Entry tags:

forgive this darkness, john/sam

Forgive This Darkness (Chapter One)
Title: Forgive This Darkness
Pairing: John/Sam
Rated: PG-13
Warnings: Incestuous overtones, language, pedophilia (Sam is 16)
Word Count: 4,472 (this part)
Notes: Beta edited by judas_denied./ This is a WIP. Sam/Dean stuff will creep in a bit later, also. And the rating on this is going up as it progresses. Way up.
Summary: When Sam was sixteen, he was bitten by a rattlesnake and everything changed. If John had to pick a moment where it happened, where everything that went wrong between them got its start; that would be it.

Forgive This Darkness
Chapter One
“When something becomes ash,
there's nothing you can do to turn it back.
About this, even diamonds do not lie.”

Dean Young


When Sam was sixteen, he was bitten by a rattlesnake and everything changed. If John had to pick a moment where it happened, where everything that went wrong between them got its start; that would be it.

They were on a hunt, but then it seemed like they were always on a hunt when something went wrong, even otherwise normal, non-supernatural things. It was the Winchester version of Murphy’s Law; whatever can go wrong, will go wrong… while some monster is trying to kill you.

This time it was some spirit in the desert that was trapping people inside the trunks of mesquite trees. It lured its victims away from the roads, got them lost, then when they were exhausted from the heat and sick with dehydration they would fall asleep and that was it. Maybe they woke up and maybe they didn’t. John didn’t know because none of them had lived and only one had escaped.

He didn’t need the boys with him on this one; it was a fairly simple salt and burn that he could have taken care of himself. But because it was simple they weren’t in as much danger, so he brought them. He brought Dean, because he begged and wouldn’t shut up about it and John could always use the extra eyes and another gun. He brought Sam, who protested and whined about it for hours, because the stubborn brat needed the experience and discipline.

The spirit was a miner’s wife who had fallen down a mine shaft. There were hundreds of silver mines in the area surrounding Carson City, Nevada though, but after two weeks of research, John had narrowed it down to one. It was the only mine that fit the description and was close enough to the house where the couple had lived for the woman to wander off and fall into.

The old miner’s house itself was almost gone, the wood dry rotted from the constant heat and returning to dust from neglect. Though he expected to find nothing, John surveyed the area with Dean following close at his heels.

The second time he paused to look at something—the shine of an old whiskey bottle half buried in the dirt—and Dean walked into him, John rounded on him with a scowl. “Go watch your brother,” he said, tilting his head toward where Sam was sitting on the old crumbling porch steps of the house, kicking dust at a scorpion.

“But, Dad—”

John shook his head. “I will call you if I need you,” he said.

Dean huffed out a disappointed sigh and went to sit with Sam on the porch steps.

“Dad told you to get lost?” Sam asked.

“No, he just…” Dean trailed off and scratched the side of his neck. “I guess.”

Sam smirked and leaned down to squint at the scorpion, which was black and shiny despite all the dust he’d been kicking at it. Black and shiny and pissed off.

“Dude, be careful,” Dean snapped. He grabbed the back of Sam’s shirt collar and jerked him back.

“They don’t jump,” Sam pointed out. He shrugged Dean’s hand off him and scuffed his foot at the scorpion, which danced a little away, its claws raised and tail lifted aggressively.

“I don’t give a shit, they’re fast,” Dean said. “Thing will scurry up your pant leg and sting you on your dick if you’re not careful.”

“Did you just say ‘scurry’?” Sam asked, looking at him with raised brows.

Dean tilted his head defiantly. “I believe I did.”

Sam snorted. “You’re dating that girl at the library again,” he said.

Dean looked uncomfortable and chewed on his bottom lip, casting his gaze back to where their dad was crouched down, dusting off something he’d found near the old outhouse. “I wouldn’t really call it dating,” he said.

“Uh-huh,” Sam said. He got bored with the scorpion and picked up a stick to flick it away from where it was advancing on the toe of his tennis shoe.

“Hey, what would you know about it anyway?” Dean said. He jostled Sam’s leg with the toe of his boot. “I keep forgetting you’re a virgin.”

Sam rolled his eyes and leaned back on his elbows on the top step of the porch, legs stretched out in front of him, one heel propped up on the other. “Whatever, man,” he said. “Call it what you want.”

“It’s not dating,” Dean said. “It’s…”

“Fucking?” Sam suggested.

“Hey, bitch, watch how you talk about my girl,” Dean said, and swatted the back of his head.

Sam jumped. “Ouch! Hey, I’m just calling it like I see it,” Sam said, rubbing the back of his head. “Jerk.”

Dean’s lips quirked but he didn’t say anything else. They sat in companionable silence and watched their father for a while. When John was satisfied that there was nothing interesting or paranormal about what remained of the old miner’s house, he walked back to where they were sitting and took a seat beside Dean on the top step.

“Nothing here,” he said. “Damn hot out, though.”

“Maybe we should wait until the sun goes down,” Dean suggested.

John shrugged and sat forward, elbows braced on his knees. “Nah,” he said. “We’re here now. The mine’s just over that little rise over there. About a mile and a half.”

Sam listened without comment, comforted by the low, steady cadence of their father’s voice and the hot wind ruffling the back of his hair where it was wet with his sweat. He watched the scorpion he’d been toying with earlier scuttle down an incline of sand. All around them, the sound of cicadas buzzing rose and fell with the breeze.

“Aren’t those trees over there mesquites?” Sam asked, not speaking to either of them specifically. He pointed toward three twisted trees about twenty feet away.

“Yeah,” John said.

“Do you think they were people?” Sam asked.

John sighed and got to his feet. He stepped around Sam and hopped off the porch steps. “I don’t know, Sammy,” he said. “Could be.”

Sam frowned, thinking how horrible it would be to be trapped inside a tree. Worse if you were conscious. How long could you live like that before you went insane? “If… If you get rid of this ghost… will the people be okay again?”

John looked away from him and Sam watched him, thinking how sad he looked. “I don’t know,” he said shortly. He reached out and ruffled Sam’s hair, smiling a little when Sam jerked his head away. “Don’t worry about it, okay?”

“Sure,” Sam said, scuffing his foot in the dirt with a sullen frown.

“Look, Sammy, you stay here, alright?” John said. “Me and your brother, we’re just gonna go take care of this thing and come right back. It’s too hot out there to be dragging you both all over the desert.”

Sam recognized the peace offering for what it was. Their dad had taken up his entire Saturday with this hunt and he’d been upset about it at first. He wasn’t anymore, had actually enjoyed spending some time with Dean and his father, but he didn’t tell John that. “Sure,” he said. “Dad?”

“Yeah?” John said, taking the box of salt Dean held out for him.

“Can we…?” He hesitated and lost his nerve. “Never mind.”

John looked at him and raised a brow, waiting for him to finish the question. When he didn’t, John rolled his shoulders and looked at Dean expectantly. “Alright then let’s get this done. Sammy, don’t wander off. There’s more salt if you need it, but it’s the middle of the day. Shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Yeah,” Sam said. He kicked a rock with his toe.

“We’ll be back in an hour,” John said.

Sam shrugged and didn’t say anything.

As Dean and their father left, Sam watched them go. He noticed the way Dean walked, pacing John almost perfectly without lengthening his strides. He wasn’t shorter than their father anymore and it surprised Sam a little to realize it. Dean was twenty, he wasn’t a kid anymore like Sam, but their father… their father was larger than life.

~~*~~

Dean was grinning and pleased with himself as they walked back and John let him enjoy it. They were alive, Dean had almost missed the mine shaft and fallen into it, but he hadn’t and that was the important thing. So what if John had to keep reminding himself of that? Dean was alive and unbroken and the bones of the miner’s wife were ashes by now. It was a successful job, probably as successful as this job ever got and Dean was young and alive walking beside him, flushed with his own importance after lighting the match that burned the bones.

He was fine. They were fine.

Then Sam screamed and whole world crashed down around them.

John started running before the fear even had a chance to register and take hold. There was panic and it was right there. It would take him over and disable him if he let it, but John squashed it down and ran faster. Sammy, Sammy, Sammy, ran through his head like a prayer, but he didn’t dare shout his name. He needed all the air in his lungs to reach him.

Distantly, he heard it anyway. Someone screaming Sam’s name over and over and he didn’t realize it was Dean until they both skidded to a stop in the sand beside Sam.

“Sam?” John demanded, pulling Sam up from where he was laying on his side, holding his leg. “Sam?” he repeated, shaking him a little. “Sammy? What’s wrong? What happened? Sam, you answer me!”

“Dad?” Sam said, blinking at him.

His eyes were glazed over and he was limp in John’s hands. How was it possible to be this fucking terrified without his heart exploding in his chest? “Yes, Sammy, it’s me. It’s Dad,” John said quickly. He eased Sam back a little and started running his eyes over him, searching for some hurt; some injury. Finding nothing, he demanded, “What happened?”

“Dad,” Dean said.

“Did you see something?” John asked. He patted Sam’s cheek, felt how hot his skin was under his fingers and scowled. “You’ve got heatstroke,” he decided, feeling Sam’s forehead.

Sam’s head lolled back on his neck loosely and he breathed out a deep sigh.

“Dad,” Dean repeated, more insistently.

“We’ll get you back to the car, get you something to drink,” John said. He started to get up, pulling Sam up with him.

Sam whined in protest and shook his head. “No… there was…”

“Dad!”

“What?” John snapped, his gaze sliding to Dean, eyes wide with fear and sudden anger.

“He’s snake bit,” Dean said.

John stared at him, uncomprehending for all of five seconds. Then it sank in and it was like a punch to the stomach. “Shit,” he breathed. He crouched back down and eased Sam onto his back to look. “His leg,” he said, seeing the little dark red spots on the upper thigh of Sam’s jeans where it had bled through.

John took the knife from his boot and started cutting the material away from Sam’s left leg to get at the bite. “Go get the car,” he told Dean. “We’ve got to get him to a hospital.”

Dean didn’t move, just stared at where John’s hand was holding the knife, slicing the worn denim away from Sam’s leg. Under the material, the bite was two small dots. It looked so harmless but Sam… His eyes shot to Sam’s face and Dean felt a sick little flutter of dread bring bile to the back of his tongue.

“He’s not going to die,” Dean whispered. He glanced at John, his eyes suddenly pleading. “Please… he’s not going to die, is he?”

With a growl, John reached over and shoved him, sending Dean sprawling away from him into the dirt and sand. “Get your ass in gear,” he barked. “Go get the fucking car. Now!”

Dean looked between Sam, pale and half conscious on the ground, to his dad who was shaking all over and looking at him with half-angry, half-pleading eyes. He got up and ran, taking the keys from his pocket as he went, praying in the back of his mind and under his breath the whole way.

When he was gone, John leaned down close to the bite and pinched it between his forefinger and thumb. Sam cried out and reached for him, probably to push him off, but John shoved him back down.

“Easy, Sammy,” he soothed. “Just lay there and be still, alright? Be a good boy. I’m gonna take care of this. You believe me?”

“Yes,” Sam managed. And he did. His dad would take care of it. He was going to be okay. He believed that and held onto the thought as he felt some of the most intense pain of his life shoot up from his thigh.

John cut between the two fang marks with his knife, an ‘X’ to open the skin. It bled a little bit, but not much and John had to pray that he’d gotten to Sam in time. He had to believe that scream had been the first, that Sam hadn’t been laying there unconscious after he was bitten. He had to believe that or everything he was about to do was for nothing and his baby boy was going to die.

He leaned back down and put his mouth over the wound. Sam tensed under him and moaned in pain, but John put that out of his mind. He couldn’t think about that right now. He sucked at the wound, sucked the flesh into his mouth and felt the way the folds of the cuts opened up to the pressure. He tasted blood on his tongue and was disgusted, but he also tasted something else. Something more like acid that burned against the back of his teeth.

He turned his head and spit it out and knew that sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach was relief. He put his mouth back over the wound immediately and sucked again, drawing the venom out of Sam’s blood with long pulls of his mouth, careful not to swallow any of it in his haste. Then he felt something press against his cheek and almost swallowed it all when he realized what it was.

Sam was hard.

John spit the venom and blood out and gave the erection tenting the front of Sam’s pants a wry look before pushing Sam’s leg back more and dropping his head again to suck. When all he got that time was blood, he spit it out and hauled Sam to his feet.

Sam moaned and struggled against him, but John put his arm around Sam’s waist and held him, his fingers digging into his hip to keep him in place when Sam started to collapse. He was feverish and shaking and despite the venom he’d sucked out of him, John was still scared as hell.

“Dean!” he shouted, hauling Sam along with him toward the car. Then it occurred to him that moving might make the blood circulate the venom through Sam’s body more quickly and he stopped. “Dean! Where the fuck are you, son?!”

“Dad… Hmm… What’s happening?” Sam asked, voice thick and slurring.

Oh, fuck, John thought, fear making his heart race. “Shh, nothing, Sammy,” he said, making his voice as calm as he could. He put a hand to Sam’s forehead, felt how he was burning up and trembling against his side and it was all John could do not to start screaming. “Just hush. You’re gonna be fine. I’m gonna get you to a hospital. Get you some antivenin or whatever it is you need.”

“Rattlesnake,” Sam said. He let his head loll back on John’s shoulder and rolled his eyes up to stare at him. “It was pretty. Didn’t… see it until it bit me.”

“Fuck,” John muttered under his breath. He stroked the sweaty hair back from Sam’s forehead and heard the approaching rumble of the Impala’s engine. “It’s going to be okay, Sam. You’re brother’s coming with the car.”

“Don’t… Don’t let Dean,” Sam took a deep breath and closed his eyes, silent.

In a panic, John patted his cheeks until Sam blinked his glassy eyes open and stared back at him. “Don’t let Dean what, baby?”

Sam’s lips quirked at the endearment, which he rarely ever heard and he picked up his sentence right where he’d drifted off. “Step on it.”

“I won’t,” John promised as Dean pulled the car up right in front of them.

Dust was still flying when Dean jumped out of the car, leaving it running with the door hanging open, and went around the hood to pull the passenger side door open.

“Back door,” John said, half carrying Sam to the car.

“What?” Dean said. He looked at Sam and his already worried expression intensified. “Oh, god. He’s not—?”

“No,” John said sharply. “Open the back door. I’m getting in with him. Hurry the hell up!”

Dean yanked the back door open and John put Sam in the back seat so he could stretch out, then climbed in after him. Sam made soft pained sounds in his throat, but didn’t otherwise complain and he let John move his head to rest in his lap without even opening his eyes.

Dean slammed both passenger side doors and ran to get back behind the wheel. Gears grinding as he threw the car into reverse, then abruptly back into drive, he got them back onto the main road. Once they were on blacktop, he put his foot to the floor and sped all the way back to Carson City.

~~*~~

At the hospital, Sam was given antivenin and hooked up to a heart monitor and an IV drip. He was unconscious when they brought him in and John had to carry him into the emergency room.

The doctor said Sam was lucky, then he gave John some pills so he wouldn’t get sick from the venom he’d sucked out of Sam’s thigh. Even with the pills, John was sick for a couple of hours and came close to vomiting a few times.

Sam was out for seven hours and while they waited, Dean paced the room and John sat beside him, brooding.

He kept thinking about Sam’s skin in his mouth and the way he shook. It had been pain from the bite and the drawing of John’s mouth against it, making a deep purple mark around the cross shaped cut to pull out the poison. It hadn’t been anything but pain and delirium and John knew that. At the time, he hadn’t thought much of Sam’s reaction to the whole thing beyond mildly cynical amusement, but now… Now his mind played with the memory like a cat batting at a mouse.

He remembered Sam, flat on his back beneath him with his legs spread, body shaking, soft, half swallowed moans and whimpers… and John felt sick.

Sam shifted in the bed and John’s head came up, eyes watchful.

Dean paused in his pacing, but when Sam continued to sleep, he went back to it. Now he was muttering to himself under his breath, too.

John watched the steady rise and fall of Sam’s chest, the way his lips were slightly parted to allow for his soft, sleeping breath and he clenched his hand into a fist and put it on his knee to keep himself from touching him. It was strange now, how he thought about it. Before… Before he would have brushed the hair back from Sam’s face, readjusted his blankets, squeezed his hand to reassure him that he wasn’t alone, but now… Now he hesitated to touch at all. Part of him was disgusted by this new hesitation because it seemed to reaffirm that there was something to hesitate for.

“Will you sit down?” John demanded.

Dean froze and looked at him then at Sam. He went over to the chair on the other side of the room by the door and sat down. “Sorry,” he mumbled.

John raked a hand through his hair and shook his head. “No, I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t snap at you… It… Fuck. I’m just…”

“Yeah,” Dean said, understanding. At least some of it. “He’s so still. It’s… I know he’s not dead, but like that he almost could be.” He chewed on a hangnail on his thumb and shifted in his chair restlessly. “He looks dead. Dad?”

“Yeah?” John said wearily.

“I ah… I’m gonna go smoke a cigarette and grab some coffee,” Dean said. “You want anything?”

John shook his head and rubbed at the bridge of his nose. “Coffee, maybe,” he said. “Black.”

“Sure,” Dean said. He gave the bed where Sam was sleeping a last lingering look then left.

John sat there with his elbows on his knees, hands clasped between his legs, staring down at the tile floor. It was baby blue linoleum with flecks of gold and green in it. He thought about getting up to turn off the light because for some unexplainable reason, it annoyed him.

He remembered the press of Sam’s erection against his cheek. Hot, fevered skin against his lips and denim rough against the side of his face as Sam shuddered.

He remembered the doctor telling him, with that self-satisfied little smile on his face like he had anything to do with it, that Sam was lucky to be alive. Sam had almost died.

He felt ashamed and sick to his stomach.

“Dad?”

John lifted his head and his eyes, startled and wide like he’d been caught doing something naughty, fixed on Sam. “Sam,“ he said.

Sam looked back at him and smiled tiredly. “Hi,” he said. He looked around the room and frowned. “Where’s Dean?”

John cleared his throat and ran his tongue over his bottom lip, his mouth suddenly dry. “He… went for a smoke and to pick up some coffee,” John said. “You… Are you thirsty?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Sam said. He watched John lean over to get a bottle of water from the floor and frowned again. “Dad?”

John looked at him, brows raised in question and stood up to give him the water, holding it to his lips while he drank. He turned his gaze away as Sam’s throat worked and only looked back when Sam pushed the bottle away.

“Dad?” Sam said again.

“What is it, kiddo?” John asked, twisting the cap back on the water bottle.

“I’m okay, right?” Sam asked. He plucked nervously at the bed sheet and looked at the machine he was hooked up to. “I’m not…? I don’t know…”

“No,” John said. “No, you’re going to be fine.” He started to sit back down, but Sam’s hand shot out and grabbed his wrist. “What is it, Sam?”

“Dad… I… You know when you were…?” He swallowed and dropped his eyes, flushing a little at whatever he was trying to say. “When you did… um…”

“When I sucked the poison out of your leg,” John supplied, guessing. “I’m sorry, Sam, but it had to be done. That venom had to get out of there and that was the only—”

“I know,” Sam said quickly. “I know that, it’s just… I didn’t mean to…”

And John got it. He really did. “Shh, hey, don’t worry about it,” he said. He started to take his arm away from Sam and sit down again, but Sam’s fingers tightened and he stopped. “It’s a perfectly normal reaction,” John assured him.

He wasn’t even sure about that himself, but it sounded true and goddamn it, he would make them both believe it. “It was just a physical reaction, that’s all it was,” he said.

“No,” Sam said. He tugged John’s arm where he had his hand around his wrist, drawing his attention up to Sam’s face.

John gave him a wide-eyed stare and made himself meet Sam’s gaze. Sam watched him and there was a whole new level of heat in his eyes that John had never seen before. Something… intense and fragile.

“No,” Sam said again, softer. “I… I liked it. Kinda. Not the bite; that hurt like… but…”

John twisted his wrist out of Sam’s hand. “No,” he said. He tried to sound calm and patient, like a father correcting his son, but he wasn’t sure he quite pulled it off. “No, Sam. Anyone puts their mouth that close to… that part of your body and… you’re going to react to it. It’s got nothing to do with me.”

“Maybe it does,” Sam insisted. He scooted up in the bed and cocked his head, studying his father with an intensity that made John distinctly uncomfortable. “I think…”

“No,” John said, because even if that were true, it didn’t matter. The very idea of what Sam was thinking—what he had been thinking—set off all kinds of alarm bells and made him disgusted and ashamed. “No, it doesn’t. Now, you go to sleep, Sammy. You… You’ve got to get better and go back to school.”

“You don’t care about school,” Sam said.

“Sam,” John said firmly. “Go back to sleep. You get yourself a girlfriend or something and you’re going to feel really stupid about all of this. Now close your eyes.”

It was on the tip of Sam’s tongue to say he didn’t want a girlfriend, but the way his dad was watching him made him swallow the words back and just nod. He looked… scared. Sam knew his dad and his dad was never scared. “I’m sorry.”

“You hush now, go to sleep,” John said. He sat back down in the chair by the bed and rubbed his temples. He was beginning to get a headache and he desperately wanted a drink. “Dean will be back in a few minutes. You just rest.”

“Sure,” Sam said.

He settled back down in the bed and watched his father. He noted the uncomfortable way he sat in his chair, shifting like he wanted to get up and pace. He kept rubbing his temples and the bridge of his nose and clenching and unclenching his hands. He wouldn’t raise his eyes any higher than where the sheet and blanket stopped at mid-chest on Sam and mostly just watched the floor or looked to the door, waiting for Dean. He was nervous and edgy and his hands were shaking. His dad’s hands never shook.

All Sam could think was, I did that and it was so strange because he wasn’t sorry for it. Not at all.


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Chapter Two>>