A slight hint of awe filled Spencer as he leaned against the nearby wall and watched his friend fight. Sneaking up on the vampires had been easy – sneaking inside their nest even easier. They were too young, too new, to really know how to be careful yet, or how to watch out for hunters. Coming up on them in their nest had been ridiculously easy. The four vampires hadn't stood a chance.

Spencer tilted his head and watched as Derek swung the machete in his hands. There was a lot of force in his arms as he swung the blade towards the vampire's neck. But even from a distance Spencer could tell that it wasn't going to be enough force. Derek was underestimating the amount of strength it took to be able to decapitate someone. Not that Spencer could blame him. That wasn't exactly something most normal people knew. At least, not from experience. Derek probably had a general idea mentally, he just wasn't quite getting it. So Spencer used his grace to reach out and add an extra push to Derek's arms. Not doing the cut for him, but pushing him forward enough to add that extra bit of speed and strength so the cut would be clean and Derek would be able to feel the necessary strength required. The blade connected with the vampire's throat and Spencer watched as the head fell down to the ground.

There was a brief second where Derek froze. The light of his soul flashed a little brighter in Spencer's vision, even though the fledgling had his sight dialed down so as not to see the human souls all around him all the time. Grief came from him, followed by determination and a little bit of pride.

Off to the side, the Winchesters were both fighting their own vampire. Derek had done what was necessary here. He'd followed the hunt, built it all up, tracked them down, and he'd made his kill. Dean and Sam weren't going to hesitate to take out the others.

It was Spencer who was paying attention to the last vampire. Even as he watched Derek, he tracked the other one. Standing by while the vamp threw Derek into the wall wasn't exactly easy, though. Spencer had a purpose for it. He wasn't just letting his friend get needlessly hurt. There was no better way that Spencer could think of for Derek to learn the strength of the creatures he was going to be up against. Just how easy it was to be hurt, or for them to overpower him.

Spencer waited until the vampire had lifted Derek up against the wall by his throat before he intervened. In the blink of an eye he was behind the vampire. The angel blade that Gabriel had given him to carry slipped down into his palm. In the next second, he jammed it up into the vampire's back and straight up to its heart.

When he pulled the blade away and the body dropped, he was face to face with Derek. His friend looked at him with wide eyes. "Shit." Derek breathed out. "Shit. I thought you had to cut their heads off?"

Spencer lifted the angel blade and flashed the bloody tip at Derek, waggling it a little. "You do – unless you've got a handy angel blade. These kill pretty much anything. Gabriel gave it to me to use."

"How do I get one of those?"

That made Spencer's lips twitch a little. Derek was looking down at his blade with just a hint of jealousy. "I'll talk to him and see what I can do."

The two turned to find that Dean and Sam had just finished dispatching their own vampires. The older Winchester looked to them with a grin bright on his face; he loved a good hunt. He took in the kill that Derek had made as well as the one that Spencer had just done and his grin flashed brighter. "Awesome. Think you could take care of clean up for us here, Doc?"

Spencer arched one eyebrow at his friend. "I thought this hunt was a learning experience? How is it learning if I do it for you?"

"What's there to learn? You take a body, burn it, and you're done." Dean said, and he shrugged his shoulders. "It's a bitch, but it's easy enough."

They could've stood there and debated a little longer. Part of Spencer was tempted to do just that. He liked the little bickering moments that he got into with Dean sometimes. Those moments reminded him of just how far their friendship had come. But right now wasn't the time for that. Right now, Derek had just completed his first hurt, had his first kill, and he deserved to enjoy it and maybe even celebrate it, not waste time to clean things up. Especially not when it took very little for Spencer to help with that.

A little bit of concentration and a snap of the fingers had all parts of the bodies in a pile in the middle of the room. Another snap and a bit more focus – the pile suddenly flashed in a bright burst of flames that had the hunters around him jerking backwards with a few curses. Spencer didn't move. He just watched as the fire flared up and then faded away. Where there had once been bodies there was now nothing but ash. Satisfied with his clean up, Spencer gave a small nod and turned to face his friends. He found them watching him with something akin to shock on their faces. "What?" Spencer asked, furrowing his brow. "What's wrong?"

No one answered for a moment. Then Dean shook his head and spoke in a low, deceptively easy voice. "Sometimes you scare me, Doc."

Spencer's eyebrows went up with surprise. Him, scary? What was scary about this? He looked over to the pile of ash and then back at Dean with confusion. "I did what you asked?" The slight lilt at the end of his sentence made it more of a question than anything else.

It was Derek who reached out to him and clapped a hand on his shoulder. When Spencer looked at him, he found his friend watching him with kind eyes. "It's like when we said it to you, Reid. It's just you doing stuff that no one else can do. Like running complicated math in your head that the rest of us could do with a computer at our disposal. It's nothing bad." He, more than either Winchester, knew Spencer and knew the things that confused him as well as how to put it into terms that Spencer understood. His explanation eased some of the tension in Spencer and had him nodding in understanding. Seeing that look, Derek smiled. He gave Spencer's shoulder a squeeze and then let go, turning his focus back to the brothers. "So, is there some after hunt thing we get to do now?"

"Yeah." Dean grinned at him. "This calls for a beer, at least. Let's go find a bar and see how drunk we can get you, Agent Morgan."

Spencer shook his head, yet he followed after his friends with a smile on his face. Some of the worries that he'd been carrying lately about Derek, worries that he hadn't even entirely realized were there, faded away. Derek had done great on a hunt. He'd had a moment of stunned shock at killing his first vampire and that was to be expected. But he'd handled himself well. He'd recovered quickly and he'd been fully capable of doing the job.

There were other things out there, darker things, that Spencer knew they were going to go up against in their future. Things that would make them all afraid. This darkness that was coming for them was going to be huge. It was going to be a war unlike anything that they'd ever known. Spencer knew that deep down inside of his grace. But he felt a little less afraid of having his friend there for it all. Oh, he'd still worry. It was just part of who he was. He worried about those he cared for. How could he not? He wanted them to survive this. He wanted them all alive and well. Still, they were all fully capable people.

This might not have been Derek's world before – he was making it his now. He was acclimating to their lifestyle and fitting in with them far better than Spencer had anticipated.

Maybe, just maybe, things might be okay.

There was more than one hangover when the group woke up the next morning. Spencer would've been content to let the humans suffer from it – he might have even got a slight bit of enjoyment from the fact that they had hangovers while he felt perfectly fine – but Castiel was a much softer touch than him in that area. All it took was a grumble from Dean and the seraph healed him, as well as the others. Watching those two together made Spencer smile. They hadn't made any grand announcement and they didn't do things like Sam and Gabriel did, they didn't climb all over one another or kiss all the time, but there was no doubt to the fledgling that they were officially a couple. He loved seeing how Castiel's grace turned warm and happy each time he was around Dean.

Spencer left Castiel with the Winchesters and Derek to ride back to the Bunker. He and Anna went off for their training session before they'd head home.

Going through the routines that she set out for him was starting to become less of a chore and more comfortable for him. Today, they worked on Spencer suppressing his grace down as low as he could and fighting at what was essentially human level. She still beat him, of course. She had a lot more practice than he did. But after the fourth time she helped him up off the ground after a leg sweep had taken him down, she smiled at him in an almost proud manner. "You're holding out longer and longer each time." She told him. "And you're connecting more than you used to. You actually got a few good shots in this time."

"Not many." Not near enough. Spencer swiped a hand over his sweaty face and pushed back the hair that had come free from the ponytail he'd pulled it into. For their training he always dressed down to cotton pants, a tank top, and he pulled his hair back.

Anna chuckled at the annoyance in his tone. "We've barely begun training, Spencer. You're learning a whole lot faster than humans would, but you can't expect to just pick it up overnight."

"I don't have the luxury of time, and I wouldn't stand a chance against something with your kind of training."

"I think you'd do better than you think you would. But, remember." She slipped her body down into the fighting stance she'd taught him, gesturing for him to do the same. A sharp smile curved her lips. "Whatever wants you is going to have to get through me first."

They sparred for another hour before she finally called enough. In that time, she dropped him three more times, but he almost got her down once. It was the closest he'd ever come and he was riding the high of it as they returned to the Bunker.

Letting go of the control on his grace had let it free once more, healing the aches in his body, but the sweaty feeling was still there, so Spencer left Anna to go report to Gabriel about their hunt and he set out towards his room with plans of a nice long, hot shower. He'd just reached his hallway when a door opened up, startling him into stopping. Anyone who slept in this hall wasn't home at the moment. When Spencer saw who was coming out of the door, his surprise grew even more.

Lucifer looked up as he exited the room. He froze briefly, one hand on the doorknob. Then his expression smoothed down into that coolly amused one that he wore around most everyone. "My brother believed it was time I tried to settle in to our little home here. I hope you don't mind." The way he said it gave the feeling that he didn't really care either way.

Reading people was always something that Spencer had been good at. Becoming a profiler had only improved it. Since meeting more and more angels, he was getting better at reading them as well. There was a tension in Lucifer's wings and his grace that showed a much different attitude than the amusement he was displaying. It was small, a barely noticeable twitch to his wings and a small pulse to his grace that the others might not have noticed. They looked at Lucifer with eyes that saw their brother, or their adversary. Spencer just looked at Lucifer. "I don't mind." It was true; he didn't. In fact, he was a bit surprised to find how little he minded. The idea of Lucifer having a room here in the same hall as him made something inside of Spencer warm in a happy way. "This is your home, too. I'm glad you're making yourself comfortable here."

Grace flashed in the back of Lucifer's eyes. He was watching Spencer like he couldn't quite understand him. It was a look he had often when watching the young fledgling.

Then, adding to Spencer's surprises for the day, he tilted his head and looked the fledgling over for a long moment before suddenly declaring, "Your wings are a mess."

"Ah." His wings gave an unconscious twitch behind him. Yeah, he imagined they were pretty messy. Something about pushing down his grace and training like that always seemed to ruffle them a bit. He could feel how out of place they were. It wasn't exactly comfortable.

There was a brief moment of indecision on Lucifer's face. Then he straightened up and finished shutting his door. "Your ol'alihm is busy. If you don't mind, I could help you with them."

It was a huge offer. Spencer understood that. The fact that Lucifer had let him touch his wings had been a huge sign – him offering to return the favor was an even bigger one. For some reason it was Spencer that Lucifer kept reaching out to. Spencer was the one that seemed to bridge that frozen gap that Lucifer kept between him and everyone else. Maybe it was because they didn't have a history like Lucifer did with the others. Maybe it was that he was a fledgling. Or maybe it was just that Spencer didn't treat him like 'the devil'. Or maybe, maybe it was just Spencer himself. That last thought had his wings fluttering a little in a way he knew gave away his pleasure at the offer. He saw the knowledge of that light Lucifer's eyes and relax his vessel. "I'd like that." Spencer said softly. He shuffled in place a bit, a hint of color creeping into his cheeks. "I just, ah…" With one hand he gestured down towards his room, feeling suddenly awkward. "I need to shower, first. I'm a bit sweaty still."

"Why don't I meet you at the rock? Say, in an hour?"

The rock. The rock where they had done Lucifer's grooming. Spencer nodded his agreement. "That'd be wonderful."

"Until then, little one."

As Spencer headed towards his room, he had to fight against the little skip in his step. Yeah, he'd been right before. They were all settling in here in their own way. Him, Derek, Lucifer, the Winchesters, the other angels. Their little family was growing and changing, but it was also cementing into something better, something stronger, and that was fine by him.

He was smiling as he stepped into his room.