Assuming that the writhing mass of bodies on the far side of the triclinium included his son, John crossed the room in two long-legged strides, launching himself onto the table with the third.
Across the room Dean's jugular vein popped like a ripe grape beneath the vampire's fangs, flooding the creature's mouth with tainted blood. The monster bellowed in rage, hurling the insensate hunter across the room to collide brutally with the edge of a thick wooden door. The young man's body dropped to the ground, boneless.
John whirled in time to see an enormous creature exiting the room, and the deafening roar of a shotgun blast added to the bedlam.
"Dean!" His expression was agonized as his head swiveled from his son to the still-living monsters within his sight and back again. An inarticulate cry of sheer torment was torn from his soul as he returned to his self-appointed task of permanently incapacitating the fanged threats to humanity spread out around the room.
When each blood-sucker had been decapitated and no longer capable of posing any danger to a distracted human, John stumbled over the collected bodies, falling to his knees and crawling across the floor to reach the nearly motionless form of his son.
He's breathing, and fresh tears cleared twin paths down the father's blood-streaked face.
"Dean." He lowered his cheek to the floor, reaching for the pulse in his son's neck, feeling the boy's panted breaths - too short, too fast - on his skin. "I'm gonna look you over, okay? Just hang on."
The pulse he sought was thick with congealed blood, and John retrieved a handkerchief from his hip pocket, securing it efficiently around the wound. Lucky the damned thing missed his jugular - or worse, his carotid artery. As if the place weren't already a fuckin' bloodbath.
And suddenly the room became a battlefield
...The screaming and gunfire are incessant, and he ducks low over the man he hopes to save
...a soldier whose fatigues are so covered in blood that the reluctant medic doesn't know where to start
...and for a moment the horror and helplessness break through the rugged shell of the United States Marine
...and the soft young man inside shatters apart
...until a voice reaches out to him - "Winchester! What do you need?"
...and he sees hands reaching, competent hands holding bandages and morphine, and he realizes that they are his own,
...and he does know what to do after all
"Dean." His voice was sure now, a solid anchor in the present chaos. His hands moved with confidence borne of experience, assessing, triaging. There was little blood to be found, but the obvious respiratory distress spoke to the gravity of his son's situation, and he cupped the boy's face in his palms. "Dean. Wake up, buddy. We gotta get you outta here, and I'm afraid to try to carry you." He patted one flaccid cheek, first gently, then harder. "C'mon, Dean. Gotta go!"
He felt the low moan vibrating in his palm before it turned into a muted cough. Tears pricked his eyes as Dean's face contorted, relief at his son's burgeoning consciousness loosening the coil of fear in his own chest.
"Dad," he panted, then: "Hur's."
"I know, buddy, I know. We gotta get you out of here. How bad are you hurt?"
"Don'. -. know." Each word was propelled by a single breath. "Breath'n. -. hur's."
"Breathing hurts? Hurts where?"
Dean's right arm moved, sliding over to cover his side where it had struck the edge of the open door.
"Lemme see." John carefully removed his son's hand, pushed the canvas of his jacket aside, then gently eased the cotton of his shirt up. He palpated gently, wincing at Dean's sharp cry. "Sorry, sorry. Broken, but it doesn't feel like there's air under the skin. Lung's probably ok." Except I've seen Dean with broken ribs before, and he didn't pant like this. Pulmonary contusions? Don't usually develop this fast, unless he hit harder than I thought. "Does it hurt to breath, or is it hard to breath?"
Dean had been on this end of his father's professionalism before, and he knew why John was asking, what the distinction meant. "Hur's. Locks. -. up."
John nodded his understanding. Still bad, but maybe not life-threatening-in-the-next-ten-minutes bad. "You got something sticking through you somewhere?"
"Do'n. -. know." He grimaced, tears wrung from clenched eyelids. "Back -" The word was a pained grunt.
"Hang on. I'll take a look." Leaning over, he had a moment to feel grateful that his son had fallen onto his side, offering John a chance to examine both sides of the injured man's torso without turning him.
He started by running his palm carefully over the wrinkled canvas of Dean's jacket. Finding neither blood, impaling objects, nor tears in the fabric, he set about removing the garment, pulling the sleeve off of the right arm with infinite care. The t-shirt beneath was equally unblemished, and John felt the pressure in his own chest ease. "Gonna lift your shirt a little, okay?"
He hopped nimbly over the recumbent man's legs before gently easing the soft cotton up, baring the side of Dean's torso from waistband to shoulder blade.
Jesus. When did he get so damned thin?
His son's ribs stood out starkly, skin stretched tight over bone with little obscuring flesh between, and pain at the realization of Dean's silent suffering hit him hard, followed closely by shame at his failure to protect the boy from whatever internal hell was literally consuming him.
He shook his head. Now's not the time. Focus, damnit.
A band of discoloration curled around Dean's side, extending over his back. There was something not right about the shape of his spine within that band, and John felt his own breathing quicken. "Dean. Move your foot."
The response was immediate, and John blew out a breath. "Hang on. Something doesn't look right. I'm gonna palpate, but I'll be as careful as I can, okay?"
"'Kay."
John closed his eyes, drawing his focus to what his fingers were telling him as they ghosted over the odd protuberances. "Dislocated for sure, maybe broken." He allowed his fingers to cross the ridge of spinous processes, inspecting the other side. "Here, too." Shit.
He climbed back over Dean's denim-clad limbs, stretching out on his side until they were face to face. "Hey, kiddo. You in there?" He raked his fingers through the hair at Dean's temple, and was rewarded with the sight of two bloodshot green orbs blinking slowly as they struggled to focus on him. "Hey. There you are." He smiled, the tenderness he felt nearly overwhelming him. "Broken, bruised, and dislocated, but I don't think there's anything that's gonna kill ya, okay?"
Dean nodded, a short, stiff motion that did nothing to disrupt the choppy pattern of his breathing.
"We need to get you out of here, but I don't think I can carry you without hurting you." He looked around, a thought having just occurred to him. "Maybe if I got you lying on your side on a litter -"
"I. -. can. -. walk." He started to push up, left arm taking his weight as his right curled in protectively against his damaged side, then changed his mind, drawing his right knee up and rolling onto it. He bent his other leg in, then paused there, shaking, sweating, and fighting nausea.
John returned to his son's less damaged side. "Let me know when you're ready."
In response Dean's abdomen convulsed, fingers digging into the antique rug beneath him as his jaw stretched, black liquid mixed with bile dripping to the floor.
He shuddered there, struggling for control, and John knelt beside him, aching for his son.
The trembling eased, and Dean pushed back, balancing on spread fingers and the balls of his feet. "Rea. -. dy."
John slid his shoulder into the cup of his son's armpit, arm draping around him to provide a solid support against the boy's shoulder blades while gripping the handle provided by a well-developed latissimus muscle. Dean draped his left arm over his father's shoulders, and John tethered his wrist securely.
"Up?"
At Dean's nod, John rose in a slow, fluid motion, bringing his son with him.
They stood while Dean fought for equilibrium, his body wet and hot where it touched John's, the trembling constant.
When the tension had eased somewhat in the tortured hunter's frame, John rubbed the wrist he held. "You ready to blow this joint?"
"Yeah."
John grimaced. "Wait. You don't happen to know where the keys to the elevator are, do you? I had to kick through some drywall to get to the stairs. Idiot at the front desk told me this place didn't have a basement."
"Vamp. -. by. -. chair."
The pair shuffled over, stopping above Antonio's decapitated form. "This one?"
Dean nodded. "An. .- ton. -. 'o."
"Not anymore." He released the wrist he'd been holding to place the boy's palm on the top of the chair back. "Can you hold yourself up for a minute?"
"Yeah."
John dropped to his knees, reaching for the body.
"Coat," Dean directed. "Right."
John plucked the keys from the deceased vampire's pocket, not at all surprised that his son had paid attention to where the creature stashed the things when they had exited the elevator.
He resumed his duty as his son's human crutch. "Alright. Time to go."
He traded the keys for his phone, appreciating the reassuring weight in his own coat pocket as he dialed a familiar number.
"Bobby? Dean could use some help."