The Angel and The Devil, Heavy On Your Shoulders [14/22] Sam/Dean, R
Title: The Angel and The Devil, Heavy on Your Shoulders (Part IV. Two.)
Word Count: 1519 [35000 total]
MASTER POST for warnings, author's notes, and link to art
Part IV. Afraid I Got Some Bad News.
--Chapter Two--
Dean was tired, very tired, or, at least, he should be, considering that his head is just scant moments away from exploding all over the fucking ugly ass wallpaper.
Did he sleep the night before? He couldn’t be sure. Seemed fair to assume, considering the nightmares, but that doesn’t mean much. He remembers hot blood, gritty iron, and stinging fire from the night before. Awake, asleep--it’s all the same, these days.
He remembers lying on beautifully cool bathroom tiles while the room swam around him and Ruby’s laughter pressing hot into the corners of his brain-but she was dead. He knew that for sure, because he remembered singing “Ding Dong the Bitch is Dead” to a confused but tolerant bartender in a dive that had Two beers on tap and about as many patrons.
Celebration had sure seemed like the just thing to do after he’d watched the last little embers of her corpse go black. Dean isn’t sure at what point that plan turned on him, but it had, and the barbed throbbing in his brain is proof of that.
Still, Dean decides to be grateful for the things he has.
First, and best of all, he has a hot breakfast headed his way, courtesy of room service. They didn’t often hole up in places that had room service, and by fucking God, after the endless string of hotels that made caves look accommodating-well, he and Sam deserved to give being pampered a spin before they bit it.
Second, Sam is not asking what the hell Dean had been drunkenly blabbing about at 4AM the night before. Which was great, cause Dean really didn’t have an answer for that one. That part of the evening couldn’t be squeezed out of his whiskey-soaked memory.
He was grateful for that, too.
And, third, Dean had gotten the answers to his question. He didn’t like them at all-in fact, he was showing some serious willpower by not breaking anything and everything he could get his hands on-but Ruby had given him something to gnaw on. More than he asked for, really.
Dean looks up from the intertwining roads, like veins, on the map under his fingers and he glances at Sam, just as Sam is quickly darting his eyes away.
Turns out, Ruby had given Dean maybe more then he could possibly swallow.
It’d dawned on Dean that Sam was almost always lookin’ at him. And sure, that was fine, it was fair enough-wasn’t a whole hell of a lot to look at in their life besides each other. But it was the way Sam looked away, eyes quick and slick and his lips pulled tight like he was holding something in.
Dean knows shame when he sees it.
But, for the life of him, he can’t bring himself to give a good god damn about it. It wasn’t the worst thing Ruby had said about Sam the night before. It was just another thing for Dean to tuck away in the “Do Not Fucking Touch” corner of his brain.
It’s a crowded corner.
Dean slowly switches to fantasizing about the breakfast that’s on its way. It involves coffee, and bacon, and Dean plans on using it to bribe his hangover into taking a hike. He just needs this meal, this morning, this moment to breathe…and then the world could get on with its ending.
“Dean?” Sam says. The sound of his voice said a question was coming up, and the chance of it being wrapped up with a yes or no was pretty damn slim.
Of fucking course.
“Yah?” Dean replies, turning back to the spread-out map.
Sam shifts, where he sits on the bed. He looks tired, maybe a little spacey, but he’s clearly awake enough get on Dean’s damn nerves. “’About this…condition..of mine?”
“Yah?”
“It…you don’t…” Sam sighs. “It’s looking bad, isn’t it?”
Dean doesn’t really want to, but he looks Sam over, checking him the way he has all his damn life. Looking at him, you wouldn’t guess there was a damn thing wrong with him. He’s a lot of broad tall muscle and you’d think, it’d take a lot to take down a guy like that. At first glance, you wouldn’t know about the infection spreading up Sam’s legs, that began with just a tingle in his toes until that same stormy gray was climbing up towards his knees. You wouldn’t see that both arms are entirely ash-colored. But at some point, you would see the hands the color of a tombstone, and you would know something was seriously, seriously wrong.
And Dean knows-the way it looks? That’s just the surface. His body is…Sam can still use his limbs and his fingers, but clumsily, like a child-as though Sam knows how to move and make things work, but his body doesn’t quite remember.
It’s gotten so Dean knows there’s nothing else he can say to Sam.
“…Yah. It’s looking bad.”
“Man, it’s been three days, and it’s spreading…fast,” Sam says.
“You’re not hurting, are you?” Dean cuts in.
“No, no…it feels like…nothing.” Sam shrugs, with a dry huff of a laugh. “Literally, nothing. I’m guessing that’s probably not a good thing. Dean, you need to let me help on this. Your whole quarantine thing is…,” Sam takes a breath, looks like he’s weighing something out. “It’s crap.”
“That’s not what you said yesterday,” Dean points out. “When I left you here, all by your lonesome…”
Dean’s got his eyes fixed on Sam’s face, watching for the twitch or shift, waiting for the truth. But he gets nothing, and he’s not surprised.
“Yah, I don’t know if you remember,” says Sam. “but you were a little difficult to talk to yesterday.”
Dean’s about to tell him that he sounds like someone’s pissy girlfriend but Sam doesn’t give him a chance.
“Dean, just admit it, you’re not getting anywhere on your own. We’ve called in more help on lesser cases. Right? Where’s Bobby? What about Ellen? I thought you were calling them.” He gives Dean a look he’s gotten a hundred times before--like Sam’s expecting something that Dean can’t give him.
Going to Bobby and Ellen means giving them all the varied and god awful facts about Sam’s situation that Dean knows, and Dean wants to do that likes he wants to take a bath in broken glass. If they knew, it would be…bad. Dean knows like he’s always fucking known that it’s all on him, Sam is on him.
Except, Sam’s got a point. Dean finally has to admit to himself that he’s going about this thing the wrong way. Far as Dean is concerned, Sam is his business, but when his brother looks at him and waits for answers, Dean realizes he doesn’t have a good one to give.
Dean’s mind is chasing itself in heavy circles when Sam says, “What about the angels? Maybe they-“
“No,” Dean says. “I want you steering clear of those son of bitches.”
“But they-“
“No. You don’t get it, do you?” And this time Dean is up and out of his seat, moving with his rising temper. “The angels are not your god damn guardians, Sam.”
“I know that,” Sam says through tight lips, looking down at the loose, gray fists lying in his lap. Dean realizes he probably can’t force them any tighter. Dean sighs and sits across from where Sam is.
“I know it bothers you, Sam. But what else do you expect when you start sleeping with the enemy?”
Sam’s eyes dart up quickly to look at Dean and there it is again-those brown eyes wide and wet looking, his mouth small and sad. Dumb damn kid.
“What about me, then? It’s safe to bet I’m not contagious, since you’re fine, and I haven’t hulked out on you, so whatever it is, I’m…I’m safe. I can help.”
Dean casually picks up Sam’s watch from where it’s sitting on the nightstand. He tosses it to Sam, who misses it by a mile and blinks rapidly when the thing smacks against his forehead and plops on the ground.
“Yah. You could help me like a heart attack.”
Dean can see Sam trying to mount up for his next move but the knock on the door puts the whole thing on hold and Dean thinks he might burst into fucking tears he’s so grateful.
He’s digging into his pocket for a tip as he walks over to the door, his mouth practically watering. He’s gonna eat, and he’s gonna figure things out, and it’s gonna get better.
Somehow.
But there’s not steaming coffee and delicious breakfast meats on the other side of the door. No, it’s the hotel manager. And a cop. They aren’t holding trays of piping hot anything, and neither of them look happy.
And Dean’s kicking himself, so fucking hard. He has got to be the biggest sucker on the face of the stupid falling apart planet.
He had honestly expected something good.
-part IV.three-