What Lies Beneath, for lennelle
Title: What Lies Beneath
Recipient: lennelle
Rating: PG13
Warnings: None
Word Count: 2400+
Author's Note: A massive thank you to my wonderful beta - you know who you are! I've tinkered so all mistakes are mine. lennelle, your prompts were all so tempting, and I hope you enjoy this fic. Thank you also to all the mods for hosting one of my favourite challenges.
Summary: When a hunt opens barely healed wounds, Sam and Dean find themselves sharing secrets, and ultimately, growing closer as brothers. Set late season one and featuring hurt!boys.
What Lies Beneath
It's late, the sun having fallen into the seascape horizon hours before. They're gazing up at the stars and constellations that twinkle like nightlights in the inky sky above them, when Jess loops her arm through his, hugging it close, her hair wild as the wind tosses her blonde curls.
A shooting star blazes across the night sky before disappearing like a snuffed out candle. Jess tugs his arm. “Did you make a wish?”
Sam curls lips into a soft smile. “You know I can't tell you that.”
Jess nudges his shoulder, and rolls her eyes at his teasing tone. “So you did! I bet you wished to ace the LSATs next week, right?”
“Nice try, hotshot!” Sam pulls her closer to his hip, the cool night air biting through his thin blue jacket. “But you're not even close.”
Jess huffs, resting her head on his shoulder, the sound of the waves crashing onto the sandy beach like a soothing lullaby.
Her blonde hair is fanned out, the gentle lap of the water on the stony beach pulling her curls straight and making it look longer than Sam remembers. Her head is turned to the side, lake water filling her mouth and covering one of her still-open blue eyes.
The bronze bullet wounds are still seeping blood down her white nightgown, pooling over the pebbles and tingeing the water a rusty-red. Her bare feet are blue from the cold, and her toe-nails are painted a familiar shade of dusty pink.
Sam's trying to focus on holding the flashlight steady for Dean, who's struggling to keep his footing on the slippery stones while covering her body with a moth-eaten army blanket from the trunk in the impala. But every time he blinks he still sees her lifeless face, and the way her blue eyes blame him for everything.
The flashlight is offering the only light they're going to get tonight; the moon hidden underneath an unforgiving blanket of thick cloud that's spitting a light drizzle. Not that it really matters, Sam's soaking wet anyway, his jeans and sneakers sodden, the flashlight bobbing as his body shivers from the cold.
Somewhere in the distance Sam can hear the gentle lap of the rolling waves against the pebbled beech, but he can still her words, crystal clear, as if she was still alive and whispering in his ear; “I forgive you Sam, for all of it, and now we can be together again. Just you and me. All you have to do is take my hand.”
He hadn't realised he was waist-deep in the lake until Dean shot her in the chest, her eyes full of hurt and betrayal all over again.
He startles when Dean cracks an ice pack, the sound like buckshot, so loud in all this silence.
Dean's standing next to him, his brow furrowed as he throws concerned glances down at Sam. And shit, maybe he has a right to; apparently Dean made it all the way over here, dumped the duffel by Sam's feet, and then rummaged around for the med kit, and Sam didn't notice any of it, still stuck in some sort of trance over what just happened.
“We've only got one, so put this on your ribs or your knee. Whichever's worse.”
Sam takes the ice pack, and tucks it underneath his jacket and shirt, over his ribs. Dean's first shot had missed her heart, but it pissed her off, somehow breaking her spell on Sam, and he was charging towards her when she'd tossed them both further down the beach. Sam landed hard on his side, his knee twisting painfully in the wrong direction.
“They need wrapping?” Dean asks, pulling out a handkerchief from his pocket and pressing it against his cheek, soaking up the blood that's trickling down his neck and staining the collar of his shirt. He sits down heavily next to Sam, his boots sinking into rounded pebbles of the beach, biting back a groan as his battered body objects to the movement.
“I'm fine.” Truth is Sam's not feeling much of anything right now, so it's not even a lie.
Sam turns to look at Dean, and then pries away the handkerchief, eyes straining to see the wound clearly in the dim light without blinding Dean with a flashlight to the face. “We still got some of that surgical glue?”
Dean pushes Sam's hands away and presses the handkerchief back to his face, his eyes big and bright even in this crap light. “It can wait.” He's staring, and the power of it is making Sam's stomach roll.
“I've got this, Sam.” Dean's tone is gentle but it's an order, and somewhere in there is their Dad's voice telling him to get in line and stop asking so many damn questions. “I'll take care of it.”
Sam tears his gaze away from his brother and stares out over the still lake and the tall trees that surround the water's edge; huddling together like they're protecting them from the world. It feels like Sam could scream at the top of lungs and no one would hear him. Maybe not even Dean.
“I can't let you do that.” He's still holding the flashlight, but the beam has dropped to his feet. It feels safer in the dark, like Dean won't be able to see right through him.
In the darkness, he doesn't have to look at... her. It still hurts--an icy grip on his heart--even though the spell is broken now and he knows it was never Jess. Dean had killed a kelpie. It wasn't a mythical water horse like the kelpies sketched in Dad's journal, but Celtic lore said these shifters could appear human as well. This one had been feeding off a little village, taking the form of deceased loved ones, and luring the grieving victims to their watery graves. In hindsight, that really should have been a warning sign. After interviewing the family of the latest victim, they'd headed straight to the lake, and had split up so they could cover more ground. When Sam saw Jess standing ankle deep in the water, the wind billowing her white nightgown, and her long blonde hair dancing in the breeze, the case and the kelpie were long forgotten.
“You need to take a step away from this.” Dean removes the handkerchief, his fingertips tentatively touching the wound to check if it's stopped bleeding. “Just wait for me in the car, and then when I'm done we'll take off; back to the motel or outta town, wherever the hell you wanna go.”
“No, I have to stay and finish this.”
Dean shakes his head, a sign escaping from his split lip, his gaze pinned to Sam's face. “Actually, Sam, you don't. You don't have to watch this happen again. Hell, I don't want you to, OK?”
But Sam watches Jess burn most nights anyway, and maybe seeing this hunt through to the end will make a difference, maybe it'll help in some twisted way, like some kind of closure.
“You've gotta give yourself some time. You're still grieving, and you're still having those nightmares.” Dean's words are softer now, but his concern is still loud and clear. “It's bad enough that this thing made itself look like Jess and tried to kill you. But salt and burning that body isn't going to make this any easier. It's just not.”
Sam looks further out over the water to where there's just darkness; no trees, no sky, just black. “I know you don't understand this, but I have to see this through to the end. I can't explain it. It's just something that I have to do.”
Sam's not even looking at his brother, but he can feel the heat of his stare warm his face. He knows this sounds crazy, but he doesn't want to keep running away from Jess and how she died, and now whether he wants it to or not, this hunt is part of his memory of her. He has to let this go.
“The stuff it said to you at the end; you know it's not true, right?”
“Isn't it?” Sam adjusts the ice pack on his ribs, trying not to grimace. After Dean's first shot missed its mark and she'd thrown them both further down the beach, she hurled a tirade at Sam, bitterness twisting her familiar features.
“If I'd told Jess the whole truth about what we do, about hunting and how we grew up, about the dreams I was having about her dying, then maybe things would be different. Maybe she'd still be alive.”
Dean shakes his head. “You'll never know that; not for sure. Besides, you can't think like that, Sam. That kinda stuff will drive you crazy.”
Dean picks up a stone from the beach and runs his fingers over the eroded smooth surface. “I overheard Dad talk about it once with Bobby back when we were kids; about what if he wasn't asleep when that thing came for Mom, and what if he'd been able to get to her sooner.”
Sam looks over his shoulder at his brother. “You did? What did he say?”
“Bobby told him that it didn't matter. That what's done is done, and you can't change the past. That he had to remember what he had, not what he'd lost.” Dean huffs, and then throws the stone towards the water, the darkness swallowing it whole; a distant splash sounding a second later. “It's funny, the stuff you remember.”
It's only been nine months, but Sam can't help but wonder about all the things he's already forgetting about Jess. “It was weird; seeing her again. I knew it wasn't really her, but I just couldn't stop looking, and then-” Sam takes a deep breath. “I believed what she was saying, and I let her distract me and I shouldn't have. If you hadn't been there-”
“But I was, and it could have easily been me, and you would have been there to shoot it, just like I did. We have each other's back. That's what we do. That's what family's for.” Dean knocks his shoulder into Sam, and they both hiss in pain. They break out into laughter, which hurts Sam's ribs, but he just can't stop.
Their panting breaths hang in clouds in the cool night air, and then Dean's pulling himself to his feet, offering his hand to Sam. “This chick flick about over? Because you've used up your lifetime quota.”
Sam huffs, reaching for Dean's hand. It hurts to move, a flash of heat in his ribs, and his knee protesting against the weight of his body, but he straightens himself to his full height; well as much as he can, anyway. He has to show Dean that he can do this, and maybe he even has to prove it to himself too.
Dean claps a heavy hand on his shoulder, the warmth of his support heating Sam up from within. They stare at each other for a second, and Sam hears every word that Dean doesn't need to say. It feels good, like how it used to before he left for Stanford; another missing piece of their brotherhood slotting back together.
Dean reaches for the duffel, hands pulling out a can of gas and a book of matches from some motel they must have stayed in.
Sam takes the first step towards the body, Dean following closely behind him, and just knowing that he's there gives Sam a wave of strength and support. Sam's sneakers slide on the water-slicked stones, his knee tight and swollen under his damp jeans.
Once they're standing over the body, the flashlight highlights blonde hair reaching out from underneath the blanket, the water still combing threw it like she's still alive, and suddenly Sam's not sure he can do this, bile pooling in his gut. But then Dean's pouring the gas onto the woolen blanket, his nostrils filling with the fumes of all the time he's done this before, and he has to remind himself that this is no different. The body on this beach is not his Jess. It's not even human.
Time slides, his head filling with memories of Jess; listening to her talk excitedly about her art history class while wandering around campus drinking coffee and holding hands, Jess sorting through all their mugs and plates as they unpacked all their stuff into their new apartment, and the time they star-gazed on the beach.
Dean's nudges his arm and passes him a book of matches. “What you had with Jess at Stanford, that's real and you should hold onto that. But all this crap today, it's just a bump in the road, Sammy. Don't let it take away what you two had together.”
Sam nods, and lets himself remember the way Jess would sometimes snort when she was in fits of laughter, how she could break down complicated theories and problems into easy to understand sections, how she could out-play Sam at pool, and tell the dirtiest jokes he's ever heard.
Dean was right; Jess was way out of his league. “She was...You'd have liked her.”
“Yeah,” Dean says, flicking his gaze over his shoulder at Sam. “I would have.”
Sam strikes the matches, watching the flame slowly spread down towards his fingers, only letting go when his fingertips start to burn. He tosses the book onto the gas-soaked blanket and it ignites immediately, the roaring flames reaching high into the starless sky.
They stand there for a long time, side by side, shoulder to shoulder, not saying a word, until the ashes are tossed into the gentle breeze, and there's nothing left on the pebbled beach but two brothers and their memories of a girl they once knew.
Sam kisses her forehead, her hair tickling his face as it dances wildly in the wind. He digs his bare toes into the damp sand, wondering what he did to deserve this girl.
Jess nuzzles closer to him, pushing her cold hands into the pocket of his jacket as she looks up at him. “What did you really wish for?”
Sam leans forwards and kisses her, her lips sea-salt soft. “I think maybe my wish already came true.”
Jess smiles, her cheeks rosy-red from the wind. She rests her head on his shoulder, the stars still lighting up the sky like fireworks. “I'm going to remember this moment forever.”
Sam pulls her closer, his arm wrapped tightly around her, like he's never going to let her go. “Me too.”
The End
Recipient: lennelle
Rating: PG13
Warnings: None
Word Count: 2400+
Author's Note: A massive thank you to my wonderful beta - you know who you are! I've tinkered so all mistakes are mine. lennelle, your prompts were all so tempting, and I hope you enjoy this fic. Thank you also to all the mods for hosting one of my favourite challenges.
Summary: When a hunt opens barely healed wounds, Sam and Dean find themselves sharing secrets, and ultimately, growing closer as brothers. Set late season one and featuring hurt!boys.
What Lies Beneath
It's late, the sun having fallen into the seascape horizon hours before. They're gazing up at the stars and constellations that twinkle like nightlights in the inky sky above them, when Jess loops her arm through his, hugging it close, her hair wild as the wind tosses her blonde curls.
A shooting star blazes across the night sky before disappearing like a snuffed out candle. Jess tugs his arm. “Did you make a wish?”
Sam curls lips into a soft smile. “You know I can't tell you that.”
Jess nudges his shoulder, and rolls her eyes at his teasing tone. “So you did! I bet you wished to ace the LSATs next week, right?”
“Nice try, hotshot!” Sam pulls her closer to his hip, the cool night air biting through his thin blue jacket. “But you're not even close.”
Jess huffs, resting her head on his shoulder, the sound of the waves crashing onto the sandy beach like a soothing lullaby.
Her blonde hair is fanned out, the gentle lap of the water on the stony beach pulling her curls straight and making it look longer than Sam remembers. Her head is turned to the side, lake water filling her mouth and covering one of her still-open blue eyes.
The bronze bullet wounds are still seeping blood down her white nightgown, pooling over the pebbles and tingeing the water a rusty-red. Her bare feet are blue from the cold, and her toe-nails are painted a familiar shade of dusty pink.
Sam's trying to focus on holding the flashlight steady for Dean, who's struggling to keep his footing on the slippery stones while covering her body with a moth-eaten army blanket from the trunk in the impala. But every time he blinks he still sees her lifeless face, and the way her blue eyes blame him for everything.
The flashlight is offering the only light they're going to get tonight; the moon hidden underneath an unforgiving blanket of thick cloud that's spitting a light drizzle. Not that it really matters, Sam's soaking wet anyway, his jeans and sneakers sodden, the flashlight bobbing as his body shivers from the cold.
Somewhere in the distance Sam can hear the gentle lap of the rolling waves against the pebbled beech, but he can still her words, crystal clear, as if she was still alive and whispering in his ear; “I forgive you Sam, for all of it, and now we can be together again. Just you and me. All you have to do is take my hand.”
He hadn't realised he was waist-deep in the lake until Dean shot her in the chest, her eyes full of hurt and betrayal all over again.
He startles when Dean cracks an ice pack, the sound like buckshot, so loud in all this silence.
Dean's standing next to him, his brow furrowed as he throws concerned glances down at Sam. And shit, maybe he has a right to; apparently Dean made it all the way over here, dumped the duffel by Sam's feet, and then rummaged around for the med kit, and Sam didn't notice any of it, still stuck in some sort of trance over what just happened.
“We've only got one, so put this on your ribs or your knee. Whichever's worse.”
Sam takes the ice pack, and tucks it underneath his jacket and shirt, over his ribs. Dean's first shot had missed her heart, but it pissed her off, somehow breaking her spell on Sam, and he was charging towards her when she'd tossed them both further down the beach. Sam landed hard on his side, his knee twisting painfully in the wrong direction.
“They need wrapping?” Dean asks, pulling out a handkerchief from his pocket and pressing it against his cheek, soaking up the blood that's trickling down his neck and staining the collar of his shirt. He sits down heavily next to Sam, his boots sinking into rounded pebbles of the beach, biting back a groan as his battered body objects to the movement.
“I'm fine.” Truth is Sam's not feeling much of anything right now, so it's not even a lie.
Sam turns to look at Dean, and then pries away the handkerchief, eyes straining to see the wound clearly in the dim light without blinding Dean with a flashlight to the face. “We still got some of that surgical glue?”
Dean pushes Sam's hands away and presses the handkerchief back to his face, his eyes big and bright even in this crap light. “It can wait.” He's staring, and the power of it is making Sam's stomach roll.
“I've got this, Sam.” Dean's tone is gentle but it's an order, and somewhere in there is their Dad's voice telling him to get in line and stop asking so many damn questions. “I'll take care of it.”
Sam tears his gaze away from his brother and stares out over the still lake and the tall trees that surround the water's edge; huddling together like they're protecting them from the world. It feels like Sam could scream at the top of lungs and no one would hear him. Maybe not even Dean.
“I can't let you do that.” He's still holding the flashlight, but the beam has dropped to his feet. It feels safer in the dark, like Dean won't be able to see right through him.
In the darkness, he doesn't have to look at... her. It still hurts--an icy grip on his heart--even though the spell is broken now and he knows it was never Jess. Dean had killed a kelpie. It wasn't a mythical water horse like the kelpies sketched in Dad's journal, but Celtic lore said these shifters could appear human as well. This one had been feeding off a little village, taking the form of deceased loved ones, and luring the grieving victims to their watery graves. In hindsight, that really should have been a warning sign. After interviewing the family of the latest victim, they'd headed straight to the lake, and had split up so they could cover more ground. When Sam saw Jess standing ankle deep in the water, the wind billowing her white nightgown, and her long blonde hair dancing in the breeze, the case and the kelpie were long forgotten.
“You need to take a step away from this.” Dean removes the handkerchief, his fingertips tentatively touching the wound to check if it's stopped bleeding. “Just wait for me in the car, and then when I'm done we'll take off; back to the motel or outta town, wherever the hell you wanna go.”
“No, I have to stay and finish this.”
Dean shakes his head, a sign escaping from his split lip, his gaze pinned to Sam's face. “Actually, Sam, you don't. You don't have to watch this happen again. Hell, I don't want you to, OK?”
But Sam watches Jess burn most nights anyway, and maybe seeing this hunt through to the end will make a difference, maybe it'll help in some twisted way, like some kind of closure.
“You've gotta give yourself some time. You're still grieving, and you're still having those nightmares.” Dean's words are softer now, but his concern is still loud and clear. “It's bad enough that this thing made itself look like Jess and tried to kill you. But salt and burning that body isn't going to make this any easier. It's just not.”
Sam looks further out over the water to where there's just darkness; no trees, no sky, just black. “I know you don't understand this, but I have to see this through to the end. I can't explain it. It's just something that I have to do.”
Sam's not even looking at his brother, but he can feel the heat of his stare warm his face. He knows this sounds crazy, but he doesn't want to keep running away from Jess and how she died, and now whether he wants it to or not, this hunt is part of his memory of her. He has to let this go.
“The stuff it said to you at the end; you know it's not true, right?”
“Isn't it?” Sam adjusts the ice pack on his ribs, trying not to grimace. After Dean's first shot missed its mark and she'd thrown them both further down the beach, she hurled a tirade at Sam, bitterness twisting her familiar features.
“If I'd told Jess the whole truth about what we do, about hunting and how we grew up, about the dreams I was having about her dying, then maybe things would be different. Maybe she'd still be alive.”
Dean shakes his head. “You'll never know that; not for sure. Besides, you can't think like that, Sam. That kinda stuff will drive you crazy.”
Dean picks up a stone from the beach and runs his fingers over the eroded smooth surface. “I overheard Dad talk about it once with Bobby back when we were kids; about what if he wasn't asleep when that thing came for Mom, and what if he'd been able to get to her sooner.”
Sam looks over his shoulder at his brother. “You did? What did he say?”
“Bobby told him that it didn't matter. That what's done is done, and you can't change the past. That he had to remember what he had, not what he'd lost.” Dean huffs, and then throws the stone towards the water, the darkness swallowing it whole; a distant splash sounding a second later. “It's funny, the stuff you remember.”
It's only been nine months, but Sam can't help but wonder about all the things he's already forgetting about Jess. “It was weird; seeing her again. I knew it wasn't really her, but I just couldn't stop looking, and then-” Sam takes a deep breath. “I believed what she was saying, and I let her distract me and I shouldn't have. If you hadn't been there-”
“But I was, and it could have easily been me, and you would have been there to shoot it, just like I did. We have each other's back. That's what we do. That's what family's for.” Dean knocks his shoulder into Sam, and they both hiss in pain. They break out into laughter, which hurts Sam's ribs, but he just can't stop.
Their panting breaths hang in clouds in the cool night air, and then Dean's pulling himself to his feet, offering his hand to Sam. “This chick flick about over? Because you've used up your lifetime quota.”
Sam huffs, reaching for Dean's hand. It hurts to move, a flash of heat in his ribs, and his knee protesting against the weight of his body, but he straightens himself to his full height; well as much as he can, anyway. He has to show Dean that he can do this, and maybe he even has to prove it to himself too.
Dean claps a heavy hand on his shoulder, the warmth of his support heating Sam up from within. They stare at each other for a second, and Sam hears every word that Dean doesn't need to say. It feels good, like how it used to before he left for Stanford; another missing piece of their brotherhood slotting back together.
Dean reaches for the duffel, hands pulling out a can of gas and a book of matches from some motel they must have stayed in.
Sam takes the first step towards the body, Dean following closely behind him, and just knowing that he's there gives Sam a wave of strength and support. Sam's sneakers slide on the water-slicked stones, his knee tight and swollen under his damp jeans.
Once they're standing over the body, the flashlight highlights blonde hair reaching out from underneath the blanket, the water still combing threw it like she's still alive, and suddenly Sam's not sure he can do this, bile pooling in his gut. But then Dean's pouring the gas onto the woolen blanket, his nostrils filling with the fumes of all the time he's done this before, and he has to remind himself that this is no different. The body on this beach is not his Jess. It's not even human.
Time slides, his head filling with memories of Jess; listening to her talk excitedly about her art history class while wandering around campus drinking coffee and holding hands, Jess sorting through all their mugs and plates as they unpacked all their stuff into their new apartment, and the time they star-gazed on the beach.
Dean's nudges his arm and passes him a book of matches. “What you had with Jess at Stanford, that's real and you should hold onto that. But all this crap today, it's just a bump in the road, Sammy. Don't let it take away what you two had together.”
Sam nods, and lets himself remember the way Jess would sometimes snort when she was in fits of laughter, how she could break down complicated theories and problems into easy to understand sections, how she could out-play Sam at pool, and tell the dirtiest jokes he's ever heard.
Dean was right; Jess was way out of his league. “She was...You'd have liked her.”
“Yeah,” Dean says, flicking his gaze over his shoulder at Sam. “I would have.”
Sam strikes the matches, watching the flame slowly spread down towards his fingers, only letting go when his fingertips start to burn. He tosses the book onto the gas-soaked blanket and it ignites immediately, the roaring flames reaching high into the starless sky.
They stand there for a long time, side by side, shoulder to shoulder, not saying a word, until the ashes are tossed into the gentle breeze, and there's nothing left on the pebbled beach but two brothers and their memories of a girl they once knew.
Sam kisses her forehead, her hair tickling his face as it dances wildly in the wind. He digs his bare toes into the damp sand, wondering what he did to deserve this girl.
Jess nuzzles closer to him, pushing her cold hands into the pocket of his jacket as she looks up at him. “What did you really wish for?”
Sam leans forwards and kisses her, her lips sea-salt soft. “I think maybe my wish already came true.”
Jess smiles, her cheeks rosy-red from the wind. She rests her head on his shoulder, the stars still lighting up the sky like fireworks. “I'm going to remember this moment forever.”
Sam pulls her closer, his arm wrapped tightly around her, like he's never going to let her go. “Me too.”
The End