A/N: Congrats to Maddy77 on graduating! I wish you the best in your future endeavors.
Heather Norton sighed and shuffled a stack of papers around her workstation. Mr. Jenkins, their resident alcoholic, had already been hauled in by the police after attempting to urinate on the wooden cowboy statue that stood outside Mort's Gas and Tobacco. He sat on a gurney, blissfully unaware of his surroundings and occasionally breaking into song. A disgruntled police officer watched him carefully, though it was clear he wasn't going anywhere until he sobered up. Billy Costello was leaving, after having the result of his newest skateboarding accident stitched and bandaged.
"Is someone coming to get you?"
"I got a ride," Billy grinned, waving his scuffed board at Heather.
"Be careful!" She cried after him, before checking the waiting room. Still devoid of life. Heather sighed; it looked like it was going to be another quiet, and frankly boring, night in the Morris County ER.
A flurry of activity by the ambulance bay caught her eye. Heather stood, straightening her long, white coat and willed herself to take a deep breath. It's probably nothing. Still, she felt the excitement of a possible trauma case crackle through her. It's pretty foggy out tonight. Car accident? That would certainly liven things up around here. Heather was in the middle of silently scolding herself, halfway down the corridor, when the doors burst open.
A tall, pale man staggered in, collapsing under the weight of two other people. The man was slung over his shoulder in a clumsy fireman's carry, arms limp and flopping against the back of the man's knees with each step he took. The woman was standing on her own-barely. He had her cradled in a half carry with his free hand cupping her waist. "Please, take care of them," he gasped.
"We need some help over here!" Heather shouted, dashing over to the stranger and easing the woman, girl- she doesn't look out of high school, out of his arms. She was ghostly white and filthy. She was breathing, faintly but steadily.
"Can you hear me?" Heather intoned in a loud voice, vigorously digging her knuckles into the girl's breastbone. Heather gave a small sigh of relief as the girl flinched away from the painful stimulus, opening her eyes in the process. Alright, she's responsive for now, got a pulse and is breathing OK on her own, she thought as she lowered the frail body onto a nearby gurney, time to move on to the next one. Heather felt her blood pumping, adrenaline coursing through her veins. This is what she lived for- multiple traumas, triage, no time to pause or dawdle about whether or not she made the right call. The man was completely still; at first she thought he might be dead but closer inspection revealed an erratic rise and fall of his chest. He was covered in blood. Heather whipped a pair of trauma shears out of her pocket and swiftly cut away his clothes. In another place and another time Heather might have admired his finely chiseled features and powerful musculature, but now all her attention was focused on the source of the bleeding. Which she couldn't find. His skin was flawless. Heather paused for a moment, utterly puzzled. She grabbed his shoulder, preparing to logroll him over to check his back and froze. A handprint? The flesh was tender and pink, like it had just been burned.
"And how exactly did this hap-" she whipped around, preparing to interrogate the odd, pale man who had brought them in, but he was gone.
Muffled cursing and a small crash alerted her to the fact that Paul Dennings, the night nurse, had finally sauntered out of the staff room.
"Shit doc, what's going on here? I heard you call but I thought-"
"Save it," Heather flapped a hand at him distractedly. "I need labs on these two right away. Umm probably some oxygen, and get a saline drip started."
Paul nodded and scurried off, leaving Heather shaking her head and wondering if she were still awake.
Consciousness returned painfully, slowly. A whisper of sheet here, a soft voice there, but mostly he felt pain. A dull constant ache throughout his body, like he'd run a hundred miles and laid down to sleep. The back of his hand itched. Dean opened his eyes, wincing at the whiteness surrounding him. Hospital? He tried to sit up, feeling the world start to tilt and swirl around him. How long was I out? Dean stared down at his lap, trying to remember how he'd gotten here. Blood, snarls, tearing, ripping, a voice screaming into the void. His voice. Dean shuddered, rubbing his eyes. Hellhounds. And then? He searched tentatively inside his own memories, like he was searching for a particularly nasty spirit trapped somewhere in a dark basement. Those memories, like the ghost were lurking somewhere out of site. He knew they would hurt him once uncovered, but he had to look nonetheless. His mind skipped and stuttered, dodging away from him when he tried to focus. Eventually Dean gave up, though he couldn't ignore the growing feeling in the pit of his stomach that this was going to come back and bite him in the ass. Might as well start with how the hell I wound up in a hospital johnny instead of bled out by the roadside. Dean stood shakily, his legs stiff and uncompromising as old leather. He gripped his IV pole tightly which, he realized belatedly, explained why his hand prickled uncomfortably. Dean felt something pull beneath his legs and froze, a flush creeping up the back of his neck. Catheter. Shit, I must've been out of it for a while. Defeated, Dean sat back down on the bed, running his finger over the call button as he tried to muster up the courage to push it. C'mon man, the longer you wait, the longer you'll have that tube shoved up your-
"Well look who's back in the land of the living!" A tall brunette stood in the doorway, her arms folded around a clipboard. Dean had to admit the whole white coat thing was pretty hot.
"Hiya doc," he croaked out, surprised at how weak his voice sounded. He squinted. "How long have I-"
"Since last Thursday, so almost a week. I'm Doctor Norton. Do you remember anything about what happened?"
Dean shrugged. Nothing you would believe.
The woman sighed, "Well it's not uncommon in patients with head trauma to have a period of amnesia surrounding the time of the injury. I was just hoping you could enlighten me. I was on duty the night you guys were brought in and… it was pretty weird."
"Weird how?"
Heather squinted at him, as if trying to decide whether he was sincere or not. "For starters a man shows up out of nowhere in the ER with you and another girl slung over his shoulder. I looked like she'd been injected with some sort of toxin and then had a large volume of her blood removed. You were unconscious and covered in blood but had no physical wounds other than your… tattoo."
Dean bowed his head, trying to work through the influx of information. The djinn victim. He realized with a pang that he'd forgotten all about her.
"The girl… She's okay?"
Heather nodded, "Spent a few days in the ICU but she was released yesterday. The cops questioned her, but she wouldn't talk. Just said someone must've grabbed her from behind and shot her up before she realized what was going on."
Dean felt a huge weight lifted from his shoulders. That's one part solved. Now about the rest…
"The guy who brought me in… did he have brown hair, kinda shaggy, about yea big?" Dean stretched his arm high above his head.
The doctor frowned, a small furrow of confusion forming on her brow. "He was tall, sure. About your height though. Short, dark brown hair…" She paused, then added almost a murmured half-thought, "His eyes were really blue. Sound familiar?"
Dean had smiled and ruefully rubbed the back of his head, explaining that he must've hit his head really hard because none of that made any sort of sense, and that now he was conscious, could he please get the catheter removed? And Doctor Norton had gotten some nervous nursing student to do the deed, and after they finally left Dean could finally drop the mask of nonchalance. Because Heather's description did sound familiar. Someone he'd given up hope of ever seeing again.
Dean's hand went reflexively to his shoulder, where he was surprised to discover the skin was raised and calloused. The doc did mention something about a tattoo. Taking advantage of his new found mobility, Dean eased himself to the bathroom, peering at his reflection in the small, smeary mirror. Slowly, he slipped the hospital gown off his shoulder. Staring back at him, angry and red, was a handprint. Dean cautiously placed his palm over the mark. Cas, are you there?