The Bible Never Mentioned Us-

A/N: If updates seem like they're slowing down a lot in the near future, it's because I'm a news reporter. I've had some pretty tight deadlines recently. Popping over here to relieve occupational stress. ;)

AN 2/

The dates in this chapter were based on the fact that most of the canon events mentioned in this chapter happened at the beginning of May for each season and Sam was born on May 2nd.

This was inspired by Birdy's "Let Him Go" which is a version of Passenger's "Let Her Go" on BBC Live Lounge. This song was the song that helped me overcome suicide as a teenager. If you are experiencing depression, hold on for a while. There may be no saving us. The Bible never mentions us, but life is sacred and we can share it for a while.

Jack had resigned himself to his fate. Sam had not. Sam was desperate to save him, to please him in any way he could. So, when Jack decided to host a birthday party for everybody in the bunker so he could celebrate with them one last time, Sam jumped at the idea. Dean, however, was not pleased.

"I don't understand...Jack wants this and needs this. Why are you so tense about it?" Sam was agitated. Dean was frosting one of three cakes on their kitchen table. Other members of their ragtag family were milling around the kitchen, filling snack orders and decorations that were part of their communal party.

"No reasons. It's cool, man. Why don't you go check on the kid? He's trying to hang a pinata in the library." Dean smiled coolly. Sam tilted his head. He took Dean's arm by the bicep.

"Are you okay?" Sam bit his lip. Dean's face was totally calm, but his lips were pursed a little. Dean always formed that little fretful shape with his lips when he was carefully controlling his tears. Dean smiled at Sam. And it was a ridiculous, ivory white and ridiculous one that let all his teeth catch in the sparkling candles Cas was testing.

"Mm, no, I'm good, bud. Go check on Jack." Dean nodded. Sam's face said he wasn't buying Dean's bill of goods for a second but he could also clearly tell that Dean didn't want to talk about this in front of everyone else.

Mary wouldn't leave it alone.

"Come on, Dean. We can all tell that you're lying. What is it? You're not much for parties?" Mary tilted her head, smiling. Dean grew suddenly defensive.

"No...No, I like parties fine. It's birthdays that I don't care much about." Dean swallowed, trying to keep the fake smile flickering across his face. Cas' eyes went wide. He already knew where this was going. He was the one who heard Dean's silent prayers and right now he was subconsciously begging God not to make him confess to this.

"I know your Dad was hard on you growing up, but birthdays are special. We could make this one different for you, Dean. I mean I know it's not your actual birthday but we could make it sort of a celebration for the first 40 we all failed to celebrate…" Mary's voice was tender and sad. Dean's shoulders arched like he was expecting a beating.

"Oh, no...If I can have a case of brews and a good action flick on my birthday I'm golden. It's because of Sam that I don't like birthdays…."Dean smiled. He was completely oblivious to what he'd just said. Mary shook her head.

"What? So he's like a little dictator about celebrations or something? Does he make them miserable?" Mary laughed. But Dean slammed down the cake platter back arching all the way like a cat whose paw was stung by a wasp.

"Yes...yes he makes his birthday, in particular, a god-awful, hellish experience." Dean's voice cracked. Mary tilted her head.

"Sam's not the kind to make a big deal about himself?" Mary laughed hoarsely, not yet understanding. Dean stood up all the way slapping the cake plate away from him.

"Oh, he wouldn't. But that didn't keep him from dying on his damn birthday three freaking times!…" Dean's voice was a claymore cleaving straight through the bones of everyone in proximity. Mary flinched looking up slowly.

Dean excused himself from the room.

Cas reached to continue frosting the cake only to find that Dean had made off with the knife.

"Don't...Mary, don't go after him. This is a problem that Sam will have to help with…"Cas held his breath and closed his eyes. He had seen what Dean had seen.

Look at me. It's not even that bad. It's not even that bad, alright?

Except that it was. Cas shook his head. For Dean, in that brief second had seen a dark and stormy night years and years ago...The night of Sammy Winchester's 24th birthday.

"SAM!" Dean had never felt a greater rush of relief in his life. There was his brother, standing in the mud of Cold Oak. He was holding his wounded arm, panting as he trudged away from the gore and evil of Azazel's gladiator field.

"Dean!" Sam's face brightened upon sight. Dean was here. This was the first night of the rest of their lives, of all that they survived and would survive. Dean's heart had jumped with happiness to think that here he was as young as he'd never be again. Butch and Sundance they would grow old together.

Unless.

"Sam, watch out!" All of Dean's hopes sank to his stomach right before the meteorites of his life blasted apart in him. It was funny how in three steps Jake Talley had taken all of that away. A knife wedged into the thin little cord that was Sam's spine. And a bird chirp cry from the little brother who would never get older.

One last moment...Dean caught him. Watched him, in denial as Sam's eyes floated over his face, letting his brother's face be the last thing he ever saw.

"Sam!" Dean shook his brother. His brother, so alive a moment ago, stumbling falling, head rolling, blood filling up Dean's hand.

Say something…Say anything! Dean had thought it screamed it from the center of his soul. And it echoed back on him. This boy who had followed him everywhere. Whose first and last steps had been walking toward him. Whose first and last word had been used to frame his name.

Dean had retreated like a snail rolled in sea salt into a boiler room's impossible dark gearbox. A knife was in his hands, but this one was covered in cake frosting. In the birthday cake frosting that acted like a veneer to hide all the breaks in Dean's heart because this history had a way of repeating itself. Another day in another life had dawned. Sam's 35th birthday had come and gone in Apocalypse world.

"We're getting close...Can't you feel it?" His smile...His smile was the last light in this fallen world. Dean's heart thrilled with relief.

Dean had driven the knife into his palm without knowing it. Blood welled between his fingers. His blood and Sam's blood. The blood of the same parents flowed through their veins, didn't it? But Sam...He saw Sam in that cave with the vampires. Sam...Who had followed Dean down this dark road, whose first steps and last had been spent trying to get to Dean...Whose first and last word was his name...Again….

Dean choked, as the blood ran from his lip which he'd just bitten. Because he recalled now, so many years later than the first time, that it was also on or near Sam's birthday the day the deciding battle of the Apocalypse had been. The memory came back unbidden.

Lucifer's fist stopped mid-air becoming Sam's once more. The light rose into the boy's eyes. It was the dawn of his 27th year alive and it was the dusk of all his days at once. And Dean was there in the end. Dean was still there. Still clutching his arm even though everything he touched surely died.

"It's okay, Dean. It's all gonna be okay…"

It wasn't.

"I've got him…."

And he was gone.

Hours passed. The birthday party came and went and Dean was not found. Sam was so busy trying to make Jack comfortable and happy while Rowena searched for a cure, he hadn't noticed his brother was hiding from the light.

"Hey. Where's Dean?" Sam swung by the kitchen again. Where Mary and Bobby were sitting, chatting over coffee.

"Oh, he left. I upset him. It was an accident but…"Mary smiled like it didn't matter like her apologetic smile made that okay. But hadn't she looked for him? Could she really think that one bonding conversation made it alright? Dean needed her…

"Upset him? How?" Sam tilted his head, feeling a stab go through his heart.

"Oh, he...I kept prying. I wanted to know why Dean doesn't like birthdays." Mary smiled.

"What? He doesn't like birthday parties...He...He never told me that? What did he say?" Sam swallowed, oblivious. Mary shrugged.

"He...um...He said you...you died three times on your birthday?" Mary frowned.

Sam felt his heart shatter. Oh. Oh God. He'd not remembered that little detail. His own birthday had been so far from his mind for so so long…. For one simple reason that Dean had left out.

"Oh, Dean...It would be like him to neglect to mention he also died on my birthday once…or more?"Sam's breath caught. Mary looked up amazed. Sam had fled the room, looking for his brother.

Sam was calling him almost as soon as he'd slipped from the kitchen. His fingers shook, smearing purple cake dye like blood and bruises of their lives over the screen of his phone. He swallowed, ringing Dean 7 or 8 times.

Say something…

But Sam knew he wouldn't say anything. Because Dean...Dean was near to giving up. He could shoulder almost anything. Anything but celebrations. Because birthdays and funerals had something in common for Dean Winchester. They all ended with fire and smoke and wishes that never came true.

"Dean!" Sam called out hopelessly and the house called back to him. And the sound of Dean's heart giving up….

And then he heard it, Dean's phone ringing. From the gearbox of the old boiler room contraption.

Sam climbed in it, nearly ripping the door off. He was afraid. Afraid of what Dean might do to himself now with the way that things were going….

Sam climbed in. There...There was Dean head leaning against the boiler shaft. Steam had made his hair stand on ends. Blood ran from his lip and from his hand that he'd pressed to his heart. And Sam would have thought he was dead, the way he lay, but tears ran from his eyes.

Sam pressed closer to him. He took the knife from his fingers and cut a piece from his shirt, wrapping the band around Dean's hand. Dean's lips twitched and he looked up at the roof.

"It was the happiest day of my life...The day you were born. My first friend and my last had debuted on the world." Dean sniffed back a laugh and then he sobbed. A soft cracking sob. A horrified dry heave sound.

"You're gonna ask me if I'm okay. I'm not…"

"Dean?" Sam pressed closer. Dean shook his head. His eyes closed and tears streamed from his eyes.

"You had your peace...Before I brought you back. If you had never gotten older. If I had left you alone. I thought I was doing the right thing, seeing to it that you lived past 24...Sammy...It's my fault you suffered all these years…"Dean beat his head against the pipe.

Sam had no response to that. He burst into tears too. He took Dean's face letting the tears run with the dye from the cake frosting. Dean let out another shaking breath. Sam laughed and then Dean laughed. And then he gasped.

"You would never have gotten older...You'd never have had to walk through the middle of all that…"Dean chewed his lip and blood ran down his chin. Sam thumbed it away.

"And the world would have burned." Sam swallowed.

"When you saved me….You saved the world." Sam gasped. Dean took Sam's face in fierce bloody hands.

"I see you dying every time I close my eyes. I see you dying and living. You could have had Jessica...I pulled you away from her. Your dreams. Every dream. Gone so fast. Because of me. I would have died for you again and again and again. Make Mystery Spot look like something fun. To keep you from that. To let you have a life. And I'll be damned,...so much worse than what happened to me downstairs...Sam! I'm the reason why you…"Dean let out a soft cry through his teeth.

"I hate your birthday. And I love it. Because once upon a time, you were a tiny, innocent little baby wrapped in a blue blanket on that day. And little innocent baby brother that Mom put in my arms, one that cried and turned red in the face until his tiny hand latched onto my fingers. All your dear life hanging on to me, like I was your hope. But just like that you were an innocent baby brother pushed into my arms by Dad and the whole damn world was burning down." Dean bit his lip, eyes popping wide open and blood mixed with his tears again.

"Blink again...Just once. And once again you're an innocent little brother dropped in my arms by a crazy with a knife. And that was the last time. The last time you were shiny eyed and innocent and in my arms. You...You were mine. And I couldn't protect you!" Dean cupped Sam's face.

"And you may be here in the body, but don't kid yourself. The you that you were, my little brother, he died a long, long time ago. I didn't know how much that I…"He still couldn't say it but it was known. He'd only ever known how much this love...When he'd been forced to let go. Sam nodded. He knew that feeling.

"I never stopped...Sam...I never stopped grieving. I couldn't save you! I couldn't save you…" Dean shook his head holding Sam's face. He screamed but it was muted by his teeth and came out as a sigh instead. Sam shook his head.

"No, Dean...But it's not your fault. You were never gonna be able to save me or my dreams because there was no salvation...mm...Not for me. That's the way it is, Dean. If I didn't go into the fire, the world wouldn't be here. In this case, I was Isaac, Jake was Abraham with the knife...But for you being the Righteous Man, but for being the ram that got stuck in the thicket our lives were not a Bible story. The Bible never mentioned us. There would be no one to take my place." Sam's eyes were wide. Dean shook his head.

"It's not. It should be me taking your place. Every time. That would be my happy ending…"Dean swallowed.

"Yeah, but then this would be a fairy tale. But Dean, there was never any storybooks that were gonna save me. Not the gospel true ones, not the evening news...Not the legends or the myths. There was for real no saving me. There's no saving me, in the end. This will end bloody. This will end bad." Sam shook his head. Dean was bawling again.

"Shh...You always knew it was gonna be that way. Honest to God...There by the grace, Dean, you always knew it was gonna be like that. I can't be saved. You can't be saved. And together we're the scapegoats and the whipping boys...But we save the world...And...And we can share it for a while." Sam smiled. And then Dean was hugging him, fiercely. Holding onto him who was never his to keep.

"Pppplllleaasee…." He hissed into Sam's shoulder.

But the Universe whispered "No."