i've been up and down in prison

[kickingand]

Who: Dean Winchester & YOUUU
What: waking up at Home and being confused out of his mind
Where: Home!
When: morning sometime
Other: talk of Hell & not overly graphic mentions of torture. also, prose or brackets are welcome!


Dean doesn't have a clue as to where he is. Granted, he doesn't have a clue as to what's going on altogether, but that would be said no matter where it was he was waking up. Because the thing is, he isn't supposed to be here. A thing that likely everyone said upon waking up here, but Dean isn't supposed to be anywhere but Hell. It's a thing he can't comprehend as he wakes up with a start and looks around to find himself not on the rack. The lack of shrill screams in the distance, the dank nonexistent smells wrecking havoc through his brain, making it impossible to do anything but shudder with anticipation of what tool was going to be used today to pry body parts from his soul, over and over and over--

Giving his head a shake, the place he is now is so opposite of what he's endure for the past years that it's nearly startling. It's beyond startling actually, and Dean doesn't know what to do about it when all he can think is he doesn't deserve it. This place is practically happy and somehow blossoms with an easiness that he can't comprehend, his stomach twisting with confusion and ultimately a sheer disorientation that he's struggling his way through. He hardly knows how to move let alone how to think his way through this and he tries to find his voice to shout for the existence of anyone else here. But it clams up in his throat, refusing to puff out from between his lips and instead makes him want to curl up that much more. It's terrifying and soft all at once and he's rejecting it aggressively, trying to butt himself up against the nearest wall and hide, wondering if this is a new breed of torture. Let him see something happy for two seconds before he's dragged back to the reality that is Hell, brutally laughed in the face by Alistair before the torture continues. A psychological thing, maybe.

He doesn't know.

But eventually, he begins to move.

Slowly, he pushes himself out of the bed, taking one cautious step at at time, moving forward and ducking around corners, peering around the edges of the spacious room and trying to adjust to everything he's seeing. Which unto itself is still just weird - if anything, he should've woken up in a dank motel room. His grave maybe. And some part of his mind wonders if he's been shot up to Heaven finally, in some sort of weird Brazil-esque filing error, but that's just ridiculous.

He's supposed to be in Hell. So what the fuck is going on.

Continuing to move, Dean soon finds himself on the stairway leading downwards, though he glances up for a moment and stares, before deciding that down is best way for now. It isn't as if any of this is truly ominous apart from the fact that he doesn't know why he's here altogether but he has to keep moving, try to figure out what's going on, understand this as best as he can before he finds himself getting tugged straight back to the one place he's actually supposed to be.

"The fuck is this-"

Rough words are finally pulled from his throat, scratchy and hard and he steps even further down, slow going as he tries to take it all in. He just wants to know where he is and why, maybe even find someone here. Or maybe he just wants to be alone for a minute, relish in the lack of pain and death fleeing across his vision, the wholeness of his body and the feeling of his limbs stretching out. It's all odd sensations after too long on the rack, at the hands of demons, souls at the hands of him, and he grit his teeth for a moment, squeezes his eyes shut and tries not to think before he keeps going, pushing himself forward, and finally gives a shout, sounding distant to his own ears.

"-- Anyone here?"

Comments

[escapedestiny]

It shouldn't come as a surprise to him, really, that Dean decides to deflect and push it all away. But for a second there he'd really thought Dean was going to tell him something big.

Sam's lips pull into a tense line for a moment before he nods and tries not to sigh anymore. "Then we'll talk about this world. I can show you around the place, try to answer any questions. But honestly we're mostly still just trying to figure things out. We haven't been left any clues as to who brought us here or why. It doesn't seem malicious, but there's always that chance... especially since we were all brought here involuntarily."

He shifts on the bed, bringing his legs up to sit cross-legged so he can face Dean. It occurs to him he never actually told him his whole afterlife theory, even if it feels like Dean had probably debunked it.

"To tell you the truth, before you got here, I'd considered the possibility that maybe this is just some sort of afterlife, somewhere you go when you die. A way-station between Heaven and Hell, maybe. I asked you how it happened when I first saw you because I thought maybe you had died, too."

And he's a little unsure now whether or not he prefers a theory where Dean didn't die. Because Sam definitely had. So if they were to leave, would they be going back to the same place? Could Sam leave? Would Dean just continue to try and bring Sam back?

Honestly, the thought that Dean may have tried selling his soul for him has occurred to Sam by now. They were both pretty sure John had made some sort of exchange of himself for Dean, and they both were aware of the crossroads demon and the deals they could make. But Dean said he'd tried everything and nothing had been successful. And he was weirdly certain that nothing he had done had caused them both to end up here. All in all, it's still in his head as a possibility, one he doesn't like in the least, that maybe that's what Dean's not telling him. Even if he has his suspicions about that though, the fact that Dean has already been to Hell hasn't crossed his mind at all.

[kickingand]

Dean listens, but his mind is somewhere at a distance. Usually he's so much better at disconnecting from the things he feels and the things he does, but it's taking him a moment right now to push it all aside. To distance himself from where he'd just been and where he is now, the electrostatic memories of hell creeping like vines at the edge of his business, a haunted house charade playing at the back of his mind. It's like he can still smell it, the fraying edges of burnt flesh and the way it all burned to the very core of his body, every time they-

every time-

Pay attention.

Dean finds himself looking up when Sam is already facing him, talking about the afterlife and thinking that this was somehow it. Their Heaven. Or some version of it, he's not entirely sure, but he supposes he could get behind that theory apart from the fact that you didn't really get transitioned from Hell out of anywhere. And if he could, if he was willing, he might even still be able to make Sam's idea work but he doesn't want to. Can't bring himself to offer the facts to the table that he was dead. It was his fault. It was what he'd asked for so that Sam could keep on living.

The only problem is he doesn't know what to say instead, and so he cants his head a bit, bobbing as if in thought, trying to figure out the best way to broach this without answering or deceiving any more than he has to.

But he's already lied. Why not lie some more.

"You mean what, like- Limbo? Be a pretty nice spot for it, I always thought limbo was, I dunno- supposed to be kind of a shit show." Granted, Dean thought most things were supposed to be a shit show so how was that any different from the norm. He still twists a bit, angling his shoulder against the wall so he can look at Sam straight on, brow furrowing a bit in construed thought, as if he's thinking really hard when he isn't truly thinking about much of anything apart from, well, all the things he doesn't want to think about.

"Could just be another Trickster thing, make us live in our very own little Hobbit Hole for awhile."

[escapedestiny]

Of course, the more he lies and the deeper he goes into the lies, the bigger chance their is of Sam realizing that he's lying. Or, at the very least, omitting information. Hell, he's pretty much already figured that out, though. He just has to settle for not pushing it right now, leaving the possibilities sitting in the back of his head until the time is right to ask about it again.

"Maybe..." The Trickster theory is as good as any they've got so far, really, even if the one they'd met they'd already (at least as far as Sam knows) permanently gotten rid of. They hadn't even known about Tricksters before running into that one though, so who was to say there was only one? It seemed odd though that they'd randomly bring a bunch of people from seemingly different universes to one place. What reason was there? The previous one's motivation seemed to be entertainment and their own version of justice. Okay, then entertainment sort of made sense. But what had any of them done that would warrant them this as... what, punishment?

Whatever is going on, it's becoming clear that even with Dean here now and the two of them together, they're not going to solve it by sitting around talking, especially when Dean is avoiding telling him things. So Sam sighs and stands up. "Alright. I'll move all my stuff from my previous room. Then I'll show you around."