Title: Factius Cum Sacrificium
Characters: Sam, Bobby, Ruby, Dean, OC
Word Count: Around 2,300.
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Sam thinks he found a way to break Dean's deal.
Warnings: Spoiler for AHBL, dialogue quoted verbatim. Oh, and a character death.
Author's Note: I don't know Latin, but I pieced together the title for this using a couple different online English-to-Latin translators. Factius Cum Sacrificium should mean something like "achieved with sacrifice". If you know Latin, I welcome you to correct my error and help me find a better suited title for this piece.
Disclaimer: I have no affiliation whatsoever with Supernatural or its creators. I'm only having fun. No infringement intended.

oxoxo

"The line was silent except for a faint electric hum. "Bobby? Bobby, you there?"

"Yeah, I'm still here, kid."

"Did you hear me?"

"Not clearly, I don't think."

"I know how to save Dean."

oxo

"I'll give you one year and one year only. But here's the thing: if you try and welch or weasel your way out then the deal is off. Sam drops dead and is back to rotten meat in no time. So...it's a better deal than your dad ever got. What do you say?" She pulled away from Dean and looked at him demurely, mouth parted just-so and demanding to be kissed.

"She gives everybody else ten, you know? That's what I offered and all she could do was laugh at me. I dropped it to five - that's barely a future, but there's a lot I could've done in five years. Still wasn't good enough. 'One year and one year only,' she said. Better a year than never seeing you again." Dean ducked his head, unable to look at Sam while being so honest.

Dean started to lean in, but hesitated. "One thing - nothing happens to Sam until I'm gone-"

"I make the rules here-"

"Promise me that nothing will happen to him until I'm gone and I can swear to you that I won't do anything to get out of this deal."

"Then you'll just tell him as soon as we're done, and what? Make me look like a starry-eyed fool?!"

"That would be the same as me trying to weasel my way out of it, wouldn't it, honey?" He stared down at her in what he hoped was an intimidating way.

"This deal, Sam?

"You even hint at it and he's dead," she whispered against his lips.

It's worth every last breath."

Dean's mouth closed over hers, sealing the deal.

oxo

"I know Yellow Eyes had a lot of followers and that many of them are still gunning for me to be the leader of their army or whatever – they wanted, maybe needed, me alive nearly as much as Dean. And I think Dean would've tried to guarantee...I mean, what would the point be of him sacrificing his life for me just to have me get killed a couple weeks later, you know?"

"Yeah, Sam, I get ya."

"Wouldn't it make sense that he'd have a rule or two of his own?"

"Yeah. But, Sam, you've gotta remember that he'd just lost you when he went to the crossroads. He wasn't thinking clearly. He might not've thought to thoroughly clarify on his deal. I think he was just hell-bent on getting you back now."

"I know Dean, Bobby."

"I'm sure if he'd had time to think it all through...I know your brother, too, Sam, and he's not always thinking for the long-run."

"I know Dean. And I know what I've gotta do."

"Sam."

"Bobby, I think we might need to summon Ruby for help," he continued, ignoring the warning tone in Bobby's voice.

"Samuel Winchester, you will not-"

"It's the only way."

"There's still time."

"Not enough." Sam paused, looking at Bobby purposefully. "I'm going to kill myself."

oxo

"You summoned?" Ruby stood in the open doorway of the kitchen, leaning against the frame, pinning Sam with an annoyed glare.

"Ruby. Hey. Come on in." He pushed his chair back from the table and stood.

"Yeah, and step into a Devil's Trap so you can give me a little exercise? Thanks, I'll pass."

"Ruby. I called you here because I need your help."

"You realize that I'm not Lassie, so if Dean fell down a well..."

"Can you not crack jokes for two minutes?" Sam questioned, exasperated.

A 'don't get your panties in a twist' comment was on the tip of her tongue, but, because Sam appeared desperate, she kept it to herself. "Sorry," she offered begrudgingly. "What did you need?"

"I need some sort of a cloaking spell."

"For?"

"A thing."

"What are you trying to hide?" Then a thought struck her. "Are you trying to get Dean out of his deal?"

Sam's heart fluttered slightly. Was he really that transparent? Had Dean seen through him, too? "What? N-no."

"You can't hide him from the Hounds, Sam."

"Oh. No, it's not for Dean."

She peered at him skeptically before slowly entering the kitchen and taking a seat across from his abandoned place at the table. "Okay, I'll bite. But you gotta tell me what you're planning."

"I don't have a lot of time – Dean and Bobby'll be back soon."

"Give me the Cliff Notes version, then."

"Okay, so I guess it kind of is about Dean's deal: I know how to save him."

"Sam. You can't."

"Do you think he'd just trade his soul to bring me back and just have that be that? No other negotiations? I don't think so. And every time we've talked about breaking the deal, it's like he knows something but won't tell me. Now, I'm thinking that he can't."

"So, you're saying that Dean had some terms of his own going into this?"

"I think so, yeah."

"You think so. But you're not sure."

Sam scoffed. "I'm fairly certain. But whether or not you believe me, I don't care. So, if I actually die, you know, maybe it's got nothing to do with you. But if Dean's still alive after the year's up, then you'll know I was right. And if he's not...Well, then we'll both be dead."

"And Dean's deal will have been for nothing."

"Maybe it was anyway." Sam shoved himself back on his chair again, making the wood screech loudly across the floor.

Ruby sighed and got up to follow him. "You're so damn stubborn."

"You don't want to help me, don't help me."

"Yeah, and risk an I-told-you-so? Look, I'll see what I can find, just give me a day or two."

"Thanks, Ruby. Really. I appreciate this."

She rolled her eyes, tossing "Whatever," over her shoulder as she left.

oxo

For the first time Sam could ever remember, Bobby looked terrified for him. "Sam, I don't know if I can do this."

Sam closed a large hand over Bobby's shoulder reassuringly. "It's okay, Bobby." He glanced at Finn, Bobby's doctor-acquaintance, setting up a couple of monitors and some sort of portable blood-transfusion device beside the motel bed. "It'll be over before you know it."

"I've got everything I need set up. You need any help with your...spell?" Finn asked. He seemed a lot calmer than Bobby with the idea of killing Sam and bringing him back.

"Yeah, thanks." Sam handed Finn a charcoal stick and showed him the symbols they needed to draw on the floor, walls, and ceiling. Bobby was busy grinding together edelweiss, heliotrope, myrrh, angelica, and sandalwood into a powder that they'd use in a couple different ways.

The herb combination was surprisingly flammable, burning a pinkish-orange in the mortar. Bobby started the spell, walking to each of the four corners of the room, reciting the first part of the ritual, voice low. "Blackest of magic bring us blackest of night; shroud us in darkness, hidden from sight." He paused in front of the windows and doors, allowing for a heavier concentration of smoke to linger. The fire was out by the time Bobby returned to the point he'd started from. Adding just enough holy water to the ashes to create a paste, he picked up the pestle, watching silently as Finn led Sam over to the bed.

"So it's understood we'll use a combination of exsanguination and asphyxiation, yes?" Finn asked.

Sam sat and pulled his hooded sweatshirt off. "Yeah." His eyes caught Bobby's gaze and he offered a small smile of reassurance, uncertainty starting to edge in on his confidence.

Bobby crossed the room, dipped his thumb into the mortar and smeared the paste across Sam's brow, reciting sure, quiet Latin. "I could lose one or both of you tonight," he said quietly.

"Or neither of us."

"Look," Bobby's voice was rough with emotion, "you boys are the only family I've got left now."

Sam felt the sting of tears welling in his eyes. "Bobby, me and Dean feel the same way about you. And me and Dean...You understand why I've gotta do this, right?"

"If it was my brother, I'd probably do it too."

"Okay." Sam swiped the backs of his hands over his eyes and turned to Finn. "I'm ready."

"All right. Just lay back and try to relax." He tightly tied a rubber tourniquet around Sam's bicep, inserted the needle into the dark shadow of a vein in Sam's forearm and released the tourniquet as he switched on the blood transfuser. "Just breathe slow and even. Nice and deep."

Bobby felt the urge to pace, but opted to sit in the chair beside the bed, opposite Finn. His heart raced as he watched Sam die.

Finn stopped the blood transfuser from extracting any more blood, close to three pints continuing to be cycled and oxygenated in its internal chambers. He produced a triangular shaped mask from a compartment in his medical bag, and fit it over Sam's mouth and nose creating an air tight seal. "We're in the danger zone now," he told Bobby quietly, eyes focused intently on the heart monitor near Bobby.

Bobby turned his gaze to the monitor's screen, eyes flitting between the infrequent spikes of Sam's heartbeat and Sam's unmoving chest. It felt like his own heart stopped when Sam's heartbeat flatlined. He sucked in a deep breath as if trying to breathe for Sam. "Okay," he said. "Okay, bring him back."

"He told me to wait a couple minutes to make sure."

"Bring him back now."

"He's okay, Bobby."

"He's dead!"

"Just a few minutes."

The seconds stretched long and dark like evening shadows until Finn peeled the mask from Sam's nose and mouth and flipped the defibrillator on. It whirred loudly as it powered up.

"Okay. Here we go." Finn pressed a button and Sam's whole body arched up from the bed. Twice more and the line on the heart monitor was pulsing again. Finn lifted the oxygen mask from its rest on top of the tank and secured it over Sam's mouth and nose. After a couple of moments he flipped the blood transfuser back on and switched it into reverse, slowly returning Sam's blood back to his body.

"So, he's..."

"He's okay, Bobby," Finn assured. "It'll take a while longer to get him back than it did to...But he'll be fine. It's just a matter of time now."

oxo

The morning light was streaming in through a gap in the hotel curtains, falling across Sam's face and making the back's of his eyelids blood red. Even that little bit of light made his head swim and throb, which was only made worse by the shrill cry of his cell phone only moments later. Thankfully, Bobby answered it.

"Dean." The shock in that one word was somehow amplified by Bobby's hushed voice. "No, no, calm down. Dean, Sam's fine. He's okay. He's right here. Dean- calm down."

"Bobby," Sam whispered weakly, feeling tears slip from the corners of his eyes and into his hair. "Let...let me."

Bobby just nodded, handing the phone to Sam.

"Dean," he sighed.

"Sammy." The emotion in Dean's voice matched what Sam felt.

"You're alive."

"What did you do? What kind of a deal..."

"No deal, Dean. Just smarter." He licked his lips and took a deep breath before continuing. "I know you, knew there was only one way you'd make that deal."

"Sam, whatever you did, it wasn't smart. It was probably the stupidest thing you've ever done."

"Yeah, but you got me beat in the Stupidest Things Done department," Sam joked. "You can thank me later." He paused again, tears welling in his eyes once more, and his voice was even rougher when he continued. "I made you a promise, Dean. I promised I'd save you. And I had a job to do. And I'd do it, or die trying."

"Sammy."

"I promised you, Dean."

"And you kept it...Thank you." Dean scoffed. "There aren't words for how much this means, and 'thank you' doesn't seem to be enough."

"It's okay...I saved you. I saved you." He held back a sob, realizing that he could've been wrong and Dean could've been dead at that very moment. "I love you, you know? And every time...every time I'll save you."

oxoxo

fin