Every Hero Has an Origin Story

NOVEMBER 1983

This is the Story

This is the story of a little boy.

It's a long, sad story, but it's a good one.

It's about love and loss. Family and sacrifice.

It's about fathers and sons. It's about brothers.

This is a story about Dean Winchester.

Everything moved too fast after the fire.

Dean didn't understand what was happening, and his father wouldn't explain. He just said that Mommy was gone; never coming back. But where could she have gone?

He remembered the fire. He remembered the heat, and the flames. He remembered carrying little Sammy outside, where it was safe. Sammy didn't even cry, but Dean wanted to.

They stayed at a friends of their dads for a while, and Dean could almost pretend that everything was normal. His dad wouldn't sleep. He wouldn't eat. Dean didn't know what his father was doing every night when he left without saying a word, but he knew it had something to do with his mom.

Dean wanted to ask his dad where he was going, and why he couldn't just stay with him and Sammy, at least until they fell asleep. He wanted to, but he couldn't find the willpower in him to speak. So he stayed silent, much to John's dismay.

And then, suddenly, they left. His dad got in a fight with the friend they were staying with. He didn't understand most of what they were saying, but his dad was saying something about Missouri and evil. Pure, pure evil. He said that he had to go. He had to take the kids and run as fast as he could, before it came back. Dean had no idea then, that it would consume the rest of his life.

It didn't take long for Dean to understand that Mommy was not coming back, not ever. She was dead. He had a concept of Death, but he never imagined it happening to his mother. Soon, Dean would understand Death all too well, but for now it was only the thing keeping him away from his mom.

Dean still refused to speak, and his dad just couldn't figure out how to help him. Dean knew that his father wanted him to speak, but... he just couldn't.

"Son, you have to talk to me. You have to tell me what your feeling." John coaxed to the four year old. "I'm trying to understand. I just want to help, Dean." Maybe, if Dean had known this was the only time he would hear that from his dad, he might have talked. But he didn't. He would just shrug, and turn his attention back to Sammy.

Sammy was everything to Dean. Sammy was his world now. He knew how much his mother loved the baby. He knew how she would hold him in her arms and look at him with such love and devotion. He knew how much Sammy meant to her, and he didn't want anything to happen to him, like it did to her.

That's why it scared him.

His dad never said it directly, but Dean could tell that his dad was scared too. For Sammy, mostly. For what it might do to him if it found him. So Dean was scared.

Ever since Dean was four years old, he was running. From the moment his dad wrapped his protective arms around him while the firemen ran about, as he sat there, cold and scared, and confused. From the moment his dad sat him down and told him that yes, monsters are real, and yes, they are coming after you. From the moment he looked into baby Sammy's eyes and realized that he was all he had left of his mother, Dean knew his life had changed forever.

This is the story of that cold, scared, and confused boy in his father's arms.

The story of the brother who would do anything for his sibling.

The story of the man who saved the world countless times.

The story of a hero.

This is the story of Dean Winchester.