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Entry tags:
comes a time
Comes a Time
Supernatural
Gen, PG-13, implied character death
Length: 1600 words (16 drabbles)
Disclaimer: Not mine, just playing with them a little before we *really* find out what happens next.
- i -
Sam doesn't give up until Dean checks himself out of the hospital and disappears. The charge nurse's eyes are sympathetic, the same as when she'd told him Dean had barred him from visiting.
"He's okay?" Sam has to ask, even if she can't answer. She nods, though, and Sam smiles gratefully.
Dad's gone; Dean hasn't even looked him since he pulled the trigger. There's not much else to do but go back to school, finish what he's always wanted.
He'd covered all his bases when he withdrew; enrolling in the spring term's simple, at least until the nightmares start again.
- ii -
After three weeks, when the nightmares migrate to daytime visions, Sam finally calls Missouri.
"Oh, baby," she croons. "I've been waiting for your call."
Sam makes it through his story, past the vision that left them all dead, past the approval in his dad's eyes as his finger tightened on the trigger, all the way to Dean leaving before his voice cracks.
"You find him," Missouri says. "You killed what took your mama from you, like your daddy wanted, but it doesn't mean a thing. Not alone."
Sam sits on the bench outside the library and wishes he could cry.
- iii -
In the end, it's the Impala that tips Sam off. Only a few places sell the parts; Dean would never screw around with fixing it, especially not after Dad called him out over not taking care of it.
It's Palo Alto--Sam's got his pick of guys who'll hack any database just for kicks. A couple of courtesy pizzas later, they text him a list of eight possibilities. He knows which one's Dean just from looking, but he cross-checks everything anyway. He can't fuck this up, even if his only plan is to hope Dean won't shoot him on sight.
- iv -
It's not much of a surprise when his advisor tells him that Stanford isn't the kind of place you drop in and out of, that he's not demonstrating maturity or responsibility. There's more, but Sam stops listening.
The real surprise is how much he doesn't care. He spent every day in high school planning and dreaming of exactly what he's throwing to hell right now and no decision has ever been easier for him to make.
He waits impatiently until the paperwork's processed and he can walk away from everything he thought he wanted to go find what he needs.
- v -
The visions keep coming more and more frequently, dust and blood and fire, but the nightmares are worse. Dean, down and bleeding, dragging himself across the ground, away from the fire. Sam hasn't seen yet what's tracking him, but he can feel how it's playing with Dean, how it's fucking getting off on it.
Flying means he can't carry anything that'll help in a fight, but driving without backup is out of the question. He jolts awake every hour, doesn't care that the stewardesses think he's nuts. All that matters is finding and fixing what never should have been broken.
- vi -
The final flight out of Atlanta's delayed--freak storms and winds. It's well after midnight when the turbo-prop lands in Savannah, but Sam can't wait for morning. The visions are a reddish overlay to the real world now; hazy and flickering.
The cabbie drives off almost before he's clear of the door, leaving him alone by the river, except he's not. He sees them, yet another layer to the visions and reality; more and each time he blinks. They're silent, until a little girl, braids covered with a still-neat headscarf steps forward.
"We know your blood," she sing-songs, beckoning him.
- vii -
They shepherd Sam along the street, surrounding him with cold dampness. He could probably fight free, but his sense of Dean grows stronger with each step.
The girl skips faster, faster, until he's half-running to keep up, stumbling over uneven sidewalks, then dodging gravestones and mausoleums, ultimately choking on the too-familiar stench of moldering flesh.
They take him then, catching him whenever he trips, straight to where Dean's scrabbling toward his shotgun, gashes in his back and thighs dripping thick into the soil.
"We know," the girl repeats, settling onto a stone inscribed "Emily," and the thing hunting Dean howls.
- viii -
"C'mon, fucker," Dean rasps, taunting it, drawing it out, and the visions clear from Sam's head so suddenly he staggers. He's got nothing, not even a knife, but the familiar shape of Dean's duffel lies in the shadows.
The thing howls again, and Sam just doesn't know. Doesn't know what it is, what Dean needs, what might kill it. In the end, he dumps everything within Dean's reach.
"Come on, you bastard." Dean's eyes flicker--unsurprised, alive--over Sam. Sam would say something, but in a rush of sulfur and fangs, it's on them and there's no time for words.
- ix -
Sam hasn't slept in weeks and Dean isn't at full strength, but something trying to rip your throat out will kick-start your reflexes. Sam ducks and rolls, grabbing a knife as he hits his feet. Dean fires twice--buckshot, Sam notices, his brain racing through the possibilities.
In the end, he doesn't really need to know what it is. It hits him high and hard and he gets the knife up in time to slow it down; Dean finishes it off with both barrels point-blank to the face.
When Dean turns to him, Sam thinks it got the better deal.
- x -
Sam doesn't look away, just stands there, blood and dirt on the knife, on his hands, lets Dean see him. Finally, it's Dean who drops his eyes.
Dean's panting lightly; Sam sees how his hands shake as he unloads the shotgun, sees how carefully he concentrates on each movement. Sam's seen Dean field-strip and clean a rifle blindfolded; he only focuses like this when he doesn't trust himself.
Sam watches a few seconds longer, then kneels and reaches for the gun. The breath he doesn't realize he's been holding comes out in a rush when Dean gives it to him.
- xi -
The Impala's two blocks away, beside a crumbling storefront. Sam matches Dean's halting pace, clamping down on the screaming need to get him somewhere safe and see how bad the claws ripped him up. If Dean can walk, he will; it's as simple as that, always has been.
When they finally get there, Dean hands over the keys, lets Sam deal with the weapons while he eases himself into the passenger seat, and Sam starts thinking seriously about ERs and real doctors. Gritting his teeth, he puts that thought on hold and starts looking for someplace to hole up first.
- xii -
Once Sam gets them cleaned up, the cuts aren't that bad: sweeping curves across Dean's back, over his hip and thigh, long but mostly shallow. Dean hisses when the peroxide foams in them, but the holy water doesn't bubble and Sam thinks they might be okay.
Dean stays sprawled on the bed, head turned away, but he hasn't told Sam to leave and that's better than Sam had hoped.
Sam sits on the floor, rests his head against the mattress, intending to ask how Dean let it get so close but what comes out is, "I saw it kill you."
- xiii -
The room's quiet and dark, the bedside lamp barely bright enough to throw shadows into the corners. Dean's still but he's listening; Sam knows it.
"Not that, not today. I saw you here, too, but … I saw it, then," he grits out and feels Dean understand, feels him tense. "Saw it kill Dad. Saw it kill you." He wonders if this is what confession is like, words carved from hatred and grief. "Like I saw it kill Jess."
He closes his eyes and sees the cabin again, like always. "I let it take her; it wasn't getting you, too."
- xiv -
The minutes slide past, marked only by the wheezing of the heating unit turning on and off. Dean hasn't spoken; Sam can't find the courage to turn and see what might be in Dean's eyes. He stays where he is, suddenly too exhausted to move, falls asleep leaning against the bed where Dean lies.
He wakes to the sun on his face, its light filtered and coarsened by the dirt on the window, his back and hips stiff from the hours spent on the unforgiving floor.
The room's quiet and warm--stuffy--and Sam's still not brave enough to look.
- xv -
For good or ill, John's never one of the faces in Sam's dreams, but there's no mistaking the quick, irritated growl in his head. Move, Sam. One way or the other, doesn't matter. *Commit*.
Just because his dad said it doesn't mean he has to fight it, Sam reminds himself, and breathes deep. "Dean?" he says, surprised at how calm he sounds.
"Yeah."
Sam counts to ten before he twists around, but he isn't hearing things. Dean's there and not pretending Sam's invisible and Sam doesn't think there's a word for what he's feeling, except that he's home.
- postlude -
It's a small cemetery, well-tended and private. Sam vaguely remembers wiring money from the hospital for expenses; Bobby made the arrangements to transfer the body--Dad--and Missouri took care of everything else.
Dean still doesn't say much, but there's not much to say today. It's taken them eight months to be ready to be here, where the headstone is simple and the plantings neatly trimmed.
"Rosemary," Sam says, remembering Missouri's letter. "For remembrance."
He drops down to sit on his heels and when he leans forward to trace over the names carved in granite, Dean's hands are already there.
Title borrowed once again from the Grateful Dead. Many thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
without_me for counting words and catching mistakes.
Supernatural
Gen, PG-13, implied character death
Length: 1600 words (16 drabbles)
Disclaimer: Not mine, just playing with them a little before we *really* find out what happens next.
Sam doesn't give up until Dean checks himself out of the hospital and disappears. The charge nurse's eyes are sympathetic, the same as when she'd told him Dean had barred him from visiting.
"He's okay?" Sam has to ask, even if she can't answer. She nods, though, and Sam smiles gratefully.
Dad's gone; Dean hasn't even looked him since he pulled the trigger. There's not much else to do but go back to school, finish what he's always wanted.
He'd covered all his bases when he withdrew; enrolling in the spring term's simple, at least until the nightmares start again.
After three weeks, when the nightmares migrate to daytime visions, Sam finally calls Missouri.
"Oh, baby," she croons. "I've been waiting for your call."
Sam makes it through his story, past the vision that left them all dead, past the approval in his dad's eyes as his finger tightened on the trigger, all the way to Dean leaving before his voice cracks.
"You find him," Missouri says. "You killed what took your mama from you, like your daddy wanted, but it doesn't mean a thing. Not alone."
Sam sits on the bench outside the library and wishes he could cry.
In the end, it's the Impala that tips Sam off. Only a few places sell the parts; Dean would never screw around with fixing it, especially not after Dad called him out over not taking care of it.
It's Palo Alto--Sam's got his pick of guys who'll hack any database just for kicks. A couple of courtesy pizzas later, they text him a list of eight possibilities. He knows which one's Dean just from looking, but he cross-checks everything anyway. He can't fuck this up, even if his only plan is to hope Dean won't shoot him on sight.
It's not much of a surprise when his advisor tells him that Stanford isn't the kind of place you drop in and out of, that he's not demonstrating maturity or responsibility. There's more, but Sam stops listening.
The real surprise is how much he doesn't care. He spent every day in high school planning and dreaming of exactly what he's throwing to hell right now and no decision has ever been easier for him to make.
He waits impatiently until the paperwork's processed and he can walk away from everything he thought he wanted to go find what he needs.
The visions keep coming more and more frequently, dust and blood and fire, but the nightmares are worse. Dean, down and bleeding, dragging himself across the ground, away from the fire. Sam hasn't seen yet what's tracking him, but he can feel how it's playing with Dean, how it's fucking getting off on it.
Flying means he can't carry anything that'll help in a fight, but driving without backup is out of the question. He jolts awake every hour, doesn't care that the stewardesses think he's nuts. All that matters is finding and fixing what never should have been broken.
The final flight out of Atlanta's delayed--freak storms and winds. It's well after midnight when the turbo-prop lands in Savannah, but Sam can't wait for morning. The visions are a reddish overlay to the real world now; hazy and flickering.
The cabbie drives off almost before he's clear of the door, leaving him alone by the river, except he's not. He sees them, yet another layer to the visions and reality; more and each time he blinks. They're silent, until a little girl, braids covered with a still-neat headscarf steps forward.
"We know your blood," she sing-songs, beckoning him.
They shepherd Sam along the street, surrounding him with cold dampness. He could probably fight free, but his sense of Dean grows stronger with each step.
The girl skips faster, faster, until he's half-running to keep up, stumbling over uneven sidewalks, then dodging gravestones and mausoleums, ultimately choking on the too-familiar stench of moldering flesh.
They take him then, catching him whenever he trips, straight to where Dean's scrabbling toward his shotgun, gashes in his back and thighs dripping thick into the soil.
"We know," the girl repeats, settling onto a stone inscribed "Emily," and the thing hunting Dean howls.
"C'mon, fucker," Dean rasps, taunting it, drawing it out, and the visions clear from Sam's head so suddenly he staggers. He's got nothing, not even a knife, but the familiar shape of Dean's duffel lies in the shadows.
The thing howls again, and Sam just doesn't know. Doesn't know what it is, what Dean needs, what might kill it. In the end, he dumps everything within Dean's reach.
"Come on, you bastard." Dean's eyes flicker--unsurprised, alive--over Sam. Sam would say something, but in a rush of sulfur and fangs, it's on them and there's no time for words.
Sam hasn't slept in weeks and Dean isn't at full strength, but something trying to rip your throat out will kick-start your reflexes. Sam ducks and rolls, grabbing a knife as he hits his feet. Dean fires twice--buckshot, Sam notices, his brain racing through the possibilities.
In the end, he doesn't really need to know what it is. It hits him high and hard and he gets the knife up in time to slow it down; Dean finishes it off with both barrels point-blank to the face.
When Dean turns to him, Sam thinks it got the better deal.
Sam doesn't look away, just stands there, blood and dirt on the knife, on his hands, lets Dean see him. Finally, it's Dean who drops his eyes.
Dean's panting lightly; Sam sees how his hands shake as he unloads the shotgun, sees how carefully he concentrates on each movement. Sam's seen Dean field-strip and clean a rifle blindfolded; he only focuses like this when he doesn't trust himself.
Sam watches a few seconds longer, then kneels and reaches for the gun. The breath he doesn't realize he's been holding comes out in a rush when Dean gives it to him.
The Impala's two blocks away, beside a crumbling storefront. Sam matches Dean's halting pace, clamping down on the screaming need to get him somewhere safe and see how bad the claws ripped him up. If Dean can walk, he will; it's as simple as that, always has been.
When they finally get there, Dean hands over the keys, lets Sam deal with the weapons while he eases himself into the passenger seat, and Sam starts thinking seriously about ERs and real doctors. Gritting his teeth, he puts that thought on hold and starts looking for someplace to hole up first.
Once Sam gets them cleaned up, the cuts aren't that bad: sweeping curves across Dean's back, over his hip and thigh, long but mostly shallow. Dean hisses when the peroxide foams in them, but the holy water doesn't bubble and Sam thinks they might be okay.
Dean stays sprawled on the bed, head turned away, but he hasn't told Sam to leave and that's better than Sam had hoped.
Sam sits on the floor, rests his head against the mattress, intending to ask how Dean let it get so close but what comes out is, "I saw it kill you."
The room's quiet and dark, the bedside lamp barely bright enough to throw shadows into the corners. Dean's still but he's listening; Sam knows it.
"Not that, not today. I saw you here, too, but … I saw it, then," he grits out and feels Dean understand, feels him tense. "Saw it kill Dad. Saw it kill you." He wonders if this is what confession is like, words carved from hatred and grief. "Like I saw it kill Jess."
He closes his eyes and sees the cabin again, like always. "I let it take her; it wasn't getting you, too."
The minutes slide past, marked only by the wheezing of the heating unit turning on and off. Dean hasn't spoken; Sam can't find the courage to turn and see what might be in Dean's eyes. He stays where he is, suddenly too exhausted to move, falls asleep leaning against the bed where Dean lies.
He wakes to the sun on his face, its light filtered and coarsened by the dirt on the window, his back and hips stiff from the hours spent on the unforgiving floor.
The room's quiet and warm--stuffy--and Sam's still not brave enough to look.
For good or ill, John's never one of the faces in Sam's dreams, but there's no mistaking the quick, irritated growl in his head. Move, Sam. One way or the other, doesn't matter. *Commit*.
Just because his dad said it doesn't mean he has to fight it, Sam reminds himself, and breathes deep. "Dean?" he says, surprised at how calm he sounds.
"Yeah."
Sam counts to ten before he twists around, but he isn't hearing things. Dean's there and not pretending Sam's invisible and Sam doesn't think there's a word for what he's feeling, except that he's home.
It's a small cemetery, well-tended and private. Sam vaguely remembers wiring money from the hospital for expenses; Bobby made the arrangements to transfer the body--Dad--and Missouri took care of everything else.
Dean still doesn't say much, but there's not much to say today. It's taken them eight months to be ready to be here, where the headstone is simple and the plantings neatly trimmed.
"Rosemary," Sam says, remembering Missouri's letter. "For remembrance."
He drops down to sit on his heels and when he leans forward to trace over the names carved in granite, Dean's hands are already there.
Title borrowed once again from the Grateful Dead. Many thanks to
without_me for counting words and catching mistakes.