Previously: Nia joins the group. She sticks close to Cas and finally washes the muck off. Benny tells Dean what happened to her as a prisoner of Luthor (the vampire) for a year and even though he's still wary of her, Dean naturally becomes protective, determined to get her to the door with Benny and Cas. While Cas is away running from the Leviathan, the group gets attacked by a hive of changelings and Cas realizes that if he hadn't come back to rescue them, they would all be dead.

A/N: Thank-you to those who have alerted, fave'd, and reviewed this story. This is something different for me so it means a lot :-) I'm hoping I am doing Cas justice.

Chapter 5 – The Wrath of… Khan?

Dean's injured leg slowed down the group's progress over the next two days but nobody complained except the hunter himself. Benny had only come across partial information about this elusive 'door' so he was only aware of the general area where it was located, which happened to be hundreds of miles away. It was going to take them months to get there so a slow couple of days weren't going to make much difference. But as Dean kept pointing out, that was two more days that Sam was alone with whatever was left of the Leviathan ranks and two more days his little brother had to perhaps do something stupid in an attempt to rescue him. After everything they had been through, he was sure Sam was trying.

The only other thing Benny knew about the door was that it would not appear unless a human was present. Dean kept insisting Cas would make it through because Jimmy Novak, although technically dead and completely dormant within his own body, was a human and his soul was still in there.

Cas had no intention of going through the door whether or not Jimmy could gain him access, but he kept that truth to himself. Dean needed to believe in something to get him through the hard months ahead and once he was home, he would have Sam to distract him from the grief of losing his angel friend again. At least this is what Cas kept telling himself. He had a penance to pay. An eternity here, being relentlessly hunted and hated, was far more than he deserved.

Nia repeatedly voiced her opinion that the door wasn't real, so the drive to reach it was limited to Dean and Benny.

Despite the pain his leg was in, Dean was still in good spirits. It seemed the relief of finding Cas after two and a half months of searching was still affecting him. Cas knew they had a long, hard journey ahead of them and it was unlikely they would all make it alive, but it pleased him to see a little hope in his friend, even if it was to be short-lived.

Nia on the other hand was quiet, quieter even than usual and by the end of the second day after the changeling attack, Cas noticed she was walking even slower than Dean. He peered down at her with a frown, discerning her temperature was abnormally high and her breathing shallow. They chose a clearing to camp for the night and she sank down at the base of a tree without a word, hugging her bent knees. When Cas brought her fruit and she refused it with a weary shake of her head, he voiced his concern.

"What is wrong?" he questioned, standing over her.

"Nothing," she said quickly.

"Your temperature is elevated and your pulse is twenty-two percent faster than it usually is with your current the level of exertion," he accused.

She blinked up at him, looking both bewildered and annoyed. "How do you...? Nothing is wrong."

The angel could see Dean and Benny watching them from across the clearing. "Then why..."

"I take care of myself," she snapped, rising to her feet and storming out of the clearing into the trees.

"Dude," Dean chuckled, shaking his head.

"I am merely concerned," Cas explained. "Her temperature..."

"Yeah, I heard ya the first time," Dean cut him off with a laugh. "She's a chick." The hunter gave Cas a look that Cas was sure was supposed to be hinting at a some obvious explanation but he had no idea what that could be.

Dean rolled his eyes. "Don't they have anatomy class upstairs? She's a chick," he repeated. "Could be... ya know... that time of month?"

Cas frowned, knowing Dean was referring to a human female's menstrual cycle but not believing that to be the problem. He decided, however, to let the subject drop.

"Did she go hunting?" Dean wondered aloud, sounding eager. "Think she'll bring one of those Hakredin things?"

"Thought it tasted like cow dung," Benny snorted.

"It does, but I need my iron and bacon cheeseburgers aren't exactly on the menu."

Cas still wore a frown. "She did not take her bow," he observed, seeing the weapon lying in the grass by the tree. Nia always took her bow with her.

Fruit was plentiful in this part of the forest and Benny ate with Dean. They had just finished their supper when the fast-approaching darkness swallowed the camp. Nia returned a few minutes later, not saying a word as she simply walked over to where Cas sat and curled up on the ground next to him.

She was restless that night, shifting and quivering in her sleep. Except for the few minutes he spent killing a rogue Gogmagog pack that had ventured uncomfortably close to his human friends, Cas never left her side.

At the break of dawn, Dean was up and sitting quietly on the other side of the angel. When a whimper escaped Nia, the hunter's expression grew concerned. "She awake?" he asked quietly.

Cas shook his head. "No." He let his hand hover above her cheek. "She is feverish." He tilted his head and gave Dean a pointed stare. "And it is not simply a rise in her basal body temperature due to the ovulation phase of her menstrual cycle…"

"Ew, dude. Guys don't talk about that shit, okay?" His face grew serious. "You thinkin' one of the bites from the changelings got infected?"

"That would seem probable."

Dean's mouth drew into a tight line. "How we gonna check it out? We can't just leave it but she's not exactly gonna let any of us near her."

Cas had lowered his hand and it was now resting gently on her shoulder. Dean raised an eyebrow when he noticed it. "Well, not me or Benny anyway," he added.

Cas considered simply making the girl sleep with his angel ability so they could check her wound but decided that would break her trust in him and crush what little headway she had made so far with Dean and Benny.

Nia chose that moment to blink her eyes open. She looked up at Cas with a glazed look but when her gaze drifted past him to Dean, she gasped and sat up quickly. There was a sheen of sweat on her forehead and Cas saw her wince in pain as she moved.

"Nia," he said somberly. "Are the bites you received from the changelings healing well?"

She gave him a long stare and her mouth opened as if to speak but she stopped and clamped it shut without saying anything. Finally she just nodded, pulling up her left sleeve to show a clean, scabbed-over circular bite mark on her wrist.

Cas frowned. "And the others?"

She bit her lower lip, looking unsure. "One on my back. Hard to reach."

Dean leaned forward on his knees to peer at her past the angel. "You're gonna hafta let someone take a look," he said softly.

She narrowed her eyes. "Stay away from me."

"Not me." The hunter raised his hands. "I'm not that brave, trust me. But how 'bout Cas?"

She was still scowling. Cas remained silent between the two, watching with interest. Nia still had no love for Benny but she was tolerating Dean.

"If it's infected, it'll just get worse," Dean pressed. "You can die."

"I know that," she snapped. "But…"

"She doesn't like to be touched," Cas told Dean. "I believe the reason to be on account of her past trauma with the vampire Luthor."

Dean gave him a look that even Cas deciphered as 'shut-up' so he stopped talking quickly.

"Cas is an angel," Dean said slowly. "They're… uhh… celestial. You know, holy and, uh, pure and all that crap. No needs or urges… He can help you out and not…uh…" He turned to Cas and lowered his voice. "You gonna help me out here?"

Cas had no idea where Dean was going with his point so he took his own approach. "Nia, you need to clean the wound and put the salve on it or it will fester," he said bluntly. The salve was a concoction Benny had supplied, made from various plants and roots in the forest. The monster souls here may not age but they did bleed and without human blood around to heal them, even vampire wounds needed tended to.

She tensed and hugged her knees tighter. "I did. I'm good."

Dean sighed in obvious frustration. "You got no healing mojo at all?" he asked Cas for the fourth time since they had reunited.

Cas shook his head. "I need a direct link to Heaven to manipulate the molecular…"

"So that's a no," Dean interrupted his explanation. The hunter looked thoughtfully at Nia for a long minute before shaking his head and getting to his feet. He squeezed Cas's shoulder. "You're up, dude." He dropped his water pouch in the angel's lap and moved over to the other side of the clearing where Benny was sitting watching them all in silence. "C'mon Benny," he said. "Let's go for a walk."

Benny rose obediently, digging in his pocket as he did so. "Hey Hot Wings," he called before tossing a small bag to the angel, who caught it easily. "That'll help with an infection."

When they were out of sight, Cas looked back to Nia. "Will you let me see the infected wound?" he asked bluntly. "Perhaps I can help."

She looked conflicted.

"Do you trust me?" he pressed.

Her expression turned thoughtful then she nodded.

"Then will you let me see the wound? I do not want you to die or become ill."

"Okay," she whispered, shrugging gingerly out of the jacket Benny had acquired for her. She was sitting on the ground with her knees bent before her and she spun so her back was to Cas.

Cas knew enough to go slowly. He could see she was scared for her body was trembling as he gently pulled up the tank top she wore, exposing the skin of her back. He noticed several long-healed scars but paid them no heed. The changeling bite was high, right up between her shoulder blades. He could feel the heat radiating off the area, which was red and raised, with yellow ooze seeping out of it. Angry red lines ran out in every direction and there was a pungent odor, all definite signs of infection.

Wishing again he could heal her with a simple touch, he grimaced and asked her to hold her tank top up. She reached over her shoulder to grab the hem, keeping her knees bent and her other arm firmly holding down the front of her top. The hand fisting the cloth on her shoulder was shaking and her entire body was tense. Cas tried to think what Dean would say to make her feel more comfortable but could think of nothing so he remained silent.

He touched the skin around the wound carefully, noting it was swollen also. He moved his fingers up to her neck, prodding gently to check for swelling in the lymph nodes. She flinched and tensed even more but remained silent. She had a great deal of scarring on her neck that Cas had never noticed before, scars he surmised were from her time in vampire captivity.

He began to wash the wound gently, apologizing every time she jerked or twitched in pain. Her skin was hot to touch from fever and he grew worried. Humans were frail in so many ways and an infection that had spread to the lymphatic system could potentially be fatal. Benny's salve was all they had to treat it. It was an unfamiliar feeling for the angel to be so helpless.

She gasped when the cold salve was applied to the open wound but otherwise remained silent. He could tell she was starting to relax as he continued working, her trust in him gradually overcoming her fear. He spread the green paste on liberally, much like he had seen Dean do with the bite on his leg. When he finally finished, he pulled her tank top back down gently before rocking back on his heels.

"There," he said. "I am done."

She turned to face him, reaching immediately for her jacket. Her eyes locked with his and she gave him a meek smile. "Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"Is it bad?" She tugged her jacket back on one sleeve at a time.

He nodded. "Yes. You should rest today. We will stay here until your fever breaks."

"But Dean… he won't want to wait. I don't want to make him mad."

"He won't, I assure you. He is human, not one of the monsters from this place. You must remember that, Nia. He wants you to be well." He was still hoping to convince her to trust Dean so that she would stay with the hunter should anything happen to Cas. "You need rest," he added. "I will have to apply more salve later."

Cas saw a gulp make its way down her throat and thought she was going to argue but she didn't. "Okay," she said weakly. He frowned, seeing how tired she was.

"You can go back to sleep," he offered. "I will stay right here."

"Thank-you," she said again sincerely, taking him up on his offer and curling back up at his side. She was asleep within minutes.

Cas thought back to Dean's comment to Benny about baby steps. He may be oblivious to many human nuances and emotions but he could tell how hard it had been for Nia to put herself in such a vulnerable position. He couldn't help but believe it was a step forward, even if it was but a small hurdle in two long, long roads - her road to moving past the last three years of her life and his road to absolution. He had sent her here, he had done this to her, and he needed to heal her in more ways than simply sending her back topside a screwed-up mess.

~X~X~X~X~

They stayed where they were for three full days. Although he had complained constantly by the delay his sore leg had caused, Dean never said a word against this hold-up. Nia's fever spiked and she shivered and trembled through restless bouts of sleep for most of the first two days. Cas redressed the infected bite a few more times with no resistance from his patient and by the fourth morning, she claimed to be feeling much better and ready to move on.

The next week went smoothly. Much to Cas's liking, Nia was far more relaxed around Dean, even staying fairly close to him when Cas left suddenly upon getting wind of the Leviathan tracking him. She refused to warm up to the vampire, however, and Benny admitted with a chuckle each night that he fully expected to be headless by morning.

She still hung close to Cas most of the time and was far chattier as time passed, even going so far as to have full conversations with him. He found her company refreshing because she found him amusing and was interested in his in-depth knowledge and rambling observations about Purgatory, its wildlife, and his philosophical wonderings. Dean and Benny, on the other hand, seemed to find his musings somewhat comical and Cas was well aware he was the subject of many subtle eye rolls from the other two men.

One afternoon Cas was walking with Dean, captivated by a heartfelt discussion with the hunter about destiny versus free will. With the distraction, he somehow allowed the Leviathan to get too close and realized too late that they had pinpointed his location and were coming.

"Run!" he yelled, shoving Dean away from him. "Leviathan are coming! Run!"

He started running also, in the opposite direction, knowing he would not be able to escape them. He could try to flee using his angel powers – if he traveled fast enough and far enough, he could sometimes evade them – but he was unwilling to leave and have his enemy arrive here with no angel to kill and two humans at their mercy. So he ran on foot.

"Cas!" Nia cried, her voice shrill with confusion and fear.

Four of the 'Old Ones' crashed into the ground in fiery balls of tar, rising and taking the forms of well-manicured humans. Cas glanced back to see Nia running after him but Dean stopped her, yanking her by the arm and tugging her in the opposite direction. Cas didn't have time to explain the situation to the confused girl because one of the Leviathan was already bearing down on him but he heard Dean shouting at her.

"Let him go! He's safer on his own for this!" The hunter then yelled back at Cas. "Blip-out, Cas! Go!"

Cas swallowed, wondering how Dean still managed to put Cas's safety before his own after all the ways he had wronged the man. Surely he must know the Leviathan would likely not all follow their intended prey. A brief thought of not deserving such a true friend struck him before he was ducking and throwing a fist at the cold, stony face of the man attacking him.

He would not 'blip-out'. He would not leave his friends. Not when he had brought this danger to them. The Leviathan lunged at him, tackling him to the ground and as Cas rolled, kicking and punching, he caught a glimpse of the other three Leviathan.

They were not all chasing him as he had hoped; two were instead charging after the others.

Alarmed, he fought more frantically, finally getting the upper hand and ripping the head off his attacker with his bare hands. He tossed it high over the trees as he pushed himself to his feet. He rushed back towards Dean and Nia, who had stopped and were standing side by side in a defensive stance with weapons drawn against an approaching Leviathan.

Still fifty yards away, he was intercepted by a second attacker who got a lucky swing in and knocked the angel to the ground. Cas fought hard and desperately but was distracted by the sounds of fighting in the distance. He took another few hard hits, barely managing to keep the enemy's fist out of his chest. A Leviathan could crush an angel's grace if they got the right grip on it. Through brutal hits to the face that had blood smearing across his cheeks, he saw Dean's weapon sweep in a smooth arc and the head of the Leviathan the hunter had been fighting dropped to the ground.

Cas breathed a sigh of relief and saw both Dean and Nia running towards him but knew already they would be too late. He was overpowered and weak and wouldn't last that long. He felt the hand of the Leviathan on top of him clawing at his chest and he braced for the worst.

This was it. This was the end of Castiel.

He heard a hiss of air and the pressure stopped. The Leviathan's head dropped to the ground with a thud. He opened his eyes to find Benny standing over him, a smug smirk on his savage, fanged-out face. Benny reached down to grab Castiel's wrist and haul him to his feet, retracting his fangs at the same time.

"Thank-you," Cas said, almost grudgingly.

"Don't mention it," Benny drawled, far more graciously.

Dean and Nia reached them out of breath. Nia hung back but Cas was touched by the relief he could see in her eyes. Dean clasped Cas's shoulder, a gesture Cas had come to realize was one expressing fondness. Benny had a cocky grin on his face and held up two fingers as he addressed his human friend.

"That's two."

Dean grinned back. "Yeah, yeah. I still got one."

"No, you got half of one." Benny pointed to Nia. "Little Bit here gets half credit."

Apparently this was some sort of friendly competition. Cas could never understand Dean's propensity to joke and make light in dangerous situations but it seemed he had found a like-minded companion in the vampire. "We need to go," he blurted sharply, only in part due to the danger they were still in. That nagging feeling of jealousy was again blossoming inside him and Cas didn't particularly like it.

They left the area quickly, keeping up the fast pace until nightfall. Dean made sure to point out to Nia that Benny had saved Cas's life today, much to Cas's humiliation, in obvious hopes the act would lessen her distrust of the vampire in their midst.

That night, as the others slept, Cas stood watch from the top of the hill they had chosen for a camp. He did not sit or allow himself to relax for even a moment, instead choosing to spend the night on his feet, staring out over the forest below, tense and alert.

He had brought danger to his friends today. He felt conflicted once more, not sure if his presence and the advantage of his celestial power in fights against regular monsters outweighed the risk of bringing the attention of the far more powerful Leviathan to the group.

He was still debating the subject inwardly when he heard soft footsteps behind him. With no moon, it was extremely dark in Purgatory at night but Cas could see almost perfectly. He glanced back to find Nia approaching. She stepped up right next to him, closer than usual and to his surprise, slipped her small hand in his.

He was taken aback at the unexpected move. Skin on skin. This was the first time she had made physical contact willingly. He kept his reaction inside, however, and simply curled his warm fingers around her cold ones, smiling at her briefly before returning his gaze out over the trees.

~X~X~X~X~

Another week passed that was, by Purgatory standards, uneventful. The group encountered several enemies each day, more and more of which seemed to know who they were and had actually been seeking them out. Apparently two humans, an angel, and a wanted vampire all travelling together were too much for the basic monster instincts to pass up.

The enemies were dealt with swiftly and most of the time, without injury to any in the group. Knowing he was attracting the majority of their attackers, Castiel comforted himself with the fact that he could often take on most of the enemies single-handed and was able to keep his friends relatively safe at night. He could sense monsters of all kinds approaching before even Benny's heightened vampire senses picked them up.

The forest had thinned out and the area in which they traveled now was far more open and exposed. The threat of dragons, who would appear in their true flying reptilian form here in Purgatory, was making all of them wary and on edge. Conversations were short and clipped and their eyes scanned the sky as much as the horizon around them.

In hindsight, it seemed he should have known the worst threat would not come from above, or even up ahead or behind them. Cas had spent many hours in his first months here observing the slugs, creatures harmless to him but relaxing to watch in their fascinating, undulating slowness. He wasn't sure how he missed it slipping into the camp at dawn, how he didn't hear it inching its way towards the sleeping hunter, and how he failed to notice the subtle shift in Dean when he stood up and announced he was going to 'take a leak' before disappearing around the hill of rocks providing them shelter from the wind.

It was a few moments later before the angel frowned, the hint of something being wrong finally hitting him. He sensed something evil was close by and Dean was taking too long for a simple urination.

"Dean?" he called into the gray light of dawn. Nia sat up immediately at the sound of his voice and Benny looked up from where he was perched for his watch shift, sharpening his blade.

When he got no reply, he marched around to the other side of the rock to set eyes on his friend. Dean was there, standing by a large, jutting rock and drawing a symbol on its flat face… using his own blood. Cas gasped when he recognized the symbol but Dean had seen him and was already slamming his bloody palm into the center of it.

"No!" Cas cried. The smug smirk on Dean's face was the last thing he saw before he was struck by a terrible force. It ripped through him like Hiroshima and sent him flying into the air.

It was an angel banishing symbol. Cas had been the victim of the harsh, violent spell before, but only in the real world, where its power sent an angel hurdling back to Heaven, or elsewhere on the planet if the angel managed to deflect it. But here, in Purgatory….

He didn't get far. He hit an invisible wall just fifty feet into the air with thunderous force, pain shooting through his vessel like none he had ever experienced. He writhed in agony, barely aware he was screaming. His every nerve ending was on fire and coherent thought was swept from him by wave after wave of excruciating pain.

It seemed to last an unbearably long time but finally subsided enough he could remember who he was. That snap back to reality had been helped along by the sound of a woman shouting his name.

"Cas! Cas!"

He hadn't been aware of falling but found he was on the ground. He could feel the hard dirt beneath him and his fingers clawed at it frantically in reaction to what his body was being subjected to. His back arched and another scream tore from his throat, one so filled with pain he hardly recognized it. He struggled to push the pain aside, to pull his thoughts together, and figure out what was going on.

A familiar voice brought it all back in a rush.

"Well shit. It didn't work. Let's try that again, shall we?"

That was Dean. Dean had done this to him. The angel banishing spell… Cas remembered the demon that had possessed Nia telling him how Gordon Walker had tried to exorcize it over and over. It didn't work because the spell wasn't designed to find a door to Hell from Purgatory, but it had caused the demon excruciating pain, much to Walker's delight. The same principle must apply to the banishing spell.

"No! Don't kill him!" That was Nia, pleading.

Cas was vaguely aware of her next to him, her small hand fisted in the front of his dirty, stained hospital top.

"I don't think so, brother." That was Benny.

Cas struggled to see past the blinding pain still wracking his body to see what was going on. He gripped Nia's arm and tried to pull himself up to a sitting position, bright blotches still blurring his vision. Dean was infected or being influenced by something, that much he had sensed just before his friend had triggered the spell. He had to help him or stop him before Benny decided he was too much of a threat. Dean was a good fighter but Benny had been here almost five decades and Cas didn't like the hunter's chances if a battle to the death was waged between them.

"Dean," he rasped, realizing belatedly that his friend wasn't in control so pleas to him would do no good. His fists were grasping Nia's arms but he couldn't orient himself enough to pull himself to his feet. He had no celestial power, no physical strength, and was barely holding in screams of pain.

"They're fighting," Nia informed him, her voice an urgent whisper. "Let's run."

"No," Cas panted, knowing the fact that he would never leave Dean alone in trouble again didn't really matter because he wasn't able to crawl, much less run. "I won't leave Dean." He shuddered through another bout of pain and tried to focus on what was going on over by the rock face.

Benny and Dean were in a full-on fight, complete with swinging blades and angry curses. Cas felt an additional stab of pain inside that he attributed to fear rather than the throbbing waves of agony caused by the spell. Whatever had a hold on Dean was giving him extra-strength and speed and the vampire was barely holding his own.

No, Benny was holding back, Cas realized suddenly. He was swinging his blade only at easy blocks and was missing brief but unmistakable opportunities with open access to Dean's neck.

Dean obviously realized this also for he started goading the vampire. "Come on, Benny. Put your back into it." He threw a malicious glance at Nia, who was still crouched by Cas. "You only need one human train out of here. You got one to spare."

Benny narrowly avoided a sweeping arc of the hunter's blade but didn't swing back. "It ain't like that," he growled.

"It's exactly like that. Your pal here, Dean, he's mine now. If you kill me, you still got a ride topside with the girl but if I kill you, well somehow I think Purgatory's the last stop on the soul train. Die here and it's over, brother. So why don't you pull up your skirt and let's dance for real here."

"Nia," Cas rasped through clenched teeth, still barely holding his wits together amidst the pain. "You should run."

She shook her head and glanced back at the fight going on not thirty feet away. "Not without you. He'll kill you."

Cas wanted to argue further but a wave of dizziness struck him and his vision went blank. His head rolled back and he fought to maintain consciousness by concentrating on the voices he could still hear.

"Dean knows it's about more than my ticket," Benny grunted behind the clanging of metal on metal. Any lingering doubts Cas had regarding Benny's motives dissolved.

Dean laughed. "Awww, you think he's your friend?" he jeered. "You're a vampire." More metal clashing. "What do you think he's gonna do when you get topside? He's not gonna put your soul into your body and even if he does, it'll just be to chop your head off one more time and send you right back here."

Benny's voice remained calm. "You don't know Dean."

"On the contrary. I am Dean."

Cas felt Nia starting to rise and his hand sought hers out, gripping it as firmly as he could to hold her still for a second. "Are you going to run?" he managed to ask, frustrated his body was so weak.

She shook her head and he noticed she had her scimitar gripped in one hand. "I'm not going to let him kill you."

"No," Cas panicked. Benny may be reluctant to kill Dean but Nia would not hesitate. And with two against one… "Please, Nia, he is my friend."

She frowned and looked back at the fight, clearly torn. Cas rolled to his side and followed her gaze.

"It may have started out that way but he knows he's more than that now," Benny was saying, his breath coming in heavy pants.

A cold version of Dean's laugh rang out and his head gave a small, spastic jerk sideways before tilting the other way in a languid roll. "See that's where you're wrong. Dean doesn't think he's much value to anyone. Just ask Cas over there. He's seen inside this mixed-up self-loathing pathetic excuse for a brain."

"Don't make no difference," came Benny's calm reply. "Just because he don't believe it don't mean it ain't true."

There was a flurry of activity as Dean lunged, clearly out of patience waiting for the vampire to put up a real fight. Metal clashed, bodies collided, and the men grunted before both blades went skittering away into the nearby brush.

"Damnit!" Dean swore before simply using his enhanced strength to shove Benny backwards through the air where he slammed hard into the rock face with the bloody symbol on it. The vampire slumped to the ground and fell deathly still, his eyes closed.

Dean's head immediately swung towards the pair thirty feet away. Nia gasped and tightened her grip on her scimitar again. She shot a quick glance at Cas.

"Sorry," she said simply and then she was charging right at Dean.

"No!" Cas cried hoarsely, still unable to move. Either she would kill Dean or Dean would kill her and there wasn't a damn thing he could do about it but watch.

Dean was fast, faster than he had been as a human, and in one fluid movement he stooped down to scoop up the weapon he had dropped and swung it at the tiny human who was howling a piercing war cry as she flew at him.

His blade didn't find purchase in Nia's flesh but he deflected her swing and knocked the scimitar out of her hands. She rolled to the ground and was barely on all fours before he was on her. He threw a fast punch that landed in her face and she hit the dirt hard. A series of vicious kicks to her stomach and side lifted her up repeatedly off the ground until she curled into a ball, making barely audible whimpering sounds.

Cas watched helplessly, grief overwhelming him as he realized how much he had come to care for the strange human he was about to watch die. Flashes of her enchanting smile flitted through his mind, the sound of her girlish laugh, the timid feel of her small hand in his, the sound of her fierce and defiant battlecry and lastly, the image of her glistening naked figure as she bathed in the river. She was something special and remarkable and regret tore at him that he had not managed to save her.

Dean stopped. His lip curled in distaste and his chest heaved with exertion, but he stopped while Nia was still gasping for air and trembling in pain at his feet. "Oh I'm not going to kill you," he told her, ignoring the angel in the brush behind him who was barely clinging to consciousness. "You're a human. I have a friend whose gonna love crawling into you."

He rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck, peering down at her.

Nia looked up at him, her face dirt-streaked and reddening where his fist had struck her. "Stay away from me," she spat defiantly.

He laughed, his hands on his hips as he looked down at her. "No can do, little one. See, Mother made us with promises of big things. We were supposed to go topside and live like we were meant to be, in a human vessel, with strength and speed and opposable thumbs. Instead she left and never came back, leaving us here to spend eternity as slugs, slow and weak and loathed by even the most lowly of creatures in this place. Dean here even calls us worms. Kahn-worms to be exact. We deserve better."

Cas could make out Nia's expression of pure fear as she lay on the ground looking up at Dean. He tried again to push his way to his feet but just couldn't find the strength. The spell had completely wiped him. "Dean," he tried to call out but his voice just wouldn't carry.

Dean kept on talking to his prey. "Now it turns out Dean here is the one who killed the Mother." He shook his head. "I'll make him pay for that. You… well you barely qualify as human anymore but you'll have to do for my friend." He made a sound of disgust as he reached down to haul her to her feet by the sleeves.

"Cas!" she whimpered, her voice terrified and pleading. Cas could only watch, helpless.

Dean laughed as he pushed her against the rock behind her. "Cas can't help you now," he gloated, firing a smug look back at the angel. "Once I get you secured, I'm gonna do that spell again, you see. If it doesn't send him away, I'll just keep doing it until it kills him."

"No, please," Nia begged.

He laughed at her, his head giving another sideways jerk. "Awww, got a little crush on your angel here? How pathetic. He's an angel, sweetheart. A celestial being, a Soldier of God. You? You're just damaged goods. Nothing but an overused, worthless whore." He laughed again. "You don't like to be touched, huh little girl?" He moved his hands up to wrap around her neck. "Well, how does this feel?"

Nia's eyes widened and she made a couple of choking sounds before Dean cut off her air entirely. She started kicking and clawing at him but he held fast, chuckling as he watched her struggle.

Cas was on his stomach, clawing at the dirt and trying with everything he had to drag himself forward. He attempted to call out Dean's name again, hoping the deep friendship he had shared with Dean remained enough intact that Cas would be able to use its influence to somehow give the hunter the will to fight the slug's influence over him. At the very least, he could distract him from his cruel tormenting of the undeserving Nia and turn the anger his way.

But it wasn't Cas who was got to save the day today. It was Benny - again. Cas couldn't help feel a fleeting flicker of resentment as he watched Benny rise silently to his feet just out of Dean's view. It was quickly swallowed by a wave of relief when the vampire picked up a chunk of wood and swung it down hard at the base of the hunter's skull and Dean dropped to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

~X~X~X~X~

A/N: Sorry about the delay in posting this chapter. RL probs got in the way and it just didn't want to write itself. Hopefully it turned out alright. As always, I appreciate any feedback. The Khan-worm (from the episode And Then There Were None) problems aren't over yet - it's caused a lot of damage and Dean runs into a familiar face next chap.