A/N: This is it, guys, this is the grand finale! I just want to thank all the reviewers again, especially ImpalaLove, PadfootCc, themightypanda, Nemu-Chan, and toridw317 for reviewing the last chapter. I'm so lucky to have consistent feedback from so many of you, and I just want you to know how much I appreciate it! I hope everyone enjoys this chapter.

Song: Ramble On by Led Zeppelin

CHAPTER 14

Ramble On

The kiss on the park bench is, perhaps unsurprisingly, not their last.

They make it back to the motel, but stop outside the door to their room. Now, there's a sort of implicit, melancholy acceptance between them. They're both too stubborn to bend to the other's will, but that doesn't mean the spark is gone, and it certainly doesn't mean that they are ready to part just yet.

Dean presses her gently against chipped beige paint, under the eerie scintillation of old fluorescent lights. It's not very late, but the hallway is abandoned, and he feels comfortable that they're not going to be caught.

"Ouch," she hisses as the area between her shoulder blades comes into contact with the wall. The pain is sharp now that the fog of alcohol has dissipated.

"Sorry," he repents into her hair, twirling them – almost gracefully – so that instead he is the one against the wall.

Claire stands on her toes to reach his mouth, pressing her full weight into him, trapping him, making him feel that she is solid and real and not yet gone. There's not even an inch between the two, and still she arches into his firm body, trying to erase space that does not exist. He knows he should not encourage this or anything beyond this because it will only make things ten-times harder in the morning, but his blood runs hot like lava when he slips his hands barely beneath the hem of her shirt, and even more so when her silken fingertips skim over his jawline. And when her hand threads through his hair, he's sure that they're playing with fire. But neither of them is drunk now, and they can stop themselves if they have to. They can. He thinks they can.

She digs her palms into his torso, testing the ridges of his abs through his shirt, knotting her fingers into the blockade of soft cotton. Her hands go no further. To have this one fleeting happiness – only to be robbed of it – will be a blow to both of them.

Even now, he feels something more than he should.

"Claire…" he whispers, words fading into the florescent hum. His eyes are screwed shut and her mouth is on his neck and, while he doesn't want her to stop, he is fearful of what will happen if they don't.

He knows her heart-rate is picking up because he can feel it throb against his bones, and his is too, and she stops moving and just rests against him, sharing his warmth. "I know," she breathes.

Impulse control has never been his forte. His hands stay glued to her, defying his authority, and she snakes her arms around his waist. She presses her ear to his sternum and hears all the signs of vitality, of reality, before inclining her head to look at him. And he is already looking at her. They stay like this for a minute, jammed against each other and against the wall, and just study the other's face.

When he peers into her cornflower eyes, he still sees that nameless thing that scares the hell out of him. And he's afraid that maybe she sees the same thing reflected in his.

"We should go in," she says eventually, and he nods his assent.

Giving her one last peck on the lips, he unlocks the door with a click and they step inside.

Sam is in Dean's bed, sleeping like a corpse. His gigantic form takes up more space than an average person's, and he looks a bit like a doll that was matched up with the wrong toy set. He's flat on his back with his arms by his side, stiff as a board, and his features are relaxed. He is so unmoving that Dean strains his eyes to make sure that his chest is rising and falling – to his instantaneous relief, it is.

It's only around 10 PM, but they are all understandably dog-tired. Dean slides off his boots and Claire does the same, and they kiss one more time (this is the last time really, they both think), before he collapses on the sofa and she on her bed.

. . .

"We both knew it was going to come to this eventually."

His tone is precise and piercing, like a shot fired through the barrel of a sniper's rifle. He has not rehearsed this, but the words have been dancing through his brain, out of order, for months. Perhaps even forever.

He needs only to put them into sequence, and the message is elucidated.

He is filled with light now, possessed by it. It is white-hot and scorching, it trickles through his veins like a sweet acid, a little like the power used to.

If he could be alive, he thinks, he would be dead. He wants to be dead, because the light burns.

It is quite a thing to be awake and asleep at the same time.

"It's over," he tells him gently, and it is fact. And he sees what he sees but he cannot say what he means.

And if it is over, truly, he wants to die too, wants it to end, the darkness to swallow the light.

Does it hurt very much? he wonders, only briefly.

But how could it? It is dark underground.

Claire crashes into consciousness when Sam does. At first, he turns his head in her direction from five feet to her left, eyebrows drawn in ashamed bewilderment, but when she reaches for her laptop with a grimace he suddenly comprehends. She's learned to bite her tongue to keep from crying out. In one way or another, it's progress.

"Did you… Did you see that?" he whispers cautiously, trying not to wake Dean.

The clock reads 4:42 AM. He will be up soon anyway. It's a miracle he's slept through the night in the first place.

"Yeah," is all she says. Her fingers move rapidly, and as they race across the keyboard the agony appears to slowly leach out of her head.

The blue glow of the backlit screen is lost when she shuts her laptop, and now that his pupils had adjusted to the light he can't see her face. He stares into the darkness, considering something, before hissing, "Can I talk to you outside for a minute?"

She nods pointlessly, and he receives her affirmation in only the abrupt rustling of sheets. They both climb out of bed and tiptoe to the door as noiselessly as they possibly can, and cringe to themselves when their exit allows a sliver of light into the room. Luckily it's gone quickly and Dean, like his brother, is a heavy sleeper.

There's a small window at the end of the hallway. The last vestiges of night are beginning to disperse as the initial rays of early morning light replace them, barely visible on the horizon.

Claire crosses her arms over her chest, bleary-eyed. "What's up?" she asks.

Sam's own eyes are swollen to a squint, and the newfound brightness of overhead lighting isn't doing either of them any favors. He towers over her to a comical extent – she has to crane her neck dramatically to even look at his face.

"I need to talk to you about Dean," he prefaces.

"Dean and I are fine now. We already talked it out, and we both decided that it's best if we both just go our separate ways."

"No, you see," he starts hesitantly, inhaling a deep, anxious breath, "you can't. I can't stay with him. Not right now, at least. I'm in a bad place, and trying to forget about it and going back to hunting and suppressing it isn't gonna work for me like it does for him. I need to take time off."

"You're going to leave him?" she questions in disbelief.

"I'm not going to leave him," he says guiltily, "I'll tell him where I'm going. I just… I need a break from all this – I need to get off the ride."

"And what if he doesn't want to get off the ride?"

He fidgets uncomfortably, shifting his weight from one mammoth foot to the other. "Then we stay apart."

Something alien and protective bubbles in Claire's throat, something she hasn't felt in a long while. "Do you have any idea how hard he looked for you? How much time he spent trying to get you back, to make sure you were safe?"

"I know," he admits, taken aback by her candor. "But I – I can't do it. I don't know what'll happen to me if I try to just ignore this. I just… I can't."

He's giving her that puppy-dog look and Claire's expression softens some. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I'm going to leave before he wakes up – before he can try to stop me – and I wanted a chance to explain myself to you."

She feels suddenly like she's joined some conspiracy against Dean, and it makes her stomach roil.

"My brother… He shouldn't be alone," he continues.

"You want me to stay with him? Is that what you're asking? Because we already went over this – he does not want me with him."

"If I'm gone, he'll cave. Dean hates to be alone – he shouldn't be alone. He doesn't get that if even you tape the shattered pieces of something back together, it's not going to be the same as it was before, and each time it breaks it's only going to get worse. At some point, it just stops being the same thing altogether. He wants it to be me and him forever, wants it to be like it always was, like it was when we were kids, but it's impossible. It may not feel right without me, but it won't feel right with me, either. If I drop out, if I don't cooperate, he'll be forced to face reality."

"So what, you want me to just badger him until he agrees to let me go with him?"

"It won't come to that – it won't take that much to convince him. Dean may seem extremely stubborn, but he's more easily swayed by his emotions than you might think."

Claire stays quiet, so he continues, "But if I go, it'll still be really hard for him, even if he knows I'm okay. Will you promise me you'll keep an eye on him?"

She falters at first, but eventually agrees, "Yeah, I guess…"

"Good. Thank you," he replies earnestly.

They size each other up for a moment, unsure how to end the conversation. Sam takes the plunge and pulls her into a hug, his body completely engulfing hers.

When the break apart he starts to go back inside, but she adds, "But why – if you don't mind my asking – if you know it's going to hurt him so much, why would you do this to him?"

Sam frowns, conflicted. "My brother," he begins, organizing his thoughts, "My brother doesn't understand that I'm not like him. He wants me to just do what he says – do what he did – but he doesn't get that we're not the same. If I just blindly listen to him, I'm not going to make it. I don't know what will happen to me, but it won't be anything good. Dean… he's my older brother and he always thought he knew what was best – and for the longest time I thought he did, too. But he never had this darkness inside him like I do. Sure, some bad shit has happened to him and that's left a mark – of course. But this… this darkness, this corruption was never part of him like it is with me. He doesn't understand."

Claire chews her lower lip contemplatively, letting his words settle in the air. "Alright," she murmurs. "I'll try my best to look after him, if he lets me."

He gives her a morose smile. "I know him – he will."

If Dean can't make the right decision for himself, he's going to have to shove him into it.

. . .

Claire re-awakes at 6 AM to "SON-OF-A-BITCH" piercing like a bolt of lightening through her subconscious.

She jerks to a sitting position just in time to see Dean hurl the coffeemaker across the room. It smashes against the wall with a loud crunch, denting the plaster and sending jagged pieces of broken plastic fluttering to the floor. They litter the grubby, brownish carpet, sparkling like shards of obsidian.

"What's the matter?!" she questions, feigning ignorance. Her sleep-laden vocal chords and the fact that she has been so rudely awakened add to the plausibility of her charade.

"Sam" is his only reply. This simple, three-letter word is an incantation, a curse, and a prayer all rolled into one. The source of his murderous rage is a harmless-looking sheet of paper on the nightstand.

The sun has risen now, and it filters in lines through the Venetian blinds.

"Did he leave?" she asks, almost inaudibly.

His eyes snap to look at her, picking up on something in her tone. In this light, his hair and his irises and his skin are all varying shades of the same golden color.

"Did you know?" His intonation is disturbingly even.

"He might have mentioned something…"

"Dammit, Claire!" he explodes.

She flinches and he crumbles onto the sofa, folding in on himself. His hands rake through his short crop of hair, making it stand on end, and then rub his eyes raw. When he finally exposes his face to her, he looks like hell. He turns his gaze up to the water-stained ceiling, looking, searching, trying to use gravity to force unshed tears back into his eye sockets.

"I'm sorry," she murmurs, not knowing what else to say.

"How could you let him go?" comes a fraught, rasping voice that sounds like a warped version of Dean's.

"I don't think I really let Sam do anything."

"You know what I mean," he warns. And, more brokenly, "How could you not tell me?"

"It was the middle of the night, and he asked me not to. There was no time, and anyway, we're all sharing a room. I couldn't have told you, even if I'd wanted to."

He laughs, and it's acidic and cold and makes her want to flinch again.

"Did he leave a note? What did it say?" she counters, trying to shift his focus off of her.

"He said he 'needs time to process,' whatever the fuck that means."

"Did he say where he's going?"

"It says he doesn't know yet, but that he'll let me know when he does – it also says that I shouldn't go looking for him unless I intend to join him on his little vacation," he answers caustically.

"Why are you so opposed to giving him time to think?"

There is genuine curiosity in her tone, and it strikes a chord. His green eyes dance with stray flecks of sunlight from the window as he stares at her, at a crossroads. He could tell her the truth – tell her how it's not that he doesn't want to give Sam his space, it's that he can feel him changing, slipping away from him - or he could lie.

Eventually he responds, "Without Sam, I don't even know what this whole thing means. He says it's just a temporary deal for now, but what if it isn't, what if he never comes back? I went to fucking Purgatory to save him, and… and now he just leaves. I've spent every single second of every single day since Detroit wishing I could see him, wishing he would come back, and doing everything I possibly could to make it happen. I nearly flung myself over the ledge after him, but I didn't – I kept going, kept searching, and I never would have stopped – never. He couldn't even bear to stay a full twenty-four hours."

"I think Sam feels like he needs to do this to stay sane – it's the same reason you keep hunting, really," she tries. "I don't think you should take it so personally. I know you see everything in terms of Sam, and, well, so does Sam."

Such is the problem with youngest siblings, she thinks. No matter how selfless they may be, in the end, they worry primarily about themselves. The oldest is the one that's burdened with worrying about everyone else.

He massages his forehead, eyes screwed closed. "Maybe."

She slips out of bed, approaching him as she might a wild beast – with immense caution. He seems not to notice as she treads closer, and even as she comes to sit beside him, he does not so much as peek through his eyelashes.

He senses she is nearer by the proximity of her voice. She says, "At least he's safe, at least you know he's not in trouble."

"For now. Something could happen, though, and I wouldn't know, I wouldn't be able to do anything." His voice breaks and so does her heart. Seeing these two, so tangled and dysfunctional, she cannot help but wonder where this road ends.

"You can't be everywhere protecting everyone all the time, Dean."

"I know. Believe me, I know. I've learned that the hard way. But if there's just one person I can protect – just one – it's gotta be Sammy."

"I know…"

"It's just… I don't… I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I don't understand why he's doing this, how he can do this."

With the same level of care she exercised walking over, she places one hand on his shoulder. She can feel his muscles twist and coil through the scratchy flannel beneath her palm. They sit, paralyzed and tense and linked only by her hand, for several long moments, until he caves into her. He's not crying, not really, but his eyes are bloodshot and glistening. Despite this, though, his features have hardened. His jaw is set and his teeth are gritted.

It seems easier now, now that he has allowed her to see him like this. She brushes her fingers along his hairline absently, his golden head in her lap. Their arms are interlinked and knotted around one another, confused and inextricable, and she's not sure how they came to be like this.

"I'll come with you now, at least until Sam comes back." All this time she has been asking him things, but this she tells him. "And when he does, I'll stay where you want me to." It's a fair compromise, she wagers. "But if I come with you, you have to agree that we'll take this seriously because… because, well, I really don't see any other way around it."

He doesn't ask what "this" is because it seems obvious – she's referring to their relationship. He turns his head to look at her for the first time since she sat beside him and slowly rises to an upright position, as though his collapse had been a temporary slip.

His lips part to speak, but Claire insists, "Don't try to tell me otherwise."

He purses his lips again, before grinding out, "I wasn't going to…" He swallows in an attempt to stifle the lump building in his throat, burning like a hot coal. He goes on, "But after everything you've seen, how could you possibly want this?"

She bristles. "You know why," she tells him gravely. "You know."

His pupils dart back and forth, reading hers, scouring her face for any indication that she is lying. He wishes she were.

Dean feels so much and so deeply that he sometimes feels with parts of himself that he is not meant to. He feels this, this unnamed emotion radiating off of her like something tangible, in his lungs. His breath hitches. He stands, pacing to the other side of the room like an animal testing the boundaries of its cage.

"This… this is as much as it will ever be," he chokes out, trying to extinguish the blaze consuming him from within. "As much as it can ever be." His fists clench, but then unclench as he remembers that fight or flight is not an option here.

She follows him across the room, this same room where everything else has come apart.

"This is enough," she states, and he does not believe.

She grasps his wrist and she is trembling, trying to steady herself, trying to get through to him.

"Don't," he whispers, tugging back his hand. "Don't." If she says the word, it will all be over.

"Dean," she says plainly. "There's no reason to be like this."

There is every reason, he thinks but does not say. The word, the name of the unnamed emotion, hovers silently in the air. He dreads to hear it with his brain, but longs to hear it with his heart.

She doesn't say it. Instead she gravitates towards him and though he stands rigid as a statue, every cell in his being gravitates towards her, too. But he fights against this otherworldly force just as he has fought against all the others.

It's only when she kisses him that he loses the battle. It's not a kiss so much as it is a brushing of lips, but for this one second, the thought of him and Sam and the Apocalypse and angels and demons and monsters and everything but this flees his head, for perhaps the first time ever.

For Dean, a man who's spent his entire life teaching himself that he is worthless, having someone adore him so totally is a horrifying concept. There's no pressure when everyone is disappointed in you, when everyone expects you to fail.

Claire does not expect him to fail, nor is she disappointed in him just yet. But it's just a matter of time.

Still, it feels good to be close to somebody, to cling stupidly to this one thing in all the world. His features are contorted in pain through the kiss, but when she starts to pull away, he does not want her to. Some new passion courses through his veins, lights his blood on fire. He sustains the connection, draws her in with a hand on either side of her face.

She touches his wrists again and when they break apart for air he sees pearl-like tears stuck to her lashes. She thought he was going to reject her.

His expression is impassive. His thoughts are conveyed only when he fuses his lips once more with hers, pouring treacherous meaning into the kiss, instilling in it a significance that neither of them can bear to acknowledge. He maneuvers their entangled figures gradually, until the backs of his knees buckle when they hit the edge of the mattress. Like this, she stands above him and wedges herself between his legs.

Dean is very aggressive in most aspects of his life, but surprisingly not in this one. He is actually very gentle. He has learned, through his depth of experience, that it is better for everyone to be unhurried and attentive.

And now, with Claire, it's natural. He wants to take care of her, he wants to draw out the limited time they are going to have together. He is complacent as she pulls his shirt over his head, her fingers grazing along his ribcage. And when she discards of hers next, tossing it into the growing heap on the floor amongst the shattered plastic from the coffeemaker, he leans back. She straddles his waist, fingers tracing the collection of scars on his torso and reminding him that these are only a fraction of what was once there. He's only healed on the outside.

He spins them so that he looms above her on the bed, and examines her face. Her flaming locks fan around her head like a halo.

"Dean, it's okay," she breathes, misinterpreting his pause as reluctance.

He kisses her, dragging his tongue so languidly and reverently across her lower lip that she can almost pretend he loves her too.

Loves? she thinks, shocked and appalled that this has slipped out, even if it's only in the sanctity of her own brain. But it's too late now. There's no going back.

His hands drift over her skin, ephemeral at first. He avoids her bandage and merely ghosts his blunt and bruised fingertips over her back and the sharp curve of her athletic waist. It is strange how something can happen so quickly and so slowly all at the same time. In what seems like an instant, the rest of their clothes have dematerialized, but he can feel every millimeter of her flesh touching his at half-speed.

His tenderness transmutes to desperation only when his body has actually merged with hers. And as his grip on her intensifies, his grip on his torment withers. Soon enough it is just the two of them, with no history and no future. Present. Existing. Nothing more and nothing less.

She pushes him back and he flips them easily, and then she draws him forward so they are face to face, as close as two people could possibly be. He looks at her when her eyes are closed, and she looks at him when his are. They watch each other in secret, searching for meaning. Eventually hooded blue meets hooded green, and they can barely fathom the abnormal ache that is accompanying their physical aching for one another.

Dean is terrified by the way this is affecting him in the other corners of his body. She is right there, concrete, on top of him, her arms around him, and while he has done this many times, it has never felt like this, he has never felt like this. Like something inside his body yearns for something inside hers.

He presses her back, into the sheets, and twines his fingers with hers. And though they've done this before, it now feels completely different, like they are different, and maybe they are.

"Dean…" she gasps.

He didn't expect to hear his name and it sends him spiraling towards the edge. He holds on tightly to his last shred of self-control, wanting her to feel what he feels, wanting to give her the best of himself, and it doesn't take much longer for him to succeed.

When it's over, he rolls off of her and she rolls onto him, her limbs still inextricable from his. They could fall asleep like this, but the morning is in full swing and they know they must leave.

Dean stares at the ceiling and tries to catch the thoughts flying through his brain. The impact of what has happened - of what is happening - is sinking into him. He feels sobered and sated, but there is still some lingering feeling that refuses to leave the pit of his stomach. It's unfamiliar, and he wants it out.

The next hour or so is a blur. In the shower, they try to cleanse themselves of this strange feeling, but the roots are already growing inside them; if they try to weed it out now, they might break something. They have no choice but to accept it.

Later, they carelessly shove crumpled clothes into battered bags. The the only traces of the tornado that struck remain in the form of smashed property and wrecked sheets, left untouched for someone else to clean up. And then they leave it all behind, almost like it never happened.

It's not until they have retreated into the Impala that Dean decides one of them should say something to acknowledge what is happening.

"Claire," he says finally, "I'm glad you're coming with me."

THE END

A/N: I know this is kind of an odd place to end it and in some ways I thought the last chapter might have been truer to the tone of the overall story (which, admittedly, is kind of dismal), but I felt like it captured the culmination of their relationship so I just went with it. As for a sequel - I have an idea, but I would actually love to run it by someone because I'm not sure if it's worth pursuing or not. I don't want to spoil it for anyone if I do go through with it though, so if you'd be willing to hear me out maybe say so in a review or PM me? Whichever is more convenient.

And finally, I hope you all liked it. Again, thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed, favorited, or subscribed to this story. Let me know what you think! :)

xx Persephone