So, originally, Collapse was supposed to be just a one-shot. But then... Oh, Hell, I don't know. This happened. I feel like it's really repetitive of the first part, but I guess that's why it's now a two-shot... I just fail at life.

Don't mind me, I'm just here, suckin' at life. Ya know.

Warnings: Spoilers for pretty much all of the seasons. So if you havent watched seasons 1-7 of Supernatural... read at your own risk. Huzzah!

Fragments

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There had been a point in his life where he had wanted a family. He'd wanted to marry Jess and have kids and raise them normally and never introduce them to anything supernatural. He had wanted to leave his life as a hunter behind, before it was too late and he was sucked in so far that he wouldn't have the strength to pull himself out.

And then Dean showed up on his doorstep and Jessica was dead on his ceiling and her blood was on his face and there was fire, fire, fire –

It took him months to realize that there was never a way out. Once you were a hunter, you were always a hunter. Sam had fooled himself into thinking that he could ever have a normal life – with Jess or with anyone, really. He had never wanted this life – the life of a hunter – but he'd been dragged into it time and time again. He was born to it. He had never had a choice.

He would never blame Dean, because Dean was a victim, too. Sam thought that, deep down, he had always been angry at his Dad for obsessing over revenge. He was angry that he left them, night after night, at random motels, sometimes without food and always lonesome. For most of their childhood, all they'd had were each other. (and maybe, he had hoped that one day he could've thanked his Dad for that, too, because he and Dean would not be as close if they hadn't had to raise one another)

Addiction, in a twisted way, had been holding him together for those long months that Dean had been in Hell, and even a little after that. The road of a hunter was dark and twisted, and he'd needed control – but then it spiraled out of his fingertips and he'd betrayed his brother and made love to a demon and ruined everything. What he longed for was something stable – unlike the millions of different hunts and supernatural beings or the ups and downs of he and Dean's crumbling relationship – and once he had it, it turned quickly from control to obsession in the sensual slices of Ruby's wrists.

He no longer deserved a normal life, after all that he'd done. He'd killed innocent people. His blood was not completely human; there was demon blood flowing through his veins. He had no idea what could happen – what if he… changed? How, he didn't know, but there was a fear that was worse than anything he'd ever felt when he'd faced a demon or a monster or even Lucifer, that one day he would turn and then he wouldn't be Sam anymore. He would be dangerous to everyone around him. He would be dangerous to Dean, and he couldn't let that happen.

Sam wasn't sure who he was anymore. And that wasn't something he could handle. So, he turned to whiskey and beer when demon blood was no longer an option. Beer to help him sleep at night, so long as Dean never found out. But he was pretty sure his brother would understand, because Sam knew that he was not coping well either – with anything. He could feel the guilt eating away at them from the inside out, and unfortunately, this was one monster they could not fight.

After that came Hell on Earth, riding on four horses named Pestilence, Famine, War, and Death, with Lucifer leading them along. After resisting the Devil himself for so long, Sam was tired. He was so terribly, terribly tired, and giving up seemed almost like Heaven on Earth (yeah, right). So he'd said yes, with the hope that his withered, broken body could resist Lucifer with all its might.

He'd lasted about 30 seconds before the glue holding his mind together gave way and he crumbled under the Devil like a shattered toy, because he was afraid to fight back, because he was afraid of what could happen to himself. For once, Sam had thought that it'd be okay to be terrified for himself but he'd chosen a horrible time to finally start caring.

But when the time came, he threw himself into the pit for the safety of his beloved brother (no, no, the world can go screw itself, he thought bitterly, whereas if Dean is safe then everything is okay) and he honestly didn't care if he were to rot in Hell for the rest of eternity (literally). So long as he could buy Dean a few more measly years (with Lisa and Ben and the apple pie life that Sam had desperately wanted for his whole life).

Being pulled out had been a miracle, but of course it was too good to be true. Somewhere along the way, he had lost his soul–what made him–him; what made him completely and utterly Sam, because all he had left was the splintered pieces of himself. Dean didn't trust him anymore and he hadn't for a while. Sam did not blame him. When Death put up the wall and Castiel took it down, he had to rely on himself to try and put the pieces of Sam back together–even the ones he'd lost so long ago that he didn't even think they were in existence anymore.

He'd killed himself twice (it's all in your head, Sammy) to gain back what was missing. And of course, because he was a Winchester and nothing ever went his way, it all went to Hell again.

"No, Lucifer, you're not real," he repeated a hundred (a thousand? a million?) times to what Dean saw as air but Sam saw as the Devil, alive and real and definitely not in the Cage. No matter how many times he wished him away, he wouldn't leave, and then all his thoughts were plagued with were, "was 160 years in Hell not enough? Is he out? Does he want his vessel back?" He was drowning in his terror and Sam couldn't tell Dean because he was already dealing with too much.

His life was a merry-go-round of guilt and fear and self-loathing. It seemed like all he could do for the rest of his life was try to redeem himself. Sam had spent so long trying to be normal that he'd tried too hard and it had slipped out of his fingers like water. After everything he'd done, it wasn't something he was worthy of. In the end, all he could do was have faith that maybe there was still hope for Dean. Sam was too far gone to be saved.

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