They are astronauts. And this must be the Moon.

Or at the very least, a different reality, because no place on their Earth was this civilized and this desolate in the same stroke. Sam's breathing bounced back harsh and hollow inside the helmet of his hazmat suit. Rush in, rush out. They looked like guys straight out of Outbreak and a little like the ones from Caddyshack, as they whirred down the empty street in a government-issued golf cart. It turned out that they couldn't actually hear each other through the gear and over the noise from the cart, so Sam took to pointing out the turns with short annoyed stabs at the air.

Dean wouldn't let him drive.

That fact rattled around inside, bumping into things that made him angry. He huffed and looked askance, then faltered a little through a guilty-bout, before sinking into a sulky silence. He'd broken the final seal, not gotten a DUI, but either Dean had decided he was unilaterally incompetent or had regressed to a five-year-old. Well, fine. Dean could find his own fucking way to the hospital, then. Dean nearly put the cart on two wheels at the turn onto East Chestnut. They didn't comment on it, which actually took tremendous control on Sam's part. He put his energy into taking in their surroundings instead.

Real ghost towns were nothing like this. Most of the time real ghost towns didn't feel haunted so much as pathetic. The buildings begged for someone to put them out of their misery, let them fall and rest and come apart. Stubborn iron and the proficient hands of man kept them standing, wind-blown, long past their natural lives. The town of Hanover's streets had cars, some still running, businesses open for customers, green grass, and functional traffic lights. Just no people. Like they'd all been plucked up and dropped elsewhere, mid-stride. A lifetime's worth of survival training screamed at the uncanny nature of it. Everything was wrong, and Sam kept looking and tensing, but finding nothing. His patience spun out into a thin thread.

Hanover Hospital was surrounded by ambulances and cars gathered at the ER door like flies. Their lights spun soundlessly as the Winchesters pulled up to the doors and got out. They turned to look at one another through the small clear windows of the suit hoods. Dean looked edgy, haunted. Red swathes of light reflected off his helmet. Sam motioned toward the door.

Inside was . . .

Just beyond the automatic door, Sam stopped moving as if he'd been bolted in place. Mother of God. His breath left in one long, cold exhale. He'd expected something bad, but not this. Not the aftermath of war. A battlefield in sterile halls. People in business suits slumped in chairs in the waiting room. Nurses and orderlies sprawled on the floor, whatever they had been carrying strewn around them. People had come in their pajamas. They had brought their children. Every face twisted in a rictus of agony, mouths open and coated in rusty dried blood. They lay in broken angles. On beds and half off them. Under each other, holding one another. He'd never seen so many dead people all at once. The magnitude just . . . fuck. This was what he'd done. This here. This everywhere. Fuck . . . fuck.

The television in the kids' waiting area flashed with cartoons, drawing Sam's eyes. His shallow gasps were an insult to the silence, and in them he could hear his own fear.

Castiel stood in triage, unmoving. Besides the Winchesters, he was the only thing standing. Dean had done his share of dumb staring as they'd walked in, but as soon as he'd seen Cas, that's where his gaze had stayed. The angel didn't turn or seem to notice their presence, which was no kind of good. Even Sam found it a little freakish.

"Cas?" Dean said, voice cautious and muffled as he approached the angel's back.

"You can take your helmets off." Castiel's voice came out low and empty, lacking command.

Sam pulled off his helmet and set it on the closest countertop with a slow, uncertain reverence. He watched Dean drop his to the floor and slowly circle around Cas like assessing a wild animal. It was a caution born of necessity, trial and error. They could both light up like flash paper, cutting into each other blindly. Sam had seen it, nursed the wounds. They both had broken edges that required a gentle hand.

"Cas?" Dean said again, this time reaching out and touching the angel's fingers. Cas tensed. Then, his hand twitched in response and recognition.

Dean maneuvered himself until he caught Castiel's eyes, and this along with the tender grip of hands seemed to win him some attention. For a long moment, they stared at one another. Emotions quick and subtle flickered on Castiel's face, darkened and flashed in his eyes. Sam only recognized sorrow and guilt. But Dean saw others made of memory and shared experience and whispered dark confessions. Despite the wounds, they came back, always, and this was why. In response to Cas's silent litany, Dean stepped closer and rubbed his thumb over the back of the angel's hand, never looking away.

Then, "I couldn't save them," Cas said in a voice of broken, stubborn suffering. Castiel's gaze shifted, and Dean turned to follow it. "Any of them." They were looking at a bed where the corpse of a mother held the body of a dead little girl. "I tried, I---" Cas's voice cracked, and Dean moved instinctively closer. Pain, whose source lay beyond these hospital walls, struck through the angel like a tolling bell. He quaked with it, and his gaze settled on Dean's chest. "But they all died anyway," he said through tight lips.

"It's not your fault," Dean said in that intense, protective way of his as he slipped a gentle palm to Castiel's cheek.

"I am an angel," the reply shook with indignation and rage.

And then Sam looked away. As much as Cas's anger was about here and now, it was about other things, too. Ones he didn't quite want to think about. There was some wrinkling of fabric. The low rumble of Castiel's voice. The indistinct mutter of Dean's reply. Then a silence where Sam took to looking around the ER for a distraction. In retrospect, that was probably worse than accidentally watching his brother making out.

Sam ended up looking at the receptionist. She was bent over her desk, one arm flung by her head. The other hung toward the floor. Dark rhagades pocked her skin, still glistening with ooze. Her one upturned palm was smeared with blood.

So many dead . . . Somehow, it was different seeing people stacked like things---just, ruined.

Sam swallowed.

Dean cleared his throat, because he could actually be generous at times, and Sam jumped. He whirled around to find them separated, but only barely. If he'd had someone to cling to, he'd've been doing so, too. Sam looked uneasily around and then met Castiel's heavy gaze. The angel looked him up and down, and Sam adjusted his shoulders under the scrutiny as though it could ease the aching sorrow that pressed heavy on his breastbone. He wondered if Dean'd told him that he didn't want to be here---in Dean's words it would have been didn't want to help. Or maybe that was the look he was going to get from now on, like he was some curious goo on the bottom of someone's shoe. And yet, he really couldn't blame him. Cas had--- Well Cas had given up everything, and the world was still pretty well fucked.

Sam cleared his throat, and couldn't quite look Castiel in the eye when he spoke. "What happened, Cas? What did you see?"

The angel's expression shifted and he slumped. "Nothing. All of them were already ill by the time I got here. It was chaos. Ambulances brought people in, but---" He shook his head slightly, gaze touching on the dead. "It was pointless. Their medicines and doctoring were pointless."

"Is it a virus?" Sam asked, drawing the angel's attention back.

Castiel squinted slightly at the question. "Yes and no."

Sam worked his mouth, about to reply, when Cas went on.

"These people were not passing it between one another. It developed spontaneously from within."

Dean watched him. "And you know this because?"

Castiel turned and watched back. "Because people from opposite ends of town died at the same time. It could not cover that distance so rapidly."

The elder Winchester made a sound at that, seeming to appreciate the clever if damning deduction. He turned his eyes away and started looking around at the wreckage. A troubled expression settled on his face.

"Why are they all still here?" Dean breathed to no one in particular. "Shouldn't this place be, I dunno, cleaned up?"

"Evidence," Castiel's voice dropped heavy in the air. "Many people have been here already, taking photos and putting things in small bags. They'll be coming back to catalog the bodies. We shouldn't be here when they arrive."

Sam gave the ER a baleful, hopeless look and found himself staring at the receptionist again. Her head had nearly crashed into a glass of water on her desk. He could see her nose distorted by the refraction.

Struck, he looked up sharply.

"Water supply."

And Dean's eyes flashed as he nodded in confirmation. "They've got city water, so there's gotta be a central pumping station. Cas?" Dean turned an expectant look the angel's way, and Sam scurried over so as not to get left behind.

"Slagle's Run Raw Water Pumping Station." Cas frowned at them both. "But Dean, I don't think---"

"C'mon man, I'm actually asking here. How often do I ask you to spread your wings and fly?" Dean's eyebrow quirked into a lewd look.

Cas sighed, exasperated.

Dean pressed. "Do we or do we not have to avoid the authorities?"

"Yes, but---"

"Then make with the magic."

Dean got a tight-lipped glare and a huff of impatience. But Castiel was Castiel, and sometimes maybe taking orders was just habit. He tapped them out of the hospital on a flutter of angel wings.

XXX

Somewhere beneath their feet water rushed with a steady, vibrating rumble they could feel up through their knees. Sam spun around to get his bearings. The place was shockingly clean, sparse, and dry. Just the inside of a warehouse with some metal piping and big motors. Who'd've thunk? Sam pictured vast pools of water, rusted damp pipes, totally cool 1890s industrial iron works, and some kind of internal whirlpool waterfall thing, you know, for effect. Reality could be such a let down.

"What are we looking for?" Castiel asked with patient longsuffering now that he was allowed to speak.

Dean gave him a close look. "Your spidey-sense isn't tingling, is it?" Which was answered with a slightly confused frown. "Demons," Dean elaborated. "Can you sense any demons."

The angel didn't move his eyes from Dean. "No."

"Damn."

Castiel shot them both a curious look. "Why did you think there would be?"

Sam took that one. "On the way in," he said, "we drove by a lake. All the fish were dead."

A sage nod from their angel of the Lord. "That explains your odor."

Dean snorted.

Sam deadpanned and tugged at his collar underneath the suit. "Yeah," he replied, self-consciously. They were finding the nearest dry cleaner as soon as this was over. Possibly, the nearest Mens Wearhouse.

A small change in the set of Castiel's shoulders made him look more serious, an accomplishment really.

"The lake," he intoned. "Was it boiling?"

"Boiling?" Sam repeated in surprise and looked at Dean. "No . . ." he hedged.

"Kinda foggy though," His brother added helpfully.

Castiel slanted a glance over. "Could it have been steam?"

"Uhm," Dean said and exchanged shrugs with his brother. "I guess so? If I say yes, does that help?"

The angel looked thoughtful and glanced at them both, doing some kind of calculation that he didn't seem to think was necessary to share. "It's important, but it is only one clue."

"Well, that's great. All the options really suck, then?"

Castiel offered a bitter grin. "Boiling lakes are rarely a good thing."

Dean sighed and held his face in his hand for a second. Sam's gaze connected with his brother's, and they stared at one another. Then Dean blew out a breath. "Okay, so, let's say we assume it's a demon, 'cause what isn't, these days. And being a demon, one town won't be the end of this. We need to figure out where it's going to go next, blip there first, and waste the S.O.B. before another city bites the dust."

Sam got that sinking feeling in his gut, and heard a little voice saying Danger, Will Robinson all over his internal monologue. He opened his mouth to speak, but Cas beat him to it.

"I disagree."

Dean's eyebrows nearly hit the roof.

"Cas is right," Sam found himself saying. His brother's jaw snapped shut, and Castiel gave him a small look of pride. "We don't even know if it's a demon. Could be a spell. Could be anything. And you just heard Cas. He can't heal us if something goes wrong. Like it or not, man, we go in blind on this and we're dead."

Dean's scowl deepened with each word and fire blazed in his eyes but, at least, it meant he was listening.

"Sam's assessment is accurate, Dean. I'm sorry. It is an unacceptable risk." The angel's voice held a timber of apology, and something deeper, something that made Dean turn to look at him.

The two of them exchanged one of their long soul gazes that made Sam feel like the guy on the other side of the glass. Sam flexed a gloved hand impatiently, watching them only because there was nothing else to watch. By degrees, Dean's scowl evened out and Cas's worried look grew more confident. When Dean finally replied, he was calm. "Ok, so that puts us out. What about you?" he said to Cas.

Castiel's eyes dropped to the floor, scanning back and forth in thought, then slowly dragged their way back up to Dean's face. "I don't know," he said softly, embarrassment evident in the tense draw of his shoulders.

Dean sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Unacceptable risk," he muttered, and turned away pacing a few steps just to think.

Even as Sam watched them, he'd been thinking. "Hey, Cas?" The angel brought shocking blue regard Sam's way. "What would you need in order to tell if this is a demon we're after?"

A slight frown. "What do you mean?"

"Well, I mean, would you have to be there when the epidemic hits? Can you smell demons afterward? What?"

Understanding dawned. "If I'm close enough, I can read its essence, but that radius is quite small. Or if there's a signature of its presence, that I could read."

"Signature?" Sam asked, his heart rate picking up. "Like sulfur traces?"

"Like sulfur traces," Castiel nodded vaguely.

Signatures. Oh, this was important. This was good. Sam started to pace, his blood suddenly pounding with excitement. Shreds of demon lore and arcane knowledge touched on one another, knitting together. His pace quickened, and he found his hands flying through the air with a language all their own.

"Any time you wanna share, Sam." Dean's voice pierced the weaving of his mind. He spun and took quick strides toward them, concepts, no no, fucking brilliance knocking him breathless. Sam brushed a hand through his hair, which was tough given the glove, and tried to order his thoughts into words.

"Ok. Ok, so, the people got sick and died, different places same time, right? So it wasn't a spreading virus or a bacteria or anything." He looked at Cas, who nodded. "Ok, so it's not in the air, and it's not in the water. So what if . . . what if it's a demon, but the demon's not releasing anything." Dean narrowed his eyes at him. "What if"---and this was the bit of brilliance---"what if it's like his aura. I mean, archangels have auras, right?"

"Yes." Castiel said the word like the breaking sun of dawn.

Sam tried not to bounce, but bounced a little anyway. "Right! And we've felt that. I mean, it isn't physical, but it affects the physical. The fear is real, even if you know it's coming. And fight or flight is all chemical!"

Castiel's astonished gaze roamed Sam's face and then Dean's. "It provokes a response in your nervous system. If what we are after is a fallen archangel, that could make sense."

Booyah! Sam's proud smile nearly cracked his face. Who's useless now, huh? Not that he expected a pat on the back, but they'd know, and he'd know they knew. Cas gave him a look that he couldn't understand, but it ended with the twitch of a grin. Sam chose to think it was approval, from one brainiac to another.

Dean set his fists against his hips and peered at Castiel with hope. "Does that mean you know who it is?"

The angel's face fell. He sighed, and looked at the pump station's concrete floor. "No." For a second it seemed like that was all he had to say, but Dean looked expectant, so Sam felt expectant, and eventually Cas lifted his head. A clever smile shaped his mouth as he looked at them both. "But . . . humans are not the only things affected by our presence."

Dean shot Sam an animated look. "Electricity."

"Lightbulbs."

Dean tried to snap his fingers, making a squidgy sound. "Video tape!"

"Old-fashioned film?" With a rush of urgency, they both looked at Castiel, who was nodding.

Jackpot. Now this? This sounded like a plan. The apprehension bundled and aching in Sam's shoulders started to ease some at that thought that they weren't going to just throw themselves to the lions on this one.

"Right," Dean said, coming to some kind of conclusion on a deliberation he didn't share. "Cas, you see what you can find on security cameras. Sam and I will look for a camera shop."

Sam blinked. "What? No! Dean---"

"Sam," his brother growled back.

Oh, fuck you, alpha dog. Sam stepped forward, glaring, too tired of this Sam's Incompetent crap to actually hide it anymore. "Dean, it's a camera shop. I've got it."

Dean glared back, clearly pissed at the challenge. His body arranged itself in a fighting stance as Sam got closer, but he didn't back down.

"Dean, c'mon, man. This is stupid. You can't treat me like this!"

Dean lifted his chin and kept glaring. When Sam didn't automatically give up, he looked elsewhere. Weariness touched his eyes, and a silent struggle followed. Then, "I'm coming with you."

Anger flashed quick and hot through Sam's veins. "It's a simple job, Dean. You don't have to babysit me."

Dean shoved forward with a look on his face like maybe he felt he did. But Castiel put a hand on his arm. Didn't pull him or anything, just rested it there, and Sam could see the pissed off just bleed out of him.

Dean gave Cas's hand a look, a long look, before relenting. He grumbled a "fine" under his breath.

While Sam would've preferred winning the right to do menial labor on his own, he gave Castiel a look of thanks and took his win.

XXX

There are a few things one can reasonably expect from any small town. One: a greasy spoon near the center of town. Two: a post office near the center of town. And three: a bank near the center of town. It was a theory Dean had been working on about the necessary things in life. Maybe he'd write a book.

For complicated, personal, and highly angelic reasons, Castiel chose to flap them into Graystone Bank. Dean blinked rapidly at the sudden appearance of close walls and carpeted floors.

"This is near the center of town?" he asked.

"Yes," Cas answered from a spot closer than Dean normally let people stand.

Dean nodded, scanning the interior. He started for the cashier's counter. "How far's the post office?" he asked lightly.

Castiel watched him without moving to follow. "Two-hundred and eighty-nine feet."

Ha! Dean chuckled and vaulted himself up onto the counter, then over.

"That's funny?" The angel was suddenly right at the counter, like they were going to make a transaction.

Dean shrugged, shaking his head, a smile on his lips. "Naw, it's . . . nothing." He pulled off his gloves and tossed them on the floor. When he glanced up, Cas was grinning faintly back at him. He looked, for just this fleeting moment, like he wasn't pondering the mystery of his own creation or strangling the crystalline memories that haunted his lonely hours. These last few minutes between the hospital and here had been the most time they'd spent together in a week or more. He missed him. Not that he felt so desperate yet as to say it, but it was there, pulsing just beneath his skin. When Cas left, without a word, he wondered where he was going. When he returned, quiet and distant, just to see how they were getting along, he wondered where he'd been. Dean stopped trying to open the cash drawer and lifted his gaze toward his companion. He must've looked serious, because Cas's faint smile faded. It wasn't the effect Dean was going for, and damn him if he was going to screw up this chance with heavy thoughts and painful worry.

He smiled, forcing an expression that filled with genuine warmth once he saw it echoed on his lover's face. Suddenly, Dean leaned across the counter.

"Hey," he breathed, looking right into those eyes that shocked his heart to life.

"Hey," came the low reply.

Dean smiled invitingly and let his gaze linger on Cas's lips. It was Castiel who leaned in the rest of the way, though it was Dean who made the kiss soft and sweet-- something reassuring, something that said stay with me. Dean pulled back just enough so he could focus on his angel's face and was satisfied with the pleased expression he found there. It was almost too bad they had matters to attend to.

Dean ticked his head sideways, motioning down. "Think you could pop this?" He tapped the cashier's till and flashed Cas a wicked smile.

Castiel quirked an eyebrow and looked down at, or maybe through, the countertop. "Yes. But why?"

Why? Dean chuckled. "Because, genius, it's full of money. And this job pays like shit." He rolled back to give the angel room to work his magic.

"You steal." Castiel just stared at him, aghast or something.

Another bubble of laughter escaped Dean's throat as Cas's expression became downright scandalized. "How do you think we live, man? Stolen credit cards and insurance schemes. This"---he motioned to the as yet unopened cash of cash---"is kinda legit for us."

Castiel glanced down at the counter and then back up, unconvinced. He frowned, and for a second Dean thought he was going to get a lecture on moral fortitude. But Cas's stance on morality had always been kinda slippery anyway, in Dean's opinion, so he wasn't terribly surprised when the angel made a thoughtful hmm sound and then put his hand on the countertop. The till popped open with a small click, and a smile as big as the sky lit Dean's face. He grabbed the nearest garbage basket, up ended it, and filled it full of cash. "If they made one of those 'mine can beat up yours' T-shirts for us," Dean said, gesturing between them, "you'd almost be able to make me wear it."

The slightly confused but indulgent look he got for that comment was right up there on his list of favorites. He'd do a lot for that look, he thought to himself. More than anybody really needed to know.

Dean cleared his throat. Now, down to the real business. "Right, security cameras." Dean clutched the bag of money in his fist and turned around. Door to the left, and a door to the right. By the contours of the other interior walls, the door to the left was a pretty small room. And another door opened onto the main floor. Dean would bet money that was a break room. Well, not this money, but the hypothetical worthless money that Sammy was in debt to for at least a trillion. So, Dean went right, and automatically reached for his back pocket where his lock picks were---his fingers slipped against the yellow material of the hazmat suit.

"Crap."

"Step back." Cas was still standing on the other side of the counter. And then suddenly he wasn't, and Dean was staring at the back of his head as he mojoed the security room door open, feeling his proximity like a charge in the air.

Stupid as it was, even the back of his head made Dean think of sex, with that wild Grab Me hair. Hell, all of Cas made him think of sex, which in his opinion they hadn't been getting enough of lately. Cause a man had needs, ya know. And because he was Dean and some things you just couldn't pass up, he slid right up behind Castiel, bracing his hands on Cas's upper arms and bringing his lips to the angel's ear. He made sure they were pressed together as closely as could be.

Dean rumbled low and breathy, "I love it when you break and enter," and twitched his hips. To his delight, he felt Castiel's body shiver, and then he let him go, hoping that the reminder would leave a lasting impression. Hoping that whatever kept Cas away wasn't nearly as enticing as what Dean would offer if he stayed.

After a pause to collect his composure, Cas went in the security office, looking over the bevy of equipment Dean was sure he didn't know how to operate. Hell, he wasn't sure he knew how to operate it. But all they really needed was the rewind button. How hard could that be?

Turned out, not at all. The tape they wanted was the one currently in the machine, and seriously, all Dean had to do was hit rewind. He let it play while it went back, so they could see what'd happened. It was both the most boring and most terrifying thing he'd seen on a TV. Hours of nothing, of no one. Just daylight outside and no cars moving from where they'd been. Dean peeked his head out once to look out the front door. Yeah. Same cars.

Then it was people running backwards back in the door, jerking around like busted marionettes. They spun, flailed too quickly, doubled over. An ambulance came and delivered a man onto the bank floor. He staggered to his feet, wiped sweat back onto his forehead, and then hobbled back beyond the camera's scope. It was uncanny watching a man un-die. Dean shifted uncomfortably and tore his eyes away. He watched Cas instead.

He watched the way the light from the screens reflected off the angel's eyes. The way he blinked slowly, and paid attention with incredible focus. Lines formed around his eyes when he squinted. Dean couldn't quite tell, but he thought Cas didn't really know that he was stunning. He accepted it when Dean told him so, with the same amused fondness he accepted half the opinions Dean felt like sharing. It always made Dean wonder if he could have chosen a better phrase, so just once Cas would see. He'd seen Jimmy and he'd seen Castiel, and there was no mistaking the two. Dean grinned to himself and thought maybe he'd try telling him that.

Suddenly, Castiel's pale face was lit by a burst of white light from the screen, and he gasped.

"What?" Dean straightened, alert, and shot a look at the screen.

"No!"

Castiel was up and moving faster than Dean could register. His hand clamped over Dean's eyes, and he shoved them both back out of the room. "Do not look at it."

"Wh--- at what? Cas! Man, lemme go!"

He removed his hand, and Dean stared, freaked and a little annoyed.

"You can't look at him," The angel's eyes blazed, and he crowded Dean back against the counter.

"The demon . . ." Dean said, because cryptic angel talk was not helping. Nor was the way Cas had him pinned. It set off fight instincts that only served to kick his freaked into overdrive. "The camera got a picture of the demon?"

Castiel opened his mouth to answer, but nothing came out. He slowly became aware of apprehension in Dean's eyes, though, and made space while he struggled for a reply. Dean watched him amend what he was going to say a few times before settling on: "No. It . . . captured the symbol of his essence."

"Uh-huh." So about that cryptic angel talk. ". . . and that means?"

"It's the representation of his true self in immaterial written form."

Dean frowned at that and had to run it through a few times before he could squeeze out any meaning. "So . . . it's his name."

"It is more than his name. It . . ." Cas pursed his lips in frustration and lifted his eyes skyward. Eventually, he shook his head and sought out Dean's gaze in resignation. "Please, just trust me on this. Asag was once Azgrathan. Sam's guess was astute. He was an archangel."

Dean took his time replying, because half his brain was too busy processing the fear rolling off his angel to come up with words. Cas's eyes were far too wide and far too blue. His whole body curled in tension each quickened breath. "What is he now?" Dean asked, forced to say something.

Castiel's jaw flexed. "Horrifying."

An eyebrow lifted. "So horrifying that I can't even see him?"

"It . . . may cause the disease if you do," Cas said darkly, drawing unthinkingly closer, as though he could ward off that fate by sheer proximity.

"From an image," Dean said, clearly unconvinced.

"That has captured the symbolic representation of---"

"Right, okay, got it." Dean held his hands up in surrender. He leaned back against the counter, of his own volition this time, and gave his companion a serious look. "So what do you know about this Azgrathan."

Castiel's gaze grew unfocused for a second. He turned away, meandering for a bit. The rush of fear passed during his silence, and when he finally answered, it was more softly than Dean was expecting. "He was The Gardener . . ."

"That anything like The Lawnmower Man?" Dean smirked, but his humor fell flat, and he grew quiet in his self-consciousness. With a gesture, he urged Castiel on.

"He tended the Garden of Eden," the angel said with solemn calm. He faced Dean, but his gaze penetrated somewhere beyond Dean's shoulder, probably somewhere a lot further beyond that. "He made sure everything grew and all of God's creatures were nourished." A small smile formed on Cas's lips. "Flowers bloomed in his wake. Fruit grew heavy." When he finally looked at Dean it was with wide, imploring eyes. "He wasn't so much beautiful as he was awe-inspiring. Like the sunrise."

The sheer wonder in Cas's voice made Dean's heart lift. He found himself picturing a morning in the Rockies, with pink clouds and golden light and that tickle of anticipation just before the sun's disc came into view over the jagged peaks. Seemed pretty beautiful to him, but maybe angels had their own kind of scale for that sort of thing.

"We basked in him," Cas said, disbelief and a smile in his words.

"Not an image I needed, thanks."

The angel blinked, and Dean got the impression that he was back in the present. Echoes of joys Dean could never know blazed and then slowly died in Cas's eyes. He looked smaller and more fragile without them. Pain squeezed in Dean's chest, and he made an effort to let his sympathy show. He briefly touched Castiel's rough jaw line, just to let him know that we was there.

"So . . . now that he's a demon, things around him die?"

A resigned nod. "Things die. And he is always hungry."

Dean's stomach did this little shake, like it was getting ready for the bad part. It must have recognized that look on Cas's face. The slightly reluctant, somewhat apologetic, but mostly Sayer of Doom one. Always hungry.

Dean let his eyes fall shut. "Always hungry," he repeated.

"For---"

"Do not tell me he eats dead people," Dean said in his reprimanding voice.

There was no reply.

A quick chill wiped all Dean's strength away in one second, but in the next a rush of heated anger had him pushing off the counter. "Aww, man! That is beyond gross!"

"He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him," Cas quoted softly.

"Yeah? Well, I always thought that was pretty gross, too." Dean clutched the bag of money tighter in his fist and strode away, slamming through the break room and out into the lobby, turning only when he'd reached the door. He thought furiously but willed himself to speak like he was sane. "So, basically, Asag just shot fish in a barrel. And there's a very good chance he's out there right now chowing down on a bunch of corpses."

"Basically, yes."

God, he hated demons. Dean drew a breath and wiped his face with one hand. They were going to need a plan, which meant---

"Shit! Where's Sam?" Dean dropped the money and struggled to get a hand back through his suit.

"I don't know, I hid you both from my sight." Cas took a step from where he stood behind the cashier's counter and appeared at Dean's side.

"God dammit!" Dean jerked and stretched to reach his cell phone, his pulse beating loud in his ears.