Don't expect Ch8 before Monday. I'm still working on it, and hotshow had to bless it before I'll post. Hope you enjoy!! Big thanks again to everyone following this, especially with the alerts down.

Chapter 7

As it turned out Bobby did receive the all-cartoon channel, much to their collective astonishment and relief. Sam sunk to the floor in front of the small set, head inches from the screen with his Batman in his lap.

Dean accepted another beer from Bobby, sinking into the aged couch. He started to do something he had not allowed himself in some time. He started to relax.

"So Dean," Bobby's voice was barely a whisper, "how's he really doing?" A beer bottle waved in Sam's direction.

Dean shook his head, took another swig. "No idea. The doctors are frigging clueless, and useless." He sighed, rubbing a hand through his short hair. "He remembered that, though." Dean pointed at the ceiling in the next room. "He won't go under it."

Bobby nodded, looking thoughtful. "Maybe traumatic experiences come back first."

Dean shrugged, unwilling to broach that topic. With everything they had been through in the past two years, traumatic pretty much summed it up.

"Must have been a cute kid," Bobby said, but his eyes were trained on Dean.

Dean stared back. "What?" He set his beer down. What was Bobby after?

"How are you doing with all this?" Bobby's head jerked towards Sam.

"What the hell do you mean?" Dean demanded. They might be leaving Bobby's sooner than he planned. Like in five minutes.

"Calm down, Dean. I know this has got to be hard for you." Bobby sighed, took another swig of his beer. "I know if I had a brother, or hell, a friend I was half as close to as you are to Sam, this would be…" Bobby frowned and his brows drew together, which was hard to tell through the hair sticking out from under that damned ballcap. "Well, it would be damn near impossible."

Dean glared at Bobby, someone who up until a few seconds ago he had considered a good friend. "We'll manage," he hissed, standing. As he turned to yell for Sam, Bobby jumped in his way.

"Dean, don't." Bobby's voice had that tone to it, the one that sounded so damn much like Dad. "Do me a favor. Hell, do yourself a favor. At least stay the night before you storm off in a huff." Bobby's stern face cracked into a smile. "You know, your daddy told me something about you once that I never really understood until this second."

Torn between his desire to run from scrutiny and curiosity about what his father said about him, Dean cast a look toward Sam. His brother was peaceably watching something animated. Apparently it did not matter what the show was, only that it was animated.

"Fine," Dean growled, retaking his seat and snagging his beer. He glowered at Bobby for a good couple of minutes before his curiosity won. "All right. What did Dad say?"

"About what?" Bobby asked innocently.

"Bobby, I swear, if you…"

Bobby held up both hands. "Just kidding, Dean, just kidding." He downed the rest of his beer. If Bobby needed alcohol to do this, it could not be good. Dean figured it couldn't be worse than anything else in the past few days, so he waited.

"Your daddy told me once that the Dean Winchester priority list only had three things on it. Numbers one and two were Sam and Dad, not that one outranked the other, and number three was the hunt. Your own health and wellbeing didn't even make the list."

Dean frowned at that. Not that it wasn't true, but he was surprised that Dad even noticed. "Why did he tell you that?"

"You remember that last hunt the three of us went on? Right after Sam left for college?" Dean nodded. "Afterwards, your daddy backed you into a corner, made you strip down and checked you all over for injuries. Remember that?"

Dean chuckled. "Just because the damn thing knocked me down," he said, shaking his head.

"Knocked you down?" Bobby stared at him for a moment. "Dean, the damn thing must have knocked you twenty feet into a tree! I was shocked you were conscious, much less that you got up and helped out afterwards."

Dean snorted. "Helped out? Dude, I so took that sucker down." He shrugged. "Well, you know, I helped Dad take it down anyway."

"Uh-huh. Anyway, after he finished checking you over and ordering you to bed for the night, I cornered him in the kitchen over a beer. My intention was to rake him over the coals for the way he treated you." Bobby looked around, but all the beer bottles next to him were empty.

Dean scoffed. "Yeah, bet that went over well."

Bobby's head tilted to the side, reminding Dean of the way Sam used to look at him when his brother thought he was lying. It was an evaluating gaze. Dean wondered if he passed.

"Not really." Bobby shook his head. "John explained, in no uncertain terms, that I was not to interfere in his family. He then went on to tell me how you've been known to carry an injury like cracked ribs and torn muscles without complaint, and that the only way he could know for sure you weren't hurt was to check for himself. I had a hard time buying that." Bobby picked up one of his empty bottles, stared down into it with a frown. "That was when he told me about the Dean Winchester Priority List and the John Winchester Priority List."

Dean leaned back, taking another swig of beer. This conversation was turning into something interesting after all. "And what was the John Winchester Priority List?"

Bobby smiled sadly at him. "I'm guessing you already know number one?"

"Find the demon that killed Mom," Dean answered without thinking.

"Yep. Number two was the welfare of his sons, and number three was to always check Dean for injuries after a hunt, because you hid them so damn well."

"Wait a minute." Dean's beer clattered on the table surface. "Checking me for injuries was an actual number on his frigging priority list?"

"Yep. I need another beer." Bobby disappeared into the kitchen. By the time he came back Dean had been able to make sense of it.

"I get it," he said, exchanging his now empty bottle for the full one Bobby offered. "Dad had to make sure I was in top shape for the next hunt. Makes sense."

Bobby ran a hand over his face, shaking his head. "Dean, he cared about you. Both of you."

"I know that!" Dean snapped, irritated at being drawn into some chick-flick crap.

"You Winchesters sure are a stubborn bunch." Bobby collapsed into an ancient armchair next to the couch. "You know that?"

Dean grinned despite himself, leaning back into the couch again. At least Bobby can take a hint.

"You are planning to stay? At least for a little while." Bobby pressed.

"Yeah, I guess." Dean gave him a shrug. "Got any work around here? I'm going to go out of my gourd with nothing to do."

Bobby smiled. "I was hoping you'd ask that."

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Its dinner complete, it returned to the salvage yard. It prowled through the rusting hulks of machinery humans used, sniffing and learning. The two men smelled familiar. They must have come to Singer before, so perhaps they could be used to punish Singer. The men may important to its enemy. It began to make plans. Its revenge was possible now. It smiled, its sharp white teeth gleaming in the dim moonlight.

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Sammy turned away from the television. Dean was not on the couch. A flutter of panic rose in his chest. "Dean?"

"He just went to the john, Sam," a deep voice answered.

Sammy spun around. It was that man called Bobby, the one Dean said was Dad's friend. Sammy chewed on his lower lip, wondering if he should ask. "Bobby?" He stood, clutching Batman to his chest again.

"Yeah, Sam? What can I do for ya?" Bobby looked up at him, waiting.

Sammy wondered if Dean would be mad, but he needed to know. "Do you know if something happened to our dad?" he asked softly, hoping Dean would not hear him. Dean had really good hearing.

Bobby's eyes darted away, toward the bathroom. So that's where Dean was. And that's what a john was! But wasn't Dad's name John, too? "Dad wasn't named after the toilet, was he?" Sam asked, still looking toward the bathroom.

Bobby laughed, a deep, comforting laugh that felt familiar. Sam cocked his head at the old man, an image flickering in his mind of Bobby talking to him somewhere else and a feeling of relief. Sam decided that maybe Bobby was not scary after all.

"Well, Sam, some people might agree with that, but I wouldn't. Your daddy was a good man." Bobby smiled at him.

Was? Did Bobby say 'was'? "Was a good man?" Sammy asked. "What happened?"

"Don't worry about it, Sammy," Dean's voice cut through the moment, causing Sammy to spin around. When he stopped, the room kept spinning. Sammy watched it for a moment before he realized that his knees were not working right and his legs felt funny.

"Sammy!" Dean's voice pierced the spinning room, but Sammy still sunk to the floor. He felt Dean's hands grab him so he did not fall. His brother was always doing stuff like that, keeping Sammy from getting hurt. That was why Sammy did not like Dean to go away, for anything. He liked Dean to always be nearby, to catch him just like this.

When the room stopping spinning, Dean's blurry face hovered over him. "Sammy? You okay?" Dean sure was demanding, but that was okay. Dean watched out for him.

Sammy nodded, blinking hard to take some of the fuzziness away. Finally Dean's face cleared, looked normal. Sam grinned. "I'm okay now, Dean." He tried to stand, but Dean held him down.

"Just wait a minute, Sammy. Can you tell me what happened?"

Dean looked really worried. Sammy didn't like it when Dean was worried, that meant something was wrong. He shook his head. "The room went around and around and I got dizzy. Thanks for not letting me fall, Dean."

"Yeah. Whatever."

Dean sat on the floor next to him, rubbing his face. His brother did that when he was really, really worried. Sammy patted Dean's arm. "It's okay, Dean. You don't need to worry."

Dean looked at him, his eyes wide. "Sammy, I'm thinking about finding another doctor. One you like this time. What do you think?"

"Why, Dean?" Sammy leaned his head to one side to study his brother. Dean still looked worried.

"I don't like the way you keep falling down, Sammy." Dean's face had creases all over it, especially between his eyebrows. It would be funny if Dean didn't look so serious.

"Me either," Sammy told his big brother. "I'll go if you say so, Dean. You're my big brother. You always look out for me." Dean really was the best big brother.

Dean looked really sad now. "But Sammy, I told you, it's my fault."

Sammy shook his head. "No, Dean. It can't be your fault. You always, always look out for me." He kept shaking his head, hoping the room would behave this time. "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no..."

"Sammy!" Hands shook him. Sammy did not realize his eyes were closed until he opened them. When he opened his eyes, he was so close to Dean's face he could smell beer on his brother's breath. Dean's breathing was heavy, panting kind of like a dog. "Sammy?"

"You can't say that Dean. It isn't your fault." Sammy insisted, hoping Dean would finally understand.

"Okay, Sammy, okay." Dean sounded like he had been running or something. "Whatever you say, Sammy." Dean's hand patted his shoulder a few times. "Go watch tv or something."

"K, Dean." Sammy pushed himself off the floor. He noticed that his big brother jumped up first to watch him, make sure he didn't fall again. Sammy smiled, liking the fact he was the center of Dean's attention all the time. It made him feel good, special. As he settled down in front of Bobby's grainy, tiny tv set, Sammy knew he had to be special to have a big brother like Dean.

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"Dean?" Bobby's voice pulled Dean from his thoughts, from watching Sam's every move. That last collapse was unnerving, shook him to the core. "I know a few people in town. First thing in the morning I'll make some calls. We can probably get an appointment for Monday."

Dean raked a shaking hand through his hair. "God, I hope that's soon enough," he whispered. He felt something cold pressed into his palm.

"Nothing to do tonight, but drink a few beers," Bobby said, nodding toward the couch. "And tell a few lies."

Dean sat, his eyes glued to Sam.

"So, you're perfectly fine, right? None of this bothers you."

"Nope," Dean forced his shaking hand to lift the beer to his mouth in one steady motion. "Perfectly fine."

"Yep," Bobby nodded at him. "Me too." Bobby glanced over at Sam before looking at Dean again. "Any other lies we can tell tonight?"

"Well, you can tell me about your last date," Dean suggested, watching his brother out of the corner of his eye.

He heard Bobby choke on his beer. "Damn, boy, give me warning before you do something like that."

Dean chuckled, despite himself. He felt some of his tension ease, but he was determined not to let his guard down around Sammy. Not again.