Fic: The Exponent of Breath
Title: The Exponent of Breath
Author: Britomart_is
Rating: PG
Characters: Sam and Dean, gen.
Words: 1400
Notes: This is procrastination!fic, because I'm supposed to be writing something else.
Summary: Coda to 4x22. No spoilers for season 5 (to the best of my knowledge.)
XXXVII
LOVE is anterior to life,
Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and
The exponent of breath.
--Emily Dickinson
There's no heat, which surprises Dean. Maybe they just can't feel it. He remembers the myth-supposed to be comforting or some shit-that if you burn to death, you don't even feel the pain once it burns through your nerve endings. Yeah, not so much. In forty years of hell, Dean burned to death a time or two. You feel it. So there's no heat. Just light, the Morning Star gone supernova.
Since Dean's been throwing himself headlong into life-threatening situations since before he deflowered his first preacher's daughter, he's had some time to think about how he'd like to go out. There are the answers he'd give out loud-the heroic blaze of glory, the heart attack while sandwiched between Playboy bunnies-and then there's the only thing that, in the quiet of his own mind, has ever really mattered-not alone. It's just basic fucking comfort, all right? Dean knows he's going to die, but there's a big warm living equally-terrified presence next to him, someone who probably even gives a shit that Dean's about to kick it. Probably. Maybe.
Actually, Dean has no idea who's standing next to him. Sam's fingers are curled into Dean's jacket, but a coma patient can do that, an infant can do that. Reflex. Doesn't mean Sammy's in there anymore. Dean knows that he's failed Sam, he just doesn't know in which way-having too much faith in him or too little.
Maybe it's better that Dean won't know for sure, before he dies. Like an old man converting in his last, terrified days, Dean can just choose to believe. That he's there with his Sammy.
The cold light goes brighter, brighter, fills up the whole room, must be filling up the whole world, and then there's noise and Dean's glad he's going to be dead and not using his eardrums because he's pretty sure it does some kind of permanent damage. The floor begins to move beneath his feet and Dean has the briefest of moments to realize how not okay he is with not getting to be alive anymore, because being alive is cool, and then it's over.
Dean wakes up. This is a surprise, but he takes it in stride. He quickly grows preoccupied when he realizes that he can't fucking breathe and that not getting killed by Exploding Satan only to be killed by slow asphyxiation is really deeply unfair. Dean pushes all the movement he can out of his body, tests its boundaries, tries to flail at whatever is suffocating him and finds that he can't move his arms. Or his … anything. Dean comes to the unhappy conclusion that there is a fallen-down church on top of him. Squinting produces darkness and dancing spots of light, listening reveals only the ringing in his ears, and all Dean can do is cough, then cough harder. Then the world around him moves and Dean can breathe again, but there's a shaking, and really, an earthquake is the last thing Dean needs.
Something is dripping on Dean.
He cracks his eyes open again and the spots have cleared enough for him to see his brother's face inches away from his own. Dean blinks.
"Sm'thing's dripping on me."
Sam makes an uncomfortable grimace, like when he's accidentally threatened to shoot the wrong person, or he's trying to hit on a girl.
Dripping. Dean follows the warm drip-drip-drop up to its source, which turns out to be Sam. Sam is bleeding on Dean.
Sam is bleeding.
Turns out that bothers Dean just as much as it always has. He snaps out of his stupor. "Shit."
Sam laughs, strained. "Think that covers it."
Dean quickly reevaluates and finds that the earthquake is Sam, shaking. Sam, ginormous Sam, weight no longer crushing Dean, shaking from the effort of holding himself up off of Dean's chest, awkwardly braced in the cramped space they occupy beneath the rubble. "Shit."
Sam drips on Dean again.
"How bad is it?"
Sam doesn't laugh this time. "Lucifer risen, end of the world, extinction of the human race." Sam's pretty wordy for a dripping shaking guy.
"You're bleeding, numbnuts. How bad is it?"
Sam's slightly out-of-focus, too close for Dean to see him clearly, but that's unmistakably his incredulous face. "Lucifer risen, end of the world, extinction of the human race."
Best to ignore Sam when he gets like this. "You hit your head?"
Sam drips twice in the pause before he speaks. "Yeah. You?"
"Some heavy asshole fell on me." Dean is keenly aware of how hard Sam is shaking, and he's never been so glad that his brother grew up into a muscle-y freak. "So just how many pushups can you do?"
As if on cue, Sam's arms give, just for a moment, enough to thoroughly knock the wind out of Dean. Dean wheezes embarrassingly as Sam pushes back up again, barely an inch of clearance between them in this little pocket of space.
"I can hold it," Sam says, but he's panting.
"Forever?" If Sam weren't right up in Dean's face, he'd be able to see the single eyebrow arched in skepticism. When Dean was fourteen, he spent a whole summer practicing to be able to raise one eyebrow. It's a useful skill.
"Till help comes. Ruby'll-" Even up close and blurry, Dean sees the moment Sam remembers.
Dean could say something there, but he doesn't. "Bobby'll dig us out. He'll come."
"Fast?"
"I have an idea." Sam falls again. Dean coughs until he wearily pushes back up. "I have an idea. Lean left."
"There is no left, Dean, we're buried-"
"You lean left, and then I'll lean left-"
"My left?"
"No, moron-" Dean tries shifting to show him, and ow ow fucking ow something is very wrong with his leg but he will deal with it when Bobby digs them out of here. He edges, barely perceptibly, onto his side. "Get it?"
Plaster dust and bits of stone rain down as they awkwardly rearrange themselves, but when it's over, Sam isn't crushing Dean's chest or holding himself up anymore; he's half on his side, half awkwardly draped over Dean.
There's just one problem. Dean still can't breathe. He listens to Sam wheeze, and makes that two problems. Neither of them can breathe, and the shifting rubble seems to have closed in even further. They're pressed too close together, too tightly to survive. Dean is oddly grateful for a lifetime of crawling into skin-crawlingly horrifying claustrophobic spaces.
"Breathe," Sam wheezes.
"Doin' my best here," Dean gasps.
"No," Sam says. "On three. One, two-"
On three, suddenly Dean can breathe-his ribcage expands fully and it's awesome, a gulp of air that clears his fuzzy senses. When he breathes back out, he feels Sam's chest press against him and suddenly he gets it-he lets all the air out, lets his own body go flat and breathless as Sam takes in a gulped breath of his own.
"Breathe," Sam whispers, and Dean does. They count quietly, patiently, concentrating on keeping the rhythm.
"Breathe."
"Breathe."
"Breathe."
Before long they can coordinate silently-like the body breathing for itself, an autonomic function. Keeping each other alive.
Sam's body pushes against Dean, then falls back, making room. Not an inch to spare between them. Dean feels Sam's heart thumping unapologetically against his chest, and Dean could almost believe that it's pumping blood through Dean's body too, now.
Sam is bleeding and Dean is broken and a church fell on them and outside the world is ending and Dean really has no idea if Bobby will find them, if anyone will dig them out before one of them loses consciousness and they both suffocate. But Dean knows one thing. This is his brother, no doubt about it. Dean's been freshly reminded how much he would really really prefer to be alive instead of dead, and he doesn't know if he's going to get that, but he's not alone. He's pretty sure no person on the brink of death has ever been less alone, and that includes the Playboy bunny scenario.
Dean curves into his brother, rests his forehead against Sam's. They're both clammy. Filthy. Dean breathes, and it's because of Sam. Holds his breath, and it's for Sam. Back. And forth. Breathe. And breathe.
And that's how life goes on.
Author: Britomart_is
Rating: PG
Characters: Sam and Dean, gen.
Words: 1400
Notes: This is procrastination!fic, because I'm supposed to be writing something else.
Summary: Coda to 4x22. No spoilers for season 5 (to the best of my knowledge.)
XXXVII
LOVE is anterior to life,
Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and
The exponent of breath.
--Emily Dickinson
There's no heat, which surprises Dean. Maybe they just can't feel it. He remembers the myth-supposed to be comforting or some shit-that if you burn to death, you don't even feel the pain once it burns through your nerve endings. Yeah, not so much. In forty years of hell, Dean burned to death a time or two. You feel it. So there's no heat. Just light, the Morning Star gone supernova.
Since Dean's been throwing himself headlong into life-threatening situations since before he deflowered his first preacher's daughter, he's had some time to think about how he'd like to go out. There are the answers he'd give out loud-the heroic blaze of glory, the heart attack while sandwiched between Playboy bunnies-and then there's the only thing that, in the quiet of his own mind, has ever really mattered-not alone. It's just basic fucking comfort, all right? Dean knows he's going to die, but there's a big warm living equally-terrified presence next to him, someone who probably even gives a shit that Dean's about to kick it. Probably. Maybe.
Actually, Dean has no idea who's standing next to him. Sam's fingers are curled into Dean's jacket, but a coma patient can do that, an infant can do that. Reflex. Doesn't mean Sammy's in there anymore. Dean knows that he's failed Sam, he just doesn't know in which way-having too much faith in him or too little.
Maybe it's better that Dean won't know for sure, before he dies. Like an old man converting in his last, terrified days, Dean can just choose to believe. That he's there with his Sammy.
The cold light goes brighter, brighter, fills up the whole room, must be filling up the whole world, and then there's noise and Dean's glad he's going to be dead and not using his eardrums because he's pretty sure it does some kind of permanent damage. The floor begins to move beneath his feet and Dean has the briefest of moments to realize how not okay he is with not getting to be alive anymore, because being alive is cool, and then it's over.
Dean wakes up. This is a surprise, but he takes it in stride. He quickly grows preoccupied when he realizes that he can't fucking breathe and that not getting killed by Exploding Satan only to be killed by slow asphyxiation is really deeply unfair. Dean pushes all the movement he can out of his body, tests its boundaries, tries to flail at whatever is suffocating him and finds that he can't move his arms. Or his … anything. Dean comes to the unhappy conclusion that there is a fallen-down church on top of him. Squinting produces darkness and dancing spots of light, listening reveals only the ringing in his ears, and all Dean can do is cough, then cough harder. Then the world around him moves and Dean can breathe again, but there's a shaking, and really, an earthquake is the last thing Dean needs.
Something is dripping on Dean.
He cracks his eyes open again and the spots have cleared enough for him to see his brother's face inches away from his own. Dean blinks.
"Sm'thing's dripping on me."
Sam makes an uncomfortable grimace, like when he's accidentally threatened to shoot the wrong person, or he's trying to hit on a girl.
Dripping. Dean follows the warm drip-drip-drop up to its source, which turns out to be Sam. Sam is bleeding on Dean.
Sam is bleeding.
Turns out that bothers Dean just as much as it always has. He snaps out of his stupor. "Shit."
Sam laughs, strained. "Think that covers it."
Dean quickly reevaluates and finds that the earthquake is Sam, shaking. Sam, ginormous Sam, weight no longer crushing Dean, shaking from the effort of holding himself up off of Dean's chest, awkwardly braced in the cramped space they occupy beneath the rubble. "Shit."
Sam drips on Dean again.
"How bad is it?"
Sam doesn't laugh this time. "Lucifer risen, end of the world, extinction of the human race." Sam's pretty wordy for a dripping shaking guy.
"You're bleeding, numbnuts. How bad is it?"
Sam's slightly out-of-focus, too close for Dean to see him clearly, but that's unmistakably his incredulous face. "Lucifer risen, end of the world, extinction of the human race."
Best to ignore Sam when he gets like this. "You hit your head?"
Sam drips twice in the pause before he speaks. "Yeah. You?"
"Some heavy asshole fell on me." Dean is keenly aware of how hard Sam is shaking, and he's never been so glad that his brother grew up into a muscle-y freak. "So just how many pushups can you do?"
As if on cue, Sam's arms give, just for a moment, enough to thoroughly knock the wind out of Dean. Dean wheezes embarrassingly as Sam pushes back up again, barely an inch of clearance between them in this little pocket of space.
"I can hold it," Sam says, but he's panting.
"Forever?" If Sam weren't right up in Dean's face, he'd be able to see the single eyebrow arched in skepticism. When Dean was fourteen, he spent a whole summer practicing to be able to raise one eyebrow. It's a useful skill.
"Till help comes. Ruby'll-" Even up close and blurry, Dean sees the moment Sam remembers.
Dean could say something there, but he doesn't. "Bobby'll dig us out. He'll come."
"Fast?"
"I have an idea." Sam falls again. Dean coughs until he wearily pushes back up. "I have an idea. Lean left."
"There is no left, Dean, we're buried-"
"You lean left, and then I'll lean left-"
"My left?"
"No, moron-" Dean tries shifting to show him, and ow ow fucking ow something is very wrong with his leg but he will deal with it when Bobby digs them out of here. He edges, barely perceptibly, onto his side. "Get it?"
Plaster dust and bits of stone rain down as they awkwardly rearrange themselves, but when it's over, Sam isn't crushing Dean's chest or holding himself up anymore; he's half on his side, half awkwardly draped over Dean.
There's just one problem. Dean still can't breathe. He listens to Sam wheeze, and makes that two problems. Neither of them can breathe, and the shifting rubble seems to have closed in even further. They're pressed too close together, too tightly to survive. Dean is oddly grateful for a lifetime of crawling into skin-crawlingly horrifying claustrophobic spaces.
"Breathe," Sam wheezes.
"Doin' my best here," Dean gasps.
"No," Sam says. "On three. One, two-"
On three, suddenly Dean can breathe-his ribcage expands fully and it's awesome, a gulp of air that clears his fuzzy senses. When he breathes back out, he feels Sam's chest press against him and suddenly he gets it-he lets all the air out, lets his own body go flat and breathless as Sam takes in a gulped breath of his own.
"Breathe," Sam whispers, and Dean does. They count quietly, patiently, concentrating on keeping the rhythm.
"Breathe."
"Breathe."
"Breathe."
Before long they can coordinate silently-like the body breathing for itself, an autonomic function. Keeping each other alive.
Sam's body pushes against Dean, then falls back, making room. Not an inch to spare between them. Dean feels Sam's heart thumping unapologetically against his chest, and Dean could almost believe that it's pumping blood through Dean's body too, now.
Sam is bleeding and Dean is broken and a church fell on them and outside the world is ending and Dean really has no idea if Bobby will find them, if anyone will dig them out before one of them loses consciousness and they both suffocate. But Dean knows one thing. This is his brother, no doubt about it. Dean's been freshly reminded how much he would really really prefer to be alive instead of dead, and he doesn't know if he's going to get that, but he's not alone. He's pretty sure no person on the brink of death has ever been less alone, and that includes the Playboy bunny scenario.
Dean curves into his brother, rests his forehead against Sam's. They're both clammy. Filthy. Dean breathes, and it's because of Sam. Holds his breath, and it's for Sam. Back. And forth. Breathe. And breathe.
And that's how life goes on.