Something I wrote very fast while The Boss was at a meeting. Set vaguely post 7.17

"Dean - "

"Sam - no." We were parked at a deserted picnic area, just finishing eating our make-do breakfast of cold leftover pizza and warm leftover soda pop. Sam wanted to drive to Duluth because some scrap of a bad dream had him thinking RoboSam might've done something lowdown and dirty there, back when we'd been separated, only I wasn't having any of it. "If nothing bad is going on there now, we don't need to go back and check anything just because you think you remember something RoboSam might've done."

"But Dean -"

"Sam - what happened the last time we went poking around your half-memories? Remember? You got a faceful of hell. I'm not doing it again."

"But Dean - I don't have the wall to worry about anymore. No hallucinations. Cas took care of that."

"Cas only said he'd get you back on your feet. You're not 100 percent yet. I'm not risking it."

"Dean - please. I need to know."

He gave me the sad little brother eyes, the 'this is so awful only you can fix it for me' eyes.

The 'guaranteed to make Dean cave' eyes.

Aaaarrrrrgh.

"All right. We make it fast. No hunting around for anything we don't find right off. In and out. I say 'go', we go. Got it?"

"Yeah, I got it." He gave me his 'you're the best big brother in the whole world' smile. "Thanks, Dean."

I grumbled a 'you're welcome' as something farther down the picnic area got my attention. A black dog, a huge black dog was snuffling and peeing his way down the line of garbage cans and picnic benches. It wasn't our usual kind of black dog, it wasn't supernatural. It looked like a Newfoundland or all-black St. Bernard or something. I didn't see any humans but us around.

He caught sight of us, or maybe he smelled the pizza, and he loped towards us.

"Hey, fella." I said. "You all by yourself here?"

"Dean - don't encourage it." Sam said.

"Why not?"

"Why not? Because it's big enough to rip your face off if it wants to."

Our shaggy visitor immediately proved Sam wrong by dropping flat onto the ground and wagging his tail. I tossed him the pizza crust I hadn't eaten and he slobbered it up in one big chomp then looked up like another one wouldn't be a bad idea.

"Sorry, I'm all out." I told him. "You might try Sammy there, though."

"I'm not giving him my pizza." Sam said. "If we feed he'll just stick around begging. He needs to go home."

The dog looked from me to Sam and then back again.

"Sorry, boy. Looks like Sammy's gonna be stingy."

Sammy huffed at me and gave me a dirty look. The dog looked at Sam and when Sam looked back at him, the dog let out what could only be described as a heavy sigh and dropped his head between his front paws. He snorted a snuffle and raised his sad eyes up to Sam.

"No. No pizza."

When Sam turned away, the dog sat up and rested his huge head on Sam's knee, looking up at him with those sad, sad eyes again and snuffling a whimper like he hadn't eaten in a year and might never ever eat again if Sam didn't do something about it right now.

"All right, fine." Sam gave in, and a lot sooner than I thought he would. He tossed his crust and the dog caught it and laid down at Sam's feet to crunch his way through it.

"'Don't feed it, Dean. He'll just keep begging'." I snarked facetiously at Sam. He shot me another dirty look and stood up from the table to throw out our trash. The dog stood up too and followed him expectantly to the garbage can.

"No, I'm not giving you anything else." Sam told the dog, who sat down, then laid down, then put his head between his paws and raised his eyes to Sam.

His sad, sad eyes.

"Ugh. All right." Sam tossed out the final piece of crust. "There? Happy?"

Very happy, if the way the dog wagged his tail as he chewed his prize was any indication.

Just then a blue minivan pulled into the picnic area. A woman got out and our doggie friend jumped up, barking and running towards her.

"T-Bone! There you are! How did you get out again?" She crouched down to grab T-Bone in a squeeze when he was close enough. "You bad dog!"

T-Bone didn't seem to give a rat's ass that he might be in trouble. He snuffled and huffed and pranced and seemed deliriously happy to be with his person again. The woman stood up after a minute and came toward us. T-Bone followed along.

"Hi! I hope my dog didn't bother you. He keeps breaking down the fence and getting out."

"No bother at all." I told her and smiled. "My brother kept feeding him pizza though. I hope that's OK."

"You fed him first." Little Brother whined. I ignored him.

"Oh - did he give you the eyes?" She asked Sam, with a laugh. "Nobody can resist the eyes. He can get just about anything out of just about anybody with that look. Anyway - thanks for finding him." Then she went back to her minivan and opened the door for T-Bone then got in after him and drove away.

"Pfft." Sam complained. "'Nobody can resist that look'. " He 'pfft' again then turned to me. "So - Dean? Duluth? Can we go now? Please?"

And he gave me the sad, sad eyes.

"All right. Get in the car. Let's go."

T-Bone had nothing on my brother.

The End