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Sam began to see him everywhere. He sang songs and threw tantrums and tried desperately to make Sam respond to anything he did.
"I saw you flinch, Sam. I know you can hear me." He smirked, blowing what appeared to be an air horn again. Sam expected it this time and didn't flinch [as badly].
This man--no, this creature--gave Sam no breaks anymore. Pain used to deter him, but after he made the mistake of asking for help...
"Sometimes all of our thoughts are misgiving, ooh it makes me wonder..." Lucifer interrupted Sam's thoughts, singing loudly. The younger Winchester sighed, tired of hearing the same song for the 20th time that day. He could revert to begging for Lucifer to stop, but he wasn’t willing to reduce himself to that point. It probably wouldn’t make any difference anyway, other than hurt Sam’s confidence in himself to deny the devil.
"Oh, c'mon Sammy. You love my voice. Sing along with me!" He sang a few more lines, inching closer to Sam.
Sam's eyes were closed, back pressed against the cold, steel wall behind him. He held his temples firmly with his middle fingers, prepared to slap his palms over his ears. Of course, he knew the effort wouldn't make any difference since this all was in his head, but it wouldn't stop him from trying. As many times as he had been disappointed, he still tried evading the irritatingly relentless distractions. Distractions from what? Sam wasn’t really sure at this point. He sat in Bobby’s panic room with nothing to do except attempt to avoid Lucifer’s interactions. All he really wanted to do was sleep.
A gentle touch on his cheek shocked him, and he raised his head. Lucifer had stopped singing but hovered over Sam. He stroked the taller man's face, and Sam couldn't help the swirl of disgust in his stomach when he leaned into the touch. His eyes fluttered shut.
Exhaustion had kicked in days ago, and now it was just a matter of getting as much sleep as he could. The gentle touch seemed like a silent invitation to enter the depths of unconsciousness. Of course, Lucifer would never actually allow this.
His hand moved from resting on Sam's cheek to harshly gripping his chin. He shook Sam's face vigorously, forcing him awake.
Sam struggled to peel his eyes open. He sighed loudly, pulled from the momentary, yet blissful, sleep.
Lucifer climbed onto Sam's lap, dropping his weight painfully hard. Still grasping his face with one hand, he dug his fingers from the other hand into Sam's scalp. He slowly dragged his hand through the long brown hair, ripping out snarled clumps. Sam had no idea how his mind was capable of creating a physical manifestation of his worst nightmare. He kept telling himself that this was all in his head, but it all felt so real.
“Sammy, Sammy, Sammy,” Lucifer crooned into his ears. “I am definitely here with you, and you already know the truth in that. It’s absolutely lovely to see you confuse reality with whatever’s in your noggin. Whether this is all in your head or not though, your company remains the same.” He spoke slowly, savoring the words. He smiled, eyes practically glowing.
“But, if you really want to, we can invite some other company too,” Lucifer suggested as he pushed away from Sam, turning his back on him. Sam didn’t understand what he meant until Lucifer turned around. Instead of Lucifer standing before him, Dean stared at him, green eyes prominent.
They held eye contact, and for a moment, Sam’s heart soared, hoping that his brother had a way to save him. His expression was all wrong though. Dean’s face revealed a twisted combination of anger and disgust. Sam had only seen him like that a few times before, but it was rarely directed at him. The demon blood incident flashed through his mind, and he couldn’t prevent the stab of guilt he felt.
“You’ll never be anything but a monster to me. There’s nothing you can do to change that.” It was distinctly Dean’s voice, but how could those be his words?
“Even if you survive this, I still won’t see you as my brother. Then again, it’s also pretty unlikely that you’ll make it through this with how weak you are.” Dean barked out a laugh. He paced around the room, leaving Sam to simply stare after him and prevent himself from unleashing the tears prickling in the corners of his eyes.
Dean stalked up to Sam, leaning in close. He pressed his face to Sam’s now wet cheek.
“You’re disgusting,” he said. When he pulled back though, it wasn’t Dean anymore. Jessica, the woman he loved, the woman he planned to marry, looked at him with the saddest eyes he had ever seen on her beautiful face.
“Jessi--” he tried, but she interrupted him.
“You killed me.” Her statement hurt so much, probably because of the blunt approach, but also because Sam believed this was true.
He wanted to tell her that he loved her, that he wanted to give her the world, that he should never have left her, but he could only hang his mouth open and watch tears slip from her shining blue eyes. Her blonde curls smothered her face.
“No, not this again. You can’t use her against me again.” He directed this at Lucifer, but his voice lacked all strength.
Sam shut his eyes tightly, blocking out Jessica’s quivering shoulders and now blotchy face.
“Oh, Sam, it just won’t stop. You know it won’t.” Lucifer’s voice was practically soothing despite his words. He climbed back into Sam’s lap, gently curling his fingers in his long hair. Sam didn’t even try to lean away. He was so tired, so emotionally drained and mentally distant and physically incapable of functioning anymore. He wanted to be done. Being confronted by all the people he wronged in the past pushed him beyond the point of caring if Lucifer was resting on top of him.
"Please," Sam croaked out.
"Please... What?" Lucifer smirked wickedly, raising his eyebrows in mock concern.
"Please, let me sleep." Sam didn't care that he was begging the worst fallen angel that existed. He barely noticed the man's weight pressed into his lap. He didn't care that he whined when Lucifer softly scratched down his face with his disintegrating nails. He just desperately wanted to close his eyes and escape the hell that was his life. Even nightmares would be better than the way he was living, as long as his body was allowed a few hours of rest. The nightmares were there when he was awake anyway, but he practically felt drugged. His head was so foggy
He had noticed that his memory failed him more often than not now. Everything that he experienced and hallucinated blurred together, and things that he had thought to be true, he wasn't sure about anymore.
He knew he was at Bobby's, in the chamber where he cried out for demon blood. Dean had put him there, unwilling to send him into a hospital where he may never return to see the light of day. Yet, the way things were going now, Sam still didn't believe he would leave that room intact. His mind already peeled at the seams.
"You really think that you're in Bobby's? You still think you're in the real world? Oh no, sweetheart. We're having a grand ol' time in the cage together. That's why you feel like you can't escape."
Sam felt a weird sense of relief at that moment. If he was still in the cage, that would explain Dean's behavior, right? Sam wanted to believe that he had finally emerged from the cage, but he also wanted to believe that his brother wouldn't leave him alone to rot with his equally rotting mind.
Lucifer smiled at the internal conflict.
"That's exactly what your brother would do. 'Sammy can't protect himself, so I need to lock him away where no one else can hurt him.'" Sam’s thoughts continually repeated the fake Dean’s words over and over in his head, as if on a constant loop. Lucifer patted the top of Sam's head, then went back to softly raking his fingers down his skin. The motion sent shivers down Sam's body and distracted him for a moment.
"What he doesn't realize is that I'm around, and I plan to stay. He thinks you're a monster--a freak. He really just put you in here so he wouldn't have to deal with you himself." The devil smirked, an all-knowing look behind his eyes.
Sam reflexively began shaking his head no, eyes wide, but hands quickly held him in place.
"This Cabeza of yours is mine," he whispered close to Sam's ear. He purposefully exhaled a long, warm breath, tickling the skin.
The younger Winchester almost cried out in both shock and frustration. He raised his arms to aggressively shove Lucifer away, but instead was too weak and found his hands pressed against the other's chest. He tried harder, but Lucifer simply pressed closer. Sam couldn’t imagine anything feeling worse: he couldn’t control his mind and body, because Lucifer clung close enough to cut off his movements and sleep. He was forced to listen to Lucifer’s ramblings and relentless conversation. At that moment, only Sam's hands separated their chests, and their faces hovered close.
"And the puppy can't resist his owner, hm?" Lucifer’s tone was mocking, yet strangely endearing.
“Why are you doing this?” Sam cried out. His voice cracked in desperation, which physically and emotionally pained him.
“Why? To kill you of course!” Lucifer spoke as if this was obvious, but Sam’s eyebrows furrowed. He was expecting him to say something like before, with blurring the line between reality and hallucinations. By not knowing what was real, it destroyed him, but to outright kill Sam?
With Sam’s hands occupied, the fallen angel firmly held Sam’s neck and covered his mouth. Sam attempted to move his head away, push against this terrible thing, but his former strength had left him.
Before the Winchester could try anything else, Lucifer leaned forward and quickly licked a stripe up Sam’s face with his forked tongue. Sam’s stomach roiled in disgust, but his voice was absent.
"Once you return to hell, you won't be able to refuse the impulse to find the cage." Lucifer tilted his head and allowed a small smile to resurface, although, he looked honestly apologetic. The fallen angel's hand stroked softly against the side of Sam's face. Sam could only watch in horror. He knew he didn’t need to say anything because Lucifer could see inside of Sam’s head.
"I know what you're thinking: 'why in hell would I visit my old bunkmate in the cage?' Well, other than your undeniable desire to see my beautiful face, the residue of your soul is still there. That part of you will pull." He made a tugging motion with both hands, rocking on top of Sam at the same time.
"And pull, and PULL, until you can't bear to be away from where you spent over 100 years." This time, his triumphant grin returned.
"Soon, you're going to die and we'll be together indefinitely. No getting pulled out by angels or idiot brothers. Just me, and we can have as much fun as before."
And Sam didn’t say anything, because his brain wouldn’t allow him to respond. He was stunned more than anything else. Was it better to finally give in to his death and suffer an eternity with Lucifer, or continue fighting to live a life where he couldn’t distinguish reality and the events in his head? He’d have to deal with Lucifer either way, but apart of him knew that he was going to die soon. A body needed sleep, and that was precisely why Lucifer prevented him from obtaining it.
He didn’t realize that his body had gone slack at that point, and his head was being held up by Lucifer.
“It’s okay, Sam. I’ve got you,” were the oddly sweet last words that Sam heard before finally being swallowed by black.