Chapter Text
Dean is really, really sick of his brothers coming back from the dead wrong.
He knows he should be grateful to have them back in the first place, but after all the shit the universe has thrown at the Winchester bloodline, he just thinks they deserve to come back right.
But the kid sitting in front of him is giving him the heebie jeebies. Not-quite-Adam-Milligan, which is an all too familiar occurrence, unfortunately.
“Dean.” Adam repeats, bringing him out of his thoughts. “...Could I have that?”
“Huh?” Dean responds intelligently. He looks down at the roll of bandages in his hand, then to the small cuts on both of Adam’s arms. They’re Dean’s handiwork, sliced with a silver knife, which Adam took like a champ. Along with the holy water, the salt, the attempted exorcism, and a thirty-minute line of questioning. It ended with Dean hefting him up off the floor and into the rickety motel chair, finally satisfied.
“Ah.” Dean says as he realizes. He pulls up a chair opposite Adam and gently tugs his arms forward, quickly wrapping both cuts. “C’mere.” He instructs.
Adam scoots closer, and Dean ties off the bandages from his new vantage point, tearing it from the roll with his teeth. He gives Adam another once-over for good measure. His clothes are dirtied from the hike to the motel, his hair is mussed in different directions, and his shirt is damp from the splash of holy water. But otherwise, he looks unscathed.
Maybe that’s what’s throwing Dean off. One of the only times he saw the kid -- actually saw the kid -- it was with his chest split open and his face drained of blood. Then, there was the brief pause in the middle, where he saw him whole, where he and Sam brutally let him down and left him for the wolves-- then Adam was gone again. Nothing behind the eyes but a sadistic archangel.
Now, those eyes are staring back at him. Fixed, investigative. Undoubtedly human. Almost teasingly prying, the exact look Sam gets when he’s milking a witness.
Dean exhales.
“Alright, what?”
Adam blinks.
“What do you mean, ‘what’?”
“What’s with the staring contest?”
Adam snorts, leaning back in his chair. He tenderly stretches out his arms and cracks his knuckles while he’s at it.
“I don’t know, I just spent a couple hundred years being tortured. Maybe it’s a little hard to believe that I’m back.”
“Believe it.” Dean leans over and pinches his arm.
Adam cracks a smile. “Thanks. The slice and dice wasn’t enough, that’s what I needed.”
Dean grins back at him. “You’re welcome.”
A beat.
“So you, uh,” Dean starts. “This is gonna sound weird, but do you feel like you? When Sam came back, he was missing a few parts. And it was a hell of a ride trying to hunt them back down.”
“I heard.” Adam replies. There’s a pause. “Guess you couldn’t hunt me down, huh?’’
Dean grimaces. Pushes through it. “We tried.”
Adam looks momentarily surprised.
“...Like how you tried with Zachariah.”
“Adam,” Dean sighs, pinching his brow. “If we had any other choice--”
“It’s alright.” Adam interrupts him. He doesn’t look sardonic now, acceptance written all over his face. “Dean, I’m not dumb... I know I’m not Sam.”
Dean nods, letting the silence hang in the air for a second.
“Thank God,” He finally replies. “One of him is plenty.”
Adam chuckles.
“I feel fine. I mean, I’m not fine, but I’m here. I don’t know why I’m here. All I know is I woke up in a field the next town over and I just started walking. Caught a few rides. I felt this pull, like I was supposed to end up right here.”
Dean snorts. “You hear how I thought that was fake, right?”
Adam shrugs, a small smile still on his face. “Yeah, yeah. Can’t be too careful--” He glances once more at his holy water soaked shirt. “--I guess.”
He finally stands, taking in their surroundings. It’s an even dingier motel room than the one he remembers. Half-remembers, that is. The hazy sludge of his real memories, with his ghoul memories spliced on top like a poorly edited student film, was difficult enough to navigate the first time he came back. Add on the centuries-long fever dream of torture in the cage, he struggles to piece together much of anything in a linear fashion.
Near their feet, a roach scurries by. Adam wolf-whistles.
“You guys always book the penthouse suite, or is this a special occasion?” He asks.
Dean is halfway through forming a reply when a key jangles into the locked door.
“Sam,” Dean explains immediately.
“Yeah, who else?” Adam shoots back, giving him a look.
Dean’s mouth twists into a frown. “Okay, don’t get smart with me--”
“Smart with you?” Adam snorts, “I’m sorry, did you turn fifty while I was gone?”
Dean cocks an eyebrow and twirls the silver knife beside him. “Keep talking, Milligan, I’ll run a couple more checks on you.”
The door creaks open. Sam’s keys hit the floor with a soft clank.
“Adam?”
Adam looks up, taking in the sight of him. He holds up both bandaged arms in a ta-da! motion, a wry smile on his face.
“Surprise.”
-
The agreement that Adam is joining the case arrives at the end of a very long, winding conversation, a Sam, can I talk to you outside? whisper argument between Sam and Dean, and a six pack of Heinekens.
Adam eyes them both as they reenter the motel room. He nurses the last few sips of his second beer.
“You two make nice?”
Dean shuts the door behind them with an ingratiating smirk.
“Oh yeah.”
Sam shakes his head and sits back down at the tiny kitchenette table. He shoots Adam that too-polite, tight-lipped smile that makes his blood pressure rise for a reason he can’t name.
“Listen, we’re only on the road for another week here.” He explains. “We’ll finish up this case, figure out what brought you back, hopefully get you back home right after.”
“What makes you think I want to go home?” Adam asks.
Sam blinks. He glances at Dean, then back to Adam.
“I mean, don’t you? Last time we saw you, you wanted nothing to do with us.”
“Oh, when I was being held hostage in your friend’s house?” Adam snorts. “I’m sorry I wasn’t chipper enough for you.”
“That’s my point, Adam.” Sam replies. He leans back in the chair, lifting his arms placatingly. “You’ve got no reason to trust us. Believe me, I get it. As soon as we’re done making sure there’s not some angel waiting around the corner to make you bait again, you never have to see us again.”
Adam considers this. He shakes his head.
“I can’t go home. Too many bad memories.”
Sam frowns. He exchanges another look with Dean, who’s been leaned against the wall with his arms crossed, listening. They have one of those silent exchanges that makes Adam feel unreasonably irritated. Sometimes, when they’re all talking, he’ll start to feel like he really is with family. Despite himself, that sort of easiness and banter gets so close to tricking his brain that it’s always just been the three of them. And then Sam and Dean will look at each other like they can read the other’s mind, and Adam is on the other side of a brick wall again. Watching a foreign film with no subtitles.
Oblivious to Adam’s annoyance, Sam turns back to him and nods his understanding.
“Okay, fair. We’ll get you somewhere safe then. There’s this bunker, it’s...sort of our home base. We could get you settled--”
“One thing at a time.” Adam frowns. “I didn’t say anything about going Full House with you guys.”
Sam looks like he’s going to say something, then just nods again. “Alright. Just somewhere safe.”
Adam seems satisfied with this. After a long few moments of silence, as agreement finally settles over the room, he sighs.
“...You’re worried the angels’re gonna ‘make me bait’, huh?” He asks, setting his empty beer down on the table.
Sam’s brow furrows in confusion. “Yeah--”
“They love doing that.” Adam continues. He’s got a tiny grin on his face, which might be the slightest bit influenced by the fact that he just had two beers in quick succession after a long ass sobriety. “Could say they’re the masters.”
Sam tilts his head, still baffled. “I guess?”
Adam glances over at Dean. Dean looks just as confused for a fraction of a second, before something clicks and he gets a mischievous glint in his eye.
“Oh, yeah.” Dean agrees with a smirk. He strides across the room and clinks his empty bottle down next to Adam’s. “Master baiters.”
Adam practically giggles. “Huge master baiters.”
Sam’s frown gives way to a smile, before he rolls his eyes. “Okay--”
“And y’know who the biggest master baiter of all is?” Dean asks.
“Who?” Adam replies, leaning forward with intrigue.
“Cas.”
“Really?”
“Oh yeah.” Dean says, and his grin is almost splitting his face now. “Trust me, we’ve spent a lot of time with him over the last couple years. Isn’t that right, Sam?”
Sam shakes his head, still smiling despite himself. “You guys are dumb.”
“Aw, come on,” Adam chides. ‘Say it.”
“No.” Sam snorts. He stands from the table and moves to the bed, rifling through his duffel bag there.
“Say it.” Dean echoes.
“No.” Sam repeats, smirking a little -- like it gives him great joy to deny both of them at once. “He’s not here to defend himself.”
“No, he’s just on a world-ending bender.” Dean agrees.
Adam sighs in defeat. “You hate to see it.”
“Catch.”
Sam throws something in his peripheral vision and Adam grabs at the mass of fabric headed at his chest. He glances down -- clean clothes, very obviously from the Winchesters’ plaid closet.
Sam grins cheekily at him. “You’re gonna wanna shower. You look like a guy who just woke up from the dead and hitch-hiked all day.”
“Ouch.” Adam replies, even as he gets up and heads for the bathroom.
“That’s my shirt.” Dean points out with a frown.
“It’ll fit him better.”
Adam pauses in the doorway, watching them.
“Oh, so because I’m not freakishly tall, we’re giving away my clothes?”
Sam chuckles, rising to the challenge. “I’m sorry you two couldn’t get the tall gene from Dad. Really, I am.” He places a hand over his heart with faux sympathy.
“Does the uh, tall gene come with a lifetime ban from the barber’s?” Adam cuts in. He eyes Sam’s haircut.
Dean snorts.
“Go shower.” Sam huffs.
-
Night drives are when they get antsy, Adam discovers. He’s slouched in the backseat, fiddling with a cassette player he picked up from a house they snooped through.
“How’s it coming?” Sam asks.
“No dice.” He answers, raising his voice to carry over the Boston track thumping through the speakers. He shifts in his seat, adjusting his shirt collar over his chest.
The fresh ink is already itchy, and the shop they went to wasn’t exactly the pinnacle of tattoo aftercare; the saran wrap they placed over his anti-possession pentagram is already peeling. Adam frowns in discomfort and rubs it through his shirt.
“Quit messing with it.” Dean grumbles.
Adam freezes in place. “I wasn’t. How can you even see?”
“You’ll mess up the ink.” Dean says. He reaches a hand behind him to swat at Adam’s knee.
“I still think it’s a little overboard.” Adam replies. “We’ve got the carved ribs, right?”
“For angels.” Sam replies. “These are for demons.”
“Yeah, I know. Any other matching tattoos I should get ready for?”
“Just the one.” Dean replies. “And don’t call ‘em that, we’re not sorority girls.”
“They’re matching tattoos, Dean.” Adam says. “And if anything, matching ribs is girlier.”
“How is that girly?” Sam asks.
Adam shrugs.
Sam snorts and shakes his head. “Well if you’re gonna be riding with us, it’s part of the deal.”
“Especilly if you’re gonna start doing weird voodoo, glowy shit at night.” Dean adds. He glances in the rearview past Adam as he maneuvers the Impala towards an offramp.
“I’m not doing anything.” Adam argues. He’s more than a little exasperated from the last few episodes of his recently emerged condition, and having to convince both his brothers that he’s not been overtaken by another force. Again.
He’d like to give them the benefit of the doubt, because he thinks if he saw one of them muttering Enochian chants in their sleep and emitting light from their wrists, he’d be freaked too. But he’s feeling a bit too overstimulated and cramped in the car to extend much sympathy at the moment.
“We know.” Sam replies. After a moment, he shifts and turns around to face Adam, reaching his arm over the seat. He got a nasty scrape across his forearm earlier that night, courtesy of a werewolf. It wasn’t serious enough to warrant stitches or anything, but Sam’s got that curious glint in his eyes.
Adam has only been traveling with them a month now, but he knows that means there’s no stopping him until he gets another taste of the unknown. He sighs.
“I don’t even know what I’m doing,” He says, even as he grasps Sam’s arm.
Dean immediately turns his head to catch a glimpse and scoffs.
“Hey, can we not try out ancient spells while I’m trying to merge? Or, I don’t know, ever?”
Sam rolls his eyes. “He did it earlier, Dean, and it was fine.”
Dean flicks his blinker off more aggressively than strictly necessary. They’re only a few blocks from a Motel 6 now, the blue and red lights from the sign beckoning from a distance.
“Sure, let’s play with the unknown forces inside us. That’s never gone badly for anyone here.”
“Ignore him.” Sam says.
Adam does. Not because Sam told him to.
He shuts his eyes, feeling more than a little awkward as he adjusts his grip on Sam’s arm. He tries to do what he did earlier, reaching the sort of calm heaviness that finds him just before falling asleep. He lets the feeling bubble up in him, then opens his eyes.
Faint bands of soft white light up each of his wrists from within, already fading. His eyes drift up to the cut on Sam’s arm -- it’s healed over slightly, but still there. Just a minor scrape now.
Shoddy, compared to the work he did earlier. Of course, earlier he was fading in and out of consciousness and sort of blindly grabbing at Dean. He’d just seen Dean take a massive werewolf swipe to the chest and was really only trying to help him up, his head pounding after a bashing against a wall. Summoning that feeling had been accidental.
“Sorry.” Adam shrugs.
“It’s alright.” Sam seems completely unbothered, still staring at his arm with fascination.
“Maybe it’s gotta be higher stakes.” Adam posits.
Sam looks deep in consideration when Dean reaches over and elbows them. Sam and Adam both fall back into their respective seats.
“Alright, enough. We’re here.” Dean announces.
He pulls into the nearest parking spot with a hard brake, which Adam has learned means he’s ready to get the fuck to bed.
Dean sits up to fish his wallet out of his pocket, then pulls out a credit card. “Adam, you wanna--”
“Check us in, yeah. I got it.” Adam grabs the card and shimmies out of the backseat. “Pin?”
“8878,” Dean replies.
As Adam opens the door to the office, he calls through the window. “Ask for a pullout!”
-
As always, they do not have a pullout. Or even a shitty little couch in this room.
Adam keeps trying to tell Dean they need to be looking at hotels, not motels if he’s that anal about having three beds. But no amount of A three-star hotel isn’t that expensive, Dean seems to be convincing him. Old dog, new tricks.
Dean took first shower without so much as a word, because the man refuses to sleep without it. Then Sam, which meant Adam was practically falling asleep by the time he emerged.
“Shower’s free.” Sam informs him, reaching over and giving Adam’s leg a little shove.
“‘M good.” Adam replies. He’s staring absently at his arms stretched out in front of him, zeroing in on the wrists. They look so normal now. He has no goddamn idea where that light comes from.
Sam fixes him with a judgemental look.
“I showered before the tattoo.” Adam says defensively, his voice pitching up.
“You know how you get without a bath, sweetheart,” Dean says, like a mother chiding her toddler. He’s got a shit-eating grin on his face.
“Shut the hell up,” Adam snorts. He sits up, because technically he’s lounging on Sam’s bed, and yawns. He crosses over to his backpack and fishes out a more comfortable shirt, swapping it out with his current one.
Sam glances at the light blue graphic tee, recognition flashing on his face. “Halo?”
Adam nods. “You played?”
Sam smiles in this carefree way Adam isn’t sure he’s seen before. “Yeah, all the time. At Stanford.”
“That’s awesome.” Adam smiles back, and for just a moment, he feels nineteen again. He’s been having more of those moments, lately, where the cage and all its memories momentarily fades from the foreground of his mind. It’s nice.
“The hell is a Halo?” Dean grumbles. He’s turning down his covers and switching off his lamp, which means they have mere minutes before every peep of conversation will be earning them an enthused Shut. Up.
“Video game.” Sam answers.
Dean groans into his pillow. “Go to bed, nerds.”
Adam and Sam share a look, grinning, before Sam yawns and gets to settling in. Adam stands between the beds, eyes flicking from one to the other.
Dean rolls onto his back, then points at Sam’s bed. “Over there, Milligan. This is a superpowered nerd free zone.”
“Yeah, right.” Sam replies from the other bed. Adam climbs in beside him, feeling exhaustion from the day set in.
“Goodnight, Dean.” He calls out sweetly.
“Night.” Dean replies, and his voice is definitely softer now.
“Night, Dean,” Sam echoes, the smile audible in his voice.
“Night.” Dean answers, rougher now. He rolls over aggressively, face smushed into the pillows.
Adam sleeps the best he has all week.