Chapter Text
"You've made your bed, Sam. Now you go lie in it."
It's dark. Darker than any darkness he's ever experienced before. And it's heavy. Heavier than laws of physics should allow. And it's cold, the kind of cold that eats on your skin, the kind that burns. Gravity feels like a neodymium magnet, and his feet are stuck to the ground and he can't move, can't see, can't lift a finger. He feels encased in cement and he's so fucking aware, more than he'd ever want to be aware of anything, that he's not breathing.
You've done it, Sam. You've done it. You jumped. You beat him.
He should feel triumphant but he doesn't really. There's nothing but the dawning realization that he's dead and yet still right here. He's conscious of his body, can still feel it twitch and strain and tremble, fighting against something that surrounds him head to toe, that seeps through the small gaps between his fingers and hardens. He can feel it on his chest, entangled with his hair, in the folds of his knees, against his nostrils. The weight. It's so heavy and it doesn't yield.
Nothingness. A nothingness that doesn't flow. It stays. It stills. It traps him within. And Sam thinks perhaps this is how it feels to be 3-dimensional, to be stuck in a painting where time doesn't exist. The thought is so terrifying he can feel the panic attack erupt in his system. Curious, though, that he can't part his lips to suck in oxygen and it's almost comical to worry about the state of his erratic heart, but his body is the only thing that is ever really there and it does what bodies do. It freaks the fuck out.
This can't be it. This can't be it. No.
Would probably be wise to remember, that whatever version of Hell he just willingly threw himself in is his choice and his eternity. And eternity is not something you could ever grasp, is it? You expected hellfire and racks and... Lucifer, you expected lucifer and a cage. Dean has made Hell sound like a medieval torture dungeon and you were okay with that. You were, you accepted it.
Not this. Not this. God, not this.
The claustrophobia burns from the inside out. He can feel something within him trying, and failing, to claw him open and escape. Something feral and mindless, hysterical, punching and kicking onto the inner walls of his skin. It's vicious and it hurts like a son of a bitch.
There's no conceivable way to estimate how long it's been. Might have just materialized here, might have been here since the beginning of time. He'd shred his whole body into tiny little unrecognizable pieces if he could just, for a second, feel them drift in the wind. He'd break his knuckles, his teeth, his spinal cord, if he could just pierce a hole into the impenetrable black and, for a second, just a second, be able to scream himself hoarse.
God, not this. Help me. Help me.
____________________________
Sam is the immovable object pushing against an unstoppable force; his body is locked in a constant state of tension, adrenaline, strain, pushing and pushing and pushing, violent and desperate and on the brink of losing his mind. And then there's one more push and, oh, look at that, he goes. He punctures into what is now suddenly air and drives himself forward face first into something warm and soft, fabric. Somehow he's sprawled on the edge of a bed and he loses his balance and falls to the floor, and there's light, and colors, and he can fucking breathe.
What? What...
He flinches the second he touches solid ground and he scrambles up on hands and knees and he breathes and shivers and breathes and shivers. There's a tinge of insanity to how frantically he pulls himself up to his feet, but he's deriving some odd sort of intense pleasure from the simple fluency of how his limbs move and his joints bend. His body vibrates with it and he's laughing and he's crying and anxiety runs hot and brutal in his veins.
Thank you thank you thank you!
It takes him an agonizingly long while to stop hyperventilating and take his lungs' fill, to school his breathing into a rhythm his heart can support, takes him even longer to summon the energy to focus on where he is and how (why?) he got here. But, eventually, he does, and cloudy delirious eyes dart up to explore his new environment.
It looks like a regular cheap motel room. Something he and Dean would book no problem because they just need to change and grab a bite and most likely won't spend the night. One bed, one small table, two chairs, one worn-out couch, nothing much else beside two doors on opposite sides and old fading wallpaper that may have once resembled trees. The economical nature of the room is comforting and familiar, and for a brief second, he relaxes just a little bit.
We did it, Dean, huh? We did it.
His vision is still a little off. He's not exactly sure but the light, the shadows, the specks in the air just don't align right. He blinks several times back to back trying to shake the feeling off. It doesn't waver. He decides to ignore it for now because just the ability to move in free space feels heavenly, and his heart is still thumbing in his chest a little too fast for him to calm down and analyze.
You're still in Hell, Sam. This is still Hell.
Two doors. He stops pacing around and stares on the one closest in proximity. He's tentative, downright scared, but he inches towards it anyway. Hand on the cold knob and it doesn't give. Locked. Okay, will try again later. He steps away and goes for the second. He expects the same scenario and, to be fair, he's not really in a stable enough mental state to practice caution, and so he reaches for the handle in a semi-automatic motion, just plain old muscles doing what they do best. It burns hot and it gives immediately. And the door is open. And for a second there he's distracted with the sudden prickly pain pulsating from the palm of his hand, but then a certain smell overwhelms him and...
There you go.
Sulfur and burning flesh. He pulls back nervously, both hands reaching behind him for the door blindly, making sure it's still right there and not going anywhere. And this is madness, is it not? Because apparently this is some sort of balcony that overlooks Hell? Before him (and below him?) extends well into the horizon a barren land of heat and fire, drowning in a hot reddish hue. Heavy sounds of clinking metal and, if he squints really really hard, he can see, amidst the smoke and heat waves, figures moving far away at the near end of his line of sight.
There's a moment of panic where he tries to push through and investigate a little further, but the heat is crawling up his skin and the smell is making him sick to his stomach and he just doesn't want to, can't, deal with this shit right now. In a hasty frantic motion, he turns away and goes back through the door. Pulling it shut behind him with the hem of his shirt. He's flustered and disgusted and fuck can he almost taste the horror on the very tip of his tongue.
"Hey, Sam Winchester. We settling in alright?"
There you fucking go.
____________________________
"Lucifer."
He hisses the name. It's a simple acknowledgment and yet it catches in his throat, and his mouth is so dry he's going to cough his lungs out.
"Hiya, Sammy. Easy."
Sam takes a couple of steps back, careful. There's a bewildered expression on his face because Lucifer looks like Nick, which doesn't make any sense unless...
Not really him. A projection. An illusion.
"Yeah, this?" Lucifer makes a general gesture towards his own chest, "Thought you'd appreciate the familiarity."
"Thanks."
It's a little too dry to be genuine, but Lucifer wouldn't sweat the small details. And Sam's eyes wander across the room inspectively, eyebrows furrowing.
Light, shadows, specks in the air, just don't align right.
"This room... It's an illusion too?"
Lucifer clicks his tongue, eyes glow with something dark and amused, but when he speaks, his words are slow and patronizing, like he's just been asked the most ridiculous question. Like he expected better.
"Yeah, I didn't build you a motel brick by brick, Sherlock, what do you think?"
Sam swallows the implied insult neutrally. He doesn't care. Because if the room is an illusion, then...
"And the, uh, dark?"
"Ah, how did you like that by the way?"
There's a small tremble to the way Sam presses his lips at the question. It doesn't go unnoticed, and he curses under his breath at how galringly he wears the distress up his sleeve. But then again, Lucifer knows, and perhaps the most dignified answer is to just give him the truth.
"Hated it. You know. Your turn."
"Short answer? No. The 'dark' is not an illusion, not my making either."
What's the long answer?
"Come." Lucifer tells him, casually strolling towards the balcony door, "I want to show you something. I won't bite."
Oddly enough, Sam believes him. Lucifer is a lot calmer than he expected him to be and it is alarming, but for the present moment, he's not on his toes dreading foul play.
He follows silently, watching him open the door, the same knob that burnt his hand earlier, with zero trouble. And he walks in. Sam steps in in his track cautiously. Hell's distinctive scent strikes him in the face.
"My life has always been a clusterfuck of weird, Lucifer, but a room with panoramic view of Hell? I think that tops the list."
This, Lucifer genuinely smiles at. He looks entertained and a little proud, something akin to the way a friend would grin when you immediately get their inside joke.
"My pleasure. Biblical hell in all its glory. This is what you expected to see, right?"
"Hm. Much hotter than I imagined."
"Comes with the territory."
Lucifer pulls a chair out of thin air and sets it so that it's leaning against the now closed exit. He sits down and pulls his legs up to rest crossed feet over the metal railing of the balcony. Sam had expected it to be scorching hot, and has kept his distance, but as they are now, he's sort of forced into a corner, and there's no chair for him; so he stands, uncomfortably, doesn't bother to disguise the emotion.
And Sam is confused. Because this, this feels like a dream. He and the fucking devil, hanging out in the balcony of a fantasy motel room, having what has been so far a very civilized almost friendly conversation, beholding literal Hell a few inches below their feet.
But more curious is the fact that, it doesn't really feel as hot as it did the first time. Lucifer being in such close proximity is probably the responsible factor. He radiates cold and Sam's body winces at the contrast.
"It's not real."
Lucifer says after a minute.
"I don't understand."
Lucifer quirks his head and raises his hand up. He snaps. And Hell disappears.
Sam stares forward mouth agape. One second it was Hell, and heat, and distant sounds of fire crackling, and the awful, awful smell of burnt meat and misery. And then it's nothing. Bright white surrounds the balcony.
Sam bursts out laughing. It's a stressed tight thing that leaves his chest heavy.
"Did you really just give me a Hell screensaver?"
Lucifer grins. It's playful and lighthearted and he looks like the child sole owner of a really fascinating magic trick.
It's the most absurd thing Sam has ever said or heard in his life. He can't stop laughing, and somewhere in there, the tightness in his chest tugs at him, and he thinks he's going crazy. Because none of this, none of it, makes any fucking sense and he's just exhausted.
You're still in Hell, Sam. This is still Hell.
"What's happening here, Lucifer? I don't get it. I don't get what you're getting at."
"What's happening is that you and me, Sam, we're the only elements in this little universe pertaining in the slightest to what you'd define as 'real'. Everything else? Smoke and mirrors and, uh, screensavers. Except you know what. Go on. Touch it."
Sam feels his heart sink.
"Touch what?"
"The white. Touch it."
"I don't want to."
"Do it."
And Sam does.
______________________________
Cold. So cold. The kind of cold that eats on your skin. The kind that burns.
Sam recoils, terror distorting his features, making his lips quiver, his eyes water. It drowns him, becomes him.
No, no, no.
"I gave it a layer of light as a courtesy. For you. Please appreciate the effort and get a grip."
Lucifer's tone is cold and hard and Sam doesn't want to be this terrified, doesn't want to be pressing his back against the wall of the balcony trying to breathe and failing, doesn't want to be this small embarrassing thing that cowers in the corner in the throes of yet another panic attack in front of the one entity he hates most.
But he can feel it closing in. The dark. Can feel the weight imposing itself onto him, enveloping him, and his vision dims at the edges and Sam knows, on some level of coherence that he can't currently fully trust, that this is not happening right now. He's reliving the dark, but it's not happening right now.
"I want to go inside."
The words are uttered with such urgency and struggle it's almost pitiful.
"No."
"Lucifer. Move the fuck away. I want to go inside."
"No. And you'll get a grip right now before I throw you back there." He enunciates the next two words, "Right. Now."
Sam stills and stares, chest heaving. And the terror is there, but so is the fury. Because he feels like a misbehaving child and is being spoken to like one and it's fucking humiliating he can taste bile at the back of his throat.
He turns his back to the endless white before them and focuses instead on the wall of the balcony. Something concrete and colored and at a safe distance. He puts herculean effort into controlling, or at the very least masking, the anxiety spreading through his system like wildfire.
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.
Lucifer pulls his legs down to the floor. He doesn't look affected by any of this. If anything there's a gleam of curious interest in his eyes, the only thing alive in his otherwise blank face. But his tone remains calm and neutral.
"Back in my day, Hell as you know it, as your brother has seen it, didn't exist. I suppose, in a way, I lay the foundation for it. Demons were my little school project after all. Had to give them a home and a job."
Sam watches him intently. He can tell where this is going and it makes his heart ache.
Lucifer resumes.
"Long story short, when I was cast out of Heaven and Dad had to lock me up somewhere to save his precious little humans, there was no Hell to send me to. Hell was more of a concept then: the absence of God you'd say?"
"The absence of God. As in the absence of light and everything. So the dark. He locked you up in the dark? That is the cage?"
"You got it, kiddo."
Sam shakes his head, incredulous. He wants to throw up again. It's an intense ugly urge in the pit of his stomach and the nausea makes his head spin.
"So this is where we are now."
"Thanks to you, Sammy, this is where we are now."
Sam looks around him, frantic again. He curls and straightens his fingers almost obsessively.
I can still move. I can still move. I'm not there.
"Then how are we here?"
"Because I'm inside your head, buddy. And lucky for you, I can make you see and feel whatever I want."
"So I am-- And you are-- We're still in the dark, right now?"
"Hm. Physically, yes. I can't do anything about your body, or my physical form, but, and call it experience, I can guard your consciousness right here."
"Why would you do that? Why would you guard me or do anything for me?"
Lucifer presses a fingerpad against his lower lip, looks contemplative for just a second. And then, "You, humans, are not built for this. I could survive it just fine because I could do, well, this. Build my own little world and stay there. You? You'd go mad."
"Why do you care? You could have let me go mad. You despise me. I brought you back here. You'd want me to suffer."
"All true. But you're also the only other real thinking being in my vicinity. Why give you up to madness when I can have you here, drive you mad myself, or not, whatever. We'll see."
Sam thinks his knees will fail him. He's clenching his fists and gritting his teeth and the claustrophobia, god, the claustrophobia is eating him alive.
"Where's Michael?"
Where is my brother?
Lucifer shrugs, "Don't know. In his own little corner of nothing snuggling up to your brother's head just like us, probably. Or at least I hope he's smart enough to be doing just that. Michael isn't the brightest of the bunch."
Sam breathes out, teeth anxiously digging into his lips, breaking skin, drawing blood. He's not sure he even exists, but the blood still tastes like metal and life.
I'm not real. None of this is real. Not real. Not real. Not real.
"Do you still wanna go inside, buddy?"
Lucifer asks and this time, there's a layer of careful tenderness there. Sam doesn't buy any of it, but he appreciates it all the same.
"Yeah."
Lucifer nods in acknowledgment, stands up and pushs the chair out of the way. He opens the door and lets them both in, and Sam throws a final skittish glance at the white, and then walks into the room. He can breathe better inside; he does plenty of that.
"Get the door."
They lock eyes briefly. Sam's lips curl into a nervous smile. There's recognition there of what this really is. If Lucifer wants to see him hurt, sure, let him have it. Sam never shied away from pain. Physical pain, that is. He's got endurance down to a fine art in this regard.
It's also pride. Sam has spent the last hour (was that an hour?) crumbling under extreme duress, and damn did he fail to hide any of it. But physical pain is fine, physical pain is easy. Something he can understand and push through. Something he'd gladly escape to if it would drown down the voices in his head screeching and wailing nonstop.
He grips the doorknob and pulls the door closed in one quick motion. It's stubborn and defiant in its own accord and Sam expects the burn to come. It doesn't. Feels like nothing at all. Lucifer smiles too.
"I'll let you be now."
Sam watches him silently walk towards the second door, the one that was locked, obviously already done with this conversation. What is there to go to?
"Lucifer."
"Hm?"
"What's behind the door?"
He shakes his head. Sam can't read the expression on his face, part of him doesn't want the answer for that.
"Oh Sammy," the devil blinks, and Sam has no idea in hell why he looks so fucking pleased with himself, "Just me."
He disappears behind the closed door.