Chapter Text
“The Storgephagos only lets go of its victim once it has eaten all the memories of the family member, right?” Sam said as if that was already the answer to all their problems.
“Yeah. I’d rather he didn’t forget me if you don’t mind,” Dean grumbled.
“So, all we have to do is make the monster think that the memories are already gone,” Sam continued, still very excited about his idea, as if Dean hadn’t interrupted. “We use that spell Rowena has told me about. You know, the one that can take specific memories away.”
“That is a horrible idea,” Cas butted in, which made Sam look at him. Apparently, he hadn’t expected to have to talk Cas into it, too.
“No, see, you’ll be free of the Storgephagos,” Sam explained.
“Because I will have forgotten you.”
“Well, me,” Dean corrected him. When Cas quickly averted his eyes, Dean added, “Right?”
“I believe memories of Sam might be getting a bit fuzzy, too,” Cas admitted. “I remember us talking about some game night? But I have no recollection of it.”
“Oh, great. That’s just perfect!” Dean rubbed a hand across his face.
“It doesn’t matter, my plan still works,” Sam insisted.
“And what plan is that?” Dean asked, letting sarcasm bleed into his voice. “The one where we take away Cas’ memories ourselves instead of waiting for the coffin monster to take them?”
“And give them back once the monster doesn’t have a hold on Cas anymore,” Sam explained.
Dean exchanged a look with Cas, then turned back to Sam. “That actually sounds like it could work.”
***
“You still remember me, darling, right?” Rowena asked Cas as soon as she entered the War Room.
Cas looked at her through narrowed eyes. “Of course.”
Rowena smiled brightly. “Of course, indeed. How could you forget me?”
Dean rolled his eyes at her blatant attempt at flirting with Cas, which, as always, went right over Cas’ head. “That doesn’t mean he likes you better. It actually means the opposite in this case.”
“Oh, Dean, don’t be jealous. Just because you’re more forgettable than me doesn’t mean the angel doesn’t like you, too.”
Dean turned around to Sam, incredulous. “You did tell her about what was going on here, right?”
Rowena didn’t pay him any mind. Instead, she asked Sam, “Do you have the empty bottle to store the memories in?”
“Right here.” Dean, who had been tasked with finding one, held out an empty beer bottle.
“Really?” Sam asked.
“What? I cleaned it out.”
“This will do nicely, thank you.” Rowena snatched the beer bottle out of his hands and put it on the map table. “Now, as for my fee…” She raised her eyebrows at Dean and Sam, and held out her hand.
Dean sighed, but took out the vial of their blood. He had no idea what she wanted with that, but Cas had bled for them before, they could give their blood for him in return—even if it was to a sort of enemy, sort of ally, without any idea where her loyalties lay at any given moment.
“Thank you, dear,” Rowena said, put the vial away and took out some ingredients of her own, before she went about setting things up.
The spell itself only took a few seconds and Dean watched, fascinated, as a bright beam of light travelled from Cas’ head into the bottle until they had a glowing beer bottle full of bright light.
The second the spell was complete, Dean knew that it had worked when Cas looked at them warily.
“Okay, can we give them back or does it still have a hold on him?” Dean asked. He didn’t want to wait around for Cas to get his bearings and start questioning—or worse, attacking them.
“Should be safe,” Sam said and looked at Rowena, giving her the sign to reverse the spell.
Rowena only said a few words while opening the bottle, and there the light went, travelling back to Cas’ head.
Once the light was gone, they all stood there, watching Cas expectantly, who still looked stunned.
“Can you still feel the connection?” Sam finally asked.
Cas’ eyes zeroed in on Sam, and he tilted his head at him, inspecting him. “Where am I?”
Not what Dean had wanted to hear.
“The bunker,” he said, a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. “Did it work?”
At that, Cas’ gaze fixed on him. “Who are you?”
“I’ll take that as a ‘no,’” Dean mumbled, and turned around to Rowena. “What the hell? What’d you do?”
Before Rowena could answer, Sam asked carefully, “You remember her, right?”
Right. Good idea. Cas might not remember him and Sam if the reversal of the spell hadn’t quite worked the way it was supposed to. But hopefully, he still remembered Rowena. She could explain and make him trust them.
“Yes,” Cas replied, his voice even lower than usual. “She is a conniving witch.”
“Yeah, she’s not with us,” Dean quickly said.
“Did you try to put a spell on me?” Cas asked Rowena, taking a few menacing steps towards her.
“They made me do it!” Rowena sold them out without blinking an eye, pointing at them.
The minute Cas looked back at Dean and Sam, Rowena turned tail and fled. Figured.
“I want my blood back!” Dean yelled after her, but he didn’t feel like chasing her—not when they had a skittish angel to convince that they were actually friends.
“So…” He turned back to Cas, who wasn’t taking his eyes off of them, still eying them with an expression devoid of emotion. “Cas—tiel,” Dean quickly added when Cas was narrowing his eyes even further. “That witch, huh? Just goes around stealing memories and then blames us innocent humans.”
“You don’t remember right now, but we’re actually really close,” Sam jumped in. “See, a Storgephagos got to you…”
“Angels aren’t ‘close’ with humans,” Cas countered.
“Yeah, well, you are with these humans.” Dean used his thumbs to point to Sam and himself, cracking a smile, which was not appreciated by the angel.
Cas didn’t seem convinced, and Dean was almost certain he was about to walk out on them—if he didn’t try to smite them first. So, he quickly tried to get him to understand, “C’mon, man. You have to know that there are huge lapses in your memory going back the last few years. I mean, why are you even hanging around on Earth, huh?”
At last, something that seemed to give Cas pause.
“You even have a room here,” Sam came to his help. “We can show you.”
He lead the way and Cas hesitantly followed, even though Dean knew that, stubborn angel that he was, Cas was about to say something like ‘Angels don’t have rooms.’
“Well, you do,” he said, clapping Cas on the back before the angel slowly turned his head to look at him and Dean thought it wiser to take his hand off the angel.
“Humans do not have the ability to read thoughts,” Cas stated slowly, and Dean realized that he should not have spoken up before Cas got around to saying his piece.
“Not reading thoughts here,” Dean clarified. “That’s just how well I know you.”
They arrived at Cas’ room and Dean wished that Cas had personalized his room more. It was really just an empty room with some furniture—they could show Cas any room in the bunker and claim it was his. How was the angel to know that it actually was his room?
But it turned out he was worrying over nothing because as soon as Cas saw the room, he took a few steps inside and said, “I remember sitting here.”
“See? Told ya. It’s your room.” Dean tried another smile, but it fell flat again.
“Why don’t you relax a bit in here, maybe some memories will come to you,” Sam suggested. “Dean and I will try to get this sorted out. Get you your missing memories back.”
“Dean?” Cas repeated.
“Yeah. Ring any bells?” Dean asked, hopefully.
Cas didn’t answer, just turned back around to inspect the room some more—as if there was much to look at. He was apparently even less chatty than usual.
“I’m Sam, by the way,” Sam introduced himself. “But hopefully, you’ll remember soon enough anyway.”
Dean didn’t feel like it was a great idea to leave Cas alone. He was kind of worried that the angel would do a runner, which was what he was good at even with all his memories. But they needed to get a hold of Rowena, who apparently wasn’t Cas’ favorite person, and make a plan that involved talking about Cas, which was better done without the angel overhearing.
So, he winked at Cas to show him that they were great pals and that he was safe here, and left with Sam for the War Room to figure out what the hell had gone wrong here.