Supernatural's not mine. You know the rest.
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Tired and Emotional 4
Sam. Where was Sam?
Dean knew the demon knew he was awake, but he kept his eyes closed anyway, trying to discover as much as he could about his surroundings without alerting his captor. He was lying on a hard surface, not too cold, probably wood. He had an ache or two here and there, particularly his head, but he didn't seem badly hurt. The brief glimpse he had had while his eyes were open had shown him a shadowy space, dim lighting blurring the edges, sparse furniture. And it, of course.
He listened, hard, wishing for a moment he had Sam's super hearing before remembering just why that was a dumb thing to wish for. He could hear his own breath, easing stiffly in and out of his nose, but that was all. He tried holding it for a brief moment to see if he could hear Sam, hear anything that would give him a clue. But when he did, utter silence descended, a silence so complete that it made the hairs on the back of his neck prickle.
Maybe it was gone. That would explain the silence. Maybe it had never been there in the first place, maybe he was just having a nightmare or he was delirious or something. Yeah, that was it, delirious. That would explain the whole of the last three weeks, actually, the nightmarish chain of events that had started in a forest in Minnesota and seemed due to end here on a wooden floor that may or may not have been somewhere in Alabama. The more Dean thought about this idea, the more it made sense – made a hell of a lot more sense than power-sucking bugs and exploding corn, anyway. He wondered if he was getting better, or if maybe the fact that everything had been going to shit in this fictional world of his meant that he was getting worse. Maybe he was going to die. Damn, that would suck. Plus, Sam would probably be freakin pissed.
"This was rather entertaining in the beginning, but you really should give it up now, you know."
Dean's thoughts froze. The cosy picture he had been building for himself, the hot nurses leaning in to sponge off his burning forehead in some hospital where the sheets were soft and dry and Sam sat by his bed, mad as hell and angsty no doubt but still Sam, crumbled into dust at the first note of that deep, full voice. He kept his eyes shut, trying to lie as still as possible, trying to think of a plan. No plan made itself known, however, and from somewhere to his left there was a heavy sigh.
"Why are you even trying?"
Dean didn't really know, and so he opened his eyes.
The demon was watching him from a battered sofa, its eyes brilliant in the low light. They were in a cabin, Dean realised now, just like before. It seemed fitting, somehow, fitted with the whole horror movie thing, so much more so than a clapboard house on a quiet suburban street in Kansas.
He cleared his throat. "Where's Sam?"
The demon chuckled, and the chuckle sounded so ordinary, so much like a man in his fifties enjoying a glass of wine and a cigar or two with friends, that it hit Dean in the gut with almost physical force, much more so than any hellish noise the thing could have made. "Ah, the fraternal concern makes its appearance already. Don't you worry, Dean, little brother will be here soon."
Dean swallowed. They've got Sam. He tried not to picture the demon's minions finding Sam hunched and fragile in the car, waiting for his brother to come back.
The demon still looked amused. "No threats, Dean? How disappointing. I so enjoyed your little show of bravado back in Kentucky."
Dean forced his mind away from visions of black-eyed minions torturing his brother to the present, and allowed his lips to curl with contempt. "Don't think it counts as bravado if you back it up," he said.
The demon snorted. "From where I was standing, you just passed out," he said. "Not exactly a candidate for hero of the hour."
Dean wondered if he was doing the right thing goading the creature, but at that moment it was all he could think of to do. "Yeah, but my kid brother kicked your ass. Now that's embarrassing."
It was beside him in an instant, breath tickling his ear, but he couldn't move his head, either to look or look away. Great plan, genius. Now it's really pissed.
It didn't say anything, though, not for a long time, as if it knew somehow that this breathing, this blowing its sick, boozy breath into his ear and why hadn't the smell of whisky faded yet, when it must have been days since the man was possessed? was worse than anything it could have said. It kept on until Dean thought he couldn't stand it any more, the tension that thrummed through every nerve becoming unbearable, and underneath it all the image of Sam curled in the seat of the Impala, holding his ears as fate finally caught up with him, repeated itself over and over like a sacred chant.
And then it was gone, just like that. It was still in the room, of course – Dean could hear its heavy shoes on the planks of the floor – but its presence was more muted. Dean wondered what had just happened, but his mind was working slowly, processing information through a fog of sulphurous fumes, and he couldn't quite grasp what was going on. He had made it angry, he remembered that. He had been talking about – what? Come on, Dean, get a grip.
Sam. Of course, Sam. He had said that Sam had kicked its ass, and the demon had been angry, and that had been decidedly unpleasant. Which, of course, didn't stop him from doing it again.
"You're scared of him, aren't you? That's why he's not here."
There was a hiss from somewhere out of sight, and in that moment Dean knew that his hastily-constructed jibe had hit its mark, and not only that, but that it was true, which was not what he had expected at all. And a second later, another thought bubbled through the fog, and he swore softly.
"You don't even have him. You never had him."
Orange eyes appeared in his field of vision, looking down at him from above. The demon didn't look angry. It looked amused. "Now I see why little brother's the brains of the family," it said.
Dean closed his eyes, relief washing through him. It didn't have Sam. It lied.
"Of course," said the demon conversationally, and Dean found that he could move his head again, follow its movements as it paced round the cabin, "it won't be long now. Soon you'll get to see little Sammy again, don't you worry." It stopped, leaning over him, leering. "He's not an easy man to get hold of these days, your brother. He's become rather... slippery." And then it laughed like it had just heard the best joke ever. "To get to him, I have to go through you," it said. "Wasn't that what you said?"
Dean felt cold.
Bait. He was bait.
----
"He's not gonna come, you know."
The demon didn't stop pacing. Dean found it kind of odd that demons paced when they were impatient, just like people. Still, this particular hellspawn had been demonstrating that very fact for quite some time now, and it was beginning to wear on Dean's already frayed nerves. Not to mention the fact that lying on the floor paralysed into a pretty uncomfortable position was making muscles ache that he hadn't known he had. Dean was way past scared and well into pissed off.
"You hear me, Damien? I said he's not coming. Sam has more sense than that."
The demon stopped, but didn't look at him. Dean had hit a nerve. Good.
Except it wasn't good, because a moment later the thing started in on that crap again, the crap they always pulled when they had you helpless and you had no way of getting them to shut up. Honestly, sometimes he thought that demons seemed to be more keen on talking about feelings than even Sam. And it was just as annoying.
"You do realise it's him, don't you?" the demon was asking, its eyes flat in the gathering gloom. Dean didn't know how long he had been lying on the floor, but daylight had come and now it was on the way out again, so it must have been a while. He wondered what Sam was doing.
The demon didn't seem to care that he hadn't responded. "It's always been him. If it hadn't been for him, you wouldn't be here. You would have had a normal life, a normal childhood, a mommy and a daddy and maybe even another little brother to satisfy your deep-seated need to protect something. Hell," the demon snorted, "you might even have been married by now with kids of your own."
"Yeah, sounds great," Dean said. "Just what I always wanted."
"But that's the problem, isn't it," the demon hissed, and it was watching him closely now, standing still, so still that it didn't even seem to be breathing. "It is what you've always wanted." It grinned as Dean's eyes flicked over involuntarily. "Oh, of course, you'd never tell anyone, especially not him. Especially not since he was the one who took it away from you."
"No," Dean said, wondering why he was even engaging in this conversation. "It wasn't him, it was you. You took it."
The demon giggled, a high-pitched noise that scraped across Dean's ears. "I know you like to tell yourself that, but deep down you know I'm right. You know it. I know it. And you can be sure as hell little Sammy knows it too. He's always known it. Such a clever child."
"Don't you say his name," Dean warned, feeling suddenly at the end of his rope.
"What're you gonna do, tough guy?" the demon sniggered, and then it was right up against Dean's face, and Dean could feel the sulphur beginning to fog up his senses again. "You know," it said, as if a thought was occurring to it for the first time, "I think little Sammy might do anything to absolve himself of that guilt. I think he might do anything to save you."
Dean swallowed. Holy crap. "You don't seriously think he's just gonna hand himself over to you?"
He felt a hand graze his cheek, and his skin crawled. "Why not, Dean? You know he'd die for you. Do you truly believe he'd live for you?"
Dean shuddered out a laugh. "You think you know us so well, but you don't know a damn thing. Sam would never give you anything. Anything." But he remembered the arguments they'd had, the ones in which he'd called Sam selfish because he was always so keen on getting himself killed for that damned demon. The same demon that was watching him now from the corner with the fires of hell in its glowing eyes.
Dean closed his eyes. This was a bad situation, he knew, but there had to be a way of getting out of it. He knew Sam wasn't coming, because although the demon kept saying that Sam was strong, Dean knew that his brother was a mess. He knew that Sam wasn't coming because no way would Sam be that stupid. He knew that Sam wasn't coming because if he did, he would probably end up getting killed, and there was no way that could happen. So he knew that Sam wasn't coming.
That meant he had to get out of this by himself.
Problem was, he'd been racking his brains for a plan for however long it was that he'd been stuck on this goddamn floor, and so far he'd come up with zip. And somewhere at the back of his brain, some mutinous part of himself thought that maybe Sam was coming, that maybe he was holed up somewhere in a darkened motel room right now, preparing to just come in without a fight.
No way in hell was that gonna happen.
Dean had one option left, and it pretty much sucked. Well, sometimes that was just how things went.
"You know," he started, "that daughter of yours, she was a real hotty. Shame she was a hell bitch."
He had the demon's attention, all of it, very suddenly. Dean felt like an ant squirming under a magnifying glass. Still, this was good, right? This was the plan, and no matter how bad a plan it was, it was still better than no plan at all.
"Shame I had to have her put down," he continued, wondering if his voice was trembling. He didn't think it was, because now that he had made up his mind what needed to be done, he was feeling oddly firm. "Or no, actually, it's not really a shame, is it? Cos damn, it was fun."
The demon quirked an eyebrow, and Dean felt a wrenching pain in his guts. Fuck. No, OK, OK. This was the plan. It was all going to plan.
He tried for a smile, though it was probably more of a grimace. "She had a lot of fight in her, huh? Took her a while to-" Dean was cut off by more pain, blinding, in his head this time, and his determination wavered for just a moment, because he didn't want to die. But if he didn't, then Sam would, or worse, and Dean, who had spent his whole life protecting Sam, was not about to be the cause of his little brother's death. He coughed, trying not to taste the blood in his mouth, and opened his mouth to deliver another line, hoping to God this could be the last one because if he was going to die, whoever it was who was in charge of these things could at least have the decency to make it quick.
That was when every window in the place burst inwards with a sound like crunching ice, showering glass over everything, and the door splintered and cracked, hanging off its hinges like it had been hit like a truck. And Dean's words froze in his throat, because there, standing in the doorway looking like he was about to die, was Sam.
The next thing Dean knew, he was sliding across the floor and up the wall, until he was hanging a few inches off the ground. He had been here before. But never like this.
The demon licked its lips and smiled. "Why hello there, Sammy," it said, the name sounding grotesque in its mouth. "How nice of you to join us. Your brother and I were just having a little chat." And it flicked its hand towards Dean, and Dean felt the pain start again and wondered if he really was going to die now and all for nothing, and then Sam flung him a furious glance and the pain stopped, and he heard his brother say don't you ever touch him again.
If Dean hadn't known what he knew about demons, he would have thought he saw a flicker of uncertainty on the creature's face. But he did know, and all he saw were hungry eyes and teeth that seemed too sharp.
"Temper, temper," it said. "Not one of your more appealing characteristics." Behind it, the glass of a picture frame shivered into pieces, and that just seemed to amuse the demon more, if anything.
"Cheap tricks, boy," it said. "That power wasn't meant for you. You can't even wield it, let alone control it." It sniggered and cast a glance at Dean. "You think it impresses me that you can keep me from him? It won't last long. That weak human brain of yours just isn't built for it. I mean, just look at yourself. It's pathetic."
Dean shot a glance at his brother, taking in the sight properly now. Sam's face was pale and set, and against that pallor the blood that flowed from his nose and ears was an almost attractive deep, rich red. His shirt collar and chest were stained enough for Dean to know that it wasn't the first blood, either. The demon took a step closer, and Sam raised his hand, a vein throbbing on his forehead, his jaw clenched.
"You want to save your brother," it said, watching Sam, predatory. "I can understand that. You can, you know. Just not like this."
Sam grunted and didn't say anything. Dean became aware that the air around his body was heating up, as if it was charged with electricity, as two wills fought for dominance.
"It would be so easy," the demon said, taking another step and crooning gently. "All you need to do is give me what's mine. I know you don't want it, so why try to hold on to it? If you just let it go, then all this could be over, and I promise you, Dean would live."
Dean tried to shift, but although the pain was gone, the force that held him in place was still very much present. "Sammy," he said, his voice low, "don't listen to him."
"Come on," said the demon, and Dean knew that that deep, persuasive voice was going to haunt him in his dreams for the rest of his life. Which, fair enough, might only be a few minutes, but still. "This is how you can atone. You can atone, and you can rest."
"Don't listen," said Dean again. Don't listen, don't listen. And what if Sam did listen? What then?
Sam was very still, leaning forward as if fighting against a strong wind, and Dean saw that the hairs on his head were rising slightly, like there was a build-up of static. He looked the demon square in the eye, and Dean felt his stomach lurch. Don't say yes, Sammy. God, don't say yes.
But Sam didn't say yes. What Sam said, in a voice that was completely devoid of emotion, was you killed my mother.
The demon took a step back, confused.
Then everything was sound and light, the sound almost beyond sound, filling Dean's ears like nothing he had ever heard, and the light blinding, shrieking, emanating somehow from Sam. And there were other noises too, the cracking and rending of tearing wood, and a howling that made the hairs on his spine rise instantly to attention, a noise that he couldn't even imagine, even as it was happening. Sam, he whispered.
And then the force that was holding him abruptly let him go, and he dropped the short distance to the floor with a thud that jarred whatever it was inside him that the demon had damaged, and he sucked in his breath and saw stars superimposed on the nimbus of brightness surrounding his brother and the demon.
The next thing he knew, he was racing forward, because he may not know what was going on, and the whole thing might be a whole swimming pool full of freakshow, but damned if he was going to let his little brother fight off a demon on his own. Except, as it turned out, he was, because the moment he got within ten feet of Sam he felt an invisible wall smack him in the face with all the physicality of the real thing.
Sam was standing ramrod-straight, his legs apart, arms opened wide, and normally Dean would have laughed at that posture, it was so dramatic, so over-the-top, but the light seemed to be coming from inside his brother, leaking from his skin like sweat, except leaking wasn't really the word because there was too much of it for that, pouring maybe, Dean thought the word torrent might be appropriate but couldn't quite work out how to fit it into a sentence, which, really, who cares about grammar when you're fighting evil from hell and your kid brother's just gone nuclear?
The demon was still howling, down on its knees, but now Sam was sinking too, sinking to the ground amidst the haze of thrumming light, and the blood was gushing now, pouring from his nostrils and his ears and his eyes too now oh God his eyes and Dean knew through the pounding in his head, knew with the same certainty that he knew the world was round and his mom was beautiful, that they were not going to win this one, that there was nothing he could do, that he had failed. He hurled himself against the wall again and stayed there, pressed against it, watching the end of the world.
And it was at that moment that the demon fell to the ground with a thud, and the sound and light drained away like water through the cracks in the floorboards, and Sam made a small noise, slumped forward, and lay still.
Then Dean noticed that the house was on fire.