Post 3x16, the first 10 days after Dean's deal came due.

xxx

Guilt, agonizing guilt, was the only emotion that Sam was able to process at the moment. To recognize anything other than his responsibility for this would be his undoing, would render him completely incapable of handling what needed to be done. Soon, he'd be able to let anger seep in, but right now the wound was too fresh and tender to let anger fester within it and morph it into the vengeance it would inevitably become. He wasn't sure if he could ever let regret or sadness through, because he would drown in it. To accept what had happened as fact, to even consider focusing on anything other than bringing him back, would make this too real and he wasn't sure if he would survive that sort of heartache. He wasn't even sure he'd want to.

There was no guidebook on how to mourn your big brother, not when your big brother practically raised you, not when your big brother had literally spent more time with you than any other person in the world. There were the five stages of grief that he had learned in the basic college psychology that everyone took for their undergrad liberal arts requirement. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance; taught to them in nice, neat, quaint little packages as if one word could describe what it felt like to have your heart ripped out and stomped on, as if it was possible to ever recover from losing the single most important person in your life. If he would have to say he was going through any of those stages, he'd have to say he was going through them all at once. This can't be happening. I can't believe I couldn't get him out of this. If it weren't for me, he'd still be alive, I should be in his place. How the fuck did he think I could handle his death when he couldn't handle mine? When he's always been the strongest person I've known? What do I do now?

No, he had to focus. The guilt he could survive under, he had been living with an unbearable amount of guilt since Jess died. Just when the tidal surge of self-condemnation for his girlfriend's disappeared had finally crested and started to recede, his father had died and it had swelled in him once again. It was only fitting that he add this to the burden of remorse he carried; out of the three deaths, this one was the one he held the most blame for. He should have protected Jessica, he should have stopped his father from making the deal, he had no doubt in his mind that those were his fault. Dean selling his soul so that Sam could live? That was completely on him. Sure, Dean had made the deal, but he had done it for Sam. He may as well have sealed the contract himself.

Guilt was definitely easier for Sam to process, to carry on his shoulders. Anything else would be overwhelming and as it was, he already wanted to find his gun and eat it, to join his brother in hell, because if they hadn't been able to cancel out the deal, what chance was there of bringing Dean back?

His hands were covered in blood, Dean's blood, both literally and figuratively. He wiped the red sludge onto his jeans, which were already ruined beyond salvation, just like the shattered remains of Sam's heart. He fought the urge to scream, cry and vomit all at once as he lifted the first shovel of dirt and showered it over the cold, torn remains of his brother. His arms shook and his lip trembled, but he forced himself to carry on despite the fact that he only wanted to jump into the hole, grab his brother and hold on for dear life.

"I can take over, if you'd like." Bobby said quietly, taking off his cap and wiping the sweat from his forehead. "If you need a minute-"

"No. I've got it. You can wait in the truck if you want." Sam dismissed, tightening his grasp on the shovel, "Unless you want a minute to say a few words…?"

"No, I…" Bobby trailed off, clearly feeling just as destroyed as Sam did. He shook his head slightly, then resumed his thought, "I'll take care of the mess in the car, you take your time, no rush."

Sam watched Bobby go, then thrust the shovel into the pile of dirt standing beside him. Bobby had done most of the digging while Sam had sat with Dean's corpse, carefully stroking his brother's hair in a manner that Dean would never have allowed at any other point in their lives, even though it had been a trademark gesture his brother had used when trying to calm him down or soothe him while they were children. Sam had never tried it before, but instinctually knew that his older sibling would have pushed him away, called him a few names and cracked jokes at his expense if he had even tried. Now, though, it didn't matter. Dean was gone and it was too late for him to worry about what sort of sappy, girly show of affection his little brother was doing to his remains.

Guilt. He had to focus on the guilt. He had to be angry at himself, to push out all of the other emotions that made his heart race and his chest ache. He scooped up another shovelful of dirt and spread it over his brother's body, watching with sickening dread as the clumps bounced and rolled off of Dean's clothing, filling in the space between his brother's still form and the surrounding earth. It hurt to breathe, it hurt to move, it hurt to think. The pain wasn't physical, but it was disabling nonetheless. If Sam had to pinpoint an origin, he would say it began in his soul, as pathetic and poetic as it sounded. It emanated from a point so deep inside that he couldn't find another word to describe it, and it poured out of him in waves of agony, dread and the suffocating truth of the situation. He was shoveling soil into a hole in the ground to cover Dean's dead body.

Sam doubled over as if he'd been punched, his breath flowing out in a wheeze and for a few moments, he was unable to refill his lungs. It was too soon, he couldn't do this now, he had work to do. He had to be strong, to be stoic, to be Dean. Once he was done with this, he would allow himself a drink before he started researching a way to bring back his brother, his reason for living. One drink, and that was all. There was work to do, and to focus on anything other than a way to resurrect Dean would hurt him in ways so deeply that he would not be able to accomplish anything at all. Sam knew this as a fact, the only way to bring Dean back would be to pour 110% of his time, energy and mind into the problem and not rest until he succeeded. Those other crippling emotions could wait, they had to wait. He didn't have time to deal with them now.

Sam closed his eyes for a moment, then got back to work, shoveling unearthed dirt back into the hole it came from. Soon, Dean's clothing was no longer visible, then his shoes. He knew he needed to cover Dean's face as well, but he couldn't, not yet. To bury Dean to his neck in dirt could easily be a game, one of those silly things children did to their family and friends when they went to the beach, at least, that's how it was portrayed on television and in books. Their father had never actually taken them to a beach, so he had no firsthand experience. To cover his face, though...that would mean Dean was gone. People only did that when they were saying goodbye permanently.

"Son? Do you need a break?"

Sam looked in the direction of Bobby's voice, only partly hearing the question. Bobby handed the young man a rag from his pocket, carried around by the old mechanic-turned-hunter in the same fashion that some may carry around a handkerchief in a pocket. Only then did Sam realize he was crying. No. He couldn't cry now. He needed to be upset with himself, guilty over his part in this. He wasn't ready to acknowledge that Dean was gone. He couldn't cry now, because if he did, the tears would likely never stop. He quickly rubbed his face, looking away with an expression of determination that he had not been able to muster up while alone with Dean's body, "It's just…"

"I'll take care of it. Why don't you grab yourself a bottle of water out of the trunk and wait for me? I won't be too long, now."

Sam couldn't respond, his brain muddled and unable to form the words he wanted to say; to express the gratitude he felt for Bobby's mere presence, the love and compassion he felt for the old man who had lost someone he considered family too, the relief that he would not be the one who covered Dean's face with soil and completed the barrier between his older brother and the outside world. He skipped the water and went straight for a flask. Dean's flask. He needed something that would take the edge off, that would hopefully prevent those other painful feelings from bubbling to the surface. How he hoped to any deity out there that it wouldn't have the opposite effect.

xxx

Sam had failed. He had tried to keep all of the other emotions buried deep beneath the surface, only dealing with what he knew he could handle, but the more he drank, the harder it became. Alcohol numbed the guilt, though in its absence, everything else bubbled to the surface, spilling over in waves of indescribable agony that prevented him from accomplishing the most basic of tasks, much less fixing a problem of this magnitude.

Because he would fix it. He had to fix it. He couldn't live in a world without Dean in it, he refused to. He had spent several years away from his brother, but was always reassured that Dean was still there if he changed his mind. Knowing his big brother was somewhere working was tolerable, knowing his brother no longer existed took away Sam's will to survive. But to fix it, he had to process some of this raw emotion that had engulfed his life. While grief over Jessica had roused the fighting spirit deep inside, driving him to hunt and search for the demon who killed her, grief over Dean was too intense to just channel into something else. If he tried to deal with demons now, he'd find himself killed before he even realized what was happening. Sometimes, the idea of that happening didn't bother him, other times, he was able to see that weakness for what it was.

The first twenty-four hours after he buried Dean was spent drinking as much alcohol as he could handle without having to have his stomach pumped. The following twelve hours were spent passed out on the couch in Bobby's living room, unable to stay in the room where he had spent so many nights beside his brother. From the moment he woke up, though, he was a changed man. He swallowed four pain relievers, fixed a pot of coffee, and hit the books. He had already thumbed through many of Bobby's resources when he was trying to find a way out of Dean's deal, but it was worth another look now that the circumstances had changed. Ignoring the throbbing in his head, he focused on his work, knowing that every second he wasted was another second that his brother was in hell and suffering because of him.

There were obvious choices, such as trying to negotiate a deal of his own or trapping a demon and drilling them for information. There were radical choices, such as going back to the devil's gate and using the demon's exit as an entrance and finding his brother himself. They were all long-shots, ideas that sounded plausible enough on paper but would never actually work. That didn't mean he wasn't going to try, because he was willing to try anything to undo the damage that had been done, but he needed plan D-Z for when his first three ideas inevitably failed. To get those ideas, he needed to do research. There was so much he didn't know about spells, witchcraft, ritualistic traditions...surely someone, somewhere, had found a way to bring a person back from hell. If there was something he needed to find, to steal, to manufacture to possibly bring his brother back, he would find it and he would make it happen.

The afternoon turned to night, Bobby popping in several times to try and force food and sleep on the focused younger man, but Sam brushed him off with barely a word, manically pouring over books while the sun set and rose, stopping only when he fell asleep on top of the book he was reading. Six days passed, and Sam had barely three pages worth of notes after scouring every book Bobby had that could possibly be of any help. If he hadn't already made up his mind that he was going to rescue his brother, he'd call it hopeless. He had made a decision, though, and Sam was a man of his word, he was going to bring his brother back.

A week after Dean had become a plaything for the hellhounds, Sam tossed himself onto the couch, covering his eyes with an arm and letting himself give in to the exhaustion that he'd been fighting off for days. His phone rested in his hand, an alarm set to wake him in three hours so he could leave without having to run into Bobby, without questions on where he was going and what he was up to. He loved the older hunter as if he were a second-father, but there were just some things Bobby didn't need to know. His dreams were restless and gory, as were all dreams he'd had since Dean's death, and before his alarm could sound he was already awake and dragging himself to his feet. He planned to stop for a protein bar and coffee on the road, not wanting to make any unnecessary noise that would rouse the last remaining person who cared for him, and slipped out, not sparing even a glance in the rearview mirror for fear that he'd be caught.

xxxx

The drive to California was silent, which was unusual but not unwelcome. When Dean was driving, the radio was usually on, classic rock blaring from the speakers with his brother sometimes singing along. Sometimes the windows were open, distorting the music as the sound waves collided with the gusts of wind. Other times, the radio would be turned down and they'd talk. Talking was Sam's favorite driving past-time, whether it be a deep topic that they were hashing out, details on a case, or something a little lighter like reminiscing about Sam's time at Stanford or Dean's latest conquest. Sometimes Sam felt like it was the lighter conversations that brought them closer; it was easy to dwell on the problems they were facing and the work they were doing and sometimes they forgot that before anything else, they were brothers who had grown up together, friends who had been in the trenches together. Even though they had spent years on the road together since the fire in Sam's apartment, there was still so many small details from their time apart that they hadn't gotten to share. That they may never get to share.

No.

Sam gripped the steering wheel tighter, refusing to let himself even consider the fact that he might not succeed. If his efforts proved futile, he knew it wouldn't be long before Bobby was burying his body, whether it be because he ate his own gun or was hunt down on the job. Life without Dean wasn't an option. During the ordeal with the Trickster he had been shown what life was like alone and there was no way he was going to live through that again. He'd rather be buried alive than to go through that pain. This was going to work. This had to work.

According to what he could find in his father's journal and the scarce lore he had been able to dig up on the topic, the Devil's Gate in Wyoming had been a large, perhaps the largest, doorway between earth and hell, but there were others scattered around that weren't as hard to get into. Clearly he couldn't open the Gate in Wyoming, since Bela had the Colt, but there was a chance he could open the one in California. The Devil's Gate Reservoir had been the location where Ellen's husband, Bill, had died and the lore showed there was ample evidence of supernatural activity in that area. There was no reason not to believe that the name was not a mere coincidence and instead was actually a Devil's Gate. He had nothing to offer a crossroads demon, nor did he have access to a witch who would be willing to do spellwork on his behalf. All he had was a knife that killed demons, a brother who needed to be saved and the knowledge that win or lose, he'd be joining Dean one way or another.

By the time he had reached the halfway point between Sioux Falls and Pasadena, the silence was deafening and Sam had to turn on the radio. He had gone over the plan at least a hundred times in his head, he had accounted for anything that could possibly go wrong and created contingency plans for those events. His eyes were burning from exhaustion, his body jittery from a combination of caffeine and hunger. He needed something else to focus on before he drove himself insane, so he reached under the seat, randomly grabbing a tape and inserting it into the tape deck.

The power clicked on and Metallica began to play, the chords alone feeling like knives being stabbed into Sam's chest. He cranked up the volume well past what he would consider a comfortable noise level, trying to drown out his doubt, his anger, his fear. He didn't have time for emotions, he had a job to do. The most important job he had ever been on, there was no room for error. Emotions made it easier to make mistakes, it was hard to focus on the job at hand when your thoughts were clouded by feelings.

The music wasn't loud enough to drown out his broken heart, so he sang along as loudly as he could manage, off-key and desperate, and tried to pretend like there weren't tears threatening to spill onto his cheeks.

I'm coming for you, Dean.

xxxx

Four days later, Sam found himself sitting beside a mound of dirt in Pontiac, Illinois. He has his knees bent, his elbows resting against them as a bottle of whiskey dangles loosely between his fingers.

The gate had been a bust. He had spent hours trying to find the entrance, and when he did manage to find it, it had been locked in a manner similar to the one in Wyoming. He didn't think it would take the Colt to unlock it, but unfortunately he had no idea what it would take. He had spent an entire day in the university library, trying desperately to figure out what it would take to unlock it, and an entire night doing the same online. At the end of it all, he found himself empty-handed, unable to make any sense of the little bit of information and clues he could find. He needed someone with the experience Bobby had, but knew he could never ask Bobby for help on something of this magnitude. Bobby would tell him breaking into hell was a terrible idea and that it would be the equivalent of suicide. Maybe it would be.

Putting the gate on the backburner, he had sought out a crossroads demon, hoping to make a deal, only to be told that he had nothing worth trading. Completely broken, he had no choice but to try and follow another lead. Unfortunately, he was fresh out of leads at the moment. The next logical choice, in Sam's mind, was to visit his brother. He knew Dean's soul was in hell, there was no chance of his spirit lingering nearby as it did when he was in a coma before their father died. There was no chance of communicating, no chance of a miracle. He couldn't find the strength to care, though, he just wanted to be near his brother, even if his brother wasn't near him.

"I don't know what to do." Sam admitted quietly, his voice wavering ever so slightly with emotion, "I feel like I'm dying. I don't know how to do this alone. I don't want to do this alone."

He took another swig of the bottle, lifting the glass and pressing his face against it as a sob broke loose, "If you couldn't handle being alone, why did you think I could? You're Dean; you're strong and resilient and a fighter. You're a hunter. You were made for this life, and I'm just Sam. I'm never going to be you, I'm never going to be as strong as you. How could you make a deal knowing that you'd be leaving me alone in just a year?"

Sam's hands shook as he angrily wiped away the tears from his eyes, not wanting to let the emotion burst forth because he was afraid he'd never be able to reign it back in. Unfortunately, his heart was not listening to his mind, and the wall he had built around his raging emotions was starting to crumble under the pressure, "Mom died because of me, because of the demon who wanted me. Dad died without even bothering to tell me goodbye, he died thinking I may need to be put down someday. Jess is gone. My friends have all moved on. Bobby is a mess. And now you're gone too. How am I supposed to live with this? Why did you think I could? What am I supposed to do?"

He lowered his head into his arms, his body trembling as he tried his hardest to stifle the agonizing waves of sorrow pushing to the surface. He could imagine Dean sitting beside him, telling him to man up and to stop being a girl. He could almost hear his brother's voice saying that none of this was his fault and that Sam was strong enough, that he'd do it again if given the chance. He could picture the sound of Dean's voice, the smell of Dean's clothing, the weight of Dean's hand on his shoulder both strong and reassuring all at once. He opened his eyes, half-expecting to see his brother there even knowing that it was impossible.

Sam lost track of the amount of time he spent sitting beside his brother's grave, drinking cheap whiskey and feeling sorry for himself, mourning the loss of his last remaining blood relative and his best friend, the one constant person in his life. The sun rose and set, his skin red from exposure, though he couldn't be bothered to care about it, to care about anything. He cried, he ranted, his whined, he swore. He screamed in rage and pain, wept in sorrow and grief, and after he was completely spent, he laid his head down on the dirt and just existed, too worn out to do anything else.

The sun had set, the moon barely visible through the trees, when his cell phone rang. Sam glanced at the small device, surprised that the battery still had a charge and confused for a moment on who would be calling him. He glanced at the display, hesitating for a moment when Bobby's name flashed on the screen. With a heavy sigh, Sam went to answer it, only for the battery to die just as it started to connect.

He let his hand trail down the still-fresh dirt, his voice steadier than it had been since he arrived, "I'm not going to let you down, Dean. I'm going to find a way. I don't know how...I don't know where...but I'm going to get you back."

He stood up, stretching slightly and dusting off his clothes, knowing he didn't want to track dirt and grass into the Impala. The time for wallowing was over, he had work to do.