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Sam and Dean spent the first couple hours in the road in silence, then stopped in the evening to get gas and something for dinner.

Dean sat in the impala as Sam went inside the gas station to get food, and felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He pulled it out, glanced at the screen and then put it to his ear. "Hey, Bobby."

"How is he?"

Dean glanced at the window of the station, where Sam was looking at the various shelves of goods. His forehead was creased and he wasn't moving, like he was thinking hard about something. As Dean watched he pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes, then shook his head and looked back up with a face entirely devoid of emotion, like he'd completely forgotten what he'd just been thinking about.

Dean sighed and rested his head back on the seat. "It's like he's struggling to remember things, but just as he starts to get a grasp on them…" He clenched his teeth. "He's forgetting everything and I can't stop it. He can't remember our dad's name, or what he looks like…he can't remember you, Bobby."

There was a moment of silence on the line. Dean heard Bobby clear his throat, then say quietly, "But he can still remember who you are, right?"

"Yeah." Dean exhaled. "But who knows how much longer that'll last. Bobby…will this even end once the bones are burned?"

"I don't know, kid. I hope so."

"Maybe it would be best," Dean said, a tremor in his voice now that he couldn't hide. "If he just forgot me now, then in a few months when I…when I leave…"

"You stop that talk right now, boy," Bobby said sharply, and Dean fell silent. "Don't be an idiot. Even if Sam loses all the rest of his memories, I don't think there's any way he could forget you. That kid needs you, Dean. So you stick with him and keep him remembering until his last memory is dust or I'll kick your ass, you get that?"

"Yeah," Dean said, running his hand through his hair. "Okay."

"Keep him talking, Dean, you hear me? Don't let him forget. Any memories you can dredge up will help."

"Right," Dean said. "Thanks Bobby. I'll see you later." He shut off his phone just as Sam opened the passenger side door, tossing Dean a bag of chips and a coke.

"Thanks," Dean said. They sat in the impala for a few minutes, picking at their food without any real enthusiasm, and when Dean couldn't stand staying still for any longer he twisted the keys in the ignition and started up the car once again.

The sun sank toward the horizon as they sped on, and Dean wracked his brain for something to say to break the silence. He had to keep Sam thinking about the past, so he didn't let go of all those memories.

"I know you're worried about me," Sam said finally, surprising Dean. "But I'm okay. I promise. We'll figure this out soon and things will be back to normal."

"Hopefully," Dean muttered. "We don't know for sure, Sam."

"Well, it's the best we've got right now. So we've got to keep looking ahead—that's what we always do, right?"

"Yeah, except looking ahead isn't the problem right now," Dean said. "You're forgetting your past, Sam. You're losing your memory."

"You think I don't know that?" Sam exhaled, clenching one hand into a fist. "I don't want to lose it completely, Dean, you know that. As shitty as some of the memories I have are…they made me who I am. I'm not about to let that go."

Dean swallowed. Sam was right. He'd considered his past to be a big pile of crap, but…all the two of them had been through, it had shaped them. All those hours in the impala, in the crappy motel rooms, the hunts—it all meant something to both of them. Two brothers, an impala, and the road.

In the end, that was all they really needed.

Dean cleared his throat. "Azazel," he said. He needed to keep working at bringing back these memories "You remember him, don't you?"

The name dredged up several fractured images in Sam's mind—an abandoned town, a graveyard, a pair of yellow eyes…but each was gone as soon as it flashed through his mind. He frowned.

"He reminds me of something, but…" Sam shook his head. "I don't know. I don't remember."

Dean cast his brother a disbelieving look. "You don't remember the demon that killed our mother?"

"Our mother's dead?" Sam said hoarsely.

"Died when you were a baby," Dean said. "Come on, Sam. Stay with me, you know this."

"Azazel was a…demon?"

"A demon our father spent his entire life searching for. You don't remember the hospital where dad made a deal with him for my life? The graveyard, where the colt made a hole in his chest? Cold Oak, where, because of him, you died in my arms?"

Sam swallowed. "I what?"

"Sam, you don't remember any of this?"

"No…I…"

"Sam, that demon's game got you murdered. I brought you back—" He paused. If he couldn't remember dying, maybe he didn't remember the deal Dean had made, or the time limit it had put him under. Maybe it was best if he stayed that way…for now. So he fell silent, and after a moment tried again.

The moment he started to speak again, however, Sam made a strangled sound and pressed both hands against his head, as though struggling to hold it together, and Dean's eyes widened. He reached across the seat to grip his brother's shoulder.

"Damn it," he said. "Hey—Sammy, look at me."

"It's Sam." His eyes were still closed, one hand pressed to his forehead, but his words were said with perfect clarity. Out of everything Sam had said over the past couple of things, all the important things he'd forgotten, these two words pained Dean the most.

Sam hadn't corrected him on the nickname in years. It had become—to both of them, it seemed—a term of endearment, solidifying the fact that to Dean, Sam was and would always be Sammy. Only months after he had come back from Stanford, insisting to be called Sam, he'd gone to insisting that Dean was the only one who could use the nickname. It had been comforting to Dean—that as grown up and changed as Sam was…he was still Dean's little brother.

Dean didn't want to lose that, too.

Dean tightened his hands on the steering week as Sam raised his head, oblivious to the pain twisting itself through Dean's gut. "Sorry. I'm okay. How much further?"

"Another few miles. Hang in there, Sam."

"I'm okay."

"No, you're not. Don't lie to me, Sam, your mind is going by the second and you could pass out at any time and leave me here before I—" he broke off and steadied himself against the rise of emotions that seemed determined to overwhelm him.

"Dean?" Sam said quietly.

"Sam, you—you've gotta hold on, all right? Because I'm not going to be here much longer, and I can't lose you yet."

"What do you—"

"I'll be gone soon," Dean said, voice gruff, "and leave you here, and eventually you're gonna move on, find something else, start a family maybe—and you're going to forget me." He took a deep breath. "I've accepted that. But I don't want it to happen yet. Not yet. You hear me, Sammy?"

Sam didn't correct him this time. Instead he was silent for a long moment, then said softly, voice concealing all kinds of emotion, "Okay. Okay, Dean."

Dean gave up on prodding Sam's memory banks, having dealt with enough for one evening, so the two of them were silent again for the rest of the ride.

SSS

They crashed in a motel for the night, then first thing in the morning went to visit the girl's family. Dean was getting desperate, because the vacant look on Sam's face had become nearly a permanent thing, and the bouts of pain were getting more and more frequent. He no longer knew what to do to help, except finish the hunt. And if that didn't work, well…he'd figure out something else.

He would not let his brother lose his memory.

Sam knocked on the door to the family's house, and it was answered by a thin young blonde woman, her hair pulled up into a loose bun. Her eyes flicked between Sam and Dean once before she asked, "Can I help you two?"

"We were hoping to talk to you about your daughter," Dean said before Sam could speak. "It will be brief, we promise. But it's very important."

"My…daughter?" The woman frowned. "I only have a son. My daughter died six years ago."

"We just need to know a few things," Sam said. "Please. It will only take a minute."

The woman allowed them into her home with reluctance, and the two of them sat on the couch across from where she sat on a cushy arm chair. She twisted and untwisted her hands in her lap again and again and spoke into them as she answered their questions. "Ellen was so young," she said. "Only eight when she…" She sighed. "It was cancer, a brain tumor. It infected her so slowly, that we didn't notice in time. She had surgery and chemo, but it made no difference. The tumor took her over and it…changed her. She became angry…forgetful…it was terrible. And we could only watched while it happened."

Sam and Dean exchanged looks. That was exactly what had happened to the two victims, as well as what was happening to Sam. "So…she's buried in this town then?" Dean said.

The woman looked up quickly. "Oh—no. She was cremated."

Dean's heart sank and suddenly it was difficult to breathe. This had been their last hope. He bit back a stream of curses and forced himself to focus, to find something else, anything else—"Did you keep something of hers to remember her by?" He didn't care that his voice sounded desperate. "A lock of hair or something?"

The woman frowned. "Um…no. Nothing. Why?"

"Never mind." Dean scrubbed a hand over his face, fighting back a complete breakdown. "We should go. Thank you for your help." He pulled Sam to his feet and they made their way back to the impala.

"Dean," Sam said. "It's okay. Really."

"It's not okay!" Dean snapped, whirling around to face his brother. "I've got nothing, Sam, nothing! That was our last chance and it got us nothing. So no, Sam, I'm sorry, but we're out of options."

"But you can't just—"

"No, I can't!" Dean raked his fingers through his hair, not wanting to look at his brother's gentle eyes and see the sympathy and resignation there. "But I have to." He swallowed, his voice hitching. "I'm sorry, Sam."

"It's not your fault."

Dean forced himself to meet Sam's eyes but couldn't stand what he saw there. He looked away quickly and opened the door to the car. "Come on, let's go."

SSS

Dean left Sam at the motel and went to get food, but the moment he pulled into the parking lot of the fast food place he dug out his phone, stepping out of the car, and dialed Bobby's number.

"I'm out of options here, Bobby," Dean said, pacing beside the car in agitation. "Sammy's almost gone, and the ghost—she was cremated. I've got nothing. What the hell am I supposed to do?"

"I…I don't know." Dean felt a clenching feeling in his chest at the resignation in Bobby's voice. He'd been Dean's last hope, and if he had nothing…"Maybe this is one battle you can't win, kid."

"I can't lose him, Bobby," Dean said hoarsely, once again not caring how desperate he sounded. "I can't."

"I know, Dean." Bobby sighed. "Listen, I'll make some calls, okay? If I find anything I'll let you know right away. I'm afraid it's the best I can do."

"Yeah. Okay." Dean tightened his hand over the phone. "Bye." He tucked the phone into his pocket and pressed one hand over his eyes, breathing deeply to try and keep it together.

He took a moment to gather himself, then headed toward the restaurant, thoughts and options and fears a confusing whirl in his head.

At the same time, Sam sat on the motel bed, his mind a similar whirl of confusing thoughts and pieces of memories. He tried to put them together, to make some sense of it, but there was no way, especially now with Dean gone.

Sam got up to shower, but he was only halfway to the bathroom when a horrible pain, far worse than anything he'd experienced before, took him by surprise.

The pain scorched its way fiercely through his mind, raw and unending and making Sam feel like his head was going to split into a million pieces. It burned away the last tendrils of memory that Sam had been trying with desperation to cling to, and soon he was left with nothing, just endless pain.

Pain that suddenly vanished, replaced by a feeling of emptiness. Solidity vanished underneath him and Sam felt himself falling, felt himself hit the floor, and then darkness took him.