Disclaimer : Any recognizable characters and mythology elements belong to their creators. Spoilers up to season eight - nothing incredibly specific, though.
Author's note : Thank you to the wonderful borgmama1of5 for the beta.
Point Me At The Sky, 1/1
Sam's selfish. He always was.
He chose Stanford. He chose Ruby.
Worst of all, he chose himself.
Sammy's greatest hits – on drums. Percussion. The background. Not singular, not a note or a cluster – a crescendo, a build-up to a chorus that never should have been.
That's what hurts the most.
He's tied up. He remembers, disjointed fractions fading in and out of focus. He followed a lead, one of possible two. He and Dean played Rock, Paper, Scissors.
He won.
There's a dull, faint throbbing in the back of his head. It hurts.
And it doesn't. Nothing does. Not anymore.
He's not going through the motions. It's better. He's an imitation. A perfect one, at that. The illusion his brother clings to – the delusion he himself wants to be. Sammy. Joke is, he never was. Not really.
He drifts. Through hazy present and jumbled past. A basement, dim light, and strangely, mirrors. Magnified reflections, tiny and huge, distorted and not, hollow silhouettes dancing to a morbid tune.
He wonders what his soul looks like. After hell. After Dean – a deal, a brother he would have given everything to save. Skinned alive. Sam has trouble believing it wasn't always like that.
He catches a glimpse. Of himself, mirror fragment painting shadows over limbs splayed across dirty ground. Tiny rivers of crimson course over a sea of shallow purple, mottled yellow and sickly green. Evidence - he'd put up a fight.
He tugs at the restraints. They're solid.
He waits. The way of the world – or maybe only his. He fucks up. Dean saves him.
He gets hurt. Dean patches him up.
He lives. Dean doesn't.
A blond, tall and slender, enters the room. It's Jess. Only it's not – hasn't been for a lifetime. Her eyes, the constant reminder. Waves of the ocean, blue and white. Dead, lifeless – burnt from the inside out.
She circles. He doesn't say a thing.
She brings claws – savage contrast to soft gaze – up to his chest, trails intention and need all the way down to his navel. She presses, searing, cutting through cotton and breaking skin. She grins.
She leaves.
It gets dark. The world blurs around the edges. Sam fights, keeps his eyes open. Reality-distorted glass and the consistency of the ever-moving sea, solid, melting, color lacking nuance, all sound lost in a plea. He sags in defeat. His eyes flutter closed.
He wakes – only not really. He stands on a cliff. Beyond, endless water. Deep, dark navy – untrue. No clouds, only a sea-foam cadence set to his breathing. Waves crashing, rolling, violent collision. Panic. Liquid horizon ending in a simmer, in a blow.
He's surrounded. Element without existence.
He's alone.
He stares. He screams. He watches the sky – the ceiling. Amethyst, cobalt and tawny – hues on a sunless canvas, desolation in shades of endless.
He jumps.
The water, warmth and surprising comfort. It pulls him under, and he doesn't fight. It's not a choice – more like the answer.
Everything scrambles, puzzle pieces – memories – firing back and forth.
A toddler, waddling on dirty carpet, chubby limbs and too-long hair.
It morphs. Dean, and Hey Jude. Sammy, and Ramble On. Discontinuous fragments, splintered and frantic.
He seizes one image. A boy, six or seven. Dean. Always him. He's playing with toy cars over an obstacle course made of cereal boxes, pencils, and Yellow Pages. Sammy, little ball of snot and tooth-filled grin – setting his own collision course, warring with inanimate objects. He trips. One of his brother's cars, the culprit. Dean's playland, the casualty. He lands on his padded butt – but the floor's hard, motel concrete under a thin layer of dirt and faux Persian rug. Round, salty tears start rolling down his cheeks, tiny chest heaving in helpless sobs.
Dean's angry.
He played. When Dad wasn't home. A kid, not a hunter in the making. Now, his game - ruined.
His glare melts at the crying infant. Seconds – from fury to love, from Dean to Sam. Always Sam. Dean tugs a miniature finger, pokes softly at round belly – and hazel eyes gaze at him. Sam sniffles miserably.
Dean picks him up. It's clumsy. And yet he soothes with practiced words, body warmth comforting, calming. Sam blinks owlishly at Dean – smile tugging at his lips, tiniest hint of dimple in crimson-colored cheek. His brother sighs, glares without heat, and sings. Off-key and unrepentant.
Sam's happy.
Dean couldn't be.
Another reason. Another piece. Dean's soul to make Sam whole.
He falls. A slow descent into human, again, into a reflection he'd hoped to forget.
It means you're a monster.
Words.
I can't trust you.
And so much more than that.
Nondescript room, framed in Technicolor. Dean sleeps, covers thrown high to block the world that's ending. Or Sam, and the disappointment.
Betrayal. A fluorescent light in the bathroom, rancid smell of vomit and copper coalescing, jumbling together in warning.
Sam's fingers shake on the needle as it pierces flesh. White hot pain, searing fire coursing through his skin as he sews up the gash: long, thin, and angry red along collarbone, across flat of his stomach, ending on his hip. Deep. He's almost done. He's panting, breath shaky and uneven, tears glinting in dim light. Not falling.
Sam's weak. He always was.
He deserves it. He always did.
He passes out. Cold tile makes a hard pillow, dried blood a crusty sheet.
Dean's not coming.
He wakes up. First hours of morning.
Or maybe he's still asleep.
He checks his stitches. Holding, all. It still hurts. He cleans up, wipes a bloody handprint off the bathroom door. It's spotless.
Dean doesn't ask.
Not when Sam winces, or takes too long to move.
Dean doesn't say a thing.
Sam sighs in relief.
After, he cries. Suddenly, it's not his wounds that hurt anymore.
You okay? Dean's duty.
I'm not carrying your Sasquatch ass. Dean's love.
Lines blur. Sam loses faith. He lives, and it's worthless. Without him. He shouldn't have. The end should have been Ruby. Maybe Lilith. Never this mindless motion.
He sinks further into fault, into human weakness. He loses the fear. He sacrifices the good in him.
Sam's his father. Revenge, a single purpose. Dean is love. Good to his evil. The hero. Everything Sam'd never be.
I don't believe. In what? In you.
It doesn't matter.
They're broken – and he stands alone.
Sammy's gone. So is Dean.
He's dizzy – nothing's smooth, or fluid – he's thrown in a rift of his own making, inside inky and hopeless. Why, he can't comprehend.
He's dreaming.
He remembers. Hell, and everything after that.
His life, raw exposure, frayed edges. He wonders.
The only constant, Dean.
A goddess – monster of the week - wavy blond hair and soft skin. Twisted shadow of his mother, of things he's never known.
But he read, and researched, like he does every hunt. It shouldn't be like this.
His whole life, control shattered in smithereens. The way he eats, the way he works – he learns and lives. Everything's restraint. Until it's not, until it all falls apart – and he's left on the outside looking in.
A pawn, since the very beginning. And never stopped.
He comes to, slowly, on the same cliff. This time, he doesn't jump.
The basement, anchor in reality.
Sam.
A voice, a simple word. Low, raspy, unmistakable.
Dean.
The same crack in tone, the same relief.
Past, shards of present. Future.
Dean's always coming for him.