Chapter 5: White Ropes

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural or any of the characters. The only things I own are the errors. ;) Happy Reading!

***I've had this (Part 2) idea in my head for quite some time now. I've been waiting for something even remotely close to happen in the show but it hasn't. You all probably don't know but I write all of these chapters in about an hour, give or take, and then polish them up for about 10-15 on here and then publish them. It's a pretty improvable thing, so it's all fresh and new to me as much as it is to you all. Since I've been tossing this idea around for a long time I felt like it all had to be 'just so.' Which in turn, made this chapter take about 2 hours and 30 minutes just to write. ._.

***I decided to split these two scenes apart because I feel like mashing them together as one continuous thing didn't seem right, but putting them in different chapters would lose the effect since they happen back to back. So, hopefully you all enjoy this rather long chapter, sorry that it took longer than anticipated! Now enough of my rambling, get reading! ;)

Part One

Two years. Sam listened to his mind for two years. All of the "Don't listen to him, Sammy!" and "That's my boy!" cheers in his mind, which was still Dean's voice, had slowly started to disappear. He used to hear his brother all the time, in the back of his head trying to ward off all of the Devil's smooth talking. Now it was just on occasion, the slight little whisper saying "No" to him but Lucifer's hundreds of delicately worded monologues eventually outweighed them.

Sam hated himself for it, but he couldn't hold on anymore. Dean was his building block to whatever scrapes of sanity he could gather in a place like The Cage. When his voice left, the blocks started to crumble on Sam. He knew Lucifer could see it too, and he didn't even feel like he was being taken advantage of because he was finally starting to grasp the concept that had been pitched to him since Day 1: Lucifer was right. The way he was always right, and it should have pissed Sam off, except that between all of the beatings and drowning, he really didn't have the resolve to fight back.

He was sitting in a meadow at the time, tall thin blades of rich green grass all swaying in the motion the light wind was blowing. It seemed like a clip taken out of a Hallmark movie, which he used to watch on late nights with Jessica in their dorm at Stanford. Shit, he was thinking about Jessica. He only did that when shit was getting really bad. She was Sam's last resort; save for Mary which he was sure would have loved Hallmark movies just as much as Jess. Now he was thinking about both of them. Damn, he really was grasping at straws here.

"That's what happens to you when you're permanently grounded in Hell I guess," Sam said to nobody in particular. Now that was not a line that belonged in any Hallmark movie. That line did fit his surroundings now though, considering the fact that the little detail that made this scenery so un-perfect was the blood covering all of the grass. Literally, every blade of grass had at least a speck of red liquid on it. He had just watched over 100 men and women get slaughtered in 100 different ways. Fake people, he had to remind himself multiple times throughout the little show Lucifer was putting on for him.

Sometimes he would do that, instead of outright physical torture he would switch to the really psychological shit that tore his heartstrings time and time again as he had to watch whatever show the Devil was playing that night. Rarely would he have to watch as a supernatural creature killed another person, which went against his now dulling hunter instincts and really fucked up his mind. "Save them!" his mind screamed at him, but he couldn't do a damn thing and had to sit back and watch as some poor kid screamed for her parents and even God before getting her throat ripped out by a werewolf.

But then again, those were the days when his mind still had the balls to speak up and say something. The only things he heard these days were someone's screams, his own screams, his blood splattering against a wall or floor, his bones snapping, his skin ripping, and Lucifer's pleading voice. He hated to even think it, but he'd rather have Lucifer's voice any day over someone else screaming bloody murder for hours on end.

He closed his eyes and fell back onto the dirt and grass that surrounded him. The whistling of the breeze was the only noise, which was honestly, a little awkward because he had been hearing chaos for so long now that he didn't even know how to relax. He tried though, because he didn't know what had gotten Lucifer in his good graces enough that he could actually be in peace for a few precious moments, he wasn't going to waste it.

"Sammy." His head snapped to the side, turning his right ear to hear the sound from where it was coming from. Was it just my imagination?

"Sammy." There it was again! He did open his eyes this time, and swiveled his head to see just what was calling him. It was either Lucifer or Dean, and well, I think he knew which one it would be, keeping in mind that he hadn't heard jack squat from Dean in far too long. So why would he now?

His top half reacted before anything, his eyes meeting two green orbs staring right back at him with that oh so familiar lopsided grin reserved only for him. It was Dean. His Dean was here! Sam's face broke into an infectious grin, causing Dean to smile even wider than before, if that was even possible.

Wait, no. If Dean was here, then that meant…no! "Dean." His voice came out rushed and panicky as it was dawning on him just how bad this situation really was if his brother was here. "Everything is fine Sam, really. I'm fine. I didn't die, and I'm not in The Cage with you." Sam relaxed at the news, because if his brother really had found a way to jump in with him, then he would have kicked his ass all over this cage.

"Well then how-" Sam started, but Dean held out his hand to stop him before he could finish. "Doesn't matter. But I gotta talk to you, so you're gonna listen." Sam nodded his head for him to continue. Damn, I almost forgot what Dean in charge felt like.

"Sam, listen to me. I know that we had it hard, all our lives. And sometimes I wasn't there for you, or I made it worse. I've said some awful stuff to you in the past, but that was just my temper man. You know I didn't mean any of it. I love you, Sammy. It was my job to protect you, and look where you're at now."

At that Dean looked down at his hands, like they had all the answers and if he looked hard enough he could find them.

"Hey, don't do that. You were an amazing brother, Dean. You are an amazing brother, and I couldn't have asked for a better one." He tried to reassure his older brother, and it apparently had at least a little bit of an effect, because he continued where he left off before Sam interrupted.

"Anyways, I just wanted to say that I'm so sorry Sammy. I know it probably doesn't feel like it, but I'm always gonna be there for you. Can you promise me something?"

"Of course, anything Dean. What?"

"Don't forget me." His voice was so tiny he almost didn't hear it.

He was about to answer when the wind picked up a huge gust and his thick brown hair started to fall in his eyes. His nose started to tickle from small strands of hair and he batted his right hand at it to hopefully stop their poking before he sneezed. He didn't even see Dean looking at him with tear-filled eyes or hear the soft chuckle that came from his lips before he disappeared.

Sam's eyes opened and the rush of daylight pierced his still sensitive eyes. Wait, what? Wasn't he just looking at Dean? He was lying on the ground still too.

No… His mind was finally catching up with itself and the pit of his stomach dropped. He jumped up and turned around every which way to find Dean but he was nowhere in sight.

It was all a dream.

Part Two

Sam blinked his eyes and he was no longer in the bloody meadow. Where was he? Wherever he was, it was dark. Not just nighttime but like, I-can't-see-my-hand-waving-in-front-of-my-face dark. He didn't even notice the sound until he stopped thinking and listened. That sounds like a waterfall. But it was all around him, a circle probably, encasing him in this area.

He slowly began to take steps, and his boots made an echo that flew off of the walls surrounding him, which did give him an idea of just how big this room was. It was about 25'x25', though it felt like much smaller. He still couldn't see shit, so when his left foot caught on a rise in the floor ahead it didn't really surprise him, but it did cause him to curse as he stumbled forward and thankfully had enough balance not to fall flat on his face. Even if this was The Cage and it was just him and Luci, he still didn't lose the feeling of embarrassment at petty things like tripping and falling down.

He finally made his way so that he was right next to whatever liquid, preferably water, was pouring out of the openings of the circular walls trapping him in this circle. From the sound he could make out, it sounded like the source of where the liquid was gushing out from was at least 15 feet above him. Oh great. So if this place does end up flooding in on itself, I couldn't even try and stop it from flowing out.

Taking a risk, because what the hell, he drew his right hand out towards it and the stuff poured down on the tips of his fingers. He heard a loud noise, as is someone flipped some huge switch behind him, and he turned his head back to see what it was. That was kind of a pointless move, considering it was still dark. But apparently the switch noise did something, because bright white light shined down on him lighting up the entire area around him. And it stopped Sam dead in his tracks.

What he thought and hoped was water turned out to be, once again, blood. Everywhere around him, in a circle he guessed correctly about, he was completely engulfed by red. Jerking his head back so quickly he heard his neck pop but not really caring and too numb to pay attention to the pain, he stared wide eyed at his hand that he was still letting get soaked with blood. He yanked his hand back and shuffled his way to the middle of the circle, looking all around him to look for something, anything.

Then he heard Lucifer's voice in a low grumble, "Sa-am." Which was followed by a wicked laugh that sounded so evil he could've swore his bones shook. It wasn't Lucifer's laugh though, no, it was… his? Extremely confused because clearly Sam was not laughing, he got a bad feeling in his gut. But who would in a situation like this?

The next thing he heard made him twice as freaked out: "Saving People. Hunting Things. The Family Business." That was Dean's voice. Better yet, he remembered Dean telling him that. It happened all those years ago when they went into the woods after that Wendigo, and all Sam could think about was finding Yellow Eyes.

"Sam? Wait. You're just going back to your brother? The guy you ran away from?" Meg? Seriously, what the fuck was going on? He remembered her saying that too, when he was at that bus stop waiting to go to California to look for their dad. What is this, blasts from the past? A huge hodgepodge of voices started coming together and he picked some of them out.

"He's my brother." My voice.

"If we're gonna do this, we're gonna do it together." My voice again.

"SAM!" Woah, that one's all Dean.

"That's my job, right? Watch after my pain in the ass little brother?" Dean again.

"COME ON! WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU!?" Me again.

The voices had started to get louder and louder, pounding against Sam's skull. He forcefully shut his eyes and tried to block it out, but the memories just started coming faster.

"I thought it was supposed to be you and me, against the world."

"If what you're doing is so terrific, then why did you lie to me about it? Why did an angel tell me to stop you?"

"Do you know how far off the reservation you've gone? How far from normal? From human? If I didn't know you, I would want to hunt you."

"It's gonna get darker, and darker, and God knows where it ends."

"You know what that means, Sam? That God doesn't want you doing this."

"You let me down in ways that I can't even…"

"You chose a demon over your own brother!"

"I don't think we could ever be what we were."

"I can't trust you."

"Monster, Sam. You're a monster!"

"I tried, so hard, to pretend that we were brothers. That you weren't one of the filthy things that we hunt. But we're not even the same species. You're nothing to me."

At this point Sam couldn't take it anymore. He put his hands up to cover his ears but he could still hear the voices. He didn't even try and hold back the tears now, it was useless. He was being tormented by his own past, and oh how shitty it looked right about now.

"You set me free." Now there was the calm line from when he had first met Lucifer.

"I want to give you everything."

"I will never lie to you. I will never trick you."

"We're two halves made whole, literally. MFEO."

"I'm your real family."

"All those times, you weren't running away from them. You were running towards me."

"I want you to be happy, Sam."

His name ringing in his ears as he felt like the room was spinning. I need to get out of here. Not even knowing where he was headed, he ran straight through the bloodfall.

He entered a room that had only a pristine white rope hanging in the center, whatever door he just came through slammed shut behind him. The floor started to shake, and cracks began to form quickly across the black marble and small sections began falling through. He ran towards the center and grabbed the rope just when the entire floor collapsed, leaving him hanging there in a dark abyss.

Lucifer appeared in front of him, reserved as always but with what looked like actual concern in his demeanor. "Sam." His heart ached at the sound and he felt so exhausted that his arms started to shake and he knew he didn't have much longer before he fell.

"I'm here, Sam. I'll always be here." Sam looked down and couldn't see a damn thing besides more darkness. God, he felt like he was being smothered with the darkness. "Trust me, Sam. Nobody cares about you more than me, the past just proved that."

Thick and heavy beads of sweat formed on Sam's brow. The ringing of his name was still in his head, and everything was starting to ache. He only saw one way out of this.

"Tell me what you want, Sam." He looked the Devil in the eye and answered him with a weak but honest voice for the first time, "I want it to stop."

"It will Sam, it will. You just have to let it go. Let it all wash away. I'll still be here." One thought entered his mind at the last second; I'm sorry, Dean.

He looked back at Lucifer who gave him a solemn nod of acceptance.

Sam let go.

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As A Side Note: This was a pretty intense chapter, don't you think? :o I thought so when I was creating it.