Author's note: Thanks a lot to Ghastly Eternity for beta-reading and to Maknatuna, Mello18, midnight0211, FireChildSlytherin5, Larkafree, keacdragon, Maddy Love Castiel, AzzaBby, Creativity Incarnate, musicfeind2392,BananaCreamCutie and one guest for last chapter's reviews.
3
Sam had been seriously worried that people would take one look at him and call child protection services or the police before he had stepped into the shop. It seemed that an exhausted and nervous guy with a sleeping baby against his shoulder didn't turn any heads, though. He supposed that would change once Gabriel wasn't sleeping anymore.
The past few years, the younger Winchester hadn't exactly paid attention to parents with their little kids, unless they were a part of a case, but he knew that there was no ignoring a crying baby.
Grabbing a basket by the entrance, Sam decided to make this as quick as possible. He was dead on his feet and in serious need of some sleep, anyway.
He had not counted on the section for baby stuff being as big as it was, though.
"Oh, for crying out loud," the younger Winchester mumbled unhappily. Even narrowing the shopping list down to clothes and food still left them with a lot of stuff to choose from. At least, the clothes were sorted by the ages they were suitable for. Not that Sam would have known how old Gabriel was supposed to be.
He just took a couple of outfits and held them against the infant's back until he was rather convinced that clothes for a six months old baby should work.
"Not a good age," Sam mumbled, but started to look through the outfits on display, anyway.
In the end, he just grabbed a couple of shirts, socks and bibs, all of them adorned with things like cartoon ducks, kittens and muffins. Something else caught his eye and he couldn't help chuckling as he took the overalls saying 'sweet little angel' and put them into the basket, as well.
When he was sure that they were on the safe side clothes-wise he took a quick look at the other things in the aisle. It couldn't hurt to take a look at the other things normal babies needed to get inspiration for the things that might be necessary for a baby archangel.
Sam wasn't exactly sure what the current public opinion on pacifiers for infants was, but he had noticed that Gabriel liked to suck on his thumb, so he decided to buy two and also added two baby bottles and formula. It was worth a shot, he supposed. Thinking of things that might be worth a shot, Sam grabbed a package of diapers, just to be on the safe side.
It was then that a dripping wet, tiny hand came up to pat around in the younger Winchester's face. The archangel apparently was going for a world record in drooling and enjoyed sharing the fruits of his labor with his caretaker.
Well, compared to other things Sam had been covered in before and especially during his time in hell, it wasn't even that disgusting. The feeling was strange and really not all too welcome, anyway.
"We're nearly done here," the younger Winchester told the infant and tried his best not to let the probing fingers get anywhere too close to his eyes, "You sure you don't want to sleep some more?"
It looked like Gabriel was damn sure about that, however. Instead, he looked around curiously and started to fidget in earnest when he spotted the shelves with the toys. This had to be the moment when all parents knew they were screwed.
Sam sighed deeply, but gave in and went over to the playthings pretty much instantly. He was too tired to have a fight of wills with an infant archangel and it looked like God – or whoever else – had equipped him with enough money so a couple of toys shouldn't be a problem, anyway.
The first thing Gabriel clearly reacted to was a stuffed plush angel that had to be about half as big as the baby angel was. The younger Winchester could appreciate irony when it basically bit him in the butt, so he added the toy to their shopping basket.
Naively thinking that this was the end of their shopping trip, Sam started to walk toward the checkout, until Gabriel started to reach for something again. A clear plastic ball with a rubber duck swimming on some sort of liquid inside. It was added to their ever growing pile of stuff before the slightly displeased expression on the archangel's face could turn into a very vocal voicing of annoyance.
"Aren't you a little young to be so materialistic?" Sam asked with a snort when the infant went on pointing to things he wanted to have. The younger Winchester gave in to the demands for a big picture book, a couple of toy blocks and a toy car before he decided that enough was enough and that he couldn't carry much more while still holding Gabriel, anyway.
Not surprisingly, the baby wasn't pleased with them leaving the toy section which he announced loudly to the entire store and probably some parts of the town.
Sam had to hand it to the archangel, he really was persistent! He only stopped crying once the younger Winchester had paid for their things and ripped the price tag from the stuffed angel before he handed it to the infant. There was content silence and some happy gurgling after that, though. If Sam hadn't been very close to finding a spot where nobody was watching and just leaving the baby there, he might have viewed the little happy noises as more of a reward.
"Gabe, you're adorable right now, but when we get back to the motel, I'm going to sleep," the younger Winchester mumbled once they had left the store and were walking back to their current residence, "And if you don't let me, I'll just have to kill you."
The way that Gabriel just snuggled up to the crook of Sam's neck and planted very wet kisses against his skin once more proved that he didn't understand a word the younger Winchester was saying, however.
"Tell you what, Sam," Lucifer whispered right into the human's ear nearly tenderly, "You're a good boy now and I'll go occupy myself with your little brother for a while."
That was exactly what the devil was a master of – giving the younger Winchester choices that weren't actual choices at all. Neither could he trust that Lucifer would keep his word, nor was there an option that wouldn't end very badly for him.
It always was a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea. Even if he decided to trust that the fallen angel was speaking the truth, he could only bring more pain upon himself, or screw the younger half-brother he had never really known over. It might have sounded like an easy choice. It wasn't Dean they were talking about, after all. Still, Sam had already pulled Adam to the cage alongside himself and the two archangels. He couldn't add even more to that. There was only so much one person could bear before the possibility to just say 'fuck it all' and 'anyone but me' became very tempting, though.
"What will it be, Sam?" Lucifer asked, getting a little impatient and digging his talon-like fingernails deeper into the younger Winchester's flesh, "What will it be this time?"
Sam jerked awake, panting heavily. He even had to lift his t-shirt to see for himself that the pain he felt was just in his memory and that there were no wounds there.
It was only then that he even realized what had woken him up.
The younger Winchester got up immediately and stumbled over to the crib where he had put Gabriel to sleep earlier.
They both couldn't have been asleep for all too long, but Sam didn't feel like he could have closed his eyes without getting tortured by pictures of Lucifer again, anyway.
The baby archangel's face was already beet-red from all the wailing he had done when the human picked him up and rocked him gently, making soothing noises. He didn't know what exactly had gotten the infant to cry his little heart out, but he could still do these little things before he figured the source of Gabriel's discontentment out.
Bouncing the baby against his shoulder, Sam went to the bag with the things they had bought earlier and unwrapped one of the pacifiers. Sometimes the easier solutions were the right ones, after all.
Gabriel's sobs had died down a little already. He still accepted the pacifier immediately and sucked on it rather contently. His face was still red and tear streaked, however.
"So, you had a nightmare, too?" Sam asked the infant while he carried him over to the small bathroom. He just felt awkward not saying a word and surely just talking about anything couldn't do any harm.
"I really got a bad feeling about all of this, Gabriel," the younger Winchester mumbled as he wet a washcloth with lukewarm water.
The archangel only looked at the tall human curiously at the mention of his name, but otherwise just continued to suck on his pacifier. He let Sam gently wipe his face with the washcloth without complaints, though.
"Let's just get you into some clean clothes," the younger Winchester decided after a moment of consideration, "It's not like we've got anything else to do."
Dean would still take hours to get to them and Gabriel had some of his lunch all over the blue romper suit he was wearing. Honest to God, Sam had meant to take care of that before he had taken a nap, but when they had gotten back to the room he had just been too tired to do anything. He wasn't trying to win any awards for babysitter of the year, anyway. Simply getting the two of them through until somebody else could take over would have to do.
Getting Gabriel out of his current outfit was easy enough. It was only when Sam had the baby stripped down to his diapers that something occurred to him, though.
"Oh, hell no," the younger Winchester sighed, "Please, don't remember this when you're an adult again."
Sam had faced all sorts of monsters, demons, angels and the devil himself, but he couldn't stop his hands from shaking when he reached for the adhesive strips that held the diaper together.
"I need a beer," the younger Winchester mumbled to himself after the infant had shot him a look like he knew exactly that Sam had no idea what he was even doing there. Yeah, he was getting very paranoid around the baby archangel, but could he really be blamed for that? He was about to undress a freaking archangel of the Lord, even if he was currently a little baby.
The younger Winchester did his very best not to look any more than he absolutely had to. However, Gabriel seemed to fidget even more when he thought he didn't have his caretaker's full attention, so he bit the bullet and more or less stared the infant down.
"Okay, threatening you is getting old fast, but just let me say that a circle of holy oil will be the least of your concerns, if I find out that you're doing all this for shits and giggles," the younger Winchester told the baby seriously, but in a voice that wasn't meant to be intimidating.
When Sam put the old diaper aside, he noticed that either the archangel didn't have the normal bodily functions a baby did, or he hadn't had them yet, anyway.
Great, so he had a buck-naked Gabriel at his hands for absolutely nothing!
The tall human exhaled soundly and pushed his embarrassment and annoyance aside. He had started this, now he had to finish it, too!
The younger Winchester sighed relieved when he finished fastening the new diaper. He pulled a shirt with a cartoon muffin over Gabriel's head, and the elastic blue pants went into place easily enough as well. All in all, Sam thought that he had done reasonably well, given the circumstances.
"You got the wrong Winchester, Gabe," he mused, picking the plush angel up from the crib and wiggling it in front of the tiny archangel, "Dean's the one that has at least some experience with babies."
Gabriel seemed to be rather content with his caretaker however, if the way he was squealing happily from his place on the bed was any indication.
Sam smiled slightly and held the toy angel over the infant's head for a little while which seemingly fascinated the little one. His big brown eyes were glued to the toy and he nearly forgot to suck on his pacifier as he watched.
The younger Winchester chuckled silently at that. "Do you think baby angels can fly? I don't know. We'd have to ask-"
The plush angel fell from his hand without Sam noticing as he was violently assaulted by memories. He pressed his palms against his temples, feeling like his head was going to explode any moment now.
"Cas," the younger Winchester breathed when the pain let up a little.
The picture of Castiel exploding into a million tiny pieces was as fresh on his mind as if it had only happened minutes ago. The holy fire Molotov cocktail the angel had thrown at Michael, Lucifer snapping his fingers and Bobby's scared expression. Bobby…
"No, no, no, no, no!" Sam yelled at no one in particular as the rest of the scene played out in his mind.
How could he have forgotten about that? He had even tried to call Bobby just a few hours ago and hadn't thought anything of Dean picking up instead of the older hunter. He had, no, Lucifer had killed Castiel and Bobby and Sam had let it happen! And now he just had to add insult to injury by forgetting all about it!
The younger Winchester didn't even notice that tears were running over his cheeks, but he finally realized that Gabriel was wailing, terrified. He reached for the scared infant with a shaking hand and gently patted his head a couple of times before he could bring himself to pull the baby archangel into his lap.
"If you knew what was good for you, you'd stay away from me," Sam whispered around the lump in his throat.
Gabriel only grabbed the younger Winchester's shirt and held on for dear life, however.