PSA: Guys, you should already be reading Boogeyman, by Caladrius. But if you are not! The stories of this Season 9 consider that story to be canon, and this chapter of this episode in particular references elements of that story. IF you want to understand Dean's issue with "planes crap," go read Boogeyman. If you don't care about Dean's issue with "planes crap," go read Boogeyman anyway. Go read Boogeyman, because it's awesome.

We now return you to your (ir)regularly scheduled fic.

Lustra: A Supernatural Season 9 AU
Episode 902
"Hangman, Turn Your Head Awhile"

Chapter One

PREVIOUSLY, on Supernatural:

"Well that was a bust," Dean said, scrubbing his hand over his face. So, an angel couldn't help Sam. Or, at least this one couldn't. Great.

"Indeed," came a voice from near the kitchen.

Dean was out of his chair in an instant, already reaching for the gun he knew wasn't tucked into his waistband. This was supposed to be a safe place, dammit. On the far side of the room, Sam spun and pushed Kevin behind him, gasping for breath at the movement, but battle-ready, demon blade out.

Death watched them a moment, amused, apparently, then swept into the room. "Looking for miracles again, I see." He narrowed his eyes at Sam across the room, then smiled brightly at Dean. "Lucky for you, I have a favor to ask."

NOW:

"How did you get in here?"

"Dean," Death said, smiling. "There's nowhere I can't get into. I'm Death." He looked around the bunker appraisingly, nodding around like he was all pleased they'd gotten such a good sturdy hidey hole. "Sam. Please."

Sam heaved breaths over there at the far wall just in front of the stairs leading down, knife out, but at Death's patient reminder, he dropped the knife to his side and stood up out of his fighting stance, looking embarrassed to have drawn down on the Big Guy himself.

"That's better. Oh, Castiel," Death said, nodding at Cas who'd fled into the corner with Lethaniel. "Nice to see you again. Don't worry." Death smiled cheerfully. "Not here to swat you. Not yet, anyway."

"What are you doing here?" Dean said.

"Cutting right to the chase, are we? I'm here to help Sam, of course."

Dean looked back at Sam to shrug at him, but Sam was already frowning at him in accusation.

"Dean? What did you do."

"Nothing, what, Jesus."

"Yeah, right." Sam looked at Death. "Whatever he promised you, don't do it. It isn't worth it."

Death chuckled softly. "Well now, aren't you just a ball of sunshine. Dean didn't promise me anything, Sam. I told you. I need a favor. Is someone going to get me a nice cold drink, or-"

"I got it!" Kevin said, fleeing through the war room and into the kitchen in record time and leaving Sam stranded.

"Kevin-!" Dean hissed, but Sam seemed to be angry enough that he could walk himself more or less steadily back to the table and slam into a chair like he was sixteen and pissed at Dean for breathing.

"You don't seem like you believe me, Sam," Death said.

"That's not it." Sam shook his head and spared the angels cowering in the corner a dirty look. "I just want to be left alone for like... several years. That's all."

Death pressed his lips together and strolled around the conference room, inspecting old Men of Letters paraphernalia hanging on the walls. "And who could blame you. But the fact is, we can help each other, or I wouldn't be here."

"What do you need?" Sam and Dean said together. Sam made a face at Dean, but Dean grinned and Death chuckled.

"I need you to find someone for me."

"What is it?" Dean asked. "Spirit or something corporeal?"

Sam rolled his eyes and Dean's singsong tone as he pronounced the word. "Isn't finding someone a little below your pay grade?" Sam said.

"Usually," Death agreed. "But the man I'm looking for has some special protection."

"Protection. Against you?" Dean said. "Great. Definitely sounds like someone we wanna tangle with. Kevin, a couple of beers while you're at it!"

"It's not so much dangerous as it is simply... impossible for me to do myself. Come on, Dean. I heard somewhere that you'd do anything for your brother."

"Yeah." Dean regarded Death. He seemed easy-going, relaxed. Just wandering around waiting for his frosty beverage. But the fact was, this thing was older than dirt, older than God, and hadn't seemed thrilled with them last time they'd all been in a room together. "About that. I thought you said one wall per customer."

Sam relaxed into his chair, slouched down, stared at the table. Dean knew he was listening because he had his thoughtful eyebrows pinched together like he was solving some complicated word math or something, even if he tried to look like he could care less.

Death smiled benignly in Sam's direction and Dean wondered briefly if Death somehow had a pain in the ass little brother too. "I'm sure we can work something out."

"What's the job," Sam said, still staring at the table.

"I need you to find Enoch."

Dean frowned. Sam actually looked up, those working brows high over wide eyes.

"Enoch. Guy who never died, Biblical Enoch?" he said.

"Got it in one."

"Why?"

Death shrugged. "Pride?" He turned to them as Kevin was coming into the room juggling a glass of something and a couple of beers and a whiskey for himself. Dean took both beers and slid one across the table to Sam.

"Pride?" Sam scoffed.

"Take this as a compliment, please," Dean half-prayed, "but you seem kinda... above pride."

Death pressed his lips into a line. "Professional pride then, if you like," he suggested. "Everyone dies, Dean."

Sam laughed derisively. "I'll believe that when I see it."

Dean waggled his eyebrows insistently at Sam, but Sam didn't seem to care that he was taunting the guy who promised to end them the next time they asked for help.

Death, however, merely smiled again at the petulant thirty-year-old grown-ass-man like he was a child up past bedtime, like he might give Sam a little rough affectionate noogie on his way out or pinch his cheeks or something. "My number's in your phones. Give me a call if you have questions or want to give me a progress report."

"Wait. We haven't said we'll do this," Sam said.

Dean frowned. "Of course we'll do it, are you nuts?"

"Yeah, any day now, apparently. But Dean, we can't keep making deals like this. You know how this goes."

Dean stood, flexing his hands into fists in frustration. "Sam, goddammit, we don't have a lot of options."

Death smiled kindly. "Sam's right. You can't keep throwing yourself into deals like this. Luckily, I'm completely trustworthy. I have absolutely no desire to meddle in the machinations of the things that want to rule this little planet. And if I didn't genuinely like you both, you'd have been smears on the walls after the last time we met. I have absolutely no reason to lie to you. This will probably be the safest deal you've ever negotiated."

"You're Death," Sam pointed out.

Death smiled again. "Well-spotted."

Sam, at the end of his ability to bitch, looked to Dean for support, and while Dean agreed with him in spirit or on principle or whatever, the fact was, Dean would do anything, remember, to save Sam's life.

"Tick tick tick," Death prompted. "I'm afraid Sam's going to go downhill fast this time."

"We're in," Dean said. Sam was staring at Death, face white at the casual assertion that he wasn't long for these unpadded walls. But he recovered himself at Dean's agreement and opened his mouth to find something else he could complain about, and Dean held up a hand. "We're in and that's final. You need this guy's coordinates or what?"

Death shrugged. "Bring me whatever you can find. I'll be in touch."

He sauntered into the library, and when Dean poked his head through to check, the tall gaunt man was gone.

"Looks like we're not completely out of options after all," Dean said.

"This is a terrible idea," Sam complained.

Kevin skirted the table double fisting Death's soda and his own whiskey and said, "That was Death?"

"Yeah," Dean said with a sigh, "We've got... history."

"Okay, ready for the data dump?"

"I love it when you do all the work." Dean leaned back in his chair, pushing away from the books and dust, and spread his arms to the sides to stretch. "Hit me."

Sam came fully into the room reading from a book. Three more cradled his book of choice, each open to pages Sam had apparently thought were important. He looked better, less pale, was walking on his own, and books were heavy. Dean sipped from his beer and soaked in the rare moment when Sam was more or less healthy and totally in his element.

"We know Enoch was a Biblical figure favored by God. He didn't die, was 'taken'-"

"Whatever that means."

"Right, no, exactly," Sam said, shuffling to another book. "In the original Greek, the verb does mean taken, but it also means raised, ascended."

"So he's in Heaven?"

"I don't think so. Death would probably know that."

"So... where then?"

"Okay. So first I thought... another plane - Dean-"

Dean was already throwing his hands up. "More planes crap, Sammy-"

"Dean that was like, seven years ago, okay, and-"

"If you start talking math at me again, I swear to God Sam-"

"Would you just calm down?"

Dean cast his eyes to the skies and shook his head. "Fine. You think this Enoch guy is on another plane?"

Sam struggled only a moment to get the books down to the table without dropping them all. Dean let him struggle, because Sam gave him that bitchy look whenever he thought Dean was mothering him too much, and if he wanted to be a brat, he could just keep dropping things. That was fine with Dean. If he wanted to keep going pale and breathing hard just because he needed to carry half the library into the war room all by himself, fine. So what if he fell into his chair rather than sit like a normal person, so what if his hands shook. Dean rolled his eyes.

Sam blew out a shaky breath, focused on the task at hand. "I'm not sure. It's an idea."

"Okay," Dean said, eyeing the rest of the books. "Well, I am sure you didn't bring me an entire library just to support this 'maybe planes' thing."

"No," he said, clipped. He scanned the pages of half a dozen open books, in addition to the three he'd just plopped down as he spoke. "Enoch was the father of Methuselah-"

"Nine hundred year old witch, right."

"Dad thought he was a witch. Other accounts just say he was favored by God."

"Wonder what that feels like."

Sam didn't look up from his book. "Well, we do seem to not-die a lot."

"Good point. Anyway, Metamucil-"

"Methuselah. Not a witch. The Biblical accounts say that Enoch was beloved by God, who didn't want him to have to suffer death. So if God let Enoch live for so long, maybe he extended that favor to Methuselah because he didn't want Enoch to have to grieve his son."

"But Methuselah did die," Dean pointed out.

"Yeah, right before the flood."

Dean raised a brow at Sam's what isn't clear about this face. "So?"

"Methuselah was Noah's grandfather, and his name literally means 'when he dies, judgment.' He dies, Noah and his family are the only people saved from a flood. Basically, Apocalypse the First." Sam looked at Dean, mouth open to say something. Then he snapped it shut, visibly resituated himself within his research, and frowned at another page.

"Spit it out, Sam," Dean said.

"Nothing. Nevermind."

Dean rolled his eyes. "So what makes Enoch so special?"

Sam shrugged that smartass how do you not know this? shrug. "Maybe because he invented Enochian?"

Dean frowned. "Like. Enochian Enochian?"

"Yeah. Like, angel language, unknown and unknowable to humans unless they're prophets."

"You think Enoch was a prophet?"

Sam sighed heavy and shrugged. "Who knows. Practically anyone who could do math and read stars was considered a prophet back then." Sam flipped his books shut and leaned back in his chair, massaged his eyes with the heels of his hands.

"So then what do we do?"

"I don't know, Dean. Give up because it's a lost cause and also, newsflash, it's a terrible idea?"

"Saving your life is a terrible idea?"

"Yeah," Sam shot back. "Maybe it is."

"Save the dramatics, okay. Just tell me what else you found out-"

Sam looked up at him then. "Nothing. I stopped looking."

"What?"

"Maybe you didn't hear what I just said. Flood. Apocalypse. Ring a bell? Dean-"

"So you just brought all this crap in here to what, prove a point?"

"I'm just saying, we know Death wants Enoch for some other reason than just pride, right?"

"Well, obviously-"

"Yes. Obviously. And whatever it is, it's probably not good, and we're probably playing right into his hands, or someone's hands, and it's probably a big mistake to help him, and there goes the world all over again."

"Sam-"

Sam looked up at him. "You think it's the right choice because you're the one making it. If it was me, you know you'd be questioning it, you'd be questioning me. So don't give me this attitude, okay? I don't have the energy to fight about it."

"Then stop fighting, Sam. Just let me do this. I don't care if this plays into some big evil plan. I don't care if the world goes to shit. I'm not letting you go through this again. If I can fix it-"

"Dean." Sam lowered his eyes to the books in front of him. "I don't want to be responsible for the end of the world again. Please - please don't do that to me."

"Sam, Jesus-"

"I'm just saying. If it turns out that saving my life this time results in... whatever, some big world-ending plan, then..."

"Then what?"

"It won't matter that you saved my life." Sam looked up at him.

Dean swallowed, mouth dry. Sam wasn't over this teen dramacide thing, and Dean hadn't really paid attention to those afterschool specials, but he was hoping it'd be as simple as "tell him he's pretty and everything will be fixed." He should have known better.

"I'll just have to make sure the world doesn't end, then," Dean said.

Sam laughed. "Cuz that's worked for us in the past," he said. "Listen. I know you want to help. But this is it for me, okay? I'm tired, man. I'm done. I'm done."

"You're done when I say you're done," Dean said. "Come on, we're going."

"Where?"

"To get clues, info, whatever. Get you out among the living."

Sam sighed again. He put his hands on the table, stared at it and looked so tired and just finished with everything. "No, Dean- Just. No. I'm not going anywhere."

"Yes you are."

Sam smiled. "You can't make me, Dean. We aren't kids anymore."

He'd gone to bed shortly after. Checked on Crowley, chatted uneasily with Cas after panic sounded alarms in his head - no, Cas, it's okay, you're not falling, you're not to blame - and he wasn't sure he'd ever get used to being prayed to. Kevin tried to get his attention, but he could see Dean's fingerprints all over that and so Sam waved him off with a vague excuse about needing sleep.

And he had needed sleep. Because there at the edges was a voice telling him what was real and what wasn't, and it wasn't a voice he could trust.

But he was fairly certain that he'd gone to bed in his own actual bed, and not the passenger seat of the Impala.

He blinked blearily. Out of the window, there were evergreens and morning-blue sky and a couple of roadside shops that looked like houses. He peered out; before and behind them stretched the road, some long indeterminate stripe on the landscape. In the backseat, his backpack.

Sam blinked down at his watch, his head swerved dangerously.

Oh. Goddammit.

The driver's side door creaked open.

"Morning sunshine!" Dean cheered.

"Dean, what-" Sam tried to - punch Dean? Flip him off? Smack him limply in the arm? Instead of doing any of that, he lurched half into the driver's seat and the world spun.

"Whoa whoa, easy fella," Dean said, and a moment later he was reaching in to resettle Sam against the passenger door. He reached back up again and when he slammed the door shut a moment later, he was in the driver's seat, two coffees in hand. He fit one of them into Sam's limp grip. "Drink up. You'll feel better."

"You kimmapme." Woo his lips felt flappy. He blinked hard.

"Yep."

"Deam. This is ams... absurb... s'dumb."

"Sam. Drink. Caffeine'll help." Dean turned the key in the ignition and the Impala flared to life.

Sam drank, on autopilot. Because even if he was being kidnapped by his own brother, coffee was a must in the morning. When the cup was half empty and his mouth seemed like it would obey him, he tried again.

"Dean."

"Good job."

"This is ridiculous."

"Yeah, but I won't hold it against you."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Where are we even going?"

"Boston."

"What's in Boston?"

"John Winthrop's grave."

Sam sighed. Dean in this mood was infuriating. "Who's John Winthrop?"

"The guy John Dee hid his missing journal with."

"John Dee?"

"Yeah, he was the last guy known to speak Enochian-"

"I know."

"You did?"

Sam leaned his head back against the headrest. "Yeah. John Dee, 16th century alchemist who communed with 'angels' to write down Enochian."

"Asshole. It took me like two hours to find that out."

"You should've just googled it. What's the Winthrop connection?"

"You coming around?"

Sam shook his head and looked out of the passenger side window. "Just making conversation. So?" He peered at Dean when he didn't answer. Dean glanced at him and back at the road, uneasy. "Dean?"

"I might have... asked John Dee."

Sam drew his brows together. "Ouija? Dean-"

"Lay off, Grumpy. I didn't summon a demon or something, Jesus." He shook his head. "I just made a guess he might still be hanging around haunting something, dusted off the old spirit-talker. Get off your high horse, Sam. It's not like you never used one."

"I was trying to talk to you, Dean, and you weren't dead."

"Well I wouldn't have had to use it at all if you were with me on this, Sam!"

"If you'd just honor my wishes-"

"Goddammit, Sam, you're not dead! I don't have to honor shit!"

Sam stopped. Whatever remark he'd readied in retaliation died on his tongue.

"Just help me think through this, okay?" Dean said, calming. "John Dee said he found a key to something, something about a ... an eternal walk - I don't know. I can't read that ancient crap."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Renaissance era is hardly 'ancient.' Wait. 'Eternal walk?' Like-"

"Like maybe he was looking for Enoch too? Yeah."

Sam closed his eyes against a sudden bout of nausea he hoped was caused by the sleeping pill he suspected Dean had slipped him. "You said you found evidence of a missing journal?"

"Yeah, something with the key in it, or... something. I got it all back there for you to sort through."

"So, we're driving to Boston on a hunch, basically."

"Basically."

"Okay." Sam pulled out his phone and dialed. When the other end picked up, he said: "Hey Crowley. I need you to come get me."

Dean frowned and jerked the car to the side of the road.

"No can do, Moosie. Can't find you."

"What do you mean you can't find me," Sam said, giving Dean's driving a dirty look.

"You'll never find it," Dean said, and Sam rolled his eyes.

"Yeah," he said to Crowley. "Hex bag. Try Dean."

Dean stared at Sam and mouthed dude, betrayal in his face. Crowley appeared in the back seat.

"You rang for car service, Moose?"

"Yeah. Let's go."

Crowley looked over at Dean, clearly confused. Sam got out of the car, frowned at the untied shoes on his sockless feet. Gross. Dean got out of the driver's side to complain, But Sam cut him off. "I told you, Dean. I'm done." He wrenched the back door open to grab for his backpack. "Crowley, home, now."

Crowley climbed out of the car and twisted his mouth at Dean in accusation. He started for Sam, but Dean lurched forward.

"Wait! Wait, Crowley. Don't. Hear me out."

"Dean," Sam started.

"I'm trying to save your life, Sam. Crowley, wait. Wait. Sam's got this death wish, okay. But I can save him."

"From this mystery ailment," Crowley spat.

"Yes," Dean said.

Sam frowned. He tried not to be surprised no one had told Crowley about Lucifer. But whether he was hurt by it or grateful, he didn't know. Either way, he didn't want- Don't do it, Dean. Don't-

But Dean took a breath and Sam knew-

"It's Lucifer. In his head. And if we don't do this, he'll die. He'll die, Crowley. But first, he'll suffer."

Crowley looked at Sam, brows up over his dark eyes. Oh yes, Crowley knew of the cage, at least enough to have once fooled them all into thinking he'd been the one to pull Sam out. But Sam doubted even King of Hell Crowley had seen the thing, the vastness, the cantilevered, inverted, perverted, unknowable geometry of it. It was so isolated, situated in the cold, dead center of Hell, eternity up and down and to all sides, suspended in void and unapproachable by demon or angel alike who wasn't meant to be there (which means you, Sammy, oh that means we were meant to be-).

And then Dean slammed his fist into the roof of the car hard enough to bang Sam out of his own head and Sam jumped and gasped and Crowley's concerned frown deepened.

Dean gestured at him as evidence, and Sam tried to calm his breathing, because the last thing he wanted was to give Dean ammunition. But Dean got his ammunition anyway, and slapped the roof of the Impala again and Sam jumped and leaned against the open door to keep himself upright -

"He'll suffer, and he'll relive it, and nothing we do will help, and then he'll die, unable to even recognize us, to tell reality from hallucination."

Sam felt his heart quicken against his will. To have it spelled out - well it didn't change anything. "Dean-" he rasped, dry-mouthed.

Crowley started for him again, grasped him at the shoulder and pulled him close. Reality blurred just the slightest, a head rush, and in the far far distance, he could hear Dean calling out his name and Crowley's name, and Sam's breath heaved in his ear, his blood rushed in his ear, and Crowley's voice, in his ear:

"I'm sorry, Moose. I'm with Squirrel on this one."

And then the hand was gone, and Sam was falling forward to brace himself on the car, catching his breath, and Dean was saying, "Guess you're stuck with me, bitch," and pushing him back into the passenger seat of the Impala.

How had he ever thought he'd have a choice in anything?

Sam woke with a start when Dean put the car into park, which was okay by Dean, because for the last three hours, he'd been a twitchy, gaspy mess in the passenger seat. More than once, Dean had checked his heart rate without him waking to find it rapid and loud, and his skin was clammy. Dean felt vaguely terrible for dragging him out in just his tee shirt and sweats.

"Gas," he said when Sam raised a brow at him in pissiness.

"Right. How long was I out?"

"If you call that 'out,' then about six hours." Dean switched the engine off and looked out at the pump rather than watch Sam rub drool from his face and pretend to be wide awake and lucid and well. "I packed you some clothes, if you want to change."

Sam twisted mid-yawn, arms in the air, to reach for his backpack in the back of the car. "Thanks," he said. "Want anything to eat or..."

"Road snacks? Thought you weren't on board with this-"

"Still gotta eat, Dean. Or are you planning to stop nagging me about that?"

"Nope, still nagging. Get me some Ho Hos." Dean pulled the credit card from his wallet to pay for gas and tossed the billfold to Sam. "And get yourself somethin' pretty."

"Ha ha." Sam caught it and promised to be back in a few minutes, and Dean watched him go, a gangly scrawny dude in shoes slipped onto his feet without socks, hair everywhere, tottering a little every few steps, and he thought I want my goddamn brother back.

But then Sam was inside getting the key for the men's room and buying Ho Hos and probably generic cardboard treats that hopefully didn't taste like rotting meat - because ew - and Dean turned to the pump to put gas in his baby.

He ran his hand down her rear fin, the gentle slope of it, and he missed her. For years she'd been his home, his and Sam's, and now that they had the bunker, she sat outside like a discarded thing. And while he loved his new bed, obviously, there was something about being on the road again with Sammy and their home on four wheels that the bunker couldn't replace.

Dean filled the tank and mulled over covered garage options for his baby while Sam did his crap, brushed his teeth, spent a million years in front of the mirror poking at his hopeless bed head, until that just wasn't going to play any more. Dean screwed the gas cap back on and reseated the nozzle at the pump, priming himself to drag his sorry brother out and back on the road, and if he was calling Crowley again, for the love of-

But when Dean opened the door to the mini mart, he was met with guns pointed at him, and shouts ringing out:

"FBI! Don't move!"