Dean returned to awareness by degrees. First, he noticed the cool, damp something that was pressing against the side of his face. Next, he felt the chill breeze ruffle his hair and snake under his shirt. He shivered.
It seemed to take him a while to remember how to open his eyes. When he did, moonlit grass grew like a forest before his eyes, the thin blades slanting this way and that, swaying gently as the breeze whispered past. Feeling groggy and light-headed, Dean pushed himself to his feet, pausing as the world spun around him.
He was standing in a small, nondescript clearing in an unfamiliar forest. The full moon was shrouded by wispy grey clouds, diffusing its light and lending an unearthly appearance to the once bright green foliage and grass.
Dean looked around, expecting to see the Impala parked somewhere nearby. "Sam?" he called, hearing his voice echo into the trees.
Nothing.
Where the hell was he?
Deciding he wasn't in any immediate danger, he furrowed his brow, trying to remember how he'd got here – wherever 'here' was.
The last thing he could remember was ... Sam's face. Dean's eyes flew open as the memory slammed into him. Sam's face, his lost eyes welling with tears, looking terrified, trying to keep it together, his hands propping him up, clutching him as though afraid he would vanish. Dean concentrated, trying to remember further back, trying to remember what had made his little brother look so heartbroken.
Memory slammed into being like an avalanche.
Metatron.
The First Blade flying into his bloody palm.
The angelblade sinking hilt-deep into his chest as his breath caught in slow motion. Then the blade was gone, and the world faded and blurred.
Then Sam was there. Sam, telling him he would be okay, promising to find a spell, pulling him up and dragging him out of the warehouse.
Dean feeling the coldness turn into something else. Knowing it was coming. Stopping Sam, needing to say it, not wanting the last thing he saw to be some grey corridor.
"I'm proud of us."
Sam's face fading to blackness. A dim sensation of falling.
Dean looked up to the sky once more. The clouds were thickening, strangling the moon's light. He breathed in great lungfuls of the cold air, but it did nothing to loosen the constricting weight pressing against his heart.
Oh, Sam. I'm so sorry.
He was dead. He'd left Sam alone.
No. Sam wasn't alone. He had Cas, for a few more months at least. And he had Jodie, and Charlie, if she ever came back from Oz. Sam wasn't alone.
Dean was.
Besides, Dean thought, if I'm still here – wherever the hell this is – then that's because Sam left me here. So I guess he's okay with it, then.
Dean tried to ignore the fierce twist of pain in his chest that had nothing to do with the aftereffects of being stabbed through the heart. He shouldn't be surprised – Sam had told him he wouldn't bring him back. And one of them had to stop this never-ending cycle of deals and go live their lives, and it sure as hell wasn't gonna be Dean.
Maybe this time, if he could just stay dead, Sam could have their happily ever after. Find a girl. Have some kids. Get a dog.
The sudden image of a grey-haired Sam bouncing a grandkid on his knee with some old terrier with a matching grey beard lounging at his feet on a porch made Dean smile.
Sam had a chance. He could be safe. Metatron would have no reason to hunt him down – Dean had been the problem. Cas'd look out for him. Sam could get a proper job – one that paid and came with free dental. Heaven could fix itself without him.
Speaking of Heaven. Dean looked around once more, turning slowly on the spot. There was no way he was back behind the Pearly Gates. Even if Cas had tried to pull some strings, Heaven was closed for business. All the dead souls were stuck in the Veil.
Or in Hell.
Dean regarded the stoic trees with a new level of suspicion. Hell seemed more fitting for Dean Winchester, but this wasn't how he'd remembered it. It was too ... non-torture-y.
He felt a tingle on his arm and brushed it absentmindedly, looking down as his fingers encountered a ridge on his skin.
The Mark of Cain.
Dean traced the Mark with his fingers, feeling ever more certain that he was somewhere Downstairs. Though it was difficult to see in the dim light, he could discern another collection of scar tissue surrounding the Mark. Squinting, he ran his thumb over it, trying to figure out what it was.
It felt like a Devil's Trap: a five-pointed star enclosed in a circle, this one ringed in flame, like his tattoo. Huh. That was new. Maybe it was to stop him taking over Hell or something? Some kind of death-induced collar for the ancient power?
Well, that was probably best. To say the Mark was a bad influence was a laughable understatement.
A rustling in the trees behind Dean had him whirling around, instantly alert, half sinking into a defensive crouch. He squinted through the trees, sure he had seen a figure move between them.
A few tense moments later, Dean relaxed his posture slightly. Whatever it was, it was gone. Since that hardly meant it wasn't going to come back, Dean searched the ground for some kind of weapon, but the only thing hiding in the grass was a rock about the side of his thumb.
Dean frowned at the rock. It was familiar. He tilted it in the dim light, trying to see the faint design that had caught his eye.
It was a fossil. A tiny, centipede-like skeleton was sketched on the dark blue rock, the tiny ridges casting deep shadows over the lines. Dean blinked. This looked exactly like the fossil he'd found on his first solo hunt.
Dean looked up and scrutinized the trees more closely.
"Well, I'll be damned," he muttered softly. It was the same forest that had been the hunting grounds of the lumberjack who'd been crushed under a tree he was felling. Was this a memory? Was the ghost what had shifted in the shadows?
Dean looked down at himself. He was wearing jeans and a grey shirt he'd bought a few months before he'd died. Dad's leather jacket was nowhere in sight. The amulet Sam had given him wasn't there either.
So ... not a memory.
What the hell was going on?
Twigs snapped like firecrackers behind him and he spun round again, clenching his fist around the fossil.
Nothing.
If this was Hell, then this was a weird-ass torture.
A low, familiar chuckle echoed from beyond the tree line.
Dean gulped.
"Who's there?" he called back, his voice low and steady.
The rustling stopped, but there was no reply.
Feeling acutely uneasy and wanting to be out of the exposed clearing, Dean turned around.
And felt his heart stop.
"B-Bobby?" he breathed, afraid to believe his eyes.
"Hey, Dean."
A wide and sincere smile spread across his lips. His memory had not done justice to the old hunter's voice. It was deeper and richer than he'd remembered. Dean had forgotten exactly how Bobby had said his name. He felt his leaden heart lift.
Bobby looked just as he always had. A plaid shirt, forest green jacket, age-torn jeans and a green baseball cap with three tiny scrapes along the visor. His unkempt beard was as scraggly as always, and his twinkling eyes were –
Wrong.
Dean's smile faltered as he finally registered Bobby's expression. He looked ... scared.
"Bobby? What is it?"
"It's not safe here."
Dean looked over his shoulder, half-expecting the Rustler to be lurking in the shadows behind him. "I know. Do you know what it is? Or where we are, for that matter?"
"It's not safe here," Bobby repeated, his voice even, almost disinterested.
Dean returned his gaze to his old mentor, frowning. "Bobby? What's wrong?"
Sorrow broke through the fear in Bobby's eyes. "I'm sorry, Dean."
"For what?"
"I should have killed you when I had the chance. I didn't know, I didn't think –"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Dean held up his hands, forcing Bobby to shush. "Killed me? Bobby, what are you talking about?"
Bobby took a shuddering breath and produced a long, curved silver sword that glinted in the feeble light. Dean stared at the weapon, confusion and caution making him take a small step back. "Bobby, what're you doing?"
"How could you do it, boy?" Bobby accused, taking a deliberate step towards Dean, the wicked weapon still clenched by his side.
Dean's mind was racing. Bobby was in Heaven, Sam had made sure of that. So either this wasn't Hell after all, or it was and this was his torture. He glanced at the grassy ground again, looking for something to defend himself with, but there was nothing. "Bobby, you don't have to do this."
"How could you do that to Sam?" Bobby's voice was quavering with sorrow and, Dean was alarmed to recognise, anger. "How could you betray him? Betray all of us!"
Dean's eyes widened in shocked hurt. "I had to, man! He was dying! I couldn't just let him – let him fade away! I trusted the wrong angel, okay? I thought Gadreel was good, I never meant for it to –"
"I don't care about the angel, boy!" Bobby boomed, taking another, longer step towards Dean, who skipped back to stay beyond the reach of the gleaming blade.
"Well, then – what?" Dean searched Bobby's face for some explanation, utterly confused. "What, are you mad at me for dying? It's not like I had a choice, Bobby! Sam's the one who's left me here!"
Bobby's expression darkened as fury won out. He strode forward, gripping the hilt of the short sword tightly. "After everything we've done, after everything John taught you – everything I taught you – how could you let yourself become one of them!"
Dean was half-running backwards, tripping over an unseen mound of grass and fell hard on his back as Bobby stalked closer. His breathing quickened. An image flashed in his mind, too quickly for him to understand. A flash of red, the echo of high-pitched screams, the shadow of satisfaction.
He shook his head hard, banishing the image. Bobby was almost upon him, raising the sword high over his head, readying to strike down into Dean's heart. Dean's eyes widened in horror. He raised a hand in a futile attempt to protect himself and cried out, pleading with the man who had been as good as a father to him to please, please, stop.
As Bobby closed the last few feet, Dean's courage broke. He lashed out with his boot, kicking Bobby's shin out from under him, and rolled to the side as the old hunter came crashing down. He fumbled in the long grass and wrenched the sword from Bobby's grasp, holding it out over his mentor in warning.
"What the hell are you doing, Bobby!" he shouted as Bobby rolled onto his back, panting.
"He's doing what I should have done ten years ago," came a deep, half-forgotten voice from behind Dean.
Feeling shock plunge into his stomach like a frigid bomb, he turned around.
John Winchester was standing near the edge of the small clearing, a sawn-off shotgun held casually against his shoulder. Dean's eyes widened.
"Dad?" he breathed, straightening up and staring at his father, unable to believe his eyes.
"It's me, son."
Hearing Bobby move to get up behind him, Dean whirled around, bringing the sword up warningly.
"Easy there, Dean," his father called. "You wouldn't want to spill any more blood, now would you?"
Dean's sense of caution flared as he glanced back to his advancing father.
"Blood, huh? You reckon he's got any? Do any of us? Where the hell are we!"
John's eyebrows rose. "Look who's all grown up and demanding. It's a pity, Dean. You were such a good soldier. Though never meant, I think, to be a general."
Hurt flickered in Dean's chest, but he reigned it in, drawing his frayed emotions behind a wall of scowls. "Where the hell am I?" he said again, his voice as low and dangerous as it had ever been.
John smiled and glanced around the clearing before returning his dark gaze to Dean's. "C'mon, Dean, I taught you better than that. Where do you think we are?"
Dean's eyes flickered from tree line to tree line. "It's not Heaven."
"That's for sure," John laughed.
"Hell?"
John squinted, shaking his head. "Not technically."
"What the hell does that mean?"
"It means we're not in Hell. But, between you and me, there's not much difference."
"Then where!" Dean barked, his patience evapourating.
John grinned at him. For some reason, it made Dean's skin crawl. This wasn't his father, he was sure of that. Just as the thing getting to its feet beside him wasn't Bobby, this wasn't his father. Just some ghost or shifter or ... something.
"We're in your head, Dean."
Dean blinked. He hadn't expected that. "My head?"
"Yep," the not-Bobby said simply.
Dean looked between them. Slowly, cautiously, he lowered the sword. "Why are you in my head?"
John and Bobby exchanged a long glance.
"We're here to do what you should have done a year ago."
Dean felt his last speck of patience wink out of existence. "You better start giving me some straight answers or I swear to God I'll –"
"What? What are you and 'God' gonna do?" John sneered. "He doesn't give a shit about you, Dean. Why would he? You're gonna threaten us with – with what? You're powerless here, kid. Helpless. And you're not gonna wake up."
"Yeah?" Dean challenged, his mind reeling. "And why's that?"
"We're not gonna let you, son," Bobby answered gently.
