Dean stood in line for about twenty minutes, all just to get two slices—albeit, very large slices—of pizza and a couple bottles of water. The auction started in a little under an hour, so Dean and Sam had enough time to eat their food and call Cas back up to take them to the hotel where the auction was being held.

At least, Dean thought they'd have enough time to get there. Now he's just getting the food and dodging the crowds of people that seem to have gathered in Central Park all at the same exact time to also get food.

"Dude, what took you so long?" Sam asked when Dean handed him a slice of pizza and water.

"I underestimated how long the line would be, I guess," Dean grumbled.

The two brothers hurriedly ate their vendor food-cart dinner and then Dean texted Cas that it was time to go to the auction.

It only took about a minute for the angel to appear, the soft whoosh of wing-beats alerting Dean to Cas's presence. It was still a bit of a shock every time he saw Cas's magnificent midnight-colored wings stretched out behind him at their full length. Usually the angel kept them tucked behind his back, perhaps out of habit since the wings weren't made of a completely corporeal material anyways.

"I was starting to get worried," Cas admitted, looking between Sam and Dean. "Are you certain you don't want me to come along to the auction?"

Sam shook his head and frowned, "Sorry, Cas. It's safer if you go back to the bunker. We'll be okay, though. We're prepared for a fight, if it comes to that."

Dean nodded in agreement with his younger brother. "If anything goes wrong, I promise I'll call you right away."

Cas put a hand on each of the Winchesters' shoulders and before Dean could even blink they were abruptly at the site of the auction.

"Okay... I looked at this place's layout earlier and it seems like we're in a side hallway that leads to the storage room where all the auction stuff is being held," Sam said, pointing down the hall.

Dean came prepared to this event, what with not only his angel blade but also a gun and a couple knives. For good measure he'd stuffed a couple ready-for-use hex bags in his pocket that Sam had made up the day before.

In theory, this mission shouldn't be an issue. They were looking for an ancient but otherwise unremarkable box at an auction that was probably only visited by rich elderly people. Not exactly a threatening group to deal with.

Once Dean and Sam reached the storage room near the end of the hallway Sam began trying to pick the door's lock. It took him a few minutes before the heavy metal finally swung open.

Inside the room were probably hundreds of boxes and crates of all sizes. The only labeling on each box was a series of numbers and letters, which were impossible to interpret without some kind of index.

"Well, shit," Dean swore aloud. "How are we supposed to find the damned thing in all of this?"

With the auction starting in less than half an hour now, there wasn't much time left.

"Shit, shit, shit," Dean continually swore under his breath as he began to open up boxes and crates at random. "This is gonna take too long, Sammy. There has to be a quicker way—" Dean cut himself off when he heard movement outside of the room.

Wordlessly, Sam moved to stand behind a large stack of boxes and Dean quickly followed suit.

"This door was supposed to be locked," a female voice said from some distance away.

"Hmm, maybe the movers forgot to lock it back up after they left," a male voice responded. "Look, let's just start moving stuff to the main room before any hotel employees bitch at us. They apparently need this room cleared out before ten."

"Why?" the female voice asked, moving closer.

"So the cleaning crew can vacuum it or something, I don't know. Ugh, why do we have to haul all this shit? I don't get paid enough for this."

The two people walked into the storage room and from the grunts and groans it seemed like they were carrying out some of the heavier boxes first. Dean dared to peek around his hiding spot and see that it would probably take a while before they'd be found out, since they were at the opposite end of the room.

"We should leave," Sam whispered from beside his brother. "It'll take them a few minutes to transport the boxes from here to the auction room. It should be enough time to duck into a side hallway and exit through the back door."

"No," Dean argued. "We gotta find what we came here for."

"But we don't even know where it is," Sam protested. "They could've already taken it out."

Dean knew his younger brother had a point, but this might be their only chance to retrieve the box.

"How about you go out and distract them long enough for me to search the boxes they've already taken out," Dean said.

"It'll take too long," Sam replied, shaking his head and frowning. "We should call Cas back and have him help us. It'll be much faster with three people. Plus, he can just use his angel mojo to knock the movers out while we continue to look through all the stuff in here."

"It's too much of a risk," Dean said. "If the angels—"

"Screw the angels," Sam whisper-shouted. "We can handle a few of them, and besides, Cas is more powerful now than he used to be. He can smite them if he has to."

Dean didn't like the idea of getting Cas involved and putting him in danger, but without his help it would be much more difficult to find the box.

"Fine," Dean finally relented. "Cas—" he started to say, knowing that the angel would be listening for him.

"Are you sure it's even here?" an unfamiliar voice cut through the room suddenly.

"Well it's what the boss told me," a different voice answered. "Seriously, why is it our job to pick up this hunk of junk? She could just fly down here herself but, oh no, that would be too easy."

"Shh, those humans are probably around here somewhere. We were told not to interfere with them, remember?"

"Yeah, whatever. Let's just find this stupid thing and leave."

Dean and Sam exchanged a look, both thinking the same thing. Two angels, who were apparently also looking for the box. But why?

Knowing that the celestial beings would be able to hear him if he spoke aloud, Dean sent a silent prayer to Cas giving him their location and a request for his help. Almost immediately after finishing his prayer, Dean heard the tell-tale flap of wing-beats accompanied by Castiel appearing in front of him and Sam.

Cas gave Dean a "I told you that you needed my help" look and pulled his angel blade out of his trench-coat sleeve.

"What're you doing?" Dean asked him quietly, hoping the other two angels were out in the hall away far enough to not hear.

"There are other angels here, yes? I can sense their presence. I'll deal with them while you and Sam get the box."

"Whoa, whoa, hold on," Dean said, grabbing Cas's arm to keep him from zapping out to the hallway. "We don't even know what they want. Shouldn't we maybe try to get some information out of them before doing anything drastic?"

"They want the box," Cas said, sounding very confident about this fact. "It's powerful, as I already told both of you. I'm not sure how the angels found out about it, but we can't let them get to it before we do."

"Okay, yeah. But they mentioned something about being told to not interfere with us. So..." Dean trailed off and shrugged.

"They know you're here?" Cas asked, raising his eyebrows in alarm.

"Well, not here here, but in the building somewhere, yes," Sam answered.

"But one of them said how they don't have wings," Dean continued. "And if they were told to stay away from us... maybe they aren't very powerful. Maybe they're some of the new angels, like the ones that drugged you."

Cas seemed to ponder this for a moment. "All right," he said eventually. "I can neutralize them and move them somewhere secure for questioning."

"What about the movers?" Sam asked. "Shouldn't they be back by now to get more of the boxes?"

Before Dean could respond, Cas zapped out of the room and back in about thirty seconds. "The angels rendered them unconscious and stuffed them in a supply closet," Cas explained. "They should be fine."

"What about the angels?" Dean said. "Where are they now?"

"It looks like some boxes were already taken to the auction room, so that's where the two angels are right now," Cas answered.

"Shit. Okay, um, you deal with the angels and Sam and I will continue to go through the stuff in here."

Cas nodded once and disappeared from the storage room, leaving Dean and Sam to sort through the stacks of remaining boxes and crates. Dean hoped that it wouldn't take too long...

The two rookie angels were no match for Castiel. He found them easily enough and quickly rendered both of them unconscious without even having to deal with a fight beforehand. If Jack really had created new angels before initiating his hands-off policy, they would've only been a little over a week old at this point. No wonder they were so unprepared.

Cas transported himself and the two unconscious angels to an abandoned warehouse a few miles away from the hotel. He zapped back to the bunker to grab some supplies needed for making a circle of holy fire and then went back to the warehouse and tied the captive angels up with as thick of a rope as he could find.

He'd wait for Sam and Dean before doing any questioning.

In the meantime, Cas kept an ear listening for any possible prayers from either brother and also checked his phone regularly for texts from them. He hoped they'd be able to find the box they were looking for, especially if it was something powerful enough to have a new faction of hastily created angels after it.

"I think... I think I found it!" Sam said excitedly, pulling something out of a large wooden crate.

Dean retracted his hands from the box he'd been sifting through. In it he'd only found some antique dishes and glassware. Sure, it was probably worth some money, but it wasn't what he was looking for.

"You sure that's it?" Dean asked, pointing to the small box that was now in his brother's hands.

The box was about the size of a textbook and looked deep enough to hold... Well, a book, probably.

"It looks exactly like the reference picture," Sam said. "This has to be it."

Dean clasped his hands together and grinned. "Okay, fantastic. Let's get the hell out of here, then."

The auction was about to start anyway, so it would probably be best for Sam and Dean to leave before anyone found out about their snooping.

"Cas," Dean said aloud. "We found it."

A few beats of silence and then the whoosh of wings. Cas opened his mouth to say something but stopped when he caught sight of the object in Sam's hands.

"What is it?" Sam asked, furrowing his eyebrows. "Do you... recognize this?"

"I..." Cas trailed off and shook his head. "Not exactly. It just... it gives off this kind of energy I can sense. The power in it."

"Okay, well, let's have this conversation back in the bunker," Dean cut in. "Where we won't have to worry about, y'know, the angels that are currently after you."

"Right," Cas said, though he was still eyeing the box warily.

Dean rolled his eyes impatiently and prompted the angel by grabbing his arm. This seemed to divert Cas's attention back to reality, because he quickly transported the three of them to the bunker's main room.

"What about the angels you said you'd deal with?" Sam asked, setting the ancient box down on the giant table in the middle of the room.

"They're currently incapacitated at an abandoned warehouse. I figured you two would want to question them yourselves," Cas answered, looking between the two Winchesters.

"Yeah, we do," Dean said. "But all that portal-hopping-angel-mojo-shit is makin' me queasy, man. Maybe you can keep an eye on them tonight for us and we'll talk to 'em tomorrow?"

"Uh... sure," Cas said, though he looked a little disappointed.

Sam gave Dean a look but the older Winchester ignored it. He knew exactly what Sam was thinking and it wasn't true. He wasn't trying to avoid Cas again. He wasn't.

"Can I, um, speak with you, Dean?" Cas asked, shifting his weight uncomfortably from foot to foot as he stood several feet away from the human. "Alone, I mean."

Sam nodded and wordlessly left the room, probably hoping for some kind of chick-flick moment to happen between the two.

"Cas—" Dean started, already objecting even though he didn't yet know what he was objecting to.

"I made you something," the angel blurted out, looking a little embarrassed. "I, um... You gave me a gift once and I never got you anything in return, so..." he trailed off and pulled a slip of paper out of the inner pocket of his trench-coat.

Cas handed Dean the paper and gave him a small, shy smile.

"What is..." Dean's words were forgotten when he realized what was written on the paper. "A poem?" he eventually managed, skimming over the lines.

"Yes, I... Do you not... Um, I thought since the gift you gave me was personal, I should also give you a personalized gift. It's uh, it's okay if you don't like it, though," Cas rambled.

Dean glanced up at him and saw how disappointed he looked.

"Oh, no! No, no, no. It's great, Cas. Thank you. Seriously. It's very thoughtful of you," Dean smiled, hoping it looked genuine.

It's not that he didn't appreciate it; it was actually the exact opposite. He felt completely overwhelmed by the gesture and was struggling to react properly. Dean was never good when it came to putting his feelings into words, and now was no exception. It took him years to finally admit his feelings for Cas, and he had to be blackout drunk to even do that much.

"So you... like it?" Cas asked hesitantly.

"Of course," Dean assured him. "I love it."

Cas smiled, looking relieved, and wrapped his arms around the human. Dean reciprocated and hugged Cas back, still holding the poem in one hand.

"I love you, Dean," Cas said into the human's shoulder.

"I love you too, Cas," Dean replied, kissing the top of his head softly.