wants that gone too.
"I can't wipe you all," says Castiel, quietly. "Some mark needs to remain. These events happened."
"'S okay," Dean responds. "I can remember. Me and the demon." He jerks his head at Ruby, who wrinkles her nose but says nothing.
In the end, Sam just nods, and closes his eyes. Dean watches as his brother is allowed to forget.
Winchesters always have their burdens. Sam has Azazel's legacy. Dean remembers what others can't bear.
***