Dreaming in Stereo, Supernatural, Part 6 (Take 1)
Fandom: Supernatural
Title: Dreaming in Stereo, Part 6 Take 1
Note: I have actually written this part with two different endings. This is the darker of the two. This is...painful...this was very difficult to write, but it is the way I envisioned the ending. I have a also posted the other ending here, which isn't as dark or painful...but necessary to alleviate the hurt...at least for me...you can decide which way you want it to end....
( Part One here, Part Two here, Part Three here, Part Four here, Part Five here)
Characters/Pairing: Sam/Dean, John, Sam/Demon
Rating: overall NC-17, for graphic violence and sex, rape, Major Character Death
Table: #1
Prompt: 074 Fire
Word Count: 2901
Summary: Time heals all wounds, but life for a Winchester doesn't wait. Sam and Dean are still working through the changes in their lives, back on the road, hunting. Nightmares of the past pave the way for nightmares of the future, and lead all three Winchesters to a showdown with the evil that started them on their path.
Warnings: Very, Very Dark Fic. There is character death. This is a follow on to "The Good Son" and "Where it Hurts" and "All for One and One for All" (A gifty fic written for my birthday by shotofjack... The overall story will involve torture and rape and extreme violence. This is likely to be at least one more chapter after this.
The first part of "The Good Son" can be found here
The first part of "Where it Hurts" can be found here
And "All for One and One for All" can be found here
This is my twentieth ficlet for my Supernatural claim on 100_situations. Clicky for table
It hurt. Sam’s head was reeling…but something new…something…Everything
“Dean…”
“Sammy, baby…you can do this…we can leave here together.” Dean’s hand stroked his face, his chest. Sam opened his eyes, shaking his head.
“No…you aren’t…can’t be…” Sam was vaguely aware he was bleeding, his nose, his chest, his arms…He was bleeding, burned, dying…his body slowly giving out. “Dean.”
Right here Sammy,…right here…
Sam groaned as Dean’s lips closed on his, then started as Dean appeared over the shoulder of the thing kissing him. Dean and the demon. Dean.
Dean forced himself forward enough that he could see into the room again. The thing was kissing Sam, pressing him into the wall. Sam’s eyes were clouded, confused. Look at me, Sam.
“You should pay more attention to me, Dean.” The demon’s eyes glittered in the little girl’s face and Dean felt his stomach churn.
“Oh, don’t worry. I have plenty of attention for you.” His eyes snapped to Its and he pushed back, her head snapping to the side as if he’d slapped her. Come on Sammy, need you.
Somewhere behind him he was aware of his father fighting his way closer, and of the fact that he was hurt, badly. He needed him just a little closer…just a little before he dropped the last of the wall that kept him and Sam from melding into the one mind, one body they had become.
Dean smirked as the demon shoved, harder than before and he felt the wall against his back. Everything. Dean closed his eyes and reached inside himself for the memory, the moment when Sam had offered himself up into the protective space they built between them…all of his gifts, untapped, unknown but for the vaguest impressions. He pulled his father toward him, physically as well as mentally. This is where it hurts…just as Sam had said to him once.
John hesitated, but Dean took him at his earlier word and didn’t wait for him to give him what he needed, taking it, pulling John past the barriers, bolstering them against one another. John stumbled into the hallway, braced against the wall, his eyes glazed over, his knees buckling.
“Ah, yes. The scene wouldn’t be complete without the eldest Winchester.” The little girl’s face was eerie as she looked at John and he yelled out.
“You might want to pay attention, bitch.” Dean pulled himself off the wall and lurched forward, his fist connecting with her little face. His knuckles burned where they had connected and her face cracked just a little, tiny flames licking out of the wound.
“You would hit a little girl, Dean? I’m surprised at you.” She rolled her head and smiled. “My turn.”
Her fist connected with his stomach and sent him flying, crashing into John and sending them both into the wall.
Sam cried out as his brother flew out of his range of vision, a strangled sound of despair. In front of him Dean made comforting sounds and petted him. “Just let go Sammy, and it will all be over.”
The girl was in the room now, the door slammed closed behind her. Its anger crackled in the air, sending tiny fire devils dancing over the floor. “I’m done waiting for you Sam.” It said. “I’ve waited all this time, and now I’m done. You aren’t the only one like you. This one? She isn’t as powerful…but she has gifts…and she doesn’t hold back.”
Fingers burned into his skin. She came toward him, her hands raised. The smile on her face was out of place, too adult, too perverted. Sam screamed as the physical fingers met the ones already eating into him, pressing into the skin of his stomach. “If you won’t give it to me, I’ll take it…and then I’ll use it to tear your father and brother to tiny little pieces.”
Sam sagged against the wall…his limbs suddenly lighter, less constricted. The presence of DeanJohn filled him and a smile tugged at his lips. Everything, Dean.
“I don’t think so.” Sam’s hands grabbed her tiny wrists and pulled them away from his skin. His hands grew hot, but he persisted, holding her as the door crashed open. His eyes met Dean’s. Everything.
Dean’s hand was up, gesturing for Sam to come to him. Sam smiled and let go of the little girl. For the moment he stood on his own, leaning into the familiar touch of family. The wall between them fell away as both he and Dean relinquished it and Sam melted into DeanJohn…SamDeanJohn.
Dean staggered under the combined essences of John and Sam filling him. He closed his eyes as they swirled around, thoughts, emotions, memories blurring, images coming and going so quickly Dean thought he might be sick. You have to control it Dean. Sam’s essence rubbed against him, something more intimate than any sex he’d ever had. His body swayed as three minds melted together, memories and thoughts tangled beyond any ability to understand…way beyond words or conscious thought…they just were one.
Now we finish it, and Dean didn’t know whose thought it was, only that he was in complete agreement. Stronger together.
Dean’s eyes opened and he turned to face the two demons, one of which wore his face. “The problem with you people,” he said, “…people being a relative term, is that you keep thinking that Sam Winchester is something you can just take…that you can own.”
His boots echoed in the strange silence as he moved toward them. His voice sounded odd, not entirely his own, almost as if all three of them were speaking together. “But you can’t. You can’t have him.”
Dean punched his evil twin across the jaw, and reached for the girl, grabbing her by the shoulders. He head-butted her and dropped her and she hit the ground. “Thing is, he’s never been yours for the taking.” He followed as she crawled across the floor.
“I’m going to enjoy watching you die.” She climbed to her feet, her hands erupting in flames. “Like your mother…do you remember Dean?” Flames shot out from her and Dean dodged them until arms wrapped around him from behind. The next shot hit him in the gut, exploding in fiery fingers of flame over his abdomen as he struggled to break free.
“We remember.” Instincts moved him, dropped him to a knee, rolled the demon off his back. Stronger together John’s instincts. Dean’s hands reached out and pulled the demon who wasn’t him close, his eyes flicking from those that mimicked his own to the little girl’s. “We’ll see about the dying part though.” His hands moved, faster than either of them expected, snapping the neck, dropping the body to the floor.
Her eyes went wide, demon yellow and black. Not-Dean’s face melted and in its place was darkness, a puddle of darkness in the shape of a man. Dean looked from the little girl to the puddle and back again. “Your turn.”
She quirked her head to the side, showing the wound in her face where flames licked at her flesh. Dean felt the movement like a blow to his shoulder and flinched. “Do you think you can just kill me, Dean?”
“We aim to try.”
“I’m no simple demon like that one. He was just a tool.”
“Don’t care.” Dean moved closer. She sneered and threw more fire. Hand. Sam moved Dean’s hand, deflecting the fire into the inky puddle behind him. An inhuman scream filled the room.
“You are reckless, Dean. Your father would never be so reckless.”
Dean’s head twitched, his eyes darkening. “No? Maybe you underestimate more than just Dean.” Push.
The little body flew away, stopping just short of the wall and turning back to him. Her eyebrow raised. “I’m impressed. Perhaps I chose the wrong brother.”
Dean smiled. “You’re still not getting it, are you?”
He turned, anticipating her next move, letting John direct his body and Sam the gifts that had been awakened inside him, a conduit for SamDeanJohn…each of them doing what they did best, together. Fire danced around the room. Blow by blow he and the little girl’s body moved closer to one another, closer to oblivion. Each blow getting harder and closer to physical contact.
“What is it that I’m not getting, Dean?” It asked as they came together, his hands locked on her shoulders, her hands burning into his chest. She was smiling triumphantly as his flesh burned, but his smile was no less victorious as he leaned closer to her to whisper.
“I’m not Dean.”
His thumbs bit into her skin, through the disguise of flesh. Fire erupted, oozing like blood over his skin. Her shriek seared in his ears, but he didn’t stop, not until the body was falling limp in his hands and the air around him grew thick with black, inky sulfur…The fire in the room seem to stop, as if holding its breath, then coalesced, swirling into a fiery whirlwind that seemed to surround the darkness, absorb it, burn it…Wind tore through the space, knocking Dean to his knees and feeding the flames before sucking them out through the door, out into the hallway…lighting walls and carpets as it went.
Dean took one stumbling step toward Sam before his knees collapsed and he was swallowed up in a darkness blacker than night.
Dean. You need to wake up Dean.
“Sam.” Dean groaned and opened one eye, regretting it instantly as bright light, white and startling bit into the pain he hadn’t yet identified in his head. Dean, I’m here…right here.
A hand on his arm made Dean attempt opening his eye again, finding a soft, female hand that he followed up to a white clad shoulder, a soft smile…a nurse he realized slowly. The rest of the room slowly came into focus. “Hospital?” She nodded and he swallowed. Sam?
Sam’s touch inside him was gentle, comforting. “What…I mean…how?”
“There was a fire.” She fiddled with his IV and checked the thick white bandages that covered his hands. “You were very lucky, Mr. Winchester. Not everyone was.”
Dean’s heart skipped a beat. “Who…I mean…” He closed his eyes and tried to compose himself. “My brother…” He licked his lips, clinging to the feeling of Sam inside of him. “My brother and my father…we were trying to help…”
Her eyes turned sad as she turned away. Dean couldn’t breathe. “Tell me.”
“I’m sorry, sir.”
No. No. No. Sammy. Where are you?
“No one else survived. It was a terrible fire.”
Right here, Dean. Always.
Hot tears burned tracks into his face. Dean turned away from her and curled in on himself, screaming silently into his pillow. No. No. No. No. Nonononononono.
Dean.
“No!” Dean screamed, slamming his head back against the pillow. His body convulsed and the room filled with people, then something cool pressed into him and the darkness came back to claim him.
“This isn’t the first time you’ve been involved in an incident at this building, is it Mr. Winchester.” The detective had been kind enough and seemed to believe Dean’s story, but Dean was still lost in a looping agony of pain.
“What? Um…no. Last year.”
“I understand you were a victim of the serial killer Kendall Garrett.”
Dean nodded dully, tears once again burning down his face. “What brought you back there?”
“My brother.” Dean’s voice cracked. It felt like he did too. “Look…I’m…I can’t.”
She smiled softly and stood, touching his hand. “I’m sorry. It isn’t important. I’ll let you rest. If you think of anything else important, give me a call.”
“Okay Mr. Winchester, you’re all set. There’s a taxi waiting for you at the front door, and I’ll be taking you down to meet it.”
“Thank you.” Dean sat dully in the wheelchair and waited. His lap held a pile of papers, including the invoice he needed to get the Impala out of impound. He glanced down as she put his discharge paperwork on top. He stared. The ache inside him doubled. Samuel Winchester.
Dean had taken Sam’s wallet when he’d left the hotel that afternoon in New Mexico, before Sam had taken off. Dean closed his eyes. Sammy…I can’t do this….I can’t…not like this…I can’t…I need you…
“Are you sure there isn’t someone we can call to get you?”
Dean looked up at the pretty blond candy stripper who was at a loss as to how to help him. He shook his head miserably. “No. They’re gone. They’re all gone.”
He had the taxi take him to the impound to get his car, even though the front windshield is shot to hell and it got pretty banged up dealing with demon children, and he doesn’t know how to explain anything. His jaw works hard to keep him from bawling as the clerk hands him the receipt and two plastic bags with the things from the car, cause it’s Sam’s duffle and it makes it that much more real.
He’s grateful as he pops the trunk to throw the duffle into that he’d emptied it of guns that afternoon for cleaning, before Sam had felt their father crash…grateful they’d never found their way back to the trunk. He’d be sitting in jail now if they had, not pulling out of the police impound yard with a blown out windshield and an empty place beside him.
But not inside.
“Fuck you.” Dean pulls his sun glasses from the second bag and turns the volume on the radio to full blast and tears out onto the street. He doesn’t mean to go there…but the Impala seems to know the way without him. The building is gone, burned to little more than ash and a few cinder blocks. Sam….Sammy….
Slowly Dean stepped out of the car. If he closes his eyes he can picture the dead bodies scattered over the charred grass…can taste the sulfur in the air…His chest clutches and he falls back against the Impala.
Dean.
“I can’t.” Dean reaches in through the window for the rest of the contents of the bag, a map of California, a lighter and a single white sheet of paper. He doesn’t want to read it, doesn’t want to let it be true…real.
With a shuddering breath, Dean lifted the paper, blinking several times to make Sam’s scribbled hand readable.
Dean,
You’re probably pretty pissed with me right now. I know…I promised I’d never leave you again…and, after…everything…well, you’ll just have to believe it was the right thing. I never meant to hurt you like this…but I know now what I have to do.
If you’re reading this then you already know everything I’m going to tell you, you just won’t have accepted it yet. When you gave yourself to me the way you did…when you…Damn Dean, you fucking let yourself get branded, just to make me…to give me…you held it all and made me safe…I need you to know that this thing, between us…it was never your fault…it was never something you forced on me. God Dean, I’ve loved you ever since I can remember…wanted you since I was old enough to realize what that meant.
I know what it wants…I know and I can’t…can’t let it have it….I gave it to you, everything It wants from me. I don’t have the strength to use it, Dean…not after Garrett. As much as I don’t want to admit it, he took something from me, broke me in ways I’ll never put back together. I’m going to crack, I’m going to break. I already have so much.
I’m so tired, Dean. But you…you’re my strength. When you come for me, you’ll understand. You’ll know. Always Dean. Always with you. Always inside of you. I love you so fucking much I can’t breathe if I think about it…and I’m sorry…so sorry…I had to push so hard, so you’d know…so you’d figure it out…Everything…for you…for Mom…and Dad…and Jess…Everything and always….
Sam
Dean slid slowly to the ground, crumpling the note in his fist as he bit it to keep from screaming. You were my strength Sammy…always…I’m nothing without you.
For a long time he sat there, hot tears and pain held together by his grip on a letter he’d never wanted to read…Dean.
He shook his head. “No. Let me be.”
You look like shit.
“How would you know?”
Mirror, doofus. Dean pulled himself up and took a deep, shaky breath.
He got back into the car and brought the engine to life. He angled the rear view mirror and looked at himself. The dark circles under his eyes were deep and as he stared he could almost imagine he could see Sam’s eyes there under his own. “I’m not forgiving you anytime soon.”
I know.
Dean nodded, rubbing at his puffy eyes. “And I’m playing fucking Metallica all the way to Kansas.”
Laughter echoed through him, laughter he couldn’t quite share as he pulled out onto the road, setting course for the nearest freeway that would take him out of California. He put a tape in the tape deck and cranked the volume, singing along as he roared out of Palo Alto.
Say your prayers little one
Dont forget, my son
To include everyone
Tuck you in, warm within
Keep you free from sin
Till the sandman he comes
Sleep with one eye open
Gripping your pillow tight
Exit light
Enter night
Take my hand
Off to never never land
Title: Dreaming in Stereo, Part 6 Take 1
Note: I have actually written this part with two different endings. This is the darker of the two. This is...painful...this was very difficult to write, but it is the way I envisioned the ending. I have a also posted the other ending here, which isn't as dark or painful...but necessary to alleviate the hurt...at least for me...you can decide which way you want it to end....
( Part One here, Part Two here, Part Three here, Part Four here, Part Five here)
Characters/Pairing: Sam/Dean, John, Sam/Demon
Rating: overall NC-17, for graphic violence and sex, rape, Major Character Death
Table: #1
Prompt: 074 Fire
Word Count: 2901
Summary: Time heals all wounds, but life for a Winchester doesn't wait. Sam and Dean are still working through the changes in their lives, back on the road, hunting. Nightmares of the past pave the way for nightmares of the future, and lead all three Winchesters to a showdown with the evil that started them on their path.
Warnings: Very, Very Dark Fic. There is character death. This is a follow on to "The Good Son" and "Where it Hurts" and "All for One and One for All" (A gifty fic written for my birthday by shotofjack... The overall story will involve torture and rape and extreme violence. This is likely to be at least one more chapter after this.
The first part of "The Good Son" can be found here
The first part of "Where it Hurts" can be found here
And "All for One and One for All" can be found here
This is my twentieth ficlet for my Supernatural claim on 100_situations. Clicky for table
It hurt. Sam’s head was reeling…but something new…something…Everything
“Dean…”
“Sammy, baby…you can do this…we can leave here together.” Dean’s hand stroked his face, his chest. Sam opened his eyes, shaking his head.
“No…you aren’t…can’t be…” Sam was vaguely aware he was bleeding, his nose, his chest, his arms…He was bleeding, burned, dying…his body slowly giving out. “Dean.”
Right here Sammy,…right here…
Sam groaned as Dean’s lips closed on his, then started as Dean appeared over the shoulder of the thing kissing him. Dean and the demon. Dean.
Dean forced himself forward enough that he could see into the room again. The thing was kissing Sam, pressing him into the wall. Sam’s eyes were clouded, confused. Look at me, Sam.
“You should pay more attention to me, Dean.” The demon’s eyes glittered in the little girl’s face and Dean felt his stomach churn.
“Oh, don’t worry. I have plenty of attention for you.” His eyes snapped to Its and he pushed back, her head snapping to the side as if he’d slapped her. Come on Sammy, need you.
Somewhere behind him he was aware of his father fighting his way closer, and of the fact that he was hurt, badly. He needed him just a little closer…just a little before he dropped the last of the wall that kept him and Sam from melding into the one mind, one body they had become.
Dean smirked as the demon shoved, harder than before and he felt the wall against his back. Everything. Dean closed his eyes and reached inside himself for the memory, the moment when Sam had offered himself up into the protective space they built between them…all of his gifts, untapped, unknown but for the vaguest impressions. He pulled his father toward him, physically as well as mentally. This is where it hurts…just as Sam had said to him once.
John hesitated, but Dean took him at his earlier word and didn’t wait for him to give him what he needed, taking it, pulling John past the barriers, bolstering them against one another. John stumbled into the hallway, braced against the wall, his eyes glazed over, his knees buckling.
“Ah, yes. The scene wouldn’t be complete without the eldest Winchester.” The little girl’s face was eerie as she looked at John and he yelled out.
“You might want to pay attention, bitch.” Dean pulled himself off the wall and lurched forward, his fist connecting with her little face. His knuckles burned where they had connected and her face cracked just a little, tiny flames licking out of the wound.
“You would hit a little girl, Dean? I’m surprised at you.” She rolled her head and smiled. “My turn.”
Her fist connected with his stomach and sent him flying, crashing into John and sending them both into the wall.
Sam cried out as his brother flew out of his range of vision, a strangled sound of despair. In front of him Dean made comforting sounds and petted him. “Just let go Sammy, and it will all be over.”
The girl was in the room now, the door slammed closed behind her. Its anger crackled in the air, sending tiny fire devils dancing over the floor. “I’m done waiting for you Sam.” It said. “I’ve waited all this time, and now I’m done. You aren’t the only one like you. This one? She isn’t as powerful…but she has gifts…and she doesn’t hold back.”
Fingers burned into his skin. She came toward him, her hands raised. The smile on her face was out of place, too adult, too perverted. Sam screamed as the physical fingers met the ones already eating into him, pressing into the skin of his stomach. “If you won’t give it to me, I’ll take it…and then I’ll use it to tear your father and brother to tiny little pieces.”
Sam sagged against the wall…his limbs suddenly lighter, less constricted. The presence of DeanJohn filled him and a smile tugged at his lips. Everything, Dean.
“I don’t think so.” Sam’s hands grabbed her tiny wrists and pulled them away from his skin. His hands grew hot, but he persisted, holding her as the door crashed open. His eyes met Dean’s. Everything.
Dean’s hand was up, gesturing for Sam to come to him. Sam smiled and let go of the little girl. For the moment he stood on his own, leaning into the familiar touch of family. The wall between them fell away as both he and Dean relinquished it and Sam melted into DeanJohn…SamDeanJohn.
Dean staggered under the combined essences of John and Sam filling him. He closed his eyes as they swirled around, thoughts, emotions, memories blurring, images coming and going so quickly Dean thought he might be sick. You have to control it Dean. Sam’s essence rubbed against him, something more intimate than any sex he’d ever had. His body swayed as three minds melted together, memories and thoughts tangled beyond any ability to understand…way beyond words or conscious thought…they just were one.
Now we finish it, and Dean didn’t know whose thought it was, only that he was in complete agreement. Stronger together.
Dean’s eyes opened and he turned to face the two demons, one of which wore his face. “The problem with you people,” he said, “…people being a relative term, is that you keep thinking that Sam Winchester is something you can just take…that you can own.”
His boots echoed in the strange silence as he moved toward them. His voice sounded odd, not entirely his own, almost as if all three of them were speaking together. “But you can’t. You can’t have him.”
Dean punched his evil twin across the jaw, and reached for the girl, grabbing her by the shoulders. He head-butted her and dropped her and she hit the ground. “Thing is, he’s never been yours for the taking.” He followed as she crawled across the floor.
“I’m going to enjoy watching you die.” She climbed to her feet, her hands erupting in flames. “Like your mother…do you remember Dean?” Flames shot out from her and Dean dodged them until arms wrapped around him from behind. The next shot hit him in the gut, exploding in fiery fingers of flame over his abdomen as he struggled to break free.
“We remember.” Instincts moved him, dropped him to a knee, rolled the demon off his back. Stronger together John’s instincts. Dean’s hands reached out and pulled the demon who wasn’t him close, his eyes flicking from those that mimicked his own to the little girl’s. “We’ll see about the dying part though.” His hands moved, faster than either of them expected, snapping the neck, dropping the body to the floor.
Her eyes went wide, demon yellow and black. Not-Dean’s face melted and in its place was darkness, a puddle of darkness in the shape of a man. Dean looked from the little girl to the puddle and back again. “Your turn.”
She quirked her head to the side, showing the wound in her face where flames licked at her flesh. Dean felt the movement like a blow to his shoulder and flinched. “Do you think you can just kill me, Dean?”
“We aim to try.”
“I’m no simple demon like that one. He was just a tool.”
“Don’t care.” Dean moved closer. She sneered and threw more fire. Hand. Sam moved Dean’s hand, deflecting the fire into the inky puddle behind him. An inhuman scream filled the room.
“You are reckless, Dean. Your father would never be so reckless.”
Dean’s head twitched, his eyes darkening. “No? Maybe you underestimate more than just Dean.” Push.
The little body flew away, stopping just short of the wall and turning back to him. Her eyebrow raised. “I’m impressed. Perhaps I chose the wrong brother.”
Dean smiled. “You’re still not getting it, are you?”
He turned, anticipating her next move, letting John direct his body and Sam the gifts that had been awakened inside him, a conduit for SamDeanJohn…each of them doing what they did best, together. Fire danced around the room. Blow by blow he and the little girl’s body moved closer to one another, closer to oblivion. Each blow getting harder and closer to physical contact.
“What is it that I’m not getting, Dean?” It asked as they came together, his hands locked on her shoulders, her hands burning into his chest. She was smiling triumphantly as his flesh burned, but his smile was no less victorious as he leaned closer to her to whisper.
“I’m not Dean.”
His thumbs bit into her skin, through the disguise of flesh. Fire erupted, oozing like blood over his skin. Her shriek seared in his ears, but he didn’t stop, not until the body was falling limp in his hands and the air around him grew thick with black, inky sulfur…The fire in the room seem to stop, as if holding its breath, then coalesced, swirling into a fiery whirlwind that seemed to surround the darkness, absorb it, burn it…Wind tore through the space, knocking Dean to his knees and feeding the flames before sucking them out through the door, out into the hallway…lighting walls and carpets as it went.
Dean took one stumbling step toward Sam before his knees collapsed and he was swallowed up in a darkness blacker than night.
Dean. You need to wake up Dean.
“Sam.” Dean groaned and opened one eye, regretting it instantly as bright light, white and startling bit into the pain he hadn’t yet identified in his head. Dean, I’m here…right here.
A hand on his arm made Dean attempt opening his eye again, finding a soft, female hand that he followed up to a white clad shoulder, a soft smile…a nurse he realized slowly. The rest of the room slowly came into focus. “Hospital?” She nodded and he swallowed. Sam?
Sam’s touch inside him was gentle, comforting. “What…I mean…how?”
“There was a fire.” She fiddled with his IV and checked the thick white bandages that covered his hands. “You were very lucky, Mr. Winchester. Not everyone was.”
Dean’s heart skipped a beat. “Who…I mean…” He closed his eyes and tried to compose himself. “My brother…” He licked his lips, clinging to the feeling of Sam inside of him. “My brother and my father…we were trying to help…”
Her eyes turned sad as she turned away. Dean couldn’t breathe. “Tell me.”
“I’m sorry, sir.”
No. No. No. Sammy. Where are you?
“No one else survived. It was a terrible fire.”
Right here, Dean. Always.
Hot tears burned tracks into his face. Dean turned away from her and curled in on himself, screaming silently into his pillow. No. No. No. No. Nonononononono.
Dean.
“No!” Dean screamed, slamming his head back against the pillow. His body convulsed and the room filled with people, then something cool pressed into him and the darkness came back to claim him.
“This isn’t the first time you’ve been involved in an incident at this building, is it Mr. Winchester.” The detective had been kind enough and seemed to believe Dean’s story, but Dean was still lost in a looping agony of pain.
“What? Um…no. Last year.”
“I understand you were a victim of the serial killer Kendall Garrett.”
Dean nodded dully, tears once again burning down his face. “What brought you back there?”
“My brother.” Dean’s voice cracked. It felt like he did too. “Look…I’m…I can’t.”
She smiled softly and stood, touching his hand. “I’m sorry. It isn’t important. I’ll let you rest. If you think of anything else important, give me a call.”
“Okay Mr. Winchester, you’re all set. There’s a taxi waiting for you at the front door, and I’ll be taking you down to meet it.”
“Thank you.” Dean sat dully in the wheelchair and waited. His lap held a pile of papers, including the invoice he needed to get the Impala out of impound. He glanced down as she put his discharge paperwork on top. He stared. The ache inside him doubled. Samuel Winchester.
Dean had taken Sam’s wallet when he’d left the hotel that afternoon in New Mexico, before Sam had taken off. Dean closed his eyes. Sammy…I can’t do this….I can’t…not like this…I can’t…I need you…
“Are you sure there isn’t someone we can call to get you?”
Dean looked up at the pretty blond candy stripper who was at a loss as to how to help him. He shook his head miserably. “No. They’re gone. They’re all gone.”
He had the taxi take him to the impound to get his car, even though the front windshield is shot to hell and it got pretty banged up dealing with demon children, and he doesn’t know how to explain anything. His jaw works hard to keep him from bawling as the clerk hands him the receipt and two plastic bags with the things from the car, cause it’s Sam’s duffle and it makes it that much more real.
He’s grateful as he pops the trunk to throw the duffle into that he’d emptied it of guns that afternoon for cleaning, before Sam had felt their father crash…grateful they’d never found their way back to the trunk. He’d be sitting in jail now if they had, not pulling out of the police impound yard with a blown out windshield and an empty place beside him.
But not inside.
“Fuck you.” Dean pulls his sun glasses from the second bag and turns the volume on the radio to full blast and tears out onto the street. He doesn’t mean to go there…but the Impala seems to know the way without him. The building is gone, burned to little more than ash and a few cinder blocks. Sam….Sammy….
Slowly Dean stepped out of the car. If he closes his eyes he can picture the dead bodies scattered over the charred grass…can taste the sulfur in the air…His chest clutches and he falls back against the Impala.
Dean.
“I can’t.” Dean reaches in through the window for the rest of the contents of the bag, a map of California, a lighter and a single white sheet of paper. He doesn’t want to read it, doesn’t want to let it be true…real.
With a shuddering breath, Dean lifted the paper, blinking several times to make Sam’s scribbled hand readable.
Dean,
You’re probably pretty pissed with me right now. I know…I promised I’d never leave you again…and, after…everything…well, you’ll just have to believe it was the right thing. I never meant to hurt you like this…but I know now what I have to do.
If you’re reading this then you already know everything I’m going to tell you, you just won’t have accepted it yet. When you gave yourself to me the way you did…when you…Damn Dean, you fucking let yourself get branded, just to make me…to give me…you held it all and made me safe…I need you to know that this thing, between us…it was never your fault…it was never something you forced on me. God Dean, I’ve loved you ever since I can remember…wanted you since I was old enough to realize what that meant.
I know what it wants…I know and I can’t…can’t let it have it….I gave it to you, everything It wants from me. I don’t have the strength to use it, Dean…not after Garrett. As much as I don’t want to admit it, he took something from me, broke me in ways I’ll never put back together. I’m going to crack, I’m going to break. I already have so much.
I’m so tired, Dean. But you…you’re my strength. When you come for me, you’ll understand. You’ll know. Always Dean. Always with you. Always inside of you. I love you so fucking much I can’t breathe if I think about it…and I’m sorry…so sorry…I had to push so hard, so you’d know…so you’d figure it out…Everything…for you…for Mom…and Dad…and Jess…Everything and always….
Sam
Dean slid slowly to the ground, crumpling the note in his fist as he bit it to keep from screaming. You were my strength Sammy…always…I’m nothing without you.
For a long time he sat there, hot tears and pain held together by his grip on a letter he’d never wanted to read…Dean.
He shook his head. “No. Let me be.”
You look like shit.
“How would you know?”
Mirror, doofus. Dean pulled himself up and took a deep, shaky breath.
He got back into the car and brought the engine to life. He angled the rear view mirror and looked at himself. The dark circles under his eyes were deep and as he stared he could almost imagine he could see Sam’s eyes there under his own. “I’m not forgiving you anytime soon.”
I know.
Dean nodded, rubbing at his puffy eyes. “And I’m playing fucking Metallica all the way to Kansas.”
Laughter echoed through him, laughter he couldn’t quite share as he pulled out onto the road, setting course for the nearest freeway that would take him out of California. He put a tape in the tape deck and cranked the volume, singing along as he roared out of Palo Alto.
Say your prayers little one
Dont forget, my son
To include everyone
Tuck you in, warm within
Keep you free from sin
Till the sandman he comes
Sleep with one eye open
Gripping your pillow tight
Exit light
Enter night
Take my hand
Off to never never land