"Whoa!" Sam exclaimed as the young demigod slipped from his chair. He and Dean caught Percy just before he could fall face-first onto the floor.

"What the hell just happened?" Dean demanded from no one.

Sam shrugged, just as clueless as he was. "I don't know."

They carefully placed Percy back onto his seat, shifting him to where he wouldn't fall off again. Once that was sorted, Sam and Dean took refuge by his side. That's when Sam saw the bruises on the demigod's neck. "Dean."

His brother moved in to get a closer look. "Son of a bitch." He reached out and gently touched the marks, before raising his eyes to meet Sam's. "This has to stop before it gets even more worse."

Sam nodded in agreement.

Thankfully, Percy chose that time to come back. He softly moaned, shifting his head to either side. Ever so slowly, he lifted his head, his glazed sea-green eyes looking at Sam and Dean.

"You back with us yet, kiddo?" Dean quietly asked.

Percy made a face, then shook his head to clear away the cobwebs. "'M good," he croaked. He winced at the sound of his voice, then cleared his throat and tried again. "What happened?" He asked, probably sensing the tension that had risen up in the atmosphere.

"That's what we wanted to know." Dean leaned back in his chair.

"Percy, what's going on?" Sam queried.

The teen shrugged his shoulders, looking as lost as the Winchester brothers felt. "I don't know," Percy replied. "All I know is that one minute I was here with you guys, and the next I was in this abandoned factory."

"Wait, hold on," Dean raised his hand, stopping Percy. "You were in a factory? When? You've been here the entire time!"

Percy sheepishly dropped his gaze to his lap, rubbing his hand through his messy hair, almost like in a nervous behavior. "Tartarus zapped me there, or more likely, my mind," he softly confessed.

Sam felt his brother's eyes on him. He raised his gaze to meet Dean's and gave him a warning look that implied, Don't go too hard on him. He feels guilty as it is.

Dean exhaled slowly. "So what? Mr. Big and Bad sends you to Narnia without the wardrobe, talks to you for a couple minutes, then sends you back when I'm still talking?"

Percy flinched, almost as though the words that Dean spoke had physically punched him in the gut. He continued to stare into his lap. "Well, when you put it that way..."

"Percy," Sam calmly said. "Dean wasn't being angry, he just wanted to make sure that he had all of the information."

"Yeah." Dean's tone softened. He got out of his chair and knelt in front of Percy. "In case you haven't noticed, Perce, we actually do care about what happens to you when you sleep, or whatever that was just now. We just need to know that you're okay." He cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Besides," he added with a cheeky grin. "If your friends found out that we did a crappy job of watching out for you, they will most likely kick the shit out of us."

That got a half-hearted chuckle out of Percy. "Well, you got that right," he answered. "But it's really Annabeth you need to watch out for."

Dean shivered. "No offense, dude, but your girlfriend seriously freaks me out."

"Hold up." Sam couldn't miss this golden opportunity to tease his big brother. "You're actually admitting that a girl, who's younger than you, scares you? That's new."

Dean opened and closed his mouth like a fish out of water before finally finding his voice. "I'm not scared... You're scared."

"What?" Sam and Percy asked in unison.

"Shut up." Dean grumbled. "Bitch." He turned to Percy. "You too, Nemo."

"Jerk," Sam retaliated.

Percy made a face. "Why am I Nemo?" He defended. "Why not Squirt or Crush?"

Sam and Dean stared at him, making Percy blush.

"What?" Percy innocently asked.

"Could you be more gay?" Dean asked. Percy tilted his head a little in confusion, making him look like a baby seal. Dean shook his head. "Never mind."

"Finding Nemo's a great movie!" Percy insisted.

Dean sighed and looked up at the ceiling, as if blaming the gods that it was their fault. Sam snorted at their antics. This was quite entertaining.

***********

About an hour later, after the three boys had dispersed into their own direction, that found Sam in his room, reading, Percy had come up to him. After their little chat, Percy had said that he wanted a shower, leaving Sam and Dean to their own devices. Dean had left, claiming that they were running out of beer and first-aid supplies.

"Thanks to Trouble Magnet, Number 2," Dean had complained to Sam. Sam just shook his head at his brother, a small smile forming on his lips. So Dean left and Sam went into his room and started to pick up where he left off in Harry Potter: The Half-Blood Prince, to which Sam found ironic. Then, Percy entered.

Sam raised his head reluctantly. He was almost at the part where Snape killed Dumbledore. He winced at the spoiler and focused his attention on the knock from his door. "Come in."

The door pushed open to reveal Percy, standing in the doorway, fiddling with his pen.

"Hey, Percy," Sam greeted, placing a bookmark in his book and closing it, setting it aside on the nightstand. He sat up in his bed. "What brings you here?"

"I was wondering if this place had like a practice arena, or something," Percy replied, not moving from his spot in the doorway.

"Uh, yeah." Sam gestured to the corridor. "Go down the hallway, take a left, then keep walking straight. First door on your right."

"Thanks," Percy commented, looking around Sam's room. Almost as if he was avoiding his gaze.

Sam nodded and reached for his book. He opened it and read the first paragraph before he realized that Percy had yet to move from his spot, his body tense.

"Percy?" Sam placed the book down again, slowly as not to startle the demigod. "Is there something you want to tell me?"

Percy took a second to actually meet his gaze, then sighed and dropped his eyes back to the floor. He bit his lips before blurting out, "What if there isn't a way for me to get any sleep again? I mean," he added, flustered and started to pace, "I already feel like I'm going crazy. What if I'll always be tortured by Michael and Lucifer?"

He messed up his already messy hair as he paced back and forth, his breaths coming in too fast for Sam's liking. Sam stood up and stopped the him before the demigod hyperventilated and pass out.

Sam grabbed Percy's shoulder on the next time he passed him. "Percy!" He exclaimed. "You are going to pass out if you keep this up."

He gently but firmly pushed the pale-faced demigod onto his bed, then crouched down in front of him. "Breath," he calmly stated, making sure Percy's breathing got under control.

It took a few minutes, but thankfully Percy's breathing began to even out. Sam took this time to study the demigod sitting before him, then spoke. "I don't want to press my luck here, but..." Sam trailed off, hesitant on what to say, but only for a second. "But, I feel like that's not the whole thing. Is it?"

Percy sighed, shaking his head and shoving his pen back in his pocket. Sam waited patiently as Percy gathered his thoughts and tried to explain. "Whenever I'm, uh, when I'm asleep, I get tormented by Michael and Lucifer," he started.

"Yeah." Sam nodded, encouraging the teen to continue, trying to fit the pieces of the puzzle together.

"But recently, I, um," Percy stammered. "I've been having these visions about my friends...about you and Dean."

Sam was silent, thinking back to the time of Azazel and his "special children"; how he had come into the night and fed his blood to six-month old babies. But he knew that situation was different from Percy's dying and bringing brought back to life.

Sam gazed at Percy, who was fascinated by the loose threading on the blanket. The kids looked like hell, if Sam was being completely honest. Dark rings contrasted with the pallor coloring Percy was currently wearing; his shoulders were hunched over, as if he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. But it was his eyes that really caught Sam's attention-and that really made him worried.

Now, Sam's only seen Percy's sea-green eyes light up faintly a few times since he's been with the brothers, but even those moments were rare. Currently, the sea-green eyes were dull and listless. But it wasn't the only thing that Sam saw-it was how broken they looked. Sam knew for a fact that Percy's eyes were nothing like that when they first met, so it had to be before Percy received those visions.

Sam was brought back to reality when he heard a soft whimper of pain, coming from in front of him.

Percy.

A wave of guilt crashed into Sam, making his heart break when he turned his attention back to the demigod. He shifted and moved to sit beside him on the bed when Percy started to massage his temples.

"What if this is my punishment?" Percy softly inquired.

Sam's brows furrowed in confusion. "What do you mean?"

Percy removed his hands from his forehead before responding. "I can never save my friends."

Sam waited to see if Percy would explain. A few seconds later, Percy continued. "Last summer, there was a battle in Manhattan. And this was the first time that I've been in a war."

Percy closed his eyes, composing himself while he got his thoughts together. Sam patiently sat by him, knowing how Percy felt.

"We lost a lot of good people," Percy softly spoke, breaking Sam's thoughts. "And I couldn't do anything to help them." He paused, letting the information sink into Sam's brain, then continued. "Then three months ago, there was another war where I lost too many people that I cared about." Percy's eyes welled up. "I had thought that when I died last month, I could maybe find some peace." He chuckled bitterly. "But I guess Tartarus wanted to give me more crap to deal with, so he brought me back, where I have nightmares about being tortured by two freaking archangels."

Before Sam could blink, Percy shot up from the bed and started to pace again in front of him.

"My mom always told me that angels were supposed to be these graceful guardians that protected us, not vengeful and hostile," Percy all but exploded. "I mean, yeah okay, maybe I don't know every little detail about capital G, God or Heaven or angels, or whatever, but I never once thought that angels were world-class jerks!"

Sam nodded in understanding. He remembered when he first met Castiel and how ecstatic he was about meeting an actual angel only to find out that they were basically dicks. Well, Uriel was. Castiel got better throughout the years.

"Believe me," Sam heard himself say. "At first, I thought that the angels were douchebags when I first met them, but over the years, Dean and I befriended one of them, who turned out to be an outcast like us. We're basically family now."

Percy studied him for a long time, then gave him a small, yet hopeful, smile in return. "That's like me with the Seven. Except only more-"

"Abnormal?" Dean's voice finished. Sam and Percy turned to see the older hunter leaning against the door, smirking a little.

Percy rolled his eyes, grinning a bit more. "No, I was going to say-"

"Supernatural?" Dean inquired, wiggling his eyebrows.

Sam chuckled at Percy's slightly annoyed expression.

"I don't have an angel in my family," Percy responded.

Dean's jaw dropped. He stared at Percy before flickering his eyes to Sam, who shrugged in reply, feeling relaxed for the first time in years.

"How's that got to do with anything?" The older brother finally found his voice.

Percy shrugged his shoulders. "Well, you brought up supernatural," he retaliated. "And I just wanted to clear things up by saying that you have an actual supernatural being as a friend."

Dean mulled over the thought in his head before nodding in agreement. "Touché."

Percy walked over to the door. "I'm going to head down to the arena," he informed, taking his pen out again and fiddling with it.

Sam nodded. "You remember where to go?"

"Yeah," the demigod answered. "I'll come back for lunch."

"Okay," Sam replied.

"Be careful," Dean added, as Percy walked away.

Sam couldn't see Percy, but no doubt the teen had thrown a mock salute to the older Winchester. "Yes, mom."

Now, Sam thought. Time to ask some questions.

"So, Dean," Sam casually piped up. "How long have you been standing there?"

He didn't need to explain. Dean knew what he was talking about. "Long enough," he vaguely replied.

"Let me rephrase," Sam corrected himself. "How much did you hear?"

This time, Dean took a little longer to respond, like he was contemplating on telling Sam how much of the conversation he overheard. "When Percy was talking about the two wars he's been in."

Sam nodded in reply. In the silence, he could faintly hear the sounds of a sword hitting defenseless dummies.

Catching his eye, Dean grinned. "Wanna go see Percy beat the shit out of those dummies?"

Sam wanted to say no, that they should leave Percy alone and give him some privacy. But then he remembered how the teen fought off the hellhound when they found him and curiosity got the better of him.

Sam looked up at his big brother and grinned back. "Why not?"