"I would enter your sleep if I could, and guard you there, and slay the thing that hounds you, as I would if it had the courage to face me in fair daylight."
Dean dreams of Hell tonight; screams devouring his shredded humanity; decades twisting horror into sick anticipation; gaping, oozing wounds carved by his own hands.
With a shuddering breath, he wakes, half-expecting to find vibrant blood coating the walls. Instead, his eyes meet a familiar face, and Cas opens his mouth — to apologise, maybe, or explain why the fuck he keeps disappearing — but Dean shakes his head.
"Stay," he says, the unspoken 'please' hanging in the air, and Cas slips into the bed and pulls the hunter to his chest.
This time, when Dean sleeps, he dreams of nothing at all.