A one shot dribble drabble kinda thing.

Dean was afraid to sleep, afraid of the demons that walked in his Nightmares. Was he one of them?

Disclaimers: Would I be sitting here making up stories if I owned anything Supernatural – I DON'T THINK SO!

Huggers, hope you like this piece of fluff! No Beta anywhere in sight - so if you find some typo and mismatched, fragmented sentences and othere mistake - they are mine and mine alone. Just march on and work through them.

Dream Walking

By

Valtira

Dean woke with a start his eye wide with panic and something else. He didn't want to put a name to it but he knew what it was. Fear! He was loosing himself and he didn't know how to stop it.

Groaning softly he swung his legs over the side of the bed and buried his head in his hands.

In the bed opposite him a gravelly sleep laced voice asked, "You ok?"

Dean stiffened, hating that he'd woken his brother and allowed him to see his weakness. "Yeah, Sam, I'm good," he rumbled quietly.

"Another nightmare," Sam queried cautiously?

"Something like that," Dean ground out. Before Sam could ask anything else the hunter pushed to his feet and practically ran for the bathroom. Nausea rolled angrily through his gut. Panting with the effort not to spill his stomach's contents into the porcelain goddess he willed the nausea away. It took all his strength to push it down, but finally it subsided allowing him to take a deep breath and calm his racing pulse.

Shaking hands turned on the water and he splashed the cool refreshing liquid across his face and neck before taking a sip to cool his throat. Standing up he turned away from the mirror unable to look at his image, unwilling to see the vile corruption he knew was mirrored in his eyes. Stepping to the side he leaned his back against the wall and slid to the floor. Closing his eyes he leaned his head back and gently bounced the back of his skull against the wall. Not once but several time, hard enough to bring tears to his eyes.

He felt the lone tear streak down his cheek. With a hard swipe of his hand he brushed the offending tear away. Why hadn't he been strong enough? Why had he let them break him? He railed at his weakness. He had failed again. He loathed what he had done and what he had become.

It didn't matter that he had endured decades of torture. It only matter that they had finally been able to break him. The worse part in his mind was that he had enjoyed inflicting pain on the weak souls that fell into his hands, relished hearing their screams.

Yet it was those same screams that echoed in his head now and no matter how hard he tried he couldn't silence the tortured souls.

His tired mind drifted into agony. Playing and replaying scenes of his time in hell. The blood, the gore, the screams of his victims echoed through his skull.

For the first time in a very long time he let the tears fall unchecked. Racking sobs shook his body until he slid to the floor and curled into a fetal position in exhaustion. His eyes flew open but he didn't move, he could not let himself sleep. The nightmares took over when he slept.

He didn't know how long he lay there staring at the wall, until heavy swollen eyelids closed, but still he didn't sleep for fear of the nightmares.

Above him the ceiling turned a misty blue. The sparkling light slowly drifted down to settle beside him. The mist solidified displaying an ethereal feminine form beside him. She reached out and gently brushed his cheek.

Dean sighed as the tension in his body eased and slipped away as sleep settled over him.

A voice, familiar and comforting echoed in his head calling his name.

"Dean," the light whispered gently.

He shifted his body calling her name, "Anna." Slowly his head turned to face the light but he didn't open his eyes.

"You have to forgive yourself Dean," the familiar voice whispered in his head.

"I can't," he cried pitifully. "What I did was unforgivable."

"No Dean," she stated vehemently, "What Alistair did to you was unforgivable. No one should have to go through that. You were never meant to be there don't you see that."

When he didn't answer she sighed saying, "You are strong. The strongest man I have ever met. You are truly a rare creature Dean Winchester."

"No, I failed," he whispered forlornly.

"Failed at what," she asked gently?

"I lost myself down there, gave everything I was to him," came the desperate cry.

"No Dean," she scolded him. "You gave away nothing. He took it, tore you apart piece by piece and left you to bleed. Your only sin was in loving your brother."

On the floor Dean moved restlessly in his sleep uncomfortable with the words playing around in his head.

"I know what you've heard them say. I've seen what lay in your mind. You gave up everything for love. That is a rare commodity my friend," she cried tearfully. "You love Sam more than life itself and you proved that. You are not worthless. Selfishness had nothing to do with it. Alistair took that love and twisted it, you can't let him win Dean, you can never let him take your love away from you and that is what he tried to do. He wanted your anger and hatred.

"He got it," Dean snapped furiously.

"Yes he did," she whispered back. "But it wasn't what he expected was it," she asked curiously.

"No," Dean chuckled. If he had hated them before, his time in hell had only shown him how evil, corrupt and despicable they were.

He sighed brokenly, for a time he had become one of them and hated himself for that break.

"Take what you learned and turn it on them," she whispered. "You have to let it go. Your fear and your hatred will only serve to destroy you and Sam. You must never forget what they did to you Dean. You have suffered more than anyone should ever have to suffer."

Silence greeted her words and the misty light sighed heavily, wondering if any of her words would change what now lay inside him. The darkness had claimed him for a short time and left its mark. To survive he would have to let it go, somehow forgive himself. If he couldn't do that, he was lost.

"And they will win," she hissed angrily.

On the floor the hunter lay still and silent in slumber, but his mind was racing. The darkness had a tight hold on his dreams; even now he could see the blood on his hands. Hear the screams of the souls he had tortured.

He wanted to let go, wanted desperately to forget the things he'd done.

Still in his mind she sighed heavily. "You'll never forget Dean, but the memories will fade. It is forgiveness you must seek. Just remember no one can forgive you but you," she whispered fiercely.

He wondered if he could ever really forgive himself. They said time heals all wounds. Would time eventually heal the darkness that lay inside him?

He heard her sigh, "There is darkness inside all of us Dean. Many choose to walk in darkness and many like you and Sam who fight what lay inside them with every breath they take. Yours was the strongest soul ever sent into the depths of hell. No one else lasted as long, but the demon was relentless in his quest. His torture was designed to strip the goodness and leave only the darkness. Alistair left you no choice. He wanted your anger, needed your hatred."

"It doesn't change anything," he cried softly. "I lost myself down there and Alistair found out what was really inside."

"You were never lost Dean only shaped by the evil that surrounded you. Shall I tell you of the souls you tortured, Dean? Tell you what kind of creature Alistair put in your hands."

"No," the restless hunter whispered vehemently! He didn't want to know, didn't need to know what kind of creature he had tortured. It was enough to know that he had torn them apart piece by piece.

Anger flashed through Anna's connection to the hunter. "Oh Dean," she snapped out. "What a wretched creature you are. Maybe I should leave you to wallow in your own self pity."

"It suits you ill!" Anna sneered, when he refused to answer. "I know what he told you about them. How they all gave up their lives for someone they love - just like you!"

Dean snarled and shifted pulling away from the blue mist that surrounded him, but no matter how far he fled, she was there beside him.

"I see him in your mind Dean. Do you remember his name, your first victim?"

"No," the hunter screamed silently. "Yes," he whined pitifully seconds later. "Robert Pickering," he ground out.

"He was a Lawyer Dean, with four children and 3 wives."

"No I don't want to know," the hunter screamed. Even in sleep his hand came up to cover his ears, unwilling to hear just how despicable he was.

Her words penetrated his mind shocking him to the core.

"He murdered them all Dean. He wanted to be rich and famous so he sold his soul and murdered seven people to do it," she whispered. "All of his wives were rich widows with children. Oh yes, Alistair made their deaths look like accidents, but it was murder just the same."

"He was a self-serving bastard. He didn't do it for love. He didn't sacrifice a piece of himself. He did it to get rich, and he was filthy rich. Happy as a clam until the day his deal came due. Then he screamed liked a baby."

Anna paused letting her words sink in. She saw more than felt his body go rigid as he processed her words. When he didn't say anything she marched on.

"Andrew Carson, do you remember him?"

"Yes," Dean snapped, "I remember them all."

"Andrew was a cruel man, ruthless and corrupt. He killed for pleasure. He enjoyed watching his victims die. Men, women, children, puppies and kittens, innocents one and all and they died at his hands. It wasn't quick or painless, it was bloody agony. An eye for an eye Dean, you gave him only what he gave others."

The hunter sucked in a breath at the picture the angel painted in his mind.

"Every single soul Alistair gave you was evil."

"Lisa Beckman?" Dean stuttered softly.

"Ahh Lisa," Anna sighed softly.

Dean sucked in a breath wondering how tiny, petite, wide eyed Lisa could possibly have been evil.

Anna's voice turned hard and unyielding. "Lisa was the worst of them. She made a deal and murdered her own children to please a man. Her new beau despised children. So she took them out for a boat ride one Saturday afternoon. They were three and five years old, a dewy eyed curly haired girl and a sweet blue eyed tow headed baby boy."

"Neither of them knew how to swim.

"Rocking the boat she made them laugh before pitching them into the dark waters of the lake to watch them drown. She laughed at the look of horror and fear in their eyes when she held their tiny heads beneath the water and drown them one by one. She got her man, and lost her soul in the bargain."

"Oh God!" the hunter whispered.

"Maybe those souls didn't deserve what Alistair had in mind for them, and then again maybe they did."

"Yes Dean, maybe he broke you – maybe he found the darkness that lives inside you, but he never took from you what really mattered. He could not take your love and he did try Dean. Do you remember?"

The hunter sucked in a breath as memories of his torture came flooding back, a face, familiar, beloved had wielded the blade and snapped the whip that tore at his body. "Sam," he cried huskily.

"That's right Dean, he tried to use your love against you but he couldn't - could he," she paused dramaticall. "You saw through his illusion, and your resolve hardened."

"Remember Dean, I've heard you say it over and over in your mind, Demon's lie."

"Demon's lie," he repeated slowly. "Demon's lie," he shouted into the mist.

Anna winced at the booming sound that tore through her head. A tiny golden light that had once flared like a bright beacon shimmered in his mind. A tiny pinpoint of light that grew and expanded with every breath he took.

Over and over and over again he repeated the words, Demon's lie; the sound slowly lightened the darkness that held him in thrall.

He looked through the mist his eyes sad, his lips trembling. "They didn't deserve what I did to them, no matter how twistd they were," he cried slowly.

"Maybe not, but then neither did you. You traded your soul for love - they traded their soul for a few selfish acts. There is the difference Dean.

He lay on the cold floor, still and silent his mind whirling with a hundred question. He turned and opened his mouth wanting, no needing more informatio but his words were cut off.

"I have to go Dean." A whispered goodbye flitted through his mind as he drifted deep into a healing dreamless sleep. "Anna," he called softly feeling suddenly bereft and cold as her warmth drifted from his mind.

The rest of the night passed slowly. When he woke hours later he lay sprawled across the bed. Consciousness slowly returned. Blinking away the fog that hovered close he groaned. Memories flooded his mind and he spun to a sitting position his head snapping toward the bathroom. A frown creased his brow as he stared at the open door. He didn't notice the bed beside him was empty.

Had he dreamed Anna beside him and in his mind?

"Not a dream," he whispered silently a few seconds later. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath feeling her touch still warm in his mind.

Sucking in a breath he turned over to lie on his back and stare at the ceiling. Had Anna told him the truth about the souls he tortured? Of course she had, he mulled silently. She was an Angel, she wouldn't lie to him. Would she?

'Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.' "No lying," he mumbled beneath his breath it was one of the God's commandments.

The front door popped open startling him. Reaching for the Glock stashed beneath his pillow he grunted as he watched Sam walk through the door his arms laden with bags of food. Two large cups of coffer were perched precariously in his right hand as he kicked the door closed behind him.

"Hey sleeping beauty," Sam called smiling widely to display the dimples in his cheeks, "Ready for some breakfast."

His voice was low and quiet as Dean stashed the Glock back beneath the pillow. "Starving," he mumbled.

"You doing ok," the young hunter asked cautiously unsure what mood his brother was in this morning. Food had been a necessity recently, his appetite as listless as his mood. This was a change and he was glad of it.

"Yeah, I'm good," the older hunter shrugged.

Seeing Sam open his mouth, he snapped quietly, "Shuddup."

Sam smiled, that was the Dean he knew and loved.

Standing up Dean took the offered cup of coffee and sipped at the hot liquid. He offered up a tired smile as he glanced at his brother. Leaning forward he pasted a smile on his lips and took the bag of food his brother offered.

"I'm good," he whispered brokenly. He wasn't - not yet at any rate, but Sam didn't need to know that.

End of Line

Please R & R for me and let me know what you think.