Okay guys. Here we are. Final stretch. Last lap. I just want to thank everyone who followed, favorited, and reviewed, All of you gave me great motivation. However, cammiemorris7, you managed to review a few times, and each time, leave a message that made me smile. Thank you especially. To anyone newly reading this story, thank you too for finding your way here. Here we go!

It had been a month now. An entire month since the Darkness had plucked Sam from his worst nightmare (well, second worst) and plopped him back in the bunker with an overprotective Dean and too many memories clamoring for attention. He had been in that cage a long time. At least, it felt like it. Old memories of the torture he had been put through were blending with the new ones and being made fresh in his mind. Dean was worried. Sam didn't have the energy, nor the motivation to care.

Sam had never in his life kneeled before someone and had the intention of letting them kill him. Until he did, just a few months ago. He had kneeled before Dean, his brother, who had been ready to slice into his neck with a scythe given to him by Death. Then, he hadn't been ready to die, but he'd been resigned to it. Now, however, it was the opposite.

Castiel was worried. He followed Sam around the bunker, in a manner the angel apparently thought was nonchalant and inconspicuous. Once, the younger man had woken to a hand on his forehead, running through his long hair, gracing his cheek. Then, whispered words barely reached his ear before unconsciousness had covered him like a soft blanket of black.

"Sam. Please stay." Apparently the angel had been reading thoughts, because that day, he'd been cleaning a gun out of nowhere, and words from years ago drifted into his mind.

"You know where to aim, cowboy... It ends when you can't take it anymore... I think that's maybe why we're cleaning our guns..." The unloaded Taurus had clattered onto the table, and Sam's stuttering breath had grown faster. No. No. Nonononononono-

"Sam? Sam! You okay? Are you-"

"Going crazy again? No. I'm fine, Dean." Before his big brother's disbelieving eyes could convince him to break down, Sam left the table, and walked calmly to his room.

But Castiel was... In the library, where he could hear everything. And sense everything, if he wanted to. And he had.

How much had those thoughts affected Sam? More than he cared to admit. He'd stared at his wrists for an hour, tracing the soft blue lines there with his eyes. Blue inside, red outside.

The day after his nighttime visit from Cas, he took out a knife and traced the veins on his arm with it. The boy with the demon blood... An abomination... He'd paid for his sins in Hell, but that wasn't enough. Nothing would ever be enough. The door flying open noiselessly startled him, and the man jumped, trying to figure out a plausible story to explain him sitting on his bed with a knife in his hand and a suicide note he'd written when he was sixteen lying beside him. To Sam's surprise, it wasn't Dean that walked in. Castiel's hands ripped away the knife and grabbed his shoulders before he could react.

"What are you doing, Samuel? Are you, the man that survived a round in Hell's darkest pit, the man who nearly completed three trials for a Godly purpose, only stopping to save your brother from certain fatal grief, going to give up? Sam Winchester, you ass!"

"I wasn't gonna-"

"Had I given you another two and a half hours, yes, you would have. You have no sense of the pain you would cause with your absence. Your brother, and I, do not only want you here. We need you here. You are no burden, no demon-spawn, nor tool for destruction or death. " The gravelly voice echoed in the bunker, down the halls, and Sam wondered when Dean would show up.

"I don-"

"Lucifer only wanted to break you down, Sam. He used the most painful methods he could, knowing he had only limited time. You were alone, Sam, and now you are not." The reject angel now sat with him on the middle of the bed. Sam watched him take the ratty, old note and place it on his nightstand.

"We care about you. You can not believe otherwise. You and your brother are infuriatingly horrible with communication of your own problems, but you two are all I currently have. We are family now. And I will help you leave this behind. I'm sure Dean-"

"No. I'm not telling him about this, and you're not telling him. Please." A moment of hesitation crossed Cas' face.

"Okay. But you talk to me about this. Unlike your brother, I do not sleep. I am always here, and you will not be a bother." Sam's throat seemed suddenly tight, and he swallowed before nodding. Distantly, the bunker door closed and Dean shouted that he'd brought food.

"Uh, Cas? I kinda wanna talk to Dean. Privately."

"I will be here. Or in the library."

"Thanks."

"You are welcome, Sam."

The rabbit food was neatly set at the table, across from Dean's greasy, though not as bad as usual, fast food. The oldest Winchester was preparing to finally drag Sam in here and provoke the girl moment at this point, because Sammy needed it. That was how he coped, and it wasn't the worst way Dean could think of. When he had all the food placed perfectly, he noticed Sam standing awkwardly at the entrance to their dining/research room. Quickly sitting down in his chair, embarrassed at having been caught organizing plastic forks beside plates and Styrofoam cups, Dean slipped a soft smile on his face. As he opened his mouth to speak, Sam beat him to it.

"I need to talk. About Hell."

And that was probably the best damn news Dean could remember hearing.