Angel Unaware 3/3
Title: Angel Unaware 3/3
Author: dragonflybeach
Category: Supernatural
Word Count: 17.7k
Characters: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester, Kevin Tran, (briefly Cas, Garth and [Spoiler (click to open)]Gabriel)
Pairings: none
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Season 9 spoilers, blood, gore, frank discussion of physical injuries, vomiting, canon typical ghost on boys whumpage, and a few naughty words. And alternating POV.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything, but if I did, I'd probably write fanfic about it anyway.
Summary: Goes AU in Season 9, Episode 9 - Sam feels great after the trials - a little too great maybe, because he gets hurt on a routine hunt and doesn't realize it. When Dean has to kidnap him from the hospital after strange things start happening, Sam starts putting together all the little moments that haven't made sense over the past few weeks and quickly comes to the wrong conclusion.
The following morning, there was a soft knock on Sam's door.
"Yeah, Kevin, it's open."
Kevin's head popped through the door. "Just warning you, Dean's planning to bring you breakfast in bed."
Sam nodded. "Thanks."
He pushed himself up to a sitting position. He hurt all over again this morning, but not as much as last night. Of course, he probably still had at least a little pain medicine in his system. He stood carefully and reached for the crutches, not bothering to change from his pajamas.
Dean was apparently putting the finishing touches on a breakfast tray when Sam entered the kitchen.
"Hey Sammy," Dean frowned. "Are you ok? I was gonna bring this to you."
"Not an invalid, Dean," Sam snapped, the words coming out much harsher than intended. He sighed and forced himself to continue more civilly. "I just think the more I'm up and moving around, the sooner I'll feel like myself again."
Dean's face didn't smooth out the way Sam expected. "What's wrong, Sam? You don't feel like yourself?"
For a moment guilt flooded Sam, the knowledge that Dean had, since he was four years old, had been programmed to take care of Sammy at all costs. In the next heartbeat, white hot anger drowned the feelings.
It didn't matter why he did it. Dean had no right to give Sam demon blood without his consent.
And Dean did it because Dean didn't want to be alone, not because Sam wanted to live at all costs.
But confronting Dean without proof was useless, so Sam forced himself to take a deep breath and count to ten.
"I just ... I know, I fell into a grave and broke my leg in four places and had surgery and then nearly screwed up my surgery, but I just don't feel as good as I did last week." Sam sighed. "I promise I'll take it slower, not try to push myself to much, but I'm gonna go nuts if you keep me propped up in bed for the next six weeks."
Dean nodded, his face still not completely relaxing. "Just don't push yourself too hard and make things worse, Sam. And you gotta tell me, if something hurts or whatever. I gotta know what's wrong with you to take care of you."
"Dean, I'm thirty years old." Sam answered. "At some point, you've got to let me take care of myself."
"Maybe," Dean said, with a hint of teasing smile at his mouth. "Here, Sasquatch. Eat up and get your strength back. And so you can take a pain pill, because we all know you get sick if you take them on an empty stomach."
He spread out eggs, sausage, fried potatoes, pancakes, and cantaloupe on the table, and despite Sam's protests that it was way too much food, the younger brother actually ate a lot more of it than he thought he would.
Dean chased Sam and Kevin into the library while he cleaned the kitchen afterward. Sam found several books on demonology, but none strictly about demon blood. He piled them onto the table next to the armchair, telling Kevin that he wanted to do some research into demon blood.
Kevin found a couple more for him. The two settled in, Sam with his books and Kevin with the tablet. Dean checked on them a few times during the day, but mostly left them at it, announcing that he was going to check out the antique cars in the garage and figure out what was needed to get each of them running again.
Life went on like that for the next few days. Dean was actually excited to have an excuse for a few days of downtime to tinker with the old cars. None of them would run, of course, having not been started for more than forty years the belts and hoses had dry rotted and the oil and gasoline had degenerated and would have to be cleaned out, but apparently all of them had been well maintained before, and Dean had found the records for each vehicle. The Thunderbird was a 1955, the first year made, and had less than 10,000 miles, which had Dean speculating how much they could get for it at the Barrett-Jackson auction.
Dean's excitement over the cars kept him pre-occupied enough that he didn't ask too many questions about what Sam was reading, and didn't seem to notice that Sam kept asking for iron rich foods, things that would build up his own blood. Sam wasn't going to complain.
It was on the fourth day, after skimming through all of the books he had initially selected and three more after that, that Sam finally found a recipe for a spell to detect demon blood in human blood.
The good news was that it seemed fairly straightforward, and they should have all the ingredients in the bunker. The bad news was that it called for two gills of blood, which was about ten ounces.
Ten ounces wasn't that much, for a healthy adult. Donated blood was usually taken 16 ounces at a time. Of course, blood banks wouldn't even think of taking blood from someone who had just had surgery, or who was still anemic from coughing up blood at a frightening rate for the better part of a year. In addition, blood banks had equipment to remove blood safely and efficiently that of course wasn't laying around the bunker.
Sam had bled more than that a few times after hunts gone wrong, and he knew what herbs to take to build himself back up afterwards.
Nothing to do but to suck it up and do it.
Sam spent the rest of the day slinking around, ducking into the storeroom to grab a few things when he was supposedly going to the bathroom, sneaking into the infirmary for a few others while Dean cooked dinner. He had everything he needed by bedtime.
The following day, Sam waited until Dean was in garage and he and Kevin were settled into the library. About half an hour later, he stretched and pushed himself to his feet.
"My leg is kinda cramping. I think I'm gonna go stretch out on my bed for a while." he told Kevin.
Kevin looked up with a frown. "Are you ok? Do you need me to get you some medicine or ... Dean ... or something?"
"It's just muscle spasms." Sam shrugged. "Part of the healing process. If I need anything, I'll call one of you."
Kevin stood and stretched as well. "I think I'll take a break and go play some Skyrim. All these symbols are starting to run together."
Sam shook his head. "You've been on baby sitting duty."
"Are you surprised?" Kevin snorted.
"Not really," Sam said, shoving his book into his belt and reaching for his crutches.
He hobbled down the hall and closed his bedroom door, listening for the sound of Kevin's door closing.
Sam sat on the bed, pulling out the nightstand drawer in which he had collected everything, placing it on the floor before lowering himself to sit beside it.
He figured if he timed everything right, he would finish with the spell shortly before Dean came in for lunch, realized Sam wasn't in the library, and looked for him, so that he could confront his brother on his own terms.
He flipped the book open to the proper page, propping it against the dresser, and put the bowl in the center of the floor. Unfortunately, all the iv tubing in the infirmary had been dry rotted, and there probably wasn't any in the Winchester first aid kit, which of course was in the trunk of the Impala and there was no way Sam would be able to get to the car without Dean's knowledge. That meant he was going to have to draw out the blood with a syringe and the largest syringe the Men of Letters had was 30cc, which was about an ounce.
He forced himself to aim the syringe carefully, not to push too far in and puncture through the vein, and draw the blood out slowly, to keep the vein usable. After what seemed like an interminably long time, the syringe was finally filled, and he emptied it into the waiting bowl. The second syringe went a little faster, but in trying to go even faster on the third take, he blew out the vein and had to move to the cephalic vein.
He forced himself to draw slowly and steadily, and even so, he still blew the second vein and had to move to a third by the time he was drawing the ninth syringe.
Finally, finally, he had all ten ounces in the bowl. He pulled the book into his lap and began to measure and add the other ingredients, chanting in Latin after each one.
Once everything was in the bowl, he gave one final stir, read the last phrase, and watched for the mixture to change color.
Nothing happened.
He checked his watch, sat back, waited five minutes, and looked again.
Still no change.
He read the spell through again, counting off each ingredient in turn, carefully repeating the incantations, and still nothing.
He double checked the conversions of the archaic measurements to standard quantities, making certain he had used the correction amounts, and read the instructions yet again. By the end of all that, there was still no change to the mixture.
It was supposed to turn orange if demon blood was present, with a lighter color signifying a greater concentration. Pure demon blood would turn the concoction almost lemon yellow.
The blood in the bowl was just as red as it had been when it came from Sam's veins, with specks of herbs stirred into it.
Sam must have done something wrong. There was just no other explanation.
He pushed himself to his feet, wincing slightly at the pressure on the forming bruises inside of his left arm. He picked up the bowl, grabbed one crutch, and hobbled down to the bathroom to rinse it out.
He came back, sat down, read the instructions through once more just to make sure he wasn't missing anything, and started again.
He blew out the third vein on the inside of his arm on the third syringe. He turned his arm over and tried the one on the underside, but by this point his hands were shaking, and he stuck the needle straight through, ruining that vein as well.
He managed to draw enough from one of the veins on the top of his good foot to finish that syringe off, but by the time he emptied the blood into the bowl, a bruise began creeping underneath the skin around the puncture, indicating that vein was now ruined as well.
He laid the syringe beside the bowl, rubbed his hands over his face, and sighed. He hefted himself onto the bed and reached across for the bottle of water Dean had left for him.
He took a deep breath, a swallow of water, another breath, more water, until he felt calmer. He put the water on the nightstand on the closer side of the bed and returned to his spell.
He drew another syringe full of blood from the other vein in the top of his foot, but as he reached over to empty it into the bowl, he dropped it. Of course, since he was already having a bad day, the plastic syringe split down the side, despite having been only dropped a few inches, and spilled the contents.
"Fuck!"
He wiped up the blood with an old towel he had brought into the room, stamped as property of the Starlight Motel, where the hell ever that was.
He had another syringe, so he unscrewed the needle from the broken one to attach to the new one.
A strange blackness began to creep in around the edges of his consciousness.
A civilian wouldn't have known what it was, wouldn't have realized how very wrong this feeling was until it was too late.
Sam was not a civilian.
He had been possessed by some random demon as a teenager, by Meg as a young adult, by Lucifer himself, and by the Wicked Witch just a few weeks ago.
Something was trying to take over his consciousness and force Sam into a remote corner of his own mind.
He closed his hands, clenched his fists, and fought back the darkness. He envisioned a light, flowing outward to the edges of his mind, pushing away the darkness.
Once he felt certain that the darkness would stay at bay for a little longer, he opened his eyes and immediately yanked his shirt aside to look at his tattoo.
It seemed to be fine. Of course, it had been fine this morning, when he had been washing up shirtless in front of the mirror.
It couldn't be a demon trying to possess him, so the only possibility was that the demon blood was trying to make him lose control, trying to make him stop the spell.
He nearly laughed out loud at that thought, realizing that he must be on pain meds to think that demon blood was sentient.
Sam took a few more sips of the water, focusing on consciously relaxing himself so that he could finish this. Dean would be coming in any time to start lunch.
Actually, Dean had usually started lunch already by this time.
Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, Sam returned to the spell.
He rolled up his right sleeve, knowing this was going to be awkward, trying to draw blood from his dominant arm with his left hand without ruining the veins, but he was running out of other options.
He forced himself to breathe deeply, concentrate on working slowly, and managed to draw seven usable syringes of blood, blowing out two veins in the process and spilling another ounce because his hands were shaking so much.
This time, he measured very carefully, and double checked the amounts of all ingredients before adding them to the bowl, making sure to clearly enunciate the Latin phrases.
The mixture still did not turn orange.
Sam leaned back against the bed, his head tipped back on the mattress, facing the ceiling.
Maybe the herbs weren't fresh enough. The stinging nettles had just been bought a few weeks ago, but he honestly couldn't remember how old the tincture of wormwood was. Possibly before Dean went to Purgatory? And the ashwagandha had been in the Men of Letters' stash. Sure it was a dried herb, and Sam had never heard of it going bad, but maybe whatever chemical in it that reacted for the spell had become inert in the past fifty years?
He sighed, wondering how he was going to get replacement ingredients without Dean finding out. None of them were very rare, so he could in theory buy them all online, but if he got a package in the mail, Dean was going to get nosy.
The darkness began to seep in again.
Sam sat up, growling "No!" out loud.
He reached under the bed where he kept a mason jar of holy water and a box of rock salt. He unscrewed the jar lid, threw a large handful of the salt in, fished out the rosary and tossed it across the room, put his hand over the mouth of the jar and shook it enough to partially dissolve the salt. He brought the jar to his mouth and chugged it as fast as he could.
This time, there was a reaction.
Almost as soon as the salted water hit his stomach, it began to roil inside him, cramps starting seconds later. Within in a minute, he was forcefully vomiting, the fluid coming up so fast it flooded his mouth and poured out of his nose.
The jar fell from his hand and shattered as water mixed with stomach acid sprayed across the room.
"Sam?" Kevin shouted from the doorway.
Sam tried to raise his head to look at him, but between the cramps that kept him doubled over and the vomit that refused to even slow, he was doing well just to not fall over face first.
"Dean, come quick! Sam's room! I don't know! Hurry!" Kevin screeched into his phone.
The blackness spread in from the edges again, and this time Sam recognized it for what it was, not a demon trying to possess him, but his own body trying to shut down on him, pulling him toward rest and recovery, telling him to stop, but he had been too stubborn to listen.
He slapped one hand down on the broken glass, using the pain to help keep him alert, to keep him awake until Dean got there.
Sam heard the thunder of running footsteps coming down the hall, and knew that he only had to hold on a few more seconds.
"Zeke!" Dean shouted from the doorway, his voice even more panicked than Kevin's had been.
Sam's last thought was that he hoped the angel didn't smite him for the demon blood.
Sam's eyes flashed blue, but Zeke didn't seem to be in much better shape than Sam did.
"What the hell?" Dean demanded.
"Sam was trying to perform a spell to detect demon blood in him." Zeke wheezed as the vomiting finally abated. "He drained a considerable amount of blood out of himself to perform the experiment, twice, but both times, no demon blood was detected. He then drank a quart of holy water mixed with a large amount of salt."
"Fuck," Dean shoved a hand through his hair. "Why didn't you stop him?"
"I tried." Zeke's face expressed concern. "I tried to take over, but he pushed me away."
Dean nodded. "I guess if he can suppress Lucifer, some injured low level angel wouldn't even be a challenge." he sighed. "Can you fix this?"
"I am very much weakened. Sam shoved me to a place within him where I could not touch his soul to draw energy for myself, and I was exposed to chemicals through his spell that are detrimental to angels. I am not sure how much I can do right now." Zeke said.
"Can you heal the needle marks?" Dean asked. "I may have to take him back to the hospital, and if they think he's shooting heroin, they're going to be a lot less willing to help him."
There was a faint glow around Sam's head, Zeke's head, and the bruises on his arms disappeared.
Zeke then slumped over.
Dean grabbed him before he fell face first into the mess on the floor. He looked up to find Kevin watching in wide eyed horror.
"There's an angel in Sam?" the young man took a step backwards.
Dean sighed. "It's a long story, but yeah. Sam doesn't know."
"What do you mean, Sam doesn't know?" Kevin shook his head.
"I mean, the angel is possessing him to try to heal him. Sam wouldn't have agreed to it, so I didn't tell him." Dean said. "Don't look at me like that. I know it's wrong, but you saw him, Kevin. You saw what the trials did to him. He was dying. I mean, maybe hours to live at best. I did what I had to do."
"Is Sam going to think you had to do this?" Kevin asked quietly.
"He's gonna through the mother of all bitch fits." Dean snorted. "But I'm not gonna let my brother die if I can stop it. That's not in me."
Dean stood, pulling Sam up onto the bed, and began checking his brother's vital signs. His pulse and breathing were both rapid and shallow, neither of which was a good sign, and his fingernails were blue.
"Kev, could you get me ... " Dean began, looking over his shoulder, but no one was there.
"Stay put, Sasquatch," he ordered the unconscious form on the bed.
Dean jogged down the hall to the former infirmary and got the blood pressure cuff. He stepped back into the hall to find Kevin coming out of his room with a backpack.
"Where are you going?" Dean asked.
"I'm not gonna hang around here waiting for you to pimp me to an angel for my own good." Kevin replied frostily.
"Kevin ... "
"Don't, Dean," the young man warned. "If you don't tell Sam by tonight, I will."
"I'll tell him," Dean nodded. "I swear I will. But right now I may have to take him to the hospital, so I'll tell him as soon as he's well enough. I will."
"We'll see," Kevin shrugged, then walked toward the front of the bunker.
Dean checked Sam's blood pressure, which was dangerously low, and rechecked his pulse, which was now irregular.
"Sammy," he sighed.
He walked down the hall to grab the rolling desk chair from Kevin's room, brought it back, and loaded Sam into it to roll him to the garage stairs.
"You're going on a diet." He informed the still unconscious figure as he hefted Sam into a fireman's carry and took him to the car.
After a moment's consideration, Dean ran back downstairs to grab a different set of fake id's and the matching credit card.
He took Sam to the nearest ER, thankful they hadn't had to use this one yet, and registered him as William Turner. Darn it, forgot to grab his insurance card, but if you could be a sweetheart and put it on this credit card, you can just give me a copy of the bill and we'll file it ourselves.
An hour later, a doctor called Dean into the consultation room.
"His electrolytes were completely a mess, and he was rather dehydrated and anemic. You said he had the ankle and leg surgery three or four weeks ago?" The doctor frowned. "And he was still taking antibiotics?"
"Oh, yeah," Dean explained. It was a farm accident, and dirt and crap got in the wound, so the doctor who operated thought he was better safe than sorry."
"Oh, ok," the doctor agreed. "It looks like the severe vomiting was probably an allergic reaction, and the electrolyte imbalance and dehydration were a result of that. I'm not sure why he's so anemic, but we're not picking up any active bleeding, so they may have just not gotten him back up to speed after the surgery. We're giving him some fluids and potassium, and we're going to give him a pint of blood. We'll probably keep him four to six hours afterwards just to make sure he stabilizes, and then he can go home."
"Thanks, doc," Dean smiled. "Can I see him?"
"Give him a little while." the doctor said. "Maybe go grab some lunch if you haven't eaten yet and come back in an hour or so."
Dean returned two hours later to find Sam sullenly staring at the wall. He pulled the curtains closed around the bed, and turned the tv on loud enough to cover the sound of their voices.
"I had to switch identities," Dean said softly. " Didn't want another repeat of Joplin if the insurance company told them you just had that surgery a few days ago. You're registered under the name of William Turner."
Sam glared at him. "Who are you, Jack Fucking Sparrow?"
"What is wrong with you?" Dean asked.
"I don't know, Dean, what is wrong with me?" Sam snapped.
"Oh, just the fact you apparently chugged a jar of salt water?" Dean pointed out. "What the hell, man? I used to mix a tablespoon of salt into a pint of water and drink it to make myself throw up when I needed to get out of school. You drank way more than that! You overloaded your system with sodium so your body tried to barf it out, except it dehydrated you in the process. And oh yeah, you apparently were doing some kind of experiment to see if you still had demon blood in you after the trials and had been bleeding yourself, so you were anemic and throwing all that sodium on top of that sent you into hypovolemic shock and caused your heart to go into palpitations!"
"I know about the demon blood, Dean." Sam said softly.
Dean narrowed his eyes and pulled up a chair. "What?"
"The trials, the trials were purifying me." Sam pressed his hands to his own chest. "They were boiling out the demon blood. That's why I was so sick. That's why I was dying. Because the demon blood was gone. You gave me demon blood to save me."
"What are you talking about, Sam?" Dean frowned.
"Don't lie to me, Dean!" Sam hissed. "I know, ok? That's why you kept Crowley alive. That's why I was getting so much better so fast. That's why I keep losing blocks of time and I do things I don't remember and why you wanted to keep Cas away from me and I was the one who killed the three demons in Oregon! I did it Dean. I remember now. That's why Ezekiel knocked me out when you called him to help Charlie. Because I'm an abomination! You've been feeding me demon blood to try to fix me and you had no right!"
"There's no demon blood, Sam." Dean shook his head. He raised a hand to head off whatever Sam was about to say. "I swear, it's the truth. I did something you're not going to like to save you, but I swear on ... on Mom ... it wasn't demon blood."
Sam's face creased in confusion. "What then?"
"You're possessed." Dean sighed.
Sam immediately yanked the hospital gown aside to look at his tattoo.
"It's not a demon," Dean continued. "It's an angel."
"You've got to be fucking kidding me." Sam said, his voice completely without inflection.
"The reason you've heard me call Ezekiel's name is because he's been riding shotgun." Dean explained. "And I had to keep Cas away so he wouldn't notice."
"So I've been possessed by an angel for six weeks?" Sam demanded. "You let an angel into me, and in all that time, you couldn't find a moment to tell me? How did he get in, because I never said yes!"
"I tricked you," Dean looked down at his hands. "We were in your head. You were dying. I begged you to let me help you, and you said yes. You didn't know what you were saying yes to."
"You said 'There ain't no me if there ain't no you,'" Sam frowned. "I thought all that was a dream."
"No, it was real. Death himself was standing there waiting to reap you. He's probably gonna be pretty pissed when we see him again." Dean snorted.
"I was ready to die, Dean!" Sam raised his head and stared down his brother. "You had no right to do that. You should have just let me go!"
"I'm never gonna do that, Sam," Dean shook his head. "I'm never gonna just let you go. I'll fight for you 'til my dying breath and you know that."
"I never wanted another angel inside me, another anything inside me, and you knew that!" Sam leaned over and grabbed Dean's arm. "You had no right to make that kind of decision for me!"
"What was I supposed to do, just let you die?" Dean growled.
"That was my choice!" Sam insisted.
"I'd have been right behind you!" Dean said.
"Fine!" Sam threw up his hands. "You could have done that if you wanted to. You're an adult. But so am I, and you have never treated me like one!"
"Sam ... " Dean began, but trailed off when Sam stubbornly kept his head turned the other way. He dropped his head into his hands instead.
"Why is the angel still in me?" Sam asked. "Why didn't he do his thing and get out? Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because you'd kick him out if you knew, and you'd die, that's why!" Dean answered. "He said the damage was extremely extensive, and he was wounded from the fall. He's been helping. You told me yourself that you felt great. I asked him after your surgery how much longer, and he said a few days to a week."
"But in the meantime, you've been just fine with letting me be some random angel's meatsuit." Sam huffed.
Before Dean could answer, Sam took a deep breath and continued. "Cas said he couldn't fix me, that I was damaged on a sub-atomic level. Why did you think this angel could fix me?"
"Zeke said he could," Dean shook his head.
"And that's all you wanted to hear." Sam made a face. "So chances are, this angel has lied to you."
"But ... " Dean trailed off, frowning.
"But what is it you call them? Feathered dicks?" Sam sneered. "Not one of them, ever, including Cas, has been completely honest with us. You suddenly think some angel you've never met before is on your side because he tells you what you want to hear? You used to be smarter than that, Dean!"
"Don't ask me to apologize for saving your life, Sam." Dean warned. "I'd do it again in a heartbeat."
"You've turned into Dad, Dean!" Sam shouted. "No, you know what? You're even worse than Dad! Dad at least let you make some decisions for yourself, let you ask me what I wanted occasionally. You've taken it all on yourself! You make all the decisions based on what you want, and never for a minute think of what's best for me or what I want!"
Two nurses rushed into the curtained off cubicle.
"Everything ok here?" one asked, looking from one brother to the other.
"Yeah, we're fine," Sam huffed. "He's just leaving."
"Sam ... "
"Go, Dean." Sam said sadly.
"But they're going to release you in a few hours," Dean argued. "You're gonna need me to take you home."
"I'm not going home with you," Sam announced, folding his arms. "I'll take a cab, go get a motel room."
"And then what?" Dean gestured at Sam's chest. "You're gonna go hole up somewhere and kick the angel out? You'll die, Sam!"
"I will or I won't," Sam shrugged. "But either way, it's not your decision to make."
"I'll tell the staff you're threatening to harm yourself, get you committed to a 72 hour psych hold." Dean folded his arms across his own chest.
Sam snorted. "Please. Like we both don't know exactly what answers to give to get out of a psych eval. Dad taught us that by the time I was in sixth grade."
"Sam, please," Dean pleaded.
"Leave, or I'll have security make you." Sam said stubbornly.
"Sam, you can't ask me to just stand back and let you die," Dean shook his head, slowly rising to his feet.
Sam's head whipped around to fix his brother with a glare. "Did Kevin know about this?"
'Not until this afternoon." Dean answered, looking at the floor. "He told me that if I didn't tell you immediately, he would."
"Does it not bother you that everyone else realizes what a dick you are?" Sam snapped.
"I'll be close by," Dean replied. "And I'll have my phone on."
Sam turned his head, and didn't watch Dean leave.
Seven hours later, the doctor finally declared "Will Turner" stable enough to be discharged with two pages of instructions and a prescription for vitamins.
He took a cab into town, refusing to look at the car he could hear idling across the street, and checked into a motel.
He didn't bother turning on the light, just pulled the curtains closed, laid back on the bed, and said "Ezekiel, get out of me."
Nothing happened.
"Ezekiel, I do not give permission for you to use my vessel. I want you to leave, now!"
Again, he didn't see or hear any indication that the angel had left.
"Why isn't this working?" Sam sighed aloud.
"Because he's not Ezekiel," a much too familiar voice answered from across the room.
Sam bolted upright in the bed.
"Gadreel, you little pissant, if you come out now, I'll just throw you back in juvie. If you give me a hard time, I'll throw you in the cage with Michael and Lucifer, and I don't think my big brothers are gonna be too happy to see you." the voice announced.
Sam felt his head thrown back, and bright white light flowed out of him, so bright that even with his eyes closed it was almost blinding.
As soon as the light was gone, Sam began coughing, the taste of blood bubbling up from his throat, his chest spasming as he tried to draw air.
Two cool fingers touched his forehead, and immediately the coughing and struggling for breath stopped.
"Gabriel," Sam said.
There was a sound of snapping fingers and the lamp flicked on.
Gabriel stood beside the bed, grinning. "Hey Sammy! I fixed you, by the way. You're welcome."
"But Cas said he couldn't fix me?" Sam shook his head, sitting up with his back against the headboard.
"Yeah, well he doesn't have 'arch' in his name." Gabriel shrugged.
"If you're not dead," Sam frowned. "Then where the hell have you been? Do you know what Kevin's been through this past two years? I thought the archangels were supposed to protect the prophet."
"Raphael, not me," Gabriel tossed his head. "I haven't been back that long, and I wasn't sent back for Kevin. I've been watching you, Sam. That's why Dad sent me back. If it looked like you were actually going to slam the gates, I was supposed to stop you. You were never meant to do it. I was in the church, about to make my appearance when Dean came running in the door."
"Fine," Sam snorted. "I didn't do it. Why are you making yourself known now?"
Gabriel folded his arms across his chest. "Let me ask you something, bucko. When I killed Dean on Wednesday, and you proceeded to tear up the country looking for me for six months so you could make me bring him back, did you ever stop and think about whether that was what Dean would have wanted?"
Sam started to speak, but Gabriel snapped his fingers and Sam found himself unable to open his mouth.
"It was a rhetorical question, dumbass," the archangel snorted. "Dean was at peace for once in his life. He wouldn't have had to worry about being mauled by a Hellhound. But you," he poked a finger at Sam's chest. "Had to bring him back because you couldn't live without him, just so he could die again a few months later. You were even willing to kill a total stranger to do it! When he went to Hell, he told you not to try to bring him back. You didn't listen. You summoned Crossroads Demons, shacked up with a double agent demon, and hunted down Lilith, because you were either going to make her bring Dean back, or kill her and move on to the next one. You listened to a demon, because she told you what you wanted to hear. Does that sound familiar? You drank demon blood. That's pretty freaking desperate right there, Sammy. You spent months trying to avenge Dean's time in Hell, even after Dean was resurrected and right there beside you. You never told him that you spent the first few months he was in Purgatory in a mental hospital because you couldn't deal with living without him, and when you got out, you did everything you could to make your life as different as humanly possible so you wouldn't be reminded of Dean every time you checked into a motel or killed a werewolf. You were the one who did those things, Sam. You. So where do you get off condemning Dean for doing the exact same thing?"
Gabriel snapped his fingers again. Sam's mouth opened slightly, but not a sound came out.
"You can answer now," the angel informed him. "But you don't have one, do you? You can lie to yourself, but you can't lie to me. If the positions had been reversed, you would have done everything in your power to save Dean. Angel possession? You tell yourself you wouldn't have, but if it really ever came down to it, what would you actually do?"
Sam looked down at his hands. "Why are you really here, Gabriel?"
"I was supposed to make sure you didn't slam the gates." Gabriel spread his hands. "I chose to hang around, because I saw who was pretending to be Ezekiel. The real Zeke's dead. The angel inside you was Gadreel, who was in Heaven's lockup until Metatron's stunt. I was waiting for a chance to grab Gadreel and put him back. But when I saw Dean not telling you the truth, I figured I should stick around a little while to see how this all played out. I knew you were gonna get all righteously indignant. And you're good at holding grudges when you're pissed. But when it's all said and done, neither of you will ever be able to work with someone else the way you work with each other, and neither of you will ever love anyone else as much as you love each other. Dad's still got work for the two of you. It's gonna be a lot more pleasant if you two forgive each other and let this go sooner rather than later. I mean, Dad can get pretty creative with punishment if he needs to. He smote the Philistine army with hemorrhoids once." Gabriel looked toward the window. "Dean's parked out front, by the way. I just interrupted time a little for him, so he doesn't realize he's been sitting out there fifteen minutes. He thinks he just drove up."
"It's not that simple. Dean betrayed my trust. He ... "
Gabriel gave him a withering look. "You know what would improve your shitty outlook on things? Getting your head out of your ass."
He disappeared with a flutter of wings.
Sam sat on the bed, staring at the door.
I wouldn't have let Dean be possessed by an angel without his consent, he thought to himself.
"I screwed up. I panicked. The doctor told me you were dying. They sent a fucking grief counselor in to talk to me!" he heard Dean's voice in his head as clear as if his brother was standing there.
If you were desperate, what would you have done to save your brother? a voice that sounded like Gabriel asked in his head. What did you do to try to save your brother?
"We are so screwed up," Sam said aloud.
He wasn't sure how much longer he laid there before the knocking on the door started.
"Sam? Sammy? Open the door! Just let me know you're ok!"
Sam swung his legs over the side of the bed. Before he could rise to his feet, the knocking became more desperate.
"Sam, just let me know you're ok and I'll leave. Please."
Sam sighed and walked over to the door, opening it quickly enough that he pulled the lock pick out of Dean's hand.
The relief in Dean's eyes stung the back of Sam's throat.
"Sammy." Dean nodded and started to turn away, stopping when Sam spoke.
"Ezekiel's gone. Of course, he wasn't really Ezekiel, he was someone named Gadreel who was apparently on Heaven's Most Wanted list."
Dean turned to face Sam, his eyes wide. "Oh God. I'm sorry. I am so, so sorry."
"He's gone. I'm not in any danger of dying any time soon. And you're gonna come in, because we have stuff to talk about."
Dean grabbed Sam, pulling him into a hug tighter than even when one of them had returned from the dead.
Sam hugged back, knowing they would get through this.
They would get through this the way they had gotten through everything, all their lives.
Together.
Author: dragonflybeach
Category: Supernatural
Word Count: 17.7k
Characters: Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester, Kevin Tran, (briefly Cas, Garth and [Spoiler (click to open)]Gabriel)
Pairings: none
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Season 9 spoilers, blood, gore, frank discussion of physical injuries, vomiting, canon typical ghost on boys whumpage, and a few naughty words. And alternating POV.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything, but if I did, I'd probably write fanfic about it anyway.
Summary: Goes AU in Season 9, Episode 9 - Sam feels great after the trials - a little too great maybe, because he gets hurt on a routine hunt and doesn't realize it. When Dean has to kidnap him from the hospital after strange things start happening, Sam starts putting together all the little moments that haven't made sense over the past few weeks and quickly comes to the wrong conclusion.
The following morning, there was a soft knock on Sam's door.
"Yeah, Kevin, it's open."
Kevin's head popped through the door. "Just warning you, Dean's planning to bring you breakfast in bed."
Sam nodded. "Thanks."
He pushed himself up to a sitting position. He hurt all over again this morning, but not as much as last night. Of course, he probably still had at least a little pain medicine in his system. He stood carefully and reached for the crutches, not bothering to change from his pajamas.
Dean was apparently putting the finishing touches on a breakfast tray when Sam entered the kitchen.
"Hey Sammy," Dean frowned. "Are you ok? I was gonna bring this to you."
"Not an invalid, Dean," Sam snapped, the words coming out much harsher than intended. He sighed and forced himself to continue more civilly. "I just think the more I'm up and moving around, the sooner I'll feel like myself again."
Dean's face didn't smooth out the way Sam expected. "What's wrong, Sam? You don't feel like yourself?"
For a moment guilt flooded Sam, the knowledge that Dean had, since he was four years old, had been programmed to take care of Sammy at all costs. In the next heartbeat, white hot anger drowned the feelings.
It didn't matter why he did it. Dean had no right to give Sam demon blood without his consent.
And Dean did it because Dean didn't want to be alone, not because Sam wanted to live at all costs.
But confronting Dean without proof was useless, so Sam forced himself to take a deep breath and count to ten.
"I just ... I know, I fell into a grave and broke my leg in four places and had surgery and then nearly screwed up my surgery, but I just don't feel as good as I did last week." Sam sighed. "I promise I'll take it slower, not try to push myself to much, but I'm gonna go nuts if you keep me propped up in bed for the next six weeks."
Dean nodded, his face still not completely relaxing. "Just don't push yourself too hard and make things worse, Sam. And you gotta tell me, if something hurts or whatever. I gotta know what's wrong with you to take care of you."
"Dean, I'm thirty years old." Sam answered. "At some point, you've got to let me take care of myself."
"Maybe," Dean said, with a hint of teasing smile at his mouth. "Here, Sasquatch. Eat up and get your strength back. And so you can take a pain pill, because we all know you get sick if you take them on an empty stomach."
He spread out eggs, sausage, fried potatoes, pancakes, and cantaloupe on the table, and despite Sam's protests that it was way too much food, the younger brother actually ate a lot more of it than he thought he would.
Dean chased Sam and Kevin into the library while he cleaned the kitchen afterward. Sam found several books on demonology, but none strictly about demon blood. He piled them onto the table next to the armchair, telling Kevin that he wanted to do some research into demon blood.
Kevin found a couple more for him. The two settled in, Sam with his books and Kevin with the tablet. Dean checked on them a few times during the day, but mostly left them at it, announcing that he was going to check out the antique cars in the garage and figure out what was needed to get each of them running again.
Life went on like that for the next few days. Dean was actually excited to have an excuse for a few days of downtime to tinker with the old cars. None of them would run, of course, having not been started for more than forty years the belts and hoses had dry rotted and the oil and gasoline had degenerated and would have to be cleaned out, but apparently all of them had been well maintained before, and Dean had found the records for each vehicle. The Thunderbird was a 1955, the first year made, and had less than 10,000 miles, which had Dean speculating how much they could get for it at the Barrett-Jackson auction.
Dean's excitement over the cars kept him pre-occupied enough that he didn't ask too many questions about what Sam was reading, and didn't seem to notice that Sam kept asking for iron rich foods, things that would build up his own blood. Sam wasn't going to complain.
It was on the fourth day, after skimming through all of the books he had initially selected and three more after that, that Sam finally found a recipe for a spell to detect demon blood in human blood.
The good news was that it seemed fairly straightforward, and they should have all the ingredients in the bunker. The bad news was that it called for two gills of blood, which was about ten ounces.
Ten ounces wasn't that much, for a healthy adult. Donated blood was usually taken 16 ounces at a time. Of course, blood banks wouldn't even think of taking blood from someone who had just had surgery, or who was still anemic from coughing up blood at a frightening rate for the better part of a year. In addition, blood banks had equipment to remove blood safely and efficiently that of course wasn't laying around the bunker.
Sam had bled more than that a few times after hunts gone wrong, and he knew what herbs to take to build himself back up afterwards.
Nothing to do but to suck it up and do it.
Sam spent the rest of the day slinking around, ducking into the storeroom to grab a few things when he was supposedly going to the bathroom, sneaking into the infirmary for a few others while Dean cooked dinner. He had everything he needed by bedtime.
The following day, Sam waited until Dean was in garage and he and Kevin were settled into the library. About half an hour later, he stretched and pushed himself to his feet.
"My leg is kinda cramping. I think I'm gonna go stretch out on my bed for a while." he told Kevin.
Kevin looked up with a frown. "Are you ok? Do you need me to get you some medicine or ... Dean ... or something?"
"It's just muscle spasms." Sam shrugged. "Part of the healing process. If I need anything, I'll call one of you."
Kevin stood and stretched as well. "I think I'll take a break and go play some Skyrim. All these symbols are starting to run together."
Sam shook his head. "You've been on baby sitting duty."
"Are you surprised?" Kevin snorted.
"Not really," Sam said, shoving his book into his belt and reaching for his crutches.
He hobbled down the hall and closed his bedroom door, listening for the sound of Kevin's door closing.
Sam sat on the bed, pulling out the nightstand drawer in which he had collected everything, placing it on the floor before lowering himself to sit beside it.
He figured if he timed everything right, he would finish with the spell shortly before Dean came in for lunch, realized Sam wasn't in the library, and looked for him, so that he could confront his brother on his own terms.
He flipped the book open to the proper page, propping it against the dresser, and put the bowl in the center of the floor. Unfortunately, all the iv tubing in the infirmary had been dry rotted, and there probably wasn't any in the Winchester first aid kit, which of course was in the trunk of the Impala and there was no way Sam would be able to get to the car without Dean's knowledge. That meant he was going to have to draw out the blood with a syringe and the largest syringe the Men of Letters had was 30cc, which was about an ounce.
He forced himself to aim the syringe carefully, not to push too far in and puncture through the vein, and draw the blood out slowly, to keep the vein usable. After what seemed like an interminably long time, the syringe was finally filled, and he emptied it into the waiting bowl. The second syringe went a little faster, but in trying to go even faster on the third take, he blew out the vein and had to move to the cephalic vein.
He forced himself to draw slowly and steadily, and even so, he still blew the second vein and had to move to a third by the time he was drawing the ninth syringe.
Finally, finally, he had all ten ounces in the bowl. He pulled the book into his lap and began to measure and add the other ingredients, chanting in Latin after each one.
Once everything was in the bowl, he gave one final stir, read the last phrase, and watched for the mixture to change color.
Nothing happened.
He checked his watch, sat back, waited five minutes, and looked again.
Still no change.
He read the spell through again, counting off each ingredient in turn, carefully repeating the incantations, and still nothing.
He double checked the conversions of the archaic measurements to standard quantities, making certain he had used the correction amounts, and read the instructions yet again. By the end of all that, there was still no change to the mixture.
It was supposed to turn orange if demon blood was present, with a lighter color signifying a greater concentration. Pure demon blood would turn the concoction almost lemon yellow.
The blood in the bowl was just as red as it had been when it came from Sam's veins, with specks of herbs stirred into it.
Sam must have done something wrong. There was just no other explanation.
He pushed himself to his feet, wincing slightly at the pressure on the forming bruises inside of his left arm. He picked up the bowl, grabbed one crutch, and hobbled down to the bathroom to rinse it out.
He came back, sat down, read the instructions through once more just to make sure he wasn't missing anything, and started again.
He blew out the third vein on the inside of his arm on the third syringe. He turned his arm over and tried the one on the underside, but by this point his hands were shaking, and he stuck the needle straight through, ruining that vein as well.
He managed to draw enough from one of the veins on the top of his good foot to finish that syringe off, but by the time he emptied the blood into the bowl, a bruise began creeping underneath the skin around the puncture, indicating that vein was now ruined as well.
He laid the syringe beside the bowl, rubbed his hands over his face, and sighed. He hefted himself onto the bed and reached across for the bottle of water Dean had left for him.
He took a deep breath, a swallow of water, another breath, more water, until he felt calmer. He put the water on the nightstand on the closer side of the bed and returned to his spell.
He drew another syringe full of blood from the other vein in the top of his foot, but as he reached over to empty it into the bowl, he dropped it. Of course, since he was already having a bad day, the plastic syringe split down the side, despite having been only dropped a few inches, and spilled the contents.
"Fuck!"
He wiped up the blood with an old towel he had brought into the room, stamped as property of the Starlight Motel, where the hell ever that was.
He had another syringe, so he unscrewed the needle from the broken one to attach to the new one.
A strange blackness began to creep in around the edges of his consciousness.
A civilian wouldn't have known what it was, wouldn't have realized how very wrong this feeling was until it was too late.
Sam was not a civilian.
He had been possessed by some random demon as a teenager, by Meg as a young adult, by Lucifer himself, and by the Wicked Witch just a few weeks ago.
Something was trying to take over his consciousness and force Sam into a remote corner of his own mind.
He closed his hands, clenched his fists, and fought back the darkness. He envisioned a light, flowing outward to the edges of his mind, pushing away the darkness.
Once he felt certain that the darkness would stay at bay for a little longer, he opened his eyes and immediately yanked his shirt aside to look at his tattoo.
It seemed to be fine. Of course, it had been fine this morning, when he had been washing up shirtless in front of the mirror.
It couldn't be a demon trying to possess him, so the only possibility was that the demon blood was trying to make him lose control, trying to make him stop the spell.
He nearly laughed out loud at that thought, realizing that he must be on pain meds to think that demon blood was sentient.
Sam took a few more sips of the water, focusing on consciously relaxing himself so that he could finish this. Dean would be coming in any time to start lunch.
Actually, Dean had usually started lunch already by this time.
Shaking his head to clear his thoughts, Sam returned to the spell.
He rolled up his right sleeve, knowing this was going to be awkward, trying to draw blood from his dominant arm with his left hand without ruining the veins, but he was running out of other options.
He forced himself to breathe deeply, concentrate on working slowly, and managed to draw seven usable syringes of blood, blowing out two veins in the process and spilling another ounce because his hands were shaking so much.
This time, he measured very carefully, and double checked the amounts of all ingredients before adding them to the bowl, making sure to clearly enunciate the Latin phrases.
The mixture still did not turn orange.
Sam leaned back against the bed, his head tipped back on the mattress, facing the ceiling.
Maybe the herbs weren't fresh enough. The stinging nettles had just been bought a few weeks ago, but he honestly couldn't remember how old the tincture of wormwood was. Possibly before Dean went to Purgatory? And the ashwagandha had been in the Men of Letters' stash. Sure it was a dried herb, and Sam had never heard of it going bad, but maybe whatever chemical in it that reacted for the spell had become inert in the past fifty years?
He sighed, wondering how he was going to get replacement ingredients without Dean finding out. None of them were very rare, so he could in theory buy them all online, but if he got a package in the mail, Dean was going to get nosy.
The darkness began to seep in again.
Sam sat up, growling "No!" out loud.
He reached under the bed where he kept a mason jar of holy water and a box of rock salt. He unscrewed the jar lid, threw a large handful of the salt in, fished out the rosary and tossed it across the room, put his hand over the mouth of the jar and shook it enough to partially dissolve the salt. He brought the jar to his mouth and chugged it as fast as he could.
This time, there was a reaction.
Almost as soon as the salted water hit his stomach, it began to roil inside him, cramps starting seconds later. Within in a minute, he was forcefully vomiting, the fluid coming up so fast it flooded his mouth and poured out of his nose.
The jar fell from his hand and shattered as water mixed with stomach acid sprayed across the room.
"Sam?" Kevin shouted from the doorway.
Sam tried to raise his head to look at him, but between the cramps that kept him doubled over and the vomit that refused to even slow, he was doing well just to not fall over face first.
"Dean, come quick! Sam's room! I don't know! Hurry!" Kevin screeched into his phone.
The blackness spread in from the edges again, and this time Sam recognized it for what it was, not a demon trying to possess him, but his own body trying to shut down on him, pulling him toward rest and recovery, telling him to stop, but he had been too stubborn to listen.
He slapped one hand down on the broken glass, using the pain to help keep him alert, to keep him awake until Dean got there.
Sam heard the thunder of running footsteps coming down the hall, and knew that he only had to hold on a few more seconds.
"Zeke!" Dean shouted from the doorway, his voice even more panicked than Kevin's had been.
Sam's last thought was that he hoped the angel didn't smite him for the demon blood.
Sam's eyes flashed blue, but Zeke didn't seem to be in much better shape than Sam did.
"What the hell?" Dean demanded.
"Sam was trying to perform a spell to detect demon blood in him." Zeke wheezed as the vomiting finally abated. "He drained a considerable amount of blood out of himself to perform the experiment, twice, but both times, no demon blood was detected. He then drank a quart of holy water mixed with a large amount of salt."
"Fuck," Dean shoved a hand through his hair. "Why didn't you stop him?"
"I tried." Zeke's face expressed concern. "I tried to take over, but he pushed me away."
Dean nodded. "I guess if he can suppress Lucifer, some injured low level angel wouldn't even be a challenge." he sighed. "Can you fix this?"
"I am very much weakened. Sam shoved me to a place within him where I could not touch his soul to draw energy for myself, and I was exposed to chemicals through his spell that are detrimental to angels. I am not sure how much I can do right now." Zeke said.
"Can you heal the needle marks?" Dean asked. "I may have to take him back to the hospital, and if they think he's shooting heroin, they're going to be a lot less willing to help him."
There was a faint glow around Sam's head, Zeke's head, and the bruises on his arms disappeared.
Zeke then slumped over.
Dean grabbed him before he fell face first into the mess on the floor. He looked up to find Kevin watching in wide eyed horror.
"There's an angel in Sam?" the young man took a step backwards.
Dean sighed. "It's a long story, but yeah. Sam doesn't know."
"What do you mean, Sam doesn't know?" Kevin shook his head.
"I mean, the angel is possessing him to try to heal him. Sam wouldn't have agreed to it, so I didn't tell him." Dean said. "Don't look at me like that. I know it's wrong, but you saw him, Kevin. You saw what the trials did to him. He was dying. I mean, maybe hours to live at best. I did what I had to do."
"Is Sam going to think you had to do this?" Kevin asked quietly.
"He's gonna through the mother of all bitch fits." Dean snorted. "But I'm not gonna let my brother die if I can stop it. That's not in me."
Dean stood, pulling Sam up onto the bed, and began checking his brother's vital signs. His pulse and breathing were both rapid and shallow, neither of which was a good sign, and his fingernails were blue.
"Kev, could you get me ... " Dean began, looking over his shoulder, but no one was there.
"Stay put, Sasquatch," he ordered the unconscious form on the bed.
Dean jogged down the hall to the former infirmary and got the blood pressure cuff. He stepped back into the hall to find Kevin coming out of his room with a backpack.
"Where are you going?" Dean asked.
"I'm not gonna hang around here waiting for you to pimp me to an angel for my own good." Kevin replied frostily.
"Kevin ... "
"Don't, Dean," the young man warned. "If you don't tell Sam by tonight, I will."
"I'll tell him," Dean nodded. "I swear I will. But right now I may have to take him to the hospital, so I'll tell him as soon as he's well enough. I will."
"We'll see," Kevin shrugged, then walked toward the front of the bunker.
Dean checked Sam's blood pressure, which was dangerously low, and rechecked his pulse, which was now irregular.
"Sammy," he sighed.
He walked down the hall to grab the rolling desk chair from Kevin's room, brought it back, and loaded Sam into it to roll him to the garage stairs.
"You're going on a diet." He informed the still unconscious figure as he hefted Sam into a fireman's carry and took him to the car.
After a moment's consideration, Dean ran back downstairs to grab a different set of fake id's and the matching credit card.
He took Sam to the nearest ER, thankful they hadn't had to use this one yet, and registered him as William Turner. Darn it, forgot to grab his insurance card, but if you could be a sweetheart and put it on this credit card, you can just give me a copy of the bill and we'll file it ourselves.
An hour later, a doctor called Dean into the consultation room.
"His electrolytes were completely a mess, and he was rather dehydrated and anemic. You said he had the ankle and leg surgery three or four weeks ago?" The doctor frowned. "And he was still taking antibiotics?"
"Oh, yeah," Dean explained. It was a farm accident, and dirt and crap got in the wound, so the doctor who operated thought he was better safe than sorry."
"Oh, ok," the doctor agreed. "It looks like the severe vomiting was probably an allergic reaction, and the electrolyte imbalance and dehydration were a result of that. I'm not sure why he's so anemic, but we're not picking up any active bleeding, so they may have just not gotten him back up to speed after the surgery. We're giving him some fluids and potassium, and we're going to give him a pint of blood. We'll probably keep him four to six hours afterwards just to make sure he stabilizes, and then he can go home."
"Thanks, doc," Dean smiled. "Can I see him?"
"Give him a little while." the doctor said. "Maybe go grab some lunch if you haven't eaten yet and come back in an hour or so."
Dean returned two hours later to find Sam sullenly staring at the wall. He pulled the curtains closed around the bed, and turned the tv on loud enough to cover the sound of their voices.
"I had to switch identities," Dean said softly. " Didn't want another repeat of Joplin if the insurance company told them you just had that surgery a few days ago. You're registered under the name of William Turner."
Sam glared at him. "Who are you, Jack Fucking Sparrow?"
"What is wrong with you?" Dean asked.
"I don't know, Dean, what is wrong with me?" Sam snapped.
"Oh, just the fact you apparently chugged a jar of salt water?" Dean pointed out. "What the hell, man? I used to mix a tablespoon of salt into a pint of water and drink it to make myself throw up when I needed to get out of school. You drank way more than that! You overloaded your system with sodium so your body tried to barf it out, except it dehydrated you in the process. And oh yeah, you apparently were doing some kind of experiment to see if you still had demon blood in you after the trials and had been bleeding yourself, so you were anemic and throwing all that sodium on top of that sent you into hypovolemic shock and caused your heart to go into palpitations!"
"I know about the demon blood, Dean." Sam said softly.
Dean narrowed his eyes and pulled up a chair. "What?"
"The trials, the trials were purifying me." Sam pressed his hands to his own chest. "They were boiling out the demon blood. That's why I was so sick. That's why I was dying. Because the demon blood was gone. You gave me demon blood to save me."
"What are you talking about, Sam?" Dean frowned.
"Don't lie to me, Dean!" Sam hissed. "I know, ok? That's why you kept Crowley alive. That's why I was getting so much better so fast. That's why I keep losing blocks of time and I do things I don't remember and why you wanted to keep Cas away from me and I was the one who killed the three demons in Oregon! I did it Dean. I remember now. That's why Ezekiel knocked me out when you called him to help Charlie. Because I'm an abomination! You've been feeding me demon blood to try to fix me and you had no right!"
"There's no demon blood, Sam." Dean shook his head. He raised a hand to head off whatever Sam was about to say. "I swear, it's the truth. I did something you're not going to like to save you, but I swear on ... on Mom ... it wasn't demon blood."
Sam's face creased in confusion. "What then?"
"You're possessed." Dean sighed.
Sam immediately yanked the hospital gown aside to look at his tattoo.
"It's not a demon," Dean continued. "It's an angel."
"You've got to be fucking kidding me." Sam said, his voice completely without inflection.
"The reason you've heard me call Ezekiel's name is because he's been riding shotgun." Dean explained. "And I had to keep Cas away so he wouldn't notice."
"So I've been possessed by an angel for six weeks?" Sam demanded. "You let an angel into me, and in all that time, you couldn't find a moment to tell me? How did he get in, because I never said yes!"
"I tricked you," Dean looked down at his hands. "We were in your head. You were dying. I begged you to let me help you, and you said yes. You didn't know what you were saying yes to."
"You said 'There ain't no me if there ain't no you,'" Sam frowned. "I thought all that was a dream."
"No, it was real. Death himself was standing there waiting to reap you. He's probably gonna be pretty pissed when we see him again." Dean snorted.
"I was ready to die, Dean!" Sam raised his head and stared down his brother. "You had no right to do that. You should have just let me go!"
"I'm never gonna do that, Sam," Dean shook his head. "I'm never gonna just let you go. I'll fight for you 'til my dying breath and you know that."
"I never wanted another angel inside me, another anything inside me, and you knew that!" Sam leaned over and grabbed Dean's arm. "You had no right to make that kind of decision for me!"
"What was I supposed to do, just let you die?" Dean growled.
"That was my choice!" Sam insisted.
"I'd have been right behind you!" Dean said.
"Fine!" Sam threw up his hands. "You could have done that if you wanted to. You're an adult. But so am I, and you have never treated me like one!"
"Sam ... " Dean began, but trailed off when Sam stubbornly kept his head turned the other way. He dropped his head into his hands instead.
"Why is the angel still in me?" Sam asked. "Why didn't he do his thing and get out? Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because you'd kick him out if you knew, and you'd die, that's why!" Dean answered. "He said the damage was extremely extensive, and he was wounded from the fall. He's been helping. You told me yourself that you felt great. I asked him after your surgery how much longer, and he said a few days to a week."
"But in the meantime, you've been just fine with letting me be some random angel's meatsuit." Sam huffed.
Before Dean could answer, Sam took a deep breath and continued. "Cas said he couldn't fix me, that I was damaged on a sub-atomic level. Why did you think this angel could fix me?"
"Zeke said he could," Dean shook his head.
"And that's all you wanted to hear." Sam made a face. "So chances are, this angel has lied to you."
"But ... " Dean trailed off, frowning.
"But what is it you call them? Feathered dicks?" Sam sneered. "Not one of them, ever, including Cas, has been completely honest with us. You suddenly think some angel you've never met before is on your side because he tells you what you want to hear? You used to be smarter than that, Dean!"
"Don't ask me to apologize for saving your life, Sam." Dean warned. "I'd do it again in a heartbeat."
"You've turned into Dad, Dean!" Sam shouted. "No, you know what? You're even worse than Dad! Dad at least let you make some decisions for yourself, let you ask me what I wanted occasionally. You've taken it all on yourself! You make all the decisions based on what you want, and never for a minute think of what's best for me or what I want!"
Two nurses rushed into the curtained off cubicle.
"Everything ok here?" one asked, looking from one brother to the other.
"Yeah, we're fine," Sam huffed. "He's just leaving."
"Sam ... "
"Go, Dean." Sam said sadly.
"But they're going to release you in a few hours," Dean argued. "You're gonna need me to take you home."
"I'm not going home with you," Sam announced, folding his arms. "I'll take a cab, go get a motel room."
"And then what?" Dean gestured at Sam's chest. "You're gonna go hole up somewhere and kick the angel out? You'll die, Sam!"
"I will or I won't," Sam shrugged. "But either way, it's not your decision to make."
"I'll tell the staff you're threatening to harm yourself, get you committed to a 72 hour psych hold." Dean folded his arms across his own chest.
Sam snorted. "Please. Like we both don't know exactly what answers to give to get out of a psych eval. Dad taught us that by the time I was in sixth grade."
"Sam, please," Dean pleaded.
"Leave, or I'll have security make you." Sam said stubbornly.
"Sam, you can't ask me to just stand back and let you die," Dean shook his head, slowly rising to his feet.
Sam's head whipped around to fix his brother with a glare. "Did Kevin know about this?"
'Not until this afternoon." Dean answered, looking at the floor. "He told me that if I didn't tell you immediately, he would."
"Does it not bother you that everyone else realizes what a dick you are?" Sam snapped.
"I'll be close by," Dean replied. "And I'll have my phone on."
Sam turned his head, and didn't watch Dean leave.
Seven hours later, the doctor finally declared "Will Turner" stable enough to be discharged with two pages of instructions and a prescription for vitamins.
He took a cab into town, refusing to look at the car he could hear idling across the street, and checked into a motel.
He didn't bother turning on the light, just pulled the curtains closed, laid back on the bed, and said "Ezekiel, get out of me."
Nothing happened.
"Ezekiel, I do not give permission for you to use my vessel. I want you to leave, now!"
Again, he didn't see or hear any indication that the angel had left.
"Why isn't this working?" Sam sighed aloud.
"Because he's not Ezekiel," a much too familiar voice answered from across the room.
Sam bolted upright in the bed.
"Gadreel, you little pissant, if you come out now, I'll just throw you back in juvie. If you give me a hard time, I'll throw you in the cage with Michael and Lucifer, and I don't think my big brothers are gonna be too happy to see you." the voice announced.
Sam felt his head thrown back, and bright white light flowed out of him, so bright that even with his eyes closed it was almost blinding.
As soon as the light was gone, Sam began coughing, the taste of blood bubbling up from his throat, his chest spasming as he tried to draw air.
Two cool fingers touched his forehead, and immediately the coughing and struggling for breath stopped.
"Gabriel," Sam said.
There was a sound of snapping fingers and the lamp flicked on.
Gabriel stood beside the bed, grinning. "Hey Sammy! I fixed you, by the way. You're welcome."
"But Cas said he couldn't fix me?" Sam shook his head, sitting up with his back against the headboard.
"Yeah, well he doesn't have 'arch' in his name." Gabriel shrugged.
"If you're not dead," Sam frowned. "Then where the hell have you been? Do you know what Kevin's been through this past two years? I thought the archangels were supposed to protect the prophet."
"Raphael, not me," Gabriel tossed his head. "I haven't been back that long, and I wasn't sent back for Kevin. I've been watching you, Sam. That's why Dad sent me back. If it looked like you were actually going to slam the gates, I was supposed to stop you. You were never meant to do it. I was in the church, about to make my appearance when Dean came running in the door."
"Fine," Sam snorted. "I didn't do it. Why are you making yourself known now?"
Gabriel folded his arms across his chest. "Let me ask you something, bucko. When I killed Dean on Wednesday, and you proceeded to tear up the country looking for me for six months so you could make me bring him back, did you ever stop and think about whether that was what Dean would have wanted?"
Sam started to speak, but Gabriel snapped his fingers and Sam found himself unable to open his mouth.
"It was a rhetorical question, dumbass," the archangel snorted. "Dean was at peace for once in his life. He wouldn't have had to worry about being mauled by a Hellhound. But you," he poked a finger at Sam's chest. "Had to bring him back because you couldn't live without him, just so he could die again a few months later. You were even willing to kill a total stranger to do it! When he went to Hell, he told you not to try to bring him back. You didn't listen. You summoned Crossroads Demons, shacked up with a double agent demon, and hunted down Lilith, because you were either going to make her bring Dean back, or kill her and move on to the next one. You listened to a demon, because she told you what you wanted to hear. Does that sound familiar? You drank demon blood. That's pretty freaking desperate right there, Sammy. You spent months trying to avenge Dean's time in Hell, even after Dean was resurrected and right there beside you. You never told him that you spent the first few months he was in Purgatory in a mental hospital because you couldn't deal with living without him, and when you got out, you did everything you could to make your life as different as humanly possible so you wouldn't be reminded of Dean every time you checked into a motel or killed a werewolf. You were the one who did those things, Sam. You. So where do you get off condemning Dean for doing the exact same thing?"
Gabriel snapped his fingers again. Sam's mouth opened slightly, but not a sound came out.
"You can answer now," the angel informed him. "But you don't have one, do you? You can lie to yourself, but you can't lie to me. If the positions had been reversed, you would have done everything in your power to save Dean. Angel possession? You tell yourself you wouldn't have, but if it really ever came down to it, what would you actually do?"
Sam looked down at his hands. "Why are you really here, Gabriel?"
"I was supposed to make sure you didn't slam the gates." Gabriel spread his hands. "I chose to hang around, because I saw who was pretending to be Ezekiel. The real Zeke's dead. The angel inside you was Gadreel, who was in Heaven's lockup until Metatron's stunt. I was waiting for a chance to grab Gadreel and put him back. But when I saw Dean not telling you the truth, I figured I should stick around a little while to see how this all played out. I knew you were gonna get all righteously indignant. And you're good at holding grudges when you're pissed. But when it's all said and done, neither of you will ever be able to work with someone else the way you work with each other, and neither of you will ever love anyone else as much as you love each other. Dad's still got work for the two of you. It's gonna be a lot more pleasant if you two forgive each other and let this go sooner rather than later. I mean, Dad can get pretty creative with punishment if he needs to. He smote the Philistine army with hemorrhoids once." Gabriel looked toward the window. "Dean's parked out front, by the way. I just interrupted time a little for him, so he doesn't realize he's been sitting out there fifteen minutes. He thinks he just drove up."
"It's not that simple. Dean betrayed my trust. He ... "
Gabriel gave him a withering look. "You know what would improve your shitty outlook on things? Getting your head out of your ass."
He disappeared with a flutter of wings.
Sam sat on the bed, staring at the door.
I wouldn't have let Dean be possessed by an angel without his consent, he thought to himself.
"I screwed up. I panicked. The doctor told me you were dying. They sent a fucking grief counselor in to talk to me!" he heard Dean's voice in his head as clear as if his brother was standing there.
If you were desperate, what would you have done to save your brother? a voice that sounded like Gabriel asked in his head. What did you do to try to save your brother?
"We are so screwed up," Sam said aloud.
He wasn't sure how much longer he laid there before the knocking on the door started.
"Sam? Sammy? Open the door! Just let me know you're ok!"
Sam swung his legs over the side of the bed. Before he could rise to his feet, the knocking became more desperate.
"Sam, just let me know you're ok and I'll leave. Please."
Sam sighed and walked over to the door, opening it quickly enough that he pulled the lock pick out of Dean's hand.
The relief in Dean's eyes stung the back of Sam's throat.
"Sammy." Dean nodded and started to turn away, stopping when Sam spoke.
"Ezekiel's gone. Of course, he wasn't really Ezekiel, he was someone named Gadreel who was apparently on Heaven's Most Wanted list."
Dean turned to face Sam, his eyes wide. "Oh God. I'm sorry. I am so, so sorry."
"He's gone. I'm not in any danger of dying any time soon. And you're gonna come in, because we have stuff to talk about."
Dean grabbed Sam, pulling him into a hug tighter than even when one of them had returned from the dead.
Sam hugged back, knowing they would get through this.
They would get through this the way they had gotten through everything, all their lives.
Together.