Legacy, for counteragent, 1/2
Title: Legacy
Author: amber1960
Recipient: counteragent
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: ~8,000
Warnings: Spoilers up to the latter half of Season 8, though nothing major. Use of the f word.
Author's Notes: This hopefully covers counteragent’s requests for a fic expanding on the Men of Letters [and the Campbell] legacies, plus Dean with a family member (not Sam). Though Sam does appear here too, and maybe gets a little tiny fix it towards the end. I dunno.
Beta: monicawoe - who imposed discipline on my excessive wordiness, caught some glaring Brit-speak and generally improved this thing immeasurably! Any and all remaining errors are mine own.
Summary: Time travel really is a bitch. When Dean accidentally stumbles through a time portal inside the Bat Cave, he discovers some new information about the Men of Letters legacy.
Legacy
If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading. - Lao Tzu
Surprisingly, it was Dean who discovered Henry Winchester’s file. Surprising because it was Sam who had been pulling out every dust covered box of papers he could find, who’d been examining every storage hole, every shelf, seeking knowledge, enlightenment, who the fuck knew what. Dean didn’t really know or care. He was more interested in figuring out the purpose of the banks of inert controls, in fixing the mechanisms for opening the roof so they could use the massive telescope, or the excitement of finding potential new weapons in the boxes of junk that were piled ceiling high in the dark storage rooms with secret doors.
It was in one of those storage rooms that Dean now found himself confronted with what appeared to be a vast archive about the all individual members of the Men of Letters. The room was narrow but long, lined with floor to ceiling shelves that stretched in a line from the door into a murky darkness that Dean’s flashlight couldn’t find an end to. Dean knew the Bunker was warded against everything evil but he still scoffed a little at the thought of storing hundreds or maybe even thousands of years worth of data in one place. Bobby hadn’t been that stupid with his precious books, had made copies and had safe places scattered round the continental US. Back ups. It made sense, but not the Men of Letters. All their knowledge was here, where a single nuke could take it out.
Dean looked at the boring beige folder with the name Henry John Winchester written in neat cursive script on its cover, and felt more inclined to burn it than to open it, even though he knew Sam would kill him for such sacrilege. The image of Henry’s blood on Abaddon’s hand was etched indelibly into his brain, as was the impression of Henry’s weakening grasp imprinted into his flesh, and he could feel again the despair at the sensation of their grandfather’s life slipping through their fingers - and that was a place he never wanted to revisit.
But.
Here was a Men of Letters file about their grandfather. What had this mysterious society known about the Winchesters, or about Heaven’s plans for the blood-line? Dean looked at the nondescript cardboard box the file had come from and wondered what else was in there. Had the Men of Letters known the Campbells? Henry had said the Men of Letters worked with hunters, even while they had clearly held the hunting community in contempt. Henry had been so sure of their intellectual superiority, sitting on this vast repository of information that they never deigned to share. Dean thought angrily about all the lives that might have been saved if the Men of fucking Letters had told all hunters about even a fraction of the lore that Sam had dug up so far.
As for the whole apocalyptic mess that characterized the family history of the Winchesters - if this secret society had gotten off their well educated asses and used their extensive sources, Mary Winchester would never have had to make her deal with Azazel and would have lived to see her boys grow up; John Winchester would never have needed to become the embittered, driven hunter that raised his two boys into the hunting life, and Sammy wouldn’t have been wasting away from undertaking the damned trials right now.
What had some famous dude said? Knowledge is power, right?
Dean rested the file on top of the box and flipped it open, holding his flashlight in his mouth.
Reading Henry’s file didn’t take long. It was pitifully thin, a reflection of both the shortness of Henry’s life and the subsequent extinction of the Men of Letters. Dean guessed there had been no one left to note their grandfather’s disappearance back in 1958, given that Larry Ganem, the sole survivor, had had other things on his mind - like escaping from Abaddon while blind. Dean had a momentary urge to get out his pen and record Henry’s ending for posterity, even though only he and Sam were left to read it. Which was all kinds of wrong, but summed up their lives very well.
There was nothing very personal in the file. No mention of Henry’s wife, John’s mother, and the only reference to Henry’s son was a bald statement that Henry had responsibility for a Legacy. Fuck, Dean hated that word. He’d hated it every time Henry had used it and seeing it written down made it even more impersonal and dehumanizing, somehow. He supposed their grandmother hadn’t counted because she wasn’t part of this exclusive club, and he couldn’t help wondering how Henry had handled that. He’d seemed like a decent guy, but the Men of Letters had certainly shoved a big stick up their grandfather’s ass. The man had been almost as surreally self-righteous as Cas at times.
Dean considered the file for a long moment before closing it and placing it back into the box. He slid the box back onto the shelf where he’d found it. If Sam discovered it himself during some future excavation of the archives, fine, but Dean wasn’t going to open that can of worms right now. It wasn’t as if reading it had shed any more light on their grandfather’s life, and besides, Henry Winchester had proved himself a better man than any scraps of paper could ever describe. For a scholar and a gentleman, Henry had kicked some demon ass with a display of courage that had made Dean proud.
His stomach gurgled loudly, snapping him out of his memories. He glanced at his watch and grimaced. He’d been here longer than he’d thought, no wonder he was so hungry. Dean strode through the nearest doorway, emerging in the hallway just off the library, where he’d left Sam busy researching. His mind raced ahead to the culinary delights he had stocked up their ancient but huge fridge with, he barely registered the slight tingle of static that ran through his body as he crossed the threshold, and dismissed the momentary sense of vertigo as hunger pangs. He was already talking as he entered the brightly lit open space of the central chamber.
“Hey geek boy! I was thinking burgers -- or how about my famous chilli?”
Sam wasn’t in his usual place at the large mahogany table where Dean had left him. In fact there was no sign of his brother at all. However, the room was not empty as it should have been with Sam not in it. Around the table sat three well-groomed men in fancy suits and ties, all strangers to Dean. His hand flew automatically to the back of his jeans where he usually carried his colt 1911, which of course wasn’t there, because they were in the impenetrable, completely safe Batcave where he didn’t need a damn gun.
Shit.
“Who the hell are you? How’d you get in here and where’s my brother?”
Two of the three stooges just stared at him as if he’d sprouted two heads, while the third, the one closest to Dean, rose slowly to his feet muttering something under his breath. Even standing the guy was a good foot shorter than Dean and didn’t look very threatening, but Dean was no fool and didn’t underestimate any of them. After all, this place was supposed to be impregnable, and yet here they were. Inside.
So he took a step back when Short Guy advanced on him, but his wariness didn’t help any when Short Guy finished his mumbling and made a flicking gesture with his right hand. Something sparkled in the air in front of Dean’s face and then everything shut down. All his muscles seized up and the sparks floating in front of his eyes were now inside his head. Then his stomach cramped, his lungs stopped and he could feel his heart-beat stuttering to a halt.
This was not how he’d thought he'd bite it this time, and it pissed him off, especially with Heaven as messed up as it was. He'd been hoping Bobby would have had a bit more time to put the place into some sort of order before he or Sam arrived…
He didn’t feel anything at all except aggravation as the floor came up to greet his head.
0x0x0x0
He wasn’t expecting to wake up, so he was surprised when he opened his eyes. Closely followed by an all pervasive body ache, accompanied by a crippling nausea that would have had him doubled up had he been able to move. He swallowed convulsively, desperate not to puke all over himself and after a few seconds managed to get the sick feeling under control. Breathing heavily he opened his eyes for the second time and took stock of the situation.
Fact one: he appeared to be alone. However there wasn’t much advantage to be had from that due to Fact two: he was strapped to some kind of chair. Metal bands circled chest, neck and forehead, holding him upright. More iron gripped him at wrist and elbow, and from the fact that he couldn’t move his legs, it appeared that his ankles were similarly restrained, though he couldn’t see past his knees to verify that. Overkill, if you asked him; even Dean Winchester couldn’t make use of the paperclip he always had up his sleeve. Rolling his eyes was the only part of his body he could move. Dean could see that the ironwork round his wrist was etched with various symbols, some of which he thought he could recognise, the Men of Letters’ Aquarian Star being one of them.
Which brought him to Fact three: he was definitely still inside the Bunker, because he knew this room. Sam and he had discovered it only the other day, and he’d been pathetically excited by the fact that their Batcave had its very own dungeon. He wasn’t feeling quite so pleased about that discovery now that someone had him trussed up in it like a potboiler chicken. A chicken that had been doused, presumably with holy water - his face, hair and the front of his t shirt were still wet. He'd been tested with knives, judging by the cuts he could feel, still stinging, on his forearms.
All of which led to a hundred questions, the first and most important being : - where the hell was Sam?
Right on cue, the door, which was behind him, of course, creaked open and Dean heard a single set of footsteps entering. Soft footfalls - but confident, no hesitation in them - that stopped directly behind his immobilised head. Dean swallowed past the tightness caused by the band around his throat.
“Hey, nice of you to drop by. Don’t suppose you brought a beer?” he croaked.
The person didn’t speak, didn’t make a move, so Dean blundered on, hoping for a reaction.
“Or a burger, I’d even kill for a fucking Happy Meal right now. See, I was just gonna go make myself a snack when I bumped into you guys and if you hadn't tied me up we could all be having dinner right now.”
He shut up at the cool touch of a hand against his cheek.
“No fever.” There was a pause, then - “Nobody warned me that you would talk so much,” a soft cultured voice continued, and the owner of the hand finally moved into view. Dean had thought he was past being surprised again, but this delicately boned vision of loveliness was really the last thing he’d expected to see in a dungeon. Albeit a dungeon in the biggest library of the occult that he’d ever known. “Or,” the owner of the voice continued, “that half of your allusions would be such crude nonsense.”
Dean was reduced to staring, open mouthed. It wasn’t that it was a woman pulling up a normal-looking chair and seating herself down that had Dean so discombobulated. It was who this petite brunette resembled that rendered him temporarily speechless. Cat-like hazel eyes gazed at him from above a tip-tilted nose and wide, generous lips - features set in a triangular-shaped face framed by waves of untamed chestnut hair. Her expression was a feminine mirror for Sam’s best serious face and Dean was suddenly finding it hard to breathe.
The woman was quick on the uptake and recognised his distress. Her hands worked swiftly, and the metal bands round his head and neck sprang open. Gulping at the air, Dean struggled to calm his racing heart, flushing as much with embarrassment at his display of weakness as from his panic attack. The embarrassment was immediately followed by concern at how weak he felt. It was even hard to hold his head up without the support the restraints had been providing. He leant back and rested against the high back of the chair while he watched the woman. Her movements were efficient and precise as she tended to him and he now had the opportunity to take in her very elegant but old fashioned clothing, which reminded him of an Audrey Hepburn movie. His initial freak out about her resemblance to his brother began to seem a little ridiculous. She showed no sign of recognizing him; clearly she didn’t know him from Adam. A phrase that Dean couldn’t now use without feeling both irony and guilt.
Of course she couldn't have anything to do with Sam. The Winchesters had been through a ton of weird crap but gender swapping was something even they hadn’t yet had to deal with. At least when they had suffered a body swap, there hadn't been any prancing around in women’s bodies to contend with.
He hadn’t even realized his eyes had slid shut until the woman started speaking again and they flew open. What the hell did they do to him to leave him this fucking weary?
“We know you are not a demon, and you have passed every physical test - but that doesn’t alter the fact that you should not be here, and we need an explanation from you. How did you get past all our gates and wards?”
“Lady, I could ask you the same thing. Except you have the advantage over me, as I have no way of testing you while I’m tied up like this. So. Who the hell are you, and how did you get inside our --my Bunker?” This time Dean avoided mentioning his most burning question - where’s Sam? - because his brother might be loose somewhere, hiding, biding his time, and Dean was kind of hoping the guys from before wouldn’t remember that he had given away the fact that he wasn’t here alone.
“We are not demons, if that is your concern.” Dean rolled his eyes. Like he was going to take her word for that. The woman moved away and sat herself back down on her chair. She leant forward, staring at him with those disconcertingly familiar eyes. “Your bunker?” she queried.
“Yeah, that’s right. I live here, and there's only one key. So how did you and the Three Stooges get in?”
The woman said nothing for a moment, her eyes narrowed, considering. Stalemate, Dean thought.
Her next question seemed to come out of the blue.
“How are you feeling?”
A little taken aback, Dean found himself answering honestly.
“A bit nauseous, tired and my head hurts like a motherf… a lot.” He amended hastily. She frowned, but fortunately not in offense at his verbal slip. It seemed that she was actually concerned for his welfare.
“Those symptoms are not a usual side effect of the chamomile powder used to subdue you. It would appear that something else has affected you…” She paused again then seemed to come to some sort of decision.
“I’m Elder Geraldine. What’s your name?”
“Dean.” He wasn’t going to offer more than that, not just yet. Not while she, this Geraldine, was holding out on him, which she definitely was. Not that he necessarily blamed her for being cautious. There was no harm in trying to use a little of the old Dean Winchester charisma though. “You don’t look much like an Elder,” he said. He flashed her his best charming smile, slipping easily into his most disarming, flirting mode. This he was comfortable with.
“It’s a title, not a description,” Geraldine said, her stern expression betrayed by the faintest quirk of her lips and the hint of a smile in her eyes.
“Right. So you are a Woman of Letters.” Dean left unspoken the qualification - but I thought you were all dead, killed by Abaddon. “That explains how you got in here then. You have a key?”
Geraldine nodded. Two keys? That was unexpected, though not as unexpected as finding there were still some Men of Letters around. Or that one of them was a very attractive young woman. Which brought his aching brain around full circle to the fact that this young woman bore such a strong resemblance to Sam. Really, he didn’t feel alert enough to cope with this right now. Which was another concern. Why did he feel so rough, when Geraldine seemed convinced nothing these new Men of Letters had done to him should have left him with any ill effects?
“I know that you are not a Man of Letters, Dean, so you may as well be honest with me. Who are you and why are you here? How do you know about this place and about the existence of the Men of Letters?”
While Geraldine was talking, Dean heard the door open behind him, so he was not surprised when a man’s voice interjected.
“And where did you steal a key to this place?”
The aggressive accusation made Dean mad. The rush of anger pushed back the exhaustion that had been creeping over him and made him forget about his aching head.
“We - I didn’t steal anything, buddy. I’m a fucking legacy, alright?” It pissed him off to be using the term, but it was the only one that described what happened with Henry. “Now why don’t you let me out of this damn chair and stop acting like total douchebags?”
Dean had to admit, the vicious backhand was a bit of a shock. After all, these guys were supposed to be bookworms and geeks, not warriors. The blow rocked his head back and he saw stars in the most clichéd fashion possible. Huh. That did nothing to help his headache.
“Foul mouthed and insolent. Watch your language in front of the lady,” the man said. When Dean could focus again, he stared. Was this guy for real? He worried at the new split in his lip with his tongue, tasted the blood. At least all his teeth seemed to be firmly anchored.
“Larry, there is no need to leap to my defence. I can fight my own battles.” Geraldine said, irritation in every line of her elegantly coutured figure, but all Dean could hear was the guy’s name. Alarm bells were ringing inside his head along with the ringing in his ears left by Larry’s blow. He honed in on the man’s face, wishing he had more than a photograph of a very old man to go on.
“Wait a minute. Larry?” Dean hesitated to say it, but once the idea had come to mind it was hard to shake… “Not Larry Ganem?”
Both of them stiffened, which was all the answer Dean needed. Well shit. That tingling static charge, the way he was feeling… he didn’t know how this could have happened, with no angels, no visible spells, but it was the only explanation that fit. The reason he was in the Bunker with these people, these supposedly defunct Men of Letters, was because Dean was no longer in 2013. Sadly that crazy option seemed more likely than a whole bunch of people time travelling into the future like Henry had done. There was only one way to find out.
“What’s the date?”
Both faces turned towards him, frowning-one puzzled, the other suspicious.
“What’s your game?” Larry said, at the same time as Geraldine told him “April 5th 1958.”
Fuck my life, Dean thought. April ’58. Henry still had a month to live. Abaddon had yet to appear. Dad was four years old and just a little kid with no idea that within a few weeks he’d have lost his father and be left with nothing but abandonment issues and bitterness in his place. What was this all about? Was Dean here just so someone or something could mess with his head by showing him yet again that you can’t change the past? He flung his head back and glared at the blank ceiling.
“Well thanks a lot. Don’t you think I learned that lesson already? Time travel blows! Is this your idea of a cosmic joke?”
The strength of his anger was making him shake, and sweat broke out on his forehead. He gripped the arms of the chair until he thought his fingers would break and he couldn’t let go. His body was bucking wildly against the tight iron bands and he couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t…
His eyes rolled back in his head and all his muscles convulsed. He could dimly hear people shouting but the rushing in his ears was drowning everything out. Unconsciousness when it took him was a blessed relief.
0x0x0x0
Voices off, stage left.
…name’s Dean… said he was a legacy…
…dangerous, should be restrained…
…interrogate him further…
…knew about the key…
…anti-possession tattoo…
then
Silence.
Dean relaxed, let himself drift. Without opening his eyes, he knew he was still inside the Batcave. He’d never mentioned it to Sam, because it sounded so sappy, but the Bunker smelled like home. When they had first crossed the threshold, Dean had taken it all in and filed it all away in his head, just as Sam had gone on to physically catalogue the place. Because there they were, all the things that meant familiar and safe-haven and yes, even family. There was the paper and parchment, the leather of book bindings, even the dust - but keeping it from smelling only like a library was the faint residue of cordite, metal oil and machinery, all underpinned by the faint hum of engines ticking over, giving the place a living heart. It was an environment Dean could feel totally comfortable with.
But right now he was so damned tired. If he had travelled in time again, there was something different about this trip. He’d never felt this sick before. Well, there had been the whole angel transport digestive problem but that was trivial compared to the way he was feeling now.
“I know you are awake, Dean, so you can stop pretending.”
Shit. He was a fucking hunter, he should not have allowed someone to creep up on him like that, however rough he was feeling. His eyes flew open. The woman, Geraldine, was sitting beside him, smiling with Sam’s smile - and damn but he was going to have to get to the bottom of that one sooner rather than later. He was no longer in that torture chair, thank God, but lying on something much more comfortable. He lifted his head with an effort and took in his new surroundings.
Dean was right. He was still in the Batcave, but in one of the smaller rooms, very similar to the one he’d commandeered as his bedroom. It could even be the same room, it was impossible to tell. The walls were plain, the ceiling featureless, but there was a bed, a wooden bedside cabinet and a utilitarian-looking cupboard against one wall that could be either for filing or for clothes. Dean let his head drop back onto the pillow, exhausted by the tiny effort of holding it up for half a minute. This was so not good. He nearly swore again out loud, but restrained himself in deference to Geraldine’s presence. Larry was right, Geraldine was a lady.
“Geraldine.” He said. “What happened?” His voice sounded as rough as he felt. He swallowed but his mouth felt as though it had been stuffed with paper towels for hours. He was pathetically grateful when Geraldine produced a glass of water, and even more so when she propped him up with pillows she seemed to conjure out of thin air and helped him drink. She was no more than 100lbs, and man (woman) -handling him like he was a baby. He was kind of grateful Sam wasn’t there to witness this humiliation.
“You are not a very good patient, are you, Dean?”
“Guess not,” he said with a grimace. “Don’t like not knowing what’s wrong with me.” He added. Geraldine was as good at looking sympathetic as Sam, and probably just as hard to resist.
“You had a seizure. Has that happened to you before?” She asked.
Dean shook his head, then winced as his head reminded him why he wanted to keep it still, thanks very much.
“You know we can’t help you if you aren’t willing to tell us how you got here.”
Dean sighed. He supposed that was true. If he was indeed in 1958, he would probably need some assistance getting home, even assuming that was possible without Cas or Chronos to work their magic. He knew that blood magic worked, he could recite from memory the words Henry had used and knew he could replicate the symbol used to unlock that time portal or whatever it was that Henry had created, but he was also aware that there was preparation involved that neither he or Sam had acquired the list of ingredients for. That part Henry had already completed by the time Dean had found him, and Abaddon had made sure that there had been no time for conversation after that.
Dean wondered if Geraldine’s file had been in that box with Henry’s, though he didn’t recall seeing any papers labelled with any female names. A thought struck him.
“What’s your last name?” Maybe he’d seen her file but not noticed it. He almost didn’t register when she answered, deep in thought as he was, so the shock of it hit him on a time delay, thrusting all thoughts of ancient paperwork from his head.
“Winchester.”
His shocked reaction made her pause, and she looked at him with suspicion mingled with concern, but he couldn’t pull himself together fast enough to cover it up. His chest felt tight again. He took a few deep breaths to calm himself before trusting his voice to sound rational and halfway normal.
“You’re Henry’s wife?” He asked, though he knew the answer had to be yes. It took him a moment to register that he had grabbed her hand, and was holding on much too tightly, as she nodded her assent. With an effort of will, he let go.
His mind was racing now, feverishly trying to figure out what this could mean. Dad had harboured a fierce resentment of his father for, as he saw it, walking out on him, but John had always given Dean the impression that his mother had already been dead when that had happened. After Henry’s disappearance, John had been raised in Lawrence by a cousin of Henry’s, a mechanic who had no connections with anything out of the ordinary. Dean knew that Geraldine hadn’t been one of the Men of Letters who had been at that fateful initiation in May 1958, when the Knight of Hell had wiped them out, all bar one. So did that mean Geraldine was to die even sooner, in some other way?
There were not enough swear words in Dean’s vocabulary, or even in the entire world, to fully describe how fucked up this was. He closed his eyes against the concerned face that looked so much like his little brother, feeling nothing but a terrible kind of despair. How could this be happening again? Was it his fate to witness every member of his family die? He remembered shouting at destiny before, yeah, fuck you in your face, and how it hadn't gotten him a damn thing.
“Dean?” It sounded as though she’d been saying his name for a while. He opened his eyes again reluctantly. Geraldine Winchester, his grandmother, was staring at him with concern mingled with determination.
“How do you know my husband?”
It wasn’t a request, and besides, Dean just didn’t have it in him to lie. He just wasn’t sure how to tell the story right. Because this really was a cosmic joke of epic proportions.
“Henry did a blood spell. Blood calls to blood, he said, and so he found us. Me and my brother, Sam. He was running from a Knight of Hell, the demon called Abaddon, trying to keep the key to this place safe.”
“You are related to Henry Winchester?”
Dean sighed. This went so well last time with Samuel…
“Yes. My name is Dean Winchester and I am your grandson.”
Geraldine Winchester was nothing like Samuel Campbell. She listened intently, without interrupting, or showing any evidence of disbelief. She was calm, intent and totally focussed on Dean. He was uncomfortable with that level of attention - but it was an uncomfortable story to be telling anyone, so he sucked it up. And he told her everything they knew about the Winchester connection with the Bunker.
He told her about Henry’s trip to the future, everything Henry had told them about the Men of Letters, everything he knew about Abaddon. He told her what had happened to David Ackers and Ted Bowen, and how Abaddon had blinded Larry Ganem. How Larry had hidden from the demon for so many years only to die at its hands, thanks to he and Sam leading the Knight of Hell to the old man’s doorstep. He didn’t know if it was wise, or permissible, or whether it would change anything to give her all this information. He didn’t know if, this time, words and knowledge would save anyone, but it felt like the right thing to do.
At least, this way, his grandmother had a chance. An opportunity.
When he finished the tale he was exhausted, but wired at the same time. The back of his neck was prickling as if he was being watched - he half expected Castiel, or one of those dead archangel bastards, or Death himself to suddenly appear and start smiting him for attempting to interfere with the natural order. Again.
He had thought Geraldine might be sceptical but she seemed to accept at face value everything he’d told her, even though it sounded fantastical to him, and he’d lived through it. He braced himself for a barrage of questions that never came. His grandmother chose to be selective, far more so than he would have been able to manage, had their positions been reversed.
“There is a lot more to this story that you haven’t told me, isn’t there?”
“Shit …sorry. Yeah. But I’m guessing we don’t have a few days spare for me to fill you in on all the crap that we’ve been through over the past eight years or so.”
“Maybe not,” Geraldine agreed. “But tell me one thing. You’ve time travelled before, haven’t you?” Dean nodded. “More than once,” he said, reluctantly, hoping she wasn’t going to ask for details. She didn’t.
“And in all those times, were you ever able to change the course of events, to change the past?”
Dean didn’t answer. He couldn’t, but he must be an open book to her, with the answer written all over his face.
“That’s what I thought.” She said.
Geraldine stood up, her movements decisive.
“We need to send you home, Dean. That’s my first priority.”
“Are you going to…will you tell Henry? Warn him and the others?”
“Are you seriously asking me if I will try and save my husband’s life? Or stop my beautiful baby boy growing up orphaned and alone - or worse, allow him to be slaughtered by a demon? Or attempt to prevent the extinction of the organization I serve, that stands between the people of this world and the darkness?”
Dean swallowed as the diminutive woman rounded on him, full of fiery passion where a minute before she had seemed unmoved by everything she’d heard. He raised his hands in surrender.
“Okay, okay, I get it. You know, I almost feel sorry for Abaddon, knowing that she has you to face now.”
He had been trying to get out of the bed while he was talking, but the effort of doing two things at once was too much, so he shut his mouth and concentrated on finding the strength to swing his legs over the edge and get his bare feet onto the floor. Where the hell were his boots anyway? By the time he was in position and was able to look up, he was breathing like he’d just climbed Kilimanjaro without oxygen, and sweat was running down his face. He didn’t even have enough breath left to curse.
While he’d been otherwise occupied, Geraldine must have left the room because she was now returning through the door with a wooden bowl and an armful of ingredients that she spread onto the bed-cover, as there wasn’t enough room on the bedside cabinet. Dean offered his bare arm up to her knife but Geraldine shook her head.
“We will use my blood, Dean. If you are telling the truth, mine is as good as yours, and you are too weak for bloodletting right now.”
Dean wanted to protest but he knew she was right. She moved swiftly through the ritual, grinding the ingredients of the spell together so the air was filled with the fragrance of herbs and the iron tang of blood. Geraldine proved to be as economical and efficient in her spell work as she had been in everything else Dean had witnessed so far, and before he knew it, she had drawn the necessary swirling symbol on the door and was poised, ready to commence the chant that would send him home to Sam.
He was swaying on his feet, but managed to stay upright long enough to make it to her side. He started a little when her small hand grabbed his elbow and turned him to face her. He had the feeling she could have liked to have gripped him by the shoulders but she couldn’t reach that high.
“You and your brother, you are my boys now. Never forget that, because I won’t.” Dean looked down into that intense hazel gaze and nodded. Behind him the symbol on the door was glowing brighter and brighter, reflected in her eyes. “And don’t look for me under the name of Winchester. You won’t find me. I’ll need to cover my tracks.”
She was pushing him towards the portal, and he could feel the gravitational pull tugging at him, warping him out of shape. He grimaced and braced himself as he was caught up in the flow, but he heard her voice calling after him.
“Look for Gerry O’Hara!”
That was the name that followed him into the dark.
0x0x0x0
(To Part Two)
Author: amber1960
Recipient: counteragent
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: ~8,000
Warnings: Spoilers up to the latter half of Season 8, though nothing major. Use of the f word.
Author's Notes: This hopefully covers counteragent’s requests for a fic expanding on the Men of Letters [and the Campbell] legacies, plus Dean with a family member (not Sam). Though Sam does appear here too, and maybe gets a little tiny fix it towards the end. I dunno.
Beta: monicawoe - who imposed discipline on my excessive wordiness, caught some glaring Brit-speak and generally improved this thing immeasurably! Any and all remaining errors are mine own.
Summary: Time travel really is a bitch. When Dean accidentally stumbles through a time portal inside the Bat Cave, he discovers some new information about the Men of Letters legacy.
Legacy
If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading. - Lao Tzu
Surprisingly, it was Dean who discovered Henry Winchester’s file. Surprising because it was Sam who had been pulling out every dust covered box of papers he could find, who’d been examining every storage hole, every shelf, seeking knowledge, enlightenment, who the fuck knew what. Dean didn’t really know or care. He was more interested in figuring out the purpose of the banks of inert controls, in fixing the mechanisms for opening the roof so they could use the massive telescope, or the excitement of finding potential new weapons in the boxes of junk that were piled ceiling high in the dark storage rooms with secret doors.
It was in one of those storage rooms that Dean now found himself confronted with what appeared to be a vast archive about the all individual members of the Men of Letters. The room was narrow but long, lined with floor to ceiling shelves that stretched in a line from the door into a murky darkness that Dean’s flashlight couldn’t find an end to. Dean knew the Bunker was warded against everything evil but he still scoffed a little at the thought of storing hundreds or maybe even thousands of years worth of data in one place. Bobby hadn’t been that stupid with his precious books, had made copies and had safe places scattered round the continental US. Back ups. It made sense, but not the Men of Letters. All their knowledge was here, where a single nuke could take it out.
Dean looked at the boring beige folder with the name Henry John Winchester written in neat cursive script on its cover, and felt more inclined to burn it than to open it, even though he knew Sam would kill him for such sacrilege. The image of Henry’s blood on Abaddon’s hand was etched indelibly into his brain, as was the impression of Henry’s weakening grasp imprinted into his flesh, and he could feel again the despair at the sensation of their grandfather’s life slipping through their fingers - and that was a place he never wanted to revisit.
But.
Here was a Men of Letters file about their grandfather. What had this mysterious society known about the Winchesters, or about Heaven’s plans for the blood-line? Dean looked at the nondescript cardboard box the file had come from and wondered what else was in there. Had the Men of Letters known the Campbells? Henry had said the Men of Letters worked with hunters, even while they had clearly held the hunting community in contempt. Henry had been so sure of their intellectual superiority, sitting on this vast repository of information that they never deigned to share. Dean thought angrily about all the lives that might have been saved if the Men of fucking Letters had told all hunters about even a fraction of the lore that Sam had dug up so far.
As for the whole apocalyptic mess that characterized the family history of the Winchesters - if this secret society had gotten off their well educated asses and used their extensive sources, Mary Winchester would never have had to make her deal with Azazel and would have lived to see her boys grow up; John Winchester would never have needed to become the embittered, driven hunter that raised his two boys into the hunting life, and Sammy wouldn’t have been wasting away from undertaking the damned trials right now.
What had some famous dude said? Knowledge is power, right?
Dean rested the file on top of the box and flipped it open, holding his flashlight in his mouth.
Reading Henry’s file didn’t take long. It was pitifully thin, a reflection of both the shortness of Henry’s life and the subsequent extinction of the Men of Letters. Dean guessed there had been no one left to note their grandfather’s disappearance back in 1958, given that Larry Ganem, the sole survivor, had had other things on his mind - like escaping from Abaddon while blind. Dean had a momentary urge to get out his pen and record Henry’s ending for posterity, even though only he and Sam were left to read it. Which was all kinds of wrong, but summed up their lives very well.
There was nothing very personal in the file. No mention of Henry’s wife, John’s mother, and the only reference to Henry’s son was a bald statement that Henry had responsibility for a Legacy. Fuck, Dean hated that word. He’d hated it every time Henry had used it and seeing it written down made it even more impersonal and dehumanizing, somehow. He supposed their grandmother hadn’t counted because she wasn’t part of this exclusive club, and he couldn’t help wondering how Henry had handled that. He’d seemed like a decent guy, but the Men of Letters had certainly shoved a big stick up their grandfather’s ass. The man had been almost as surreally self-righteous as Cas at times.
Dean considered the file for a long moment before closing it and placing it back into the box. He slid the box back onto the shelf where he’d found it. If Sam discovered it himself during some future excavation of the archives, fine, but Dean wasn’t going to open that can of worms right now. It wasn’t as if reading it had shed any more light on their grandfather’s life, and besides, Henry Winchester had proved himself a better man than any scraps of paper could ever describe. For a scholar and a gentleman, Henry had kicked some demon ass with a display of courage that had made Dean proud.
His stomach gurgled loudly, snapping him out of his memories. He glanced at his watch and grimaced. He’d been here longer than he’d thought, no wonder he was so hungry. Dean strode through the nearest doorway, emerging in the hallway just off the library, where he’d left Sam busy researching. His mind raced ahead to the culinary delights he had stocked up their ancient but huge fridge with, he barely registered the slight tingle of static that ran through his body as he crossed the threshold, and dismissed the momentary sense of vertigo as hunger pangs. He was already talking as he entered the brightly lit open space of the central chamber.
“Hey geek boy! I was thinking burgers -- or how about my famous chilli?”
Sam wasn’t in his usual place at the large mahogany table where Dean had left him. In fact there was no sign of his brother at all. However, the room was not empty as it should have been with Sam not in it. Around the table sat three well-groomed men in fancy suits and ties, all strangers to Dean. His hand flew automatically to the back of his jeans where he usually carried his colt 1911, which of course wasn’t there, because they were in the impenetrable, completely safe Batcave where he didn’t need a damn gun.
Shit.
“Who the hell are you? How’d you get in here and where’s my brother?”
Two of the three stooges just stared at him as if he’d sprouted two heads, while the third, the one closest to Dean, rose slowly to his feet muttering something under his breath. Even standing the guy was a good foot shorter than Dean and didn’t look very threatening, but Dean was no fool and didn’t underestimate any of them. After all, this place was supposed to be impregnable, and yet here they were. Inside.
So he took a step back when Short Guy advanced on him, but his wariness didn’t help any when Short Guy finished his mumbling and made a flicking gesture with his right hand. Something sparkled in the air in front of Dean’s face and then everything shut down. All his muscles seized up and the sparks floating in front of his eyes were now inside his head. Then his stomach cramped, his lungs stopped and he could feel his heart-beat stuttering to a halt.
This was not how he’d thought he'd bite it this time, and it pissed him off, especially with Heaven as messed up as it was. He'd been hoping Bobby would have had a bit more time to put the place into some sort of order before he or Sam arrived…
He didn’t feel anything at all except aggravation as the floor came up to greet his head.
0x0x0x0
He wasn’t expecting to wake up, so he was surprised when he opened his eyes. Closely followed by an all pervasive body ache, accompanied by a crippling nausea that would have had him doubled up had he been able to move. He swallowed convulsively, desperate not to puke all over himself and after a few seconds managed to get the sick feeling under control. Breathing heavily he opened his eyes for the second time and took stock of the situation.
Fact one: he appeared to be alone. However there wasn’t much advantage to be had from that due to Fact two: he was strapped to some kind of chair. Metal bands circled chest, neck and forehead, holding him upright. More iron gripped him at wrist and elbow, and from the fact that he couldn’t move his legs, it appeared that his ankles were similarly restrained, though he couldn’t see past his knees to verify that. Overkill, if you asked him; even Dean Winchester couldn’t make use of the paperclip he always had up his sleeve. Rolling his eyes was the only part of his body he could move. Dean could see that the ironwork round his wrist was etched with various symbols, some of which he thought he could recognise, the Men of Letters’ Aquarian Star being one of them.
Which brought him to Fact three: he was definitely still inside the Bunker, because he knew this room. Sam and he had discovered it only the other day, and he’d been pathetically excited by the fact that their Batcave had its very own dungeon. He wasn’t feeling quite so pleased about that discovery now that someone had him trussed up in it like a potboiler chicken. A chicken that had been doused, presumably with holy water - his face, hair and the front of his t shirt were still wet. He'd been tested with knives, judging by the cuts he could feel, still stinging, on his forearms.
All of which led to a hundred questions, the first and most important being : - where the hell was Sam?
Right on cue, the door, which was behind him, of course, creaked open and Dean heard a single set of footsteps entering. Soft footfalls - but confident, no hesitation in them - that stopped directly behind his immobilised head. Dean swallowed past the tightness caused by the band around his throat.
“Hey, nice of you to drop by. Don’t suppose you brought a beer?” he croaked.
The person didn’t speak, didn’t make a move, so Dean blundered on, hoping for a reaction.
“Or a burger, I’d even kill for a fucking Happy Meal right now. See, I was just gonna go make myself a snack when I bumped into you guys and if you hadn't tied me up we could all be having dinner right now.”
He shut up at the cool touch of a hand against his cheek.
“No fever.” There was a pause, then - “Nobody warned me that you would talk so much,” a soft cultured voice continued, and the owner of the hand finally moved into view. Dean had thought he was past being surprised again, but this delicately boned vision of loveliness was really the last thing he’d expected to see in a dungeon. Albeit a dungeon in the biggest library of the occult that he’d ever known. “Or,” the owner of the voice continued, “that half of your allusions would be such crude nonsense.”
Dean was reduced to staring, open mouthed. It wasn’t that it was a woman pulling up a normal-looking chair and seating herself down that had Dean so discombobulated. It was who this petite brunette resembled that rendered him temporarily speechless. Cat-like hazel eyes gazed at him from above a tip-tilted nose and wide, generous lips - features set in a triangular-shaped face framed by waves of untamed chestnut hair. Her expression was a feminine mirror for Sam’s best serious face and Dean was suddenly finding it hard to breathe.
The woman was quick on the uptake and recognised his distress. Her hands worked swiftly, and the metal bands round his head and neck sprang open. Gulping at the air, Dean struggled to calm his racing heart, flushing as much with embarrassment at his display of weakness as from his panic attack. The embarrassment was immediately followed by concern at how weak he felt. It was even hard to hold his head up without the support the restraints had been providing. He leant back and rested against the high back of the chair while he watched the woman. Her movements were efficient and precise as she tended to him and he now had the opportunity to take in her very elegant but old fashioned clothing, which reminded him of an Audrey Hepburn movie. His initial freak out about her resemblance to his brother began to seem a little ridiculous. She showed no sign of recognizing him; clearly she didn’t know him from Adam. A phrase that Dean couldn’t now use without feeling both irony and guilt.
Of course she couldn't have anything to do with Sam. The Winchesters had been through a ton of weird crap but gender swapping was something even they hadn’t yet had to deal with. At least when they had suffered a body swap, there hadn't been any prancing around in women’s bodies to contend with.
He hadn’t even realized his eyes had slid shut until the woman started speaking again and they flew open. What the hell did they do to him to leave him this fucking weary?
“We know you are not a demon, and you have passed every physical test - but that doesn’t alter the fact that you should not be here, and we need an explanation from you. How did you get past all our gates and wards?”
“Lady, I could ask you the same thing. Except you have the advantage over me, as I have no way of testing you while I’m tied up like this. So. Who the hell are you, and how did you get inside our --my Bunker?” This time Dean avoided mentioning his most burning question - where’s Sam? - because his brother might be loose somewhere, hiding, biding his time, and Dean was kind of hoping the guys from before wouldn’t remember that he had given away the fact that he wasn’t here alone.
“We are not demons, if that is your concern.” Dean rolled his eyes. Like he was going to take her word for that. The woman moved away and sat herself back down on her chair. She leant forward, staring at him with those disconcertingly familiar eyes. “Your bunker?” she queried.
“Yeah, that’s right. I live here, and there's only one key. So how did you and the Three Stooges get in?”
The woman said nothing for a moment, her eyes narrowed, considering. Stalemate, Dean thought.
Her next question seemed to come out of the blue.
“How are you feeling?”
A little taken aback, Dean found himself answering honestly.
“A bit nauseous, tired and my head hurts like a motherf… a lot.” He amended hastily. She frowned, but fortunately not in offense at his verbal slip. It seemed that she was actually concerned for his welfare.
“Those symptoms are not a usual side effect of the chamomile powder used to subdue you. It would appear that something else has affected you…” She paused again then seemed to come to some sort of decision.
“I’m Elder Geraldine. What’s your name?”
“Dean.” He wasn’t going to offer more than that, not just yet. Not while she, this Geraldine, was holding out on him, which she definitely was. Not that he necessarily blamed her for being cautious. There was no harm in trying to use a little of the old Dean Winchester charisma though. “You don’t look much like an Elder,” he said. He flashed her his best charming smile, slipping easily into his most disarming, flirting mode. This he was comfortable with.
“It’s a title, not a description,” Geraldine said, her stern expression betrayed by the faintest quirk of her lips and the hint of a smile in her eyes.
“Right. So you are a Woman of Letters.” Dean left unspoken the qualification - but I thought you were all dead, killed by Abaddon. “That explains how you got in here then. You have a key?”
Geraldine nodded. Two keys? That was unexpected, though not as unexpected as finding there were still some Men of Letters around. Or that one of them was a very attractive young woman. Which brought his aching brain around full circle to the fact that this young woman bore such a strong resemblance to Sam. Really, he didn’t feel alert enough to cope with this right now. Which was another concern. Why did he feel so rough, when Geraldine seemed convinced nothing these new Men of Letters had done to him should have left him with any ill effects?
“I know that you are not a Man of Letters, Dean, so you may as well be honest with me. Who are you and why are you here? How do you know about this place and about the existence of the Men of Letters?”
While Geraldine was talking, Dean heard the door open behind him, so he was not surprised when a man’s voice interjected.
“And where did you steal a key to this place?”
The aggressive accusation made Dean mad. The rush of anger pushed back the exhaustion that had been creeping over him and made him forget about his aching head.
“We - I didn’t steal anything, buddy. I’m a fucking legacy, alright?” It pissed him off to be using the term, but it was the only one that described what happened with Henry. “Now why don’t you let me out of this damn chair and stop acting like total douchebags?”
Dean had to admit, the vicious backhand was a bit of a shock. After all, these guys were supposed to be bookworms and geeks, not warriors. The blow rocked his head back and he saw stars in the most clichéd fashion possible. Huh. That did nothing to help his headache.
“Foul mouthed and insolent. Watch your language in front of the lady,” the man said. When Dean could focus again, he stared. Was this guy for real? He worried at the new split in his lip with his tongue, tasted the blood. At least all his teeth seemed to be firmly anchored.
“Larry, there is no need to leap to my defence. I can fight my own battles.” Geraldine said, irritation in every line of her elegantly coutured figure, but all Dean could hear was the guy’s name. Alarm bells were ringing inside his head along with the ringing in his ears left by Larry’s blow. He honed in on the man’s face, wishing he had more than a photograph of a very old man to go on.
“Wait a minute. Larry?” Dean hesitated to say it, but once the idea had come to mind it was hard to shake… “Not Larry Ganem?”
Both of them stiffened, which was all the answer Dean needed. Well shit. That tingling static charge, the way he was feeling… he didn’t know how this could have happened, with no angels, no visible spells, but it was the only explanation that fit. The reason he was in the Bunker with these people, these supposedly defunct Men of Letters, was because Dean was no longer in 2013. Sadly that crazy option seemed more likely than a whole bunch of people time travelling into the future like Henry had done. There was only one way to find out.
“What’s the date?”
Both faces turned towards him, frowning-one puzzled, the other suspicious.
“What’s your game?” Larry said, at the same time as Geraldine told him “April 5th 1958.”
Fuck my life, Dean thought. April ’58. Henry still had a month to live. Abaddon had yet to appear. Dad was four years old and just a little kid with no idea that within a few weeks he’d have lost his father and be left with nothing but abandonment issues and bitterness in his place. What was this all about? Was Dean here just so someone or something could mess with his head by showing him yet again that you can’t change the past? He flung his head back and glared at the blank ceiling.
“Well thanks a lot. Don’t you think I learned that lesson already? Time travel blows! Is this your idea of a cosmic joke?”
The strength of his anger was making him shake, and sweat broke out on his forehead. He gripped the arms of the chair until he thought his fingers would break and he couldn’t let go. His body was bucking wildly against the tight iron bands and he couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t…
His eyes rolled back in his head and all his muscles convulsed. He could dimly hear people shouting but the rushing in his ears was drowning everything out. Unconsciousness when it took him was a blessed relief.
0x0x0x0
Voices off, stage left.
…name’s Dean… said he was a legacy…
…dangerous, should be restrained…
…interrogate him further…
…knew about the key…
…anti-possession tattoo…
then
Silence.
Dean relaxed, let himself drift. Without opening his eyes, he knew he was still inside the Batcave. He’d never mentioned it to Sam, because it sounded so sappy, but the Bunker smelled like home. When they had first crossed the threshold, Dean had taken it all in and filed it all away in his head, just as Sam had gone on to physically catalogue the place. Because there they were, all the things that meant familiar and safe-haven and yes, even family. There was the paper and parchment, the leather of book bindings, even the dust - but keeping it from smelling only like a library was the faint residue of cordite, metal oil and machinery, all underpinned by the faint hum of engines ticking over, giving the place a living heart. It was an environment Dean could feel totally comfortable with.
But right now he was so damned tired. If he had travelled in time again, there was something different about this trip. He’d never felt this sick before. Well, there had been the whole angel transport digestive problem but that was trivial compared to the way he was feeling now.
“I know you are awake, Dean, so you can stop pretending.”
Shit. He was a fucking hunter, he should not have allowed someone to creep up on him like that, however rough he was feeling. His eyes flew open. The woman, Geraldine, was sitting beside him, smiling with Sam’s smile - and damn but he was going to have to get to the bottom of that one sooner rather than later. He was no longer in that torture chair, thank God, but lying on something much more comfortable. He lifted his head with an effort and took in his new surroundings.
Dean was right. He was still in the Batcave, but in one of the smaller rooms, very similar to the one he’d commandeered as his bedroom. It could even be the same room, it was impossible to tell. The walls were plain, the ceiling featureless, but there was a bed, a wooden bedside cabinet and a utilitarian-looking cupboard against one wall that could be either for filing or for clothes. Dean let his head drop back onto the pillow, exhausted by the tiny effort of holding it up for half a minute. This was so not good. He nearly swore again out loud, but restrained himself in deference to Geraldine’s presence. Larry was right, Geraldine was a lady.
“Geraldine.” He said. “What happened?” His voice sounded as rough as he felt. He swallowed but his mouth felt as though it had been stuffed with paper towels for hours. He was pathetically grateful when Geraldine produced a glass of water, and even more so when she propped him up with pillows she seemed to conjure out of thin air and helped him drink. She was no more than 100lbs, and man (woman) -handling him like he was a baby. He was kind of grateful Sam wasn’t there to witness this humiliation.
“You are not a very good patient, are you, Dean?”
“Guess not,” he said with a grimace. “Don’t like not knowing what’s wrong with me.” He added. Geraldine was as good at looking sympathetic as Sam, and probably just as hard to resist.
“You had a seizure. Has that happened to you before?” She asked.
Dean shook his head, then winced as his head reminded him why he wanted to keep it still, thanks very much.
“You know we can’t help you if you aren’t willing to tell us how you got here.”
Dean sighed. He supposed that was true. If he was indeed in 1958, he would probably need some assistance getting home, even assuming that was possible without Cas or Chronos to work their magic. He knew that blood magic worked, he could recite from memory the words Henry had used and knew he could replicate the symbol used to unlock that time portal or whatever it was that Henry had created, but he was also aware that there was preparation involved that neither he or Sam had acquired the list of ingredients for. That part Henry had already completed by the time Dean had found him, and Abaddon had made sure that there had been no time for conversation after that.
Dean wondered if Geraldine’s file had been in that box with Henry’s, though he didn’t recall seeing any papers labelled with any female names. A thought struck him.
“What’s your last name?” Maybe he’d seen her file but not noticed it. He almost didn’t register when she answered, deep in thought as he was, so the shock of it hit him on a time delay, thrusting all thoughts of ancient paperwork from his head.
“Winchester.”
His shocked reaction made her pause, and she looked at him with suspicion mingled with concern, but he couldn’t pull himself together fast enough to cover it up. His chest felt tight again. He took a few deep breaths to calm himself before trusting his voice to sound rational and halfway normal.
“You’re Henry’s wife?” He asked, though he knew the answer had to be yes. It took him a moment to register that he had grabbed her hand, and was holding on much too tightly, as she nodded her assent. With an effort of will, he let go.
His mind was racing now, feverishly trying to figure out what this could mean. Dad had harboured a fierce resentment of his father for, as he saw it, walking out on him, but John had always given Dean the impression that his mother had already been dead when that had happened. After Henry’s disappearance, John had been raised in Lawrence by a cousin of Henry’s, a mechanic who had no connections with anything out of the ordinary. Dean knew that Geraldine hadn’t been one of the Men of Letters who had been at that fateful initiation in May 1958, when the Knight of Hell had wiped them out, all bar one. So did that mean Geraldine was to die even sooner, in some other way?
There were not enough swear words in Dean’s vocabulary, or even in the entire world, to fully describe how fucked up this was. He closed his eyes against the concerned face that looked so much like his little brother, feeling nothing but a terrible kind of despair. How could this be happening again? Was it his fate to witness every member of his family die? He remembered shouting at destiny before, yeah, fuck you in your face, and how it hadn't gotten him a damn thing.
“Dean?” It sounded as though she’d been saying his name for a while. He opened his eyes again reluctantly. Geraldine Winchester, his grandmother, was staring at him with concern mingled with determination.
“How do you know my husband?”
It wasn’t a request, and besides, Dean just didn’t have it in him to lie. He just wasn’t sure how to tell the story right. Because this really was a cosmic joke of epic proportions.
“Henry did a blood spell. Blood calls to blood, he said, and so he found us. Me and my brother, Sam. He was running from a Knight of Hell, the demon called Abaddon, trying to keep the key to this place safe.”
“You are related to Henry Winchester?”
Dean sighed. This went so well last time with Samuel…
“Yes. My name is Dean Winchester and I am your grandson.”
Geraldine Winchester was nothing like Samuel Campbell. She listened intently, without interrupting, or showing any evidence of disbelief. She was calm, intent and totally focussed on Dean. He was uncomfortable with that level of attention - but it was an uncomfortable story to be telling anyone, so he sucked it up. And he told her everything they knew about the Winchester connection with the Bunker.
He told her about Henry’s trip to the future, everything Henry had told them about the Men of Letters, everything he knew about Abaddon. He told her what had happened to David Ackers and Ted Bowen, and how Abaddon had blinded Larry Ganem. How Larry had hidden from the demon for so many years only to die at its hands, thanks to he and Sam leading the Knight of Hell to the old man’s doorstep. He didn’t know if it was wise, or permissible, or whether it would change anything to give her all this information. He didn’t know if, this time, words and knowledge would save anyone, but it felt like the right thing to do.
At least, this way, his grandmother had a chance. An opportunity.
When he finished the tale he was exhausted, but wired at the same time. The back of his neck was prickling as if he was being watched - he half expected Castiel, or one of those dead archangel bastards, or Death himself to suddenly appear and start smiting him for attempting to interfere with the natural order. Again.
He had thought Geraldine might be sceptical but she seemed to accept at face value everything he’d told her, even though it sounded fantastical to him, and he’d lived through it. He braced himself for a barrage of questions that never came. His grandmother chose to be selective, far more so than he would have been able to manage, had their positions been reversed.
“There is a lot more to this story that you haven’t told me, isn’t there?”
“Shit …sorry. Yeah. But I’m guessing we don’t have a few days spare for me to fill you in on all the crap that we’ve been through over the past eight years or so.”
“Maybe not,” Geraldine agreed. “But tell me one thing. You’ve time travelled before, haven’t you?” Dean nodded. “More than once,” he said, reluctantly, hoping she wasn’t going to ask for details. She didn’t.
“And in all those times, were you ever able to change the course of events, to change the past?”
Dean didn’t answer. He couldn’t, but he must be an open book to her, with the answer written all over his face.
“That’s what I thought.” She said.
Geraldine stood up, her movements decisive.
“We need to send you home, Dean. That’s my first priority.”
“Are you going to…will you tell Henry? Warn him and the others?”
“Are you seriously asking me if I will try and save my husband’s life? Or stop my beautiful baby boy growing up orphaned and alone - or worse, allow him to be slaughtered by a demon? Or attempt to prevent the extinction of the organization I serve, that stands between the people of this world and the darkness?”
Dean swallowed as the diminutive woman rounded on him, full of fiery passion where a minute before she had seemed unmoved by everything she’d heard. He raised his hands in surrender.
“Okay, okay, I get it. You know, I almost feel sorry for Abaddon, knowing that she has you to face now.”
He had been trying to get out of the bed while he was talking, but the effort of doing two things at once was too much, so he shut his mouth and concentrated on finding the strength to swing his legs over the edge and get his bare feet onto the floor. Where the hell were his boots anyway? By the time he was in position and was able to look up, he was breathing like he’d just climbed Kilimanjaro without oxygen, and sweat was running down his face. He didn’t even have enough breath left to curse.
While he’d been otherwise occupied, Geraldine must have left the room because she was now returning through the door with a wooden bowl and an armful of ingredients that she spread onto the bed-cover, as there wasn’t enough room on the bedside cabinet. Dean offered his bare arm up to her knife but Geraldine shook her head.
“We will use my blood, Dean. If you are telling the truth, mine is as good as yours, and you are too weak for bloodletting right now.”
Dean wanted to protest but he knew she was right. She moved swiftly through the ritual, grinding the ingredients of the spell together so the air was filled with the fragrance of herbs and the iron tang of blood. Geraldine proved to be as economical and efficient in her spell work as she had been in everything else Dean had witnessed so far, and before he knew it, she had drawn the necessary swirling symbol on the door and was poised, ready to commence the chant that would send him home to Sam.
He was swaying on his feet, but managed to stay upright long enough to make it to her side. He started a little when her small hand grabbed his elbow and turned him to face her. He had the feeling she could have liked to have gripped him by the shoulders but she couldn’t reach that high.
“You and your brother, you are my boys now. Never forget that, because I won’t.” Dean looked down into that intense hazel gaze and nodded. Behind him the symbol on the door was glowing brighter and brighter, reflected in her eyes. “And don’t look for me under the name of Winchester. You won’t find me. I’ll need to cover my tracks.”
She was pushing him towards the portal, and he could feel the gravitational pull tugging at him, warping him out of shape. He grimaced and braced himself as he was caught up in the flow, but he heard her voice calling after him.
“Look for Gerry O’Hara!”
That was the name that followed him into the dark.
0x0x0x0
(To Part Two)