AN: thanks for all the positive reviews you've been leaving! Glad to see you're interested. Here's another chapter for you. Let me know what you think, or any theories about what you think's happened. A little more has been written, also, so an update will be posted in the near future.

The journey takes forty-five minutes. It's half an hour until he sees the city on the horizon, and he wants to stick his head out of the window and feel the fresh air on his face. Though the AC in the car is heavenly, he longs to feel the wind in his hair. It reminds him of Dean; how they used to roll down the windows in the Impala, and drive like crazy people on deserted highways. He wanted to feel that one last time.

He didn't doubt Dean would find him soon, and kill him. He wanted to deny it, but he felt it was inevitable. At least it would be Dean, and not someone like that creep Gordon. At least he could go quietly, and on his own terms, if Dean let him.

Half-way through the story of how Alex and Laurie – who turned out to be newlyweds from Illinois – were on their holiday in Vegas because they wanted exciting memories, and because they wouldn't be able to go if they had a baby within the year like they wanted to, Sam's vision went completely blank.

Then, he was assaulted with images, tinted with yellow. They were violent and relentless in their intensity, but strangely, they didn't hurt. They felt . . . Right.

He saw himself, entering a hotel room – room 1222. The room was lavishly decorated, though a little on the tacky side, what with all the gold trimmings. Aside from the decorations, it was pretty standard – tea and coffee making stuff, stationary, and an en suite bathroom which looked to be equally extravagant in furnishings. In the room stood a man, facing the window: they were high up; there was a fountain down below, in addition to pillars, and the ever-present lights of the city.
"Excuse me?" Sam asked him in the vision.
The man turned around. His eyes were yellow, and he was smirking. He held his arms open, and said,
"My boy! I'm glad you found the place alright,"
From what he said, it sounded as if he'd lost Sam, was welcoming him home.
"You were always my favourite, Sammy. I'm so glad you were able to kill that sap Jake – very cold-hearted! Knew you had it in you, kid,"

Sam snapped back to the present, suddenly seeing the face of Laurie looking at him with concern. She was still twisted in her seat, facing him, but her excitement had been replaced with a look of worry. She was snapping her fingers in front of his face; he flinched, turning away.
"Sam? Can you hear me?" She asked. Sam surmised that she would be a good mother; she had the mother-hen act down.
"Uh – sorry, zoned out – just tired," And hungry. And confused. And thirsty, again.
She just smiled and nodded. He was so glad they hadn't asked too many questions: that would have been too much for him to handle right now.
"I coulda sworn . . . Your eyes, they sort of-"
"What?" He asked, mentally taking back the thankfulness about the lack of questions.
"They went – yellow?"

He turned towards the window. The sun was setting now – it was already the late afternoon when he'd woken up, and now the bright lights of the city were coming to life one by one. He considered his answer carefully. He was about to shrug and make up some bullshit excuse, when she laughed and comically smacked her hand to her face.
"The sunset! God, I'm so stupid. The sun's doing all kinds of crazy things to your face . . . Isn't it pretty?" She said, looking out of the window with a dreamy expression.
"Sure is," Remarked Alex, smiling at her. They shared a romantic moment. Sam felt awkward.

But he didn't care about the awkwardness; he relaxed immediately. She'd provided him with a get-out clause, all of her own accord.
But why the Hell had his eyes gone yellow?

Once they were in the city, they stopped talking about their lives and started pointing out the landmarks. Sam nodded along with them, and smiled wanly. He was thinking about Vegas week: the week he and Dean would traditionally take off to go drinking and gambling with each other, rather than hunt.

He missed his brother a lot.

"So, um – do you want us to drop you off at a hotel, or something?" Laurie inquires.
"Yeah . . ." Sam says with a frown, looking out at the streets.

Sam tried to remember what he'd seen out of the window of the room in his vision; anything that might identify it. There were pillars, and a fountain, and it was high up, and the stationary said –
The stationary. Caesar's Palace . . . Classy.

"Caesar's Palace – if that's okay," He added hopefully.
"Sure! That's where we were going, anyway!" Alex replies cheerfully. "You have a room there?"
"I'm meeting someone, I think," Sam explains. The room number was something like 1222; there was a tiny sprinkling of yellow sulphur around the threshold, which should point him in the right direction.

When they arrived, Sam helps them with their suitcases, and the valet took their car. They moved to check in, but Sam stopped them first.
"Hey, thanks so much for your help – I don't know what I would've . . ." He trailed off, their expectant faces making him wonder how he could say what he needed to next without sounding like a creep and/or serial killer. "Listen – keep safe, please. There's a lot of bad people here. Look out, okay?"
"Sure thing. We won't get fooled by the scammers," Alex replies with a knowing smile.
"Yeah, uh, sure – the scammers. And stuff," Sam says vaguely, biting his lip. After a few seconds, he waves them off to go and check in, and cast his gaze about for the elevators. He spots them – of course they're gold – and rushes over, immediately self-conscious about how under-dressed he is for this hotel. His jeans are covered in desert dust, as is his scruffy red undershirt, and his hair is probably a mess, too.

He gets in the first one that arrives: there is one lone occupant, with blonde hair. She smiles at him calculatingly, which is a little creepy. She looks predatory, and he really isn't in the mood to be flirting. Stepping in, he wonders suddenly which floor to choose . . . He'll have to ask her, embarrassingly. The doors close.

He takes a breath to ask her which floor, but she speaks before him.
"What's the room number?"
"1222 – that's what they said at the check in desk, but I forgot the directions," He lied, a rogue hand brushing the back of his neck. It's an obvious tell, but he's sure she doesn't really care about his back-story anyway.
"Sure," She presses the button for him, and the lift starts its achingly slow progress upwards.

He slips his hands down into his pockets awkwardly. The atmosphere, as he sees it, is uncomfortable, because she's staring. She seems to find nothing wrong. He decides to ask a question to ease the tension.
"Do you have the date?" He asks. She smirks.
"August 1st,"
"What?!"

Three months. It's been three months.

Then, an equally emotionally startling realisation hits him: not only is he in Vegas, but it's Vegas week. The first week of August is always Vegas week. Here he is, without Dean. He runs his hands through his hair to calm himself, but the sensation of three months of growth only makes him want to panic more.

His hands scrub down his face, and feel the stubble. It's not three months of growth, strangely, but it's definitely more than if a day has passed, like he thought. He grips the handrail so tight his knuckles go white.

"You okay there?" The girl asks, though there's a slight patronising edge to her voice. "You seem a little sick, buddy,"
"No, no – I'm fine. Thanks," He replies shortly, though he wants to get out as fast as he can. He imagines Dean, on Vegas week, planning on how to hunt him down and kill him, hate in his eyes and exorcisms in his journal. The thought makes him sicker than the swaying of the elevator does.
"I'm Ruby, by the way," She adds, smirking again. What's with this girl? He gives her a tight, quick smile.
"Sam," He replies. The elevator at that point thankfully pings, and he is allowed to leave. Her gaze follows him out, and she doesn't even blink. It's creepy.

He follows the corridor along – even numbers are on the right – past 1022, 1204, 1206 . . . The corridor is giving him tunnel vision, stretching on and on in a curve. The motion of moving slowly and surely grounds him, but he still feels a coil of nausea at the revelations jus thrust upon him.

Even if Dean didn't want to kill him – which he did, so why was Sam even considering this hypothetical situation? – he'd have trouble explaining the missing three months to him. He didn't even know himself what happened.

1208, 1210, 1212 . . . Perhaps the reason he could remember is because he didn't want to. Perhaps he'd done something awful – what if he was repressing the memory?

1214, 1216, 1218 – what if killing Jake was like opening the floodgates to the darkness inside of him? What if it was the catalyst to him going dark-side?

1220 – 1222. He stopped, leaning on the wall outside the room with his right hand, steadying himself. He shut his eyes, and rested his temple against the cool wallpaper.

You cannot afford to freak out now. The yellow-eyed demon is in there, and he will rip you to shreds if you can't keep it together. Your only chance of finding out what happened to you, why you're here, is talking to him.

He caused this.

He did this to you.

This isn't your fault.

The reassuring voice in his head sounds an awful lot like Dean. It just serves to make him more sad, knowing that Dean won't ever give him a pep talk other than 'you should have convinced me to kill you like Dad wanted so we could prevent this mess', ever again. He stared down at the sulphur trace on the floor, slightly yellowing the tips of his boots.

He takes a deep breath, pulls himself together, and pats himself down . . . Of course he doesn't have any weapons. Perfect.

The door is open when he tries the handle. He takes a breath, and steps in.