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CHAPTER IX

Dean laid in the bed on his back and stared at the ceiling above him, listening to the sounds coming out of the bathroom. His gaze flickered towards the pill bottle on the nightstand and the half full glass of water.

Maybe it was normal for Sam to spend that much time in there after a rough night ... or maybe he felt awkward around him now that Dean knew what was going on inside of him – what had happened to him. Maybe Dean shouldn't have gone into the dream like that. Maybe he should've been hid, checked things out and disappeared as soon as he knew what was going on in those freakish dreams.

But nope. He had decided to show himself, let Sam know that he wasn't alone, that there was someone who wanted to help him. And maybe that would make everything awkward and hard from now on. Even when Dean didn't feel like it, he assumed that the hunter might not take it as given as he did.

It was about half an hour later that he finally heard the shower turn on, and Dean decided to get up and prepare breakfast. Though, before that he had to do something else – something more important. So he hurried up to get into his own room, where he dressed in a fresh set of clothes and his jacket and headed downstairs and out of the house onto the porch, from where he took a sharp turn around the house.

He glanced back up at the second floor where Sam's room was, before he vanished behind some trees so that he'd be out of hearing range and sight if the hunter decided to open the window, or get on the porch and look for him.

Dean pulled a tiny leather bag from the inside of his jacket and a Zippo from the front pocket of his jeans and set it on fire.

"Castiel!" he called out, when he let the bag fall to the frozen ground before his feet.

It was one of those hex-bags he kept for emergencies. It was a mix of different herbs and items which would force Castiel to come. It was made as something like an SOS Call for the angel to know that Dean was in giant trouble and that he had to be where he was RIGHT THE FUCK NOW.

Dean figured it was one of those moments.

They didn't have a lot of time for figuring out what kind of spell or curse was laid on Sam and bound him to Alistair – or vice versa. Okay, Dean could possibly pull the stunt from last night two more times, maybe three, but then it'd be impossible for him to get enough power together again. - At least for a week.

Dean didn't want to give the demon any more chances to harm Sam. Nor taking revenge on the human because Dean hadn't been able to wait and overthink things and had to burst into the guy's session like that – including frying him with his god-given mojo.

He was a man who kept his promises and he knew he'd need help with this one.

There was the fluttering of wings and when the demon turned around towards the house, Castiel stood before him, just about a yard away and stared at him with giant ocean-blue eyes. He held his angel-sword in his left hand and another one in his right, obviously ready to jump in the fight.

"Whoa, tiger," Dean rose both hands and showed him his palms in surrender. "It's not that kind of emergency."

The angel's features relaxed slightly and he let the blades disappear in his sleeve again. "Does not look like an emergency either."

"It's about the hunter," Dean spat out with a serious gaze. "There's a spell or something messing with him. - We need to undo it ..."

The angel cocked both eyebrows. "And you need me to ...?"

"I need you to check out what kind of spell it is. We'd take too long to figure it out and it'll get worse. - Alistair knows that I know and he's not gonna back off now," Dean explained calmly. "If anything he's going to make it harder on the hunter."

Castiel looked a bit pensive, but he nodded. "I see. He's in the house I suppose?"

Before Dean could answer, there was the rustling of wings and the angel was gone, short followed by an high pitched cry from inside the house which definitely belonged to the hunter.

Dean's mind didn't need to process what probably had happened. His instincts kicked in right away and he burst into a run through the branches and underwood, so that he was back in the house in no time. He thumped up the stairs, not caring that the door was wide open and that he let the cold air in. Running down the corridor and taking a sharp turn into the hunter's bedroom he heard the familiar low voice of the angel and the hunter's adrenaline-heavy one even before he could see the both of them.

He stopped abruptly one step after he crossed the threshold as his gaze caught both men. The trench-coat-wearing one was backed up against the wall an angel-blade at his throat, while the one with the towel didn't seem to be in an any better stance, even when he was the one backing Castiel up.

Both men held their blades in an iron grip against each other's throats.

"Please tell your friend that I did not intend to harm him in any way," Castiel spoke calmly, not breaking eye contact with Sam.

Sam's anxious gaze flickered towards the demon and back at the intruder, the knuckles of his hands white, his face drawn in tight lines.

"Who's this?" the hunter hissed through gritted teeth. His gaze flickered towards Dean again. "You called one of your friends to fuck with me?"

Dean rose both hands, panting. "Sam. No." He took a deep breath. "It's nothing like that, okay?" He could see hurt and disbelief on the hunter's face and in his eyes "He's a friend. - He's ... he's just clueless about how humans prefer their dignity and not getting their personal space invaded."

Sam didn't seem to believe it. There was a visible struggle going on in his mind between letting go and holding onto the blade.

"Dean is right. - I am an angel of the lord," Castiel explained and slowly eased the blade from the hunter's throat and let it fall to the floor with a clang. "I am not supposed to hurt any human being ... well ... except if the human being is in the way of the mission-"

"CAS!" Dean ground out before the angel could mess up this situation even more. "Not helping here, okay?" After all there was still an angel-blade pressed against his throat, something the angel seemed to have forgotten about.

"Sam," the demon spoke with reassurance in his voice, "Put the blade down. - It's okay. I called him. He can help. Castiel's not here to hurt anyone. I called him to help YOU."

For a moment it seemed like something like defeat was crossing the man's features and his hold on the blade seemed to ease, so did the grip on the angel's shoulder with which he was holding him against the wall. Sam searched the man's face for a long moment, then his gaze wandered to Dean for a split moment.

There was a buttload of disappointment and hurt mixed with anger in the hunter's face – that much was clear. Though, Dean couldn't figure out WHY ... It wasn't like he had called the angel for ...

Okay, for someone who didn't know that this huge baby in a trench coat was actually an angel and here to help it might look weird. And if he was in Sam's place, he wouldn't trust the strange guy too, who miraculously popped up on him way too close and Sam just wearing a towel ... Not to mention his history of possible betrayals and his time with a certain dickhead of a demon.

The muscles in Sam's back seemed to relax and the hard lines of his face grew softer until he was able to let go of the angel and backed a step off.

Though, Sam kept the blade and wouldn't drop it nor did he think about giving it back.

"Cas. - Why don't you give us a minute?" Dean offered and stared at the angel intently, "Just ... wait in the kitchen, would you?"

The angel looked over at the demon and gave him a short nod. Then there was the fluttering noise of wings again and he was gone – including the angel-blade he had dropped before.

"I probably should've told you," Dean started and took a step towards the hunter, who didn't move.

"Angel, huh?" he asked instead of giving into the demon's attempt to explain. Sam wouldn't look at him. He stared on the floor, his hair dripping wet and the blade clutched in his hand.

Dean Winchester nodded guiltily. "Yeah." He swallowed. "I'm sorry ... look ... I didn't plan on it happening that way, okay? First I wanted to talk to him and then talk to you ... and ... then he was gone ..." Dean's words were dripping with guilt and the need to explain himself. "He has no clue what personal space means."

Sam huffed out a breath, an unreadable expression on his face. "Popping up an inch in front of a guy who's just wearing a towel ain't clever." He blinked at him as he turned his head a bit to see Dean standing there, in the middle of the room. "I could've killed him."

Well, Dean wouldn't want to break it to the hunter, but Castiel wasn't that easy to be killed. Sure, Sam had the blade, but Cas could've zapped himself somewhere else if he really wanted to. He had actually been more worried about Sam's wellbeing, since the angel was a fighter too and in an act of self-defence, he could've hurt him badly ...

"Or he could've killed me ..." Sam seemed to think out loud, his expression pensive.

"Hey ... I'm gonna prepare breakfast ... and check on Cas ... when you're ... you're you know ... dressed and so ... come downstairs okay?" Dean knew he was stuttering and didn't make a lot of sense right the fuck now. He also knew that Sam wouldn't give him the angel-blade, so he didn't even ask for it.

"Yeah ..." Sam breathed and looked back at the wall before him. "Be down in ten."

With a nod Dean disappeared, leaving the hunter to his business and found Castiel right where he had told him to be. Cas stood in the middle of the kitchen and eyed the dishes from last night curiously as if he had never seen such a mess before.

Dean sighed when he entered the room. "You know ... I already told you about personal space, dude. You can't just pop in on a man who's naked."

Castiel hummed low in his throat, when he slowly looked over at Dean. "He was wearing a towel. I did not figure that it would be a problem at all. After all I am an angel and don't share the same sense for dignity ..." Big blue eyes were staring innocently at the demon.

He chuckled and shook his head, blowing out an amused breath. "I don't think you'll get the blade back ..."

Castiel nodded. "A blade like this one is not supposed to stay in human's hands," he stated with lack of emotion – maybe with a bit of confusion in his face but not in his voice.

"You popped in on him. And he was naked, Cas!" Dean pointed out again and before the angel could open his mouth to protest he rose his hand and cast his look down. "Nope. Don't want to hear it. Towel or no towel. Next time just ... knock and wait outside the door or something ... He doesn't even know you, Cas. You're a stranger to him."

"You know me. And you trust me." Again big blue eyes eyed the demon quizzical. "I'm an angel. Humans tend to pray to me, not to prey me."

"Yeah. - He's a hunter. Everything that pops up before him out of nowhere is a monster, so I doubt he was expecting an angel to visit him." He sighed and looked up again to meet the angel's eyes. "Anyway ..."

"You LIKE him," it sounded confused and surprised at the same time. "You care about him a lot."

"Thanks, Cas. - So not the time to talk about THAT," Dean waved at him and walked past him, towards the fridge.

"Why him?" he asked then.

The demon huffed out another breath and gathered eggs, milk, butter, sugar and flour on the counter while he seemed to think about the question. When he bowed down to get a pan out of the cupboard under the fridge, Dean answered with a question himself: "Why would you wanna know?"

Castiel turned around and eyed the demon's behaviour closer. "You are embarrassed. Is it common to be embarrassed when you are in love with another person? Or is it because he is a hunter?"

"CAS." Dean said warningly. "I'm not in love with him.", he murmured to himself – as if he could make himself believe that. "We became friends." ... nothing more. "He needs someone." ... I need him.

The angel looked even more confused now than a minute before and his mouth had the perfect shape of an "o". Either the demon was lying, or being human was truly one of the curious things upon earth.

The demon got a red plastic bowl from under the counter and a whisk from a drawer and started to mix up the butter, eggs, sugar and flour. Besides the beating of the whisk against the wall of the bowl, nothing was heard.

The angel had taken a seat at the table and watched the demon doing his thing. Sometimes he was a bit jealous of humanity. After all they were able to TASTE, to FEEL ... simply everything. It wasn't like he wasn't incapable of tasting or feeling things – it was just different from what his vessel – Jimmy – remembered. Everything was moved into perspective ... and sometimes he wondered why Jimmy Novak had given up his life to become a vessel for an angel ...

Dean was heating up the pan, when footfalls were heard from the staircase. Short after Sam came around the corner into the kitchen and stopped shortly as he spotted the angel at the table. He stared at the blue-eyed man for several long seconds before he fixed Dean's skull with his gaze.

"Sit down. We need to talk," Dean said without turning around and flipping a pancake on the plate beside the stove. "Cas's gonna explain what he's gonna do ... he's gonna figure out how to get rid of the spell – or whatever."

Sam pursed his lips and seemed to think for quite some time about what Dean had said. He then eyed the angel warily, before he sat down on the chair on the opposite side of Castiel.

"An Angel?" Sam asked the man curiously, "Of the lord? Honestly?" It was understandable that he didn't trust the stranger instantly. He could be anything. Shapeshifter, vampire – though those creatures weren't capable of teleporting.

Castiel gave him a sharp nod. His face open like a book.

"Prove it." Sam leaned back and his eyes narrowed. "Where are your wings?" His gaze flickered towards Dean, thinking about what he had thought he'd seen in his dream. Dean Winchester with wings and blinding light surrounding him ...

"My wings are invisible to human's eyes." Castiel answered honestly.

"Why don't you knock things over with them if they're just invisible?" he kept on questioning the angel's existence.

"Some psychics can see them – or rather sense them. My wings exist on a different level of existence," the angel staid weirdly calm – too calm for Sam's liking, because Sam was boiling on the inside with white-hot anger and rage.

"How come I've never come across one of your kind out there?"Sam carried on, his words sharp at the edges.

"We are not meant to walk the earth among humanity. Only in rare cases we get sent here. Either because it is to guard someone special or to interfere whenever it is needed," the angel answered.

"What about prayers? Do you hear them?" Sam asked a bit calmer. The guy was high likely a good little soldier, following his daddy's orders. So yeah, there was actually something more pathetic out there than he himself.

"Yes. We can hear them," he said, this time a bit nervous, it seemed.

"Never got answers to my prayers. EVER. Where have you been?" The hunter's expression was cold and calculating, as if he was waiting for the angel to say or do something wrong.

"We are not supposed to answer the human's prayers either." Castiel cleared his throat. "I can not prove being an angel. I think you have to trust Dean's word when it comes to my person."

"You zap into other men's bathrooms often?" Sam wouldn't stop – he couldn't. This guy was a dick. What meant they weren't supposed to answer prayers? Who the fuck were they? People were believing in them. HE had been believing in them. He had prayed every damn single fucking night for those dickheads to come and save him. To fucking help him!

"Dean told me to check on you, so I figured it would be the best thing if I did it immediately." He spoke as if it wasn't something unnatural at all.

Sam huffed out a breath and shook his head in disbelieve. "You're one great bag of dicks. You and your retarded family." he hissed angrily and stood up, shoving the chair back and the table a bit forward, making sure to knock it into the angel's ribs. "Humans are calling for help, and you won't come. But a freaking black-eyes is calling you once and you're here. Within seconds. You may think that you're an Angel, but you sure as hell don't act as one!"

Sam was out of the kitchen and the house, before Dean could even register what was going on.

So when he turned around to make the arguing stop, all he saw was a flash of Sam's plaid shirt and heard the front-door slam shut.

Dean stood there with the spatula in one hand and the pan in the other one, his mouth open to tell Sam to shut up and listen what they had to say, but his words died somewhere between his brain and mouth and the house fell silent.

Castiel turned around and faced the demon, his expression shocked. Actually shocked. Something he had never seen on the angel's face before. Sure that dude could smirk and smile and look awkward, but he sure as hell never had this look on his face.

"I think he does not like me, Dean," Castiel stated bluntly.

"He didn't like me at first either," was all he could utter at the moment, stunned by his own calmness and the sudden lack of noise except for the sizzling of the pancake in his pan. "But I think I kinda grew on him ..." Dean put the spatula and the pan on the counter and made his way towards the living room, when a hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"Your hunter looked upset," Castiel stated, "We should give him time." He paused and caught the demon's gaze who looked back over his shoulder at him.

Dean gave him an incredulous look and the angel shrugged. "You once told me, that sometimes humans need space and ... to let out steam ... before they can think straight again," he pointed out with risen eyebrows.

"You're right. He'll come back." Dean pursed his lips. Of course he would. After all the hunter hadn't anywhere else to go and his cure was waiting for him HERE. Dean was waiting for him HERE. So he resisted the urge to go after him.

Castiel decided to stay until the hunter would come back.

Dean finished the pancakes and put them into the microwave, where he glanced at the clock.

"I'm gonna take a quick shower," he informed his angel-friend, who hadn't left his place at the table yet. "When he gets back I'm gonna talk to him."

Castiel gave him a sharp nod when Dean walked past him and disappeared upstairs. Giving the hunter some more time seemed legit. Though ... it didn't feel right. Okay, Sam had all rights to be upset and in a bad mood.

He had a shitty night. Had an angel zap in on him and had learned that they weren't as fluffy and cute as he had thought they would be. After all the hunter still had to learn that there was more than monsters and ghosts between heaven and hell and that the good things weren't as good as they were supposed to be.

Dean rubbed over his face as he entered the bathroom and switched the light on. He snapped the fly of his jeans open and was about to pull the zipper down, when his gaze landed on something small and white on the blue bathroom floor. His eyes narrowed suspiciously.

Dena didn't know what made him look closer, or why his look had even been caught on the tiny thing ... but as soon as he realized what he was looking at, his eyes widened and he pulled the zipper back up. Not giving a damn about anything else right now, he stormed into the bedroom and snatched the pill bottle from the nightstand. On his way down the stairs, he fumbled with the fly of his jeans to get it closed again, clutching the bottle in his left hand all the while.

"Cas!" he called out as he grabbed the jacket from the banister.

The angel appeared in the doorway, staring at the demon curiously.

"It's Sam. - We gotta find him." Dean burst out and ripped the front-door open. "Before it's too late."

Either it was the panic or the sheer horror in his friend's voice and face, which made him understand the urgency without uttering a question about the whys and hows and was on his side in a matter of seconds.

... to be continued

... yep, you go & find Sam, I'm gettin' myself a cup of HOT STEAMING COFFEE XD