Ash8 will have my gratitude, Ster1 and samantha-dean a medal for encouragement, and Thru Terry Eyes some of my promiscuous infatuation with writers (because your skill writing broken!Dean is something I wish I had).

Wild wolf free17 gallantly betaed this beast, too. And suffered the first version. Trust me, this (scars and all) is better.

So, yeah...
Those Winchesters are just wonderful when hurt, aren't they?
Off to see if hell has a circle for whimbound writers, now.
Spoilerific for 2x10.

Vicissitudes:
Vestiges
by Sade Lyrate

Almost half a year, and he had trouble seeing Sam on the bed instead of John.

Assess the damage, fix what you can.
Wait, watch.

And that was, as always, the worst part.
He hadn't realized just how bad it was until there was no one to share the wait with. Or how bad it could be when there was no way to tell whether or not he had failed the promise to a dead man.

His thoughts trailed back to the days before, the earlier hours of the night as he sat in the chair, let the band of beads flow to the rhythm of now calm respiration between his fingers time and again, provide a constant in his world of worry.

The words that twisted Sam's face, darkened his eyes with contempt.

The tenuous agreement that blew up on his face after a couple of careless comments.

Waking up with a throbbing head to find Sam gone.

Lacking any trace beyond a gut feeling.

Calls returned with nothing but "Better this way," until the mobile had just rung away, beeped into voice mail.

The search, the bartender's comments, the trail (half guts, half luck), the cry, the whole damn thing reeking of something familiar.

The look in Sam's eyes as he'd burst in, guns a-blazing like some stupid macho hero. And just for a moment, they were too dead.
The look in Sam's eyes just before 'Duane' had jumped up.
The look in Sam's eyes, unblinking, as he'd witnessed the demon leaving the boy's body, shatter and disappear.

All of those haunted him, if only because they were not looks he'd seen in Sam's eyes. Rarely, if ever.

He didn't like the way the last look still made him feel, the way something shifted in the depths of the hazel eyes.

He wasn't sure he'd welcome any of them even if it meant Sam would open his eyes now.

The tall man lay unresponsive, alive, on the bed, pale even in the early rays peeking through the threadbare curtains. Hesitantly, Dean reached, laid his hand for a moment on the forehead, brushing aside the bangs.
When all of it had passed, the hellspawn expelled and Duane dead, Sam lay sprawled on the floor, breath and beat matching each others' erratic pace. Skin clammy, blood on his lips, staining his cheek, rope burns around his wrists, cracking wax on his chest over pale burns. Smelling of pain and fear and alcohol, and everything else just took a backseat. There were too many alarms, too many things potentially wrong, too much he just didn't plain understand.

But he'd done what he could, prayers to anonymous deities flitting around his skull like trapped flies. Still, his brother refused to surface, limbs lax.

What happened after Sam left?

Does it matter?

The only part that Dean cared about was that he thought he'd gotten there in time. Sam had been alive, recognition overriding pain-clad panic in his eyes, well enough to tear his arms free halfway through the knots, attack the bindings around his ankles without a word. Stumbled off the bed, leaned heavily against it, curled up, Dean's own hesitation, words clogging his throat in their hurry to get all out, the impulses from his brains to his muscles cancelling each other out.

He should have been smarter than to think a single human would manage to catch Sam. Drunk as a skunk-Sam, but still...after that incident in Minnesota, he should have known better. Both of them.
Especially considering what they knew now. Why John had wanted to keep them from the fight. Why he had gone underground just before Sam's dreams burnt.

Past is past.

The old phrase flickered among the single-minded thoughts, mocking him for failing to live up to that tenet.
He evicted its accusations, concentrated on the easy rise and fall of Sam's mottled chest, the fine line between living warmth and fever, any sign betraying the return of awareness.

Another phrase, as devious and damaging as the first, slithered into his thoughts, whispering What if...
...he'd shot Duane back in River Grove?
...he'd kept his mouth shut?
...he'd found Sam earlier?
...he'd been too late?

The memories ghosted through his head, cunning bastards like all his past failures.
The flashback horror of being back in that damn cabin, body pressed by alien will against worn wood instead of cold concrete.
The way Duane's hands had roamed Sam's unconscious body, claiming, taking. Promising more with each sweep, each brush, each syllable. What if...

"You touch him again, you're dead."

"I thought I'd be dead anyway...The least I can do is to ascertain I'll die guilty."

The memory-sensation of his heart drowning in blood, world swallowed by pain trying to lure him away, leave Sam shieldless.
The cold shower of recollections that had come after, sobered him enough to challenge, the phantoms banished with the reality of the situation.

And the reality had been that Sam, eyes lacking recognition or awareness, had somehow managed to tear the demon out of the boy.

Dean bowed his head.
He was tired of always being too pressed for time, lacking enough cards to play the game, not knowing the name of the game. Or if it even was a card game to begin with. He was tired of being forced to act on an impulse, improvisation after improvisation, living constantly on the edge, in the shadows, never really seeing the things that held the blade, cast the shapes.

John Winchester's been dead for a while, and he took all his secrets with him to the skies.
Sam Winchester's body still lived, but Dean wasn't sure whether his brother still inhabited it or not.
Dean Winchester, trapped, was just waiting for the bell to toll.

So he let the litany he has never really professed dribble through his thoughts as another decade travelled under his thumb, the Holy water on a table near him, next to the guns, one loaded with silver, one with consecrated rounds, and their father's journal. He didn't know what he'd do if Sam woke up with nothing left.

If Sam didn't wake up...
Well, Dean was willing to bet he'd end up in the seventh circle anyway. The only difference would be which ring.

Author's Notes:
Just so we're on the same page here: This malarkey is not an educated guess on any part of the story (except for Dean's state). This isn't even logical. This is nothing but feeding the angstbunny in hopes that its brethren won't desert me. I don't agree with nor condone what's happened in this so far. Damn you, Bunny!
...had enough of a palpitation with the Velvet Inn Motel scene...;)

I have a question for all those who have read this far...
Should I continue?