[FIC] Father's Gun (60/?)
Title: Father's Gun
Authors: diana_lucifera & tersichore
Pairing: Dean/Sam
Rating: Mature
Warnings: minor character death, mentions of torture, the slowest of burns, and excessive bed-sharing
Summary: After the events of "Brother's Blood," Sam and Dean are faced with teaming up with John to hunt the Yellow-Eyed Demon, all while keeping Sam's powers a secret and dodging their dad's questions about just why things between them are so... different.
Notes: Aaaand we're back! Did'ya miss up?
Previous Chapter | Master Post
They climb out of the car, silent except for the sounds of raindrops pattering against their jackets and the squelch of their boots in the mud. From his shelter under the front porch, Rumsfeld greets them with a lazy, welcoming woof. Dean barely has a chance to set foot on the steps before the screen door creaks open, and then Bobby’s standing there, face set in a hard expression Dean would call disapproval if he didn’t know how to read the relief in his eyes.
“Well,” the old hunter grumbles, “it’s about time you two chuckleheads decided to turn up.”
“Bobby,” Sam rasps cautiously, voice a wrecked croak as he gives the older hunter a nod.
“You got company?” Dean cuts right to the chase, jerking his head at the Harvelle’s pickup on the lawn.
“Ellen and Jo.” Bobby nods, offering his Holy Water flask to Sam and Dean for proofing sips before he waves them through the door and into the familiar, research-strewn warmth of his living room. “Showed up as soon as they got everything squared away for the arson investigation.”
“Arson?” Sam croaks, color draining from his face as he freezes, stares at Bobby, mouth open in horror.
“She said it was demons.” Dean glares, keeping a hand at Sam’s elbow, his brother safe and near and his hand just itching for the familiar weight of a piece, his or Sam’s or the goddamn Colt or anything, anything to squash the feeling of the walls closing in, the trap shutting, the tromp of enemies at the gate. “Ellen’s message said it was demons. You’re tellin’ us this was another fire? Another demon fire?”
“Too soon to tell for sure,” Bobby hedges, “but it sure as hell looks like it.”
“When did it happen?” Sam demands, voice sharp for all that it sounds like it’s been run through a cheese grater. “When exactly? Did they see who did it? Do they know who was possessed?”
“We can do the hunter share-and-care after you boys get some goddamn rest,” Bobby gravels, looking from Sam to Dean and putting on his best ‘Listen to Your Goddamn Elders, Ya Idjits’ face. “El and Jo are sacked out in the back bedroom. They won’t be good to go over the details for a while yet. ‘Till then, you two set up in the master upstairs, catch some fuckin’ shuteye. I’ll mind the phones.”
“Bobby-” Sam protests, and for all that it sounds like the kid’s only got a couple sentences left in him, Dean is pretty goddamn with him on this one.
If Yellow Eyes is making it his mission to hit as many of their contacts as quick as possible, if this is part of something bigger, deadlier, something targeting anyone and everyone they’ve ever cared about, they need to know and they need to know now, dammit.
“Fire or no, what happened happened,” Bobby cuts him off. “Ain’t gonna un-happen just ‘cause you get a few hours sleep, and you ain’t gonna learn any more about it by keepin’ awake, I can promise you that. Ellen and Jo’ve got the intel you need, but they’re not givin’ it for a few hours yet. ‘Til then you got nowhere to go and nothin’ to do but rest up and wait.”
They open their mouths to argue, but Bobby’s right there, cutting them off for all he’s worth.
“Now you want answers? You want leads?” he challenges. “Well then, you turn your tails back out that door, get your goddamn things, and set up for some rest before you fall the fuck over and get soot and sulfur all over my clean goddamn floors.”
Sam and Dean look down to the dusty, salty planks beneath their feet, scattered here and there with escaped shreds of herbs and loose scraps of research.
“Clean, huh?” Dean can’t help but grin as Sam tries to hide his smile with some industrious nose-scratching.
“It’s a relative term, smartass.” Bobby glowers. “Now make yourself useful and unload the damn bags, let your brother head on up for some rest. Boy looks like he’s about to drop.”
“I’m fine,” Sam rasps defensively, drawing closer to Dean just as Dean snags a handful of his brother’s jacket, angles himself in front of Sam on instinct, on the memories of trading what he knows for what he knew, on following orders and trusting elders and ending up drugged here while Sam burns there, him on one side of the door and his brother on the other and hell, hell if he falls for that one a second fucking time.
“Sure, and only my ass can prevent forest fires.” Bobby snorts, rolling his eyes at Sam’s protest. “Suit yourself, but you pass out on my porch, I’m not helpin’ haul your ass upstairs.”
He shrugs, waving them on as he stomps into the kitchen and starts rummaging through cabinets.
“Be an idjit about it. Bunk in the yard with Rumsfeld for all I care.”
Dean tries to not be relieved, tries not to relax at the familiar annoyance and dismissal, at this one, tiny sign that this isn’t about to blow up in their faces just like every other damn thing in their lives always does.
Of course, that tiny ghost of relief only lasts about as long as it takes them to get back to the Impala, for Dean to snag their duffels and Sam’s not-getting-fucking-sepsis-on-my-watch meds and slam the door and catch his little brother looking a little more longingly at the driver’s seat than he has, well, ever.
“You can’t be serious.” Dean snaps, dropping the duffels on the gravel of Bobby’s drive and setting the pharmacy bag down on top with a sharp, plastic-y crinkle. “You were the one who was all gung ho about coming here in the fucking first place! What about intel? What about resources? What about ‘We owe this to Bobby, Dean?!”
“It was a fire, Dean,” Sam rasps. “What if this is some new coordinated attack thing? Or if this is the next step in Yellow Eyes’ big goddamn plan? Either way, we’re putting them all at risk just by being here. We can’t do that to Bobby, Dean. We can’t do that to Ellen and Jo, not after everything they just lost! Not after helping us out got Ash and everyone else in that place killed!”
“We don’t know-”
“Bullshit!” Sam snaps, eyes sharp. “Jim and Ellen’s, burning in the same way in the same night? Bullshitwe don’t know. And I don’t know about you, but I’m not gonna walk in there and risk a repeat of Jim’s without letting them know exactly what they’re in for!”
“What, you talkin’ full disclosure?” Dean sputters. “The psychic kids, Yellow Eyes’ big goddamn plan? Sam, are you nuts?!”
“Bobby’s already got the broad strokes, Dean,” Sam counters. “Ellen, too, if she knows even a little of what Ash was up to. They deserve to know what’s after us. They deserve to know what they’re in for if they work with us, and they- they deserve a choice, Dean!”
“And what choice is that, Sam?” Dean demands.
“The choice to either get out now or stick around and become just another body on the ceiling!” Sam snaps, cutting quick and deep, and goddamnit, did he have to- have to-
“The body count’s been too high for too goddamn long now, Dean!” Sam presses urgently. “And if they’re all we’ve got left, I’m not gonna douse them in fucking gasoline and start playing with matches! Not with our luck being what it’s been lately!”
“So knowing us should come with a goddamn warning label now, huh?” Dean gravels, sharp and angry and hating how right Sam is, how true it is that they just keep going and getting people killed, good people, people who were just trying to live their lives, people they were meant to protect, to save.
“… Beats the alternative,” Sam murmurs after a long, painful pause.
Dean knows where his head’s at right now, knows because he’s there too, right back in that church and right back with that baby, soft, and sweet and innocent and just another life they failed to save. Just another innocent who burned for the unforgivable sin of knowing them, trusting them, sticking around long enough for the demons to catch on, catch up, rip another family apart, another world to shreds, and burn it to ashes.
Every safe haven they’ve found, every place they’ve stopped to catch their breath, to go to ground- Jim’s… the Roadhouse… Stanford… God, even as far back as Lawrence…
It’s hard to argue with twenty plus years of everyone and everything that’s ever meant anything to any of them going up in smoke.
The demons got Mom. They got Jess. They got that baby. Her parents. Jim’s church.
Is Dean really willing to risk Bobby on those odds? Everything he’s ever been to them on the half-hope that as long as they don’t stick around, as long as they move along quick, he’ll be safe? That he and Ellen and Jo won’t get caught in the crossfire? Won’t be just as valid targets as Jim or Jess or Mom?
“Fine.” Dean sighs, scrubbing a hand across his face, agreeing but hating himself for it because it makes sense. It makes sense for Bobby and Ellen and Jo and anyone who’s ever meant anything to them, who’s at risk, but there’s still a big problem with this whole damn line of thinking. If Sam hasn’t hit on it yet, he’s gonna, and that’s almost worse in a way. “Full disclosure. Whatever you want, just…”
“What?” Sam blinks when Dean trails off, glares daggers at the gravel of Bobby’s drive as he tries to find the words that aren’t too- too paranoid or over-protective or goddamn needy to say without forfeiting his fucking Man Card.
“Just promise me I’m not gonna go to sleep and find out you made for the state line in one of Bobby’s goddamn junkers, okay?” he snaps, his head jerking up and eyes searing into Sam’s.
Saying they’re cursed because of the demon thing, that they’re better off alone, better off cutting ties and warning contacts because of what they are isn’t quite right, is it? Because Dean’s not the one with the blood. He’s not the one with the powers or the visions or the Big Goddamn Destiny.
Sam is.
And all those rules, all those reasons Bobby and Ellen and Jo are at risk, deserve a choice, should be kept at arm’s length, they apply to Dean, too. Could work just as well for Sam’s brother as they could for any no-name hunter they pick a lead from at a truck stop on some lonely stretch of Interstate. Except that’s total fucking bullshit, and if Sam thinks he can “Fair and Balanced Choice” his way into ditching Dean like an ugly hookup the morning after, he’s got another goddamn think coming.
“I- I promise.” Sam blinks, caught off-guard. “Dean, I wasn’t thinking- That’s- that’s not where I was going with this, okay? Swear to god.”
Dean pins him with a look, and Sam draws himself up, squares off.
“Maybe it means I’m putting you in danger,” Sam says, voice wrecked and face weary, but solid. Determined. “Maybe it means that I’m weak and selfish and one day your blood is gonna be on my hands, but all I could think about in that goddamn panic room, as the smoke started coming in under the door and the walls started getting hot and it looked like no one, and I mean no one, was coming for me, was that I had you. I had you and only you, and I’d spent the last night we’d ever have together on some stupid, petty fight.”
Dean wishes he didn’t know what his brother was talking about. Wishes that didn’t sound exactly like what he thought those last few days in that cage in Louisiana, counting the days in bites on his skin and how far the sinking, seeping chill of blood loss was creeping up his limbs, the only thoughts he could string together one long, lonely chain of regrets. How badly he’d screwed it up with Sammy. How bad he felt for leaving things with the kid like they were. Hating that he’d never get the chance to make it right.
“I won’t ask you to stay.” Sam sighs, looking up through the gray morning light and shoving his hands in his pockets. “You’ve got the choice, same as Bobby or Ellen or Jo. But I’m tellin’ you right now, Dean, I-I’m not- I don’t have it in me to go.”
Sam shakes his head, swallowing thickly.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry if this makes me an awful person, but after that, after all of that- If you’re still here, I’m- I’m not gonna fight you on it.”
“Yeah, well see that you fucking don’t, okay?” Dean grumbles through a sigh of relief, more thankful for one of Sam’s girly speeches than he’s ever been for anything in his life as he snatches up their bags and starts back up the drive. “And do your breathing exercises.”
“Seriously?” Sam laughs faintly from behind Dean before tracking up the gravel after him, trying and failing to steal his duffle from Dean.
“Every hour, on the hour, bitch.” Dean smirks as Sam rolls his eyes though his first held breath, flipping Dean the bird as they stomp across Bobby’s porch.
“I’m gonna take that finger as a ‘jerk’ and move on.” Dean chuckles, digging in the pharmacy bag with big-brotherly glee as they make their way to upstairs bedroom. “Now take your fucking rescue inhaler. No goddamn point to it if it’s in the bag and not on you at all fucking times.”
“Dean, I’m not carrying that,” Sam scoffs before taking another breath and holding it.
“What? You afraid the other hunters are gonna make fun of you?” Dean snorts, dumping their stuff on the floor and flopping onto the worn floral quilt.
“Yeah, a hunter with a rescue inhaler and panic attacks,” Sam says acerbically. “I’d make fun of me. This is hunting, Dean, not the Special Olympics.”
“What’s the big deal? Think someone’s gonna shove you in a locker? Give you a swirlie?” Dean teases, nudging Sam’s hip with his foot as the kid digs his shower stuff from his duffle. “Come on, Sammy, a Purple Nurple’s not that bad.”
“Like you’d know.” Sam snorts.
“Well, hey, if anyone makes fun of you, you tell me.” Dean chuckles, settling down for a doze as Sam heads into the attached bathroom, pulling the door shut behind him. “I’ll take ‘em out behind the bleacher and kick their ass. It’ll be just like old times.”
“You suck!” Sam calls from the other room over the sound of the shower kicking on.
“Do your breathing exercises!” Dean shouts back, snickering as Sam pounds the wall in his general direction.
Chapter 61
Authors: diana_lucifera & tersichore
Pairing: Dean/Sam
Rating: Mature
Warnings: minor character death, mentions of torture, the slowest of burns, and excessive bed-sharing
Summary: After the events of "Brother's Blood," Sam and Dean are faced with teaming up with John to hunt the Yellow-Eyed Demon, all while keeping Sam's powers a secret and dodging their dad's questions about just why things between them are so... different.
Notes: Aaaand we're back! Did'ya miss up?
Previous Chapter | Master Post
They climb out of the car, silent except for the sounds of raindrops pattering against their jackets and the squelch of their boots in the mud. From his shelter under the front porch, Rumsfeld greets them with a lazy, welcoming woof. Dean barely has a chance to set foot on the steps before the screen door creaks open, and then Bobby’s standing there, face set in a hard expression Dean would call disapproval if he didn’t know how to read the relief in his eyes.
“Well,” the old hunter grumbles, “it’s about time you two chuckleheads decided to turn up.”
“Bobby,” Sam rasps cautiously, voice a wrecked croak as he gives the older hunter a nod.
“You got company?” Dean cuts right to the chase, jerking his head at the Harvelle’s pickup on the lawn.
“Ellen and Jo.” Bobby nods, offering his Holy Water flask to Sam and Dean for proofing sips before he waves them through the door and into the familiar, research-strewn warmth of his living room. “Showed up as soon as they got everything squared away for the arson investigation.”
“Arson?” Sam croaks, color draining from his face as he freezes, stares at Bobby, mouth open in horror.
“She said it was demons.” Dean glares, keeping a hand at Sam’s elbow, his brother safe and near and his hand just itching for the familiar weight of a piece, his or Sam’s or the goddamn Colt or anything, anything to squash the feeling of the walls closing in, the trap shutting, the tromp of enemies at the gate. “Ellen’s message said it was demons. You’re tellin’ us this was another fire? Another demon fire?”
“Too soon to tell for sure,” Bobby hedges, “but it sure as hell looks like it.”
“When did it happen?” Sam demands, voice sharp for all that it sounds like it’s been run through a cheese grater. “When exactly? Did they see who did it? Do they know who was possessed?”
“We can do the hunter share-and-care after you boys get some goddamn rest,” Bobby gravels, looking from Sam to Dean and putting on his best ‘Listen to Your Goddamn Elders, Ya Idjits’ face. “El and Jo are sacked out in the back bedroom. They won’t be good to go over the details for a while yet. ‘Till then, you two set up in the master upstairs, catch some fuckin’ shuteye. I’ll mind the phones.”
“Bobby-” Sam protests, and for all that it sounds like the kid’s only got a couple sentences left in him, Dean is pretty goddamn with him on this one.
If Yellow Eyes is making it his mission to hit as many of their contacts as quick as possible, if this is part of something bigger, deadlier, something targeting anyone and everyone they’ve ever cared about, they need to know and they need to know now, dammit.
“Fire or no, what happened happened,” Bobby cuts him off. “Ain’t gonna un-happen just ‘cause you get a few hours sleep, and you ain’t gonna learn any more about it by keepin’ awake, I can promise you that. Ellen and Jo’ve got the intel you need, but they’re not givin’ it for a few hours yet. ‘Til then you got nowhere to go and nothin’ to do but rest up and wait.”
They open their mouths to argue, but Bobby’s right there, cutting them off for all he’s worth.
“Now you want answers? You want leads?” he challenges. “Well then, you turn your tails back out that door, get your goddamn things, and set up for some rest before you fall the fuck over and get soot and sulfur all over my clean goddamn floors.”
Sam and Dean look down to the dusty, salty planks beneath their feet, scattered here and there with escaped shreds of herbs and loose scraps of research.
“Clean, huh?” Dean can’t help but grin as Sam tries to hide his smile with some industrious nose-scratching.
“It’s a relative term, smartass.” Bobby glowers. “Now make yourself useful and unload the damn bags, let your brother head on up for some rest. Boy looks like he’s about to drop.”
“I’m fine,” Sam rasps defensively, drawing closer to Dean just as Dean snags a handful of his brother’s jacket, angles himself in front of Sam on instinct, on the memories of trading what he knows for what he knew, on following orders and trusting elders and ending up drugged here while Sam burns there, him on one side of the door and his brother on the other and hell, hell if he falls for that one a second fucking time.
“Sure, and only my ass can prevent forest fires.” Bobby snorts, rolling his eyes at Sam’s protest. “Suit yourself, but you pass out on my porch, I’m not helpin’ haul your ass upstairs.”
He shrugs, waving them on as he stomps into the kitchen and starts rummaging through cabinets.
“Be an idjit about it. Bunk in the yard with Rumsfeld for all I care.”
Dean tries to not be relieved, tries not to relax at the familiar annoyance and dismissal, at this one, tiny sign that this isn’t about to blow up in their faces just like every other damn thing in their lives always does.
Of course, that tiny ghost of relief only lasts about as long as it takes them to get back to the Impala, for Dean to snag their duffels and Sam’s not-getting-fucking-sepsis-on-my-watch meds and slam the door and catch his little brother looking a little more longingly at the driver’s seat than he has, well, ever.
“You can’t be serious.” Dean snaps, dropping the duffels on the gravel of Bobby’s drive and setting the pharmacy bag down on top with a sharp, plastic-y crinkle. “You were the one who was all gung ho about coming here in the fucking first place! What about intel? What about resources? What about ‘We owe this to Bobby, Dean?!”
“It was a fire, Dean,” Sam rasps. “What if this is some new coordinated attack thing? Or if this is the next step in Yellow Eyes’ big goddamn plan? Either way, we’re putting them all at risk just by being here. We can’t do that to Bobby, Dean. We can’t do that to Ellen and Jo, not after everything they just lost! Not after helping us out got Ash and everyone else in that place killed!”
“We don’t know-”
“Bullshit!” Sam snaps, eyes sharp. “Jim and Ellen’s, burning in the same way in the same night? Bullshitwe don’t know. And I don’t know about you, but I’m not gonna walk in there and risk a repeat of Jim’s without letting them know exactly what they’re in for!”
“What, you talkin’ full disclosure?” Dean sputters. “The psychic kids, Yellow Eyes’ big goddamn plan? Sam, are you nuts?!”
“Bobby’s already got the broad strokes, Dean,” Sam counters. “Ellen, too, if she knows even a little of what Ash was up to. They deserve to know what’s after us. They deserve to know what they’re in for if they work with us, and they- they deserve a choice, Dean!”
“And what choice is that, Sam?” Dean demands.
“The choice to either get out now or stick around and become just another body on the ceiling!” Sam snaps, cutting quick and deep, and goddamnit, did he have to- have to-
“The body count’s been too high for too goddamn long now, Dean!” Sam presses urgently. “And if they’re all we’ve got left, I’m not gonna douse them in fucking gasoline and start playing with matches! Not with our luck being what it’s been lately!”
“So knowing us should come with a goddamn warning label now, huh?” Dean gravels, sharp and angry and hating how right Sam is, how true it is that they just keep going and getting people killed, good people, people who were just trying to live their lives, people they were meant to protect, to save.
“… Beats the alternative,” Sam murmurs after a long, painful pause.
Dean knows where his head’s at right now, knows because he’s there too, right back in that church and right back with that baby, soft, and sweet and innocent and just another life they failed to save. Just another innocent who burned for the unforgivable sin of knowing them, trusting them, sticking around long enough for the demons to catch on, catch up, rip another family apart, another world to shreds, and burn it to ashes.
Every safe haven they’ve found, every place they’ve stopped to catch their breath, to go to ground- Jim’s… the Roadhouse… Stanford… God, even as far back as Lawrence…
It’s hard to argue with twenty plus years of everyone and everything that’s ever meant anything to any of them going up in smoke.
The demons got Mom. They got Jess. They got that baby. Her parents. Jim’s church.
Is Dean really willing to risk Bobby on those odds? Everything he’s ever been to them on the half-hope that as long as they don’t stick around, as long as they move along quick, he’ll be safe? That he and Ellen and Jo won’t get caught in the crossfire? Won’t be just as valid targets as Jim or Jess or Mom?
“Fine.” Dean sighs, scrubbing a hand across his face, agreeing but hating himself for it because it makes sense. It makes sense for Bobby and Ellen and Jo and anyone who’s ever meant anything to them, who’s at risk, but there’s still a big problem with this whole damn line of thinking. If Sam hasn’t hit on it yet, he’s gonna, and that’s almost worse in a way. “Full disclosure. Whatever you want, just…”
“What?” Sam blinks when Dean trails off, glares daggers at the gravel of Bobby’s drive as he tries to find the words that aren’t too- too paranoid or over-protective or goddamn needy to say without forfeiting his fucking Man Card.
“Just promise me I’m not gonna go to sleep and find out you made for the state line in one of Bobby’s goddamn junkers, okay?” he snaps, his head jerking up and eyes searing into Sam’s.
Saying they’re cursed because of the demon thing, that they’re better off alone, better off cutting ties and warning contacts because of what they are isn’t quite right, is it? Because Dean’s not the one with the blood. He’s not the one with the powers or the visions or the Big Goddamn Destiny.
Sam is.
And all those rules, all those reasons Bobby and Ellen and Jo are at risk, deserve a choice, should be kept at arm’s length, they apply to Dean, too. Could work just as well for Sam’s brother as they could for any no-name hunter they pick a lead from at a truck stop on some lonely stretch of Interstate. Except that’s total fucking bullshit, and if Sam thinks he can “Fair and Balanced Choice” his way into ditching Dean like an ugly hookup the morning after, he’s got another goddamn think coming.
“I- I promise.” Sam blinks, caught off-guard. “Dean, I wasn’t thinking- That’s- that’s not where I was going with this, okay? Swear to god.”
Dean pins him with a look, and Sam draws himself up, squares off.
“Maybe it means I’m putting you in danger,” Sam says, voice wrecked and face weary, but solid. Determined. “Maybe it means that I’m weak and selfish and one day your blood is gonna be on my hands, but all I could think about in that goddamn panic room, as the smoke started coming in under the door and the walls started getting hot and it looked like no one, and I mean no one, was coming for me, was that I had you. I had you and only you, and I’d spent the last night we’d ever have together on some stupid, petty fight.”
Dean wishes he didn’t know what his brother was talking about. Wishes that didn’t sound exactly like what he thought those last few days in that cage in Louisiana, counting the days in bites on his skin and how far the sinking, seeping chill of blood loss was creeping up his limbs, the only thoughts he could string together one long, lonely chain of regrets. How badly he’d screwed it up with Sammy. How bad he felt for leaving things with the kid like they were. Hating that he’d never get the chance to make it right.
“I won’t ask you to stay.” Sam sighs, looking up through the gray morning light and shoving his hands in his pockets. “You’ve got the choice, same as Bobby or Ellen or Jo. But I’m tellin’ you right now, Dean, I-I’m not- I don’t have it in me to go.”
Sam shakes his head, swallowing thickly.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry if this makes me an awful person, but after that, after all of that- If you’re still here, I’m- I’m not gonna fight you on it.”
“Yeah, well see that you fucking don’t, okay?” Dean grumbles through a sigh of relief, more thankful for one of Sam’s girly speeches than he’s ever been for anything in his life as he snatches up their bags and starts back up the drive. “And do your breathing exercises.”
“Seriously?” Sam laughs faintly from behind Dean before tracking up the gravel after him, trying and failing to steal his duffle from Dean.
“Every hour, on the hour, bitch.” Dean smirks as Sam rolls his eyes though his first held breath, flipping Dean the bird as they stomp across Bobby’s porch.
“I’m gonna take that finger as a ‘jerk’ and move on.” Dean chuckles, digging in the pharmacy bag with big-brotherly glee as they make their way to upstairs bedroom. “Now take your fucking rescue inhaler. No goddamn point to it if it’s in the bag and not on you at all fucking times.”
“Dean, I’m not carrying that,” Sam scoffs before taking another breath and holding it.
“What? You afraid the other hunters are gonna make fun of you?” Dean snorts, dumping their stuff on the floor and flopping onto the worn floral quilt.
“Yeah, a hunter with a rescue inhaler and panic attacks,” Sam says acerbically. “I’d make fun of me. This is hunting, Dean, not the Special Olympics.”
“What’s the big deal? Think someone’s gonna shove you in a locker? Give you a swirlie?” Dean teases, nudging Sam’s hip with his foot as the kid digs his shower stuff from his duffle. “Come on, Sammy, a Purple Nurple’s not that bad.”
“Like you’d know.” Sam snorts.
“Well, hey, if anyone makes fun of you, you tell me.” Dean chuckles, settling down for a doze as Sam heads into the attached bathroom, pulling the door shut behind him. “I’ll take ‘em out behind the bleacher and kick their ass. It’ll be just like old times.”
“You suck!” Sam calls from the other room over the sound of the shower kicking on.
“Do your breathing exercises!” Dean shouts back, snickering as Sam pounds the wall in his general direction.
Chapter 61