"What's the matter?" he asked, standing in the parking lot, staring at Dean, "You and Sam have been rather loud. I was taking care of something with Bobby."

"Her name's Brinn. She survived a vampire attack. They gave her demon blood and something else…we don't know what…she hallucinated for a few hours and now she's cogent but she's retching blood, her fever's steady at 110, she's in a hell of a lot of pain, and we don't know what to do about it."

"Oh."

"Care to fix it?"

"Right…of course. Where is she?"

"Follow me," Dean told him.

XXXXXXXXX

"Cas!" Sam exclaimed as the angel walked in, leaving Dean to stand in the door and glare. He was glad Cas had finally arrived. But that didn't erase his anger. They'd been moments away from a dead body…and Cas could have fixed it all ages ago.

"This, I presume, is the girl?" Cas said, bending down and attempting, unsuccessfully, to avoid the cold shower Sam had running for Brinn.

"Yeah. She got bitten up quite a bit, then they gave her demon blood…"

"Your brother got me up to date," Cas replied, laying a hand on Brinn's shaking shoulder and probing with his mind – trying to figure out what was wrong. He searched for what felt like an eternity – feeling her pain – feeling her fear.

"We can fix it," Cas said after the agonizing wait.

"How? With what?" Sam's eyes brightened.

"They gave her a poison I've only seen a few times before. There's an antidote."

"Great – now go get some," Dean said.

"It's a little more complicated than that."

"Why?"

"If I touch it, it won't work."

"Fine…I will go to the store or wherever the heck they keep this stuff and I'll get it," Dean replied none to gently.

Brinn stirred in Sam's arms and he resumed the gentle circles he'd been rubbing at the nape of her neck.

"That's the problem."

"Where does this antidote come from Cas?" Dean asked.

"You've got to be north of the 45th parallel. It grows everywhere up there. By the side of the road. Everywhere."

"And we are currently…at the 39th parallel," Sam thought for a moment before adding, "It's what – a five hour drive to get that far north?"

"Approximately," Cas responded.

"Give us a minute Cas," Dean said, kneeling down beside his brother and Brinn.

Castiel departed. He stood, seemingly purposeless, in the center of the room, then decided he could tidy things up, and started cleaning frantically.

Meanwhile Dean sat on the wet bathroom floor, watching Brinn breathe, trying to assess her condition.

"Dean I don't think she has ten hours."

"I know Sam. I don't think so either."

"Dean what do we do? We can't let her die. We didn't save her for this to happen," Sam's voice was getting a frantic edge.

"Sam, you know better than I do, we can check with Castiel…" Dean trailed off, it wasn't an easy question, "Do you think she can last five?"

"We could all three of us go – and she'd get the antidote twice as fast…" Sam considered the option, "make her detox in the car…"

"She's in so much pain and she's so scared right now Sam…honestly I think as long as we take ice packs and something for her to throw up in…if she has you she'll be okay."

"I don't want to hurt her anymore Dean."

"I know Sam."

"But I want to save her."

"Then go get dressed and we'll get rolling."