So much had happened.

Sam was hardly the man he'd been when he'd been lucky enough to know Gabriel.

It had been years.

Sam burned and broke in the cage. Cas raised him back up, soulless. Death retrieved his soul. Castiel broke the walls in Sam's mind that kept Hell at bay. Sam hallucinated Lucifer while sitting in a mental hospital. Cas took the broken parts of Sam into himself. They defeated the Leviathans. Sam hit a dog and met Amelia. He started hunting again once Dean got back from Purgatory.

And then the trials.

And the church.

Death.

Ezekiel...or Gadreel, rather. Dean tricked him into giving up his own autonomy to some angel just so Sam wouldn't die. Dean. His own brother. Mr. Team Free Will, himself. He decided that Sam wasn't allowed to make his own decision.

And then Kevin...

All of this came to pass without Gabriel.

At first it was hard, Sam having to remember that his archangel was dead, having to remember that the only archangel that gave a shit died for them. As time passed and months became years, Sam only thought of Gabriel occasionally.

So much had happened.

"Hey," Sam said, stepping inside the bunker.

Cas muttered, "Tastes like molecules."

"What? What're you talking about?" Sam asked.

Sam walked down the steps to find Cas eating a sandwich. The angel wasn't human anymore, so the scene was more than a little odd. Dean would've found it endearing, but Dean wasn't around anymore. He'd left to hunt down Gadreel on his own. Sam wasn't exactly upset about it. He needed some time away from his brother after learning that Dean had allowed him to be Gadreel's vessel without his knowledge. Still, Dean would've loved this sight of Cas.

"When I was human, y'know, I-I had to eat constantly. It was kind of annoying," Cas said.

"Yeah," Sam said, "A lot of human things're pretty annoying."

"But I enjoyed the taste of food, particularly peanut butter and grape jelly. Not jam. Jam I found unsettling."

Sam put his shopping bag down and sat on the table. "So, what? You can't taste PB & J?" he asked, stealing a dab of the grape jelly and tasting it.

"No," Cas said, "I taste every molecule." He put a dab of peanut butter in his mouth.

Sam asked, "Not the sum of its parts, huh?"

"It's overwhelming," Cas said, "It's disgusting."

Sam tried to imagine what it would be like to taste food so much that you couldn't enjoy it. He couldn't. Being human was really tough on Cas. At least before, Cas didn't know what he was missing when it came to food. Sam couldn't help but feel a little sympathetic for the angel.

Cas looked at his sandwich sadly and said, "I miss you, PB & J." He took a breath and stood up. "We need to continue your healing," he said, "We're almost done."

Sam closed his eyes, and Cas put two fingers to Sam's forehead.

Sam looked at Cas. Normally, he could feel Cas' energy when it entered him. Now, nothing was happening. Cas looked confused. "What?" he asked.

"Nothing," Cas said quickly.

Sam smacked Cas' hand away and said, "You're a terrible liar."

"That is not true," Cas said, seemingly offended, "I once deceived and betrayed both you and your brother."

"That's not the point. Cas, what's wrong?" Sam asked.

"I noticed something. It's, uh, resonating inside you," Cas said.

"What?"

"Something angelic."

Sam asked, "Okay, uh, the hell does that mean?"

"Maybe we should call Dean," Cas said.

Sam looked away. He tried to look back at Cas, but he couldn't. There was still too much hurt over what Dean had done. Talk about betrayal. Cas was probably the only one Sam could trust right now. Dean had stabbed him in the back and betrayed every ounce of trust Sam had to give. And Kevin was...

"No," Sam said, getting up off the table, "He wanted to go, and he's gone. We'll handle this." He sat down in a chair this time and reached for the book in front of him.

Cas sat down beside him and kept further comments about Dean to himself.

An hour later, the two of them were in the Men of Letters library, scouring through books for any ideas about Sam's partially angelic condition.

"I found...something," Cas said, "It's a detail about when angels leave their vessels. I think. It's enochian, which can be a bit flowery."

Sam drew closer, resting his arms on a book rack. Sam wanted nothing more than to figure this out and be done with Gadreel and anything else angelic inside of him.

Cas read aloud, "And the departed shall remain, and the remains shall be the departed."

Sam said, "Okay. So, when an angel leaves a vessel, they leave behind a piece of themselves. Like a-like an angelic fingerprint."

"Whatever you want to call it," Cas said, "This piece of the departed contains grace."

"Wait, you're saying there's angelic grace inside of me?" Sam asked.

"Yes," Cas said, "But it's fading each time I heal you."

Cas started walking towards a table with a book.

"Okay, so is that good or bad?" Sam asked.

Cas said, "Well, it's harmless, but the grace itself might be helpful." He flipped through some folders and paperwork until he came up with a case file called 'The Inner Workings of Angels.' "According to this," he said, "We may be able to use the grace that remains inside you to track Gadreel. If we can extract it."

Sam was game. Sam was all in. Sam wanted to catch Gadreel and make him pay for what he'd done. "How would we do that?" he asked.

"Well, painfully," Cas said. He held open the folder enough to give Sam a look at a design for a very large syringe.

Needles. Great. Sam was still all in.

Cas said, "The Men of Letters believed that you could perform a tracking spell with extracted grace, but they were never able to test the theory."

"Well, they didn't have a guinea pig, but we do," Sam said.

"You have a guinea pig?" Cas asked, "Where?"

Sam struggled not to sigh. Cas had gotten much better at recognizing colloquialisms, but this one was apparently still beyond him. "Me, Cas. I'm the guinea pig," he said.

"Oh," Cas said.

Sam reached forward and flipped over the needle design to see a picture of the needle after it had actually been created.

"Any idea where that is?" Cas asked.

Sam actually did have a pretty decent idea. Something like that would probably be up in the archives with the other angel-based contraptions.

Sam and Cas headed upstairs to look through some boxes. There were some questionable looking hemostats, a pair of handcuffs, a box of angel feathers, some kind of metal thing that looked like some sort of suction device but Sam really couldn't be sure.

Cas pushed aside a jar with burbling green ooze at the bottom. "It don't know what that stuff is," he said, "But I found the syringe." He picked up a small box and handed it to Sam.

They headed back downstairs.

"Can I ask you a question?" Cas asked.

Sam said, "You just did."

Cas asked, "Can I ask you another question?"

"Well, technically, you-" Sam said, realizing that this joke that he and Dean used to pull on each other would probably continue forever with Cas, "Yeah, go ahead. What's up?"

Cas stopped and faced Sam. "Sam, the trials," he said.

Sam gave a small, breathy laugh. The trials. Right. The most painful waste of time he'd ever gone through.

"You chose not to go through with them for a reason, didn't you?" Cas asked, "You chose to live rather than to sacrifice yourself. You and Dean chose each other."

Sam saw where Cas was going with this. "Yeah, I did. We did. And then...Dean made a choice for me."

"What Dean did-" Cas started. Sam walked into the hallway.

"It doesn't matter what Dean did," Sam said, "Look, I could have put a stop to all this, Cas. I could have closed the gates of Hell."

"Oh, Sam-" Cas tried. Sam walked into what he and Dean had dubbed 'The Operating Room.'

"Dean's gone, okay?" Sam snapped, "This is on me now, and if I can find Gadreel, I can fix this. Now. Being a human means settling your debts." He took off his plaid flannel, placed it next to the operating chair, and handed Cas the box with the large syringe. "Let's start balancing the books."

Cas took the box reluctantly, and Sam sat down in the chair. He'd be lying if he said he wasn't nervous, but he had to do this.

Cas opened the box and picked up the needle.

Sam took a deep breath.

"You're sure about this?" Cas asked.

Sam nodded. "Do it," he said.

Cas held Sam's head against the headrest with gentle but steady pressure. Slowly, he inserted the needle just under Sam's jawline. It was horribly uncomfortable, a sharp pain that stung as much as it pinched.

"Now comes that part that will actually hurt," Cas said.

Sam glanced at him, unsure for a moment. But he could do this. He could handle pain.

"I'm going to begin the extraction," Cas said.

Cas pulled back on the plunger, and Sam stiffened. It felt like Cas was trying to pull Sam's muscle through the tip of the needle. Sam tried his best to control his reactions, knowing Cas would not be comfortable with causing him undue pain. It still hurt like a bitch, though.

"Is it working?" Sam managed to ask.

Cas sighed and said, "Yeah."

"But?" Sam asked, concerned at Cas' subdued sigh.

"I-I need to push the needle in deeper," Cas said, "We need more grace in order to cast the spell."

Sam was already struggling not to squirm or scream from the pain. But it was worth it.

"Okay, do it," Sam said.

"Sam," Cas said, "If I get too close to-"

"Damn it, Cas. Just do it," Sam said. He didn't have the energy to push through the pain and have an ethical debate with Cas.

Cas pushed the needle in further. Sam's vision blurred a bit. Normal people would probably have lost consciousness from how much it hurt.

A flood of memories smashed into Sam's awareness. Gadreel flooding Sam's body with grace to save them from demons. Gadreel causing Sam's eyes to flash blue with angelic intent. The pain of the trials.

Sam was barely aware of how much he squirmed and groaned from the pain.

Cas pulled the syringe out.

Sam gasped, holding a hand to his neck. He couldn't catch his breath. "What the hell was that?" he asked.

"Your body is regressing to the state it was in before Gadreel," Cas said.

Sam asked, "Do we have enough grace for the summoning spell?"

"Sam," Cas said, voice thick with concern.

"Do we or not, Cas?" Sam asked.

Cas said a very reluctant, "No."

Sam caught his breath as best he could and removed his hand from his neck. He had to do this. No matter the cost. "Then keep going," he said.

Cas hesitated for a moment before pushing the needle back in.

Sam grunted in pain, his eyes closing weakly. He had to do this. He had to be of some use.

"Sam?" Cas called, worried.

Sam said, "Keep going."

"Why?" Cas asked.

"We-we-," Sam said, his voice growing weak, "We have to find Gadreel."

"No," Cas said, "Why must the Winchesters run toward death?"

Cas started to pull the needle out, but Sam grabbed his hand before he could.

"No, don't. Don't-don't stop," Sam said.

Cas said, "Sam, when I was human, I died."

Sam still struggled to keep Cas from taking out the needle. But he couldn't fight both Cas and the pain at the same time.

Cas continued, "And that showed me that life is precious and it must be protected at all costs, even a life as...as pig-headed as a Winchester's."

Sam dropped his hand from the needle. He was so tired. He needed to do this.

"My life isn't worth more than anyone else's," Sam said quietly, "Not yours or Dean's. Or Kevin's. Please. Please, help me do one thing right. Keep going." He had to do this. He had to do this for Kevin. It was the very least he could do.

Cas pushed the syringe further in, so much further that Sam couldn't hold back anymore. He cried out from the pain.

It wasn't long after that that Sam started bleeding. He wasn't fully aware of it, but he could feel his nose dripping. Everything else hurt so much more that he barely noticed it. But that was okay. It didn't matter. It was just blood, just life, nothing that Sam wasn't willing to lose.

He knew his strength was fading, he knew he'd die from the state he was in before Gadreel. But after Kevin, he deserved this. His life wasn't a life worth living anyways. He was so, so tired.

"Hold on," Cas said softly, "This may pinch." He pulled the syringe out.

Sam blinked wearily. He tried to turn towards Cas. "Cas, what the hell?" he asked with a raspy whisper.

Cas placed two fingers on Sam's forehead. Sam felt Cas' grace surge through him like a lightning bolt.

Sam writhed for a moment and sat up quickly, feeling his neck, confused. "Cas," he gasped, "What the hell was that?"

"I've healed your wounds completely," Cas said.

"And the grace?" Sam asked.

Cas said, "Well, whatever grace was inside you is gone now. What's left of Gadreel is in here. We'll just have to try the spell with what we have."

Cas put the syringe with the last of Gadreel's grace back in the box.

"Damn it," Sam said. Why didn't Cas keep going? He should've pulled the rest of the grace out.

Cas faced Sam. "Sam, I want Gadreel to pay as much as you do," he said, "But nothing is worth losing you."

Sam looked up at Cas. He didn't know how to feel about that.

"You know, being human, it didn't just change my view of food," Cas said, "It changed my view of you. I mean, I can relate now to how you feel."

Sam wasn't sure where this was going. "What are you talking about?" he asked.

Cas said softly, "The only person who has screwed things up more consistently than you is me."

Sam dropped his gaze. He knew what Cas was trying to say, but he wasn't sure it was something he wanted to hear.

"And now I know what that guilt feels like. And I know what it-I know what it means to feel sorry, Sam. I am sorry," Cas said.

Sam said, "I know."

"You know, old me-I would've just kept going. I would've jammed that needle in deeper until you died, because the ends always justified the means. But what I went through-well, that PB & J taught me that angels can change, so who knows? Maybe Winchesters can, too."

Sam sat there in silence as Cas left the room. Maybe Cas was right. Maybe he could break the cycle of fucking everything up. Maybe he would be more good alive than dead. It just felt so strange to hear Cas say those words. It felt good, hearing that someone cared about him, but strange. It warmed him to know that at least one angel saw value in him.

Sam followed after Cas to see if the spell could work. They put the concoction together, and Cas poured in what little grace there was.

The grace made the water bubble up with a dazzling display of celestial light, but nothing else happened.

"Was that, uh, was that it?" Sam asked.

Cas looked at Sam and said, "I'm afraid there wasn't enough grace. We'll have to find Gadreel another way. I'm sorry, Sam."

Sam braced himself on the table. Of course there wasn't enough grace. But Cas was right. Finding Gadreel wasn't worth dying over.

"It's alright, Cas," Sam said, "You, uh, you were right. You were right about everything."

If it had been up to Sam, he wouldn't be alive. Cas had saved him from himself. And Sam was grateful.

Sam hugged Cas tightly. There was a lot of pain inside Sam after everything that had happened, but maybe Cas could relate. Maybe Sam wasn't as alone as he felt.

"Now's the part where you hug back," Sam said over Cas' shoulder.

"Oh," Cas said, "Right. Uh, sorry." He reached up to hug Sam back awkwardly.

Sam said, "Ah, there you go."

Sam broke off the hug and patted Cas' shoulder and neck. He didn't know how else to show his appreciation, at least not in a way that Cas would understand.

"As far as I'm concerned," Cas said, "Metatron is the key to fixing everything that's wrong. I'm gonna find him." He put a hand on Sam's shoulder before starting to walk away.

Sam felt terrible. He hated that they hadn't had enough grace to work the spell, but he really hated that he'd been willing to die for it. He hated that he wanted to die.

"You know, Sam, we could use all the help we could get to find Gadreel and Metatron," Cas said.

Sam nodded and said, "We got this." This was just one setback. They'd find them. Gadreel and Metatron would pay.

Cas left, leaving Sam alone with his thoughts. There had been a time that Sam enjoyed life, but it was long gone. Everything was pain, and more often than not, he couldn't see the point to living anymore. But Cas was right. Cas cared and knew that working on fixing some of this nightmare would help Sam find purpose. It was something that Gabriel would've known to do. Having an angel care about him so much felt so familiar that it made Sam long for death in a different way. He didn't know where angels went when they died, but if there was any chance that Sam could see Gabriel again, Heaven was where that chance would be.

But Cas was right. He had to keep going. They had work to do.