The next couple of weeks went by without much change. Both Dean and Castiel were rather cold towards the other, and it was really starting to affect Dean's mood. The fact that he had his doubts about whether he was ready to go back to work, after the incident with the vampires in the alley, was also affecting Dean.
Sam was getting rather annoyed by his brother's foul mood, but Dean didn't want to talk about it. Instead, he spent most of his nights picking up women at the local bars and went home with them to have sex. It helped him with his frustrations, though he wasn't particularly proud of it. He had probably picked up almost half a dozen women since he started at work again… Heck, he had even picked up a guy, and it had been ages since he'd done that.
Everything was just chaos since he returned to work. He wished the damn angel would just be nice for once. The few times Dean thought Castiel was finally getting nicer, it always ended up getting even worse than it was before.
They had worked on a few cases together over the past few weeks: demons, more vampires, a witch, even a shape-shifter. Dean hated to admit that the actual capture or killing of the creatures was actually going very well thanks to the angel's senses and strength.
When Dean showed up at work one morning, Castiel didn't seem to have arrived yet. He went past the cubicles in the big room leading to his office, and overheard a conversation between his co-workers.
"Did you hear that a rich family up on Silver Street was arrested for having vampire, demon and angel slaves?" said Allan to another colleague.
Dean stopped and listened.
"Yeah, I heard," answered Eric, as the two were standing on either side of a cubicle wall, talking. "It's too bad. Now we have those things put into the shelter which is already filled up by now. Probably won't take long before they bust their way out and make a hell of this town."
Allen laughed. "Yeah, those damn things should have stayed where they were. Who the fuck forbid slavery of Creatures in the first place? Being a sex slave is the only thing those things are good for."
They both started laughing at that before Dean interfered.
"Hey!"
They looked up at Dean in surprise as he approached them.
"Don't fucking talk like that! It is not all Creatures who are bad, and you know it. Just because they aren't human, doesn't give us the right to imprison and torture them; many of them have feelings, too. Remember that," Dean growled; pinning both men down with a glare.
Allan and Eric stared at him in disbelief, so did the rest of the people in the room.
"Okay, sure thing, Dean…" Allan stammered, staring at him in shock.
Dean glared them down for another moment before he walked away.
"What the fuck is your problem all of sudden?" Eric shouted at him, but Dean ignored it.
When Dean approached his office, he noticed Castiel standing at the corner of a hallway; leaning his shoulder against the wall and staring at Dean with his head titled, like he was assessing him. Obviously, he had heard the conversation just now.
They stared at each other for a while before Dean finally went into the office.
He sat down by his desk and buried his face in his hands.
He had no idea why he just did that – defending the Creatures. But it was true. Not all of them were evil – particularly the angels. Angels had helped humans in many ways to fight the crime and terror committed by both humans and Creatures. And angels were not known for attacking or killing humans, so why have them as slaves? For status? Ridiculous.
He was glad slavery had been banned, even if it meant that many of the former slaves were now roaming the streets and causing trouble. But those were only the bad ones – the good ones were being taken well care of.
Dean almost didn't notice it when the door opened and his boss walked in with Castiel behind him. He handed them with a new case; a shtriga was in town, taking life force from children which left them sick and vulnerable to decease in the hospitals. Seven children had already been touched by it, and they needed to kill the creature soon before the children starting dying.
Once again, Dean would have preferred to take the car to the hospital to question the children and their parents, but Castiel's wings just wouldn't fit. So they were walking.
They took a short-cut through the park which led almost right to the hospital. It was around noon and the park was filled with people on their lunch break, and school and kindergarten children.
Castiel walked somewhere to Dean's right, a bit behind him. They kept their distance to each other as usual. They didn't go far into the park before the children started approaching them; staring and pointing at the angel's wings.
"Look, Mommy! He has wings!" said a little boy at a bench they just passed.
Dean noticed how Castiel flinched slightly and drew his wings closer to himself. He smiled at the sight, though he felt kind of sorry for the guy.
Castiel seemed very uncomfortable and starting walking faster; trying to get out of the park as fast as possible. When one of the children who trailed after them reached out a hand to touch his wings, Castiel almost yelped; the wings extended to the sides and he turned around to glare at the kid.
"Whoa, hey!" Dean said, trying to calm down his partner. "It's just kids, dude."
The children flinched back and stared in both fear and awe at Castiel, whose wings were still half-way extended, and the feathers were standing out a little.
Probably something angels did to appear bigger and scare away people, Dean thought.
"They get too close," Castiel muttered and turned to walk again; wings folding against his back once more.
Dean didn't miss the look of fear in the angel's eyes as he stared at the children.
What was up with that?
"Well, after what you just did, I don't think they'll be following you anymore," Dean pointed out.
After fifteen minutes they finally reached the hospital. The nurses led them to the room in which the sick children were kept. Several children were in the room, many of them related. All had been victims of the shtriga, and their parents were there, worried and crying.
Dean walked into the room while Castiel stayed by the wall and eyed the children warily.
Dean snorted at that.
"Hey, I'm Dean, what's your name?" He asked a little boy, who seemed to be the most lucid of the children. He kneeled down by the boy's bed so their eyes were on the same level.
"Timmy," said the boy in a weak voice.
Castiel observed as Dean talked to the boy. He asked him questions about the shtriga; if the boy remembered it, where he had been, if he had noticed anything, etc.
"Am I going to die here?" asked Timmy suddenly.
"What? No, no we won't let that happen, not ever, you hear me?" Dean said; putting a comforting hand on the boy's shoulder.
"How? You don't even know where the thing is going to be."
"Well…" Dean shifted a little, moving closer to the boy. "You see my partner over there?" he gestured at Cas. "He's got super-powers, and this shtriga can't out-smart him. We'll find this creature and we'll make sure it can never hurt you or any other children ever again, okay?"
"Okay," Timmy smiled.
"Now, be a big boy, because that is what your parents need right now; they need you to get through this and be brave, okay?"
Timmy nodded and threw his arms around Dean's neck in a hug. Dean returned the hug and smiled.
Castiel watched the scene with a tilt of his head. He had never really seen humans hug before – especially not Dean. He had heard Dean say to Jo a few times how he hated 'chick-flick moments', but now the human was accepting the moment with a smile. He had comforted the frightened, sick boy – something Castiel had never seen any human do before.
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They had found and killed the shtriga successfully – Dean had predicted its next location, and Castiel helped him pin down the Creature while it was feeding on a child's life force, so that Dean could finish it off. With the death of the shtriga, all of its victims recovered and survived.
It was a well-done job.
It was getting late when they returned to the station. They sat down in the office and divided the work between them as they closed up the case and filed it in the logbook.
It was extremely hot in the room, and Dean had already taken off his jacket.
Castiel, however, seemed very uncomfortable. He kept twitching and loosening his tie a little, and Dean could hear him sigh every once in a while because of the heat.
It went on for a few minutes until Dean had enough.
"Dude, just take it off," Dean said.
Castiel turned to look at him in surprise, eyes full of confusion. "What?"
"Your coat. And jacket. It's too hot for you in here, isn't it?" Dean pointed out. His partner hesitated. "Look, I lost my jacket too; I can't stand the heat, either. So just take them off if you wonna be comfortable."
It was probably the longest he had ever really talked to the angel before, and he saw Castiel think about it for a moment before he stood.
Castiel turned slightly; most of his back facing Dean, and then he noticed how something in the wings seemed to change. Castiel then started shrugging off the coat and the jacket like the wings weren't even there.
So that was how angels got dressed. It always wondered Dean how they did it with those huge appendages in the way.
Dean took the opportunity to look at the wings. They were spread out, more than Dean had ever seen them before, while the angel undressed. The feathers were smooth and perfect, and he could see how they all seemed to move along with every movement Castiel made.
Dean shouldn't be staring at the wings like this. It was wrong. Castiel had already pointed it out to him once.
But he couldn't help it.
He held his breath while he continued to stare, taking in every movement of wings and feathers. Dean had never seen anything like them before, and it awed him.
Dean shook his head.
No, he did not find Castiel hot!
No way. Not ever. The guy was a dick!
He turned to get back to work when, suddenly, he caught glimpse of something weird around the wing bone of the left wing. It was like a scar, going from the base of the wing almost up to the first joint. The feathers didn't grow out properly, that much Dean could see, but he had missed it before because it was very hard to see unless you were really looking. Some of the muscle tissue was probably damaged, too.
Dean frowned.
Angels were good healers. They shouldn't have any scars.
What could possibly have happened that Castiel's wing didn't fully recover?
He was brought out of his thoughts – and stare – as Castiel finished undressing and draped his trench coat and suit jacket over the back of his chair, and sat down; wings on either side of the chair. He glanced at Dean, who quickly pretended not to have been looking and they both went back to work.
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When Dean came back home, Sam sent him to the local supermarket to buy some stuff, as they didn't even have anything to make dinner. Dean reluctantly went, after Sam insisted that it was his time to go. He suddenly felt himself looking forward to Sam moving in with Jess, then he wouldn't boss him around anymore.
As he walked down the aisle of the supermarket with a basket, looking for canned tomatoes, he suddenly heard someone talking on the aisle next to his. The voice was familiar, but he couldn't quite place it, so Dean moved a few things aside and looked into the other aisle.
His mouth nearly dropped.
It was Castiel.
And he was not alone. Some short, brown-winged angel was walking next to him. Dean wondered who that could be.
"Damnit, bro, I told you we should have gone for take-out instead," the brown-winged angel said.
"We always have take-out when I'm with you, Gabriel," Castiel replied; taking down a bag of something from a shelf and examining it.
"Hey, I like take-out! Got a problem with that?"
"Yes," Castiel answered, annoyed, and put the bag into his cart.
Gabriel sighed. "C'mon, bro, what is it with you? You've been so grumpy ever since big, old, scary Zachariah sent you to the humans' hunter department."
"I do not wish to talk about it, Gabriel," Castiel grumbled.
"Well, you need to talk about it," Gabriel said, following his brother as the other angel started walking again. Dean walked with them, from the other aisle, and listened.
When Castiel didn't say anything, the elder angel sighed. "Look, I know you don't like humans, giving everything that happened… But they aren't all bad, trust me. I think you need to give your new partner a chance. What was his name? Duke, Doug, Dick…?"
"Dean," Castiel corrected him.
"Right, Dean!" Gabriel exclaimed. "So? Have you talked to him yet? Made friends…?"
Castiel sighed and stopped walking. "No, I… I try not to get too close. It's better that way."
Dean frowned and listened carefully.
"And? Is it working?" Gabriel said, smiling knowingly because he knew it was probably not going so well.
"No," Cas sighed. "It's… I mean, sometimes I do things I probably shouldn't have done. Like… healing him from a vampire infection," he muttered.
Gabriel laughed. "I can't believe it! My brother healed a human! Really? You're like the biggest human-hating angel ever."
Castiel bit his lip. "He's not… I mean, I don't think he's bad. He doesn't seem bad, and his soul seems… pure. It felt like he was worth saving. But he's like every other human; he only thinks about sex, women and showing off."
Dean snorted. He had been talking to his colleagues about that stuff and had probably showed off a few times, and the angel had probably overheard it, but it didn't mean it was all he cared about.
"Hey, he's human, that's how humans are," Gabriel shrugged. "Besides, angels think of it, too."
"I don't," Castiel muttered.
"Well, you're freak, it's as easy as that," Gabriel said.
In other aisle, Dean blinked, confused.
Castiel was keeping his distance to Dean because he was afraid of humans? He acted the way he did to avoid getting too close to him?
He was confused, but everything sense now; the way Castiel had said he was sorry for Dean's loss of his old partner, and how he had saved him from the vampire and the infection…
Castiel wasn't a mean, cold bastard like Dean thought he was – he just wanted Dean to believe that he was.
Dean didn't notice when a kid suddenly rammed into him with a cart; making him lose his balance – and since he was standing at the end of the aisle, he fell forward and into the path of the other aisle, where Castiel and Gabriel were standing.
They both looked up when they heard the noise, and saw Dean fall over; bracing himself with his hands as he hit the floor.
"Stupid kid!" Dean yelled at the boy, who only looked back over his shoulder at him before hurrying away.
"Dean," Castiel gasped, shocked, as he saw the other man. Gabriel simply raised his eyebrow at him.
Dean got up and turned to face Castiel, who was still staring at him in shock.
"Err, I'll just….go," Dean said, giving a nervous smile before he gathered his basket and hurried away.
He was so screwed.
To be continued…
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Thanks for the reviews so far, they keep me motivated! Hope you enjoyed this chapter and please review :)
I apologize for spelling/grammar mistakes…