Chapter 9

So I just realized I've been saying TBC instead of TBI for traumatic brain injury. I'm probably gonna fix it but just pretend it says TBI :)

"Come on, Sammy stop playing around," Dean chuckled nervously.

"Dean, I'm not! Just tell me where Jess is. Is she okay? She's okay right?"

Dean paled. His brother had lost eight years of his memory; he didn't remember the hunts, the numerous injuries they've gotten, dad's death, his own death in Cold Oak, or anything! Only Jess and college.

"Dean!"

"Sam calm down. Jess is…" Dean looked into his brother's worry filled eyes and heaved a sigh. "Jess is fine. I had come to take you for a short road trip, because- you know- I haven't seen you in forever and you…um…you in a car crash." Well at least some of it wasn't a lie.

"W-What? Really? What about you? Are you okay?"

"Huh? No, I'm fine. You wanted to drive my car to get us some eats and I reluctantly agreed, so I let you go. Next thing I know…you're here. I'm sorry Sam, I didn't mean for you to get hurt."

Sam was silent with shock. He looked away from his brother and stared straight ahead as he tried to get the information pumping through his drugged brain.

"Well, uh, you just dote on that for a sec, and I'm just gonna go tell the doctor you're awake," Dean smiled forcefully, pressing the call button and leaving the room. In minutes, the doctor came running towards him. Dean shoved his hands in his pockets and waited for the questions to bombard him.

"Dean, what's the matter? Is everything okay?" the dr. said, seeing the grim look on Dean's face.

"Yeah everything's fine. Sam's up, but…"

"But what Dean?" Asked the doctor as he made his way for Sam's room.

"He, um, he lost his memory. He's back eight years ago."

The doctor looked at Dean, panic in his eyes, as he pushed past him and into the room.

"Hello, Sam, my name is Dr. Walker and I've been attending to your health."

"What the hell happened? My brother said car accident, but he likes to joke around sometimes."

"Well, I'm afraid he's not joking this time, Sam. You really did and you almost died a couple times. Now, I would like to take you to get a couple of CT scans for your head; you hit it pretty bad and you could have done some serious damage to your brain. But for now I'll just check your standard vitals."

"O-Okay," Sam nodded hesitantly, still rather shocked on the news he was receiving.

Dean watched silently from the window as the doctor shone a penlight into Sam's eyes, checked his breathing and his head. When he was finished, he smiled and thanked Sam, leaving the room wordlessly. As soon as he stepped out of the room, the smile had disappeared.

"What? What's wrong?

"We're going to have to take some CT scans to confirm it, but, as I suspected, there is some temporary swelling in your brother's brain."

"And that's what's causing his memory loss?" Dean asked eagerly.

"Possibly. We can't know for sure, but from my experience, that's what it is, most likely."

"But it will go away right? He'll get his memory back?"

"Eventually, but it could be days, months, even years."

"Y-Years?" Dean swallowed.

Dr. Walker nodded sadly and patted Dean's shoulder. I'll be back in thirty minutes to get your brother for the CT scan."

Dean nodded unconsciously as he looked back to Sam who was staring into space. He wiped a hand down his face nervously. And just when things were starting to look up.

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"Dean?"

"Right here, buddy. You're gonna be okay, I'll be here when you get back," Dean assured as he watched his brother get wheeled out of his room.

Sam hesitated, but eventually nodded. Even though he didn't know why his brother was here with him, he was still family and he was still confused. His doctor, named Dr. Walker, had come to back to take him for a CT scan, but he didn't trust the guy. Dad's number one rule: Never trust the hospital and its staff; they ask too many questions.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~SPN~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Well?"

"Just as I suspected; there is some swelling in his brain causing the memory loss."

"But he will get it back," Dean said, not posing it as a question.

"Like I said before…eventually."

"Alright…thanks." Dean said as he nodded dejectedly and stepped back inside his brother's room.

"Ah, Sammy," Dean muttered. Thankfully Sam had fallen asleep again so he couldn't hear him. "You better get your memory back; I can't do this without you, man." He squeezed Sam's arm gently and sat back down in the worn out crappy chair. He shook his head and laughed. The stress his little brother caused him.

"You are so gonna give me gray hairs kid, and people do not look attractive with gray hairs."

"What was that boy?" A gruff voice grunted behind him.

Dean turned around sharply and grinned sheepishly. "Hey, Bobby. What are you doing here?" Dean said getting up.

"Come to see how the kid was doing. Now what was that about gray haired people not looked attractive?"

Dean chuckled nervously as he ran a hand through his hair. "Nothing, it's nothing. I was just joking."

Bobby grunted skeptically, but brushed it off. "So? How is he?"

"He's okay, except…"

"What Dean?"

"He lost his damn memory, Bobby."

"What was the last thing he remembered?"

"Jess."

That one word explained it all.

"Oh…balls."

"Yeah, you got that right."

"Is it permanent?"

"Fortunately no, but the doctor isn't sure when he'll get it back. It could be fucking years Bobby. Years!"

Bobby looked at Dean sadly, feeling the boy's pain. Then he noticed the dried blood on the kid's jacket sleeve and frowned. "What the hell happened there, Dean?"

"What?" Dean looked down to where Bobby was pointing to. "Oh…it's uh…it's a long story." He hadn't even realized that Frank's blood was still on his hands.

"Don't wanna know…idjit."

Dean chuckled and he went to go sit back down. "So where've you been?"

"To get what was left of your car."

"The Impala? She's alive?"

Bobby smiled and nodded. But suddenly the smile vanished as he looked past Dean.

"Uncle Bobby?"

Dean turned around and saw Sam sitting up on his elbows, pain lines visible on his pallid face. Fear and confusion shone through the big brown eyes and it broke Dean's heart to see the kid hurting so much.

"Dean what is he doing here?"

"He's just coming to visit you to see if you were okay; he's making up for dad not being here."

"Oh…okay," Sam said cautiously.

Afterwards, there was an awkward silence that broke out in the room. Suddenly…

"I'm hungry," Sam whined.

Dean's face broke out into a smile as Sam's usual bitchy complaining began.

"Then sit tight, buddy, I'll get you some more jello cups…since…I ate them all."

Sam scrunched his nose. "I don't like jello."

"Stop being such a picky eater, Sam. It's either jello or some slop shit that doesn't look, in my opinion, very edible."

"Fine," Sam gave in with a bitch face.

Bobby smiled at the brotherly banter he was so used to. The boys were gonna be okay, just hopefully Sam would get his memory back…and soon.

"Well I'm gonna get goin'. You two behave and Sam you get better."

"Thanks," Sam yawned, suddenly feeling very drained.

Bobby left the room as Dean began to leave, too, for the jello.

"I'll be right back, man."

"O-kay," Sam said sleepily.

"Don't fall asleep on me," Dean warned.

"I won't."

"Promise?"

"I promise," Sam smiled.

Dean smirked as he left the room. When he returned, he approached a sight that made him roll his eyes, yet smile.

"So much for keeping your promise, bitch," Dean said as he placed the five jello cups, he "borrowed" from the food cart, onto Sam's tray. Sam had fallen asleep…again. The kid must have been beat, but he couldn't blame him. Combine the meds and the fatigue could make a person very drowsy. Dean smiled faintly as he pulled the blankets up to Sam's shoulders and brushed his bangs out of his eyes.

"Please get better Sammy," Dean whispered, tears welling at the brim of his eyes. "I don't know what I'd do if you went back to Stanford. I don't wanna lose you; its happened way to many times in our life." Dean grabbed Sam's hand and squeezed it. "I'll be back, man, I'm just gonna grab our stuff form the motel so we don't overstay and bring it to Bobby's. I'll come back as soon as I can, okay?"

As expected, he received no response, so he turned to leave. He shut off the lights, looked back at his sleeping brother once more before leaving the hospital. He called a cab and rode back to the motel, grabbed his and Sam's things, got back in the cab and ended up at Bobby's.

"Is it okay if we stay here for a while once Sam gets out of the hospital?"

"You don't need to ask, boy, you two are always welcome."

"Thanks."

Dean dumped the bags in the living room before eagerly heading for the door. Bobby had lent him one of his "working" cars to go back to the hospital, but the whole way there Dean was cursing and grumbling. It was a 1976 Chevy Chevette and it popped sputtered and screeched the whole way. Dean swore he was going to be deaf.

Finally he parked the car and trotted into the hospital. He got to Sam's floor, passing the hot nurses and flashing them smiles. Every single time he was rewarded with blushes and giggles; something that was to be expected. But what wasn't expected was the screaming and alarms ringing out near none other than Sam's room. He prayed and prayed that it wasn't his brother who was causing the ruckus, but even still he broke into a run.

"We need to sedate him now!" He heard someone yell. "He's getting out of control!"

Unfortunately, when Dean reached the room, he saw a horrible sight that made him face lose color. Sam's face was contorted in pain, his body thrashing around on the bed. It looked like a seizure, but Dean knew it wasn't. He knew exactly what was going on: Sam was having a nightmare.

"Sedate him now!" The doctor yelled.

"No!" Dean shouted as he ran in. "I know how to handle this!" He moved closer to his brother and saw there were tears running down the kid's face.

"Sam!" Dean yelled, shaking his brother's shoulders roughly. "Sammy wake up, dammit! You're having a nightmare, wake up!"

At first, Sam didn't seem to hear him, whimpers escaping his mouth, but finally Sam's eyes snapped open and he began gasping for air.

"Easy Sam, you're okay. It was just a nightmare, alright? I got you."

Sam looked around frantically until his eyes landed on his older brother. Sam's hands were gripped tightly on Dean's arms; the only thing that was keeping him upright. His arms were trembling, and his breath was harsh and rapid.

"D-Dean. J-Jess she-I-I saw something. Jess was burning alive on-on the ceiling, Dean."

Dean gulped. Another one of those damn dreams. The dream that Sam used to have almost every day since Jess' death.

"It was nothing man; nothing but a nightmare, okay? Just forget about it."

Sam nodded slowly as Dean gently eased his brother back onto the pillows.

"You okay?"

"Y-Yeah. I-I think so."

"Good. God dammit, Sam, you almost gave me a heart attack."

"Sorry."

The nurses smiled and left the two alone, sighing in relief. The kid had a good brother.

"By the way…Dean?"

"Yeah dude?"

"I'm still hungry."

Whew, that was a long one! Poor Dean and poor Sam, they are really getting it rough. Next chapter sneak peek: Sam gets his memory back- thank god right? BTW Thanks for all the reviews; they make me happy!