Title: Now I Know My ABC's
Author: Disasteriffic Kaz
Info: A hurt/comfort romp through the alphabet, one letter at a time from A to Z. Each chapter is a stand-alone one shot. There is hurt, comfort, angst, humor, feels and all around fun.
Author's Note: Because I decided to go for the trifecta a second time as I just could NOT make up my mind. Lol This one is set after 11x13 'Love Hurts' and a slight tag to 8x16 'Remember the Titans'. Wow. First time I've played in the current season. I've wanted to explore this bond between Dean and Amara and exactly what it could mean for him and Sam both.
Beta'd by the always awesome JaniceC678 :D– Friend and Muse's co-conspirator.
**Follow me on Facebook as "Disasteriffic Kaz" for frequent fic updates or just to chat!
~Reviews are Love~
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S is for Starvation, Sleep Deprivation, and Stoning -
Dean strolled slowly along the square, sidestepping people while they wandered in and out of the long line of small tents at the local craft and arts festival. He rolled his eyes at the collection of knick-knacks and dust collectors on display, the woven art in all the colors of the rainbow, and the gaudy jewelry twinkling in the sunlight. He stopped and looked out over the sea of people and snorted when he easily picked out his little brother's head towering above everyone around him a hundred yards away. He took out his phone and dialed him.
"Hey, Sammy. Anyone try to climb you yet?" Dean chuckled at his brother's disgusted snort over the line. He looked around at the crowd again and sighed. "We're not gonna spot shit in this, you know that? Too many people."
"It's our best bet to catch whatever's been kidnapping people."
"And killing them. Don't forget killing them." Dean moved so his back was to the wall of one of the tents and watched his brother's head move out of sight behind a collection of brightly colored tents. "The victims didn't die easy, dude. I saw the crime scene pics too." He remembered the images of blood and bruises on bodies that looked like they hadn't been fed in weeks. "You watch your ass." He rolled his eyes again. "Still say we should be focusing on finding Amara. Bigger fish, Sammy."
"People are dying, Dean. This is what we do."
Dean couldn't help the small smile at the tone of Sam's voice; it was full of Sam's concern for him. "Yeah, right. I know. Think I'm gonna have to investigate the fried dough stand while I'm over here." He laughed and ended the call before Sam could make a joke about his weight.
Dean had taken only one step to his left when chaos erupted around him. He put a hand into his jacket, taking hold of his gun, and ducked instinctively as the first scream tore through the air. "What the hell?" He grunted and backed up against the nearest tent while people screamed and shouted and ran, bumping into him and nearly taking him off his feet. "Hey!" He grabbed one man before he could slide away and tugged him to a stop. "What's going on?"
"There's these weirdos with knives over there!" The man waved a hand toward the other side of the fair, tugged his arm free and took off again.
"Shit." Dean pushed into the swarming, panicked crowed and left his gun in his jacket not wanting to add to the fear. "Sam!" he shouted. His eyes roamed over the mob, looking for his brother's head above the rest but not finding him, and a bad feeling began to come over him. He tried to move faster and had to stop as a woman fell to the ground a few feet away. He grimaced, seeing several feet stomp across her back as she cried out. "Dammit!" He ducked down and caught a hand under her shoulder, pulled her to her feet and clamped his arm around her waist when she swayed.
"Hey, hey, easy. I've got you." Dean steadied her and looked down at her dazed eyes. He gritted his teeth together and began to drag her toward the edge of the fair grounds. She was in no condition to make it on her own. "Come on. Make a hole, dammit!" Dean yelled. He shouldered through a group of people gathered at the edge of a sidewalk and pulled the woman up and beyond them. "Here we go. Come on. Sit down." Dean helped lower her to a patch of grass beneath a tree and leaned her back against the trunk. He smiled when she looked up at him with wide, blue eyes. "You alright?"
"Um…" She coughed and ran a hand over her face. "I… I think so. Thank you."
"Don't mention it." Dean patted her knee and stood. He looked around and spotted two police officers trying to calm down a group of people. "Stay put. I'm gonna get you some help." He jogged over to the officers. "Hey! I got a woman over here who got trampled!" He pointed to the woman he had left and felt relief when one of the officers immediately waved a hand to him and ran to her.
"Good." Dean turned, took a breath, and waded back out into the still-panicking crowd. It was slightly easier as many of them had fled the fairgrounds, but he still had to dodge and weave to avoid being knocked down as the woman had. "Sammy!" he shouted. Dean made his way across to the last place he had seen his brother. As he neared the center of the fair, the area cleared and he took out his phone, dialing his brother when he still found no sign of him. Dean moved at a slow jog, his eyes scanning each tent, and sometimes he stopped to lean over and look behind the covered tables. But though he found several people hiding, he didn't find his brother, and he snarled as Sam's phone rang itself into voicemail for the third time.
"Dammit! Sam!" If there had to be trouble, leave it to Sam to get himself caught up smack in the middle of it.
"Hey, mister. Who you lookin' for?"
Dean turned and saw a very tall, teenage girl with short, curly blonde hair looking at him with frightened brown eyes from between two tents. She had to be nearly six feet tall though she still had a baby-face. "Hey. You alright, sweetheart?"
She nodded and cautiously stepped out. "They didn't get me."
"Who? What happened?" Dean demanded and tried not to growl the question and frighten her even more.
"There were these weird men. They had hoods and knives." She wrapped her arms around herself and trembled.
Dean put a hand on her shoulder and smiled. "What's your name? I'm Dean."
"A… Amanda."
"You're safe, Amanda. Alright? No one's gonna hurt you." Dean squeezed her shoulder to offer support and met her eyes. "I really need to know what happened with the freaks in hoods."
"I think… I think they were going to take me." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "But then this guy - he was huge, you know?" She looked up at Dean with big eyes. "He started yelling and he… he pushed me between the tents and he wouldn't let them near me."
Dean's eyes fell closed for a moment and he took a breath to steady his nerves. "This big guy, he have shaggy, brown hair hangin' in his eyes? Blue jeans and a jacket?" She nodded and Dean's bad feeling grew. "Did you see where they went or what happened to them?"
"I think…" She paused and met Dean's eyes with true fear in her own. "…I think… they were carrying him away. I don't know if he's… if they… he wasn't moving." She shivered at the look of cold anger that washed over the face of the man in front of her. "I'm sorry. He saved me."
"He'll be fine. I'll find him. Go that way." Dean gave her a nudge back the way he had come and started away on his own. He scoured the ground for any signs, but there had been too many people. "Dammit!" Dean spent over an hour searching every inch of the fairgrounds until he was finally run off by the police in favor of their investigation. He sat behind the wheel of the Impala, staring out at the fair tents in the fading light with their protective wall of police and tried not to feel hopeless. Sam was out there and he would find him. "You're not goin' out like this, Sammy. No way."
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The cold woke Sam. He shivered in a fog, trying to remember why he was asleep and why he was so cold. He moaned softly as a dull pain went through his shoulders and neck. It was a sad testament to their lives, that he instantly realized what it meant without even thinking – his hands were bound to something overhead. It took a huge effort to lift his head and even more to convince his heavy eyes to open. When they did, he blinked furiously several times in an effort to make sense of what he was seeing. He was outside and surrounded by a group of people in gray robes. Gone were the fair and his brother, and, as he looked down at himself, he realized his clothes were gone as well.
"What?" Sam coughed to clear his throat and watched the figures around him shift. "Let me go." He pulled at the ropes binding his hands above his head to no effect and glared angrily at his captors as his head cleared a bit more with the sudden surge of adrenaline. "And why did you freaks take my clothes?" His face was burning with embarrassment to be naked in front of so many people. He felt exposed and helpless - two things he no longer dealt very well with, and he could feel the first stirrings of panic.
"The offering has no need of earthly coverings."
Sam jerked his head to the left as the soft voice carried to him. He frowned and watched one of the robed figures step closer. "What do you mean, offering? Let me go!" Sam yelped as his arms were jerked more forcefully above him. He was pulled higher, just high enough that he could barely keep his balance on the balls of his feet and felt something hard behind him, likely a wooden post from the way it felt scratching harshly along his back. "What… what the hell are you doing?"
"The darkness is coming."
Sam's mouth fell open at that. "How do you know about that?"
"You will be our offering to our great lord." The man drew closer and rested a hand on Sam's chest. "To bring him forth and cleanse the darkness from our world with his light before it destroys us all."
Sam struggled and wished he could see the face beneath the hood, but a sheer, gray veil the same color as the robe hid the man. "Look, you're making a mistake. Just… let me go and we can talk about this. We're trying to fight it too."
"You cannot fight the darkness." The man swept his arms wide to encompass those with him. "We cannot fight the darkness. We are but mere mortals. Our lord is all that can stand in its way." He placed his hand on Sam's chest again, heedless of the man's vain attempts to pull away. "Through the Perikathairo, we will purify you. With the Oxuthumis, we will cleanse your sins. All that you are shall be as new and our great lord will rise to bring his light and defeat the darkness. Be honored, brother."
Sam frowned as the man moved away. "Perikathairo? That's…" Sam's eyes widened. "That's Greek. It's from… hang on, I know I've read it. Uh... from the world of… of Prometheus!" His head jerked up and he stared at the people gathered around him in sudden fear and understanding. "Oh, no. You have to listen to me! This won't work!"
"Be still, brother."
Sam watched as each of the people around him bent to pick something up from the ground; stones. "Oxuthumis. Sharp anger." Sam tensed as their arms went back and he yelled in desperation. "Listen to me! I know what you're doing! You think you're going to raise Prometheus, but you can't!" He stared at the veiled faces hopelessly. "He's dead! Prometheus is gone!" He wouldn't soon forget Prometheus dying along with the god Zeus. It wasn't often you got to see Greek gods take each other out.
"He will return. A titan cannot die. Now."
Sam yelled in pain as a hail of stones slammed into his body, and he hoped his brother would find him soon. He didn't think there was any way he was getting out of this on his own.
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The thump as the cheap motel chair slammed into the wall wasn't nearly as satisfying as Dean had hoped it would be. He ran his hands through his hair for the hundredth time and only barely resisted the urge to roar in frustration. He grabbed his phone from the table and dialed Castiel. He glared up at the ceiling as it went to voicemail yet again.
"Dammit, Cas. I need your help, man." Dean paced around the room and kicked the end of the bed. "Sam's been missing for two damn days now. I can't find him. I can't even find the whackos who took him! Call me back, dammit!" He shoved his phone into his pocket and wondered what the hell the angel was doing that he couldn't answer a single call. He closed his eyes, feeling slightly ridiculous. "Oh, Castiel. If you could get your feathery ass down here and help me save Sam, that'd be damn nice. Amen."
Dean opened his eyes and looked around the room, waiting. He blew out a frustrated breath when the angel failed to appear. "Dammit!"
He was beyond the point of desperation and stuck in a loop remembering all the times Sam had gone missing over the years, with special note of the Benders who had tried to hunt him, and – he shuddered – what had happened at Cold Oak. The previous victims that had brought them to this case in the first place had obviously been kept alive for some time, which was giving him some hope, but what they had gone through and suffered in that time…
Dean shook himself and stalked outside, slamming the motel door behind him. He had no other favors to call in. Sam was going to die because Dean was failing at finding him. Whoever or whatever had taken him had done too good a job covering their tracks, and Dean was going to fail him. He felt the air backing up in his lungs. Dean leaned down on the hood of the Impala gleaming under the moonlight, and tried to catch his breath, tried to force the gut-wrenching panic back.
"No," Dean gasped and closed his eyes. He thought through anyone else he could call for help and realized there was nothing. Even if he were willing to talk to Crowley, if he could even get a hold of him, he wouldn't lift a finger to save Sam. Dean figured the bastard would laugh in his face. "What do I do?" Dean straightened and stared out into the dark field across from the motel. He narrowed his eyes and clenched his fists as an idea, as desperate as he was, came to him.
"Sam would kill me," Dean muttered. He went around the car and climbed behind the wheel. "Probably get myself killed first." He turned the engine over and pulled out quickly to the empty road, then started driving away from the city and out into the fields and forest. He couldn't stop the knot from twisting in his gut, but he was desperate. He could not let his brother go through the torture and slow death that the others had suffered, no matter the cost… no matter the promises he had made. "This is a bad idea." The headlights cut through the gloom and low wisps of fog drifting across the road as he drove, and Dean said a silent apology to his brother, wherever he was for what he was about to do.
He drove for nearly an hour before he finally pulled off and parked near the center of an overgrown field. Dean climbed out and brushed a hand over the warm hood of the car before looking out into the night.
"Can't believe I'm gonna do this." Dean closed his eyes and for the second time that night, he prayed. "Amara. Darkness, whatever the hell you are. I, uh…" Dean groaned and scrubbed a hand over his face. The monumental ways it could all go wrong began to beat down on him, and he realized he couldn't do it; not even to save his brother. Sam had been right. Some risks were just too big to be taken, even for this. Too many other innocent lives at stake. "Shit." Dean opened his eyes, turned back to the car, and staggered back a step in shock.
"Hello, Dean." Amara smiled serenely at him.
"Shit. Shit." Dean's heart hammered in his chest. "I, uh… never mind, you know?"
"I heard you call to me." Amara reached out and brushed her fingers lightly over the stubble on Dean's jaw. She frowned. "You sound… upset."
Dean scowled and tried to look away from her eyes, but it was difficult. "So, what? I call and you come running?"
"Don't be flippant." Amara looked around the field they were in before meeting his green eyes again. "I told you, Dean. We will always help each other."
Dean shook his head and managed to back away another step from her, though it took an effort. Resisting her was damn near impossible. "What's the price tag for your help?"
Amara smiled that infuriatingly calm smile of hers and moved closer to him, amused at his attempts to put distance between them, as if that would help. "No price, Dean. Not for you. Now, tell me what you need. What is so dire that you would pray to me?" She chuckled softly and rested a hand on his chest over the thumping of his heart. "I don't think anyone's ever prayed to me before. I liked it. That was…" She dragged her nails softly over his chest and enjoyed the way he shivered in reaction. "…intimate."
"Cut it out," Dean said but with no real heat. As before, she was beginning to overwhelm his senses, and he had to hold on tight to the thought of his brother. "Sam."
Amara's indulgent smile faded. "What about him?" The warmth was gone from her voice, replaced with disinterest.
"He's… I need to…" Dean huffed out a breath and took Amara's hand before it could slide into the neck of his shirt, holding it away from him. "He's been taken. I need your help to save him."
"Why would I help you do that?" Amara moved away from him. "I don't care about your brother, Dean." She smiled without humor and looked up at the night sky. "Brothers only hurt you in the end. You know that."
Dean twitched as she moved behind him and forced himself to stay where he was rather than turn to keep his eyes on her like a lovesick puppy because it pissed him off. "Look, lady. I get that you've got some issues with your brother. He's a dick. Trust me." Dean snorted a disgusted laugh. "I got no love for the guy and all his dick angels. But this ain't about them. Sam is my brother. He's my blood and I'll die for him if I have to." Dean stared down at the ground and shook his head. "Hell, I have." He looked back up when she moved into his line of sight again and met her dark eyes. "Keepin' him safe is my job. I don't expect you to understand that."
Amara leaned in and brushed her lips over his jaw, near his ear. She smiled, hearing his breathing hitch for a moment. "You don't need him, Dean. You have me. We're going to be together forever, and there's no room for anyone else. Just us. You'll forget about Sam eventually. I promise."
Her words lit a fire in his soul that gave Dean the strength to push her back. "I killed Death for him!" Dean yelled and let the protective anger for his brother burn through him. "You think I won't do any less to you? To anyone who tries to hurt him?" His chest was heaving with emotion as he glared at her and he worked to get himself back under control. "Listen." He fought to speak more calmly. "You want my good will or whatever? You want me battin' for team 'Darkness'? That's never gonna happen if I lose Sam." In his heart, he swore it would never happen no matter what, but she didn't need to know that.
"He's that important?" Amara watched the anger and fear warring in Dean's eyes. She could feel an echo of the terror in his heart for his brother. She studied him, trying to see why Sam meant so much, but all she could feel was her rage for her own brother. "Fine. I will help you find him." She gave a small nod and watched relief flow into Dean's green eyes. "Only because it isn't time for us yet." She leaned into him again and this time pressed a kiss to his lips. She could feel his inner battle to resist and it amused her when he helplessly gave in and returned the kiss. Amara leaned back and rested her fingers along his jaw as she watched his eyes flutter open again. "But I want you to remember this, Dean." Her gaze became fierce. "I do not share." She punctuated each word with a tap of her nails against his skin and then smiled. "Stay here. I'll find your wayward brother and return."
"I…" Dean's breath came out in a heavy gust as she was suddenly gone from in front of him. He staggered and leaned against the side of the car, suddenly bereft of strength. "Fuck, what am I doing?" He rubbed his hands over his face and looked out over the empty field. "You gotta be alright, Sammy."
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Sam wheezed air in and out, pointlessly trying to catch his breath. His legs felt like they had no strength left, but he fought to keep his balance. It was all that kept him from suffocating. His arms had long gone numb above his head. He looked up at the ring of torches around him and flinched as the robed figures all rose as one.
"God," Sam gasped and let his head drop. He knew what was coming. For two days it had been the same; at predetermined times Sam couldn't understand, they would stand as one and pelt his defenseless body with stones. At first, the pain had been easy to ignore. He'd suffered much worse after all. But as the hours wore on, the pain became larger and harder to ignore as it seemed to take over his senses. He was so hungry. They hadn't fed him since they took him, and the rain the night before was the only reason he'd been able to drink anything, hungrily licking the rainfall from his lips even as it made his abused body shudder with cold.
Sam yelped as the first hail of small stones hit him. He truly understood what oxuthumis meant now; sharp anger. "Stop!" he yelled, or tried to. His voice was little more than a hoarse croak, but the hail of stones stopped and he lifted his head. "I told you." He panted to catch his breath as one of them, probably the man who always and only spoke to him, came forward. "Prometheus… he's dead. I'm sorry. This won't work. You're… you're doing this… for nothing. Please, stop."
"Lies will not save you." The man nodded his head. "We expect the offering to plead for its life." He reached out and rested his palm against the cold skin of Sam's chest and then against the rabbit-fast pulse in his neck before backing away. "Another day at most and you will be worthy. Then you can sleep forever."
Sam groaned as the man moved away and let his head drop. Two days of being woken with buckets of frigid water over his head or his own lungs refusing to work if he sagged too far in his bonds… he was beginning to lose his grip on reality. He could see colored lights flashing in the periphery of his vision each time he opened his eyes and even when they were closed. Sometimes, he heard voices, usually his brother's, as though Dean were calling him and begging him to hold on. He was no stranger to having a shaky grasp of reality, and he could take it all, manage it all, except when the voice in his ear belonged to Lucifer. Those were the moments that nearly brought him to tears with the hopelessness of it all.
"Dean," Sam breathed his brother's name into the air, a desperate plea that he knew was never going to be answered. Sam was on his own. "Castiel." The angel's name was a soundless whisper. "Please. You have to help Dea…" His voice broke off as a fresh wave of stones slammed into him, battering rational thought from his mind. Darkness crept across his thoughts, and just when he would have given in to the peaceful blackness, cold water shocked him back to wakefulness so violently, he strained in his bonds and arched his back as he sucked in a breath before slumping forward once more.
"The wicked do not sleep."
Sam wanted to kick the bastard. He was so tired of hearing that line, but his legs had barely enough strength left to keep him standing and breathing. "Go… go to hell." The stoning started again. He turned his head into his arm to protect his face and hoped the pain wouldn't last much longer.
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Dean sat on the hood of the Impala, aimlessly turning a half-empty can of beer in his hands. He glanced behind him to the expanse of black hood, and it felt like a piece was missing without Sam there, taking up far too much space. "Dammit, Sammy. Where the hell are you?" He took another sip of beer while guilt and failure swirled sickly through him. It felt like Cold Oak all over again, and he didn't know if he could survive the death of his little brother because of his failure to protect him one more time.
"You haven't failed him yet."
Dean startled badly and coughed beer as Amara's voice sounded nearby. He slid off the hood and wiped his face clean while he stared at her. "Wear a damn bell or something! Holy crap." He saw the minute tilt of her mouth that was definitely an amused smirk and scowled. "You in my head now? Do I need to invest in tin foil hats or something?"
Amara's smirk became a smile. She reached out and brushed a last drop of liquid from Dean's chin. "Sometimes you think very loudly."
Dean stilled as her first words registered and the beer can fell from his nerveless fingers. "You said I haven't failed him. He's… Sam's alive? Where is he?"
"He doesn't have long, I don't think." Amara shrugged and looked Dean up and down. "Are you armed?" She chuckled. "Of course you are."
"I've got a damn arsenal in my trunk. You tell me where he is." Dean gasped and stumbled as the scenery changed suddenly. One moment, he was beside his car in a field and the next, he was near the top of what looked like an old quarry. "What the hell?"
Amara pointed one, pale arm down. "Sam is there. You'll have to hurry."
"Where did you take me?" Dean demanded. "And what, God's sister couldn't bring the damn car too?" He looked away from the humor in her face and down instead. Below, in the base of the quarry, was a ring of guttering torches surrounding a pitiful, naked figure tied to a stake, and his heart clenched in fear and rage, knowing it had to be Sam. A dozen or more figures in robes were standing around his brother and Dean looked back to her. "So, are you gonna smite them all?"
Amara chuckled. She cupped a hand around Dean's face and indulged herself with another kiss before stepping back. "Dean, I promised I would find him for you. There he is. How you save him is up to you."
"What?" Dean asked in surprise. "There's at least twelve of those assholes!"
"Thirteen."
"And you're just gonna leave me to twist?"
Amara smiled. "You'll figure something out."
Dean gaped at her for a moment and swallowed. "What if they kill me? You think of that?" He waved an arm to the gathering below. "You just gonna find a new date for the post-apocalypse?"
"They won't kill you."
"How do you know they won't turn me into a grease stain?" Dean pulled the gun from the back of his jeans. "I've got twelve shots and a damn knife. Not exactly odds in my favor."
Amara gave another small shrug and stepped back. "They won't kill you because you need to save him." She looked as though the thought was distasteful. "You will live, Dean. Go. Save your brother. We'll see each other again."
Dean blinked and she vanished, leaving him standing alone and woefully unprepared. "Son of a bitch," he groaned and turned to look down at his brother again. "Great." He started moving along the narrow road he stood on, following the curve as it angled down, and took in every detail he could see below in the moon and torchlight. "Should have known God's sister would screw me and not even buy me a damn drink first."
Now that he had Sam in his sight, regardless of his condition, Dean found he could think and breathe again. Sam was there and Dean would damn well reach him. Amara wasn't wrong about that. He was not going to fail his little brother again.
"Alright, you assholes," Dean muttered as he stopped a bare ten feet above the ground. He knelt down and braced his gun arm along his knee. His gut- hell, every big brother instinct he had - said 'shoot to kill'. But he didn't know if they were monsters or humans; and if they were just people, he knew what Sam would say, regardless of what they'd done to him. Dean snorted softly and took aim. He wouldn't kill them, not yet, but he would damn sure make them hurt. He chose the robed figure closest to his brother as his first target. The man, if it was a man, stood barely five feet from Sam. Dean frowned as the man raised an arm and then snarled in righteous rage as the figures behind him began throwing rocks at Sam, pelting him like they were tenderizing a side of beef.
Dean fired and took great satisfaction in watching the man near Sam drop to the ground and howl in pain. "You hold on, Sammy."
Sam flinched hard where he hung as the sound of a gunshot rang out over the stones striking him. He looked down blearily at himself, searching for a wound, for blood, but found nothing. He frowned in confusion as more shots were fired and the people around him began to scream and yell. He dragged his head up to look but could make no sense of the bodies either running or lying on the ground around him.
"Wha…" Sam's voice died on a cough and he dropped his head again, waiting for whatever torment they were going to visit on him next, his muddled mind unable to make sense of what was happening around him. He was so thirsty, so hungry, his stomach was cramping painfully, and so tired his eyes felt as though they were packed with sawdust. He looked out again and squinted. The world around him was a blur of motion. For a moment, his vision cleared and he thought he saw his brother's face. Sam choked on a sob and let his head fall, knowing it wasn't real.
Dean shot five more of the men before he sprinted to the bottom of the quarry. The remaining people were scattering with screams of terror. He grabbed one by the arm, swept his legs and ripped the hood from the man's head. Dean glared down into blue, human eyes. "Who the fuck are you people? What'd you do to him?" he demanded with a nod toward his brother.
"We… we're… the cult of Prometheus!" The man flinched back as Dean shoved the gun beneath his jaw. "The man is a sacrifice! We… we're cleansing him! You have to let us finish! Our great god is the only hope against the coming darkness! His light will…"
Dean punched the man in the side of the head with his gun and let him fall. "Prometheus? Jesus." He looked around as the last few unharmed cultists ran up the path beyond him and away and suffered for his little brother, kidnapped and tortured for a god who was already dead. He crossed the flat, stony ground to his brother and saw Sam's head fall. "Sammy?"
Dean skirted the first man he'd shot and glared down at him. "Don't you move, you bastard. I got three bullets left, and I will put one in your brain. That's my little brother. You got me?" The man gave him a terrified nod and scooted back from him. "Sam. Hey." He went to his brother, sliding his gun into the back of his pants and took Sam's head, lifting it carefully. He grimaced seeing all the damage, and didn't care that his brother was naked. "Hey, little brother. Come on. Give me a sign here." He brushed Sam's overlong hair out of his face and smiled as Sam's eyes slowly cracked open to meet his own.
Sam felt tears gather in his dry eyes, faced with the image of his brother as though his own mind were taunting him. He could even convince himself he could hear Dean's voice, feel his hands on his face. He closed his eyes again and a sob worked out of him. "Not real… not r-real. Not here."
"Aw, Sammy." Dean leaned his forehead against his brother's for just a moment. "I am here, kiddo. I swear. I'm gonna get you outta here. Just hang on." He turned around and bent to the man he'd shot. Dean dragged him up, ignoring the man's pained cries, and dragged the man's robe off, letting his body roll back to the ground with a heavy thump.
"Please! We need him!" The man begged as he huddled over the bleeding wound in his knee.
Dean laid the robe out on the ground and gritted his teeth together. "I'm workin' real hard to not shoot you dead, so you'd probably be smart to shut the hell up." He looked over at Sam, taking in the state of him - pale skin with an almost blue tinge, the shuddering of cold or exhaustion or both that was constant, the bleeding welts and bruises that covered every inch of him from the stones, and Dean swore he could count his brother's ribs. "Have you even fed him since you took him? Huh?" He kicked the man's knee, taking a bit of satisfaction from his agonized cry. "Food? Water? A damn blanket?"
The man wept with pain and shook his head, refusing to meet the look of cold death in Dean's eyes. "He… he has to be pure." He heard the snarl a moment before a booted foot slammed into his head.
Dean's hand itched to grab his gun and to shoot the now unconscious bastard, but he didn't. He turned away with difficulty and drew his knife instead. He reached up above Sam, wrapped one arm around his waist, and sliced through the ropes holding him in place with the other. "Easy." He wasn't surprised when Sam simply collapsed like a puppet with no strings. Dean grimaced in sympathy when his brother gave a choked scream as his arms dropped. "I gotcha. I gotcha. Easy." Dean knelt and carefully laid Sam out atop the robe to get a better look at him. "Sammy." He frowned as Sam's head turned into the hand he put to his cheek but his eyes didn't open.
"Sammy, I swear it really is me. I need your help to get you outta here." Dean patted Sam's cheek lightly. "I know you hurt and you're tired, dude, but I need you. Come on, Sammy."
Sam fought to listen to the voice, Dean's voice, and opened his eyes again. He blinked, trying to clear his vision, and took comfort in the warm, rough palm against his face. "Dean?"
"Yeah, Sam."
Sam blinked again. He coughed lightly and frowned. "Real?"
Dean felt sympathetic tears well in his eyes as he nodded. "Yeah, buddy. I'm real. You're safe, alright? We just gotta get outta here now. Think you can stay on your feet long enough for that?" He hated to ask that of Sam, especially in his condition after nearly three days with no food or water, but there was no way he could carry his too-large little brother up out of the quarry, and he sure as hell wasn't going to leave him alone long enough to go find a car; not with those freaks still lurking around somewhere.
Sam's fingers twitched, but he couldn't lift his arms and he looked miserably up at his brother, still unsure it really was Dean and not another sleep-deprived hallucination. "Can't… I can't move m'arms."
"Don't worry about it. Here. Come on." Dean slowly eased Sam up so he was sitting, leaning against his shoulder. He pulled the robe up over Sam's back and threaded his arms into the loose sleeves. It felt so much like when he had dressed Sam as a child that Dean wished he could bundle him up and hide him away from all the death rolling downhill at them. Sam gave a particularly violent shudder, and Dean wrapped both arms around him. "Hey, you still with me?"
Sam nodded and shamelessly let his weight lean against Dean. "Warm."
Dean snorted softly, realizing Sam was huddling against his body heat. "Promise I'll get you warm soon. Now, come on. Here we go." He disentangled himself from his brother and got to his knees. He wrapped his arms around Sam's chest and hoisted him up from the ground until he was standing, though still leaning all his weight on Dean. "You get your legs under you?"
Sam fought to make his legs cooperate. He breathed heavily, trying to stand on his own, but after so long supporting himself at near tip-toe just to keep breathing he was done. They collapsed under him and only Dean's hold on him kept him from slamming into the ground. He grunted softly as his brother lowered him back to the ground and sat beside him. "Sorry."
Dean squeezed the back of Sam's neck sadly. "Don't worry about it, ok? I got this." He pulled his phone from his pocket and was relieved to find he had service. He made a hasty call to emergency services, telling them of the cult and his brother's condition and sagged a little in relief when the operator was able to find their location from the cell signal. He ended the call and sat back a little more comfortably, wrapping Sam in the robe as best he could. "They'll be here soon. I got you."
Sam slumped into his brother and finally allowed himself to believe that he was safe. "So tired."
"Yeah." Dean rubbed a hand briskly over Sam's arm, trying to help keep him warm. "You get any sleep since they took you?"
Sam shook his head. "Wouldn' let me. Kept…" He shuddered. "Buckets of… of water on my h-head. Kept me 'wake."
Dean stilled in horror. "You've been awake since they took you? Three days?" The small nod of Sam's head drove a wedge of guilt further into Dean's heart. "No wonder you thought I wasn't really here. I'm surprised you even know my name right now."
Sam gave a lazy smile. "Jerk."
Dean was surprised into a laugh and wrapped his arms around his brother. "Bitch." He felt Sam's shivering start to ease a little and tucked his brother's head under his chin. "Go ahead. Fall asleep. I can handle these pinheads." He could still hear the occasional voice whimpering in pain from the few he had shot and heard the echo of other voices shouting from above, but he didn't care. He'd shoot them all if they were stupid enough to come after Sam again. He'd given them all the mercy he was capable of at that point. "You're safe, Sammy."
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Dean followed his brother's gurney up the road to the top of the quarry. He glanced down to the bottom and felt no remorse for the cult members being tended by paramedics for the gunshot wounds he had given them. He flicked a glance to the police officer beside him and caught the man eyeing him. "What?"
"Kind of surprised you didn't kill any of them."
Dean snorted. "Sam would'a kicked my ass. He's the moral center, not me."
The officer gave a soft laugh and sobered quickly as he looked back to the tall, young man being wheeled away. He had been first on the scene and saw the damage the cultists had done to him. He figured it was a miracle the guy was even still alive. "Better man than me. If it'd been my brother…"
"Yeah." Dean blew out a breath and started toward the ambulance. He stumbled to a stop when he saw a familiar, sleek black shape beyond it. "Son of a bitch," he breathed.
"What?" The officer looked around, expecting more cultists and frowned.
Dean coughed and shook his head. "Uh, nothing. Just…" he waved a hand out. "That's my car. I, uh… just glad they didn't mess her up when they ran." He grinned at the Impala and was surprised that Amara had bothered to zap it to him at all. It both amused and bothered him.
"I noticed that one when I came in." The officer glanced over at Dean again. "Weirdest thing. There's not a single tire track in the gravel around that one. It's like… like it just dropped out of the sky."
"Yeah. That's weird alright." Dean ignored the implicit question and played dumb. "So am I good to go follow him to the hospital?"
The officer studied him a moment longer and then shrugged. He didn't even know why he had a strange feeling about the car. "Yeah. Hope your brother's going to be alright."
"He will be," Dean replied firmly. He wouldn't allow any other outcome. He jogged ahead and stopped the paramedics before they could load the gurney into the ambulance. Sam was wrapped in blankets with an oxygen mask covering his face, but his eyes were stubbornly open and blinking in a daze. "Heya, Sammy." Dean leaned down so Sam could see him and gripped his shoulder gently. "They're gonna take you to the hospital now." He saw Sam's eyes widen fearfully and Dean smiled. "I'm gonna be right behind 'em. I'll see you when they open the doors again, alright? Don't give these guys any trouble." He waited for Sam's face to soften, for the momentary panic at being left to fade and then stepped away. "You take care of him," he told the paramedics and forced himself to leave Sam there and head to his car.
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One hospital was pretty much the same as another, Dean mused, while he stood outside his brother's room waiting for the doctor and watched nurses bustling back and forth. He was just about to bust into the room, his patience at an end, when the door finally opened and an ageing man in a white coat with a shock of curly, silver hair came out and smiled. "'bout time," Dean muttered.
"You must be the brother. I'm Dr. Svenson."
Dean shook the man's hand and tried not to let his impatience show. "So, how is he and can I go the hell in there now?"
Dr. Svenson smiled and nodded. "Your brother's going to be alright with time. There's a… long list of injuries, I'm afraid."
"I saw him in that damn quarry, Doc. I know." Dean glared at the man in a silent bid for him to stop screwing around.
"Right then. Well, Sam has two cracked ribs and three more bruised, no doubt from the stoning the officer mentioned." The doctor shook his head as he pulled Sam's chart off the wall beside the door and looked down at it. "Honestly, in this day and age. Anyway, most of his body is bruised really. His shoulders were on the point of dislocation, and we've immobilized them for the next couple days while they heal. He's going to be very sore for the next couple of weeks. The dangerous part was actually the exposure. Sam's malnourished and dehydrated. He was hypothermic when they brought him in. I'm told he was out there for three days with no protection from the elements?"
Dean nodded. "They had him tied naked to a damn pole."
"Good Lord." The doctor shook his head in disbelief. "That explains the deep rope burns around his wrists. Those are going to take time to heal as well. You'll have to be studious in keeping them clean so infection doesn't set in. He's also fairly badly sunburned." He lowered the chart and looked at Dean. "What I'm really concerned about at this point is getting him to sleep. He's suffering from sleep deprivation - delusions, blurred vision, loss of time." He sighed. "But the poor man can't seem to stay asleep. As soon as he does, he wakes right back up in a bit of a panic. I'm about ready to sedate him at this point, though I hate to do that in his condition. His system is very weak."
"He'll sleep." Dean scrubbed a hand over his face for the litany of Sam's injuries and moved to the door. "Thanks, Doc. I got him from here."
"I want to keep him for a couple days to make sure there aren't any complications from the exposure." The doctor gave Dean a firm look. "He needs to stay at least that long."
Dean looked at him in surprise and knew the man had somehow understood that Dean wanted his brother out of the hospital and away from that city. "No problem," he said easily and meant it. He waved a hand and stepped into Sam's room. Dean blew out a breath as he went to stand over his brother. Bandages wrapped Sam's chest and shoulders. His arms were tucked across his stomach and wrapped as well to keep him from moving them and irritating his shoulders. He was still far too pale, but the blue tinge was gone from his skin, and, even as Dean watched, Sam flinched and then rolled his head over to look at him.
"Dean," Sam breathed and managed a small smile. He tried not to pull at the bandages restraining his arms, but it was hard. It made him feel trapped all over again.
"Take it easy." Dean saw the rising panic in Sam's face as he tried and failed to move his arms. He rested a hand along the side of his brother's neck and smiled. "Your shoulders need a day or two. No one's tyin' you up. You good?"
Sam swallowed and forced himself to relax and nodded slightly. He settled back in the bed and took comfort in the weight of his brother's hand on his neck. "You alright?"
Dean snorted. "Yeah, buddy. I'm fine. You're the one who went ten rounds with the crazy train." He sat carefully on the side of the bed and watched his brother's eyes blink tiredly. "Dude, go to sleep."
"No." Sam shook his head. "Not tired."
"Bullshit." Dean would have given him a shake if he could have figured out how to do it without hurting him. "Three days with no sleep, Sammy. I remember the last time you couldn't get any." Sam, predictably, flinched at the reminder of going slowly insane with the devil riding shotgun in his brain "Not doin' that again. Close your eyes and sleep."
Sam closed his eyes and then quickly opened them again. "I keep…" He breathed out heavily and looked up at his brother again. "I keep forgetting what's real." It burned to make that admission to his brother, but he really was trying not to keep secrets from him anymore.
Dean smiled and knew Sam was being painfully honest for a change. In a gesture he had not used for many years, Dean reached over and gently took Sam's left hand in his, pressing his thumb firmly into the long-healed scar on his brother's palm. "You're safe. You're out." He watched Sam's eyes widen in surprise, but then his face relaxed into a soft smile, the old-but-not-forgotten gesture still able to ground him with his brother's steady presence.
Dean stood and slid his hands under Sam's hip and shoulder. "Budge over, Bigfoot."
"Dean, what?" Sam grunted and gritted his teeth through the discomfort as his brother carefully pushed him to the other side of the bed and he stared a little in surprise as Dean then climbed up to sit beside him, back resting against the wall as though he were going to be there for a while. "Dude."
Dean smirked and plucked the television remote off the bedside table. "Take a nap, princess. You need your beauty sleep, and I don't wanna miss Oprah."
Sam craned his head to see his brother and felt moisture gather in his eyes. He looked quickly away and closed them as the television hummed to life on the opposite wall. "Dean." He wished he could move his arms, or anything really. He felt Dean lean just a little heavier against his left side and sniffed softly. "Thanks."
"Awesome big brother, Sammy." Dean chuckled and folded his arms behind his head. "I keep tellin' ya'." He looked down and watched Sam quickly drop off into much needed sleep, and with a soft smile on his pale face. "Got your back, little brother," Dean whispered. He would tell Sam later about Amara and how he had found him, once the guy could actually stay awake and think clearly. He took a deep breath, now that Sam was finally safe, and let his own eyes drift closed, sure that he would stand between Sam and whatever came after him.
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The End.
Next Up: T is for Tsukumogami
