Dean wakes up with blood in his mouth and no memory of the last six hours. He's in total darkness; he seems to be lying on some kind of concrete floor, and there's a smell of damp.
A cellar, then. Sam is probably somewhere close by; hopefully he evaded whatever caught Dean. Or maybe Sam is down here with him, unconscious, but if that's so Dean has no way of knowing where he is; it's pitch-black, and he's disorientated. He probes at his memories. Sam went to stake out the creepy lady house, right? It feels hours ago. Dean's sure something else has happened since, but he can't put his finger on it. The last thing he remembers is tossing Sam the car keys, and Sam smiling, tentatively, before walking out the motel door.
He's not sure why but he has a feeling that this is quite bad.
'Cas,' he says, praying to a tale of Sam's, 'wherever the fuck you are, I definitely have a concussion.'
SPN SPN SPN
He stands up cautiously, but nothing starts swaying- not that he'd be able to tell, it's black as a fucking tomb in here. Spitting the blood out of his mouth, Dean feels his way to a wall, and slides down against it.
He doesn't feel like he broke anything. Should probably have Sam check him over later, though. Heh. That could end well. Dean replays last night- darkness, darkness just like this, and the hot satin of Sam's cock in his hand. He's concerned that Sam would give him what he wanted just because it was Dean, whether it was something he should be wanting or not.
Suddenly all the shoulds seem slightly tedious. Dean wants Sam now; it's likely, then, that Past Dean also wanted Sam. And Dean likes Sam, that's the thing. A weird tug is starting to pull at him at the sight of his brother. It's those big fuzzy eyes; he just can't help himself. Dude's like ten and a half feet and Dean wants to sweep him up and cuddle him and feed him salad. And when he remembers how sick he looked that morning, he can't help but worry.
Fuck, Dean should never have let him go on stakeout alone. He's sure there was a reason why he did, but he can't recall it now. It can't have been as important as Sam's health, whatever it was. Christ, what if something had happened to Sam on stakeout? Was that why he was alone down here- because Sam had been caught or worse and Dean had come out looking for him?
Wasn't his memory holey enough before? He's lost thirty-four years to this spell. Must he really lose a crucial six hours, too?
And what the hell is he doing just sitting here?
He starts to feel his way round the wall. The floor's uneven in places, and he stumbles a couple times. His heart jolts when he finds the outline of a door, and then a doorknob- but it's locked, of course.
Dean feels round his pockets. They're all empty, unsurprisingly- whoever caught him would have patted him down. The tops of his socks contain nothing but a candy wrapper. Desperation growing, he pulls off his boot-
There. The tinkle of a bobby-pin on a concrete floor. He scrabbles in the dark and grabs it. Sam, you better fucking be alright.
But he will be. He must be. He can't not be. And if he isn't- Dean will fix whatever needs to be fixed, hold whatever needs holding, he'll stop pestering for answers for a damn month, just let Sam be okay. Shit, when did Sam start mattering so much? He met him about three days ago. Well, not really, but still.
Dean works the bobby-pin into the lock, and he could cry when he hears the click after thirty seconds. That was too easy, part of him thinks, but he pushes the door-
-and it doesn't budge.
Oh God no.
He tries again. It doesn't move.
Dean puts his back into it the third time, and now he can only conclude that the door is bolted, heavily, from the outside.
'C'mon, don't do this to me,' says Dean helplessly.
The door continues to do everything it is already doing.
'Oh fuck,' Dean says. 'Oh fucking fucking fucking fuck.'
He smashes his shoulder into the door as hard as he can. Still; nothing.
'Motherfucker.'
It takes a good fifteen minutes of throwing himself against the door before he realises he isn't going anywhere. He carries on anyway, until he's battered and bruised and sweating; he feels his way all over the room, looking for some kind of tool, but it's empty. The floor's concrete, and he chips his nails on it; he jumps to try and reach the ceiling, and stubs his toes trying to kick through a wall.
When there's nothing else that he can think of, he stands behind the door and starts to count.
He's reached six thousand, four hundred and twelve when a line of light appears below the door. Dean stiffens.
There's a sound of bolts going back, and the door begins to open-
Dean throws all his weight at the door, and it swings back into whoever's on the other side. There's an 'Oof' sound, and he runs through the open door, down a brightly lit corridor.
He's gone maybe ten steps when every muscle in his body locks up and he drops to the ground, spasming. His nerve endings are tingling with something that's not quite pain. It subsides, and he's left in a heap on the ground, a line of drool leaking from the corner of his mouth.
From the corner of his eye, a fuzzy shape limps forward and stands over him. Dean tries to speak, but all that comes out is a strangled groan.
The shape tuts at him. It's getting clearer now. It looks like- fucking Christ, it's an old lady. He's never seen her before, though. Is she a witch or something?
'Now aren't you just the prettiest thing,' she says. 'But my, your mind's as holey as a swiss cheese. Now how did that happen?'
And Dean feels his limbs move against his will, pulling him to a standing position. His legs walk him forward like a marionette, head hanging down so he can only see the floor, hands behind his back. Panic lurches in his chest. Sam, now would be a great time.
Black shutters over his eyes.
SPN SPN SPN
'Don't think I don't know why you're here.'
He's tied to a chair; he can feel the ropes digging in. They're too tight.
'You're here for our manticore, aren't you? I can only assume that you're after its eyes. Important for spellwork, those are, but you already knew that.'
He peels open his eyes.
'Oh, look. It's awake.'
The old lady's sitting on a chair in front of him. They're in a kitchen. Dean's mouth is dry and he stinks of sweat, but he manages to shape the words. 'What have you done with my brother?'
She laughs. It's so like a cackle that Dean rolls his eyes. 'It looks like he's a little late to the party.'
Dean wants to push, but he changes tack. If Sam isn't here, if he's safe, then the less she knows the better. 'You can't keep a creature like that locked up, lady. Trust me.'
The woman leans forward. 'And what makes you think I'm keeping it locked up?'
He draws his head back.
A man bursts through the open door, panting. 'Sarah, it's hungry. Come on.'
'Just a second,' the old woman says. She looks at Dean, almost pityingly. 'I'm doing you a favour, sweetie. Trust me, I'm a witch; I can tell when someone's memories have been erased. And it looks like you got a pretty interesting cocktail of spells.'
When Dean didn't answer, she smiled. 'Still feeling the side-effects, are we? It'll be over soon.'
'Wait,' says Dean. 'Wait. How did you catch me? What the hell happened?'
She laughs again, and Dean winces. 'You came rushing right at us. We thought you'd gone feral, dearie, but I think it was just a slight malfunction of that spell you've got muddling up your brain. You were screaming-' she pretends to shudder- 'all kinds of nasty things. You went straight for our manticore, and I really think it's out for blood.'
The man comes forward; he loops Dean's wrists together with what feel like zip ties, cuts the rope, and grabs Dean by the shoulders, yanking him up from the chair and forcing him to stumble to the door. Somewhere out in the night, he hears a screaming roar, and suddenly Dean is afraid.
'Why are you doing this?' he says to the man. 'I get her, but why you?'
But the man's face remains grim as he shoves Dean out of the door. The witch follows them, with her tinkling laugh.
'What the fuck is so funny,' says Dean, almost spitting.
'Oh, dear,' the witch says, smiling. 'You see, manticores? Almost deities. As long as we give it what it wants, it gives us wealth, fortune, peace. Gives this man a family, that woman a miracle cure. So forgive them if they aren't lining up to plead your case.'
'You're sick,' says Dean furiously, 'you're fucking sick-'
He's being bundled out into the street, and now there's the butt of a shotgun sticking into his back. 'Walk,' says the man behind him. 'And shut your fucking mouth.'
Another of those terrible shreiks, like a human throat trying to imitate a wild beast's battle cry. Dean can't help shuddering. Sam, wherever you are, please. It's cold out here, and he's only in a shirt. God, what made him leave the motel like that on a cold-
There's blood on his shirt.
Not much. Only a few spots here and there. Not enough that he would have registered it earlier. And not his.
Someone has done something to Sam.
Dean grabs the end of the zip tie, pulling it as tight as he can. He jerks his arms up backwards, hitting the man in the chin, and hits his wrists hard on his own ass. The zip ties break, and he bolts. When he brings his hands forward, seeing them for the first time, they're covered in blood. Even under his nails.
Wait.
Did-
Did he?
Then a heavy weight crashes into him from behind and his chin hits the ground. He struggles, but his captor already has a hold of his wrists, and the guy pulls him back to his feet. 'SAM!' Dean yells. 'SAM!'
He's cut off quickly by a punch to the jaw. He tries to headbutt, but the man's half-dragging him across the deserted road. God, why is it so quiet? He knows it's suburbia and all. Do they all know about the manticore? Are they all scared to leave their homes? Sam could be anywhere, and Dean already knows what's happened to him, if he could only remember. The six missing hours is the key.
He's being herded into the town square, and something like deja vu stirs in him. Come on, he tells it, come on, but he still remembers nothing. There's a wooden stage in the centre of it, and he forces himself not to look up at the creature up there... the roars are much louder now. The only people round the platform are men, six or seven of them, all huge and muscular with shotguns and terrified eyes. Guards. The entire town's been keeping this thing alive.
They near the stage. In front of it, they stop. So do the snarling noises.
Dean looks up.
The manticore is on all fours on the stage, hackles raised. Its human head looks the size of a potato compared to the monstrous, gleaming body, muscles shifting beneath thick fur. The head is bald, but dwarfed by the reddish ruff of a mane, and a tail swings impatiently back and forth like a pendulum. And its eyes are rheumy, milky like spider eyes or pearls.
It's hideous. It's beautiful. It's chained to a post.
He understands, now, why they worship it.
Dean knows without the shadow of a doubt that he is about to die, and it will have been worth it just to see this twisted beast with the moonlight-silvered fur.
His heart is beating very fast.
Hands drag him onto the stage, up wooden steps. He is three feet away; there is a stench of meat and rotten fruit. It strains at its chains, a vein bulging in its human forehead.
He hears the men retreating down the steps. He's alone on the stage. A small part of his mind tells him that they only did that because they know he's under its thrall, because they don't want to fall into the cobwebs of its gaze too.
This isn't right, he thinks, but it is, it is.
Move, he thinks, but he doesn't know whether he means backwards or forwards.
Against his will his feet start moving. He tries to stop but the manticore's moony eyes are reeling him in, and he's about to die, he's about to die without remembering anything or knowing what happened (what he did) to Sam, and it's crouching to spring and its jaw is unhinging as he watches and it's obscene, any second now-
A gunshot.
'OUT OF THE WAY!'
The manticore's eyes glaze over. It wobbles to one side, then topples. Shot.
Dean looks round.
Sam is striding forward, only the merest hint of a limp, only the merest hint of a face pinched with pain, and he's pointing a gun at the cluster of men and he's too far away and fuck what's wrong with his hands? 'It's over,' Sam's shouting at the men, 'Your fucking pet is dead, go, run,' and they do, they just scatter and run because of one gun, and Dean stands dumbly and wonders if the manticore had worked some magic on them after all.
It's thee steps up to the stage, and Sam winces coming up every one of them. Dean snaps out of it and goes to grab his hand, but Sam jerks back from the offer, not even looking at him. He limps straight by him, hand going to a container in his pocket. It's full of a thick, pinkish gloop.
Sam kneels by the manticore's body, his whole face taut with what is obviously agony (so why doesn't Dean move?), and pulls out a pocket-knife. He digs out the manticore's left eye with delicate, levering movements- it's tiny, the size of a small grape- and lets it fall into the container in his hand.
Then he straightens painfully up and hits Dean in the jaw.
Shocked, Dean goes down gasping. Sam's on top of him, face twisted, pinching Dean's nose with bloodstained fingers until he opens his mouth, and then Sam pours the contents of the container straight down his throat.
Dean's vision blurs. He gags, pitching forward onto his knees. He dimly registers Sam collapsing beside him, but he's being swamped by remembrances, too many to pinpoint, flooding in like seawater
dust smile rose sex wreck sam what is that shirt monster meat pale laughing dad no drunk nestled just a baby veined kindly junkyard
forty years forty fucking years
(they put Sam in a Cage)
golem paintwork bright torture snow missouri swamp turkey dude that's gross
why are you the boy that hates christmas
only he gets to call me that
(Sam died Sam died in his arms and all he can think is Sammy you child, you fucking child)
(the Trials, he was never just ill, it was the Trials and oh God Sammy what did I do to you)
-he tortured him. He tortured Sam for no reason other than his shitty fucking latent trauma or whatever-
(Because his Sammy is sick and fuck, he could die in his fucking sleep and then what the hell would Dean be able to adore the shit out of? He could get run the fuck over or poisoned or get cancer or a brain haemhorrage or, hell, get killed on a hunt, it could happen so fucking easily, and then it'd be Game Fucking Over because Dean is not doing this without his little bitch of a kid brother. Because he loves the skinny dumbass more than anything in the entire world and who said that it was okay to love anything so fragile so much, who fucking said that, because love doesn't do much fucking good when Sam's puking blood into the sink, okay?)
-and then he's drowning in a quicksand of memories.
SPN SPN SPN
Five minutes (thirty-four years) later, Dean gets to his knees.
