Author's Note: Gah! Sorry for the delay. Work has been busy and then as soon as I was ready with another chapter to publish, it was my turn to stay on the ship all week without internet to post it with. And to add insult to injury, it's a short chapter. In my defense, I've given you some very long ones as well.

-SQ

Disclaimer: I missed my boyfriend's (aka Sap Police) Season Premier Party because I'm in the middle of the ocean! I can't even watch the show right now; do you think I own it?

Chapter Six: A Seraph in the Living Room

Several hours and another dozen gas stations later, Dean could tell that Cas was flagging. Though the angel insisted he was fine, beads of sweat stood out starkly against his gray face and he was leaning ever more heavily on the cane, panting with the effort and struggling to catch his breath. Dean was worried that overexertion could cause a relapse of Cas' illness and insisted they call it a night.

"It's getting dark anyway," he reasoned, "and we're only a few miles from Jody's. Let's regroup there, have a home-cooked meal and a decent night's sleep, and start fresh tomorrow."

It seemed that Sam had had the same idea, as he showed up a short time after they did, tired, hungry, and still with no word on Claire.

"Where have you been?" Jody asked Castiel once the five of them, including Alex, had settled down at the table for dinner. "You look a little worse for wear, to put it mildly."

"I had something of a run in with some of my kin," said Cas. "They are...unhappy with some of my recent actions."

"He was tortured," Dean said flatly.

Jody sucked in a breath.

"So Claire was right," said Alex, speaking for the first time. "You were in trouble."

"There was nothing she could have done to improve my situation," said Cas. "I am glad she did not go looking for me sooner."

"I should have called her the minute we'd found you," said Dean. "Then she wouldn't have gone looking for you at all."

"But she did," said Jody, cutting Dean's pity party short. "So now the thing is to find her."

"She's right," said Sam, pushing his chair back from the table. "Thank you for dinner, Jody, it was delicious. Can I help you with the dishes?"

Dean and Cas got up as well, Dean catching Cas by the elbow when he stumbled.

"You alright?" Jody asked with motherly concern. "You'd better go sit down in the living room and take it easy. Sam, Alex, and I've got the dishes."

Dean slung an arm around Cas' waist and helped him into the living room, where he sank gratefully down into the couch.

"Let's go ahead and take that glamour off," said Dean. "I want to make sure you haven't done any more damage while you were bumping around today."

Dean rifled around in Sam's bag for a minute and pulled out the spellbook he had brought from the Men of Letters Bunker. He flipped it open to the appropriate page, which was bookmarked with a zip lock bag containing the necessary components of the spell.

He opened the bag, used the contents to trace the appropriate symbol in the seemingly empty space above and behind Castiel's head, and spoke the incantation. The illusion of nothingness melted off of Cas' wings like morning fog.

There was a sharp intake of breath from the direction of the kitchen. Dean and Cas looked over at the door to see Alex standing there with her hands over her mouth.

"Holy shit!" said the teenager. "What are you?"

"Alex!" said Jody from behind her. "That was rude." She stepped into the living room, her eyebrows lifting when she saw the coal-black wings spread out on the couch behind Cas, but all she said was, "Well those aren't usually visible. You see something new every day."

"An after effect of Cas' little 'family reunion,'" said Dean darkly. "Apparently angels really know how to give it to each other."

"Angels?" said Alex incredulously. "Like Michael and Gabriel and all that Bible crap?"

"No," said Castiel, "those are the archangels, my elder brothers. I am only a Seraph."

"There is a Seraph in my living room," said Alex, shaking her head and walking up the stairs. "No one at school would believe this."

"Sorry about that," said Jody, tilting her head toward the stairs up which Alex had just disappeared. "We had just gotten into a good dynamic with Claire. And now her disappearance has upended the routine all over again."

"Not to mention having a Seraph in her living room," said Dean dryly.

Jody chuckled. "Yes, that too. Is there anything more I can do for you boys? Castiel looks like he could use a good night's rest."

"Several good nights' rests," said Dean. "But one will have to do for now. Sam, will you toss me my bag?"

Sam obliged, and Dean rifled around for a minute until he found what he was looking for: a tube full of ointment.

"Cas, if your wings got any stiffer, I think they'd snap in half in I blew on 'em," said Dean. He squeezed some of the ointment onto his palm. "Let's see if we can loosen them up. If you go to bed like this, you're likely to not be able to walk at all in the morning." He began massaging the ointment into the muscles of Cas' wings. The angel let out a grown of pain; that hurt.

"Sorry, buddy," said Dean, his hands not stopping in their ministrations. "No pain, no gain."

Sam winced in sympathy with the angel, knowing from experience that Dean's wasn't the gentlest of doctoring. Effective, certainly, but not gentle.

Dean mercilessly worked the kinks and knots from Cas' wings before moving to his neck and shoulders and down his back.

At first the pain made the angel grit his teeth in order to keep himself from pulling away from the hunter's not-so-gentle touch. But after a while he began to relax into the pressure and to actually enjoy the sensation of Dean's skillful hands on his wings and back. He couldn't deny that the targeted areas felt much better once Dean had done his work on them.

"There you go, Cas," said Dean, clapping the angel on the shoulders and arching his own back, hearing it creak and pop. Ugh, all the years in this life were taking their toll on him; he wasn't in his twenties anymore. "Better?"

"Yes, much," said the angel, rolling his neck and shoulders experimentally. "Thank you, Dean." He yawned.

"I think it's time for you boys to get to bed," said Jody. "We only have two empty rooms: Claire's and the guest room. So one of you will have to take the couch."

"Cas and I can bunk together," said Dean.

"I'm afraid there's only one bed per room," said Jody.

Dean faltered. He felt Cas shift on the couch next to him and knew without looking that his brother's probing eyes were fixed on them. Dean scooted over on the sofa, putting a few inches of distance between himself and the angel, but shrugged, feigning nonchalance, and said, "We'll figure something out."

The sheriff gave Dean and Castiel a long, considering look. "Well then," she said finally, " I'll go make up the rooms before one of you does fall asleep on the couch."

*****SPN*****

Cas was indeed half asleep on his feet and leaning heavily on Dean as Jody led them to the room usually occupied by Claire. The room certainly looked lived in; piles of clothes on the floor in front of the closet, makeup paraphernalia strewn across the vanity, a toppled over pile of books next to the bed. But it didn't look like somebody's home. There were no posters on the walls, no knickknacks decorating the shelves. The only personal touches were two photographs sitting side by side on top of the dresser. One showed a smiling Claire, about eight or nine years old, standing between her parents, who each had an arm around the little girl, as though promising to protect her from the world.

The second showed a much older Claire, the shadows of bitter experience lurking behind the smile that had been startled out of her by the bone breaking group hug Castiel and the Winchesters had swept her into.

"I remember that day," said Cas, looking at the photo.

"Yeah, me too," said Dean with a smile. "It was fun, taking a break from saving the world. Claire creamed me at mini golf, though," he added ruefully. He tossed Cas a pair of pajama bottoms and a t-shirt and began to strip off his own clothes.

It was only once his pajama pants and t-shirt were already on that Dean realized that he had just stripped down to his boxers in front of Cas without a second thought. He mentally shook himself. Earlier that day he had been making out with the angel on the hood of his car, and only the fact that they were more or less in public had kept it from going further; it was probably safe to say that they had reached the seeing each other in their boxers stage. Actually, come to think of it, Dean had seen Cas in less than his boxers, though that was hardly what he had been thinking about at the time.

"You need any help, Cas?" asked Dean, pulling his toothbrush and toothpaste out of his bag.

"Thank you, Dean, I think I can manage," said Cas, who was currently brushing his own teeth, elbows resting on either side of the sink.

Dean waited until Cas was done in the bathroom and then quickly readied himself for bed, stowing his meager toiletries and then hesitating beside the bed.

"I will be fine, if you would prefer to sleep on the couch," said Cas, sensing the elder Winchester's discomfort.

Dean, who had been about to suggest that very thing, changed his mind at the note of resignation in the angel's voice.

"Move over," he said instead, "the bed's big enough for two."

Cas obliged and felt Dean's weight settle onto the other side of the mattress.

"Night, Cas," said Dean's voice gruffly.

"Goodnight, Dean," the angel replied. He closed his eyes and as he began to drift off, he let himself think that maybe, just possibly, something was finally going right for him.

*****SPN*****

Dean woke to Castiel's wing hitting him in the face.

"Cas. Cas." He shook the angel's shoulder. "Cas, wake up." He shook him harder. "Cas!"

The angel started awake. "Don't—!"

"It's just me," said Dean.

"Dean?"

"The one and only." He helped Cas sit up, smoothing his ruffled feathers. Then he grabbed the glass of water he had left on the bedside table for just this purpose and waited to speak again until Cas had emptied it.

"What did you see?"

"Claire," said Cas in clear distress. "They had Claire and they were..." he shook his head.

"It was just a bad dream," said Dean, tracing circles on Cas' forearm with his thumb.

"I wish I had my Grace, so I didn't have to sleep."

"Sometimes I wish I didn't have to sleep either," Dean agreed. "And sometimes I wish I'd never wake up."

Cas made a sound of frustration and shrugged Dean's hand off his arm. "I'm pathetic."

"Cas," said Dean, "you're not pathetic. Anyone would have nightmares after what you went through."

"What I went through?" said Cas. "You and Sam went to Hell."

"And you think we didn't have nightmares after that?" said Dean. "Sam literally went insane." He pulled Cas roughly toward him and kissed the side of his head. "You've been through more shit in the last seven years than the entire rest of eternity. Cut yourself a break. You'd've been a lot better off if you'd never pulled me from Hell," he added.

"You wouldn't," said Cas. "And I would still be a self-righteous dick."

Dean snorted. "Yeah, maybe." He stood up. "I've got to use the bathroom."

When Dean came out of the bathroom, Cas took his turn, and then they both returned to bed. But Cas found that no matter how he tossed and turned, he couldn't get comfortable. His muscles ached and the healing skin on his torso itched and burned, but it was more than that. He felt trapped, suffocated by his lack of Grace. He wanted to fly, to escape the confines and limitations of this damaged human body. He wanted to be an angel again, not a freaky man with wings. And that thought itself was so incredibly human, it made him feel sick.

"Hey Cas, you got ants in your pants or what? I'm trying to sleep here."

"No, Dean, there are no insects in my lower garments. I apologize for disturbing you. I find myself unable to sleep. I think perhaps I will take a walk." He sat up and reached for his cane, which was leaning against the bedside table.

"Leave it," said Dean, also sitting up. "I'll go with you."

"You need sleep," Cas protested.

"So do you," said Dean, "yet you're going on midnight walks. I'm not an idiot, something's up. Come on." Dean stood and looped an arm around Cas' waist and the two of them made their way out of the bedroom, down and out the back door.

Cas looked up at the night sky, his elbows resting on the porch railing. Dean mirrored his stance, following his gaze to the sprinkling of stars above their heads.

"Penny for your thoughts, Cas? It's an expression," he added before the angel could open his mouth. "It means, what are you thinking about? What's on your mind?"

"Ah." The angel was silent for several minutes. "I miss it," he said finally.

"Uh, you're going to have to be a little more specific, buddy."

"It. Everything," said Cas, opening his arms to indicate the sleeping world around them. "I used to be a part of it. It was a part of me. I could see and hear and feel and taste every living thing in the universe in a manner that goes beyond your human comprehension of the senses. And always, my brothers' and sisters' frequencies were turned on in my head. Now the little piece of Earth that I occupy at any given moment encompasses the entirety of my experience. And the only one inside my head is myself. It is...lonely."

Well, Cas certainly had some deep three am musings.

"You'll get it back though, won't you?" said Dean.

"My Grace, yes," said Castiel. "And the angelic powers that go with it; what you refer to as my 'mojo.' My connection with the other angels...right now it could be dangerous, if not downright deadly, for me to turn that back on, even once I can. I do not know if I will ever be able to go back to my family."

The sorrow in his angel's voice filled Dean's chest with guilt. It was because of him that Cas had turned his back on his brethren, had sacrificed his life and his sanity, had lost both his Grace and his place in Heaven. If Dean lived to be a hundred he could never repay that. He laid a hand on Cas' shoulder.

Cas covered it with his own. "Let's go back inside. I think I can sleep now. And we both need it."

Dean nodded, wordlessly offering his arm as support to the angel. They returned again to bed, Dean lying down first and opening his arms to Cas, who accepted the invitation, settling with his head on Dean's chest like a pillow. The hunter tangled his fingers in his angel's hair and they slept.

AN: I hope I got Cas' existential angst right, lol. And I'm serious, I haven't seen any of Season 12 yet. A little hard while stuck on board a cruise ship. We'll see if I can get an episode in today, in which case I'll only be one week behind. In any case, please, NO SPOILERS!

-SQ