Chapter Ten

Holman bellowed and charged toward them, but Sam flicked his hand toward him in the same dismissive way Holman had that night in the motel room. And just like Sam, Holman's shock at being frozen in place showed on his face.

Then Sam twitched his finger, and Holman's back slammed into the wall across from the table.

"No!" The sound of Holman's voice, which years before had filled Sam with fear, now almost made him laugh. He didn't sound like a monster anymore. He sounded like a child throwing a temper tantrum. "This is my world! You cannot do this!"

Sam tilted his head. "Funny, because I think I just did." He'd managed to rescue his brother and take control away from Holman. The only thing left to do was kill the bastard.

"Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas."

Sam turned his head toward Dean, nodded and smiled. Maybe he and Bobby couldn't exorcise Holman in the outside world, but with Sam holding him still, there was no reason why Dean couldn't do it in the dreamworld.

"Dean, you stop!" Holman demanded as he struggled against Sam's hold on him. "You know better than to make me angry!"

"Omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio."

"I don't think he's listening to you anymore," Sam said. He was walking toward Holman slowly, threateningly, and enjoying the demon's discomfort far more than he probably should have been.

"Ergo draco maledicte et sectio."

"No! Dean! Think about what I'll do to you when I get free. And I will get free! You cannot kill me!"

"Kill you?" Sam said smugly. "Oh, Dean's not going to kill you."

"Ergo draco maledicte et legio secta diabolica."

"He just wants to send you back to Hell." Sam was close enough to Holman that he could lean forward and whisper in his ear, just as he'd done to Dean all those years ago. He could say him anything he wanted, because there was no way Dean would ever hear him say it. "I'm the one that's going to kill you."

Holman started to choke as the ritual went on. Black smoke was starting to pour from his mouth, nose, and eyes as he fought to hold his chosen form together.

"This is the lesson you didn't learn last time, Coy."

"Ut Ecclésiam tuam secúra tibi fácias servire libertáte."

"If you want to win, don't pick a fight with a Winchester."

"Te rogámus, audi nos."

Sam grabbed Holman's hair and yanked his head back, then leaned down until his lips almost touched the demon's ear.

"And if you want to live, don't fuck with my brother."

"Domine."

Sam let go of the monster's hair, turned away and fell to his knees as Holman's body fell apart, reduced to a formless blackness that could no longer hold itself together in human form. He could see Dean a few feet away, down on one knee with his arms over his head. Above them was an angry, swirling cloud of greasy black smoke – all that remained of Coy Holman.

It rose toward the ceiling of the basement as it was pulled out of the dreamworld and back down to Hell. Its upward movement suddenly halted, as though something were preventing it from leaving. It changed direction and started sinking back to the ground, but only made it a few inches before it was stopped again. Stuck between the forces that pushed and pulled against it, all it could do was spin in place as small tendrils snaked out from it, seeking an escape that it would never find.

Sam lifted his head and smiled.

The glow started in the middle, faint at first but growing brighter. As it spread out across the cloud, the colors deepened, changing from yellow to orange to red, and streaks of what looked like lightning started to appear. By the time the glow from within became flames that consumed it from the outside, both Sam and Dean were on their feet.

The explosion started in the center, a shockwave of blackness that shattered the smoke cloud into a million pieces that it immediately pulled back and into oblivion. The force of it knocked them both to the floor.

Coy Holman was gone, and this time, there'd be no coming back.

Sam immediately pushed himself up and half-ran/half-crawled to his brother's side.

Dean was lying face-down where he'd fallen, one arm flung out to his side and the other under him, and so far as Sam could tell, he hadn't moved since he'd hit the floor.

"Dean!" He grabbed Dean's outstretched arm and rolled him over to his back. Dean's eyes were closed, and the fresh blood that ran from the broken skin above his left eye told Sam that he'd slammed his face into the floor when he'd fallen. That didn't stop Sam from grabbing his shoulders and shaking him, though.

"Hey, Dean, wake up."

Dean's eyelids fluttered a few times before finally opening all the way, and he blinked up at Sam in confusion. After a few seconds, he pressed his hands against the floor and started pushing himself up.

"Hey, easy. Take it easy." Sam helped him finish sitting up and waited for him to regain his balance. He had every intention of letting go of Dean's arm once he stopped wobbling, but that wasn't what happened. Before Dean could say anything, definitely before he could protest, Sam wrapped his arms around him and pulled him into a tight hug. He didn't even feel the urge to cry, until he realized that Dean was returning it instead of pulling away.

"I'm sorry, Dean," he whispered into his brother's hair. "I am so sorry."

Dean didn't answer him, but Sam could feel him shaking his head. A few moments passed before three taps on Sam's back told him that Dean was done with the hugging. But Sam wasn't, so he didn't let go.

"Sam," Dean finally said. "Can't breathe here."

Sam finally released him and pulled away, wiping the tears from his cheeks quickly in the hopes that Dean wouldn't notice them.

"Wuss."

Sam snorted; of course he noticed. "Asshole."

"So," Dean said, "we get him?"

"Yeah," Sam answered with a nod of his head. "We got him."

"Then why are we still here?"

Sam shrugged. "I'm not really sure, but I think I ... well, we took over. We're controlling it now. I think we'll be here until we decide to leave."

"So can we? Please?"

"Sure," Sam said. He ignored the pleading and slightly fearful tone behind Dean's words and pushed himself to his feet, then reached back down and helped Dean to his. Holman was dead and they were in control, but the adrenaline that had been feeding him before was gone, and Dean was still too hurt and weak to stand on his own. Sam pulled Dean's right arm across his shoulders and kept his left arm behind Dean's back as he turned around.

"It's ours, huh?" Dean asked as Sam walked them toward the door. "We can do whatever we want to it?"

Sam stopped in the door and looked at Dean, who was staring across his shoulder and back into the room. Sam adjusted his hold slightly and stepped to the side, so that Dean could look back more easily. He could see the memories written on his brother's face, even if he didn't share them all. He knew that he'd never ask again, never demand that Dean fill in any more of the blanks. The memories they did share were more than enough, and Sam knew he'd be having nightmares about what he imagined had happened for months. He had a feeling that if he knew what had actually happened, he'd never sleep again.

"What do you want to do to it, Dean?"

Dean swallowed hard and stared down at the floor. Then he took a deep breath, raised his head, and looked Sam right in the eye.

"Burn it down."

"Okay," Sam answered softly.

And because it was their world and they wanted it that way, fire could burn concrete, and the flames they walked through on their way out didn't touch them.

Sam opened his eyes slowly and found himself lying on the bed in the motel room, with Bobby standing beside him, looking down.

"Sam?" Bobby said hesitantly. "You okay?"

Sam nodded slowly and looked around, giving himself a few moments to adjust to reality again. He didn't know why he'd half expected to wake up in the basement, but he was glad that he hadn't. As the fog of confusion lifted, he remembered the last few minutes of his time in the dreamworld. He remembered standing in the yard with Dean, watching the flames consume the basement from below. Then the white light had flashed again, and he'd opened his eyes back where he belonged.

"Did you get him?" Bobby asked. "Is it over?"

"Yeah," Sam croaked. His eyes stung and his throat was raw, almost like the smoke he'd been standing in had been real. If it had all been a dream, he shouldn't still feel it, should he? But he did. And if he was still feeling the effects of the smoke, then Dean had to be ...

"Dean!"

Sam bolted upright on the bed.

"Don't yell so loud," Dean answered quietly. "My head hurts."

Dean was still lying on the bed where he'd been since Sam had put him there. The bruises Holman had left on his neck when he'd tried to strangle him were still there, and he looked as rough as twelve miles of bad road, but Dean's eyes were open and he was almost smiling. That was more than enough for Sam.

"He woke up a few minutes before you did," Bobby explained. "Cussing a blue streak because you weren't awake yet."

Sam realized that his hand was still wrapped around Dean's wrist, and he rubbed the back of it with his thumb. Dean's smile grew into a smirk.

"Wuss."

Sam laughed. The confused expression on Bobby's face made him laugh even harder. When Dean chuckled along with him, Sam nodded and let go of his arm.

"Yeah, I am."

"You two are ten kinds of crazy, and Sam, the next time you do somethin' that friggin' stupid, I just might kill ya myself. Taunting Holman like that ..."

"You did what?"

All of the humor was gone from Dean's voice, and Sam rolled his eyes. "It worked, didn't it? You're alive, I'm fine, and Holman's dead."

"Dead?" Bobby's voice was filled with disbelief, and he looked back and forth between them. "You killed a demon?"

"Yeah," Sam answered. He looked down at the bed and avoided Bobby's eyes. "I guess if you're not afraid of a fear demon, it makes him weaker. And if he's using a nightmare to scare you, you can take control of it."

"And if you're really lucky ..." Dean's voice was raw and ragged, and he sounded like he'd screamed himself hoarse. Sam cringed when he realized that he probably had. "Sam can blow it up with his brain."

"Sam can do what now?"

Sam shook his head. "No, nothing like that. It was just ... the things that happened in there were what Holman wanted, right? So I ... we turned it around. We wanted him to die, so he did. Just used his own power against him, that's all."

As far as Sam was concerned, that was all it was. At least, that was all he'd ever admit to. Neither Bobby nor Dean ever needed to know what he'd done, how he'd done it, or that he'd done it by himself. And it wasn't like he knew how he'd done it anyway.

"Hey," he said, turning back to Dean again. "How're you feeling?"

"Head hurts," Dean answered. "That's all."

"No, it's not," Sam said. "I know it's not."

"It was a dream, Sam. It wasn't ..."

"Yes, it was," Sam interrupted. "Dean ..."

"'Scuse me a minute, boys." Bobby held his hand up and walked toward the door. "I'm just gonna go get ... something outta my car. I'll be back."

Sam smiled at the obvious excuse, but he was thankful to Bobby for leaving all the same. Because the conversation he and Dean were about to have needed to happen, but no one else needed to hear it.

Sam pushed himself up on his knees and crawled to the other end of the bed, then turned around and sat next to Dean's pillow. He settled back against the headboard and sighed. Dean looked up at him, obviously waiting for Sam to start.

"The smoke stung my eyes," Sam finally said. "And made my throat hurt."

"Yeah," Dean said with a small nod. "Me, too."

"And I can still feel it. Even though it was never 'real,' and it never 'happened,' my eyes still sting and my throat still hurts."

Dean turned his head on the pillow and stared across the room.

"Don't, Dean," Sam begged. "Please. What happened in there it was ... I don't know. I don't want to know." And he hoped Dean could hear the truth of that in his voice, because he really didn't. "But I do know that whatever it was, however ... bad it was, whatever it felt like, you can still feel it."

Dean closed his eyes then, and if silent tears were starting to roll down his cheeks, Sam wasn't going to mention them.

"It did happen, and it was real. Then and now. And you need to admit that so you can see it for what it really was."

Dean shook his head and opened his eyes, but he kept his face turned away from Sam. "I know what it really was," he whispered. "I've always known."

Sam tilted his head in confusion. "Then why did you say ...?"

"Because knowing what it was doesn't mean I wanted to admit it. And I didn't think it would ever come up again." He half-shrugged. "When we got here and it started all over again, I just ... didn't know what else to do."

"So when you said you dealt with it ...?"

"I wasn't lying."

Sam nodded; he could accept that. "I guess all I really need to know right now, Dean, is are you okay?"

Dean huffed out a humorless laugh. "No." He took a shaky breath and blew it out. "But I will be. He's dead this time, right? Really dead?"

"Yeah," Sam answered.

"That helps." Dean turned his head on the pillow again and looked up at Sam with a smile that spoke of pain and sadness, but also a small sense of hope. "And maybe I'll tell you more than that someday, but not right now. I've had enough touchy-feely crap for one day. First a hug, now a talk ... you don't expect me to do the 'feelings' thing too, do you?"

But Sam wasn't ready to let it go, not yet. He still had one thing left to say.

"What you did for me that night, Dean ..."

"Was what I had to do," Dean interrupted. "Because it's my job, and because it was the right thing to do. You're my little brother, Sam. If I don't take care of you, who will?"

Sam was trying to figure out how to answer that when he felt Dean nudge his leg with his hand.

"Besides, you'd do the same thing for me, right?"

Sam gave a crooked smile. "I think I just did."

Dean nodded and smiled back. "Nah, but you tried to. Not your fault I'm too awesome to need it."

Sam snorted. "Dude, I was so totally the big brother."

"Were not."

"Was to!" Sam argued. "You were nineteen, and I was twenty-two. That so does make me the big brother."

"In your dreams, Sammy-boy."

It was making light of a serious situation, gallows humor at its finest, and Sam knew it. But it felt righter than any conversation they'd had in days, and that was all that mattered. It meant they were already getting back to normal. It meant it was really over.

It meant they were going to be fine.

Bobby chose that moment to walk back through the door, with absolutely nothing in his hands. Sam smiled at him, and Bobby shrugged.

"Whatever you say, Dean," Sam said. "You're the big brother. But I'm still telling you to go to sleep, because I know you need it."

Dean smiled, nodded, closed his eyes, and slowly rolled on to his side, facing away from Sam. But he turned back over suddenly and looked up at him with panicked eyes.

"What time is it?" Dean demanded.

Sam glanced across at Bobby, who looked as confused as Sam was at Dean's strange question, and then back down. "Relax and go to sleep, Dean. It doesn't matter what ..."

"What time is it?"

Obviously there was no placating Dean until he had an answer, so Sam squinted down at his watch. "It's two in the morning. Why?"

Dean smiled, then turned back to his side again, obviously contented with the answer.

"Dean?" Sam asked. He put his hand on Dean's arm and leaned over him, trying to see his face. "Why does it matter what time it is?"

"Because," Dean said. "Check the date, Forgetful Jones." He yawned, grinned at Sam, and then said sleepily, "Happy birthday, Sammy."