Later that same day, at dusk they went to the clearing in the woods, which they had chosen for this encounter. They were as prepared as they could possibly be and eager for the fight, eager for it to be finally over. The brothers went to hide in the trees, while Castiel disappeared for a moment to lead the creature right to the clearing.
When the angel returned the clearing appeared to be empty, except for him. He turned around slowly so he wouldn't miss the arrival of the creature. His angel's sword was in his hand though hidden in the folds of the trench coat.
For a while everything remained quiet. Sam and Dean were crouching behind some low bushes, keeping an eye on the clearing where the angel stood, all three of them waiting and hardly moving. Then, suddenly, a loud roar sounded through the woods and soon after the monster appeared in the clearing.
It was the first time that the Winchesters actually saw the creature that had caused Castiel all this trouble. It came thundering into the clearing, almost exactly opposite from where they were hiding.
"What an ugly son of a bitch." Dean whispered when he saw it. "Have you ever seen anything like his or even read about it?" he asked his younger brother.
Sam shook his head. "No, I haven't. And I think once is quite enough." he whispered back.
The monster was four-legged and huge. It almost stood as tall as Castiel and had a stocky, muscular build. It was covered all over in matted black fur and it had yellow eyes which blazed like fire from its misshapen face. It opened its maw for another earsplitting roar and in doing so also showed dozens of long and probably razor-sharp teeth. Saliva dripped from the two especially long fangs and the grass on which it fell started to sizzle and smoke.
"Acidic saliva. What a nice monster." Dean remarked sarcastically.
"Yeah, sweet. I wouldn't let it lick my hand though." Sam replied.
They kept on watching. They wanted to wait until the creature actually did something more than just look intimidating. As if it had read their thoughts the monster started to move. It slowly circled Castiel and after it had completed one round it rushed the angel and was met by a blade.
Sam and Dean now grabbed their weapons and left their hiding places to help Castiel. The angel was still keeping the creature at bay, but all the cuts with the blade didn't seem to slow the thing down at all. The wounds appeared to be closing almost instantly.
The brothers had almost reached the fight when the monster hit Castiel with its massive clawed paw and Castiel flew several feet across the clearing. But before it could pursue him to finish the job, Sam and Dean were there and started firing shots at the creature. This at least distracted it, if nothing else.
The brothers kept firing at the thing until Castiel was back on his feet and attacked again. It went on like this for a while and the creature seemed to be almost invincible. Only very slowly their massive attack started to show results. The wounds they caused the creature weren't closing as fast anymore. This was good because it meant that it could probably be killed eventually. The only problem was that Sam and Dean were quickly becoming exhausted by this dragged out battle.
Even Castiel was having more and more trouble to keep up the speed and accuracy necessary to fight the monster. He sustained a few cuts and bites from the monster, which of course were healing fast because he was an angel. But the Winchester brothers could tell that the angel's wounds were gradually healing slower as well. Especially the bites, which also burned because of the saliva.
Then, suddenly, the creature turned entirely on the brothers, who quickly retreated to get out of the way of the saliva dripping teeth. But the thing didn't even try to bite them. It just ran into them with tremendous speed, surprising them so that they couldn't get out of the way in time anymore. The creature knocked them down at the edge of the clearing and they both needed a moment to catch their breaths before being able to get up again.
When they were finally standing upright again they had to watch the monster attack Cas again. They were too far away to really be able to help him. Even though they ran towards him as fast as they could they could not prevent the bite. The monster caught Castiel's side with its teeth and almost tore a piece out of the angel's upper body.
"Cas!" Dean yelled as he saw his angel fall and not getting up again. He raced across the last few yards separating him from the creature and he reached it before it could get to Castiel again and hurt him even more.
Sam followed as quickly as he could, worried that his brother might do something stupid now that he thought Castiel might be dead. He saw Dean grab the creatures short tail and pulling it back with it, away from Cas. It was enough to distract the creature, which didn't know what to do about the hunter holding on to its tail. It was too muscular to just twist its body around enough to reach Dean with its muzzle.
Sam seized this chance and ran to Castiel and, taking his sword, attacked the creature while it was busy trying to get rid of Dean, who almost pulled off its tail. The thing didn't even notice Sam at all and therefore he was able to cut of its head with one clean and powerful strike of the blade.
When the head fell, Dean immediately let go of the monster and ran over to where Cas lay. Sam came, too, after he had set the creatures remains on fire, just to be sure that it stayed dead. Dean was kneeling next to Cas, cradling the angel's head in his hands.
Sam knelt on Cas' other side and looked the angel over. The bite had already healed, there were no physical wounds left anymore. And Sam could also feel a pulse, which had to be a good sign. Something else was keeping him from waking up.
"Come on man. Wake up. You can't just leave me like this. You promised you wouldn't, you lying bastard." Dean was begging the motionless form of his angel, a tear running down his cheek.
"He's not dead Dean, just unconscious. He'll wake up eventually." Sam tried to cheer up his brother. And after he had said it about three time the words finally seemed to register with Dean.
"Not dead?" he asked, his voice breaking.
"No, I don't think so. But I'm no specialist for angels." Sam answered.
"We should get him out here. Take him back to the motel where he can recover." Dean decided after another moment. And together the two hunters carried the comatose angel through the woods to where they had parked the Impala. They gently laid him down across the backseat and drove back to the motel, hoping Castiel would soon wake up again.
Aren't we all hoping that Cas will wake up again soon? Anyway, now I really have only one more chapter planned, which should be just right to finish the story. Hope you enjoyed it, even though the chapter doesn't exactly end on light note.