Fiction: A Moment in Time

[wiccaqueen]

Title: A Moment in Time
Author: wiccaqueen
Characters: Sam, Dean
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Spoiler for 'No Rest for the Wicked'
Disclaimer: Sam and Dean belong to their respected owners at CW! I'm just borrowing them....

This hardly more than a drabble, centred around the last scenes of the finale episode.
Just my way to deal with the emotional ending....

A Moment in Time

He was gone, just like that.  It had all happened so fast, too fast for Sam to do anything.

Yeah of course, he had been stunned by Lilith, unable to move while the hellhound leaped upon Dean and tore him to shreds, but he still felt like he should have done something. Something had happened, but Sam couldn’t explain what it was. In an instant Lilith had lost her powers and Sam had been free to move again. The triumph over her didn’t really mean much to Sam though, not when he saw his brother’s dead body lying only a few feet away. He hadn’t been able to stop the hellhounds, hadn’t able to get Dean out of his deal, and now he was here, holding his body in his arms, feeling the warmth fading away, seeing the blood dripping from the wounds, his eyes staring at him lifeless, dead.

Sam was crying now, letting the tears flow without any control. He bit his lip to stop from trembling, from shouting out loud, from doing anything, because nothing would help anymore, nothing could help Dean, because Dean was already on his way to hell.

Even though Sam couldn’t even begin to fathom what hell must be like, he had a pretty good idea that it wasn’t made of white clouds and golden gates. And just the thought of Dean being tortured in hell, over and over again, having to relieve his worst nightmares, day after day, was enough to almost make him puke his guts out.

His mind was racing, trying somehow to figure out a way to stop this. To stop what already was over and done with. He replayed the last seconds in his mind, hearing Dean’s shouts still ringing in his ears and tried desperately to find a way out of this, but he couldn’t come up with a solution. But Sam just couldn’t accept defeat. Not yet, not when it came so sudden and not when it deprived him of what was most precious to him, the only thing that really mattered in his life: his beloved brother. Although he was the younger one and had never sworn to Dad to look out for him, it was his job too. With Jess gone and with the crazy life they lived, day in and day out, Dean was all he could hold on to. Everything that was stable and good and precious to him. With Dean gone what would become of him now?

He thought about the powers he’d had in the moment when he defeated Lilith. The origin of that power was still hidden to him, something Sam didn’t really want to look into too closely. He didn’t want to explore them either, fearing of what he might turn into in the end. But at the same time, he tried with all his strength to gather those powers again, clenching the dead body of his brother, praying, wishing, and trying desperately to force life in to the body again. Dean had to live! He just had to! He had to wake up and breathe! Sam looked at his chest, right about where his heart was. No movement was to be seen. His heart had truly stopped pumping. Although he had the proof right here in his arms, he didn’t want to accept it, not yet.

Tears swell up again and ran down his cheeks. He allowed himself to weep, not just letting the tears spill over his face, not just letting every muscle in his body tremble, it was more than that. His whole being, his soul or whatever it was that was keeping him alive was weeping over Dean. He was full of grief, because there was nothing else left, there was nothing, because Dean had taking everything with him when he had gone to hell.

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Dean woke to a terrible pain. His body was bruised and broken, his wounds burned as though he was being torched alive. His hands and feet were bound tight, just tight enough to make him feel the burning pain of his wrists and ankles. Everywhere he looked he saw nothing, but blood and darkness. Death was all around him, the scent of burnt flesh, and the screams of souls being tortured. Hell, as it now turned out, was truly formed out of bones and blood, like he heard in a legend somewhere once upon a time.

Dark clouds surrounded him, carrying the distinct scent of sulfur and death with them. There was no end to it, everything seemed to be eternal. There was no time, no space, no dimension of any sort he could decipher. He saw his body, felt the pain, but somehow he knew that he couldn’t be his body feeling the actual pain, because his body was lying dead somewhere. Was Sam still holding on to it?

Never before in his life had Dean been so scared as in this very moment. The pain sharp, run through his body, again and again. He couldn’t see what was causing it, but it felt like his back was being torn apart, like every inch of his skin was being ripped open by sharp, pointy nails to let the blood drip out slowly. It was torture, but then that’s what hell is all about. Like a demon once told him: Hell is, well it’s like hell.

He screamed, but there was no one to hear him, no one to answer his calls. He was desperate, as desperate as he had never been in his life before, as desperate as pride had never let him become. But now there was nothing else left, so he could be desperate. He shouted out for somebody to help him, and then he shouted out for Sam. The only name he seemed to remember, the only name that seemed to weigh more than his heart. The only name that had ever meant anything to him.

But Sam didn’t answer, Sam wasn’t here, Sam couldn’t help him. He was alone.