Fic: If I Have Freedom (15/15)
Chapter XIV: Let the Screaming Echoes Rest
Epilogue: We Two Fare On Forever
Dean came to complete wakefulness with a snap. For a second he lay still in the darkness, blinking up at the ceiling, letting his eyes grow accustomed to the dim light and his ears hear -
Sammy.
Dean bit his lip.
It was true that he'd been relieved - happy - to have the Sasquatch back, because adorable as a four-year-old Sammy was, with the lives they led his brother needed to able to defend himself. It was true that as an adult, Sam could and did make more of an effort to fight the memories when they overwhelmed him.
Unfortunately, it was also true that for some reason Sam had decided that now that he was twelve feet tall again, he couldn't go running to Dean every time he started feeling hellfire in his head.
Stupid idiot.
Dean had tried talking to him, but did that work?
Does it ever bloody work?
All he'd achieved was to make himself hoarse while Sam sat there looking up at him with damp eyes and ignoring everything he said. And damn it if Sam was going to give him eyes that made him feel like something had ripped out his heart and was twisting it into knots, the least he could bloody do was to let Dean comfort him.
Dean kicked back his covers.
Stupid, stupid Sammy.
He got out of bed.
Stupid twenty-eight-year-old Sammy thinking he has to do this alone.
He sat on the edge of his brother's bed.
"What have I told you about waking me up, Sam?" Sam's only answer was to turn towards Dean and raise those dewy eyes to his. Dean ran a hand over his face. "You want to tell me what's going on in your head?" That made Sam jerk violently, shut his eyes and turn his face into his pillow. Dean scowled. "Fine. But it'll help you if you do."
Sam's shoulders were shaking. Dean laid a hand lightly on his arm.
As though that had been permission, Sam reached for Dean. Dean was ready for it; he pulled his little brother up and into a hug.
"Idiot," he grunted. "Free pass when you're feeling like this. I told you that. Dude, you're not just making me have chick-flick moments. You're making me initiate them. You're lucky it's you; I wouldn't be doing this for anyone else." When he realized Sam was sobbing silently, he gentled his voice. "Yeah, OK, I'm here. Nothing's going to hurt you."
"It's cold," Sam said unexpectedly. His tone told Dean he wasn't talking about the weather. Not daring to say anything, almost not daring to breathe, Dean shifted his grip so that Sam's head was resting on his shoulder. "It's always cold in the Cage. Absolute Zero. Makes it… difficult… to think." Dean rubbed Sam's head. "They always - well, not always, but almost always - turned into youwhen they wanted to do things to me."
"I kind of got that much, Sammy."
"I didn't know it wasn't you."
Dean felt himself going rigid. Sam noticed as well, and started to pull away, but Dean pulled him back with a wordless snarl.
"You thought I was torturing you?" His voice was soothing when he asked the question: the anger hadn't been directed at Sam.
"That's just it - I couldn't think. They didn't let up long enough for me to think. If I'd thought about it I would've known it couldn't be you. But it never stopped. Not once, not for a second. Sometimes they'd come as themselves and then I knew you were up here and safe. That helped. I think that's why they did it. They didn't want me to actually lose my mind. It would have taken the fun out of it for them. But most of the time…"
"Most of the time it was me."
"It had your face. Wasn't you. I was just hurting too much to think about it. It didn't… feel… like you." Sam sighed softly. "Didn't feel like this. Safe."
Safe.
Dean sighed. Sammy was far from safe. There was a world out there that had already proven that it hated Winchesters and wanted to make their lives as miserable as possible. There was civil war in Heaven, probably anarchy in Hell, monsters breaking all the rules and being stranger and deadlier than ever… And then there was Purgatory. Dean didn't know what would happen when they found Purgatory, but he was willing to bet everything he had (except Sammy and the Impala) that it wouldn't be good.
In the meantime, though, he had this.
He was finding himself surprisingly at ease with the immediate situation. It sucked that Sam's memories of the Cage kept trying to overwhelm him, but Sam was fighting them with all he had - and this time he was letting Dean help him.
Somehow a lot of the things that had once seemed so important didn't seem to matter anymore. The angels and their crap and their stupid claims about Sam being evil… so bloody what? One thing Dean had learnt was that good and evil, at least the way the angels saw them, didn't mean a damn thing. Michael had been their embodiment of good, the perfect Seraph, the perfect son, and he'd turned out to be the biggest bastard ever created.
And Sam? Sam who'd given himself up to eternal torment to fix the mess they'd all made, Sam who had taken everything they'd thrown at him and survived and saved them all? Sam, who was lying still in Dean's arms as though his big brother's heartbeat was the only thing anchoring him to sanity?
Sam was good - he damn well was, and Dean was ready to take up the issue seriously with any angel who tried to tell him otherwise - but again, so bloody what? It was true, and it didn't matter.
Sam was his.
Dean didn't know about good and evil but he knew that and it was the most important thing: Sam was his and he was Sam's, and when it came to the bitter end they would still have each other. He found himself feeling a little sorry for Michael. The self-righteous son of a bitch had no idea what it was to have a little brother. Little brothers were whiny and annoying and they did stupid things and they got in your way, but sometimes…
Sometimes, when you realized or they admitted that all the screw-ups had been because of the blind adoration they had for you, which was really the only constant in their lives…
Sometimes, in the silence of the night when there was no sound but breathing…
Sometimes, when the world was collapsing, all it took was your arms around them to make them feel safe. And if that didn't make everything worth it, Dean didn't know what did.
THE END