Title: The Edge

Rating: PG

Length: Drabble (424 words)

Pairings: Sam/Ruby (could also be read as implied Sam/Dean)

Era: Post-season 03 to pre-season 04

Warnings: Implied past character death (and "Wincest," if you read it as such, but it wasn't intended)

Summary: She's the one who gives you a purpose.

Note: Written for LJ community - wordsmeetwings; prompt - 'Sam/Ruby - Walking the edge'

Every night, you dream the same thing.

You can't escape it, no matter how hard you try. No matter how many bottles of alcohol you consume. No matter how long you keep yourself from sleep, in the hopes that exhaustion will overcome the dream. No matter what you do to try and forget, you can't.

The dream still comes every single night.

You watch as your whole world is torn apart. You watch, helpless, as he screams and bleeds and twists in pain. You watch and you scream, you plead for it to stop - to end - but it doesn't.

It never stops. It never ends.

Not until he is dead.

Not until she has taken everything from you.

And then you wake up, only to know that he is gone. That the dream was so much more - a memory you cannot escape - and that it will no doubt return to haunt you once again, the very next time you close your eyes.

You think about ending it. You think about just throwing it all away - because what, exactly, is left for you anymore? You cannot bring the world back to how it should be - you cannot bring him back - and that edge is looking more and more inviting with every day that passes.

So when you killed that demon last week, who cares if you were a little too reckless? And if you went after an entire nest of vampires with barely any sleep and no plan at all, who cares if you were, perhaps, tempting Fate just a little too much?

You don't care about anything anymore, so why should anyone care about you?

Until she comes back.

And she gives you a purpose.

"I can't bring Dean back. But I can get you something else that you want."

And when she tells you she can give you Lilith, and you see the white-eyed bitch (and the blood-screams-dead) from your dreams, you realize that this purpose will do.

You don't even pause as you think, briefly, over his warning.

"It's only gonna kill you."

Because it doesn't matter anymore.

You have been searching for death for so long ... have been walking along that edge - that high, exhilarating, and oh-so-inviting edge - for so long, that to step back from it actually feels kind of nice.

It feels nice to see the deadly edge fade away as you step back into her embrace.

Even if her touch only leads to a different sort of edge.

-FINITE-