Graceful

It had to be close to four in the morning when the sound of it woke Sam from a light sleep. He blinked a few times, glanced at the clock and turned his head to the empty side of the bed. With a deep breath, he took a moment to prepare himself for the worst.

Since the day they found out about the merge of Ali and the organism, both men had been on edge about how it might affect her but so far there had been nothing out of the ordinary, at least not until that weekend.

Her kids were gone, and she was at the bunker, just like everytime she could possibly get away to see them, but there was something off when Cas brought her by on Friday night. She was pale and though she wasn't sick, something was definitely wrong. It had been weeks since they figured out the reasons for the insane way they had all been acting, not that Sam cared at all because he hadn't found their actions at all surprising.

So he had slept with his girl, so what if his brother had been in bed with them, it's not like he had slept with his brother, it was just them and Ali and it was consensual. It didn't matter that it had started out as a bet, to see whether or not she was right, and honestly Sam had been waiting for something to come up, or go down between them, Ali and Dean were just too close.

Sam swung his feet over and placed them on the floor, reaching for the slippers that were tucked under the bed. Concrete floors on bare feet were never any fun. He didn't bother with a robe, just grabbed a t-shirt and headed out. He wore sleep pants to bed, but never a shirt, not when Ali was around, and hell, he was lucky if he stayed in the pants while she was over but that night she had been cold.

Following the sounds of the music, he moved through the bunker, down the hall past Dean's room, which he wasn't surprised to find open and empty, to the bathroom that had the large, claw foot tub in it. The door to this room was open too and the light sounds of Africa from Toto played in the air. He mostly heard the instruments and not the words. He knew that it wasn't for Dean's enjoyment, the guy hated the song, but for Ali's. Strange, though, he could hear Dean mumbling the words just above the sound of the vocalist.

Sam leaned on the doorsill, crossed his arms and put his shoulder against the frame. Dean was sitting on the toilet, elbows on his knees with a book in his hand as he hummed to the beat. He didn't look up as Sam stood there but Dean's eyes occasionally went to the body in the bathtub. Sam's brows creased with curiosity as he tilted his head and looked further into the room.

The water was steaming so either she hadn't been in there very long or Dean was there to make sure it stayed warm, and Ali was dipped down up to her neck in the water with her eyes closed. He could see the bubble that covered most of her body but here and there skin peeked through, giving him just enough to stoke his imagination and he cleared his throat.

"Hey," Dean sat back and put the book, page side down, on his knee.

"Hey," Sam sighed, moving in so that he could lean back against the wall. "What's going on?"

"She was cold."

"Cold?"

"Yeah, she, ah," Dean paused, "she came into my room to steal my bathrobe on the way in here."

"She never even woke me up."

"She didn't want to wake me up either, but you know how I am."

"Yeah," Sam sighed and slid down against the wall to get a little more comfortable. "She didn't seem right when she came here yesterday."

"I think she's sick."

"Cas said she wasn't."

"Well, Cas doesn't know everything, like how her body is reacting to this thing."

"Dean, she's been running around like this for months, there's no reason for her to react this way now that…"

"She's not right, Sam, just like you said."

Sam took a deep breath and looked over at the tub, watching the relaxed way that Ali's chest rose and fell in the water.

"So she was cold," he sighed, "is the water helping at all?"

"I think it's trying to regulate her body temperature," Dean whispered, "but having a hard time."

"He." Sam smiled as he replied, which got Dean to look at him.

"What?"

"He," he grinned wider, "Ali calls it a he."

"Why?"

"Do you really want to know?"

"When you put it that way…" Dean paused, "maybe not, but you know what, go ahead."

"She associates it with a male, so she calls it he or him when she talks about it," Sam couldn't keep the smile away as he explained to his brother, that had the same bewildered look on his face that Sam had carried through the whole conversation, "because the only ones who get to be inside of her are guys."

"What!?" Dean sat up, the book fell from his knee, knocking against the ground and he shook his head as he glanced from the girl in the tub back to him. "That's…" he clenched his jaw, "that's disturbing."

"You wanted to know."

"I really didn't." Dean shook his head and closed his eyes as he rubbed his hand over his forehead. "So, he is trying to regulate her temperature, at least that's what Cas guessed, I mean she's usually cold, but, man, she was chattering when she came in. I swear I was cooking a lobster with how hot she had that water when she first got in."

"Okay, so extra blankets and some flannels?" Sam questioned.

"I don't know, Sam, this whole thing just bothers me. I wish we knew more about it," Dean paused, rolling his eyes, "him." He let out a sigh and shook his head. "If she names it, I'm done, just done."

Sam couldn't help but laugh because he knew this was Dean's way of dealing with everything that was going on. He also knew that Dean was going to have a hard time letting her go after this and as he watched his brother place his chin in his hand and lean down to test the water once again, Sam had an idea.

"Hey, Dean, I know another way of keeping her warm," Sam watched as he didn't even budge, just kept his hand as close to her as he could. "Dean?"

"Hmm?" the older one questioned.

"Body heat," Sam replied, which got Dean's attention, and the green-eyed man whipped around to face him. Sam smiled quickly as the blush raced up his neck. "I'm not saying that anything needs to happen but wouldn't it be better if she was laying between us? That would keep in the…"

"Body heat," Dean breathed in quickly, his eyes darting back to her. "Right," he cleared his throat, "your, ah… your bed is bigger than mine."

"Yeah," Sam nodded and pushed himself up, "I'll go grab a few extra pillows."

"I'll wake her up." Dean whispered and Sam tapped his leg before turning quickly and nearly sprinting from the room.

His heart raced as he entered the spare bedroom and stole the pillows from the bed, turning quickly as he did and ran face-first into the door. Stopping for just a second, he collected his thoughts and took his time heading back to his room.

Graceful, Winchester! He thought to himself, really graceful.