Fanfic - SPN: Failure Deserving of Blame (Sam/Dean)
Title: Failure Deserving of Blame [Evil!Sammy Universe]
Author: eboniorchid
Fandom: Supernatural
Characters: Sam Winchester/Dean Winchester
Prompt: 048. Guilty. For 100moods, challenge table here.
Word Count: 1360 words exactly.
Rating: R for language, hearsay sexuality, and hearsay violence.
Warnings/Spoilers: Angst! Dark! Future. Apocalypse. Slash. Wincest. Manipulation. Plot. Spoilers for "Devil's Trap," "In My Time of Dying," and "Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things". Potential vague spoilers for Season 1, generally.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Really. Nothing.
Summary: Dean's POV. Settling into his new place in society and in Sam's life, Dean seeks to understand how Sam came to be the man he is now.
Author's Notes: This story follows shortly after The Heat Outside Would Never Warm Him (Sam/Dean) and Owned (Sam/Dean). For more info about my Evil!Sammy Universe, including links to all installments, please go here.
"While you were gone, what happened to you?" Dean had been looking out the window, as he was drawn to do a lot these days, even though there wasn't much of a view anymore. He turned to look at Sam, who was leaning against a bedpost, watching him.
"You want to know how I got to be this way." It was like Sam knew the question would come up eventually, that Dean wouldn't just be able to let go of the Sam he used to know.
"Yeah. I do."
Sam shrugged with a half-smile. "Some friends helped me realize my potential … see what I could do … what I could have."
"Yeah, but how, Sam?"
"You don't want to know." He said it more like a challenge than a statement of truth.
"You say that a lot, but I always want to know. I wouldn't ask if I didn't want to know."
Sam seemed to consider his request, before shrugging and speaking again. Not that he said much. "Pain brings clarity."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Just what I said, Dean. Pain. Brings. Clarity."
Dean felt like there was a heavy stone lodged in his throat, but it didn't feel like Sam's abilities at work, it was just him choking up. "How much?"
"You don't-"
"How much?!"
Sam closed the distance between them, not touching Dean, just looking hard into his eyes. "I don't need your pity, Dean." He scoffed, looking down and up Dean's nude body with a sneer. "I'm not the Hunter-turned-slaveboy-whore here. So you should really keep that pity for yourself."
Sam's words stung deep, made Dean grind his teeth together and turn his head to get some perspective away from the sharp intensity of Sam's eyes. The part of him that wanted to draw back his fist for a blow warred with the saner part that knew he'd be screaming on the floor before his fist ever made contact. It wasn't that he'd ever really tried to fight this new Sam, but that was largely because there wasn't really a question about how he would react. It would be swift and vicious.
Really, when he thought about it, though, this was the most real emotion and insight that he'd gotten out of Sam about Sam since the Day of Fire and he couldn't just let it go because his ego got smacked around. "How much?"
When Dean turned back, Sam's sneer was still in place, but it became a sadistic smile as he started to explain. "You remember the wall in the cabin? With our dear Fallen friend? He was tearing your insides apart, right? What if he was just squeezing them tight, like I do to you sometimes, but the pain was like you remember, just without the blood?"
Dean felt like his brain functions had slowed. Things just didn't quite compute. "They punished you? Like you punish me?"
Sam's brow furrowed before his expression faded to its typical blankness. "It wasn't so much about punishment. Not usually. It was mostly about discipline, I think." He spoke of his ordeal as if it were a curiosity more than a brutal experience from his past. He could just as easily have been talking about how often it rained in Seattle.
"I don't understand."
Then Sam's smile was back with a vengeance, chilling Dean's core in a way that only true evil ever really did. "Every day, Dean. Every day and for hours. To help me focus, keep me in line, speed up my progress. Pain. Exhaustion. Hunger. Thirst. Cold. And more plain-old pain, Dean. Every. Day."
Sam wielded his words like swords, like he knew they would cut Dean to the bone.
Dean shuddered, his voice a strained whisper. "Oh God, Sam."
"Shut up."
He couldn't help the words spilling out of him, even though he knew they wouldn't change anything. "I'm so sorry."
"Shut. Up."
He could feel the heat radiating off Sam, but he just couldn't stop himself from drowning in apologies. "I should have been there, should've-"
"But you weren't, Dean. You. Weren't."
For a moment, Dean could see the reflection of a scared and angry broken boy, shining up at him through stranger's eyes. "God, I'm so sorry, Sammy." His baby brother was still in there somewhere, buried alive under pain and darkness. And all because Dean hadn't been there, hadn't gotten there in time.
But then Sam turned away and when he looked back at Dean, his eyes were only empty pools of murky green. "I don't care if you're sorry, Dean. Nothing to be sorry for, bro."
This new Sam somehow found a way to smile at all the wrong times and in all the wrong ways. Like right now it was that cheery patient smile meant for confused little children, and, apparently, for Dean. "I'm grateful that you weren't there, Dean. If you'd have actually come for me, I'd still be following your orders, taking all your shit. I'd still be the bait for every trap you ever set. I'd still be the one left alone while you went charging off to save barmaids from the horrors of midnight boredom. I'd still be chasing you around like some mindless lovesick puppy. And I'd still be that worthless little boy that fucking worshipped you. Like you could really save him from bad men hiding in the dark. Like you really were some kind of superman."
Sam smirked, cold and hard, like it should hurt. "But you're not, Dean. I'm the superman that bad men fear now. You're just nothing, Dean, nothing but pretty. And you'd better be damn glad I want to keep you that way." Sam shoved him away so hard that Dean stumbled, hearing the door slam behind him as he tried to right himself.
Dean had thought that he wanted to know the answers to his questions. And he'd known the answers would be terrible. But not like this. Not like Sammy tortured day in and day out. Not like the pain he remembered from the night of the accident. Not like Sammy alone for months, starving and freezing and enduring everything, just waiting for Dean to find him, to save him.
Waiting, and never being saved.
It was like his legs refused to work and Dean just sank to the floor, his arms wrapped around his body as he sat and rocked. He could see how Sam could hate him, want to hurt him, want to use him like … like maybe they'd used him. Oh God, Sammy, please forgive me.
Dean knew that he'd fucked up the minute he'd realized his dad was dead because of him, and this just made everything all the more obvious. Dad would've found a way to save Sammy. Now, they were both gone.
He'd always thought that it would end this way, that he would be the only one left. But he hadn't thought it would all be his fault. Sam was broken and heartless because of him. He had destroyed so much of himself and the world because Dean hadn't searched hard enough, hadn't asked around enough, just hadn't done enough.
Maybe this life was a just punishment for all his failures.
Maybe he deserved this.
Maybe he deserved even less.
He'd thought he had it hard with Sam, but despite all his threats, Sam had never really hurt him as much as that night with the Demon. And Dean might hate being just a pretty thing for Sam to play with, but Sam had never really used him just to make Dean feel humiliated. Sam might have even been rough with him a lot, but he almost always tried to make Dean feel good enough to come. And at night, Sam held him in the bed they shared, held him like he was something precious, something to be protected.
Whatever it was that Dean was being pushed into, it would likely never compare to the torment that Sam had faced alone. It made Dean wonder if, somewhere deep inside that hard shell, his Sam still loved him. Even if he'd lost the sense of how to love anything.
Author: eboniorchid
Fandom: Supernatural
Characters: Sam Winchester/Dean Winchester
Prompt: 048. Guilty. For 100moods, challenge table here.
Word Count: 1360 words exactly.
Rating: R for language, hearsay sexuality, and hearsay violence.
Warnings/Spoilers: Angst! Dark! Future. Apocalypse. Slash. Wincest. Manipulation. Plot. Spoilers for "Devil's Trap," "In My Time of Dying," and "Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things". Potential vague spoilers for Season 1, generally.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Really. Nothing.
Summary: Dean's POV. Settling into his new place in society and in Sam's life, Dean seeks to understand how Sam came to be the man he is now.
Author's Notes: This story follows shortly after The Heat Outside Would Never Warm Him (Sam/Dean) and Owned (Sam/Dean). For more info about my Evil!Sammy Universe, including links to all installments, please go here.
"While you were gone, what happened to you?" Dean had been looking out the window, as he was drawn to do a lot these days, even though there wasn't much of a view anymore. He turned to look at Sam, who was leaning against a bedpost, watching him.
"You want to know how I got to be this way." It was like Sam knew the question would come up eventually, that Dean wouldn't just be able to let go of the Sam he used to know.
"Yeah. I do."
Sam shrugged with a half-smile. "Some friends helped me realize my potential … see what I could do … what I could have."
"Yeah, but how, Sam?"
"You don't want to know." He said it more like a challenge than a statement of truth.
"You say that a lot, but I always want to know. I wouldn't ask if I didn't want to know."
Sam seemed to consider his request, before shrugging and speaking again. Not that he said much. "Pain brings clarity."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Just what I said, Dean. Pain. Brings. Clarity."
Dean felt like there was a heavy stone lodged in his throat, but it didn't feel like Sam's abilities at work, it was just him choking up. "How much?"
"You don't-"
"How much?!"
Sam closed the distance between them, not touching Dean, just looking hard into his eyes. "I don't need your pity, Dean." He scoffed, looking down and up Dean's nude body with a sneer. "I'm not the Hunter-turned-slaveboy-whore here. So you should really keep that pity for yourself."
Sam's words stung deep, made Dean grind his teeth together and turn his head to get some perspective away from the sharp intensity of Sam's eyes. The part of him that wanted to draw back his fist for a blow warred with the saner part that knew he'd be screaming on the floor before his fist ever made contact. It wasn't that he'd ever really tried to fight this new Sam, but that was largely because there wasn't really a question about how he would react. It would be swift and vicious.
Really, when he thought about it, though, this was the most real emotion and insight that he'd gotten out of Sam about Sam since the Day of Fire and he couldn't just let it go because his ego got smacked around. "How much?"
When Dean turned back, Sam's sneer was still in place, but it became a sadistic smile as he started to explain. "You remember the wall in the cabin? With our dear Fallen friend? He was tearing your insides apart, right? What if he was just squeezing them tight, like I do to you sometimes, but the pain was like you remember, just without the blood?"
Dean felt like his brain functions had slowed. Things just didn't quite compute. "They punished you? Like you punish me?"
Sam's brow furrowed before his expression faded to its typical blankness. "It wasn't so much about punishment. Not usually. It was mostly about discipline, I think." He spoke of his ordeal as if it were a curiosity more than a brutal experience from his past. He could just as easily have been talking about how often it rained in Seattle.
"I don't understand."
Then Sam's smile was back with a vengeance, chilling Dean's core in a way that only true evil ever really did. "Every day, Dean. Every day and for hours. To help me focus, keep me in line, speed up my progress. Pain. Exhaustion. Hunger. Thirst. Cold. And more plain-old pain, Dean. Every. Day."
Sam wielded his words like swords, like he knew they would cut Dean to the bone.
Dean shuddered, his voice a strained whisper. "Oh God, Sam."
"Shut up."
He couldn't help the words spilling out of him, even though he knew they wouldn't change anything. "I'm so sorry."
"Shut. Up."
He could feel the heat radiating off Sam, but he just couldn't stop himself from drowning in apologies. "I should have been there, should've-"
"But you weren't, Dean. You. Weren't."
For a moment, Dean could see the reflection of a scared and angry broken boy, shining up at him through stranger's eyes. "God, I'm so sorry, Sammy." His baby brother was still in there somewhere, buried alive under pain and darkness. And all because Dean hadn't been there, hadn't gotten there in time.
But then Sam turned away and when he looked back at Dean, his eyes were only empty pools of murky green. "I don't care if you're sorry, Dean. Nothing to be sorry for, bro."
This new Sam somehow found a way to smile at all the wrong times and in all the wrong ways. Like right now it was that cheery patient smile meant for confused little children, and, apparently, for Dean. "I'm grateful that you weren't there, Dean. If you'd have actually come for me, I'd still be following your orders, taking all your shit. I'd still be the bait for every trap you ever set. I'd still be the one left alone while you went charging off to save barmaids from the horrors of midnight boredom. I'd still be chasing you around like some mindless lovesick puppy. And I'd still be that worthless little boy that fucking worshipped you. Like you could really save him from bad men hiding in the dark. Like you really were some kind of superman."
Sam smirked, cold and hard, like it should hurt. "But you're not, Dean. I'm the superman that bad men fear now. You're just nothing, Dean, nothing but pretty. And you'd better be damn glad I want to keep you that way." Sam shoved him away so hard that Dean stumbled, hearing the door slam behind him as he tried to right himself.
Dean had thought that he wanted to know the answers to his questions. And he'd known the answers would be terrible. But not like this. Not like Sammy tortured day in and day out. Not like the pain he remembered from the night of the accident. Not like Sammy alone for months, starving and freezing and enduring everything, just waiting for Dean to find him, to save him.
Waiting, and never being saved.
It was like his legs refused to work and Dean just sank to the floor, his arms wrapped around his body as he sat and rocked. He could see how Sam could hate him, want to hurt him, want to use him like … like maybe they'd used him. Oh God, Sammy, please forgive me.
Dean knew that he'd fucked up the minute he'd realized his dad was dead because of him, and this just made everything all the more obvious. Dad would've found a way to save Sammy. Now, they were both gone.
He'd always thought that it would end this way, that he would be the only one left. But he hadn't thought it would all be his fault. Sam was broken and heartless because of him. He had destroyed so much of himself and the world because Dean hadn't searched hard enough, hadn't asked around enough, just hadn't done enough.
Maybe this life was a just punishment for all his failures.
Maybe he deserved this.
Maybe he deserved even less.
He'd thought he had it hard with Sam, but despite all his threats, Sam had never really hurt him as much as that night with the Demon. And Dean might hate being just a pretty thing for Sam to play with, but Sam had never really used him just to make Dean feel humiliated. Sam might have even been rough with him a lot, but he almost always tried to make Dean feel good enough to come. And at night, Sam held him in the bed they shared, held him like he was something precious, something to be protected.
Whatever it was that Dean was being pushed into, it would likely never compare to the torment that Sam had faced alone. It made Dean wonder if, somewhere deep inside that hard shell, his Sam still loved him. Even if he'd lost the sense of how to love anything.