In Medias Res (3/6)
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dime_lioraEaton, Colorado October 2nd, 2008
"Sam fought for scholarships and went to college because he couldn't stand the idea of losing you. He thought if he could put distance between you then he'd be able to handle it when he got the call that you were gone. Which was a desperation move if I've ever seen one, because I can promise you he never would have gotten over it. Please don't, we're having a perfectly civil conversation." It takes Dean a whole ten seconds to figure out she's talking to someone standing behind him instead of just not being able to meet his eyes. He weighed his options as a friendly Midwestern voice spoke at his back.
"I'm gonna take that gun out of your pants friend, and then you're going to stand up and sit next to your brother. You twitch though, and I fill him full of buckshot." Dean keeps his eyes on her face in an attempt to remain civil, but the urge to attack before he can put Sam in danger is pretty fucking overwhelming.
"I don't think that's necessary. Doc is right after all. Civil conversation."
There's a laugh from behind him, shockingly real, and then a hand brushes up his shirt and removes his gun smoothly and easily. "Winchesters don't have civil conversations. How you doing babe?"
Her eyes move to Dean's face then. "I am perfectly fine. I wish you wouldn't threaten Sam."
"I wish you wouldn't add to the reasons the demons are out to kill you. I wish you'd, just once you know, make a decision with that big old brain of yours. Instead every time I come back here you've made some new crazy mistake."
Dean watches all expression leave her face, watches her eyes slip shut, and then she leans back in the armchair and rubs at her temples. "Then stop coming back. In the meantime I'm going to tell Dean what I told his brother, and then you can go over your miracle cure. Get us some beer and put the gun down."
There's a second where Dean's sure the cold metal of a shotgun is going to brush him, and he's prepared to try a disarming technique, but it never comes. Instead there's a whisper of sound and then a man almost as tall as Sam walks past him. From here Dean can see that he's lanky like Sam, and that his hair is short, bristly, and bright blonde. He's wearing jeans and a flannel that suggest he's never been comfortable anywhere that doesn't serve chicken tenders. Dean's kind of guy really. If he wasn't threatening Sam a few moments ago.
"You still drinking that Canadian bullshit, or did you finally buy something American?"
"Shut up." Her face is still expressionless, but her voice carries a hint of affection that surprises Dean. When she finally looks at him again there's confusion in her gaze. "Are you one of Nate's hunter friends? He rarely brings anyone here. He must really like you."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
Her face pales a bit and she leans back from him. "I-I'm not sure-"
Nate comes back in then, three beers in his hand and a soft look on his face. "Yeah you gotta get some Coors or something babe. This is ridiculous." He sees the look on her face and drops all three bottles onto the coffee table before kneeling in front of her.
"Too many people for you to keep track of huh Sadie? It's ok. It's October. 2008. That's Dean Winchester, and you taught his brother how to go to Hell. Remember?"
That look of confusion deepens for a second, and then she shows the most life she has since Dean arrived. Her cheeks flush red, and her eyes go to the floor even though Nate's holding her face steady so he can study her.
"I got lost. Sorry." She sounds like a little girl in that moment, and Dean's eyes stray to Sam. How long has she been back exactly, and how hard has it been to get her here? How long will it take Sam? He can't go on hunts like that. Can't question victims or check out leads, because who knows when he'll lose track of whatever it is he's supposed to be doing, or when it is. It's not hard for Dean to guess that only the other hunter's presence keeps her from panicking. What would happen if Sam got lost like that without him?
"It's ok babe. Happens. I see you made pie. Did you think it was Tuesday?"
Sadie's head is shaking before her lips start moving. "We don't do Tuesdays anymore. Not in years. You hunt and I teach now. It's 2008. That's Dean Winchester and I'm helping him figure out what happened to his brother because I helped break him. Take a seat because you have to cover the fixing part."
Nate sits beside her on the floor and puts one hand on her knee as he studies Dean. "She do the reveal yet, or is she still wandering around the story?"
Dean's almost amused, but he looks to Sam and that dies pretty quickly. Instead he grips his hands between his knees and leans towards them. "It's all Tarantino here. You got a way to focus her?"
There's silence as light blue eyes take him in and Dean takes this chance to really look the guy over. To see the heavy ring of scars on his throat as if it had been ripped out. He thinks of his own chest, and wonders how hard it was for her to see that. How hard it was for Sam to see him. Then Nate turns to her and strokes her hair. There's a hesitance in his hand, a kind of slow wonder, and Dean has to ask himself for the third or fourth time just how deep in it he and Sam really are. How long the road out is going to be.
"Sadie. Tell Dean about your dissertation and your research. How you put theory into practice. Remember?"
-------
Cambridge, Massachusetts December 22nd, 2001
She remembers that she's supposed to sleep, but it's hard to make that take a back seat to what's taking shape in front of her. The computer has been running for hours now, and her fingers are sore, but she's pretty sure that if she goes just a little bit longer she can finish. If she finishes…
She's honestly surprised that her dissertation director didn't laugh at her. They were so excited about the Quantum Mechanics thing, and eventually she'll tell them she finished it already, and they can read it whenever they want. Harvard has strict non-spoken policies on its students not letting them down, and she's been teaching three courses ABD while working on her dissertation and that. Sadie doesn't really remember what sleep is like. She has nine messages on her machine from Nate, and if she doesn't call him back soon he'll just show up. He always does. It's not his fault that she understands now the difference between what used to be mythology and reality, but he's been pretty hard on himself about it.
Sadie doesn't have delusions about herself. Since she was nine and they first tested her everything has been on a singular track. The only outlier in her damn life has been Nate. He's the only one who never saw her as the little prodigal, and he's the only one who has worked to make her be human. Geniuses, she knows from studies, walk a very thin line between psychosis and sanity. They have trouble making personal connections, sustaining relationships, keeping track of day to day life. It's a tale as old as time, and she'll admit that if there isn't someone there to remind her every now and then to eat or sleep she'll go days without. Which is why she's only half-surprised when a heavy hand lands on her shoulder.
"You haven't been answering my calls babe."
The words blinking in front of her are pretty damning, but he still thinks she's working with the difficult mesh of physics, philosophy, and string theory and he won't read them. "Sorry. Got kinda lost in it. You know how I am."
His touch. His touch is stable and grounding, and she wants to lean into it but she's not supposed to. He's told her more than once that he can't be with her that way because of his work. She argued that maybe he should let that be her decision, but that resulted in a car crash and the mess they're in now. They don't have that kind of time anymore. Time has been on her mind a good deal. She's not sure how time will work once she's down there, or what she'll do when her time is up. She knows what she's going to do when his time is up though.
"How long since you ate?" He's already heading across the loft and to the fridge. She hears him digging around in the fridge, hears him make a thick noise, and then his head is popping back up over the door while she saves the word file and pushes away from her desk. "Babe this Chinese food is so out of date it's growling. You got any real food around here?"
Does she? She's pretty sure she picked up peanut butter and some bread a day or two ago, but with the way her mind has been working she has no way to be certain about that. When he finds the moldy bread she checks her calendar and realizes that it's been over a week since her last grocery run. Sadie remembers that she went the last day of classes. She has to rub her face for a second and try to remember when the Chinese food is from. "How about pizza Nate? There's a place a couple blocks away, and the menu is on the fridge door."
She watches him place the call, and then slips off to shower and change clothes. She's just figured out the sigils, and if she can find the right combination of herbs then she'll be able to open the door. There's a hand on her shoulder and she jumps when she realizes the water is cold and Nate is standing there with his eyes diverted. He's touching her again. "What happened?"
"Pizza is here. You've been showering for an hour. Water's cold babe." There's a tight smile on his face and she waits for him to leave before toweling off and changing into clean clothes. When she comes out he's staring at a book she has open, and there's a tense moment where she's not sure if he'll figure it out. "This don't look like physics."
"It's not. Side project for a fellow scholar. I promised I'd get it done soon." She remembers the calendar. He has one year, six months, and twenty-three days. She goes up for her defense in a week. She has to pick a school that will allow her to take sabbatical shortly after starting there, and that means the Ivy League is right out. They'll be impressed by her C.V., but that doesn't change the fact that she'll need to prove herself as a professor. She can shoot high enough to be able to afford the kind of place she'll need for the ritual, but still pick an institution that will be so impressed they'll give her extra leeway. Her list of potentials has been narrowed down to six, and Boulder is looking promising. There's an old farm there with a well that may have the kind of energy she needs. There's just not enough time. "I like the pepperoni and mushrooms."
His grin is broad and easy, and he holds out a plate with three slices of it even as he chews on a mouthful of whatever mess he's ordered for himself. "You got a pizza place this good nearby and you're eating cold Chinese? I always thought you were kind of stupid."
It's his oldest joke, and she loves it more than any other he tells. Sadie laughs and then starts eating her own. Turns out she was hungry. "Yes. I hear that all the time. How are the hunts going?"
Nate's grin falters. "Dad's in the hospital about thirty miles away. Witch did serious damage to his internal organs. They're doing a lot of tests."
Sadie can't help but glance at the book, and then she focuses on him. "He sent you here so you wouldn't hover? He always hated when you hovered."
"Well he won't have to put up with it much longer." All traces of a good mood are eradicated, and she's not sure if he's hinting that his father is dying, or mentioning his own upcoming death.
"This is where we get drunk right? I'm fairly certain normal people get drunk over this sort of thing." His smile comes back, faltering but there, and she's willing to do anything to keep it. More importantly this may be her last chance to do the first step. She has the incense, and she remembers the words. That's all it's going to take really. She makes him go to the corner store and get the liquor, because she's got a few more pages to write before it's done and that's the best excuse she can come up with. It's true, so he doesn't call her out on the lie. The prep work is minimal. She carves the sigils into the box spring, and then places the incense and anoints herself with the oils. She's had sex before once with a fellow academic at a conference. She remembers the logistics of it.
When he comes back she makes sure that he is drinking more than her, talking as much as she can get him to, and waits for the moment when he's so drunk he's having a hard time paying attention to everything that's going on. He's still aware enough though. "You gotta take care of yourself little girl. Them Harvard boys don't make you be careful." When he's like this he loses all pretenses at not having an accent. Becomes the boy from the small Oklahoman town that she grew up with. She likes it that way.
She stands up slowly and then reaches for the hem of her shirt. "Nate." His eyes catch hers, and then go wide. This is how she remembers it working on television shows. "Nate let's have sexual relations."
He starts laughing, and that makes her hands hesitate. Then she bites her lip and pulls the shirt over her head. His laughter dies. She's not wearing a bra, and the pants she's pulled on have nothing underneath. This is all it takes right? He stares through slightly glazed eyes and then shakes his head.
"Babe. Sadie. We talked 'bout this."
She unbuttons her pants and drops them. Steps closer and keeps his gaze. "I'd like very much to do this. I think it will help you feel better. It will be pleasurable for me as well."
Nate swallows hard and reaches for her before pulling back. "Wait. Wait a sec and let's talk 'bout this 'cause-babe I can't be-ah shit." She sees the moment he gives up. Nate lifts her over his shoulder and then carries her into the bedroom and drops her onto the bed.
"There's incense there. Will you light it? I like the smell." He does, one hand lighting while the other works the button on his jeans. Then he's back in the bed, and he's a big solid wall of muscle and heat. It's hard to focus, hard to keep track, but right after he enters her she whispers in his ear.
"What does that mean?" He moans it out and bites his lip before pulling back.
"It means I love you. I have loved you all this time. You are the only thing I have ever loved."
His eyes clear for half a second, and then there's a softening in his face that makes her feel a flutter in her stomach unconnected to the building spell energies he's too distracted and drunk to feel. He murmurs the words back, and that's just brilliant. That works fine. So she lets herself go and the rest of it is better than she ever imagined.
When she wakes up in the morning he's still there, and she wraps herself in an extra blanket and turns up the clanky heater before settling down in front of the computer. She'll finish this. Step one is complete, and now all she has to do is wait. Which may be the hardest part.
-------
Eaton, Colorado May 8th, 2008
The hardest part is knowing when to leave. A part of Sam wants to talk Dean into coming here. He knows the veil is thin enough that she was able to pierce it once, and she'll know if something is going wrong. He wants very badly for her to be there and to watch everything, because there's only one shot at this. He thinks he has it all down, hasn't had a problem repeating it to her, but that's not a sure thing. Nothing is a sure thing. She's sitting across from him at the table and mechanically chewing a sandwich he knows for a fact she's been working on for over an hour. He reaches out and stops her hand before she bites the sandwich again.
"Sadie. What's the price?"
She looks up from her hand to his face, and as so often happens she can't hold his gaze for very long. "Isn't it obvious? I thought it was obvious." There's suddenly less color to her. "I've never been very good at knowing what is obvious."
"It's ok. I'm not upset. Just-other than what I promise them. What's the price?" He thinks he knows, but he needs to hear her say it.
"Dean will have to figure out how to bring you back to yourself. Anchor you in one time and place. It's not easy and it won't be permanent, but it can be done. Once that's past it will take time for you to remember how to properly take care of yourself again. You forget how important it is to do things. You need a schedule. There has to be a schedule. Then there's the loss of sensation. Things don't really have tastes the way they used to, and pleasure isn't…well as far as I can tell it takes a while to come back." Sadie eyes her sandwich and then puts it down completely. "You'll feel numb at first, and then you'll be overwhelmed, and then it will be both at once. There's no getting past that part. I can't think of anything else off the top of my head."
As if that wasn't enough. As if he needed more. Then her body jerks. "Constipation. There's a lot of that. I suggest investing in fiber."
He can't help it. Sam starts laughing and he can't stop. She looks at him sympathetically. When the spasms subside and he can breathe again he rubs the tears from his eyes and puts his head down. "You make it all so clinical. We're talking about the craziest shit and it's like you're teaching me a book or an equation."
Sadie's hand strokes his hair hesitantly, and then she pulls back and grips her hands together. "That is a surprisingly accurate description of what is happening here. Sam, this isn't the kind of thing that you can just do and walk away from. What we're talking about here-the chances of a mistake are tremendous. I spent years studying every aspect of this, and breaking it down until it was an approachable thing. I did all of that under the nose of several very prominent organizations that were funding me to research something else entirely. So if you're asking me if I'm worried you'll suffer more damage in the cognitive function area the answer is yes. I'm a genius Sam. Have been for a very long time." There's nothing pretentious or proud in her statement. It's delivered wearily, and she keeps her head down as if she's almost ashamed. "On the other hand I'm functionally retarded when it comes to social interaction and emotions. So on that count I have a feeling you'll put my healing process to shame. It's all about context you know. Hey what day is it?"
"It's Tuesday. Why?"
"Nate's coming, or at least he should be. I should bake."
Sam watches her scurry off, and wonders if she's honestly capable of giving him any advice outside of her theory.
--------
Eaton, Colorado October 2nd, 2008
"A theory? You taught my brother a damn theory?"
Sadie's head ducks down and her hands cover her mouth carefully. "Technically in science everything is a theory because-"
"Don't give me that bullshit! You knew he might fuck it up and you gave it to him anyway! He could have-fuck Sammy doesn't understand when he shouldn't do things, and you just handed this to him. All it took was some sob story and puppy eyes. This is dangerous shit lady and you just told him how to-"
"Ok that's enough. Take a breather babe. Let me talk to Dean alone in the kitchen okay?" Which is when Dean really takes her in. She's looking more like Sam with every second, and she nods her head and hunches into herself when Nate pushes himself up and leads Dean out of the room. They end up in the kitchen and the other hunter digs out more beer and hands one to Dean. "Don't ever yell at her again. Got me?"
He still sounds friendly, but the tension in him suggests that he's so on edge it's really just a matter of seconds before he launches at Dean and goes after him.
"You don't understand. You can't-"
"Before we started hunting the supernatural my dad and her dad were real good friends. I was older than her, and I knew her vaguely. Always kinda weird, quiet, didn't talk to a lot of people. She tested out of all these grades. Ended up in high school at the tender age of ten and everybody knew who she was. Knew she was some kind of genius. Her dad talked to my dad, and I got pulled aside and asked to watch over her. Well fuck that I thought, because I was a sophomore and I'd be damned if she was gonna kill my carefully built rep. So the first day I tell her that I got other stuff to do and you know what she says? 'Ok Nathan. I'll be quiet.' Wanders off and I don't see her again 'til the end of the day. Bumped into some older girl and spilled her drink, so this girl starts shouting at her about feeling froggy and wanting to jump." He cracks open his beer and takes a long swallow. "So she jumped. 'Cause she didn't know a damn thing about any of that stuff. Girl thought she was being funny and she and her friends beat the snot out of her. So I pick her up to walk her home and there she is with blood still crusted around her mouth and this lost look on her face. 'What the hell happened' I asked her, and then she said-" He stops and his adam's apple jumps before he takes another gulp of beer. "She told me the story all factual and calm, and then she looks me in the eye and says 'I wasn't supposed to actually jump was I?'"
Dean wants to laugh and cry at the same time. He remembers Sammy being bullied. Remembers the hopeless fury he had, and all the little kids he half-strangled in an effort to keep anyone from even looking askance at his little brother. He nods once and Nate takes it for what it is.
"I rarely let her out of my sight after that. Kept an eye on her all the time, and then senior year my aunt is killed by a Wendigo, and off we go from hunting deer to hunting monsters. I had all the training, just not the focus. I never told her what it was I was really doing 'til I got her killed. Then when she figured it out I had to explain, and she took it all in real quiet and then nodded once and insisted she'd figure something out. I know how it went with you. I can tell you like it was yesterday 'cause I remember how it went with me. You went to face your death like a man, because that's how we were taught it's done. Sam insisted on being there, and then the hellhounds came. The pain is like nothing you ever felt before, and the worst part is you can hear him over the sound of their growling and that choking stench of rotting flesh and sulfur. You can hear him screaming for you, 'cause he knew it was coming but that don't really prepare you for it. Then the light's fading, and you know where you're going, and there he is over you and his eyes are all anguish and regret, but there's determination there. You think to yourself that ain't right, because every time you see determination in those eyes it's right before he does something that proves he ain't half as smart as everybody says he is. So you wanna ask but it's too late and you're dying, and then you hear these words and they mean something, something you heard once before when you were in a whole other version of intimate and close, and then you're gone. But it's only for a few moments, and the next thing you know-"
------
Monks Mound, Cahokia Mounds State Park, Indiana June 3rd, 2008
The next thing he knows is pain. All of his joints are screaming, and his eyes feel like they've been rubbed with sand and sulfur. Blinking sets off a sensation of agony so intense that Dean wonders if he should stop doing it, and then he turns his head towards the sound that woke him. If this is Hell, then the powers-that-be fucked up because Dean has always loved the outdoors. The woman crouching in front of him looks concerned, and her outfit indicates she is a park ranger. A park ranger? He tries to figure out how that would work into a torture scheme and nothing comes to mind. Ruby told him it was like Hellraiser but without all the bondage leather, but this doesn't look anything like that. It looks like a park, and the soft grass underneath as well as the breathtaking view he can see behind the uniformed woman suggests the same thing. The air is clear and warming up rapidly, and the park ranger is reaching out very slowly like she's going to poke Dean but she's worried he'll bite.
He waits, lies perfectly still, and when her fingers connect with his he reaches up despite the screaming of his muscles and grips her wrist as tightly as he can, fingertips searching. When he finds a pulse all the tension goes out of him, and he lets his head bounce against the soft grass when he lets go of her skin. He wants to cry or scream, but he's not sure either response is appropriate and they may be tricking him. This may still be Hell, but he's pretty sure it isn't. Somehow, instinctively, Dean knows Sam got him out. Sammy figured out some ritual or spell, and now here Dean is on a grass hill in some state, and Sam will come collect him when he figures out what happened. Which brings up a whole new universe of questions including where he is and when it is. How long did it take Sam? Why doesn't Dean remember Hell? He fights the agony of his throat and manages to harshly grind out, "When?"
Her eyes are inquisitive, green, and she looks over her shoulder before refocusing on him. "June 3rd, 2008 sir. You've been scaring the tourists all morning. Were you drinking or were you attacked?"
Most mornings Dean could say yes to both, but he swallows against the dry ache in his throat and manages another word. "Attack." Scaring the tourists? When he looks down he realizes his clothes are tattered and torn, and covered in blood. His blood. No wonder they were all so scared. That would be enough, but suddenly his foggy and ruined brain picks up on what she said. June 3rd. Dean was only in Hell a day. What the fuck did Sam do?
"Sir? I need you to focus. The ambulance is on its way, but is that the man that attacked you?"
He tries to turn his head, but the pain is too much. Too much and Dean doesn't want to experience it. Doesn't want to fight against the ground glass making its way through his system. He does it anyway though, because what if it's a demon she's pointing at. Some leftover that followed him out of Hell, and will pop up at any second and rip through her and whatever terrified tourists are standing in the distance no doubt rubber-necking. What he'll do about it is beyond him, but he'll certainly try. He pushes against the knotted and screaming muscles, and then he sees it and the painful slamming of his heart triples and screams at him to calm down before it explodes in his chest. It's not a demon. It's Sam.
What the fuck did Sam do? His hands are dipped in blood, and there's a knife beside him that glints in the light and screams with red. Sam's face is ashen, and his eyes are open but unseeing. There's a brief moment where Dean is back in Cold Oaks, back in that muddy street, but Sam's chest is moving and Dean knows he's breathing. His brother is breathing. He reaches out one shaky hand and actually screams with the pain as he grips the ground and starts dragging himself. He hears the park ranger telling him no, trying to stop him, but she's afraid to touch and Dean's probably a pretty scary sight. He grips handful after handful of the warm earth, smells the richness of the soil and the fresh scent of grass, and then reaches Sam after an eternity of crawling. His brother is still staring at nothing.
He can't get the leverage necessary to really check Sam over, but he finds a way to lift Sam's hands and see that the blood is Sam's. All Sam's as far as he can tell, and then he's crying over his brother's mutilated hands as every cell in his body rebels. Dean just manages to turn his head away before he vomits, and then the park ranger is overcoming her fear, and she and a guy in a Hawaiian shirt are pulling him back despite his growling and screaming. They let him ride in the ambulance with Sam, let him stick close, and Dean can't formulate words anymore but he tries to make noises to let Sam know he's there. That whatever stupid fucking thing Sam's done Dean is still here and he's not leaving. The EMTs rattle off conditions and issues in the background. Multiple lacerations, shock, blood loss, and all of it plays like a soundtrack for their lives.
They're split at the doors to the ER, and Dean can only make these animalistic grunts as they roll him down the hall and Sam disappears around the corner. There are doctors and nurses swarming him, and he can't focus on what they're saying because all he sees is blood. All he hears is the shallow sound of Sam breathing. What did Sam do? He remembers his last seconds, Sam crouched over him and weeping as Dean fades away. Sam's eyes so determined, and Dean knows the look. Sam has a plan, and that never ends well. He wanted to tell his brother goodbye, and that he loved him. That all those years ago, what happened to split them, it wasn't just Sam. Was never just Sam. That last night in Pennsylvania when they'd been together was the highlight of Dean's crazy fucking life. The culmination of years of fear and need, and he'd played it off but that was all he wanted. All he thought of. He had planned on holding it close, making it the last of his anchors, and when he was in Hell he'd let it keep him human. He would stay human.
Except there was no Hell. No fire and no chains, just waking up to Sam bleeding in the grass and all this pain and despair. Dean wants to explain to Sam that the fire would be preferable. That he'd rather suffer than see Sam like that. There's no way to do it though. It takes two weeks for Dean to be able to formulate full sentences, another week after that to be able to walk, and then one more to get Sam out of the hospital. They're already in July when he sneaks Sam out in a wheelchair and hightails it back to the Cahokia Mounds State Park. He finds where Sam parked the Impala and starts her up, and then heads for a motel. Sam can't function properly. Has to be reminded to eat and move, and for a little while Dean has to work with Sam soiling himself, Sam falling down, Sam waking up and screaming like someone is carving him open and apart.
There are notes in Sam's journal, and receipts from his little trip away from Dean. He pieces it together slowly, always distracted by the shambling corpse his brother has become. Still, there's a promise of better because he can find out what Sam did. Find it out and fix it. There's no world in which Dean can't fix Sam. He won't allow it. So Dean works, and eventually he finds Sadie McCullough, and the long story of her rise to academic glory and her strange fall. He tracks her down, and once he has a destination he shoots towards it. The whole time he talks to Sam. Talks about the past, their future, and what he's going to do when Sam comes back. How he's going to beat him until he can't stand or walk again. How he's going to taste every inch of Sam's body and memorize every line and mark. There are new scars on Dean, thick furrows along his chest where the hellhounds ripped him apart. He wonders aloud if Sam will avoid them, or if he'll touch them and wonder at the whole thing. Sam's always been a tactile kid, and Dean's always appreciated that.
Most importantly he tells Sam that he's going to make it alright. Because it has to be alright.
Next
Previous
"Sam fought for scholarships and went to college because he couldn't stand the idea of losing you. He thought if he could put distance between you then he'd be able to handle it when he got the call that you were gone. Which was a desperation move if I've ever seen one, because I can promise you he never would have gotten over it. Please don't, we're having a perfectly civil conversation." It takes Dean a whole ten seconds to figure out she's talking to someone standing behind him instead of just not being able to meet his eyes. He weighed his options as a friendly Midwestern voice spoke at his back.
"I'm gonna take that gun out of your pants friend, and then you're going to stand up and sit next to your brother. You twitch though, and I fill him full of buckshot." Dean keeps his eyes on her face in an attempt to remain civil, but the urge to attack before he can put Sam in danger is pretty fucking overwhelming.
"I don't think that's necessary. Doc is right after all. Civil conversation."
There's a laugh from behind him, shockingly real, and then a hand brushes up his shirt and removes his gun smoothly and easily. "Winchesters don't have civil conversations. How you doing babe?"
Her eyes move to Dean's face then. "I am perfectly fine. I wish you wouldn't threaten Sam."
"I wish you wouldn't add to the reasons the demons are out to kill you. I wish you'd, just once you know, make a decision with that big old brain of yours. Instead every time I come back here you've made some new crazy mistake."
Dean watches all expression leave her face, watches her eyes slip shut, and then she leans back in the armchair and rubs at her temples. "Then stop coming back. In the meantime I'm going to tell Dean what I told his brother, and then you can go over your miracle cure. Get us some beer and put the gun down."
There's a second where Dean's sure the cold metal of a shotgun is going to brush him, and he's prepared to try a disarming technique, but it never comes. Instead there's a whisper of sound and then a man almost as tall as Sam walks past him. From here Dean can see that he's lanky like Sam, and that his hair is short, bristly, and bright blonde. He's wearing jeans and a flannel that suggest he's never been comfortable anywhere that doesn't serve chicken tenders. Dean's kind of guy really. If he wasn't threatening Sam a few moments ago.
"You still drinking that Canadian bullshit, or did you finally buy something American?"
"Shut up." Her face is still expressionless, but her voice carries a hint of affection that surprises Dean. When she finally looks at him again there's confusion in her gaze. "Are you one of Nate's hunter friends? He rarely brings anyone here. He must really like you."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
Her face pales a bit and she leans back from him. "I-I'm not sure-"
Nate comes back in then, three beers in his hand and a soft look on his face. "Yeah you gotta get some Coors or something babe. This is ridiculous." He sees the look on her face and drops all three bottles onto the coffee table before kneeling in front of her.
"Too many people for you to keep track of huh Sadie? It's ok. It's October. 2008. That's Dean Winchester, and you taught his brother how to go to Hell. Remember?"
That look of confusion deepens for a second, and then she shows the most life she has since Dean arrived. Her cheeks flush red, and her eyes go to the floor even though Nate's holding her face steady so he can study her.
"I got lost. Sorry." She sounds like a little girl in that moment, and Dean's eyes stray to Sam. How long has she been back exactly, and how hard has it been to get her here? How long will it take Sam? He can't go on hunts like that. Can't question victims or check out leads, because who knows when he'll lose track of whatever it is he's supposed to be doing, or when it is. It's not hard for Dean to guess that only the other hunter's presence keeps her from panicking. What would happen if Sam got lost like that without him?
"It's ok babe. Happens. I see you made pie. Did you think it was Tuesday?"
Sadie's head is shaking before her lips start moving. "We don't do Tuesdays anymore. Not in years. You hunt and I teach now. It's 2008. That's Dean Winchester and I'm helping him figure out what happened to his brother because I helped break him. Take a seat because you have to cover the fixing part."
Nate sits beside her on the floor and puts one hand on her knee as he studies Dean. "She do the reveal yet, or is she still wandering around the story?"
Dean's almost amused, but he looks to Sam and that dies pretty quickly. Instead he grips his hands between his knees and leans towards them. "It's all Tarantino here. You got a way to focus her?"
There's silence as light blue eyes take him in and Dean takes this chance to really look the guy over. To see the heavy ring of scars on his throat as if it had been ripped out. He thinks of his own chest, and wonders how hard it was for her to see that. How hard it was for Sam to see him. Then Nate turns to her and strokes her hair. There's a hesitance in his hand, a kind of slow wonder, and Dean has to ask himself for the third or fourth time just how deep in it he and Sam really are. How long the road out is going to be.
"Sadie. Tell Dean about your dissertation and your research. How you put theory into practice. Remember?"
-------
Cambridge, Massachusetts December 22nd, 2001
She remembers that she's supposed to sleep, but it's hard to make that take a back seat to what's taking shape in front of her. The computer has been running for hours now, and her fingers are sore, but she's pretty sure that if she goes just a little bit longer she can finish. If she finishes…
She's honestly surprised that her dissertation director didn't laugh at her. They were so excited about the Quantum Mechanics thing, and eventually she'll tell them she finished it already, and they can read it whenever they want. Harvard has strict non-spoken policies on its students not letting them down, and she's been teaching three courses ABD while working on her dissertation and that. Sadie doesn't really remember what sleep is like. She has nine messages on her machine from Nate, and if she doesn't call him back soon he'll just show up. He always does. It's not his fault that she understands now the difference between what used to be mythology and reality, but he's been pretty hard on himself about it.
Sadie doesn't have delusions about herself. Since she was nine and they first tested her everything has been on a singular track. The only outlier in her damn life has been Nate. He's the only one who never saw her as the little prodigal, and he's the only one who has worked to make her be human. Geniuses, she knows from studies, walk a very thin line between psychosis and sanity. They have trouble making personal connections, sustaining relationships, keeping track of day to day life. It's a tale as old as time, and she'll admit that if there isn't someone there to remind her every now and then to eat or sleep she'll go days without. Which is why she's only half-surprised when a heavy hand lands on her shoulder.
"You haven't been answering my calls babe."
The words blinking in front of her are pretty damning, but he still thinks she's working with the difficult mesh of physics, philosophy, and string theory and he won't read them. "Sorry. Got kinda lost in it. You know how I am."
His touch. His touch is stable and grounding, and she wants to lean into it but she's not supposed to. He's told her more than once that he can't be with her that way because of his work. She argued that maybe he should let that be her decision, but that resulted in a car crash and the mess they're in now. They don't have that kind of time anymore. Time has been on her mind a good deal. She's not sure how time will work once she's down there, or what she'll do when her time is up. She knows what she's going to do when his time is up though.
"How long since you ate?" He's already heading across the loft and to the fridge. She hears him digging around in the fridge, hears him make a thick noise, and then his head is popping back up over the door while she saves the word file and pushes away from her desk. "Babe this Chinese food is so out of date it's growling. You got any real food around here?"
Does she? She's pretty sure she picked up peanut butter and some bread a day or two ago, but with the way her mind has been working she has no way to be certain about that. When he finds the moldy bread she checks her calendar and realizes that it's been over a week since her last grocery run. Sadie remembers that she went the last day of classes. She has to rub her face for a second and try to remember when the Chinese food is from. "How about pizza Nate? There's a place a couple blocks away, and the menu is on the fridge door."
She watches him place the call, and then slips off to shower and change clothes. She's just figured out the sigils, and if she can find the right combination of herbs then she'll be able to open the door. There's a hand on her shoulder and she jumps when she realizes the water is cold and Nate is standing there with his eyes diverted. He's touching her again. "What happened?"
"Pizza is here. You've been showering for an hour. Water's cold babe." There's a tight smile on his face and she waits for him to leave before toweling off and changing into clean clothes. When she comes out he's staring at a book she has open, and there's a tense moment where she's not sure if he'll figure it out. "This don't look like physics."
"It's not. Side project for a fellow scholar. I promised I'd get it done soon." She remembers the calendar. He has one year, six months, and twenty-three days. She goes up for her defense in a week. She has to pick a school that will allow her to take sabbatical shortly after starting there, and that means the Ivy League is right out. They'll be impressed by her C.V., but that doesn't change the fact that she'll need to prove herself as a professor. She can shoot high enough to be able to afford the kind of place she'll need for the ritual, but still pick an institution that will be so impressed they'll give her extra leeway. Her list of potentials has been narrowed down to six, and Boulder is looking promising. There's an old farm there with a well that may have the kind of energy she needs. There's just not enough time. "I like the pepperoni and mushrooms."
His grin is broad and easy, and he holds out a plate with three slices of it even as he chews on a mouthful of whatever mess he's ordered for himself. "You got a pizza place this good nearby and you're eating cold Chinese? I always thought you were kind of stupid."
It's his oldest joke, and she loves it more than any other he tells. Sadie laughs and then starts eating her own. Turns out she was hungry. "Yes. I hear that all the time. How are the hunts going?"
Nate's grin falters. "Dad's in the hospital about thirty miles away. Witch did serious damage to his internal organs. They're doing a lot of tests."
Sadie can't help but glance at the book, and then she focuses on him. "He sent you here so you wouldn't hover? He always hated when you hovered."
"Well he won't have to put up with it much longer." All traces of a good mood are eradicated, and she's not sure if he's hinting that his father is dying, or mentioning his own upcoming death.
"This is where we get drunk right? I'm fairly certain normal people get drunk over this sort of thing." His smile comes back, faltering but there, and she's willing to do anything to keep it. More importantly this may be her last chance to do the first step. She has the incense, and she remembers the words. That's all it's going to take really. She makes him go to the corner store and get the liquor, because she's got a few more pages to write before it's done and that's the best excuse she can come up with. It's true, so he doesn't call her out on the lie. The prep work is minimal. She carves the sigils into the box spring, and then places the incense and anoints herself with the oils. She's had sex before once with a fellow academic at a conference. She remembers the logistics of it.
When he comes back she makes sure that he is drinking more than her, talking as much as she can get him to, and waits for the moment when he's so drunk he's having a hard time paying attention to everything that's going on. He's still aware enough though. "You gotta take care of yourself little girl. Them Harvard boys don't make you be careful." When he's like this he loses all pretenses at not having an accent. Becomes the boy from the small Oklahoman town that she grew up with. She likes it that way.
She stands up slowly and then reaches for the hem of her shirt. "Nate." His eyes catch hers, and then go wide. This is how she remembers it working on television shows. "Nate let's have sexual relations."
He starts laughing, and that makes her hands hesitate. Then she bites her lip and pulls the shirt over her head. His laughter dies. She's not wearing a bra, and the pants she's pulled on have nothing underneath. This is all it takes right? He stares through slightly glazed eyes and then shakes his head.
"Babe. Sadie. We talked 'bout this."
She unbuttons her pants and drops them. Steps closer and keeps his gaze. "I'd like very much to do this. I think it will help you feel better. It will be pleasurable for me as well."
Nate swallows hard and reaches for her before pulling back. "Wait. Wait a sec and let's talk 'bout this 'cause-babe I can't be-ah shit." She sees the moment he gives up. Nate lifts her over his shoulder and then carries her into the bedroom and drops her onto the bed.
"There's incense there. Will you light it? I like the smell." He does, one hand lighting while the other works the button on his jeans. Then he's back in the bed, and he's a big solid wall of muscle and heat. It's hard to focus, hard to keep track, but right after he enters her she whispers in his ear.
"What does that mean?" He moans it out and bites his lip before pulling back.
"It means I love you. I have loved you all this time. You are the only thing I have ever loved."
His eyes clear for half a second, and then there's a softening in his face that makes her feel a flutter in her stomach unconnected to the building spell energies he's too distracted and drunk to feel. He murmurs the words back, and that's just brilliant. That works fine. So she lets herself go and the rest of it is better than she ever imagined.
When she wakes up in the morning he's still there, and she wraps herself in an extra blanket and turns up the clanky heater before settling down in front of the computer. She'll finish this. Step one is complete, and now all she has to do is wait. Which may be the hardest part.
-------
Eaton, Colorado May 8th, 2008
The hardest part is knowing when to leave. A part of Sam wants to talk Dean into coming here. He knows the veil is thin enough that she was able to pierce it once, and she'll know if something is going wrong. He wants very badly for her to be there and to watch everything, because there's only one shot at this. He thinks he has it all down, hasn't had a problem repeating it to her, but that's not a sure thing. Nothing is a sure thing. She's sitting across from him at the table and mechanically chewing a sandwich he knows for a fact she's been working on for over an hour. He reaches out and stops her hand before she bites the sandwich again.
"Sadie. What's the price?"
She looks up from her hand to his face, and as so often happens she can't hold his gaze for very long. "Isn't it obvious? I thought it was obvious." There's suddenly less color to her. "I've never been very good at knowing what is obvious."
"It's ok. I'm not upset. Just-other than what I promise them. What's the price?" He thinks he knows, but he needs to hear her say it.
"Dean will have to figure out how to bring you back to yourself. Anchor you in one time and place. It's not easy and it won't be permanent, but it can be done. Once that's past it will take time for you to remember how to properly take care of yourself again. You forget how important it is to do things. You need a schedule. There has to be a schedule. Then there's the loss of sensation. Things don't really have tastes the way they used to, and pleasure isn't…well as far as I can tell it takes a while to come back." Sadie eyes her sandwich and then puts it down completely. "You'll feel numb at first, and then you'll be overwhelmed, and then it will be both at once. There's no getting past that part. I can't think of anything else off the top of my head."
As if that wasn't enough. As if he needed more. Then her body jerks. "Constipation. There's a lot of that. I suggest investing in fiber."
He can't help it. Sam starts laughing and he can't stop. She looks at him sympathetically. When the spasms subside and he can breathe again he rubs the tears from his eyes and puts his head down. "You make it all so clinical. We're talking about the craziest shit and it's like you're teaching me a book or an equation."
Sadie's hand strokes his hair hesitantly, and then she pulls back and grips her hands together. "That is a surprisingly accurate description of what is happening here. Sam, this isn't the kind of thing that you can just do and walk away from. What we're talking about here-the chances of a mistake are tremendous. I spent years studying every aspect of this, and breaking it down until it was an approachable thing. I did all of that under the nose of several very prominent organizations that were funding me to research something else entirely. So if you're asking me if I'm worried you'll suffer more damage in the cognitive function area the answer is yes. I'm a genius Sam. Have been for a very long time." There's nothing pretentious or proud in her statement. It's delivered wearily, and she keeps her head down as if she's almost ashamed. "On the other hand I'm functionally retarded when it comes to social interaction and emotions. So on that count I have a feeling you'll put my healing process to shame. It's all about context you know. Hey what day is it?"
"It's Tuesday. Why?"
"Nate's coming, or at least he should be. I should bake."
Sam watches her scurry off, and wonders if she's honestly capable of giving him any advice outside of her theory.
--------
Eaton, Colorado October 2nd, 2008
"A theory? You taught my brother a damn theory?"
Sadie's head ducks down and her hands cover her mouth carefully. "Technically in science everything is a theory because-"
"Don't give me that bullshit! You knew he might fuck it up and you gave it to him anyway! He could have-fuck Sammy doesn't understand when he shouldn't do things, and you just handed this to him. All it took was some sob story and puppy eyes. This is dangerous shit lady and you just told him how to-"
"Ok that's enough. Take a breather babe. Let me talk to Dean alone in the kitchen okay?" Which is when Dean really takes her in. She's looking more like Sam with every second, and she nods her head and hunches into herself when Nate pushes himself up and leads Dean out of the room. They end up in the kitchen and the other hunter digs out more beer and hands one to Dean. "Don't ever yell at her again. Got me?"
He still sounds friendly, but the tension in him suggests that he's so on edge it's really just a matter of seconds before he launches at Dean and goes after him.
"You don't understand. You can't-"
"Before we started hunting the supernatural my dad and her dad were real good friends. I was older than her, and I knew her vaguely. Always kinda weird, quiet, didn't talk to a lot of people. She tested out of all these grades. Ended up in high school at the tender age of ten and everybody knew who she was. Knew she was some kind of genius. Her dad talked to my dad, and I got pulled aside and asked to watch over her. Well fuck that I thought, because I was a sophomore and I'd be damned if she was gonna kill my carefully built rep. So the first day I tell her that I got other stuff to do and you know what she says? 'Ok Nathan. I'll be quiet.' Wanders off and I don't see her again 'til the end of the day. Bumped into some older girl and spilled her drink, so this girl starts shouting at her about feeling froggy and wanting to jump." He cracks open his beer and takes a long swallow. "So she jumped. 'Cause she didn't know a damn thing about any of that stuff. Girl thought she was being funny and she and her friends beat the snot out of her. So I pick her up to walk her home and there she is with blood still crusted around her mouth and this lost look on her face. 'What the hell happened' I asked her, and then she said-" He stops and his adam's apple jumps before he takes another gulp of beer. "She told me the story all factual and calm, and then she looks me in the eye and says 'I wasn't supposed to actually jump was I?'"
Dean wants to laugh and cry at the same time. He remembers Sammy being bullied. Remembers the hopeless fury he had, and all the little kids he half-strangled in an effort to keep anyone from even looking askance at his little brother. He nods once and Nate takes it for what it is.
"I rarely let her out of my sight after that. Kept an eye on her all the time, and then senior year my aunt is killed by a Wendigo, and off we go from hunting deer to hunting monsters. I had all the training, just not the focus. I never told her what it was I was really doing 'til I got her killed. Then when she figured it out I had to explain, and she took it all in real quiet and then nodded once and insisted she'd figure something out. I know how it went with you. I can tell you like it was yesterday 'cause I remember how it went with me. You went to face your death like a man, because that's how we were taught it's done. Sam insisted on being there, and then the hellhounds came. The pain is like nothing you ever felt before, and the worst part is you can hear him over the sound of their growling and that choking stench of rotting flesh and sulfur. You can hear him screaming for you, 'cause he knew it was coming but that don't really prepare you for it. Then the light's fading, and you know where you're going, and there he is over you and his eyes are all anguish and regret, but there's determination there. You think to yourself that ain't right, because every time you see determination in those eyes it's right before he does something that proves he ain't half as smart as everybody says he is. So you wanna ask but it's too late and you're dying, and then you hear these words and they mean something, something you heard once before when you were in a whole other version of intimate and close, and then you're gone. But it's only for a few moments, and the next thing you know-"
------
Monks Mound, Cahokia Mounds State Park, Indiana June 3rd, 2008
The next thing he knows is pain. All of his joints are screaming, and his eyes feel like they've been rubbed with sand and sulfur. Blinking sets off a sensation of agony so intense that Dean wonders if he should stop doing it, and then he turns his head towards the sound that woke him. If this is Hell, then the powers-that-be fucked up because Dean has always loved the outdoors. The woman crouching in front of him looks concerned, and her outfit indicates she is a park ranger. A park ranger? He tries to figure out how that would work into a torture scheme and nothing comes to mind. Ruby told him it was like Hellraiser but without all the bondage leather, but this doesn't look anything like that. It looks like a park, and the soft grass underneath as well as the breathtaking view he can see behind the uniformed woman suggests the same thing. The air is clear and warming up rapidly, and the park ranger is reaching out very slowly like she's going to poke Dean but she's worried he'll bite.
He waits, lies perfectly still, and when her fingers connect with his he reaches up despite the screaming of his muscles and grips her wrist as tightly as he can, fingertips searching. When he finds a pulse all the tension goes out of him, and he lets his head bounce against the soft grass when he lets go of her skin. He wants to cry or scream, but he's not sure either response is appropriate and they may be tricking him. This may still be Hell, but he's pretty sure it isn't. Somehow, instinctively, Dean knows Sam got him out. Sammy figured out some ritual or spell, and now here Dean is on a grass hill in some state, and Sam will come collect him when he figures out what happened. Which brings up a whole new universe of questions including where he is and when it is. How long did it take Sam? Why doesn't Dean remember Hell? He fights the agony of his throat and manages to harshly grind out, "When?"
Her eyes are inquisitive, green, and she looks over her shoulder before refocusing on him. "June 3rd, 2008 sir. You've been scaring the tourists all morning. Were you drinking or were you attacked?"
Most mornings Dean could say yes to both, but he swallows against the dry ache in his throat and manages another word. "Attack." Scaring the tourists? When he looks down he realizes his clothes are tattered and torn, and covered in blood. His blood. No wonder they were all so scared. That would be enough, but suddenly his foggy and ruined brain picks up on what she said. June 3rd. Dean was only in Hell a day. What the fuck did Sam do?
"Sir? I need you to focus. The ambulance is on its way, but is that the man that attacked you?"
He tries to turn his head, but the pain is too much. Too much and Dean doesn't want to experience it. Doesn't want to fight against the ground glass making its way through his system. He does it anyway though, because what if it's a demon she's pointing at. Some leftover that followed him out of Hell, and will pop up at any second and rip through her and whatever terrified tourists are standing in the distance no doubt rubber-necking. What he'll do about it is beyond him, but he'll certainly try. He pushes against the knotted and screaming muscles, and then he sees it and the painful slamming of his heart triples and screams at him to calm down before it explodes in his chest. It's not a demon. It's Sam.
What the fuck did Sam do? His hands are dipped in blood, and there's a knife beside him that glints in the light and screams with red. Sam's face is ashen, and his eyes are open but unseeing. There's a brief moment where Dean is back in Cold Oaks, back in that muddy street, but Sam's chest is moving and Dean knows he's breathing. His brother is breathing. He reaches out one shaky hand and actually screams with the pain as he grips the ground and starts dragging himself. He hears the park ranger telling him no, trying to stop him, but she's afraid to touch and Dean's probably a pretty scary sight. He grips handful after handful of the warm earth, smells the richness of the soil and the fresh scent of grass, and then reaches Sam after an eternity of crawling. His brother is still staring at nothing.
He can't get the leverage necessary to really check Sam over, but he finds a way to lift Sam's hands and see that the blood is Sam's. All Sam's as far as he can tell, and then he's crying over his brother's mutilated hands as every cell in his body rebels. Dean just manages to turn his head away before he vomits, and then the park ranger is overcoming her fear, and she and a guy in a Hawaiian shirt are pulling him back despite his growling and screaming. They let him ride in the ambulance with Sam, let him stick close, and Dean can't formulate words anymore but he tries to make noises to let Sam know he's there. That whatever stupid fucking thing Sam's done Dean is still here and he's not leaving. The EMTs rattle off conditions and issues in the background. Multiple lacerations, shock, blood loss, and all of it plays like a soundtrack for their lives.
They're split at the doors to the ER, and Dean can only make these animalistic grunts as they roll him down the hall and Sam disappears around the corner. There are doctors and nurses swarming him, and he can't focus on what they're saying because all he sees is blood. All he hears is the shallow sound of Sam breathing. What did Sam do? He remembers his last seconds, Sam crouched over him and weeping as Dean fades away. Sam's eyes so determined, and Dean knows the look. Sam has a plan, and that never ends well. He wanted to tell his brother goodbye, and that he loved him. That all those years ago, what happened to split them, it wasn't just Sam. Was never just Sam. That last night in Pennsylvania when they'd been together was the highlight of Dean's crazy fucking life. The culmination of years of fear and need, and he'd played it off but that was all he wanted. All he thought of. He had planned on holding it close, making it the last of his anchors, and when he was in Hell he'd let it keep him human. He would stay human.
Except there was no Hell. No fire and no chains, just waking up to Sam bleeding in the grass and all this pain and despair. Dean wants to explain to Sam that the fire would be preferable. That he'd rather suffer than see Sam like that. There's no way to do it though. It takes two weeks for Dean to be able to formulate full sentences, another week after that to be able to walk, and then one more to get Sam out of the hospital. They're already in July when he sneaks Sam out in a wheelchair and hightails it back to the Cahokia Mounds State Park. He finds where Sam parked the Impala and starts her up, and then heads for a motel. Sam can't function properly. Has to be reminded to eat and move, and for a little while Dean has to work with Sam soiling himself, Sam falling down, Sam waking up and screaming like someone is carving him open and apart.
There are notes in Sam's journal, and receipts from his little trip away from Dean. He pieces it together slowly, always distracted by the shambling corpse his brother has become. Still, there's a promise of better because he can find out what Sam did. Find it out and fix it. There's no world in which Dean can't fix Sam. He won't allow it. So Dean works, and eventually he finds Sadie McCullough, and the long story of her rise to academic glory and her strange fall. He tracks her down, and once he has a destination he shoots towards it. The whole time he talks to Sam. Talks about the past, their future, and what he's going to do when Sam comes back. How he's going to beat him until he can't stand or walk again. How he's going to taste every inch of Sam's body and memorize every line and mark. There are new scars on Dean, thick furrows along his chest where the hellhounds ripped him apart. He wonders aloud if Sam will avoid them, or if he'll touch them and wonder at the whole thing. Sam's always been a tactile kid, and Dean's always appreciated that.
Most importantly he tells Sam that he's going to make it alright. Because it has to be alright.
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Date: 2021-07-31 07:23 am (UTC)These couples are similar to eachother oh my god dhbrhrvr
My h e a r t 🥺