Chapter Text
December 25th, 2011
Lakeside, Vermilion, Ohio
Sam Winchester was on the run.
Boots slapping through ankle-deep puddles of snowmelt, jacket flapping open against his sides, he looked frantically over his shoulder, checked his stride when he saw no one following, but kept going. He’d been on the move for a while now, it almost felt like second nature to just keep going. Just keep going, don’t stop, don’t look back. Except he did keep looking back, the way his dad had always taught him not to.
Everything John Winchester had ever taught his sons was crumbling apart.
Sam hit the end of the wide, high-walled alley, stepping out onto a misty street lined with drifts of slushy snow. He swung around the corner and didn’t stop moving, the lights of the city to his left falling right, strafing against the wind-swept surface of Lake Erie and tossing a muted reflection across the corners of his eyes. It was midnight, and so cold with the breeze chasing itself off the lake, Sam was sure if he blinked his eyelashes would stick together.
His heart, aching with every single beat, every time it jumped in his chest, it felt like someone had their fingers wrapped around it and they were curling in, stabbing, holding on to him too tightly.
Sam came to the end of the wide walkway and took the next corner, knowing that doubling back wouldn’t buy him more than a minute, maybe two if he was lucky. But that was all he had left.
Instead he careened around the sharp brick edge of the building and skidded to a stop, hands up in a gesture of surrender.
Staring down the barrel of a gun.
Caught, resigned, Sam took one step back.
The muzzle angled between his eyes.
In the cold wash of moonlight and streetlamps, Sam glared at his brother.
“Where is it?” Dean asked, tone as frosty as the air. Sam blew breath out through his gritted teeth, the heat of it jetting against his numb cheeks and creating a cloud of vapor in front of him, blurring his sight. Still, the click of the gun cocking was unmistakable. “Dammit! Sam. Where is that son of a bitch?”
Sam knew from that tone in and of itself just how ragged Dean was. He knew because he felt the same way, not trusting himself to speak in case it betrayed that. In case is betrayed everything he was holding on to by the tips of his fingers: his conscience, his soul, his sanity.
And the tighter he held that, the person he’d sworn he would give anything for was slipping away like the melted snow running beneath their feet on this cold, lonely street on Christmas Eve, five minutes until midnight.
“Sam. This isn’t a game, man.”
Sam flung his arms out in a wide shrug, shoulders brushing his ears in the gesture.
Dean stepped through the haze created by their heavy breathing, moving fast, catching the unresisting Sam by the front of his jacket and turning him, slamming him against the building on Sam’s left. He hardly felt it against skin so cold it was going raw-red and numb.
The thing he did feel was the way the odor of the gunpowder corroded the back of his throat as Dean wedged his arm under Sam’s chin to hold him against the wall, and shoved the weapon into his face.
“Tell me where you hid him and we can get the hell out of here.”
Sam stared him down, rigid and tense, for all the good it would do him. He knew what would come next; but even that wasn’t enough to make him turn his back on everything he’d done. The last few days had made him more alive and more sure of himself than he’d been since the first time he’d had a taste of demon blood.
Dean wasn’t so at peace with the inevitable outcome. “Don’t make me do this, Sammy.” His voice broke slightly, desperate eyes reflecting the streetlights on both sides of the walkway. “Don’t make me keep this promise.”
“No one’s making you do anything, Dean.” Sam said softly, proud at least of the fact that his tone didn’t betray anything of what he was feeling.
Dean’s arm jerked up and back, jamming the barrel of the gun against Sam’s temple. Sam dragged in an unsteady breath and Dean, teeth gritted, bowed his head.
They stood like that for several seconds, Sam slumped back against the wall, Dean pinning him, and the gun, the gun shaking in his hand. But close enough that it wouldn’t make a difference. A shot from that range wouldn’t miss no matter how unsteady Dean’s grip was. Not with the muzzle leaving an imprint on Sam’s skin.
Dean finally picked his head up, and Sam felt his gut take a plunge at the glassiness of his brother’s eyes.
“Wasn’t supposed to be like this, Sam.”
Sam’s reply was soft. “I know.”
And it wasn’t. Christmas, their first chance to get away from it all in years—and here they were. And right then Sam just wanted out. He wanted a plastic carton of spiked eggnog, a Trans-Siberian Orchestra song blasting on the car speakers, and miles of open road beneath the wheels. He wanted to be anywhere but here. He wanted everything he couldn’t have, knowing it never should have come down to this.
Dean’s arm went slack against Sam’s throat. His hand moved to the side of Sam’s neck, holding him in place.
The report of a single gunshot echoed through the lonely street as the clock struck midnight on Christmas Day.