Alive With the Glory of Sam
Title: Alive With the Glory of Sam
Summary: The beginning of Season 4. The facts are same. Nothing else is.
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 4, definitely.
Wordcount: 7,249.
Author's Note: Sammyverse--asthmatic Sam and BFF Winchesters. This is basically me giving the middle finger to season 4. Title is from "Alive with the Glory of Love" by Say Anything. Great song.
--
For a few months (days, hours, years? It's Hell, he doesn't fucking know) Dean has been hearing this voice.
It's only every once in a while, but it's been enough to keep him a little bit sane. He'd be convinced he's imagining it if it sounded in any way familiar (he'd be telling himself it's Sam if it sounded anything, anything at fucking all, like that kid, Christ he misses him, Christ he he didn't think it could possibly be this bad, Jesus God damn it he can't even think his name anymore, not like he used to, Sam isn't his bratty snot-nosed beautiful little brother anymore, Sam is the holy of holies, Sam is the reason to hate himself for the horrible things he does, Sam is somehow at the end of all of this, in the beginning, there was Sam) but he must not be imagining it because it doesn't sound like anyone he's ever met and why would his mind make up a voice, is he that fucking crazy? So he has no idea, but he clings to it, he clings because there is nothing the fuck else to cling to besides burned flesh and stripped down bone and tongue and the hair wrapped around his finger like a fucking wedding ring and the fractured melodies of lullabies John used to sing to them.
The voice.
It's going to be all right, Dean.
We're going to get you out of there.
We have work for you.
It isn't Sam's voice, which is what makes Meg, standing here telling him that this a sign, all the more fucking confusing.
Because Dean does hear Sam's voice, all the time, this fucking running monologue in his head, all these things that Sam's ever said mixed together and incoherent, just this voice, this voice that makes him want to buckle at the knees and bend at the waist and heave for all of eternity (which is not a turn of phrase, nothing is a fucking turn of phrase anymore) just Sam's voice saying fucking everything he's ever said, but one sentence rings out on its own all the damn time is Before I get you out, I'm going to send you a sign and Dean twists the strand of Sam's hair he has around his finger, twists it and twists it and twists it.
And that voice, that voice that isn't Sam's, complicating everything:
We're going to get you out, Dean.
But Dean wants Sam.
And Sam promised him a sign.
Sam Sam Sam Sam Sam he can't take this anymore, he can't get any fucking further from the person who holds you when you're sick, he can't get any further away, he doesn't know what he'll fucking do, he doesn't know how long he'll be able to believe that there are signs.
**
He's alone with Alastair, that fucking hand on his fucking cheek, when he feels it.
A tug.
It starts small, like someone has reached into his shoulder and pinched a muscle, but then it grows until it's ripping, burning, and he chokes out a scream and Alastair chuckles for a moment, then he narrows his eyes and says-what--
And then there's a flash of blue, there's warmth, there's the smell of rotted wood and dust--not flesh-and he hears a crash and a crack and something metal hitting his stomach and then he's yanked up, there's too much air and too much sun in eyes, and he's coughing up dirt, someone else is coughing-holymotherofGodthatcough.
'That fucking goddamn fucking cough, he would know it anywhere. He would know it if he had had to wait another thousand years.
So he rubs his eyes, he rubs them hard, get this fucking dust out let him see Jesus fuck let me see and he feels thumbs on his face helping to get him clean and holyfuck he knows those thumbs, he never would have thought he'd recognize these thumbs but he does, he doesn't have to fucking think about it, he knows them, rough and long and shit and then he can see. The dust is out, he blinks, he can see.
There he is.
Framed in sunlight like some kind of saint, shoulders broader than Dean remembered, stupid hair in his eyes, dirty t-shirt, Dean's necklace, enormous fucking smile and forehead on Dean's and hands on the sides of Dean's head and whispering “Heyhey. Hey. Hey,” and then just, “Dean. Fuck. Dean. Jesus. Dean.”
“Sam.” Dean wraps himself around Sam's neck and nothing else matters, nothing that happened to him matters, nothing else is ever going to fucking matter again.
**
He feels okay; he doesn't really need Sam's arm around his waist, helping him to the car, but Sam doesn't need to know that, okay?
“You're breathing,” Dean says.
Sam laughs-Sam's laugh-”I think your breathing is a little more remarkable this time around, D.”
“No.”
Sam smiles at him-Sam's smile-as he helps Dean into the car, and Dean's hand moves up all the fuck on its own and taps a finger over one of Sam's dimples. Those stupid fucking things, girls always went crazy over them, Jess would hook in a finger and pinch his cheek, John could look so much like Sam when he wanted to (Sam never looked like John-in the motherfucking beginning there was Sammy) and these fucking things, this fucking smile fucking kid fucking ground under Dean's feet, his goddamn car, and Sam.
Sam lets him, grabbing Dean's other hand and twisting it up.
“You're bigger,” Dean says. “Yeah?”
“Yep.”
“And breathing. What did you do? You did something.”
Sam scratches behind Dean's ear. “I'll tell you all about it. Let's get you some water first. Some clean clothes. Something to eat, okay? And I'll tell you all about it.”
Telling him all about it.
That sounds incredible.
And maybe that's why Dean doesn't wait for some tearful midnight confession after some nightmare, maybe that's why they're in the car driving to wherever the fuck and Dean's heart is still pounding and he's still tasting the dust from his fucking coffin and he's already working on burying everything, already figuring out how he's never going to talk about it fucking ever and then he goddamn hears himself saying “They strung me up on racks, Sam, crammed next to all these other...and all of us, on these fucking wracks, and Alastair, and then he told me that if I couldn't take it anymore, and I tried, Sammy, I tried-” and Sam does exactly what the fuck Dean needed him to, he holds the scruff of Dean's neck and looks at him every once in a while and he listens and nods and he keeps driving. He gets them the fuck away from there.
He says these are our lives, and I will not stop driving because you fucked up.
And then he turns off the car in the parking lot of some motel and he scoots over so he's closer to Dean.
“Hey,” he says. “Look at me.”
He can't.
Because what the fuck? He's Dean's little brother, this fucking kid that he's looked after since the beginning, and he's been so fucking careful with him, kid gloves, always, cradling Sam and his fucking lungs through every fucking childhood disease and then some, and Dean's been a fucking machine about it, okay? Dean was a fucking machine made to take care of Sam, he was the sidekick, he was coaching Sam and holding Sam and getting Sam ready to be that big hero and now Sam's looking at him (Sam is healthier than he was when Dean was here) and Dean is a machine capable of so much fucking more, horrible, horrible fucking more, and he would have been just find never fucking learning that and why did he have to tell Sam, he just got him back, he just fucking got him back and now Sam will run screaming.
“Look at me, Dean. C'mon, shit, you've got to look at me, you have any idea how much I missed those eyes?”
Dean looks up.
“There we go.” Sam takes the water Dean's been gulping down, spills some into his own hands, wipes Dean's face clean. “That's all over now,” he says. “I got you out. You're staying here with me.”
“I don't know how to live with this, Sam. With this shit that I did. How the fuck am I supposed to act now?”
“Then let me live with you. And I'll teach you. And if we have to learn together, we learn together.”
“This stupid fucking shit you say, I missed it so goddamn much.”
Sam laughs and pulls Dean into a hug.
“Thanks for telling me,” he says, quietly. “Thank you so fucking much. I didn't think you could.”
“I didn't think you could breathe, so...”
Sam laughs a little and fucks up Dean's hair, the little shit. “C'mon. Let's talk. Room service has... well.” He pauses. “Room service has whatever you want.”
Dean wants ice cream.
**
So Sam's clearly been staying at this motel for a little while, a week or two at least. There are clippings hanging from the wall, books open on the spare bed, a pile of dirty clothes in the corner.
A pile of dirty girl clothes.
“Girlfriend?” Dean says, tugging off his shirt, pulling on one of Sam's.
“Not...exactly.”
“Drag queen boyfriend?”
“Honestly, maybe closer.”
“Fuck. Ruby?”
“That's the one.”
Dean groans.
“I know. She's brunette now. I have a problem.” He holds up his hands before Dean can say anything. “Dead brunette. There's no one in there with her. Let's not talk about the dead part. Just...”
“Ugh.”
“I know. Anything you can think about it, I've already thought, I swear.”
Dean shudders, but he does it mostly for affect, and Sam smiles like he's supposed to.
“So where is she now?”
“Out. Reconnaissance. We're still after Lilith.”
“I kind of thought...”
“That we got you out by killing Lilith? Nope? Bitch runs wild.”
“Then how...”
“You keep asking all these half-questions that I'm about to full-answer, but you have to just let me talk, okay?” He says it all really fucking gently. “Let me order some food and I'll tell you all about it.” He takes his inhaler off the nightstand and shakes it, and, wow, that isn't right. The inhaler was on the nightstand? Why didn't Sam have it with him? Since when does Sam go fucking anywhere, since when does Sam go to the fucking bathroom, without the thing in his pocket?
Sam sees Dean's face, wheezes (this quiet, soft, nothing to fucking worry about wheeze) out a sigh, and says, “Okay. I guess food can wait.”
**
In all honesty, Dean appreciates that Sam clearly does not have a speech prepared. He hasn't figured out the gentle way to deliver this news. He's not spinning anything. He's stumbling and blushing and giving Dean these nervous looks and not trying to think of a positive way to say I've been drinking demon blood for three months and Dean appreciates that, really, but he's not exactly at his most reasonable right now, give him a day or two, all right?
Sam reads his fucking mind as usual and says, “I didn't want to spring this on you today.”
“What the fuck, Sam?”
Sam flops on his back on the bed. “It was...after you died, and I was so sick, that fucking pneumonia held on because at first I just didn't have it in me to fight, okay? And I know, I know, I promised you I'd be all big and strong, but...fuck, I had a fever of a hundred and fucking five and you were there one minute and then I was in that fucking ambulance and your blood was all over me and the paramedics are yelling about why the fuck am I bleeding and then I started coughing up all this blood so they left that alone, but that didn't exactly bring you back, you know, and...”
These long rambling sentences aren't Sam, Sam doesn't talk like this because Sam isn't supposed to fucking breathe like this, holy shit, listen to Sammy, look at Sammy all big and strong and...fuck.
“And I'm in the hospital and I'm just a fucking mess. I was in there for like two weeks, it sucked, and I wasn't getting any better and...the doctors were talking some scary shit. And I was fighting at that point. I swear to God, I was. But it was like...it was like when Jess died, remember? My body just fucking gives up on me when bad shit happens.”
Dean plays with Sam's fingers because it's easier than looking at him.
There's demon blood running through these fingers.
But he's known that for a long time.
He's known that since Sammy, hole still healing in his back and chin shaking and eyes watering, told him that Azazel broke into the nursery to bleed in his mouth, that there was a little bit of demon blood in him and that's why he was supposed to go bad, and that Yellow-Eyes killed Mary just to get to him, and then all that stupid bullshit about if I hadn't been born Mom would be alive and Dean had never, ever, seen his kid cry like that (had never watched Sam watch him die at that point) and he held him and whispered stupid nonsense bullshit and Sam was okay.
And now Sam's drinking demon blood.
And Sam sits up and Sam is Sam, he doesn't have black eyes or an evil smile, and a minute ago he took a big swig of holy water just to show Dean he could, and he's breathing.
“It makes you breathe?” Dean says, quietly.
Sam nods. “Ruby told me it would help. I thought she was fucking with me. I was about ready to exorcise her, I swear. But I was dying, Dean, and...and you told me not to die.”
Dean tugs on Sam's hair.
“And she just dabbed a little on my lips and...” Sam looks away. “God, it's so gross. I'm sorry.”
“And what?”
“It's...not a miracle, you know? I'm not healed, I'm still not, you know. Normal. But it's so much better. The food allergies are gone. Practically all the damn allergies are gone, I'm a little sneezy in the mornings but fine besides that. I use the inhaler when I need it but that's once a day, sometimes not even, and I take the steroid one still at nights but I don't really need it and I'm off everything else. I can exercise...shit, we always thought I wasn't exercised-induced, right? It's amazing how much more I can do now, Dean. Amazing. I didn't know I could ever fucking feel this good. You should see the hunts I'm doing and the stuff I'm able to do, how long I can go without getting tired. I gained twenty pound of muscle like it was nothing. And I...”
“And what?” Dean says, again. Gentler.
Because shit.
His kid.
His fucking kid here.
He's breathing.
“And I can sort of exorcise demons with my mind. Yeah. And apparently drag people out of hell. Though that was not fucking easy, so let's not make a habit out of that, okay?”
“Dad?” Dean says, quietly.
“Dad's not down there. Ruby and I called in every connection we know, just looking for him. Wherever he went when the gate opened, it wasn't back down there.”
“I don't like that you know demons,” Dean says, quietly.
“It's not like they're my friends. Besides Ruby. I fucking tortured them, Dean. We're...well, you know. Horses of the same color.”
“Shit.”
“Essentially, yeah.”
“You can exorcise demons with your fucking mind?”
Sam laughs, once. “I was wondering when you'd get to that part.”
“Jesus, Sam.”
“The victims survive,” Sam says. “Unless the demon's fucked them over. It's so much better than the knife. Ruby says if we keep going like this, I'll be able to kill them soon. Kill them, and save the people they're possessing. That's...I mean, that's the dream, right?”
He's desperate, fucking desperate, for Dean to agree with him.
And he's wheezing a little, sounding like Sammy.
“I need to think about this,” Dean says. “This can't be good.”
“But I'm only doing good things with it.”
“It's demon blood, Sam. Did you even stop to think that maybe the reason it's helping you is because Azazel or whoever the fucking wanted it to? You always wondered why you have this fucking shit pair of lungs, maybe you were fucking bred for this, did you think about that? They put this fucking crack in your armor and made you live with it so that you'd do anything to patch it up?”
Sam nods a little.
“Well?”
“I'm only doing good things,” Sam says, again, then he swallows and looks down and says, "But...Dean...if you tell me to stop, I'll stop. I mean it. This was...to get me through until you got back. And to get you back.” His voice gets small and he says, “Just don't be mad, okay?” and God, he's twelve years old again.
“I'm not mad. I just need to think. And we'll talk about what to do about this, okay?”
Sam keeps nodding, harder now, but then he says, “I really like breathing, Dean. It's really awesome,” and shit, what the fuck is Dean supposed to say to that?
“Does it hurt you?” he says, quietly.
“Drinking the blood? No.”
“Exorcising.”
“Headache. Like with visions.”
“How about pulling people out of hell, how's that feel?”
Sam rubs the back of his neck, doesn't say anything.
Dean sighs. “All right. Bedtime.”
“I'm okay.”
“Are you fucking crazy right now? I haven't seen you in...Jesus.” He gives Sam's hair another pull. “And you're not going to let me fuss over you?”
Sam smiles a little. “Sorry. I'm out of practice.”
“Me too. So we've got to get back into it. C'mon.” He waits for Sam to take his shoes off, then moves him underneath the covers and pulls the comforter to his chin. “Let me take care of you. Be sweet. Let's...be good guys.”
Sam pushes his face into the pillow. “I want to be good guys.”
Dean sits on the side of the bed and practically drowns in the Samness of this entire fucking situation, then says, “Hey. Did you work with anyone?”
“Ruby.”
“To get me out of hell?”
“Just Ruby.”
“Never...a guy?”
Sam yawns. “Drag queen boyfriend.”
“I mean a real guy?”
“No. What are you talking about?”
“I just...heard this voice sometimes, that's all.”
“Wasn't me?”
“No. I wanted it to be.”
“I'm here now,” says Dean's little brother, Dean's breathing, fucked-up, beautiful little brother.
“Yeah.” Dean puts his hand on Sam's arm. “Jesus. Yeah. You are.”
And he's still Sam, and that's all there fucking is to it. The end.
**
Except it's not, because he's lying next to Sam because why the fuck would he be in his own bed right now, Sam is here, when a voice says, “Dean,” not a voice, the voice, and Dean springs the fuck up and grabs his knife.
In the low light, he can make out a man, not bigger than him, sure as hell not bigger than Sam. Suit, tie. Trench coat.
Dean holds the knife out with one hand and shakes Sam awake with the other and says, “Who the fuck are you?”
“I'm Castiel. We need to talk.”
“No, who are you?”
Sam sits up, coughing. “Not a demon.”
“How can you tell?”
“I can tell.” He wheezes and wraps his arms around his chest. “Where's Ruby?”
“She hasn't been here. You okay?” He's still looking at the guy. Castiel.
“Yeah...”
“I need to talk to you,” Castiel says. “Without Sam.”
“How the fuck do you know Sam?”
“There's been a lot of talk about Sam.”
“Famous Sammy,” Dean says, softly to him, just to make him smile. Because that's the kind of thing you do when Sam can't breathe, and Sam is struggling over there.
He looks at Sam long enough to see the weak smile he gives him before he turns his attention back to this guy.
“If you're not a demon,” Dean says. “Then what the fuck are you?”
“I'm-”
“And how did you talk to me in Hell? I was under the impression I had an unlisted number, since I wasn't getting any other calls.”
“No other calls,” Sam says, quietly.
Castiel says, “I'm not sure what you're referring to.”
“Your voice. My head. Who the fuck are you that you can do that? You a psychic? I have enough psychics.”
Sam high-fives him. Oxygen-deprived Sam is ridiculous.
Castiel says, “We need to talk, Dean. Alone.”
“What are you?”
“I'm an angel of the Lord.”
Dean laughs, and Sam, stupid God-fearing kid that he is, gets all wide-eyed like he's seen a celebrity, and ugh, Sam, how do you live this long and stay this goddamn stupid? Fuck, but he missed the little son of a bitch, and he really should be concentrating on the crazy guy in their motel room but just...Sammy, you know?
Then Sam tilts his head back and wheezes.
“What is he doing?” Castiel says.
“He's...wheezing, Jesus. You want to talk? Come back later.”
“I will,” Castiel says, and then there's this noise-this noise like wings-and he's gone.
“I...” Dean starts, and then he turns and looks at Sammy, who's clearly unhappy with the state of his lungs. He's leaning forwards onto his knees and coughing, and fuck it's been a while. It's been a really long while.
He rubs Sam's back and practically dies at how normal everything suddenly is.
“What's wrong?” Dean says. “You're all upset. Did the fucker scare you?”
Sam snorts out a laugh. “No. I'm not upset.”
“You're shaking.”
Sam runs a hand through his hair, wheezes out a breath. “Ruby should be back by now.”
“Oh.”
Shit.
**
Right when Dean's about to look up a summoning charm to get any fucking demon here, do some bloodletting, and put his kid out of his fucking misery, Castiel shows up again.
Sam's rocking back and forth a little, arms around his chest, wheezing and pulling at his shirt and every once in a while saying, “Um, Dean, um,” and Ruby won't pick up her phone and this is fucked up, this shit is just fucked up, Dean doesn't care if Sam was drinking sunshine and pixie dust, if it fucks him him this badly when he can't get it, it's not fucking okay.
(Except, Jesus, it's not like Sam's ever okay when he skips meds, how is this any different, the only difference is that when he drinks this crap he actually breathes while all the meds in the world have just left him stranded at his shitty fucking baseline.)
Anyway, there's that flapping sound and here he is again, and he says, “It's later. So I came back.”
“Yeah, I can see that.” Dean's crouched in front of Sam, rubbing up and down his back. “It's not a good time.”
Castiel looks at Sam. “What is wrong with him?”
Dean can tell by the look on Sam's face that Sam wants to explain, that he wants to do his geeky calm explanation and talk about bronchospasms and alveoli and and oxygen exchange and that's just too fucking bad, Sam, because you're not fucking breathing so Dean says, “He's having an asthma attack. You're going to have to leave a message, all right?”
“What is an asthma attack?”
Dean taps his forehead against Sam's, whispers, “Sorry.”
“'s'okay,” Sam whispers back.
“It's an exacerbation of a chronic lung disease,” Dean recites, giving Sam a quick rub up and down his back. “He's not feeling well, he doesn't need some creepy son of a bitch here stressing him out. You need to go.”
“Dean,” Sam says, quietly. “He says he's an angel.”
“And I'm supposed to believe that?”
And then there's this squealing noise, this scream, so high-pitched and fucking painful and Dean covers his ears and curls into Sam's chest because what the fucking hell, but Sam grabs him and points to Castiel and Dean doesn't know what he's looking at at first because he's just standing totally still looking like the same creepy son of a bitch he was before, and then he sees shadows of these fucking enormous wings stretching across the walls of their motel rooms.
Then it's all over. Silence and Sammy breathing.
“Now will you listen to me?” Castiel says. “We have a problem here.”
Sam starts coughing, bad, and Dean puts a hand on Sam's knee and watches him. “I'm listening,” he says.
Castile is quiet for a minute, then says, “The problem is Sam, Dean.”
“Yeah. He's going to be fine. He's going to be fine, Sam, you got that?”
“That's not what I mean.”
Dean rubs Sam's hand with his thumb and looks up at Castiel.
“Do you know what your brother's been doing?” Castiel says.
“The demon blood thing?”
Castiel looks surprised, and Dean feels himself smiling a little.
“Yeah,” Dean says. He moves his hand to the back of Sammy's head. “He might have mentioned it.”
Castiel says, “I didn't think you'd tell him.”
“Here's the thing about me and Dean,” Sam wheezes out. “We tell each other things.” He coughs into his elbow. “Can we do this later? I-”
Castiel says, “We don't need you in this discussion, Sam.”
Dean says, “Yeah, but apparently you need me, and you don't fucking get me when Sam isn't feeling well.”
“Dean,” Sam croaks, and Dean hears his lungs lock down harder, and fuck, they're past the point where they want any fucking laypeople around, okay?
“Leave,” Dean says.
“He's breathing. I can hear him.”
“You shouldn't be fucking able to hear someone breathing.”
“But he is breathing.”
Dean resists the urge to punch him. He just has this feeling it wouldn't end well. (Fucking angel. What the fuck? Why does anything surprise him anymore?)
Castiel says, “What Sam's doing is dangerous. It needs to be stopped.”
Dean says, “We can look after ourselves, thanks.”
“Let me rephrase. What Sam is doing is dangerous. We are prepared to stop it.”
Well.
Dean stands up and takes a fucking giant step in front of Sam.
“Prepared to stop it?” Dean says. “Like you were prepared to get me out of Hell? In my experience, Castiel, you do a fuck lot of talking and a fuck little of doing.”
Castiel pauses. “We needed a few more days.”
“Yeah, well, Sam didn't.”
“Sam shouldn't have the power to do what he did.”
“But I did,” Sam says, with an unsaid but very blatant suck it, bitch at the end there.
Dean says, “You heard the kid.” Sam coughs, hard, and Dean winces and says, “Can you go? We have shit to do.”
But Castiel doesn't go. He comes and gets all the fuck up in Dean's face, looks at him hard.
“I am not your enemy, Dean,” he says, all still and quiet, too quiet for Sam to hear, which Dean guesses is the fucking point. “This is war is bigger than either you or Sam is prepared for, and we need to make sure you're on the right side. We need to make sure your brother doesn't get in the way of that.”
“I'm on Sam's side,” Dean says. “Get the fuck out of here.”
Castiel takes a step back, straightens his coat. “This isn't over.”
“Yeah, of course not.”
And then Castiel does something weird.
He looks at Dean's wheezing little brother and says, “I sincerely hope you feel better, Sam.”
And then he's gone.
**
Sam doesn't feel better. Sam's puking in the bathroom while Dean rubs circles on his back. The nebulizer and his inhaler aren't doing fucking anything, and he's too hot to steam up the bathroom and shit, this is exactly like when Dean died and he wanted to take care of Sam, because Sammy's sick and again there's nothing he can do but nobody is fucking dying tonight, okay?
Sam's fucking teeth are chattering and he's still rocking back and forth and this isn't how he acts when he misses a dose of asthma meds, this is how John acted when he went a day without drinking, and Dean never wanted to deal with this again, he never ever ever ever ever ever ever wanted to clean someone off the floor again.
And Sam knows it, and Dean's pushing his face into Sam's back while he coughs and throws up and Sam's whispering, “Sorry, sorry, I need it, I just need it.”
“No,” Dean says. “We're getting you off this shit.”
Sam nods and cries a little and begs not to do it cold turkey, and Dean agrees because fuck if he knows if this is one of the drugs you can do cold turkey, he knows alcohol can fucking kill you if you try and he's not killing Sam by pulling him off a drug because some angel told him to and Dean has a few bad memories, no, that's not how this is going to work.
But Sam is still crying so Dean whispers nice things, tells him he's strong, that he doesn't need this shit, that he got Dean out, Dean is so proud, Dean is so grateful, Sam doesn't need to drink this shit anymore because he got him out, it's over now. He whispers that a fucking angel just learned not to fuck with the Winchesters, and how fantastic is that?
Sam agrees that it is fantastic but then he's coughing up blood. Not demon blood. Just Sam's.
**
This chick shows up an hour later, and even though she's all short and dark-haired Dean can fucking tell it's Ruby by that look on her damn face. She's a mess, bruised and dirty, and she barely nods at Dean on her way into the bathroom. “Baby,” she whispers, kneeling next to where he's crashed on the bathmat, shivering. “Hey hey hey. I'm so sorry. C'mere.” She helps him sit up and pulls a knife out of her pocket. “It's okay,” she tells him. “You're going to be fine.”
Sam wheezes, says, “Dean, wait outside, okay? I don't want you to see this.”
“What?”
“It's gross,” Sam says. “Please?”
Ruby stays, “Stay or go, just do it now.”
Dean steps outside and he listens but it's all very quiet, but in his head he can still see it: the blade on Ruby's skin, Sam's lips on the cut, Jesus. He can't even fucking imagine how far gone you'd have to be before you drank that (he does not want to think about the things shoved down his throat in Hell, but that was Hell, this is real life, there are rules here).
He pours himself a drink.
Then he goes back into the bathroom where Sam's wiping his mouth and bandaging Ruby's arm and Jesus, he's breathing. He sounds fucking fantastic, and it goes to show what fucking scrambled eggs Dean has for brains that he's thinking shit, I wish we'd discovered this years ago when five seconds ago he was thinking fuck, Sam is getting weaned off this shit right the fuck now.
He grabs Ruby by the arm-over the fucking cut, thanks-and hauls her up. “We need to talk.”
Sam says, “Dean.”
“Sam, go to bed.”
Sam narrows his eyes.
“You've got to be worn out.”
“I feel fine,” Sam says.
Ruby says, “It's fine, Sam. Dean and I will catch up.” She tugs his face down and kisses him. “You had a long day. Get some rest.”
Sam glares at both of them.
“Hey.” She pulls him down to her level again, touches her forehead against his. “We're just going to fight over you a little,” she says. “Same thing you've been missing for months, huh?”
He breathes out. Quietly.
“Perfect,” she says. “We'll be back in a second.”
**
Ruby lights two cigarettes as soon as they're outside and tosses one to Dean. “How long's he breathing for?” Dean says, looking at it.
“He'll get two days from what I gave him. Longer than it'll take you to get the smoke off you.”
“Bite me.” He inhales, hard.
“You told me to take care of him,” she says. “You told me to try anything. This was anything. Sam's fucking amazing now. The shit he's getting done, you can't believe it. He's this fucking close to being able to kill Lilith.”
“Where the fuck were you tonight?”
She points at the black eye. “Got a little tied up.”
“Bullshit.”
“Excuse me?”
“Everyone thinks I'm such a fucking idiot. You knew I was coming back today. You knew I'd try to get Sam off this shit you put him on. So you pulled back to make him suffer a little so he'd remember how good it makes him feel. Is that it?”
“No.”
“You're not his girlfriend, you're his fucking dealer, and you're afraid of losing a customer. Jesus, Ruby, I can't believe you.”
“Customer? What exactly the fuck do you think I'm getting out of this? You think fucking Sam is worth all that much?” She blows smoke in his face. “I don't have time to play mind games, Dean. I'm trying to win a fucking war. How many push-ups could you have done in the time it took you to think up that little theory?”
“How many push-ups could you have done instead of going down on my brother?”
“You're jealous, it's cute, I get it, we don't have time for it. We have shit to do. So stop pointing fingers and let Sam be as strong as we can fucking make him. You told me to keep him alive. Did you think it was going to be pretty?”
“I told you to keep him Sam, too, and here he is all hopped up on parts of a fucking demon. Does that sound like Sam to you?”
“You want me to answer that?”
“Fuck you.”
“Sam's happy like this, Dean. He's strong and he doesn't feel sick all the time-he felt sick all the time-and he can eat what he wants and he can protect you. He got you the fuck out of hell, Dean. You think taking away all that power's going to be any good for him? Taking away his control? How long have you known Sam, again?”
“Jesus. Fuck. This never should have happened.”
“Then maybe you should have let him die in Cold Oak, because I bet Jake whoeverthefuck would have drunk my blood like wine if he had half the chance.” She eyes the glass in Dean's hand. “Like whiskey.”
“What the fuck's your point?”
“Glass houses, that's all.”
“I got out of Hell today, bitch.”
“Yeah, well, I've seen Hell,” she says. “And I've seen your brother half-alive in a hospital bed. And if you get a drink for what you've been through, rest fucking assured that he deserves to drink me dry. You want to argue with that?”
“No.”
“All right, then.”
“If you fuck with him like this one more time, I will exorcise the shit out of you, you understand me?”
“And watch your brother detox? It's not a fun drug to quit.”
“Yeah, I noticed.”
She laughs. “What you saw in there? That was fucking child's play. This shit is keeping your brother alive, Dean. Do you know what his lungs have been through? He needs this.”
“The world's fucking full of demons. I'll bleed one out of if I have to.” Or he'll kill her and feed all her blood to his kid, but no need to get nasty, right?
She lights another cigarette. “I'll leave a flask. Jesus.”
“How much does he get?”
“A tablespoon once every two days will keep him going. Better give him a fuckload more if you want him to actually do anything.”
“I'm not juicing the kid up for you. That's not what this is.” Probably. Fuck.
“Then a tablespoon once every two days.” She takes her knife out and digs a flask out of her bed, checks to see if it's empty, then unbandages the cut on her arm and squeezes blood into it. Dean, for all the fucking times he's seen demons bleed, almost expected it to look different. It doesn't. Dean would never know it wasn't human. (Dean's fucking kid is drinking blood.)
She caps the bottle and hands to to Dean. “That's as much as I can get tonight. I'll be back tomorrow. Okay?”
Dean shrugs, and something in Ruby changes.
“Dean,” she says. “I really fucking like your brother.”
The thing is that he believes her.
“He is a fucking force,” she says. “It's incredible. I've never met anyone that fucking dedicated to reaching his potential. And shit, the way he loves you. It's inspiring. It makes you want to love someone as much as he loves you.” She makes eye contact with him. “And I'm getting there. I think I'm really fucking close.”
And what's he supposed to say, don't love Sammy? Shit, if he knew how to say it, he would have said it to himself the first time Sam tried to fucking die on them when he was four years old and fucking none of this would ever exist.
“I'm not in this to hurt Sam,” she says. “That's not at all what's going on.”
“Then what the fuck is going on?”
“Killing Lilith, Dean. Winning a fucking war.”
“What does Lilith want?”
“I don't know.” She's walking away. “But it's bad shit and I'm going to find out. I'll see you, Dean. I'm glad you're back. Sam needs you.” She pauses. “We both do.”
And then she's gone, and Dean turns around to go back inside and who the fuck is between him and the door but Castiel.
“We need to talk,” Castiel says.
“Jesus, I fucking gathered that by now.”
“We raised you up because we have work for you.”
“My brother raised me up, Castiel.”
Castiel pauses. “Well. We would have raised you up because we have work for you.”
“I seriously cannot believe this shit. Can I go see Sam?”
“Sam is breathing. I checked on him.”
“You talked to my brother?”
“No. I checked on him very quickly. He could not see me.”
Dean reaches for the doorknob, but Castiel knocks his hands away and flicks his eyes to the flask.
“This is wrong,” he says. “This demon blood. It isn't the way to defeat Lilith.”
Dean swallows. “So you are on our side.”
“Yes.”
Dean is just so fucking tired. “Unless you know a better way to kill a demon? Somehow I don't think stabbing her with our fancy knife is going to do the trick.”
“No.”
“So we need Sam. And we need Sam and all his exciting little fucking psychic powers, which means I'm going to drug him like he's a fucking dog, so excuse me if I'm not in the best fucking mood tonight, all right? It's been a long day.”
“Sam isn't the one meant to kill Lilith, Dean. You are.”
Dean looks at the flask and sincerely hopes that doesn't mean he has to drink this shit.
“What?”
“Your brother is interfering. Stop him.”
“Yeah, I don't do that.”
He's all up in Dean's face again. “Learn.”
Dean stares at him.
“I'll be back for you, Dean.” And then he's gone.
Someday Dean's going to be the one to leave a conversation, he fucking swears.
Back in the room, Sam's changed into a clean shirt and his favorite pair of sweatpants and he's sitting on the bed tugging on socks. “Hey.”
“Hey. Feeling better?”
“Feeling great, yeah.”
Dean holds up the flask. “This is your brain on bitch-juice. Don't go stealing this out of my bag, okay?” He tucks the flask away in his bag, and can't fucking miss the way Sam's eyeing it. Shit.
But Sam says, “I won't. What'd you guys talk about?”
“Who's better in bed, you or Satan. And then the angel showed up and wanted to talk about Lilith.”
Sam flops backwards onto the bed. “My favorite topic.”
“Fucking Satan? You really are full of demon blood.”
“You're a douchebag.”
“Youuuur douchebag.”
“You're damn right. I meant Lilith.”
“He says I'm supposed to kill her. Not you.”
Sam sits up. Raises an eyebrow.
“What'd you tell him?” Sam says.
“I told him that trying to distinguish one of us from the other is a stupid exercise, and that one Winchester's job is another Winchester's job, asshole, and that if he wants me to be his bitch, he should try beating my little asthmatic brother to the punch next time.”
Sam grins. “And what'd he say to that?”
“Nothing, he'd flown away. I just thought of that speech right now.”
“I liked it.”
“Thanks.”
Sam yawns. “Bedtime.”
“I think so. Take your meds, okay? All of them.”
Sam nods a little. “What are we doing about...”
“I think we're weaning you off. Or pumping you full of it so you can kill evil bitches. One or the other.”
“Well, I'm glad you have a plan.”
“Bite me.”
Sam takes all his meds and tosses Dean a spare toothbrush. They brush their teeth side-by-side, and Sam grabs Dean's hand and tackles it under his arm.
He gives him back his necklace. Dean unties Sam's hair from his finger and knots it onto Sam's. He doesn't know why.
Sam lets him.
He's expecting nightmares, but Sam wheezes quietly in the next bed and Dean sleeps like a baby.
Summary: The beginning of Season 4. The facts are same. Nothing else is.
Warnings/Spoilers: Through 4, definitely.
Wordcount: 7,249.
Author's Note: Sammyverse--asthmatic Sam and BFF Winchesters. This is basically me giving the middle finger to season 4. Title is from "Alive with the Glory of Love" by Say Anything. Great song.
--
For a few months (days, hours, years? It's Hell, he doesn't fucking know) Dean has been hearing this voice.
It's only every once in a while, but it's been enough to keep him a little bit sane. He'd be convinced he's imagining it if it sounded in any way familiar (he'd be telling himself it's Sam if it sounded anything, anything at fucking all, like that kid, Christ he misses him, Christ he he didn't think it could possibly be this bad, Jesus God damn it he can't even think his name anymore, not like he used to, Sam isn't his bratty snot-nosed beautiful little brother anymore, Sam is the holy of holies, Sam is the reason to hate himself for the horrible things he does, Sam is somehow at the end of all of this, in the beginning, there was Sam) but he must not be imagining it because it doesn't sound like anyone he's ever met and why would his mind make up a voice, is he that fucking crazy? So he has no idea, but he clings to it, he clings because there is nothing the fuck else to cling to besides burned flesh and stripped down bone and tongue and the hair wrapped around his finger like a fucking wedding ring and the fractured melodies of lullabies John used to sing to them.
The voice.
It's going to be all right, Dean.
We're going to get you out of there.
We have work for you.
It isn't Sam's voice, which is what makes Meg, standing here telling him that this a sign, all the more fucking confusing.
Because Dean does hear Sam's voice, all the time, this fucking running monologue in his head, all these things that Sam's ever said mixed together and incoherent, just this voice, this voice that makes him want to buckle at the knees and bend at the waist and heave for all of eternity (which is not a turn of phrase, nothing is a fucking turn of phrase anymore) just Sam's voice saying fucking everything he's ever said, but one sentence rings out on its own all the damn time is Before I get you out, I'm going to send you a sign and Dean twists the strand of Sam's hair he has around his finger, twists it and twists it and twists it.
And that voice, that voice that isn't Sam's, complicating everything:
We're going to get you out, Dean.
But Dean wants Sam.
And Sam promised him a sign.
Sam Sam Sam Sam Sam he can't take this anymore, he can't get any fucking further from the person who holds you when you're sick, he can't get any further away, he doesn't know what he'll fucking do, he doesn't know how long he'll be able to believe that there are signs.
**
He's alone with Alastair, that fucking hand on his fucking cheek, when he feels it.
A tug.
It starts small, like someone has reached into his shoulder and pinched a muscle, but then it grows until it's ripping, burning, and he chokes out a scream and Alastair chuckles for a moment, then he narrows his eyes and says-what--
And then there's a flash of blue, there's warmth, there's the smell of rotted wood and dust--not flesh-and he hears a crash and a crack and something metal hitting his stomach and then he's yanked up, there's too much air and too much sun in eyes, and he's coughing up dirt, someone else is coughing-holymotherofGodthatcough.
'That fucking goddamn fucking cough, he would know it anywhere. He would know it if he had had to wait another thousand years.
So he rubs his eyes, he rubs them hard, get this fucking dust out let him see Jesus fuck let me see and he feels thumbs on his face helping to get him clean and holyfuck he knows those thumbs, he never would have thought he'd recognize these thumbs but he does, he doesn't have to fucking think about it, he knows them, rough and long and shit and then he can see. The dust is out, he blinks, he can see.
There he is.
Framed in sunlight like some kind of saint, shoulders broader than Dean remembered, stupid hair in his eyes, dirty t-shirt, Dean's necklace, enormous fucking smile and forehead on Dean's and hands on the sides of Dean's head and whispering “Heyhey. Hey. Hey,” and then just, “Dean. Fuck. Dean. Jesus. Dean.”
“Sam.” Dean wraps himself around Sam's neck and nothing else matters, nothing that happened to him matters, nothing else is ever going to fucking matter again.
**
He feels okay; he doesn't really need Sam's arm around his waist, helping him to the car, but Sam doesn't need to know that, okay?
“You're breathing,” Dean says.
Sam laughs-Sam's laugh-”I think your breathing is a little more remarkable this time around, D.”
“No.”
Sam smiles at him-Sam's smile-as he helps Dean into the car, and Dean's hand moves up all the fuck on its own and taps a finger over one of Sam's dimples. Those stupid fucking things, girls always went crazy over them, Jess would hook in a finger and pinch his cheek, John could look so much like Sam when he wanted to (Sam never looked like John-in the motherfucking beginning there was Sammy) and these fucking things, this fucking smile fucking kid fucking ground under Dean's feet, his goddamn car, and Sam.
Sam lets him, grabbing Dean's other hand and twisting it up.
“You're bigger,” Dean says. “Yeah?”
“Yep.”
“And breathing. What did you do? You did something.”
Sam scratches behind Dean's ear. “I'll tell you all about it. Let's get you some water first. Some clean clothes. Something to eat, okay? And I'll tell you all about it.”
Telling him all about it.
That sounds incredible.
And maybe that's why Dean doesn't wait for some tearful midnight confession after some nightmare, maybe that's why they're in the car driving to wherever the fuck and Dean's heart is still pounding and he's still tasting the dust from his fucking coffin and he's already working on burying everything, already figuring out how he's never going to talk about it fucking ever and then he goddamn hears himself saying “They strung me up on racks, Sam, crammed next to all these other...and all of us, on these fucking wracks, and Alastair, and then he told me that if I couldn't take it anymore, and I tried, Sammy, I tried-” and Sam does exactly what the fuck Dean needed him to, he holds the scruff of Dean's neck and looks at him every once in a while and he listens and nods and he keeps driving. He gets them the fuck away from there.
He says these are our lives, and I will not stop driving because you fucked up.
And then he turns off the car in the parking lot of some motel and he scoots over so he's closer to Dean.
“Hey,” he says. “Look at me.”
He can't.
Because what the fuck? He's Dean's little brother, this fucking kid that he's looked after since the beginning, and he's been so fucking careful with him, kid gloves, always, cradling Sam and his fucking lungs through every fucking childhood disease and then some, and Dean's been a fucking machine about it, okay? Dean was a fucking machine made to take care of Sam, he was the sidekick, he was coaching Sam and holding Sam and getting Sam ready to be that big hero and now Sam's looking at him (Sam is healthier than he was when Dean was here) and Dean is a machine capable of so much fucking more, horrible, horrible fucking more, and he would have been just find never fucking learning that and why did he have to tell Sam, he just got him back, he just fucking got him back and now Sam will run screaming.
“Look at me, Dean. C'mon, shit, you've got to look at me, you have any idea how much I missed those eyes?”
Dean looks up.
“There we go.” Sam takes the water Dean's been gulping down, spills some into his own hands, wipes Dean's face clean. “That's all over now,” he says. “I got you out. You're staying here with me.”
“I don't know how to live with this, Sam. With this shit that I did. How the fuck am I supposed to act now?”
“Then let me live with you. And I'll teach you. And if we have to learn together, we learn together.”
“This stupid fucking shit you say, I missed it so goddamn much.”
Sam laughs and pulls Dean into a hug.
“Thanks for telling me,” he says, quietly. “Thank you so fucking much. I didn't think you could.”
“I didn't think you could breathe, so...”
Sam laughs a little and fucks up Dean's hair, the little shit. “C'mon. Let's talk. Room service has... well.” He pauses. “Room service has whatever you want.”
Dean wants ice cream.
**
So Sam's clearly been staying at this motel for a little while, a week or two at least. There are clippings hanging from the wall, books open on the spare bed, a pile of dirty clothes in the corner.
A pile of dirty girl clothes.
“Girlfriend?” Dean says, tugging off his shirt, pulling on one of Sam's.
“Not...exactly.”
“Drag queen boyfriend?”
“Honestly, maybe closer.”
“Fuck. Ruby?”
“That's the one.”
Dean groans.
“I know. She's brunette now. I have a problem.” He holds up his hands before Dean can say anything. “Dead brunette. There's no one in there with her. Let's not talk about the dead part. Just...”
“Ugh.”
“I know. Anything you can think about it, I've already thought, I swear.”
Dean shudders, but he does it mostly for affect, and Sam smiles like he's supposed to.
“So where is she now?”
“Out. Reconnaissance. We're still after Lilith.”
“I kind of thought...”
“That we got you out by killing Lilith? Nope? Bitch runs wild.”
“Then how...”
“You keep asking all these half-questions that I'm about to full-answer, but you have to just let me talk, okay?” He says it all really fucking gently. “Let me order some food and I'll tell you all about it.” He takes his inhaler off the nightstand and shakes it, and, wow, that isn't right. The inhaler was on the nightstand? Why didn't Sam have it with him? Since when does Sam go fucking anywhere, since when does Sam go to the fucking bathroom, without the thing in his pocket?
Sam sees Dean's face, wheezes (this quiet, soft, nothing to fucking worry about wheeze) out a sigh, and says, “Okay. I guess food can wait.”
**
In all honesty, Dean appreciates that Sam clearly does not have a speech prepared. He hasn't figured out the gentle way to deliver this news. He's not spinning anything. He's stumbling and blushing and giving Dean these nervous looks and not trying to think of a positive way to say I've been drinking demon blood for three months and Dean appreciates that, really, but he's not exactly at his most reasonable right now, give him a day or two, all right?
Sam reads his fucking mind as usual and says, “I didn't want to spring this on you today.”
“What the fuck, Sam?”
Sam flops on his back on the bed. “It was...after you died, and I was so sick, that fucking pneumonia held on because at first I just didn't have it in me to fight, okay? And I know, I know, I promised you I'd be all big and strong, but...fuck, I had a fever of a hundred and fucking five and you were there one minute and then I was in that fucking ambulance and your blood was all over me and the paramedics are yelling about why the fuck am I bleeding and then I started coughing up all this blood so they left that alone, but that didn't exactly bring you back, you know, and...”
These long rambling sentences aren't Sam, Sam doesn't talk like this because Sam isn't supposed to fucking breathe like this, holy shit, listen to Sammy, look at Sammy all big and strong and...fuck.
“And I'm in the hospital and I'm just a fucking mess. I was in there for like two weeks, it sucked, and I wasn't getting any better and...the doctors were talking some scary shit. And I was fighting at that point. I swear to God, I was. But it was like...it was like when Jess died, remember? My body just fucking gives up on me when bad shit happens.”
Dean plays with Sam's fingers because it's easier than looking at him.
There's demon blood running through these fingers.
But he's known that for a long time.
He's known that since Sammy, hole still healing in his back and chin shaking and eyes watering, told him that Azazel broke into the nursery to bleed in his mouth, that there was a little bit of demon blood in him and that's why he was supposed to go bad, and that Yellow-Eyes killed Mary just to get to him, and then all that stupid bullshit about if I hadn't been born Mom would be alive and Dean had never, ever, seen his kid cry like that (had never watched Sam watch him die at that point) and he held him and whispered stupid nonsense bullshit and Sam was okay.
And now Sam's drinking demon blood.
And Sam sits up and Sam is Sam, he doesn't have black eyes or an evil smile, and a minute ago he took a big swig of holy water just to show Dean he could, and he's breathing.
“It makes you breathe?” Dean says, quietly.
Sam nods. “Ruby told me it would help. I thought she was fucking with me. I was about ready to exorcise her, I swear. But I was dying, Dean, and...and you told me not to die.”
Dean tugs on Sam's hair.
“And she just dabbed a little on my lips and...” Sam looks away. “God, it's so gross. I'm sorry.”
“And what?”
“It's...not a miracle, you know? I'm not healed, I'm still not, you know. Normal. But it's so much better. The food allergies are gone. Practically all the damn allergies are gone, I'm a little sneezy in the mornings but fine besides that. I use the inhaler when I need it but that's once a day, sometimes not even, and I take the steroid one still at nights but I don't really need it and I'm off everything else. I can exercise...shit, we always thought I wasn't exercised-induced, right? It's amazing how much more I can do now, Dean. Amazing. I didn't know I could ever fucking feel this good. You should see the hunts I'm doing and the stuff I'm able to do, how long I can go without getting tired. I gained twenty pound of muscle like it was nothing. And I...”
“And what?” Dean says, again. Gentler.
Because shit.
His kid.
His fucking kid here.
He's breathing.
“And I can sort of exorcise demons with my mind. Yeah. And apparently drag people out of hell. Though that was not fucking easy, so let's not make a habit out of that, okay?”
“Dad?” Dean says, quietly.
“Dad's not down there. Ruby and I called in every connection we know, just looking for him. Wherever he went when the gate opened, it wasn't back down there.”
“I don't like that you know demons,” Dean says, quietly.
“It's not like they're my friends. Besides Ruby. I fucking tortured them, Dean. We're...well, you know. Horses of the same color.”
“Shit.”
“Essentially, yeah.”
“You can exorcise demons with your fucking mind?”
Sam laughs, once. “I was wondering when you'd get to that part.”
“Jesus, Sam.”
“The victims survive,” Sam says. “Unless the demon's fucked them over. It's so much better than the knife. Ruby says if we keep going like this, I'll be able to kill them soon. Kill them, and save the people they're possessing. That's...I mean, that's the dream, right?”
He's desperate, fucking desperate, for Dean to agree with him.
And he's wheezing a little, sounding like Sammy.
“I need to think about this,” Dean says. “This can't be good.”
“But I'm only doing good things with it.”
“It's demon blood, Sam. Did you even stop to think that maybe the reason it's helping you is because Azazel or whoever the fucking wanted it to? You always wondered why you have this fucking shit pair of lungs, maybe you were fucking bred for this, did you think about that? They put this fucking crack in your armor and made you live with it so that you'd do anything to patch it up?”
Sam nods a little.
“Well?”
“I'm only doing good things,” Sam says, again, then he swallows and looks down and says, "But...Dean...if you tell me to stop, I'll stop. I mean it. This was...to get me through until you got back. And to get you back.” His voice gets small and he says, “Just don't be mad, okay?” and God, he's twelve years old again.
“I'm not mad. I just need to think. And we'll talk about what to do about this, okay?”
Sam keeps nodding, harder now, but then he says, “I really like breathing, Dean. It's really awesome,” and shit, what the fuck is Dean supposed to say to that?
“Does it hurt you?” he says, quietly.
“Drinking the blood? No.”
“Exorcising.”
“Headache. Like with visions.”
“How about pulling people out of hell, how's that feel?”
Sam rubs the back of his neck, doesn't say anything.
Dean sighs. “All right. Bedtime.”
“I'm okay.”
“Are you fucking crazy right now? I haven't seen you in...Jesus.” He gives Sam's hair another pull. “And you're not going to let me fuss over you?”
Sam smiles a little. “Sorry. I'm out of practice.”
“Me too. So we've got to get back into it. C'mon.” He waits for Sam to take his shoes off, then moves him underneath the covers and pulls the comforter to his chin. “Let me take care of you. Be sweet. Let's...be good guys.”
Sam pushes his face into the pillow. “I want to be good guys.”
Dean sits on the side of the bed and practically drowns in the Samness of this entire fucking situation, then says, “Hey. Did you work with anyone?”
“Ruby.”
“To get me out of hell?”
“Just Ruby.”
“Never...a guy?”
Sam yawns. “Drag queen boyfriend.”
“I mean a real guy?”
“No. What are you talking about?”
“I just...heard this voice sometimes, that's all.”
“Wasn't me?”
“No. I wanted it to be.”
“I'm here now,” says Dean's little brother, Dean's breathing, fucked-up, beautiful little brother.
“Yeah.” Dean puts his hand on Sam's arm. “Jesus. Yeah. You are.”
And he's still Sam, and that's all there fucking is to it. The end.
**
Except it's not, because he's lying next to Sam because why the fuck would he be in his own bed right now, Sam is here, when a voice says, “Dean,” not a voice, the voice, and Dean springs the fuck up and grabs his knife.
In the low light, he can make out a man, not bigger than him, sure as hell not bigger than Sam. Suit, tie. Trench coat.
Dean holds the knife out with one hand and shakes Sam awake with the other and says, “Who the fuck are you?”
“I'm Castiel. We need to talk.”
“No, who are you?”
Sam sits up, coughing. “Not a demon.”
“How can you tell?”
“I can tell.” He wheezes and wraps his arms around his chest. “Where's Ruby?”
“She hasn't been here. You okay?” He's still looking at the guy. Castiel.
“Yeah...”
“I need to talk to you,” Castiel says. “Without Sam.”
“How the fuck do you know Sam?”
“There's been a lot of talk about Sam.”
“Famous Sammy,” Dean says, softly to him, just to make him smile. Because that's the kind of thing you do when Sam can't breathe, and Sam is struggling over there.
He looks at Sam long enough to see the weak smile he gives him before he turns his attention back to this guy.
“If you're not a demon,” Dean says. “Then what the fuck are you?”
“I'm-”
“And how did you talk to me in Hell? I was under the impression I had an unlisted number, since I wasn't getting any other calls.”
“No other calls,” Sam says, quietly.
Castiel says, “I'm not sure what you're referring to.”
“Your voice. My head. Who the fuck are you that you can do that? You a psychic? I have enough psychics.”
Sam high-fives him. Oxygen-deprived Sam is ridiculous.
Castiel says, “We need to talk, Dean. Alone.”
“What are you?”
“I'm an angel of the Lord.”
Dean laughs, and Sam, stupid God-fearing kid that he is, gets all wide-eyed like he's seen a celebrity, and ugh, Sam, how do you live this long and stay this goddamn stupid? Fuck, but he missed the little son of a bitch, and he really should be concentrating on the crazy guy in their motel room but just...Sammy, you know?
Then Sam tilts his head back and wheezes.
“What is he doing?” Castiel says.
“He's...wheezing, Jesus. You want to talk? Come back later.”
“I will,” Castiel says, and then there's this noise-this noise like wings-and he's gone.
“I...” Dean starts, and then he turns and looks at Sammy, who's clearly unhappy with the state of his lungs. He's leaning forwards onto his knees and coughing, and fuck it's been a while. It's been a really long while.
He rubs Sam's back and practically dies at how normal everything suddenly is.
“What's wrong?” Dean says. “You're all upset. Did the fucker scare you?”
Sam snorts out a laugh. “No. I'm not upset.”
“You're shaking.”
Sam runs a hand through his hair, wheezes out a breath. “Ruby should be back by now.”
“Oh.”
Shit.
**
Right when Dean's about to look up a summoning charm to get any fucking demon here, do some bloodletting, and put his kid out of his fucking misery, Castiel shows up again.
Sam's rocking back and forth a little, arms around his chest, wheezing and pulling at his shirt and every once in a while saying, “Um, Dean, um,” and Ruby won't pick up her phone and this is fucked up, this shit is just fucked up, Dean doesn't care if Sam was drinking sunshine and pixie dust, if it fucks him him this badly when he can't get it, it's not fucking okay.
(Except, Jesus, it's not like Sam's ever okay when he skips meds, how is this any different, the only difference is that when he drinks this crap he actually breathes while all the meds in the world have just left him stranded at his shitty fucking baseline.)
Anyway, there's that flapping sound and here he is again, and he says, “It's later. So I came back.”
“Yeah, I can see that.” Dean's crouched in front of Sam, rubbing up and down his back. “It's not a good time.”
Castiel looks at Sam. “What is wrong with him?”
Dean can tell by the look on Sam's face that Sam wants to explain, that he wants to do his geeky calm explanation and talk about bronchospasms and alveoli and and oxygen exchange and that's just too fucking bad, Sam, because you're not fucking breathing so Dean says, “He's having an asthma attack. You're going to have to leave a message, all right?”
“What is an asthma attack?”
Dean taps his forehead against Sam's, whispers, “Sorry.”
“'s'okay,” Sam whispers back.
“It's an exacerbation of a chronic lung disease,” Dean recites, giving Sam a quick rub up and down his back. “He's not feeling well, he doesn't need some creepy son of a bitch here stressing him out. You need to go.”
“Dean,” Sam says, quietly. “He says he's an angel.”
“And I'm supposed to believe that?”
And then there's this squealing noise, this scream, so high-pitched and fucking painful and Dean covers his ears and curls into Sam's chest because what the fucking hell, but Sam grabs him and points to Castiel and Dean doesn't know what he's looking at at first because he's just standing totally still looking like the same creepy son of a bitch he was before, and then he sees shadows of these fucking enormous wings stretching across the walls of their motel rooms.
Then it's all over. Silence and Sammy breathing.
“Now will you listen to me?” Castiel says. “We have a problem here.”
Sam starts coughing, bad, and Dean puts a hand on Sam's knee and watches him. “I'm listening,” he says.
Castile is quiet for a minute, then says, “The problem is Sam, Dean.”
“Yeah. He's going to be fine. He's going to be fine, Sam, you got that?”
“That's not what I mean.”
Dean rubs Sam's hand with his thumb and looks up at Castiel.
“Do you know what your brother's been doing?” Castiel says.
“The demon blood thing?”
Castiel looks surprised, and Dean feels himself smiling a little.
“Yeah,” Dean says. He moves his hand to the back of Sammy's head. “He might have mentioned it.”
Castiel says, “I didn't think you'd tell him.”
“Here's the thing about me and Dean,” Sam wheezes out. “We tell each other things.” He coughs into his elbow. “Can we do this later? I-”
Castiel says, “We don't need you in this discussion, Sam.”
Dean says, “Yeah, but apparently you need me, and you don't fucking get me when Sam isn't feeling well.”
“Dean,” Sam croaks, and Dean hears his lungs lock down harder, and fuck, they're past the point where they want any fucking laypeople around, okay?
“Leave,” Dean says.
“He's breathing. I can hear him.”
“You shouldn't be fucking able to hear someone breathing.”
“But he is breathing.”
Dean resists the urge to punch him. He just has this feeling it wouldn't end well. (Fucking angel. What the fuck? Why does anything surprise him anymore?)
Castiel says, “What Sam's doing is dangerous. It needs to be stopped.”
Dean says, “We can look after ourselves, thanks.”
“Let me rephrase. What Sam is doing is dangerous. We are prepared to stop it.”
Well.
Dean stands up and takes a fucking giant step in front of Sam.
“Prepared to stop it?” Dean says. “Like you were prepared to get me out of Hell? In my experience, Castiel, you do a fuck lot of talking and a fuck little of doing.”
Castiel pauses. “We needed a few more days.”
“Yeah, well, Sam didn't.”
“Sam shouldn't have the power to do what he did.”
“But I did,” Sam says, with an unsaid but very blatant suck it, bitch at the end there.
Dean says, “You heard the kid.” Sam coughs, hard, and Dean winces and says, “Can you go? We have shit to do.”
But Castiel doesn't go. He comes and gets all the fuck up in Dean's face, looks at him hard.
“I am not your enemy, Dean,” he says, all still and quiet, too quiet for Sam to hear, which Dean guesses is the fucking point. “This is war is bigger than either you or Sam is prepared for, and we need to make sure you're on the right side. We need to make sure your brother doesn't get in the way of that.”
“I'm on Sam's side,” Dean says. “Get the fuck out of here.”
Castiel takes a step back, straightens his coat. “This isn't over.”
“Yeah, of course not.”
And then Castiel does something weird.
He looks at Dean's wheezing little brother and says, “I sincerely hope you feel better, Sam.”
And then he's gone.
**
Sam doesn't feel better. Sam's puking in the bathroom while Dean rubs circles on his back. The nebulizer and his inhaler aren't doing fucking anything, and he's too hot to steam up the bathroom and shit, this is exactly like when Dean died and he wanted to take care of Sam, because Sammy's sick and again there's nothing he can do but nobody is fucking dying tonight, okay?
Sam's fucking teeth are chattering and he's still rocking back and forth and this isn't how he acts when he misses a dose of asthma meds, this is how John acted when he went a day without drinking, and Dean never wanted to deal with this again, he never ever ever ever ever ever ever wanted to clean someone off the floor again.
And Sam knows it, and Dean's pushing his face into Sam's back while he coughs and throws up and Sam's whispering, “Sorry, sorry, I need it, I just need it.”
“No,” Dean says. “We're getting you off this shit.”
Sam nods and cries a little and begs not to do it cold turkey, and Dean agrees because fuck if he knows if this is one of the drugs you can do cold turkey, he knows alcohol can fucking kill you if you try and he's not killing Sam by pulling him off a drug because some angel told him to and Dean has a few bad memories, no, that's not how this is going to work.
But Sam is still crying so Dean whispers nice things, tells him he's strong, that he doesn't need this shit, that he got Dean out, Dean is so proud, Dean is so grateful, Sam doesn't need to drink this shit anymore because he got him out, it's over now. He whispers that a fucking angel just learned not to fuck with the Winchesters, and how fantastic is that?
Sam agrees that it is fantastic but then he's coughing up blood. Not demon blood. Just Sam's.
**
This chick shows up an hour later, and even though she's all short and dark-haired Dean can fucking tell it's Ruby by that look on her damn face. She's a mess, bruised and dirty, and she barely nods at Dean on her way into the bathroom. “Baby,” she whispers, kneeling next to where he's crashed on the bathmat, shivering. “Hey hey hey. I'm so sorry. C'mere.” She helps him sit up and pulls a knife out of her pocket. “It's okay,” she tells him. “You're going to be fine.”
Sam wheezes, says, “Dean, wait outside, okay? I don't want you to see this.”
“What?”
“It's gross,” Sam says. “Please?”
Ruby stays, “Stay or go, just do it now.”
Dean steps outside and he listens but it's all very quiet, but in his head he can still see it: the blade on Ruby's skin, Sam's lips on the cut, Jesus. He can't even fucking imagine how far gone you'd have to be before you drank that (he does not want to think about the things shoved down his throat in Hell, but that was Hell, this is real life, there are rules here).
He pours himself a drink.
Then he goes back into the bathroom where Sam's wiping his mouth and bandaging Ruby's arm and Jesus, he's breathing. He sounds fucking fantastic, and it goes to show what fucking scrambled eggs Dean has for brains that he's thinking shit, I wish we'd discovered this years ago when five seconds ago he was thinking fuck, Sam is getting weaned off this shit right the fuck now.
He grabs Ruby by the arm-over the fucking cut, thanks-and hauls her up. “We need to talk.”
Sam says, “Dean.”
“Sam, go to bed.”
Sam narrows his eyes.
“You've got to be worn out.”
“I feel fine,” Sam says.
Ruby says, “It's fine, Sam. Dean and I will catch up.” She tugs his face down and kisses him. “You had a long day. Get some rest.”
Sam glares at both of them.
“Hey.” She pulls him down to her level again, touches her forehead against his. “We're just going to fight over you a little,” she says. “Same thing you've been missing for months, huh?”
He breathes out. Quietly.
“Perfect,” she says. “We'll be back in a second.”
**
Ruby lights two cigarettes as soon as they're outside and tosses one to Dean. “How long's he breathing for?” Dean says, looking at it.
“He'll get two days from what I gave him. Longer than it'll take you to get the smoke off you.”
“Bite me.” He inhales, hard.
“You told me to take care of him,” she says. “You told me to try anything. This was anything. Sam's fucking amazing now. The shit he's getting done, you can't believe it. He's this fucking close to being able to kill Lilith.”
“Where the fuck were you tonight?”
She points at the black eye. “Got a little tied up.”
“Bullshit.”
“Excuse me?”
“Everyone thinks I'm such a fucking idiot. You knew I was coming back today. You knew I'd try to get Sam off this shit you put him on. So you pulled back to make him suffer a little so he'd remember how good it makes him feel. Is that it?”
“No.”
“You're not his girlfriend, you're his fucking dealer, and you're afraid of losing a customer. Jesus, Ruby, I can't believe you.”
“Customer? What exactly the fuck do you think I'm getting out of this? You think fucking Sam is worth all that much?” She blows smoke in his face. “I don't have time to play mind games, Dean. I'm trying to win a fucking war. How many push-ups could you have done in the time it took you to think up that little theory?”
“How many push-ups could you have done instead of going down on my brother?”
“You're jealous, it's cute, I get it, we don't have time for it. We have shit to do. So stop pointing fingers and let Sam be as strong as we can fucking make him. You told me to keep him alive. Did you think it was going to be pretty?”
“I told you to keep him Sam, too, and here he is all hopped up on parts of a fucking demon. Does that sound like Sam to you?”
“You want me to answer that?”
“Fuck you.”
“Sam's happy like this, Dean. He's strong and he doesn't feel sick all the time-he felt sick all the time-and he can eat what he wants and he can protect you. He got you the fuck out of hell, Dean. You think taking away all that power's going to be any good for him? Taking away his control? How long have you known Sam, again?”
“Jesus. Fuck. This never should have happened.”
“Then maybe you should have let him die in Cold Oak, because I bet Jake whoeverthefuck would have drunk my blood like wine if he had half the chance.” She eyes the glass in Dean's hand. “Like whiskey.”
“What the fuck's your point?”
“Glass houses, that's all.”
“I got out of Hell today, bitch.”
“Yeah, well, I've seen Hell,” she says. “And I've seen your brother half-alive in a hospital bed. And if you get a drink for what you've been through, rest fucking assured that he deserves to drink me dry. You want to argue with that?”
“No.”
“All right, then.”
“If you fuck with him like this one more time, I will exorcise the shit out of you, you understand me?”
“And watch your brother detox? It's not a fun drug to quit.”
“Yeah, I noticed.”
She laughs. “What you saw in there? That was fucking child's play. This shit is keeping your brother alive, Dean. Do you know what his lungs have been through? He needs this.”
“The world's fucking full of demons. I'll bleed one out of if I have to.” Or he'll kill her and feed all her blood to his kid, but no need to get nasty, right?
She lights another cigarette. “I'll leave a flask. Jesus.”
“How much does he get?”
“A tablespoon once every two days will keep him going. Better give him a fuckload more if you want him to actually do anything.”
“I'm not juicing the kid up for you. That's not what this is.” Probably. Fuck.
“Then a tablespoon once every two days.” She takes her knife out and digs a flask out of her bed, checks to see if it's empty, then unbandages the cut on her arm and squeezes blood into it. Dean, for all the fucking times he's seen demons bleed, almost expected it to look different. It doesn't. Dean would never know it wasn't human. (Dean's fucking kid is drinking blood.)
She caps the bottle and hands to to Dean. “That's as much as I can get tonight. I'll be back tomorrow. Okay?”
Dean shrugs, and something in Ruby changes.
“Dean,” she says. “I really fucking like your brother.”
The thing is that he believes her.
“He is a fucking force,” she says. “It's incredible. I've never met anyone that fucking dedicated to reaching his potential. And shit, the way he loves you. It's inspiring. It makes you want to love someone as much as he loves you.” She makes eye contact with him. “And I'm getting there. I think I'm really fucking close.”
And what's he supposed to say, don't love Sammy? Shit, if he knew how to say it, he would have said it to himself the first time Sam tried to fucking die on them when he was four years old and fucking none of this would ever exist.
“I'm not in this to hurt Sam,” she says. “That's not at all what's going on.”
“Then what the fuck is going on?”
“Killing Lilith, Dean. Winning a fucking war.”
“What does Lilith want?”
“I don't know.” She's walking away. “But it's bad shit and I'm going to find out. I'll see you, Dean. I'm glad you're back. Sam needs you.” She pauses. “We both do.”
And then she's gone, and Dean turns around to go back inside and who the fuck is between him and the door but Castiel.
“We need to talk,” Castiel says.
“Jesus, I fucking gathered that by now.”
“We raised you up because we have work for you.”
“My brother raised me up, Castiel.”
Castiel pauses. “Well. We would have raised you up because we have work for you.”
“I seriously cannot believe this shit. Can I go see Sam?”
“Sam is breathing. I checked on him.”
“You talked to my brother?”
“No. I checked on him very quickly. He could not see me.”
Dean reaches for the doorknob, but Castiel knocks his hands away and flicks his eyes to the flask.
“This is wrong,” he says. “This demon blood. It isn't the way to defeat Lilith.”
Dean swallows. “So you are on our side.”
“Yes.”
Dean is just so fucking tired. “Unless you know a better way to kill a demon? Somehow I don't think stabbing her with our fancy knife is going to do the trick.”
“No.”
“So we need Sam. And we need Sam and all his exciting little fucking psychic powers, which means I'm going to drug him like he's a fucking dog, so excuse me if I'm not in the best fucking mood tonight, all right? It's been a long day.”
“Sam isn't the one meant to kill Lilith, Dean. You are.”
Dean looks at the flask and sincerely hopes that doesn't mean he has to drink this shit.
“What?”
“Your brother is interfering. Stop him.”
“Yeah, I don't do that.”
He's all up in Dean's face again. “Learn.”
Dean stares at him.
“I'll be back for you, Dean.” And then he's gone.
Someday Dean's going to be the one to leave a conversation, he fucking swears.
Back in the room, Sam's changed into a clean shirt and his favorite pair of sweatpants and he's sitting on the bed tugging on socks. “Hey.”
“Hey. Feeling better?”
“Feeling great, yeah.”
Dean holds up the flask. “This is your brain on bitch-juice. Don't go stealing this out of my bag, okay?” He tucks the flask away in his bag, and can't fucking miss the way Sam's eyeing it. Shit.
But Sam says, “I won't. What'd you guys talk about?”
“Who's better in bed, you or Satan. And then the angel showed up and wanted to talk about Lilith.”
Sam flops backwards onto the bed. “My favorite topic.”
“Fucking Satan? You really are full of demon blood.”
“You're a douchebag.”
“Youuuur douchebag.”
“You're damn right. I meant Lilith.”
“He says I'm supposed to kill her. Not you.”
Sam sits up. Raises an eyebrow.
“What'd you tell him?” Sam says.
“I told him that trying to distinguish one of us from the other is a stupid exercise, and that one Winchester's job is another Winchester's job, asshole, and that if he wants me to be his bitch, he should try beating my little asthmatic brother to the punch next time.”
Sam grins. “And what'd he say to that?”
“Nothing, he'd flown away. I just thought of that speech right now.”
“I liked it.”
“Thanks.”
Sam yawns. “Bedtime.”
“I think so. Take your meds, okay? All of them.”
Sam nods a little. “What are we doing about...”
“I think we're weaning you off. Or pumping you full of it so you can kill evil bitches. One or the other.”
“Well, I'm glad you have a plan.”
“Bite me.”
Sam takes all his meds and tosses Dean a spare toothbrush. They brush their teeth side-by-side, and Sam grabs Dean's hand and tackles it under his arm.
He gives him back his necklace. Dean unties Sam's hair from his finger and knots it onto Sam's. He doesn't know why.
Sam lets him.
He's expecting nightmares, but Sam wheezes quietly in the next bed and Dean sleeps like a baby.