Chapter Text
Chapter One
“What am I doing?” Sam thought to himself. “It’s 4 o’clock in the morning, and here I am, waiting up on an angel that might not come home at all. He’s so unpredictable. This hunt is just a lot of stress in general. Dean and Cas are a lot to deal with under normal circumstances, but now Chuck wants to come along for the ride? At least I have Gabe. He keeps me sane, in a strange way, even if I do feel like the mother to the world’s most dysfunctional family. I make sure everyone gets enough sleep, I make everyone’s lunches, I break up any arguments. This is crazy. And Gabriel... he left at like 7, and he still isn’t back...what if something happened? An ice storm? A gang war? The bird flu? Trains colliding? I’ve lost him before, and now I have him back. I’m not doing that again. I can’t.” Just then, he heard the faint sound of the motel room being unlocked, and Gabriel slid in the door.
“Sammy, are you waiting up for me?” Gabe smirked, feeling a little too important.
“I worry about you, Gabe. It’s the seventh night this week I’ve sat till morning. I was afraid you might have died...again. Some freak accident or something...”
“What did we say about watching the news? I’m back, ok? For good. There is nothing for you to worry about!”
“Stop it. You swore you’d come home early tonight. You lied.”
“You gotta let go, Sammy.”
Then they heard someone in the other room getting out of bed. It could only be Chuck, since Dean and Cas had started getting a separate room from the group. Gabe let out an audible sigh.
“Gabe, go. Out the back way.” Chuck had taken to playing the father figure, and his nitpicking was about to drive Sam up the wall. He had no right to be as rude to Gabriel as he had been since the archangel’s return.
“Why does he hate me?” Gabe begged.
“Because you’re a little twat. Now go!”
“You can’t call me a twat!” laughed Gabe as he rushed out the motel room’s outside door, barely missing Chuck, who was luckily still groggy.
“Oh, good morning.” muttered Sam, his tone a little icy.
“Morning. Everything ok? I heard voices.”
“Oh, just me talking to myself. Go back to bed, everything’s fine.”
Chuck shook his head and walked back to bed. If Sam didn’t want to talk about whatever was bothering him, it was his deal. Sam stayed sitting at the table, wondering how he got to where he was. It seemed like since Gabe miraculously returned from the dead, everyone else simply ignored his existence. He could tell that it hurt Gabe, especially when Chuck ignored him. Gabe was mostly used to it from Dean, and where Cas is concerned, well, no one knew better than Sam that brothers could be weird. So he made sure to treat Gabe no differently than before. He loved him and was glad to have him back. That’s all that matters, right? Sam’s thoughts were quickly interrupted by Cas barging in with a large stack of books and a red bull in his hand.
“Cas, it’s four in the morning, is everything okay?”
“Everything’s great. Why wouldn’t it be great? It’s great. I’ve just got three more pagan gods to research, a hand full of Crowley’s demons, and Dean won’t let me work for two seconds! Everything is just so under control, it’s just like...calm.” Cas finished, a little out of breath. The angel looked very tired and very stressed out. Sam patted the chair next to him.
“Sit. Let me help. What are we looking at?” So Cas opened up one of the books and the research began.
The next thing they knew, it was 7:00 and Chuck stumbled out of bed, wanting coffee. Sam, on cue, stood up to start making sandwiches for the day. He made the necessary 5, but once those were done, he didn’t stop. Chuck finally looked over to see Sam sitting on the floor with about 20 sandwiches around him. Just then, Gabe walked in. He stood next to Cas, both of them watching Sam nervously. Chuck walked over to the hunter and helped him up.
“Sorry, I...I wanted to get ahead on lunches. Everything’s fine.” Sam said uncomfortably. He looked at the three men standing before him and knew this didn’t look good. “I’m fine. Go get Dean and get started. Seriously.” Cas got up and practically ran out the door. Gabe paused a bit, wanting to stay, but Sam simply mouthed “go”, and Gabe knew now wasn’t the time. Chuck sat Sam down where Cas had been just moments before.
“Hey, Sammy. Do you think we should, maybe, get you some help? Find a doctor who you can talk to? I’m worried about you...we all are. I think it would help.”
“We can try it. Why the hell not?” Sam replied, not daring to hope.