comment_fic | Thursday: siblings

tigriswolf posting in

Welcome to Thursday, y’all. Today’s theme is siblings! You either love ‘em or you hate ‘em – or maybe you’re completely indifferent to their existence.

As ever, the rules are:

*No more than five prompts in a row.
*No more than three prompts in the same fandom.
*No spoilers in prompts for a month after airing. Use a spoiler cut as needed.

If your fill contains spoilers, warn and leave plenty of space.

Have fun!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

canonisrelative.livejournal.com

[This was only supposed to be the beginning, I wanted to write where they all actually met up. But life and other stupid demands on my time, you know how it is. So here this.]

“I. You. Uh,” Dean coughed, looking at their father, looking him in the eyes. “We have a, uh…me and Sam, you say we have a what, now? Sir?”

Sam felt like he was operating on two different planes. He was reminded in a wild way of that time when he was fourteen and a hunt took them to San Francisco, his first time in California. He’d never known the famous bridge was a double-decker, that people going to and from the city travelled on different levels. It had blown his mind, somehow, and all he remembers from that trip was how patiently Dean had put up with him talking about cantilevers and suspension mechanics. Dean had been eighteen then and it was about the last time he’d been really patient with Sam. After that Dean had decided Sam was old enough not to be a bitch, and any time Dean indulged him it was when dad was out of town or, with Flagstaff fresh in mind, when Dean was afraid he’d run away again.

Speaking of Flagstaff, Sam had gone there two weekends ago. Brady’s uncle — Brady being Sam’s awesome roommate — worked for a company that did lighting for a bluegrass festival and he’d given Brady a handful of tickets and they’d gone with some friends, spent a long weekend listening to music and drinking cheap beer, smoking pot and not worrying about anything.

Now, here was his father, here was his brother, sitting in his cramped dorm room and dropping the biggest bomb on him since they told him the closet monster was real.

Only, this time, it’s not Dean sitting beside him, nodding along because he’s in the know already and it’s his job to be there to hold Sam and make it better when the lights go out. This time it’s dad sitting on Brady’s bed and Sam sitting on his own, Dean standing by the window (which is dirty and grimy and Brady keeps saying he’s going to borrow some Windex from the RA that has a crush on him but it hasn’t happened yet and fuck but this place is a mess, it’s a disaster, honestly, it’s worse than what their motel rooms looked like on those long weeks that dad left them alone, and Sam’s embarrassed to be here. Okay? He’s ashamed that this is what he ran away for).

“Yeah,” Dad said, nodding at Dean but not looking at him. “I just found out. He, uh, he’s in middle school. Good grades, I guess.” Dad said, glancing at Sam like he’d prepared this tidbit of information just for him, but looked away before he could really see him, before he’d have to pretend not to see the look on Sam’s face.

“So, what,” Dean said, and Sam locked his eyes on his big brother, focused on how he didn’t look any different than he had last year when Sam said goodbye to him. “So that’s it? Dad, we had a shifter on the hook, and you let it go and brought us here for this? What is this kid, some fuckin’ angel? Cuz unless he’s got some magic powers gonna help us get that sonofabitch demon, I’m taking the car and you can walk back for all I care.”

“Dean,” Sam was on his feet and reaching for him, covering his brother’s hand on the doorknob without thinking about it. His heart skipped enough fucking beats he should probably be dead, but he didn’t let up. Old habits, and all that; the Winchester loyalty died hard. “Chill out, okay? It’s…” He glanced at their dad who was just looking down at his hands. Okay, then. He took Dean’s elbow and dragged him out into the lobby.

In the harsh fluorescent lights, Dean looked terrible. Sam wanted to ask him if he was okay, if he’d been eating anything other than gas n’ sip buffet, and if he could help.

“Dude,” Sam said, ducking his head to try and catch Dean’s eye. “Seriously, are you okay? I mean, yeah, it’s a bombshell, but how could you not expect something like this? Dad disappears for weeks at a time and you taught me yourself how to steal condoms out of his bag so he wouldn’t notice. I mean, those things are pretty safe but they’re not idiot-proof and dad’s an idiot sometimes. It makes sense, right? It’s not like all this time we thought he was some kind of monk avenging your mom’s memor—“

From:

canonisrelative.livejournal.com

Dean had him by the throat and shoved up against the rough brick wall before Sam could react, which pissed him off. Before he left for college, he and Dean had been 50/50 on taking each other down. Dean’s strength versus his own height, reach, raw power and teenaged anger. He choked against Dean’s hand and lashed out, flailing more wildly when Dean evaded him like he knew exactly what Sam was going to do.

“My mom, Sammy? ‘My’ mom?” Dean was fucking scary, as it turned out. Sam had always watched the bad guys shrink away from him. He’d never been that guy himself. He gasped and went still against the wall.

Dean let up on Sam’s throat because, duh, it was Sam, and if Dean actually hurt him his next move would be to jump off a bridge. When he’d caught his breath, Sam wheezed in a couple breaths, glaring at Dean but holding himself still.

“I’m sorry, Dean. I’m sorry. I didn’t meant that.” His voice was thick, like talking around a mouthful of syrup. Dean rubbed his hand over his mouth again and looked at him. His eyes on Sam’s felt like permission so he said, “I just, I meant, the way we lived. It’s not a surprise, right, that this would happen.”

Dean turned away, pressing his fingers into his own temples. “A half-brother, man,” he muttered. “Another brother. How am I supposed to deal with that, huh, Sam? He springs this on me, that I got some half-brother he says he didn’t know about? The kid’s like twelve, what am I s’posed to do with him?”

“Uh,” Sam worked his jaw over the multitude of things he wanted to say, staring at Dean. “Um. I mean. Why the hell do you have to do anything? Did Dad, like, tell you you were taking him in or something? Come on, Dean. The kid’s a civilian, leave it alone.”

“Are you shitting me? Sammy, are you fucking trying to make a stupid joke right now?” Dean was right back up in his face, and Sam flinched away.

“For fuck’s sake, Dean, could you be a normal person for like a second? Lots of kids have dads they don’t know, this Adam dude is probably fine, all right? It’s not like he’s in any more danger than any normal person on any given day. You know?”

Dean snorted and looked away, but didn’t move out of Sam’s personal bubble. The brick wall at his back snagged at the soft material of his sweater, the new one he’d bought after his first work-study paycheck. He moved carefully away from it and resisted the impulse to try and feel over his own back, make sure it hadn’t been ruined. “What?” Sam asked, pulling at the hem and realizing Dean had muttered something.

Dean groaned and rolled his eyes. “I said, he’s a Winchester. Of course evil shit is gonna track him down.”

Sam frowned. “Dude, he’s not, though. He’s a, whatever Dad said. Mulligan? He’s not one of us, so don’t push it. Look.” Sam reached for Dean, laying his hands on his chest, going for placating. “I’ll keep an eye on him, all right? Maybe I’ll try and contact him, if I do I’ll let you know. You and Dad, you go do you thing, but please, I’m begging you, don’t drag him into all this. Okay, Dean? Kids growing up without a dad, there’s a million support groups for that. For kids like us? There’s nothing.”

Dean flinched and pulled back from him, smacking Sam’s hands away when he tried to reach for him again. They stood looking at each other, and finally Dean reached for Sam, coasting his fingers over him like he had a thousand times before, but this time there was no injury to check for, no wound he could find with his hands.

“See you around, huh, kiddo?” Dean said, going for bravado and landing on tired and heartbroken. Sam turned his face away, not wanting to see the look Dean was giving him.

He stayed in his dorm lounge for another ten minutes, sprawled awkwardly on the stained sofa, unable to distinguish the sounds of his fellow freshmen coming and going from the sounds of his family leaving without him.

From:

tigriswolf

Aww, *cries* Please please tell me Adam gets a better fate in this 'verse?

From:

canonisrelative.livejournal.com

You know I've been like unable to stop thinking about this since I wrote it last night, I really want to expand on it and YES Adam would totally have a better fate in mine! I was really intrigued by the idea of how the boys would have received a new brother before all the events of the show, how it would have been different from the time they met ghoul!Adam. If I write more I'll link to it here.