Title: Beyond All Repair [8/?]
Author: alakewood
Warnings: AU. Slash (Dean/Adam). Angst.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~970
Summary: Dean finally comes clean to Adam about his deal. (This is one of the only plot points I remember from my mental planning way back then.)
Disclaimer: As always, I own nothing.
A/N: Quite a few people (or one person posting anonymously multiple times) requested a continuation of this WIP that kind of faded off into the background for me a year and a half ago. I've been pretty entangled with the J2 side of fandom and a lot of my old SPN WIPs fell by the wayside. I should be working on my Big Bang right now, but my muse refuses to cooperate. So, here's this.

oxoxo

Adam woke to a dark room and rolled over, tangling the sheet around his legs as he reached for Dean's side of the bed and found it cold. He stretched and leaned up on his elbows, catching sight of Dean standing naked in front of the open curtains, looking out the window, gorgeous and unashamed. "Hey," he said quietly, pulling the blankets towards himself. "Come back to bed."

Dean glanced over his shoulder before slowly turning away from the window and crossing the room, sitting on the edge of the mattress and sliding beneath the sheet. "Go back to sleep," he told Adam, voice gravelly as he settled himself along Adam's side.

"I will," Adam said, rolling over to wrap his arm around Dean's waist. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Just thinking."

"I can see that," Adam huffed. "About what?"

Dean shifted further down his pillow and pulled the comforter up over the both of them. "There's something else I haven't told you."

"Are you leading a double-life with a secret wife and kids in Iowa or something?"

Dean scoffed and shook his head. "No. Um. A few months ago... Sam and I were on this job and he got taken by the demon that killed my mom."

"Sam- is he okay?"

"Yeah," Dean said, nodding, remembering. "Now, he is."

"What happened?" Rolling further onto his side, Adam braced his head on his hand, elbow bent and buried in his pillow.

"A lot. Short story, though, is... Sam, uh, Sam died."

Shocked, Adam gripped Dean's arm tight. "You just said-"

"I did. And he's fine. But I- to get him back, I had to- I had to make this deal."

Adam wasn't following, but there was a lot about Dean's life as a hunter he probably didn't understand. "What kind of a deal?"

"The same kind Dad made."

"But-" It was apparent there was more than a lot that he was missing.

Dean laughed mirthlessly and rolled onto his back, pulling free of Adam's hold. "Man. Winchesters are just... we're fucked, man. Seriously. I've almost died more times than I can count. Should've for sure at least twice. The last time, Dad made a deal – his life for mine. And that's what I did for Sam. But I got lucky."

"Lucky? How can you say-"

"The demon gave me a year. Dad got minutes."

Adam rolled away from Dean, needing the distance to try to take it all in. "So... if you got a year... How much time do you have left?"

"Like... seven months."

"And there's no way to stop it?"

"Not without something happening to Sam. And he's- as much shit as we've been through, he's all-" Dean bit at his lip and rubbed his hands over his face. "I can't risk it. He's my brother and it's my job to protect him."

"Even if that means you have to die? Dean... that's crazy."

"Growing up, Sammy's all I had. I'm not turning my back on him, not with everything that's happened to him and not when I'm already living on borrowed time."

"Dean."

"I don't expect you to understand-"

"Good," Adam said, sitting up and scooting away from Dean, "'cause I don't."

"If you grew up like we did, maybe it'd make sense."

"So you're just gonna leave and do what?"

"Sam and me, we've still got work to do. There's still stuff out there that needs to be killed. There's still time to figure out-"

"Take me with you," Adam blurted. "You and Sam can teach me how to- how to hunt and I can help."

Dean shook his head and sat up, leaning back against the headboard. "No. You've gotta stay with your mom, graduate, go to college. Do all the things you planned to do before you ever met me."

"That's bullshit. You know that, right?" It was baffling, how they managed to end up in this place after the way their night had gone. He could still feel the dull soreness in his muscles, the empty ache inside of him, from the three rounds they went when they got back to the room after their stop at the tattoo parlor.

Dean shrugged. "Doesn't matter. You can't come with me. And there's no way I'm letting you get dragged into the kind of life me and Sam were raised into. It's not something you choose."

Adam huffed a laugh. "Why not? You and Sam-"

"We never had a choice. After our mom was killed, Dad tried to make sense of what happened, of what he saw. It changed him." He sighed. "You've got a really great life here. Maybe it doesn't seem like it all the time, but this is better. You just gotta trust me. You don't want to be a hunter. You don't want to live like me and Sam."

Adam gave a halfhearted shrug and laid back down, turning onto his stomach and crossing his arms beneath his pillow to keep himself from reaching out to Dean. "Whatever."

"I'm just trying to be honest with you. I'll try to make it back to see you before..." he trailed off. "But if I don't, I want you to know why." Dean rolled back over onto his side, settled a hand on the small of Adam's back beneath the blankets. "I'm sorry."

Adam stared back at Dean for a long moment before closing his eyes against the sight of his brother limned in hazy pink light that filtered in through the open curtains. "Me, too."