things that don't get lost
Title: things that don’t get lost
Pairing: Gen, mention of Dean/Castiel
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Spoilers through 6.22
Summary: Somebody’s gotta be there to pick up the pieces when it all goes to hell. Bobby POV.
Sam keeps it together pretty well until they’re out in the parking lot, out beyond the glare of the streetlamps. He starts weaving like a drunk right around the time they hit the strip of grass where the Impala lies crushed like a tin can--and ain’t that just nostalgic in all the wrong ways, Bobby thinks.
He reaches out a hand to steady the kid, but Dean’s faster, close in to his brother’s side and an arm around his waist, “Come on, Sammy, one foot in front of the other, you can do it, man.”
He’s enough shorter that he fits under the hollow of Sam’s shoulder, sturdy enough to take most of his weight alone. Sam looks pale and sick and dazed, sweaty skin and a wandering strangeness in his eyes that disturbs the hell out of Bobby. Dean jostles him as they walk, and each time his head lurches up, eyes clearing for an instant before sinking back into whatever fresh hell is playing out inside his skull. He looks worse than Dean ever did when he came back, and Sam’s a tough kid but Bobby can’t see any way he’s gonna walk out of this one with his sanity.
Ain’t likely any one of them’s gonna walk away from this at all, really.
Dean’s jaw is tight, face like a mask. Bobby doesn’t even bother trying to talk, just jimmies the first likely-looking car he can find and helps Dean load Sam’s semi-conscious bulk into the backseat. Dean slides in next to him instead of taking the front seat, meets Bobby’s raised brows with a snake-eyed glare. “What the hell are you waiting for? Drive already.”
Bobby shakes his head and walks around to the drivers side to hotwire it. Reckon he should be happy one of them’s keeping it together enough to give him lip, anyway.
***
The car is an old Jeep with one headlight out and power steering that’s temperamental at best. In the backseat, Sam is mumbling, shaking fit to break apart, one big hand clutching helplessly at the front of his brother’s t-shirt. Dean has an arm around his shoulders, heads canted together like he’s telling a secret, lips moving. Too quiet for Bobby to make out the words, but the cadence is eerily familiar, soft and sing-song, the same way Dean used to read little Sammy to sleep from old Batman comics. Bobby hasn’t heard him talk like that since before his voice started to change.
It hits him in the gut in the worst way, those two lost boys grown up to this, but he doesn’t let that show.
***
They feed Sam pills and whiskey and get him settled down on the bed in the panic room. There’s still the angel-banishing sigils on the walls in there, and they oughta work on Castiel’s feathered lackeys even if they won’t do anything to stop the big man himself.
He sees Dean’s eyes travel over the scrawled spells, can read the same thoughts in the bitter turn of his mouth.
Sam mumbles, then, reaching out to grasp at Dean’s wrist like a little kid in the grip of a nightmare, and Dean’s attention is back on him. Bobby leaves them to it. He’s got angel gore all over his shirt, the low bloody stink of it all overlaid with sulfur and ozone, and he wants to get some clean clothes on, have a drink or three, and hit the books. See if there’s anything on God’s green earth they can do to stop what’s coming. Again.
Ain’t much he can do for Sam, anyway, and Dean will look after him as well as anybody can. Kid’s been picking up the pieces of this kind of mess his whole damn life, after all. It’s what he’s good at.
***
When he gets back downstairs, Sam’s sleeping the sleep of the heavily sedated and Dean is nowhere to be seen. The whiskey bottle is also missing, though, so Bobby ain’t that worried.
He checks Sam’s pulse, just to be on the safe side, rests a palm briefly on the kid’s sweaty forehead, then heads back up.
***
Dean’s out in the junkyard, sitting on the tailgate of a ‘56 F-100 with the bottle of whiskey and staring at the sky. His cheeks are wet, but it doesn’t look like he’s still crying. He doesn’t look up when Bobby approaches, doesn’t even try to wipe his face. Tilts his head back to drink, then holds the bottle out. “Hey, Bobby.”
“How you holding up?”
“About how you’d figure.”
Bobby nods, sits down on the tailgate next to Dean. He doesn’t bother trying to be sympathetic; it’s not something he’s good at, and Dean doesn’t really know how to deal with sympathy anyway. They’ve got that much in common.
The whiskey burns his throat, cheap rotgut strong enough to take the skin off the roof of your mouth, and he hands it back over to Dean. “Sam’s sleeping,” he offers.
“Yeah,” Dean says. He scrubs a hand over his face, then drops it helplessly to his lap. Looks too damn old to be the kid Bobby remembers, but that just means that Bobby’s getting too old himself. Goddamn. He never thought he’d survive this long, and he can’t say he’s glad to be wrong.
Laughing little Sammy, Sammy with the books and the smarts and the best chance of normal any of them ever had, back in the day--he’s passed out like a drunk in the panic room, and if he ever pulls together the scraps of his brain enough to say a coherent word again, it’ll be more than Bobby expects. John is dead. Rufus is dead. The one angel they had on their side just went and lost his goddamn mind, and Dean looks like he’ll sink down through the earth himself to take a dirt nap, given half a chance.
Bobby reaches out, puts a hand on his shoulder and gives him a little shake. “We’ll get this taken care of. Castiel is--”
“--no damn different from any other thing we’ve hunted,” Dean interrupts harshly. “Juiced-up angel with daddy issues. Same fucking thing as Lucifer all over again.”
“He’s your friend,” Bobby says sternly, even though he privately thinks there might have been a little more to it than that. It’s never really been a secret that Dean goes for guys sometimes--at least not from anybody but the late great John Winchester, and that mostly because John never had eyes to see anything about his sons that he wasn’t expecting to be there--but he’s never exactly encouraged discussion on the topic. Bobby knows more about Dean’s sex life than he’d really rather any which way, and he’s always been happy to let it lie. Never really been an issue before, except now there’s this goddamn mess. “We’ll get it taken care of.”
Dean rubs his face again, but Bobby keeps on staring at him until he finally nods. “Yeah. Sure thing, Bobby.”
It’s about the farthest thing in the world from sincere, but it’ll have to do.
“Come on, get your lazy ass inside and give me a hand.” He propels Dean to his feet with one hand and pulls the whiskey bottle away with the other, takes one long, fortifying gulp, then twists the lid back on. “We got work to do.”
Pairing: Gen, mention of Dean/Castiel
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Spoilers through 6.22
Summary: Somebody’s gotta be there to pick up the pieces when it all goes to hell. Bobby POV.
Sam keeps it together pretty well until they’re out in the parking lot, out beyond the glare of the streetlamps. He starts weaving like a drunk right around the time they hit the strip of grass where the Impala lies crushed like a tin can--and ain’t that just nostalgic in all the wrong ways, Bobby thinks.
He reaches out a hand to steady the kid, but Dean’s faster, close in to his brother’s side and an arm around his waist, “Come on, Sammy, one foot in front of the other, you can do it, man.”
He’s enough shorter that he fits under the hollow of Sam’s shoulder, sturdy enough to take most of his weight alone. Sam looks pale and sick and dazed, sweaty skin and a wandering strangeness in his eyes that disturbs the hell out of Bobby. Dean jostles him as they walk, and each time his head lurches up, eyes clearing for an instant before sinking back into whatever fresh hell is playing out inside his skull. He looks worse than Dean ever did when he came back, and Sam’s a tough kid but Bobby can’t see any way he’s gonna walk out of this one with his sanity.
Ain’t likely any one of them’s gonna walk away from this at all, really.
Dean’s jaw is tight, face like a mask. Bobby doesn’t even bother trying to talk, just jimmies the first likely-looking car he can find and helps Dean load Sam’s semi-conscious bulk into the backseat. Dean slides in next to him instead of taking the front seat, meets Bobby’s raised brows with a snake-eyed glare. “What the hell are you waiting for? Drive already.”
Bobby shakes his head and walks around to the drivers side to hotwire it. Reckon he should be happy one of them’s keeping it together enough to give him lip, anyway.
***
The car is an old Jeep with one headlight out and power steering that’s temperamental at best. In the backseat, Sam is mumbling, shaking fit to break apart, one big hand clutching helplessly at the front of his brother’s t-shirt. Dean has an arm around his shoulders, heads canted together like he’s telling a secret, lips moving. Too quiet for Bobby to make out the words, but the cadence is eerily familiar, soft and sing-song, the same way Dean used to read little Sammy to sleep from old Batman comics. Bobby hasn’t heard him talk like that since before his voice started to change.
It hits him in the gut in the worst way, those two lost boys grown up to this, but he doesn’t let that show.
***
They feed Sam pills and whiskey and get him settled down on the bed in the panic room. There’s still the angel-banishing sigils on the walls in there, and they oughta work on Castiel’s feathered lackeys even if they won’t do anything to stop the big man himself.
He sees Dean’s eyes travel over the scrawled spells, can read the same thoughts in the bitter turn of his mouth.
Sam mumbles, then, reaching out to grasp at Dean’s wrist like a little kid in the grip of a nightmare, and Dean’s attention is back on him. Bobby leaves them to it. He’s got angel gore all over his shirt, the low bloody stink of it all overlaid with sulfur and ozone, and he wants to get some clean clothes on, have a drink or three, and hit the books. See if there’s anything on God’s green earth they can do to stop what’s coming. Again.
Ain’t much he can do for Sam, anyway, and Dean will look after him as well as anybody can. Kid’s been picking up the pieces of this kind of mess his whole damn life, after all. It’s what he’s good at.
***
When he gets back downstairs, Sam’s sleeping the sleep of the heavily sedated and Dean is nowhere to be seen. The whiskey bottle is also missing, though, so Bobby ain’t that worried.
He checks Sam’s pulse, just to be on the safe side, rests a palm briefly on the kid’s sweaty forehead, then heads back up.
***
Dean’s out in the junkyard, sitting on the tailgate of a ‘56 F-100 with the bottle of whiskey and staring at the sky. His cheeks are wet, but it doesn’t look like he’s still crying. He doesn’t look up when Bobby approaches, doesn’t even try to wipe his face. Tilts his head back to drink, then holds the bottle out. “Hey, Bobby.”
“How you holding up?”
“About how you’d figure.”
Bobby nods, sits down on the tailgate next to Dean. He doesn’t bother trying to be sympathetic; it’s not something he’s good at, and Dean doesn’t really know how to deal with sympathy anyway. They’ve got that much in common.
The whiskey burns his throat, cheap rotgut strong enough to take the skin off the roof of your mouth, and he hands it back over to Dean. “Sam’s sleeping,” he offers.
“Yeah,” Dean says. He scrubs a hand over his face, then drops it helplessly to his lap. Looks too damn old to be the kid Bobby remembers, but that just means that Bobby’s getting too old himself. Goddamn. He never thought he’d survive this long, and he can’t say he’s glad to be wrong.
Laughing little Sammy, Sammy with the books and the smarts and the best chance of normal any of them ever had, back in the day--he’s passed out like a drunk in the panic room, and if he ever pulls together the scraps of his brain enough to say a coherent word again, it’ll be more than Bobby expects. John is dead. Rufus is dead. The one angel they had on their side just went and lost his goddamn mind, and Dean looks like he’ll sink down through the earth himself to take a dirt nap, given half a chance.
Bobby reaches out, puts a hand on his shoulder and gives him a little shake. “We’ll get this taken care of. Castiel is--”
“--no damn different from any other thing we’ve hunted,” Dean interrupts harshly. “Juiced-up angel with daddy issues. Same fucking thing as Lucifer all over again.”
“He’s your friend,” Bobby says sternly, even though he privately thinks there might have been a little more to it than that. It’s never really been a secret that Dean goes for guys sometimes--at least not from anybody but the late great John Winchester, and that mostly because John never had eyes to see anything about his sons that he wasn’t expecting to be there--but he’s never exactly encouraged discussion on the topic. Bobby knows more about Dean’s sex life than he’d really rather any which way, and he’s always been happy to let it lie. Never really been an issue before, except now there’s this goddamn mess. “We’ll get it taken care of.”
Dean rubs his face again, but Bobby keeps on staring at him until he finally nods. “Yeah. Sure thing, Bobby.”
It’s about the farthest thing in the world from sincere, but it’ll have to do.
“Come on, get your lazy ass inside and give me a hand.” He propels Dean to his feet with one hand and pulls the whiskey bottle away with the other, takes one long, fortifying gulp, then twists the lid back on. “We got work to do.”