Short Story - Supernatural, PG, gen.
Title: Short Story
Fandom: Supernatural
Rating: PG.
Length: About 700 words.
Characters/Pairings: Sam, Chuck.
Summary: Sam doesn't have the comfort of knowing it's not over. But nothing really ends.
Notes: Also on AO3 and DW.
Short Story
There's a bunch of colorful pictures in Sam's head when he thinks about Lucifer, almost like twisted Renaissance paintings, but they disappear when Sam says yes. Lucifer isn't anything so beautiful or complex. He's a weight. He pushes and holds down, and if Dean didn't drive into Stull Cemetery with music blaring, ready to take part of the load, Sam would be nothing but dust. Dean's share is less proportionally than usual, but just a little brush with the big names is enough to leave him a bloody smear on the Impala's door.
It's only the physicality of Sam, the direct line to every emotion that makes his meat suit tick, that does Lucifer in. On the celestial plane, Lucifer's existence is more than any human can handle. Tied to the rules of the mortal realm, a car and an extra man are more than enough to tip the balance.
Sam stands on his two legs again. He tips backward, and when Michael makes to grab for him, he can't stay upright against the pull of Sam's two hands.
To Dean, it appears they fall. To Sam, it feels like flying.
-
When the hole closes, Sam isn't in darkness. And despite the way his eyes - if souls have eyes - twinge when the light returns, there isn't a stereotypical blinding white light. If anything, the sunlight's dim, filtered through clouds and glass and the dingy corners of a house.
A man sits at a computer typing.
Sam blinks. "Chuck?"
Chuck doesn't turn around, but as Sam draws closer, Chuck narrates his document. "'If this is Hell,' Sam thinks, 'maybe there were more dangers in the prophet's house than he'd known.'"
"Except you're not a prophet," Sam and Chuck say in unison. Sam opens his mouth twice to speak again, and when he finally spits the words out the third time, Chuck doesn't talk with him.
"So what are you?" he asks.
"It doesn't matter." Chuck skips to the next paragraph. His voice isn't emotionless, but it is neutral. "'As Sam looks around, he realizes something is missing. Or someone.'"
"Dean," they say together.
Chuck types a sentence, then reads, "'And another sibling.'"
There's more typing while Sam mulls the lack of Adam, and it's Sam's turn to voice the words. "'The weight is gone, lifted like it was never there.' But Lucifer isn't dead."
"No." For the first time, neither sentence gets typed into the document.
"So..."
"'It hits Sam as the letters appear on the screen,'" Chuck reads. "'It isn't the final destination, but a stop on the way. There's one more thing to do.'"
"Adam."
Adam, Chuck types, the word its own paragraph. He reads aloud. "'Sam saved the world of his own choice, and goodness is rewarded.'"
Sam snorts. "Not in my fucking world."
He hears Chuck laugh - Chuck chuckles? - quietly, and he hits the backspace button and taps others until the sentence reads, Sam saved the world of his own choice, and balance must be restored. A man takes a too-strong punishment to rectify his mistakes, or--
"Or," Sam says.
Chuck types the last of it and steeples his fingers.
"'Sam wonders if there's free will at all, when the choice comes between letting Adam move on to some nicer existence or taking his own selfish reward when he's done nothing to deserve it. Either way, it doesn't matter. There's only one choice to make here, and he disappears into Hell the second it's made, forgetting about the prophet, forgetting about his second brother, forgetting about everything as Lucifer begins the very long process of tearing him into shreds. He doesn't have the comfort of knowing it's not over.'"
"But nothing really ends," Sam finishes.
Chuck turns around in his chair. He looks exactly as he always has, wrung-out and apologetic.
"This story's over," Chuck says, and judging by the weariness in his eyes, he's relieved. It doesn't mean he isn't teary-eyed.
Which is how Sam spends his last moments before Hell kneeling on the ground, arms wrapped around a ratty bathrobe. And even if the arms hugging him back aren't the ones Sam wants, they're oddly comforting all the same.
Fandom: Supernatural
Rating: PG.
Length: About 700 words.
Characters/Pairings: Sam, Chuck.
Summary: Sam doesn't have the comfort of knowing it's not over. But nothing really ends.
Notes: Also on AO3 and DW.
Short Story
There's a bunch of colorful pictures in Sam's head when he thinks about Lucifer, almost like twisted Renaissance paintings, but they disappear when Sam says yes. Lucifer isn't anything so beautiful or complex. He's a weight. He pushes and holds down, and if Dean didn't drive into Stull Cemetery with music blaring, ready to take part of the load, Sam would be nothing but dust. Dean's share is less proportionally than usual, but just a little brush with the big names is enough to leave him a bloody smear on the Impala's door.
It's only the physicality of Sam, the direct line to every emotion that makes his meat suit tick, that does Lucifer in. On the celestial plane, Lucifer's existence is more than any human can handle. Tied to the rules of the mortal realm, a car and an extra man are more than enough to tip the balance.
Sam stands on his two legs again. He tips backward, and when Michael makes to grab for him, he can't stay upright against the pull of Sam's two hands.
To Dean, it appears they fall. To Sam, it feels like flying.
-
When the hole closes, Sam isn't in darkness. And despite the way his eyes - if souls have eyes - twinge when the light returns, there isn't a stereotypical blinding white light. If anything, the sunlight's dim, filtered through clouds and glass and the dingy corners of a house.
A man sits at a computer typing.
Sam blinks. "Chuck?"
Chuck doesn't turn around, but as Sam draws closer, Chuck narrates his document. "'If this is Hell,' Sam thinks, 'maybe there were more dangers in the prophet's house than he'd known.'"
"Except you're not a prophet," Sam and Chuck say in unison. Sam opens his mouth twice to speak again, and when he finally spits the words out the third time, Chuck doesn't talk with him.
"So what are you?" he asks.
"It doesn't matter." Chuck skips to the next paragraph. His voice isn't emotionless, but it is neutral. "'As Sam looks around, he realizes something is missing. Or someone.'"
"Dean," they say together.
Chuck types a sentence, then reads, "'And another sibling.'"
There's more typing while Sam mulls the lack of Adam, and it's Sam's turn to voice the words. "'The weight is gone, lifted like it was never there.' But Lucifer isn't dead."
"No." For the first time, neither sentence gets typed into the document.
"So..."
"'It hits Sam as the letters appear on the screen,'" Chuck reads. "'It isn't the final destination, but a stop on the way. There's one more thing to do.'"
"Adam."
Adam, Chuck types, the word its own paragraph. He reads aloud. "'Sam saved the world of his own choice, and goodness is rewarded.'"
Sam snorts. "Not in my fucking world."
He hears Chuck laugh - Chuck chuckles? - quietly, and he hits the backspace button and taps others until the sentence reads, Sam saved the world of his own choice, and balance must be restored. A man takes a too-strong punishment to rectify his mistakes, or--
"Or," Sam says.
Chuck types the last of it and steeples his fingers.
"'Sam wonders if there's free will at all, when the choice comes between letting Adam move on to some nicer existence or taking his own selfish reward when he's done nothing to deserve it. Either way, it doesn't matter. There's only one choice to make here, and he disappears into Hell the second it's made, forgetting about the prophet, forgetting about his second brother, forgetting about everything as Lucifer begins the very long process of tearing him into shreds. He doesn't have the comfort of knowing it's not over.'"
"But nothing really ends," Sam finishes.
Chuck turns around in his chair. He looks exactly as he always has, wrung-out and apologetic.
"This story's over," Chuck says, and judging by the weariness in his eyes, he's relieved. It doesn't mean he isn't teary-eyed.
Which is how Sam spends his last moments before Hell kneeling on the ground, arms wrapped around a ratty bathrobe. And even if the arms hugging him back aren't the ones Sam wants, they're oddly comforting all the same.