Fic: Too long in the Wasteland [Part 2] (spn_summergen)
Back to Part One
--
Mayor Trisha delivers the news, her tone brisk and no nonsense. She’s good, Dean thinks. Inspires calm and loyalty in her people. The Dust storm itself sounds like something out of a nightmare. 12,000 feet high and six miles wide, it contains two tornadoes and a lot of debris. And it’s heading straight for Cawker, estimated arrival time, dawn tomorrow.
Dean is impressed by the lack of panic. Everybody has a job to do and everybody does it, quickly and well. Dean secures his stuff down in the underground shelter and then asks what he can do to help. He’s directed down to the Lake, where dozens of people are working to cover the Waconda with several giant tarpaulins, strung together. It’s awkward and time-consuming and takes a lot of people in boats and on the shore to get done, but it’s worth the effort. If the Dust storm silts the lake the town is screwed.
It’s a little before dawn and Dean is just starting to think that the town is as ready as it’s going to get when suddenly the wind drops completely. The sky is an ominous mist of rust and black and Dean swears he can feel the pressure dropping.
“Get to the shelter,” Billy yells. “Run!”
Most of the town is already down there, there are only twelve people still up on the surface seeing to whatever last minute tasks need doing to make the town as secure as possible. Dean volunteered to help with that because he’s strong and competent and has more lives than a cat. He is also, let’s face it, expendable. Better he gets banged up than someone the town actually relies on.
Dean hangs back and lets everyone else down into the shelter first. The wind has started up again now and is shrieking worse than a banshee. There’s debris flying too and Dean’s face and the back of his hands are already scored by dozens of small flying chips of rock.
Dean staggers down the stairs into the shelter and a screaming match between the mom of those kids and Mayor Trisha.
“I can’t let you go,” the Mayor is saying, her hand on the mom’s chest.
The mom’s face is streaming with tears. “But they’re my kids,” she says. Her chest is heaving and her voice is agony itself. Dean recognizes the tone, remembers using it himself in a hotel room in Cold Oak when Bobby suggested that maybe they should bury Sam.
“I’ll go,” Dean says. He’s still half way up the stairs anyway.
Trisha shakes her head. “Can’t let you do that, Winchester.”
Dean nods. “Can’t stop me either,” he looks at the mom and asks her where he should look for the kids.
Trisha sighs but holds her hands up and moves out the way.
“Our house is four doors down on the right,” the mom glares at an old man sitting back against the wall. “Someone who was supposed to be keeping an eye on all the kids, wasn’t doin’ his job. Ruby went back for her doll. Tommy went with her.”
“Okay. I’ll find them,” he hesitates, glances at Trisha who’s glowering at him with her arms folded across her chest. “If I can’t get back here, does anywhere else have a basement?”
She tells him that the Mayor’s office does and that there’s a root cellar under the general store too, but both of those places have been boarded up. Dean just nods. He’s willing and able to break down doors if he needs to.
Outside, the wind is moaning and Dean is immediately lashed with grit and rocks and small branches from spiny desert shrubs that have been ripped up by the tornadoes travelling within the dust storm. He staggers forward, his jacket billowing behind him and his forearm across his face to keep the choking dust out of his eyes, nose and mouth.
Something hard and heavy smashes into Dean’s side and he falls. His head hits the gravel hard and he is momentarily stunned. He crawls forward, ribs aching and pulling, head throbbing. A piece of corrugated tin roofing cartwheels over him, tearing into his calf as it goes, and Dean bites back a cry. He calls on the mark’s strength to help him withstand the wind and stumbles to his feet, pushing his way to the fourth house on the right, counting the mailboxes by touch until he gets to the right house. The wind is screaming now and Dean shouts, but can’t even hear his own voice. The house is creaking and straining and the windows shatter. Dean is sprayed with small shards of glass. He spies Tommy and Ruby underneath the kitchen table, and yeah, they’re not going anywhere in this storm. The kids have pushed the small Formica table into a doorway between the living area and the sleeping area. Dean nods and then hauls the large rag-rug off the living room floor and covers the table with it, before crawling under himself.
“You okay?” he bellows.
Tommy mouths something and grins, all false bravado. Ruby just stares at him. Her lips move too, but there’s too much noise for him to make out what she says. Eventually she just points at his leg and, oh yeah, he’s bleeding quite a lot. Shit. That looks nasty.
Tommy has a bandana around his neck and he pulls it off and hands it to Dean who bandages his leg tightly. “It’s just a scratch,” he shouts. “Nothin’ to worry about.”
Something smashes into the table and both kids scream loudly enough for Dean to hear them. He crouches over them and uses his body to shield them from anything that might make it past the table and the thick rug and into their shelter. He hears the roof tear off the house and holds onto a leg of the table with all the mark-strength he can muster.
For the first time in a long while, Dean actually prays. Not for himself, but for the kids.
They lose the rug.
Tiny fingers bite into his flesh and sonofabitch his ribs hurt. Having a small girl pressed against them is not helping and Dean bites his lip until it bleeds to stop himself from hissing in pain or whimpering or anything else that might let the kids know that he’s not in tip-top shape. His head is still pounding and there’s a good chance he’s going to puke before they’re done here.
The wind dies and the sudden silence is eerie.
Dean opens his eyes. It’s mostly dark, with odd spears of sunlight. He sits up, the kids still clinging to him like limpets. “It’s over,” he says. “Storm’s moved on.”
There is building rubble piled up on all sides of the table and some underneath it too. Dean crawls around the perimeter to see if there’s an obvious way out that won’t cause them to get even more buried than they already are, but it doesn’t look good. He figures it’s better to wait for the townsfolk to pull the rubble off them, one careful piece at a time.
“We’re good,” he tells the kids. “Just gotta wait for the rescue team.”
Ruby points at his leg again. “You’re still bleeding.”
Dean glances down and sees a small patch of crimson soaking through the calico bandana.
He puts pressure on the wound. “I’ll be okay,” he says. “Shouldn’t take us too long to get rescued.”
The kids look dubious and Dean realizes with sudden clarity that they’re scared of being trapped under the rubble with a dead body. Of course, if he dies, it’ll be so much worse than that.
“It’s a bad cut,” he tells the kids, “and yeah, I feel like crap. But I’m not gonna bleed out before help arrives. Okay?”
“You said a bad word,” Tommy says disapprovingly.
Dean rolls his eyes and apologizes grudgingly. “Gimme a break,” he adds, “my leg hurts!”
“When we’re sick or hurt,” Ruby says, “Mommy makes us soup and tells us stories.”
“My mom used to do that too,” Dean says wistfully. “She would make me tomato and rice soup and tell me stories about how there were angels watching over me.”
“I could tell you a story,” Tommy ventures. “I’ll tell you my favorite Sam’n’Dean story about how an angel rescued Dean from Hell.”
Dean settles back against one of the table legs. “Could you tell me a different one? Maybe something funny?”
Tommy purses his lips. “Sam’n’Dean stories aren’t really funny,” he says.
“Yeah,” Dean rubs at the mark on his arm. “They’re really not.”
“That one with the rabbit’s foot was pretty funny,” Ruby says. “You know, the one where Sam lost his shoe?”
Dean sniggers. “Man, I forgot all about that, um, story.”
“Ooh!” Ruby bounces on the spot. “And the one where Dean gets ghost sickness and he gets chased by the tiny dog. Remember how Jimmy did that really high squeal? It was so funny!”
Dean scowls. “It wasn’t funny! You try getting torn about by hellhounds, see if you wanna be bff with a dog after that.”
Tommy eventually starts on a story, but Dean is mostly asleep by then and doesn’t really hear the words, just listens to the reassuring cadence of Tommy’s voice.
+
Dean is roused from his sleep by a blast of white light. He opens his eyes, shields them against the light and blinks.
“Hello?” he says.
A shadowy figure steps forward, dark wings flaring behind it.
“Hello, Dean,” says a gravelly voice.
The table is gone; all the rubble is cleared and Dean and the kids are sitting in the middle of what looks like a blast zone. The good people of Cawker are standing around them wearing stunned expressions.
“Are we dead?” Dean asks.
“No, Dean. You are not dead.”
Dean drinks in the sight of messy dark hair and vivid blue eyes. It’s been too long since he last saw the angel.
“Hey, Cas,” he says. “I hear you do a good imitation of me screaming like a girl.”
Cas inclines his head. “It is accurate, yes.”
A small hand tugs on Dean’s sleeve. He glances down at Tommy who’s looking up at him with awe and wonder. “That’s Jimmy,” says Tommy. “The Storyteller. And you’re Dean. The Dean from the stories.”
Dean offers Tommy a hesitant grin and then drags himself to his feet. “What’s going on, Cas?”
“I’m here with a message from Sam,” the angel says. Beside Dean, Tommy gasps out loud.
“Your brother has found a way to remove the mark.”
Dean frowns. “We can’t do that, man. See, it’s a lock-”
“Yes,” Castiel nods. “Sam knows about the Darkness. He has put other locks in place. This one is now superfluous. It’s over, Dean. It’s time for you to come home.”
He holds out a hand. Dean stares at it and frowns. “Home? But Sam’s in heaven.”
Cas says that it’s a long story and that perhaps he’d better start at the beginning.
He explains that it was Death himself who told Sam that the mark was a lock and that it kept the Darkness from swallowing up the Earth.
“Death hastened to explain the consequences of the mark’s removal to your brother,” Cas says, “because he knew that not even Sam’s demise would keep him from trying to free you of the mark.”
Dean’s stomach feels like a pool of wriggling eels. “Right,” he says. “Guess it’s harder to hit a dog in heaven.”
Cas stares at him with a creased brow and then he sighs. “Dean,” he says reprovingly, “He thought that was what you wanted. He thought you were dead and after everything with Bobby, he thought that it was your wish to remain dead if you died again.”
Dean knows that. They’d discussed it at length.
The last ten years of Sammy’s life had been surreal. He’d genuinely been an old man and Dean just couldn’t treat him quite the same way he always had. As Sam had aged Dean had found it easier to talk to him, to open up to him about his feelings and the things that really mattered to him. For his part, Sam had been much less angry, much less the younger brother, demanding to be heard and understood. He’d been increasingly willing to sort through Dean’s sarcasm, to see past the masks and the armour, and it had made it easier for Dean to let Sam take care of him sometimes, just as he had always taken care of Sam. Sam forgave him for the thing with Gadreel (although Dean still hasn’t completely forgiven himself, because his decision got Kevin killed) and their bond; their friendship; had been stronger than ever. They’d reached a good place. And all it had taken, Dean sometimes thinks ruefully, was for the world to end.
Dean forgave Sam for not looking for him when he was in Purgatory a long time ago, he’s just feeling a little defensive right now because, if he’s truly honest, he’s scared to death that whatever Sam has cooked up won’t work and he really, really wants to be done.
“When Sam died”, Cas continues, “and Death took him aside and told him about the Darkness, he also reassured Sam that you would be all right out in the Wasteland, because a dying world would keep the mark sated without you needing to kill innocents. He told Sam that he should first work on putting another set of locks in place, before he began to work out how to remove the mark.”
Dean runs a hand across his mouth. “And has Sam now worked out how to remove the mark?”
Cas says that he has. He explains that Sam translated the Book of the Damned and found that it contained a spell powerful enough to remove a curse as potent as the Mark of Cain.
“The spell requires three ingredients,” Cas says gravely. “Firstly, something made by God, but forbidden to man-”
“Like what?” Dean interrupts. “Like…the Apple? The one that Eve…”
“It’s actually a quince,” Cas says. “The forbidden fruit. It’s a quince. Not an apple.”
Dean frowns. “Dude, unless we’re making pie, I really don’t care. How are we gonna get a piece of fruit that rotted away millions of years ago?”
“I’m an Angel of the Lord, Dean,” Cas says. Beside them, Tommy gasps again, his eyes going wide. “I have the quince. And the Golden Calf too,” he frowns. “What’s left of it anyway. Something made by man, but forbidden by God. Crowley helped with that one,” Dean opens his mouth, but Cas shakes his head. “Don’t ask. The last ingredient,” Cas clears his throat and his brow furrows. “The last ingredient I will let Sam explain to you. Stand aside so that I can pull him through.”
Dean does as he’s asked, pulling Ruby and Tommy back with him. He glances down at the kids, his expression dazed. Is he really about to see Sammy again? “You guys okay?” he asks.
The kids are both staring up at him with awe. “I can’t believe you’re really here,” Tommy says. “This is gonna make an awesome story and I’m gonna be the Storyteller!”
Dean grins, wide and bright and happy. He grins so hard it actually hurts his face. It’s been a hell of a long time since he really, truly smiled.
The air before them shimmers like a giant pool of crystal clear water and then Sam steps out of the air and is right there, in front of him.
It’s too much. Dean staggers and almost falls, would have fallen, except for the strong arms that are suddenly around him, holding him up. He sags against his brother’s broad chest and rests his chin on his shoulder.
“Sammy,” he says. He closes his eyes and holds on tight. If this is a hallucination it’s a damn good one and he doesn’t want it to end.
Sam smells of Irish Spring, sweat and sunshine and Dean breathes in the scent of him. It takes him a long moment to realize that his brother is lightly kissing his hair and murmuring meaningless platitudes in his ear; another moment to realize that his eyes sting and his cheeks are wet. And that’s his cue to push Sammy away, before things get any girlier and Sam wants Dean to braid his hair or something.
“Hey,” he says, clearing his throat gruffly. “You look good. Like fifty years too good.”
Sam shrugs. “Residual self-image,” he says. “Apparently, in my mind; in my soul; I stopped aging when you did.”
Sam straightens up and looks around at the devastated town. “Damn,” he says. He glances back at Dean. “You’re bleeding,” he sighs. “I’d have Cas fix it, but it doesn’t really matter.” He rubs a hand over his chin. “Cas told you the good news, right?”
Dean nods. “You’ve got the Darkness locked up so you can get this thing off my arm without ending the world.”
Sam smiles. “Yeah. And we’ve already got the first two ingredients; all we need is the third.”
He’s looking intently at Dean and the scrutiny makes Dean uncomfortable.
“Right,” he says. “Well, you’ve already got a calf and a quince. I’m guessing the last ingredient ain’t mashed potato with gravy?”
Sam laughs shortly. “No. It’s my heart.”
Dean blinks. “Your…heart?” his nose wrinkles. “Please tell me I don’t have to eat all this stuff, because, ew.”
Sam is smiling, eyes so incredibly wide and young and Sam. “No,” he says. “And when I say my heart, I don’t mean literally my heart. I mean something that I love. The spell calls for the spellcaster-me-to kill something that I love.”
Sam laughs again, just as humorlessly as before. “You always used to tell me that the only way out of this thing was your death. Turns out you were right. Because something that I love? That’s you, Dean.”
+
Cas says they have a little time before he needs to get Sam back to Heaven. At Dean’s insistence, Cas restores the town of Cawker to its pre-storm state and then Dean shows Sam around, shows him that humanity is still clinging to the edge, is still stubbornly raging against the dying of the light.
Sam smiles at him. “Dylan Thomas,” he says.
Dean raises an eyebrow. “Michelle Pfeiffer,” he counters.
Sammy rolls his eyes and shakes his head. “I wish you wouldn’t do that.”
And okay, Dean knows perfectly well that he just quoted Dylan Thomas, it’s just that Sam looks so like Sam again, so like his little brother, that he’s having a hard time not falling back into bad habits, like dumbing himself down and selling himself short.
“Speaking of,” he says lightly, “I’m more than ready to go gentle into the good night. Maybe we should move this thing along?”
Sam suggests to Mayor Trisha that they should probably be given some privacy for the rest of the ritual; that at least there shouldn’t be any children present. He puts a hand on her upper arm while he’s talking to her and then stops speaking abruptly, his lips pursed and his eyes wide. “Oh,” he says. And suddenly, he’s looking at Trisha like she’s the most magnificent thing in the world.
“What?” Trisha demands.
Sam smiles. “You’re doing a great job with the town,” he says. “Keep doing what you’re doing.”
Sam and Dean head back to the place where Sam came down from Heaven. Cas is waiting for them.
A few people stay to watch the ritual, but most have already gone back to their homes, eager to get on with their lives.
“What was all that?” Dean asks, checking Sam with his hip. “Back there with Trisha? Were you flirting with her?”
Sam smiles widely and shakes his head. “Remember when everything first went to shit? Remember how I went to check on Jody and the girls?” he lowers his eyes coyly. “We uh, Jody and I, we… it was a ‘this could be our last night on Earth kind of a thing, you know?”
Dean grins and waggles his eyebrows suggestively. “Oh yeah. Sammy, you sly dog.” He frowns. “Wait a minute. You’re not telling me…”
Sam nods. “Two hundred years in Heaven, you pick up a trick or two. I could tell as soon as I touched her. She’s Jody’s great, great, great granddaughter. And mine.”
Dean glances back at Trisha and his heart skips a beat. His great, great, great niece is the mayor of one of the last remaining townships. And he got to have a drink with her. That’s…that’s awesome.
“You gonna tell her?”
Sam shakes his head. “Maybe if she doesn’t know she won’t get stuck with the Winchester bad luck.”
“Sam,” Cas says. “We do only have a limited time. We must do the spell.” He waves a hand and a table, a mixing bowl, a knife and the spell ingredients appear before them.
Dean frowns. “You sure you know what you’re doing, Sam? This is pretty old, pretty dark magic; the kind of thing that goes wrong easily.”
“Yeah,” Sam nods. “It is. But I’ve had a lot of great teachers.”
He explains to Dean that the angels had given up trying to keep him confined to his own Heaven and allowed him to wander at will, learning from anyone and everyone who had something to teach him. “I even got Cas to take me Downstairs,” he says, and Dean’s stomach lurches. Sam grins. “I had to get a Hallpass from Crowley for that, obviously, but there were a couple of people down there I needed to speak to.”
“That was stupid and dangerous,” Dean tells him.
Sam just shrugs. “Hey, I told you I was gonna get that mark off your arm, no matter what,” he bites at his bottom lip and stares intently at Dean. “I’m sorry it took so long.”
Sam gets to work and Dean stands beside Cas and watches him cast the spell, chanting in a language Dean doesn’t understand and making dramatic hand gestures. He turns at last to face Dean and approaches him slowly, a knife held in his hand.
“It’s time, Dean,” he says, and oh yeah, Dean had sort of conveniently overlooked the fact that Sam was going to have to kill him.
“Hang on a sec,” he says. He takes the demon-killing knife out of his jacket pocket and hands it to Cas. “There’s a little girl,” he says. “Her name’s Ruby,” beside him, Sam makes a startled noise.
Dean turns to him and nods. “I know, right?” he says. “Cas, I want you to give her the knife. Tell her what it is. It sort of…it feels right, giving it to her,” he pauses and holds up a hand indicating that Cas should wait. “My stuff’s in the Bed ‘n’ Breakfast. Give my journal to Tommy and the rest of my stuff to the kid’s mom. Trisha can have all the rest of my weapons. They’re still up at the Gatehouse.”
Cas disappears in a flutter of wings and Dean turns to Sam. “They liked the Sam’n’Dean stories,” he shrugs. “Gotta pass the baton on to someone, right? If they’re smart, they’ll even figure out how to get into the bunker eventually.”
Sam looks surprised. “You’re still there? By yourself?”
“Most of the time, yeah.”
Sam’s eyes flutter briefly shut. “You hate being alone,” he says. “That must’ve been Hell.”
“Nah,” Dean grins. “More like Purgatory. And I should know; I’ve been to both. But I knew you’d save me, Sammy, no matter how long it took.”
Sam turns his head and when he looks back at Dean his eyes are glassy with unshed tears. He nods. “Okay. Let’s do this. Close your eyes Dean.”
Dean closes his eyes. His soul is weary and he’s long overdue for a rest.
Once upon a time someone promised that there’d be peace when he was done. Well Dean’s done and he’s ready for his peace.
+
Book of Winchester: Gospel of The Witnesses
And when it was time, Sam came down from Heaven and he took the mark from Dean’s arm and told him that he had earned his rest. Sam and Dean walked together up a staircase of clouds, through the pearly gates and into Heaven, where the noise of a motor car revving its engine and music that was definitely not Angelic harps could be heard.
Sam and Dean had the Angel Castiel leave the people of Cawker one final gift; a giant ball of twine. Castiel was not able to explain the purpose of the Gift, merely saying that Sam and Dean’s ways were often Mysterious.
Excerpt from Cawker Town - A History
Having been blessed to witness the Ascension, the town of Cawker prospered and developed a reputation for producing the best Hunters and the best moonshine. Nowadays, people from all around make at least one pilgrimage to Cawker in their lifetime, to see the giant ball of twine and to hear the tale of the day Dean Winchester, the oldest man alive, walked out of the Wasteland and did battle with a monstrous Dust Devil, before Ascending to Heaven and taking up his rightful place by his brother Sam’s side.
The End.
--
Mayor Trisha delivers the news, her tone brisk and no nonsense. She’s good, Dean thinks. Inspires calm and loyalty in her people. The Dust storm itself sounds like something out of a nightmare. 12,000 feet high and six miles wide, it contains two tornadoes and a lot of debris. And it’s heading straight for Cawker, estimated arrival time, dawn tomorrow.
Dean is impressed by the lack of panic. Everybody has a job to do and everybody does it, quickly and well. Dean secures his stuff down in the underground shelter and then asks what he can do to help. He’s directed down to the Lake, where dozens of people are working to cover the Waconda with several giant tarpaulins, strung together. It’s awkward and time-consuming and takes a lot of people in boats and on the shore to get done, but it’s worth the effort. If the Dust storm silts the lake the town is screwed.
It’s a little before dawn and Dean is just starting to think that the town is as ready as it’s going to get when suddenly the wind drops completely. The sky is an ominous mist of rust and black and Dean swears he can feel the pressure dropping.
“Get to the shelter,” Billy yells. “Run!”
Most of the town is already down there, there are only twelve people still up on the surface seeing to whatever last minute tasks need doing to make the town as secure as possible. Dean volunteered to help with that because he’s strong and competent and has more lives than a cat. He is also, let’s face it, expendable. Better he gets banged up than someone the town actually relies on.
Dean hangs back and lets everyone else down into the shelter first. The wind has started up again now and is shrieking worse than a banshee. There’s debris flying too and Dean’s face and the back of his hands are already scored by dozens of small flying chips of rock.
Dean staggers down the stairs into the shelter and a screaming match between the mom of those kids and Mayor Trisha.
“I can’t let you go,” the Mayor is saying, her hand on the mom’s chest.
The mom’s face is streaming with tears. “But they’re my kids,” she says. Her chest is heaving and her voice is agony itself. Dean recognizes the tone, remembers using it himself in a hotel room in Cold Oak when Bobby suggested that maybe they should bury Sam.
“I’ll go,” Dean says. He’s still half way up the stairs anyway.
Trisha shakes her head. “Can’t let you do that, Winchester.”
Dean nods. “Can’t stop me either,” he looks at the mom and asks her where he should look for the kids.
Trisha sighs but holds her hands up and moves out the way.
“Our house is four doors down on the right,” the mom glares at an old man sitting back against the wall. “Someone who was supposed to be keeping an eye on all the kids, wasn’t doin’ his job. Ruby went back for her doll. Tommy went with her.”
“Okay. I’ll find them,” he hesitates, glances at Trisha who’s glowering at him with her arms folded across her chest. “If I can’t get back here, does anywhere else have a basement?”
She tells him that the Mayor’s office does and that there’s a root cellar under the general store too, but both of those places have been boarded up. Dean just nods. He’s willing and able to break down doors if he needs to.
Outside, the wind is moaning and Dean is immediately lashed with grit and rocks and small branches from spiny desert shrubs that have been ripped up by the tornadoes travelling within the dust storm. He staggers forward, his jacket billowing behind him and his forearm across his face to keep the choking dust out of his eyes, nose and mouth.
Something hard and heavy smashes into Dean’s side and he falls. His head hits the gravel hard and he is momentarily stunned. He crawls forward, ribs aching and pulling, head throbbing. A piece of corrugated tin roofing cartwheels over him, tearing into his calf as it goes, and Dean bites back a cry. He calls on the mark’s strength to help him withstand the wind and stumbles to his feet, pushing his way to the fourth house on the right, counting the mailboxes by touch until he gets to the right house. The wind is screaming now and Dean shouts, but can’t even hear his own voice. The house is creaking and straining and the windows shatter. Dean is sprayed with small shards of glass. He spies Tommy and Ruby underneath the kitchen table, and yeah, they’re not going anywhere in this storm. The kids have pushed the small Formica table into a doorway between the living area and the sleeping area. Dean nods and then hauls the large rag-rug off the living room floor and covers the table with it, before crawling under himself.
“You okay?” he bellows.
Tommy mouths something and grins, all false bravado. Ruby just stares at him. Her lips move too, but there’s too much noise for him to make out what she says. Eventually she just points at his leg and, oh yeah, he’s bleeding quite a lot. Shit. That looks nasty.
Tommy has a bandana around his neck and he pulls it off and hands it to Dean who bandages his leg tightly. “It’s just a scratch,” he shouts. “Nothin’ to worry about.”
Something smashes into the table and both kids scream loudly enough for Dean to hear them. He crouches over them and uses his body to shield them from anything that might make it past the table and the thick rug and into their shelter. He hears the roof tear off the house and holds onto a leg of the table with all the mark-strength he can muster.
For the first time in a long while, Dean actually prays. Not for himself, but for the kids.
They lose the rug.
Tiny fingers bite into his flesh and sonofabitch his ribs hurt. Having a small girl pressed against them is not helping and Dean bites his lip until it bleeds to stop himself from hissing in pain or whimpering or anything else that might let the kids know that he’s not in tip-top shape. His head is still pounding and there’s a good chance he’s going to puke before they’re done here.
The wind dies and the sudden silence is eerie.
Dean opens his eyes. It’s mostly dark, with odd spears of sunlight. He sits up, the kids still clinging to him like limpets. “It’s over,” he says. “Storm’s moved on.”
There is building rubble piled up on all sides of the table and some underneath it too. Dean crawls around the perimeter to see if there’s an obvious way out that won’t cause them to get even more buried than they already are, but it doesn’t look good. He figures it’s better to wait for the townsfolk to pull the rubble off them, one careful piece at a time.
“We’re good,” he tells the kids. “Just gotta wait for the rescue team.”
Ruby points at his leg again. “You’re still bleeding.”
Dean glances down and sees a small patch of crimson soaking through the calico bandana.
He puts pressure on the wound. “I’ll be okay,” he says. “Shouldn’t take us too long to get rescued.”
The kids look dubious and Dean realizes with sudden clarity that they’re scared of being trapped under the rubble with a dead body. Of course, if he dies, it’ll be so much worse than that.
“It’s a bad cut,” he tells the kids, “and yeah, I feel like crap. But I’m not gonna bleed out before help arrives. Okay?”
“You said a bad word,” Tommy says disapprovingly.
Dean rolls his eyes and apologizes grudgingly. “Gimme a break,” he adds, “my leg hurts!”
“When we’re sick or hurt,” Ruby says, “Mommy makes us soup and tells us stories.”
“My mom used to do that too,” Dean says wistfully. “She would make me tomato and rice soup and tell me stories about how there were angels watching over me.”
“I could tell you a story,” Tommy ventures. “I’ll tell you my favorite Sam’n’Dean story about how an angel rescued Dean from Hell.”
Dean settles back against one of the table legs. “Could you tell me a different one? Maybe something funny?”
Tommy purses his lips. “Sam’n’Dean stories aren’t really funny,” he says.
“Yeah,” Dean rubs at the mark on his arm. “They’re really not.”
“That one with the rabbit’s foot was pretty funny,” Ruby says. “You know, the one where Sam lost his shoe?”
Dean sniggers. “Man, I forgot all about that, um, story.”
“Ooh!” Ruby bounces on the spot. “And the one where Dean gets ghost sickness and he gets chased by the tiny dog. Remember how Jimmy did that really high squeal? It was so funny!”
Dean scowls. “It wasn’t funny! You try getting torn about by hellhounds, see if you wanna be bff with a dog after that.”
Tommy eventually starts on a story, but Dean is mostly asleep by then and doesn’t really hear the words, just listens to the reassuring cadence of Tommy’s voice.
+
Dean is roused from his sleep by a blast of white light. He opens his eyes, shields them against the light and blinks.
“Hello?” he says.
A shadowy figure steps forward, dark wings flaring behind it.
“Hello, Dean,” says a gravelly voice.
The table is gone; all the rubble is cleared and Dean and the kids are sitting in the middle of what looks like a blast zone. The good people of Cawker are standing around them wearing stunned expressions.
“Are we dead?” Dean asks.
“No, Dean. You are not dead.”
Dean drinks in the sight of messy dark hair and vivid blue eyes. It’s been too long since he last saw the angel.
“Hey, Cas,” he says. “I hear you do a good imitation of me screaming like a girl.”
Cas inclines his head. “It is accurate, yes.”
A small hand tugs on Dean’s sleeve. He glances down at Tommy who’s looking up at him with awe and wonder. “That’s Jimmy,” says Tommy. “The Storyteller. And you’re Dean. The Dean from the stories.”
Dean offers Tommy a hesitant grin and then drags himself to his feet. “What’s going on, Cas?”
“I’m here with a message from Sam,” the angel says. Beside Dean, Tommy gasps out loud.
“Your brother has found a way to remove the mark.”
Dean frowns. “We can’t do that, man. See, it’s a lock-”
“Yes,” Castiel nods. “Sam knows about the Darkness. He has put other locks in place. This one is now superfluous. It’s over, Dean. It’s time for you to come home.”
He holds out a hand. Dean stares at it and frowns. “Home? But Sam’s in heaven.”
Cas says that it’s a long story and that perhaps he’d better start at the beginning.
He explains that it was Death himself who told Sam that the mark was a lock and that it kept the Darkness from swallowing up the Earth.
“Death hastened to explain the consequences of the mark’s removal to your brother,” Cas says, “because he knew that not even Sam’s demise would keep him from trying to free you of the mark.”
Dean’s stomach feels like a pool of wriggling eels. “Right,” he says. “Guess it’s harder to hit a dog in heaven.”
Cas stares at him with a creased brow and then he sighs. “Dean,” he says reprovingly, “He thought that was what you wanted. He thought you were dead and after everything with Bobby, he thought that it was your wish to remain dead if you died again.”
Dean knows that. They’d discussed it at length.
The last ten years of Sammy’s life had been surreal. He’d genuinely been an old man and Dean just couldn’t treat him quite the same way he always had. As Sam had aged Dean had found it easier to talk to him, to open up to him about his feelings and the things that really mattered to him. For his part, Sam had been much less angry, much less the younger brother, demanding to be heard and understood. He’d been increasingly willing to sort through Dean’s sarcasm, to see past the masks and the armour, and it had made it easier for Dean to let Sam take care of him sometimes, just as he had always taken care of Sam. Sam forgave him for the thing with Gadreel (although Dean still hasn’t completely forgiven himself, because his decision got Kevin killed) and their bond; their friendship; had been stronger than ever. They’d reached a good place. And all it had taken, Dean sometimes thinks ruefully, was for the world to end.
Dean forgave Sam for not looking for him when he was in Purgatory a long time ago, he’s just feeling a little defensive right now because, if he’s truly honest, he’s scared to death that whatever Sam has cooked up won’t work and he really, really wants to be done.
“When Sam died”, Cas continues, “and Death took him aside and told him about the Darkness, he also reassured Sam that you would be all right out in the Wasteland, because a dying world would keep the mark sated without you needing to kill innocents. He told Sam that he should first work on putting another set of locks in place, before he began to work out how to remove the mark.”
Dean runs a hand across his mouth. “And has Sam now worked out how to remove the mark?”
Cas says that he has. He explains that Sam translated the Book of the Damned and found that it contained a spell powerful enough to remove a curse as potent as the Mark of Cain.
“The spell requires three ingredients,” Cas says gravely. “Firstly, something made by God, but forbidden to man-”
“Like what?” Dean interrupts. “Like…the Apple? The one that Eve…”
“It’s actually a quince,” Cas says. “The forbidden fruit. It’s a quince. Not an apple.”
Dean frowns. “Dude, unless we’re making pie, I really don’t care. How are we gonna get a piece of fruit that rotted away millions of years ago?”
“I’m an Angel of the Lord, Dean,” Cas says. Beside them, Tommy gasps again, his eyes going wide. “I have the quince. And the Golden Calf too,” he frowns. “What’s left of it anyway. Something made by man, but forbidden by God. Crowley helped with that one,” Dean opens his mouth, but Cas shakes his head. “Don’t ask. The last ingredient,” Cas clears his throat and his brow furrows. “The last ingredient I will let Sam explain to you. Stand aside so that I can pull him through.”
Dean does as he’s asked, pulling Ruby and Tommy back with him. He glances down at the kids, his expression dazed. Is he really about to see Sammy again? “You guys okay?” he asks.
The kids are both staring up at him with awe. “I can’t believe you’re really here,” Tommy says. “This is gonna make an awesome story and I’m gonna be the Storyteller!”
Dean grins, wide and bright and happy. He grins so hard it actually hurts his face. It’s been a hell of a long time since he really, truly smiled.
The air before them shimmers like a giant pool of crystal clear water and then Sam steps out of the air and is right there, in front of him.
It’s too much. Dean staggers and almost falls, would have fallen, except for the strong arms that are suddenly around him, holding him up. He sags against his brother’s broad chest and rests his chin on his shoulder.
“Sammy,” he says. He closes his eyes and holds on tight. If this is a hallucination it’s a damn good one and he doesn’t want it to end.
Sam smells of Irish Spring, sweat and sunshine and Dean breathes in the scent of him. It takes him a long moment to realize that his brother is lightly kissing his hair and murmuring meaningless platitudes in his ear; another moment to realize that his eyes sting and his cheeks are wet. And that’s his cue to push Sammy away, before things get any girlier and Sam wants Dean to braid his hair or something.
“Hey,” he says, clearing his throat gruffly. “You look good. Like fifty years too good.”
Sam shrugs. “Residual self-image,” he says. “Apparently, in my mind; in my soul; I stopped aging when you did.”
Sam straightens up and looks around at the devastated town. “Damn,” he says. He glances back at Dean. “You’re bleeding,” he sighs. “I’d have Cas fix it, but it doesn’t really matter.” He rubs a hand over his chin. “Cas told you the good news, right?”
Dean nods. “You’ve got the Darkness locked up so you can get this thing off my arm without ending the world.”
Sam smiles. “Yeah. And we’ve already got the first two ingredients; all we need is the third.”
He’s looking intently at Dean and the scrutiny makes Dean uncomfortable.
“Right,” he says. “Well, you’ve already got a calf and a quince. I’m guessing the last ingredient ain’t mashed potato with gravy?”
Sam laughs shortly. “No. It’s my heart.”
Dean blinks. “Your…heart?” his nose wrinkles. “Please tell me I don’t have to eat all this stuff, because, ew.”
Sam is smiling, eyes so incredibly wide and young and Sam. “No,” he says. “And when I say my heart, I don’t mean literally my heart. I mean something that I love. The spell calls for the spellcaster-me-to kill something that I love.”
Sam laughs again, just as humorlessly as before. “You always used to tell me that the only way out of this thing was your death. Turns out you were right. Because something that I love? That’s you, Dean.”
+
Cas says they have a little time before he needs to get Sam back to Heaven. At Dean’s insistence, Cas restores the town of Cawker to its pre-storm state and then Dean shows Sam around, shows him that humanity is still clinging to the edge, is still stubbornly raging against the dying of the light.
Sam smiles at him. “Dylan Thomas,” he says.
Dean raises an eyebrow. “Michelle Pfeiffer,” he counters.
Sammy rolls his eyes and shakes his head. “I wish you wouldn’t do that.”
And okay, Dean knows perfectly well that he just quoted Dylan Thomas, it’s just that Sam looks so like Sam again, so like his little brother, that he’s having a hard time not falling back into bad habits, like dumbing himself down and selling himself short.
“Speaking of,” he says lightly, “I’m more than ready to go gentle into the good night. Maybe we should move this thing along?”
Sam suggests to Mayor Trisha that they should probably be given some privacy for the rest of the ritual; that at least there shouldn’t be any children present. He puts a hand on her upper arm while he’s talking to her and then stops speaking abruptly, his lips pursed and his eyes wide. “Oh,” he says. And suddenly, he’s looking at Trisha like she’s the most magnificent thing in the world.
“What?” Trisha demands.
Sam smiles. “You’re doing a great job with the town,” he says. “Keep doing what you’re doing.”
Sam and Dean head back to the place where Sam came down from Heaven. Cas is waiting for them.
A few people stay to watch the ritual, but most have already gone back to their homes, eager to get on with their lives.
“What was all that?” Dean asks, checking Sam with his hip. “Back there with Trisha? Were you flirting with her?”
Sam smiles widely and shakes his head. “Remember when everything first went to shit? Remember how I went to check on Jody and the girls?” he lowers his eyes coyly. “We uh, Jody and I, we… it was a ‘this could be our last night on Earth kind of a thing, you know?”
Dean grins and waggles his eyebrows suggestively. “Oh yeah. Sammy, you sly dog.” He frowns. “Wait a minute. You’re not telling me…”
Sam nods. “Two hundred years in Heaven, you pick up a trick or two. I could tell as soon as I touched her. She’s Jody’s great, great, great granddaughter. And mine.”
Dean glances back at Trisha and his heart skips a beat. His great, great, great niece is the mayor of one of the last remaining townships. And he got to have a drink with her. That’s…that’s awesome.
“You gonna tell her?”
Sam shakes his head. “Maybe if she doesn’t know she won’t get stuck with the Winchester bad luck.”
“Sam,” Cas says. “We do only have a limited time. We must do the spell.” He waves a hand and a table, a mixing bowl, a knife and the spell ingredients appear before them.
Dean frowns. “You sure you know what you’re doing, Sam? This is pretty old, pretty dark magic; the kind of thing that goes wrong easily.”
“Yeah,” Sam nods. “It is. But I’ve had a lot of great teachers.”
He explains to Dean that the angels had given up trying to keep him confined to his own Heaven and allowed him to wander at will, learning from anyone and everyone who had something to teach him. “I even got Cas to take me Downstairs,” he says, and Dean’s stomach lurches. Sam grins. “I had to get a Hallpass from Crowley for that, obviously, but there were a couple of people down there I needed to speak to.”
“That was stupid and dangerous,” Dean tells him.
Sam just shrugs. “Hey, I told you I was gonna get that mark off your arm, no matter what,” he bites at his bottom lip and stares intently at Dean. “I’m sorry it took so long.”
Sam gets to work and Dean stands beside Cas and watches him cast the spell, chanting in a language Dean doesn’t understand and making dramatic hand gestures. He turns at last to face Dean and approaches him slowly, a knife held in his hand.
“It’s time, Dean,” he says, and oh yeah, Dean had sort of conveniently overlooked the fact that Sam was going to have to kill him.
“Hang on a sec,” he says. He takes the demon-killing knife out of his jacket pocket and hands it to Cas. “There’s a little girl,” he says. “Her name’s Ruby,” beside him, Sam makes a startled noise.
Dean turns to him and nods. “I know, right?” he says. “Cas, I want you to give her the knife. Tell her what it is. It sort of…it feels right, giving it to her,” he pauses and holds up a hand indicating that Cas should wait. “My stuff’s in the Bed ‘n’ Breakfast. Give my journal to Tommy and the rest of my stuff to the kid’s mom. Trisha can have all the rest of my weapons. They’re still up at the Gatehouse.”
Cas disappears in a flutter of wings and Dean turns to Sam. “They liked the Sam’n’Dean stories,” he shrugs. “Gotta pass the baton on to someone, right? If they’re smart, they’ll even figure out how to get into the bunker eventually.”
Sam looks surprised. “You’re still there? By yourself?”
“Most of the time, yeah.”
Sam’s eyes flutter briefly shut. “You hate being alone,” he says. “That must’ve been Hell.”
“Nah,” Dean grins. “More like Purgatory. And I should know; I’ve been to both. But I knew you’d save me, Sammy, no matter how long it took.”
Sam turns his head and when he looks back at Dean his eyes are glassy with unshed tears. He nods. “Okay. Let’s do this. Close your eyes Dean.”
Dean closes his eyes. His soul is weary and he’s long overdue for a rest.
Once upon a time someone promised that there’d be peace when he was done. Well Dean’s done and he’s ready for his peace.
+
Book of Winchester: Gospel of The Witnesses
And when it was time, Sam came down from Heaven and he took the mark from Dean’s arm and told him that he had earned his rest. Sam and Dean walked together up a staircase of clouds, through the pearly gates and into Heaven, where the noise of a motor car revving its engine and music that was definitely not Angelic harps could be heard.
Sam and Dean had the Angel Castiel leave the people of Cawker one final gift; a giant ball of twine. Castiel was not able to explain the purpose of the Gift, merely saying that Sam and Dean’s ways were often Mysterious.
Excerpt from Cawker Town - A History
Having been blessed to witness the Ascension, the town of Cawker prospered and developed a reputation for producing the best Hunters and the best moonshine. Nowadays, people from all around make at least one pilgrimage to Cawker in their lifetime, to see the giant ball of twine and to hear the tale of the day Dean Winchester, the oldest man alive, walked out of the Wasteland and did battle with a monstrous Dust Devil, before Ascending to Heaven and taking up his rightful place by his brother Sam’s side.
The End.