News of my Death
Title: News of my Death
Rating: PG13
Characters: Dean, 2014!Dean.
Wordcount: about 3,700 words
Warnings: Language, violence, character!death [Spoiler (click to open)]Sam died as Lucifer's vessel; 2014!Dean dies, present!Dean survives.
A/N: Written for spn_reversebang. Thanks to my beta wave_obscura, and to my artist, dollarformyname, who was a pleasure to work with and that you should go and congratulate for her excellent art! I'm very happy as it is the first time an artist makes icons for a story of mine. :D
Summary: The End!AU. Lucifer is dead, and the world seems to be on the brink of total destruction. Meanwhile, Dean is looking for himself.
Link to the art: here
Link to the fic on AO3: here
When could it be said that the world had actually ended? In Dean’s now extensive experience, it appeared that the world had taken its sweet time to reach that point.
Howls from a horde of Croats reached his ears, so Dean plunged to his elbows and knees and crawled into the tight space between a car and the section of wall that had fallen onto it. The key to survival, he’d learned, was to keep very still and be silent as a corpse. The Croats had an eye for movement and damn good ears, but small favors and all, their noses were nothing special. Dean could smell himself, mud, blood and rancid sweat - he hadn’t showered since he’d barged into 2014, a few days ago. He hadn’t seen a living, non virus-crazy soul since his future counterpart had knocked him out and gone on his merry way kill to Lucifer. No Cas, no Risa, or any of the others. No himself. And no Sam, with or without Lucifer along for the ride.
A rushed stomping of feet made Dean hold his breath, a hand in front of his mouth so nothing - not a whimper, not a pant - could escape. He felt cold and wet, and the ground smelled like gasoline. His heart pounded so loudly that he worried they could hear it. He tried to will it to slow down. Breathe in. Thump. Breathe out. Thump. Breathe in - thumpthumpthump. The sound of footsteps faded away, just as Dean was starting to feel dizzy, and he let out an explosive breath. He waited a few moments longer before he crawled out of his hiding place.
“Damn it,” he mumbled, picking debris from the palms of his hands.
He sat on his heels, knees cracking, and took a moment to find the strength to get back on his feet and resume his search. The wind brought him the smell of burning, and he looked up to see dark smoke billow and flames licking up the sky.
“Fucking pyromaniacs,” he said.
It was the third fire he’d seen the Croats start. He didn’t know why, but the freaks had been working themselves up into an unbridled, destructive frenzy - more so than before - for two days now.
Okay, he had an idea why - something had happened, they could feel it, and there was, well, only one thing that could be major enough. One big event that could make or unmake a world that was already worn out.
In the meantime, Dean was looking for himself. There would be the answers to his questions.
Where would I go if I had killed my little brother?
He heaved a sigh and hauled himself up. Every joint hurt, his feet were screaming at him, and his stomach was one giant knot trying to disappear into the hole inside him. It was becoming hard to find a store that hadn’t already been looted or destroyed beyond salvaging.
Stumbling down the street, he almost tripped himself over the leg of a mannequin, lying there across his way like someone had placed it on purpose. Dean looked at it dumbly for a moment.
Where would I go?
He looked at the sky once more, at the glow painting the clouds with violent orange. He started walking again, heading for it.
He walked for a while, oblivious to his pain and fatigue now that he knew where he was going. He turned around the corner of one street and took everything in quickly - the street was empty, no Croats in sight, the fire roared and crackled and Dean could feel the heat of it on his face, even though he was about a hundred yards away. It was a big structure, probably some kind of official building. He walked toward it, until he caught movement out of the corner of his eye - someone was standing in the shadow of a hole in the wall across from the burning building.
“I know you’re there,” he said.
He saw Dean walk out slowly, stepping over some rubble, then stop at the sight of him and raise his gun - the long barrel betrayed it as the Colt.
“You don’t have any bullets left,” Dean said. It was a guess, but one he was pretty sure of.
The other Dean let his arm drop. He looked as dirty and exhausted as Dean was. He had a wound that went from the corner of his right eye to his cheekbone, but seemed otherwise unscathed.
“You found me,” he said.
“I’m you. I know how you think. I knew you’d want to see it- ” Dean waved at the building on fire; there was a loud crashing noise as part of it crumbled. “You’d want to see the destruction. Are you looking to get killed by those things?”
He felt anger bubbling inside him and it was strange - he didn’t know exactly who he was angry at - himself or himself? Or was it at the whole fucking universe and its sick sense of humor?
“Fuck you,” Dean said, sliding the Colt inside his jacket. “You don’t know anything.”
“I know you did it,” Dean bit back. They were still standing a few yards from each other and it felt like the air between them was sizzling - could just have been from the fire, though. “You killed him, and it didn’t change a fucking thing. It even seems like it’s taken a turn for the worse. How is that for saving the world?”
“I hate-”
-you, Dean probably almost said, but the word never came - something, nothing more than a human-shaped shadow from what Dean could see, crashed into the other Dean from behind and the two rolled on the ground in a flurry of limbs. It looked like a teenager, short and scrawny, with a mop of unkempt dark hair; it shrieked and fought with wide, wild movements. Dean saw something glint in its hand - a knife, a piece of broken glass - and it spurred him into motion.
“Hey you,” he snarled and when the Croat’s head turned, drawn to the sound of his voice, Dean kicked him in the face. He heard bone crack and the thing was shoved away from Dean, falling on its back.
Dean looked around for a weapon, anything. The Croat jumped to his feet, screeching, launched himself at Dean, who braced himself for it; the shock of them meeting the ground expelled all air from Dean’s lungs, but he immediately started fumbling with his right hand for something that would hurt while holding back the Croat’s armed hand with his left. He heard the other Dean cough and moan, and at the same moment his fingers closed around a stone. The Croat’s knife - a long hunting knife, whose blade was stained with brown spots - was getting closer to Dean’s forehead, and Dean had a good view of the thing’s - the boy’s - wide, bloodshot, crazy eyes. He hit its head as fast and hard as he could. The Croat slumped down on him.
Dean lay there breathlessly for a moment, then pushed the Croat off him. He rose to his knees and looked at the body - the Croat had a young, pale face, with blood matting his hair and running down his forehead. It - he, whatever - was still breathing.
“Kill it,” the other Dean croaked.
Dean turned around and saw his counterpart struggle to push himself up on his elbows. The front of his jacket was dark with blood.
“Kill it,” Dean repeated. “There’s nothing you can do for him.”
Dean didn’t think it would be wise to point out the pronoun slip-up. He swallowed, tightened his grip on the stone, and brought it down again and again until his makeshift weapon was slick with blood. Then he threw it in disgust and turned away, thinking for a moment that he was going to be sick.
“For fuck’s sake,” the other Dean said. He was on his knees, but seemed to have trouble making it on his feet, tilting to the right like he was about to fall over.
Dean wiped his hands on his jeans, and went to help him, wrapping an arm around his waist and hauling the man up. Dude was fucking heavy, leaning against him with most of his weight and breathing harshly.
“You okay?” Dean asked.
“What do you think?” Dean said.
That was when the howling resounded in the air. It sounded like it came from all around them, loud cries echoing and responding to each other, like a pack of wolves. Dean looked frantically around, then up; they could come from absolutely anywhere.
“Shit,” he said. “Can you run?”
“Does it look like we have a choice here?”
“Point.”
They began to run. Or rather, Dean tried to run while dragging Dean along like a bag of potatoes. They stumbled together several times, narrowly missing a hard fall, and all the while Dean was feeling a wet warmth spread against his right side, where the other Dean was gradually bleeding out. The howls were getting closer.
“Hey,” Dean said, panting heavily. “Leave me, leave me behind.”
Dean glanced sidelong at him - the man’s face was gray, his lips colorless. He obviously couldn’t go on like this any longer. He was a dead weight and he knew it. They knew it. It wouldn’t be like leaving a fellow hunter or a civilian behind, Dean told himself - it was just him, so it shouldn’t have mattered at all. Still, it felt wrong.
They turned round a corner, and there was a red brick building whose door was ajar - Dean made a split-second decision and rushed inside.
“What - ” the other Dean started.
“Shut up.”
It looked like it had been a restaurant - there were tables and chairs toppled over, broken glass and porcelain, a dirty red tablecloth bunched up on the floor. Two doors facing each other in a corner of the room; Dean left Dean propped up against a wall and went to check the first one - it lead to the kitchen, whose walls and stainless steel countertops were splattered with blood. The second door opened on a staircase.
“Okay, let’s move on,” Dean urged Dean, grabbing him roughly by the shoulders - the romp of feet and the cries from the Croats sounded just about to overwhelm them. “Up, up you go.”
Dean groaned, tried feebly to bat at his hands, but otherwise let himself be manhandled, limp as a rag doll. Dean had to positively carry him up the stairs, and the blood was now dripping steadily and leaving a trail of red spots behind them.
On the second floor they found a small apartment, probably the owners’ - kitchen, bathroom, mostly intact, and a larger room that must have been the bedroom but was empty, save for pieces of wood and rubble on the dirty floor. Dean dropped his burden, closed the door behind them. There was a lock on it and it seemed undamaged - although Dean had no illusion that it was enough to keep a horde of Croats out if they wanted to get in, he still locked the door.
He pressed himself against the wall by the window, keeping himself hidden but looking out. He couldn’t see anyone on the street, and the noises from the Croats had died away. They’d lost them, it seemed, but Dean couldn’t shake the distinct impression that the freaks had been after them, specifically. It meant that they’d be back.
“What now, genius?” Dean slurred; he was sitting against the wall on the other side of the window, and his head lolled to the side like it was too heavy to bear.
The fact that he was still conscious constituted a miracle in itself. Dean had to acknowledge what stubborn bastards they were, if nothing else.
“I don’t know,” he said. “You got any brilliant ideas to get us out of here? Do you have any weapons besides the Colt?”
“’Course. Thigh holster.”
“Then why did you point the Colt at me earlier?” Dean shook his head. “Never mind; doesn’t matter much now.”
He took Dean’s gun from his thigh holster. After a moment of hesitation, he decided to have a look at his wound. Dean hissed in pain when he peeled his blood-soaked shirt away from his stomach. The wound was still bleeding heavily so Dean couldn’t give it a proper examination, but it looked pretty deep. Dean torn some bands of his own shirt and bandaged Dean up as well as he could, which wasn’t much.
“Why d’you brought me here for?” Dean asked when he was finished, looking at him with half-lidded eyes. “You know I’m dyin’.”
“Didn’t sit well with me to leave you out there, that’s all.”
It was a very strange thing to be able to look and see himself die. For all that Dean had died before, it wasn’t anything comparable to what was happening now. It was a chilling, sobering experience, watching it; watching his eyes dull, his skin lose all color, his breathing become weak and shallow. Talk about walking on your own grave - Dean had to tear his eyes away after a moment.
“Can I ask you something?” he said, looking at the opposite wall; sunset was coloring it with orange-tinted shadows.
“You see me runnin’ away ‘nytime soon?”
“Smartass bastard. When you killed - was Sam…” He trailed off; he could feel Dean’s gaze on him, like cigarette burn. “Did it look like there was anything left of Sam in there?”
“No.” As firm an answer as Dean could manage.
“Okay. Just wondering.”
“Well, don’t.”
They didn’t talk for a long time after that. Dean kept an ear out for any alarming sounds, but the city was eerily silent. It didn’t do anything to calm his nerves, because it felt more like the calm before the storm. He sometimes glanced at Dean, who had his eyes closed and didn’t make a sound, maybe unconscious or maybe shutting Dean out - or maybe dead. Soon enough, it was dark, and he could barely see him.
He realized he had drifted off when he woke up with a start and a cry on his lips. It was a moonless night and there were no streetlights, so he couldn’t see a thing, like he had gone blind during his sleep. Although the rational part of his mind knew it was unlikely, it still made his heart beat too loud. Dean wasn’t afraid of the dark, couldn’t remember having ever been. He fumbled for his gun anyway, rested his fingers on it for comfort, and called out, “Dean, you alive?”
“Yeah,” came the barely audible response, then Dean heard the distinct sound of the man’s teeth chattering.
“You cold?” Dean asked.
“Wha’ d’you think? More blood,” a pause for more chatter, “out than in.”
Dean really should have thought of it. Dying was cold - except when you were heading for hellfire, and then you burned to the bone again and again, and once more for fun.
“Do you want- ” Dean cut himself off; it was himself he was talking to, he wouldn’t admit to wanting the warmth and comfort of another human being.
So Dean groped his way across the distance separating them, on all fours and with a hand stretched out in front of him. When he found Dean, he moved him cautiously away from the wall so he could spoon him from behind.
“What the fuck you doing?” Dean protested weakly.
“Keeping you warm, asshole.”
He wrapped his arms around Dean, who didn’t try to shove him off - probably couldn’t move at all.
“I’m dying,” Dean said.
“I know. Doesn’t mean I have to let you freeze your ass off.”
“No, I mean - again, goddamn it.”
Dean knew what he meant. He almost wished he would fall asleep again, because it would make having a dying man leaning against his chest less awkward, but he was wide awake now, and there was no helping the thoughts running through his mind. It had happened, it seemed, he had killed Sam, as prophesied by Sam himself in his darkest moments.
“When Sam died,” Dean said, startling him out of his thoughts, “there was a moment- he was lying on the ground with his white suit all bloodied-”
Dean paused, probably exhausted by the long sentence - his breathing was ragged, his chest heaving and his heart fluttering under Dean’s fingers, fighting to keep on living. Dean knew he should tell him to quit talking and save his strength for… whatever was going to happen, but he couldn’t.
“And what? What happened?”
“He looked at me, and it was Sam - it was Sam and he saw me and he knew exactly what’d happened. I wanted to tell him I was sorry but then he was dead.”
Dean closed his eyes - it didn’t make a lot of difference with the darkness, but his eyes burned and he wanted to keep it under control. He felt his breath hitch in spite of himself, and Dean felt it too because he said angrily, “You crying?”
“And why the fuck wouldn’t I be crying?” Dean replied, angry too now. “He was our brother, my brother, he was Sam and we-”
“-couldn’t save him.”
Dean realized he was digging his fingers into Dean’s arms - Dean, of course, hadn’t let out a sound of pain - and he made himself stop.
“Try to sleep,” he said, a bit harshly; they both knew that if Dean fell asleep, chances were that he wouldn’t wake up.
“You’re- pathetic.”
“Shut up. Try to sleep.”
He didn’t want to discuss whether he’d say yes to Michael with this living - dying - proof of his failures lying in his arms. What he wanted was Sam, to find his brother in their own time, in 2009, but it didn’t look like that was going to happen.
Sleep must have gotten to him once more, lulled as he was by the shallow heartbeat of his counterpart, because next time he knew, it wasn’t dark anymore but alight with lurid colors, and the shouts of a crowd gathered in the street had broken the silence.
“Fuck,” Dean swore to the sound of windows breaking, hysterical shrieking, and to the roar of fire - it was always about fire, in the end. “Dean,” he called. “Dean, wake up. They’re coming.”
Dean moaned incoherently. The sounds made by the Croats suddenly boomed, moving from outside in the street to right under them.
“They’re inside,” Dean said, more to himself than in the hope that Dean would reply.
It sounded for the moment like they were busy throwing tables into walls and such, but they would move upstairs soon enough, and what did Dean have? - one gun, an empty Colt, and a dying man. Odds weren’t exactly in his favor.
Dean grabbed his - well, Dean’s - gun with a firm hand, pointed it at the door, waiting.
He heard them coming up the stairs, then they started to throw themselves against the door. Boom, boom, boom. It was like the countdown from hell. In retaliation, Dean shot through the door, twice.
Like the gunshots had woken him from the depths of a dying sleep, Dean started to wriggle in his arms, and to cough weakly.
“Dean?” he mumbled.
“Right here - not like I could go anywhere even if I wanted to.”
“What’s-”
“Croats are here, ready to bleed on us - or maybe to beat us to death, it’s a toss up at this point.”
“Gonna die-”
Dean shot again. “Yeah, we covered that.”
“No, you. Can’t die, gotta save him. Sam.”
An upper corner of the door broke down and a disheveled man passed his torso through the hole, and waved his arms in their direction, like a crazier version of Jack Nicholson. Dean swallowed, and shot the Croat in the head.
In his arms, Dean was getting agitated.
“Promise.”
“I don’t need to make any promises to you. He’s my brother too.”
But Dean’s fingers were digging painfully into his arm, the last convulsions of death or a message he couldn’t voice anymore, so Dean said, “Okay, okay, I promise. I’ll do whatever it takes.”
It didn’t mean anything at all, but it did the trick, somehow, or maybe Dean had nothing left in him to keep fighting. Whatever it was, the grip on Dean’s arm relaxed, the body against him became limp. Dean knew then with absolute certainty that Dean was dead. With a gentle hand, he closed the man’s eyes.
It was a funny thing, but it happened at the exact same moment the Croats finished smashing the door down and rushed in, pushing each other aside to get to Dean more quickly. Dean fired his last shots on them; all the while it felt like it was happening in slow motion, straight from one of those Matrix movies, and Dean wasn’t afraid at all because it would take no less than a million of years for the freaks to reach him. He didn’t know if the warmth on his face was from Croat blood or from his own tears, the stupid tears he was shedding over a man that was both himself and someone he didn’t understand at all.
At one point, he found himself out of bullets. The Croats were trampling on the bodies of the ones Dean had shot, uncaring; they were so close to him it was a miracle he wasn’t dead or turned yet, but they were in such a hurry to reach him that they were clawing at each other’s backs and arms, fighting all the way. Dean wondered what their deal was, why so much excitement over him - or was it over Dean, the one who had killed Lucifer? What was going through the Croats’ heads, if anything?
A young woman, with long straight hair so caked with blood that it was impossible to guess its original color, was the first to pull out from the groaning pile of Croats; she yelped in triumph and-
Dean closed his eyes, waiting for the blow, and-
“Dean, welcome back!”
He opened his eyes to Zachariah’s smug face.
Rating: PG13
Characters: Dean, 2014!Dean.
Wordcount: about 3,700 words
Warnings: Language, violence, character!death [Spoiler (click to open)]Sam died as Lucifer's vessel; 2014!Dean dies, present!Dean survives.
A/N: Written for spn_reversebang. Thanks to my beta wave_obscura, and to my artist, dollarformyname, who was a pleasure to work with and that you should go and congratulate for her excellent art! I'm very happy as it is the first time an artist makes icons for a story of mine. :D
Summary: The End!AU. Lucifer is dead, and the world seems to be on the brink of total destruction. Meanwhile, Dean is looking for himself.
Link to the art: here
Link to the fic on AO3: here
When could it be said that the world had actually ended? In Dean’s now extensive experience, it appeared that the world had taken its sweet time to reach that point.
Howls from a horde of Croats reached his ears, so Dean plunged to his elbows and knees and crawled into the tight space between a car and the section of wall that had fallen onto it. The key to survival, he’d learned, was to keep very still and be silent as a corpse. The Croats had an eye for movement and damn good ears, but small favors and all, their noses were nothing special. Dean could smell himself, mud, blood and rancid sweat - he hadn’t showered since he’d barged into 2014, a few days ago. He hadn’t seen a living, non virus-crazy soul since his future counterpart had knocked him out and gone on his merry way kill to Lucifer. No Cas, no Risa, or any of the others. No himself. And no Sam, with or without Lucifer along for the ride.
A rushed stomping of feet made Dean hold his breath, a hand in front of his mouth so nothing - not a whimper, not a pant - could escape. He felt cold and wet, and the ground smelled like gasoline. His heart pounded so loudly that he worried they could hear it. He tried to will it to slow down. Breathe in. Thump. Breathe out. Thump. Breathe in - thumpthumpthump. The sound of footsteps faded away, just as Dean was starting to feel dizzy, and he let out an explosive breath. He waited a few moments longer before he crawled out of his hiding place.
“Damn it,” he mumbled, picking debris from the palms of his hands.
He sat on his heels, knees cracking, and took a moment to find the strength to get back on his feet and resume his search. The wind brought him the smell of burning, and he looked up to see dark smoke billow and flames licking up the sky.
“Fucking pyromaniacs,” he said.
It was the third fire he’d seen the Croats start. He didn’t know why, but the freaks had been working themselves up into an unbridled, destructive frenzy - more so than before - for two days now.
Okay, he had an idea why - something had happened, they could feel it, and there was, well, only one thing that could be major enough. One big event that could make or unmake a world that was already worn out.
In the meantime, Dean was looking for himself. There would be the answers to his questions.
Where would I go if I had killed my little brother?
He heaved a sigh and hauled himself up. Every joint hurt, his feet were screaming at him, and his stomach was one giant knot trying to disappear into the hole inside him. It was becoming hard to find a store that hadn’t already been looted or destroyed beyond salvaging.
Stumbling down the street, he almost tripped himself over the leg of a mannequin, lying there across his way like someone had placed it on purpose. Dean looked at it dumbly for a moment.
Where would I go?
He looked at the sky once more, at the glow painting the clouds with violent orange. He started walking again, heading for it.
He walked for a while, oblivious to his pain and fatigue now that he knew where he was going. He turned around the corner of one street and took everything in quickly - the street was empty, no Croats in sight, the fire roared and crackled and Dean could feel the heat of it on his face, even though he was about a hundred yards away. It was a big structure, probably some kind of official building. He walked toward it, until he caught movement out of the corner of his eye - someone was standing in the shadow of a hole in the wall across from the burning building.
“I know you’re there,” he said.
He saw Dean walk out slowly, stepping over some rubble, then stop at the sight of him and raise his gun - the long barrel betrayed it as the Colt.
“You don’t have any bullets left,” Dean said. It was a guess, but one he was pretty sure of.
The other Dean let his arm drop. He looked as dirty and exhausted as Dean was. He had a wound that went from the corner of his right eye to his cheekbone, but seemed otherwise unscathed.
“You found me,” he said.
“I’m you. I know how you think. I knew you’d want to see it- ” Dean waved at the building on fire; there was a loud crashing noise as part of it crumbled. “You’d want to see the destruction. Are you looking to get killed by those things?”
He felt anger bubbling inside him and it was strange - he didn’t know exactly who he was angry at - himself or himself? Or was it at the whole fucking universe and its sick sense of humor?
“Fuck you,” Dean said, sliding the Colt inside his jacket. “You don’t know anything.”
“I know you did it,” Dean bit back. They were still standing a few yards from each other and it felt like the air between them was sizzling - could just have been from the fire, though. “You killed him, and it didn’t change a fucking thing. It even seems like it’s taken a turn for the worse. How is that for saving the world?”
“I hate-”
-you, Dean probably almost said, but the word never came - something, nothing more than a human-shaped shadow from what Dean could see, crashed into the other Dean from behind and the two rolled on the ground in a flurry of limbs. It looked like a teenager, short and scrawny, with a mop of unkempt dark hair; it shrieked and fought with wide, wild movements. Dean saw something glint in its hand - a knife, a piece of broken glass - and it spurred him into motion.
“Hey you,” he snarled and when the Croat’s head turned, drawn to the sound of his voice, Dean kicked him in the face. He heard bone crack and the thing was shoved away from Dean, falling on its back.
Dean looked around for a weapon, anything. The Croat jumped to his feet, screeching, launched himself at Dean, who braced himself for it; the shock of them meeting the ground expelled all air from Dean’s lungs, but he immediately started fumbling with his right hand for something that would hurt while holding back the Croat’s armed hand with his left. He heard the other Dean cough and moan, and at the same moment his fingers closed around a stone. The Croat’s knife - a long hunting knife, whose blade was stained with brown spots - was getting closer to Dean’s forehead, and Dean had a good view of the thing’s - the boy’s - wide, bloodshot, crazy eyes. He hit its head as fast and hard as he could. The Croat slumped down on him.
Dean lay there breathlessly for a moment, then pushed the Croat off him. He rose to his knees and looked at the body - the Croat had a young, pale face, with blood matting his hair and running down his forehead. It - he, whatever - was still breathing.
“Kill it,” the other Dean croaked.
Dean turned around and saw his counterpart struggle to push himself up on his elbows. The front of his jacket was dark with blood.
“Kill it,” Dean repeated. “There’s nothing you can do for him.”
Dean didn’t think it would be wise to point out the pronoun slip-up. He swallowed, tightened his grip on the stone, and brought it down again and again until his makeshift weapon was slick with blood. Then he threw it in disgust and turned away, thinking for a moment that he was going to be sick.
“For fuck’s sake,” the other Dean said. He was on his knees, but seemed to have trouble making it on his feet, tilting to the right like he was about to fall over.
Dean wiped his hands on his jeans, and went to help him, wrapping an arm around his waist and hauling the man up. Dude was fucking heavy, leaning against him with most of his weight and breathing harshly.
“You okay?” Dean asked.
“What do you think?” Dean said.
That was when the howling resounded in the air. It sounded like it came from all around them, loud cries echoing and responding to each other, like a pack of wolves. Dean looked frantically around, then up; they could come from absolutely anywhere.
“Shit,” he said. “Can you run?”
“Does it look like we have a choice here?”
“Point.”
They began to run. Or rather, Dean tried to run while dragging Dean along like a bag of potatoes. They stumbled together several times, narrowly missing a hard fall, and all the while Dean was feeling a wet warmth spread against his right side, where the other Dean was gradually bleeding out. The howls were getting closer.
“Hey,” Dean said, panting heavily. “Leave me, leave me behind.”
Dean glanced sidelong at him - the man’s face was gray, his lips colorless. He obviously couldn’t go on like this any longer. He was a dead weight and he knew it. They knew it. It wouldn’t be like leaving a fellow hunter or a civilian behind, Dean told himself - it was just him, so it shouldn’t have mattered at all. Still, it felt wrong.
They turned round a corner, and there was a red brick building whose door was ajar - Dean made a split-second decision and rushed inside.
“What - ” the other Dean started.
“Shut up.”
It looked like it had been a restaurant - there were tables and chairs toppled over, broken glass and porcelain, a dirty red tablecloth bunched up on the floor. Two doors facing each other in a corner of the room; Dean left Dean propped up against a wall and went to check the first one - it lead to the kitchen, whose walls and stainless steel countertops were splattered with blood. The second door opened on a staircase.
“Okay, let’s move on,” Dean urged Dean, grabbing him roughly by the shoulders - the romp of feet and the cries from the Croats sounded just about to overwhelm them. “Up, up you go.”
Dean groaned, tried feebly to bat at his hands, but otherwise let himself be manhandled, limp as a rag doll. Dean had to positively carry him up the stairs, and the blood was now dripping steadily and leaving a trail of red spots behind them.
On the second floor they found a small apartment, probably the owners’ - kitchen, bathroom, mostly intact, and a larger room that must have been the bedroom but was empty, save for pieces of wood and rubble on the dirty floor. Dean dropped his burden, closed the door behind them. There was a lock on it and it seemed undamaged - although Dean had no illusion that it was enough to keep a horde of Croats out if they wanted to get in, he still locked the door.
He pressed himself against the wall by the window, keeping himself hidden but looking out. He couldn’t see anyone on the street, and the noises from the Croats had died away. They’d lost them, it seemed, but Dean couldn’t shake the distinct impression that the freaks had been after them, specifically. It meant that they’d be back.
“What now, genius?” Dean slurred; he was sitting against the wall on the other side of the window, and his head lolled to the side like it was too heavy to bear.
The fact that he was still conscious constituted a miracle in itself. Dean had to acknowledge what stubborn bastards they were, if nothing else.
“I don’t know,” he said. “You got any brilliant ideas to get us out of here? Do you have any weapons besides the Colt?”
“’Course. Thigh holster.”
“Then why did you point the Colt at me earlier?” Dean shook his head. “Never mind; doesn’t matter much now.”
He took Dean’s gun from his thigh holster. After a moment of hesitation, he decided to have a look at his wound. Dean hissed in pain when he peeled his blood-soaked shirt away from his stomach. The wound was still bleeding heavily so Dean couldn’t give it a proper examination, but it looked pretty deep. Dean torn some bands of his own shirt and bandaged Dean up as well as he could, which wasn’t much.
“Why d’you brought me here for?” Dean asked when he was finished, looking at him with half-lidded eyes. “You know I’m dyin’.”
“Didn’t sit well with me to leave you out there, that’s all.”
It was a very strange thing to be able to look and see himself die. For all that Dean had died before, it wasn’t anything comparable to what was happening now. It was a chilling, sobering experience, watching it; watching his eyes dull, his skin lose all color, his breathing become weak and shallow. Talk about walking on your own grave - Dean had to tear his eyes away after a moment.
“Can I ask you something?” he said, looking at the opposite wall; sunset was coloring it with orange-tinted shadows.
“You see me runnin’ away ‘nytime soon?”
“Smartass bastard. When you killed - was Sam…” He trailed off; he could feel Dean’s gaze on him, like cigarette burn. “Did it look like there was anything left of Sam in there?”
“No.” As firm an answer as Dean could manage.
“Okay. Just wondering.”
“Well, don’t.”
They didn’t talk for a long time after that. Dean kept an ear out for any alarming sounds, but the city was eerily silent. It didn’t do anything to calm his nerves, because it felt more like the calm before the storm. He sometimes glanced at Dean, who had his eyes closed and didn’t make a sound, maybe unconscious or maybe shutting Dean out - or maybe dead. Soon enough, it was dark, and he could barely see him.
He realized he had drifted off when he woke up with a start and a cry on his lips. It was a moonless night and there were no streetlights, so he couldn’t see a thing, like he had gone blind during his sleep. Although the rational part of his mind knew it was unlikely, it still made his heart beat too loud. Dean wasn’t afraid of the dark, couldn’t remember having ever been. He fumbled for his gun anyway, rested his fingers on it for comfort, and called out, “Dean, you alive?”
“Yeah,” came the barely audible response, then Dean heard the distinct sound of the man’s teeth chattering.
“You cold?” Dean asked.
“Wha’ d’you think? More blood,” a pause for more chatter, “out than in.”
Dean really should have thought of it. Dying was cold - except when you were heading for hellfire, and then you burned to the bone again and again, and once more for fun.
“Do you want- ” Dean cut himself off; it was himself he was talking to, he wouldn’t admit to wanting the warmth and comfort of another human being.
So Dean groped his way across the distance separating them, on all fours and with a hand stretched out in front of him. When he found Dean, he moved him cautiously away from the wall so he could spoon him from behind.
“What the fuck you doing?” Dean protested weakly.
“Keeping you warm, asshole.”
He wrapped his arms around Dean, who didn’t try to shove him off - probably couldn’t move at all.
“I’m dying,” Dean said.
“I know. Doesn’t mean I have to let you freeze your ass off.”
“No, I mean - again, goddamn it.”
Dean knew what he meant. He almost wished he would fall asleep again, because it would make having a dying man leaning against his chest less awkward, but he was wide awake now, and there was no helping the thoughts running through his mind. It had happened, it seemed, he had killed Sam, as prophesied by Sam himself in his darkest moments.
“When Sam died,” Dean said, startling him out of his thoughts, “there was a moment- he was lying on the ground with his white suit all bloodied-”
Dean paused, probably exhausted by the long sentence - his breathing was ragged, his chest heaving and his heart fluttering under Dean’s fingers, fighting to keep on living. Dean knew he should tell him to quit talking and save his strength for… whatever was going to happen, but he couldn’t.
“And what? What happened?”
“He looked at me, and it was Sam - it was Sam and he saw me and he knew exactly what’d happened. I wanted to tell him I was sorry but then he was dead.”
Dean closed his eyes - it didn’t make a lot of difference with the darkness, but his eyes burned and he wanted to keep it under control. He felt his breath hitch in spite of himself, and Dean felt it too because he said angrily, “You crying?”
“And why the fuck wouldn’t I be crying?” Dean replied, angry too now. “He was our brother, my brother, he was Sam and we-”
“-couldn’t save him.”
Dean realized he was digging his fingers into Dean’s arms - Dean, of course, hadn’t let out a sound of pain - and he made himself stop.
“Try to sleep,” he said, a bit harshly; they both knew that if Dean fell asleep, chances were that he wouldn’t wake up.
“You’re- pathetic.”
“Shut up. Try to sleep.”
He didn’t want to discuss whether he’d say yes to Michael with this living - dying - proof of his failures lying in his arms. What he wanted was Sam, to find his brother in their own time, in 2009, but it didn’t look like that was going to happen.
Sleep must have gotten to him once more, lulled as he was by the shallow heartbeat of his counterpart, because next time he knew, it wasn’t dark anymore but alight with lurid colors, and the shouts of a crowd gathered in the street had broken the silence.
“Fuck,” Dean swore to the sound of windows breaking, hysterical shrieking, and to the roar of fire - it was always about fire, in the end. “Dean,” he called. “Dean, wake up. They’re coming.”
Dean moaned incoherently. The sounds made by the Croats suddenly boomed, moving from outside in the street to right under them.
“They’re inside,” Dean said, more to himself than in the hope that Dean would reply.
It sounded for the moment like they were busy throwing tables into walls and such, but they would move upstairs soon enough, and what did Dean have? - one gun, an empty Colt, and a dying man. Odds weren’t exactly in his favor.
Dean grabbed his - well, Dean’s - gun with a firm hand, pointed it at the door, waiting.
He heard them coming up the stairs, then they started to throw themselves against the door. Boom, boom, boom. It was like the countdown from hell. In retaliation, Dean shot through the door, twice.
Like the gunshots had woken him from the depths of a dying sleep, Dean started to wriggle in his arms, and to cough weakly.
“Dean?” he mumbled.
“Right here - not like I could go anywhere even if I wanted to.”
“What’s-”
“Croats are here, ready to bleed on us - or maybe to beat us to death, it’s a toss up at this point.”
“Gonna die-”
Dean shot again. “Yeah, we covered that.”
“No, you. Can’t die, gotta save him. Sam.”
An upper corner of the door broke down and a disheveled man passed his torso through the hole, and waved his arms in their direction, like a crazier version of Jack Nicholson. Dean swallowed, and shot the Croat in the head.
In his arms, Dean was getting agitated.
“Promise.”
“I don’t need to make any promises to you. He’s my brother too.”
But Dean’s fingers were digging painfully into his arm, the last convulsions of death or a message he couldn’t voice anymore, so Dean said, “Okay, okay, I promise. I’ll do whatever it takes.”
It didn’t mean anything at all, but it did the trick, somehow, or maybe Dean had nothing left in him to keep fighting. Whatever it was, the grip on Dean’s arm relaxed, the body against him became limp. Dean knew then with absolute certainty that Dean was dead. With a gentle hand, he closed the man’s eyes.
It was a funny thing, but it happened at the exact same moment the Croats finished smashing the door down and rushed in, pushing each other aside to get to Dean more quickly. Dean fired his last shots on them; all the while it felt like it was happening in slow motion, straight from one of those Matrix movies, and Dean wasn’t afraid at all because it would take no less than a million of years for the freaks to reach him. He didn’t know if the warmth on his face was from Croat blood or from his own tears, the stupid tears he was shedding over a man that was both himself and someone he didn’t understand at all.
At one point, he found himself out of bullets. The Croats were trampling on the bodies of the ones Dean had shot, uncaring; they were so close to him it was a miracle he wasn’t dead or turned yet, but they were in such a hurry to reach him that they were clawing at each other’s backs and arms, fighting all the way. Dean wondered what their deal was, why so much excitement over him - or was it over Dean, the one who had killed Lucifer? What was going through the Croats’ heads, if anything?
A young woman, with long straight hair so caked with blood that it was impossible to guess its original color, was the first to pull out from the groaning pile of Croats; she yelped in triumph and-
Dean closed his eyes, waiting for the blow, and-
“Dean, welcome back!”
He opened his eyes to Zachariah’s smug face.