L4D BIGBANG fic: eight and a half minutes
Okay, wow, so I'm posting late on my day, but hey, FIC.
So, words: thank you taylor_serenil for the beta. Any remaining mistakes are my own, since I am a compulsive tweaker, ;D
ZOMG, guys, ART! The wonderfully talented caz2y5 picked my story and made some awesome icons and banners for me. All without much help/input from me, since I was a sad flake. I don't think I, or my fic, really deserve the work we got, but I'm greedy. I WILL TAKE IT ALL ANYWAY, >;D and you guys should check out her art post here. Thank you, Caz, for the artwork. I love it a lot!
Last, title taken from the song of the same name by Dismemberment Plan
warnings: this isn't L4D-verse compliant. I took the mod's statement about the "spirit" of L4D and ran with it, so anyone hoping for a true L4D fic might want to not read this, and could be said to take place before the game picks up, I guess. Post-series SPN. This is gen, technically, but could be read with slash glasses, definitely. Graphic imagery of the death of a minor, and blood/gore, angst, warnings apply, too.
eight and a half minutes
The story breaks on the news. Words are thrown around: infected, quarantine, safe zones. Anyone showing symptoms …
Sam’s just getting in, shaking leftover rain off on the stupid little mat in front of the door. He comes up behind Dean, smell of cool wind and fresh water, typical summer storm, and asks, what?
Dean doesn’t spare him a look, the feel of his brother’s fingertips rough against the back of his neck. He says, Green Flu.
**
They’re zombies.
That’s what Dean says, and he’s never been happier about his gun collection than when it saves their asses for the twentieth time in as many days. Not that firearms don’t have their own drawbacks - sharp crack, smell of gunpowder, burst of quick fire - enough to attract even more attention, more jerky, fuckin quick zombies to drop on the already overwhelming pile outside of their apartment.
Sam says, "they’re not, Dean. They’re alive."
"Fuck alive," Dean replies, dropping another. Again and again and again. "That don’t look alive to me, Sammy."
Dean can almost feel it when Sam rolls his eyes. "Whatever, Dean."
**
It’s hard at first - killing people, when Dean’s spent the first few decades of his life doing everything to protect them. It gets easier, though (fun, he thinks privately, it gets fun) when he stops seeing people in the angry, spasming horde that descends on them.
He remembers what he told Sam, years ago, about saving people and hunting things, and believing it.
Except there's no people left, only things, scrabbling, bloody things to kill, and after a while it's just the tang of spent shells and reverb, grunts and moans and the sound of glass breaking, and the taste of tap water and canned food.
Just enemies, closer and closer to killing Sam and him, and it's overwhelming, sudden sweat momentarily loosening the grip he has on his rifle, clumsy fingers strangling the trigger guard in response.
He shakes Sam awake after that. His brother is quiet and unmoveable under his hand, the glint of his eyes visible where the moon slips in through the window.
Dean says, "we need a better plan."
Morning is gray. Sam's eyes bore into him, and it makes Dean edgy, picking at the tension between them like a scab.
"What," Sam starts and stops, words like shells, tap tap tap. Dean can hear the muffled movements outside, scratching and pummeling that mirror every move they make inside.
"Fuckin bat hearing," he mutters, and Sam shrugs, unfinished can of corned beef hash beside him.
"Jesus." Sam rubs at his lips after the word spill out, rubst at his forehead and the space between his brows. "How the fuck are we doing anything besides this? We can't. We can't even move without - "
"Sam." But Sam's already looking at Dean, not away, not distracted. Dean leans over, rubs his thumb over the spot Sam's fingers were just a second ago, easing imaginary lines (headache, he thinks, another headache). His brother's skin is warm. "We've got to."
**
The thing is, when the virus, or whatever the fuck it is, gets up close and personal, it's too late. Dean knows, when he hears the first sounds of fighting, exactly what's happening.
The complex Sam and Dean live in is overrun in seconds - people screaming, being mobbed, beaten, all the noises Dean hears are either screams or hisses, and they try - unprepared after years of civilian life, but it's like riding a bike, don't panic, think, regroup - to get as many people as they could somewhere defensible.
It just doesn't work. The wave of people break like the fuckin Red Sea, some swollen monster stumbling into the crowd. He remembers Sam's voice, shocked and carrying, oh shit, oh shit; and then: no, come on, come on, this way.
Dean knows that Sam was thinking their best chances of survival lay with sacrificing the people directly in the thing's eyeline and saving the ones on the periphery, just like John had taught Dean and Dean had drilled into Sam: you're not a hero; you can't save everyone (anyone) all the time, along with: get yourself out of danger. Sam had listened grudgingly to the first one, and never to that last one.
Dean creeps up behind the man, and he's using the term "man" loosely. The thing is bulbous and leaking, half-torn clothes shrunken deep into the guy's skin. And god this can't be just an infection, this is something else entirely, has to be.
It's easy, so fuckin easy like it just doesn't care about its surroundings (and that makes warning bells go off in Dean's head, definitely, but the hell else can he do), and shoots it in the head. Dean can still remember the swell of relief, the brief moment of maybe it's okay, maybe it's dead flooding through him a split second before the bastard explodes, spraying everyone, fuckin spraying Sam, with thick, toxic bile.
Wherever it lands the sticky, putrid stuff seems to make people temporarily blind, staggering around, being run down by more infected. Dean learns a number of things, then: he can move fast when he sees Sam surrounded by a bunch of fuckin zombies; the big guy's guts are some kind of damn zombie catnip; even blind, Sam can kick some ass.
He grabs two wrists after splattering more blood and brains onto the walls behind Sam, pulls them along behind him, and he hears, Dean. What - we can't -
But there is the sound of screams behind them, the sound of fists and feet slamming into flesh. There's nothing we can do, Dean shoots over his shoulder.
They run.
The person he drags with them into a second floor abandoned apartment unit turns out to be a middle-aged woman (Angela, Mrs. Angela Kingham, thank you, smart and haughty, crumbling around the edges) who saw her husband and son torn apart.
They blockade themselves in the set of rooms, no other choice when their race through the complex revealed the blocked exits, packed with dead and dying and infected. Sam whispers, we wait? We're waiting it out?
Dean shrugs, hunches his shoulders. First things first, they have to make it back to their apartment, to their weapons.
Dean, look at this.
Sam's up at the side of the window overlooking the shared courtyard, one finger curled around the edge of the curtain to hold it askew.
Dean knocks Sam's shoulder out of the way, and looks down at the square lot. There are infected milling around, aimless and quiet, but in a half bow underneath their window there's a small group, headed by one almost normal looking man. Even from here, he can see the man's eyes track their movement, head cocked. When Dean raises a finger and slowly trails it across the mostly curtained window, the man below mimicks the movement.
Angela says, what -
- and even in the stillness, the absolute quiet hovering over them, it seems loud. The infected below has to hear it, crouches with a deep, swelling hiss and then throws himself against the side of the building, springing away to relaunch himself, over and over, thick wet smacking and blood trailing down his face. But it brings the horde, screeching and running, reawakening dying interest.
Dean drags Sam away from the window, crouches down against the far wall. Fuck, he mutters.
Sam studies him a moment, eyes drifting over his face, and Dean doesn't know what Sam sees, but he sighs, says, the stuff we were sprayed with. It attracts attention, right? Maybe - maybe when it fades they'll leave.
Right, Dean says, right.
Their first dash is out into oddly deserted hallways, bloodstained and piled with bodies, to the nearest stairwell and scurrying to apartment 6C (theirs, theirs with closets and trunks full of weapons that Dean never could get rid of, never store away and forget about).
If Angela was a little vicious, a little vocal, in killing some of the wandering infected, well. So were they, and she had lost more, had lost her family.
Grief. Guilt.
It's only when they barricade their own apartment and she doesn't stop, stumbling legs and hoarse grunts that Dean gets it (faster than Sam, who's off and looking for something, something, Dean doesn't know what).
Goddamnit, he thinks, of course she would have to wait until they lock themselves in, and Dean can hear the battering of bodies hitting their door, infected drawn to the sounds of their flight.
They should have realized, he guesses, maybe these infected don't act hungry, don't bite and leave saliva behind, but - but that damn thing exploding - she was exposed (and Dean's mind was screaming Sam was. Dean had seen the splatters, dark and cloying, and the truth sinks his stomach).
It's his apartment. There's a gun in the table next to him.
Either Angela's sudden shrieks or the quickfire pop pop of the shots drag Sam back to the living room, arms braced in the doorway, face pale and eyes confused.
Dean had asked, spun to face them when they'd first gotten free, asking, any wounds? Did they bite you?
Sam had shaken his head, the woman stuttered out a no. They had scrubbed the congealing mess off, and hours later - when the screaming had stopped - they had taken turns showering, scavenging clothes from closets and drawers.
Now Sam's eyes drift up from the sprawled out corpse in the living room. Maybe. Maybe I.
Dean shifts, rolls his shoulders back, gun down and pointed at the floor. So?
They've stood here before, at opposite ends of a room, waiting for the world (terror and almost-tears and I'm tired, so fuckin tired, Sammy, I.) to come crashing down. Dean knows how this goes.
Their breath comes out harsh as they count out the seconds until the sun slips over the horizon.
They end up getting the screen out and tipping Angela out of the window. The infected down below converge on the movement, but they know, seem to, that she was more one of them than anything.
Dean watches them spread out again, calm and controlled, when everything goes still again.
**
"What are we gonna do, then, Dean?" Sam hisses back, night still heavy around their vocal chords.
Dean just stares, watching Sam shrug and flinch. The majority of the infected had dispersed within the first week, and every day there are less and less of them, more piles of rotting corpses but nothing to replace them.
"Load for bear," he says. "And run like hell."
**
Back before everything, before the start of the infection, before they had gotten a month into the end of the world, Dean would get home earlier than Sam, by minutes. Sam would always come bursting in, and Dean would always be by the window, just in the process of lowering the sheet that served as their curtain.
One night Sam comes up to him, chest brushing Dean's shoulder, and pushes the sheet backward, revealing the large square of lawn and the car park surrounding it. It's paid space, and if Dean's going to shell out money for his baby, it'd be better than an uncovered parking lot in an apartment complex (and he did, found a garage space first thing and stashed the Impala there).
What are you doing? Sam's breath is warm against the side of his face, carrying the peculiar tang of artificial sweetener, and Dean'd give him grief about switching to Diet Coke or whatever, but he's suddenly tired.
See the black CX-9, first row, first space? Sam's close enough that Dean feels his nod before he mumbles yeah. Belongs to 2C. The black Camry belongs to 7C and the black -
Blue. Dark blue.
Dark blue Lincoln belongs to -
Mr. Hesher. Sam grins when Dean turns his head up toward his brother. Otherwise known as 8C. Have you been casing people, Dean?
Dean snorts. Have you? Dean rocks back, pushing at Sam to get him to move. His brother leans in a minute before slipping to the side. Sam stays silent. 'S not hurting anyone.
Just in case; it's just in case. And then, what he thinks they both know: we're not normal, Sam, we don't get to have this.
**
They’re packed with what they can carry and still haul ass with. Dean takes one more look at the window, sees the CX-9 sitting quietly in its spot, relatively unharmed even with the carnage around it. Dean can’t see any infected, but it doesn’t mean they’re not there, just still, now that the weird ass bile scent - whatever - is fading. Not as hyped up and aware.
They can do this, Dean thinks. They are doing it.
“We get into 2C, find the keys, and get down there, quiet as possible.”
Sam shrugs his pack higher. “Dean, what if the keys aren’t there - it was crazy - “
“The family was home. When they came out to check, the guy was in gym clothes, empty handed, remember?” No way they even had time to get the keys - kids screaming and running, the mom gone after them, the dad stone still and gape mouthed until one infected ripped his head off -
-the keys were still there.
“Nn - no, Dean, I don’t remember, I.” Sam shakes his head. “Fine, okay. We get the keys, get out and get to the car.” He takes a deep breath, and Dean’s chest is too constricted to do the same. “Let’s go.”
The place is destroyed, wide open since that night, furniture torn and randomly stained, rotten food in bowls and on the counter and at the table, remnants of their last meal, all furred and green-white.
“Shit,” Sam whispers, shuffling through papers and books spilled along the walls. There’s blood everywhere Dean looks, although there’s no bodies, not like what lines the hallways outside, but everything’s tacky in the humidity, still, rust and copper, metallic tang in the back of Dean’s throat.
“Just look, Sammy,” he manages, in between popping up like gophers at the slightest noise. They have tp look demented, and he fights back the laughter tickling through his chest.
They’re quiet after that, dry shush shush of moving paper, until Sam jumps up, arms over his head, keys dangling from his fingers. “Dean, Dean, got ‘em.”
They share a look. Window checks and hall checks are clear, but damn.
Damn.
Rotting bodies are everywhere, the stench of them is thick in the dead, still air, Dean's racing by quick, Sam right behind him, a hulking shadow weight over his shoulder. There's only the occasional infected who sees them, and they're easy to dispatch. Using blades, this time, because Dean doesn’t want a mass of them coming their way when the guns go off. And these guys, these guys might be quick and might be strong, but they’re easy to put down, bodies susceptible to blunt force or a gaping hole courtesy of 9 inches of pointed steel.
They bypass the lobby, splattered with dry blood and bile and use the maintenance door instead, quick check into the cramped, bare area and then they’re piling in, exit highlighted under the buzzing red light.
Sam has the key ring in his hand, fingers hovering over the unlock button. Dean says, “ready?” and sees his brother’s jerky nod.
The door swings open and they step out.
It’s easy until they’re near the SUV, outrunning the small group chasing them when Sam hits the unlock button, and gets his door open and closed just as an infected slams into the side of the car.
Dean rips at the door, hears the sound of an infected sliding across the slick body of the car, and hears the sound of the lock engaged when he pulls against it.
“Sam!” He yells, one hand still on the door, other holding up his shotgun, “unlock my door!” The blast gets the slavering infected right in the face, and Dean ducks as a wet mess showers down on him. Others are right behind and just as he’s getting ready to shoot again, he hears the shink of the door unlocking. He throws it open catching an infected in the stomach with the side of the door.
He gets in, slams the door shut, and it’s only when Sam’s flying into reverse that he realizes there’s fingers caught in the door. “Fuck!”
“What, what, what - “ Sam’s looking frantic, vibrating in his seat as he shifts into drive, speeding through the rush and thunk of bodies hitting the car. Dean braces himself, swings his door open to Sam’s yelled the fuck and plants a boot in the face hissing up at him. He hears the body hit the pavement before he gets the door closed again.
“We did it,” Sam laughs, “fuck, we actually did it.”
Dean grins, head rolling back against the headrest, blood congealing thick and tight against his skin, too damn close to his mouth. “Go to the garage,” he says, “we’re getting the Impala.”
Everything’s empty. Not surprising, considering, but first driving in the Mazda, smooth glide of a too-new car, faint hum of the engine working, and then later, loud rumble of the Impala under Dean’s hands, heading down the highway, it’s only that, only them, and a repeated message on the air, giving them a place to start.
Pennsylvania.
Their first stop hours later is a convenience store, topping up the Impala, and then heading in, guns out and ready. No one’s around, though, and the inside of the store is full of crashed displays and broken refrigerator sections, glass sprinkled on the floor and bottles crushed.
“Keep an eye out,” he says, and heads to the back. He sees bathrooms, and he turns on luckwarm, smelly water and scrubs at the crusted red mess in his hair, across his cheeks and hands, trailing down his neck.
The bathroom looks like a fresh crime scene by the time he's done and leaving. He spots cleaning closets and then at the farthest end of the building he sees what he’s looking for. Thin wood door, locked, but caving quickly under his boot.
Inventory is stacked neatly in the back, pallet after a pallet of non perishables, and Dean loads spare bags he finds with up water and convenience store foods enough to make Sam roll his eyes. Cans go in, too, chilli and soup, whatever he comes across.
“Jesus,” Sam says, but when Dean raises an eyebrow at him, he just shrugs takes two of the bags off of him to carry to the car. “All quiet.”
“Yeah,” Dean says, looking around at the flat landscape. He sees cars and buildings, trash and belongings in the street. Bodies and blood, but no movement.
“It’s weird. I mean, I guess if they aren’t dead, then the virus or infection eventually kills them. I mean, right? Or.” He stops, slams the trunk closed. He doesn’t speak again until they’re in the car, radio on low and whispering, to anyone who can hear this … “I mean, what’s left? Do they become undead?”
Sam trails off like he’s expecting a response, but he isn’t looking at Dean, he’s facing straight ahead, arms stiff, hands in his lap.
“I don’t know,” Dean says, “I guess.”
**
They settle on Tennessee. Small town, but uncurious locals, isolated homes. There’s no walking down Main Street smiling and waving at so-and-so and what’s-her-face.
It’s normal, but not Sam’s normal, not his fantasy of what it should be (what he thought he signed up for with Jessica and Stanford and a future law degree). Even two years later, Dean can still see the disappointment.
Dean, on the other hand, adjusts quickly. It’s not what he imagined. Not after a trip to Hell, watching his brother figuratively and then literally do the same. He thought he’d die hunting, free Sam then for all this day-to-day, wake up in the same place shit. But after Sam’d come back, soulless and empty, then raving and almost dying, he decided fuck it.
The Winchesters had done enough, good and bad. They could stop.
He doesn’t get rid of everything. He doesn’t deny it. He just puts a little bit of distance between him and hunting. Sam and hunting. Nights are spent indoors watching sitcoms, weekends are for grilling in the quad, or going out to the only grimy bar in town.
It becomes real in a way the past few years of dying and angels and end-of-the-world hijinks haven’t been. Sam there, a room away, a text or call away. Not in danger, not that, but easier, looking younger and less hurt and damaged. Every time Dean sees it he thinks, this is what Dad meant. This is keeping Sam safe.
**
They can’t drive forever, Dean knows that, and he doesn’t really feel like doing zombie checks at night.
“Just pick, I guess,” Sam says, he’s bouncing his knees, and Dean knows it’s from a combo of needing to piss and needing to stretch mile-long legs. But when Dean drives by a few more buildings, Sam growls, and snaps, “there. Christ. That one.”
Out of habit, Dean pulls into the Motel 6’s parking lot. He already knows it was stupid - no real way to barricade these rooms, but they need a break, a quick one, and he thinks they can maybe just look around. There's no infected he can see right away, and the pain in his ass says he'll take the chance inside.
It’s shocking, though, turning off the engine, and having nothing else filling up the air, no cars passing by, nothing. They sit, waiting, seeing if anything’s drawn to their noise.
“Nothing,” Sam whispers, and they check guns, load up duffel bags with weapons, salt, and food and water, before heading toward the office.
There’s the corpse of an overweight man collapsed on the floor in front of the check in desk. There for a while, judging by the smell and bloaty decomp.
“Gross,” Dean says, side stepping the body.
“Back here,” Sam says, voice echoing from past the desk and through the darkened hallway. “Fuck,” said as Dean flips on the switch, weak light buzzes overhead but Sam’s still squinting like it’s high noon or some shit.
“Don’t have to be standin around in the dark, Einstein, there’s - wait. Personal rooms?”
“Hmm.” Sam edges closer to the shut door. Amber light shivers out from the edge. Sam nods his head and steps toward the door, slowly turning the knob and pushing forward. There’s no sound, but judging from the way Sam pockets his gun and braces his other hand higher on the door, pushing with slightly more force, that there’s some kind of weight blocking the entrance.
When it’s cracked open, Sam backs up, pulls out his gun and waits. Dean keeps one eye on Sam and the room and the other toward the front of the office.
When Sam slips through the door, Dean’s right behind him, turning to train his gun on the front of the door and a little girl.
At first he thinks she’s dead (and god that’s a relief, barely able to see skin or clothes under the blood and wounds), but then Sam moans, and Dean looks again.
He sees the girl’s chest rise and fall, shallow and unsteady. “Oh, Christ,” and it almost sounds like a sob, and Sam’s touching her, trying to see, before Dean can protest. “I don’t - I don’t see bite marks, Dean. I think they just tore her apart. Jesus, she’s alive, how is she alive.”
“Sam, come on, man, you can’t - “
“She’s a kid, Dean! We can’t leave her!”
“And she could be infected, for fuck’s sake. How do we know whose blood that is? Hers or one of the infected?”
“That’s the least of our problems, goddamnit, or did you forget about that damn thing exploding back at the apartments? I lived through that - ” and Dean can hear what Sam doesn’t say, when Angela didn’t; when I was right there with her, as covered in it as she was. And there's Dean, towelling off blood, brain and bits of bone in a ransacked convenience store. “She was his kid. She must have heard him getting killed.”
Sam’s hands drift restlessly, shoulders to face to hair, all blood spattered, every motion wasted. She’s ten, maybe twelve, wearing what looks like a summer dress, bare feet curled stiff and spastic in the dingy shag carpet. Dean can see eyes slit open under matted lashes. She’s not there, empty and gone, body just too slow to follow.
Or, Christ, that’s what he prays, anyway.
They wait there. Sam seems rooted to the spot, shocky. Dean sits on her other side, uneasy but unwilling to rush Sam (he can’t say, we can end it, Sam. We can make it easier on her, because it wouldn’t be easy for Sam, and Dean flashes on tears and moonlight and she asked me. I have to, I have to).
He knows, can see the moment, when everything catches up to his brother, and he slumps, one still-tan, strong arm outstretched, hand palm up underneath a dirty, scrawny arm. Dean can imagine the heat rising up out of his brother, slipping through the girl’s skin, and maybe that’s enough, maybe she’ll know she isn’t alone.
Sam sleeps through it, the last bit of her dying. Her gasps cause spasms, and Dean can imagine stress fractures deepening, shattering under the strain. More pain, more damage, to the tiny body and he slides his hands under her, draws her closer and up, until her head is pressed under his jaw, bloody, mangled legs draped over his thighs.
He rocks her, and as her lungs squeeze out the last bits of air, he chants, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
He wants to let Sam sleep, figures someone should and Sam claimed it first, but at some point, holding a rapidly cooling body, he falls asleep, too.
He jerks awake when pressure is suddenly lifted off of him. He looks up, sees Sam cradling the girl’s body, and looks down, at his own chest and pants, and sees streaks of blood, bits of hair left behind where Sam has taken her away.
“I found a sheet,” Sam says, and Dean finally sees the righted cot, off-white sheet spread out neatly on the thin mattress. "It's been quiet." Sam's mouth is twisted, unhappy and unsure.
“Yeah,” he says, and turns away when Sam walks over to the rickety bed. He doesn’t need to see to know Sam’s laying her down, wrapping her up. A shroud, a fuckin shroud for a kid.
“You should have woken me up, Dean,” Sam’s voice is wounded animal soft, wary. “I would’ve - “
“What?” Dean shrugs and still doesn’t look at Sam, goes to gather up their shit. “Watched her die, too? Lotta good that would’ve done.”
“I was the one - “
“Sam, just shut up, okay?” Dean finally looks, turns back and looks. Sam’s tall, ragged, behind him, to the side of the low bed. Dean wants to apologize, but Sam knows; he always fuckin knows now. No more fights over stupid shit, just a self-deprecating smile and a nod like Sam knows the secrets of the universe, so of course his brother’s head is nothing.
It’s late afternoon before Dean’s even tempted to try to eat something from the bags in the backseat. They’ve stopped to clean up at another empty convenience store bathroom (and maybe they could have showered at the motel, but fuck. Dean was too antsy to do anything but splash water and handsoap over visible parts of himself, fuck the rest of it), switched seats twice, stopped to piss three times, and Dean’s head is pounding, ready to slaughter him for a cup of coffee, instant crystal shit or not.
“Goddammit,” he grunts, sunglasses over his eyes, blocking out too-bright sun. It almost feels like any other hunt, although it’s been years since they’ve been in the car this long.
“Tired?” Sam asks, and Dean rolls his head toward him, hears if anyone can hear this … but only says, “uh,” before turning back and resting his forehead on the cool glass of the window.
Sam leaves him to it.
He must fall asleep again, because when he opens his eyes it's near dark, and Sam is shouting, doing something to the car to make her fuckin scream.
Dean looks away from the horror that is Sam's driving, and for a second his eyes don't comprehend what's right outside the windshield. It's big, gray flesh stretched and twisting over elongated and mutilated arms, surrounded by other infected (and jesus christ, are they wearing hazmat suits?), and. Oh, shit.
"Oh shit," Dean says, pressing back into his seat, like it's going to get him farther away, "Oh shit oh shit oh shit. GO!"
"Where, Dean, the fuck am I going, he's holding the goddamn road in his hands!"
"Back," Dean shrieks, and sees Sam go stiff, "go back go back!"
Sam's not looking, arm over the seat, head twisted around as the Impala shoots backward. Dean is, though; he sees the huge arms come up, lob the damn piece of asphalt after them, he sees it hit, feels it hit, shaking them and making his girl skitter and veer. He can see the pavement part under the assault, nice beeline straight for the Impala's bumper.
Then the infected start running.
"Fuck," he says, and the words are long, drawn out, like he can't think. He can't think. Sam's making a low keening noise; Dean doesn't think his brother's even aware of it. "That one's wearing armor."
**
God, you’re stupid, Sam huffs, bony shoulders bunched under his ears. Familiar look during Sam’s sophomore year, all angst and dark hair, but it’s fading now, blue-gray smoke clearing the frown out of Sam’s lips.
No, Sammy. Fuckin zombies. Imagine it. We’d be total badasses, right.
Yeah, until two-thirds into the - the apocalypse or whatever, Dean. We’d be toast.
What? The hell you talkin about, Sam. We’d be made, we’re the only ones know about this kinda shit.
First, what do we know about zombies? Dean opens his mouth to respond, and shuts it when he can’t come up with anything. Right, Sam smirks, nothing. Second? It’s the people who know anything that don’t actually make it. They always almost make it, but they never really make it.
Fuckin - fuckin character development for the surviving douchebags, dude, Dean laughs and leans back against the Impala’s windshield, joint held out to Sam. In his peripheral, the cherry flares as Sam tokes up, and Dean can smell the musk on Sam’s exhale.
Zombies, Sam says, a beat too late, and giggles.
**
Dean almost cheers when they cross into Pennsylvania. He doesn’t know why. He’s not sure what they’ll even find, if anything. Maybe just more survivors, or maybe a compound or maybe a death sentence for anyone stupid enough to actually follow the transmission.
All Dean knows is that he wants to know, either way. Whether Sam and he turn back, go on their own, or whether whatever’s in Pennsylvania is worth sticking around for. The curiosity is burning in him (living, living, unzombified people, Christ and it’s almost like he craves seeing a group of sane, functioning people).
What they actually see, though, is more and more of the infected. Howling and running, throwing themselves at and under the Impala, until the grind and thump is something familiar, the wave motion of rolling over rabid people just another part of the day.
“Survivors.” Sam says it like he’s guaranteeing something (an end, Dean thinks, as another body screams past his window, mouth wide and gaping bloody). Whatever it is, Dean has to believe him.
“You know,” Sam says later, when they’ve settled into an old paper factory’s basement, doors blockaded, floors laid with old sacks that smell pungently sour, small camp light situated between them. “I would have thought that all the other supernatural shit would have used this as an excuse to go all out. I mean, talk about a convenient distraction.”
“Maybe they did,” Sam says after a while, continuing a conversation Dean doesn't feel like having. “Not like we’ve seen a lot of anything besides ... infected. How do we know? Maybe everything else got everyone else.” Sam's eyes are swollen, red, and Dean thinks exhaustion is riding him hard. Always has.
“Why’s it matter, Sam?” Dean finally asks. He crunches Twinkie wrappers between his fingers, sugar and flavoring too sweet on the back of his tongue. It makes him want to puke.
“Why wouldn’t it?” Spark of anger, finally, in the words, and Dean grins like it’s a victory, lips stretched tight over teeth, already crumbling at the edges.
He reaches out, and for a moment his arm feels heavy, shaky, the streaks of left over blood like a curse on his skin. Sam’s hair is greasy, soft spiked with dirt and oil in his grip when his fingers knot in the strands.
He tugs, and Sam allows it, shudders slightly when Dean’s other arm comes around his shoulders holding him tight to Dean’s chest. It’s a familiar weight pressing against his lungs, more solid, though, more noticeable than a tiny girl dying slowly in his arms.
He bows his head over Sam, just pretending for a moment that they’re not sitting, covered in blood and muck and their own smell, waiting for the dawn, waiting for the morning and a road that will lead them on, to the end of the world or the start of it.
He breathes with his brother, and when he feels the swell of Sam’s ribs against him, Dean cuts him off. “We’ll find it, Sam. We’ll find something.”
So, words: thank you taylor_serenil for the beta. Any remaining mistakes are my own, since I am a compulsive tweaker, ;D
ZOMG, guys, ART! The wonderfully talented caz2y5 picked my story and made some awesome icons and banners for me. All without much help/input from me, since I was a sad flake. I don't think I, or my fic, really deserve the work we got, but I'm greedy. I WILL TAKE IT ALL ANYWAY, >;D and you guys should check out her art post here. Thank you, Caz, for the artwork. I love it a lot!
Last, title taken from the song of the same name by Dismemberment Plan
warnings: this isn't L4D-verse compliant. I took the mod's statement about the "spirit" of L4D and ran with it, so anyone hoping for a true L4D fic might want to not read this, and could be said to take place before the game picks up, I guess. Post-series SPN. This is gen, technically, but could be read with slash glasses, definitely. Graphic imagery of the death of a minor, and blood/gore, angst, warnings apply, too.
eight and a half minutes
The story breaks on the news. Words are thrown around: infected, quarantine, safe zones. Anyone showing symptoms …
Sam’s just getting in, shaking leftover rain off on the stupid little mat in front of the door. He comes up behind Dean, smell of cool wind and fresh water, typical summer storm, and asks, what?
Dean doesn’t spare him a look, the feel of his brother’s fingertips rough against the back of his neck. He says, Green Flu.
**
They’re zombies.
That’s what Dean says, and he’s never been happier about his gun collection than when it saves their asses for the twentieth time in as many days. Not that firearms don’t have their own drawbacks - sharp crack, smell of gunpowder, burst of quick fire - enough to attract even more attention, more jerky, fuckin quick zombies to drop on the already overwhelming pile outside of their apartment.
Sam says, "they’re not, Dean. They’re alive."
"Fuck alive," Dean replies, dropping another. Again and again and again. "That don’t look alive to me, Sammy."
Dean can almost feel it when Sam rolls his eyes. "Whatever, Dean."
**
It’s hard at first - killing people, when Dean’s spent the first few decades of his life doing everything to protect them. It gets easier, though (fun, he thinks privately, it gets fun) when he stops seeing people in the angry, spasming horde that descends on them.
He remembers what he told Sam, years ago, about saving people and hunting things, and believing it.
Except there's no people left, only things, scrabbling, bloody things to kill, and after a while it's just the tang of spent shells and reverb, grunts and moans and the sound of glass breaking, and the taste of tap water and canned food.
Just enemies, closer and closer to killing Sam and him, and it's overwhelming, sudden sweat momentarily loosening the grip he has on his rifle, clumsy fingers strangling the trigger guard in response.
He shakes Sam awake after that. His brother is quiet and unmoveable under his hand, the glint of his eyes visible where the moon slips in through the window.
Dean says, "we need a better plan."
Morning is gray. Sam's eyes bore into him, and it makes Dean edgy, picking at the tension between them like a scab.
"What," Sam starts and stops, words like shells, tap tap tap. Dean can hear the muffled movements outside, scratching and pummeling that mirror every move they make inside.
"Fuckin bat hearing," he mutters, and Sam shrugs, unfinished can of corned beef hash beside him.
"Jesus." Sam rubs at his lips after the word spill out, rubst at his forehead and the space between his brows. "How the fuck are we doing anything besides this? We can't. We can't even move without - "
"Sam." But Sam's already looking at Dean, not away, not distracted. Dean leans over, rubs his thumb over the spot Sam's fingers were just a second ago, easing imaginary lines (headache, he thinks, another headache). His brother's skin is warm. "We've got to."
**
The thing is, when the virus, or whatever the fuck it is, gets up close and personal, it's too late. Dean knows, when he hears the first sounds of fighting, exactly what's happening.
The complex Sam and Dean live in is overrun in seconds - people screaming, being mobbed, beaten, all the noises Dean hears are either screams or hisses, and they try - unprepared after years of civilian life, but it's like riding a bike, don't panic, think, regroup - to get as many people as they could somewhere defensible.
It just doesn't work. The wave of people break like the fuckin Red Sea, some swollen monster stumbling into the crowd. He remembers Sam's voice, shocked and carrying, oh shit, oh shit; and then: no, come on, come on, this way.
Dean knows that Sam was thinking their best chances of survival lay with sacrificing the people directly in the thing's eyeline and saving the ones on the periphery, just like John had taught Dean and Dean had drilled into Sam: you're not a hero; you can't save everyone (anyone) all the time, along with: get yourself out of danger. Sam had listened grudgingly to the first one, and never to that last one.
Dean creeps up behind the man, and he's using the term "man" loosely. The thing is bulbous and leaking, half-torn clothes shrunken deep into the guy's skin. And god this can't be just an infection, this is something else entirely, has to be.
It's easy, so fuckin easy like it just doesn't care about its surroundings (and that makes warning bells go off in Dean's head, definitely, but the hell else can he do), and shoots it in the head. Dean can still remember the swell of relief, the brief moment of maybe it's okay, maybe it's dead flooding through him a split second before the bastard explodes, spraying everyone, fuckin spraying Sam, with thick, toxic bile.
Wherever it lands the sticky, putrid stuff seems to make people temporarily blind, staggering around, being run down by more infected. Dean learns a number of things, then: he can move fast when he sees Sam surrounded by a bunch of fuckin zombies; the big guy's guts are some kind of damn zombie catnip; even blind, Sam can kick some ass.
He grabs two wrists after splattering more blood and brains onto the walls behind Sam, pulls them along behind him, and he hears, Dean. What - we can't -
But there is the sound of screams behind them, the sound of fists and feet slamming into flesh. There's nothing we can do, Dean shoots over his shoulder.
They run.
The person he drags with them into a second floor abandoned apartment unit turns out to be a middle-aged woman (Angela, Mrs. Angela Kingham, thank you, smart and haughty, crumbling around the edges) who saw her husband and son torn apart.
They blockade themselves in the set of rooms, no other choice when their race through the complex revealed the blocked exits, packed with dead and dying and infected. Sam whispers, we wait? We're waiting it out?
Dean shrugs, hunches his shoulders. First things first, they have to make it back to their apartment, to their weapons.
Dean, look at this.
Sam's up at the side of the window overlooking the shared courtyard, one finger curled around the edge of the curtain to hold it askew.
Dean knocks Sam's shoulder out of the way, and looks down at the square lot. There are infected milling around, aimless and quiet, but in a half bow underneath their window there's a small group, headed by one almost normal looking man. Even from here, he can see the man's eyes track their movement, head cocked. When Dean raises a finger and slowly trails it across the mostly curtained window, the man below mimicks the movement.
Angela says, what -
- and even in the stillness, the absolute quiet hovering over them, it seems loud. The infected below has to hear it, crouches with a deep, swelling hiss and then throws himself against the side of the building, springing away to relaunch himself, over and over, thick wet smacking and blood trailing down his face. But it brings the horde, screeching and running, reawakening dying interest.
Dean drags Sam away from the window, crouches down against the far wall. Fuck, he mutters.
Sam studies him a moment, eyes drifting over his face, and Dean doesn't know what Sam sees, but he sighs, says, the stuff we were sprayed with. It attracts attention, right? Maybe - maybe when it fades they'll leave.
Right, Dean says, right.
Their first dash is out into oddly deserted hallways, bloodstained and piled with bodies, to the nearest stairwell and scurrying to apartment 6C (theirs, theirs with closets and trunks full of weapons that Dean never could get rid of, never store away and forget about).
If Angela was a little vicious, a little vocal, in killing some of the wandering infected, well. So were they, and she had lost more, had lost her family.
Grief. Guilt.
It's only when they barricade their own apartment and she doesn't stop, stumbling legs and hoarse grunts that Dean gets it (faster than Sam, who's off and looking for something, something, Dean doesn't know what).
Goddamnit, he thinks, of course she would have to wait until they lock themselves in, and Dean can hear the battering of bodies hitting their door, infected drawn to the sounds of their flight.
They should have realized, he guesses, maybe these infected don't act hungry, don't bite and leave saliva behind, but - but that damn thing exploding - she was exposed (and Dean's mind was screaming Sam was. Dean had seen the splatters, dark and cloying, and the truth sinks his stomach).
It's his apartment. There's a gun in the table next to him.
Either Angela's sudden shrieks or the quickfire pop pop of the shots drag Sam back to the living room, arms braced in the doorway, face pale and eyes confused.
Dean had asked, spun to face them when they'd first gotten free, asking, any wounds? Did they bite you?
Sam had shaken his head, the woman stuttered out a no. They had scrubbed the congealing mess off, and hours later - when the screaming had stopped - they had taken turns showering, scavenging clothes from closets and drawers.
Now Sam's eyes drift up from the sprawled out corpse in the living room. Maybe. Maybe I.
Dean shifts, rolls his shoulders back, gun down and pointed at the floor. So?
They've stood here before, at opposite ends of a room, waiting for the world (terror and almost-tears and I'm tired, so fuckin tired, Sammy, I.) to come crashing down. Dean knows how this goes.
Their breath comes out harsh as they count out the seconds until the sun slips over the horizon.
They end up getting the screen out and tipping Angela out of the window. The infected down below converge on the movement, but they know, seem to, that she was more one of them than anything.
Dean watches them spread out again, calm and controlled, when everything goes still again.
**
"What are we gonna do, then, Dean?" Sam hisses back, night still heavy around their vocal chords.
Dean just stares, watching Sam shrug and flinch. The majority of the infected had dispersed within the first week, and every day there are less and less of them, more piles of rotting corpses but nothing to replace them.
"Load for bear," he says. "And run like hell."
**
Back before everything, before the start of the infection, before they had gotten a month into the end of the world, Dean would get home earlier than Sam, by minutes. Sam would always come bursting in, and Dean would always be by the window, just in the process of lowering the sheet that served as their curtain.
One night Sam comes up to him, chest brushing Dean's shoulder, and pushes the sheet backward, revealing the large square of lawn and the car park surrounding it. It's paid space, and if Dean's going to shell out money for his baby, it'd be better than an uncovered parking lot in an apartment complex (and he did, found a garage space first thing and stashed the Impala there).
What are you doing? Sam's breath is warm against the side of his face, carrying the peculiar tang of artificial sweetener, and Dean'd give him grief about switching to Diet Coke or whatever, but he's suddenly tired.
See the black CX-9, first row, first space? Sam's close enough that Dean feels his nod before he mumbles yeah. Belongs to 2C. The black Camry belongs to 7C and the black -
Blue. Dark blue.
Dark blue Lincoln belongs to -
Mr. Hesher. Sam grins when Dean turns his head up toward his brother. Otherwise known as 8C. Have you been casing people, Dean?
Dean snorts. Have you? Dean rocks back, pushing at Sam to get him to move. His brother leans in a minute before slipping to the side. Sam stays silent. 'S not hurting anyone.
Just in case; it's just in case. And then, what he thinks they both know: we're not normal, Sam, we don't get to have this.
**
They’re packed with what they can carry and still haul ass with. Dean takes one more look at the window, sees the CX-9 sitting quietly in its spot, relatively unharmed even with the carnage around it. Dean can’t see any infected, but it doesn’t mean they’re not there, just still, now that the weird ass bile scent - whatever - is fading. Not as hyped up and aware.
They can do this, Dean thinks. They are doing it.
“We get into 2C, find the keys, and get down there, quiet as possible.”
Sam shrugs his pack higher. “Dean, what if the keys aren’t there - it was crazy - “
“The family was home. When they came out to check, the guy was in gym clothes, empty handed, remember?” No way they even had time to get the keys - kids screaming and running, the mom gone after them, the dad stone still and gape mouthed until one infected ripped his head off -
-the keys were still there.
“Nn - no, Dean, I don’t remember, I.” Sam shakes his head. “Fine, okay. We get the keys, get out and get to the car.” He takes a deep breath, and Dean’s chest is too constricted to do the same. “Let’s go.”
The place is destroyed, wide open since that night, furniture torn and randomly stained, rotten food in bowls and on the counter and at the table, remnants of their last meal, all furred and green-white.
“Shit,” Sam whispers, shuffling through papers and books spilled along the walls. There’s blood everywhere Dean looks, although there’s no bodies, not like what lines the hallways outside, but everything’s tacky in the humidity, still, rust and copper, metallic tang in the back of Dean’s throat.
“Just look, Sammy,” he manages, in between popping up like gophers at the slightest noise. They have tp look demented, and he fights back the laughter tickling through his chest.
They’re quiet after that, dry shush shush of moving paper, until Sam jumps up, arms over his head, keys dangling from his fingers. “Dean, Dean, got ‘em.”
They share a look. Window checks and hall checks are clear, but damn.
Damn.
Rotting bodies are everywhere, the stench of them is thick in the dead, still air, Dean's racing by quick, Sam right behind him, a hulking shadow weight over his shoulder. There's only the occasional infected who sees them, and they're easy to dispatch. Using blades, this time, because Dean doesn’t want a mass of them coming their way when the guns go off. And these guys, these guys might be quick and might be strong, but they’re easy to put down, bodies susceptible to blunt force or a gaping hole courtesy of 9 inches of pointed steel.
They bypass the lobby, splattered with dry blood and bile and use the maintenance door instead, quick check into the cramped, bare area and then they’re piling in, exit highlighted under the buzzing red light.
Sam has the key ring in his hand, fingers hovering over the unlock button. Dean says, “ready?” and sees his brother’s jerky nod.
The door swings open and they step out.
It’s easy until they’re near the SUV, outrunning the small group chasing them when Sam hits the unlock button, and gets his door open and closed just as an infected slams into the side of the car.
Dean rips at the door, hears the sound of an infected sliding across the slick body of the car, and hears the sound of the lock engaged when he pulls against it.
“Sam!” He yells, one hand still on the door, other holding up his shotgun, “unlock my door!” The blast gets the slavering infected right in the face, and Dean ducks as a wet mess showers down on him. Others are right behind and just as he’s getting ready to shoot again, he hears the shink of the door unlocking. He throws it open catching an infected in the stomach with the side of the door.
He gets in, slams the door shut, and it’s only when Sam’s flying into reverse that he realizes there’s fingers caught in the door. “Fuck!”
“What, what, what - “ Sam’s looking frantic, vibrating in his seat as he shifts into drive, speeding through the rush and thunk of bodies hitting the car. Dean braces himself, swings his door open to Sam’s yelled the fuck and plants a boot in the face hissing up at him. He hears the body hit the pavement before he gets the door closed again.
“We did it,” Sam laughs, “fuck, we actually did it.”
Dean grins, head rolling back against the headrest, blood congealing thick and tight against his skin, too damn close to his mouth. “Go to the garage,” he says, “we’re getting the Impala.”
Everything’s empty. Not surprising, considering, but first driving in the Mazda, smooth glide of a too-new car, faint hum of the engine working, and then later, loud rumble of the Impala under Dean’s hands, heading down the highway, it’s only that, only them, and a repeated message on the air, giving them a place to start.
Pennsylvania.
Their first stop hours later is a convenience store, topping up the Impala, and then heading in, guns out and ready. No one’s around, though, and the inside of the store is full of crashed displays and broken refrigerator sections, glass sprinkled on the floor and bottles crushed.
“Keep an eye out,” he says, and heads to the back. He sees bathrooms, and he turns on luckwarm, smelly water and scrubs at the crusted red mess in his hair, across his cheeks and hands, trailing down his neck.
The bathroom looks like a fresh crime scene by the time he's done and leaving. He spots cleaning closets and then at the farthest end of the building he sees what he’s looking for. Thin wood door, locked, but caving quickly under his boot.
Inventory is stacked neatly in the back, pallet after a pallet of non perishables, and Dean loads spare bags he finds with up water and convenience store foods enough to make Sam roll his eyes. Cans go in, too, chilli and soup, whatever he comes across.
“Jesus,” Sam says, but when Dean raises an eyebrow at him, he just shrugs takes two of the bags off of him to carry to the car. “All quiet.”
“Yeah,” Dean says, looking around at the flat landscape. He sees cars and buildings, trash and belongings in the street. Bodies and blood, but no movement.
“It’s weird. I mean, I guess if they aren’t dead, then the virus or infection eventually kills them. I mean, right? Or.” He stops, slams the trunk closed. He doesn’t speak again until they’re in the car, radio on low and whispering, to anyone who can hear this … “I mean, what’s left? Do they become undead?”
Sam trails off like he’s expecting a response, but he isn’t looking at Dean, he’s facing straight ahead, arms stiff, hands in his lap.
“I don’t know,” Dean says, “I guess.”
**
They settle on Tennessee. Small town, but uncurious locals, isolated homes. There’s no walking down Main Street smiling and waving at so-and-so and what’s-her-face.
It’s normal, but not Sam’s normal, not his fantasy of what it should be (what he thought he signed up for with Jessica and Stanford and a future law degree). Even two years later, Dean can still see the disappointment.
Dean, on the other hand, adjusts quickly. It’s not what he imagined. Not after a trip to Hell, watching his brother figuratively and then literally do the same. He thought he’d die hunting, free Sam then for all this day-to-day, wake up in the same place shit. But after Sam’d come back, soulless and empty, then raving and almost dying, he decided fuck it.
The Winchesters had done enough, good and bad. They could stop.
He doesn’t get rid of everything. He doesn’t deny it. He just puts a little bit of distance between him and hunting. Sam and hunting. Nights are spent indoors watching sitcoms, weekends are for grilling in the quad, or going out to the only grimy bar in town.
It becomes real in a way the past few years of dying and angels and end-of-the-world hijinks haven’t been. Sam there, a room away, a text or call away. Not in danger, not that, but easier, looking younger and less hurt and damaged. Every time Dean sees it he thinks, this is what Dad meant. This is keeping Sam safe.
**
They can’t drive forever, Dean knows that, and he doesn’t really feel like doing zombie checks at night.
“Just pick, I guess,” Sam says, he’s bouncing his knees, and Dean knows it’s from a combo of needing to piss and needing to stretch mile-long legs. But when Dean drives by a few more buildings, Sam growls, and snaps, “there. Christ. That one.”
Out of habit, Dean pulls into the Motel 6’s parking lot. He already knows it was stupid - no real way to barricade these rooms, but they need a break, a quick one, and he thinks they can maybe just look around. There's no infected he can see right away, and the pain in his ass says he'll take the chance inside.
It’s shocking, though, turning off the engine, and having nothing else filling up the air, no cars passing by, nothing. They sit, waiting, seeing if anything’s drawn to their noise.
“Nothing,” Sam whispers, and they check guns, load up duffel bags with weapons, salt, and food and water, before heading toward the office.
There’s the corpse of an overweight man collapsed on the floor in front of the check in desk. There for a while, judging by the smell and bloaty decomp.
“Gross,” Dean says, side stepping the body.
“Back here,” Sam says, voice echoing from past the desk and through the darkened hallway. “Fuck,” said as Dean flips on the switch, weak light buzzes overhead but Sam’s still squinting like it’s high noon or some shit.
“Don’t have to be standin around in the dark, Einstein, there’s - wait. Personal rooms?”
“Hmm.” Sam edges closer to the shut door. Amber light shivers out from the edge. Sam nods his head and steps toward the door, slowly turning the knob and pushing forward. There’s no sound, but judging from the way Sam pockets his gun and braces his other hand higher on the door, pushing with slightly more force, that there’s some kind of weight blocking the entrance.
When it’s cracked open, Sam backs up, pulls out his gun and waits. Dean keeps one eye on Sam and the room and the other toward the front of the office.
When Sam slips through the door, Dean’s right behind him, turning to train his gun on the front of the door and a little girl.
At first he thinks she’s dead (and god that’s a relief, barely able to see skin or clothes under the blood and wounds), but then Sam moans, and Dean looks again.
He sees the girl’s chest rise and fall, shallow and unsteady. “Oh, Christ,” and it almost sounds like a sob, and Sam’s touching her, trying to see, before Dean can protest. “I don’t - I don’t see bite marks, Dean. I think they just tore her apart. Jesus, she’s alive, how is she alive.”
“Sam, come on, man, you can’t - “
“She’s a kid, Dean! We can’t leave her!”
“And she could be infected, for fuck’s sake. How do we know whose blood that is? Hers or one of the infected?”
“That’s the least of our problems, goddamnit, or did you forget about that damn thing exploding back at the apartments? I lived through that - ” and Dean can hear what Sam doesn’t say, when Angela didn’t; when I was right there with her, as covered in it as she was. And there's Dean, towelling off blood, brain and bits of bone in a ransacked convenience store. “She was his kid. She must have heard him getting killed.”
Sam’s hands drift restlessly, shoulders to face to hair, all blood spattered, every motion wasted. She’s ten, maybe twelve, wearing what looks like a summer dress, bare feet curled stiff and spastic in the dingy shag carpet. Dean can see eyes slit open under matted lashes. She’s not there, empty and gone, body just too slow to follow.
Or, Christ, that’s what he prays, anyway.
They wait there. Sam seems rooted to the spot, shocky. Dean sits on her other side, uneasy but unwilling to rush Sam (he can’t say, we can end it, Sam. We can make it easier on her, because it wouldn’t be easy for Sam, and Dean flashes on tears and moonlight and she asked me. I have to, I have to).
He knows, can see the moment, when everything catches up to his brother, and he slumps, one still-tan, strong arm outstretched, hand palm up underneath a dirty, scrawny arm. Dean can imagine the heat rising up out of his brother, slipping through the girl’s skin, and maybe that’s enough, maybe she’ll know she isn’t alone.
Sam sleeps through it, the last bit of her dying. Her gasps cause spasms, and Dean can imagine stress fractures deepening, shattering under the strain. More pain, more damage, to the tiny body and he slides his hands under her, draws her closer and up, until her head is pressed under his jaw, bloody, mangled legs draped over his thighs.
He rocks her, and as her lungs squeeze out the last bits of air, he chants, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
He wants to let Sam sleep, figures someone should and Sam claimed it first, but at some point, holding a rapidly cooling body, he falls asleep, too.
He jerks awake when pressure is suddenly lifted off of him. He looks up, sees Sam cradling the girl’s body, and looks down, at his own chest and pants, and sees streaks of blood, bits of hair left behind where Sam has taken her away.
“I found a sheet,” Sam says, and Dean finally sees the righted cot, off-white sheet spread out neatly on the thin mattress. "It's been quiet." Sam's mouth is twisted, unhappy and unsure.
“Yeah,” he says, and turns away when Sam walks over to the rickety bed. He doesn’t need to see to know Sam’s laying her down, wrapping her up. A shroud, a fuckin shroud for a kid.
“You should have woken me up, Dean,” Sam’s voice is wounded animal soft, wary. “I would’ve - “
“What?” Dean shrugs and still doesn’t look at Sam, goes to gather up their shit. “Watched her die, too? Lotta good that would’ve done.”
“I was the one - “
“Sam, just shut up, okay?” Dean finally looks, turns back and looks. Sam’s tall, ragged, behind him, to the side of the low bed. Dean wants to apologize, but Sam knows; he always fuckin knows now. No more fights over stupid shit, just a self-deprecating smile and a nod like Sam knows the secrets of the universe, so of course his brother’s head is nothing.
It’s late afternoon before Dean’s even tempted to try to eat something from the bags in the backseat. They’ve stopped to clean up at another empty convenience store bathroom (and maybe they could have showered at the motel, but fuck. Dean was too antsy to do anything but splash water and handsoap over visible parts of himself, fuck the rest of it), switched seats twice, stopped to piss three times, and Dean’s head is pounding, ready to slaughter him for a cup of coffee, instant crystal shit or not.
“Goddammit,” he grunts, sunglasses over his eyes, blocking out too-bright sun. It almost feels like any other hunt, although it’s been years since they’ve been in the car this long.
“Tired?” Sam asks, and Dean rolls his head toward him, hears if anyone can hear this … but only says, “uh,” before turning back and resting his forehead on the cool glass of the window.
Sam leaves him to it.
He must fall asleep again, because when he opens his eyes it's near dark, and Sam is shouting, doing something to the car to make her fuckin scream.
Dean looks away from the horror that is Sam's driving, and for a second his eyes don't comprehend what's right outside the windshield. It's big, gray flesh stretched and twisting over elongated and mutilated arms, surrounded by other infected (and jesus christ, are they wearing hazmat suits?), and. Oh, shit.
"Oh shit," Dean says, pressing back into his seat, like it's going to get him farther away, "Oh shit oh shit oh shit. GO!"
"Where, Dean, the fuck am I going, he's holding the goddamn road in his hands!"
"Back," Dean shrieks, and sees Sam go stiff, "go back go back!"
Sam's not looking, arm over the seat, head twisted around as the Impala shoots backward. Dean is, though; he sees the huge arms come up, lob the damn piece of asphalt after them, he sees it hit, feels it hit, shaking them and making his girl skitter and veer. He can see the pavement part under the assault, nice beeline straight for the Impala's bumper.
Then the infected start running.
"Fuck," he says, and the words are long, drawn out, like he can't think. He can't think. Sam's making a low keening noise; Dean doesn't think his brother's even aware of it. "That one's wearing armor."
**
God, you’re stupid, Sam huffs, bony shoulders bunched under his ears. Familiar look during Sam’s sophomore year, all angst and dark hair, but it’s fading now, blue-gray smoke clearing the frown out of Sam’s lips.
No, Sammy. Fuckin zombies. Imagine it. We’d be total badasses, right.
Yeah, until two-thirds into the - the apocalypse or whatever, Dean. We’d be toast.
What? The hell you talkin about, Sam. We’d be made, we’re the only ones know about this kinda shit.
First, what do we know about zombies? Dean opens his mouth to respond, and shuts it when he can’t come up with anything. Right, Sam smirks, nothing. Second? It’s the people who know anything that don’t actually make it. They always almost make it, but they never really make it.
Fuckin - fuckin character development for the surviving douchebags, dude, Dean laughs and leans back against the Impala’s windshield, joint held out to Sam. In his peripheral, the cherry flares as Sam tokes up, and Dean can smell the musk on Sam’s exhale.
Zombies, Sam says, a beat too late, and giggles.
**
Dean almost cheers when they cross into Pennsylvania. He doesn’t know why. He’s not sure what they’ll even find, if anything. Maybe just more survivors, or maybe a compound or maybe a death sentence for anyone stupid enough to actually follow the transmission.
All Dean knows is that he wants to know, either way. Whether Sam and he turn back, go on their own, or whether whatever’s in Pennsylvania is worth sticking around for. The curiosity is burning in him (living, living, unzombified people, Christ and it’s almost like he craves seeing a group of sane, functioning people).
What they actually see, though, is more and more of the infected. Howling and running, throwing themselves at and under the Impala, until the grind and thump is something familiar, the wave motion of rolling over rabid people just another part of the day.
“Survivors.” Sam says it like he’s guaranteeing something (an end, Dean thinks, as another body screams past his window, mouth wide and gaping bloody). Whatever it is, Dean has to believe him.
“You know,” Sam says later, when they’ve settled into an old paper factory’s basement, doors blockaded, floors laid with old sacks that smell pungently sour, small camp light situated between them. “I would have thought that all the other supernatural shit would have used this as an excuse to go all out. I mean, talk about a convenient distraction.”
“Maybe they did,” Sam says after a while, continuing a conversation Dean doesn't feel like having. “Not like we’ve seen a lot of anything besides ... infected. How do we know? Maybe everything else got everyone else.” Sam's eyes are swollen, red, and Dean thinks exhaustion is riding him hard. Always has.
“Why’s it matter, Sam?” Dean finally asks. He crunches Twinkie wrappers between his fingers, sugar and flavoring too sweet on the back of his tongue. It makes him want to puke.
“Why wouldn’t it?” Spark of anger, finally, in the words, and Dean grins like it’s a victory, lips stretched tight over teeth, already crumbling at the edges.
He reaches out, and for a moment his arm feels heavy, shaky, the streaks of left over blood like a curse on his skin. Sam’s hair is greasy, soft spiked with dirt and oil in his grip when his fingers knot in the strands.
He tugs, and Sam allows it, shudders slightly when Dean’s other arm comes around his shoulders holding him tight to Dean’s chest. It’s a familiar weight pressing against his lungs, more solid, though, more noticeable than a tiny girl dying slowly in his arms.
He bows his head over Sam, just pretending for a moment that they’re not sitting, covered in blood and muck and their own smell, waiting for the dawn, waiting for the morning and a road that will lead them on, to the end of the world or the start of it.
He breathes with his brother, and when he feels the swell of Sam’s ribs against him, Dean cuts him off. “We’ll find it, Sam. We’ll find something.”