Hunter Becoming Hunted, Part 6 Supernatural, Keeper!Verse, R-ish
Fandom: Supernatural (Keeper!Verse)
Title: Hunter Becoming Hunted, Part 6 of ? ( Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five)
Characters/Pairing: Sam/Dean, Dana, John
Word Count: 2956
Rating: R-ish, for remembered abuse, sexual situations
Summary: The family copes with what Dana did; Dean tries to hold them together while Dana tries to make sense of Sam's life and Sam tries to feel worthy...and neither Sam nor Dana can begin to face the other...
A/Ns & Warnings: Part of the Keeper!Verse, recollections of childhood rape and abuse, demon possession, and some wincest loving (though not graphic).
Dana watched her Papa sleep, sitting with her back to the headboard, her knees pulled up tight to her chest. Her eyes hurt, from crying and rubbing for the last few hours. She was cried out, but she couldn’t shake the emotion…couldn’t tell whose emotion it was, hers or Sam’s.
His memories spilled through her randomly. Images, thoughts, feelings…sensory input…She’d tried to control them at first, but it was too much…and they flowed over the walls and barriers she tried to put up to contain them.
He had always been this shining light in her life…always there, always helpful…and while she’d known his life hadn’t always been like that, and she knew there was dark stuff he kept hidden from her…she’d never imagined…
She shuddered as the memory of his first kill swept through her. He was seventeen, months after he swore his oath and spilled his own blood. She could feel the knife in her hand, feel the heat of the blood soaking into her skin. She closed her eyes and willed it away, laying her head on her knees.
Exhausted, she wanted desperately to sleep, but knew it would only bring her nightmares. She had never realized just how sheltered a child she had been. She’d always thought that because she knew about the evil that stalks the night, knew about ghosts and vampires and demons, that somehow she knew…everything about evil.
But she was learning that when it came to real evil, she knew nothing.
It had never occurred to her that mortal men would willingly offer themselves up to possession…not even by one demon, but many. She had never wondered what it felt like to have some thing take control of her body and use it to…She shook at the thought, at the feeling of Sam’s body and the things the demon made him do.
Nothing was worse though than the thing he’d fought the hardest to keep from her. It made her feel dirty, she had violated him just as surely as the Harriers did. She flinched, twitched as claws grabbed and pulled and he was pushed to the floor, she sobbed and bit into her knee, trying to keep from waking her Papa sleeping in the other bed. He couldn’t know. Not…she closed her eyes as they used him, her body feeling the echo.
Dana wasn’t naïve, she was, after all, a Winchester and thirteen…and they’d done the whole mystery of life thing at school, but this was different than knowing a thing…this was knowing it, with her body, not just her mind.
She tried to make sense of it…to adjust her image of Sam to include it all…but she couldn’t…There was the Sam who killed and stole and used magic to control her father and there was the Sam she had known and there was a third Sam…who was broken and small and cried in the dark for his mother while demons chewed on his legs…who submitted beneath Harriers…who tried to run away…and no matter how she tried the three of them wouldn’t go together.
Dean rolled over, reaching into the empty space where Sam had been. The sheets were cold. He opened his eyes. Sam stood staring out the window, silent and unmoving. Dean watched until Sam felt him and turned, a sad smile on his face. “Hey.”
Dean stretched. He could still feel the touch of Sam inside him. “Hey.”
Sam turned to face him. It was obvious he had been crying again at some point. “You okay?” Sam asked, the concern coloring his voice and the touch Dean felt inside him.
“I’m good. What about you?”
Sam took a deep breath and went back to staring out the window. “I’m…working on it.”
Dean watched him for a minute, watched him find a comfortable stance, watched a forced calm settle over him. He sighed and relaxed himself. They had never had anything like what they shared the night before…all open and offering and Dean was still softly pulsing with the intensity of it all.
Slowly he got out of bed and padded to the window to look over Sam’s shoulder. The snow had stopped falling, but they’d be lucky to get the Impala the rest of the way down the mountain with that much snow on the ground. He could feel Sam, sense the movement in his head as he worked to restore order, to replace walls that Dana had torn down. He breathed deep and settled his arms around his brother, thinking an invitation back to bed.
It should seem odd to know that Sam had access to every thought, every emotion and memory…but it didn’t…somehow it was comforting…a little bit of what he and Dana had shared for so long.
He felt Sam chuckle. “You were jealous?”
Dean kissed the shallow between his shoulder blades. “Only sometimes.”
Sam’s hands slid over his, pulling first one, then the other to his mouth to kiss. “You shouldn’t be.”
“I know…” He remembered watching them together…before Dana learned to talk, knowing that they communicated in a way Dean would never share.
Sam nudged him a little and suddenly Dean had a different perspective on that memory.
Sam cajoled Dana, dangling a toy just out of reach. She giggled and cooed, stretching her arms trying to reach it.
Dean was aware of how her body hummed with energy, the slick-silvery threads weaving around and between them…and himself…Dana’s eyes, her smile that was only for her daddy…and he wasn’t sure how he knew all that, but he did…without words.
“Never be jealous.” Sam whispered.
Dean opened his mouth to respond, but stopped when his cell phone rang. It took a minute to find, still in the back pocket of his jeans somewhere on the floor. “Dad?”
He looked up at Sam and held up a hand. “Is she okay? Yeah…I’ll be over in a minute.”
“Dana?” Sam asked, though his expression said he knew the answer.
“Dad’s worried, she’s been in the bathroom since he woke up. Won’t come out.”
Sam’s face pinched, the pain of the night before evident as he tried to find the right words. “She’s…It’s all pretty hard for her. Don’t expect her to just cope with it.”
“She’s going to have to Sam.” Dean pulled on his pants and rooted around under the bed for his boots. “We have bigger problems than her having temper tantrums after she’s the one who did the wrong thing.”
“Dean-“
“No, Sam. She was wrong. I realize she’s probably traumatized by the whole thing, but we’ve got a fucking demon to deal with.”
“Are you finished?” Sam asked, crossing his arms as Dean pulled his shirt on.
“Yeah. For now.”
“I know you don’t want to hear this…but you have to…before you go barging in there.” Sam sighed and dragged his hands through his hair. “What happened last night…essentially…she relived every moment of my life, Dean. Every one.”
He looked Dean in the eye. “She, god I feel sick even thinking it, but Dean, she was raped last night, repeatedly…she was possessed…she killed and…and…raped…she was betrayed and bled and…”
“Stop. Please Sam.” Dean squeezed his eyes shut. He’d managed to put it out of his head…had to so that he could concentrate on Sam. The thought of his little girl enduring the things he knew Sam had endured…He shuddered and felt Sam’s arms and presence fold around him.
“On top of that, she’s feeling plenty guilty…for forcing me…and foolish, for thinking she could handle it…and just to put the icing on the whole situation, all the blocks and stuff Missouri and I put in place to try to let her grow up slowly are gone. She has all of her power at her disposal. I don’t think she’s realized it…but that’s how she blew up Andras…and I don’t know if you knew, she plugged me with two shots, one in the leg, the other in my arm. When I woke up, when she left me, they were gone. Even the cut on my chest is almost gone.” Sam kissed his forehead. “We have to go slow.”
Slow. Dean wasn’t necessarily good with slow. “Dana, I’d really like to see you.” He leaned against the door frame and tried not to sound exasperated. “Come on, honey. Papa’s gone to get us breakfast and Sam’s still in our room. It’s just you and me.”
The door opened slowly and Dana looked up at him, her green eyes filled with red, her nose running. She fell into him, pressing herself against his body as giant sobs wracked her. He folded his arms around her. “Okay, baby….it’s okay. Everything is going to be okay.”
“He hates me…he must.” She looked up at him. “Did he tell you? What I did to him?”
Dean kissed her forehead and nodded. “Yes. He did. Told me what you got in return too.”
Her face was red, with embarrassment, shame…pain…he wasn’t sure. “I-I didn’t know…I mean…I thought I did.” She buried her face in his shirt again and her next words were lost to a low buzz against his abdomen.
“Dana, honey…look, take a breath…a deep breath…and let’s sit down.” He walked them over to the bed. Truth was, he didn’t have a clue what to say. “Are you…alright? The last 36 hours have been rough. Physically, are you okay?”
She nodded. “I-I think so. I’m sore, but not bad.”
Dean brushed a hand along her cheek. “That’s good. I hear you shot him, took the demon down so that you could exorcise him.”
She nodded, then her eyes got big. “God…Dad…I shot Sam.”
Dean smiled and nodded. “And I am very proud of you.”
“I shot him…then I…barged into him and pushed him and…”
“He’s fine…physically anyway.”
“What?”
“He says you healed him.”
“I…what?” She looked confused, some of the pain draining. She stood and walked away. “I don’t heal.”
“Apparently you do.”
She paced a little then stopped. “You said he was fine, physically.” She chewed on her lip and he could almost feel her reaching out, but she recoiled, closing her eyes. “Is he…okay?” she asked after a long pause.
“I’m not going to lie to you Dana. You may not be an adult, but…what you did yesterday, what you experienced yesterday…it kind of means you’re going to have to act like one. So I’m going to treat you like one. What you did, after the demon thing…what you did to Sam was wrong. You hurt him.”
She crossed her arms in front of herself and Dean ached to pull her into his arms, but she needed this…she needed to face it, or she’d never be able to face Sam again. “Is he…does he hate me?”
“You said some nasty things…and you didn’t say a lot more, but you thought them…and he heard you. He’s hurting and he’s sad and he has to re-build a lot of defenses you destroyed, wall up things you let loose. Sam wasn’t just protecting you from the man he used to be Dana, he was protecting himself.”
That obviously hadn’t occurred to her. “All I could see was what he did to you…how he used you…and I had to know…” She trembled and looked up at him. “I couldn’t stop…every time he tried to make me…I had to know…and there was so much there…so much I didn’t know…and I was so angry…The things I said…He must just hate me now.”
Dean sighed. “He doesn’t hate you Dana.” He looked up at her. “He’s not even angry. He’s worried.”
“About me?”
He nodded and she looked like she was about to start bawling again. “When I first met him, Sam was a different man, Dana. Being with me, and with you has changed him. He chose to leave everything behind and change himself…and he’s spent the last 12 and ½ years believing he wasn’t good enough…that nothing he ever did was good enough to redeem him.”
“And I just validated that last night.” Dana hung her head. “I should go talk to him….tell him I’m sorry…that I-“ She stopped, her back to Dean. “Nothing I say will ever make this better, will it?”
Dean inhaled deeply, a little surprised that she’d figured that out already. “No, Dana. Only time and love can fix this.”
“I do love him.” She said it softly.
“Then, that’s what you should tell him.” Dean stood up. “But not until you’ve had a shower, washed that mushy face and had some breakfast.”
She started to protest and he turned her around, heading her back to the bathroom. “No arguing. He’s doing the same thing. You both need a little space.” Dean pulled the door shut behind her and sighed. This was not going to be easy.
Sam was grateful when the door closed behind Dean and he was alone. His body hurt from the strain of the last few days. He could feel Dana tentatively…the vague connection that bound them even when they were apart…it was enough to know she was hurting, that she wanted to know he was okay, but was afraid…it was enough that he knew where she was and that Dean wasn’t coddling her.
He collapsed onto the bed. Childhood memories he had hidden in the deepest recesses of his brain flared to life at random moments, things he’d lived through only by forgetting them. It had taken a lifetime to hide away the things that made him the man he had been and in less than a moment, Dana had exposed them all…left him stranded in a wasteland of memory and fear and pain…and her horror, her anger…it had poured through him, forced him to see those moments from her eyes, to see him as he really was.
He had always known he was not a good man. He had tried, for Dean…for Dana. Of all of them maybe John saw him best, not obligated by the blindness of love…held to him only by the requirement of blood.
Now…he couldn’t hide anymore. It was there, laid out inside him. Dean had told him that it didn’t matter, that nothing mattered from the time before they were together, but Sam knew better. It was his past that was threatening them. He should have told Dean years before about Asmodai, but he’d escaped him, he’d run…run back to Dean, to Dana…he’d locked away the past and played house instead.
He sighed and curled up on the bed, huddling into himself like he would in the punishment closet, leave as little flesh exposed as possible. They poured through him, swirling in nonsensical patterns, memories and images of the scared little boy, the murderous young man, the man he became in those first early days with Dean…he didn’t feel the tears.
Like a sliver of sun climbing over the horizon, another memory slipped out of hiding…only it wasn’t his own…it was Dean’s. Sam could see himself, kneeling at Dean’s feet, the ring held between them in offering, in question…he could feel Dean’s desire, his trust…the love that had changed everything.
He cradled the emotion, tried desperately to believe it. With Dean in the room it had been easy. Now…it slipped away too easily, replaced with the condemnation and anger Dana radiated as she left him…
Sam sat up suddenly. He remembered. Asmodai. He knew how to find him. He knew. He could…if he found him…if he killed him…Dana would be free. Maybe then she could forgive him, maybe then…
He stuck his feet into his boots and stood. His head hurt from the tumbling thoughts and memories, but he ignored it, reaching for his coat. He didn’t pretend he could ever be the man Dean saw him as…but maybe he could use what he was to make their lives easier.
He paused long enough to scribble a note, leaving it on the bed, then he set out into the cold, planning on hitching a ride down the mountain and from there he could steal a car or something to get where he needed to go.
Dana picked at her plate, but she hadn’t eaten anything. John was quiet, still not entirely clear on everything that had happened the night before. Dean sighed into the silence. Something was nagging him…a feeling, fleeting, unfamiliar. Suddenly, Dana’s head came up and it snapped into place. “Sam?”
Dana’s eyes were wide as she nodded. Dean was up and out the door, plowing through the snowy parking lot to throw open the door to the room. “Sam?”
The room was empty, all but a small piece of hotel stationary on the bed. I know how to end this. I have to…when she’s ready, tell Dana I love her…and I never wanted to hurt her. Dean…I will always love you…thank you for believing in me. All my heart, Sam.
“Damn it Sam.” Dean pocketed the note and ran out to the road, looking in both directions, but his brother might as well have vanished. He felt a hand in his and looked down at Dana.
“He left because of me.” Her voice was small.
“Can you track him?”
She made a face, her eyes tracking across the road. “Kind of…he’s blocking me…but…” She was breathing heavily. “Its like he’s still in here too.”
“Shit.” Dean dragged his free hand over his face. “What does he think he’s doing going off on his own like that?”
“Saving me.” Dana said. The pain in her voice cut into Dean’s resolve and he slipped his arm around her, pulling her close.
“Well, if he gets himself killed in the process, I’m going to be pissed.”
Dana shivered and Dean turned them around. “Come on, let’s see if we can’t follow him.”
Title: Hunter Becoming Hunted, Part 6 of ? ( Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five)
Characters/Pairing: Sam/Dean, Dana, John
Word Count: 2956
Rating: R-ish, for remembered abuse, sexual situations
Summary: The family copes with what Dana did; Dean tries to hold them together while Dana tries to make sense of Sam's life and Sam tries to feel worthy...and neither Sam nor Dana can begin to face the other...
A/Ns & Warnings: Part of the Keeper!Verse, recollections of childhood rape and abuse, demon possession, and some wincest loving (though not graphic).
Dana watched her Papa sleep, sitting with her back to the headboard, her knees pulled up tight to her chest. Her eyes hurt, from crying and rubbing for the last few hours. She was cried out, but she couldn’t shake the emotion…couldn’t tell whose emotion it was, hers or Sam’s.
His memories spilled through her randomly. Images, thoughts, feelings…sensory input…She’d tried to control them at first, but it was too much…and they flowed over the walls and barriers she tried to put up to contain them.
He had always been this shining light in her life…always there, always helpful…and while she’d known his life hadn’t always been like that, and she knew there was dark stuff he kept hidden from her…she’d never imagined…
She shuddered as the memory of his first kill swept through her. He was seventeen, months after he swore his oath and spilled his own blood. She could feel the knife in her hand, feel the heat of the blood soaking into her skin. She closed her eyes and willed it away, laying her head on her knees.
Exhausted, she wanted desperately to sleep, but knew it would only bring her nightmares. She had never realized just how sheltered a child she had been. She’d always thought that because she knew about the evil that stalks the night, knew about ghosts and vampires and demons, that somehow she knew…everything about evil.
But she was learning that when it came to real evil, she knew nothing.
It had never occurred to her that mortal men would willingly offer themselves up to possession…not even by one demon, but many. She had never wondered what it felt like to have some thing take control of her body and use it to…She shook at the thought, at the feeling of Sam’s body and the things the demon made him do.
Nothing was worse though than the thing he’d fought the hardest to keep from her. It made her feel dirty, she had violated him just as surely as the Harriers did. She flinched, twitched as claws grabbed and pulled and he was pushed to the floor, she sobbed and bit into her knee, trying to keep from waking her Papa sleeping in the other bed. He couldn’t know. Not…she closed her eyes as they used him, her body feeling the echo.
Dana wasn’t naïve, she was, after all, a Winchester and thirteen…and they’d done the whole mystery of life thing at school, but this was different than knowing a thing…this was knowing it, with her body, not just her mind.
She tried to make sense of it…to adjust her image of Sam to include it all…but she couldn’t…There was the Sam who killed and stole and used magic to control her father and there was the Sam she had known and there was a third Sam…who was broken and small and cried in the dark for his mother while demons chewed on his legs…who submitted beneath Harriers…who tried to run away…and no matter how she tried the three of them wouldn’t go together.
Dean rolled over, reaching into the empty space where Sam had been. The sheets were cold. He opened his eyes. Sam stood staring out the window, silent and unmoving. Dean watched until Sam felt him and turned, a sad smile on his face. “Hey.”
Dean stretched. He could still feel the touch of Sam inside him. “Hey.”
Sam turned to face him. It was obvious he had been crying again at some point. “You okay?” Sam asked, the concern coloring his voice and the touch Dean felt inside him.
“I’m good. What about you?”
Sam took a deep breath and went back to staring out the window. “I’m…working on it.”
Dean watched him for a minute, watched him find a comfortable stance, watched a forced calm settle over him. He sighed and relaxed himself. They had never had anything like what they shared the night before…all open and offering and Dean was still softly pulsing with the intensity of it all.
Slowly he got out of bed and padded to the window to look over Sam’s shoulder. The snow had stopped falling, but they’d be lucky to get the Impala the rest of the way down the mountain with that much snow on the ground. He could feel Sam, sense the movement in his head as he worked to restore order, to replace walls that Dana had torn down. He breathed deep and settled his arms around his brother, thinking an invitation back to bed.
It should seem odd to know that Sam had access to every thought, every emotion and memory…but it didn’t…somehow it was comforting…a little bit of what he and Dana had shared for so long.
He felt Sam chuckle. “You were jealous?”
Dean kissed the shallow between his shoulder blades. “Only sometimes.”
Sam’s hands slid over his, pulling first one, then the other to his mouth to kiss. “You shouldn’t be.”
“I know…” He remembered watching them together…before Dana learned to talk, knowing that they communicated in a way Dean would never share.
Sam nudged him a little and suddenly Dean had a different perspective on that memory.
Sam cajoled Dana, dangling a toy just out of reach. She giggled and cooed, stretching her arms trying to reach it.
Dean was aware of how her body hummed with energy, the slick-silvery threads weaving around and between them…and himself…Dana’s eyes, her smile that was only for her daddy…and he wasn’t sure how he knew all that, but he did…without words.
“Never be jealous.” Sam whispered.
Dean opened his mouth to respond, but stopped when his cell phone rang. It took a minute to find, still in the back pocket of his jeans somewhere on the floor. “Dad?”
He looked up at Sam and held up a hand. “Is she okay? Yeah…I’ll be over in a minute.”
“Dana?” Sam asked, though his expression said he knew the answer.
“Dad’s worried, she’s been in the bathroom since he woke up. Won’t come out.”
Sam’s face pinched, the pain of the night before evident as he tried to find the right words. “She’s…It’s all pretty hard for her. Don’t expect her to just cope with it.”
“She’s going to have to Sam.” Dean pulled on his pants and rooted around under the bed for his boots. “We have bigger problems than her having temper tantrums after she’s the one who did the wrong thing.”
“Dean-“
“No, Sam. She was wrong. I realize she’s probably traumatized by the whole thing, but we’ve got a fucking demon to deal with.”
“Are you finished?” Sam asked, crossing his arms as Dean pulled his shirt on.
“Yeah. For now.”
“I know you don’t want to hear this…but you have to…before you go barging in there.” Sam sighed and dragged his hands through his hair. “What happened last night…essentially…she relived every moment of my life, Dean. Every one.”
He looked Dean in the eye. “She, god I feel sick even thinking it, but Dean, she was raped last night, repeatedly…she was possessed…she killed and…and…raped…she was betrayed and bled and…”
“Stop. Please Sam.” Dean squeezed his eyes shut. He’d managed to put it out of his head…had to so that he could concentrate on Sam. The thought of his little girl enduring the things he knew Sam had endured…He shuddered and felt Sam’s arms and presence fold around him.
“On top of that, she’s feeling plenty guilty…for forcing me…and foolish, for thinking she could handle it…and just to put the icing on the whole situation, all the blocks and stuff Missouri and I put in place to try to let her grow up slowly are gone. She has all of her power at her disposal. I don’t think she’s realized it…but that’s how she blew up Andras…and I don’t know if you knew, she plugged me with two shots, one in the leg, the other in my arm. When I woke up, when she left me, they were gone. Even the cut on my chest is almost gone.” Sam kissed his forehead. “We have to go slow.”
Slow. Dean wasn’t necessarily good with slow. “Dana, I’d really like to see you.” He leaned against the door frame and tried not to sound exasperated. “Come on, honey. Papa’s gone to get us breakfast and Sam’s still in our room. It’s just you and me.”
The door opened slowly and Dana looked up at him, her green eyes filled with red, her nose running. She fell into him, pressing herself against his body as giant sobs wracked her. He folded his arms around her. “Okay, baby….it’s okay. Everything is going to be okay.”
“He hates me…he must.” She looked up at him. “Did he tell you? What I did to him?”
Dean kissed her forehead and nodded. “Yes. He did. Told me what you got in return too.”
Her face was red, with embarrassment, shame…pain…he wasn’t sure. “I-I didn’t know…I mean…I thought I did.” She buried her face in his shirt again and her next words were lost to a low buzz against his abdomen.
“Dana, honey…look, take a breath…a deep breath…and let’s sit down.” He walked them over to the bed. Truth was, he didn’t have a clue what to say. “Are you…alright? The last 36 hours have been rough. Physically, are you okay?”
She nodded. “I-I think so. I’m sore, but not bad.”
Dean brushed a hand along her cheek. “That’s good. I hear you shot him, took the demon down so that you could exorcise him.”
She nodded, then her eyes got big. “God…Dad…I shot Sam.”
Dean smiled and nodded. “And I am very proud of you.”
“I shot him…then I…barged into him and pushed him and…”
“He’s fine…physically anyway.”
“What?”
“He says you healed him.”
“I…what?” She looked confused, some of the pain draining. She stood and walked away. “I don’t heal.”
“Apparently you do.”
She paced a little then stopped. “You said he was fine, physically.” She chewed on her lip and he could almost feel her reaching out, but she recoiled, closing her eyes. “Is he…okay?” she asked after a long pause.
“I’m not going to lie to you Dana. You may not be an adult, but…what you did yesterday, what you experienced yesterday…it kind of means you’re going to have to act like one. So I’m going to treat you like one. What you did, after the demon thing…what you did to Sam was wrong. You hurt him.”
She crossed her arms in front of herself and Dean ached to pull her into his arms, but she needed this…she needed to face it, or she’d never be able to face Sam again. “Is he…does he hate me?”
“You said some nasty things…and you didn’t say a lot more, but you thought them…and he heard you. He’s hurting and he’s sad and he has to re-build a lot of defenses you destroyed, wall up things you let loose. Sam wasn’t just protecting you from the man he used to be Dana, he was protecting himself.”
That obviously hadn’t occurred to her. “All I could see was what he did to you…how he used you…and I had to know…” She trembled and looked up at him. “I couldn’t stop…every time he tried to make me…I had to know…and there was so much there…so much I didn’t know…and I was so angry…The things I said…He must just hate me now.”
Dean sighed. “He doesn’t hate you Dana.” He looked up at her. “He’s not even angry. He’s worried.”
“About me?”
He nodded and she looked like she was about to start bawling again. “When I first met him, Sam was a different man, Dana. Being with me, and with you has changed him. He chose to leave everything behind and change himself…and he’s spent the last 12 and ½ years believing he wasn’t good enough…that nothing he ever did was good enough to redeem him.”
“And I just validated that last night.” Dana hung her head. “I should go talk to him….tell him I’m sorry…that I-“ She stopped, her back to Dean. “Nothing I say will ever make this better, will it?”
Dean inhaled deeply, a little surprised that she’d figured that out already. “No, Dana. Only time and love can fix this.”
“I do love him.” She said it softly.
“Then, that’s what you should tell him.” Dean stood up. “But not until you’ve had a shower, washed that mushy face and had some breakfast.”
She started to protest and he turned her around, heading her back to the bathroom. “No arguing. He’s doing the same thing. You both need a little space.” Dean pulled the door shut behind her and sighed. This was not going to be easy.
Sam was grateful when the door closed behind Dean and he was alone. His body hurt from the strain of the last few days. He could feel Dana tentatively…the vague connection that bound them even when they were apart…it was enough to know she was hurting, that she wanted to know he was okay, but was afraid…it was enough that he knew where she was and that Dean wasn’t coddling her.
He collapsed onto the bed. Childhood memories he had hidden in the deepest recesses of his brain flared to life at random moments, things he’d lived through only by forgetting them. It had taken a lifetime to hide away the things that made him the man he had been and in less than a moment, Dana had exposed them all…left him stranded in a wasteland of memory and fear and pain…and her horror, her anger…it had poured through him, forced him to see those moments from her eyes, to see him as he really was.
He had always known he was not a good man. He had tried, for Dean…for Dana. Of all of them maybe John saw him best, not obligated by the blindness of love…held to him only by the requirement of blood.
Now…he couldn’t hide anymore. It was there, laid out inside him. Dean had told him that it didn’t matter, that nothing mattered from the time before they were together, but Sam knew better. It was his past that was threatening them. He should have told Dean years before about Asmodai, but he’d escaped him, he’d run…run back to Dean, to Dana…he’d locked away the past and played house instead.
He sighed and curled up on the bed, huddling into himself like he would in the punishment closet, leave as little flesh exposed as possible. They poured through him, swirling in nonsensical patterns, memories and images of the scared little boy, the murderous young man, the man he became in those first early days with Dean…he didn’t feel the tears.
Like a sliver of sun climbing over the horizon, another memory slipped out of hiding…only it wasn’t his own…it was Dean’s. Sam could see himself, kneeling at Dean’s feet, the ring held between them in offering, in question…he could feel Dean’s desire, his trust…the love that had changed everything.
He cradled the emotion, tried desperately to believe it. With Dean in the room it had been easy. Now…it slipped away too easily, replaced with the condemnation and anger Dana radiated as she left him…
Sam sat up suddenly. He remembered. Asmodai. He knew how to find him. He knew. He could…if he found him…if he killed him…Dana would be free. Maybe then she could forgive him, maybe then…
He stuck his feet into his boots and stood. His head hurt from the tumbling thoughts and memories, but he ignored it, reaching for his coat. He didn’t pretend he could ever be the man Dean saw him as…but maybe he could use what he was to make their lives easier.
He paused long enough to scribble a note, leaving it on the bed, then he set out into the cold, planning on hitching a ride down the mountain and from there he could steal a car or something to get where he needed to go.
Dana picked at her plate, but she hadn’t eaten anything. John was quiet, still not entirely clear on everything that had happened the night before. Dean sighed into the silence. Something was nagging him…a feeling, fleeting, unfamiliar. Suddenly, Dana’s head came up and it snapped into place. “Sam?”
Dana’s eyes were wide as she nodded. Dean was up and out the door, plowing through the snowy parking lot to throw open the door to the room. “Sam?”
The room was empty, all but a small piece of hotel stationary on the bed. I know how to end this. I have to…when she’s ready, tell Dana I love her…and I never wanted to hurt her. Dean…I will always love you…thank you for believing in me. All my heart, Sam.
“Damn it Sam.” Dean pocketed the note and ran out to the road, looking in both directions, but his brother might as well have vanished. He felt a hand in his and looked down at Dana.
“He left because of me.” Her voice was small.
“Can you track him?”
She made a face, her eyes tracking across the road. “Kind of…he’s blocking me…but…” She was breathing heavily. “Its like he’s still in here too.”
“Shit.” Dean dragged his free hand over his face. “What does he think he’s doing going off on his own like that?”
“Saving me.” Dana said. The pain in her voice cut into Dean’s resolve and he slipped his arm around her, pulling her close.
“Well, if he gets himself killed in the process, I’m going to be pissed.”
Dana shivered and Dean turned them around. “Come on, let’s see if we can’t follow him.”