Title: Till I'm Gone

Summary: Cause you never think that the last time is the last time. You think there will be more. You think you will have forever, but you don't. Hurt/Comfort. Hurt!Sam. Protective!Dean. Coda 14x17 "Game Night".

Warnings: Spoilers up to 14x17 "Game Night". Warnings for bad language, blood loss, hemorrhaging, character death and resurrection, psychological trauma, codependence.

Disclaimer: I don't own the show or the art.

Sam knows every essence of dying.

He knows what it's like to feel a pain so intense you can taste it, like a hot poker tearing your insides apart. Like a million stars burning bright behind your eyeballs and a black hole sucking all the energy from your bones. He knows the warm fuzzy feeling that comes afterward, when his nerve endings have burnt to ashes and the pain finally ebbs away. It's almost like being afloat, as though some invisible hand reaches deep inside of you and lifts all the memories from your soul. The pain drifts away then and all that is left is an alluring darkness, a darkness that creeps into every pore, a heaviness that weighs down your limbs and your eyelids until every flutter of lashes becomes an impossible feat meant to fail.

Sam has died enough times to know.

He knows the feel of getting his spine severed by an army knife and he vividly remembers the way air clogged in his throat, fire licking at his lungs as he was smothered to death. He remembers getting hit by lightning, 300 kilowatt of energy shooting through his system with the power of a nuclear reactor and he knows what it feels like to have a chunk of his throat ripped out by vampires, or to have the blunt end of a rusty lead pipe thrust through his middle, tearing his insides apart.

It's a bit overwhelming, even after all these years, to know the various stages of dying and how excruciatingly slow it can be, or how painfully fast, from one second to the next, no chance for your brain to catch up before the world just goes blank. No chance to say the things that really matter, no chance for that final goodbye that you're never quite ready for.

Sam has given this a lot of thought and he knows it's not the actual dying part that gets to him anymore. He's made his peace with death a long time ago. It's the thought of leaving Dean behind that gets to him. The idea of a separation, quite possibly forever, that shakes him to the core.

He feels like by now, he should have come up with the perfect thing to say. The perfect 'goodbye' in case they don't get another chance.

But then he blinks up at Dean and there's only pain and darkness seeping into his skin, through his veins, pumping tar-like goo through his heart and making it heavy… so heavy. And Dean is calling him 'Sammy' which registers on an instinctual level and suddenly there is so many things Sam wants to say and so little time and so many memories getting swallowed by the darkness but the one thing – the one constant remains. And that constant is Dean.

It was Sam's last conscious thought before Cold Oak. Before the pit. Before Anna and Lucifer and freakin' Roy and Walt. And every time, every goddamn time, Sam wasn't ready and he had no idea what to say, how to capture the magnitude of what Dean has done for – of what he means to him – with simple words.

"You - You always put - You always put me first."

"No, no," Dean shushes him, denying the inevitable.

He is smiling, but it's a twisted smile. He's trying to hold it together for Sam's sake, trying to hold Sam's freakin' head together, but Sam can't really focus on any of that, can't hold on to that thought for too long as the darkness drowns out the world around him.

Dean's trying to keep Sam conscious, his tone is gentle but authoritative at the same time. Their father never really got a perfect balance, between authority and comfort. But Dean does. Dean always knows what tone to use with Sam, which words when to call Sam out on his bullshit, when to say nothing, when to ask and prod and when to back off. Dean is comfort and protection and home where no one else ever was and if Sam wants to tell him, but the goddamn words are stuck in his throat.

He just needs Dean to know that he's grateful.

For everything.

"Shh, shh."

For every time Dean chose him over their father and mother and just about everyone they ever knew. He's grateful for every time Dean called him Sammy, even when they weren't in a good place.

For every time Dean believed in him when Sam had given up on himself and for every time Dean had his back when no one else did.

"Come on. Come on, man."

Sam wants Dean to know that for all the pain they'd gone through, for their countless losses, their fallouts, their betrayals and for the way they'd always, eventually found their way back to each other, he's grateful. And he wouldn't change a thing that's happened, even if he could.

He opens his mouth, but all that comes out is a sharp gasp. "Your w-whole life—"

"Okay," Dean says, unable to hear it, denying that it might be their last chance. "All right. All right. Come on, come on… just count with me."

There is no more pain, which is a bad sign. No sensation at all, not the hard, gravel beneath him, or the painful throbbing behind his eyes, or the rush of blood in his ears. Nothing, safe for Dean's callous hand against the side of his face. Dean's voice pitched high with panic. Shaking.

"Sammy? SAM!"

Sam is not aware of his eyes falling shut and his head becoming heavy, his bones sagging as every last bit of tension drains from his muscles.

His world becomes blurry but there are fingers prodding and shaking and slapping, a voice, so close and yet so far, dulled as though Sam's head was under water. There's Dean, though.

Dean.

It's his last conscious thought before the darkness consumes him.

Dean knows that head injuries are bad news. He knows it because it has been drilled into him from an early age on. He knows it from years of getting tossed into walls and getting hit over the head. Most of all, though, he knows it because of the deep, gutting fear that takes hold of him every goddamn time he sees Sammy knocked out or barely conscious, pupils blown from a concussion. Still and pale, with blood trickling down his forehead, a dash of fiery red against ghostly skin.

The second he rounds the Impala and sees Sam on the ground, sprawled out like a puppet with its strings cut off, Dean knows. The way Sam gasps out his pain, making that hurt, tiny sound that gets stuck somewhere in his throat. It's bad. Really bad.

Dean goes through the mental checklist in his head, ticking off one symptom after another until there's absolutely no doubt that A) Sam is losing too much blood, B) Sam's skull might be fractured C) there might be cranial pressure, which – really fucking bad doesn't even begin to cover it.

And Dean has been down this road way too many times to lose his shit over a freaking head injury. His heart shouldn't be hammering like crazy, his palms shouldn't be drenched in cold sweat, his eyes shouldn't be flying around the street to look for someone – anyone – to help. This isn't anything Dean knows how to fix. And judging from the useless dispatcher on the phone that Dean yells at that 'Sam doesn't have 20 minutes, don't you people understand?!' nobody else can help Sam either.

So it's just the two of them, this time. And Sam is trying so hard for him. It's almost like he's a kid again, chubby-cheeked and gap-toothed, holding a macaroni picture up for his big brother's inspection. "Do you like it, Dean? Do you? It's got the 'pala on it- look!" and he's trying so hard to impress Dean, to be a good brother, to be a good son, to make them proud, to make them happy.

Dean presses the cloth to the wound and his insides churn at the way Sam whimpers. He's panicking so hard, it's almost like this never happened before and he's not ready to lose Sam. He's never ready.

Dean is not the same twenty-six-year-old, insecure, codependent kid he was when he got Sam from Stanford. He no longer thinks that Sam will jump at the first chance to leave him. He has a mom and a whole bunch of friends and a 'sorta' kid to look after. He has a home base, a community, a purpose and self-confidence that he worked hard to re-establish after so many years self-worth issues.

It shouldn't be the most terrifying thing in the world, to think that maybe, maybe finally the time has come to really let go.

But there is one constant that never changed throughout the years, one thing that Dean can't ever grow out of and that's how much he needs Sam. It's an instinct so primal, so deeply ingrained in him that Dean doesn't even know whether it's ever been indoctrinated by his dad or whether it's just always been a part of who he is. A big brother. A protector. Sam has always asked for so little and given it back tenfold. With hugs and stick-figure drawings, and essays on 'Who do you want to be when you grow up?' and dimpled smiles and hero-worship and Dean needs him like he needs air to breathe.

Dean knows he can get over any kind of loss. He knows it because he's lost so many people he loved. But the one loss he can't ever seem to get over, no matter how hard he tries, is Sam.

"Hey. Come on. Stay with me now. We're gonna play a little game. We're gonna count, okay?"

They did this a lot when Sam was younger. When the kid came home with teary eyes and a skinned knee and literally all it took to get him distracted from the pain was playing that stupid number game. Geek that he is, Sammy still reacts to the old-familiar instructions. There's just something about numbers and facts that calm the kid down. It also gets him to focus. So Dean tries.

"Count with me. One, two—"

"T-two." Sam's speech is slurred and Dean's heart skips a beat, his fingers pressing the cloth down a little harder against the wound.

Atta boy.

"Yeah, there you go," Dean encourages his brother despite the way his pulse spikes at the incoherent speech, the lack of concentration, the way Sam's eyes threaten to roll back into his head any moment now. Dean is losing him. He's losing him fast and he's terrified.

"Three. Come on. Come on," he urges, desperation clogging his vocal cords.

Sam exhales sharply, struggling so hard to get the words out.

"You— You always put— You always put me first."

Every last trace of composure Dean has clung to, crumbles and the fake smile suddenly falls from his lips. He can't do this. Not again.

Please god, Chuck, who-the-fuck-ever. Please don't take him.

"No, no," Dean forces the smile back one, wider than before because now he's no longer just faking it for Sam. "Shh, shhh. Come on. Come on, man."

"Your whole life," Sam gasps and Dean is just… done.

"Okay." He doesn't recognize his voice as the words crawl out of his burning throat. There is a lump the size of Texas stuck there and it hurts to make any sound at all.

"Alright. Alright." His breath is shaking and so are his fingers. "Come on. Just count with me."

Sam's head rolls to the side, one eye half-shut in a way that is unnatural. His body goes lax and Dean's panic sky-rockets.

"Sammy?"

No response.

Dean can't. He fucking can't.

He moves his hand up to cup Sam's face, cradling it gently in the small of his palm. His brother's pale skin feels cool to the touch and Dean gives him a shake despite knowing better, his fear clouding his better judgments.

"SAM!"

Jack shows up and Dean's first instinct is to growl out a warning for the kid to back off. He's not thinking rationally, the fear of losing his brother drowning out his inner voice of reason. The urge to protect Sam flares hot and bright in every fiber of his body. But then Jack runs over and crouches down and before Dean knows it, the kid's got two fingers pressed against Sam's forehead and the blood on Sam's forehead starts creeping back up into his hairline, the fracture in his skull vanishing behind Sam's thick, blood-coated hair. Suddenly he's gasping, eyes wide open and alert as they fly around in a panicked motion. Dean's brain can't really catch up with everything that's happening. He's on autopilot when he grasps Sam's hand and pulls his brother up into a sitting position. His heart is still beating so fast that his whole body buzzes with adrenaline and he's so relieved – so goddamn relieved – that the sound of Sam's voice doesn't even fully register over the rush of blood in his ears.

Sammy is talking.

Sam is awake and alert and talking.

That's all that matters.

With his pulse still going a mile a minute in a way that only ever Sam was able to freak him, Dean turns around to gather his bearings. He ran a shaky palm over his mouth and took a deep breath to calm his frayed nerves and get his heartbeat back to normal. But the shock ran deep this time.

A little too deep for him to deny.

It's not until much later, with only Sam and him in the car that Dean feels some of the shock drain out of him. The familiar rumble of the Impala's engine and the sound of Sam's even breathing on the passenger seat are the perfect cure to the residual after-effects of almost having lost his whole world to that bastard, Nick. Again.

Dean still can't help but keep shoot Sam stolen glances every couple of minutes until Sam, who has dozen off with his jacket bunched up against the cool car window, suddenly cracks an eye open. "You gonna keep staring at me creepily the whole way back to Kansas?"

A guilty flush creeps up Dean's neck.

"Sorry," he mutters, ready to go back to brooding quietly now that he's been caught.

But Sam is awake now, slowly straightening up in his seat.

"This one hit you worse than usual," Sam says quietly after a while, averting his gaze as he stares out the windshield.

Dean grabs the steering wheel a little tighter, pushes the gas a little harder. He suddenly wishes they were back home, or at a motel, somewhere with a door and a bar close by so Dean could grab his jacket and run from away from the conversation. He reminds himself that he almost didn't get to have this, he reminds himself of how still Sam was against the snow-covered ground and about the blood that had colored the road around his head like a halo. Suddenly the prospect of a heart-to-heart doesn't seem so bad.

"You were saying goodbye."

The words linger there for a moment, accusatory.

It would be easy for Sam to write it off on the concussion, to say he hadn't been fully aware of what he was saying, but he doesn't even try to find an excuse. "I guess I just..."

"Just what?" Dean snaps. "I thought we were clear on the whole 'no goodbyes' thing."

Because goodbyes are final and Dean isn't ready for that. He doesn't think he will ever be.

To his credit, Sam seems to understand that Dean's emotions are getting the better of him, that he can't be held accountable for his anger because it's just misdirected grief. They both stay quiet for the longest moment. Sam looks out the passenger window at the scenery passing by and sighs.

"When you pulled that crap with the Mal'ak box, you apologized for not being a good enough brother – you, Dean. As though that was ever the case."

Dean locks his jaw, a sad smile passing his lips. "That was differ—"

"I swear to god, if you say it was different I'm gonna punch you," Sam cuts him off angrily. "You even apologized for dad splitting us up, Dean."

Dean snaps his mouth shut, hearing the anger in Sam's tone and feeling a phantom sting in his jaw from where Sam's fist had connected not too long ago.

"I mean If you seriously think that I need an apology from you for the fucked-up mind games dad used to play on us when we were kids then you obviously don't know me as well as I thought you did," Sam says. "But the thing is, you said it, Dean. Which means there are things you aren't sure about when it comes to me... when it comes to us. And I get it, I do… I just. I don't want you to ever doubt that I—"

Dean swallows down whatever protest had been on the tip of his tongue and purses his lips in defeat.

Sam sighs again. "I want you to know that I know, okay? I know how much you've sacrificed for me."

Dean's heart clenches painfully in his chest. "Sam—"

"Like that time you were at Sonny's place. I know you didn't come back for dad that day." A flicker of guilt flares behind Sam's eyes. "I know how often you went hungry so I could eat. And how often you took the couch so I could sleep on a real bed." Sam takes a deep breath as if to calm himself.

Dean's throat tightens. "Where are you going with this, Sam?"

"At one point we're gonna die for good, Dean," Sam looks at him, then, all wide-eyed and serious. "And when that day comes, I don't want for things to be left unsaid between us."

And Dean can live with that.

"Okay," he replies, his voice rougher than usual and Sam relaxes a bit on the seat beside him, his features smoothing out, the wrinkles disappearing from the corner of his eyes. He doesn't think there is a whole lot of stuff that needs saying, no immediate death-bed apologies he can come up with or declarations of love he feels ready for. But if Sam needs to have more chick-flicks with him or whatever... well, it's a small price to pay for Dean.

"So," Dean smirks. "Since we're being all honest and stuff—"

"I'm not gonna cut my hair, Dean." Sam rolls his eyes and suddenly the tension in the air just evaporates, from one second to the next as though they hadn't just both kind of acknowledged that one day would eventually be their last and that they were slowly but surely running out of extra lives.

"It's just so impractical," Dean continues mercilessly. "I mean, how did Nick get the drop of you, anyway, huh? It's like you're wearing a bright neon sign with 'grab my hair for extra leverage'."

Sam's expression turns sour as he shoots Dean another sideways glare.

"I'm serious." Dean is so not serious. He likes Sam's hair just the way it is, but that is one thing he is going to take to the grave. "They would have shaven all of that glorious hair off your noggin at the hospital." The thought actually makes him chuckle. "Man... just imagine your face."

"Shut up," Sam says, but there's a hidden smirk in his voice and Dean can hear the affection in his tone, loud and clear.

"You gonna call mom?" Sam bunches his jacket up into a ball and leans against the window, his eyes already half-closed in sleep. He yawns and Dean thinks he looks younger than just a few moments ago. Maybe he really needed to get the words off his chest. Maybe they both did.

Sam is here and they are both alive, Zeppelin playing quietly in the background as the Impala drifts peacefully across the blacktop.

It's all they need.

"Dean?" Sam asks sleepily.

Dean smiles and cranks up the volume of the radio.

"Not yet."

The End.

A/N: Hope you enjoyed the read. Please take a minute to share your thoughts with me! :)