Title: Darkness Shall Follow

Rating: PG-13 for creepiness and violence, gen

A/N: First of all, um, WOW. I so was not expecting that kind of response. It makes me a little nervous with the rest, because I'd hate to disappoint. But, like I said, three more parts and an epilogue to go. All my notes on chapter one still stand. This is NOT a deathfic, but it's a bit dark, but certainly not the darkest thing I've ever written. All love (still) to geminigrl11 who can break my heart and I still love her despite the fact that she mocks my pain. sendintheclowns is like a brainstorming GENIUS, no joke. And Brenna, who does more than she thinks. And to everyone who reviewed and read--just thanks :)

-o-

Chapter Two

He's good at digging graves, much better than anyone should be, and he's pretty sure he's moving faster than he ever has before. All he can think about is his sons, trapped in boxes, under the ground. He feels claustrophobic just thinking about it.

So he digs. He uses the shovel and frantically moves the dirt. He's sloppy and dirt is flying everywhere, each shovel full to the brim. His back aches. His arms scream with the strain. But he doesn't stop, can't stop, won't stop.

He can almost see them both, hear them both. Dean with his cocky smile. Sam with his chin jutted out in a brood. Just as they'd been this afternoon. Hours ago. When they were safe.

Tears are almost blinding him, but he doesn't really need to see. He feels himself drawn forward, drawn deeper, drawn to whichever child rests beneath him.

He tries not to think about that. Not to think about how he's standing on top of one of his sons. Tries not to think about how the other one is so close but not getting the help he needs.

It doesn't matter who it is.

It just matters that it's not both of them. That he's going to save one and probably condemn the other.

This destroys him either way.

-o-

When he sees the wood, he hears the pounding.

Someone inside of the coffin. Someone's calling, begging, screaming.

He rips the boards away with is bare hands, barely feeling the wood as it splinters in his grip. He needs to save him, needs to get him out.

And fists connect with his helping hands, punching then grasping then pulling.

He sees dirty blonde hair, an amulet, strong arms.

He sees Dean.

It's Dean, he's alive, he's okay, it's Dean.

Dean pushes himself up on shaking arms and he's breathing hard and sweating. He's blinking like crazy, like he's seeing for the first time, and John pulls him into his arms just like he's a child again, holding him close in the purest relief and love.

Dean breathes into him, hands groping somewhat blindly still. They don't say anything, they don't have to, the hug is enough, the touch relates the reassurance of life and protection that is still unbroken between them.

But then Dean pulls away, pushes himself away from his father, and takes a deep breath.

"Sam," he says, and his voice is hoarse, like he's been screaming and crying. "Where's Sam?"

Just like that, John's elation disappears completely and he's dumbstruck.

"Dad?" And damn it, if his son sounds like he's four and not twenty.

"He's buried," John manages, and Dean's eyes go wide.

"You didn't get him out?"

There's the rub, the problem, the failure.

Dean is pushing himself up, struggling to stand. "We have to get him out," he says.

He thinks Dean should sit down, Dean should take it easy, because Dean just got out of a coffin and he's pale, still too pale, and he's panting.

Dean stops, stops dead still, and looks at him. "We can't leave him down there," he says, and John can tell that Dean knows what he's talking about. "We can't leave him."

-o-

John's done the math thirteen times. Each time it comes up the same.

They will never be fast enough.

It's already too late.

No matter how he rounds, how he fudges, his baby boy has already run out of oxygen. They're digging up a corpse.

The fact makes him stagger and he nearly falls to his knees.

"Dean." He barely recognizes his own voice. It's empty and broken and terrified.

Dean doesn't hear him or doesn't listen. His actions are losing their focus, losing their accuracy, and dirt is flailing all over both of them.

"Dean," he says again, this time pleading and desperate.

Dean's panting breaks on a sob but he doesn't stop. He can't, he won't, he never could.

And John feels himself breaking and he reaches out and grabs his son, grabs him hard and without giving him an inch. "Dean."

There is a struggle, but it is weak and it is without strength. Dean can't even see him, his eyes are blind with tears as he looks at his father. "Sam--"

Dean stares at him, eyes wide and full.

There is no way to make this easier, no way to say it nicer. "It's too late."

Dean shakes his head, tries to argue. He's trembling and can't catch his breath.

"It's too late," John says again, letting the words sink into both of them like a brand that sears the soul.

They stand there for a second, Dean wavering in John's grasp, John barely holding it together. Failure passes between them, failure and resignation and utter hopelessness. Because there is no recovering from this. There is no plan B. This is the failure that kills them both, and they can both feel it happening, sapping their energy, their will, their strength.

They're a heartbeat away from disaster, a fleeting second away from losing everything.

Then an ounce of defiance gurgles up from within Dean and he's pulling away. He's fighting again. "No," he says, his voice throaty and barely human. "No."

And John wants to stop him, wants to shake him and say it's over, we lost, we lost, but he can't. He can't do anything. He just stands there while Dean wrenches from his grasp and grips the shovel like a lifeline and digs with a ferocity that John has never seen before.

John just stands there, covered in dirt, feeling the distant urge to cry.

Dean runs into him, falls into him, and anger replaces the grief in his son's eyes. "Dig!"

His voice is hysterical, sounds like a toddler throwing a tantrum.

"You dig, damn it! He's your son! You will dig him out!"

There is such a foreign look in Dean's eyes that John is shocked into motion. Without feeling, his own hands tighten around his shovel and he rejoins the pursuit.

It's a painful dig, now, not one of urgency, but of denial, and that weight hovers all around. But they don't stop. They may lose, but they'll never quit.

-o-

They hit wood and Dean loses it.

It's John who has to open it--carefully breaking the top and peeling away the boards. Dean's on his hands and knees, scrabbling at the dirt ineffectively, crying the entire time, and they're not going to get anywhere like that. John knows they've come this far, they have to finish this.

Then when the boards finally come away, John finds that he can't move, he can't think, he can't breathe.

Because there's Sam, his youngest son, lying still and pale. His eyes are closed and his lids are tinted blue. His dark lips are parted slightly almost as though he could speak at any minute. The dark hair that John so often laments is strewn limply about his forehead, tainted and curled with evaporated sweat.

He's not moving.

Not even a little.

Neither is John.

Dean moves enough for all of them, with frantic and desperate movements that speak of the deepest denial and grief John can imagine.

Dean rips the rest of the boards away to reveal Sam's body, long and skinny in the box. The younger boy's arms have fallen to the side, the long fingers limp and lifeless. His blue t-shirt is rumpled and stained. He should have his jacket on, because it's cold--too cold--John thinks, and he doesn't know where it is or why Sam doesn't have it and wonders if the boy lost it. He'd probably yell at the kid if he wasn't so still, if he wasn't so pale, if he wasn't so...

Oh, God…

He can't breathe.

Sam's dead.

He knew it already, had known it ten minutes ago, but it doesn't make it easier.

Sam's dead.

He's in a coffin, a mound of dirt all around him, the two people who promised to keep him safe standing over him, and he's dead.

And John's pretty sure he's dead too. That standing there, numb and cold and blank, that he's just as dead as his baby boy. His heart just doesn't know it yet.

Dean doesn't either. About either of them.

Dean's screaming, but John can't hear what he's saying, he's not even sure Dean is using words. Dean is grabbing at Sam, pulling at the younger boy who doesn't respond to his brother's touch.

Sam's body has no life and it flops in Dean's unsteady hands. But Dean doesn't notice, doesn't care. He hauls his brother up, sitting in the coffin with him, pulling Sam's chest against his own, burying his head into Sam's shoulder.

Sam's head falls back, his hair falling long away from his head. His arms drag back, sliding against the wood as his brother rocks him.

John just watches, watches like he's not even there, like he's watching some movie playing out before him that he can't stop or change or even comment on, just witness. He stands with his arms unmoving at his sides on legs he can't feel and he's not even sure he's breathing. He's never felt so powerless, so useless, so utterly pathetic--not even in the days after Mary died when all he could do was sit and stare at the wall has he felt this impotent.

Dean's cries are far away. His grieved motions are untouchable. John can only watch as his older son tries to revive his younger. He wants to stop Dean, to tell him it's too late, but he doesn't have the heart, doesn't have the will, doesn't have the power.

Dean pulls away so he can look at Sam. His hands are on Sam, probing, trying. They go over his chest, his neck, his face. Fingers on his pulse point on his cheeks, searching for any sign of life. Sam doesn't move, doesn't twitch, just lays there while his brother tries to salvage something from John's mistake.

Then Dean is leaning over him, curled over him, shaking him. When that yields nothing, Dean nearly collapses, his forehead to his brothers, his lips to Sam's cheek, showing more affection than John has permitted since they were young.

And then something changes. Dean snaps. His grief breaks and his denial flares up. "No."

He drops his brother down, moves himself so he's on his knees in the confined space, still cradling his brother's head. Then he leans over and for a second John thinks he's going to kiss him, but instead Dean breathes into his brother's mouth.

John's distance shatters suddenly, with a rush of life and coldness, John is there again at his sons' sides. He can't let this happen. He needs to help them, he needs to help Dean, he needs to help Dean let Sam go.

"Dean..." He is reaching for Dean, reaching for the only son he can help now.

"He's not..."

There are no words that aren't cruel, so John says nothing, keeps his hand heavy on Dean's shoulder.

Dean breathes again, his free hand touching the side of Sam's cold face.

John's about to speak, about to do something, when Dean shrieks.

"He's not dead," he says, and this time it's not denial, it's not desperation, it's belief and truth and relief. "Sammy!"

And just like that John sees a miracle.

Dean is crying again, tears of joy now, tears of shock, and Sam is still limp in his arms, limp but trembling.

His skinny chest hitches ever so slightly forward and his mouth gapes for air.

"He's alive," Dean says again, almost choking on the words in utter joy.

It can't be...

John's afraid to believe. He knows the math. He knows what was said to him. He knows he lost one son tonight at the price of his arrogance. He knows it...

But Sam is breathing. Alive and breathing.

But they're all still in the hole, both boys in the coffin, and that's not okay.

He bends down to take Sam, to raise Sam up, but Dean's grip is fierce and he's not letting go. Dean doesn't know how to let go. He's been holding onto Sam since he was four years old and it's pretty clear he's not about to start now, not for anything.

"We need to get him out of here," John reasons, sounding far saner than he feels.

Dean looks up at him for the first time in what seems like years and he looks young and barely put together. "He's going to be okay." There's a scary shade of hope and brokenness in Dean's voice, and John wonders how he'd forgotten that they really were just boys.

They need comfort and love and stability. They need the things that John doesn't know how to give the, doesn't have time to give them.

But he can offer them strength. It's all he has right now, welling up from a source he can't identify. "Of course he will," John says.

It's enough to subdue Dean and the older son relinquishes the younger to his father's arms.

Sam almost stirs, a faint flicker of awareness that diminishes as soon as it rises and Sam is slack in John's arms as he stands. He hefts Sam up, one arm under his son's knees, the other under his shoulders, and he pulls his son gently so he is rested against him, his head cradled in the crook of John's neck.

As he comes to his full height, he can feel Sam's cold skin against him, seeping through both their clothes, and Sam's messy hair tickles his neck and chin.

He pauses for a moment, holding his baby in his arms, striving to feel for himself the tiny tremors that constitute Sam's breathing. He's still worried--oxygen deprivation, organ failure, brain damage--but Sam's alive, and it's such an unexpected gift that John doesn't know how to understand the joy that is breaking his chest.

He doesn't know how to understand any of it. All he knows is this is his son, his baby.

Dean scrambles out of the grave, kneeling on the dirt, reaching down to help hoist Sam clear of the lip. All of a sudden, John's loathe to let go. Dean's arms are reaching, waiting, expectant, but John wants to hold Sam close. But he knows he doesn't have that right. Not now. Not after all this.

Carefully, John helps Dean lower Sam to the ground just beyond the edge of the grave. John doesn't let go until Sam is still and Dean adjusts his neck and limbs in some ridiculous notion of comfort.

John climbs out, and kneels next to Sam and begins a more processed assessment.

"He's weak," John says, pushing Sam's hair out of his eyes. "His breathing is still shallow."

It's an understatement. Sam's chest is barely moving and John keeps his other hand there just to be sure.

Dean's fidgety and nervous, practically bouncing on his heels. "Shouldn't he be waking up? Why isn't he waking up?"

John lets his hand slide across Sam's hair, a movement of comfort and solace. He doesn't want to answer, doesn't know how to answer.

"Sam, please," Dean says to his little brother. "Please."

John looks at his oldest, looks at how lost Dean looks and is scared again.

"Please, Dad, make Sam wake up," Dean says, his wide eyes meeting John's. He's so vulnerable, so young, and John can tell he's probably in shock himself. "Make this right."

And Dean's four years old again, looking at him with complete trust and faith and goodwill. There's no doubt in his eyes, no question, and John's the superhero who puts all the pieces back together.

Even if it's not true, even if he doesn't believe it himself, it's enough to make John act. His sons have lost too much, come too close tonight, for them to lose anything, even something as transient as belief.

"Come on," John says, moving to take Sam up again. "Let's get him to a hospital."

Dean follows, a little like a lost puppy, and Sam doesn't move, limbs dangling like a ragdoll, and he can't get to the car fast enough.

-o-

Dean and Sam are situated in the back, and he covered both of them with all the blankets he could find. Now he's trying to remember his route to the hospital and hoping that his hands are steady enough to drive.

John rotates the mirror so he can see the boys, so he can see Sam's still limp body cradled in his brother's arms. Even in the dimness, Sam still looks dead. The blue has faded some, but not all the way, and it's beginning to frighten John. Because Sam should be looking better at least, with the oxygen now, he should be breathing more, stronger, gaining color.

"Check his breathing, Dean," John orders, trying to keep the panic from his voice.

Dean complies without a word, leaning over his brother and straining. "He's barely breathing," Dean reports, and John can tell he's trying to keep his panic at bay too.

But he's breathing, and John figures at this point that's what counts. It's all they have, and it needs to be enough.