Hellbound, for juliasets

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Title: Hellbound

Recipient: juliasets

Rating: R

Word Count: ~8,500 words

Warnings: graphic descriptions of Hell-torture, Lucifer, angst with a happy ending

Author's Notes: big thanks to my beta wetsammy !

Summary: Sam is in Hell, and then he isn't. He's standing on a sidewalk with a stranger looking back at him—a stranger that has his face.

season 6 AU Written for these two prompts: The guy says he's Dean's brother, but Dean's an only child. He doesn't even know any "Sams." / Dean can’t see or hear or feel Sam, even though Sam is right there. Dean is blind and deaf to any evidence of Sam’s existence. Sam about loses his mind trying to keep Dean from doing crazy reckless stuff—some to solve where Sam is, some just because Dean is Dean.

*

There was a streetlight. Sam looked at it, disoriented. He’d been somewhere else a moment ago, somewhere dark and hot, and he’d been in so much pain. And now he wasn’t.

Now he was outside, standing in front of a house. With no memory of how he’d gotten away from where he’d been—Hell it was Hell and Lucifer—and no idea of where he was. He looked through the window, where a family sat having dinner. Smiling, laughing. A woman that looked familiar and a boy around twelve...and Dean. Dean who threw back his head and laughed as he took a heaping scoop of mashed potatoes from a bowl. Dean who’d been with Sam when Lucifer had used his fists to…

Sam turned away, eyes tearing at the memory and looked instead at the sidewalk, where somebody was watching him. Somebody who looked exactly like Sam, watching him with an inscrutable expression. He raised his chin, like a challenge, like he was waiting for Sam to say something, then turned on his heel and walked away.

“Hey—wait!” Sam shouted, snapping out of it. He ran after the man, or doppelgänger, or shifter, whatever it was. Sprinting, he caught up with him quickly, since the mimic didn’t seem the least bit alarmed by Sam’s pursuit.

Sam skidded to a halt inches away and said again, “Hey!”

And now his double turned around again, leveling him with a look. “Hiya, Sammy.”

Sam grabbed the stranger by the shoulder, and the sidewalk around them erupted. Hooks burst through the cement, attached to long red cords. They snaked through the air and bit into Sam, dug into his ankles and wrists pulling at him, pulling him back down. His double watched impassively and did nothing as the pain overwhelmed Sam, searing inside of him, flooding his veins with fire and agony. The world around him crumbled away, the street, the copycat, the sliver of moon in the dark sky above and everything burned.

*

The cage was covered in bleeding thorns, winding, red vines that looped themselves around Sam's ankles and wrists and bound him, limbs spread painfully wide. The hooks were still there, slick and shining and barely discernible amongst all those other points of searing pain.

"You think you can get away?" Lucifer seethed, "You think you can just leave me, without suffering the consequences?"

The thorns dug deeper into Sam's flesh. His blood was black in the darkness of the cage, Lucifer's rage the only light.

"I—I don't know how I got out," Sam grated out.

"A slip up. It won't happen again. You're here forever, with me."

"No," Sam said weakly, throat constricted by another vine, a disembodied, massive vein, that wrapped its way around his neck, choking him as it worked its way towards his mouth. If he could figure out how to get away again, he'd do it. But he didn't know how it had happened the first time, he'd been here, in excruciating pain and then—

The thorns and hooks were gone. He was dressed again, wearing his old clothes—jeans, flannel, jacket. He wasn't bleeding, he brought a hand up to his throat, checking for vines that weren't there. It was brighter too, though not by much. He was in a bar, the stink of it came back moments later, old beer, stale smoke and sweat. He was in a bar, sitting in a booth. Something pulled inside of him, much softer than when Lucifer pulled his guts out of him, but similar—deep and visceral and then the tension broke like a snapped rubber band, and then Sam saw himself doubling, like blurred vision at first: his hand and arm outlined with another, moving further away inch by inch until his whole body stood up and separated from him, even though he was still sitting there.

His other self sat down across from him, something like a scowl on his face. He took the single bottle of beer on the table and pulled it towards him, leaning back in the seat as he took a drink, one arm spread across the back of the booth seat. Setting the bottle back on the table, he looked Sam up and down. "You're back."

Sam still wasn't sure where he was. This could still be Hell. Lucifer had made the cage into all sorts of places, most often memories of Sam's he didn't like. But he didn't remember this particular bar. They all did sort of look alike, but this one had a garish neon bull on the back wall that he thought he would've recognized.

"Why do you keep coming here?"

"Why?" Sam asked, dumbfounded. It wasn't just the disorientation. "I was in Hell."

"Yeah, and? You what—just decided you didn't want to be there anymore?"

"I—" Sam's head throbbed as he searched for the answer. He didn't want to be there, ever, but he deserved to be didn't he? It's what he'd signed up for. To lock Lucifer back up, to fix his unforgivable mistake.

His double leaned closer, resting his forearms on the least sticky part of the table. "I don't need you."

"Who are you?" Sam asked, getting angry.

"Oh please, you know the answer to that."

"You're me. And I'm..." Sam's words trailed off as his eyes were drawn towards the door which had just opened. Dean had walked in. Sam's heart dropped to his shoes. He was happy to see his brother, but how would he even begin to explain what had happened, how he even got here, when he himself didn't know.

But none of that mattered. Sam stood and headed for Dean, weaving through the crowd of patrons. Dean was by himself at a stool near the end, so Sam walked up to his side, leaving a good foot between them. The shock would be enough for Dean as was. Sam cleared his throat, trying to draw Dean's attention, but he didn't react. It was loud in the bar, he hadn't heard him. "Dean," Sam said, pitching his voice loudly enough that Dean would hear him. Except he didn't.

A bearded guy, laughing and preoccupied with his friend, took a step back, nearly colliding with Sam, which sent Sam dodging out of the way and into the bar. Into the bar. He'd stepped right through the bar, hips and waist midway into the beer-stained wood. Sam reached his hand out tentatively and pushed his finger into the bar-top. They sunk right in. Which meant he wasn't tangible. He was a spirit, or maybe he wasn't even really here. His heart started pounding—though he couldn't really have a heart if he was still dead, if he was still in Hell and maybe this whole thing was just another trick of Lucifer's maybe that's why he'd gotten out in the first place because he wanted to taunt him with this mundane torture of Dean sitting by himself in a bar.

Dean for his part hadn't noticed any of Sam's struggles with tangibility and was just sitting there quietly drinking his beer.

"What're you drinking?" a guy asked from Dean's other side. No, not just a guy. Sam's double.

Dean turned to him and held up his bottle. He waved the bartender over and signaled for another bottle.

The other Sam had positioned himself so he was in clear view. For Sam's benefit. He paid the bartender for his bottle, took a drink and said, "My brother used to drink this."

"Used to?" Dean asked. "Did he—"

"No. We...sorta went our own ways."

"Huh. Well, your brother's got good taste," Dean said, taking another swig.

Sam's double looked at Sam pointedly then turned back to Dean. "You have one?"

"One what?"

"A brother."

"Nah. No brothers, no sisters. My parents died a while back so it's just been me for years now."

Sam's phantom heart sunk. Dean didn't even recognize him. Someone had done something to him, messed with his memories. He could think of only a handful of beings with that kind of power.

"If you ask me," Sam's double said, "family's more trouble than it's worth."

"Hm," Dean took another drink from his beer. "Something to be said for being your own man. Nobody to tell you what to do, or where to go."

"Cheers to that," Sam's double said, clinking his bottle against Dean's. Then he gave him a nod and headed outside.

After one more look at Dean, Sam followed him out. The parking lot of the bar was empty, save for one couple arguing near a car.

Sam's double took a drink from his beer. "You satisfied?"

“He doesn’t remember you, I mean... us,” Sam said crestfallen.

“I’m not you.”

“But you are, I know you are, you’re a part of me. I can—I don’t know, I can feel it.”

“See that’s your problem right there, feeling.”

"You don't feel?"

Sam scoffed. "It's overrated."

"What happened... to us? I was in Hell, and then I was here. And it’s happened twice—“ A sharp pain cut through Sam’s thoughts, and how could he even feel pain if he didn’t have a body. “Or maybe,” he winced, “more than that."

“More than that, yeah. You do this all the time... and you don't remember, do you?” Sam's double arched a brow. "Lucifer’s trying to make you forget.”

“But how—“

“Best I can figure, somebody broke us out, but fucked it up. We split in two. You stayed behind downstairs, at first anyway." He shrugged. “And now, every few weeks, or months sometimes, you show up again.”

“You’re not doing it?” Sam asked, his first theory crumbling. "I thought maybe we were both—"

“No. I’m better off without you.” He stood, like he was ready to leave.

"No. Wait! You can't just—what am I supposed to do?"

"I don't care what you do. Stay here and haunt Dean who doesn't even remember you exist." He scoffed. “Believe me, I’ve tried to get him to remember. Somebody scrubbed his brain.”

“You don’t want to know who?” Sam asked. “We have to find out and get them to undo it!”

“No, we don’t. You really think he’d be better off if he knew?”

Sam was taken aback. He couldn’t imagine a version of himself that would be okay with Dean forgetting him, but here they were, right across from him.

“But go ahead and try if you’re looking for something to do.” His double leaned in closer, voice low and tinged with anger. "Or go somewhere else and see if the world's gotten any less shitty since you saved it. It hasn't, you know. Your sacrifice, your torture hasn't changed a damn thing."

"I stopped Lucifer," Sam said weakly.

"Did you? He's still got you, doesn't he?" His double's mouth shifted to a sneer. "I’m done with you, go back to the cage. That's where you think you belong, right?"

And at his words, that dreadful pull started low in Sam's gut. He could feel Hell's heat licking at his skin, the tearing teeth of the hooks, the burning cold of the bars. "No," he gritted out, teeth clenched as he fought it.

"No? Did you finish atoning for all of your fuck-ups already?"

"No," Sam admitted, "but I—" The pull was growing stronger and Sam in a panic clutched at his double's wrist forgetting for a moment that he was as insubstantial as air as his fingers wrapped around the doppelganger's forearm. He held on like it was his lifeline. Because maybe it was.

"You're pathetic." His double straightened, shrugging easily out of Sam's hold, turned on his heels and left Sam to his struggles, the rest of the bar’s patrons unaware of his existence let alone the pain creeping up his spine and the horror of its inevitability. He could only escape Lucifer for so long, or maybe he’d never escaped at all. Maybe this whole thing was just a new form of torture.

The ground beneath him cracked open and the hooks came shooting through, sinking into Sam's ankles, winding around his wrists and biting down. Hell had come to reclaim him again. "Please," Sam said, and in pained desperation turned his head towards the window for one more look at Dean at the bar, but he'd left. There was nobody to hold onto.

And so he fell.

*

Lucifer took on a lot of faces. Nick’s sometimes, Jessica’s, fairly often, Dean’s when he wanted Sam really off kilter and sometimes, on special occasions, he looked like Sam.

At this particular welcoming back to the Cage, Sam’s own face stared back at him with the Devil’s undying hate.

“What’s the worse Hell?” Lucifer asked, cocking his head, “Being forgotten, or being remembered?” He cupped his hands over Sam’s cheeks, tracing his thumbs over Sam’s forehead and shoved his own memories back at him, until his mind was full to bursting with them. All his greatest hits came back to him but from a different angle, his lowest moments as seen through the eyes of demons Sam had killed: Lilith her body wracked with pain, her nurse and the human soul that died as she did, Alastair, who witnessed in the moments of his death Sam reveling in his own power, Ruby, Brady, all of Famine’s guards—Sam with blood smeared across his face, eyes glazed and inhumanly hungry. Then his perspective shifted, he was watching through his own eyes, powerless as Lucifer used him to kill countless more—arms soaked to the elbows in blood, gallons of it downed, roiling inside of him like an electric tide. Stull Cemetery and a half-brother he'd barely known worn by Michael, Bobby pleading with him, Castiel exploding with a snap of Lucifer's—of Sam's—fingers. The fear in Dean's swollen eyes, and the sound of his pained choking breaths.

“That’s what Dean remembered,” Lucifer crooned as he pushed in the last few images, Sam’s fist crashing down into Dean’s face over and over and as it did Lucifer struck Sam with his own fist, over and over. “This was his last memory of you.”

“No,” Sam said, tasting his own blood in his mouth, sulfurous and foul as any demon. “It wasn’t me. It was you.”

“You don’t even believe that. It was you,” Lucifer nodded to himself, “Your choices, you’re the one who said yes to me.”

“And I stopped you,” Sam said, his voice grazing against his throat. A loose tooth slipped out between his lips and he wondered idly if he even had teeth here. Everything felt real—flesh and blood and pain—but it was all in his head, even Lucifer.

“Did you?” Lucifer asked sweetly, and Sam knew he’d never smiled like that himself, malicious, patronizing pleasantry. “You locked me back up, but I got out before, didn’t I. Because you let me out.”

“I didn’t know.”

“And you’ll do it again.”

“No, I won't." Sam forced himself to look the archangel in the eyes, eyes that looked like his but weren’t, no soul behind them, not even the cold intellect of his soulless double, and said, "You're never getting out of here again."

"Neither are you," Lucifer said, claws of light curling out of his fingers and into Sam's insides. The pain grew and grew until Sam's thoughts dissolved and he couldn't do anything but scream.

*

Lucifer stopped.

For a long time after there was silence. Empty and dark.

Then Sam drifted upwards again, up and up, buoyant and untethered, and slipped out of the darkness into the light, into an apartment.

He thought he was still floating at first or hanging until he felt the shifting slide of him falling out of his body and dropped to the floor. He turned around to find his double doing pull-ups on a pipe hanging from the ceiling.

"You're back," he observed, never breaking his rhythm.

Sam watched him for a while, watched his body move without him inside of it.

"Are you bringing me back here?"

"Why would I do that?" Pull-ups done, he dropped to the floor and immediately switched to doing push-ups.

Sam watched him a while longer, found himself admiring his perfect form and relentless repetition, despite how much he'd hated those drills growing up. He tore his eyes away, looking at the rest of the apartment. His duffel bag—weapons, clothes, books on the table, a bowl, herbs and a sigil. He'd been trying to summon something, or someone. "What are you working on?"

"None of your business."

Sam scoffed. Actually it was his business. This was his body. "You're hunting. By yourself? What about Dean?”

“What about him?”

“He’s our brother.”

“No, he isn’t. He doesn’t even remember us. And anyway, I work alone."

The response was final, and it shocked him. This version of himself wasn't who he thought he was, that much was clear. There was a hardness to him, a distinct lack of compassion and Sam didn't like thinking about what he'd been up to without his knowledge. He couldn't say nothing, and he couldn't go on like this, never knowing how long he'd have up here before Lucifer pulled him back down. Before Hell reclaimed him.

His double changed his stance, switched to knuckle push-ups, never breaking his pace. "You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here."

Sam nearly protested, but cut himself off. The last time he'd tried to hang on to himself—his body—he'd been yanked right back down to Hell, so he had to figure out another answer. He headed for the apartment door, eyes falling again on the collection of summoning herbs and oils. "Who are you calling?" he asked, recognizing one of the sigils on the paper left on the table near the bowl.

His double ignored him, breathing still strong and steady as he switched from push-ups to sit-ups.

Sam reached for the doorknob, but his fingers slipped right through the brass. So, swallowing (figuratively) he walked through the door, down the steps and left the building.

*

He wasn't a ghost, not exactly. But he knew a little about being a ghost, had been one before, and how many people could say that?

It was still early, shortly after dawn and Sam was grateful for the mostly empty streets. It made it easier to ignore his state of being. He passed a newsstand and scanned the headlines long enough to learn three things: he was in Pennsylvania, in a town called Easter, and the date. The latter struck Sam like a shock of cold water. He'd been in Hell for just over a year. It felt like so much longer, and it was, he supposed the way time moved in Hell. He'd been in the Cage more than a century. His heart beat faster and that familiar pull began low, a tugging on his ankles seeping up his legs, flames licking at his insides. "No," Sam gritted out, clenching his eyes shut against the fire at the periphery in his vision, ignoring the whispers of the archangel. He forced his eyes open again, put all of his energy into grabbing hold of the newspaper. It took a few tries, fingers passing through paper, but he finally grabbed hold and clutched it to him, needing that tactile reminder to convince himself that he too existed here.

Hurrying down the street, Sam tried not to think about the scraping echo of Lucifer's laugh or how it devolved into an angry threat. He forced it from his mind, as best he could, focusing instead on the sounds of the waking town around him. The mourning doves on the roof, the shopkeeper blowing his nose loudly, the barking of a small yippy dog and the overpowering rose smell of a woman's perfume. He could sense all of these things, then he was somewhere, he was here and he wasn't in Hell. For now, that had to be enough. He didn't know how long he had before it pulled him back down but he was determined to stave it off for as long as he possibly could.

There was a boarded-up building nearby that Sam decided he could use to get in a little more practice. He'd learned this before and it didn't take long for him to remember how to pick things up and move them. It wasn’t much, but if he was stuck like this he wanted to at least be able to do something. If he tried hard he could make an audible sound, loud enough for birds to hear, and maybe even angels. So he prayed to Castiel.

Even though the memory of killing him was still fresh in his mind, Sam knew Castiel was alive. His double—his body—had Castiel's sigil handy, and there was no reason to have that out unless he'd been trying to reach him which he wouldn't even attempt if he was still dead. Death was becoming a transient thing for them, Sam acknowledged briefly. This was his sixth time being dead, by his count, and Dean had been dead three times plus a hundred and thirty-eight more in Gabriel's time loop. Castiel as far as Sam knew was only on his first.

Sam fell to his knees and prayed, forcing all his concentration into making his words audible, whether or not that mattered he didn't know, but he figured it couldn't hurt. Still, his prayers to Castiel went unanswered, despite his growing desperation. He needed answers. And he had no one else to ask.

He waited until his double left his apartment and then helped himself to the supplies he needed.

Castiel had shown them how to summon him a while back, in case prayers didn’t reach him. Sam made the summoning circle finding a bitter sort of comfort in how similar the whole process was to summoning demons. He chanted the invocation, lit the herbs and waited.

The sound of feathers ruffled behind him and Sam turned to see Castiel looking at him with a furrowed brow. “Sam. It’s you.”

“Yeah,” Sam said. “Part of me, anyway.” He took a few steps closer and couldn't help but smile. “Cas. I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Likewise.” Castiel nodded, expression growing softer. “Are you okay?”

Sam scoffed. “I’m not really sure. My body’s walking around without me in it, and every once in a while I get pulled back down to the Cage and tortured, so... not really okay.”

Castiel swallowed, averting his eyes. “I see.”

“Any idea how that happened?” Sam asked. "How'd I come back like this? And how did you come back?"

"I'm sorry, I don't have any good answers, Sam," Castiel said, still looking at the ground.

"I'll take not-good answers," Sam said humorlessly. "Any explanation."

"I believe God brought me back."

"Wow, that’s—"

"And I—I tried to raise you, like I raised your brother. But I was not entirely successful."

"I see," Sam said, nodding to himself. He cleared his throat. "Thanks for trying."

"Have you seen him? Dean?"

"Yeah, I did last time I...before I got pulled down to Hell again, but...he doesn't remember me." Castiel's expression didn't change. Not one bit. He wasn't the least bit surprised by Sam's revelation, which could only mean one thing. "Why doesn't he remember me?" Sam asked, dread coiling in his stomach.

"Because I made him forget you."

"You what?" Sam's phantom heart thumped again, confusion and rage making him feel more real than he had all day. "How could you do that? Why did you—"

"Because you begged me to, Sam. And because it was... the merciful thing to do."

"I begged you to?" Sam asked, floored. His own memory wasn't the most reliable thing, decades of pain had burnt away so much of it, smoldering splotches of charred space where his own life used to be.

"You and I agreed that if you said yes to Lucifer, and Dean survived he should be able to live a normal life. And that if he didn't stop trying to bring you back, I would make him stop. Even if that meant he had to forget you."

Sam swallowed, guilt settling as a lump in his throat, even if he didn't need to breathe.

"Not just you," Castiel continued, "all the pain and guilt associated with you." He tilted his head, studying Sam now. "It wasn't easy."

"How much did you take?"

"A lot." Castiel nodded to himself. "I had to create false memories, I tried my best based on what I knew of you two, but—"

"It's not working," Sam finished.

"Most of the time, it's fine. But there have been... unexpected consequences."

"Such as?"

“So much of Dean’s identity is tangled up in his memories of you. There were too many times where he went on hunts and started to remember you, so I—I had to erase his knowledge of hunting to make him forget.”

“That’s—that’s our whole life.”

“Yes, but he still wants to hunt. He sees things in the news and goes out on hunts even though he doesn’t remember what he’s fighting or even entirely how to fight it.”

“That sounds like Dean,” Sam said. And it sounds dangerous, Sam thought bitterly. “Has he gotten hurt?”

“I don’t know. Not that I’m aware of.”

“Not that you’re aware of?”

“I do have other things to do, Sam. Heaven is at war.”

Sam’s mind was reeling and another thought struck him then. “My memory’s not right either,” he started. “The other part of me, my body, said that I’d been back before. Did you—are you making me forget too?"

“No,” Castiel snapped. Then, more softly, added, “If I could I would, nobody should have to remember Hell.”

“I don’t think it’s Hell that I’m forgetting,” Sam said carefully.

Castiel held his gaze for a moment. “Why do you think that?”

“Because the other half of me seemed to think I’ve been back more than I can remember.”

“I see. And you trust him?”

“Why wouldn’t I? Cas, what aren’t you telling me?”

“Sam, you're not exactly human right now. Your soul is only partially here. You’re still anchored to the Cage. If anyone is making you forget it's probably Lucifer, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know what to think.”

Castiel’s eyes went distant suddenly as though he was listening to something Sam couldn’t hear.

“Cas?” Sam asked.

"I'm sorry Sam," Castiel said, voice unexpectedly steely. "I have to go."

"What, you can't just—"

"Heaven is in chaos. I have other things to do then help the two of you," Castiel snapped and then vanished with a gust of air that unsettled the dust in the room.

Sam stood there shocked for a few seconds, mind still whirling with what Castiel had told him. Everything about this felt wrong. The idea that he'd ask Castiel to wipe Dean's mind was awful, though not entirely unthinkable, particularly if his continued memories of Sam had made him so miserable. But the idea of not being remembered, more than that of all their shared memories being gone—that was the bulk of Dean's life. Whatever substitute Castiel had given him couldn't be close to the same. It made Sam feel pointless and even more insubstantial.

As the thought spread through Sam's mind, that pull started again, Hell circling around his limbs, ready to pull him back. But Sam fought back again, focusing on his surroundings, held onto the doorframe until his hand felt as solid as he could make it. He wasn't ready to go back. He had to find Dean.

*

There were advantages to being just a soul, Sam discovered, mainly by accident. After thinking hard about the bar where he'd last seen Dean he found himself standing inside of it. It was the middle of the day and the bar was empty, and of course Dean was nowhere nearby, but at least he'd figured out what he could do. Of course, tracking Dean was going to be nearly impossible. Dean could be anywhere. If he could reach him somehow, use a phone or track him some other way.

But of course, he could track him. Despite his spotty memory, Sam still remembered the tracking spell Ruby had used, years ago, to find Dean when the angels had taken him and forced him to torture Alastair. Sam hesitated for a minute, as those particular memories bubbled up, the taste of Ruby’s blood, the rush of power as he’d killed Alastair, Dean’s battered face and his pale skin, nearly as white as the sheets of the hospital bed. Sam shoved the memories back down and set to work. All he needed to do the spell was a map and fire.

*

The fire went out, leaving a charred map with one small perfect circle remaining. Sam squinted, realized moments later that he didn’t actually have irises without his body, decided he didn’t care, and squinted harder as he tried to make out exactly where Dean was.

Having narrowed down the town to Rutland, Vermont, Sam, with considerable effort, willed himself there and once there found a local map and repeated the spell until he had the exact block where Dean was. He tried to will himself there too but found he couldn't, he was too weak—-dizzy, which was an odd thing for a disembodied soul to feel, but then he shouldn't really be able to feel anything at all, should he. Hell started to pull on him again too, tendrils coiling around his ankles, tugging at him, but Sam fought them off again, steadying himself in the here and now. If he let himself drift again, let himself move through space like a spirit, Hell would snatch him back easily, he could feel the certainty of it in every cell, or whatever he was made of now. So instead he went by foot running as quickly as he could in this form to the street the spell had shown him, twelve miles away.

By the time he got to the block Dean was on, the sun had gone down. The house Dean was in was a typical suburban pre-made, ugly mismatched shapes with Pepto Bismol pink paneling. The door was open, and Sam stepped in, sensing the frigid air around him as a physical thing.

"Get off!" Dean shouted from another room, and Sam sprinted there, following the sound. Dean was on the floor in the living room, and a ghost was straddling him, hands around Dean's throat. Sam lunged for the ghost—an older woman, maybe the previous house-owner—and tried to pull her off of Dean, but his hands went right through her bony shoulders. He got her attention though, she turned her head nearly all the way and glared at him, mouth open wide in a feral hiss.

"Leave him alone!" Sam shouted, and that, Dean heard, looking towards Sam, but not at him.

The ghost, for her part focused back on Dean, strangling him again.

Sam looked around the living room and found a fire poker, grabbing for it, but weakened as he was, he couldn't grab hold of it. He did however kick it, so it skittered across the floor, landing near Dean's hand. "Use that!" Sam shouted again, his voice echoing oddly.

Dean grabbed the poker and brought it towards the spirit with as much force as he could muster. She recoiled from the iron with a yowl and let go, giving Dean the opening he needed to strike again, disapparating her, for the moment.

Dean stood, eyes wide, scanning the room. "You still there?" he asked.

"Yes," Sam said, "I'm here, Dean."

"How do you know my name?"

"I'm—" Sam nearly finished that thought. I'm your brother. Please remember me, but they had more pressing issues. "We have to find her remains and burn them or she'll be back."

"What?"

"She's a vengeful spirit, something is binding her to this house. We need to find it and destroy it." It felt odd, teaching Dean the basics of ghost hunting, when he'd learned it all from him.

Dean looked at the fire poker he was still holding and then back up, towards where he thought Sam was. It wasn't quite right, but better than nothing. It made Sam feel more real, at any rate. "Wait—first explain to me why this worked?" he asked, holding up the poker. "And that didn't." He pointed at a tire iron on the floor, a few feet away. His tire iron.

Sam cracked a half-smile. Basics. "You need iron."

"It's a tire iron."

"That's made of steel."

"Oh." Dean nodded to himself. "So what are you, a friendly ghost?"

"Something like that."

"You gonna try to kill me too?"

"No, definitely not."

"Okay, Casper. Let's go find her remains, then," Dean said, and headed to the fireplace's mantel.

It took them no more than five minutes to find the remains, a lock of hair on the top shelf of a closet in the bedroom. They worked quietly in concert and for those few precious minutes, Sam mused, it felt like old times. They were working a case together, and he wasn't dead, and he wasn't in Hell.

Sam held the lock of hair up as Dean set it aflame and the spirit manifested again just in time to burn. The spirit's screams turned to wails as the fire consumed all of her and Sam felt it echo inside of him with every fiber of his being. He'd burned for so long, so many times and he was going to burn again. And when he looked down at his ankles the fire was there, searching for him.

"No," he said, "please."

"Casper?" Dean asked.

But it was too late. The hooks came next, burning white heated metal digging into his ankles, flames wrapping themselves around Sam's legs, and pulled him back down.

*

"You can't go back, Sam. You're not wanted there. You don't deserve absolution, you don't deserve forgiveness."

"Maybe," Sam gritted through clenched teeth as razor wire cut into his cheeks, "But Dean needs me. I have to go back."

"No matter what you do, you'll always end up back here." Lucifer said, and it was meant to be a threat but Sam took it as encouragement. Lucifer knew he couldn't keep Sam from slipping away.

He couldn’t. The realization hit Sam like a wave, cutting through the pain with startling clarity. Something had changed. Lucifer’s hold was loosening. Sam had to go back, he had to, and that need grew stronger until It was his only thought, until Sam no longer cared what the Devil did to him. The razor wire crumbled away, and one by one the coiling vines around Sam’s limbs snapped as he sat up.

“What are you doing?” Lucifer asked, expression gone from furious to frightened. “How are you doing that?”

Sam didn't so much drift back up as propel himself. He'd never done that before, not that he could remember. He could sense his soulless counterpart, feel the connection between them thrumming like a cello string and so he followed it up, all the way up.

He got topside in his body, like before, and his body wasn't thrilled about it. He shoved Sam out violently, sending him hurtling through the air and into the wall. Sam supposed it would've hurt less if he hadn't immediately focused on making himself more tangible. But it was worth it, to feel something real and not Hell-made.

"Again?" his soulless self snapped.

"Yeah." Sam stood, and met his body's angry glare. "I don't want to stay down there."

"You did before."

"I've suffered enough."

"You sure about that?" the double scoffed. "If you're not careful, you might be locked up somewhere else."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You pissed the angel off."

"Lucifer? "

"Castiel."

"I asked him for answers."

"You stole my stuff."

Sam scoffed. "It's our stuff. What's he up to anyway?"

"Something shady. Don't know, don't care." His soulless self shrugged. “Whatever it is, we’re lower priority. Anyway, he came to see me—told us to back off."

"From what?" Of course Castiel had other things to do, but they had a history. Something was definitely going on with him, something he didn’t want Sam—either of them—or Dean to know about.

"He says you helped Dean on a hunt. That your actions will make wiping his memories much harder."

"He couldn't remember how to hunt a ghost!"

"So? He shouldn't be hunting at all!"

"He's Dean."

"He was doing fine with his new life. For a few months, anyway."

"We need to help him. Tell Castiel to stop so Dean can remember who he is."

"No."

"No?"

"It's easier to hunt by myself."

"You can't just— He's gonna get himself hurt."

"So?"

Sam scoffed and turned his back on his double. "Fine. I'll go help him myself."

"Maybe you can possess him."

"What? No, I would never—"

"Then what? What are you gonna do—blow some papers around? Whisper him fighting tips?"

"I'll figure out something," Sam snapped and willed himself away.

*

Sam finds Dean and he is mid-fight with a shifter.

When he tracked down Dean again, his brother was two states over. Sam made his way to him in smaller, shorter bursts, trying to conserve his energy. If he got there completely depleted he wouldn't be able to do a damn thing to help. Dean was in yet another suburban neighborhood, investigating a series of baby abductions. Sam suspected changelings, and would've brought a flamethrower if he could move with objects but he couldn't. Anything he tried to carry with him fell away the moment he disapparated.

So he was there, empty-handed, but ready to help however he could. Sam entered the house Dean was in quietly, not sure if they were alone or if there were any civilians. He found a crying baby by itself in a crib, paused there briefly and then ran when he heard footsteps nearby. Familiar boots. He found Dean in the living room, with a silver knife in hand, a duffel bag at his feet and a look of trepidation on his face.

The worst part was that Sam had no idea how long he'd last this time. What if he got yanked back down right when Dean needed him the most. What he had was a half-life at best. He needed back-up. So he took a minute, as Dean's back was turned, grabbed his phone and texted himself—he knew the number his soulless self was using, remembered it, and wondered for a second what else he'd picked up from his thoughts. But that line of thought got cut off quickly as another Sam walked through the door.

Sam hesitated, thinking for a moment that it was his soulless counterpart who had somehow followed them. But within seconds he realized it wasn't. In this free-floating state he was in, he could see things outside of the normal spectrum and this thing's skin shimmered in a way that was distinctly inhuman. It looked like Sam but it wasn't him. It was a shifter. And if it was a shifter, then it had to have encountered Sam before, which meant—"Dean, lookout!" Sam shouted as the shifter leapt forwards, Dean's back still turned.

Dean had brought the right weapon after all, which filled Sam with both relief and concern. Did he research what to use or remember? And if he did remember then was it causing him as much turmoil as Castiel had said?

He didn't have time to pursue the thought further as the shifter lunged forward grabbing Dean by the throat and as he did he shifted form again, changing into Dean, without shedding its skin. This wasn't a normal shifter.

"Dean!" Sam shouted, grabbing for the shifter again, using all his energy to manifest enough to pull the shifter back some, but not nearly enough to pull him off of Dean, and Dean—he wasn't getting any air, his face and lips going blue. If he didn't get the shifter off soon, he'd have lost Dean and that couldn't happen. He wouldn't let it. He grabbed the silver knife off the floor and thrust it into the shifter's back, causing it to hiss in pain, but he didn't let go, only tightening his grip.

So, without any other options left, Sam let himself become intangible again and slipped inside the shifter. The shifter fought him, or tried to, but Sam knew what to do, having been in his own body enough now in this state to understand how to take control of limbs. Instead of feeling his energy wane as he forced the shifter's hands to open and arms to pull back, Sam felt stronger as he did it, the certainty that what he was doing would save Dean spurring him on.

Dean took in two big gulping breaths of air, the color returning to his face and thrust up with his legs, locking the shifter between his thighs as he turned them both, slamming the shifter on its side.

"Dean, now!" Sam ground out with the shifter's voice, holding his limbs locked in place.

Dean staggered to his feet but got his focus back quickly, leaping over the shifter to grab the knife from his back and bring it down again in a tight arc, right into its heart.

The shifter howled in pain, its body sparking as the silver hit its blood, but still it fought back, hands clawing at the blade and forcing it back out as Dean simultaneously tried to push it deeper in.

Sam couldn’t help the nauseating pulse of sympathy he felt. He’d been there before hundreds of times with Lucifer. He let go of the shifter, ricocheting off the wall, still not manifested enough to take damage but enough to feel his surroundings. He was weakened though, considerably, and the tugging had started again, low in his gut. He didn't have much time left. Frantically, he searched the room for another option, anything they could use as a weapon, and found nothing. He considered going back into the shifter again just to help Dean, despite how much it had taken out of him, but he wouldn't be able to hold him for long, and if Hell pulled him down again then he wouldn't be able to help Dean at all.

Then the door opened, Sam's body walked in with a machete and decapitated the shapeshifter.

The headless body collapsed, blood pooling rapidly and Dean shoved himself away, staring at his savior. "Thanks for the save, Sammy."

Sam's heart skipped a beat, and Dean clutched at his head, a headache clearly overcoming him.

Dean blinked back up at Sam's body, eyes still clenched from the pain. "Do I know you?"

Sam's soulless counterpart smirked at Dean. "Do you?"

"Wait—the baby!" Sam said. "Is it okay?"

"It's fine," Sam's counterpart said. "I brought it out to its mom while you had the shifter distracted."

"Thanks for that," Dean said.

"That wasn't a regular shifter," Sam said.

"No, it wasn't." Dean said. "It didn't shed its skin." Dean stopped himself. "Okay, how did I know that? And how do I know you?" He whirled on Sam's counterpart. "And why do you sound exactly like him?" Dean asked, pointing towards Sam's general direction.

"Because we're the same person," Sam said quietly.

"No, we're not," Sam's body said.

"Yes, yes we are!" Sam snarled, because he'd had enough of this. He was done pretending to not exist. He leapt forward and grabbed hold of his soulless counterpart, but he held Sam back. Hands locking onto his forearms, keeping him at bay. But Sam poured all of his being into the effort, until he could feel himself start to manifest, becoming more solid.

"Now there's two of you. What the fuck is going on?" Dean asked. "Who are you?"

"I'm your brother," Sam said as he pushed with all his might, even when the fire started licking at his heels again.

"You—I don't have a brother," Dean said, "I—" He winced again, clenching his eyes shut as he bowed forward from the pain.

"Let me in!" Sam shouted at himself.

"My brother's in Hell," Dean said slowly, righting himself. "He's in Hell."

Sam looked at him, focus slipping as the flames climbed higher. The hooks would follow, like they always did.

"That's right," Sam's soulless double said, voice cold, "Where he belongs."

"No," Dean says. "No, he doesn't belong there. He didn't deserve it. Neither of us did," he said, the last part like a revelation. Then, looking right at Sam he asked, "Sammy?"

"Yeah, Dean, it's me." The floorboards started to creak, the hooks were grating against them from below, Sam could feel them trembling beneath his feet, burrowing their way up, seeking him out. "Help me!" Sam shouted at his body, fear and fury making his voice tremble. His fingers became insubstantial again, and his grip vanished, slipping through his body's flesh like ether. He couldn't fight this alone, he needed help, he needed his other anchor to hold him here.

"I can't." His lips curled as he backed away from Sam. "I'm not the one who keeps sending you back down. You are."

"What?"

The hooks burst through, bleeding sinew trailing in their wake as they headed straight for Sam. Dean could see them too, stumbling back from where they'd come forth, stricken with horror.

You're mine, Sam, Lucifer's voice said, making the walls of the house shake. Come home.

"No!" Sam shouted, all his will in that one word and as the first hook came at his wrist he reached for it and caught it in his hand instead.

You belong with me. I have so much more to give you.

“I don’t want it. I don’t deserve it!” Sam snarled, tears streaming down his face. “I’ve suffered enough.”

"Sam, what's happening?" Dean asked.

But Sam couldn't answer him, the hook struck out and Sam tried to catch it the way he had the first but missed, and it yanked back, tearing through the flesh of his hand instead. Sam winced in pain, but kept his focus, refusing to give in, fighting to stay here.

Dean tried to grab for one of the hooks as it flew towards Sam’s ankle, but his fingers passed through. Dean couldn’t touch the hooks, they were only solid for Sam’s soul and they kept hurtling forwards, latching onto Sam’s flesh. "Tell me how to help," Dean said, "I don't know what to do!"

Sam was beyond words, too terrified of Lucifer, of Hell. The world was starting to peel back, reality flaking away, floorboards and wallpaper turning to ash as hellfire burned up, searching for him.

Dean kept trying though, grabbing for the hooks and finally grabbing for Sam himself, futile as his efforts were. And then, as Dean leaned forwards in a useless effort to grab the last hook, something caught Sam’s eye, something small and gold gleaming from a cord hanging from Dean’s neck. The amulet.

The amulet Dean had thrown away what felt like a lifetime ago. When he’d lost faith in Sam. But he was wearing it now, even though he didn’t remember Sam. The thought was such a shock that Sam forgot about the hooks, forgot about the pain and Lucifer coming to retake him. Suddenly they didn’t matter, they weren’t nearly as real as that piece of metal and what it meant.

Inside of Sam, something shifted—not the pulling of Hell but an entirely different force. His counterpart let out a groan and steadied himself against the wall. The hooks in Sam’s flesh crumbled away becoming dust, the embers in the floorboards faded back into non existence and Lucifer’s laugh fell silent.

Then, like the snap of a rubber and, Sam felt himself propelled not down nor up but sideways, towards his body, pieces fitting back together with a shockingly palpable finality. His body was his own again. He steadied himself on the walk and took a deep breath before turning to look at his brother.

“Sam?” Dean asked, and that one word told Sam everything he needed to know. Dean crossed the room and pulled Sam into a tight hug.

Sam, still adjusting to being in his own body, couldn’t quite sink into the hug the way he knew he used to. His pieces fit differently. He’d changed, he’d been away for who knows how long in Hell and his soulless body had been here for over a year, and now that they were joined his memories were swirling together, eons of Hell with streaks of the overworld mixed in. He’d done things during this year, without a soul and without Dean to tell him what he’d done, he’d have to figure it out all on his own. “What do you remember?” Sam asked.

“Everything,” Dean said, voice thick. His eyes had gone glassy and he blinked, clearing his throat as he stepped away, “What do you remember?”

“I’m not sure,” Sam admitted. It was too much to parse and he absolutely didn’t have the luxury to do that right now. “We need to clean this up,” Sam said, surveying the damaged room. “That poor woman’s been through enough.”

Dean nodded. They worked together in silence, hauling the headless body outside. Dean made a dismayed noise at the idea of putting the monster’s body in the Impala, so Sam offered up his trunk. His double had his own car—a sleek black Charger with plenty of trunk space.

Sam shut the trunk, and the motion, the distinct sound of this car set off a flurry of memories all its own. More bits of his past, other people he’d hunted with, other hunts. He took a deep breath, letting them settle in his brain. It was bloody, violent and he'd done things he couldn't begin to understand, but it was his, his life, and he had it back now. He turned towards Dean already in the Impala and gave him a nod before climbing into the driver’s seat, then followed him out onto the road.