for wolfpup
Our True Selves
K Hanna Korossy
Sam was doing it again.
The startled, anxious glances at Dean, those he was used to. After the Trickster had kicked his big brother off for six months, Sam had done the same thing for weeks after, afraid Dean wasn't really there, that his return was a dream, forgetting sometimes Dean was back. That, Dean had been expecting.
But the feeling-up-the-car thing, that was new. Well, okay, not exactly new: he remembered Sammy doing that sometimes after Dad had been gone for a while, like the kid was reacquainting himself with home. He'd done it again after Jess had died, trying to ground himself, maybe, find some kind of connection after losing almost everything. But that had been a very long three years before, and Sam had stayed with the car this time, kept her even when he'd lost the rest of his family. So this ritual, now, had thrown Dean a little at first.
Until the third time—okay, Dean was a little slow—Sam had automatically headed for the driver's side before catching himself, and Dean finally realized his little brother may have had the car, but he hadn't been in the passenger seat in four and a half months. He'd gone even longer with the Trickster, true, but he'd never accepted Dean was dead then, never claimed the driver's side as his own. That relocation was bound to take some getting used to.
Dean didn't point it out, however. Just like how Sam never mentioned that Dean didn't like to sleep in total darkness anymore. No heart-to-heart would help, and Winchesters just dealt and moved on. So Dean played his music extra loud, made himself ramble more than usual, and hoped it would help heal what was broken in his brother. And maybe, by extension, Dean, who didn't remember the time he'd been gone but felt the distance nonetheless.
Sam's phone rang in the middle of Dean's ruminations on why raccoons seemed to make up the highest percentage of roadkill. Dean just cocked an eyebrow as Sam dug his phone out and peered at the screen like it was in Swahili. He kinda thought Sam hadn't been answering his phone a lot those last months, either. When he spoke, it was with vocal chords rusty with disuse.
"It's Tamara."
Huh, he hadn't been expecting that. Dean canted his head and shamelessly listened in as Sam answered the call.
"Yeah…Yeah, he is…" Then, impassively, he was reaching the phone to Dean. "She wants to talk to you."
Dean accepted the phone with a frown. Last time he'd had any contact with Tamara had been over a year before, when they'd watched her salt-and-burn Isaac's body. Losing her husband had apparently turned her into Super Hunter—kinda like someone else Dean knew—and all he'd heard of her since was rumors of an impressive series of kills. The three of them had traded phone numbers initially and Dean had encouraged her to call if she needed, but she hadn't done so…until now.
"Hey, Tamara."
"Dean." Her British-cool voice was an unwelcome reminder of Bela and about as friendly. "I hear a 'welcome back' is in order."
He'd gotten a few calls like this, but all from people he'd at least nominally considered friends. How had Tamara even known he'd been gone? A glance at Sam revealed nothing but mild curiosity on his brother's face, though, so Dean turned his attention back to the phone. "Yeah, well, you know what they say, can't keep a good man down."
"Indeed." There was an unusual hesitation, then, "Bobby says you're in my corner of the country these days."
Even weirder. Dean glanced around, looking for signs. Sometimes he wasn't sure what state he was in, when exactly he'd crossed boundaries. "Uh…yeah, if the middle of nowhere counts."
"Georgia?"
"Something like that. Why, need help on a job?"
"Not exactly. I was…hoping perhaps I could buy you a drink. Just…talk."
Oh. He softened involuntarily. He knew what it was like losing both your last family and your hunting partner, and had offered her a listening ear when she was ready. He was kinda glad she'd finally taken him up on it. Dean's mouth quirked."I never refuse a drink from a beautiful woman."
Beside him, Sam rolled his eyes, which just made this all the better.
"Here," Dean continued, "I'm gonna give the phone back to Sam—tell him when and where, and we'll be there."
"No offense, Dean, but I was hoping to talk to just you. I, erm, I'd rather not—"
Funny, Sam used to be the empathetic one everyone felt more comfortable opening up to. Of course, Tamara wasn't just anyone, and if the lady didn't want to bare her feelings to more than one person, well, Dean understood that. There were only two people alive in his life whom he trusted enough for that, himself. "No problem. Sam's a gigantic buzzkill anyway." That earned him a classic Sammy scowl that almost made Dean grin. "Just give him the details, okay? I'll meet you tonight."
Sam glared but took the phone and dug out a pen and his notebook. He was terse as he took down directions, then said goodbye and put his phone away. "Sounds like it's about two hours from here."
Dean nodded. "Okay."
Sam looked over at him. "She wants to see you alone?"
He shrugged. "I don't get the feeling she shares too often. Probably easier doing it with just one person instead of two." He glanced back at Sam. "It's not like we're all old friends."
"Yeah, that's another thing—why you? I mean, I'm sure she and Isaac hunted with others, like Bobby. Why not talk to someone she knows better?"
Dean hitched his shoulder again. It felt funny without the pull of the old bullet wound and burn. "Sometimes it's easier to talk to someone you don't know that well. C'mon, you never did that when—?" He broke off suddenly when he realized where he was going with this. As painful as the years had been when Sam had been at school and Dean hunted alone much of the time, they weren't close to what Sam must've gone through alone on the job, the last Winchester.
Sam turned toward the window. "No," he said dully, his fingers slipping over the metal and glass.
Dean took a breath. "Right." As if he couldn't have guessed that.
Sam didn't look his way again or let go of the car door for the rest of the trip.
00000
She was sitting in the corner booth like a good hunter, her back against a wall and her eyes scanning everyone who came into the place. Considering Isaac had died in a bar, Dean was impressed she was up for even that much. Although, the three empty beer bottles in front of her had probably helped.
"Dean." Her face barely softened as he slid into the booth opposite her. "It was good of you to come."
"Hey, all you had to do was ask." Dean looked up, caught the bartender's attention, then pointed at the beer bottles and held up two fingers. He got a nod in response and turned back to Tamara. "Sam says hi."
She did unexpectedly almost smile at that, if soberly. "I hear your little brother's become quite the exorcist. He'll have to teach me his technique sometime."
Dean's skin prickled. If she was trying to get something out of him about Sam being different, she wasn't just barking up the wrong tree, she was doing it in a cage of lions. Dean made himself smile lazily although his eyes stayed sharp. "You'd have to talk to Sam about that."
The bartender arrived, a clean-cut guy around Dean's age with a ready smile. Dean returned it with a nod of thanks and reached for the beers, only to be surprised by Tamara preempting him, taking the bottles and slipping a bill in their place to the bartender. Considering why they were there, Dean let her pay, taking the offered beer and tipping it toward her before they both drank.
"Yes," she continued as if there'd been no break in the conversation. "I hear you've been gone a while. Rumor had it you'd been killed, but you look rather well for a dead man."
Dean considered that over another sip of beer. On the one hand, they weren't exactly advertising where he'd spent his summer vacation. Nothing got up a hunter's back like the return of the dead. On the other hand, her eyes said she already knew the truth, and she'd clearly been in touch with Bobby. Dean tried to shrug it off. "Yeah, that's what they tell me, too. Me, I don't remember anything, but I'm okay with that." He gave her a closed-mouth smile.
Her beer forgotten, she leaned forward. "That's amazing. And you don't know how?"
This wasn't exactly going as he'd pictured. Was she trying to find a way to bring Isaac back? Because that's all they needed. And nobody knew about Castiel and his whole part in the Lazarus deal except for Bobby and Pamela, but they wouldn't be talking. Dean loosely rolled his shoulders, rubbing his tired eyes. "No. Tamara—" He fumbled for words that wouldn't come.
"It's all right, Dean."
What's all right? He blinked at her, confused, even more so when she blurred in front of him. His hand dropped from his temple, limbs suddenly leaden.
Oh, crap. She'd handled his beer. "Son'f'a—"
Her unfocused face filled his vision. "I'm sorry, but it's the only way. I promise it will be all right."
Dean fumbled for his phone, dragging his heavy head up to seek out the bartender, anyone. " 'M na…S'm." Even he couldn't understand himself.
Gentle but strong fingers pulled his phone away. "…time…going…" He didn't understand, his hearing warping and wavering as badly as his vision.
A shoulder nudged under his. His head spun as he rose, legs trying to shuffle. Voices, the bar, the world tunneled. Once more he tried to find the friendly bartender, send a silent SOS. Sam would've known immediately that something was wrong, but Sam was in a motel room a few miles away, and his mojo didn't seem to extend to telepathy. Even if Dean was screaming inside his head.
There was cold air, briefly focusing his vision again, and the shiny creak of a car door. He tumbled down onto something soft, felt his legs folded up, got an up-close view of cream vinyl upholstery.
It was the last thing he knew.
00000
Oh, God. No party was worth this hangover.
Dean shook his head gingerly, feeling his brain slosh around inside his skull. It cleared his senses a little, though, enough that his position started to register.
And his lack of clothing above the waist. And the ropes.
Awesome.
His hands were tied together expertly, the insides of his wrists pressed against each other, no give in the rope. His ankles were bound separately to the legs of the chair, not that he could see them because a slightly looser rope circled his neck, keeping his head up against the chair back. As Dean groaned and lifted his chin, pressure against his throat he hadn't even noticed suddenly eased, making him cough. Breathing was good, though, and swept away the last of the cobwebs.
Allowing him a good view of the large cage he was locked up in. Right, because the ropes weren't enough. Well, Sam would be pleased; he was usually the one who ended up in cages. Tamara was really—
Oh, yeah. He'd almost forgotten his hostess for this little bondage scene. Dean strained to see as much around him as possible, but the brightly lit, plank-lined room—shack? barn?—seemed to be empty. Didn't stop him from yelling "Tamara!" and a few curses while he was at it.
Surprisingly, it netted a response. A door at the opposite end of the room opened, and the petite hunter stepped through, a larger man following her inside. The guy stopped just inside the door; clearly the show was all Tamara's.
Dean glowered at her. "When you said a drink, I didn't think you meant going back to your place after."
"It's not my place. I don't have a home anymore. A friend is letting me borrow it for this hunt." She tipped her head back to her silent shadow.
Dean sneered at her. "That's what we are now to you, a hunt? Gee, kill a few demons with someone and you think you can trust them…"
She shook her head. "This isn't personal, Dean. I've learned the hard way that feelings don't belong in hunting. If everything works out, you and your brother will be safely on your way tomorrow."
His heart sank at the mention of Sam. Dean only let the anger show, though. "So I'm just bait? Get Sam here and, what, make sure he's not a demon? Yeah, 'cause demons are always going around exorcising their own kind."
Tamara frowned at him. "This isn't about Sam. This is about what is dead not staying dead. Surely you must see how unnatural that is, Dean. If the tables were turned, you'd investigate as well."
And yeah, if that didn't just send a whole different kind of shudder down his back. At least the focus wasn't on Sam, because Dean wasn't one-hundred percent sure about his brother, either, truth be told. But himself? Seriously? He barked a laugh. "'Investigate'? Please. Don't pretend you're just being noble, sweetheart, okay? I'm already trying not to throw up here."
Tamara walked around the side of the cage to Dean's left. The enclosure was small enough that he was within her arm's reach whichever side she was on, and tied to the friggin' chair, he wasn't going anywhere. Still, everything in him wanted to recoil when she reached through and clasped his shoulder, almost as if she were expressing solidarity. "I'll make this as brief as possible."
"So exorcise me already," Dean spat. "Hey, even better, I'll say it for you—Exorciso te—"
"It's not as simple as that, Dean." Tamara's eyes were stone-cold, and try as Dean did, he couldn't see the grieving widow underneath anymore. "But if you're the real Dean Winchester, you should know that." She gestured to her companion, and he brought over a bag not unlike the duffels Sam and Dean lived out of. This one clinked and looked heavy. "Pass the tests, and I'll let you go, simple as that."
Dean swallowed, fear sinking like a cannonball in his gut.
He never had been good at tests.
00000
Dean was gone. Again.
They hadn't been exactly joined at the hip since Dean's…return; Sam had snuck out several times of his own volition to practice with Ruby. But he'd always known Dean was safely asleep back in the room, and that had quieted the feverish buzz in the back of his brain of Dean's dead Dean's gone I'm alone. The rest of the time, there was no replacement for glancing over and seeing Dean driving, or cleaning the guns, or digging happily into pie. Because that buzz had been building over months, and no near-impossible miracle would scour that out of his brain anytime soon.
So Sam hadn't been crazy about letting Dean go off to meet Tamara. They even went to bars together ever since…well, ever since. But Sam got it, sorta. Tamara had connected more with Dean when they'd hunted together, and he'd been the one to offer to stay in touch. Both Sam and Dean had lost everything at some point and could relate to her, but Sam wasn't feeling too empathetic those days. Tamara had picked a good person to talk to. And he got why she'd want to do it one-on-one.
He just didn't have to like it. And his liking grew less and less—and the buzz got louder and louder—every hour Dean was gone.
The bar closed at two; Sam had checked because he vetted everything these days. Dean's phone was turned off, and as the hour approached, anxiety turned into something sharp and hungry. Yeah, maybe Dean and Tamara had taken their conversation elsewhere, or maybe Dean had just gone for a drive after; talking to a widowed hunter was bound to bring up some pain of his own. But Sam had never gotten used to being alone, not really, and he was damned—literally—if he would risk that happening again. Two minutes after two, he was striding out the door.
Oh. No car. He wasn't quite used to that, either.
Picking something out of the lot to borrow took a few seconds, breaking in and hotwiring it a few more. Sam had picked for speed rather than low profile, and soon the Camaro was racing toward the bar his brother had been headed to six hours before.
The neon was turned off, the parking lot dark. Still wasn't hard to pick out the shape of the black muscle car in the nearly empty lot. Sam's jaw ticked as he parked the Camaro haphazardly close and got out to stalk to the Impala.
It was locked, hood cool, no sign of anything amiss. Like she'd just been forgotten there, and that made Sam's blood turn icy.
He forgot sometimes Dean was back. Or thought it was a dream, or an alcoholic hallucination. Wasn't like his grief-stricken brain hadn't conjured his brother a few times in those hellish months of being alone. Some part of Sam kept waiting for the bubble to pop, for him to wake up in a room with a single bed and total silence.
That wasn't happening now, though. No way. He'd die first, kill first.
Sam's hands were already curled into fists when he banged on the bar door.
It took a minute to open, and he'd already raised his hand to pound again when he was awash in the light from inside and a young bartender was squinting at him in the doorway.
"Hey, sorry, man, we're closed."
"I'm looking for someone," Sam dug in. "He was here tonight but he didn't come home. That's his car over there." He nodded over his shoulder. He had the picture ready and held it up. "Him. He was probably here with a young black woman, British accent?"
The bartender looked at the picture, and Sam could see the recognition in his eyes. His gaze wandered speculatively over Sam. "Boyfriend?"
That, of all things, didn't spark his anger, just a weary déjà vu. "Brother."
The guy's face shifted. "Huh. Yeah, he was here. He left with her, but he was pretty out of it—she practically had to carry him. She said he'd had too much drink, but dude was still on his first beer."
Sam felt his face harden, the chill seep into his eyes. He knew it scared people, that once upon a time he'd gotten his information through empathy instead of intimidation, but now he just didn't care. "You didn't do anything?"
"Actually." The guy dipped into his front pocket and pulled out a piece of paper. "I wrote down her license plate. Kinda SOP for us, just in case someone comes around asking questions later. Like you."
A license plate. That probably wouldn't help much if the car was registered to Tamara; Sam already knew who had Dean. But it was something. He shoved the paper into his own pocket and gave the bartender another sharp look. "When did they leave?"
The guy thought about it. "Um…about eight-thirty?"
A half-hour after Dean had arrived. Tamara had probably planned this from the start. Why, to get some sort of twisted revenge for Isaac? Or maybe to lure Sam in? He knew hunters had been whispering about him for weeks.
Dean wasn't suffering for him. Not again.
A curt nod at the bartender, and Sam turned away.
"Good luck!" the guy called after him.
Not for the Winchesters. But that was okay; Sam had something even better.
Rage.
00000
Turned out the car wasn't Tamara's, which was the second mistake she'd made.
The name on the title wasn't familiar to Sam—Darryl Greenwood—but the part that mattered was that the guy had a local address. Five minutes after the bartender gave him the plate number, Sam was speeding toward the outskirts of town, this time in the Impala. Any comfort to be gained from being in the old black car again was lost sitting in the driver's seat.
He parked a half-block up from the house, wary of the powerful engine's roar, then stalked back to the trunk to arm himself. Dean's favorite shotgun had become Sam's, and he slipped his Taurus into his pocket. Just in case Tamara wasn't acting of her own free will, Sam stocked up on holy water, too, but he had no reason to think this wasn't just human trouble.
Just. Like Jake Talley, or the Benders.
Sam checked the load in the shotgun—regular shells—snapped it shut, and headed toward the house.
The homes were spread apart in that area, each on its own shaded, multi-acre plot. There was an old South look to the place, with a pair of white columns in front and ivy trying to swallow the brick. The house looked empty, though, dark and quiet. Sam's stomach clenched even tighter, until he noticed the gleam of chrome tucked in past the far end of the house. Didn't take long to confirm it was a Dodge Charger, the one the bartender had seen.
Sam smiled grimly in the dark. He started again for the house, this time moving around back. That was when he saw the outbuilding.
There was no telling what the wooden structure had once been: pantry? smokehouse? maybe even a small slave's quarters. The covered windows were edged with light, and there was a streak under the door, too. Sam shifted the gun in his grip and slunk closer.
There was no way to get the lay of the room. The thin slits of light didn't allow him enough of a glimpse inside, and while he heard the low murmur of voices, he couldn't tell who or where or what.
And then Dean yelled out in pain, and that Sam knew too well.
All that time, he'd been thinking with the calculated fury of a hunter: careful, experienced, detached. That cry, though, seemed to turn it all off. Sam was suddenly a little brother again, impulsive and desperate. He was bursting through the door before he even planned it, shotgun upraised.
It was totally a rookie move. He paid for it.
Even worse, Dean did.
Before his eyes could even adjust to the indoor light, the shotgun was yanked out of his hands. Sam bellowed his outrage and charged blindly in the direction of the attack.
He was brought up short by the double barrels aimed squarely between his eyes.
The moment's freeze allowed his surroundings to sink in. There was the big guy holding Sam's own shotgun on him with unwavering expertise. Tamara standing behind him, looking both surprised and chagrined at Sam's presence. And beside her, a cage about as tall as she was, with Dean bound to a chair inside, shirtless. And bloody.
Even as his brother puffed out his name, Sam started forward again, only to have shotgun-guy—Darryl?—fire a shot next to him, leaving his ears ringing and his cheek feeling singed. He pulled up short, skewering his captor with a glare, for all the good it did. The gun was back in his face and showed no sign of moving.
Dean swore, and Sam shifted his attention back to his brother. Dean's head was back, a rope—a freaking rope—digging into the thin skin of his neck, mouth tight with pain, but his eyes fierce and focused. He shook the chair as he fought to get free, but only managed to make blood and sweat run. "Sam, get out of here!" he finally said raggedly.
Sam dragged his eyes away, to the figure beside the cage. "Tamara, let him go."
"I will soon, Sam," the hunter promised him, picking up the pail she had on the floor next to her. "There are a few tests left to go, but so far he's passed."
Sam's face screwed up with confusion. "What—?"
She reached through the bars, grabbing a handful of Dean's hair to pull his head as far back as it would go. Even as he opened his mouth to curse at her, she threw the full container of water in his face.
Dean spluttered and choked, coughing harshly.
"Holy water," Tamara said coolly, then pointed to Dean's arm, sliced in neat parallel rows and now trailing watery blood. "I've tried every kind of blade, from sanctified silver to cold iron. Scourging with hyssop—" Sam's eyes drew to what looked like a bad case of road rash on Dean's shoulder, "—cleansing fire—" a half-dozen patterned burns dotting Dean's pecs, "—and several rites have had no effect." Sam's eyes fell to the diagram drawn in the floor of the cage under Dean, the lines scorched in some places. Probably explained the red, blistered look of Dean's bare feet.
Sam's head swam with the senseless cruelty of it. Human evil, not demon or creature or spirit, nothing his powers could help with. But nothing that should've happened, either, not after all Dean had been through. Sam tried to catch his brother's eye, but either out of exhaustion or shame, Dean's face was tilted down as far as the rope would allow it. "Tamara," Sam swallowed, "why?"
"Can' ask…crazy 'why'…Sam." Dean's voice was thick around the words. His head rolled to the side, bleary eyes seeking Sam. "…should go…"
"Dean, I'm not—"
"—not crazy," Tamara was talking over Sam. "He's back from the dead, Sam! I'm surprised you of all people are so blasé about it. This is not natural—he shouldn't—"
"Let. Him. Go." Maybe he couldn't exorcise her, but Sam knew his words rang with power. Power and quiet wrath.
"Soon, I promise. I'm almost finished." And before Sam had a chance to react, she leaned in to yank Dean's chin down with a ruthless pull of the hand, and dumped a small vial of some liquid into his mouth.
Dean swallowed it automatically, sputtering a little.
Sam's heart raced, and his eyes flicked from Darryl—who wasn't budging—back to Tamara, then his panting brother. "What—?"
"Basil, clove, betony, a few others. Nothing that will seriously hurt him if he's human." She reached back through the bars to stroke the handprint burned into Dean's shoulder. "It makes you wonder, though, doesn't it? How he could return months later, unblemished except for this."
Sam grit his teeth. "You have no—"
Dean started to gag, the spasms visibly crawling up his stomach and chest. His eyes slammed shut as his body twisted in the chair, pulling at the rope around his neck until the hemp bit into the skin and his lips paled into blue. Dean's bound hands yanked at the noose in vain.
Tamara stared at him, eyes wide.
Sam lurched forward a step, halting frantically at the gun shoved into his face. "Tamara, let me help him." His hand strayed under his jacket toward his Taurus. Human or not, Tamara would die before Dean did.
"This isn't… He's not…"
Dean threw up some dark liquid, gasping for air around the heaves.
"He's human," Tamara murmured but didn't move.
Dean's eyes were rolling back in his head.
And Sam's self-control snapped. Enough was enough. With even steely Darryl distracted by Dean's choking on his own vomit, Sam took advantage of the distraction. At that point, he didn't even care if it got him shot. He feinted forward, then swept out his leg to send Darryl crashing to the floor. Sam had the gun a moment later, which he brought down firmly in Darryl's face, then turned on Tamara.
"Open the cage."
Looking shell-shocked, Tamara stumbled to obey. "He's finished," she stammered. "I would have let him—"
As soon as she began to swing the iron door open, Sam shoved her aside and ducked into the cage, knife in his free hand.
"Hey. Hey, calm down, it's me, Dean. I'm gonna get you loose, all right? Just breathe." Sam sliced through the rope at his throat first, right by the chair back where he wasn't in danger of cutting Dean. Then he held his brother up with an arm across the chest until Dean's stomach stopped trying to evict itself. Once he went limp, breathing harshly in Sam's ear, Sam propped him up with one shoulder and got to work on his wrists. "You okay?" he muttered for Dean's ears alone, and felt his heart settle a little at the small nod against his collarbone.
By the time he'd cut Dean's feet free, his brother's hands had shakily curled around the armrests of the chair, muscles tightening. His eyes were feverish and his hair was spiky with sweat, but even Sam knew to step out of the way as his brother suddenly lunged out of chair and cage, unsteady legs just sending him slamming all the harder into Tamara's slight form. The two hunters hit the board wall hard enough to rattle it, and then Dean had two handfuls of Tamara's jacket in his fists, shaking her hard.
Darryl started to stir where Sam had put him down by the door, but it was Sam's turn to casually point the gun at him. "Stay down," he ordered.
"Dean, I'm sorry." Tamara was babbling. "I wasn't trying to hurt you, I swear to God. I have to stop the Evil—you understand, right? It's all that matters. And I had to know, had to be sure. Sam and Bobby would never have done it, but we had to make sure—"
Sam growled under his breath, stalking forward a step as he swung the shotgun forward.
"Don't." Dean's soft mumble drew him up short. Sam watched as his brother drew in a labored breath. "Just…" He drew back slowly, as if he had to struggle for each inch. When his hands finally uncramped from Tamara's jacket, she slid down to the floor, her legs drawn up to her chest. Dean stared down at her, face unreadable.
"Dean," Sam argued.
His brother's face angled his way although their eyes didn't meet. But when Dean finally spoke, it was still to Tamara. "I get it, you know. I've been where you are, when the hunt's all you got left, when you're the last one. When it hurts more to stay alive than to die."
Tamara's face crumpled, tears glimmering in her eyes.
Sam knew how she felt.
Dean leaned down a little, one hand splayed against the wall for support. "But Isaac? He wouldn't've wanted this for you. You know that."
She buried her face in her knees then and wept.
Dean started to straighten, then locked up. "Sam," he whispered to the wall.
Sam shrugged out of his jacket as he dodged forward, laying the material loosely over his brother's shoulders before slotting up under one arm. He was careful not to touch any open wounds. "I've got ya."
Dean melted against him, just for a moment. Then he slowly straightened, leaning on Sam only for balance as he limped heavily to the door and outside. His damage to his feet had to be agonizing, but Sam knew better than to offer to carry him. Especially when he heard the hoarse "Who's got you?" belatedly tossed back to him.
"You're here now, jerk," he answered with fond exasperation. And didn't know if he was relieved or sorry when that shut Dean up.
00000
Sam was fondling the car again.
Dean had suffered through four days of an overabundance of first aid, from bandagings to burn cream applications to meals in bed. But it had seemed to give Sam needed permission to have contact with him and take care of him and convince himself Dean was there and okay, so Dean thought maybe it was a sort of blessing in disguise. A deep, deep disguise, the kind that came with pain and exhaustion and two more bouts of vomiting until his stomach finally settled. Leave it to them to do even blessings the hard way.
There was still a look sometimes in his little brother's eyes that worried Dean. The foreign, murderous glint they'd carried back in the shack had given way to glimpses of the same kind of deadness Dean had seen in Tamara. But it evaporated like air when Dean cracked a joke or gave him a nudge, and that was the difference. They had always been each other's difference.
Sam would get used to that again in time. Dean was sure of it.
But for now…
Swallowing the wince as he pulled on healing injuries, Dean slung an arm along the back of the bench seat, his fingertips just brushing Sam's shoulder.
Sam didn't touch the car again for the rest of the trip.
The End