This is my very first modern day fic. I used to write Star Trek TOS fic in the dark ages...on a TYPEWRITER...before there were any other ST series! ;)

I wanted to fill in that missing time period when Cas broke his foot. Although some hilarity ensues it's mostly
pretty dark, but then it had to be to leave things canon and make sure Future!Cas was still the same when Dean
arrived from the past in "The End". Please read and review. I very rusty at this, so if you see anything that needs
correcting please let me know. I had asked several friends to edit for me, but they have been busy and I wanted to
get it out here.

I have also just figured out how to edit the text in the Chapters, so I'm going back now and making things a bit easier on the eye.

PROLOGUE

"Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.
He guards all his bones; not one of them is broken." (Psalm 34:19-20)

Apparently not, I thought as I recalled the verse from the human Bible. It was a long fall from "I am Castiel, an Angel of the Lord"
to simply Cas,drug addled wreck of a man with a damn broken foot…yet here I was lying alone near the fence surrounding
Camp Chitaqua trying to figure out what had just happened. I had only a second to think about it before I passed out.

I had perched high up a tree in the deer blind that Dean had adapted to a Sentry Post. I removed my boots and socks for
comfort thinking nothing would be coming this time of day and pulled out the joint that I had brought along for entertainment.
I had been up here day after day and nothing ever happened, probably the reason Dean always sent me instead of the more
valuable men in camp. A noise startled me and I dropped the joint, seeing something moving along the fence. Not thinking
about the fact that I had no shoes on...I never had to as an Angel...I jumped down the 30 feet to the ground rather than taking
the makeshift ladder as the humans did. I had done that many times before when there was some Angel "mojo" left, but
apparently the humans knew something I didn't, the human body wasn't made to endure such a fall without injury.
The sickening crunch of the bones in my right foot and the resulting breathtaking pain told me I was completely…human?

Human…I turned the word over in my mind as I fell to the ground, unable to support my weight on the now useless foot…it
sounded strange to be thinking of myself in that way, and it was then I realized that my slow fall from Grace was nearly, if not
completely, finished. Something I heretofore didn't think twice about doing had suddenly made me realize I was now at the end
of my journey from Heaven to Earth. Things seemed to be moving in slow motion as my forehead made contact with the capacious
mineral formation at the base of the tree. Um, should probably just call it a big rock if I'm human was my last thought and then
everything went dark.

"Cas! Wake Up! There are Croats out there and we have to get back to camp!" I heard someone say nearby and I felt a hand
on my shoulder shaking it frantically. I opened my eyes, but they refused to focus, my head pounding like it had after I went on
my first "bender" many years ago. The voice…I couldn't quite place it…it was female…"Risa?" I said. "Yes, it's Risa Cas! Now you
have to get up!"

What she couldn't see, was that my foot, hidden from her view under my left leg, was now turning lovely shades of deep red
and purple and was about twice its normal size. As I moved to reveal the damage her eyes widened, but not nearly as much as
mine when I saw the foreign "thing" that that had taken the place of my foot. How could this once powerful Angel of the Lord
have been reduced to such a predicament?

I tried to stand, but was unable to put any weight on the offending appendage, and promptly slipped back to the ground. Where
were my damn wings when I needed them? I thought angrily, and the forgotten need for some chemical relief came roaring to the
front of my consciousness. The drugs, booze, and women had been my refuge when it first became apparent that I wasn't going
to be able to save Dean from finally becoming the "burnt and broken shell of a man" that I had once thought he was. Now they
were just part of my everyday existence, a way to dull the pain of simply living…if you could call what I had been doing lately as
living. Oh, for a hit of the joint I had left up in the deer stand.

Risa knelt down on my left and wrapped my arm around her neck to help me up. "Oh Father, what have I been reduced to?" I thought,
before realizing again that He hadn't cared in a very long time. I rose, carefully avoiding putting any weight on my foot and my head
swam, dizziness taking over where the pain was the only thing I felt before. Somewhere in the back of my mind the word "concussion"
stood out, something Dean had mentioned before that humans got when they hit their head hard. As I wobbled I distantly heard Risa
yell, "Cas! Don't pass out on me now! You have to stay with me. I can't get you back to camp without some help!" I tried to summon
the small flicker of my Grace that I could still feel inside me, and felt my head clear slightly, but I feared that this small act was the last
thing my Grace would ever do.

She shouldered most of my weight as I leaned heavily on her, and we slowly made our way towards camp. I hopped as best I could
on my one good leg, but I knew that my contribution to this endeavor was very slight. As we neared camp she yelled out, "Help guys!
Cas is hurt! I need help getting him into his cabin." With that I promptly passed out again as I felt several hands pick me up and
carry me to my bed, much the same way I had once conveyed Dean out of the Pit.