Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed. I got a request to update chapter titles with the name of the character that chapter's POV is from so I went ahead and did that (although the discerning reader has probably noticed that it goes Dean-Cas-Sam-Dean, etc, by this point).

"—amn it, answer me!"

Dean was being loud. Which wasn't really an unusual occurrence, but the fight against Zachariah had drained what little reserves Castiel had managed to rebuild, and he found himself wanting nothing more than to fall back into darkness for a little while. Especially since he wasn't likely to find a safer location to do so than Gabriel's stronghold. But he was finding it very difficult to let his consciousness slip away while Dean was being loud.

He vaguely registered both Michael and Lucifer being mentioned, and then the sound of his name drew Castiel even closer to consciousness. And if he'd had the strength, Castiel would have winced when he heard the words that Dean was directing at Gabriel. Not that Castiel could blame him—he had a difficult time understanding Gabriel's motivations as well and also wondered why Gabriel assisted them at the motel given his statement that he would do no such thing—but he didn't think that deliberately provoking Gabriel to anger was particularly conducive to having his questions answered. To being transformed into a small mammal, yes, but….

Another rude accusation, and Castiel wished that Sam would awaken. Sam would know how to stop Dean. But if that hadn't already happened, it wasn't likely to happen, so he concentrated on his own shell instead, trying to find the energy to speak in the hopes that he could perhaps stop Dean before he went too far.

"You will be silent."

Gabriel's words cut across Dean's before Castiel gathered the strength to say anything, silencing him instantly, and Castiel felt himself flinch inside his shell at the tone despite the fact that the words weren't even directed at him. That wasn't any Trickster speaking, it was the Archangel Gabriel, and he was not pleased. Castiel only hoped that Gabriel hadn't done something to force Dean to go mute. Like removing his mouth. Or his lungs.

"I told you before; I'm not picking either side for this idiocy." Gabriel continued in the same deadly tone. "But how I choose to act is none of your concern,"

"Yeah, actually, it is."

Well, at least Dean was still in a form that could speak. Although Castiel wished that he'd refrain from antagonizing Gabriel further.

"Look, I don't give a damn if you get off tormenting frat boys and siccing comic book characters on jackass wife beaters," Dean continued. "Hell, if it wasn't for your habit of killing people, I'd say more power to you and we could both just get on with our lives. Preferably without ever seeing each other again. But not only do you kill people, you put my brother through hell, you jerk Cas around like he—"

"I have never—" Gabriel interrupted.

"Yeah, right." Dean didn't have any trouble returning the favor. "I don't know where exactly you dropped him while Sam and I were stuck in TV Land, but wherever it was, he came back cut up and pissed off. And that's just for starters."

For his part, Castiel preferred not to remember that desolate mountain and the force that had slammed him—and his easily-damaged shell—back down to the earth every time he'd tried to take flight. The incident in which his face had impacted a fallen log had been particularly unpleasant. He'd eventually managed to fight his way down the mountain and free of the wards, at which point he'd easily shifted back to the United States and into Gabriel's dream reality—he'd figured out the trick of that the first time, when he'd originally gone searching for the boys at Bobby's request—but the first part of the journey had been anything but an easy process. And when he'd ended up back there a second time, this time with even heavier warding surrounding him, he hadn't been at all sure that he would have the strength to escape a second time. Fortunately the Winchesters had managed to trick Gabriel and force him to return Castiel to the warehouse so he hadn't had to, but….

"It wasn't supposed to go that far," Gabriel muttered after a moment, now sounding more defensive than angry. "I figured that he'd take a couple swings at the wards. The ability to just relax and go with the flow does not run in our family. But little brother's too damn stubborn for his own good; he just kept pounding on them. And they pounded him right back. I mean, I didn't even leave him out in the snow!" His tone had turned indignant. "I put him in a nice, sturdy little cabin that the monks always keep well-stocked, and the wards were more than obvious enough that anyone with sense would have just stayed put. How was I supposed to know he was going to be so pigheaded about it?"

Castiel debated pointing out that he did not, in fact, have the head of a pig, but since Dean didn't seem to find anything strange about the statement, he decided that it was yet another bizarre human phrase. And saying nothing required him to exert no effort, so he decided that that was the better option.

"He's our friend," Dean answered instead. "He'd never have just abandoned Sam and I to your little mental amusement park, or whatever it was. Although, since just about every other angel we've met has been a dick with wings—present company included—maybe it shouldn't come as a surprise that you wouldn't know that." He paused. "How sick do you have to be to come up with something like TV Land, anyway?"

"Well, it's not like you and your brother ever seem to figure anything out for yourself without being whacked upside the head with a clue-by-four first. Six months for Sammy-boy to get it through his thick skull that he couldn't save you—and I still don't think that one stuck—several days, a gunshot wound, and getting whacked in the family jewels before it occurred to either of you that people on a TV show you play roles…." He snorted. "And obviously that hasn't stuck either, since the two of you seem bound and determined to drag out the start of this damn apocalypse as long as you possibly can. What's the human expression—like pulling off a band-aid? Newsflash, Mr. Pain-in-my-ass, it's better to just get it over with."

"You know, you're not really helping your case," Dean shot back. "We're not doing the vessel thing. We're not starting the apocalypse. Deal with it." There was a clatter as he, either kicked something or knocked it over. "My point before was that one minute you're helping Cas, then you're not, then you're visiting from Mars, then you're…hell, I don't even know what you're doing most of the time. You're just jerking him—and the rest of us—around."

"How long do you think you would have survived if I hadn't come?" Gabriel snapped. "Either back at that farmhouse or at the motel today? You and your brother are about as useful as a couple of sticks of bubble gum in a fight against my brothers and sisters, and Castiel's not much better at the moment. So you'd both be dead, or your brother would be dead and you'd have Michael in you, which amounts to about the same thing considering what's left of a vessel after an archangel gets through with it, and Castiel…." He went silent for a minute, and when he answered again his voice was quieter. "It wouldn't have gone well for him. I wasn't 'jerking him around' as you so eloquently put it, I just didn't have a choice. And as for you and Sam…believe me, if I thought I could have pulled him out of there and left you and your brother behind, I would have, but since he would have gone back for you, I didn't see the point."

Gabriel was correct about that much; he would have gone back for the Winchesters no matter the cost. And considering what had happened before, Castiel had a very good idea of what would have happened this time if he'd been dragged back up to Heaven. He was glad that he'd been spared the experience, whatever Gabriel's reasoning had been.

"So, what, we're supposed to be grateful? He's supposed to be grateful? Is that why you did this?"

That made no sense to Castiel. Anything that he could do for Gabriel, Gabriel could far more easily do for himself, and while the Winchesters could given him something that he wanted—assuming an apocalypse could ever be called 'wanted'—it had to have been obvious during their last encounter that that was not going to happen.

There was a scoff, and Gabriel's first words echoed Castiel's thoughts. "I don't need gratitude. Yours is useless—unless, of course, it involves saying the word 'yes' to a certain pressing question, in which case by all means be grateful—and his…." He sighed quietly. "He's my little brother. He doesn't owe me anything. I'd have saved all of them if I could have."

'All of them' presumably being the other angels that had been killed thus far in the war. Castiel was suddenly glad that neither Gabriel nor Dean knew he was awake because he had no response for that. While the majority of the deaths of his siblings had had nothing to do with him, he did bear sole responsibility for a few.

"Okay, well, here's a question for you then," Dean said after a few moments. "If Sam or I ever do end up saying yes, do you really think that either side is going to let him live given that he's been fighting them at least as hard as we have? What's the point of saving him now if it's just going to come down to that later?" A snort. "Maybe you should follow your own advice and just pull that band-aid right off."