But What We Make (Part II)
JC startled awake, his phone buzzing in his pocket as he sat up straight in the front seat of the jeep. It took a second to get his bearings, but he remembered where he was quick enough. He berated himself for falling asleep as he reached for the phone.
“Hello?”
“JC, I’ve got Sam.”
“Can I talk to him?” Jesus, that was a relief. He’d been about to go to blows with Dean when he refused to let him along for the ride, but Dean had always been a dirty fighter. The idea that his presence was what the woman might want was logical enough that it blew through his angered resistance. His mother would have a lot to say about his emotional reaction if she was still there, but six years of living alone with the Winchesters had given him a slightly skewed idea of things. He knew he couldn’t sacrifice himself for another person, knew the human race would depend on him in the future, but Sam and Dean weren’t just anyone else. They were his brothers and he’d die a hundred times over to protect them.
Not that Dean or Sam would ever give him the chance.
“He’s asleep right now. He was in the hospital when I got there. Nothing too bad but I talked to the nurse before I saw him and found out they were just keeping an eye on him because of the smoke inhalation.” Dean’s voice was quiet as he spoke. “I’ll have him call you when he wakes up though. He looks like hell, JC,” Dean admitted over the phone.
He ached for his brother then, for both of them. He didn’t know what the first 12 years of Sam’s life had been like but by the time he’d become a part of the family Sam and Dean had been so far gone on one another there was no way of stopping what they became. JC couldn’t imagine Sam and Dean any other way, couldn’t remember a time when they weren’t wrapped around each other. The last two years had been hard on Dean, and hard for JC to watch. He was caught between his two big brothers, Dean refusing to talk about Sam or ask about him and Sam refused to ask but waiting with pained silence until JC told him Dean was alright.
Sam had walked away, knowing how far gone they were, afraid the connection they shared would get his brother killed. JC had tried to talk him out of leaving - in fact, he thought he had - up until the night he showed up with a full ride from Stanford, and a bus ticket in his back pocket. Dean had accepted his decision better than he or John had. It wasn’t until Sam was gone a full two years that Sam had finally cut the string between him and his big brother, telling Dean not to come back. Two years of Dean and JC running off to see Sam when John wasn’t paying attention. Not that he didn’t figure out where they were headed. John Winchester might have a blind spot a mile wide when it came to certain things, but he knew where his boys were at all times.
For two years Sam went to school, learned about the normal life Dean and JC never stood a chance at - JC had to lead mankind against skynet and Dean was too long in his grief over his mother to want normal again - but then Sam needed to break away from Dean for reasons JC still didn’t understand. Their long distance relationship hadn’t been perfect but it gave Sam the chance to do what he wanted and still have Dean. Back then, he wasn’t sure if Dean would survive the loss of his brother/lover. Listening to the ache in his brother’s voice now, he wasn’t sure Dean would survive his return.
“Hospitals always make Sam sick,” JC offered. And though he hadn’t planned on bringing his own trouble up, he knew there was nothing that would kick-start Dean’s recovery better than possible danger. “Dean, I know it can’t be her, but I think I’ve got a tail.”
“What?”
“I caught some guy following me around today. He was good, Dean, blending in well and took his time. Didn’t rush me or try to get me into a dark corner. He just… watched. I booked a motel and put my stuff in, but I’m keeping an eye on the place from outside just in case. If nothing happens tonight I figure I’m safe to go in tomorrow.”
“JC, why didn’t you call before?”
Dean was angry and JC smiled to himself. Dean was still, in so many ways, the young man he’d met that first day in the woods. Without John and Sarah to dictate his role, he was still trying to keep himself between his brothers and harms way.
“It could be nothing, maybe I’m just overreacting after this thing with Sam. Either way, I didn’t notice it until you were already on the way to get Sam and he’s got real trouble, Dean. He needs you there.”
He heard Dean snort over the phone line. “Yeah, he needed a ride.”
“Dean-” There was so much bitterness and self-doubt in that one comment that JC hated Sam for a moment for doing this to their brother, for making them all live out this painful sham for two years. They all knew - Sam included - that Sam would never be able to stay in the normal world for long. Something was always going to get him back to the hunt.
“Don’t. Just… take care. If you even think you can’t shake this, you haul your ass to Bobby’s or Ellen’s, alright?”
“You remember what happened the last time we were at Ellen’s?”
“Yeah, well Sarah ain’t with us to cause trouble this time.”
JC smiled at that, remembering the day his strong willed mother finally met a woman that had the same steel in her. They’d gotten along about as well as two lions fighting over the same prize piece of meat. They still couldn’t figure out if the women had been fighting over John or the boys. Ellen had finally told Sarah if she ever set foot in her bar again she’d be saying hello with her shotgun.
When they were on the way out, she’d handed each of the boys a brown bag with lunch, candy bars, and an ice cold soda along with a pre-paid phone card, letting them know they, at least, were welcome back.
“Good thing John isn’t with us or that’d put Bobby out of reach too.”
Dean laughed slightly and JC could hear the way his oldest brother was letting go of some of that pressure. “How the hell we manage not to piss of every person we meet, with those two as role models, is beyond me.”
“Speak for yourself. With my role models it’s a wonder I don’t sleep my way through every bar in town.”
Dean laughed and JC knew he had to be remembering better times, when JC was too young to realize he shouldn’t be watching his older brothers in the next bed. What he’d witnessed had been natural then, just two people who loved one another, filling in the holes where doubt and fear had crept in and wormed their way in. He’d just watched and some nights, when they were still catching their breath, he’d crept into the other bed with them, just laying against Dean’s side to be close to them. His mother had always told him he had to hold on to what he could and Sam and Dean were the best things that had happened to them. He knew Sarah had felt the same.
“Take care, JC and just remember, don’t get fingerprinted.”
Like he needed a reminder. “Find some sleep soon, Dean. Don’t need to come after you when you crash.”
“Yes, Mother.”
“Nite, Dean.”
“Nite, Little Brother,” Dean said, reminding him just who he was. The world might someday see him as John Connor, but to Dean he would always just be his little brother.
JC hung up the phone but continued to look at the screen for a moment. Dean wasn’t good at expressing his emotions on the best of days, but JC and Sam had always been able to read him well enough that he didn’t need to be. Tonight, JC felt a little lighter for the reminder of his place in their world.
A Winchester by right, Dean had told him once, if not by blood. And as always, the thought was followed up by Bobby’s no nonsense voice, “Family don’t end with blood.” The first time he’d met Bobby the man said the phrase and then looked perplexed when JC busted out into laughter. Dean said it with the same tone and cadence without ever meaning to. Sam had smiled his most wicked smile too, understanding JC’s humor, and Dean had looked just as surprised as Bobby.
Nights like tonight, he wished the whole world just forget he ever existed. He was more than okay remaining JC Winchester, hunter of the supernatural. He had no desire to be John Connor, savior.
Life didn’t work like that though, not for a Connor and certainly not for a Winchester.
The jeep was parked in a deserted part of the parking lot, hidden in shadow. The room was just across the way, the back room the way John had always liked. Sarah always said John liked the back because he didn’t like people, didn’t want to be around them. JC knew it was because John couldn’t trust anyone anymore and even if the distance was just another room or two, he wanted to keep his family from outsiders. Dean got it naturally, still taking the bed closest to the door to protect JC. For his mother’s memory, and for Dean’s sanity, he still let him.
None of it meant anything as a body shifted into his periphery, a gun held to his temple. “Don’t move.” The voice was calm and smooth, someone who wasn’t afraid of what he was doing, someone who had experience on that end of the gun.
“If you want money you can have my wallet. You can have anything.” He was cursing himself for being so damn caught up in the front of the room that he wasn’t paying attention to his own back - he was not telling his brother about this, no way in hell - but the wallet and money could be easily replaced.
“I’m not here for your wallet, John Connor.” The man paused when JC started to turn his head to see who was addressing him by his real name but the gun pushed at his temple to keep him where he was. “John Connor. JC Winchester. Son of Sarah Connor . Unofficially adopted into the Winchester family in 1995, soon after you nearly died at the hands of a T-1000.”
“Who the hell are you?” He couldn’t be a terminator. One of the T’s would have just killed him as soon as he saw him. That didn’t mean he was safe though. Anyone who knew the name John Connor knew too much.
The gun moved away from him and for the first time he could turn to look at the man that had pulled the weapon on him. He had his hands up, showing JC he didn’t have any other weapons trained on him. His dark hair was close cropped, jeans and a dark tee hidden under an army green jacket. His eyes, blue as the sky, held him with the same sort of intensity John Winchester had.
“Who are you?” JC asked again.
“Derek. I’m … I’m from the future. I was sent back to protect you.”
“Prove it.”
“Can we take this someplace a little more private?”
“Why?” JC wasn’t ready to trust him yet even though there was something in the other man’s eyes that made him want to. He looked at JC like he was something, like he was hope, and he knew the man wasn’t looking at some young guy in a parking lot, but John Connor, leader of the resistance.
The guy pulled up his jacket sleeve and held his arm up, showing the marks that he knew as sure as any; the barcode marked into the skin of resistance fighters who were caught by Skynet.
“I still don’t trust you,” JC said, but he was getting out of the Jeep and leading the other man, Derek, into his room. He had his hand on a gun as soon as he was through the door and Derek was watching him wide eyes as he turned on him, pushing him further into the room. “Sit down and keep your hands where I can see them.”
Derek did as he was told and JC watched him take a seat at the table. “Did you really think a little tattoo would get my trust?”
“Just enough to get me in the door. I know your mother disappeared in 1997. I know John Winchester disappears sometime this year. And I know about your brothers.”
He swallowed against the lump in his throat at the mention of John’s disappearance. He wasn’t his father, not really, but for the last 10 years he’d lived with the man, 6 of those years after his mother had disappeared. He was the only father JC had ever known. In fact, he held a certain amount of pride that he would one day be known as John, as if after everything he could claim that name as his, that he could honor John Winchester in some way.
“What do you know about my brothers?” His hands were steady on the gun and his voice was cold. No matter what anyone could say about his relationship to John - or Sam and Dean’s relationship to Sarah - no one doubted they were brothers through and through.
“I know they’re lovers.”
JC nearly pulled the trigger on principle. No one knew, no one but his brothers and himself. “How?”
“We’re part of the resistance,” Derek said. “We’re … close … your brothers and I, in the future.”
“And what about me?”
Derek smiled then and there was something warm and affectionate there. He didn’t understand it but he’d learned to trust his instincts a long time ago. “We’re close too. As close as you let anyone get.”
“If we’re so close, tell me something no one else would know.”
“Sam was only 14 the first time it happened, a bad hunt and Dean was bleeding bad. You got him patched up but Sam was messed up about Dean getting hurt. You were there for all of it. You never felt weird about watching your brothers having sex in the bed beside you or even jealous because Sarah told you to hold onto the things you loved because the world was gonna end. What you never told them, was that you would never have asked to be a part of it, but you’d have gone willingly to them if they’d asked.”
JC’s mouth dropped open because there was no way anyone else knew his thoughts. No way he’d spoken of it either. “How d-“
“You sent me back and you knew I’d have to convince you somehow. I’m here because someone else came back too.”
“The crazy lady?”
“You’ve seen her?”
“Long black hair, Asian descent, Australian accent? She attacked me at school 6 years ago, claimed to know where my mother was. She showed up at my brother’s apartment last night and killed his girlfriend. Who the hell is she?” He lowered his gun then because the things he knew, the fact that he knew what their attacker looked like, was enough. The guy had to be on the up and up.
“Jessie Flores.”
“You know her?”
“We used to be friends.”
“Used to be?” JC couldn’t help but ask because the answer was hard and cold, the type of voice that came after a deep betrayal.
“Used to be, until she tried to kill John Connor and escaped into the past before we could stop her.”
“Jesus, you have any idea what she’ll do next?”
“She killed Jessica last night?”
“You know her name?”
“Sam used to talk about her from time to time. Never when Dean was around, but sometimes, when Dean walked away. He was as good at saying what people needed to hear as Dean was at knowing when they needed to hear it.”
JC snorted at that because there was a common mistake when it came to his brothers; that Sam was the one that always knew when to talk and Dean was the insensitive one. It was quite the opposite actually. Dean always knew what people wanted, he just wasn’t the type of guy to sugar coat things. Sam took his direction from Dean when it came to matters of the heart. Dean walking away or rolling his eyes was just one of a set of signals that meant it was time for Sam to do his sympathy thing. Left to his own devices, Sam would barrel right in the puppy dog eyes every time before people were warmed up enough to him to let him in.
“Yeah, that’s my brothers,” JC conceded to Derek. “So, you’ve been following me around. Why not just come up to me like you are now?”
“I had to wait until Dean was gone. He wouldn’t let me within 50 feet of you without a full interrogation. When he left I knew I could get close enough to get you to hear me out. I was just waiting for the right time to introduce myself.”
“Dean will be back with Sam in the morning.” Derek just nodded. “Come back then. I might have let you in the door, but I don’t let anyone in closer than that without further inspection.”
“This mean Dean is gonna grill me anyway?”
There was something in his voice, amused resignation that made JC smile. “Yes.”
“Damn. I ever get back home I’m gonna owe him.”
“You made a bet with Dean?”
“I was drunk. He took advantage.”
“I bet,” JC smiled. “See you in the morning, Derek.”
The other man left and JC wasn’t sure what to think of the situation. Derek had held a gun to his head, purposely waiting until he was alone to come forward. He thought about his mother though and what little she’d said about his father. He thought about the difference in thinking like a hunter and thinking like a resistance fighter and how much trust Derek had to have given JC to walk in that room first without checking the location thoroughly. And he realized he wanted to trust him. Derek knew enough about them that his knowledge had to come from him or his brothers but that didn’t mean as much as it should. There was more than one way to get information. He needed Dean there to help him see the truth.
He set the locks, made sure the salt lines were undisturbed, and settled on the second bed with his clothes on. He had a gun under the pillow and a throwing knife on the night stand beside him. Dean would be there in the morning, someone he could trust to watch his back, and he’d have Sam again, finally able to see how his brother coping was with his own eyes. Until then, he decided to just settle in. If Derek was going to betray him in the night, he’d already made his bed. He was too damn worn out not to sleep in it.
**
“JC!” Sam barreled down the hall trying to find his ‘little brother’. It was funny, how fast his dad had taken to Sarah Reese and her son, how easily they’d fit into their messed up lives, but Sarah made his dad pay more attention to them, not letting him leave them behind the way he always had and JC was fun to have around. He didn’t really know what Dean thought about it all, his brother had become tight lipped ever since JC and Sarah had come into their lives, but it was only a matter of time before Sam wheedled it out of him.
JC looked up from his locker, shoving books into his backpack as Sam came up alongside him. “Hey, Sam.”
“You ready? Dean said he’d meet us up front right after school.”
“Why are you in such a hurry?” JC asked as he shut the locker and Sam pulled him towards the door.
“First day of school,” Sam answered, and then realized JC didn’t know about the tradition. Actually, no one else did, this was just something Dean always did with him. He slowed his steps then, suddenly worried that with JC there, Dean wouldn’t follow through with it. “Um, Dean sometimes takes me out on the first day.”
JC looked at him oddly for a second and Sam couldn’t help but smile. JC had never really had anyone but his mom to rely on and it was going to take longer than three months to get used to Sam and Dean. Still, it made Sam happy that he had a chance to prove himself to JC. He wasn’t really a big brother, but he was trying to live up to the idea. It was a lot harder than Dean made it look, always being there to help out when he was needed without crowding JC too much when he needed his own space.
The thought made Sam realize Dean would never disappoint him though, so he gripped JC’s arm and pulled him out the front door. There, sitting right in front of the school was Dean, leaning up against the sleek black Impala. John and Sarah were off on a hunt, probably gone for two days their dad had said as he packed that morning. Sarah had promised Dean she’d call each night to make sure everything was okay since they were leaving him in charge of both boys. Dean had rolled his eyes at Sarah’s need to mother him but Sam could see his brother softening to her just a little more each time it happened.
“Hey JC, Sammy, how was school?” Dean asked as he opened up the car, letting JC jump in the back seat as Sam opened the front and crawled across to the passenger side.
“Fine,” JC said with a roll of his eyes.
Sam smirked. “New day, new school, same ol’ shit.”
Dean shook his head as he slid behind the wheel looking back at JC. “Yeah, same here. Teacher make you stand at the front of the class?”
JC just nodded and Sam groaned sympathetically. He’d managed to avoid the introduction speech, but it was the first day of the school year and no matter how good an influence Sarah was on their dad, he knew it was only the first of many schools they’d be attending that year. There was still plenty of time to have to come up with a lie for the obligatory ‘meet the new kid’ moment.
“Well this here is a Winchester tradition,” Dean said, a lazy drawl making his voice take on an accent that was totally in place in the small Texas town they were currently living in but was completely different from his brother’s usually terse words. “First day at a new school I always pick you up. Next, we head to a diner and we get to order whatever we want. After that, we find something normal to do, like movies or, I don’t know, bowling or miniature golf. Someplace we can scope out the local kids and figure out what normal looks like in this place.”
“And we have fun,” Sam said with a wink. “No training tonight, though if Dad asks, you tell him we did, got it?”
JC nodded, but a smile was growing on his face. “Can I have a milkshake?”
Dean turned back around to start the car up but Sam just laughed at JC’s expression. “Of course you can have a milkshake.”
The diner was greasy and cheap and just the way Dean liked it. Sam sat across from his brother in the booth, his legs stretched out so one heel was pressed on the seat between Dean’s legs with his ankles crossed over one another. John sat next to the wall beside Dean as he slurped away at the chocolate shake. They each had one in front of them and there was a mostly empty basket of onion rings and fries sitting between them.
“Where to next?” Dean asked as he finished a French fry, dropping his hand between his legs to wipe the grease off on the leg of Sam’s jeans.
“I heard some of the kids talking about a movie theater around here,” JC mumbled.
Sam looked at Dean because JC didn’t mumble like that. He was quiet, sure, but when he spoke JC always made himself heard.
“Yeah, we can do that, can’t we, Sammy?”
“Sure, sounds like fun.”
“You like going out to the movies, JC?” Dean asked as he reached for his wallet to pay for their meal.
JC looked down and didn’t answer until Dean nudged him with his elbow. “I … I’ve never been.”
Dean’s eyes shot up, looking incredulously at Sam for a moment before he looked back at JC. He smiled widely, as if to make up for his moment of surprise. “Good thing you got stuck with us then, huh?”
Dean didn’t say anything else then and Sam didn’t make a big deal of it either. For all the things they never had, for all the things they had to give up, their dad had always given them the time and space to have a little fun when they could. It was alarming to Sam to find out that Sarah, who took such good care of JC and who obviously wanted him to be happy, never let him do things like that.
The drive was quiet and JC took five minutes to decide what he wanted to eat once they were inside and in front of the concession stand. Sam didn’t say anything when Dean ordered all the candy JC had been looking at but hadn’t asked for. He even shared his popcorn and managed to wait until the closing credits before starting to throw the remaining popcorn at his brother. JC had been startled at first, but he’d joined in as soon as Dean threw popcorn back at both of them.
Sarah called to check in around nine and Dean told her about the diner, but said they’d come straight home to do training and got started on homework. JC confirmed it when he talked to her and Sam was handed the phone next, a surprise he still hadn’t gotten used to. After Sarah made sure he was okay, they hung up and Sam realized he was alone in the living room of their small rental apartment.
He walked down the hallway and quietly looked in their room to find JC sitting on the single bed. Dean and Sam had a bunk bed set up across the room on the other wall. Dean was sitting beside JC, a piece of paper in hand as he spoke softly.
“So you just write it all down, alright? It doesn’t matter how simple or silly or ordinary the activity seems. If you haven’t been able to do it yet because of the way we live, you just add it to the list. It might take a while to get through the whole thing, but Sammy and I will make sure we do.”
“Do you have a list?” JC asked Dean as he took the paper.
“In my head, sure, I keep one for Sammy and me both. I don’t know what you’ve done though so you gotta help me out.”
“What’s next on your list for you and Sam?”
Dean stared down at his hands for a second and Sam wanted to go throw himself at his brother. He never knew Dean did anything like that, but it made sense.
“Sam’s always wanted to play soccer. I’m hoping this is the year I can convince Dad to stick around long enough for Sam to play. I think I can convince him the benefits of team training, but it just depends on the hunt. For me? I’d like to get invited to a party. No one ever gets to know me well enough, you know, to just invite me so I usually just crash them. I keep thinking, it’s gotta be different to have someone ask you to be there.”
“Yeah, that’d be cool.”
“Yeah,” Dean said with a sigh. “And barring all that, we’ve never been to a state fair. I think we might actually be in town long enough this time to go.”
Sam stepped into the room then, “Fair sounds awesome.”
Dean looked up and Sam could tell his brother was surprised by his appearance. Sam just smiled as he went to sit on the other side of Dean. “You know what else we haven’t done?” Sam asked. Both Dean and JC turned to look at him and Sam smiled. “We haven’t been roller skating.”
“I haven’t either,” JC admitted.
Dean nudged JC with his shoulder then. “Looks like something for the list then.”
JC smiled and grabbed his school back pack, pulling out a pencil to start out the list. No one else would know what the paper was, but at the very top in clear, crisp lettering JC wrote S, D, & JC’s list. It was that moment Sam realized JC was finally letting them in. It was that same moment Sam realized he and Dean were finally letting JC in too. He didn’t know what their parents had planned for the future, but JC was theirs now. There was no turning back.
Sarah always liked to tell them stories about fate, and how people that were smart enough could outrun destiny. Sam didn’t believe in things like that, even though Dean ate it up with a spoon. JC was supposed to be theirs. He was sure of it. Whatever fate had in mind for JC Reese, the Winchester boys were gonna have his back.
**
Sam knew better than to try to take a seat on the bed so he leaned over, coffee in hand as he tried to tempt his little brother into wakefulness. The scent of coffee filled the small motel room, but the enticement wasn’t enough to wake JC. Sam sighed, setting the two coffees on the table before he leaned in and grabbed his brother’s shoulder. JC shot up in bed, nearly nailing Sam in the chin with his forehead.
“Jesus, JC,” Sam muttered as he stepped back. At least he didn’t sleep with a knife under his pillow. That was why Sam always woke Dean from across the room, preferably with something to throw. He forced his mind away from other ways to wake Dean, ways that always got a much different outcome. The truth was, since his brother had shown up at the hospital he felt like he was just waiting for his brother to pick him back up, dust him off, and throw them right back into the relationship they’d had when he left. It was unrealistic, especially with everything that had just happened, but Dean had always been there for him, had always forgiven him everything. Some part of him had always thought Dean would accept him back if he ever came home to him, no matter the circumstances. Sam’s grief was threatening to overwhelm him and what he needed was the comfort of his brother’s arms. A comfort Dean was obviously unwilling to give.
“Sam?” JC was on him then, arms thrown around Sam’s neck as he held him close.
Sam knew his brother wanted to ask if he was alright but they both knew the answer to that already. He wasn’t sure he’d ever be right again, but part of him knew that was the grief coming through. He held tight to his brother though, tight to the one he didn’t have to worry about. JC was neutral territory for his grief and Sam took advantage of that, letting himself be comforted. It didn’t happen often that Sam or Dean let JC have that role, but he was damn good at it none the less. Sam tried not to think of how often JC had taken on the role of comforter for Sarah in the ten years before he’d become a Winchester.
“Hey, got you coffee,” Sam finally mumbled against JC’s neck.
Dean took a seat on the other bed - the one closest to the door, Sam noted - and drank his own hot cup of caffeine. “You alright, JC?”
Sam pulled back because there was something in Dean’s voice that made his words more than just a casual question. This wasn’t a good morning - how you been since I left sort of question.
JC shrugged. “I was right.”
“What?” The words came out in unison, Dean furious and Sam confused.
JC rolled his eyes as he sat up in bed, grabbing for the coffee before he started talking. “I was being followed. He got the drop on me last night while I was trying to catch him. I think he’s an ally, Dean. Either way, he’s coming by sometime this morning.”
“What the hell are you playing at, JC?”
“He knew things only we could have told him, Dean. He said he’s from the future. He said,” he looked at Sam and he could see JC trying to find the right words. “The woman who killed Jess is Jessie Flores. She’s from the future too.”
“She’s not a terminator.” Dean said immediately, before Sam could process what that all meant.
“Nope, just someone who decided to kill John Connor.”
Sam gripped John’s shoulder out of instinct. Whoever she was, she was still a danger to JC. He refused to lose his brother the way he’d lost Jess and Sarah. “We won’t let her get close to you.”
JC opened his mouth as if to answer, but a knock at the door made all three men look to the door. “JC?”
“It could be him. Says his name is Derek.”
Dean motioned to the door and Sam took up placement behind it while Dean stood at the side that would open. JC rolled his eyes again, obviously thinking they were going a little overboard but for someone who had been trained to keep himself alive at all costs, JC took too many risks for Sam’s liking. Still, JC reached for the knob. “Yeah?”
“John, its Derek.”
JC nodded to his brothers and slowly unlocked the door before opening it. He stepped back, letting Derek in but Dean was moving after he was just a foot in the door, pulling him forward. Sam slammed the door shut, pushing JC back behind them as Dean forced the guy back against the closed door. JC’s gun was in hand - he had no idea when he’d even picked the weapon up - centered on the guy’s forehead and Dean’s forearm was against his throat, not cutting off air but only because Dean was holding back.
The guy didn’t even look surprised. “Hello, Dean,” he said with a small smile. He looked over Dean’s shoulder and nodded in acknowledgment. “Sam.”
“How do you know us?” Sam demanded.
“Same way you know me. We fought together in the resistance with John Connor.” His eyes moved over to where JC was standing in front of the bed. “Not that John Connor, but the older one. We’ve still got a few more years before we actually meet.”
“How do we know that’s true?”
“I know you. I know things about you that you’d never tell anyone else.”
“Like what?” Dean demanded.
“Oh hell,” JC murmured behind them but Sam didn’t look back at him.
Derek smiled. “I know you like to flirt with anything blond and busty, Dean, but your real tastes run to tall puppy eyes over there. And I know you popped Sam’s cherry after a bad hunt somewhere in Arizona. John was in the other bed watching.”
Dean pushed with his forearm, cutting off the guy’s air flow and Sam was at a loss. He looked over his shoulder at JC and knew this was the same information he’d told JC already. Not that the kid didn’t already know, he’d lived through it after all, but it wasn’t something he ever expected to hear aloud. Not from the lips of a stranger.
“Dean,” Sam said, trying to cut through his brother’s need to protect. “Dean! We need to see what he wants.”
The guy’s face was turning red as Dean stared at him. Sam was about the step closer to Dean, try to get through to his brother - because even though they’d ended this before Sam went to Stanford his brother was still an overprotective bastard - when Sam saw him finally pull back. “Sam’s got a gun on you. Even think about making a move and you’ll have a bullet in the brain. I’m gonna pull out a chair and you’re gonna take a seat.”
Dean stepped back then and Sam trained his gun on the guy again. He didn’t want to kill him, but they all knew he’d pull the trigger to protect his family. Dean pulled a chair up into the middle of the room and once the seat was settled Derek sat down as he was told.
“So, what do you want here, Derek?” Sam asked. Dean had his own gun trained on him now so Sam relaxed his, though he kept the weapon out and ready.
Derek looked back at JC, as if waiting for him. JC sighed as he moved up to Sam’s side. “If you know us as well as you say you do, then you know you can say anything to them you’d say to me.”
Derek nodded as he looked between the three brothers. “I was sent back here after an attempt on John’s life. The soldier got away by sending herself into the past. I was sent back to stop her.”
“You’re talking about the crazy lady that tried to kill me six years ago. You said you knew her,” JC told them.
“Jessie Flores. She was a good soldier. I don’t know what caused her to turn, but she went off the deep end. John said,” Derek’s eyes flicked over to JC and quickly away, “she accused him of betraying us. If Jessie was talking about anyone else, I would have trusted her opinion. But it was John Connor and no one believed her. She got away and managed to get far enough in the facility to get to the machine and come back in time.”
“How the hell did she get away?” Dean demanded.
“Like I said, she was a good soldier and the men she was fighting against knew her. She took advantage of it.”
“Why was she sent back in the past and you came out here?”
“I came out a few hours after she did, but too late to follow her at first. Then, well,” Derek shrugged, “you aren’t exactly easy to find. You went to ground after she attacked you so I did the only thing I could. I tracked her instead. About a year or so ago I came across a guy, a hunter, and mentioned the name Winchester. He knew all about you boys, started talking shit about the three Winchester brothers. He had plenty to say, including the last hunt he’d seen you heading for. I caught your trail there and just kept going. Unlike Jessie, I knew you well enough to see your aliases when they came up.”
“How do we know you?” Sam stopped him at that point. “The things you’re saying, you’re not just a soldier in John Connor’s resistance. How do we know you?”
Derek nodded his head as he looked at Sam, but he turned his eyes to JC when he spoke. “My brother, he was still just a kid, but the only things on the radio were the broadcasts from John Connor and he would listen to them, memorize them.” He looked at Dean then. “He was obsessed with joining the resistance. I wanted to stay hidden, just keep him safe, you know?”
Dean nodded and Sam could feel some sort of connection between them. Derek knew how Dean felt about his brothers, knew the lengths he’d go to protect them. It wasn’t something he was told, it was something he understood deep down. Sam could see it in that moment between Derek and Dean.
“It took us a long time to find them, but then we were there and all these guns were on us. People in the resistance don’t take kindly to strangers, not until they can prove they aren’t metal or weren’t going to turn gray and betray them. But then the whole room went still. These men came up from the back hall and all you can see in their eyes is this cold steel. Two of the men are in front of the other, but he’s the one that asks what we want with John Connor. My brother,” Derek grinned fondly at the memory, “he doesn’t skip a beat. Just says “We came to join you.” Everyone was laughing and I could feel my brother’s heart just breaking so I stepped in front of him, just a bit, and the first guy who’d come in looked at the other man he was standing with. I don’t know what they were thinking, they never told me, but the tallest of them looks over at us. “What are your names?” The guy in the back is watching the other two, not us anymore but I figure this is the only chance we have. “This is my brother, Kyle, and I’m Derek Reese.” As soon as I said my name, all three sets of eyes were on Kyle. I still don’t know what that was about either, but then the stone faced guy, the one that had noticed my move, he comes over and offers me his hand. “Welcome to the resistance boys. I’m Dean. These are my brothers Sam and John. Let’s find you a place to bunk because it looks like you’ve got a hell of a lot of training to do.” The three of you took us in.”
Sam took a deep breath at the revelation. Not that Sam and Dean were still with JC in his resistance, because nothing could keep him from his brother’s side if there was trouble, but at the idea of who Derek was.
JC shuffled back until he could sit heavily on the bed. “Derek Reese?”
Dean looked over at Sam and he didn’t need to ask to know what his brother was saying. He went to JC’s side and sat down. Dean kept his gun on Derek but Sam knew he wasn’t going to take that shot. Sam just sat next to JC, close enough his thigh brushed against his brother’s, their shoulders bumping.
“When I came back in time, I figured the name meant something to you that day. I figured it meant I’d gotten to you and you knew us by name if nothing else. That wasn’t right though. You already know the name Reese. You knew Kyle.” Derek’s eyes were a little wild and Sam couldn’t blame him. The only thing they knew about Kyle Reese was he’d come across time to die saving Sarah Connor’s life. And without knowing, to give her a son. Derek obviously didn’t know anything about what had happened to his brother.
“Dean?” JC’s voice called out and Sam knew what he was doing. John Connor would be the leader of the human resistance, but here he was still just a young man that was too wrapped up in a need for family to know what the right call was. He was deferring to his older brother and Sam, for all his love of them both, didn’t know if he could have made the call either.
Dean stared at Derek for a long moment before putting his gun away. “Did John Connor ever tell you what happened to your brother?”
Derek just shook his head but there was so much need in his eyes. Sam couldn’t imagine what it would be like to lose one of his brothers and not know what had happened to him. Hell, it’d been hard enough to go to Stanford and to have his connection to Dean cut off and he’d still had JC to keep him informed, to let him know how they both were.
“He came back in time to protect Sarah Connor against a Terminator. He died, protecting her.” Derek’s eyes closed in his grief but Dean only gave him a moment before continuing. “But not before he gave her a son.”
“What?” Derek’s eyes shot right back open, searching Dean’s face for any sign of deception.
JC stood up then, drawing all eyes to him. “Kyle Reese was my father.”
“No. He can’t be. You … John never said anything…”
“The only people who know are in this room and this secret stays that way. The only way to make sure Kyle isn’t targeted for termination before he comes back is to make sure his importance is never known.”
Derek’s eyes stayed on JC the whole time, anger and something darker in his glare. “You never said anything to me!” he screamed, taking a few steps closer to JC.
Sam stood, placing himself between JC and Derek but Dean was at the front, pushing Derek back against the wall in warning. “You need to calm the hell down.”
When Dean pulled back enough, Derek didn’t say anything. His eyes screamed betrayal at JC, but he just turned and walked out the door. To Sam’s surprise, Dean let him go.
JC crumpled to the bed and Sam sat beside him, arm immediately wrapped around his shoulder.
“JC?” Dean asked as he looked at the two of them.
“She said I betrayed them. The way Derek looked at me … who the hell am I going to become?”
Sam closed his eyes, praying his brother didn’t start down the guilt road again. He didn’t know when it had started but when they’d met JC, only ten years old, he’d already had the weight of the world on his shoulders. He knew his father’s death was his fault and he shouldered that blame. He shouldered the death of every person in the world, of every life that would someday die at his orders, and Sam didn’t think he could take his own grief and JC’s need to take Jessica’s death as his own yet.
Before he could think of anything else to say though, Dean cut through the moment. “John Connor, the leader of the human resistance and the only thing keeping the machines at bay.” Dean moved over to them then, crouched between JC’s legs. “And don’t you dare think John Connor is any more capable of betrayal than JC is because Derek already confirmed what we’ve been telling you for years. Sam and I? We are always gonna be there to kick your ass when you forget you’re still just our snot-nosed little brother. You got it?”
JC looked horrified and Sam caught a laugh bubbling up his throat. He had an image of John Connor standing in front of his troops, face aghast as Dean sent him to his room for skipping training that morning. His laughter had an edge of hysteria but before he could recover from it, JC had him pulled up onto the bed and had Sam wrapped up in his arms, comforting and secure. Dean sat on the other side of Sam, not wrapping him up as he always used to, but his hands were in Sam’s hair, fingers pulling tight and then relaxing in the way he’s always done. When his grief came crashing down, when the image of Jessica covered in blood refused to leave the inside of his eyelids, he let the whole world go black, knowing his brothers would keep him safe.
On to Part Three
“Hello?”
“JC, I’ve got Sam.”
“Can I talk to him?” Jesus, that was a relief. He’d been about to go to blows with Dean when he refused to let him along for the ride, but Dean had always been a dirty fighter. The idea that his presence was what the woman might want was logical enough that it blew through his angered resistance. His mother would have a lot to say about his emotional reaction if she was still there, but six years of living alone with the Winchesters had given him a slightly skewed idea of things. He knew he couldn’t sacrifice himself for another person, knew the human race would depend on him in the future, but Sam and Dean weren’t just anyone else. They were his brothers and he’d die a hundred times over to protect them.
Not that Dean or Sam would ever give him the chance.
“He’s asleep right now. He was in the hospital when I got there. Nothing too bad but I talked to the nurse before I saw him and found out they were just keeping an eye on him because of the smoke inhalation.” Dean’s voice was quiet as he spoke. “I’ll have him call you when he wakes up though. He looks like hell, JC,” Dean admitted over the phone.
He ached for his brother then, for both of them. He didn’t know what the first 12 years of Sam’s life had been like but by the time he’d become a part of the family Sam and Dean had been so far gone on one another there was no way of stopping what they became. JC couldn’t imagine Sam and Dean any other way, couldn’t remember a time when they weren’t wrapped around each other. The last two years had been hard on Dean, and hard for JC to watch. He was caught between his two big brothers, Dean refusing to talk about Sam or ask about him and Sam refused to ask but waiting with pained silence until JC told him Dean was alright.
Sam had walked away, knowing how far gone they were, afraid the connection they shared would get his brother killed. JC had tried to talk him out of leaving - in fact, he thought he had - up until the night he showed up with a full ride from Stanford, and a bus ticket in his back pocket. Dean had accepted his decision better than he or John had. It wasn’t until Sam was gone a full two years that Sam had finally cut the string between him and his big brother, telling Dean not to come back. Two years of Dean and JC running off to see Sam when John wasn’t paying attention. Not that he didn’t figure out where they were headed. John Winchester might have a blind spot a mile wide when it came to certain things, but he knew where his boys were at all times.
For two years Sam went to school, learned about the normal life Dean and JC never stood a chance at - JC had to lead mankind against skynet and Dean was too long in his grief over his mother to want normal again - but then Sam needed to break away from Dean for reasons JC still didn’t understand. Their long distance relationship hadn’t been perfect but it gave Sam the chance to do what he wanted and still have Dean. Back then, he wasn’t sure if Dean would survive the loss of his brother/lover. Listening to the ache in his brother’s voice now, he wasn’t sure Dean would survive his return.
“Hospitals always make Sam sick,” JC offered. And though he hadn’t planned on bringing his own trouble up, he knew there was nothing that would kick-start Dean’s recovery better than possible danger. “Dean, I know it can’t be her, but I think I’ve got a tail.”
“What?”
“I caught some guy following me around today. He was good, Dean, blending in well and took his time. Didn’t rush me or try to get me into a dark corner. He just… watched. I booked a motel and put my stuff in, but I’m keeping an eye on the place from outside just in case. If nothing happens tonight I figure I’m safe to go in tomorrow.”
“JC, why didn’t you call before?”
Dean was angry and JC smiled to himself. Dean was still, in so many ways, the young man he’d met that first day in the woods. Without John and Sarah to dictate his role, he was still trying to keep himself between his brothers and harms way.
“It could be nothing, maybe I’m just overreacting after this thing with Sam. Either way, I didn’t notice it until you were already on the way to get Sam and he’s got real trouble, Dean. He needs you there.”
He heard Dean snort over the phone line. “Yeah, he needed a ride.”
“Dean-” There was so much bitterness and self-doubt in that one comment that JC hated Sam for a moment for doing this to their brother, for making them all live out this painful sham for two years. They all knew - Sam included - that Sam would never be able to stay in the normal world for long. Something was always going to get him back to the hunt.
“Don’t. Just… take care. If you even think you can’t shake this, you haul your ass to Bobby’s or Ellen’s, alright?”
“You remember what happened the last time we were at Ellen’s?”
“Yeah, well Sarah ain’t with us to cause trouble this time.”
JC smiled at that, remembering the day his strong willed mother finally met a woman that had the same steel in her. They’d gotten along about as well as two lions fighting over the same prize piece of meat. They still couldn’t figure out if the women had been fighting over John or the boys. Ellen had finally told Sarah if she ever set foot in her bar again she’d be saying hello with her shotgun.
When they were on the way out, she’d handed each of the boys a brown bag with lunch, candy bars, and an ice cold soda along with a pre-paid phone card, letting them know they, at least, were welcome back.
“Good thing John isn’t with us or that’d put Bobby out of reach too.”
Dean laughed slightly and JC could hear the way his oldest brother was letting go of some of that pressure. “How the hell we manage not to piss of every person we meet, with those two as role models, is beyond me.”
“Speak for yourself. With my role models it’s a wonder I don’t sleep my way through every bar in town.”
Dean laughed and JC knew he had to be remembering better times, when JC was too young to realize he shouldn’t be watching his older brothers in the next bed. What he’d witnessed had been natural then, just two people who loved one another, filling in the holes where doubt and fear had crept in and wormed their way in. He’d just watched and some nights, when they were still catching their breath, he’d crept into the other bed with them, just laying against Dean’s side to be close to them. His mother had always told him he had to hold on to what he could and Sam and Dean were the best things that had happened to them. He knew Sarah had felt the same.
“Take care, JC and just remember, don’t get fingerprinted.”
Like he needed a reminder. “Find some sleep soon, Dean. Don’t need to come after you when you crash.”
“Yes, Mother.”
“Nite, Dean.”
“Nite, Little Brother,” Dean said, reminding him just who he was. The world might someday see him as John Connor, but to Dean he would always just be his little brother.
JC hung up the phone but continued to look at the screen for a moment. Dean wasn’t good at expressing his emotions on the best of days, but JC and Sam had always been able to read him well enough that he didn’t need to be. Tonight, JC felt a little lighter for the reminder of his place in their world.
A Winchester by right, Dean had told him once, if not by blood. And as always, the thought was followed up by Bobby’s no nonsense voice, “Family don’t end with blood.” The first time he’d met Bobby the man said the phrase and then looked perplexed when JC busted out into laughter. Dean said it with the same tone and cadence without ever meaning to. Sam had smiled his most wicked smile too, understanding JC’s humor, and Dean had looked just as surprised as Bobby.
Nights like tonight, he wished the whole world just forget he ever existed. He was more than okay remaining JC Winchester, hunter of the supernatural. He had no desire to be John Connor, savior.
Life didn’t work like that though, not for a Connor and certainly not for a Winchester.
The jeep was parked in a deserted part of the parking lot, hidden in shadow. The room was just across the way, the back room the way John had always liked. Sarah always said John liked the back because he didn’t like people, didn’t want to be around them. JC knew it was because John couldn’t trust anyone anymore and even if the distance was just another room or two, he wanted to keep his family from outsiders. Dean got it naturally, still taking the bed closest to the door to protect JC. For his mother’s memory, and for Dean’s sanity, he still let him.
None of it meant anything as a body shifted into his periphery, a gun held to his temple. “Don’t move.” The voice was calm and smooth, someone who wasn’t afraid of what he was doing, someone who had experience on that end of the gun.
“If you want money you can have my wallet. You can have anything.” He was cursing himself for being so damn caught up in the front of the room that he wasn’t paying attention to his own back - he was not telling his brother about this, no way in hell - but the wallet and money could be easily replaced.
“I’m not here for your wallet, John Connor.” The man paused when JC started to turn his head to see who was addressing him by his real name but the gun pushed at his temple to keep him where he was. “John Connor. JC Winchester. Son of Sarah Connor . Unofficially adopted into the Winchester family in 1995, soon after you nearly died at the hands of a T-1000.”
“Who the hell are you?” He couldn’t be a terminator. One of the T’s would have just killed him as soon as he saw him. That didn’t mean he was safe though. Anyone who knew the name John Connor knew too much.
The gun moved away from him and for the first time he could turn to look at the man that had pulled the weapon on him. He had his hands up, showing JC he didn’t have any other weapons trained on him. His dark hair was close cropped, jeans and a dark tee hidden under an army green jacket. His eyes, blue as the sky, held him with the same sort of intensity John Winchester had.
“Who are you?” JC asked again.
“Derek. I’m … I’m from the future. I was sent back to protect you.”
“Prove it.”
“Can we take this someplace a little more private?”
“Why?” JC wasn’t ready to trust him yet even though there was something in the other man’s eyes that made him want to. He looked at JC like he was something, like he was hope, and he knew the man wasn’t looking at some young guy in a parking lot, but John Connor, leader of the resistance.
The guy pulled up his jacket sleeve and held his arm up, showing the marks that he knew as sure as any; the barcode marked into the skin of resistance fighters who were caught by Skynet.
“I still don’t trust you,” JC said, but he was getting out of the Jeep and leading the other man, Derek, into his room. He had his hand on a gun as soon as he was through the door and Derek was watching him wide eyes as he turned on him, pushing him further into the room. “Sit down and keep your hands where I can see them.”
Derek did as he was told and JC watched him take a seat at the table. “Did you really think a little tattoo would get my trust?”
“Just enough to get me in the door. I know your mother disappeared in 1997. I know John Winchester disappears sometime this year. And I know about your brothers.”
He swallowed against the lump in his throat at the mention of John’s disappearance. He wasn’t his father, not really, but for the last 10 years he’d lived with the man, 6 of those years after his mother had disappeared. He was the only father JC had ever known. In fact, he held a certain amount of pride that he would one day be known as John, as if after everything he could claim that name as his, that he could honor John Winchester in some way.
“What do you know about my brothers?” His hands were steady on the gun and his voice was cold. No matter what anyone could say about his relationship to John - or Sam and Dean’s relationship to Sarah - no one doubted they were brothers through and through.
“I know they’re lovers.”
JC nearly pulled the trigger on principle. No one knew, no one but his brothers and himself. “How?”
“We’re part of the resistance,” Derek said. “We’re … close … your brothers and I, in the future.”
“And what about me?”
Derek smiled then and there was something warm and affectionate there. He didn’t understand it but he’d learned to trust his instincts a long time ago. “We’re close too. As close as you let anyone get.”
“If we’re so close, tell me something no one else would know.”
“Sam was only 14 the first time it happened, a bad hunt and Dean was bleeding bad. You got him patched up but Sam was messed up about Dean getting hurt. You were there for all of it. You never felt weird about watching your brothers having sex in the bed beside you or even jealous because Sarah told you to hold onto the things you loved because the world was gonna end. What you never told them, was that you would never have asked to be a part of it, but you’d have gone willingly to them if they’d asked.”
JC’s mouth dropped open because there was no way anyone else knew his thoughts. No way he’d spoken of it either. “How d-“
“You sent me back and you knew I’d have to convince you somehow. I’m here because someone else came back too.”
“The crazy lady?”
“You’ve seen her?”
“Long black hair, Asian descent, Australian accent? She attacked me at school 6 years ago, claimed to know where my mother was. She showed up at my brother’s apartment last night and killed his girlfriend. Who the hell is she?” He lowered his gun then because the things he knew, the fact that he knew what their attacker looked like, was enough. The guy had to be on the up and up.
“Jessie Flores.”
“You know her?”
“We used to be friends.”
“Used to be?” JC couldn’t help but ask because the answer was hard and cold, the type of voice that came after a deep betrayal.
“Used to be, until she tried to kill John Connor and escaped into the past before we could stop her.”
“Jesus, you have any idea what she’ll do next?”
“She killed Jessica last night?”
“You know her name?”
“Sam used to talk about her from time to time. Never when Dean was around, but sometimes, when Dean walked away. He was as good at saying what people needed to hear as Dean was at knowing when they needed to hear it.”
JC snorted at that because there was a common mistake when it came to his brothers; that Sam was the one that always knew when to talk and Dean was the insensitive one. It was quite the opposite actually. Dean always knew what people wanted, he just wasn’t the type of guy to sugar coat things. Sam took his direction from Dean when it came to matters of the heart. Dean walking away or rolling his eyes was just one of a set of signals that meant it was time for Sam to do his sympathy thing. Left to his own devices, Sam would barrel right in the puppy dog eyes every time before people were warmed up enough to him to let him in.
“Yeah, that’s my brothers,” JC conceded to Derek. “So, you’ve been following me around. Why not just come up to me like you are now?”
“I had to wait until Dean was gone. He wouldn’t let me within 50 feet of you without a full interrogation. When he left I knew I could get close enough to get you to hear me out. I was just waiting for the right time to introduce myself.”
“Dean will be back with Sam in the morning.” Derek just nodded. “Come back then. I might have let you in the door, but I don’t let anyone in closer than that without further inspection.”
“This mean Dean is gonna grill me anyway?”
There was something in his voice, amused resignation that made JC smile. “Yes.”
“Damn. I ever get back home I’m gonna owe him.”
“You made a bet with Dean?”
“I was drunk. He took advantage.”
“I bet,” JC smiled. “See you in the morning, Derek.”
The other man left and JC wasn’t sure what to think of the situation. Derek had held a gun to his head, purposely waiting until he was alone to come forward. He thought about his mother though and what little she’d said about his father. He thought about the difference in thinking like a hunter and thinking like a resistance fighter and how much trust Derek had to have given JC to walk in that room first without checking the location thoroughly. And he realized he wanted to trust him. Derek knew enough about them that his knowledge had to come from him or his brothers but that didn’t mean as much as it should. There was more than one way to get information. He needed Dean there to help him see the truth.
He set the locks, made sure the salt lines were undisturbed, and settled on the second bed with his clothes on. He had a gun under the pillow and a throwing knife on the night stand beside him. Dean would be there in the morning, someone he could trust to watch his back, and he’d have Sam again, finally able to see how his brother coping was with his own eyes. Until then, he decided to just settle in. If Derek was going to betray him in the night, he’d already made his bed. He was too damn worn out not to sleep in it.
**
“JC!” Sam barreled down the hall trying to find his ‘little brother’. It was funny, how fast his dad had taken to Sarah Reese and her son, how easily they’d fit into their messed up lives, but Sarah made his dad pay more attention to them, not letting him leave them behind the way he always had and JC was fun to have around. He didn’t really know what Dean thought about it all, his brother had become tight lipped ever since JC and Sarah had come into their lives, but it was only a matter of time before Sam wheedled it out of him.
JC looked up from his locker, shoving books into his backpack as Sam came up alongside him. “Hey, Sam.”
“You ready? Dean said he’d meet us up front right after school.”
“Why are you in such a hurry?” JC asked as he shut the locker and Sam pulled him towards the door.
“First day of school,” Sam answered, and then realized JC didn’t know about the tradition. Actually, no one else did, this was just something Dean always did with him. He slowed his steps then, suddenly worried that with JC there, Dean wouldn’t follow through with it. “Um, Dean sometimes takes me out on the first day.”
JC looked at him oddly for a second and Sam couldn’t help but smile. JC had never really had anyone but his mom to rely on and it was going to take longer than three months to get used to Sam and Dean. Still, it made Sam happy that he had a chance to prove himself to JC. He wasn’t really a big brother, but he was trying to live up to the idea. It was a lot harder than Dean made it look, always being there to help out when he was needed without crowding JC too much when he needed his own space.
The thought made Sam realize Dean would never disappoint him though, so he gripped JC’s arm and pulled him out the front door. There, sitting right in front of the school was Dean, leaning up against the sleek black Impala. John and Sarah were off on a hunt, probably gone for two days their dad had said as he packed that morning. Sarah had promised Dean she’d call each night to make sure everything was okay since they were leaving him in charge of both boys. Dean had rolled his eyes at Sarah’s need to mother him but Sam could see his brother softening to her just a little more each time it happened.
“Hey JC, Sammy, how was school?” Dean asked as he opened up the car, letting JC jump in the back seat as Sam opened the front and crawled across to the passenger side.
“Fine,” JC said with a roll of his eyes.
Sam smirked. “New day, new school, same ol’ shit.”
Dean shook his head as he slid behind the wheel looking back at JC. “Yeah, same here. Teacher make you stand at the front of the class?”
JC just nodded and Sam groaned sympathetically. He’d managed to avoid the introduction speech, but it was the first day of the school year and no matter how good an influence Sarah was on their dad, he knew it was only the first of many schools they’d be attending that year. There was still plenty of time to have to come up with a lie for the obligatory ‘meet the new kid’ moment.
“Well this here is a Winchester tradition,” Dean said, a lazy drawl making his voice take on an accent that was totally in place in the small Texas town they were currently living in but was completely different from his brother’s usually terse words. “First day at a new school I always pick you up. Next, we head to a diner and we get to order whatever we want. After that, we find something normal to do, like movies or, I don’t know, bowling or miniature golf. Someplace we can scope out the local kids and figure out what normal looks like in this place.”
“And we have fun,” Sam said with a wink. “No training tonight, though if Dad asks, you tell him we did, got it?”
JC nodded, but a smile was growing on his face. “Can I have a milkshake?”
Dean turned back around to start the car up but Sam just laughed at JC’s expression. “Of course you can have a milkshake.”
The diner was greasy and cheap and just the way Dean liked it. Sam sat across from his brother in the booth, his legs stretched out so one heel was pressed on the seat between Dean’s legs with his ankles crossed over one another. John sat next to the wall beside Dean as he slurped away at the chocolate shake. They each had one in front of them and there was a mostly empty basket of onion rings and fries sitting between them.
“Where to next?” Dean asked as he finished a French fry, dropping his hand between his legs to wipe the grease off on the leg of Sam’s jeans.
“I heard some of the kids talking about a movie theater around here,” JC mumbled.
Sam looked at Dean because JC didn’t mumble like that. He was quiet, sure, but when he spoke JC always made himself heard.
“Yeah, we can do that, can’t we, Sammy?”
“Sure, sounds like fun.”
“You like going out to the movies, JC?” Dean asked as he reached for his wallet to pay for their meal.
JC looked down and didn’t answer until Dean nudged him with his elbow. “I … I’ve never been.”
Dean’s eyes shot up, looking incredulously at Sam for a moment before he looked back at JC. He smiled widely, as if to make up for his moment of surprise. “Good thing you got stuck with us then, huh?”
Dean didn’t say anything else then and Sam didn’t make a big deal of it either. For all the things they never had, for all the things they had to give up, their dad had always given them the time and space to have a little fun when they could. It was alarming to Sam to find out that Sarah, who took such good care of JC and who obviously wanted him to be happy, never let him do things like that.
The drive was quiet and JC took five minutes to decide what he wanted to eat once they were inside and in front of the concession stand. Sam didn’t say anything when Dean ordered all the candy JC had been looking at but hadn’t asked for. He even shared his popcorn and managed to wait until the closing credits before starting to throw the remaining popcorn at his brother. JC had been startled at first, but he’d joined in as soon as Dean threw popcorn back at both of them.
Sarah called to check in around nine and Dean told her about the diner, but said they’d come straight home to do training and got started on homework. JC confirmed it when he talked to her and Sam was handed the phone next, a surprise he still hadn’t gotten used to. After Sarah made sure he was okay, they hung up and Sam realized he was alone in the living room of their small rental apartment.
He walked down the hallway and quietly looked in their room to find JC sitting on the single bed. Dean and Sam had a bunk bed set up across the room on the other wall. Dean was sitting beside JC, a piece of paper in hand as he spoke softly.
“So you just write it all down, alright? It doesn’t matter how simple or silly or ordinary the activity seems. If you haven’t been able to do it yet because of the way we live, you just add it to the list. It might take a while to get through the whole thing, but Sammy and I will make sure we do.”
“Do you have a list?” JC asked Dean as he took the paper.
“In my head, sure, I keep one for Sammy and me both. I don’t know what you’ve done though so you gotta help me out.”
“What’s next on your list for you and Sam?”
Dean stared down at his hands for a second and Sam wanted to go throw himself at his brother. He never knew Dean did anything like that, but it made sense.
“Sam’s always wanted to play soccer. I’m hoping this is the year I can convince Dad to stick around long enough for Sam to play. I think I can convince him the benefits of team training, but it just depends on the hunt. For me? I’d like to get invited to a party. No one ever gets to know me well enough, you know, to just invite me so I usually just crash them. I keep thinking, it’s gotta be different to have someone ask you to be there.”
“Yeah, that’d be cool.”
“Yeah,” Dean said with a sigh. “And barring all that, we’ve never been to a state fair. I think we might actually be in town long enough this time to go.”
Sam stepped into the room then, “Fair sounds awesome.”
Dean looked up and Sam could tell his brother was surprised by his appearance. Sam just smiled as he went to sit on the other side of Dean. “You know what else we haven’t done?” Sam asked. Both Dean and JC turned to look at him and Sam smiled. “We haven’t been roller skating.”
“I haven’t either,” JC admitted.
Dean nudged JC with his shoulder then. “Looks like something for the list then.”
JC smiled and grabbed his school back pack, pulling out a pencil to start out the list. No one else would know what the paper was, but at the very top in clear, crisp lettering JC wrote S, D, & JC’s list. It was that moment Sam realized JC was finally letting them in. It was that same moment Sam realized he and Dean were finally letting JC in too. He didn’t know what their parents had planned for the future, but JC was theirs now. There was no turning back.
Sarah always liked to tell them stories about fate, and how people that were smart enough could outrun destiny. Sam didn’t believe in things like that, even though Dean ate it up with a spoon. JC was supposed to be theirs. He was sure of it. Whatever fate had in mind for JC Reese, the Winchester boys were gonna have his back.
**
Sam knew better than to try to take a seat on the bed so he leaned over, coffee in hand as he tried to tempt his little brother into wakefulness. The scent of coffee filled the small motel room, but the enticement wasn’t enough to wake JC. Sam sighed, setting the two coffees on the table before he leaned in and grabbed his brother’s shoulder. JC shot up in bed, nearly nailing Sam in the chin with his forehead.
“Jesus, JC,” Sam muttered as he stepped back. At least he didn’t sleep with a knife under his pillow. That was why Sam always woke Dean from across the room, preferably with something to throw. He forced his mind away from other ways to wake Dean, ways that always got a much different outcome. The truth was, since his brother had shown up at the hospital he felt like he was just waiting for his brother to pick him back up, dust him off, and throw them right back into the relationship they’d had when he left. It was unrealistic, especially with everything that had just happened, but Dean had always been there for him, had always forgiven him everything. Some part of him had always thought Dean would accept him back if he ever came home to him, no matter the circumstances. Sam’s grief was threatening to overwhelm him and what he needed was the comfort of his brother’s arms. A comfort Dean was obviously unwilling to give.
“Sam?” JC was on him then, arms thrown around Sam’s neck as he held him close.
Sam knew his brother wanted to ask if he was alright but they both knew the answer to that already. He wasn’t sure he’d ever be right again, but part of him knew that was the grief coming through. He held tight to his brother though, tight to the one he didn’t have to worry about. JC was neutral territory for his grief and Sam took advantage of that, letting himself be comforted. It didn’t happen often that Sam or Dean let JC have that role, but he was damn good at it none the less. Sam tried not to think of how often JC had taken on the role of comforter for Sarah in the ten years before he’d become a Winchester.
“Hey, got you coffee,” Sam finally mumbled against JC’s neck.
Dean took a seat on the other bed - the one closest to the door, Sam noted - and drank his own hot cup of caffeine. “You alright, JC?”
Sam pulled back because there was something in Dean’s voice that made his words more than just a casual question. This wasn’t a good morning - how you been since I left sort of question.
JC shrugged. “I was right.”
“What?” The words came out in unison, Dean furious and Sam confused.
JC rolled his eyes as he sat up in bed, grabbing for the coffee before he started talking. “I was being followed. He got the drop on me last night while I was trying to catch him. I think he’s an ally, Dean. Either way, he’s coming by sometime this morning.”
“What the hell are you playing at, JC?”
“He knew things only we could have told him, Dean. He said he’s from the future. He said,” he looked at Sam and he could see JC trying to find the right words. “The woman who killed Jess is Jessie Flores. She’s from the future too.”
“She’s not a terminator.” Dean said immediately, before Sam could process what that all meant.
“Nope, just someone who decided to kill John Connor.”
Sam gripped John’s shoulder out of instinct. Whoever she was, she was still a danger to JC. He refused to lose his brother the way he’d lost Jess and Sarah. “We won’t let her get close to you.”
JC opened his mouth as if to answer, but a knock at the door made all three men look to the door. “JC?”
“It could be him. Says his name is Derek.”
Dean motioned to the door and Sam took up placement behind it while Dean stood at the side that would open. JC rolled his eyes again, obviously thinking they were going a little overboard but for someone who had been trained to keep himself alive at all costs, JC took too many risks for Sam’s liking. Still, JC reached for the knob. “Yeah?”
“John, its Derek.”
JC nodded to his brothers and slowly unlocked the door before opening it. He stepped back, letting Derek in but Dean was moving after he was just a foot in the door, pulling him forward. Sam slammed the door shut, pushing JC back behind them as Dean forced the guy back against the closed door. JC’s gun was in hand - he had no idea when he’d even picked the weapon up - centered on the guy’s forehead and Dean’s forearm was against his throat, not cutting off air but only because Dean was holding back.
The guy didn’t even look surprised. “Hello, Dean,” he said with a small smile. He looked over Dean’s shoulder and nodded in acknowledgment. “Sam.”
“How do you know us?” Sam demanded.
“Same way you know me. We fought together in the resistance with John Connor.” His eyes moved over to where JC was standing in front of the bed. “Not that John Connor, but the older one. We’ve still got a few more years before we actually meet.”
“How do we know that’s true?”
“I know you. I know things about you that you’d never tell anyone else.”
“Like what?” Dean demanded.
“Oh hell,” JC murmured behind them but Sam didn’t look back at him.
Derek smiled. “I know you like to flirt with anything blond and busty, Dean, but your real tastes run to tall puppy eyes over there. And I know you popped Sam’s cherry after a bad hunt somewhere in Arizona. John was in the other bed watching.”
Dean pushed with his forearm, cutting off the guy’s air flow and Sam was at a loss. He looked over his shoulder at JC and knew this was the same information he’d told JC already. Not that the kid didn’t already know, he’d lived through it after all, but it wasn’t something he ever expected to hear aloud. Not from the lips of a stranger.
“Dean,” Sam said, trying to cut through his brother’s need to protect. “Dean! We need to see what he wants.”
The guy’s face was turning red as Dean stared at him. Sam was about the step closer to Dean, try to get through to his brother - because even though they’d ended this before Sam went to Stanford his brother was still an overprotective bastard - when Sam saw him finally pull back. “Sam’s got a gun on you. Even think about making a move and you’ll have a bullet in the brain. I’m gonna pull out a chair and you’re gonna take a seat.”
Dean stepped back then and Sam trained his gun on the guy again. He didn’t want to kill him, but they all knew he’d pull the trigger to protect his family. Dean pulled a chair up into the middle of the room and once the seat was settled Derek sat down as he was told.
“So, what do you want here, Derek?” Sam asked. Dean had his own gun trained on him now so Sam relaxed his, though he kept the weapon out and ready.
Derek looked back at JC, as if waiting for him. JC sighed as he moved up to Sam’s side. “If you know us as well as you say you do, then you know you can say anything to them you’d say to me.”
Derek nodded as he looked between the three brothers. “I was sent back here after an attempt on John’s life. The soldier got away by sending herself into the past. I was sent back to stop her.”
“You’re talking about the crazy lady that tried to kill me six years ago. You said you knew her,” JC told them.
“Jessie Flores. She was a good soldier. I don’t know what caused her to turn, but she went off the deep end. John said,” Derek’s eyes flicked over to JC and quickly away, “she accused him of betraying us. If Jessie was talking about anyone else, I would have trusted her opinion. But it was John Connor and no one believed her. She got away and managed to get far enough in the facility to get to the machine and come back in time.”
“How the hell did she get away?” Dean demanded.
“Like I said, she was a good soldier and the men she was fighting against knew her. She took advantage of it.”
“Why was she sent back in the past and you came out here?”
“I came out a few hours after she did, but too late to follow her at first. Then, well,” Derek shrugged, “you aren’t exactly easy to find. You went to ground after she attacked you so I did the only thing I could. I tracked her instead. About a year or so ago I came across a guy, a hunter, and mentioned the name Winchester. He knew all about you boys, started talking shit about the three Winchester brothers. He had plenty to say, including the last hunt he’d seen you heading for. I caught your trail there and just kept going. Unlike Jessie, I knew you well enough to see your aliases when they came up.”
“How do we know you?” Sam stopped him at that point. “The things you’re saying, you’re not just a soldier in John Connor’s resistance. How do we know you?”
Derek nodded his head as he looked at Sam, but he turned his eyes to JC when he spoke. “My brother, he was still just a kid, but the only things on the radio were the broadcasts from John Connor and he would listen to them, memorize them.” He looked at Dean then. “He was obsessed with joining the resistance. I wanted to stay hidden, just keep him safe, you know?”
Dean nodded and Sam could feel some sort of connection between them. Derek knew how Dean felt about his brothers, knew the lengths he’d go to protect them. It wasn’t something he was told, it was something he understood deep down. Sam could see it in that moment between Derek and Dean.
“It took us a long time to find them, but then we were there and all these guns were on us. People in the resistance don’t take kindly to strangers, not until they can prove they aren’t metal or weren’t going to turn gray and betray them. But then the whole room went still. These men came up from the back hall and all you can see in their eyes is this cold steel. Two of the men are in front of the other, but he’s the one that asks what we want with John Connor. My brother,” Derek grinned fondly at the memory, “he doesn’t skip a beat. Just says “We came to join you.” Everyone was laughing and I could feel my brother’s heart just breaking so I stepped in front of him, just a bit, and the first guy who’d come in looked at the other man he was standing with. I don’t know what they were thinking, they never told me, but the tallest of them looks over at us. “What are your names?” The guy in the back is watching the other two, not us anymore but I figure this is the only chance we have. “This is my brother, Kyle, and I’m Derek Reese.” As soon as I said my name, all three sets of eyes were on Kyle. I still don’t know what that was about either, but then the stone faced guy, the one that had noticed my move, he comes over and offers me his hand. “Welcome to the resistance boys. I’m Dean. These are my brothers Sam and John. Let’s find you a place to bunk because it looks like you’ve got a hell of a lot of training to do.” The three of you took us in.”
Sam took a deep breath at the revelation. Not that Sam and Dean were still with JC in his resistance, because nothing could keep him from his brother’s side if there was trouble, but at the idea of who Derek was.
JC shuffled back until he could sit heavily on the bed. “Derek Reese?”
Dean looked over at Sam and he didn’t need to ask to know what his brother was saying. He went to JC’s side and sat down. Dean kept his gun on Derek but Sam knew he wasn’t going to take that shot. Sam just sat next to JC, close enough his thigh brushed against his brother’s, their shoulders bumping.
“When I came back in time, I figured the name meant something to you that day. I figured it meant I’d gotten to you and you knew us by name if nothing else. That wasn’t right though. You already know the name Reese. You knew Kyle.” Derek’s eyes were a little wild and Sam couldn’t blame him. The only thing they knew about Kyle Reese was he’d come across time to die saving Sarah Connor’s life. And without knowing, to give her a son. Derek obviously didn’t know anything about what had happened to his brother.
“Dean?” JC’s voice called out and Sam knew what he was doing. John Connor would be the leader of the human resistance, but here he was still just a young man that was too wrapped up in a need for family to know what the right call was. He was deferring to his older brother and Sam, for all his love of them both, didn’t know if he could have made the call either.
Dean stared at Derek for a long moment before putting his gun away. “Did John Connor ever tell you what happened to your brother?”
Derek just shook his head but there was so much need in his eyes. Sam couldn’t imagine what it would be like to lose one of his brothers and not know what had happened to him. Hell, it’d been hard enough to go to Stanford and to have his connection to Dean cut off and he’d still had JC to keep him informed, to let him know how they both were.
“He came back in time to protect Sarah Connor against a Terminator. He died, protecting her.” Derek’s eyes closed in his grief but Dean only gave him a moment before continuing. “But not before he gave her a son.”
“What?” Derek’s eyes shot right back open, searching Dean’s face for any sign of deception.
JC stood up then, drawing all eyes to him. “Kyle Reese was my father.”
“No. He can’t be. You … John never said anything…”
“The only people who know are in this room and this secret stays that way. The only way to make sure Kyle isn’t targeted for termination before he comes back is to make sure his importance is never known.”
Derek’s eyes stayed on JC the whole time, anger and something darker in his glare. “You never said anything to me!” he screamed, taking a few steps closer to JC.
Sam stood, placing himself between JC and Derek but Dean was at the front, pushing Derek back against the wall in warning. “You need to calm the hell down.”
When Dean pulled back enough, Derek didn’t say anything. His eyes screamed betrayal at JC, but he just turned and walked out the door. To Sam’s surprise, Dean let him go.
JC crumpled to the bed and Sam sat beside him, arm immediately wrapped around his shoulder.
“JC?” Dean asked as he looked at the two of them.
“She said I betrayed them. The way Derek looked at me … who the hell am I going to become?”
Sam closed his eyes, praying his brother didn’t start down the guilt road again. He didn’t know when it had started but when they’d met JC, only ten years old, he’d already had the weight of the world on his shoulders. He knew his father’s death was his fault and he shouldered that blame. He shouldered the death of every person in the world, of every life that would someday die at his orders, and Sam didn’t think he could take his own grief and JC’s need to take Jessica’s death as his own yet.
Before he could think of anything else to say though, Dean cut through the moment. “John Connor, the leader of the human resistance and the only thing keeping the machines at bay.” Dean moved over to them then, crouched between JC’s legs. “And don’t you dare think John Connor is any more capable of betrayal than JC is because Derek already confirmed what we’ve been telling you for years. Sam and I? We are always gonna be there to kick your ass when you forget you’re still just our snot-nosed little brother. You got it?”
JC looked horrified and Sam caught a laugh bubbling up his throat. He had an image of John Connor standing in front of his troops, face aghast as Dean sent him to his room for skipping training that morning. His laughter had an edge of hysteria but before he could recover from it, JC had him pulled up onto the bed and had Sam wrapped up in his arms, comforting and secure. Dean sat on the other side of Sam, not wrapping him up as he always used to, but his hands were in Sam’s hair, fingers pulling tight and then relaxing in the way he’s always done. When his grief came crashing down, when the image of Jessica covered in blood refused to leave the inside of his eyelids, he let the whole world go black, knowing his brothers would keep him safe.
On to Part Three