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Dean sat where Angua had deposited him, staring after Angua's back as she went to rummage for pie ingredients. Sam was still at the bar, still hunched over his glass, shoulders tight and too long hair falling over his ears and into his eyes.

It made him look younger than he was, younger then the new lines around his eyes and mouth betrayed, and Dean's heart twisted a little tighter in his chest.

Sam would be okay here. Somehow, Dean could make that happen, and if not Dean than Jess or Dad or Twerp or any combination of people left on the island that loved him. The only person in the way of that was Sam himself, but Dean would find a way around that, too.

He just had to find a way around whatever it was that stood between them, first.

Sam had arrived on the island spitting words like apocalypse and Lucifer from his mouth, and those scared Dean, but not nearly as much as the look in Sam's eyes when he said them.

Dean sighed, tucking himself further into the booth, watching with an anxiousness barely contained while those around Sam came and went. Occasionally he looked away, out into the jungle beyond the Winchester, to his hands and the small but growing marks on his palms his own fingernails had left behind, but always Dean's focus shifted back to Sam at the bar.

"Fuck," he murmured, twitching helplessly as the long line of uncertain questions restarted themselves in his head. What the hell happened to us?

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"No, he isn't from the same time." Dean's hands tightened around each other on the table top. "He's a lot different than the Sam you knew. Been through a lot more."

I nod wordlessly, knocking back what's left in my glass, watching the last drop or two swirl in the bottom when I roll the glass between my palms. I don't know what to say. I can't keep asking questions I know he doesn't wanna answer. It's rare, seeing him like this, and I never know quite what to do when I do.

Worrying my bottom lip with my teeth, I nudge his boot under the table with my battered sneaker, trying to say as much as I can without a goddamn hug or pat on the back or whatever.

"I'm sorry, Dean," I said, because even though Sam being back wasn't a bad thing fundamentally, there was so much upsetting stuff that came with it. I squeezed his arm tighter, and I didn't care that it made me a selfish person, I was glad he was there, on the island, with me. I didn't like imagining him back home in danger, even if it was for the best cause in the world.

"I want to see him, but I also don't. You know?" I couldn't even look over my shoulder to catch a glimpse of Sam inside, despite wanting to desperately. "The last thing he needs is some crazy dead chick he doesn't even know crying all over him, right? I should just leave it alone."

"I'm glad you have him back," she said, nodding a little. "It's been kind of hard, right? Not having him here?"

"Kind of hard." Dean chuckled low. "Pretending you haven't noticed me being a giant, mopey asshole." He pointed a finger. "You are learning some social etiquette."

"He needs to believe he's here," said Dean, "and that it isn't all a trick. The more people recognizing him, grounding him..." Dean let a shoulder rise and fall - he couldn't admit that he wasn't sure what his brother needed. "Probably more the better."

He looked over, trying for a smile. "You might dial down the crazy tears, though."

Dean took some comfort in that single point of contact, unmoored from his endless, desperate circle of thoughts long enough to flush. "Oh man," he said, shifting. "Footsie? Now I know I look like ass."

"Fuck you," I mutter, rolling my eyes and scrubbing a hand across my face. "I didn't exactly go over too well over there, either," I say, jerking a nod toward where his brother's still hunched at the bar, "He pretty much told me to fuck off."

"He did what?" Dean followed Neil's brief gaze to the bar, expression suddenly as pinched as the set of Sam's shoulders. That wasn't like Sam, he'd always been the one with social graces. Try as he might, Dean couldn't picture him telling Neil to fuck off. "Why?"

"Maybe," O-Ren conceded, "but if I had a brother and he disappeared...." She shook her head. "And then that thing, where people fell asleep, that happened." A frustrated breath. "It had to be hard, to get to go home and then be brought back here."

"I dunno. I acted like I knew him, I guess. Said he wanted to just drink his drink and be done with it," I shrug, "It was my own fault, anyway. I called him a jackass." Which isn't the entire truth, but now, looking at Dean's face, I feel an unfamiliar need to take the blame.

I shouldn't have said anything at all.

"Well, I'm not...arguing that he can earn the title, some days," said Dean slowly, turning back to Neil. He was doing some shuffling, too, trying to push that information into a place that didn't make Sam out to be the bad guy.

"He's had a long day. Came right out of a battle back home," he said, willing Neil to understood it. Things weren't pretty back home, and neither were the Winchesters, most of the time. "He'll chill out. What'd he say, anyway?" he added, expression almost making it to a smile. "That made you call him a jackass."

Dean shook his head. "It was only hard 'cause I couldn't find him. Here's where I want to be, O-Ren, and it will be as long as you guys are around. Sam's back now, things are gonna get better."

He sighed and rubbed a hand over his eyes, dry and scratchy like he hadn't slept in a week. "Like they were, I promise."

"Yeah, I know he has," I say, coughing out a laugh and returning that weak smile as best I can, "Asked if we brewed the booze inna bathtub. I don't even know where this batch came from. He'd have to ask Ianto." I guess I'm more protective of this place than I thought.

"It doesn't matter, man. He doesn't even know me. I'm just the fuckin' mouthy bartender."

"I'm not making any guarantees," I said, and managed to force a weak smile. I couldn't tell whether Dean's answer was a relief or a burden: Part of me wanted to see Sam again, part of me wanted to stay as far away as possible.

Rollie has a habit of talking to Dean whenever he runs into him, sometimes just small talk, sometimes talking shop for a while, but after stopping in to the Winchester to see if he can pick up some hot food for the kidlet for dinner and spotting Dean there, he thinks this conversation is going to be neither of those things.

"I was going to ask you if you wanted go over a few procedures tonight," he says while he's waiting for his takeout, "but you look like you've got other things on your mind."

"I'm glad he's back," O-Ren said. "I'm going to make him like me this time around. You'll see." It might have been pointed out to her before that such goal-oriented ways of thinking could be a downfall.

On the other hand, things having to do with other people were a whole other sort of challenge.

Where Sam was, of course Dean was not far.

"Your brother is a prick," Castiel growled as he slid into the booth next to Dean. He took the bottle from Dean's hand to have a drink of his own and grimaced, forgetting how bitter it tasted.

Edited 2009-10-28 03:23 (UTC)

Dean whistled low, managing a decent smile this time. "Ought to know better than to insult another man's baby," he said, nodding at the Winchester. "He'll settle down. 'specially when he figures out that out of the few places to hang on the island, this is easily the nicest."

"S'all right," Dean murmured, pushing a lock of loose hair back behind her ear. "Him popping back in like this...he's not the only one who got shook up today. He's a smart kid. He'll figure that out."

"Yeah?" said Dean, smile tugging at his lips. "I can see you have a battle plan. Go on." He spread his hands. "Lay it on me."

"Yeah," Dean exhaled. It was crazy how quickly things could change. Earlier today he'd been worrying over his latest learning assignment, now he was knee deep in trying to figure out how to hold Sam's head above water.

"My brother's back."

Words Rollie maybe should have been expecting at some point, but they still come as a surprise.

"Well, shit," he says, and while he's never personally experienced the hope-elation-despair of having a loved one return changed, he can imagine it. "Clinic's there if you need it, but don't feel like you have to. Take whatever time you need."

"Damn right," I say with a quiet laugh, "What we lack in decent booze, we make up for in... whatever the fuck this is," I wave my hand around the room, "Fuckin' ambiance or whatever."

I guess nudity and stripper poles counts for ambiance too, though.

"Atmosphere," Dean agreed, knuckles rapping light against the table. It was good to think of something else for a moment, even if thoughts of Sam had led him to it, and even if all thought would eventually wander back the same way.

"He'll get a look at those fucking concrete Compound walls and think better, I promise you."

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