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Chapter One
Sam shifted against the hospital chair trying to get comfortable again. Accustomed to sleeping in the car made this seem almost like a hotel stay...still. He repositioned the blanket watching Dean jerk in his sleep, the confusion of the last two days still plaguing Sam. The overnight stay had turned into three days so far as Dean's condition seemed to finally show the extent of damage by the rest of the test results that had come back.
The doctors had been giving Sam the run around on some of it trying to come up with answers themselves. They couldn't explain some of the results. Sam had had to practically steal the chart to even get some answers. Dehydration and starvation weren't the only conditions that Dean was suffering...Shock wasn't the extent. The fever still coursing through his body wasn't all of it. He had tissue damage on his hands and feet...mirroring frost bite. His body was practically broken down...so weak and depleted that after the second battery of tests, Dr. McCarver had insisted that Dean stay for a few more days of rest.
Sam hadn't asked Dean yet...not about the frost bite. Dean was only awake for a few minutes at a time as the fever had yet to really leave him. Three days in and Sam had never seen Dean not shake a fever like this. This wasn't just some bug. Sam knew better. He just didn't have an explanation yet. And Dean wasn't very froth coming either.
Sam tried to think about the drive to Huntington...tried to place the pieces together...but the puzzle pieces didn't fit no matter how he looked at them. The drive had been fine. Dean had been fine. Sam couldn't remember him even looking ill. In fact a few hours before Sam fell asleep in the passenger seat Dean had been singing along with the radio and dancing around in the drivers seat like he always did when he was getting a little stir crazy on the road.
They stopped at that diner back in Rockford two hours before that and Dean had eaten a burger...had a soft drink. Sam didn't remember Dean even looking sick. He didn't remember when Dean could have eluded him in finding time to have gotten sick...as in discarding his stomachs contents. It was like Dean had in a mere moment just suddenly become violently ill.
Sam flipped the channel on the TV making sure that the noise didn't disturb his brother as he watched the news of the twin engine jet that had exploded over Huntington. It had killed two people they were saying. A real tragedy. Sam barely remembered watching it break up in the night sky now as he had racked his brain over everything else trying to make sense where none could be made. There was a soft knock at the door.
"Yeah." Sam straightened up tossing the blanket off him as a nurse walked in with a chart in one hand and a plastic handled box full of vials in the other.
"Shift change," The girl whispered as she slowly closed the door behind her. "I'm your brother's nurse for the next twelve hours." She gave Dean a cautious glance obviously not wanting to disturb his sleep. "Ambre Gallager." She offered her name as she went to look over Dean's vitals setting the blood pressure cuff on his arm to take another reading with the press of a button. "How's he been?"
Sam wiped the sleep from his own eyes with a nervous smile. "He's been...sleeping." Sam finally got out. "He looks better." He added finally as she seemed to be encouraged by the readings she was getting on the monitors.
"That's great. I hear he may get to go home this evening, if the fever breaks." She smiled again. She seemed good at that. Offering a bit of peace and comfort with a smile. "Have you been eating?" Sam wasn't ready for a question about his own health. He had practically given up on getting much rest since he started worrying about Dean.
"Here and there...when I get a chance. Yeah. I'm fine." Sam nodded. He wasn't concerned about it. He felt fine physically...so if Dean did have something contagious then he supposed that he hadn't caught it. "I haven't seen you on this floor." Sam hadn't really left the hospital in the last three days and he didn't remember the girl on this floor.
"I usually work trauma in the ER." Ambre nodded at his observation. "They were short up here this morning though."
"Aha...so I guess this must be a bit quieter then you're used to." Sam chuckled softly. It was nice to have someone to talk to other then a near incoherent Dean. Ambre seemed more sociable then most of the nurses he's run into as of yet.
"Not really. Small town like this...we don't see that much trauma...a little...but this is about normal for me. I was just about to go grab some snacks for the other patients, if you want I can bring you something too." Ambre added as she finished writing on the chart in her hand.
"I'd appreciate that." Sam smiled in return offering Dean another glance as he jerked against the bed.
"I won't." The desperation in Dean's slumbered voice got Sam tossing the rest of the blanket off as Ambre looked down at him narrowing her eyes at his utterance. "She won't get her...Sam, You gotta hold her."
Sam had never heard Dean talk in his sleep. Not like this. He furrowed his brow as he watched a sweat bead up against Dean's forehead. Dean gave another hard jerk against the bed, pulling the sheet loose with the strong movements before Ambre took his hand to secure it before he could rip the IV port that was taped into the bend of his elbow of his left arm out.
"Sam, take the baby!" Dean suddenly screamed out sitting bolt upright in the bed his eyes wide in a panic.
"It's alright Mr. Hanover." Ambre started immediately her voice sounding soothing and compassionate to Sam as he made his way to his brother trying to settle him back down. "It's just the fever. You're dreaming. Do you remember where you are?" Ambre went through the barrage of settling bit that should have taken Dean down a notch in the panic scale, but instead Sam saw the heightened response the moment Dean's eyes settled on the young nurse. Dean jerked his arm back and scooted as far away from her as he could.
"Get out." He breathed against cracked lips his eyes widening even more. "Get out!" He yelled louder when she seemed to freeze like a doe caught in the dangerous lights of a car.
"Dean." Sam's hand wound around his arm pressing him back against the bed...back down as he watched Dean stare up at Ambre like he'd seen some kind of ghost. "Hey. That's your nurse. She's just trying to make sure you're alright. You were just dreaming...having a night mare. It's alright. You need to calm down." Sam was doing all he could to keep Dean settled in the bed, feeling his brother's body shivering again - shaking uncontrollably.
"I'll go get the doctor." Ambre breathed finally still shaken by his response, the feel of his eyes on her. It seemed to shake her to the core...like he could see right through her...like she scared him. She had never scared anyone.
"No...no he's alright." Sam shook his head, knowing that Dean didn't want to be sedated. Sam had ulterior motives though as well. He wanted a few answers and Dean couldn't very well answer them if he was out again. "He'll be alright in a min. I'll get him calm."
"Get her out of here." Dean whispered against Sam's ear. Sam's muscles tightened in fear as he heard the emotional play in Dean's voice.
"Really he'll be alright." Sam nodded in response to what Dean was saying. "I'll call you if he needs anything." Sam watched the realization that he needed some time alone with his brother surfaced in her eyes and she nodded before retreating from the room.
"Dude, what the hell was that?" Sam asked as the door closed behind the nurse.
"I want a different nurse." Dean got out in a rush swallowing hard as he sank back against the bed exhausted from the actions of a moment of ago. "Don't let her back in this room."
Sam narrowed his eyes in bafflement. "What?!" He was never going to understand this. "Where did that come from? Do you know her?"
"No," Dean whispered watching the back of the closed door now. "I just...I" Dean broke off closing his eyes as both hands went to his face shaking against his skin while he tried to calm down. Dean finally caught himself. He had been reacting on pure instinct from the moment he woke. Now he had to reign himself back in. It was almost as if he had forgotten that Sam didn't know the things that plagued his mind. "Must of been the nightmare." Dean finally whispered refusing to meet Sam's eyes.
"I don't think so...no way...Dean, what the hell are you not telling me?" Sam refused to believe that Dean had simply had a nightmare and gone off his rocker a moment. What he just saw was more then that. Sam couldn't explain it, but he had seen Dean sick before...and this wasn't a normal reaction to a nightmare...to some fever...this wasn't Dean at least not the Dean he knew. Something had happened to him...and Sam wasn't going to rest until he knew what it was. "Dean," Sam's voice softened as he settled his hands on the safety rail on the side of the bed. "What's happening to you?"
"Nothing." Dean replied stubbornly. "I'm fine...just forget it."
"Like hell." Sam shook his head. "It's like you've been a whole other person since I woke up in the car. Since that plane crash. Now did you see something before I woke up? Did something happen out there that I missed? I mean case I've done the math here and you were fine before then."
He almost though he caught a failed attempt to suppress a frustrated laugh before Dean shook his head. " I'm sick...that's it. The plane was just a coincidence." Dean got out angrily. Sam wasn't buying that for a second no matter how straight faced Dean delivered the line. "I barely remember seeing it explode." Dean was trying to put on a stellar performance, but Sam could see through every bit of it. "It's this disorientation, Sam. I just feel out of it and like things are disjointed." That part Sam believed. "Cut me a break here..." Dean seemed desperate to sell it. "I'll apologize to Ambre when she comes back."
It was the lowering of his voice and the name that did it for Sam...that truly showed him the extent of what he was missing here...of what Dean refused to say...was too fevered up to stop himself from letting slip. The hints of emotion...the slips with information he was supposed to not have...Sam was picking it all up and hoping like hell that it made sense eventually because he was still at a loss right now. How did Dean know Ambre...and why the hell was he so scared of her? Better yet How did he know her name? He had been asleep when she came into the room so he'd never heard her name and her last name was the only thing on her name tag. "Alright." Sam didn't know what else to say.
He knew Dean needed to calm down...to not get worked up again so he let it drop. Sam wasn't going to let it go though. That plane crash had something to do with it and so did Ambre and he was going to get to the bottom of this...wether Dean liked it or not.
"Alright." Dean nodded as if he was truly relieved as his closed his eyes winded against the pillow again.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
She rolled over with a groan and swatted at the alarm clock before realizing that it was the phone that was ringing. She wasn't exactly sober...she never was. Life had taught her that drinking could be beneficial in her line of work. She picked up the phone still laying on her stomach with the blanket pulled over her half naked form.
"Yeah." She whispered into the receiver as she shouldered her latest boy toy's arm from around her back and listened to him roll over with a drunken groan.
"We have a job for you." She felt the left side of her mouth curl upward at the edges as she slowly propped herself up on her elbows.
"I'm listening." She replied kicking the boy toy from the bed. He rolled out of the bed and sat up dazed as she threw him his clothes and mouthed "Go."
"Your charge has been located at the Huntington Memorial Hospital. Alturoc hunts her." Her smile grew as she sat up glaring at the boy toy's protests before motioning at the door. He cursed repeatedly as he pulled on his clothes and then grabbed his wallet off the small hotel table before walking out the door in a huff as she waved at his back.
"It'll take me two hours." She replied quickly as she scanned the floor for her own clothes. She got to her feet stretching her long arms over her head and grabbed her shirt from the motionless blade of the ceiling fan.
"Fine." Came the reply.
She paused her white shirt in mid air over her head. "I get to pick the team or do you have them in mind already?"
"We're sending two more in. They are a little younger then you...a little rougher around the edges. This job should be a breeze for the three of you."
"Ah come on...surely it can't be that easy." Nessa laughed into the receiver. "You called me, didn't you."
"It's Alturoc...you know how hairy things can get. I just ...it's one nurse...how hard can it be?"
"Hard." Nessa's smile faded as she felt a shiver race up her spine from the disconcerting level of deja vu that ran through her.
"Well get to it...I don't want another dead could have been on my hands...and I know you don't want it on yours." Nessa grabbed her pants from the partially open night stand drawer and pulled them on in a hurry before pulling her pistols from the recess there and making sure it was loaded before sliding it into her ankle holster.
"I'm working on it." Nessa breathed pushing the second gun into her shoulder strap before making sure her wrist straps were tucked into place. She pushed the last guns into place with a sigh. "Alright where am I meeting my team?"
"Huntington Memorial. Selena and Rachel are in bound as we speak. Nessa..."
"Yeah." She snapped the two smaller guns into place against her wrists.
"Be careful." She gave a moments pause at her handler's caution before she shook it off and narrowed her eyes in confusion.
"Always." She nodded. "Bye." She hung up the phone pausing one more time before looking to her keys on the night stand. Dammit she would have given anything to have just flown. She reluctantly packed up and tossed the room key on the bed before she went and loaded her car. Oh well...everyone had rules to follow. She just hated them. She sank into the drivers seat and cranked the car before pulling out and heading to Huntington.