I own nothing.
Dean is fifteen years old and he is free. Or, at least, partly free. It is the first time their father has left them alone for more than a month and it's his job to look after eleven year old Sam. But it is freedom enough that Dean can sit back, relax and enjoy the life of a pseudo-orphan.
"Don't you get sick of it?" Dean looks up from the gun he is cleaning – the first gun John ever trusted to him – and glances at Sam with a raised eyebrow.
"What do you mean?" he asks curiously, letting the hammer slide back into place as he sets the gun down on the bedside table. Sam shakes his head, dropping the TV remote and turning so that he can look straight at Dean.
"Dad's orders," the younger boy responds. Dean cocks his head to the side now, lips pursed as he waits for Sam to continue. The boy thinks for a moment then shakes his head. "We're like soldiers, Dean. I can't even tell you the last time I had a conversation with dad that didn't involve some type of monster or gun quiz." Dean laughs now, unaware of how serious his sibling wants the conversation to be as he throws his head back and chuckles.
"What d'ya expect, Sammy?" The younger boy looks away, hiding the flush on his cheeks and the anger in his eyes. "We're not exactly the Brady Bunch, yeah, but that's because we know what's out there." Sam clicks his tongue angrily and jumps up from the bed, pacing towards the door. "What, do you want to go run off and live with your little buddy Marcus?" In later years, neither Dean nor Sam can remember who or what Marcus is. At the time, he is Sam's best friend – Sam's connection to normal. "You want the normal life and the bright, shiny parents? You want daddy to huddle us into a corner and protect us from the scary monsters all our lives?" Sam turns to the window, his shoulders hunched angrily.
"Don't talk to me like I'm five," he commands broodingly. Dean shakes his head, rubbing his bottom lip before even thinking of what he wants to say to his little brother.
Finally, he stands up and crosses over to where Sam is glaring out the motel window. Clapping a hand on the boys shoulder, he shakes him. "Come on, man," he says after a beat. "We're not like other families, you know that."
Sam raises a hand to brush across his face, trying to hide the tears that Dean pretends he doesn't notice. "I know." The voice is water-logged and angry. Dean bites his bottom lip and nudges his brother again gently.
"Come on, man."
"Come on, Dean," the Sam that is not Sam is saying, arms spread and inviting. They are much older now, and far past complaining about their Father's antics to each other in a broken down motel room. Now they stand at opposite sides of the room, Sam with open arms and Dean with clenched fists. Yes, they are far past all of that.
"Shut up," the older brother growls. It's his voice that is water-logged now, his face that he has to brush tears from. The creature on the other side of the room laughs, a cruel mockery of his baby brother. "Sammy, if you're in there-"
"He's not, Dean," the thing interjects with Sam's voice. Dean winces and shakes his head, his tongue licking away the saltwater that has collected on his lips.
"If you're in there," he continues despite the smirk on its face. "I'm sorry." He lunges forward and the smirk turns into a grin.
Dean is seventeen years old, reading up on John's latest case while waiting for the call that will give their next instructions. Sam sits across the room at fourteen, throwing a tennis ball against the wall and catching it. The rhythm of it pounds against Dean's skull, but he has enough trouble with focusing on the reading; if he stops to yell at Sam he knows he'll never get it done. And then John'll be pissed.
Thwump. Thwack.
The corner of Dean's lip begins to twitch and he rubs his hand against the side of his head, trying to ignore the fact that he has now read the same line five times.
Thwump. Thwack.
He bites his bottom lip and grabs a sheet of paper to underline the lines he is reading, hoping to concentrate. It is not working.
Thwump. Thwack.
He slams the book shut and throws it onto the table. "Sammy!" The younger boy looks up, startled. The ball he has just tossed against the wall comes flying back and knocks him in the temple.
"Son of a bitch," he groans, rubbing his head and tossing the ball aside with an angry pout. "What?" His anger is now directed at Dean; good, because Dean is pissed at him too.
"Will you just shut up for a little bit so I can get this done?" Even as he says it, he knows that it is wrong to be angry at Sam. They're both going stir crazy here, locked in a motel room for what seems like months while their dad roams free, looking for a creature that hunts down brothers.
Sam rolls his eyes and sits back against the wall, banging his head backwards and groaning out in annoyance. "Don't you ever get tired of being Daddy's little bitch?" he growls out. Dean pauses in mid-reach for the book on the table and his hand shifts from a searching palm into a clenched fist.
He turns his head slowly to look at his brother, his jaw clenched and his eyebrows drawn down. "You wanna run that by me one more time?" Sam looks back at him, his own jaw set and his shoulders straightened in his anger.
"You heard me," he answers shortly. Dean stands up fast enough to topple the chair he was sitting in, but he ignores that as he advances on Sam. The younger sibling jumps up as well, and - even though he is the younger one – he is able to match Dean's height.
"You have no idea, do you?" Dean demands, tilting his head to the side and pushing Sam back a step. "You're the reason why we're out on the road all the time, Sammy. You're the reason we can't go home. And, big surprise, you're so focused on yourself that you don't notice."
Sam clenches his jaw and steps forward, his hands are clenched into tight fists and his arms are already reedy with muscles to come. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Dean laughs, a harsh chuckle that he somehow manages to spit into Sam's face.
"It was your damn nursery," he tells the boy, unflinchingly cruel. "You ever think that maybe – just maybe – if you hadn't existed, mom'd be alive right now?" Sam takes a step back, as if Dean had physically slapped him, but Dean hasn't moved at all. "We're out here because of you, Sammy, and you have the nerve to complain about Dad's method of raising us?" Sam turns around but Dean won't take that as an answer; the feelings have always been there, the angry lies that he knows aren't true but it feels so good to finally say them out loud. "If it weren't for you-" selfish, so selfish "-dad wouldn't have to raise me this way. You-"
Sam wheels around and his fist connects with Dean's face. Like a true hunter, his punch is powerful and at fourteen he is able to knock his older brother back a couple steps. "It's not true!" he growls, throwing another fist and biting back tears. "It's not my fault!" Dean can't react; he knows that his words were empty, hurtful, so he stands and takes fist after fist. He lets his little brother beat him down, waiting until the fists stop and the tears are all that Sam can manage.
"Sammy," Dean breathes after Sam's punches get weaker and weaker. "Sammy!" The younger boy drops his hands, falling to his knees. Without missing a beat, Dean has his little brother in his arms and is rocking him back and forth. They're both crying.
It is the first time Sam has ever hit Dean, the first time they've even come close to an all out fist fight. And it feels wrong; it feels like they're breaking already. But they can't; Dean needs Sam too much to let them break over something this stupid. Over little lies developed in a stir crazy mind.
So he holds onto his little brother tight, letting tears coarse down his cheeks as he listens to Sam sob. "Sammy, I'm sorry," Dean whispers. He holds on tight, so tight that it is years before he even starts to think of being able to let go.
His fist lands a blow and its head cocks back, a guttural cry of pain coming from the six foot four behemoth as it stumbles back a couple steps. Without waiting for him to recover, Dean descends – fists first – on the thing that used to be his little brother.
They've come so far from those motel rooms without their father. They've fallen from grace, from the times of forgiveness and the petty little arguments. It's been months since they've had an exchange of "bitch" "jerk". It feels wrong to Dean, it feels like breaking. But he can force through it just a little bit longer; he can bite the bullet and get his job done. Because it's not his little brother anymore. It's not anything remotely human.
"D-Dean," the thing chokes out, holding up hands to fend off the blows. He doesn't hear anything, just the pounding of blood in his ears as punch after punch hits flesh. "You need him, Dean." Another fist fall, another spray of blood, this time followed by a cackle. "You need him too much."
He hesitates now, a fist at the thing's throat and the other cocked back, ready to descend. Staring into dark eyes, he catches a brief glimpse of what was – a glimpse of Sammy. Then the thing smiles, a bloodied wide smile. "Not anymore." The fist descends and his little brother is knocked unconscious.
As he stands up, he notices how hard he is crying. Crying for what he's lost, for what they've lost. Somewhere along the way, Sammy stopped being Sammy. They stopped being brothers. He's been wanting so hard – sacrificing so much - for the old Sammy to come back that he never noticed the truth.
His father once told him that he'd have to find a way to save Sammy. Save him or kill him. It is four years late, a deal with a crossroads demon late, an Apocalypse late, but Dean finally sees what his father was telling him. He grips the handle of his gun, aims, and blows away what's left of his family.