Title: Alone
Author: 427-67Impala
Rating: M
Warnings: Spoilers for S7 finale, limp!Dean, language.
Word count: 8,860
Setting: Immediately after 7.23

Summary: Dean is on his own in Purgatory, with just his handgun and countless hungry monsters for company, and it takes about five seconds for everything to go to hell.

A/N: I was immediately struck by the similarities between the finales of S7 and S3 - Sam in the real world, totally alone, while Dean is stuck in a different dimension with monsters. I've wanted to write some 'Dean in Hell' for a while, and it all just coalesced as I was making pancakes late on Sunday morning. :)

As we know, Sam and Dean belong to Kripke & co. - I'm just borrowing their toys...

Chapter 1

There was a rustle of wings, and Cas was just gone.

"Cas?" Dean turned around, but there was nothing but empty air where the angel had been standing two seconds earlier.

It was at this point that Dean would usually curse and complain about always having to save his own ass. As it was, the thought didn't even cross his mind - his brain was preoccupied with the fact he was now alone in Purgatory. On his own with the essence of every monster, ever. The monsters that had survived by eating the other monsters…

He looked around him, slowly. It was cold out here, but the shiver of fear that crawled down his spine like icy spiders had nothing to do with the temperature. No sudden moves, Dean, he told himself, eyes searching the forest of skeletal trees for the natives.

They were there. He saw them moving in the shadows, the yellowish not-light that bled through the clouds showing him flashes of bright red eyes and glistening teeth. Leaves rustled on the ground under countless feet, and bodies scraped against dead twigs and desiccated foliage in all directions. Something howled mournfully in the distance.

Dean did his best impersonation of a tree as he watched them, circling him - dark shapes just out of view in the trees around the clearing. He heard unsettling little chittering noises from the vicious black spines of branches above and around him, and clenched his jaw. He tried not to flinch while he imagined hungry things dropping down at him from the trees and ripping his face off.

Stay cool, Dean.

Even as he tried to control his breathing and not look like the prey animal he obviously was, Dean knew it was pointless. It's not like they didn't know he was there. Even worse, a lot of them probably even knew who he was. That was a downright scary thought; there were a lot of things running around Purgatory that would literally kill to settle up with a Winchester.

All was calm for maybe five seconds while Dean and the monsters sized each other up, and it was the longest five seconds of his life.

He was just starting to reach slowly into his jacket for his gun when the uneasy silence was broken by a bloodcurdling, inhuman yowl from the woods on his left. Dean's head snapped around to see one of those anonymous shadows leap out of the trees, all snapping teeth and raking claws, screaming at him as it sailed through the air.

He threw himself to the ground with a yelp of surprise, getting a faceful of half-rotted leaves and God knows what else as the creature - something vaguely resembling a big mountain lion with dark skin and too-long limbs - slashed at the air where he'd been standing a second before.

It landed on its feet, catlike, and spun to face the eldest Winchester with a grating shriek of a growl that sounded more like a circular saw than an animal. Dean scrabbled back over the decaying leaf litter on his backside, eyes locked on the creature, trying to put a little distance between them. His right hand reached into his jacket as he went, searching desperately for his gun.

Now that he was face-to-face with the thing, Dean realised that his first impression wasn't entirely accurate. It might be about the same size as a mountain lion, and move like one, but that was where the similarity ended.

This thing was almost entirely hairless, save a few sparse patches of coarse, off-white hair on its chest and the tips of its ears and tail. It was covered in black/grey mottled skin that looked like dry leather, stretched tight over bones that poked out from under steel-cable muscles, which gave the creature a skeletal appearance even though it must have weighed nearly 250 pounds. There were six long toes on all four of its paw-like feet, and each ended in an evil looking two-inch, scythe-like claw.

Its eyes burned into Dean, blood-red sclera with yellow irises around a black slit of a pupil. Its wide, heavy skull was held low as it regarded him, its too-wide mouth open in a snarl and full of yellow teeth that looked like they came from a frigging dinosaur. He couldn't even guess at what flavour of monster it might have been back in the land of the living.

The cat-thing crouched and then sprang at him, eyes glittering with bloodlust, foaming at the mouth and ready to tear him to ribbons. Dean got the stainless steel Colt free of his jacket just as the creature's back feet left the ground, brought it up in front of him, and shot the mutant cougar twice through the roof of its open, snarling mouth while the thing was still in midair.

He continued the momentum of the draw and rolled to his left with a grunt of effort, getting out of the creature's flight path. He heard a heavy thud on the ground behind him a second later, then a single rattling exhalation, and when he turned to look over his right shoulder he saw the cat-thing lying dead in the leaves with a ragged, bloody hole where the back of its skull had been. It had hit the ground chin-first, its muzzle ploughing a two-foot-long furrow in the forest floor before the creature's corpse finally came to a stop.

"Take that, Sylvester!" Dean gasped, enjoying the small victory as he pushed himself back into a sitting position. He couldn't help it - it always felt good to kill something that wanted to eat his face. He was under no illusions about his situation: he didn't have nearly enough bullets to even make a dent in the citizenry of Purgatory, but for a few seconds, that didn't matter. Now there was one less-

"Ow!"

Dean was snapped back to reality by a sharp, burning pain in his left hand, and he jerked it up out of the detritus with a yelp of shock. At the same time, he reflexively swung the butt of his Colt at the mangy little squirrel-like thing that had just bitten a chunk out of him. It ducked out of the way, impossibly fast, and hissed at him like a snake from between needle teeth before it shot off into a nearby tree.

Dean swore and scrambled back to his feet, Colt held ready in his right hand as he glanced down at the wound on his left. It was on the side of his hand, in the fleshy part near the base of his little finger. It was only about half an inch long and wasn't all that deep, but it still hurt and Dean winced a little as he braced his grip on the gun with the injured hand. A few drops of blood splattered on a rock by his feet.

There was another low, predatory growl from the trees on his right, and Dean spun to face the next nightmarish thing that wanted to try its luck. "Bring it on, ugly." he breathed, watching dark shapes darting around in only-slightly-darker shadows. He couldn't see anything well enough to know whether it was in fact ugly, but he figured it was a safe bet. None of these things seemed to be any prettier now than the forms they'd taken in the real world.

As he stood there, Colt grasped in steady hands and every sense on red-alert, Dean knew one thing for sure: he couldn't stay here, waiting for Cas. This clearing was too exposed, and there were too many things out there in the dark that wanted to take a bite out of him. Or worse. He'd been lucky to gank the cougar-thing, and he wasn't keen on a repeat performance. He had to go, and now.

Dean was taking a few quick glances around, trying to work out if there was such a thing as a good direction to run, when one of those dark shapes made the decision for him. It flew out of the trees in a blur of shadows, and he didn't even get a good look at it before he instinctively ducked left and took off into the trees at a dead run. The thing screeched like a bird of prey and followed him - Dean heard it coming, even over his rapid breathing and his own heartbeat in his ears.

It soon became apparent that Dean was fighting a losing battle. The thing was gaining on him. The sound of its feet on the dry leaves and the sharp pops of the branches and twigs it broke as it ran left him in no doubt. Oddly, it didn't run in a regular stride - there were quiet patches lasting a few seconds, where it only broke the odd branch. Like it was taking huge leaps periodically, or even flying.

God, that was an unsettling thought. Dean knew there was no way he could run faster than this thing could fly - if he came to open ground, with no trees to slow Tweety down, he was dead. Simple as that. He had to find a better solution than just trying to outrun it.

Gotta find a place to make a stand, Dean thought, ignoring his burning lungs. He was in good shape, but no-one can keep up a dead sprint for long.

Gotta turn around and kill it before it tears out my spine.

Dean veered off to the right, more or less randomly, and skidded to a stop behind the widest, least-rotten tree he could find. He stayed there, stock still and trying not to breathe too loud, and waited.

His injured hand throbbed dully in time with the rapid heartbeat thumping in his ears, and Dean leaned against the tree and shut his eyes as a wave of dizziness washed over him. He grimaced, remembering the noxious-looking saliva dripping from the squirrel-thing's jaws, and really really hoped this episode of vertigo was just a symptom of too much sprinting.

His eyes snapped open when he heard Tweety make the turn too, just a little beyond where he had. He took a long, steadying breath and listened to the leaves and twigs crunching as it started in his general direction - it was moving slowly now, each step almost tentative.

That's right, motherfucker. Dean smiled grimly, raising the Colt. Now who's hunting who?

Dean was concentrating so hard on tracking the flying thing's light footfalls through the pounding in his ears that he didn't notice the newcomer till it was almost upon them.

It thundered in the way he'd come, with heavy steps that reminded Dean of the resonating thud noise he'd heard rhinos make when they ran in those Discovery Channel docos. Dead leaves fluttered down around him, jostled loose by the vibrations.

The flying thing that had been chasing him let out a panicked shriek and Dean heard it try to run. It only took a handful of frantic steps before something snarled, there was a snapping of jaws, and the sound of crunching bone. There were no more light, bird-like footsteps after that - just the sound of tearing flesh as this new nightmare tore the unfortunate smaller one in half and swallowed it in only a couple of bites.

In his hiding spot behind the tree, Dean's eyes were very wide. What the hell just happened?

It was generally not a good sign when predators started getting eaten, he figured, and whatever had snacked on Tweety was huge. It had devoured its prey in seconds, and every step it took sounded like the Hulk was stomping around out there.

Dean caught his bottom lip between his teeth as he looked down at his handgun - suddenly, he really wished he'd come armed for bear. He missed his nice, big shotgun. Some deer slugs would be handy, too. Maybe a nice grenade launcher…

Or that frigging angel!

He screamed the words inside his head as loud as he could, drowning out the rapid beating of his own heart.

Cas, where the hell are you?

Dean froze as he heard the enormous creature sniffing the air, making a noise like a snuffling horse. He looked at the blood that had covered half his left hand and started to run down his arm, and swore under his breath. He didn't need the Discovery Channel to tell him predators were attracted to things like bleeding wounds. Suddenly, Dean thought he knew what the giant on the other side of the tree was smelling on the air.

Despite the lactic acid he could feel pooling in his legs and the increasing feeling of dizziness that made the slightly-blurring trees sway like belly dancers, Dean took off running again. He stole a look over his left shoulder as he went, and caught a glimpse of the thing that had been sniffing him out.

It was stone grey, covered in vast slabs of muscle, and had a heavy canine-shaped skull. While it resembled the general body shape of a horse on steroids, its front legs looked a little too long, and it was probably two feet taller at the shoulder than any nag he'd ever seen. Overall, it looked like the silhouette of an enormous hyena.

Dean stopped looking then and concentrated on running. He had a bad feeling that thing could swallow him whole, and being eaten alive Jonah-style was not on his list of things to do today.

As he ran, trying not to trip and fall while the forest swam and swayed around him, Dean heard the thing snarling as it started after him. The sound was deep and resonant, like rolling thunder, and its footfalls on the ground sounded like small earthquakes as it picked up speed.

Dean winced as a branch slashed at his cheek when he ran by, opening up the classic running-away-through-trees cut over his right cheekbone. He hadn't even seen it coming - his vision was closing in around the edges, narrowing into a black tunnel of waving trees and blurry ground. If the enormous thing thundering along behind had run up beside him, he wouldn't have seen it.

Dean was so dizzy and his vision so limited that he barely noticed when the forest ended and he ran out of the trees onto rockier ground, a mountain of sharp, craggy rocks looming up out of the gloom in front of him. He reached out to grab at a rocky outcrop as a fresh wave of dizziness hit him like a ton of bricks, and yelled out in surprise when he all but fell into a cave with a mouth not much bigger than he was.

As he stumbled to a stop and threw himself into a natural nook in the cave wall, Dean knew it was entirely possible something even worse was waiting in the cold and dark ahead of him. Even so, at this point, the unknown darkness was a better bet than the certain death that awaited him if he stayed outside. And maybe, just maybe, the small entrance would keep out the hulking, hungry thing snapping at his heels.

There was a sound like a small explosion from the mouth of the cave as the monster smashed itself against the side of the mountain trying to follow him in, and Dean's heart skipped a few beats. There was just a small avalanche of rocks though, falling from the ceiling and crashing to the dusty floor. Then, a growl of frustration from the thing as it backed away for another run.

"Come on. Come on. Just give up and leave me alone." Dean breathed - prayed, really - his eyes closed against the dizziness as he lay against the cold stone of the cave wall and listened.

If Tiny out there could smash open the mouth of the cave... well, that was game over. Dean didn't think he could get his legs under him to make another run for it; even sitting on the ground, they felt like jelly. And if by some miracle he did get up, he was dizzy and seeing double.

Yeah, Dean, you're not going anywhere. He sighed, and rubbed at his forehead with the back of the hand holding his gun.

The monster outside rammed the cave entrance again, not five metres from Dean, but only succeeded in bringing another small rockfall from the ceiling. It took a few steps back, sucking in deep, heavy breaths that sounded like someone working a set of blacksmith's bellows. Then it let out a frustrated, angry roar - a frigging roar - that reverberated around inside the cave, shaking loose more stones as it vibrated through the living rock.

Dean waited with bated breath for what seemed like an eternity, but Tiny didn't charge the cave again. He looked out around the corner of his nook, back towards the entrance, and found it mostly blocked with freshly-fallen rocks. There was only a small gap at the very top, where anaemic yellow light filtered in through the dust still suspended in the air.

He settled back into his niche and breathed a sigh of relief. If something wanted to eat him, it would have to dig him out first. And he figured anything that was small enough to get in through that small window at the top of the cave mouth would probably want to stay the hell away from Tiny, so he was pretty safe. For the time being, anyway.

Now that he had the front of the cave scoped out, Dean turned his attention to what lay beyond him. He blinked and squinted into the darkness, but couldn't tell if the cave continued on for two metres or two hundred. There was no light, no sound - no nothing. Again, probably a good thing.

"Well, looks like I'm off the menu." Dean said to himself, and set his Colt on the floor by his right hip. There was just enough light coming in over the rockfall to let him examine his aching hand, and he leaned to his left a little to get it into the light.

"What the…?" He sucked in a long, slow breath and tried to ignore his stomach as it twisted itself into knots. This was not good.

The wound wasn't a little love bite anymore. It had opened up to at least twice its original size, and the area around it was red and inflamed. The puckered edges of the wound itself were black, and dark lines of infection radiated out along the nearby veins. The little black threads had made their way to his wrist so far, and his arm was next.

"Well, that's just fucking awesome." Dean swore under his breath and stared up at the roof, trying to take some calming breaths. "Guess there's a little something extra in that little rat bastard's bite." he said, to no-one in particular. Clearly, there was venom or something in the squirrel-thing's saliva.

"So, that's how you get your food, you sneaky sonofabitch. You poison it, and wait for it to…" Dean let the sentence trail off. He swore again and chewed on his bottom lip, looking back down at his hand. Was he imagining it, or had the dark veins spread a fraction of an inch further since he last looked…?

"Cas?" Dean called, into the darkness. His voice sounded thin and strained even to his own ears. "Cas! You there?" He looked up at the roof of the cave, willing that broken frigging angel to answer him. There was no reply though, and he winced as he rested his injured hand palm-down on his left thigh. His whole arm ached now.

Damn Cas and his River Tam impersonation. Dean leaned his head wearily back against the cold stone wall. A deadly weapon that chases bees and makes organic fucking sandwiches...

Dean's stomach growled at that thought. I could go for a sandwich. Hell, he could eat the whole pig - he was starving. To make matters worse, his head was starting to throb with what promised to be a splitting headache. It pulsed in time with the dull throb in his hand.

"Why is it that every time me and Sam save the frigging world, one of us ends up in hell?" Dean demanded of the empty darkness. The only difference between Purgatory and Hell, as far as Dean could see, was the lack of torture. Both places were full of monsters, of one variety or another, and the colour scheme was approximately the same.

Crowley said Purgatory was 'Hell-adjacent', so that makes sense, I guess. The temperature was pretty similar, too, and Dean shivered and pulled his legs up against his body.

Maybe Hell was a smidgeon colder… but, as for the torture, maybe you just haven't found the right monster here yet. He shuddered again, but this time it was nothing to do with the cold. Then again, if that wound on his hand kept going downhill like this, he wasn't going to have to worry about what special skills and inclinations the denizens of Purgatory might have.

"Come on, Cas." He sighed, wrapping his arms around his body. His eyes suddenly felt very heavy, and they started to flutter shut.

"I'm in a cave at the bottom of the mountain." he added, as an afterthought - just in case Cas needed a hand getting around the Enochian chicken scratch on his ribs.

Vaguely, in the back of his mind, Dean knew he should try and stay awake. This drowsiness was just a side-effect of the venom, and he'd need to be awake when Cas popped back in to get him…

Hey, maybe he'll even bring Sam.

That thought brought a little smile to his face.

It'd be nice to see Sammy.

Dean knew, if he were here, Sam would be telling him to stay awake.

Would probably be slapping me across the face right about now.

Not such a bad idea, really.

His instincts screamed at him to wake up, and Dean's right hand twitched a little.

He slipped into unconsciousness before he could even finish lifting it out of his lap.

Cas, obviously, isn't just going to leave Dean in Purgatory. Sam, either. I love the Dean/Cas dynamic, but I want more Sam, and if the writers won't give it to me then I'll do it myself ;) Stay tuned!

And as always - I'm a review junkie... Please support my habit and tell me what you thought. *smiles sweetly*