[Prompt #27 – Shore. Written for likely_evil. Originally you asked for the happy verse, but I went with 2026, pre-Apocalypse instead because I just don’t have the juice for the original happy verse anymore. Hope you like it!]

“Dean, be careful!”

Bela stares down the beach to the water’s edge where her brother-in-law has her two year-old son by the hand, ready to lead him down into the surf. Michael looks thrilled with the adventure of it all, letting out a happy giggle when the cool ocean water washes over his feet, but his mother still looks fairly worried, not wanting her son to get in too far over his head.

“I got it, Bela!” Dean fires back, before scooping Michael off the ground and starting to head into the water itself. Bela still doesn’t look particularly pleased, and will stand there frowning until Sam comes up behind her, placing a hand against her back gently, while the other has Olivia curled against his chest.

“He’ll be fine,” Sam says softly, guiding her to sit under the umbrella. “He promised he wouldn’t go in too deep.”

“Michael’s two, Sam,” Bela points out as she sits with a sigh. “Anything beyond the shore is too deep.”

“If he were on his own, maybe.” Sam pauses as he moves to sit next to her, shifting so that Olivia is turned to face the ocean more, wide eyes scanning the scene in front of her while her hat keeps the sun out of her eyes, and Bela reflexively reaches forward to adjust it gently so she gets better coverage. “But Dean won’t let him go. I promise.”

“I’m sure he won’t.” She doesn’t sound as though she believes it.

Sam studies her for a moment, his eyes watching her face carefully, before turning to face her more. Olivia reaches up to tug on the edge of his shirt, before drawing her fist back into her mouth. “What are you actually worrying about?”

“Are you telling me that worrying about my two year-old sun drowning in the ocean isn’t a viable concern?”

Sam makes a face at her before he continues. “No. But I think you’re being a little excessive about it.”

Bela sighs heavily, before shaking her head as she turns her eyes back to the shoreline again. “This isn’t going to last much longer, is it?”

Sam’s face goes more serious for a moment, before he shakes his head. “We said we weren’t going to talk about that today.” Because talking usually ends in fighting and they didn’t want to fight on the kids first trip to the beach.

“Yes, we did,” she replies simply. “But if I can’t talk about that, then I’m going to excessively worry about the safety of our children.” She takes a breath before turning to face him again, raising an eyebrow in a challenge as a result. “So you choose.”

Sam huffs for a moment, before shifting to get to his feet again. “I’m going to take Olivia down to the water. I’ll be back.”

“Be careful.”

He doesn’t respond, and she continues to watch them both like a hawk from a distance.

* * * * *

A few hours later, it’s time to get the kids out of the sun and they all pile back into the Impala. Olivia is out cold from the overstimulation, whereas Michael will probably be out in a few minutes once the car starts moving but for now is busy showing his mother all the sea shells he found and babbling about what they are.

None of his explanations have any relevance to what they actually are, but the intelligence and creativity is encouraging at least.

It’s not long before he’s out like a light, however, and Dean keeps driving, his eyes on the road ahead. Sam keeps his eyes up front for a moment, but after a few minutes he shifts to face her, leaning over the top of the seat as he looks back at his family.

“We have a plan.”

Bela looks up at him as well, meeting his gaze in a way that’s as challenging as her words. “A good plan?”

“Well, it’s us, so probably not.” Dean glances back to meet her eyes in the mirror before turning back to the road. “But it’s pretty much the only plan we’ve got. Nothing else has worked.”

“And if it doesn’t work.”

“If it doesn’t work, we’re screwed,” Sam says simply. “But if it does work, then it’s over. The Apocalypse, all of it.”

Bela studies both of them, trying to find the things that they’re not saying in the in-between. “What’s the catch?”

“Bela … ”

“You said it yourself. The two of you made the plan, so it’s probably not a very good one. So what is it? What’s the cost?”

“Me,” Sam says softly. “The cost is me.”

There’s a moment where she stares at him almost as though she isn’t sure she heard him properly. But a few minutes later she’s already shaking her head in the refusal of this plan that’s supposed to save the world. “No. You can’t.”

“Bela, I have to.”

“No, you don’t.” Her voice rises high and sharp and for a moment she almost worries that she has woken up the children in the process, but at the same time she doesn’t care. She doesn’t want this. “You can’t leave me to do this on my own.”

“And what? Just let Lucifer destroy the world?” Sam looks at her just as incredulously in return. “We always knew that it was going to come to this one day.”

“Oh, don’t use that line with me,” she snaps, now anger replacing the initial disbelief. “Don’t try and make me feel like I should have seen this coming. Do you really think that if I had, we would have done this?”

It’s possible at this point she’s being cruel just because it’s safer, but it doesn’t mean it’s not the truth either. Bela put aside a lot of her own hesitations to be with him, to fall in love with him, to be a mother. If she knew he was just going to throw it all away, she never would have put herself in this position in the first place.

The barbs hit their intended target, and the hurt is clear on Sam’s face. Dean’s watching her in the rearview mirror again, and he doesn’t try and defend Sam’s choice, which means that part of him is at least thinking it too. But at the end of the day, there’s only so much they can do to change his mind – she trusts Dean enough to know that he’s tried.

She crosses her arms in front of her chest, leaning back into the seat and shaking her head in return. “If you’re going to take this kind of risk, Sam, you better succeed.”

Sam’s jaw tightens for a moment, before he turns to face the windshield again, tension clear in his shoulders as he does. “Don’t worry,” he replies. “I intend to.”



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