Fic: Smoke and Mirrors
Title: Smoke and Mirrors
Author: dzturtlepower (aka earthanthem)
Word Count: 768
Rating: PG
There was a tiny hand wrapped around his own, and it was warm, pulsing against the night air, pulsing with blood and saying no, no, I will not go quietly; I will not stand down.
There was a house on fire and it was blazing like the sun, curling wisps of flame that sprouted from the nursery like malevolent branches growing out of a rotten trunk. There was smoke, and it was in his lungs-it would always be in his lungs, no matter how many breaths he took-but it was beginning to thin into the space between the stars.
The father was running to him, grabbing the tiny body from Dean’s arms, and Dean had to pause, to blink, to remember that this was not his own house and this warm body clutched to his neck was not his own brother.
No, that was the past.
It was not the past, and Sam was not safe on the ground with his older brother, and their own father was not about to emerge from the shadows, sweep them into his arms, and shield them from the oncoming storm. Their own father had succumbed to the smoke and mirrors of a thinning reality and left them in the line of defense.
Sam was still inside.
The thought formed somewhere behind Dean’s eyes, where he doubted thought had ever before taken hold. Dean liked to let his thoughts drift carelessly and with as little deliberation as possible, but this one hooked around his senses and consumed his attention. Sam was not outside; therefore, he was inside. Sam was in the midst of all that smoke, all that fire. Sam, choking with black air; Sam, searing with heat and desperation to escape. Dean remembered split seconds of the past, when he didn’t even know how to write his name, when he had taken Sam with open arms and been told to run because his father said so. They had kept running, him and Sam and sometimes Dad, running from the smoke and the flame and the Other World that tried to consume them like paltry moths.
Sam was still inside.
It felt like another twenty years had passed since this other father had taken his own son into his arms-it may have been twenty years in which Dean had refused to let go. But no time had passed at all, in truth; thoughts simply ran more slowly than time.
Dean’s legs moved of their own accord; he didn’t have time to think about moving them, didn’t have the space in his mind to abandon Sam is still inside. The father yelled, even as he crushed his son against his chest, but Dean did not answer. That was not his father, after all. He wasn’t even sure he would listen to his own father right now.
He was inside in moments, the smoke thick and black and blinding, the fire bright and scorching. His lungs were searing, wheezing protest at the lack of oxygen. His eyes began to water and the hair on the back of his neck felt like it was turning to ash, but he kept going, deeper and deeper, running because he had been told to run, and they had kept running, he and Sam and sometimes Dad.
“Sammy!” he called into the smoke and it curled away from his breath like a wave bending around the shore.
Instinct told him to flee, to save his own life, but that didn’t make sense to Dean, not the way a .45 in his palm or a dagger tucked against his waist made sense. Instinct lied, Dean knew, because he had seen the way it lied when Dad had died. Dad had to have died for a reason, for a cause, Dean had instinctually thought, but when that reason was him, well, that wasn’t a reason at all; it was a lie.
There was a coughing noise ahead of him; a crouched shadow was leaning against the wall, wilting like the scorched wick of a used candle. Dean caught Sam around the waist, shoulder pressed into Sam’s armpit for balance. Another hacking cough wracked through Sam’s body and Dean could feel it reverberate into his gut, shaking his own lungs to rebellion. He wouldn’t let them, though. He swallowed down the smoke, savoring the taste of ash and night-time and destruction, and headed out the door.
They hit clean air at a run, him and Sam, and they kept running, oxygen burning its way into their blood; running, because it was what Dad had told them to do.
Author: dzturtlepower (aka earthanthem)
Word Count: 768
Rating: PG
There was a tiny hand wrapped around his own, and it was warm, pulsing against the night air, pulsing with blood and saying no, no, I will not go quietly; I will not stand down.
There was a house on fire and it was blazing like the sun, curling wisps of flame that sprouted from the nursery like malevolent branches growing out of a rotten trunk. There was smoke, and it was in his lungs-it would always be in his lungs, no matter how many breaths he took-but it was beginning to thin into the space between the stars.
The father was running to him, grabbing the tiny body from Dean’s arms, and Dean had to pause, to blink, to remember that this was not his own house and this warm body clutched to his neck was not his own brother.
No, that was the past.
It was not the past, and Sam was not safe on the ground with his older brother, and their own father was not about to emerge from the shadows, sweep them into his arms, and shield them from the oncoming storm. Their own father had succumbed to the smoke and mirrors of a thinning reality and left them in the line of defense.
Sam was still inside.
The thought formed somewhere behind Dean’s eyes, where he doubted thought had ever before taken hold. Dean liked to let his thoughts drift carelessly and with as little deliberation as possible, but this one hooked around his senses and consumed his attention. Sam was not outside; therefore, he was inside. Sam was in the midst of all that smoke, all that fire. Sam, choking with black air; Sam, searing with heat and desperation to escape. Dean remembered split seconds of the past, when he didn’t even know how to write his name, when he had taken Sam with open arms and been told to run because his father said so. They had kept running, him and Sam and sometimes Dad, running from the smoke and the flame and the Other World that tried to consume them like paltry moths.
Sam was still inside.
It felt like another twenty years had passed since this other father had taken his own son into his arms-it may have been twenty years in which Dean had refused to let go. But no time had passed at all, in truth; thoughts simply ran more slowly than time.
Dean’s legs moved of their own accord; he didn’t have time to think about moving them, didn’t have the space in his mind to abandon Sam is still inside. The father yelled, even as he crushed his son against his chest, but Dean did not answer. That was not his father, after all. He wasn’t even sure he would listen to his own father right now.
He was inside in moments, the smoke thick and black and blinding, the fire bright and scorching. His lungs were searing, wheezing protest at the lack of oxygen. His eyes began to water and the hair on the back of his neck felt like it was turning to ash, but he kept going, deeper and deeper, running because he had been told to run, and they had kept running, he and Sam and sometimes Dad.
“Sammy!” he called into the smoke and it curled away from his breath like a wave bending around the shore.
Instinct told him to flee, to save his own life, but that didn’t make sense to Dean, not the way a .45 in his palm or a dagger tucked against his waist made sense. Instinct lied, Dean knew, because he had seen the way it lied when Dad had died. Dad had to have died for a reason, for a cause, Dean had instinctually thought, but when that reason was him, well, that wasn’t a reason at all; it was a lie.
There was a coughing noise ahead of him; a crouched shadow was leaning against the wall, wilting like the scorched wick of a used candle. Dean caught Sam around the waist, shoulder pressed into Sam’s armpit for balance. Another hacking cough wracked through Sam’s body and Dean could feel it reverberate into his gut, shaking his own lungs to rebellion. He wouldn’t let them, though. He swallowed down the smoke, savoring the taste of ash and night-time and destruction, and headed out the door.
They hit clean air at a run, him and Sam, and they kept running, oxygen burning its way into their blood; running, because it was what Dad had told them to do.