A/N: This came to mind while reluctantly waking up to Glen Campbell's "Any Trouble" playing on the radio. Torture and tragedy. How's that for a good morning?

Disclaimer: Not mine, no money made.

"Hold me like a breath

You can count on me to ten

And any trouble you got will be gone"

ooo

Six long months after they thought they lost Cas, there's a lead, unexpected as a punch in the face. They weren't looking for leads, certain there couldn't be any.

But now they follow one, and another and another, five more weeks, then Dean puts a round in the lock on a heavy door and bursts into a room, dim and cold and empty except for him and Castiel.

There is no need to ask what happened. Every detail of this scene makes sense and explains itself. An angel in a demon's hands, and scalpels and electrodes and whatnot in those same hands, it's a perfect equation. Crowley is a scientifically interested demon.

How does an angel interact with its vessel? Different from demon? If you cut the heart open, will you find a pool of grace? Does consent tie tighter knots? Does it generate power?

Dean stops dead in his tracks for a moment anyway, even though he knows his head, his heart must have been expecting something like this. He sees peeled off skin, muscles and veins and sinews laid bare, as if there were some network of shining synapses and nodes to be uncovered, some secret subcutaneous map that spells out the rules and connections between angel and vessel. Maybe there is. Maybe Crowley found something.

Dean can read this mangled body too, but what he sees is altogether different. He doesn't even begin to tell himself that they can fix this … or perhaps he does, against his better judgement, at first. But stops pretending when he kneels on the cold floor sticky with blood and Cas' bright eyes open to him.

They tell him clearly that there is only one thing he can do to help.

All the years Dean has known Cas, learnt his language and gestures, kick in at that moment. Dean doesn't know, and will probably never find out, if the Leviathans weakened his angel so much, if Crowley found a way to tear his grace to shreds. If he's locked into his human frame by some spell or simply too spent to escape.

Cas doesn't have the words or the voice to explain anymore, and the truth is it doesn't matter. For once, Dean won't mind the whys and hows, and he won't try to buy time or talk nonsense. But just do what Cas needs him to do.

Gingerly, he lifts the angel off the ground, touching skin that's cold but hot underneath, and raw flesh. Cas is quiet, but Dean feels the pain ripple through him. It's the one discomfort Dean will cause him, because he hopes that, for once, he can also lend some comfort.

'I'm so sorry,' he murmurs. 'I'd do anything to go back,' and there's a world of other things he needs to say as well, but he won't do that either because this isn't about his peace of mind.

'It's okay, Cas,' he says, 'Close your eyes,' and pulls the angel blade from inside his jacket. 'It's alright, I've got you now. Just close your eyes.' He isn't even sure why he brought the blade.

Habit. Precaution. Premonition.

He feels a minute movement, and responds, slipping his hand into Cas'. If he weren't looking for it, all senses focussed on it because it's important, the squeeze of Cas' fingers would have been too weak to register. Dean nods. You're welcome, he thinks. Too little, all wrong, and much, much too late, but it's all he can do.

'I'll miss you like hell,' he says.

He feels his lips touch Cas' temple, it's almost reflexive, and it's good-bye. After a moment or two, Cas closes his eyes and Dean feels the desperate urge to do the same, but he forces himself to stay alert, to see this through. He wants this moment burnt into his memory. If it ends up haunting him, all the better.

The moment stretches, because it takes him too long to fit his fingers tightly around the hilt of the blade, quite firmly so he knows it won't slip. One breath. Eyes open.

There's just a quiet gasp when the blade pierces Cas' heart, and then his body finally slips from the grip of pain and icy coldness, and goes calm.

That's when Sam catches up, and that's when Dean runs out of strength to hold back the tears.

Fin.

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