Just need some sleep, Sammy. (SPN)

[Zwee]

Maybe it's you're first fic, but you're obviously not new to writing--this is SO goooood!!

And I love that Charlie's involved!! She's the best.

Can't wait for more! (Haha, Dean will be FINE on the hunt... sure...)

[SpookyScarySkeleton]

Awwwwwe "stubborn son of a bitch" yep that's Dean alright and adorable too <3

[MissBayliss]

Sorry, no sneezing in this part, but the meds will wear off soon. More weak, sick Dean and controlling bossy Sam coming your way

Part 7

“You guys eat yet?” Dean said, fishing for the keys in Sam’s jacket.

“You’re not driving, Dean. You’re out of your mind”

“Shut up, I feel great,” he grunted.

After sneezing his face off in the shower, he shoved a fistful of meds into his mouth. Sam muttered something about taking too many at once but the way Dean felt he didn’t really care. He just wanted to be able to breath again or to even just form a proper thought process.

He threw his jacket on as he left the motel room, Sam and Charlie exchanging worried expressions.

“You’re not supposed to operate heavy machinery,” Charlie whinged, running after him.

“Oh, don’t listen to ‘em, baby,” he rasped, patting the bonnet.

“Dean, give me the keys,” Sam ordered.

“Fine. God,” he sighed, tossing them to Sam and collapsing into the passenger seat, Charlie taking up a position in the back. “Bitch.”

“Yeah, alright... Jerk,” Sam replied, climbing into the drivers seat.

Charlie made a high pitched squeal noise, “Sorry,” she said as the brothers turned to face her in that synchronised way they often did, “It’s just kind of...”

“Don’t tell me that’s in those books too?” Dean groaned.

“Sure is,” she chirped.

Sam huffed, Dean groaned, and then they both kind of smiled at each other.

When they made it to the diner Dean was in a state of blissful numbness, air able to enter his lungs through his nose. He still felt heavier. His arms clumbsy limbs like lead at his sides, and his head was fuzzy, but it was better than how he felt before.

They sat down at the same table from that morning. Dean weak and wheezing from walking up the stairs at the diner’s front door.

It wasn’t long before they were approached.

“Well, hello, Rebecca,” Dean said, laying on the charm.

“Oh, hello again,” she said, sounding a little surprised, “How are you feeling? You sure you’re up for food just yet?”

He glanced at Charlie and Sam, looking a bit like a wounded animal, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Well... You were retching in the mens toilets this morning for a good twenty minutes...”

He flushed with more than fever.

“Oh, yeah. I’m fine now, honestly. Must have been something I ate... Not from here though,” he rasped, kicking Sam under the table as he struggled not to laugh.

She nodded, “Fair enough. You want to order?”

“Just soup, thanks,” he sounded so defeated. As if it wasn’t obvious to everyone in the diner that he was sick as a dog. He was still trying to play it off, the recent kick from the drugs giving him this newfound energy.

She recorded all their orders and flounced away. Dean wasn’t done with her yet.

He inhaled deeply through his nose, “Ahhh, this stuff is great. I can breath again.”

“Stop talking, man,” Sam instructed.

“What?” he said, “I thought you liked my adorable wit.”

“You’re gonna lose your voice.”

“Yeah, you’d like that wouldn’t you,” he rasped.

“If we’re going hunting tonight, which I still haven’t agreed to yet, you’re going to need to speak... Or scream if something happens. So stop talking,” his tone was reminiscent of Dean’s plane ride from hell like a million years ago.

“Whatever,” he croaked.

Sam was right. Even with the drugs his throat was still killing him, and speech, that was usually so natural, was actually wearing him out. Tugging at his tender swollen throat, and decreasing in volume every time he used it.

“You wanna talk business or not?” Sam raised an eyebrow at his brother.

Dean folded his arms on the table and looked at his brother expectantly. Well go on then, smart ass.

“So the first kid, Paul, stabbed 13 times, missing 3 teeth, right? Second victim, same thing.”

“Demon?” Dean whispered, keeping it short.

“Could be,” Charlie piped up, “But look what I found,” she said flipping open her tablet, “Three deaths, across three nights, night of the 13th, 14th and 15th, stabbed repeatedly, missing teeth. Exactly the same as this time but 50 years ago to the day.”

Charlie was absolutely beaming. Dean thought it was cute, as long as she stayed in the research business and not in the getting-herself-killed business.

“So tonight, we have to find out what’s doing this and stop it happening again,” Sam said.

Dean nodded, then crinkled his brow, “Any leads?”

“Not so far...”

Dean pointed at his wrist. Running out of time, dude.

Just then Rebecca appeared with their meals.

"So, Rebecca, what time do you get off? I'd like to ask you a few questions,” Dean croaked, pressing a hand to his sternum as he talked.

It was Sam's turn to kick him in the shin.

"What kind of a pick up line is that?" She smiled, but totally still buying it.

He pulled out his FBI badge and flipped it open. Sam and Charlie followed suit.

"Oh," she said, reeling back a little, "You're here about those boys that got murdered."

"That's right," Sam said, taking over, sick of hearing Dean struggle with his vocal chords, "If you think of anything, maybe if anyone strange past through here or someone acting out of the ordinary please let us know."

Dean pulled out a card with his number on it and offered it to the young waitress.

“We’re staying at The Sun, if you want to come by after work,” Dean winked.

She nodded hesitantly then retreated back to the kitchen.

"She wants me," Dean smirked, then proceeded to cough up a lung.

“Dude, that sounds awful. Remind us to stop for cough syrup.”

Dean made a face, “You know how I feel about that,” he groaned, rubbing his knuckles against his chest.

Sam made a concerned face as Dean sunk lower in his seat, the initial buzz from the codeine wearing off.

The soup was warm on his throat. He couldn’t decide whether it was making him feel better or worse. He began to play with it as Sam and Charlie engaged in a more in depth conversation about the murders, having decided it was too much effort to eat.

--------

“We ready to go?” Dean asked the others, trying not to sound too tired. How could he be tired? All he’d done was sleep.

"Dean, you've eaten like two mouthfuls."

"I ate more than that," he croaked, then cleared his throat. It was a bad idea. He was hoping it would help him get the words out but he was wrong. So, so wrong. He tried to stifle the coughs through a closed mouth but he couldn't for very long. He found himself gripping the table with one hand and coughing into his fist. The sound went on a little too long which made the diner uneasily quiet around Dean.

"Alright, we're out of here," Sam said, rising and throwing some bills down with the clean plates and almost full bowl of soup. He grabbed Dean's bicep and pulled him up, ushering him out of the diner. Dean, red faced from coughing, struggling to get a breath, gripped the hand rail on the steps down from the diner door.

Sam tried to continue to lead him but Dean pushed him away.

"Sam, stop," he whispered, then fell onto his knees on the cement steps, hands wrapping around the railing.

"Dean!" Charlie and Sam called simultaneously.

He closed his eyes to stop the world spinning and then it was blackness. It engulfed him.

[Always-a-Ginger]

Aww poor boy. Somehow I don't see Sam or Charlie letting him hunt...

[MissBayliss]

Here's the next part. Hope ya'll are still interested! Dean is on a downward trajectory and some more sneezing...

Part 8

"Do you want me to call an ambulance?" He woke to a strange voice, a patron of the diner.

"No," Dean whispered, eyes fluttering open.

"Dean, you okay, man?"

"Peachy," he coughed, "Just got up too quickly." And couldn’t get a proper breath, but Sam didn't need to know that.

"It's okay," Sam muttered to the gathered towns folk.

Charlie knelt down next to Dean and was running a hand back through his hair while Sam held his upper body up against him.

"Get me up," he snapped.

As Charlie and Sam hauled him to his feet he noticed a seering pain in his right knee, making him crumple against Sam, hissing through the pain.

"What is it, Dean?" Sam asked, panicked, a hand against his chest, feeling the laboured shallow breaths.

"Are we sure we don't want to call an ambulance?" Charlie suggested.

"Guys, relax," Dean whispered, "and... help me to the car."

Dean cursed himself the whole way there. He must have fallen funny on the steps and twisted his knee or something. Great. What else could go wrong? He leaned against Sam. He could tell his fever was back, he could feel his temperature creeping up minute by minute, just like the congestion that was finding its way back to his face. The main problem though was his lungs. He didn’t know what was wrong with him, he wasn’t a doctor, but he knew this wasn’t normal. It was really hard to get a breath. It was like he was under water. Sam’s hand on his chest felt the crackling wheezing sound inside as he breathed raggedly in and out. His skin was sensitive, his muscles and joints ached and now his knee was friggen killing him. The light hurt his eyes, walking made his mind hazy and this lump in his throat was making it incredibly painful to talk and swallow. Basically, yeah, he felt like ass.

Sam put him in the passenger seat and he winced as his knee bent. There was no way Dean was hunting tonight. No way he was doing anything that wasn’t lying in bed, doped up on flu medication and icing his knee that he could now see swelling under his jeans.

Charlie climbed into the back seat and started massaging Dean’s shoulders. Sam peered at him. He didn’t push her away, he relaxed further back into the seat, and Sam knew he must be sick, really sick.

“We’re going to the motel. You’re going to bed. Charlie and I are gonna do this.”

Dean just growled back in response. He didn’t have the energy to argue, and if he didn’t have the energy to argue then he didn’t have the energy to hunt. He coughed again, having to sit up properly to be able to breath.

“Cough syrup,” Sam said, reminding himself to go to the pharmacy.

Charlie waited in the car with Dean while Sam went in and got cough syrup, ice gel packs and a padded knee brace. He didn’t know what he had done to it but he could assume that he would need it eventually.

The drugs he’d already taken had almost completely worn off, still with a while yet before he could take more. He sniffed in thickly, his nose once again full of mucus.

“Urgh, well, that didn’t last long,” he groaned, sneezing into the crook of his arm.

He sniffed again, his tingling nostrils turning pink.

When Sam was getting back in the car Dean had both hands cupped around his mouth and nose sneezing uncontrollably. His breath stopped hitching after 4 and he leant back against the seat, Charlie still rubbing his tense shoulder muscles.

“You got tissues in that bag of goodies?” Dean croaked.

Sam tore the box open and handed his brother a wad, which he happily emptied his sinuses into.

By the time they made it to the motel Dean was curled up against the passenger side door.

“You awake, Dean?” Sam asked, putting a hand on his shoulder.

“Mm,” he groaned, eyes still closed.

“You think you can get up to come inside?”

Dean was still for a moment, then he ever so slightly shook his head.

Sam got out of the car and went round to his brothers door.

“Charlie, can you get his bed set up? You might need to ask reception for more pillows.”

Charlie did as he said.

He opened Dean’s door slowly in case he was leaning on it. Dean had his face pressed up against the seat, grimacing in his sleepy haze, and sweating bullets. Sam knelt down beside him.

“I’m gonna help you, okay?”

“‘Kay,” he whispered.

Sam was strong but his brother weighed a ton, he needed him to help him out. Just to get himself upright to begin with. Dean had gone downhill really quickly and Sam was freaking out just a little bit. But someone was also going to be murdered tonight and someone had to stop that from happening.

“You going to open your eyes?” Sam asked.

Dean shook his head again.

“Alright, I’m going to help you up,” Sam bent over and carefully lifted his right leg out of the car so his foot connected with the ground. Dean threw his head back a little with the pain of the movement. He did the same with the left leg till Dean was in a better position to hoist up.

“Lean on me,” Sam said, as he grabbed Dean’s left arm. “One, two, three,” he counted. On three Dean got out of the car, leaning heavily into Sam.

Now out of the car Sam could lean him on the impala while he positioned himself at Dean’s right side, wrapping his brothers arm around his shoulders.

“You gonna pass out?” Sam asked.

Dean opened his eyes ever so slightly to look at his brother, “Nah, I think I’m good.”

“Good. Let’s get to the room.”

“Ah! Son of a bitch!” Dean crumpled against Sam as his knee gave out underneath him.

“Woah, Dean. Don’t use that leg. Lean on me, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, his annoyance at himself coming off as annoyance for his brother.

Sam hoisted him up higher, pulling him closer and began helping him to the room. Charlie was quickly at Dean’s left side to help him up the two steps to the door.

They got him to the bed and began the difficult task of putting him in a position where he wasn’t in pain and could still breath. He had to be more or less sitting up against a stack of pillows or when he coughed he couldn’t breath, and they had two more pillows stacked under his leg.

“This is friggen fantastic... Just... awesome,” he moaned, as loudly as his voice would allow.

Sam set the tissues at his bed side and a bottle of water. Dean grabbed at them, bringing them to his face before sneezing helplessly, jolting his knee every time.

“You alright?” Sam asked, sitting down on his bed. It was a stupid question really.

Dean evil stared him.

“Right, sorry,” he said, reaching a hand out to feel his brothers forehead.

“What the hell, Sab?” he groaned, pushing the hand away weakly.

Sam fought him easily, lying his giant palm across his head. Dean’s arms fell limply by his sides and he almost leant towards Sam’s hand.

Sam grimaced and Dean let a small moan escape his lips. Try as he may, he was too sick to fight anyone. Charlie appeared with a cold washer, handing it to Sam to lie across his head.

They force fed him water and pills and let him drift off to sleep before, once again, thinking about the case.

“Seriously, Sam, we have nothing,” Charlie whispered, sitting across from him at the tiny table that made Sam look like he was surrounded by doll’s furniture.

“Maybe we should hit the library,” Sam suggested, keeping his voice low and glancing at his sleeping brother.

“You sure we want to leave him alone like this?” Charlie asked, raising an eyebrow.

“What choice do we have?”

[telltale]

Dean is on a downward trajectory and some more sneezing.

This is like music to my ears, hee! It is, though. This was great. I'm definitely still interested.

[MissBayliss]

Part 9

When Dean finally woke it was dark outside. He leaned over and flicked the lamp on, groaning briefly and squinting at how bright and invading it was. He picked up his phone from his side and dialed Sam.

“Dean, you alright?” he answered the phone with a hurried voice.

“You left...” he started, voice so scratchy he hoped Sam understood, “You ass hat.”

“Sorry, Dean. Lives to save.”

“Who’s gonna save my life?” he groaned, fever mixing his words.

“What?”

“I dunno, man. Stop talking so fast... Makes my head hurt.”

“I’m guessing you still have a fever. Man, you can’t do anything the easy way, can you?”

“You... you’re easy...” he growled, sneezing into his elbow.

“Dude, go back to sleep,” Sam commanded down the phone.

“Wait, the hunt. You guys need help?” he suddenly remembered what they were there for and began pushing himself up before the pain in his knee caught him and he almost coughed up a lung.

“Dean, Dean...”

“‘M good,” he grunted, almost hearing Sam’s bitch face.

“Stay in bed, Dean. We’re gonna handle this.”

“Running out of time...” he panted, leaning back against the pillows.

“I know, but we think we know what we’re dealing with.”

“Sharing is caring.”

“It’s Wiccan, Dean. Pretty powerful. Just the one though as far as we can tell. She’s making deals to keep on living. She’s got to be hundreds of years old.”

“She’d be all pruney...” Dean cringed.

“She’s bargaining for her youth, dude. She’d be young.”

Dean was having a hard time focusing now. He wanted to go back to sleep. But he also didn’t want his little brother out there, with Charlie, hunting a “pretty powerful” friggen witch. Not good. No. Not what Dean needs to hear to get a good night’s sleep.

“You should come pick me up. I can help,” he said, trying to sound like he wasn’t dying.

“I’m gonna hang up on you now. Go to sleep, man.”

*Click*

“Sam, you son of a bitch!” he growled as loud as his voice would go, curling in on himself when he coughed so hard he nearly vomited.

He reached out to the cough syrup bottle that was on the night stand and unscrewed the top, guzzling it like it was gatorade... or Budweiser.

Life was not fair.

----------

He slept on and off for about another hour before a noise at the door woke him up. Blinking, he gazed at where the noise came from.

“Sam?” his strained voice didn’t carry very far.

“Agent Tyler? It’s Rebecca. You told me to come over when I finished?” the sweet voice came.

Dean groaned outwardly. Of course he wanted Rebecca to come over. She was smoking. But not when he looked and felt like ass.

He coughed trying to sit up.

“Are you okay?” she wrapped on the door again, concern in her voice.

“Yeah,” he called out. He wasn’t even sure if it was loud enough to hear but he wasn’t trying again.

He managed to get into and sitting position after maneuvering his leg around with great difficulty. He breathed a few times shallowly before pushing himself up to stand. He could bare weight on his leg but not a lot. He was panting like he’d run a marathon by the time he made it to the door. Running a hand down his face, from forehead to chin, he tried to look a little more alert before opening it to the sexy waitress on the other side.

He only opened it halfway.

“Wow, you... Wow,” she sighed, tilting back on her heels.

“Sorry, Becca,” he groaned, his voice thick with gravel and congestion, “Not a good time,” he put his wrist to his face and sneezed into it, holding it there for a second.

“Bless you,” she offered, “You do not look well,” a sympathetic smile on her lips.

“Yeah, well, I feel worse,” he sighed, lowering his arm to his side.

“You want me to get you anything?” she asked, pushing closer to the door like she wanted to come in anyway.

“Nah, I’m good, just need some sleep,” he whispered. His voice was shot.

“Here, let me help you back to bed. I can make you some tea if you like?” she smiled.

He was too tired to argue and she was too good looking to refuse, and he really didn’t know if he would make it back to the bed on his own.

He pushed the door open all the way and she came in grabbing his arm and helping him to the bed.

“What did you do to your leg?” she asked, as he leant into her.

“Fell,” he shrugged.

She helped him lie down and then walked back towards the kitchen.

“You should be at the hospital, Dean,” she said, filling the kettle in the sink.

Dean paused. His heart stopping for longer than medically advisable.

“I never told you my name was Dean...” he croaked.

She turned the tap off suddenly, completely still for a minute.

“Oh,” she sighed, turning to face him, “And I so wanted it to be a surprise.”

[Always-a-Ginger]

Great addition. Really looking forward to the next part.

[LeadaAlexys52]

“Oh,” she sighed, turning to face him, “And I so wanted it to be a surprise.”

Dun Dun DUUUUNNNN!!!!!!!!!

OOo So exciting!

[crazy_cat_girl]

Oh, SNAP~ I love the twist!

[MissBayliss]

Last part guys! By popular demand I may do an Epilogue Thanks for sticking with me even though it doesn't quite fit the genre. All your feedback has been amazing and has definitely inspired me to write more.

Part 10

“You’re the witch,” he croaked.

“And I could hardly believe my luck when a sick, pathetic Winchester pulled into my town. You just needed a gentle push in the right direction and you were flat on your back.”

“You did this to me?”

“Oh, honey, you already did it to yourself. I may have helped your condition along a little bit,” she smiled, stepping closer to where Dean lay completely helpless.

He tried to sit up, to move, to do anything but he doubled over coughing, his lungs seizing up.

“You know, you really should see someone about that. Well, should have seen someone about it. I’m going to kill you now.”

“Why are you doing this? To work in a diner for a hundred years?” he panted, clutching at the sheets, knuckles turning white.

She laughed, “I like the atmosphere.”

“Seriously?” he stared up at her.

He knew his only chance was talking her around. He couldn’t move. He could hardly breathe. He thought maybe she was doing something to him even now but he doubted it. He was that sick that it didn’t matter what she did at this point. Even Dean was ready to admit it. He needed a hospital... And an oxygen mask.

“I have family here, okay?” she snapped.

Dean remembered an older lady at the diner.

“At the diner? That woman... She’s your mother, isn’t she?”

“She’s my daughter,” she said, putting a hand on Dean’s foot, standing over him at the end of the bed.

“How old are you?”

“You are a blip, do you understand? Your life is nothing. I am forever. I will be forever.”

“And you’re just going to keep killing people?”

“Why not?”

“Well, you are just all sorts of crazy, aren’t you?”

She smiled, then tightened her grip around his ankle. The pain traveled upwards to his knee, like a fuse she’d lit inside him. His knee popped out of it’s socket with a loud snap. He couldn’t even scream it hurt so much. His voice wouldn’t allow him. He gritted his teeth and tried to roll away from her, falling onto the floor, his limp leg jutting out unnaturally.

She straightened herself and walked back towards the kitchen, opening the cutlery drawer.

Dean pushed up onto his hands, scrambling back against the wall, looking for anything he could use against her.

She pulled a knife out of the drawer.

“You’re going to be victim number three, Dean. After I kill you I’ll live for hundreds of years. See, you’re worth more dead than you are alive. I’ll go down in history as the one who finally got the famous Dean Winchester.”

The pain was so much that he couldn’t speak. He couldn’t answer, he couldn’t move. His chest was heavy, his throat felt like it was swollen shut. His sinuses burned but his leg was all he could focus on. He was going to lose consciousness... soon.

She turned to him, walking back across the room, blade in hand.

Dean’s eyes drooped. He saw her coming for him. He saw the knife. He heard the door crash open and a flurry of limbs and blades and crashing sounds.

“Dean!”

Sam’s voice. Sam was here. It was going to be okay.

He felt Charlie’s cold hands on his carotid and brushing across his head. Rebecca screamed and he heard a body drop to the ground. Lucky they were the only ones staying in this godforsaken motel.

Sam’s voice was close to him. It was worried. Don’t worry, Sammy. Then he heard the numbers counting...

“One, two, three.”

The pain sent him rolling onto his side, coughing as he struggled to get air. His leg was back in place but it hurt like a mother f-.

“Dean! Can you hear me?”

“Ngh,” he moaned, continuing to cough.

“Dean, are you alright?”

“S’mmy... Can’t breathe...”

Sam pulled him close to him, sitting him up against his chest so he could get a breath, but he couldn’t stop coughing. Sam had a hand on his chest willing him to breathe.

“Get the bag,” Sam gestured to the table where the bag from the Chemist sat. Charlie raced it back to him.

“Fix his leg,” he hurried, too scared, too worried to focus. He needed to get Dean out of there. “Shhh, you’re alright. Just breathe, Dean. Please.”

Charlie put the padded brace around his knee and held one of the instant cold packs against it. Dean was shivering and shaking, sweat dripping from his forehead, coughing and spluttering. His lungs and throat were blocked. It was so hard, so hard to breathe.

“Sam, we have to call an ambulance,” Charlie pleaded, holding Dean’s leg close to her, tears in her eyes.

“We can’t call an ambulance. We just killed a girl.”

“We have to do something.”

Sam scrambled to get his phone from his pocket, still holding Dean against him, feeling the shuddering breaths as he coughed.

“Here, call this number. His name’s Garth. He can help us clean up after this...” he said handing her the phone. “I’m going to get him to the car.”

He finally stopped coughing, taking quick shallow breaths, tears and sweat wetting his face, struggling to keep his eyes open.

“Dean. Hey, Dean. You okay, man? We gotta get to the car, okay? I’m gonna get you to a hospital. Can you stand up? You have to help me, please.”

Dean could comprehend the words. Sammy needed him. His little brother needed him to help so he was going to use all the energy he had to try.

-------

Sam couldn’t take him to the closest hospital. He had to drive a town over, and hope they wouldn’t be arrested for the various crimes they’d committed. Garth actually knew a hunter close by that he got to go straight to the motel and dispose of the crime, but it was touch and go. If someone heard them, saw them... They had to get away, quickly.

But Dean was lying across the back seat, head in Charlie’s lap, and he wasn’t doing very well.

Charlie hushed him, rubbing his back and his forehead, brushing his hair back off his sweat soaked face. He was pale and he was wheezing heavily, when he wasn’t coughing. His hand clutched around her knee so tightly it was actually starting to hurt. It was a desperate grip, crying for help.

“Sam, hurry,” she pleaded.

“I know, I’m going as fast as I can,” he said, still stepping on the gas a little bit more.

Dean breaths got shallower and shallower until Charlie had to check and make sure he was still breathing. His lips were white, but he was still sucking in tiny breaths. The witch was dead now, so anything she had been doing to Dean she couldn’t possibly be doing now. She must have hexed him each time at the diner, when he threw up and then again when he passed out. But, he was sick long before then. Not that Sam knew. He’d been keeping it to himself, because he couldn’t stop hunting and he couldn’t slow down. It just wasn’t in him.

---------

“Need some help here!” Sam bellowed into the hospital foyer, carrying his brother at his side. Dean’s arms were draped over his brother’s and Charlie’s shoulders. He was turning blue, coughing and gasping. “Dean! Dean!” he yelled, his brother going completely limp in their arms, the only colour on his lips was from the blood he’d coughed up.

The nurses came quickly, getting oxygen on him and wheeling him swiftly away.

Sam tried to follow but a hand on his chest stopped him, “You have to stay here. We’ll look after him.”

Sam sat in the waiting room, bouncing a leg up and down furiously. Charlie’s hand was wrapped around his but he couldn’t really feel it. He was numb, tuned out from the world, because Dean couldn’t die... again. Not for this. Not for something so stupid. If Dean was going to go, he was going to go out in a blaze of glory, not blue and gasping for air because he’d had a sniffle for a few days... few weeks. God, how long had this gone on before Sam really noticed. That wasn’t fair.

“Are you Dean’s next of kin?” A doctor was holding a clipboard and leaning over him. Sam and Charlie sprung up.

“Yes, he’s my brother.”

“What’s happening? Is he alright?” Charlie asked.

“Your brother has a very severe case of bacterial pneumonia. There’s a lot of swelling and tissue damage inside his lungs and throat. He’s intubated at the moment as he was having trouble breathing on his own. We’ve got him on strong antibiotics and pain medication. Hopefully we got to it just in time. Bacterial pneumonia can be quite dangerous.”

“Is he going to be alright?”

“We’ll have to wait and see if there’s going to be lasting damage on his vocal chords. He was also without oxygen for a while...”

“What does that mean?”

“We’ll just have to see if there was any damage done to his brain.”

Sam pursed his lips and nodded, tears in his eyes, reminded of the time the doctor told him his brother would be dead in three weeks.

“Also, what did he do to his leg?”

“Ah, he, um, fell, when he passed out...” Sam choked out through the tears, trying to give them a story that didn’t involve witches.

The doctor looked skeptically, “Well, I don’t know how that would have caused it but his knee has been dislocated. It probably slipped back into place on it’s own, but it is causing him a lot of pain. We won’t worry with a cast but I’m going to have to give him a proper brace and he’ll be on crutches for a few weeks. Again, we’ll have to see if he needs any further treatment like physical therapy.”

“Can we see him?”

“He’s unconscious...” he looked over his shoulder then back to Sam and Charlie, “Are you his partner?” he directed to Charlie.

“No,” Sam said quickly, “She’s our sister. Please, it’s just the three of us. We’d really like to see him.”

-------

Dean was out for a day and a half before Sam was shaken awake in his waiting room chair, Charlie sleeping on his shoulder.

“Excuse me,” an attractive female nurse uttered, as Sam and Charlie suddenly woke.

“You’re Dean’s family aren’t you?”

“Yes, what’s going on?” Sam said, quickly getting to his feet.

“Can you come and see him? He’s awake.”

“Yeah, is everything okay?”

“We’re trying to get him to stop using his voice but he keeps asking for “Sam”?”

Sam huffed and smiled, “Yeah, that’s me.”

“He’s pretty agitated at the moment. We’re hoping you can calm him down.”

“Sure,” he said, and they followed the nurse towards Dean’s room.

“Dean,” he called, from the door, coming to his brothers side, where he was shaking his head back and forth on the pillow. Glassy bloodshot eyes found his and his body relaxed against the mattress.

“Sam?” his voice was so damaged it hurt them to hear it, “Is she dead?” he gulped painfully, tears running down his cheeks from the pain of talking, “The witch?”

The nurses looked at Sam with looks of confusion.

“Ah, movie we were watching, before he got sick,” he looked down at his brother, “Yeah, she died, Dean. Another score for the good guys,” he smiled.

Dean let out a long breath from behind the oxygen mask and let his eyes slip shut, and like that he was out again.

“Is he... going to get his voice back?” Sam asked the nurse.

“I’m sure he will. He just needs to rest,” the young nurse smiled, “You two can stay in here with him if you like. We’d prefer it actually in case he wakes up again. You can give him some water but try to get him not to talk.”

Sam laughed, “We’ll try but no promises.”

---------

The End

[Always-a-Ginger]

Great job! Love that Charlie got to be a sister.