Summary: post "Swan Song". The Winchesters have been through every torture of Hell and Heaven…what could be worse?

A/N: I'm just now writing a tag since the episode so utterly destroyed me. Going into season 6, I see two emotionally eviscerated brothers getting back together and (after much anger, lingering issues, etc…) figuring out that they both tried normal, but what they need is each other…and a grizzly old hunter and an angel at times. ^_^

Enjoy and please review!

Worse Hells Than Those We've Seen

"Dean, you can't."

"Watch me."

"You can't….Listen we've done this before and we've paid- big time." Sam licked his lips. He was desperate, he had to get Dean to understand. This was…they couldn't do this again. He would let Dean do this to himself.

"Dean…we thought death was the worst thing that could happen to us, then we screwed with that and thought that going to hell was the worst. Then we just kept going and found out Hell on Earth was the worst and you know what? It's probably not. There's probably something even more horrible out there that we don't know about, that we don't have to know about, Dean!" Sam's watery eyes stared into his brother's pleadingly.

"Sammy…"

"Please…Dean. For once, whatever's out there that's worse….we don't have to be the ones that find out about it."

Dean set his jaw and blinked back tears as he fixed his gaze determinedly on the road.

"Dean…please…."

Dean never answered Sam, never had to. Listening to his little brother beg with that same shaky voice he had when he was three and wanting to wait up with his big brother for their father to come home…With Sam, Dean never had to say yes when he didn't say no.

As he drove toward Detroit with burning eyes and a weight in his gut, all he could think was, What could be worse than this? What could possibly be worse than driving your little brother to the place he was going to die, be trapped in Lucifer's Cage for eternity to suffer and bleed and hurt forever for something he never asked for, never wanted?

Later, when he was sure Sam was too lost in his own thoughts to notice and past caring if he did or not, Dean stole every glance over at his brother that he could. Catalogued every detail and mannerism, and refused to admit that he was committing Sam to memory.

Because that would make it too real.

Sitting on Lisa's front porch with a beer in his hand and all pretenses dropped, Dean looked to the sky.

He gave a quick derisive laugh and hung his head instead. Nothing above him was listening. And the only one he wanted to hear him…well, he was downstairs anyway.

Green eyes watched the condensation on his beer drip to dirt in the outline of the bottom of the bottle. Other drops slid from the end of his nose to join them. He smiled bitterly.

"I found it anyway Sammy…" He told the cold ground at his feet, wishing Sam could hear him and hoping he couldn't. He barely managed to catch the desperate sob trying to escape, the ones he'd been trying to hold in since he'd gotten here, since he said goodbye to Bobby, since Stull, since…

"God!" he smashed the bottle against the brick front of Lisa's porch. Lisa's, not his, not ever his. He didn't want it. His home was buried in layers of dirt and sulfur and blood and never ending pain.

And Dean sobbed, Dean dug his hands into his hair and mourned.

The last Winchester standing collapsed, clawing at the dirt like maybe, maybe…

He heard the front door open and footsteps that were lighter than Bobby's, too hurried to be Castiel's, and too…there to be…

Well meaning words and good-intentioned questions only made him hunch down more. Closer so he could see the dirt under his nails becoming mud as he leaned forward until his head rested beside his trembling hands.

"Sammy…I found what's worse…"