A/N: I don't have any medical expertise, and although I've done a little drabbling online for this, most of my 'medical knowledge' comes from a combination of Grey's Anatomy and Scrubs. Try to suspend a little disbelief here for a bit, and if anything seems too off, of course feel free to let me know. To any medical-savvy readers, I'm sorry for any mental pain associated with reading my mumbo jumbo for the next few chapters.
A/N 2: This scene actually takes place before the nurse's talk with Sam in the previous chapter, but I wanted to give Dean a quick break so it is posted here instead. It is longer than the earlier chapters and would probably be even longer if I didn't feel the need to be evil and give another cliffhanger...sorry! I can't resist.
A/N 3: I've made a few changes to Chapter 3, nothing too major and no alteration of storyline. Just wanted to let you know!
"…may need to open him up. At least three ribs broken, probably more, and we need to see what kind of damage they did. Kidneys are tender, and I can't tell on his stomach because of the level of bruising but we need to check for any lacerations or ruptures. Portable CT open yet?"
Dean felt awareness creep into him this time, rather than the sharp swing back into it. He felt the throb in his head, chest, and stomach, but it seemed far-off now, faded. His entire world felt dreamlike, as though he were swimming through a fog of people and places without any care or desire to stop and look around.
"Alright, let's bring him in for prep."
"Hang on, he's waking up. Dean?"
"Nn…" His mouth could barely open, forced closed by thousands of pounds on his lips. The same weight covered his entire body, rendering him trapped, frozen. It was a concept that panicked him, but he was too tired and too numb to have much concern.
Hospital. I'm in the hospital. Bad thing, huh.
He tried again, pulled up strength from deep within himself to open his mouth again. He wanted to say something, anything, but his body betrayed him and he fell silent.
God, he was so tired.
He felt the strangers hustle and bustle around him, working proficiently but steadily. He heard mumbled voices calling out over his head to each other, maybe to him, but he couldn't find the urge to listen in.
He was content to drift for a moment. In the back of his mind he knew it wasn't a good idea, knew he shouldn't let himself fall down too far, but it was a fleeting thought cast away a little further with each second that he coasted through the waking world.
Until, of course, someone had to ruin it. A man appeared in his eyesight, shooting blinding rays straight into his brain with what the small logical part of him realized was probably a penlight. It was enough to break past the fog around him. He squirmed, feeling his wounds give a small ache of protest, sedated by the drugs coursing through his system and shock keeping a firm hold on him.
"Dean? You with us?"
"Whhh…nnn…"
He was surprised to hear a small noise, coming from him no less. It wasn't words, but it was a start.
"Talk to him, see if you can get him to say anything about what happened. I'm going to let the surgeon know we're getting ready for the CT and to be on standby."
The man left. Dean couldn't even remember what he'd looked like, but he remembered what he'd said. Surgeon. Surgeons meant surgery. That meant this was bad.
He felt like a child, but he wanted his father. Wanted so badly for his father and brother to be here and take care of him, reassure him. Through the haze of drugs and pain, he was sure that undercurrent of emotion he felt was fear.
A woman turned towards him. She was pretty and plain, hair pulled back into a tight bun and frown and laughter lines etched upon her face. She gave him a small smile.
"Dean? It's all right, sweetie. You're in the hospital, you've been hurt pretty badly but we're taking care of you."
Dean felt his eyes start to close and abruptly forced him open. He needed…had to stay awake…he thought so, it was important.
"Can you speak for me?"
Speak. She wanted him to speak.
"…Sssgn..." Not exactly words, there, Dean. Let's try this again. "…Surrg…jun." Close enough.
"Your doctor is going to talk to the surgeon. You may have some internal injuries, but we can't tell yet. They're bringing in the portable CT to check, and they're going to fix what they can. I know this is hard, but can you tell me what hurts?"
Everything.
"Mm…stmach…side…nd…should'r…"
His shoulder. Left shoulder. Yeah. Hurt like a bitch. He remembered slamming it into the wall, but compared to everything else it shouldn't have been that bad. The more he focused on it, though, the worse the pain was, scraping its way through the cocoon of drugs to settle in his bones and inch by inch revved up in magnitude until he felt himself gasp.
"Hey, it's alright. What is it?"
He scrunched his eyes, the sweet coating of painkillers becoming seemingly ineffective as his body was once again set on fire. "…Nnn…ah." He threw his head back, panting to the ceiling.
"Dean? You still with us? Shit, heart rate's up again. Dean? You need to breathe, sweetie."
She could see the pain return to him swiftly, muscles tensing and head rolling back as he tried to fight back against it. She heard the swish of a door and turned to see the doctor enter, surgeon in tow.
"Update, Marie?"
She turned to one of her coworkers. "Keep an eye on him, talk to him, and try to calm him down." She followed the doctor back into the hall, pausing for a last look at the man lying on the gurney as the team rushed around him.
As the doors closed behind them, the doctor let out a huff of frustration. "Goddamn CT's being used, we can't grab it for another 15 and it's too risky to put him in the main one."
The surgeon, a handsome man in his mid thirties but one of the best when it came to dealing with blunt trauma injuries, turned to them both. "There's nothing we can do about that now, we just have to hope he makes it that long. If not, my team's ready for exploratory surgery. Room 1 is prepped and ready to go. What's his status?"
"Still in shock, we're trying our best to get him stabilized but it's slow going. His B.P. is still too low and his heart rate's too high, and between that and the pain meds he's pretty out of it. He's got more severe pain in his shoulder, I think it's a lacerated or ruptured spleen."
"Makes sense, with the amount of bruising on his chest and abdomen, there might be more than just that. Has he coughed up any more blood?"
"No. He's got cuts on his lips and his nose is definitely broken, the blood we saw on him when they brought him in may have been from that. Or it might be that there isn't enough hemorrhaging to induce vomiting."
"Let's hope it's the former. He say anything about what happened?"
"No. The second he mentioned his shoulder his heart rate started climbing again. He's in pretty severe distress, we're trying to get him calmed down now—"
"Hey! Could use some help in here!"
Whoops, I was supposed to have him going into surgery at this point…my bad! I hope everyone's enjoying reading, more soon.