Disclaimer: Supernatural and its characters are Kripke's brainchild. I make no claims to the contrary.
"Oh, shit."
The words tumbled from his lips before he could stop them. The denim was shredded from just below Sam's hip all the way down to his ankle, stained completely purple by an alarming amount of blood. Sam strained forward a bit, trying to get a look, but Dean automatically put a hand to his chest to push him back down.
"No, no, no, no. Stay down, Sammy. Stay still."
Sam shuddered in mixed pain and panic as Dean slotted the end of the flashlight into his mouth. With both hands, he tore one of the gashes in the denim all the way open so that he could see the damage to the limb underneath. His stomach dropped another inch as he uncovered four long lacerations beginning in the meat of Sam's thigh and ending at the top edge of his boot. Without hesitation, Dean sat up and started unbuckling his own belt to use as a tourniquet as he raked his eyes over the wounds, trying to discern where the worst of the blood was coming from.
"H-how bad?" Sam stuttered out, his entire frame shaking.
Dean growled at nothing in particular as he pulled the flashlight from his mouth again and brought it closer to the wounds. They were ugly. The edges were puckered up, gaping a half-inch apart in some places. Blood streamed steadily onto the denim and dirt below as he prepared to wrap his belt around Sam's thigh, but as he continued to search for the worst source of the blood, he realized that he couldn't find one and stilled.
"Dean!" Sam panted, his voice a half-octave too high. "How bad?"
"Just hold on a second, Sam, let me look."
He readjusted his grip on the flashlight and leaned in closer. The wounds were positioned toward the outside of Sam's leg, rather than the inside where the femoral artery ran; and while blood welled up steadily in the gashes, running in rivulets over Sam's leg and soaking into the fabric below, there was no great spurt or fountain of blood indicative of a life-threatening bleed. Life or limb, Dad had always said about using a tourniquet, and if he didn't absolutely have to use one, he damn well wasn't going to.
With one final sweep of the flashlight, Dean concluded that while the amount of blood was alarming at first, he could already see the wounds beginning to clot. They were deep, no doubt, but Sam wasn't going to bleed out. He leaned back on his heels with a huff of relief. Or maybe it was disbelief. He couldn't tell. The vapor of his breath rolled out over Sam's quivering form as he tried to will the panic away.
"Alright," he breathed, trying to reassure himself as much as he was his brother, "alright, it's not too bad. Nothing that can't be fixed." He raised his eyes to Sam's face, leaning forward again to look him directly in the eyes, hoping that the secondhand glow from the flashlight would illuminate his face enough that Sam could tell he was serious. "You're gonna be just fine, alright Sammy?"
Sam's brow furrowed as he searched Dean's face for the lie. And really, Dean couldn't say that he blamed him. How many times in their lives had Dean said "Everything's gonna be just fine," even when he didn't believe it? Even when everything was going to shit, and Dean was freaking the fuck out because he knew he was lying? And yet, he always said it anyway. Hell, not six months ago, he'd knelt in the mud in front of Sam, hands cradling his face, blood streaming from the knife wound in Sam's back, and he'd lied straight to Sam's dying face. He'd told him, "It's not even that bad," and "We're gonna patch you up," and "You'll be good as new."
So he wanted Sam to see his face, see the conviction in his eyes, when he told him this time.
"Listen to me, it's not that bad. I'm sure it hurts like a bitch, but it's clotting up already. You're gonna be fine. Some stitches, some down time, and you'll be right back in the field again."
Sam's winced and grunted in pain as he shifted, his grip on his right shoulder tightening, but his eye contact matched Dean's in intensity as the words sank in. Slowly, the raw panic lessened in his eyes, and he let out a huff of acceptance and nodded his head once before letting it fall back to the ground with a hiss of pain.
"Not gonna lie to you, this ain't gonna be a fun," Dean conceded as he lowered his attention to Sam's leg again, trying to position his hands over the deepest parts of the wounds. "You're gonna be feeling this one for a while, but we'll get you some of the good stuff at the hospital."
He leaned his weight onto his hands, pushing on the wounds as hard as he could to help them clot faster. Sam jerked violently under beneath him, and what started off as a word choked off into a shout of pain.
"Breathe, Sammy," Dean tried to soothe his brother, but Sam wasn't having any of it.
"Nuhh-aaagh!" Sam tried again as he threw himself forward, his good arm scrabbling toward Dean's. Reluctantly, Dean was forced to let one of his hands up to catch Sam's arm as he flailed.
"Sam! Damn it—calm down!" Dean leaned further into Sam's arm, trying to wrestle him back down to the ground.
"Nuh—no!" Sam choked out as he fixed Dean with an urgent, wide-eyed expression. "No hospitals!"
Dean froze in place, left hand pressing down into Sam's leg, right hand gripping Sam's wrist. "Sammy—"
"No hospitals, Dean!" Sam growled through the pain. "The FBI—argh!—the FBI are still on our asses!"
Okay, so Dean hadn't thought about that.
Fuck.
Dean eyes flicked down to Sam's mangled leg again. Sam's logic was perfectly valid, but it still warred against his brotherly instincts to get him medical attention. In his head, he started to walk through everything they would need. Thinking over the supplies they had. Trying to gauge whether they could get away with a motel patch-up job. The number of stitches alone...
Fuck.
"Sam, I don't know if I can take care of this by myself," Dean admitted, eyes lingering a moment longer on the damage before he tore his eyes away and looked at Sam's face again.
Sam growled lowly in frustration. "Then call Bobby," he ground out around the pain. "We're supposed to—to be on our—our way there—anyway."
Fuck Sam and his stupid fucking logic.
Fuck.
Of course, he wasn't actually mad at Sam, and he knew it. He was mad that, for the second time in as many minutes, his injured, bleeding, pain-addled little brother had managed to beat him to a logical thought.
What the hell was wrong with his head tonight?
He was almost positive that he hadn't said any of that aloud, but as he pulled his phone from his jacket pocket, he could have sworn his brother was smirking at him.
Or it might have been a grimace of pain.
Yeah, probably that.
But the thought had already taken root in his head and woken his competitive side. The last fingerprints of his panic were smothered by a wave of annoyance. Sam was being his normal, self-righteous, stubborn self, which was infuriating enough; but worse still was the knowledge that even if Sam was two seconds from death, he'd be a pain in the ass about this anyway. Whether the smirk had been real or imagined didn't really matter, because Sam was digging in his heels, consequences be damned.
Well, fine, Dean thought bitterly as Bobby answered the phone. Two can play that game.
"Yeah?"
"Bobby, it's me."
"Dean," Bobby acknowledged. "You boys on your way?"
Dean's voice went to that high, deliberating tone he used when he wanted to contradict someone and be a dick at the same time. "Ehhh... Sam and I need to settle a little disagreement here first."
Bobby grumbled on the other end of the line. "What're you boys fightin' about this time?"
"Sam's being a stubborn ass—"
Sam growled at Dean from the ground. "Put him on speakerphone, damn it!"
Dean pulled the phone away from his ear to do as Sam requested, held it out for Sam to take, then pressed his free hand into his brother's bleeding thigh again. He hadn't meant anything vindictive by it—he was just trying to stem the flow of blood a little more—but it worked in his favor, as far as the disagreement went. Sam bit down hard on his lip as he tried to stifle a groan, but it was obvious a second later that Bobby had heard it anyway. And just like that, Bobby's tone changed from exasperation to concern.
"Sam? You alright, son?"
"Yeah," Sam huffed tightly as he fought for control of his tone.
Oh, hell no. Dean wasn't going to let him play this down. "Sam got himself torn up pretty good by this thing we were hunting, and now he's refusing to let me take him to the hospital."
Sam growled again. "You said yourself that it wasn't that bad!"
"Yeah, and I also said I couldn't handle it by myself, smartass!" Dean snapped back. "Come on, use that fancy college education of yours!"
Somehow, Sam's retort was just as forceful as Dean's, despite the fact that he had to bite it out between pained gasps. "We can't go to the—the hospital, you idiot, or—guh!—or the damn FBI will be there—in about ten seconds to arrest us!"
"Bobby, talk some sense into him, will ya?"
Dean could practically see the hesitation on Bobby's expression when he didn't answer immediately.
Well, fuck. He might not win this argument after all.
"How bad is it?" Bobby asked finally. "And don't either of you think about lying to me, or I'll kick both your asses."
"Dean said—"
"He needs a few hundred stitches, here, Bobby," Dean cut Sam off abruptly, because he really didn't need Sam repeating again how he said he'd be alright. Yes, of course he was going to be alright, but that didn't mean he didn't need a well-stocked medical facility to get the job done. And that was his primary argument in the matter.
"Balls," Bobby swore under his breath. Then Dean heard him repeat his words away from the phone, like he was filling in someone else. Dean realized that Bobby might not have been alone at home when he'd called.
A moment later, a different voice came on the line. "Boys, it's Ellen."
Dean eyebrows shot up in surprise, and he saw the expression mirrored on his brother's face. "Ellen! What're you—"
"We'll do all that later, Dean. Did Bobby hear you right? Sam needs a few hundred stitches?"
"Yeah, I think so."
Dean had no idea why he was suddenly talking to Ellen, but Bobby had let her take the phone without any fuss, so he went along with it. He lifted his hand gently from Sam's leg again to get another look. Sam hissed and squirmed at the pressure change and Dean, feeling suddenly more sympathetic, winced and gave him a brief apologetic look before he picked up the flashlight and shined it down onto Sam's leg again.
"We're looking at about ten feet of lacerations, all told," he explained. "Four long cuts down his leg, thigh to ankle."
"Claw marks?"
"Yep."
"Blood loss?"
"Could be worse, but..." Dean shined the flashlight down at the ground around Sam's leg, looking at the reflective areas on the ground where Sam's blood had seeped in. "If I had to guess, I'd say he's a pint and a half down. Maybe two."
"Sam, sweetie, can you hear me?"
"Yeah," Sam shuddered, "yeah, I'm here."
"Now listen to me, 'cause this is really important," Ellen said, a serious edge in her voice. "You lie to me, and I will kick your ass into next month. Understood?"
Sam swallowed, eyes pinched closed. "Yes, ma'am."
"Good. I need you to tell me, are you feeling light-headed or dizzy at all? And I mean, at all?"
Sam opened his eyes and let them glance around as he gauged himself. "No," he said after a few seconds.
"Nauseous?"
"No."
"Cold?"
Sam huffed out a sardonic laugh, another grimace creasing his face, and Dean translated for him. "It's twenty degrees out here, Ellen. I'd be concerned if he wasn't cold."
"Yeah, I know. My bad," Ellen drawled. "Sam, sweetie?"
Sam's face was still pinched in pain, and his voice betrayed it as he answered. "Yeah?"
"The hospital's got the good painkillers," she said seriously. "They've got anesthetic for those stitches. Hell, they'll probably put you under sedation so you don't feel a thing. Your brother doesn't have any of that, and Bobby doesn't either."
Sam swallowed again and nodded. "I know."
"Best we can do for you is a few shots of whiskey," Ellen warned him. "And we can get some penicillin at any local feed 'n seed, but still, Bobby's place ain't exactly a sterile environment."
In the distance over the line came Bobby's agitated voice. "Hey! You insulting my house-keeping habits?"
"Shut up, old man."
"You callin' me old?"
Dean fought back a chuckle at the brief exchange and tried to meet his brother's eye, but Sam wasn't looking at him. His eyes were closed as he listened. His lips twitched into a weak smirk, but it was quickly lost again under a grimace of pain.
"All I'm saying," Ellen returned to the conversation, "is that you're in for a rough night. So if you're sure you're up for that..." The statement trailed off, leaving the boys to chew on it for a moment before she continued. "How far are y'all from Bobby's?"
"An hour or so," Dean answered. "We were meant to be headed there anyway."
"Alright. Bobby's got a massive stash of sutures here for some damn reason, so if y'all can get here, I can stitch up that leg. But I'm tellin' you, it ain't gonna be pleasant."
Sam huffed from the ground, but Dean already knew that he wasn't going to relent. For a moment, they tried to stare each other down, a silent war between two horribly fucktastic ideas. Dean hated this. He hated all of it, because it was his job to make sure Sam was okay, damn it, and he was failing spectacularly tonight. He hated seeing Sam in pain, and he knew this was going to hurt like a bitch. He hated that he was probably going to be the one holding his brother down while Ellen did her thing. And he hated, hated, the realization that that's what he was shying away from the most. He just didn't want to have to hold Sam down while the stubborn idiot rode out the pain. He'd rather leave that job to the sedatives at the hospital.
"Dean," Sam urged him, "we can't get arrested right now."
Because they couldn't look for a way out of Dean's deal from inside a prison cell. Sam didn't have to say it. He knew that that's what he was thinking about. Dean growled lowly at him in frustration, not just because he wished Sam would drop it, but also because he was starting to realize that he was beat. Bobby hadn't expressly said it, and neither had Ellen, but they hadn't exactly agreed with him, either. As long as Sam wasn't dying, it seemed like they were going to back his decision, whatever it was.
"I hate you," he glared down at Sam.
Sam's mouth twitched again, and he nodded in complete understanding of the I love you behind the words. "I know."
Dean growled again, more loudly this time. "Fine! We'll be there in an hour."
"Alrighty. We'll be waitin' for you." And the phone call ended.
Law of Parsimony: the philosophical or scientific principle, according to which an explanation is made with the fewest possible assumptions.
Also known as Occam's Razor or the Precedence of Simplicity: of two competing theories, the simpler explanation is to be preferred.
