The lone and level sands stretch far away, for reapertownusa
Title: The lone and level sands stretch far away
Recipient:
reapertownusa
Words:~2800
Rating: R for swearing
Warnings: Torture
Summary: Dean wakes up in a bad place and things rapidly go downhill from there. Set during some unspecified period in Season 5.
Prompts: Kind of a mishmash of 3 of reapertownusa's prompts - she asked for hostage!Dean; hurt/comfort with Dean being on the receiving end; and anything to do with Dean's post Hell PTSD. So here you go, I hope you enjoy this, in spite of there being angels present!
There was an unforgiving quality to the light that Dean could sense even before he opened his eyes. He opened them anyway, and regretted it immediately as the white light stabbed right into the center of his cerebral cortex. Sometimes he hated being right.
Everything hurt and he hadn’t even tried moving yet. Fuck. Even his eyelashes hurt. Nerves were zinging across every inch of skin as if he’d been flayed, and that was a memory he’d hoped never to relive. However, because Stubborn was Dean Winchester’s middle name, he tried flexing his muscles in order to sit up and take a look around. Two things registered with him then, after the initial blinding agony died down. First was, of course, that moving made everything hurt worse than keeping still. Second was that he was tied down - making more than mere flexing of muscles nigh on impossible.
“Great,” he said out loud -or rather rasped - as his throat was drier than Monument Valley and felt twice as full of sand. In fact, now he came to think of it, it was hot enough to be Arizona, and certainly gritty enough where the bare skin of his back was pressed against the hard ground. Which brought him rapidly to revelation number three. He was naked. Of course he was. Because being staked out in the middle of a desert with a useless concussion but without a stitch of clothing was just the sort of thing that happened to Dean Winchester. Every fucking time.
He turned his head - which was about the only movement he could make at the moment - in an attempt to shield his eyes from the sun, and tried opening them again, with a little more caution this time. His eyelids felt as crusted up and raw as the rest of him, in fact his right eye didn’t want to open at all, but this time the pain in his head was more manageable, and he could focus his one-eyed gaze on his surroundings a little more.
His surroundings being his outstretched arm, a rough rope bound tight around his wrist and attached to a large rusty iron spike, and beyond that, exactly what Dean had feared would be the case - an isolated sand-filled and rocky landscape of various shades of red, purple and yellow that in any other circumstances would have been beautiful in its desolation. The fact that his skin was already a delicate shade of puce-red that matched some of those pretty rocks was a bit of a dampener on his appreciation of the view, especially when he turned his head again, very gingerly, to take in the rest of his body.
Oh man, he really hoped that sun burning his family jewels didn’t impair their performance…Holy crap! Maybe it would make his nuts shrivel and drop off…
When the shadow fell over his face, his first reaction was one of relief that something was cutting out the sun’s burning rays. It was a very short-lived emotion, quickly replaced by a chill that had nothing to with the touch of shade on his bare skin and everything to do with the thrill of fear that ran through him as he recognized his captor’s voice.
Really? Could this day get any worse? He was completely and utterly fucked.
“Hello, Dean,” Lucifer said.
**-**-**
Dean tried to think of something to say but his concussed brain was too jumbled up and by the time he had a necklace of words strung together in something resembling a sentence, Lucifer was talking again.
“The demons I tasked with bringing you here were a little over enthusiastic, I think. I wanted you secured, not barbecued. I suppose they were caught between fear of failure and fear of you, though really the latter is giving you far too much credit, from what I’ve seen.”
“So how about you cut me loose, then,” Dean said, his voice catching in his throat like brambles. He wouldn’t have been surprised to find his mouth full of blood, but sadly, there wasn’t even that much moisture to be had. Then Lucifer, that smug son of a bitch, decided to take a stroll around Dean’s compass points, depriving Dean of the scant comfort of his shadow. Dean could feel his skin starting to blister.
“Set you free? I don’t think so, Dean. You are my bargaining chip. You are the lever that will allow me to move Sam’s world. What would your brother sacrifice for you, Dean? What would you sacrifice for him? No, don’t answer that one, we already know the answer.”
Lucifer’s voice was coming from near Dean’s feet, and he strained his neck to lift his head up enough to keep an eye on the bastard. He couldn’t remember a thing about how he’d gotten here. The last memory he had was of a late night beer-run to a Gas n Sip, so he guessed he must have been bushwhacked somewhere between the petrol station and the motel. Man, he’d kill for just one of those cold beers right now. He couldn’t help a flinch when Lucifer kicked contemptuously at one of Dean’s swollen ankles.
“Hey! Watch the goods,” Dean croaked.
“Honestly, I don’t understand what my brother sees in you. At least Sam has been well prepared to be my vessel. He is a fine physical specimen. You on the other hand…? Pathetic. Worthless. Broken.”
Lucifer punctuated each slur with a vicious kick as he circled round Dean, which was just great. A pretty crappy situation made worse by the biggest douchebag this side of Heaven or Hell adding injury to insult. Dean winced when the toe of Lucifer’s shoe connected with his ribs, and he distinctly felt something crack. Yeah, he was broken all right.
“It won’t work, you know,” Dean said, trying to keeping his tone conversational. Lucifer paused his pacing to rest one foot on Dean’s left wrist, just below the rope burns. Dean was barely aware of the discomfort, he was so grateful that Lucifer’s position had brought him full circle, putting Dean in his shadow once again. It also meant Dean couldn’t see Lucifer’s face, which was a mixed blessing - good because the vessel’s decay was an ugly thing to see, but bad because it meant Dean had nothing to distract him from the memory of the Devil wearing Sam’s face.
“Sam won’t say yes to save me,” Dean continued, spurred on by the horror of that mental picture. “You have the wrong bait.”
He couldn’t help a grunt of pain as Lucifer put his weight on the foot pinning his wrist to the floor, grinding the bone into the stone. Shit. If Lucifer kept that up, Dean’s wrist was going to snap just like his ribs.
“You said it yourself. I’m worthless. Sam thinks I’m weak.” Dean said through gritted teeth. He kept on talking, even though his mouth was so dry it could rival Death Valley for lack of moisture; even though he was riling up the Devil - because that was kind of the point. His brain might be parboiled mush, but even while Lucifer had been doing his B movie villain impression, a couple of thoughts had been sparking into life in there.
The first thought was - if Dean were to die, Michael would lose his ‘perfect’ vessel. That had to have some impact on the whole Last Battle scenario, right? The second was more immediate. If Dean died here and now, there would be no way for Lucifer to pressure Sam into giving in. No Dean, no lever. A dead hostage was of no use to anyone. Apart from which, goading Lucifer was satisfying. Better than lying around brooding about a rescue that could never happen.
“I’m the brother who fell, just like you. You are right, I’m a failure, a disappointment to my dad and to my brother, and I guess you know exactly how that feels, having been there yourself…”
Dean tensed, waiting for Lucifer to lose it and lay into him for real this time, but the expected blow never came. Instead, Lucifer laughed, making Dean shiver again in spite of the heat.
“I see what you are trying to do, Dean. It won’t work.” Lucifer crouched down close to Dean’s head, and it was only the fact Dean was tied down that kept him from running away screaming from the touch of sheer madness staring out of those cold blue eyes. As it was, the ropes and a certain Winchester stubbornness that Bobby would probably have called a death wish held Dean in place.
“I’m going to keep you alive until Sam says yes, and he will say yes, don’t worry about that.” Lucifer reached out a hand and touched Dean’s forehead. There was a sharp, more focused burning sensation, and Dean found that he could open his right eye. The son of a bitch must have done some sort of healing mojo on his head injury, though whatever it was hadn’t alleviated the headache any. It stood to reason that a fallen angel, even one as powerful as the Devil himself, wouldn’t have the kind of grace that mended things that well.
Dean did try to turn his head away when Lucifer started pouring water down his throat, but he was weak as a kitten, and couldn’t resist when Lucifer grabbed his chin and forced his mouth open. His thirst was so overwhelming he couldn’t have stopped swallowing after the first taste of the nourishing cool drops, however much he wanted to.
“There. That should be sufficient to keep you alive until I have my little chat with Sam tonight. It is most inconvenient, having to wait until my vessel sleeps in order to converse, but those symbols my meddling little brother carved into you both are far too effective at hiding you. Thankfully, they also mean no one will find you here, so I can leave to attend to more important business. I have an army to train, after all.”
Lucifer rose to his feet and Dean had to squeeze his eyes shut against the miniature tornado of dust that was stirred up when the Devil disappeared.
God fucking damn it to hell.
Dean spent the next few minutes, hours, whatever, straining and straining at the ropes around his wrists and ankles, achieving nothing except making the ropes slippery with his blood. There was no give in the metal stakes; they wouldn’t budge even a fraction, however hard he tried. Whoever had trussed him up and laid him out like lunch had done as good a job as a Winchester.
Time passed. Or didn’t. Dean couldn’t be sure. The sun was there, burning, burning - it never seemed to move. It wasn’t until the big ass vulture turned up that Dean realized how monumentally stupid he’d been. This wasn’t Arizona, of course it wasn’t. How he could have ever thought he’d gotten out of Hell, he had no idea. What an insane illusion that had been - rescued by angels and somehow important to the fate of the world. Madness and delusion, the very substance of the Pit.
He watched with resignation as the blind, white-eyed bird mantled its dark wings over him and bent its ugly wattled neck to tear into his side. Alastair had always liked to take different forms when torturing Dean.
He lost count of how many times Alastair tore his tender flesh open to eat his liver or his lungs before flying off to let him heal. After a while his eyes were so crusted up with tears and his lids so burnt by the ever-present sun, he could no longer see the vulture when it returned, only feel its savage beak and wicked claws as they excavated between his ribs. Dean floated in a sea of pain. It felt familiar, deserved. Cracked and bleeding lips stretched into a half smile.
He knew he was delirious when he heard Sam’s voice. Obviously, he ignored it, even when he felt cool hands - large hands, just like Sam’s - touching him gently, much too gentle and soothing to be real.
“Dean. Oh god, Dean, what have they done to you? Shit, Cas, can you…?”
“I cannot heal him fully, Sam, no. I am not strong enough, being cut off from Heaven. Let me take you both somewhere safe and then I can perhaps relieve some of the pain, and help with the worst of these burns.”
Cas. Castiel. Another voice that he knew… no, no, no… not possible because angels didn’t exist, right? Dean knew that. Neither Sam nor angels belonged in Hell, therefore they couldn’t be here.
Wait, Sam. There was something important about Sam being here. Something deadly and dangerous and wrong. Adrenaline surged through him and he began to struggle against the grip of the new hands touching his raw flesh. He was sure he would disintegrate if they moved him; he was held together by sinew and nothing else, his muscles stripped like meat from his bones, his skin in tatters.
“Sssss…” Dean couldn’t open his mouth, couldn’t speak through the desert dryness and the iron taste of his own blood. His eyelids were gummed together so tight they could have been super-glued. His whole body was one writhing mass of agony and he couldn’t even scream. Because if Sam was really here, he must have said yes and though Dean couldn’t remember why that was a bad thing, he knew this was something that should never have happened, something that couldn’t be allowed. And it was his fault.
“No, y’can’t be here. Did you say it? S..Sammy? Did he make you say yes, for me?” Dean didn’t know if he was making sense, if any of the words that were dripping from his burned lips like acid were being understood.
“Dean, please relax and let us help you. I haven’t said yes, I’ll never say it. Do you understand?”
“Then how’d you find me? How’re you here? You shouldn’t have come to Hell for me, m’not worth it.”
“Sam persuaded a demon to tell us where you were, Dean. No bargains were made, no souls jeopardized, Sam is still hidden from Lucifer.” Castiel said, but Dean didn’t - couldn’t - believe him.
“Dean, you are not in Hell, please stop fighting me!” Sam’s voice was pleading, wrecked, and any other time Dean would have listened when his little brother was clearly hurting, but he couldn’t breathe and he couldn’t see and…
And then something was pressing on his forehead and a peaceful blackness overtook him.
**-**-**
Whispering woke him. Low voices somewhere in his vicinity, trying to be considerate and leave him undisturbed. That was his first clue that this probably wasn’t Hell. It really didn’t smell like Hell either, nor did it smell much like a hospital, which might have been his second guess. The air was scented with wood smoke and ancient tobacco, musty carpet and take-out food cartons. There was an open door or window, because a cool damp breeze caressed his cheek, carrying the scent of resin, leaves and rain. Not a desert either then. That was encouraging.
The voices fell silent and Dean waited for something to happen. He felt very tired but kind of floaty, like he was made of feathers. His skin was tight and sore but no more than that, and his headache had disappeared, vanished along with the ropes that had bound him and the hard rock underneath him. Instead his back was cradled in something soft that smelled like Sam. His chest hurt when he took a deep breath, but broken ribs were a familiar experience, nothing to worry about. His internal organs felt intact and where they should be, his limbs articulated and his pain hummed at a manageable level. He sneaked a hand down between his legs to cup his junk. Tender, but all present and correct, yessir. Incapable of saluting right now, but he was fairly confident that his dick would be back on parade as soon as the rest of Dean healed.
There was a faint rustling that Dean identified as the rub of denim on denim, and the displacement of air that told him someone had sat down next to his bed, couch, whatever. He could feel a comforting gentle heat radiating from the seated person, warming the back of his hand where it lay by his side.
Sam, he thought. Kid always ran so hot.
Finally feeling that he would be safe here from any number of liver-eating, blind vultures and insane Devils, Dean opened his eyes.
A/N title from Percy Byche Shelley’s Ozymandias
Recipient:
reapertownusa
Words:~2800
Rating: R for swearing
Warnings: Torture
Summary: Dean wakes up in a bad place and things rapidly go downhill from there. Set during some unspecified period in Season 5.
Prompts: Kind of a mishmash of 3 of reapertownusa's prompts - she asked for hostage!Dean; hurt/comfort with Dean being on the receiving end; and anything to do with Dean's post Hell PTSD. So here you go, I hope you enjoy this, in spite of there being angels present!
There was an unforgiving quality to the light that Dean could sense even before he opened his eyes. He opened them anyway, and regretted it immediately as the white light stabbed right into the center of his cerebral cortex. Sometimes he hated being right.
Everything hurt and he hadn’t even tried moving yet. Fuck. Even his eyelashes hurt. Nerves were zinging across every inch of skin as if he’d been flayed, and that was a memory he’d hoped never to relive. However, because Stubborn was Dean Winchester’s middle name, he tried flexing his muscles in order to sit up and take a look around. Two things registered with him then, after the initial blinding agony died down. First was, of course, that moving made everything hurt worse than keeping still. Second was that he was tied down - making more than mere flexing of muscles nigh on impossible.
“Great,” he said out loud -or rather rasped - as his throat was drier than Monument Valley and felt twice as full of sand. In fact, now he came to think of it, it was hot enough to be Arizona, and certainly gritty enough where the bare skin of his back was pressed against the hard ground. Which brought him rapidly to revelation number three. He was naked. Of course he was. Because being staked out in the middle of a desert with a useless concussion but without a stitch of clothing was just the sort of thing that happened to Dean Winchester. Every fucking time.
He turned his head - which was about the only movement he could make at the moment - in an attempt to shield his eyes from the sun, and tried opening them again, with a little more caution this time. His eyelids felt as crusted up and raw as the rest of him, in fact his right eye didn’t want to open at all, but this time the pain in his head was more manageable, and he could focus his one-eyed gaze on his surroundings a little more.
His surroundings being his outstretched arm, a rough rope bound tight around his wrist and attached to a large rusty iron spike, and beyond that, exactly what Dean had feared would be the case - an isolated sand-filled and rocky landscape of various shades of red, purple and yellow that in any other circumstances would have been beautiful in its desolation. The fact that his skin was already a delicate shade of puce-red that matched some of those pretty rocks was a bit of a dampener on his appreciation of the view, especially when he turned his head again, very gingerly, to take in the rest of his body.
Oh man, he really hoped that sun burning his family jewels didn’t impair their performance…Holy crap! Maybe it would make his nuts shrivel and drop off…
When the shadow fell over his face, his first reaction was one of relief that something was cutting out the sun’s burning rays. It was a very short-lived emotion, quickly replaced by a chill that had nothing to with the touch of shade on his bare skin and everything to do with the thrill of fear that ran through him as he recognized his captor’s voice.
Really? Could this day get any worse? He was completely and utterly fucked.
“Hello, Dean,” Lucifer said.
**-**-**
Dean tried to think of something to say but his concussed brain was too jumbled up and by the time he had a necklace of words strung together in something resembling a sentence, Lucifer was talking again.
“The demons I tasked with bringing you here were a little over enthusiastic, I think. I wanted you secured, not barbecued. I suppose they were caught between fear of failure and fear of you, though really the latter is giving you far too much credit, from what I’ve seen.”
“So how about you cut me loose, then,” Dean said, his voice catching in his throat like brambles. He wouldn’t have been surprised to find his mouth full of blood, but sadly, there wasn’t even that much moisture to be had. Then Lucifer, that smug son of a bitch, decided to take a stroll around Dean’s compass points, depriving Dean of the scant comfort of his shadow. Dean could feel his skin starting to blister.
“Set you free? I don’t think so, Dean. You are my bargaining chip. You are the lever that will allow me to move Sam’s world. What would your brother sacrifice for you, Dean? What would you sacrifice for him? No, don’t answer that one, we already know the answer.”
Lucifer’s voice was coming from near Dean’s feet, and he strained his neck to lift his head up enough to keep an eye on the bastard. He couldn’t remember a thing about how he’d gotten here. The last memory he had was of a late night beer-run to a Gas n Sip, so he guessed he must have been bushwhacked somewhere between the petrol station and the motel. Man, he’d kill for just one of those cold beers right now. He couldn’t help a flinch when Lucifer kicked contemptuously at one of Dean’s swollen ankles.
“Hey! Watch the goods,” Dean croaked.
“Honestly, I don’t understand what my brother sees in you. At least Sam has been well prepared to be my vessel. He is a fine physical specimen. You on the other hand…? Pathetic. Worthless. Broken.”
Lucifer punctuated each slur with a vicious kick as he circled round Dean, which was just great. A pretty crappy situation made worse by the biggest douchebag this side of Heaven or Hell adding injury to insult. Dean winced when the toe of Lucifer’s shoe connected with his ribs, and he distinctly felt something crack. Yeah, he was broken all right.
“It won’t work, you know,” Dean said, trying to keeping his tone conversational. Lucifer paused his pacing to rest one foot on Dean’s left wrist, just below the rope burns. Dean was barely aware of the discomfort, he was so grateful that Lucifer’s position had brought him full circle, putting Dean in his shadow once again. It also meant Dean couldn’t see Lucifer’s face, which was a mixed blessing - good because the vessel’s decay was an ugly thing to see, but bad because it meant Dean had nothing to distract him from the memory of the Devil wearing Sam’s face.
“Sam won’t say yes to save me,” Dean continued, spurred on by the horror of that mental picture. “You have the wrong bait.”
He couldn’t help a grunt of pain as Lucifer put his weight on the foot pinning his wrist to the floor, grinding the bone into the stone. Shit. If Lucifer kept that up, Dean’s wrist was going to snap just like his ribs.
“You said it yourself. I’m worthless. Sam thinks I’m weak.” Dean said through gritted teeth. He kept on talking, even though his mouth was so dry it could rival Death Valley for lack of moisture; even though he was riling up the Devil - because that was kind of the point. His brain might be parboiled mush, but even while Lucifer had been doing his B movie villain impression, a couple of thoughts had been sparking into life in there.
The first thought was - if Dean were to die, Michael would lose his ‘perfect’ vessel. That had to have some impact on the whole Last Battle scenario, right? The second was more immediate. If Dean died here and now, there would be no way for Lucifer to pressure Sam into giving in. No Dean, no lever. A dead hostage was of no use to anyone. Apart from which, goading Lucifer was satisfying. Better than lying around brooding about a rescue that could never happen.
“I’m the brother who fell, just like you. You are right, I’m a failure, a disappointment to my dad and to my brother, and I guess you know exactly how that feels, having been there yourself…”
Dean tensed, waiting for Lucifer to lose it and lay into him for real this time, but the expected blow never came. Instead, Lucifer laughed, making Dean shiver again in spite of the heat.
“I see what you are trying to do, Dean. It won’t work.” Lucifer crouched down close to Dean’s head, and it was only the fact Dean was tied down that kept him from running away screaming from the touch of sheer madness staring out of those cold blue eyes. As it was, the ropes and a certain Winchester stubbornness that Bobby would probably have called a death wish held Dean in place.
“I’m going to keep you alive until Sam says yes, and he will say yes, don’t worry about that.” Lucifer reached out a hand and touched Dean’s forehead. There was a sharp, more focused burning sensation, and Dean found that he could open his right eye. The son of a bitch must have done some sort of healing mojo on his head injury, though whatever it was hadn’t alleviated the headache any. It stood to reason that a fallen angel, even one as powerful as the Devil himself, wouldn’t have the kind of grace that mended things that well.
Dean did try to turn his head away when Lucifer started pouring water down his throat, but he was weak as a kitten, and couldn’t resist when Lucifer grabbed his chin and forced his mouth open. His thirst was so overwhelming he couldn’t have stopped swallowing after the first taste of the nourishing cool drops, however much he wanted to.
“There. That should be sufficient to keep you alive until I have my little chat with Sam tonight. It is most inconvenient, having to wait until my vessel sleeps in order to converse, but those symbols my meddling little brother carved into you both are far too effective at hiding you. Thankfully, they also mean no one will find you here, so I can leave to attend to more important business. I have an army to train, after all.”
Lucifer rose to his feet and Dean had to squeeze his eyes shut against the miniature tornado of dust that was stirred up when the Devil disappeared.
God fucking damn it to hell.
Dean spent the next few minutes, hours, whatever, straining and straining at the ropes around his wrists and ankles, achieving nothing except making the ropes slippery with his blood. There was no give in the metal stakes; they wouldn’t budge even a fraction, however hard he tried. Whoever had trussed him up and laid him out like lunch had done as good a job as a Winchester.
Time passed. Or didn’t. Dean couldn’t be sure. The sun was there, burning, burning - it never seemed to move. It wasn’t until the big ass vulture turned up that Dean realized how monumentally stupid he’d been. This wasn’t Arizona, of course it wasn’t. How he could have ever thought he’d gotten out of Hell, he had no idea. What an insane illusion that had been - rescued by angels and somehow important to the fate of the world. Madness and delusion, the very substance of the Pit.
He watched with resignation as the blind, white-eyed bird mantled its dark wings over him and bent its ugly wattled neck to tear into his side. Alastair had always liked to take different forms when torturing Dean.
He lost count of how many times Alastair tore his tender flesh open to eat his liver or his lungs before flying off to let him heal. After a while his eyes were so crusted up with tears and his lids so burnt by the ever-present sun, he could no longer see the vulture when it returned, only feel its savage beak and wicked claws as they excavated between his ribs. Dean floated in a sea of pain. It felt familiar, deserved. Cracked and bleeding lips stretched into a half smile.
He knew he was delirious when he heard Sam’s voice. Obviously, he ignored it, even when he felt cool hands - large hands, just like Sam’s - touching him gently, much too gentle and soothing to be real.
“Dean. Oh god, Dean, what have they done to you? Shit, Cas, can you…?”
“I cannot heal him fully, Sam, no. I am not strong enough, being cut off from Heaven. Let me take you both somewhere safe and then I can perhaps relieve some of the pain, and help with the worst of these burns.”
Cas. Castiel. Another voice that he knew… no, no, no… not possible because angels didn’t exist, right? Dean knew that. Neither Sam nor angels belonged in Hell, therefore they couldn’t be here.
Wait, Sam. There was something important about Sam being here. Something deadly and dangerous and wrong. Adrenaline surged through him and he began to struggle against the grip of the new hands touching his raw flesh. He was sure he would disintegrate if they moved him; he was held together by sinew and nothing else, his muscles stripped like meat from his bones, his skin in tatters.
“Sssss…” Dean couldn’t open his mouth, couldn’t speak through the desert dryness and the iron taste of his own blood. His eyelids were gummed together so tight they could have been super-glued. His whole body was one writhing mass of agony and he couldn’t even scream. Because if Sam was really here, he must have said yes and though Dean couldn’t remember why that was a bad thing, he knew this was something that should never have happened, something that couldn’t be allowed. And it was his fault.
“No, y’can’t be here. Did you say it? S..Sammy? Did he make you say yes, for me?” Dean didn’t know if he was making sense, if any of the words that were dripping from his burned lips like acid were being understood.
“Dean, please relax and let us help you. I haven’t said yes, I’ll never say it. Do you understand?”
“Then how’d you find me? How’re you here? You shouldn’t have come to Hell for me, m’not worth it.”
“Sam persuaded a demon to tell us where you were, Dean. No bargains were made, no souls jeopardized, Sam is still hidden from Lucifer.” Castiel said, but Dean didn’t - couldn’t - believe him.
“Dean, you are not in Hell, please stop fighting me!” Sam’s voice was pleading, wrecked, and any other time Dean would have listened when his little brother was clearly hurting, but he couldn’t breathe and he couldn’t see and…
And then something was pressing on his forehead and a peaceful blackness overtook him.
**-**-**
Whispering woke him. Low voices somewhere in his vicinity, trying to be considerate and leave him undisturbed. That was his first clue that this probably wasn’t Hell. It really didn’t smell like Hell either, nor did it smell much like a hospital, which might have been his second guess. The air was scented with wood smoke and ancient tobacco, musty carpet and take-out food cartons. There was an open door or window, because a cool damp breeze caressed his cheek, carrying the scent of resin, leaves and rain. Not a desert either then. That was encouraging.
The voices fell silent and Dean waited for something to happen. He felt very tired but kind of floaty, like he was made of feathers. His skin was tight and sore but no more than that, and his headache had disappeared, vanished along with the ropes that had bound him and the hard rock underneath him. Instead his back was cradled in something soft that smelled like Sam. His chest hurt when he took a deep breath, but broken ribs were a familiar experience, nothing to worry about. His internal organs felt intact and where they should be, his limbs articulated and his pain hummed at a manageable level. He sneaked a hand down between his legs to cup his junk. Tender, but all present and correct, yessir. Incapable of saluting right now, but he was fairly confident that his dick would be back on parade as soon as the rest of Dean healed.
There was a faint rustling that Dean identified as the rub of denim on denim, and the displacement of air that told him someone had sat down next to his bed, couch, whatever. He could feel a comforting gentle heat radiating from the seated person, warming the back of his hand where it lay by his side.
Sam, he thought. Kid always ran so hot.
Finally feeling that he would be safe here from any number of liver-eating, blind vultures and insane Devils, Dean opened his eyes.
A/N title from Percy Byche Shelley’s Ozymandias