This has been bouncing around in my head since I saw the S4 finale. Um, also, warnings for a minor mention of Wincest. Sorry, I thought that it was ambiguous enough.
you can sit beside me (when the world comes down)
Sam is shaking.
It isn't really a new thing. Sam thinks that he's been shaking for a while, but it's something that he can't prove. The evidence is there, but Sam is not a reliable witness.
"Are you cold?"
Dean's voice.
Sam shakes his head, no. His hands are trembling and he feels like he's about to be sick. Again. It's going to be over the minute he opens his mouth. He knows it.
"You have to say it."
"I'm gonna hurl," he spits out, and there it comes, burning bile, and he's choking on it. He can't turn over, can't move from the fucking spot, and the most he can do is turn his head and feel miserable.
Sam is really good at feeling miserable these days.
Dean's hands are on him, warm and tender, and he quickly mops up the vomit without complaint. How sad is it that Sam is grateful just for that? No recriminations, no guilt, and no smart-ass comments. Well, okay, maybe he wouldn't really mind that last one. Being mad sometimes took his mind off of how completely fucked up he was.
"I found your phone," Dean says, and it's sudden. For a second Sam forgets, and tries to lift his head to look at him. The world swirls around him, and he catches a glimpse of Dean's face, pale and unshaved. "Sit back, you idiot! You want to be sick again?"
Dean doesn't say what he expects, but he answers correctly anyway. "I'm sorry." He presses his eyes shut again. It should be a drinking game, with how many promises he's broken. No need to add one more to the very long list. "Did you...?"
Dean doesn't answer him. "You didn't delete my message," he says instead.
"Yeah, well," Sam tries for a laugh, but the sound he makes is more of a choking cough. "I wanted to keep it around, in case I decided to try something really stupid again."
Dean's voice is soft, which surprises him. "You really think I would say something like that to you?"
"You did say it. And I deserved it."
"Sammy, I said I was sorry. I said that we were family." There's a pause, and then Dean's voice drops again. "Fucking angels. Uh, no offense." The second part of that is softer, almost like he's speaking to someone next to him, someone he can see but is invisible to Sam.
That hurts too, but it's a duller pain, an old pain, like a trick knee that aches when it's damp. "You didn't believe in angels," he says.
"When did we get on this topic?" Dean asks, and Sammy wonders if he passed out again, or if he started babbling, because there seems to be a skip in the conversation that he's not aware of.
"You brought them up," he says, and then coughs. His lips are cracked, and he's thirsty, so very thirsty, but water burns and everything else tastes like ash. He knows what he wants, tells himself a silent no. It isn't any easier than the last time. "Even when you'd seen one, been pulled out of Hell by him, you didn't believe in them."
"There a point to this?"
Sam licks his lips again. "I prayed every day, Dean. Even after you died, even when nothing was right and there was no Trickster to blame, I prayed." He swallows, or tries. "They picked you."
Dean sighs. "They didn't pick me," he replies. "I sort of fell into the middle of their war. Believe me, Sammy, I wish it had been you."
But it wasn't. For whatever reason, Dean was the special one. "Maybe it was destiny. They said I had a destiny. Boy king of Hell. Man, I wasn't the right material for them. I haven't been for a long time."
"Screw destiny," Dean says, and his voice is hard. "We're Winchesters. It doesn't apply to us."
Except when it does. But Sam doesn't say that. He says, "I'm thirsty," instead.
Dean shifts and comes closer, but cautiously. Sam doesn't blame him for that. He can hear Dean's heartbeat, smell the sweet copper tang of blood, and his mouth is watering. "I hurt you," he says, more to remind himself than anything else. "I tried to drink your blood and I hurt you."
"You thought I was Ruby," he says, and Sam flinches away at that name. Dean comes closer, holds a straw to his mouth, and Sam sips at it. It burns like holy water, and he chokes on it.
Sam doesn't realize he's sobbing until Dean's hands are on him again. The blood is so close, if only he could reach out and—the handcuffs stop him. He's chained to a cot, he reminds himself, he's unable to move freely. He's grateful for it. He's more grateful that Dean doesn't move away. Not this time, at least.
Dean strokes his hair and mumbles something that might be reassuring. Sam can't really tell, but it doesn't really matter, because he's certain that this Dean is another hallucination. No princess comments, no teasing, no stories about when they were little and Sam didn't know that the monsters in the closet were real.
"Thank you," he manages. It's almost a prayer, the closest he's come to one since learning that God has left the building. Even if Dean is just a product of his fevered brain, this touch of comfort in the middle of everything helps, just a little.
"You don't have to thank me," Dean says, and Sam almost – almost – opens his eyes again. It would almost be worth it, too, to see his brother caring for him. Even if he isn't the real Dean. But he promised, Sam reminds himself, and it's such a simple promise that he can't willingly back out of it.
"Thank you," he says again, and leans into Dean's touch.
"Tell me about Ruby," he says. "If you talk then maybe," Dean's voice falters a little, "you know, maybe it won't hurt so much."
"I'm pretty sure it's going to hurt no matter what I say."
Dean pulls his hand away. "Then explain it to me."
Without the warmth of Dean's hand, he starts to shiver. It's not like the shakes he had before; now he really is cold. He wonders if it's real, the cold feeling, or if that is another part of the torture his brain has cooked up for him.
"Explain it to me," Dean repeats.
It doesn't make sense, exactly. This Dean is a hallucination, like the hundred others that have poked and prodded at him and demanded to know all sorts of things. There's no reason to answer, none at all, but he wants to. "It'll feel better," he says to himself. It's not a real reason. Just an excuse to pretend like this Dean is the real one. He likes this Dean and his warm hands and soft touches. "Can't we stay like this?" he asks.
"I want to know."
"Ruby," Sam repeats, and just saying the name hurts. He's so dirty, so ashamed of what she did, of what he did to himself. He wants to curl up and be buried, or open a vein and bleed out everything she fed him. His wrists hurt, and he wonders if it's the handcuffs cutting in or if he tried that route already. "What do you want to know?"
He can hear Dean breathing, close by, just a little out of reach. Close, but not touching. "Twenty questions?" Dean asks.
Sam shakes his head. "No. No games. What do you want to know?"
"Why'd you fuck her?" It's not the question Sam expects, and he hesitates. But that's okay, because Dean continues onward, "She took my place, Sammy, my rightful place. She stood by your side and she protected you. It was all for her own ends, but still. Why, if she was a stand-in for me, did you fuck her?"
The realization comes crashing down on him and he starts to moan, "oh, god," but can't make it past the initial sound before he's sick again. It isn't so much the thought of sleeping with his brother in proxy that does it. It's the thought of what Dean would say, what he would do if he knew. God's name burns on his tongue, even though he didn't say it.
He chokes again.
The warm hands are back, touching his face and neck. Sam leans into them again, presses his mouth against the broad palm and breathes in. The blood is still there, the blood is right there and he still wants it. "Dean," he says, reminding himself. Dean has already given so much for him. He has to remember that, how much Hell Dean has suffered because of him.
"Sammy?"
He can't add to that. Dean can't know about this. "I love you too much," he manages to say. It's should be a confession, but it isn't. He wants to say everything, to have it out on the table and be over with, but it wouldn't be real. This Dean isn't real, but Sam's Dean, the real one, is also there.
"How much?" Dean's voice whispers, close to his ear. "How much do you love me?"
"Too much," Sam answers. "Too much and not enough." That is the confession, the real truth. "I thought you were weak, you know? Man, what a joke that was." He tries for a laugh, like it really is a joke. He's certain that the result is pretty terrible. "I should have known, you know? Forty years is a long time. Forty years in Hell and you still want to save me. Four months without you and I turn into a monster."
And he's crying again, sobbing into the warm crease of Dean's hand.
"I'm sorry," he whispers, raw and hoarse. He wants to look, but he promised. He knows, he knows that his eyes have been beetle-black since he stepped into the Devil's Trap. And he knows that the only way he can leave is if he's completely human again.
Or dead.
***
Dean still wasn't used to Castiel walking up to him, like a real mortal. When he heard the footsteps, he thought it was Bobby at first. Which was stupid, because Bobby was out there, in the world, trying to deal with the fallout of Ruby's manipulations. Zachariah's, too, if Dean wanted to admit that he'd been manipulated as well.
"How is he?" Cas asked.
"Dunno. I want to think he's doing better." But that wasn't the truth, and Dean knew it. Sam was out of it more than he wasn't, and Sam couldn't seem to tell the difference, sometimes veering out of a conversation mid-sentence. It was hard to watch, harder to talk about, so he changed the subject. "How is it top-side?" he asked.
"Bad," Cas replied. He turned to Dean, eyes surprisingly soft. "We need you."
"I told you before," Dean began, but Cas cut him off.
"Both of you."
They turned back to Sam, cuffed to a cot in Bobby's panic room, crying to himself. Dean moved closer, but warily. Sam seemed to think he had hurt Dean at some point, and the occasional violent outburst did happen. It never hurt to be cautious. Sam looked a mess, and something inside of him rebelled against it. "When is this going to be over?" Dean asked. He didn't feel like a good older brother. He felt like he was killing Sammy. "Hasn't he been through enough?"
"That isn't for me to decide," Cas said. He still hadn't gotten the hang of rhetorical questions, apparently. "God's forgiveness is infinite, but His angels watch over us with flaming swords." It was still strange to hear Castiel talk like that, to talk of His angels like they were something alien to him, to refer to himself as being a part of humanity. He came closer, put his hand on Dean's shoulder, a gesture so comforting Dean wondered if he had been practicing it. "The important part is over," he said, and nodded towards Sam.
"What do you mean?"
"He has asked for forgiveness, has he not? That's more than any of the fallen angels can say."
"Is it worth it?" Dean wanted to know, suddenly very curious. Somehow, Cas had managed to piece himself back together from nothingness. He was no longer holy, but he wasn't quite human either. A fallen angel of sorts, choosing to doubt and disobey like all of humanity.
Like Dean.
Castiel smiled. "Is he?"
Dean looked back at his brother. Sam was very still, his breathing even. Peaceful. It wouldn't last forever. The angels were calling, screaming through the sky, balls of fire and glory. They wanted him, to lead them or to destroy him. Dean didn't know for sure. Zachariah was pissed enough that he had broken his promise of obedience; he wasn't sure what the other angels thought.
Castiel understood that some promises were more important than others. That was what happened, what had changed everything, why Zachariah had such a giant bug up his holy ass.
"Dean? I don't know if I can do this alone."
"You won't have to, Sammy. I'll be here. I promise."
"Until death do us part?"
"What, again? We've both died, and I'm still here. I guess you're just stuck with me."
Dean had wanted to make fun of him, to tell his brother just how much of a girl he was, for extracting a promise out of him that sounded suspiciously like a wedding vow. But Ruby and Lilith had conspired to bring Lucifer back to the land of the living, and the consequences of Sam's choices were all too clear. It hurt, for both of them. Sam suffering. Dean watching him suffer and knowing there was nothing he could do to help but stay by his side.
But that was one sacrifice Dean was all too willing to make.
"Of course he is," Dean said at last. "He's my brother. No matter what he did, he's still Sam, and I still love him."
Cas nodded, like that response was exactly what he expected. He made for the door, started to walk away, but hesitated. "Dean."
Dean looked back at Castiel.
"If you need anything," Cas promised, "anything at all, just ask. I'll bring it for you."
"I'm good," Dean assured him, and turned back to watch his brother sleep. "All I need is right here."