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The floor in Gabriel’s room was cold and hard. Most of the floors in the bunker were cold. All the more reason to get into bed quickly. Sam leaned his back against the side of the bed and stared at the walls. The Enochian markings glared back at him even in the darkness. He felt the form beside him shift and Sam bit back the urge to ask Gabriel again if he wanted to try getting into bed. A pang in Sam’s heart reminded him that it had probably been a while since Gabriel had slept in a warm bed. That he was probably more used to cold floors and the smell of blood.
It was the first silent night in the bunker since Gabriel arrived. The previous nights had been interrupted by the screams and wails of someone unable to break free of a nightmare. Sam, Dean, and Cas had found him in a tangled mess of bed sheets, roaring in pain as images of his torture flashed through his mind. Cas had finally been able to wake him, but Sam had seen the terror in Gabriel’s eyes and he knew. Nightmares were commonplace in the Winchester family. Some you could just walk away from. Others… Sam would sometimes dream of his time in the cage. What Lucifer did to him. Dean or Cas would find him in the same state Gabriel was in now. It happened less frequently now, but every now and then, he’d wake to see his brother or the angel gripping his shoulders, the fear in their faces. Sam would feel the tension in his mussels and the tears sliding down his cheeks.
He sat beside Gabriel and tried not to imagine what the angel had gone through. Gabriel shifted.
“It wasn’t fun.” The voice was course, unused, attempting to use the tongue for something other than screaming.
Sam looked down, seeing a pair of amber eyes met his.
“I can read your mind.” Despite his best efforts, the bluntness in Gabriel’s tone drew a smile from the hunter. This wasn’t funny. But the fact that Gabriel was attempting to recover gave him hope. Sam nodded.
“Do you want to-“
“Talk about it? No.” Gabriel finished. “You know what happened, Sasquatch, there’s no point.”
“No, I-“
“You do,” Gabriel said, his eyes boring into Sam’s. “Believe me, you do.”
Sam stiffened. For a moment, he could see Lucifer smiling wickedly down at him.
“Yeah,” Gabriel said, wrapping his arms around his legs. “Pretty much the same thing, except with grace extraction.”
Instinctively, Sam felt his hand move towards Gabriel’s shoulder, an unprecedented urge to provide some comfort, but he stopped. He had no idea how Gabriel would respond to the contact and the last thing he wanted to do was push the archangel further away.
The figure beside him moved closer, their arms pressing against each other.
“It’s fine,” Gabriel mumbled, “I’m okay with this.”
Sam huffed a little. “Okay, when you’re feeling better, you gotta stop reading my mind.”
A smile tugged at the edge of Gabriel’s lips. “Afraid I’ll see something emotionally scaring?”
Chuckling a little, Sam looked down at the angel. “There’s a good possibility of that.”
“Fine,” The angel responded. “You stop worrying about me, I stop looking in your noggin. The mothering is more than enough anyway.”
“I’m not mothering you,” Sam said.
Gabriel gave him a pointed look. “You’re sitting on this cold-ass floor next to me at two in the morning after I had a nightmare.”
“Do you want me to go?” Asked Sam, who clearly had no intention of moving.
“God, no,” Gabriel responded. “I’m just pointing it out.” He moved closer, his head extremely close to Sam’s shoulder. “Better you than Dean or Cas. At least you want to be up and are willing to talk.”
“I thought you said-“
“Not about what I went through, just about stuff in general,” Gabriel said. “And no, I didn’t read your mind. I assumed.”
Sam huffed. “Alright… what do you wanna talk about?”
Gabriel leaned his head on Sam’s shoulder and to his own surprise, Sam moved closer.
“Cassie has a son?” Gabriel offered. Sam nodded.
“Jack,” Sam said. “Technically he’s Lucifer’s son, but he chose Cas as his father.”
Gabriel chuckled. “Smart kid. Don’t you wish we all could do that?”
Sam closed his eyes, nodding slightly. “Yeah, sometimes.”
Gabriel was silent for a moment. “You guys just can’t catch a break, can you?” His tone was thoughtful, somber. “Even after all this time, you’re still picking up dad’s mess.”
“It’s not all his fault,” Sam said. “We’ve all screwed up here, more times than we can count.”
“You made terrible choices, you didn’t create the universe,” Gabriel pointed out. “And you sure as shit didn’t abandon it. You’ve done more for this hunk of rock in your lifetimes than dad did in a thousand.” The angel huffed angrily. “More than I did, to be honest.” He leaned further into Sam and the hunter could feel the anger and exhaustion pouring off him in waves. “All of us…. Cassie was right. We were supposed to be your shepherds… and look what we’ve become.”
Sam wanted to say something to counter Gabriel’s words, but there was nothing. Gabriel was right. The only angel –aside from Gabriel himself- they could trust was Cas and their world was a mess. Instead, he sighed.
“Do you think it would have been any better if he’d stayed?”
Gabriel thought about it and shrugged. “Probably not. Hell, might have been worse. Who knows?”
Sam nodded. He felt a question forming on his lips, one he wasn’t sure he wanted the answer to.
“Are you going to leave?”
The silence was longer now. Gabriel didn’t look up at the hunter as he spoke.
“Eventually, yeah.” He laughed. “Guess it runs in the family.”
Sam stared at the wall, willing his voice to stay steady. “Will you come back?”
The pressure on Sam’s shoulder shifted. He watched Gabriel get to his knees, his gaze locked with Sam’s.
“Of course.”
Despite his best efforts to hold them back, Sam could feel the tears starting to well up. “Why can’t you stay?”
Gabriel’s hand was soft and Sam felt himself lean in as Gabriel brushed the tears away with his thumb.
“I wish I had a good answer,” he said. “I wish I had an answer period.”
Sam held the angel’s gaze, choking back the sob welling up inside him. He knew there was nothing he could say that would convince the angel to stay. Gabriel was like Dean in too many ways. For all the strength and trickery, he could be just as stubborn and foolish.
The thumb on his cheek drew away, replacing it with the feeling of two hands cupping his face. Gabriel said nothing as he leaned forward and pressed his forehead to Sam’s. The hunter leaned in, letting himself be lost in this moment. When he felt Gabriel’s lips close to his, he didn’t hesitate.
It was soft and delicate. Something the hunter would never have expected from an angel known for his sexual appetites.
“I don’t want to leave you,” Gabriel breathed into his mouth.
“You can choose to stay,” Sam let his hands thread through Gabriel’s hair.
Gabriel kissed him again but said nothing. Instead, he stood up, taking Sam’s hand and pulling him to his feet as he lead him to the bed. He let Sam get in first before snuggling up beside him, letting his head rest on top of the hunter’s heart.
“You gonna sleep?” Sam asked. Gabriel shook his head.
“You?”
Sam kissed the top of Gabriel’s head. “No.” He wrapped his arms around Gabriel, feeling the angel press against him.
“What if Dean finds us like this?” The smile was back in Gabriel’s voice and Sam chuckled.
“He’ll keep his mouth shut.”
“…. You walked in on him and Cass, didn’t you?”
“Twice,” Sam said. “Dean forgets how a lock works when he’s in the mood sometimes.”
“That won’t be an issue here,” Gabriel said. “I mean, not tonight, but-“
Sam rested his chin on Gabriel’s head. “If you have to leave,” he said softly. “Can we just enjoy this? Right now?”
Gabriel moved so close to Sam, he was almost in the hunter’s lap. “Whatever you want, Sasquatch.”
While they keep their gaze on the darkness the rest of the night, they both knew they were only aware of each other. This moment in time. Sam knew Gabriel would leave, no matter how much he might plead with him not to. Gabriel knew he never wanted to leave Sam’s side again, but he would have to. And they both knew as much as they would both fight for it, there was no certainty that Gabriel would come back… at least, there was no certainty he'd even be alive to come back.
Still, sitting there, curled up together in the dark, both knew they wouldn’t let go until they absolutely had to.
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End