Happy Birthday to KayCee, aka; that one follower of this fic who keeps reviewing to ask for another chapter and refuses to give up on me and my terribly slow updates. This is my birthday present to you (sorry it's a bit terrible and kinda short too). It's named after the Johnny Cash song

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Chapter 14: Ring of Fire

Lilith paced around the table of demons. Everyone in the room was silent and awaiting her orders.

"We need to push Sam Winchester back in the right direction," she said slowly while looking straight on at the other five demons in the room. They would all be crucial to her plans. "But that damn trickster keeps getting in the way. So far, we have learnt nothing about him – that needs to change. Tobias, I'm leaving this to you. Their group needs to be infiltrated and their weaknesses need to be learnt. Ruby failed but I trust that you won't."

The tall gangly demon nodded his head, determined to make Lilith happy.

"Do you really think Tobias is the right demon for that?" Another demon scowled before Lilith could say anything further.

"Crowley," she sneered. "You're questioning my orders? You're lucky that I didn't feed you to the dogs for screwing up Dean's deal last year."

"It all worked out in the end didn't it? He still went to hell, he still broke the first seal," the smarmy demon replied. "And that's not really the point right now, is it?" Crowley paused and leaned back in his chair as all the demons in the room stared at him; but Lilith made no other move to quiet him so he kept talking. "The point is, that Tobias is the last person the Winchesters would trust – look at him; he talks like a prat and he can't smile without pulling a muscle. They would peg him as a demon the second he got on their radar."

"You're a weasel, Crowley. I'm not letting you anywhere near those boys," Lilith responded, guessing Crowley's true intentions. "However… your crossroad deals could come in very useful," she continued as a new plan began to brew. Lilith smirked to herself.

The Winchesters and their pet trickster wouldn't know what hit them.

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Dean was sitting at the bar alone while staring into his glass. It was still fairly early and so the bar was still a couple of hours away from being busy – but he'd had a long day. He wasn't too sure what the demons were up to but why did they have to go playing with fire?

Today he'd been captured, beaten, tied up and thrown onto a boat in the middle of a lake that was then blown up! He'd barely been able to make it out alive and only managed to escape the damn boat seconds before it was set alight. He'd almost been the sacrifice for a seal and he should be angry – and he was, right up until him and Sam ganked the demons. Then he just felt empty. He'd saved a seal… great. He'd been saving them for months now – there just always seemed to be another one right around the corner. This fight was never ending.

Sam was back at the motel, researching, but Dean just needed to get out of there. He needed a distraction. Though he didn't suppose he was going to be getting laid tonight, what with the black eye he was currently supporting from being kicked around by a group of demons.

"I'm guessing that you had a bad day?"

Dean turned slightly and saw Cas sliding into the seat next to him at the bar.

"You could say that," Dean replied. He downed the last of his drink and waved the barmaid over to order another. Once he'd got his new drink and paid for it, Cas started talking again.

"This is just about a bad day is it," he said as he indicated to Dean's current state of drunkenness. Dean said nothing in reply. "You need to stop blaming yourself." Dean once again kept quiet; he would never be able to quit blaming himself for everything that was about to happen. For all the deaths that would have been avoided if he'd just kept saying no to Alastair. "You need to have some fun."

"Fun?" Dean asked and Cas nodded.

"How about a bet? See who can pick up a girl the quickest." Dean snorted into his glass.

"You really think you can beat me at that?" He asked, "You look like a tax accountant," he mentioned, indicating the trickster's current state of dress… only state of dress? Did Cas actually own any other clothes?

"I'll even heal that black eye of yours," Cas lifted his hand to Deans shoulder and suddenly, the throbbing stopped. Dean smirked and agreed.

Cas ordered a drink and then they turned to survey the crowd. They agreed that they just needed to get the girl's number – nothing more. It worked quite well as a distraction until, twenty minutes later, Dean was talking to a girl and he turned around to look at the bar. That's when he saw Cas with his hands all over this women. She was tall and leggy with brown hair and a large bust. The girl was kissing at his jaw. Cas opened his eyes and grinned at Dean, holding up a napkin that clearly had the girl's number on.

Dean had to admit that Cas had skills. So they decided to do the first to get three numbers.

Dean ended up winning the bet by less than a minute and Cas was forced to pay for the remainder of their drinks. He looked down at the napkins with numbers on and frowned – he had no interest in calling any of them. Particularly the first girl, she'd been really dull.

Then Dean looked over at Cas' napkins and one of the names jumped out at him. He frowned and pulled the napkin closer as he reread the name that was written above the eleven digits. Yep, that definitely said Jack. Cas had got a guy's number? Dean frowned as he remembered all the flirting and innuendos from back when they'd first met. Had those actually meant something? And then there was that god damn kiss that had taken Dean months to forget.

There was a million questions running around Dean's head; was Cas interested in him? Was he interested in Cas? And what if the answer to both those questions was yes? Could they actually be together?

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Zachariah walked down the long hallway. He'd been summoned to talk with Michael and that couldn't mean anything but bad news. He had only ever been to Michael's preferred Heaven twice before – it was that of some politician who had required a sizable amount of money from inheritance. The house was vast and could be described as beautiful if Zachariah bothered enough for those things – but he usually didn't. And right at that moment he was too worried to even fully notice his surroundings. A few moments later, he arrived at the room where the Archangel resided in.

"Zachariah," Michael acknowledged and Zachariah bowed his head in respect. "Come in. I want a report on your progress." Zachariah of course knew what Michael was referring to. It was the only thing of any importance at the time being and everyone was getting more and more restless the longer that Dean Winchester was left unfound. Zachariah gave orders to the leaders of five different garrisons. All five had been put onto the task of finding the vessel and rescuing him from perdition. They had searched hell for many earth months before receiving the news that the Winchester had already been rescued.

Then the search had moved to earth but something was shielding their ability to track him.

"Unfortunately, there hasn't been much progress yet, Michael," Zachariah replied slowly and felt the annoyance radiating off of Michael's celestial form.

"You haven't been able to find Dean Winchester?"

"No, we haven't."

"What about his brother?" Michael asked and Zachariah shook his head. "Their friends?"

"I'm afraid not, sir."

"Well then, whatever you are doing is turning out to be highly ineffective. Have you not tried new tactics?" The question was asked completely calmly but Zachariah could sense the tension bubbling underneath the surface.

"We've tried estimating which cases the brothers will take on next but so far to no avail,"

"Maybe this needs some new eyes. Should I bring in someone else for your job?" Michael threatened and Zachariah felt a sense of fear – he was of too high a rank, he knew too much, a demotion was not an option available for him. If he was fired it would likely mean his death. "You have one last chance, Zachariah. Find Dean Winchester. Find whatever rescued him from hell and destroy it."

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So it's finally starting to resemble a Destiel story line. Only took 14 chapters to get to it… did I mention it was slow burn?