Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. They belong to Eric Kripke and I wouldn't have it any other way!
Summary: Sam and Rowena make a deal to "save" Dean, and Dean ends up paying the price. Hurt!Dean and Protective!Sammy. SPOILER ALERTS for episodes S10E17-S10E19.
"I begged you to torture me."
"What?" Sam's mouth went completely dry at his brother's confession.
Dean never begged for anything. Sure, he had a habit of goading himself into deeper trouble at the worst of times, but to plead for more pain? It just didn't make any sense to Sam.
Dean's restraints gave him just enough leeway to reach up and scratch the back of his head in discomfort.
"Hey, Cas? Do you think you could give us another minute here? I need to talk to my brother, alone."
Cas, who had looked just as flustered as Sam by Dean's previous statement, regained his composure and nodded.
"Yes. Yes, of course. I'll uh… I'll reach out to some trusted members from my old garrison to see if they have more information to share about the mark and its effects." His eyes drifted over to Sam pointedly. "You know how to contact me if any… problems should arise."
With that, the angel excused himself from the room, leaving a tense silence behind in his wake.
"Well that was subtle," Dean joked half-heartedly, trying to loosen the tension a bit, but Sam wasn't exactly in a laughing mood.
"What really happened in the pit, Dean?" he forced out before he lost his nerve. "What did I… What did he do to you?"
Dean had ducked this question multiple times already, but there was no getting out of this one. It was time to come clean.
He fiddled with his hands in his lap so he wouldn't have to look his brother in the eye. "How much did Cas tell you?"
"Just that Alistair was the ringleader behind the torture. He didn't go into specifics."
Dean nodded solemnly, preparing himself to reveal information he had hoped to take with him to his grave. Fate never seemed to work out in his favor though.
"The first thing you need to know is that Alistair was one creative son-of-a-bitch. He had a reputation in the pit, and he sure as hell earned it. I guess you could say he was the warden in my cellblock, and he liked to take his time rippin' souls to pieces.
"He'd work his way down the hall, one cell at a time, and you could judge how close he was by the screams. I swear, that was the worst part of Hell. The screamin' never stopped, Sam. Just changed direction and distance. But at least when he was torturin' me it was an effective distraction."
"Is that why you…?" Sam started then trailed off, unable to say the painful word aloud.
"Begged?" Dean supplied hollowly, then shook his head. "No. In fact, I refused to make any sound whatsoever in the beginning. I knew the screamin' was what Alistair got off on, so I wasn't about to give him the satisfaction. Hell, I even bit off my own tongue a few times just to spite that bastard.
"And the whole time he was tearin' me to shreds, the only thing that kept me sane was envisioning you out there somewhere livin' that normal, apple pie life you always wanted."
Sam looked away at that, knowing all too well that he hadn't fulfilled his brother's dying wish. Instead, Sam had crossed more lines than he cared to admit trying to break Dean out of Hell, and when all else failed, he tracked Ruby down to begin his training in preparation for killing Lilith.
Dean must've been so disappointed when he finally reunited with Sam, only to find his little brother had literally been sleeping with the enemy in his absence.
Dean cleared his throat, shifting awkwardly before continuing.
"Eventually, Alistair realized he wasn't winning the game, so he changed the rules. That's when he got into my head, and when you walked into my cell. I'll admit, he had me goin' for a while there, thinkin' you somehow found a way to bust me outta the pit, and like an idiot, I let my guard down."
"It should've been me, Dean. I tried everything to get you out."
"I know, and I'm not tryin' to guilt-trip you here, Sammy. I don't blame you for any of it, alright? I'm just sayin' he pulled a pretty obvious con on me and I was dumb enough to buy it."
"You were desperate, man. I'd have done the same thing in your shoes."
"Yeah, well… You make mistakes, you pay for 'em, right? When 'demon you' turned on me, it was the closest I'd ever gotten to breakin' and Alistair knew it. He tapped into my memories and threw everything he had at me.
"I kept tryin' to convince myself that it wasn't really you; that even if you went dark side after I became puppy chow, there was still no way you'd take it that far. Not to your own brother. But eventually, the doubt started to seep in and it was all downhill from there."
Sam was relatively sure a piece of his heart was now lodged in his esophagus. He swallowed hard before giving voice to his worst fear. "After all the crap I pulled before you died, I gave you every reason to doubt me."
Dean sighed. "It's more complicated than that, man."
He licked at his dry lips before continuing.
"You gotta understand something, Sammy. Hell was easily the most scared I've ever been in my entire life, and once I saw you there, I just… I couldn't face it alone anymore."
Dean absently played with the chains around his wrists, looking for anything to keep him grounded in the here and now while his memories of Hell kept tugging at him from the shadows.
"I needed him to be you, because even though we've had our ups and downs through the years, there was nothin' we couldn't beat when we had each other's backs. I figured maybe with time, I could find a way to save you, ya know? Bring back the Sam I knew so we could kick Alistair's ass and bust outta the pit together in true Winchester fashion."
Dean glanced over and forced a small smirk to cross his lips for his brother's benefit, but gave up the attempt when Sam didn't meet his gaze, too lost in his own guilt to acknowledge Dean's efforts at lightening the atmosphere a bit.
Dean looked back down at his hands, running his left thumb over the shallow, crescent-shaped cuts along his right palm from where his nails had dug into his flesh.
He had done the same thing in Hell to try and offset the agony in the rest of his body.
So much pain. The slicing. The tearing. The gouging. The malicious laughter, and the echoing screams…
Realizing belatedly that his brother had stopped talking, Sam glanced up and recognized the hundred-yard stare in Dean's eyes.
"Hey." He gently nudged Dean with his elbow, shaking him from his stupor and bringing him back to the present. "You good?"
"Yeah. Sorry," Dean grunted out, his voice deeper than it was only a moment ago. "Just zoned for a sec."
"I still don't get it, Dean. Why'd you do it? Why'd you beg for more pain when Alistair was clearly doing just fine on his own?"
A muscle in Dean's jaw twitched as he ground his teeth together.
"Cause that's when he figured out my real weakness. After years of me not screamin' like your demon-double wanted, you finally got bored. And then you turned your back and walked away. It was weeks before I saw you again. Before I saw anybody again.
"That was worse than any physical pain you coulda dished out. So when you showed up at my cell again and started layin' into me, I begged for more, because I knew if I did you'd keep comin' back, and as screwed up as it sounds, I just couldn't let you go, Sammy."
Dean's voice quavered on the last word and he had to close his eyes to help rein in his emotions.
"Even a sadistic copy of you was better than bein' alone down there. After a while, you didn't even bother chainin' me up anymore. I'd just kneel on the ground like a good little soldier and let you go to town."
"God, Dean…" Sam blinked back tears as his heart shattered at his brother's admission.
He knew Dean had always been afraid of abandonment. That's why his brother came to get him at school back when their father went missing.
After spending his whole life caring for others, Sam in particular, Dean was lost and without purpose when he suddenly found himself all alone.
But to choose physical torture over solitude?
Sam was instantly reminded of all the times he had walked away from Dean in the past and what that must have done to his brother.
Dean had no self-esteem left, no sense of self-worth.
It wasn't Alistair that broke his brother after all. The real damage had already been done, long ago.
Sam wiped at his face, his hand coming away wet. Dean pretended not to notice, continuing his story in an empty, emotionless tone. He had to disconnect himself or there was no way he'd be able to get through it all.
"Then at the end of every day, Alistair would come in to make his offer like I told you before; to take me off the rack if I put other souls on. And all I could think of was that I didn't want to turn into the monster that you had become. So every day, I shot him down."
Every day, for thirty years…Sam swallowed hard and unstuck his throat to ask the one question that had been plaguing him ever since their roadside chat about Hell. "What happened thirty years in, Dean? What changed?"
Dean turned away, hiding the tears that had started to stream down his own reddened face.
"I did the one thing I swore I'd never do. That day started like all the others, but halfway through tearin' into me, you brought up Dad. You told me I made him a promise but was too weak to keep it. That I was supposed to put you down if you went dark side, and that I was a failure for lettin' you live. For lettin' you turn into this… thing.
"And I had chances to end it all, believe me. Alistair wasn't as careful as he thought, leavin' the blades just close enough to reach and the chains just loose enough to break free if I tried. But even after thirty years of Hell, I wasn't ready to give up on you yet. I was still determined to save you, Sammy, no matter what it cost."
Dean looked up at Sam, his eyes begging his little brother to understand. To forgive him for what came next.
"But that's when you told me that Dad was down there with us, just one cell over where he could hear everything, and how disappointed he was that his soldier would beg a demon for pain cause it was easier than finishin' the damned job. Then you said if I didn't stop you right then and there, you were gonna start rippin' him apart next, and God help me, Sammy, I just lost it.
"I grabbed a blade from the instrument tray and I tore you apart until I couldn't raise my arms anymore. It was my job to keep you safe, Sam, and I failed in the worst possible way.
"And when I finally finished, there was this… darkness inside of me that was hungry for more. So when Alistair came back in to make his deal, I said yes, and what you had done to me all those years was nothin' compared to what I did to those innocent souls."
Dean's voice broke at the end and Sam knew he was done talking. He could practically hear his brother's mental walls trying to rebuild themselves before they were destroyed completely.
"I am so sorry, Dean," Sam whispered, tears streaming down his face unchecked. He could clearly recall Dean's reaction to him drinking the demon blood; how scared he had been that his little brother was turning himself into a monster.
After his time in Hell, Dean had started taking reckless chances; using himself as bait, sacrificing his blood for rituals so Sam wouldn't have to, egging the baddies on when they caught him and drinking away the pain from his wounds afterwards…
And now Sam understood why.
It wasn't just about the family business anymore. Dean was also fighting for his own redemption.
Sam stood up from the cot and stepped in front of his brother, gently taking his bound wrists into his hands.
Dean looked down in confusion as if just waking from a horrible nightmare, then he chanced a glance up at Sam. He was expecting to see betrayal or hurt in his brother's eyes, even anger or disgust.
But all he saw was a deep-seated love and respect that he didn't feel he deserved.
"Dean, listen to me," Sam stated, making sure he had his brother's undivided attention. "You have never failed me, okay? You are the strongest, most loyal person I've ever known. You did what you had to do in the pit and now you need to forgive yourself. I'm the one who failed, and I hope someday, maybe you'll be able to forgive me too."
With his mobility still restricted by the cuffs, Dean reached out and latched onto the front of Sam's shirt, pulling him forward. Sam went easily, wrapping his brother into a tight embrace, using the physical contact to convey everything that words alone never could.
Dean buried his face in his little brother's neck as he felt some of the weight lift off of his shoulders. Suddenly, the air wasn't so thick anymore and he could finally breathe again.
"Nothin' to forgive, Sammy," he stated next to his brother's ear. "It wasn't you."
But it was to an extent, and they both knew it.
Sam gripped Dean tighter, silent tears streaming down his cheeks for the broken man in his arms and the role he had unwittingly played in his destruction.
Never again would he give Dean a reason to doubt his loyalty.
Dean suddenly let out a small gasp. Sam was terrified he had hurt him so he immediately pulled away, studying his brother's face for an explanation. "Dean? You alright?"
Dean blinked up at him, wide-eyed and confused. "My back… It doesn't hurt anymore, Sam."
"What?"
"The pain. It's gone."
Sam stepped around the cot and his jaw dropped when he realized his brother's skin was mark-free. No more cuts. Not even faint scars. He had completely healed.
Sam let out a small, elated laugh. "You did it, Dean. You beat your inner demon."
"I'm afraid this is just a reprieve," Cas stated sadly from the doorway, making both boys twist around in surprise. "From what I've gathered, it's only going to get worse from here."
TBC
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