Chapter 68.

Sam was watching Jack watching Netflix when he got the single-word text, "Busy?"

He sent back, "No."

The delay before Dean answered was too long. Sam knew what it meant. Dean needed something, but was unable to say it. "Problem?" he sent.

"No." came back, soon followed by, "Yes." then "No." again, then "Forget it."

"What's wrong?" said Jack.

"Nothing. Dean just wants to talk to me." said Sam.

"Oh, okay."

Sam called Dean's phone. "Where are you?"

"I'm going to my room I think maybe all I need is some sleep. You do whatever you're doing. I'm okay."

"I'm on my way." said Sam.

"It's fine." said Dean, "I'm just ... "

"Two minutes." said Sam, endimg the call before Dean could argue.

When he got to Dean's room, he didn't bother to knock. He went in and closed the door behind him. Dean was sitting on the bed. "Sorry I bothered you."

"No apologies, okay?" said Sam, "What's going on?"

"Nothing." said Dean then he dropped eye contact for a second and said, "Okay, something, but it's dumb." He looked uncertainly at Sam. "I called Sarah and she thought I should have you around because solitary thought can be good or it can be ... less good and she thinks this is the less good kind."

"Did you call her because you also thought that?" said Sam.

"I don't know. These days, I'm not sure why I do anything. Calling her just seemed like the right idea."

"It was." said Sam, "It always is." He sat on the end of the bed. "If I ask you what the solitary thoughts were, are you gonna clam up?"

Dean gave a brief and incomplete smile. "You know me well, Sam."

"Yeah, I do."

"And I'll bet you've given a lot of thought to the Michael situation."

"Just a bit."

"I mean the me and Michael situation." said Dean, "How he managed to breeze past the whole consent thing and retain possession. How and why I let him do that."

"Let him do it?"

"So you've been thinking the same thoughts I've been thinking, but with a cool head and a little distance."

Sam's first response was surprise, but thinking about it, he knew he should have expected it. There was nothing for which Dean could not, given time, find a way to blame himself.

If he argued too quickly, Dean would hear it as a rehearsed response, prepared in advance so when he realised what he had done, he could be distracted from it. If he didn't argue quickly enough, Dean would hear it as agreement.

"I was there." he said quietly.

"I know you were." said Dean, "You saw what went down."

"I didn't see him breeze past anything. I saw him fighting all the way and you fighting to resist him."

"He won far too easily."

"Yeah, for a low-level demon. This is God's most powerful archangel we're talking about." Dean's expression had not changed. He was not listening. He had virtually convicted himself and he would only hear witnesses for the prosecution. Sam hadn't wanted to bring up Lucifer, but he felt he had no choice. "Dean, when I fought Lucifer in my own head, he brushed away my resistance like it was nothing. I was like a toddler facing down a tornado. I had no chance."

"You won."

"No. I lost. I conclusively lost. Later, I had another chance and I took it, but if he hadn't tried to make me kill you ... if you hadn't been there, with the Impala ... " He shuddered, remembering the horrors of that day and how complete his own defeat had nearly been. "In all the years since, you have never once said I was weak that day or that I let him take control."

"You weren't and you didn't."

"Archangels are almost infinitely powerful. They're focused. They're absolute. We are like gnats compared to them. You fought Michael, but he was stronger, because he's a frickin' archangel and you're human."

"I'm not sure I did put up much of a fight."

"Like I said, I was there."

Dean gave the weird semi-smile again. "I'm at a disadvantage here."

"How so?"

"Because the last thing I wanna do is convince you I'm right, "

"Or maybe because you know that you're wrong. I get it, Dean. Guilt is your thing. Guilt is easy, because when you can't punish the bad guys, having yourself as the fall guy gives you someone to hurt, someone to hate."

"You think I want this guilt?" said Dean.

"I think you feel you need it. Why else would you try so hard to make yourself the scapegoat for every bad thing that happened from the moment you were born?"

"This isn't like that. He needed consent, so if I had truly withdrawn consent, he would have had to leave."

"Yeah. No. You may not have noticed, but the problem with archangels is, they pick and choose what rules to obey. You withdrew consent and he didn't want to go, so he ignored that."

"How?"

"Same way Lucifer rebelled against God." A thousand frenzied reactions to that name battered at his mind and he struggled to control them. Somewhere, far in the back of his head, Castiel's voice whispered, "Here if you need me."

"Thanks, Cas." he sent back silently, "I'm okay."

Dean wasn't. The set of his shoulders, the tension in his hands, the fruitless attempt to hide how troubled he was, all told Sam that nothing he was saying had made the slightest impact. "Talk to me." he said.

Dean stared down at the bedlinen, unable, it seemed, to look him in the eye.

Sam spoke calmly. "If you blame yourself for any of this, Dean, you're wrong."

Silence. Dean was not listening. Sam wondered if he had even heard.

"Dean?" he said.

When Dean spoke, his voice was a little unsteady. "Sam, it's not just about what's happened. It's about what's coming. If I can't fight him ... "

"You've done nothing but fight various versions of Michael for years."

"I always thought I'd never say yes. Then I thought I could limit his control or at least expel him. Findng ou that I can't or won't do that ... "

"You did do that."

"No. He left. When ... when Luci ... No. Sorry. I don't need to know."

"What? Come on, Dean. At this point, there's nothing I won't tell you, if you need to know."

"Did it ever feel ... Hell, I don't even know what I'm asking. Go back to Mom. I can't make this make sense to myself, so I can't expect you to understand it."

"I do." said Sam, a little above a whisper.

"What?"

"I do understand it. I went through the same thing, of course I understand it. I know how it feels to be invaded on every level, to be helpless, unable even to scream, but wanting to at every moment."

"I never meant to remind you of that."

"Please. You think I ever forget? You think I ever will?"

"I'm sorry, Sam."

Sam put his hand on his brother's shoulder. "For the first time, I'm seeing a silver lining. At least I can understand whar you're going through."

"I wish I did."

Sam let go of his shoulder, wishing he knew whether to offer comfort or pretend he didn't see how much Dean needed it. "I know how it feels." he said, "I know how it tears apart your sense of self, destroys everything you think you know about who you are."

"Is that how it was for you?" said Dean, suddenly making eye contact.

Sam couldn't help but smile. "Stop worrying about me, Dean."

"I've tried. Doesn't work." said Dean.

"You're not weak because you were temporarily defeated by an archangel. You're strong because you never stopped fighting him."

"I'm not sure I even fought at all and that makes me weak."

"You fought and you're still fighting him now, but they twist your mind against itself. They're so corrupt, they make you feel contaminated. It's like a stain you can never clean off."

"Never?" said Dean and for a moment, Sam thought he was afraid for himself, but then he saw that look of brotherly concern and knew Dean was again worrying about him and his wounds of the distant past.

"Can we focus on you for a moment?" said Sam.

"Is this what you feel every single day?" said Dean, "Have you lived with this since ... "

"Dean, please. This is not about me."

"Which is as clear a yes as I'm ever going to get from you."

"How about you stop deflecting for five seconds and tell me how you, personally, feel right now?"

"The truth?"

"The truth."

"I'm scared, Sam, scared that I can't trust myself and worse, that you can't trust me. If I'm compromised ... if there's some dark corner of my soul that has a weakness for angelic contact ,,, "

"Are you conflating what you feel for Cas with ,,, "

"Hey, easy on the big words, college boy! I don't know what that means."

"You know exactly what it means."

"If I'm not able to refuse or resist Michael's possession of this vessel, I am a danger to everyone here ... to everyone in this world."

"You're the strongest of us, you always have been."

"That's a lie, Sam and you know it. Anyway, I never felt weaker in my life." Dean looked at his watch. "You've wasted a lot of time on me today. You have other stuff to do."

"No I don't." said Sam.

"I'm not gonna do anything stupid."

"Just think a lot of stupid things?" said Sam.

"It's not your job to look after me." said Dean.

"Not only is it specifically my first and most important job, it's the job you asked me to do."

"Why do you want to stay and listen to all this crap?" said Dean.

Sam smiled. "Because I can argue with it."

"What if I'm right?"

Sam grinned. "You never have been before."

"I should break your nose for that." said Dean, but he was smiling.