Chapter title is from song by Downplay.
71
The One Who Laughs Last – Downplay
He wasn't sure how long they had been here, in this beaten up, overdressed meat suit, one cheek pressed into dry dirt, the bruising weight of sanctified walls crushing him into sacred ground. He reached out a hand, his fingernails torn and bloodied, the sleeve of his shabby trench coat dirty and frayed, and he clawed his way deeper, yearning for fire.
She wasn't sure how long they had been here, shockingly bruised and battered, chained by fire and anger to the earth. She wasn't sure how long these hallowed walls could protect them, from the wrath within and the wrath that was coming. She lifted blunt fingertips out of the ground, the sleeve of his trench coat dirt streaked and frayed. She tried to find them air in the flames; her wings wrapped tenderly around her charge, her feathers charred all to smoke, still straining for the sky.
He was still screaming.
Screaming and screaming and being torn apart. There were fragments of him in the earth and in the sky and he couldn't keep himself whole. There were flashes of light and flames alternating, too bright where he could feel his flesh scalding, broiling away as steam and smoke. Theo's grace bubbled, precarious, like boiling lava on his parched lips. He was being ripped to pieces, the particles of his existence flayed and shredded, and he couldn't hold on.
He had to hold on.
"Dean." He croaked. "Dean."