Song Remains the Same

Chapter 110 / Bad Moon Rising

"I am swimming in an ocean all alone."
- Backstreet Boys

Two Weeks Later

Dean threw his jacket down angrily as he stormed into another predictably derelict motel room. No one came with him or waited for him. He was alone. And that's what had him so fired up.

The oldest Winchester wasted no time in expressing his furious frustration—the second after he slammed the door behind himself, he snatched up and then threw the motel phone that was sitting innocently on the kitchenette table. The plastic object cracked loudly against ugly flowered wallpaper before landing in broken pieces onto water-stained carpet. The sound of it hitting the wall abruptly jarred him out of his mania and Dean stared at that phone in a sudden crestfallen hopelessness—he breathed hard for a minute, raking a hand through his short hair in an attempt to calm the fuck down.

Everything was sideways. Sideways and screwed. A couple weeks ago he'd emerged from Purgatory and felt uncharacteristically optimistic. Like he had this and could handle it. He'd been overjoyed at the thought of seeing Sam, of finding Jamie and the baby, of getting Cas out of Purgatory and finding a new normal. See, after monsterland, planet earth was so much brighter than it had been before.

And then all his hopes and dreams had all gone to shit in a second: Alex disappeared back into Purgatory after inexplicably leaving behind an oddly formally worded note. Then the unbelievable phone call to his brother during which he had discovered Sam was basically a quitter and a traitor. Then Dean had stumbled into Jamie's childhood home and found out the daughter he'd been supposed to have had been miscarried. So, yeah. Dreams, crushed.

Now it was two weeks later and things still weren't really going his way. Scratch that: nothing was going right at all. The final letdown: while at breakfast this morning, he and James had fought over something stupid, she had blown a fuse at him and said she was done with his attitude then dumped her orange juice all over him on purpose before storming off and disappearing. She had just now sent him a text telling him she to go back to his life and leave her out of it. The hurt and confusion and anger inspired by that text message? Had just resulted in a broken motel phone. And a broken heart. But who cared about that?

Dean sank down to sit on the end of one of the motel room beds. The room was offensively quiet and empty, so silent that his chest hurt and anxiety grew inside. He stared at the TV that was off and blank in front of him.

…Now what? What is even happening right now?

He didn't know.

Dean was worthless without a mission to be part of and a role to fill. He was drifting internally, panicking a little because he was so powerless against the huge odds stacked against him. Alex and Cas missing and beyond his reach, Sam an ass, Jamie gone after, you know… breaking up with him or whatever that was. He knew she was scared shitless and that fear was making her self protect and run away. But his feelings were deeply hurt. She was so hot and cold lately, so volatile. Not really herself… and he knew that she was acting like that because she was getting more and more terrified with each passing hour. Dean's biggest fear was that maybe today was the day. He wondered that every single fucking day—he'd wake up and look over at her and wonder is today the day the Hellhounds are gonna come? And he had never known because she refused to say.

He'd woken up beside her every day for the past couple weeks as they'd lived in this weird bubble existence of avoiding reality… which was funny because they were hunting Jake the demon the entire time and that demon was the most bitter symbol of reality there was for Jamie. In the better moments it had been just the two of them and the Impala and the open road as Dean had headed up the get-James-out-of-going-to-Hell thing. Although there was a lot lying underneath the surface between them—questions, doubts, suspicions—just being near her gave him a sense of happiness that was few and far between for him in most respects. Even though there was a new heaviness there because of the lost child and everything else that was screwed up in their lives… even though they clashed and bickered like an old married couple half the time… he found himself a little deeper in every day as far as his feelings for her were concerned.

Dysfunctional was probably the best way to describe them. But with two people as broken as they were, it was a wonder they functioned at all. Jamie didn't admit it using the English language, but Dean knew. He saw it sometimes. Felt it sometimes. She had a lot of deep feelings for him, too. They might have been confused feelings, but they were still feelings. He heard it in how she said his name in the heat of the moment and how she held onto him and the way she curled into him afterwards and didn't want to separate. If he were to have said anything about it, if he had called to light how she obviously liked to be close to him, she would have jerked away and made a crack at him. But he never said anything. Just held her and hoped he could save the life that laid in his arms.

But maybe he couldn't. Because maybe now she wouldn't let him.

No one could ever say he hadn't tried, though.

Two weeks ago had found Dean powerless to get back into Purgatory to help Alex and Cas and too angry to even want to see Sam. So Dean had done the one thing he could do: found James and then thrown himself into hunting down Jake—the demon who had tricked her into the soul deal. It had taken the better part of a week and a half to find the bastard, but once they found him, Dean had pulled out his best torturing skills in efforts to extract information and cooperation out of the demonic asshole. Long story short, none of it had worked. Demands for the deal to be called off had been laughed at, Dean's varying threats had fallen on cocky ears, and poor Jamie had put on the I-couldn't-give-a-damn face whenever she was present with the demon but it was obvious that he got under her skin and was incredibly intimidated by him. Jake had enjoyed it, taunting her and Dean alike with his firsthand knowledge of her habits and life, her body, how she was during sex… all that predictable stuff. He'd gloated over how in love Jamie had been with him and how it had all been a meaningless game for him. Dean had killed him brutally after the comments pissed him off too bad. And then Dean had watched Jamie sink down to a crouch on the floor and put her hands in her face as Jake's blood pooled on the ground. It was a moment that would forever stick in his mind… the inability to do anything to take away what she was feeling. And the realization that maybe he really couldn't change her fate or do what he'd promised.

Later on, Jamie was blank and hollow. She said it was okay and that she'd accepted her fate, which only served to piss Dean off. He insisted she fight for her life, she told him she didn't need him telling her what to do, he disagreed and said someone needed to tell her what to do if she was going to be 'that way' about it. She got incredibly cold and distant after that—obviously angry and frustrated with him (the guy who was trying to save her ass). That was yesterday. Now she was gone and he knew she didn't want to be followed but… Dean wasn't like Jamie. He wanted to fight for her until it was too late. And then maybe even more past that. But the fight had him feeling hurt and he wasn't sure anymore about how to do this. Or if he could do this.

He was realizing more and more that he wasn't sure if he could trust James. He knew she was loyal and smart and committed, but she was such a private person when it came down to it and so goddamn unwilling to receive help. Maybe he felt like that because he wasn't sure if he believed her about the miscarriage claims. Some sense in him just said she wasn't telling the absolute truth. His deepest inner suspicion was that she'd had an abortion. And when he thought about that, he wasn't sure how to feel at all. He just wanted to know once and for all if she were being honest with him or not. Dean hoped he was wrong about his doubts. But honestly he'd probably never know for sure. What he did know was the girl he cared about was in genuine pain. And scared to die. She covered up her terror with a bad attitude or a blank face. And Dean understood.

He let his elbows rest on his knees as his hands clasped and his head bowed down, he closed his eyes. For a minute, he just breathed and calmed his racing mind. He was distracted and upset about everything else in his life—his siblings, Cas, even killing Benny. It all haunted him and refused to give his mind rest. What was he gonna do about all this? He'd promised to save Jamie and the clock was running out. He had a sister in Purgatory and a brother who… geez. He didn't know about anymore.

Dean opened his closed eyes and looked upward. "Cas?" he asked softly. "You out there?" As usual, it felt stupid to talk out loud when no one was there, but he was desperate. "Listen man. I don't know if my signal's coming through to you in monsterland or not. Just… please. Take care of my little sister, okay?" He went quiet for a long, heavy couple of seconds. "Hurry up and get both of you topside so I can stop killing myself about this, okay?" He paused then added a disclaimer in case Cas, ever the literal one, was hearing him. "Metaphorically killing myself."

The silence rang in his ears as he sat there, perhaps foolishly waiting for a reply. He jumped when in what felt like exceptional volume, his phone began to ring. For the smallest fraction of seconds, he got a wild hope in the pit of his stomach that it was going to be Jamie. But when he pulled the phone out, the screen said different: Sam Calling.

Souring, Dean contemplated answering the phone at all. He and his brother had spoken a couple times here and there the past couple weeks, enough to know what was going on with each other, but things were tense. And they hadn't even seen each other since Dean had gotten back. It had been like five days since he'd talked to Sam at all… wounded pride aside, Dean knew he should answer. It might be important. But he was very gruff when he did pick up. "Hey, Sam."

His brother's familiar voice greeted him warily. "Hey." In that single spoken word, Dean heard a million things: Sam's reluctance, guilt, shame, reservations, embarrassment, his willingness to atone. "Look, I know I said I wouldn't bother you again or whatever but I actually have something this time."

Dean stood up, needing to move around to channel his jangled emotions. "Yeah?" he asked warily. "What's that."

"Well… Kevin." Sam paused then explained who he meant kind of needlessly. "Tran. I found him. And he's not doing so good."

Dean could have guessed that much. "Of course he's not doing good, he's the 'chosen one' or whatever—when's that been a trip to Disneyland?" He paused the unconscious pacing he caught himself in. "Where's the little prophet been, anyway?"

"In Iowa, just like Alex said," Sam said, then paused before asking about his sister and Cas anxiously. "Any word from them?"

Dean's face held in a gaunt expression. "Nope." The tension between the brothers was sad and felt wrong to him. But he was angry with Sam and didn't foresee himself getting over it any time soon either. "If there had been, I would have told you," he said in a clipped tone. He wanted to get to the point of the conversation. "Now what about Kevin?"

Sam let out a dark sigh as he explained. "Well, Crowley had him for a good couple months after everything went down at SucroCorp last year and—long story short—he was using Kevin to translate another Word of God."

Dean's eyes widened fractionally as his interest was abruptly very highly peaked. "Wait… like another Leviathan tablet thing?" he asked, becoming vaguely worried at the thought of what that meant. "I thought the chompers were the only ones who got one of those."

"Nope," Sam replied grimly. "Apparently, there's a demon tablet. And Crowley found it."

"Crap," Dean breathed, wondering what the hell was even on a demon tablet and what Crowley might be doing with it. "That's bad. Seriously bad." He paused, suddenly unsure. "Right? It's bad?"

Sam's somber expression was audible through the phone. "If Crowley gets his hands on it again, yeah."

Dean was listening hard, glaring into space intently. This felt important and big, but in very bad ways. "Why's he want it? What's in there?"

"Well apparently it has information on where some Hellgates are and how to open them—but—it also has the recipe on how to close Hellgates, too. Like, permanently."

"Whoa." Dean stared and blinked at nothing, digesting this information with a stunned expression and airless lungs. That sounded… huge. Like, grand finale huge. Slowly and carefully because he wasn't sure if he understood, he tried to summarize what he thought he was being told. "So… we could lock demons into Hell… like… for good? And never have to see one ever again?"

"From the sounds of it… I think so, yeah. Kevin's got the tablet hidden somewhere safe and he didn't have enough time while he was on the run to read it completely. So we're gonna go find it and finish translating it and see what we can see." Sam paused and tried not to sound too nervous. "So, uh—I was wondering—hoping—maybe you'd be on board for this one. Could use the backup if nothing else."

"Yeah," Dean said, momentarily on a high as he thought of a world without demons, without Crowley, without the constant problems presented by their interference. "Yeah!" Despite himself, he was grinning because the significance of closing Hell was not lost on him. "Dude, this is the best news I've had all week!"

Dean could hear the cautious smile spreading on his brother's voice. "Thought you might think that. After all… no access to Hell, no Hellhounds. No Hellhounds… no one to collect on soul deals."

A little touched because Sam had known what he was thinking before he had even remotely said anything about it, Dean was sobered. He was supposed to be mad at his brother, but it was hard when Sammy said things like that. "Y-yeah. Exactly."

There was a long and awkward pause in which Dean wondered why Sam was the way he was. He didn't understand how someone could apparently care as much as Sam did and yet walk away from it all so apathetically at other times. After the pause because decidedly uncomfortable, Sam chanced a faltering question about Jamie. "So uh… you two doing all right?"

Dean darkened and grew more pessimistic. "Not really." He glanced around the empty motel room and reality sank through him again. "Don't think she'll be along with me for this one, Sam." He didn't really want to talk about it. Like, at all. It hurt too much and got to him too bad. So instead of talking about it or thinking about it, he was gonna see what he could do with this demon tablet and go from there. Maybe he could save Jamie from that soul deal and this Hellgate thing then find her and deliver the good news. If she didn't do something stupid first and if her time didn't come due before he'd found the solution. Dean bent to collect his thrown jacket off the floor. "I'm gonna hit the road now," he said into the phone. "Send me an address, all right?"

Sam's response was simple and to the point, just like everything between the brothers currently. "Will do."

One Week Later
Whitefish, Montana

Under powder blue skies, Dean cruised down the road with one hand on the wheel and the other resting on his thigh. He was headed back to the good old hunting cabin that used to belong to Rufus Turner where Sam was doing what Sam did best: research. The brothers had spent the past week in a whirlwind that had left them with less than they started with (which hadn't been much to begin with, really). Classic rock played at a low volume—but he wasn't really listening to it. Thin trees tall and straight as buildings were thick on either side of the twisting road that wound slowly through the Montana wilderness. The effect of those tall limbs made Dean feel mildly claustrophobic, but he chalked his nerves and caginess up to his current life circumstances.

He dug his phone out and dialed Jamie's last working number and waited for the endless ringing that would follow—he did this every day, multiple times, basically badgering her with calls and texts she never replied to. But instead of ringing, a startling error tune played in his ear. "We're sorry. The number you have dialed has been disconnected."

Dean was pissed and scared all at once. "Mother fucker," he swore, throwing his phone into the empty passenger seat. Was it disconnected because she was tired of his constant calls, or was it disconnected because she was dead? Kicking himself a million times for losing her to begin with, Dean clenched the steering wheel tighter until the material groaned a little under his frustrated squeezes. He was so mad at her he could have smashed something but also so freaked out. It was hard to find his middle ground when it came to her these days. And without a way of finding her, he was left to wonder and kill himself over the what ifs.

As the nondescript pine trees kept scrolling past outside the windows, Dean glared at the road ahead. He hated everything, currently.

Dean and Sam had reunited a week ago (grudgingly and awkwardly at best) in an attempt to recover the demon tablet Kevin had stolen and hidden from Crowley. Although Kevin had been willing to show the boys where the stone was, he had first insisted that they check on his mother. Maybe it was because Crowley had used Kevin's ex-girlfriend Channing and then killed her right in front of Kevin. Either way, Kevin wouldn't budge until he knew his mom was safe. And, guess what? She wasn't. In suburbia, an unwitting Linda Tran was in mourning over his missing son and totally unaware that demons were watching her twenty-four-seven. After rescuing her from the danger she hadn't even known she was in and giving her the hard and fast facts about the supernatural and Kevin's role in it all, the Winchesters took her along with them to find the tablet Kevin had stashed. Unfortunately, the train-station locker Kevin's brilliant self decided to hide the tablet in had been ransacked. After painstakingly tracking the tablet to a pawn shop and finding that it had already been sold, it looked like they had hit a dead end.

And then not even five minutes after that, a weird guy approached them on the street and invited them to an auction where all kinds of paranormal and mystical goods were being sold. It was like something out of a joke: demons, angels, and monsters had all been in attendance. And Crowley, too. Of all things, that cocky bastard had approached Dean and demanded to know where the hell Alex was. Said something about her trying to give him the shaft. Dean still didn't know what that smarmy bastard was talking about. Long story short, the King of Hell pulled some bullshit at the auction and stole the tablet before he disappeared into thin air. The boys turned their backs for all of one minute and then the Trans disappeared too—apparently deciding they would be safer on their own.

Frustrated and out of things to do, the brothers decided to regroup and look for signs of demonic activity. The thought was that they could hopefully get a lead on Crowley and get the tablet back before it was too late. They still didn't even really know what the guy wanted with the tablet other than to safeguard himself against Hell getting closed. Dean thought it probably went deeper and more malicious than that. He was worried as crap that maybe there was something on that tablet that would spell disaster for them. After all, pretty much every new day seemed to spell disaster for the Winchesters.

When are we gonna catch a break?

Dean thought that and then abruptly, cynically shook his head. The days of breaks were gone. Things just got darker, worse, and more fucking hopeless. That was just life.

A flash of movement in the distance caught his eye and distracted him out of his thoughts. What was someone doing all the way out here in the middle of nowhere…? A lone figure was walking up the road ahead, his or her back turned to Dean. Huh, that kinda looks like Cas's coat if it were super dirty. In fact, the closer he got to the slowly walking figure, the deeper Dean frowned. Shortish brown hair, awkward gait, hunched over shoulders. Damn, that really could be Cas. As he passed the walker, Dean's heart almost stopped as he caught a glimpse of a painfully familiar bearded face. Wait, that is Cas! Dean slammed the car to a stop in the middle of the road and yanked the rearview to a new angle as he stared into the mirror at the place where Cas had just been—his heart was banging around in his chest from a surge of shocked adrenaline. But what he saw in the rearview was… nothing. No one.

…What?

That wasn't right! Mystified and slightly ill because he knew what he'd seen, Dean got out of the car and looked around. There was nobody around and no signs of anyone either. But Cas had been right there! Refusing to believe he was seeing things, Dean wandered over to the side of the road and peered around and then into the woods, his expression held tight out of confusion and anxiety. "Cas?" he called. And then, just in case: "Alex?"

No reply came. No one was there. And Dean wondered if he was finally losing his damn mind after all these years of living insanity.

Ten minutes later, a dazed and confused Dean Winchester wandered into Rufus' cabin with the six pack of beer and brown bag of dry goods. Sam was at the table and hunched over his laptop. He threw a brief glance back at his brother. "Hey."

Dean found speaking to be a little more difficult than usual because he was so busy questioning his mental capacities. "Hey," he replied, his tone giving away his inner uncertainty. He stood right where he was for a long minute, contemplating just how far gone he might be. That really looked like Cas, and it had been vivid, crystal clear. It had looked real. So why hadn't there been anyone there when Dean had stopped the car? It made no sense. Unless maybe he was losing his mind.

When Dean didn't move more or do anything else, Sam glanced back at him again, this time with a closer gaze. "You okay?" he asked. "You look like you've seen—" Sam stopped himself mid-sentence ruefully. "Well I was gonna say 'you look like you've seen a ghost,' but you'd probably be stoked if that happened."

Dean didn't respond to his brother's hesitant joking. He was too disturbed at himself. Instead, he set the beers down beside Sam and nodded at the computer screen. He'd rather not let his brother know how possibly insane he was. "Find anything?"

Sam, who was being especially meek and compliant lately (his attempt to try and excuse all his wrongdoings the past year no doubt), shrugged and pulled an anxious expression as he looked at his laptop again. A young boy's face was on the display. "Well, this kid went missing from a preschool in Kansas. And at the same time he vanished, a surprise tornado hit, lasted maybe twenty seconds, then, uh... shazam! Back to perfect weather."

Dean cracked open a beer as he replayed his car ride and Cas's appearance in his mind again. "Hm," he commented, only half hearing his brother. "Weird."

Sam was on a roll though—in full-on information deliver mode. "And get this, similar wackiness has happened over the past few weeks in other places—uh, Tulsa, a bus driver vanishes and a river gets overrun with frogs. New Mexico—a mailman disappears, the earth splits open. There's a few others, too." He looked at a stony-faced Dean. "Might be connected."

Taking a second to digest what he'd paid marginal attention to, Dean couldn't quite get focused. "Sounds kinda biblical, though, what with the frogger stuff," he mused. "Angels, maybe?" Even the words 'angels' made him think of Cas and worry.

Sam shrugged his mouth downward briefly in consideration. He was unaware of his brother's inner thoughts. "Maybe. Or demons. Hard to tell. Either way, this stuff was no joke and I think it's a safe bet that whoever's doing it is a major player. Wouldn't put this stuff past Crowley." He paused and stared in tense thoughtfulness at the laptop screen as he clicked through to another tab. On that page, Dean saw an article with 'missing persons' in the title. Sam tapped his fingers softly against the wood surface of the table beside his computer. "The weird part is though… these folks have nothing in common—no religious affiliations, different hometowns, all ages. The only thing they seem to have in common is that they're just… gone." When Dean said nothing and only stared off into space with his opened but not-tasted beer in his hand, Sam turned in his chair to more fully peer at his brother. "Hey. You paying attention?"

Dean tried to snap out of it. "Uh yeah. Yeah." He sipped at his beer to buy himself a second to think. The beer was all but tasteless. He swallowed down the watery, lukewarm brew and posed another question to his brother, a question he was pretty interested in finding out the answer to. "Find anything on the chompers?"

Sam shook his head no grimly, growing markedly somber at the mention of Leviathan. "The only way we had to find Zip was Kevin, and he's gone, so…"

"Yeah," Dean cut him off brusquely. "I see your point." He wasn't in the mood to talk about things of actual consequence with Sam. "So we on this disappeared person thing or what?"

Sam hesitated. "I mean, I think we should be. Don't you? Might have something to do with Crowley and the tablet."

Dean glanced at the screen again. Kansas. A little wry, he gave Sam a smile that wasn't really a smile. "There's no place like home, right?" He wasn't really in the mindset to do it and his constant thoughts about Jamie, Cas, and Alex all made him a liability. He was doing this demon tablet thing mostly for James. But if she was gone already, if she was dead or worse, he was wasting his time. Maybe he should be helping his sister and friend Cas instead. He was, in a word, torn.

Later in the car as they headed to Kansas, the boys were completely silent.

For Dean, he was trying to avoid talking to Sam much at all here lately. It got to him too bad and set him off too easily. Keeping it short, sweet, and all business was the only thing that would see them through at this point. Blaming his brother for things being the way that they were was just easier right now. Dean liked to think that if Sam had actually manned up and not left Alex on her own all last year, maybe they wouldn't even be in this boat right now. If she'd had backup and a wingman, if Sam had come to Purgatory with her to get them out… maybe they'd all be here together right now. But Sam had picked a dog and a girl over his family. And that was unforgivable.

Dean felt Sam studying him sidelong and completely irritated by the fact, he threw his brother a screw off glance. Sam did the opposite of that. "…You okay Dean?" he asked in that gentle, earnest tone of his. When Dean clenched his jaw and flared his nostrils while refusing to look back at him, Sam tentatively continued. "I mean ever since we've been together again, you barely talk about anything and you have this look in your eyes like…"

Dean sent his brother a sharp, challenging look. "Like what, Sam?"

Although it was like climbing down into a cage with a rabid Rottweiler who hadn't been fed in a week, Sam still tried to reach out to his brother. "Like you need to talk to someone about everything that's going on in your head."

The sarcastic reply that dripped with bitterness was out before Dean could stop himself. "And what, I should talk to you about all this supposed stuff?"

Angry and hurt, Sam's reply was a little loud and a lot indignant. "Yes!" Dean scoffed as Sam continued onward in his wounded exclamation. "I'm still your brother, Dean!" He lost his bravado as Dean remained outwardly hostile and apathetic. "I… I care about you, I wanna help you if I can." But even as Sam said that, he seemed to realize that his brother wasn't going to let him help.

"Yeah well you could have helped me last year, Sam," Dean muttered gruffly, driving the dark nail of guilt in deep. Sam deserved to feel terrible about walking away from his family all for some chick and a 'normal life.' And the more he thought about it, the more Dean realized he was kind of doing the same thing right now. And that was something he couldn't do. Sit around and wait for his family. They needed help, pronto. "Look, I can't do this with you," he said, dark and hard and making his mind up then and there. "I'm giving this job two days and that's it. After that, I'm tracking Kevin down and using him to figure out where that Zip guy is. You can come along or you can screw off… I don't care." Of course he cared. But he would never admit to it. Not right now. Purgatory had to be priority one right now. Purgatory and getting his sister and Cas out. He thought that if he didn't get them out soon the survivor's guilt was gonna have him in the loony bin for sure. He once again thought of the sight of Cas walking on that road. Shaking his head, Dean tightened his jaw. "I can't sit around knowing what Cas and Alex are up against down there. They need help, Sam. And I'm not gonna make the same mistake my brother made. I'm not leaving my own out in the wind. I don't do that shit."

Sam said nothing in reply. He was stony and quiet, and utter hurt rested on his youthful face.

One Day Later
Salina, Kansas

It was the middle of the night and Dean couldn't sleep. It wasn't the nearly-lethal amounts of coffee he'd been drinking to stay sharp and it wasn't the Red Bull he'd chugged in place of a beer and it wasn't the crazy loud thunderstorm outside the motel room. All those things might have had something to do with it but it was more the general unease and sick feeling he got from being so at odds with Sam. Dean hated it but couldn't find it in himself to even be civil to his brother even if he wanted to be. He was so goddamn angry and jilted and frustrated and Sam was the perfect target for all his bad feelings. What made it worse was how Sam didn't call Dean on his bullshit. He just took the verbal abuse and disrespect because he obviously felt he deserved it.

So, Dean sat awake in bed inside of the motel room of the day and tried to distract himself. He had the laptop open and balanced on his upper legs as he read and re-read all the missing persons cases that they were trying to string together. He and Sam had dressed up as FBI agents earlier that day and gone to see the last person who had seen the missing preschooler. She said all she remembered was taking him to the bathroom and then blacking out. She's awoken to no kid and the smell of sulphur. Demons. This wasn't good, but at least they knew who was most likely behind the disappearances.

Dean sighed softly and then fiddled with his phone, checking the screen on the foolish hope that he'd have a missed call or a text from someone of importance. But there was only a blank screen. No one and nothing.

A particularly jolting flash of lightning made Dean's stomach jump and he looked out the window, wondering if a tornado was brewing. And his heart stopped when lightning flickered again, illuminating the window and showing a solitary, trench-coated figure standing there and staring into the room. Cas. Sitting up higher really fast as his chest spasmed in shock, Dean stared hard at the darkened window—lightning flickered again and this time, there was no one there. Already closing the laptop and tossing it aside, Dean went to the window, dismayed. Nothing. No one. He put a hand on either side of the window frame and leaned forward, looking left and right as far as he could see into the dim, rainy night. All he saw was an empty parking lot and a torrential downpour. This couldn't be happening. It looked so real…!

Behind him, the sound of stirring alerted him that Sam had woken up. "Dean?" came his sleepy voice. Who knew how Sam did it, but his ultra-sharp senses, even in drowsiness, didn't fail him. He saw that something was up. "What's going on? You all right?" He sat up in bed and moved his covers aside, squinting at his brother in the dark.

Feeling exceptionally scared because he didn't know if he trusted his own eyes anymore, Dean was quiet. "I-I don't know," he managed at bare volume, searching the darkness outside for a sign that he wasn't delusional. "I… I just saw something."

Sam stood up slowly, obviously getting really worried at his brothers strange expression and odd tone. "What do you mean?" he asked, wandering over in his t-shirt and gym shorts and looking out through the window along with Dean. "Saw what?"

Swallowing hard, Dean shook his head. He could have said nothing. But he forgot his dedication to closing Sam out. "It… it looked like Cas," he said, feeling helpless and freaked. He gestured blankly. "Right there." Sam hesitated, and Dean could literally hear Sam's thoughts about him: he's crazy, he's lost it. Defensive immediately even though Sam hadn't even said anything, Dean got a little louder. "I saw him Sam, I saw him!" Wow. I even sound totally bonkers. Dean quieted a little, not understanding as he stared out into the rainy night in a befuddled daze. "And I, I saw him earlier, too. On the road w-when I was driving."

Sam was gentle and worried and sympathetic, almost like how someone would be to a child who had woken up afraid about a monster in their closet. "Dean… there's no one there."

And then an unmistakably deep, husky voice spoke behind them. "That's because I'm right here."

Whirling in unison at the unexpected third party in the room, Sam and Dean gaped with wide-eyes. In the flesh, not an hallucination or a mirage, Castiel. He was soaking wet as rainwater dripped off him and he was still fully bearded and filthy like he'd been for the whole time in Purgatory. He looked miserable, unhealthy, and emotionally defeated. He greeted them in exhausted, grim civility. "Hello Dean. Sam."

Dean's mouth hung open, he stared in complete disbelief. He barely dared believe it. "Cas?!"

Sam stared too, a little beside himself as he took the angel's appearance in. "You look… terrible." And Cas did. Terrible might have been an understatement, actually.

But terrible or not, he was there. Dean approached his friend, a growing expression of sheer furious relief growing on his face in the form of an incredulous, hesitant grin. "This really you, man?"

Dead in the eyes and totally bland in tone, Cas nodded once, having difficulty meeting his friend's gaze. "Yes. It's really me."

There was a whoop of laughter from Dean, who grabbed and hugged Cas hard, slapping him on the back heartily before suddenly stopping as his face fell and he realized someone was missing. He pulled back, his brows working in toward each other. "Wait, where's Alex?" he asked. At the extremely telling look on Cas's face, both brothers grew incredibly dread-filled. "Cas?" Dean asked in a voice he tried to keep steady. "…Where's our sister?"

The angel's eyes fell downward and the single word he uttered was soft and broken and earthshattering. "Gone."

Dean blinked twice, not understanding that word in the least even as Sam's eyebrows slammed together and a look of sheer oh no took over his entire face. Cas turned away, putting his back to the boys as he walked off a couple steps. "…okay, gone?" Dean repeated in a hard tone that demanded explanation now. Cas couldn't mean gone.

And then Cas turned around and his eyes were shining, his face was a mask of pain. "She's dead, Dean." Both of the brothers lost the ability to breathe as the angel told them what made no sense and never would. "Your sister… is dead."