Author's Note: After today's s9 preview of Dean praying to Cas, I came up with this little reunion ficlet here.

Disclaimer: Don't own the characters. Don't really own the plot either because I bet there's a 1000 others just like this.

I'll find my way back

That was Cas' hurried goodbye over a static filled phone called. It happed over a week ago. They've repeated themselves in the middle of the night as you mull over the implications of that statement. The angel…human – you have to correct yourself – had only been at the bunker for a day. Nowhere near enough time to consider it as a place to go back to. So what was he trying to say? The 'ifs' and 'maybes' roll and tumble at the edges of consciousness enough to give you a headache. One, you suspect, will refuse to go away until your friend is found.

He told you to forget about him (as if that were possible) that you should keep hunting with Sam. That you should try and get a lead on what to do about all the angels and maybe Abaddon. All the while, he'll find his way back and then he'll be able to help out.

So you try not to worry too much about him. It's Cas you're talking about here. He might be new to this humanity thing, but he is still a million-year-old - what was it that he called himself? – wave of celestial intent. He can get by a few days on his own.

Try is such a relative term, though. You might have been the one who drove Sam and yourself to a crime scene that could have been caused by Abaddon. You might have thrown in a few questions to the possible witnesses. You might have even made a couple of jokes on the way out in a very Dean-Winchester fashion. But both you and Sam know that you're not really there. Most of your mind is occupied with a constant thrum of Cas, where are you? Cas, do you still know my number? Cas, are you okay? CasCasCasCasCas. Sam doesn't do more than give you his soul-searching glances - God, you hate those so much because can he just not – and does all the questioning himself like a champ.

The both of you are walking to where you had to park the car (damn these big cities with their traffic and small parking spaces and having to walk 6 blocks) when it happens. There is a small gurgle of your stomach reminding you that, hey, you haven't eaten in more than a couple of hours. Stopping at an intersection among the crowd, waiting for the light to give the go ahead (as if you needed a little white man to tell you when cars aren't coming), you spot a diner on the next block. Why wait to get to the bunker when you can have food now? So you turn to Sam, ready to tell him, but the words die in your lungs.

Something else begins to claw at your throat at the look on Sam's face. The thing is, he isn't looking at you. He's looking right over your shoulder to someone behind you with his mouth hanging slightly open. Before you can even think about what you're doing, you are slowly turning around while, simultaneously, reaching for the gun that is hidden under your jacket. A futile thing to do, you realize, when your body has turned and you see who Sam had been staring at.

It's Cas. It's freaking Cas standing there, looking like part of the crowd. His head is up attentively, staring at the light that will grant him permission to cross the street, so he doesn't notice how your entire world is falling apart and coming together in that instant.

You try to say something, anything, to get his attention. I thought that, maybe, you weren't really coming back. I thought that you just lied to please me and you would keep on going on your own way, doing whatever it is angels do when they turn human. Something like that would have been better. Maybe less tactless, but thousands of time less embarrassing then the one barely audible whisper, "Cas." You flinch at how fucking vulnerable you sound and want to kick yourself in the ass.

All forms of self punishment at your display are forgotten when you realize Cas heard you. Instead of turning to you as you expect, he shuts his eyes and hangs his head. What the fuck kind of reaction is that? You watch, in some sort of fascination, as his hands grip the hem the torn up jacket he's wearing and he whispers lowly, "I wish humanity would stop being cruel enough to taunt me with hallucinations."

Hallucinations? Hallucinations!? Oh. Your lungs release the air they were holding in as it hits you. Then the crowd begins to move and he's leaving with them. Not again. Not this time.

You trip over air and swing your arms in an awkward attempt to part the sea of people in your way. He has one foot on the street when you finally manage to latch your arm onto his right shoulder. How fitting isn't it? But there's no time for that either. You turn him and pull until he's pressed to you and you have no other option to wrap your arms around his shoulders and just hold hold hold hold.

He's gasping for breath now, each inhale bringing you impossibly closer causing the exhales of space to be a little painful. So you pull and pull and pull without even noticing that you're not the only one pulling. His fists are balled and drawing you in, two tethering weights sitting on either side of your lower spine. Cas starts saying something. Or, he's been saying something, but your brain is now catching up to your surroundings that don't include Cas and here.

It's odd, having the scrape of another man's unshaven face scratch against your own. But you don't care because your heart has either stopped functioning or has reached a speed so fast that you can't even feel it anymore. And the cause? The rumble of a more felt than heard, rough whispered DeanDeanDeanDean.

You don't know how long the both of you stand there, shaking and whispering and holding and being. However long, it's way too soon when a hand lands on your shoulder with a stern Dean following it behind. So you pull away, only an arm's length with a smile on your face. "Cas, you feel like burgers?"

Dear God, it's like the sun is shining on this man's face because he smiles at you the way a friend should never smile at another friend. "I would enjoy that very much."