BROKEN

Summary: The werewolf hunt was supposed to be an easy peasy silver-bullet-to-the-heart kinda thing for the Winchester brothers, but when the hunt takes a turn in the wrong direction, Sam is the one to pay the price. Set sometime in Season 2. Hurt!Sam, Protective/Big-Brother!Dean.

Author's note: Just in the mood for a good old hurt Sam story – combined with a big amount of awesome big brother Dean. Who's with me? :D

-Elisa.

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"Broken does not mean non-functioning or incapacitated. It does however mean ready for repair."

- Unknown.

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"So werewolf, huh?" Dean said while filling up his favorite gun – the Colt 1911 A1 .45 caliber semi-automatic – with silver bullets.

"Yeah, seems like it." Sam answered. "Fits with the lunar cycle, the description of the person from the witnesses, and the missing hearts."

From his position on the edge of his motel room bed, Dean glanced at his younger brother who was sitting cross-legged on the other bed with his computer in his lap. The last encounter the brothers had had with a werewolf had ended with Sam getting his heart broken, and Dean wondered if this case would rip open old wounds that – if he knew his little brother well enough which Dean had no doubts that he did – probably hadn't healed completely and, being as emotional and guilt-ridden as Sam tended to be, probably never really would. However, Dean didn't intend to be the one to bring up the sore subject. If Sam needed to talk about what happened to Madison, he would talk.. but if Dean could avoid it, there was no reason to start something that most certainly would turn into one of those rare chick flick moments that was reserved for Sam - and for Sam only.

"Dean, are you listening?" Sam asked, tearing Dean out of his thoughts.

"What? Yeah, sure." Dean said and cocked his gun. "Big bad wolfie is about to get hunted. That'll teach him not to go after old ladies and little girls, huh?"

"Funny." Sam said in a dry voice and closed the lid of his laptop before putting it away. "You ready to go?"

"You know I am." Dean said with a wry smile and handed Sam his gun which the younger man accepted and stuffed into the waistband of his pants. "Time to pay Mr. Goodwin another visit."

The Impala came to a stop by the curb in front of an old mansion that belonged to the managing director for an IT company, Mr. Charles Goodwin, that Dean and Sam had questioned the day before about the mysterious murders in his neighborhood. Mr. Goodwin had politely shown them his mansion and had answered all their questions before they'd left the place again, but there had been something about the way Charles Goodwin had reacted to some of the questions that had awoken the brothers' suspicion. It was especially the way the middle-aged gentleman had kept glancing nervously towards the sky through the curtains of the windows, as the day came closer and closer to dusk that - combined with the housekeeper's testimony and the statements from some of the neighbors - had convinced the Winchesters that something was indeed off with the guy.

"You're wrong." Dean said to Sam as they stepped out of the car and started walking towards the front door of the mansion. "The Joker is way more wicked than the Green Goblin will ever be. And I'm surprised you don't agree with me on this one."

"Why?" Sam asked when they reached the entrance, and used the old iron handle attached to it to knock on the door.

"Dude, the guy's practically a clown!" Dean exclaimed. "And we both know how you feel about clowns, little brother."

"He's a joker, not a clown." Sam protested with a huff.

"Seriously Sam, how many comic book pictures of the Joker have I shown you throughout the years? 'The clown prince of crime'?" Dean said and looked incredulously at his younger brother as Sam shrugged his shoulders and used the iron handle to knock on the door once more. "He's already wearing the clown makeup – give the guy a red nose, a wig and those stupid big shoes, and he's ready to join the circus."

Sam seemed to think about that for a few seconds and then shot his older brother a bitchface.

"I hate you sometimes, you know that?" Sam said which made Dean grin.

"Yeah you keep telling yourself that." Dean said and then turned serious. "Nobody home?"

"Let's find out." Sam said and tried the door knob before pushing the door open.

"Huh. I guess there's no need to huff and puff and blow the house in to find the wolf." Dean said as he pulled out his gun.

"Actually it's the wolf and not the pigs that.. you know what, never mind." Sam said, pulled out his own gun and followed behind his brother into the mansion.

The entrance hall contained a big staircase with two set of stairs that were divided through a landing in the middle, a lot of art sculptures and paintings covering each walls on the sides of it and from the ceiling high above hang a chandelier. The ostentatious room echoed with each of the careful footsteps the brothers took, making their attempt of a surprise-attack pretty impossible. Being quite grateful for the fact that they'd been shown around in the mansion the previous day, Dean gestured with his gun for Sam to go left while he himself went right – knowing that they would be able to meet up in the dining room a few moments later.

"Anything?" Sam asked when the brothers found themselves face to face again shortly after splitting up.

"Nothing." Dean answered. "Let's try upstairs."

As they started climbing the mighty staircase, Sam noticed that the sun had almost set which meant that they didn't have much time before Charles Goodwin would transform into his werewolf self. The younger Winchester brother preferred taking down the man in his werewolf form any day though; after what had happened to Madison, he couldn't stand having to kill anyone that looked as innocent and just pure human as she had done the moment Sam had ended her life.

"Sam. You gotta see this." Dean said and the younger man hurried to catch up with his brother, not even realizing he'd sagged behind in the first place.

"Damn it." Sam muttered and let out a sad sigh as he caught up with Dean and found himself looking down at a woman's body that had a big bloody gaping hole in her chest from where her heart used to be.

"The housekeeper." Dean confirmed. "I guess she didn't make it to her sister's place after all then."

Sam swallowed down rising bile and tore his look away from the dead housekeeper's wide-open but unseeing eyes, before he walked away from the corpse with his brother following suit.

The first floor of the mansion consisted of a long hallway with a bunch of doors on each side of it. In a sync that had resulted from a lifetime of watching each other's every move, the Winchester brothers checked room after room for any signs of Goodwin the werewolf, but without success.

"Dean, there's a set of stairs leading to the attic here." Sam said after opening up a door, revealing a small and sheer staircase that they weren't familiar with from their visit in the house the previous day.

"You think there's any chance our werewolf buddy might hang out up there?" Dean asked, reaching into his jacket and pulling out a flashlight before illuminating the dark staircase in front of them.

"Worth a shot." Sam said and let Dean lead the way up the stairs.

The stairs creaked disturbingly much by each step they took and Dean inwardly cursed as their position was once again compromised by the old mansion. If Charles Goodwin was indeed hiding out in the attic, there was no way that he hadn't heard them approaching already.

The attic looked like most attics do; a whole bunch of stuff were spread out and piled up in the large room – furniture in all kinds of shapes and styles, dozens of boxes stuffed with things and even an old piano had found a spot to retire. In the far end of the room, there was a set of glass doors leading out to a balcony. Every surface in the room was covered by a thick layer of dust and every corner and curve of the room were covered by spider webs. All in all, a pretty normal-looking attic – which unfortunately meant tons of places to hide for a werewolf.

"Stay close." Dean whispered to his little brother who had also brought out a flashlight and was holding it alongside his gun.

Practically moving around back to back, the brothers scanned the various items of the attic, looking through every possible hide-out in their search for the werewolf.

"Maybe he's not here." Dean said after a little while and stopped up to study an old doll with a missing eye that looked rather creepy in the dim light of the room.

"I don't know, Dean." Sam said and let the beam of his flashlight move by a big floor mirror. The younger Winchester brother caught his own reflection in the mirror and the back of his brother's head as he let his eyes slide passed it. "We saw his car out front and he.. Dean!"

Sam spun around with his gun raised, just in time to see his big brother being tossed into a pile of boxes by the werewolf that Sam had spotted in the mirror a second earlier. Before he was able to fire his gun, Sam screamed out as a burning pain shot through his shoulder from where the werewolf's sharp claws had suddenly torn into his flesh. The younger brother tumbled back a few steps and almost dropped his flashlight but managed to save it before the werewolf lunged for him again.

"Over here, you fugly son of a bitch!" Dean shouted, and the werewolf – a.k.a. Charles Goodwin – turned his attention away from Sam to focus on the older brother instead.

Dean, having lost his gun as he had been tossed into the pile of boxes, used himself as bait and started running towards the balcony – leading the werewolf away from Sam that was cradling his injured shoulder.

"I'm the one with the gun, you moron." Sam mumbled with annoyance and ran towards the balcony as well.

The werewolf made a sharp turn and disappeared from Sam's sight, but before he could comprehend what the creature was up to, Sam saw Dean stop up right in front of the glass doors to the balcony with a confused frown on his face.

"Where did it go?" Dean called out to Sam.

Before Sam could answer, his eyes widened as the werewolf suddenly shot out from Dean's left side and collided with the older Winchester brother in an impact that sent them both flying through the glass doors and landing on the balcony.

"Dean!" Sam shouted and closed the distance to the balcony in a rush.

Dean and Mr. Goodwin were rolling around in pieces of glass fighting each other, but had both just managed to get back on their feet as Sam reached them. The werewolf quickly spun around, ready to attack the younger Winchester brother but didn't get that far before Dean had grabbed the werewolf's collar from behind and smashed its head into the brick wall; effectively knocking Goodwin out cold.

"You alright?" Dean panted out, letting the limp creature drop and noticing the bleeding gashes covering Sam's left shoulder.

"I'm fine." Sam said with a roll of his eyes. "You were the one that crashed through the doors."

"Yeah, in order to save your sorry ass." Dean said with no real heat behind his words.

"Right, like I was the one who.." Sam started but was cut off as the railing he had just leaned back against suddenly gave away under his weight and sent him tumbling off the balcony.

"Sam!" Dean shouted, threw himself down on his knees and succeeded in closing his hand around Sam's left wrist just in time to prevent his brother from falling, groaning as his arm protested against Sam's weight.

Sam let out a yelp of pain as his injured arm got harshly yanked in the process, and white hot pain started travelling down his arm, spreading all the way to his fingers.

"Dean!" Sam gasped and stared up at Dean with panicked eyes - his brother's grip around his wrist the only thing keeping him from falling the two stories down from the balcony.

"I've got you." Dean hissed out between clenched teeth, his arm shaking from the efforts of preventing Sam from falling.

Dean closed his other hand around his brother's forearm and clenched his jaw hard as he prepared himself for the upcoming task of pulling Sam up.

"Dean, you can't keep holding us both up." Sam said as he felt how much Dean's hands were shaking and saw the exertion on the older brother's face. His own arm was slowly starting to get numb from the pain in his shoulder.

"Shut up! I'm not letting you fall!" Dean growled.

"Dean.." Sam said, wet eyes blinking rapidly up at his older brother.

"Don't you dare, Sam!" Dean warned and locked his eyes with Sam's. "You're not gonna let go! You hear me? I'll get you up!"

A whimper escaped Sam's lips; the pain in his arm so bad now that it was making black dots dance in front of his eyes.

"Hang on." Dean hissed out, moving backwards slowly as he put all his strength into pulling Sam up.

Dean kept pulling and panting and groaning as Sam came closer and closer to being able to reach the edge of the balcony with his right hand; the hand that was somehow still clenching his gun.

"Almost there, Sammy." Dean panted out but Sam wasn't listening cause his eyes had just caught sight of Charles Goodwin that had regained conscious and was rising up behind the older brother.

"Dean!" Sam shouted. "Look out!"

Dean snapped his head to the side to see the werewolf lunging towards him but hadn't got time to react before a shot rang through the air. The werewolf crumbled to the ground as a silver bullet pierced through its chest – at the same time as the ricochet from the gun, that Sam had just fired to save his brother's life, yanked the younger brother from Dean's grasp.

"No! Sam!" Dean shouted and watched in horror as Sam slipped from his grip and fell backwards through the air. "Sammy!"

Dean's terrified face was the last thing Sam saw before his body collided with the hard pavement two stories down.

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TBC..

Thanks for reading! Reviews are love!

-Elisa.