White.

It stretched everywhere, as far as the eye could see, and further. It was blinding, crystalline…beautiful.

Sam Winchester smiled a little as he stared out the window of the Impala. He loved winter…more than any other season, he loved winter. He loved the cold, and the ice, and the blinding whiteness that was snow. And most of all, he loved the string of holidays that came with winter—though, of course, he couldn't ever tell Dean that. Thanksgiving, Christmas, and most of all, New Years.

There was really no reason for him to love these holidays. Sure, they were basically the three most important holidays to most of the world, but it wasn't like he'd ever really celebrated them, or anything. In fact, Sam couldn't remember ever celebrating a national holiday—any holiday—and maybe it was a miracle that he knew anything about them at all.

And yet…and yet…

The holidays represented…so much to him. Everything that was normal, and good, and happy in the world. Oh, he had experienced that—had lived it for four years of his life. With Jessica…

But it was no use dwelling on those so painfully-recent days. They were over now, and his holiday celebrations were…well, over. Maybe not forever, but…for long enough, anyways. Might as well get resigned to the fact now, before it got depressing.

Sam sighed slightly, and turned away from the window, his good mood evaporated, and reached out irritably to turn down the radio. He could think of no reason to blast Metallica that loudly—or, really, to have Metallica on at all—and the music grated on him more at this moment than it ever had before.

Sam tried to force his mind away from the subject and toward their new case—a winter-oriented one, of course. Something had been terrorizing the small town of New Hope, in the middle of Wisconsin, and Dean was fairly certain that it was an ice-drake. So, that was where they were headed right now, and they could probably look forward to quite a fight when they reached their destination.

And yet, his mind kept turning inexplicably back to his last New Years with Jessica. Her parents had thrown a party, and they'd gone together. And it had been completely…normal. Even after three years of holidays with his girlfriend, Sam still had a hard time getting used to that, and all in all, it was a lot easier to fall back into the old routine than he'd thought it would be.

That didn't mean he liked it, though.

XXX

White.

It had taken over the whole freakin' world.

Dean Winchester ground his teeth in annoyance as he drove down the highways of Wisconsin. He hated winter more than any other season. Really, really hated it, with a violent passion. The cold irritated him, and the ice was slippery, and the snow soaked slowly through basically any clothing. And the holidays—people seemed intent on throwing every holiday, major and minor, from November to January, together in one endless string of psychotic cheer. Dean would have thought it was some kind of demon-induced insanity if it hadn't affected basically every single person in the United States of America.

He sighed as his eyes strayed to the endless expanse of snow. Nothing good ever came from snow—or the creatures it supported, like the ice-drake they were hunting now. Falls, auto accidents, a seriously-upped body count…not to mention the brutal things the stuff did to his baby. He couldn't for the life of him understand what Sam saw in any of it.

His glance wandered to his brother then, and Sam was once again looking out the window, his forehead pressed to the glass as if he was trying to escape the confines of the car. He may not know it, but right at this moment his…longing…was clearer to Dean than it had ever been.

But why? Why did Sam long for everything? Everything except what he actually had. It was annoying. And…well, sad. Sad that Sam was stuck with the one thing he didn't want outta life…

Okay, that's it. This is all getting a little too deep for me…

He reached out absently to return the radio to its original volume, ignoring Sam's glare, and turned his mind back to their hunt. Or…well, tried, anyway. Now, though, for some reason, it was…hard to think about hunting, which was just weird. He had never found it hard to turn to thoughts of his job before…

And yet his mind kept returning determinedly to winter, the holidays, and Sam.

He couldn't help but wonder what Sam had been up to during the three strings of winter holidays he'd spent at Stanford. He honestly had no clue—had never found out. He'd made a token call a few times a year and sometimes his calls did just happen to fall around the holidays, but they'd never really talked about anything…personal. And now…Dean was regretting that fact, because he did want to know. How had Sam spent his holidays? Alone? With friends? With Jessica? Did he ever once wish that his father and his brother were with him over the holidays?

And most important…what was Sam thinking right now?

XXX

White.

It only became more pronounced as they drove closer and closer to their goal. It was like the sun was determined to afflict them with snow-blindness, and neither brother had sunglasses or anything else to protect their eyes.

Between that, and the fact that Sam hadn't said a word the entire trip, no matter how Dean tried to coax him into conversation, the elder Winchester looked on the tiny, backwater town of New Hope with relief as they approached the city limits. Thank God…now we can hunt…and by the time we leave here, the damn holidays will be over and so will this broodfest.

Sam had spoken over the phone to one of the few survivors who had actually seen the drake, and now he spoke for the first time in hours, directing Dean to the man's home. Not that it was difficult to find, or anything—there were probably only about twenty houses in the whole freakin' town.

By the time the Winchesters left the place half an hour later, they had a relative location on the drake. There was a well-sized patch of wood a couple of miles on the outskirts of town, and that was where the thing was supposedly nesting, deep in a ditch it had dug for itself in the icy ground.

Now, there were a number of things wrong with that. First of all, ice-drakes liked the cold. Like, subzero temperatures. The fact that there was even one down here in the States was bizarre. Secondly, ice-drakes were supposed to be enormous—much too big to live in a forest. They didn't even like tree! And though its food source was obvious, where was it getting water? Even if there had been a creek or something—which their contact had assured them there wasn't—there couldn't possibly be enough to support anything that massive.

And yet, every sign positively screamed "drake," and that was what Sam and Dean prepared for, arming themselves to the teeth with guns—to temporarily disable it, which was probably the most bullets would be able to do—and machetes, to finish off the job by hacking it to pieces, since it was highly unlikely they'd manage to hit the eye, the thing's only vulnerable point.

But all their preparations didn't change the fact that this thing wasn't supposed to be there in the first place, and it was with that thought in mind that Dean pulled up at the edge of the woods, got out of the car, and made for the trees with Sam following behind.

Sam's self-enforced silence continued as they trudged through the trees, moving slowly while Dean looked for those small but tell-tale signs that there was something in this place that didn't belong. But for something supposedly so gigantic, the drake hid itself well, and it was by sheer accident that they found it at all. Well, actually, they didn't "find" it so much as "stumble on its ditch and nearly fall into it."

The drake must have heard—or somehow sensed—them coming, because it was already moving sluggishly when they peered down into the deep ditch. It actually wasn't as big as the rumors said, so either people had wildly exaggerated its size, or this one was very young, which explained how it stayed comfortably here.

As soon as Dean looked at the area, another of his questions was answered. The snow and ice for ten feet in any direction just wasn't there, so apparently the drake had been swallowing snow or chomping ice to drink.

But that didn't explain why it was here at all…

The drake uncoiled slowly, and its head began to rise. As it got closer to the surface, it seemed to leech the warmth from the very air around them, and that, at least, fit the description exactly. Dean tensed as the first wave of paralyzing cold swept over them, and he felt Sam do the same as he raised his rifle and fired off a shot before his fingers began to go numb.

The bullet didn't do any critical damage as it sank into the nearly impenetrable skin, but Dean wasn't looking for critical damage. The drake writhed in pain, but didn't even slow its ascent, and Dean and Sam stumbled back as it boiled out of the ditch, unnervingly silent, and the cold increased exponentially. Sam's gun went off, but once again the thing didn't even grunt, let alone slow down.

The next few moments were like something out of a dream, a dance of avoidance to keep away from the long, lethal fangs and whatever else the drake could use to kill. Over and over, Dean and Sam fired, trying desperately to incapacitate the drake long enough to deal it a mortal blow. But the cold seeped past layers of clothing, under skin, and into bones, and their reactions slowed inevitably. All it had to do was hold them off a few more minutes, until the extreme temperature became too much, and then it could deal with them at its leisure…

And then Sam fell, the skin across his chest laid almost impossibly deep by those deadly fangs, and Dean realized that this wasn't a dream, but a nightmare.

The drake seemed almost gleeful as it set eyes on its prey, and it seemed to forget entirely that it had another pursuer as it slithered casually over to Sam's still form. It raised its head high, opened its mouth…

And the man it had either forgotten or deemed unimportant stepped between then, took careful aim, and shot it through the left eye.

XXX

White.

It filled Sam's eyes, but it wasn't the comforting light that bounced off the snow and reminded him of the happy Stanford years. No, this light was harsh and angry, and it pierced his head, bringing only pain.

Then he moved—rolled over, in fact—and only then did he discover exactly how much pain one man could be in at a given moment. He would have screamed, but he couldn't find his voice, and so he just lay there, shaking.

At this moment, he didn't give a damn if the ice-drake came and took him apart piece-by-piece, as long as he didn't have to move anymore. He did wish he knew where Dean was, though…he should look around…but that would require moving his head, and was finding Dean really worth that?

Well…yes…

He was still trying to get up the courage to move again, knowing the pain it would bring, when a gunshot cracked through the silence of the woods, followed by a thunderous crash that actually managed to give Sam another flash of that blinding pain. He gave an inward sigh of relief when the realization that the ice-drake was dead filtered through his pain-hazed mind, and then concentrated very hard on not so much as twitching.

In fact, he concentrated so hard that he didn't even notice Dean dropping down beside him until a hand fell on his arm and squeezed, and another wrapped around his shoulders, lifting him to rest against Dean's chest, all so gently that the pain was only semi-blinding. He still didn't move—just concentrated on breathing, one second to the next…and the next…and the next…

XXX

White.

Dean was so sick of white. It seemed like he couldn't escape it. Outside, there was snow, and in here the walls were white, the floors were white, even the furniture was white.

Dean tried not to look at any of it, instead staring at his knees as he thought—or rather, tried not to think. The problem was, his mind was not cooperating—it kept showing him pictures…Sam lying in the despised snow, his blood dying the ground red…Sam's white face as he was loaded into the ambulance…Sam being rushed away on a gurney…

His brother had passed out as he was lifted onto a stretcher, and he hadn't regained consciousness when they reached the hospital. Dean had left his beloved Impala behind and ridden with him, never breaking contact with the limp arm under his hand, but his efforts went unrewarded as Sam remained exactly the same way.

And then they had rushed him off and now Dean was sitting here, waiting and, against his will, thinking.

He had the nagging feeling that something was…wrong…with all this. Sam had just…gone down way too easily. He'd hardly fought at all. And as much as Dean would have liked to write that off as an off-day or something, his instincts wouldn't allow it. That, combined with his lifetime of older-brother experience and the recent trauma, caused him to actually abandon his "no deep thoughts" policy, and begin to delve into the "whys."

After a moment of contemplation, he decided to just start with Christmas. That had really been when Sam's mood had fallen. He'd been even crankier than usual, and most of the time he'd just stomped around in silence. And that was just…strange. He'd never been remotely put off by the fact that they never celebrated the holidays…

The answer hit him then. They never celebrated the holidays. They never had. Had never acknowledged them, in fact. It just…didn't seem to matter, in the big scheme of things, and besides, the hunt was just too important to take time off to party. And for most of his life, Sam had understood and accepted that. But now…

Now, Sam had just come off four years of normal life. Four years of doing absolutely whatever he wanted. Four years of friends he saw every day, and four years of having…Jessica. And obviously he would have spent holidays with them, too…

And he misses it…of course he does. Sam had gotten a taste of normalcy—a rather big taste—and…well, Dean didn't have any experience with the matter, but he imagined that kind of thing would be hard to let go of.

And really, it did make sense that the holidays would be the worst for him, considering what those must have been like for him, and how happy he must have been celebrating them.

And he thinks that has to be over now…because of me…

And the truly bitter irony of it was that now that he'd finally realized all this, and finally figured out how to make it right…

No, no, no, we're not going there. That's a bad, bad place to go…

"Sam McGibbon?"

XXX

White.

Even Sam was getting a little sick of white. It seemed that he couldn't open his eyes even slightly anymore without seeing it.

Well, at least this time it was a different kind of white. It wasn't snow-glare or white-hot knives—just the normal white walls of…

Damn. Hospital.

Sam let his cracked eyelids slide closed again, and it was only then that he realized he wasn't in pain. He felt as if he should be in a great deal of it, but there was only a dull ache in his chest. He was as weak as a newborn kitten, but he didn't hurt.

Hmm…morphine. Morphine does that…

But…he should probably open his eyes. He needed to find out what had happened with the drake, and he needed to find out where Dean was.

That last was probably what prompted him to actually open his eyes, after a long and pitched battle, and a few moments later he was looking around sluggishly.

He didn't need to so much as glance at the room itself—he could predict almost exactly what it would look like, anyway. And as for Dean—well, finding him didn't take much work, since it was sitting about two inches from the bed, scribbling in the journal. Sam smiled a little, wondering if there would ever be a time when he woke up and Dean wasn't in exactly the same position.

He didn't have to say a word—knew he wouldn't have to, that Dean would somehow sense his wakefulness like he always did. And sure enough, not two seconds after he thought it, Dean's pen stopped, and he looked up. The journal closed and Dean set it down on the table, a grin crossing his face the size of which had not been seen in years, so wide it almost managed to make one forget about the dark circles under his eyes.

Sam was a little startled, but he refused to show it. He very nearly lost his grip on himself, though, when Dean leaned forward and laid a calloused hand over his arm, squeezing gently.

What the hell happened here?

"Hi," Dean said, his voice pitched low.

Sam cleared his throat a couple of times and said hoarsely, "Did you kill the drake?"

Dean rolled his eyes. "'Course I did. You think we'd be here now otherwise?"

"Right…stupid question…" Sam licked his lips and took a deep breath before going on. "Here's a stupider one. How long…have we been here?"

Dean shrugged, nonchalantly, but his eyes were so unemotional, his face so expressionless, that Sam knew he'd been feeling some deep, personal agony in this hospital. "A couple days. You went into surgery on the twenty-eighth. They…uh…they lost you a couple times on the table, but…well, obviously. And then you slept all night, and all day yesterday. It's only almost dawn now."

Sam added the time up—Dean had answered every one of his questions just now—and said, "So today is…"

"Day before New Years Eve, yep."

Now…why did Dean's face go all shadowy when he said that? And why did he seem so distracted? He was being unusually quiet, too…

"Dean, what's wrong?"

He hadn't really expected Dean to answer, so his surprise was considerable when Dean did, and instantly.

"What, besides the fact that you've been so damned distracted lately that you nearly got yourself killed?"

Whatever answer Sam had been expecting, it wasn't that. "What're you—?"

"Sam, don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about." And Dean's voice wasn't even angry—just curiously flat. "You've been stomping around in this…mood…for days, and it distracted you during the fight, and that's why you got hit."

"What? I…I didn't…"

But then Dean cut him off, with the most shocking words in a conversation of shocking words. "I'm sorry, Sam."

"…Huh?"

"I'm sorry," Dean repeated impatiently, looking highly uncomfortable. "I've been thinking about it—haven't had much else to do—and I figured out why you've been acting this way."

"Oh…Oh! …Oh." Sam looked down at the bed sheets, and sighed. Damn…

"Why didn't you just tell me?" Dean asked quietly, and now he sounded angry. "Why didn't you just tell me you missed her most now? You could've…taken the time off. I wouldn't have made you hunt with me. But no. Instead, you just decide to get yourself landed in the damn hospital."

Sam began to get angry despite the fact that all he really wanted to do was sleep. "I didn't decide—"

"You died, Sam." Dean cut him off again, his voice still quiet. "You died twice. And all just because you couldn't open your mouth and tell me. Freak…" The last word was nothing more than a mutter, a pathetic attempt to lighten the mood, and Sam ignored it.

"I…I'm sorry, Dean. I didn't think…"

"Of course you didn't. You think about everything else, but when it's something tiny like your life…"

Dean shook his head, and during the following silence, the random thought that Dean hadn't let go of his arm occurred to him. He didn't mention it, though—maybe Dean just hadn't noticed.

"Just…"

Sam looked up again, and Dean was looking hard at him.

"Just…next time you feel the need to throw yourself at an ice-drake's fangs…promise me you'll try to find some other solution, okay?"

Sam smiled, just a little. "I'll think about it."

Sam spent the rest of the day sleeping off and on, in between examination and all, but every time he woke up, Dean was still next to him, sometimes sleeping, sometimes writing, sometimes reading. Every time, Sam was amazed at the fact that Sam could stay in one place that long. He never showed that ability unless it was Sam or John that was hospitalized—even if he himself was the one in the bed, he was always trying to leave.

When Sam was awake, he didn't talk much to Dean. Mostly, he kept his promise, and he thought mainly about how to keep anything like this from ever happening again. Thinking wasn't easy, since he tended to fall asleep mid-word, but when he woke up for the fifth time, in the evening, he thought he had an answer.

"Hey, Dean?"

Dean looked up from his magazine, a little surprised, and asked, "Yeah, Sammy?"

"When can I check out of here?"

Dean shrugged. "Well, you'll be moving slowly until your stitches come out, and they want you to stay for another couple days, but it's just 'precaution.' You can check out any time, AMA."

"So…we can leave tonight?"

"I guess…why, though?"

"Well…uh…I was wondering if you could…uh…take me to California. To Stanford."

"…Come again?"

XXX

"Are you sure you want to do this?"

Sam stared out the window at the large house where the party was supposed to be taking place. In that house were all his friends, people he hadn't seen in months. People who wanted him back…people who loved him...

"No. Let's go in."

He felt the weight of Dean's gaze on him for a moment, before the driver's side door opened and then closed. He was still sitting there when his own door opened and Dean's hand fell on his shoulder. Slowly, he unfolded himself and got out, Dean supporting him carefully.

"So…is it a good coincidence, or a bad coincidence, that the last e-mail Becky sent you mentioned this New Years Eve party?" Dean asked as they walked slowly toward the door and up the porch steps.

"Uh…" Sam murmured, reaching out to push open the door, grunting a little. A wave of noise hit him, and he flinched. "Let me get back to you on that."

"You're also gonna have to get back to me on how good or bad it is that this thing isn't invitation only."

"Yeah…Andres never did like running things that way. Everyone's welcome to anything he does…" Sam smiled fondly as they headed down the hall to the living room, his feet remembering every step of the way.

"Dude, you seriously have a friend named Andre?"

"Not Andre, you idiot. Andres. It's Spanish."

"Yeah, Spanish for 'big pet seal.'"

"I absolutely forbid you to say anything like that to him."

They had reached the living room by then, and the Winchesters stood in the doorway awkwardly, waiting for someone to notice them. The living room was truly gigantic—Andres' family being loaded and all—and filled with no less than fifty people, all chattering and dancing and eating and laughing.

They didn't have to wait long.

"OH, MY GOD!"

The voice rang out across the room, followed by a wordless, excited screech. Sam broke out in a smile, despite his nerves, as a rather small, dark-skinned man pushed through the crowd, grinning like a fiend, and came to engulf the youngest Winchester in a hug. Sam let go of Dean to hug him back, chuckling a little, and only letting go when his legs began to buckle. He let Dean take hold of his arm again as Andres began chattering in Spanish, starting with an inquiry of "Who's he?"

Sam felt Dean's surprise when he responded in the same language. "This is my brother, Dean. And he speaks English and Latin, but not Spanish, so stop being mean."

Andres laughed good-naturedly, and switched to heavily-accented English. "Ah, si, si. Dean. Yes, I have heard a lot about you."

"Oh, really?" Dean smirked, and taking her turn to hug Sam, and then Dean.

"Oh, my God, what're you guys doing here? When did you get here? How did you get here? Weren't you headed for Wisconsin?"

Sam was about to start answering when he looked around and realized they were being mobbed.

It took several minutes to quiet everything down, and in the end it took a quietly terrifying glare from Becky to restore relative calm. She had noticed Sam's weakness, if no one else had, and as soon as she did, she began clearing a path to the couch. Sam felt his face reddening as Dean helped him there, embarrassed at not being able to make it a few feet, but there was really no arguing about it.

He felt much better once he was sitting down, though, and Dean perched himself on the arm of the couch as the whole party gathered around them.

Dean spent the rest of the night just watching, and being amazed at how popular his brother really was. Just about everyone there, with the exception of the freshmen, seemed to know him, and well enough that most of them took a turn hugging him.

And that wasn't the only amazing thing, either. No, the truly amazing thing was how much Sam could talk. He was a regular chatterbox tonight. He smiled when he talked with them, and he laughed…and Dean nearly had a heart attack when he made a joke. A good joke, too.

There were questions, of course, and no few of them. What had Sam been doing all this time? (Road tripping, just like he'd said in his e-mails.) Where had they gone? (All over the U.S.) Why was he so pale, and why did he need help walking? (Freak accident that Sam didn't really want to talk about.) Was he actually returning to Stanford? (No, he was just visiting, and Dean let out a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding.)

But the most frequent question was, "How are you?"

And every time someone asked him, Sam would look up at Dean, for some reason, before he gave them one of those charming smiles and said, "I'm getting better."

And yet…

"You guys can talk about her, you know."

The words were quiet, but they brought absolute silence.

"Seriously…you can. Hell, maybe you…we…should. Y'know?" His voice softened then, and he smiled sadly. "I want…to remember."

The silence went on for a moment, but then the tide of conversation reluctantly began to swell again, as each of Sam's friends spoke up with a story about Jessica. Dean sat back and just listened without a word, as his secret wish to learn as much as he could about the love of his little brother's life was fulfilled.

Sam, for his part, mostly just listened, too, because his throat had grown too tight for speech by the end of the first story. Because it hurt to talk about her. And yet, at the same time, it was indescribably wonderful, to hear people who had really known Jessica talking about her with the same tears in their voices that had now began to slip unnoticed down his cheeks.

He looked at Dean, who was watching him with concern, a hand on his shoulder, and smiled through his tears. Dean studied him for a moment, then nodded and squeezed his shoulder. Sam turned back to the group then, just in time to burst out laughing at a story of Jessica stripping a group of six men of all their cash during a poker game. That laughter felt good.

And later Dean would drive him to Jessica's grave, and that would hurt, too, but he still needed to do it, just as he needed to listen to these stories.

And anyway, right now, he didn't care about later. Because right now he was with all his friends, bringing in the New Year, and his brother was nearby, and he was feeling more at this moment than he ever had in his life.

And right now, everything, inside and out, was white.

AN: Well, there it is. My attempt at a warm and fuzzy New Years story, before I get back to my crossover. Review, please!!!