Fanfic - SPN: Plain Gold Band - Ch. 1 - The End
Title: Plain Gold Band [Evil!Sammy Universe]
Author: eboniorchid
Full Header for the Series
Chapter One: The End
[047.Grumpy]
Dean's breath whistled softly out from between his pursed lips as he surveyed the pale grass, grey-brown headstones, and monuments, dotted like giant chess pieces tossed out on the lawn. There weren't nearly enough trees here, he decided. Too much open space. Too much vulnerability. As many graveyards as he'd visited, he couldn't find them creepy in the exciting way that story-fed preteens with flashlights might find them, but, still, they were often like this one, too flat and with too little cover, a security liability. In fact, since they weren't digging anyone up or putting anyone in the ground, Dean would have felt ten times better if they could spend even less time here than they'd already spent, but- … He turned slightly, his gaze angling back towards his brother. Sam was busy.
His frame had grown or he'd grown into it, broader and taller and even deeper somehow, as if there was more of him packed into it and his body was a container one size too small. He inhabited space far beyond the boundaries of his skin and that space was full of shadows. It was a fitting state for a cemetery, maybe, but Sam had carried that weighted presence with him since Minnesota and it didn't seem likely to shake off any time soon, especially not after something like this.
There was a winter bouquet in Sam's hands, whites and evergreens pierced with reds from some greenhouse home, and the cotton stripe of his shirt shouldn't have been enough to keep the bite of chilled air from his skin. He clearly didn't care, though, and Dean could understand that. There were far heavier things on his mind. The dusty dark of his perpetually too-long, too-wild hair hung with his head and he stared down at the plaque set into the raised stone platform at his feet.
A hunt had taken them back to California, and Sam had asked, in a strained and quiet voice, if they could go by and 'see Jess', because 'she could probably use some new flowers or something' and it had been a while since he'd been by. So, that was where they were now, standing, cold, in a cemetery, in some too-normal suburb of San Francisco, putting fresh flowers on the grave of the woman that Sam had once planned to marry.
Dean looked away, trying to give his brother a respectable amount of room to honor the woman he'd thought he would spend the rest of his life with. Something ached in him when he thought about all of this, about Sam and Jessica, about Sam and him, about Sam. He couldn't name it, but he almost felt like he'd stolen something, like he had no right to be here instead of her, like everything would've been better if it was Sam's hand holding hers as they visited his grave or just tucked his amulet down into the dirt on Mom's spot back home like they'd done with Dad.
"I thought she was the one, you know?" Sam's voice broke through Dean's thoughts, framed with bitterness and some kind of anger, maybe at the Demon, maybe at himself. That strain of frustration fit somehow with how Dean was feeling, a sense of injustice lingering, dirtying the air.
It didn't quite seem like a question that Dean was supposed to answer, though, so he just gave a grunted 'hmpf' and continued looking everywhere but at his brother.
"But she wasn't. … She couldn't've been. … This never would've worked. … Not really. … Not with me being what I am." Sam didn't sound as broken as he once had, but his tone of resignation was not an improvement.
Dean sighed loudly, immediately frustrated, because they'd been over this already, too many times to count. "You're human, Sam. That's what you are. So … you can't know if it would've worked or not. And I'm sorry for that. But it doesn't have anything to do with what you are."
Sam left his graveside post, stomping around until he was in Dean's view and Dean grudgingly looked up. "Don't play dumb, Dean. You know the truth. Don't act like it's nothing, 'cause I know for a fact how hard you worked to keep it from me."
After a moment of breathing, Dean's gaze slid down and away, because they'd been over this too, but it always stung somehow. It always had the bite of a hidden accusation in tow, something that said 'liar' and 'guilty' and 'hurtful' and 'wrong'.
Sam scoffed, his arms flung wide in challenge. "Why did you even let me come?!"
Dean's eyebrows scrunched together, his words a little louder than necessary. "You said you wanted to. Flowers and all that."
"Not here! On the road with you … even knowing what I am. Shouldn't you be afraid of me? I mean … aren't you?"
"No, Sam! I shouldn't and I'm not. If it's even true, what dad said, then it's still only one part of you, some little piece of you that hardly even matters. It never mattered before we knew and it doesn't matter now."
"Really? You think so?" Sam was sputtering, fuming, incredulous. "Do you know how fast my powers have grown in the past year, man? … Frighteningly fast. … Know what that means? … That supposedly tiny little part of me is getting bigger and bigger every damn day."
Sam stepped right up in Dean's face and it was like his anger made his body into a furnace as he demanded Dean's full attention, snarling. "Big bro can't fix that one, can he?"
Sam stormed off to the car then and Dean turned to follow, the words echoing in his mind as he tried not to add up the many things he seemed to be so unable to fix. Dad and Sam were the biggest ones, but god there were more issues of every size that he just didn't seem to have answers for anymore and now he was even starting to question the problems he thought that he'd solved long ago, be they cases he'd done alone or just situations where he'd followed his gut. If he couldn't fix damn near anything now, how could he be sure that he'd ever really fixed anything at all? Maybe he'd just been kidding himself all along.
He pulled the car door open, almost yanking, but immediately regretted it as he heard his baby squeak at him, protesting his less than gentle treatment. He was just … off his game somehow. Sam kept throwing him off it.
In the car, though, Sam seemed remorseful, a bit more of the introspective guy that Dean remembered, staring out the passenger side window at the passing scenery, and Dean couldn't bring himself to turn on the radio, as if that would somehow break the spell. So, the words that Sam let slip into the silence carried that much more weight.
"You know … you're probably the only one who'd care enough to stick around … even knowing what you do."
Dean shook his head, brushing off the powder of Sam's emotion with a huff and a grumble. "Yeah, well, that's what brother's are for. Well, that … and occasionally teasing you about being a girl … which you are."
Dean could practically hear Sam rolling his eyes, but he saw the edge of his brother's lips lift in an almost smile and he blew out air, relieved, because Sam didn't seem to smile much at all these days, not happy smiles, at least. Sometimes his responses to things were so thin, a reaction to meet certain expectations and little else. His brooding was intense now, reminiscent of the months right after Jessica died and his eyes got too bright sometimes, the way they'd done right after Dad. It wasn't something Dean liked to think about much, but even if Sam was with him now, he'd left something back wherever he'd been, something he grieved for.
Dean brought his focus back to the road, continuing the short drive to the site of their hunt, but moments after they'd passed under the first highway sign stating the miles yet to Tiffany, Sam grunted, clutching his head.
"Sam? Sammy?" Dean's eyes blinked from the road to his brother to the shoulder of the road, prepared to slide the car over.
"Fuck. Vision." Sam's eyes squeezed shut and he rocked his head down into his lap.
Adding his own curses into the mix, Dean checked his mirrors. "I'm pulling over."
Sam's hand shot out, waving, even as he continued to curl in on himself. "Just drive, Dean. Almost there, alright? Just- … fuck."
Dean was wary about having his hands full and his attention needed elsewhere while Sam was shrinking down with pain, but he caught the sign for the Tiffany exit ramp and saw the ad for the Tyre Road Motel. So, he just nodded with a resolute "no problem," and shot more gas into the engine, speeding his way up the road and into the parking lot.
Almost running in to get keys to a room, he nearly throttled the clerk for his sluggishness before darting back to the car and helping Sam into the room.
"Ice," was the only thing Sam said when he crashed down onto the bed, body coiling up tight as he lay without even trying to take off his shoes or his jacket. Out Dean went to get ice from the machine at the far end of the lot, something tightening in his chest as he had to kick it twice before it put out enough to have something to take back. By the time he'd sprinted back to the room, full ice bucket in tow, Sam was sitting up and just rubbing his temples instead of clutching them like his brain was trying to run out on him.
"Sam?"
Sam looked up, eyes weary and haunted, but he didn't really say anything. He just reached for the bucket of ice, removed the lid, and pressed the top of his face into the pail, his hair spilling over the side.
"You want a towel?"
Sam's answering groan was enough and Dean went to grab a towel from the bathroom, tapping Sam's shoulder when he'd returned.
As Sam pulled up and started to fill the towel with ice, he slid out of his shoes and tugged his legs up onto the bed, scooting back until he was leaning against the headboard. "They're not supposed to hurt like that." It sounded as much a complaint as a statement of fact and Sam groaned again as he finally pressed the towel-held ice to his forehead and closed his eyes.
"Was it worse than usual?" Dean perched on the edge of the second bed, regarding his brother with concern. He figured that he already knew the answer from the sheer amount of body twisting Sam had done, but it seemed like an important question, regardless.
Sam sighed, not quite reluctant, but certainly resigned. "They haven't been hurting for a while." His eyes flicked open and his look pressed against Dean, heavy. "It was one of the … upgrades … or, I thought it was."
Dean nodded slowly, trying not to think too hard about all the power Sam said had been growing in him while they were apart. Visions without headaches, at least, sounded like a reasonably good idea. "Well … what'd you see?"
Sam's eyes slid away then, looking past him as if at something far away. "War. … Fire and blood and death and war."
Dean licked lips that were suddenly chapped. "What kind of war are we talking about here, Sam? There are wars going on all over."
"Humanity- …" Sam's voice was low and weighted, like it didn't want to move, didn't want to say the next words, but knew it had to. Then Dean blinked and Sam was looking directly into his eyes and yet still at something beyond. "Humanity … against the rest of us."
War or no, Dean's first reaction was about Sam. "You're not one of them, Sam."
Sam's eyes softened, sadder, then blinked back to something hard, his voice a little shaky. "That would be easier, wouldn't it? If I wasn't? Not so many questions to ask when you're Hunting?"
Dean shook his head, though, refusing to let the focus of the conversation shift in that direction. "This is not about Hunting, Sam. This is about you … and your visions, so … there's a war coming, okay, but what did you see? 'Cause I already know what side you're on. No sense wasting time debating that."
Sam looked at him for a long time, but Dean knew the strength of his conviction lay heavily in his eyes and eventually Sam's gaze shifted away. "Armageddon."
"Okay, but … that's kind of a given if demons are going to come out of the woodwork and try to destroy humanity. What did you see specifically … as in things that can help us win?"
Sam shrugged, taking in air then letting it out. "I didn't see anything specific, Dean, just- … fire … and blood … and death … and war. I mean- … there are faces, but I don't know them."
"Places? Names? Words? Sounds? Anything?"
"I don't know, Dean!" Sam huffed out the words, near exasperation, then he glanced upwards as if distracted, thinking. "Mountains maybe?" Then he shrugged again with a shake of his head. "I really don't know. I can never see enough to do anything with it."
Dean blinked twice, running back over those words in his mind as Sam scrubbed down his face with his hand. "You mean … you've had this vision before?"
Sam sighed heavily. He looked like he could use some sleep, but they really needed to talk this through first. "Yeah. When I got out- … of training- … for my job- … I got sick with it, saw it every day, almost all the time, for a week. I nearly thought I was losing my mind, but then … I stopped trying to figure it out so much as just let it say whatever it was trying to tell me and … it eased down, went away."
"So what was it trying to tell you?"
Sam swiveled his head a little, side to side, not quite a shake, and his eyebrows bent inwards. "Humanity loses, Dean."
"Well, how do we fix it?"
"We don't. We can't. It's not like my other visions. It's- … it's not a hint to follow. It's just a truth. I know the difference now."
"What do you mean?"
"Not all my visions are the same. It's like- … knowing the different sounds your car makes when there are different things wrong with it. Even though this hasn't happened yet, it has the same kind of certainty to it that I should have recognized when I saw that woman light herself on fire. Everything's already set in motion. It can't be stopped."
"So you're saying, this war's going to happen, humanity's going to lose, and there's nothing we can do about it?" Dean was confused, angry, but he didn't know at who exactly or what. It just kind of seemed like the universe was ganging up on them all the damn time.
Sam turned away from him, his head angled down as his voice threaded with a kind of apology. "Yeah, Dean. That's what I'm saying." He looked broken and lost for a moment, the lines of his face deepening with a kind of weariness that twenty-four year olds really shouldn't have.
It reminded Dean of the way he'd stared out the window when he'd first picked him up. "Is that why you called me, Sam? Is that why you don't care anymore? Because you think the fucking End is near?"
Sam's eyebrows knitted together, mouth setting into a hard line. "It is, Dean. I can feel it. I know it. And you would too, if you'd just open yourself up to everything that's going on out there."
"So … what? You just want me to sit around meditating with you while the world goes to Hell?"
"No. Of course not." Sam's tone settled into something rich and final. "We don't know when this is or where it happens or even who it happens to, exactly, so … we should just … keep Hunting. … Together."
Dean wasn't really good with thinking about endings or emotions, but he didn't miss that there was something revealing about how, even with all the issues they'd had lately, Sam still wanted them to be together whenever the end of the world came along. It was the kind of thing that should have been a given, and it had seemed that way for most of their lives, but when Sam had left for Stanford and again when he ran away all those months back, the idea of them being together at all, let alone during some guns-blazing end-of-the-world scenario, had become a total unknown. So, to have it set out in simple terms sort of … gave Dean pause … and made him want to change the subject as quickly as possible.
"Well." He coughed, not quite clearing his throat. "For the record, I don't believe we're going to lose, even if the war happens, but … I agree with you about the Hunting, so … let's just do our job and … keep our eyes open for any signs of a coming apocalypse, alright?" He managed to say it with half a smile, because, yeah, it might be true - more than might be, actually - but, come on, how often did he get to talk about Armageddon as a real thing that they needed to watch out for, in case it, ya know, popped up in the middle of a hunt or something.
Sam just shook his head with disbelief, then tilted it off to the side with a resigned smile. "I didn't expect that you'd believe me. It's okay. Everything seems to be under control for the moment anyway."
"It's not that I don't believe you, Sam. It's just- …" Dean shrugged, sighing. "You run away. You get answers that you don't like and won't tell me about. You have visions about the end of the world. You call me to come out hunting. And then … you spill all this stuff and tell me I can't do anything about it … as if I'm just supposed to swallow it down with my coffee."
Sam's jaw shifted as he nodded slowly. "Then … let's just pretend I never said anything." His eyes seemed to wash darkly with the tilt of his head, but there weren't any signs of the anger or hurt that he tended to wear like an ID bracelet everywhere he went. "Why don't we just … stick to the case?"
Dean could see Sam's neutrality for the mask that it was, subtle but present and unmoving, and, for a second, he wanted to ask Sam what was really going on in his head.
"What?" When Sam tossed away the wet towel and moved to sit across from Dean on the edge of his own bed, the word he dropped, nonchalant, held no veneer of confusion. He knew exactly 'what' and Dean thought he might want to know 'what' too, but a roiling in his stomach made him shut his mouth before he'd even opened it.
"Nothing." He shook his head and took a deep breath, before rubbing his hands together with a clap. "So … the case. Right." He got up and went for his bag, rifling through it to grab some printouts and his dad's journal before settling back on his bed again. "You think it's some kind of mind control?"
Sam's eyebrows gently stitched together. "Another mind control thing? I dunno, seems like a stretch to me."
"It doesn't to me." Dean passed an article to Sam, pointing at the stats for the frequency of suicides in the area. "People aren't just up and killing themselves for no good reason, Sam."
"Is there ever really a good reason to kill yourself?" The words were casual on Sam's tongue, almost flippant, but it didn't quite seem rhetorical.
Dean's thoughts paused mid-stream with Sam's question. "Are you actually asking me? Or is this some kind of philosophical-psychological bullshit you're throwing out there just to make me think or something?"
Sam seemed to consider the issue for a moment, but he dismissed it with a lift of one shoulder. "Mostly bullshit, but, ya know, if you have an answer … shoot."
Dean puzzled, not finding his brother funny enough to laugh, but still being unable to stop the soft puff of something that might have been a quiet snicker. "Right. Well, I don't, so …"
"Then how do you know this is supernatural? Maybe the poor town just attracts suicidal people."
"There are just too many people dying this way for this size of a town, Sam, and too close together. Sorry, but that stressful water story just isn't cutting it for me and neither is the suicide-magnet idea."
"It's more than that, though, isn't it?" Sam's tone was accusatory again, as if they hadn't just had what seemed like a minor brotherly breakthrough.
Dean shrugged. "I just laid out the reasons, Sam."
"But you've got a feeling, right? A kind of hunch? Like you get with most supernatural things?"
He knew where this was going and he didn't want to go there. "I dunno, Sam. Sometimes. But it doesn't matter. It's not like there's no evidence."
Sam's eyebrows folded inward just a little, not quite menacing, but curious and wary. "Do you feel that around me?"
"All I feel is that you're my annoying little brother, and that's what's important." He put a jovial hint of sarcasm in his voice as if a brotherly smack on the back should accompany his words.
Sam rolled his eyes, suddenly more cynical than anything else. "What did I tell you about lying to me, Dean? I'm not some chick you just met in a bar. Is it really that hard to be honest with me?"
Dean swallowed, then scratched his head, more sick than he'd like to be about being called a liar all the damn time. "Fine. Honestly? Sometimes, Sam. Yeah, I do, okay? Can we move on now?"
"In a minute. Can you tell me when? Like did the feeling get stronger when my vision came through?"
"Just- ... let it go."
"No. You might have a heightened sense of things sometimes, but you're also a Hunter. We might run into other Hunters. I need to know what tips you off, so I can protect myself."
Dean felt his face scrunch up, hesitating. It was weird, having this conversation, about Sam protecting himself from other Hunters as if he wasn't really part of that category of people and Dean was giving him some kind of insider Hunter info. It was only a moment, but it was enough to make Sam half-nod, something like a bitter smile curving under his nose.
"Unless you don't want me to know how to protect myself ... Hunter."
Sam's nostrils flared with the last word, and his tone seemed somewhat sharp, but Dean was tripping over the words in his mind, trying to phrase things in some way that didn't make him a target of more accusations.
"That's not- ..." His exhale was as audible as his frustration was tangible. Why did everything shift back into this oppositional shit? "Damnit, Sam! You know I'm not going to let anyone come after you and I'm not going to let you go out there with a sign on your chest!"
"Then tell me what gives you that feeling, so I won't do it."
Fuck.
When he thought about it, tried to parcel it down into digestible pieces, it started to seem like maybe he got that feeling from ... everything Sam did, just from Sam in general. He glanced off toward the blank television screen as if it could provide a diversion, but then returned his eyes to Sam, biting the corner of his lip.
"I don't know. Sometimes you ... carry yourself differently than I remember. Sometimes you ... give me this look ... like you want to break something ... maybe me." Dean's shoulders lifted a little, hitching then settling, and Sam's smile became a full-on smirk that sent a shiver down Dean's back, though he tried to play it off by shifting in his seat. "And sometimes you do ... that. But mostly ... I really don't know ... and that's the truth."
He turned up the intensity of his gaze then, hoping to put the subject to rest, for today at least, if not for good. "Can we work on the case now?"
Sam's smirk melted into a gentle smile, the hardness in his eyes replaced by something blank with just an edge of kindness. "Sure. I'm sorry." He ducked his head a little, looking up from under the flop of his hair. "I'll try not to freak you out so much. It's just- ..." A bit of the broken boy was back peeking through those eyes. "I just don't want to attract the wrong kind of attention, ya know?" Sam swallowed, blinking over the shine in his eyes. "I don't want to be ... another thing to Hunt on someone's list."
"Don't worry." Dean leaned towards his brother, his posture as strong as his words. "I won't let you be."
There was a long moment where Sam just held his eyes, wishing for something, and Dean nearly reached out for him, but Sam was already shaking it off with half a bitter laugh. "Thanks, but … I won't let myself be."
It felt like the words struck center in Dean's chest, not quite a punch, but it ached nonetheless. He couldn't find anything worth saying, though, so he just nodded and dropped his eyes, his attention turning, at least superficially, back to the case.
Prologue - One - Two - Three - Four - Five - Six - Seven - Eight - Epilogue
Author: eboniorchid
Full Header for the Series
Chapter One: The End
[047.Grumpy]
Dean's breath whistled softly out from between his pursed lips as he surveyed the pale grass, grey-brown headstones, and monuments, dotted like giant chess pieces tossed out on the lawn. There weren't nearly enough trees here, he decided. Too much open space. Too much vulnerability. As many graveyards as he'd visited, he couldn't find them creepy in the exciting way that story-fed preteens with flashlights might find them, but, still, they were often like this one, too flat and with too little cover, a security liability. In fact, since they weren't digging anyone up or putting anyone in the ground, Dean would have felt ten times better if they could spend even less time here than they'd already spent, but- … He turned slightly, his gaze angling back towards his brother. Sam was busy.
His frame had grown or he'd grown into it, broader and taller and even deeper somehow, as if there was more of him packed into it and his body was a container one size too small. He inhabited space far beyond the boundaries of his skin and that space was full of shadows. It was a fitting state for a cemetery, maybe, but Sam had carried that weighted presence with him since Minnesota and it didn't seem likely to shake off any time soon, especially not after something like this.
There was a winter bouquet in Sam's hands, whites and evergreens pierced with reds from some greenhouse home, and the cotton stripe of his shirt shouldn't have been enough to keep the bite of chilled air from his skin. He clearly didn't care, though, and Dean could understand that. There were far heavier things on his mind. The dusty dark of his perpetually too-long, too-wild hair hung with his head and he stared down at the plaque set into the raised stone platform at his feet.
A hunt had taken them back to California, and Sam had asked, in a strained and quiet voice, if they could go by and 'see Jess', because 'she could probably use some new flowers or something' and it had been a while since he'd been by. So, that was where they were now, standing, cold, in a cemetery, in some too-normal suburb of San Francisco, putting fresh flowers on the grave of the woman that Sam had once planned to marry.
Dean looked away, trying to give his brother a respectable amount of room to honor the woman he'd thought he would spend the rest of his life with. Something ached in him when he thought about all of this, about Sam and Jessica, about Sam and him, about Sam. He couldn't name it, but he almost felt like he'd stolen something, like he had no right to be here instead of her, like everything would've been better if it was Sam's hand holding hers as they visited his grave or just tucked his amulet down into the dirt on Mom's spot back home like they'd done with Dad.
"I thought she was the one, you know?" Sam's voice broke through Dean's thoughts, framed with bitterness and some kind of anger, maybe at the Demon, maybe at himself. That strain of frustration fit somehow with how Dean was feeling, a sense of injustice lingering, dirtying the air.
It didn't quite seem like a question that Dean was supposed to answer, though, so he just gave a grunted 'hmpf' and continued looking everywhere but at his brother.
"But she wasn't. … She couldn't've been. … This never would've worked. … Not really. … Not with me being what I am." Sam didn't sound as broken as he once had, but his tone of resignation was not an improvement.
Dean sighed loudly, immediately frustrated, because they'd been over this already, too many times to count. "You're human, Sam. That's what you are. So … you can't know if it would've worked or not. And I'm sorry for that. But it doesn't have anything to do with what you are."
Sam left his graveside post, stomping around until he was in Dean's view and Dean grudgingly looked up. "Don't play dumb, Dean. You know the truth. Don't act like it's nothing, 'cause I know for a fact how hard you worked to keep it from me."
After a moment of breathing, Dean's gaze slid down and away, because they'd been over this too, but it always stung somehow. It always had the bite of a hidden accusation in tow, something that said 'liar' and 'guilty' and 'hurtful' and 'wrong'.
Sam scoffed, his arms flung wide in challenge. "Why did you even let me come?!"
Dean's eyebrows scrunched together, his words a little louder than necessary. "You said you wanted to. Flowers and all that."
"Not here! On the road with you … even knowing what I am. Shouldn't you be afraid of me? I mean … aren't you?"
"No, Sam! I shouldn't and I'm not. If it's even true, what dad said, then it's still only one part of you, some little piece of you that hardly even matters. It never mattered before we knew and it doesn't matter now."
"Really? You think so?" Sam was sputtering, fuming, incredulous. "Do you know how fast my powers have grown in the past year, man? … Frighteningly fast. … Know what that means? … That supposedly tiny little part of me is getting bigger and bigger every damn day."
Sam stepped right up in Dean's face and it was like his anger made his body into a furnace as he demanded Dean's full attention, snarling. "Big bro can't fix that one, can he?"
Sam stormed off to the car then and Dean turned to follow, the words echoing in his mind as he tried not to add up the many things he seemed to be so unable to fix. Dad and Sam were the biggest ones, but god there were more issues of every size that he just didn't seem to have answers for anymore and now he was even starting to question the problems he thought that he'd solved long ago, be they cases he'd done alone or just situations where he'd followed his gut. If he couldn't fix damn near anything now, how could he be sure that he'd ever really fixed anything at all? Maybe he'd just been kidding himself all along.
He pulled the car door open, almost yanking, but immediately regretted it as he heard his baby squeak at him, protesting his less than gentle treatment. He was just … off his game somehow. Sam kept throwing him off it.
In the car, though, Sam seemed remorseful, a bit more of the introspective guy that Dean remembered, staring out the passenger side window at the passing scenery, and Dean couldn't bring himself to turn on the radio, as if that would somehow break the spell. So, the words that Sam let slip into the silence carried that much more weight.
"You know … you're probably the only one who'd care enough to stick around … even knowing what you do."
Dean shook his head, brushing off the powder of Sam's emotion with a huff and a grumble. "Yeah, well, that's what brother's are for. Well, that … and occasionally teasing you about being a girl … which you are."
Dean could practically hear Sam rolling his eyes, but he saw the edge of his brother's lips lift in an almost smile and he blew out air, relieved, because Sam didn't seem to smile much at all these days, not happy smiles, at least. Sometimes his responses to things were so thin, a reaction to meet certain expectations and little else. His brooding was intense now, reminiscent of the months right after Jessica died and his eyes got too bright sometimes, the way they'd done right after Dad. It wasn't something Dean liked to think about much, but even if Sam was with him now, he'd left something back wherever he'd been, something he grieved for.
Dean brought his focus back to the road, continuing the short drive to the site of their hunt, but moments after they'd passed under the first highway sign stating the miles yet to Tiffany, Sam grunted, clutching his head.
"Sam? Sammy?" Dean's eyes blinked from the road to his brother to the shoulder of the road, prepared to slide the car over.
"Fuck. Vision." Sam's eyes squeezed shut and he rocked his head down into his lap.
Adding his own curses into the mix, Dean checked his mirrors. "I'm pulling over."
Sam's hand shot out, waving, even as he continued to curl in on himself. "Just drive, Dean. Almost there, alright? Just- … fuck."
Dean was wary about having his hands full and his attention needed elsewhere while Sam was shrinking down with pain, but he caught the sign for the Tiffany exit ramp and saw the ad for the Tyre Road Motel. So, he just nodded with a resolute "no problem," and shot more gas into the engine, speeding his way up the road and into the parking lot.
Almost running in to get keys to a room, he nearly throttled the clerk for his sluggishness before darting back to the car and helping Sam into the room.
"Ice," was the only thing Sam said when he crashed down onto the bed, body coiling up tight as he lay without even trying to take off his shoes or his jacket. Out Dean went to get ice from the machine at the far end of the lot, something tightening in his chest as he had to kick it twice before it put out enough to have something to take back. By the time he'd sprinted back to the room, full ice bucket in tow, Sam was sitting up and just rubbing his temples instead of clutching them like his brain was trying to run out on him.
"Sam?"
Sam looked up, eyes weary and haunted, but he didn't really say anything. He just reached for the bucket of ice, removed the lid, and pressed the top of his face into the pail, his hair spilling over the side.
"You want a towel?"
Sam's answering groan was enough and Dean went to grab a towel from the bathroom, tapping Sam's shoulder when he'd returned.
As Sam pulled up and started to fill the towel with ice, he slid out of his shoes and tugged his legs up onto the bed, scooting back until he was leaning against the headboard. "They're not supposed to hurt like that." It sounded as much a complaint as a statement of fact and Sam groaned again as he finally pressed the towel-held ice to his forehead and closed his eyes.
"Was it worse than usual?" Dean perched on the edge of the second bed, regarding his brother with concern. He figured that he already knew the answer from the sheer amount of body twisting Sam had done, but it seemed like an important question, regardless.
Sam sighed, not quite reluctant, but certainly resigned. "They haven't been hurting for a while." His eyes flicked open and his look pressed against Dean, heavy. "It was one of the … upgrades … or, I thought it was."
Dean nodded slowly, trying not to think too hard about all the power Sam said had been growing in him while they were apart. Visions without headaches, at least, sounded like a reasonably good idea. "Well … what'd you see?"
Sam's eyes slid away then, looking past him as if at something far away. "War. … Fire and blood and death and war."
Dean licked lips that were suddenly chapped. "What kind of war are we talking about here, Sam? There are wars going on all over."
"Humanity- …" Sam's voice was low and weighted, like it didn't want to move, didn't want to say the next words, but knew it had to. Then Dean blinked and Sam was looking directly into his eyes and yet still at something beyond. "Humanity … against the rest of us."
War or no, Dean's first reaction was about Sam. "You're not one of them, Sam."
Sam's eyes softened, sadder, then blinked back to something hard, his voice a little shaky. "That would be easier, wouldn't it? If I wasn't? Not so many questions to ask when you're Hunting?"
Dean shook his head, though, refusing to let the focus of the conversation shift in that direction. "This is not about Hunting, Sam. This is about you … and your visions, so … there's a war coming, okay, but what did you see? 'Cause I already know what side you're on. No sense wasting time debating that."
Sam looked at him for a long time, but Dean knew the strength of his conviction lay heavily in his eyes and eventually Sam's gaze shifted away. "Armageddon."
"Okay, but … that's kind of a given if demons are going to come out of the woodwork and try to destroy humanity. What did you see specifically … as in things that can help us win?"
Sam shrugged, taking in air then letting it out. "I didn't see anything specific, Dean, just- … fire … and blood … and death … and war. I mean- … there are faces, but I don't know them."
"Places? Names? Words? Sounds? Anything?"
"I don't know, Dean!" Sam huffed out the words, near exasperation, then he glanced upwards as if distracted, thinking. "Mountains maybe?" Then he shrugged again with a shake of his head. "I really don't know. I can never see enough to do anything with it."
Dean blinked twice, running back over those words in his mind as Sam scrubbed down his face with his hand. "You mean … you've had this vision before?"
Sam sighed heavily. He looked like he could use some sleep, but they really needed to talk this through first. "Yeah. When I got out- … of training- … for my job- … I got sick with it, saw it every day, almost all the time, for a week. I nearly thought I was losing my mind, but then … I stopped trying to figure it out so much as just let it say whatever it was trying to tell me and … it eased down, went away."
"So what was it trying to tell you?"
Sam swiveled his head a little, side to side, not quite a shake, and his eyebrows bent inwards. "Humanity loses, Dean."
"Well, how do we fix it?"
"We don't. We can't. It's not like my other visions. It's- … it's not a hint to follow. It's just a truth. I know the difference now."
"What do you mean?"
"Not all my visions are the same. It's like- … knowing the different sounds your car makes when there are different things wrong with it. Even though this hasn't happened yet, it has the same kind of certainty to it that I should have recognized when I saw that woman light herself on fire. Everything's already set in motion. It can't be stopped."
"So you're saying, this war's going to happen, humanity's going to lose, and there's nothing we can do about it?" Dean was confused, angry, but he didn't know at who exactly or what. It just kind of seemed like the universe was ganging up on them all the damn time.
Sam turned away from him, his head angled down as his voice threaded with a kind of apology. "Yeah, Dean. That's what I'm saying." He looked broken and lost for a moment, the lines of his face deepening with a kind of weariness that twenty-four year olds really shouldn't have.
It reminded Dean of the way he'd stared out the window when he'd first picked him up. "Is that why you called me, Sam? Is that why you don't care anymore? Because you think the fucking End is near?"
Sam's eyebrows knitted together, mouth setting into a hard line. "It is, Dean. I can feel it. I know it. And you would too, if you'd just open yourself up to everything that's going on out there."
"So … what? You just want me to sit around meditating with you while the world goes to Hell?"
"No. Of course not." Sam's tone settled into something rich and final. "We don't know when this is or where it happens or even who it happens to, exactly, so … we should just … keep Hunting. … Together."
Dean wasn't really good with thinking about endings or emotions, but he didn't miss that there was something revealing about how, even with all the issues they'd had lately, Sam still wanted them to be together whenever the end of the world came along. It was the kind of thing that should have been a given, and it had seemed that way for most of their lives, but when Sam had left for Stanford and again when he ran away all those months back, the idea of them being together at all, let alone during some guns-blazing end-of-the-world scenario, had become a total unknown. So, to have it set out in simple terms sort of … gave Dean pause … and made him want to change the subject as quickly as possible.
"Well." He coughed, not quite clearing his throat. "For the record, I don't believe we're going to lose, even if the war happens, but … I agree with you about the Hunting, so … let's just do our job and … keep our eyes open for any signs of a coming apocalypse, alright?" He managed to say it with half a smile, because, yeah, it might be true - more than might be, actually - but, come on, how often did he get to talk about Armageddon as a real thing that they needed to watch out for, in case it, ya know, popped up in the middle of a hunt or something.
Sam just shook his head with disbelief, then tilted it off to the side with a resigned smile. "I didn't expect that you'd believe me. It's okay. Everything seems to be under control for the moment anyway."
"It's not that I don't believe you, Sam. It's just- …" Dean shrugged, sighing. "You run away. You get answers that you don't like and won't tell me about. You have visions about the end of the world. You call me to come out hunting. And then … you spill all this stuff and tell me I can't do anything about it … as if I'm just supposed to swallow it down with my coffee."
Sam's jaw shifted as he nodded slowly. "Then … let's just pretend I never said anything." His eyes seemed to wash darkly with the tilt of his head, but there weren't any signs of the anger or hurt that he tended to wear like an ID bracelet everywhere he went. "Why don't we just … stick to the case?"
Dean could see Sam's neutrality for the mask that it was, subtle but present and unmoving, and, for a second, he wanted to ask Sam what was really going on in his head.
"What?" When Sam tossed away the wet towel and moved to sit across from Dean on the edge of his own bed, the word he dropped, nonchalant, held no veneer of confusion. He knew exactly 'what' and Dean thought he might want to know 'what' too, but a roiling in his stomach made him shut his mouth before he'd even opened it.
"Nothing." He shook his head and took a deep breath, before rubbing his hands together with a clap. "So … the case. Right." He got up and went for his bag, rifling through it to grab some printouts and his dad's journal before settling back on his bed again. "You think it's some kind of mind control?"
Sam's eyebrows gently stitched together. "Another mind control thing? I dunno, seems like a stretch to me."
"It doesn't to me." Dean passed an article to Sam, pointing at the stats for the frequency of suicides in the area. "People aren't just up and killing themselves for no good reason, Sam."
"Is there ever really a good reason to kill yourself?" The words were casual on Sam's tongue, almost flippant, but it didn't quite seem rhetorical.
Dean's thoughts paused mid-stream with Sam's question. "Are you actually asking me? Or is this some kind of philosophical-psychological bullshit you're throwing out there just to make me think or something?"
Sam seemed to consider the issue for a moment, but he dismissed it with a lift of one shoulder. "Mostly bullshit, but, ya know, if you have an answer … shoot."
Dean puzzled, not finding his brother funny enough to laugh, but still being unable to stop the soft puff of something that might have been a quiet snicker. "Right. Well, I don't, so …"
"Then how do you know this is supernatural? Maybe the poor town just attracts suicidal people."
"There are just too many people dying this way for this size of a town, Sam, and too close together. Sorry, but that stressful water story just isn't cutting it for me and neither is the suicide-magnet idea."
"It's more than that, though, isn't it?" Sam's tone was accusatory again, as if they hadn't just had what seemed like a minor brotherly breakthrough.
Dean shrugged. "I just laid out the reasons, Sam."
"But you've got a feeling, right? A kind of hunch? Like you get with most supernatural things?"
He knew where this was going and he didn't want to go there. "I dunno, Sam. Sometimes. But it doesn't matter. It's not like there's no evidence."
Sam's eyebrows folded inward just a little, not quite menacing, but curious and wary. "Do you feel that around me?"
"All I feel is that you're my annoying little brother, and that's what's important." He put a jovial hint of sarcasm in his voice as if a brotherly smack on the back should accompany his words.
Sam rolled his eyes, suddenly more cynical than anything else. "What did I tell you about lying to me, Dean? I'm not some chick you just met in a bar. Is it really that hard to be honest with me?"
Dean swallowed, then scratched his head, more sick than he'd like to be about being called a liar all the damn time. "Fine. Honestly? Sometimes, Sam. Yeah, I do, okay? Can we move on now?"
"In a minute. Can you tell me when? Like did the feeling get stronger when my vision came through?"
"Just- ... let it go."
"No. You might have a heightened sense of things sometimes, but you're also a Hunter. We might run into other Hunters. I need to know what tips you off, so I can protect myself."
Dean felt his face scrunch up, hesitating. It was weird, having this conversation, about Sam protecting himself from other Hunters as if he wasn't really part of that category of people and Dean was giving him some kind of insider Hunter info. It was only a moment, but it was enough to make Sam half-nod, something like a bitter smile curving under his nose.
"Unless you don't want me to know how to protect myself ... Hunter."
Sam's nostrils flared with the last word, and his tone seemed somewhat sharp, but Dean was tripping over the words in his mind, trying to phrase things in some way that didn't make him a target of more accusations.
"That's not- ..." His exhale was as audible as his frustration was tangible. Why did everything shift back into this oppositional shit? "Damnit, Sam! You know I'm not going to let anyone come after you and I'm not going to let you go out there with a sign on your chest!"
"Then tell me what gives you that feeling, so I won't do it."
Fuck.
When he thought about it, tried to parcel it down into digestible pieces, it started to seem like maybe he got that feeling from ... everything Sam did, just from Sam in general. He glanced off toward the blank television screen as if it could provide a diversion, but then returned his eyes to Sam, biting the corner of his lip.
"I don't know. Sometimes you ... carry yourself differently than I remember. Sometimes you ... give me this look ... like you want to break something ... maybe me." Dean's shoulders lifted a little, hitching then settling, and Sam's smile became a full-on smirk that sent a shiver down Dean's back, though he tried to play it off by shifting in his seat. "And sometimes you do ... that. But mostly ... I really don't know ... and that's the truth."
He turned up the intensity of his gaze then, hoping to put the subject to rest, for today at least, if not for good. "Can we work on the case now?"
Sam's smirk melted into a gentle smile, the hardness in his eyes replaced by something blank with just an edge of kindness. "Sure. I'm sorry." He ducked his head a little, looking up from under the flop of his hair. "I'll try not to freak you out so much. It's just- ..." A bit of the broken boy was back peeking through those eyes. "I just don't want to attract the wrong kind of attention, ya know?" Sam swallowed, blinking over the shine in his eyes. "I don't want to be ... another thing to Hunt on someone's list."
"Don't worry." Dean leaned towards his brother, his posture as strong as his words. "I won't let you be."
There was a long moment where Sam just held his eyes, wishing for something, and Dean nearly reached out for him, but Sam was already shaking it off with half a bitter laugh. "Thanks, but … I won't let myself be."
It felt like the words struck center in Dean's chest, not quite a punch, but it ached nonetheless. He couldn't find anything worth saying, though, so he just nodded and dropped his eyes, his attention turning, at least superficially, back to the case.
Prologue - One - Two - Three - Four - Five - Six - Seven - Eight - Epilogue