Thunderstorms, Rain and Kashmir

It's raining, and Kashmir plays as Dean drives.

Sam is asleep with his head resting backwards on the seat, his mouth slightly open and his hair falling in his face. It makes him look all of seventeen again, and Dean feels a pang as he remembers those days, when all they had to worry about was moving. They were so innocent then, especially Sam, despite everything that they knew, and oh so naive.

The angry spirit they've been hunting is finally at rest, duly salted and burned by yours truly. After a long shower each they checked out, and Dean has been driving ever since. He checks the dashboard clock - it's half past one.

A flash of lightning briefly lights up the road in front of him, and once upon a time he might have appreciated the eerie beauty of it but today he can't. There are other things to appreciate. Also, his old philosophy that lightning is beautiful and strong and powerful kind of melted away four years ago, when his baby brother jumped into Satan's room to save the world. When he'd regained enough of himself to be able to get out of bed each morning, he realized that compared to his Sammy, lightning was weak and feeble and not so beautiful after all. Nothing was braver, or stronger, or more beautiful, than his little brother, his hero.

And Sam doesn't know it but he was Ben's hero too, Dean's Ben who could easily have looked up to him but instead idolized Sam, because every night at bedtime Dean would tell him a story about his little brother who'd made some mistakes but was the bravest, strongest person Dean knew. And Ben would listen in awe, and sometimes ask, and sometimes wish he could meet Sam. And Dean would wish it too, more for himself than Ben, because the ache in his heart, that all-encompassing black hole, would never go away unless he had his Sam back again.

The song ends, and Dean rewinds the tape. It's his favorite Zeppelin song, and he can happily listen to it for hours.

Oh let the sun beat down upon my face
Stars to fill my dreams
I am a traveler of both time and space
To be where I have been
Sit with elders of this gentle race
The world has seldom seen
Talk of days for which they sit and wait
And all will be revealed...

Sam mutters something in his sleep and shifts a little, away from the window with the rain beating down on it. Sammy has never liked storms, says they make him feel all weird and strange and just so sad inside, and Dean doesn't understand (storms have always fascinated him) but he tries to help. He used to tuck Sam in every night when it was stormy, right up till he left for Stanford, and for a couple of years afterwards. He only stopped after his deal, reasoning that Sam had to learn to cope on his own, because in a bit Dean wouldn't be there anymore. And even after Dean came back from Hell Sam never asked for him during a storm, and it broke his heart a little but he accepted it as part of Sam's somewhat belated growing-up.

Talk and songs in tongues of lilting grace
Sounds caress my ears
Not a word I heard could I relate
The story was quite clear
Oh oh, oh oh, ohhhh oh...

Another flash of lightning followed by thunder drowns out the song for a second, but Dean almost doesn't notice. He is far away, in another state, on another road, in another time and another life, where there had been no Sammy, and despite Lisa and Ben it had all been so bleak and hollow. For the first few months Dean had raised the middle finger to his so-called machismo and cried; he'd cried and cried and cried until he was spent, and then he'd become empty, with Sam's voice echoing in his head and Sam's face burned into his eyelids and the memory of Sam jumping playing like a movie in his mind. And Lisa had tried; God bless her, she'd tried. And Dean appreciated it, and loved her that much more for it, but nothing could fix him, nothing but Sammy. He did try to act more normal though, for her sake and Ben's.

And now he has Sam back again, but he is not okay. He is sick and hurt and struggling to accomplish something so much bigger than anything he's ever done, and he's suffering for it but refuses to give up. It angers Dean sometimes because Sammy doesn't seem to care at all about his health, just carries on and lives it one day at a time. But he doesn't expect anything less, because this is Sam, and he's made some mistakes but to Dean he is still a hero, and nothing will ever change that.

Oh I been flyin'... mama, ain't no denyin'...
I've been flyin', ain't no denyin', no denyin'...

Sam shifts again and Dean turns the volume down a bit, afraid of waking his brother. This piece of cake job has been hard on Sam due to his health, but he's been pushing himself hard, too hard, and now he's exhausted. He fell asleep the moment Dean began driving at five p.m., and has been asleep ever since. Dean doesn't mind because it means Sammy can rest, and rest is always a good thing.

The kid tries so hard, Dean knows. The trials aren't easy on him but he takes it silently and stoically, and doesn't once complain because this is his job, and his chance to redeem himself to the world, to put things right. Dean forgave him for the demon blood and Ruby and starting the Apocalypse a long time ago, but no one else did and Sam still blames himself sometimes. There are days when the guilt becomes too much and the kid can't handle it and Dean hears his heavy breathing at night and knows he is crying. It happens very rarely and so Dean pretends he doesn't know, because Sam deserves some space. But Sam knows Dean knows, he reads it in Dean's forgiving smile and his jokes and wisecracks and his light touch on his arm that tells him it's all right, and for all that Sam is grateful.

All I see turns to brown
As the sun burns the ground
And my eyes fill with sand
As I scan this wasted land
Tryin' to find, tryin' to find where I been

Dean blinks as he remembers Sam might not make it. He's just a man after all, and there's only so much he can take. And Dean cannot lose him again. He'll die, he knows. The pain and grief and guilt will kill him. The excruciating ache from four years back is still fresh, too fresh. He can't lose his Sammy. Drinking down concentrated sulfuric acid would be less painful.

He glances at Sam, the kid's profile momentarily outlined against a flash of lightning. He looks so young and innocent, and there is no vestige of pain or sadness or brokenness on that face, and Dean finds himself wishing it could stay like this forever. Just Sam and him, driving down lonely roads at night, with Kashmir blaring through the speakers and Dean's free hand running through Sam's hair (when did it get there anyway? Dean doesn't really know or care). But the universe hates them and he can't fathom why, they try so hard and all they get in return is pain, so much pain and loss. It would be much kinder to let them die permanently for once, without anyone resurrecting them for selfish purposes. Oh, if only!

Oh pilot of the storm that leaves no trace
Like thoughts inside a dream
Heed the path that led me to that place, yellow desert stream
My Shangri-La beneath the summer moon, I will return again
Sure as the dust that floats high in June
When movin' through Kashmir...

Dean's attention wanders to the song for a minute. Absently he thinks of how nice Kashmir sounds, and how wonderful it would be to be able to go somewhere else, a far-off country where no one could find them. It would be just him and Sam, and they'd be happy for the rest of their lives. Maybe someday, he promises himself, after everything is over. He'll wrap Sam in several blankets and bundle him inside the Impala, and they'll get on a ship to nowhere and leave forever. Someplace exotic and beautiful. Madagascar, Brazil, Spain, New Zealand... or perhaps somewhere isolated. Maybe northern Pakistan... Kashmir does sound great.

He shakes his head to rid himself of the thoughts. One day at a time, he reminds himself. All else can come later. Besides, it's silly. They'd need passports and papers etc... Details, he thinks, that can be taken care of. He tries not to think of it but he can't help clinging to that small shred of hope, that little daydream. If Sam knew what he was thinking he'd have an aneurysm laughing. Dean smiles a little at the thought.

Oh father of the four winds, fill my sails
Across the sea of years
With no provision but an open face
Along the straits of fear...

It scares him, the idea of losing Sam, fills him with a terror so extreme it chills his blood and paralyzes his body, causes anguish to seep through every pore of his skin. Too many times he's been alone, lost too much and too often. So many people, so many lives, and they are no more. It hurts, but he can take that pain. What he can never bear is existing in a world with no Sam. Too many times. He just can't do it anymore. If anything happens to Sam this time around he is going to kill himself, and he is completely serious when he promises himself this. No Sam, therefore no Dean. End of story.

Of course, Sam will kill him for even suggesting it, but he doesn't care. He knows Sam feels the exact same way about losing him, doesn't need Sam to tell him to know what it was like for the kid while Dean was in Purgatory. Just because Sam didn't look for him doesn't mean it didn't hurt, didn't kill him from the inside out. So it isn't really surprising that Sam latched on to Amelia the same way Dean did to Lisa. It wasn't so much love as it was just needing someone to hold on to. And so what if Sam hadn't looked for him? Sure, it hurt, still feels a little not okay sometimes, but Dean thinks he understands. He understands hopelessness, he understands despair and the agony of not knowing. He understands pain so excruciating that you can't bring yourself to get out of bed in the morning, can't make yourself live another second because it hurts so bad. He knows what it's like to be undone and so broken that you just want to close your eyes and stop existing. So when he puts himself in Sam's shoes, he kind of gets why Sam didn't look, because for the first time in his life, Sam gave up, not on Dean, but on hope. Hope has kind of let them down a lot. And it's understandable because Sam had no one left, there was no one there to hold him and tell him it was okay, and Dean's heart clenches at the thought of Sam just surviving each day one at a time, with no outlet for his grief and pain, and no one for him to talk to.

When I'm on, when I'm on my way, yeah
When I see, when I see the way, you stay...
Yeah

But this time it won't happen. Dean won't let it. He is Sam's big brother, his protector and rock, and Sam is his baby, his little hero, his North Star. They are each other's life, each other's very being, and nothing can change that. And this time Dean determines that neither angels nor demons will separate them, or else Dean Winchester will be well and truly pissed. And when Dean Winchester is pissed then everything with any sense of self-preservation would do well to stay away. Silly things like dying won't stop him from wreaking the worst kind of havoc upon whichever unfortunate creature has triggered his wrath.

Sam shifts again and his head falls onto Dean's shoulder. The familiar weight causes something to flare inside him, something strong and warm and a lot like hope and - dare he say such a cheesy thing? - love of the strongest, most unbreakable kind. Despite everything that happens he is still Sammy's protector and Sammy is still his baby brother and that will never change.

"Dean?" murmurs Sam, and Dean, jarred from his thoughts, smiles softly at the puppy dog eyes blinking at him.

"Yeah, Sammy?"

"I don't like the storm," Sam states, his voice still hazy with sleep. Dean knows that if it wasn't for his exhaustion and still half-asleep state Sam would never have admitted it, and that makes it all the more endearing.

So he pulls over and reaches into the backseat, and when he finds the blanket he wastes no time in draping it over Sam, as best as he can manage with the kid's head still on his shoulder. Sam burrows into the extra warmth almost unconsciously, and before long he is asleep again. Dean smiles again at his sleeping baby brother, and begins driving again.

Ooh ooh, yeah yeah, ooh ooh, yeah yeah, when I'm down
Ooh ooh, yeah yeah, ooh ooh, yeah yeah, when I'm down
So down
Ooh baby, ooh my baby, let me take you there
Let me take you there
Let me take you there...

Dean risks diverting his attention from the road for a moment, and presses a small kiss to Sam's head. The world is not okay, their lives are messed up, and Sam is not fine, but he is here, with Dean and not without, and that's all that matters.

It's raining, and Kashmir plays as Dean drives, and Sam sleeps peacefully on his shoulder where he belongs forever, and despite everything, Dean is happy.

Work on One Winchester, Two Winchester, Three Winchester is suspended until exams are over - which is June 19th. I'm sorry, but I've got to focus on what's more important right now... which, it pains me to admit, is exams. However, since oneshots are a lot easier to work on, I might put up a few of those.

Reviews are nice. This fic is made even better if you listen to Led Zeppelin's Kashmir while sitting in a dark room (or car) and imagining rain. Or, you know, if you're lucky, it actually is raining and you don't have to imagine it. Or you know, just try to imagine the ambiance Dean is in.

Also, I seem to have a fixation with Sam and blankets... the idea's just too cute, ya know? And apparently the showmakers agree - we get Sam-in-a-blanket in this week's episode :D

Which, by the way. Was so cute. Sick!Delirious!Sam and Worried!Awesome!Dean. THANK YOU KRIPKE YOU AMAZING MAN. This literally made my entire week. It might even get me through my Bio and Chem exams next week. *cries at the thought of all that studying coming up*

Enough of babbling, I haven't shut up since like 8 AM, and it's 5 PM. It's probably the shit-tons of caffeine on an empty stomach.

-Peace x