original by apocalypsos

Remix Title: But Sometimes They Fly By
Remix Author: sanyin
Original Story: The Days Don't End Here, My Friend
Original Author: apocalypsos
Rating: R
Pairings:Wincest (sort of Dean/far removed – see original for details)



1.

This is how it starts. John Winchester, consummate soldier, examines his son's face carefully. He puts rough fingers on a chin scraped raw, tilts the head from side to side, watches how the eyes following him through the blinking lashes.

Ripening bruise above one brow, scrape at the corner of swollen lips. Nothing serious, so he smiles.

But years later, John Winchester is dead.

And the dead can't see how flesh breaks and builds itself anew, old scars, old maps disappearing.


2.

This is how it goes.

Sam knows right away, when Dean doesn't even drop his shoulder at the hit, just keeps going, face unnaturally blank, gait unnaturally smooth.

In the motel room, his heart's sticky in his throat even as he calmly tells Dean to strip.

In a way, Sam has always measured himself against his brother's path, his brother's motions, and now he's at a loss, too much unmarked skin in front of him.

He looks for old memories, a sign of a familiar map, but his fingers only press on flesh that's too smooth, too blank.

He runs his hands over the sharp edges of shoulders, collarbones; the heavier curves of ribs, thighs, chest; softer hollows of throat, hip, wrists, vulnerable before, except Dean doesn't even flinch now, just veils his gaze with a brittle sweep of lashes.

Sam is gentle at first, like he's handling glass, but he's still human, breakable, and he gets desperate, grip tightening until the skin springs white around his touch, hard enough to hurt, to bruise.

Nothing, still nothing.

He touches his brother's face, fingers humming with nervous energy, turns his head from side to side, watching for the eyes to follow.

He has to swallow because his throat is thick and Dean won't look at him.

"You always were a quick healer."

He punches his smile through even though his stomach's heaving and rolling inside him. He's afraid a frown will let it all spill out.


3.

Sam watches his kids grow up on a weak grin and a folded sigh. DJ – Dean John – he had once thought there'd be a need for a memory like that - with his sharp, dark eyes and single minded intensity. Anna watching wide eyed from the sidelines, always asking for more.

He hides himself in Lisa at night, and comes back each morning hoping for a change.

Still nothing.

He tells Dean it's a gift, even when his stomach tightens as the word spits from his lips.

He thought that maybe he would worry less, his brother's scars sealing themselves up before they exist, smooth face in an always familiar grin, but the visions come fast and strong now, and they don't stop.

They can't stop.

He lies awake, over and over, watching his brother dash himself on the rocks, split to pieces each time, only to stroll through his front door days later, beautifully, terribly whole.

He gathers his children's things together, old books and DVDs from when they were little, yearbooks and projects from more recently, watches the years slip by in each of the pictures.

Dean isn't in a single one.


4.

He's always thought Uncle Dean could do anything.

He did kill monsters for a living. It was less of a stretch than with most kids.

He used to look for the scars when he was little, in the warmth of his uncle's lap, smiling into his bright eyed face.

The face hasn't changed, but DJ knows not to look for scars now. He's watched Dean bend and break and come right back, in his head and in front of his eyes.

He's seen what it's done to his father, knows the terrible pull of Dean and his elastic youth.

They laugh and joke, fight fiercely.

"Screwing little girls half your age, Uncle Dean? Is it even half now?"

Dean always, always keeps his hand on the steering wheel, laughs this choked thing into his chest.

"Fuck you, DJ."

"You remind me of your grandfather," Dean tells him once when DJ's old enough to play his father.

He feels protective, wants to hold Dean's cheek, check him again for injuries they overlooked. It's ridiculous.

"Yeah?"

But he never gets anything else, because Dean's always been like that to him, half thoughts and bitten off memories, starting to fall apart, never knowing how to connect, to live.

DJ loves his Uncle Dean almost more than anything in the world, which is why he leaves the first chance he gets.


5.

He's worse than her father at bars, but Olivia knows how to play Dean from the start.

Her mother had said he was her favorite uncle.

"Your only uncle," Olivia pointed out.

All she got was a carefully raised eyebrow.

Her mother was rarely wrong about these things.

He's confident, too slick, prone to cheesy pick up lines that she giggles at from a distance, but she always feels like she needs to fix something, straighten his crooked lines. .

Dean can fake being normal pretty well, but the more she watches him, the sadder it gets.

He gets this look across his face sometimes, when he'll make a reference that has his little blondes looking into his face quizzically, or sometimes, when his head's just far away, too caught up in something old even to notice that she's watching him.

She prefers her research, maybe college, a Think Tank, in her future. Still, they're both happiest in the midst of a job

The way he moves never quite fits, a little too smooth, too fast, too slow, always something off under the constant barrage of charm. He's only beautiful during a fight, limbs flying, guns cocked, something more familiar, more grounded when he's taking them with him.

At first, Olivia couldn't begin to understand why Uncle DJ ever left, even though she admits (to herself) that his little squirts are kind of adorable.

Now though, watching Dean stare uncomprehendingly at where the bones in his hand have cracked out of the skin, she turns away, heart thudding slowly, something like sadness in the back of her mouth, sour.

Gets it.


6.

Dean has a good hand with children and small animals, which, depressingly, is probably why he handles Jesse so well.

His dad had warned him, looking tired.

Jesse, my uncle -

My great uncle, Jesse always thinks, staring with half wonder at Dean's laughing eyes and smirking mouth, the smooth motion of his walk.

- he's not easy to live with, ok? It gets hard.

But he never stopped him.

He actually likes Latin, something that's a never ending source of jeering and good natured ribbing from Dean.

Jesse loves Latin for its structure, the fractured ugliness of its staccato vowels on the surface, the fluid rhythms that it runs on. They never really use Classical stuff on hunts, only the corrupted ferocity of Church Latin. It flows fast from his tongue even when he's ready to piss his pants, an old comfort, and he always draws smiles, real ones, from Dean.

More so than werewolves, zombies or angry spirits, he's terrified of Dean finding out that he reads Cicero for fun.

Dean calls him straight laced when he fails at hustling, holding his drink, any number of things, and sometimes Jesse will scowl into his pussy, light beer, thinking of the Virgil he's got stashed in the trunk.

But then he'll be trying to hold his guts in after a bad hunt, Dean's hand on his cheek, around his middle, that utterly steady voice going strong in his ear even when his vision's flickering.

"Hold on, kiddo, for me, ok?"

Then he can't imagine being anywhere else, loving anyone else like this, a binding of flesh and sweat and desperation. He cries almost without noticing because he's dizzy and oh God, there's -

Dean assumes it's the pain, soothes him, the flesh on his chest knitting together before Jesse's eyes.

It's not the pain. It's Dean.

Afterward, Dean tries to send him away, eyes always straying to the ugly stitching hidden under Jesse's layers, his mouth tight.

But after all these years, Jesse knows how to handle Dean too, knows how to use his voice, their history.

Damned if he's bailing out now.

When he feels himself getting older, fingers the wrinkles around his eyes, he looks at Dean, a ghost of himself, always young, slouched in bars, motels, the car.

He wonders what kind of family tradition this is supposed to be, always staying, bleeding, seeing.

Always leaving.


7.

From the beginning, he tells her that she's strong, and patiently waiting through his jokes, his idiocy, she has to goggle that he knew her great, great grandfather.

She's always been older than him, cool, contained, a breed apart.

But they work well together, and she knows that.

One time she finds him in the bathroom, smoke curling lazily out of his mouth in a blue haze.

"You shouldn't do that."

It's automatic.

"Does it matter?"

And his eyes are terrible in that moment.

She's strong, and he knows it.

She's afraid of what he's going to ask of her, if he's finally reached the end after all these years.

She has to go. He doesn't say anything.


8.

He has to stare at this white man shuffling in front of him, pale freckled skin and broad shoulders.

He looks at his own arm, dark and brown, remembered suffering, and wonders how many generations separate them.

Still, when Dean smiles sometimes, he sees a little bit of his mother, is comforted by it.

They sit together, share drinks, Dean tells him it wasn't always like this - they weren't always so split. People wouldn't stare at the two of them so openly.

"Yeah, I remember ancient history, old man."

And Dean is ancient history, so he just smiles, tells him about his brother, how passionate he was.

"Woulda lobbied for shit to change. He was a lawyer."

"I hate lawyers."

"Not him."

And looking into his face, he has to believe him.

His daughter has a mass of dark curls, good hair, and a bright smile.

Dean dotes on her, buys her stupid things, picks her up and swings her until she screams with delight.

When she gets a little older, learns to write and argue and yell, he says, finger on his chin,

"You remind me of someone I knew once, Dee."

"Really? What'd she look like? Was she pretty?"

He laughs then, touches her cheek.

"I guess I don't really remember all that well, sweetheart."

"That's dumb, Uncle Dean."

"Yeah, it is, isn't it?"


8.

Her mother warned her about him.

Dangerous, she said.

Too charming for his own good.

He'll rip your heart out if you stay too long.

The first time she kisses him, he strays back, startled.

The second time, he takes her face in a bruising grip.

The third time, she makes sure to get him drunk first, and they wake up, tangled damp and hot around each other.

She watches his face fall, childlike, his lashes dipping low in the bright sunlight, his crooked nose and his too full mouth.

The curve of his shoulders seems too delicate now, his cock limp between his legs. She puts her hand there, comforting, not even sexual, just a motion, a pale comfort.

He looks at her with this half calf-eyed trust and something deeper, more frightening, in his eyes, and she feels awful.

She's a woman of logic, helps him build his bombs, his new equipment, equations flying through her head like water, excited that he can half keep up with her. She traces the numbers in his hair, his eyes, wonders if forensics would turn up the truth or another lie. She imagines the stars arching over him, simple science never enough to explain the world they're in, explain him.

Sin, she thinks, is too simple a way of looking at things. Technically, they probably don't have much more shared blood than the next person. There's nothing of him, his classical face and green eyes, in her, or anyone in her family. But they've always talked about him, like a talisman. A legend.

She learns her mother was wrong. It's they who have the power over him, because he opens up too quickly, spreads his arms and begs to be taken with every breath. She wonders if the bitter feeling in her mouth is regret.

He's beautiful though, and she's always liked beautiful things.


9.

"You ready?"

"Yeah."

"I didn't want this to happen."

"Do it. I can feel the change coming."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. Haven't you learned anything from being fucking immortal?"

It's meant as a joke, but it just cuts them both. He's tired, burning, feels it coming, wants it to end.

"I didn't want to leave," he says it quick, through his teeth.

It's too late for a last kiss, some final awkward gesture of romance that they never shared, a last chance to sink into this creature, his guardian, his relative, something, a slow lick down that never changing spine, tasting the heat inside. It was just curiosity at first, but now he realizes he'll miss it, when he's gone.

"Do it." He throws his head back, gasping. "Please."

He hates how weak it sounds, how the face in front of him, blurring fast now, is cool and broken all at once.

There's a quick blessing, an unexpected stab of sadness, then he's free.


10.

He looks like he's from another world, even his features subtly different because it's been so long since he was born.

Not that these things matter with the radiation mutating every other child, spidering white patterns of scars marking survivors.

But she can see it in his face, how alien he is, awkward and beautiful in her arms.

She rides him, takes him, wondering what he's looking for when he stares into her face like that.

He loves to wait until she's just waking up, smiling sort of sleepily. Then she can almost pretend this is normal. A girl and her boyfriend. A woman and her ancestor. A hunter and her partner, alone.

She's always been good at watching people, and the clawing hollowness inside him shines out, clear as day.

"Was it like this for him?"

His chest is smooth, always smooth. She doesn't want to get old, break, leave this thing they have.

He touches her cheek, then her waist, always too gentle even when she wants something more.

"Not like this."

And that has to be enough, their laughter ringing out like church bells in the empty world around them.

She can't imagine living through it all, counting all the generations, all the faces, a never ending parade, spidering out into infinity, but at the rate things are going, she won't have to.


11.

This is how it ends.

Sam sees it coming before it actually comes, and he's fine with it. Lisa's settled, DJ and Anna grown.

It's in his bones, brittle now. Sometimes he wonders if, in the end, it was the visions, pounding through his head, burning through his blood, his life. But lingering on things like that doesn't help anyone, so he tries to stop the thought before it comes.

"Sam," says Dean, gruff, and he's only an older brother again.

Sam looks at his veins, like crags in a mountain, feels how his body is losing it, any day now.

"Lisa called?"

"Yeah."

"Take a walk with me."

"Sam - you can't - "

He looks, in the way that an old man can, and Dean, like a young man, just shuts up.

"Can we - can we just pretend?"

An old man with his grandson perhaps, his height toppled by age and disease, and oh, what a nice boy, helping out his grandfather like that.

Sam feels a little sick, but when Dean takes his hand, it holds him up, comforts him, a breath on his cheek, and they're children again, their father in the next room, an age ago.

He looks at Dean, his eyes cast down, wonders if time, life, this whole thing, even passes the same way for him now, wonders how everything seems so distant, so silly.

"Walk with me."

So they do, a grandfather and his dutiful grandson, two children playing in the sunlight, lovers with arms entangled, brothers hand in hand.

It's a beautiful day, and he closes his eyes to really feel the sunshine, Dean's hand in his grip.

He's having trouble remembering everything these days, his sight going, his motion going, but he can still feel Dean's skin, the beat of his heart close to his own.

He presses hard because it's all he can do, presses into smooth flesh and a familiar jacket - still there after all these years, through changing fashions and times.

And Dean is there, with the echo of their childhood, how they were bound, how they're still there.

Sam never expected to lose him like this, wants to tell him, I didn't want to leave you again. I promised myself that I wouldn't.

But the sun is there, and his brother, everything the same, so he just smiles sweet, slow, right in his cheek, walks on.

*

~end.