"A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin."

- H. L. Mencken

His breath rasped and he choked on dust, his eyes fluttering open to gaze around him. He coughed, ignoring the ache in his chest as he took in… what was this? He couldn't move his arms, he kicked up his legs only to hit something solid. It sounded like wood. Dean rotated his palms to press out against the sides of the box he was somehow in, but he couldn't break it. Where was Alastair? Where was anything?

He grit his teeth and threw his head up against the wood above him, wincing at the strength of the wood. And then he thought harder. What if there was something on top of the wood? Dean growled, the sound making his lungs burn. He knew better than to call for help, it had never gotten him anywhere before. And so he waited. Waited for the torture that he had come to expect every day for the last forty years. But it never came.

Dean was running out of air. Breathing became harder, and he found himself struggling, pounding his weight against the box because he knew something wasn't right. The more he kicked and punched at the wood, the more it gave, splintering just a little. A few specs of something fell through the cracks and Dean paused for a moment, before he croaked out in a sharp hiss. He wasn't in a box. He was in a coffin…

He pounded harder, using every bit of strength that he could to get out. This was something new.

Alastair had never been one for offhanded tortures, didn't like to sit back and watch. He'd rather take his time and participate, draw it out with little shivs and bone needles. Alastair wouldn't just shove Dean into a coffin and wait.

Dean shifted inside the wooden box as dirt began to pile into the space…

"The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
And miles to go before I sleep…"

- Robert Frost

The light burned his eyes when he finally breached the surface, gagging out remnants of dirt that he couldn't help but swallow as he had climbed out of the hole. Dean lay there on his stomach, panting and scraping his nails through the earth, catching them on blades of dead grass. He keep his eyes shut tightly, his forehead resting on cool soil as he mind raced ahead of him.

'Where am I? Is this Hell?' he thought, trying to wet his throat with his saliva. It was just so dry.

With a grunt, Dean pushed himself up with his hands and sat back on his legs. He let his head fall back on his shoulders as he slowly opened his eyes. It took him several tries to adjust to the sudden burst of light, sunlight he realized. And when his eyes were finally focused and he blinked around, his chest contracted.

He wasn't in Hell anymore.

He couldn't be. Hell didn't look like this, with clear blue skies and soft white clouds and a big freakin' bright sun shining down. It was almost too good to be true…

So it had to be. But then, where were the demons? Dean started looking around, and his breath left him in a rush. He was sitting in the middle of a clearing, a shabbily constructed cross bearing down on the hole he had just clawed his way out from. Every tree that had been surrounding the area was now blown back, each one pressing into the other. Dean could see the roots, tangled masses of dirty tendrils and thick shoots with patches of earth still clinging to them, arching upwards now that the trees had nearly been uprooted.

He made to stand up, wobbling as his legs were so numb, and finally got to his feet. His legs shook, and he could feel the pinpricks of his nerves protesting against him, but he didn't care. Something big had gone down, and whatever it was had somehow resulted in Dean zapping up out of Hell.

He couldn't remember what it might have been, but at the moment, he really didn't care. He was hungry, and thirsty, and he was covered in dirt. He frowned as he started walking towards what remained of the woods, stepping carefully over the fallen trees and heading… whatever direction he was going in…

He had a long way to go…

Dean had found his way to nothing after nearly an hour of searching through the woods. Or maybe it had been longer, how was he to know? He sighed heavily as he padded through the low shrubs, barely noticing how they scraped over his skin. Did he mention that he was naked? Yeah, that was wrong in so many ways. But he hadn't had clothes in Hell, so what did it matter?

Well, if he really was back on earth, he probably needed some.

His feet were poked by needles and the lower branches cut his arms as he went on farther, chasing the light ahead that looked like it could lead to somewhere…

"Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the power of reason to believe."

- Voltaire

Dean eventually found an shady looking convenience store, and as he peered into the window, he saw no one. He snuck in through the back door, prying it open with a shovel that had been resting beside the dumpster just a few feet away. He wedged the bladed end into the door and pressed his weight against it, heaving to force the door open.

When the metal began to give, Dean grabbed the door knob and pulled, the locked portion slipping out of its hole with ease. These people really needed to install a proper lock…

Dean sneaked inside, taking the shovel with him.

The wall were lined with glass cases filled with sodas and water and the occasional beer. The shelves were stocked full of candy bars and crackers, and the ones further toward the back were covered in knickknacks and touristy t-shirts. He went for the fridges first.

The handle was cool against his skin as he pulled the door open and rifled through its contents. There were water bottles of various brand names; who needs brand-name water? Some energy drinks with claw marks running down the front of the can which Dean sidled away from. And, at the very bottom of the shelf, beer. He smiled despite himself and grabbed that instead.

He walked to the counter and set the beer down, then headed back into the isles looking for clothes.

Dean rifled through the assortment of shirts, grabbing one of the few without anything stupid written on it, and shoved it over his head. He pulled this way and that, getting his arm in the neck-hole twice before finally getting it right. He grabbed a pair of baggy jeans off of the rack behind him and tugged those over his hips with a little struggle. They were almost too loose, but he tied them up with some of them fishing line two isles over.

Next, he perused through the food, trying to remember what all of these things tasted like. Chocolate was sweet, but what was sweet? He ripped the silver wrapper off and tore off a chunk of the bar with his teeth. Dean grimaced and spat it back out. It didn't taste good.

He did the same with five more different foods, but there was nothing that he wanted to eat here. He groaned, scratched at his head, and went back for his beer. It wasn't as cold as it had been, but it would do. Dean pulled back the tab and lifted the can to his mouth; he remembered beer…

But he didn't swallow.

He made a deep, gurgling sound in the back of his throat as the beer dripped steadily out of his mouth and onto the floor. Dean wiped his mouth on the sleeve of the shirt, frowning at the rest of the beer. Did nothing taste good here?

And then the smell hit him…

"The most violent appetites in all creatures are lust and hunger;
the first is a perpetual call upon them to preserve their kind,
the latter to preserve themselves."

- Joseph Addison

Dean groaned and plugged his nose with his hands as the building around him shook. A high pitched keen echoed throughout the room as it rattled, various things all falling off of the shelves with crashes, thumps, and muffled thuds. His eyes squeezed shut, and he could feel his teeth cutting into his lower lip. The sound of it was so painful, but it was nothing at all compared to the scent.

It was cold and bitter, assaulting his nostrils no matter how hard he pressed his hands against them. The thing, whatever it was, smelled bright, like ozone or a mix of sharp chemicals. It made him dizzy, and he dropped to his knees, unable to stand anymore.

Suddenly, the sound died to a lull, and it sounded like an airplane had just passed overhead. The dull roar of it almost unheard for the screeching noise that preceded it.

When it had passed, Dean opened his eyes, still holding his nose for the scent still clinging to the air. The shop was in ruins, every window shattered with their broken remains littered across the floor. The shelves were all toppled, the jars of pickles foods and random edibles lay stickily on the floor in puddles. The glass doors had broken as well, along with any beverages within.

Even the beer cans he had abandoned on the counter had exploded, their contents slowly dribbling down the sides. He frowned as he realized that he was sitting in a pile of it.

Dean growled at it and stood up, walking around behind the counter to the register. He muttered strangled words underneath his breath as he pulled at the drawer. He couldn't, or rather wouldn't, eat any of the things here, because, face it, convenience store food is never good. He figured simply that, if he really was home again for whatever reason, he would need money. Dean only hoped these people were stupid enough to have left some cash in the register overnight…

Yep. They were.

He shoved maybe seventy dollars into his pocket, and left the change. He really didn't need anything jingling in his pockets, making unnecessary noise…

Dean's hand came up to rub at his eyes, and stopped when something glinted to his left. A computer screen monitor, one of those old, chunky things. The precursors to the tiny, flat as a board laptops of today. It was suffering just as badly as the rest of the store. The screen was cracked, but Dean could still see his reflection in it.

His face was dirty, and fuzzy, and he remembered shaving. He might need to do that soon…

His hair was matted, little short knots on the top of his head. Dean rubbed his fingers at them. His lips were chapped to hell, and his eyes were… He frowned as he looked at himself, had his eyes always been like this? He grumbled and thought harder than before. He remembered his brother, but not his name, and another guy, with a perpetual angry face. Bobby. Bobby, and his brother, Sam.

The one thing he didn't remember, and it had been forty years, so he decided that he deserved a break if his brain wasn't one hundred percent up to snuff, was if his eyes had always looked like marbles…

"Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads."

- Henry David Thoreau

Eventually, Dean just got pissed off and pushed the computer off of the counter. Who would have noticed any difference?

He huffed, checked that the money was still in his pocket, and walked to the front door. He edged his way around the glass shards, kicking his feet a few times before stepping widely over what remained of the door. The glass in it was much like the windows; all over the floor.

The sun was higher now, and Dean looked around curiously. There were gas pumps in front of him, and a long, barren road beyond that. He thought absently of the Impala, wondering what happened to her. He sighed and scratched at the hair at his nape, swallowing thickly as he started walking.

Dean kept his eyes forward as he went, shifting occasionally upward, and the fear of those creatures still nagging in the back of his mind. He wasn't sure where he was, or where he was going, but he knew that whatever that noise, that scent, belonged to wasn't anything he wanted to run into. Dean supposed that as long as he continued walking, he would find someone that knew where he was, but the road was nearly deserted, nothing ahead of him but trees and asphalt.

The sun glared down at him from above, it must have been midday. It must have been well over ninety degrees outside, but he barely even felt it, not a drop of sweat dotted his brow. Maybe he'd gotten used to it, or maybe it was just a side-effect of spending forty years in Hell.

Dean cracked his shoulders and heard a rumbling noise drawing closer from behind him. He turned his head to see a small silver car making its way down the road. There was a woman behind the wheel, young, maybe early thirties, long dark hair. He waved towards her and watched as she drove straight past him. He didn't have time to be upset before she pulled the car off the side of the road, stopping a little too fast and sliding into the dust and making a large cloud of it pile up into the air.

It went up his nose and he snorted softly, his face twisting itself up. His eyes itched as he saw her roll the windows down and call out to him as he walked over, "You need a lift, guy?"

"Just to the nearest town, if you don't mind, sweetheart," he said, his voice sounded rough and sickly, and by the fleeting expression she gave, she'd noticed.

"Sure thing, I can drop you off in Sioux Falls."

The car door unlocked and Dean climbed inside. Bobby lived in Sioux Falls, didn't he? He said a quiet thank you to the woman as she pulled the car back up onto the road. His eyes twitched again, he must have gotten too much dust in them, and he rocked his head back against the seat, staring out the window.

Dean didn't know how, he didn't know why, but he was home, or at least as close to home as he was going to get for the moment.

And he didn't trust it for one goddamn minute…