#tfwk

A Supernatural one-shot (sort of) starring Ben Braeden and technically an OC that may never ever get any more explanation or detail idk.

This shit is NOT beta read… I wrote this in a couple hoursat 1:00 am (stopping midway through to finish watching the og Lilo and Stitch movie with my mother) and it’s now currently 3:22 am as I’m posting this.

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Ben could feel the heat blazing down on him, the suns deadly rays burning up his skin. Rocky sand kicked up beneath his feet with every labored step as he dragged himself along the open road, if you could even call it that. At this point, he was merely following the faded tire marks he thought were on the ground. He was too tired, too hungry, and he didn’t know how much longer he could carry himself.

His eyes scanned across the barren horizon, the mirages burning themselves into his vision. He could hear his mother’s voice in his ears:

Find him… find Dean Winchester…

Whether or not that was his mind going crazy or sign telling the young boy to push forward, he wasn’t sure. He blinked and spotted it in the distance: a small shack of a house, with what seemed to be an outhouse beside it, and a field of dummy’s or mannequins posted out behind it. A vintage, old car sat parked nearby the house, and while Ben couldn’t make out exactly what model it was, he could tell it couldn’t have been more than forty or fifty years old.

This was it. This was the place.

With all the strength he could muster he marched faster, his backpack loosely slung over one of his shoulders as the small home got closer and closer.

“C’mon… c’mon! Almost there–” BANG

Ben nearly tripped over himself as a gust of rock and sand blew up into tiny chunks, a gunshot ringing out as the boy looked up. Before him stood a tan old woman in a straw hat, a double barreled shotgun nestled comfortably in her hands as it aimed directly at Ben.

“This is private property, and that was a warning shot boy,” she spoke in a low, serious tone, “Trust me when I say I won’t miss the next shot.”

“I-I come in peace okay!” Ben raised his hands, trembling slightly as stared down at the woman, her squinted eyes and pursed lips showing no sign of sympathy or emotion.

“Drop the bag,” she commanded. Ben did as told. “What’s your business here?”

“I heard you knew a few things,” Ben spoke softly, keeping his arms held up as best he could, “About demons. And monsters.”

That got a reaction out of the woman. Here eyebrow raised, her shoulders hunching slightly as she gripped her gun even tighter.

“Monsters huh?” She asked, “What would a kid like you need to know about that?”

“My mother…” Ben said, his eyes wincing as he tried to hold back the tremble in his voice… whether it came from remembering her or the fear of the gun pointed at him, he couldn’t tell. “My mother, she was k-killed… by a yellow-eyed demon. I-I found her, burning on the roof…”

The old woman’s eyes raised as she muttered something under her breath. A look of confusion, of fear and frustration dotted the lady’s face. She paused, before lowering her gun, setting it down to rest against the fence.

“Stay there. I didn’t say you could come any closer,” She snapped as Ben began to move, “What else? There’s something more you’ve yet to tell me.”

Ben struggled to find his words, “H-How’d you kno–”

“I just do,” she interrupted, “now speak.”

Ben nodded.

“Before she died, she told me to find somebody. She told me to ‘find Dean Winchester’. Since then… I’ve been trying to track down anyone who knows anything about the Winchesters,” he explained.

She looked at him with shock. The name seemed to astound her. This boy… he couldn’t have been older than a teenager, probably even less so. How? How did this… this child find her? How’d this child track her down?

“Your mother’s death, when did this happen?” She asked.

“7 months ago,” Ben replied, “I’ve been trying to find this place, and you, for three days.”

The woman’s mouth dropped, a gust of wind breaking the silence, as she began to laugh. “I spent years… years cutting all ties to my hunting life and holing myself up in a dingy shack in the middle of nowhere, with the only civilization I interact with being a small town some miles away that I go to for food and essentials… only for some boy to track across the desert to find me?”

“The Winchesters, do you know them?” Ben asked. He’d heard the stories in his travels. Tales of two brothers, Sam and Dean Winchesters, the greatest hunters of the modern age.

“Heh…. you mean the brothers? Sam and Dean, or whatever? No… I don’t,” She replied, watching the boy’s heart sink before her eyes, “But I knew their father, John. He was a good man, one who let the hunting life eat away at him, until he became the very monsters he’d slain… not in body, but in soul, or perhaps lack thereof. He raised his two as hunters the bastard… shaping them into his little soldiers. The only time I ever saw Sam and Dean Winchester, was when they were young, perhaps younger than you.”

She watched Ben’s shoulders sink, a light fading in his eyes as they began to well up. He’d come so far, looking for answers, for something that could guide him in the right direction. Ben could feel his knees growing weak beneath him, trembling under his weight.

“What a poor sight… coming all this way for what you think is nothing,” she began to speak, “Too inexperienced, too weak, and far too stupid.”

“S-Shut up,” Ben choked out.

“Look at you… dehydrated, hungry, hell, you can barely stand up,” she mocked the boy more, her arms crossed as she bore down at Ben under her gaze, “and you want revenge on what killed your mother? You must be dumber than you look. You’re failing before you barely even began.”

“SHUT UP!”

The cocktail of hunger, thirst, and heat boiled his brain, his blood, his emotions, as anger fueled him. He ran forward, an arm raised as he threw out a punch. Before he even registered his punch had connected to something, he felt his stomach drop, as he flipped through the air. His back landed on ground with the thud as he felt the wind get knocked out of his body, leaving him gasping and choking.

“Now that… that was stupid,” the woman spoke unimpressed, “The punch was telegraphed, not to mention you have no energy to throw anything remotely damaging. Don’t ever do that again.”

Ben began to cry, tears streaming down his face. She was right… it was over. He wasn’t any closer to finding the Winchesters or his mother’s killer than he was 7 months ago. He was stupid for thinking he could find the answers on his own. Now he was far from home, far from his friends and whatever family he might’ve had left, lost in the middle of a desert.

“I-I’m sorry… I’m sorry mom. I-I couldn’t d-do it…” he whimpered, staring up at the blue sky above him.

Something in his words, in the desperation and distraught that sunk into every utterance of his voice… it struck the lady. It caught her attention. The look in his eyes, it reminded her of something… of someone. A girl who’d long since faded away. A girl who watched her own family get slaughtered by a creature of the night. A girl who’d spent years pushing her body and mind to the limit to take revenge on the bastards responsible. She looked into the sky, watching as a flock of birds passed over the clouds, drifting through the wind as they journeyed across the barren wasteland.

“Why give up now?” She asked, standing over him, her bold silhouette blocking out the light of the sun, casting her in an eclipse before the boy, “Like I said, you’d only just begun.”

“W-What?” Ben gasped through the tears, staring up at her.

“I can turn you into a world-class sharpshooter. I can fold and form you into a black-belt fighter in hand-to-hand combat. I can train you to be a hunter… a real hunter. Not some kid with a gun, silver, and a dream. It’ll take some years, but I can do it,” she said. Her eyes bored into Ben’s soul, as if to weed out his conviction, ripping it out before her to observe like a hawk stalking its prey. And yet, there was no animosity in her gaze, only strength, a confidence, drive, and most of all certainty with which she seemed to emanate. She was certain of it, of what she could build from the boy lying in front of him.

“P-Please…” Ben croaked out.

“I’ll need to feed you first,” she sniffed, wincing and scrunching her nose, “God! And bathe you next.”

Ben tried to let out something like a chuckle, but only a small huff of breath escaped his lips.

“Well then, boy–”

“It’s Ben,” Ben interrupted, “My name. It’s Ben Braeden.”

“Well then, Ben Braeden,” she smiled, “You’re training begins today.”

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Tagging both@spn-tng and @loveswinchesters cause I low key wrote this kinda for both of you, but also because I was bored, and also because I realized how long it was taking me to post anything fanfic related to Ben or Jesse or any of the tfw kids.

THE FREE WILL KIDS + TEXT POSTS

[Nobody says a word]

Dean: I'm not mad. I just want to know.

Jack: I did. I broke-

Dean: No, no you didn't. Ben?

Ben: Don't look at me. Look at Jess.

Jesse: What? I didn't break it.

Ben: Huh. That's weird. How'd you even know it was broken?

Jesse: Because it's sitting right in front of us and it's broken.

Ben: [leans in on him] Suspicious.

Krissy: If it matters - probably not - but Claire was the last one to use it.

Claire: Liar! I don't even drink that crap!

Krissy: Oh, really? Then what were you doing by the coffee cart earlier?

Claire: I use the wooden stirrers to push back my cuticles; everyone knows that, Krissy!

Jack: Ok, ok! Let’s not fight! I broke it, let me fix it, Dean!

Dean: No! Who broke it??!

Jesse: [looks at Kaia, then at Dean] Dean... Kaia's been awfully quiet.

Kaia: REALLY??

Jesse: Yeah! Really.

Kaia: Oh, my God!

[everyone starts arguing at one another except Dean]

Dean: [to Sam and Cas] I broke it. It burned my hand, so I punched it. I predict ten minutes from now they'll be at each other's throats with war paint on their faces and a pig head on a stick.

[turns to look at the Free Will Kids as they continue to argue, then looks back]