new-to-hunting john winchester who is desperate for any and all information he can get his hands on. where to buy guns, and not just guns, but ammunition blessed by holy men and made from special alloys. how to kill monsters, things from horror films and fairy tales. when to watch the moon, the clouds, the weather; how to tell when a lightning storm isn't just a lightning storm.
new-to-hunting john winchester who is scared absolutely shitless that his headstrong, willful eldest child won't listen in a crucial moment. that dean — so independent, so like mary in the way he'll put his hands on his hips and dig in his heels and deny john's orders — is gonna get himself or john or sammy killed because he couldn't or wouldn't follow directions.
new-to-hunting john winchester who's not quite sure how he feels about spellcraft and curses yet, but who finds a practitioner anyways. a woman from a long line, hard-up for cash who'll perform the spell he asks for, even though her mouth flattens into a tight, white line when he explains what he wants. but he has greenbacks and she has the thigh bones of stillborn kittens, so they're both a part of it, now.
it only takes a moment, and then it's over. john still worries about a lot of things, but dean's obedience isn't one of them. dean's a good boy. he follows directions now, follows john's orders with a jerk of his head, like a string's been run up his spine and john's got the other end wrapped around his wrist. it's never a suggestion, always a command. john's words that compel dean, run, fight, shoot, duck, look after your brother, grab me a beer, get on your knees, push-ups 'til you puke, clean the guns, watch out for sammy.
and sam who grows up always gritting his teeth, you always take his side, we don't have to do whatever he says, dean, who sobs ugly when he's standing on the threshold and dean has a hand on his arm until dad shouts from inside, get back here, dean and dean's fingers slip from sam's sleeve like a scab coming free from a wound.
and it's... an accident, almost. a fluke. bobby turning up his nose at the stink of dead witches, guts and powders and who knows what blasted into the fibers of their jeans and jackets. "you boys get any'a that on your skin?" he asks and dean remembers with technicolor vividness sam wiping witch-bits from his brow so it's cleansing spells for both of them. bobby with his little iron cauldron propped up on the coleman camp stove in his library, muttering under his breath as he grinds rams horn and lizard skin and water from a sandstone seep together into a paste. tastes like shit going down, grainy and bitter, but feels good after. sore all over, but better, like the breaking of a fever.
nobody even notices until they catch up with their dad. until dad snaps an order at dean and dean says, "no", his voice cold and cutting as a new-honed blade. dad pulls up short and says it again, clipped enunciations, like maybe dean just hadn't heard him. but the balance has shifted. it's not dad's call anymore.
