canon au } { post-1203: the foundry

[thisholyspark]

Olivia: [and after Sam gives her a heads up of what's going on she makes her way into the bunker with a kind of care that isn't usually indicative of her arrivals home. Usually, when Liv comes back there's noise and exuberance enough to make up for her small stature in a family of giants. but this time around, she makes her way through the hallways carefully, almost as though she might be expecting something dangerous to be lurking around every corner]

Mary: [and she is cautious so she may appear behind her] Can I help you?

Olivia: [whirls around but she doesn't reach for a weapon at that, just waves her arms a bit so she doesn't fall over before giving a small smile] Hi. I'm Liv.

Mary: Liv. [she nods, then smiles] Sam's daughter.

Olivia: [and her smile widens a bit] Yeah. I'm usually not this sneaky, but I didn't want to just ... slam into you, you know? Dad said you were having a pretty steep adjustment curve.

Mary: Yes, it's hard to miss almost 40 years.

Olivia: Tell me about it. I kind of had that with Dad, but for me it was only twenty. Plus smart phones are ridiculous.

Mary: They are, aren't they?

Olivia: Yeah, but they're at least somewhat useful. You get used to them after a while.

Mary: I'm still getting used to any computer.

Olivia: It took me a while, but once you get the rhythm of it, it's really easy. We didn't really have them where I was growing up - at least not ones that worked, anyway.

Mary: Maybe you can show me better than Sam has. I think i tend to frustrate him with my questions.

Olivia: Sure, yeah. I can definitely help with that.

Mary: Good. [smiles] So, Liv... are you staying awhile or heading right back out?

Olivia: I can stick around. Hal's going into finals right now, so the less distractions he has the better.

Mary: Hal is your boyfriend?

Olivia: [she nods] He goes to Berkeley.

Mary: That's a good school. How did you meet him?

Olivia: Mutual friend who also goes to Berkeley. I went to visit her, and he was in one of her classes.

Mary: Have you thought about going?

Olivia: It would probably be too much of a hassle considering I've never been to school ... ever.

Mary: [laughs] School is easy to pick up. You know most of it already and as long as you can read, you can fudge the first 12 years.

Olivia: [she laughs a bit] Yeah, I mean, my mom and Ben taught me how to read and write but there's still a lot of other stuff I'm behind on? Like the only history I know is the stuff I learn on jobs or from Hal's dad, and I haven't read most books that people would expect you to, and ... well, I'm not even going to touch math with a ten foot pole. [she shrugs] Besides, I like what I do. There's a purpose in it, you know?

Mary: [smiles] Yeah, there is. And I'm sure you dad can tell you - even if you try and get out, it will always pull you back in. [thinks] Does Hal know?

Olivia: [she nods] Yeah. I told him a little while back. He actually ... took it surprisingly well, given everything I had to tell him.

Mary: [laughs] Well, that's good then. My keeping it from John so long was probably the worst mistake I made. Sometimes I think if I hadn't, things could have been different.

Olivia: [she gives a small shrug] Maybe. But then I might not exist so hard to regret things too much right? [cheesy smile and she is clearly a lot like her uncle]

Mary: [laughs softly] True. And your dad loves you a lot, so I'd hate to deny him you.

Olivia: Probably for the best. [she nods a bit] Things for my mom would have been pretty different too.

Mary: Yeah, I heard. She's a nice woman, despite what Dean insists.

Olivia: Yeah, well ... Uncle Dean hasn't always been the most tolerant of individuals and they kind of bring out the worst in each other at times. They fought a lot back in my universe too.

Mary: She reminds me of me when I was younger.

Olivia: [her eyebrows go up at that because that's not what she was expecting] I wouldn't have thought that. But then again, most of the stories I heard about you were from Uncle Dean.

Mary: Well, this was before I became a mother.

Olivia: [she nods a bit] Right. But even when my mom was a mother she was never the ... apple pie kind of mom, you know? But then again, we weren't exactly living in an apple pie kind of world.

Mary: No, I'm sure you weren't. I'm sorry for that.

Olivia: [she shrugs] It's not your fault. It's just what happened. You couldn't control it any more than I could.

Mary: You know, you're a lot easier to talk to than the boys.

Olivia: [snorts] That doesn't surprise me.

Mary: I mean, I can't blame them. But still...

Olivia: Dad and Uncle Dean have never really been good with the hard stuff, and Michael isn't really a talker at all unless he has something he needs to say. I've always been way better at shooting the shit, because I'm the baby. No one expects me to say anything greatly profound.

Mary: Boys. [she shakes her head] And I've yet to meet Dean's kid. Ben.

Olivia: [she nods] He's out in Beacon Hills with his girlfriend. Lindsay, she's a slayer? Beacon Hills has been pretty crazy ever since the nematon got woken up.

Mary: I've got the whole rundown on Beacon Hills and how it's off limits for hunting because of connections the boys have there, including Ben.

Olivia: [she nods] Yeah, and most of the time they don't really need us. Scott's a little green for an alpha, but he's good at it, and he's got a pretty solid pack with what's left of the Hales and stuff. He's even got Buffy Summers crashing there every so often, so we don't wind up out there unless he asks for us to come.

Mary: And he's open to having help? That's a good sign. Most packs are very insular.

Olivia: As Scott is prone to saying: nine times out of ten he has no idea what he's doing, so help is pretty much always appreciated. And he's also a bitten true alpha so ... he's a little outside the box to begin with.

Mary: [nods] I only remember the Hale line in that area. But change can be good sometimes.

Olivia: Yeah, the Hales ... Kate Argent burned them alive a little over a decade, now, including Talia. Her kids and her brother got away, but from what I've been told, Derek sacrificed the last of his family's power to save his sister. So they have Scott now, and it's a good fit.

Mary: Do any of them have the gift she had?

Olivia: Gift? [she doesn't know that much about Talia beyond she existed, sorry]

Mary: It was said that she had the ability to change into a full wolf. For her type of werewolf, that was a rare thing.

Olivia: Oh. [and then after a minute] Oh! Yeah, Derek can. Or at least that's what I've been told.

Mary: [nods] Then you will want to keep an eye on him. Even if he isn't an alpha, that power comes with a lot of responsibilities.

Olivia: Right now the only responsibilities I think he's concerned with are being a dad. He and his wife just adopted.

Mary: Aww, yeah. That is going to be taking up a lot of his time then.

Olivia: Yep. But yeah, Beacon Hills is in good hands. At least from what I've seen.

Mary: Good. One thing not to have to worry about.

Olivia: Yep. Oh! And the Sunnydale Hellmouth is gone - I don't know if the boys told you that.

Mary: They hadn't, but that's good.

Olivia: Yeah. There's still one in Cleveland, but that's pretty well taken care of by the Slayers.

Mary: [nods, going to sit]

Olivia: [hesitates before following her, unsure if she should leave or follow] I know a lot of this has to be pretty heavy after being away for so long.

Mary: It is... but I notice that people find it easier to talk to me about hunting than anything else.

Olivia: I guess cuz that's the universal constant. It's less ... personal? [she settles for splitting the difference and going to sit across from her, instead of next to her] Mom had it rough, Dad and Uncle Dean had it rougher, and me and Michael ... well, we didn't have any normal stuff at all. Hunting's ... something we all understand. A common language.

Mary: Yeah. I grew up in it. But it seems, at least with Sam and Dean... they'd rather talk to me about that than themselves.

Olivia: Cuz they know you didn't want them to be hunters. To be ... part of this? And they didn't really have much of a choice in the end. [a beat] They just don't want you to be disappointed if they don't have what you wanted for them.

Mary: I can't be disappointed in that. I'm the reason they didn't get it. I'm proud of them.

Olivia: Yeah, but I don't think they want you to blame yourself either, because it wasn't your fault? It was ... two thousand years of celestial bullshit in the making.

Mary: They explained a lot of that to me.

Olivia: [she nods] You did your best to protect them and take care of them and they get that. And they made their fair share of bad decisions, so it's not all on you. But they also know the Winchester guilt complex very well, so it's ... a hard thing to balance - being ... open, versus watching you try and juggle it all. [she shrugs] Give Dad time and he'll come around. Uncle Dean might take a little longer, but he's not unhappy you're here. He's the only reason I even know who you were.

Mary: Sometimes I worry Dean has created this whole image of me in his head and I can't live up to it.

Olivia: The stories he told me? Were of a badass hunter who did the best she could to protect her family, even when she was squaring off at things that were stronger and more powerful than her. Even when she didn't stand a chance in Hell, or she knew the consequences, she did it anyway. [she pauses for a moment] Do you think you can't live up to that?

Mary: Yeah, he's giving me a lot more credit than I deserve.

Olivia: Maybe. But it was what I needed to hear at the time, being the only Winchester woman in a sea of Winchester men. [small smirk]

Mary: If it helps - Winchester men only came into the game because of me. They were nerds until then.

Olivia: [she laughs] It does. I don't like giving the asshole on the other side of my family too much credit if I can help it.

Mary: Which one would that be?

Olivia: Bela's father.

Mary: Yes. I heard some things about them.

Olivia: He was a douchecanoe. [but he's definitely where Bela got her killer instinct from, so as much as Olivia loves her mother, she'd rather attribute it elsewhere] And I'm glad I'll never have to meet him.

Mary: Never say never in this line of work. I'm an example of that.

Olivia: Well, if he comes back as a demon, that means I get to shoot him. [she gives a small shrug] But I'm ninety-nine percent sure he's rotting in Hell where he belongs. [a beat] Maybe I should ask Crowley about that.

Mary: Crow... oh right, King of Hell.

Olivia: That's the one.

Mary: Yeah, I have a few choice words for him, but I know better than to say it out loud.

Olivia: Crowley's not as bad as he used to be. He's just a pain in the ass.