A/N: Humm... yeah, I got nothing cool to say this time. So I'll go right into explaining tonights oneshot... I was having a bad day yesterday (today was a GREAT day though!), and so to let it out, I wrote this one shot. It is not a death fic, but is really not a happy one either. I don't suspect many people will like it, but I'll give it out to you anyways. Enjoy!
Title: I Killed a Mockingbird
Genre: back to my angst!
Summary: Dean is forced to kill... and is having a hard time dealing with it.
"No! No Sam, no!" Dean's scream could have been heard halfway down the block, but it was just meant to be heard across the room.
"Dean!" Sam's equally loud response came as one word.
Dean squeezed the handle of his gun as he pointed it towards the middle of the dark room. Moonlight splashed through a broken window, sending glimpses of the scene into view. But it wasn't enough. There was three things that Dean knew were in the room with him; a powerful echo demon, a seventeen year old girl, and Sam.
Only one would live to see the sun rise.
Dean sat on the soft bed and stared down at his hands. There was still blood on them; stained into his skin as a sick reminder of how the night went. He cringed at the thought of whose blood it was, and paused to think if perhaps there was his own on there; that maybe he was injured.
Dean quickly found he didn't care.
"Hey," a voice jostled Dean out of his brooding, "You ok?"
Dean looked up; a twinge of a smile on his face as Sam took up residence on the bed across from him. His little brother had just finished his shower and now wore nothing but sleeping pants; revealing his cut up torso.
"I'm fine Sammy," Dean cleared his throat, "How about you?"
Sam reached for some bandages that he'd left on the end table, "I'll be alright," he saw Dean stare back down at his hands, "Why don't you go take a shower? Clean up."
Dean stared as Sam worked on patching himself up, "But--"
"I'm fine," Sam insisted, "Go."
Dean numbly nodded his head, and stripped off his outer shirt as he walked to the bathroom. Turning on the water as hot as he could bear, Dean stripped, stepped underneath, and let the water run down his back. Turning the water even hotter, Dean stayed until his skin started to turn pink and tears of both physical and emotional pain filled up inside him.
"Dean!" a pound came at the door, "You alright?"
"Yeah!" Dean called back out.
The older brother turned off the water and stepped fully into the steam filled bathroom. He realized quickly why Sam usually left his clothes on the bed when he took a shower as Dean dried off and put on his damp pajama bottoms and an old t-shirt. Finally he emerged into the significantly cooler living area of the hotel, and noted with relief that Sam had covered all the major wounds he'd accumulated.
Sam furrowed his eyebrows, "You were in there for like half an hour."
"Sorry," Dean grabbed a bottle of water and took back residence on the bed.
Sam sighed and sat down opposite, "Dude, what's wrong?"
Dean washed his hand over his face before whispering, "… I killed her."
Sam paused; that's what he thought was wrong. Indeed only one person made it through the scuffle inside the abandoned house in the middle of nowhere. It was also a fact that Dean had been responsible for getting rid of the other two things.
"Don't Dean," Sam shook his head, "Don't do that to yourself-- you did what you had to do."
"I didn't have to shoot her Sam," Dean made eye contact with his brother, and Sam saw the hurt and pain swimming in his eyes.
"Dean," Sam swallowed hard, "That demon was going to kill me. The only way to stop it, was to stop her."
"She was just a kid," Dean mumbled out, wishing he had something stronger than water in his hand.
"A kid who was controlling a demon who had already killed four people, and was gunning for a fifth," Sam reminded, "Dean… you know as well as I do that this job is dangerous. Both for us, and them."
"Those kind of demons take over a persons mind," Dean ignored what Sam told him, "Once they start toying with the demon, they can't control it anymore. That girl had no idea what the hell she was doing."
"But you did," Sam placed a hand on Dean's arm, "Dean… you saved me. I would have done the same thing for you."
Dean got up and paced to the other side of the room before turning around, "That's the problem Sam. How many innocent people are we killing just to save each other? I mean… we're not so innocent ourselves."
"How many innocent people are we saving by what we do?" Sam countered back getting to his own feet, "Dean, that girl may not have been knowing what she was doing-- hell, for all we know, she was trying to stop it, but the fact of the matter is that she couldn't. She was killing people, and she needed to be stopped. I know it sucks man, but it had to be done."
"You're right it sucks!" Dean shot out, "This whole fricken system of killing evil sucks. I mean, Mom died to save you," Sam cringed at this, but Dean went on, "Dad died to save me, I'm--" Dean's voice caught in his throat, "I'm going to die to save you. This war is going to end, and there'll be nobody left to win!"
"There will be," Sam insisted firmly, "Those people that would have died from the demon tonight will still live. All those people we've saved will still live. There's just sacrifices to be made Dean, and choices we have to make."
Dean sat back on the bed and spoke softly, "She shouldn't of had to die Sam."
Sam swallowed hard and sat back on his own bed, giving Dean a sympathetic look. The younger brother had no idea what to say; sometimes to save the world… you have to kill a mockingbird.