Never Again

AN: Picture-prompt. Hopefully I can upload that when I upload the story. If not, the picture was from two works from Jensen and Jared in their younger years; Jensen in Devour (movie=bleh) with tears in his eyes as he stands in a hospital, and the other of Jared in a hospital bed intubated (ER I believe is the show it's from). So...this is a teenchester fic. One-shot. Total sappy fluffy whatnot. I apologize.

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The first time Sam ever got hurt on a hunt—hurt enough to rush him to a hospital because it wasn't something Dad could fix—turned out to be the first time Dean had cried since their mother had died. He'd at least been able to hold it back while their dad was still there.

There was an explosion. No one had expected it. Wasn't even part of the gig, after all. But Sam was closest to it, and it sent his fifteen-year-old body into the concrete bunker wall. Specifically, the other wall, dislodged by the explosion, smacked into him and collided with the opposite wall, sandwiching Sam between them for a moment until gravity pulled it to the floor.

Once the realization of what had happened dawned in Dean's head, he'd run across the bunker to get to him, screaming out his name to get some kind of response; some proof that his brother was alive. But Sam hadn't replied. He hadn't made a sound, and Dean's heart was torn between hammering away and stopping altogether as he reached the destroyed end of the bunker, dust trying to settle around the pile of rubble Sam was somewhere in.

Dean couldn't recall any fire. There was no smoke, really, just stuff—pulverized concrete floating back to the ground, and Dean's lungs protested as he began pulling away the heavy blocks. "Sammy!" he called out again. "Sam, talk to me!"

It was hard to hyperventilate and choke on dust at the same time. At the continued silence, Dean could feel tears pricking at his eyes.

"Dean!" John shouted as he came up behind him. "Where's your brother?"

"I can't find him," Dean sucked up the tears and the fear and kept working through the debris. "Shit! Sammy!" he cried out when the dust cleared enough to reveal Sam's motionless body in front of him.

"He okay?" John asked loudly as he kept his shotgun aimed behind them, keeping watch for the ghost they'd come to hunt.

"He's got a pulse, but Dad, he's not breathin' too well," Dean tried not to sound panicked, but he couldn't stop the shaking in his voice. "We gotta get him to a hospital!"

"Sonofabitch," John said through clenched teeth. Dean couldn't tell whether their dad was pissed or scared, but he didn't have time to care about that right then. "Can you get 'im to the car?" he asked, turning his head to look at him.

"What?"

"Well he can't get there himself, and I need to finish this."

"Dad, you can't stay here alone!"

"We've got one hour, Dean! One hour till this bastard stows away for another year. You wanna have the next victims' blood on your hands for waiting?"

"You could be the next damn victim!" Dean shot back.

"I can take care of this. Get your brother to the hospital. It's five miles south of here, remember?"

"Goddamnit!"

"Go, Dean! Now!" John ordered. He knew his oldest son was worried, knew he wanted him to come with them to the hospital more than he wanted the ghost dealt with, and tried not to make matters worse—let alone waste precious time—arguing with him about back-talking his father...

Dean had gotten Sam to the car, praying to whatever deity might be listening that he wasn't breaking Sam by doing so. He'd laid him in the front seat if for no other reason to keep him from flying around the back while Dean drove like a bat out of Hell to the hospital. Sam hadn't woken up. Not even for a second. He'd never made a sound.

Dean had the thought to call the hospital ahead to have a gurney or whatever ready when he pulled up to the ER doors. So when his tires screeched into the driveway, he could see them all out there, the crash cart and everything, and his fear kicked up another impossible notch.

They didn't even wait for him to be in park before they were pulling the door open and grabbing his baby brother out of the car and up onto the bed. Shaking, Dean had cut the engine and got out, watching as one of the technicians began intubating Sam. He nearly tripped over his own feet as he hurried around the car toward them.

"Is he gonna be okay?" he asked, voice still shaking.

"You said there was an explosion?" one of the nurses asked.

"He got thrown into a wall...I didn't see it, but I heard it and... The other wall, it was...it had to have crushed him, and I..."

"He hasn't regained consciousness at all?"

"No," Dean shook his head. "What's that mean? Is he gonna be okay?"

"We're gonna do whatever we can for him," she replied. Dean watched anxiously as they began quickly wheeling Sam away, one of the nurses squeezing the air bag connected to the tube coming from Sam's mouth.

"Did he stop...stop breathing?" Dean asked, voice cracking.

"Just a precaution, I'm sure," she replied...

Now...now it'd been hours since he'd heard anything. They'd taken Sam for a CT, x-rays, the works. Dad wasn't answering his phone. Dean was alone. The panic and fear made him feel like throwing up, and he'd about worn a hole in the floor pacing. He decided to call Bobby, if for nothing more than to talk to someone else in the world that knew Sam.

"Hey, Dean," Bobby greeted on the other end. "Havin' trouble with that spirit?"

"I...I dunno," Dean replied quietly. Bobby must've detected something in his voice because-

"Oh Hell, what happened? Who's hurt?"

"It's Sammy," Dean's voice cracked.

"Where's your father at?"

"He's...he's on the job, Bobby. Couldn't leave till it was done, so I brought Sam to the hospital."

"How bad is he hurt? You need me to come?"

"No I...I dunno. I have no idea. They won't tell me anything. He hasn't woken up and I dunno what's going on..."

"Son, now take a breath," Bobby tried to calm him. "It's gonna be okay, ya hear? I'll come down."

"It'd take a day for you to get here," Dean said, shaking his head even though Bobby couldn't damn well see it. "We'll be long gone from here by then, 'cause Sam's fine. He's gonna be fine and we're gonna be outta here and...and it'd be a wasted trip, I'm tellin' you. Sam's gonna be okay. No need for you to come out here..."

"You tryin' to convince me or yourself?" Dean closed his mouth. "Facts are, you're there alone and your dad's out workin'. Who knows how long it'll be. He might've ended up getting' pulled straight into another gig."

"He wouldn't go," Dean cut in, shaking his head again. "Not with Sam in the hospital. Not without calling."

"It's happened before, Dean. And you said so yourself, you've got no idea how bad off Sam is. Someone should be there for you in case..."

Dean didn't comprehend anything Bobby said after that. Instead, a sharp, heavy, invisible foot was pressing into—or out of, he couldn't tell—his chest. A million thought were running around in his head at once, all of them revolving around Sam not making it through this. Everything inside of him suddenly hurt like it was being wrung out.

" Jesus H, Dean, breathe!" he heard Bobby shout, and it made him realize that he was hyperventilating again. For the sake of not looking like a baby in front of Bobby, he forced it all down. "I didn't mean to imply Sam isn't okay," Bobby told him. "I just meant...you know. Point was supposed to be, you boys might be laid up a while regardless. You might actually need me around, 's much as you'd rather deny it."

Dean thought about it for a long moment, considered how his father hadn't bothered to answer the phone and still hadn't called back. "What if...what if he's okay and you're half way here?" Dean asked quietly.

"Then I reckon you oughta stay put in town so's I can at least say howdy in person," Bobby replied.

Dean swallowed against an ache in his throat, some swell of relief that someone was at least trying to get there. The stinging in his eyes was back. "Yeah...yeah okay," he said finally.

"I'll get there quick as I can. You call me if anything changes, ya hear?"

"Yes, sir."

"Hang in there, kiddo."

Dean ended the call and shoved the phone back into his pocket just as a nurse was heading in his direction.

"Are you the one here with Sam Smith?" she asked him.

"He's my brother," Dean replied with a hopeful nod. "Is Sammy okay?"

"He's still unconscious," she told him. "I was told to bring you back. The neurologist will speak with you shortly."

She led Dean into the ICU, right up to Sam's current room. "I know it might look bad," he heard her say, "But he's stable." Then she was gone, leaving Dean to stand there staring through the glass window that separated him from his brother.

Sam was still motionless, still intubated and looking kinda pale, unless it was just Dean's imagination or the lighting in the room. It was the stillness, though, that scared Dean the most. It looked nothing like when his little brother was sleeping; when he was sprawled out, limbs everywhere and head barely on the pillow anymore. No. This was different. This was Sam hurt. Bad.

The tears started pricking at the backs of Dean's eyes again, and once again he had to reign it in because the neurologist was suddenly right there beside him.

"You must be Sam's brother," she said as she approached, a sympathetic smile on her face as she held out her hand.

"Dean," he replied, taking her hand to shake it.

"I'm Dr. Adler, your brother's neurologist for his stay. I just wanted to go over a few things with you, let you know what's going on with Sam. You said he was standing close to some kind of blast, am I right?"

"Yeah," he replied.

"Well I spoke with the other doctors who've been monitoring his test results. He has three broken ribs and several more at least badly bruised. There was an impressive gash on the back of his head, but no fracture. His left knee was dislocated when you brought him in, but there was no break. His left arm, however, specifically the radius bone was broken. I'm guessing most of the impact to his body happened after he was knocked out," she told him. "A lot of the bruising starting to show up now indicates several points of contact where he could've broken a lot more than what he did. Aside from a severe concussion, there is nothing physiologically wrong with his brain," she told him.

"If that's true," he replied, voice almost cracking with the relief brought from the statement, but still skeptical, "Then why hasn't he woken up?"

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about," she replied. "We had him sedated for the MRI and CT, and to set his arm...basically to keep him comfortable. But we've since stopped that. According to the scans, there's nothing that should be keeping him in this coma-like state. His nutrition levels look normal. There's no noticeable damage or bleeding inside the brain."

"I...I don't understand," Dean said, shaking his head as if to clear it. "He's just...not waking up? And you have no idea why?"

Adler's expression changed to that of sympathetic understanding. "My advice is to just give him a little more time. There's nothing to suggest that this would be permanent. He could wake up any time."

"And when he does...he'll be fine, right?"

"That...I can't guarantee," she replied with a grimace, knowing it wasn't what he needed to hear. "With a trauma like this, the concussion he received when he slammed into that wall, there's honestly no way to be able to tell if there's something wrong until he wakes up."

Dean looked back through the glass at his brother, new worry aching in his chest, too soon from the recent and small amount of relief. "You can go in there if you want," she told him. "We won't ask you to leave if you want to stay with him."

Dean was inside the room before she was finished with the sentence. The closer he got to Sam, the more impossible it was to hold back the tears. His Sam. His baby brother. His responsibility; the one he was supposed to keep safe. The possibility of something being permanently wrong with the kid was tearing at Dean's heart like nothing he'd ever felt before.

"Wake up, Sam," he said quietly. Maybe if he believed hard enough... "Sammy, wake up," he said more sternly. But Sam didn't move; didn't even flinch. His eyes were wet now, he could feel the tears pooling, see his vision swimming with them, and he didn't give a damn who might see it now.

Dean stepped closer to the bed, taking a breath in. "Sammy, please," he said, almost whispering now. His chin quivered almost imperceptibly as he carefully laid a hand on his brother's arm. "Please wake up. I swear to god I'll do your laundry for a week." No response. "I...I'll take you to see your friends from that last school you liked so much. I swear it. I'll drive you there and we'll stay a whole weekend. Hell, we'll stay till your arm heals up, okay? I swear I'll make Dad let us stay..."

And that's when he lost it. The tears made their way down his cheeks as his breath hiccuped, spasmed really without his control. But he kept as quiet as he could. He sobbed in whispers as he held onto Sam's arm and sunk down in the chair beside the bed. If Sam came out of this okay, no matter what, Dean would never see him like this again; he'd never let anything hurt his Sammy ever again...

Suddenly the heart monitor was beeping, and he felt Sam's arm move under his hand. Dean's heart jumped up in his throat as he shot back up to stand and look down at his brother. "Sammy?" Sam's eyes shot open and he looked to be in a panic as he sought out Dean's face. "Sam, calm down, okay? You're okay! Nurse!" Dean yelled after turning his head to the side, then he looked back down to Sam, moving his hand down Sam's arm until he could grasp onto Sam's hand instead. "You're in the hospital, buddy, okay? There's a tube in your throat, but they're gonna come take it out. You're okay. You hear me? But you gotta calm down. Can you do that for me?" Sam squeezed his hand, though the fear was still present in his eyes. Dean forced himself to smile and keep eye contact with him. "You're doin' great."

Then there were nurses all around them asking questions, making sure Sam wanted the tube out (which honestly was a stupid question, in Dean's book), and removing the tube. Sam gagged and coughed once it was out, then took a deep breath in. It was that moment that Dean felt the weight drop off of his chest.

He took advantage of that chaos and wiped the evidence of tears from his face. They gave Sam a little water before putting an oxygen mask over his face, helping him to calm down and catch his breath before the began asking him questions Dean knew were standard for checking to see how badly the concussion affected his brain. Thank god they only asked for his first name. Sam answered everything correctly, and Dean let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

Soon enough, the room cleared, and it was just the two of them again. Dean just stood there watching his brother as if he would spontaneously combust.

"Dean?" Sam's slightly rough voice shook Dean from his jumbled thoughts. "Wha' really happened?" he asked, voice slightly slurred from whatever pain meds they had him on.

What really happened? Oh...When the nurses had asked him if he remembered the explosion, Sam had simply agreed as trained; back-stories were important in ERs. "No really," Dean told him with a breathy laugh. "There was an explosion and you were right there in the next room.

Sam's brows pinched, his eyes flitting back and forth in the air between them. "In th' museum?" he questioned.

"Yeah. No idea what it was, but there wasn't any fire, so..."

"Where's Dad?" Sam asked, suddenly pushing up as if he would try and get out of bed.

"Whoa, hang on, little bro!" Dean pushed him back down. "Dad stayed to finish the job before the timer could run out. It's all good."

"'s he mad?"

"What?" Dean shook his head at Sam's guilty look. "Dad's not mad. Why would he be mad?"

"I got hurt."

"That wasn't on you, Sam."

"But we lef' 'im out there 'lone!"

"It was just a spirit. Dad handled it fine, I'm sure."

"You're... You haven't heard from him?" Sam asked quietly.

"I'm sure he's been busy covering our tracks." His cell started to vibrate in his pocket and he pulled it out in a hurry, suddenly remembering Bobby was on his way. But the caller ID showed a payphone calling. "Hang on a sec," he told Sam before putting the phone to his ear. "Who is this?" he asked in a low voice.

"It's your Dad," John's voice sounded on the other line, and Dean was relieved. Part of him worried something had happened to him, but he'd been too focused on Sam to let himself think about it too much. "How's Sammy?"

"He's banged up, but he's gonna be okay," he replied. "Dad, where've you been? It's been hours."

"Cops came sniffing around while the bones were still burning," he explained. "I had to hide out for a while. Lost my damn phone somewhere, so I couldn't call you. Went back for our stuff once they took off. Now I'm waiting on a cab to bring me there."

"You dropped your phone in the grave, didn't you," Dean said with a smirk.

"Don't act like you've never done something like that, Dean."

"I knew it," he smiled.

"I'll be there soon. Can you get him outta there in twenty? I'll have the car ready."

"Good to know you didn't drop the spare key in there, too."

"You're only getting slack on that mouth because you've had a rough night, son," he replied more sternly.

"Sorry, sir," Dean replied, smile gone from his face. "I'll have him ready in twenty." He ended the call.

"Dad's gonna be a bear," Sam said, eyes goofy and nearly crossing, and Dean turned to look at him. "He's always pissed when he busts his phone."

"I think he'll lay off this time," Dean told him. "You're gonna be laid up a while, so he's just gonna have to chill."

"I'm fine!" Sam claimed, trying to sit up again, to no avail as Dean held him back down.

"You're knee is gonna hurt like hell for a while, you broke your arm and three ribs, and you have a severe concussion, dumbass. You're not gonna be fine for at least six weeks, and even then..."

"Dad's gonna be pissed," Sam repeated, this time with tears in his eyes.

"He's not gonna be pissed!"

"It's the whole rest of the summer. I'm laid up until school starts. He's gonna dump me at Bobby's an' take you halfway 'cross the country and leave me alo-"

"I'm not leaving you, Sam," Dean said sternly, stopping Sam mid-freakout. "I'm staying with you."

"But Dad..."

"I don't care what Dad says about it. Not this time. I'm stayin' with you. If you wanna hole up at Bobby's, then I'll hole up at Bobby's with you. I thought you'd wanna go see your little friends back in Arkansas, but-"

"You'll really stay with me?" Sam interjected. "Even if Dad gets pissed?"

Dean looked at him for a long moment. He didn't know how to convey how the past several hours of his life had been; how messed up the inside of his head was when he didn't know what was gonna happen to Sam. He didn't know how to say he wasn't gonna let him out of his sight for a good long time, without sounding like a freak about it. He couldn't tell him how much Sam had scared him; he needed to be the big, brave brother Sam expected him to be. He just needed to tell him that he'd be there for him.

"I'm not gonna leave you, Sammy," he settled on. For a moment, in silence, he pressed Sam's banged back off of his forehead and left his hand there. Sam looked up at him like he used to, like when he was little, before puberty hit and made him all gangly and awkward and moody and internal. He looked up at him like he was his hero again. Dean smiled and let out a breathy laugh. "They wrecked your clothes, man, so we're gonna have to break you outta here in that gown. I'm gonna go gank a decent pain killer supply before we jet," he said before heading toward the door. He looked back at him with a grin. "I hope they at least left your underwear on," he said, then laughed at Sam's flared nostril-donned look of embarrassment. "Be back in five."

He was back in five minutes, and Sam was frantically putting on the remnants of his clothing the best he could manage with one good arm and a bum knee.

"You're gonna bust your damn head open for real this time," Dean said, only half angry as he stalked over to the bed before Sam could fall out of it. "What the hell were you thinkin', huh? We wanna get you outta here, not end you up straight back in ICU." He stood beside the bed to make sure Sam wouldn't fall out, and grabbed for the jeans from the hospital-provided bag. "These things are toast, man," Dean told him as he held them up. They'd been cut up the middle of each leg.

"Great. 'm s'posed to walk outta here in a teeshirt an' boxers?" Sam scoffed.

"And your socks and shoes," Dean grinned and moved toward the foot of the bed.

"I can do it," Sam said.

"Yeah, as much as I'd like to see you try, we've gotta hurry it up," Dean told him, then quickly got to work. "Here's the plan," he began, trying to distract his stubborn brother from his obvious annoyance that Dean needed to be putting his shoes on for him. "I watched a nurse head out a back door to smoke. It's thirty feet up the hall to the left. I parked the car on the side of the building and I'm betting we can see it from that exit. Dad's getting' dropped off via cab, so they'll have to pass us to get to the car. If we time it right, he'll meet us halfway so I don't have to pull my back out carrying your overgrown ass."

"I'm not overgrown," Sam mumbled, tugging his shirt down self-consciously, trying to hide the stretchmarks on his hips from his sudden growth spurt.

"You're as tall as me right now, freak," he said, helping Sam carefully off of the bed. Sam wasn't expecting to be pulled into a hug right then. It'd been a while since he hugged Dean. In fact, Dean seemed a lot bigger the last time he'd hugged him, and it made him feel a little guilty and sad right then and there, because he knew it was his own fault. But this was different, too. He could feel something else, like a vibration. Like Dean was shaking ever so slightly. And Sam's brain started piecing together what might've happened while he was unconscious. As soon as he started to hug Dean back, though, Dean was starting to pull away, clearing his throat as he did so "Keep your weight off that leg," he directed, then went to support Sam's left side. "No don't use your arm, dude," he told him when Sam accidentally hit him with his cast. "I'll hang on to you. Just lean on me instead of using this leg..."

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End

AN: I was gonna keep going, but it felt kinda lame to explain the details of getting to Bobby's (which would've been the end). Hopefully you enjoyed this!