The Ground, She Is Hard

He fell long, and he fell hard.

No. Not long. Short. Too short. It just felt long.

The impact was abrupt. It knocked every ounce of wind he had right out of him.

No oxygen. No oxygen.

Shit, he thought, breathe—

Nothing worked.

"Dean - ? Dean!"

Maybe Sammy could breathe for him.

Shitshitshit. Breathe, dammit!

And it came, then, the air. On noisy, choppy breaths, whooping painfully.

"Dean!"

With breath came thought. Crap. He'd fallen.

Little memory of details. Kitchen, he thought. Something about a kitchen. Abandoned house. Paper-thin linoleum with rotted wood beneath. The place had reeked of mold, mildew, dead things. They'd gone for ghost or spirit, but he remembered voices, voices of strangers, not Sam, from just before he fell.

Not down. Through. Right through the floor.

Holy crap.

Where the hell was Sammy?

He lay where he'd landed. Lungs heaved, and then everything eased. Breathing steadied. He felt drifty and sleepy and calm.

"Dean . . . oh Jesus -!"

And he knew, he just knew it. If I wake up, it's going to hurt like hell.

So, don't wake up.

# # #

Sam was sweeping with the EMF unit when he heard the crack of wood, the blurted yelp from his brother. From the hall he made the kitchen in two long strides, just in time to see Dean go down through collapsing floor. Shock pinned him in place.

Basement.

Crap.

"Dean-? Dean!"

At the edge of the gaping hole, he knelt carefully, looking down. The old house had no power, and daylight would end in a couple of hours. Sam grabbed for the small Maglite he always carried in a coat pocket. Flashed light down into the hole as it gave up puffs of dust and debris.

His brother, one floor down. Sam heard the choking spasms of a man with the wind knocked out of him, trying in panic to draw air into paralyzed lungs. "Dean!"

A tangle of sprawled limbs. He almost didn't look human, his brother. Just a mannequin upon the basement floor. Sam saw movement, saw fruitless searching of hands, of boots soles scraping at cement floor. Could see nothing of Dean's face, blocked by a shoulder.

And then Dean went still. Much too still.

"Dammit . . . " Yet even as Sam thrust himself upward, concentrating solely on finding the door, and the stairway, and scrambling down in a mad dash, something very hard from behind connected solidly with his head.

The Maglite went spinning, falling down through the hole to the floor far below. Part of Sam tried to follow, but something dragged him back, jerked him hard away from the edge of the hole. But even as hands began to yank at his clothing, to plunge into pockets, he felt consciousness waver.

. . . Dean . . .?

But he was gone, just . . . gone . . . and so was his brother.

# # #

As Dean swam to consciousness, he heard the litany. "Dean. Dean. Hey, man . . . Dean."

He did not desire consciousness. It was easier to be nonexistent.

"Come on, Dean . . . wake up. Wake up!"

No. He'd really rather not. Something out there, something in the dark, around the corner, was lurking, like a black dog.

Pain was its name.

He had learned, over the years, the degrees of pain. He'd seen his father deal with it; had learned, in time, to stuff it, to pack it away. How many times had he been hurled against a wall? How many times had skull impacted brick, or wallboard, or stone? Mostly, not much breakage. Now and then. But bruises galore, and stretched tendons, sore muscles, dislocated shoulders, joints that didn't care for dampness. Once, stuck in a hospital because there was no other option, a doctor had remarked that for a very young man, radiographs suggested he was much older.

Yeah. But there was no time to retire. Retirement killed hunters. Also killed other people.

"Dean. Wake up!"

No, no, not part of the plan. Drift . . drifting . . . riding the current . . .

"Dean, if either of us is to get out of here, you gotta wake up."

It wasn't death he desired. Just oblivion.

"Dean, dammit!"

Sammy. He registered it now. Sammy's voice. From very close by.

"Come on, man . . . wake up. I'd throw something at you if my hands weren't cuffed. Come on, Dean . . . it's all on you. I've got one hellacious headache, and they've cuffed me to pipes. Nothing I can do. Up to you. Dean . . . wake up . . ."

The bed beneath him was hard. Oh, but . . . not bed. Wasn't a bed. Was . . . floor . . .?

"Come on, Dean. I know you're in there somewhere. Wake up, or we're both screwed. Really, really screwed."

No. No, he wouldn't be screwed if he didn't wake up. Sammy didn't know. Sammy hadn't fallen the way he'd fallen.

Basement. Wasn't it? From the kitchen?

Floor beneath his boots. Giving way.

A long, but short, fall.

And the impact. Flesh, bone, against concrete.

"Dean? Dean . . . come on . . ."

Sammy sounded afraid.

But it was so much easier just to lie on the floor. The minute he moved, it was all over. He knew it. He recalled it from other collisions with very hard things. The body wasn't made to do that. And he'd done it more than most. Walls. Ground. Floor. Trees.

Trees were the worst, because they had branches that stuck out in all directions. Branches were extremely talented at stabbing right through clothing and flesh.

No branches, here. Just a cement floor.

"Dean!"

He was all twisted awry. Limbs were every which way. He thought maybe he ought to put them back the way they were supposed to be. But that would require movement.

"Dean, please!"

Sammy.

He wasn't a coward. He knew that. But still . . . the whole movement thing just did not appeal. No frickin' way.

"Dean! You gotta wake up!"

Sammy.

For that, it was worth moving. No matter what.

Let the black dog bite.

He twitched. Boot soles scraped. He felt cement floor against the side of his head. Felt it cold, and hard, and nothing like a pillow. Or even like the Impala seats.

Only in high-end cars, these days, or with major upgrades, did they use leather. But his baby . . . oh, she had the whole leather thing going.

"Dean, we gotta get out of here. Come on, man. Just wake up! You're our only hope."

Princess Leia. He saw her behind his lids doing the holograph thing. Stupid white bedsheet they had over her, headphones of hair. Her liked her considerably better with Jabba the Hutt, wearing that brass bikini. You're our only hope.

He was Han Solo, wasn't he? And not stuck in carbonite.

He stirred upon the floor. Scraped boots again, trying to find purchase. Felt cold cement beneath searching hands. Rolled his head against it.

"Get your sorry ass off the floor and come over here," Sam said. "Dammit, Dean—I need you. You need you. We're not getting out of here unless you can get over here with the lockpick kit. Which you'll have to use. Because I can't. You suck at it—oh man, I got you beat six ways to Sunday with the picks - but you're our only hope."

Obi-Wan.

He had enough leverage, and vague consciousness. Dean settled himself, then tipped himself over onto his back.

. . . oh . . . holy crap . . .

And the walls came down.

"Dean!"

But he was gone. Other side of the galaxy gone.

# # #

Sam watched the twitches, the minute fumblings of a body in shock slowly rousing itself. He knew full well Dean had absolutely no control over anything. He assumed concussion, but likely more. Likely worse. Possibly really bad. He'd fallen through a floor and one long story down deep into a basement, unobstructed, with nothing to break his fall.

But there was no help for it, Sam knew. No hope, otherwise. They'd found his cuffs and used them, once they'd dragged him down to the basement. He'd roused as they locked him up, arms behind his back, all slumped against the wall. Pipes. They'd hooked the cuffs around pipes.

Squatters?

Squatters. Probably. So maybe no ghost, or spirit at all. Just squatters, and the newspaper had gotten it wrong.

He wasn't going anywhere until someone unlocked the cuffs. But Dean lay in a tumbled sprawl perhaps thirty feet away, and he had his kit on him.

He put everything he had into the words, the tone, the command. "Dean! You gotta wake up!"

Sam wished like hell it was the other way around, that it was Dean cuffed to pipes, because then the pain would be his -Sam's - rather than his brother's, and it wouldn't matter so much. He could suck it up like a good soldier, as their father always said, and get his brother out of the jam they were in.

But it wasn't him lying so still and quiet upon the basement floor. It was Dean, and it scared the holy hell out of him to see his brother like that. Dean was never, ever still. Life ran harder, and hotter, in him than in anyone else Sam knew. Drove him nuts sometimes, because now and again he wanted everything to just stay still for awhile, so he could think, so he could simply just be, but that wasn't in Dean's makeup. Dean was not a Zen kind of person. Even in sleep, he twitched. At rest, he wasn't. Not wholly.

Sam sat slumped against the wall, arms cuffed to pipes behind his back, and realized that the only times he ever, ever, saw his brother still, truly and wholly still, was when he lay in a hospital bed.

Desolation swept in. His chest filled up, and ached. "Dean. Please. Wake up. You don't even have to come over here and unlock me. Just wake up."

Dean moved then. As if answering Sam's words.

He scraped, shifted, tipped from side to back. His head rolled toward Sam. His face, now visible in waning light, contorted briefly, reflecting pain and panic, and then he went still again, much too still, limbs slack against the basement floor.

Fear was foremost in Sam. "Dean. Come on. Dean."

But wherever Dean was, it wasn't here.

The sun went down, taking all ambient light. Nothing, now. Darkness. Blackness. Sam sat slumped against pipes, arms aching as he listened for anything from his brother, any noise at all.

"Dean. Please. Just move."

Dean didn't.

# # #

No light. No light at all. Behind Dean's lids, darkness; in front, lids open, the same.

But sound. Dean heard breathing, and an occasional chime and scrape of metal on metal. Heard a body shift, and muttering, a snatch of words. He managed one for himself. " . . . Sammy . . ."

Movement, and breathing, stopped. "Dean? Oh God . . . Dean-?" A scramble and scrape of body, a bitten-off curse, metallic scratching. "Dean?"

He lay very still, but he could speak. " . . . can't see . . . where are you?"

Sam's voice was strained, breathy, and his words ran fast. "I can't see, either. It's night. Late. No moon, remember? No power here, and they took my flashlight. Listen—can you move? At all? They cuffed me to pipes. You've got your kit on you, right?"

" . . . Sammy . . . "

"You gotta move, Dean. I'm sorry, but they may be back tomorrow. Squatters, far as I can tell. I think they got everything off me, but they may be back to check again." And then, "Crap, did they check your pockets? Do you know? Do you have your kit? Because if not, we are well and truly screwed."

He swallowed against dryness, attempted to wet lips. No saliva. " . . . this means I gotta move, doesn't it . . . ?"

"Kinda. Yeah."

"It's in my boot. Right one."

"Then maybe they missed it, if they searched you. And we gotta assume they did. I mean, they dragged me down here, cuffed me. Before I went out, they checked all my pockets. We have to assume they checked yours."

"Boot, Sammy."

"Then drag your boney ass over here and unlock these cuffs, dammit. It's all on you, Dean."

He drew in, then released a long, loud breath. " . . . like always . . . and my ass is damn sweet . . . "

The timbre of Sam's voice changed. It was subtle, but Dean recognized it. He meant it as a statement, a declaration, but a question, and doubt, crept up through the cracks. "You're okay, Dean . . . ?"

" . . . I'll get it done . . . "

"Can you? For sure?"

"Always do."

That sounded like a gusty breath of relief. "Maybe before daylight?"

"Can I do this without moving?"

"I don't know. Can you?"

"Crap. Probably not."

"Dean—how badly are you hurt?"

It was part grin, part wince. "I got no frickin' clue, Sammy. Just—hold on."

He wiggled his right foot, and the boot upon it. The pressure points felt right. He carried his pick kit, and a knife tucked between leg and boot shaft. Felt like they were still there.

He lay on his back. Nothing about him had any inclination, not even the least desire, to move, but he had no choice. "Sammy -?"

"Yeah?"

"You okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah, Dean. I'm fine."

"Really fine? I mean, like fine fine? Or just—fine?"

After a moment, Sam said, "Do you know what that sounds like?"

"Sounds like us."

Sam's snicker was loud in the quiet, in the dark. "Yeah. Guess it does. But—I'm fine. Really."

" . . . 'kay. So, here goes." He tensed everything, gritted his teeth, prepared to essay a shift from back to left side, to front. He wasn't going to walk, he knew. Likely not even hands and knees. Foxhole belly crawling might work.

Hell, it was all he had in him.

And movement sent a shockwave of electricity shooting from the base of his spine out through the top of his skull. All the breath left him on a blurted, convulsing gasp of pain.

"Dean!"

He lay face-down on the floor cramped around the pain. Even with jaws clenched so hard he thought teeth might shatter, the grunts and gasps exited on a shuddering stream of breathy invective.

"Dean?"

Pack it away, pack it away. " . . . comin' Sammy . . . " He had to, now. Sam needed him, and if he stopped, if he sought refuge again in unconsciousness, he wasn't sure he'd ever wake up again. And that wouldn't help Sam. It was on him. All on him. A responsibility he accepted one night years before, when their father put a six-month-old brother into his very young arms. " . . . comin' . . . "

# # #

There was a point when words merely got in the way. Became white noise. Best to save them for when they could mean the most, make a difference. So Sam sat in the darkness and listened to his brother.

Crawling.

God. Dean was crawling.

A man doesn't crawl if he has any other option.

He'd fallen through a floor, and hit cement. He could be broken six ways to Sunday. Let him be okay . . . let him be okay . . .

Sam felt a hand on his jeans. "Sam?"

"Yeah."

The hand closed on his ankle, gripped hard. "Okay. Okay. Give me a minute."

"You okay?"

"Ask me later."

"Yeah." Sam drew in a very deep breath, felt it tremble in his chest. He hated this. Hated that it hurt. Hated that he'd told Dean it was all on him.

Like, he didn't know. Hell, it was always on Dean, because Dean made it that way. Always had. And everyone else was happy to have it that way. And he hated nagging at him now, but he knew Dean was hurt. Knew the only way he could help his brother was to keep driving him.

The hand gripped his ankle again. Sam heard the ragged breathing, the catch-gasps, the choppy exhalations. It tore him apart to hear them. "I'm sorry . . . Dean, I'm sorry. I just . . . there's just no other way. I can't get my hands through the cuffs."

Dean was moving again. " . . . giNORmous hands . . ."

Sam smiled into darkness. "Goes with the territory."

" . . . how . . . the hell . . . did you get so frickin' . . . tall . . . ?"

"Genes, I guess."

"Dad's not . . . wasn't . . . "

Neither was Samuel Campbell, or Henry Winchester, come to think of it. Tall men, yes, six feet or over—and Dean was a smidge over 6'1" - —but none up in his layer of the stratosphere. "Gotta be back there somewhere."

"Just a piss-ant little kid, scrawny as hell . . . I could have broken an arm if I looked at it wrong."

Sam smiled again. "Yeah. But you never did."

"Nah, I was too busy saving your ass."

"Dean?"

" . . . yeah? . . . "

"You don't have to talk."

"Oh yeah. I do. Because then I don't have to remember someone shoved a hot poker down my spine."

Unease stirred. "Can you move your arms and legs?"

Dean's laugh wasn't actually a laugh, just an expulsion of breath. " - the hell do you think I'm doing?"

"Anything numb?"

"Oh, I wish."

He tried to keep his voice matter-of-fact, so his own fear wouldn't spook Dean. "How bad is it?"

"Shut up, Sammy."

Dean was close now. Sam sensed his brother next to him, heard the scrape of clothing, boots, and body. He wanted Dean to focus on something other than pain. "How long has it been since you picked a lock in the dark?"

"Are we counting, now? Who the hell cares."

"I do. I'm the one cuffed. Just wondering if it'll be daylight, or maybe tomorrow night, by the time you get me unlocked."

Dean said something inarticulate that appeared to be a mixture of several words, and none of them very polite. For a moment he closed a hand on Sam's knee, gripping it tightly enough to hurt, and then he was moving again. The next time he touched Sam, it was to pat first his belly, his shoulder, follow one arm down to the pipes to find the locked handcuffs.

" . .. 'kay . . . gotta pull the kit . . . ahhhhh, crap . . ."

"What?"

" . . . means I gotta bend my leg . . . "

Alarm jolted through Sam. "You mean—you can't? Can you try?"

" There is no try . . . only do, or do not . . ."

"Dude—you're quoting Yoda."

" . . . how about . . . 'I got a bad feeling about this.'"

"Yeah. You always were Han Solo."

"He's the hero - " Dean caught his breath sharply, released it on a series of grunts. " . . . 'kay . . . got it . . . "

Sam stared hard into darkness, focusing on anything other than his brother's pain. "No, Dean. Luke Skywalker's the hero."

"You only say that because you were always Luke."

"He was tempted by the Dark Side, but didn't give in. And he dropped the WMD down the Deathstar's port. Han Solo-? Hell, all he did was- "

"—fly a cool spaceship, hang out in saloons, romance the girls, get the hell out of Dodge before the Imperial Forces caught him . . . saved the Republic . . ." Dean actually laughed. "Hell, Sammy, admit it . . . I am Han Solo."

Sam thumped his head against the wall as he grinned. "Yeah. Right."

" . . . I got a cool car, and she can make the jump to lightspeed when I need it . . . now, shut your piehole. I gotta concentrate."

Sam shut his mouth on further discussion. Dean wasn't as good as his brother with the lockpicks, but he got the job done. Didn't generally have to attempt it when lying in a dark basement after falling through a kitchen floor, though.

It required swearing, rests to catch his breath, and repeated attempts. But finally the lock clicked, and the cuff on Sam's right wrist snapped apart.

Ordinarily he'd have jerked his arm free, triggered the ratchet on the other cuff. But he'd been sitting with his arms caught tightly behind him for hours. It took a minute to shift his too-heavy arms, and then he swore as sluggish blood moved.

" . . . you free?"

"Yeah. Yeah." Sam shifted his weight forward, got his legs tucked under him. His shoulders ached, but he reached out. Found his brother. An assessment told him Dean lay belly-down, forehead pressed against the cement floor, tensed shoulders heaving from hard breaths. Sam closed a hand around the back of his neck. "Hey. Hey?"

Dean merely grunted.

"Okay - you've got a backup cell, right?"

Dean said, "My coat. They may have missed it. Just . . . do it without making me move, okay?"

The inside of Dean's coat contained a plethora of concealed pockets. Sam reached beneath, tugged the coat flaps as free of his brother's torso as he could, found the little zippers, the Velcro'd compartments. Dug into them. Located the phone. "Got it!"

Dean released a long gust of air. " . . . there is a God."

"Okay." Sam flipped open the phone, saw the glow of the screen. One bar showed. He thumbed the buttons. "Listen, I'm not moving you. I'm calling 9-1-1."

"—Sam -!"

"Shut your piehole. It's done."

" Aw, Sammy, you know we don't do the 9-1-1 thing . . ."

But Sam had a dispatcher on the other end, and he wasn't listening to his brother.

# # #

When Dean came to, he was lying in a hospital bed with an IV needle in the back of his left hand and a nasal cannula hooked over his ears. And a brother standing at the foot of his bed, one big hand wrapped around a vending machine cup, smiling at him.

Deepening his voice to a theatrical croak, Sam said, "It's . . . aliiiiive . . . "

Dean recognized the vagueness of heavy painkillers. He scowled. "Why am I here?"

"Uh, vacation?"

"Why couldn't we do this in a motel?"

"You fell through a floor, Dean, and landed one whole basement story down. What did you expect? You didn't exactly bounce."

Dean just rolled his head against the stacked pillows in grim disapproval.

"So, we can wait for the doctor, or I can give you the gist in non-medical terminology."

"Gist."

"Sprained ankles—both, by the way—a bunged-up knee, hairline skull fracture, a vast array of Technicolor bruises, including two black eyes . . . oh, and a broken back."

"A what?"

"In two places." Sam's brows arched. "Not bad, though—couple of cracked vertebrae. They'll keep you in a hard brace for a while, kinda like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle. Not going anywhere for a while, Mr. Han Solo, Hero of the Republic."

Dean glared at him. "Saved your ass, Skywalker."

Sam smiled. It was wide, and it was good, and it made his dimples show. "Yeah. Yeah, you did."

The room grayed just enough that Dean knew he was going out. Drugs. Good drugs. " . . . all right, then. Just so that's clear."

Dimples deepened. "Clear."

Dean nodded. Squinted. " . . . Sammy?"

"Yeah?"

"The ground, she is hard."

~ end ~