Title: He's the Boy King for a Reason

Rating: PG-13

Word Count: 1912 (plus 506 for the bonus story)

Beta: The wonderful and awesome etrix over on livejournal, without whom this would be a much poorer story.

Disclaimer: Sadly, they aren't mine; I'm just playing with them for a while.

Spoilers/Warning: Season Three

Summary: Sam Winchester is the Boy King. And he's not happy when that title is abruptly very literal.

Notes: Written for pathsforme as part of the AntiChristmas Fic Exchange over at the LJ community sammessiah. The prompt was "Boy King Sam gets turned into a child."

Sam Winchester, the Boy King of Hell, sighed as he stared out at the fires of Hell.

Despite what some people said the fires were not a metaphor, not usually. They burned and they smoldered, and only demons or their rulers could pass through them unharmed. Right now, Sam didn't want to risk stepping into them. He was the Boy King, yes, but that title had never been more apt than now.

Dean Winchester, Sam's brother and closest advisor, stopped next to him. "You alright, Sammy?"

Sammy. Dean was the only being in the universe who would still call him Sammy. He was the only being who was allowed to call him Sammy. Mostly because Sam just couldn't stop him.

"I'm fine, Dean," Sam said. "Just a bit… put out by this."

Dean snorted because he would never laugh at his brother's predicament, and put his hand on his brother's shoulder. "I dunno, Sammy. I'd be a bit more than "put out" by this if it was me."

"You'd get out the holy water if we knew who did this. Or the acid, if it wasn't a demon."

"Yeah. Or we could pull out the old C4."

"No. No C4. Not after what happened last time."

Dean sighed in disappointment. Sam chuckled. It had actually been his idea to use C4 to punish the demons. Neither of them had known that C4 would react so impressively with the energy in the pits. It had taken them months to fix everything and track down all the escaped souls.

"Yeah, well, it was a good explosion, right?"

Sam laughed. "Yeah, it was." He stopped laughing after a second and sighed. "It won't help us solve this."

"No," Dean said. "Sammy… we're going to need help. You can't even reach the top shelf anymore, I don't know where to begin researching, and you know there's a chance your mind will soon match the rest of you." Dean pulled Sam close to him. Sam leaned into Dean's comforting frame. They both froze as they realized what they had done.

"We'll break this curse before then," Sam said. He started to pout. He didn't want to tell anyone about this. He looked up at Dean to make sure Dean hadn't seen him.

Dean's lip quivered suspiciously. "What if we don't?"

Sam gave in and went back to pouting. "Alright. Fine. We'll tell Ruby. But only Ruby. And I'll make you Regent while I… while I head out on a research trip. That should cover things."

"Research trip?"

"Why else would you stay behind?" Sam asked.

Dean nodded, acknowledging the truth in that. Unthinking, he reached down to pick Sam up, then froze in embarrassed realization. Sam rolled his eyes. They did have to get back to the palace after all, and the only way to do that was to go through the fire. Sam, as the twenty-five year old Boy King, was immune to them. Sam, and the six year old body he currently had, very possibly wasn't.

"I got you, Sammy," Dean said as he tucked Sam close to his body. Once again, Dean would carry him though the flames easily.

Ruby would not stop laughing. Ruby was going to choke if she didn't stop laughing. Ruby was going to die if she didn't stop laughing. Sam would take her knife and stab her if she didn't stop laughing. He could totally reach her thigh if he wanted to. He was sure of it.

"Enough, Ruby," Sam said. It wasn't nearly as intimidating as usual, since his voice was normally an octave and a half lower, but it got the job done.

"Sorry, Sam, but you're a kid! Five years old?"

"Or six," Dean said. Once again, his lips twitched. "I'm not really sure, and we won't know unless the spell starts taking his memories."

Ruby narrowed her eyes. "You need to stop it before then," she said.

"I know," Sam said. He sat back in his throne. It was normally the perfect size, but now it towered over him, and his feet didn't even reach the edge of the seat. He refused, he absolutely refused to pout about that. "The problem is I need to research the spell, see how to reverse it, and then do it. I need help with that. And Dean needs to stay visible, so the rest of the demons don't get any bright ideas."

"Sam… are you even the Boy King anymore?"

"We don't know." Dean admitted. "We're not going to test it, either."

Ruby looked worried. "We have to," she said. "If Sam here is just a normal kid, he can't stay here."

"Sammy was never a normal kid," Dean said. "Even at this age, he had the demon blood in his system."

"Yeah," Sam said. "And, well…"

"Still," Ruby said. "Do you want to be the one to explain to a six year old Sam Winchester that he's in Hell, because he's the ruler of Hell? It'd be much easier…"

"I need to use the library here," Sam interrupted. "The palace has the most exten- exten- largest occult library in existence." He frowned slightly. He couldn't' seem to manage the word extensive properly.

Ruby twitched. Sam narrowed his eyes at her in an intimidating glare. Apparently, trying to look intimidating was the wrong thing to do.

Sam decided to take the high road and ignore Ruby's attack of the giggles. He talked to Dean instead. "To be honest, I'm not sure where to start. This isn't a simple de-ageing spell."

Dean snorted. "A simple de-ageing spell shouldn't work on you, Sammy."

"I know, Dean," Sam snapped.

Automatically, Dean reached out and ruffled Sam's hair. Sam ignored it.

"I can try to figure out who cast the spell," Ruby said. "That will help us figure out what it is."

"Yeah, sure, go ahead," Sam said. "I don't think you'll find anything, though."

"Of course I will," she smirked. "I'm the best damn witch there is."

Sam rolled his eyes and sighed. "Get to it, then," he said and shooed her away. She bowed, smirk still firmly in place, then vanished.

Sam and Dean exchanged glances. "Time to see if I still have my powers," Sam muttered. He stood up on his throne. He still felt uncomfortably dwarfed by it, even as he gathered his power together.

*I am going to be researching something critically important, and am not to be disturbed. Lord Dean Winchester is in charge until I am finished. Treat his orders as you would mine.*

Dean shook his head hard. "I hate it when you do that," he said.

"Well, at least it worked," Sam said. He pumped his fist into the air, and froze. "Umm…

Dean chuckled. "I won't tell anyone, Sammy."

Sam groaned as he telekinetically lifted another book off the top shelf. He'd been locked in the library for nearly a week now and, every time he had to pick out a new book, he was only reminded of how just a week ago, he could've picked these books up right off the shelf. He'd been so tall once: taller than Dean, taller than Dad. Ruby had been miniscule next to him. He wiped the suspicious sting from his eyes. He was just tired, that's all. He was just tired.

At least he still seemed to have all his abilities, even if Ruby hadn't been able to find out who had done this to him.

Sam paused as he turned the page. "The Transformations of the Rulers of Hell," he read quietly. "Found it!"

He practically climbed onto the table to read the book, he was so excited. He'd found it and soon he would fix it and everything would go back to the way it should be; he'd be big and grown up again. Except this wasn't a cure.

His frown grew the more he read. His fists clenched. When he was done, the only thing that kept him from losing his temper was the fact that he was surrounded by rare and important books. Even so, the chair across from him flew across the room. "SON OF A BITCH!" he yelled. He winced almost as soon as he did so. It just didn't sound right in a child's voice. With an angry growl but cute, he unlocked the door and teleported away.

He needed to destroy something.

Dean threw the papers down on his desk in disgust. How did Sam do it? Sure, Dean had been right there by his side every day, watching Sam made decisions, acting as a sounding board for his ideas, but Dean hadn't had to do anything so it had been easy to zone out. Sam had made it seem easy, but Sam had always been more detail orientated. Man! He missed Sam.

He looked up. Suddenly, he could feel Sammy. His brother was down in the large room they'd set up as a gym; a place they could go when dealing with demons got to be too much.

Dean contemplated the stack of paperwork that he really should deal with. Then he snorted and walked out of the office and down to the gym. He walked in as Sam was reducing a table to rubble. Three piles in various parts of the room showed it wasn't the first.

Sam gave a wild yell as he spun around. Dean blinked at him. His eyes were golden yellow, which just looked wrong on a six year old.

"Dude, I take it you found out what's going on?"

Sam stalked towards another table. He stopped a safe distance away and took a deep breath. "It's not a spell," he said. "It's because of Hell." He laughed, a little hysterically. "Hell, Dean."

Dean frowned. "Sammy?"

Sam closed his eyes. "We're in Hell, Dean, and part of Hell is being tormented for turning against God."

"Yeah, Sammy, I know. I got chapter and verse on that when I died."

Sam flinched. Dean winced. He hated how, even now, Sam still felt guilty for being unable to stop Dean's death. "But I was never tormented by Hell. I was chosen to rule before I even got here. Didn't have to fight my way up, just moved into the palace. So… it's part of the package. If we don't suffer beforehand, Hell makes us suffer after. Which means we transform, sometimes."

"How long?"

"I'm stuck like this until Hell decides that I've been tormented enough," Sam spat. He stamped his foot and pouted until he remember that he was still the King of Hell. "Probably another month. Maybe more."

Dean cleared his throat trying to be solemn. Still he remembered that face. The last time he'd seen it, Sam had been disappointed that there were no more Lucky Charms. "A little kid, though? Pretty random, dude."

"Not really," Sam said as he glared at the table. "The previous ruler was sometimes called the Dragon Queen. She literally turned into a dragon."

"Did she breathe flames?" Dean asked.

"YES!" Sam kicked the table into shards, breath hitching. "At least a d-dragon is cool and awe-inspiring. Me? I'm the Boy King." He sniffed hard and closed his eyes, fighting with himself until it was clear that he just couldn't take it anymore.

"I hate being six!" he wailed before he threw himself at his big brother.

Dean rocked him gently, and let him cry himself out. Actually, he'd kind of missed this.

And now for the bonus! This prompt was "why you never let Sam & Dean have explosives to punish the underlings in Hell."

"No."

"Aw, come on, Sammy. Don't you want to know what will happen? We never used C4 when we were topside," Dean looked at Sam giving him his best "innocent enthusiasm look". They were relaxing in their common room after Sam spent the entire day yelling at some of the most stupid demons they'd encountered, which was saying a lot.

"Because it's dangerous."

"Dude. Sammy. You're the Boy King. I'm your right hand man. And I want to see what C4 would do. It's not like we'll be using Holy Water."

"And I suppose Alastair does deserve it…" Sam mused. Dean smirked ferally. Sam had a serious grudge against Alastair. Not that Dean blamed him… or discouraged him.

"Exactly. We can just plant it in his workroom, and that's it."

Sam frowned. "How much C4 did you manage to get?"

Dean struggled to keep from grinning. He'd convinced Sam, now all he had to do was put his plan into action. "Not much. Just enough to make a bang. A big bang." Probably a really big bang. And we'll get to see what happens."

"Alright," Sam said finally. "Let's do it, then."

Dean grinned at his brother happily and picked up the pack that contained the C4 and the stuff he needed to set it up.

They headed down to Alastair's workshop. Luckily, he wasn't there. It was easy to set it up right under the torturer's "tool" table.

They walked out and into one of the gloomy corridors where they could watch the entrance without being seen. When Alastair returned, Sam threw him a glare before following Dean out of range.

"Ready?" Sam asked once they knew from the incongruously cheerful humming that Alastair was staying for a while.

"Of course," Dean said. He held up the button to set off the detonator. "On three. One, two…"

"Three," Sam chorused with him as he pressed the button.

The explosion was much bigger then they'd expected. Walls shook. Ceilings collapsed. Demons howled by the hundreds and the Hellhounds joined in just like the dogs they weren't. There was screeching and wailing and even some insane cackling. Flames shot out of the room, filled the corridors with their light and their heat. And still, Hell trembled.

Once the noise faded and the dust cleared, they both looked up.

"Oh," Sam said. "Maybe we shouldn't have done that."

Dean nodded dumbly. "It wasn't that much C4."

"I think the Hellfire made it worse."

Worse was a good word. Probably an understatement, but a good word.

There was a huge, gaping hole in the torturer's level and Dean didn't even want to know what it was going to take to fix the mess. And find all the cells that probably weren't on their racks anymore. Or in the holding pens, or anywhere near where they were supposed to be.

Dean looked up in shock. He could practically see daylight from here.

"Awesome," Dean said in satisfaction.

Sam glared at him. "We are never using explosives in Hell again."