Don't Dream It's Over – Chapter 8 - Invictus

As he powers the Impala across the empty miles of blacktop, a thousand conflicting images and thoughts flicker through Sam Winchester's mind. He wishes he could turn some of them off – at least tune them down. Mostly he thinks of Dean. But those thoughts, his joy and anticipation at being reunited with his brother are intermingled with flashes of Dean's broken, bloody flesh and ravaged face as he hangs on a rack of bone.

No – that's all over. Dean is alive. Free.

Except Sam knows that the memories of Hell will never be erased. They are part of Dean, and in a small way they are a part of him too now. Sam is glad that they are. It is the closest he can come to sharing his brother's pain. At least, Sam thinks, his knowledge will help when Dean begins to deal with what happened to him, as he eventually must. Dean will never be the person he was -no one could suffer what he has and not be irrevocably changed. The nature of those changes will be revealed over time.

But Dean will never face anything alone ever again.

It is not so much a decision as a covenant that Sam makes with himself as he barrels neck-or-nothing down the dusty interstate. Dean sacrificed so much for the sake of his family. He did so willingly out of an innate sense of duty and honor, but mostly out of love. Sam knows nothing he can do will restore what Dean has lost - mother, father, faith, home, dreams – but there is one thing Sam can do. He can make sure Dean is never hurt again. With his powers, he will be able to shield his brother from all things evil -identify every threat and take it out before it even gets close. He needs to do this for himself as much as for Dean, because the moment he looked into Dean's unconscious face as Castiel cradled him down in the pit he knew that he could not bear to lose Dean again. He wouldn't survive it. He wouldn't want to.

Sam understands this will present some problems - not the least of which is Dean himself. His brother's deep distrust and abhorrence of things supernatural - (hell – he wouldn't even admit to believing in God, or angels, or the Devil or any of the "truths" that believers accept on faith) will make it difficult for him to accept Sam's new abilities. Or to put it more bluntly, Sam knows that one glimpse of him with his eyes gone all glowy and Dean will freak right the fuck OUT.

No. As much as it grates on him to lie to Dean or hide things from him, Sam decides that it's necessary for the short term, at least until Dean's had some time to deal with his own baggage. Sam's control of his abilities makes him confident that he can protect Dean in all situations without his even being aware of it. Nothing – nothing will ever hurt his brother again, and no force this side of Heaven will ever separate them.

A painful lump is lodged about heart-level in his chest. He will check back into the motel in Pontiac where he had briefly stayed before heading out on the road and wait for Dean to find him. This is the best way, he thinks, to deflect any possible suspicion of his being involved in Dean's rescue.

Ω Ω Ω

The hot shower felt good. Sam felt as if he'd washed off 10,000 miles of filth and dust. His body felt like a sack of lead and all he wanted was a beer and his bed. Well, he was pretty hungry too - ravenous in fact, and he'd ordered a pizza.

A sharp rap at the door – dinner. Sam, jeans-clad and barefoot, wet hair slicked back, padded over to the door, opened it…

… and found himself staring into a pair of green eyes he'd once feared he'd never see again. Standing beside Dean in the doorway, Bobby glanced from one brother to the other, hardly daring to breathe. Sam just stood there transfixed, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down with the sudden rush of a hundred cascading emotions.

"Hey Sammy."

Dean's face seemed lit from within, his lip curled faintly upward in that well-remembered smile. For all his planning, Sam could not have predicted the effect that seeing his brother walking, breathing, speaking would have on him. For a moment his mind went blank; he couldn't remember the script he had so carefully concocted to account for his time and whereabouts for the last four months. Unconsciously, his mouth opened and closed but no sound came out. "Move, idiot", some inner voice finally said.

Sam grabbed his hunting knife from the side table, lunging at Dean just as he stepped through the doorway. Bobby shouted, grabbing Sam's arm and thrusting him forcefully back against the wall.

"Who are you?" Sam yelled.

"Sam! Sam it's him!" Bobby shouted.

"No!" Sam lunged forward again, and again Bobby grabbed him and flung him backwards, pinioning him with an arm around his neck.

"Sam! I've been all through this. It's him. It's really him!"

Sam stopped struggling, feigning capitulation, and straightened, staring dumbstruck at his brother across the few feet of space that separated them. He gasped raggedly, straining to draw breath into his lungs.

"Dean?" Sam couldn't tear his eyes from his brother's face.

"I know. I look fantastic, huh?"

Almost without volition, Sam closed the distance between them in two strides, pulling Dean to him in a frantic bear hug and burying his face in his brother's shoulder. His eyes misted as he drank in his brother's scent, so long absent. Sam was holding on so tightly he knew Dean could barely breathe; still, he couldn't seem to will his arms to let go. For his part, Dean was holding on to Sam so hard he could feel Sam's heart thudding against his own chest, feel the corded muscles in his brother's back.

Seconds passed, punctuated by only by the sound of hitching breath. With a final squeeze of his brother's shoulder Sam stepped back, a dazed smile on his face.

"God, Dean – how? How'd you get out?"

Dean smiled wryly. "Funny you should put it quite that way, bro, 'cause apparently, the Man Upstairs sent some angelic posse to break me out. One of them, Castiel is his name, is like, assigned to me or something."

Sam's smile was tinged with gentle skepticism. "Angels? Dean, are you telling me you have an actual guardian angel?"

"No, no it's not like that exactly."

"Well, what is it like, exactly?"

"Hey, c'mon, man. I've been out of the loop for four months – as in dead, remember? My brain's still trying to wrap itself around the fact that it's not screaming anymore."

Sam looked contrite. "Shit, Dean – man, I'm sorry. You're right. That shit can wait."

"It's okay Sammy. It's kinda - messin' with my head too. It's-"

"Hey, let's just let it go for tonight, 'kay? I just – how 'bout we go somewhere and get something to eat, yeah? Right now! I'm taking you both out for the best steak dinner of your lives."

"Yeah, good luck with that – I mean, this is Iowa, right? But -well, I sure could use a beer – or twelve," Dean conceded.

Bobby stepped up to face them both, clapping a calloused paw on each of their shoulders. "Well, I'm just glad both you boys are okay, but I'll be heading back now; you got plenty to talk about and besides, I didn't bring muh tux with me this trip."

Sam grasped Bobby by the elbow as he turned to leave. "Bobby, forget it, you're not going anywhere. You're family; you've been with us through the worst - do you think we would let you skip the good parts? Hell, there aren't all that many that we can afford to let them pass unheralded."

Dean's eyes rolled. "Unheralded? Dude, who are you – Anderson Cooper?"

Ω Ω Ω

It is a warm late-September evening. A black, '67 Impala sits parked at the edge of an Iowa cornfield. The smell of ripe corn hangs heavy in the still air and cricket song rises and falls like the susurrus of the ocean. Sam and Dean Winchester are sitting side by side on the hood, beers in hand, staring up at a sky so full of stars it makes them dizzy.

They haven't spoken for many minutes and every so often Sam steals a sideways glance at his brother. There is so much he wants to say, so much he has to tell that he doesn't know where to even begin. Beyond describing his rescue by Castiel, as it was told to him by Castiel, Dean hasn't said much; nothing at all about Hell or his time there. He seems content just to be with Sam again, and in the 24 hours since they reunited in Sam's motel room they have spent hardly a moment apart.

Every so often though, they cast sidelong assessing glances at each other. The Sam Dean sees seems much the same as he was before - cocky, focused, softhearted, incurably geeky, broody and emo. But Dean has caught glimpses of a different Sam too – more confident, stronger, and somehow deeper, more self-contained and reserved. But Dean quickly concludes that this perspective may be more a result of his own recent experiences than any actual change in Sam. The thought makes him cringe. He is stung with guilt whenever he allows himself to think of what life must have been like for Sam all those months. Thinking of his brother alone, unprotected, eaten up with grief and guilt and surrounded by all the evil the world has to offer with no one at his back fills Dean with shame and a fierce conviction that he will never allow this to occur again. Now that he has seen – up close and very personal – the awful, pervasive power of evil to corrupt and destroy even the good and the innocent, he is afraid for Sam. Afraid that the strange abilities Sam began to manifest near the end of Dean's last year could leave him open to the forces of evil, could seduce and blind and trap him before he is even aware. Except now Big Brother is back - and that's so not going to happen.

After the disorienting red-spectrum colors of the pit, Dean finds the cool, star-shot blackness infinitely comforting and beautiful. Sam watches his brother watch the stars with the wide-eyed innocence of an 8-year old, and he smiles a little.

"What are you smiling at, Wonderboy?"

"Nothing. Really - nothing"

"Yeah, ok-aay. And I'd be buying that except your face is telling a different story."

"Hey, I'm just glad you're back, okay? I –"

Sam looks down at his giant hands; opens and closes them once, twice. He struggles to speak around the sudden lump in his throat. But when the words finally come they tumble out in a pained, ragged torrent.

"God, Dean. It was all shit without you, man. Every day was like – like walking around with this giant hole in the middle of me. It hurt so bad - some nights I went to sleep praying to just not wake up. And the worst, the worst was knowing you weren't gone. That you were still there somewhere and this awful shit was happening to you, but I could never ever reach you; I couldn't find you, couldn't help you… "

Sam doesn't know when he started crying, but his face is wet. Tears are spilling out of his eyes and running down his cheeks, over his lips, leaking into his mouth where his tongue tastes the salt. He makes no sound though, and that scares and moves Dean more than anything. "Sammy, I'm sorry…"

"After that night, for weeks, I couldn't stop thinking about it – couldn't stop seeing it in my head - hearing it in my dreams."

"Why didn't you go to Bobby, Sam? He's our family, he would have understood, helped you deal."

Sam turns to Dean, suddenly angry, his eyes red and wild. "Helped me deal? How do you deal with something like that, Dean? Seeing the most important person in your world torn apart in front of you while you stand there and let it happen? How do you live with that? Oh wait – you didn't have to, cause you didn't let it happen. You saved me! I should have stopped it. I should have found a way to save you before -"

Sam breaks off raggedly, sucks in air. He had almost given everything away, almost said, "before they hung you in that room—"

Dean turns enough to grab Sam by the shoulder and pull him, unresisting, into his side.

"Sam – Sammy, it's okay. Everything's okay now. I'm here. I'm here, I'm okay, and I'm not going anywhere," follows Dean's rough whisper, fingers unconsciously brushing Sam's long hair back from his face.

"I'm so sorry, Sammy. I'm sorry I left you alone. I was supposed to take care of you, and I didn't. I didn't – but it's gonna be okay – because I'm here, and I'm gonna always have your back from now on. I promised Dad, and I promised you, most of all I promised myself I would do that - never let anything hurt you. I know I haven't always done that good a job of it, but I promise – I promise you, Sam, whatever comes, whatever happens, I'll be here, always.

Sam doesn't speak, but Dean can feel the tension in his brother's body ease, the hitching breath even out. The thought comes, unbidden, that here is yet another change – in both of them, it seems. Before his vacation in Hell they were rarely overtly emotional toward each other. For Dean, manly silence was the order of the day, and he had almost thirty years of compressed, repressed feelings to show for it. Now it seemed his time in Hell had broken down his carefully maintained walls. Or perhaps he now understood that there could be no walls between Sam and himself. Didn't need them; didn't want them.

Sam straightens away from his brother and smiles into those astonishing green eyes. His heart still aches, but with love instead of despair. He feels the energy of his power rippling through every cell of his body. He feels as if he is made of light. He knows that the light is Dean.

Hard on the heels of this realization comes another: his plan to use his power to protect Dean will not work – will, in fact, destroy his brother. Sam understands, finally, that Dean's purpose is to protect Sam.

Just not in the way Dean believes. Not by any action of his, but by his very presence. Everything he has just experienced has taught Sam that he will simply not live long without his brother. Or if he does, eventually, he won't be Sam anymore. Dean is the Guardian of Sam's soul. And if Sam becomes Dean's protector he will rob his brother of his manhood and his soul more profoundly than 1,000 years in Hell could and destroy the one relationship that will keep him (somewhat) human.

It's a hard choice that in the end is really no choice. Dean is strong – stronger than the monsters, stronger than demons, stronger even than Hell itself. Even in Hell, his strength was sustained by his love for Sam. Sam knows now that he can never reveal his powers to Dean – that he must not even manifest them. Much as the idea of allowing his brother to put himself in harm's way, to continue hunting monsters and facing down death terrifies Sam, he knows he must. He vows then and there to bury his powers deep in his subconscious, to never use them again, even when he is alone. He will be the Sam Dean needs him to be; the Sam he needs to be. They will be as they were – fighting evil with hunters' weapons, looking out for each other, gambling with death, winning some, losing some…

Ω Ω Ω

The wide open sky is lightening in the East when the brothers haul themselves back into the Impala. They drive toward the horizon, each silent with his thoughts. But there is no tension now, no pent-up sadness or fear or guilt. They are driving past field after field of swaying grain, pale gold beneath the rising sun.

Sam turns to Dean with a grin. "Hey Dean, doesn't this remind you of the scene in 'Field of Dreams?' The first time Kevin Costner sees Shoeless Joe?"

"Hey, yeah, it does. What a great movie. Sometimes a comet flies across the heavens and Hollywood actually makes a movie that doesn't suck. That miracle in itself makes you almost believe something like that could happen, y'know? I mean, why not? If the world can hold wendigos and vampires and ghouls and every other goddamned awful thing, why not something beautiful like an immortal baseball team dropping in every now and then?"

"It would be sweet," Sam murmurs. They drive on for awhile in comfortable silence, Sam looking out the passenger window at the bucolic scenery.

"Hey Dean, pull over!"

"-What?"

"Just pull over here. I just saw something weird."

Dean slows the car to a stop, an impatient frown forming between his drawn brows.

"Sam, what 'weird' could you possibly find out here in the middle of Amber Waves of Grain-land? Wait – weird weird, or our kind of weird?"

"I dunno – maybe both; maybe neither. I'm gonna take a look."

"Hold up, we'll both take a look."

When he exits the car, Sam is already striding back down the dusty road, heading toward what looks to be an old barn at the side of a wheat field. Even from here, Dean can see what caught his brother's attention. The barn is all ramshackle grayed wood; one of its doors is missing and sunlight pours through the half- caved in roof. But above the sagging doors stark red lines form a strange symbol, similar to ones Dean has seen on barns in Pennsylvania and other rural places. He is unfamiliar with this particular mark though, and he follows Sam, his curiosity piqued.

When he reaches the barn, Sam has already gone inside. He spends some minutes gazing up at the cryptic symbol, searching his memory for a reference point. But the sign is new to him, although it bears elements common to several incredibly ancient Eygptian marks having to do with immortality and the afterlife. The mark itself is a vibrant, electric blue that seems to scintillate in the morning sun as though it were just painted and still wet. The strange thing is, unlike so many arcane symbols Dean has seen, it gives off no dark, negative vibe - quite the opposite, in fact. As Dean continues to gaze at the symbol, he feels a serene calm wash over him. The feeling is so unexpected, so alien to him that he is momentarily transfixed until the sound of his own name brings him back to himself.

"Dean! Dean, c,mere!"

Sam sounds excited, but not panicky or alarmed. Dean joins him in the cool stillness of the barn. Nothing strange here. The interior is empty save for a few moldy bales of hay and the remains of what look to be horse stalls, now just rotting slats of wood, mostly fallen down. Little motes of dust drift down around Sam like glinting gems on the stream of sunlight slanting through the riven roof.

"What the hell, Sam? Where's the weird"? Except for that symbol over the door – what do you make of that, by the way? – this is just an old barn, dude. If you're that into them, we'll take the "Old Barns of America" tour next vacation.."

"Yeah, okay, stop. I thought it might be something."

"Huh. Obviously I've left you alone way to long, bro. You're jonesing for a hunt."

"Yeah, must be…"

"Can we go now? "

"Yeah, sure. I just wanna sketch that symbol though. Might as well add it to the collection".

"Sure, okay. Let's just get the show on the road; I'd like to make it back to civilization while I'm still young."

Dean has already turned to walk out when Sam says "Wait! Did you hear that?"

"What?"

"Shut up a minute."

Sam grabs Dean by the arm, face scrunched up in concentration. For a moment there is silence, and Dean's patience, never long, has been stretched to its limit.

"Shit, Sam –"

Then he hears it. A hollow "pop" followed immediately by the unmistakable sound of running feet and what sounds like - cheering.

Both brothers tear out of the barn and look toward the field; then stop short, eyes a-goggle at the scene before them.

The wheat field is gone. In its place a perfect baseball field now sits, reddish-brown hard-packed earth marked with glowing white baselines; white wooden benches along each opposite sideline and a set of bleachers across from an old-fashioned wooden scoreboard. The bleachers are empty, but the dugouts on each side of the field are filled with young men in baseball uniforms - white with blue stripes on one side, sky-blue on the other. Even from where he stands, jaw agape, Dean can hear the murmur of their chatter, interspersed with laughter.

"What the – no way! Are you seeing what I'm seeing?"

Sam stands beside him, just as wide-eyed. "Holy shit."

"I'll take that as a 'yes'. What the hell, Sam? We're hallucinating, right? I mean, c'mon!"

"I dunno, Dean."

"Well, this can't be real! Something – supernatural going on here. Can't be good."

Sam's eyes, as he turns to his brother, are curiously gentle. "Why not?"

"What?"

"Why can't it be good?"

"What? Because nothing supernatural is ever good, Sam! Not in our experience!"

"Maybe not. But that doesn't mean that in this whole big universe there can't be something - some supernatural something - that's benevolent."

"Benevolent? Okay, Professor. You take your "benevolent" while I just run back to the car and get my gun. Then we'll go take a look-see."

"Dean, I don't think you're gonna need your gun. It's just baseball. There are no guns in baseball."

"Wrong movie reference, Ebert. Just wait here."

Dean races back to the Impala, throws open the trunk and pulls out his .45. In afterthought he pulls out a bag of salt. Pocketing the salt he races back to the barn, but Sam is gone. Dean swears bluely as he looks toward the field and sees his brother now standing in the center of a cluster of players.

As he runs toward Sam, Dean's mind automatically processes the scene before him. A baseball game is definitely in progress. There are runners on first and third base. A sandy-haired man dressed in blue stands at the plate, bat poised to swing. On the pitcher's mound, a white-uniformed figure is on his wind-up. He releases the ball and the batter swings. There is a resounding crack! and the ball soars up, up and out across the field straight towards Dean. Muscle memories dormant for 15 years suddenly spring to life, galvanizing Dean into action before he is even aware he is moving. Suddenly, he is running, running, head up and eye on the ball as it hits its apogee and begins its descent to earth. Dean marks its trajectory; still running, he reaches up. The ball drops into his outstretched hand and he continues to run toward the infield, fires the ball toward home plate, where it is caught before the runner at third can reach home. Tagged. The player at home fires the ball back to third, where the third baseman catches it neatly, tagging out the runner before he makes the base. Double play.

The white-striped team's dugout empties as players run to Dean. He finds himself suddenly surrounded by a bunch of sweaty, laughing men pounding his shoulders, slapping him on the back, cheering him by name. From the corner of his eye he can see Sam standing a little ways off smiling full-on, his face lit like a hundred-watt bulb. The uniform should look strange on his giant body, but it doesn't. Dean glances down at himself, surprised to note that he is now similarly dressed. What the hell.

The team settles down and the players straggle back to their dugouts. Dean walks slowly over to Sam, his eyes full of questions.

"Sammy –"

"Don't ask me, cause I got nothing."

"This is crazy. This shit – it doesn't happen. This is the movies, man. This isn't real."

"Maybe. Guess not – but – it's here. We're here – so it is happening, isn't it?"

I don't get it, man. How can you be so calm about this?"

Sam stepped up close to his brother, a hand on Dean's arm. He looked into Dean's eyes – those bottomless eyes in which he could still see so much pain, fear and grief. He had wanted more than anything to see something else there – hope, peace, forgiveness.

"Dean, listen to me. Just listen. You're right. Most of the time all this supernatural stuff is evil. And yeah, there's evil everywhere. But just – not here. Not today. Trust me. I can feel it. What this is, it's a gift – for us. Maybe your angel buddies are doing it, I don't know. All I know is, this is something good. Please trust me on this. Please."

Dean looked at his brother's earnest face, a rejection of Sam's plea on his lips. But something in Sam's eyes stopped him. A certainty, a conviction of truth that Dean couldn't gainsay. Suddenly, something that had been coiled inside of Dean since his return topside seemed to relax and dissolve. The ball of fear and guilt that at times threatened to strangle him unclenched and flowed out like water from a smashed bucket.

"Okay. Okay, Sammy. I – I do trust you."

"Hey Dean! Dean, you're up!" Dean flashed Sam a brilliant smile, then turned and walked toward the plate. A slender, dark-haired young man ran up to him and handed him a beautiful bat made of white ash. Around its base the name "Winchester" was carved in small block letters.

"Here, you can use mine, Dean."

Dean took the bat, glancing up at the man with a smile of thanks. And met the beautiful dark green eyes of twenty-seven year old John Winchester.

"DAD!"

John gazed at his son with loving eyes. "It's so good to see you, boy. You and Sam. Good to see you both. We'll have lots of time to talk later. Right now, we've got a game to win."

Dean stands motionless in the middle of a wheatfield in central Iowa. Above him, the warm sun blesses the perfect diamond of the ballfield, the crowd of chattering players, and the folks who have found their way to the bleachers. He looks towards them, scanning the faces, and is somehow unsurprised to see among them his mother in a pale yellow sundress and her parents, Deanna and Samuel. They are smiling and waving. Slowly, Dean does a complete 360 of the field. He is making a memory. The last thing his eyes alight upon before he takes his first swing is his brother, warm eyes radiating love and pride, mouth curved up in a small, secret smile.

Ω ∞ Ω