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tigriswolfChapter: IV. Genetic Codes
Rating: R for language and an assortment of other things(take a look at the warnings. I think you’ll understand.)
Point of view: third
Chapter one: "Rapture"
Chapter two: "Bloodcall"
Chapter three: "Crystalline"
He thought that if he took himself out of the equation, things would be better. Dad would be able to take care of Mom without having to worry about him.
So he took one of the cooking knives and locked himself in the bathroom. It was easier than he thought it’d be and the blade was sharp. He pressed it into his skin and lightly pushed it down. His flesh divided beneath the edge and he pulled it along his arm.
Watching the blood well and spill over, Jake felt no pain. None at all. And that’s why he chose to do nothing else.
Thinking back, he still has no clue what that says about him.
He softly ran a cloth across the wound, poured water and rubbing alcohol over his arm, bandaged it. He wore long-sleeved shirts for weeks, until the cut healed enough to be only a line down his arm.
It was months before he cut again. And that time, he took one of Uncle Ross’ hunting knives and stabbed it down into his forearm. It hurt, it burned like he’d set his flesh on fire, but it also felt good, so fucking good.
He just sat on the porch of Uncle Ross’ cabin, blood flowing out of his arm. By the time Uncle Ross found him, he was cold and unconscious, knife slack in his grip.
Uncle Ross covered for him, said it was a hunting accident, and got a blowjob after Jake was released from the hospital.
It was two years later at Thanksgiving when Jake bled himself again. He was building Mom a ramp for her wheelchair, wondering why Dad hadn’t done it years before. He had the hammer in his hand when Father Moore walked up and Jake thought for the briefest second how it would feel to slam the hammer into Father Moore’s skull. And from there his thoughts flowed to Dad and Uncle Ross and his teachers and his neighbors, all sorts of bloody, painful things he’d love to do to them but never, ever would.
After the Thanksgiving feast and it was only him and his parents at the house, Jake locked himself in the bathroom and slid the carving knife, still smeared with turkey juice, up his left arm, from the wrist to the elbow. And the pain burned, radiated out from the cut to the rest of his arm; he looked in the mirror, watched the blood drip down his skin to the floor, and he smiled.
He dreamed that night. Dreamed of Heaven and Hell and angels falling from the sky. Dreamed of fire and blood and pain, of salvation and damnation, of life and death. Of God and the devil.
That night, he dreamed of sacrifice.
Upon waking, he had no memory of his dreams at all.
After that Thanksgiving, Jake’s waking nightmares came frequently. He’d always had them, but sporadically. Now they were almost daily. And they never made sense. Little visions, just a hint, not nearly enough to understand.
He didn’t consider telling Connie, not even for a heartbeat. Connie had his own troubles and Jake wanted to help him but couldn’t see how. Jake’d asked Uncle Ross, once, if the law could do anything.
Buried deep in Jake’s ass, Uncle Ross laughed. Jake took that as a no.
-
Mom moved to the hospital just after Jake’s twentieth birthday. He could have gone to any school in the world, done anything he wanted, but he loved his mother too much to leave her.
He has no memory of ever being held by her, ever hugged. It hurt, lacking that, but it wasn’t her fault.
Even after he learned of Marisol, he never blamed Mom.
Without Mom at the house, the fights were often and loud. They’d held their tempers and tongues because they loved her and hated to see her crying. And now Jake said what he’d always wanted to say and Dad lashed back with words intended to cut deep.
Only a few times did Dad raise a hand to Jake. Jake had no qualms about fighting back, and he was young and strong.
Eventually, though, they found a way to coexist and neither ever told Mom just how bad it could be.
Jake tried to visit the hospital every day, bring Mom some orchids. They’d talk about books and movies and places around the world Jake would take her to some day. She’d always wanted to see Ayers Rock and the Easter Islands, Stonehenge and Loch Ness.
“Your father and I had plans,” she said. “We’d take you to each of them, make memories as a family. But after the accident…” her voice trailed off.
Sometimes, Jake thinks he can remember the accident, hear shrieking metal and then silence. Even after he learns the truth, he still thinks he can remember the accident.
Jake did care for Dakota. In a way. Not as much as Mom or Connie, but more than Dad. She was beautiful and broken, kind of like him. The first time he laid eyes on her was the middle of sophomore year. She slept her way around the high school, everyone but him and Connie. She tried to seduce Connie but Jake interrupted them. Then she went after Jake, and he gently—far gentler than any partner she’d ever had—took what he wanted.
She was a member of their group after that. But Dakota and Connie never had sex of any kind, Jake made sure of it.
For some reason, he never got sick. Not once. No chicken pox, no colds, no sinus infections, no ear aches, nothing. And he’s willing to bet he never will get sick. So he’d fuck Dakota and he’d let Uncle Ross fuck him, but Dakota wouldn’t give anything to Connie.
And if Jake ever has cause to believe Connie’s dad raped him, he’ll kill the son of a bitch.
-
By the time Marisol pranced her way into his life and fucked everything all to hell, Jake saw no way out. No escape.
But then she killed Connie and Dakota and Uncle Ross and Dad and Mom—he’ll mourn only two of them, but he’ll mourn those two for the rest of his life. So he stabbed her with the bones and then woke up in an institution, written off as crazy and delusional and dangerous.
Which he is, dangerous. Because he killed Aiden Kater and Marisol, and now he feels the power in his blood.
He’s twenty-one. And he knows Marisol was not the devil, but she was damned close. The knowledge swims in his memory, all that he is and could be—
One month after Mom died, Jake’s out. Free. There is no record of him anywhere and no one remembers he ever existed. He wanders down back roads, eats when he needs to—not often—and drinks water when he thirsts.
He could survive on blood, if he had to, but he won’t. There’s no fun in killing.
Jake thinks that’s Mom’s influence. It sure as hell didn’t come from Dad or Marisol.
-
It’s almost as year after he freed himself. He’s just turned twenty-two, with no celebration, no fanfare at all. He’s the end of the world in human form and no one knows he exists.
Jake knows how he was created, pulled the knowledge from Marisol’s mind. Thankfully, she hadn’t told anybody, scared that someone would make an army of mortals who wield the power of a god.
One of her fellow high demons did, after a fashion. Infused pregnant women with a piece of power, then killed the mothers’ on their child’s sixth month birthday. Messy and wasteful, it also left evidence. But it did use less power than Marisol’s way. Those children could take the world from humans with ease, but even together they could never equal Jake.
When the car stops beside him, Jake knows. Senses it. Feels the hum in his blood.
His father wasn’t Ivan Reisz, Satanist. His father was a five-year-old boy who Marisol stole from.
Jake looks nothing like his mother. But he matches his father down to the last freckle.
He’s five years younger than Dean and a thousand times more powerful than Sam, strongest of the fire-children.
Before the car stops, Jake knows.
Since he accepted his heritage, the waking nightmares make sense, fall into place. Seeing the future or past is easier than breathing now.
Sam, the uncle barely a year older, also has the gift of sight. Nowhere near as clear and far more painful, but good enough to find Jake.
If he wanted, Jake could send them on their way with no memory of him. Could point them towards Mary’s killer, tell them how to kill the demon.
But he’s lonely. And bored.
And they’re the only family he has since Mom and Connie died.
So the car stops beside him and the Winchester brothers get out and Jake lets them in. Smiles his father’s I’m innocent, I swear smile and gives his uncle’s puppy eyes. He’ll probably never love them like he loved Mom and Connie, but he already cares for them more than he ever did Dakota.
Dean is wary and keeps himself between Jake and Sam. Sam can’t take his eyes off Jake. Dean has a gun in his hand, pointed at the ground. Jake knows he has two more guns and four knives hidden on his person.
“Jake?” Sam asks, trying to appear smaller, less intimidating. Jake isn’t intimidated at all, of course, because he could obliterate them both with a thought. Sam does tower over him, but Jake doesn’t mind. He’s more concerned about Dean, his hunter instinct, and the gun—though, of course, it’s still no threat at all.
“Yeah,” he answers and grins Dean’s grin.
Sam steps forward and Dean moves with him, poised to leap if Jake threatens him in any way.
Jake is reminded of Connie and it hurts. His smile falters for an instant; both Winchesters notice. Sam glances at Dean and Dean nods.
“Have you been having strange dreams lately?” Sam asks in a gentle voice, the kind used for scared victims and wounded animals. Jake had used that voice before, when Connie was beaten too much to recognize him. “Dreams that come true?”
Jake shakes his head. He knows they’re writing off the similarities and if he’s going to go with them, then they’ll know the truth.
He’s just so goddamned tired of lies.
“I’ve always had dreams that come true,” he says. “Except they’re while I’m awake.” His gaze flits from Sam to Dean and back. He knows who’s in charge of their partnership and if he can convince Sam—without using his abilities—then Dean will follow.
He pushes away the voices, slams the door on his telepathy—Sam will know if Jake reads his mind. He just will.
So Jake’ll only listen to what their words say, what their tones say, what their body language says. And he will hope Sam feels the truth of his words.
He may be the most powerful semi-human in the world, but he never asked for it. He doesn’t want it. And since he killed Marisol, he no longer wants to hurt people.
His whole life, he knows, that desire came from her, trying to mold him. Turn him to her way, so twisted he couldn’t see an escape.
And she very nearly succeeded, he knows. Looking at the Winchesters, he knows she came very close indeed.
“My mother,” Jake says quietly, “was a demon. High on the ladder, just a few rungs lower than the devil.” He almost smiles as Sam’s gaze shoots to Dean then back. Sam’ll know Jake is telling the truth. “My parents stole me from her the night she gave birth. She was weakened from the power it took to bring me into the world.” Softly, without pause, he explains all that happened. Slowly Sam and Dean draw closer, fall into his voice, into the story. Because he knows he speaks the truth, they can feel that he’s not lying. Dean’s grip on the gun loosens and Jake meets his eyes.
Speaking to Sam, Jake never looks away from Dean. He seamlessly continues the story, looping back to Marisol and her theft of blood.
He has never vocalized this before and he searches for the correct wording. “It was quick,” he whispers. “Painless. You don’t even remember. It was a dream, the woman talking to you. She asked your for permission, had to—and you didn’t know any better.” Dean’s eyes deny Jake’s words, but Jake can see the memory filtering in. It will never be clear, but now that it’s there, he’ll never forget. “It was only a little blood, a few drops. The next day, you were the same as ever. Why she picked you…” Jake lets his voice trail off. That is the only thing he’s unsure of, why she chose him. He thinks it has to do with their mother, Mary, but he’s not certain.
Dean pulls his gaze away, looks at Sam. Without looking, Jake knows they’re having a conversation, like he and Connie used to. They’re brothers of blood, Sam and Dean, not choice. But still… they’re friends. Toward the end, Connie said some things he didn’t mean. That final morning, the breakfast they never had, it would have healed them. But Marisol took Connie away.
She wanted him to have only her.
Watching the Winchesters, he ponders how Dean or Sam would have reacted if put in his place.
They’d both snap, kill Marisol for sure, but after that he doesn’t know. Sam is just now beginning to grasp his power, trying to control it instead of the other way around. And Dean… Jake can’t quite make it out, but there’s something lightly humming about him. It’s soft, barely there, but he still feels it.
Neither Dean nor Sam knows it’s there, Jake bets. But it’s important.
“Alright,” Dean finally says. Jake snaps his gaze to Dean’s face, meets eyes identical to his own. “I’m not quite sure what to believe right now, but we found you for a reason. I’m hungry and so’s Sam. We can’t leave you here in the middle of nowhere, so…” Dean pauses and assesses Jake. “Hop in the backseat.”
Jake doesn’t smile, doesn’t react with anything but a nod. In some ways, Dean is like Dad, doesn’t know how to react to physical affection or praise. Sam’s like Connie, though, like Mom. Accepts and gives hugs, pats on the back, just a light touch on a shoulder. But Jake—he’s a mixture.
Dean slides into the driver’s seat without waiting for Jake’s affirmation. He half believes Jake but the rest of him is convinced of Jake’s insanity.
Not that Jake can blame him.
Sam gives Jake a steady stare. He can feel Jake’s power and now that he’s heard the story, he doesn’t know how to react.
“C’mon!” Dean hollers from the Impala and Sam straightens to his full height.
“I don’t think you’re a threat,” Sam says. “But if you do anything to hurt him, I won’t feel guilt for my actions.”
Without hurry, Sam slips shotgun. Dean starts the car and Jake quickly gets in the back.
-
The ride down the road is quiet. Dean’s music—the kind of god-awful stuff Connie liked—is muted. The brothers are having another silent discussion, involving shrugs, nods, eyebrows, and shakes of the head.
Jake has never minded silence, but since he turned off the telepathy, he’s got to ask.
“How long have you been fucking?”
It’s twenty miles down the road, a few minutes from the turn-off that’ll lead to a town and food, and Jake can’t hold his tongue anymore.
Sam turns around in his seat, Dean jerks the wheel, and they both exclaim, “What?!”
Jake has Dean’s I swear I’m innocent, and aren’t I just the cutest thing? expression on his face and he asks again, “How long have the two of you been screwing like bunnies?” He’s quick to assure, “Not that I have a problem with it. I’m just curious.”
Dean looks in the rearview mirror and Sam’s still staring at Jake. “You didn’t mention being telepathic,” Sam says.
“I’m not,” Jake replies, but then corrects, “Well, I am, but I’m not using it at the moment. Promise.” He grins but Sam’s not amused, so he continues, “You telegraph it with every move of your bodies, every look. You’re so used to it you can’t tell anymore, but from the outside looking in, it’s obvious the two of you are lovers.”
Sam’s gaze is level, steady. Jake doesn’t look away, just stares back. All the way to the diner Dean picks out, there’s an almost strained silence. Jake asked and he’s waiting for an answer, Sam’s trying to think of something to say, and Dean won’t speak first.
When Dean cuts the engine with a weary sigh, Sam says, “Seven years.”
Jake nods, asks, “Why?”
Sam licks his lips. Dean is still not talking; he just stares out the window, at the sunset. After a moment, Sam continues. “Dad was gone, on a hunt somewhere or drinking himself into a coma. It was Dean’s twentieth birthday and Dad couldn’t be bothered to be home.” Dean makes a small movement, like he’d gone to look at Sam and changed his mind. Sam half-smiles and says, “Dean didn’t let on it hurt him, but I’m neither blind nor a fool. Not even at fifteen. So I broke into Dad’s stash of booze. He thought he’d hidden it well, but I think he’s always underestimated me.”
Dean laughs softly, bitterly, but stays silent.
“I got him drunk.” Sam’s admission is so soft as to be a murmur of wind. “I knew how much he could drink and still have control. So I took him past that. He hated himself in the morning, for the little he could remember.”
Sam has yet to look away from Jake, to look at Dean.
“It doesn’t matter to him that it was my fault. That I wanted it. That I wanted it at Stanford, that as much as I loved Jessica—and I did, I loved her a lot—I’ll always love him more.” Jake doesn’t recognize the look on Sam’s face, can’t decide if it’s shame or self-loathing or something else entirely.
Dean sucks in a breath. Jake doesn’t need telepathy to know he’s probably never heard the words out of the bedroom—or wherever it is they fuck.
“He doesn’t care that I’ve always wanted it, since before I even knew what it was.” Sam isn’t talking to Jake anymore, if he ever really was. “All he sees is a kid, someone he’d die to save, and he thinks he let that kid down, and no matter what I tell him, he’ll never believe me. He does it because I want him to, because I need him to—I don’t know what he wants. But he doesn’t care what he wants, he’ll do anything I want, and—” Sam cuts himself off harshly, tears his gaze away from Jake, throws open the door, and rushes from the car. He stalks into the diner and the doors slams shut behind him.
“Fuck.” Dean says it wearily and lowers his forehead to the steering wheel.
Jake doesn’t know what he’d been expecting the answer to be, but it sure as hell isn’t what he got.
And for some reason, he can’t keep quiet. That something in Dean’s blood, in Jake’s blood because of Dean, is humming at him, demanding he fix this, which is fucking ridiculous because he can’t fix anything, including himself.
“My Uncle Ross fucked me when I was fourteen,” he says conversationally, like he said instead, You know, looks like rain today.
Dean moves so quickly Jake almost can’t see him. He rears back, spins around, gapes at Jake with horror and the beginnings of fury.
Jake shrugs. “I was spending the summer with him, at his cabin away from town. Mom and Dad needed time together, with me completely out of the picture, so I spent three months with Uncle Ross, hunting. He taught me a lot in those twelve weeks.” Jake’s laugh isn’t entirely sane, isn’t mirthful at all. “It was the third week when he collapsed next to me on my bed. When he said that though he’d taken me in as a favor to his sister, I needed to earn my keep. So he told me what to do and I did it.”
He raises his gaze from the back of the seat to the eyes exactly like his. “It wasn’t about love, Dean. Never. It was about want, submission, power.” His smirk is razor-edged. “About owning beauty.” Dean’s nod is reluctant. “I expect you know about that.” Jake is hesitant, really unsure of his footing here. It’d be so easy to let the power flow out of him, to know the correct words, to pull everything from Dean’s head.
So easy. Which is why he refrains.
Dean doesn’t look away. And when he smiles his dangerous, razor-edged smile, Jake is ready with the mirror.
They get out of the car with reflected movements, walk side by side, twins separated by five years, demon blood, and memories.
When they enter, Sam raises his head. He’s gotten control of himself, gotten them a table, and ordered three waters.
The meal is silent until Jake makes an inane comment about sports. It’s so stupid Sam snorts. Then Dean laughs. It’s laughter of relief, but it’s contagious. All three of them laugh for far longer than the remark deserves, but conversation is steady after. They get dessert and walk back to the Impala in companionable silence.
It can’t last, of course. Jake knows it and so do they. But for the night, soul bearing is over.
Jake tries to look into tomorrow. While Dean navigates the town and Sam fiddles with the radio, Jake tries seeing the future.
He hasn’t felt this way so swiftly since he met Connie when they were five. Then, he didn’t know it for what it is. Now he does.
Before the Impala stopped beside him and his family got out, he knew.
Jake is well and truly fucked, and tomorrow is blocked from him.
“How about here?” Dean asks, shooting Sam a sideways glance.
“Sure,” Sam shrugs so Dean flicks his eyes to the rearview. Jake nods; he doesn’t care where they stop. He hasn’t slept in a bed in almost a year.
There’s two beds in the room and Dean says, “I’ll take the floor.”
“No,” Sam answers. “I will.”
“I’m oldest,” Dean shoots back. “So I get first choice. I called the floor.”
“You know,” Jake cuts in, “I could take the floor.”
“No,” both Sam and Dean reply instantly, simultaneously. They’re a few feet apart, Sam in the middle of the room and Dean by the door.
Jake would suggest they bunk together, but even before he knew he could read minds, he’d have been able to see that would be the worst thing to say now. He could also suggest he bunk with one of them, but that would also not go over well.
“You’re hurt, Sammy,” Dean says rationally, seriously. “Don’t pretend your ribs aren’t still bothering you. So, you get the bed.”
Sam goes to argue for the sake of arguing but pauses. He considers Dean for a moment before deflating. “Fine,” he mutters and tosses his bag on the bed closest to the door.
Jake glances from one to the other. “Mind if I take a quick shower? I haven’t had a real one in a long time.”
“You don’t smell that bad for someone who hasn’t bathed,” Sam comments and Jake smiles.
He shuts but doesn’t lock the door behind him. Looking in the mirror, he’s still the same as ever. But inside… he can feel something shifting, changing. His world was turned on its axis, flipped over and shaken around. Everyone he remotely cared about died—because of him. The woman he thought he could grow to love turned out to be his mother—and she killed Mom. She killed Connie.
He killed her and still hasn’t felt regret.
Of course, he admits silently, meeting his reflection’s hazel eyes, I was fucked up before Marisol.
Jake slips the thin jackknife from his pocket. While Sam and Dean had their pissing contest over the sleeping arrangements, he’d palmed it from Dean’s bag.
Tracing the blade with his thumb, he grins mirthlessly when the skin parts easily.
He places the knife on the side of the bathtub and strips. Turns the water on hot as it’ll go and slips under the spray with a hiss.
“Jake,” Sam calls through the door, “is there any shampoo?”
Jake glances around and calls back, “Yeah.”
Sam doesn’t say anything else so Jake reaches out and grabs the shampoo that materializes before him.
So he can’t see into the future but he can still summon stuff. He wonders if being near Sam and his gifts is blocking his own. If so, it doesn’t matter. He’s not leaving them now that he has them.
He rinses out his hair. The water is still as hot as it can go and he makes it hotter with a thought. For a moment he wonders if he could heal. Sam’s ribs are tender; Jake wonders if he could fix them, make them good as new. Better than new. Both of them, his father and uncle—could he make them invincible?
For one shining second, he thinks about it. But then he remembers that everything has a price. And he won’t make them pay it.
He already has, once. But he survived Mom’s death, he survived Connie’s death. But Sam couldn’t survive Dean’s and Dean wouldn’t survive Sam’s.
He picks up the knife, still flicked open. He slides the blade down his thigh and sighs when the skin tears.
A small amount of pain. He turns so that the scalding water hits the wound and it burns so beautifully—
He lets the water beat down for a few minutes more then turns it off. He towels dry and slips his clothes back on. He could create some but he’s worn out from the excitement of the day, feels drained. He hasn’t slept well in a year, but wonders if tonight he will.
-
When he leaves the bathroom, Dean’s in the motel chair, feet propped up on the bed Sam claimed. Sam’s stretched out on the bed, staring at the ceiling. They’ve changed clothes; Sam’s in sweatpants and a loose T-shirt, while Dean’s in boxers.
“Here,” Dean says and tosses Jake a bundle of clothing. He pulls it apart to reveal boxers and a shirt. Jake nods and slips back into the bathroom.
When he leaves the bathroom a second time, Dean’s making a pallet on the floor. He’s taken one blanket and one pillow from each bed. Sam watches from his bed and smiles at some of what Dean’s muttering.
Jake wants a brother so much it hurts, aches deep inside him. The closest he came was Connie.
Sam turns his head and meets Jake’s eyes. For a second, Jake wonders if he projected the thought but then Sam looks back at Dean. “Satisfied with your nest yet?” he asks.
Dean shoots him a glare. Jake has a feeling he missed something while he changed clothes.
-
Jake wakes when Sam does. Dean’s already up, sitting in the chair, watching them.
Sam’s breathing shallowly, gasping down air. Jake feels an echo of the dream, the nightmare, the vision, the premonition.
“It’s never been that vivid before,” Sam says, looking at Dean.
But Jake’s the one who speaks. “I’m sorry.”
Both of them turn toward him. There isn’t much light, since it’s two in the morning, but Jake can see them perfectly.
He’s always had good night vision.
“When we left the diner last night,” Jake tells them both, but looking between them, at the window, “I tried to see what tomorrow held. Ever since Marisol—it’s been easy. I didn’t do it often because I didn’t need to, but whenever I did, it was easier than breathing.”
The Winchesters share a glance. Jake takes a breath and keeps going. “But I couldn’t. There was a wall between me and the pane of glass that shows the future.” He chuckles, then laughs, and can’t stop. He wants to, he tries to, but in a year he’s never let his emotions go.
He may be half-demon, but he’s also half-human, and he’s long overdue for a breakdown.
Jake rolls over onto his stomach, gasping and crying with laughter. Dean moves first, settles onto the bed next to him, slowly and gently runs his fingers through Jake’s hair. Sam slips out of his bed and comes around Jake’s other side, stretches out beside him.
By this time, the maniacal, uncontrollable laughter is over and Jake’s wracked with sobs. He’s almost silent in his grief, only gasping a few times.
He can’t hear anything except his own thundering heartbeat, but he feels them, feels their warmth, feels their hands, one in his hair and one on his back.
For the first time in ever, since before be can remember, even with all his power, Jake feels safe. And he sinks into the best sleep of his life.
-
When he wakes the second time, it’s well into the afternoon. He’s curled up beside Sam and Dean’s on the other bed, facing him.
“Welcome back, Sleeping Beauty,” Dean greets him, with a warm smile.
Jake knows he’s finally passed the final test. Dean, now, will treat Jake like he treats Sam. Which both comforts and terrifies him.
“I’m sorry,” Jake says. “Somehow—and it shouldn’t be possible; hell, it’s not possible—he had my vision.”
“I know,” Dean replies. “And you don’t need to apologize for that. He picks things up, always has.” Dean shrugs.
Jake slips off the bed and Sam rolls over, eyes flickering open. His hand catches Jake’s. “Why did you stop?” he asks, voice thick and full of—something. Jake can’t place it, just like he couldn’t place Sam’s expression yesterday.
“Stop what?” Dean asks, springing to his feet in a movement smoother than the cougars Jake used to hunt.
Sam’s eyes don’t leave Jake. He answers as if Jake had asked. “When you were fifteen—the knife. Why didn’t you finish?”
“Because it didn’t hurt enough.” Jake’s voice is hollow, as hollow as Sam’s green eyes.
Dean places one hand on Jake’s shoulder, the other on Sam’s wrist. “Let him go, Sammy,” Dean whispers, softly squeezing Sam’s wrist. “You need to wake up and let him go.”
Sam’s grip is iron and the pressure on Jake’s fingers feels good. Slowly, Sam’s lips stretch into a smile. The ghost of a smile, Jake amends, and Dean’s voice is harsher. “Sam. Let him go.”
Dean could break Sam’s grip. So could Jake. But they both know, Jake bets, that more will be broken than Sam’s grip if they take the choice from him.
“He’ll never let us go, Dean,” Sam says. His voice is still harsh, deep and dark. “Neither of them will. Mom and Jess’ killer—he’s pissed that we’ve held off this long. It’s a war—a long, bloody, death-filled war. We’ll never escape.” Sam’s eyes, bright and glittering with tears and knowledge, still haven’t left Jake’s. “And Jake won’t let go either,” Sam continues, grip slackening a little. “He’s like you, except more stubborn.” Sam’s eyes flick to Dean. “When I asked you, you let me go. But even if we beg Jake…” Sam’s laughter is full of dark promise. “Which we might, before the end, he’ll never, ever let go.”
Sam’s fingers loosen around Jake’s. He shivers; Jake can feel him tremble. He blinks and shakes his head, releases Jake fully and lets his hand fall. Dean lets go of Sam and pulls his arm back, leaving his other hand on Jake.
“I’m sorry.” Sam’s voice is barely there and Dean sighs, sinks down beside his little brother. Jake doesn’t know what to do, if he should back away, leave them alone. Marisol murmurs in the dark recesses of his mind, whispers for him to let go, to release the power at his disposal. He shoves her away with rancor, with a bitter delight. He didn’t give in a year ago and he sure as hell won’t give in now.
Dean glances his way and his eyes ask Are you okay? Jake shrugs, unsure.
Sam looks up, completely apologetic, his big puppy eyes full of sorrow and fear—of himself, of the past and futures he saw, of Jake’s reaction.
Jake has never lacked tact, but sometimes he chose to ignore his better judgment. That dream of Sam’s ran both ways and he saw some things, too. So when the words form in his mind and flow to his tongue and he takes a breath to speak—he knows he should keep quiet, back away, leave them to whatever they’ll say. He should hide out in the bathroom, with memories and a blade, should bleed for what he is and all his mother had done.
He should. But he doesn’t. He says, “When you were nineteen, why didn’t you pull the trigger?”
Dean’s voice rings out, loud and disbelieving. “What?” There’s an undercurrent of danger threading through the words and Sam flinches back, hitting the wall.
Jake continues, “When you cleaned and loaded the gun, when you held the barrel to your temple and rested your finger on the trigger—why didn’t you pull?”
Sam hasn’t looked away from Jake and he doesn’t have the words for an answer, so Jake takes pity and tells them.
“Because,” he says, glancing from Sam to Dean and back, “it would have been too quick.”
He walks to the bathroom and locks the door behind him.
-
Jake spends the better part of an hour in the bathroom, sitting with his back to the door. He twirls the open jackknife with his right hand, then tosses it to the left and does the same. He thinks back to the past, to the life he had before he turned twenty-one.
He wasn’t happy. Not then, and not now. He can’t explain but he doesn’t think he was meant for happiness.
Dean, though—he could be. And Jake’s fucked it up, like he always does.
Jake clenches the knife in his fist and jams the blade into his other palm, twisting and wrenching it. The pain is glorious, and not nearly sharp enough, so he jerks the blade across, ripping and tearing his skin from one side to the other.
But it’s not enough. No matter what he does, it’ll never be enough. He aches inside, deep and long, for things he’ll never have, could never have—he’s demonspawn. Created to be the end and no matter how much he denies it, tries to do anything else… nothing is changed.
Distantly, Jake realizes tears are pouring down his face. The pain in his hand is receding, far too swiftly, and he takes the knife, holds it to his inner elbow, jabs down—with relish, he pulls it down his arm, smiles as pain blossoms.
Behind him, the door shakes. Someone is banging on it, but everything is distant, hazy. The knife slips from his fingers. Jake doesn’t see the darkness coming and he falls into it without qualm.
-
He knows it’s a dream. The certainty fills him but he doesn’t fight for consciousness.
Dean is kneeling in an alley and Sam is across the street. Jake can see them both and he thinks about speaking but doesn’t. Suddenly, Dean’s younger; thirteen, if that, Jake bets. Sam’s still twenty-three, though, and his face is swiftly darkening with rage.
Now, Jake knows whose dream this is. But why would Sam be asleep—didn’t he just wake up?
The man—old, pot-bellied, disgusting—hurries down the alley toward Dean, and Jake knows. He knew earlier, back in the car, when he spoke of Uncle Ross—but that is different from this knowing. Now he’s seeing it.
And if the man were before him now, Jake would kill him without pause.
When the bastard stops in front of Dean, Jake closes his eyes.
-
His eyes open. His left arm is numb, feels heavy, bandaged. He’s hungry, thirsty, and he has to piss. He can hear two voices arguing and one sounds like his.
Jake tries to sit up and nearly accomplishes it before collapsing back onto the bed.
When his vision clears, Dean’s face is looming above him, eyes wide with fear and anger.
“You would kill him,” Jake says, tongue tripping on the words. “If he weren’t already dead.”
“I have thing against pedophiles,” Dean answers, somehow knowing where Jake’s out-of-the-blue comment came from. “Which is funny, since I am one, myself.”
Sam’s face appears next to Dean’s. “You’re not a pedophile, Dean,” he says before focusing on Jake. “What the fuck do you think you were doing?” he demands.
Jake sighs and replies with, “I really have to piss.”
“I don’t care,” Sam returns. “I don’t give a flying fuck what you have to do, because you’re not doing it until you tell me why you felt the need to carve a river and ocean into your left arm!”
Jake actually feels a little cowed. “It didn’t hurt enough. For my crimes.” He turns his head, trying to escape their gazes. “It just didn’t hurt enough.”
He feels the bed dip next to him. “It’ll never hurt enough.” Dean’s voice is gruff, weary. “Never, no matter what you do. So, you’ll keep doing more, fighting monster after monster, defeating them all, getting thrown into walls and down stairs and out of windows—you’ll get bones broken and concussions, bruises and cuts, rips deep into your skin and your soul. And every wound, it’ll hurt less and less, so you’ll seek out more.”
Jake turns, watches Dean, watches Sam watching Dean.
“To make up for what you think you’ve done,” Dean continues softly, not looking at either of them, “you’ll try to kill yourself every day. But you never can manage it, because deep down, you don’t want to die. If you die, there might not be any more pain. Hell, you might even get into Heaven, somehow.” Dean’s bark of laughter is sharp and biting. “You fucked your little brother when he was fifteen and no amount of pain will ever make that better.”
Dean reaches down and gently picks up Jake’s left hand. “This?” he says, and Jake meets his identical eyes. “This isn’t pain. This is rage. And you’re going to keep on punishing yourself for surviving them, for ruining them, and it will never be enough.”
Jake lifts his right arm and places his hand on Dean’s face, runs his thumb along Dean’s skin. Dean licks his lips and Jake pulls him down, raising his head a little to meet Dean.
It isn’t soft or gentle. But they both can take it and they’re both fucked up enough to want it.
Distantly, Jake hears Sam sigh and then a door closing. Barely over Dean, the noise of the shower tells Jake what Sam is doing.
But then Jake’s attention settles where it should, on the father who could be his twin.
Dean isn’t soft or gentle, but Jake doesn’t want soft or gentle. So Dean gives him what he needs, and then he gives Dean what Dean needs, and he’ll deal with the fallout when it comes.
part 2
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(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-06 10:20 pm (UTC)one little thing: Ayer’s Rock is Ayers Rock (no apostrophe). actually, its proper name is Uluru.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-01-06 11:01 pm (UTC)