Fic: Stacking Bones

Gen, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, AU after 3.16

Epilogue

Additional warnings: Same as last chapter: Dark (but not quite as dark)

It's a beautiful, cloudless day outside when Sam meets Bobby to collect his brother's body.

Sam arrives at Singer Salvage before dawn. He steers the Impala around the hulking shapes of rusted-out cars, their skeletons throwing grotesque shapes against the ground, the fence and the house. He pulls up slowly, carefully, and parks perfectly perpendicular to the front of the weathered old two-story, sets the emergency brake and gets out of the car.

It's taken him all year to get used to the sound of only one door slamming shut.

Bobby isn't here yet, so Sam lowers himself to sit down on the worn front steps of Bobby Singer's house. He keeps a vigil in the dark, silent and patient, and watches the sun come up. There are wind chimes above his head, rusty old relics of a better time. The sound they make when a breeze touches them is disjointed, broken and sad.

Sam watches cars as they pass by on the dirt road beyond Bobby's collapsing fence. He tries to guess the make and model before they come into sight. It keeps his mind occupied and his ears sharp until he hears the growling of an eight-cylinder engine, rumbling like a thunderhead as it moves closer.

Sam stands. His shoulder brushes the wind chimes, sets them jangling. His handgun digs into the small of his back, warm from the heat of his body.

Bobby's Chevelle pulls into sight, glare of the rising sun on the windshield that prevents Sam from seeing inside. The vehicle moves molasses-slow, no longer a muscle car but a vintage hearse. It pulls up beside the Impala and crawls to a stop.

Sam moves forward, down the steps, which complain under his weight. He crosses half the distance from the house to the Chevelle before his feet won't carry him any further. He stops at the Impala's front fender, stands stalk-still except for the tremors rattling his hands and feet.

The Chevelle has two doors; big, heavy doors, the kind that put huge dings in the sides of lesser vehicles. They open at the same time and the gravel driveway drops out from under Sam's feet. He can't close the distance between the porch and the Chevelle quick enough.

Dean's hair is longer than it's been in years, colorless and waxy. He's wearing clothes that don't fit, clothes that he never would have picked out for himself. His skin is pale and when Sam wraps his arms around him he's so. Damn. Thin. But underneath the hair and the clothes and the sick-smell it's him. It's really him.

"Hey Sammy," Dean says in a whisper that's husky with tears or exhaustion or lack of oxygen because Sam is squeezing the life out of him.

On the driver's side of the car Bobby gets out slowly, like he's a thousand-year-old corpse rising from the grave. His eyes are red-rimmed and haunted-looking. They find Sam's over the roof of the Impala and Sam's shocked to see that the old man is crying.

"I'm sorry, Sam," he says.

And Sam can't imagine what Bobby has to be sorry about, because Dean's there. He's alive, heart pounding against Sam's chest, strong and steady.

"I couldn't…I-"

"It's okay, Bobby," Sam says, relieved, happy even.

Bobby is shaking his head back and forth, and that's when Sam sees that the old hunter has a pistol leveled at them both.

Sam shoves his brother behind him like Dean weighs nothing at all.

Bobby's voice is strained with grief, "You got ten seconds. Take your brother and go."

"You should listen to the man, Sam."

Sam turns his head, just a quick glance, so he can't be completely sure of what he sees; at least that's what he'll tell himself later. Dean's face is chalk white: a stiff, expressionless mask, and the eyes looking out of that mask are black as sin, black as the hollow barrel of the colt, pointed directly at him.

"Go!" Bobby roars.

Sam backpedals slowly, and Dean backs away with him.

Sam hasn't unlocked the passenger side of the Impala in months. He shoves Dean into the driver's side and scrambles in after him, pushing his brother awkwardly into the passenger seat. Neither of them is buckled up when Sam stabs the key into the ignition, turns the engine over and swings the car into reverse.

The tires spin and then find traction. Gravel sounds like hail from below as it flies up and strikes the undercarriage. Dean flies forward, catching himself with both hands on the dashboard. Sam spins the wheel, flinging his brother into the passenger-side door. He shifts from reverse to drive, and guns it, straight out of the gate, all the while watching the lone, stooped figure in the rearview mirror.

Bobby's standing in his driveway, head bowed, pistol pointed towards the ground, getting smaller and smaller as they leave him behind.

Sam finds the nearest entrance to interstate 90 and doesn't take his foot off the gas until they've crossed the state line. In all that time Dean doesn't say a word, just keeps staring out the window, framed by the blur of grass and trees and road signs. His arms are crossed over his chest, and he's hunched like it hurts to breathe, coat wrapped tight over his shoulders. Sam notices that unlike the jeans and the shirt that Dean is wearing, the coat looks old and worn.

"You can stop," Dean says, somewhere around Luverne.

Sam's been taking visual stock of his brother every minute or so for the last fifty miles.

"Sorry," Sam mutters. "Just want to be sure you're okay." This whole thing is so surreal. He half-expects to wake up on Bobby's porch, still alone, still waiting for the old hunter to bring him his brother's body.

"Not what I meant. You can stop the car."

"Are you tired? Hungry? You want me to find a motel?" Solicitous? No, downright worried, Sam rattles off the questions in rapid-fire fashion.

"Just pull over."

Sam puts the blinker on and does what he's told. Not much of a shoulder along this stretch of highway. The Impala cants to the right when it's fully off of the road, forcing Sam to lean towards the driver's side door to keep from falling on his brother.

Dean lets gravity have its way with him, lets it push him into the space between his seat and the passenger's side door. Sam hates the defeated slump to his body.

They listen to the mid-morning traffic rush by. It's a long time before either of them speaks. Dean seems to be searching for something, his green eyes (normal, human, Sam assures himself) flicking back and forth like there's writing on the dashboard, invisible to everyone but him.

"Bobby's not coming after us," Sam says.

Dean comes back with, "He was going to kill me."

Sam's stomach clenches as he remembers his last conversation with Bobby, a call that the old hunter made from a payphone. "I know."

"Did he tell you why?"

"Yes."

"He couldn't do it."

"I'm glad," Sam says, and lets it show in his voice.

"It would have been the right thing to do."

"Dean, you can't think that-"

"I made a deal with him," Dean interrupts.

"With Bobby," Sam repeats.

"We keep our noses clean, he keeps the other hunters off of our trail…when he can. He finds out I couldn't keep up my end of the bargain, he's going to finish what he started."

Sam nods. He's not as surprised as he should be. "We'll make it work. We'll go on like we always have: Saving people, hunting things."

"I don't think it's going to be that easy," Dean says quietly.

Dean won't turn to look at him. Sam swallows. "I can show you how…"

Dean does look at him now, and his eyes widen slowly, shocked white showing all around the irises. The passenger side window is dark enough that Sam can see his own eyes looking back at him, golden-yellow, almost glowing in the dim cab of the Impala.

Sam blinks and his eyes return to normal. Dean's eyes are still wide in his pale face. Underneath Bobby's jacket his muscles are tense, ready to fight or flee, and Dean doesn't look like he's in any kind of condition for either one.

Sam puts his hands up, like he's soothing a wild animal and not his brother, not Dean, who's always been strong, determined, stubborn.

Sam asks, calmly, "Do you trust me?"

Dean stares at him, body frozen, back against the window. His right hand is wrapped around the door handle. He's been to Hell and back, and there aren't many things on this earth that can scare Dean Winchester.

Sam sighs. He makes his voice low and gentle, reasonable, "Maybe it's too late to save ourselves. That doesn't mean we can't save anyone else. Please trust me."

Slowly, very slowly, Dean relaxes his grip on the door handle.

A few minutes later the Impala pulls back onto the highway, headed east, leaving Bobby, South Dakota and the Black Hills far behind.

There are dark clouds ahead, and the distant rumble of thunder.

End

Thank you for reading. Feedback is welcome.

Additional thanks to everyone who has reviewed and encouraged me so far. I hope that you are not too mad at me for ending things this way.

Notes: This story ended darker than I had originally intended. I wanted to send Sam and Dean off into a beautiful sunset or sunrise or something poetic like that, but the idea that I had was that the dark clouds are demonic omens, preceding them wherever they go. The way I picture it, there are still plenty of good days ahead for the boys. If the story had to continue after this, it would be a story of redemption.

Additional notes: I don't have an excuse for myself. I really don't.

I'm sorry.

So very sorry.

Loved it? Hated it? Say so, but, uh, in a nice way.