He stands on the edge and watch as the whole world burns. Dean has long ago shut out the screaming, numb with the enormity of it all, blind to the flames that eat dry scrubland and broken cities alike. The sky is red, bleeding, clouds darkened with the smoke and still Dean watches, casts his eyes over the burning orange lights on the horizon, wonders vaguely about the sea.
He doesn't know how many survived, other countries, other people, maybe they escaped the flames. There's still time for him, roads that have burned already, black now, leading away from the destruction, but Dean doesn't want any of it now. It's over, and he is done.
"Hey." Sam's voice is cracked, a broken whisper that he shouldn't be able to hear over the crackle of the flames. But he knows that voice, it haunts his nightmares and all his waking dreams now, and he turns as surely as if Sam had grabbed him. He's smaller somehow, deflated, shoulders slumped and crooked, and in his mind’s eye Dean still sees the awkward teenager with his books and his sulking.
Maybe if Dad had been stricter, or if Mum hadn't died...
Sam can't even look at the fire, keeps his eyes fixed on the ground, on his hands, not looking at Dean, or the sky or the world he's destroyed. Dean wants to shake him, to haul him around and force him to look, to see what he has done, but his hands just settle on Sam's shoulders, rub in response to the shaking, soothe him the only way that Dean knows how.
"I'm sorry." Sam's face is streaked with tears when he finally looks Dean in the eye, broken and exhausted. Dean just shakes his head, scrubs at the cut on Sam's cheek because it seems that even Lucifer himself still bleeds. He can't blame Sam, because this is bigger than them, bigger than all of them, and Sam just wasn't strong enough. It's broken them, and Dean wishes he could have protected Sam, curled his body around his brother’s like he could when they were kids, fought off the whole damn world with just his fists. But he didn't, couldn't, and that wasn't Sam's fault at all.
The flames bounce off the Impala's paintwork, and Dean catches sight of himself reflected in her glass, turns away from the empty stare that colours his eyes and motions for Sam to climb in. The roads before them are blacked from the smoke, the world around them filled with shadows and smouldering wastelands, but Sam's asleep in the passenger seat and the Impala's purring away beneath him, and Dean wonders if it was always meant to end like this.
Supernatural, Dean & Sam, forgiveness didn't mean forgetting everything
He doesn't know how many survived, other countries, other people, maybe they escaped the flames. There's still time for him, roads that have burned already, black now, leading away from the destruction, but Dean doesn't want any of it now. It's over, and he is done.
"Hey." Sam's voice is cracked, a broken whisper that he shouldn't be able to hear over the crackle of the flames. But he knows that voice, it haunts his nightmares and all his waking dreams now, and he turns as surely as if Sam had grabbed him. He's smaller somehow, deflated, shoulders slumped and crooked, and in his mind’s eye Dean still sees the awkward teenager with his books and his sulking.
Maybe if Dad had been stricter, or if Mum hadn't died...
Sam can't even look at the fire, keeps his eyes fixed on the ground, on his hands, not looking at Dean, or the sky or the world he's destroyed. Dean wants to shake him, to haul him around and force him to look, to see what he has done, but his hands just settle on Sam's shoulders, rub in response to the shaking, soothe him the only way that Dean knows how.
"I'm sorry." Sam's face is streaked with tears when he finally looks Dean in the eye, broken and exhausted. Dean just shakes his head, scrubs at the cut on Sam's cheek because it seems that even Lucifer himself still bleeds. He can't blame Sam, because this is bigger than them, bigger than all of them, and Sam just wasn't strong enough. It's broken them, and Dean wishes he could have protected Sam, curled his body around his brother’s like he could when they were kids, fought off the whole damn world with just his fists. But he didn't, couldn't, and that wasn't Sam's fault at all.
The flames bounce off the Impala's paintwork, and Dean catches sight of himself reflected in her glass, turns away from the empty stare that colours his eyes and motions for Sam to climb in. The roads before them are blacked from the smoke, the world around them filled with shadows and smouldering wastelands, but Sam's asleep in the passenger seat and the Impala's purring away beneath him, and Dean wonders if it was always meant to end like this.