Gabriel watched from the bed as Sam packed his duffle with quick efficiency. He pulled his sucker from his mouth with a wet pop. "Are you sure I can't come with you guys?" he asked for the third time since Sam had announced that he and Dean were leaving to go take care of a hunt.

Sam rolled his eyes. "I'm sure, Gabriel." He zipped the duffle and hauled it onto his shoulder, "It's just a small vampire nest in Nebraska. We'll only be gone for two or three days tops," he said, turning toward the door.

Gabriel jumped from the bed and followed him. "What the hell am I supposed to do for three days by myself?" he demanded as they made their way out into the hall and toward the bunker's main room.

"Well, Cas isn't coming with us," Sam said. "Why don't you two bond or something?"

Gabriel pouted. "He said he was going to watch the bees. Bees are boring."

Sam stopped at the stairs and turned around. "I'm sure you'll find something to do." He leaned down and pressed a chaste kiss to Gabriel's mouth before stealing his sucker and bounding up the stairs. "See you in a couple days, Gabriel!"

Gabriel blinked up at him. "You can't just leave me with that half-assed kiss, Sammy!" he shouted. Sam just disappeared through the bunker door with a laugh.

[line break]

An hour later, Gabriel looked up from the map table, where he had been recreating different, movie scenes made entirely of candy and sweets, and checked the time. Only an hour had passed since Sam had left, and Gabriel was tired of his candy models. He looked forlornly at the candy model of the Battle of Hogwarts; not even the marshmallow Voldemort with his black, candy ribbon robe could get Gabriel's mind off how lonely he was without Sam.

His head snapped up as he heard a chirp. Gabriel identified it as a cricket, as it kept up its chirping. The sound echoed through the empty halls of the bunker, and Gabriel felt even more alone. The cricket chirped on, and Gabriel frowned. "Stop mocking me!" he shouted; the bunker fell quiet as his voice echoed then faded.

Sighing, Gabriel grabbed the gummi Nagini and bit her head off. The cricket began to chirp again, and Gabriel moaned.

[line break]

One day later found Gabriel stalking through the halls of the bunker as the cricket chirped on. It had been two hours of continuous chirping yesterday before Gabriel decided that he was going to find the cricket and remove it from the bunker. What he did not expect was the difficulty he was having finding the damn thing! 20 some hours of searching and he had not found the thing yet. He had tried to stretch his grace and locate the tiny, life force, but the sigils reinforcing the bunker threw off his more fine-tuned senses.

Gabriel stopped in the middle of the hallway when the chirping came to an end; he narrowed his eyes and listened closely, waiting for the cricket to start up again, but was interrupted when his phone rang. Gabriel pulled his phone from his pocket, still half-listening for the cricket as he looked down to see Sam's face on his phone screen. "Hey, Sammy," he said, picking up the call.

"Hey, Gabriel, just wanted to see how you were doing. Did you find something to keep you busy?"

"Yeah, I'm good," Gabriel answered absently as he heard a low chirp; he swung his head to the left, and ran down the hall as the chirping picked up full swing again, "Gotta go, Sammy!" he said before cutting off the call and stuffing his phone back into his pocket. The chirping was getting louder, and he skidded to a stop in the doorway of the firing range. "Found you, you little shit!" Gabriel said triumphantly. The chirping died momentarily before starting up again from down the hallway Gabriel had just came from.

"Dad, damn it!"

[line break]

"In the vents," Gabriel says as he pulls himself through the bunker's ventilation system six hours later. "That's got to be it. Not just the echoing, you're actually running around." He growls to the still constant chirp of the cricket. "I am an Archangel, a fucking Trickster God for Dad's sake! How can one little cricket evade me?!"

Gabriel pulled his body through the shaft and looked out the next grate into the library and stops, the chirping sounded clearer here. Gabriel looks through the library carefully before his eyes fall on one of the swords that decorate the library, on its handle sat a little, brown cricket. Gabriel tensed and disappeared from the vent quickly and appeared right in front of the cricket. It chirped again, but the sound died as Gabriel's hand darted out and grabbed the small insect.

Gabriel held the tiny bug gently and flew from the bunker to the nearest woods; he set the cricket down on a log and left. He sighed happily as he landed sprawled out on his and Sam's shared bed; he snapped himself up a victory candy bar with a smirk and brought it to his mouth when a sharp chirp echoed through the halls. Gabriel froze, and he narrowed his eyes; the chirping started up full swing, and Gabriel groaned, letting his candy bar fall to his side.

[line break]

Sam strode into the bunker, listening to the Impala rumble as Dean left again to go to a bar in town. "Gabriel, I'm…." he trailed off as he took in the scene before him. On the map table was the ruins of what looked to be a candy castle, pieces of said castle were spread around the war room along with papers and full, Men of Letters files. As he followed the path of destruction to the Library doorway, he saw Gabriel crouched behind the first table with a fly swatter in each hand.

Sam watched with a mix of amusement and confusion as his boyfriend slid around the side of the table before jumping up and hitting one of the lamps hard with the flyswatter in his left hand; the blow shattered the lampshade glass and the light bulb. Sam's confusion grew as Gabriel threw both his arms up in a touchdown pose and shouted, "Got you! You little bastard!"

"Gabriel," Sam said evenly.

Gabriel spun around and looked at him; a huge grin spread across his face, and he dropped his flyswatters on the table so he could run to and hug Sam. "You're back!" he said happily.

Sam let out a short laugh, "Yeah, I'm back." He pulled from the embrace just enough so he could look down at the angel. "Do I even want to know why the lamp deserved to be smashed?"

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "I didn't mean to break the lamp. I was trying to kill the cricket."

Sam lifted an eyebrow and looked down at the shattered glass on the table. "You mean that cricket?" he asked, nodding to where the little, brown bug was sitting in the middle of the mess. Gabriel jolted out of Sam's grip and grabbed the bug; he flew away and reappeared in front of Sam moments later. "Gabriel, what…."

"Shhh," Gabriel hissed, listening intently for a minute before he grinned and focused on Sam. "Alright, now that that's taken care of, how about I welcome you home properly?" he said, wiggling his eyebrows.

Sam grinned and dropped his duffle. "I guess I wouldn't be opposed to that," he said as Gabriel pulled him down by his shirt, and their lips met. Gabriel's arms slid around Sam's neck as Sam hiked Gabriel's legs up around his waist. Sam turned and pressed Gabriel's back up against the library's archway before pulling back to look at him. "You know, I still want to know what happened."

"Priorities, Sam-a-lam," Gabriel said, pulling Sam back for another kiss.

As the room filled with breathy moans and the sound of clothes being removed, a single chirp sounded.

"Dad, damn it!"