The television show "Supernatural" is copyrighted by Warner Brothers Entertainment, Inc. This chapter contains dialogue excerpts from the episode, "On the Head of a Pin."

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Zachariah raised his eyebrows. "I'm sorry, were you giving the orders here?"

"He has just begun – just begun – to forgive himself for what he became in Hell. It is – " Castiel flailed for words – "it is simply wrong to thrust him back into that nightmare."

"If Heaven requires it, it's not wrong."

"I thought that our superiors had work for Winchester. This will destroy him, and how will he be able – "

"Perhaps this is the work our superiors have for him. All I know is that my superiors gave me my orders. Which they got from their superiors, which they got from their superiors – Do you understand what I am saying?"

Castiel stared at him, trying to believe it, and Zachariah flipped a hand at him dismissively. "But since it upsets you, you don't need to be a part of this." He looked over at the grim figure near the door. "Uriel, find Winchester and take him to Alastair. Supply him with anything he asks for."

"I beg your pardon, sir," Uriel said, "but I can't do it. Winchester would rather be tortured himself than take an order from most angels. He will only do it if Castiel requests it."

Zachariah's head snapped around and he glared at Castiel. "What was that?"

There was no point in trying to hide the flash of feeling at this point. "I'm – very sorry."

"What was that?"

Zachariah wanted him to say it out loud, and perhaps he should. Castiel took a breath. "It was pride."

"Pride in what?"

"When Uriel – said that my charge trusted me enough – that he would only do this if I requested it – I felt pride."

"Yes, you did." Zachariah slammed a hand down on his desk and leaned across it. "Do you even understand how far you've gone? How close you are to falling?"

"I have always," Castiel said with just a trace of anger, "always been an obedient servant of God and my superiors."

Then he lowered his gaze away from Zachariah's. "But – I must admit that lately – I have had – questions."

"Questions. Would you like us to bring God into the office so He can explain Himself to you?"

Castiel bowed his head.

"If I may, sir," Uriel said, "I don't believe that this is unprecedented. It is my understanding that not infrequently the most able of us are the most susceptible to doubts."

"Of course they are!" Zachariah snapped. "Lucifer was brilliantly able. Do you think he doesn't recognize ability? Of course his forces focus on those of us who would be most valuable to them, and set up situations where they can work to turn our best warriors. Castiel likes humans. Therefore his emotions and his – " Zachariah hesitated, then spat out the word – "caring for his charges will be his weakness. Emotions are doorways to doubt, and they're just waiting for Castiel to walk through. How do you think Anaciel started? How do you think Lucifer himself started? All they had were a few – " he looked at Castiel directly – "questions."

Castiel sighed deeply, then looked up at Zachariah.

"You are correct, of course," he said. "I hadn't realized myself how I have endangered the Host."

Zachariah just looked at him for a long moment.

"From now on you will be Uriel's aide. You are to follow his orders explicitly and completely. You will persuade Dean Winchester to get the information we need out of Alastair, however that needs to be done." He looked over at Uriel. "You will report to me both about the mission and about any – questions your aide has."

"Yes, sir," Uriel said.

They knew that the Winchesters were on a road that led to Cheyenne, Wyoming. They moved the devil's trap and Alastair to an old meat-packing plant outside of town. Because it was a good a place as any to wait until they knew exactly where the brothers stopped, Castiel and Uriel sat on the roof of the state capitol just in front of the domed tower, watching the lights above and below. Below it was mostly street lights – it was late at night, humans were letting their bodies go dormant, and there weren't many cars moving.

Castiel breathed deeply, an effort to banish the feeling that he'd been kicked in the stomach. It was not only Zachariah's right to demote him, but he had been correct in doing so. For what Castiel had done, the punishment could have been worse – although thinking of what lay ahead, he almost thought it couldn't be.

"I am sorry, Castiel," Uriel said.

"For my demotion? Don't be. Zachariah was right. I have been – closer to falling than I'd like to believe."

There was silence for a moment.

"I don't understand why a pedestrian mind like Zachariah's is allowed to hold sway over – "

"Don't," Castiel said.

"I'm not being emotional. He has a pedestrian mind. I don't understand why Heaven's structure is – why he should – "

Castiel glanced over at Uriel with the faintest hint of a smile. "Are you testing me already, Uriel?"

"I am not. You know what I think of our leadership. We spoke of it once before."

"We did. You thought it was possible that one of our brethren had betrayed Matthias and Ezekiel to the demon."

"I still do. An angel betrayed angels. While mud monkeys ravage and despoil the Earth and Lilith breaks seals unchecked. And the most forceful response they have is to humiliate you. Castiel, to me, injustice is rampant in both Heaven and Earth."

"God's ways are hard to discern."

"If they are God's ways."

Castiel felt a faint thrill of fear. "Uriel, you – are you questioning the Plan?"

A moment's hesitation. "I'm questioning the implementation of the Plan. I'm saying that I wonder if Michael and Raphael would recognize the Plan if our brother Lucifer expended his last ray of light to illuminate it for them."

In the last four hours, Castiel had tortured a bound prisoner, seen the body of a murdered comrade, been demoted, and been ordered to take part in something that he was sure would destroy his charge. At any other time, Uriel's declaration would have shaken him deeply. As it was, he only frowned a little, cocked his head, and looked at Uriel to ask a question.

"The Winchesters have stopped," Uriel said suddenly.

They had, two minutes ago. Castiel had been putting off this moment.

Uriel was listening. "Room 18. Let's go." He put a hand on Castiel's arm, his voice now the commanding officer's rather than the confiding friend's. "Let me explain what needs to be done. You stick to wheedling Winchester."

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Again Castiel felt that sense of betrayal from Dean, as though he'd expected more from Castiel. And Dean picked up very fast on the change in his and Uriel's status. Dean refused, of course, and Uriel allowed him only one refusal before touching him and taking him to the room outside the devil's trap.

Don't leave Sam alone, Castiel thought as the three of them vanished, Don't underestimate Sam.

He didn't say it out loud, so perhaps he was partly to blame for what happened later.

But Dean's emotions, as the hunter looked through the small round window in the door that led to Alastair's prison, almost battered Castiel physically: terror, disgust, betrayal, righteous anger, shame, and below it all a desire for sadistic vengeance. Castiel was having a hard time keeping his energy masked and his vessel upright, so warning Uriel to go back, bring Sam, and keep an eye on him was very low on the angel's priority list.

Dean demanded to speak to Castiel alone, and Uriel grinned and said something about going to seek revelation before he left.

Dean asked why Uriel was now in charge, and Castiel forced himself to look directly at Dean. "I was getting too close to the humans in my charge. You. They feel I've begun to express emotions, doorways to doubt." He could not look into that honest, angrily astonished face; his gaze shifted again. "This can impair my judgment."

Dean went over to stare through the window again as he said, "Well, tell Uriel or whoever – you do not want me doin' this. Trust me."

"Want it? No. But I've been told we need it."

In a small voice, "You ask me to open that door and walk through it, you will not like what walks back out."

If Castiel had been human, he might have reassured Dean – this would upset him, of course, but he would be the same man afterward that he'd been before. But Castiel knew better, and couldn't lie. "For what it's worth, I – I would give anything not to have you do this."

Dean turned back to Castiel, and his gaze fell on a cloth-covered gurney with one object on it, an iron rod. "That the official Angel Torture Instrument?"

Castiel swallowed. "I've been told to supply you with – whatever you require."

Dean looked at him suddenly, sharply. "These angels who were murdered, they were all from your garrison?"

Castiel nodded. Then he realized what Dean was thinking and the desire to say something swelled in him until he thought Jimmy's heart would burst. Don't do this to repay or protect me, Dean. Don't even use that as an excuse.

But he said nothing.

Dean sucked in a sharp intake of breath. "OK, then. Start with the basics." He put the demon-killing knife on the gurney. "Salt."

Castiel opened a large black cabinet standing by one wall. It was empty, but Dean didn't seem even slightly surprised when Cas pulled out of it a large box of salt.

"Holy water, a big jug. A ritual goblet and, yeah, just a regular glass. Three scalpels, different sizes, one with a dull edge. Syringe." Then he shook his head, businesslike. "Three syringes. They thrash around and break the points off. Couple yards of four-aught double-loop chain. Two – no, wait – " A smile that, although brief, made Castiel shudder with remembered revulsion. "Four large fishhooks and a spool of fishing line. A bolt cutter. Heavy duty work gloves . . . "

.

Castiel understood basically the human concept of sarcasm: Say the opposite of what you mean in a rough enough tone and (most) other humans will understand that you mean the opposite. Dean used this form of expression often enough that Castiel was beginning to understand when it was used, and he'd saved one of Dean's sentences to use it himself someday and surprise a human with his ability to be sarcastic. However, either the occasion hadn't arisen or the sentence had fled his mind at the time.

Now, though, listening to Alastair moan and bellow in the next room, feeling the cracks that rage and cruelty were putting in Dean's soul, himself demoted and shamed and soul-battered from beating a chained prisoner, as he looked up at flickering sparking lights and felt a familiar presence at his back, Castiel heard Dean's sentence roll into his mind pat:

That was exactly what this day needed.

"Anna," he said.

"Hello, Castiel."

She was using human speech, and he glanced over his shoulder to see a brittle doe-eyed woman with long red hair. "Your human body – "

"It was destroyed, I know. But I guess I'm sentimental. Called in some old favors, and – "

She broke off as Alastair gave a full-throated scream.

"You shouldn't be here." Castiel tried to put iron in his voice. "We still have orders to kill you."

"Somehow," she said softly, "I don't think you'll try."

Anna wanted Castiel to stop the torturing immediately. She was sure that it was not God's will, merely the will of some high-ranking angel.

Castiel argued. He had to. Because if God disapproved of the orders, and wasn't quickly and decisively correcting the archangels, then it meant that God had indeed withdrawn from Heaven. It meant that angels had no more idea of God's true intention, of God's Plan, than humans did, and that the fear Heaven had felt for so long was justified. Either God had ordered torture, or God was not the leader of Heaven, and in the moment when Anna broke off to hear Alastair strangling on blood, Castiel realized that he didn't know which would be worse.

"The Father you love – you think He wants this?" Anna's quiet voice had the force of hammer blows. "You think He'd ask this of you? You think this is righteous?"

She told him that he was feeling doubt – which apparently made that opinion unanimous in the celestial dimension. She was telling him that the orders were wrong and that he could rebel against them, and he wanted to so badly –

Then it occurred to him: Satan doesn't tempt you with things you don't want. You are tempted by things you want desperately.

"You can do the right thing," she said, laying her light hand on top of his. "You're afraid, Cas. I was too. But together, we can – "

"Together?" He threw her hand off and broke away from her persuasive voice, her pleading gaze, to stare through the window at what Dean was doing to Alastair now. "I am nothing like you! You fell! Go."

"Cas."

"Go." The threat in his tone was real, and she went.

Then there was the sound of Alastair bellowing again. The feeling of Dean's soul starting to warp, nothing like as mutilated as it had been in Hell, but beginning to twist in the same patterns.

Half an hour later, Castiel was beginning to feel as if he himself were being tortured. Alastair still hadn't broken, but Dean's soul was battered to the point that Castiel was seriously considering finding Sam.

Then he heard Uriel. "Castiel, report to me."

He fought down a quick flare of anger. Uriel had forced Dean into this situation, and now couldn't even bother to be present where the horror was taking place.

But to be honest, it was Zachariah's order, which Uriel was merely implementing. And Dean had expressly urged Uriel to leave. And Castiel had to control his emotion; he had no desire to be demoted again, to fail, to fall.

He found Uriel in the middle of a park, where their privacy was guaranteed by the nighttime and the bitter cold. "I am here, Uriel."

Uriel, who had been pacing, stopped and looked at him. "I felt I should tell you that I requested permission to kill Sam Winchester."

Castiel's breath stopped and he went completely rigid. He was so shaken that his vessel was reacting. Control. Control. They're only humans. Their lives are over in the blink of an eye anyway.

Uriel looked at him for a moment, and Castiel simply looked back.

Then Uriel said, "I was refused."

Castiel began breathing again.

"Then I requested permission to kill that demon whore Ruby."

That was far more understandable. She'd been useful in finding Alastair, but Castiel didn't for a moment believe that she was feeding and training Sam for the benefit of humanity.

"I was refused again."

Castiel raised his eyebrows. "Interesting."

Uriel dropped down on a park bench. He was having difficulty masking his own emotions, rather to Castiel's (well hidden) satisfaction. "You've always understood how the minds of our superiors work better than I have, Castiel. Sam is filling himself with arrogance and demonic power. He can be nothing but a pernicious influence on Dean, who our superiors claim is so important. And Ruby is – a demon! We kill demons! Regularly! Why are both of them protected? Can you explain this to me?"

Castiel sat beside him. He was sensing brutal waves of guilt from Dean, but he needed to make this clear to Uriel while Uriel was in a listening mood.

"I can only speculate. Sam is very important to Dean, the only living member of his family, a younger brother he has protected throughout his lifetime. If Sam were to be killed, the spiritual stress on Dean would be profound – certainly more profound than any pernicious influence Sam may have by cultivating his powers. Recall that Dean sold his soul when Sam died before, in order to bring Sam back to life. If Sam were to die again – particularly if Dean ever suspected that Heaven was behind it – " Castiel tried to imagine it himself, and failed. "I can have no idea what Dean would do this time. Particularly since his soul is being damaged as we talk here. But whatever he would do, be assured, it would not be of help to Heaven."

Uriel thought about it for a moment, nodded reluctantly. "And Ruby?"

"I don't understand that myself, Uriel. I can only assume that our superiors want Sam to be strong. Ruby is – helping him develop his strength."

Uriel looked at him. "They want the Righteous Man's brother to be filled with demonic strength."

"As I say, this is merely speculation."

"Something is very wrong in Heaven, Castiel."

"I do – I wonder – I understand how you could feel that way." Castiel stood. "But we should go back now."

"Castiel, I want you to know – I realize that this, that our use of Dean in this matter, is distressing to you. To me – " Uriel shrugged – "they're all savages, just one breath from torturing or killing their neighbors, and you must know that their history agrees with me. I don't believe that torturing the demon who tortured him is going to be that shattering to Dean. But I know you believe it, and it distresses you, and it was never my intention to drive a wedge between us."

"You haven't done that. I know the original orders weren't yours. But I feel that the fulfillment of those orders requires me to return. Are you coming?"

"Not just yet. I may have – communicated my feelings somewhat frankly with our superiors. I should communicate again and – and – "

"Mend a fence."

Uriel looked up. "What?"

"It's a human expression. Call if you need me again."

When he got back to the room next to the torture chamber, Alastair was talking. Not screaming, not murmuring taunts through a blood-filled mouth, just talking loudly in his normal sneering tone, and for a moment before he got to the windowed door, Castiel hoped it was all over.

How had Alastair got free?

For one second, Castiel simply didn't believe it. Somehow the devil's trap had broken. The demon-killing knife lay on the floor and Dean had been beaten bloody. Alastair, his vessel pale and gory from all it had undergone but at full demonic strength, was holding Dean by the throat with one hand, suspending him in the air, strangling him.

Castiel materialized next to the knife, scooped it up and struck, but Alastair sensed him and turned, dropping Dean and throwing Castiel back.

Except for Lilith, Alastair was the strongest demon Castiel had ever fought. He'd beaten some very tough customers over the centuries, but it wasn't five minutes before Alastair had Castiel slammed onto a hook on the wall, his arm dislocated so that he couldn't lift it to Alastair's head. Alastair began the Latin chant that would send Castiel back to Heaven, and Castiel was fighting it when Alastair suddenly flew away from him, pinned against the opposite wall.

Sam Winchester, his hand extended, moved to the middle of the room from the doorway radiating calm.

Ruby must have used her magic to let Sam find them, and her blood to give him preternatural power. Sam glanced down to be sure Dean was breathing, but didn't even spare a look at Castiel, who wrenched himself free from the hook and healed his shoulder and back as Sam asked Alastair, "Who's killing the angels? How are they doing it?"

"You think I'm going to tell you?"

"Yeah, I do," Sam said in a conversational tone, and turned his hand as though he were turning Alastair's guts inside of him. The demon's eyes went white, he made sounds deep in his throat, and for the first time since he'd been in the devil's trap he did not look like on some level he was enjoying this.

It took Sam less than a minute to wrench the truth out of Alastair. ("You have to enjoy it to inflict maximum pain," Alastair had said.) Sounding as if the words were being forced from him by someone jumping on his stomach, Alastair gagged out: "Lilith is not behind this! She wouldn't kill seven angels! She'd kill a hundred," and with fantasizing pleasure, "a thousand."

Sam dropped his hand. Alastair, as if indulging a petulant child, told Sam to go ahead and exorcise him. Sam smiled frighteningly. "I'm stronger than that now. Now I can kill."

Castiel stared at him, remembering Sam's exhaustion and nosebleed after his battle with Samhain. There was none of that now. He extended his hand again and closed his eyes, as if he were meditating. Alastair's head slammed back against the wall, his eyes bulged, and he gasped. Sam opened his eyes and gave Alastair another chilling smile; light bled from Alastair's whole body; they could see his vessel's bones by it. The room shook. With a blinding orange flash the vessel crashed dead to the floor, its eyes still bulging, and Alastair, the terror of Hell itself, no longer existed.

Sam caught a quick breath, met Castiel's eyes, and looked away, but in that instant Castiel could read, under Sam's brief abashedness, a steadier smugness: I did it, and none of you could.

But then Sam looked down at Dean and everything else became secondary as he knelt beside his brother.

Castiel dropped down on Dean's other side. The greatest concerns were two blood clots, and he healed them quickly, Sam looking between his face and Dean's with anxiety. A broken rib had punctured and collapsed a lung; he healed the rib, healed and reinflated the lung. He put his hand on Dean's head where there was a concussion, and as that healed Dean came back to consciousness. Castiel re-secured three teeth that had been loosened.

"Stop." Dean raised his arm to bat Castiel's hand away. "Don't."

"Dean, he's healing you," Sam said.

"Tell'm to stop." Dean's mouth was so bruised that his words were coming out slurred. "Where's Alastair?"

Cas and Sam exchanged a glance. Castiel said, "Dead."

"Good f'r you." Dean struggled up to one elbow and stared Castiel in the face, the stare more disconcerting because one of his eyes was swollen shut. "He tol' me."

Castiel cocked his head questioningly.

"The firs' seal. He tol' me. Is't true?"

Alastair had told Dean that Dean himself had broken the first seal on Lucifer's cage. That explained the waves of guilt he'd sensed from Dean during his meeting with Uriel. His hesitation gave Dean the answer.

"God." Dean covered his face with one hand.

"Dean?" Sam said. "What about the first seal?"

Somehow Dean lunged to his feet and the other two sprang up also. Castiel tried to support him and Dean waved him away again. "Help some'ne who d'serves it."

"You deserve it, Dean," Castiel said. "And you need it. You still have considerable blood loss, deep tissue bruising, two broken ribs – "

"Anna partridge inna pear tree." Dean was heading for the door. "I said lea' me alone."

"Dean, you're not leaving until Cas heals you," Sam said flatly.

Dean leaned against the wall. "You don' know, Sammy. You don' know. Lea' me alone."

"Don't know what?" Sam yelled, and Dean slid to the floor unconscious.

"Heal him now." Sam was giving an order to an angel.

"He will not die. And he doesn't want me to."

"Who cares? Do it anyway."

Castiel looked at him directly. "Are you so far gone that you've forgotten the human need to pay penance?"

Sam's gaze dropped, then met Castiel's again. "Maybe so. But at least I'm not so far gone that I force someone into a place where they pay penance by getting the life beat out of them."

Now Castiel looked away.

"You know what, fine." Sam went to Dean and took his wallet. Dean groaned and tried to sit up again. Sam stood and looked at Castiel. "You can get him to Cheyenne Regional faster than an ambulance. He'll be a John Doe you found beaten up and robbed near the hospital. When I get there I'll be a tourist looking for my brother." He picked up the demon-killing knife and stashed it in his jacket. "And then we'll talk about the healing thing again. And a few other things." His gaze swept the room. "Like how two angels manage to screw up a straightforward devil's trap."

With a ferocious bang, he slammed the door open and left.

Dean stood, shakily. "Where's he goin'?"

"Ahead of us. We'll see him soon." Castiel pulled up one of Dean's arms, eliciting another groan, and draped it across his shoulders. Dean tried to pull away, but the angel easily won the strength contest, and the two of them disappeared from the torture chamber.