Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural and as such am not making money for having written this.

Season finale week! Are you freaking out as much as I am? Well, here is your next angst filled chapter. We're going to learn a bit more about what Cas is going through. Thanks to those of you who continue to read this and especially those of you who took the time to review. Enjoy. :)


Castiel awoke to see the grey interior roof of the truck above his head which meant that, for some reason, he was lying down. Whatever he was lying down on shifted beneath his neck and Meg's face appeared above him.

"You're awake? Good, you can stop using me as your pillow," Meg said before unceremoniously pushing Castiel from her lap and he rolled to the floor like a bag of rocks.

"Meg," Dean said, sternly.

"What? I can't even feel my legs anymore!"

"Well, technically, they're not your legs."

"Still annoying," the demon muttered, rubbing them.

"We left the rest stop?" Castiel asked, climbing back to his seat behind Sam.

Lucifer, now having taken on Bobby's form, appeared suddenly in the empty space between Castiel and Meg so he was sitting wedged between them. While Castiel expected Lucifer in any form to look at the demon Meg with some sort of fatherly, loving affection, the man was staring at the demon with the lowest bit of disdain that Castiel could've sworn it was truly Bobby himself glaring at her.

"That was a few hours ago Cas," Dean said, calling Castiel's mind back from his musings.

Castiel frowned. "I do not remember leaving..."

"Maybe that's for the best," Sam said without even turning around.

When Lucifer/Bobby turned to give Castiel a soft look and tried to give him a pat on the knee, Castiel shifted away and ignored him, trying his hardest to remember that the figure was not real...sort of.

He could've sworn he heard a mutter of "Balls!" before the figure flickered away again.


As it turned out, the ride to Montana was still much too far away so when it became too dark, the Winchester's decided it was time to stop for the night at the first motel they found.

"Can't you guys stay somewhere nicer? You've got the credit card scam down," Meg asked.

Dean stared at her surprised. "How the hell do you know about that?"

"Pfft, how don't I know?"

Never the less, the first slightly run down place they came across, Dean and Meg got adjoining rooms for the night and again Castiel was left in a room alone with the demon.

"Looks like it's just you and me again tonight, Clarence. You want the bed by the door or by the wall?"

"It does not matter. Either," Castiel said from a chair beside the door.

"Um, I'm giving you a choice in the matter and believe me that never happens. So - door or wall?"

"Pick the wall! Pick the wall!" Lucifer (Nick's form) said, jumping up and down.

"Door."

"Pfft, boooooring."

Castiel sighed as he walked to the bed and sat down on top of the sheets.

"But," Lucifer suddenly whispered in his ear, "I can still help you have some fun."

"Night," Meg said, shutting the light by her bed and climbing under the sheets.

Castiel didn't say anything in response. The room was suddenly becoming warm and his eyes burned for no reason so he rubbed them. Castiel just sat with his back against the headboard and simply stared at the wall across the room while Lucifer continued to laugh manically in his head.


Dean couldn't have been asleep for more than hour when someone was shaking him awake.

"Dean, man – get up!"

"What?" He was halfway to consciousness when he heard something thumping against the wall. It wasn't regular thumping though, it was more like something or someone hitting the wall. The wall that connected them to the room next door. The one that Cas and Meg…

What was going on next door?

Dean didn't know why but he had a feeling something very bad was happening next door and he needed to go check it out. He was out of his bed and to the door without even bothering to put his shoes on first as he ran in the direction of the next room over. When Sam joined him, Dean rammed his shoulder into the door and it flew inwards.

The scene before the brothers was gruesome; Castiel, his eyes tightly shut, had Meg in a chokehold and was bashing her head again and again into the wall between the beds leaving behind a wide, bloody circle.

"Ugh, what kept you?" Meg choked out.

"Cas, stop!" Dean yelled.

Castiel raised his free hand while turning and Dean was jettisoned through the air into the thin wall at the far end of the room. Staring after his brother, Sam tried to get the angel's attention by standing by his side and talking.

"Cas. Castiel, snap out of it!"

He saw a flicker of something outline Castiel's vessel but he couldn't be completely sure if it was just the light in the room or something else.

"Cas, you gotta hear me man...Lucifer isn't real."


"…Lucifer isn't real...Whatever it is you're seeing...it's not there."

"What a load of crock!"


"He is here, Sam. He is," Castiel said, punctuating the words with another smack of Meg's head.

"No he's not, Cas. Lucifer is just a hallucination."

Castiel's head turned to Sam and he opened his eyes revealing a dark glowing blue that seemed wrong and oddly…familiar.

"Cas," Sam asked, backing away slightly," what's wrong with your eyes?"

"Lucifer is here - in me as he was in you," Castiel said with a whimper, placing his free hand over his heart.


"He's scared of you brother," Lucifer gleefully chirped.


Castiel flinched and swallowed, looking to his back. He refused to meet Sam's eye again as he spoke in a breathy whisper. "It was not psychosis you were experiencing when I tore down your wall, Sam. Lucifer was speaking to you directly from the cage, trying to take over your body once again. With your soul in a truly damaged manner, he would have been able to destroy it completely and be free of the cage to reclaim what you relinquished when you said yes. When I transferred all of that into myself, Lucifer was...Lucifer was..."

"He what, Cas," Dean asked, wincing but now standing beside his brother.

"He was able to begin something new. Something worse."

"What?"

"The Cage..."


"Oops, you're just out of time."


Castiel suddenly fell backwards into Sam, his body beginning to seize, his hand falling away from Meg's neck as he went. The brothers did their best to keep him comfortable and after a few minutes he stopped.

"You got him, Sam?"

"Yeah."

"Meg. Meg," Dean said, snapping his fingers, trying to get the demon's attention.

"Either of you hear a ringing?"

"Meg you're fine. Where's Cas' meds?"

Meg clutched the back of her head, trying to remember. "Uh, in my jacket pocket?"

Dean retrieved it and removed three bottles, each containing less than seven pills each. "Um, which is the sedative?"

"Sedagive?"

"Tive. Sedative - which one?"

"Blue pill. Should knock him out for the rest of the night into late tomorrow, give or take. Give him two."

Dean shook two out of the bottle and handed them to Sam. He put Castiel's back against the wall and gently opened his mouth and placed the pills on the back of his tongue. Sam massaged the throat and eventually Castiel swallowed.

"Help me get him on the bed," Sam asked his brother.

Dean grabbed his legs and Sam grabbed the torso and together they levered Castiel onto the bed, his head lying on the pillow.

"I'm going to go take a shower - actress girl's blood on the outside isn't going to help style it in the morning," Meg said before disappearing into the bathroom.

Neither brother said anything until the water was turned on.

"How much did you hear of that?" Sam asked.

"Enough to know Lucifer's really real," Dean said. He heavily sighed and rubbed his eyes. "God Cas - what've you gotten yourself into?"


Got a finale theory you want to share? Review and tell me what you feel is going to happen in the last episode of season 7.

Thanks very much for reading. Next chapter - Dean and Cas talk. See you next time.