[FIC] Brother's Blood - Story Notes
I've written up some (very long) story notes with lots of pictures and tidbits about the real life inspirations and settings for this fic.
This story was first conceived in early 2012. The two of us got into Supernatural at around the same time (to be most accurate, tersichore convinced me to watch it with her with promises that it would be "fun"). We'd finally finished the series to date and were biding our time until the end of hiatus by rewatching episodes when we noticed this exchange in the pilot:
SAM
So when Dad left, why didn't you go with him?
DEAN
I was working my own gig. This, uh, voodoo thing, down in New Orleans.
SAM
Dad let you go on a hunting trip by yourself?
DEAN
I'm twenty-six, dude.
As Gulf Coast natives, we realized almost simultaneously that the setting of the pilot in October 2005 meant that Dean had been working that case in New Orleans less than two months after the city was devastated by Hurricane Katrina, and we began talking about what that case could have been, as well as how difficult and dangerous it must have been to operate as a hunter in that setting. This conversation, in addition to a fascination with the relationships between Sam, Dean, and John would eventually blossom into "Brother's Blood."
The images from Sam and John's trip through New Orleans are largely from our memories of that time. We went through our fair share of hurricanes and were in New Orleans for the relief effort around the same time Dean would have been. tersichore did a fantastic job describing the haunting drive into the city in Chapter 4. All of the graffiti is stuff we personally witnessed. My personal favorite is "WE WILL NOT GO QUIETLY INTO FEMA CAMPS" which I wish dearly I had a photograph of.
Some post-Katrina graffiti:
The taped up fridges were mentioned in Chapter 5.
In several of these photos, you can see the x-code rescue tagging that Sam and John discuss at the end of Chapter 3. Southern Spaces has a fantastic article and photo gallery of those that you should definitely check out here.
Considering the setting, we conceived of Georgina Moret as being a more sympathetic villain, someone driven to the breaking point by rage and grief. If you're curious about why someone would lash out again FEMA employees and NOPD or if you just want to learn more about the city, I'd recommend picking up Life in the Wake from NOLAFugees Press, City of Refuge by Tom Piazza, and Nine Lives by Dan Baum.
I'd also like to take a brief second to thank Dr. Paul Mahaffey, whose Post-Katrina Literature class was a big inspiration to me in writing about my experiences and without whose influence I might never have been so inspired to write this fic. He also introduced me to the hysterically funny A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole, which I snuck into Chapter 8 when Sam is looking through Dean's audiobooks.
Speaking of that chapter, I have to mention that it was one of my absolute favorites to write. I put a LOT of thought into Dean's book choices. The idea of Dean having a photo of Sam in the car was inspired by the scene in "The Benders" where Kathleen shows a photo of Sam to Missy Bender, which made me think that - yeah - Dean really does carry at least one photo of Sammy around. I wondered what the backstory of that was and came up with the story of Sam mailing it to Dean from Stanford.
I did a ton of research on the voodoo stuff as well, although I'll admit that I have no real experience with it or its practices. I tried to be as accurate as possible, but if I got anything wrong I apologize. The idea of the snakes and snails being found inside the bodies of Georgina's victims was inspired by early 1900s New Orleans folklore, which I read about in James Haskins' Voodoo & Hoodoo.
I debated over several different Loa to use for the story (including a relatively unknown one who may make the person he's mounting EAT THEMSELVES) but decided on Kalfu for the simple reason that he's the Loa that controls the crossroads.
Kalfu's veve:
A shotgun house similar to the one shared by Georgina and the Bernard family, where Sam finds the veve and other evidence of Georgina's voodoo:
We are both extreme research junkies, and our memories of the area (as we're both living overseas now) as well as Google Maps have been our best friends while writing this fic. If you wanted, you could very well take a "Brother's Blood" roadtrip, exploring the Seventh Ward then driving across the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, through Mandeville, and into Covington.
On the way, you could stop off at Dot's Diner, where Dean hit on Christie the waitress before getting kidnapped from the parking lot. This is actually a small chain of restaurants in Louisiana. The one in Covington is a transplant from Metaire:
The hotels the Winchesters stay at in Covington are both real (the one where Sam performs his impromptu surgery is called the Green Springs Motel). So is the Swiss Clock Inn in Pecos, Texas - and yes, it really does have a cuckoo clock theme.
The Biscuit King Cafe/Fun Barn, where Sam meets Rick Stevens, is real too, but it's actual location is in Fairhope, Alabama, our hometown.
Their specialty, the Ugly Biscuit:
This is actually a very flattering photograph. They're usually a lot uglier. They're also delicious.
Rick actually has a very detailed backstory which includes how he knows John Winchester, what happened to his leg, and why he quit the police force to become a hunter, but it didn't make the final cut of the story. We've flirted with the idea of bringing him back into the verse at some point, so I'll keep quiet on all of that for now. I will say that we thought of him as having a daughter around Sam's age, which is one of the reasons Rick was so sympathetic and willing to help him.
The title of the fic - and now the verse - is from "Brother's Blood" by Kevin Devine, which is very much the soundtrack for this series. The image of Sam giving Dean a direct blood transfusion to save his life and the implications of him doing so were very strong in our minds, and once we'd thought of that turn, the rest of the story seemed to unfold itself for us. A lot of where the verse is going is based on both the symbolism and the reality of that event.
If you're curious, Sam's scar would likely look like this (a surgical scar along the radial artery):
It's a very obvious, very permanent mark, and we loved the idea of that, as much as Dean hated it. The hurt/comfort stuff was pretty inevitable (especially considering I'm one of the authors, ahem) but I don't think we really planned for the fic to continue as long as it did after Dean was found. However, we both ended up being happy with the result.
We knew that we were going to kill Jess from the beginning, and our plan was always to make it a quite literal "Pilot AU," ending where the first episode did. But we didn't just want to shove her off-stage. We wanted to explore who Jess was, why her death was such a tragedy, and we loved the idea of Dean and Jess bonding (after all, they have the same birthday and love the same boy; it makes sense that they would have gotten along like - pardon - a house on fire), so we ended up spending quite a bit more time in Palo Alto than we originally thought we would.
I got a couple of responses saying that they really liked the idea of Jess being an art student. I'd love to say we came up with the idea ourselves, but actually, we noticed as we were rewatching the pilot for the zillionth time that Sam and Jess have a lot of plants. I mean, a LOT of plants. The next thing we noted were all of the paintings and art prints on the walls. Then, a one-second shot of an artist's desk and canvas in progress and we realized "SHE'S AN ARTIST!"
And she builds her own frames, too, which is just awesome.
It's so interesting to find these little character notes that were never brought up in the series and to explore them as an author. The scene where Jess finally dies brought actual tears to my eyes. I think I fell in love with her over the course of writing the fic. I hope readers did, too, and not just because I live for your pain.
Lastly, I'd just like to thank you guys for sticking with us for all this time! It's been a crazy ride!! Part of me never really believed I'd be typing the words "The End" on this story, and it's because of your comments and support that we were able to get here! So thank you, once again. We hope to see you all back for the continuation of this verse.