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"Sometimes being a brother is better than being a superhero."

-Marc Brown

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1987

"You're still watching this?" Dean pushed by Sam's feet stuck out flat from Bobby's worn plaid sofa, two bowls of cereal in his hand. One of them Lucky Charms, the other one plain Cheerios. He set the bowl of Lucky charms onto the TV tray that Uncle Bobby had set up in front of Sam.

A Superman Cartoon played across Bobby's beat up RCA television. Superman was flying downward from a sky scraper to catch Lois Lane who had just been thrown off of the roof, flailing her arms and screaming for him.

It had been three days since their dad had dropped them off at Uncle Bobby's house and Sam had been parked on the couch watching the same Superman cartoons the entire time.

Superman swooped under Lois just in the nick of time and caught her, flying her down to the ground.

Sam turned away as Lois started kissing Superman's neck in gratitude, making a disgusted face until he spied the Lucky Charms in front of him. He sat up and reached for his spoon with his good hand. "Do girls ever try to kiss you like that Dean?" Sam's mouth was chocked full of marshmallows and the cereal that Dean would normally just throw out.

"None of your business," Dean retorted back, gripping his hand on Sam's arm that held the spoon. "Slow down dude, you're going to choke." He waited until Sam swallowed, watching him take another bite before he was satisfied that he wouldn't choke to death on purple moons and green clovers. "Why'd you ask that about girls anyway Sammy?"

"Cause your Superman Dean-" Sam said like it was an obvious answer.

Dean turned to Sam, his casted arm rested on the tray beside his cereal bowl covered in oval shaped stick figure drawings of dogs and black cars in permanent marker that Dean drew for him.

"I'm not Superman Sammy." Dean had thrown out the Superman shirt he bought in the trash at one of the rest stops on the way out of Florida; he would never be able to wear it again without picturing Sam falling off the shed and hearing his scream.

"Yeah huh!" Sam interjected; a spray of chewed up marshmallows and cereal flew out of Sam's mouth and hit Dean in both cheeks.

"Eww Sam, gross!" Dean wiped the chewed up cereal off his face.

Sam shot him a smile full of Lucky Charms.

"How are we doing squirts?" Uncle Bobby came out of the kitchen and stared down at both of them. He was wearing jeans, a beige down fest, a faded gray shirt that said: 'Singer Salvage' and the same old ball cap that they'd seen him wear for years. A black pit bull moved past him and right over to Sam's side of the couch, jumping up and licking his face, jostling the cereal bowl on the table, Sam laughed.

But Bobby didn't. "Gunner! Get down!" Bobby grabbed the pit bull's collar and pulled him off of the sofa.

Gunner whined and tried to jump back up on the couch.

"You stupid flea trap, I set get down!" Bobby pushed Gunner away. "Don't give me that look," Bobby said to the dog's whines and sad face. "How about you get back outside and guard my business like you're supposed to?"

Gunner hung his head even lower, tail drooping to the floor. He slunk, dejected, out of the living room and through a back screen door in the kitchen that led out into Bobby's salvage yard.

Bobby eyed the dog until he disappeared, then turned his attention back to the boys on the couch. "You doin' okay there Sammy?"

"Yeah Uncle Bobby!" Sam said this as he continued to eat the cereal in front of him with such voraciousness Bobby was surprised that the kid wasn't choking.

"Mind if I take a look the ol' catcher's arm kid?" Bobby bent over to inspect the cast that Sam had laid up beside his cereal bowl, seeing all the scribbling of cars and dogs drawn on the white fiberglass. He rotated the cast carefully, eyeing Sam for any signs of pain on his face. But those grape children's chewable Motrin pills that Bobby had given Sam an hour ago were obviously working because Sam only winced once, and not even a big wince.

Dean watched Bobby moving Sam's broken arm with a hesitant breath, afraid that something might have happened to him when he wasn't looking.

Bobby laid Sam's smaller fingers in his palm, pressing them down with the tips of his thumb. "This hurt kid?"

Sam shook his head, then said: "No."

Bobby slid a finger under where the cast started at the middle of Sam's palm, pressing lightly, but firmly on the skin. "How about here? Anything tingly or feelin' like the sun's burning you?"

"No Uncle Bobby," Sam said raising his hazel eyes up to Bobby's.

Bobby pushed his finger carefully out of the cast and gently rotated Sam's arm back onto the tray in a more comfortable position.

"Does it look okay Uncle Bobby?" Dean asked.

Bobby looked down at Sam with a serious look, casting some of that look across to Dean.

Dean's breath sucked back into his mouth like milk from a straw. He saw Sam watching him, so he sat up straighter and tried to hide his fear.

"I'm afraid so," Bobby looked at both his surrogate nephews with a serious face. "Looks like Sammy here is right on track to getting better," he roughed up Sam's messy hair affectionately and heard Dean let out a relieved breath. "I'll call your dad later on and tell him the good news." John had dropped the boys off with him a few days ago to track down a Shape Shifter in Wyoming, telling Bobby to keep him informed of Sam's progress with his broken arm. It was a far cry from a devoted father, but John sounded like he was trying, so Bobby didn't give him an earful this time.

"When can I get this thing off?" Sam thumbed his cast like he wanted to take it off himself.

"In another few weeks squirt," Bobby answered.

The look on Sam's face was like Bobby had said in a few years. "But it itches!" He dug the thumb of his other hand into his cast like Bobby had.

"Hey now, none of that, you're going to mess it up," Bobby pulled Sam's thumb out of the cast. "It has to stay on to heal Sam."

"But. It. itches!" Sam repeated again like Bobby could not fully comprehend just what kind of pain and discomfort he was enduring. He sneakily stuck his thumb back under his cast.

"Sammy quit!" This time it was Dean who yanked Sam's thumb out. "Uncle Bobby knows what this feels like; he broke his arm before."

The remark made Sam stop trying to scratch under his cast and look up at Bobby in amazement. "You did?"

"Sure did kid," Bobby answered. "Arm, both legs, shoulder, one time even my nose."

"How'd you break your nose?" Sam questioned in wonder.

"On a rake in the yard," Bobby answered. "Just like those cartoons you boys like to watch," He pantomimed a scene where he stepped on the business end of a rake and made a 'whap!' sound with his hand on his face to mimic the rake handle bashing him square in the face.

Sam broke into peals of laughter.

"Thanks for the sympathy Sam," Bobby joked as Sam continued to laugh in the way that kids did when they just discovered something new that was funny. He eyed the half eaten bowls of cereal in front of Sam and Dean. "How about we take a break from the cereal eating and I whip you boys up something hot, say like my famous Queso Chili?"

Both Sam and Dean sat up with eager expressions on their faces; Uncle Bobby's Queso chili was legendary, and didn't come out of a can.

Dean sat up more on the sofa, staring at Bobby. "Can I help?"

"Sure thing kid," Bobby returned easily to Dean. "Always helps to have an extra pair of hands to do the work."

Cooking was something that neither Winchester boy did very often, not real cooking with pots and pans and chopping things. So whenever Bobby had the boys he would always think of something for them to do in the kitchen, and they loved getting to make things, and get a chance to be messy at the same time.

Sam leaned over the arm of the sofa, mimicking his brother. "Can I help too Uncle Bobby?"

"I'm afraid not with that busted arm Sam," Bobby said to Sam.

Bobby watched Sam's expression drop practically to his socked feet in disappointment, and he felt like the biggest jerk there ever was for saying no. He set his hand on Sam's shoulder. "Sorry boy, but it's best that you rest your arm, alright?"

Sam sat back against the couch cushions with a thud. He dropped his head down, tracing the designs that Dean drew on his cast with his fingers looking like someone had ran over his puppy.

Dean stared over at Sam; his younger brother's eyes half buried in his loose mop of dark hair. But even half hidden Dean saw the sheen of tears hanging just in Sam's eyes as he tried to watch the cartoon on the TV and pretend that they weren't there.

"I changed my mind Uncle Bobby," Dean said. "I never got to see the end of this Superman before- it's supposed to be a really good one." his words were about the TV, but Dean never took his eyes off of Sam as he talked.

Bobby watched the boys, a deep welled feeling winding tight in his gut as Dean settled back into the couch cushions beside Sam, reclaiming his bowl of Cheerios, taking another bite from it.

"Don't you go and fill up on that now Dean," Bobby reprimanded, though there no harshness to it. "Hot food should be ready in about an hour and a half."

"Can we eat the chili in here?" Sam look hesitantly at Bobby, afraid that Bobby would say no again.

"I think that would be okay," Bobby returned with a smile to the five-year-old. "Considering how Dean hasn't seen the ending of this Superman episode yet, wouldn't want to ruin it for him."

Sam's smile came back to his face, he leant forward and grabbed up his bowl of half eaten Lucky Charms leaning back by Dean, just like he was.

Bobby watched the two boys on his sofa for a long moment before talking again. "I'll call you both when it's ready,"He heard Dean remark about something Lois Lane said to Clark Kent in the newsroom, and heard Sam giggling at it in return as he headed into his kitchen.

Dean turned his eyes away from the TV just as Lois disappeared into the elevator to go meet the informant who was secretly double crossing her and Superman to try and kill him; he'd seen this episode at least eight times already. He glanced over at Sam who had his bowl on his lap, slurping up cereal with his good hand, getting milk on his face, stopping every few seconds to place the spoon back into the bowl to wipe his mouth with the back of his hand.

Dean turned back to the TV, just as Clark Kent was thrown off of the building by a man who didn't know who he really was. Midway to the ground, Clark became Superman and flew back up to the top of the skyscraper and to the surprised criminal.

Sam's eyes widened in 'O's of excitement and he turned back to Dean. "He flew just like you did in Flor'da!"

"Sammy, stop it-" Dean turned to Sam, tucking his denim clad knee up on the sofa. "I already told you, I can't fly, I'm not Superman- he isn't even real okay?"

Sam turned to Dean in the same fashion Dean was, his hazel eyes misted in confusion. "Then what are you?"

"I'm just me Sam," Dean answered back like it was a confession that he didn't want to admit to himself.

Sam's expression changed like he had been looking at Dean upside down this entire time. "Then you're better then Superman!" He grinned at his triumphant discovery.

Dean stared back at Sam in bewilderment; a dry laugh bubbled its way up his throat. "Watch the TV you dork-" Dean shoved Sam playfully before turning back to the TV.

Sam tucked his head on Dean's arm pit, resting his broken arm near him.

xxxxxXxxxxx

2014

"Hey, did you get it?"

"It's done, luckily I have some pull with the Miami-Dade police system, they handed over the surveillance tapes without much of an issue."

"How much 'without much' are we talking about?" Dean questioned into his cell phone, pressing it between his shoulder and his ear as he lifted the lid of a black cast iron pot. Steam billowed up past his face; he picked up a wooden spoon from off the counter top in the Bunker's kitchen with a bandaged hand, stirring the contents inside.

"They wanted to speak to the Bureau before handing the tapes over; do damage control at the local level first," Jody responded from the other end of the line. "They were more pissed off that they weren't informed about an animal attack was deadly enough to warrant an investigation from the FBI-"

"So what'd did you tell them?" Dean stopped stirring and put the spoon down on the butcher block counter top, reaching over the stove for a long brown wooden pepper mill, grinding the whole peppercorn into flakes over the pot.

"The truth-at least a variation on twisted version of it. Told them you and Sam were investigating some chatter about animal attacks when Sam got jumped in an alleyway, and there was no time to launch an official investigation before the shit started to hit the fan."

"What about animal control?" After five cranks of the peppermill Dean dipped the wooden spoon into the pot and lifted it to his mouth, tasting. He pursed his lips together with a frown then moved over to a cutting board with pieces of chopped white onion on it in varying cube sizes. He grabbed a handful of them and dropped them into the pot.

"Managed to forge a report that said that the burning of the body was necessary for contamination prevention. That part was harrier though, this –Lapelas, of yours, clawed her way through thirteen bodies – the two police officers that survived are critical, the doctors don't expect them to make it, and from what you say, they won't without this things blood-"

"Look in-between the mattress of the room Sam was in," Dean threw another handful of onions into the pot and stirred them into the brown colored mixture.

"I already did Dean," Jody responded. "The tube of that thing's blood you stashed was enough for both of them, but it was hell trying to find a way to give it to them without getting caught."

"But you did it," Dean tasted the mixture again, his expression more satisfied, lowering the spoon back in to stir it again to mix in the flavors.

"Hell or not, it was easy compared to what you boys must have gone through-" Jody's words dropped off into a heavy pause. "How's Sam doing?"

Dean's hand stilled on the spoon, leaving it halfway stuck in the mixture. "That bitch really did a number on his arm, but the blood I gave him seems to be working-"

"Not seems to be Dean," Jody corrected. "Is. Sam's a fighter, especially with you in his corner, you have to believe that."

"I don't need my arm twisted on that Jody," Dean bent down and reached into the cabinets that sat under the stove pulling two steel blue ceramic bowls.

"I'm talking about you being there for Sam," Jody corrected. "Just like he's there for you, don't either of you go blaming yourselves for any part of that understand?"

"Yes ma'am, you got it," Dean's response was a like a quiet kind of hum, "Listen I gotta go, I'll tell Sam you said hey alright?" He ended the call and set his phone down, picking up the wooden spoon and scooping out the chili into the two bowls, filling them both over halfway.

He grabbed two spoons with bear claw shaped hands from the drawer and stuck them into the bowls, picking them both up and walked out of the kitchen with them.

He rounded the library and the map drawn conference table, moving down the long, black bricked hallway until he came Sam's door closed partway.

He pushed the door open with his shoulder with a creak of the wood; the door swing wide inward.

The manila comforter on the single bed was pulled out and thrown into a pile like regurgitation at the end of the mattress. Sam took up the bed's remaining occupancy, leaned up against a pillow behind the brick wall at his back, his jeans and t-shirt were wrinkled and had two day slept in wear. A wooden tray sat across his legs, and Sam was currently resting folded piles of newspaper on it, with his tablet resting at a propped up angle on the edge of it.

"Okay, here we go-" Dean stepped inside the bedroom with the bowls. "Bobby's famous Queso Chili- guaranteed to jump start some pep back in your step," he set one of the bowls on the wooden tray.

"Thanks," Sam moved the bowl off of the papers, folding them up with his right hand. His broken arm was laid out beside him on the pillows from Dean's room, the halo traction device re-created by Dean in a makeshift way by pieces of rebar and reams of white Curlex bandages.

Dean grabbed up the folded newspaper off the tray, grabbing up the bowl again.

"I got it Dean-" Sam made a grab for the bowl from Dean.

"Bobby's chili is gold Sam," Dean dropped the papers on the unpainted night stand on the right side of the bed then dropped the bowl of chili closer to Sam. "You're not wasting one damn drop of it being a one fisted drinker." He pulled the spoon out of the beans and handed it to him.

Sam huffed a quiet kind of sound, eyeing the recipe that looked almost identical to the one that he remembered. "When did you learn Bobby's recipe anyway?"

"Remember Ninth Grade in Syracuse? When I had to take Home Ec as an elective my freshman year," Dean responded- "My cooking skills then peaked at microwavable Hungry Man dinners so Bobby jimmied open his secret recipe box to keep me from looking like a total doushbag in front of everyone else."

"Wait- I thought you took woodshop as your elective when you were a freshman," Sam cut in.

"They ran out of space in the class," Dean insisted to Sam's returning look, he shoved the spoon right at his nose. "Eat."

Sam finally took the spoon from his hand and Dean turned his attention to Sam's broken arm. He pulled a pocket knife out of his jeans, flipping the blade up, and slicing apart the curlex bandages on Sam's arm that had become damp with old blood with slow movements. After the bandages were cut all the way through, he carefully pulled the pieces apart like he was removing old skin, hearing Sam wince and the spoon drop out of his hand with a clatter against the bowl.

Sam's arm was tye dyed in blood and large dark bruising of varying purple shades, along with some gashes that Dean had sewn up with the field suture kit. The traction device had been almost torn apart, but the rods that were inserted in Sam's skin had been spared, along with most of the sutures that the surgeons had done in the hospital. Dean had cobbled together the rest of the device and had read up about orthopedic internal rotation device maintenance online, and had managed to turn screws and keep rods cleaned without any infections or other things going wrong - so far.

Sam looked over Dean's glancing, trying to decipher the look in his brother's face. "How's it look?"

"Like I should have dropped out of orthopedic surgeon school when I had the chance," Dean returned in a deadpan. "But you're not dead, so I'm calling that a win," He pinched the edges of each of Sam's fingernails, the digits were a dark reddish purple, but the color came back in a few seconds. He moved his hand up further on Sam's arm, pressing his nails into a spot just under a sutured surgical rod. "You feel that?"

Sam nodded on the edge of a wince.

Dean moved his hand up and repeated the same gesture over a particularly nasty looking dark purple bruise. "How about here?"

This time Sam's wince turned into a gasp. "Like a heart attack." The pain shot up through his nerves, before settling back down, but the acuity of the pain didn't reek of the fatality it had in the hospital, it was just the slightest notch duller, like it was trying to heal.

Dean took the moment of Sam already wincing to grab a bottle from off of the nightstand and pour the remaining dregs of a bottle of Makers Mark over his skin.

Sam nearly bolted out of the bed from the coldness and pain, his newly returned vision almost going white from both sensations.

"Hey, hey!-" Dean braced a hand on his arm, "Easy-"

Sam glanced up in a blow of exhaled breath up at Dean's hand on his shoulder; he saw the bleeding tips of bitten fingers. "How's your hand?"

"You mean this?" Dean held up his bandaged fingers like they were an afterthought. "It's fingernail polish Sam," Dean pulled a fresh roll of Curlex bandages from the top drawer of the dresser that sat on the right side of the bed. "I'm not the one who looks like a Mummy and Young Frankenstein reject," He started at the top and began to roll the thin, gauzy bandages over the damaged flesh of Sam's arm, working the bandages around the rods in his skin.

"How'd you even know that I had to kill the Lapelas?" Sam asked in a subject change, but not an area change.

"I didn't," Dean wound the bandage down past Sam's elbow.

Sam's face distorted in confusion. ""Then why did you grab my hand with the knife?"

"I just figured all shit she was spouting about you being her prey meant more than her just being a bitching bitch. I took a shot and got lucky; that actually happens to me sometimes."

Sam gave a noise of disbelief. "More than sometimes." He watched as more of his mangled arm disappeared behind Curlex bandages.

"Shut it," Dean snapped.

Dry laughter escaped Sam's mouth at Dean's retort.

The Curlex bandage in Dean's hand ran out. He held it in place with his thumb, reaching into the drawer on the night stand, pulling out another package of Curlex and some white medical tape. He closed the drawer sending the stack of newspapers he set there falling to the ground. The front of the paper contained a headline about a 'Deadly Dog Attack in the Sunshine State. Dean tore off a piece of medical tape from the roll and affixed it to the end of the Curlex bandage and the beginning of the next roll before beginning his winding again. "Listen man I know you're cagey, But I think you need to lay off all the recon reading. Jody just checked in and she squared away as much as she could down in Miami."

Sam's look went quiet. "Thirteen people died in there Dean-"

"And it would have been thirty if we weren't there Sam," Dean finished winding the length of the bandage and secured the loose piece under Sam's elbow.

"It would have been zero if we weren't there Dean!" Sam yelled, he turned blood shot eyes up to Dean; after two days they were finally visibly hazel again, but they were still webbed in capillaries, and they stung the longer he kept them open, but he was able to see again. "The only reason the Lapeleas was there in the first place was because of us, because she was hunting me! And you want me to ignore it?"

"I'm not saying ignore it," Dean cut Sam off. "I'm saying stop with the blame, and the self-hate, and deprecation. Because you did what you had to do and you ganked that bitch. Now that may not be the win you want, but it's still a win Sam-" Dean paused for the span of a breath. "If you want to blame someone, blame me for bringing you to that hospital in the first place."

Sam stared at Dean like he couldn't comprehend what Dean had said. "Dean you were doing what you had to do-"

"And I own it," Dean gathered all the bloody bandages off of the bed and threw them in the small tin garbage can that sat on the floor beside the bed. "I wasn't about to let you die from that mangy bitch, even at those costs. I could save a thousand people Sam, but if one of them isn't you, it doesn't mean a damn thing. That's how we live- and I'm not apologizing for it."

Sam's anger cooled like lava meeting the open air. He stared at Dean over the length that divided them in the air that smelled heavy like blood. "Thank you." The words were more mouthed than spoken, but the look that proceeded it weren't.

Dean didn't answer, but returned Sam's look. "Alright-" Dean said this after a long moment. He moved away from the bed and walked over to the dresser that stood on the left side of the door. "Let's derail this estrogen train shall we?" He opened the top drawer where Sam kept his socks and boxers, pulling a white plastic bag.

Sam eyed him from the bed. "Dude when do you stash shit in my underwear drawer?"

"When you were unconscious for the better part of yesterday Sam," Dean pulled a DVD case out of the bag, and opened it with a snap. He inserted the disc into the black RCA player Sam had rigged up under the TV. "Shut up, and eat your food before it grows icicles sitting there will ya?"Dean stepped back after the DVD drawer closed, walking back around to the bed.

Sam watched the TV screen go blue, then black and white with an FBI warning flashing across the screen. "What is this?"

"Appropriate," Dean responded, picking up his bowl of chili, and dropped into the leather chair that sat next to Sam's bed. "It was a toss up between this and Season One of Zena Warrior Princess I found since you were hanging out with the Greek Gods again-"

"Shut up," Sam cut Dean off with this this time. "It's not like I had a choice, I was tripping balls on Ancient Greek Wolf roofies remember?"

"Yes you were," Dean spooned some of the chili into his mouth.

Sam made a disgruntled noise in this throat as an FBI warning for copyright infrigment flashed across the TV screen. It soon disappeared and was replaced by the DC Comics logo before vanishing again to a black screen. Sam's eyebrows encroached on his forehead in confusion, but raised up again when the introduction to Superman played over the cartoon view of the Metropolis skyline.

The scene opened up to the Daily Planet newsroom with Perry White talking to Lois Lane about a story for an unstoppable Earthquake machine that was threatening the city.

Sam made a surprised noise and glanced over at Dean the back at the screen just as Perry told Lois that they should call Superman, and seconds later a flash of blue and red shot into the newsroom sending papers flying everywhere, and Superman touched down right in front of Perry and Lois with a swish of his red cape.

Sam glanced back over to Dean, who watched the scene with nostalgia in his eyes, eyeing the show with a pleased shake of his head.

"Lois Lane, I tell ya man-" Dean made an over appreciative whistle at the shot of Lois leaning over her desk to write something down on a piece of paper. "Chick hasn't age a day."

"You do know she's a cartoon Dean-" Sam told him.

"Hot is hot, Sammy," Dean corrected taking another spoonful of chili in his mouth. "I gotta say though I'll never know what the hell she sees in Superman. He flies around in blue lycra body suit and red speedo with a belt and his sex can kill her-"

"Dude you were the one wanted to be Superman remember?" Sam said, pulling the spoon through his bowl of chili and finally giving it a taste test. The beans and sauce were now lukewarm, but the flavor was just the way he remembered, laced with spices and onion and the heady taste of tarragon.

"Yeah when I was nine Sam, and you were going stir crazy at that dump in Florida," Dean returned. "But I grew up, realized that this," he gestured to himself with his free hand, "was all there was too me, no superpowers, or blue body condom." He dug at his chili with his spoon, moving around the beans like he was digging a hole.

"That was never a bad thing," Sam said over the noise of the cartoon, he set the bowl of chili in his lap as Dean stared up at him from his bowl.

"Dean, the only reason that Superman was cool to me, was because I thought he was you."

Dean's mouth closed in silence around the words that stopped in his throat. He stated into the blood shot eyes of his brother across the distance between them.

And Sam stared back.

xxxxxXxxxxx

End

The Laelaps is a female mythological Greek Dog; a telling of the Legend states it was given as gift to a woman named Procris by Artemis, Greek Goddess of the Hunt, and that the Laelaps was always destined to catch its prey. There is only one Laelaps in Greek Mythology, but I took liberties with the rest of the mythology to fit the story.

Hope you liked it.

R/R please

Mystic