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amberdreamsCharacters: Dean, Bobby, Sam
Rating: PG
Word count: 1771
Warnings: Season 7 spoilers ahoy. And schmoop - 'tis the nature of the beast.
Summary: Sometimes it's hard to know whether you are awake or dreaming when you are a Winchester.
Written for
laurificus's silverbullets prompt "on the bright side".Monty Python knew a thing or two about life (and death)
Dean doesn’t know where he is.
After a few moments – time seems sluggish, unmeasurable – he thinks perhaps he’s dreaming.
Maybe he has a fever, or Sam’s given him morphine for some injury or other, because whatever is going on, it’s pretty trippy, man.
First there’s this baby, plump and happy, gurgling and waving its chubby arms and legs in that aimless way that babies do. (Like Sammy had). Then suddenly it is writhing, wriggling and rolling around like a butterball because it is somehow giving birth to another baby, like some sort of parody of a Russian doll, but all fleshy and naked. In that weird impossible way of dreams, the image is at the same time realistic, believable, fascinating and obscene, in equal measures.
Then the dream morphs, as dreams tend to do, and he’s running in a marathon (like he was Sam for Crissakes), except it’s on this beach that seems to stretch forever with no sign of the sea. The crowd of runners around him thin out then disappear all together, leaving him alone. The sand is firm underfoot, and his feet are bare and it’s fucking freezing. Clearly this is not California. Probably somewhere grim and northern that looks pretty in photos but is always cold, even in summer.
Dean knows dreams are supposed to have meanings, but he hasn’t even the faintest idea what any of that is supposed to signify.
A firm hand falls on his shoulder, and he lets the touch bring him out of sleep with a huge sense of relief. He might have been to Hell and back, but weird babies giving birth in conjunction with healthy exercise are just too freaky, even for him.
“Wake up, son, you’re scaring the dog with all that whimpering.” The hand gives his shoulder a little shake, lets it go.
Dean sits up, indignant. “Hey! I don’t whimper!” he protests, rubbing one hand over his face to properly wake himself up. He’s on the sofa in Bobby’s study, and it is dark outside. Rain is peppering the glass of the bay window, sounding like someone’s standing outside throwing handfuls of gravel at the house. Maybe it’s even hail. A fire burns in the grate, the wood popping occasionally. He can hear Bobby pottering around in the kitchen, reassuring domestic noises that momentarily have Dean relaxing back into the sagging cushions of the ancient sofa, before something starts to niggle at the back of his mind.
“What dog?” He says, picking up on Bobby’s wake up call, a puzzled frown crossing his face. ‘You got a new dog, Bobby?”
The old hunter sticks his head round the partition wall, wooden spoon in one hand, wiping the other on his Kiss the Cook apron. “What do you mean a new dog, ya idjit? It’s the same old Rumsvelt, of course. Anyhow, he’s back outside now, doing his job. I keep tellin’ you boys, he’s a guard dog, not a house pet.”
“Riiiiight.” Dean draws the word out, hesitates. Something is wrong with Bobby’s statement, but he can’t quite put his finger on it. Baffled, he puts the feeling to one side in favour of more important matters.
“Where’s Sam, anyway?” Dean asks, glancing back out at the moonlit rain.
Bobby disappears back into the kitchen and Dean follows; perches his butt on the old wooden table while the old man busies himself with his baking. He’s going at the floury mix like it has offended his mother’s honour, with the big bowl tucked into the crook of one sinewy arm.
“And are you making…apple pie?”
“You’re chock full of questions tonight, aren’t you? Sam’s driven Karen into town for supplies, and yes, genius, I’m makin’ pie.”
“Wait, what – did you say Sam’s with Karen?” Dean is on his feet now, backing away on full alert with his heart beating too fast. Something is wrong, very wrong, with this scenario.
Bobby stares at him, then puts the bowl down slowly, a thoughtful expression on his familiar craggy features that makes Dean’s heart twist as he remembers.
Bobby is dead.
“You’re not my Dean, are you?” This Bobby says, his voice musing and curious. “I can see it now.”
The old man doesn’t make any move to advance on Dean, who has slipped readily into combat mode, all tensed up ready for fight or flight, whichever seems most appropriate. Instead Bobby (or whoever/whatever this was) simply sits down at the kitchen table and sighs.
“It’s ok, son, you are not in any danger here. In fact, you couldn’t be safer.”
“What do you mean? Who are you and what is going on?” Dean fights to keep his voice even but thinks it might just have come out panicked. The wall behind him feels solid enough, the wooden doorframe rough under his fingertips; hell, the kitchen even smells real. Smells good, in fact, better than it had most of the time in real life, back before Dick Roman burned Bobby’s house down. Before that slimy son of a bitch put a bullet through the real Bobby’s brain.
“Fuck you,” Dean grates out without thinking. “You’re not my father.”
It is like an echo of the past. An echo of that same bitter phrase, and accompanying it, that exact same tight feeling in his chest when the expression on this Bobby’s face freezes in exactly the same way the real Bobby’s had done all those months ago when those four killer words had passed Dean’s lips. It makes Dean want to apologise all over again, to take it back – as if each syllable had been made of sharpened steel, ready to slice deep into the old man’s heart.
It’s not real, it’s not real, he’s not real was the litany running through Dean’s head, but it wasn’t helping any. Purely instinctively, he blurted out the words he should have said to his Bobby, way back then.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean… I should never have said that. I loved Dad, I really did, but you, you were the one who was there for me and Sam when Dad wasn’t, when he couldn’t leave his hunting to care for us.
You were so right when you told me family don’t end with blood, and I … you meant more to me than I can…I ain’t got the words, Bobby.”
The old hunter just sits there, silent, and Dean can feel his legs start to tremble. His grip on the door frame seems like it’s the only thing that’s stopping him from crumpling in a heap on the floor. Sweat is breaking out on his forehead, tricking down between his shoulder blades. He tugs at the suddenly constricting neck of his t shirt with a hand that won’t stop shaking.
“What…what’s wrong with me?”
“You shouldn’t be here, Dean.” Sam’s voice comes from behind him, startling him, and he whirls around, too fast for his swimming vision to cope with it seems, as the next minute he is being lowered gently to the floor, his brother’s arms around him.
“Not a freaking baby, Sam,” Dean protests weakly, but Sam just smiles in that annoyingly superior yet tolerant way of his. This Sam looks good, relaxed and happy and healthy in a way that hurts Dean’s heart for his Sammy.
Bobby crouches down next to them, puts a cool hand on Dean’s hot forehead, his touch gentle.
“Sam’s right, you shouldn’t be here.”
Finally realisation rocks Dean’s increasingly febrile brain.
“This is your heaven, isn’t it? Man, you chose to spend eternity with me and Sammy, as well as Karen? That’s..that’s…,” Dean chokes up thinking about what it is. If there is a tear in his eye, it’s totally down to being feverish, or dead, or whatever the hell mess it is that he is in now.
“That’s how it should be, Dean. I wanted my family round me, and that’s what I got. Karen, and the two boys I loved like my own.”
Sam is grinning at him now, that affectionate my brother is an oblivious, emotionally retarded idiot look, and to be honest, Bobby’s expression is pretty similar. Suddenly Dean wishes this is where he’s supposed to be. Staying here with the two people he loves most in the world seems pretty damned attractive, or it would have, if he wasn’t feeling so woozy and ill. If there wasn't a real live brother waiting for him somewhere out there.
“So, what, I’m dead or dying or something in the real world and ended up here?” he asks, wishing that the room would stop swaying like a hammock in the wind, as he is starting to feel a bit queasy as well as overheated. “Maybe I could stay. Rest here a bit…,” he stops himself as both Sam and Bobby are now sharing a knowing and sympathetic look, and he can’t bear it.
“Okay, okay, stupid idea.”
“I think your real body is calling you back, Dean,” Bobby says, and damn if he doesn’t sound regretful, even though Dean knows the old man has his own version of Dean living there already.
“And look on the bright side. If you like this heaven, then that is more’n likely what you’ll be getting when it’s your time, eh?”
Dean looks up at the old familiar face leaning over him, tries to memorise every crease and wrinkle, the twinkle in those pale hazel eyes, saying his goodbyes all over again.
“We - I miss you, Bobby.” He says, and closes his eyes.
“Go home, ya idjit,” Bobby says, a world of gruff affection in his voice. “Sam’s waiting for you.”
x0x0x0x
There was a moment of nothingness, then a wave of pain swept over him, and he gave an involuntary moan.
“Dean! Dean, you with me?”
Large hands were patting at him, checking him over and he cautiously opened his eyes a crack. Correction. He opened one eye; his left seemed to be gummed shut and was refusing to cooperate. Still, one eye was enough to make out Sam’s giant face hovering over him, too close to focus on properly but still gloriously Sam.
“Geeze, fuck Sammy, personal space,” Dean mumbled, and was rewarded with a huge grin swiftly covered up with a frown of exasperation. His Sam was older, more worn looking than Bobby’s Sam had been, but Dean wouldn’t have him any other way.
“I had a weird dream.” Dean said, as Sam (his Sam, fuck yeah!) put grabby hands all over him, manhandling him up onto unsteady feet. He could hear the smile was back on Sam’s face as his brother replied.
“Oh yeah? Clowns or midgets?”
