Shouldn't Have Come to This
Riverton, Wyoming
January 24, 1996
Sam groaned, turning to the left to face his dad, and back to the right again, to face the door of the Impala. He couldn't sleep, and he didn't want to. The dawn was over and still there was no sign of Dean.
Their dad had sent Dean to hunt alone, for the first time in his life, right on his seventeenth birthday. Sam had watched with gritted teeth how his brother was almost beside himself with delight with that assignment. What a stupid, stupid person. When Sam was eleven, he got his first computer, a Macintosh Performa. Now that was a good reason to be happy, a perfect birthday present. Not this – this suicidal mission to salt and burn the spirits of some nuns who had loved each other when they were alive, discovered, and then killed themselves. Sam had felt like screaming to dad for merely having the thought of getting Dean to do the job. Not that the dim-witted boy he had as a brother would have been elated had he got a computer as a gift though. Oh no, Sam wouldn't have dreamed of that.
And now it had been hours past the agreed time for Dean to get out of the haunted church. Sam was desperate to fetch Dean himself if not for his dad's stern warning not to leave the Impala.
"Dean!"
Sam jerked up when his dad suddenly shouted and dashed off the car. He jumped out, too, and together with his dad they grabbed Dean who was staggering out of the mission complex. Dean's hand clenched his duffel bag so tightly his knuckles went white but he wouldn't let it go as if his life depended on it.
"Dean," Dad yelled again this time in Dean's ear. "Did you finish it? Did you? Talk to me."
But Dean was past listening, past talking. His face was paper white apart from the horrible splatters of dark red blood running down the left side of it. Sam swallowed, cold dread down his spine noticing for the first time how his brother's shirt had turned to shreds on the back and the angry red welts tore up his skin.
"Oh, Dean." Sam bit back a sob.
Dean arched his back, moaning in pain, as Sam and dad laid him down at the back seat of the Impala. "Ssh, Dean. Easy," dad murmured, manhandling him into lying on his side. Then he turned to Sam. "Kid—"
"I'm staying," Sam snapped and, realizing he had sounded harsher than he'd meant to, mumbled, "Sorry, but I'm staying here with him." He could be as bullheaded as his brother if he wanted to.
Then he slid down to sit behind the front seat on the floor of the car, leaning against the back door. He wrapped an arm around his brother who was lying down facing him. Dean's eyes were squeezed shut and Sam realized he had fallen asleep. Sam was hesitant for a second before reaching out and gently dabbing the blood off Dean's face with the sleeve of his hoodie.
"Sammy, let your brother be." Sam felt dad's look at the back of his head.
"It's okay, dad, I'll be careful."
He would be careful all right for he would never hurt Dean, Sam promised himself. He would be the one who watched out for him just like what Dean had done all through this time. Sam would make sure no one, nothing, would do him harm anymore. Sam sniffed quietly as his eyes warmed up with tears.