Title: Blackbird

Author: Oldach's Dream

Summary: Someone or Something is trying to trap Sam within his own mind. Alluring him with the promise of the normal life that he's always wanted. Will Dean be able to save his baby brother before he's gone forever?

Disclaimer: Supernatural defiantly isn't my creation.

Rating: M

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Chapter Nine

Sam made his way down the stairs quietly. It was the middle of the night and he had woken with the oddest taste in his mouth. So he'd crawled out of bed, intent on not waking Jessica. His destination was the refrigerator. He was forever convinced that if he drank water from the tap in the middle of the night, something evil would come out of it and get him.

He had no idea where that insane fear had come from, but he'd had it since he was a child, and didn't even bother trying to understand it anymore. He just always made sure there was a bottle of water present in the fridge.

He turned the corner to the kitchen, ready to pat himself on the back for remembering where all the creaks in the floorboards were, but stopped dead in his tracks.

"Dean." He exclaimed in an angry whisper. He could barely make out his brother's figure in the moonlight streaming through the kitchen window, and he was not making a sound. "You trying to give me a freaking heart attack?" Sam shivered slightly when he said the words.

His brother didn't reply, he just continued to stand there, still as a statue.

"Dean?" Sam questioned, his voice holding less anger and more apprehension now. Perhaps this was just some brotherly joke that existed only in this world. If you here someone coming late at night and your already up, pretend to be sleep walking or something.

"Okay Dean," He tried to say lightly. "I don't get the joke. Time to fill in the guy with brain damage."

Dean still didn't move. "Ah...alright then. I'm gonna turn on the light now."

Sam took a few steps to the right, not taking his eyes off his brother's silhouetted figure as he did so. His hand hesitated briefly at the light switch. He felt his stomach drop slightly and a nervous feeling consume him. Something wasn't right.

His hand moved in one fluid motion, light dawned over the kitchen and Sam's eyes went wide in shock.

Dean was still standing before him, but now that he could see his brother clearly, Sam couldn't even begin to guess what was going on.

Dean's face was a mess of black and blues, his right eye was swollen considerably. His ever present brown leather coat was torn and bloodstained. His hair was a mess, his jeans looked as bad as his jacket, but nothing beneath the leather could be seen.

His eyes were dead. The melted chocolate orbs that Sam knew as well as his own, might as well of been that of a corpse. He knew also, instantly, that this was his Dean. The real Dean. Or someone impersonating the real Dean. Simply put, Alternate reality Dean had no place here.

Sam's arm fell limply to his side.

"What...what happened?" He knew before he even opened his mouth that the question was pointless, but he had to try. He didn't know what else to do.

"They're coming for you." He spoke in a monotone voice that made Sam recoil. "They eat your soul and rip out your heart. You'll see it beating before you fall over dead."

"Dean..."

In an instant, Dean's face changed, it went from expressionlessly dead, to pleading. He looked at Sam with fear and desperation displayed clearly.

"Help me Sammy." He begged and Sam could see tears pooling in his eyes, and pain gathering in his gaze. "You have to help me. I can't do it by myself this time."

"I don't know how Dean, what do you want me to do?" Sam's voice was pleading as well, but he knew already that his brother wouldn't answer.

"You can't hide." He changed again, from pathetic to dangerous. He was moving towards Sam now. They weren't normal movements either; they were jerky and demonic, like those of Bloody Mary and the Woman in White.

"Your pathetic." He growled. "You can't run. You can't hide, they're all waiting, all inside."

He said the last words with a musical air. It sounded vaguely familiar, but Sam couldn't place it right away, he was too preoccupied, backing away from his brother. Or whatever this thing was. Trying to make himself as flat as possible against the kitchen wall. He could not tear his eyes away from Dean's face.

His brother's form was smirking slightly now, in a way that his big brother, either version of him, never had before. It was pure evil.

A trickle of blood made its way down the side of his chin, from one of the open wounds there. The thing reached a finger up and wiped it away, moving the digit to his mouth, where he sucked on it for a moment. Before letting it go with a pop and a satisfied look.

He was mere inches away from Sam when he sang it again. "You can't run. You can't hide. They're all waiting. All inside."

His voice was still low, but Sam recognized the Freddie Krueger theme now. At least, that's what it sounded like to him. The words were sung in that same, slowed down children's tune, way.

"You -can't- run. You- can't- hide. I'll be wait-ing. We're in-side."

Dean was now directly level with his brother's eyes. Meaning either Sam was slouching slightly against the wall he had pressed himself against, or this thing could cast allusions or make himself taller.

Sam felt fear travel to every single one of his nerve endings. But he didn't let himself think about it, or anything else, too much. Over contemplation was always bad during hunts. Sam had to stay focused.

It didn't seem to want to kill him, or even hurt him, just scare him. He was reminded of the ghosts at Roosevelt Asylum.

"What do you want?" He managed to say it at a level, unafraid tone.

"I want to eat your heart, Sammy." His eyes flashed completely black, for only a second. Then changed to pleading, deep brown again. "Help me Sammy. I need your help."

His eyes were back to black and Sam felt an extreme pressure on his chest. He took a deep breath trying to steady himself, but the feeling of pressure would not go away. He couldn't stop himself from clutching at his heart.

"What are you doing?" He rasped, managing to sound angry, confused and betrayed in those four words. Before falling to his knees.

He recalled the Woman in White, in the Impala, trying to pull his heart out with her ghostly hand. What he was experiencing now was so horrifically worse, that the comparison didn't even begin to do it justice.

Only the demonic version of Dean wasn't doing it. Not that Sam could see anyway. He was standing over him, smirking wickedly, but there was no indication that he was inflicting the torturous feelings of flesh being ripped open within his chest.

Sam lost sight of his form altogether though, when a fresh round of pain started. His head fell down and he gasped for air.

What in the hell was going on?

Another wave hit and he had to drop one of his arms from his chest, to the ground, so he wouldn't fall over entirely. Until the pain struck again and his arm gave out, leaving him on his side, curled up on the cold linoleum floor.

"...you can't run...you can't hide...we're all waiting...all inside..."

"You're not real. You're not my brother and I'm going to kill you." Sam managed to rasp and when the thing chuckled demonically, Sam really couldn't blame it. He was curled up in pain, trying desperately to catch his breath enough so as not to suffocate, and he was attempting to dish out threats.

"It'll be okay Sam," The voice was a little different now; Sam couldn't put his finger on how. "Just relax. I promise it will all be over soon."

There. That voice. He knew it.

Dean's demonic voice was now layered up with another one. Both were saying the same things, but Sam could tell it was no longer coming from the demon.

"I'll make you better Sam. You'll be happier like his." It was less Dean now, and more of the other one. The other one... "Death isn't the end."

Finally he placed it. As soon as he thought it, the whole world changed.

He was back on a hospital bed. Only now he was laying flat on his back, the ceiling was coming into focus slowly.

Dr. Kabala kept speaking to him, all traces of demonic Dean gone. "You'll be helping so many people Sam, Don't you think your brother would be proud?"

"What..." he rasped. He swallowed thickly but then went on, ignoring his dry throat. "The fuck 'ou doing?"

"Awake I see." He said as cheerfully as his eerie voice could manage. "It's a shame. You've been trapped in your own little place for so long, I thought maybe this would be easy..." he trailed off and shook his head. "Oh well, I guess you'll just take more time than I anticipated."

Sam tried to lift his arm, he wasn't sure what he wanted to do. But found out immediately that it didn't matter anyway. He could not move the limb.

He tried the other, and found the same problem existed. His heart rate quickened as panic began to set in. He pulled at his limbs as hard as he could; jerking pathetically, but nothing moved more than a few inches.

"I strapped you down Sam." The doctor said in the scratchy voice that might as well of been demonic. It was certainly one of the evilest things he had ever heard. "You were becoming a danger to yourself. What with all that thrashing about." He clucked his tongue disapprovingly.

"Sick fucker." Sam spit at him, but Dr. Kabala just laughed good naturedly and moved his hand to Sam's bed side table.

He extracted a long, dangerous looking, syringe from the depths of the drawer. "It seems your medications have a negative affect on you when you're trying to wake up." He said it like he was stating an interesting side note. "I bet that hurt, didn't it? Did you hallucinate anything?" He asked it almost eagerly.

Then chuckled heartily, answering himself. "I guess that's a silly question. As your whole world's a hallucination, isn't it?" He tapped the needle against his fingers professionally, grinning as some liquid shot out of the end of it. "I don't know what did this to you Mr. Winchester, but if I ever get the chance, I'll be sure to thank it. Your condition's proved invaluably helpful in my business. Maybe if your brother ever returns I'll get him to tell me."

"Stay away from Dean." Sam managed to grind out between clenched teeth. "Or I swear to God I'll fuckin' kill you."

"That's cute. Your defensive little brother thing." Dr. Kabala's smile turned patronizing. "But I have to tell you, you aren't very threatening."

Sam opened his mouth to protest, argue, to do anything that would make him fell any less pathetically weak than he did right now.

Dr. Kabala cut him off before he got the chance. "I don't want to hear it Sam."

With that, he forcefully shoved the needle in his arm. Sam guessed it hit a vain, for he could not hold back the cry of pain that was ripped from his throat.

"Bye-bye Sam." Dr. Kabala's words sounded above the ringing in his ears, his vision became tunnel-like and he could tell the darkness would be consuming him shortly.

The world was spinning, his arm was throbbing, and the doctor was now humming to himself lightly. Sam wanted so desperately to move, to save himself and kill this fucker, to figure out what in the hell was going on, to get to his brother...

All trains of thoughts stopped as Sam blacked out.

End Chapter.

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A/N: Well, ah...

Betcha wanna review this one, huh?