A/N: Hey everyone! Guess what!? This story now has a trailer! Watch it here: www. youtube (.com) (/) watch?v=DJXPKFbnQGY (minus the spaces and the parentheses).

Again, I wanted to say thank you to everyone still reading this story. I love you guys!

Disclaimer: If this were mine, the show would consist of nothing but chick-flick moments and brotherly schmoop. But as it is, Supernatural has a plot. So clearly, it does not belong to me.

AU after episode 7x04

Dean was tense long before the door creaked open. But when Kathleen stuck her head inside, his body froze, muscles locking into place. As if able to sense exactly how pissed off he suddenly was, Sam shifted, snuffling against his shoulder. And when Kathleen's gaze flickered over to Sam, Dean was pretty sure the red that clouded his vision couldn't be good for him.

Snapping his fingers, he pointed out the door, an order to get the hell out as he went about extricating himself from Sam's unconscious body. That was far easier said than done, especially because the last thing he wanted was to wake his brother up and most of said-brother's weight was resting against his side.

All through it, he could feel her gaze on him, could feel her analyzing his movements. And he was pretty sure she didn't have the right to do that. He didn't think she had the right to be there at all. Not anymore.

So when he finally made it to his feet, he stormed to the door, shoving her through it and following after.

He saw her hold her hand up to the two leviathans posted there as guards. Probably a warning to not eat him. Yet. And if things weren't perfectly clear to him before, they certainly were now.

"Give me one reason I shouldn't just shoot you," Dean demanded, hand tensed around the door handle, something he hadn't quite built up the courage to let go of. And when one of the leviathans hissed at him, he really wished he had something sharp to drive through its neck. Just because. It wouldn't do any damage but it'd be fun and would honestly make him feel better.

"You don't have a gun?" Kathleen offered and it took Dean a moment to realize that the low, rumbling, menacing growl that was echoing around the room was coming from him. It didn't take Kathleen nearly as long though if the way she stepped back and held a hand up in placation was any indication. Which he kind of felt that it was. And if the way the leviathans stepped forward meant anything, they figured it out pretty quickly too.

Pulling her other hand out from behind her back, she revealed a fast food bag that almost definitely had something greasy and hamburgery and delicious trapped inside it, just waiting to be eaten. "There's no need to be so rude. I even brought you food." And Dean wanted that bag. He wasn't sure how long it had been since he had last eaten. He had been eaten, but that wasn't the same at all. So he was hungry. So hungry. And it was something to keep him from killing himself. Because he was apparently starving to death and killing himself was definitely a far less unpleasant way to go.

But... He couldn't take food from her. He couldn't. Because it was a peace-offering and he couldn't accept the offering without accepting the peace.

Though at that moment, he was a bit fuzzy as to why that was.

Letting go of the door, he crossed his arms over his chest, watching as her face fell. "What do you want?" he asked, knuckles whitening as he tightened his fingers around his bicep.

"How did you know?" she whispered, looking down at the ground. Though Dean kind of felt that How could you not know? was a far better question. The list was shorter. Far shorter. And anything that lessened the amount of time he would have to stay standing out in the hallway was his favorite thing ever. Because firstly, he had already left Sam alone for long enough, and secondly, it was cold out there.

"You mean other than the fact you were allowed to just walk right in here?" he demanded, trying to ignore the hollowness, the ice he could hear in his voice. But then he had to wonder why he was bothering. There could be ice there. She deserved it. She deserved to be yelled at and screamed at and pelleted with tiny chunks of frozen water. She had betrayed them and nothing could be worse than that. She should feel so goddamn guilty that it wasn't even funny. And the sad thing was that she probably didn't feel guilty. Not at all.

He sunk back against the door, pointedly not looking at the bag of food. Doing that also required that he not breathe through his nose, or rather, not breathe much at all. Because it smelled so good and this was so not fair. Shrugging, he explained, "The leviathans knew about Sam. They knew why he was suddenly having such a hard time with Lucifer. They knew all about the bonds. They knew practically everything about everything that had happened while we were with you." He took a breath and glanced over at the leviathans. Whose bodies were those? Where did they come from? Did they have families too?

...Families they'd never see again and families that would never see them. "So it got me thinkin', y'know?" he continued. "Bobby wouldn't've told 'em. No way, no how. I seriously doubt Sam would've told them, 'specially not in the state I left him in. And even if he had been firing on all cylinders, he's not that self-destructive. I sure as hell didn't tell them. So I had to wonder... who could possibly be left?" One of the leviathans started staring at him like he was a meal. And now he really wished he could go back inside the safe, quiet, almost empty room.

"And then I realized: Oh, Kathleen, the only one left. You were so willing to help us yet for some reason... Sam never seemed to be getting any better." Never. He only got worse. And that was the clue - aside from the obvious fact that she was here. Sam never failed at anything he put his mind to. School, sports, hunting... He did everything physically possible in order to be the best at whatever it was he was doing. Which meant she hadn't really been helping him. Had she been, Sam could have fixed himself, would have fixed himself. Dean refused to believe anything else. He refused to believe that Sam wouldn't have fixed himself eventually. Because if anyone could face the devil twice and win, it would be Sam. And he had to believe that he hadn't somehow managed to kill that part of his brother.

With that, Dean saw something flicker in her eyes. Not regret or guilt... more resignation. "All facts pointed to a sell-out," he finished, twisting his ring around his finger. It was times like these that he felt a physical absence against his chest. Because as far as nervous habits went, twisting a ring didn't have nearly the same effect as holding onto an amulet.

"I thought you would understand," she whispered. "I thought you... of all people... would get it..."

"Oh, sorry. I usually have a hard time rationalizing things when there's a knife sticking out of my back." It was true. Knives were very uncomfortable.

"You- You were supposed to understand." And really, Dean had had enough of being a moral compass back when Sam was soulless. Far more than enough. Now, he had retired, hung it up, waved goodbye and passed the baton back to the master, A.K.A Sam. So there was no way he was going to take up the job again for the sole purpose of explaining to her why it was wrong to give people over to strange men with big mouths.

Rolling his eyes, he stood up straight and started to turn around, hoping he would finally get to go back into the room. Though, with the obvious exception of Sam, in there was not much better than out here... His guidance counselors would have said that he should aimed higher. But then her hand was on his arm, forcing him to turn and look back at her. "You said you didn't regret it," she said, confusion in her voice and on her face. "You said you'd do anything for Sam."

"I would." The response was instantaneous. And really, by bringing Sam into this, she wasn't really helping her case. Sam was off-limits in all forms of bargaining, wheedling, and guilt-tripping. Though the guilt-tripping one was negotiable. "Let go-"

"They're bringing my brother back." Dean froze, but only for a second. Because in the next, he was laughing, forehead falling against the door with an audible thunk. He was sure he sounded at least partially unhinged. And at that point, he wasn't so sure he wasn't completely unhinged.

When the dark, semi-morbid humor had passed, he turned around, taking the bag of food from her hand. "They're not. Y'know that, right? They can't do that." He looked inside and found two wrapped up hamburgers and Dean was really about to just turn around and go inside, slamming the door in her face. Because he wanted the food. But then he remembered the boy in the picture Kathleen had, the picture she kept turning towards the wall. The one Dean had thought her to be punishing. And with that, a cold understanding flooded through him.

"They can. They can and they're gonna," Kathleen answered, crossing her arms over her chest. He wasn't sure who she was more determined to convince, him or her, but he didn't think it was working either way. Because apparently leviathans lied just as much, if not more, than the demons did.

"They have no connection to heaven or Hell or souls or anything like that. It's impossible," he told her. And he tried to stop the flash of sympathy that pulsed through him, tried to ignore it. But he couldn't. She didn't understand what she was doing; she just wanted her brother back. And that was something Dean could understand better than anyone, past, present, or future.

On the other hand, she had put Sam in danger. Mortal danger. Danger that could leave him in agonizing mental and emotional and physical pain that would slowly kill him and Dean would be forced to watch as he died and then Dean would die from mental torment and there'd be a friggin' ton of dead Winchesters lying around (No, he hadn't had nightmares about that at all). And that was unforgivable. Had she done anything else, Dean might have been able to look past it, one older sibling to another. But from one older sibling to another, she had to know that he couldn't look past this.

"You're right. For them, it is impossible," she conceded. And it took Dean a moment to realize that she was agreeing with him. He had had his argument all prepared, ready to go, and he didn't even need it. Waste of brain power.

Just as he was about to ask her why they were still even having this conversation, she looked up at him, eyes full of resolve, and said, "They can't...

"But Sam can."

A/N 2: Thanks for reading! I hope you all had amazing holidays!