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The lingering scent of blood-tinged ash was unfortunately at this point in his life a very familiar one.
“What happened?” he asked himself aloud, his voice sounding more croaky than usual.
The last thing he remembered...the last thing he remembered was a bright gold light. The three of them were working what they’d decided as their final, big case. The gates, the passageways that led to everywhere had to be closed. Heaven. Hell. Purgatory – everything needed to be sealed shut so that nothing whatsoever would be able to come through to harm the earth and its inhabitants ever again.
Waking up on his back and in the middle of a forest was not what Dean remembered from before. No, weren’t they just in Lebanon?
The forest was nothing but tall trees and tiny glimpses of sky between the branches. The sky itself was a shade of gold, signaling twilight. Carefully and curiously feeling no pain, he got up and looked around. Somehow, someway, this place wherever it was looked kind of familiar. Not Lebanon familiar but just, well, familiar. Like he’d been here before.
"Uhhhh."
Dean turned and, with his back against a tree and his hair covering his face, was Sam.
"Sam?" he asked, walking carefully towards his brother, debating whether or not to believe he was really right there in front of him or not. Cause, he remembered seeing Sam disappear in a beam of bright white light while saying the last spell to shut down Hell, finally completing the third trial. "Sammy?"
Sam turned at his name and stared at Dean, running his hand over the top of his head to move the hair out of his eyes. "Dean?"
Dean went to his brother and stood in front of him, drinking in the sight of him healthy and whole for the first time in a long, long time. Dean took in several deep breaths to calm himself before he reached out and hugged his brother tightly. Sam hesitated for a second before doing the same.
"Dean, what happened?” Sam asked with his face smashed against his shoulder. “I was closing the gates and...nothing."
"Well, you did it. I think," Dean said, pulling away. "Sam, you closed them and then the sky went all white and...and now we're here. Wherever here is I guess. Where are we?"
Both brothers took a long look around and, directly behind them, was a simple log cabin bathed in a single shining beam of yellow light like in a movie.
"Huh," Dean said, side-eyeing Sam, "that's not weird at all."
Standing up straighter, Sam put his hands into his pockets, looked back at Dean and asked, "Should we...?"
"What? Go into the mysterious cabin in the woods?" Dean looked between the house and his brother, shrugged his shoulders and pursed his lips. "Yeah. I'm game if you are."
"Together?"
Dean and Sam locked eyes and, as one, walked side by side up to the door of the cabin. Sam turned the knob and a bright gold light engulfed the two of them.
When the light faded, the brothers were no longer standing on the precipice of the forest and a cabin. No, now they were standing in the middle of a lavish office and, behind an ornate desk was a large, plush velvet chair facing away from them and towards a wall-sized cabinet full of all manners of liquor and other doodads.
"The hell?" Dean muttered, looking around.
"Not exactly, Winchester," a voice from the chair said, slowly and deliberately with the hint of an accent.
Both brothers knew that voice; it wasn't one they'd likely ever forget. The chair swiveled around and, seated with his fingers laced together and his forearms on the desk, sat Death himself.
"Please," Death said, motioning before the desk, "have a seat. We have much to discuss."
Dean and Sam both looked to see two cushiony chairs that were definitely not there a second before and they hesitated before moving to sit.
"Now," Death said and Dean noticed two manila files side by side on the desk that were definitely not there before they had sat down that the being reached for from his left hand side. He put on a pair of glasses, opened the first file and read, his lips moving over the words. Dean looked to Sam and Sam simply shrugged his shoulders, having no idea what the hell was going on.
"Um," Dean got up the nerve to say, "what's going on?"
"You're dead, my boy," Death said, closing that file and moving on to the next, reading this one in its entirety as well.
"I'm sorry, what?" Dean asked, leaning forward and blinking, because, no. Not possible.
"Oh yes," Death said, closing the second file, sitting up straight in his seat and putting his hands together again.
Dean wouldn't have it, no matter how definite Death sounded while saying it. "What do you mean, we're dead?" Dean practically growled out.
"It means, son, that you are no longer one among the living."
Surprisingly steady, Sam asked in a calm voice, "And you're reaping us?"
"Yes," Death said, sitting back in his seat.
"Well, fantastic," Dean said, standing. He walked to the door, expecting Sam to follow but when he turned back, his brother was still seated. "Come on. Sam."
"Dean..."
"No," Dean said, moving in front of him and waving his finger in his face. "Sammy, we are going back. Just like before, we're going back to earth. To Cas and hunting and...and to...to burgers and Baby and, I don't know, trees? Sex? Salad?"
Sam stared at the floor and Dean rounded then on Death. "Send us back."
"I'm afraid," Death said, getting to his feet, "that, that is not possible. Your bodies are no longer inhabitable."
"You're lying!"
Death gestured and, on a square of blank wall about the size of a big screen tv, a scene played out before everyone's eyes. Dean running towards Sam, white light, and an explosion. The light vanished and the bodies were gone.
"As you can see," Death said, turning back to them, taking in the sight of the brothers with their mouths both agape, "that is not a viable option. Your work is over boys. You're done."
Dean took a breath in through his nose and nodded. So, this was it then. Sam did the same as well, rising to stand.
"However."
Death came around the desk to stand before them.
"However?" Sam questioned.
"However," Death said while nodding, "there is another option."
Dean looked at his brother from the side of his eyes and waited.
"I know that you do not wish to be done with Earth - I can see it written on your very souls."
"Go on," Dean said.
Death looked Dean in the eye and raised his chin, saying, "How would you boys like to become Reapers?"
"Reap - you want us to become Reapers?" Sam asked, incredulously.
"I do not believe it is necessary for me to repeat myself again. But yes."
"Why us?" Sam asked while pointing to himself.
"Well, boys," Death said while moving around his desk, "you have been a visitor to just about every realm in existence, yes?"
"Yeah," Dean said, "between the two of us, we've sort of gotten around."
"Your souls are veritable passports, littered with stamps and markings. Heaven. Hell. Purgatory. The Fairy Realm. The Cage. Other realities all together. Yes, Dean - I do believe that the two of you have 'gotten around'."
"Yeah but you can't really count the Cage though, right?" Dean asked on behalf of Sam.
Death looked at Sam Winchester and said, "On the contrary; it is a realm all to itself."
"Okay, so, what? So we become Reapers,” Dean said. “We reap people that are dying. I don't know about you but has anything, ever, in our lives let you think that even for a second we'd be in favor of sending people to the not-so-great beyond? Especially the fact that we've experienced it all for ourselves, in bright surround sound?"
"Honestly, no,” Death said, looking proud. “But I know in your heart of hearts that you do not want rest. It is...boring for you, yes?"
Death looked down at his fingernails. "Working under me though does include certain...benefits."
"Benefits?" Dean said with a laugh. "I think if we take your offer we're a little beyond health insurance, pal. Um, Sir."
"Actually, I was speaking more about traveling between all worlds. Reapers can do that you know. You have friends everywhere, do you not?"
Shaking his head, Dean sighed and looked somewhere (anywhere) else.
"Would this have to be for forever?" Sam asked.
Death turned to him and said, very plainly, "No."
"So we can leave this anytime we want to and just...rest?"
"Yes."
"Dean," Sam said, turning to his brother, "what's the harm?"
"What's the - are you even listening to yourself. Be Reapers? Come on."
"You reaped once."
"Yeah but that was to get your soul back. That was a deal. This, this is I don't know what this is...”
"It's an option. And I think it's a good one. Dean, Death is right - I don't want to rest. The ghost route isn't viable either but as long as we reap, we can still do something that's good. We can still save people."
Dean glared at his brother and then at Death who seemed unruffled.
"We can leave anytime we want?"
"I believe that that has already been stated vociferously. And before you even ask, the ones you reap will come through me first and then to you. No picking and choosing. You reap them and they move on and then you move on to the next."
Death waved his hand and two ancient looking parchments full of writing appeared on the top of his desk along with two black quill pens.
"Contracts?" Sam asked, leaning over to look them over.
"I will give you two a few moments to talk and then expect you as soon as you're ready."
Death was before them one minute and gone the next and Dean rounded on Sam who was already picking up one of the quills.
"Sam," he said, "you can't really be serious."
Sam looked up over his shoulder, put down the quill and shook his head. "Dean, I said it before and I'm more than willing to say it again - we can still something good for the universe. We've done so much messing it up. It's down to us to bring some kind of order back to everything. We can see Mom and Dad. Bobby. Benny. Jo and Ellen. Jess."
Dean broke at that. "So it's basically like having a job in the afterlife."
"Okay,” Sam laughed, “if you want to get that technical. Yeah. I guess."
"We can go at any time."
"Yup. Doesn't have to be for forever. Death promised."
“Death promised,” Dean laughed. “Seriously, man, what are our lives? After-lives.”
Dean smirked and that was all it took for Sam to smile. That was that then. Sobering up, Dean grabbed the other quill and both brothers locked eyes and then, as one, turned to the contracts and signed on the dotted line.