"Hero"
Title: "Hero."
Genre: Gen, hurt-comfort.
Warnings: Language and some violence.
Words: 2, 063.
Summary: Posted in response to rainylemons prompt: "Stanford era, Jess POV - kids are getting jumped on campus. Hazing pranks gone horribly awry, someone with a crazy violent streak, who knows? It means they're all meant to travel in packs at night, but it's a two minute jog across the quad to the library and Jess really, really needs to get some studying done. One the way, she passes the tall, quiet dishy Sam Winchester hobbling along on his crutches. She remembers he'd had a bike accident or something a week ago. She'd investigate more, but hasn't worked up the nerve yet. The library's in sight when the reason for all of the campus warnings become apparent. Jess is dragged into the shadows and she's sure that she's about to become a campus rape statistic. Cue said young Sam on crutches right about now. For a guy gimping and maybe with a broken rib or two? Utterly bad ass."
A/N: - Originally posted in three parts over on the hurt!Sam May 2nd comment-fic meme over on ohsam.
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Jessica Moore takes pride in being tough. She was raised with three older brothers, and her daddy had taught her enough that she could handle all three of them pretty well; it had become a running joke between them, her daddy smiling at her and calling her Baby Badass when she had Tony pinned to the floor. At her tenth grade dance, she’d been sent home for punching Tony Morris in the face when he’d tried to stick his hand up the skirt of her dress; he’d hit the floor hard enough that he hadn’t gotten back up again, and her dad had taken her out for ice cream.
So yes, Jess could look after herself, but that didn’t mean that she particularly liked putting herself in a situation where that was necessary. After the first rape was announced to the students, people made callous jokes about hazing pranks gone wrong; after they second, the jokes stopped. When the third in a month was reported, students were asked to travel in ‘groups’ after dark for their safety - three people minimum.
Jess had been more than happy to stick to that, up until the moment that she’d found herself stuck on one end of the quad, the library on the other side teasing her with the knowledge that she was on her own.
Jess ran track in high school; she knew that it would take her three minutes max to get across. She also knew that three minutes was a lot longer than it seemed.
But she really needed to study for her Art History class, and the only way she could do that was to get to the stupid, freaking library. If she wanted to pass, she had no choice. And Jess really wanted to pass.
A strange clink-clink sound tore her from her internal debate and she blinked, craning her head around the doorway of the building as a slightly bent-over shape hobbled into view, heading from the other edge of the quad. It took a few seconds for her to work out who it was, but as soon as she spotted the crutches it all fell into place.
Sam Winchester. She had a few classes with him; tall and handsome, with a friendly smile and a relaxed attitude towards other people - her friend Becky had talked about him a few times. Apparently he was friends with Becky’s brother, Zack. Jess had been meaning to introduce herself to him for weeks, but she’d never quite plucked up the nerve; in a weird way, it was almost as if introducing herself to him would reveal a huge flaw in his personality, and she couldn’t bear to ruin the God-like status she’d afforded him in her brain.
The accident had only made him better.
Everyone knew what had happened - Casey Miller had stepped out in front of a car, stupid ditz that she was, and everyone had thought that she was going to become a Casey-pancake, and then Sam had appeared out of nowhere. Knocked her out of the way and gotten himself two broken ribs and a busted ankle for his trouble.
After he’d been released from the hospital, he’d headed straight for her dorm room to check that she was alright, not at all angry at the girl who had - for all intent and purposes - caused him a fair bit of pain.
Tearing her gaze from the hobbling figure, Jess once more sized up the distance between herself and the library, and promptly thought screw it. It was a split-second decision true enough, but in the brief second that she darted from the doorway, she figured that it was too late to turn back.
It was drizzling and her thin hoodie offered little protection, but she’d left her coat in Becky’s dorm room, so it would have to do. It wasn’t like she planned on being outside for long, anyway. Thankfully, the path across the quad was fairly flat and straight, and she was making good time, treating it like a meet and flying across the group at a decent speed.
And then it all went wrong.
A man stepped out onto the path in front of her, close enough that she’d never be able to stop or change direction in time to prevent herself from crashing into him, but she tried her best, scrambling frantically backwards and straight into the arms of a second guy, one of his hands clapping down over her mouth.
It was around about then that Jess realised the biggest flaw in her plan: the route to the library took her nicely through a little patch where the streetlights didn’t quite stretch far enough, the space that Jess and the two strangers were now occupying. She remembered her sociology classes, that long list of rape statistics, and she swore loudly.
“Now, now,” The first man laughed, teeth glinting in the dim light even as he slowly slipped a knife out of his jeans. The man behind her grabbed her arms tighter as she began to struggle in earnest, shoving her roughly forwards and further into the shadowed area - off the path and towards the woods. “Make sure you hold her tight, Mark.”
“For Christ’s sake, Chris, I’ve got her, alright?”
It was true. Jess wasn’t making it easy for him, but he had her in a serious position of vulnerability. Her arms were clasped tight to her side, and his height meant that her own was working against her, making it hard for her to get a decent angle on his shins or kneecaps. If she couldn’t figure something out soon, she was going to end up as another number in a textbook. Another face in the paper, a headstone in a graveyard - Jessica Lee Moore: complete and utter idiot.
She could imagine her mother sobbing, her father glassy-eyed and pale-faced, and her brothers receiving the phone call to tell them that she’d gotten herself killed. She could imagine the faces of her friends, of distant family who she’d met once or twice. She couldn’t imagine any other outcome.
She was outnumbered, outsmarted, not to mention the fact that the two men had a weapon and she didn’t even have the textbook that she’d dropped on the grass.
“We’re going to have so much fun with you,” Mark whispered in her ear, the sensation of his breath on her neck making her shudder. “Gonna make you scream.”
“Go to hell.” The words came out garbled, but still recognisable, and Jess followed them up with the best scream she could manage. It wouldn’t be enough - they were by the fringe of the woods, and there was no way that anyone would be able to hear it. There was no one there; everyone would have cleared out for the night-
“I think you should let her go.”
There was no sign of Sam’s crutches in sight, although he had his weight carefully balanced on one leg, and his back was straight despite his broken ribs, gaze unwavering. He looked every part the hero, and Jess was suddenly terrified for him.
He was just a guy. He wasn’t a hero, no matter how much she liked to pretend, and her two attackers were armed and dangerous - how could he even think he stood a chance in saving her? He was just going to add to the growing number of victims.
He was going to be killed, and it would be Jess’ fault.
“Holy shit.” Chris breathed, eyes flying to Sam. Like the incident with Casey, Sam seemed to appear out of nowhere, not even the sound of a snapping twig to give him away - if nothing else, Sam had the element of surprise.
“Listen here, kid. If you walk away now, I promise we’ll let you go.” He leered, clearly doing his best to get things back under control. “No harm, no foul, right? We’ve got all we want right here.”
He tipped his head towards Jess, and a small whimper broke free despite her desperate attempts to remain brave. She nodded frantically at the teenager, begging him mentally to leave. Instead, he smiled.
It wasn’t a nice smile - not the one she’d seen him give to other students and staff, not the one he’d offered to her a few times, across the width of the classroom. This one was feral, dangerous, and for the first time Jess found herself wondering just who exactly the real threat was. Sam had seemed like a nice guy, true enough, but most psychopaths did until they cut your head off; she’d never seen any malice in him before, but the smile he was wearing now, the easy stance he was falling into, certainly suggested that he was capable of it.
It also seemed to piss Chris off, and his gripped his knife tighter in his hands.
“You wanna play games with me, boy?” He grinned. “’Cause we can play.”
Three things happened at once: Chris lunged forward, blade flashing in the moonlight; Mark shoved Jess to the floor, hard, and Sam Winchester laughed. He dodged the first swing of the knife in a move that screamed of experience, blocking the second with his arm and sending his knee careening into Chris’ stomach. The man groaned, but Sam didn’t hesitate for a second, slamming his elbow down on the back of the man’s head and sending him crashing to the floor.
Mark yelled in anger, aiming his own knife for a short stab at Sam’s stomach. Sam twisted away, bringing a hand up in a hard punch to the Mark’s face. The man stumbled backwards, but didn’t go down, and Jess had a fleeting thought of helping… and then Sam was moving again, and she figured that he was doing pretty damn fine by himself, and she’d probably just get in the way.
The two men shifted, and she couldn’t see what was happening for a few seconds, and then Mark was dropping to the floor with a deafening thud and Sam was stumbling backwards. Jess reached his side just in time to stop him from going down, propping her shoulder under his (and trying not to notice the way that they fit together perfectly).
“’M alright,” He grinned, shifting most of his weight off her and testing his ankle carefully.
“Where are your crutches?” Jess demanded, following his shift to try and keep as much of him supported as he’d let her.
“Somewhere on the quad,” He laughed, switching seamlessly back into the Sam she knew and loved. “I saw the two of them surprise you… I would have been quicker, but, y’know.”
He waved at his ankle, bandaged bulkily below his jeans.
“You got here quick enough,” Jess smiled, and blinked up at his face. “Thank you, by the way. I thought I was a gonner for a while there.”
“Nah,” Sam smiled, an adorable blush gracing his cheeks. “You’re much too pretty for that.”