I just wanted to say sorry for the wait. I've been busy with school and now, for the next two days I'll be stuck in a mansion type boarding school at a writing workshop. They are so primitve they have no net access so I wont be able to read any reveiws I might get! Oh well.

I also wanted to thank Liv, as always for helping me come up with this story and now, I want to thank Carocali for putting up with my emails and brainstorming with me. Thanks also to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, it made my day.

I don't own Supernatural, although if I did, I'd make Dean do some naughty things with...or right, I think I'm keeping this PG. lol.

Enter Sandman

Chapter 11

The heat was building on his cheek and Dean closed his eyes against the swirling smoke tingling his nose and burning his lungs. It was pressing down on his face, smothering him with unseen weight. How the hell had it found them? Why the hell couldn't he move? Oh hell he wanted to kick this son-of-a-bitch's ass!

Opening his eyes, he found himself surrounded by blackness. There was no pale streetlight coming in through the parking lot window. The demon's body was pressing into his, weighing down his chest, cutting off his breath. He couldn't have screamed even if his voice weren't frozen because the sudden weight had pushed the air from his lungs.

His head was swimming but he still had the presence of mind to feel Sam roll away from him, contact breaking completely. Sam had just rolled away from the demon but also safety. It was Dean's job to keep him safe and here he was, trapped with in his own body, unable to move or breathe.

Tears stung his eyes and began leaking down his face as he struggled against his paralysis. A rushing was filling his ears, growing in tempo, shifting and changing to the thump thump thump of his speeding heart. He was going to die. He couldn't breathe. Sam was going to die.

The vision of Jess on the roof morphed into a vision of his mother burning in the kitchen before him a few weeks ago, in Lawrence. He could feel the tremble of his hand holding the shot gun as he stood between her and Sam, watching fire dancing around her face.

He could feel the pain of seeing her again, her beautiful face smiling weakly as she watched him…so close he could almost have reached out and touched her. She'd been just as he'd remembered when he was four, that smile as she tucked him in, the look in her eyes that suggested they were alone in the world…it was just the two of them.

He swallowed the burning itch in his throat, unsure if it was the sudden surge of memories of the smoke rushing down to his starving lungs. He had to break free of his prison. He had to save Sam. He couldn't let this thing pin him to the ceiling like some bug in a dissection pan.

The weight was growing, pressing harder and harder on his body. The rushing sound was dying down, growing fainter as his heart beat slowed. The heavy sensation began to travel up his chest, filling his mouth and rolling like vomit over his tongue. It was sand; he could feel it washing beneath his teeth, warm and gritty. The stinging in his eyes were no longer tears but little, fine golden grains…

As his heart stopped all he thought about was Sam…and how Mom had loved him enough to say she was sorry to him and not her oldest…her oldest who had sacrificed everything in the name of family and love. Sam…sacrifice…love…

His toe wiggled. That's all he needed. The paralysis lifted and Dean bolted upright, a terrified, pleading, bloodcurdling scream tearing at his searing throat as he launched himself across the bed. Crawling frantically across the mattress, he tugged and scrabbled with the mess of blankets twisting around his legs until with a dull thunk he landed hard on the floor beside the dresser.

Sam was calling for him, screaming over the terrified yells of Dean's own voice but he ignored him. He had to reach the gun. He had to save Sam.

Spitting onto the rug as he crawled, Dean grimaced at the gritty feeling of sand in his mouth as he reached into the weapons duffle bag and pulled out a side arm filled with rock salt. Spinning around on the dirty carpet, his knee grating painfully as his sweat soaked jeans rubbed against shag, he aimed at his side of the bed with a shaking hand and fired.

The rock salt tore little pinprick holes in the wall, shattering the glass on the picture above the bed and sending a sharp little rain down on Sam who ducked, arms flying up over his head to protect him from the onslaught.

Dean's voice suddenly fell silent, all noise ripped from his body like a tide as he spun on the spot, gun raised. Sam had, at some point, turned on the lamp between the two beds and now sat there, delicately shaking glass from his hair as he watched his brother cautiously. The demon had been there, he'd seen it! It had almost choked him to death with its swirling body…and the sand.

Letting the gun fall to the ground with a clatter, Dean scooted over to the dresser and leaned against it, his head aching, and his throat dry and scratchy. Every breath hurt and rattled deep inside his chest where the sand had welled just moments before. Had it all been a dream? A nightmare? A cruel joke of his subconscious? The tightness of his chest and the squeeze of lungs around breath told him it wasn't but he couldn't even be sure of his own body anymore.

Sam got up slowly, his eyes shifting around the room as though he were looking for the source of his brother's panic. Dean closed his eyes, feeling his wet eyelashes pressing down on the tight skin beneath. How could he wipe away the tears without Sam noticing?

As Sam sat down by his side and leaned back against the dresser, his shoulder just barely touching Dean's. Bringing his knee up to his chest slowly, he let out a dramaticly tired sigh and leaned his head down to press his right eye into his jeans.

Groaning, he moved his head the side, wiping his wet cheek off before moving to the other one. Hopefully Sam wouldn't notice but the little shit was amazingly perceptive. They sat there like that for a few minutes before Sam broke the silence.

"Are you okay?" Dean rolled his eyes. He could never be less okay. The dreams were getting more intense, his time was running out and any day now, Phil's spirit was going to kill his ass.

Yeah." He answered. His voice was scratchy and the words ripped at the raw flesh inside his throat like razor blades. "I ah," He cleared his throat. "Just a nightmare."

"Were you on the roof like mom…and Jess?" Sam's voice was casual but there was a hint of nervousness in the way he stuttered.

Dean felt his stomach clench and a chill run through him. Pulling his head up slowly from his knee, he stared sideways at his brother. Dean didn't know what to say so he said nothing. Sam had known…Sam always knew. Sam shrugged as though it was just a casual, throw away question but the wrinkle of his brow and the paleness of his face showed his worry.

"No." Dean answered finally, clearing his throat and letting his head fall back onto his knee. "Why?"

Sam shifted beside him but stayed silent. Dean brought his head up again, eyes determinedly fixed on the mess of blankets lying at the end of the bed. There was no sand, just sweat and the tip of one of his socks that had been lost sometime in the last few hours. The crusty tickle of the carpet beneath his toes finally penetrated his brain and he realized dimly that he had only one sock on. He suddenly felt like stupid.

"Sam. Why would I dream about that?" Sweat prickled his back and he wiggled uncomfortably, his shoulder pressing briefly into Sam's but long enough to feel his little brother's tremble.

"I donno." Sam shrugged. "I just had a dream that I was standing under you, like Jess." His voice had taken on a feigned uninterested now, as though they were having a late night discussion about the relationship between Kevin and Britney or the Care Bears. "And then, before I woke up, I had a dream that there was something reaching for me."

Dean swallowed hard and dredged up a smile. "It was just a dream, Sammy." Sam visibly bristled.

"A dream? Is that what you had? A dream?" He pulled away from the dresser and sprang to his feet, stepping over Dean and going over the rock salt wounded wall. "Look at this!" Dean stared at the wall impassively. He had no energy left to feel anything anymore. He was drained. "Dean! This is not nothing!"

"I thought Wynn was there. That bitch deserves some rock salt shot up her ass." Sam sighed dramatically and dropped onto the bed, letting his head fall forward into his hand. "I swear, that woman needs to get laid. High maintenance like her and no husband? Bachelors of America unite, there's trouble brewing." He was trying to make Sam smile…hell, he was trying to make himself smile but it wasn't working. The humor died on the frosty air between the brothers, leaving a long moment of chilly silence in it's wake.

"Dean." Sam's voice was weak. "Dean, what did you dream about?"

"Nothing." Dean cried. Damn it, why did Sam have to push and push and push! It was an annoying habit that someday Dean would beat out of him. Getting up, he moved the safety of the bathroom. "I need a shower."

Closing the door, he locked it and moved to the mirror. His reflection was pale, black circles framing his eyes and tear tracks running down his face. Oh God, he'd been reduced to this. Searching his memory, he tried to think of a soap opera man he could compare himself to. A fuzzy memory of laying on Stacy Corbeya's bed, her fingers running through his hair as she traced the scars on the back of his neck with kisses came to him. The television was playing quietly in the background, her dad's snores down the hall as he performed his usual midafternoon nap…

He could barely remember the soap opera Tracy used to watch but it was Days of Our Lives and her favorite character was Eric Brady. Ashamed and slightly amused that he could remember this about a chick he'd had a summer fling with, Dean moved to the shower and drew back the ragged floral curtain. He decided with this whole emotional breakdown he was some stupid soap character like that freakin' Eric Brady who Stacy had liked more then him. Life was so unfair.

And now he was jelous of a tv character! Wasn't it bad enough he was mad at his brother for his Mom…

The shower he turned on full blast. Letting his hand trail for a moment beneath the freezing cold jet of iron smelling water, he finally stripped his jeans and boxers and stepped into the tub. Shivers instantly consumed his body but the beating water beading down his back felt good. Closing his eyes, he tilted his head back, taking great steadying breaths as the images of tonight's horror movie played out in his mind.

He went through everything he could remember, frame by frame realizing that as he was on the roof, bleeding and on fire, he'd heard a child's laughter. It had calmed him at that moment but now it was chilling and oddly foreboding.

Opening his eyes, he let his head fall forward into the stream. Children's laughter? Was it his? It couldn't be. He'd always remember Sammy's laughter and his own was still practically the same after all these years. No. This voice had been someone else's…and definitely not the Demon's.

"What's happening to me?" Moving to the far end of the shower, he let his legs slip out from under him and fall into a sitting position on the floor, huddled into himself against the freezing shower.

Pain flowed up his body from his chest and stung his eyes. It seemed everything he'd been holding in for the past twenty-two years was bubbling and bursting below the surface. He tried to hold it down but it was too strong. It pushed against his eyes and burned against his throat until it escaped in a silent breathy gasp followed by shuddering sobs that wracked his whole body. The only thing he could think of as he completely broke down was keeping his anguish silent enough that Sammy wouldn't hear.

SUPERNATURAL

Sam sat for a long time in the main room, watching the bathroom door. He'd grown up learning to discern the mask that his family always wore. He knew when his brother was lying, in pain or masking his feelings and at the moment it was all three. There was pain there, a painful up swinging of emotion that had settled just below that calm mask since the day they left Lawrence…just a few hours after they'd seen their mom.

It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Dean was far from okay. In fact, if Sam didn't know any better, he would have guessed this would be the point where Dean would spill his guts about the dreams and the feelings and the nagging jealousy that was almost steaming off of him.

Although he'd never show it nor admit it even to himself, Sam always knew Dean was jealous of him. The attention their dad gave him when he was little, the way the women seemed to flock towards Sam, the quiet, vulnerable, tortured new kid. Though Dean always had a flock of his own and attention from their dad, it was always overshadowed and Sam knew it. He could see it.

Getting up slowly, he moved towards the door and pressed his ear against it. He could hear the cold gurgling moan of the shower. It sounded like it was spitting…keening…It was odd but the thought that the frickin' shower would release ice instead of water was unsurprising seeing as how he'd been shocked when the furthest heat setting in their had given him a mild case of hypothermia. Dean won't stay in there long. He'd have a hard time picking up women as an ice statue.

He was about to turn away when the sound of the keening changed tempo. Confused, he pressed closer, trying to stop the rubbing sound of his clothes against the wood incase Dean could hear him.

The keening was more of a breathy moan that stuttered for a second and then hissed out long like Morse code. It was barely audible over the shower, yet still there. It was sobbing. Sam'd heard it a few times, once when his father hadn't known he was home and the other when Jess had thought she was pregnant and the world was over. He'd never heard it like this before. This sound was different. This sound was heartbreaking. This sound was terrifying.

Dean was trying to keep it low and noiseless, he could tell by the barely controlled rise and fall of the gasps and heaves as his breath rallied to escape the clutches of his mouth. He'd never heard his brother sob. Cry? Yes, once when he was twelve and their dad had called injured from another town, out of their reach. Sam had sat at the kitchen table and watched his brother desperately try to come up with someway to get him help, finally breaking down when there was non to be had. It had been another hour before they saw their father again, leaning heavily on Caleb who had come to the rescue. Dean had cried that he'd failed. Sam could still feel the fear as he'd watched his stone of a brother break down in the kitchen, clutching the phone to his chest.

Sam raised his fist to knock but thought better of it. He needed Dean to trust him not to judge and if that meant turning a blind eye to what Dean felt, then Sam could do that. He only hoped when the time came he'd be brave enough to do something.

Lingering at the door a second longer, he moved back the bed and collapsed onto the twisted, drying sheets and blankets. He closed his eyes, visualizing the things he'd seen in the dream. In a plane, in the old house in Lawrence, his mom…Dean burning on the ceiling above him like Jess had.

There had also been laughter in the fire. Child's laughter. He'd woken from Dean's screams and the feeling of choking sand filling his mouth.

Reaching up to shift the pillow beneath his head, Sam's hand clasped over something hard and twisted. Sitting up, he grasped the object tightly and held it up to the light.

It was the dream catcher…or what was left of it. The colorful beads were black and twisted as though they'd been thrown into a campfire and fished out long after the flames had subsided. The strings were also black, frayed and broken leaving smudges of ash on his fingers. The acrid smell of burnt plastic and smoke emanated from the deformed dream catcher. Something really powerful had been caught in its web and broken through.

TBC...