by David Reed
Last Will and Testament
I DON’T HAVE MUCH in the way of property, but I think the time’s come to say where I want it all to go once I’m gone.
My collection of cars, though they’re in rough shape, goes to Dean Winchester. Treat them half as well as you treat the Impala, and they’ll be in better hands than they ever were with me.
My guns, those go to Sam. Because I don’t want you to feel left out, mostly, and I know you’ll share with Dean. My real gift to you, Sam, is giving you permission to digitize all my books, like you’ve been bugging me to do for years. Have fun with it.
My house, burn to the damn ground. This place still holds so many terrible memories for me, it’s a wonder I’ve been able to live here myself. Let someone else start here fresh, with a new home that won’t have all this baggage.
My books, those go to hunters everywhere. Do what you have to do to get them out into the world, to where they can actually help people.
Everything else, give to charity. To folks who are down on their luck, in the same way that I’ve been, so many times.
. . . . .
I’m going to try to close my eyes for a bit. I hope I wake up.
Sam and Dean
WHOA. Something just . . . snapped in my brain. I saw that woman, from the bog, but this time she was against a field of stars . . . but not outside. They were stars painted on something. Where was she?
I hoped this mental exercise would help dislodge a memory, that I’d remember some clue that could help me fix myself, but . . . I’m no better off now than I was when I started. Worse, really, since most of my mind is gone. It’s like . . . something is searching my memory, and throwing out the bits they don’t want. As for what that thing might be, I’ve gone through every possibility I know of, written it all down, but I’ve failed.
The thought has occurred to me that whatever it is, it could be in my house. It could be right here, laughing at me from the shadows as I flail around, trying to stop the inevitable. Damn. I guess I really think that . . . it is inevitable.
I don’t say this often, but I’m giving up.
Said everything I need to say, left what instructions I can remember. I could go on for a thousand pages more, but that’s what my library’s for. If you need answers you can’t find here, you know where to look. Or call Sam and Dean, or Creaser, or Visyak, Rodger Stanton, or Willie Freeman—their numbers are . . . somewhere. I don’t even know where I keep them any more.
So that’s it. I’m ending this little memento mori with a final note. A message for Sam and Dean, if they ever find this.
I first met Sam and Dean when they were tiny. Dean must have been six or seven, Sam three. Even then, you could see their personalities clear as day. Dean was daddy’s good little soldier, walking and talking like John as best he could, while Sam was quieter—more reserved, introspective, looking at the world and really thinking about it before he acted. I never knew Mary, but I imagine that’s how she was, too.
By the time I really got to know the Winchester family, I’d already given up the road life and settled back into Sioux Falls. John would call me often enough to ask for intel, backup, or a place to crash. Most often, though, he’d need a place to drop the boys while he went after some dangerous thing.
To them, I was Uncle Bobby—the old kook with the really cool backyard. Even Sam, who wasn’t much into cars, couldn’t help but have fun back in the salvage yard, playing hide and seek with Dean and imagining the stories behind each one of the cars. Did it have a family? Did they miss it?
When John would come back from his hunts, we’d all sit around my kitchen table and talk about what’d happened while he was gone. John would make up some story about his sales job for Sam’s benefit, which Dean saw right through. Sam would sit and listen, sometimes tell John about a book he’d read while John was gone. When Sam had gone to bed, Dean would rattle off all the lore he’d learned from poking through my library, so proud to be one of the men.
Then, they’d disappear for a few months. I worried so much for those boys, it was like seeing my own sons go off to war each time they drove away. John was a great hunter, but he wasn’t careful. Not careful enough, anyway, to have two small kids with him.
In 1991, I gave Sam a present to give John for Christmas. It was an amulet that I got in trade from a woman in Tampa who said it was a protective charm. My intention was dead simple—if I could do anything to make sure John was always there for his boys, I’d do it. The next time I saw them, in January of ’92, Dean was wearing the amulet. Sam had given it to him instead, and I asked why. Sam had learned the truth about what John did, and the risks he took every day. Sam felt betrayed that John had lied to him for so long. It didn’t make sense to him that his dad would go so far out of his way and risk so much for other people instead of protecting his own kids. That was the true beginning of Sam’s falling out with John, and I have to say . . . I agreed with Sam.
At the same time, I’d lost my own wife to a demon. I never got my revenge. I understood John. But . . . when Karen died, I was left with nothing. John had a family. He had so much left to live for, I was envious of him. If those’d been my boys, no way I woulda gone after the demon that killed their mom. I woulda plopped ’em down in a nice town, tried to make sure their lives were as normal as I could.
I know, that’s all talk. I wasn’t in John’s shoes, I can’t truly know what I woulda done. But John’s quest for vengeance killed him and dragged his sons into a life that’ll eventually kill them too (it already has a few times, but so far it hasn’t stuck).
One day, the Winchesters showed up on my doorstep and Dean had a gun in his belt. He was twelve years old. I’d known that the boys knew how to shoot—hell, I’d taken them out back for target practice myself, but that was too far. I tried to talk to John about it, but he wouldn’t hear it. “They need to know the truth about what’s out there, Bobby,” he said to me. “I need to make sure they’re ready.”
He trained those boys like they were Navy SEALs. Dean was more excited about it, but Sam was a good shot, too. They were well versed in all kinds of monster lore, they knew the difference between a ghost and a poltergeist (a poltergeist can move stuff), they could field strip a rifle in thirty seconds. They also never really got a chance to be kids.
John left them with me to go on a hunting trip to Montana, said he would be gone a week. After ten days, I started to get worried. He had a cell phone by that point, but he wasn’t answering it. The boys were old enough to tell I was worried, but I played it off. Told them that I’d spoken to John, and that he’d be back for them as soon as he could. Secretly, I started calling hospitals and morgues all over Montana, seeing if his body had turned up somewhere.
After two weeks, I started calling every hunter I knew, to see if anybody could go up there to check in on him. I couldn’t leave the boys alone, that’d make me as bad as John. Nobody was available—the nineties were busy years for hunters. All I could do was keep waiting.
It was summer, so the boys weren’t in school. I did my best to keep them occupied, to keep them from asking too many questions about where John was and when he was coming back. Sam was the worst, since he was littler and still naive. He’d believe any lie I told him, but it killed me to do it.
After a month, I accepted the fact that John was dead. Figuring out how to tell Sam and Dean was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do, and I hated John for making me do it. I sat them down in my living room, but couldn’t even bring myself to say the words. I had tears in my eyes when I finally said it. “Boys, your dad’s not coming back this time.”
Sam was so in shock, he couldn’t even cry. Dean, he screamed at me. Called me a liar, told me that John was too tough to die, that he was just busy with a case, and he’d be home soon. I wanted to say, “You’re right, Dean. I’m sure he’ll be back soon.” I couldn’t. I had to tear the bandage off, make Dean understand that holding out hope for John’s return would only make things wor
se. Dean and I have never argued that bad since. He was screaming, pounding on my chest, cursing me out for not having any faith in John. All the while, Sam just sat there, silent. Taking it all in.
I went too far. In trying to make Dean understand, I said things about John I couldn’t take back. Things that no son should ever hear about his father. I said John was an idiot, a damn fool for chasing the thing that’d killed their mom, and that they’d be better off having been put in an orphanage after Mary died rather than being dragged around by John. Every bad thought I’d ever had about him, I let out right then and there. Between that and what happened in Omaha, I’ve told you the two moments I’m least proud of.
Dean stormed off, disappeared into the forest by my house. For ten hours I waited for him to come back. As I contemplated having to call the police to help find him, I realized just how much Dean was like his dad. And that Dean’s reaction was just his way of processing what he must have known to be true—that John really wasn’t coming back. I’d made things so much worse than they needed to be. And poor Sam . . . smart enough to know exactly what was happening, but shy enough to bear it all in silence. God only knows the pain he was feeling.
At midnight, I heard footsteps on my front steps. When I opened the door, there was Dean, holding John Winchester’s hand.
He was alive. And when he returned, he found his son on the side of the highway, trying to hitch a ride to Montana to look for him.
When John saw me, there was ice in his eyes. He was so furious at me for what I’d said to Dean and Sam, he coulda sucker-punched me. He called out for Sam, who was asleep on the couch. Said they were leaving, going to stay with some real friends.
I told you I wasn’t proud of what I said to Dean, but I’m also not that proud of what I did next—I grabbed a rock-salt shotgun from my shelf and chased John off my property, blasting the back of the Impala with salt as it skidded out of my driveway.
I spent the next few years regretting what’d happened. Hunting can be a lonely life, and it was a lot lonelier without the Winchesters. I may put on a gruff exterior, but everybody wants a family. That’s what John had, and I felt like he was throwing it away.
The next time I saw Dean and Sam, it was years later, and they were grown. Sam had gone to college, Dean had started hunting solo. They’d joined up to find John, who’d (again) gone missing. It was the same old story, except this time they were both old enough to know the truth about John.
They eventually found him, but their reunion didn’t last. John gave up his life to save Dean’s, and was sent to hell for his trouble. Sam, Dean, and I were able to open the Devil’s Gate in Wyoming and let him out, and finally get vengeance on the Yellow-eyed Demon for what the bastard did to Mary Winchester.
Having the boys back in my life has been one of the best things that’s ever happened to me. Felt like it gave me a purpose I hadn’t had in years. Gave me a family again.
If I’ve taken anything from my life, it’s this—you choose your family. It’s not just blood, it’s not just the cards you’re dealt, life is about what you make for yourself, who you choose to spend your days with. If Sam and Dean are what I’ve made for myself, then I feel like I’ve done damn good.
I’m trying to remember the last time I saw their faces. Ashland is a blur. Must have been a couple weeks before that. Dean made Sam drop everything for an AC/DC show in Rapid City, and I made the trip out to meet them. Dean pushed his way into the crowd at the amphitheater, came back out bloody—no. That wasn’t Rapid City. Where was it? Dean, his face bloody, like he’d been beaten within an inch of his life.
That was Ashland.
The stars were behind him, too. Painted stars.
The Starry Nite Inn, off Highway 13, two miles outside of Ashland. That’s where Sam and Dean were staying. That’s where the woman took us, after the bog.
I’m leaving, right now. Gonna go back there, try to find them, try to find that woman I keep seeing . . . and if she’s what did this to me, I’m gonna kill her.
I hope I never have to finish this journal. If you find this text and I’m dead, spread the word. Keep fighting the good fight.
— Bobby Singer, 2011
Oblivion
UH. HI.
I’m not Bobby.
My name is Dean Winchester, and I’m not quite sure how to explain what’s happened the last few days. Guess with these things you start at the beginning. I’m no writer, so bear with me.
My brother Sam and I were in northern Wisconsin, chasing down a lead on something that’d disappeared a few dudes. My money was on a succubus or siren, but Sammy bet crocotta. That’s when we got the call about an Eve sighting in Port Washington, a few hours south. Eve was a big fish (not, you know, literally), so we had to jump off the Ashland case and called in Bobby to take over for us. Shocking nobody, he was a grumperpuss about it, but got in that beat up old Chevelle of his and drove up.
When we came back from Port Washington (the Eve thing was a false alarm), Bobby’d done most of the legwork for us. It turned out to be a banshee we were after, so Sammy and I were both wrong. In his infinite wisdom, Bobby’d gotten the banshee hooked on him, so we were looking at a countdown situation. Sooner or later, Bobby would fly the belfry and disappear on us, so we had to stay with him wherever he went. And boy, Bobby’s a regular Chatty Cathy when you’re with him all day.
He started getting antsy, wanted to go to the bog real bad, so the banshee’s call had definitely kicked in. Before we drove to the swamp, Bobby had to sing this terrible song into Sam’s phone, said it was the only way to off the banshee, and hey, he was the expert. Felt like we were the ones getting punished, though.
Bobby already told you how things went with the banshee. She wasn’t the problem. This other—pardon my French—total bitch came out of nowhere and beat the living crap out of us and we all woke up back in our hotel, the Starry Nite Inn on Highway 13.
The woman was standing over Bobby, working some bad-touch mojo on him. His face was all twisted up in pain, like he’d eaten some bad shellfish or something. She was talking to him, whispering, too low for me to hear.
Sam and I were tied to chairs, which happens to us so often that we oughta hide knives in our sleeves. Being absolute geniuses, though, we don’t do that. Maybe we’ll start, right after we put our weapons on a bungee. I could tell Sam was already working on his bindings, and so was I, but it’d take us a minute.
The woman touched her finger to Bobby’s temple, did some kinda Vulcan mind meld on him, and when she took her finger away, a trail of white light followed, like she was tugging out a string of pure energy. Whatever she was doing, Bobby did not seem jazzed about it. She took her finger, dragging the white light with it, and touched her own temple. Like she was making a psychic connection between them.
There wasn’t anything we could do except watch and make angry faces at the lady. Bobby started mumbling, babbling nonsense, like he didn’t know where he was. The bitch was messing with his mind, putting a tap into his brain and letting all the juice drip out.
Sam, being Sam, got out of his binds first. Those huge biceps aren’t just for impressing other dudes at the gym. The woman raised her hand, clenched her fist, and he was sent flying ass-over-elbows, knocked right into me. My chair tipped backwards, which actually helped me out, since it put me in a better position to get at the knot in my rope. I was up a few seconds later and saw Sam get his ass handed to him a second time. Guy is always getting beat up by girls.
When I went at her, I won’t say it went great, but I didn’t get flung into a wall. She might have punched me a little, but I got in a few blows, too. Sam came in behind her and got a hand around her neck, while I went for the pillow on the bed, where I’d stashed a knife and a gun.
That’s when things got weird.
Bobby stood up, started going crazy. And I mean cuh-ray-zee. Taking swings at all of us, demanding we take him to the bus stop, crap like that. She must have really scrambled his eggs, because
a second later he ran out of the room and didn’t look back. Last I saw him, his Chevelle was fish-tailing out of the Starry Nite’s parking lot.
And then the lady really got pissed off.
. . . . .
I don’t like getting my ass kicked any more than the next guy, but it’s a little more embarrassing when your job is to kick other people’s asses. Anyway, the next few days weren’t exactly the champagne room at the Spearmint Rhino. Sam and I were kept in that hotel room and got our noodles twirled, just like Bobby did.
Parts of my memory are fuzzy (because of the noodle twirling . . . , but it felt like she was scanning my brain. Sampling what she found inside, and psychically ripping out the parts that she liked. Every now and then, she’d laugh, cry, or start talking to herself, reliving the memories she was taking from us. As she took the memories, they’d flash in our heads. Little pieces of them, like echoes.
She was still taking memories from Bobby, too. Once she put that tap in his brain, she was able to siphon off his memories wherever he went. Pretty good racket, I guess, if stealing other people’s lives is your thing. What she was doing with the memories and why she picked the ones she picked, she kept that to herself.
While I was tied up, having my grapefruit juiced, I got to thinking. That after what she’d done to him, maybe I’d never see Bobby again. He didn’t seem to be in any shape to come rescue us, and the guy was the only person who knew we were here.