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It was a small change. It shouldn’t’ve made much difference in the grand scheme of things. But that was the thing: it did.
It happened when Sam was five and Dean was nine. John Winchester flipped his newspaper open to a different page, and he found a different hunt than he otherwise would’ve. He should’ve been hunting a simple ghost. It would’ve been a tricky hunt, but he could’ve managed it with nothing worse than a sprained ankle and some of the hair singed off his arms. Instead, he found a nest of vampires a state away.
The hunt didn’t go well. John thought it did, but it didn’t. He brought Dean with him, and they found three vampires and caught them by surprise. John beheaded two of them, and Dean got the last one. Dean was quite proud of himself, if a little shocked and horrified by all the blood. He’d never beheaded a monster before. John thought it was over; he didn’t realize there were five vampires in the nest. The two surviving members of the nest tracked Dean and John’s scents back to the motel room in the next town where John had left Sam. They wanted revenge.
Sam was happy in the town where his father and older brother had left him. He missed Dean, but he had enough money to take care of himself on. He was proud of being old enough to be on his own for a few days. He wished he had a library card and he wished he had his brother, but beyond that he was doing great.
Sam was in the kid’s section in the basement of the library doing ‘homework’ when the vampires found him. Kindergarten didn’t have much homework and he’d finished it already, but reading next year’s book counted, right? Sam loved reading. He’d been supposed to stay in the motel room, but he’d run out of books and John and Dean weren’t supposed to be back for another day. Not having any new books was just unlivable.
John should’ve told Sam about the supernatural. Then he might’ve known what to expect or had some idea of how to defend himself. He knew that John’s story about being a traveling salesman was a lie, of course, he wasn’t stupid, but he hadn’t guessed what was actually going on. So the innocent five year old didn’t expect anything bad to happen when a strange woman he didn’t know came to talk to him. He knew her smile was creepy, but it wasn’t enough to go on.
“You’re John Winchester’s younger son, right?” she asked.
Sam looked up at the vampire, setting aside his book. “Yeah,” he said. “Why? What’s going on?”
“I’m very sorry,” she said. The concern in her voice seemed fake to Sam, but he didn’t think it unusual. Grownups faked a lot of things.
“Sorry bout what?” Sam demanded, brow wrinkling. “He’s gotta be ok. Dad can’t get hurt.”
“He’s in the hospital,” she told him. “I was sent to fetch you.”
Sam shook his head frantically. “He- he can’t be in the hospital. Wait- is Dean ok?”
She wanted to say something nasty to make Sam suffer as much as possible before she kidnapped him, but it was hard. He was only five, and she didn’t know if he even knew what his dad did. She was angry with John, not little Sam. And he had big, endearing hazel puppy eyes that swirled with a dozen colors. She decided to be partially truthful. “Dean is fine. He’s waiting with your father in the hospital.”
“Oh.” Sam’s shoulders slumped as he relaxed involuntarily. “Can I go see them?”
“Of course,” she said. “Come on.”
“OK,” Sam said cheerfully, popping up from his seat and sticking his book back on a shelf. “Let’s go see Dean.”
The vampire led Sam out of the library and into a waiting car. It smelled funny. There was a dark reddish spot on the seat that made Sam nervous. He shifted uneasily, looking out the heavily tinted windows and trying not to squirm too much. “Is Daddy gonna be ok?”
“No,” the other vampire said, smirking happily. “Not when we’re through with him.”
“Umm,” Sam said nervously. “Can I get out?”
The car didn’t stop. Sam hadn’t expected it to, but he was still hoping this wasn’t some sort of kidnapping. He tried to pull the door open, but it was locked. “Lemme out. Lemme out!” He raised his fist to punch the glass window.
The male vampire moved quickly, leaping into the backseat and catching Sam’s fist. Sam flinched, trying to pull away from him. He wasn’t strong enough to get anywhere. The vampire smashed Sam sideways against the car door, hard enough to daze him. Sam held back a whimper.
Sam was confused. Why did the guy who’d kidnapped him suddenly have so many teeth? There were twice as many as normal, seemingly in two layers, and half of them were thin and pointed. And then the guy bit down on Sam’s shoulder. Sam screamed. His skin tore, and his head felt light, and somebody was yelling something about needing bait and not taking too much. Sam passed out.
When Sam came to he was tied to a chair. It wasn’t the abandoned warehouse of movie kidnappings, but rather a normal living room. The chair was just a normal wooden chair like you might see around someone’s kitchen table. The ropes on his wrists and the blood splatters on the beige carpet were the only indications that something was wrong. Speaking of the ropes, they were too tight. They cut painfully into his wrists, and he couldn’t feel his fingers.
Everything looked a little fuzzy, and his head felt light. His neck was burning and felt all wrong. He shook his head hard, trying to clear it. It was hard. Everything was so confusing and he’d lost a lot of blood. He could hear his heart pounding in his chest. It seemed louder than usual. He started crying for his brother, but nobody came.
There was only so long a five year old could be scared and miserable while nothing scary or painful was immediately happening. Soon Sam’s dominating emotion was boredom, not fear. He started swinging his legs, which were too short to reach the floor. He tried futilely to squiggle out of his bonds, not because he thought he could, but because there was nothing else to do.
It felt like hours before anything happened. And then the girl vampire walked in. Sam studied her quizzically. “Why are your teeth weird?”
She smiled at him predatorily. “I’m a vampire.”
Sam’s nose wrinkled. “Vampires aren’t real.”
She flashed her fangs at him. “You sure, honey?”
He made a face. “You kidnapped me. You don’t get to call me stuff.”
“I captured you,” she said. “By definition I can do whatever I like to you.”
“That’s not true,” Sam said confidently.
“How?” she snorted. “You’re gonna stop me? You’re like- a preschooler.”
“I’m in kindergarten,” Sam said indignantly. “That’s a whole year older.”
“And I’m seventy,” she said. “You’re a baby.”
Sam squinted at her. “Don’t seventy year olds have grey in their hair?”
“I was thirty when I was turned,” she said.
“Oh,” Sam said. “Huh.” He wasn’t entirely sure what she was talking about. “So you used to be human.”
She nodded. “It was a long time ago. Don’t try appealing to my humanity or anything like that; I don’t have any left.”
“What are you planning to do to me anyway?” Sam asked uncertainly.
“Use you as bait, and then kill you or turn you,” she said with a casual air.
Sam leaned away from her in his chair, whining quietly. This was bad. This was really bad. Maybe he should just ignore her; that might be the safest option.
She laughed, and after a minute she left. Sam was relieved for a while, but he quickly got bored and irritated again. He shifted his weight quickly back and forth, and soon he managed to tip over the chair he was tied to. He smacked his head for the second time that day, but it was worth it. Maybe he’d be able to get away from this position.
The chair was old fashioned and heavy, and Sam was too small to be able to shift it. His wrists were trapped in a really uncomfortable position. His weight pulled his arms down, making the ropes cut more into his skin. They felt damp, like he was bleeding. He hoped he was just sweaty, but the room was cool and- yeah, no. He wasn’t sweaty. That was his blood.
Sam wasn’t on the floor for long before he heard odd noises. There was some kind of fight happening a room over. The noises were jumbled and he couldn’t tell what was going on, but he heard stuff being smashed and metal whistling through the air. The male vampire who’d fed off Sam earlier ran into the room. His arm was cut; he was bleeding all across the carpet. Sam felt faint at the sight of all that blood. John ran into the room after the vampire, carrying a bloody machete.
“Dad,” Sam said.
John decapitated the vampire. The head landed right in front of Sam’s face, and he screamed. He tried to push the chair he was tied to away from the head but didn’t get anywhere. John kicked the head away from Sam and quickly sliced through the ropes. Sam got up slowly, rubbing his wrists and staring wide eyed at the corpse.
“Are you alright?” John asked brusquely.
Sam nodded in a detached way, still looking at the dead vampire.
John hurried back to the other room, where he’d left Dean fighting with the female vampire. Sam followed a few minutes later. The room was a mess of smashed objects, blood, broken glass, and knife marks. John was standing over the female vampire’s decapitated corpse, but Sam hardly registered his presence. Dean was lying on the ground, not moving. His head was bent back unnaturally.
“Dean!” Sam ran over to his brother and rolled him into a more natural position. “Dean? Dean, wake up!”
“He’s gone,” John said. His eyes were dead. They’d been empty and broken since before Sam could remember, but this was worse. It was like it wasn’t even his father he was looking at.
“Why won’t he wake up?” There was a tightness in Sam’s throat that made talking hard. Something was wrong. Something was wrong. “Dad. What’s wrong with Dean?”
“He’s dead,” John answered mechanically, staring vaguely at the blood dripping from his machete.
“No,” Sam said, “he can’t be dead. He- he has to wake up! He has to. Dean! Dad- Dad, help me. You have to make him wake up.”
John didn’t answer or move.
Sam’s heart was beating too fast again.
Sirens screamed in the distance. Blood dripped from the knife. A fan was running somewhere in the house; it made a humming noise. Wind came in from a broken window over the sink. There was blood on the glass shards. The sirens were still screaming.
“We need to leave,” John said at last.
Sam shook his head mutely. “Dean.”
“He’s dead,” John said. His voice was harsh and mechanical. “The police are coming. We need to leave.” He tried to pull Dean’s body away from Sam, but Sam’s fists were clenched tightly in Dean’s jacket and he wouldn’t or couldn’t let go.
Sam was still slowly shaking his head. Something damp tickled his cheeks, and when he licked his lips he tasted salt. The sirens got louder. They were pounding and shrieking, and Sam couldn’t think. It was burning- there was ice in his head and it was burning- Dean couldn’t be gone.
“Let go,” John said harshly. When Sam didn’t move or respond he tore off Dean’s jacket and pulled the body out of the house. He threw Dean onto the backseat of the Impala and ran back in for Sam.
Sam was standing where John had left him, Dean’s jacket clenched tightly in his fists.
“Come on,” John ordered, grabbing Sam’s shoulder and yanking him out of the house. He threw Sam in the backseat of the Impala as well and they left. The sirens got quieter over time. The only noise besides Sam’s uneven breathing was the rumble of the engine. John drove late into the night; the sun was already visible in the eastern sky when he pulled over.
John built a pyre to give Dean a hunter’s funeral. He wrapped his eldest son’s body in old, yellowed sheets and laid it on the pyre, dousing it in gasoline and flicking a lit match onto the corpse. Sam watched, silent and emotionless, throughout the entire process. His tears had dried, but his face was a mess and his eyes were bloodshot. It was only when the flames had died down to embers that he spoke.
“Dean.”
It was only a whisper, and no one heard him. And it was the last thing he said for years. A small, choked whisper of his brother’s name.
He was still holding Dean’s jacket.