A Good Jest (joke's on you)
Oct. 5th, 2016 03:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amberdreamsMy 
spn_cinema fic - oh boy, I struggled with this one, and it's unbetaed so apologies in advance! LOL
Title: A Good Jest (joke's on you)
Author or Artist:
amberdreams
Movie Prompt: Beau Geste
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG13
Word Count or Media: ~6300
Summary:In a strange twist, a completed case and a snowstorm in Minnesota lead Sam and Dean to the Algerian desert in the middle of a deadly siege.
Notes: Warnings: Apparent/temporary character death. This fic bears only the sketchiest resemblance to the Gary Cooper movie. (Which might be just as well as I watched it when researching for this and it was pretty bad!)
It had been a relatively simple case, but unfortunately more time consuming than they’d anticipated. Dean lowered at the heavy, yellow-bellied sky, knowing it was already too late to get far, snow tyres or not. Ice crystals carried on the north-easterly wind stung his cheeks; the cold air seeped into his frown, freezing it on his face as the temperature plummeted.
Damn, came from Sam, a solid presence, blocking the warmth from the bonfire blazing behind them. Dean shivered. He guessed Sam was realising what Dean already knew – that these first flakes were just harbingers of the coming blizzard that was going to trap them here in bumfuck-nowhere, Minnesota, for god knows how long. For a brief moment Dean couldn’t even remember the name of the town, though really there was no excuse for forgetting. Only in Minnesota would anyone name a town Goose, especially when it was only a few miles down the road from Blackduck. What was it with these strange northerners with their round smiling faces and their weird town names? At least he hadn’t forgotten the route back to the motel from the backwoods where they’d finally made the kill. After one last glare at the offending weather front, he decided they should be able to make it back to Goose’s lone motel before the worst of the snow hit.
“C’mon, Sammy.”
Dean grabbed the empty gas can and shouldered his duffel, and the two Winchesters jogged for the Impala, leaving the body of the last of the three werewolves to burn down to ashes unsupervised. Once the snow came, the remains would be buried anyway, no point in hanging around here. As it was, even in the Impala they barely outran the storm to arrive safely back at their motel. Snow whitened the blacktop in front of them, Baby’s wipers on full only just preventing a blanket of white forming over the windshield. By the time they were pulling into the parking lot, Dean’s eyes ached from straining to see his way through the mesmerising swirl of snowflakes. Like waking up hung over to find the TV still on and no channel playing, he thought, as he brought Baby to a halt as close to their room as he could manage in the growing drifts.
Sam went straight to the trunk, bringing out the shovels with a smug flourish that was almost lost to Dean’s view in a flurry of snow. Dean jostled shoulders with Sam in a fight to get indoors first, both of them shaking a layer of snow onto the surprisingly thick carpet. Dean had to admit, the Norseman was a pretty nice motel, one of the better ones they’d stayed in. Apart from the weird-ass décor – a lot of purple and yellow everywhere, which he supposed was to be expected given their location – it was clean, the towels were thick, and large enough to wrap round a gigantor like Sam, and, being Minnesota, the heating was top notch. The place even smelled nice, kind of like lemon with a hint of something spicy. Which reminded Dean (or rather his stomach) of an important fact. Namely that their motel was next to a diner, and there was a Target only a couple of hundred yards down the road where they could stock up on beer after filling their bellies.
So yeah, there were worse places to be stuck, but Dean wasn’t going to say any of that out loud. Not when he had complaining to do and a reputation as resident grump to uphold.
“North Minnesota winters, man. Why the fuck did we agreed to take this stupid case anyway? Nobody sensible lives this far north. The place is full of stupidly-nice Vikings, gross fish and nothing much else.”
“And werewolves,” Sam added in that annoyingly reasonable tone he liked to use when he wanted to point out something obvious Dean was missing.
“Yeah well, they’re ex-werewolves now, so there is that.”
There was a pause as both brothers looked mournfully into the empty cupboards over the microwave and came to the same realisation. They were definitely going to have to venture out again. Sam sighed heavily and zipped up his soaked jacket.
“Supplies?”
Dean nodded and echoed. “Supplies.”
It was harder than either of them expected to reach the Target. Although they were wrapped in every layer of clothing available to them, the Minnesota cold was biting, and the snow was already lying a foot deep. Luckily one of Dean’s stupidly nice Vikings called Annika, who was on the motel’s reception that evening, somehow spotted them through the swirling snow and growing gloom. She rushed out to intercept them before they collapsed and died an ignominious death trapped in a snowdrift in the parking lot. She insisted on loaning them a couple of huge stay-puft-marshmallow-man jackets complete with those charming earflap hats to top off the traditional look. Dean grumbled all the way round Target’s blessedly snow-free aisles, but finally acknowledged on their return trudge through what was now more than a foot and a half of snow, that Annika’s niceness had probably been a lifesaver, If only because it meant he’d gotten his beer and the half of jack safely back to the motel room.
“Don’t you forget to take your shovels with you to the diner, boys,” Annika called out through the growing gloom as they ventured past reception again after dumping their supplies. “Snow ploughs won’t reach this end of town for a while yet.” Dean shrugged, but Sam made the effort to go back for the shovels, and once again, Dean was forced to admit Annika (and Sam) had been right, when another foot or so fell in the time it took for them to chomp their way through the diner’s special of the day.
“This ain’t half bad,” Dean said through a mouthful of tater-tots and calling the server over to order another portion. “What’s it called again?”
“Hotdish,” said the matronly woman, whose label told them she and her ample bosom was called Eloise. Dean nodded. “Yeah, Eloise, I know it’s the hot dish, but what’s it called?” Eloise’s smile took on a slightly strained quality but luckily for Dean, Sam was ready to step in.
“Dean, the dish is called hotdish, it’s a Minnesota thing, okay?”
Dean looked from one to the other then shrugged again. “Whatever,” he concluded, “it’s really awesome, so who cares what it’s called.”
So awesome, in fact, that Dean didn’t take much notice when Sam engaged Eloise in a conversation about the weather, and was only marginally listening when she confirmed what Annika had said, that the snow ploughs cover a large area, so Goose tends to be towards the end of their rounds.
“The end being…?” Sam asked.
“Oh, probably a week to ten days,” Eloise said. Dean almost choked on the last tater-tot.
Annika waved at them in a disgustingly cheery manner as she watched them digging their way into their room on their return from the diner. “I know it’s not that cold, boys, but it’s always good to be prepared, yanno?” and Dean gritted his teeth.
“Ten days, Sammy. This place is going to drive me stir crazy!”
Sam patted his back in a consoling manner and Dean yelped. Sam’s hand had dislodged a thick slab of snow that had evidently been masquerading as part of his hat and which now slid in a cold wet mass down the back of his collar.
“Sorry, man,” Sam said in a tone that was far too amused to be genuinely apologetic, and Dean promised silently to make sure his little brother woke up with an icicle or two between the sheets tomorrow morning. Vengeance, after all, was a dish best served cold…Dean sniggered a little until he noticed Sam staring with narrowed eyes. Tiredness washed over him suddenly, and he yawned, wincing when his jaw cracked audibly. They’d been on the go since leaving Kansas the previous day – no, it was more like two days now, thanks to those inconveniently wily werewolves – and Dean’s body was calling a time-out.
Sam called dibs on the shower and Dean conceded without complaint. “Knock yourself out,” he mumbled, shucking off his wet jeans before collapsing face first onto the top of the bed nearest the door. He was asleep before Sam closed the bathroom door.
Sam emerged from the shower chased by a billow of steam only to find Dean crashed on top of the covers, his face buried in the pillow. Dean had managed to peel off his wet jeans and boots and strip down to worn t-shirt and boxers, but must have flaked out before he’d managed to pull back the quilt. Sam rolled his eyes. Why Dean still insisted on taking the lion’s share of the driving when he knew they had a hunt ahead of them that was likely to mean hours without any sleep – well, it was beyond Sam’s ken. The end result was Dean was exhausted, while Sam was still too wired from the adrenaline rush of the hunt to think about sleeping yet.
He manhandled Dean’s comatose body; knowing Dean wouldn’t be woken by anything less than another apocalypse. He managed to free the coverlet and pulled it across his brother. The heating in the motel was pretty good, but Sam could feel a lingering chill in the air nonetheless. Dean would thank him in the morning. Sam drew the thermal-lined drapes before pulling on a pair of sweat pants and a threadbare t-shirt. The allure of the books he’d brought from the Bunker was stronger than the call of bed and sleep, so Sam sat down at the small table and took a slim, leather-bound volume from the top of the pile.
He flipped it open and smiled. It was a journal of some sort, dog-eared and stained, but the handwriting was a bold cursive, written in English and appeared to be legible. It would make a change from the cramped mediaeval Latin in the last volume he’d attempted to translate. He stretched out his legs, propping his feet up on the other chair and made himself comfortable.
He flipped open the journal at the first page and began to read.
He screws up his eyes against the glare of the desert sun. He swallows, suppressing a cough. His throat is constricted, as scratchy and sandy as the bare land that stretches as far as he can see, all the way to the heat-distorted horizon. At his side his big brother is keeping up a running commentary of woe that ranges from the ever-present sand flies to the blister on his left heel. Sam knows what Dean’s doing, and at any other time he’d have been grateful, but right now Sam’s too weary, hot and thirsty to be distracted by Dean’s gallant efforts at distraction. Sweat soaks through his uniform; Sam can smell it, his own and Dean’s, and all he can think is that this is water they can’t afford to lose.
He tips back his khaki-covered tepi, wipes his forehead and quickly replaces the hat, even though the band is tight like iron round his head. It’s too hot to go without protection for long, so with a sigh Sam tries to ignore the headache that’s building like a thunderstorm inside his over-heated skull.
Heat mounts as the sun nears its zenith, and the air is heavy and stifling. Sam’s head nods, his eyelids drooping until sweat trickles into his eyes, stinging him back into wakefulness. The moisture being wasted reminds him again how thirsty he is, a fact he’s been trying to ignore since the Tuareg attack had put an abrupt halt to Renault’s ill thought out mutiny. Sam’s thoughts waver like a desert mirage and for a brief moment the desert fort, together with its ramparts populated with the dead and wounded, dissolves into snow, and an incongruous cold wind chases chilled fingers down his spine.
He shivers and stares over to where Dean’s fallen silent. His brother’s position mirrors Sam’s – slumped at the base of a crenellation, rifle loose across his body while he grabs a moment of shut-eye in between Tuareg attacks. Sam blinks away another image that’s threatening to superimpose itself over Fort Zinderman. It’s an image that feels familiar, somehow; of Dean in too-skimpy smalls, spread out on a comfortable bed in a cramped, carpeted room. It’s discomforting and strange, and doesn’t fit with the reality of the here and now. Unsettled, Sam touches a finger to the cloth badge sewn into his uniform over his heart to ground himself in the present. The gesture seems to work, dispels his momentary confusion.
Honour and loyalty. Valour and discipline. The mottos of the French Foreign Legion. The Winchesters had always had the first three in abundance, and accepted the last when necessary, but it’s at times like these that Sam finds himself pondering how the hell they had gotten themselves into this situation. It’s a rhetorical question, because Sam knows the answer. Of course he does, this odd feeling is merely the effects of the heat, no doubt. He and Dean are here thanks to a stolen sapphire, an act inextricably tangled with issues of honour, and loyalty. So it isn’t surprising this was where they’ve ended up, stateless and friendless, calling the French Foreign Legion their fatherland. The fact that Sam can’t quite recall the exact steps he took to get here is irrelevant.
Flies buzz around the dead where Sergeant Markoff propped them up, to make the fort appear manned. It might be working, at least to a degree, unless the Arabs are just holding off their next attack until the heat of noon is over. As if thinking about the sergeant conjured him up, Sam sees the sun glint on the brass badge on a navy kepi. It’s Markoff climbing back up to the parapet, back from whatever he’s been doing in the bowels of the fort. Searching through their meagre kit for the sapphire, probably, Sam thinks. Good luck to him. The sergeant sits down opposite Sam, leaning back against the stained wall, his legs sprawling casual and loose as if this is some sort of picnic instead of a bloody siege. Sam shifts, uncomfortable under Markoff’s calculating stare. Except he realises after a few seconds that Markoff isn’t staring at him. No: Markoff is looking past Sam and is watching Dean as he sleeps, and that isn’t creepy at all.
Anger flares in Sam’s chest. The sergeant thinks he knows all about the Winchester brothers, has categorised them as common thieves. Markoff believes the sapphire is stashed away somewhere in this fort. In fact, Sam doesn’t know where the damn jewel is, and he’s not sure Dean knows either. That is the weird thing about this whole situation. Sam remembers a lot, but not enough to make any of it feel right.
Sam remembers being in the country house where their family lived, though he can’t quite recall its location. When he tries, the information dissolves and distorts like ink on wet paper. Sam can picture a scene – it’s vivid at the center but the edges are in shadow... He and Dean are standing in the oak paneled room with Aunt Patricia and the others, gathered round in anticipation. Finally they are going to see the fabled jewel that is the foundation of the family’s fortune; then the lights go out and in the darkness the sapphire is spirited away, the velvet lined box empty when the lights come back on. Sam can even recall the smell of the room, beeswax polish mixing with the light flowery scent of Aunt Patricia’s perfume, though he can’t bring to mind her face. Later that evening Dean had left a note, claiming he’d stolen the jewel, but everything after that is foggy. Sam can’t trace the thread of logic that had brought them both to Algeria, to this besieged fort in the middle of the desert. Sam thinks Dean might be a lot of other things but he’s no thief. None of this makes any sense. It’s like he’s been given a few pages of script about their lives with Aunt Patricia but the rest of the story is missing. He can’t remember growing up, or going to school or college, even though he was sure all those things had happened. The details are beyond his grasp, running through his fingers like the water his thirst won’t allow him to stop thinking about. It’s disturbing, and if Markoff with his dangerous pale eyes hadn’t been there, Sam would have shaken Dean awake to ask if he felt the same disconnect.
Sam doesn’t wake his brother. Instead, he stays alert, watching Markoff watching Dean and waiting for something to happen – whether it’s relief from the siege by the Legion or the next Tuareg attack. All the while Sam can’t shake the feeling that this is not where they are supposed to be.
Less than an hour later the point is moot and the bullets are flying again. Markoff’s running from one emplacement to another with a manic grin on his weathered face. He fires at the Arabs from behind the shield of each dead comrade, trying to seem like a dozen men. Sam narrows his eyes against the sandstorm the Tuareg horses are kicking up as they descend the loose dunes towards the fort and fires methodically. In his peripheral vision he’s aware that Dean’s in the next embrasure, doing the same.
The fine sand gets everywhere, carried on the super-heated Saharan winds, and Sam can feel it gritting between his teeth.
Renault is down, then Voisin. Now there’s only Sam, Dean, Rasinoff up the tower, and Markoff, and Sam knows it’s just a matter of time. Even if Major Beaujolais got the message asking for help and was on his way, relief is likely to come too late. Sam shoots, reloads, and shoots again, making every bullet count. Sweat runs into his eyes, he blinks it away, no time to raise a hand to wipe his face. Through the firing and whine of bullets, Sam hears Markoff’s order to fetch more ammunition just as he realises he’s used his last bullet. He nods and runs for the steps, taking them two and three at a time.
Arms full of wooden ammunition boxes, Sam races back to the parapet, ignoring Rasinoff’s high pitched scream as a lucky shot sends the little weasel toppling from his high perch in the tower. Sam never liked the man so it’s easy to ignore the sickening crunch of the body hitting the hard earth behind him. Sam’s focus is honed in on the scene that greets him on the parapet. The Tuareg have fallen silent; indeed, for Sam the whole desert is holding its hot breath, suspending the moment. Because Dean is lying on his back, face pale and eyes closed and Markoff is kneeling over him, pawing at Dean’s uniform with bloody hands.
Ammunition boxes drop unheeded at his feet and Sam strides forward, taut as a bowstring ready to snap. Only to halt, vibrating with anger, in the face of Markoff’s gun, cocked and pointing at his face.
“Take your fucking hands off my brother,” Sam said, his voice even and expressionless. Behind him on the ramparts someone he cares less about wheezes and dies on a rattling exhale. Sam doesn’t even blink. Dean’s still breathing, and that’s all that matters.
Markoff is smiling; he thinks the gun gives him the advantage, that the threat of bodily harm or death cedes him control of the situation. He couldn’t be more wrong.
“Your brother, hey?” Markoff muses, never taking his pale blue gaze off Sam’s face. Sam, on the other hand, is looking at Dean. He’s minutely aware of every laboured breath his brother takes. He watches the thin trickle of blood glistening as it runs down Dean’s chin to drip silently on the dusty ground, sees the glint in Dean’s half open eye and knows Dean is focussed on him, in the same way he’s focussed on Dean. Always is, always will be.
“I knew there was something off about you two, that you were more than the friends you pretended to be. Still, there’s no point in you both dying now, is there? Just tell me where the sapphire is and I…”
Sam never finds out what Markoff intended to offer him, not that it is important. While the Sergeant’s attention is firmly fixed on Sam, Dean finds reserves from somewhere and makes his move. Dean rolls his body hard as he can into the back of Markoff’s legs, unbalancing the sergeant, who staggers, cursing. Sam’s heart swells with pride in his big brother even while he moves, fast as a striking rattlesnake, to take advantage of the distraction Dean’s provided. His knife slides between Markoff’s ribs so easily, punching up through muscle and tissue and into the heart. The sergeant doesn’t even have time to squeeze the trigger of his gun. Markoff’s heart beats once, vibrating down the metal into Sam’s hand, then Sam’s yanking out the blade in a rush of blood, warm even over the desert heat as it flows out of Markoff’s body so eagerly. It’s as if even his blood is seeking to escape the taint of the Sergeant’s dark twisted soul.
Sam doesn’t care about that, or that the Tuareg might recommence their attack at any moment. He shoves Markoff’s body aside and falls to his knees. His kneecaps crack audibly as they hit the ground next to Dean, and Dean, the utter idiot, actually winces on Sam’s behalf.
“Easy, Tiger,” Dean says, or rather rasps, because his voice sounds like he’s sandpapering wood with his vocal chords, and Sam has to lean in close to hear him. Sam doesn’t hesitate, he gathers Dean into his arms, cradling Dean’s head with one hand to settle his brother more comfortably into his shoulder. It makes no sense, but Sam knows part of him has been here before. Although it’s impossible, he’s seen Dean die too many times before, and that part of him knows this is bad. Stubbornly ignoring the obvious, unwilling to face precedents set in a past that doesn’t match the script they are living, Sam the eternal kid brother tries to ignore that there is no coming back from injuries like these.
“It’s ok, Dean, I’ve got you. Where’re you hit? C’mon, I’ll get you patched up, we’ll be fine.”
“Don’t think you can plug these holes, Sammy,” Dean says. His blood is obscenely bright on his white teeth, but his green eyes are dark with pain. “What the fuck are we doing here anyway? I can’t…remember…”
Dean’s breath is nothing but a gentle whisper against Sam’s cheek. Sam shudders and grips Dean tighter. This is all wrong. Dean’s touch should score Sam’s flesh with the abrasive potency of a sirocco; his big brother is a force of nature and should never be still—but Sam can’t stop Dean trickling through his fingers like grains of sand, no matter how tightly he closes his arms round Dean’s body.
Sam knows the exact moment of Dean’s death; he’s felt this too many times before to mistake it now. The way Dean’s body seems to gain mass and weigh heavier than his one eighty pounds, the way those green eyes dull to the matt sheen of pebbles, the slackness of that mobile mouth. It’s intimate and horrifying and Sam is disintegrating in a maelstrom of memories of grief that can’t possibly have happened.
The sound of a bugle jolts Sam out of a threatening fugue state. He can’t leave Dean here, as if his brother mattered as little as all the other dead legionnaires littering the parapet, but he can’t carry Dean with him into the desert. Besides, Sam knows at some instinctual level that this time, it’s important to give Dean a proper hunter’s funeral. He doesn’t stop to wonder what a hunter might be, or why it matters so much. The company of Legionnaires who had arrived to relieve the siege of Fort Zinderman wouldn’t hang around outside forever. If he’s going to give Dean the send off his brother deserves, he doesn’t have much time.
He gathers Dean up in his arms and carries him down the steps, oblivious to the way his legs tremble and his lungs refuse to expand because Dean is dead, Dean isn’t breathing, and Sam just wants to shut down and stop but he can’t. Not yet.
The bugle sounds again, its jauntiness jarring in the desert silence, but it spurs Sam on. He lays Dean on one of the bunks, overturns a few of the other empty beds that will never be filled again and stacks them round Dean. Oil from the lamps will make the perfect accelerant, and Sam even finds a sack of salt in the mess, which he scatters like snow. For a second he glimpses another scene, with real snow not salt that is a foot deep, glittering like diamonds in moonlight, then it’s gone, and he’s lighting Dean up, watching the flames take hold of dry wood and dusty blankets and pale bloody flesh with a whoosh that sucks the oxygen from the room.
But that’s okay, because Sam really doesn’t need it any more.
Dean woke up when he died.
Which wasn’t as strange as it sounded, especially as he’d done it before. This time was more instantaneous than previous occasions, and he was infinitely thankful there was no digging involved, or Crowley standing over him talking about moons and invitations to form a demonic bromance.
Although he was evidently and very much not dead, Dean couldn’t help passing shaking hands over his torso, checking for bullet holes that weren’t there. He was also fucking freezing, which was novel after the last few weeks. Except no, that wasn’t right. He couldn’t have just spent weeks or months in a frigging Algerian desert because he remembered – didn’t he? Come on Winchester, get a grip – he remembered arriving here in Goose just a couple of days ago. There’d been a case – werewolves, wasn’t it?
Dean sat up and looked around. It took him longer than he liked to get his head round the fact that there was a spring mattress cushioning his butt instead of a wooden platform, and the walls surrounding him were blessedly clear of dead bodies; though, man, that wallpaper was reassuringly fugly. He was also unhappy that the bed next to his was empty, though the sliver of light shining under the bathroom door gave him a clue as to where Sam might be. He reached for his jacket, shivering.
That was when he noticed three things. The first was the wall heater on full blast, the second was the conspicuous silence from the bathroom, and the third was the journal lying open on Sam’s empty bed. He was on his feet faster than the Impala could accelerate. He flung open the bathroom door – as he feared, it was empty. He spun on his heel, heading for the room door when a thought struck him. He grabbed the journal off the bed and quickly scanned the pages Sam had left open. He felt the blood drain from his face as he read the tiny, neat handwriting.
“Beau had killed Markoff and saved my life. Yet I had no time to mourn. I was startled out of my reverie by the clarion call of a bugle, and the scrape of a grappling iron on the parapet beside me. I knew what I had to do. I lifted Beau as gently as I could, and carried him down the stairs into our quarters. If it was the last thing I did, I would give Beau the Viking funeral he had asked for so long ago, and that he deserved…”
Markoff; he and Sam; the Legion and that fucking horrible heat-blasted desert. Dean snapped the book shut as the memories came flooding back. This journal must have been the instrument that had shaped the dream or vision that had trapped Dean in that desert world for the last few hours, and now Dean was certain Sam had been trapped there too. Given Sam’s conspicuous absence right now, Dean would put money on Sam still being stuck in that other world. Whether this was a spell of some kind, or ghost possession, he didn’t know, but whatever the unnatural cause, Dean had to find Sam and pull him out before his brother was lost forever.
Dean stuffed the journal into his jacket and threw one of the two down jackets Annika had loaned them over the top of everything as he opened the door on snowmageddon. It wasn’t until he had waded through several yards of drift that he realised that two coats hanging in their room meant Sam had not only been out here in the sub zero temperatures for god knows how long, he was out here half-fucking-naked. Luckily it had stopped snowing sometime during the night, and the trail Sam had trampled from their motel door was easy to follow. Dean hesitated a moment, torn between going back for the other coat and finding Sam as quickly as possible. In the end, the need for speed won out. Besides, it really didn’t seem all that cold now. Maybe there was a thaw on the way.
In fact, Dean was sweating under the goose down layer after only a few trudging steps down the path Sam had forged through the deep snow, and he was already regretting putting the damn thing on. Luckily Sam hadn’t ventured too far into the wooded area at the back of the motel, or Dean might have melted before finding his errant brother.
Sam had his back to Dean’s approach, and showed no sign that he heard anything, even though Dean wasn’t making any attempt at stealth. Sloppy, little bro, Dean thought. As Dean feared, his brother was only wearing his usual button-down and t-shirt combo, and the bottoms of his jeans were dark with snowmelt, but Dean’s worry about Sam getting hypothermia seemed unfounded. Sam had been busy.
Rising up in front of Sam was a pyre, almost as tall as Sam’s shoulders. The structure was constructed haphazardly, as if Sam had been in a hurry, though it appeared sound enough. Dean frowned in puzzlement. Sam had used what looked like wooden pallet beds to build the pyre, if the couple of thin mattresses and remains of bed frames were anything to go by. Looking around, Dean couldn’t see any evidence of construction – no debris, no tools – and the place at the top of the pyre where a body should rest was empty. The flames licked lazily round the bottom of the bonfire, the wet ground perhaps dampening the fire’s energy. Strangely, though the fire hadn’t really taken hold yet, Dean could feel waves of heat washing over him, even standing several yards back, while Sam was almost touching the flames, he was so close. Damned idiot must be scorching his boots.
It was that concern, combined with the fact that Sam’s shoulders were silently shaking, a clear sign his little brother was fucking crying, that finally galvanised Dean into action. He strode forward, one hand outstretched towards Sam, the other preoccupied with wiping the sweat from his eyes. Because the flames were shooting higher, fanned by an unseasonably dry, hot wind that had sprung out of nowhere the moment Dean moved.
Dean was burning up.
“Sam!” Dean tried to shout, but it was nothing more than a strangled croak. Acrid smoke choked him, and left him gasping for air. Sam was still out of reach, which shouldn’t have been possible. Dean had only been a few strides away from reaching his brother, and though he’d felt like he was pushing against a headwind as he moved, he was certain he’d taken more than five strides. Yet he was no closer than when he’d started.
Something was very wrong – yeah, no shit Sherlock – but he couldn’t think straight. He stared down in horror at his outstretched hands. His skin crisped and blistered while he watched and he couldn’t breathe. He was burning up in the middle of a Minnesota snowfield and Sam was oblivious. The air was thick, heavy with heat and wood smoke and the unforgettable smell of burning flesh, which was probably his own. Crap.
A dull thud snapped Dean’s attention back to the scene in front of him. Sam had dropped to his knees and was tipping in slow motion towards the blaze. Dean’s brain kick-started at last. The journal. It had to be something to do with the book that Dean was carrying close to his heart. The strange vivid dreams of deserts and Bedouins, the fort and the sadistic sergeant. The brothers who were and were not Winchesters. His own death and the promised Viking funeral in the journal.
His hands were stiff and every movement agonising but he managed to pull the leather-covered journal out of his coat pocket. His eyes were streaming with tears and he thought maybe his hair was on fire, but he gritted his teeth and flung the slim volume into the pyre.
The book landed in a shower of sparks and though it felt like an age to Dean, finally the edges began to curl, and then it was ablaze. Dean could no longer distinguish between the sparks in front of his eyes and those behind lids that had closed while he wasn’t paying attention. He pitched forward to face-plant into the ground. The last thing he was aware of was the smell of damp earth and the blessed chill of snow on his scorched skin.
He missed how the pyre morphed into a small campfire the moment the book turned to ash. He didn’t see his burns fade and disappear that same moment. He missed Sam’s wild-eyed terror that turned to relief when he spotted Dean and ascertained his big brother was alive and physically intact. Dean didn’t, however, miss the slap to the face that brought him back to consciousness with an outraged yell.
“Fuck, Sam, whatcher doing?”
Sam enveloped him in a massive sweaty bear hug, and Dean hugged back. Fuck you, Jody Mills; he’s not emotionally repressed. He knew when a PDA was appropriate, even if there was no actual public to witness the gesture.
Sam finally released him and sat back on his heels, grinning like a lunatic. “You fainted,” Sam pointed out; with that ‘I’m only being factual’ expression on his face that Dean knew meant ‘I’m going to tease you for all you’re worth for the next ten years’. Dean was so relieved to see Sam was in one piece that he didn’t care. He sat up and shivered. Now the supernaturally fuelled fire was gone, the sub zero Minnesota temperature was making itself known with a vengeance. The actual fire, that Sam must have built while the younger Geste brother was building Beau’s pyre in whatever desert time and dimension, wasn’t up to the challenge of warming them against the freezing wind.
“I did not faint,” he said, poking Sam’s stupidly broad chest for emphasis. “I might have passed out for a second, after saving your giant ass. You should be grateful.”
“Huh, you love my ass,” Sam retorted.
Sam rose to his feet and offered Dean a hand up, which Dean wasn’t too proud to accept. Dean took off the down jacket and won the tussle over who should wear the damn thing because, as Dean pointed out, he had his own jacket while Sam was wearing a flannel shirt and wet jeans and was probably already half-way to hypothermia.
They jogged through the trampled down snow back to the motel in a companionable silence, neither much inclined to analyse their experience. Annika waved them over.
“You’re in luck, gents, the snow plough’s been and the roads are clear.”
Dean couldn’t help a whoop and a fist pump, leaving Sam to look apologetic that Dean was so enthusiastic about leaving. That was okay, diplomacy was Sam’s job, and Dean was just happy both of them were still here to fulfil their respective roles in life. That bubble of happiness expanded when he felt the rumble of Baby’s engine vibrating through his butt. He pressed his foot down on the gas until her engine fairly roared. They high-tailed it through the slush and out of Goose.
“One day I’d like to get us a case that’s straightforward, you know, Sammy?”
Sam nodded. “Yeah, I hear you. One where we don’t come out of it simultaneously sunburned and frostbitten would be nice. How about we head someplace where the rocks haven’t developed sentience and are begging for iced lemonade because it’s so fucking hot.”
“Uh huh. Somewhere that isn’t white and lethal to my precious man-bits if I need to take a piss.”
A mile or so and safely headed south, Dean flipped the radio on. As the first strains of the song filled the Impala, he exchanged a look with Sam. Both of them started laughing as they sang along.
spn_cinema fic - oh boy, I struggled with this one, and it's unbetaed so apologies in advance! LOLTitle: A Good Jest (joke's on you)
Author or Artist:
Movie Prompt: Beau Geste
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG13
Word Count or Media: ~6300
Summary:In a strange twist, a completed case and a snowstorm in Minnesota lead Sam and Dean to the Algerian desert in the middle of a deadly siege.
Notes: Warnings: Apparent/temporary character death. This fic bears only the sketchiest resemblance to the Gary Cooper movie. (Which might be just as well as I watched it when researching for this and it was pretty bad!)
It had been a relatively simple case, but unfortunately more time consuming than they’d anticipated. Dean lowered at the heavy, yellow-bellied sky, knowing it was already too late to get far, snow tyres or not. Ice crystals carried on the north-easterly wind stung his cheeks; the cold air seeped into his frown, freezing it on his face as the temperature plummeted.
Damn, came from Sam, a solid presence, blocking the warmth from the bonfire blazing behind them. Dean shivered. He guessed Sam was realising what Dean already knew – that these first flakes were just harbingers of the coming blizzard that was going to trap them here in bumfuck-nowhere, Minnesota, for god knows how long. For a brief moment Dean couldn’t even remember the name of the town, though really there was no excuse for forgetting. Only in Minnesota would anyone name a town Goose, especially when it was only a few miles down the road from Blackduck. What was it with these strange northerners with their round smiling faces and their weird town names? At least he hadn’t forgotten the route back to the motel from the backwoods where they’d finally made the kill. After one last glare at the offending weather front, he decided they should be able to make it back to Goose’s lone motel before the worst of the snow hit.
“C’mon, Sammy.”
Dean grabbed the empty gas can and shouldered his duffel, and the two Winchesters jogged for the Impala, leaving the body of the last of the three werewolves to burn down to ashes unsupervised. Once the snow came, the remains would be buried anyway, no point in hanging around here. As it was, even in the Impala they barely outran the storm to arrive safely back at their motel. Snow whitened the blacktop in front of them, Baby’s wipers on full only just preventing a blanket of white forming over the windshield. By the time they were pulling into the parking lot, Dean’s eyes ached from straining to see his way through the mesmerising swirl of snowflakes. Like waking up hung over to find the TV still on and no channel playing, he thought, as he brought Baby to a halt as close to their room as he could manage in the growing drifts.
Sam went straight to the trunk, bringing out the shovels with a smug flourish that was almost lost to Dean’s view in a flurry of snow. Dean jostled shoulders with Sam in a fight to get indoors first, both of them shaking a layer of snow onto the surprisingly thick carpet. Dean had to admit, the Norseman was a pretty nice motel, one of the better ones they’d stayed in. Apart from the weird-ass décor – a lot of purple and yellow everywhere, which he supposed was to be expected given their location – it was clean, the towels were thick, and large enough to wrap round a gigantor like Sam, and, being Minnesota, the heating was top notch. The place even smelled nice, kind of like lemon with a hint of something spicy. Which reminded Dean (or rather his stomach) of an important fact. Namely that their motel was next to a diner, and there was a Target only a couple of hundred yards down the road where they could stock up on beer after filling their bellies.
So yeah, there were worse places to be stuck, but Dean wasn’t going to say any of that out loud. Not when he had complaining to do and a reputation as resident grump to uphold.
“North Minnesota winters, man. Why the fuck did we agreed to take this stupid case anyway? Nobody sensible lives this far north. The place is full of stupidly-nice Vikings, gross fish and nothing much else.”
“And werewolves,” Sam added in that annoyingly reasonable tone he liked to use when he wanted to point out something obvious Dean was missing.
“Yeah well, they’re ex-werewolves now, so there is that.”
There was a pause as both brothers looked mournfully into the empty cupboards over the microwave and came to the same realisation. They were definitely going to have to venture out again. Sam sighed heavily and zipped up his soaked jacket.
“Supplies?”
Dean nodded and echoed. “Supplies.”
0x0x0x0
It was harder than either of them expected to reach the Target. Although they were wrapped in every layer of clothing available to them, the Minnesota cold was biting, and the snow was already lying a foot deep. Luckily one of Dean’s stupidly nice Vikings called Annika, who was on the motel’s reception that evening, somehow spotted them through the swirling snow and growing gloom. She rushed out to intercept them before they collapsed and died an ignominious death trapped in a snowdrift in the parking lot. She insisted on loaning them a couple of huge stay-puft-marshmallow-man jackets complete with those charming earflap hats to top off the traditional look. Dean grumbled all the way round Target’s blessedly snow-free aisles, but finally acknowledged on their return trudge through what was now more than a foot and a half of snow, that Annika’s niceness had probably been a lifesaver, If only because it meant he’d gotten his beer and the half of jack safely back to the motel room.
“Don’t you forget to take your shovels with you to the diner, boys,” Annika called out through the growing gloom as they ventured past reception again after dumping their supplies. “Snow ploughs won’t reach this end of town for a while yet.” Dean shrugged, but Sam made the effort to go back for the shovels, and once again, Dean was forced to admit Annika (and Sam) had been right, when another foot or so fell in the time it took for them to chomp their way through the diner’s special of the day.
“This ain’t half bad,” Dean said through a mouthful of tater-tots and calling the server over to order another portion. “What’s it called again?”
“Hotdish,” said the matronly woman, whose label told them she and her ample bosom was called Eloise. Dean nodded. “Yeah, Eloise, I know it’s the hot dish, but what’s it called?” Eloise’s smile took on a slightly strained quality but luckily for Dean, Sam was ready to step in.
“Dean, the dish is called hotdish, it’s a Minnesota thing, okay?”
Dean looked from one to the other then shrugged again. “Whatever,” he concluded, “it’s really awesome, so who cares what it’s called.”
So awesome, in fact, that Dean didn’t take much notice when Sam engaged Eloise in a conversation about the weather, and was only marginally listening when she confirmed what Annika had said, that the snow ploughs cover a large area, so Goose tends to be towards the end of their rounds.
“The end being…?” Sam asked.
“Oh, probably a week to ten days,” Eloise said. Dean almost choked on the last tater-tot.
Annika waved at them in a disgustingly cheery manner as she watched them digging their way into their room on their return from the diner. “I know it’s not that cold, boys, but it’s always good to be prepared, yanno?” and Dean gritted his teeth.
“Ten days, Sammy. This place is going to drive me stir crazy!”
Sam patted his back in a consoling manner and Dean yelped. Sam’s hand had dislodged a thick slab of snow that had evidently been masquerading as part of his hat and which now slid in a cold wet mass down the back of his collar.
“Sorry, man,” Sam said in a tone that was far too amused to be genuinely apologetic, and Dean promised silently to make sure his little brother woke up with an icicle or two between the sheets tomorrow morning. Vengeance, after all, was a dish best served cold…Dean sniggered a little until he noticed Sam staring with narrowed eyes. Tiredness washed over him suddenly, and he yawned, wincing when his jaw cracked audibly. They’d been on the go since leaving Kansas the previous day – no, it was more like two days now, thanks to those inconveniently wily werewolves – and Dean’s body was calling a time-out.
Sam called dibs on the shower and Dean conceded without complaint. “Knock yourself out,” he mumbled, shucking off his wet jeans before collapsing face first onto the top of the bed nearest the door. He was asleep before Sam closed the bathroom door.
0x0x0x0
Sam emerged from the shower chased by a billow of steam only to find Dean crashed on top of the covers, his face buried in the pillow. Dean had managed to peel off his wet jeans and boots and strip down to worn t-shirt and boxers, but must have flaked out before he’d managed to pull back the quilt. Sam rolled his eyes. Why Dean still insisted on taking the lion’s share of the driving when he knew they had a hunt ahead of them that was likely to mean hours without any sleep – well, it was beyond Sam’s ken. The end result was Dean was exhausted, while Sam was still too wired from the adrenaline rush of the hunt to think about sleeping yet.
He manhandled Dean’s comatose body; knowing Dean wouldn’t be woken by anything less than another apocalypse. He managed to free the coverlet and pulled it across his brother. The heating in the motel was pretty good, but Sam could feel a lingering chill in the air nonetheless. Dean would thank him in the morning. Sam drew the thermal-lined drapes before pulling on a pair of sweat pants and a threadbare t-shirt. The allure of the books he’d brought from the Bunker was stronger than the call of bed and sleep, so Sam sat down at the small table and took a slim, leather-bound volume from the top of the pile.
He flipped it open and smiled. It was a journal of some sort, dog-eared and stained, but the handwriting was a bold cursive, written in English and appeared to be legible. It would make a change from the cramped mediaeval Latin in the last volume he’d attempted to translate. He stretched out his legs, propping his feet up on the other chair and made himself comfortable.
He flipped open the journal at the first page and began to read.
0x0x0x0
He screws up his eyes against the glare of the desert sun. He swallows, suppressing a cough. His throat is constricted, as scratchy and sandy as the bare land that stretches as far as he can see, all the way to the heat-distorted horizon. At his side his big brother is keeping up a running commentary of woe that ranges from the ever-present sand flies to the blister on his left heel. Sam knows what Dean’s doing, and at any other time he’d have been grateful, but right now Sam’s too weary, hot and thirsty to be distracted by Dean’s gallant efforts at distraction. Sweat soaks through his uniform; Sam can smell it, his own and Dean’s, and all he can think is that this is water they can’t afford to lose.
He tips back his khaki-covered tepi, wipes his forehead and quickly replaces the hat, even though the band is tight like iron round his head. It’s too hot to go without protection for long, so with a sigh Sam tries to ignore the headache that’s building like a thunderstorm inside his over-heated skull.
Heat mounts as the sun nears its zenith, and the air is heavy and stifling. Sam’s head nods, his eyelids drooping until sweat trickles into his eyes, stinging him back into wakefulness. The moisture being wasted reminds him again how thirsty he is, a fact he’s been trying to ignore since the Tuareg attack had put an abrupt halt to Renault’s ill thought out mutiny. Sam’s thoughts waver like a desert mirage and for a brief moment the desert fort, together with its ramparts populated with the dead and wounded, dissolves into snow, and an incongruous cold wind chases chilled fingers down his spine.
He shivers and stares over to where Dean’s fallen silent. His brother’s position mirrors Sam’s – slumped at the base of a crenellation, rifle loose across his body while he grabs a moment of shut-eye in between Tuareg attacks. Sam blinks away another image that’s threatening to superimpose itself over Fort Zinderman. It’s an image that feels familiar, somehow; of Dean in too-skimpy smalls, spread out on a comfortable bed in a cramped, carpeted room. It’s discomforting and strange, and doesn’t fit with the reality of the here and now. Unsettled, Sam touches a finger to the cloth badge sewn into his uniform over his heart to ground himself in the present. The gesture seems to work, dispels his momentary confusion.
Honour and loyalty. Valour and discipline. The mottos of the French Foreign Legion. The Winchesters had always had the first three in abundance, and accepted the last when necessary, but it’s at times like these that Sam finds himself pondering how the hell they had gotten themselves into this situation. It’s a rhetorical question, because Sam knows the answer. Of course he does, this odd feeling is merely the effects of the heat, no doubt. He and Dean are here thanks to a stolen sapphire, an act inextricably tangled with issues of honour, and loyalty. So it isn’t surprising this was where they’ve ended up, stateless and friendless, calling the French Foreign Legion their fatherland. The fact that Sam can’t quite recall the exact steps he took to get here is irrelevant.
Flies buzz around the dead where Sergeant Markoff propped them up, to make the fort appear manned. It might be working, at least to a degree, unless the Arabs are just holding off their next attack until the heat of noon is over. As if thinking about the sergeant conjured him up, Sam sees the sun glint on the brass badge on a navy kepi. It’s Markoff climbing back up to the parapet, back from whatever he’s been doing in the bowels of the fort. Searching through their meagre kit for the sapphire, probably, Sam thinks. Good luck to him. The sergeant sits down opposite Sam, leaning back against the stained wall, his legs sprawling casual and loose as if this is some sort of picnic instead of a bloody siege. Sam shifts, uncomfortable under Markoff’s calculating stare. Except he realises after a few seconds that Markoff isn’t staring at him. No: Markoff is looking past Sam and is watching Dean as he sleeps, and that isn’t creepy at all.
Anger flares in Sam’s chest. The sergeant thinks he knows all about the Winchester brothers, has categorised them as common thieves. Markoff believes the sapphire is stashed away somewhere in this fort. In fact, Sam doesn’t know where the damn jewel is, and he’s not sure Dean knows either. That is the weird thing about this whole situation. Sam remembers a lot, but not enough to make any of it feel right.
Sam remembers being in the country house where their family lived, though he can’t quite recall its location. When he tries, the information dissolves and distorts like ink on wet paper. Sam can picture a scene – it’s vivid at the center but the edges are in shadow... He and Dean are standing in the oak paneled room with Aunt Patricia and the others, gathered round in anticipation. Finally they are going to see the fabled jewel that is the foundation of the family’s fortune; then the lights go out and in the darkness the sapphire is spirited away, the velvet lined box empty when the lights come back on. Sam can even recall the smell of the room, beeswax polish mixing with the light flowery scent of Aunt Patricia’s perfume, though he can’t bring to mind her face. Later that evening Dean had left a note, claiming he’d stolen the jewel, but everything after that is foggy. Sam can’t trace the thread of logic that had brought them both to Algeria, to this besieged fort in the middle of the desert. Sam thinks Dean might be a lot of other things but he’s no thief. None of this makes any sense. It’s like he’s been given a few pages of script about their lives with Aunt Patricia but the rest of the story is missing. He can’t remember growing up, or going to school or college, even though he was sure all those things had happened. The details are beyond his grasp, running through his fingers like the water his thirst won’t allow him to stop thinking about. It’s disturbing, and if Markoff with his dangerous pale eyes hadn’t been there, Sam would have shaken Dean awake to ask if he felt the same disconnect.
Sam doesn’t wake his brother. Instead, he stays alert, watching Markoff watching Dean and waiting for something to happen – whether it’s relief from the siege by the Legion or the next Tuareg attack. All the while Sam can’t shake the feeling that this is not where they are supposed to be.
Less than an hour later the point is moot and the bullets are flying again. Markoff’s running from one emplacement to another with a manic grin on his weathered face. He fires at the Arabs from behind the shield of each dead comrade, trying to seem like a dozen men. Sam narrows his eyes against the sandstorm the Tuareg horses are kicking up as they descend the loose dunes towards the fort and fires methodically. In his peripheral vision he’s aware that Dean’s in the next embrasure, doing the same.
The fine sand gets everywhere, carried on the super-heated Saharan winds, and Sam can feel it gritting between his teeth.
Renault is down, then Voisin. Now there’s only Sam, Dean, Rasinoff up the tower, and Markoff, and Sam knows it’s just a matter of time. Even if Major Beaujolais got the message asking for help and was on his way, relief is likely to come too late. Sam shoots, reloads, and shoots again, making every bullet count. Sweat runs into his eyes, he blinks it away, no time to raise a hand to wipe his face. Through the firing and whine of bullets, Sam hears Markoff’s order to fetch more ammunition just as he realises he’s used his last bullet. He nods and runs for the steps, taking them two and three at a time.
Arms full of wooden ammunition boxes, Sam races back to the parapet, ignoring Rasinoff’s high pitched scream as a lucky shot sends the little weasel toppling from his high perch in the tower. Sam never liked the man so it’s easy to ignore the sickening crunch of the body hitting the hard earth behind him. Sam’s focus is honed in on the scene that greets him on the parapet. The Tuareg have fallen silent; indeed, for Sam the whole desert is holding its hot breath, suspending the moment. Because Dean is lying on his back, face pale and eyes closed and Markoff is kneeling over him, pawing at Dean’s uniform with bloody hands.
Ammunition boxes drop unheeded at his feet and Sam strides forward, taut as a bowstring ready to snap. Only to halt, vibrating with anger, in the face of Markoff’s gun, cocked and pointing at his face.
“Take your fucking hands off my brother,” Sam said, his voice even and expressionless. Behind him on the ramparts someone he cares less about wheezes and dies on a rattling exhale. Sam doesn’t even blink. Dean’s still breathing, and that’s all that matters.
Markoff is smiling; he thinks the gun gives him the advantage, that the threat of bodily harm or death cedes him control of the situation. He couldn’t be more wrong.
“Your brother, hey?” Markoff muses, never taking his pale blue gaze off Sam’s face. Sam, on the other hand, is looking at Dean. He’s minutely aware of every laboured breath his brother takes. He watches the thin trickle of blood glistening as it runs down Dean’s chin to drip silently on the dusty ground, sees the glint in Dean’s half open eye and knows Dean is focussed on him, in the same way he’s focussed on Dean. Always is, always will be.
“I knew there was something off about you two, that you were more than the friends you pretended to be. Still, there’s no point in you both dying now, is there? Just tell me where the sapphire is and I…”
Sam never finds out what Markoff intended to offer him, not that it is important. While the Sergeant’s attention is firmly fixed on Sam, Dean finds reserves from somewhere and makes his move. Dean rolls his body hard as he can into the back of Markoff’s legs, unbalancing the sergeant, who staggers, cursing. Sam’s heart swells with pride in his big brother even while he moves, fast as a striking rattlesnake, to take advantage of the distraction Dean’s provided. His knife slides between Markoff’s ribs so easily, punching up through muscle and tissue and into the heart. The sergeant doesn’t even have time to squeeze the trigger of his gun. Markoff’s heart beats once, vibrating down the metal into Sam’s hand, then Sam’s yanking out the blade in a rush of blood, warm even over the desert heat as it flows out of Markoff’s body so eagerly. It’s as if even his blood is seeking to escape the taint of the Sergeant’s dark twisted soul.
Sam doesn’t care about that, or that the Tuareg might recommence their attack at any moment. He shoves Markoff’s body aside and falls to his knees. His kneecaps crack audibly as they hit the ground next to Dean, and Dean, the utter idiot, actually winces on Sam’s behalf.
“Easy, Tiger,” Dean says, or rather rasps, because his voice sounds like he’s sandpapering wood with his vocal chords, and Sam has to lean in close to hear him. Sam doesn’t hesitate, he gathers Dean into his arms, cradling Dean’s head with one hand to settle his brother more comfortably into his shoulder. It makes no sense, but Sam knows part of him has been here before. Although it’s impossible, he’s seen Dean die too many times before, and that part of him knows this is bad. Stubbornly ignoring the obvious, unwilling to face precedents set in a past that doesn’t match the script they are living, Sam the eternal kid brother tries to ignore that there is no coming back from injuries like these.
“It’s ok, Dean, I’ve got you. Where’re you hit? C’mon, I’ll get you patched up, we’ll be fine.”
“Don’t think you can plug these holes, Sammy,” Dean says. His blood is obscenely bright on his white teeth, but his green eyes are dark with pain. “What the fuck are we doing here anyway? I can’t…remember…”
Dean’s breath is nothing but a gentle whisper against Sam’s cheek. Sam shudders and grips Dean tighter. This is all wrong. Dean’s touch should score Sam’s flesh with the abrasive potency of a sirocco; his big brother is a force of nature and should never be still—but Sam can’t stop Dean trickling through his fingers like grains of sand, no matter how tightly he closes his arms round Dean’s body.
Sam knows the exact moment of Dean’s death; he’s felt this too many times before to mistake it now. The way Dean’s body seems to gain mass and weigh heavier than his one eighty pounds, the way those green eyes dull to the matt sheen of pebbles, the slackness of that mobile mouth. It’s intimate and horrifying and Sam is disintegrating in a maelstrom of memories of grief that can’t possibly have happened.
The sound of a bugle jolts Sam out of a threatening fugue state. He can’t leave Dean here, as if his brother mattered as little as all the other dead legionnaires littering the parapet, but he can’t carry Dean with him into the desert. Besides, Sam knows at some instinctual level that this time, it’s important to give Dean a proper hunter’s funeral. He doesn’t stop to wonder what a hunter might be, or why it matters so much. The company of Legionnaires who had arrived to relieve the siege of Fort Zinderman wouldn’t hang around outside forever. If he’s going to give Dean the send off his brother deserves, he doesn’t have much time.
He gathers Dean up in his arms and carries him down the steps, oblivious to the way his legs tremble and his lungs refuse to expand because Dean is dead, Dean isn’t breathing, and Sam just wants to shut down and stop but he can’t. Not yet.
The bugle sounds again, its jauntiness jarring in the desert silence, but it spurs Sam on. He lays Dean on one of the bunks, overturns a few of the other empty beds that will never be filled again and stacks them round Dean. Oil from the lamps will make the perfect accelerant, and Sam even finds a sack of salt in the mess, which he scatters like snow. For a second he glimpses another scene, with real snow not salt that is a foot deep, glittering like diamonds in moonlight, then it’s gone, and he’s lighting Dean up, watching the flames take hold of dry wood and dusty blankets and pale bloody flesh with a whoosh that sucks the oxygen from the room.
But that’s okay, because Sam really doesn’t need it any more.
0x0x0x0
Dean woke up when he died.
Which wasn’t as strange as it sounded, especially as he’d done it before. This time was more instantaneous than previous occasions, and he was infinitely thankful there was no digging involved, or Crowley standing over him talking about moons and invitations to form a demonic bromance.
Although he was evidently and very much not dead, Dean couldn’t help passing shaking hands over his torso, checking for bullet holes that weren’t there. He was also fucking freezing, which was novel after the last few weeks. Except no, that wasn’t right. He couldn’t have just spent weeks or months in a frigging Algerian desert because he remembered – didn’t he? Come on Winchester, get a grip – he remembered arriving here in Goose just a couple of days ago. There’d been a case – werewolves, wasn’t it?
Dean sat up and looked around. It took him longer than he liked to get his head round the fact that there was a spring mattress cushioning his butt instead of a wooden platform, and the walls surrounding him were blessedly clear of dead bodies; though, man, that wallpaper was reassuringly fugly. He was also unhappy that the bed next to his was empty, though the sliver of light shining under the bathroom door gave him a clue as to where Sam might be. He reached for his jacket, shivering.
That was when he noticed three things. The first was the wall heater on full blast, the second was the conspicuous silence from the bathroom, and the third was the journal lying open on Sam’s empty bed. He was on his feet faster than the Impala could accelerate. He flung open the bathroom door – as he feared, it was empty. He spun on his heel, heading for the room door when a thought struck him. He grabbed the journal off the bed and quickly scanned the pages Sam had left open. He felt the blood drain from his face as he read the tiny, neat handwriting.
“Beau had killed Markoff and saved my life. Yet I had no time to mourn. I was startled out of my reverie by the clarion call of a bugle, and the scrape of a grappling iron on the parapet beside me. I knew what I had to do. I lifted Beau as gently as I could, and carried him down the stairs into our quarters. If it was the last thing I did, I would give Beau the Viking funeral he had asked for so long ago, and that he deserved…”
Markoff; he and Sam; the Legion and that fucking horrible heat-blasted desert. Dean snapped the book shut as the memories came flooding back. This journal must have been the instrument that had shaped the dream or vision that had trapped Dean in that desert world for the last few hours, and now Dean was certain Sam had been trapped there too. Given Sam’s conspicuous absence right now, Dean would put money on Sam still being stuck in that other world. Whether this was a spell of some kind, or ghost possession, he didn’t know, but whatever the unnatural cause, Dean had to find Sam and pull him out before his brother was lost forever.
Dean stuffed the journal into his jacket and threw one of the two down jackets Annika had loaned them over the top of everything as he opened the door on snowmageddon. It wasn’t until he had waded through several yards of drift that he realised that two coats hanging in their room meant Sam had not only been out here in the sub zero temperatures for god knows how long, he was out here half-fucking-naked. Luckily it had stopped snowing sometime during the night, and the trail Sam had trampled from their motel door was easy to follow. Dean hesitated a moment, torn between going back for the other coat and finding Sam as quickly as possible. In the end, the need for speed won out. Besides, it really didn’t seem all that cold now. Maybe there was a thaw on the way.
In fact, Dean was sweating under the goose down layer after only a few trudging steps down the path Sam had forged through the deep snow, and he was already regretting putting the damn thing on. Luckily Sam hadn’t ventured too far into the wooded area at the back of the motel, or Dean might have melted before finding his errant brother.
Sam had his back to Dean’s approach, and showed no sign that he heard anything, even though Dean wasn’t making any attempt at stealth. Sloppy, little bro, Dean thought. As Dean feared, his brother was only wearing his usual button-down and t-shirt combo, and the bottoms of his jeans were dark with snowmelt, but Dean’s worry about Sam getting hypothermia seemed unfounded. Sam had been busy.
Rising up in front of Sam was a pyre, almost as tall as Sam’s shoulders. The structure was constructed haphazardly, as if Sam had been in a hurry, though it appeared sound enough. Dean frowned in puzzlement. Sam had used what looked like wooden pallet beds to build the pyre, if the couple of thin mattresses and remains of bed frames were anything to go by. Looking around, Dean couldn’t see any evidence of construction – no debris, no tools – and the place at the top of the pyre where a body should rest was empty. The flames licked lazily round the bottom of the bonfire, the wet ground perhaps dampening the fire’s energy. Strangely, though the fire hadn’t really taken hold yet, Dean could feel waves of heat washing over him, even standing several yards back, while Sam was almost touching the flames, he was so close. Damned idiot must be scorching his boots.
It was that concern, combined with the fact that Sam’s shoulders were silently shaking, a clear sign his little brother was fucking crying, that finally galvanised Dean into action. He strode forward, one hand outstretched towards Sam, the other preoccupied with wiping the sweat from his eyes. Because the flames were shooting higher, fanned by an unseasonably dry, hot wind that had sprung out of nowhere the moment Dean moved.
Dean was burning up.
“Sam!” Dean tried to shout, but it was nothing more than a strangled croak. Acrid smoke choked him, and left him gasping for air. Sam was still out of reach, which shouldn’t have been possible. Dean had only been a few strides away from reaching his brother, and though he’d felt like he was pushing against a headwind as he moved, he was certain he’d taken more than five strides. Yet he was no closer than when he’d started.
Something was very wrong – yeah, no shit Sherlock – but he couldn’t think straight. He stared down in horror at his outstretched hands. His skin crisped and blistered while he watched and he couldn’t breathe. He was burning up in the middle of a Minnesota snowfield and Sam was oblivious. The air was thick, heavy with heat and wood smoke and the unforgettable smell of burning flesh, which was probably his own. Crap.
A dull thud snapped Dean’s attention back to the scene in front of him. Sam had dropped to his knees and was tipping in slow motion towards the blaze. Dean’s brain kick-started at last. The journal. It had to be something to do with the book that Dean was carrying close to his heart. The strange vivid dreams of deserts and Bedouins, the fort and the sadistic sergeant. The brothers who were and were not Winchesters. His own death and the promised Viking funeral in the journal.
His hands were stiff and every movement agonising but he managed to pull the leather-covered journal out of his coat pocket. His eyes were streaming with tears and he thought maybe his hair was on fire, but he gritted his teeth and flung the slim volume into the pyre.
The book landed in a shower of sparks and though it felt like an age to Dean, finally the edges began to curl, and then it was ablaze. Dean could no longer distinguish between the sparks in front of his eyes and those behind lids that had closed while he wasn’t paying attention. He pitched forward to face-plant into the ground. The last thing he was aware of was the smell of damp earth and the blessed chill of snow on his scorched skin.
He missed how the pyre morphed into a small campfire the moment the book turned to ash. He didn’t see his burns fade and disappear that same moment. He missed Sam’s wild-eyed terror that turned to relief when he spotted Dean and ascertained his big brother was alive and physically intact. Dean didn’t, however, miss the slap to the face that brought him back to consciousness with an outraged yell.
“Fuck, Sam, whatcher doing?”
Sam enveloped him in a massive sweaty bear hug, and Dean hugged back. Fuck you, Jody Mills; he’s not emotionally repressed. He knew when a PDA was appropriate, even if there was no actual public to witness the gesture.
Sam finally released him and sat back on his heels, grinning like a lunatic. “You fainted,” Sam pointed out; with that ‘I’m only being factual’ expression on his face that Dean knew meant ‘I’m going to tease you for all you’re worth for the next ten years’. Dean was so relieved to see Sam was in one piece that he didn’t care. He sat up and shivered. Now the supernaturally fuelled fire was gone, the sub zero Minnesota temperature was making itself known with a vengeance. The actual fire, that Sam must have built while the younger Geste brother was building Beau’s pyre in whatever desert time and dimension, wasn’t up to the challenge of warming them against the freezing wind.
“I did not faint,” he said, poking Sam’s stupidly broad chest for emphasis. “I might have passed out for a second, after saving your giant ass. You should be grateful.”
“Huh, you love my ass,” Sam retorted.
Sam rose to his feet and offered Dean a hand up, which Dean wasn’t too proud to accept. Dean took off the down jacket and won the tussle over who should wear the damn thing because, as Dean pointed out, he had his own jacket while Sam was wearing a flannel shirt and wet jeans and was probably already half-way to hypothermia.
They jogged through the trampled down snow back to the motel in a companionable silence, neither much inclined to analyse their experience. Annika waved them over.
“You’re in luck, gents, the snow plough’s been and the roads are clear.”
Dean couldn’t help a whoop and a fist pump, leaving Sam to look apologetic that Dean was so enthusiastic about leaving. That was okay, diplomacy was Sam’s job, and Dean was just happy both of them were still here to fulfil their respective roles in life. That bubble of happiness expanded when he felt the rumble of Baby’s engine vibrating through his butt. He pressed his foot down on the gas until her engine fairly roared. They high-tailed it through the slush and out of Goose.
“One day I’d like to get us a case that’s straightforward, you know, Sammy?”
Sam nodded. “Yeah, I hear you. One where we don’t come out of it simultaneously sunburned and frostbitten would be nice. How about we head someplace where the rocks haven’t developed sentience and are begging for iced lemonade because it’s so fucking hot.”
“Uh huh. Somewhere that isn’t white and lethal to my precious man-bits if I need to take a piss.”
A mile or so and safely headed south, Dean flipped the radio on. As the first strains of the song filled the Impala, he exchanged a look with Sam. Both of them started laughing as they sang along.
I've been through the desert on a horse with no name / It felt good to be out of the rain / In the desert you can remember your name / 'Cause there ain't no one for to give you no pain…