Title: A Little Thing Like Death

Disclaimer: Me no own, You no sue.

Warning: WINCEST, language, character deaths (duh)

-z-

There are times in life when you realize that who you are and what you do cannot stop the inevitable.

There are times in life when you realize that who you love cannot be changed by what others believed is right or wrong.

So when Sam Winchester first learned that it wasn't normal to masturbate to his older brother's picture, he just shrugged his shoulders and went off to find Dean and relay the news and when Dean heard it, he smiled a lecher's smile and shoved his tongue down Sam's throat.

-z-

There are some people who are left alone to raise children by themselves.

There are some people who don't know the first thing about raising these children in a world of darkness and evil. So Jonathan Winchester did the best he could with what he did know and raised his sons to have only each other.

And the first night he was woken by sounds that he and Mary had made during their early years, he felt an odd mixture of anger, of sadness, of humiliation, of defeat as he asked himself: What have I done to her boys? But then he remembers that Lovers make the best Fighters so he took a deep breath, rolled over, and went back to sleep.

-z-

There are times when a father knows that he has to let go.

There are times when a father knows that he has to hold back and smile and let his son learn a hard lesson on his own.

So when Jonathan Winchester learned that his youngest had gotten a free ride to Stanford, he knew that he should let go. But he also knew that there were evil things out there, out there in the wide world of craziness and demons and monsters that hide in closets and under beds. So he fought. He fought tooth and nail to get Sam to change his mind. But Sam had a secret weapon on his side: Dean.

-z-

There are some times when you have to know what you want and have to know who you want it with.

There are some times when you have to know what you want and who or what you have to sacrifice to get it.

So when Sam Winchester saw his father researching sacrificial rituals, he watched the man more closely than he all ready did. He watched as his father watched Dean, and then it all clicked in his head and he wanted to break down and sob. And he hates how he's now having nightmares about Dean sliced open and bloody, their father standing over him, no regret on the older man's face as he stabs Dean through the heart and begins to chant.

So when Dean leaves the motel to dig up a death certificate, Sam asks his father why. Asks his father why he would do something so horrible to someone who had done everything he had ever asked and more. He begged for it all not to be true, begged for it all to be a lie. But then his father sighs and asks Sam to be reasonable, asks for his help to bring down the demon.

And as the question was asked and the gun off to the side came into focus, the sound of jingling keys and the door opening didn't register in Sam's mind as he picked up the pistol. And neither did the sight of Dean walking in waving a document around with a smirk plastered across his lips and a look of pride on his face, Sam just pulled back the hammer and said simply, "You can't take him away." And then the trigger was pulled and everything that was right with the world ended with a father's life.

-z-

There are some things that we never plan to do.

There are some things that we just have to suck up and learn to deal with.

But, then again, Dean never thought he would live long enough to bury his own father. Sam tells him everything, about their father's plans of sacrificing Dean to get the demon, about the nightmares Sam had had.

He lets Dean fuck him after the funeral, rough and messy and just the way they used to when Dad was gone on some of the longer hunting trips, the way they used to before Sam felt the need for normalcy and the title of Joe-college. But in Dean's mind, it was never really that bad, because what Sammy wants, Sammy gets.

Dean never sheds a tear over the man that had raised him. Because he knew that this was coming and he's just thankful that John hadn't targeted Sammy, 'cause if he had, Dean would have killed him a hell of a lot slower than a quick bullet between the eyes.

-z-

Love. She is all about who is involved, a blind being who is fueled by irrational thoughts. Her eyes do not see gender; they do not see bloodlines. She sees their past lives and knows that they were meant together, their souls having been intertwined with each other over the eons.

Love. She smiles at the Winchester Hunters and gives them her blessings.

-

Sam and Dean spend the next few years fucking and Hunting and killing and drinking. Sam calls his friends and tells them that he can't return to school, that his brother needs him (which they both know is the truth, though Sam neglects to mention that he needs Dean just as much) and that the sudden death of their father was too much for either of them to take.

"It's not healthy to lie so much," Dean smiles and Sam smirks in response and looks out the window, watching the trees that after so long have begun to all look exactly the same.

Sam reflects on what he could've had. What could've been had he gone with Sarah, but then Dean smiles and his chest tightens and his throat goes dry and he knows this is where he belongs. He asks Dean about Cassie and Dean just shrugs and says that it wasn't meant to be and that, even though nothing could change what happened, frankly, if Sam had walked back into his life during those few weeks that Dean was sincerely happy with this normal girl, he would have left her without a second thought, without a single glance backwards.

-z-

And lo, the beast looked upon the face of beauty, and beauty stayed his hand. And from that day forward, he was as one dead.

Death watches the Winchester brothers and the proverb rings about in his head. And he knows that there is no Beauty -- either from Heaven or Hell -- that could tame a Winchester. And he regrets not being able to watch them longer; but they're catching on that someone is following them, so he takes his leave and orders out another one of his Reapers.

-z-

They've lived a long time, longer than most Hunters. They've outlived each contact in their father's journal as they add in new ones.

They've lived a long time, longer than most consider normal for what in the job description. And they live, they just live and live and live, doing their thing and living.

Yes, they have lived a long time; they've lived only for the other and for no one else. They Hunt those things that try to hunt others and laugh in Death's face.

-z-

Their tale does not last much longer, for even though they are among the best of all Hunters, they are still human and Death figures that if his Reapers cannot take care of these boys, than he'll have to do it himself...

Dean never even sees the other car, never even hears Sam begin to scream, never even tastes his own blood. And right now, as he and Sam watch the paramedics try to revive their scarred bodies, Dean shakes his head, tugs Sam on the jacket, and they walk away. They're too tired to fight anymore.

-

Where do they go, you ask? To where ever it is that the Hunters go, to where ever it is that the Hunters such as these brothers can go and be together. Because even though Sam left Dean for those few years, he swore never to do so again, and he'd managed to keep that promise for past three decades and a little thing like Death could never hope to change that.

Death could kill them, yes, but he could never separate them. That fact alone has been proven.

-z-