Sam stood in the small room between the exterior door and the once-locked door that permitted entrance to the bunker. He hadn't been back in over a week, and felt a slight twinge of something unidentifiable, being back. He considered going back inside, seeing the damage done, but he thought better of it. That was in the past, best leave as much of it there as possible.
Instead he got to work on the sigils that were next to the door. A bit of legacy blood, a few magic words. He could feel the rumbling in the floor as the spell activated. He could hear the creak and groans of the wood as it settled itself back in place, could hear the crack of stone propping itself up. The weird crunch of tiles correcting their broken surfaces. The men of letters bunker would likely never cease to amaze him.
He had one more piece of business to attend to before he went in. He located the runes that had initiated the lockdown to begin with. He had spent the last few days working out what he was going to do to it, considering disarming it altogether, but Cas had helped him with an obscure text. Together they had devised what he thought was a better fix.
In the case of something supernaturally dangerous in the future, the alarms would sound. The bunker would lock itself as it's intended to do. However, with activation of a new rune, which Sam carefully etched into a brick on the interior of the bunker, the lockdown could be ended by them, but only them, at any time.
They would never again become prisoners in their own home. Because honestly, if they live through this shit a third time, Sam swears he is going to drop a nuke in here and never return, no matter how much Dean loved their subterranean home.
Days later, Sam found himself smiling as he grabbed a few articles of Dean's clothes and packed them into a duffel bag. He gave the room another once over, glad that it would soon be occupied by his brother once more. Turning off the light, he headed back towards the library.
Cas was unloading another box, lining the shelves with new books that Sam had selected from the archives, making room for new materials and knowledge to be easily at their fingertips. With the structures repaired, it had only taken Sam and Cas two days to clear out the remaining dust and shattered furniture. Dean had, from his recovery room in the hospital, already ordered an entire new set of furniture similar to the old tables and chairs that filled the library (and of course a new mini fridge because heaven forbid they walked the whole thirty feet to the kitchen every time they wanted a beer).
"He's coming home today?" The angel asked, eyes falling on the duffel bag in Sam's hand and the hunter's slight smile.
"Yeah. He's driving the nurses crazy. I'm sort of surprised he hasn't broken out already. He's been itching to go for days."
Truthfully he had been itching to go from the second he regained consciousness, but Sam had convinced him to stay until his symptoms faded.
Sam had no delusions. There wasn't going to be a long stint in rehab like the doctors wanted. There wasn't going to be lifelong meetings or complete lifestyle overhauls. Dean was going to laugh this incident off as a 'tolerance break' or something and never speak of it again.
However, Sam knew that this entire incident was a better intervention than any of them could pull off. Dean would be more careful. He would be back to his old ways but… this time he was hopeful his brother could keep himself in control.
And more importantly, if not, Sam felt confident he now had a strong enough backbone to stand up and steer his brother forcefully onto the right path for good.
For now though, he was content to just be thankful that the entire thing was behind them. That everyone had come out more or less unscathed, and life could get back to semi-normal. Whatever that meant for them.
Soon they would be on the road again. Saving people. Hunting things. Team Free Will.
It was over.