(A/N- Eh heh heh… I love you all.
OMG! I'M GETTING MY CAR PAINTED LAVENDER! WHEE!
Conversation snippet:
Me: (in the car on the way home from the mall) I had fun in the beauty supply store, 'cause they have lots of girly stuff!
Mark: Hearing you say that makes me die inside.
Sorry about the Sammy ouchies… I really do love him… You believe me, right? Right? Anyways, prepare for some kind of unpleasant mental images. Just trust me: I'm cringing right along with you as I type this. Sam really deserves some hugs and cookies after what I'm about to put him through…)
"Sam!"four voices screamed in unison as Sam fell to the ground under the creature's weight. The werewolf shook its massive head like a dog with a chew toy, the imbedded fangs ripping through muscle and tendon to scrape bone. Sam cried out in pain as one powerful jerk of the beast's head yanked his arm out of socket.
He saw the steel toe of Dean's boot nail the werewolf in the snout, followed by a yelp and a gunshot, and in an agony- and shock-induced blur he found himself being hoisted to his feet by his good arm while the other hung limply at his side, dripping blood onto the ground. It took his brain a second to register the words coming from Dean and Sabine's mouths: they were asking how bad the damage was, and whether he could move his arm.
No, he couldn't.
"Shoulder's dislocated," he managed between clenched teeth, refusing to shed the tears stinging his eyes. Crying over someone's death was one thing, but crying out of physical pain was something the Winchester men didn't do. Ever.
Dean managed to snap his brother's arm back into socket on the second try; on the first try, his hand had slipped on the blood, and all he'd done was jar poor Sammy's shoulder even more. Each time Sam had only winced, and Dean was proud of him for that, having had his own shoulder relocated enough times to know that it hurt like a bitch.
Hell, he wouldn't have thought any less of Sam if he'd screamed.
By the time Dean had gotten an increasingly woozy Sam into the house, the kitchen table had been cleared off as an operating space.
"'M gonna bleed all over your table," Sam mumbled in protest as he was laid out on top of it.
"Honey, I can buy a new table," Sabine cooed, brushing the hair out of his eyes and placing a rolled-up towel under his head as a cushion. "We can't get a new Sam."
For some reason, that one sentence seemed to clear all the fog from Sam's mind.
"A werewolf bit me," he said, the would-be calm statement laced with undertones of fear.
"Yes, it did," Sabine replied softly, still stroking his head in a comforting, maternal way as Dean cut what was left of Sam's shirt from his wounded shoulder and David filled a large tub with hot water in the sink.
"I'm gonna turn into one."
"Not necessarily." That comment was made even stranger by the fact that it had come from David's mouth, and everyone else turned his or her head to stare at the physics professor in disbelief as he held up a small vial. "I spoke to one of the old Gypsy healers in town yesterday. She said that if a werewolf bite is cleaned out with silver nitrate right away –" he shook the vial for emphasis "– lycanthropy might not set in."
"You willingly spoke to a Gypsy healer?"
"There's a first time for everything, Sabine," he said, emptying the vial of silver nitrate into the hot water tub and soaking some clean cloths with the mixture. "Now I have to warn you, Sam, she said this wouldn't be very comfortable. 'Like holy water on a demon-inflicted wound' were the exact words, if that means something to you."
From the way Sam's face paled, David gathered that such a description certainly did mean something to him.
"Okay, maybe I'd better hold him down," Dean suggested. Sabine nodded her approval, and went to wash her hands.
"I'm not a toddler getting a shot, Dean," Sam growled, half out of annoyance and half out of repressed pain, although he seriously hoped the annoyance was all Dean picked up on. Somehow he doubted it; Dean wasn't as dumb as he acted.
"You'll always be my toddler, Sammy."
"You suck."
"No way, dude. I'm straight."
"Dean, turn him on his side," Sabine instructed, approaching with a steaming, dripping cloth. Dean obliged, pinning Sam to the table as gently as possible in the awkward position.
"Comfy?"
"No."
"Tough luck."
Sabine squeezed out the cloth over the bite, and Sam gritted his teeth as the wound sizzled and smoked, feeling like the flesh was being melted away by acid – but he didn't move. And after a few more cloth-fulls of Sam proving that he could hold perfectly still on his own, Dean stopped holding him down, and instead took up the position Sabine had been in earlier, almost glad that Sammy was in too much pain to care that his big brother was cradling his head and murmuring to him that it was okay; that it would be done soon.
Blood washed away, Dean, David, and Sabine surveyed the damage to Sam's shoulder. Flaps of skin hung loose, and the entire area was already starting to bruise terribly, but it could have been so much worse. The werewolf had managed to yank Sam's arm out of the socket in less than a second – any longer and the arm probably would have been ripped clear off.
"Alright, honey, we're going to have to sew you up," Sabine said gently, putting down the blood-soaked cloth in favor of some sutures. "David's going to give you a tranquilizer, and when you wake up –"
"You'll make me brownies?" Sam asked weakly. Sabine's eyes teared up, and he wasn't sure exactly why.
"Sam, I will make you as many brownies as your little heart desires," she promised with a sniffle.
The first thing Sam noticed when he regained consciousness was that, from his neck to halfway down his ribcage, everything on the left side of his body ached. He'd been moved into his bed, though, so at least he was comfortable while in pain – if that made any sense at all. The second thing that caught his attention…
"Dean? Can I have my arm back?"
He watched in mild amusement as Dean jolted awake and relinquished the arm he'd been using as a pillow. Sam wondered how long Dean had been there, right beside the bed waiting for him to wake up. The thought warmed his heart, and he held back a smile.
"How long you been awake?" Dean muttered sleepily, raking a hand through his tousled hair.
"Long enough to hope you weren't drooling on my arm."
"Oh, very funny, Sammy," he yawned. "You feeling okay?"
"I feel like I got hit by a truck, actually," Sam admitted. Dean gave him a lopsided smile.
"Werewolves are some nasty sons of bitches, dude. Be glad you're still in one piece. And," he added, reaching over to the nightstand and grabbing a plate which he proceeded to wave under Sam's nose, "be glad that Sabine takes her patients' comfort very seriously."
"Brownies?" Sam nearly swooned at the smell.
"Lots and lots of brownies," Dean confirmed. "I told you. She's a goddess."
Sam happily munched on a brownie, not bothering to remind Dean that just a few hours ago – how long had be been asleep, exactly? – he had been cursing up a storm at Sabine. Fact of the matter was that Dean had likely forgiven Sabine all her trespasses three seconds after his tirade had ended. Dean never was the kind of guy who could hold a grudge; he could only stay mad at someone for any length of time if he constantly reminded himself what they'd done to deserve his wrath.
"Did you know she's a midwife?" Dean continued, eyes glazing over with adoration.
"No." You're back in safe territory, Sabine: he worships you again.
"Turns out the nearest real hospital is, like, a two hour drive away, so the people in Oakvale have just sorta figured out how to do most of their medical stuff on their own." He grinned. "It's kinda cool for Kate and Bryce and Maddy, you know? I mean, their mom can deliver their babies."
Sam didn't really see why that could be considered "cool", but he was too tired to really care, and he had more important things on his mind. Things like the aching wound on his left shoulder that may or may not have condemned him to grow a fur coat.
"Hey, Dean?" he said, trying to word this as carefully as possible. "Speaking of Oakvale's medical systems and all… we're not really a hundred percent on whether the silver nitrate's gonna work, right?"
"…No."
"And… there's a chance that I'm going to turn into a – a werewolf."
"Yeah… I guess so," Dean said slowly, fixing Sam with a suspicious look. Sam sighed, knowing that Dean wasn't going to like what he was about to say.
"Look, I don't want to be one of those… things, and tomorrow night's the full moon, and… Dean, if I start to turn, I want you to kill me."
"What? Fuck no!"
"It's either that, or have me turn into the very thing we hunt."
"So what? You'd only have to turn one night a month, Sam, it's not worth killing you!"
"I wouldn't be the same person, you know that. I mean, come on, Remus Lupin isn't exactly a realistic example of a werewolf."
"Who's –?"
"Never mind," Sam said quickly. He should have known that a Harry Potter reference would be lost on Dean, who avoided literature like the Ebola virus. "The point is, I won't be me anymore. I'll be a monster."
"Sammy –"
"Please, Dean. Promise me that if I start sprouting fur tomorrow night, you'll end it for me." Dean's expression went blank, and for a moment Sam almost thought he could see tears in the older man's eyes. But, that potentially emotional moment passed quickly, replaced by clearly written agitation on Dean's face.
"Fine. You want me to put a silver bullet in your head, I'll do it. But we're waiting until we know for sure that there's no chance of you staying human."
"Thank you."
"Shut up," Dean muttered.
(A/N- Hmmm, still no Werewolf/Not Werewolf verdict. Wow…)