Author's Chapter Notes:

After all the angst a light (ish) little chapter albeit at Dean's expense. Sorry honey!

"Why can't he lift his arms?" Sam cornered Castiel the minute that they cleared the room.

Castiel paused, thought for a minute about his answer. "Have you ever been really hungry, thought of your favourite food, and your mouth watered?"

Sam shook his head and the angel sighed. "This would be much easier to explain to Dean."

The young hunter huffed. "Get a better example." He should have been careful what he asked for.

"Did you ever think back to the day Dean died, when the hellhounds ripped him apart and all you could do was watch? Could you feel the sadness that was in you at that time, feel the pain that his death caused you?"

"Too good an example." Sam cleared his throat and wiped at his eyes. "Are you talking about sense memory?"

The angel took in the glisten in the younger man's eyes and smiled knowingly. "That is what I mean." He pointed at Sam's face. "At the moment all of Dean's thoughts will be on what has just been done to him in Hell, his body will react to that whether he likes it or not. To it, it will still feel real even though it is just a memory. If he thinks about Alastair skinning him, then he will feel the knife on his skin, feel the pain, just as truly as he did down there. When I raised him last time, I didn't erase his thoughts of Hell but I blocked those feelings filtering through to his body. Gabriel has not. Dean was tortured, his body will feel the physical effects of his soul's suffering. It will ease as time goes on but at this point, he will be in a great deal of pain that no doctor or pill can ease. He will need your help for the littlest of things until his mind starts to get control and force the nightmares back to being just that, nightmares."

Sam was staring at him open-mouthed.

"What?" Castiel moved forward, concern on his face.

"Did you say Alastair? Was my brother back in Hell with that butcher?" Sam's face had paled and the angel rested a gentle hand on his arm.

"Alastair was there. You unfortunately did not kill him. It was Lucifer and him that were overseeing Dean's……confinement." The angel steered away from the torture word, having learnt that paleness on the human face was never a good sign.

Sam proved him right by suddenly dashing off to the main bathroom in Bobby's house, avoiding the one in the room Dean was in and the questions that him loosing part of his lunch might cause. Not that Dean was up to questioning him about anything at that moment. That thought brought back Castiel's words and the rest of his lunch.

Castiel followed at a trot behind him, stopped only by the smell of sickness that found it's way out the wooden door that was part closed in front of him. "Samuel? Are you alright?"

Sam throw open the door and glared at the angel. "It's Sam." With that he headed off back to his brother's room.

----

A few hours later

Dean didn't want to sleep and dream but he didn't want to wake up and live the nightmare either. Other factors forced him awake though.

Sam was sitting in a chair at the bedside reading when he opened his eyes, his brother sensing even from behind the pages of the book that Dean was awake. "How you feeling?," Sam asked as he placed the book down on the bedside table.

"Need up." Dean waited for Sam to move. He didn't.

"You are not getting out of that bed."

"Need to pee," Dean explained breathlessly.

"Oh." Sam looked round the room as if looking for help and his eyes lit on Bobby's stuff that they'd moved out of the way to place Dean in here. "Bobby's got bottles and bedpans." His brother's look could have made Hell freeze over and solve any problems they had left.

"Over. My. Dead. Body." Dean tried valiantly to sit up, almost got his back off the pillow, and fell back.

Sam reached over and pulled the covers free of Dean's legs. He smiled at his brother. "How do you want to do this? I could give you a carry?" He felt the ice forming on his skin as Dean continued to glare at him. "Ok. Ok."

Reaching forward Sam put his arms under Dean's and hauled his brother upright, trying to ignore for now the little gasp of pain that the action brought forth. "Right, I'm going to stand up and take you with me. On three." Sam counted and stood, pulling Dean upright and taking all his brother's weight on his arms. "Think you can walk?"

Dean was still trying to get his breath back from just the effort of getting upright. He had no idea how he was supposed to get to the bathroom, even with Sam's help.

Realising that Dean was struggling Sam stood, waiting until his brother moved his head and looked at him, face pale and sweating. "You sure you want to do this?"

Dean's first thought was no, but he swallowed that down. "Yeah. Need…..to….hurry."

"Great." Sam started backwards, watching his brother's face as they moved, hoping that the discomfort in Dean's features was from the need of where they were going and not caused by how they were getting there. Finally he felt the door behind him. "So, what now genius?"

"Sit."

Sam couldn't resist. "Was that sit?"

"Hurry….up," Dean huffed.

"Oh yeah, sorry." He kicked the door opened and lifted the lid, spinning them and deposited Dean down on the toilet. "Do you think you can…." Sam waved a finger at Dean's pyjama bottoms.

"No." Dean's face was flushed and Sam knew that it wasn't from the exertion of getting this far.

"Promise I won't look," he chuckled as he almost rested his chin of Dean's shoulder and reached down to push the bottoms down.

"Bite…me."

"Such gratitude, I'll give you five minutes, try not to fall off." Sam left Dean to it and wandered out to find Bobby hovering in the bedroom.

"Everythin' ok?"

"Yeah, he needed to go and didn't want to use the bottle."

Bobby's grin was a wide one. "He's a stubborn son of a bitch. Winchester trait. Nice to see a little fight in him though."

Sam laughed "Hold that thought for a day or two when he's complaining and throwing things around because he frustrated."

"Yeah well, as long as he's breathing I'll take what he can give. Think he'll eat?" Bobby lifted the cup that he was holding in his hands.

"I'll check. Better go rescue him." Sam headed back into find Dean resting his head back on the wall, eyes closed. "Hey, hey, hey. No sleeping in here. Let's get you decent and back to bed."

---

Three Days Later

"Think I preferred Hell's form of torture," Dean moaned as Sam helped him sort himself on yet another trip to the bathroom. "At least there I could actually die of embarrassment."

"One, not funny. Two, quit moaning. Three, you'll be on your own feet soon enough. Four, I don't mind."

"Well I do."

"Stop whining!" Sam pulled him up and jumped as he realised Castiel was behind him.

Dean snorted. "Please anyone else want to come and destroy my last strands of dignity?"

"Can I help?" Castiel asked. "What are you both doing in here?"

Dean cracked at that. "I needed to go, but since your buddy decided to leave me like this, I can't go on my own, hence my brother having to invade my personal space."

The angel lifted a hand. "Why did you not say?" He touched Dean's forehead and caught Sam as he fell forward when Dean's weight lifted from him.

Dean's voice carried through to them. "Why didn't we think of that?"

Sam walked out and went over to sort Dean's bedclothes, his brother still unable to grip anything. "I still have to help you dress and undress though," he said as he sat down next to him on the bed.

"Yeah, but at least now I'm only gonna need to pee for the next week." Sam snorted and then both brother's dissolved into giggles. Dean rested against Sam, putting his hand to his chest to ease the pain that the laughter caused, but enjoying the feeling of laughing freely with his brother too much too try and stop.

The angel just looked on in confusion.