Dance of the Stone Death (pt. 1)

Title: Dance of the Stone Death
Pairing(s): Sam/Dean, Sam/other, Dean/other
Rated: NC-17
Warnings: AU, original characters, disturbing situations, slash obviously
Word count: 33,358
Notes: I started writing this a while back, so it's AU as of somewhere in the middle of season 4 I think, possibly earlier. There are original characters in this, but I love them and their existence doesn't make this story any less of a Sam/Dean focused story. I don't really know how to warn for some of the things in this story, just be aware that the situation is pretty messed up right from the start. Oh, and just FYI, everything I know about being a doctor I learned from shit like ER and General Hospital, so don't hate. Each part has a quote for a header and there are quotes within the story throughout. The authors of these are, in no specific order: Rainer Maria Rilke, D.H. Lawrence, Seamus Heaney, Horace Mann, Thomas Campion, Robert Burns, Neil Gaiman, Salman Rushdie, Richard Donner and Edward Khmara. The story idea was inspired in part by the movie Ladyhawk and I think one of those names is the guy responsible for that, but I can't remember which one. Anyway, they are credited. Beta edited by judas_denied.
Summary: They could spend the rest of their lives chasing eclipses, hunting that frail ghost of a touch, but that was no way to live.



Dance of the Stone Death

“You are the call and I am the answer,
You are the wish, and I the fulfillment,
You are the night and I the day.
What else? It is perfect enough.
It is perfectly complete,
You and I,
What more—?
Strange how we suffer in spite of this!”

— D.H. Lawrence
“Bei Hennef”


All I know is a door into the dark.

Dean came out of the bar where he’d spent most of the night getting falling down shit-faced while taking everyone’s money at the pool tables and almost ran smack into the big green dumpster in the alley. He put out his hands to steady himself, caught the edge of the dumpster and felt one of his hands squish in something half decayed that hadn’t quite made it in the can when it was thrown out.

“Ick,” he said, shaking his hand to get whatever it was off of him—almost losing his balance in the process.

Staggering back, he tripped over a pothole and only managed to keep his balance by stepping right in it, going ankle-deep in ice cold rainwater, then falling with his back against the brick wall. He stayed like that for a while, blinking his eyes to try and focus them and then tilted his head back to look up at the sky.

It would be daylight in a couple of hours and before that happened; he had to get back to the hospital and into the chapel. He had to be there when the sun came up or Sammy would worry and come looking for him.

Dean heaved a deep sigh and stood away from the wall, ready to make his way to the nearest bus stop to catch a ride home. Then he stopped and unzipped his pants, suddenly needing to piss like nobody‘s business.

“Hands up! Gimme y’ wallet!”

Dean looked up, peered blearily at the person before him and blinked. It was a man, that much he could tell from the voice and he was tall and probably white, Dean thought, despite his lame attempts at sounding like a bad-ass mo‘fo. But it was dark and his eyes didn’t want to focus, so all he could see was a tall smear. “Can’t,” he said. “Kinda… in the middle of something.”

“Doan fuck wi’ me, man. Put ya hands up an’ gimme y’ wallet or I’ll put a hole in yo’ goddamn forehead!”

“I’m not fucking with you, just let me pee first, okay?” Dean said. He swayed and put out a hand to brace himself against the wall. The guy trying to mug him tightened his grip on his gun when Dean moved and Dean rolled his eyes up to look at him and make sure the trigger-happy dipshit didn’t shoot him for it.

“Doan chew try nothin’!” the guy yelled, his voice cracking.

“Jesus, who writes your dialog?” Dean asked. He was slurring, but it probably didn’t matter. The guy didn’t seem to hear him anyway.

Dean finished peeing, zipped up and suddenly had a gun right in his face. He frowned, desperately trying to focus and wishing like hell he hadn’t drank that last drink. Or maybe the last two drinks.

He tilted his head up and looked at the sky again. It hadn’t changed much from the last time he’d looked, but he was starting to get that insistent warm feeling in his skin that he knew meant dawn wasn’t far off. “Got to get home,” Dean muttered. “Going to be late.”

“I doan give a fuck,” the guy said, shoving the barrel of the gun against Dean’s cheek on the last word. “Gimme yo’ wallet or I’ll blow yo’ fuckin’ head off, man.”

Dean’s hand shot out and he snatched the gun out of the guy’s shaking grip. His otherwise hair-trigger quick reflexes were off because, yeah, he was really drunk, so he didn’t get it before the guy pulled the trigger, but the bullet went wild. He heard it scream by his ear and just like that, Dean was viciously pissed.

He hit the guy in the face with the hand still holding the gun he’d taken away from him, saw the clip where it hooked out from the butt of the gun cut the guy’s face open, then he just kept hitting him. Such rage roared through him that he saw red and heard his own screams inside his skull before they passed through his lips. He knew the would-be mugger was unconscious, he knew he had to leave now if he wanted to catch the bus back to the hospital before daybreak and he knew Sam would be so upset if he could see Dean now—he knew all of this, but he still didn’t stop. He wanted to cave the asshole’s head in and spit in what remained of his eyes. He wanted to castrate him with his bare hands, then force-feed him his own pathetic manhood. He wanted to do all of that and more, but he couldn’t make himself stop hitting him long enough to get down to that kind of serious business.

The door that led from the bar into the alley opened and someone looked out. He saw Dean, recognized him and called his name.

Dean’s head came up and he froze. He was breathing hard, making low sounds almost like snarls in his throat and it took a few seconds for his vision to clear. When it did, he looked back down at the man he’d been hitting, noted his own hand clenched in the guy’s blood-matted hair, and dropped him. His chest was heaving like he’d been trying to breathe fire.

“Fucker,” Dean muttered under his breath. He felt the gun still in his hand and looked at it. It was covered in blood and there were pieces of skin and strips of hair hanging off the textured grip. He curled his lip in disgust and threw it down on the ground beside the guy, who didn’t move—who didn’t even look like he was breathing much. Dean almost hoped he wasn’t, except…

“Eddie?” Dean said, looking back toward the bar.

Eddie nodded and came out of the bar, closing the door behind him. “Whoa, man,” he said, speaking with a soft tone of awe as he looked down at the man who’d tried to mug Dean. “Wow. Um… you think I should call somebody?”

He reached for his phone in the inside left pocket of his coat then paused when Dean looked at him. “Or not,” he said. “Ah… Dean, my friend, you’ve got yourself some serious anger issues.”

“Yeah,” Dean said. He wiped his bloody hand on his pants and then hissed at the sting of cuts on his knuckles rubbing against the denim.

“Might want to get that looked into,” Eddie said.

Dean snorted. “No,” he said.

His breathing was starting to slow and his heartbeat was beginning to regulate. Enough that Dean almost felt bad about what Eddie was seeing. He liked Eddie a lot; they were pretty good friends and they sometimes hustled pool together or spent the night bar-hopping, but Dean didn’t like Eddie seeing him like this.

Dean didn’t like anyone seeing him like this.

“Eddie?” Dean said.

“Yeah, man,” Eddie said.

“Uh… I’m gonna be late if I take the bus now, could I get a ride home?” Dean asked.

He hated to ask it. Hated the questions that would inevitably be raised when Eddie pulled up in front of emergency at St. Sebastian’s General Hospital to let Dean out. But… Dean looked up at the sky again and noted that it looked a little lighter. But it was an emergency, in it’s way, and Dean thought Eddie might find it a hell of a lot more weird if he saw what happened to his friend when the sun came up.

The silky shadow of dawn doth approach, he thought and grinned to himself. For some reason, the voice in his head took on a pseudo-Romanian, Count Dracula accent when it said that.

“Sure, Dean,” Eddie said. He looked back down at the unconscious, bleeding guy on the ground. “I think maybe I should call someone, though. Else this dude may die.”

“Fine,” Dean said. “Call the cops, but leave me out of it, okay? Just… say you found him like that and let them figure it out.”

“I can do that,” Eddie said. He took out his phone to dial 9-1-1 while he walked with Dean to his Honda parked by the curb around the building. He gave the police the address of the bar, told them the guy was in the alley and looked like he might be dead, then hung up.

“Okay, so where am I taking you?” he asked, getting in the car and hitting the locks to let Dean in.

Dean got in the passenger side and slumped gratefully in the seat. “St. Sebastian’s,” he said.

“I thought I was taking you home,” Eddie said, pinning him with a look and the kind of scrutiny Dean had been expecting and dreading. “You ain’t hurt, are you? That guy shoot you or something?”

“No, I’m fine,” Dean assured him. “Just… take me there, okay?” he said. He frowned anxiously at the purpling color of the sky and scratched his arm where his skin felt warmer. “Please, Eddie?”

“Yeah, sure,” Eddie said. He turned on the car and rolled down his window as he pulled away from the curb. At a red light, he took a cigarette out of a pack in his coat pocket, offered one to Dean and lit them both with the lighter in the dash. “What’s at St. Sebastian’s?” he asked.

Of course he had to ask his questions now. Probably, Dean thought, he just couldn’t help himself.

“My brother works there,” Dean said. It was only half a lie.

“Your brother a doctor?” Eddie asked, looking at Dean out of the corners of his eyes as the light turned green.

“Yeah,” Dean said.

“What kind of doctor is he?” Eddie asked.

“The medical kind,” Dean said, hoping he would let it go. He caught the skeptical look Eddie was giving him, though and sighed. “He works in the emergency room, mostly,” Dean said. “I think he has a few regular patients, but I’m not sure how many.”

“Huh,” Eddie said.

He was quiet for a long time and Dean had time enough to hope that Eddie might just get him home before something else occurred to him. They pulled into the visitor parking lot in the front instead of outside emergency and Dean cursed softly to himself. He would have to walk around to the back of the building or go through the front and all the way through the hospital to where the chapel was.

He looked at the sky again and felt his heart leap. It was turning that grey-lavender color it got when the sun was preparing to make its grand appearance.

“Thanks a lot, Eddie,” Dean said and got out of the car just as Eddie pulled into a parking space.

“Any time,” Eddie said. “You don’t seem much like a doctor’s brother,” he added after a while.

Dean didn’t know what the hell he was supposed to say to something like that so he just shrugged and thanked Eddie again as he jogged toward the main building.

He went around the building to the back where the emergency entrance was. Emergency was always open. It was some kind of a rule, Dean supposed, which was okay with him because if not for that rule, he’d most likely spend a good portion of his life as an oversized lawn gnome in one of the hospital’s many flowerbeds.

Dean would have liked to slip by the front desk unnoticed but it was not to be. There was a new intern, a girl Dean had met once before under very similar circumstances and she was diligently manning her station. She was wearing pink scrubs today and popping purple bubblegum against her teeth when he walked in.

“Hello, Dean,” she said, smiling brightly at him. Until she noticed the blood on his hand and smeared on his pants. “Oh,” she said, a little more surprised by it than Dean thought an intern working in the ER should really be.

“Er, hi,” Dean said. “I’m supposed to meet Sam here this morning,” he lied.

“Oh,” she said again.

Her nametag said “Cindy”, but for some reason Dean could have sworn her name was “Judy”. Oh well. Daylight, as he’d quickly learned, did funny things to him and it was fast approaching. And he was still a little drunk, which probably didn’t help matters either.

“I uh… slammed my thumb in the car door,” Dean said, thinking he should try to explain the blood on his hand to her so she’d quit staring like that.

“Oh,” Cindy said again. “Okay. Do you want me to clean it up for you?”

Dean shook his head. He sidled toward the hallway that would lead him straight down to the chapel. “Ah… I’ll get Sam to look at it. Later. When he gets here.”

“He’s not scheduled until ten o’clock,” Cindy said. She turned in her swivel chair to follow him as he moved by the desk. Her gum made that irritating little clicking sound and Dean felt his skin twitch a little.

“That’s okay,” Dean said. “I’ll… do you mind if I wait in the chapel?”

She smiled at him and shook her head. “No, of course not,” she said. She probably thought Dean was super religious because that was where he always went. Little did she know. “Go right ahead. I’ll let him know where you are when he gets here.”

“Okay, thanks,” Dean said, and practically dashed down the hall to get there.

The chapel, which he sometimes thought of as a prison, home or hiding place depending on his mood, had that moment been elevated to the status of sanctuary. His skin felt like it was glowing now. Like there were little burning ants tunneling under his skin, into his muscles and chewing at his tendons. Strangely, it didn’t hurt, but it was very uncomfortable and because he knew what it portended, it was really unsettling.

Dean ducked inside the chapel and glanced around to make sure he was alone before making his way to the front pew. By now, he could feel the sun rising. It was like a hum through his center, a stutter in his heart, numbness on his tongue and in his lips. He didn’t need to see it to track its slow progress across the sky.

“I feel like a fucking vampire sometimes, Sammy,” Dean said, stopping beside the life-sized nude statue that everyone in the hospital called “Adam”. Except Dean, who still called him “Sammy” most of the time.

Dean glanced toward the chapel door and started to strip, hoping like hell he wouldn’t get caught with the sun up and his pants half down. He wanted a few minutes to talk to Sam, but he wasn’t going to have time for that this time. He looked at the blood on his clothes and thought he should leave Sam a note so he didn’t panic and get the wrong idea, but he might not even have time for that.

He folded his clothes and set them on the end of the pew, then looked around for something to write with. He spotted the podium where they kept the guest book and went over to it. There was a pen, but it was on a chain fastened to the podium, so Dean flipped to a blank page in the book, scribbled quickly, and ripped the page out.

He laid the note on top of his pile of clothes, then stood there, looking at Sam while he waited. He hated this part.

“I hate this part,” Dean said, whispering it.

Dean glanced at the large crucifix on the wall over the podium and shuddered. In this particular model, Jesus was severely emaciated with blood running down his back and into his eyes. He had a look of torment and suffering on his face that didn’t seem the least bit holy. Dean wondered now, as he had, standing in that very spot, wondered a thousand times before, how anyone could believe that a god who would do that to his own son could be just, kind and righteous.

“I know exactly how you feel,” Dean told Jesus on the cross.

He looked back at Sam and he ached with how much he loved him, how much he wanted to reach out and touch him. But Dean would rather be beaten and crucified than put his hand out now and feel cold stone against his fingertips.

It was strange how it happened; the closer it got to dawn, the more anxious he became until it was almost like he wanted it to happen so he could stop waiting for it. It was something that Dean had learned well in his life, in many ways; how the anticipation of pain was often more excruciating than the pain itself.

And it was, for maybe a minute before the real pain hit and he forgot all about the anticipation. He forgot about Jesus and the fact that he was standing naked in the chapel of the St. Sebastian General Hospital and any second Cindy with the pink scrubs could come walking in to ask him if he wanted coffee. And was he sure he didn’t need her to take a look at his hand?

Then he felt the sun rise in his belly and for an instant Sam wasn’t cold stone, he was flesh and blood again. And Dean knew that if he could reach out and touch Sam before his hand turned to cold marble, he would feel yielding flesh beneath his fingers. He had tried, every single time since the first, he had tried and even though it never happened, he still tried again now. Sometimes it was so hard to believe that Sam was really there anymore, that in this fucked up way they were there together, all this time later. A touch would reassure him and make all the wasted, lonely nights maybe not so worthless.

Wanting to touch Sam again more than he wanted to draw breath, Dean reached out to do just that and felt the stone creeping through him right there, moving over his arms like scales, until the sunlight froze in his heart, stilled that last breath in his lungs and he slept.

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