Summary: Withdrawn after an assault, pediatrician Dean is visited by handsome therapist Sam, a man with two shocking secrets. AU Sam/Dean slash romance. Warning: implied Alastair/Dean noncon

A/N: Finally all becomes clear...

Conjugal Glue (Part 10: The Facts Of Life) by frostygossamer

Dean went back to work. The day to day routine at Welby Memorial was comfortingly familiar. He got a new cellphone, and told the hospital clerks to quit taking messages for him that he wasn't going to read. He spend long, busy hours just doing his job, and went back to his lonely apartment only to sleep.

Sam stopped calling. On the odd occasions when Dean spotted Castiel, the janitor quickly made himself scarce.

The tingle faded and died. Weeks and months passed. Dean coped.

"Guess what don't kill me makes me stronger, or some crap," he thought.

Sometimes he also thought about Lisa. He wondered how she was doing. Did she have the baby? Was it a boy or a girl? Was she happy?

Because he sure as hell wasn't.

Nurse Carmen was very sweet. She seemed to be a little disappointed when she realized Sam Singer wasn't coming back any more, but she didn't press Dean as to why. He took her to dinner a couple times. Someplace with good old plain American food, nothing French or Italian.

He let her take him home to her place once. And it was pretty much the same as it always used to be... meaningless.

~0~

It was spring before Anna turned up at the hospital.

Dean was going about his rounds in the usual way, when he spotted her sitting patiently, in the little alcove reserved for visitors beside the hot drinks machine. He considered ignoring her completely, but the moment she saw him she smiled uncertainly and rose carefully to her feet. He immediately saw why. He led her into an empty private room, where she perched on the empty bed.

"You're pregnant, isn't that right?" he demanded brusquely. "Don't try to tell me you're carrying MY baby."

"Yes, Dean," Anna replied calmly. "This baby IS yours."

Dean shook his head, unable to believe it.

"Can't be mine. I'm sterile." he stated, bitterly. "Always have been. My ex, Lisa, could never forgive me for that."

"You're not sterile, Dean," Anna insisted, then she took his hand and looked straight at him. "You're a zemale. There's quite a difference."

"What are you talking about, Anna?" Dean demanded. "That some of the Deltaic psychology crap Sam Singer used to spout?"

Anna sighed. "It's not 'crap', Dean. And it's not psychology. It's biology. You're a zemale, I'm a female and Sam's a hemale. Together we make the full set. Together we can make a baby. And we did."

"Whaddya mean 'together'? Don't get it," Dean complained, bewildered.

Anna touched his face gently. Dean couldn't help but lean into the touch.

"I suppose I'm going to have to give you 'The Talk'," she said. "I really think Sam should have explained all this properly."

"'The Talk'? Crap! I'm not some kid," Dean snorted. "I do KNOW how babies get made."

"Dean," Anna whispered. "It seems you don't know how THIS baby got made. Just sit down and listen."

Dean reluctantly flopped down on the bed beside the lovely redhead.

"Dean, we're all Deltaics," Anna began. "The Seraphoses and our cousins the Singers, and YOU, evidently. We Deltaics migrated to the US from a tiny in-bred Greek island more than a century ago. We're kind of special. We have three genders."

Dean laughed. "Three genders? Oh sure. Straight outta freakin' Star Trek."

Anna shook her head. "Sam tried to tell you about it, but the big baby was scared you wouldn't accept it." She sighed. "We're not going to get anywhere if you can't trust that I'm telling you the truth."

"OK," Dean allowed. He couldn't stay angry with her, in her condition. "Suppose I believe you. How does it work, this three sex thing? Answer me that, huh?"

Anna shrugged. "It's pretty easy, Dean. Three sexes: hemale, zemale and female or plus, zero and minus. Sam Singer is a hemale, a regular macho guy, pretty much. I'm a female, which is how come I'm the one lugging this sweet little bump around with me right now. And you, my darling, are a zemale, the INTERMEDIARY sex."

"I'm a... WHAT?" Dean hissed, sensing an affront to his machismo.

"Let me explain this in words of one syllable," Anna continued patiently. "Sam bangs you. You bang me. I make baby. Simple math."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Lady, that dog don't hunt. You're talking freakin' sci-fi here."

Anna laughed playfully. "Sweetheart, you want to talk science? You've had the fertility tests? You already know you don't make regular sperm, right? That's because you make 'metasperm'."

Metasperm? Dean frowned. He remembered how his heart had sunk, as he watched his little misshapen guys wallowing around on the specialist's microscope slide, with no sense of direction.

"My homeboys are meant to be that way?" he asked, amazed.

"Mhm darling," Anna confirmed. "They fuse with regular sperm and add your own genetic markers. You can fertilise an ovum if you've been with a hemale in the last three or four days. Trust me. We've been doing it this way for generations."

Dean was dazed. This sounded like total hokum but...

"So this baby... It's mine? Sam's and yours AND mine? That what you're saying?"

"That's it," Anna agreed, smiling warmly. "Now isn't that cosy, darling?"

Dean pondered. Actually this explained a lot. It explained Sam's cockamamie family. It totally explained why Sam had seemed to push him and Anna together, and why he had been so damned cool about it afterward.

Sam had wanted to make a baby with Anna and had USED him to do it. The scumbag!

He stared at the floor for a while, marshaling his temper, then he sighed, defeated.

"What I don't see, Anna, is why you needed me for this. Why not just get it on together? Wouldn't that get the job done? Why the hell drag me in at all?"

Anna's expression became tender, and she patted Dean's hand.

"Oh Dean, of course we COULD have done this without you. But Sam is in love with YOU. He wanted to make a baby with YOU. I'm just what we call a 'third angle', the extra body that brings it all together."

Dean had the sudden feeling that he might have misjudged Sam completely.

"So Sam loves me?" he asked, hoping he didn't sound too pathetic.

Anna beamed at him. "Of course he does, darling," she said. "He's crazy about you. And I'm so sorry that I messed it up between you two."

Dean felt a tiny flame of hope ignite in his heart. Sam loved him.

"So you came here today just to tell me all this?" he asked.

"Well, no, actually I had hoped you would've worked it all out on your own by now," Anna admitted. "I came here to ask you to help me get Sam back here in time for the birth. I've sent the guy a couple of messages via cousin Cas' famous grapevine already, but the stubborn boy refuses to acknowledge them. He's brooding someplace down in Colombia, apparently."

"That jack-ass," Dean interjected. Colombia was a part of Sam's criminal past. Colombia didn't sound good.

"I can't blame him, Dean," Anna continued, apologetically. "When Sam ran away the first time, he wanted so much for me to beg him to come home that I guess he figures it's my turn to be ignored."

Her eyes took on a pleading look. "I think he'll only come home if he believes YOU want him back. Send him a message, Dean. Tell him you need him. Tell him you forgive him."

Dean considered. "I don't know if I forgive him," he said. "He set me up."

"Yes, well," Anna agreed. "You may find he's misled you about a great many things. But if you can get him to come home, you can have it out face to face at least."

Dean nodded. "I'll think about it," he allowed. "In the meantime, I'm right here if you need help with the baby. I'm not angry with you, Anna. And I'm no deadbeat."

Anna smiled and hugged him before slowly standing up.

"I know you're not, Dean darling," she said, sounding relieved. "You're a zemale. You care. I'll keep in touch."

Then she kissed Dean and left.

Dean realized that he had misjudged Anna too. She had the abrasive manner of a career businesswoman, but deep down she was vulnerable and lonely like him. He was going to take good care of her through this.

~0~

"Conjugal glue? What the hell even is that?" Dean demanded, as he sat in a bar with Bobby Singer.

Bobby put down his beer glass and chuckled. "You wanna know, huh?"

Dean sighed. "It's Anna. She's pregnant. And..."

Bobby cut him off. "You three're having a baby? Hell's bells, that's goddamn amazin'! Wait till I tell Karen she's gonna be a grandmom. And Fergus, bless him, he makes like a hard-ass but he's gonna be stoked."

Dean was a little relieved that Bobby was obviously up to speed with the situation between the three of them. No need for awkward explanations.

"So you see," Dean continued. "Anna wants me to get Sam home."

Bobby grinned. "Well, sure she does. But, wait, I guess you're not so sure, huh?"

Dean shook his head. Bobby finished his beer and leaned back in his chair, assessing him.

"You miss my boy?" he asked.

Dean twisted his face. "Yeah, I guess," he admitted.

"Well, there you go," Bobby pronounced. "Sounds simple enough to me."

"I just... I just need to know what I'm letting myself in for," Dean explained, uncertainly. "This Deltaic thing. Just what are they gonna expect from me? What the hell is this conjugal glue crap anyways?"

Bobby grinned. "It's you, sonny," he said. "You're the glue that's gonna hold this thing of yours together."

"Me?" Dean responded. "They want ME to hold it together? Not sure I can hold myself together, man."

"Yeah, YOU, Dean," Bobby confirmed. "You really think my Karen and Fergus woulda gotten together by themselves? Hell no. Me and Karen were an item long before Fergus came along. He's our 'third angle'. We had an arrangement and that arrangement got us Sam. Now we're family and we've stuck together. And I've had to work damn hard to do it. That's what Sam and Anna are gonna need from you."

"Not sure that I'm up to it," Dean commented.

"Sure you are," Bobby insisted. "You're as tough as buffalo hide, all you been through, come out fightin'. Gonna be a piece of cake, easy as pie."

Dean looked doubtful. "You think?"

"Sure, sonny. And it's gonna be worth it. Gonna wonder how you lived any other way. It'll be a snap."

Bobby smiled avuncularly and patted him on the shoulder.

"Dunno what it is, sonny, but you feel like family already."

TBC

A/N: So now you know. Anybody guess I was going to go sci-fi? There were clues. More tomorrow.