There Goes the World
Title: There Goes the World
Pairing: Sam/Dean
Rated: NC-17
Word Count: 5,000
Warnings: Apocalypse fic, language, angst, incest
Disclaimer: Don't own the characters, just the words.
Notes: Beta edited by judas_denied. Story inspired by In the Middle by Theory of a Deadman, which I have been listening to on repeat a lot lately *ahem* Yes, I am pathetic. I'm okay with that.
Summary: Sam isn't invited to this new Paradise the angels are building, and Dean isn't going without him.
There Goes the World
“And as we stand on the edge of darkness
Let our chant fill the void
That others may know
In the land of the night
The ship of the sun
Is drawn by
The grateful dead.”
Tibetan Book of the Dead
The sun through the floor to ceiling glass wall slanted over their bed and woke Dean. The light glanced off his eyelashes, making gold sparkles in his vision when he blinked and he lay there watching them and feeling Sam’s warm breath puff against the back of his shoulders.
Beyond the windows the world outside was bright with the rising sun, the sky pink and salmon colored blending into gold filigreed clouds that hovered in smears of lavender. It was like watching a sunrise painted by an impressionist painter with a brush made from a single hair. Distantly, if he strained to hear it, Dean could just make out the sounds of angels singing and the earth crumbling against the hum of their voices.
Someone cleared their throat and Dean turned his head to see Castiel standing at the foot of the bed, looking at the carpet between his feet.
Dean smiled faintly and reached over Sam’s hip to pull the sheet over them. “What is it?” he asked.
Castiel glanced up from studying the floor and frowned at him. “I’m here to ask you again to reconsider.”
“Every day you come for the same reason,” Dean said. He shifted on the bed and sat up, resting against the headboard. Sam muttered unintelligibly in his sleep and laid his head on Dean’s thigh. Dean ran his fingers through his hair and regarded Castiel with calm sadness. “I have reconsidered it-”
“Then come with me,” Castiel said anxiously. “We have no time to waste here, the-”
“And my answer is still no,” Dean said.
“I cannot believe that you would refuse such a thing,” Castiel whispered. “An offer given by God himself-repeatedly-for absolution. All your sins forgiven and washed away and a hand outstretched to welcome you into Paradise. It is more than you, with your life spent in sin, could ever have achieved otherwise.”
Dean sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose between his fingers. “Your god’s letting his angels tear my world apart,” Dean said, gesturing with his hand to the world crumbling outside the windows.
They were in the presidential suite of some fancy hotel in Los Angeles that Sam had always wanted to see and it was literally on top of the world. He could look out that glass door and watch as the city disappeared. It was still there, empty and waiting, but Dean could hear Castiel’s Paradise approaching and did a quick calculation of how much time they had left.
“You’re building your Paradise over everything that I-that we-know,” Dean said. He cocked his head to one side and held up a hand for Castiel to be quiet when the angel opened his mouth to speak. “Hear that? It’s being swallowed and what gives Him the right?”
“He is God,” Castiel said.
Dean looked at him, eyes sparking with anger, and shook his head. “And just like he left you all in Heaven to fend for yourselves, now he’s gonna wipe the slate clean down here and start over and do you really think it’s going to be a better place?” He laughed and let his head drop back against the headboard of the bed. “We’re human. Fucking shit like this up is what we do. If your God paid more attention, maybe he’d know that. Or maybe he does know that, huh?”
“It is Paradise,” Castiel said, perplexed. “Nothing bad can happen. Everyone will be happy. Everything will be… wonderful.”
“And someone will get bored and write ‘Michael sucks Raphael’s peen’ with divine, sparkling spray paint across some pristine palace wall and there you go. Next, you’ll find the cherubs watching a fucking orgy on cloud nine and there goes Paradise. Right out the damn window.”
Castiel blinked at him and frowned. “That cannot happen.”
“Hey, man, not everyone’s idea of paradise is the same, alright?” Dean said. “Some guys dream about sitting around in their stinking underwear watching the Superbowl, eating Cheetos out of the bag while a Playboy bunny brings them beer. That shit isn’t going to fly in this Paradise your god is cooking up, though, is it?”
“Maybe…” Castiel said, frown deepening thoughtfully. “Something will be done. Everything will be fine.”
Dean shrugged then stilled when Sam moved against him. He lowered his voice, trying not to wake him. “We don’t know that,” he said. “Frankly, even if I did know that, I still wouldn’t be going anywhere.” He let his hand slide out of Sam’s hair to rest on his shoulder lightly. “My paradise includes him. Yours doesn’t.”
Castiel sighed and nodded. “I knew that already,” he said.
“Then why do you keep coming back here?” Dean asked.
Castiel shrugged, a remarkably human gesture for an angel, but Castiel had spent a lot of time with Dean and he was a quick study. “I have never had… friends,” he said after a while. “I… find that I rather enjoy it.”
“Aw, man,” Dean said. “Shit, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to leave you all high and dry with no one to hang out with but those… sanctimonious feather dusters, but… I can’t.”
“Yes, I know,” Castiel said. He shifted uncomfortably on his feet, ran a hand over the back of his neck and gave Dean a weary look. “If you change your mind-”
“If He changes His mind,” Dean said. “You know where to find us.”
Sam mumbled under his breath in his sleep and pressed his face into Dean’s belly. Dean stroked his hand down his back soothingly, murmuring back to him that he was there, that he wasn’t going anywhere, Sam was fine, he should go back to sleep.
When Dean looked up again, Castiel was gone.
~~*~~
Dean was standing on the balcony overlooking the hotel parking lot and the empty swimming pool when Sam woke up. He had a cup of coffee, dark with the scent of hazelnuts and he sipped it as he heard Sam softly call his name from the bed behind him.
“Out here,” he called back.
Sam sighed and the note of tension that had crept into his voice disappeared. “What are you looking at?”
Dean rolled his shoulders and let out a deep breath, staring at the diminishing skyline. “I’m watching them destroy the world,” he said softly. He took a long drink of his coffee, enjoying the way it burned his tongue just a little.
Sam came to stand behind him and slipped his arms around Dean’s waist, watching over his shoulder. “Wow,” he said.
In the distance, the faint and tiny outlines of towers collapsed one by one and the sky, bright yellow with the sun, was darkening under strange, black fingers that seemed to eat up the light. There were no stars in that darkness and no life. Nothing recognizable as life, anyway.
“When do you think it’ll get here?” Sam whispered.
“Tonight,” Dean said without hesitation. “Maybe early in the morning. You know what it reminds me of?”
Sam shook his head, his chin moving lightly against the curve of Dean’s shoulder. “What?”
“You remember that movie The Neverending Story we saw when we were kids?” Dean said.
“The one with that flying dog thing?” Sam said. He smiled and pressed his lips to the side of Dean’s neck.
“No, I mean yeah, but not the dog thing,” Dean said. “It reminds me of the Nothing. The thing that was eating their world, making everything hollow.”
“That’s fucking creepy,” Sam said. He cast one last, lingering look over the sky and then let Dean go. “There any coffee left?”
~~*~~
They lay in bed together, Sam against Dean’s back, their heartbeats making up a strange, comforting rhythm in the fading light as they watched the world end outside their windows. The distant rumble of crumbling stone and the hum of two million angel voices vibrated in the floor and the walls, making the bed tremble and the glass of water on the nightstand shake. Somewhere out there, God was throwing sinners into the fiery pit to set the foundation of Paradise.
Sam nuzzled into the back of Dean’s shoulder and leaned over to kiss the curve of his jaw, his cheek, the side of his mouth. “What do you think will happen when it gets here?” Sam asked.
Dean made a low grumbling sound of contentment and turned his head to press his mouth to Sam’s briefly. “I think… we’ll blink out of existence. We will cease to be.”
Sam pressed his mouth back to Dean’s and put a hand on his hip to urge him onto his back. “That’s not so scary,” he whispered, moving over Dean to lay on him.
Dean spread his legs so Sam could lie between them and petted his fingers through his long hair, smiling gently up at him. “No, it really isn’t,” he said, thinking that the two of them gave entirely new meaning to the term ‘world weary’.
Sam pulled Dean’s shirt up and slid down the bed to lick at his belly. He slid his tongue over his bellybutton, into the dip of flesh reaching out toward each hip and nipped lightly over each hipbone until Dean’s breath caught and his fingers tightened in Sam’s hair.
“So… the question is, will it end with a bang or a whimper?” Sam asked him as he flicked open the button on Dean’s fly and dragged the zipper down.
Dean stared at him for a moment, then laughed and shoved Sam’s shoulder. “That is so fucking corny,” he said.
Sam grinned and sat back, swatting Dean’s ass as he got off the bed. “Shut up and take your pants off, asshole,” he said, yanking his own shirt off.
Dean squirmed around on the bed to lift his hips up and pushed his jeans down. Naked, Sam crawled back up on the bed and pulled them the rest of the way off of him. Dean started to sit up and take his shirt off, but Sam pushed him back down on the bed with a hand on his belly and leaned over him to lick and kiss along the inside of his thighs, pushing Dean’s shirt up as he moved up, nipping at the fleshy part of his belly, licking into his bellybutton again.
Dean rocked up against him, his cock sliding over Sam’s throat, along the curve of his jaw as he panted. “Sammy… I would ask you to indulge that oral fixation of yours later, but…”
“Mhmm, I know,” Sam said. He shoved Dean’s shirt up and flicked his tongue over a nipple. When he caught it lightly in his teeth and tugged, Dean hissed out a soft curse and twisted his hands in the coverlet. “Maybe there won’t be a later,” Sam whispered, blowing lightly on Dean’s skin where it was slick with his saliva.
“Yeah,” Dean said. “But… hurry up.”
Sam grinned and trailed nipping, sucking kisses up Dean’s chest, working his shirt up as he did until Dean had to lean up for him to pull it off. When it was gone, Sam put his mouth over the hollow of Dean’s throat, felt his heart beating heavily against his lips and tongue and sucked. Dean’s pulse jumped under his mouth and he tilted his head back as Sam sucked the thin skin between his teeth. The strange pulling pressure of it made Dean moan and the sound vibrated on the back of Sam’s teeth.
Dean ran his tongue over his lips and gasped, drawing one leg up Sam’s side to hook his knee around Sam’s hip and push against his lower back with his heel. “Sam...”
Sam let go, giving the red spot that had bloomed there in the hollow of Dean’s throat a last lick and leaned up to kiss Dean’s open, panting mouth. Dean kissed him back fiercely, a hand going to the back of Sam’s neck to pull him down as he licked into his mouth and sucked lightly at his tongue. Sam growled at him and bit his lips; Dean laughed at him and bit him back, both sounds blending to hum over their tongues and down their throats.
Dean broke the kiss by turning his head to the side as he reached out to snatch the tube of lube off the nightstand. He hit it with his fingers and sent the tube skittering over the top of the small table, but Sam caught it before it fell and uncapped it with his teeth, grinning down at Dean as he spit the cap aside and sat back.
Sam held Dean’s gaze as he rubbed lube over his fingers, watching the way he shuddered on every exhaled breath and he thought that maybe it was okay that they weren’t going to live to see forty. If Dean lived to see forty, he might also live to see lung cancer if the shallow way his breathing sometimes rattled was any indication. Dean cocked his head, lifting a questioning brow and Sam smiled a little, watching the way the red light through the glass made his impossibly long eyelashes look like they had glitter stuck in them.
“Sam,” Dean said and impatiently prodded Sam’s side with his knee.
“Sorry,” Sam said. He moved his hand down between Dean’s spread thighs and pressed the tip of his index finger over Dean’s hole, felt him tense instinctively and waited for him to relax again before pushing it inside. “I was thinking.”
Dean sucked a hissing breath through his teeth as Sam pushed his middle finger inside him with the first and twisted them, bending them inside him to seek out his prostate. “Stop,” Dean said.
Sam stilled his hand, his fingertips brushing over Dean’s prostate once, making his stomach muscles tighten and looked up at him. “Seriously?”
“No… not that,” Dean said, nearly moaning the last word in his frustration as he rolled his hips trying to get that fleeting pleasure back. “Don’t you dare stop that. Just… I meant stop thinking and… Christ, Sam, hurry up.”
Sam laughed softly and moved his fingers again, massaging Dean’s prostate with steady strokes of his fingers that made Dean shudder and move with him, fucking himself on Sam’s hand. “I could make you come just… like you are right now,” Sam murmured, leaning over him as he moved his fingers inside Dean’s body, drawing them away and thrusting them back, fingertips angled toward that same spot again and again. “Completely untouched, except for here. Tell me I’m wrong.”
Dean reached up and fisted his hand in Sam’s hair beside his ear and pulled his face down to bite his mouth. He licked, making low moaning sounds in his throat as he rocked against Sam’s hand and held Sam’s gaze with his own, piercing, demanding. “You’re not wrong,” he panted. “In me. Now.”
Sam dropped a kiss to the end of his nose and smiled down at him. “Is that an order, big brother?”
“You bet your goddamn ass it is, Sammy, you fucking tease,” Dean muttered. He let go of Sam’s hair, gently pushing him back and started to sit up.
Sam put a hand on his chest and pushed him back down. “Ah-ah,” he said, shaking his head. “No.”
Sam withdrew his fingers and Dean caught his breath, hands going to Sam’s upper arms to grip his biceps as Sam shifted up the bed, tilting Dean’s hips back as he slowly began to push inside him. Dean swallowed around a strained sound in his throat, a whimper that made his throat work. Sam entered him gradually, going so slow that it made them both shake with it and Sam could feel every single beat of Dean’s heart like that, faintly when Dean relaxed, stronger when his ass tightened around him.
“Sam… please, we don’t… have time for this,” Dean hissed, pressing his face into the curve of his shoulder to whisper it into his sweat damp hair.
“Shh, we do,” Sam said. He held Dean’s hips cupped in his hands and ground against him, moving deeper until he was in, until there was nothing left and Dean had taken him all the way to the hilt. He reached up to run the backs of his knuckles up Dean’s working throat, through the sweat sliding down his neck and up into his hair. “This is all we have time for,” he whispered, lowering his head to lick along the path of his hand up to Dean’s mouth. “Last chance,” he murmured against Dean’s lips. “This is it.”
“Yeah,” Dean said, his lips moving against Sam’s as he spoke. He smiled faintly and tightened his legs around Sam’s waist, pulling him in closer with his heels against Sam’s lower back. “Move, damn you.”
Sam nipped his mouth then kissed him and threw his hips forward in a quick, hard thrust. Dean cried out, surprised by it and Sam swallowed the sound down with a moan. He stretched out over Dean bracing his weight on one forearm, slipping the other arm around Dean’s waist to hold him close and support his back as he moved. Sam thrust into him with slow, deep strokes, barely withdrawing at all, just rocking his hips to push against Dean’s ass, pressing in and in, a constant rubbing friction within Dean‘s body.
It was slow and maddening and agonizingly pleasurable. Dean clutched at Sam’s shoulders, his blunt fingernails biting into his skin and he pressed his face into the side of Sam’s neck, lightly setting his teeth into his shoulder when it became too much to muffle his moans and cries. Dean closed his legs tight around Sam and moved with him as much as he could with Sam’s body pushing him down into the mattress. Pleasure built inside him, a tight coil of fire gnawing at his insides, making him shiver uncontrollably as it grew.
“I’m close,” Dean gasped into Sam’s hair, pulling at his shoulders.
Sam turned his head and nudged Dean’s mouth and nose gently with his own, arm around his waist tightening to pull him closer. Dean’s back bowed and their bellies slid together, sweaty, warm and quivering. Whimpering, soft and breathless, Dean opened his mouth against Sam’s and tasted the salt of his sweat on his lips. Sam caught his mouth in a quick kiss and moaned, the sound breaking as he rested his head on Dean’s shoulder, panting.
“Sam,” Dean said, moaning it.
“Already?” Sam whispered.
“Yeah,” Dean said.
“Want… me to-”
“No,” Dean said. “This… Just this.”
Sam nodded against Dean’s shoulder and kept his steady, slow pace, hips angled to rub his cock over Dean’s prostate. His belly slid against Dean’s in their mingled sweat and Dean‘s precome, stroking Dean’s cock between them. He could feel Dean trembling all around him, his arms around Sam’s shoulders, the muscles in his thighs, everything shook as Sam drew pleasure from his body. He pressed his face into the curve of Dean’s shoulder and breathed him in, all tobacco, leather and the scent of lemongrass that came from his shampoo.
Dean bucked against him as he came, his shout of release bouncing off the walls like a clap and Sam held him tight as he fucked him through it, chasing the last sparks of his orgasm until Dean’s moans dwindled off to soft, rhythmic panting. Sam turned his head on Dean’s shoulder to watch his face, studying the fall of pink light over his skin, the sweat beaded on his forehead and in his hair like opals. Dean’s eyes were closed and his mouth open and as Sam watched, he threw his weight behind a thrust. He felt Dean’s body contract around his cock, making it just that much more pleasurable and watched Dean’s lips tremble before he sucked the bottom one between his teeth and bit down.
Sam’s orgasm surprised him, rushing through his body close on the heels of something else, some emotion that felt a lot like grief. He cried out and shivered, pleasure snaking through his body like water and cupped Dean’s face in his hands to lean down and kiss him. He moved through it, thrusts rougher now, no longer measured or restrained and kissed Dean like he was trying to climb inside him through his mouth.
When he stilled Dean’s hands stroked lazily up and down his back. It was soothing, something so achingly familiar that Sam made a soft pained sound in his throat as he lay his head down on Dean’s chest. “I’m going to miss you,” Sam said softly.
Dean’s hands stilled for a minute before he started petting them over Sam’s back again. “No,” he murmured, “you won’t.”
“Maybe I want to,” Sam said, a touch of irritation in his voice.
Dean smiled faintly and put his face down into Sam’s hair, breathing him in as he pressed a kiss to his earlobe. “Maybe I want you to,” he said. “And that’s the only really scary part of this disappearing completely thing, because we won’t. I won’t miss you, I won’t love you, because-”
“I does not exist,” Sam whispered. “Nor you.”
“What?” Dean said. He lay back to look at Sam, one corner of his mouth turned up in a half smile. “What is that?”
“Pablo Neruda,” Sam said a little sheepishly.
Dean grinned and ran his fingers through Sam’s hair. “That won’t exist either,” he said. “Listen to the rumble outside. That’s the world falling down.” He frowned thoughtfully, then jostled Sam’s leg with his foot. “What’s the rest?”
“What?” Sam said.
“Of the poem, dude,” Dean said. “What’s the rest of it?”
Sam blinked at him, then smiled and shook his head. “No way,” he said. “I am not spouting sonnets at you even if it is the end of the world.”
Dean sighed and frowned. “Fine,” he said, sounding suspiciously like he was getting ready to pout. Then the frown disappeared and he nudged Sam with his foot again. “If you won’t give me poetry, Romeo, go get me a beer, huh?”
Sam made an amused chuffing sound and climbed off of him to roll off the bed. “Sure thing,” he said. “Juliette,” he added as he ducked out of the room.
~~*~~
The tiny ping, ping sounds of something hitting the glass door woke Sam and he lay there in the dark, watching as little sparks bounced off the windows and skipped along the balcony to die. Dean was asleep with his back to him, his bottom pressed up against Sam’s belly, his head resting on one bent arm, the other hand on his hip. Sam laid his hand over Dean’s, felt his fingers twitch at the touch and nuzzled into the hair at the back of his neck.
“It’s beautiful, you know,” Castiel said, his voice abruptly breaking the silence and startling Sam so that he jerked and squeezed Dean’s fingers.
Dean frowned in his sleep and squeezed back. Sam whispered a curse under his breath and let him go to get out of the bed.
Fastening his jeans, Sam glared over at Castiel who was standing to one side of the sliding glass door looking out. “What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded.
“Watching the end, same as you,” Castiel said. “I said it’s beautiful.”
“I heard you,” Sam said, going around the bed so he wouldn’t have to talk over Dean and risk waking him. “Dude, you still really need to learn about doors and how to knock on them.”
Castiel turned his head to look at him over his shoulder and smiled. It was the most cynical look that Sam had ever seen on his face before, but strangely, it looked perfectly natural. “I don‘t think I’ll have much use for such information anymore,” he said.
“Why, they’re not going to have doors in Paradise?” Sam asked, coming to stand beside him and watch through the glass.
“I don’t know,” Castiel said.
Suddenly what he was really saying hit him and Sam stared. “No,” he said. “No… hey, man, don’t do what you’re thinking, alright? You go, sit on your cloud and enjoy the party, don’t stay down here with…”
Castiel shook his head and looked back out the glass. “It’s so beautiful, it’s hard to believe that it’s real,” he said softly. “I couldn’t describe it to you, you would have to see it for yourself. How it stretches out and out and there is no horizon in any direction because it never ends. Yet, still it reaches and soon… very soon… it will be here, too. Right where you and I are standing, right where your brother is sleeping, none of this ugliness will exist.”
Sam scowled at him and put his hand out on the glass door. The cool air from the air conditioned room made the warm glass fog up around his fingers. “That sucks,” he said. “I like this ugliness. I like beer and dirty clothes, stupid chicks in bars hitting on my brother, catching the flu once every three years, sheets with come stains, channels with soft-core porn at three in the morning, Daddies that neglect their kids, crackheads, breaking news about serial killers on rampages, shag carpets that will never come clean, cockroaches in the bathtub and yeah, even demons trying to kill me. I like this world. Your Paradise can go fuck itself.”
Castiel made an amused sound in his throat and Sam’s jaw clenched in annoyance. “So you would rather go down with the ship,” Castiel said. “That’s very… noble.”
“I’m not being noble,” Sam said. “We aren’t being noble.”
“You have no choice in the matter,” Castiel said.
Sam thought about punching him in the face. “Yeah, I know,” he snapped. “What the fuck do you want?”
Castile shrugged. “Nothing,” he said. “Just conversation.”
“Yeah, well while you’re learning about the etiquette of knocking on doors, you should maybe pick up a lesson or two about what constitutes light and friendly conversation,” Sam said. He ran a hand through his hair and looked back out the glass door. “Dick,” he muttered.
“I apologize,” Castiel said.
Sam snorted and shook his head. “Whatever,” he said. “I’m going back to bed.”
Sam turned to do just that then stopped when Castiel said, “Those are all stars,” in a soft, wondering voice.
Sam turned back. “What?”
“Out there,” Castiel said, gesturing out through the glass. “All the stars are falling from Heaven. Out there and beyond this world, too. All of them. They’re burning out and crashing to the surface of the nearest planet. Every constellation, every galaxy. Everything is dying.”
“Did you think it would only be this world?” Sam asked.
“No,” Castiel said. “But I wish it wasn’t so beautiful.”
“Something you pick up pretty quick, being a hunter,” Sam said. “The most beautiful things are a lot of the time the most evil things. Don’t trust them.”
“This is God’s doing, how can it be evil?” Castiel asked.
“Lucifer was God’s creation, too, wasn’t he?” Sam said. “And there you go; beautiful and fucking evil. Now I’m going back to bed. Wake me when it’s over.”
Castiel smiled a little, but he didn’t move from his place by the glass door.
Sam crawled back into bed with Dean and wrapped his arms around his waist when Dean turned toward him and nuzzled his face into Sam’s chest. Dean put his arms around Sam and moved his hands down his back, resting against the small of his back over the waist of his jeans. His fingers played idly with Sam’s belt loops and he kissed Sam’s chest lightly.
“Sam?” he mumbled.
“Here, Dean,” Sam said, reassuring him.
“Did it happen yet?” Dean asked.
“Not yet,” Sam said. “Soon, though.”
Dean yawned and shifted closer to Sam’s warmth. He was very nearly snuggling up to him and the thought made Sam smile to himself as he dropped his head to kiss him. Dean tipped his head back to meet the kiss. It was slow and lazy, lightly stroking tongues, gently pressing lips. It was a kiss goodbye in a lot of ways and they both knew it.
“Wish we could sleep through it, but that’s pretty loud, isn’t it?” Dean said.
Sam cocked his head, listening and yeah, it was loud, that rumbling sound of everything falling to pieces, but he hadn’t really noticed it until Dean mentioned it. “Close your eyes,” Sam said.
“They are,” Dean said. He yawned again.
Sam petted a hand down his back and Dean made a low, contented sound in his throat. “Now imagine that it’s rain,” Sam said softly. “It’s rain falling on the rooftop and beating down on the windows. We drove all night through a storm, listening to it on the roof of the Impala. Now we’re in a shitty little motel room outside of Portland and it’s pounding down on the roof so hard that it sounds like it could be hail instead of rain. Our hair is wet and we smell like water and we’re too tired to take a shower, so we take our clothes off and crawl under the covers together to stay warm…”
Sam heard Dean’s breathing deepen with sleep and lay there listening to the falling stars crash and the angels singing the world into dust and tried to sleep himself. He remembered, not long ago when they were both scared to die in their sleep. They would rather see it coming, not be taken by surprise in the night when they were most vulnerable. It was strange how their fears had changed so dramatically with the Apocalypse and all the shit they had faced in the last couple of years. Not a lot scared them now because there wasn’t much either of them hadn’t faced. Now, death coming to take them in their sleep seemed like rest offered by a gentle old friend.
“Goodnight,” Sam said, whispering it to Dean.
“Goodnight,” Castiel answered him from where he still stood watch by the door.
Sam yawned and rested his head on the pillow by Dean’s, the world and its destruction becoming suddenly unimportant. He closed his eyes, thinking of rain and fell asleep.
XXX
Pairing: Sam/Dean
Rated: NC-17
Word Count: 5,000
Warnings: Apocalypse fic, language, angst, incest
Disclaimer: Don't own the characters, just the words.
Notes: Beta edited by judas_denied. Story inspired by In the Middle by Theory of a Deadman, which I have been listening to on repeat a lot lately *ahem* Yes, I am pathetic. I'm okay with that.
Summary: Sam isn't invited to this new Paradise the angels are building, and Dean isn't going without him.
There Goes the World
“And as we stand on the edge of darkness
Let our chant fill the void
That others may know
In the land of the night
The ship of the sun
Is drawn by
The grateful dead.”
Tibetan Book of the Dead
The sun through the floor to ceiling glass wall slanted over their bed and woke Dean. The light glanced off his eyelashes, making gold sparkles in his vision when he blinked and he lay there watching them and feeling Sam’s warm breath puff against the back of his shoulders.
Beyond the windows the world outside was bright with the rising sun, the sky pink and salmon colored blending into gold filigreed clouds that hovered in smears of lavender. It was like watching a sunrise painted by an impressionist painter with a brush made from a single hair. Distantly, if he strained to hear it, Dean could just make out the sounds of angels singing and the earth crumbling against the hum of their voices.
Someone cleared their throat and Dean turned his head to see Castiel standing at the foot of the bed, looking at the carpet between his feet.
Dean smiled faintly and reached over Sam’s hip to pull the sheet over them. “What is it?” he asked.
Castiel glanced up from studying the floor and frowned at him. “I’m here to ask you again to reconsider.”
“Every day you come for the same reason,” Dean said. He shifted on the bed and sat up, resting against the headboard. Sam muttered unintelligibly in his sleep and laid his head on Dean’s thigh. Dean ran his fingers through his hair and regarded Castiel with calm sadness. “I have reconsidered it-”
“Then come with me,” Castiel said anxiously. “We have no time to waste here, the-”
“And my answer is still no,” Dean said.
“I cannot believe that you would refuse such a thing,” Castiel whispered. “An offer given by God himself-repeatedly-for absolution. All your sins forgiven and washed away and a hand outstretched to welcome you into Paradise. It is more than you, with your life spent in sin, could ever have achieved otherwise.”
Dean sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose between his fingers. “Your god’s letting his angels tear my world apart,” Dean said, gesturing with his hand to the world crumbling outside the windows.
They were in the presidential suite of some fancy hotel in Los Angeles that Sam had always wanted to see and it was literally on top of the world. He could look out that glass door and watch as the city disappeared. It was still there, empty and waiting, but Dean could hear Castiel’s Paradise approaching and did a quick calculation of how much time they had left.
“You’re building your Paradise over everything that I-that we-know,” Dean said. He cocked his head to one side and held up a hand for Castiel to be quiet when the angel opened his mouth to speak. “Hear that? It’s being swallowed and what gives Him the right?”
“He is God,” Castiel said.
Dean looked at him, eyes sparking with anger, and shook his head. “And just like he left you all in Heaven to fend for yourselves, now he’s gonna wipe the slate clean down here and start over and do you really think it’s going to be a better place?” He laughed and let his head drop back against the headboard of the bed. “We’re human. Fucking shit like this up is what we do. If your God paid more attention, maybe he’d know that. Or maybe he does know that, huh?”
“It is Paradise,” Castiel said, perplexed. “Nothing bad can happen. Everyone will be happy. Everything will be… wonderful.”
“And someone will get bored and write ‘Michael sucks Raphael’s peen’ with divine, sparkling spray paint across some pristine palace wall and there you go. Next, you’ll find the cherubs watching a fucking orgy on cloud nine and there goes Paradise. Right out the damn window.”
Castiel blinked at him and frowned. “That cannot happen.”
“Hey, man, not everyone’s idea of paradise is the same, alright?” Dean said. “Some guys dream about sitting around in their stinking underwear watching the Superbowl, eating Cheetos out of the bag while a Playboy bunny brings them beer. That shit isn’t going to fly in this Paradise your god is cooking up, though, is it?”
“Maybe…” Castiel said, frown deepening thoughtfully. “Something will be done. Everything will be fine.”
Dean shrugged then stilled when Sam moved against him. He lowered his voice, trying not to wake him. “We don’t know that,” he said. “Frankly, even if I did know that, I still wouldn’t be going anywhere.” He let his hand slide out of Sam’s hair to rest on his shoulder lightly. “My paradise includes him. Yours doesn’t.”
Castiel sighed and nodded. “I knew that already,” he said.
“Then why do you keep coming back here?” Dean asked.
Castiel shrugged, a remarkably human gesture for an angel, but Castiel had spent a lot of time with Dean and he was a quick study. “I have never had… friends,” he said after a while. “I… find that I rather enjoy it.”
“Aw, man,” Dean said. “Shit, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to leave you all high and dry with no one to hang out with but those… sanctimonious feather dusters, but… I can’t.”
“Yes, I know,” Castiel said. He shifted uncomfortably on his feet, ran a hand over the back of his neck and gave Dean a weary look. “If you change your mind-”
“If He changes His mind,” Dean said. “You know where to find us.”
Sam mumbled under his breath in his sleep and pressed his face into Dean’s belly. Dean stroked his hand down his back soothingly, murmuring back to him that he was there, that he wasn’t going anywhere, Sam was fine, he should go back to sleep.
When Dean looked up again, Castiel was gone.
~~*~~
Dean was standing on the balcony overlooking the hotel parking lot and the empty swimming pool when Sam woke up. He had a cup of coffee, dark with the scent of hazelnuts and he sipped it as he heard Sam softly call his name from the bed behind him.
“Out here,” he called back.
Sam sighed and the note of tension that had crept into his voice disappeared. “What are you looking at?”
Dean rolled his shoulders and let out a deep breath, staring at the diminishing skyline. “I’m watching them destroy the world,” he said softly. He took a long drink of his coffee, enjoying the way it burned his tongue just a little.
Sam came to stand behind him and slipped his arms around Dean’s waist, watching over his shoulder. “Wow,” he said.
In the distance, the faint and tiny outlines of towers collapsed one by one and the sky, bright yellow with the sun, was darkening under strange, black fingers that seemed to eat up the light. There were no stars in that darkness and no life. Nothing recognizable as life, anyway.
“When do you think it’ll get here?” Sam whispered.
“Tonight,” Dean said without hesitation. “Maybe early in the morning. You know what it reminds me of?”
Sam shook his head, his chin moving lightly against the curve of Dean’s shoulder. “What?”
“You remember that movie The Neverending Story we saw when we were kids?” Dean said.
“The one with that flying dog thing?” Sam said. He smiled and pressed his lips to the side of Dean’s neck.
“No, I mean yeah, but not the dog thing,” Dean said. “It reminds me of the Nothing. The thing that was eating their world, making everything hollow.”
“That’s fucking creepy,” Sam said. He cast one last, lingering look over the sky and then let Dean go. “There any coffee left?”
~~*~~
They lay in bed together, Sam against Dean’s back, their heartbeats making up a strange, comforting rhythm in the fading light as they watched the world end outside their windows. The distant rumble of crumbling stone and the hum of two million angel voices vibrated in the floor and the walls, making the bed tremble and the glass of water on the nightstand shake. Somewhere out there, God was throwing sinners into the fiery pit to set the foundation of Paradise.
Sam nuzzled into the back of Dean’s shoulder and leaned over to kiss the curve of his jaw, his cheek, the side of his mouth. “What do you think will happen when it gets here?” Sam asked.
Dean made a low grumbling sound of contentment and turned his head to press his mouth to Sam’s briefly. “I think… we’ll blink out of existence. We will cease to be.”
Sam pressed his mouth back to Dean’s and put a hand on his hip to urge him onto his back. “That’s not so scary,” he whispered, moving over Dean to lay on him.
Dean spread his legs so Sam could lie between them and petted his fingers through his long hair, smiling gently up at him. “No, it really isn’t,” he said, thinking that the two of them gave entirely new meaning to the term ‘world weary’.
Sam pulled Dean’s shirt up and slid down the bed to lick at his belly. He slid his tongue over his bellybutton, into the dip of flesh reaching out toward each hip and nipped lightly over each hipbone until Dean’s breath caught and his fingers tightened in Sam’s hair.
“So… the question is, will it end with a bang or a whimper?” Sam asked him as he flicked open the button on Dean’s fly and dragged the zipper down.
Dean stared at him for a moment, then laughed and shoved Sam’s shoulder. “That is so fucking corny,” he said.
Sam grinned and sat back, swatting Dean’s ass as he got off the bed. “Shut up and take your pants off, asshole,” he said, yanking his own shirt off.
Dean squirmed around on the bed to lift his hips up and pushed his jeans down. Naked, Sam crawled back up on the bed and pulled them the rest of the way off of him. Dean started to sit up and take his shirt off, but Sam pushed him back down on the bed with a hand on his belly and leaned over him to lick and kiss along the inside of his thighs, pushing Dean’s shirt up as he moved up, nipping at the fleshy part of his belly, licking into his bellybutton again.
Dean rocked up against him, his cock sliding over Sam’s throat, along the curve of his jaw as he panted. “Sammy… I would ask you to indulge that oral fixation of yours later, but…”
“Mhmm, I know,” Sam said. He shoved Dean’s shirt up and flicked his tongue over a nipple. When he caught it lightly in his teeth and tugged, Dean hissed out a soft curse and twisted his hands in the coverlet. “Maybe there won’t be a later,” Sam whispered, blowing lightly on Dean’s skin where it was slick with his saliva.
“Yeah,” Dean said. “But… hurry up.”
Sam grinned and trailed nipping, sucking kisses up Dean’s chest, working his shirt up as he did until Dean had to lean up for him to pull it off. When it was gone, Sam put his mouth over the hollow of Dean’s throat, felt his heart beating heavily against his lips and tongue and sucked. Dean’s pulse jumped under his mouth and he tilted his head back as Sam sucked the thin skin between his teeth. The strange pulling pressure of it made Dean moan and the sound vibrated on the back of Sam’s teeth.
Dean ran his tongue over his lips and gasped, drawing one leg up Sam’s side to hook his knee around Sam’s hip and push against his lower back with his heel. “Sam...”
Sam let go, giving the red spot that had bloomed there in the hollow of Dean’s throat a last lick and leaned up to kiss Dean’s open, panting mouth. Dean kissed him back fiercely, a hand going to the back of Sam’s neck to pull him down as he licked into his mouth and sucked lightly at his tongue. Sam growled at him and bit his lips; Dean laughed at him and bit him back, both sounds blending to hum over their tongues and down their throats.
Dean broke the kiss by turning his head to the side as he reached out to snatch the tube of lube off the nightstand. He hit it with his fingers and sent the tube skittering over the top of the small table, but Sam caught it before it fell and uncapped it with his teeth, grinning down at Dean as he spit the cap aside and sat back.
Sam held Dean’s gaze as he rubbed lube over his fingers, watching the way he shuddered on every exhaled breath and he thought that maybe it was okay that they weren’t going to live to see forty. If Dean lived to see forty, he might also live to see lung cancer if the shallow way his breathing sometimes rattled was any indication. Dean cocked his head, lifting a questioning brow and Sam smiled a little, watching the way the red light through the glass made his impossibly long eyelashes look like they had glitter stuck in them.
“Sam,” Dean said and impatiently prodded Sam’s side with his knee.
“Sorry,” Sam said. He moved his hand down between Dean’s spread thighs and pressed the tip of his index finger over Dean’s hole, felt him tense instinctively and waited for him to relax again before pushing it inside. “I was thinking.”
Dean sucked a hissing breath through his teeth as Sam pushed his middle finger inside him with the first and twisted them, bending them inside him to seek out his prostate. “Stop,” Dean said.
Sam stilled his hand, his fingertips brushing over Dean’s prostate once, making his stomach muscles tighten and looked up at him. “Seriously?”
“No… not that,” Dean said, nearly moaning the last word in his frustration as he rolled his hips trying to get that fleeting pleasure back. “Don’t you dare stop that. Just… I meant stop thinking and… Christ, Sam, hurry up.”
Sam laughed softly and moved his fingers again, massaging Dean’s prostate with steady strokes of his fingers that made Dean shudder and move with him, fucking himself on Sam’s hand. “I could make you come just… like you are right now,” Sam murmured, leaning over him as he moved his fingers inside Dean’s body, drawing them away and thrusting them back, fingertips angled toward that same spot again and again. “Completely untouched, except for here. Tell me I’m wrong.”
Dean reached up and fisted his hand in Sam’s hair beside his ear and pulled his face down to bite his mouth. He licked, making low moaning sounds in his throat as he rocked against Sam’s hand and held Sam’s gaze with his own, piercing, demanding. “You’re not wrong,” he panted. “In me. Now.”
Sam dropped a kiss to the end of his nose and smiled down at him. “Is that an order, big brother?”
“You bet your goddamn ass it is, Sammy, you fucking tease,” Dean muttered. He let go of Sam’s hair, gently pushing him back and started to sit up.
Sam put a hand on his chest and pushed him back down. “Ah-ah,” he said, shaking his head. “No.”
Sam withdrew his fingers and Dean caught his breath, hands going to Sam’s upper arms to grip his biceps as Sam shifted up the bed, tilting Dean’s hips back as he slowly began to push inside him. Dean swallowed around a strained sound in his throat, a whimper that made his throat work. Sam entered him gradually, going so slow that it made them both shake with it and Sam could feel every single beat of Dean’s heart like that, faintly when Dean relaxed, stronger when his ass tightened around him.
“Sam… please, we don’t… have time for this,” Dean hissed, pressing his face into the curve of his shoulder to whisper it into his sweat damp hair.
“Shh, we do,” Sam said. He held Dean’s hips cupped in his hands and ground against him, moving deeper until he was in, until there was nothing left and Dean had taken him all the way to the hilt. He reached up to run the backs of his knuckles up Dean’s working throat, through the sweat sliding down his neck and up into his hair. “This is all we have time for,” he whispered, lowering his head to lick along the path of his hand up to Dean’s mouth. “Last chance,” he murmured against Dean’s lips. “This is it.”
“Yeah,” Dean said, his lips moving against Sam’s as he spoke. He smiled faintly and tightened his legs around Sam’s waist, pulling him in closer with his heels against Sam’s lower back. “Move, damn you.”
Sam nipped his mouth then kissed him and threw his hips forward in a quick, hard thrust. Dean cried out, surprised by it and Sam swallowed the sound down with a moan. He stretched out over Dean bracing his weight on one forearm, slipping the other arm around Dean’s waist to hold him close and support his back as he moved. Sam thrust into him with slow, deep strokes, barely withdrawing at all, just rocking his hips to push against Dean’s ass, pressing in and in, a constant rubbing friction within Dean‘s body.
It was slow and maddening and agonizingly pleasurable. Dean clutched at Sam’s shoulders, his blunt fingernails biting into his skin and he pressed his face into the side of Sam’s neck, lightly setting his teeth into his shoulder when it became too much to muffle his moans and cries. Dean closed his legs tight around Sam and moved with him as much as he could with Sam’s body pushing him down into the mattress. Pleasure built inside him, a tight coil of fire gnawing at his insides, making him shiver uncontrollably as it grew.
“I’m close,” Dean gasped into Sam’s hair, pulling at his shoulders.
Sam turned his head and nudged Dean’s mouth and nose gently with his own, arm around his waist tightening to pull him closer. Dean’s back bowed and their bellies slid together, sweaty, warm and quivering. Whimpering, soft and breathless, Dean opened his mouth against Sam’s and tasted the salt of his sweat on his lips. Sam caught his mouth in a quick kiss and moaned, the sound breaking as he rested his head on Dean’s shoulder, panting.
“Sam,” Dean said, moaning it.
“Already?” Sam whispered.
“Yeah,” Dean said.
“Want… me to-”
“No,” Dean said. “This… Just this.”
Sam nodded against Dean’s shoulder and kept his steady, slow pace, hips angled to rub his cock over Dean’s prostate. His belly slid against Dean’s in their mingled sweat and Dean‘s precome, stroking Dean’s cock between them. He could feel Dean trembling all around him, his arms around Sam’s shoulders, the muscles in his thighs, everything shook as Sam drew pleasure from his body. He pressed his face into the curve of Dean’s shoulder and breathed him in, all tobacco, leather and the scent of lemongrass that came from his shampoo.
Dean bucked against him as he came, his shout of release bouncing off the walls like a clap and Sam held him tight as he fucked him through it, chasing the last sparks of his orgasm until Dean’s moans dwindled off to soft, rhythmic panting. Sam turned his head on Dean’s shoulder to watch his face, studying the fall of pink light over his skin, the sweat beaded on his forehead and in his hair like opals. Dean’s eyes were closed and his mouth open and as Sam watched, he threw his weight behind a thrust. He felt Dean’s body contract around his cock, making it just that much more pleasurable and watched Dean’s lips tremble before he sucked the bottom one between his teeth and bit down.
Sam’s orgasm surprised him, rushing through his body close on the heels of something else, some emotion that felt a lot like grief. He cried out and shivered, pleasure snaking through his body like water and cupped Dean’s face in his hands to lean down and kiss him. He moved through it, thrusts rougher now, no longer measured or restrained and kissed Dean like he was trying to climb inside him through his mouth.
When he stilled Dean’s hands stroked lazily up and down his back. It was soothing, something so achingly familiar that Sam made a soft pained sound in his throat as he lay his head down on Dean’s chest. “I’m going to miss you,” Sam said softly.
Dean’s hands stilled for a minute before he started petting them over Sam’s back again. “No,” he murmured, “you won’t.”
“Maybe I want to,” Sam said, a touch of irritation in his voice.
Dean smiled faintly and put his face down into Sam’s hair, breathing him in as he pressed a kiss to his earlobe. “Maybe I want you to,” he said. “And that’s the only really scary part of this disappearing completely thing, because we won’t. I won’t miss you, I won’t love you, because-”
“I does not exist,” Sam whispered. “Nor you.”
“What?” Dean said. He lay back to look at Sam, one corner of his mouth turned up in a half smile. “What is that?”
“Pablo Neruda,” Sam said a little sheepishly.
Dean grinned and ran his fingers through Sam’s hair. “That won’t exist either,” he said. “Listen to the rumble outside. That’s the world falling down.” He frowned thoughtfully, then jostled Sam’s leg with his foot. “What’s the rest?”
“What?” Sam said.
“Of the poem, dude,” Dean said. “What’s the rest of it?”
Sam blinked at him, then smiled and shook his head. “No way,” he said. “I am not spouting sonnets at you even if it is the end of the world.”
Dean sighed and frowned. “Fine,” he said, sounding suspiciously like he was getting ready to pout. Then the frown disappeared and he nudged Sam with his foot again. “If you won’t give me poetry, Romeo, go get me a beer, huh?”
Sam made an amused chuffing sound and climbed off of him to roll off the bed. “Sure thing,” he said. “Juliette,” he added as he ducked out of the room.
~~*~~
The tiny ping, ping sounds of something hitting the glass door woke Sam and he lay there in the dark, watching as little sparks bounced off the windows and skipped along the balcony to die. Dean was asleep with his back to him, his bottom pressed up against Sam’s belly, his head resting on one bent arm, the other hand on his hip. Sam laid his hand over Dean’s, felt his fingers twitch at the touch and nuzzled into the hair at the back of his neck.
“It’s beautiful, you know,” Castiel said, his voice abruptly breaking the silence and startling Sam so that he jerked and squeezed Dean’s fingers.
Dean frowned in his sleep and squeezed back. Sam whispered a curse under his breath and let him go to get out of the bed.
Fastening his jeans, Sam glared over at Castiel who was standing to one side of the sliding glass door looking out. “What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded.
“Watching the end, same as you,” Castiel said. “I said it’s beautiful.”
“I heard you,” Sam said, going around the bed so he wouldn’t have to talk over Dean and risk waking him. “Dude, you still really need to learn about doors and how to knock on them.”
Castiel turned his head to look at him over his shoulder and smiled. It was the most cynical look that Sam had ever seen on his face before, but strangely, it looked perfectly natural. “I don‘t think I’ll have much use for such information anymore,” he said.
“Why, they’re not going to have doors in Paradise?” Sam asked, coming to stand beside him and watch through the glass.
“I don’t know,” Castiel said.
Suddenly what he was really saying hit him and Sam stared. “No,” he said. “No… hey, man, don’t do what you’re thinking, alright? You go, sit on your cloud and enjoy the party, don’t stay down here with…”
Castiel shook his head and looked back out the glass. “It’s so beautiful, it’s hard to believe that it’s real,” he said softly. “I couldn’t describe it to you, you would have to see it for yourself. How it stretches out and out and there is no horizon in any direction because it never ends. Yet, still it reaches and soon… very soon… it will be here, too. Right where you and I are standing, right where your brother is sleeping, none of this ugliness will exist.”
Sam scowled at him and put his hand out on the glass door. The cool air from the air conditioned room made the warm glass fog up around his fingers. “That sucks,” he said. “I like this ugliness. I like beer and dirty clothes, stupid chicks in bars hitting on my brother, catching the flu once every three years, sheets with come stains, channels with soft-core porn at three in the morning, Daddies that neglect their kids, crackheads, breaking news about serial killers on rampages, shag carpets that will never come clean, cockroaches in the bathtub and yeah, even demons trying to kill me. I like this world. Your Paradise can go fuck itself.”
Castiel made an amused sound in his throat and Sam’s jaw clenched in annoyance. “So you would rather go down with the ship,” Castiel said. “That’s very… noble.”
“I’m not being noble,” Sam said. “We aren’t being noble.”
“You have no choice in the matter,” Castiel said.
Sam thought about punching him in the face. “Yeah, I know,” he snapped. “What the fuck do you want?”
Castile shrugged. “Nothing,” he said. “Just conversation.”
“Yeah, well while you’re learning about the etiquette of knocking on doors, you should maybe pick up a lesson or two about what constitutes light and friendly conversation,” Sam said. He ran a hand through his hair and looked back out the glass door. “Dick,” he muttered.
“I apologize,” Castiel said.
Sam snorted and shook his head. “Whatever,” he said. “I’m going back to bed.”
Sam turned to do just that then stopped when Castiel said, “Those are all stars,” in a soft, wondering voice.
Sam turned back. “What?”
“Out there,” Castiel said, gesturing out through the glass. “All the stars are falling from Heaven. Out there and beyond this world, too. All of them. They’re burning out and crashing to the surface of the nearest planet. Every constellation, every galaxy. Everything is dying.”
“Did you think it would only be this world?” Sam asked.
“No,” Castiel said. “But I wish it wasn’t so beautiful.”
“Something you pick up pretty quick, being a hunter,” Sam said. “The most beautiful things are a lot of the time the most evil things. Don’t trust them.”
“This is God’s doing, how can it be evil?” Castiel asked.
“Lucifer was God’s creation, too, wasn’t he?” Sam said. “And there you go; beautiful and fucking evil. Now I’m going back to bed. Wake me when it’s over.”
Castiel smiled a little, but he didn’t move from his place by the glass door.
Sam crawled back into bed with Dean and wrapped his arms around his waist when Dean turned toward him and nuzzled his face into Sam’s chest. Dean put his arms around Sam and moved his hands down his back, resting against the small of his back over the waist of his jeans. His fingers played idly with Sam’s belt loops and he kissed Sam’s chest lightly.
“Sam?” he mumbled.
“Here, Dean,” Sam said, reassuring him.
“Did it happen yet?” Dean asked.
“Not yet,” Sam said. “Soon, though.”
Dean yawned and shifted closer to Sam’s warmth. He was very nearly snuggling up to him and the thought made Sam smile to himself as he dropped his head to kiss him. Dean tipped his head back to meet the kiss. It was slow and lazy, lightly stroking tongues, gently pressing lips. It was a kiss goodbye in a lot of ways and they both knew it.
“Wish we could sleep through it, but that’s pretty loud, isn’t it?” Dean said.
Sam cocked his head, listening and yeah, it was loud, that rumbling sound of everything falling to pieces, but he hadn’t really noticed it until Dean mentioned it. “Close your eyes,” Sam said.
“They are,” Dean said. He yawned again.
Sam petted a hand down his back and Dean made a low, contented sound in his throat. “Now imagine that it’s rain,” Sam said softly. “It’s rain falling on the rooftop and beating down on the windows. We drove all night through a storm, listening to it on the roof of the Impala. Now we’re in a shitty little motel room outside of Portland and it’s pounding down on the roof so hard that it sounds like it could be hail instead of rain. Our hair is wet and we smell like water and we’re too tired to take a shower, so we take our clothes off and crawl under the covers together to stay warm…”
Sam heard Dean’s breathing deepen with sleep and lay there listening to the falling stars crash and the angels singing the world into dust and tried to sleep himself. He remembered, not long ago when they were both scared to die in their sleep. They would rather see it coming, not be taken by surprise in the night when they were most vulnerable. It was strange how their fears had changed so dramatically with the Apocalypse and all the shit they had faced in the last couple of years. Not a lot scared them now because there wasn’t much either of them hadn’t faced. Now, death coming to take them in their sleep seemed like rest offered by a gentle old friend.
“Goodnight,” Sam said, whispering it to Dean.
“Goodnight,” Castiel answered him from where he still stood watch by the door.
Sam yawned and rested his head on the pillow by Dean’s, the world and its destruction becoming suddenly unimportant. He closed his eyes, thinking of rain and fell asleep.
XXX