Even without his growing powers, it wasn't hard for Sam to pick up on the stream of his brother's thoughts as everyone once more sat down to have another of the talks that had become far too commonplace for them lately. Sam had known him for long enough, better than anyone else really, and he knew what that look on Dean's face meant.

The older Winchester wasn't the type to sit and talk this much. He wasn't the 'sharing and caring' type and they'd been doing a lot of that lately. He'd done so much better than Sam had expected, really. He'd put up with a lot more than Sam had ever thought he would – and he'd done it all for Sam's sake. He'd listened and waited and let others take charge of something that he considered his responsibility. But apparently he'd reached the end of that tolerance. He was straightening up now and squaring his shoulders, feet firmly planted in the ground and arms crossed over his chest. It was a look Sam knew meant that Dean was done with this and was about to speak up and say his piece.

Sure enough, he spoke not a second later. "I've had enough of this." Dean growled out at them. His words drew the attention of everyone, but the hunter didn't flinch underneath all those stares. "I want some answers and I want them now. I'm tired of this back and forth bullshit that's not getting us anywhere. Someone's gonna explain what's going on!"

"That was what we were planning on doing, Dean Winchester." Michael said flatly. He sounded annoyed, though not truly angry – for which Sam was grateful. He had a feeling it was only for Sam's sake that Michael wasn't getting angry, though.

However, Gabriel had no such trouble getting short with Sam's brother. "Stow your crap, Winchester. There's a lot more important stuff than you and your need to be in charge right now."

"Dean." Sam spoke low and clear, knowing that his voice would grab his brother's attention no matter what else was going on. When Dean's eyes shot over to him, Sam took a deep breath and tried to make himself focus, make the words come that were still so hard for him. "Please… listen. It is.. long story." The sentence was broken and Sam wasn't quite sure that he'd gotten all the words right – they felt right – but judging by the way Dean was looking at him, he must've at least managed to get his point across. This whole thing was one long story and Sam knew he was going to have a lot of explaining to do. He had to fight not to grit his teeth in frustration at the fact that he wouldn't be able to sit and explain it all to Dean on his own. There was no way he would have enough English to be able to tell all of it to Dean and Bobby himself. He was going to have to either let everyone else tell the story for him or he was going to have to rely on them for translation. It was annoying. He just, he wanted to be able to talk. To tell Dean himself instead of relying on other people to tell his brother and hope that they'd be able to say things right and soothe him down the way he would need. None of them understood Dean like he did and they wouldn't know the way to say or do things to make the older Winchester relax.

His broken words seemed to have done the job somewhat, though. Dean deflated just the slightest bit. His eyes, however, stayed a bit hard when they ran over the two archangels still pressed so close to Sam. He was held against Gabriel but he wasn't moving entirely away from Michael, either. Right now he didn't want to be far from either one of them.

It'll be okay, Samshine. Gabriel sent to him over their bond. His grace stroked soothingly over Sam's, the two of the still twined together deeper than normal. We'll help you with this. Your brother will understand, I promise.

Will he? Sam drew in just a bit and tried to let Gabriel's grace calm him down some. Even knowing what he did now, knowing that this was real and this was really his brother and Dean would never hurt him, he couldn't quite break out of the responses that the Cage had trained into him. Especially after going through all his memories like that again. That had brought to the surface things that Sam had been trying so hard to avoid thinking about.

He wasn't the same person who'd first showed up and flinched every single time that someone's voice turned angry. But he couldn't help how he still tensed up when people got angry around him. It was too much a part of him, burned into his very soul. Especially with Dean. That made him a little ashamed of himself. He should know better. He should be able to tell the difference between the two. He should be able to look at this Dean and remember that this was his actual brother and Dean wouldn't do anything that would hurt him like that. It was just… the Cage had liked to use Dean more than anyone else.

Sam was so caught up in thoughts and memories that he didn't notice everyone finding their seats once more. Not until Gabriel and Michael both tugged him over to sit down.

I can do this, Sam thought to himself as he sat down with an archangel on either side of him. I can do this. I can do this. Over and over he repeated that mantra until he felt like he had some semblance of calm once more. Then he lifted his head and tried to smile over at Dean, who was sitting beside Castiel. "We seem to be doing this quite often, brother."

Castiel, wonderful being that he was, immediately translated the words for Sam, who was eternally grateful for it. The little nod that Castiel gave let Sam know that the seraph was willing to play this part. That made things much easier. He knew he could trust the literal-minded angel to translate him word for word without any deviations. It would make this easier.

Well, that had been Sam's hope, at least. He really should've known that nothing was going to make this conversation any easier. Because there was a quite a lot he had to say, quite a lot he didn't feel ready to say. It had to come out, though, whether he liked it or not. And he couldn't force anyone else to tell that story for him. "To make you understand everything, I need to go back quite a ways in my timeline. I need to go back to the beginning. Otherwise it will not make any sort of sense."

Drawing in a deep breath, Sam prepared to bare his soul for the second time today.

Telling the story of the apocalypse – an abridged one, of course – wasn't easy. There were times he had to pause, times he had to lean in to Gabriel or Michael and accept the embrace from them just to settle himself down and find the courage to keep on talking. He didn't leave anything out, though. There was no point. This was his chance to get everything out in the open and he was going to do it all right here and right now. After today, he didn't want to have to go through all of this again. This was just, it was too many times in a row. Seeing some of it in his dreams, then going and sharing it with Michael in a touching of grace – a communion, Gabriel explained to him – that had felt as real as if he'd lived much of it again, and now here, saying it all out loud.

Sam told them everything. When he finally got to the end and spoke of saying Yes to Lucifer, his voice cracked. Gabriel had to step in for him and take over the story.

Stunned was a mild word to describe the way that Bobby, Dean and Castiel were all looking at him. Their emotions were strong in the air around them and they were also written clearly on their faces. It wasn't hard for Sam to see. He closed his eyes, not quite sure he could continue to look at them for the next part of this. He didn't know if he could look at their faces as he told them what had happened to him and the things that had been done, the ways that he'd broken. How could he? He hated just how much they'd seen so far. All the ways that they'd seen him break.

Shuddering a little, Sam curled his hands in his lap, gripping at his pants. There was no putting this off - he had to get it done. "The Cage..." His voice broke a little and he had to clear his throat just to get the words out. "The Cage is not as you think of it being."

"Perhaps it is best if I explain this." Michael cut in. He settled a soothing hand on Sam's shoulder and offered him a swell of grace, the angelic equivalent of a hug, before he looked back at the others. "The Cage was built to contain Lucifer, as you no doubt know. But it was built to contain him alone. It is powerful, yes, but it was tailored to my brother specifically. To his grace. When Sam jumped into the Cage with both my brother and myself, that put two archangels in a place meant to house one, and one human stuck with us."

"Think of it like being a leaf in a hurricane." Gabriel added in helpfully.

Sam nodded. That was a good analogy. He'd sort of felt like that sometimes. Like a leaf being blown around by a hurricane, tossed and turned this way and that, never able to do anything else but go along for the ride. It had left him feeling ripped and battered and broken in so many different ways. And that had been before the Cage had started to reach out for him.

Another little shudder ran down Sam's body. He felt Gabriel's grace wrapping around him in an attempt to keep the memories back and he appreciated more than he had words to admit to. Sam, this is enough, Gabriel sent to him. You can finish this another day. You don't have to do all of this at once, kiddo.

Yes, I do. Sam absolutely had to. If I stop now, I do not know that I will ever be able to make myself continue, Gabriel.

He heard Gabriel make a soft sound and then the archangel was leaning in to press his face against Sam's hair and kiss his head gently.

The little gesture gave Sam just a bit of strength. Enough to keep talking, even if it wasn't quite enough for him to actually be able to look up at them all. "In the Cage, Michael and Lucifer...there was not a lot they could do. It was either fight or talk – and they did both."

"Sometimes at the same time." Michael supplied with an edge of rueful amusement.

Sam smiled and nodded. "Yes."

"Because of our fighting, I'm ashamed to admit it took us a while to figure out what the Cage was doing to Samuel."

"You're talkin' about the Cage like it's alive." Bobby said slowly.

"In a sense, yes, it is. It is designed to torture, Robert. For Lucifer, it was designed to hold him in there, to keep him there and alive, unable to escape the reality of Hell around him." Michael explained. "With the powers of the Cage stretched thin to contain two archangels as well as a human, it made its control over Lucifer and myself minimal, but it was still strong enough to reach out for Sam. It tried to hold him there, unable to escape Hell around him, but instead of forcing him to witness actual Hell it seemed to instead force him to witness the Hell inside of his mind. It would lure him to the corners of the Cage and trap him inside a dream inside of his mind. Dreams that tortured him with as much skill as any of Hell's personal torturers."

"You're telling us it wasn't you two in there with him that did this, it was the Cage itself?" Dean repeated. There was skepticism that was easy to hear in every single word of that sentence. It was practically dripping off the last two words.

Sam knew he had to step in here. Dean would never believe any of it coming from Michael or even Gabriel. He needed to hear it from Sam, even if he still had to listen to a translation of it. But to do this, Sam had to open his eyes, had to pull up out of his head and look over at his brother despite how little he wanted to. Seeing the grief there on Dean's face, the lines of pain around his eyes and the tense line to his jaw, it was like a blow. Sam hadn't wanted to do this to him. He hadn't wanted to hurt Dean like this. I'm so tired of always hurting him. "Dean." He used his brother's name to bring Dean's eyes off of Michael and to him. The pain he saw in them only made Sam hurt all the more. Shoving that down, he cleared his throat and tried to think of the words to say to make his brother understand. "I know it does not make sense to you. But Michael is telling the truth."

"Are you sure, Sam?" Dean asked, once Castiel ha translated Sam's words. "Are you really sure? I mean, dude, you were pretty messed up when you got back…" Unspoken was the thought that maybe Sam had been messed up enough that he might be remembering things wrong.

"I am sure." Sam lifted one slightly shaky hand and rubbed it over his face. He ignored everyone and just focused right on Dean; he needed him to understand. He needed it. "I know the difference between the pain caused by them and the pain caused by the Cage." Memories of Michael's early rage pushed at Sam's mind and he ruthlessly shoved them down. "If it was not for them, I would not be here. They did not do this to me, but it is because of them that I am here with you. They saved me. Lucifer would pull me out of the torture dreams and then, with Michael, they would piece me back together. They gave me grace when my soul started to break apart and they used it to sew me back together. If it was not for them, the Cage would've destroyed me within the first hundred years. They saved me." Sam said softly. He could feel tears building in the backs of his eyes and wasn't ashamed of them. Not for this. They deserved his tears. "They kept piecing me back together, over and over, trying to save me, trying to hold on to me until someone could pull me out. Castiel tried at one point, but he only got my body. I was just a soul, shredded and broken and barely human anymore, but still a soul, and they tried their damndest to keep me alive. But the Cage grabs at you and pulls you in. It builds its tortures and throws you into it, like the biggest of all mind games, and it feels so real you do not even know any better until you are out. I was starting to lose myself to those. They did not… they were not sure if I would survive another. So they poured as much grace as they could into me and then they used the rest to, to launch me back." A few tears slipped free. "They destroyed themselves to send me out of there so that I could live."

"It was worth it." Michael reassured him. He stroked a hand over Sam's hair and cupped the back of his head, smiling at him. It was both strange and familiar to see that smile. "You taught us what it was to be brothers again, Samuel. You taught us how to see the wrongness in what we were doing. We owed you everything. What we gave was a small price to pay."

"And now it is my turn to return the favor." Sam told him. With Gabriel sitting supportively beside him, Sam looked at the other archangel and reached out, hand and grace, to touch him. "You and Lucifer gave yourselves so that I might live. Now it is my turn to give a piece of myself as well so that you both might have the lives that you were supposed to have." It was the least that he could do. He could pay them back for how they'd saved him, over and over again. They had given their very lives for him. Deep down inside, Sam knew he could do no less than the same.

This time, when Sam went to meet with an archangel, he didn't go alone.

His brother and the man who had been like a father to him helped to bait the trap. They prepared at the church and they helped to lure Lilith there, setting up the summoning spell that was needed to draw Lucifer's first demon to them. The presence of the others would've been a glaring beacon that might've set the whole plan off. So the two humans went in, with Castiel to stand guard, and they did their part. They did the only thing they were really able to do. They set up the spell and they summoned her, binding her only seconds after she landed, thanks to a few sigils provided by Michael.

Once she was trapped, it was a simple matter for Castiel to fly the humans out and for Michael and Gabriel to come in with Sam in tow.

Only a brief moment was spared for the Winchesters to say their goodbyes. True to form, they didn't say it in words. There were no flowery speeches about coming back home or making it out of this alive or anything like that. The two clasped one another in a tight hug. Holding his younger brother close, Dean buried himself against him, holding on for what he knew might be the very last chance he got to see Sam alive. If things went wrong, this could be most dangerous for Sam.

When they pulled apart, Sam gave him that same shy little grin he'd been giving him ever since he was a little boy, smiling up at his big brother with all the affection and admiration that Winchesters usually refused to show. "Be safe." Sam said, two words he'd worked hard to know, to be able to say so that he could give them here to one of the people who mattered most in his life."

"You too." Dean said gruffly. Then he smiled, just a small quirking of lips. "Bitch."

Sam's smile grew blindingly bright. "Jerk."

There was another brief hug, one for Dean and then one for Bobby as well. Quiet words were whispered against Sam's ear that no one else around them heard. When they pulled apart, Sam's eyes were shining with the tears that he refused to shed, and he nodded ever so slightly.

Then there was no more time. Castiel took the humans and Sam was left standing with an archangel at either side. He didn't waste time on pleasantries. He didn't bother to say anything to Lilith, or engage any of the questions or snarled out words she sent his way. He simply walked right up through the wards that held her and lifted one hand to her forehead. Gabriel's words and grace inside of him guided him through the gesture as he placed his palm to her forehead and let his powers surge free. Light flashed blindingly bright around them as Lilith, the very first demon, fell dead at their feet. Sam had lived this before and he remembered both the joy that had come next and the horror that had swiftly followed.

This time, he was prepared. This time he knew what killing her meant. He wasn't alone, afraid, thinking about how he'd just screwed the world. He didn't have to hear Ruby taunting him or see Dean burst in, hoping that he'd be in enough time to save him only to discover that Sam had damned them all. This time, Gabriel was there, his hand on the small of Sam's back, and Michael was there, holding lightly to Sam's shoulder. They stood at the side of the room and watched as Lilith's blood pooled into a pattern on the ground that slowly revealed a doorway – a doorway which led to horrors Sam would never, ever forget.

He watched the light rise up and start to fill the room and this time, though it was bright, it didn't blind him. There was no terror, no fear of losing his eyes or his life. No God to yank them out and throw them safely onto an airplane. The beacon of Lucifer's grace rose up out of the Cage and Sam's eyes had the ability to actually see. He saw not just a light, but Lucifer himself, as he was meant to be. The beautiful being that he was when he was free and home, without any vessel.

And when that light reached for him, Sam let it come. He stepped away from his bonded and the one who he privately called brother, and he moved right into that light, letting it wrap around him, shutting out the world. Sam opened up every shield and let his own grace free. He could feel Gabriel gasping behind him as he too was drawn into this, their bond too strong to keep him separate. Grace mingled with grace inside of that church and Sam offered up everything he had and everything he was to the being who had once been destined to use him to destroy the world.

Just as had happened with Michael, there was pain mixed in with this all, pain that came from a part of Sam's grace breaking free, ripping itself off of him and joining the rest of the light. A part of Lucifer that had stayed Lucifer inside of him now broke free to go to the one it belonged to. And Sam felt as it connected. He heard the gasp and then what sounded like a scream. The windows of the church shattered as the sound of Lucifer's True Voice rang free. To human ears, it would've been a horrible screeching noise, blasting out glass and eardrums alike.

To Sam, it was beautiful.

Without a body, there was no way for Lucifer to actually reach out to Sam like this, not in a physical sense. But his grace wrapped itself around the hunter and cradled him close in a way Sam remembered – a way he would always remember. "Thank you." The words echoed around them even as they filled the inside of Sam. "Thank you, Sam."

Another light joined them, the light of Michael's grace, and then Gabriel's as well, both the archangels leaving behind their bodies. They joined into the group and Sam was wrapped up in a sense of security and home that was so perfect his body wept.

He was still weeping when those lights drew back, slow and reluctant, and then shot off towards the sky.

Standing alone in the church with the empty vessels on either side of him, Sam stared up at the sky where the lights had vanished and continued to cry even as he smiled.

They'd done it. Everything he'd gone through, all the pain Sam had dealt with in his life, all of it had brought him here, brought him to this place where he'd had a second chance, a chance to do things right, and for once—he did. He'd done the right thing here. He'd saved the world and he'd saved his family. Both families. Dean and Bobby were safe – Ellen and Jo would be safe now, they would never go to Carthage, never have to die – Gabriel was alive, Michael and Lucifer were alive, and there was no apocalypse. They'd done it. They'd done it.

They had won. They had saved everyone.

Lucifer was home – and, finally, so was Sam.