Dean had hit his head hard, and it took him about three hours to fully come around. When he woke up, he found that he was alone, his hands cuffed behind his back, and laying on the cold, mossy ground. Near him, he could barely make out the silhouette of an aging cabin.
"Sammy?" he muttered, confused, "what happened?"
Sam appeared beside him, anger apparent on his face. "Don't you remember?" he shouted, "you killed my wife!"
"No choice," Dean replied groggily, "couldn't lose you again. We at Elkins'?"
Sam nodded. "Yeah, it's Elkins' place."
"Good boy," the elder smiled, "now get these cuffs off and we can go see how the old place's upkeep's been, huh?"
Sam shook his head. He'd fished through his unconscious brother's pockets for the key and cuffed the older man for a reason. Dean was dangerous. He couldn't risk his psychotic brother lashing out at anymore innocent people.
"No, Dean. I'm going back."
"Back to Cali?" Dean asked with a hint of fear in his hazel eyes.
"No. Back to '89. I'm fixing this."
"You can't. He died, Sam, and there's no bringing him back now. You can't just drop us off with some random person on the street, either. It won't work. I'm just too messed up. Face it. All we've got is us now. All we've got is each other."
Sam shook his head. "I'm not falling for it, man. You're sick and you need help. I'm not gonna let this happen to you. I can fix it. You just stay here, and-"
"Will you come back?"
"Hopefully, to another time. One where you're not so buckets of crazy."
"Sam," Dean whispered as his brother turned to the wormhole, "please. I'll try to get better."
"It doesn't work like that and you know it."
"I'll do anything you want," he pleaded, standing up shakily and stumbling forward a couple of steps before falling back down to his knees, "I'll do anything, give you anything, just, please, stay with me. Don't leave again. Don't make a liar out of him."
"What?"
"Dad. He told me that first night we were an actual family again that I'd never have to be alone again. Please don't make him a liar, Sammy. Just stay with me. You know I'd never hurt you."
Sam sighed, shoving his hands in his pockets, and looked at his brother, who seemed so weak, and pale, and innocent, and scared in the small amount of moonlight filtering through the clouds and trees. Looks can be deceiving, though, and Sam knew better.
"I'll make it right, Dean, I swear."
"Wait! Please, I've never asked you for anything."
"I'm not gonna live like this," Sam snapped, "like some fugitive in a run-down old cabin with my psychotic brother. I can't do it."
"Then end it," Dean whispered, "just end it."
"What did you say?"
"End it for me, Sammy. If you're not going to come back, if he lied, then there's nothing left for me to live for. I used to think he'd come and save me from them, I used to think you'd find me and we'd be a family again. I never took the incentive because I thought you would do it. And then you did. But it's not right. It's not the way I wanted it, and I just can't deal with that. I won't. So end it, Sam. I know you've got the guns. Just end it for me. Please."
Sammy stared at his brother. The man was usually so strong, so secure, so… not crazy. Not begging for his death. "I can't do it, Dean."
Something like anger crossed his brother's face, that subtle, hidden malice playing in his eyes again. "Fine, Sammy," he hissed, "I just hope that you make things better. Because if you don't, you won't have much of a homecoming party. It'll just be me. You know, I've never killed a kid before, but I'm sure I could do it. Can't be that hard."
"No," Sam whispered, realizing what Dean was suggesting, "you can't go after Ava. She's just a baby."
"Kill me, or I kill her."
Without hesitation, Sam drew the gun he'd stuffed into the waistband of his jeans and shot his brother through the head. Dean smiled a bit as his body went limp and he fell sideways onto the cold, frozen earth.
Without even checking to see if he was really dead, Sam turned and stepped through the wormhole, his stomach doing summersaults as he fell through time and landed with a thump beside the trunk, right next to his dead brother.
Dean lay there, eyes open and glassy and accusing, a neat little bullet hole in the middle of his chest. Sam scrambled to his feet and grabbed his brother under the arms, pulling him into the cabin. The kids didn't know that he was dead, would think he'd just abandoned them until they saw a body. As much as he hated to do it, Sam was going to show them that body.
"Camp Witkit," he muttered, pulling the Impala's keys from Dean's pocket and heading out of the small cabin.
You know what this means, right? More Weechesters!
