Nora walks into work that morning thinking that it's just another day. She opens up the cash register, flips over the "Closed" sign on the door, and starts a new pot of coffee. Steve should be in in about half an hour to do an inventory, so Nora settles down with a book to wait.
Fifteen minutes later, the door jingles and swings open. Nora looks up, expecting Steve's familiar awkward smile, but finds three customers instead. She jerks to her feet, hastily stowing her book under the counter.
The customer in front is tall, with a serene smile and an awkward stiffness to her posture. She wears a business suit, something rarely seen in Rexford, Idaho. The man and woman behind her wear matching slate gray suits.
"Hi, how can I help you?" Nora asks, pressing her hands into the counter and smiling as warmly as she can this early in the morning.
The woman twists her head slowly, movement stilted. "I'm looking for Castiel."
"Who?" Nora leans forward, unsure if she heard correctly.
"Castiel. He's been sighted working at this… establishment." She frowns disdainfully.
"I'm sorry, we don't have anyone named 'Castiel' working here. Maybe you've got the wrong Gas-n-Sip?"
The man on the left's eyes fix on something behind her on the wall. He nudges the woman.
"Levanael," he says, "look."
What's with the weird names? Nora turns to follow the gaze of the customers, and her eyes settle on the row of Employee of the Month photos. Steve, the most recent winner, looks panicked in his picture, smile fake and uncomfortable. Afterwards, he admitted to her that he'd only ever had his photo taken once before. Nora wondered how someone could live for thirty years and only take one photo, but she hadn't dwelled too much on it. Steve was weird. That was that.
The woman – Levanael, Nora assumes – now wears a malicious smile. "You have lied."
"Excuse me?"
"That-" she points at the picture behind Nora, "-is Castiel."
"Who? Steve? I'm sorry, you must have the wrong person. That's Steve." This is starting to creep her out. She only met a friend of Steve's once before, that man in the army boots, and he seemed perfectly reasonable. These guys, on the other hand… There's some otherworldly quality about them, something like what Steve has. Only Steve's eccentricity is warm, comfortable, endearing. This is harsh and foreign.
"Adriel, Seviel, take care of her," Levanael says dismissively, turning towards the door. "I will wait for our brother."
Wait, so now these three are Castiel's siblings? But they look nothing alike. Nora barely has time to react before the other two lunge forward, pinning her against the counter.
"What are you- help!" she calls, fighting back, but their hands are like steel. She doesn't have a fighting chance.
Within moments they've bound and gagged her to her chair. This is no ordinary stick-up, she knows. These three aren't even looking at the cash box. Instead, they keep their eyes fixed on the door, anticipating Steve's arrival.
And he does arrive, punctual as usual. He pushes the door open before he realizes what's happened, eyes skimming the front page of a newspaper.
"Hello, Castiel," says Levanael.
Steve looks up at the word, eyes going wide. The newspaper falls out of his hand. Faster than Nora thought he could move, Steve dives forward. Nora blinks, unsure if she imagined the silver sword suddenly appearing in Steve's hand.
Nora doesn't even have time to register the melee. Swords appear in the hands of the strangers too, but before Adriel can parry his stroke, Steve has his sword buried in her ribcage. Nora must have imagined the flash of light from her eyes. Then she slumps down to the floor.
Steve withdraws his bloody knife like it's no big deal, like he didn't just murder someone. He stands straight, stance defensive, and eyes the other two.
"Levanael. It's been some time," he says, breathing heavily.
"I remember our last meeting well," Levanael says, eyes growing hard and angry. "When you slaughtered thousands of our brothers and sisters!"
Nora tries to reconcile these words with mild-mannered Steve. Her sales associate, the man who can't even afford food and shelter, just killed a woman in front of her.
She whimpers, fighting once more against her bonds. Finally, Steve's eyes alight upon her.
"Nora," he says. She sees a flash of the Steve she knows, confused and childlike, in his eyes. "What are you doing here?"
Levanael takes his brief moment of distraction to attack, and Steve reacts just in time. Seviel dives in as well, punching Steve across the face. The two opponents each grab one of Steve's arms.
"You're growing weak, brother," Seviel says. He laughs. "You puny humans are so incompetent in battle."
Steve just glares, completely ignorant of the rivulet of blood from the corner of his mouth.
It takes a moment before Nora realizes Seviel addressed humanity like he wasn't a part of it.
"You won't get away with this," Steve says finally. He jerks and twists, but cannot break free from Levanael and Seviel. They begin to tie his hands, then his feet.
Nora doesn't understand what's happening, and she doesn't understand who is good and who is evil. But she knows one thing – Steve, the Steve she met, is still under those angry eyes. And he is good. Whatever Levanael said about killing thousands, it must be an exaggeration, or a lie. Nora doesn't know the whole story. Steve would never do that.
(He did just kill a woman in front of Nora. Can anything justify that? What kind of life does this man lead?)
She thought she knew Steve. Sure, he was cryptic about his past, but he seemed good. Innocent. Now Nora realizes she didn't know him at all.
Levanael pushes Steve to the ground and kicks him once, hard. He slumps against the side of the counter. Seviel kneels to tie Steve to the bar. Steve pushes back with all his strength, but it's no use. He is outnumbered and outweighed.
"I'd ask what you want with me," Steve says, voice darker and rougher than Nora's heard it before, "but I suppose it's obvious."
"We're not going to kill you, Castiel," Levanael says, looking at him over her nose like a man in front of a caged animal. She smirks and adds, "Yet."
Why do they keep calling him Castiel? Why does he respond to it? A barrage of memories hit Nora, moments when she'd called out for Steve and he'd taken a moment to respond, as if he'd forgotten she was talking to him. Maybe Castiel is his real name.
What can he have done that forced him to assume a pseudonym?
Steve groans. "I'm bait," he says, and it's not a question.
Seviel's smirk is cold. "Yes, you and that pretty girl tied up over there." He nods to Nora. She shrinks down under those inhuman eyes. "The Winchesters will come looking for you."
Levanael crouches down in front of him, and Nora has to crane her neck to see what they're doing. Levanael pats Steve's coat, coming forth with a phone.
"Seviel, I don't understand these infernal machines," she says, passing it to her comrade. "Find Dean Winchester, will you?"
"They won't come for me." Steve spits blood from his mouth. "They're smarter than that."
"Maybe, but when has Dean Winchester ever listened to logic when it comes to you? You two are always throwing away the rules for each other."
Dean, Nora thinks. Why does that name sound familiar? Oh. Dean was Steve's friend. She'd though he was nice, decent. He's involved with this?
Maybe Steve – or rather, Castiel – worked for the mafia. Maybe he tried to get out.
She wants to scream, to try to escape, but they have those swords, and she's afraid. Nora has never been one to make a bold move. She knows she is going to die right here.
"I'm going to make a phone call," Levanael says, taking the phone and backing towards the door. She nods to Seviel. "He belongs to you now. Don't kill him; remember how fragile these humans are."
Seviel follows her with his eyes as she steps outside the shop. Then he turns to Castiel with that malicious grin. "Oh, Castiel, I have anticipated this for years."
Steve says, "I'm sorry," but it's not Seviel to whom he speaks. He twists his head to meet Nora's eyes. His eyes are still a clear blue, even amidst the blood staining his skin. "I'm sorry you have to see this, Nora."
She shakes her head, unable to say a word, but the tears come silent and ceaseless. She knows what's coming. She sees the knife in Seviel's hand.
Seviel kneels in front of Steve and presses the edge of the blade against his jawline. "You know, last time I saw you, you had the power of half a million souls. Your grace shined brighter than Michael's."
"I'm sorry," Steve says again, this time to Seviel. "I was not myself then. My actions were unconscionable."
"Unconscionable," Seviel repeats, cocking his head to the side. Steve does that too, sometimes, only the way Seviel does it is much severer, much crueler. "An English word, one we don't have in Enochian. It means unforgivable. We never needed that word, for angels do not make mistakes. We follow the word of God. But oh," he says, cutting a thin slice in the hollow of Steve's neck, "you're not an angel anymore, are you?"
Steve makes no sound, but his eyes scream.
"Angels never make mistakes," Seviel continues, "But what you did, Castiel… that is unforgivable. Unconscionable. You will never be able to repent for your sins. When you die, you will go to Hell, Castiel."
Steve inhales sharply, and Nora can't tell if it's due to Seviel's sharp sword or his sharper words.
"I will never forgive myself, nor do I expect you to," Steve says, "but I have already been to Hell and back. I embrace my fate." The last word is bitter, spat in Seviel's face.
Seviel rises to his feet, the movement sudden but smooth. "I would enjoy killing you now, but Levanael has given me orders. And unlike you, I never disobey."
Nora doesn't understand most of Seviel's words, but the mafia theory seems more and more likely. Steve was a part of something, and then he disobeyed, and killed many of his former allies. It doesn't seem like him, surely, but Nora did just witness him kill that woman, Adriel. The Steve she knew was a lie.
Seviel shifts his sword hand, and Steve lets out a guttural caterwaul. Nora doesn't want to see this, doesn't want to know what just happened. Steve pants, low whimpers between each breath.
"I accept the blame for my actions all those years ago," Steve says, "but know, it was not my fault that we were cast from Heaven. That blame lies with Metatron."
Seviel mouths the word, then shakes his head. "It matters not. You're too human, Castiel. For you, the civil war was a long time ago. For us it was the blink of an eye. I still remember the anguish echoing through my mind, the anguish of thousands of angels dying at your hand."
"I felt it too," Steve says. "I still feel it. Every day."
Seviel seems less sure of himself than he did before. He turns to Levanael, on the phone outside the store. Then he looks back at Steve.
"Seviel. Brother. I deserve death. But the Winchesters don't. They never have. They tried to stop me, when I…" His words fade, his eyes unfocusing for a moment. "You know what I mean. Dean Winchester is the righteous man; he always has been. The Apocalypse may be past, but that will always remain true. Surely you remember that. Don't let Levanael kill him."
Seviel frowns, looking again to Levanael. Her back is turned.
Steve laughs softly. "An old friend once told me, 'What you're feeling? It's called doubt.' Accept it, Seviel. Your orders are wrong. God decreed that it was our mission to defend humanity. Yet look at what you have done, Seviel. Look at Nora, tied and terrified."
He nods to Nora, and Seviel follows the gesture with his eyes.
Nora doesn't know how to react; she is terrified. She doesn't understand the context for this, doesn't understand Steve's role, or why they keep mentioning God and angels, but she understands now that Steve is good. He always has been. Even bound and tortured, he's trying to do the right thing.
For a moment, it really looks as though Seviel might surrender. Then, his eyes harden again.
"I follow my orders." Seviel kneels again and drives his sword through the side of Steve's left thigh, pinning it to the ground. Steve chokes, muscles thrashing, but does not scream. The pain is incomprehensible to Nora, yet he bears it.
She cannot imagine what he must have been through to have such a high pain threshold.
"I will be back," Seviel says, rising once more to his feet, "and I will kill you."
Then he strides out of the store, to Levanael's side.
Nora wants to say something, anything. Now that the threat is out of the room, she fights against her bonds, trying to get a hand free.
Steve grunts in pain, his breaths more ragged than before. "Nora. Nora, are you with me?"
She whimpers in response.
"Listen, Nora, I'm going to get you out of this. I won't let them do anything to you."
He shouldn't be comforting her. He's the one with the goddamn sword in his leg.
For a moment there is silence, silence and the ragged breaths of a man in pain.
"I'm sorry, Nora," Steve continues. "I didn't want- I never meant- I thought I would be safe here. I never meant to put you in danger. I'll leave after this, I swear."
The way he says the last words almost makes her smile. He sounds like the Steve she knows again, nervous and shy.
"I know this must be confusing, and terrifying. Just know, Nora, I am on your side. I would never hurt you, or any other human." He leans forward to meet her eyes, then winces as the pain increases. "I'm sorry you had to see this. My life was… my life is violent. I've become acclimated to the gore, but you… you're pure. I wish I could obliterate the images from your mind."
She knows what he means. Nora doesn't think she'll ever sleep after this.
At that moment, Levanael and Seviel reenter the store.
"Dean Winchester says hello," Levanael says, her smile wide and cruel.
"You called him?" There is something underneath the question that Nora can't quite name, something between panic and frustration.
"Of course," says Levanael. "I told him and that bumbling brother of his that we had you bound and gagged. I may have mentioned the torture." Her smile is cold and inhuman.
"They will kill you," Steve says, and it sounds less like a threat and more like a statement of fact.
Levanael smiles serenely. "I should like to see them try."
Seviel leans forward to withdraw his sword from Steve's leg. Steve groans through clenched teeth.
For a moment there is silence, and then Nora hears something new. It sounds… it sounds like Steve is laughing.
Yes, that's it. He starts out quietly, just low chuckles, but they build in intensity.
"What is so funny?" Levanael snaps.
Nora leans forward to see Steve's face. There's something manic about his smile, wider than Nora's ever seen it before. Like he knows something they don't.
"For once, I'm glad I'm human," Steve says, "because I can do this."
He slams his hand onto something on the ground beside him, and Levanael and Seviel both scream.
"When did you- no!" Levanael says, eyes wide with rage.
Nora can't believe her eyes. Right in front of her, Levanael and Seviel disappear in a burst of white light.
Her ears ring in the silence that follows. The store, suddenly peaceful, feels empty without the intruders.
"Nora," Steve says, "are you all right?"
She says yes, muffled through the gag.
"I have a hand free," he tells her. "That's how I was able to banish them. I'm going to untie myself now, and then I'll free you. You're safe, Nora. The crisis is over. They're gone."
She doesn't understand what Steve did, or where those two just went. They disappeared into thin air. A sneaking suspicion had pressed at the back of Nora's mind, a suspicion that those strangers weren't human. They referred to humanity as if they weren't a part of it. And here is the confirmation – what just happened was impossible. But Nora can't ignore what she saw.
She hears shifting, and then Steve rises slowly into her line of vision. He looks worse than she imagined – face bruised and bent, a steady flow of bright blood dripping from the cut on his neck. His blue vest is stained dark brown. He presses one hand to his leg and limps to her side.
"Let me just-" His hands fumble with the knot on her gag, shaking slightly, slippery with blood. He curses under his breath.
The gag slips from her mouth. "Who were they?" is her first question.
Steve works on the ties around her hands. "Once, they were my brothers and sisters. Then, my enemies. I wronged them greatly."
"But you're sorry for what you did," she says. "I heard you. Why did they try to kill you?"
He shakes his head, unable or unwilling to say. "I never meant to involve you in this. I will disappear, I promise. No one will threaten your life again."
But he's still Steve, the best sales associate she's ever had. He is quiet and kind and endearingly awkward. He doesn't know how to work a slushie machine.
Nora can't reconcile that Steve with the bloodied, war-torn man in front of her. She never understood how old those blue eyes were, how much horror they'd seen.
"Your real name, it's Castiel?"
"Yes." He nods, looking up briefly to meet her eyes. His gaze is even, boring deep into her skull. Those eyes were innocent before, but now they are deadly. She just saw him kill a woman and obliterate two more.
"I can see why you went with Steve." She laughs, because this situation is just too weird to process. She just watched her coworker be tortured by something inhuman.
Then it occurs to her… "Are you human?"
Steve finishes untying her. Goal completed, he slumps against the counter, as if all the energy has dissipated from his muscles. Nora understands why. He has gone through too much pain this morning. It's a wonder he's still functioning. But then again, it seems like danger is a regular occurrence for Castiel.
"I am," he admits, as if ashamed of the fact, "but only recently. I was once one of them."
"And they are?"
"Angels."
"Angels," she repeats. But after everything she's heard today, Nora finds the existence of angels surprisingly easy to accept. "You were an angel?"
"Since the beginning of time." He frowns, wrinkles at the corners of his mouth.
The man she worked beside for the past month, the man who babysat her daughter, was an angel. A child of God. Nora's purview is too small to recognize the enormity of this. It is too grand, too immense for her human mind.
"But angels are good," she blurts, "and they tried to kill you."
He shakes his head. "Any hierarchy can be corrupted, even the hierarchy of Heaven."
"I'm sorry," Nora says. She stands up from her stool, rubbing her sore wrists. "It's just too much to process."
"I understand. Even the most seasoned hunters have difficulty believing in angels. Take your time."
"So you were an angel. But that other man – that other angel – Seviel, he talked about a betrayal. And now you're human?"
"It's complicated," Steve sighs, "and I don't have the time to explain it all. I need to borrow your phone. They took mine when they…"
"Disappeared in a flash of light. Can you at least explain that?"
Steve points with one weary hand to the floor where he'd been bound. "That sigil there, it banishes angels. I've most likely sent them somewhere in the South Pacific. They won't be back for some time, and I'll be long gone."
"Magic. Magic exists too?"
"The world is much larger than you think it is. Don't stress yourself with making sense of it." Steve pushes himself up onto the counter, and props his injured leg on the stool. "A phone, please."
Nora doesn't hesitate any longer. She shoves the phone into Steve's hand, and then goes to find a first aid kit."
When she returns to Steve's side, he is talking to someone on the phone.
"Yes," Steve says, sounding mildly annoyed. "Yes, I'm fine. Levanael exaggerated the extent of my injuries." He pauses as the person on the other line speaks. "I banished them both." A smile plays on his lips. "Yes, I thought of that too. Fortunately, I did not have to carve the sigil into my own skin this time." Nora isn't sure what to make of that. It sounds painful. "I am safe, and I have my sword. I won't be caught off-guard again."
Nora opens up the first-aid kit. Terrified though she may be, she knows to keep a level head. Steve has injuries that need attending to, and that is something she can do. She begins to wipe the blood from his jaw.
Steve glances at her uncertainly, recoiling slightly under the sudden touch. When he sees what she's doing, he relaxes. "Nora's fine," he says into the phone. "We're both fine. Yes, I know. I understand." He waits for a long moment. "Fine. I'll see you soon. Thank you."
Steve clicks the phone off, then sets it gently on the counter beside him.
"That was Dean?" Nora asks. She picked up on enough of Levanael's words to understand that. Whoever Dean is, clearly he's involved in this.
"Yes," says Steve. "Levanael contacted him. I had to call and ensure him of my safety. He worries too much."
"Is he coming here?"
Steve nods. "I will be leaving with him. It is too dangerous for me to remain here."
Nora frowns. He'd said he was leaving before, but she didn't want to believe it. Steve is her friend, dangerous though he may be.
"I thought…" He takes in a deep breath. "I thought I could leave behind my life, and start fresh here. I understand now that I am too deeply entrenched in Heaven's politics."
He talks like Heaven is a real place. Then, Nora realizes it probably is. It's probably his home, if he is a former angel.
"And Dean? Is he an angel?"
Steve smiles softly. "No. But he and his brother were under my protection, long ago. Now I am under theirs. Now that I am human, they are my family."
"Dean seemed nice. When I met him. Are you two…"
Steve frowns momentarily, then his eyes clear in understanding. "No, we are not. He is like my brother." The frown deepens. "A better brother than Seviel, anyway."
Nora reaches to clean up the cut on his leg, but Steve pulls away.
"Thank you, but Dean and Sam can take care of that one. They know plenty about stitching up wounds."
She doesn't press it. Nora isn't sure she wants to learn how, or why, Steve's friends are so good at first aid. Instead, she goes to the door and flips over the "Open" sign. No more customers for today.
Steve's eyes remain fixed on the window, waiting expectantly for his friends. Nora has more questions, a thousand more, but she refrains from asking them. Steve is tired and hurt. He looks defeated.
Nora wonders what it must be like to have lived since the beginning of time, to see the world turn and die with each passing eon. Humanity must have looked so small to him, and now he is one of them. She wonders what choices led him to a Gas-n-Sip in Idaho. How can he, a celestial being, possibly be satisfied with the job of a sales associate?
There is something indomitable and unconquerable in his eyes. Nora wonders how she didn't see this side of him before. Steve may be human, but Castiel is not. He is, and always will be, an angel of the Lord.
They wait together in silence for Dean to come, and for the world as she knows it to crumble.