A/N: I found it a little harder to write from Dean's perspective, but I had fun exploring more of Sam from his brother's POV. As always, I hope you enjoy and feedback is completely welcome!
Last Time:
"Give your angel friend a call," Bobby butted in.
With a fresh swell of hope Dean closed his eyes. "Cas? Uh, I have a question for you and I really hope you can help." He waited a couple seconds before opening his eyes and looking around the room. No angel. He shrugged. "Guess Cas has more important things—" The flutter of a trench coat behind him made him break off and spin to face his old friend.
Before he could ask anything though, the angel cocked his head to the side and asked, "Why is Sam standing outside?"
Chapter 3:
Dean felt the bottom drop out of his stomach. He ran to the door and threw it open.
"Sam!" Dean's eyes flicked frantically, scanning the salvage yard for a hint of his brother. "Sammy!"
A hint of movement from the side of the house had him sprinting over, feet barely touching the ground in his haste to see his brother with his own eyes. He turned the corner and stopped abruptly.
There stood a sight he had never expected to see again. His little brother. Sam stood there in ill-fitting clothing, barefoot, his hair a wild mess.
He was the most beautiful thing Dean had ever seen.
"Dean," Sam rasped right before his brother plowed into him. Dean felt a shiver run through Sam's body, a hesitation, before he gripped the back of Dean's shirt just as tightly.
Too thin, was Dean's first thought once the haze of shock lifted, at least a minute later. He grabbed Sam's shoulders and held him at arm's length, concern piercing his joy. The kid's shoulders were too slight and there was a distance Dean had never seen before in his brother's eyes.
Before he could voice any of the million anxious questions flying through his head, he heard Bobby shout his name from the front. Dean looked at Sam who nodded in response to the unspoken question.
Dean tightened his grip before letting go, relishing the contact to his lost brother. He led the way back into the house, pretending not to notice Sam's cautious entrance. When Bobby caught sight of the youngest Winchester, he clutched him in as hard a hug as Dean's.
Sam hugged him back, but Dean could see from his angle that Sam's eyes never stopped moving. And when Bobby released the hug, Sam smoothly turned so that he was the closest to the exit.
"Lisa, Cas," he said, nodding to each of them in greeting before turning an accusing gaze on his older brother. "What did you do, Dean?"
"Actually, he didn't have anything to do with this. It was all Bobby and me," Lisa inserted.
She crossed the room to stand by Dean, not touching him, but acting as a beacon of support. "I found a book by accident in our library at the University of Michigan where I work," Lisa explained, "Deep in the stacks where no one would find it, but it fell when I walked by it. When Bobby and I ran out of ideas for getting you out, Sam, the book was our last bet."
"Ancient Greek, a bitch to translate," Bobby grunted. "So much dialect to wade through, I really could've used your help," he said nodding at Sam, who stayed silent.
"What was in the book?" Cas inquired.
"Fate," answered the old hunter. Then to dodge further questions, he said, "Now Sam, I'm sure you want to shower and put some of your own clothes on. I never could throw away that duffle you left here last time."
Properly distracted by the promise of being clean, Sam nodded and exited.
"I have to go if I want to be home before Ben gets home from his friend's house," Lisa said. She stood on her tiptoes and kissed Dean on the cheek. "Call me." Once he nodded his assent, Lisa grabbed her purse and left.
"I must leave as well," Cas said before he disappeared abruptly in a fluttering of feathers.
"Well then, guess that just leaves us." Seeing the oldest Winchester staring at the ceiling, listening for footsteps, Bobby said, "Go see if your brother needs anything. I'll be down here."
Nodding gratefully at his surrogate father, Dean took the stairs three at a time. He stopped outside the bathroom door and, not hearing the water running yet, opened it and looked inside. Nothing.
Continuing down the hallway, he heard a soft footfall from Bobby's room. Sam stood by the window looking out, brow furrowed in such a familiar way Dean felt his heart leap with joy. He remembered all the hours he'd spent trying to tease a smile out of his studious brother, but he loved his Sammy's serious face that was usually a prelude to some equally serious topic or introspection.
Joining him at the window, he looked out at the back view of the salvage yard. Not the most picturesque scene, but the snow softened the outlines of the broken cars and the sunlight filtered through the clouds with beams of light. Dean didn't know what horrors his brother had suffered at the hands of Lucifer and Michael, but he knew with a certainty that it didn't have as tranquil a setting.
"I'm sorry," Sam said, surprising Dean from his reverie.
Looking into his little brother's earnest hazel eyes, Dean raised an eyebrow. "What could you possibly be sorry for?"
"For giving in. For snapping Bobby's neck. For exploding Cas. For nearly killing you." Sam looked back out the window, but not before Dean saw the sheen of tears in his eyes.
Smiling to hear more words out of the kid than he'd heard in a long time, Dean put his hand on Sam's shoulder. "I don't know if you noticed, Sammy, but all that was fixed. God brought back Cas who healed both Bobby and me."
"God," Sam muttered, his mouth twisting bitterly.
Dean couldn't help but to agree. If God were so mighty, why couldn't he have stepped in a minute sooner and saved Sammy too? But with his brother's form solidly beneath his hand, he couldn't muster up much of that old anger.
"C'mon, Sammy, let's get you cleaned." He went back to the bathroom to start the warm water, Sam following behind. But when he turned around, Sam was standing there with a white-knuckled grip on the bottom of his hoodie, as if he was fighting a battle with himself to get it off.
Dean crossed the short distance between them. "Sammy? What's wrong?" His eyes were drawn to Sam's death grip and only then did Dean see the lines that covered them, glowing pink against his pale skin.
"Show me," he ordered, his blood flowing cold. Unable to fight a direct order from his sibling, Sam stripped off his hoodie and shirt in one move. Carefully folding the clothes, he set them next to the sink, not meeting Dean's eyes.
The rush of blood in his ears was competing with the pounding of the water behind him as he tried to absorb the sight of his brother's body.
Scars decorated every square inch of skin below his collarbone. In some places there was almost symmetry, almost beauty, as if it were only an intricate decoration, not markings left by carving into human flesh.
But in others there lay only cruelty.
Around the anti-possession symbol, there were smiley faces and etchings saying, "Lucifer was here," mocking the tattoo's useless purpose in Hell. Lower, on his abdomen, there were games of tic-tac-toe, which X always won.
Seeing the direction of Dean's eyes, Sam shrugged. "I never won. If I could, he promised me…" He swallowed heavily. "But I never did."
Meeting Sam's tortured gaze, Dean tried to convey how he felt. But he couldn't describe the rioting feelings even to himself.
The hatred and bitter fury towards the fucking bastard that could do this to his brother, his helpless wish that he could take all of the pain off Sammy's scarred shoulders and put them on his own, the well of sorrow at his realization that his innocent kid brother was forever gone.
"Sammy," he breathed and reached out to trace the checkered pattern on his left bicep. He was surprised to feel only skin. No raised flesh, no scar tissue.
"It changes—er, changed every day," Sam said and examined himself with detached curiosity. "He enjoyed my uncertainty of what I would look like the next time he showed me my reflection."
Wanting to punch something, to tear out something's throat and bathe in its blood, soak in its dying screams, nearly overwhelmed Dean. No, not something. Fucking Satan. He wanted Lucifer to suffer for what he'd done to Sam, but he was safely ensconced down in his cage.
Alistair had taken a sick pleasure in torture. Pushing Dean beyond his threshold of pain every single day gave him a perverted sense of joy.
But that didn't even compare to the bored precision of the devil with nothing better to do with eternity.
Sam shrugged with finality and moved past Dean to test the water's temperature. "I need to shower," he said, not turning around to face his brother's stare again.
And not knowing what else to say, Dean left, closing the door behind him.