Sam wasn't sure when he'd fallen asleep, exactly. But he knew what pulled him back into consciousness, and his eyes flew open at the sound of his brother's retching. Dean had managed to flip over onto his other side and make it to the bucket in time. And Sam could tell he was trying his damnedest to be quiet about it.

"Dean?" Sam sat up and put a hand on his back.

"S'ry, Sam... Didn't mean to wake you up," he said before heaving once more over the bucket.

"Didn't mean to fall asleep," he replied, worriedly. "Do you need more meds?"

"Yeah," he rasped before wiping his mouth with his sleeve.

The fact that he agreed so willingly and without hesitation, made Sam realize how bad it must be getting. As Dean slowly maneuvered back to laying in the chair, Sam caught a glimpse of the bloody sleeve and Dean's eerily pale face.

"B'fore you ask," Dean said, short of breath, "I was sleepin'. Di'nt realize..."

"I'm sorry, Dean. I should've stayed awake. I didn't mean to fall asleep..."

"'S not your fault," he said as Sam injected the pain meds. "Meds didn't really do much for the pain, anyway. Took the edge off. Mostly jus' knocked me out for a bit, though."

"Should we try more this time?"

"Maybe you should jus' gimme all of it," Dean closed his eyes and clenched his jaw as a wave of pain coursed through him.

"All of it?"

"Yeah, Sammy," he grunted and turned back onto his side as he began to heave again.

"All of it is enough to kill you, Dean," Sam said as he placed his hand on his brother's back again, rubbing in effort to comfort him through the heaving.

"'S the point-" he replied with a groan.

"The point is to kill you?"

"Yeah, Sammy," Dean's body began shaking with the effort to hold himself up, and Sam got up from his chair to move in front of him and help keep him upright.

"Are you asking me to assist suicide?" Sam gave him an incredulous look.

"Mercy killing," Dean corrected.

"Assisted suicide, by any other name, is still assisted suicide, Dean."

"Can't do this again, Sammy..." Dean doubled over; Sam catching him before he could fall completely from the chair and guiding him to lay back against his chest as he held onto him.

"Dean..."

"Please...please, Sammy, don't make me do this again..."

His words tore at Sam's heart and caused tears to sting his eyes. "I can't kill you, Dean."

"I'm gonna die anyway...Cas will bring me back," he reasoned.

"Don't do this," he begged. "Would you do this if it were me? Would you kill me if I asked you to? 'Cause I already know the answer to that..."

"Damnit, Sam," Dean cried. Cried. Sam couldn't hold back the tears anymore at all. "At least knock me out; punch me or somethin'..." Dean gripped down on Sam's leg beside him as he began to heave again, this time unable to even attempt to aim for the bucket. The blood simply flowed down his chin and down onto his shirt as he leaned back against his brother's chest. The blood reached Sam's arm that held around him. "Please...please, Sammy... Please..."

Sam's face scrunched painfully in anxious indecision. He didn't want to hurt Dean even more. But he didn't want Dean to be suffering either. He turned his head to look into the house. "Tony!" he shouted.

"What're ya doin', Sam?" Dean groaned.

"He said to call if we needed anything," Sam said as he watched, and saw Tony jet into the kitchen and toward the patio door.

Upon seeing Dean's current state, Tony paled, turned his head back into the house and called for Ducky, then came out onto the deck. "What can I do?" he asked.

"Convince...Sam to...put me outta my m-misery," Dean choked out.

"Gonna see if Ducky will sedate you, Dean," Sam told him.

"Dyin's not s'bad," Dean rasped. "'S this part that sucks... Ducky... Ducky'll help me."

"Not sure the doc is into euthanasia, Dean," Tony narrowed his eyes.

"Anthony is right, dear boy," Ducky said as he walked out onto the deck, Gibbs tailing behind him.

"The pain meds aren't helping him," Sam told him. "He wants me to give him all of it."

"Yes, well, as I said...There will be no more deaths this night," Ducky knelt down in front of him. "You've already made it this couple of hours. Castiel shouldn't be very much longer. You can manage until then."

"No...no, I can't, Ducky, please..." Dean cried. "Please..." More blood spilled from Dean's mouth as he gagged and coughed.

Ducky's brow furrowed in concern and helplessness. "The best I can do is to sedate him," he told Sam. "However, I'm uncertain what the effects will be in conjunction with this...poison in his system. And you'll need to keep him upright, as he could very well drown in his own blood if he were to lie down. In fact, one of my major concerns is that some of this could be coming from his lungs. In which case, sedation would stop him from being able to bring it up on his own."

"Jus' do it..." Dean groaned.

"No, wait," Sam hesitated. "Dean...you could-"

"Sam!" Dean gathered every ounce of strength in him and twisted around in his brother's arms, grasping his Sam's shirt in fists in effort to hold himself there. "Let him do it," he said through bloody, gritted teeth. His body shook, painfully as he tried to keep his focus on his little brother. "Please, Sammy...let him. Please...please..." his head fell into Sam's chest as tremors took over his body.

Sam swallowed at the lump in his throat as his arms wrapped tighter around Dean. More tears dripped down his cheeks before his eyes met Ducky's again. "Okay," he told him. "Just do it..."

Ducky nodded in acknowledgment and looked over at Gibbs who had brought him his medical bag. Once handing it over, Gibbs stood back a bit with Tony as Ducky prepared and injected a serum into Dean's arm. Dean continued to squirm in Sam's arms for a while until the medicine began to show signs of its success.

"There we are," Ducky said quietly. "Now let's get him up on the chair and clean him up a bit. Anthony, if you could fetch some towels and warm water..."

"Sure, Ducky," Tony hurried into the house.

"Lemme help with that," Gibbs said before Ducky could lift Dean from Sam's hold. Ducky moved out of the way and Gibbs knelt down, meeting Sam's eyes for a moment. "You okay?" Sam took a breath and nodded, then allowed the agent to pull Dean's limp body from his arms.

Sam pushed himself up to stand, and helped Gibbs to arrange Dean on the chair. Then Sam immediately grabbed the blanket and draped it over his brother. Gibbs didn't miss the fact that the younger Winchester's hands were shaking. He reached out and laid a hand on his shoulder until the kid looked at him.

"Why don't you go inside and get cleaned up," he told him in a calming voice. "I'll stay here with him; Duck, Tony and I...we'll watch over him 'til you get back."

Sam gave him an appreciative smile that didn't quite reach his eyes, "I'll be fine. Cas should be back soon...right?" Gibbs nodded as Tony stepped back out onto the deck with a large bowl of warm water and washcloths and a dry towel.

He placed the bowl onto the small table beside the chair and handed a wetted cloth to Sam grazing his hand a bit before pulling away, "You're freezing," Tony narrowed his eyes.

Sam withdrew his hand, "It's a little cold out."

"You should go inside and warm up a bit," Tony suggested.

"I'm fine!" he snapped. "If Dean has to wait out here, then I will too. I'm not leaving him..." he sat down beside Dean on the chair and put the cloth to his brother's chin to begin wiping off the blood.

"Okay," Tony said in barely a whisper. He sat on the other side of Dean and dipped another cloth into the warm water.

"I'll go inside and make you some tea, lad," Ducky told Sam and he turned to go back into the house. Gibbs met a glance from Tony, nodded, then turned to follow Ducky.

Tony and Sam continued careful cleaning of the bloodied, unconscious man in the chair. But Tony paid close attention to Sam, who seemed greatly disturbed by his brother's predicament. It was justified, of course. They could see Dean's eyes moving rapidly beneath the lids; twitching facial muscles indicating that though he was asleep, he was still in pain.

There wasn't really anything Tony could say to make Sam feel better, and he knew that. He knew that the fact that Castiel would return and this would all go away, was something Sam was already well aware of. But watching Dean suffer in the meantime...well, there wasn't much any of them could do to comfort either of them.

Suddenly, Dean's eyes flew open and his mouth opened as if to scream, but nothing came out. No breaths...nothing. Sam grabbed his arm, "Dean?"

Dean arched his head back and his body lifted impossibly from the chair so that the only parts of him that remained touching it were his head and feet. Instinctively, Tony and Sam moved fast to grab onto him. Then Dean screamed out in pain...

It started out more like a shriek than anything, then grew into a guttural growl and held there until there was no more breath to squeeze sound from. His struggle caused his shirt to ride up, and exposed the muscles in his stomach as they rippled and spasmed like nothing Sam or Tony had ever seen before. They were fairly certain that this was happening all over Dean's body...the spasming. The pain...

Dean sucked in breath as if he were coming up out of water, gasping for whatever air he could get. "Sa- Sam..." his voice shook violently.

"I'm here, Dean," Sam told him as he tightened his hold around him.

The older brother's skin was white as a sheet, and when blood began to drip from his nostrils down the sides of his face, it looked an even more sickly shade of red. "H- hur- hurts, S'mmy... please..." Sam cradled Dean's head as he spoke. But Dean's eyes weren't focusing. Instead, they shot around aimlessly into the night sky and he screamed out again as a new wave of spasms enveloped him. "Sam, please!" he shouted.

Sam knew what he was asking, and he looked to Tony as if he'd had the ultimate answer. But Tony looked just as lost as Sam felt. Both sets of eyes shot back to Dean at the unmistakeable sound of a breaking bone, and Dean shouted out in agony. The spasms had caused Dean's collar bone to crack; they could both see it sickly poking under the skin.

"Oh god..." Sam swallowed the bile that rose in the back of his throat.

"M-make it...s-stop...please, Sam...please!" he screamed.

Sam met Tony's eyes once again; every worry-line on his face creased; nostrils flaring and eyes spilling over with the knowledge of what he had to do... "Okay, Dean," his voice cracked as he reached for the pain-killer kit. "Can you hold him?" he asked Tony before releasing his hold on Dean.

"Yeah," Tony replied with furrowed brow as he watched Sam prepare the syringe. They both flinched when the bones in Dean's arm began to snap, followed by the painful cry. "God what- Have you ever seen anything like this before?" Tony questioned in horror.

Sam shook his head as he pulled the completely filled syringe from the bottle. With one last pained glance at Tony, he took hold of Dean's arm and quickly stuck the needle into his vein. He emptied it within a few moments and removed it from his arm and met his brother's eyes as they began to focus on him, finally. Slowly, his body began to relax from its deathly self-binding, and they were able to lower him back into the chair.

"Th- thank you...thank you, Sam-my..." his voice grew quieter.

Sam took hold of Dean's hand with both of his, suddenly overcome by a feeling of dread and regret. "Dean..."

"Gon' be okay, Sm... You'll see... gon' be okay..." his breaths slowed and his eyes began to unfocus and cross.

"Dean, wait...wait..." he panicked as tears streamed down his face. As if he could call 're-do'.

"S'ok..." Dean whispered. And that was the last thing he said...the last breath that left his body...

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Tbc...