"…they're not brothers, they're just one guy, and he knows you, and he's talking to you, but you're in pain and you cannot understand him. What are you still doing in this field? Get out of the field! You should be in the hotel room! You should, at least, be trying to get back into the hotel room."
-Richard Siken
The air in front of Dean's face curls into thick white clouds, escaping with each of his uneven gasps. He hadn't been running. He'd probably only moved a total of ten feet in the last twenty-four hours. Yet, his heart is pistoning inside his chest.
He's bursting at the seams.
He's losing it, and if he doesn't get his breathing under control in the next few minutes then he knows he's going to pass out.
Below, water laps at the littered, rocky river bank. It should smell clean outside—crisp, like winter. Instead, it smells like hell.
No…literal hell.
Dean knows. Dean knows…
It's all blood, piss, and rot. And Dean's hot. He's sweated through his layers, his socks, the waistband of his ratty jeans. He should be shivering. He should be freezing. He should be doing anything other than standing like a PTSD patient having a panic attack in the middle of a crisis.
I can't be in there…I had to get out. I had to…
Wheels scratch the pavement behind him, gravel scattering past his ankles. Dean flinches, but does not turn. He doesn't need to.
"He's asking for you." The familiar voice is quiet, but still rough, still annoyed.
And Dean's rapid breaths cut off at once. He's spinning around, eye line dropping to meet the other's dark, sympathetic ones. "He's awake?"
And there's his heart again—fast, painful.
A silence reigns, so heavy the weight is a tangible presence on his shoulder blades. He's sick of silence, though. The silence he's created, the silence he allowed to grow and fester, the silence that has lead him to this very moment.
The man in the wheelchair continues to stare with that odd, appraising expression. Dean fidgets, "Bobby…"
"You gonna tell me what happened now? Or do I gotta wait until the next time you take off like a bat out of hell."
They both wince at his choice of words.
Dean breaks eye contact, glancing at the cracks in the sidewalk. "I just stepped out for some air," he grumbles, "Room's small…"
Dean practically hears the eye roll. "Right, 'cause takin' a walk's always been your coping strategy of choice."
"Not really a walk if you don't actually leave the property." Dean quips irritably, turning away from Bobby to peer at the black waves again. The streetlights reflect back at him, dancing in a disjointed pattern until they disappear beneath the shadow of the navy yard a few miles in the distance.
"Look at this, Dean! You can see the ships from the window."
"Yeah, Sam…I saw."
"Man…Dad would've loved that."
"Dude, you gonna stand there all day or do I gotta grab dinner myself?"
"Dean!"
And Bobby's beside him now, hand on his arm and eyebrows scrunched in concern. Dean jerks, pulling away from the man. "Uh-sorry. I just…got distracted."
Bobby sighs, "Look, son, I've let you handle your own issues as you've seen fit these past few years. But Dean…you need help. Sam needs help. I can't help you, I can't help your brother, unless someone around here starts talkin'." The words slice through the atmosphere and Dean's fingers clench at his sides.
He wants to refuse. The thought of saying out loud what happened is terrifying. If he says it out loud…it's real. It happened. If he says it out loud, he'll see in Bobby's eyes what he already knows.
He's a failure…completely and utterly. A piss poor excuse for a man, a Winchester, a brother. He doesn't want to talk. I'm satisfied with panicking at the side of the river, thank you very much.
Somewhere someone is laughing at the morbid ironic joke that is his life. Bobby's talking again, and Dean realizes that he'd never really stopped. "So, seeing as how Sam's in no state to be rehashing the hits, that leaves only you. I kept quiet long enough, but now that boy's awake in there, Dean." And Dean doesn't know how he does it, but the paralyzed man is staring down at him and Dean cannot look away, "And if you can't give him what he needs, then I have to be able to."
"You need to say yes to us, Dean Winchester."
"Last chance, Sam. I need you to tell us where your brother is."
"I need you to stay awake, Sammy."
"I need you to pick up the phone, you idgets!"
"I need…" a miracle…an angel, except I've got those and they kinda suck ass.
Dean can sense Bobby's impatience and knows he's drifting again. As the older man opens his mouth, Dean cuts him off, "He broke his ribs."
Silence…this time abrupt and crackling with energy. Bobby's pupils narrow and the bill of his baseball cap tilts upward. "Sam?"
Dumb question. Rhetorical really, because who else would it be?
Dean clears his throat, stuffing his hands in his pockets, "Yeah…poltergeist threw him 'round a bit before I torched the sucker. He didn't say anything…I didn't ask." He shrugs, "Got wind of a possible werewolf hit here, so we packed up and shipped out a couple a hours after."
Bobby's a smart man, and Dean's knows he's being less than clear, but it doesn't take him long to catch up to where Dean is leading him. Dean chews on the inside of his cheek for a moment, sniffing the dry air and smelling nothing but dirt…iron. When he looks back over at the man, realization is just beginning to dawn. "His ribs…the sigils."
Dean only stares back at him sadly…bitterly. Bitter because the world's a shit hole he keeps stepping in. "I was tired. He drove the whole way here. By the time we checked in, I was starving and told him to go back out and get dinner." Dean counts three cars passing over the bridge to the east before whispers, "He didn't come back."
Bobby sits for several moments, processing. Finally, he says, "Lucifer—"
"No!" And Dean surprises them both when he spins rapidly around, eyes blazing. He shakes his head, "Not Lucifer. Not demons. It wasn't any of those sons of bitches."
"Then…who?"
Dean's jaw clenches, breath hitching as he towers above his friend. "Zachariah." Dean laughs, "Zachariah and the rest of his corrupt "angels"."
Bobby shakes his head again, "Why would they—"
"To get to me, Bobby!" Dean exclaims. It's loud…it echoes across the brick exteriors of the old buildings, across the river, down the drainpipes along the streets and alleys. "To get him to take them to me, to give me up, sell me out! Don't you get it? They took him, and they had him for three days before we could find him. Three days, trying to make him talk…and he fuckin' wouldn't."
The two men stare at each other—one a statue, the other gasping like an asthmatic. Blood pumps inside Dean's ears and the backsides of his eyeballs are painted in red. The rage brewing in his stomach is palpable…he feels as if he could vomit it onto his boots and watch as it disintegrated a hole in the ground.
Since the apocalypse, it's been this way. Way…the word for the ineffable. The way the trees are all starting to grow backward—odd upside down creatures with roots and branches on both ends inside Dean's mind. They make sense though, like how the trees throwing apples and being assholes in The Wizard of Oz make sense because that's the way it is in The Wizard of Oz. Witches travel in bubbles and trees throw shit.
The way the hunt is more of a filler—a distraction in every sense of the word. The way his brother is a fiberglass shell, giving himself splinters and cracks with every step he takes while Dean grumbles and tells him to walk faster. The way the daylight is cause for suspicion—because nothing can be bright, or warm, or healthy on an earth on the threshold of destruction.
The way Bobby is looking at him right now, as if he's the one lying in a cesspool of his own bodily fluids after spending 72 hours enduring the worst kind of psychological and physical torture.
"All right, I think I saw a diner a few miles back. But…you should check the view out before it gets dark. They raise the bridge up when the ships come in and out of the harbor."
It's dark now. Dean can't see it at all, even when he squints. "He was excited about the navy yard."
Bobby swallows and scratches at the stubble on his cheek. " I know you're blaming youself—"
Dean scoffs, because yes he's blaming himself, because yes, it's his fault.
"—and whether or not it's your fault is something we can get into later." And he's being fixed with a stern gaze now, "But right now, Sam needs you. I was bluffin' when I said I could be anywhere near what that boy needs. You had your pissy fit…it's in the open now." Dean's not sure whether to be offended, ashamed, or angry, but the man continues before he can decide. "So it's time you get in there, and be a good brother. That is, if we're done acting like teenage girls."
"Stop being such a girl, Samantha. It's only six hours going the speed limit. Even you can make that drive."
Dean blinks, looking beyond Bobby at the door. "You're right…"
"Wake me up when we get there. The cheap motels are downtown by the river."
TBC…
Next chapter will begin to flash back to what EXACTLY happened to Sam and how Dean eventually rescued him. Reviews are love! ;) Let's get through this hellatus together!