So that episode, huh? Let's have some affectionate Destiel to cheer ourselves up, eh?

Dean saw Sam throwing something in the air, and clapping with joy as the firework exploded in the air. Sam was younger – thirteen and a half years old, to be exact. They were celebrating their mother's life; Dean's idea. No one was around them in the clearing, to tell them that two underage boys shouldn't be playing with fire. Not even their father, who had locked himself in the study.

When he blinked, Dean saw Jo and Ash rough housing on the rec room floor. Jo was winning, with her hands pinning down the weedy boy's shoulders until he screamed for a parley. Dean was sat on one of the plush arm chairs, laughing and being threatened by the blonde that he was next. They were in their fourth year at the academy, and Ash had only just started to grow the mullet, and Jo still had a tiny reminder of the puppy fat on her face. It was cute.

"Dean," someone called to him, and he tried to turn. When he did, the rec room was empty, and Jo, Ash, and Sam were all gone. He tried to call out, but his head started throbbing, and he felt something warm trickling down the side of his face. "Dean," the voice said again.

Cracking his eyes open, Dean was startled back into being with the knowledge that the gorgons were there. He tried to pull the knife from his sleeve, but the movement didn't seem to coordinate his arm, and he hit himself in the head.

"Ouch," he groaned. Attempting to sit up, Dean bit back curse words and ignored the pain. "Rufus?"

"This is Castiel," the deep voice said again. Of course it was Castiel; he was only a day late. Instead of complaining about the utter tardiness that the angel had exhibited, Dean found the energy to grumble.

"Good timing," his eyes finally opened, and he could see the room, dimly lit as it had ever been. "The light…"

"Did it hurt you?" Castiel asked in his usual straight laced voice. He was leaning over into Dean's bubble, eyes intent on the cuts that seemed to be there. "Heavenly light can be damaging to fragile human eyes," which annoyed Dean more than ever, and he swatted the angel away.

"My fragile human sensibilities are fine, thanks," Dean snapped. He was in a lot of pain, and just wanted to go and grab a coffee (or something stronger) and reacquaint himself with his bed. "Let's get out of here,"

"Dean, you're very hurt," Castiel pointed out.

"I am aware of that thanks," but as he tried to haul himself to his feet, his head started spinning, and the room wouldn't stay still. "Fancy zapping us away from here?"

"The force of the flight would probably concuss you at this point," admitted the angel with a grim expression. He was wearing his regulation trench coat, and his hair was as messy as ever. Dean wanted to ask if they didn't have hair product in heaven, but couldn't muster the energy to do it. Instead, he just watched the wisps of black hair move uncharacteristically in the breeze. "Dean?"

"Yes Cas?"

"Stay conscious,"

Dean blinked and did the best he could at not passing out. Castiel looked down at the young human, considering him. Dean Winchester; Castiel knew, was not someone who had faith. He believed in angels, only because he could see them, and the possibility of God became less and less likely the more he saw of the world. In all considerations, Castiel shouldn't heal him with the power of heaven.

The angel held out a hand, two fingers pointing towards the boy's bleeding face. He didn't flinch, but his eyes were glazed over as he stared up at the angel. The wonky grin on his face told Castiel that concussion might already be present, and so he felt no guilt as he pressed two of his vessel's fingertips to Dean Winchester's temple and watched as his grace soothed the wounds. Within seconds Dean's eyes focused, and each of the bruises faded quicker than human vision could notice.

"Better?" he asked. Dean nodded, feeling as his head was instantly better. The only sign that Dean had been hurt at all was the dried blood that had dripped onto his shirt and crisped into the fabric. As he sat up, Dean stared around the room - finally able to take everything in. There were three lumps of cracked statue in the centre of the floor, which appeared to have been blown apart from the inside. The floor was scattered with shards of the gorgon's flesh.

"Much," he answered finally. Hauling himself up, Dean stood almost nose to nose with the angel. It was only then that he noticed the pair of azure eyes focused on his every movement. When the fuck did he start describing blue as "azure" he didn't know, but it made him feel uncomfortable. He took a step back, but the eyes followed him. "Shall we?"

When they reached the impala, Dean was surprised that Castiel hadn't vanished on him yet. It was only when the angel slipped into the passenger seat, with all of his attention aimed at Dean, did the Winchester stop what he was doing and stare right back.

"Where were you yesterday?" he demanded finally, not forgetting how pissed he had been the previous evening.

"Chasing your dopple ganger down a sewer system," his tone was impatient and his face looked angry. "I am not going to always appear at your will to be your study buddy, Dean,"

"Hey! You're the one that said- never mind," Dean started the car up. "What's going on, then?"

"Azazel is after something," Castiel said as though it would make any sense to Dean. He'd heard the gorgon's mentioning the name, but he didn't actually understand who the fuck Azazel was. As though reading his mind (which in itself was a scary thought for Dean) Castiel added, "He's a demon. Quite a powerful demon,"

"Fantastic," Dean growled sarcastically.

"There is nothing sublime about that news Dean. I am afraid people are in danger,"

"That was called sarcasm, Cas," Dean mumbled, but didn't push the matter. "Right, and what does he want?"

"I don't know," admitted Castiel guiltily.

"I thought you guys were meant to be all knowing warriors of God?" snapped Dean, wishing that the guy would give him a little more information than the fact that they were all fucked.

"Demons are deceiving creatures Dean, and they are not of my father's creation. There is no way that I could understand Azazel's motivations from a whim," and suddenly Dean fell silent. "The gorgons were acting as witches for him. Powerful ones as well,"

"And now they're gone, will Zazel give up?" Dean asked, fearing the answer.

"Azazel. And no," Castiel informed. Dean pulled onto the main road and swerved to miss an Audi going twenty miles per hour over the speed limit.

"And the dopple ganger?" Dean pushed.

"A decoy perhaps," mused the angel. "Possibly trying to frame you for the mutilation of civilians,"

"Well then we're just going to have to catch this son of a bitch quicker than I thought,"

Pulling into his drive way, Dean noticed that his father's car was still in its spot. The man loved classic cars, but had given his oldest son the impala, when it became inconvenient for him to use for long journeys. Now, he drove a pristine car that was young enough to be Baby's grandchild, and about as appealing as the thought of his brother in a dress.

Castiel was out of the car without the use of the door, and Dean joined him on the garden path.

"So what? You wanna come in for some pie?" Dean joked, tucking his keys into his jean pocket. Castiel shook his head, seemingly confused by the invitation. "Because I don't have any,"

"There are things that need to be done, Dean," he said. "An angel of the Lord has no time to break for pie,"

"Why are you still here?"

"I couldn't leave you to crash and die. A gorgon has minutes ago cracked your skull into a wall. As a human you are…"

"A vulnerable little butterfly, I get it," Dean snapped and turned to the door. When he turned back to the street, the angel was gone.

Flicking through old demon text books was a lot easier now that he had a name. In fact, Dean even employed the use of Google to search his target. Things on the internet were often very mixed and sometimes wrong, so it was best not to attain all of his information from it, but it had some uses. The mythology of Azazel came from Hebrew texts – there were some ideas that he was an angel, or even a god himself, but Dean ignored these. He didn't need to be fighting what were supposedly the "good guys". His head was already hurting.

"Dean," a gruff voice said, followed by a slight rapping at the wood of the door. Dean stuffed the tattered book under his pillow and straightened up.

"Sir?" his father walked in, wearing an old t-shirt, and some of what he called "house-pants". He edged through the door, and past the desk filled with old paper with doodles, and the occasional piece of work, the little figurines Sam had given him, and the purple lava lamp that had been his mother's. John Winchester stood at the foot of his son's bed, staring down the boy.

"There's blood on your shirt," he pointed out, without questioning. Dean stopped his face from blushing, and nodded as though it was nothing.

"Just a nose bleed,"

"Rufus said you were in the bar this morning," ah. The stop-drinking-before-lunch talk. How he'd missed this talk. "Drinking scotch,"

"Just a morning wake up, to celebrate the end of exams," Dean said, unsure as to why he was lying to his father. Would the older Winchester really be so taken aback by his son hunting the thing that killed his wife? The answer was obvious from the way that Dean's eyes dropped from his father's.

"You still have two papers left," reminded the man.

"Oh," Dean blinked once. "I should get on that, then,"

"Dean," the tone was warning. "You need to stop spending time with that angel,"

Fuck.

"Excuse me?" Dean asked, feigning confusion. What angel? There was no angel. He didn't know what his father was talking about.

"Bobby told me about the fire, and the visit from the angel. And there have been rumours from the hunters that a boy of about your figure was seen in the Roadhouse-"

"I was visiting Jo!"

"With an odd man in a trench coat, who proceeded to almost blow the place up," Dean had nothing to reply. "Angels are bad news, Dean. Angels are warriors. They don't care about humans, and they will make you fight their battles, and they will leave you battered,"

How do you know? Dean wanted to ask. You've never fought a battle in your life. You didn't even fight for your family. You gave up. I won't give up – but he said nothing, letting the silence melt the room to an uncomfortable emptiness, until the older man nodded at his son and left the room.

Dean removed the book from under his pillow, but the words weren't making sense anymore. He dropped the book onto his bed, and rushed down to the kitchen to grab himself a quick lunch and forget his father's words. Sam was sat at the kitchen table, scribbling down runes into a little notebook.

"What'cha doing there, Sam?" he asked as he swung the fridge open and gazed into its depths. They needed to go grocery shopping. The only things in the door were milk, an egg, and herb paste, with old Greek yoghurt (Sam's) and some blue cheese at the back of the fridge, behind the beers.

"Kevin's been teaching me some translations," he explained. "Kid's a freakin' genius," Kevin Tran was one of Sam's best friends, and of course they got along because they were both massive nerds.

"Anything interesting?" but Dean zoned out as his brother started to go into intricate details about the inner workings of ancient myth, and how it was formed and written. He nodded in all the right places, but continued to search through the nearly empty cupboards. Giving up on finding anything delicious, Dean lowered his standards and returned to the fridge.

"Sam?"

"Yes Dean?" his brother replied sweetly.

"Who baked pie?"

"No one baked pie, Dean,"

"But there's pie. There wasn't pie here before. Did someone buy pie?"

"No one's been shopping, Dean," Sam was staring at Dean as though he was losing his mind. The kid's wide brown eyes were like weapons on a puppy, and right now they were distinctly worried about their older brother. Dean shook his head.

"Weird," he said, removing the pie from the fridge. He tucked into the crust – buttery and sugary and not too thick to take the taste away from the filling. Apples as tender and sweet as if they had been picked from the Garden of Eden.