Sam stretched his arms over his head and yawned as he climbed out of the Impala, skilfully closing the door with his foot as he went. He'd only woken from his angel induced nap a few moments before Dean had pulled up outside Bobby's, giving him just enough time to shoot dark looks at the both of them before they came to a stop. While he was unconscious Dean must have called ahead seeing as Bobby was already outside, parked beside the doorway, casting a scrutinising gaze over Sam as he approached; a look that Sam returned with a tired smile.

"You don't look half bad for a guy who's just been gutted," he commented as Sam towered over him.

Sam shrugged, "Yeah well, I've seen worse," he gave a little smile and clapped a hand on Bobby's shoulder as he brushed past and into the house itself.

It was in the same dishevelled state it was normally in. It was comforting. Bobby's run down, untidy, almost falling apart house was always the same; a constant pillar in the Winchesters' otherwise tempestuous life that Sam needed now more than he had realised. Though, with his fractured memory it didn't seem like long ago that he was here. Taking a deep breath of the stale, smoky air, he relaxed slightly then moved from the study into the kitchen, eyes fixed on the fridge. An alcoholic drink was desperately needed.

"Hey, sorry for the lack of beverages," Bobby's voice floated from the hall; he, Dean and Cas were apparently still in the doorway, "I haven't exactly been the most mobile little housekeeper recently."

Sam paused in the process of reaching into the open fridge to pluck one of the brown bottles from the anything but empty shelf to frown. After a second he shrugged it off and grabbed one, "What are you talking about? There's plenty," he called back, turning away from the fridge and shutting it behind him as he wandered across the room to the desk, opening his beer as he went. He could hear the other three talking in the corridor, their voices were too muffled and hushed for him to understand the topic but he could make a pretty good guess.

"How's your tea party going?" he enquired loudly, absently leafing through one of the books laid out on Bobby's desk. It was one he'd already read. He sighed and closed the book, lifting his head to see Dean enter, Cas and Bobby close behind.

"I was just giving Bobby a catch up," Dean explained apologetically, heading straight through to the fridge, "You said there was beer right?"

Sam nodded, taking a swig of his own, "Yeah, loads."

Bobby frowned and grumbled to himself about how unfair it was that beer magically appeared for the Winchesters but not for him as he wheeled himself across the room and behind his desk.

Sam smirked and eased himself down into a nearby chair, "Hey, seeing as Bobby got the whole story, mind telling me?"

Dean hesitated, then pulled the fridge door open, not answering Sam's question. There was a quiet chink of bottles as the older brother took two beers from it. He didn't still reply as he returned, placing one beer on the desk for Bobby before dropping onto the sofa, knowing full well Cas would have declined one even if he was offered. Sam raised his eyebrows expectantly, making Dean stop mid-swig and sigh as though disappointed that his brother hadn't forgotten that he'd asked the question in the first place.

"Well there isn't much to tell," Dean replied with a shrug, "Except that you got your ass royally handed to you by some bitch with a bad case of PMS."

Sam rolled his eyes at his brother's poor attempt at an insult. Any other time, he would have risen to it and shot something back but right now he was tired and too confused to bother. It was disconcerting having a completely blank memory. The only thing he wanted to do was fill it and he knew that fighting with Dean right now wasn't going to help that, "Yeah, I got that much thanks. But who was it? I mean, it looks like you two got off unscathed."

"You were the specific target," Cas answered, before answer Dean's scolding look with a confused frown.

Sam glanced between them, waiting for a further explanation. When it didn't come he filled the silence himself, "What? Why?"

"We don't know," Dean answered quickly, probably to make sure that Cas didn't get a chance, "We didn't exactly get time to stop for a chat over coffee and cake."

Sam's frown persisted, "So you saw them? You know who it is?"

"No, we don't," Dean repeated, more forcefully this time.

Sam's expression became wounded at the tone of Dean's words. It was clear he was hiding something. He continued to look desperately at his brother, hands out in front of him, "Come on Dean, throw me a bone, you gotta know something..."

The elder brother exhaled forcefully and ran a hand through his hair, the only flicker of conflict in his otherwise steadfast posture, "Well we don't," he said finally slumping back in the chair and fixing Sam with a steadfast look. His tone rebuked any argument before Sam could even think of one, "So just drop it, alright?"

With that he looked away, avoiding Sam's hurt, disbelieving gaze. After a long moment of getting nothing from his brother, Sam looked to Cas for something, anything that might help him find his way through the hazy mess that was his mind. But the angel had taken his cue from Dean and was looking to the floor. The silence was final. Sam swallowed and nodded to himself, "Right. Thanks for the help," he muttered, standing violently and storming from the room, heading for the front door. Just as he pulled it open he caught sound of Bobby's gruff voice.

"Why don't you just tell him?"

There was a short pause before Dean answered, "He's better off not knowing."

Sam didn't stick around to hear any more. The door slammed on his way out.

It was pleasant outside, the sun was out but a gentle breeze alleviated most of the heat leaving only comforting warmth. Sam stopped a moment on the porch to take a calming breath then descended the stairs into the car graveyard that Bobby kept. He just needed some air. It wasn't often that he woke up in a hospital bed, with no memory of why or how he got there. It was disconcerting to say the least. What didn't help was Dean's sudden frostiness and apparent refusal to help him sort his head out. Sam snorted and went to swig once again from his bottle but just as it brushed his lips, he found a better use for it, as a vent for his annoyance. The glass shattering over the wall was satisfying.

"Aren't you going to go after him?" Bobby asked, looking pointedly between Dean and the door.

Dean sighed and swallowed another mouthful of drink before he answered, "Like I was saying before Sam interrupted us, it's not that easy."

"Oh, then what is it?"

"It was Gabriel."

Bobby blinked, "Gabriel? You mean Sam's Archangel, bunk buddy, Gabriel?"

Dean wrinkled his nose at Bobby's description then nodded, "Yeah. That'd be him. "

Bobby's eyebrows knitted together, "What the hell does he have to do with this?"

"This is his doing," Dean answered with another frustrated tug at his hair, "Cas and I, we couldn't get anywhere near Sam when he was... Anyway, Gabriel went in there and drove the bitch off while we got him to a hospital. The things she had done..." Dean took a moment to gaze at the floor, "I honestly don't know how he was still alive...Our Archangel buddy found us at the hospital while Sam was in the OR, told us what he was planning to do; to erase all memory of the Archangel Gabriel from Sam's mind."

"Why didn't you stop him?" Bobby asked, almost accusingly.

Dean raised his eyebrows, "Sorry, my archangel stopping powers were a little run down after the whole fiasco."

Bobby leant forward, elbows on the desk, rubbing his face with his hands, "And now you don't wanna push it in case the whole thing comes flooding back."

"Yeah, leaving us with not only a messed up Sam, but a pissed Archangel on my back as well," Dean agreed, staring intently at the bottle he was rolling in his hands.

That night was clear. The stars were out and the moon glowed bright enough for Sam to see without having to use a torch. Not that he was moving around that much. He lay quietly in the same place he had been for the last few hours, laid out on the bonnet of one of the old gutted cars in Bobby's lot. His back was against the windshield and arms up behind his head, staring up at the stars. It had taken a while for him to calm down after Dean's refusal to help him and now that he was more relaxed he actually began to probe his memory to try to just pinpoint what was there and what wasn't.

Everything from the past week was missing. There was just nothing; a blank. For all he knew, the previous seven days never happened. But he knew that already. What was really strange was the fact that as Sam began to look further back; seemingly random fragments of memory were missing. A day here, a couple more there. A few were just missing segments of conversation that had been glazed over. The conversation was there, some of the phrases just slipped through his grasp like smoke but there was nothing connecting them. Sometimes the gaps came during times he and Dean were on hunts. Other times he was alone in motel rooms, researching things on his laptop. The lack of pattern was what was frustrating Sam above the fact they were missing in the first place. If there was no pattern then there was no way of working out what the memories could have been. It wasn't helped by his brother's apparent refusal to tell him anything about his lost memories. He may defend his innocence until he was blue in the face but he couldn't hide anything from Sam.

"Hey Sam!"

Speak of the devil...Sam turned his head to watch Dean approach without responding to his call. He wasn't going to afford him that courtesy.

"Sam, what you doing out here? It's been hours," Dean tried again when he reached the car that Sam had claimed as his seat.

The younger brother regarded Dean for a moment, "What do you want Dean?" he asked flatly, "You got anything you want to explain yet?"

Dean sighed and looked to the floor, "We don't know anything." Sam scoffed. "But Cas and I, we're gonna head back and see if we can find anything out."

Sam frowned and he sat forward causing the rust bucket he was sat on to creak, "You and Cas? What about me? Maybe if I go, it'll kick start my memory and - "

"No," Dean interrupted, "Maybe it's better if you stay here."

Sam just stared at his brother, eyes narrowed slightly as a look of reluctant revelation washed over his features, "You don't want me to get my memory back!"

Dean shook his head quickly as a feeble attempt to deny it, "No, man, it's not like that. I'm just wondering that maybe there's a reason for the loss and until we figure out if there is or not its better not to push it," he explained.

There was that tone again. The 'shut up and don't ask questions' tone that Dean used whenever he tired of arguing. Sam shook his head and leant back against the windshield of the car. What was the point of arguing now?

"Whatever," was the only response Sam could be bothered to mutter and Dean was lucky to get that much.

A hint of regret flickered over Dean's face before he nodded to himself, "We'll be in touch soon," he told his silent brother before turning and walking away, back towards the house.

They must been working on this plan for the entire time Sam had been outside because Dean went right past the front door in the direction of the Impala. Sam returned his gaze to the stars and quickly became too lost in his own frustration to even register the sound of the car starting up.

Dean was driving off leaving Sam alone in the dark, in more ways than one. His memories were broken and foreign now that large gaps separated each section; and now his brother had not only refused to tell him anything, he was actively trying to stop Sam from doing something that might help his situation. A muscle strained in his neck as his jaw clenched. The only one he could have turned to had abandoned him. He was on his own.

An image flashed up in his mind. The image of the unknown angel berating Dean and Cas for some reason or other at the hospital. The memory made him smirk.

The car creaked and strained as Sam shifted so that his legs were hanging over the edge of the bonnet, hands in his lap.

"Thanks..." he muttered then gave a breathy, embarrassed laugh before continuing, "I'm not used to this whole prayer thing except for, you know, calling Cas. I mean I don't even know if you can hear me, but hell what else can I do?" he paused to gather his thoughts and attempt to word them, "So hey, I was wondering, could you help me? Just once more...I don't remember anything...a lot of my past is just missing. I just want to understand why? I can see where the last week has gone but the other bits...is there a pattern?" he broke off to leave space for an answer. None came. Sam released the breath he didn't realise he'd been holding and hung his head, "Right, ok then. It was a long shot anyway."

That was it. Even his guardian angel had left him.

Hope you liked! Yeah, I know it took a little while to update but I wanted to make sure it was all right for y'all. Neeway, i would love to know what you think...reviews are the candy to my Gabriel

LOVE YOU ALL FOR GETTING TO THE BOTTOM OF THE CHAPTER