Oh yeah. You were not imagining a thing - after all this, how could I have a schmoopy ending, where all is love and happiness? Why would Sam have any reason to leave home then? That would defeat the purpose of the cruelty and all would have been for naught.

I have been tempted, oh yes, very tempted to have John give in and be nice about things, but have resisted. I'll come to a sentence that could go either way and I have to take a step back and really think it through. In the end, I think in John's mind, he wins (because the training has been successful) but he's not counting the cost. And Sam thinks he wins because he never bowed down and kissed Dad's ass.

As to the question of whether Dean notices, that's an interesting one. If Dean notices, like, say, sees that Sam has more welts and bruises than could be accounted for by one beating and speaks up, then the story crosses over into one of abuse, which then becomes the issue, how Dean would protect Sam from more abuse. So I decided not to go that route, even though some readers would have liked that, they use the logic that Dean would protect Sam in all things. To which I answer, only if he thinks something is wrong, which he doesn't. Yeah?