Part Four.

Faces brimming over with apprehension and happiness greeted him in the waiting room as he looked into the eyes of a restless Bobby and Sam.

"Has she had it yet?" Bobby asked, a smile on his lips and anticipation in his gruff voice.

"Yeah" Dean exhaled shakily, that being all he managed to get out, his brain running out of words to make a comprehensible sentence with. He didn't seem able to take in what had just happened. It just wouldn't compute.

"Everything's ok though, isn't it?"

The tell-tale look on Dean's colour-drained face told the pair of them that every thing was far from ok.

"What ain't you tellin' us, boy?"

"Bobby, I...erm...I think you should go. We're gonna be here a while and...just...I'll call you."

"The hell I'm leaving! You tell me what's going on now." The hunter demanded, searching Dean's shattered expression with wide eyes.

"There...there were complications. She's in the OR."

"And the kid?"

"Fine, I think. Oh God, I haven't even seen my own kid. They said...they said I had to leave before I had the chance."
Dean squeezed his eyes tightly shut, breathing slowly and deeply as he realised that it wasn't just his brother and his girlfriend he had to worry about anymore.

"Dean..." Sam began, preparing to comfort his older brother with sorrow in his eyes.

"Don't start, Sammy. There's nothing you can say that I haven't heard before."

"I know, but..."

"I said, I don't wanna talk about it Sam!" Dean yelled, knowing that he had caused several patients and nurses to stare, but his own tear filled eyes remained fixed on the hazel eyes of his younger brother.
"I...I can't. I can't talk about it."
For a second Sam could see the dull light in his eyes, where there was once the glisten of ambition. He could see the toll the years of loss had taken on his older sibling, and how broken he was inside. Sam didn't know how much more Dean could take.

Dean turned away without another word and walked over to a seat, sitting down and placing his head in his hands, just wanting the world to open up and swallow him whole. Both Bobby and Sam exchanged knowing, worried glances before sitting in the row opposite Dean, searching for some way, any way, to comfort the troubled hunter.

"I'll get you a coffee", Sam suggested, contemplating laying a reassuring hand on Dean's shoulder before stopping. He feared that if he touched Dean, his fragile looking form might actually break under the gentle touch.

Minutes passed like years as the hands of the clock edged further around the faded clock face, the glossy black coating of them shimmering under the fluorescent lighting of the waiting room. Another nurse, a young friendly face, led Dean to another room. He bit his lip and let the tears he'd held inside roll freely down his cheeks, preparing himself for the worst.

She was dead. She'd died on the table. She's gone.

Instead, once inside the room, she turned to a small plastic cradle and gathered up a tiny blue bundle of blankets in her arms.

"Would you like to hold your son?" She asked in a hushed voice, that same smile etched on her young face.

He couldn't speak, words would only get stuck in his throat, and he accepted the miniature being into his arms. It was his son. He was real and he was safe, but when Dean looked into the tiny child's face, all he could see was Alex. His stomach flipped as he tore his eyes away from the baby he was awkwardly holding close to him, feeling suddenly out of his depth.

"I can't...I can't do this. Lexi's meant to be...this should be her, she should be holding him...I'm sorry..." He stumbled as he hurriedly handed his son back to the bewildered nurse. He rubbed a hand across his cheek, pushing back glistening tears, and turned his back to her. Without another word, he left, only pausing at the door to attempt to stop his shaking hands.

The hunters continued to sit in anxious silence, Dean's now cold coffee still on the small table, untouched. Instead, he'd turned to his whisky filled hipflask with Sam and Bobby pretending not to notice. In any other situation he'd turn to Alex for help and even Bobby's futile phone calls to his various contacts proved useless in the end. She'd been in a room on her own with men covered in masks, slicing and dicing, prodding and poking for hours on end.

When the moment finally came and the surgeon approached the trio, his words were anticipated. Dean felt the words wash over him like ice cold water, numbing every cell in his body.

"We did everything we could, but the complications were just too severe. She didn't make it."

He heard the words before the surgeon had even said them. He knew he'd be hearing them for a long time after as well.

TBC.
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