Chapter 14
Rocking, pushing back, not really completely conscious Sam responded to the urgency in his brother's voice. Blinking and with trembling muscles he forced himself upright, his vision blurred and unfocused as a breeze burned his skin caressing the damaged nerve endings with pain.
He shuddered his world had slowed to a crawl, movements and sound existing in slow motion, incomprehensible, unfathomable to his misfiring brain. He tried to think, follow the thoughts to their conclusion but somewhere they got lost, wandering without connection in his synapses.
"Saaaaaaaaam?" Dean's voice still recognisable as his brother's failed to have meaning the word strange and elongated. He watched the lips forming the syllables heard the intonation but as he stared intent on finding some significance he could make no sense of the issuing sounds.
Sam swayed a rolling sickness swooping in his stomach and he leaned forward bending, fighting against the nausea. Black dots dimpled his vision fading out the light around him as saliva filled his mouth.
"Sam." The warmth in the voice matched the heat of the hand on his shoulder. "Dude, you okay?" Swallowing convulsively Sam raise his head pain was now radiating from the touch on his skin.
"Do…n't." He squirmed, ducking his shoulder out from under Dean's grasp.
"H…hurts." The pain rushed the clarity back into his confused brain. Steadying himself against another wave of dizziness with a hand on his brother's chest Sam glanced about him.
He was in the forest, that's right he was …he paused looking at his brother who was now kneeling next to him looking decidedly ill himself. Sam tried to process the information coming in but it kept getting mixed up but one thing seemed to keep resurfacing overriding the other data; his suspicion, the smell of damp fur as he'd dragged his brother away from the fire, the flaming form in the heart of the inferno. He checked about him alarm striking through his daze.
"The…ra…acoon?"
"Toast."
"Y..y...you sure?"
Dean cupped Sam's chin bringing it around so that once more he faced his brother.
"If it was in the hut then yeah it's beyond extra crispy…"
But if not Sam silently finished his brother's sentence we're in deep s**t.
"W..we need to m.." His breath hitched as he moved, "..ake sure." Sam clutched onto Dean to get the leverage he needed to stand but his tired limbs faltered and he pitched forward into his brother.
"Sammy?"
Pain rocketed as hands grabbed at him the touch on his seared skin sending out hot needles of sensation. He sank down in a sea of hurt his receptors overloaded almost past bearing unaware that he was dragging his brother with him.
Both hunters hit the ground, Sam first, his breath exhaling in a rush as Dean's weight landed on him, crushing him momentarily before sliding to the right scraping across his sore, flushed skin, renewing the stinging torment. He held still, not moving, not breathing, not anything, trying to ride out the pain waiting for that time when it subsided to a level he could cope with.
Awareness slowly seeped into Sam's unconscious mind; awareness that one side of him was cold and the other a furnace, damn he must have passed out.
"D'n." He tried to move but found his arm was trapped under the weight of his brother the source of the heat running down the left of his body. "Bro?" He was rewarded with a groan and a slight shifting of the calidity. "You with me...Dean?"
Dean rolled pushing off from Sam causing the double sensation of shivering cold at the loss and hot pain at the touch. "S**t...Dean."
"M's'rry."
He could hear Dean's laboured breaths and he turned towards the sound trying to open his eyes. "Y'u o...kay?"
"Define okay." Dean's voice sounded stronger if a touch breathless and even a little pissed. Sam had a sudden inexplicable urge to laugh. How Dean managed to regain his equilibrium so fast in the face of such terrible odds he'd never know but he did know that he was thankful for it.
"Alive?"
"Then ...you could say I'm awesome... " It wasn't a long speech but Sam could hear with concern the wheeze as Dean sucked air back into his lungs.
"How's the chest and the head?"
There was silence and Sam heard Dean shift. He twisted ignoring the rise in pain levels as his skin dragged on the floor to bring his brother into view.
Their gaze met and Sam shuddered as the green colour in his brother's eyes, so reminiscent of the racoon's, caught the light, it distracted him and the sense of unease he'd felt returned. He pushed the feeling away this was his brother not some weird creature.
His sibling was still watching him seemingly waiting for what, Sam didn't know but eventually he saw Dean struggle to gain enough breath before he opened his mouth and asked.
"What the hell happened Sammy?"
Sam gave Dean the Readers Digest version. Hut burning, racoon in the burning hut, hut collapsing sending out showers of burning sparks, clothes catching alight. Then Sam pulling his brother clear of the burning hut, the appearance of the burning racoon and then Sam found he got a little vague not entirely sure himself what had happened but he ploughed on explaining how the racoon kind of went all big and Godzilla-like but still burning and then ...that was where Sam ran out of explanation and shrugged his shoulders.
Listening Dean had not commented throughout Sam's recount and then he remained silent after his brother had finished. Sam shifted uncomfortably under Dean's scrutiny feeling more like the 'little brother' than he had in a long while. Somehow he felt he had failed the elder hunter, it was how his father had made him feel and from somewhere deep inside the old resentment burned on inside as his skin burned on the out.
"Dean ...I…" He faltered stood shakily and walked away stupidly upset fighting with the feeling that he had to prove himself. Retreating back down the path towards the shell of the hut he tried to bring his emotions back under control. He knew that his brother didn't mean to make him feel inadequate and that much of the pressure he felt was self-inflicted but it didn't seem to stop his reaction.
Disturbed by Sam's footfall the ash swirled around flaring upward as he walked clinging to his damp jeans. Tears pricked at his eyes and he rubbed the back of his hand over them smearing the wet across his cheek. Now he was being irrational.
Sam never heard Dean's approach, never heard him until he was directly behind and even then he never suspected anything was wrong until hands, fingers closed around his neck.
Twisting, shock slowing his reactions Sam tried to turn and only half succeeded before Dean bore him to the ground squeezing, crushing Sam's windpipe.
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"NO," Dean yelled, screamed but other words came hissing from his lips. "Profligate, dissenter… Human," hate abounded this last utterance a hostility that seethed and boiled and finally manifested in Dean's hands closing, pressing down strangling Sam.
Fighting against the entity with every ounce of his failing strength Dean saw with horror his brother's face contort, mouth open in a silent cry as deprived of oxygen Sam's skin coloured from the tanned burnt pink to an angry purple.
It was killing Sam, it was killing him.
"No don't …please don't…..I'll stay."
He felt the Deity ease the pressure but it didn't let go and again Dean heard the hissing voice but this time in his head.
"Stay…"
It was neither a question nor a statement but it hung ominously a word in waiting.
"I'll be whatever you want…just let him go."
Beneath him Sam rasped in a lungful of air.
"You want an acolyte; I can be that, I can do the bow down thing." Was he making headway? Was it listening?
"He won't leave you."
"He will …I'll make him." Dean had to believe that the clothes thing was still working because he was slammed down, out and out lying. He knew there was no way Sam would leave him and no way on this earth that his brother would let him remain in perpetual servitude to a Forest Deity. If, and it was a big if, it let Sam go Dean knew and trusted that the young hunter would come back for him all he needed was for Sam to have a chance.
"Sam'll go if I tell him too." Dean pushed all the conviction he could into his words. He waited but his hope was dying, destroyed inexorably as long seconds ticked by. "Please."
His muscles tensed, "No." Dean beat at the creature, over and over, moaning incoherently "NO, NO, NO." because he could not stop his hands clenching, fingers squeezing and Sam choking.
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Sweet cool air rushed into Sam's deprived lungs flooding oxygen into his bloodstream and clearing his mind of the red fog but his relief did not last long as the fingers once again began to exert their pressure. Fear drove him on and he reared up taking his arms up, through in between his brother's pushing outwards. He broke the grip and scrabbling with his heels he slid his upper body away from Dean's outstretched hands.
Fingernails scraped down the skin on his ribcage as Dean clutched at him but this time Sam was ready. Flexing his knees bringing them up tight to his chest he kicked upwards, his feet connecting with his brother's torso. Sam pushed all his strength into the jerk up, kicking out, grunting with the effort, sending his possessed sibling sprawling backwards.
Panting heavily Sam immediately rolled bringing himself up onto his hands and knees putting distance between himself and Dean before turning, crouching readying for the counter attack.
It came swiftly, his brother, green eyes blazing with hatred, was on him in seconds covering the space between them with preternatural speed. Sam evaded the main brunt of the lunge but was caught by the shoulder and spun to the left. The tree trunk as Sam impacted felt very solid and the air whooshed out of his lungs but before he could draw in another Dean crashed into his back slamming him against the rough bark bearing down making it even more difficult for him to breathe.
"He said you'd leave and you will…permanently." Dean's voice hissed in his ear, Dean's voice but not his words.
Sam had realised the instant Dean's hands had closed around his neck what must have happened, that the racoon had somehow jumped into his brother but the creature had hit his carotid artery so fast and with such force that he'd been unable to take any counter measures. This time however he wasn't going to let it get the advantage.
Struggling weakly, head still dizzy from the lack of oxygen, Sam tried to dislodge the weight of his brother's body but he had no leverage with the way Dean had his upper arms pinned to his sides. Punching at his sibling's thigh Sam pushed his clenched fist into the muscle trying to incapacitate or at least make the entity ease up. What the hell else was he supposed to do? He couldn't kill Dean, couldn't maim him and he'd prefer not to injure to his brother's already damaged body any more than necessary.
"He's mine now he doesn't need you any more."
Thrusting his head back Sam connected, crunched his skull into his brother's face. Dean would never have fallen for such a simple move but then this wasn't Dean. It hurt like f**k but he knew it had to have hurt Dean more because the constraint lifted. Instantly Sam pushed back, created space, ducked and twisted out from underneath.
Blood was streaming down Dean's face and Sam hoped that he hadn't broken his brother's nose. S**t he'd never hear the end of it if he had. He circled keeping the undergrowth between him and the Deity. His hand scraped across the trunk of the tree in front of him as he steadied himself still breathing heavily then Sam stared. The bark was silvery and peeling and as Sam stared and kept staring an idea formed, coalescing, something he'd read in one of Bobby's ancient tomes.
Flicking through dust covered yellowing pages in a rare idle moment he'd found a summoning, a ritual to invoke a forest spirit. It had piqued his interest and he remembered discussing it with Bobby who'd found the whole thing totally ridiculous. "Who the heck would want to perform something like that?" Sam smiled; he could hear his friend's gruff voice in his head "Idjits." But maybe it wasn't so ridiculous; maybe he could reverse it somehow. It was a long shot and probably totally laughable but he had nothing else.
Keeping a wary eye on the deity Sam took out his knife and cut several straight slender boughs from the Birch tree. Then slowly, praying that the entity would hold off, he circled the perimeter of the clearing until he reached the large root of an old tree sticking up from the loamy soil. Hastily he placed the branches in a rough circle before standing on the rotting surface of the stump.
The deity moved his brother's body, edging it closer watching him intently with those unearthly eyes. Sam's skin pricked under the scrutiny but he steeled himself to ignore it. Squinting up into the sky he quickly checked the position of the sun. It was setting. He turned his back on reddening sky, widened his stance and bent forward to look through his legs.
"Uncle Leshy depart thou, Agree to release thy servant from thy service and be gone."
For long moments nothing happened and Sam felt more than a little stupid then increasingly worried but when he was about to give up he detected a low hum vibrating, growing louder as it swelled sliding up the range to a piercing pitch. Dean glowed eerily a green aura emanating from him increasing in brilliance and luminous in the forest's quickening gloom. It dazzled, so bright that it hurt Sam to watch but he couldn't look away.
The light and the sound grew in intensity the green glow filling the clearing the hum throbbing through the earth beneath Sam's feet. He staggered unable to maintain his precarious balance, bent double and peering through his legs as he was. Stumbling from the stump he fell landing awkwardly on his backside cushioned only by the springiness of the leaf mould. Pain, nothing to do with his fall resonated through his body pulsing, in tune with the clamour in his head. Then, suddenly like someone had hit the light switch everything stopped.
The silence panicked Sam more than the piercing discord. Squirming round he scanned the clearing for his brother.
"Dean?"
Sam located the elder hunter a few feet from him in the place where he'd last seen the deity. Dean stood unmoving and Sam watched warily waiting for some sign that the deity had left. His brother looked ordinary, normal and his eyes; still green had lost the glowing manic look. Sam tried again. "Dean?"
Swaying Dean took a step forward.
"S..s..sam."
The whisper reached Sam just as his brother crumpled, his knees giving way, body falling forward.
Dean hit the floor with a sickening boneless thud and lay still.
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Leaning against a tree Dean winced, as trying to stem the blood which still trickled down his face, he pressed a wad of lint onto the tender puffy skin that went along his split cheekbone and over the bridge of his nose. His brother had certainly done a number on him but fortunately for Sam's future wellbeing he'd not broken Dean's nose although it hurt like crap.
Saliva pooled at the back of his throat and he swallowed mechanically against the rising tide of sickness. All in all he felt like s**t warmed up. Where the hell was Sam? Steeling himself against the headache, which had now reached gargantuan proportions, he squinted looking for his brother but gave up with a groan. The relievers Sam had practically forced on him earlier had kicked in taking the edge off the throbbing but they hadn't stopped the pain behind his eyes and the sharp stabbing sensation as he shifted his head.
Sam came back into Dean's field of vision busy with something or other and Dean relaxed slightly, carefully resting his head on the tree behind him while he tried to piece together what had happened. He was slightly fuzzy on the whole you were possessed thing and he really wasn't sure what heck had gone down.
He remembered listening to Sam telling him about the racoon and the fire but then he'd felt a sudden unexplained rush of unadulterated fury and the rest was fragmented, small flashes, impressions blurred and indistinct except for the clear sharp clarity of his hands choking Sam.
Guilt swathed through Dean and although he knew Sam would say that it wasn't his fault. It was. Somehow, if what Sam said was true then Dean had let the sonobabitch racoon get the drop on him. He berated himself he should have been more careful, should have been prepared.
Dean closed his eyes but the image of Sam lying beneath him haunted his vision and the keen anguish he suffered was still acute along with the angry frustration of not having been able to do a damned thing to stop it. He remembered pleading, offering himself up but that hadn't made an ounce of difference and now every time he thought about how he could have lost Sam Dean felt like his guts had been ripped out anew.
If Sam hadn't banished… he brought himself up short, the image of Sam upside down, hair framing a flushed pink face played in his head….what the hell had Sam done to banish the thing? Dean gazed at his brother.
"What the hell was all that?"
Sam looked up puzzled.
"What?"
"All that standing on your head stuff."
"You saw?" Sam reached forward, looking embarrassed and plucked at the corner of the gauze that Dean held to his face trying to look at the damage. "How is it?"
Jerking back Dean glowered. "Don't try to avoid the issue."
Huffing Sam still didn't seem inclined to answer.
"So?…" Dean prompted and waited then irritated by the silence pushed again. "What was that?"
"It was a thing…" Dean detected a note of irritation in Sam's reply but he ignored the warning signal and let Sam carry on, "…I saw….at Bobby's a summoning and I thought …that it might work….if I reversed it," Sam shrugged, "….so….. I gave it a shot." He finished lamely.
Blinking at his brother incredulously Dean could hardly believe Sam's cavalier attitude. His mouth worked silently until… "You gave it a shot….Sam, I thought we talked about this." The whole Samhain incident was still a sore point with Dean, Sam had taken another shot smearing both himself and Dean with mask of blood 'hoping' that it would stop the powerful Demon from killing them, it had saved them but at what risk.
Shrugging again Sam reached forward and much to Dean's annoyance, avoided Dean's stare to focus on his brother's injuries. "It worked didn't it?"
Being unable to think of an instant comeback Dean ground his teeth in silence as Sam's long fingers prodded and pushed at the sore skin on his shoulders. Fortunately or unfortunately, Dean was definitely leaning towards the latter, the first-aid kit had been in Sam's backpack and by some miraculous means Sam had managed to save the damned bag from the fire as well as Dean. His resentment against the bag escalated to the point where nothing short of a ritual bonfire was going to satisfy his irritation because now, as he watched his brother extract the first aid from its confines he knew that he was going to have to endure 'Nurse Sammy' and his bedside manner.
Dean bore the pain stoically at first but was forced into bitching loudly when Sam dug particularly deeply as he tried to clean away the melted material adhering to the burns.
"Ouch, sonofabitch Sam that f**king hurts."
He hadn't meant to complain he wanted to prolong his pissed aloofness but the sharp sting and after-burn of the peroxide for some reason was harder to take than the pulsing ache in his torso and head.
"Hold still I gotta get all the fabric and ash out or you'll get infected." Sam bitched back, not letting up on the poking and dabbing.
His brother swabbed again "Ouch! F**k." Dean pulled away sharply from Sam's ministrations but then had to still, holding his breath, as pain shot hotly through his whole body.
Truth was Dean knew he was in a bad way and Sam was doing his best but it still f***ing hurt like hell.
Holding himself stiffly Dean let Sam continue his work but noted the redness of his brother's skin, the drawn look around his eyes and the tight line of his lips. Not to mention, Dean saw with a fresh swathe of shame, the discoloured ring of bruises around his brother's neck. Sam was hurting but wasn't saying.
"That's a bad case of sunburn you got there Sammy." Dean deliberately bypassed the strangulation marks the heavy weight of his guilt stilling his tongue knowing that neither he nor Sam were ready to go there yet. Sam snorted and dabbed at yet another burnt patch on Dean's shoulder. "Looks sore." Dean continued.
Sam dismissed Dean's concern with a, "Its superficial I'm fine."
Dean ignored the 'I'm fine' speech he'd given it enough times himself to give any credence to its platitude. "Pass me the kit."
"What?" Sam clutched the green box possessively. "What for?"
"I'm gonna perform open heart surgery." Dean reached forward, wincing but managed to pluck the container from his brother before Sam could protest further.
"There's nothing in there that will help." Sam tried to grab the kit back.
Dean looked up, "this is the one from the car, right?"
Sam nodded.
Pulling at the unzipped bag Dean dug into a far corner of the now much depleted pack and produce a small tube of cream with a flourish. Unscrewing the lid he squeezed a pea-sized sphere onto a finger and leaning forward smeared it on Sam's burn-flushed skin.
Starting back Sam shifted out of reach. "What ..."
"Antibiotic cream, do I need to give you the medical entry in the almanac, it'll cool and lubricate your skin as well as stop any infection."
"I know what it is but where did it come …"
Cutting off Sam's query Dean reached forward again wiggling his eyebrows. "Ah Sammy you have your Boy-Scout Back Pack and I have my Hunter's First Aid kit." He continued to lightly rub in the greasy lotion, grinning to himself at, in his view, getting one over on his brother.
"What about you?" Sam twisted so he could see Dean's face.
"What about me?"
Sam cocked his head to one side and Dean felt his gaze but ignored it studiously applying himself to smearing the cream over Sam's pink shoulders.
"Save some for yourself, some of your burns are pretty deep."
"I'm fine."
Lips twitched and then teeth showed and finally the dimples. Dean joined in the laughter holding himself tight against the increase in pain but enjoying the lightness of the moment. There was precious little to smile about in their life so these moments had to be filed away and savoured.
Half an hour later Sam had a small fire going and Dean was huddled close trying to glean some warmth from its meagre output. Night had come quickly bringing with it a stinging cold. Shivering Dean had tried to help his brother collect dry kindling but found that standing unaided let alone bending was beyond his current capabilities.
Dean's stomach grumbled, boiled water had warmed his insides but done little to assuage his hunger. For some reason he couldn't bring himself to even look at the granola bar Sam produced and apparently the 'Superbag' had run out of soup, well there was a first.
Shivering Dean watched as Sam leant forward to build up the fire, banking earth around it to keep it alight as long as possible. He then packed their dwindling supplies back into the rucksack before scooting in behind Dean.
"Sam?" Dean protested this 'position' was very close to what could be called spooning and he wasn't some damned girl that needed a cuddle.
"Medical Emergency." Was all Sam said as he pulled Dean back into his arms and then added. "Conserves body heat."
Dean 'allowed' the cuddling in the interests of modern medicine; to tell the truth he was too tired to complain and too cold to protest and as the warming heat from his brother seeped into his cold body his knotted muscles relaxed, the pain receded and he fell into an exhausted sleep.