Like the screeching of a crow, the door cried on its hinges as it was forced shut in the darkness, making Dean start. A soft booming echo signaled it's closing, and there was the sound of a larch bolt being slid into place. Once again, they were trapped in here. Alistair had just locked them in like rats in a cage.

The invisible push against Dean's body lifted, and he was air-born for a whole of two seconds before his back slid backwards against the wall, his heel hit sideways on the ground, and his knees buckled underneath him. When he landed on his side – and his sore shoulder – he couldn't help the cry of surprise that was pushed through his lungs. The stonework underneath Dean's chest was cold between the flaps of his jacket, and it made the bumps on his skin raise precariously. He was exhausted.

Even though he would have wished to lie on the floor till the end of existence, Dean pushed himself to shaky elbows, knees, and eventually feet. Sam. Sam was still hurt.

"Sammeh..." Dean's voice came out as one big slur as he stumbled over in the direction where he hoped to find the table, and had to take a few slow and deep breaths to calm down the heart that was pounding adrenaline through his shaking body. Puffing up his cheeks to slow down an exhale as he sensed something to his left, he kicked his leg out sideways and his toe brushed stone.

"Sam?" He lowered his voice to the calmest tone that he could force out, and sat down on the edge of the stone block warily. Reaching out to touch Sam's wrist, he noticed that his brother's hands were fisted tightly. He could hear Sam's breathing, and while it was too soft it was also much quicker than it should be. Like the way someone breathed when they were in pain. "Hey…" Dean rubbed his hand up and down Sam's arm, trying his absolute hardest to keep himself from hyperventilating too. "Come on Sammy, easy does it."

His brother nodded briefly, his eyes on the ceiling, although not much in his behavior changed. Dean noticed that there were little lines around the corners of his eyes. "Dean…" Sam's voice was at a level of fragility that was completely out of place in a man his size, and it made Dean flinch.

"I know, I know…" Dean responded in understanding, letting Sam claw his fingers into a fist in the fabric of his sleeve. He couldn't help wincing when he remembered the noise that the demon's fist had made against Sam's stomach, and the pain that it must have inflicted against his already troubled internal injuries. "We're getting out of here soon, Sam. I mean it. Just…" Just what?

Sam seemed to sense that Dean had nothing to end his sentence with. "…Dean?" His voice had little horsepower.

"Yeah?"

"What'd… What'd he…"Sam stopped for a breath. "You know?"

Dean wasn't exactly sure what Sam was asking, although he knew who he was. Alistair. What did he… what? "Sammy?"

"What's he gonna do?"

Heart falling in his chest, Dean's eyebrows came forward into a V. "Not a damn thing, Sammy. I won't let him touch you."

"But…" Sam was clearly struggling with that. It was obvious that Alistair had thrown Dean across the room like a bug once, and that he could do it again.

"No butt's," Dean raised his voice a slight bit to try and sound confident. "Dude, you heard him. He's not going to do anything. He'll sit out there like the stupid douche he is while we slink out of here, and no one will be the wiser. Alright?"

There was disbelief in Sam's eyes, and Dean couldn't help missing the days where his word was law and Sam would believe anything he said. It would be so much easier that way. "How 'r we gonna do that?" Sam mumbled a reply that was barely audible.

"I have a plan." Dean said it before he could even process what it meant. I have a plan? It was like the standard response when they were in trouble. "Don't worry little brother. I have a plan. I'll take care of everything. Don't you worry about it. I'll take it all on. I have a plan." That was just how it went. But Sam was just too old and too damn smart to fall for that anymore.

"Right now, you are worthless." Alistair's voice played in his head like a broken record. "Hear me? Worthless. There isn't a single thing you can do, or a single reason for you to even be here other than I need a way to keep you out of harms way."

Sam just leaned his head back against the stone with a loud sigh through his teeth, his face scrunched up tightly. He was trying extremely hard not to move his chest very much, but at the same time it looked like he was having trouble doing so because he needed to get enough breath. Dean felt for him like this more than he could describe. Why did this have to keep happening to them? He wished that for once, he could just take care of Sam properly. That he could take care of himself. Once, it had been easy. When they were growing up, the worst thing on Sam's path was their father. All Dean had to do was keep his pig-headed family from tearing each other's throats out and things would go smoothly. Well… their kind of smoothly. But he was always okay with that. So how had they ended up chasing a dead-end hunt with white-eyed sons of bitches and getting hit by trucks and coming back from hell and watching Pamela die from a stab-wound that they could have prevented? None of that was in the Winchester handbook. Dean didn't know how to handle this mess. Sam was dying on a table in a demon-experiment underground and Dean couldn't help stop it! This was never what he wanted as a hunter. He didn't have a freaking plan!

"But your brother on the other hand, has something that I want. And until I get it, you two aren't getting out of here."

Looking at his brother in earnest, Dean tried to find out exactly what was supposed to be meant by that. Something that Alistair wants? Well other than the obvious, that was? He was going about this in a way that Dean had ever seen before, so who was to say that he wasn't out for something more than pain this time? Maybe Sam actually had something substantial that Alistair wanted. But what was that?

"Sammy?" Dean focused back on the present when he felt Sam's hands squirming in the handcuffs under his grip. He squeezed his brother's wrist comfortingly. "How are you feeling?"

Normally in a situation like this, Dean would have gotten at least a glare or eye roll at such a stupid question. But this time… nothing. That was a bigger clue than any answer would have been. Well if they weren't getting out of here right away, they needed to settle in.

"How about we get you nice and comfy, Sam?" Moving into first-aid mode, Dean slid his but off the stone table and turned to face his little brother fully. Sam was shivering, and still breathing in a rapid and shallow manner. Breathing in and out through his mouth, his jaw was relaxed and his eyes more or less unfocused on the ceiling. God, the kid was going into shock. Dean slid the jacket off his shoulders and covered his brother's torso with it, Sam flinching while he did so. Dean looked at his empty-walled surroundings in disappointment, knowing that elevating Sam's feet and legs was important in treating shock and keeping any internal bleeding from escalating. Suddenly struck with an idea, he slipped his shoes off of his feet, lifted Sam's ankles slightly, and slid them underneath. Sam moaned slightly as Dean did so, and he caught himself mumbling random words of apology in response. It wasn't much elevation, but at the highest point Sam's legs were up good four or five inches from the ground. And that was better than nothing.

"Dean…" Sam's voice was disproportionately small. "I… I'm…"

Sitting back beside Sam's leg's, Dean rubbed Sam's arm comfortingly. He could literally feel his brother shaking beside him. "Yeah?"

"I'm scared, man."

Chest suddenly filled with an odd heavy pressure, Dean swallowed down the lump in his throat. Sam hadn't said that to him since he was seven – it was pretty hard to forget how and when and why your baby brother was afraid – and hearing it now was almost as terrifying as the circumstances themselves. Sammy was hurting, he was terrified, and it was clear that it was all going to get a hell of a lot worse sooner or later.

"It's okay, Sammy." Dean lied through his teeth, feeling the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and his head pound from the shear wrongness of it. "I promise you that it's going to be okay."

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This chapter was a hard one to write (I have my reasons. I promise that they are good ones.) and I'm genuinely sorry that it took so LONG to post this. It was short, but I hope that you guys liked it. Please review and let me know what you thought!