CHAPTER 2: I wonder if I'm too far gone

Slipped into a dream

Woke up in a nightmare

Scars on my skin

Don't know how they got there

How heavy was the crown of thorns?

I wonder if I'm too far gone.

~Dark Hills, Day of Fire

~*~*~*~*~*~

It was overwhelming.

After over a year of freedom, the return to Hell was worse than I'd imagined.

I curled in upon myself and concentrated on just existing.

Eventually, I calmed enough to manifest a form. I still looked awful ... but it was preferable to existing as smoke.

At first, the volume of pain-filled, terrified screaming drove me to my knees. I rested there, concentrating on blocking out the deafening, heart-wrenching sound into the background. When I had managed that, I raised my head to find myself in the midst of a rocky wasteland. Fires burned off to the left, giving my rough, black skin and orange glow.

The smoke that rose obscured any view of what might be found above and reflected the flames, creating the image of an angry red sky.

Eventually I stood and began making my way across the rocky, barren wasteland.

I had a brother to find.

~*~*~*~*~*~

The wicked-looking knife slipped in his hand, the blood coating the jagged blade and running down the handle, forcing him to adjust his grip before lowering the blade to the flesh once more. His stomach was now a solid knot, his eyes empty and hollow. Nothing affected him anymore. No amount of blood turned his stomach, no screamed platitudes wrenched his heart or brought tears to his eyes. Nothing remained of his humanity. And he blocked off the part of his mind that still mourned its loss.

As he dug the blade once more into the flesh of the soul before him, he looked into the scattering of demons around him, taking part in the torture, their teeth gleaming in the firelight as grins of sadistic pleasure split their hideous faces.

One demon caught his attention. It wasn't tearing into the soul on the rack. It was watching him. With an intensity that bordered on obsession, the black eyes regarded him. He turned away, the fear that was his constant companion in this place flaring at the scrutiny.

He felt more than saw the demon move towards him, stopping behind him and leaning in to whisper in his ear.

"I've seen Sam."

The name woke something inside of him. Something he's let go of and lost the moment he got off the rack and went from victim to tormentor.

He stamped it back down. Shooting a glare over his shoulder in the demon's direction, he bared his teeth and returned to his work with renewed vigour.

Something that might have resembled disappointment flickered across the demon's face, but he ignored it and focussed instead on the knife and the blood. The screams and the pleas. The black hopelessness of his doomed soul.

~*~*~*~*~*~

It was back.

The demon. The one who stalked him with its cold granite eyes.

But with Alastair looming over his shoulder, the fear made it easier for him to ignore the stalker.

But when Alastair moved away, the stalker snuck up beside him to whisper with fetid breath in his ear once more.

"You are not yet lost. I've seen Sammy."

The stone surrounding his heart cracked. He stared at the bloodied knife in his hand as though seeing it for the first time. His throat felt tight.

Then Alastair moved back to hover by his shoulder and the fear overwhelmed him. He plunged the cold knife into the burning flesh of the whimpering soul laid out on the rack before him.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Something happened the next day.

The demons became distracted, buzzing with news of some kind. One by one they crept away. Dean paid them no mind, continuing the job Alastair had set him without looking up. He lost himself in the grisly torture to avoid his curiosity lest Alastair notice. Sometimes he hated himself for his fear.

A shift in the atmosphere caused Dean to risk a look. There were only two minor demons left joining the torture.

And Alastair had left.

The hand holding the knife fell limply to his side as he looked around, searching for the demon who had broken him. But all he found were the eyes of the stalker. The one who knew the name.

It spoke to him again, the whisper carrying to his ears eerily as though it was meant for him.

"I've seen Sam."

That name again. Sam.

Blood dripped steadily from the knife hanging loosely at his side.

"Come and I'll tell you about Sammy."

His feet moved of their own accord, the bare, calloused soles scraping across the oddly warm stone.

Without conscious thought, he found himself standing in front of the stalker. The whisperer. The one who spoke the name.

Sam. That name. The one that flits through his mind in a constant loop as though it can't be forgotten. But he has forgotten. No face comes to mind. No other details.

But at that whisper of the name at his ears, feelings overwhelm him. Laughter. Fierce protectiveness. Safety. Love. Things he thought he'd forgotten and buried years ago somewhere in this hole.

"Sam." His voice, rough from disuse, sounded odd to his own ears. But the demon looked satisfied. It beckoned to him with one hand, then turned and moved through the rocks.

He followed, the name and the feelings still haunting his barren soul.

Sam.

~*~*~*~*~*~

TBC