(A/N- Happy New Year, y'all! May we toast 2006 with champagne, yummy snacks, and chapter 12!

Thought of the day: Y'know… whenever I hear that Nickelback song, "Animals"… It makes me think of the Impala, and all the wicked, immodest things Dean has likely done in it.)

Dean wasn't behaving as he should have been. He and Sabine had dragged the newly-killed werewolves into a pile for burning – she'd even refueled the flamethrower and let him do the honors – and instead of being exuberant, he was silent and withdrawn.

"You're worried about Sam, aren't you?" she said as they sat nearby, keeping an eye on the blazing bonfire illuminating the gray dawn. Dean said nothing, but rewarded her with a slight nod. Sabine put an arm around his shoulders – an instinct that had developed after years of soothing hurt or frightened children. What the boy really needed was some confirmation of his brother's current species, but failing that a bit of comforting couldn't hurt.

"We've done what we can," she said gently. "We gave him the only known cure. All we can do now is pray for the best."

Again, Dean didn't reply; just let out a deep breath and stared into the flames. Moments later he spoke.

"He wants me to kill him if he starts to turn," he said hollowly.

"Honey, you won't have to –"

"But what if I do? What if he starts growing fangs and fur tonight? He made me promise that I would kill him rather than let him live as a monster." His voice had begun to shake and, embarrassed, he took a few breaths and fought back the tears burning his eyes.

Helluva time to have an emotional breakdown, you freakin' pussy, he berated himself. The second Sammy really needs you to be tough about something, you melt into Super Wuss.

Dean's inner voice was, admittedly, kind of a bastard.

"I wouldn't be able to do it," Sabine said quietly, giving him a little more time to compose himself before speaking again.

"I don't know if I'll be able to do it. It's what Sam wants, and it's the same thing I'd tell him to do if it was me about to turn into a werewolf, but… God, how am I supposed to put a gun to my brother's head and pull the trigger?" He wiped his eyes violently, despising the moisture that threatened to leak out of them at the thought of doing anything to harm Sammy. He decided to take his mind off of it with some good old-fashioned self-deprecation. "Hell, if I'd been doing my damn job right, he wouldn't even have been bitten."

"You couldn't have stopped it."

"I should have been paying attention! I should have had his back, should have seen the thing coming before it attacked him! But I didn't, and look what happened! It's my responsibility to protect him, and I blew it."

"He's not a baby, Dean –"

"He's my baby brother. And whether he likes it or not, he'll still be little Sammy to me when he's ninety! I mean… assuming I don't have to put a bullet in his brain tonight." He choked on the repressed tears, and covered his face with both hands, ashamed of himself.

Well, so much for taking his mind off it…

At a loss for anything reassuring to say, Sabine just hugged his shoulders, softly humming a Gaelic lullaby that had calmed her daughters on countless occasions. Sure enough, after a few refrains of the melody his breathing became more even, the sniffles few and far between. She smiled to herself. She wasn't sure what gave the song its power, but there are some things in life that should just be appreciated and left unquestioned.

"Sam's your whole world, isn't he?"

Dean made a sound halfway between a harsh laugh and a sob.

"You ever say that kinda thing in public, I'll have to kill you."

Sabine took that as a yes.

The occupants of the McLeod-Harvey household spent the rest of the day as a study in frazzled nerves and anxiety. Sabine cooked nonstop, David was hidden in the living room under a stack of huge books, Kate spent hours in the shooting range, Bryce and Dean played a never-ending game of cheating (for it really didn't deserve to be called poker when they were participating) at the foot of Sam's bed, and Maddy refused to leave his side for any purpose other than to fetch food and drink when it was required.

"I win," Bryce stated for the hundredth time, holding up her cards. Dean grumbled an impressive string of curses under his breath, still really pissed off that anyone could cheat poker better than he could. He only prayed that she never learned to hustle pool.

"Maybe we should try a few rounds without any tricks," he suggested, trying his very hardest to sound sincere. Bryce snorted and rolled her eyes.

"Like I trust you. Now ante up before I punch you."

Dean smirked.

"You should've been a boy, Bryce," he said. "You'd be a good boy." He reluctantly pushed her the chips he owed. "See, nobody expects this kinda stuff from a pretty little girl like you." Bryce beamed, indigo eyes gleaming mischievously.

"Deception is half the battle," she replied, shuffling the deck. Dean couldn't stop himself from laughing.

I want a daughter… Wait, where the hell did that come from?

"Hey guys," Sam said, softly so as not to wake up Maddy, who had long since snuggled up to him and fallen asleep. "The sun's setting."

The quasi-relaxed feeling in the room vanished. Dean could have kicked himself – he hadn't even noticed that the room had been getting darker. How long had Sam held out on telling him?

Sabine, David, and Kate appeared moments later – in his state of panic, Dean hadn't even noticed when Bryce dashed out of the room to get them. His gaze was locked on Sam, who was looking increasingly ill by the second, though his eyes alone betrayed any fear. Oh, this was not good…

Sam was now very aware of why the Oakvale werewolves had opted to just stay in one form; if the waves of nausea and the splitting headache were what always accompanied a shift, he certainly wouldn't have been too keen on switching back and forth, either. Not that he really had a choice at the moment.

His hazy mind briefly noted that everyone had gathered in the room, but they faded in and out like a wavering mirage, and though he heard them talking, everything they said sounded like he was hearing it underwater. A sudden chill at his side told him that Maddy was no longer there. It made him sad. He would miss little Maddy. It had been nice to hold her in his lap and pretend for just a little while that she was his own child – his Julia – a child he could never have.

Sharp pain shot through his body as his organs shifted – he might have screamed. He didn't know.

Images flashed into his head. Images of chasing, hunting, ripping into living creatures with his teeth and feeling the blood spurt into his mouth. He knew it should have felt glorious. He should have felt powerful; invincible; ravenous. But he felt…

Nothing.

The pain had stopped. His stomach had settled. His head had cleared. He raised what should have been a wickedly-clawed paw, and saw a hand in its stead. He looked up and saw David, Sabine, and Dean looking at him warily. Dean hadn't even pulled out his gun. Bastard never listened to a damn word…

"Hey," Sam mumbled, suddenly exhausted, "is it weird that I have a huge craving for red meat right now?"

A wave of relief hit Dean, and before he could even think about it he found himself hugging – actually hugging – his little brother. To his credit, the second he realized what he was doing he let go of Sam as though he were poisonous and hung back slightly with a cough of embarrassment, but the damage was done.

Sabine had no such self-consciousness. The woman had burst into tears of joy, and proceeded to hug Sam to the point where Dean thought his eyes might actually pop – and without even touching his wounded shoulder, which just… must have been a woman thing.

"You want red meat, you got it!" she wept. "I must've cooked something along those lines… You know what, if I didn't, it doesn't matter. Whatever you want, sweetheart, I'll make it right away! Can't let you be hungry after all that!" Sabine swept out of the room, all the while reciting to herself a list of the things she'd cooked over the course of the day.

David didn't speak – or maybe didn't trust himself to, if the redness around his eyes was any indication. He clasped Sam's hand, flashed a small smile, and followed his wife from the room. Moments later, a chorus of happy squeals sounded from somewhere below them, and Dean had an oddly vivid mental picture of the Harvey girls jumping up and down in a sort of group hug. Then he snickered a little at the idea of Bryce participating in something so feminine.

Then he locked his eyes on Sam – tired-looking, blessedly human Sam.

"Well. I didn't have to shoot you," he said past the burning at the back of his throat.

"You didn't even have your gun out, Dean," Sam accused. "What if the transformation hadn't stopped?"

"Then we kinda would've been fucked," Dean replied with a huge grin. "Man, I couldn't have fired on you, are you nuts?"

"You promised you'd do it."

"Sam, you've known me long enough to figure out that almost every promise I make is a big, fat lie. Besides, it might've been kinda cool; you could've been my hunting dog."

And then, metaphorically speaking, the dam broke, and Dean had to turn his face away and pretend to be highly interested in the picture on the far wall.

"…Are you crying?"

"No!"

"You are crying!"

"Sammy…"

"You really love me!"

"Shut up, Sammy."

"I love you, too, Dean!"

"Shut up!"

"Can I have a hug?"

"Dammit, Sam!"

"Oh, come on, just a little one?"

"Don't make me hurt you…"

(A/N- Are we ha-a-a-a-a-a-a-appy now? One more chapter after this one, I think. Lucky 13, and all that…)