If We Are to Survive
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May 26th, 2007. That night had been the beginning of the end. He just thought it was a different beginning.
But the end would be the same.
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Dean walks into his first night of life without Sammy with a bag of burgers and fries. The hotel room is covered with birds, and the last thing he says to Sammy before leaving to find dinner is, "Damn Sam, you sure know to pick 'em."
He doesn't think he'll be coming back to find the Demon there. He doesn't think he'll be coming back to find Sammy pinned against the wall, blood running in his eyes and from his mouth, obscuring his face to Dean. The blood didn't hide the terror though. Dean knows that face all too well.
Please Dean. Fix this. Make this go away. Fix it.
"Welcome to the party, big brother," The Demon hisses from where he is laid out on the bed, his head against the backboard. "I have a proposition for you."
Later, when Dean asks why not just kill him and take Sam, the Demon only chuckles before replying, "Suffering is my business, not death. I haven't kept you alive for twenty eight years for shits and giggles, after all. Besides, I like a challenge. It's just business, at any price. Just like your business is keeping Sammy alive, am I right, Dean? At any price?"
Dean looks into Sam's half-lidded eyes, catches his barely conscious gaze and utters, "Yes. Any price, Sammy."
The demon smirks and jumps between the brother's gaze. "Remember now, Dean, three chances. After the third, he's dead – no coming back at sunrise, even if you were all the way to Hell." The demon chuckles again. "But now, we've spent too much time dallying, I'm afraid, and Sam isn't going to make it tonight anyways."
Dean looks to Sam, and he can tell Sam is too far gone to heal back now. He's going to die before he lives again. Dean curses himself for not going right after the deal was made, but turns when the Demon calls him again.
"Don't blame yourself, big brother. Just this once, I'll let this one not count. After all, first and second time will probably be busts, but as they say third time's a charm, right?"
Dean forces himself to the door and out of the room, but not before he hears the Demon laugh again, and Sammy whisper with his first last breath, "Not for this. Dean. Dean."
Sam dies that night. Dean runs. It feels like the end. But the end is still coming.
---
Dean never thought there'd come a time when he only felt relief that Sam wasn't there. After all, Dean still considers the years Sam was at Stanford to be the most difficult of his life, if only because Sam had chosen to leave him, to reject him and the life their father had given them.
This time though, Sam hadn't left Dean on purpose. And now Sam was trying his hardest to fix it. Well, Dean thought to Hell with that, as far as he was concerned, the situation was fixed.
Sammy is alive. Sammy no longer has visions or headaches or other psychic problems. Sammy isn't wanted by a demon. Sammy is safe.
Or at least, that's what he tells Sam the second time Sam dies. It had been Sam who orchestrated it; he was the only one of the two who knew when Dean was close by. He could tell because he's the one who bleeds and can't breathe and slowly dies when the two are near each other.
Back then – The First Chance, as Dean thinks of it - Sam had wheezed for a moment before growling, "If it's a life without you, Dean, I don't want it. I never wanted it. Please, just let me die."
"Never, Sammy. If the sigils didn't work, you gotta find something else. Find another way, and track me down again. You got me, Sam? Only when you find another way – the way. Sam? Sammy?!"
Sam nodded, and died.
So, Dean left for the third time – the only differences now are that Sam was already dead, and the Impala was left behind. It was cold out after all, and Dean didn't trust Sam not to get himself sick walking back to the town.
Dean did three miles of walking and seventy-three of driving before Sam took his third first breath.
Dean wasn't there but he knew it had happened, and wasn't that the whole point?
---
The sky is red and the world bleeds black the night Dean runs again, and he feels more like a coward then he did the last time he did the same thing. Sam lies in the middle of the clearing, amongst all the runes and ruins. His body is bloody and broken, damp and cool.
Dean pats his shoulder once before stepping away, though he knows if Sam was awake – was alive - he'd hold him and comfort him and never leave him again.
Thank God Sam's not awake.
So instead of letting Sam die alone again, Dean waits until his eyes go glassy and unfocused, then just lifts himself up and says, "Find another way, Sammy, please," before walking back to the road.
Within ten minutes he's found and hotwired an old Ford, singing AC/DC at the top of his lungs to numb the silence. Though he tries not to, he counts the miles and notes the time.
Later, he records it in his journal. Sam took his fourth first breath at 9:07 pm, June 22nd, 2010. Thank God.
It's the last mention of Sam Dean makes in his journal before the end comes.
---
Any contact of the senses would kill Sam. If Sam heard Dean speak, even over the phone, he'd go into a coma. If he caught sight of Dean, even at a distance, he'd have a heart attack. If Dean touched him, even just a brush of the hand, Sam would convulse until foam and blood gaped from ever pore of his body.
A small postal box in Arkansas is all they have left to share that the FBI doesn't know about, though Dean fears every day they'll figure it out and the walls will come crashing down. The idea of both him and Sam in the same courtroom terrifies him, if only because if it comes to that only one brother will live to be condemned by the law.
However, when Dean comes back the second week of December, 2011, to find a small note with coordinates and a date, he doesn't hesitate to show. This is the last chance, but Dean knows that if he doesn't go now, Sam may never try to find him again. And at this point, that thought seems worse then Sam not being anywhere at all.
---
Sabin, Minnesota lies in the heart of a valley, the land gone flat as the ocean. The small town seems way too normal, but Dean supposes that's why Sam picks it.
When Dean comes to the clearing Sam has chosen, he gets out of the Ford but stays by the truck. He can barely see Sam across the field, but even from this distance he can tell the difference between the colors of Sam's tan skin, and the blood slashed across it. Even from here, he can tell Sam is having trouble staying conscious and coherent.
He waits until Sam calls him over, then runs as fast as he can, trying to save as much time as possible.
Because once Sam dies, they lose their chance. Both brothers have to be together for the Demon to die. It's part of the agreement and as much as Dean hates it, he has to let it be.
"Dean," Sam whispers, and he's grinning despite the blood gushing from his nose and eyes and mouth and ears and other places Dean can't and won't acknowledge.
Dean nods, then mouths, "How, Sammy?," worried it'll do even more damage if he actually voices the question.
Sam gestures to the ground, and Dean recognizes the remnants of an already-performed summoning ritual right away.
Dean doesn't think to stay silent. "But Sammy, who's gonna be the vessel?"
Sam shakes his head, and thrusts a gun – goddamn, the fucking Colt – into Dean's hands.
"You know what to do, Dean," he says, and then his body stops trembling and his eyes burn gold.
"Why Dean, you know you won't use that," the Demon sneers, his expression a pitiful impression of Sam's smirk face.
Dean holds up the Colt to the Demon's heart, says, "Not for this price. Not anymore, Sammy," and fires.
---
Dean runs, runs farther and faster then he ever has before. He hits mile 82 as the sun rises, and at mile eight-five he makes a complete one-eighty.
After all, third time's a charm, and Sam will be waiting. He knows Dean isn't leaving him behind again.
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A/N: Reviews are food for the soul.