"What, you think you can shove a needle into my neck and make me all better, Sammy? Sorry, man, the demon inside me is 100% pure grade A Dean Winchester. I ain't smokin' out of this hot body."
"Dean, we know how to cure a demon. I can cure you."
"There's nothing to cure," Dean growls the last word as though it's bitter on his tongue. "This is the new me now. I'm finally free."
"You don't look so free to me," Sam deadpans.
Dean sneers and raises his eyebrows, "Oh, you mean this?" He shakes his hands, rattling the cuffs that bind them together. "You really think this little bit of bondage play is going to keep me here? I'm not just another stunt demon. Knight of Hell, remember?"
Sam sighs and purses his lips, hearing his brother speak this way burns a hole in his gut but he can't let Dean get to him.
"I'm a chip off the old Cain block. And when I get out of these," Dean smiles at him, predatory and feral, "well, gotta uphold family tradition, right? Brother killing brother...it's the new family business."
"No... you won't," Sam says with a small head shake and all the resolve he can muster.
Dean just laughs, "You sound awfully sure about that for a man who's got a demon handcuffed in a devil's trap."
"I know my big brother's in there and, Dean, you're home now and I'm going to help you."
"Fuck you, Sam! Home! Don't you fucking talk about brothers and home! You said this wasn't your home. You said we weren't brothers. Well, lucky you... I ain't your brother and this sure as hell ain't home. It's just another pit where I watched Kevin die and Cas leave and it's the coldest place on earth with your frigid ass just down the hall. So you'll excuse me if I don't respond to your cries of brother when my hands are dripping with your blood as I burn this place to the ground."
Sam tries to steele his face. He knows too well that Dean can read him like a well worn book. Dean knows his every tell and expression and the last thing he wants is for his brother to know how much his words are hitting their mark. He just shakes his head, swallowing down the bile that is rising up and turns, shutting the large dungeon door behind him.
He is so tired of the two of them having to lock each other behind thick doors. How many times have he and Dean had to do this? To go through demon blood detox… twice, to keep Dean from saying yes, to keep Dean from killing Gadreel and now to keep Dean safe as he tries to cure him. He prays that this is the last time, that he and Dean will never have to shut a door on each other again.
But now isn't the time to dwell on that. He has a bother to save. He has to collect himself and prepare for the ritual. He needs supplies - needles and spell ingredients and... a purified soul. It's been over a year since he was in that church with Crowley. Over a year since he had prayed (to whom he didn't even know) for forgiveness. Over a year since he has felt clean.
In that year, his own hands burned the life out of his Kevin, his friend, his charge. It was his own voice that told Dean to send Castiel away. If he hadn't stopped the trials, if he hadn't been possessed by Gadreel, would Kevin be alive? Would Cas be hunting by Dean's side, human and alive? Maybe he wouldn't have had to steal noxious grace that is poisoning his own body and draining the life from him. And worst of all, in that year he let his anger with Dean fester and turn the rift between them into an impossible chasm. But if there is one thing he knows, he is determined to fix it, this sickness between he and Dean that keeps them in a constant loop of hurting onto another to save each other.
Damnit, this is his home and Dean is his brother and he is going to prove it to him.
But first, he needs to get everything ready for the demon cure ritual. He grabs his keys and heads out to the garage where the Impala sits in the middle of the bunker's garage, standing out like a sore thumb, a filthy eyesore among the pristine classics snuggled happily their orderly enclosures. Usually she sits proudly in the center of this display, the gleaming pride of Dean's possessions. He shakes his head and sighs at the mess Dean has let her become.
Yeah, the Impala has been Dean's car since Dad turned over the keys when he turned 18, but she's more than just a car to Sam too. This car feels more like home and family than anywhere else ever has to him.
She is long rides down two lane blacktop back roads with him and Dean laying together in the back seat, heads propped up in the middle of the bench seat and little bare feet hanging out of opposite windows. Dean would read him comics while Dad's classic rock weaved through the car, guitars dancing on the wind. It's playing with hot wheels and Legos and army men and making up secret languages with Dean so they could talk to each other without Dad knowing what they were saying. It's memories of fits of giggles over the Mad Magazines Dean would swipe from gas station shelves while Sam would distract the employees with his adorable-little-kid-who-needed-help routine.
And it's Dean cautiously handing over the keys and a couple of twentys as he finally gives in and lets Sam borrow the Impala for a date with Ashley Roth. Always open the door for her, Sammy, and if you fuck around in my backseat, I'll shave your head while you sleep. Of course, Dean's warnings didn't stop him from getting his first blow job that night, the memories of Ashley's pretty red hair tickling his thighs and big brown eyes looking up at him still make occasional spank bank appearances.
He walks over to the car and circles it once, checking for damage through the dirt and grime that now covers the sleek black paint. Luckily, he doesn't see anything major.
"What has he done to you, Baby?" Sam surprises himself as he hears the words whispered from his mouth. He's not usually one to talk to the Impala and call it Baby like Dean does, but something inside him feels like it's just the right thing to do. He pats the hood and tells her, "Don't worry, we're going to get you and Dean back in hunting shape."
Sam grabs a trash bag and begins cleaning the flotsam that Dean has left in the car. Beer bottles and food wrappers, a mostly empty bag of weed, and aw fuck is that a condom?! "Jesus, Dean," Sam grumbles. He finds crumpled up receipts for booze and bars and motels and he cringes as he retrieves a blurry picture of Dean and Crowley sitting shoulder to shoulder in a seedy dark bar with three identical looking blonde strippers hanging all over them. Yeah, Crowley's next on his list of monsters to kill.
He finds the box of Dean's cassette tapes and for the first time in months finds the edges of his lips curling up into a slight smile. Who but his brother, in 2014, is still carrying around a shoebox of tapes? He pops in one of their favorites, Led Zeppelin IV, and lets the sounds of his youth fill the car as he works. Another memory, this one of kneeling in the backseat, holding back tears as he presses a blood soaked t-shirt into the gaping slashes across Dad's chest while Dean burns up the road, barely tall enough to see over the dash and reach the petals at the same time, his right hand frequently leaving the wheel to feel the handle of the 9MM sitting on the passenger seat. Dean had insisted that they blast Zeppelin to cover the sounds of Dad's wheezing breaths and pained moans. That was Dean's first time behind the wheel of the Impala. He was twelve.
Now that Sam has started cleaning up the car, he doesn't seem to be able to stop. He can fix this. He can get the Impala back to the way she should be; clean, proud, badass, strong.
He wipes down the dashboard, taking care to use only the products that Dean has deemed safe to protect her aging leather. And then goes to work cleaning up the seats. He can feel the stickiness of spilled drinks and even a dark red dried splotch that he prays is ketchup dripped down over the middle of the front seat. He doesn't stop until the black leather once again has that soft sheen to it that Dean is always so proud of.
By the time the tape gets to Going to California the interior is looking like it should again. This song will never not remind him of sitting across from Dean in the front seat and silently handing him the envelope with shaky fingers. Dean knew before he even looked at the letter what it said.
"So... you got in, huh?"
"Yeah," Sam shrugs and focuses on his feet, "full ride."
"Shit, Sammy, that's," Dean's voice breaks and he pauses to swallow...hard, "that's great. You gonna go?"
Sam gives a noncommittal shrug and the silence weighs heavy between them. Finally, he breathes out in barely a whisper, "I don' wanna… I can't... hunt anymore."
"Yeah," Dean nods and stares at the unopened envelope in his hand. After a long pause and a deep breath he tells Sam determinedly, "You gotta go, Sam."
"But Dad-"
"Dad's got me. We'll be fine. Go. Learn, party, get laid… be normal and safe."
They sat in the car for a long time after that, neither one wanting to go in and face the wrath of John Winchester. Dean listened quietly as Sam rattled off all of the amazing things he was going to be doing at Stanford. Sam didn't know at the time that his heart was breaking a little with every word.
Sam sits down in the passenger seat for a moment and takes it in, lets himself absorb the feeling of home that this car gives him. How many important conversations has he had sitting in this seat? How many prank wars started? How many songs belted out off key? How many arguments? Tears shed? Jokes told? This car holds the story of his life.
He sighs and gets up to retrieve a soap bucket and sponge. Time to bring her exterior back to mint.
As he scrubs, he checks for scratches and dents. He finds a few and cringes at the thought of Dean's reaction when he's Dean again, not that he won't be able to fix those, after all he has already rebuilt her a couple of times - after that crash with Dad and when demons flipped her the night Cas became a god. Heck, even Sam fixed her up after Meg drove her through Dick Roman's sign. The memory of Dean teaching him how to take care of his car before he went to hell nearly chokes a sob out of him. Is Dean now what he would have become if he had stayed in hell much longer? Sam wonders if he ever told Cas just how truly grateful he is that he saved his brother from that. His stomach turns as he thinks of how hard fought Dean's freedom from hell was only to now meet that same demonic end.
As he continues to work wet soapy circles across the smooth paint, his mind flits to memories of sitting on this trunk beside Dean sharing a beer on a clear night, to taking nights off of hunting to go to classic monster-movie marathons at dusty old drive-ins, to he and Dean carving their initials under the upholstery in the back seat while Dad was hustling pool in some bar so they would have money for their next meal.
And he remembers one quiet day during the apocalypse, when Cas had started falling and hanging around more. Once Dean saw that the angel was getting weaker and actually needed things like sleep and food, he took it upon himself to introduce Cas to his favorites. If you gotta eat, man, at least do it right - I'm takin' you to Guiseppi's. The three of them had grabbed a large pizza with everything on it and parked alongside of a quiet pond. They ate pizza and drank beer and avoided all talk of angels, vessels, Colts, and Lucifer long into the evening.
At some point, Dean and Cas climbed onto the hood of the Impala, leaning back against the windshield, their shoulders just touching, as they sipped beer and stared up at the star-filled sky. Sam sat under a nearby tree and watched as the two friends talked quietly, in a world of their own. Something about it felt intimate and sad and Sam had felt a pang of love for this little family of his so much that it physically hurt. Damn, he wishes Cas were here now. Dean's going to need his best friend to get through this and he could really use Cas' support too.
When the car is clean and dry and her glossy black coat is once again gleaming under the artificial lighting of the bunker's garage, Sam stands back and takes a final look at the car - no not just a car. The Impala has been a constant presence in his life, a home and a refuge, the vessel that has carried him and Dean through this insane life of theirs together. Dean let her become dirty, dented, filled with trash, covered with filth and grime. Some TLC and she's going to be OK, though. She isn't perfect, there's still the army men in the door and the Legos in the vent and the initials carved in the back. Plus she's got a few new dents and scratches to show for her misadventures with the demon that has taken over Dean and the King of Hell, but those can - and will - be fixed. Under it all she is still a Winchester.
Sam sits down in the driver's seat and starts the engine, comforted by the familiar rumble of her powerful engine.
"C'mon, Baby," he says quietly, laughing a little at himself for talking to the car like his brother does. But he continues anyway, maybe Dean's on to something here. "Let's go put our family back together."