In Medias Res (6/6)
May. 15th, 2013 04:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dime_lioraEaton, Colorado October 5th, 2008
Sam wakes up to the smell of burning flesh. At least he thinks he does, but it's probably not really there. When he takes the time to really analyze it he finds it's actually cinnamon. Dean isn't in the room, and Sam takes several long deep breaths and reminds himself that his brother is not always there, but he's there. Somewhere. Sam just needs to find him. That's what he was doing before he fell asleep anyway. Opening the door so he could go down to Hell and find Dean. Except not really Hell, but Sam can't remember what the place he went to was called other than a courtroom, and that Dean is not here.
He pushes out of the bed and stumbles his way across the room before finding the door. The knob looks familiar, and it takes Sam a moment to realize why. Because this is Sadie McCullough's house, and Sam is being taught how to save Dean. The rest of it was a dream, and that makes sense. All a bad nightmare because really? Who could go to Hell and survive? The things he dreamed are not something a human being could experience. The burning and ripping, the constant humiliation and shame, and the knowledge that all of the people he loved most were let down by his inability to be good enough. He lets down the people he loves. That's the truth they taught him in Hell, and Jess and Mom and Dad and Dean and always and forever and up and down-
Sam stumbles on the last three steps and barks his shin against the corner of the wall. The pain grounds him. Just a nightmare and Sadie's gonna finish telling him what to do to make sure Dean doesn't spend more time in Hell than he absolutely has to. Except when Sam comes around the corner into the kitchen he finds Sadie, and the real-life version of the picture of her lover, and Dean. Sitting in the middle of the kitchen like it's no big deal. Until Dean looks up and spots him, and then Sam's shaking with the need to apologize. To go to Dean and apologize because Sam has done something very bad but for the life of him he can't remember what. Something unforgivable though, and Dean doesn't look angry but he should. Dean looks awestruck, and open, and Sam grabs the doorframe and wonders who's behind him. When he looks there's no one there. Maybe what he did wrong was coming here. Dean's only got so much time left and Sam sort of abandoned him. Does Dean know the plan?
It takes milliseconds to cross the kitchen and grab Sadie's arms, and the way she jerks under his palms suggests he might be gripping too hard but he can't loosen up yet. "Did you tell him? You didn't did you? Sadie? If you told him I can't-"
And then he's there. The other piece of Sam's puzzle slotting against him and pulling him back into his warm body. Dean's arm like a bar of titanium around his chest as he collapses into Dean's heated flesh. The fire was so hot it was cold Dean. I was always cold there, and you always danced right out of my reach, and I knew you'd be warm. It's an alien thought, foreign and unwelcome even if it sounds like it's in his voice. The hunter, Nate, is there and he's touching her and tilting her arms to look at the livid handprints on her flesh. They'll no doubt bruise, and Sam opens his mouth to apologize, but he can't remember how to make his vocal chords work. He catches Sadie's dark blue eyes though and she seems to forgive him even as the world spins and his face is buried in the heat and strength of Dean's shoulder.
"Sammy. Fuck Sammy it's good to see you up little brother." Dean's voice sounds wrecked, and Sam tries to remember how long he was sleeping. Why Dean would be so surprised to see him moving around.
"Dean." His voice sounds a hundred times worse than Dean's, which is ridiculous because he just woke up. It sounds like he's been screaming for a long time though which makes sense because he's been screaming for an eternity. The whole of it swells into his consciousness at once and Sam staggers under the weight of all that time. All that memory. He hears a male voice he doesn't recognize, and then Dean is talking and the sound of him holds Sam from spinning down into the darkness he's been in since forever.
"Ok Sam. I got you. I got you baby. October 5th, 2008. That's when it is, and you're in Eaton, Colorado at the Doc's house, and I'm here. You're not in Hell anymore Sammy. Not there. You're here with me, and this is real, and I got you. Won't let nobody near you again ok? You hear me? Nobody's gonna hurt you again, 'cause that's what I'm here for. To protect my little brother. Just hold steady Sam 'cause you ain't there anymore. You hear me?"
He can't talk again, but he can nod and hold on. Hold on to the furnace heat of his brother. Remember that this is where he's been trying to get for so long, and that he's finally here. There's a chair under him without warning but Dean stays in contact with him. Stays close. This isn't Hell anymore, and Sam can see that now. Of course he can because he'd know if he was still in Hell. Wouldn't he?
There's food in front of him suddenly, and he looks up to see Sadie's hesitant smile. He clears his throat three times before he can force his voice out over the rusty machinery that makes it. "I didn't let you down."
Sadie's face crumples and then breaks into a huge smile. "No you didn't Sam Winchester. You did an incredible job. Congratulations on making it back."
Sam reaches out then, touches her, and there's a substantial difference in the feel of her and the feel of Dean. For so long every sensation has been painful and obscure, lost in his new consciousness, and now he can feel flesh. She feels insubstantial the way he does, as if she's only half there and half spun dream webbing. It's more than comforting to feel it, and he grips her hand tightly. Dean's voice breaks the spell. "You need to eat Sammy. Will you eat?" It's strange because she said there'd be no pleasure, and while soft sheets hold no joy for him Dean's hands are hard and unforgiving and they thrill him beyond belief. Dean's a spark in the darkness, a promise of something lost but not eradicated.
Yeah. He'll eat. The food has taste, but taste is like a distant concept that Sam only half gets. It's there because he needs it, and because food is essential to the body continuing to run properly. He needs to eat. When it's all gone Dean stays and the plate disappears. It's the steady pressure of Dean that lets Sam know this is real. Dean is not everywhen like Sadie or Sam. Dean is one place and time. Dean is solid and stationary. Dean is-
--------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Pressing a finger into Sam's asshole even as he bites Sam's thigh. It's distracting and engaging and hotter than fuck. Dean's all teeth and tongue, and Sam couldn't have ever really imagined how good this could be. A lifetime of learning every single one of the other's tells, of memorizing every sight and line and sound, and now they're learning new ones. Sam never knew for example that Dean's mouth could melt steel. Didn't know that Dean's fingers could carry an electric current, and fuck that hurt. Blunt pressure and burning and Sam wants more of it. Wants Dean to hurt him until he can't stand, can't walk to fight Lilith. They can just stay here, because secretly Sam knows it won't do them any good. It's the ritual that will save Dean, but he can't tell his brother that, and he can't call this attack off because if he does Dean will figure out something is wrong. It has to look like Sam-holy fuck. Dean's finger is joined by another, and then in a move so shocking it's criminal Dean's tongue traces the line of Sam's rim and circles his own fingers. If it wasn't for Dean's free hand holding him down Sam would have broken his brother's nose when he jerked.
There's a laugh, husky and sweet, and it takes Sam a minute to figure out it's Dean because that broken pleading is coming from him. Which would be embarrassing if Dean's tongue wasn't moving into him along with those two fingers, and that blunt burning is giving way to something else entirely. He wants to ask Dean if this was the plan all along, or what he's supposed to be doing, but the best he can accomplish is his brother's name as he grips the sheets with one hand and Dean's shoulder with the other. Sam knows he's leaving bruises there, and he can't feel bad for that because Dean is bringing it on himself. He'd like to give something back to Dean. Would like to pleasure his brother as well, but then the tongue is gone and there's a third finger and Sam's keening. Keening and crying, and he'd can't think anymore. There are words. He's supposed to say words. This is a ritual. He can actually feel the spell energies coiling around them and gaining strength with every second of the pleasure and arousal.
Dean's mouth is on his cock again, and his brother is propped at an awkward angle. It takes Sam a while to realize Dean's digging in his jeans, and when he sees the condom come out he finds his voice. "No."
Mossy green and brown eyes meet his and Dean raises an eyebrow. His brother can claim Sam has a monopoly on the "bitchface" all he wants, but Dean can be just as stubborn and unyielding. There's a hint of that when he looks at Sam. "Sammy. I haven't been-"
"Don't care. Don't care Dean. No." After all, what's the point of worrying about that? Sam's world is ending in a few days and his shot at saving it is slim to none. Fuck the consequences. It fits with the role he's trying to play. The suggestion that he's giving Dean up entirely. They stay like that for what feels like forever, eyes locked and wills battling until Dean gives up and drops the condom. Removes his fingers from Sam and uses both hands to take off his jeans and to slick his cock with the lube and then Dean stops entirely and just stares. Sam feels self-conscious then, and he twists under the intensity of it until Dean licks those swollen lips and meets his gaze again. Sam's seen most of Dean's looks, but never this one. As if he could burn through Sam with his gaze alone. As if Sam is the only thing in the whole goddamn world with value.
He'd like to say something flowery and sweet. That this is them finally becoming each other's everything, but it would be untrue. Dean has always been Sam's world. Everything worth fighting for and believing in all wrapped into one bow-legged, pink-lipped, hazel-eyed package, and Sam loves him. Loves his brother more in that moment than he ever thought possible because only now does the true depth of that love make itself known. He's going to give up his life and his sanity for this and it's all worth it. Always has been, because it's Dean.
"So goddamn beautiful like this Sam. All spread out and fucked-up for me. Always wanted to see this, and now I got it." Sam moans at that and Dean's eyes go heavy-lidded and darker than Sam ever thought they could. "Fuck Sammy. Fuck."
Hot hands grip his thighs, spread them wide, and then the blunt head of Dean's cock is pressing against his entrance and Dean is holding his eyes as he pushes against him. There's a pause, and then Sam takes a deep breath and Dean pushes in without having to discuss what it is they're doing. They move in synch like they always have, one mind in two bodies, and it hurts but it's so fucking good. He's burning up from the inside, and he holds still just like Dean and takes deep breaths. The same sticky fingers that were inside him stroke along his stomach, and he relaxes slowly into Dean's touch. It takes a while, and that's ok because they don't have to discuss it. Dean's forehead pushes against his, and instead of kissing they breathe each other in. This is Sam's last chance, because once Dean starts moving for real Sam knows that his brother is going to fuck every last functioning brain cell out of his head, and Sam's going to love every second of it.
So he says the words. Says them softly into Dean's mouth and listens to Dean breathe them in and absorb them.
"What does that mean?" Dean moans it out because Sam chooses that moment to tense his muscles and grip Dean harder than before. Feels his brother shift another few inches inside.
"It means I love you. I have loved you all this time. You are the only thing I have ever loved."
There's a noise, thick and low in the back of Dean's throat, and then his brother repeats the spell as if it's nothing. They've spent their whole life doing it after all. Repetition and release. And it's good, so good, because after Dean says it he thrusts all the way in and Sam's head slams into the headboard with the force and power of it. Dean is in him. Dean and he are joined and Sam wants to see the place it's happening at, but all he can see are Dean's eyes swallowing him down and Dean's lips spit slick and plush descending towards his own.
--------
Eaton, Colorado October 7th, 2008
Nate leans down and kisses Sadie's forehead before he moves on to make sure the house is secure. Hunt together? The shit he knows about the Winchesters can be put into two columns. People They've Gotten Killed and Things They've Killed. They're a legend in the community, but legends are never wholly good. When he comes back he finds only Dean and a beer waiting for him. Sadie's feeling better, because she's subtly manipulating shit again. He'll have to keep that in mind. He glances once at his watch and sees that she's probably gone upstairs for her class. Dean answers his second question before he asks it.
"She took Sam with her. Said he'd like the lecture." Dean pushes the beer towards him and then studies him for a bit. "How long you been hunting?"
"Monsters? Since I was nineteen. My dad was real big on survival and self-sufficiency though, so a lot of my training started when I was ten." He doesn't ask the question back because everybody knows the Winchester story. Both boys raised in the life since they were knee-high to a grasshopper, and that's just filler if he brings it up. He takes a long pull from his beer and goes for a different question. "How long you been sleeping with Sam?"
Dean jerks once, looks up, and then raises an eyebrow. "That gonna be a problem?"
"Well that depends on your definition of problem. With me? Hell no man. It probably should be, but I've been doing this long enough to know that the rules ain't always applicable. Life is bloody and short, and we better take what we can as long as we don't hurt anyone along the way." He taps his beer bottle against Dean's when it's offered and then considers how best to state the next part. "But for you? It may be a problem. The Sadie thing got complicated after Hell."
There's a long pause where he simply studies the other hunter, and then Dean sips his beer and puts it down before he starts sliding it back and forth between his hands. "Have you been with Sadie long?"
"Never." That gets the same quirked eyebrow, and Nate laughs even though he shouldn't. "I always told her no. That it wasn't her kind of life, that it'd put her in danger, that I couldn't be devoted to her like that. After Dad and I started hunting we were in and out so much I barely saw her. Talked on the phone a lot. Emails. Shit like that, but not the kind of thing that constituted a relationship. I imagine it was all wrapped up in a lot of stuff, including me thinking I didn't deserve a girl like her. Then one night I'm staring down the barrel of Hell, I've had some drinks, my dad's dying in a hospital, and she takes her clothes off. You know how you know she's nervous?" Dean shakes his head and Nate takes a long drink. "She starts talking like a robot. Shuts down totally. 'I would like to have sexual intercourse with you.' That and stripping were her idea of seduction. Saddest part? Worked like a damn charm."
Dean's laughing, eyes crinkled at the corners and hand clutching the bottle. "Sam cried." The moment it comes out it looks like Dean wants to take it back, but Nate clinks his beer again and Dean continues. "Cried and was already naked. I was three days away from Hell. It was the first time."
Which is where Nate's concerns come in. "And I get that man. I really do, but now? When they're like this? How do we know we ain't taking advantage? They're tied to us. Belong to us. What's the line between want and obedience?"
It's a fear that's been brewing in the back of his head since he got back, and he half-hoped it would surprise Dean. That he'd see reluctance or something other than the knowing nod he's getting in return to his statement. Because this was the only damn person in the world who would understand his predicament.
"I always thought Sam wanted it because I did. Or because he thought it would tie us together. Some complicated bullshit like that, 'cause Sammy's always coming up with crazy plans. I never thought that he'd-" Dean's voice breaks and Nate knows exactly what he wants to say. What he wants to get across.
"It's a lot of goddamn weight. She keeps telling me I earned it by putting it on her first, but she didn't have to watch me be tortured. She didn't have to see the aftermath of it."
Dean's nodding, head eager and eyes showing how much beer he's already had. Nate can't judge him, because he's planning on getting pretty wasted today himself. The whole thing, Sam and Dean, it's too familiar. Too much like before. "Sammy's always doing shit like this. Self-sacrificial like it's ok. Like he's s'posed to protect me. I'm the older brother. I'm the one that's gotta do the protecting. Sam can't see that, but it's always been true. Since he was born. Now he's all broken up and I can't do shit but talk to him and hope he gets better. But he knew. Knew he wasn't gonna get no damn better because he researched it. He knew she didn't get better."
He feels like he should argue that, and then changes his mind before changing it back. How many beers has he had? The empty bottles on the table don't give a clear indication because there's no telling which are his and which are Dean's. "She's better. You shoulda seen her when she first came back. Worse off than Sam, and took her longer to get to that point. When she went back to work? Girl couldn't even make eye contact with anyone. Shook like a leaf if you touched her, and every damn sentence was flat and straight. Like they burned all the questions outta her."
There's a pause as Dean studies his beer bottle. "Worse than Sam?"
Nate would love to stop. This isn't something he enjoys doing, and he's still a little iffy about the proposition of discussing what amounts to incest. Then again people in Hell want ice water, so he may as well just suck it up. "Yeah. Worse. You two are-" He tilts his bottles and wobbles it, knows Dean isn't sure what he means, and forges ahead. "-better together? Stronger. You may be just as bad at committing as I am, but you stuck by him through it. I left her."
That's when he notices Dean's eyes are wet, and damn if he doesn't feel like responding in kind. Too much fucking weight and too much fucking beer. "Sammy all obedient. Flies in the face of everything 'cause that boy ain't never liked orders. Always asks about them, always gotta push the envelope and demand. Used to fight Dad every step of the damn way before he started fighting me about it."
The next part comes out before he can stop himself. "My old man hunted with yours once. Mara in San Francisco. Said your dad was one of the best damn hunters he ever saw, but colder than a witch's tit."
Dean laughs. Laughs so hard any trace of that sadness is out of his eyes and his hands are gripping his stomach as he tries to get himself back under control. "Yeah. Yeah Dad could be cold. I got some of that but Sammy's just like mom. Always wanting to save everybody. Best damn witness handler I ever saw man."
They get quiet again, and then Dean leans forward and is the kind of suddenly serious that only happens when a person is officially drunk and beyond any form of verbal control.
"You think it could work? Me and you as partners and Sam here with your girl?"
Nate considers that for a long time. Could he be a partner? A real one? He hasn't hunted exclusively with anyone since his father, and he's always wondered. Pairs seem to work better, to last longer, and there's never been a person he gets along with well enough to try it out. Dean seems like a good guy, but his dad's warning rings in his ears the whole time. Then he thinks of Sadie standing there, eyes clear and defiant, a stronger shade of the woman he fell in love with than any he's seen in years.
"Actually I sorta do."
Dean nods once. Puts his beer down and stands on wobbly bow-legs. "Then let's do it man. Fuck it."
--------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
"But fuck it right? Am I right?" Nate's looking around with a big grin on his face and Sam tries to remember what he's asking. Dean is standing roughly two inches away from Sadie asking about pie cooling times, and Sam can't even remember what kind of pie it is. Smells like berries. Something with berries.
"Yeah. Yeah you're right." He's looking at Dean though. Studying the way his brother's bruised face pulls into a broad grin as he pokes at the pie on the counter and says something charming that makes Sadie nod but not grin. That's her though. Not grinning even when it's obvious she wants to. Sam tries to smile, but it feels odd stretched across his face. He can't smile the way she can sometimes, but he thinks with time he might be able to. It takes time to reorder what's been happening in his head, and what's been happening outside of it. Sam knows, for instance, that Dean and Nate have been hunting together. That his brother has been coming back every week to check on him, and that he keeps telling Sam his progress is incredible. Sam's not sure about that. He knows they just took down a nest of vampires, and that the two of them are feeling like kings right now. Which makes Sam feel good he thinks, but there's no telling.
He can string sentences together though, and every day he sounds a little better. When Dean's gone things get fuzzy, but Sam thinks he can handle that. That he can get over the hurdles one at a time if he tries very very hard. Doesn't change the fact that everything is still off and wrong. That this is today and yesterday all at once and Sam wants it gone. Wants to be free of it, but the best way out is through.
"Robert Frost." Sam's head jerks up and he realizes he's been talking aloud. Dean looks wounded, and Nate looks concerned, but Sadie is staring right into him. "It was Robert Frost that said that."
Dean clears his throat and then catches Nate's eyes. "Hey man we should grab some extra firewood. We'll be right back for pie ok girls?" There's a tightness to it that suggests that it isn't as much of a joke as Dean would like it to be, but Sam forces a smile again and watches Dean wince at it.
When he's alone with Sadie he finds himself standing near her as she slices pie. "Does it ever really get better? Do I ever get better so I stop hurting Dean?" Because that's what Sam did to deserve punishment. He let everyone down. Especially Dean.
"You went to Stanford. That's a core school instead of a distribution so you took, what, Great Books? A Shakespeare class?"
That's hard to remember but Sam tries. Those were the Deanless years, when Jessica was a factor and Sam felt almost as lost as he does now. He remembers that's where he met a man who talked about books, but the name escapes him. This is the man that led him here though, so this should be important. Should be right there. Except when he strains for it all he gets is a picture of Dean standing there the night he left. When was that? He left for Stanford and Dean didn't fight him, didn't argue, and Sam wanted to be stopped but Dean wouldn't stop him. Which wasn't fair because Dean could never stop him. No matter how much he loved Dean there were things his brother just wouldn't understand and to suggest Sam should give in and betray his own judgment was-but if Dean said it now Sam would do it because Dean was right. Because Dean owned him, and that used to scare Sam but Sam isn't afraid of it anymore. He's afraid of blood and pain, and screaming. Sam can't stand screaming. But he was asked a question and that question was about Stanford. "Yes. I took both of those." Clewsky. It's a vicious and triumphant thought.
"There's a quote from Shakespeare. 'Oh God, I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space-were it not that I have bad dreams.' Do you know what that means?"
No. No he doesn't and he shakes his head. If they covered that Sam doesn't remember it and he can't trace the meaning back to something he doesn't remember. He tells her all this and her lips tighten but she pushes back a lock of her hair before finishing her slicing. It's blueberry pie.
"When you can tell me the meaning Sam. That's when you're better. Wait for that alright?"
Which sounds good. He watches Dean and Nate come back in, and then watches his brother devour pie like there's no tomorrow. The bruising on Dean's jaw is worrying, but Sam suddenly can't remember how he got it and there's that smell of burning flesh again but he has to fight it off because Dean is eating pie and it will ruin the pie. That smell ruins everything. Taste and sound and joy and anger are all subsumed under the sickly sweet scent of Sam's own rotting and burning corpse. He must not be hiding it well because Dean is suddenly there, and Sam lets himself be swept up in Dean's strength. Remembers that it's going to be Thanksgiving soon and Sam is staying here for protection and that he can't help Dean anymore. Can't help anyone because he's broken, and that's how it is now.
Sam lets himself be led upstairs. Follows Dean's directions to shower and brush his teeth. It's dark outside so it is bedtime and Sam is led that way. When Dean comes back they always sleep in the same bed, and sometimes Dean calls this home but Sam sees the hesitance he has about it. By all technical definitions though it is a home. It's a home and they sort of live here when Dean is here and Sam sort of lives here when Dean isn't. So now they're in bed together and Sam touches Dean's shoulder and finds himself pulled into a tight embrace and surrounded by Dean's scent which is the only thing that takes away that burning flesh smell sometimes. The only thing that keeps Hell at bay. He clutches at Dean like he's an anchor, or a life preserver, and technically he is. A rock in a swiftly flowing river. Because time is everywhere and it takes Sam away, but Dean can stop it. Time is afraid of Dean. It behaves when he's around.
Asked later Sam wouldn't have been able to explain what it was that made him think it was a good idea, but suddenly he wanted to touch Dean. Wanted to see that look he remembers from before he was broken, and know that he can still do that for Dean at least. Can still give him that. He wants the connection and the comfort, and his hand slides over Dean's hip and down to Dean's groin. He slides it along and up, cups Dean and feels that his brother is getting hard. Dean starts to talk, but Sam shuts him up by locking their lips together and licking against Dean's lower one in the hopes that he'll get entrance. It doesn't take long, and then Sam can taste blueberry pie and mint and Dean and that's wonderful. That's perfect, because it's the first time Sam has tasted something and liked it in an eternity. He licks harder, pushing past the last of Dean's defenses, and searches for the source of that goodness. The core of Dean's taste, and this is what he needed. This is what he always needed, and if he could just stay here and be here then he could always be safe and whole.
Then their lips are parted and Dean's speaking in this husky and shot voice. "Sammy we-fuck this isn't-I don't want you to do something you don't want."
That's confusing, and Sam has to take a moment and consider Dean before he can even begin to get the implications there. Suddenly it all comes clear, and he wants to hit Dean for the first time since before Hell. His brother can be so stupid.
"Then shut up and it won't be an order jerk." He goes back to kissing, and Dean doesn't fight when Sam licks the seam of his mouth.
Dean's getting into it, dark and thick noises coming from his throat as Sam gets his hand under Dean's sweatpants and wraps his fingers along Dean's cock. He remembers how this works, how you make someone feel pleasure, and to Sam's eternal surprise he feels it again. Feels the simplistic joy of it, and that's the first time he's felt that in an eternity too, and he wants it. Wants all of it. Dean's not a spark anymore he's a fire, a promise fulfilled. Which is why when Dean breaks off and takes a deep breath as if he's going to speak Sam wants to stop him again and finds out he can't. Instead Dean starts talking, and his hands are grabbing at Sam's wrist like he's going to stop him.
"Sam-Sammy wait a minute man. Jesus slow down. This isn't-do you uh-" Dean's eyes glitter in the dark and Sam wishes he could see his brother's face better, because he's not very good at making vague connections anymore, but then Dean makes it clear with a sound in the back of his mouth and a slight withdrawing. That's no good. That can't happen.
"I want. I want this. Please Dean. Please. First good thing since forever. No more smelling Hell or feeling it when you're here and I need this. Need you to make me something closer to stationary because I'm going insane without it. I can't-"
It's Dean that shuts him up this time. Dean's mouth on his and Sam lets his brother lick into his mouth. Lets him taste back and enjoys every second. Suddenly he's under Dean, and there's warm breath on his throat and Dean's talking.
"Yeah ok. Ok baby I got you so just hold still and I'll do this. Just-" His voice shudders as his fingers push Sam's shirt up and off, and Sam loves every second of it. Loves the rasp of Dean's rough fingers along the smooth skin of his stomach and the sensation of Dean's erection rubbing against his hip as Dean undresses him. Whatever Dean was going to say is gone, lost in a sea of kissing and licking. Dean tasting his flesh and muttering about soap and sex. Something Sam can't understand, but he doesn't really want to because Dean's got his pants off too now and-
------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Dean's in. He can see the exact place where he and Sam are joined, and Sam's so fucking hot and tight that Dean can't think straight. Can't follow one logical thought process to another because that's him in his little brother, and it's a sick thrill that feels every kind of amazing even when he knows it shouldn't. Maybe he deserves Hell. He traces the line of their connection with one finger and Sam makes a noise like Dean is killing him. Which is fucking sexier than anything Dean's ever experienced in his whole life. He holds still though, because Sam has to be hurting. Has to. Except Sam isn't looking hurt even though it takes several more hard thrusts for Dean to realize the banging sound isn't his heart beating its way out of his chest, but Sam's head slamming into the headboard. Dean grabs Sam's thighs and pulls him backwards so that he's buried deep, but not pushing his brother towards head trauma with every deep thrust. There's a spot that one of Dean's kinkier hook-ups explained to him, and Dean angles and tries to find it even as he attempts to eat as much of Sam's skin as he can find.
Sam's talking again, saying something that doesn't make any sense, but it sounds like poetry or classical literature. Which probably isn't true, but Dean thinks it should be because his brother, it turns out, has a filthy fucking mouth in bed and it's better than anything Dean ever had to read in any of his classes. "Fuck Dean. Fuck yes. Harder, please, fuck, harder. I can't-" Then Dean hits it. Hits that spot and Sam's body arches like he's being electrocuted, and his face cramps up tight and his lips fall open so wide that Dean thinks he can see Sam's tonsils. All the words have been driven out of Sam, and now he's just making those broken rough noises and Dean wants him to make them forever. Wants to hear them the next time Sam starts bitching about shit.
Sam's coming apart underneath him. Dean loves it. Loves to see his big lanky brother spread below him with his face flushed and his head tilted back. Loves the way Sam's chest is getting red and mottled, the way his thigh feels gripped in Dean's fingers and the scent of sweat and sex mixed up with the smell of Sam. It's a good mix, one Dean thinks he should have all the time, and he knows that can't happen. He has to do his best to leave a mark so deep Sam will never forget it. To touch him in a way that he can carry with him all the years he lives beyond Dean. He keeps feeling though, skating his fingers over Sam's flesh and working his way to Sam's hard red cock. It's trapped between them and Sam is so busy ripping at the sheets and scratching up Dean's back that he's neglecting his own needs. Which is why it's so good that Dean's here to take care of him.
He grips it finally, hot and hard and heavy, and wonders when Sam got so big there and when he started thinking shit like this. Which is gone when Sam's muscles flutter around him and he lets out this half-formed shout of Dean's name. That's it. He loses the ability to think and simply moves-
------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
His fingers shake as Dean leads them in between his legs. He can't remember how this got turned around like this. One second he was underneath Dean and now he's on top. Dean's hand is burning into his wrist, and there's lube on his fingers as he traces Dean's entrance. He pushes one in, hears the hiss of pain, and he starts shaking harder. He's hurting Dean. Hurting him, and Sam should never hurt Dean but he is and what's he supposed to do about that? Which is when Dean starts talking.
"Wanted this then too. Wanted to do everything with you. You're good Sammy. You're doing fine." Sam's still shaking, but Dean's voice lessens it a bit, and he moves his finger around and marvels that he ever thought Dean was hot. This is like dipping his finger into an inferno, and he tries to remember all the things he researched before he and Dean did this the first time. Except Sam was looking at the other end of it because he honestly never believed Dean would offer this. Which is when his fingertip finds something spongy and what was tight becomes complete constriction as Dean clamps down on him and jerks. "Fuck Sam-yes!"
Well that's good. That's a series of words Sam wants to hear again so he rubs Dean's prostate another two or three times until Dean is coming undone under him, and Sam adds a second finger as his brother's pretty mouth moves at light-speed.
"It's good. It's good. I'm not delicate man so just-fucking hell Sam!" He's licking Dean's shaft now, enjoying taste all over again as he gets a mouthful of velvety skin and precome. It's not a taste he's terribly familiar with, but it makes all the difference. Dean in distilled format maybe and that's an odd thought, but Sam's used to odd thoughts. He remembers what Dean did when they did this last time, and he mouths his way down Dean's cock and over his balls before licking at the stretched skin of Dean's hole. The sounds his brother makes at that make Sam lick harder, slide his tongue in with his fingers, and there's an earthy taste that isn't bad but is certainly different. Dean's actually whimpering, and Sam likes that. Likes it a lot, because it's a good sound and Dean's happy and Sam's happy for that. Happy and that's like waking up after a long nightmare because he never thought he'd be happy again but-
------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
Fuck it's funny and it makes her happy to see the way the demon's face tightens. It thinks that the pretty meat-suit will fool her, but she can see the truth. Has been able to since her trip, and now she's looking into one of those smoky twisty faces all over again as she considers her options.
"You're being used to test what I did. You're supposed to go back and tell your superiors that if they want Sam Winchester alive they'd better not touch Dean. That their suspicions are correct."
There's no more sultry sweetness in it. "What the fuck are you talking about you lunatic bitch?"
"They wouldn't tell you because you're low on the food chain. Probably not important enough to even be granted a slight bit of information. That's ok. You're not to blame. I'd recognize you if you were important, but you're what's traditionally called cannon fodder. If you died here they'd know their answer anyway, and you're going to die here. There's no real question of that. All that's left is for you to decide if you want to die ignorant, or if you want to die with the answer you didn't know you were coming for."
It sneers once and then crosses its arms under its breasts. "Indulge me crazy-town. What's the big secret?"
She keeps her eyes on the demon and considers the many ways she could draw this out. How easy it would be to lie. There's any number of options she has, and she could take all or none of them. That's one of the side-effects of meeting the Winchesters. Options. It'd be amusing if it wasn't against every belief she's ever held. Free Will indeed.
"Those marks on his hands, those aren't just for show. They didn't just give him access to Dean in Hell. They link them, intrinsically, make them one singular person in the eyes of the Damned and the Divine. It's poetic isn't it?"
"Yeah and real sweet. Then again we all had our suspicions about those two. None of this is news."
Sadie waits another few seconds and then taps her fingers against the wall. "So you're low on the totem pole and you're not very intelligent. That's a bad mixture. Sam can die, and if he does he'll go nowhere because he can't leave Dean."
It's eyes flash black and the snarl is back. "You've gotta be fucking joking."
"Not even a little. You kill Dean Winchester and Sam Winchester dies too. Ends up wherever his brother goes. That's the final trick. You bastards never even considered the implications, and now here they are. Demons may be tricky, but you've apparently never handled a really good Humanities Major." And then Sadie's laughing again because this is exactly the expression she was hoping for. She leans towards the edge of the salt line and keeps the grin evident on her face even if it already feels off. She has research to do. Work that needs to be finished. Plus, Sam promised to teach her how to play poker and she's never learned that. She'd like to. She thinks-
--------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
He's going to die, and that's just fine with him. Because fuck it, this is a better place to die. Going down in a blaze of glory would be amazing, but going out buried balls-deep in Sam is possibly even better. There's pain here, yes, his muscles are straining to push harder than Sam can handle this first time and he's fighting himself not to bite Sam's lips bloody as he eats the moans and groans out of his brother's mouth. He wants very badly to slam so hard, but Sam's Sam, and even now crossing this line he still sees something delicate in his brother. Something that needs to remain pure and untouched. He can't treat this like all the ones before. There's sweat and sound and the lights in the room are bright enough he can see the way Sam's pupils take over his eyes, how the dimples come out when his brother half smiles at the push-pull of his cock, or the way Sam's jaw hardens and then softens when Dean's grip shifts and pulls.
He's getting close, can feel his orgasm building and his balls drawing tight, and he's never wanted an orgasm less. He wants to stay here with Sam until there's no more time left. Wants to continue with this until the world ends and falls down around them. They've been together so long Dean can't imagine a better way for this to go down. Sam's all he's ever wanted really, and now he's got him and there's not enough time. Never enough time because-
--------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
Sam's being pulled up and then pushed down, and Dean's over him, and there's so much time in between them. Sam feels ancient and untethered underneath his brother, and he watches the dim light catch a hint of slick hipbone, a curve of muscle, the flex of Dean's thighs and then his cock is pushing at Dean's entrance and then he's there. Sam knows what forever feels like. Understands it in a way only two mortal people on the whole planet do, and this is forever. Dean's descent on his cock is slow and torturous and Sam's tempted to grab Dean's hips and slam him down but he can't. Can't because he holds perfectly still and clenches his fists and lets Dean lead. This is such a big fucking thing and Sam knows it. Knows from the way Dean holds himself that his brother is pushing every single one of his limits to give Sam this. To help Sam.
He wants to help Dean back. So he holds still and tries to not move until Dean growls above him. "I'm not a delicate girl Sammy. Fuck me." So Sam does. He thrusts upwards and now he's all in and Dean cries out once and then settles his hands onto Sam's chest. They're slippery and slick and this is everything Sam needs and most of what he wants. They're united like this again, and it suggests that Dean is considering him a person again. An equal. Which is great because Sam is willing to try his hand at that even if the idea of it is a weight on his chest that can't-but those are Dean's hands, and Dean's mouth eating his, and that's all that matters. There are no demons here and no pain, and all Sam wants is to control the stutter of his hips. All he wants is to remember only this and the moments connected to it. The ones in which he feels like he's a human being again because that's what he's been missing and that's all that-
---------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
Really matters is that the demon keep looking this way. Keep looking right at her. Normally this would be breakdown material, but Sadie's got this. Can keep control for just a bit longer. People in her position are masters of bullshit and Sadie can do it. She forces her face to show another slick smile, and the demon rankles a bit further.
"You think you'll get away with this free and clear crazy-town? Really? We may need Sam Winchester, but nobody needs you which puts your little boy on the top of our list. We told you there'd be punishment if you helped the Winchesters, and you just thought-"
"I thought," Sadie raises her voice to cut the demon off and to make sure everything is still on track, "that Hell would send muscle instead of brains. I thought that it would be supremely easy to get you talking. I also thought you would have figured out by now that killing Nate wouldn't phase me much. Your people burned that out of me. You have no leverage and no intimidation power with me. So as Dean would say, eat it bitch." She's fairly certain that's what Dean would say. It seems like a fair approximation at least and none of it really matters, because here it comes. Sadie watches-
----------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Sam fall apart completely, and with Sam's orgasm Dean isn't far behind. The clutching heat and the sounds tumbling up through the air to him tell Dean that all he really needed was to be here in this moment to know everything he needed to about the world. It's not that Dean's having a magical epiphany about potential beauty or clarity, but there is something there that he'd make fun of Sam for if it was coming from the other side. This is Sam and this is Dean, and they are Sam and Dean, and that's all there is. All there's ever really been. Who knows when it really started after all? When his parents first brought Sammy home and mom said, "this is your little brother" or when Dad dropped Sam into his arms in the fire, or the thousands of times Dean saved Sam's hide? Does it matter? What matters is that Sam is here, and now, and everywhere on Dean. Physically and emotionally and all the other frilly, girly, chick-flick moment, gag-inducing bullshit Sam is there. He is Dean's completely and wholly, and that's what Dean will hold onto. That's what will keep him-
------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
Sane and whole and in this moment forever. Dean's coming apart on top of him and Sam can't believe how absolutely, marvelously, earth-shatteringly beautiful his brother is in this moment. Dean's not a pillar, not a rock in a stream he's a goddamn mountain, he's a monument to all the things Sam has lost, and Sam feels the edge of it then. The realization that he can be himself again, or close so fucking close, as long as he holds on to this. Holds on to the knowledge that Dean is not going anywhere and that he and Sam have an eternity, experienced the right way, to make a go of this. To belong to each other. It wasn't a pointless exercise and Sadie is wrong. Sam chose to follow Dean of his own free will, and that choice was-
-------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
The best choice she ever made. The only one that ever really mattered. To do things not because of logic, to avoid discussions of nature and nurture, and simply go with her heart. It was the impetus behind going after Nate, and the inspiration for offering Sam a place to stay, and now it's what has her leaning so close to the salt line it's foolish and reckless. It's what has her right there in the thing's reach, because this only has to go on another few seconds.
The demon makes a lunge, probably expecting the best to come of such an action is to humiliate or scare Sadie, and when it lunges it finds a completely different kind of barrier holding it back. The demon's black eyes blink to color, and then the masculine voice Sadie has been waiting for comes to the forefront of the action. Takes over the vibrating air and makes itself known, asserts strength and surety that makes Sadie's heart swell with something she almost believes is pride.
"Go to hell Meg."
Then there's a blur of-
------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Movement as Dean pulls Sam into his arms. Fuck the word cuddling, this is simply holding on. Holding on to what is his and remembering. Imprinting the scent and touch and taste of Sam into Dean's every molecule so that this is all he knows. This is all that's left. It's not like it doesn't scare Dean. The idea of losing Mom and Dad and every other thing he's ever cared about, but the thought of them tearing Sam away from him is unbearable and Dean won't let it happen. He let Sam down when he wasn't there to save him in Cold Oaks, and he's abandoning Sam now, but he can keep that. Can at least protect the memory of Sam because that's all that will keep Dean human. This is the only thing he needs to feel real, and moral, and alive so Dean-
--------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
Shatters and Sam holds his brother's hips and tumbles after him into the bliss of his orgasm. It's all sharp and jagged pieces, pain and pleasure, and Sam feels tears in his eyes even as he's laughing. Honestly laughing and did he think Dean was beautiful before? Because the smile his brother gives him is the best thing he's ever seen and god he wants to keep it. Wants to keep it forever. He'll slip in and out, he's not healed, but this is a step and a big one. He knows it without being told, that's what Sam's saying out loud he realizes because Dean's nodding. He actually starts to hear himself mid-sentence, which is bizarre beyond all reason.
"-and even if I slip Dean I'll come back. I'll come back to you. Always you."
Dean's arms wrap around him and Sam is buried in the smell of sex and sweat and Dean and that's just wonderful. Glorious. That's what the world should always smell like, but no one else should smell it, and his thoughts are already fracturing but Dean's got him. Dean's got him and the man is duct tape for Sam's psyche and that's what matters. That's what matters. Not the blood, and the torture, and hideous things they all said. None of that was real and now Sam-
-------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
Is removing the knife after the flash of light. So that's what a demon's death looks like, Sadie has time to think right before she blacks out. She still can't handle blood very well, but when she comes back Nate tells her she's only been gone three days and that Sam took care of her. Sam did. And she tells Dean and Nate the story, about the demon coming and Sam's plan. Of how amazing he was when he snuck up behind it and used that special knife. Of Sam's prowess and strength and cunning. She tells the story to tell them, tells it so Sam can see it outside of his humble little recounting, but mostly she tells it to tell herself. That Sam is getting there, and fast, and that takes the guilt off. It takes the guilt right away, and that's good because Sadie couldn't live with the guilt too.
But this is it. This is her ticket back home really because there's hope now. It's always been a sad fact that Sadie, as smart as she knows she is, isn't very social or emotional. She knows the studies. Knows them. Quotes them to herself constantly, but here is her hope. Samuel Winchester and his remarkable love for his brother. Dean Winchester and his ability to hold onto the love and let it lead his brother back out. She'll work harder on Nate, because if her observations are correct then physical contact is a big part of the healing process. It's done wonders for Sam after all. Nate was so worried that the Winchesters would be a destructive force, but she's learned more from Sam than she has in all her years researching PTSD and trauma theory. Sam and Dean are the breaking of all those rules she's put into place to keep her hope dimmed and low. Sam and Dean are what she has to be like if she wants to be whole and in love again. More importantly Sadie's willing to try because this is-
----------
Eaton, Colorado December 20th, 2009
The last hunt he'll go on with Nate for a while. They've agreed to Sam's ridiculous proposition to celebrate Christmas in some traditional sense. How could he say no though? Sam remembered that Christmas was coming on his own. Sam actually reminded Dean that the holiday was coming up, and that's just fucking huge. That's just everything. Sam's not fixed. Not by any means is he a hundred percent, but his little brother is making it there in leaps and bounds. Maybe it's all false promise. Maybe this will end up being the same sort of there and gone again Sadie went through, and Sam's first exposure to the real world will result in him falling apart at the seams, but honestly? Dean knows the way back now. Knows how to lead Sam there and help him through each and every step.
Dean knows the way, and even if Sam gets lost sometimes Dean will be there to bring him back. It's a bizarrely symbolic version of their childhood, and it's hard sometimes to not see Sam's hand as the tiny one that Dean used to hold. The one that he'd grip so fucking tight to make sure that his little brother was right there beside him always in case the world decided to try and grab him. It's Dean's job to protect Sam, and that's always been true, but it's Dean's job to preserve Sam too. To grip his little brother tight and keep him anchored down. Keep him here and now. That's not a new job he's come to realize. Sam's always had a habit of wandering just out of reach, and Dean's never seen before just how important it is to curb that. To give Sam as much length as he can while making sure that he's never going too far.
They're lying in bed that night and Sam is running his fingers over the stitches Nate put in Dean's side the night before after the ghost slammed Dean into the window. Sam's fingering each stitch individually so lightly and gently that it's hard to know if Sam's really touching him or if Dean's brain is playing tricks on him. "I could have done these better."
It's the first time Sam's spoken since Dean spilled inside of him, and Dean jerks a bit in surprise at the sound of it. He can't help the shit-eating grin that crosses his face. Sam is getting better at responding to emotion, and Dean's always amazed at how much that pleases him. "Yeah maybe. But the fainting and fluttering would've added a bit of time to the whole process." Sam punches him once in the stomach, lightly, and then flops back onto the mattress and covers his eyes. There's silence for a bit and then his brother starts laughing, and the sound is a goddamn revelation. A fucking choir really. "What's so funny Sammy?"
"I get it. I get what she was saying."
He raises an eyebrow that Sam can't see and then nudges his brother in the ribs once carefully. "Get what?" He tries to keep the creeping concern out, because it's never good when Sam starts to mentally wander. When those hazel eyes open though they're clear and present, and Dean feels a weight lift from his chest.
"Hamlet. She quoted Hamlet to me. Said that when I understood it I'd be on the road to recovery."
Dean chews on his cheek for a second before nodding slowly. "So what'd you get?"
"I am a king of infinite space bounded in a nutshell Dean. Lock it all down tight and then the whole thing isn't so overwhelming. I just needed to get rid of the bad dreams."
He lets the silence spin out as he takes that in. Considers every angle of what Sam is saying and then hauls his brother into his body and grips him tight. It doesn't escape him that Sam's body temperature has risen drastically in the last few months, that touching him now isn't like it used to be. Like handling snow with burning fingers. "This is going to be a chick-flick moment isn't it? You gonna tell me I ran off the bad dreams 'cause I'm your white knight, and now you're all better and shit?"
His cock gives an exhausted twitch of interest when Sam bites the skin directly beneath his nipple. "Shut up jerk."
"Bitch."
Sam wakes up to the smell of burning flesh. At least he thinks he does, but it's probably not really there. When he takes the time to really analyze it he finds it's actually cinnamon. Dean isn't in the room, and Sam takes several long deep breaths and reminds himself that his brother is not always there, but he's there. Somewhere. Sam just needs to find him. That's what he was doing before he fell asleep anyway. Opening the door so he could go down to Hell and find Dean. Except not really Hell, but Sam can't remember what the place he went to was called other than a courtroom, and that Dean is not here.
He pushes out of the bed and stumbles his way across the room before finding the door. The knob looks familiar, and it takes Sam a moment to realize why. Because this is Sadie McCullough's house, and Sam is being taught how to save Dean. The rest of it was a dream, and that makes sense. All a bad nightmare because really? Who could go to Hell and survive? The things he dreamed are not something a human being could experience. The burning and ripping, the constant humiliation and shame, and the knowledge that all of the people he loved most were let down by his inability to be good enough. He lets down the people he loves. That's the truth they taught him in Hell, and Jess and Mom and Dad and Dean and always and forever and up and down-
Sam stumbles on the last three steps and barks his shin against the corner of the wall. The pain grounds him. Just a nightmare and Sadie's gonna finish telling him what to do to make sure Dean doesn't spend more time in Hell than he absolutely has to. Except when Sam comes around the corner into the kitchen he finds Sadie, and the real-life version of the picture of her lover, and Dean. Sitting in the middle of the kitchen like it's no big deal. Until Dean looks up and spots him, and then Sam's shaking with the need to apologize. To go to Dean and apologize because Sam has done something very bad but for the life of him he can't remember what. Something unforgivable though, and Dean doesn't look angry but he should. Dean looks awestruck, and open, and Sam grabs the doorframe and wonders who's behind him. When he looks there's no one there. Maybe what he did wrong was coming here. Dean's only got so much time left and Sam sort of abandoned him. Does Dean know the plan?
It takes milliseconds to cross the kitchen and grab Sadie's arms, and the way she jerks under his palms suggests he might be gripping too hard but he can't loosen up yet. "Did you tell him? You didn't did you? Sadie? If you told him I can't-"
And then he's there. The other piece of Sam's puzzle slotting against him and pulling him back into his warm body. Dean's arm like a bar of titanium around his chest as he collapses into Dean's heated flesh. The fire was so hot it was cold Dean. I was always cold there, and you always danced right out of my reach, and I knew you'd be warm. It's an alien thought, foreign and unwelcome even if it sounds like it's in his voice. The hunter, Nate, is there and he's touching her and tilting her arms to look at the livid handprints on her flesh. They'll no doubt bruise, and Sam opens his mouth to apologize, but he can't remember how to make his vocal chords work. He catches Sadie's dark blue eyes though and she seems to forgive him even as the world spins and his face is buried in the heat and strength of Dean's shoulder.
"Sammy. Fuck Sammy it's good to see you up little brother." Dean's voice sounds wrecked, and Sam tries to remember how long he was sleeping. Why Dean would be so surprised to see him moving around.
"Dean." His voice sounds a hundred times worse than Dean's, which is ridiculous because he just woke up. It sounds like he's been screaming for a long time though which makes sense because he's been screaming for an eternity. The whole of it swells into his consciousness at once and Sam staggers under the weight of all that time. All that memory. He hears a male voice he doesn't recognize, and then Dean is talking and the sound of him holds Sam from spinning down into the darkness he's been in since forever.
"Ok Sam. I got you. I got you baby. October 5th, 2008. That's when it is, and you're in Eaton, Colorado at the Doc's house, and I'm here. You're not in Hell anymore Sammy. Not there. You're here with me, and this is real, and I got you. Won't let nobody near you again ok? You hear me? Nobody's gonna hurt you again, 'cause that's what I'm here for. To protect my little brother. Just hold steady Sam 'cause you ain't there anymore. You hear me?"
He can't talk again, but he can nod and hold on. Hold on to the furnace heat of his brother. Remember that this is where he's been trying to get for so long, and that he's finally here. There's a chair under him without warning but Dean stays in contact with him. Stays close. This isn't Hell anymore, and Sam can see that now. Of course he can because he'd know if he was still in Hell. Wouldn't he?
There's food in front of him suddenly, and he looks up to see Sadie's hesitant smile. He clears his throat three times before he can force his voice out over the rusty machinery that makes it. "I didn't let you down."
Sadie's face crumples and then breaks into a huge smile. "No you didn't Sam Winchester. You did an incredible job. Congratulations on making it back."
Sam reaches out then, touches her, and there's a substantial difference in the feel of her and the feel of Dean. For so long every sensation has been painful and obscure, lost in his new consciousness, and now he can feel flesh. She feels insubstantial the way he does, as if she's only half there and half spun dream webbing. It's more than comforting to feel it, and he grips her hand tightly. Dean's voice breaks the spell. "You need to eat Sammy. Will you eat?" It's strange because she said there'd be no pleasure, and while soft sheets hold no joy for him Dean's hands are hard and unforgiving and they thrill him beyond belief. Dean's a spark in the darkness, a promise of something lost but not eradicated.
Yeah. He'll eat. The food has taste, but taste is like a distant concept that Sam only half gets. It's there because he needs it, and because food is essential to the body continuing to run properly. He needs to eat. When it's all gone Dean stays and the plate disappears. It's the steady pressure of Dean that lets Sam know this is real. Dean is not everywhen like Sadie or Sam. Dean is one place and time. Dean is solid and stationary. Dean is-
--------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Pressing a finger into Sam's asshole even as he bites Sam's thigh. It's distracting and engaging and hotter than fuck. Dean's all teeth and tongue, and Sam couldn't have ever really imagined how good this could be. A lifetime of learning every single one of the other's tells, of memorizing every sight and line and sound, and now they're learning new ones. Sam never knew for example that Dean's mouth could melt steel. Didn't know that Dean's fingers could carry an electric current, and fuck that hurt. Blunt pressure and burning and Sam wants more of it. Wants Dean to hurt him until he can't stand, can't walk to fight Lilith. They can just stay here, because secretly Sam knows it won't do them any good. It's the ritual that will save Dean, but he can't tell his brother that, and he can't call this attack off because if he does Dean will figure out something is wrong. It has to look like Sam-holy fuck. Dean's finger is joined by another, and then in a move so shocking it's criminal Dean's tongue traces the line of Sam's rim and circles his own fingers. If it wasn't for Dean's free hand holding him down Sam would have broken his brother's nose when he jerked.
There's a laugh, husky and sweet, and it takes Sam a minute to figure out it's Dean because that broken pleading is coming from him. Which would be embarrassing if Dean's tongue wasn't moving into him along with those two fingers, and that blunt burning is giving way to something else entirely. He wants to ask Dean if this was the plan all along, or what he's supposed to be doing, but the best he can accomplish is his brother's name as he grips the sheets with one hand and Dean's shoulder with the other. Sam knows he's leaving bruises there, and he can't feel bad for that because Dean is bringing it on himself. He'd like to give something back to Dean. Would like to pleasure his brother as well, but then the tongue is gone and there's a third finger and Sam's keening. Keening and crying, and he'd can't think anymore. There are words. He's supposed to say words. This is a ritual. He can actually feel the spell energies coiling around them and gaining strength with every second of the pleasure and arousal.
Dean's mouth is on his cock again, and his brother is propped at an awkward angle. It takes Sam a while to realize Dean's digging in his jeans, and when he sees the condom come out he finds his voice. "No."
Mossy green and brown eyes meet his and Dean raises an eyebrow. His brother can claim Sam has a monopoly on the "bitchface" all he wants, but Dean can be just as stubborn and unyielding. There's a hint of that when he looks at Sam. "Sammy. I haven't been-"
"Don't care. Don't care Dean. No." After all, what's the point of worrying about that? Sam's world is ending in a few days and his shot at saving it is slim to none. Fuck the consequences. It fits with the role he's trying to play. The suggestion that he's giving Dean up entirely. They stay like that for what feels like forever, eyes locked and wills battling until Dean gives up and drops the condom. Removes his fingers from Sam and uses both hands to take off his jeans and to slick his cock with the lube and then Dean stops entirely and just stares. Sam feels self-conscious then, and he twists under the intensity of it until Dean licks those swollen lips and meets his gaze again. Sam's seen most of Dean's looks, but never this one. As if he could burn through Sam with his gaze alone. As if Sam is the only thing in the whole goddamn world with value.
He'd like to say something flowery and sweet. That this is them finally becoming each other's everything, but it would be untrue. Dean has always been Sam's world. Everything worth fighting for and believing in all wrapped into one bow-legged, pink-lipped, hazel-eyed package, and Sam loves him. Loves his brother more in that moment than he ever thought possible because only now does the true depth of that love make itself known. He's going to give up his life and his sanity for this and it's all worth it. Always has been, because it's Dean.
"So goddamn beautiful like this Sam. All spread out and fucked-up for me. Always wanted to see this, and now I got it." Sam moans at that and Dean's eyes go heavy-lidded and darker than Sam ever thought they could. "Fuck Sammy. Fuck."
Hot hands grip his thighs, spread them wide, and then the blunt head of Dean's cock is pressing against his entrance and Dean is holding his eyes as he pushes against him. There's a pause, and then Sam takes a deep breath and Dean pushes in without having to discuss what it is they're doing. They move in synch like they always have, one mind in two bodies, and it hurts but it's so fucking good. He's burning up from the inside, and he holds still just like Dean and takes deep breaths. The same sticky fingers that were inside him stroke along his stomach, and he relaxes slowly into Dean's touch. It takes a while, and that's ok because they don't have to discuss it. Dean's forehead pushes against his, and instead of kissing they breathe each other in. This is Sam's last chance, because once Dean starts moving for real Sam knows that his brother is going to fuck every last functioning brain cell out of his head, and Sam's going to love every second of it.
So he says the words. Says them softly into Dean's mouth and listens to Dean breathe them in and absorb them.
"What does that mean?" Dean moans it out because Sam chooses that moment to tense his muscles and grip Dean harder than before. Feels his brother shift another few inches inside.
"It means I love you. I have loved you all this time. You are the only thing I have ever loved."
There's a noise, thick and low in the back of Dean's throat, and then his brother repeats the spell as if it's nothing. They've spent their whole life doing it after all. Repetition and release. And it's good, so good, because after Dean says it he thrusts all the way in and Sam's head slams into the headboard with the force and power of it. Dean is in him. Dean and he are joined and Sam wants to see the place it's happening at, but all he can see are Dean's eyes swallowing him down and Dean's lips spit slick and plush descending towards his own.
--------
Eaton, Colorado October 7th, 2008
Nate leans down and kisses Sadie's forehead before he moves on to make sure the house is secure. Hunt together? The shit he knows about the Winchesters can be put into two columns. People They've Gotten Killed and Things They've Killed. They're a legend in the community, but legends are never wholly good. When he comes back he finds only Dean and a beer waiting for him. Sadie's feeling better, because she's subtly manipulating shit again. He'll have to keep that in mind. He glances once at his watch and sees that she's probably gone upstairs for her class. Dean answers his second question before he asks it.
"She took Sam with her. Said he'd like the lecture." Dean pushes the beer towards him and then studies him for a bit. "How long you been hunting?"
"Monsters? Since I was nineteen. My dad was real big on survival and self-sufficiency though, so a lot of my training started when I was ten." He doesn't ask the question back because everybody knows the Winchester story. Both boys raised in the life since they were knee-high to a grasshopper, and that's just filler if he brings it up. He takes a long pull from his beer and goes for a different question. "How long you been sleeping with Sam?"
Dean jerks once, looks up, and then raises an eyebrow. "That gonna be a problem?"
"Well that depends on your definition of problem. With me? Hell no man. It probably should be, but I've been doing this long enough to know that the rules ain't always applicable. Life is bloody and short, and we better take what we can as long as we don't hurt anyone along the way." He taps his beer bottle against Dean's when it's offered and then considers how best to state the next part. "But for you? It may be a problem. The Sadie thing got complicated after Hell."
There's a long pause where he simply studies the other hunter, and then Dean sips his beer and puts it down before he starts sliding it back and forth between his hands. "Have you been with Sadie long?"
"Never." That gets the same quirked eyebrow, and Nate laughs even though he shouldn't. "I always told her no. That it wasn't her kind of life, that it'd put her in danger, that I couldn't be devoted to her like that. After Dad and I started hunting we were in and out so much I barely saw her. Talked on the phone a lot. Emails. Shit like that, but not the kind of thing that constituted a relationship. I imagine it was all wrapped up in a lot of stuff, including me thinking I didn't deserve a girl like her. Then one night I'm staring down the barrel of Hell, I've had some drinks, my dad's dying in a hospital, and she takes her clothes off. You know how you know she's nervous?" Dean shakes his head and Nate takes a long drink. "She starts talking like a robot. Shuts down totally. 'I would like to have sexual intercourse with you.' That and stripping were her idea of seduction. Saddest part? Worked like a damn charm."
Dean's laughing, eyes crinkled at the corners and hand clutching the bottle. "Sam cried." The moment it comes out it looks like Dean wants to take it back, but Nate clinks his beer again and Dean continues. "Cried and was already naked. I was three days away from Hell. It was the first time."
Which is where Nate's concerns come in. "And I get that man. I really do, but now? When they're like this? How do we know we ain't taking advantage? They're tied to us. Belong to us. What's the line between want and obedience?"
It's a fear that's been brewing in the back of his head since he got back, and he half-hoped it would surprise Dean. That he'd see reluctance or something other than the knowing nod he's getting in return to his statement. Because this was the only damn person in the world who would understand his predicament.
"I always thought Sam wanted it because I did. Or because he thought it would tie us together. Some complicated bullshit like that, 'cause Sammy's always coming up with crazy plans. I never thought that he'd-" Dean's voice breaks and Nate knows exactly what he wants to say. What he wants to get across.
"It's a lot of goddamn weight. She keeps telling me I earned it by putting it on her first, but she didn't have to watch me be tortured. She didn't have to see the aftermath of it."
Dean's nodding, head eager and eyes showing how much beer he's already had. Nate can't judge him, because he's planning on getting pretty wasted today himself. The whole thing, Sam and Dean, it's too familiar. Too much like before. "Sammy's always doing shit like this. Self-sacrificial like it's ok. Like he's s'posed to protect me. I'm the older brother. I'm the one that's gotta do the protecting. Sam can't see that, but it's always been true. Since he was born. Now he's all broken up and I can't do shit but talk to him and hope he gets better. But he knew. Knew he wasn't gonna get no damn better because he researched it. He knew she didn't get better."
He feels like he should argue that, and then changes his mind before changing it back. How many beers has he had? The empty bottles on the table don't give a clear indication because there's no telling which are his and which are Dean's. "She's better. You shoulda seen her when she first came back. Worse off than Sam, and took her longer to get to that point. When she went back to work? Girl couldn't even make eye contact with anyone. Shook like a leaf if you touched her, and every damn sentence was flat and straight. Like they burned all the questions outta her."
There's a pause as Dean studies his beer bottle. "Worse than Sam?"
Nate would love to stop. This isn't something he enjoys doing, and he's still a little iffy about the proposition of discussing what amounts to incest. Then again people in Hell want ice water, so he may as well just suck it up. "Yeah. Worse. You two are-" He tilts his bottles and wobbles it, knows Dean isn't sure what he means, and forges ahead. "-better together? Stronger. You may be just as bad at committing as I am, but you stuck by him through it. I left her."
That's when he notices Dean's eyes are wet, and damn if he doesn't feel like responding in kind. Too much fucking weight and too much fucking beer. "Sammy all obedient. Flies in the face of everything 'cause that boy ain't never liked orders. Always asks about them, always gotta push the envelope and demand. Used to fight Dad every step of the damn way before he started fighting me about it."
The next part comes out before he can stop himself. "My old man hunted with yours once. Mara in San Francisco. Said your dad was one of the best damn hunters he ever saw, but colder than a witch's tit."
Dean laughs. Laughs so hard any trace of that sadness is out of his eyes and his hands are gripping his stomach as he tries to get himself back under control. "Yeah. Yeah Dad could be cold. I got some of that but Sammy's just like mom. Always wanting to save everybody. Best damn witness handler I ever saw man."
They get quiet again, and then Dean leans forward and is the kind of suddenly serious that only happens when a person is officially drunk and beyond any form of verbal control.
"You think it could work? Me and you as partners and Sam here with your girl?"
Nate considers that for a long time. Could he be a partner? A real one? He hasn't hunted exclusively with anyone since his father, and he's always wondered. Pairs seem to work better, to last longer, and there's never been a person he gets along with well enough to try it out. Dean seems like a good guy, but his dad's warning rings in his ears the whole time. Then he thinks of Sadie standing there, eyes clear and defiant, a stronger shade of the woman he fell in love with than any he's seen in years.
"Actually I sorta do."
Dean nods once. Puts his beer down and stands on wobbly bow-legs. "Then let's do it man. Fuck it."
--------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
"But fuck it right? Am I right?" Nate's looking around with a big grin on his face and Sam tries to remember what he's asking. Dean is standing roughly two inches away from Sadie asking about pie cooling times, and Sam can't even remember what kind of pie it is. Smells like berries. Something with berries.
"Yeah. Yeah you're right." He's looking at Dean though. Studying the way his brother's bruised face pulls into a broad grin as he pokes at the pie on the counter and says something charming that makes Sadie nod but not grin. That's her though. Not grinning even when it's obvious she wants to. Sam tries to smile, but it feels odd stretched across his face. He can't smile the way she can sometimes, but he thinks with time he might be able to. It takes time to reorder what's been happening in his head, and what's been happening outside of it. Sam knows, for instance, that Dean and Nate have been hunting together. That his brother has been coming back every week to check on him, and that he keeps telling Sam his progress is incredible. Sam's not sure about that. He knows they just took down a nest of vampires, and that the two of them are feeling like kings right now. Which makes Sam feel good he thinks, but there's no telling.
He can string sentences together though, and every day he sounds a little better. When Dean's gone things get fuzzy, but Sam thinks he can handle that. That he can get over the hurdles one at a time if he tries very very hard. Doesn't change the fact that everything is still off and wrong. That this is today and yesterday all at once and Sam wants it gone. Wants to be free of it, but the best way out is through.
"Robert Frost." Sam's head jerks up and he realizes he's been talking aloud. Dean looks wounded, and Nate looks concerned, but Sadie is staring right into him. "It was Robert Frost that said that."
Dean clears his throat and then catches Nate's eyes. "Hey man we should grab some extra firewood. We'll be right back for pie ok girls?" There's a tightness to it that suggests that it isn't as much of a joke as Dean would like it to be, but Sam forces a smile again and watches Dean wince at it.
When he's alone with Sadie he finds himself standing near her as she slices pie. "Does it ever really get better? Do I ever get better so I stop hurting Dean?" Because that's what Sam did to deserve punishment. He let everyone down. Especially Dean.
"You went to Stanford. That's a core school instead of a distribution so you took, what, Great Books? A Shakespeare class?"
That's hard to remember but Sam tries. Those were the Deanless years, when Jessica was a factor and Sam felt almost as lost as he does now. He remembers that's where he met a man who talked about books, but the name escapes him. This is the man that led him here though, so this should be important. Should be right there. Except when he strains for it all he gets is a picture of Dean standing there the night he left. When was that? He left for Stanford and Dean didn't fight him, didn't argue, and Sam wanted to be stopped but Dean wouldn't stop him. Which wasn't fair because Dean could never stop him. No matter how much he loved Dean there were things his brother just wouldn't understand and to suggest Sam should give in and betray his own judgment was-but if Dean said it now Sam would do it because Dean was right. Because Dean owned him, and that used to scare Sam but Sam isn't afraid of it anymore. He's afraid of blood and pain, and screaming. Sam can't stand screaming. But he was asked a question and that question was about Stanford. "Yes. I took both of those." Clewsky. It's a vicious and triumphant thought.
"There's a quote from Shakespeare. 'Oh God, I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space-were it not that I have bad dreams.' Do you know what that means?"
No. No he doesn't and he shakes his head. If they covered that Sam doesn't remember it and he can't trace the meaning back to something he doesn't remember. He tells her all this and her lips tighten but she pushes back a lock of her hair before finishing her slicing. It's blueberry pie.
"When you can tell me the meaning Sam. That's when you're better. Wait for that alright?"
Which sounds good. He watches Dean and Nate come back in, and then watches his brother devour pie like there's no tomorrow. The bruising on Dean's jaw is worrying, but Sam suddenly can't remember how he got it and there's that smell of burning flesh again but he has to fight it off because Dean is eating pie and it will ruin the pie. That smell ruins everything. Taste and sound and joy and anger are all subsumed under the sickly sweet scent of Sam's own rotting and burning corpse. He must not be hiding it well because Dean is suddenly there, and Sam lets himself be swept up in Dean's strength. Remembers that it's going to be Thanksgiving soon and Sam is staying here for protection and that he can't help Dean anymore. Can't help anyone because he's broken, and that's how it is now.
Sam lets himself be led upstairs. Follows Dean's directions to shower and brush his teeth. It's dark outside so it is bedtime and Sam is led that way. When Dean comes back they always sleep in the same bed, and sometimes Dean calls this home but Sam sees the hesitance he has about it. By all technical definitions though it is a home. It's a home and they sort of live here when Dean is here and Sam sort of lives here when Dean isn't. So now they're in bed together and Sam touches Dean's shoulder and finds himself pulled into a tight embrace and surrounded by Dean's scent which is the only thing that takes away that burning flesh smell sometimes. The only thing that keeps Hell at bay. He clutches at Dean like he's an anchor, or a life preserver, and technically he is. A rock in a swiftly flowing river. Because time is everywhere and it takes Sam away, but Dean can stop it. Time is afraid of Dean. It behaves when he's around.
Asked later Sam wouldn't have been able to explain what it was that made him think it was a good idea, but suddenly he wanted to touch Dean. Wanted to see that look he remembers from before he was broken, and know that he can still do that for Dean at least. Can still give him that. He wants the connection and the comfort, and his hand slides over Dean's hip and down to Dean's groin. He slides it along and up, cups Dean and feels that his brother is getting hard. Dean starts to talk, but Sam shuts him up by locking their lips together and licking against Dean's lower one in the hopes that he'll get entrance. It doesn't take long, and then Sam can taste blueberry pie and mint and Dean and that's wonderful. That's perfect, because it's the first time Sam has tasted something and liked it in an eternity. He licks harder, pushing past the last of Dean's defenses, and searches for the source of that goodness. The core of Dean's taste, and this is what he needed. This is what he always needed, and if he could just stay here and be here then he could always be safe and whole.
Then their lips are parted and Dean's speaking in this husky and shot voice. "Sammy we-fuck this isn't-I don't want you to do something you don't want."
That's confusing, and Sam has to take a moment and consider Dean before he can even begin to get the implications there. Suddenly it all comes clear, and he wants to hit Dean for the first time since before Hell. His brother can be so stupid.
"Then shut up and it won't be an order jerk." He goes back to kissing, and Dean doesn't fight when Sam licks the seam of his mouth.
Dean's getting into it, dark and thick noises coming from his throat as Sam gets his hand under Dean's sweatpants and wraps his fingers along Dean's cock. He remembers how this works, how you make someone feel pleasure, and to Sam's eternal surprise he feels it again. Feels the simplistic joy of it, and that's the first time he's felt that in an eternity too, and he wants it. Wants all of it. Dean's not a spark anymore he's a fire, a promise fulfilled. Which is why when Dean breaks off and takes a deep breath as if he's going to speak Sam wants to stop him again and finds out he can't. Instead Dean starts talking, and his hands are grabbing at Sam's wrist like he's going to stop him.
"Sam-Sammy wait a minute man. Jesus slow down. This isn't-do you uh-" Dean's eyes glitter in the dark and Sam wishes he could see his brother's face better, because he's not very good at making vague connections anymore, but then Dean makes it clear with a sound in the back of his mouth and a slight withdrawing. That's no good. That can't happen.
"I want. I want this. Please Dean. Please. First good thing since forever. No more smelling Hell or feeling it when you're here and I need this. Need you to make me something closer to stationary because I'm going insane without it. I can't-"
It's Dean that shuts him up this time. Dean's mouth on his and Sam lets his brother lick into his mouth. Lets him taste back and enjoys every second. Suddenly he's under Dean, and there's warm breath on his throat and Dean's talking.
"Yeah ok. Ok baby I got you so just hold still and I'll do this. Just-" His voice shudders as his fingers push Sam's shirt up and off, and Sam loves every second of it. Loves the rasp of Dean's rough fingers along the smooth skin of his stomach and the sensation of Dean's erection rubbing against his hip as Dean undresses him. Whatever Dean was going to say is gone, lost in a sea of kissing and licking. Dean tasting his flesh and muttering about soap and sex. Something Sam can't understand, but he doesn't really want to because Dean's got his pants off too now and-
------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Dean's in. He can see the exact place where he and Sam are joined, and Sam's so fucking hot and tight that Dean can't think straight. Can't follow one logical thought process to another because that's him in his little brother, and it's a sick thrill that feels every kind of amazing even when he knows it shouldn't. Maybe he deserves Hell. He traces the line of their connection with one finger and Sam makes a noise like Dean is killing him. Which is fucking sexier than anything Dean's ever experienced in his whole life. He holds still though, because Sam has to be hurting. Has to. Except Sam isn't looking hurt even though it takes several more hard thrusts for Dean to realize the banging sound isn't his heart beating its way out of his chest, but Sam's head slamming into the headboard. Dean grabs Sam's thighs and pulls him backwards so that he's buried deep, but not pushing his brother towards head trauma with every deep thrust. There's a spot that one of Dean's kinkier hook-ups explained to him, and Dean angles and tries to find it even as he attempts to eat as much of Sam's skin as he can find.
Sam's talking again, saying something that doesn't make any sense, but it sounds like poetry or classical literature. Which probably isn't true, but Dean thinks it should be because his brother, it turns out, has a filthy fucking mouth in bed and it's better than anything Dean ever had to read in any of his classes. "Fuck Dean. Fuck yes. Harder, please, fuck, harder. I can't-" Then Dean hits it. Hits that spot and Sam's body arches like he's being electrocuted, and his face cramps up tight and his lips fall open so wide that Dean thinks he can see Sam's tonsils. All the words have been driven out of Sam, and now he's just making those broken rough noises and Dean wants him to make them forever. Wants to hear them the next time Sam starts bitching about shit.
Sam's coming apart underneath him. Dean loves it. Loves to see his big lanky brother spread below him with his face flushed and his head tilted back. Loves the way Sam's chest is getting red and mottled, the way his thigh feels gripped in Dean's fingers and the scent of sweat and sex mixed up with the smell of Sam. It's a good mix, one Dean thinks he should have all the time, and he knows that can't happen. He has to do his best to leave a mark so deep Sam will never forget it. To touch him in a way that he can carry with him all the years he lives beyond Dean. He keeps feeling though, skating his fingers over Sam's flesh and working his way to Sam's hard red cock. It's trapped between them and Sam is so busy ripping at the sheets and scratching up Dean's back that he's neglecting his own needs. Which is why it's so good that Dean's here to take care of him.
He grips it finally, hot and hard and heavy, and wonders when Sam got so big there and when he started thinking shit like this. Which is gone when Sam's muscles flutter around him and he lets out this half-formed shout of Dean's name. That's it. He loses the ability to think and simply moves-
------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
His fingers shake as Dean leads them in between his legs. He can't remember how this got turned around like this. One second he was underneath Dean and now he's on top. Dean's hand is burning into his wrist, and there's lube on his fingers as he traces Dean's entrance. He pushes one in, hears the hiss of pain, and he starts shaking harder. He's hurting Dean. Hurting him, and Sam should never hurt Dean but he is and what's he supposed to do about that? Which is when Dean starts talking.
"Wanted this then too. Wanted to do everything with you. You're good Sammy. You're doing fine." Sam's still shaking, but Dean's voice lessens it a bit, and he moves his finger around and marvels that he ever thought Dean was hot. This is like dipping his finger into an inferno, and he tries to remember all the things he researched before he and Dean did this the first time. Except Sam was looking at the other end of it because he honestly never believed Dean would offer this. Which is when his fingertip finds something spongy and what was tight becomes complete constriction as Dean clamps down on him and jerks. "Fuck Sam-yes!"
Well that's good. That's a series of words Sam wants to hear again so he rubs Dean's prostate another two or three times until Dean is coming undone under him, and Sam adds a second finger as his brother's pretty mouth moves at light-speed.
"It's good. It's good. I'm not delicate man so just-fucking hell Sam!" He's licking Dean's shaft now, enjoying taste all over again as he gets a mouthful of velvety skin and precome. It's not a taste he's terribly familiar with, but it makes all the difference. Dean in distilled format maybe and that's an odd thought, but Sam's used to odd thoughts. He remembers what Dean did when they did this last time, and he mouths his way down Dean's cock and over his balls before licking at the stretched skin of Dean's hole. The sounds his brother makes at that make Sam lick harder, slide his tongue in with his fingers, and there's an earthy taste that isn't bad but is certainly different. Dean's actually whimpering, and Sam likes that. Likes it a lot, because it's a good sound and Dean's happy and Sam's happy for that. Happy and that's like waking up after a long nightmare because he never thought he'd be happy again but-
------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
Fuck it's funny and it makes her happy to see the way the demon's face tightens. It thinks that the pretty meat-suit will fool her, but she can see the truth. Has been able to since her trip, and now she's looking into one of those smoky twisty faces all over again as she considers her options.
"You're being used to test what I did. You're supposed to go back and tell your superiors that if they want Sam Winchester alive they'd better not touch Dean. That their suspicions are correct."
There's no more sultry sweetness in it. "What the fuck are you talking about you lunatic bitch?"
"They wouldn't tell you because you're low on the food chain. Probably not important enough to even be granted a slight bit of information. That's ok. You're not to blame. I'd recognize you if you were important, but you're what's traditionally called cannon fodder. If you died here they'd know their answer anyway, and you're going to die here. There's no real question of that. All that's left is for you to decide if you want to die ignorant, or if you want to die with the answer you didn't know you were coming for."
It sneers once and then crosses its arms under its breasts. "Indulge me crazy-town. What's the big secret?"
She keeps her eyes on the demon and considers the many ways she could draw this out. How easy it would be to lie. There's any number of options she has, and she could take all or none of them. That's one of the side-effects of meeting the Winchesters. Options. It'd be amusing if it wasn't against every belief she's ever held. Free Will indeed.
"Those marks on his hands, those aren't just for show. They didn't just give him access to Dean in Hell. They link them, intrinsically, make them one singular person in the eyes of the Damned and the Divine. It's poetic isn't it?"
"Yeah and real sweet. Then again we all had our suspicions about those two. None of this is news."
Sadie waits another few seconds and then taps her fingers against the wall. "So you're low on the totem pole and you're not very intelligent. That's a bad mixture. Sam can die, and if he does he'll go nowhere because he can't leave Dean."
It's eyes flash black and the snarl is back. "You've gotta be fucking joking."
"Not even a little. You kill Dean Winchester and Sam Winchester dies too. Ends up wherever his brother goes. That's the final trick. You bastards never even considered the implications, and now here they are. Demons may be tricky, but you've apparently never handled a really good Humanities Major." And then Sadie's laughing again because this is exactly the expression she was hoping for. She leans towards the edge of the salt line and keeps the grin evident on her face even if it already feels off. She has research to do. Work that needs to be finished. Plus, Sam promised to teach her how to play poker and she's never learned that. She'd like to. She thinks-
--------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
He's going to die, and that's just fine with him. Because fuck it, this is a better place to die. Going down in a blaze of glory would be amazing, but going out buried balls-deep in Sam is possibly even better. There's pain here, yes, his muscles are straining to push harder than Sam can handle this first time and he's fighting himself not to bite Sam's lips bloody as he eats the moans and groans out of his brother's mouth. He wants very badly to slam so hard, but Sam's Sam, and even now crossing this line he still sees something delicate in his brother. Something that needs to remain pure and untouched. He can't treat this like all the ones before. There's sweat and sound and the lights in the room are bright enough he can see the way Sam's pupils take over his eyes, how the dimples come out when his brother half smiles at the push-pull of his cock, or the way Sam's jaw hardens and then softens when Dean's grip shifts and pulls.
He's getting close, can feel his orgasm building and his balls drawing tight, and he's never wanted an orgasm less. He wants to stay here with Sam until there's no more time left. Wants to continue with this until the world ends and falls down around them. They've been together so long Dean can't imagine a better way for this to go down. Sam's all he's ever wanted really, and now he's got him and there's not enough time. Never enough time because-
--------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
Sam's being pulled up and then pushed down, and Dean's over him, and there's so much time in between them. Sam feels ancient and untethered underneath his brother, and he watches the dim light catch a hint of slick hipbone, a curve of muscle, the flex of Dean's thighs and then his cock is pushing at Dean's entrance and then he's there. Sam knows what forever feels like. Understands it in a way only two mortal people on the whole planet do, and this is forever. Dean's descent on his cock is slow and torturous and Sam's tempted to grab Dean's hips and slam him down but he can't. Can't because he holds perfectly still and clenches his fists and lets Dean lead. This is such a big fucking thing and Sam knows it. Knows from the way Dean holds himself that his brother is pushing every single one of his limits to give Sam this. To help Sam.
He wants to help Dean back. So he holds still and tries to not move until Dean growls above him. "I'm not a delicate girl Sammy. Fuck me." So Sam does. He thrusts upwards and now he's all in and Dean cries out once and then settles his hands onto Sam's chest. They're slippery and slick and this is everything Sam needs and most of what he wants. They're united like this again, and it suggests that Dean is considering him a person again. An equal. Which is great because Sam is willing to try his hand at that even if the idea of it is a weight on his chest that can't-but those are Dean's hands, and Dean's mouth eating his, and that's all that matters. There are no demons here and no pain, and all Sam wants is to control the stutter of his hips. All he wants is to remember only this and the moments connected to it. The ones in which he feels like he's a human being again because that's what he's been missing and that's all that-
---------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
Really matters is that the demon keep looking this way. Keep looking right at her. Normally this would be breakdown material, but Sadie's got this. Can keep control for just a bit longer. People in her position are masters of bullshit and Sadie can do it. She forces her face to show another slick smile, and the demon rankles a bit further.
"You think you'll get away with this free and clear crazy-town? Really? We may need Sam Winchester, but nobody needs you which puts your little boy on the top of our list. We told you there'd be punishment if you helped the Winchesters, and you just thought-"
"I thought," Sadie raises her voice to cut the demon off and to make sure everything is still on track, "that Hell would send muscle instead of brains. I thought that it would be supremely easy to get you talking. I also thought you would have figured out by now that killing Nate wouldn't phase me much. Your people burned that out of me. You have no leverage and no intimidation power with me. So as Dean would say, eat it bitch." She's fairly certain that's what Dean would say. It seems like a fair approximation at least and none of it really matters, because here it comes. Sadie watches-
----------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Sam fall apart completely, and with Sam's orgasm Dean isn't far behind. The clutching heat and the sounds tumbling up through the air to him tell Dean that all he really needed was to be here in this moment to know everything he needed to about the world. It's not that Dean's having a magical epiphany about potential beauty or clarity, but there is something there that he'd make fun of Sam for if it was coming from the other side. This is Sam and this is Dean, and they are Sam and Dean, and that's all there is. All there's ever really been. Who knows when it really started after all? When his parents first brought Sammy home and mom said, "this is your little brother" or when Dad dropped Sam into his arms in the fire, or the thousands of times Dean saved Sam's hide? Does it matter? What matters is that Sam is here, and now, and everywhere on Dean. Physically and emotionally and all the other frilly, girly, chick-flick moment, gag-inducing bullshit Sam is there. He is Dean's completely and wholly, and that's what Dean will hold onto. That's what will keep him-
------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
Sane and whole and in this moment forever. Dean's coming apart on top of him and Sam can't believe how absolutely, marvelously, earth-shatteringly beautiful his brother is in this moment. Dean's not a pillar, not a rock in a stream he's a goddamn mountain, he's a monument to all the things Sam has lost, and Sam feels the edge of it then. The realization that he can be himself again, or close so fucking close, as long as he holds on to this. Holds on to the knowledge that Dean is not going anywhere and that he and Sam have an eternity, experienced the right way, to make a go of this. To belong to each other. It wasn't a pointless exercise and Sadie is wrong. Sam chose to follow Dean of his own free will, and that choice was-
-------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
The best choice she ever made. The only one that ever really mattered. To do things not because of logic, to avoid discussions of nature and nurture, and simply go with her heart. It was the impetus behind going after Nate, and the inspiration for offering Sam a place to stay, and now it's what has her leaning so close to the salt line it's foolish and reckless. It's what has her right there in the thing's reach, because this only has to go on another few seconds.
The demon makes a lunge, probably expecting the best to come of such an action is to humiliate or scare Sadie, and when it lunges it finds a completely different kind of barrier holding it back. The demon's black eyes blink to color, and then the masculine voice Sadie has been waiting for comes to the forefront of the action. Takes over the vibrating air and makes itself known, asserts strength and surety that makes Sadie's heart swell with something she almost believes is pride.
"Go to hell Meg."
Then there's a blur of-
------
Eerie, Pennsylvania May 28th, 2008
Movement as Dean pulls Sam into his arms. Fuck the word cuddling, this is simply holding on. Holding on to what is his and remembering. Imprinting the scent and touch and taste of Sam into Dean's every molecule so that this is all he knows. This is all that's left. It's not like it doesn't scare Dean. The idea of losing Mom and Dad and every other thing he's ever cared about, but the thought of them tearing Sam away from him is unbearable and Dean won't let it happen. He let Sam down when he wasn't there to save him in Cold Oaks, and he's abandoning Sam now, but he can keep that. Can at least protect the memory of Sam because that's all that will keep Dean human. This is the only thing he needs to feel real, and moral, and alive so Dean-
--------
Eaton, Colorado February 7th, 2009
Shatters and Sam holds his brother's hips and tumbles after him into the bliss of his orgasm. It's all sharp and jagged pieces, pain and pleasure, and Sam feels tears in his eyes even as he's laughing. Honestly laughing and did he think Dean was beautiful before? Because the smile his brother gives him is the best thing he's ever seen and god he wants to keep it. Wants to keep it forever. He'll slip in and out, he's not healed, but this is a step and a big one. He knows it without being told, that's what Sam's saying out loud he realizes because Dean's nodding. He actually starts to hear himself mid-sentence, which is bizarre beyond all reason.
"-and even if I slip Dean I'll come back. I'll come back to you. Always you."
Dean's arms wrap around him and Sam is buried in the smell of sex and sweat and Dean and that's just wonderful. Glorious. That's what the world should always smell like, but no one else should smell it, and his thoughts are already fracturing but Dean's got him. Dean's got him and the man is duct tape for Sam's psyche and that's what matters. That's what matters. Not the blood, and the torture, and hideous things they all said. None of that was real and now Sam-
-------
Eaton, Colorado November 13th, 2008
Is removing the knife after the flash of light. So that's what a demon's death looks like, Sadie has time to think right before she blacks out. She still can't handle blood very well, but when she comes back Nate tells her she's only been gone three days and that Sam took care of her. Sam did. And she tells Dean and Nate the story, about the demon coming and Sam's plan. Of how amazing he was when he snuck up behind it and used that special knife. Of Sam's prowess and strength and cunning. She tells the story to tell them, tells it so Sam can see it outside of his humble little recounting, but mostly she tells it to tell herself. That Sam is getting there, and fast, and that takes the guilt off. It takes the guilt right away, and that's good because Sadie couldn't live with the guilt too.
But this is it. This is her ticket back home really because there's hope now. It's always been a sad fact that Sadie, as smart as she knows she is, isn't very social or emotional. She knows the studies. Knows them. Quotes them to herself constantly, but here is her hope. Samuel Winchester and his remarkable love for his brother. Dean Winchester and his ability to hold onto the love and let it lead his brother back out. She'll work harder on Nate, because if her observations are correct then physical contact is a big part of the healing process. It's done wonders for Sam after all. Nate was so worried that the Winchesters would be a destructive force, but she's learned more from Sam than she has in all her years researching PTSD and trauma theory. Sam and Dean are the breaking of all those rules she's put into place to keep her hope dimmed and low. Sam and Dean are what she has to be like if she wants to be whole and in love again. More importantly Sadie's willing to try because this is-
----------
Eaton, Colorado December 20th, 2009
The last hunt he'll go on with Nate for a while. They've agreed to Sam's ridiculous proposition to celebrate Christmas in some traditional sense. How could he say no though? Sam remembered that Christmas was coming on his own. Sam actually reminded Dean that the holiday was coming up, and that's just fucking huge. That's just everything. Sam's not fixed. Not by any means is he a hundred percent, but his little brother is making it there in leaps and bounds. Maybe it's all false promise. Maybe this will end up being the same sort of there and gone again Sadie went through, and Sam's first exposure to the real world will result in him falling apart at the seams, but honestly? Dean knows the way back now. Knows how to lead Sam there and help him through each and every step.
Dean knows the way, and even if Sam gets lost sometimes Dean will be there to bring him back. It's a bizarrely symbolic version of their childhood, and it's hard sometimes to not see Sam's hand as the tiny one that Dean used to hold. The one that he'd grip so fucking tight to make sure that his little brother was right there beside him always in case the world decided to try and grab him. It's Dean's job to protect Sam, and that's always been true, but it's Dean's job to preserve Sam too. To grip his little brother tight and keep him anchored down. Keep him here and now. That's not a new job he's come to realize. Sam's always had a habit of wandering just out of reach, and Dean's never seen before just how important it is to curb that. To give Sam as much length as he can while making sure that he's never going too far.
They're lying in bed that night and Sam is running his fingers over the stitches Nate put in Dean's side the night before after the ghost slammed Dean into the window. Sam's fingering each stitch individually so lightly and gently that it's hard to know if Sam's really touching him or if Dean's brain is playing tricks on him. "I could have done these better."
It's the first time Sam's spoken since Dean spilled inside of him, and Dean jerks a bit in surprise at the sound of it. He can't help the shit-eating grin that crosses his face. Sam is getting better at responding to emotion, and Dean's always amazed at how much that pleases him. "Yeah maybe. But the fainting and fluttering would've added a bit of time to the whole process." Sam punches him once in the stomach, lightly, and then flops back onto the mattress and covers his eyes. There's silence for a bit and then his brother starts laughing, and the sound is a goddamn revelation. A fucking choir really. "What's so funny Sammy?"
"I get it. I get what she was saying."
He raises an eyebrow that Sam can't see and then nudges his brother in the ribs once carefully. "Get what?" He tries to keep the creeping concern out, because it's never good when Sam starts to mentally wander. When those hazel eyes open though they're clear and present, and Dean feels a weight lift from his chest.
"Hamlet. She quoted Hamlet to me. Said that when I understood it I'd be on the road to recovery."
Dean chews on his cheek for a second before nodding slowly. "So what'd you get?"
"I am a king of infinite space bounded in a nutshell Dean. Lock it all down tight and then the whole thing isn't so overwhelming. I just needed to get rid of the bad dreams."
He lets the silence spin out as he takes that in. Considers every angle of what Sam is saying and then hauls his brother into his body and grips him tight. It doesn't escape him that Sam's body temperature has risen drastically in the last few months, that touching him now isn't like it used to be. Like handling snow with burning fingers. "This is going to be a chick-flick moment isn't it? You gonna tell me I ran off the bad dreams 'cause I'm your white knight, and now you're all better and shit?"
His cock gives an exhausted twitch of interest when Sam bites the skin directly beneath his nipple. "Shut up jerk."
"Bitch."
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2013-05-17 06:39 pm (UTC)Very interesting theories about time and religious beliefs. I feel like I'll have to read it again to really understand everything.
I liked Sadie and Nate. They were a great foil to Sam and Dean's journey, and helped highlight the awesomeness of their relationship.
no subject
Date: 2013-05-18 03:24 am (UTC)I'm so very glad you liked it, and glad you liked the OC's, and that you saw them as a foil. It was a big concern of mine that the importance of Sam and Dean's relationship and its strength come through. :D
Thank you so much for reading and reviewing!
no subject
Date: 2013-05-17 08:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-18 03:25 am (UTC)Thanks for reading and reviewing!
no subject
Date: 2013-05-17 10:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-18 03:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-18 09:23 am (UTC)Where the HELL did you come up with the concurrent-stacked-moments-eternity thing? The loss of self, of memory, of free will, is a personal terror of mine. This lined up neatly with a lot of those fears, which made this story more unnerving. But the idea of experiencing an eternity compressed into a single moment, and what that would do to your mind, that was the point where I stared in horror for a bit before I could go on. Where'd that piece of brilliance come from?
I particularly liked the jumping around in time. At first I was annoyed by constantly having to look at the dates, because I'm bad with time's passage under the best circumstances, but after a bit, I grokked it. It reinforced the utter confusion and mental jumble Sam and Sadie were living through.
Favorite line: "...but you're what's traditionally called cannon fodder." Grinned and bounced a bit in my seat in joy.
no subject
Date: 2013-05-19 03:24 am (UTC)I'm so glad you liked it, and that you liked the cannon fodder line. I was pretty proud of it. Thanks for reading and reviewing!
no subject
Date: 2013-05-18 03:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-19 03:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-18 05:07 pm (UTC)I like creative looks at their relationship, and having it not be simple and linear. Sam had the deck stacked against himself from the beginning, I think, because I doubt Sam beleived that Dean's feelings were as deep as they were, and Dean of course never thinks he's worthy. I like that it was getting past those feelings and really connecting in all ways that helped anchor Sam, and that helped Sadie realize that it was her own key to coming back. Wow. I'd have to be smarter to really tease this story apart, but I can deeply enjoy trying!
It's a real pleasure to have wincest flavored with these lovely twisty, thinky explorations of the possibilities the SpN universe offers. Also, you're so good with OCs and that's another fav of mine that folks seldom explore.
Thanks for sharing this, I enjoyed it very much!
no subject
Date: 2013-05-19 03:28 am (UTC)I'm flushing with pleasure by the way, so thanks for that too!! :D
no subject
Date: 2013-05-18 05:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-19 03:30 am (UTC)Also, your dog sounds awesome.
That scene, when weekendship and I first started talking about art that was the scene I wanted the most, and she agreed. I think what she did for it made me wish I'd written it better. I'm so very glad you liked it!
Thanks for reading and reviewing! :D
no subject
Date: 2013-05-19 10:39 pm (UTC)I'm going to have to go back & re-read this one - the theories of space, time & string are pretty complex.
This must have been a true labour of love & I hope a lot of people read it & show you appreciation.
Thank you
no subject
Date: 2013-05-20 07:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-20 11:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-20 07:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-20 01:41 pm (UTC)this was amazing and I`m not sure I even got everything. How you wove theory and thought and philosophy together with heartbraking winchester love, that was just incredicle. Not to mention that the sex was so hot and heartwrenching at the sime time.
all my love for you!
no subject
Date: 2013-05-20 07:09 pm (UTC)Thanks so much!!
no subject
Date: 2013-05-20 07:59 pm (UTC)<3
no subject
Date: 2013-05-21 12:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-05-21 01:07 am (UTC)The OC's were awesome as well. :)
no subject
Date: 2013-05-21 10:41 pm (UTC)Thanks for reading and reviewing!
no subject
Date: 2013-05-21 03:41 pm (UTC)I loved the way you weaved the last segments together...beginning each new one as a continuation from the last. Your work is just pure genius, and what really makes me happy is that you're writing in the present. So many Sam/Dean fics (many good ones anyway) are from the past. So excited to see fantastic writers such as yourself and cydsa(who led me to this wonderful story-thank you very much)working on new material. I cannot wait to read your back list and see what you've got cooking for the future. You're at the top of your game! What a brilliantly penned work. Thank you!
Caro
no subject
Date: 2013-05-21 10:42 pm (UTC)I'm told I have to stop apologizing for people crying and losing sleep because it's a compliment. I'm working on that by telling people I won't apologize anymore instead of outright apologizing. It's a compromise.
I'm glad you enjoyed it, and I'm glad I could pull off that last part because it made me nervous as hell. Thanks for reading and reviewing!!
In Media Res
Date: 2013-05-24 02:16 am (UTC)Thank you! Please keep writing!
Re: In Media Res
Date: 2013-05-25 04:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-13 05:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-14 01:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-03-16 03:10 am (UTC)The apparent insanity of Sam and Sadie is a source of many possibilities about what, when, where... I'd like to read a fic about their journey through space and time, and how their minds could understand and remain sane with that. I figured they continued under the penance of Osiris, and after their deaths, Nate's and Dean's included, they will continue under that curse.
You know, the story was great, the romance was hot, but the ideas under the plot burned my mind. :-)
no subject
Date: 2014-04-04 09:58 pm (UTC)I have waited so long to respond to this, because I had no idea what to say. Because oh my god.
This is the kind of comment that every writer longs for, and you gave it to me. And I am squeeing so hard I cannot even begin to tell you.
The plot burned your mind. I just. I love you.
I would love to write more about Sadie and Sam and what happened with them, because when I started out theory and pushing boundaries was what I wanted to do with my fic. And then I started writing porn. And maybe if I try hard enough I really could reproduce this, but this fic has always felt like lightning in a bottle for me.
Thank you so much. Really. You've made my year and I've read this so many times and I still don't feel like I'm telling you enough how much your comment means to me.
no subject
Date: 2021-07-31 09:03 am (UTC)"It means I love you. I have loved you all this time. You are the only thing I have ever loved."
There's a noise, thick and low in the back of Dean's throat, and then his brother repeats the spell as if it's nothing. They've spent their whole life doing it after all. Repetition and release. And it's good, so good, because after Dean says it he thrusts all the way in and Sam's head slams into the headboard with the force and power of it. Dean is in him. Dean and he are joined and Sam wants to see the place it's happening at, but all he can see are Dean's eyes swallowing him down and Dean's lips spit slick and plush descending towards his own." This is BEAUTIFUL 💘💘💘
Nate and Dean bonding omfg imma d i e 🥺😭💘
"Sam's coming apart underneath him. Dean loves it. Loves to see his big lanky brother spread below him with his face flushed and his head tilted back. Loves the way Sam's chest is getting red and mottled, the way his thigh feels gripped in Dean's fingers and the scent of sweat and sex mixed up with the smell of Sam." I also fucking love it 🥵
Man I just love Sadie SO much 🥰🥰🥰
Yay for happy ending 💘