This fic is a prequel of sorts for "Life Used to Be So Hard," but it can easily be read alone.

As per a request, it expounds upon the events in this moment of that fic:

Dean nods, realizes he's rubbing his scar unconsciously and yanks his hand down. It's almost fully healed, but it still looks lurid and painful, curving down over his collarbone to just above his belly button, signature of the gash that nearly gutted him.

Enjoy!

:::

Now-

Dean is at the foot of the basement stairs with his hand on the railing and his back to Sam when he hears the chain snap.

He knows, abstractly, what the sound signifies. His heart stutters and freezes in his chest as he whips around, but despite the immediate response of his body, his mind is somehow calm. He has a tranquilizer gun, but there's no time to aim. Bobby is upstairs, but there's no time to yell. No time for anything but one deep intake of breath before the pain rips through him and he's knocked to the ground, skull bouncing off the concrete steps with a crack, and even at the last moment before he blacks out, Sam's searing breath on his face and Sam's teeth inches from his throat, something inside him is shaking its head in tranquil disbelief. It's cocking its brows and saying, Nah, no way. No way.

Dean looks up and meets Sam's eyes, and they are the same shifting hazel color they've always been. Sam's eyes.

And everything is quiet for a while.

Then-

"You sure this is gonna hold?" Sam asks doubtfully, glancing up at Dean from across Bobby's cluttered kitchen table.

"Dude," Dean snorts. "Don't flatter yourself. You're a pansy-ass human, you're probably gonna be a pansy-ass canine, too. My money's on a golden retriever."

Sam doesn't smile, just fingers the cold steel links and swallows. "I'd just – I'd just feel better if we had, I dunno… a cage or something."

"Well," Dean says with a cheer he doesn't feel, "think of this as a trial-and-error period. If this doesn't work, we'll hop on down to PetSmart and see if they have any Yeti-sized dog-carriers."

Sam winces. "I don't like the sound of that, man."

"You're right. PetSmart probably only has those little dinky cat-baskets."

"I mean the trial-and-error part, Dean. Specifically the error." Sam knots his fingers into his hair, tugs hard. "I just wish there were some sort of precedence for this."

Dean sighs, sets down the padlock he's holding with a heavy clank.

"Listen," he says. "I know you don't feel comfortable doing anything unless you've read five thousand books about it first, but we looked, Sam, and we found exactly zip. You gotta let it the fuck go."

Sam bites his lip, gives his head an unhappy, uncertain shake.

"Look at it this way," Dean continues. "We're doing original research. It's a breakthrough in the scientific world. Think how jealous all your Stanford friends'd be."

"Right," Sam mumbles. "We're gonna write the book on werewolf containment theory."

"Damn straight," Dean agrees, lifting the padlock again and reaching for a screwdriver. "Someone's gotta be first. So quit moping and help me lock this shit up in the basement."

Sam finally meets his gaze, and he looks so frustrated, so fucking young. His eyes are wide and luminous as the full moon.

"I just don't want to hurt anyone," he says helplessly. "I don't want to hurt you."

"You're not gonna hurt me," Dean says with utter conviction. "I can whip your ass any day, fur or no fur. I'll pump you full of tranquilizer darts faster than you can bark, see if I won't."

"You gotta promise," Sam says, and there's a desperate note in his voice that makes Dean's stomach clench uncomfortably. "You have to promise me, Dean, if I'm – if something goes wrong, you can't hold back. I'd rather – you have to protect yourself, all right? Promise me."

"Nothin's gonna go wrong," Dean says, but at Sam's pleading look he lets out a long breath and rolls his eyes. "All right, man," he says, placating. "I promise. Swear to god." He tries to look as sincere as possible, and Sam stares at him for a moment before nodding, seemingly satisfied.

"I'm gonna go see how Bobby's doing downstairs," Sam says, and rises from the table, leaving Dean to snag a rag and the rubbing alcohol and begin disinfecting the tranquilizer needles. He tries not to think too hard about the reasons behind the need to do so.

Despite Sam's insistent taunts to the contrary, Dean's not stupid. He knows they've landed themselves in some deep, rank shit, and it's not something he can banish with an exorcism or blow away with a shotgun. He's not afraid, or nervous, but he is… worried. He's worried. Mildly. He doesn't know how the fuck this is gonna go down, doesn't know how to reconfigure their lives to include monthly basement-chainings. He's worried about his brother, worried about the gaunt, haunted look Sam's been wearing ever since he pulled up his sleeve to reveal the jagged set of teethmarks in his forearm.

What he's not worried about is getting hurt. And not because he's a "self-destructive martyr," as Sam has so delicately put it, but because he – he just can't see it happening. Dean trusts his gut, and his gut is calm. A little hungry, maybe, but he called for pizza twenty minutes ago, so that's not a problem he'll have for long. His instincts are good, and they're telling him not to worry. So worry he won't.

After all, it's Sam. Sam's not gonna hurt him.

Now-

When Dean opens his eyes, the first thing he sees is Sam's face, anguished and squid-pale under red splotches, his hair pushed away from his forehead in greasy spikes.

"Oh thank god," Sam says, and his fingers dig painfully into Dean's arm.

"You look like shit on a stick," Dean tells him, and is surprised when the words come out in a dry rasp. He coughs once, just to clear his throat, and promptly passes out.

:::

The next time he wakes up, he does not cough, though he wants to. He breathes shallowly, because he's cognizant enough to realize that the blazing agony he feels is centralized around his ribs and down his side, and breathing hurts like a motherfucker.

Sam's still there, and he still looks like someone has slowly pulled out all his teeth, mouth squinched in a tight line, dark circles swiped under his eyes.

"Dean," Sam says immediately, jabbing at a button by the head of Dean's bed. "Don't make any quick movements."

Roger that. Dean just breathes for a moment, blearily takes in his surroundings: the bed, the too-bright fluorescent lights, the clean, pale walls, the white tile on the ceiling…

"Sam," Dean croaks. "Am I in the fucking hospital?"

"I am so sorry, Dean," Sam says, voice strained almost to the breaking point. "I – god, I don't even – I can't –"

"Jesus," Dean wheezes, remembering. "That chain is fucking bullshit. I'm writing to the manufacturer."

"Shh, Dean, you can't strain yourself, you –"

"Dear Mr. Chain-maker, your chains fucking blow. You may as well boil some water, because you're making spaghetti."

"I – Dean, you broke three ribs, and you have a bad concussion. And – and you have thirty stitches down your left side. The – the cut's deep but all the important stuff is safe. I was – god, Dean, it was so close, man."

"I'm not dead," Dean realizes aloud. "What – how come I'm not dead?"

Sam flinches hard, but Dean's head is too fuzzy to allow for guilt. "Bobby got me off you in time. Fuck, Dean, just in time, I was – I almost – it was bad, fuck, it was really bad. I don't even—"

"Bobby," Dean repeats, and feels something sink in his gut. He thought – what a fuckin' idiot, but he'd thought maybe it was Sam. Maybe Sam had pulled back at the last second, or –

There's a rap on the open doorway at that moment, and a broad-shouldered nurse comes in, clipboard dangling loose at his side.

"Hey there," he says with a sympathetic smile, coming over to fiddle with the shit that Dean's only just noticed is sticking out of his body all over the place: sensors and clamps and an I.V. line. "We're awake, huh?"

Dean would be irritated by that "we," but he's too busy gasping in pain as the nurse starts to adjust his bed from its half-inclined position. Fire faces down his chest and belly and his ribs shriek in time with his head, vision racking and the re-settling.

"Not feelin' so hot, huh?" the nurse asks, and reaches to adjust one of the machines humming at Dean's side.

"I," Dean starts, but his body is flooded with a loose, lazy warmth, and he almost groans in relief as the lighting-sharp pain is dulled and soothed into a far-away ache. "Mmmm," he concludes.

"Vitals are looking good," the nurse says. "I'm gonna get your doctor to come in here and check you out, explain what's going on, how's that sound?"

"When 'm I gonna get outta here?" Dean tries, fighting the sudden slur of an unruly tongue.

"Well," the nurse says. "I'm gonna let Doctor Setty talk to you about that. But I don't think she'll hold you for more than another night. You were lucky, man. Mountain lions don't usually let go once they've got a victim. It's a good thing your friend was there."

The nurse reaches out to prop Dean's left arm up on a pillow, setting it away from his stitched side, and then he leaves.

"Bobby?" Dean asks, suddenly exhausted. He doesn't have the energy for full sentences just now.

"He's at the house," Sam says, understanding Dean's question. "He – he's fixing up that kennel out back. Reinforcing it and stuff. And until we figure out how to do this safely, we're gonna put me down for the night. We've got some big-game tranqs and we think they'll do the trick."

"Thas dangerous," Dean protests. "That stuff'll fuck you up."

"Kinda like you're fucked up right now?" Sam asks bitterly, and he drops his head into his hands. "Fuck," he says, muffled by his palms. "Fuck."

And Dean wants to comfort him, he really does, but he feels strangely hollow at the prospect. It must be the drugs, or the pain, but – he just can't get up the strength necessary to try and soothe his brother. So he doesn't.

They sit like that, Dean with his throbbing head tilted back on the pillow, Sam with his face in his hands, in silence save for the thrumming of the machines and the bustle of the hospital outside of their door.

:::

True to the nurse's word, Dean is released the next day. Bobby is the one who comes to take him back to the house, and when he walks in the door without Sam, Dean's heart seizes and he pushes himself up frantically, ignoring the ripping pain.

"What—"

"He's fine," Bobby says, "Just still a little… groggy from last night."

Dean's a little groggy himself, and he has to lean heavily on Bobby as he struggles from the car and walks up the steps of the house.

Sam is splayed out on the couch, one arm tossed over his eyes, a glass of water on the table beside him, and from the drawn curtains Dean can tell he has a headache. He sits up, though, when Bobby walks Dean through the door and helps lower him carefully into an armchair, giving him a pillow to hold to his chest. The pressure is supposed to help, and it does, but Dean feels like a dumbass embracing the cushion like a teddy-bear.

"Hey," Sam says, "hey, man. How're you feeling?"

"Fan-friggin-tastic," Dean says testily. "How'd last night go? You try and vivisect anyone?"

Sam blinks a little, and it's clear from the way his face falls that he's hurt, but Dean watches him force a hoarse laugh and say, "Nice. You get that from Bobby's word-a-day toilet paper?"

Dean grunts in return, trying to find a position against the cushions that might at least simulate comfort. He doesn't know why he's being an ass to Sam. Because he's tired maybe, and he hurts, and the morphine is making him nauseous, but those aren't excuses – the kid is clearly beating himself up, and god knows it wasn't his fault.

"You need to eat something," Bobby says. "The botha you. There's still chili left from the batch I made a few nights ago. I'll warm us up some."

Dean's stomach turns at the thought, but he nods and attempts a smile. He looks up and catches Sam doing the same thing, face turning a little green, and his fake smile turns into a real grin as Sam pretends to gag as soon as Bobby's turned his back.

"Those drugs do a number on you, huh?" Dean asks.

"I feel like I got smacked in the face with a sledgehammer," Sam moans.

"Tell me about it," Dean agrees, and Sam looks crestfallen again.

"Dean, I've been thinking," Sam starts, and Dean immediately shakes his head, ignoring the stab of pain.

"Dude, whatever you're gonna say, I don't wanna hear it. We're gonna figure this out, and we're gonna do it in a way that doesn't involve drugs, or crappy scrap-metal chains. Like I said – trial and error. This –" he indicates himself, the white bandages peeking out from the neck of his t-shirt "—this was an error. But now we know. So it's not gonna happen again."

"I just," Sam says, and swallows. "I know it's not – it's not me – but –" he lets out a bitter laugh that sounds more like a sob. "I can't help but think that if it had been you… if it had been you, you woulda fought it. You would have known it was me you were attacking, and you would have – I don't know, broken free somehow. It's stupid, I know, but, god – if I were stronger—"

"Stop that," Dean says automatically, but his stomach curdles a little at Sam's words, and his chest clenches in unwanted recognition. Because maybe… maybe deep down, he'd been thinking the same thing. Thinking that he could never hurt Sam, never would, no matter what, and had assumed that Sam couldn't hurt him. Despite the fangs and the claws and the ability to break through fucking steel, Dean had believed he was safe.

He should have known better.

There is no safe.

"Sam," Dean says, with renewed fervor. "Sam, it was not your fault. It wasn't you that attacked me, man – it was not you." And he realizes it's the first time that he's believed this. "You can't fight off something like this. I wouldn't be able to do it, Bobby wouldn't be able to do it, hell, Dad wouldn't be able to do it. No one can. It's – it's just something we gotta live with. It's – it's forever. And we don't know exactly how to deal, yet. But we will, Sam. We will. I swear to god we will."

Sam is listening, lips pressed tightly together, head bowed.

"Do you hear me?" Dean asks. "Sam. Look at me."

Unwillingly, Sam meets his gaze, eyes damp. "I could have killed you," he whispers.

"Sure," Dean concedes, shifting position with a grimace. "But you didn't. And you won't. I won't let you. It's gonna be okay eventually, Sammy, alright? I promise."

There's a beat of silence, the huff of Sam's uncertain breath.

"Sam," Dean presses gently.

And finally, finally, Sam nods. It's slow and it's doubtful and it's reluctant, but there's a stutter of hope in his eyes that had been absent moments before.

"Yeah," Sam says quietly. "I believe you, man. I have to believe you."

Dean doesn't ask what he means. His ribs are pounding and his side is throbbing and his head feels like it's filled with waterlogged chipmunks, so he leans back and lets his eyes flutter closed.

It's true, what he said. It was not Sam's fault, in any way. When Sam changes, he doesn't know his brother, doesn't know himself – he's gone, so far gone that Dean could never hope to reach him. Removed to a degree that even Stanford and those four years and thousands of miles had never managed.

He watches as Sam settles against the couch, leaning back and staring up at the waterstained ceiling as if he's looking directly through it. Dean remembers, with a fierce clarity, how he'd met Sam's eyes right before he passed out, remembers his conviction that anything with Sam's eyes could never hurt him. But he understands now that Sam may have been looking at him, but he didn't see him.

Dean pulls in as deep a breath as he can manage, adjusts the pillow on his chest. The gash above his heart sparks and aches.

He's going to have a wicked fucking scar.