Chapter 7

The sun was going down outside when the demon put down her last instrument and stood a few feet back from Dean, hand on her hip as she regarded him.

Dean had been wondering how it was going to end, and he raised his head with some effort to peer at the demon through his right eye - his left cheekbone was fractured, and that eye was swollen almost shut. He was a bloody mess, covered in cuts and bruises and burns, hanging from his bonds like a rag doll.

"Well, Dean, it's been fun, but it's time we headed downstairs."

The demon's black eyes were all but glittering as she extended her right hand towards him. She closed her hand almost theatrically slowly, her eyes burning into his, and he felt a corresponding crushing pressure on his neck almost like she was choking him from the inside.

It didn't hurt as much as someone wrapping their hands around his throat and actually physically choking him, but it was just as effective. His chest burned as his muscles worked reflexively, trying to expand his lungs, but he got nothing. He couldn't get any air at all, and he knew he should have been terrified, but he just wasn't. He was ready for it to be over.

So, this is it. I learned the frigging Rituale for nothing. Despite his situation, a small, fleeting smile touched the corners of his mouth. Well, it was worth it to get into Sam's pants.

It was storming again, and he looked out at the trees whipping in the wind and driving rain, punctuated by flashes of lightning and rolling thunder that shook the windows in their frames. It seemed like a better last image than looking into those bottomless black pits of eyes.

He saw two flashes of lightning before his vision started to close in at the edges. The tunnel got narrower and darker and all his pain ebbed away as his brain started to shut down, scrounging every last molecule of oxygen it could to keep him alive. His eyelids were getting heavy, and he let them fall closed.

It would've been nice to go out in a blazing fireball of glory and take a few dozen of those hellspawn with me. He would especially have liked to get this one - the one that watched Sam die - but that just wasn't in the cards.

And anyway, once he finds out what happened here, Bobby's gonna hunt this bitch down. It was a struggle to put the words together now and maintain his train of thought, but that one made Dean smile again. She doesn't have long left.

Dean was still enjoying the notion of what Bobby would do to this black-eyed bitch when the crushing pressure on his neck suddenly disappeared.

There was an almost painful sensation as the blood rushed up into his brain, and he sucked in a deep, reflexive breath which immediately started him coughing and retching. His eyes flew open and tried to focus, but it was like waking up in a dark room and it took a few seconds for his vision to come back.

When it did, he saw the demon grinning back at him. She looked like she was laughing, but he couldn't hear it over the sound of rushing blood and his racing heart pounding in his ears.

Even in his oxygen-deprived state, it was immediately obvious to Dean what she was doing. She wasn't quite ready to call it quits - she intended to draw this out, choking him mostly to death as many times as she could before he either had a stroke or she decided to end it.

"You bitch," he rasped - or at least, tried to. It didn't really sound anything like that, coming out of his bruised throat. The demon got the message, though it just seemed to make her smile wider.

"Oh, you didn't think I was just going to let it end, did you?" she laughed, genuinely amused. "I'm supposed to have you delivered by sundown, but it's not sundown just yet, sugar."

Dean could hear her now that the roar of blood in his ears was dying down and he half expected her to clap her hands with glee, she looked so pleased with herself.

He let his head fall back against the slats and stared up at the roof, ignoring the way his neck protested when he moved. Wasn't it enough that she'd inflicted all those other tortures on him already, and that there were more, worse ones waiting when he got downstairs? Couldn't she just let him go?

"It's nothing personal, Dean." She leaned in and whispered in his ear, like she was telling secrets. "I just really, really like this part." Then she stood back and extended her hand out towards him again.

Dean lost count of how many times she choked him. She would bring him right to the edge of unconsciousness, then just at the point where everything went black, she'd release the pressure and let him get his breath. She did it over and over and over again, taking him to the edge and then bringing him back, smiling and laughing the whole time.

He could hardly focus when she loosened her grip the last time, and it was hard to make out more than a shadowy silhouette in the faint twilight, but he saw it as she pulled on a pair of black leather gloves. She picked something up off the table, but she had to come all the way over to stand in front of him before he could see what she had in her hand.

It was a strand of high gauge wire, about three feet long. It wasn't quite piano wire, but it was almost as thin, and Dean let out a soft sigh. This was it. This was how it was going to end.

For once, the demon didn't say anything. She just smiled as she looped the wire around his neck so it crossed at the front of his throat, the ends wrapped around her gloved hands. She wanted to be close to watch the light go out in his eyes, but evidently didn't want to damage her meatsuit while she choked the life out of him.

The demon was strong, and the wire hurt when she pulled it tight. It cut cruelly into Dean's flesh as it choked off his air and the blood to his brain, but he didn't fight it and the black tunnel closed in fast. This time was going to be the last time, for sure, and he felt a flutter in his chest that had nothing to do with his imminent suffocation. This was it, and where he was going there was no way he was going to see Sam again.

Dean let his eyes fall closed, remembering Sam sitting across him. He was on the bed in a fleabag motel room, leaning against the bedhead with soft pillows at his back. Sam was straddling his thighs, one of those big hands resting on his bare chest as the other caressed his cheek, and Dean could feel the warmth of his smooth, hard chest press against him as he leaned in for a kiss - one of those soft, gentle ones that Sasquatch shouldn't be able to pull off…

"Dean."

Sam. He could even hear the kid's voice, and it made him smile. As last moments go, that was a nice one.

"Dean?"

God, it sounds so much like him, too…

"Dean!" There was a sharp smack on his left cheek, and his eyes flew open.

Dean realised a few things in quick succession. Firstly, the crushing pressure was gone from around his neck and he could breathe.

Second, although he was still in that Godforsaken warehouse, he wasn't tied up anymore. He was lying flat on his back on the cold concrete floor, and someone was leaning over him.

He blinked a couple of times, squinting and trying to clear the lingering fog from his vision. After a few torturously-long seconds, the looming figure started to come into focus.

"Sam." Dean's voice came out in a hoarse, rasping whisper, but the relief in it was evident. He tried to reach up to touch Sam, to see if he was real, but as soon as he moved his broken ribs exploded into agony and his arms dropped back to his sides accompanied by a grunt of pain.

"For the love of God, don't move," Sam told him, pressing down slightly on Dean's shoulder and grimacing a little himself when his hand came away bloody. He looked confused when Dean's face broke into a smile.

"Hurts too much to be a dream," Dean breathed, still smiling. The fact that he was in this much pain meant this must be real.

Sam rolled his eyes and sat back on his heels, rubbing his hand across his lips to wipe away smudges of bloody saliva from around his mouth.

"This really the time for us to be making out, Sammy…?" Dean croaked. It was a miracle he could speak at all, but he still managed to be a smartass.

"I was giving you CPR, you jackass," Sam told him, but he was smiling now too. "She choked you out."

Dean blinked and looked around, wincing as he moved his neck. He saw the demon lying on the floor nearby, motionless, and his brain suddenly kicked back into gear.

"What happened? Is she dead?" he rasped. Then, more urgently, "Where's the Colt?"

Sam held up the gun for Dean's benefit, then tucked it back into the pocket of his jacket. "Demon's not dead - I couldn't shoot her without hitting you. I had to improvise, but don't worry, she's not going anywhere."

Dean held up his right hand, and Sam helped him sit up. It enticed fresh stabs of agony from all his injuries and made his already-throbbing head start spinning too, but he did it anyway.

"You okay?" Sam asked, concerned. Dean gave him a pointed look with the eye that wasn't swollen nearly shut, holding his arm to his injured ribs.

"Right." Sam nodded, giving himself a mental head-slap. Of course he wasn't okay.

"So, what's her deal?" Dean whispered, looking over at the demon. She was about six feet away, and not moving. He squinted, trying to make out more detail with his still-blurry vision, but he could have sworn...

"Sam, is that a stake sticking out of her back?"

"Yeah." Sam shrugged, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. "Carved a quick devil's trap on the end of a broken piece of wood and stabbed her in the spine with it while she was concentrating on you. She can't move, but she can't smoke out either."

"Very sneaky, Buffy."

Sam smiled and helped Dean struggle to his feet. "I've been wanting to try that one for a while." He paused while Dean got his balance, then turned to look at the demon as he pulled the Colt out of his pocket.

"No, no, no - wait." Dean put a hand on his arm. "This one's mine."

Sam looked puzzled, but waved a hand in an 'after you' gesture. Dean took the gun and shambled a few steps closer to stand over the immobilised demon - there was indeed a piece of wood sticking out of her upper back, high between her shoulder blades. She was conscious and she glared up at him out of the corner of her eye, almost palpable waves of contempt coming off her.

That has to hurt like hell, Dean thought to himself, and a little smile played over his chapped, bloody lips.

"I told you I'd send you back to Hell, you sabotaging, mouthy bitch," he growled.

"Fine. Send me back," she spat, blood dripping from the corner of her mouth onto the concrete. "When I claw my way out again, and I will, the first thing on my to-do list will be to peel the meat from your boyfriend's bones while you watch. Then, when I'm done with -"

She was cut off mid-sentence when Dean wordlessly raised the Colt and put a round into her back, just below the stake. She lit up from the inside with that orange light, flickering over her skin in waves as her body tensed and her eyes widened in disbelief.

"For the love of God, shut up…!" Dean complained, exasperated. The body twitched once more then went still, and he sank down to sit on the cold concrete floor. Now that it was over, his legs didn't have it in them to hold him up any more.

"Thought you might wanna break out the Latin for that one," Sam observed, taking the gun when Dean offered it back to him. "You did learn it, after all."

Dean shook his head, eyes on the dead demon in front of him. "When she got outta Hell, she was gonna follow through. She and Blondie were dating."

"Wait - and they were making fun of us?" Sam said indignantly. Dean just smiled up at him from his spot beside the corpse.

By the time Sam disposed of the body in the woods outside, it had stopped raining. He went back to get Dean, who was sitting on the corner of the desk, and found all the demon's instruments were on the floor behind it like he'd swept them off the table top. Sam didn't blame him - most of them were still stained with his blood.

Sam helped him up and got his big brother's right arm around his shoulder. Dean held his other arm close to his broken ribs, and although Sam knew it had to hurt like hell, he didn't complain as they went slowly out through a small side door.

"Where the hell are we, anyway?" Dean asked, squinting against the late afternoon light as he looked around. There were a handful of old warehouse-type buildings much like the one he'd been held in, and apart from a battered old asphalt road leading away into the trees there wasn't much else to be seen.

"Abandoned industrial estate outside town," Sam replied. "This and an old sawmill were just about the only places nearby she could go without crossing the flooded bridge, so I figured she'd be here." He didn't say anything further.

"So, she told me she left you in the burning house. How did you get out?" Dean asked, after a moment of silence. It hadn't escaped his notice that Sam had a bandage over his left forearm, from just below his elbow up under his shirt sleeve. He wasn't using that arm to support Dean and he held it like it was sore.

Sam grimaced. "Yeah, she did. Local cops were coming to check on the bridges when they saw the smoke and hauled ass. They pulled me out of the house at the last second," he said. He didn't volunteer any further information, but before Dean could needle him further, they rounded the corner of the building where Sam had parked the car.

Where Dean expected to see the Impala, there was instead a beaten-up, ancient old Jeep that looked like it was older than both of them. Combined.

"So whose is this?" Dean asked, vaguely amused.

Sam flushed a little. "The cops insisted on giving me a ride into town. I raided the Impala's trunk for clothes and weapons, so I didn't need to go, but I couldn't exactly get them to bring me here. So I needed wheels that would get me back past the flood." He let Dean lean against the rear quarter panel while he got the back door open.

"Hey, you don't have to convince me," Dean told him. "I've always been of the opinion you don't steal enough cars, Sammy," he added, gritting his teeth as he started to climb up into the back seat. Sam winced and put out a hand to help, but Dean swatted it away. He struggled up into the 4x4 and lay down across the seat, pale and covered in a sheen of sweat, taking short, rapid breaths.

"You okay?" Sam asked, and Dean gave him a shaky thumbs-up.

"Will be," he croaked. "But next time I get kidnapped and tortured by demons, can you pick a rescue vehicle a little closer to the ground?"

Sam rolled his eyes as he shut the door, but he was smiling. Dean was going to be fine.

It was dark when they got back to the motel, but Dean was pleased to find the Impala waiting in the carpark where the tow truck dropped her off.

"Thought I was never going to see you again, baby," he breathed, running a hand lovingly along the generous curve of her rear end. Sam was sure there was a one-liner in there somewhere, but he was too tired to ferret it out. It had been a long day.

"I call the first shower," Dean said, as Sam shoved their door open.

"You gonna be okay by yourself?"

That got a smile from Dean. "I'd love you to come with me, Sammy, but I actually need to get clean today," he replied, with a wink, and headed into the bathroom.

His torn and bloodied boxers went straight into the bin, and he paused briefly to check out his wounds in the mirror. They hurt, and they weren't pretty, but on the whole they weren't really serious. Most of them would probably barely even leave a scar, if they were cleaned and dressed properly. It could have been much, much worse.

"I told you, sweetheart - you were terrible at it," Dean said to no-one in particular, and turned away to start the shower.

As it turned out, it was a pretty quick one. Even lukewarm, the water stung his wounds and burns and he only stayed under it long enough to rinse off most of the blood and sweat. He got out and gingerly dried off a little, then wrapped the towel around his waist with a little difficulty - it was hard with a broken hand. He got it secured, though, and had just started to push the door open when he saw Sam standing in front of the mirrored closet door by the beds.

The younger Winchester had pulled his shirt off, and was wincing as he checked out his arm in the mirror. There were fresh white bandages covering what were obviously burns over most of the surface of his upper arm and around the back of his shoulder, which was badly bruised from running into the demon's invisible wall. The point of his shoulder was obviously swollen and the skin was turning shades of blood red and port wine.

"Just in the nick of time, huh?" Dean rasped, pushing the bathroom door open.

Sam started and turned to see Dean watching him. He turned back to the mirror without a word.

"You okay…?" Dean pressed, as he shambled out into the room.

"Yeah," Sam sighed, pulling his shirt back on over the bandages. "It hurts, but the burns aren't bad and the paramedics don't think anything's broken," he replied, matter-of-factly.

Dean sat gingerly down on the end of the bed. "So you ran back in for the Colt?" he asked. Sam nodded wordlessly, deliberately avoiding Dean's eyes as he did up his buttons.

"That was stupid, Sam," Dean sighed. "You've gotta be smarter than that."

"Yeah, well, excuse me for not giving up." Sam's face was turned away from him, but Dean heard the pain in his voice.

"It's not worth your life," Dean told him, making an effort to keep his voice calm. "I made that deal so you could have one, not throw it away running into burning buildings."

"What if I don't want one? What if there's no point without you?" Sam shot back.

When Dean didn't return fire with a retort of his own, Sam turned to look at him. He was staring off into the distance, lips pursed, with a pained look on his face.

"She told me that you were in the house when it burned, you know," he said quietly.

It took a second for it to dawn on him, but as soon as Sam realised what Dean was saying, the head of steam he'd built up on his anger just evaporated. He understood a little about what it was like to lose your reason to live.

"She told me she was going to torture me to death and drag me down into the Pit, and I didn't care. If you really were in that house when it burned down and you…" Dean trailed off and took a long breath, looking down at the nondescript, gunmetal grey carpet. He couldn't quite bring himself to say the words.

"I gave up, Sam. I couldn't go through that again. If you were gone, she could do whatever she wanted to me because there was no point fighting anymore." Dean looked up to find Sam looking back with one of his patented emotional, dew-eyed expressions, and immediately looked away again. If the kid actually started crying, he didn't think he could get the words out.

"Look, I get it, okay? I understand why you're so hell-bent on saving me, and I understand why you ran back in for the Colt." He paused and took as deep a breath as his ribs would let him. "But you can't sacrifice yourself. I won't let you."

"So I'm just supposed to let you do it?" Sam asked, his voice thick.

"I don't want either one of us to make the sacrifice." Dean paused, chewing on his bottom lip, and when he continued his voice was very soft. "I don't wanna die, Sammy."

There was a pause as Sam drew in a deep breath. It seemed like he'd been waiting forever for Dean to say that. "Will you let me save you now?" he asked.

"No more burning buildings, okay?" Dean replied, with a small smile.

Sam couldn't help it - he smiled back. "Well, then you're not allowed to get kidnapped by demons again."

"Deal." Dean pushed himself up off the bed and enfolded Sam in a hug, as tight as he could manage. It felt good to have Sam's warm, firm body pressed close, and when he leaned in for a kiss Dean gave it to him, if somewhat gingerly.

"We've gotta clean these," Sam said, and touched a finger to Dean's split lower lip. He was covered in a myriad of other cuts and abrasions that were going to need attention, too.

"Way to kill the mood, Florence," Dean groaned, but permitted Sam to sit him on the bed. "Can you at least start with my back so I can lay down?" he asked, as Sam came over with a bowl of warm Dettol solution and a pile of clean gauze pads.

"I suppose you've earned a bit of R&R," Sam conceded, smiling as he sat cross-legged behind Dean on the bed. His smile faded when he saw what was in front of him.

Dean's back was a mess. Besides all the old scars, both from John and a life of hunting things with teeth and claws, new wounds literally covered the skin all the way from his lower back to his shoulders - cigarette burns, small knife wounds just deep enough to hurt, plus parallel bands of scrapes and bruises from the rough wooden slats of the bedframe. There were even splinters still embedded under the skin.

"Jesus, Dean," Sam breathed.

"Just get on with it, will you?" Dean told him, shifting uncomfortably. He didn't like people fussing over him when he was hurt - he didn't like medical attention of any kind, really, and he certainly didn't want a running commentary. "It's not exactly a picnic, sitting here with broken ribs."

Sam sighed, dipping a gauze pad into the bowl, and Dean tensed as he waited for the sting. He felt something warm and wet touch the back of his left shoulder, just where it met his neck, and winced as the antiseptic irritated one of his numerous cigarette burns. It stung like crazy for a couple of seconds, but then Sam leaned in and placed a soft, soothing kiss on the unmarked skin beside it - then a second, and then a third.

Some of the tension went out of Dean's shoulders, and Sam smiled. He placed another kiss next to the next burn before he touched it, and was pleased to see Dean's breathing stay slow and steady. The older Winchester sat still and relaxed, eyes closed, and let Sam continue cleaning his wounds, trailing gentle kisses along beside the injuries as he went through gauze pads one after another.

"So, what did you see?" Sam asked, as he dabbed at a knife wound on Dean's lower back.

"Mmm?" he murmured, as Sam laid another soft kiss on the point of his shoulder. He was really enjoying that.

Sam tossed out another square of gauze, adding it to the small, bloodied pile in the bin beside the bed. "She had you dead to rights, Dean - you all but crossed over. What was it like?"

Dean sighed, considering that for a second. "Well, it wasn't hellfire and brimstone," he said, slowly.

"So what then?" Sam raised his eyebrows, but tried not to sound surprised. "White light, angels singing…?"

Dean nearly choked, and winced when his ribs stabbed him. "You think I saw Heaven?"

Sam just shrugged. "Well, we know you couldn't have actually gone upstairs…" he said, without putting too fine a point on it. They both knew that if Dean had in fact 'crossed over', there was only one place he could possibly have ended up.

"I know," Dean admitted, as Sam got up off the bed and pulled a chair away from the table so he could sit in front of his brother and start on the rest of his wounds. "Honestly… I think it was a dream, you know? Like a Heavenly hallucination or something."

Sam nodded, dipping a fresh wad of gauze into the antiseptic. "So? What was it like?" he asked, and dabbed a little too hard at the wound in the front of Dean's right shoulder. He yelped and pulled back, shooting a glare at his baby brother.

"Sorry," Sam winced, watching as fresh, red blood started to well up.

"You're damn right!" Dean complained. That was a deep one, and it was sore.

"Oh, come on. Like that's the worst thing that's happened to you today," Sam said drily, and placed a gauze pad over the wound and taped it gently down. "Suck it up, princess." He smiled, and pressed his lips to Dean's in a soft kiss. Dean nipped at his bottom lip, catching it briefly between his teeth.

"Some Florence Nightingale you are. Do you torture all your patients?" he quipped, getting a smile from Sam.

"Only the ones I let fuck me senseless on a regular basis."

Dean had to chuckle at that. Sam placed another kiss on his collarbone, still smiling, and Dean winced as he wiped at a particularly deep cigarette burn.

"Do you reallywant to know what I saw?" he asked, after a long moment.

"Yeah," Sam told him, eyes on the cluster of burns on the skin over Dean's left pectoral muscle. He was incredibly curious as to what was in Dean's Winchester's Heaven.

"You."

"Me?" Sam looked up, eyebrows raised. He wasn't expecting that. He'd always figured it was probably full of beer, burgers and classic muscle cars draped in women of questionable morals.

Dean nodded, enjoying that look of surprise. "Yeah, just you. Your hands, your floppy frigging hair all in my face, and your lips…" Dean trailed off, remembering the warmth of Sam's skin, those kisses and soft caresses…

"I'm your Heaven," Sam said, and a smile spread slowly across his face.

"Oh God," Dean muttered, rolling his eyes. This was rapidly turning into another chick-flick moment. "Well, when you say it like that…"

"I love you too, Dean." Sam leaned forward for a kiss, and Dean gave it to him. He lay back on the bed and pulled Sam down to lay beside him, enjoying the way his baby brother's body moulded itself to his as he cuddled up close. If they couldn't break his deal, this was the kind of thing he wanted Sam to remember.

The end. :)

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