Dean was aware of someone standing over him, one large hand shaking him vigorously and Castiel's deep, commanding voice calling to him. The hunter cracked his eyes open slowly, saw Castiel sitting beside him, fully dressed except for his trenchcoat, looking down upon him with a tender expression held deep within his blue eyes. Sam was the one who was shaking Dean insistently awake, dark eyes stretched wide in his urgency.

"Dean, get up, before Bobby gets in here," Sam hissed, as Dean sat up, almost head butting his brother into unconsciousness on the way up.

Castiel smiled, reached out and pressed a flattened palm against Dean's forehead, blinked and Dean was dressed.

"Hey, thanks, Cas," Dean said, before he yawned hugely, pawing at his eyes sleepily.

Castiel retrieved his coat from Dean's lap, but made no attempt to put it on, seeing more fragile, smaller somehow without the tan material wrapped around his slender frame. He was still sitting there in his dark suit when Bobby came in, rolling his wheelchair with practiced ease and flinching slightly at what he assumed was a stranger in his house.

"Cas, you idjit, I thought you were someone else," he grumbled, turning away from the coatless angel grouchily.

"Sorry, Bobby," Castiel said, as he wrapped his coat around his shoulders once more, shrugging into the thick material and looking like himself once more.

Bobby didn't notice, just carried on rolling into the kitchen to make breakfast for everyone. Even though Castiel said he didn't need sustenance, Bobby made him some food anyway, refusing to hear it, loitering with intent nearby until the angel dutifully ate the elder hunter's cooking. Surprisingly, Castiel ended up eating more than anyone that morning, even Dean, who had second helpings of Bobby's bacon.

Bobby was smiling at the angel, eyes crinkled in the corners as he started to chuckle proudly, shaking his ball-capped head in wonder. Castiel tilted his head to the side, thin cheeks stuffed with fried eggs and mushrooms.

"I could get used to you being around, son," Bobby said, as he clapped the angel gently on the arm. "I like you. You eat my food!"

Castiel merely smiled, puffed his chest out proudly, as though grateful that Bobby had finally accepted him into his small family circle. Dean winked at him proudly, gave him a brief hug when Bobby was other wise engaged, stealing a greasy kiss from Castiel's egg-flavored lips. The elder hunter sorted though a few things before returning to Dean's side.

"We'd best be getting along," he said, not noticing that Dean's fingers were wrapped around Castiel's hand protectively. "We've got a long day ahead of us and it won't wait for us just 'cos we're tardy."

"Huh, Bobby? Where are we going?" Dean asked, casting a glance at Castiel, who merely shrugged, lips pushed out in a ripe pout of confusion.

"The antiques store, ya idjit. I thought we talked about this last night," Bobby reminded him, looking up at him sharply. "Not like you to forget something like that, boy."

Dean didn't have a ready explanation for him and neither did Castiel. The older Winchester threw Sam a warning glance when he opened his mouth dangerously wide, making Sam grin and flash his deep dimples in the early morning sunlight. He puckered his lips in an exaggerated kissing face at first Dean, then Castiel before opening his mouth once more. Dean held his hand out over Bobby's head palm flat and outstretched as though threatening to slap Sam, earning himself a confused look from Bobby himself.

"What's got into you this morning, boy?" Bobby asked him, gruffly.

"He didn't get enough sleep last night," Castiel offered, face too innocent, too demure, almost choir-boy like in gentle persuasion. "Kind of restless to get onto the hunt."

"Yeah, what he said," Dean replied, nodding too emphatically to be comfortable.

Bobby didn't look convinced, but still he looked away, hefted his wheelchair through his living room, with the Winchesters and Castiel in his wake.


The search at the antiques store proved non-conclusive. The EMF meter held between Dean's determined fingers showed there was something otherworldly about the place but it seemed to have no known focus. Everywhere provided a reading. The fact didn't make sense to any of them; judging by Castiel's angelic radar, there had been an angel involved, but Dean couldn't understand why that angel was showing up on his meter. By all accounts, he shouldn't have been.

"None of this makes sense," he said, rubbing at the back of his neck with a weary hand, huffing breath in a long, worn out exhalation into the dusty air.

"You're telling me," Bobby groused on his way past, wheeling over to the far wall and staring up at a pair of Samurai swords hung ceremoniously on the plastered wall.

"You're not thinking of buying those things, are you?" Dean asked, as he watched Bobby curiously.

"Dean, you idjit, the victim was killed by knife wounds," Bobby reminded him, sharply. "These are the closest things to knives in the whole store."

"So whoever killed that poor bastard yesterday used an antique pair of Samurai swords?" Dean asked, lifting his eyebrows at Sam.

Castiel remained expressionless beside him, large blue eyes taking in the proceedings with a vaguely curious air. His hands were pushed deep into the pockets of his coat, looking for all the world like an innocent child right then to Dean, even though he was anything but. The hunter reached out, stroked Castiel's shoulder gently, before returning his attention to Bobby.

"Makes more sense than anything else," Bobby replied to Dean's earlier question.

"Okay, so we have the murder weapon. We have a start. Now we have to figure out who did it, and why," Sam said, with a weary sigh of his own.

"That's where you come in," Bobby said, turning his eyes onto first Dean, then Castiel. "You're staying here tonight, see if you can catch the son of a bitch."

"And what are we gonna do?" Sam asked, uncertainly, quirking his lips uncertainly at the older hunter.

"We're staying outside, keeping watch in case these two need back-up," Bobby replied, in determination, jerking his thumb in Dean and Castiel's direction.

"Sounds like a plan," Dean said, glad to be doing something other than just standing around chatting and being confused by events. "Now lets get some food; it's getting late and I'm hungry. Got a long night ahead of us."

He smiled at Castiel, who smiled back, blue eyes shining translucently in the darkened room. If Bobby even noticed the tension held between them, the obvious spark of love exchanged between them, he didn't comment, just wheeled past them on his way out of the store.


-tbc-