Chapter Text
It’s dark and the wind is howling like a caged animal, clawing at his skin and tossing grit and sand into Dean’s eyes. He doesn’t notice or care. How can he, when the only thing he has left to live for is bleeding out in his arms?
“Sammy?” Dean shouts, but Sam doesn’t respond. Bobby’s run off after the bastard that did this, and Dean’s all alone with his dying brother. “Hey, I’m gonna fix you up, okay? Because that’s my job. Take care of my pain-in-the-ass little brother. Sam? Sammy!”
Sam doesn’t respond, and Dean knows.
“No!” he cries, and clutches the limp body closer.
XXXXX
The road is hard beneath his feet, and he can feel dust clinging to his slightly damp face. He finishes scraping dirt over the cold metal box and waits, staring angrily at the four roads that stretch from where he’s standing. The wind howls and the rickety windmill behind him turns lazily, rusty metal squeaking and protesting.
Dean blinks and there’s a woman standing in front of him. She’s gorgeous and smirking at him in a way that he usually wouldn’t complain about, and when she speaks her voice is melodious. “Dean Winchester. Wasn’t expecting you.”
“Bring him back,” Dean spits out.
The demon laughs, tossing her dark curls behind her head. “It’s not that easy, sweetie. Why should we give up a Winchester?”
“Because you can have the other one,” Dean growls. “My soul, and I get Sam back. You come for me in ten years and I go quietly, and he gets to live his life.”
“Nice thought, but no deal,” the demon purrs. Dean tightens his hand on the knife in his pocket, struggling to refrain from stabbing this thing right in its heart. She grins at him, as if sensing his fury. “Like I said, we have the Sam Winchester downstairs right now. Why should we give that up?”
“Five years,” Dean says in desperation.
The demon’s eyes widen for a split second, as if she’s impressed. She quickly schools her expression into one of cool boredom. “Sorry, but still no.”
“Just give me a year,” Dean pleads, shaking his head. he can feel more tears welling, and if he doesn’t do something soon he’s going to cry in front of a crossroads demon. “One year, and you can have my soul.”
The demon bites her bottom lip, hands folded in front of her stomach like a proper businesswoman. She shakes out her curls and settles her gaze on Dean, intent as a prowling lioness. She sighs heavily, giving in. “Fine,” she says. “One year, and then you’re dead. And if you try to get out of the deal at all, you’re both dead. Understood?”
Dean nods rapidly, and the demon takes a step forward. She bats her eyes at him, and he grimaces. This won’t be particularly pleasant.
The kiss is a quick one, made up of cool business on the demon’s end and Dean trying to pretend he’s doing anything but this. When it’s over, the demon steps out of his personal space as if she’s just as disgusted as he is. She coughs delicately, and smirks at him. The wind gusts, and she’s gone.
XXXXX
Sam is confused, but Dean manages to brush off his questions, telling him that Bobby fixed him up. Bobby knows, of course, but that’s a bridge Dean can burn later. For now, all that matters is that he’s got his brother back, and he’s got a whole year to live in. so long as Sam never finds out, everything will be fine.
But because the universe must hate Dean with every fiber of its being, Sam finds out almost immediately. They’re in the car, driving down a highway in Minnesota two days later, when Sam just blurts it out. “You sold your soul for me, didn’t you?”
Dean doesn’t answer.
This is enough for Sam.
“Dean!” Sam shouts, and Dean shakes his head. “Dean, you didn’t!”
“I had to, Sammy,” Dean murmurs, trying to keep his voice from breaking. “You were dead. What was I supposed to do?”
“Not that!” Sam exclaims. His voice is getting deeper like it always does when he’s yelling. Dean shakes his head again, trying to get Sam off the topic. If he can change the subject, he can prolong the argument until he’s drunk enough to handle it without breaking.
“I had to,” Dean repeats.
“How long do you have?” Sam asks, his voice quiet and soft with worry, whole body shaking slightly. Dean exhales, feeling his throat close up. He knows the tears care coming, but that doesn’t mean he has to be happy with it.
“A year.”
Sam practically explodes, in both fury and worry, and he doesn’t relax until Dean starts crying. And then they’re both crying, and Dean has to pull over to the side of the road or he’ll wreck the car, and they can’t make complete sentences because Sam was dead, and Dean’s next, and what are they both going to do now?
Neither of them knows.
XXXXX
Dean doesn’t try to get out of the deal. Sam does, and Dean knows it, but he never lets on that he knows. If he were to make it obvious that he realizes what Sam’s doing, the demons would kill them both. The deal said that Dean couldn’t weasel his way out of it; the crossroads demon never said anything about Sam.
They don’t talk about it, either. Dean knows Sam wants to, but every time the conversation starts, Dean shuts it down as quickly as he can. If he were to start talking about the deal, and their future, he might curl up in a ball and quit living. Why go on, after all, when you’ve only got a year to do it in?
It’s six months after he made the deal that things go horrifically wrong. They’re taking out a ghost in a house in Maryland, just a routine salt-and-burn job, one that doesn’t even require more than a weekend stay at the local cheap motel. It’s the second night of the hunt, and they’ve already broken into the house, lit up the body, and are on their way back to the car when it happens.
The body was “buried” in the upstairs bedroom, hidden beneath the floorboards, right under the only window in the room. A curtain goes up in flames in an instant, and then the antique wallpaper is catching too, and then the whole room is a spiraling wall of pure light and heat, encroaching from all sides, singing the hair on the boys’ arms and filling their lungs with smoke.
Dean grabs Sam’s arm, pulling him to the door. If they can get out of the room before the rest of the house catches, they can be out of town by the time the fire department responds. But the walls were thin, and flames are licking the hallway. Dean curses and takes a deep breath. If they run, they can make it.
“Come on! We can make it if we run for it!” he shouts over the roar of the flames. Sam nods, and then he’s off, sprinting down the hallway in a way that makes Dean wonder if he was on the track team at Stanford. When he reaches the end of the hallway, he turns back, waving a hand for Dean to follow.
Dean coughs into his sleeve and runs. He can feel the sweltering heat of the fire, the smoke in his lungs, the burn of it in his eyes. Everything is red and furious, bright and hellishly lit. The flames are growing, reaching closer to him, gently licking his back and legs. He squeezes his eyes shut, praying feverishly even though he doesn’t believe, hoping for a miracle. “Hurry!” Sam screams, and Dean knows he can’t make it.
He slips on the melted remains of something made of wax, and falls to the burning floor. He catches himself on his elbows, stomach hitting the ground, the air knocked from his lungs. Everything swims before his eyes, and he can barely make out Sam coming toward him through the thick smoke.
“Dean!” Sam shouts, bending down to help him up.
Right as the wall caves in.
XXXXX
Dean wakes up in a hospital, with a tube in his nose, alone. He immediately rips the tube things away from his face and sits up, coughing. His whole body aches. Both his left arm and his left leg are covered in plaster, and his other arm is in a sling. His chest aches and his lungs burn when he tried to breathe.
“Hello?” he calls. “Sam?”
The door opens and a short nurse bustles in, playing with the rubber gloves on his hands. He flashes Dean a bright grin, picking up the chart from the foot of the bed and reading over it. Dean frowns at him, waiting to be told exactly what the hell is going on.
“Good morning,” the nurse says, overly cheery.
“Where am I?” Dean demands gruffly, voice breaking from smoke inhalation. “What happened?”
“You’re at Justice Memorial Hospital, in South Justice. You were in a house fire, and the wall collapsed on top of you. The firemen pulled you out and brought you here. I have to say, we didn’t think you’d make it,” the nurse explains. He pulls out a syringe from a pocket somewhere in his white coat and empties it into the IV bag connected to Dean’s arm.
“Where’s my brother?” Dean asks, feeling a sick twinge of worry in his chest.
The nurse looks down and purses his lips. “I’m not sure. I’ll have to get someone who would know,” he murmurs, and then he leaves.
Dean wants to hit something, but he doesn’t get the chance. Whatever the nurse put into his drip must have been a sedative.
XXXXX
Dean wakes up again a while later. It’s dark outside, with cold moonlight filtering in through the blinds on the small window. There’s a tall woman in his room this time, perusing his chart with hawklike eyes, frowning deeply.
“Who are you?” he croaks.
“Your doctor,” she says without looking up. “I’m Maria, but you’re technically supposed to call me Dr. Green.”
Dean coughs, wincing as pain rockets through his ribcage. “What happened to me?”
“You were in a house fire, but I presume Darren already told you that. He’s the nurse that drugged you this morning. Anyway, you were pulled out by EMTs along with another man, and both of you were brought here. You have a broken femur, a shattered clavicle, and three broken ribs. Add in a concussion and serious smoke inhalation, I’m honestly amazed you’re awake right now.”
“Where’s my brother?” Dean asks, trying to keep his eyes open long enough to get an answer. His head feels fuzzy and everything aches. He’ll be lucky if he can stay awake long enough to check himself and Sam out of this hospital and call Bobby to take them back to Sioux Falls.
“Was he the man with you?” Dr. Green—Maria?—asks softly. Dean nods, his hair rustling against the uniform white fabric of the hospital-issue pillowcase. Dr. Maria turns to face him, hey eyes immeasurably sad, biting her bottom lip.
Dean feels his face go numb. He stops breathing, and the monitor attached to his pulse skips a few beats before picking up again at an alarming rate. He thinks he might be about to start hyperventilating. “No. Not again.”
“He was pronounced dead on arrival by the EMTs, and they brought his body back here. When you’re able, we’ll need you to identify him,” she murmurs, and Dean wants to curl up in a small, dark hole and drown in his own pain.
His mind shuts off, refusing to accept it. Sam has always been the one thing that was set in stone in his life, the one constant that never changed, more so than his father or even the Impala. How can he live when Sam is gone? He didn’t make it more than a few hours last time. There’s no way he can survive.
“I’m sorry,” Dr. Maria murmurs. “I’m going to need to sedate you now.”
Dean is knocked out again within minutes.
XXXXX
Bobby comes to pick him up the next morning, and identifies Sam’s body while he’s there. Dean is wheeled out of the hospital, still heavily sedated, and into the passenger seat of Bobby’s rusty old pickup. Bobby gives instructions to the morticians to salt and burn the bones, explaining it as some sort of religious practice.
The drive to South Dakota passes in silence, Dean still too exhausted from the many painkillers to do much more than hum occasionally. Bobby turns on the radio, and they listen to classic rock songs all the way home.
When they pull up to Singer Salvage, Bobby helps Dean inside and sits him down on the couch. Dean is asleep in seconds, exhausted from the trip and medication and the grief. Bobby goes into the kitchen and opens up the alcohol cabinet.
XXXXX
The first week Post-Sam goes by quietly, with few hiccups. Dean takes his meds and keeps still, and Bobby occupies his time doing research for other hunters and making food once in a while. Neither man mentions what they’ve lost.
XXXXX
The second week is much the same, but Dean talks more this time. He wonders out loud if the demons are still going to come and collect on his soul, now that they’ve got Sam back. He tries to walk a short distance on his own, and actually makes it from the couch to the kitchen, where he collapses into a chair and promptly falls asleep. He takes his medication and complains frequently that they’re making him useless.
XXXXX
Week three Post-Sam is the hardest. It finally hits Dean just how much he’s lost, exactly what’s gone. He breaks down more than once, silent sobs in the night, trying as hard as he can not to wake Bobby. He doesn’t say much, and completely stops talking for a few days. How can he survive, he wonders, now that everything he loves is gone? His mom died long ago, his dad has been gone for over a year, and now Sam. The Impala is still parked outside the hospital in South Justice. All that he has left is Bobby.
XXXXX
In the fourth week PS, Bobby gets another hunter to drive the Impala up to Singer Salvage. Dean sits in it for hours on end, in the passenger seat, trying to smell Sam on the leather. He can barely make out a hint of Sam’s girly shampoo, and if he closes his eyes, he can almost hear him, whispering in his ear. He knows it isn’t actually Sam, but it helps.
XXXXX
Dean lives at Bobby’s house for a month after the accident before he finally gets up the energy to saw his casts off. He takes about three hours to get the one on his arm off, but after that it’s fairly simple to get the leg cast off. He hasn’t worn the sling in weeks, and stopped taking the medication last week.
Hopefully, he’ll be allowed to go back out hunting soon. After all, he only has about five months to live now, maybe slightly less. He needs to do as much as he can, take down as many sons of bitches as possible before they send the hellhounds for him.
One morning at breakfast, about one month PS, he asks Bobby. “How long do you think it’ll be before I can get back to work?”
“Work?” Bobby scoffs.
“Saving people, hunting things,” Dean clarifies, waving his fork in the air. “The family business.”
Bobby sighs heavily and turns around to face him, leaning back on the counter. He points the greasy spatula at Dean with narrowed eyes. “I suppose you could go out now, so long as you promise you won’t get killed.”
Dean tries to smile, but he can’t quite make it. Bobby nods in understanding and goes back to his sausage, turning them over in the pan with a focus that is usually only seen in those who are trying desperately to avoid feeling.
“I’m going to look for a hunt,” Dean announces loudly, as if trying to chase the tension and grief away. “Got anything good?”
Bobby clears his throat. “There’s a triple haunting up in Des Moines, if you’re up to it,” he offers.
Dean packs his bag and is gone in three days.
XXXXX
And so he passes the months saving people and hunting things, taking as many sons of bitches out with him as possible, returning to Bobby’s house at the end of each hunt for food and company. The days pass in monotony—wake up, go to work, come back and wash the blood off, check out, and drive home to Bobby’s. He keeps things simple as he can, not wanting to get killed too early. Sam wouldn’t have wanted it that way, no matter how bad Dean might.
The jobs pass in a blur, one ghost to the next, ghoul to vampire to werewolf, with barely any pause for breath in between. He comes back to singer Salvage to eat, sleep for a night, and get another job, and then he’s gone again, off to Maine or Oregon, driving away in his long black car that feels too empty without someone singing off-key in the passenger seat.
When he has two months left, Dean stops hunting and spends time with Bobby. Bobby is the only family he has, and he knows that it’s mutual. He cooks breakfast sometimes, grills burgers in the evenings, does research and helps passing hunters bury bodies in the backyard. He catalogues books, indexes whole tomes of archaic Latin, keeps himself busy doing the kind of work that doesn’t require a knife. In a way, it’s nice to have a bed at night that’s probably never had a hooker in it, and food that isn’t usually weeks past the expiration date. But the gaping hole in his chest is still there, festering and pounding, never-ending.
Dean starts to get headaches when he has a week, horrible migraines that stick around for hours at a time and don’t go away until he drowns them in whiskey. Bobby says that it’s because he’s on the brink of death. The thought is somehow comforting.
When he has a day left, he starts to hallucinate. He sees horrible things everywhere. There’s a dead woman in the hallway, bleeding and broken and just lying there, weeping softly. She never moves or says anything, so he doesn’t mention her to Bobby. He knows that hallucinations are just part of the process. He’s almost gone now.
The clock strikes twelve, and Dean can hear growling. He and Bobby are on the couch, watching some infomercial about jewelry, eyes glued to the clock. He swallows hard and turns to Bobby.
“You were the only father I ever had,” Dean whispers, hoping Bobby can hear.
And the hound pounces.