Staring down at the paper, Dean wished things were different. It wasn't that he didn't understand the charms, or the spells, or whatever else they were asking of him. He wasn't as smart as Sammy, but he wasn't an idiot either. His problem was the complete distance that the Men of Letters took from their world. They looked at the monsters and they studied them – heck, maybe they'd even send a hunter out if things got really bad – but they never took control for the people.

Dean set his pen to the paper and started etching out a sigil in the space provided. Across the hall he saw Ash leaning back in his chair with his hands held behind that haircut of his. Of course Ash was already done; Dean thought with a curse, Ash was top in the class. Luckily, Dean didn't seem to be the only one struggling with the exam they had been set. Two rows down and one row across, Jo Harville was biting the end of her pen and staring at the expanse of concrete wall like it might give her the answer. It wouldn't – Dean had already tried.

By the time the clock at the front of the hall had struck twelve, Dean had answered all the questions that he possibly could without causing an aneurism. Sammy was better with the exam stuff, Dean thought glumly. Once the papers had been collected, each row was dismissed one at a time, meaning that Jo stood and filed out, shooting a worried wink Dean's way. He smiled back with a bite of his lip, and followed her out once his row was told to stand. He grabbed his satchel from the back of the room, and walked through the double doors.

The second he reached the main expanse of hallway, noise and relief hit him like a gust of wind. Within a second he heard small groups chattering about the answer to question 4B but he couldn't remember if he'd answered that one, so he did his best to ignore them. Ash met him by the main stairwell with a smug look on his face, which Dean hit away with the back of his hand. Ash laughed out loud.

"Shut up, man," he warned before Ash had even had the chance to brag. "Can we just go?"

"Went that well then, huh Winchester?" the weedy boy grinned. Ash was a certified genius, and allowed to attend the Academy purely out of smarts. It was people like Ash that belonged in the academy – not high school drop outs like Dean.

"I did enough to pass," he hoped out loud.

"That makes one of us," a familiar voice chimed from where the owner was head-butting Dean's arm. Her pretty blonde hair looked ruffled, as though she'd run her hands through it one too many times. Dean tweaked her chin with a sympathetic smile.

"Cheer up, Harville," he smiled. "We've still got the Lore paper to go,"

"Shit," she groaned, and followed Dean towards to the rec-room. Ash spotted a girl with dark hair and a tattooed arm, before winking at Dean and dropping back to talk to her. Beside him, Jo looked glum. "I'm sorry, I know I don't have anything to worry about. My mum won't mind if I fail, but you… Daddy Winchester won't be too pleased-"

"Thanks Jo, I know," he interrupted her. "I wonder how Sammy's getting on," he turned the subject.

Jo pushed her way into the rec-room, fighting past much taller and worried looking sixth years. They'd be taking their final exams within an hour, and seal their fate within the Men of Letters forever. Neither of the fifth years envied them at all. Dean followed Jo as she took place in a green leather seat next to a book shelf. As if anyone read in the rec-room other than Dean's dorky little brother.

"Sam'll be fine. It's only his second year exams and he's probably done better than me," she looked miserable again. "It's not like he'll get chucked out if he can't average at a 5.6 at least,"

"My dad wants me to hit 7," Dean sighed. Jo sucked in breath as though the thought hurt.

John Winchester was a renowned man of letters, as was his father, and his father before that. Being a man of letters was expected of Dean, it was in his blood. When his father had married a mere hunter it had brought shame onto the Winchester name, but his father had reasoned – if the children can be good fighters as well as good thinkers, it'll make them better Men. So far, Dean had not obliged the thought. He'd dropped out of school, joined the academy at sixteen, and even five years on, he wasn't in the top 10% of his class.

Dean liked to fight – that was the problem. He fought with his father about attending the academy, he fought his teachers when they told him that he just wasn't trying hard enough, and he fought the older kids who called him an idiot. Dean Winchester was not an idiot, but he wasn't one of them.

"You not eating?" Jo commented as she pulled out a chicken wrap. Dean shook his head.

"I'll grab something later," the girl stared at him with an eyebrow arched at him. It wasn't often that Dean Winchester denied the opportunity for food. "I'm just not hungry,"

"Yeah, okay," she laughed.

A tall girl entered the room. She had long dark hair that was tied aside in a braid, and her eyes were fixated on Dean.

"Pamela's looking at you again," Jo pointed out. Now it was Dean's turn to laugh. Pamela was a psychic in the year above them, and was about to sit her final exams. She had the brains to help her go far, but if that failed she could just read the smarter kid's minds – that was probably why she looked so confident. Dean was about to reply to Jo just as Pamela walked over to him. Her heels must've been against uniform regulation.

"Dean Winchester, how'd the exam go?" she smiled at Jo as she took the chair opposite them.

"Don't act like you don't already know, Pammy,"

"I hate it when you call me that," she informed him with a kind smile. "So do you think you passed?"

"Who knows?" he sighed.

"You going to Rufus' later?" Rufus' was the bar in the centre of town, and this evening the majority of fifth and sixth years took it upon themselves to celebrate another exam finished.

"Nope," Dean shook his head.

"Jo?"

"Too young," Jo didn't actually turn twenty one for another few weeks.

"Shame," Pamela smiled. "It would've been nice to see you," and with that she jumped up, winked, and went over to a new group of friends.

"She likes you," Jo pointed out.

"I guessed,"

"Why're you not going to Rufus'?" Jo asked him. Everyone had assumed that Dean would be going, but in truth his father was home for the evening, and hadn't been in weeks.

"No reason," he lied. "I just didn't fancy it.

The bell rang to signal the next period, and Jo and Dean watched all the worried bodies walk down towards the exam hall with a smile. Pamela was at the back of the group and shot Dean an anxious grin. Everyone else looked like they were going to vomit. That wouldn't be them until next year – if they were allowed to stay on – Dean thought thankfully. Finally, Jo stood.

"You don't have class?" she asked him as she threw her bag over her shoulder. Dean shook his head.

"We've already taken the damn exam for the subject, I don't see why I should go and learn about what I didn't know during the exam," he growled, making Jo smile as she walked off without complaint. She knew Dean, and she knew that sometimes he just needed to do what wasn't expected of him. Dean watched her go, thankful that she hadn't pushed him.

The rec-room was blessedly silent as lessons started, with only one boy in the corner scribbling into a small book. Dean took the time to pull out an old journal that he'd found amongst his mother's possessions and flip through the pages. It was a hunter's journal – thick and leather bound, with the pages doodled, crossed out, and messy. None of this organised knowledge crap. When he came to the pages that hadn't been filled in, Dean flicked to the front again, starting to flip through once more.

On one page, Dean saw his mother's artistic recreation of a wendigo, with a scribble besides denoting it as "rare, but dangerous". Most of his revision of lore came from his mother's old journal, and so it was that thought that kept him feeling guiltless as the time passed by and he reread pages on vampires and ghouls.

However, Dean had the sneaking suspicion that none of his professors would see it that way. Outside of the room Dean heard voices growing, coming towards him. Being the headquarters for the Men of Letters, people walking around wherever and whenever was not unheard of, but it was the voice itself that made Dean look up. He recognised one of the two.

"All is well, then?" a deep gravel of voice asked. Dean stuffed the journal into his satchel and jumped from his chair.

"Yes Castiel," another voice replied. This voice, Dean recognised. It was Professor Singer. Sure enough, just as Dean reached the door to exit the rec-room in attempt to jump out without being caught, the Professor reached it, leaving Dean jumping back into the room in case he'd been seen. Professor Singer made an audible sigh before popping his head into the room, right beside Dean's face. "Mr Winchester, don't you have class?"

Dean went to shake his head, before the older man grabbed the scruff of his shirt and pulled him forwards. In a whisper barely escaping the side of his mouth he growled, "Don't show me up, boy. There is a damn angel here," before dropping Dean with a smile. Dean nodded, Bobby was a close friend of his dad's, and if Dean managed not to embarrass him in front of one of God's messengers, then Bobby might not tell his dad about him skipping class. He winked.

"No sir," Dean started. "I've err… been assigned to the gym for this study period," he spoke innocently, a childlike smile lighting up his face. Bobby stepped back with a nod, ready to turn back to his angel friend and continue their tour, but something must've been amiss, because with the sound of a whipping sheet, Dean felt a presence behind him, rather than behind Professor Singer.

"I'd like to see the gym," the deep voice spoke. Air brushed past Dean's ear, making him shiver from the proximity. He'd heard that angels didn't understand human boundaries, but this seemed silly.

Slowly, Dean turned to finally see the owner of the voice. He was shorter than Dean by the smallest fraction, and everything from his messy hair to scruffy tie spoke "out of work teacher" over "angel of the lord", but the colour of his eyes insisted that he was from heaven. Dean nodded, wanting to shuffle back from the angel, but being caught between the wall and Professor Singer.

"I'd err… love to show you?" he asked of Professor Singer, who looked mildly alarmed but nodded anyway.

"Of course," Bobby said. "That's fine, follow me," he gestured for the angel to step forward, and as he did, the older man shot one angry look at Dean and followed suit.