"Dean?!" you shout down the phone. ""Please, come quick, something's wrong!"
The room continues to spin and you lean heavily against the guard rail of the buildings stairwell. Your breaths are short and strained as your vision begins to blur slightly.
"Alright, calm down, what happened!" Dean's voice sounds gruff with worry. You can vaguely hear the creaking sounds of the Impala door open and slam shut on the other end of your mobile phone, all the while Dean is still speaking sternly. "(Y/N), focus! Where are you?!" a bit more firmly.
You cough at the dry patch in your throat. "I'm at the Corewell Building; 46 Benton road." You reply feebly and begin slowly descending the stairs to ground level.
"Corwell? Wait...you're on the Bentleigh case?!" He barked back at you as the Chevrolet engine roared to life.
You stopped briefly in the middle of the flight of stairs to catch your breath. "Yes, Dean, I'm on the Bentleigh case." You sassed back.
There was a pause over the phone and you could almost hear Dean muttering 'son of a bitch' through gritted teeth. "I thought Sam and I were handling it." He growled.
You resumed your descent, practically sliding down the hand rails as the stairs overlapped each other and swayed to and fro. "I wanted to prove it to you." You mumbled with a frown.
"Prove what?!" Dean shouted over the screech of the tires.
You opened your moth to reply before a burning sensation stopped your words from escaping your lips. You're whole body began to tremor and your skin felt like it was tightening. Oh my god. You must have been poisoned!
But how?
Was it a touch? You couldn't recall any physical contact during your questioning with the Chairman of Corwell industries over the recent death of his employee, Ethan Bentleigh.
Was it the glass of water that had been supplied during the interview?
"(Y/N)! Are you still there?!" Dean's voice snapped you back to reality.
"Dean..." your voice was a whisper. The burning sensation had spread throughout your entire body and your skin felt like it was still tightening. You begin coughing as the dryness in your throat burns too and a bead of sweat runs down the side of your face.
Before you can finish your sentence, you see the stairs rear up at you and darkness swallows you up before impact.
LATER...
You open your eyes numbly to a cold against your forehead. As your eyes begin to adjust you recognize Sam sitting in a chair beside your resting place. He pulled back the damp cloth from your head in surprise before smiling with what appeared to be relief. "Good, you're awake." He spoke softly.
You breathe in deeply, almost feeling like you have been under for a week...but still not rested. "Where are we?"
"We're home (Y/N). We're in the bunker."
Your eyes traced the familiar cement walls of your room as Sam soaked the cloth in a bowl of water on your bedside table.
"How did i-?" you rose slowly from the bed as you tried to remember anything after your interrogation, but Sam was quick in his response to calm you down and push you lightly back down to the pillows.
He explained briefly about himself and Dean finding you collapsed on the level 3 staircase. You began to sit up again as you drew a sharp breath to speak but Sam held his hand firmly to your shoulder and pressed with a little more force to keep you from moving. "Dean's out, he's getting food and more medicine."
"For what...?"
Your heart missed a beat and you gripped his hand tightly on your shoulder. "Did he poison me? Did the Witch poison me with something?"
You waited for Sam to give you the puppy-dog eyes and the apologetic expression, but instead...he burst out laughing.
This took you by surprise and you weren't really sure how to react.
"It's ok (Y/N), you were not poisoned. You have a cold." He spoke with a hint of empathy, smiling reassuringly at you.
You paused a moment, still with your puzzled expression. "A cold?" you mocked.
"You collapsed of a high fever; you've been out for almost 5 hours."
"But what -" you stopped short.
"Then how-" you paused again.
Sam sat back in the chair beside your bed and took his hand from your shoulder, studying your every move as you took in this information.
"Screw this then."
You rise swiftly out of bed before Sam can react and barge through the open door out into the hallway. Sam walks swiftly behind you and attempts to put on his best 'grown up' voice to persuade you to get back into bed. He knows better than to physically force you; especially after that time you gave him a black eye after he tried to leave you out of a case on a simple windego.
"Sam, we don't have time for this. A cold is nothing, I will be fine!" You hiss back, rounding a corner and looking over your shoulder at him. "We have waisted enough time! The witch is probably-"
Your words fall short when suddenly you feel like you have stepped into an open furnace. You barely see Sam's worried expression, or even hear him shout your name as you begin to topple forward.
A forceful grip catches you mid-fall and you look up briefly to see Dean with a sarcastic expression. "Damn you are stubborn, kiddo." He says in a dry tone.
Before you could utter any sass, the darkness swallows you up again.
LATER...
You awake to the interior of your room again, only this time it is the elder Winchester by your bedside. You shift slightly under the sheets to confirm that you are in no way bound, but you don't dare try to sit or get up with him in the room.
Dean stares at you disapprovingly for a few seconds of your consciousness before picking up a tablet from your bedside table and dropped it into a glass of water. It bubbled and fizzed as he swirled the contents in the whisky glass before motioning for you to sit up. "Take this."
You sit up slowly and as you take the glass from him a smile begins to tug at his lips, but he never breaks.
While you down the horrible medicine, Dean breaks the silence. "So do you wanna tell me what it is you think you were doing?" he crossed his arms and cocked his head to the left, raising his eyebrows in frustration.
You slump against the bed board behind you and look into the empty glass in your hands, avoiding eye contact as you replied crossly. "My job."
Dean immediately unfolded his arms and leaned forward threateningly as he responded with his gruff and strict tone. "You're JOB was to stay here and find out all you can on the company! Not run off into open fire!"
He was so much better at the adult voice than his younger brother.
You gritted your teeth and dared to glance up at him. "I'm not a kid, Dean. I know what I was doing." You spoke with your best tough-girl voice. "There's only so much information you can gain from the internet from abroad."
You two continued to argue until your voices were raised to a riotous decimal. You had hit breaking point and as Dean counter-fitted your previous words, you interrupted him with the remainder of your energy. "I didn't want to let you and Sam down, OK?!"
Dean's rigid posture slowly relaxed back into the chair as you hung your head in shame, your grip tightening around the thick glass until your fingers were white. You averted your eyes from him completely out of fear of embarrassment. "I...I'm sick of being so...weak and useless on hunts."
You shiver and take a deep breath as your head spins slightly. "I thought I would show you two that I'm capable of solving the case by myself...I wanted to prove to you-"
You are cut short as a warm hands enclose over your own. "That's enough." Dean whispers gently.
You look up quickly to find his face inches from yours, his green eyes swimming with compassion. "You don't ever need to prove yourself to Sam, or me." He spoke with determination and as you tried to avert your eyes in self doubt he took your chin between his index and thumb, persuading your attention back to him. "You have done so much for us these past few months. You don't need to gank the monster to be a hunter, kiddo. And besides, what's the first rule of this business?" he raised an eyebrow.
You smiled meekly and replied softly with tears building up in your eyes. "Never hunt alone."
"That's my girl." He smiled.
Your hands dropped away from the glass and you both embraced for a time. A feeling of acceptance and belonging washed over you and you felt more at home than you ever have before...mixed with feelings of dizziness and chilliness as you shivered beneath his hold.
Dean stood up repeating the words 'OK'. "Time for you to rug up and rest." He spoke again with his strict tone again, taking the empty glass from your bed and placing it on the bedside table.
"Moment killer." You mumbled as he smirked and waited for you to lie back down before he tucked you under the sheets. He leaned down and gently kissed your forehead before straightening up and headed out of the room, pausing at the door with his hand on the light switch as he looked back at you. "Oh and (Y/N)?"
You looked up from your pillow. "yeah?"
Dean produced a cheeky smile. "If I get sick because of you, you better pamper me!" he laughed and ducked out of the room as you launched your pillow at the door, growling loudly in a mixture of frustration and amusement.
"With pie!" Dean added through the door.
-END