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‘Every effort of mine is a condemnation of fate;
And my heart is - like a corpse - buried.’
-The City, C.P. Cavafy (Translation by Rae Dalven)
Dean left that morning with a party of eight and arrives back with only three: himself, Cas, and a stranger dressed in blood-stained white. He doesn’t need to tell the rest of the camp what happened on the mission - they know the Devil is gone; the whole world felt it when he died. Nor does he need to explain who the broken, bleeding figure he’s carrying through the camp is. They get a feeling when they look at him. They see that he’s rotten inside.
What they don’t know, and what he won’t tell them - yet, at least, but probably ever - is that the ex-vessel of the Devil is his brother. Part of this is because he doesn’t want to jeopardise his authority (how many of them will still follow him if they know it’s his own flesh and blood that kicked it all off?). Another, more honest part, is shame.
Suffice to say, people aren’t pleased, and that’s an understatement. So many have been lost on this mission - good people, friends, leaders - and it feels like a kick in the teeth for the Devil’s vessel to arrive in their place. But they keep their mouths shut for now because Dean looks pissed and he’s not easy to deal with even on a good day.
Anyway, he wouldn’t listen to their complaints if they tried. The only thing on his mind is making sure his dumbass little brother stays alive long enough for Dean to tear him a new one for saying yes (and to finally get to ask him why). So he carries on his way, storming through the camp towards the infirmary, refusing to look anyone in the eye or slow his march.
Cas, bleeding and bruised but somehow still alive, trails behind as an afterthought. It’s a genuine miracle, Dean thinks later, that he of all of them made it through to live another day. Cas would laugh at the thought.
It’s a pitiful sight, the body on the bed. His skin is waxen, hair limp and greasy, limbs thin and frail like twigs gathered from a tree felled before its time. The worst part is the wound hidden under the bandages: a deep hole in the centre of his chest, all raw skin and crusty blood and possibly the beginning of an infection, though the medic promises he’s working hard to keep that at bay. He looks nothing like the Sam that once was or even like Lucifer. He is nothing more than a shell.
During the scraps of downtime he can find amidst the tireless work he has cut out for himself to keep the camp running, Dean will come to sit by his bedside. He doesn't touch him - doesn't hold his limp hand or brush his hair aside, no matter how badly he wants to - only stares at him, for hours on end. There is a conflict inside of him. The desire to shake the body and scream at him until he wakes up - to ask him why the hell he would ever say yes, to call him a fool and a murderer and a demon - is fighting against his rusty-from-disuse brotherly need for him to be okay.
The camp’s medic - Mark, a military doctor in his past life - reminds him to manage his expectations, that there’s a good chance he won't pull through. But Dean doesn't need to be told this. He’s amazed Sam has survived this long at all.
Cas walks up behind him as the rest are shuffling out of the room. They just had a meeting about Sam, about why Dean thinks it’s not totally suicidal to have Lucifer’s meatsuit hanging around the camp and using up their precious medical resources. He didn’t once say the word ‘brother’.
“Spun that well,” Cas mumbles, words dripping with sarcasm. He smells like sex and weed, and his voice is all gravelly, low and gritty, but less harsh than it used to be back before all of this, when the world was whole and he was still one of God’s soldiers. (Funny how the apocalypse has mellowed him.) “Real convincing.”
Dean turns his head and lets his gaze wander over Cas. This is the first time they’ve spoken or even seen each other since that day. He looks rough but far better than he did when they arrived: doused in blood, likely not just his, left arm hanging limp and useless by his side, dislocated. In hindsight, Dean kicks himself for not trying to see him, not asking how he was.
It’s just the two of them now. Everyone has left, the door shut behind them. The silence is palpable. Neither says anything for a moment, each waiting for the other to speak.
Dean gives in first. “Cas, I’m-”
“Don’t say it,” he interrupts, his voice without judgment or malice. He just sounds tired. “You and I both know you’re not. Anyway, I knew what I was getting into, what you were planning. You’re not as covert as you think you are.”
“Damn,” Dean huffs out with a sigh. Cas is right; If it meant icing the Devil, he wouldn’t hesitate to send the whole camp to their deaths. Still, there’s a part of him that knows he doesn't deserve Cas’ endless mercy, his forgiveness and his camaraderie. Buried deep, guilt claws at him when he thinks about how ready he was to sacrifice Cas - the being who raised him from Hell and followed him all the way here, even though it meant falling, losing the defining part of himself. “...You sure? We’re good?”
“We’re good,” Cas confirms, sounding like he genuinely means it. His forgiveness means the world to Dean, though he’d never say it outright. “No use holding a grudge if we could die tomorrow, right?”
“Right.” Dean agrees, and that’s that. They don’t mention it again. Perhaps it would be healthier to sit down and talk it through and explain their feelings instead of shutting them all down, but they don’t. That’s just not how they do things.
After this, they begin spending more time together. Somehow, they manage to act just like they did before Dean sent him to his death, almost as if it never happened. They don't always get along - never have - but it’s easier. Cas even starts hanging around the infirmary. Dean’s pleased to have him there. It’s not like Sam is great company at the moment.
Dean misses the first time Sam opens his eyes, busy on a scavenging mission in a further-out city (because even though his mind screams whenever Sam isn't in his sight, he is still a leader, responsible for the lives of many more than just Sam, and he can’t just forgo his duties to play caregiver).
He’s told it was pretty uneventful: Sam just opened his eyes, didn’t seem to register what was going on or where he was, barely moved an inch, and fell back asleep not five minutes later. Still, he kicks himself. What if it wasn’t so easy? What if he’d woken up and freaked the hell out and hurt someone? Or, even worse, what if he’d let slip about them being brothers?
The second time Sam wakes up, Dean is there, and thank God for that because it’s not as uneventful as the last time. It comes a whole week after the first time, and honestly, if his sleep went on any longer, Dean would have lost hope in him ever waking up again. But he’s sitting in the infirmary, talking with Cas about how the winter preparations are going, when the shift of breath catches his attention, and he turns his head to see Sam’s hazel eyes open. Half-lidded and not much behind them, but open.
“Sammy?” He whispers, instinctively, mouth working faster than his brain. Then: “Hey, he’s awake!” he calls out, loud and urgent, to catch the attention of the medic, who’s caught in the middle of treating one of the younger kids for a graze. He gets up immediately and rushes over while the kid (one of a tiny new generation who have been raised only ever knowing the end of the world) scampers off.
“Can you hear me?” Mark asks, now crouched down right next to Sam, flashing a small torch into his eyes. He’s shoved Dean and Cas away from the bedside but they remain as close as possible, never taking their eyes away. “Sam?”
Sam doesn’t respond. His eyes dart around the room, flicking from corner to corner and never quite settling, and his breathing has picked up, coming now in short, shaky gasps. He keeps opening his mouth as if he wants to say something, and he licks his cracked lips with a dry tongue as if it’ll be any help.
Mark places his hand on Sam’s brittle wrist to check his pulse and he flinches violently in response, struggling weakly in Mark’s grip as though he wants to pull his hand away but is too frail to do so.
“No,” Sam croaks, voice so faint and scratchy they can barely hear him. “No. He’s… Where is…?” Speaking sounds laborious, like it’s using up all of what little energy he has. Even with all his effort, he cannot form the words.
“You’re in the infirmary, Sam. At Camp Chitaqua. Do you understand me?” Mark has let go of his wrist now. It was only making him more agitated and he doesn’t want to risk him aggravating his wound. “How do you feel? Are you in pain?”
Again, Sam gives no response. Dean watches with gritted teeth, holding his tongue because, as much as he wants to jump in and help (because ‘yes’ or no, that’s still his brother), he has no idea what he can do in this situation. Cas clings to his side, saying nothing but watching intently.
Eventually, Sam’s gaze stops its restless flittering and settles on Dean, looking him dead in the eyes.
“Gone,” Sam rasps, the first coherent thing he has said since the Devil was evicted. “He’s gone.”
And then Sam starts sobbing. Loud, ugly wails that he doesn’t have the strength or hydration to sustain. They’re dry and heaving and rack his whole body; It’s exhausting just to watch. It reminds Dean of when Sam was just a baby, cradled in a blanket and held in his arms. Dean used to rock him on his knee while sitting in the backseat of the car, holding him tight and willing for him to stop. It used to upset Dean, seeing Sam cry like that. Like it meant he was doing something wrong, not doing a good enough job at protecting him. That’s never changed.
Dean thinks he should try to reach out, offer comfort, but he is frozen in place, with no room for anything in his mind except the question: are these tears of relief or mourning?
Sam starts to wake more often after that. In his waking moments, he hardly speaks or acknowledges anyone, and it’s a struggle trying to get him to eat or drink anything. He doesn't look Dean in the eye again.
Mark manages to perform some checks when he’s compliant enough. He finds that Sam’s pulse is on the lower end of okay, which is a relief, but his breathing is strained and he’s awfully weak, often unable to get out of bed or even support the weight of his head. His motor functions have suffered badly, too. These issues should improve with time, Dean is told, though he struggles to picture it.
It’s his mental state that’s most concerning, though. He’s having trouble concentrating and his short-term memory is unpredictable. He has a strong aversion to physical contact and has, on occasion, become violent when someone has gotten too close. Dean has lost count of the number of times they’ve had to remind him where he is, what day it is, why he’s stuck in that bed. When he speaks, his words are disorganised and practically unintelligible. Sometimes, he will wail in a language that Dean and Mark don’t recognise. When that happens, Cas will go pale in the face and excuse himself to his cabin, where he will, Dean assumes, find some kind of chemical distraction.
It’s hard seeing him reduced to this, like Lucifer’s grace burned out everything that made Sam Sam, twisted him into this broken toy with his brother’s face. It was almost easier when he was comatose. At least then, he could pretend it would all work out. Now, he has to face the reality of what being the meatsuit for an unholy archangel does to someone.
A sudden movement caught in the corner of his eye pulls Dean out from where he’s been lost in his head, and he sees that now Sam is no longer lying prone on the bed but stumbling out of it, legs shaking and unsteady beneath him like a drunk stumbling home after a late night. He doesn’t get far, knees buckling underneath him in seconds, causing him to land heavily on the floor. His knees will bruise. This doesn’t stop him, though. Undeterred, he begins to crawl, painstakingly slow and uncoordinated, weak wrists shaking under his weight. There’s a desperation in his movement, a clawing need.
Dean moves into action the second he registers what’s happening. Shooting to his feet, he makes his way to where Sam is crawling, tries to grab his arms and pull him back into a seat. Sam attempts to fight him off, jerking his arms and kicking out and shaking his head against Dean’s chest, but he is too weak for this to make any impact.
“Sam! Knock it off!” Dean shouts as he attempts to drag Sam, who is ceaseless in his efforts despite their inefficiency, back to the bed.
“No,” Sam gasps out, breathless. “Got to… Not… On me. ‘S under. Clinging. Need to.” His words make little sense, like most of what he says these days. It’s all disjointed thoughts and half-finished phrases. He used to be so articulate. He made it to Stanford once, lifetimes ago.
Dean has managed to shove him back down on the bed, pinning him there with one arm to the stomach (paying careful attention to avoid the gory, still-healing hole in his chest). Still, Sam writhes and wriggles. Like a baby. Like a worm.
“Dammit, Sam, use your words,” Dean commands, voice hard and stern, pushing Sam down harder. It’s mean; He knows Sam’s doing the best he can with his stupid, fucked up brain, but it’s just so frustrating. “What do you want?”
One of Sam’s arms keeps trying to reach out towards the sink on the other side of the room, fingers grabbing desperately at thin air. That was the direction he was headed in earlier, too.
“You want water? Is that what all this was about? Jesus...” Dean gets up, risking leaving Sam unrestrained for the two seconds it takes to get the sink and fill up a glass of water. This action is nothing for him and yet Sam’s attempt was enough to leave him crawling and moaning. Moments like this highlight how messed up the whole situation is, how badly Lucifer screwed him up. It makes Dean feel sick.
Dean sits Sam up and hands him the glass. Fingers fumbling as they try to grab it, at least a third of the water is lost before Sam’s even holding it. When he finally gets his grip - both hands holding it, shaking incessantly - he doesn’t bring it to his lips. Instead, Sam pours it over his hands and rubs them together viciously, soaking himself, the bed, and Dean in the process.
Dean has to move to the other side of the room before he acts on the urge to strike him. He paces, running his hands through his hair and gritting his teeth so hard they could shatter. This is ridiculous. It’s pathetic. It’s so damn frustrating. He regrets, and not for the first time, bringing Sam back to the camp at all. “What the fuck, Sam? What are you- Why are you like this? What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Clean,” Sam says. He’s still rubbing his hands together, slick now with both water and blood because he has been scrubbing so hard, nails catching and scraping at the skin. At least he isn't trying to get out of bed anymore. “Need to. He… They’re on me. The- The blood. Got to get it off.”
Fuck. He can't do this anymore. Dean leaves Sam to it while he storms off to find Mark and drag him away from his dinner to take over. The guy is, understandably, disturbed at the sight, and is quick to sedate him.
Dean leaves before Sam’s eyes have even closed. He ventures out into the woods to punch some trees until his knuckles are bruised and bloodied, and then he spends the night curled up and unable to sleep in the backseat of the Impala, which still sits rusted and abandoned on the edge of camp. (Under the damp, it still smells like home).
As the weeks pass, Sam starts getting better. Sort of. It’s more of a three steps forward and two steps back scenario, but that minor upward trajectory is something Dean clings to.
Good days - or at least, the better days - look something like this: Sam will eat the food he is served, drink the water he is given, follow along with conversations and answer questions (though these answers are rarely coherent and always disturbing), let Mark do his check-ups without flinching or fighting, do his prescribed motor skill exercises without complaint, and manage to sleep through the night. It’s all basic stuff, but it’s basic stuff that he hadn’t been capable of just months ago. The pride in Dean’s chest is clouded by pity.
On one of these good days, Dean asks him what it felt like. Sam mumbles something about a lake, about fear and coldness and glue. It makes no sense; It’s all a collage of random words and memories and sounds that must make sense to Sam in some way, even though it’s indecipherable to anyone else. Dean isn’t surprised. He’s not sure what he expected. He thinks that maybe possession is one of those things you can’t describe, that there just aren't the words in human language for it. It becomes a bad day after that. Dean decides not to ask again.
Bad days are punctuated with agonised moans and indecipherable babble. Sometimes he will claw at his arms so relentlessly that he is left with angry, raised welts. Often they have to restrain him, sometimes sedate him. Dean wonders why he does this; Is it him trying to punish himself or ground himself, or is this him trying to peel himself away from the phantom devil inside of him? Most likely, though, Sam doesn't even know why he’s doing it.
On these days, his hands shake harder and his fingers get clumsier, so bad that he cannot even hold a pencil or feed himself. Sam gets so caught up in his delusions that he becomes convinced none of this is real, that Lucifer is still festering inside him, giving him a sick vision of hope and peace just to rip it all away again. He’s always cold. Sometimes, Sam tells them, feverish and addled, that this is what he deserves. His penance. There are other times he begs for death.
“Should’ve done it,” Sam says on one of these days while he is restrained to his bed and soaring on some combination of whatever benzos they could scavenge. (Cas would be jealous.) “You. Like he… Like Dad said. Wish you’d- you’d killed me. There was no savin’ this. Nothing good in me.” And Dean’s only response is to bite his fist so hard the teeth indent into his flesh, hoping it keeps him from crying. That night, he gets blackout drunk with Cas in a desperate attempt to make himself forget. It doesn’t help.
Horrible as they are, the bad days are slowly growing fewer and further apart. Every day brings Dean closer to getting his brother back, to getting answers.
It’s been five months since Lucifer died. Frost is glazing the windows and the grass, a dreadful chill fills the air, and the trees are skeletal. Campers are now donning layer upon layer and squeezing themselves into as few cabins as possible in a desperate effort to conserve heat. Winter is on their heels, and it’s shaping up to be a rough one.
Dean is standing across from Sam in the infirmary, which remains quiet despite the influx of flu and cold hitting the camp. Usually, this time of year, the infirmary is stuffed to the brim, but most people avoid the infirmary now if they can help it, only entering when it’s life or death and itching to get out as soon as possible. People say Sam gives off an aura, some kind of miasma of horror and despair. They say that even the thought of him makes them queasy, anxious, unsettled - like the Devil is still nestled under his skin, watching them and waiting to burst out. (Sometimes, Dean feels it, too.)
Sam’s upright, legs hanging off the bed, and he looks more like himself than he has in all these months: a healthy flush is beginning to colour his face, the bags under his eyes are less stark, his cheeks marginally less hollow. Good days are beginning to outweigh the bad. He should be well enough to leave soon. Dean is wary about how that will work out. But that’s not what he came to talk about.
“Sam,” Dean says, then swallows, throat tight. “Why’d you say yes?”
It’s the question that has been at the forefront of his mind for the last five years. Whatever he did, wherever he went, he couldn't stop wondering. Now, with Sam miraculously alive and the Devil gone for good, he has the chance to find out. And after all these months, he’s finally ready to ask.
Sam doesn’t look at him, not even in his general direction, but Dean knows he hears. He saw the twitch in his face, the subtle shift in his shoulders. “Sam,” Dean repeats, insistent, because this isn’t the time for Sam to be avoidant. This isn’t a question he will allow him to ignore. Sam flinches at the growing harshness of his tone, and Dean almost feels guilty, but he doesn’t have the patience to mess around.
“I… I don’t…” He stumbles, keeping his eyes glued to the window, which is so cloudy with condensation that nothing can be seen through it, only colours. “It’s all… It’s all foggy. Unclear. Can’t put the, um… put it together right. But I know he used to come to me. Told me I wouldn’t…. wouldn’t be lonely with him inside.”
Before he got Sam back - when he was bitter and angry all the time, when he couldn’t bring himself to feel anything by hate for Sam - Dean pictured this moment countless times. It always looked something like this: Sam telling him that he was just too weak, that he let that evil, corrupted, demonic part of himself take over, that he let the Devil manipulate him just as Ruby did the same, that he wasn't strong enough to resist it (unlike Dean). He pictured him breaking down and sobbing, begging for forgiveness he didn’t deserve, dropping to the floor and supplicating at his feet. He pictured himself finally getting the whole story, finally satisfied.
But this isn’t satisfying. This isn’t the pitiful breakdown he expected, nor the clear-cut, black-and-white answer he wanted. No, this is-
Sam’s rambling about giving in to the devil because he was the only damn thing who’d give him the time of day, and all Dean can hear is pick a hemisphere ringing in his ears.
And it’s not- it’s not fair. Sam’s the one who said yes, who gave Lucifer the body with which to destroy the world, to kill millions, and somehow Dean is left with the guilt. Dean, who has had one task, one purpose his whole life - to take care of Sam - and has failed at every turn. Dad would be so disappointed in him.
He leaves before either can say another word. Sam watches through the window, Dean’s blurry, barely visible figure growing smaller and smaller until he’s gone. He stays gone for a while.
Cas barges into Dean’s cabin six days into his self-imposed isolation. “You need to talk to Sam,” He says, totally apathetic about ruining the cozy, blissful nothingness Dean has curated. “He’s moping and it’s a total bummer.”
The open door welcomes a chill into the cabin, which seeps through the thin blanket to bite at his skin, and the daylight is blinding after so long of blinds-drawn darkness. Groaning, Dean pulls the covers tighter around him, head burrowed underneath. “Jesus, Cas, shut the door. Were you raised in a barn?”
“No,” He answers bluntly. That part of him never changes. “Looks like you’re moping too. The guys are freaking out, thinking you’ve bailed on them. You’ve not been answering your door.”
“Not moping,” Dean replies, clearly moping. “Can’t a guy take a few days off? You’d think for all the shit I’ve done to keep this camp running, I’d have earned a couple vacation days.”
“This…” Cas pulls the covers away from Dean, who squints at the light and stuffs his face in his pillow. He’s a mess: scruff on his face, hasn’t showered in days, the smell of sleep and booze on his breath. At least he took his boots off before he got in bed. “...Isn’t a vacation. And believe me, I’d be up for it if you wanted one. You could do with lightening up a little. Or a lot. No, this is just sad, Dean. The hell happened? Haven't seen you this bad in a long time.”
(What Cas is referring to - the last time Dean was ‘this bad’ - was when the world had only just ended, and he had simultaneously experienced the biggest betrayal possible and lost his baby brother for good (at least, so he thought at the time). Anger came first, as it always does for Dean, and he had punched a wall so hard he broke his knuckles and took all the skin clean off. He had cursed and shouted and said some horrible things to Cas and Bobby simply because they were there to take it. He wore himself out after a while, though, and even though he knew he should be doing something about the end of the world, he couldn't bring himself to care.
He shut himself away in Bobby’s spare room for as long as he could, refused to eat or drink, barely slept. For two weeks, he didn’t say a single word (which Bobby said he used to do a lot as a kid and thought he had grown out of it). He snapped out of it eventually, but he came back angrier and meaner and dead set on killing Lucifer.
They don’t speak about those days. Just another item on the long, long list of shit they avoid and repress. It means something that Cas has brought it up now.)
“Asked him why he said yes,” Dean mumbles into the pillow. “He told me it was ‘cause he was lonely. That the freakin’ devil was paying him house calls, too. God, Cas, if I had done it differently, hadn’t shut him out and told him we were better off alone, would he have still said yes? Could we have avoided all of this if I had just listened to him? Been a better- been a better brother?”
He has risen now, sitting upright, slumped against the wall for support. His head hangs low but he raises his eyes to meet Castiel’s, as if pleading for an answer.
“You can’t change what happened, Dean,” Cas says after taking a moment to process the words. He’s never been good at comfort and he’s far too sober for this. “There’s no use agonising over it. And even if you two hadn't split up, who’s to say he wouldn't still have said yes? I mean, the forces of heaven and hell were both gunning for it.”
“I guess.” Dean slumps further, covers his face with his hands and rubs his eyes tiredly. “But he shouldn’t’ve had to deal with that alone. I mean, I had no idea Lucifer was coming to him. Michael didn’t do that to me. It must have been so hard, and I wasn't there for him.”
“If I were you,” Cas pauses, purses his lips, as if he’s not sure he should say what he’s thinking. He says it anyway. “I would stop worrying about how he felt before and start worrying about how he’s feeling now. You know, this whole time, he’s been asking after you. I swear it’s like every other word he’s going ‘where’s Dean?’ He probably doesn’t even remember the conversation; he just knows you were there for him and now you’re not. Freezing him out like this, it’s not gonna do either of you any good.”
Dean sighs a heavy, burdened sigh. Cas is right, and deep down, he’s known it this whole time. The thought of having to face Sam after knowing what he does now is overwhelming, but avoiding him is part of what got them into this mess in the first place.
“Shit. Yeah, okay.” Dean gets to his feet, grunting with the effort, bones all stiff from a week of hardly moving. “I’ll go talk to him.”
“Good,” Cas says, and just as Dean passes the threshold of the cabin's door, he shouts, “But shower first!”
Sam is already bombarding him with apologies before Dean has even walked through the door. The words are streaming out so quickly and so jumbled that Dean can make little sense of anything he’s saying except ‘sorry’. Hell, Sam probably doesn't even understand half of what he’s saying, going too fast for his brain to keep up. His anxious desperation for forgiveness is both pitiful and repellent.
“Just… Stop apologising,” Dean says with enough authority to shut Sam up and draw his full attention. He stares at Dean so intently, just waiting to hear what he has to say. His shaking is worse than the last time Dean saw him; he wonders if that’s his fault.
Dean sits down on the chair beside Sam and takes a deep breath. He says that he’s still mad at him for saying yes, and that he doesn’t think that will ever go away, and that he’s never going to be able to fully understand why, no matter how much Sam tries to explain it. He also tells him that he’s sorry. That yeah, Sam made the final call, and he’s really fucking pissed that he did, but that it wasn’t all on him. That God and those bastard angels and Dean himself all had their part in pushing him to it.
“Didn’t work anyway,” Sam whispers, glassy-eyed. “Him in me. Wasn’t any less lonely.”
Dean promises him that he won’t ever have to feel like that again.
It’s midwinter when Sam is finally cleared to leave the infirmary. There’s some debate about what to do with him. People argue over where he will stay (because nobody wants him near their cabin), how he’ll be of any use in the state he’s in (everyone is meant to contribute - that’s a rule. Why should he be an exception?), and whether he should even be allowed to stay at all (some say to leave him in the woods or in a hot zone, let him fend for himself, see how long he lasts, how he copes with the damage he caused). But Dean wants him to stay, and Dean’s word is final.
They decide to settle him into a cabin near the edge of the camp, tucked away in a corner, far enough from the rest of the camp that the others won’t complain. Well, it’s less of a cabin and more of an old supply shed with a bed squeezed in, but he did start the apocalypse, so it’s not like anyone is too concerned about luxury. It’s so crammed with useless, forgotten junk that there’s barely room for a person.
Before Sam’s arrival, they clear space amidst the clutter and equip the room with the bed, donned with several thick blankets because Sam runs cold and there is no heater here; a torch, because the shed isn’t hooked up to the generator; a few pieces of clothing stuffed in a drawer, some scavenged from the city, some hand-me-downs from the dead; a chipped mirror hanging on the wall; and a battered, well-read copy of Milton’s Paradise Lost.
Dean helps move him in. Sam leans on his shoulder as they shuffle out of the infirmary, heavy-footed and uncoordinated. He looks around at first, taking in the sight of a camp he has lived in for months and never once been outside to see, but the sun is hitting the snow in a way that’s almost blinding, in a way that reminds him of the awful, all-engulfing light of the Morningstar, so he soon closes his eyes tight and asks Dean to lead the way.
It takes Sam a while to begin to settle. The change in routine is disorientating for him after so long in the same bed, staring at the same four walls. The clutter is overstimulating. Dean watches silently as Sam roots through the drawers and runs his hands over the sheets and thumbs through the book (which they both know he will never be able to read, not anymore). He makes no comment when Sam covers over the mirror, no matter how much he wants to.
Once Sam has finished fiddling and worn himself out, they sit together, side by side, on the edge of the bed, knees almost touching. This kind of calm, domestic closeness feels foreign. Dean thinks back to when they used to sit like this all the time, not even batting an eye: side by side in the Impala or crowding around Sam’s laptop on shitty motel beds.
“Why… Why am I still here?” Sam asks quietly, interrupting Dean’s thoughts, which he’s grateful for because he can spiral all too easily when reminiscing about before, but also the words send him an awful wave of nausea that he could do without.
“What do you mean, Sam?”
“I mean… I know they don’t- don’t want me here. See the looks. And I get it. I wouldn’t want me here. Not after what I did - or, well, he did, I guess, but that was still me. I let it happen. And now I’m all mess- messed up. Useless. My head is… it’s all wrong up there, not like I used to be. But you’ve kept… I’m still here. I- I don’t deserve it.” He takes a stuttering breath. It’s getting him too worked up. “You should’ve just killed me after you killed him.”
Dean swallows back vomit.
“Sam-” The words catch. Dean feels genuine tears collecting in his eyes, threatening to spill over. He thinks that if he lets them, they might never stop falling. That maybe they’d drown him. “Sam, I didn’t kill him. You did. Don’t you… Don’t you remember?”
Dean remembers, clear as day. He’ll never be able to forget - the moment is burned into his soul for eternity. He remembers the ache from a foot no longer on his neck, the words I got him in a voice that was Sam’s - really Sam’s. He remembers watching, from way down below, Sam pulling out an archangel blade, fighting against himself. It looked painful, like Lucifer was clawing at Sam’s insides to get himself back into the driver's seat. He remembers the noise Sam made when he plunged the blade deep into his chest, the way he gasped what Dean thought would be his last breath, how he wobbled on his feet and left the singed shadows of two great, terrifying wings behind him as he fell. He remembers the demons freezing, retreating, mourning. He remembers feeling a pulse, so fragile and faint that he thought at first he had imagined it, when he had crawled his way over to hold the body in his arms.
As Dean relays all of this, Sam stares at the ground, jaw clenched and brows scrunched in concentration. He ends with: “Yeah, you said yes - I’m not gonna say you were in the right, not gonna say I forgive you - but you also said no, Sam. That was all you. So quit talking like that. You still deserve to be here, alright?”
“I didn’t… I didn’t know.” Though his face is now half covered by his shaking hand, Dean can see the wavering, wobbly smile forming on Sam’s face. He hasn’t smiled in years. The next words come out as a whisper. “Got him. Can’t believe I got him.”
“I have this dream,” Sam says, many months later. “It’s the same one, every night, over and over and over. I’m standing in a lake in a forest, neck-deep and soaked through. Cold. The trees are so tall. So tall, and I am nothing next to them. And you’d expect there to be sounds, right, like…uh… like birds or wind or the water, but it’s silent. Can’t even hear my breathing.
I try so hard to move. I know there’s a way out, another side to reach. But something is stopping me, keeping me stuck there, like… uh… like glue. Or a dev- devil’s trap. And I’m shivering and scared and so close to drowning. And I want to get out so badly, but after a while, I just stop trying. Accept my fate. And then, um, then I wake up.”
If this were before, Dean would tease him. Make some kind of wet dream joke out of it or tell him to keep his girly dream journal to himself. They’d laugh it off and forget about it and get back to life on the road, killing monsters and saving people - what they did best. But it’s not before, and Sam so rarely opens up like this - giving something up without being prompted first - that he doesn’t want to risk saying the wrong thing, making him close off even further.
“That’s what it felt like. Him. Lucifer. You asked, once. A while ago. Couldn’t, uh… couldn’t fit the words together til now. Like a- a jigsaw with too many pieces. All the same colour,” Sam pauses for a long time, a weight in the air between them. His head hung low, sounding more defeated than ashamed, he says, “Sometimes I think I miss it.”
The world around them quietens. Dean hears ringing in his ears and his heart threatens to jump out of his throat.
“You miss it ?” Dean asks after a beat. The phrase is begging to escape as a shout, an accusation, but he fights the instinct, working hard to keep his tone free from judgment. His fists, now curled at his sides, shake with the effort to keep from striking. Anger comes too quickly to him; it has since well before the end of the world, and that situation didn’t help matters. But he’s learning, now, to do better. Putting in the effort, just like Sam is.
“Yeah,” Sam admits. “Not him, I mean, not the things he did with my hands, the- the things he made me see. But that, uh, detachment. Pass- Passivity. Hated what he was doing with me. Made me sick and dirty. But it was so much easier. And he fit so well. I didn't have to think or say or do anything ‘cause he did it all for me. He was in charge for so long that I forgot how to do it. How to… how to be human.”
“Right,” Dean says as he blows out a weary sigh and tries to take in… all of that. What Sam’s talking about - the lack of autonomy, the helplessness, the gradual loss of self - sounds like a nightmare. Yet he talks about it with this disturbing fondness, almost a longing. Dean doesn’t get it. He doesn't think he ever will. He’s starting to accept this now. “Right.”
Sam’s gaze flickers over to him from where they’re been resting on his lap the whole time. He isn’t crying, but his eyes carry a glossy, distant look. He needs comfort, Dean realises, then panics internally for a moment because he’s not good at that. He used to be better, back when they were younger, when he used to patch up Sam’s grazes and keep him calm through Dad’s outbursts and hold him tight after a bad dream, but he’s out of practice now. He’s not expected to comfort anymore, but something in him wants to be that big brother again.
“I can’t say I understand it. You wouldn't believe me if I tried, anyway. But…” He pauses, racking his brain for the right words. As a rule, Dean doesn’t talk about Hell. Shoves those thoughts down deep. But if it can help Sam, and Dean thinks it will, he’s willing to open up. “Sammy, I struggled real bad after I got out of Hell. Down in the pit, I did some awful things. Enjoyed it, too. Was good at it. And nobody was piloting me; I did those things myself.
When I got out, those memories, those feelings - they stuck with me. Felt like maybe there was a piece of myself that was still stuck down there, or there was a piece of it still clinging onto my soul. But eventually, it started to get a little easier. It was slow going but I felt that dirt washing off me, felt the better parts of myself coming back. It’s not gone completely, even now. Hell is still always in the back of my mind and will be for life, most likely, but it’s… quieter now. More of a hum than a roar.
And I know it doesn’t feel like it right now, but I think it’ll start feeling easier for you too. You’re doing good, kid. I mean, the progress you’ve made so far is… Anyway, what I’m trying to say is you’re never gonna get rid of Lucifer or the memories, not fully, but you are gonna start feeling like you again, start taking back the reins. It’ll just take time. And I’ll be here with you for it, whenever you need me.”
Sam keeps his eyes on Dean the whole time, not quite meeting his eyes but hovering around his face, trying his hardest. He nods and keeps nodding, reminding Dean of one of those drinking bird toys. A lot of the time, Sam doesn’t process things properly; the words get mixed up in his head like a puzzle too complicated to solve. This seems to get through to him, though. Seems to make an impact.
“H- hope so,” Sam says eventually, voice thin and wavering, “Thanks, Dean.” And for the first time since neither can even remember when, Dean puts an arm around Sam’s shoulder. Not quite a hug, not yet, but it’s closer than they’ve been in a long time. It feels good, feels right.
That night, in his dream, Sam takes his first step.