I wanted to move the story along because it took me so long to post a second chapter. I'm going to try and get a few more chapters out this week.
As usual, please do review. It means a lot to me and I learn a lot from them.
Stay safe everyone! :)
In an ideal world the journey to Casa Singer's Salvage would have been accomplished in record speed. The impala would be fulfilling her destiny as Winchester home and protection, and Dean would be resting (however fitfully) with the smell of the Impala's leather and the sound of this brother's voice comforting him into whatever peace his scrambled brain would allow. John Winchester did not live in an ideal world, the degrees of imperfection in his life were what had both broken and hardened him and he clung onto the good he had (his family) like a alcoholic clings to the last drink in the bottle.
The journey to Bobby's was actually fraught and terrifying. Rather than settling, Dean became steadily more confused and was in obvious pain. No longer responding to Sam or seemingly able to lift his head, by the end of the second hour of driving (and still with an hour to go at least), Dean lay whimpering on the backseat, his head in Sammy's lap, each bump of the Impala on the road seemingly causing agony to the prostrate boy and causing him to vomit into a shirt Sammy had taken off and put under his chin. The back of Dean's head, not sewn up at the hospital, started to bleed again (though thank fully not gush) and John had Sammy hold a scarf to it. All John could hear was the sound of his son in distress and all he could do was fend off Sammy's insistent "We gotta take him to a HOSPITAL Dad! He's sick!" and "Dad, he's not answering me!" as Sammy dealt with his fears by providing a running commentary on Dean's deteriorating condition.
Though he responded to Sammy with "I know" and "We'll fix him up at Bobby's, it's just the concussion", in truth John heart was in his mouth the whole time. He thought about detouring to a hospital, but he couldn't see a good outcome to that decision. In his rush to leave the hospital and the spectre of the CPS, he hadn't considered Dean might get worse, he hadn't really thought about pain medication and, for all his injury knowledge, he really didn't know how much pain relief should be given to a seriously concussed child. So, John Winchester did what he did best, he made a decision and stuck to it. Reminding himself that Dean was breathing and conscious, he decided to floor it to Bobby's (never mind the pain to Dean's head), get someone in Bobby's book to look at Dean and make it all up to him later. After nine years without Mary and many hard decisions, John had become an expert at promising himself to make things up to his children in the future.
This is how the Dean and his entourage arrived at Bobby Singers. A now snivelling Sammy being snapped at by John to be quiet and help him get Dean out of the car. Dean only semi-conscious, whimpering and oblivious to his surroundings as John tried to move him in such a way as to cause the least amount of pain to him (a totally unsuccessful attempt by the way). John, tight lipped and murmuring what lies and comforts he could as he eased his boy out of the car and into the light flowing down from Bobby's porch, where the junk yard owner stood slack jawed.
Bobby Singer was many things (life had taught him to be adaptive) but one thing he had never been was an optimist. When John told him Dean was beat up some and that it had been bad enough for John to risk a hospital in the first place, he knew the boy would have more than an "owie". The one thing he and John had in common though was that they both loved those boys from the depths of their being. Bobby wasn't a fan of John's decision to hunt with Dean, but he knew John took precautions and he knew he was skilled enough to make sure his son was safe (or as near as dammit). He, therefore, never considered that that John would arrive with a terrified nine-year-old (Sammy wore his fears on his sleeve) and a blood soaked semi-conscious and obviously in pain thirteen year old in his arms.
"Turn off the damn light! It's hurting him" snapped John as he carried Dean up the outside stairs, past Bobby and into the house, turning into the kitchen. This snapped Bobby out back to reality and turning off the outside lights he quickly followed John, Sammy behind him and clinging to his jacket as he did so.
"Sammy" snapped John as they entered the kitchen "clean that table off and wipe it down. I gotta take a look at your brother"
Sammy jumped to the order, moving random crockery to the kitchen side and quickly rinsing a cloth with bleach.
This gave Bobby the seconds he needed to collect his, not entirely favourable, thoughts. "What the hell, Winchester? That boy needs a hospital, not a kitchen table. This isn't a field hospital and he ain't a private. Get in your damn car and get him to Sioux Fall General now, or I will".
Putting his crying son on the table gently John growled back at Bobby "Singer, I ain't got time for this. You think of a good way to tell a hospital I've been driving around with a boy with his head peeled and I'll go right now. You know as well as I do, if Dean goes into a hospital like this, getting him out is going to take more skills than we may have. He'll be okay, he's got a concussion that's all. The hospital were real happy with how he was doing"
At this point Sammy started to interject at this, very rosy, picture of the medical advice but John immediately shot him down with a "Sammy, not now".
Realising this was all taking time that should be spent on Dean, Bobby started to boil water and got out his field medical kit.
"John, that head wounds beyond us, hell I don't know if I'm looking at skin or brain. I know a local guy looks after hunters sometimes when there's no insurance and no luck. I'm gunna ring him and get him over. He owes me a small one. He ain't a Doctor, he's a paramedic but he's seen more injuries than the average Doctor. If he says Dean needs a hospital, he's going to one and if I have to walk over your corpse to get him there, I'll do your salt and burn later".
John grunted and started to clean around Dean's head to allow a proper examination. He murmured to his son all the while, but Dean seemed, literally, in a world of pain and away from the comfort of his Father's words. Sammy now stood silent and totally still in the kitchen corner, wide eyed and terrified.
Bobby was as good as his word and left the kitchen to ring his contact, returning quickly to say he was on his way but none too thrilled to be dealing with a child.
Whilst John tended to Dean, Bobby sat Sammy down and warmed him some sweet milk. He tried to comfort him "You'll brother will be fine Sammy, head wounds bleed a lot and concussions a bitch, but he's a tough kid and will we actually notice if he loses a few brain cells? It ain't his upstairs brain he's using most of the time".
Sammy didn't join in the usual game of teasing Dean but instead burst into tears and flung his arms around Bobby. Not a demonstrative man by nature or circumstance, Bobby stood there slightly awkwardly patting Sammy gently and rubbing his back.
Thirty minutes passed quickly with the two men tending to one child and comforting another, until a blessed knock on the front door was heard. Scurrying to let the visitor in, Bobby returned with a tall man in his forties. As he started to introduce him the man interjected "Introductions ain't necessary Bobby. It's my licence on the line here, all I know about this guy is that he's dumb enough to take a kid on a hunt and get him hurt and then dumb enough to take him out the hospital. I ain't in the business of trusting my livelihood to dumb. I'm here 'cos I owe you and I need to see that kid gets treated. I don't need to make anyone's acquaintance to do that".
John bristled at the man's words but John was used to swallowing his pride for his children and stepped back from his son saying "I'm John. This is Dean, he's fourteen. He got thrown into a headstone backwards. He said some stuff when he was coming round at the hospital which meant we couldn't stay. They were happy enough with him once he'd started to come around and when they saw his x-rays"
The man started examining Dean but snorted at this "Sure, hospitals are just ecstatic at semi-conscious teenagers, never causes them any concerns.
At this point Bobby interjected "This ain't exactly the ideal circumstances for you to get to know each other, but John loves those boys. If he took Dean from the hospital, it's cos he needed to.
"Mebbe", said the paramedic "but he didn't need to take him to a graveyard. Kids shouldn't hunt. It ain't complex. Kids should be kids."
"Well" said Bobby "Life sometimes ain't candy canes and jellybeans. It is what it is".
With that the men fell into silence as the medic examined the boy.
After a few minutes he asked John "Did he have any skull fracture or swelling?", grunting when John replied in the negative.
After a few more minutes he said "This is a skin flap, it should have been stitched by now, but I'll clean and get it sorted now"
Another half hour whilst Dean's head was shaved and the flap irrigated and stitched. Dean continued to murmur and cry throughout, the sound like nails on a blackboard to those in the room, but he was relatively still and that was a bonus.
After Dean's head was sewn and dressed the medic stood up.
"I'm taking it that it is out of the question to take him to a hospital? I'll be straight that's where this boy should be. Never mind the injury, you ain't got the pain medication or the experience to see whether he deteriorates. If you love this boy, you'll pack him to go".
At this Bobby bristled "This ain't about love, this is practicality. Can he stay here and recover or not?".
The medic took a deep breath, "theoretically" he said "he's conscious but confused and in pain. That's normal for an injury that severe. In a hospital, they'd be able to keep an eye on him and spot in an instant if things were going south. Here, you could miss something. There ain't a lot of time margin in a head wound for getting help. That said, he's young and he woke up fairly quickly so he might feel a lot better in forty-eight hours. You could dose him lightly here with pain meds, but you're taking a risk, if he was mine I wouldn't wanna do that"
"But it could be done" repeated John "so long as we keep a good eye on him, in forty-eight hours he's over the worst of this?"
"On a good day!" said the medic. "Anyway, I've done what I can. Bobby will call me if he needs me. I've got some sample meds outside, but for now, a dark room may be the best thing. See if you can get him to rest. Wake him every hour or so, just enough to know he's conscious. Not all the way back"
"Well I guess that's decided then" said Bobby sarcastically "I'll show you out and then get Dean to a bed".
Nodding briefly at John, the medic left with Bobby, who returned a few minutes later with some packs of medication.
John gently picked up Dean and carried him to the spare room his boys used at Bobby's, followed by Sammy. Covering him up, he kissed him gently and said "Sleep Dean, it'll all be better later". Lifting the cover, he indicated for Sammy and after the small boy had done so, kissed him on the forehead and said "it'll be okay Sammy, he's just addled. It will be better soon". Sammy snuggled down miserably next to Dean and nodded.
John fully intended to pull up a chair next to his boys and see the day out (it was by now mid-morning) watching over his sons and praying to a deity he long thought had abandoned him for Dean's recovery. Winchester's however weren't famed for their luck and Bobby's phone rang and Bobby went to answer it returning a few minutes later.
"Well, if that just ain't the icing on the Christmas cake. Your salt and burn didn't seem to take the hint. Earlier this morning two mourners were killed at your cemetery, one a little girl. I'm guessing all you did was piss off this ghost and now it's got the entire town in its sights. Stella work John" said bobby unfairly but it had been a trying night. "I'm trying to think of someone who could go back and take care of it, but ranks are a little thin right now. I'll be back once I've found someone" he said leaving the room.
John grunted behind him and thought of a family decimated by the loss of a child because he couldn't do his damn job.
After a while Bobby returned "I can't find anyone, and I can't go cos I'm minding the phones. We'd just better pray nothing else happens 'til we can get it covered".
John looked up and said "I gotta go back. I wasn't planning on seeing that town again until, maybe, judgment day or later. It's a few hours there and back. I can find out what's holding the spirit there and be back late tonight or tomorrow latest. Dean's settled with Sammy. All I'm going to be doing here is holding his hand anyway"
"You're an asshole" growled Bobby "That boy is confused and in pain and he needs his Daddy. His brother is scared witless. Your place is here"
"it's my mess to clear up Bobby" said John "Two people are dead because of me; I need to sort it. Dean would want me to. Now I can leave the boys here or I can take them with me. Dealers choice".
John looked at Bobby in the eye. Bobby recognising the ultimatum said "That boy ain't getting out of that bed until he's good and well. You wanna bail on them, be my guest. You can't save everyone though John, it's the oldest rule. You try, and it's them boys' who'll suffer.
John grunted and looked at the boys now resting fitfully. "Take care of them Bobby. I'll be back as soon as I can". With that John looked at his sleeping sons again, stood up and left the room, leaving Bobby behind to hear the sound of his door opening and closing, the sound of the Impala leaving and to look at the two sick and traumatised children John had left behind.
TBA