Chapter Text
"Dean, for the last time get your foot off the fucking-"
"Yeah yeah I know," he cuts Roman off, sighing with annoyance as he removes his foot from resting on the dashboard.
"Then why do you keep doing it?" Roman snaps, just as annoyed.
"It's comfy!"
"Boys! Boys!" a voice from the backseat interjects. "Calm down. Keep the peace for like ten more minutes and then you don't have to talk to each other at all until tomorrow afternoon," Renee says. Both Dean and Roman grumble a little but there's no further arguments.
The three are halfway through a two-week long road trip, an idea proposed by Renee because they 'needed to live a little bit'. Not that Dean minds, it's been pretty fun roadtripping with his girlfriend and his best mate, but as they now know too much time together leads to arguments over stupid things.
Dean sighs, feeling a head ache on it's way and dozens of another strange pains throughout his body. Keeping still is hard, especially when Roman keeps calling him out on all the leg bouncing and finger tapping.
The road is dead apart from their car, copy and pasted desert rolling by outside the windows in the dark. Up ahead Dean can see the town that they're stopping in for the night, but they're not there yet and he's so damn tired he nearly falls asleep every time he blinks.
"What's the name of the place again?" Roman asks, startling Dean.
"Uhhh," Renee says, followed by rustling sounds as she sifts through her stuff in the back, the low light making it hard. "Hotel California," she answers. Roman just nods, continuing to look ahead.
Time stretches on and Dean nearly loses the battle to stay awake about a dozen times, but he persists, and eventually they're driving past the 'Welcome' sign that he doesn't care enough to read. He hears the scribble of a pen, which must be Renee writing in her travel diary.
"Is this it?" Roman asks tiredly a few minutes later, squinting at the near blinding light emanating from the sign to their left.
Dean lets out a yawn before saying, "Well, considering the sign is right there and it is indeed the name of our hotel, I'd say so." Roman punches his arm, albeit weakly. Renee's too done to scold either of them.
They find a park easily, stepping outside of the car and stretching out their sore limbs. Dean's the first to get around to the boot and pull out his suitcase, stepping aside to let the others get theirs.
"Why is this sign so fucking bright," Dean mumbles, face bathed in the bright blue neon light of the sign as he squints up at it. The other two make no comment, too busy pulling their luggage out of the car. Once all three have everything they set off, eager to get into a nice comfy bed after a long day of driving.
It's not the fanciest hotel, but it's the fanciest place that Renee booked for them to stay in.
They enter the lobby, but Dean doesn't take in the details. It's small, a seating area around a fireplace off to the side and a reception desk to the other. They beeline right for there, finding a single woman sitting behind it. She looks up from inspecting her nails as they approach, hair pulled back in a tight bun.
"Oh, hello," she says, voice thick with an accent Dean doesn't recognise.
"Hey, uh," Renee starts, fumbling around as she looks for something. "We booked some rooms for the night-"
"Yes yes," the woman - Dean squints at her nametag - Lana, says, cutting Renee off. "Room 125 and Room 165, a singe room and a double room. Prepaid. Here are your keycards." She seems to provide the keycards out of thin air, not in her hand one moment and then in them the next. Renee looks confused as she takes them, but thanks Lana regardless.
"That was . . ." Renee says as they cram themselves into the elevator. She presses the button for their floor and hands Roman the keycard to his room.
"Whatever, we're here. Let's just go to sleep," Dean says, feeling his eyes burn with the need to be closed. It's been a long day. Roman mumbles something like an agreement and when they reach their floor they practically don't even say a good bye, constantly stifling yawns instead.
Renee opens their room for her and Dean and they haul their luggage in, dumping it at the foot of the bed, both with a loud sigh. The room is decent, a smallish kitchen, a bathroom, a couch with a TV and a double bed. The view isn't anything special but that's not what they booked the room for. Dean closes the curtains while Renee reads an information booklet left on their bed.
"Dinner is served at six thirty pm every night," she reads out loud. "Breakfast is at eight am."
"Don't remember that being a thing," Dean says, coming up behind Renee and wrapping his arms around her waist, slumping down a little to rest his head on her shoulder.
"Well, the website didn't have much information anyway. It's affordable, that's all that matters."
"I guess."
"Right," Renee sighs, patting his arm. "Bedtime. The more sleep you get the less you and Roman will be at each other's throats when we start moving again."
"Well maybe he should stop getting mad at me putting my foot on the dashboard," Dean defends as Renee slips out of his arms. "It's comfy, babe. His 'what if we crash?' argument is so stupid. I'd get injured if my foot was there or not. And he's like, the safest driver I've ever met. My grandma drives more recklessly than him."
"I'm not going to go on about this," Renee gives him a tired look, getting dressed into her night gown. "You've been bickering about this since the day we left. I swear you just like pissing him off."
"That's part of it, yeah," Dean admits with a chuckle.
"Stop being an ass to him, he's your friend."
"Well then I'd have to be an ass to you," Dean smirks.
"And then you'll regret it," Renee warns, sending the smirk right back. Dean laughs and finally relents, stripping down to his boxers and slipping under the covers beside Renee. She reaches to turn off the light before settling into the familiar position at Dean's side, listening to his heartbeat as she rests her head on his chest.
The only thing that gets Roman out of the bed the following morning is the threat of missing breakfast. If there's one thing he loves more than sleep, it's food.
He pulls back the curtains to a decently sunny day, not really looking outside as he throws on some proper clothes and wrangles his hair into a bun. That shit can wait for him to get some food into his system.
He slips on some sandles, the sandles that he knows Dean - but mostly Renee - hates because they look so cringey ("Worse than crocs, Roman. Crocs!"), before he exits his room and starts off in the direction of the stairs. If he has to spend half of the day in a car then he may as well move as much as he can now.
Up ahead he sees a large man in a red checkered shirt walking towards him, slight limp in his step, reading stuff off of an old looking clipboard.
"Ah, Roman!" the man greets cheerily, looking up. How does he know my name?
"Hi," Roman replies lowly, a little confused. The two stop walking when they reach each other.
Up close, he can see that the man is much older than him, unruly brown hair surrounding his face and soft, kinda dog-like brown eyes peering out at him through it.
"Those shoes are nice," he says, smiling as he looks down at Roman's feet. Roman returns it, though the awkwardness isn't eased. "Oh! I'm Mick. I'm the hotel manager, person," Mick stutters. "I know everyone here."
"This place must be pretty old, then? No offence," Roman adds quickly. Mick just laughs.
"Uh, you could, you could say that," his smile fades a little. "You headed to breakfast?"
"Yeah, we're leaving like, after lunch sometime."
"Right," Mick says. Roman notices that he's not meeting his eyes anymore, only looking off to the side. "Well uh, I'd best be going. Don't want to keep you. The breakfast is great, trust me."
Mick walks off before Roman can even say anything, his limp limiting his pace. Roman stares after him for a few more seconds, but the growling of his stomach brings him back to the moment and he sighs, shaking his head. They'll be out of here soon.
On the way down the stairs he pulls out his phone to see if there are any messages. It doesn't turn on. Roman's brows furrow. He'd just taken it off charge.
He turns the corner into what he believes to be the dining room, still trying to get his phone to work when he realises that the conversation has come to an abrupt stop.
Looking up, he sees a few dozen men and women paused in their seats, many more than he'd anticipated, looking up at him. Some glance up for a second and then just look away, while others are looking at him with . . . sorrow?
He stares a few of them in the eyes, before diverting his gaze away to where the food is. Man, this fucking place is weird . . .
"Hey."
A quiet voice startles Roman out of his thoughts on the way back to his room. He turns his head to see an area with a few chairs and couches and a table in the middle of all of it. One man is sitting alone, crossed legged and slouched.
"Hey," Roman says back, confused. "I don't remember this being on my floor."
"Because this isn't your floor."
"What?"
"The elevator. It does that sometimes. The stairs, too. Everything looks the same here." The man's talking almost to himself, tone quiet and a little dazed.
Roman stays silent, processing the information. "Have you uh, have you been here long?" he asks. The man gives him a small smile, before he pats the cushion beside him. Roman hesitates for a second but complies, taking a seat beside the ginger man.
"You must be new here. I'm Sami."
"What do you mean by new?"
"Did you come here with the other man and the woman?" Sami ignores his question.
"I did."
"That's nice. It's always good to have friends."
Is he . . . okay? Roman bites his lip as he stares at the ginger, his confusion ever growing.
"I bet you're probably wondering what's going on," Sami says, like he's reading Roman's thoughts.
"I am, yeah."
Sami opens his mouth to speak then, but closes it, cringing. Silence stretches on between them. Roman sees Sami open his mouth to speak numerous times, but also close it just as many.
"I uh, I have to go," Roman says, standing up from his seat. It isn't a lie, he does need to shower and get all his stuff ready for . . . something. They're going somewhere. He doesn't remember, but he knows Renee will. She planned the whole trip, anyway.
"See ya, Roman," Sami says, giving him a wave and a warm smile. It doesn't reach his eyes.
Okay, now I want to leave.
He continues in the direction he had been going, thinking about Sami's words. The elevators just . . . did that? And the stairs? How could either take him to the wrong floor? They just don't . . . work like that.
Sami was right about one thing though, every did look awfully similar. After a while of walking down the hallway, he slowed his pace. He should've come to a turn or something, by now. Yet the hallway looks like it goes on for ages. Reluctantly, he presses on, concern mounting when after another minute everything is still the same, and there's no door to the stairs or elevator in sight.
"What the fuck," he mutters, picking up the pace. This isn't right, it couldn't be.
He's in a full-on sprint before he even realises it.
Stage one
"Where are we going next babe?" Dean asks from the bathroom, voice muffled from the toothbrush in his mouth.
"We're going-" Renee begins, but trails off. Silence fills the air in the room. Dean pauses when he realises, brows creasing.
"Renee?" he backs up, turning to see her sitting on the edge of the bed, staring at the ground wide-eyed. "Do you remember where we're going?"
Her response is so quiet he barely even catches it, but the second she whispers "I don't remember" he stops his brushing, spitting out the foam in his mouth and dropping the toothbrush in the sink.
Renee's still staring at nothing when he comes back out, and he goes to her side, sitting down beside her and wrapping his arm around her waist.
"Hey, baby, it's okay, you're probably just tired. We can-"
"I don't remember anything, Dean."
"What?"
"I don't remember why we came here. I don't remember how we got here," she whispers, barely audible.
"Baby, we came here because-"
Because . . . they came here because . . .
Nothing. His brain is empty. It shows on his face to Renee, whose eyes widen even more as her hand fumbles to find Dean's, squeezing it shakily.
"W-why can't we remember?" she asks, voice almost as shaky as her hands.
Dean doesn't know what to say.
"Wait, your diary," he mutters a few moments later, a faint memory coming back to him. Her head lifts up from his shoulder, and she must remember it too, by the look on her face. She gets up immediately, running over to her bag and unzipping it with shaky hands. Once it's open she digs her hands in and rummages around until her hand draws back, holding the plain looking notebook.
Dean rushes over as she opens it and practically tears through the pages, trying to find where she last left off. But as Dean watches her, his heart sinks. He closes his eyes, and grabs her wrist, stopping her.
"It's empty, babe."
"But-" Renee looks back down at it, only to see that Dean isn't lying. There's absolutely nothing written in it. "But - there has to be!" Ripping her arm out of her boyfriend's grip she continues to flicks through the pages, muttering frantically under her breath.
"Renee, c'mon, there's no-"
Her hand stops dead as she reaches a certain page. Dean's whole body stills as he sees it too.
'I can't breathe'.
Barely decipherable. Like it was written in a rush, or from an odd angle. Blood smears shaped like finger prints littering the page. The book drops to the ground, Renee's trembling hands slowly rising to cover her mouth, muffling the sob that escapes her throat.
"Where are we? What's happening to us?"
This can't be real. This can't be real.
But every time he pinches his own arm he feels the pain, every time he closes his eyes as hard as he can everything still looks exactly the same when he opens them. It's real. It's happening. It's endless.
Roman runs out of breath, his legs and lungs burning despite the fact that he basically exercises for a living. He must've been running for ages. He can't tell if it's night or day, there's no windows. Logically he knows it's still daytime, it has to be. But he just doesn't know anymore.
"Fuck," he breathes out, leaning against the wall. "What the hell is going on? This has to be a dream," he mumbles to himself, feeling the oncoming of tears beginning to well up behind his eyes. He closes them to try and contain it.
"Stage one."
Roman nearly jumps out of his skin when he hears a familiar voice ring out beside him. He turns his head to see Sami sitting on the floor not too far from, back to the wall with a tight grip around his knees.
"What the fuck is going on?" Roman says. Sami wasn't there a second ago. Neither was the painting on the opposite wall. He doesn't know how he got here. He's almost too tired to even question it.
"Stage two is 'how the hell do I get out of here?'" Sami continues, ignoring Roman's question.
"What the fuck is going on?" Roman nearly yells. Sami cringes a second, before letting out the most tired sigh Roman's ever heard.
"You're in Hotel California now," he says, quiet voice deadpan. He's still not even looking at Roman, his gaze almost fixed permanently on the ground. Roman swears he sees him hug his knees even tighter.
"What does that mean?" he asks, voice soft.
"It means nothing. You're here. That's it."
"But-" Roman begins. Sami looks like he's in another world, perfectly still save for the slow rise and fall of his back and chest. He lets out a sigh of his own, before slowly sitting down beside him, trying to calm himself.
"Sami, I need you to tell me what's going on. I'm freaking out over here okay," he tries again.
Sami stays still for a few more seconds, before he turns to look at Roman, revealing fresh tear streaks down his face.
"Okay. I'll . . . I'll tell you. Everything."
Stage two
"We have to get out of here!"
She was completely unreachable, pacing the room frantically, muttering under her breath even more so.
"Listen, listen," Dean pleads, holding her wrists as gently as possible as she struggles to pull away. "It's fine. We're okay." He doesn't believe a word of what he's saying, but he's going to make sure that she does. "We're fine. Maybe it's a dream."
"It's not a fucking dream Dean! I don't know what's going on, but we have to leave."
"Renee listen . . . let's go talk to Roman. He probably remembers." At this point he's just trying to convince himself. Reluctantly, she nods, and Dean gives her forehead a comforting kiss before beginning to guide her out of the room, taking the keycard from the bed.
He's the first out of the door, meaning that when he suddenly comes to a stop Renee accidentally walks into him, making a comical 'oof' sound.
"Roman?"
Their friend is just sitting on the floor a little ways down the hall, staring ahead at the ground. At the sound of Dean's voice he looks up, confusion on his face.
"What? I'm on your floor-" he looks around, brows drawn tight. He looks so tired.
"What do you mean? What are you doing here?" Renee asks as they approach him. He stays seated.
"I got lost."
"What?"
"I got lost. Elevator took me to the wrong floor and then the hallway never ended and so I stopped. This place is fucked."
"What the fuck," Dean uses both hands to push back the hair from his eyes and forehead. "What are you talking about?"
Roman's silence is worrying, more so than the cringe that makes the smile lines near his eyes crinkle.
Renee kneels down in front of him. "Roman, you need to tell me why we came here," Renee pleads, not waiting for him to answer Dean's question. "'Cause I don't remember and neither does Dean and-"
"I don't either," he cuts off Renee's rambling, voice deadpan. Silence.
"W-what do you mean? Why can't we remember?" her voice rises in pitch, panic setting in again. Dean steps forward and pulls her up, enveloping her in a hug that she hardly reacts to.
"No one remembers. We're all stuck here."
The couple snap their heads to look down at Roman again, Renee's face one of pure fear and Dean's one of pure confusion.
"What the fuck are you saying?" Dean asks. Roman finally looks up them, his face still relatively emotionless.
"We can't leave."
"But what-" Renee says, unable to grasp the simple statement.
"Don't fuckin' joke with us Roman."
"I'm not joking. We can't leave. This place was weird the second we got here. People don't just randomly forget everything. Something's going on here, and we're caught up in it. Everyone-"
"Like fuck we're stuck here."
Dean's moving before he even registers that he is. There's no way. Roman's just being a dick. But why can't you remember anything? He pushes those thoughts of the way, also ignoring Renee calling out after him. The elevator is only a few dozen steps away.
He enters it, smashing the button for ground floor and waiting for the doors to close, the soft elevator comically unfitting for the situation. It's not long before they open again, sliding back to reveal the rustic lobby. A few people are sitting around by the fireplace, quietly chatting.
Dean ignores them. He heads straight for the doors, watching himself approach in the mirror glass, stopping him from seeing outside.
"Woah! Hey, hey!" someone yells behind him. Dean reaches the door, completely ignoring them. It doesn't open when he pushes. He tries pulling. That doesn't work either. The doors don't even budge, like they're just . . . a wall.
"No," he says in disbelief, shaking the 'doors' harder. Hands grab at his arms a few seconds later, and he's pulled back.
"Let me go!" Dean barks at them, frustration peaking.
"They don't work!" one of them replies, as if that's any help.
Dean jerkily twists his arms out of their grip and refuses to meet their eyes, but his anger is melting back into the pure fear and panic it had come from. It isn't a dream. And everyone's so convinced that there's so no way out . . .
No. It's not true.
He's moving again, this time back to the elevator, smashing a random button and trying to keep it together.
"It's just a dream, it's just a dream," he repeats to himself, tapping his foot frantically.
The elevator seems to take forever before it comes to a stop and slides open it's doors. Dean walks out, finding himself in a dimly lit hallway that looks practically abandoned. He immediately takes to pacing, trying to get himself in order.
Too preoccupied with his own thoughts, he misses the sound of the elevator reaching his floor again, and the doors clicking open once more.
It's someone saying "Dean, Dean," that gets his attention, and he turns around to see an old man walking towards him, limp in his step.
"How do you know my name?"
"I know everyone's name. I'm Mick, I take care of everyone here. I uh, I take it you found out?" he asks slowly, as if reluctant.
"You need to tell me what the hell is really going on, okay," Dean says, ignoring Mick's question. "Because I'm not buying this shit. There has to be a way out. Shit like this doesn't just . . . happen."
"But it does. It has," Mick says. Dean turns away from him, taking a breath and resuming his pacing to try and get rid of the unwanted emotions.
"I don't believe you."
"Dean, listen to me," Mick pleads, catching up to the younger man and grabbing a hold of his arm. "You. Can't. Leave." He sounds like he's on the verge of tears. "God, I'm so sorry. I've been here since I was twenty. I don't know why I came here. All I remember is seeing the big blue sign and going in. I've been trying to find a way out ever since. Dean, you can't leave here. It's impossible. I've tried for so long."
"Stop saying that!" Dean tears his arm out of Mick's grip, backing away as he feels his eyes watering. "Mick . . . there has to be a way out. Please. I think I'm going insane."
Mick's tears have more free reign than Dean's, falling freely down his face. His just shakes his head, hanging it in shame. "Everyone loses their mind here. No one knows what this place is. No one. Not even me."
"Are we . . . are we even real? I don't even-" Dean can't finish that sentence, his emotions betraying him as a sob escapes his throat. He flinches away from Mick's attempt to comfort and instead slides down the wall, hugging his knees tight as he stares ahead, eyes throbbing as tears leak unchallenged down his cheeks.
"No Dean, c'mon, you've gotta stay strong," Mick says. "Renee needs you. You need to keep her sane. You need to keep yourself sane. It's so hard, I know that. But you just have to."
Mick's words sink in. Dean sniffles, feeling so weak for crying. But what else can he even do? He's trapped in a hotel full of strangers, with no memories, no contact to the outside world . . . if there even is one, and there's nothing he can do about it?
"I don't want to be here," he admits quietly, voice weak. "I want to wake up."
Mick doesn't say anything, but Dean knows that he heard him. After a minute, Mick walks off, leaving Dean curled up and alone in the dark hallway.