ohsam | comment fic meme!

mimblexwimble.livejournal.com posting in

It's the week leading up to Sam's birthday, which means *drumroll* pain! Pain and horror and terror and illness - and ~~a wee bit of~~ comfort too!

SPREAD THE WORD

THE RULES

→ Leave a comment here with your prompt. This is a Sam-focused hurt/comfort community, so Sam should be the one in the hurt/comforted role. Your prompts may involve sick!Sam, hurt!Sam, angsty!Sam, basically anything that results in Sam being on the receiving end of hurt/comfort. (No rules against whumping other characters as well, of course, but you have to whump Sam first. ;) )
→ In your prompt, please state your desired characters or pairings. All genres/pairings welcome, but no real-person (RPF) prompts.

Example A: “Sam, Dean, gen, set in season 2. Sam has a vision and passes out. Cue caring!Dean and limp!Sam.”
Example B: “Sam/Dean, trauma. Sam is injured on a hunt, Dean freaks out when he thinks Sam might be dead.”

→ Post as many prompts as you like - but one prompt per comment. If you've got a couple, comment with each separately.
→ Prompts can be as short or detailed as you like. Remember though - more detail means less wriggle room for the writer, which might lower the chances of someone picking up your prompt.
→ Go through the prompts! If you find one you like, write a fic for it. There's no limit to how many users can reply to a prompt, or how many prompts someone can write for.
→ When replying to a prompt with your comment-fic, put ‘filled’ in your subject line and then anything else you want, like a title if you have one/part numbers. It’s not a big deal if you forget this step, but it will make it easier for people to find your fic.
→ Anon posting enabled.
→ NO SPOILERS FOR UNAIRED EPISODES.
→ Play nice - no flaming and no character bashing, period. Any comments that break this rule will be deleted without warning.
→ Feedback is catnip for writers. Leave some author-love!
→ No spam comments.
→ Contact one of the mods if you have a question.
→ Spread the Sam love - pimp this meme!
→ Have fun!

THE MASTER LIST
(with shortened prompts - full prompts at link)

Back to Where We Were by

authoressnebula
After Sam gets his soul back, Dean's become even more mother hen than usual ... Sam can't understand why Dean's so, well ... brotherly, after their downhill relationship the last couple of years...

Creepy-Ugly by

glovered
Sam now has a Thing about cages. A jail cell is a cage.

And In My Soul, An Icy Dread Remains by

authoressnebula
Sam gets himself locked in a freezer. The memories of Hell's frozen lake. Lucifer's icy touch, all those fun things, are banging on the wall and Sam? Sam's not coping too well.

Which Way Do I Steer by

mercuryblue144
Jess was a vegan and Sam has some trouble readjusting to the hunter diet of Mountain Dew and Burger King.

Fire and Ice by

weesta
Sam gets himself locked in a freezer. The memories of Hell's frozen lake. Lucifer's icy touch, all those fun things, are banging on the wall and Sam? Sam's not coping too well.

I'll Be There For You by

cherry916
Sam has nightmares. Dean comforts him. Slash or gen.

Untitled by

erisinia
Gen. Sam is stranded in the middle of the desert. Heat stroke, dehydration, mirages.

Same Time, Same Place by

twoskeletons
Highlight to Reveal Summary - Spoilers for 6.18 [Sam & Castiel... Cas desperately needs to power up a lot and often to fight his war, and the soul of Lucifer's vessel is the most powerful one around. Sam helps him willingly, but it's still extremely unpleasant and draining.]

And Thus Was a Giant Felled by

running_hot
Tall guys constantly get roped into changing light bulbs when shorter humans would need to get a ladder -- like the bulbs in the twelve-foot kitchen ceiling at Jess's parents' house. Sam really should have known better than to stand on a swivel chair to do it.

A Sore Topic by

phx69
Highlight to Reveal Summary - Spoilers for 6.18. [Sam, who is the very definition of a novice rider, had to ride 20 miles to Colt's and 20 miles back. I would love me some saddle sore, limping Sam.]

Here It Comes, There It Goes Again by

lavishsqualor
What with detoxes and resoulings, Sam's memories of the panic room can't be good. So it's unfortunate that they are under some supernatural siege at Bobby's and retreating into the panic room and closing the door is the only way to be safe.

Better On Our Own by

si_star_x
Small fracture in a limb--not OBVIOUSLY broken, but hurts like hell, and no, you really can't use the limb. Sam gets it checked, but the first x-ray misses it.

Carried Home by

samidha
Highlight - Spoilers for 6.18. [Dean, after hearing how soul juice helps Castiel, gets the bright idea to use his own soul to help Sam with the whole wall thing ... And if that isn't Sam-hurty enough for this comm, make the process of healing Sam's soul involve remembering hell. Bonus points if the fallout from this involves le classic telepathic soul-bond.]

Visible Evidence by

authoressnebula
Sam's always spent a lot of time online, researching this and that, even when there's no immediate hunt. Dean doesn't think there's anything significant about it now. Though Sam's getting obsessed. Dean wakes up at three, four in the morning to the glow of the laptop screen and the tap of the keyboard. exhausted!sam

A Certain Beginning by

mimblexwimble
AU Pilot. As horrible as the situation is, Dean's still sort of glad to know that 22 years later he can still carry his baby sister out of a burning building, even if she's now a heavily pregnant amazon.

Shot Down in Flames by

winchesterhaunt
Highlight to reveal - spoilers for 6.18. [In the final shootout, both guns were fired. Dean's shot found it's mark. The Phoenix's shot went wide...and hit Sam.]

Hell Shall Not Wash Us Away

brosedshield
The problem with permanent damage to the soul is that death does nothing to fix it. The wall lasts through Sam's life, and he and Dean are in their shared heaven, but there begin to be cracks and fissures. Sam stumbles from happy memories into memories of hell. And because this part of heaven is actually constructed of memory, this is shaking the fabric of things. Just Dean and Sam's heaven for now, but it's going to spread. Cas has a responsibility to heaven; he's going to have to seal off this part and set it adrift. Dean has the choice to leave if he wants to before that happens, but do we really think he'll take it? Cue Dean and Sam in their own bubble apocalypse, where the islands of sanity are fewer and farther between every day.

Panic by

ratherastory
What with detoxes and resoulings, Sam's memories of the panic room can't be good. So it's unfortunate that they are under some supernatural siege at Bobby's and retreating into the panic room and closing the door is the only way to be safe.

Daydreams You Have in Hell by

wave_obscura
Sam now has a Thing about cages. A jail cell is a cage.

balance good, everything good by

de_nugis
Sam and Dean are sparring and Dean slips/misjudges and cracks one of Sam's ribs. Sam doesn't mention it.

Unravelling by

emmram
Highlight to read - spoilers for 6.18 [Castiel has become addicted to the whole soul-touching thing, and Sam's soul? That's something special he can't get enough of. That doesn't make it any more pleasant for Sam.]

Along Every Horizon by

twoskeletons
If Dean were to die on Sam now I don’t think Sam would ... fade, get killed by some random monster, not out of any suicidal drive, but just because he was having trouble paying attention to details like food or sleep or ravening creatures with lots of big, nasty teeth.

Kiss it All Better by

sakura_no_mi
Sam and Dean are having sex and it goes all wrong. Sam falls off the bed and then manages to slam his head against the head board when he and Dean try again. Dean feels guilty and goes overboard in trying to help him recover.

You Have One Saved Message by

killabeez
After Sam gets his phone back, it's time for a new one. The phone company's awesome enough to retrieve his contacts, his address book, his games, his photos, oh, and one voicemail he's had saved for what's now going on almost three years. Dean gets a hold of the new phone with all of this stuff first. Dean hears The Voicemail first. Dean is so not cool with it. Because to keep an email for beyond fourteen days, someone's gotta keep listening to it and making it fresh and resetting the delete date. Which means Sam's still been listening to it.

nothing left to lose by

sikeminatural
When Sam is pulled from Hell by some unknown force (up to the author) a year after the showdown, he has his soul and goes to find Dean who is not living with Lisa but alone, and still hunting. Dean takes him in but its easy to see that Dean depsises Sam, he beats him, verbally abuses him, uses his memories of Hell to hurt him and blames Sam for everything that has happened. Sam becomes brainwashed and at first fights back but then starts to accept it. Would love if Cas or Bobby come and save Sam and make Dean see the error of his ways!

Never Buy Yellow Shoes by

tversan
Sam buys a pair of cursed shoes that squeeze his precious little feet. He hobbles around, unable to take the wretched things off and they seem to get smaller and smaller the more he tries.

Heart of Stone by

mamapranayama
A curse slowly turns Sam into stone. Frist his feet, then his legs - working its way up until he's completely motionless, cold hard rock. Your descision whether or not he's accompanied, whether the curse is broken, or whether he's simply left to turn to stone alone.

Some Guys Have All the Luck by

si_star_x
Gen. S1-S3. Sam passes a Kidney Stone... or a series of them (your choice whether there's only one or several of them) -- and possibly has a kidney infection on top of it. Just give me whimper-y, tear-y Sam trying to piss and failing and the little he manages to pass is bloody and feels like shards of burning glass.

Let it Bleed by

sakura_no_mi
Sam got into a fight (with a person or a monster), he's roughened up a bit, sore, bruised, scratched and dirty, and he really, really doesn't have any strength left. Dean drags him (carries, really) to a motel room, undresses him, grabs a wet washcloth and starts to clean him up in silence. His touches go from caring to sensuous to heated while all the time being very slow, deliberate and careful. Sam lies there and takes it, mesmerized by his brother's touch, his breath catching and heart beating faster.

To Die For a Memory by

authressnebula
Season five. Sam is captured by a Djiin or some similar creature that keeps its prey docile by trapping them in a mental prison. Whatever the brain spits up as a treasured, wonderful memory becomes the gilded prison that keeps you docile and too happy to fight back. Dean saves the day and kills the creature, but Sam won't wake up. Desperate, Dean whips up some dreamroot tea and goes in after him.

Out of the Dark by

samidha
Sam accidentally gets trapped in the panic room for reasons up to the author. Dean doesn't find him until Sam's in the midst of a flashback with Accusing!Dean and doesn't recognize real!Dean. Dean has to talk him back to reality.

Fade, Far Away, Dissolve, and Quite Forget by

minviendha
Gen or Wincest AU of "The End"- In "The End" when Dean tells Sam that they should stay away from one another, Sam takes it to heart. He cuts off all ties with Bobby and any other mutual acquaintances in order to avoid inadvertently having contact with Dean. Not because he doesn't WANT to see Dean (he does) but he knows that Dean doesn't want to see HIM, and he's pretty sure he's a curse to anyone who cares about him. So it's just better that he disappear.

All is Fine by

moviegeek03
Teen!Chesters. Dean's away on a hunt with Caleb and with Dean gone there's no buffer between Sam and John. Sam isn't meaning to be all angsty and rebelling against his Dad but the new school he's in he's having a hard time because he's getting bullied almost constantly and it's hard hiding bruises and cuts from his Dad but he manages somehow. He didn't want to tell Dean because he doesn't want to appear weak in his eyes and he sure as hell doesn't want to tell his Dad because he knows what his Dad will say No son of mine just get's bullied. Cue John not being a total dick but somehow finding out what Sam's been going through and comforts him/takes care of the problem.

He Ain't Heavy by

beamin_sunshine
After getting his soul back, or maybe after a couple seizures, Sam wakes up in Dean's bed, which is definitely not where he was when he went to sleep. Sam is embarrassed, even though Dean doesn't really mind all that much. But then it keeps happening, with Sam never remembering getting up. Now Dean's starting to get a little annoyed because, as much as he loves the kid, Sam is not the best person to share a bed with, he moves around and makes noises and clings, so Dean gets him his own hotel room, just so he can get some sleep for once. But even that doesn't keep Sam away. As mangled as his soul is, once the brain is shut down, it's going to go find it's mate. Gen, please.

Big Things, Small Packages by

winchesterhaunt
2.06, No Exit. H.H. Holmes doesn't usually take men, but he is getting dangerously close to his lair. Sam's trapped in a space nearly to tight for him to turn his head. His knees ache from being crammed up against the top, his scalp is bleeding, he's pretty sure his wrist is messed up worse, there's a hysterical woman with him for company, and all he can do is wait and hope for Dean and Jo to find him.

Points of Authority by

kiscinca
So the boys have just gotten back together after taking a break, and they're already arguing with each other, or really, Dean's arguing with Sam while Sam's attempting to not argue but still getting pissed off at Dean. Then Dean throws down the trump card: that Castiel was the one who saved Dean, not Sam. Sam was obviously too busy screwing Ruby.

Really Bad Day at Black Rock by

gwendolynd
Dean has to cut off one of Sam's limbs.

Just One of Those Weeks by

authoressnebula
Sam is having a really, really, really, crappy week and just needs a hug...

To Die for a Memory

authoressnebula
Sam is captured by a Djiin or some similar creature that keeps its prey docile by trapping them in a mental prison. Whatever the brain spits up as a treasured, wonderful memory becomes the gilded prison that keeps you docile and too happy to fight back. Dean saves the day and kills the creature, but Sam won't wake up. Desperate, Dean whips up some dreamroot tea and goes in after him. He finds Sam reliving the same memory over and over again - the two of them as kids, playing hooky from training, laying out in a field of grass on a summer day watching clouds and wrestling and just being BROTHERS.

Until Death Do Us Part by

phx69
I don't care what the situation. I just want Dean carrying Sam bridal style.

All Waters Have the Color of Drowning by

minviendha
Meg captures the boys -- somehow -- and decides to have some fun with them -- because she's crazy. And as she goes to work on Sam, she somehow accidentally triggers a Hell seizure. Her reaction: Ooh, Sammy. Twice the bang for the buck. Let's do that again!

Aim, Shoot, Repeat by

authoressnebula
"There's a pattern in the system,
there's a bullet in the gun.
That's why I tried to save you,
but it can't be done.
It can't be done."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

elliemurasaki.livejournal.com

aw FUCKIT. Somebody show me the way to make the screenreader-skippable highlight-to-read text work in comments?

Anyway. Between S3 and S4. Sam decides he's going to get Dean out come hell or high water, so he opens the Devil's Gate (Colt, C4, whatever) and marches right in. Describe the trials and tribulations he endures on the way to find Dean and on the way out with Dean.

From:

rokhal.livejournal.com

In Windows, you can select the text in question, right-click, and click "View Selection Source" and a window will pop up with the html codes displayed.

From:

vail-kagami.livejournal.com

[font color="#FFFFFF"]Text[/font] (Change [] to <>)

Love the prompt, by the way!

From:

elliemurasaki.livejournal.com

Thanks

From:

minviendha.livejournal.com

I wasn't even expecting this one to happen. But apparently the prompt kicked something into gear. Hm. Blood. Er. A lot of it. And a death.

-----

He tried.

He tried for grief. Nice, normal, healthy five-step-process grieving. But that doesn’t, he discovers, cover the kind of rip-your-heart-out-of-your-chest, half-a-whole feeling of losing Dean, who was so much. Bobby doesn’t know this. No one knows this feeling, and he knows that isn’t true but it is how it is all the same.

This was not supposed to happen.

In the end, it is Dean’s words he arms himself with. Remember what Dad taught you, he said. And remember what I taught you. Sam remembers. Dad taught him that family has to come first, that you always have your brother’s back, and above all to never give in. Dean taught Sam self sacrifice and how to go too far for the ones you love.

That’s all he needs.

It’s reason and excuse all in one, and while he knows there is nothing rational about it, rational no longer matters.

He can’t mimic Dean exactly, though; can’t die. It won’t work that way. It’s not that he doesn’t think he’ll go to Hell, more that he’d be just another prisoner, and that’s not what Dean needs. Dean needs a rescue, and that means he has to walk in alive.

Sam has the peculiar feeling that his sanity is fraying around the edges, and decides that in Hell, that will probably only help him.

Sam considers doing what research he can, right down to rereading Dante’s Inferno, but in the end he decides that it doesn’t matter, he’ll go in with what he can take and there’s probably no words to do it justice, anyway.

He tells Bobby that he’s going out for lunch. He’s been careful to be honest for the rest of the time, so the older hunter suspects nothing now. This is something that has to be done alone. This is a hunt without backup.

Sam wears the same clothes he would wear on any hunt, and brings his duffel bag. Ruby’s knife is strapped to his leg and there’s another made of iron at his hip. The bag has a rifle loaded with salt rounds and the Colt.

It’s not enough; but there’s probably nothing that will be enough. The worst he can do is fail, and he’s already done that.

He drives the Impala to Wyoming out of a sense of duty and studies the Devil’s Gate. The stone looks so cold and innocuous. It’s hard to believe that a year ago, Sam almost thought that things would end here, but no – the Winchesters hadn’t lost everything yet.

Sam squares his shoulders and carves the symbol in the ground that he dug out of one of Bobby’s books. A holding spell. It’ll keep the demons inside while he opens the door. Hopefully.

Dean would be pissed at him. Sam hopes that Dean will be pissed at him.

He pulls out the Colt and examines the barrel for a second, then steps forward and slides it into the keyhole, watches the familiar spinning motion. The door opens more slowly this time, and looking through it at the red light and empty space, Sam thinks of Milton.

Into this wilde Abyss the warie fiend stood on the brink of Hell and look'd a while, pondering his Voyage.

Sam suspects he should be afraid. He isn’t. After all, what is there to lose?

He steps through, and descends.

**

At first it is just darkness.

And then it is darkness, and there is nothing just or only about it.

This darkness presses, it crowds, it swallows and devours. He can hear sounds, but they seem to come from everywhere, strangely muffled, as though this is all a great black fog and he is wandering in circles, going nowhere at all.

Still longer, and the darkness seems to whisper. It murmurs and seems to writhe, like the fog is really eels squirming in one great dark mass. Slimy and oppressive. There is something that feels like it is burning in his veins, and he wonders if it is the demon or living human blood responding.

It goes on. And on. And on.

From:

minviendha.livejournal.com

He calls out, once, and discovers that his voice makes no sound. Sam can feel his heart thudding, the only living thing here. Everything else is silence, and darkness, as it might have been in the night before life awoke, before the idea of the first particles was even a mote in emptiness.

Sam goes on. Descending, going forward, going back – he has a feeling it doesn’t matter. Perhaps this place will never let me go. Perhaps this is all Hell is, just this, forever-

Sam stops. The sound of his breathing is loud and harsh in his ears, and there is nothing else in the dark. His legs are feeling heavy and weak. You shall not pass, Sam thinks absurdly, in Ian McKellan’s voice, and giggles too loudly in the dark.

Stand up, he thinks, savagely, move!

The air seems to resist him as Sam lunges up and forward, seems to push back as it grasps and tugs at his ankles. And just as suddenly, it is gone.

Sam slams his eyes shut so he will not go blind in the sudden sear of light.

When his eyes will open again, Sam discovers that his duffel bag is gone. For a moment, he holds still, breathing. The air tastes wrong and his head is trying to spin. He fights it back down and looks forward.

There is a wall of thorns blocking the way. They are thick and black and oozing blood from their tips.

Sam bares his teeth and draws the iron knife. “Dean,” he says, to remind himself. And forward.

**

The thorns dig deep and hold fast. They grow nearly as fast as he can cut them back. Their branches bend and twist and grasp at his arms, his legs, and for every snap of a limb that then weeps clear fluid like tears, he rips ten thorns out of his own skin.

Two stab through his hands, and Sam laughs at the irony even as he yanks them out, not screaming. Blood is coursing in rivers down his arms and into his eyes from his scalp, but they are only thorns. Through the wall, he can see flickering light, like flames, and fights all the harder for it.

When the end comes, it is a surprise. He staggers and nearly falls. There are holes in the center of both his palms. His arms look like more blood than skin. His coat is gone and the flannel shirt is in tatters.

But he has not lost his weapons. The knife is slick with blood in his ruined palm, but it is still there. He clutches it more tightly, the pain shooting up his battered arms only incidental.

In front of him is a stone cavern. He blinks and there is a stone altar in the center. A man is stretched out on his stomach on it, shuddering. His arms are stretched out taut and Sam can see the muscles in his back straining.

The head turns, and glazed green eyes meet his. “Sam,” Dean says, “Sammy.”

Sam’s breath comes out explosively, and the iron knife clatters to the floor in a spatter of blood. He lunges forward, but then Dean is standing behind the altar, and Dean is still stretched out in bonds, and they’re both looking at him.

“Stop right there, Sammy,” says the standing Dean. “That’s not me. This is me.” He lifts his right hand, holding a long, curved knife, and runs his tongue along it. Sam shudders.

“No,” he says, in denial, and the standing Dean tilts his head and says, “No?” and then strides forward and slams the blade home between tied-Dean’s shoulder blades.

Sam lunges with a furious yell, but standing Dean is gone and it is only him and his brother, still splayed out, eyes open and staring. Sam pulls out the knife as though that will help, and hacks through the bonds with what might be tears or sweat running down his face. He rolls Dean tenderly over, because you can’t die in Hell, can you? He’ll be back, and then they can return together-

He sets the knife down and waits, though his face feels too warm. It’s fine. Any minute now.

From:

minviendha.livejournal.com

He feels Dean twitch, the first rise of his chest. The movement of his arm.

And the hot, sweet, sudden burn of the knife in his gut.

He looks down, and Dean’s eyes are solid black, and his face is twisted, mangled, and rotting. “Gotcha,” he – it – says, smirking, and twists.

Then, in a flash of light, it is gone.

Sam bends double over the blade, gasping, choking. It hurts, this time, really hurts – a fatal wound, he knows. But Sam doesn’t scream. He doesn’t need to. Or can’t.

He pulls the knife out and watches the blood run. It flows sluggishly. I won’t die, Sam concludes, Not here. Not for a very long time.

He forces himself to straighten and picks up the knife. The hole in his palm twinges in reminder.

He doesn’t have to keep it together forever, Sam reminds himself. Just long enough.

There is a tunnel ahead now. He moves forward and steps in, looks ahead. It spirals down. Sam takes one step in. Then another. Then another.

He’s getting closer, he can feel it.

**

It gets darker again, now, and the demons find him when the quality of the light reaches that of dusk. “Sam Winchester,” one hisses, though it looks more like a frog than a snake, and he has a feeling that even that is an illusion. “Sammy Winchester. The delinquent Boy King.”

Sam adjusts the knife in his hand. His middle is soaked with blood, now, pumping warmly out of his stomach. “Yeah,” he agrees, and says, “I’m looking for my brother.”

“He’s never getting out,” says another one, loping to the frog’s side. This one is even more twisted and grotesque, with a human mouth but fish eyes and gills. “And neither are you.” Others are massing in the darkness behind them. He can see them. Hear them.

“Just try,” Sam says, baring his teeth. His heart beats rapidly, once-twice, and a new surge of blood washes out, dripping from his hand. “Just try.”

They surge forward, howling, gibbering, roaring. He meets them, tearing with flashing steel and hands and eventually teeth. Their claws bite deep, leaving ribbons of flesh. Their teeth meet in his shoulder and try to drag him down. For every body that flashes and melts with a strike of Ruby’s knife, another rises. Sam’s whole world is demons and blood and war, fighting, fighting, fighting.

And his mouth is full of blood that could be his or might not be, but he still has the knife, the knife and the thought of Dean, Dean, Dean throbbing inside him like a homing signal that he can’t resist. It is too much to fight, but he still has something left to give.

Sam throws back his head and lets everything go. Flash flash flash flash they die, demon after demon after demon. Flash flash flash. One by one and then three by three and then twelve by twelve. They scream and thrash and writhe almost like they are people in pain. “No mercy,” Sam whispers, “No mercy.”

One of them crawls to him and clings to his foot. “Master,” it whimpers. Sam kicks it in the face, or what passes for its face, and then kills it.

Then they are gone. The power is still thrumming through his veins, but Sam’s body is starting to fail. He staggers. Something runs down his face and it could be sweat or blood. When he glances down, one of his own ribs is gleaming white through the ruin of his chest. His entire body aches, begging to lie down and rest.

Soon, Sam promises. It’s almost over.

From:

minviendha.livejournal.com

He continues downward. There are dark shapes ahead, but they flee from him now. The knife is stuck to his hand with dried blood.

Sam keeps moving. One step. After another. After another.

All the while, the humming feeling grows louder, and he is coming near.

**

Dean doesn’t understand.

There’s no pain. There is always pain. But stranger still, his torturer, Alistair, looked up not a moment ago and seemed displeased, though with his face it would be impossible to say for sure. “Hold on a moment,” he said pleasantly, and disappeared.

He hasn’t come back.

Someone is coming, though. He can feel footsteps, hear their quiet approach, and when they pause beside him he turns his head to see.

At first he doesn’t understand what he is seeing. It doesn’t look like a demon. It looks like a human, bleeding, mutilated. As he himself must have looked at times. But there is something wrong. “Dean,” it says, and that isn’t unusual – everyone here knows his name – but the voice is. The breathed, relieved way it says it.

“No,” Dean says, fierce, vicious denial. It’s not the first time they’ve used Sam against him, but this is worse, because Sam doesn’t look angry or upset or in pain. His eyes shine with adoration, and nothing else.

But Sam’s face has been ripped open on one cheek, and his nose is smashed. His hair is matted badly with blood, and the rest of him –

He looks like he’s been through a paper shredder, and then a meat grinder. And there he is, trying to smile.

Moving forward and starting on the chains. The unbreakable chains that slide apart under Sam’s mangled fingers. (He can see bone in a few places. On his left hand, three are downright missing. Sam pauses and coughs, and blood sprays.)

His little brother hardly seems affected. “We have to go,” he says, and Dean doesn’t move, trying to understand this new torture and what it means. Sam, torn apart and drenched in blood. Alistair, gone. And, Dean realizes, everything is quiet.

No screaming. Nothing. Everything gone silent.

“We don’t have much time,” Sam says. “I don’t know what else they’ll try, but I don’t think…I can still get you out.”

“What?” Dean says. His voice sounds strange and ragged in his own ears. Sam’s hand wraps around his wrist, sliding for a moment in blood, and tugs him forward.

“I’m getting you out,” Sam says, and there is something in his tone, too calm, unreal. “That’s what I came here for, dumbass.”

When Sam turns his back, dragging him along, Dean can see it, through the blood and bone and ruined muscle (god he shouldn’t even be able to move but this is Hell)-

Sam’s lungs quiver. His heart beats.

In all this time, in all the screaming, Dean hasn’t breathed once. Hasn’t heard his own heart once.

It’s the demons. It has to be. It has to be. Sam isn’t here. Isn’t here and alive, certainly. That’s not even possible. It’s not-

But he follows. What does Dean have to lose?

From:

minviendha.livejournal.com

Sam drags him upward. The ground is somewhere between stone and flesh, and Sam is leaving bloody footprints. He stumbles, once, and swears, under his breath like he’s afraid someone will hear. “Just a little farther,” Dean hears him say. “Just a little-“

They come to a cavern. This one is full of mirrors. Sam doesn’t look at any of them, seeming in fact to quicken his pace, as though he fears something. Dean glances at himself in the mirror and blinks. He doesn’t look any different. Sam is little more than a smudge of red, or black, or both.

Next it’s a thicket of thorns, but they draw back and quail away from both of them. Sam makes a noise that might be a laugh but sprays blood on the ground, and Dean stares at it, disbelieving and disinterested. This isn’t Sam, he’s decided. This is just another trick, and he won’t fall for it.

After the thorns, it is darkness. Darkness so pure and utter and absolute for a moment Dean thinks he’s lost sight even of this false Sam, of everything, and can’t stop the noise bursting from his mouth. (Not a cry. A shout.)

Sam’s hand tightens on his wrist, and Dean can feel the warm wetness of fresh blood welling up between them. “I’m here,” Sam says, “Just – keep going. Almost there. I promise. Almost there.”

Almost where? Dean wants to ask, but he’s afraid he doesn’t want to know.

**

Sam’s heart has started to stutter and stagger unevenly. They’re so close, though, so close. The darkness is as bad as it was before, as close and hungry, but Sam hardly even notices. Dean, it’s Dean he has to think of. Dean who he found, who is following him now, confused and probably scared but there.

The hole in his gut is throbbing and his whole body feels cold. Some way back he started to limp. His body is remembering that it has limits and trying to make him remember too.

Sam ignores it. The darkness was long, but not forever. They will get out. And then –

And then nothing. After that, nothing matters. Just this. This is what matters.

Further up and further in, he thinks hysterically, but they couldn’t be farther than the heaven of C.S. Lewis’s children’s series.

“Sam?” Dean says, sounding uncertain. Probably he thinks this is a trick. Sam will be sure he knows it isn’t.

“Almost there,” he says again. “I promise. We’re almost there.”

They have to be. He isn’t sure how much longer he can push like this. (Damn you. Forever, if you need to.)

He won’t leave Dean behind in this darkness. He won’t.

His hands hit stone. Sam opens his eyes. There is light, sunlight, far, far above. “Dean,” he says, turning, “We have to climb.”

Dean is staring up, his mouth open. Sam nudges him again, and Dean grabs onto the stone. It molds under his hands, and Sam finds a smile. He lets Dean get a few feet up, then begins to follow him, eyes on the opening. Just a little farther. That’s all. Just a little farther.

From:

minviendha.livejournal.com

**

Dean crawls over the edge and falls facedown into the grass. It tickles his face. It itches in his nose. It’s cloudy overhead and the ground is damp from a recent rain.

He looks up, waiting for some sign it’s a trick, and realizes what he climbed out of. The Devil’s Gate is open. The Colt is still in the lock.

No, he thinks, no, this is all wrong.

And then something else is crawling over the edge, hardly recognizable. It stands, wavering, and reaches out, pulls the Colt free, and shoves against the door. Dean remembers it being hard to move, but it slams shut like it wanted nothing more.

The thing that followed him out is hardly recognizable as human in the stark, cold, light of day. It was easier in Hell.

Dean still knows, though. The Colt. The Devil’s Gate. Those eyes, shining with adoration.

It must be a smile. “You’re out, Dean,” Sam says, and his voice is hoarse, little above a whisper. “It’s okay.”

And then he falls. Not like fainting, not gently, but like the strings holding him up were just severed. Dean’s mind is gibbering.

Sam walked into Hell. He walked into Hell. What does that-

But Sam isn’t moving. Sam is red and still on the grass and dirt, body torn and shredded and broken, and Dean staggers to him, waiting for him to heal, expecting the wounds to knit-

This isn’t Hell, dumbass. This isn’t his soul. This is Sam.

Sam torn apart. Sam bleeding. Sam-

His eyes closed and head tilted back so the stillness in his neck is perfectly visible.

He’s out and he’s alive and the air smells like coming rain, and Sam walked into Hell for Dean.

Where can he walk for Sam? Someone can tell him, and he’ll do it. He’ll do it in a second, find some way to fix this, because this was never what was supposed to happen, and a scream is bubbling up unwanted in Dean’s throat, he wants to throw up, wants to hit something or break something. Sam was supposed to-

Remember what I taught you.

Maybe, a dark voice murmured, he just learned all the wrong lessons.

Edited Date: 2011-05-08 10:16 pm (UTC)