Title:  Prisoners of War 3/5
Author: *bright
Rating: Gen. R (extreme violence, language)
Spoilers: Hints from throughout the series up to 3.11 – Jus in Bello.
Character: Sam, Dean.  Cameos - Ruby, Ellen, Bobby and Missouri (in order of appearance).
Category: Angst, h/c and demonic action.
Summary:  The boys get hurt on a hunt; demons follow their trail to finish off the job. And Dean learns things about Sam that breaks his heart.  Set between Jus in Bello and Ghostfacers.
Author's note: I just wanted to fill the void the writers' strike caused.
Words: part III - 4330 
Disclaimer: Me own zip and nada, ‘cept an over-active imagination. Everything belongs to Kripke & Co.





A strange lethargic sensation kept Dean captive, it felt like he had been knocked out and stripped of sensations.  If the world would go under now, he wouldn't give a shit. Not even the nurses coming in and checking on him gained his interest. His knee had been surgically fixed, or so he was told, damned if he remembered. Every time he'd open his mouth to ask about Sam, some evil bitch stuck a needle into him and he was gone. 

But the picture of Sam in the back of the Impala wouldn't leave him alone. He was still able to feel it; Sam still under his pressing hands, not responding, not breathing, not moving, not fucking alive. It was the only thing occupying his mind; that freakish picture of Sam dying. What he needed to do was get out of the bed, hunt Sam down and save him. He really didn't trust anybody else to take care of his brother.  Sam would probably pout the life out of anybody trying to, or do what he was best at, leaving things out. Because apparently, according to Sam, that was not actually lying. That kind of passive resistance, applied with puppy-eyes of doom, was liable to land Sam in even more trouble. The stubbornness that was Sam had always been the reason for the head-on collision course with Dad, and it had made Dean so pissed it had occasionally made him make the wrong decision when trying to handle his brother.  You had to know Sam to read him, and nobody knew Sam like he did.

Sometimes it felt like he knew Sam better than he knew himself and now it seemed he didn't know Sam at all. His brother keeping secrets was nothing new, but if something had fundamentally changed him, like Ruby seemed to insinuate,  Dean didn't even know where to start to get Sam to open up.

The door opened and he turned his head, hoping there'd be news about Sam. He'd have to learn how to stay calm and collected when asking, or he'd be drugged up again. 

It was Ruby sauntering in, and he'd never seen a demon look that beaten before. Dean didn't have it in his heart to even slug her  verbally. And then the horrid thought crossed his mind.

“Sam?” He was up sitting, ready to leap out of bed when Ruby groaned and rolled her eyes at him.

“You must be liking the drugs they keep you on. Another freak-out and you'll be on your way to the psych-ward, trust me. I saw your last flip and it wasn't pretty.”
     
Dean growled. “Your bedside manners stink, I wouldn't have to freak out if somebody told me how Sam is- I don't even know if he's still alive and you're all just -.”

Ruby raised her hand to stop him. “Still hanging in there. In ICU on a vent and I can't go there because I had to mix holy water in the air-conditioning of the ward. There was no other way to keep possible demons out.  I've spent the last days putting out false leads. But it won't hold for long, we need to get you out of here. You're like sitting ducks in here – just waiting to be offed.” She dragged the chair from the corner behind her during her speech and sank down on it by his bedside.

“I told a nurse four hours ago that I wanted the paperwork to sign out. Haven't seen her since and they keep drugging me up and trying to feed me food for toddlers. I seriously need to get out of here, but not in this fucking gown! Find my clothes, steal me some if you have to and I won't kill you the first thing I do.”  Dean tried to keep his voice non-committal and blank, because damned, he was starting to like the girl. Something about the tiredness, the slump of her shoulders and the way she obviously cared for Sam, to the extent that she actually stuck her neck out to save him, was enough for Dean not to off her immediately. It was probably for her own agenda, still Dean couldn't help but feel for her.  If she got him some clothes; she'd be off his hit list.

“Can't do,” Ruby shook her head, reaching over him to snatch the Jello off his tray. “Doc had a long chat with me, told me she thinks you're emotionally drained. Wants to keep an eye on you.” She smiled, dipping the spoon in the flowery plastic bowl and shoveling the Jello into her mouth. The superior glint was back in her eyes. “Emotionally drained, huh? Dean Winchester, that's so cute!”

Dean's eyes narrowed; Ruby was back on his most hated list, right on top, knocking Bela down a peg. “You're too kind, Ruby. It's nice with such maturity. What is it you celebrate this year, your three hundred fiftieth?”

“I'll be sure to send you an invitation if you get out of this alive.” Ruby replied soberly, scooping out the last in the bowl and licking the spoon clean. “I've called Bobby, he's gonna be here soon, picked up Ellen on the way. I'm running out of holy water and with that gone – goodbye Sam.”

“Shut up!” Dean groaned. “You get off on jinxing him, don't you?” He rested his face in his palms, trying to form a plan to get them out of this and keep Sammy alive. Then it dawned on him.

“Hey, you ditched your plan to be married to Sam, did you?”

“You said his name!” Ruby pointed the spoon accusingly at him. “You should have kept your trap shut until I had the paperwork. It would have been so much easier to look for anybody matching your age and family status but you had to go and blabber? Took me forever to find a dork with decent health-care and a brother named Sam. By the way, your name is Rufus Atwater, just so you know.“

“You did that on purpose! Rufus? What the hell?” He glared as Ruby shrugged and placed the bowl back in its place. People named dogs Rufus, not their children. What was wrong with people?

“Well, he's married to a registered nurse and there was some discussion about the IV in Sam's arm to begin with. I cleared everything up, that cereal doctorate worked wonders, in case you wondered.”

It hit him, clear as a day, he saw their escape. “Well, Dr. Cap n' Crunch, I know how to get out of here.”

“Huh?” Ruby looked at him suspiciously.

“Easy when you're awesome like me. We do a Hannibal Lecter, we steal a rig!”  

“We what? Talk about dumb and crazy! County vehicles can be traced and private ambulances come with alarms that'll take you forever to disengage. You've been watching too many movies.” Ruby shook her head dismissively.

“Ambulances have all Sam needs, right? Even a ventilator if he's not out of it when hell breaks loose. You just work your mojo and make it look like the insurance company wants him moved.  We switch plates, destroy the tracers and take Sammy to Bobby's.” Dean held his eyes steadily on Ruby, watching how she was slowly caving.

“You think he's gonna die if he stays here, what grand plan do you have to save him? Or is it just that Dr. Cap 'n Crunch is not all she's cracked herself up to be?” Adding a heavy dose of sarcasm to his words had the effect he'd hoped for. Ruby turned to him, the calm demeanor she usually sported momentarily gone when they had a silent war of wills.

The war was interrupted by a nurse knocking on the door and stepping in.  “Good afternoon Mr and Mrs. Atwater,” she saluted. “I've come to change the bandages. You seem to be doing fine, though. Won't take long.”

“Oh, I'm off anyhow, need to call Bobby. You take care sweetie.” Ruby  leaned in to feign a peck to Dean's cheek, never touching his skin while the green-blues shot him a dose of venom.  He had to refrain himself from rubbing his chin and perform an exorcism on the spot.

“Thank you, Honey Puff.” He even mastered a half-smile before Ruby disappeared and he turned to the nurse. 

“I need my clothes and personal items right now.  I did ask for the release form several hours ago, I haven't seen it yet. If I don't have the requested items in half an hour, I will contact my lawyer.” He used his Sam-meaning-business-voice, that was exactly what stuck-up Sam would have sounded like.

The nurse hesitated. “It would be against medical advice to -.”

“I am not asking here, I am telling you to arrange it. You have no right to keep me here against my will.”

“Yes Sir, I will get the Doctor.” The nurse nearly curtsied before she turned and hurried out of the room. 

If Sam were here Dean would have made a point to tell him how awesome a brother he had. But Sam wasn't, and Dean hadn't seen him in two days and demons had an ugly habit of lying. What if Sam was already gone? What if that was the reason he was being kept here? No! He stood, gown and all and walked over to the window, leaning on the crutch he had been given. The sun was shining outside, early spring light showered the buildings, glinting off the windows. No, he'd feel if Sam was dead, he'd know.  Just like that night when he was too late to save his little, pain in the ass, brother. The night that he watched Sam's face contorted with unfathomable pain, the awful sound he had made when he fell to his knees and keeled over, right into Dean's arms. The sickly sweet smell of blood, the unfocused eyes, the last breath and the absolute horror that Dean felt in the moment Sam's head lolled onto his shoulder and Dean just knew.  And maybe, just maybe if things got real bad, he would end up killing him all over. He felt cornered, a prisoner of war, a traitor to all that was holy. You just don't pull your injured brother out of hospital, not when Sam was still on a vent and desperately needing medical care. But you just don't leave him there for the demons to take either.   

He looked at his trembling hand, wondering if he had made the right decision? Would fate slap his face a good one this time? His hand had been all bloodied after holding Sam and begging him not to let go. Sometimes he could still see it; his palm smeared with rusty red. The fingers that he'd dug into Sam's coat with desperation, trying to keep his brother with him, had been covered in rapidly crusting red. Would they remain sticky with guilt?

Would his hands forever be stained with his brother's blood?

He didn't hear the door open, the sunshine had become watery before his eyes. Not until someone repeated the ridiculous name did he remember that it was him they were calling for. Blinking away the tears, he turned and reached for his clothes.

The young doctor opened her mouth to speak but Dean's ardent stare had her think otherwise.

When he was done, he had only one thing left to say: “Take me to my brother.”  

 

There was black, mostly black and almost black and then there was that searing light that cut though him. He was  floating between confusion and insecurity, bedded with throbbing pain and clicking, wheezing and beeping sounds. Sometimes he thought he heard his brother's voice, but it sounded so different in the mist. Dean seemed defeated and lost, an edge to his voice that Sam didn't recognize. Questions were shot over his head, answers mumbled and Dean's hand came to lay on his chest. He tried to turn his head in the direction of his brother's voice but he was captive in his own body, his own unmoving body. When Dean told him to look at him, he tried, he tried so hard that his eyes teared up and still he was incapable of even shifting his eyes slightly to the left and catch Dean's. It occurred to him that he might be in hell, and this was his penitence; reliving his inability. It would be fitting after all.

“Sammy, you girl,” his brother told him with the non-Dean voice. The pad of Dean's thumb sliding over the skin under his eyes. He blinked, that's all he was able to do. And it was mostly involuntary.  Yes, his hell held inability and lack of control. After all that was where he had failed in life too, it was really such a hellishly, beautiful poetic justice. 

“He's in pain,” Dean stated, like he really was able to feel the throbbing, stabbing and aching in Sam. Was that part of hell? Would his pain be Dean's too? This was all so fricken wrong. 

“He shouldn't be in pain. We're keeping him under full anesthetic to control it. He just got a boost thirty minutes ago that will keep him under for another two hours. We check on him constantly.” The man speaking sounded  confident and  pedagogic.

“You get your degree off a cereal-box too? Did I miss the day had them for half-price at Wal-Mart  or something? Sam is in pain!”

Dean's fingers were back, wiping away his tears. Sam hated crying more than anything.

There were mumbles when the  light seared though him again, having his body scream in protest. Then Dean's hand disappeared, and with it his grasp on what was his current reality. The surface he was fighting to break through  floated to the edge of his consciousness, dimming all sounds and muting the pain. He really wanted to let go forever this time, wanted to leave all this and just vanish.

But he couldn't let go, not as long as Dean was waiting for him. Dean's time was limited, Sam was aware of that. He needed to get out of this place and find the solution. Needed to break through the surface and take control. It was the hardest fight he'd encountered until now; the darkness so thick it felt suffocating as it gripped him and dragged him deeper. He wanted to claw at it, rip it open and let it well out of him. Dean was right there, wherever they were and San had to somehow reach his brother. Had to save him.  But his body was useless; it drifted relentlessly into the dark, dragging his mind along.  

He hated himself for leaving like this.

 

 

Dean had felt a pang of pure pain when he'd first laid eyes on his brother.  The white  linen competed with the pallor of Sam's face, and Sam was winning. The hissing sound when air was pushed into his lungs through the tube sounded like a menacing animal just waiting to grab Sam and take him away from Dean.  And it was all so real, so utterly devastatingly real. All his earlier optimism about getting Sam out of here and saving him had vanished and he felt light-headed from the onslaught of the bitter reality he was witnessing. He'd leaned up against the bed-frame, his fingers aching from the hard grip around the plastic.  

He had to steel himself in order to look at Sam again, grit his teeth and consciously lift his eyes to take in Sam's scratched up face. The stillness was the worst; Sam might as well be dead, he wasn't even breathing on his own at the moment. Dean loosened his hand around the bed-frame and moved it to lay on his brother's chest, desperate to feel the heartbeats. But Sam's left side was covered in a  thick bandages, covering his shoulder and ribcage. Dean had to let his hand lay on the bare skin to the right, a long way from Sam's heart.

At least Sam had still been  warm under the touch. Not as cold as he remembered from that horrid night last spring.

And then the tears. Those had almost killed him. They had assured him that Sam wasn't in pain, anesthetized to keep him that way.  But the tears told Dean a different story and the fucking doctor should be glad he still had his jewels intact. Dean had been so close to ripping them off and feeding them to the smug bastard. 

And now he was sitting here, on a plastic chair in the waiting area. Forbidden to stay with Sam, prevented from watching over his brother. Anyone could get to Sam like this and the way he was looking, it wouldn't take much to finish the job.

By the time he'd been whisked out of the room, his knee and ribs were aching so much that he had to cave and take one of the pain-killers the nurse had offered him. Then he must have fallen asleep because he had been woken when the day had faded into night.

Then he had stood by the window to Sam's room, watching his brother. Only the changing numbers and lines on the monitors told him that Sam was still alive. When his injured leg started shaking so hard  that his teeth rattled in sync, he had to give in and plant his ass on a chair.
 
He must have fallen asleep, because when he woke up it was light outside and he had been offered a coffee and a sandwich before he was allowed back inside to see Sam for ten minutes. There was no change. 

Now he had been sitting here for hours, his ass getting numb and he was no closer to a solution on how to save Sam. He had walked over to the nurses' station half a dozen times already, asking and prodding for updates. Sam would be out of the vent when his situation allowed it, Whatever the fuck that meant, he had no idea. Sam could be dead five times over by then. Cell-phones were not allowed and he had no idea where Bobby was at the moment, he was all alone with this. And damned, he missed Dad; Dad would have had a solution.  Even Sam may have had an idea about what to do to get out of this but not him, he was too tired to even think right now.

Then someone by the main door asked for Sam Atwater and he looked up. A strict nurse was standing by the door, conferring with someone at the nurses' station. When she stepped in, her eyes widened slightly and she gasped for air. 

Dean was up on his feet in an instance.

The nurse staggered backwards, hands flown up to her throat, scratching as if she were trying to rid herself from unseen, choking hands. She coughed violently when she went down. The sudden commotion in the nurses' station impeded him from seeing what really happened. But he did see the black cloud rising to the ceiling and filing out of the ward.

He went cold when his eyes followed the escape of the demon.  The elevator door opened  behind him and a hand settled on his shoulder.

“Dean?” 

He swayed on his feet. Ellen, clad in a nurse's uniform stood by his side, Bobby behind her, steering an empty gurney. Then Dean's eyes nearly poppet out of their sockets; the doctor he'd encountered before stepped out of the elevator. His face was grim and serious and Missouri Mosley walked right by his side, her face set and determined. The uniform, a girly pink, clashing against her innate authority.

“We're here to get Sam,” Ellen spoke, all confident and assured. Lowering her voice she spoke to Dean, like if she were able to read his thoughts. “They're coming Dean, no turning back now.”

Dean looked through the windows into Sam's room. The lines and numbers on the monitors changing constantly. For a moment he doubted everything, then he pushed all emotions aside and nodded in Ellen's direction.

Inside of him something was screaming that it was wrong, so wrong. But he had his game-face on and whatever it took, he'd get Sam through this, alive.

 

 

He woke with a start. Somebody was holding his jaw, telling him to open his eyes. The voice was familiar but he didn't believe his ears at this point. When he finally got his eyes to open his jaw literally dropped. Missouri Mosley was bent over him, berating him softly.

“That's right Sammy, you need to wake up now, you're all dressed and set to go. We gave you an anti-dote already. Don't have me pinch you.” She looked at him, with sternness. He didn't even  protest at her calling him Sammy. You just didn't mess with Missouri.

“That's right, Sammy,” she smiled. “Don't wanna mess with me. Doc, he's awake we need to get the tube out!”

That so didn't sound good and Sam winced when a very pissed off MD appeared at the side of his bed.

“Don't be a baby, Sammy,” Missouri admonished. “Do as the Doc tells you and you're gonna be fine.”  Her warm hand curled around his good one.

“I strongly advice against this transferral. Mr. Atwater has pneumonia and it would be preferable to keep the tube in and ventilate him at intervals. Even though he does breathe on his own, the injuries are making his breath shallow and combined with the pneumonia the risk of pulmonary oedema is imminent. Not to mention that he needs another MRI.”

Sam blinked up at the man, wondering who he was talking about. Dean? Sam body tensed and Missouri squeezed his hand comfortingly. “No sweetie, Dean is just fine. Come over here, boy, and let your brother see you!“

“Mr. Atwater, I'm going to take out the tube from your throat now. Just exhale forcefully. Now!”   

He had time to see Dean's pale face behind Missouri's shoulder before he had to cough his lungs out. He tried to roll in on himself to alleviate the pain but Missouri just pulled his head to rest against her bosom and held on to him, keeping him together while he spit and gasped for air. Just like a baby. Dean would never let him live through this. 

“Dean, hand me the oxygen mask, gotta get some air into this big boy,” Missouri spoke soberly. “Get the stretcher over here, side by side to this bed. Dean, open the oxygen tank up, do I have to spell everything out? And don't faint on me, boy! You can faint in the rig, just not right now. That's right, now take those bags and hold them while we move Sam over.”

Sam closed his eyes, idly noting that humiliation was part of his hell too.  

“Talk about dumb and crazy,” Dean muttered somewhere to his left.

Sam tried to look for him but Missouri had him flat on his back and the sheet raised, blocking his view.

“Ellen, you take the head and let Bobby handle the feet. We turn him on two and drag him over on three. Remember to watch the IV-line, Dean!” 

Sam was trying to put all the intel he had been served into some kind of understanding of what was happening, he failed sorely at the task and blinked to clear his eyes. Ellen and Bobby were here? Where ever here was?  And he was being shuffled around like a piece of meat. And he was cold, dammit!

He gasped for air when the pain exploded as they pulled him from the bed onto the gurney. His left side ached like it was on fire, his breath hitched when he landed on his side, losing what little air he'd managed to inhale.  Tears sprang to his eyes and he caught Dean's drawn face when his brother put the oxygen mask on him. Sam tried to catch his brother's eyes but Dean's face was the one he always had when he was scared shitless. Sam just didn't get what this was all about? He needed somebody to tell him what was going on, where he was and why they were  pulling him in every direction known to man?

“Hold on Sammy, I'll tell you everything as soon as we're out of here.” Missouri promised with a friendly pat on his knee.  “You cold, huh? Ellen, got the extra blanket? Have the copies of the chart, Dean? And stop worrying, your frettin' won't help Sam right now! You're thinking so hard you make my head ache!”

Dean mumbled indignantly and miraculously enough; Sam managed to get a grip on the skirt of his brother's shirt. He twined his fingers around the fabric and closed his eyes from the harsh lights in the winding corridors and held on. 

He knew he was going to be all right as long as Dean was around.