fic#14 - gen by sanyin
Gen fic to start your Tuesday!
Title - Road's Gotta Go, Sky's Gotta Fall
Pairing - Gen. Sam, Dean (some Dean/other - non central)
Rating - R
Author - ???
Warnings - Apocalypse AU, pre-series
*
It's the January after the world ends.
Dean has bony shoulders, a younger brother, and no license, but he's driving anyway, because there's still a road, a little sky, and something safer ahead.
Sam hunches down in his seat, fingers dug into the shiver soft down of his jacket, bright blue and stained. He looks little and dirty, bored out of his mind.
"Do you think we'll find Dad?"
His father had told him not to lie, not to hide, not to protect, because the whole goddamned world's out there, and Sam's not always gonna have you.
But Dean's learned in the haze of the last few months that his father messed up, that sometimes his hands weren't steady and the words shook bitter and brittle out of his mouth, so he just tightens his hands on the wheel.
"Yeah, once we get out of here."
*
Things are new to him now, roads not where they're supposed to be, borders lined with wards and blood instead of state troopers, but some things don't really change.
They stop at a run down little place that might have been a diner once. There's no waitress, just a tired looking woman in a plate blue dress and beaten boots.
Dean gives her a round of bullets for coffee and eggs. He scuffs his feet on the white floor, Sam at his shoulder, wiping a runny nose on his sleeve. The air winds down with a familiar crisp cold shift, but she's actually got a ceiling fan that's running in creaking fits to ward off the half rotten half sterile smell.
He's surprised she's got electricity, measures the widths of the walls to the doors and tables with a quick glance as he's collecting the shells. She's got more food, more supplies than she's letting on, but everyone's hoarding these days. Not his business long as him and Sam are set up.
When he drifts up to her eyes, she has the hollow look of someone who's lost too much weight. He can still see the soft heaviness that used to be in her face, the smooth, wide mouth under the lines that cut against her lips.
Dean imagines if things were different, there might have been a, Got enough, kid? You gonna be ok? A warm smile and a whiff of cheap perfume or something as she passed, breasts that strained the thin material of her dress instead of sloping narrowly on her chest.
He chews the coffee on the way out, his mouth full of bitter and dark.
"I don't wanna drive any more," Sam says, his cheeks round because he's ready to yell.
Dean yanks the car door open.
*
The official seemed nice, patted his back with a heavy hand and a, Son, you know where you're headed?
Dean nodded, except he had no idea. His father didn't look that different, but he could see the soft sag of rot, a slackness in the mouth that had never been there before. Everyone had trouble keeping up morgues these days. The barn still smelled like hay, but there were too many flies.
He didn't know, didn't have a map or an order, but he had Sam.
Yessir, he said.
*
"Are we close?" Sam squirms in his seat, the cheap leather creaking.
"Yeah," Dean drives because he's not sure how to do anything else. Lots of things are gone, but not food, not gas, not the twisted up road.
They've been everywhere, but he's not sure where it's safe, where to go.
"Has he talked to you?"
Sam can't stop talking, can't stop asking, but now his mouth's turned down, his dirty face cracked open in the bad light. Dean thinks maybe his father was right after all.
He's tired though, jaw a hot, hard line and his eyes soft in his head.
"Left his journal, didn't he?"
The numbers don't really make sense to him anymore, but he tries to follow.
"Ok," Sam huffs, and now he sounds brighter. "Ok."
*
He thinks it might be close to February when they find her, but he's not sure.
She's got light, watery hair and thin arms, couple years on him maybe, but nothing in her face for it. Dean thinks she looks hungry, even after she eats.
Sometimes they don't see people for miles, and maybe he's a little hungry too, because her mouth tastes good against his dry tongue. He thinks there's something warmer there.
He's a little ashamed when she skims his shirt off, knows how thin he's gotten, his bony shoulders, jutting collarbones, how there's nothing but awkward boy muscle there now. He wants to cringe because he knows she's seeing freckles and bruised eyes, looks at her through the blurry spike of his lashes, but she doesn't seem to care, just holds his face hard, fierce, her breath like ice.
She's open and winking slick beneath her ratted jeans, wet against his hands, a scent so sharp he has to suck his fingers afterwards, just suck.
When he pins her with his hips, she claws at them, at his back, like something inhuman, piercing in the way that she tightens around him, quick and narrow, a high, winding motion of flesh and crackling bone.
Afterwards, he finds Sam crouched by their car, head bent.
Dean smells like sex, smells like her, but he sinks down to touch his brother's cheek. His hand feels heavy.
"What's going on, freak?"
He hasn't teased Sam like this in a long time. It's not so easy now.
When Sam looks up, there's something sharp and unfamiliar in his jaw that scares Dean, the child melted away under the slanted, hollow eyes and set mouth.
"I hate you," he says, and whatever it is vanishes, just Sam with his round cheeks again, about to yell. But this time he's quiet, hunches there in the dark.
Dean shifts around uncomfortably, damp and rough against his clothes, the air sinking into his skin.
Then Sam's hands are scrabbling at him, his arm snaking around his waist, thin and surprisingly strong. His face is crushed against Dean's jacket, like he can't bear to look.
"I want Dad - "
Dean can hear the odd little echo in the air where he bit himself off. Daddy.
He swallows because there's nothing else to do, just tightens his grip.
*
When Sam was still a baby, and Dean older than that, he remembers them driving for days and days, his father rubbing his face, cracking his knuckles and the car all stale like his mother never kept it.
The road stretched black and wide ahead of them, white stripes flashing past and the sky darkening. Sammy was being good, quiet and gurgling in the back instead of crying his head off.
"Dad," said Dean, "Dad." Not like a whine because he didn't whine.
"Yeah," and his father sounded grizzle tired, his sideburns scratchy against his old laugh lines.
"Where does it go?"
Forever. That's what it looked like, and he was ok with that, liked the hum of the engine and the bumps and curves, liked having his father there to smell and burrow against at night.
He can never remember what the answer was.
*
Later, he thinks she might have been inhuman after all. It's hard to tell these days, but there are still faint prints on his hips that aren't quite bruises. He thinks they catch the light sometimes.
Sam doesn't talk, which usually takes an effort, extra rations and a hard smack, just slouches in his seat and sulks.
Finally, Dean can't take the crossed arms, the shuffling quiet, and he pulls over sharp. His hands are cold and they're both jarred by the sudden turn, the crumbling slope off the road.
"What's wrong with you?"
He wants to shake him, but Sam just stares back, taller now, surprising and a little frightening, his hair in his eyes because Dean hasn't had time for haircuts. Something crinkles soft and sad in his hand.
It's a Twinkie.
Sam holds it like he's going to cry or run. It's the stupidest thing ever, because Dean thought neither of them had seen a Twinkie for months, all yellow and ridiculous in this brittle, gray place of too long silences and sunken eyes.
"Where - "
"In Lawrence," Sam looks down like he used to when he was a little embarrassed, one hand curling up and the other tapping his leg.
And Dean remembers now, because of course they'd gone back, even when everything happened. The convenience store, empty of everyone but not everything, how they'd gone wild together, just boys, stuffed their jackets. They crushed cheap, rich things to their mouths until their stomachs were heavy and swollen, the sounds of the feast echoing empty along the aisles, Sam crouched against the flickering lights and the silence.
He thought they finished the last of it months ago though, and now he laughs, a little wild again, in relief and the sharp rat tat of old humor.
"You - "
"It was your birthday, when she was here," Sam spits it out like Dean never thought a kid his age could, but Sam's never stood for normal expectations.
He hadn't even been keeping count. There didn't seem to be a point.
"How did you know?"
Sam flushes a little, his pulse threading quicker at his throat. "I keep track, how many days we've spent looking, so I'll know when we find him."
Dean can't talk for a second, because sometimes you realize you're the biggest asshole in the world when your little brother looks up at you, earnest for once, and everything you were going to do or say crumples before it can fly.
He takes the Twinkie, and the hug cuts like loneliness.
But he's sixteen now, with the stupid Twinkie, with Sam, and he really doesn't care about the road, the sky or what's ahead.
"Come on."
*
Poll!
Poll guess the author!
Title - Road's Gotta Go, Sky's Gotta Fall
Pairing - Gen. Sam, Dean (some Dean/other - non central)
Rating - R
Author - ???
Warnings - Apocalypse AU, pre-series
*
It's the January after the world ends.
Dean has bony shoulders, a younger brother, and no license, but he's driving anyway, because there's still a road, a little sky, and something safer ahead.
Sam hunches down in his seat, fingers dug into the shiver soft down of his jacket, bright blue and stained. He looks little and dirty, bored out of his mind.
"Do you think we'll find Dad?"
His father had told him not to lie, not to hide, not to protect, because the whole goddamned world's out there, and Sam's not always gonna have you.
But Dean's learned in the haze of the last few months that his father messed up, that sometimes his hands weren't steady and the words shook bitter and brittle out of his mouth, so he just tightens his hands on the wheel.
"Yeah, once we get out of here."
*
Things are new to him now, roads not where they're supposed to be, borders lined with wards and blood instead of state troopers, but some things don't really change.
They stop at a run down little place that might have been a diner once. There's no waitress, just a tired looking woman in a plate blue dress and beaten boots.
Dean gives her a round of bullets for coffee and eggs. He scuffs his feet on the white floor, Sam at his shoulder, wiping a runny nose on his sleeve. The air winds down with a familiar crisp cold shift, but she's actually got a ceiling fan that's running in creaking fits to ward off the half rotten half sterile smell.
He's surprised she's got electricity, measures the widths of the walls to the doors and tables with a quick glance as he's collecting the shells. She's got more food, more supplies than she's letting on, but everyone's hoarding these days. Not his business long as him and Sam are set up.
When he drifts up to her eyes, she has the hollow look of someone who's lost too much weight. He can still see the soft heaviness that used to be in her face, the smooth, wide mouth under the lines that cut against her lips.
Dean imagines if things were different, there might have been a, Got enough, kid? You gonna be ok? A warm smile and a whiff of cheap perfume or something as she passed, breasts that strained the thin material of her dress instead of sloping narrowly on her chest.
He chews the coffee on the way out, his mouth full of bitter and dark.
"I don't wanna drive any more," Sam says, his cheeks round because he's ready to yell.
Dean yanks the car door open.
*
The official seemed nice, patted his back with a heavy hand and a, Son, you know where you're headed?
Dean nodded, except he had no idea. His father didn't look that different, but he could see the soft sag of rot, a slackness in the mouth that had never been there before. Everyone had trouble keeping up morgues these days. The barn still smelled like hay, but there were too many flies.
He didn't know, didn't have a map or an order, but he had Sam.
Yessir, he said.
*
"Are we close?" Sam squirms in his seat, the cheap leather creaking.
"Yeah," Dean drives because he's not sure how to do anything else. Lots of things are gone, but not food, not gas, not the twisted up road.
They've been everywhere, but he's not sure where it's safe, where to go.
"Has he talked to you?"
Sam can't stop talking, can't stop asking, but now his mouth's turned down, his dirty face cracked open in the bad light. Dean thinks maybe his father was right after all.
He's tired though, jaw a hot, hard line and his eyes soft in his head.
"Left his journal, didn't he?"
The numbers don't really make sense to him anymore, but he tries to follow.
"Ok," Sam huffs, and now he sounds brighter. "Ok."
*
He thinks it might be close to February when they find her, but he's not sure.
She's got light, watery hair and thin arms, couple years on him maybe, but nothing in her face for it. Dean thinks she looks hungry, even after she eats.
Sometimes they don't see people for miles, and maybe he's a little hungry too, because her mouth tastes good against his dry tongue. He thinks there's something warmer there.
He's a little ashamed when she skims his shirt off, knows how thin he's gotten, his bony shoulders, jutting collarbones, how there's nothing but awkward boy muscle there now. He wants to cringe because he knows she's seeing freckles and bruised eyes, looks at her through the blurry spike of his lashes, but she doesn't seem to care, just holds his face hard, fierce, her breath like ice.
She's open and winking slick beneath her ratted jeans, wet against his hands, a scent so sharp he has to suck his fingers afterwards, just suck.
When he pins her with his hips, she claws at them, at his back, like something inhuman, piercing in the way that she tightens around him, quick and narrow, a high, winding motion of flesh and crackling bone.
Afterwards, he finds Sam crouched by their car, head bent.
Dean smells like sex, smells like her, but he sinks down to touch his brother's cheek. His hand feels heavy.
"What's going on, freak?"
He hasn't teased Sam like this in a long time. It's not so easy now.
When Sam looks up, there's something sharp and unfamiliar in his jaw that scares Dean, the child melted away under the slanted, hollow eyes and set mouth.
"I hate you," he says, and whatever it is vanishes, just Sam with his round cheeks again, about to yell. But this time he's quiet, hunches there in the dark.
Dean shifts around uncomfortably, damp and rough against his clothes, the air sinking into his skin.
Then Sam's hands are scrabbling at him, his arm snaking around his waist, thin and surprisingly strong. His face is crushed against Dean's jacket, like he can't bear to look.
"I want Dad - "
Dean can hear the odd little echo in the air where he bit himself off. Daddy.
He swallows because there's nothing else to do, just tightens his grip.
*
When Sam was still a baby, and Dean older than that, he remembers them driving for days and days, his father rubbing his face, cracking his knuckles and the car all stale like his mother never kept it.
The road stretched black and wide ahead of them, white stripes flashing past and the sky darkening. Sammy was being good, quiet and gurgling in the back instead of crying his head off.
"Dad," said Dean, "Dad." Not like a whine because he didn't whine.
"Yeah," and his father sounded grizzle tired, his sideburns scratchy against his old laugh lines.
"Where does it go?"
Forever. That's what it looked like, and he was ok with that, liked the hum of the engine and the bumps and curves, liked having his father there to smell and burrow against at night.
He can never remember what the answer was.
*
Later, he thinks she might have been inhuman after all. It's hard to tell these days, but there are still faint prints on his hips that aren't quite bruises. He thinks they catch the light sometimes.
Sam doesn't talk, which usually takes an effort, extra rations and a hard smack, just slouches in his seat and sulks.
Finally, Dean can't take the crossed arms, the shuffling quiet, and he pulls over sharp. His hands are cold and they're both jarred by the sudden turn, the crumbling slope off the road.
"What's wrong with you?"
He wants to shake him, but Sam just stares back, taller now, surprising and a little frightening, his hair in his eyes because Dean hasn't had time for haircuts. Something crinkles soft and sad in his hand.
It's a Twinkie.
Sam holds it like he's going to cry or run. It's the stupidest thing ever, because Dean thought neither of them had seen a Twinkie for months, all yellow and ridiculous in this brittle, gray place of too long silences and sunken eyes.
"Where - "
"In Lawrence," Sam looks down like he used to when he was a little embarrassed, one hand curling up and the other tapping his leg.
And Dean remembers now, because of course they'd gone back, even when everything happened. The convenience store, empty of everyone but not everything, how they'd gone wild together, just boys, stuffed their jackets. They crushed cheap, rich things to their mouths until their stomachs were heavy and swollen, the sounds of the feast echoing empty along the aisles, Sam crouched against the flickering lights and the silence.
He thought they finished the last of it months ago though, and now he laughs, a little wild again, in relief and the sharp rat tat of old humor.
"You - "
"It was your birthday, when she was here," Sam spits it out like Dean never thought a kid his age could, but Sam's never stood for normal expectations.
He hadn't even been keeping count. There didn't seem to be a point.
"How did you know?"
Sam flushes a little, his pulse threading quicker at his throat. "I keep track, how many days we've spent looking, so I'll know when we find him."
Dean can't talk for a second, because sometimes you realize you're the biggest asshole in the world when your little brother looks up at you, earnest for once, and everything you were going to do or say crumples before it can fly.
He takes the Twinkie, and the hug cuts like loneliness.
But he's sixteen now, with the stupid Twinkie, with Sam, and he really doesn't care about the road, the sky or what's ahead.
"Come on."
*
Poll!
Poll guess the author!