I have nightmares

msmooseberry

Summary:

I dreamed of Mexico. Mexico without you.

Notes:

A translation of У меня кошмары by Торика.

Endless_Torment did translations of two other fics by Торика - Griffel on gloss and Good people.

Work Text:

The day seemed to drag on for six months. Or the last six months merged into one single day, which was finally drawing to a close and they could soon have a rest. Change out of the dusty street clothes, put on some comfy shorts and a t-shirt, grab a can of coke from the fridge, heat up leftover pasta, recline on the couch and relax the tired muscles. Scoot away from Dad's embrace in a bout of teenage moodiness, but a second later smile at him and scoot back into it. Restart the disc that stayed in the cd-player from the other night because everybody is comfortable and content for once and nobody is in the mood to argue about what movie to watch next, or who is going to get up and put it on.

The Diaz brothers didn't have a TV anymore, they had no cd-player, nor any discs. No couch, no pasta, no coke from the fridge. No comfy shorts or t-shirts, no house to sleep in either, and no Dad who, after finishing an n'teenth shift with no days off or a set schedule, would give them a kind sympathetic smile, ruffle their hair and say, "I know you had a rough day at school, hijo. You did great, you're working so hard, I'm proud of you."

The Diaz brothers only had two backpacks in the back of Karen's car, which broke down on them in the middle of the desert two hundred miles away from the border. But even that couldn't dampen the peaceful drowsiness of the evening. The day had considerably lowered their standards so all they needed to feel safe and sound was to see each other, not unconscious and bleeding out, not being cuffed to the table, held up at gun point and shielded from bullets with a force barrier. All they needed was the ability to take a deep breath of foreign air before having to do anything.

In Mexico night fell very quickly. The world beyond an arm's reach melted into black nothingness, which created an impression that one step would suffice to get lost, although the heated air didn't have time to cool down yet. Daniel got out of the car in the sweater from the gas station, climbed on the roof, and sat there cross-legged since he couldn't see his brother behind the raised hood through the windshield. Sean was aiming the beam of his pocket flashlight onto the unfamiliar parts and resembled Dad an awful lot. He was lacking just a couple of inches to his height and to the width of his shoulders, a wise little crease between the brows, a ragged three-weeks stubble and a shorter haircut. The sight of Sean doing something that Dad usually did made Daniel feel totally at peace.

"How does it look?"

"No better than it did before I opened the hood." Sean slammed the lid with a desperate sigh and sat down on it sideways, pulling one knee up to his chest. If Daniel wasn't getting back inside the car, he wasn't either. They would've seen enough of each other through the glass had they decided to surrender. Would've had around fifteen years of scarce visiting hours, unable to even hug each other, only press phones to their ears and touch the bulletproof partition separating them. The idea of it alone was sickening. "I'm not good at fixing cars."

Sean leaned against the hood a few inches away from Daniel's feet, feeling sleepy, and his brother squeezed his shoulder in support. Sean's lips formed into a soft grin.

"It would've been much easier if Dad was with us."

Daniel chuckled, and it sounded genuine for a change, with no hint of pain or sorrow.

"So much easier we wouldn't be driving through Mexico in Mom's old car at all?"

They both fell silent, but it wasn't a tense kind of silence. The memories of Dad no longer created a bitter lump in their throats, nor did they make their eyes sting, but rather left a sense of quiet melancholy and gratitude. Like scars which eventually stop being associated with suffering and remind of solace and relief that come after the wounds have closed and healed.

"Maybe we can still go like this? I bet the car's not too heavy, I'll move it with my power."

"For a whole hundred miles?"

"We don't have to take it all the way to Dad's house. Sooner or later we'll come across a garage. We'll start pushing it when we're close and say we just broke down."

It's amazing how fast the both of them grew up. Six months ago Daniel was squealing in delight while making fake blood from corn syrup, and now he managed to come up with a nice plan to solve their 'out-of-commission vehicle' problem and find help without getting anyone killed or prompting unwanted questions. Sean learned to survive in this world when he was sixteen. Daniel had to figure it out at ten, and Sean couldn't say if it was good or bad. It would be wrong to expect from kids what one would expect from adults. Kids burn out quicker no matter what.

"No, enano, we've reached your power limit for today."

"Are you serious?"

Daniel sat up straighter in indignation, taking offense, and it caught Sean off guard for a second. Usually letting his brother rest and ditch his chores earned him good points, not the other way round.

"Dude, you've been saving our asses for the past twenty four hours."

"And you've been at it for the past six months."

Sean smiled sadly. It suddenly struck him that he'd never said anything like that to Dad who deserved it most. He'd taken care of them for a lot longer than six months.

Daniel apparently realised that too because he cut himself off abruptly and continued carefully, lowering his voice.

"I can help, Sean."

"I know. And you will. You're the only one who can help us out here. But not before you've slept well and got your strength back. Deal?"

Daniel rolled his eyes but didn't argue. He went down the windshield as if it were a slide and jumped to the ground, dusting off the back of his shorts.

"Deal. Let's go to sleep then."

"What, right now?"

"Isn't that the plan? The sooner we sleep, the sooner you'll let me take us to the mechanics. I'm glad that we're in Mexico, Sean, but I'd rather get to Dad's house than camp out in the desert. It'd be tricky to get any Choc-o-Crisps here."

Sean laughed, watching his brother walk to the back of the car, and couldn't think of anything to say against that. Daniel grabbed the door handle, then stopped short and turned to look at him.

"Front or back?"

"You lie in the back." Sean smiled at him warmly, climbing off the hood.

He was too tall to stretch out his legs in the back seat, but Daniel could sleep there quite comfortably. Sean went for the driver's seat because, although they allowed themselves to relax, it didn't mean they dropped their guard. If they needed to get the hell out of here all of a sudden, it'd be better if somebody was sitting at the wheel: a moving car with no driver in sight could look spooky and trigger people to open fire.

Sean locked the doors, leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. After the numerous times they slept in national parks under the stars, on the battered mattresses in abandoned houses, in tents or on the floor of freight trains, sleeping in a car, even in a seated position, was practically a luxury.

"Goodnight, Daniel," got him an indistinct mumble in return. Superwolf could appear brave and insist on doing what other kids his age would never pull off, but he really needed a break. A long and proper one. They both did.

Sean fell asleep almost instantly, feeling not at home exactly, but like he was standing on the threshold already.

His back got stiff, making him want to go out and stretch, closer to sunrise, which was extremely lucky. Were he to step out of the car in the middle of the night, seeing only impenetrable darkness in front of him, his story could've ended right then and there. But when his foot didn't find any purchase Sean reflexively gripped the back of his seat and glanced down.

The car was suspended in the air two hundred feet above the ground, which was pretty invigorating even at such an early hour and despite the fact that he'd hardly had a few hours of sleep.

Sean's mouth went dry and he firmly shut the door, pressing his back into the seat hard. He spent a couple of minutes trying to slow down his heartbeat: put his palms over his face, breathed in slowly through his nose until his lungs started to burn. Then he gathered the courage to twist around and look at his brother. Daniel was deeply asleep and didn't thrash or moan but faced his pain and fears in silence, so that only his anxiously knitted brows and pursed lips gave them away. It was another reminder that he had grown up: he was forced to accept much earlier than other kids that his tears and complaints wouldn't get him anywhere. Still, suppressing emotions always ends badly, and even normal people can let it slide four times in a row, but explode on the fifth one. As for Daniel, as of late, his outbursts had never not resulted in disasters.

"Enano…" Sean moaned quietly, glancing outside the window.

His first thought was to simply wake Daniel up, which was logical perhaps, but in their current situation was far from the best choice. When someone is harshly pulled out of sleep they feel disoriented for a while. How many seconds would it take for the car to plummet to the ground when Daniel loses control over it and it gets seized by gravity again? Would Superwolf be able to understand what's happening and catch it mid-air in time?

It could've been easier, if only Daniel wasn't afraid of heights, but the circumstances were clearly against them. Waking Daniel up from his nightmare just to thrust him into this nightmarish reality was the worst idea ever. One fear multiplied by another neutralized both of them solely when it was all about pluses and minuses in a third grade math class.

In real life, however, problems rarely had one concrete solution or one single answer.

Sean slowly blew out all the air he had in his lungs through his lips and mentally greeted Dad, wishing he would hear him and help them.

He braced himself and in one jerky motion stepped over the gearbox to the back of the car. It rocked and tilted underneath him and Sean felt sick, then quickly landedr on the edge of the seat and pulled his brother's head into his lap. Daniel winced at such a rude intrusion into his personal space and started regaining consciousness. Before he fully came to, Sean swiftly threw a seat-belt over him and then over himself, fastening them with shaking hands. It probably wouldn't save them, but could somewhat improve their chances at survival. And at the moment Sean would be glad to raise those at least by one-percent.

"Don't panic," he whispered soothingly and patted his brother's head in a heavy awkward gesture. "I'm right here."

"Sean?" Daniel groaned, haunted and distressed, and made a move to sit up. Sean stopped him gently but firmly. "What's happening?"

"Everything's fine, we'll get through this."

The car started creaking and trembling and Sean's vision swam. He kept his gaze trained on the window and deliberately held Daniel down. The kid was trembling too.

"Eeeasy, enano."

"What did we get into? What did I do?"

"You thought about our safety. Nobody would get us so far up."

The muscles of Sean's face contorted with the effort he put into smiling. His eye also ached from peering down and struggling to calculate the distance.

"We're in the air?!"

"Stay calm. Nothing bad happened yet, we'll fix it."

Sean's fingers brushed hot damp skin: Daniel's forehead got covered with little beads of sweat.

"What should I do?"

"Looks like you lifted the car in your sleep. Try to let go of it bit by bit, okay?"

His ears were ringing, his chest felt like it was being constricted. If Sean hadn't skipped physics, he would've known at what altitude the air gets so thin people black out from hypoxia. Or maybe it was for the best because this information probably wouldn't have let him think clearly right now.

"No, Daniel, no, it's getting worse."

"Got it, this isn't 'letting go' then."

Daniel whimpered and pushed his face into Sean's lap. His forehead was burning, like a hot stove, and Sean noticed him clawing at the upholstery from the strain.

Sean swallowed down the irritation that rose in his throat: he could never know in advance how else Daniel's power would manifest. Unfortunately, little brothers with superpowers didn't come with instructions.

Daniel tried doing the opposite of what he did before and the car heavily sank a little lower.

"Good job, little cub, you're doing great. Keep it up."

"It's hard," Daniel complained but didn't drop it. And Sean could only guess how hard it really was.

Blood seemed to have drained from his whole body from the stress, his hands were ice cold. He put one on his brother's forehead and hoped it would make him feel a bit better. Daniel was panting for breath and whining something unintelligible, as his nails were tearing into the old upholstery.

"Shh. It's all good. You're doing amazing."

Sean sensed it when his brother lost control for a second: the car dropped down thirty feet at once, Daniel yelped, and Sean forgot for a few terrifying moments what his lungs needed to do to get oxygen. His head felt ready to burst.

"It's okay, Daniel. It's nothing."

He wouldn't be surprised if it turned out they'd been lowering the car for a whole day. But when the ground was finally a bearable distance away a tight ball of nerves in Sean's chest began to uncoil and he was able to let out a deep breath. Even if Daniel didn't have the strength to hold them afloat the rest of the way down, were they to fall they would get away with bruises. The tires would get busted as well, but at least they'd still be able to walk. In the last six months they learned that if they were in a shape good enough to run nothing could stop them.

Daniel was wiped out, it was obvious, and yet he didn't let go until Sean gave him the go-ahead. A minute or so after they started their descent Sean dropped his tense smile that was supposed to calm Daniel down, but now his lips lifted in happy relief on their own.

"That's it, captain Diaz. You're cleared for landing."

The car jumped slightly when it touched the ground, and Daniel gave a strong whole-body shudder, then gripped his brother's knees and wept.

"I'm sorry!"

Sean rubbed his back, damp and rigid, attempting to lift him up and sit beside him, but then realised that he didn't have any strength left for it either.

"Don't worry, enano, we've made it. You can relax."

Which was easier said than done, Daniel kept shaking for several more minutes and Sean didn't want to leave him alone in the car, but he let himself slump against the seat, open the window and smoke a cigarette in victory, leisurely watching the Mexican sand seep in the morning sun and not staring at it until he saw stars.

Daniel sniffled and rolled on his back, while his head remained lying on his brother's lap. Sean ruffled his hair, noting how his gaze was fixed on the roof of the car.

"Feel better?"

"Yeah."

He sounded normal, but Sean had lived with his brother long enough to be able to tell when he was okay and when he was still getting there. He didn't want to bother him with questions so soon after what they'd gone through, but speaking of sunshine and rainbows instead would also be weird. Sean considered how he should better formulate it and opted for something neutral that would resemble polite curiosity rather than interrogation.

"What did you dream about?"

"Mexico."

Sean didn't plan this conversation in bullet points, but Daniel's fast and straightforward answer crushed all of his possible options into dust. Sean knew that out of the two of them he believed in Mexico much more than his brother, but he kept hoping for some reason that Daniel was at least not opposed to the idea. His voice got hoarse and the words came with immense difficulty.

"You have nightmares about Mexico?"

"About Mexico without you."

"Why without me?" Sean brushed his brother's sweat-soaked bangs away from his forehead and gave him a small warm smile. That clarification was somehow very touching.

"Because you were shot at the border." That made Sean flinch. He saw his brother being shot at, on multiple occasions, and it wasn't anything deadly or very serious, which didn't make it less scary though. As cynical as it sounded, Sean had got over his father's death because his brother was always by his side. And if he had lost him too Sean doubted his life would've had any meaning. Sean wasn't about to ask his brother for details but after a few moments' silence Daniel spoke up again. "We crossed the border, but I couldn't hold the barrier and stop all the bullets. They got you in the throat. You never took a single breath on the other side."

Two more tears rolled out of Daniel's eyes and slid down his temples, Sean clumsily wiped them away, although his brother's face remained wet and tear-stricken.

"It didn't happen, little cub. And it won't happen, ever."

"It better not." Daniel bent his knees and pushed back a little, propping himself on one elbow in a half-lying position so that he could look Sean in the eye. Sean turned as well to meet his gaze. "I'm glad we're in Mexico. Really. But even if it wasn't Mexico, but Canada, or Brazil, I would've come there with you. I would go anywhere with you. That's why I want you to promise me, I need you to promise me, Sean, that the story of the wolf brothers will never end. That it will continue forever."

Sean dropped down on his elbows to press his forehead against Daniel's. And when he replied he was being completely honest.

"I promise."