All evidence had pointed toward Djinn when they had started this case two days ago.

Despite Sam's declining health from the trials, they had packed up and set out for Wamego, Kansas on a lead from Garth of five victims who were reported to have been found near an abandoned manufacturing plant. All five had been in a comatose state with a single puncture wound at the joining of the neck and left shoulder. After a day or two, the victims woke, insisting they had lived another life whilst they'd been unconscious. The only thing that had seemed kind of odd at the time was that all the victims were recovered alive, and no outstanding missing persons reports had been filed in the area since the strange occurences had begun roughly three weeks before.

So when Dean plunged the knife dipped in lamb's blood into the thing's breast only to be met with an irritated hiss and a pair of yellow, reptilian eyes, it went without saying that he was surprised. She wasn't quite the picture of the typical Djinn, either; she could almost pass as human, if it weren't for the freaky lizard eyes and olive toned skin that almost looked tinged green. She was tall-ish, dark brown hair falling down her back in tight waves, dressed head to toe in denim with a black t-shirt and biker boots, statuesque with the profile of a Greek cameo. If she'd been human, she'd totally have been the kind of chick Dean could find himself sharing space with at the end of the night. But man, those eyes. Yeah, that totally ruined it for him.

The creature pulled the blade out of her chest, looking it over calmly before turning eyes like slits back toward the hunter, seeming almost amused beneath the anger at having been stabbed. It reminded Dean of a time years ago, in a particular barn, faced with something powerful and unknown. This particular encounter, however, didn't leave him the slightest bit warm and fuzzy.

Sam was somewhere in the warehouse. He had to take this bitch out before it could get to Sammy.

Only problem was, if a knife dipped in lamb's blood didn't take her out then what the crap was she, and how the hell was he supposed to put her down?

Instinct took over then, and Dean struck out with what he had left, fists and elbows and knees, punching and kicking and writhing with the nameless creature in front of him. The serpent-woman hissed and bobbed and jigged, avoiding and blocking every blow with fluid ease, and it was pissing Dean off. Why wasn't she attacking? What the hell was the deal here?

Suddenly, the thing was in his face, luminous, slitted yellow eyes swarming his field of vision as her cool, dry hands clamped onto the sides of his face.

She hissed something into his left ear, the alien words punctuated by a sharp pain in his shoulder.

Dean felt the fight go out of him then, drawn in as though hypnotized by her gaze, and he found himself falling away from the world, fading to black.


Bright afternoon sunlight broke in through the slatted window shades, just bright enough to be completely freaking annoying.

Dean opened his eyes abruptly, registering the off-white walls of the small bedroom, the not-quite-rock-hard mattress he was laying on and the fact that, rather than his usual t-shirt and boxers, he had apparently slept in the buff last night.

Only, last night...

Dean spun out of the bed, wrapping the thin, striped sheet around himself as he searched the room, looking for something to wear which, oddly enough, presented itself to him in the closet. Every item of clothing he owned and then some hung in a neat rows on the suspiciously colour-coordinated hangers, arranged by colour and style, from plaid shirts to long-sleeved henleys to t-shirts, jeans pressed (pressed? Who the hell irons jeans!?) and neatly hung on the opposite side.

Pausing to file this observation away, he hurriedly pulled on a pair of comfortably worn jeans and, upon cautious appraisal, his favourite AC/DC t-shirt.

Thrown off by the discovery of finding his belongings in a closet he'd never seen before, he took another moment to glance around the room. It wasn't overly decorated, just a few posters on the walls, a night stand and plain lamp beside the full-size wooden-framed bed and a small four-drawer dresser against the opposite wall. On top of the dresser he found his leather bi-fold wallet beside Ruby's knife, both familiar and welcome as he grabbed them and ventured to explore the rest of this place he'd woken in, all while racking his brain to try and remember how he got here.

He remembered Sam arguing his case about going to Wamego with him, that even though Djinn were a relatively simple job, it'd be better to have someone at his back anyway, just in case. He remembered tracking it to an office in the production plant, and then...

Then he'd woken up in a strange bedroom with his crap all over it.

Yeah, this just kept getting better and better.

Carefully, with the demon-killing knife gripped in his hand, blade resting flat against his wrist, he nudged open the bedroom door and crept out into what was, apparently, a small one-bedroom apartment.

The rest of the dwelling was much like the bedroom; sparsely decorated, a few items hanging on the walls that Dean vaguely recognized from the Bunker; a scimitar, a shelf full of old books, a KNAACK locker against the wall beyond what looked like a hand-me-down entertainment centre bearing an old console television and an XBOX. A threadbare beige couch stood opposite the television, a pair of mis-matched chairs flanking it on either side with a rough-looking coffee table at the centre of it all, a few beer bottles set upon it alongside a pair of controllers for the game system and the television's remote control.

To his right, adjoining the living room, was a small dining area with a table and four chairs that looked just as rough as the living room furniture, a folded newspaper and empty coffee cup the only evidence of life in the apartment other than Dean himself. Beyond the table was a sliding glass door that led out onto a small wooden patio. Peeking through the curtain, Dean could make out a small vegetable garden in pots and buckets growing a variety of peppers, tomatoes and some other plants he couldn't identify, as well as a couple of hanging baskets laden with strawberries.

Frowning, Dean stepped back, his stance loosening as he passed the kitchen. He peeked into the bathroom, where he found nothing more interesting than a pair of razors, a pair of toothbrushes and the usual things one might expect to find in, well, a bathroom. Hoping to find something descriptive, he opened up the medicine cabinet and scored when he saw, on the top shelf, three orange pill bottles with prescription labels neatly tacked onto the sides.

Pulling one down, he turned it in his hands until he found the patient name: NOVAK, JAMES C.

Well, he thought to himself, that was totally unexpected. Not to mention really unsettling.

With a frown, he put the bottle back on the shelf (anti-anxiety medication, his mind catalogued absently) and closed the cabinet, making his way back into the living room.

What the hell? So he was at Jimmy Novak's place? If he was at Jimmy's place, what had happened to Castiel? Dean felt a pang in his chest at the thought that Cas might be gone. It wasn't like he had anything against Jimmy, he was an all right guy from what Dean knew of him, but Cas? Cas was something else. He hadn't seen the angel since the guy had beaten his face in and taken off with the angel tablet just a few weeks ago, this place looked way too lived in for it to have only been here that long. There was also the fact that Dean's stuff was here, as well. And Sam... Where the hell was Sam?

Returning to the kitchen, he found his cell phone plugged in next to the toaster (why the hell wasn't it with his wallet? He never let that thing leave his side, what if Sam had called? Maybe Jimmy had plugged it in for him while he was out... why was he out? The Djinn knocked him out... What the hell was going on? Gah, too many questions). Flipping it open, he scrolled through the short list of contacts, but Sam's number wasn't there - just a blank entry with his name and no number.

Weird.

Backing out to the main screen, he hit speed dial one, and nearly dropped the damned thing as Cindy Lauper's Girls Just Wanna Have Fun began blaring in his ear.

What the fuck, Sam? Cindy Lauper!?

"Hello?" greeted a familiar, female, totally-not-Sam voice.

"... Charlie?" What the hell was Charlie's number doing on his speed-dial? Sure, they were friends, but he didn't call her all that often... "Charlie! It's-"

"Psych! Just kidding. I can't get to the phone right now, so, when it beeps, you know what to do!"

"Hey, Charlie, it's me, uh... Dean. Winchester. Um, look. I dunno what the hell's goin' on, but uh... I've got some pretty weird crap going on here, and I think I could use your input. You uh, you haven't uh... n-nevermind. Just gimme a call back, okay?"

Folding his phone closed and shoving it in his pocket, he scrubbed a hand down his face, wondering what the hell he was supposed to do now. He could head out, but he had no idea where he was, and everything was too familiar to just be coincidence.

Treat this like a case, Dean, Sam's irritatingly rational voice advised him from inside his head. First thing's first; figure out what you're dealing with.

"Yeah, thanks. I did that. It just opened up a whole can of worms I don't even know where to begin with!"

Dude, calm down, Rational-Sam-Head-Voice admonished, go take a look at the newspaper on the table. Maybe it'll tell you something, maybe you're working on a case here and something went South.

"I am calm," Dean pouted at the voice, but did as it suggested anyway, picking up the newspaper and glancing over the headlines and the title reading Detroit Sun Times. "Wait, Detroit?"

He frowned at the paper as though it had insulted his intelligence, glaring at it like it might change its tune if he could just intimidate it with scowly facial expressions. The newspaper didn't seem impressed, however, and continued to proclaim the same information it had done just moments ago.

He was just about to drop it back on the table when the date caught his eye; August 17th, 2014.

2014!?

Dean felt himself blanch as he sank into one of the dining chairs, staring at the newspaper like it had just transformed into a nest of snakes in his hand. This had to be a Djinn-dream. Had to be. But why this? Why in some random apartment, in Jimmy Novak's apartment? The last encounter he'd had with a Djinn had been much different. True, it wasn't perfection, but it had at least been a familiar setting.

This, wherever this was, was anything but familiar.

He was just beginning to work up his resolve to find a pair of boots and get the hell out of there when he heard the sound of footfalls climbing up the steps outside the front door, followed by a key turning in the lock.

An unwelcome flutter worked its way through his intestines, holding his breath as he heard the door swing open on the other side of the wall partition separating the living area from the front door. The door shut, sound of another door opening, shoes being shucked off and the aforementioned door closing again.

Dean was still gripping the newspaper in his hands when a familiar figure came into view; white shirt, skewed blue tie, wild, untamed hair and about a day and a half's worth of stubble.

A brief smile flashed across the dark-haired man's face, accompanied by a slightly puzzled expression.

"You're home early," he greeted Dean in that familiar, sandpaper-rough voice - though it was lighter, somehow more relaxed than he remembered. It reminded him of when the other man, who was then an angel of the Lord, had informed him of his intent to become a hunter.

Dean wasn't sure how to respond to that. Home? Early? What? He tried a few words, but none of what he wanted to say seemed to fit on his tongue. He didn't know what he wanted to say; that this wasn't his home? He didn't remember how he'd ended up here? His head began hurting again.

The other man seemed to pick up on his silent floundering, a frown darkening his brow as he pulled out a chair to sit beside the hunter, gingerly prying the newspaper out of Dean's white-knuckled grip.

"Dean?"

Dean became aware that he was staring into the depths of those worried blue eyes, eyes that he had last seen through a fog of pain and confusion. He finally released the breath he had held since first hearing the door and forced himself to try a smile. He hoped it was working.

"Uh, hey," he tried, attempting not to sound awkward, though he was pretty sure he was failing miserably at it, "um, Jim... thanks for uh, I guess..."

He fumbled through whatever it was that was trying to pass off as a greeting or whatever, and Jimmy's eyes grew more and more confused as he continued mumbling near-nonsense. Whatever was going on here, Dean was pretty sure he didn't like it. The other man had pulled back, staring at him in earnest with a mixture of unabashed bewilderment and concern, brow furrowed in a way that made Dean think more of Cas than the man he'd met only briefly years before.

"Dean, stop," he said, leaning forward and taking Dean's hand in his own, then pulling away when the hunter abruptly snapped his jaw shut to stare down at the hands wrapped around his.

Huh, Dean thought to himself as he pulled his own hands back, straightening up in his seat to search the blue eyes that were intently focused on him in contemplation, that was fucking weird.

Jimmy cleared his throat, seeming to gather courage before meeting Dean's eyes fully. The hunter could see hurt there, and perhaps a bit of fear as well. What the fuck was going on here?

"Dean," he began again, hands folded neatly in his lap as he fixed his eyes on the other man's chin, "you... you do remember that... Jimmy Novak is dead?"

Oh. Now it was Dean's turn to stare. What the actual fuck was going on? Djinn dream. Right. But seriously, what the fuck?

"Uh, right... Cas..." he murmured, glancing again to the newspaper. This wasn't making any sense. Djinn venom was supposed to act on the subconscious mind, extracting the heart's innermost desires and all that shit, construct a reality based on that. Maybe he was wrong, but he'd kinda figured if that were the case, he'd be at home with Lisa and Ben, or maybe that weird reality where his mom was alive and Sam was in college and engaged to Jess... but a shitty one bedroom with Cas? Weird didn't even begin to cut it.

Whatever. Sam would find him. That... whatever the hell that creature was... she wasn't killing anyone - it was more like a dine and dash. So, he'd be all right, right? Then again, he did stab her...

"Dean, are you all right?"

Play it cool, Winchester.

Dean flashed his most winning smile at the angel sitting across from him. "Yeah, fantastic. I'm awesome. So, uh... what's up?"

Castiel looked at him oddly, not seeming to buy it.

"Um," Dean continued, glancing around, "so where's Sam?"

The angel's face did this weird flip-flop, his eyebrows shooting up as his eyes narrowed, brow furrowed and seeming to spasm as his mouth worked, as though unsure if he should react with Human Facial Expression #8 or Human Facial Expression #26.

Castiel stood, walking calmly to the little kitchen, keeping his eyes on Dean as he moved around the place like he'd lived there his whole life.

Dean barely registered a flash of red before a stream of cold water struck him dead in the face, leaving him sputtering.

"Wh-what the fuck, Cas!?"

The angel in question merely regarded him contemplatively as he set the squirt gun down, then moved back around the bar, lashing out with quick and precise movements.

"OW! Son of a- dude! Did you just-" Dean stammered, grabbing a napkin from the table and holding it over the shallow nick on his left forearm, courtesy of the silver knife held firmly in Castiel's hand. "Swear to God if you soap me or throw salt in my eyes, angel or not I will fucking punch you!"

The look on Castiel's face went from stolid and wary to simply being sad and concerned, setting the knife down on the counter top and leaning his hip against the ledge of the island separating the kitchen from the dining area, folding his arms over his chest with a sigh.

"Dean," he said again and damn it, Dean was kind of getting sick of hearing his own name.

"All right, I give," Dean huffed, standing from the table and pacing toward the living room, "I have no fucking idea what's going on here. I'm pretty sure I'm passed out on a dirty warehouse floor in fucking Kansas, but knowing my life, fuck! This could be goddamn anything. I mean, fucking hell, Cas - the last I remember it was goddamn 2013 and you were fuck knows where."

Castiel's eyes widened suddenly in comprehension.

"What!?" Dean spat, tossing the napkin onto the coffee table.

"I see," was all his friend could come up with, it seemed. The angel smiled sadly at him, and dammit that just made Dean want to punch his smug face even more than he already did.

"Oh, do you? Because I sure as fuck don't!"

Castiel nodded, staring down at his feet, as though contemplating something profound.

With a sigh, he brought his eyes back up, pausing before he began to speak.

"I think I understand. This will not be easy to hear," Cas said, staying exactly as he was, "it's been a year since Sam completed the trials to close the gates of Hell. A... a lot has happened."

Dean blinked at this. A year? Sam completed the trials?

The angel nodded, continuing, "Sam didn't survive, Dean. The trials... he wasn't meant to. Something that big, something that would have such a profound effect on humanity... There was always meant to be a... a sacrifice."

"What the fuck are you saying to me, Cas?" Dean bit out, forgetting for the moment that this was all supposed to be a dream. "And where the fuck were you when..."

Castiel looked away again. "I made a mistake. I-"

Dean didn't think, just acted, his fist like a guided missile propelling him across the room to connect with the other man's jaw, only...

Cas was an angel, so why the fuck was he now sprawled on the kitchen floor, hand on the side of his face like that'd actually hurt him? Dean was the one who should be in pain after stupidly clocking the celestial being, not...

Castiel just flexed his jaw, smiling ruefully as he pulled himself to his feet, keeping his distance from the angered hunter nonetheless. Dean instantly felt guilt welling up in his gut, mingling with the confusion and the rage.

"As I said," he continued, "I made a mistake. I trusted someone I shouldn't have. I'm not an angel anymore, Dean."

I'm not an angel anymore, Dean.

A shudder coursed through the hunter as he stared at the shorter man in front of him, horrified at the reminder of his last jaunt into the future, to 2014.

"Why are you so fucking calm about this," Dean demanded, fists clenching at his sides again in anger because really, was this fucking real? Sam gone, Cas human, the two of them apparently sharing an apartment together... what the fuck had happened over the last year?

"I'm going to go to the store," Cas said, ignoring the question as he turned away, disappearing into the bedroom Dean had woken up in.

"Hey!" Dean called out after him, stopping as he registered the fact that there was only one bedroom. Did Cas crash on the couch or something? He was human now, so that meant he slept somewhere, right? "What the hell, man? You can't just walk out on a conversation like that!"

The door opened a few moments later, Cas re-emerging in a pair of jeans and Dean's Led Zeppelin shirt as though it were the most natural thing in the world for him to be wearing Dean's clothes.

"Dean, I know you well enough that explaining things to you won't do much good unless you've come to your own conclusions," Cas explained as he headed toward the door, pulling on a pair of fucking Converse of all things. An angel. In Converse. Dean had officially seen it all. "I don't know exactly what is happening, but relax, look around the apartment. I'll be back in half an hour."

Dean had barely registered that the door had closed behind the retreating angel before realising that he took the keys to the Impala from the key hook by the door.

Cas took the Impala.

"HEY! Son of a bitch," Dean swore as he ripped the door open, flying down the stairs just in time to see his Baby being driven off by that fucking dick with wings he'd befriended.

"You scratch my fucking car Cas and I'll fucking murder you," he muttered under his breath as he climbed the stairs back up to the apartment. Not like he had anything better to do.

With a sigh, he stood at the entryway to the living room, taking it in once more. Everything looked thrift-store bought, other than what had obviously come from the bunker. But why move to some crappy little apartment in Michigan? The bunker'd had everything they needed, right there.

Then again, with Sam...

No, he wasn't going to even think about that. Not yet. He knew the trials were kicking his brother's ass in the worst way, but really? They were the fucking good guys, why couldn't they catch a fucking break? They had closed the gates of Hell, if he'd inferred what Cas had said correctly, but the cost just seemed too fucking high.

Damn, he'd thought about it anyway. Sammy...

Dean sat on the couch with a heavy sigh. "Damn it, Sam, it was supposed to be me you fucking moron..."

He scrubbed his hands over his face, trying to decide how to feel. A year ago. It felt so remote, yet it was fresh at the same time. His little brother was gone, so long gone there was literally nothing he could do about it. Sam had sacrificed himself to do exactly what they had been fighting for all those years; a means to an end.

At the end of it all, he supposed he was proud of his little brother. It was a hell of a thing.

Then there was Castiel. What had happened there? Had Cas done the angel trials after his Houdini act with the tablet? And what was up with the pills under Jimmy Novak's name? The thought should worry him, the parallels he was seeing between this... dream? Future? Whatever this was, and the future Zachariah had shown him. At least Cas seemed balanced, from what he saw... he appeared autonomous, doing things for himself, and not clouded in a haze of illicit drugs and alcohol.

Speaking of which, Dean could really go for a drink right about now. Where would he stash liquor in a place like this?

He stood, moving into the kitchen to peek through the cabinets. This place was nothing like the bunker's kitchen, with all its industrial steel, gas-powered appliances and walk in pantry and enormous cold-storage. It was comparatively tiny, the shelves crowded with boxed dry goods and cans, but he found what he was looking for anyway, pouring himself a glass of scotch (and not even the shitty kind, this was like, mid-shelf at least).

He gave in to poking around the place, looking for clues as to what kind of life he'd landed in after the Trials were completed.

On the top two shelves of the book-case were a number of framed photographs; the one of him and his mom when he was a kid stood in front, making him smile. There were a couple of him and Sam that looked like they'd been printed out from one of their phones, as well. He smiled sadly when he came across one he remembered well; him, Sammy, Bobby, Ellen and Jo Harvelle and Cas, just before...

He shook his head, moving on from the painful memory and frowning at two in particular that stood out among the rest that he didn't recognize; One was of him and Cas at what looked like a church gathering - it was older, a stone and mortar building with a high bell tower and stained glass windows. It looked like they were having a barbecue, and in the photo, he was stationed at the grill, Cas smiling and wedged up beside him, far beyond the boundaries of personal space.

The other looked like the interior of a bar, Cas and Charlie seated at a table side by side, and Dean stood behind Cas with his arms wrapped around his friend, resting his chin on the other man's shoulder and grinning like an idiot. What the hell? Maybe they were all drunk or something. He picked the picture up, looking closer at the details. He looked so... happy, like he didn't have shit to worry about and all was right with the world.

The door clicked, and Dean downed the rest of his scotch, setting the picture back on the shelf and moving away from it as though it was something incriminating.

He stepped around the entertainment centre just in time to meet Cas as he was coming back in, carrying a couple of re-usable shopping bags in one hand as he hung the keys to the Impala back in their hook.

"So," he said offhandedly, "you drive now?"

Cas smiled almost shyly, going into the kitchen and setting the bags down on the counter to put away his purchases.

"Yes," he shrugged, "you taught me a few months after I... after my stay here became permanent."

Dean frowned at the sadness in the other man's tone, watching him carefully. "What happened?"

Cas glanced over as he put a box of cereal (some kind of whole grain crap) on top of the refrigerator, a small, mysterious smile on his face.

"It's not really of any import, now," he said, folding the now empty bags and tucking them away under the sink, "as I said. I made a mistake."

Dean scowled, wondering what kind of mistake would cost him his wings.

"What's going on here, Cas?" Dean blurted, all the clues he'd found around the apartment adding up to a big fat X he didn't really want to think about.

Cas shoved his hands in his jeans pockets, leaning a shoulder against the frame of the kitchen entryway and regarded the hunter for a long moment as though contemplating his very existence whilst visually vivisecting his soul. Basically, the usual Cas stare, but for some reason, something in the former angel's eyes made him a little uneasy. He'd loosened up a lot over the last couple of years, but not like this - not so easy and comfortable in his own skin.

"You said the last that you remember was shortly after I left with the tablet?" Cas tilted his head.

Dean nodded, refilling his glass.

"I did return to you, obviously," Dean snorted at this. Thank you, Captain Obvious. "I had been moving from place to place for weeks, trying to stay a step ahead of Naomi and the other angels. They... found me, unfortunately, as did Crowley. It seemed that there were angels working closely with the King of Hell, feeding him information regarding Naomi's search for me.

"I escaped but was seriously wounded, and I found my way to you. It wasn't easy, and you were angry that I had left on such... bad terms with you, and that I had not contacted you in all that time. You found Metatron, and though Crowley had found the prophet and taken the demon tablet, he helped you with the third trial.

"At the same time, I spoke with him and he made a proposition to me; he wanted to seal the gates of Heaven, to put the angels on 'time out'"

Dean snorted as Castiel finger quoted the expression for emphasis, allowing a small smile at the image of all those jerk angels with their noses in the corner. But then, how was Cas still here if he'd completed the trials on the angel tablet? Wouldn't he have been sucked back up to Heaven with the rest of them? Even more, weren't his brothers pretty much all pissed off at him for all the crap he'd pulled up there?

Cas sighed, pulling a glass from the cabinet and pouring for himself, sipping thoughtfully.

"I was betrayed. Metatron stole my Grace and cast the angels out of Heaven. All of them."

Dean stared at the fallen angel as he sipped his scotch, not looking at the hunter. There was pain in the other man's eyes, and an ache throbbed through Dean's chest that he wasn't entirely sure he was comfortable with.

He opened his mouth, a question forming on his lips that felt like a revelation, but was cut short as a loud chime caught him off-guard, echoing through the sparsely furnished apartment.

Cas raised an eyebrow, pushing away from the wall he'd been leaning on and going to see who it was at the door.

"Cas," a familiar voice bounced through the air, "where's Dean? Is everything okay?"

Dean moved to the hallway to greet the fiery redhead, recalling the message he'd left her a little over an hour ago.

"Hey, Charlie," Dean attempted to grin, but after everything he'd had dumped on him in the last hour, he wasn't really feeling it.

A pair of slender arms wrapped around his neck suddenly as he received a face-full of ginger locks. He tentatively wrapped his arms around the petit woman, lifting her off her feet.

"Jeez, you jerk!" she admonished as she pulled back, socking him (girly) hard in the arm. "You scared the bejeezus out of me!"

"What," Dean scoffed, "you never heard of picking up your phone and calling back?"

She leveled him with a sizzling glare, rolling her eyes and turning to Cas.

"Cas, tell your boyfriend if he didn't leave me creepy, cryptic messages I wouldn't have to freak out and drive over here at ten miles over the speed limit."

The look of panic that crossed the fallen angel's face would have been fucking hilarious if Dean hadn't been blind-sided by those two syllables that had come out of Charlie Bradbury's mouth.

"Boyfriend? For fuck's sake, Charlie, Cas is-" Dean stopped in his tracks, staring between his two friends; the odd, inquisitive look of concern Charlie was giving him and the awkward way Cas wasn't looking at him.

Dean covered his mouth with his hand, staring at Cas as the realization hit him, breaking down his wall of denial; the pictures, the single room, the shared closet, Cas in Dean's favourite shirt and driving the fucking Impala...

"Oh, fuck," Dean breathed, and it was a wonder he didn't fucking pass out right there.


The three of them sat at the dining table later that evening, a barely touched box of pizza between them as they sipped their beers, contemplating the situation.

Dean had explained everything at length to both of them; the hunt in Wamego, the creature they'd thought was a Djinn of some type and how it had got the jump on Dean.

In return, Cas had made a fumbling attempt to explain the last year, Charlie filling in where the former angel had been vague. The fallen angel summarized again what had happened after Naomi had caught up to him in a Biggerson's somewhere in the Mid-West, Crowley had muscled in and run her off with a gun made from an angel's blade. He had shot Cas with it, wounding him and taking the angel tablet from where he had hidden it within himself, and when Crowley had left him under the charge of another angel by the name of Ion, Cas had dug the bullet out of his own wound and used it to incapacitate Ion and make his escape (Dean was secretly really fucking impressed at Castiel's badassery).

Dean understood a little better why Cas had taken the tablet after hearing this story; he was trying to keep it safe, and to keep the Winchesters safe from Naomi by hiding it. Just, his choice of words at the time he took it could have been a little less bitchy, considering.

After bringing him back to the bunker to heal and rest, Metatron had found Cas and made the deal to work with him in closing the gates of Heaven, the scribe relaying the tasks of each trial from memory. The heart of a nephilim and the bow of a cupid were the first two items on the list, and Cas bowed his head as he related this part of his story, ashamed that he had shed more blood needlessly for the sake of a plan that, once again, was a huge mistake.

Metatron had also told them the third and final trial for closing the gates of Hell after rescuing the prophet Kevin from Crowley; to cure a demon.

Crowley contacted them days later, telling them that he would kill everyone they had ever saved unless they gave him the demon tablet. At a loss for another option, they agreed in exchange for the angel tablet - though instead of following through on the deal, they tricked th King of Hell, capturing him with iron shackles engraved with demon warding sigils they had found in the bunker, using Crowley as the third and final trial.

Sam performed the ritual in an old abandoned church whilst Dean went to assist Castiel in completing the second trial of the angel tablet. They succeeded, but then were met by Naomi, who told them that Metatron had lied, that he was seeking revenge and that he had not been honest with them about the third trial on the demon tablet; that completing the trials would kill Sam.

Doubtful but cautious, Cas had returned Dean to the church to try and intervene and save his brother, but instead of staying with Dean, Cas had gone to Heaven to confront Metatron about what Naomi had told them. Dean had tried to reach his brother, but Sam was insistant, weighing his own life against the world and coming up short in his own mind, completing the ritual on the King of Hell despite Dean's pleading for him to stop, to not leave him alone.

When Cas found Metatron in Heaven and questioned him about what Naomi had told them, the scribe revealed his hand, trapping Castiel and cutting out his Grace to use as the final component of a spell that would cast every last angel out of Heaven other than himself and then dropping the newly-human Cas in the middle of the woods on the other side of the lake from the church where the demon trials were completed.

It had taken him a couple of hours to circumvent the lake, but he found Dean still there holding Sam's body, the just-cured Crowley dead from a gunshot wound to the head, still tied to the chair in the middle of the chapel with Dean's gun at his feet.

Castiel had stayed with Dean in silence until the hunter was ready to let go, then had helped him burn Sam's body in a pyre on the lake.

They had returned to the bunker, but Dean had proclaimed it reminded him too much of his brother and, in a drunken rage, had tried to set it on fire.

Most of the archives were untouched, the bunker's fire system preventing any serious damage to the structure, but afterward it had been decided that, at least for a while, they should go somewhere else.

That somewhere else at first happened to be Charlie's house in Farmington Hills, Michigan, until about six months ago, when Dean and Cas had decided to try out living on their own like... sort of normal people.

What neither Cas nor Charlie mentioned was when or how exactly the apparently retired hunter and former angel had ended up sharing a room as well as an apartment, but then again, Dean wasn't entirely sure he wanted to know. He and Cas had always been pretty close, like brothers almost. Cas had been there for him more often than not, despite royally fucking things up a few times. But hey, Dean had started the goddamn Apocalypse, so he guessed he really couldn't hold it against the guy.

It was a lot to take in, but he supposed he sort of understood where the shift in their friendship had come from; with Sam gone, and Castiel fallen, Dean would have done anything to occupy his mind, to keep himself going after losing his brother. Cas had been there, had needed Dean as much as Dean needed him - probably more so.

Dean could see himself taking care of Cas, probably being a pain in the ass about it, too. He could see their friendship strengthening and straining over the weeks and months until it reached a breaking point. He had always suspected that Castiel's 'profound bond' with him was something a little more than simple friendship. He'd accepted the angel into the small group of individuals he considered family, which was really fucking saying something about how much Dean liked the guy.

The thing that he had trouble grasping, however, was that he wasn't gay. He never had been, nor had ever thought about the possibility he might be gay. Dean Winchester had always been a ladies' man, a player and a charmer. He'd never even considered another dude before (except for maybe Brad Pitt, or Dr. Sexy, but that was a totally different issue. Didn't count. There's a difference between manly admiration and fawning over some dude like a fifteen-year-old girl).

But then again... things had changed between them during their time in Purgatory, hadn't they? Now that Dean thought about it, they really had. He wouldn't have called it love, or really identify it as any sort of attraction, per say, but there was ... something. Some shift in the way he thought about Cas, the need to reconnect with him at all costs, cutting a path through the desolate forests of Monster Hell to get to his angel and even allying himself with a freaking vampire to accomplish that goal.

When Cas had beat him down while he was under Naomi's control, he had told the angel that he needed him. He had played the scene out in his head a hundred times since then and it did funny things to him. Not like that, ugh. Just... he realised that he had meant it when he'd said it, and the fact that it had impacted the angel enough to make him falter, to break the hold that bitch had on him, it really said something to Dean.

"This is crazy," Charlie said once they had finished swapping stories, "like, Slaughterhouse Five crazy. You think that not-a-Djinn sent you here? Why? And what happened to, you know, current you?"

"Dunno," Dean admitted, feeling numb from the overload of information. "Everyone else she hit woke up after a couple of days, though, so I'm thinking this is temporary?"

He looked to Cas, but the fallen angel seemed deep in thought, not paying attention to the conversation.

"Cas?" Dean prodded, nudging him with his foot.

Castiel's eyes shot open, staring at Dean like a deer caught in headlights before taking a steadying breath.

"I was thinking," he said finally, looking down at his hands, "of what it could have been that you and your brother encountered. I don't remember you telling me of this hunt... of this creature. It's possible that already, something in your timeline has been changed, altered so that the outcome was different. Something like this, I believe you would have mentioned it."

"I don't always talk about shit, Cas," Dean murmured. Like Zachariah sending him on a sight-seeing adventure to the Apocalypse in 2009.

Castiel gave him another one of his sad, private little smiles in response. God, that was infuriating, even if it was nice to see the angel expressing genuine emotion.

"Based on your description of the entity," he continued, "I believe you may have encountered a Naga Priestess. They used to be common in Indonesia and the Middle East, centuries ago. There are still a few that linger, wandering in small numbers. They are generally harmless unless provoked..."

"Oh, great," Dean huffed, "good to know after the fact."

"So it sounds like you just have to camp for a couple of days and you should zap back where you were," Charlie summarized, putting together what both he and Cas had inferred in their assumptions.

Castiel nodded, giving Dean a thoughtful look.

"Well," Charlie said, smiling brightly as she stood, "I should get going. Dean, when you get back, no matter what happens, you better not miss AdventureCon in February. And you better bring Cas, too. Trust me."

With a smile and a conspiratorial wink, Charlie excused herself, leaving Dean alone with the fallen angel his future self had apparently hooked up with.

Dean let out a shaky breath, looking anywhere but at his friend. Now what? How was he going to survive the next few days, constantly under the weight of Castiel's eyes, knowing that the fallen angel saw him differently now than he did a year ago? And how was he supposed to cope with knowing that their friendship had changed into something more? He acknowledged that the potential had been there for a while, but still - it was too much for his manly-man head to wrap around.

"Dean," Cas said, fidgeting with his hands again, "I don't want to make you uncomfortable."

Dean huffed out a quiet laugh, taking a sip of his now-warm beer. "It's fine, Cas. I'm just a little out of my depth here. I crashed into your life, so it's cool. I can uh... I'll crash on the couch or something until things sort themselves out, okay?"

Dean wanted to kick himself at the heartbroken look the suggestion earned him, however fleeting it was. What an ass, Winchester. He had been all Castiel knew of the human experience, his centre in a world where entire dimensions had been ripped away from the once multi-dimensional wavelength of celestial intent. After losing Sam and Cas losing Heaven and his Grace, they had likely grown more dependant on each other than Dean and Sam had ever been.

"If you like," Cas agreed hesitantly, "or I can. It is fairly comfortable, I wouldn't mind."

Dean couldn't help but laugh at this. "Do you ever stop sacrificing yourself for me?"

Cas gave him another one of those minute, shy smiles that he was quickly beginning to love. "No," he admitted, staring down at his hands, "and I never will."

"Look," Dean sighed, running his fingers over the soft bristle of hair at the back of his head, "I don't really know what to make of all this. I'm still not entirely convinced that I'm not just having some kind of monster-induced dream or some crap, but I guess it does raise a few questions even if this is all in my head."

Castiel raised an eyebrow at him, waiting quietly for Dean to elaborate.

The hunter cleared his throat, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt. "Like, I mean, even Djinn can't just, uh, invent stuff, right? I mean, all this has to be in there somewhere if I'm just making it up. You, and me, I mean... I never even really thought about, y'know, us being, uh, us.

"And Sam... God, I can't..." Dean leaned forward, putting his face in his hands. It was hitting home, suddenly. Sammy being so sick from the trials. He knew that it was a possibility, that he might lose Sam after the trials were all finished, but he was too pig-headed and stubborn to acknowledge it. He buried it, ignoring the notion whenever it was brought up because, he couldn't lose Sam. He refused to even conceive of it.

He was surprised to feel a warm, gentle hand on his shoulder, a gesture of comfort that seemed so alien from the angel he knew - the awkward and socially handicapped angel with his bizarre analogies and mixed metaphors and his blunt, formal way of speaking.

Dean surprised himself by putting his hand over Castiel's, gently squeezing long, slender fingers and kind of liking the way that felt.

Clearing his throat, he pulled away from his angel (he hoped not too abruptly... this was awkward enough as it was) and turned to regard him, contemplating Cas the human, the former angel that hadn't turned into a drug addicted lascivious hippie.

"So," he said, breaking the weird silence that had stretched between them, "what does Future-Cas do? I mean, I figure I must have a job or something... but what about you?"

Cas smiled, something in his eyes softening at the change of pace.

"I have a job," he said proudly, seeming to search Dean for approval. "At a pet store. I care for the birds and, sometimes, the cats and dogs. It is a compromise."

Dean raised an eyebrow. "Compromise?"

"You are allergic to animal dander, cats in particular," Cas explained as though Dean was unaware of this. "I've found myself rather fond of cats, so I find that my work is a compromise. Birds are enjoyable as well, though they are quite... noisy."

Dean laughed outright at this, because it was just so Cas. He found himself endeared even more to his friend, and proud that the angel had really seemed to find his place in this world. It was heartening to know that Cas was capable of surviving the loss of his Grace, though he supposed the angel had more experience this time around, not to mention it seemed like Dean didn't have his head wedged up his ass this time, and the fact that the Apocalypse wasn't exactly an issue here, either.

"That where you were this morning, then?" Dean wondered aloud, genuinely curious about the day-to-day life of the fallen angel.

"No," Cas said with a faint flush to his cheeks that knocked Dean for a loop, "I attend a small, liberal congregation on Sundays. I have... offered to bring you as well, but you have always declined, aside from the occasional non-sermon gathering."

"The picture on the shelf," Dean said, "with the barbecue, that was at your, uh, church?"

Castiel nodded. "It's not that I..." he trailed off, seeming to search for the words to continue his thoughts, "I find that it helps to ground me, to remind me who I was in contrast with who I have become. Honestly, it is sometimes amusing to see how scripture has been re-interpreted over the centuries."

Dean felt himself grin at Castiel's frankness. He hadn't imagined the fallen angel putting much stock in churches and preachers after finding out that his Father had turned his back, the Apocalypse and everything else, but he now found himself admiring that Cas stuck with his roots, not letting go of himself despite losing everything, and still managing to keep himself balanced.

The hunter frowned, remembering what he had found in his search for answers when he'd woken up earlier in the afternoon.

"Cas," he said, trying to moderate his tone so that he didn't come off as accusatory, "I uh, I kinda poked around earlier, you know, before I knew what was going on. Uh, in the bathroom... those prescriptions you had under Jimmy's name..."

Castiel's expression turned somber, maybe even a little embarrassed. "Yes. I had no identity after I fell, and for some time you were... inconsolable. I had no other form of identification other than what was in Jimmy Novak's wallet. In retrospect, I wish I had more foresight; my use of his identity did not go unnoticed by authorities."

Dean frowned. "What do you mean?"

Cas smiled, giving a humourless chuckle. "Word of my activities reached Jimmy's family, and Amelia contacted me, shortly after we moved here. She doesn't like me very much, but... I suppose we made a sort of peace with each other."

"So I guess to everyone but me and Charlie, you're Jimmy Novak, huh?"

Castiel nodded, seeming thoroughly embarrassed. "I retain the moniker 'Cas' amongst friends and coworkers. As for the medications..." the fallen angel glanced up without moving his head, and Dean assumed his future self must have had a conversation with him at some point about the other 2014, because he could swear that Cas looked almost ashamed, "I experienced frequent 'panic attacks' after the loss of my Grace. I suppose in my own way I was just as inconsolable as you were. I had lost everything and I was... self-destructing."

Dean nodded, understanding completely. Only, Dean had been there to catch him this time, rather than absorbed in his mission in a world that was ending.

"It was bad, for the first month," Cas continued, picking at his fingernails as though they were the most fascinating things in the world, "but you helped. You, uh, 'talked me down from the bridge'."

"You mean that figuratively, right?" Dean frowned, concerned by the choice of phrase.

Castiel gave him a guilty look, and Dean knew he'd meant it literally. Fuck.

"We're even now," he evaded with a mysterious smirk. "We've saved each other from Perdition. I would not have survived in this new life without you, of that much I am certain. You told me of what Zachariah showed you, of the future before you and Sam stopped Lucifer. I believe it was true, all of it. But you stopped me from destroying myself."

"That's... that's good," Dean managed. What was he supposed to say to that?

Maybe it couldn't be helped, but they'd fallen into an awkward silence after that, neither quite meeting the eyes of the other. Dean had a million thoughts flying through his head at super-sonic speed, fighting to be on the dominant wavelength.

It was getting late, and eventually Castiel went to bed after Dean insisted adamantly that he'd be fine on the couch. He tried not to notice the slightly crestfallen look on the former angel's face as he trudged off to the bedroom alone, having set Dean up with a pillow and an extra blanket from the closet for his night on the sofa.

Dean tried to watch television for a while, feeling exausted but wired at the same time. The thought that whether this was a dream or some bizarre future vision there was some truth to what he was seeing bothered him to a degree. He felt something stir that he hadn't known existed within himself until now, something warm and comfortable and decidedly directed toward his best friend.

It was confusing, but a large part of him wanted to just roll with it. This was a dream, or a future that was still merely one of a hundred possibilities. The players in this pseudo-reality didn't seem to mind where he'd ended up, and judging from the evidence, it was probably one of the best futures he could hope for.

He turned off the television, shifting onto his back and staring up at the dark ceiling, unable to rest his thoughts and sleep.

No one's going to judge you, Dean, Head-Sam provided, adding fuel to the fire already building up within him, why not explore this? I know you're thinking about it.

"Ugh, shut up, Samantha," Dean griped, covering his face with his hands. "And get out of my freaking head."

He sighed, dropping his hands to lay clasped over his stomach. Head-Sam was right, though; he was thinking about it. Thinking about what it would be like to quietly sneak into the room that Cas and his future self shared, to slip beneath the cool sheets and wrap his arms around his angel and hold him close, breathing him in.

The thoughts wouldn't relent, however, and for an indeterminate amount of time Dean just laid there with his eyes closed, wondering 'what if...' and 'how would...' and 'if I...' until, finally, it became too much temptation to ignore. Head-Sam did have a point; there would be no consequences here, no judgement to fear for simply trying, testing his comfort level as it were.

Curiosity is a bitch.

Besides, he was restless. Cas lied about the couch being comfortable.

With a long-suffering sigh, he rolled upright, padding across the soft carpet to the bedroom door. Cas had left it open a crack, and Dean pushed it open quietly, trying not to disturb the sleeping angel.

Faint moonlight seeped in through the window, revealing just enough of the room to navigate by. He stood and watched Cas sleep for a moment, transfixed by how different he looked relaxed in slumber. He thought briefly that he should probably feel creepy standing over his friend's bed, but how many times had Cas done the same to him, looming over Dean waiting for him to wake up?

Dean smiled to himself and gave in because, why the hell not? Cas was curled up on the edge of the bed closest to the window, leaving plenty of room for Dean to pull the covers back and slip up behind him, tentatively draping an arm around the other man's waist.

It was comfortable - surprisingly so, and oddly he didn't feel the slightest bit weird spooning against Castiel's back, the former angel's messy, dark brown hair tickling his nose and smelling faintly of Axe Phoenix.

Cas stirred, tensing at the contact, and Dean wondered belatedly if maybe this wasn't kind of a stupid idea.

"Dean?" the angel asked quietly, his voice thick with sleep.

"Hey," Dean murmured back, "I uh, I couldn't sleep."

More shifting, and Dean found himself face to face with Castiel in the dark, the phantom light casting his face into shadow, though his eyes seemed to radiate with it.

"Is... this okay?" Dean asked awkwardly, wondering if he should give his friend a bit more space.

"Yeah, it's fine," came the certain if a bit puzzled reply, and Dean felt himself relax a bit.

For a long time, they simply lay there facing each other, neither batting an eye or knowing what to say to the other.

You're still thinking about it, aren't you?

Dean sighed, biting back a response because, yeah. He was thinking about it.

He was thinking about it right up until he felt his lips against something warm and pliant and heard the soft gasp of surprise from the fallen angel beside him in the bed, and then he wasn't thinking of anything beyond the fact that it felt awesome.

So maybe Dean wasn't gay, and maybe he'd never even thought about kissing another dude before, but here he was, kissing Cas, his best friend who was once an angel, who was still his angel, and who was kissing him back with enthusiastic fervor. As his angel rolled over so that he was straddling Dean's hips, he thought that maybe, just maybe, he could make an exception here.


(A/N: So, this fic is based on a dream I had the other night (yes, I dream in Destiel. Don't hold it against me - or do, ;) There's one more part which picks up a little bit before the Great Escapist and continues through the finale, which is almost complete. I was going to post it all as one piece, but it got so freaking huge I decided to break it into two parts.

Other notes: The title of this fic is from the Oingo Boingo song of the same name (which I happened to be listening to whilst watching Supernatural in the background before bed, which probably contributed to the ship dream setting sail).

Anyway, I might post part two later today, or I might wait until tomorrow. Don't forget to review and let me know what you think :)
This is totally unbeta'd, so any mistakes are mine and you can't have them! Unless Heaven's Eagle reads this and wants to pick the nits out of it, then she can have them. )