Title: Dead Man Walking
Author: HalfshellVenus
Characters: Dean and Sam (Gen, Drama)
Rating; PG
Summery: Mid- Season 3, this is how Dean survives the waiting.
Author's Notes: For my Switch_25 challenge, this is "Disconnection." I started this back in November, not realizing that it was nearly finished!
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The days are getting shorter, rushing by too quickly.
One hero-savior-soldier mission after another, just to fill the silence. That lifetime ago is gone now, the one where it all meant something, where he used to believe. Faith is a luxury Dean no longer has.
The quiet is short-lived, smooth breaths broken by the knowledge of what's coming. Nothing lasts forever, least of all him.
"Talk to me, Dean," Sam says-his voice a tether to the present. He doesn't understand why it's easier to sink into hedonism, or to chase the familiar rhythm of hunting and slip cleanly through unmarked hours. Dean thrives on the denial that makes surviving his timeline possible.
"Where are you going?" Sam asks, on those nights when Dean just has to get out from under the agony of his fate. Dean can't explain what he's looking for, the need to be touched with heat and desire and not the slightest hint of pity. Sam doesn't know that even the weight of his eyes on Dean is a plea for a miracle Dean can't provide.
Back seats, back rooms-Dean's own rented bed when he's shameless enough to return there and send Sam away. More and more often it's joyless, just a distraction from the inevitable.
Bedding all these strangers makes Dean feel lonelier than ever.
He knows he's still alive because he still wakes up from those nightmares that show him the future. Otherwise, he would wonder-haunted by Sammy's pain, his own soul a fading shadow in the blinding sun, it could all be Hell or just the bleakness of a world without hope.
They might even be the same.
Sam's says he's tired of the gallows humor, but Dean doesn't have the energy to find new ways to keep them from falling apart.
All he can do is hang on through another day, knowing they'll run out long before he's ready. Then he'll be gone.
In some ways, he already is.
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