Chapter 35

Heaven and Other Matters

"The connections we make in the course of a life—maybe that's what heaven is."

Fred Rogers, children's television host

There were few things for heaven's new leader to take pleasure in. The responsibilities and authority sucked ass, and his Father's shake-ups were just going to make them worse. So, when one of his little brothers come and asked him to screw with Dean Winchester's dreams, he'd jumped at the chance. Unfortunately, thanks to a mess going on in a small monastery in Italy, he'd only managed to give the dreams a very specific angelic focus.

It was probably for the best that he hadn't been able to micromanage the content of those dreams. The last time he'd tried his hand at romance, she'd caught him in his lies and dumped him, but she'd ended up in a relationship with a perfectly rational—and consequently unendingly infuriating—pagan god. He knew his ability to be romantic was stunted even more than old Dean-o's. But he had at least made it so the hunter's thoughts would focus on Castiel.

He was about to peek in to see just how things were progressing when Azrael floated in, almost literally, to his little corner of heaven. There were only a few things he feared, and she gave him a case of the heebie jeebies that were damned near impossible to shake. There was something supernatural about her, even for an angel.

Of course, that could be the whole Angel of Death thing, and that she was the one with him when Lucifer had killed him.

"More good news?" he asked with a sigh. She offered a small quirk of her lips at his frustration. She had a slightly sadistic sense of humor, but at least she had one. That was more than he could say for most of the other angels. He'd take anyone up here who could crack a smile, even if it was at his expense.

"Father Constantine Guisard has been healed and will survive. Unfortunately, we were not able to save a number of his fellows." She walked past where he was sitting and gazed out of the window that overlooked a "lake," which was somewhere in Switzerland on Earth. "The prophet monk is understandably distraught, but I have in in a safehouse much like I did for the Winchester's prophet. Though, I am sure Father Constantine is more at peace there than Chuck."

"You did that?" he asked, and Azrael barely nodded her head before he burst out in laughter. "You have more of a sense of humor than people give you credit for."

"I do try sometimes, but many of you are too terrified of me to notice." He didn't even bother arguing with Azrael on that point. They'd both see through it. She turned back from the window. "He has shirked his responsibilities far too often and we both know he has secretly wanted more people to worship him and recognize his talent. I gave that to him and a safe house in one go."

"Don't you think it's a little cruel?"

"Cruel would have been to not have an open bar. Especially if you are successful in your little side endeavor. I imagine the images of Dean and Castiel will require quite the amount of liquor to wash out of his memory." Azrael offered a small smirk.

And while he was more than willing to help on that front, he really didn't want those images of his youngest brother and the hunter, either. "Back to the monk... Did we get all of his records?"

"I was told that the angels got all of the 'important' ones and most of the others."

"The 'important' ones?"

"I already have them scouring through the lineages to see whose was missing," she said. "Unfortunately, because only four of us have even the foggiest about the whole story, the underlings are bound to make mistakes. We need to ask the chief to broaden what falls into 'need to know' information, or we will be cleaning up many more messes."

"Father's got big plans." He huffed a laugh. "It's been a long time since I said that."

"And it is about time God got his act together. Behaving like an absentee father nearly ended everything." Azreal spoke with more emotion in her voice than she probably managed over a hundred conversations. She sounded angry in the way a person was only ever angry at family. It was telling, since so many of the other angels just assumed she considered herself something above them.

To anyone else, Azreal in her anger should have been less approachable, there was something so real about her for once now that the carefully held control was gone. "I know I was off in witness protection, but what about you? Where were you when the Apocalypse went down?"

Azrael's fists clenched at her side. "I was tied up. I wasn't allowed to do a damned thing while Michael and Lucifer prepared to settle their sibling rivalry on a worldwide scale. I couldn't do a bloody thing except take orders..." And the carefully constructed wall rose back up once again. She was the same unapproachable angel she had always been.

"I will check on the seraph's progress."

"Let me know what you find," he said, going back into his role as counsel leader.

"Of course, Gabriel," Azrael said before leaving him alone in the lakeside lodge borrowed from someone else's heaven.

#

Castiel had been helping Metatron locate an appropriate family for his current vessel. He intended to wipe the boy's memories and place him somewhere safe. Given that he already spoke French, but they wanted some distance from the boy's father in France, they had looked first in Quebec.

They had appeared, in all of their angelic glory—within the limits of burning out the couple's eyes—before a lovely man and woman who, like the boy, were descended from Enoch. They were devout and loving people, happy to obey the word of two of God's angels requesting them to take on this teenaged boy with the promise that paperwork, the boy's past, all of it would be taken care of.

Castiel had felt quite happy to help a second child now find a good home that his first instinct had been to return home to see Johnny. It seemed Dean had only recently left the boy and another little girl sleeping in the crib. The girl was older than Johnny by very nearly two years, but she was curled close to him in sleep as though he was her very best friend.

He realized the girl must be Fallyn, and Castiel couldn't help but think as he spied the girl's soul that this early friendship would last for quite some time in the future. They were kindred spirits, even if they were far too young to know that yet. He found himself smiling at this piece of information, and he decided he would keep it tucked away for now. Dean had explained often enough that there were just some things that a person needed to discover on his own.

The angel gently placed his hand over the girl's braided hair and offered a small blessing upon the child. Instinctively, the child leaned into his touch before grabbing hold of Johnny's T-shirt and settling back onto the bed.

His attention shifted back to the boy. He ran his fingers through baby-soft hair and smiled as Johnny's lips quirked upward in response to his touch. Castiel knew that he was supposed to love all humans alike, but he also knew he loved Johnny more. And the boy wasn't the first to find favor above all others with the angel. The Winchesters and Bobby had a long time ago.

Castiel could hear Dean and a woman, likely Fallyn's mother, talking from Dean's bedroom. The house's walls were not designed to keep out noise. Castiel had traveled with the Winchesters long enough to know what it meant when Dean managed to get a woman to his bedroom.

The angel took that as his cue and left, and went back to heaven.

"I am really going this time," Castiel said as he stood in front of Balthazar at a pub along the new Heaven's Main Street. This one looked to have been plucked out of 1960s England, and Balthazar looked quite at home as he took a sip of red wine. The bar was largely empty, save for a few of Heaven's population and the two angels. (The ability to mingle with other occupants of Heaven was being slowly implemented, but notice had not yet gotten to much of those who had died earlier than 1980.)

"So you say. So you've said. I don't believe it." Balthazar said with a huff and an irritated tilt of his head. "Call me from Rio or send me a postcard."

Castiel held his hands out, palm up. "Please," he said. He rarely used that word, and it had not come easily in that moment, either. "I need an answer."

"Of course you do," the other angel said. "But you don't want one. You have two options in front of you: either you find out that you are just finally ready to pop that cherry and Dean is convenient fodder for your fantasies or you want only Dean, who you think won't want you back."

"He won't," Castiel assured his brother. He gestured to his trenchcoat and suit. "I will change. Then you might believe I am serious."

"You've flown off on me twice as it is," Balthazar said. "I don't think you'll stick around if I take away your security blanket, too. We'll go and pretend we're businessmen fresh off the plane."

He stood and threw an arm over the dark-haired angel's shoulders. "Let's get you a little action."

#

"You took him to Rio?" Metatron asked incredulously. "Again."

"And the chicken went and flitted off on me. He was inches away from kissing this gorgeous bloke who totally wanted to shag him and off he went."

"So, basically it was the same as when you tried to get him to dance with that woman." Metatron followed Balthazar through the streets of Pompeii, which were still being reconstructed by some of the seraphs. "Did you expect anything different?"

"No, but I think the point is clear, at the very least. Everything functions just fine, but the only person he wants to have it function with is Dean Winchester."

Metatron winced at the unwanted imagery that flooded his brain at that statement. "How is it that you're so at ease talking about this when Castiel is actually your brother?" Metatron had trouble with the imagery, and he was something more akin to a step-brother, if that.

Balthazar merely shrugged. "It just feels like the right thing to do. Those two can stare at one another in a way that just isn't natural and for longer than should be possible, and Cassie's whole world revolves around Dean. Johnny, now, too."

The blond opened a heavy door and led Metatron into the house. "So when does your great-great-whatever-grandson go to his new family?"

"Everything will be ready tomorrow, I believe," the angel said. "I've already visited his father in this vessel, frightened him and might have put the fear of the wrath of heaven into him. Right after I planted enough evidence for police to finally arrest him for the things he has been doing to children for the last two decades."

"Good on you," Balthazar said. "But that means you will need another vessel. And that's where I come in. I've found you a new meat suit. Not too bad on the eyes, and with the bonus that this one will be permanent."

"I'm not wearing someone else's skin forever," Metatron said as he followed his friend into the triclinium, the ancient Roman dining room. "Even if they're not in it."

"Here's the thing... You know that Jophiel has been dying to expand her field of work. She was unbelievably jealous that a mere Angel of Thursday got to rebuild a human being from the ground up and that Anael never came to her when she wanted her old body back, either. She's been ranting for ages that creating from flesh and bone should be the Angel of Artists' job, so I proposed a suggestion to her."

Balthazar stood aside and let Metatron see, finally, what was resting on the lounge-like sofas in the dining room. It was him. His flesh, his black hair, his beard, his nose—it had always been slightly prominent, but suited his face—his body. It was rebuilt and waiting on him.

"You... how did you do this?"

"Angels are a little more free-thinking now, thanks to Cassie. And Jophiel didn't need an order from God to do it this time around. God's also lightened up on the whole, 'if-he-still-has-his-human-body-he-will-never-relate-to-other-angels' thing." Balthazar was grinning; Metatron suspected that it was partly at the pride that he had stunned God's own scribe to silence, but it seemed that he was mostly just happy for his friend.

"Try it on."

Metatron pressed his hand to his forehead and transferred his Grace from his descendant's body to the newly created copy of his own. The moment he was back inside the forty-year-old form, he felt at ease once again. Dark brown eyes opened to find his friend carefully placing the teenaged body on the nearby sofa with a level of care that too many assumed Balthazar didn't possess.

"How does it feel?" Balthazar asked, and he sounded just a bit nervous.

"Perfect," Metatron said, standing and moving without the awkwardness that he always had in someone else's borrowed body.

"It's like your very own bespoke vessel."

The former human smiled, then clapped his hands to either of Balthazar's shoulders and kissed the man on each cheek. It had been the appropriate means of showing gratitude when he'd last felt the weight of these limbs and it had been instinctual to do it again. Though he spoke many languages and adjusted his language depending upon the audience, Metatron was fairly certain that when he thanked his friend aloud, it had been in his native tongue.

#

She had an old name, one that dated back thousands of years and given to her by her father. The body was relatively new, for her at least; she'd only had it a few years now. The name she went by was just a few years older than that. Her purpose had been ripped away from her and then she'd been forced to team up with new demons and take orders from complete idiots.

Meg could feel their eyes on her as she looked at the so-called "worthless" sheet of paper in her hands. Apparently the first of the two self-proclaimed leaders wasn't quite as dumb as his friend who was just staring at them both slack-jawed. There had been enough glee on Meg's face when she'd looked at these family trees to at least make #1 suspicious. #2 was too busy worrying about where he might get off next.

She trained her expression to as close to neutral as she could manage until both of the demons were focused again on the loot that was obviously useful.

Even the angels seemed to have found no value in the papers she was holding in her hands at that moment. It had been abandoned in a church in Italy when word had reached heaven of the demons' planned attack. There were documents that were important to get out of there, vessels' families who were important to protect, so if the lines of Aaron and Boaz were discovered, it shouldn't matter because their angels were long gone. Raphael had been gone for just over a year and Uriel had been offed sometime in '09.

Meg was, apparently, better at math than her compatriots. Better at a lot of other things, too, in her own humble opinion. She couldn't help but notice two brand new births noted at the end of the scrolls, right where the two lines intersected. One born in March of this year and another born in January of 2010.

"Anything good?" a voice at Meg's side asked.

"Possibly. Not that Tweedles Dee and Dum would realize it." Meg doesn't entirely trust the woman-turned-demon at her side. She knows that Bella couldn't give a damn about getting their Lord back out of the cage, but she does at least have a healthy desire for revenge against Dean Winchester for their time together in Hell and against Heaven for saving him instead of her. For now, at least, their goals had them on similar paths.

"I thought both Uriel and Raphael were long gone."

"So did I. So why keep records on the vessels of dead angels? And why do they have births that just so happen to coincide with dates nine months after the angels' deaths?"

"You're thinking they could be useful allies?" Bella asked. Meg was pleased she didn't need to spell this all out for her. It was a refreshing change of pace since Meg's brother and father died. Though, at least with dumb ones, she wasn't so worried about watching her back; when the stupid ones tried anything, she could catch on long before they succeeded.

"Uriel was already in our camp by the end; Raphael though... He was squarely backing Michael. If he's a mere child, though, we can do something about that, reeducate him, perhaps. At the very least, we may convince him to help us pop the cage. He might have been rooting for the other guy, but at least he wanted to see the grudge match go down. If we find the kids, snag them and their Grace, we could have some real heavy hitters on our side."

"Or at the very least, the Grace of a seraph and an archangel." Bella smiled. "Do you want to go after the kids and let me see if any of my contacts can give me some info on some fallen Grace?"

Meg couldn't help but think that her father would have liked Bella and her self-starting attitude. "That sounds fine with me. My people are a little better at turning up living things. I should be able to find Shantiah and Augustus Jackson and their bouncing baby boys in no time."

"I assume our commanders don't need to hear about this?"

"If they were dumb enough to toss this out as garbage, then they've given up any right to be informed."

#

Castiel was perched atop Mount Kilimanjaro, doing his very best to clear his head. Sadly, it wasn't working. He was certain Balthazar would never take him out again, and he didn't even think he wanted to go back. He was sure now that he had his answer about his feelings toward Dean. Really, he had always known it, but it was not what he wanted.

He was apparently capable of getting some response from and genuinely appreciating attractive human forms. Castiel had never had difficulty admiring the aesthetics of humans or the pull of their souls. But none affected him as strongly as Dean.

Castiel didn't doubt that it had a lot to do with the bond he already had with the hunter. They were friends, they trusted one another. They both understood one another's mistakes and had reached the point of forgiveness for them. If he were to develop a preference for one human, it was probably a given that it would be Dean.

What the angel found most confusing was that these feelings would come on after years of no indication. Perhaps it was the knowledge that this body was truly his own now, that he had Jimmy Novak's consent to treat it as such. Maybe it was Johnny and how the baby's presence had forced their relationship to change, to transform from friends to something much vaguer. It may even have been that dream, the feeling Castiel had gotten when Dean reached out and grabbed hold of his hand as though it was the most natural thing in the world.

All that the angel was certain of was that Dean didn't want their relationship to change. He had made that clear the morning after that dream, and it was clear he was on his way toward at least a fling with this Ramona woman.

That was when Castiel sensed Dean's distress, which spared the angel from more of his own. He quickly stopped at Johnny's side to find the boy was still asleep, but alone in the crib this time. Castiel could sense that the girl and her mother were no longer in the house. He was slightly ashamed by his relief at that.

He reappeared in the corner of the room where Dean sat, hunched and holding his head. "Dean?" he asked tentatively. He wasn't sure if it was appropriate to say anything more. Dean looked up at him, and Castiel would have sworn he saw a little fear there, but he quickly covered it with anger. That was fairly standard for the hunter.

"Were you tapping into my head again?" Dean didn't want Castiel to view whatever it was he'd been dreaming about. That wasn't unusual, since he was typically very protective of his dreams and inner thoughts.

"No," he answered. It was largely true. He had sensed Dean's sudden worry and fear, but he hadn't actually seen the cause of it. Though their connection made it difficult for Castiel to block out Dean's moments of distress, even the ones that were caused by nothing more than a dream.

Castiel took a few steps forward, but considering what he had tried to do today, what he had proven to himself, he held himself back. "I know that Johnny is asleep and well. I went to his room first. You don't appear to be injured. Is something troubling you?"

"Weird dreams." Instinctively, Castiel extended his fingers to try to take the bad memories away. Dean saw the movement and pulled back. "Not bad, Cas. Just weird."

For a moment, Castiel considered apologizing for even offering to remove the dreams from Dean's memories, as they seem to hold something positive in their depths, but he wasn't sure how to say it. He focused instead on the television behind him. It was in Spanish, which was odd. "I wasn't aware you spoke Spanish," he said to Dean, in lieu of that apology.

"I don't," Dean said, then continued on before Castiel could express his confusion, "but I wanted some mindless entertainment. And it's not that hard to follow. I don't know why they're angry, but I know they're angry."

Dean made room on the sofa, either knowingly or not, and Castiel took advantage of it to sit beside his friend. If it felt nice to be that close, or if a part of his mind wandered just a bit, there was very little he could do about it.

He tried to focus on the show. Perhaps, given that Castiel had no issues understanding any spoken language—including both pig latin and Klingon, they had discovered after Dean got especially bored and wanted to see how well the angel's "built-in translation software" really worked. "He was manipulative and liked about his involvement in a crime syndicate. Also, apparently, she is having another man's child."

"Well, that'd do it." Cas nodded in response and was impressed that he managed not to stare at Dean's profile as he watched the fight in amusement. He did smile on the few occasions that Dean burst into laughter at the angel's attempts at explaining the action going on in the show. Apparently, using the phrase, "proclivity for promiscuity and lax moral behavior" was worthy of a deep belly laugh.

Castiel found himself laughing, too, even if it was at himself.