Known Abilities: Walt is lean and spry, a fast climber (though he can’t keep up with Sam at his best), and ready to fight. He is the one that teaches Sam and Dean how to take on rats at their size, assisted by his handy exacto razor he found in a motel room years back.
Walt is a tanner, able to work the pelt of any rats he kills into various objects, including but not limited to satchels, jackets and boots.
Most of the passages and entrances in and out of the walls of the Trails West were designed by Walt. He lived in the building before it was turned into a motel, and took the time to guarantee access for all the others of his size living there.
Despite his stern appearance, he is very good with children, often acting as a surrogate father to those who lost their families– Sam, Dean, Krissy and Sean all owe him their lives.
Background: Walt is one of the littles who has lived at the Trails West for the longest. So long that he remembers the days it was a bed and breakfast on the side of the road and remembers the hunters that nearly captured everyone there. Thanks to help from a certain Bobby Singer, nothing came from that.
Walt has been with the love of his life, Mallory Watch, since he was 18, and with her he raised a daughter, Briella Watch.
Though they lived for years in peace, it didn’t last. Bree was captured by humans when she was still a kid, and taken away from her family. Since then, Walt took in any estranged child as his own and helped raise them, doing his best to make sure the children had the best chance at survival. He doesn’t even flinch from raising cursed humans as his own, and has allowed actual humans into his family, like Dean Winchester after the hunter rescued Bree from her captors and brought the lost daughter home.
“Mornin,’ doc!” Dean called gamely, keeping his eyes trained on Sam. “Learned it all from my dad!”
During Dean’s brief distraction, Sam took advantage of his only chance to get out of the pin, knowing Dean could keep him in place. Sam kicked out, tossing Dean off balance, and then aimed his kick at Dean’s side, smoothly knocking his older brother to the ground and reversing their positions.
“You were saying?” Sam grinned, one hand around Dean’s throat to keep him from trying to get up.
Timeline: During A Lich of Sense, after Dean’s arm is bitten and they are on their way to Wellwood.
“But why wings? ”
Sam blinked, having started to drift off during their trip through the forest. He didn’t exactly have much he could do, between Bowman guiding Dean towards his village and Dean doing the actual walking. On the opposite shoulder, Bowman frowned critically and eyed Dean’s profile. His attention had been on guiding the human back, but now he was more concerned by the sudden outburst.
There hadn’t been much conversation since starting off aside from Bowman’s directions, over on Dean’s other shoulder. Sam had to smirk at that, entertained by the thought of his brother serving as a taxi to people the size of his finger. Dean Winchester, the man monsters had nightmares about, ferrying around the tiniest people around.
The smile soon fled. Dean was growing weaker. Sam couldn’t stop from glancing at his brother’s injured arm, the bloodsoaked sleeve of his jacket a poignant reminder of just how much damage the wolves had done to him during their fight.
That, and the odd non sequiturs Dean kept blurting out.
“Wings, Dean?” Sam asked, curious despite himself.
“Yes, wings,” Dean pronounced, gesturing wildly with his good arm. Luckily, the arm that was attached to the shoulder Sam was perched on, and he was prepared for the movement. Bowman, who wasn’t prepared, nearly fluttered off of his perch to avoid the erratic movement, but before he could complain, Dean went right on with his rant.
“Everyone we meet these days has wings! We’ve got small fry over here, but then you remember Nixie? And Ilyana? Wings. Nixie couldn’t even function without hers! It’s like having you with me automatically attracts the first people with wings in the state right to us!” On his shoulder, Bowman lifted a wing to peer at it with an eyebrow raised, wondering why exactly it mattered.
Sam rubbed his face. “Y’know, I don’t think Bowman wanted to run into us…” he pointed out, wondering what had brought this on.
“Spirit’s truth,” muttered out from the perplexed sprite sitting opposite him.
“He’s here, ain’t he?” Dean asked knowingly. “I’m shocked you didn’t end up with wings. That’s just what I’d need. A pint-sized brother fluttering around my head. You know what happens if you have a Dean with wings?”
The silence drew out until Sam realized he was supposed to respond. “What? What happens if we’ve got a Dean with wings?”
“Nothing good!”
With that, Dean nodded sharply to himself, and resumed his previous trek through the forest.
Sam’s head was on a swivel as he stepped towards the keys, taking it all in. He’d seen laptops operated before, but this was his first chance to see it all from up close. The screen loomed overhead, a search engine ready and waiting for him as he committed it all to memory. The powerful whirr of the hard drive came from underneath his boots, and Sam could swear his feet felt warmer than the rest of him.
Dropping his satchel down at the edge of the keyboard, Sam pulled out a blank sheet of paper and his pencil tip, just in case he needed to remember anything. He stuffed them both in his jacket pocket, pacing over to the trackpad. He knelt down, swiping his entire hand over the flat surface and was pleasantly surprised to see the mouse react to his touch the same way as it did for John or Sherlock’s fingers. It took him more work, but a few swipes moved the cursor over the entire screen, Sam slowly getting used to using it.
He clicked the search bar, then paused, realizing he had no idea what to search for first.
“I’ve always been curious about computers…” Sam said, always truthful with John. “If I’m not interrupting. I watched you work on it a few times during the last year, but I could never see what you were doing.” His eyes drifted to the yellow smiley face across the room from their seats. It was distant enough from John’s armchair to make it hard to read the laptop.
“Not interrupting me at all,” John assured. “I’m just finishing up, but… well here, have a look.”
The doctor shifted his weight to lean a little more toward the bookshelf, rotating his computer so that he and Sam could both have a good view of it.
It was unusual for Oscar to care about how much he overslept. His routine for his entire life had been to sleep when he was tired, and after helping Sam and Dean Winchester hunt down a demon, he’d gone to bed exhausted. The day before ran together in a long chain of scary events, many of which he’d witnessed from inside a pocket.
Oscar hadn’t yet had time to come to terms with everything, and he was already in the vents, wandering back toward that room. Back to the odd pair of brothers he’d befriended despite how crazy they could be.
If his memories were to be believed, their insanity had rubbed off on him.
In spite of himself, he was glad to hear a familiar gruff voice filtering into the air ducts. They were still there, even though he’d slept into the morning. He found that he wouldn’t even mind if breakfast was gone already. He could at least see them off before they left.
Dean held Sam close to him, looking up at the woman with dried tears clinging to his eyelashes. Twenty-four hours. Just twenty-four hours since they’d woken up like this, and there was a small light in the dark.
He couldn’t quite remember everything. It was all a blur before waking up in the hot, humid darkness. A woman, breaking into their room and attacking them. Dean could do nothing to keep her from his little brother. She’d pinned him effortlessly to the wall, without once touching him, forcing him to watch his little brother vanish into a white light.
And then doing the same for him, the world going black as the white light surrounded him.
Now, they’d escaped from her, but nothing was the way they remembered.
Motel rooms were larger than sweeping cathedrals. A football stadium could fit on the two beds. People were giants, the remote for the TV was unmovable, and Dean was scared.
Nothing, not his dad’s training, not Bobby’s stories, nothing, could have prepared him for this.
The woman stared down at him, her eyes widening in slight surprise. Dean could see so much detail in her face, he knew the moment her pupils dilated. He could smell the sickly-sweet scent of wine on her breath when her mouth parted.
That was all the warning they got.
Her hand swept out, long fingers curling around the two tiny children. Sam cried out in surprise as Dean did his best to block her attack, but standing under four inches tall meant there was no way for him to stop her.
A fist closed harshly around them, and Sam’s cries went from surprised to pained, and then stopped.
Dean sucked in a breath as the motel room nightstand vanished under their feet, the height forgotten in the wake of worry for his brother.
What did she do to Sammy?
“Please,” Dean begged. “We just need help…”
She lifted them up, her hand opening when held in front of her eyes. There was no warmth in those eyes as she scanned every one of the brothers’ very few inches.
“Wonderful…” she breathed, that sickly smell hitting Dean in a wave. He almost retched.
Containing his reaction, Dean glared at the woman as he cradled his brother in his arms. “What did you do?” he shouted angrily, Sam’s arm limp and hanging from the socket in an unnatural position.
“Sweetie,” she said in a condescending voice, “you’re just a toy. A possession. You should remember that the next time you talk back.”
She turned from the nightstand, the long fingers curling around the two boys as she rifled through the pockets of a jacket and withdrew a phone. A red-painted fingernail winked in the light at them as it tapped out a message.
While Sam climbed his way back up Jacob’s arm, Dean paused and pulled Melanie into one last hug. He held her against his chest. “If we ever pass by this way, maybe I’ll have Jacob drop me off in the area,” he said with a wink. “I can check up and make sure you didn’t get into any trouble.”
Melanie’s smile was shy again and there was some pink in her cheeks. “I’d like that,” she told him, her fingers curling slowly around the lapel of his leather jacket. She had to push herself up on her tiptoes to claim one more kiss before he had to leave.
The small pair on the floor drew out their last kiss, enjoying one final embrace. Melanie’s slight form fit into Dean’s arms perfectly, filling in the emptiness in his center that had been there for a decade. He pulled away from her slightly so he could drink in her beauty one last time, brushing a thumb that was callused from years of climbing over her bottom lip.
“See you around, sweetheart,” he said softly as he straightened. It put him out of easy reach for her, his own natural height showing up for one of the first times in years.
The tip of Dean’s tongue stuck out between his teeth as he concentrated all of his efforts down on the tiny ball of ground beef he was forming into the world’s smallest and most perfect hamburger patty.
It was the first opportunity he’d been able to get into the kitchen on his own, Bobby out to pick up more supplies for his crowded household, not used to entertaining guests at all, and certainly not sure what to do when one of those guests was smaller than a finger.
Sam was off exploring, and Dean hoped he stayed gone until he figured this thing out.
Tiny beef patties were harder than they looked.
His first attempt was too large. When Dean finished frying it, he’d realized that it was the size of Sam’s torso. No good. The entire point of this was making food Sam could eat like Bobby and Dean, not Sam-sized food. Dean had eaten it himself as he started his next attempt.
The next one had turned out smaller, but ended up looking like a tiny meatball. It wouldn’t sit on a bun. Another snack for Dean.
Now, he finally finished pressing the patty into shape and smirked. Perfect.
Dropping it onto one of Bobby’s smallest frying pans with the heat set on low, Dean went to turn his attention to the bun and fixings only to find Sam standing on the counter, curiously looking over the remains of Dean’s former attempts.
“Having some trouble?” Sam asked, his face open and innocent.
Caught in the act, Dean forced himself to unfreeze. Sam couldn’t see into the pan from where he was standing. There was still hope of it remaining a secret until it was ready. He reached for the fridge, leaning over to look inside while he talked. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you to not sneak up on a hunter?”
Sam took a few steps towards Dean, and away from the stovetop. “That same person once said he was always alert,” Sam joked, his grin widening. “So I guess this means you could work on those instincts of yours.”
Dean rolled his eyes, but there was no hiding the amusement in them. “And I know just the pint-size hunter who’s up to the challenge,” he snarked back.
“Do you?” Sam pretended like he had no idea what they were talking about. “You’ll have to introduce us. I could use some support the next time we go head to head.”
Dean snorted, sitting at the kitchen table with everything he needed. Tomato, onion, lettuce to shred and ketchup. He started to slice everything down to the size needed for Sam’s hamburger. The cherry tomato was perfect as soon as he had a slice, and he wondered why he hadn’t used that to judge how much ground meat for Sam’s burger.
“What are you doing?” Sam asked as Dean reached over to the pan, his arm long enough to reach the pan from his seat at the table and flipping over the mini patty to keep it from burning.
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Dean said, trying to buy himself time and blinking away the fumes of the onion. There wasn’t much hope of hiding it from Sam much longer, but all he needed was a few more seconds.
The last part was the bun, and Dean only had the buns he and Bobby ate from. He flattened one, cutting it down to the same circular dimensions of the tomato. That was it, and now it was time to assemble.
With the tiny patty cooked, Dean placed that first on the bun, followed by the onion, tomato, shreds of lettuce and the smallest drop of ketchup before holding it out for Sam. “Hungry?” he asked, his eyes lighting up. The hamburger was small enough for Sam to hold between two hands, and actually take a bite of normally instead of picking it apart.
Sam looked dumbfounded, and a grin crept onto his face as he reached out for it. His tiny hands took the mini-burger from Dean, folding around the flattened bun. Then he smirked and looked up at Dean.
“What, no cheese?”
Dean froze again, thinking he’d done it wrong before spotting the smirk. Sam was kidding around with him. He flicked his fingers in Sam’s direction. “Special orders not accepted,” he said primly.
Sam took a bite, closing his eyes at the flavors, all together at once instead of separate like normal. “Thanks, Dean.”
Brothers Apart 