Time and Time Again
I AM DONE. This is the twenty-fifth draft of the story, and I'm still not completely satisfied. However, I do value my sanity-if not nearly as much as it's worth.
This is the latest addition to the Each Our Own Devil 'verse. It's set a couple of months after the events of Each Our Own Devil, and well, well before Brink. It would be advisable to read EOOD first to understand fully what's going on, but for this story, I don't think it's completely necessary. Just know this: Sam and Dean were ambushed by demons and Sam had one of his eyes taken. He got his soul back. And he's apparently the key to every door in Hell, so every faction involved in the civil wars in Heaven and Hell are after him. In summation, the Winchesters are in a lot of trouble.
Summary: This was supposed to be easy, routine: Sam's first hunt after getting his soul back. It turns out to be anything but.
Warnings: SPOILERS upto and including 6.09: Clap your hands if you believe, violence, plentiful blood and gore, weirdness, tense-skipping, metaphor-abuse. Unexplained stuff that'll get cleared up later in the 'verse.
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or any of its characters.
Time and Time Again
Dean should've known.
He won't stop staring at you.
"Thank you, Mrs. Redfern. We'll, uh, let you know as soon as something... comes up. About your husband, I mean." You smile tightly, waiting for Sam to pick up the cue. There's not a word from him, however; he's still looking at you like he's never seen you before (you're not my brother). His face is gleaming with sweat, the scars that snake from beneath his eye-patch appearing stark against pale skin.
Oh, he's so not ready to get back in the game.
"Right, we'll... we'll just leave, then." You gently tug at Sam's elbow, moving towards the door. Mrs. Redfern is just about starting to get suspicious, looking from you to Sam with wide red-rimmed eyes, and- that's it. Screw this shit. You bodily haul Sam out of there, down the driveway and into the Impala. He comes along without resistance or protest (i'm stronger than you, faster, smarter-) and slumps more than sits in the passenger seat.
"Well," you say, "that was productive."
Sam raises his head, hands fluttering toward the eye-patch. "Can I-?"
You grip the steering wheel tightly, gritting your teeth. "Of course-Jesus, Sam, you don't have to ask me-if, if-"
(you're a grown-overgrown man)
Almost impossibly, Sam slumps even more. "Sorry."
You sigh. This hunt was a stupid idea. A stupid, stupid idea.
Dean woke with a jerk and a muted groan. There were hands on his face, rubbing gently along his jaw, and in circumstances where his arms weren't contorted and tied behind his back, and there wasn't a freakin marching band inside his head, he might've even appreciated the gesture. But given that every part of him hurt like he'd just been thrown down a flight of stairs and then run over by a lawnmower for good measure, and the fact that he was freakin tied up, again- "Gerruufff."
So, okay. That wasn't as intimidating as he'd intended. Or in any way coherent, really. But the hands disappeared, and Dean finally opened his eyes.
It was dark-and musty. Dean sniffed and blinked and shifted, trying to get used to the darkness and the pervading smell of dust and mould and old wood. When he could see again, he realised he was in what seemed to be some kind of old cabin, sparse but clearly falling apart at the edges. What little furniture there was - a chair, a lone table standing on what seemed like three and a half legs - was run over by creeping vegetation and moss. Moonlight sifted through the cracks in the walls, dust motes swirling lazily in the light.
Abandoned cabins, Dean thought, testing the rope that bound his hands to a wooden strut behind him, should be some sort of national hazard. Can't seem to go more than five miles before somebody smuggles you into one.
The rope wouldn't yield; whoever tied him up knew what he was doing. Dean sighed, leaned back, and strained against the bonds anyway, rope-burn be damned.
Just how did he keep getting himself into these situations?
Right. Okay. No use whining about what'd already happened - it was time to take stock of the situation. He still had most of his clothes on-only his jacket and boots were missing. He was fairly sure that every weapon he had on his person had been taken, and his jeans pockets were even turned inside-out: ha ha, do your little knife-trick now, the kidnapper seemed to be saying.
Huh. Props to you. Right, then-judging by, well, everything, but mostly the pain in his head, he'd been kidnapped. When was the interesting question-he couldn't quite remember. His last definite memory was of him and Sam-
Sammy!
Dean jolted upright, grimacing against the flare of pain in his head. Shit-how the hell could he have forgotten about Sam? "Hey." He cleared his throat. "Hey! Sam! You there, man? Sammy!"
He looked from side to side, already beginning to panic. It was a tiny place; it wasn't like he could've missed his gigantor brother lying about. Sam could be-could be anywhere: he could be wandering about, half-blind and mostly insane; he could be lying in a ditch somewhere, alone and bleeding-out; he could be de-he could be, he could be doing his Sam-thing, kicking supernatural ass while Dean hung around here being as useful as a sack of potatoes. Dean wouldn't exactly put it past him.
"I know I'm not alone here!" Dean dragged his heels across the floor, straining harder against the ropes. "I swear, if you've done anything to my brother-"
He caught movement from the corner of his eye; he stilled as a little boy came into view. The kid smiled at him as Dean stared. "Hey-hey." He lowered his voice, tried to soften it. "What're you doing here, huh?"
The boy giggled. He reached up and clutched at his cheek, and to Dean's horror, began to peel off a long, bloody strip of skin-
There's someone else out there.
Sam is hunkered in front of his laptop, tapping away, ostensibly researching. One of the first things he asked for with any sort of clarity was his goddamned computer, and well, you're not sure what exactly he's doing, but hey, at least it's something. It's a welcome change from the thousand yard stares and the abrupt changes in subject, like he's having an entirely different conversation with somebody else-
Somebody's definitely out there.
You pull back the curtains, take a quick glance out of the window, but it's all normal (not normal, dean. safe.) out there: a mostly empty parking lot leading into an even emptier street. You've been doing this at increasingly shorter intervals over the last two hours, with the same results every time. But you can't shake off that feeling-that electrical tingle at the very edge of your senses, that if you look ever so quickly from the corner of your eye...
The laptop is closed with an audible click. You turn to see Sam with his head in his hands, fingers digging into his temples as he grimaces. "Painkillers?" you ask automatically (upchuck-upholstery-drive) but Sam only shakes his head. "I've found it," is all he says.
Found it. Right. Get off my case, Dean, we've bigger things to deal with. At least that's familiar from before. The 'bigger thing' in question here is your first case since two months ago, when Sam got his ethereal ass pulled out of Hell: a series of missing person cases, all centered around a quiet little suburban neighbourhood in Hastings, Pennsylvania. There's no real connection between the people who've gone missing: not gender, not age, not social standing. But what's really got you and Sam over here is the witness accounts: reports of some invisible creature, plucking these victims right in front of their eyes, clawing and tearing and pulling them into nothingness. It could be a bust, still: the witnesses' stories have been frustratingly inconsistent, and half the time one of them's just building on the story that they've heard somebody else tell. But it seemed like a safe case to start off with, to ease Sam back into the swing of things.
And you'd be lying if you say you hadn't hoped this case would turn out to be nothing; Sam's still not all there (he'll never be) and you're never sure what's the right thing to do around him anymore. Never know what might trigger another episode of Sam just-retreating into himself, sitting around like he's in suspended animation, and you're left wondering if you don't prefer the endless screaming nightmares.
You try to play it casual (ninja-funny-terrified). "Three hours of tapping at that thing, and only now you've got something? Losing your touch, bro." You wince even as you finish saying it (six year-monkeys-you), but Sam just says, "I found the connection between the vics." He raises his head, one hand still over his empty eye socket. "Their names-Andy Summers. Ellen Foster. Nancy Cartman. Ronald Smith. Victor Redfern. Mary Lightwood-" He takes a deep breath, and to your surprise, actually smiles, though it is a horrible smile, sad and bitter and utterly devoid of humour. "See the pattern, yet?"
(call us-worried sick-gonna be all right-like you better-can you guys beat it-i'm sorry)
"No," you say, and smile as wide as you can. "It's just a bunch of names, Sam."
Sam nods slowly, then closes the laptop. "I'm going to take a shower," he says, gets up, and stumbles as he struggles to find his balance. You fight the urge to go and steady him; you know it annoys him when you do that. Or you think it does, anyway-he goes all blank and rigid, and it makes you kind of want to hit something and scream.
He eventually makes it into the bathroom of his own volition. You wait until he's closed the door behind him, and then flip open the laptop. There's only one thing open on the desktop: a document filled with absolute gibberish that goes on for nearly forty pages. There's no pattern or code that you can see to what he's typed: just random letters and characters. The product of nearly three hours of aimlessly tapping away at the keys.
(you're scaring me man)
You frown.
Dean woke with a jerk and a muted groan. There were hands on his face, rubbing gently along his jaw, and in circumstances where his arms weren't contorted and tied behind his back, and there wasn't a freakin marching band inside his head, he might've even appreciated the gesture. But given that every part of him hurt like he'd just been thrown down a flight of stairs and then run over by a lawnmower for good measure, and the fact that he was freakin tied up, again-
(again)
He struggled, snapping his head from side to side. The hands disappeared, and Dean opened his eyes.
It was dark-and musty. Dean sniffed (smell of dust and mould and old wood), looking around as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. It seemed like an old abandoned cabin (falling apart at the edges) sparsely furnished, overgrown with vegetation.
national hazard-
No. No, no, wait. Something was-something was wrong-
He'd been... kidnapped? Certainly, going by the pain in his head and the fact that he was freakin trussed up like he was some sort of-
(just how did he keep getting himself into these situations)
Shut up, Dean told himself. He wasn't quite sure what had happened; even the memories of what he'd last been doing was kind of fuzzy, and (ha ha, do your little knife trick now)-goddammit! He just couldn't shake off the feeling that he'd seen all this before, and not even in a yeah-another-day-at-work kind of before, no; it was like straight-up freakin déjà vu. Maybe he could ask Sam if-
Sammy!
Dean sat bolt upright, looking around frantically for his brother. Sam was nowhere to be found, and just as Dean was about to descend into a full-on kicking-and-screaming panic mode, somebody finally came into view.
It was a little boy, maybe six, seven years old. He smiled at him, reached up and clutched at his cheek, and to Dean's horror, began to peel off a long, bloody strip of skin-
"Y'know, this is getting to be pretty pointless."
You watch as Sam neatly lays out the weapons from the duffel bag onto a cloth spread over the bed; for all the problems that he's been having with balance and co-ordination lately, there isn't a single falter to his movements as he dismantles the guns and organises the knives, right from the big ghurka knife to the little blade you usually stash away in your boot. He smiles as he draws out the whetting stone; and it's the same, lifeless smile of before. "I agree," he says.
"This is a total bust. We could go back," you offer.
Sam drops the stone with a loud bang and a clatter; he looks at you with unbridled panic. "No," he says, voice high and tight like a child that knows it must not cry, "please. Give me some more time. Please-I'll come, I'll come, but not now-"
Oh god, no. "Sam, hey." You come to his side, reach up to hold his shoulder. "It's okay; whatever you want, yeah? We'll take it easy."
He flinches away from your touch, gaze skittering from your face to every corner of the room and back again (i'm not an animal, dean). He picks up one of the knives from the bed and hands it over. "Fine," he says, and it feels like that child's been replaced by an old, old man, and some part of you sympathises with the dichotomy-so old and so young and so tortured and so alone. "I get it. I know what's happening, so-so thanks. We can move on." He tries to press the hilt of the knife in your hand.
"Stop it, Sam." You grip his wrist and put the knife away. "Sam-look. You're here, okay? I'm Dean, I'm your brother, and you-"
"No," Sam says, shaking his head. "No."
You barely clamp down on rising frustration. "Sam, please-don't do this; focus, man, for me. You're not in Hell!"
"But you're not him," Sam says, with the same old-young stare right into your eyes, "you haven't been Dean in a long time. Where else can I be?"
You sigh and look away (just wish you'd drop the act and be my brother again). "And what makes you think I'm not me?"
(... just 'cause.)
"I can see you," Sam says, "and you're not him."
You nod slowly, then turn and pick up the knife again. "I'm glad," you say, smiling, "because, really, this charade was getting a bit tiring."
Dean woke with a jerk and muted groan. There were hands on his face, rubbing gently along his jaw, and in circumstances-
-dark and musty and dust and mould and old wood-
-kidnapped, but when and where and how-
-Sammy.
"Stop this!" Dean yelled (okay, screamed, but he was not scared out of his wits, he was not). "I know all of this! I've seen all of this," he added with a grunt as he strained against the ropes, "before!"
(straight-up freakin déjà vu)
But only the little boy answered.
He never screamed as he peeled off his own face like strips of candy; only giggled.
You're not thinking of ropes; you've not thought of anything, really-you haven't had the chance to, not with your head this crowded. In all your centuries of being what you are, in all the minds you've adopted, you've never had to be the person who's been to Heaven and Hell and returned to conquer both. You've never had to be the person whose soul shines so hard, brims with such emotion, that it is all you can do to suppress its mere echo.
You've never had to be one of the Winchesters, not like this.
What this means is that you're caught unawares when Sam Winchester sees right through your deception.
(gigantor geek boy)
Sam's got his entire weapon arsenal right in front of him-missing eye or no, he was still formidable. But he doesn't pick up any of them (this is what we do this is the family business); he just sits down and looks at you and the knife in your hand like he's waiting for the worst you can do-and you might've spent a week with this man, but only now does it strike you just how much of a broken, pathetic little thing he's become, from the veritable monster he was barely a few months ago.
"Go on, then," Sam says.
You crouch in front of him and smile (and i'm going to come down there and kill every one of you sons of bitches). "This is not Hell, Sam," you say, gently running the knife up his forearm, nestling the blade in the crook of his neck. "Well, not your version, anyway." You apply just the slightest amount of pressure, and grin. "The devil will never grant you a whole week of respite."
Sam's expression does not change. "The names."
You remove the blade, twist your mouth thoughtfully. "Ah, yes-I thought you'd be clever enough to note the pattern in that one: all the names of the people who've ever died because of you two. Mind you," you add with a tilt of your head, "that is a huge list; thought I'd just start off with the most prominent."
Sam's hands clench into fists; the burst of recognisable emotion inexplicably delights you. "Where's Dean?"
"Right here," you say, tapping the blade against your temple. "Well, technically, he's tied up somewhere and out of harm's way, but my god," you close your eyes, grimacing for the briefest of seconds, "is he loud. So many thoughts, so many memories, always interrupting-"
(i look over to you and all i can think about is)
You shake your head and lift the knife. "No more talking. You can't be allowed to open Purgatory, Sam. If this means I have to kill you-I am not sorry to perform my duty as the first of my kind."
(that stupid son of a bitch who brought me here)
Sam doesn't move. "The Shapeshifter Alpha," he breathes.
(i just didn't want to let you down)
You bring the knife down.
Dean woke with a jerk and a muted groan. There were hands on his face, rubbing gently along his jaw, and in circumstances where-
"Go!" he screamed, and the hands vanished.
This time, he closed his eyes and pretended he didn't hear the sound of tearing skin.
You sit at the edge of Dean's bed with your head in your hands. From what you can hear, Sam hasn't made a move, either. Both of you sit together in near-companionable silence for nearly ten minutes before Sam finally asks, "Why haven't you killed Dean?"
(a baby sam not a monster)
"I owe him," you say slowly, lifting your head. "Kindness for kindness."
"And me?"
You haven't an answer for that, and you know he knows it just as well. You've been convincing yourself for days that you're waiting for Dean Winchester to break free and kill Sam just in time to minimise suspicion of outside involvement, but you know that's not the truth. Not really.
There is perhaps just too much Winchester in you right now.
(and the thing so bright that connects Sam to Dean and Dean to Sam that tugs and pushes and burns on touch)
"Thank you," Sam says, and there's a flicker of a genuine smile about his lips. "Thank you."
You sigh. "This is not right."
Suddenly it's Sam crouching in front of you, taking your hands in his, and looking up at you with that lopsided stare of his. You look at him, the thin, pale face and the long line of his throat and think of the billion ways to kill him (so very very easily) and safeguard Purgatory, while he just says, "I won't give in. Trust me."
(believe in you)
"Please," says prey to hunter, or perhaps it is hunter to prey, and you open your mouth to answer.
Dean woke with a jerk and a muted groan. And this time there were no hands-he woke to the sound of gunfire, several voices all shouting at once, and one high-pitched scream. He snapped open his eyes just in time to see the little boy's head explode in front of him, and Samuel Campbell framed in the flying gore for a split-second, before he was screaming again.
"Do shut up, Dean," Gwen told him, smiling good-naturedly as she crouched next to him and sawed off his bonds quickly and efficiently. "That was just a shapeshifter kid."
(warm hands rubbing gently)
Dean got shakily to his feet, rubbing his hands to get the circulation going. Samuel stood at the door, gesturing impatiently with his sawed-off. "We'd better get going, boy-your brother's in big, big trouble."
Dean opened his mouth, shook a gunk of mangled flesh out of his hair, then continued, "Tell me what the hell is going on. Where's Sam? Hell, where am I?"
Samuel rolled his eyes, but Gwen answered. "We've been tracking the 'shifter Alpha. It came here about a couple of weeks ago. And then we heard that you two guys were on the same case, too, so," she shrugged, "we figured you had a better lead on the thing than us. We've been tracking your movements in town for the last week or so."
"Wait." Dean blinked rapidly, trying to process all the information. "A week? Sam and I arrived just two days ago."
Gwen and Samuel exchanged uncomfortable glances before Samuel said, "You've been suspended in a sort of-well, time loop, over the last four days. And we? We just broke it." He tilted his head. "It doesn't make any sense, does it-shapeshifters, hell, any of the fuglies out there are just not powerful enough for this kind of magic... manipulating time-"
"Sam," Dean breathed. "Sam! He's with-"
"The 'shifter-you, yeah," Gwen finished. "We've wasted enough time tracking you here; we need to get to your brother."
And so it was that they found themselves in Samuel's van, racing toward their motel. "Silver bullet to the back of the neck," Gwen panted as they pounded up the stairs. She tossed him a revolver. "Does the trick."
They burst open the door to Sam and Dean's room to find Sam kneeling in front of Dean (no, no, not), holding its frickin hands, and there wasn't even time to think-as Samuel and Gwen ran in, guns hefted and effectively cornering the thing, all Dean had to do was slip behind them, take aim, and pull the trigger.
The Alpha collapsed into Sam's arms.
"Excellent," Gwen said, grinning from ear to ear. "That should have it where we want it for at least a few hours."
But Dean had already thrown the gun aside and stalked up to his brother, performing a quick visual triage. Sam seemed none the worse for wear; pale and shell-shocked, maybe, but he seemed to be all right otherwise for a guy who spent a week with the most powerful shapeshifter on the planet. Dean could've hugged him, then and there. Instead, he settled for asking, "Sam. Hey. You okay?"
Sam didn't meet his eyes. "I promised," was all he said.
Finis