"Chas…come on, kiddo, wake up."

Chas groaned, turned over, and fell back into sleep.

"You've been asleep for twelve hours. Get off your ass, I made you breakfast. Or, uh…lunch. A pancake lunch."

Chas slowly opened his eyes, rolling back over to give John a curious look.

"The guilt breakfast again?"

"Yeah. The guilt breakfast. Come on, move it."

"M'head hurts."

"I'll give you aspirin as soon as you eat something."

Chas moaned, said something not quite decipherable, and then slowly sat up.

"John?"

John turned in the doorway. "What?"

"…I'm wearing your clothes."

"Yeah, so?"

"I wasn't wearing your clothes before…"

John laughed. "It's not like I haven't seen you naked before. Get over it."

Chas's eyes widened, but John simply turned and left the room. Chas got out of bed and stumbled after him, the headache hitting him full force with all the movement.

"Hey, John, wait! Hey! What's that supposed to mean!"

He entered the kitchen just as John dropped a plate covered in pancakes on the table, and his mind was immediately torn between interrogating John further and stuffing his face. Of course, he could interrogate John just as effectively later, and he didn't want his pancakes getting cold.

He sat down and dragged the plate across the table to him, grabbed a fork, and started to eat. He was absolutely famished. John set a bottle of aspirin on the table beside his drink, and then went back to looking through a file sitting on the other side of the table.

"So, uh, John…what happened? After I…"

"I beat the shit out of him."

"Oh…" Chas said, taking another large bite of pancake and not bothering to finish chewing before he spoke again. "Did he tell you anything?"

"Nope."

"Oh."

Cue awkward silence.

"So…I have to do this again?" Chas asked hesitantly, and John shook his head.

"No. You don't. You're back to driving."

Chas choked on the food he'd been trying to swallow, coughed a few times, and then finally managed to choke out words. "Back to driving? Back to driving, John?"

"You just aren't ready, kid, not by a long shot. If you didn't notice a demon spiking your drink-"

"The bartender spiked it, John! What, was I supposed to think everyone in that club was plotting against me?"

"Yes, that's exactly what you were supposed to think, Chas."

"So it's my fault?"

John hesitated a single moment, and Chas leaped on the pause, enraged.

"Oh, that's just great. That's just fucking wonderful, John. Next time you come home and a demon has royally kicked your ass, I'm just gonna say it's your fault and assume you can't handle it," He snapped, standing up and shoving the chair back into the table with a loud 'bang'.

"Chas, hang on a second-"

"Oh, but I might not be able to handle your words, John."

"Okay, that's fuckin' enough!" John snapped, standing up and roughly grabbing Chas by the shoulder. Chas stopped and closed his eyes for a few moments, his head pounding with pain.

"Listen to me, Chas," John said, turning the teenager to face him and tightly gripping both his shoulders, close enough that Chas could smell the stale smoke and whiskey on his breath. "When I said that you aren't ready, I don't mean that you aren't smart enough, fast enough, or strong enough. None of that shit. Because hell, when it comes to some of this shit about demons, you have more book smarts than I ever will."

Chas tilted his head and frowned, trying to ignore the strange feeling in the pit of his stomach and the tingling of his shoulders where John was gripping them. "What are you getting at?"

John hesitated again, as if planning out the words before he spoke them, and then he let go of Chas's shoulders. "What I'm getting at, Chas, is that time is working against you. You can read all the books you want, but nothing's going to prepare you like experience, experience you couldn't have gotten in seventeen years. But…experience without temperance will get you killed."

"So…"

"So what I'm saying is, no more solo missions for you until I think you can handle a half breed on your own."

Chas snorted. "Well, that'll be about never, according to you."

"Maybe. But we can discuss this when you're actually up to leaving the house. That drug is still in your system."

John turned and walked back to the table, and Chas just stood there for a few moments, uncertain. He'd quite suddenly lost his appetite.

"So…what now?" He finally asked. John looked up at him and raised an eyebrow, and Chas shrugged. "Hey, I did all that work. I'm not about to let you get away with doing nothing about it."

"I told you-"

"You told me no solo missions. You didn't say anything about me not helping."

John chuckled, lighting up a cigarette. "Well…there may be one thing you could do…"