Agreement
Title: Agreement
Author: winyumi
Rating: PG-13
Words: 1900
Characters: Sam, Dean, John
Warnings: language
Summary: AU Having learned about the demon's plans for Sammy, John takes a drastic step to protect his sons. Because for Winchesters control equals safety.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Don't sue.
“Woe to him that claims obedience when it is not due; woe to him that refuses it when it is.”
-Thomas Carlyle
“Dad, come on, why do we have to leave tomorrow?” Sammy whines, hovering next to John’s chair. John knows he should be glad Sammy is getting back to normal now. He sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose against his emerging headache. Whatever pattern there might be to these deaths, it’s been eluding him all day. Sammy couldn’t have picked a worse time to interrupt him. But be glad, he orders himself.
“There’s no reason we can’t stay one more day,” Sammy tries a little louder. Ignoring him only makes him get louder. John had almost forgotten.
“That’s enough, Sammy,” he says firmly. This reemergence of the old Sammy is not exactly pleasant, but it’s a good sign. He’s well aware of that.
Sammy’s been acting like a shadow of himself, and it’s had John worried that the binding ritual changed something in his son that he hadn’t meant it to change. The purpose of the thing was never to diminish him, only to give them a firm handle on him. Specifically, to give Dean a handle on him, and John a handle by proxy.
There were elements of the spell that worried John, deeply. Things that still had him questioning his decision to go ahead with it, and would have even if Sammy hadn’t begun acting so...timid afterward. Afraid almost, of him and of Dean. But if Sammy’s back to whining about the latest move, that means the fear was temporary and is waning.
Be grateful to have one less thing to worry about, he firmly reminds himself as Sammy ignores his warning, tone wavering somewhere between earnest and frustrated.
“The science fair is tomorrow night. I’ve got my poster all done and I’ve almost got my presentation memorized. Why can’t we stay for that and leave the next morning? Dad, c’mon-”
“Sammy, enough!” He breaks in. “People’s lives are at risk and you’re crying over a science fair?” It’s frustrating he has to point this out. Somewhere in that nimble brain of his Sammy knows John’s right, and yet it doesn’t stop him from making a stink over a science fair, of all things, at a time when John’s attention needs to be on the notes he’s been rushing to compile. Bad enough that agonizing over and prepping for and finally performing the ritual delayed him from beginning research on this hunt for a week too long. Throw in the distraction of the worry he’s continued to feel for Sammy and Dean and he’s ashamed at how little progress he’s made on this one so far.
“It’s just, I’ve been working on this project for weeks,” Sammy wheedles, bulling on even in the face of common sense.
“I don’t care if you’ve been working on it day and night for ten years!” John barks. Maybe there are more artful ways to say it, but he doesn’t have the luxury of wasting time arguing to a forgone conclusion with his twelve-year-old son, whether the kid’s adjusting to a big change or not.
“One more day-” Sammy begins, chin thrust forward sullenly in a way John recognizes all too well.
“Drop it, Sammy.” John grits, trying to stare him down. “It’s not going to happen.”
“You always do this! It’s like you don’t even care!” Sammy bursts out. His abrupt transformation from sullen to outraged leaves John at a loss.
"About the science fair?” John asks in disbelief. “No, Sammy, I don’t.” He sees Sammy looking like he’s about to open his mouth to interrupt and gets a little louder to forestall it. “Between a science fair and people’s lives-”
“Not about the science fair! About me! About what I want!” Sammy breaks in, blood suffusing his face.
“Can you even hear yourself right now?” John asks harshly, “I didn’t raise you to be selfish. I raised you-”
“Selfish? You’re calling me selfish? I did your stupid ritual,” Sammy interrupts wildly, and this time John does raise his voice.
“Godammit Sammy! That isn’t what this is about! This is about innocent people dying because you-”
“No, this is about-” Sammy cuts in, forcing John to get even louder.
“-are too selfish to miss some goddam school event-” but Sammy is still trying to yell over John, who’s about one minute away from leaving his seat and really giving Sammy something to yell about.
Dean appears in the doorway. John had been so absorbed in the fight, he didn’t even hear the Impala arrive home.
“He wants to leave before the science fair!” Sammy turns immediately to his brother, angry and self-righteous and far too loud, and the worst of it is how it makes Dean cringe. John loves his youngest son, but the way he acts... sometimes he doesn’t like him very much. Dean’s been having his own troubles since the ritual, and he doesn’t need to be dragged into a fight so pointless, doesn’t need to be asked to pick sides. Which Sammy would see if he could look beyond his own feelings for once.
“Sammy...” Dean begins, then trails off helplessly, looks to John. “We’ve got a hunt, sir?” he asks, with none of his usual enthusiasm.
“Yes,” John says calmly. “People are dying in Wichita, middle of the city, what looks like wildcat attacks. One every two weeks.”
“When was the last one?” Sammy breaks in.
“Last night.”
“So then we have time,” Sammy is making an attempt to sound reasonable, but his intense gaze is just daring John to contradict him. John shakes his head, too frustrated to speak. Sammy is doing this deliberately. Baiting him, because he’s still upset. Sammy is a manipulator, John knows this about his youngest as surely as he knows that his oldest is the exact opposite.
The science fair is nothing but an excuse. This goes deeper, and it needs to be nipped in the bud.
“Sammy,” he says quietly, dangerously. “You need to drop this now, or you’re not going to like where it leads.” Their eyes lock. Sammy’s holding himself stiff and breathing hard, practically snorting like a bull. Even for a fight of theirs, this is a level of anger John’s rarely seen.
“Then it won’t be that different than the rest of my fucking life,” Sammy hisses, fiercely challenging John to escalate. Testing the limits as he’s always done, throwing himself at the walls to see if they're more than plaster. But the wall this time is John, and he’s made of concrete.
“You will apologize for that disrespect,” John growls. Sammy just keeps glaring. John gives him a silent three count, only vaguely aware of Dean holding his breath in the doorway. “Fine,” John spits, when the time is up. “Push-ups. Twenty. Now!”
But Sammy doesn’t move.
“You can’t make me,” he snarls. The emphasis on ‘you’ is clear, and if John had any doubts about what Sammy’s really fighting him on, he’s got no illusions now. Sammy’s still upset about the ritual, the ritual that had to be done. John had explained it, he’d been honest. It had damn near killed him to do it, but he’d given Sammy the whole truth, and Sammy had seen that it was necessary. He’d agreed to it. And now he stands there, blaming John like this is something his father did to him instead of a choice he made for himself.
John doesn’t want to do it. God knows there’s nothing he wants less than to fight with Sammy about this, rub salt in this still healing wound. But he knows in his heart that he can’t let this slide, because someone who learns to blame everyone else for their problems is weak, and a menace to themselves and others. And he will not raise his sons to be lesser men than he knows they can be, even if it means standing firm when they bruise themselves against him. He knows what he has to do.
“That’s twenty more. And you will do them now,” he growls roughly, “Or I will have Dean tell you to.” Sammy’s flinch at the words is almost unnoticeable.
“Then you’ll have to have Dean tell me,” he bites out, barely missing a beat.
“You would do that to your brother?” John pushes, still hoping Sammy will see reason, take pity on his brother if he won’t on his father.
“I guess so,” Sammy says low and cold, and waits a long second before finally shifting his laser-beam gaze to Dean. John wishes he could see a sign of doubt there. He could work on that, maybe talk them back down from this stand-off somehow. Try though he might, he can’t read anything in his son’s face but sheer pigheaded defiance.
“Do it, Dean!” John barks without looking at his older son. He knows if he does, he’ll be the one to back down, and he can’t be. He can’t let himself when he knows he’s right. He feels the pleading look Dean sends him like a physical pull, but he doesn’t take his eyes off Sammy.
“Do the push-ups, Sammy,” Dean says finally. His even tone fools none of them, and he looks away after he says it, down the front hall like he’s contemplating an escape.
John forces himself to watch Sammy as he stiffly gets down on the floor.
The push-ups seem to take forever in the hushed kitchen. It bothers John a little, that he never slows or takes a rest. That there's a certain mechanical set to his spine which never softens. John knows Sammy is capable of doing more than forty when forced to, but he's making them look too easy. There ought to be some decline in form as he nears the end, some subtle sign of relief that the punishment is almost done. He's always working to train it out of them, but both boys still fall prey to it regularly.
On the other hand, the point here is not to push the limits of Sammy’s physical endurance. The point is to make sure Sammy knows that there will be consequences. The point is that Sammy knows that no matter the emotional fallout of the binding, John will not be afraid to use it whenever he deems it necessary. That point has been made, and of all the effects the spell could have, Sammy doing perfect push-ups could hardly be called a downside.
When he’s finished the last one, Sammy rises unsteadily, his glistening eyes staring over John’s shoulder. Tears track down his face. Their presence isn't surprising, but John had watched every push-up and hadn't seen that he was crying, and that surprises him a little. In his experience Sammy is the loud crier, Dean the stoic.
John sends him to bed and he goes without protesting, or looking at either of them. Once he’s disappeared down the hall, John resettles himself at the table and grimly shuffles his papers until Dean follows after his brother. He listens to Dean’s guilty murmur drifting in from the bedroom. John can’t make out the words, but he knows his son, knows Dean’s trying to cajole Sammy into talking. Trying and failing.
It seems to be the theme of the evening, he thinks to himself with a grimace, and manages to pour himself a drink despite shaking hands.