Dean paced the living room in front of Bobby's couch. "Where the Hell is he?"

"Dean," Sam said patiently, "you only called him a couple of minutes ago."

"He's usually here two seconds after I call."

Sam didn't say anything. He knew Dean was right.

"Maybe you should call him again-"

This was not necessary, as Castiel appeared before Sam had even properly finished his sentence. Dean walked towards him at first, looking ready to yell, but stopped. Standing beside Castiel was a thin man with dark brown hair and eyes and wearing a brown suit with blue pinstripes. The man stumbled back a step or two, looking a bit sick, but then smiled.

"Wow! That was good, we should do that again sometime!" He turned to look at Dean. "Hello! I'm the Doctor!"

Dean and Sam just stared at him.

"Cas," Dean began, still staring at the Doctor, "who the hell is this?"

"He's the Doctor." Castiel spoke the words as though they explained everything.

Dean stared at him in disbelief. "Yeah, I got that."

"Then there should be no confusion." Castiel's tone was cold. "Why did you call me?"

Dean looked taken aback at his friend's harsh tone. He looked at the Doctor suspiciously. "We'll get back to you."

The Doctor just smiled at him. He seemed used to suspicion. "Take your time."

Dean's look was one of contempt. Sam sat watching the exchange in silence.

"Dean." Castiel said, his tone harsh. "Why did you call me?"

Dean turned back to him. "You just left earlier before we finished talking to you."

"And?"

"Annnd, we need to finish talking!"

"Ok. Talk." Castiel stood with his arms crossed. The Doctor was standing off to his side, his gaze switching between Dean and the angel, almost like he was watching a tennis tournament.

Sam stood up. "Well first we need to know exactly which gods were attacked and what their powers were."

"Hi, um," the Doctor began, "what is this about gods?"


And that is how Castiel spent half an hour explaining every painstaking detail of the supernatural world to the Doctor while ignoring Dean. He only spoke to Dean once when he asked a question and his tone made it clear that another such interruption would not be welcome.

The Doctor stared at Castiel intently, his centuries old eyes taking in every tiny detail. Castiel's eyes were a deep ocean blue, his hair was dark brown, his skin was at the perfect place in between tan and pale. He was about as tall as the Doctor himself, but his demeanor was one of a warrior. He had slight crow's feet that the Doctor found strangely endearing.

In short, he was beautiful.

Castiel finished his spiel. For a moment, everyone just sat there in silence.

"Who the hell is that?!"

All four of them turned to face Bobby, who was standing in the doorway.

"Well?"

"I honestly have no idea." That was Sam, who looked like he really wanted to leave. The only thing more uncomfortable than seeing how the Doctor looked at Cas was seeing how Dean looked at the Doctor. That is, like he was going to kill him at the first chance.

"You." Bobby pointed at the Doctor. The Doctor's eyes widened and he placed a hand to his chest. "Yeah, you. Who and what the hell are you?"

"I'm the Doctor. Hi!" He grinned and waved his hand cheerfully.

Bobby continued to stare at him. "Who and what?"

"Doctor, Alien, Species: Time Lord. Hi!"

Bobby stared at him for a few minutes. Then he turned to Dean and asked him, "Is he ok?"

"I honestly have no idea. Cas, where the hell did you get this guy?"

"Greece. He had a blue box. It is called a TARDIS."

The Doctor smiled at him. "You remembered!"

"Are they serious?" Bobby had a bottle of water in his hand and was uncapping it.

"Yes I am- ahh!" The Doctor had received a face full of holy water. He stared at Bobby in shock. "That was very rude!"

"Well, he's not a demon."

"I think I would have noticed that Bobby," Castiel said to him coldly.

"Well, somebody's in a mood."

"Really? Who?" The Doctor was adorable in his cluelessness.

Bobby stared at the Doctor for a moment before turning to Castiel and asking him, "Is he for real?"

Castiel set his jaw and nodded. "Yes."

"And he's really an alien?"

"Yes."

Sam asked him, "How do you know?"

"I can see his soul. It is not that of a human, but he is not a monster or a demon."

Dean asked mockingly, "What's his soul like?"

Castiel stood silent for a moment, contemplating the question. Finally, he said. "Gold and shining." His voice was almost reverent.

Everyone was silent.

"I have two hearts." Everyone stared at the Doctor. "Just in case anyone wanted to know."

"We didn't." Dean snapped at him.

"Dean," Castiel spoke to him for the first time in half an hour, "you called me because you wanted to speak."

"Yeah, and then you spent half an hour talking to a goddamn Martian! What the hell, man?"

Castiel didn't answer him. Instead, he turned to Sam and asked, "What is it you need?"

Sam had been watching the whole thing as though waiting for an explosion. Now he sat up straight and said awkwardly, "Well, uh, like Dean said earlier, we need all the names and powers of the gods that Hypnos had captured."

Castiel nodded. "There was Pele, she is the Polynesian goddess of fire and volcanoes. There was Chac, who is the Mayan god of fertility, known for benevolence. There was Euterpe, one of the nine Greek muses, particularly known for music. There's Baldr, Norse god of light. There was Amatsu Mikaboshi, the Japanese god of evil. Then Shiva, the Hindu god of war. Ankou, the Celtic god of death. And Nut, the Egyptian goddess of the sky."

Sam's eyebrows were furrowed, his face one of intense concentration. "And you're sure that there's no link between any of them?"

"Nothing apart from the fact that they're all pagan gods."

"Well what about the one who took them? Hypnos?" The Doctor was standing next to Bobby, who was still looking at him suspiciously. Everyone turned to look at him when he spoke. "I mean, I'm no mythology expert, but isn't he just the god of dreams? What would he even want with them?"

Castiel told him, "The gods were all stripped of their powers. It may be that Hypnos has stolen them for himself or another."

"Well what happened to the other gods? Didn't you say you'd take care of them?" Dean was staring intensely at Castiel, trying to force him to meet his eyes. It wasn't working.

"I took them to a human hospital to recover from their injuries. It is not safe them to be around other gods at the moment, and they are basically human now."

Sam asked him, "What were they like when you left?"

"Most of them were asleep. Except for Euterpe. She was awake, but also incoherent."

The Doctor asked him, "How was she incoherent?"

Dean rounded on him. "Why the fuck do you care? Shouldn't you be going back to Mars now anyway?"

"Actually, I'm from Gallifrey, which was a completely different planet. Although, it was red…" The Doctor's voice trailed off. He seemed very old all of a sudden.

"Was? What do you mean it was red?" Dean's face was harsh and accusing, although no one was sure what he was accusing him of.

"It's gone." The Doctor's voice was quiet and pained. His face had been drained of blood. In his mind, he saw Gallifrey, he saw red grass and silver trees and twin suns.

"How can an entire planet just be gone?"

"It was destroyed."

He saw a young boy with black hair and blue eyes, smiling at him. He saw that same boy huddled in a boy, crying and clutching his head. He saw the Master, standing in front of Rassilon, energy bursting from his hands.

"What can destroy a plan-"

"Dean, leave him alone!" Castiel shouted at him.

Dean looked shocked. Dean was shocked. Everyone was shocked. Except the Doctor, who was trembling with painful memories.

"Dean," Castiel began, his voice restrained, "I know that you have no understanding of the concept of respect, but could you at least be a little less horrible to someone who's clearly in pain."

Nobody said anything.

"I'm going to go check on the gods. Doctor, would you like to join me?"

"No, it's ok, I think I'll stay here for a bit. Maybe take a nap, it's been a couple of weeks since I got any sleep. Besides, I don't want to slow you down." He sounded very nonchalant, as though it didn't matter. Whether he actually did want to stay or wanted to see if Castiel would insist he come anyway, even he didn't know.

"Are you certain?" Castiel looked upset. He really didn't want to leave the Doctor with them.

"Yeah, I'll be fine. Go ahead." The Doctor was grinning, but it was fake. He knew it was fake.

Castiel hesitated before nodding slowly. "Alright. I shall return shortly. Dean."

Dean had been staring off into space. Now he snapped to attention. "Yeah."

"Be nice."

Castiel flew away without another word.


"What the fuck is with him?!" Dean paced the living room. Castiel was gone and the Doctor had gone outside. "He's acting like a douche bag!"

"Did you do something?" Bobby asked him from his position against the wall.

"No!"

"Really?" Bobby said in his most sarcastic of tones. "'Cause you were the only one he was like that to."

Sam was worried. "Do you think he knows what we were talking about earlier?"

Dean stopped in his tracks. "How could he?"

"I don't know. Maybe he heard us talking about him and kept us from seeing him. He can turn himself invisible, remember?"

"Wait a minute." Bobby said. "What were you two idjits talking about earlier?"

Dean scratched behind his ear awkwardly. "Nothing important."

"I doubt that. Sam, what did you two dumb asses say?"

"Well, we were talking about the case and Cas came up."

"You mean you brought Cas up?" Dean asked him accusingly.

"Shut up, Dean. Anyway, Cas came up and I suggested that Dean talk to him about...stuff," he finished awkwardly.

"What sort of stuff?"

Dean explained, "He thinks I have a crush on Cas."

Bobby was silent for a moment, his face confused. Then he said, "You mean you don't?"

Dean stared at him in shock. "No! Of course not! What the hell is wrong with you two?!"

He didn't wait for an answer. Instead he grabbed his leather jacket off of the back of a chair and headed for the door.

"Where are you going?" Sam asked him worriedly.

"Out!"


The Doctor sat on top of the hood of an old car, staring out at nothing. He couldn't tell what he was feeling. At first, he'd been worried about the TARDIS and the fact that he seemed to have been sucked into a different universe. Then, he'd met Castiel and had been too excited about meeting him to think about that. And really, who wouldn't be, the man's an angel! A literal angel of the Lord! That's not something you see every day. And he was handsome, so that didn't help.

Then he'd met the other three and...well, he didn't want to be rude, but they were a bit horrible. Especially Dean.

Thinking of Dean made him think of Gallifrey again, and he really didn't want to do that, so he stopped. He needed to concentrate on how he'd got here. There weren't many things that could pull someone out of their universe and into another one. Actually, as far as he knew, nothing could do that. But then again, this was a different universe. One with gods and goddesses and angels apparently. Can't expect it to play by all the same rules.

That left him with...nothing really. Darn.

He was thinking of reasons that the TARDIS might not be working when he realized someone was coming towards him. He tensed before realizing it was Sam. Of the three humans he'd met earlier, Sam seemed to be the most reasonable. So that was something at least.

He smiled cheerfully, hiding his wariness of this new person. "Hello!"

Sam started at the unexpected welcome. "Hey."

"Need something?"

"Uh, no actually, I just wanted to talk to you. If you don't mind."

"No, not at all." He scooted over so that he was only taking up half of the car hood. "Go ahead, have a seat."

"No thanks, I'm good."

"I insist." The Doctor smiled at Sam endearingly. His puppy-dog eyes made it impossible to refuse.

Sam stood still for a moment. Then he sat down awkwardly on the car hood.

"So," the Doctor began, "what do you want to talk about?"

"Well, a few things actually."

"Alrighty then, take it away!"

"Well, first of all, how did you meet Castiel exactly?"

"Oh, it was the weirdest thing. One minute, I'm standing in my TARDIS - that's my time and space machine - and then the next thing I know is I'm being pulled into another universe! Can you believe it!"

"What could do that?"

The Doctor shrugged. "I don't know actually. I've never heard of anything like it. I mean, I've been able to travel to different universes before, but I've never heard of something that can pull someone out of a universe. It's strange." He shrugged again. "Oh well. Anyway, I tried to move my TARDIS, but it refused to budge. So I went outside - I was in Greece, outside some sort of temple - and I saw Castiel. I'm a Time Lord, so I can see more dimensional planes than humans can, so I could see that he had wings - they're beautiful by the way - and I wasn't entirely sure what he was because I'd never seen anyone else like him. I said hello, and he seemed a bit upset so I asked him if anything was wrong. He said no, and I didn't quite believe him, but I didn't want to push so I didn't say anything about it. Then he asked me who I was, and I told him I'm the Doctor and he said he was Castiel. I recognized the name and realized he was angel. Well, I was excited, because I'd never met an angel before. But that's not important. Anyway, I asked him if he could help me since I wasn't able to go anywhere on my own, but before he could answer me he got a phone call. He talked on the phone for a minute - I think he was talking to Dean - and when he hung up he said he had to leave. I offered to come with him and he said ok and-" The Doctor stopped talking for a moment. The smile he'd had since he'd started talking about Castiel slipped from his face now, leaving a pained look. He quickly hid it under a neutral mask. "And we came here."

Sam had been trying to keep up with the Doctor's long, fast explanation, so he immediately noticed when the Doctor paused in his speech. "Did something else happen?"

"Nothing important."

Sam didn't really believe him, but decided it wasn't a good idea to ask. "Earlier, when you were talking to my brother, Dean-"

"He's your brother? You don't seem anything alike - oh, wait," he said when he saw Sam's face, "that was rude wasn't it? Rose always used to say I was rude. Donna too. And everyone else I know, now that I think about it. I'm sorry, please go on."

"You mentioned a place called Gallifrey, you said it was your home planet."

"Yes it was," he said quietly.

"Do you mind telling me about it - you know, for educational purposes."

The Doctor nodded. "I don't mind. Not as much as I used to, anyway." He took a deep breath before continuing. "Gallifrey was where I was born. It's name meant 'They That Walk in the Shadows'. My race, the Time Lords, were from there. We were the oldest race in the universe, the inventors of Time Travel. Gallifrey had scarlet grass, trees with silver leaves, two suns, and a burnt orange sky. It was truly beautiful. But, I was never really the type to stay in one place. As soon as I graduated school, I stole - I mean, borrowed, a time machine and left. I went back a couple of times, not always legally. But the last time I came back was the last time I'll ever see it. Gallifrey was at war with another great species, the Daleks. Evil things, daleks, bent on destruction. The war would have torn the universe apart if it had gone on. The only way to end it was to end Gallifrey. So I did."

Sam stared at the Doctor. His face was pained. Tears streamed down his face. Sam searched for words to say to him. Really though, what can you say to comfort someone who destroyed their entire planet and species to save the universe? Finally, he settled on, "I'm sorry."

The Doctor nodded. "So am I."

They sat in awkward silence. Finally, the Doctor said, "Your brother doesn't seem to like me."

Sam chuckled. "Yeah, Dean doesn't really like anyone at first. He'll get used to you eventually."

"Yeah, I know people like that. Granted, I don't have to live with then." He waited until Sam stopped chucking before continuing. "What do you and your brother do, anyway?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, as far as I can tell, you're two perfectly normal human men. What are you doing chasing after gods?"

"Well, we're not exactly normal, first of all. We're hunters."

"Hunters?" The Doctor's expression was a mixture of surprise and disgust. Sam guessed that made sense. Someone who had seen so much death and destruction wouldn't like the idea of people who killed for fun.

"Not that kind of hunters. We track down demons and other monsters that kill or hurt humans and...stop them."

"You mean kill them," the Doctor said accusingly.

"Only if they kill people. We wouldn't hurt anyone innocent."

The Doctor still didn't look happy, but he seemed less upset. He wasn't one to judge such a thing anyway.

The Doctor changed the subject. "When do you think Castiel is going to come back?"

Sam shrugged. "I don't know. I just hope he doesn't run into any trouble."

"Do you think he might?" The Doctor asked, suddenly sounding very worried. "Maybe I should have gone with him. Then again, I'm a bit of a magnet for trouble. That might have meant more trouble for Castiel than if I stayed." It was meant as a joke, but it came out self-depreciating.

"I'm sure he's fine." Sam assured him. "He is an angel, after all. There's not a lot of things that can hurt him."

The Doctor began to say something, but stopped. "Do you hear that?"

Sam listened. "I don't hear anything."

"No, of course you can't you're human. Might as well not have ears at all."

Sam was about to retort when the sound reached his ears. "That's the impala." He slid off the car and started walking back to the house. The Doctor followed suit.

"Impala?" The Doctor looked confused. "Isn't that a type of antelope? Why would one of those be here?"

Sam shook his head. "No, it's Dean's car. He left just after Cas. He must just be getting back."

"Where did he go?"

"He didn't say. I think he just needed to get out of the house."

"Is he ok?"

Sam shrugged. "I don't really know, to be honest."


Dean parked the impala and sat back in the seat. He rubbed his face with his hand, looking exhausted.

Did Cas hear him and Sam talking earlier? He wasn't sure. He guessed it was possible. Even if he had, so what? It had just been Sam being an idiot. Unless...

No. He refused to go down that road. There was no way Cas felt that way about him. He was pretty sure Cas wasn't capable of feeling that way about anyone, definitely not him. He was broken, completely and utterly. Nobody could really love him like that, especially not an angel.

Dean got out of the car. He winced when he realized that he'd slammed the door. "Sorry baby."

Dean had been halfway to the front porch when he realized two people were walking towards him from the back. He groaned when he realized it was Sam and the Doctor.

Dean wasn't sure why, but he hated the Doctor. The man was cheerfully annoying. Maybe that was why. Plus, he was an alien. Probably going to invade them.

But Cas liked him. For some reason, that only made him angry. Cas hadn't even really liked Dean at first. What made this guy so special?

Dean kept his thoughts to himself and went inside, ignoring his brother and the alien. He sighed when he heard the two come in after him anyway.

"Dean!" Sam shouted. The Doctor followed after him, looking wary of being in the same room as Dean.

"What?"

"Where the hell were you?"

"I told you already, out."

"That's not an answer."

"Yeah, well it's all you're getting." He went to grab a beer from the fridge. "Is Cas back?"

"Not yet. Why won't you tell me where you went?"

"I just went out for a drive, OK? Now lay off."

Sam sighed but didn't say anything.

Dean walked back to the living room. "Did you do any research on the gods?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I was talking to the Doctor."

"Oh, so you two are best friends now? What's next, sleepovers? Gonna braid each others hair?"

"What's with you, Dean? You're acting like a dick."

Dean didn't answer. Instead, he said, "I'm gonna call Cas. See what's taking him so long." He went upstairs and slammed the door.

Sam sighed as the Doctor stared at the stairs. He decided that Dean probably wasn't going to grow to like him. The thought made him a bit sad since he seemed to be a friend of Castiel's. The Doctor turned around and let out a sharp yelp. He was standing face to face with the angel in question.

"Hello Doctor."

"Hello Castiel," he said casually, trying to cover how startled he'd been a moment ago.

"Cas." Sam said, walking over to them. He tried not to notice that Cas was standing as close to the Doctor as he usually did to Dean. "Dean was just about to call you."

Castiel looked at him tiredly. "Can you get him? He needs to hear this."

Sam nodded. "I'll be right back."

It was only once he was gone that Castiel allowed himself to feel how exhausted he was.

"Castiel? Are you ok?" The Doctor asked, placing a hand on his arm.

Castiel stood still, contemplating the question. Finally, he said, "I don't know."

The two of them continued to stand there. The Doctor's hand was still on Castiel's arm. The two stood inches apart. The position seemed oddly...intimate.

"What the hell Cas?"