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cetaceans-pls · 3 years

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Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Batman - All Media Types Relationships: Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Alfred Pennyworth Additional Tags: Momentary Vampirism, Discussion of Blood bags, Family Bonding

The one where Bruce gets turned into a vampire, and Alfred has to call in the cavalry to deal with him.

Or, Dick comes through on a Friday night to help wrangle a reluctant bloodsucker.

Bro I just kind of went off on the concept of short-term vampirism and silverware, so here’s some Alfred-Dick-Bruce bonding over Bloody Marys and the different sorts of magic. Please enjoy this pick-me-up I wrote in one weird, frizzy sitting!

On tumblr below the cut:

“I came as soon as I could!” Dick says, rounding a corner so quickly he skids on the marble floor. The text had come through almost an hour ago, but he had been on the tail end of a Zoom interview (quitting policing this pandemic has been both terrifically easy and terribly hard) so between putting on pants and getting through Friday-night traffic, this is how things lie. “How is he?”

“‘He’ is fine, Dick, thank you for concern,” Bruce says tetchily from where he’s sat in the centre of the Yellow Room, surrounded six foot deep by Wayne Manor silverware haloing out around him. The UV lights they use at crime scenes are blaring harsh violet lines around the perimeter, and further out by the edges of the room, 6 of their portable sun lamps are turned off but trained right on him.

“This is all pointless,” Bruce carries on, sweeping his arm ‘round wide in a grand gesture, hissing when a brush against a silver-plated serving trolley has his hand sizzling. “Alfred really shouldn’t have called you.”

Dick ignores him completely to turn to Alfred, who has 3 sets of rosary beads hanging around his neck and irritation hanging from his eyes. “Uhm. I didn’t read further down the text than ‘B was attacked, please come over when you can’. I’m guessing I missed something?”

“You would be guessing right, Master Richard.” Alfred whips off a rosary and hangs it around Dick’s neck, and plops three teaspoons into a blazer pocket. “We aren’t sure quite who is to blame for this latest conundrum, but Batman was struck down by something while making rounds by the Cathedral. Master Bruce appears to have become a, a…” Alfred makes a disgusted noise, “a vampire of some sort, and had insisted I lock him up in a cell till a magic-user from the League could come by and take a look.”

Dick’s ashamed to admit that on hearing the word ‘vampire’ his fist had curled tightly around a teaspoon. After all, the bluntest edge can still manifest as a shiv, if you shove it in hard enough. He’s further shamed that Bruce clearly catches his micro-movement, and he just downright hates the pleased look B has at knowing that Dick is open to bodily violence against him.

Part of the commute time to get back to the Manor almost always involves him psyching himself up to deal with Bruce, and today it looks like it’s going to pay off.

“Okay, got it.” Dick deeply doesn’t, but bluffing can be as important as actually understanding, so. “Why’s he being kept here instead?”

“No master of the Manor,” Alfred says the way a lesser man would say ‘No son of mine’,”will be tossed into some cell while in full possession of himself, thank you very much.”

“I was going to start an automated protocol to have myself manacled and emergency-signal Superman to come by and potentially put me down,” Bruce interrupts from the near distance, “but I was lured here and now I’m trapped.”

Dick catches himself halfway through a laugh; he can’t help it. If Bruce really, really wanted to, escaping this room with its myriad hazards and shining lights would be possible, especially if the situation was so urgent that he was willing to risk serious injury for it.

If Bruce really, really thought he was a danger, thought deep in his messy little heart that he really, really could hurt or injure Alfred while it was just the two of them here waiting for reinforcements, Dick knows he would have grabbed the silver steak knife closest by and, ah, taken matters into his own hands.

It’s as ingrained a response as Dick instinctively putting himself between Bruce and Alfred even while his brain was still catching up to sudden vampirism, shiv-spoon (shvoon?) at the ready.

He lets out a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding, untenses muscles that had been ready for something awful since the text had come through. “You’re finally more bat than man, B, so don’t bother pretending to be upset.” Dick spies a tray laden with soup and bread on a little coffee table and heads over, giving up guarding Alfred because their much scarier guard dog has just sprouted fangs. “Oh, man, tomato soup and garlic bread? Alfred, you think of everything.”

“I do try,” Alfred primly says, clearly satisfied that Dick is on his side. “And if you could see your way clear to getting Master Bruce to also partake?”

“I said no, Alfred!” Bruce’s voice cracks like sudden thunder across the room, and it would have been mighty terrifying with its slight unearthly timber if the UV lights bouncing off forks didn’t make the room look a lot like a rave. Even with his eyes starting to turn red, even with the harsh edges of his shape blurring into mist, Bruce can’t quite manage to intimidate.

Everyone in the room knows that it’s just for show, now, so even paranormal powers manifesting doesn’t slow down Dick’s enjoyment of soup. “C’mon, Bruce. It’s just like a blood transfusion, except you take it through the mouth. We all routinely take worse things through the mouth.” Just last week Dick had crunched on something while eating a bowl of soggy cereal he’d accidentally left out overnight, and the certainty that it was some sort of super-armoured cockroach haunts him till this day. “Is it a supply and demand thing? You can have some of my blood bags, Alfred can take some out of me while I’m here.”

“What an excellent suggestion, Master Richard. My blood has unfortunately been turned down because Master Bruce has some spectacularly backwards thoughts regarding older folk, but surely there’ll be no complaint for yours.”

“There are plenty of complaints!” Bruce roars, now up on his feet and pacing in the little circle at the centre of all the silver. “I will not eat anyone’s blood, I will stay in this space and meditate until Zatanna shows up and cures me. There is a magic user zapping vampirism into people in Gotham, and none of this will be solved by you sticking an arm under my teeth!”

His fangs are all the way out now, down almost to his chin, drawing scratches on stubbly skin. Under the native environment of the Bat, out in the night perched somewhere high, he’d be a terror.

Under the warm loving light of the Yellow Room, under the warm loving gaze of people who know him best, he’s more ‘angry hissing kitten’ than anything else.

Dick slurps the rest of the soup, and mops up the rest with the crusty bit of his garlic toast. “So, if it was me that got turned into a vampire, you’re telling me you… wouldn’t IV pump me full of blood fresh out your veins? If you lie to me I will throw a teaspoon at your head.”

There’s nothing but a mutinous quiet from Bruce, who’s huffing and misting and snarling and floating a good three inches off the ground. Good, at least he’s not feeling so pressed to the edge that he needed to lie.

“… I’ll take my own blood.”

Alfred sniffs, and it’s a dignified sound that somehow echoes in this fairly large room. “After your little altercation with Dr. Ivy last week, sir, your own supply is running unfortunately low. Two bags left, and I intend to keep them in case coming out of vampirism treats you poorly. No, sir, you’ll have a mug of Master Richard’s blood or so help me God I will tranquilise you and feed it to you myself.”

Alfred catches himself mid-rampage, and huffs a little while neatening the cuff of his shirt. “Those are your choices, sir. Pick one.”

Reading the room, it’s easy to tell that the hour it took Dick to get here from Bludhaven has likely been filled with that sort of tersely-worded bitching that Alfred and Bruce have down to the finest art. “A couple of pints of blood, Type D, coming right up. Bruce, I’d recommend just giving up right now. If Alfred works down the line, Jason’s coming in next, and that’s gonna end with a fist to the mouth.” Dick brushes crumbs off his hands, and jumps out of the crouch he’d been in on the arm of the sofa to head towards Alfred. “No one’s getting out of that without a broken finger or fang or both, so just take mine, okay? For us.”

Bruce doesn’t deign to actually say yes or fine , just seems to fade into shadows he’s manifesting himself, but it reads like a grumpy acceptance of defeat.

Good enough , thinks Dick. “Give us a sec, we’ll be right back. If you’re extra good, I’ll even make a Bloody Mary out of mine!”

Batarangs aren’t made of silver, but they sure do make a flashy thunk when they bite into a doorjamb a clean 10 feet away from the nearest person.

Alfred huffs a quiet laugh but Dick is much louder and substantially more insulting as they make their way down to the Cave.

The blood fridge is a thing of stainless steel tucked in a corner of the medbay, and it’s covered in magnets. The Wayne brood travel a lot, but Bats and Birds travel even more. It’s become a weird habit that got adopted like kids get adopted ‘round here; Dick looks at a cracked dinosaur magnet he’d bought at the Bludhaven Natural History Museum his first night out as Nightwing, and nostalgia hits harder than teeth in the neck. “We’re gonna need a bigger one of these soon, Alfred. We’re almost out of free real estate.”

“We shall persevere nonetheless, sir.” Alfred opens the fridge, and goes along the top row till he gets to the little placard with Dick’s face on it. The filing system remains sweetly, sweetly old-school, even if everyone knows where theirs is stored by feel alone, and each bag is barcoded with enough details to alarm even the most dedicated phlebotomist.

Looking over the racks, Dick whistles. “Bruce isn’t the only one who’s had a rough time recently, huh? Tim didn’t mention that the last Titans’ fight got him two bags down.”

For that, he gets his ear flicked. “Don’t snoop, Master Richard, it’s unbecoming.” Alfred takes a bag off Dick’s shelf and pops it into a cooler bag. He closes the door, and heads to the kitchenette in the Cave where he scrounges up a little metal straw. “Thank you for coming by so quickly. I was at my wits’ end trying to convince him to have just the littlest nibble. He tried to keep himself locked in the Batmobile when he came back via autopilot.” Alfred rinses the straw with more aggression than necessary. “I tugged on the handle, and the door was locked. A door, locked to me! In my own home!” He sounds as incensed as Alfred ever does, but he also goes to grab some tomato juice and a couple of sticks of celery, just in case.

“You wore him down for me, Alfred, I had it easy.” Dick quietly grabs another couple of bags of his blood, because deep deep down Bruce isn’t the only one hesitant about feeding on family, looks like. “Surprised you’d turn to me for this, though. Seems like more of a Tim thing, have him over with a 50-slide presentation on why vampirism’s really not that different to CPR, or something.” He swoops by Alfred’s side and picks up the cooler bag and the bucket of ice, because there are a lot of stairs from the Cave back up to Yellow, and kind men deserve kind things done on behalf of their creaking knees, thanks very much.

“You certainly have a point, Master Tim can be alarmingly persuasive with his statistics and, ah, unblinking stare.” Alfred doesn’t acknowledge Dick helping him with his things, just looks a little glad to have a hand free to hold on to the handrail, which is acknowledgement enough. “However, I have to admit that when I am at my wits’ end with Master Bruce, I always want to turn to you, Master Dick.” He pauses at the top of the stairs, turns and smiles his neat little smile at Dick who is finding balance harder to maintain than usual. “You have kept me company in my never-ending fight to care for Master Bruce longer than anyone else, after all.”

(Longer, longer, longer even than Bruce’s parents, God love them both.)

Alfred reaches out, pats Dick’s hand and nimbly reacquires his wares. “Do not under any circumstance tell the others, of course, but an old man is allowed his favourite ally.”

Dick is a whole-ass adult who’s lived through more things than people 15 times his age, he’s dressed in a smart suit and tie after an interview for a position as a flight paramedic, and he’s helped ward off the apocalypse at least on three separate occasions.

He knows enough about enough to know that their vampire-magician is deeply, deeply outclassed by Alfred’s mastery over spacetime, because right now Dick knows that if he looks down at himself, he’ll be 9 years old again, wearing oversized pyjamas as he tries not to cry because it’s his birthday and Alfred had made him a stack of pancakes the size of his head, while Bruce skulks by the door holding five separate tubs of ice cream, looking uncomfortable and uncertain and bound and determined to be a responsible parent

(like he’s bound and determined to be a responsible vampire).

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Dick murmurs under his breath, rubbing his cheek to break the spell.

“Language,” Alfred’s voice floats back towards him, as they make their way back to the Yellow Room.

There’s a bit of a scuffle, trying to get Bruce to actually drink the blood. When Dick had casually tossed a bag at Bruce, it had been batted right back at him like the world’s weirdest opening to a game of ping-pong. Another fight almost broke out then, because at least a third of all of Gotham’s collective stubbornness was sat in the room at that point, but Dick managed to force through a resolution by making a Bloody bloody Mary for Bruce, and regular Bloody Marys for himself and Alfred.

They sit where they want, Bruce in his circle, Dick perched on a windowsill, and Alfred on the sofa, and they sip at their meticulously non-identical drinks. They’re on their third round of Bloody Marys and sweet idle conversation when the message comes through that Zatanna’s on her way, and the tension in the room drains as smoothly as they do their drinks.

“Ah, what perfect timing,” Alfred says like he hasn’t worked his way through an alarming amount of vodka. “Just in time for a really early breakfast.”

It’s 3 AM, and hopefully after unraveling vampirism Z will be interested in some god-tier chicken and waffles. Dick’s stomach is already rumbling, and he’s in an unspeakably good mood. It’s a trinity of trinities, three generations of Wayne and Wayne-adjacents, three Bloody Marys each, it’s three o'clock in the morning.

There’s a father, a son, and Alfred counts as their Holiest Ghost, probably. Funny that Bruce has to become unholy to make Dick feel gently religious, though that might be the vodka and dreams of fried chicken futures. “How’re you feeling, Bruce?”

Flushed with blood, Bruce looks healthier and heartier than he does on average, which is a fight to tackle a different night. “… Better,” he admits, digging a fang into a celery stick with an expression of deep concentration. “I could fly if I tried, I think.”

Dick whoops, and nearly drops his glass. “It’s that vitamin D, bay-bee.”

It even earns a chuckle from Alfred, and Dick can feel god in this Yellow Room tonight. “I think,” Dick says with utmost seriousness, “that being a vampire is a good look for you, B. Feels good to get you something, even if it’s just a drink.”

Feels good to be able to provide for you instead of the other way ‘round, is something a more sober Dick would think.

From his corner, Alfred raises his glass in a steady-handed toast. “Just a drink is plenty when just a drink is all you need. So here’s a toast to you, Master Dick. Thank you for coming to our rescue.”

In the middle of a sea of silverware, Bruce raises his glass too, and oh, now Dick’s the one gone red in the face.

“Any time,” he says, and he’s glad to know he means it. “Honestly, this makes me feel like B should get turned into a vampire more often.” There’s a lot of magic in the Manor tonight, and only the tiniest fraction of it has to do with their rogue magician. Dick can’t remember when he last spent this much time with just Alfred and Bruce, and it feels like a loose anchor digging in juuust right.

The world’s in turmoil and his personal life has seen better days, but there’s a tether that comes off from the Manor and these two men. Sometimes, it’s a noose.

More often than not, it’s a lifeline, and what a fine feeling it is to know that that goes both ways.

Dick doesn’t know what’s showing on his face, though by how Bruce is now sat up and intensely staring at him, he’s probably revealing way, way too sopping much.

Bruce clears his throat, and his flush deepens into a rosy, rosy red. “Well. As being a part-time vampire does have its advantages, it’s. Hmm. I will discuss it with Zatanna, and see what I can do.”

And geeze, time-travel magic must be inherited too because Dick’s been forced back to his 9th birthday again, to Bruce Wayne-the-literal-Batman hovering uncertainly while holding way too much ice cream as he tries to accommodate Dick in that stupid, awkward, and hideously embarrassing way only he knows how.

“I’ll toast to that,” Dick says, ignoring the terrible scratch and crack in his voice, and he and Bruce both only nearly lose it when Alfred raises his glass again, and

quietly, quietly

murmurs, “Here’s a toast to my family”.

#batfam #dick grayson #alfred pennyworth #bruce wayne #family bonding #whale writing #bro i watched a weird japanese tv show last week #and it just left me in the weirdest most off-kilter mood #there literally way no direction for this story #i just like the thought of alfred having different niche categories #he can assign favourites too #and also vampire bruce who can turn to mist but doesn't #bc he was raised right #anyways here's wonderwall

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ladyhaesoo · 4 years

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hotel blue moon

"There are a lot of people in this world who deserve to die. And some thoughtful freaks kill them for us in secret. That's why clueless civilians can sleep peacefully at night, completely unaware. Which one do you think I am?"

“Which one do you think I am?"

part 2 | read on page (not for the mobile app, but prettier)

There were a lot of things Moonyoung did not enjoy doing. Smiling unnecessarily. Being touched. Having to censor her books for the general public when their intended audience had no problems with her content. Meeting with obnoxious directors of large hospital chains that took advantage of people's suffering to make billions while looking like great philanthropists.

Ham and Gam hospitals hosted the largest paediatric wards in all of South Korea, with the country's best (highest paid, inflated, overconfident) paediatric doctors and surgeons on their staff. The ugly posters of smiling doctors (couldn't they have hired models?) and smiling children with assorted bullshit statistics stared at her as she sat there, doing one thing she hated so she wouldn't have to do another thing that she, unfortunately, hated more.

The earliest reviews of Zombie Kid were not looking good. Sangin was crying or yelling every time he spoke to her. The art was too gruesome, the story was too violent—of course it was too violent for the timid reviewers that read it from the safety of newspaper positions that afforded them the right to have no critical thinking whatsoever. Themes? Metaphors? These were the people who ate Cinderella up and pretended no feet were harmed in the making of this fairytale.

Still, she had a fanbase. Her books would sell, and, per Sangin, if she went to a hospital and read her books to children who needed money and medicine and possibly new organs, everyone would clap about her good deeds and forget all about the child that ate his mother.

If that had been all, Moonyoung wouldn't have minded. She liked readings; the terrorised but delighted little eyes staring up at her, eating up every word, learning something that a good many adults would never understand. The reading of this book did not have nearly as much drama as she would like, and any more cannibalism-based artwork had been ruled out, but it was still a good read. She made chewing noises as she read, and the children were delighted.

But it was not all.

And the truly generous Ham Kojeon had then had the audacity to postpone their meeting.

Moonyoung had nearly turned around and walked for the stairs, but Sangin was getting scarily fast at keeping up with her; his arm had popped up in her way before she could take a step down, and he'd dodged when she'd gone for her purse, then said something and gone to argue with the secretary.

"The director's been called into an urgent meeting," the secretary had told Sangin half an hour ago. "But the director has arranged snacks for you in the waiting room."

The waiting room in question surrounded the director's office, separated by frosted windows that gave a nice view into the room itself. Nothing was clear, but she could just about make out a pair of nice broad shoulders walking around the room. "Oh my," she said when the shoulders visibly walked around the desk to stare down at where the director was presumably sitting. "Has he delayed us to meet with a personal guest? How impolite."

Sangin glared at her. On the other side, his makeshift assistant giggled into her folder.

"Well, maybe I should go join them. Better view from inside. I deserve some entertainment too if he's going to keep me waiting."

Sangin hissed something about the people listening, even though it was just them and the director's secretary. Moonyoung rolled her eyes and turned away. Sometimes—just sometimes—she almost wished she valued her creative autonomy less than she did.

She shifted to relieving her frustration with all of this by grinding the metal heel of her boot into the metal leg of the chair and enjoying Sangin wincing every time she did it. The trick to something like that was variation. A few seconds of relief meant he wasn't expecting it when—

A thin distant alarm bell began to peal throughout the building, and Moonyoung laughed. "Can this day get any worse?"

Sangin groaned. "Wait a minute, let me go find out what's happened. Don't go anywhere!" he commanded, then gave the art director a look that said make sure she doesn't go anywhere. Then he ran off, presumably to interrogate someone poorly.

Moonyoung gave it a second, then got up and left. "Ms. Ko!" Poor little Seungjae called, but didn't make to follow. Moonyoung ignored her and went down the stairs. If nothing else, she needed a smoke break, especially if she was really expected to shake hands with Ham Kojeon after this.

She was halfway down the stairs when she saw it; a man in a patient's uniform dragging a child into what looked like a supplies closet. She followed at some distance, eyes narrowing, mind whirring uncomfortably. The girl was crying, but the alarm bells were loud enough on this floor that she wasn't audible over them—was that smoke she smelled? Had the man taken advantage of the fire, or had he started it?

When she slipped into the still-open closet door, the man was on his knees in front of the sobbing girl. "I'm your father!" he insisted. "I'm really your father! Why are you crying?"

"My father's dead!" the girl was repeating, eyes screwed shut, "You're not my father!"

"Listen to Daddy! I'm not dead! We both have to go together, do you hear me? Children can't live alone without their parents, that's why we both have to go at the same time!"

Moonyoung clicked her tongue. "What is this? Some kind of personality disorder? Delusions? I didn't realise it was that kind of hospital." She did hope the contempt came through. It worked; the man dropped the girl's arms, and turned to glare at her.

"Who the hell are you?" the man's voice faded between ordinary and not-quite-ordinary. Moonyoung frowned despite herself as his face seemed to shudder into something grotesque for a second—but when she blinked, it was just a grey-haired man with yellowing teeth. "This is between me and my daughter! Stay out of this!"

"She said she isn't your daughter," Moonyoung said. "If you want to die, die alone. If you want to live, don't steal others' children."

The man scrambled off his feet and came towards her. "Do you want to die? What the hell do you know? This is my daughter, and I'll do whatever the hell I like."

"Hearing problem?" she yelled, making an exaggerated gesture towards her ear. "I said, she—"

The man lunged towards her, and she slammed the hard end of her purse into his face, knocking him clean to the ground. The purse flew open, and her knife—too pretty for this place, with its carved handle and its surgical sharp tip—flew out of it to land somewhere beyond the man's hand.

He reared towards it, but he was on the ground, she was faster, and she stamped on his hand, keeping him from reaching the knife, and kicked it out of the way but somehow the man was up again. He jumped, and reached for her throat, grabbing her in a violent choke and banging her head onto the tile. A storage shelf crashed to the ground somewhere behind him. Her legs froze. The hands on her throat went from warm to cool to warm to cool to warm. "Die! Die! Why won't you just die!" a familiar face screamed. Hair floated in her vision, and the face blurred out.

The pressure on her throat lifted abruptly. She grabbed at her throat, air coming in way too fast, the imprint of cold—cold? warm—no—they had been cold, hadn't they?—hands around her throat still stinging, along with every uncomfortable nightmare they drew up.

When her vision re-adjusted, the man was wrestling with another man in a waistcoat. Consciousness returned. She was in Ham and Gam hospital. She was awake. She was an adult. And a piece of shit had just—fucking—strangled her—

She got to her feet and grabbed the knife.

Waistcoat had won, but that didn't help her. "I'll kill you all! All of you!" the man was shouting, even on the ground and clearly restrained by something. Her ears were still buzzing; the man's voice phased again, into something wrong, before it came back.

She lifted her arm, and brought the knife down—

It was a sharp knife. Moonyoung always ate her steak rare, red and raw enough to bleed if she cut into it too quickly—tough enough that no dull knife would cut through cleanly, without ugly ragged edges. This knife cut through her meat perfectly, even with little pressure. That was why she liked it.

It sliced cleanly through flesh, catching on bone too tough for it. She felt the fingers that closed around the knife in her own grip on it, surprisingly sensory. Blood dripped down a forearm and stained the cuff of a sleeve.

Waistcoat stared at her, and she stared back.

"I'd appreciate if you stayed out of this," she said.

The man with the knife currently embedded in his palm said, "Do you know how difficult it is to get stains out of a suit like this?"

"Are you with the hospital?" she asked. "There's a vermin infestation. I was just helping." she glanced down at the man whose arms were bound behind his back —by what, she couldn't see. He started shouting again as he realised her meaning, then promptly fainted, mid-word. She frowned, about to say something, when Waistcoat wrenched the knife from her palm, wringing his arm like a dog shaking water out of its fur. Little drops of blood landed around her heels. He began to wrap a bright silk handkerchief around the knife.

Moonyoung scoffed. "What, is the knife hurt? Why are you wrapping that around the knife?"

He didn't respond. She opened her palm in front of him. He looked up—finally. "Your hand," she said, "not the knife."

Waistcoat smiled. "Haven't you injured me enough right now?" he asked, and slipped the bandaged knife into his pocket.

"That's mine. "

"You tried to kill someone with it," he said.

She shrugged. "If he's Non-Compos Mentis, I can say I acted in self-defense. I was only going to give him a small cut with the knife, but you overreacted and injured yourself," she said, placing her unnerving smile on her lips. The man's lips quirked up, too—he had little dimples at the very corners, which made the smile far too cheerful for his otherwise unsmiling face.

"It landed in my palm, so it's mine now," he said, then cocked his head. "That was a lot of power for a small cut."

She smiled, and grabbed a handkerchief from her own purse. "There are a lot of people in this world who deserve to die," she said, grabbing his palm—apparently, she hadn’t injured him enough just yet. She began to wrap that around his hand, and it stained the red immediately, creating a deep blush in the center—blood in blood. "And some thoughtful freaks kill them for us in secret. That's why clueless civilians can sleep peacefully at night, completely unaware." She tugged the handkerchief shut, smiling when he shuddered. "Which one do you think I am?"

Waistcoat's smile widened. He looked to the unconscious man on the ground, then to his hand, and then to her. "Just a clueless civilian,” he said, after she had stabbed him clean through the palm, held hard enough that the steak knife would go through skin and artery easier than meat. “But which one do you think I am?"

#kdramanetwork #psycho but it's okay #it's okay not to be okay #it's okay to not be okay #pbio #mine #minefic #pbiofic #im so excited about this little plot bunny hehe #it's based on hotel delluna but like. soohyun's little cameo at the end there #significant credit for the idea goes to that manwol/moonyoung fmv on youtube #ik kangtae seems a little ooc. that's because he's hundreds(?) years old and has had some personality changes #i had fun writing this so i hope anyone who reads has fun with it too #pbio fic

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luci-in-trenchcoats · 6 years

Text

Imperfect Little Demon

(x)

Summary: Dean is a demon and Sam and the reader have been attempting to cure him for two months to no avail. Dean’s getting out more often though and it’s only a matter of time before he finds a way out of the bunker for good. Can the reader and Sam figure out a cure or are they stuck with Dean as a demon forever?

Pairing: Demon!Dean x reader (featuring plenty of Sam)

Word Count: 9,300ish

Warnings: language, kidnapping, mild injury, threats of violence, kinda drugging, self-depreciation, mention of suicidal thoughts to alleviate pain, mentions of canonical torture

A/N: There are parts of this fic that are somewhat dark so heed the warnings (most of these are not described in great detail though)...

A/N #2: I missed writing Demon Dean and wanted to put a different spin on it with this...

“Dean,” you growled, his green cocky eyes on his brother, smiling at him while Sam held a blade to his throat. “What did you do?”

“Sammy and me were just playing a little real life whack-a-Sammy, weren’t we,” he said, shaking his head, eyes still locked on a panting Sam. “You don’t have the guts. Put that thing away Sammy before you hurt yourself.”

“Sam,” you said, ripping the blade out of his hands, holding it to Dean’s throat who shrugged as he glared at you. “Go relax. I’ll take him back to his room.”

“Oh, sounds kinky,” said Dean, your hand on his shirt collar turning him around, shutting his playfulness off. “Y/N, back off.”

“Watch yourself Dean,” you said, pressing the tip of the blade ever so gently against his pulse point, Dean’s breathing changing for a moment. “Good boy.”

“Stop it,” he growled, letting you walk him back to the dungeon, staying perfectly rigid as you went.

“Behave. Last time I nearly nicked your pretty neck when you started thrashing around. We both know how scared you got when that happened,” you said.

“I was not scared you pathetic little-”

“I said watch yourself,” you said, changing the angle on the blade, letting the sharp point give the lightest cut to his skin.

“Okay, okay!” he said, an angry whimper grumbling through his teeth. “Don’t mess around with that thing. You might actually kill your precious Dean.”

“I was going to cook you a steak dinner tonight too before you went and escaped your room,” you said, walking Dean back into the dungeon, pushing him over the devil’s trap and stealing the lore book he’d managed to sneak in back. For someone who had always hated research, he sure was damn good at finding new ways out of a devils trap. Dean grumbled and sat down on his mattress, crossing his arms at you.

“Can I please have steak for dinner?” he asked, forcing a smile on his face.

“Considering you tried to kill your baby brother...no,” you said. “You were being good too ya know.”

“What can I say, I get a little antsy sitting in here staring at the same four walls all day long,” he said, twitching his bottom lip.

“Yes, you’re so obviously being treated poorly, Mr. Demon,” you said, throwing your arms around. “It’s not like you have a bed and laptop and tv and books and booze and snacks and even a freaking bathroom Sam put in. We could leave you tied up in a hard ass chair all day with nothing so consider yourself lucky.”

“Aw, I hurt her feelings?” said Dean, giving you a mean smile. “Always was such a tough little thing except when she was around Dean. What’d you tell him? He made you feel safe with a big and strong guy around to take care of you?”

“Hey, genius,” you said, crossing your arms at him. “Maybe if you help us figure out why the blood cure didn’t work and how to get you human again, maybe you can go back to those hugs and kisses you liked so much?”

“Oh sweetie, the only thing I want your mouth wrapped around on me is my-”

“Watch the mouth or you can have peanut butter sandwiches for the next week,” you said.

“Oh, what awful torture!” he said, rolling his eyes. “I give it two days before you’re back in here with another book to try another cure that won’t work and I’ll get out again and I’ll hunt you two down again and it’ll be a whole thing again and-”

“Bunker’s warded babe,” you said, cocking your head with a smile, his face falling. “Good luck finding it. Until then, you can stay as strong as a pissed off three year old.”

“Still strong enough to take care of you and Sam,” said Dean with a shrug. “Better get going on that cure sweetheart. One of theses days, I’m getting out and I’m certainly not getting tossed back in here.”

“I’ll bring you dinner in an hour, demon boy.”

The next day felt odd. Sam had to run out for supplies, only home long enough to drop them off before Jody was calling, asking for backup on a case. You sent Sam off, knowing he needed a break from his brother, knowing you needed to have your nurture time with him.

You rarely did it when Sam was home but Dean had never mentioned it to him and you were fairly sure Sam wasn’t aware you did it at all. It wasn’t a secret but in a way it was. Dean wasn’t surprised when you walked in through the open door to the hall way around lunchtime, dragging a chair and then another in. You slid his roast beef sandwich over, chewing on your own as you took a seat. Dean quietly stood up from his bed and adjusted the tv so you could see, moving his big bean bag chair over close to you but that barrier keeping him from actually reaching out and touching.

You were midway through a comedy, both of you laughing when you caught him looking at you, something sweetly dangerous staring back.

“I can be good,” he said, glancing up innocently. “I can act like this outside of this room too.”

“Don’t do that,” you said. “Our relationship is on hold until you’re a human again, Dean. You know I can’t let you out. You’ll hurt me or use me to get to Sam and then get rid of us both.”

“Then you wouldn’t mind leaving me to finish watching on my own,” he said, his jaw going hard. “Please.”

You sighed, taking the plates and chairs away, Dean nodding a thank you for giving him some privacy. You knew his head had to be a whole lot of messed up and it hurt to see him fight not only you but himself at times. It was probably just a faint echo in the back of his head but you knew from the way he looked at you sometimes, how he let himself get caught sometimes...your Dean was somewhere buried deep down in there and he wanted the fuck out.

After doing a couple chores you passed by Dean’s room, catching him passed out in his bed, the tv going while he caught a nap. You figured you were due for one yourself and some nice and fresh sheets were the perfect thing to crawl into. In twenty minutes the dryer would be going off anyways and Sam would come home to a clean house for once.

“Oh no,” you said before you even opened your eyes. Your arms were behind your back, not that that was cause for concern. The fact you couldn’t move them or that you were laying on something cold and hard screamed your afternoon plans had gone horribly wrong.

“Now...I have to say, Y/N. For as careful as you are, you done messed up sweetheart,” said Dean, his hand patting your cheek making you groan. “Up and at ‘em.”

His hands on your shoulders tugged you into a sitting position, your eyes blinking open to find you were in the library, leaned up against one of the columns. Dean was sat in a chair across from you, twiddling the demon blade in his hands, laughing to himself.

“See...whenever you come in there and just hang out, I know Sam’s not home which makes this...well it makes it really fucking easy is what it does,” he said, chuckling when you tested the ropes on your wrists, finding them way too tight and already cutting into your skin. “The other part...you made me bleed. Not nice, Y/N. Not nice at all. It was barely a paper cut but...it was all I needed. I found a neat little spell in the grimoire. Get out of a devil’s trap free card but...and here’s the kicker...they don’t work on me anymore. Doesn’t that just sound really shitty for you?”

“Is this the part where you kill me? Or torture me? Or...bore me to death? I’ve had the enjoyment of being stuck with Lucifer. Trust me, you’re like dealing with an oversized kitten right now, bucko,” you said, doing a pretty damn good job of sounding indifferent to the whole situtaiton if you thought so yourself.

“Where is the warding that’s keeping me from leaving?” he asked, finally pointing the knife at you.

“Sorry, don’t have a clue,” you said with a shrug and a smile.

“You actually don’t, do you,” said Dean with a laugh, you face flickering. “Alright, I’ll hand it to you, that’s a little bit smart.”

“Well if you want to untie me I’m sure Sam would love to tell you when he gets home. In fact, I’ll go over to Jody’s and ask him and then I’ll be sure to come right back and tell you, okay?” you said, Dean pursing his lips, your own pouting.

“Or,” he said kneeling down, grabbing your hair until you whimpered. “We call him and if he doesn’t give me the answer, I’ll use every trick in the book I learned in hell on you. I wonder what’ll happen up here if I do it? I bet you wouldn’t even last until the fun stuff...or I’ll just use the grimoire and that little book of the damned and keep you going until-”

“Stop it,” you whined, Dean’s face faltering for a second.

“If he tells me what I want to know, I promise I won’t hurt you,” said Dean, his grip still too tight but his voice softer. “The more scared you sound, the easier this’ll go.”

You didn’t say anything, Dean relaxing his hold until he was running a hand over your head, shushing you while the phone rang. The second you heard Sam’s voice on the other end, Dean’s hand clamped over your mouth, his finger tapping it onto speaker.

“Y/N? What’s-”

“Hiya Sammy,” said Dean, giving the phone a smile. “Y/N’s a little tied up at the moment but we sure were curious where you put that warding.”

“Dean, don’t-”

“Y/N, say hi to Sammy and I mean only hi. Understand?” he said. You nodded your head, his hand sliding over to cup your cheek.

“Hi, Sam,” you said, the hand immediately back, a large huff of air spurting out of your nostrils, Dean ignoring you.

“She’s alive and as pretty and perky as ever. If you want to keep her that way, tell me where the warding is and I mean now, Sam,” said Dean. Sam was quiet on the other end, Dean staring at you. “Looks like he’s hanging you out to dry, sweetheart...I guess we’re finding out if your-”

“Garage, behind the red toolbox on the floor, near the garbage cans,” said Sam with a sigh. “It’s on the wall. Let her-”

“Thank you,” said Dean, ending the call, pulling his hand from your mouth to snap the phone in half. “Let’s hope he was telling the truth, huh?”

About five minutes later your butt was cold from the cement floor, Dean nodding to himself when he pushed opened the garage door and stepped outside, the warding holding him gone.

“Freedom, that’s nice,” said Dean, taking a deep breath, gaze going back to you. “It’s not fun being locked up, is it.”

“Are you gonna kill me?” you asked, Dean shaking his head. “Torture me?”

“I think I want an insurance policy right now until I can figure out where to lay low,” said Dean, your head dropping. “If you’re good, maybe I won’t need to keep you stuck in a chair either.”

“Just let me know when I wake up from this nightmare,” you said, Dean hauling you to your feet, putting you in the back of Baby and taking off without looking back.

Six Months Later

“Ouch,” grumbled Dean, your eyes blinking open to see him on the other side of the dungeon, his eyes furious. “What did you do!”

“I’m locked in here with you in case you hadn’t noticed!” you said, staring at your wrists in front of you, the leather bracelet that you’d worn for so long now gone.

“What did you-”

“She didn’t. I did,” said Sam, pulling open the doors, giving you a hard stare. “You’ll feel like your old self soon and Dean...you’ll feel like your old self pretty soon too I hope. The two of you are going to sober back up into your normal selves the next few hours and then I’m putting you both to bed.”

Sam gave you a little nod before he left, closing up after himself, your wrist covered in a nasty looking scar, your other hand squeezing over it.

“Y/N, you got to figure out a way to get us out of here,” said Dean, your eyes spotting the chain around his ankle. “Come on sweetheart. I know you can do it.”

“I don’t think I’m supposed to,” you said, cocking your head at him. “You’re...I thought...you...I’m going back to sleep.”

“Y/N. Don’t...Y/N...dammit Y/N!”

You woke up alone in an empty bedroom, Sam giving you a big hug when he came by a few minutes later. Your body had it’s will power back, Sam already saying he’d destroyed that thing Dean stuck on you months and months ago. Dean had quickly given up on you seeing things his way, preferring a bit of spell work to keep you what you could remember as being in a happy but fuzzy state. It wasn’t like you didn’t have disagreements during that time but you always quickly caved to him and figured you weren’t looking at things from the right perspective. You never remembered him hurting you or being afraid but there were times when you really just wanted to take him home to Sam and couldn’t.

“Sammy,” you said, his hand rubbing up and down your arm. “How’d you find us?”

“Took a bit of tracking down but I finally figured out he got his hands on that bracelet and that if I tracked it, I could find you both. You must be feeling a lot better, huh?” he asked, your head nodding. “We’ll talk more after you get some sleep.”

“Is Dean okay?” you asked, Sam’s pause making your stomach drop. “You didn’t...”

“The cure I have...it’s...think of Dean being at a center point on a line. One way is good, the other bad. The cure is going to...push him a little down the good, so less demon...but then snap him back bad so more demon. He’ll have to go back and forth until he gets all the way good again and he’s human,” said Sam.

“That...what?” you asked, scratching your head.

“He’s on the good right now so that’s a positive,” said Sam, rubbing the back of his head. “He just...needs to live in the dungeon a little while longer is all. It’s going to work. It’ll just take time and we both need to be very careful about him getting loose again.”

“Sam, how positive are you that this cure will work? Devils traps are no good against him anymore,” you said. Sam didn’t say anything but his eyes flickered down, slowly coming up with a pained expression.

“It...might work...but probably not...I had to get you back somewhere safe again. I saw you guys on some gas station footage and you were sticking to him like glue. I knew he did something to you and had to get you home,” said Sam. “I’ve been more focused on making sure I didn’t miss you in a morgue than looking for cures.”

“I’m okay, Sammy. Not sure he actually has it in him to do that despite what he says. As far as locking him up again, that’ll have to be okay,” you said, nodding your head. “We’ll just have to ward the bunker and his room and that hall. That’ll help keep him put, right?”

“Warding plus the cuffs will-”

“No cuffs,” you said, Sam sighing. “No. Cuffs. It’ll scare him.”

“Your undying desire to treat him normally is sweet Y/N but he’s gotten out too many times and he’s going to be extra pissed off so I’m sorry but he needs to wear them for now. He can still run around his room and crap, just for our own protection, we need it,” said Sam.

“Fine. I’ll get him to do it,” you said, swinging your legs over the edge of the mattress. “It’s less likely he wants to kill me right now anyways.”

“Please be careful,” said Sam. He pulled the cuffs out of his back pocket and handed them over. You slowly walked down to the dungeon area, seeing all of the warding painted on the walls there, more so in the hall just outside Dean’s room. Dean was laying on the floor, Sam seeming to have left the dungeon set up for Dean in your absence.

“Well if you wanted to get dirty, all you had to do was say so, sweetheart,” said Dean, turning his head with a smile, resting his hands on his chest. He spotted the cuffs in your hands, shaking his head. “Not really in the mood for that though. Maybe later.”

“Dean, put them on,” you said. He shrugged his shoulders, wearing that big grin the whole damn time. He looked behind you at Sam, flashing his black eyes, Sam inhaling sharply.

“Why so scared, pup? Big brother won’t bite...” said Dean, snarling his lip up for a moment.

“Put the cuffs on, Dean,” said Sam. Dean rolled his eyes and sat up, holding out his arms. You tossed them at him, Dean sighing, snapping one on with a wince, the other with a growl. He panted hard a few times, shaking his head out at the sudden energy loss. “We’ll figure it out Dean.”

“I’ve been hearing that for a long time Sammy. Might be time to realize this is permanent,” said Dean.

“I’m going to research,” said Sam, turning and walking out. Dean stood up and walked just a few feet away from you, cocking his head.

“How about you be a good girl and let me out of these, sweetheart?” asked Dean, holding up his arms. “I know you weren’t on board with this.”

“You forced me to go with you. You deserve it,” you said. Dean dropped his arms, laughing to himself.

“You were being stubborn. Admit it, you like me like this,” said Dean, biting his bottom lip. “You’re very own demon on your side.”

“I’ll bring you some food in a little while,” you said. Dean scoffed and you unfortunately turned around, saw the dangerous green eyes staring back.

“I said to let me out of these cuffs,” said Dean, stepping over the old devil’s trap, backing you down the corridor.

“I’ll be back,” you said, quickly getting into the hall and locking the door tight behind you.

“Y/N, please,” you heard Dean mumble through the door. “You know me.”

“I’ll be back soon, Dean.”

Nearly two months had passed and Sam’s rubber band cure was a bust. Dean was agitated that he was stuck with the cuffs on most of the time but he was behaving. So much so, Sam thought it might be okay to leave him on his own while the two of you went off on a lead.

“Sam, I don’t feel comfortable leaving him here locked up by himself,” you said, Sam rolling his eyes. He closed his laptop, running his hands over his face with a groan. “One of us needs to stay.”

“Last time he was home alone with you, he-”

“He won’t get out. I won’t go near him, I promise,” you said, Sam sighing, holding up his hands.

“Fine. But I swear, if I find out you even went near that side of the bunker...” warned Sam, your head nodding. “I know it’s hard Y/N but it’s not him. We’ll get him back.”

“Let’s hope fifty seventh time is the charm,” you said, Sam chuckling.

A few hours later Sam was on his way towards Washington, the bunker warm and not at all sinister feeling for the fact you had a demon hiding away there. You kept your word to Sam that you weren’t going near Dean, letting him fend for himself on a few sandwiches and other things you made up and gave him before Sam left.

You took a long hot shower that evening, wracking your brain for some new angle you hadn’t thought of yet. Nothing came apart from a growl in your stomach. You wrapped up your hair in a towel and threw another one around yourself, padding down the hall into the kitchen.

“I was dying for grilled cheese,” said Dean, standing in the kitchen, munching on a slice wearing a big smile. Your stomach was falling and hit rock bottom when you saw the demon blade was on the counter behind him. “You were pretty distracted in that shower. You didn’t even hear me hide all your little weapons.”

“How...” you asked, Dean shrugging.

“Well, it’s only a wood door. A few good hits with a chair did it in,” said Dean, taking a big bite, moaning to himself. “I’m gonna make you one, this is delicious.”

“The warding,” you said, Dean shaking his head.

“There was an old bottle of cleaner shoved on one of the shelves in the back. Few wipes cleaned it away. The cuffs were from a bobby pin of yours. I picked it off you two days ago,” said Dean. He took out two slices of bread, buttering one side, layering a few different kinds of cheese before sticking the other side on, tossing it in the hot pan. “You didn’t eat yet did you?”

“No,” you said, tucking your towel in tight, Dean glancing back over his shoulder at you.

“Worried about something back there,” he said, your eyes scanning the room, Dean frowning at you. “You didn’t believe me when we were on the road I see.”

“Believe what,” you said, Dean humming, plopping a sandwich down on a plate for you. He carried it over with a smile, handing it to you.

“I want to have a life with you. Sam too. You’re my family,” said Dean, your hands resting under the plate. Dean backed away, gave you some much needed space, even if he looked hurt in doing so.

“You...no, I don’t feel one bit sorry for you. You took me and basically drugged me and-”

“Yes. I am a demon sweetheart. My patience runs a little short these days. I apologize for that. Now I think I’ve been locked up enough and been good enough lately to show that I do feel bad about that. I just...you really don’t understand how much that blood cure hurts. You two keep trying it over and over and I was afraid it would happen again so I apologize for acting out,” he said, holding up his hands.

“You can shove your apology up your ass,” you said. “Get the hell back in your room, stay there, and maybe I won’t tell Sam about-”

“Mmm, alright, I understand our relationship will take some mending,” said Dean, crossing his arms. You thought about smacking him with the plate in your hands but his shot out first and grabbed it, setting it down on the counter beside him. “I guess you aren’t hungry then.”

“Why won’t the blood cure work? Why?” you growled, Dean taking a deep breath. He shot a hand out, gently resting over your neck, not squeezing, no pressure at all actually, but enough to make you go still.

“I don’t know,” he said. “But it’s been almost a year, Y/N. It’s time you and Sam stopped and got with the program. This is the Dean you get now and I’m getting damn tired of being treated like some thing by you two. I’m a demon. Well guess what, you’ve screwed up a whole crap load too and I don’t see why everyone else gets special treatment over me. I was your boyfriend, your best friend, that random stranger you saved on the easiest hunt in the world because my stupid jacket got caught on a stupid hook and I should have been a goner. Why do you not give a crap about me anymore?”

“Is this your way of apologizing?” you asked, glancing down at the hand on your throat.

“Actually, it is,” said Dean, pausing a few seconds, your body waiting for those long fingers to squeeze.

It didn’t come, his hand sliding around to the spot between your shoulder blades, shoving you hard behind him. You stumbled to the floor, nearly losing your towel on the way. You lifted your head to see another man in the room, Dean throwing a punch at him, your eyes wide.

“Y/N!” Dean shouted as you reached your hand up to the counter, grabbing the blade above you. You tossed it over to him, Dean continuing the motion and shoving it through the man’s gut, sparks lighting him up before he collapsed. “Sorry for the bit of theatrics. I really needed you to not back up straight into his arms was all.”

“How did a demon...how...” you said, Dean shaking his head.

“Okay, I might have accidentally taken down a bit too much of the warding I suppose. You hit it back on and I’ll clear the rest of this place just in case,” said Dean, holding out a hand to you. You saw him sigh and fumble with his shirt, ripping off the flannel and tossing it to you. “Cover yourself up with that for now.”

You got up on your own, buttoning the shirt up tight, thankful for the length as you left your towel behind, Dean clearing hallways until you could get back in the electrical room. After a minute, the warding was back up, Dean moving around the bunker with efficiency, the rest of the place empty.

“Sorry, I didn’t...I didn’t mean to turn off the whole damn thing off,” said Dean, looking over at you with careful eyes. “You okay?”

“Was that a set up just now? To get me to believe you?” you asked.

“Answer my question and I’ll answer yours. Why’d you stop giving a crap about me?” he asked.

“I didn’t,” you said. “I’ve been trying to turn you-”

“You can’t stand what I am now. Awesome,” said Dean, nodding his head. “No, it also wasn’t a setup. But I know you think so highly of me so it’s not that much of a surprise.”

“If our roles were reversed, would you believe me?” you asked. Dean bit his bottom lip, shaking his head.

“Tell me what I need to do to get your trust back. I’ll do it. I swear. I’m...Y/N I think I might be stuck like this for good. I don’t want you and Sam to hate me forever. I want us to be normal again. Maybe I won’t be able to interview witnesses or hunt the same way I did but I can do other stuff now. I can protect you and Sam better. We can make this work. Please give me a chance and if I screw up, lock me up. Please? One little chance?” he asked.

“Go to your room. I need to clean up that demon in there and think about this.”

“Y/N, I grabbed some beers and takeout on the way home,” said Sam, walking down the stairs a few days later. “Washington was another big ole waste of time. I’m at my wits end and...”

“Hi Sam,” said Dean, sitting at the library table, reading a book. You were already out of your chair, Sam barely setting the food down before his gun was in his hands.

“Sammy, it’s okay, we’re...trying something new and it’s working so far,” you said, nodding over at Dean. “He just wants to be treated normal and it’s a lot easier for him to act like his old self when we do.”

“He’s a demon,” said Sam.

“You were addicted to demon blood. How many times did I get you clean? How many times did I help?” said Dean.

“Y/N, it’s a trick and you know it,” said Sam, gun still raised.

“We came to a little arrangement,” you said, Dean tugging at his shirt collar, showing his anti-possession tattoo. “If he kills, or hurts, anyone with this mark, the one we all have, whatever he does to them...”

“You used that mimicry spell on it,” said Sam, dropping his gun. “That thing killed a god last time we saw it.”

“Strong enough to kill a god, strong enough to kill little old me,” said Dean, holding up his hands. “I’m on a tight leash. I get it. Just don’t strangle me with it.”

“You so much as accidentally bump into her in the hall, you look at her the wrong way-”

“Sam,” you said, pushing him away from Dean. “Dean’s been out for nearly two days now and it’s the best two days we’ve had in a year. This...this might be a good way of doing things.”

“Tight leash,” said Sam, glaring at Dean. “Let’s eat, demon boy. I’m starving.”

It’d been nearly two weeks of your mimicry spell on Dean and he was doing remarkably well. He was brash and couldn’t help from being a little menacing looking at times but he was helping with chores and organizing your research with you and Sam to make sure you weren’t wasting your time on anything old.

“Y/N,” you heard Dean say, knocking on your door one night. He normally went to bed before you and Sam as a demon so hearing him up this late was strange. You pulled open your door and he was grimacing, clutching his stomach. “Sorry to bother you but I don’t feel right.”

“Okay,” you said, nodding, his body already stepping inside and sitting on your bed. He was pale and covered in sweat. You put a hand on his forehead and he was absolutely burning up, his face and neck hot to the touch.

“I promise, I didn’t hurt Sam, I didn’t,” he said, shaking a little as he wrapped his arms around himself.

“I know. You’re okay,” you said, laying him down on the bed. “Sam! Something’s wrong with Dean!”

You heard Sam patter down the hall, wearing a grumpy expression that softened quickly when he saw Dean curled up in a ball. Sam sat down on the bed, Dean groaning now, his nails digging into his flesh.

“Hurts,” Dean whined, his face scrunched up. Sam carefully put a hand on Dean’s back, rubbing up and down it, Dean nearly sobbing from the sounds of it.

“Did you eat something funny? Or...did you have a sore throat and you didn’t tell anyone or...does it feel like some demon flu? Do demons even get sick?” you asked Sam, his shoulders shrugging.

“Hell,” mumbled Dean, letting out a sharp grunt. “Make it stop. I’ll do whatever you two want just stop, please.”

“Dean, we’re not doing this to you,” said Sam, trying to shush his older brother. “What the fuck is going on with him?”

“I said stop!” shouted Dean, Sam’s body flying back agains the wall, your own getting pushed out into the hall, Dean howling on the bed as he felt the impact from you both.

“Alright,” said Sam, standing up, clenching up his fist and popping Dean in the face. He went limp on the bed, Sam’s chest heaving as he glanced over at you. “He wanted it to stop he said.”

“We need to figure out what’s wrong. Now.”

“Hey, Dean,” you said, running your hand through his hair as he woke up a few hours later, giving him a soft smile. He looked nervous, blinking his black eyes away before squeezing them shut, trying to hide from you. “You’re okay now. You’re not in hell.”

“What?” he said, lifting his head up, looking at Sam who was sitting at your desk.

“My rubber band cure...it’s actually been working this whole time,” said Sam softly. “It’s just not that apparent to us because it’s happening to your soul. Tonight...you got snapped pretty hard to that dark edge, made you feel like you did when you were in hell, when you were being...hurt. Hopefully when you snap back this time, you’ll go full on human again.”

“If it doesn’t, I have to feel like I’m back in hell again?” he asked, glancing back and forth between you two. You turned back to Sam, frowning when you caught Dean’s face. You ran your hand over his head again, Dean shuddering into it.

“We’re going to stay right here with you,” you said, smiling at him.

“I thought I was a no good evil demon,” said Dean, closing his eyes.

“Well even if you are, neither one of us can stand to see you like this,” said Sam, resting his elbows on his knees. “We’ll stick with you, get you through this.”

“I don’t think I can do that again,” said Dean. “It’s gonna get worse.”

“We’ll be right here.”

Four days later Dean was helping wash the dishes when he doubled over, looking up like he wished you’d put him out of his misery.

“Sam! It happened again!” you called, hooking one arm under Dean, Sam coming in and helping you get him back to your room and in a bed, just in time for him to start thrashing.

“I can’t, I can’t, I can’t do this!” he shouted. “It’s like...it’s that last day, the day I broke and it hurts so bad. Please, you got to stop it.”

“Dean, you can get through it,” you said, Dean shouting, the muscles in his entire body so tense you saw just about every vein bulge out. He shook his head, eyes landing on the demon blade over on your desk. “No. You can get through it.”

“I couldn’t then,” he said. “Neither of you want me and I have a bad feeling this isn’t going to make me human. It’s making me stuck like this and you’ll go back to hurting me and...I can’t breathe...”

“I think he’s starting to have a panic attack,” said Sam, Dean sitting upright and shoving him away. He locked eyes with you, your body already moving to get the blade as far away from him as possible. You were out the door with it, Sam tackling Dean, Dean following you out of the room with a big bruise on his cheek.

“Y/N, just let me do this,” said Dean, backing you up in a dead end hall, reaching for the knife. “I’ll do it. You don’t have to. I won’t make you do that.”

“I won’t let you do this,” you said, kicking at the air vent on the ground, leaning down and chucking the blade in, Dean scrambling on top of you to get at it. “I am still right here with you, Dean.”

“It’s gonna break me,” he mumbled, slumping down, holding his body tight, Sam rounding the corner. “I’m a demon and you can’t fix it.”

“Okay, Dean,” said Sam, hositing him to his feet. “Back in bed. We got you.”

Dean shook and shivered and shouted for what felt like days in that bed, still asking for you to put an end to him but his energy to try another move on his own completely gone. Sam made you take a break after the third day, take a minute to forget about what was going on. It almost worked too until you heard him shouting for you.

“What? What’s wrong with him?” you asked, Dean sitting upright in bed, staring at his lap.

“It didn’t work this time either,” said Dean quietly, Sam sighing.

“Maybe it has to go one more time?” said Sam, Dean raising his head. He still looked in pain and honestly, like he was afraid of his brother.

“Leave me alone. Both of you,” he said, laying back on the bed, tossing his covers over his head. Sam held up his hands, following you out to the kitchen.

“Why the hell is he acting like a...like a...I swear he’s like a toddler almost,” said Sam, your head shaking.

“His head as a normal adult is screwed up. This...going through all the pain of hell again, being a demon and trying to go against that nature to be good, this cure that’s bending him back and forth in the blink of an eye...what if he’s right? What if it doesn’t make him human? What if it makes him a demon for good? We’ll have hurt him for no reason and he’s pretty close to terrified in there right now,” you said. “Which is ridiculous considering he’s a demon.”

“Y/N,” said Sam, rubbing his eyes. “I never had it in me to do what he’s asking. Why do you think every time he got out, he went after me? He knew I couldn’t do it. You can get that real cold look in your eye which makes it so hard to know what’s going on up there but I know deep down you wouldn’t do that to him either. We’ve got an emotionally unstable demon on our hands and no fucking clue what to do.”

“What if we turn off the mimicry spell,” you said, Sam cocking his head. “I don’t know how to convince him that we still care. Even if he’s stuck, we’re still here for him, right?”

“Of course we are,” said Sam, giving you a smile. “We’ll turn it off and give him a little while to get his head on straight. Or as straight as it can get.”

“Maybe he’ll even crack a smile,” you said, stepping out into the hall, catching Dean lingering by the doorway, looking away quickly. “Dean.”

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” said Dean, glancing down as Sam cleared his throat.

“Feeling any better?” asked Sam. Dean hummed, refusing to look at either one of you. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

“You want to take a shower? Get in some new clothes while I put some fresh sheets on that bed?” you asked.

“Why are you two doing that,” said Dean, slowly running his hand through his hair, like the simple task took up too much energy. “You don’t know what the cure is doing to me. I might try to kill one of you next time.”

“No offense tough guy but I think we can take you,” you said, Dean letting out a short laugh. “Do you need help in the shower?”

“I can do it myself,” he said, pushing off the wall, wobbling a little on his first step. You ducked under his arm and supported his side, Dean sighing. “I could use some help.”

“Alright demon boy,” you said, taking a short step forward, Dean following after. “Let’s get you fixed up.”

A week later Dean was panting in bed, a brief break in this next round of pain. He wasn’t freaking out this time though. Whatever small amount of trust he had in you and Sam to get him past this, he was clinging to it for dear life.

“You’re okay baby,” you said, wiping the sweat off his forehead, Dean glancing up with a smirk.

“I haven’t heard that in a while,” he said, coughing, reaching for his water. You helped him sit up and guide it to his lips, Dean sucking it down greedily. “This one feels different. I think we’ll know one way or the other after this.”

“I don’t want you to be scared about what happens if you’re a demon. Sam and I...we’ll take care of you,” you said. Dean nodded, turning his head away. “Starting back up?”

“Yeah. Might want to put your headphones back in. This one’s gonna...” said Dean, your music blasting in your headphones again as he gripped the bedsheets tight.

You slipped off your headphones in the middle of the night, resting your head on the bed and leaning over in your chair. Dean seemed like he was either having a long break or on his way over this thing. You could only hope for his sake it was over soon.

A large hand was rubbing up and down your back, softly going over your head at times, lightly stirring you awake. It was different than Sam’s touch but you weren’t the least bit frightened by this one.

“Hi Dean,” you said, blinking your eyes open, green ones staring back.

“Hi,” he said, moving the hair out of your face, brushing his thumb over your cheek.

“It didn’t work, did it,” you said, Dean smiling.

“No, it didn’t,” he said, still running his hand gently over you. “It did something though. Something just feels different in me now. I want...I want you and Sam to try the blood cure one last time.”

“Dean, you need a break from feeling like absolute shit,” you said, Dean chuckling.

“This time I’m asking you to help me. I know it if doesn’t work, it’s not the end of the world. One last time, that’s all I’m asking,” said Dean, your face burying into the mattress. “I want to try one more time for you.”

“One more time.”

“Well...that was unexpected,” said Dean shaking his head as you took the restraints off his arms after giving him his last injection.

“We could write our very own lore book on you,” you said, Sam getting the ones off his legs, Dean still shaking his head. “Tell us again, Dean.”

“I don’t...I don’t feel like a demon anymore. I feel normal and...pretty damn fantastic actually,” said Dean, stretching out his arms. “But...I can still do this.”

One of the restraints that had been on Dean’s arm was floating just off the ground, doing flips and curls like a ribbon before it fell down.

“Your soul is perfectly pure and not an ounce of demon in sight. You kept the hardware for some reason though,” said Sam, scartching his head. Dean glanced back and forth between you, staying seated even when you both stood up.

“So I’m not human,” said Dean. “Not really.”

“Yeah, you are,” you said, leaning down in front of him. “You just got a little devil side in you too. We always knew that though.”

“Y/N, I’m serious,” he said, swatting your hand away when you tried to hold his. “I’m still incredibly dangerous.”

“Led Zepplin is an awful band and their music deserves it’s own special place in hell,” you said with a smile, Dean pouting at you. “And your car sucks.”

“That is untrue and you know it,” said Dean, squinting at you.

“Now, Mr. Big Bad Demon, if you really were a demon, what would have done just now?” you asked. Dean pursed his lips. “Exactly.”

“But-”

“Dude,” said Sam, grabbing one of his hands, pulling him to his feet. “I guarentee Y/N during her special time of the month is far more demon than you are.”

“What was that Samuel,” you said, glaring up at him.

“Told you,” said Sam, Dean still not moving when Sam tried to get him to follow. “Dean, come on. We even made you a birthday cake for the one you missed last year. Please?”

“You made a birthday cake for a demon?” said Dean, rubbing the back of his head, his cheeks blushing for the first time in ages.

“We told you before. We don’t care what you are. We’re going to stick by you,” you said.

“Maybe we’ll tease you about the demon thing every once in a while but even if you were full on demon, we’d still be doing this,” said Sam, ruffling Dean’s hair.

“Thank you. Both of you.”

You were just about asleep when a knock came at your door. You hopped out of bed, worried something had happened to Dean. Instead he was standing sheepishly at your door, rubbing his eyes.

“Are you okay? Do you have a fever? Your stomach hurt?” you asked, running your hands over his face, Dean chuckling at you.

“No, none of that,” he said, pushing your hands down. “I...I had a nightmare.”

“Oh,” you said, pulling him inside, patting the bed. He climbed on top of it, crossing his legs as you got back under the covers. “This is really old school for us. Pre-dating us actually.”

“I don’t think we’re dating anymore. I remember being told we weren’t a thing until I was human again and since I guess I’m not quite there all the way, I have to earn that back,” said Dean, rubbing his neck, looking anywhere but you.

“Would you be nice to yourself for two seconds, Dean?” you said. “Speaking of which, would you look me in the eye when we talk? You still act like you’re scared of me.”

“I don’t want...sorry,” said Dean. “Multiply my baggage from a year ago by a thousand and that’s where I’m at now.”

“Good thing I never cared about the baggage then, huh?” you said, flipping back the covers on the other side, patting it again, Dean hesitantly shifting his body to slide under them. You ran your hand over his head, Dean’s eyes fluttering shut. “What was your nightmare about?”

“It’s going to sound silly,” he said, leaning back against the pillows, turning his head towards yours.

“There’s nothing silly about a nightmare. You can tell me anything,” you said, Dean humming.

“I was a demon. A full on big scary demon and you were scared of me,” said Dean, your smile faltering. “Are you?”

“No,” you said, pulling him closer to lean on you. “I just get scared of you acting the way you did during the cure again.”

“And risk that ass kicking from you? No thanks,” said Dean, forcing his eyes open. “I will never do that or say something like that ever again. I don’t feel like that anymore.”

“I’m just glad that third time hurt less,” you said.

“Worst one actually,” said Dean, your head cocking. “I didn’t want you or Sammy to look at me like that again. I knew I was going to be alright, no matter what happened so even though it hurt the most, it was easier in a way.”

“We aren’t scared of you, Dean,” you said, smiling at him, his green eyes crinkling up when his smile reached them. “I missed that look on you.”

“I missed you,” he said, his smile slipping as he went to sit up. You shifted your arm around his shoulders trying to pull him back down. “It’s okay. I feel better now, sweetheart.”

“You always stay,” you said. “That’s the rule.”

“You really want me still?” he asked. “After everything I said and did?”

“I miss you waking me up with your snoring and tangling our legs up and your bear hugs in the morning. I just want to wake up with you by my side again, baby,” you said, kissing his forehead, pausing before you moved to kiss his lips.

“Stop,” he hissed, turning his head away, taking a deep breath. “You just...you did something to me just now. I don’t know what but...”

“Does something hurt?” you asked, Dean’s head shaking, his head rubbing it.

“Look at me,” he said, blinking his eyes. “Are they black?”

“No,” you said. Dean spun around, grabbing your phone off your night stand and putting it on the bed, staring at it.

“It won’t move,” he said, scrunching up his face. “I can’t...the demon stuff, it isn’t working.”

“All because I kissed you?” you asked. Dean shrugged, the two of you hoping out of bed, heading into the library.

You were flipping through pages and pages, Dean running off after a minute to come back with two cups of coffee, the two of you getting down to research. It was a few hours later, deep in the middle of the night when Dean burst out laughing.

“You have got to be shitting me,” said Dean, looking at you with a look of relief. “Oh, sweetheart, we’re okay. Oh, we are so much more than okay.”

“What’d you find?” you asked, climbing into the seat beside him, Dean still laughing.

“It was a fear curse. On you,” said Dean, your face scrunching up as he showed you the text. “’The thing you love most will become what you fear most. Only loving the thing you fear wholly will remove the curse.’ Y/N, you kissing me...you love me still. No wonder the blood cure never worked or the other one...I wasn’t really a demon. The more I trusted you, the more you trusted me...the more you were falling for me again and the more I got better. I’m human. I’m me again.”

“My biggest fear was not being there for you,” you said. “Letting your demons win out.”

“I guess my inner demons decided on being a demon. Good thing I wasn’t a bug. You’d have squashed me,” said Dean, your head resting on his shoulder.

“Oh thank god,” you said, giving him a big sloppy kiss. “I mean we we’re okay before but-”

“Kind of obvious you would have loved even a broken me at this point, Y/N,” said Dean, picking you up, heading off for Sam’s room.

“Told you I’d never give up on you,” you said.

“I know,” said Dean spinning you around. “I love you, love you, love you. I don’t have to worry about hurting you or Sam now. Thank you so much for that.”

“You wouldn’t have,” you said, Dean humming as he kicked at Sam’s door.

“Sammy! Guess what!” shouted Dean. Sam ripped open the door, a gun in both your faces, Dean hitting the deck with you as Sam jumped.

“Geez, don’t sneak up on me like that!” said Sam, lowering the gun. “What? He turning into something else now?”

“Your big brother’s all human again. Turns out it was a curse on me,” you said. “I’m guessing it must have been from that witch hunt in Tulsa way back.”

“Still a little devil,” said Sam, tucking his gun in his pants, giving you and Dean a big hug. “Now do you feel better, Dean? No bull this time.”

“Yes,” said Dean with a smile. “A thousand times better. Whatever you two want, it’s yours.”

“We got what we wanted,” said Sam, squeezing you both too tight but Sam too happy to care at the moment. “And Y/N sort of wanted to go see a chick flick this weekend.”

“Sure,” said Dean, laughing against you. “If you want to take your rascal of a boyfriend out that is.”

“When’s the last time you were outside, Dean?” you asked. He shrugged, Sam quickly grabbing a couple extra coats from his room, the three of you heading back to the library and outside into the cool night air. You were already shivering two steps out the door but Dean took a deep breath, smiling to himself.

“I want to go camping soon,” said Dean, glancing back at the two of you. “And go eat at that new steakhouse that you two said I would love. And buy a big bag of gummy bears and just chow down until I get a stomach ache. A hunt, I want to go on a hunt in a couple weeks too, get my footing again.”

“We can do all of that, Dean,” said Sam. “Promise.”

“We should get back inside. She’s shaking like a leaf,” said Dean, wrapping his arms around you. “Great idea sweetheart. I needed this.”

“I need a blanket,” you teased, Dean getting the two of you back in bed within five minutes flat. He fell asleep easily, for possibly the first time in a year but your mind was in overdrive.

“Hey,” he mumbled, nudging you with his head. “Go to sleep. It wasn’t your fault.”

“I thought you were sleeping,” you said.

“It’s not your fault,” he grumbled, popping open an eye. “Now cuddle your ex-demon please. He’s had a very long day, long year, and I’m very likely going to have more nightmares or cry at some point tonight so the closer you are, the less I have to move to hide away in you.”

“I kind of like this emotional honesty thing, a nice little change of pace,” you said, scooting close enough where he could pull you flush against his chest.

“My head feels like I just got off a very, very long rollercoaster,” he said, taking a deep breath. “I don’t have it in me right now to act like the tough guy.”

“I’m still with you,” you said, kissing him, earning a smile that put your worries at rest. “No matter what version of you I have.”

“Always with you too sweetheart.”

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