Take My Body Home

by RoweenaC

...In my time of dying, want nobody to mourn
All I want for you to do is take my body home ...

His chin falls heavily to his chest, an anguished gasp whispering out of him as he tries to remain conscious and at the same time desperately hopes for the promising relief of oblivion. His fingernails cut deep into the calluses in his palms, breeching the rough surface and engraving themselves deep into the tender tissue beyond. He knows that soon there will be blood oozing out the small grins, gory clown grins; yet he amplifies the pressure. The faint echo of agony rises to his awareness, curling and swirling on the surface of his consciousness, like a multicolored oil film on a dark, deep lake. Thin, a transparent rainbow of hurt, hardly recognizable, not mixing with his thoughts.

He hears the rasping in his lungs, the squelching sound of liquid bubbling in the fine capillaries, congregating and rising until it will finally reach the larger vessels, blocking the airways. Drowning him in his own blood. Slowly. Agonizingly slowly. He feels his forehead crease with an annoyed frown. He has always pictured himself dying a warrior's death in battle, like a hero, protecting others. Going down first. Going down in a blaze of glory...

'Bon Jovi rocks... on occasion.'

The ghost of a cocky smirk plays around his tired mouth, tugging at the corners, surrendering finally to fade away. He lifts his head higher, straining against the burning cough assaulting his lungs. A bright red bubble bursts with a faint pop! in the left corner of his mouth as he fights to pry his eyes open, the need to see daylight overwhelming. Is it morning already?

The lashes brushing against the dark smudges under his bloodshot eyes have become entangled, gritty. Disgusted with the evidence of his defeat, the dried tears crusting his eyelids, he finally forces them apart. A few tiny, dark, curled hairs are plucked from their rightful places gliding gently to rest on his cheekbones, highlighting the deathly pallor there. Make a wish...

'This is my dying wish, Sammy!'

The memory gently floats to the surface, pushing the rainbow agony aside. It had been a cocky and manipulative remark thrown at his baby brother. The hurt in Sammy's eyes had flashed bright white for an instant and then been quickly replaced by Sam's own set of walls. Walls that had kept Dean from worrying, from the irresistible surge of the omnipresent protectiveness honed into his every fiber. Sam had hoisted up a lopsided grin and cracked a joke.

'Aw Sam. I'm sorry.'

The burning sensation in his lungs eventually becomes unbearable and he surrenders to the cough, shivering through the ordeal, contorting in a quick succession of spasms. His ribcage threatens to burst with scorching fire and he gulps down air, forcing desperately needed oxygen into his mangled bronchia. An unwanted, hated sob hisses through his clenched jaws as fine red spray puffs through the air to settle on his already blood stained, dusty shirt. The red-sprinkled amulet shines like copper in the morning sun. The background sound of gargling in his lungs becomes barely audible as he attempts to control the steady flow of air, his breaths turning shallow, less painful.

Wincing as his eyes fall upon the unmoving weight in his lap, he forces himself a little more upright, leaning heavily against the chipped wood panels to ease his breathing. Tiny splinters of moldy wood spike through the cotton fabric of his threadbare shirt and bury themselves into the soft skin of his back. The fine sheen of cold sweat stings in the minuscule prick wounds. He senses the bullet pressing down hard against his spine, forced into motion by his own attempt to move. A sick scraping sound and the accompanying jarring feeling inside his chest – inside his backbone! - fills his already sluggish mind with dizziness, ensuing nausea causes his long-empty stomach to lurch agonizingly.

If he had been able to move at all he would have bent sideways to retch. Now however, pinned down by the numbness wrapping his body from the waist down and the too familiar shape sprawled – strangely weightless - across his thighs, he is forced to swallow the acrid bile down again. The result is another spastic series of coughs and renewed somersaults of his stomach. A deep hitching sigh huffs out between his blood painted, cracked lips and he wearily wishes for it to be over. Black spots dance before his watering eyes, merging to a black frame narrowing his vision.

His hands still clenched into stone-hard fists shiver echo the quiver in his chin. The need to brush away the tears that slowly wind their way in silvery rivulets down his dusty cheeks becomes over-powering. His right hand loosens its death grip slightly, allowing the blood to flow back into the prickling fingers. Four small, crimson grins sneer up at him as he opens his hand fully, mocking him. The fingernails are covered in his own fresh blood that mingles with the dried, rusty color smeared on the back of his hand. Sam's blood.

With a sharp stab at his soul he remembers how he had frantically tried to quench the steady gush of blood rushing out from his brother's neck with his bare hands, the torn carotid artery a bright red fountain indicating the quickly dissolving hope for Sammy to live a normal life. To live. The gash in his neck is still oozing blood but it has thickened since the younger man's heart stopped. The drops remind him of red molasses spreading a salty pool around the torn throat. He can't feel the sticky moisture in the blood-soaked denim of his jeans. Eying it with dull curiosity he wonders vaguely if it is the blood loss or the injury to his spine that numbed him waist down.

He remembers crouching down next to Sam to still the red, viciously sputtering torrent. Then, being tossed backwards against the wall and gasping for air against an unfamiliar stabbing pressure in his chest. The sound of their quarry escaping was lost on him. All he cared about was his baby brother. He remembers Sam, his brother's glassy, surprisingly wide eyes locked with his own gaze. Still sees Sammy's mouth open and close feebly, desperately trying to form words of wonder and good-bye, an overgrown hand rising weakly to his mauled throat and falling down flat on his chest.

Comprehension spread on the younger man's face as Dean had forced himself away from the wall and slowly skidded over to his brother on his numbed bum, breath catching for a moment as his legs slid uselessly beneath him, hands working like paddles in a quagmire, pushing himself forwards and wincing at the gut-wrenching, bone-jarring echoes of the movement coursing through his body up to the base of his skull. Dean remembers whispering words of comfort and brotherly challenges in a steady flow directed at his sibling while he worked his way to him. Forcing Sam to hold on and stay with him. Telling him reassuring lies.

"Come on, it's not even that bad... We're gonna patch you right up in no time, bro'... Look at me, Sammy, look at me, dammit! ... SAM! ….Stay with me! …Nonononono!"

The short distance between Dean and Sam – a scant 30 inches – had proved to be the distance between life and death. Finally, arriving next to his brother, coughing and spraying Sam with ruby-red sprinkles, the younger hunter had exhaled his last breath without breaking eye contact. Too late for a last hug.

Sam never felt his brother's frantic, hysterical fists clutching the fabric of his jacket, or the trembling lips brushing his forehead gently. The tears dropping on his slack cheeks wound their way to the angry gash leering up at Dean as he shook with the sobs wracking his body. His own physical pain forgotten, as his bleeding soul howled in misery.

Dean had held Sam's slowly cooling, stiffening form in a viselike grip, knowing this was the end. There was no turning back. No do-over.

In the slowly darkening room he had managed to settle back against the wall, dragging his brother's corpse with him, incapable of losing physical contact with Sam. The younger man's hair had come to rest on his face, shrouding the blueish tinge now creeping into the slack features. His pallid, red-rimmed eyes brush gently along Sam's strong jaw barely visible beneath the long, blood clotted strands of unruly brown hair. Averting his suddenly wet gaze, another sob works free from his protesting, strained throat.

'I screwed up.'

Tears fall again, searching for the shallow wrinkles and crevices, ready-made arroyos in the dying hunter's suddenly very young face. Guilt blazes in pale green eyes, hot and burning guilt. It should have been him, not Sammy. He should have been the first to go, offering one final self-sacrificial act of protection. The memory of the light in his sibling's eyes being snuffed vividly played over and over in his mind. Stranded immobile in a backroad dump of a haunted house, condemned to die a slow painful death, Dean gasps out a lonely, desperate sob. Crying, he winces as his hitching chest jars against the bullet nestled snugly in his shattered vertebra.

A sudden barrier in his windpipe disrupts his grief, forcing the sobs to cease instantly. His eyes widen in terror as the choking sensation pushes away every rational thought. Primal instinct rules his mind and he clutches with both hands at his throat as if to force away an invisible attacker's slowly tightening claws. Fingernails scrape along the stubbly skin and furrow deep scratches along the strained sinews in his neck, blood vessels bulging with the sudden rise in his blood pressure as the adrenaline pumps through his body. His suddenly crystal clear vision finds the window to his left. A glimpse at normality. A window to the world spinning on, indifferent to one of its inhabitants' agonized struggle. Sun beams pierce through the grimy window pane, dust swirling in a fairy folk dance.

He splutters and coughs, a big clot of congealed blood hurls through his gaping mouth into the deathly silent air, splashes gorily against the window, sliding downwards it submerges the room in eerie, reddish light. Sweet, soft, fresh air floods his burning lungs. Relishing the mere chance to breathe, albeit in painful, hitching rasps, he closes his streaming eyes, blinking against the salty liquid welling there. His hands fall limply into his lap and he concentrates on evening out his hiccuping breath. Sweat beads his forehead now, droplets forming in his brows, erratically falling down to mix with the tears and blood already soiling his fair features.

He is aware of the longer intervals between each breath, as his vision grays slightly. His chest feels as if cast in concrete, every breath more shallow and wet than the last. The bubbling, gargling sensation rises up his windpipe and red foam forms between his parted lips. He turns his head wearily to look out the window again, when his eyelids seem to morph into lead. They start to droop and he urgently refocuses his dwindling gaze on his brother's clammy, silent corpse.

Sluggishly, he reaches with one trembling hand for the strands veiling Sam's face from his view. Gently brushing them aside, he smiles. Peaceful slumber seems to have grabbed Sammy. No nightmares or visions disturbing his final rest. Only the unmoving chest indicates Sam won't wake up anymore.

His befuddled mind takes refuge in the ever present memory of that one last evening before insanity and pain entered his life, never to leave it again. Breathing in a mixture of sweet milk, baby powder and a flowery perfume, his awareness drifts off to rest gladly in that single moment when all had still been good. Dean senses his mother's reassuring arms around him as she lifts him up to kiss baby Sammy good night. Drinking in her special scent, he curls his chubby fists around her neck and rests his head close to her heart. A shadow darkens the threshold to the nursery and Dean looks up almost reluctant to vacate the safe, warm place.

"Daddy!"

His mother lowers him to the ground and pudgy legs propel him forward into the strong arms of his father. John lifts him up on one arm and jokes playfully, ghosting a kiss along the hairline of his eldest son.

Together they stand, over Sam's crib. Happy. Dean relaxes. Truly relaxes for the first time in more than two decades. He lets his guard down and relishes the love and comfort permeating the scene. Baby Sammy blabbering, Mom and Dad smiling lovingly at each other and their sons.

Dean's calloused, bloodied hand reaches out for Sam one last time, brushing gently along his forehead, not feeling the cold in Sam's skin, concentrating on the gesture and his memories of the brother he'd shared his life with rather than on the brutal reality. His last breath is a sigh of contentment, stretching out longer than his awareness would ever know.

'Home. This is home.'

...Oh, did somebody some good.

I must have did somebody some good.
Oh, I believe I did
I see the smiling faces
I know I must have left some traces

Oh, don't you make it my dyin', dyin', dyin'...cough...

Lyrics and title are from Led Zeppelin's awesome In My Time Of Dying.