apocalypsos | Fic: Ain't Nothing a Little Fire and Brimstone Can't Solve (Supernatural)

Title: Ain't Nothing A Little Fire and Brimstone Can't Solve
Author: Troll Princess
Fandom: Supernatural
Rating: R
Pairing: None
Spoilers for: "Shadows"
Warnings: Violence, bad language
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, I just like playing with them.
Summary: Surviving that final fight's a hell of a lot easier than you think and twice as hard at the same time.

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Ain't Nothing A Little Fire and Brimstone Can't Solve

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five

You can still hold a gun slick with your own blood if you cut yourself off from a lot of things.

See, this is what you do. First, you ignore that dull angry pain that's settling over your body like a wet quilt, the pain that's easier to deal with every passing moment if you convince yourself the nerve endings are the first thing to go. Maybe it's shock. Fuck if you really know, not right now with your T-shirt turning black and sagging downward.

But pretend you're drunk or something, three bottles of Southern Comfort past thinking straight. That's your best bet.

Then you can fixate on staying conscious and upright. You can't smell anything but copper and dampness, not the stench of the thing on the other side of the room, not the sulfur permeating the air in this place as if the oxygen was too scared to stay. Use it, though. Focus on that, on the heavy scent of your own blood grasping at you like a needy child.

Next up is looking at that dark presence that's leering at you like some pervert picking you up in a seedy bar and remembering you're currently the only Winchester capable of holding a weapon.

Then you give your own blood a little time to dry. Tell a joke or crack wise or something. That's how you deal with stress, after all. Pay more attention to how batshit insane this son of a bitch is and not on how badly your fingers are quivering or the way your heart's beating so fast it's about to travel through time.

That'll give you time to let that dried blood practically glue the fucking gun to your hand.

Gross, yeah, but desperate times and desperate measures, right?

four

What Sam does when he passes out is this.

He sags all boneless and limp to the ground like a ragdoll, and he could have been beating the shit out of someone but his hands will relax and his muscles will loosen in just the right way to make him look like he just decided to take a nap in the middle of a fight. Once you found him passed out while fighting a poltergeist in a hospital and this nurse you were trying to save asked if he was narcoleptic.

What you do when you pass out is this.

You drop like you're fighting, is what Sam says. You could faint from lack of food or sleep or something and you'd still look like you'd gone down in the middle of the heavyweight championship against unconsciousness. He said one time that when he finds you like that, he always expects your knuckles to be broken or cracked.

What Dad does when he passes out is this.

He doesn't.

Right now that evil bastard's laughing at your father's lifeless body and if there had ever been a better time for you to go fucking psychotic, you can't remember it.

three

About two weeks after your mother's death, Dad cooked hamburgers on the grill and the smell of it made you throw the first temper tantrum you'd had in months.

It wasn't that high-pitched screaming you've seen spoiled little brats in stores and at parks pulling off, not the way Dad tells it. You have this vague memory of crying so hard you hurt all over, of this head-to-toe ache like your entire body had been one giant pulled muscle. The memory pierces through you when you dwell on it, sharp and vicious with someone else's wailing ringing in your ears.

Dad says you wouldn't eat hamburgers for months after that. You wonder sometimes what that says about you now, that if it used to have horns and hind legs you want it thrown on an open flame and cooked just this side of charcoal.

You know that stench that saturates the air right now?

Of course you do. It's making your stomach clench and flail, writhing like a mad thing in your chest. And the worst part, the absolutely worst part of that smell, is that it comes at you sharp and vicious with someone else's wailing ringing in your ears and right now you know for a fact it's not Sam doing it.

two

It would be easier if this were just a random place, just another dumping ground or abandoned building or old warehouse. But in the kitchen there are three dead bodies piled against the fridge like cordwood, one larger and two smaller, and if you squint at the doorway you can still see the faint marks low to the ground where Mom marked your height and Sam's in pen.

The ceiling isn't on fire, not yet, but every time you've been in this room since the last time the ceiling burned, it's felt like a fucking sauna in here.

Sweat pours off Sam in rivers and you wish you weren't being so close to literal.

one

How you kill the monster that murdered your mother is easier than you think it's going to be.

First you remember you're a superhero. Correction ... you're a goddamn legacy. Your father is the one who's the superhero, the one who's the closest thing to Batman you've ever seen in real life. But you're the next in line, see, the one whose grip on a weapon never falters and whose aim is pristine. If you had a son tomorrow, you'd train him to do the same shit you've had pounded into you for years, and you'd like to think Sam would do the same for his kids.

Don't you get it? It fucked up, is what it did. It tried to break your family and ended up starting an army.

Remember that when it takes in your father's lifeless body and laughs.

Next you keep it simple. Just remember, if all else fails, you can always take the son of a bitch down with you. You've had a good life, and even if you haven't, the people you've saved will.

Now comes the hard part, because this is where you have to realize that gun in your hand won't even make this bastard flinch. You'll raise it to aim directly between his eyes, at his heart, at his crotch because you're feeling really fucking vindictive right now. You'll fire, and that laughter of his will scrape along your spine like nails down a chalkboard.

Okay, so you want to know the really hard part?

And this is what's going to kill you, see, because that face staring you down and laughing like a madman is yours. Sammy's in that light, but yours in this one. Ain't nothing of John Winchester in that face and everything of yours and Sam's that didn't come from Mom.

Hurts, does it?

Good. Use it.

Anything you can do, I can do a hell of a lot better.

Remember that? A couple of crack shots at Sam's expense when he was a kid, the kind of wise remark that would get him pissed off so much he'd take you down that much faster. You used to do it all the time in sparring matches, and still do on a more subtle level when the big geek could use it.

In the past three years he's been on the road with you, Sam's had dreams of the future, visions of evil you have to fight. He's made things move with his mind. He's started fires without matches. He once made some snot-nosed punk do exactly what he wanted just by thinking really hard about it.

Don't you get it? This is where you win.

This is where you stare down the thing that killed your mother and hurt your family, get that mental image of picture frames that shudder on walls and spontaneously erupting flames that engulf your enemies, and crack a smile as you think, Anything Sam can do, I can do a hell of a lot better.