Song Remains the Same

by R. W. Winters

For Alex Winchester, normal has never been in the equation. Mute since the nursery fire, she grew up on the road chasing ghosts with her brothers and father. When her voice is inexplicably restored and the angel Castiel appears claiming to be her guardian, both of their lives change forever in ways that Heaven and Earth never expected. Castiel/OFC. Sisfic - S4-9 - Alternate Ending.

71. Date Night

Song Remains the Same

Chapter 71 / Date Night

"Such a long time running. And I can't stop now."
- Embrace

---

Sioux Falls, South Dakota

In the front of the Impala, passenger seat side as usual, Sam Winchester was deep in thought and not very aware of his surroundings. He'd been spacing out for most of the ride back because if he didn't stay quiet and retreat into his own headspace he was pretty sure he'd explode in a ball of helplessness and anger.

Imagine thinking you'd been dead in the ground for over a year. Imagine remembering nothing but the moment you died and the moment you woke… then imagine finding out for the year plus in between those two moments you'd been alive and doing unimaginable, horrific things. Imagine still not being able to remember any of what you'd done.

Sam didn't have to imagine that scenario. He was in it.

Ever since Sam had fooled Cas into telling everything two days ago, the middle Winchester had been hit hard by guilt, confusion, disbelief, horror, and great emotional pain. How was he supposed to know how to react to finding out about all of this crap he did? All the crap that happened to his brother and sister? He didn't know. But the worst part hands down was finding out what his twin sister went through. The demon blood, being on her own, the fight with Dean—but out of everything that had happened there was one thing that devastated Sam the most.

What brother could ever be prepared to hear their sister was attacked like that?

And how was he supposed to live with himself knowing that he hadn't given a single crap about her when it happened? Sam didn't know how to perceive himself anymore. He couldn't imagine not caring about that and it was eating him alive.

He also couldn't imagine trying to kill Alex. But he knew he had.

She wasn't supposed to have gotten hurt. Not by him and not by anyone else. Maybe stupidly, Sam had brought up her attack to her after he found out and the look on her face had cracked his heart in half.

Two days ago he'd held her tight as she cried and he cried, too.

"Are you okay?" he asked her through tears and a voice laden with the deepest grief. He pulled back to look at her, try to see the truth about it.

She had wet streaks down both cheeks but was ironically smiling bravely. "Sam, I'm fine."

Her words felt like a slap. "How the hell can you be fine?" he asked softly in a stricken voice, trying to understand. He was shaking his head blankly and looking her over so carefully, trying to see the damage done, as if it would have left a physical scar. But the only thing he saw was the weight in her eyes. The weight she tried to hide from him and sidestep, discredit. Sam put his hand against the side of her face to get her to look him in the eye so she could see how much he meant what he confessed yet again tearfully and emphatically: "I am so, so sorry." That he couldn't have been there for her. That he hadn't kept her safe. That any of it had happened to her at all.

His words obviously touched her deeply. "I know, Sammy."

Her use of his childhood pet name, the one only she and Dean were allowed to use… the gentle way she said it, like he was the one who needed comforting… Sam had to cover his face with a hand as he wallowed in deep grief at everything flooding his mind at the moment.

Two days later and Sam was still completely aghast and reeling.

However, Dean didn't know that Sam knew what he knew. Sam had wanted it that way and made Alex promise not to tell their brother about it until the hunt they'd been on was over and done. The logic was that Sam recognized the hunt was important and young girls' lives were on the line. There hadn't been time to deal with the fallout and wreckage of what Sam had discovered. That, and Sam was so angry at Dean that he had to bite back his personal thoughts so he didn't commit homicide.

"Home sweet home," Dean said at that moment, chuckling to himself as the car slowed down and pulled into the familiar driveway of the Singer residence. Sam glanced at Dean sidelong darkly. There were some things he needed to say to his older brother and soon. He couldn't hold out much longer or keep this stuff inside. Dean's mostly cheerful demeanor was rubbing Sam every wrong way there was. He knew Dean was happy because he was himself again and not some soulless douchebag but Sam just couldn't get past some things. He couldn't share his brother's feelings of relief and contentedness with the weight of knowledge on his shoulders.

The car pulled around to park at the garage side of Bobby's house. No sooner had Dean turned the engine off than he was getting out and hauling out the bag of gold they'd taken from the dragon's sewer lair back in Portland. Sam watched his brother walking to the covered garage as he put some loose books he'd had out back into the bag between his feet.

Dean had gotten a dragon-sword from that professor Bobby knew and with the weapon that could kill a dragon in hand, the three Winchesters had tracked the dragons to the sewers. There they'd found the kidnapped virgins, piles of stolen gold, and a mysterious leather-bound tome in some language none of them recognized. After killing one of the dragons and missing their chance to kill the other one before he got away, the Winchesters had freed the girls, gotten them to safety, then called the case closed for the time being. It was all a blur to Sam who only had one thing on his mind currently.

He turned and hung an arm over the back of his seat to look at his twin. She was sitting in the back seat and still engrossed in the dragon's book they'd confiscated. When she didn't notice his patient, waiting gaze, Sam spoke up. "So can you make heads or tails on that thing?"

Alex glanced up at him briefly before a playful smile tugged on her mouth. "Is that a dragon joke, Sam? If I remember right those guys didn't have tails…" at the bad pun Sam made a face and groan-laughed very reluctantly. She obviously knew it was bad too from the little self-deprecating smile on her face. "I think it's some kind of dawn-of-time Latin?" She shrugged with a grimacing, unsure expression as she looked down at the open page again skeptically. "Maybe? I dunno. Bobby might. I'm gonna go see what he thinks." She closed the volume carefully and scooted toward the door of the car to get out.

Sam wasn't getting out yet. "Yeah," he said, turning to look out the windshield at his brother. "Sounds good."

Dean had dumped out his little treasure trove of stolen gold onto the wooden table in the messy carport area just ahead. Sam contemplated him and watched as Alex said something to their brother and ruffled his hair fondly before ducking inside with the dragon book. Sam expelled a deep breath and decided now was probably the best opportunity he'd get for this. He got out of the car and approached his brother, a thousand conflicting emotions and thoughts getting to him.

Seated at the table and picking out a gold Rolex out of the pile, Dean had a shit-eating grin on his face. He glanced up at Sam's approach. "Hey—ask me what time it is," he said, then at Sam's pinched expression Dean's smile fell. He seemed annoyed at the bitch face and he studied the watch again closely to avoid looking at Sam. "Okay fine Sam, I'll bite," he muttered, then threw the watch down and folded his arms on the table, giving a facetious little expression up Sam's way. "What's your problem? Been acting like you've got PMS since Portland."

"The problem is that I know everything," Sam said, seeing no point in beating around the bush. Dean sat back slightly, his face gone slack. "The past year, the crap that happened, what I did…" Sam trailed off and let a humorless little excuse for a laugh escape. His stomach was churning from anxiety. "All of it, Dean."

Somber and a little pissed off as well, Dean looked down at the table unseeingly as his jaw tightened and clenched. "Who told?" he asked after a couple of tense seconds. "Was it Alex? Or was it Bobby."

Sam shook his head once, waiting for Dean to meet his waiting gaze. "It was Cas."

More disapproval washed over Dean's baleful features. "Dammit, Cas," he muttered. "Friggin' child."

Sam's more angry feelings were quickly coming out of hiding. "No, he told me straight," he said in a tight voice. "He answered me instead of hiding or lying to me." At Dean's sharp scowl, Sam got more intense instead of backing down. "You should have told me, Dean."

Without warning Dean stood up and rounded the table. Even though Dean was shorter than Sam he carried a lot of weighty authority in his stride, his posture, and his mannerisms. "No, Sam, you weren't supposed to know point blank! Death didn't just shove your soul back in, okay? He put up the great wall of Sam between you and the things that you don't remember and trust me when I say that the things you don't know could kill you. That's not a joke."

Sam nodded dour understanding. "Yeah, I get that—Alex told me about the wall and the thing with Death—but Dean… I'm still on two legs," he said earnestly. "Finding out that stuff didn't do anything to me. And Cas told me everything he knew. Everything, Dean." As Sam thought about it, the helpless fury came out of him unbidden and translated into accusing. "Where the hell were you all year, man? You sat around at Lisa's and settled for not having a damn clue where our sister was?" Dean obviously hadn't expected that and his face went slack. "And as if that's not bad enough, she gets herself in a bad situation—the worst situation—and you don't make sure that bastard is dead?" Sam demanded, shaking at the thought of what had happened. "You let him come back for more?" Seething with guilt and fury at the mere thought of it, Sam's voice raised to a shout. "If that had been me I wouldn't have slept until I ripped his heart out!"

Dean was the picture of dismay. "She—she said he was dead, Sam," he said in a voice that wasn't very strong at all. "I thought he was dead!"

Sam didn't care. "How the hell could you have risked that? Why wouldn't you make sure?" He was so angry that he couldn't see and so sad that he hadn't slept since finding out. "Cas said I knew what happened when I was soulless and didn't care but shit, Dean, I do now!" He was beginning to lose control. "You couldn't have dropped whatever crap hunt we were on to make sure the guy who tried to rape my sister was really dead?"

It looked like Dean had been punched in the stomach and was having a hard time getting a deep breath of air. "Sam—"

"You should've checked!" Sam shouted, abruptly grabbing Dean by the jacket and shaking him. "You should've made sure!"

"Well I didn't and I wish to god I had!" Dean exploded then shoved Sam away with shocking force and strength. Sam always forgot that even though Dean was smaller, he could still take Sam in a fight most days. "The whole time you've been gone has been one mistake after another and I regret the whole goddamn thing, Sam!" Dean shouted. "I know I messed up, you think I don't know that?!" There was a short, breathless silence where they both stared at each other with similarly pained expressions. "What happened happened and not a day goes by I don't wish I'd known or done something but I can't and that's it, so get off my case!" Dean shook his head, fighting emotion and looking away then dragging a hand down over his face to compose himself. "You give Cas the third degree about this, too, or did you save the guilt trip just for me?"

Sam shook his head and looked down briefly. For as angry as he felt, the sadness was even bigger. "I had some things to say to him, too." Things pretty similar to what he was saying to Dean right now, honestly. Only Sam had been shocked at the time when Cas told him—now he'd had time to stew about it and get angry. Sam remembered that Cas had looked just as heartbroken about it as Dean looked, if not more. Sam felt himself beginning to regret his harsher approach to this and he tried to explain himself. "Look. I'm sorry, Dean. You can't imagine how… how helpless I feel about all this. I can't imagine… I never wanted…" to find out that some guy hurt her bad enough to land her in the hospital. To see it in her eyes, the painful wound she still carried and deep fear she refused to acknowledge about it happening again, Sam wished so fucking bad he had been there and able to prevent it from happening or stop it altogether. He had meant what he shouted at Dean a minute ago about ripping the guy's heart out. He would have. Without a second thought. No one messed with his sister. No one.

Sam knew Dean felt the same and he relented from giving Dean the third degree about it. Obviously, the oldest Winchester had beaten himself up over it enough. "It was just my worst nightmare finding out what she went through," Sam said. Dean nodded tensely, eyes down on the ground. "I just… I just feel like one of us should've been there for her," he continued earnestly, not sure if he should be grieved or furious that they hadn't been. "Cas included. And she was on her own, she had to go through it alone and there was no one there to help her." His throat was tight and there was a hard lump he couldn't swallow away. "And she says it's fine and that it's over but how can it be? That stuff does things to people."

There was a short silence. "Well if he wasn't dead before, he is now Sam, trust me." Dean stared hard into far distance then glanced at Sam guilty. "Saw it with my own eyes."

Sam had to force a rueful smile onto his face to keep his face from crumpling into a more pained expression. He shook his head faintly. "He may be dead but what he did… you can't kill that or wipe it off the board."

Dean shut his eyes, face working tiredly. "I know, Sam, I know. You don't have to tell me twice." He sounded so sad. When he looked at Sam again he looked extremely concerned and confused, a little disillusioned. "She… talked to you about it?"

"A little." Sam wet his lips and let out a weighted breath, sat down at the table and set his jaw as he thought for a minute. "Look. I'm sorry for blowing up at you, man. I guess we both got stuff we regret doing. And not doing." Sam let his hands rest atop the table, loosely clasped, and he contemplated his fingers blankly. Those same fingers and hands had crushed Alex's windpipes and he remembered that. He didn't remember anything else, not really, from his time being possessed by Lucifer. But he remembered that. What other things had he done with these hands during the year he hunted with Samuel Campbell like Cas said?

Sam looked up at his watchful and grim brother. "Dean, I gotta set things right. Or try, anyway. The crap I pulled… trying to kill Alex, letting you both get turned to vamps, who knows what else—I'm so, so sorry."

Dean heaved a heavy sigh and slowly came to sit down across from Sam. He then gave Sam a very fervent, pointed gaze. "It wasn't you. RoboSam wasn't you."

Eyes on his hands again, Sam was very sober. "She said the same thing." Long pause. "You know, I kind of feel like I got slipped the worst mickey of all time…" He paused again, contemplating his reality. "And I woke up to find out that I had burnt the whole city down. And you can say it wasn't me, but… I'm the one with the zippo in my pocket, you know? So I'm not sure it's that cut and dry." Looking across the table at his very distressed big brother, Sam tried to say thank you, which was ironic considering how he'd just blasted Dean for what he was about to say thanks for. "I appreciate you trying to protect me," he said. "I really do and I get why you did what you did. But… I know now. And I gotta fix what I gotta fix and I have to make up for the ways I let you both down." Intent and assertive, Sam leveled Dean with a solicitous gaze. "So I need to know what I did. I need you to tell me the stuff Cas couldn't."

Dean didn't like the idea at all. "But you don't know how dangerous that could be," he protested.

Sam pushed. "What would you want if this were opposite and you were the one who spent a year soulless?" He asked. Dean's face worked silently. "Right," Sam said. Dean couldn't argue with that. "Same thing."

"Sam…" Dean started heavily.

"Hey!" Alex's brown head of hair popped out of the the back door. Sam and Dean's somber expressions were quickly covered up by casual default expressions. Missing the more dark subject matter of the conversation, she was good-natured. "You two princesses wanna get your asses in here?" She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "Bobby found something in the dragon book."

"Two seconds," Sam said, giving a smile that indicated everything was A-OK.

It was then that her sharper observational skills appeared. Giving them a slightly suspicious squint as she looked them over closely, Alex narrowed her eyes then opened her mouth slightly—then she reconsidered, shut her mouth, said nothing at all, and disappeared back into the house after giving them a certain look of warning… she could definitely tell something was going down. Sam was glad she hadn't asked though.

A crow called out in the junkyard and the brothers said nothing for a few seconds. Dean was looking down with his eyebrows pressed together in thought. When he said nothing further, Sam tried to catch his gaze. "Dean?" he asked intently, refusing to let his brother sidestep this one. "What about it? I need to know what you know."

Giving a disgusted, defeated sigh, Dean looked up and he was the picture of contemptuous. "Yeah Sam. Fine. I'll tell you what I know. Tonight, after I get some damn hunter's helper in my system." He stood up, signaling that he was done with the exchange.

Sam followed him to the back door where Dean unexpectedly stopped him by holding an arm out and blocking his step. "Do me a favor and don't bring it up to her again if you don't have to," he told Sam stiffly. "She doesn't wanna talk about it anymore."

Sam pulled a slightly bitchy face. "I know, Dean."

He knew because after the initial breakdown, after he held his sister and they gotten the tears out of the way, she'd talked to him about it a little. Said how she had learned a lesson about trusting people, said how she thought she knew the guy but definitely didn't, would never have pegged her attacker as a rapist in a million years. She'd asked Sam to please, please never bring it up again because it was something she didn't want to remember or think about ever again.

So, yeah. Dean didn't have to tell Sam twice not to bring it up again.

---

Later That Day

The afternoon waned. There wasn't much of a front yard to speak of at Bobby's but there was a huge side yard complete with un-mowed grass and a tree where a tire-swing used to hang off. The rope had rotted away years ago and the tire had rolled to a sad final resting place at the foot of said tree. The Winchesters had spent a lot of time on that tire swing in their younger years and had climbed the tree countless times.

Laying on her back in the soft and overgrown grass underneath that very tree, Alex peered up drowsily at the clear blue sky through the branches overhead.

"I mean, don't you ever just wanna leave all this behind?"

Alex turned her face slightly, almost bumping her head into Sam's in the process. She'd forgotten he was laying there beside her, he'd been so quiet for so long. "Hm?"

He sounded introspective, like he'd been thinking about it for the entire time he'd been so quiet. "The crazy crap we get ourselves in to, the soul deals and the soullessness and Heaven and Hell and… just all of it." Sam was staring up at the sky in contemplation and Alex joined him in doing so. "We've hunted for years and had so many close calls, lost so much. Almost seems like someone's trying to tell us something or like we're pushing our luck to stay in the game. I mean, haven't we served our time?" There was a short pause and Sam gave a soft little laugh, like he thought his own thoughts were laughable and sorry. "I want a dog. And a girlfriend. I even want a mortgage." He got stony and his smile fell. "And I shouldn't."

"…Why not?" Turning her head again, grass tickled Alex's cheek. She let her eyes study her twin brother's profile for a second. "If you really want those things, you should go get them." She wasn't being rude or sarcastic, and her sympathetic, open tone made Sam frown, turn his head to look at her.

"What, just drop hunting for suburbia?" he asked, face scrunched up in an expression that seemed to say I don't know about that.

"You've been through Hell. Literally," Alex replied, looking at Sam's familiar face and seeing how his eyes carried the sorrow of a man much older than he was. She didn't know what the cage had been like, but she remembered Lucifer's essence clawing at her veins and defiling her atoms and leaving her cold as ice. She knew part of her brother's nightmare, understood some of the terror that had befallen him. Gentle, loving him so much and hoping maybe he would walk away from hunting to be safe, she gave him an earnest little bittersweet smile. "No one would blame you for leaving this life." She realized she couldn't guarantee that. "Or, I wouldn't blame you, anyway."

Sam looked back at the sky for a long moment and when he spoke again he sounded somber, young, unsure. Lost. "Just… don't you think we deserve normal? Peaceful?"

Her mouth pursed sideways slightly in thought. "Deserve is an interesting word," she murmured, garnering a sidelong questioning glance from her twin. At Sam's deepening frown, she steered back to his question. "I mean, yeah. In theory I want a normal life. But I'm not normal and I just don't know if I could ever fit in to a normal world completely." She sent him a little smile despite her surprisingly unexpected feelings on what she was saying. "You wouldn't have that problem, though. And you deserve to be happy, Sam. You saved the entire freaking world from the devil. Don't forget that."

Sam's expression showed slight surprise, like he hadn't really thought about that much. "I almost destroyed the world, though. If I hadn't gotten control back at the last minute—"

"But you did." Her firm statement was backed up by a warning look that said don't even go there.

Sam heeded the warning and he stared up at the sky quietly for a moment. "Maybe I wanna leave this life before I can do any more damage, you know? But I gotta make things right first. I just don't know what I did."

"You'll have to ask Grandpa about that one," Alex said cynically.

"Samuel." There was a soft little huff, a humorless laugh. "Yeah, Cas told me a little about that."

Her eyes slid sidelong to Sam. "He tell you Gramps is a frigging maniac too?"

Another cynical little exhale of air. "Yeah. I got the gist." Sam frowned deeply at the sky. "What I don't get is why would he want Mom alive so bad that he was willing to kill her three living kids to get her back."

It was Alex's turn to give a short cynical huff. "Delusion? Psychopathy? I dunno. Tell you what though, I don't ever wanna see him again. I'll do more than break his nose this time."

That comment earned her a surprised face. "You broke his nose?" Sam asked, an impressed little grin spreading over his face. "Cas didn't tell me that part."

Answering him with a silent little smile, Alex proceeded to look up at the sky again.

"Speaking of Cas…" Sam trailed off for a second and his probing gaze made the side of Alex's face itch. "Just curious, but like… how serious is it with you two these days?"

His question caught her a little off guard. She knew he was curious but he hadn't asked yet. She guessed she should have known it was coming and she thought a minute about that question and its answer. "Well… we…" honestly, she was considering telling Sammy everything. Letting her eyes flick to him sidelong, she tested the waters. Her heart raced with nervousness at what Sam was asking and how close she was to telling him everything. "Remember how you told me to go marry him?" That very neutrally toned question got a very sharp what did you just say? look from Sam and Alex immediately chickened out and shrugged, pretending to be offhand by studying her nails then squinting up at the sky. "Uh… just… maybe someday I will."

Sam looked mildly relieved, like he'd thought something else and was glad he was wrong about his assumption. "It was the end of the world and I was dying…" he said, sounding almost like it was laughable how he'd told her to go marry him. "I said a lot of crazy stuff."

That caught Alex off guard. All this time she had thought Sam meant what he said. Had he not? He thought that was 'crazy stuff' now? Outwardly remaining playful even though inwardly she was coming into possession of a knotted up stomach, she made herself smirk. "Oh. So marrying him would be crazy?"

Sam turned his head fully to look at her. "What, you've actually thought about it?" he asked in vast, hesitant surprise.

Self conscious and feeling too scrutinized to meet his gaze, Alex looked up into the tree branches above and was honest… but at a minimum that left a lot of truth out. "He's the only guy I've ever loved. Or ever will love."

Sam sounded cautioning and a little nervous, like he was trying to ret-con what he'd said so long ago. "Yeah, but… just 'cause you love someone doesn't mean you gotta marry them. And just 'cause it's your first love doesn't mean it's the one." Alex frowned a little at her brother who got mildly defensive and backed off a bit. "Just saying."

She knew that stuff but hearing him say it to her was unsettling and made her feel unsure of herself. Still, she stuck by her guns and stood up for herself. "I know I'm not as experienced as maybe you or Dean with relationships," she said—Sam and Dean had been with lots of girls in all capacities and she'd only ever loved and been with one man her entire life. But for her, the one was enough. More than enough. She let her earnest, certain gaze bore into Sam's for a couple seconds. "But I know what love is."

Open and quiet, Sam said nothing in return, just listened and watched her. He looked faintly worried but didn't argue with her or say anything else. Alex looked back up again, wishing guilty secrets didn't gnaw at her day and night, wishing she knew exactly how she felt about the things she and Cas kept from everyone else. She knew one thing, anyway. "Me and Cas are in it for the long haul." That was the truth—or part of it, anyway.

There was a short, thoughtful silence. When Sam spoke up again, he sounded like he regretted his word choices. "Look, if you're happy, then I'm happy. I wasn't trying to say anything about him or step on your toes, I was just trying to, you know. Give you some big brother advice, I guess." Rueful, Sam glanced Alex's way with a self-deprecating smile. "Hey, at least I care one way or the other, right?"

Meeting his glance with her own, Alex sensed that he needed reassurance. "Right," she said, mouth curved to the side in a bittersweet smile. He'd been soulless for so long. Him caring wasn't something she would complain about. Poor guy felt so bad about it too but there was nothing to do but move forward. She hesitated—their arms laid at their sides in the grass, knuckles almost brushing. Decisively, she moved her hand and took his in hers and let their hands lay between them as she interlaced their fingers, squeezing tight. "Really missed you, Sam," she said in a failing voice. "Glad you're back."

He squeezed her hand back. He looked away, face working oddly. "Me too."

She didn't let go of his hand as she studied his profile for a minute. "Scared?"

His eyebrows moved in together slightly. "Of what?"

"The wall thing."

A muscle jumped slightly in his cheek and his eyes went back and forth in silent, tense thought. "A little. But I'd rather know and fall apart than just run away from what I did."

That was a very brave stand to take. Alex had to admit she was pretty terrified that if Sam really started to remember everything that things would go south… that she'd lose him all over again. She squeezed his hand a little tighter and tilted her head to his shoulder. They were quiet for a really long moment. An early fall breeze rustled across the yard and some birds sang somewhere nearby.

Out of nowhere (maybe trying to lighten the mood with some black humor or maybe just genuinely curious), Alex moved her head off his shoulder and asked her brother a question only he could answer or relate to. "So, from one ex-demon blood junkie to another, do you ever just see a demon and wanna stick a straw in them, drink them like Kool Aid?"

At the sudden wacky question, Sam turned his head to look at her and made a face like he wasn't sure if he heard her right—then he laughed, white teeth showing and dimples cutting into his cheeks. "Like Kool Aid?" he asked, that grin splitting his face in two and making him appear years younger and happier. Alex shrugged, baring her teeth in an overly cutesy wincing expression. Sam shook his head in amusement. "I never really thought of it in those terms but… yeah." The sparkle of mirth in his eye lessened. He thought long and hard. "It doesn't really ever totally go away. The temptation."

That wasn't entirely reassuring. But he'd stayed clean from it for a long time now and she hadn't really had any issues since detoxing. The only thing good about it was at least they could have each other to fall on and understand if problems came up again. Shaking her head, Alex squinted up at the sky again, thinking about the Kool Aid comment. "If I said that to anyone else they'd think I was a psycho," she murmured, picturing herself walking up to a demon and literally sticking a straw in. However, what had been funny a second ago to her was suddenly sobering and a little disturbing. Self conscious, Alex took her hand out of Sam's and studied her nails. "Maybe I am."

"Hey. Just 'cause you've done some freakish stuff doesn't mean you're a freak," Sam said gently, a wan smile on his face. "Take it from me."

Saying thanks with a quiet smile, Alex laid her arm across her stomach, eyes far away in thought. "You know, I wish I hadn't bitched at you like that about it before. I should have seen it for what it was. You needing some help to get by."

"Yeah, but I should have picked another solution. Not… demon blood." Sam sighed heavily through his nose, staring off into space with a knit brow. "And I shouldn't have run off and left you like I did back then. I won't. Not again, not ever." He was looking at her again for effect. "Promise."

"Me either." Finding her lips upturned in a smile that came from a warm, comforted heart, Alex cleared a thick throat and put her hand in the air. "Secret handshake?"

Surprise showed on his face again as a little lopsided grin crooked his mouth up as he went to accept her invitation. It wasn't complicated or anything, it was just their little special thing, that fist bump with the pinky promise then the one single handshake to wrap it all up.

As they grinned stupidly at each other at their little inside joke, a gust of wind blew across the yard and tossed hair into Alex's face and she raked a hand through it, trying to get it out of her eyes and mouth. Sam was doing the same—brushing his ever-lengthening hair out of his face—and she grinned his way. "Needin' a haircut there, Samantha?"

"Psh." He gave her a look that said that wasn't gonna happen. "I like it."

"Just don't be surprised if you wake up one morning with it in braids," Alex warned jokingly—he laughed that off, but seriously… his hair was almost getting long enough to put in a ponytail or a man bun. She pictured that and chuckled to herself… she'd pay to see that, honestly.

After a couple minutes of companionable quiet, Sam sat up. "Hey, I'm getting hungry. Think I'm gonna head in, you coming?"

Shaking her head, Alex remained laying down. "Not yet. I'll be in after awhile."

Sam nodded, stood up, dusted off his hands, and headed in. Nappish, Alex listened to the sound of his muffled, fading footsteps swishing through the grass. Stifling her worries about him knowing everything and prodding at the wall in his mind, Alex tried to think about something else. Her lower stomach ached—damn ovaries. Sighing in annoyance, she looked up once again. Her gaze flickered around the blue expanse between the jagged, leafy tree branches above. Cas's eyes were bluer than any sky could ever hope to be.

She let her eyes fall closed and she breathed in deeply, listening to breeze rustling through the tree branches overhead. When would this war finally end and stop dragging him away from her? He was the final missing piece in her life, he was the empty place beside her in bed at night, the ache in her heart and the void in her arms during the lonely hours when she longed to hold and be held.

The thought of him returning to stay gave her patience when there was none left and the ability to hope even when she felt defeated over the separation. For him, she could endure. The reason why was simple. Like she had said to Sam a little earlier, she knew what love was.

Somewhere in between asleep and awake, Alex's mind continued to wander around from thought to thought at a lazy and slow pace. Most of the thoughts were of Castiel. Thoughts of him were warm, comforting, and intimate in a way that transcended the physical. But there was also a deep worry eating at the edges and a recurring fear that something would tear them further apart. She tried not to dwell on those.

Twenty minutes or more passed as she laid there and let her skin drink in dappled late-afternoon sunlight through the leaves above. When she heard a soft sound near her like angel's wings, she thought it was her sleepy imagination. And then he spoke. "Hello, Alex."

Startled and abruptly elated at that unmistakable, familiar voice, her eyes snapped open. Cas was standing beside her, looking down at her fondly. Unprepared for his unexpected appearance, Alex shot up onto her elbows, a relieved, disbelieving smile popping onto her face. "Hi Cas," she breathed through her hopeful little grin.

He crouched down at her side, surprising her with the soft, fascinated look in his eyes. "What were you just thinking about?"

A demure little smile began to spread across her face and she ducked her head down slightly, coquettish without meaning to be. "You."

Pleasantly puzzled, Cas's eyes squinted at her even as a faint smile softened his mouth. He offered his hand to her to help her up. "And what sort of things were you thinking about me?"

She took his hand and let him haul her up to her feet where she immediately hugged him tightly, arms around his neck as her face buried in the familiar feel and smell of the trench coat. "How much I miss you," she murmured into his shoulder then neck as she hugged him tighter and shut her eyes. "And worry about you."

His face was turned in towards hers and his arms held her close, returning the embrace with every bit of fervency she felt. After a moment they pulled apart just enough to look at each other. The breeze caught some of Alex's hair and Cas's fingers traced across her cheek to sweep the hair out of her eyes and face. "I'm fine," he said, looking at her with soft eyes. "You don't need to worry."

Still, she did, and had to ask about what worried her right away. "How's everything upstairs?"

At the mention of the war, Cas's soft expression tightened a little. "As dire as ever." He looked down briefly. "I prefer not to discuss it, if that's all right with you."

Nodding tensely, Alex studied him carefully, still worried—in fact maybe a little more than before because of his reaction. "Yeah, okay," she said, refusing to push. "Understood."

Cas switched subjects with mild relief and his face was soft again, expression something like anticipatory. "I'm… actually here to take you on a social outing," he said with an awkward and stilted cadence, like he was nervous about her answer. "If you want."

Social outing…? She vaguely remembered he'd wanted to take her on a date the last time they'd been together but she'd been too drunk to even stand up straight. Grinning at the expression on his face as he waited for her answer, Alex's eyes crinkled up. "Of course I want!" she said, pretty stoked at the thought of spending time with Cas. She didn't care where or what they'd do, but was still curious about what he was thinking. "Where did you have in mind?"

"Uh, I thought dinner," Cas said, his subtle nervousness still present. "Would you like that?"

"Yeah!" Alex suddenly frowned and looked down at her outfit. "Uh… should I change though?"

Befuddlement pinched Cas's features. "What's wrong with the garments you have on?"

"Nothing, just… I think some couples dress up to go out to eat…?" Alex said then directly after had a lightbulb moment. "Actually, never mind, I don't have anything besides stuff like this." And by 'stuff like this' she meant jeans, scuffed boots, and an old AC/DC shirt with a flannel over it. She eyed Cas curiously. "How much money do you have in those pockets of yours, anyway?"

Cas dipped a hand into his right-hand pocket and pulled out a bunch of wadded up bills, frowning at them. "This much."

Alex took them from him and un-crumpled them then counted quickly. "Twenty-one big ones," she chuckled. "And I've got like a couple ones in my wallet…" she trailed off, thinking about where twenty-five dollars would be enough. "So, you know where this means we have to go, right?" She handed the money back to him, folded a lot neater than it had been.

Cas looked apprehensive as he took the money back. "…Where?"

"Biggerson's!" Alex cracked a wise-ass grin. "Where you can get food that's not that great at a price that's…" she made a face and got a little less animated, "well, that we can afford."

At the mention of Biggerson's, Cas became deeply thoughtful and contemplative. "I've heard this name before…"

Alex knew why and hid a self-conscious little smile as she coyly jogged his memory. "We uh… we're been to one before, actually. But… we were in the freezer…" Making out hot and heavy like there was no tomorrow under Famine's spell.

Alex saw the lightbulb go off his his eyes. "Oh." He smiled too, sort of bashful. His eyes had that edge of flirty interest to them as they looked into hers. "I remember."

"I bet you do," she said in a voice that was a touch more brazen than she meant it to be.

Cas's head tilted to the side just slightly. His eyebrows worked in together, his eyes crimped up, his smile grew slowly. "Is that a flirtation?"

Alex abruptly grabbed him by the tie and yanked him into a brief kiss. She smiled against his lips then made an impish little face at him when she pulled away. "That was."

Cas said nothing, just looked at her with a face that was the picture of quiet contentment. Alex slid her hand down his arm to take his hand and grasp securely. She indicated he walk with her to the house. "Should probably tell them where I'm going before we just zap off," she said. "Also, I need my jacket."

---

In the study, three men were hunkered down around Bobby's desk over several volumes. They shared quiet theories and passed around the whiskey, keeping a slow and steady stream of the amber liquid flowing. When the front door of the house opened and two sets of footsteps sounded, they all looked up in vague curiosity.

Cas wandered in, sans Alex—they could hear her jogging up the stairs overhead. Dean sat back in his chair slightly.

"Hey Cas," Sam greeted, sounding faintly surprised.

Cas nodded greeting, letting his gaze sweep over them all in turn. "Sam. Dean. Bobby."

Dean eyed Cas closely, wondering what was up. "Thought you'd come and hang out for awhile, huh?" he asked, then cracked a cocky grin. "You up for a rematch or what?"

"A rematch?" When Dean nodded to the chess board that was set aside on the top of some shelves, Cas understood and gave the man an almost patronizing, smug look. "Dean… you know that I will always beat you at chess."

Dean raised his eyebrows slightly as a smile continued to play on his lips. "Those sound like fightin' words, Cas."

"Perhaps later," Cas said factually, looking the room over and letting his eyes run across the stacks of books edging the room. "I am taking your sister out for dinner."

Not what Dean had been hoping for (he just felt better when he could keep an eye on them, okay?), he got a little cranky. Sam glanced at Dean briefly, a veiled smile on his face. He was obviously pleased for his sister. "That sounds nice, Cas."

"Yeah, bring me some pie," Dean quipped, bending back over the books.

"What kind?" Cas asked, getting a caught off guard look from Dean, who hadn't expected to be taken seriously.

"Uh…"

Sam smacked Dean on the arm. "Hey—don't turn your sister's date into a pie run."

Bobby, who typically favored watchful silence, piped up. "Hey Cas, while you're here, you heard of a 'mother of all'?" He peered up at the angel from under the brim of his cap.

Cas seemed mildly taken aback for a fraction of a second and then he quickly became stern and confused. "Uh… no. Who is that?"

Dean rolled his eyes. For a second he'd been hopeful there would have been a quick answer to this latest mystery they were unraveling. "You know for a guy who's been around since the dawn of time you don't know crap," he muttered.

That got him a pretty surprisingly sassy frown from the angel. "I'm not omniscient, Dean." Alex's steps sounded again overhead, clattering down the stairs quickly.

Leaning an arm against the desk in an easy, relaxed postured, Sam cracked a grin. "Don't listen to him, Cas," he said, pleasant and even keeled. "You two go have fun. Take your time."

Alex breezed into view, jacket on and face a little flushed from the stair-running. "Ready, Cas?" She smiled at him, trying to hold back her beaming smile.

Cas looked at her differently than Dean had ever seen the guy look at anyone or anything else. "I am."

"All right, no funny business and home by twelve," Dean said, getting looks from everyone in the room. "What? I'm kidding!" he defended.

…He was only sort of kidding.

Apparently nothing could ruin Alex's good mood. She gave a solitary little wave. "See you guys later," she said, already looking to Cas again. They took each others hands and exchanged a sappy little secretive smile before disappearing into thin air.

Dean rolled his eyes. "Make me wanna barf," he muttered lowly. They were turning into that couple, the ones who were so sickeningly sugar-sweet and in love that they inspired everyone around them to vomit from annoyance.

His comment earned him a knowing look from his brother who was currently hiding a smile. "Jealous?" Sam asked which quickly got him a disgruntled Dean face. Sam shrugged mildly, already turning his attention back to the books. "Just saying. Maybe you act like that because you want what they have."

"Ooh Mr. Psychologist thinks he's so smart," Dean said in a condescending, grumpy voice as he flipped a page of the book in front of him.

…He did still think about Lisa all the time and missed her. Or at least the idea of her. Honestly, he couldn't get over how fast she turned on him and dropped him like yesterday's news. It hurt. He had thought they were stronger than that or maybe, you know, she actually loved him enough to stick around through some of the more shitty stuff. Nope. Hadn't turned out that way.

So yeah. Maybe he was a little jealous.

It was like damned if he did, damned if he didn't. No matter where Dean Winchester was, he was never a hundred percent happy. He was always stuck looking at the grass on the other side and longing for something out of reach. Well, it didn't matter anymore. Lisa and him were over and his family was back together again at last. He knew where he belonged: Right here. With that in mind, he forcibly pushed the image of Lisa's face away. But he couldn't really push aside the gaping hole in his chest, the expanse of loneliness that was inexplicably growing bigger and bigger.

Whatever. He'd lived with it his whole life, he'd just deal.

---

Biggerson's
Downtown Sioux Falls

Hand in hand, Cas and Alex walked into the dining establishment called Biggerson's. The restaurant was bustling and most of the booths and tables were full. Mildly overwhelmed by all there was to see, Cas let Alex lead him in as he put a curious, sweeping gaze over everything. "It's… very colorful," he observed first. The bright yellow restaurant logo was plastered everywhere and the booths all had bright red seats. A patterned carpet in multiple colors was underfoot.

"Yup," Alex replied offhandedly, scouting for a place to sit. "I think I've been to like three million Biggerson's. And guess what? They all look exactly the same." She found them a small square table with four chairs at it. Remembering a custom he had seen in many cultures, Cas eagerly put it into practice and pulled a chair out for her, waited for her to sit. She looked unsure at the gesture then sat, letting him push the chair back in for her.

He vaguely wished a booth had been available so they could sit side by side—the table she had found for them was too small to fit two chairs at one side. Cas sat on the side of the table to her right, the next best thing. No sooner had he taken his seat than a young, thin male server with a very enthusiastic smile appeared with shining, laminated menus.

"Hello folks, welcome to Biggeron's! I'm your server Nate and your meal today is going to be great!" Castiel looked to Alex to know how to respond—she was just giving the man a slightly skeptical look. Perhaps it was the unbridled pep the server was exhibiting. "Menus!" he exclaimed with more enthusiasm than Castiel thought was necessary. "One for the young lady, one for…" he looked at Castiel a bit strangely. "You." He paused and looked at Alex and then Cas again, perhaps wondering about the obvious age difference between them. It was noticeable, Cas knew that… he looked nearly forty and Alex still looked early twenties even though she was approaching thirty. Their true age difference was much more shocking than whatever age difference their human appearances gave. The server charged forward despite his misgivings. "So, our specials today are the triple stack burger with baconnaise! And we've also got an Asian won-ton taco trio—" he pretended to covertly whisper at that point, putting a hand to one side of his face, "and lemme tell ya it's super." He chuckled in a grating high pitch then put his hands on his hips. "So, what can I get you two to drink?" He looked at Cas first.

"I do not require a beverage," Cas said. The server, again, looked at him strangely, then looked at Alex.

She tore her eyes away from Cas—she'd been smiling at him. "Lemonade," she told the server.

"Okie dokes, I'll be right back with that."

As the young man sashayed away, Cas looked at Alex curiously. Lemonade? He had watched over for her for a long time and she'd never gotten that before… or not that he had observed. "Not beer?"

She shrugged mildly. "I dunno, felt like lemonade all the sudden. It was my favorite when I was little." A reminiscent smile tugged a corner of her mouth upwards. "You'll have to try some." Her head tilted to the side curiously. "Are you even gonna eat?"

He wouldn't have… but he reasoned that them eating together (a human bonding and social event) would please her. "I have no need of sustenance as you know but… I do remember liking waffles."

As he had guessed, she liked that. He saw evidence of it in the way her smile reached her eyes, softening every part of her face. "I remember that too," she said. It was a good memory for her—he could tell. Her smile inspired one on his face too and he drank in the sight of her near to him and happy. Her hand rested on the table and he reached out and covered it with his own, remembering the days when he had liked waffles and been utterly powerless and needed pain medicine. He recalled the day he had woken up from his month-long coma and been reunited with her. At that time he had been all but human. In a strange twist she had saved his life from Zachariah and then taken on the role of protector and nurturer for him… making sure he had pain medicine, staying at his side. Those few days when he had been like her (or at least more than he was now) had been very pivotal and important for them. Thinking of that small window of happiness and togetherness they had shared, Cas let his thumb brush across her hand a few times. Her hazel eyes contemplated him quietly, her fingers slipped through his, and Cas wished to know every part of her heart and soul. In all the ages and in all the centuries that had come and gone, never had there been a more beautiful human being than her.

"I've really missed you," she told him quietly. "I know I say that constantly, but…" she trailed off and shrugged her shoulders faintly.

"I understand the sentiment," Cas assured her kindly and emphatically. In fact, he thought he might break sometimes from the feeling of separation and the longing for togetherness. He had never understood how missing someone could be so all consuming. It made their time together than much more precious and the time apart that much more agonizing. However, nothing could compare to the peace and calm of being with her currently and feeling her fingers tighten on his trustingly. In some moments, he was so very struck by the love that had grown between them that he couldn't quite believe it was real at all. The realization that it was genuine left him in awe completely.

Alex considered him like he considered her, then became studious and she looked at their hands in growing tenseness. "Hey, Cas—did you not know about the wall in Sam's mind?"

He didn't understand the question. "Pardon?" Cas asked, confused and jolted out of the haze of good feelings. Her tone alerted him to the fact that something was amiss. "The what?"

Alex was looking at him somberly now and nodding. "Yeah. I guess Dean thought I told you and I thought Dean told you." The statement further mystified him. She saw that and took in a deep breath and began to explain to him. "Death put a wall in Sam's mind to like, block out the Hell stuff. He doesn't remember any of the past year."

An ice-cold feeling of shock plunged into Cas's stomach. "But he said…"

"Yeah. He tricked you." She said that in a vaguely dismayed tone. "He figured out Dean and I weren't telling him something and… to figure out what, he tricked you."

For a few seconds that seemed to drag on for a long time, Cas fumbled for comprehension as he suddenly worried. He pulled his hand out of Alex's as his internal alarm grew. "Did what I said—is he all right?"

"So far so good," she said, then took him by the arm gently, attempting to reassure him and catch his gaze. "You didn't know."

"Now some of his reactions to what I told him make much more sense," Cas said grimly, looking down at the table and shutting his eyes. He believed humans had a term for how he felt right now… like kicking himself. "I should have known… he's too lucid and sound for there to be another explanation."

"Hey, what's done is done," Alex said, that same tone of comforting in her voice. She was looking at him in deep concern when he opened his eyes back up. "We should have told you."

Considering what he had just learned, Castiel was quiet for a long moment, frowning into middle distance. "A wall." He mulled that over.

"Y-you think it'll hold?" Alex asked, and the apprehensive worry in her voice caused him to turn his attention to her. The way she looked to him for reassurance softened him. She was very worried about her brother.

"It would take a great amount of pressure to break it, I think," he told her honestly, then took her hand again where it rested on her upper leg. "As long as you tread carefully… there's no reason to count him a lost cause."

His words visibly relaxed her and relieved her in some small way. "Thanks, Cas." She looked down toward where their hands clasped and rested against her thigh. She cleared her throat as her gaze darted to his timidly. "Hey, um, real quick, while I'm thinking about it: was I super ridiculous the other night? When we…?" She trailed off and prompted him with a facial gesture only.

Castiel understood. She was referring to their most recent sexual encounter. At the memory of it, a smile that could have been called coy snuck onto Cas's lips. "You… laughed most of the time," he said, recalling a barrage of images and memories that were both amusing and erotic. "And said some very nonsensical things."

"Yikes," she said, making a face that seemed to indicate she was embarrassed. "Sorry."

Frowning, Cas observed her closely. "You don't remember?"

"Nope, next to nothing," she said, even more mortified. "Maybe it's best if I don't. Sounds like I embarrassed myself."

Cas shook his head, not wanting her to feel embarrassed. "No. It was…" he trailed off, thinking of it again. It had been different than their other times together. "I laughed, too. Chuckled is a more accurate descriptor, really."

At that confession, Alex looked wistful and full of quiet yearning. "Wish I could remember better."

A wish that was within Castiel's ability to grant. "You can," he said, then since he was already touching her hand, he poured his memories from that night into her mind. He let her see it all… them arriving to the motel room and her kissing him as she stumbled backwards, pulling him by the tie… Cas protesting that he didn't want to do anything if she wasn't in the frame of mind to know what she was doing… Alex insisting she knew what she was doing and it was him… then him beginning to give in when she said that. There had been a lot of laughing and silliness—a strange mix of sensual and goofy moments that were loving at their root but still a bit... strange to Cas. He did have to admit, he found the memories amusing. The word 'cute' was fitting.

When Cas let her see into his memory in the middle of Biggerson's during the dinner rush hour, Alex's eyes went wide and she became visibly flustered. "Whoa." Her cheeks went red as roses as she covered the lower half of her face with her hand. "Geez. Awkward." She chuckled nervously and wet her lips. "I, uh, had no idea you could do that. Memory share, or whatever…"

"I'm an angel. I can do a lot of things," Cas said factually. "Why are you embarrassed?" he asked, growing fractionally worried at her fidgeting. "Was what we did not all right?"

Her hand was nervously touching the edge collar of her flannel shirt, twisting the fabric in anxiety. "I just acted so stupid," she said, clearly mortified with herself.

"It was the alcohol," Cas reasoned, then corrected her. "And you were not stupid. You were uninhibited."

She considered his words, thought about it, and then an impish little smile began to grow on her face as her eyes, a little darker than before, looked into his knowingly. "Some of it was pretty hot, huh?"

His smile echoed hers. "Some of it?"

She grinned and looked down, touching her hair nervously then moving it behind an ear. When she looked up, Cas decided to go to another subject and inquire on her current physical status, to express interest in her femininity. "So. How is your menstrual cycle affecting your moods?"

Alex's eyes widened. "Uh what?"

Cas lost confidence slightly. Her reaction to his question seemed to indicate he'd done something wrong. Perhaps she'd misheard him. "I've… heard that the cycle has negative effects on women's emotions."

She stared at him for a few beats. "And that's the conversation topic you pick…?" There was a strange smile spreading across her face. "Okay…"

"Is it not appropriate to inquire about your well-being and thought processes?" Cas asked innocently, truly not sure why she was making such an odd face.

His question seemed to confound her. "Wha—well, touché." She rubbed the back of her neck self-consciously, her gaze dodging his. "I just grew up around men and they acted like a period was the plague and was never to be mentioned if not necessary."

Further confused, Castiel thought about her statement for a moment. "The plague manifested itself in blackening of the extremities… and usually resulted in fatalities. I don't see the connection. Also, it was a highly infectious disease. The menstrual cycle is a natural occurrence in a healthy female body. Why should there be a stigma on the topic?"

"Well… when you put it like that… I dunno." She rested her hand in her chin and studied him for a minute with a faint smile. "You have this way of taking things I never thought twice about and, well. Making me think twice."

Her statement seemed profound and stirred him. With eyes that were soft and attentive, he gazed upon her and contemplated the depth at which he loved her. When he spoke, his tone was gentle. "You've made me reconsider many things, too."

The server re-appeared then, plunking a glass of lemonade down in front of Alex and disturbing the more emotionally quiet moment that had been transpiring. "Okie dokie folkies! Sorry that took me a second. Lemonade for the little lady." He whipped out a pad and a pen, appearing ready to take their orders. "Now, whatcha gonna have for dinner? Sir?" He looked at Cas expectantly.

"A waffle, please," Castiel said.

The server hesitated. "They're a breakfast item."

Cas squinted just slightly. "Yes." So they were. He knew that already.

"I mean we only serve them for breakfast," said the server. "At breakfast time."

Oh. Cas frowned, looked at Alex in confusion, not entirely certain what to do. Out from within the inside pocket of Alex's jacket came an FBI badge and she opened it crisply, her expression bored and slightly threatening as she looked up at the server loftily. "You can make a special exception I'm sure," she said in a voice she had never spoken to Cas in. This voice was forceful and patronizing and he recognized it as the voice she usually used when she donned the guise of an FBI agent—he'd observed her doing that a few times when he'd watched over her in times past. She snapped the ID closed and nodded at Cas while keeping the server under her gaze. "For my partner here, right?"

The badge intimidated the server visibly. "Oh. Uh… yeah, yeah, I guess we can make a special exception," he said, then looked at Cas. "Just a waffle? Nothing else?"

"You make sure it has butter and syrup," Alex answered for Cas, still using the Agent voice. "Or we send it back and shut this place down just 'cause we feel like it." Cas watched how a bit of a smile played and hid on her lips. It was working too—the server looked petrified and swallowed nervously.

"O-okay, no problem. Uh, what would you like, miss? Er, Agent?"

Alex handed the two menus back. "Mac n' cheese."

"Sure, sure, yeah, the mac n' cheese platter?" The server was being overly helpful and attentive now. "What three sides?"

Alex shook her head once. "No. Just mac n' cheese. A plate or bowl of mac n' cheese. Nothing else."

The server looked irritated then and withheld a great deal of chagrin and annoyance. "All right. One waffle and a plate of macaroni and cheese," he said, then stalked off.

Alex chuckled, shaking her head at herself and watching the guy walk off. "He's mad."

Cas understood that, but didn't know the reason. "Why?"

"We didn't order much food," she explained. "servers, you know, they live off tips. The smaller the bill the less the tip unless the customer's feeling generous. We'll leave him a good tip for putting up with my trolling, huh?" Her grin turned into a curious expression. "Where'd you get that money, anyway?"

Cas hesitated, his eyes faltered away from hers. He knew the answer would disrupt the lighter mood. "Uh… I got it from Jimmy Novak's wallet. I never unfolded it to look inside until recently."

Just as he had predicted, she was startled—her expression fell a little and her smile faded. "Oh." It was an odd and awkward subject matter for them and Cas suspected always would be. Neither said anything about it for a second, then Alex cleared her throat. "So where's the wallet now?"

Cas looked down again. "I… threw it away. It made me feel strange, carrying that thing around." Alex watched him with a tense expression and Cas felt as though his face must look the same as hers did. "It… had pictures of his family in it." What a startling discovery that had been for Castiel to see a photo of Jimmy and his family. A stark reminder of the consequences of his actions, the outcome of Cas taking James Novak's body as his own. "I… feel sad sometimes," Castiel said quietly. "Knowing what I did to them. What I took." They were both quiet for a minute. The deep and hushed dismay resting on Alex's features made Cas feel guilty. "I'm sorry," he said regretfully. "I don't mean to be morose."

Coming out of her thoughts, she shook her head a little and focused her sights on him. "No, Cas, it's okay. If something bothers you, you should talk about it. Even if it is hard to think about."

Cas wasn't convinced. They were in a family environment where people were talking and laughing, enjoying themselves… and Cas didn't want to dampen Alex's spirits. She spent too much time being subjected to mental and emotional pressures her entire life let alone in recent times. He had desired to give her reprieve from that, actually. "It's gloomy subject material for this setting though," he protested in a melancholic voice. Weren't romantic dates supposed to be happy and carefree?

Her hand found his where it rested atop his leg and she was earnest. "I don't care. Whatever's on your mind is what I wanna hear about." When his expression remained uncertain, her smile took on a tone of ruefulness. "And I mean, who else would you talk to about this stuff?" Right after she asked, she seemed to come up with an idea of who. "I guess maybe some of your angel friends? Samandriel? Zion? Balthazar?"

Cas smiled—she remembered and knew the names of his closest angel acquaintances, even remembering Zion who had only been mentioned once. "They are good friends, yes," he said, considering his own thoughts on the matter. "But… it's strange. I would assume those of my own species would understand me best. But they don't." Some of them sympathized with him more than others, some of them tried to comprehend him, but none of them made Castiel feel understood. None of them seemed to share his thoughts or sentiments or convictions. It was a struggle to identify with his angel brothers and sisters… but there was one being in all of creation where that struggle wasn't present. That being was beside him and she was holding his hand and encouraging him to share his thoughts with her. No one else expressed such interest in him. No one else cared about him like she did and he valued her all the more for it. As such, borne of a deep-seated desire to know and love every single part of her, Castiel tightened his hand in hers and searched her eyes deeply. "I would like to know you better, Alex."

His out-of-the-blue proclamation caused her to become mildly confused. "What?"

Cas hesitated then removed his hand from hers to reach into his trench coat. This seemed like a good time to show her what he was carrying. "On the night when I tried to take you on a date and instead we, uh… were intimate, I had wanted to share this with you." He produced the paperback book he had been carrying around for a few days now.

She stared at the book cover with an open mouth and an odd expression. Two wedding bands of gold were interconnected and swirly script proclaimed Two As One: deepening your knowledge and understanding of your spouse for greater intimacy through communication.

"Is… is that a self-help book on marriage?" she asked doubtfully.

"I got it on sale at a place called Barnes and Noble," Castiel told her proudly. When she only looked more wary and uncomfortable, he became uncertain. "I thought… I thought I would like to deepen my knowledge and understanding of you for greater intimacy through communication," he explained, which was what the book cover claimed to help couples do. Surely it wasn't a negative thing to know each other better? When she only gaped at him, Cas gestured at the back cover and told her what it said. "The book is a series of questions 'designed to prompt deeper understanding and more meaningful connections in every day situations.'" Alex looked almost like she dreaded to hear more and Cas, thoroughly taken aback by her reaction, became worried. "What is it?"

"Um… nothing," she said, shaking her head and looking at the book as if she were suspicious of it and thought it might bite her.

Cas tried very hard to read her very subtle behaviors. "Is this incorrect? Do you… not want to?" Why was she so clearly averse to the book in his hand?

"No. Well." She looked at him almost fearfully. "Aren't those books for relationships that are like, in trouble or something? Like, failing?"

Taken aback, Cas looked at the book with a deep frown. "I… don't know. Are they?" He quickly became dismayed and embarrassed at himself and his continuing lack of cultural human knowledge on how to do the right things. "That's not what I was… I only wanted to enrich our relationship. Not imply it was in a state of decay." So distraught that she would think that, Cas tried to reassure her despite his own discomfort. "I am very happy with you. I only want to better what we have." He had been carrying around so much guilt over the ways he was failing her that he wanted to make special efforts to make it up to her. This had been one such attempt but now he thought he'd made a mistake.

Alex seemed relieved and mildly embarrassed, perhaps thinking she overreacted. "Sorry, I just saw it and thought… I dunno what I thought." Her eyes flickered from the book cover to his eyes back and forth a few times. "And when you put it that way, I mean… I guess we could try it. It's just a bunch of questions we ask and answer back and forth, right?"

Cas nodded slowly. "Correct."

Alex thought about it for a moment then made a face that Sam made a lot—shrugging her mouth downward very briefly as her eyebrows rose. "Okay. Why not? Doesn't sound so bad. Hit me."

Shocked, Cas thought surely he had misheard. The spanking had been bad enough. "Hit you?"

Apparently finding him funny, a grin cracked her face and she looked down. "I mean tell me," she explained, her amused eyes flicking up and catching his. "Go for it."

"Oh." Really, humans had strange ways of saying things. Adding the slang term 'hit me' to his vernacular, Cas turned his attention to the book, growing mildly excited to see what would come of this interaction. Maybe this would turn out to be something she liked. He hoped so. "I'll choose a page at random," he said, and opened the book to a place near the middle. Alex watched him with a faintly worried expression but was silent and waited for him to go ahead. "This is from the Reminiscence chapter," he said, then selected the first question his eye fell upon. "What did you want to be when you grew up?"

The question made Alex blink a couple times and she considered for a moment. "Huh. Well… I didn't think about it much." A ghostly smile came over her face. "But—when I was really little I wanted to be a space gymnast. 'Cause I thought gymnasts looked cool and I liked space exploration… plus, no gravity would be cool for doing flips I thought, so… I just put the two together." A self-conscious little grin crooked her mouth to the side. "It's… not a real thing." Cas smiled a little, too—she seemed pleasantly surprised at herself as she continued to tell him about her younger thoughts. "When I was older, like twelve and on… I dunno. I didn't really have a career or anything in mind. I pictured the future and always saw myself with Dean doing whatever he did, sort of just following him around forever. He used to talk about opening a car shop and I thought I could be a mechanic if that happened… I'm good with car crap…" she shook her head and chuckled, fiddling with the silverware in front of her. "Riveting stuff, huh?" She looked at him in an increasingly studious way. "Does this question even apply to you? When you were a…" she didn't seem to know the right term, "a new angel, did you want to be something else? Did you aspire to be some higher-level angel… or…?"

Cas realized some of these questions wouldn't apply to him at all as she turned the question back on him. "No," he answered slowly, thinking back. He hadn't existed and then he simply had. There had been no childhood for him and no free will or dalliances into choices. Just existence and servitude from day one. "I was content with my role. I never questioned it or thought of questioning it." He remained quiet for a moment, remembering how his home had been once. The difference between then and now was very unsettling. "Heaven was so stable in the beginning," he murmured almost to himself. "It lived up to its name. I had pride in my place among the heavenly host." Disquieted, Cas became jaded as he glanced at her. "As you know, this has changed in recent times."

Sympathy colored her one word response. "Yeah."

Not wanting to think of the war or the creature it was turning him into, Cas looked to the book for another question. "What hobbies do you wish we could do together?"

Alex frowned silently, seemed to be surprised and then unsure of how to answer. "I need to think about this one," she said after a few seconds. "You answer first."

Cas had to think, too. Hobbies… human pastimes… were something he hadn't tried much of. He had enjoyed chess with Dean and Candy Land with Alex… and television was fascinating to him too. Then, it came to mind, something he had seen done by many humans and he had always found personally interesting. "Gardening always seemed like a pleasing pastime to me," he said. "Have you ever tried it?"

Alex made a sound that seemed to indicate that was a funny thing to ask. "No… never really in a place long enough to take care of it or put in the work. Plus I'd probably kill everything… I don't think I have a green thumb."

Cas frowned slightly and looked at both of her thumbs. "No, they're pink, like the rest of your fingers," he said, garnering a sudden grin from Alex. Perhaps what she'd said was a figure of speech. Cas didn't know. He was imagining the two of them partaking in gardening together, creating something out of soil and seeds and water, caring for it and watching it grow… and he felt very inclined to this idea. "Perhaps we can start a garden together someday," he said hopefully, thinking of how pleasing that would be.

She was receptive of the idea and her soft eyes carried very much love in them. "If you want to, we will."

"I think I would also like to play board games together," Cas said, wistful in recollection. "Do you remember Candy Land?"

Alex was smiling again. "Do I remember Candy Land," she repeated teasingly in a tone that seemed to playfully poke at him for thinking she wouldn't.

He smiled too. When she said nothing further, he prompted her carefully, reminding her, wanting to know her reply. "And your answer?"

"Oh." She paused, repeated the question slowly. "What hobbies would I like for us to do together…" she paused then became a little apprehensive, worried her bottom lip, scratched the curve of her neck absently. "Um… I… don't think I really even have hobbies now that I really think about it." Doubtful, she began to list things. "I used to be into collecting old film cameras for a few years… I used to draw. I even used to write really angsty poems." Her expression was mildly frustrated. "This is all stuff I used to do and it was all like solo stuff." It suddenly came to her. "Wait! I like cooking! Well. Trying to cook. I'm getting a lot better. I think maybe cooking together would be fun. Or, interesting at least." She grinned, maybe imagining amusing scenarios.

"I would like that," Castiel said earnestly. He would like doing anything with her, he thought. But he was curious about something she'd mentioned and glossed over. "You've written poems? I would like to read them."

Alex's eyes went wide and she shook her head very slowly. "No—no, no, no. They are so bad."

Cas's head tilted to the side and he frowned slightly. How could they be bad? "I think if they were written by you, I'd enjoy them."

Alex seemed to think that was sweet but her answer was a resounding: "No. No one but me has read them and trust me… no one ever will." She chuckled and moved the conversation along. "How about the next question, Cas?"

Relenting—perhaps someday she would let him see her poetry—Cas agreed. "All right." He began to read the next question on a random page he turned to. "How's—" he stopped and realized what the question was and hesitated as a slight bashfulness crept across him. "How's our sex life for you?"

She pressed her mouth inwards briefly to hide a smile. "Okay, this I know the answer to: two thumbs way, way up." She stuck her thumbs up for a couple seconds and grinned, a self-conscious little blush spreading up her neck which she rubbed with a hand as she propped her elbow onto the table. "What about you?"

Cas mimicked what she had just done very slowly. "I… also raise my thumbs." He hesitated, eyebrows moving up uncertainly. "That means I am highly enthused, correct?"

"Mm-hm," she confirmed, then bent across the table and surprised him with a sudden kiss, pulling his face to hers with a hand. She was grinning at him when she pulled away. "God, Cas, I love you so much you angelic goofball," she said, fondly ruffling his hair before snatching the book from him. "Give me that. Okay, random question…" she flipped through the book and selected the first question she saw. "What hopes and dreams do you have for… our children?" She read it and then sat back and made a face, glanced up at him uncertainly. "Well that doesn't apply. Oops."

Cas was quiet for a moment, stricken by a spark of anxious curiosity. "Do you wonder if perhaps it will someday?" Many marriages produced offspring… would theirs?

Her eyes flickered up to his. Curiosity and apprehension rested there in the brown-green orbs. "Would you want it to?" she asked softly.

Cas took a moment to reply, considering her question very carefully. "I think that—"

"All right, all riiiiight," Nate the server said, suddenly there again. "Food's here folks," he said, sliding a plate with a waffle and two mini containers of butter beside it in front of Cas. He then slid a bowl of orange pasta in front of Alex and set down a little silver pitcher of syrup. He clapped his hands together and gave a wan little smile. "Bon appétit." He disappeared again and Cas and Alex were left in silence. Neither of them prompted the other to continue with the question they had been asking a moment ago. In fact, for a minute, they dodged it.

Cas watched Alex stir through her macaroni with her fork. She let her gaze flicker up to him a few times. Cas reached for the syrup and began to drizzle it over the waffle methodically. Relaxing a little after a moment or so, Alex smiled at him. "I like this," she said, about to take her first bite.

Cas knew what she meant. Not the food, but being together. "So do I." Their eyes remained locked and Cas felt the need to fill the silence. "Another question?"

"…What about the other one?" Alex asked cautiously, food temporarily forgotten.

He feigned forgetfulness for reasons he didn't really understand. "Oh. Yes. The children one." He hadn't forgotten. "I… don't think I would make a good father."

Alex looked at him for a long moment and contemplated him with a certain light in her eyes Cas didn't recognize. "Well, we disagree there," she said, then took a bite of her pasta. Before Cas could reply, she turned her attention back to the book and read as she chewed. "What's your favorite thing about yourself?"

The question struck Castiel as an odd one. About himself? "I've never thought about that. Um… my favorite thing about myself is you."

"Psh," Alex scoffed in good nature and then beamed at him. "No, you can't say that."

"Why?" Cas asked.

"Because that's not the question," she said playfully. "What's your favorite thing about you? It can't be me."

But… it was. Still, Cas tried to answer the way she seemed to want. "I find more things to dislike than like," he answered honestly, his mind going to the darker places and to all the things he loathed about himself currently. What could he answer this question with? He thought and finally found an answer. "I like that I have chosen to stand on my own two feet, to use the metaphor," he said. "I like that I have learned to think for myself." As soon as he said that, he reconsidered his words. Thinking for himself had led to some very unsavory actions. He let it go though in favor of asking the question of her. "And you? What's your favorite thing about yourself?"

She thought too, tapping her fork against the bowl. "Hm. It's definitely easier to come with a list of dislikes than likes, isn't it." She rubbed at her chin for a minute in consideration, not seeming to find an answer. Finally it came to her and she seemed satisfied with the answer she gave. "I think my favorite thing about me is my ability to hang in and survive. A lot of people might have cracked after living the life I have." She smiled then, secretive, her eyes coy on his. "Also… one of my favorite things about myself is my voice. I like how it sounds. And I really like the guy who gave it back to me." Cas felt himself smiling. Chuckling self-consciously, Alex stirred at her pasta. "You know the first day I got my voice back, or maybe it was the second day… I spent a couple hours just shouting out every cuss word I knew of and laughing like a deranged idiot?" She looked at him then, a sheepish smile working on her lips.

Cas's smile grew a little bigger. "I remember."

"Oh yeah." Her captivating gaze became tender on him. "You were there." She studied him a moment more then took a bite of her macaroni and Cas followed suit, cutting a bite-sized chunk of waffle off as Alex had taught him in the past. As Alex chewed, she leveled him with a curious look. "Hey, you haven't asked about what I did with the soul claim."

The sudden mention of the soul claim made Cas's stomach feel as if it dropped. He stopped mid waffle-slice. The soul claim, which she thought she was in possession of… was still inside of him, lodged deep in his beating heart where it had been all along. The fake one he had given to her so dramatically was buried in Bobby Singer's salvage yard and he knew this from Samandriel. He was sick with himself over the deception he had planned and executed despite inner feelings of uncertainty—he did it because her soul claim could not fall into the wrong hands or all was lost and he had to see it through to the end. Selfishly he didn't feel able to handle her being angry with him over it if he continued to refuse it to her. He was her guardian angel in his mind, still, and her safety was his greatest desire.

Still. He didn't feel justified knowing he had tricked her and lied to her face, manipulating her emotions that way. He didn't recognize himself sometimes, and that day had been one of them. Cas was utterly silent, regretting it and yet knowing there wasn't another approach he could have taken. You could have told her the truth. That still, small voice in him wracked him over with relentless guilt.

Alex, who had no idea—who trusted him and believed in him and hadn't questioned his ruse even once when he performed it in the salvage yard recently—looked at him expectantly, affectionately. "What, after making such a huge fuss over it, you aren't curious?"

Castiel supposed he had to continue in the lie he had committed himself to. "Of course I am," he said, attempting to look curious and not ill. He wished they didn't have to talk about it at all. He wanted to pretend he hadn't done it to make himself feel better. "Where did you bury it?"

Her expression faltered and the faintest look of near-suspicion crossed her face. "…I didn't say I buried it."

Struck by his mistake, Cas fumbled for an explanation. Instead of telling her the truth, that he had asked Samandriel what she had done with it, he lied, not even sure why. "Well—I… only assumed you would… it seems the safest place to put it. Did you not bury it?"

A look of understanding washed away the suspicion. "No… I did. Out back in the salvage yard."

"Good." Cas looked down at the food item in front of him, hand tightening on the fork and bending the metal slightly in the process. "Good." He had convinced himself at the time that it was the right thing to do—she would never have to know he had given her a fake, he would put the soul claim into the book of Heaven and her eternal fate would be secured and no harm would be done either way (or so he had thought). Now, the guilt he felt for violating her trust was tremendous. It was wrong to lie to others. It was wrong to deceive the woman he loved. And yet… here he was.

He wasn't trying to run her life as she had accused him, he was trying to save it. He still wished she had understood and accepted that and let him do what had to be done. But she was stubborn until the end and he had known she wouldn't be happy until she had the soul claim. That's why he had substituted a falsehood. To throw her off the truth and appease her and yes, very selfishly keep her endeared to him. Oh, what a shadowy thing to do…

Castiel hadn't predicted how much fear it would inspire in him to keep this from her. If she knew… if she discovered what he'd done… he knew her anger and shock and worst of all heartbreak would be matchless. She couldn't know. Not now and not ever.

Keeping it inside of himself was risky for a different reason too. As they had discovered, it would slowly kill him if she died—yet it seemed a fitting fate for him, that if she perished for all eternity he would perish too. Maybe, in part, he hoped her soul claim in his chest would drag him along with her into the afterlife, if she even had one at all. Without being written into Heaven or Hell, where would the soul go? Perhaps it would just shatter completely. That was why he had to win this war and put the claim in its rightful place. To protect her everlasting fate. No one was as important as she was.

While Cas thought on these things and got more and more upset, Alex pushed the half-eaten bowl of pasta away from herself and sat back in her seat, making a face of discomfort and putting a hand on her lower stomach. "Ughhh."

Cas, recognizing the signs of distress and pain, came out of his thoughts and sat up a little straighter in worry. "What's wrong? What is it?"

She shook her head, subdued. "Just cramps."

Castiel knew that they were a part of the monthly cycle but even her most minor of discomforts was something he didn't like. "Can I help? Are you in very much pain?"

"Nah. Used to it. Just super annoying." She sighed discontentedly and began to stare longingly at the little table-top display that advertised a chocolate cake. "Need… chocolate."

A strong and almost mad desire to do something right for her seized Castiel who in turn grabbed a passing server by her arm, surprising her. "Server—bring my wife chocolate. Immediately." He realized his urgent tone might not be appropriate for the social context. Also, the server was looking at his hand on her arm with an indignant expression. He let go of her and made himself speak more calmly. "…Please."

"Uh, sure," the server said, eyes flickering to Alex briefly then to Cas. "Like the brownie sundae or the—"

Cas was losing patience. "Chocolate in any form, now."

The server backed off a little, then scurried away to do as she'd been asked. Cas looked at Alex, who was looking at him in faint surprise. "You… used the 'W' word," she said, appearing to be a little nerve-wracked. What, wife? Castiel frowned a little, confused. He had noticed over time that she almost wanted to avoid speaking about what they were and he wondered why. Somewhere in the deepest part of him he suspected that she was ashamed of their marriage or unsure of what she felt about it. She didn't seem to want anyone to know. It saddened him but he also felt he deserved it… he was a shameful, low creature right now and he was so very aware of it.

"I'm… it's always weird when you say that," she said, eyes dodging his. "I'm not used to it." A smile came over her face as she visibly tried to sweep away that topic completely and change subjects. "Hey, and by the way, don't get too upset. I'm not gonna die from chocolate deprivation or something." Cas just touched her stomach with his hand, willing comfort and warmth to be hers. He couldn't erase cramps—only ease them. They were a necessary part of the cycle. At his touch, her anxiety melted away and she smiled at him, touched his hand with hers. "You are something else, you know that?"

Yes. And not in a good way. He looked away, trying to appear flattered but probably looking more guilty than anything else.

The server reappeared then with a chilled pie slice on a small plate. "Here ya go, slice of chocolate silk pie to the rescue," she said then beat a hasty retreat away from them.

Alex picked up her spoon and dug in. "Mm. Wow. Really good."

Cas looked at her anxiously—mostly because he felt so terrible for his deception. "Is that satisfactory?" he asked as she savored another spoonful of chocolatey pie. "I can have them bring more, or I could go get—"

She gave him a rather lecturing look. "Cas—this is fine." She chuckled, licking the spoon. "Anyone ever tell you you're a worry wort?"

Her light, unsuspecting mood was the worst thing in the world for him. Lost in darker thoughts and deep feelings of utter self-loathing he shook his head in weary distraction. "No. No one has ever called me a wort of any kind before." He was quiet a moment, working on finally taking the bite of his waffle. It tasted as he remembered but he didn't feel any sort of enthusiasm about it. In an effort to fill the silence that felt so stark to him, he commented on the food. "This waffle is very tasty." He lacked exuberance and sounded depressed about it. He had no desire to eat more of it though and swallowed it dryly.

"You okay, Cas?" She cocked her head to the side briefly.

"I'm fine," he lied. He turned the conversation over to her instead of himself. "Do you feel any better?"

"Mm-yup," she said, smiling at the spoon she'd just taken a mouthful of pie from. "Chocolate is some kinda magic. I don't even know how this works but… mmm." She shoved another mouthful in. "I think it's all in my mind. Want some?" She offered a spoonful his way.

Alex looked so innocent and unaware, so unsuspecting as she tried to share her food with him. He thought of their relationship ever since it had begun—she hadn't trusted him when he first met her and he had wanted her to, and now she did trust him and he didn't deserve that trust. Moved deeply on every level and not even remembering her offer of pie, he let his intense and meaningful gaze overwhelm her. "I hope you know I would do anything to protect you," he said, wanting to tell her the truth and knowing that if he did he might lose her completely. He was filled with terror for the future and doubt in himself and the conviction that what he was doing was wrong. But in the end he had to protect her at all costs, even if one of those costs was her being angry with him or even rejecting him completely. There was a painful lump in his throat. "Anything."

Mild confusion at the abrupt confession showed on her face, then as her eyes flickered back and forth between his, he saw that she knew something was very wrong. "What is it, Cas?" Her eyes traveled his face in an attempt to see into him.

He shook his head, avoided her gaze. "Nothing."

"It's not nothing." She looked at him thoroughly. "You've been acting so strange lately."

His heart hammered hard in nervous panic. "It's… the war," he said, trying to deflect. "You know how it has burdened me."

She abandoned the pie in favor of studying him tensely and taking his hand in both of hers. "Tell me. Tell me what's wrong. Let me help you somehow."

"No one can help me," he said, dodging her caring gaze. "But thankfully I can sense the culmination drawing near." That was the truth. "Raphael's followers are spread out thinner than before. And, well, so are my forces." He thought about the seemingly endless war and how it had waxed and waned and was reaching the apex which would determine everything. "It's no longer full-on battles up there. It's mostly guerilla warfare, so to speak. I don't know how or when it will end but I haven't done what I have and come as far as I have to lose now." He said that last part with a deadly grimness and looked at her hands cupping his. He wanted to pull his hand away because it felt like trickery.

Alex, beautiful and kind and unquestioning Alex, looked at him with concern he didn't know if he deserved. "And God? Still no word from him, or…?"

"No." Cas let his teeth tighten downward for a moment as he again avoided looking her in the eye. "He's been gone longer than I thought… perhaps since the creation of the world. It's very difficult to know how to feel about it."

Apologetic, Alex squeezed his hand lightly. "Sorry, Cas. I know that's hard on you."

He pulled his hand away after a second, unable to bear himself at the moment. "It's all right."

A moment more of quiet passed, in which Alex looked more and more doubtful of Cas's shift in behavior. She picked up the book again. "How about more out of here?" she asked, pushing forward with a forced upbeat tone and trying to make the best of their time together. "Okay, first one I point to…" she chose one at random and read it. "Where do you see us in five years time?" She deflated, her attempt at being positive falling flat. "Geez. These are really hard."

It was Cas's turn to wonder why she appeared emotionally distraught. "Why do you look so anxious?"

She did what he knew she did when her feelings weren't very confident—shrugged a single shoulder up and made a face. "Thinking about the future always gets me sorta antsy," she confessed in a stilted way. "And, us in five years? I don't even know where we'll be two weeks from now." Her voice was quietly fearful. "What if the war's still full speed ahead five years from now? What if you're always gone?"

Intense out of the desperation he managed to keep at bay most days, Castiel took her hand that rested atop the table in his with renewed conviction. All of the unseemly things and lies would end and become worth it when he defeated Raphael and secured Heaven and ensured Alex's eternal fate. He had come this far and would finish it and told her as much. "I promise you, Alex. I will end this." His intensity stilled her. "Soon."

Appearing both hopeful that what he said was true and afraid at the absolute way he said it, she tried a smile. It looked more like a grimace. "…Don't say if it's the last thing you do," she counseled gently. It was also a plea, Cas realized. She was afraid of losing him. And she knew, on some level, how desperate he was getting. He had felt humbled and awed at her instinctive understanding of him earlier, but now he felt fearful of it. He didn't want her to see some things. He didn't like to see some things about himself.

"I am going to make it right," he promised fiercely, only able to think of everything he had worked for and the need to accomplish victory. Then he would leave behind his dark deeds and never tread in the shadows ever again.

Instead of comforting her, his intensely-spoken words seemed to upset her further, but she attempted to hide it by working her face and clearing her throat and trying to appear accepting of what he'd just said. And then she looked around as if trying to find a temporary escape. "I, uh, I gotta go to the bathroom."

Cas frowned a little. She seemed uneasy. "Should I come with you?"

She was in the middle of pushing her chair back and standing up. "Um… no?" She was faintly amused at his question. "If the server comes around, he can take my plate, I'm done."

"Of course."

Cas watched as she headed for the back of the restaurant and threw a glance at him before she disappeared into the small hallway where a sign that said restrooms hung. Did she know? Why had his promise to finish this upset her? Cas looked around himself for the first time and took in the patrons surrounding them. Mostly families and couples dined. Usually, watching humans inspired pleasant feelings for him but currently nothing could make him feel better.

One table over and across from him, a girl of about nine years old turned around in her chair and looked at him curiously, letting her arm hang over the back of the chair. She sat with an older woman, presumably her mother, who was on the phone and not paying attention. The little girl had wild corkscrew-curly hair that stood out around her head like a cloud and bright, keen eyes that looked Castiel over thoroughly in fascination. "I like your long jacket," she said after a moment.

Cas looked down at himself. "Thank you. It's actually a trench coat."

The girl's mother, on her phone, batted her daughter's shoulder distractedly. "Hannah, don't bother him, turn around in your seat." She returned to her phone conversation about acupuncture, mostly oblivious to her surroundings.

The little girl, Hannah, was still looking at Cas thoroughly. Her eyes swept an arc to the left of him, then did the same to the right of him. "I always thought angel wings would be white," she said calmly, a quizzical frown on her young, freckled face. Castiel was startled. Only very special people could see angel's wings.

"Hannah," her mother covered the mouthpiece of her phone and looked at the little girl meaningfully. "Eat your green beans." She returned to her phone-call. "Yes, yes, sounds great Martha. We'll see you then, buh-bye."

Hannah looked at her mother very sadly. "But I didn't want green beans, Mama."

"There's a lot of things in life you won't want but will have to accept anyway, Hannah," her mother said.

"I know, Mama. But green beans are the worst."

"Sorry darlin'," the woman said, giving her daughter a sympathetic but pointed look as she grabbed her purse. "Okay, I'm gonna go pay the bill, don't you leave this table. Eat those veggies."

Hannah sighed obediently. "Yes ma'am."

Her mother left and little Hannah shifted. Cas heard a metallic clanking sound. He craned his neck to see where the noise had come from. Then he saw and was saddened. On Hannah's small, frail legs (legs that were much smaller than they should have been) metal braces clamped ankle to thigh. Her legs were misshapen and bowed despite the braces and Castiel understood immediately as his eyes perceived what a human's eyes could not. Muscular dystrophy… a condition in which muscles weakened throughout the lifetime of a child and commonly stopped working altogether in adulthood. Next to Hannah little crutches were propped against her chair. She could walk. For now. But in adulthood she would be in a wheelchair. Castiel wondered if this child had ever run in her lifetime. He doubted it. Not with legs that were so curved. That thought saddened him again.

Hannah turned and looked at him again, using her arms to turn herself in her seat better. She seemed to find him fascinating and was looking at his wings again. Decisive, she grabbed her crutches and deftly hobbled over to him, eyes journeying his wingspan with great peaceful wonder. "Can other people not see?"

"No." Cas looked at this child closely, wondering.

"Hm." Her head canted to the side. "Why can I?"

Cas thought that was a very good question. "I'm not sure." He looked at her deformed legs which were so unlike what God had designed for human beings to have. "Have you always had to use crutches?"

She was still contemplating his wings. "Yup, gonna be in a wheelchair soon." She visibly made herself be cheerful about it. "Mama says I can have pink wheels though, so it's okay. And I got to walk for a few years, so we are happy about that." What tenacity and maturity this innocent child had. And what a tragedy that she should never know what it was like to walk without supports or labor, what a shame that she would never run, that she would become confined to a wheelchair. Only… Castiel knew he could change that. Easily. What reason stood against him doing just that?

At that moment, Alex reappeared at the table. Curious as to the company Cas had attracted, she looked at Cas questioningly then Hannah, who was apparently not shy. "Hello." Hannah smiled brightly and nodded at her plate one table over. "Can I interest you in some green beans?"

Alex hesitated, an uncertain smile on her face. "Um… no thanks?"

"You sure? They're really…" Hannah tried to sound enthusiastic, "um, green beany."

Alex pulled an apologetic wince as Cas stood up. "Sorry, they're just not my favorite."

Hannah sighed gustily and flopped down to sit in the chair Alex had been in before. "Yeah, me either, which is the problem."

Castiel crouched down to be eye level with Hannah, who balked and gaped at him, leaning in to study him closely and unashamedly. "Whoaaa. Your eyes are really blue."

He had other things on his mind than the shade of his irises. Castiel had done many things wrong regretted much. But this child, today, could be healed. Today, he could be the angel he had been created to be. "Hannah." He touched her mid-shin and commanded her atoms and cells and molecules to bend to his will. Power filled his voice. "Stand up and walk."

The little girl's face fell and her voice dropped to a whisper the second he touched her, and when he told her to stand, she looked as if she didn't dare believe. "…What?" she asked in a whisper, looking down at her legs with growing shock and hope.

Castiel stood up and offered her his hand. Just a couple feet off, Alex was just as shocked as Hannah, who took Cas's hand and slowly stood, her little face showing disbelief that was becoming overjoyed. The braces on her legs fell off seemingly of their own accord. The metal bands and bars clattered to the ground as for what was the first time in her young life, Hannah stood on legs that were strong, straight, and healthy.

"Oh… oh!" she cried, staring at her legs, afraid to really believe it was real. She kicked a leg out into the air and looked at it with a dropped-open mouth and she wobbled and almost lost her balance and grabbed onto Cas's coat for support. Deciding it was real Hannah looked up at him in utter awe through eyes filling with amazed tears. "I saw your wings but… but… now I know angels are real." She abruptly hugged him tightly around the waist. "Thankyouthankyouthankyou trench coat angel man," she whispered fiercely. Abruptly she gave a shout of glee and tore away from Cas, running and jumping and skipping across the restaurant laughing the entire time.

"Mama, Mama!" she shrieked, knocking over a chair in her zeal and garnering some annoyed looks in the process. "Look! Look!"

At the counter where she was paying, Hannah's mother turned around with a confused look on her face. Castiel put all the money he possessed down onto the table as he watched Hannah and her suddenly sobbing, shocked mother. Hannah was pointing back at Cas and Alex as her mother became hysterical and began to shout things about "a miracle, a miracle!"

"We should go," Cas told Alex, who was looking at him with an indescribable expression of utter admiration and respect. "But first… Dean wanted some pie."

---

After snatching an entire apple pie, Cas and Alex returned to Bobby's. They hadn't been gone for very long and Dean, Sam, and Bobby were all surprised to see them back so soon. Once he spotted the pie though, Dean had been instantly in good spirits and suggested everyone have some. After he'd given takers a slice, he attacked the rest of the pie with a fork, not even bothering to get a plate. As they all settled in, somewhere along the way Dean mentioned how Cas was unbeatable at chess and Sam (the resident Winchester expert) decided to take that bet. A couple hours passed and found the little group sharing beers and surprisingly good company over chess and then poker and then Jenga. Dean kept jokingly accusing Cas of cheating with his 'angel stuff' at Jenga and Alex had defended Cas and said he was very good with his hands… then snorted at her own innuendo.

Now up in the attic and just the two of them again, Cas sat on the end of the bed and watched the old tube television Alex had elevated upwards by a couple feet onto a box. She was changing into some sweat pants behind him as he watched the black-and-white images on the screen with a fascinated little smile. "This Lucy character seems to get herself into very odd predicaments," he said as Alex shimmied into more comfortable sweat pants.

"Yup… she's pretty great," Alex agreed, glancing up at the woman on the screen who was stuffing chocolates into her mouth at an alarming rate. She'd seen pretty much every episode of I Love Lucy in existence thanks to reruns on TV Land. Cas looked back at her and stood up, walked over, and wordlessly pulled her to him for a hug. The unexpected action sent a thrill of warmth through her and she melted, nestling to him. Sometimes she forgot they were as close and comfortable as they were and when she was reminded, it made her turn to mush. The weirdness Cas had shown earlier (his unexplained worries and strange behavior) was a fluke apparently. He was himself again. On TV, the laugh track sounded faintly. Warm in arms that held her steady and secure, Alex let out a soft breath feeling contended and okay in almost every way. "Today was just what I needed," she confessed in a whisper as to not break this serene moment. Having him there with her had set her at peace again.

His soft, deep voice reverberated in his chest against her ear, his hand stroked against the back of her head. "I'm glad."

Pulling back to look at him, Alex had a bittersweet smile on her face. His familiar features were so beautiful to her and she touched the side of his face in quiet adoration. "You gotta get this war won so days like today aren't the minority," she said, trying not to give away how deeply she despaired for that exact thing.

"I know," he answered, becoming a little more tense as he saw through her and probably felt the same way himself. "I think of that day often." Cas took one of her hands in his own and peered into her eyes in quiet concern. "How are your menstrual cramps? Do you need anything? Anything at all?"

It was kind of cute of him to worry about her like that and she chuckled lightly. "They're not bad," she said, then turned, sat on the bed, and pulled him along toward her. "I just want you to stay as long as you can."

"Of course," he replied, following her as she tugged on him and beckoned him to be near to her. She laid down—it was dim in the attic and she just wanted to be close to him in the darkness. He followed her there, shifting to lay on his side near her.

The TV was a dull drone in the background and she curled up against him then reached into his coat, searching for the book she had at first been dismayed to see. "More questions?" she asked, grinning a little.

A slow smile spread across Cas's face. "You like the book," he surmised as she found it and pulled it out.

She flipped through it randomly, glancing at him briefly, a smile trying to hide on her lips. He looked so very pleased with himself. "I didn't think I would, but I kinda do. Let's see. Hmm. Okay." She scanned the question before asking it this time. "What has brought you the most joy recently?"

Cas didn't have to think about his answer. "You," was the single-word reply. His fingers came to trace down the side of her face as his eyes drank hers in. "Being with you. Thinking of you. Sometimes, when I can't conjure hope or when I'm in battle, the thought of you is what gets me through." The words touched her so deeply. "What about you?"

She didn't have to think about her answer either. "Seeing you heal that kid." Thinking of it again made her want to cry from emotion. Hannah's hair bouncing as she ran and skipped for probably the first time in her life was something Alex could never forget. "You changed her life forever. Just because you could… just because you wanted to." What kind of magic was this angel laying beside her? He truly fit the term angel. "I think all angels should be like you," she said, meaning every word and looking at him with all the love she felt for him. "Kind. You have more heart than most people alive in the world."

Her compliment seemed to make him doubtful and his eyes fell away from hers. "That's very nice of you to say." Her hand rested on the book between them and he contemplated it then covered it with his own. "I often wonder why angels shouldn't go into the world and fix every broken thing. It's within our power to heal the sick and to perform many great miracles. Think of the suffering my brothers and sisters could end. If we weren't consumed by war, we could help mankind in ways we never have before." He seemed to feel very deeply on the matter. "In the past, miracles and healings weren't allowed except when commanded. I always wondered why."

His love of humanity and his willingness and vision to heal those in need of healing was one of the greatest things about him. Alex knew it was part of his character. After all, the voice she spoke with was something he'd given her out of personal compassion. Maybe he would change the whole world forever in time. He'd certainly changed her whole world. "Well, maybe after the war that's what angels will do, huh?"

He considered it dubiously and spoke with faint sadness. "Perhaps. The other angels seem too caught up in the politics of paradise than the condition of humans. Not many of them are interested in much else other than following orders and maintaining the status quo. Many overlook the wonder of humanity. Many fail to see what's so special about your kind."

Curious about his thoughts, Alex let her eyes study his face in fascination. "And what would that be?"

"Everything. Humans are vessels of hope. And creation." His eyes raised to hers, he pulled her hand off of the book and to himself where his fingers caressed her hand lightly. "And love."

How was he even real? He was like a dream and even though she thought his face and body were absolutely gorgeous, his mind and heart were even more so. "I think your mind must be a very beautiful place, Castiel," she murmured softly, very much in awe of him at the moment. He was so much more than the man that he appeared to be. She thought of his wings, she thought of his powers and abilities and it crashed over her all over again. He was an angel. And she was… just Alex. Even though his love for her was apparent and pronounced and undeniable, she always still felt like it was too good to be true and one day she'd wake up and find out it had been a huge cosmic joke or something. Something she'd wondered recently popped out of her mouth before she could stop it. "Do you ever worry we won't know what to do when we're finally free to be together?" she asked anxiously. "What if this relationship only works because of all the separation?"

In response to the query, Cas looked abruptly confused. "What do you mean?"

"I mean… what if we don't actually like being together or something?" They had never been with each other for more than a few days at a time and what if the charm wore off or they realized they were deeply incompatible in some way they hadn't yet or… maybe she was way off base. Becoming confused at herself, she shook her head. "I don't know…"

"The thought seems quite absurd," Cas said factually, then quickly added more. "Not that I am trying to disrespect your thoughts, I only meant… I could never dislike being with you. You are my favorite person in all of the world. And there are currently over seven billion people on this planet."

Leave it to Captain Facts to romance her with statistics. It worked though. "Oh you," she murmured affectionately and then hugged him, grinning into his chest and wondering how the hell she got so lucky. Sighing as he held her, she looked down the length of their close bodies, letting her legs tangle with his. That's when she saw a small black fleck on her gray sweats and subsequently freaked out at epic proportions.

Kicking her legs and shrieking as she flailed backwards in an attempt to escape what she thought was a spider, Cas of course immediately freaked out too and sat up as she screamed "get it away!" as well as a few choice expletives.

"Alex, what is it?" Cas demanded while he looked around and held onto her tight as if he were shielding her from some big attacker.

"A spider!" she panted, brushing at her sweatpants with shaking hands and looking around with frantic eyes as she searched for the small insidious dot. She was backed up against the headboard with Cas beside her. "I swear I saw one, Cas! Auuugh, where'd it go?!" Her hands fluttered at her neck nervously.

Cas, calm and steady, peered at a spot on her sweatpants behind her knee and plucked something off then showed her. It was a black fuzzball. "This is not a spider."

Chagrined but very relieved, she relaxed and went slack against the headboard, half sitting. "Oh." Apologetic, her eyes darted to his ruefully. "Sorry."

Cas looked at her with veiled worry. "Why do you fear spiders so much?" His eyes were narrowed into shrewd slits. "It seems peculiar, as you regularly face monsters twice your size."

"It's dumb," she told him, embarrassed of herself. She knew spiders were smaller and easy to kill and couldn't 'get her' but she was so traumatized over them that she locked up every time she saw one. Cas was peering at her solicitously, waiting to hear, and she hesitated. "You really wanna know?"

He seemed to think that was a strange question. "I want to know everything about you."

Alex hesitated. She already knew he wasn't going to like it. She'd come to terms with this but Cas… he'd be mad. She slid back down to the bed and laid on her back, thinking about how to begin. Cas settled beside her on his side and looked as if he were becoming nervous about her answer.

Alex thought back to when she had been about seven maybe. "When I was little, Dad had us staying in some creepy cabin for a couple weeks. I woke up one night and this huge spider was crawling up my bare arm and I just freaked out—they'd always scared me a little but that was just terrifying. So, I started jumping around and accidentally kicked my dad in the head with my knee real hard when I did. We were in the same bed and Sam and Dean were in the other room sharing the other bed." Alex very clearly remembered her dad yelping and swearing as her knee cracked into his ear. He woke up angry, which was always just great. "He got pissed… and when he figured out it was a spider that had freaked me out, he took me outside in the middle of the night and said I just needed to get over it, face my fears, yada yada yada… then he locked me in the shed and said I had to stay in there thirty minutes with the spiders. Well… he forgot I was in there or fell back asleep, I dunno. I was in there all night and there were spiders were everywhere and dad never came to get me." And that was why she was so freakishly scared of spiders. Just thinking about that shed made her feel anxious and tic-ridden. She could still feel them jumping on her and crawling on her, she could still remember how her sharp panting breaths sounded all night long.

Just like she had predicted, Cas had become stone faced at the revelation. "He was wrong to do that to you," he finally said in a low, rough voice that stowed a lot of cold anger.

"I know," Alex said, then tried to explain why she believed her dad had done that. "They did immersion therapy like that when he was in the Marines. Made people face their fears at really intense levels. But… that was for full grown adults. I was just a scared little kid who needed to be told it was gonna be okay." As if it might make things better, she tried to make her dad appear marginally less a villain. "He felt really bad about it in the morning."

Cas seemed to think that was rich and said nothing, only stewed silently.

Alex remembered crying in that silent pitch-black shed for hours, screaming silently for help, blowing on her whistle and trying to get someone to come help her please. The shed was too far from the house and no one heard. Only the spiders heard her. Early in the morning, dad had reappeared and had been disheveled, freaked out, had yanked the locked door open and picked her up and hugged her hard. "Oh baby, I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry, I fell asleep sweet girl, so sorry baby… Christ, you okay baby?" Should she have smacked him in the face for leaving her there all night? Maybe so. But she had hugged his neck and sobbed silently and clung to him for the comfort he didn't usually give. Was it sad she remembered that moment as one of her best memories with Dad? When he messed up bad, he used to apologize and actually show emotion. But as she'd gotten older, he had gotten more and more withdrawn, more apathetic and angry at everything.

"He was trying to help," Alex said, echoing what he'd told her as he rocked her and tried to calm her down. But really. What dad helped their kid that way? "Or I hope he was," she said, deeply sad at the thought of John Winchester and all the issues he'd left her with and subjected her to. "But now every time I see a spider I just remember being in that fucking shed. So…" she trailed off. That was the story of her and spiders. Like she'd said, it was dumb.

Cas was silent, clearly very incensed, and Alex said nothing. She had never told anyone about it before. Sam and Dean didn't even know. They just thought she was freakishly scared of spiders for no reason. They'd always made fun of her for it and rolled their eyes at her for it. She hadn't wanted to tell them. Dad had this way of making you feel like his mistakes should be covered up and hidden, like he was the victim even when he was the culprit.

Pushing some of his darker fury away in favor of focusing on her, Cas looked at her and pulled her a little closer to himself with a very grim and serious look on his face. "I will always keep you safe from spiders."

Smiling helplessly at how damn cute he was without meaning to be, she snuggled into his chest. She felt safe and right there with him. "Thanks, Cas. My hero."

There was a short silence. "I am very angry imagining him for subjecting you to that."

"I know," Alex said. For another long moment they were silent and surprisingly, as she thought about her father, a sudden intense pang of loss and emptiness hit her. "And despite it all, I miss my dad sometimes," she confessed, not even sure what to think. "Is that crazy? I wish… I just wish he would have been better. I wish he could have been the father we needed." She remembered a man who had been too focused on revenge. She remembered how sad and lonely and angry John Winchester was but how desperate he was to love and be loved. He didn't know how. She wished he had. She had lost her dad a long time before he died and that was what hurt the most and put tears in her eyes, made her shake her head at the unfairness of it all. "I just wanted him to tell me he loved me and that it was gonna be okay… not put a gun in my hand and tell me what a dark place the world was."

"I wish I knew what to say ," Cas said softly, obviously anguished over her pain. Almost like it were his own.

"I feel sorry for him," Alex said, seeing her dad in her mind's eye. She didn't understand the man and didn't know why he had done the things he had. She loved him and despised him all at once. She grieved who he should have been. "I feel sad for him. He wasn't supposed to be the way he did."

Her hand, holding onto one of Cas's lapels, was gently taken into Cas's hand and he slipped his fingers between hers, seeking her gaze. "I understand that there were extenuating circumstances," he told her. "But no one should hurt you or abuse you, Alex. Especially not the man pledged to protect and raise you."

That was true enough but it had still happened—what the hell could be done about it now? Getting too emotional about things she didn't want to confront, Alex tried a smile, then tried a little laugh. "Yeah well we both know about dads who didn't do it right, don't we?" she asked, trying to think what if had been like to be Castiel. "To exist all those years as an angel of God and put all your faith and identity into him only to find out he's ditched… I know that had to suck."

Cas thought about it. "It did. And it does." He tested out the word she had just used: "Suck." He began to share his deep and intimate thoughts with her in a slow voice. "I expected very much from my father and have received only questions and disappointments. I reached out with waiting hands and was given nothing."

That made her so sad to hear, sadder than she thought she'd feel. Maybe he really did identify with her daddy issues. More than she thought. "Do you still hope maybe God shows back up?" she chanced after a minute.

He sighed long and hard. "I don't know what I want." There was a long silence. "I just want to know why. Why he would leave. Why he would allow Heaven and earth to become so tarnished and disorderly. I trusted my father implicitly. I had faith. I thought revelation was from him. But all along it was Michael and Raphael who imagined themselves gods in their own right. It was a sham. We all believed simply because we were told."

Alex pulled back and let her head rest into the pillow there as she looked at him in fond admiration. Yes, this was a hard road for him (and for them), but it had crafted him into such a strong individual. She was proud of him for making a stand and fighting for justice and sticking with it even though it was harder than hard. "Who would have thought, when I first met you, how you'd turn into a revolutionary?" she asked, thinking back to when he'd been stoic and seemingly emotionless. "I remember when all you cared about or knew was obeying."

He looked at her somberly. "I was afraid. Of listening to my own instincts." He looked upwards, his expression unsettled. "Sometimes I still am."

There it was again. That unexplained insecurity and distant look of grudging he got sometimes. "Why?"

He hesitated, maybe choosing his words carefully. "I am not sure I know how to chose the right path sometimes," he confessed, shaking his head, staring off into the dark attic unseeingly. "I'm new at this. All of it. Everything."

"Well, you're not so bad for a newbie," she said in gentle teasing, trying to get him to cheer up however fractionally. It didn't work so she took his face in her hand and held his gaze meaningfully. "I trust your instincts, Cas. If you don't, I do. You're smart. You care. You're trustworthy."

Strangely, his expression seemed pained at her words. "You don't know the things I've done."

"Well then you could tell me…" she suggested, wishing he would and feeling slightly wary at the tone he used.

He loved her very much and his eyes told her as much. "Some things are too heavy for you to carry," he said, seeming to be resigned to whatever fate he had subjected himself to. "Allow me to do this for us."

Alex hesitated. Something felt wrong, but maybe it was just her wishing he would tell her everything he was going through. "Just promise to share some of that heaviness with me when it gets to be too much," she said earnestly, squeezing his hand tight. "I know you're an angel, but everyone has their limit."

"I promise," he said quietly, his eyes unreadable but touched. "Thank you for being so kind to me."

Why would he thank her for that? Smiling a little, she joked lightly. "Anytime, Cas." The book, which laid in the small space between them, called to her. "More questions?" She asked. She liked hearing his answers very much and it was a good distraction from the more somber, heavy subjects they kept finding themselves in. Finding a random question on a random page, she asked it. "What are some of your favorite memories of us?"

Cas's expression softened as his eyes scanned over memories and met hers. "The first time I saw you," he replied, then his tone became more tender, more affected. "The first time you could see me, too. The first time you smiled at me." His hand still in hers stroked fingertips lightly across her palm and his eyes shifted back and forth between hers. "When you first laid your hand arm when I came to you in a dream. I didn't understand why I was so inclined to the touch of your hand." His touch sent little shivers up her spine and Cas grew more and more genuinely emotional. "Every memory of us is my favorite," he said, taking her hand firmly in his own and pulling it near to his heart.

His declarations of love were making her all the more emotional. "Stop, Cas, you're gonna make me lose it," she said, trying not to get misty-eyed.

"Lose what?" He asked, quickly becoming very concerned.

She shook her head, leaned in, and kissed him wordlessly, then looked him in the eye and let her gaze speak to him as she stayed close, a breath away. Stilled by her kiss, Cas's brilliant blue eyes searched hers then he inched closer as his gaze dropped to her lips briefly. His hand found her face and his nose brushed hers as his lips brushed to hers softly and sweetly for another kiss. Sighing at the feeling, Alex nestled her body closely to his and pulled him closer by the back of the neck, deepening the kiss without a second thought, needing to taste him and be tasted. His lips and mouth were so much more intoxicating than any other substance she'd ever experienced and as such, she became lost in him and the way he returned the kiss so deep and slow.

What a beautiful and warm world to exist in there with him in that bed. She couldn't get close enough to him or have enough of his kiss or touch. Her hands slid up to his neck then cupped his face, fingers dragging against the pleasantly rough stubble there. Her eyes fluttered open and she saw his eyes were half open too, watching her as their mouths explored the other's. She caught him doing that often… looking at her while they kissed. But, she guessed in order to have caught him doing that in the first place, she had to have been doing it too.

"I could kiss you forever, Cas," she murmured against his mouth, drowsy and drunken from the effect he left on her.

He traced two fingers down her cheek thoughtfully, pulling back a little and examining her tenderly. "Forever is a very long time."

Her mouth curved up to one side. "Mm-hm, I know," she said. "That's why I used that word." She craned for him, seeking another kiss, but Cas spoke, making her pause.

"You didn't answer the question," he said, and she realized she hadn't.

Biting away a cheeky smile, she shrugged. "You distracted me."

What was her favorite memory of Cas and herself? So many moments flooded her mind and it was impossible to pick. Everything from the very first time he had healed her and asked her to trust him to him taking her to see the northern lights competed for favorite. "So many…" she mulled, trying to pick one. She couldn't. And then she thought of the first time he had spoken aloud what she had known for awhile. "The first time you said you loved me," she said in just a whisper as she remembered thoroughly. It made her stomach flip around to recall the way he sounded saying that to her. That had been the day he had vowed the rest of his days to her alone and she was overwhelmed that could have actually happened. "The day we got married."

When she said that, Cas softened and became deeply touched, his eyes treasuring her. "How is it that you agreed to be mine?" he asked, seeming to be in awe over it anew.

Smiling again, letting a thumb stroke his cheek soft and slow, she shrugged. "Kinda made me fall in love with you," she joked.

Abruptly deep worry and pain filled his face and he got intense. Beyond intense. "I never want to hurt you," he said with strange intensity. "I never want to be the source of your sadness."

Not suspecting him of anything but being under severe and mind-numbing stress from the war in Heaven (even though later she would beat herself up for not realizing his odd behavior for what it was), Alex attempted to comfort him. "Shh," she soothed quietly, brushing both her thumbs against his face. His anxiety made her anxious, too. "Stop worrying," she encouraged, and kissed just beside his mouth, then on his cheek. He closed his eyes, eyebrows moving in together as she lightly, slowly kissed and nuzzled his face all over. "Everything's gonna be okay," she told him. "Soon. I promise."

His eyes opened back up to look at her and Alex couldn't have guessed how wrong she was about what she'd just said. Leaning close to him and beckoning him to let her reassure him, she stroked a hand through his hair and looked into his eyes, loving him so completely and needing him to have hope so she could too. "Just kiss me a little longer."

Cas gave in and did as she asked, letting his strong arms pull her close as his eyes fell closed and their noses brushed. He took hold of her face and carefully he kissed her with smoldering affection, savoring her as if he thought he would have her forever, surrendering to the comfort her touch gave him.

In the proverbial distance, the storm gathered. Soon, it would break over their heads and devastate everything. But that night, ignorance was bliss. They turned their heads away from the horizon and did not heed the signs of approaching destruction.

---

A Few Weeks Later

In a crowded yacht party Heaven belonging to a very rich CEO, two angels were among the human apparitions—this was to hide themselves from Raphael's followers and their watchful eyes. A soft blue sky arced overhead and calm ocean waters lapped tranquilly as a pleasant, salty breeze sighed across the upper deck.

Leaned over a cocktail table with a drink in hand, the first angel was the picture of relaxed and jaunty. He gave his counterpart a subtly questioning look as he raised his glass to his own lips. "So, I'm supposing you've heard the rumors then?"

The angel opposite of him looked out of place—he stood stiff like a board, arms at his sides while a stern frown pinched his face. "…What rumors?" he asked cautiously, seeming vaguely uncertain and suspicious of what was being discussed.

"Well that Raphael's back of course," Balthazar replied casually, sipping his scotch. "Word is he's finally got his new vessel and's ready to play ball." There was a look of dawning utter dread and shock on Castiel's face. Balthazar knew why… they both understood that Raphael's first task would be to track down and use the youngest Winchester against Cas who had, if you asked Balthazar, been very careless about the entire thing. Every bloody angel in Heaven knew about Cas's strange preoccupation and interest in the girl. As Cas's face got more and more panicked as realization set in, Balthazar held up a finger with a calm and knowing smile on his face. "Now now, before you get upset, hear me out." He set his scotch down and leaned forward over the tall cocktail table covertly. "I know exactly how to get him off your ass and more importantly off the ass of your little lady friend."

Castiel's was still quite alarmed and as such, was ready to hear Balthazar's plan. "How?"

Balthazar grinned easily and spread his arms, as if the answer were obvious. "The other half of the weapons of course."

Dismayed and obviously disappointed at what had just been said, Cas set his jaw and looked sidelong in a caged way. "Which Daniel has."

"For now," Balthazar corrected confidently. His coy smile was growing and one of his eyebrows was lifting just slightly. "I've got a way to steal the weapons away."

Cas appeared suspicious but was willing to hear Balthazar out. "Tell me."

"Dunno if you're going to like it…" Balthazar warned.

Impatient and not bothering to hide it, Castiel let his gaze bore into his brother's. "Just tell me, Balthazar."

Balthazar smirked a bit as he fiddled with his scotch glass. "Ever heard of a battle tactic called a feint, Cas? It involves drawing the attention of the enemy to an area of battle where little or nothing is going on… at which time the offensive strategy can take place without much interruption." He looked at his brother pointedly, suggestively.

Cas's frown only deepened. "What are you saying?"

"We stage a distraction and send Raphael and company on a useless chase while you get the weapons back," Balthazar said, then in false humility put his hands to himself. "With yours truly leading the way, of course."

Digesting the idea, Castiel was nodding intently, eyes down in thought. "This sounds promising." He peered at Balthazar in veiled hopefulness. "What distraction do you have in mind?"

Balthazar grew mildly hesitant. "This is the part you're not going to like," he said, reluctant to say. He waited a couple more seconds then let came out with it. "It's the Winchesters."

Immediately, Cas's face showed complete aversion. "No." Intense and meaningful in a way that was borne out of protectiveness and affection, Castiel drew himself up to his full height. "They will not be used in that way. It's too dangerous."

A bit irritated and impatient, Balthazar sighed loftily and looked around the scene around them. "Do you want to win the war or not, Cassie?" Deeply abiding guilt showed on Cas's face. Balthazar jabbed an imperative finger down onto the table and he pressed his advantage. "Then this is how. We need those weapons and you know we do." Overhead, sea gulls swooped and gave squawking cries. When Cas said nothing, Balthazar continued in his efforts to convince him. "I've got it all thought out—I've done my research I promise you, and yes, there's slight risk to the boys, but basically none to your little chérie." Balthazar chanced a roguish, self-assured grin. "It'll practically be a vacation for them." He almost sounded like he was boasting. His more easygoing demeanor was not matched by Castiel. Giving up on the more playful attempts, Balthazar became serious. "If this can give you the upper hand, why not risk it?"

Cas's eyes snapped up to Balthazar's balefully. "Because I don't want to risk them. Especially her."

Sighing chidingly, Balthazar gave his brother a patronizing look. "Cas, Cas, Cas… the time of wants is sadly past. The time of action is upon us. I can personally guarantee her safety and assure you the reward will outweigh the risk." Not convinced, Castiel was stony and silent, his eyes piercing Balthazar's, testing and probing and clearly wondering if it were the right course of action. Balthazar was contrite—he knew he had wronged his brother in the past and did want to atone. "Let me make up my faults to you once and for all," he requested earnestly. "Just say yes and the weapons are yours. I'll take care of the lying-to-their-faces part, you don't have to get your hands dirty. This will work, Cas, I vow it to you on my existence." There was more uncertain, grudging silence from Castiel and Balthazar couldn't understand why his brother was so hesitant. "Cas, you need these weapons."

A weary sigh whispered out of Cas's slightly parted lips. "I know that I do." Deep in thought, the angel in the trench coat thought for a terse moment, his dark brows pushing toward each other. "Balthazar, if any of them are harmed at all, especially Alex…" he trailed off, very loathe to continue onward.

Balthazar smiled cajolingly at his brother whose concern for the humans was unique. "Not a hair on their heads, Cas old boy." A muscle jumped in Cas's already-tight jaw. His struggle was marked and vast. Balthazar didn't see the issue or why Cas had to think about it. Win the war by the simple act of dangling the Winchesters as bait. They'd be fine, and even if they weren't, there were angels that could bring humans back from the dead (Cas included). What was the dilemma?

When Cas still said nothing, Balthazar prompted him. "Do you trust me or no?"

Cas's conflicted gaze slowly rose up to his brother's and he looked upset with himself and trapped, forced into a scenario he hated. However, he was also quite resigned. "Tell me what to do," he said heavily.

A slow, pleased smile spread across Balthazar's face and he reached out, clapping Cas once enthusiastically on the side of the arm. "Right choice, Cas."

---

Later

A violent downpour raged outside at night, beating the ground with relentless rain showers. Thunder shook the Singer house and lightning flickered here and there.

Dean sat at Bobby's desk hunched over in front of a laptop. When Sam strolled in with a couple thick volumes from the attic in hand, Dean glanced up and noticed he was alone—he hadn't been when he left a few minutes ago. "Where's Pipsqueak?"

"She'll be down in a minute, picking out a few more she thought might help," Sam said, setting down the stack with a thud and looking around curiously. "Where'd Bobby go?"

"Supply run," Dean answered.

Sam looked pretty impressed. "In this?"

"Yeah, man's a hero."

"What supplies could we possibly have needed that bad?" Sam asked, making a face.

Dean smirked up at his brother and gestured at his empty bottle. "We were officially out of hunter's helper."

Amused understanding came over Sam's face. "…Ah."

A particularly violent series of lightning flashes flickered abruptly, and with the lightning came a feeling in the air that caused both the Winchester boys to frown.

They both sensed it at the same time—they weren't alone. Dean spotted him first and shot out of his seat as Sam turned to look.

"Hello, boys," Balthazar said, shocking them both at his appearance and then the way he charged right into the study like he owned the place. "You've seen The Godfather, right?"

Cautious—this couldn't be good—Dean stood back, hairs on the back of his neck standing up straight. "Balthazar…"

"You know, the end, where Michael Corleone sends his men to kill his enemies in one big, bloody swoop?" Balthazar asked. He was mildly out of breath and began to poke around on the shelf behind the desk, pulling out a container of salt and paying no attention to the brothers.

"Hey." Dean said, trying to get the guy's attention.

"Dead sea brine…" Balthazar muttered to himself, reading the container in rapt attention. "Good, good, good…" he began to sprinkle salt into a bowl on Bobby's desk, turned his attention to Sam. "You know, Moe Greene gets it in the eye, and Don Cuneo gets it in the revolving door?"

Pissed, Dean stared at the angel who wasn't giving him the time of day. "I said hey."

Balthazar stopped what he was doing and looked at Dean in a very pretentious way. "You did. Twice. Good for you." He patted Dean on the arm with a facetious little smile. "Blood of lamb," he muttered, now casting his gaze around the study. "Blood of lamb…" he suddenly disappeared from in front of their eyes. In the kitchen, they heard him talking some more, lazily cataloging the contents of the fridge. "Beer, cold pizza… blood of lamb. Yes!" He turned and grinned at them stupidly, a red jar in hand which he held up victoriously. "Blood of lamb!"

Sam had to raise his voice to a shout over the din of the storm outside. "Why are you talking about The Godfather?"

Balthazar disappeared again and his voice sounded directly behind them. "Because we're in it," he said. The boys turned, growing more and more confused. "Right now, tonight. And in the role of Michael Corleone, the archangel Raphael." He began to unscrew the lid of the jar of lamb's blood then paused, seeming to remember something. "Now where is that sister of yours?"

Dean didn't like this at all and took a couple steps forward, demanding an explanation as Balthazar poured blood into the bowl. "Okay, what the hell is going on here, harpsichord? You need to tell me right now or—"

"No, no, no, no…" Balthazar was abruptly pulling out the drawers of the desk and searching through the contents, dumping everything onto the floor. "No, no, no, no!" He dumped another drawer out and abruptly became relieved. "Yes. Bone of a lesser saint." He held up a little specimen in a plastic baggie, smiling all the while. "This vertebra will do very nicely. Your Mister Singer does keep a beautiful pantry." He began to dig the vertebrae out.

"What's going on?" came a new voice. The loud storm had covered up the sound of Alex coming down the stairs. She stood in the entrance to the study with three books and a look of sheer confusion on her face. "Balthazar? What are you doing here?"

Giving her a sarcastic little expression, Balthazar paused what he was doing. "Baking you a cake. What does it look like I'm doing?"

He resumed crushing up the bone with his hand and Alex drifted closer cautiously, shooting her brothers questioning looks briefly. "Arts and crafts project I wasn't invited to?" she ventured.

"So close," Balthazar retorted in a sassy tone, letting the crushed bone dust sift into the bowl. "No, I am here to protect you from Raphael—and I don't mean the teenage mutant ninja turtle." He began to stir up his weird mixture with a pestle.

"What?" Alex asked, almost dropping the books at the mention of Raphael. Her face showed absolute dread. "H-he's back?"

Balthazar gave her a knowing look. "Oh yes."

"And what, he's after you?" Dean asked, trying to figure out what the hell was going on.

Balthazar looked at Dean with disdain. "Didn't you hear me just now you useless shelf decoration?" Startled at the comment, Dean made a disgruntled face. "Raphael is after us all." Balthazar mixed the bowl contents harder, faster. "You see, he's consolidated his strength. And now he's on the move."

"And where's Cas?" Sam asked carefully.

Balthazar was now hurrying over to the large window with his mixture. "Oh, Cassie? He is deep, deep underground, running fast and hard, can't come to the phone at the moment." He caught sight of Alex and the chastising little look he gave her made both her brothers look at her. "Oh don't look so distraught," he told her. "I'm sure he'll be fine." He paused, let his eyes narrow slightly in consideration. "Maybe." Balthazar began to swirl two fingers around in the bowl of liquid he'd created. "Good old Raffy put out a hit list on every last Samaritan who might be of any importance to the angel in the trench coat. See, he wants to draw Cas out in the open." He inexplicably began to draw a strange symbol in blood on the pane of the window. "Makes sense, doesn't it? After all—Heaven knows how much Cas likes your sister, boys. You and me? Cas might not bat an eye. Her? Oh, he'll come running." He finished drawing and shook the blood off his hand. "Which is why I've got to hide you, and now."

"Hide us?" Sam asked, skeptical and suspicious, standing in the front of both his siblings sort of protectively. That's when the lights began to flicker and buzz. The Winchesters all looked up. That was never a good sign.

"Ah." Balthazar seemed to share their sentiment. "That's all the time we have, children." He strode over and pulled his blazer aside and a large bloodstain in his lower chest became visible as he rooted around in the inner pocket of the jacket. "Where is it?"

"Whoa," Dean commented at the sight of his injury. "What happened there?"

"Oh. Garish, I know," Balthazar said offhandedly, letting the blazer fall back into place. "You see, uncle Raffy sent one of his nastiest to handle me. I'm flattered, actually. And down a lung at the moment, but that's all right." He held out what he'd been looking for to Sam. "Here's for you." It was a key with some kind of tag attached.

Sam held it away from himself like it was diseased. "What am I supposed to do with this?" he asked doubtfully.

"Run with it," Balthazar said, matter-of-fact. And then without warning, he went flying backwards for no conceivable reason and crashed with a loud thud into the wall. Startled, the Winchesters all took a step back and reacted in a split second—between her brothers, Alex dropped the books she'd been holding, a hand going for a weapon—Sam grabbed hold of her other arm and Dean had one of his arms in front of her to instinctively shield her.

A man with dark hair and a fierce, angry expression appeared in the kitchen and began to approach them with fatal intention etched into his features.

Scrambling to his feet and staring at the approaching angel, Balthazar breathed a name: "Virgil." Obviously panicking, Balthazar thrust his hands out at the Winchesters. A mighty gust of wind followed the movement. "I said RUN!" he shouted at deafening, ear-bursting volume.

At his command the three Winchesters went flying backwards into the window hard, shattering the pane of glass completely. What they found on the other side of that glass was a different world altogether…