Life of a hunter's - makes it easy to pack up and go. You want it, I can make a call.
( Get some mom time in, too, which he and Sam never get enough of. They still have that chip on their shoulder, but a lot's been smoothed over now. They're all hunters. In the life. And when she can, when she's in town, she bunks it. )
I didn't know, Ben. About you. I don't think your mom did, either. I don't know what I would have done. I'm not going to lie to you. Back then, only thing I wanted was you and your mom safe. And, I made a lot of mistakes. And Sam... Everything was off the rails and I thought I was doing the best thing. I made the call.
( He's sorry.
He doesn't say he'd make the same call. He remembers life back then. Remembers their other grandfather. Shady dealings. The Cas of it all. He can't imagine any of that year, any year with a kid. How many times he was offed. The Men of Letters: London style. Mark of Cain. He would have kept Ben away from all of it.
But, maybe that's not being a father. He's gonna find out. )
I'm still figuring some things out. But I like my job, and I have good friends. Everything else I have time for.
[Clearly something was missing since he went looking for his paternity for no good reason, but it got this knot untied, so maybe that was worth the effort.]
Well, like father. ( He said the hard things. And Lisa was kind of pushing him away at that point. And, it's fine. It's not. None of it is. He can still remember that week. Being terrified for Lisa and Ben. Not begging, but asking Balthazar. Not accepting Cas' help. It steams him up inside thinking about that time. Cas' shady shit reputation never went away, it just took on new forms. He's reminded, again, he needs to have another conversation after this.
Out of earshot of his kid. He suspects his kid likes using four letter words, too. Still doesn't need him to hear it. ) Ben, I was terrified for you and your mom. And I moved heaven and earth to find you. ( Then. He saw the fear in Ben's eyes when he exorcised his mother. When he told Ben to lock in, to hold the gun close to his shoulder, watch for kickback.
Be a man. It was the most John he'd ever been with him. Other than the shove. He wants to say he knows how hard it was. To see him like that. To go through it. But, he locked in and they saved his mom.
No. Cas saved his mom.
And nothing changed. ) It hurt. Losing you. It hurt more than you could ever know.
[Ben glances away when he realizes that they're talking about something else entirely - not a twelve year-old boy trying to figure out if this father-figure he loved still actually gave a shit about him, but the demons that came later. The night where Dean put a gun in his hands and told him to shoot or his mother would die and he did the best he could but he can feel it all now.
Every time the rifle kicked back.
Every time the bodies just flopped down like someone cut their strings and there was nothing animating them anymore. He'd never hurt someone before, not like that, and even though he knew they were demons, they still looked like people.
Trauma never fully processed before the memories were ripped away and replaced with something else. Something not real.
And Matt ... well, he was putting a lot of effort into not liking Matt, but he didn't deserve that.
He tries to take Dean's comment for the statement that it is. Tries to push past the way it makes him feel, to the intent behind it. That it was hard for him to let them go and let them forget him when he was the only one who had been given a choice in the matter.
Now he feels like he should have taken the opportunity for the beer when he had it, but it still feels like a bad idea.]
I get what you're trying to say. But it's kind of hard to look at it as you losing us when you were the one making all the choices.
Ben, I was there. I heard the things the demon said. I saw what I brought to your door. And whether or not, I could've done better, prepared either one of you, I don't even know, and I didn't. All I saw was a life neither of you deserved.
( And then it comes back to Rudy and the nail he hit on the head. Dean didn't deserve them. Dean didn't want to hurt them, didn't want them running, or learning a new way of life. Not becoming the traveling girlfriend of a hunter. And who knows what she even wanted. He never asked. And Ben wouldn't speak to him.
And then, Cas.
But, this isn't about Cas, or his choices or how Dean felt like he'd been backed into corner all damn year. )
Me making your mom happy, being your family --
( Sacrificing all that meant, thanks to Cas, they could live their lives. He even threatened Sam's life afterward if he ever mentioned them again. Well, deep, deep amounts of violence.
He wasn't worth all that. He was broken. With his legacy and his unrelenting attitude, alcoholism, nightmares, the brother he's saddled with but would never give up. She said it to him under the influence of the truth curse. He doesn't believe it anymore. Sam and him have their own touchstones now.
But, they will die for one another and fuck if that isn't family. )
Ben, if you wanted anything out of this. Anything at all. What is it.
[Ben takes a deep breath before shaking his head.]
Honestly? I don't know.
[He leans back in his seat as he tries to figure out how exactly to say it.]
I was drunk when I decided to take the test. And when I took it. I think I just wanted an answer more than anything else. If it hadn't been so fucking weird, I might not have even called.
[Which feels shitty to say, but he hadn't really thought through what he would actually have done once he had the name.]
( He gets it. And Ben's uncle is out there somewhere, sharing his body with an archangel. Not really first sit-down material. He would've found something. Dean's the stone he overturned.
This is veering off into emotional territory and he's not built for it in public. Or, at all. He's a brick wall that has to be broken down piece by piece, until he breaks and puts himself back together again. Taking out his wallet, he unfolds a twenty and puts it on the table.
Turning back, he makes the eight ball. )
I'll make the call to your grandmother.
( Get that ball rolling. He reattaches the pool cue to its' wall-mount. )
You got my number.
( He doesn't wait for Ben to object, he doesn't ask for any more time or confidence, or empty promises. This is on the kid now.
He doesn't say goodbye to Helene.
Outside, someone watches from a few cars down. He sees Dean leave from the rearview mirror and then watches him climb into that sick Impala in the side mirror. After Dean drives off, Dickerson pulls out of his unmarked car and hoofs it back down the pavement, up to the familiar bar.
Inside, he gives a look around, nods to Helene. Gives a 'Where's my boy at,' eyebrow raise, she nods toward the pool tables. He flicks his hat with his pointer finger in thanks and moves around the emptying tables.
"Was it bad," he asks. Yes, he's off early. Yes, it's because this is monumental. Just accept that you got a good guy in your court and speak up. Or, don't if that's what you want. )
*
( Dean hopes this was enough of a start. It's late to call his mom, not that she wouldn't answer. Hunters answer on the second ring. Sometimes on the first.
He buys a bottle of Jack at the corner store by his motel. Inside the room, he pulls the paper down, sets the bottle on the table, and takes a long, lingering breath. Composed. No tone. He speaks. )
[Ben startles, then blinks up at Dickerson like he's pulling himself out of a mire, thoughts swirling around his brain like he doesn't quite know how to process any of this.]
Nah. No, it was fine.
[It gave him a lot to think about, but it wasn't bad.]
( Doesn't take away from the sincerity of the moment. And how monumental it is. He stayed. That matters. Maybe they'll have a Gingerale about it. But, he doesn't want his friend stewing. )
As far as explanations go, mortal danger's a pretty rock-solid one. Not letting him off the hook, you shouldn't, but maybe that helps you process it. You feel like any progress was made?
[That counts as progress, right? And yeah, remembering now what demons were like, how scared he was the last time he and Dean were together, he could see how Dean would think that it was better for him to forget it all ever happened.]
I don't think it was to keep us safe. I think it was more to keep him safe. But Dean is not a well-functioning human so I can't really expect him to act as a well-functioning person would.
I don't know, man. I'm not going to lie, the stuff I remember from right before he left is really rough. Like I'm going to have to go back to therapy rough. Maybe he thought he was helping. But it was more for him than it was for us. If it was actually for us, he would have asked.
( Maybe not by relationship, not all his life, he doesn't know anything. )
Just going out on a limb here. You think Dean, in his moment of crisis, was going to sit you both down, your mom, in the hospital, and you and ask if you wanted to be erased from his life. To keep you safer. And, if he did sit you down. What would the alternative have been?
( He's just trying to find the devil's advocate here. Because yes, he gets it, he gets how it looks and sounds and yeah, it's selfish, but he sees like, maybe the 10% of how selfish it is.
Still, ride or die for Ben Braeden, this one right here.
-- Wait. A second. He pulls the needle up from the record. He leans in, whispering. )
[And he does, as promised, appear where requested. He appears on the other side of the table, staring back at Dean and wondering if this is the delayed conversation they haven't been having since Ben made a reappearance.]
( He pours one for Cas and one for himself. He forces the glass across the table. It slides in front of Cas, taking a seat. He gestures for Cas to sit. Join him. Once he does, Dean speaks. )
[Would there be a point to denying it? No. Is Dean about to be very angry? Yes. Does this make Cas' silence on the matter better? Also no.]
Since that is not a question, I assume you are not looking for an answer.
[It's childish of him, but he also doesn't think that Dean is looking to have a conversation about this. Dean wants to yell at him, as the representative for all angels, so he might as well let him get it over with.
Because of course, Heaven knew. Michael was principled enough to not want to posses a child to force Dean's hand, but the rest of Heaven wasn't above using it as a manipulation tactic if needed.]
Really. You were there, the Hell Sam and I went through with Adam. With Zachariah. Hell, they freakin resurrected him and you didn't think I needed to know there could've been another pawn on their celestial dick-Chessboard? ( He looks away, watching Cas' reflection in the TV behind them. ) You erased everything about me from his life.
[Castiel doesn't move, doesn't sit. This conversation doesn't feel like a casual one, and he will stand and be ready for the battle that is coming. All he came to do that night was heal Lisa and apologize to Dean. Dean was the one who upped the ante. Dean is the one who made the choice.
Castiel assumed that it meant Dean didn't want to know.]
It wasn't my secret to tell. If Michael indicated that he intended to use the child to force your hand, I would have. But prior to you going to live with them, I didn't know that they were important to you.
( Because, until he let them be, they weren't. And by the time they burrowed into his heart, he wasn't good for either one of them. )
I remember you bringing Sam back. Bringing Samuel. You were well aware I was playing house and who I was doing it with. Don't blame me for you keeping your souls under wraps and being surprised when we didn't take it well.
That has nothing to do with why I didn't tell you about Ben. Don't you think if that was all it was about I would have played that card?
[Castiel had asked Dean to stand down, and he wouldn't. He could have pushed the buttons that he knew would get him the result he wanted and he didn't.
That time wasn't exactly the best for their relationship.]
And who's to say that you would have even believed me, for exactly that reason. I wasn't exactly high on the list of people you trusted at the time. Would you rather I wave Ben's paternity around like some kind of trump card? I am not his mother. Why should I have been the one to tell you? If Lisa didn't, I assume she had a reason.
You know, Cas, I knew all angels had dick capacity, but until now I forgot how bad you all can be.
( And if things were any lighter, he would pause and acknowledge how that sounded, but he's too pissed. )
You don't need to remind me I'm damaged goods, thanks. ( His fingers retract back into a fist, the bottom of his hand knocking against the table. ) I think we're done here.
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everyonelives2025-07-26 07:05 pm
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( Get some mom time in, too, which he and Sam never get enough of. They still have that chip on their shoulder, but a lot's been smoothed over now. They're all hunters. In the life. And when she can, when she's in town, she bunks it. )
I didn't know, Ben. About you. I don't think your mom did, either. I don't know what I would have done. I'm not going to lie to you. Back then, only thing I wanted was you and your mom safe. And, I made a lot of mistakes. And Sam... Everything was off the rails and I thought I was doing the best thing. I made the call.
( He's sorry.
He doesn't say he'd make the same call. He remembers life back then. Remembers their other grandfather. Shady dealings. The Cas of it all. He can't imagine any of that year, any year with a kid. How many times he was offed. The Men of Letters: London style. Mark of Cain. He would have kept Ben away from all of it.
But, maybe that's not being a father. He's gonna find out. )
You like your life?
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I'm still figuring some things out. But I like my job, and I have good friends. Everything else I have time for.
[Clearly something was missing since he went looking for his paternity for no good reason, but it got this knot untied, so maybe that was worth the effort.]
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( He fights the urge to clap a hand to his shoulder. To, try and bring him in for the patented Winchester hug. )
Do you remember what I told you? When you called and cried wolf about your mom? I hightailed it there. We sat down.
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I still stand by calling you a dick.
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Out of earshot of his kid. He suspects his kid likes using four letter words, too. Still doesn't need him to hear it. ) Ben, I was terrified for you and your mom. And I moved heaven and earth to find you. ( Then. He saw the fear in Ben's eyes when he exorcised his mother. When he told Ben to lock in, to hold the gun close to his shoulder, watch for kickback.
Be a man. It was the most John he'd ever been with him. Other than the shove. He wants to say he knows how hard it was. To see him like that. To go through it. But, he locked in and they saved his mom.
No. Cas saved his mom.
And nothing changed. ) It hurt. Losing you. It hurt more than you could ever know.
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Every time the rifle kicked back.
Every time the bodies just flopped down like someone cut their strings and there was nothing animating them anymore. He'd never hurt someone before, not like that, and even though he knew they were demons, they still looked like people.
Trauma never fully processed before the memories were ripped away and replaced with something else. Something not real.
And Matt ... well, he was putting a lot of effort into not liking Matt, but he didn't deserve that.
He tries to take Dean's comment for the statement that it is. Tries to push past the way it makes him feel, to the intent behind it. That it was hard for him to let them go and let them forget him when he was the only one who had been given a choice in the matter.
Now he feels like he should have taken the opportunity for the beer when he had it, but it still feels like a bad idea.]
I get what you're trying to say. But it's kind of hard to look at it as you losing us when you were the one making all the choices.
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( And then it comes back to Rudy and the nail he hit on the head. Dean didn't deserve them. Dean didn't want to hurt them, didn't want them running, or learning a new way of life. Not becoming the traveling girlfriend of a hunter. And who knows what she even wanted. He never asked. And Ben wouldn't speak to him.
And then, Cas.
But, this isn't about Cas, or his choices or how Dean felt like he'd been backed into corner all damn year. )
Me making your mom happy, being your family --
( Sacrificing all that meant, thanks to Cas, they could live their lives. He even threatened Sam's life afterward if he ever mentioned them again. Well, deep, deep amounts of violence.
He wasn't worth all that. He was broken. With his legacy and his unrelenting attitude, alcoholism, nightmares, the brother he's saddled with but would never give up. She said it to him under the influence of the truth curse. He doesn't believe it anymore. Sam and him have their own touchstones now.
But, they will die for one another and fuck if that isn't family. )
Ben, if you wanted anything out of this. Anything at all. What is it.
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Honestly? I don't know.
[He leans back in his seat as he tries to figure out how exactly to say it.]
I was drunk when I decided to take the test. And when I took it. I think I just wanted an answer more than anything else. If it hadn't been so fucking weird, I might not have even called.
[Which feels shitty to say, but he hadn't really thought through what he would actually have done once he had the name.]
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( He gets it. And Ben's uncle is out there somewhere, sharing his body with an archangel. Not really first sit-down material. He would've found something. Dean's the stone he overturned.
This is veering off into emotional territory and he's not built for it in public. Or, at all. He's a brick wall that has to be broken down piece by piece, until he breaks and puts himself back together again. Taking out his wallet, he unfolds a twenty and puts it on the table.
Turning back, he makes the eight ball. )
I'll make the call to your grandmother.
( Get that ball rolling. He reattaches the pool cue to its' wall-mount. )
You got my number.
( He doesn't wait for Ben to object, he doesn't ask for any more time or confidence, or empty promises. This is on the kid now.
He doesn't say goodbye to Helene.
Outside, someone watches from a few cars down. He sees Dean leave from the rearview mirror and then watches him climb into that sick Impala in the side mirror. After Dean drives off, Dickerson pulls out of his unmarked car and hoofs it back down the pavement, up to the familiar bar.
Inside, he gives a look around, nods to Helene. Gives a 'Where's my boy at,' eyebrow raise, she nods toward the pool tables. He flicks his hat with his pointer finger in thanks and moves around the emptying tables.
"Was it bad," he asks. Yes, he's off early. Yes, it's because this is monumental. Just accept that you got a good guy in your court and speak up. Or, don't if that's what you want. )
*
( Dean hopes this was enough of a start. It's late to call his mom, not that she wouldn't answer. Hunters answer on the second ring. Sometimes on the first.
He buys a bottle of Jack at the corner store by his motel. Inside the room, he pulls the paper down, sets the bottle on the table, and takes a long, lingering breath. Composed. No tone. He speaks. )
Cas, I need a word.
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Nah. No, it was fine.
[It gave him a lot to think about, but it wasn't bad.]
What're you doing here? Didn't you have to work?
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[She was one hundred percent trolling for the hot goss, but they know and accept that about her at this point.]
I just ... feel like I'm still catching up. He's spent like ten years missing us, allegedly, and I'm still trying to sort through it all.
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As far as explanations go, mortal danger's a pretty rock-solid one. Not letting him off the hook, you shouldn't, but maybe that helps you process it. You feel like any progress was made?
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[That counts as progress, right? And yeah, remembering now what demons were like, how scared he was the last time he and Dean were together, he could see how Dean would think that it was better for him to forget it all ever happened.]
I don't think it was to keep us safe. I think it was more to keep him safe. But Dean is not a well-functioning human so I can't really expect him to act as a well-functioning person would.
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( Just - to keep it in perspective. Maybe he'll get there. But, maybe it helps to help him. )
Keep him safe. From what? Penetrating his non-functioning heart?
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[Ben shrugs.]
I don't know, man. I'm not going to lie, the stuff I remember from right before he left is really rough. Like I'm going to have to go back to therapy rough. Maybe he thought he was helping. But it was more for him than it was for us. If it was actually for us, he would have asked.
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( Maybe not by relationship, not all his life, he doesn't know anything. )
Just going out on a limb here. You think Dean, in his moment of crisis, was going to sit you both down, your mom, in the hospital, and you and ask if you wanted to be erased from his life. To keep you safer. And, if he did sit you down. What would the alternative have been?
( He's just trying to find the devil's advocate here. Because yes, he gets it, he gets how it looks and sounds and yeah, it's selfish, but he sees like, maybe the 10% of how selfish it is.
Still, ride or die for Ben Braeden, this one right here.
-- Wait. A second. He pulls the needle up from the record. He leans in, whispering. )
Your until now dead grandmother? Mary Winchester?
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Is everything alright?
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You knew Ben was mine.
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Since that is not a question, I assume you are not looking for an answer.
[It's childish of him, but he also doesn't think that Dean is looking to have a conversation about this. Dean wants to yell at him, as the representative for all angels, so he might as well let him get it over with.
Because of course, Heaven knew. Michael was principled enough to not want to posses a child to force Dean's hand, but the rest of Heaven wasn't above using it as a manipulation tactic if needed.]
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Really. You were there, the Hell Sam and I went through with Adam. With Zachariah. Hell, they freakin resurrected him and you didn't think I needed to know there could've been another pawn on their celestial dick-Chessboard? ( He looks away, watching Cas' reflection in the TV behind them. ) You erased everything about me from his life.
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[Castiel doesn't move, doesn't sit. This conversation doesn't feel like a casual one, and he will stand and be ready for the battle that is coming. All he came to do that night was heal Lisa and apologize to Dean. Dean was the one who upped the ante. Dean is the one who made the choice.
Castiel assumed that it meant Dean didn't want to know.]
It wasn't my secret to tell. If Michael indicated that he intended to use the child to force your hand, I would have. But prior to you going to live with them, I didn't know that they were important to you.
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( Because, until he let them be, they weren't. And by the time they burrowed into his heart, he wasn't good for either one of them. )
I remember you bringing Sam back. Bringing Samuel. You were well aware I was playing house and who I was doing it with. Don't blame me for you keeping your souls under wraps and being surprised when we didn't take it well.
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[Castiel had asked Dean to stand down, and he wouldn't. He could have pushed the buttons that he knew would get him the result he wanted and he didn't.
That time wasn't exactly the best for their relationship.]
And who's to say that you would have even believed me, for exactly that reason. I wasn't exactly high on the list of people you trusted at the time. Would you rather I wave Ben's paternity around like some kind of trump card? I am not his mother. Why should I have been the one to tell you? If Lisa didn't, I assume she had a reason.
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( And if things were any lighter, he would pause and acknowledge how that sounded, but he's too pissed. )
You don't need to remind me I'm damaged goods, thanks. ( His fingers retract back into a fist, the bottom of his hand knocking against the table. ) I think we're done here.
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