WARNINGS: Self-Mutilation, Language; Insults not tintended to offend anyone personally.

Disclaimer: Winchesters are not mine. Let's all be sad together.

Departing Thoughts

(FB) After years of hiding it from John, it's Sammy that finds Dean in his glory...

Caught

By: chocolate rules

The lights are out. The house is asleep. It's dark out. And nightmares creep.

Dean tossed and turned all night for the third night in a row. He's shivering against the humid summer day. Sweat hangs from every stand of hair as it drips onto his face. He's whimpering and moaning. The images plague his mind, tormenting him.

With a final twist, Dean bolts up on his bed and barely manages to hold in a yell.

He's dripping in his own sweat and his eyes have already adjusted to the dark night, but Dean knows that won't help him any. He rises from his bed, as quietly as possible so as to not disturb Sammy sleeping in the other bed. He makes his way out of the room and closes the door softly behind him.

The fourteen year old is panting and can't breathe. If he wouldn't have known, he would have thought he was hyperventilating. But, after two years, Dean knew exactly what was wrong.

He messed up again. They went on a hunt that night and Dean screwed up, big time. Once again, he was supposed to protect the innocents, not get them hurt.

He was watching over the trapped girls while his father went after the poltergeist. It was simple enough, keep them together and keep them safe. At first he was bored, the girls were seven, ten and eleven, and those weren't the kind of girls for Dean. Then, they got to talking and he found out that Tabby, the ten year old, loved ACDC almost as much as he did. And then Katy, eleven, mentioned that Metallic could kick ACDC's ass, and Dean decided that this was one argument he didn't mind having. With Janie safe in his lap, the two hours he spent with the girls actually wasn't too bad. But Dean underestimated the poltergeist.

As he was trying to get Tabby to stop screaming the lyrics to Dirty Deeds, he felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise. Dean stopped as he paid closer attention to the changing temperature of the room.

Before he could do anything, the girls sensed it too. They got silent all of a sudden and then something pulled Tabby right from them. She went flying through the wall into the hallway and was crying for Dean the entire time.

Dean stood up and grabbed his shotgun, placing Janie down next to Katy. He ran to Tabby and kneeled down beside her.

"Tabby?" Dean whispered to the fragile body beside him. "Tab?" And again, he received no response. He reached out to feel for a pulse or something, but found nothing. Then, finally a faint beat began beneath his fingers.

Katy and Janie started to make their way towards them.

"Is she okay, Dean?" Katy asked in a very innocent voice.

"Stay there, okay!" Dean barked out. He didn't know how to answer that and he wasn't into lying to little kids, but he knew that they couldn't see their sister like this.

"Dean?" said Janie. Dean turned around and gave them a sad look. Janie turned around and clung tightly to Katy and they both cried.

"She's…she's alive," offered Dean, but he couldn't even make himself believe it.

Tabby lied on her back. Blood was growing around her in a steady stream. Flashbacks from the blond girl in the basement began playing thorough his mind. The blood. Her tragic ending. The aftermath.

"Hey, Tabby, open those pretty eyes." Nothing. Dean felt his throat clump up. "Hey, Tab, I think Katy wants a rematch. You going to let her win like that?"

Dean felt again for a pulse and was happy enough to know that it was at least somewhat stronger. But it was still weak and that bothered him. He knew what had attacked them, but he didn't know why. John had told him that they'd be safe in that room. That the poltergeist left the guest rooms alone because no one had ever lived there in the first place.

Yet, here he was crunched down beside a shattered girl. A girl's whose life lied between life and death. A girl he was supposed to protect.

Dean fumbled around for his cell phone as he rose from beside Tabby. Tears were starting to form in his eyes but he ignored them. He called John and told him what had happened. John told him to not touch her and to get the other girls outside. He told him to call 911.

Dean opened his eyes from the memory and found himself shaking. He closed his eyes again, only to find the image of Tabby in a stretcher, being pulled from the house. The paramedics had said that the fall had broken something in her spine. She was never going to walk again, and it was too soon to know if she'd be able to do anything else.

Dean drew a shaky breathe as he pulled himself away from the wall. He softly walked past his father's room, where John lied sleeping, and made it into the bathroom without any incidents.

He closed the bathroom door softly and turned on the lights. He had started shaving a few months ago, and so no longer needed his father's razor for this task. Sammy had made fun of him saying that he didn't need it because he had no beard and Dean had retaliated that that was the point of shaving. The truth was, when his father had offered, all Dean could think about was that with his own razor, he wouldn't need to take his father's and that would minimize the possibility of him getting caught.

Dean was always careful that John never noticed his marks. He always wore a jacket so it was easy to conceal them on a hunt, but at home he usually opted to go only in boxers and that would minimize his areas of possible relief. And since that area included that area, Dean wasn't that crazy about it.

He slipped out a blade and set the razor down on the sink ledge. He walked over to the edge of the tub and sat down on it. He reached over to the toilet paper and grabbed enough to wrap around his hand three times. Then, Dean pulled up the short boxer leg of his left leg and began to slice.

The first slice was always for whatever he had screwed up on lately. It took away the most immediate pain. The first slice always brought out a sigh of relief. The second slice was for guilt. He felt that he deserved some pain after causing Tabby's paralyzes, or all the other tragedy's he caused the last two years. And the last slice was always for Sammy. Because if Dean wasn't more careful, next time it could be Sammy. And that could never happen.

He never heard the door, but he heard the gasp. Dean dropped the blade on the floor, missing his toe by inches and looked up to meet Sammy's shocked face.

"Oh my God," he whispered. Sammy stared at Dean's leg for what felt like an eternity. Dean couldn't move and couldn't cover the wound. His left hand held the toilet paper below the wound to collect the wayward drips.

Sammy made to turn around and Dean knew that the boy would run to their father. He acted then standing up and grabbing Sammy around the waist. Dean lifted the ten year old and turned him around back into the bathroom, setting him down on the toilet seat cover.

"Shhh," Dean instructed, placing his hand over Sammy's mouth. Sammy's eyes were filled with terror and sleep and all Dean could do was question were his senses had been. How had he not felt Sammy open the bedroom door? Usually, he could be in the kitchen and sense when Sammy was trying to sneak out of his room past his bedtime.

"Please Sammy, please don't scream." Pleaded Dean. After a few seconds, Sammy slowly nodded and Dean let him go. He was dripping the blood onto Sammy's pajama bottom and onto the floor. The linoleum tiles could be wiped clean, but the evidence remained on Sammy's clothes. If there was evidence then Dean couldn't fool himself into thinking that this didn't really happen. That they were all only dreams of what he sometimes wished he would do, but nothing he would actually do.

He sat back down on the bathtub edge and this time placed his head in his hands. They both stayed like that for a minute or two before Sammy spoke up.

"Dean? What happened?"

"I ...cut myself…" Dean tried to make up a lie. But he couldn't lie to Sammy, even if he still hadn't looked up to him.

"Why Dean?" Sammy's innocent little boy voice asked. Dean shrugged and he could hear Sammy taking in a sharp breath.

He couldn't lie to Sammy; the ten year old was practically a baby in Dean's eyes. There was no way that he could tell him why. Sam hadn't been there and it was so much for the better, because Dean knew that once Sammy had seen that kind of evil around then he wouldn't be the same sweet little guy that he was now. Sure, Sammy knew what was out there, but John hadn't yet taken him to hunt, and even if Sam complained that Dean had been allowed, having both Dad and Dean agree that he was still too little meant he wasn't going anywhere anytime soon.

Dean finally lifted his head and looked up to Sammy. They locked eyes and Dean watched as Sammy's started to water. God, he thought, the boy can still cry if he feels something. He's so small, I can't. He shouldn't ever have seen this.

Sammy seemed to understand that Dean wasn't going to tell him, because not one second after, he leaped up and wrapped his arms around Dean's neck. He cried onto Dean's shoulder and Dean hated knowing that he was the cause for those tears.

"Ok, Dean. Don't tell me. It's okay." Sammy started. Dean wrapped his own arms around the boy. God Bless Sammy, the boy always seemed to understand him.

"I'm sorry, Sammy."

"Promise me you'll tell me someday." Sammy said out of the blue. Dean hadn't thought of that and didn't know how to respond. Sam pulled away and looked straight into Dean's eyes.

Damn Sammy and those eyes because before Dean could control himself, he nodded. Sammy's face lit up some and he went back into the warmth of the hug. They held each other for a few minutes, before Sammy once again pulled back and wiped away his tears. He looked down at the wounds and nodded, as if accepting them for what they were.

"I'm gonna clean you and get some band aids and then you'll be okay." He said. He looked up and flashed Dean a genuine, however remotely weak, smile. Sammy turned around and reached into the cabinet underneath the sink and pulled out the first aid kit.

The ten year old had gained a lot of schooling in this department lately. He had spent the weekend with Caleb and Caleb had taken the time to teach Sammy the 'basics'. He had taught him how to clean a wound and how to tell if it'd need stitches or not. And how to administer them if need be. Caleb had told Sammy that the next time he went; he could actually dissect a dead cat!

Dean watched as Sammy cleaned and bandaged his sliced leg. He knew that there would be no scarring since he hadn't cut that deeply. Not yet anyway.

As he watched Sammy's new skills unveil, he became mesmerized in the youngster's technique. Sammy was still nervous, but he got the job done. Then, for good measure, Sammy placed the little kiddie band aids, the ones with smiling faces of different colors, on the cuts.

"All done," he stated as he placed everything back into the kit. As he rose to put the kit back he locked eyes with Dean. As Dean mindlessly wondered when the heck the boy had gained or learned of his power over him, he watched Sammy's face turn serious.

"I won't tell, Dean." He said softly. Dean nodded. He knew that Sammy could keep this to himself.

"Dad will never know as long as you never do this again." Sammy challenged. Dean gave him a skeptical look at this.

"Sammy…"

"No, Dean. This is dangerous! You lost a whole lot of blood…"Sam started. He was going on in a no nonsense tone and being the little one in Dean's eyes, the tone wasn't helping.

"Look, Sammy," he interrupted. "I know this looks bad. I know you're scared. But, everything's okay." Dean said in his calming, big brother is always right voice.

"No, Dean," Sammy said with a sigh. Suddenly, he looked like there was a weight on him and Dean knew he was guilty for it. "It's wrong. I know it is. You're not 'posed to hurt yourself. And, and if I see you do that again, well then I'm telling Daddy."

And without waiting for a response, Sammy turned around and headed back out to their room.

Now Dean felt like shit. He'd been caught, not by Dad like he had feared, but by Sammy. And there was nothing like the terror in his eyes. Terror Dean never wanted to see again.

A few minutes later, Dean entered the room again and found Sam curled up in his own bed turned away from Dean and the door. Knowing the little one like he did, Dean knew the boy wasn't sleeping. Now, he could either ignore this, and get into his own bed, or…

Dean eased himself onto Sammy's bed. He waited and sure enough, Sammy turned around, tears streaming, and looked at him. Before the kid could say anything or try and get Dean to promise something else, Dean spoke.

"Listen, kiddo. I'm sorry I scared you like that. I never meant for you to find me like that."

"I woke up…and you weren't there." He said softly. Well, Dean had figured that much.

"Nightmare?" Sammy shook his head no. "Then?" Sammy shrugged.

"You just weren't there. I got scared." Dean placed his hand on the little boy's forehead and brushed away the long strands.

"I'm sorry."

"I know. But, then when I found you, I wasn't sure if that was you. I wanted to call for you but thought better to go for Daddy."

"I know. I'm sorry." He repeated. "It must have been very scary for you" Sammy nodded. A few tears dripped to his cheek.

Dean sighed and brushed the tear away with his thumb. "I'm done. No more."

Sammy leaped up again and for the second time that night clung onto Dean. "Thanks." He said.

He sounded so happy by that promise that Dean made it for real in his head. Never again would he allow for Sammy to go through that. And with that new resolution, Dean crawled into Sammy's bed and slept better than he had planned to that night.

tbc...Monday, if the alerts are up...:D