GEN please, Sam, Dean, Bobby.

Bobby is severely injured helping the boys, the boys have to figure out how to save him for once. Bonus points for extremely protective boys. Details up to author. :)

"Shit!"

Sam winced at the sound of his brother's voice. It wasn't so much the word choice - at thirteen, he was pretty much immune to the glares offered by people who didn't care much for his language - as it was the tone, sharp and choked off. He scrambled over to that side of the barn, iron crowbar at the ready just in case, and peered into the darkness to try to see what had happened.

He saw Dean before his older brother noticed him, which immediately made the situation that much worse. Dean was wincing, eyes screwed shut and teeth worrying into his lower lip as he clutched at his right forearm. The fingers of that hand were dripping blood slow and steady from something hidden by his jacket.

"Dean?" Sam couldn't quite keep the tremor out of his voice and the slight irritation he felt towards himself at that flared into outright guilt when Dean's face immediately smoothed out, pain wiped away in a manner that was no where near as effective as Dean likely hoped.

"The hell are you doing here, Sam? You were supposed to wait in the car!" Dean was apparently trying for a glare, but Sam was having none of it. He ignored his older brother's huffing to scurry to his side and try to pry his hand away from the wound to get a better glance at it.

"Where's Bobby?" Sam asked, accidentally scoring the cut as Dean tried to swerve and avoid him. He pulled back a bit to wait for the flurry of curses that followed to end before opening his mouth again. "He was supposed to be right in here and he's been gone for /ages/. And now you're /hurt/."

Guilt at his own actions were easily subsumed over righteous indignation at the man who was /supposed/ to be taking care of the spirit of one James Elison Cott, Esquire. It was supposed to have been a simple vacation, a break with a family friend while their father took on a nasty patch of red caps that he hadn't wanted Sam or Dean near. That had been interrupted by an emergency call by one of Bobby's network, begging his assistance with a two century old piece of property he was renovating that turned out to be still occupied by its original owner. Even then, it was supposed to be a simple hunt, one that would have been resolved as soon as Bobby tracked down and burned some relic the man had kept on his property. It should have taken only a matter of minutes, or so Bobby had said when he'd left them parked in his truck almost two hours prior.

Simple vacation, simple hunt, simple lies.

Dean had waited about half that time before turning to Sam and telling him that something had to be wrong and he was going to check things out. No matter that Bobby had sworn himself that he'd tan both their hides if they left the truck, Dean had been acting as their father's back up on hunts since he was younger than Sam and the effort of staying behind like a dumb kid had been clearly visable. Finally he'd given in and left with an evil eye and a glare and a promise that involved super glue, Sam's hair, and possibly cayanne pepper if Sam even /thought/ about leaving the car to follow him. (Sam couldn't help rolling his eyes after his brother had left. Dean was many awesome things, but he was also ridiculously hypocritical when it came to treating Sam like a dumb kid.)

Fifteen minutes after that, Sam had been after them both.

Back in the barn, Sam tried to peer around Dean's locked grip to get a glimpse of what actually lay underneath. "What happened, anyway?"

Dean grunted in response and Sam, resigned, cast a glance around to see if he could find anything to stop the bleeding. The barn was almost two hundred years old and full of equipment that hadn't seen use for much of that time. None of it looked like it could be used for a makeshift bandage.

Sighing, he pulled his knife and carefully cut a swatch from the bottom of his sweatshirt. Sam waited expectantly, sure his brother would bitch about Sam's presence or another shirt being demolished (this one even decently fitting and thick, good quality and an utter waste as bandages), but instead Dean was warily scanning the dim air over Sam's head. He finally acquiesed to Sam's recontinued efforts to tug Dean's hand away from the jagged slice in his arm, looking far more distracted by whatever he was looking for out in the darkness. Cott's ghost, probably. Or maybe Bobby. Sam didn't comment, merely took grateful advantage of Dean's distraction to examine the wound (clean cut, but flaked with rust - he'd need a tetnus shot boost just to be careful, it it should heal well enough) and then bind it up.

That latter part regained him Dean's attention as Sam tightened the shirt strips.

"Fuck, Sam, you've got the touch of a freaking butcher!"

"Suck it, jerk." Sam calmly returned, tongue edging out between his teeth as he tried to make as tight a knot as possible with the thick sweatshirt material.

"Bitch."

Task done, Sam glanced back up at his brother through his lashes. "What about Bobby?"

Dean shrugged jerkily. His face was very pale and Sam wondered how much blood he'd lost. He didn't think it was too much though; Dean didn't seem lightheaded or to be having trouble moving around.

"I haven't seen him. I thought I heard his voice, but it was that bastard Cott instead - he threw me into one of the scythes." Dean jerked his head towards a series of wickedly sharp blades suspended on one wall.

It was Sam's turn to wince at that, over how bad it could have been. He wished he had a flashlight, then considering the moonlight glimmering on the sharp edge of the scythes, decided he was better off not being able to see clearly.

There was a muffled noise behind Sam and he half turned to look. By his side, Dean swore again before reaching out left handed and shoving Sam behind him. Sam squwacked at this for a second, then fell silent again, eyes wide as he took in the apparition before them both.

It wasn't that Sam didn't /know/ about ghosts. He knew. He'd read Dad's journal and, once he'd gotten (mostly) over the shock of it, had badgered Dean into telling him stories about the hunts he'd been on and what he'd seen and what Dad had done, and, because Dean wasn't always the most reliable narrator, he'd also attacked Bobby's library with a vengence, trying to glean every bit of information possible on the subject. He /knew/ about ghosts.

It's just that he had never seen one before this night. Sam never went on hunts because he was considered too young and even supposedly routine salt and burns were considered too dangerous for him. He'd been pissed off by that before, but the sight of the creature in front of them was almost enough to make him rethink that.

It was bone white and vaguely see-through, old, odd looking clothing worn over an almost paunchy frame, its hair slightly overlong and grown out. It was obviously dead, neck bent at a horrible, horrible angle, the rope it had been killed with still loosely knotted around its neck. Cott's tongue bulged out from between blacked teeth. The most horrible part though was his eyes: completely black, the radiated fear and hurt and rage and agony and a desire to share all of that with anyone foolish enough to look at him.

Sam might have squeaked, though he'd deny it entirely later. Dean stepped in between him and the ghost, left hand still clentching tight to Sam's shoulder, fingers gripping hard enough to hurt. With his right, he reached back, palm open, silently demanding the crowbar. Sam wanted to protest, Dean was hurt, he couldn't possibly try to fight it, but Cott loomed at least six feet tall and even injured, Dean had a better chance of protecting them both than Sam did. He left the crowbar go and Dean swung it up in front of them both, holding it at the ready.

Cott cocked his head to one side, aiming a thousand yard stare in their direction, though Sam couldn't be certain the ghost could even see them.

"Matthew." It said in a voice like gravel over ice. "You disappoint me, son."

"When I give the signal," Dean said quietly, not looking back at Sam, "You run, you hear me? You get the fuck out. We still need to find Bobby."

"But-" Sam started, but Dean didn't even pause.

He shook Sam once, hard. "You /run/."

Sam opened his mouth again, maybe to demand what the signal would be or to entirely refuse all together or maybe something else entirely, but Cott moved again before he got the chance, blinking out of existence and reappearring inches away from them both. A wave of icy air gusted over them and Sam's eyes widened as the ghost snapped out a hand, smacking Dean in the head hard, tossing him to one side and leaving Sam alone, facing down six odd feet of nightmare.

He tried to dash back but the creature grabbed him by the front of his shirt, hoisting him up in the air. Feet dangling, Sam tried desperately to breathe through both the terror and the cold, the ghost's fingers frigid even through two layers of shirts, feeling like they were sapping the strenth and life out of him with his touch.

"Dea-" He tried to call for his brother, eyes rolling in an attempt to locate where Dean even was, but Cott started to shake him roughly, slamming his head back and forth before he could even get the word out.

There was a crack, impossibly loud, that left his ears ringing. Cott vanished and Sam dropped like a stone, head spinning. Then Bobby was there, grasping at him, shotgun held in one hand as he used the other to run roughly over Sam's head and chest, checking for injuries. Sam gaped at him, gasping, trying to catch his breath back and hear what the man was saying but the buzzing echo of the gun shot was making that difficult.

"-the hell your daddy was thinking, neither one of you has a lick of sense, charging into a hunt without /any/ back up, going to get your damn selves /killed/, both of you just /idiots/-"

Sam wanted to protest because after all they'd only gone looking for Bobby because the man had been gone for so long, but right then it was all he could do not to burst into tears.

"Sammy!" That was Dean, sounding shocky and horrified, racing back over towards them. Sam thought it was just fear over what had just happened, but then he caught a glimpse at Dean's face. "Bobby! /Behind you/!"

Sam didn't have time to look, but Bobby spun them both around, catching Sam up and throwing his own body on top of him right before one of those scythes flew off the wall and over both their heads. It crashed into something Sam couldn't see, clattering loudly, but before Sam could scutter out from underneath Bobby, he stiffened strangely, eyes wide and face suddenly white.

Then he swore, wrenched himself to his feet, and pulled Sam up into his arms, tucking him to his side. Something else long and jagged and sharp wizzed past them and Sam flinched, felt the air of it brush against his face as it passed. Cott's voice was raging in the background, screaming about Matthew and betrayals, and Sam couldn't bear to listen to the rest, just pulled his hands up to his ears and tried to block it out.

He could still hear Bobby scream out Dean's name though, heard him order Dean to get the hell out of dodge. Dean gave them both a white-eyed stare for a moment, then turned and high-tailed it. Bobby followed close behind, swerving every few feet as something else flew past them.

Cott materialized in front of the double barn doors when they were perhaps twenty feet away. Dean skidded to a stop but Bobby kept running. Cott's lips pulled back in a grimace as he reached towards them, but when they reached within ten feet, his expression turned shocked instead and he drew back, as if being so close burned. He had to vanish again as Bobby kept going, his scream of rage growing louder and more furious as they finally exited.

Sam expected Bobby to put him down as soon as they were out in the night air again, but the man didn't, kept going instead until they were more than a hundred yards away. Then he let Sam slip to the ground, cast his eyes around to check on Dean, and finally reached into his pocket to pull out a remote device.

"Both of you on the ground and cover your eyes." His voice sounded strained and he was breathing heavy. Sam swallowed hard but did as he was bid, curling up and hiding away behind his hands. He heard a click and then a second later there was a huge explosion. Light and hot wind flared against his face and hands for a moment, then faded.

Blinking, Sam pulled his arms away and stared at the newly burning wreakage of the barn, before shifting his gaze back to Bobby.

"Caleb didn't tell me the relic was the damned barn." Bobby said softly, watching the flames. "Took me longer than I'd have liked to rig the explosives. When I got back to the truck and saw that the two of you weren't there, I damn near had a heart attack."

"Bobby?" Dean's voice sounded smaller than usual. Sam turned to look at his face, curious, but was swiftly distracted again as the older man slowly crumpled forward, first to his knees and then flat on his face.

"Bobby!" Sam rushed over and knelt, tried to see what was wrong. Dean shoved him out of the way before he'd been able to do more than put a hand on Bobby's back, but even that much was enough to show Sam how serious the situation was. He held his hand out, warm and sticky and half covered with blood, and whipped his gaze back over to where Dean was looking at a jagged piece of metal sticking out of Bobby's back.

"Oh fuck," Dean breathed, eyes wide.

Sam bit his lip. "Do we take it out?"

Dean shook his head, collecting himself. "No. No, I can't tell how deep it is. Run back to the truck and get me another flashlight. Cott destroyed the one I took with me."

Sam nodded and pushed himself back up again and was off, feet pounding the turf. Dean's voice rang in his ears a second later, hollaring after him to bring the first aid kit as well. The truck wasn't far off; Sam made it within just a couple of minutes or maybe even less. He fumbled with the door latch for a second before finally succeeding in yanking it open, glancing about in despair a moment later because Bobby's truck wasn't the Impala and without the welcome familiarity of it, he had no idea where anything /was/. He lost maybe ten or fifteen seconds dithering there, eyes filling with entirely unwelcome tears, before frustration forced him back to the task at hand.

Glovebox. Under the seat. Trunk. Any of those places made sense. He found another flashlight in the glovebox and the first aid kid turned out to be in the trunk, under an herb kit and a twelve pack of thick, white candles.

Sam had both in his arms and was racing back within seconds, truck left open and forgotten behind him. Dean was kneeling beside Bobby, his jacket now off and bundled cautiously against the fragment of metal sticking up out of Bobby's skin. Dean looked up with a tight smile as Sam skidded to a halt beside them, both kit and flashlight tumbling out of his grip.

"Hold the flashlight, I've got to check it out." Sam nodded, reached again for the torch and flipped it on, holding it with hands that were not perhaps entirely steady in an attempt to direct the light toward Bobby's back. Dean didn't seem to notice and instead pulled the jacket, now sodden with blood, away. More blood welled up to replace it.

Bobby took that moment to groan, shifting on the ground.

"Hold still," Dean ordered him, one hand coming up to press on Bobby's shoulder. "You're hurt and I'm going to check it out."

"What?" Bobby's voice sounded far more thready than anything Sam had heard before and he shivered at the sound. Despite that, he flailed out with one hand, trying to dislodge Dean's grip. "What are you talking about, boy?"

Dean's face was set, stony. "You're hurt, Bobby. You're bleeding all over and I've got to make it stop."

"Oh, hell, son." Bobby grumbled, shaking his head and then pushing to sit up. Dean's hand went with him, helping him up. "This ain't nothing."

Sam snorted, he couldn't help it. "Bobby, you /passed out/." Guilt welled up again then, more easily felt now that his heartbeat was returning to something resembling normal. "And you got hit because you were protecting me."

Bobby half turned to look at him over one shoulder. The cast of his face was decidedly unamused. In fact, he looked downright angry.

"I passed out because I had to cast about six different incantations to ensure that torching the barn would get rid of Cott, not because I got scraped on the way out."

Sam glanced down at the metal slice still sticking eerily out of Bobby's flesh and turned a disbelieving look back. Bobby didn't even bother to look at he reached back, grasped the shard, and yanked it out. Dean made a muffled sound of protest but his attempt to rush back in with his jacket was met with an outright glare. He brought it up near to his face for a moment, made a disguisted sort of noise, and flicked it away. Bobby slapped a hand awkwardly across the wound to staunch the bleeding instead and stood, wobbling only a little bit. Then he was casting a gaze down at both of them every bit as furious as the one Cott had earlier.

"You two want to tell me why the /hell/ you didn't wait in the truck like I told you?"

Dean's face froze but Sam didn't hestitate. He'd been at turns terrified, worried, and exhausted already that night and it all came rushing out.

"We /couldn't/ wait. You were /gone/ and we didn't know what happened and you could have been dead in a ditch or something!"

Bobby stared at him for a second, then swung his glare over to Dean instead. "That how your daddy raised you?"

Sam worried for a second that Dean would crumble under it, he'd never seen Bobby so upset before and he knew how much the man's opinion meant to his older brother, but the words seemed to have the opposite effect. Dean's shoulders straightened and his expression turned every bit as furious as what was being directed his away.

"Yes, /sir/. You left and didn't give any intel. Anything could have happened to you and we don't leave men down. I /had/ to go after you."

"And Sam?"

Dean paused for a second, shifting his gaze over toward's Sam. There was just as much protective anger there as what Sam had seen in Bobby and Sam knew right then that cayanne pepper and super glue was going to be the /least/ of his worries in the near future. As if that mattered. As if he'd been any more able to sit in safety when Dean and Bobby were in danger than his older brother had been. He resisted the urge to stick his tongue out and instead glared back.

"/Sam/" Sam stated coldly, to both of them, "shouldn't be left in the dark /either/."

Bobby stared at them both, the anger in his eyes slipping away to something a bit more helpless. Sam returned his look with as much determination as he could muster, could feel Dean doing the same thing at his side, and finally Bobby looked away, coughing lightly.

"The both of you are nothing but idiots, I swear. And I will have both your hides if you do anything so stupid again. And heaven help all of us if John ever catches word of this."

That last was more muttered than anything else, words barely caught under his breath, but Sam heard and couldn't help a small grin.

"Beat us later," Dean said, not sounding like he got the joke at all. "Right now, let me take a look at your back and make sure you don't need stitches. And I think you might have a concussion; you've got a nasty lump on your head and it needs to be looked at. And-"

"For God's sake, you worry more than a mother bear." The words were tempered with the first hint of affection Sam had heard from Bobby since he'd ordered them to stay behind and before Dean could try again with his jacket, Sam had pulled open the first aid kit and found some decent, actual bangages. He batted Bobby's hand out of the way, lifted layers of shirts, and began to roughly tape them into place, sealing the wound with as much pressure as possible. Bobby hissed softly at the touch before reaching up to gingerly feel the lump Dean had mentioned.

"We need to get you back to the junk yard so we can look at over properly," Sam decided. "Dean can drive, you should lay down in the back cab."

"Dean can, can he?" Bobby's tone could have been amused or angry or some bewildered mix of both.

"Yeah, I can." Dean's voice matched it rather well, though when he continued he had a tinge of disgust as well. "You drive an /automatic/, I could have driven that when I was Sam's age."

Sam frowned at both of them before snagging Bobby's arm and gently tugging him towards the truck. "Can you walk? We can pull it closer if you need."

Bobby might have muttered something about thinking Dean was bad, but Sam primly ignored it. He needed to get Bobby back and they'd have to make sure he really wasn't concussed. Not to mention Dean's arm still had to be looked at, and Bobby's back probably would take stitches. And then he'd need to make sure both of them actually ate something and took some pain meds because sure as anything, neither would think to do either on his own.

They finally made it to the truck and Bobby must really not have been feeling well because he didn't argue any further about Dean driving them back. Sam clambered into the cab with him, letting Dean swing the door shut behind him. He waited until it was closed, then leaned in to hug Bobby tightly.

"I'm really sorry you got hurt because of me." He whispered. Bobby gathered him up in a half hug, squeezing him close. He smelled of fire and gunpower and blood and iron and under all that, a bit like dog. It was a good smell. Not as familiar as Dad, who was leather and whiskey, or Dean who was salt and oil and usually sweat, but it was close. And comforting.

"Not your fault, Sam." Bobby murmured, but then Dean was opening the driver's side door and Sam pulled away, wiping at his eyes. Not that he was crying or anything. Because he wasn't. At all.

Dean adjusted the mirrors and the seat, glancing back at them over one shoulder afterward. He didn't say anything, but Sam pushed Bobby on his side and forward, so he could better put pressure on his back wound. Bobby allowed this, snorting softly, but it was without any anger this time.

"Go on, Dean." He said instead, letting one arm curl back around Sam's shoulders. "Drive us home."

Epic. Amounts. Of WIN.

I love you for freakin' ever. *offers up a plate of cookies*

~Nebula

Thank you so much! I had a lot of fun writing it so I'm glad to hear you enjoyed reading it. :)

This is perfect!!! I don't even know where to start! I have SO MUCH SQUEE for preseries, and YAY UNCLE BOBBY.

And! Bobby is such a badass, and Dean is so firm and Sam is so insistant and this just made my whole week and it's still Monday!!!

*TACKLEGLOMPS*

"Dean?" Sam couldn't quite keep the tremor out of his voice and the slight irritation he felt towards himself at that flared into outright guilt when Dean's face immediately smoothed out, pain wiped away in a manner that was no where near as effective as Dean likely hoped.

Bonus points for Dean's manpain!mask (TM)

"The hell are you doing here, Sam? You were supposed to wait in the car!"

Bonus points for the Winchester Brotherly Double Standard! (TM)

It's just that he had never seen one before this night.

Bonus for Sammy's first ghost! \o/

"-the hell your daddy was thinking, neither one of you has a lick of sense, charging into a hunt without /any/ back up, going to get your damn selves /killed/, both of you just /idiots/-"

Bonus points for Gruff!Bobby!

Sam didn't have time to look, but Bobby spun them both around, catching Sam up and throwing his own body on top of him right before one of those scythes flew off the wall and over both their heads.

EEEEEEEEEEEE, TRIPLE BONUS FOR PROTECTIVE!BOBBY. AND ALSO FOR USING THE WORD SCYTHE! *throws confetti*

There was just as much protective anger there as what Sam had seen in Bobby and Sam knew right then that cayanne pepper and super glue was going to be the /least/ of his worries in the near future.

Bonus points for impending shenanigans!!!!

♥

*throws bonus points all around*

I think I'm going to have to print your comment out and save it to reread any day where I'm the least bit depressed. Thank you so much for letting me know what you thought! Pre-series and S1 are my favorite time periods to read fic for and they're unsurprisingly the ones I get the most plot ideas for. Thank you for the prompt; I've never written anything with Bobby in it before, even though I love him, so this was a lot of fun. :)

(Also, I think I'm a bit in love with the phrase "Winchester Brotherly Double Standard! (TM)" because that's just awesome!)

You are welcome! Thank YOU for writing it! XD

Oh, fantastic. :D Love Uncle Bobby, angry because he just doesn't quite get how the Winchesters work, how they CAN'T stay quiet and safe when someone they love might be in danger. ♥ Protective!boys are made of win.