Prologue

He looked sadly at the sleeping man on the bed that he was crouched beside. "I'm sorry, Samsquatch, but I can't let you, your brother and the lady Power Rangers interfere with my plans." He murmured quietly.

His golden brown eyes filled with regret as he touched Sam's forehead and brought the wall that Death had placed to protect him, down. Sam let out a small whimper as the wall disintegrated.

The man crouched beside his bed stood up and looked over at the man sleeping in the other bed. He smiled sadly and then, with an almost imperceptible flap of wings, disappeared from the room.

Chapter 1.

"Rise and shine, Sammy!" Dean called out cheerfully; glancing at his little brother's sleeping form before heading into the bathroom to do his morning routine. When he came fully dressed, he noticed that Sam was still in the same position as he had left him.

Dean shrugged, put his boots on, grabbed the keys for the car and the room and quietly left the room to go get breakfast for the two of them.

When he got back, he placed the bag of food and two cups of coffee on the small table and looked over at his brother still crashed out on the bed.

A look of irritation crossed his face as he said "Sam! Breakfast!"

When that elicited no response, Dean walked over to the bed and roughly shoved his brother. "Sam, come on. Food."

When that still got no response, a frisson of fear snaked through him. "Sam, come on, man. This isn't funny anymore. Wake up!"

He crouched down next to the bed and, with a shaking hand, checked to see if his brother still had a pulse. He sighed with relief when he found it beating strongly against his fingers. He shrugged and then did something that he hadn't done for a VERY long time. He started to dress his brother. Usually, if he started doing that, Sam would wake up very irritated and shove his older brother away saying that he wasn't a little kid anymore and that he could dress himself. When, that failed to happen, Dean started getting a little worried again and then realized that he was probably completely wiped out from the hunt that they had been on earlier that week. He packed up the few belongings that they had in the room and took them out to the Impala.

They had packed up the car the previous night, and only left out what they needed the next morning, so that they could get an early start. Kid must be really tired not to notice anything. Dean thought, as he headed back into the room and managed to get Sam out of the room and into the passenger seat of the car. After buckling him up and closing the door, he headed back into the room for the coffee and bag of food. After quickly eating his breakfast sandwich and downing his lukewarm coffee, he headed to the office to check out.

A couple of hours later, he still hadn't heard Sam move or even make so much as a sound. He pulled the car over so that he could get a better look at his big baby brother. He checked his brother's forehead for signs of a fever and found a slight elevation in temperature. His lips pulled into a straight line, as worry filled his green eyes. Just then his cell phone rang. He checked to see who was calling and smiled, as he pressed talk.

"Hey, babe." He said, trying successfully to mask his worry, or so he thought.

"Hey, Dean." The female voice responded, Slayer hearing clearly picking up on the worry in his voice. "Is everything okay?" Buffy asked, concern marring her brow.

"Yep. Everything's fine. Me and Sammy are only four hours out of Cleveland, so we should be there in time for dinner." Dean said, a little too cheerfully.

"Dean, come on. This is me you're talking to. I can hear the worry. What's going on?"

He sighed and closed his eyes briefly as thought about how to respond. "Sammy won't wake up."

"Anything exciting happen that could cause that?" She asked.

Dean shrugged and replied "The only thing that happened was the salt and burn we did a couple days ago, but I checked him and he was fine." Fear starting to colour his voice. He switched the phone to his other hand and slid back into the driver's seat, put the car into gear and started driving on the road again.

"How about you come to the Council building when you get in. We have a pretty decent infirmary and a registered nurse." Concern filling her green eyes and was evident in her voice.

"Yeah, sure. See you then." He replied distractedly, focusing on the road after he hung up. Every so often during the four hour drive he would glance over at Sam, fear and worry darkening his green eyes.

As he approached Cleveland, he called Buffy to let her know how far away he was. As he pulled into the parking lot, he saw Buffy and two other Slayers, whose names escaped him at the moment. He parked and, as he was turning the engine off, they approached the car. He got out and went around to open the door so that they could get Sam out. The three Slayers and Dean got Sam in the infirmary and down onto a bed. The pretty nurse then proceeded to kick everyone out of the room. Including Dean.

"I need to get our stuff." He said, gruffly to his lover.

Sensing his need to be alone right now, she just nodded and said "Come to the kitchen when you come back in and I'll have coffee and food ready for you."

He nodded as he turned to go. She was tempted to go to him and hug him and reassure him, but she had the feeling that if she did that then her strong Hunter would fall apart right then and there. She knew that he wouldn't like that.