Cas's lips are softer than he thought they would be.
The angel stiffens, and Dean takes what he can in that chaste press of lips, knowing that it was extremely unlikely that he'd ever get to taste them again.
Cas's eyes are wide and stunned when he reluctantly pulls back. Dean licks his lips, watching for the angel's reaction. For a moment, he considers denying it; denying that it had been something he had been longing for. Denying that he had wanted to kiss the angel for so very, very long.
But he can't do that to Cas, or himself. He can't bring himself to say 'I'm sorry,' or 'It won't happen again,' or 'Forgive me.'
He can't bring himself to regret that press of lips, of easing the yearning that had been bubbling away inside him for longer than it should have been. The initial feelings that he had had about Cas the first time he had seen him in the cafeteria are nothing compared to the bone deep ache for closeness that had been affecting him for longer than he would admit to. He had stolen touches here and there, pressing up against the angel to feel him, even as it accentuated his otherness, his coldness, his inhumanity.
He can't regret the feelings he had been trying to avoid for months, he ones that made him feel less shit when the other being is with him, the ones make him believe that maybe there is some hope him after all. He wants Cas, in both a way that he should not (he wants to feel the angel under him, pressed against him, moaning and falling apart because of him) and the way that is probably worse (he wants him by his side every second, to see him smile every second, to hear his laugh every second: he wants to drag him from Grace and drop him in the filth of humanity, of Dean and all he represents). He wants to shield him from his wants as they grow and fester and scratch at his insides, thirsty to be out. He tries to fight that down, that unholy want, and it recedes grudgingly, waiting for its time in the spotlight, waiting for the time to be let out, for it to be allowed to whine and growl and roar in the open air, to be able to voice it's desires and have them returned. Dean swallows the urge to spit the words out, staring at the wide eyed and shocked angel.
"Cas…" He begins, but before he can say anything else, the angel disappears. Dean lets the stab of pain and regret fester in his stomach for a few minutes as he doesn't move, staring at where the angel had been.
He's furious with himself for ruining one of the only good relationships that he had in the fucked up situation that he had found himself in in the previous few years. He starts the Impala, and starts driving. It takes a shorter time than normal to get home, because he doesn't stop.
He calls Charlie, telling him that he's home and that the problem was dealt with. Charlie sounds worried when she asks after him, but he brushes it off as being a long drive. She doesn't sound convinced, but tells him that she'll see him tomorrow.
Dean hangs up and puts the phone down on the bench. He picks up the bottle of whiskey that is sitting unobtrusively on his kitchen bench and throws it across the room, where it smashes with a loud crash, the golden liquid sliding down the wall, mocking him with its cheery colour. He can't bear to look at it, feeling as if it is silently berating him for not being able to control himself.
He resists the urge to swear, and slowly drags his feet as moves towards the couch. Sitting down slowly, he covers his face with his hands, breathing out as a wave of self-loathing burrows its way out of his soul to carve a place for itself in his heart.
Silently, he uncaps a bottle and starts drinking.
/\/\/\/\/\
Charlie's worried when Dean doesn't show up on time. When he hasn't called an hour later, when everyone is in the office, she's more than worried. An hour after that, Garth and Ash are quietly talking about what could have broken into Dean's apartment and caught him off guard. She decides that she needs to go and check on him.
Rufus is uneasy as well. Charlie says she's going to go and check on him after Krissy tries to call him and doesn't get a response. Nobody tries to stop her. The phone call with Dean had her concerned already, and now he isn't picking up or showing up, and she's more worried. Last night he had sounded tired and sad and angry. That's not a good mix, and now she has a quiet ball of worry rolling around in her stomach.
Charlie tries not to fret as she makes her way through the city to Dean's apartment block. It's hard, and she'd speeding by the time she pulls up in a fifteen minute parking space, not caring if she gets towed.
When she gets to Dean's floor, she can see the precautions on it, and can feel the magical ones when she pushes her hand towards the door. There's no way she's getting through it without a battering ram and a few psychics to stop the supernatural defences. That's time that she doesn't have, not when she really needed to go and check on Dean last night, when her instincts had been screaming at her that something was wrong.
She briefly wishes for an angel of her own, so that they could help, but dismisses the thought. She can't linger on the impossible solutions. It won't help her find a plausible one.
A dim memory of Dean telling her of a neighbour that takes care of his place when he's gone surfaces. Charles? Chick? Chuck?
She knocks her way down the hall and asks until a sleepy looking dishevelled man answers his door, blinking at her blearily. When she asks if he's Chuck, he brightens and stiffens a bit before answering.
"Who's asking?" He questions her warily.
"I'm a friend of Dean's. Do you have the key to his apartment?"
Chuck hesitates. "Why?
"He didn't call in to work today. We're worried."
Chuck rubs a hand over his face and closes the door. Charlie waits, and isn't really surprised at the holy water that's thrown in her face. She wipes it off and glares at the man peering nervously out of the crack in the door.
"I'm not a demon," she pleads. "Just let me in."
Chuck still looks doubtful. "I'm keeping the key," he tells her. Charlie is grateful for the loyalty that Dean inspires, but wishes that right now it's a bit less, and that Chuck would hurry up.
"Fine," she bites out. "Just hurry up."
Chuck scuttles down the hall to Dean's apartment and turns the key in the door. It clicks open all the other locks, and it must be some sort of master key to do that. She can feel the supernatural defences falling as they recognised someone authorised to unlock the door behind the key, and Charlie feels a little wave of relief that Chuck had unlocked the door. Who knew what might have happened if she had tried to do it. Sometimes Dean's ruthlessness and ingenuity worked against you.
Chuck stands aside, and Charlie takes a deep breath before pushing open the door. The reek of alcohol hits her before anything else. The second is the massive glyph drawn on the wall opposite her, and if she's not mistaken, it's done in blood. It looks over a week old though, so she ignores it for the time being.
The third thing she notices is Dean, passed out on the floor between the couch and his table. There's vomit on the ground beside him, and that smell hits her next. Technically, she doesn't run when she goes to him, but it's a close call. When Charlie touches him, he's cold, and for a second she thinks he isn't breathing, which freezes her, uncomprehending. Then he takes a shallow breath, and so does she.
"Call an ambulance," she orders, turning him on his side and checking to see if there is anything caught in his mouth or throat. She hears Chuck talking in the background, but she ignores it in favour of making sure Dean is going to be okay. He doesn't respond when she rolls him over, and she can only hope that he's simply passed out from drinking too much, and that it's not something worse.
Charlie has the sense to move Dean out of his apartment before the paramedics get there and think he's involved in some sort of cult, due to both the glyph and various paraphernalia around the apartment that most normal people don't have, like ancient and dusty tomes and ingredients for spells strewn all over the place. The paramedics don't let her ride in the ambulance, even after she tells them her car was towed.
Chuck offers to drive her, and she thanks him for it. They arrive with Chuck in his dressing gown and Charlie covered in vomit from when she had knelt in it. They still look better than some people that are sitting around in the emergency room.
She takes the time to call Rufus, and soon Ash and Annie turn up at the hospital. They all wait for an hour until a nurse comes and tells them what had happened.
He says that Dean has acute alcohol poisoning, and that it was one of the worst cases he had seen. Charlie bites her cheek through the while spiel, including the part about how he could have died if someone wasn't called. They had fitted a catheter to him, and were hoping he would wake up soon. They could see him if they wanted.
Charlie's worry about Dean grows as the hours tick by and he doesn't stir. Annie and Ash leave, and tell her to call if anything changes. Charlie nods, and continues her vigil. She uses the time to call Sam and tell him about what happened. Predictably, he wants to fly down as soon as he can, but she manages to persuade him not to, reminding him of his wife and their daughter, as well as his work. He reluctantly concedes, and tells her that as soon as Dean wakes up, she should call him, even if it's in the middle of the night. Charlie hangs up after reassuring him, and stares at Dean as he lies there quietly.
"There are a lot of people worried about you, you know," she tells him. She hopes that it'll reach him somehow. "You've got friends and family who all look out for you. What happened, Dean? What prompted you to do this?"
She sits in silence as she waits for an answer, with only the soft sound of their breathing filling the space between them.
It is only when nurses are beginning to usher visitors out of the hospital that he stirs.
"Dean?" She questions softly. Dean blearily looks around the room before his eyes settle on her.
"Charlie?" He mutters, confused. "What…?" A suddenly jolt of remembrance strikes him, and Dean grimaces, his face drawing up and clouding with pain.
Charlie doesn't want to ask, but she has to know.
"What happened?" What happened for you to down so much alcohol you nearly died?
Dean looks away. "Nothing," he mumbles.
All of the worry and fear she had been holding inside her snaps into anger.
"What do you mean, nothing?" She hisses. "I find you curled in a ball in your own vomit, hardly breathing, and you say nothing? Don't patronise me Dean Winchester. You are going to tell me what happened right this second, or so help me God, I will kill you for making me so worried and afraid."
Dean blinks at her, stunned. "Sorry," she mutters.
"Don't be," Dean replies.
They sit for a minute with Charlie looking at Dean expectantly and Dean looking anywhere but her.
"So I went out on the hunt, right?"
Charlie nods, and Dean proceeds to tell her every boring minute of what happened while he was on the case. They're just getting to when Dean is pulling up at a warehouse when a nurse comes in.
"Excuse me, but you have to leave." She looks apologetic, but firm.
Charlie shows the nurse her badge. "I'm FBI."
The nurse shrugs. "Even so, you have to leave, for the good of the patients."
"Yeah Charlie," Dean buts in, before starting to cough. The nurse and Charlie watch him as he gets his breath back. "For the good of the patients."
The nurse stares at her, and she can't get the rest of the story out of Dean with her there anyway, so she reluctantly stands. "I'll be back tomorrow," she threatens, making sure Dean nods before she leaves.
It's after eight, and she runs a hand through her hair, trying to ease the headache that she can feel coming. She fishes her phone out of her bag, pressing down the three to speed dial that number.
"Charlie? What's up?" Lara's voice comes through the phone line, tinny and scratchy and not doing her voice the justice it deserves. Charlie can feel herself unwinding just listening to it.
"Can I come over?" She inquires, hoping the other woman will say yes. There's a pause, which is filled with the rustle of clothing and fabric.
"You don't have to get dressed," she continues.
"I need to wear something other than my pyjamas," Lara grumbles.
"Why?" Charlie laughs, unlocking her car and putting the phone on speaker.
"Because you're probably coming from work and it'll be weird if you're in business gear and I'm wearing the clothes that I sleep in."
"It's so hot that I'm probably just going to shed most of my clothes anyway," Charlie offers.
"You're welcome to shed all your clothes after we have dinner," Lara replies in a lower voice. "And so will I. After dinner."
Charlie rolls her eyes, even though the other woman can't see it. "Bossy much?"
Lara laughs. "If you say so. When are you going to get here?"
Lara lives on the outskirts of Phoenix, being one of three people that Charlie knew that don't live in the city centre. "Twenty minutes maybe? It depends on the traffic."
Lara makes a humming sound, and Charlie knew that she sympathised.
"Maybe I should just change my day off to your day off," she muses.
Charlie can hear the smile in Lara's voice when she continues. "That would be nice," she utters shyly.
Charlie smiles. "I'll see what I can do. I'll see you when I get there?"
"Yep. See you then."
Charlie hangs up and finishes the drive to Lara's, and she enjoys both the food and the after dinner activities. She leaves from there in the morning, not bothering to go to the office, simply going to the hospital to question Dean some more.
She's at the hospital and by Dean's side as soon as she's able, where he tries to dodge her questions about what happened. He tells her about the trickster and some of the things he'd put both Dean and Castiel through. She finally gets some info out of him when she asks about Castiel.
"Cas left," Dean eventually grunts, and Charlie tries not to hit him.
"Dean," Charlie says, annoyed. "I can see that this is eating you up. Just tell me what happened!"
Dean looks at the floor before talking. "I kissed Cas," he admits softly.
Charlie feels her jaw drop. "You did what?" She asks, her voice verging on hysteria. "Dean, he's an angel. You can't just drop something like that on him with no warning! He isn't equipped to handle it!"
"Yeah, I figured that out," Dean says moodily.
Charlie drags a hand down her face. "Look, when he comes back, just let him explain. He probably just freaked or something. Give him some time, and it'll be fine. What you don't do, is come home and try to drink yourself to death."
"Sorry," Dean mutters. Then he lifts his eyes to Charlie's, and she sees something moving in their green depths. "But what if he hates me? Or doesn't want to be friends?"
Charlie narrows her eyes. "Okay, one, you sound like a twelve year old getting over their first crush. And two, Castiel won't do that. He's into you as much as you're into him."
"You don't know that," Dean tells her, looking annoyed.
God save her from idiots everywhere. Especially the ones she has to work with. "Ah, yes I do. I've been waiting for something like this to happen, for like, six months."
Dean stares at her, and Charlie rolls her eyes. "Get over yourself," she tells him. "Honestly."
Dean looks away. "I think I might take some time off. Clear my head."
Charlie frowns at him. "Why?"
Dean shrugs. "I just need some space."
Charlie purses her lips. "I'll call in your leave then."
Dean shakes his head. "Don't do that."
Charlie raises an eyebrow. "You're going to want somewhere to come back to. Don't sweat it."
Dean looks less than pleased, but he has no choice but to accept it, because it's happening, whether he wants it to or not.
They let Dean out of the hospital after he's been cleared, and he waves to Charlie as he drives off in his Impala. Charlie looks after him, still worried that he's going to do something stupid, like try to hunt alone.
She sighs softly, thinking about what he had told her. Dean could have gone about in any other way, and he had to do the thing that would freak Cas out the most. Shaking her head, she goes over to her car and climbs in.
She can only hope that they'll work it out.
/\/\/\/\/\
Castiel cannot breathe.
His Grace is burning, burning, burning, and it's hard to take air into his vessel, the lungs contracting and heart beating too fast. He can't think, mind clouded with the feeling of Dean's lips pressed against his, and he is burning.
He whimpers, curling up in a ball, trying to stop his Grace from doing anything else. He can't stop thinking about Dean, about how he smelt and how his soul felt pressed up against his Grace, and how Dean had kissed him. His wings flap abortively into the ground, disrupting some snow, but not doing much else.
"Cassie?" Balthazar's voice echoes toward him as if the other angel is far away, but Castiel knows that to hear his voice he must be standing near his vessel. He tries to reply, but his throat is tight and he can't move.
"Castiel!" Balthazar yells, and Castiel can hear the panic in his voice. He feels arms wrapping around him, and Castiel can tell he's going to try and take him up to Heaven.
No, he whispers quietly, and Balthazar falters.
"What?"
Somewhere quiet. Safe.
Balthazar's white and black magpie wings beat around them as he carries Castiel somewhere. Castiel is not sure where he had landed in his desperate flight away from where Dean had been.
Balthazar puts his vessel onto a bed, and he's tempted to leave it behind. Leave Dean's touch on his skin and get away from his body and breathe for a second. But if he abandons his vessel then he would have to go to Heaven, and he cannot do that now.
"Cassie, what's wrong? Where are you hurt? I can see something is wrong with your Grace, but I don't know what. I'll get Abiel, she knows the most about poisons."
"No," Castiel manages to grate out. "Do not get anyone. Do not tell anyone."
Balthazar flutters worriedly by his side for a few more seconds before leaving. Castiel hopes that he has not disobeyed him. His Grace twists again, and he groans as it separates itself slightly from him.
Balthazar lays a cloth over his forehead. "Cassie…" He murmurs quietly, and Castiel knows that he is trying to see why he is hurting.
"Hurts," Castiel whimpers quietly. He feels Balthazar's distress grow.
"What happened? What's wrong?"
"It should pass soon," Castiel gasps. "This is stronger than normal."
Balthazar sits by him until he isn't curled into a ball. His Grace gives out one last shudder before subsiding.
Castiel relaxes in relief, feeling his wings sprawl out behind him from where they had been twisted up. The black feathers ease and spread on the mattress as he blinks open his eyes. Balthazar is watching him, concern written all over his face. He lets go of the bedspread where it had been ripping in his grasp and rubs a hand over his face.
"Cassie?" Balthazar queries softly. "What was that? Your Grace…" He trails off.
Castiel looks at him. Balthazar is not stupid. He should be able to know what is happening to him.
Balthazar cautiously wraps a wing around him and brings him closer. Castiel gratefully curls up closer to the other angel, finding comfort in the touch.
They don't say anything for a while, Castiel picking at a string in his coat. Balthazar sighs.
"I knew this mission would be bad for you Castiel."
"I know," Castiel sighs quietly. "I knew as well." Even from the beginning, Dean had been too intriguing, too fascinating, too lovely.
"You care too much. And at the beginning of this, I saw how much you cared. It's always been your flaw."
"It's not a bad flaw to have," Castiel says testily.
"True. You could be so good looking that the ladies throw themselves at you. That's what I have to deal with every time I go out in public."
"That's your vessel, and you do not have women throwing themselves at you. Don't exaggerate Balthazar."
Balthazar lets out a huff. "Well I have to say something." The silence lapses again. "What happened?"
"He kissed me," Castiel mutters.
He can feel Balthazar starting to smile. "Yeah? Anything more than kiss Cassie?" He teases. "Ahh, you're growing up. I feel proud."
Castiel can feel himself blushing. "No, we did not do anything more. I left after that."
"I can't say that I approve of the human, but he deserves better than that Castiel. You can't just love em and leave em. Even if you did a little less lovin' than I would have recommended."
Castiel's cheeks heat even more. "Dean is perfectly suitable as a mate."
Balthazar continues, ignoring him. "You could do with a good hard fuck. It'd loosen you up."
"Balthazar!" Castiel exclaims.
"What?" The other angel says. "It's true. You don't know what you're missing out on Cassie."
Castiel looks away. "I don't…" He rubs his head briefly, lost. Balthazar takes pity on him.
"It's okay Castiel. How many times have we watched humans fall for people who are not suited for them? How many times have we seen the circumstances stacked against them?"
Castiel did not say that most of them failed.
"They are humans Balthazar," he painfully, the words wrung out of him as he closes his eyes.
There's nothing the other angel can say to that.
"That's not all," Castiel breathes eventually. "I suspect…"
"Yes?"
Castiel lets out a breath. "I suspect that angels are giving the demons angel blades, and information so they can work against us."
Balthazar is quiet for a second. "That's a serious accusation Cassie. You sure?"
Castiel nods. "Yes. And I also think that there are some in our garrison. I trust you, and Anna, but others are suspect."
"Well we have a reduced number of angels, so that should make it easier." Balthazar's words are light-hearted, but his tone is not. When Castiel looks at him, his face is drawn.
"Yes," Castiel replies. "It should."
"Any other bombshells you have to drop on me?"
Castiel hesitates. Balthazar sees it and sighs. "I was joking, but let's hear it."
"Anna is in re-education," Castiel confides quietly. He had kept that from the rest of the garrison. "I haven't seen her since Zachariah took her away from us. And," he is about to continue.
"More, Castiel? How much have you been hiding?"
Castiel casts an annoyed look at him. "And, I think the traitors know that I know about them. And they know that I am injured. Likely, they will try to kill me to weaken the entire garrison. We are the only ones left who have deep knowledge of earth and how to move on it. With Anna gone and myself dead, they would have little trouble either killing the rest of the angels not loyal to them, or chasing them back to Heaven."
"This is more and more screwed up by the minute. Why didn't you tell me anything?"
"I didn't want to involve you," Castile mumbles. He doesn't need to look at Balthazar to see the irritated look the other angel is giving him.
"Really?"
Castiel shrugs.
They sit for a few minutes, Castiel still thinking about Dean and Balthazar absorbing everything that he's been told.
Castiel lifts his head as he hears a tremble and a flick in the distance.
"Balthazar?" Castiel whispers. "Did you hear that?"
It isn't something that anyone who isn't an angel could hear. It is on the celestial plane, a whisper of wings and the quiet stink of hell-bound intentions.
"Yes," Balthazar hisses. "We have to go. You can't fight, they'll rip you apart." It's true. Castiel is still weak. Even though he is an extremely good swordsman, there's no chance that he will be able to fight off more than two angels without getting hurt.
Castiel slides his blade into his hand. "I can fight if I need to."
Balthazar grimaces. He summons his blade as well. "I don't want to see you die Cassie. Fly now, get away."
"No," Castiel retorts, affronted. "Don't be ridiculous. They want me, not you. You leave." Balthazar never preferred to fight with a sword. He always favoured using Grace.
Balthazar rolls his eyes. "As if."
The sounds come closer. "It's the traitors," Castiel whispers lowly. "It has to be."
Balthazar nods once, sharply.
Light begins to shine through the windows. Castiel looks at Balthazar, and wishes that Anna was there to help them in the fight.
Then the windows burst, and angels swarm through the cracks.
/\/\/\/\/\
Dean hasn't seen Castiel in nearly three weeks.
He hasn't gone to work since leaving the hospital. He didn't leave any explanation, but Charlie had called in his leave without his consent. She claimed it was because he would want a job to come back to, but he didn't deign to answer that. He is running on less than fumes, and he knows it.
He stops at shitty motels and drives. He ignores calls from everyone, even Sam. Doesn't check his emails. Ends up dealing with a ghost when he was looking through some papers and had seen a suspicious article.
He tries not to think about his angel.
He is such an idiot.
Why couldn't he leave well enough alone?
He always wants too much. Why couldn't he just leave well enough alone? Everything was fine, and more than fine. It had been great. Cas had been great.
Who was he kidding? It would have come to this eventually. No matter what Charlie said, no matter what she claimed Cas felt, the angle hadn't shown head or wing for three weeks. Dean could feel the rejection coming from the angelic sphere, or wherever the hell Cas lives when he isn't with Dean.
He's been travelling around in the Impala, hunting if he saw something, and trying not to think about how long it's been since he's seen Cas.
He's looking up a string of murders where the hearts are missing. Sounds like werewolves, and Dean doesn't know what to think of it. There have been too many around recently to be coincidence, no matter when he told Bobby. Something is up, and he's going to get to the bottom of it while trying to avoid thinking about Cas.
He's currently driving through Alabama, although his destination is Savannah, Georgia. Right near the coast, the town has been getting some unwanted supernatural attention lately, and Dean is going there to end the reports in newspapers of suspicious deaths.
He gets there around dinner time, and eats at a small restaurant, paying with cash so Charlie can't track him too easily. The red haired lady means well, but he really needs a break right now. He's already turned all his phones off and hasn't been near an email account in a week.
There's a half decent hotel a street away from Georgetown, and Dean books a room there for a week, paying with cash again. The teenager manning the front desk flicks through the cash before typing something on the computer in front of him and then leaning back to give Dean one of the keys that are hanging from the wall behind him.
"Room eleven," the guy throws out, eyes focused on the computer and not Dean. Dean takes the key and walks to the room, the one in the corner of the ground floor. It's the room that's most easily guarded, and he takes the time to set up the wards around the room, hesitating before opening a small cut on his arm and painting the angel sigil on the wall.
The murders were from two months ago, and Dean isn't sure if that means another hunter came last month and killed all the werewolves or if they had only turned people last month, or if they had laid low last full moon. He would just have to wait another few days and see. He would call Bobby and ask, but the older hunter would ask about the trickster, and Charlie had probably told him by now that Dean had run, so he would ask about that as well. He just doesn't want anything to disturb him while he worked stuff out. Damn that angel.
He spreads out all the information that he has before starting to put it all up on the wall, putting connections between them in red thread. It's past midnight by the time he's happy with what's there, but there are several gaping holes in his information that he needs to fill before he can proceed. That's what he's going to have to do before the full moon arrives, and that only gives him three days.
He spends the time asking everyone who is even remotely connected questions. The police, the morgue, the families of those who were killed. It turns up a large steaming pile of nothing, to Dean's dismay. He still carries his gun loaded with silver bullets though.
He's just been wading through the sewer on a lead that turned out to be nothing. The full moon is tonight, and he's probably just going to have to drive around in the Impala and listen for any reports on the police scanner. He scowls at the thought, and checks the time on his phone, not looking at the texts that have popped up in the last few hours. There's some from Charlie, asking if he's alright, one from Bobby that tells him that hunting alone is dangerous, and one from Rufus saying that his leave runs out in a week. He doesn't text any of them back, instead having a shower to get rid of all the disgusting sewage out of every nook and cranny of his body.
Deciding to get an early dinner, he heads over to the local bar and orders a steak sandwich. He talks to the people around him, trying to get any clues, but comes up with nothing. Eating his dinner despondently, he's resigning himself to a night of driving around aimlessly when he sees someone that makes his jaw drop.
"Madison?" Dean asks. The werewolf turns and stares at him, eyes wide. She's wearing torn jeans and an old tee shirt, but the two guys behind her are giving her the respect of someone higher ranking than them. One of them lifts a lip and growls at him. Dean pulls a face.
Madison looks as surprised to see him as he is to see her. "Dean? What are you doing here? Don't tell me that you have a squad of hunters around here," she grouses, looking around.
"No, actually. I'm hunting alone." Madison raises an eyebrow. "Yeah, dumb, I know. I don't need you to tell me that as well as my friends."
"Okay then. What are you doing here?"
"Why do you think? There's weird in the papers. It attracts me."
"Of course," Madison says. "So you're here to hunt wolf."
Suddenly feeling a bit awkward, Dean nods. "Yeah."
"Good," Madison says. "Because so are we. If you come somewhere a bit more private, I'll explain it to you."
"And get eaten?" Dean questions her.
Madison shrugs. "You let me go last time, and Sam was pretty cool. So, I guess I owe you one. And you're not a bad asset to the team. So, you coming?"
Dean looks around the bar before shrugging. He has his angel blade and a gun loaded with silver bullets, so he should be fine. And if Madison does try to kill him, he's not sure he cares all that much. With everything that had happened with Cas, he isn't particularly clinging to life right now.
Madison leads the way to a table at the outskirts of the bar, her two cronies following her. "Sit," she commands, and Dean does, looking up at her bemusedly.
"So how've you been?" Dean asks the werewolf. She cocks her head and he ignores the pang of recognition inside him.
"You've changed," she comments.
Dean shrugs. "I'm not in a great place right now. I'm running from a few things, and I don't really care what happens to me. You can tell. Only crazy people hunt alone."
Madison frowns. "Well I hope you get through that. But we're not going to eat you. Let me tell you what's going on." She cracks her knuckles. "I've moved up in the world a bit since you last saw me. Got my own pack and everything. It was a good set up. Was." She shakes her head. "Then I start hearing things. About a larger pack, one made of 'pure werewolves.' I do some snooping, and as it turns out, there is a pack running around, turning people, killing others and attracting hunters for the new werewolves to be killed by. You've probably noticed a lot of werewolves hanging around." She waits for Dean to nod before continuing. "Well, that's the reason. There's talk in the werewolf community about the leader of this pack. Calls himself 'the Alpha,' which is ridiculous. Every leader of a pack is an alpha." She rolls her eyes. "Anyway, I'm trying to build up my pack to rival his. The pack in this town? It's an offshoot of his pack, one of the ones that he left behind that prospered. We're going up against them tonight to crush them, to stop the other pack from getting stronger when they join together. So, you in?"
Dean absorbs the information. It would explain what's been happening over the last year. "I'm in," he confirms. "I'll gather my stuff, and meet you here tonight then?"
Madison nods. "Yeah. I'll have a few of my boys around, so don't shoot them on sight."
Dean feelings about this whole arrangement plummet. "Great," he mutters.
"Well, you have a friend, so don't complain. I don't want to be out numbered."
"Friend?" Dean asks, thrown. Madison nods towards where he had parked the Impala. When Dean turns around, he can barely keep himself from gaping. Gabriel is leaning against the Impala, lollipop in his mouth like he does it every day. "Ahh, I suppose I do," he says bemusedly.
"Then see you tonight." Madison turns on her heel and walks off, the two other werewolves following her. Dean reluctantly turns to walk back to the Impala. He has no idea what the archangel is doing here, but he's going to find out.
"Gabriel?" Dean asks.
"So Castiel told you who I was," Gabriel says, taking the lollipop out of his mouth and twirling it in his hand.
"Yeah, he, ah, did. Why are you here?"
Gabriel lifts an eyebrow. "So I'm going through town, and I'm like 'huh, why has that room got Enochian on it?' So I go have a bit of a look around, you know, through the window, and see that it's a hunter's room. Then I see the ward. It's got Castiel's name worked into it, so he can get through it, right? Well, I saw his name, and figured that it must be your room, because there's no other human that Castiel would give his name to like that, or work it around a protection symbol like that for. So I moseyed around until I spotted you, talking to that werewolf, and waited for you back here."
Dean purses his mouth. "Look, can you get off my car? You'll scratch her."
Gabriel grins lewdly but stands up. Dean grimaces distastefully
"So, while we're talking about my little bro, where is he?"
"How about we talk about why you're here Gabriel. If you think I'm going to believe that bullshit about wandering around and finding me randomly, you have another thing coming."
Gabriel rolls his eyes. "Fine. I was looking for you. I was thinking about you, and I wanted to talk to Castiel."
"Why?"
Gabriel frowns. "So Castiel hasn't told you anything?"
"Cas hasn't seen fit to talk to me in nearly a month."
Gabriel bites his lip. "That doesn't sound right."
Dean snorts. "Well it's what happened."
Gabriel shakes his head. "That's not like Castiel. Not like him at all." He looks worried.
"Well that's what he's done," Dean says. "And I don't want to talk about it."
Gabriel lowers his eyebrows. "Sensing some tension. There more to the story than you're telling me?"
"No," Dean tells him shortly. "There's not."
"So there is," Gabriel says. "What happened?" He questions gleefully, grinning at Dean.
Dean ignores him and goes around to the driver's side of the door. Gabriel appears in the passenger seat and Dean glares at him. "Get out of my car."
"Not until you tell me why Castiel is absent. He likes you, he wouldn't normally spend this long away from you."
"I have no idea why Cas is gone," Dean says tightly.
"Liar," Gabriel sings. "Liar, liar, liar."
Dean grits his teeth and ignores the archangel. Gabriel keeps looking at him expectantly, and Dean can't stand the silence anymore.
"It doesn't concern you, alright?"
"What did you fight about?" Gabriel asks. When Dean gives him the stink eye, he shrugs. "Hey, I'm just curious about what could get under Castiel's feathers. Most stuff just bounces off him. He's a pretty dependable guy." Dean drives into the parking lot of the hotel he's staying at, trying not to think too hard about Cas. The archangel sitting next to him could probably read his mind or some shit like that, and he really doesn't want him sticking his nose into whatever it is that's happening between himself and his angel.
"Can you come inside my room?" He grumbles, locking the Impala.
"Well, I could blow it up, but that would kill you, and alert the other angels to my location, so no."
"Great," Dean says. "Goodbye. Go away Gabriel."
Dean shuts the door of his motel room, but Gabriel pops his head up in the window. "I'm not leaving until I talk to Castiel."
"I told you, Cas hasn't been around."
"And I told you, Castiel likes you. He'll be back."
Dean has his own thoughts about that, but he doesn't want to talk about them with Gabriel, so he doesn't say anything.
"I don't know what's going on between you, but it'll blow over," Gabriel flips his hand and a chocolate bar appears in it. "Trust me."
"I've got no reason to," Dean mutters, checking all his equipment and starting to strip his guns to make sure they are all in perfect working order.
"Aw, don't be like that, Dean-o! I have your best interests at heart, really." Gabriel pouts and Dean looks at him disbelievingly."
"Like I'm going to believe that," he scoffs. "As if. If you're worried about anyone, then it's Cas."
Gabriel shrugs. "I was always close to him. I governed over his training, did you know that? Of course you didn't. Anyway, I always liked him. And I'm worried about his involvement with you," Gabriel says, scowling at him. "You're not good for him."
Dean bites back his response. He doesn't want to agree with the archangel after all. "It's none of your business."
"He's my brother, isn't he? Sam is your business, right?"
Dean whips around, staring down the angel. "Don't you even think about Sam," he threatens lowly, stalking over to the window. "Don't you even talk about him. He has nothing to do with any of this. Nothing."
Gabriel stares at him for a moment before looking away. "Touchy," he mutters. "I think I got my point across."
Dean lets out a breath, annoyed. "Don't you have like, five million siblings then?"
"Sure. But that doesn't mean I can't have favourites." He wriggles his eyebrows at Dean. "Some of them just suck, all around. But there are some who I like, and Castiel just happens to be one of them."
Dean goes back to the bed and finishes checking all his guns, ignoring the archangel. There's a few hours until he has to meet Madison, so he pulls the curtains shut, ignoring Gabriel's annoyed protest, and has another shower, taking advantage of the good pressure and water heater here. He might be on bad terms with Cas, but he isn't a good enough person to avoid thinking about him when his hand brushes against his cock. He has to work off some pressure somehow, and he wants to be relaxed for later on in the evening, when he's going to be killing stuff.
And so he gets himself off to the thought of blue eyes and ruffled hair and those pink lips.
He dresses in dark clothes, not wanting to stand out in the gloom of where the werewolves would be. He's at a big enough disadvantage without having them be able to spot him easily as well.
Putting his angel blade into the leather loop inside his jacket, he sticks as many silver bullets as he can into his pockets, and grabs his two favourite guns. Feeling suitably prepared, Dean locks his hotel door and walks out to the Impala, glaring at Gabriel, who is leaning on his Impala again.
"Can you not?" Dean asks grumpily, getting in the Impala and starting her engine.
"Well you didn't let me into the room, so what was I meant to do?" Gabriel pouts, looking at him with wide eyes. Dean tries not to glare a hole through him.
"Leave?" Dean suggests hopefully.
Gabriel huffs and rolls his eyes. "Yeah, nah."
"Because that would make my day easier," Dean mutters under his breath. Gabriel raises an eyebrow at him but doesn't comment.
Madison is standing near the table when they pull up to the bar, and there are several men and women in the background. The sun's final ray falls behind the horizon, and the world is cast in a shadow that gets deeper with every second.
"So are you helping or not?" Dean asks, casting a look over at the archangel.
Gabriel huffs out an extended sigh. "Fine. I'll help. I don't like werewolves anyway."
"Right. Come on then," Dean tells the archangel, who opens the door and gets out instead of zapping.
"What, no flying?" Dean asks Gabriel.
"Never show your enemy all your tricks," Gabriel advises. "Now let's go show those dogs who's boss."
Dean looks after him with a mystified expression, wondering if he was ever going to work the archangel out. It had taken him a long time with Cas, so it is probably going to take a long time with him. And frankly, Dean doesn't want to hang around the archangel for much longer. He's already on his nerves.
"Who's he?" Madison asks, looking at Gabriel. She inhales and her eyes narrow. "He's not human."
"He's someone who won't leave no matter how much I tell him to," Dean grumbles, going around to the back of the Impala and opening the trunk.
"I don't bite, promise," Gabriel snarks. "Unlike you."
"Gabriel, shut your mouth, or I will stab you," Dean threatens, taking a few silver knives out and putting them in places where he could grab them easily.
"You don't keep very nice company Dean," Madison sniffs. "You should leash your pet."
"Whoa whoa whoa, I am not his pet," Gabriel says, affronted.
"Are you sure about that?" Madison says, obviously enjoying teasing the angel. "You're more powerful than him, and you're following him, so he has some hold over you."
"The only reason I'm here is because my younger brother likes this one human for some reason, and I'm making sure the idiot doesn't get himself killed while he's absent."
"Hey!" Dean shouts. "I can hear you."
Gabriel continues like Dean didn't interrupt. "And because I don't like werewolves, and any excuse to smite some is good enough for me. So don't give me an excuse," he huffs, looking down at her even though he's shorter.
"Smite?" The werewolf says, laughing at him. "What are you, an angel?"
"Maybe I am," Gabriel retaliates coolly, and Dean step in between them before they can start fighting each other.
"Gabriel. Calm the fuck down or fuck off. I don't really care which. Madison. He can kill everything in a twelve mile radius with a click of his fingers, so don't piss him off."
"It's more than twelve miles," Gabriel sulks.
Madison rolls her eyes. "Whatever. As long as he helps tonight and I never have to see him again."
Dean lifts his eyes to the sky. This is going to be harder than he thought.
"Look, we all have the same purpose here," he reminds them. "And that's to kick some werewolf ass. We need to co-operate for that, okay?"
Madison and Gabriel cast him twin glares of unhappiness, but both of them nod slowly, turning their glare on each other. Dean rubs a hand over his face briefly, looking at Madison's hanger's on, who are growling at Gabriel. Why can't my life ever be easy?
"The place is an apartment building that they've rented out all for themselves. They're a big pack, but inexperienced and undisciplined. That's why we're hitting them now." Madison's eyes dart to Gabriel every few seconds, like she doesn't trust the archangel not to fry her. To be honest, Dean isn't sure that he's not going to.
"They in walking distance?" Dean asks, and Madison nods.
"That's why we've been eating at this place for the past few days. It's the nearest we can be to the apartment block without raising suspicion."
"You'd think that they'd notice another pack in town," Dean mutters, checking all his gear.
Madison shrugs. "Like I said. Amateurs. They have no idea what's going on, or what's happening to them. Their leader is a crazy fanatic, who only wants to convert others to his nutso religion."
"Sounds like this guy could use a prank or two," Gabriel says happily. "Lead the way."
Madison frowns at him, but shrugs. "We're going to turn in a few minutes, and then we're heading out." She points to the horizon, and Dean can see the beginning of a lightness, where the moon would rise. "As soon as she's up, we're gone. Just try to stay out of our way."
"What, no blue food dye this time?" Dean asks. Madison raises her eyebrows.
"We can tell who's who just by scent. Think of it like this… If they're trying to kill you, then you can shoot them."
Lovely.
"Sounds like my type of fun," Dean mutters reluctantly. They all wait, until, one by one, Madison and her pack start dropping to the ground. There's a minute delay while they somehow double in size and grow fur. Gabriel shakes his head.
"And you think that what I do is weird. But I've never turned a seventy kilo girl into a two hundred kilo beast. Physically, it's impossible. That's one of the reasons I don't really like them. They bend reality with their magic."
"What, like you do?" Dean replies dryly.
Gabriel puffs up his chest. "What I do is far above this."
Madison sits up and raises her head, howling to the moon. Suddenly the clearing swarms with werewolves, and Dean's first instinct is to go on a shooting rampage. Kill all the unnatural creatures with his bullets, and then get out the sword that is cool against his chest and stab the being next to him as well. Rid the world of a few problems.
He takes a breath and calms it. Madison is leading them to other wolves, ones that aren't so disciplined, ones who kill and turn innocent people for kicks. Them first.
The wolves start to stream from the clearing, and Dean and Gabriel start following them at a run.
"They said it wasn't far," Dean pants, after five minutes of running. Gabriel's shorter legs should have slowed him down, but he isn't even breathing hard, and Dean takes a moment to hate him for it.
"Shouldn't hunters be in better shape?" The archangel asks innocently, and Dean scowls at him.
"Stop questioning me! I'm a fine hunter."
"Apparently, only if it doesn't involve running. I think maybe you eat a few too many burgers for your own good Dean."
Teasing him. The fucking archangel is teasing him, while he runs down a road after a pack of werewolves, to kill other werewolves. When did this become his life?
"Shut up," Dean growls. Or at least, he attempts to. The words come out in harsh breaths, and sound a lot less intimidating than he wants them to.
Gabriel throws his head back and laughs, and Dean wants to kill something already. Where is that apartment building?
The wolves eventually gather outside a building with no lights on, situated away from other buildings in the area. Dean hopes that someone doesn't call the cops when there's a whole bunch of wolves inside, trying to kill each other.
Madison sniffs around the entrance – he can tell it's her because she is grey with black paws and ears – before huffing to the others. Dean gets his breath back while they apparently argue, taking his time to count them all. They're moving, but he thinks that there's about twenty. Not something to argue with lightly.
The werewolves start running towards the forest behind the building, and Dean takes a moment to swear lightly to himself. Gabriel grins at it.
"Apparently they all went for a little midnight stroll in the woods. How do you feel about forests in the night Dean?"
"I hate them," Dean mutters, taking his gun out from where it had been stashed. Gabriel draws his blade, and Dean notes that it's different to both Cas's and the one Cas gave him. It's longer, and shimmers with light when he looks at it out of the corner of his eye, and there's more engraving around the hilt.
Gabriel sees him looking and shrugs as they approach the forest. "Archangel issue," he comments, and Dean nods.
Dean pauses before the first of the trees, takes a deep breath, and then walks in.
The moonlight doesn't penetrate as well here, and it's a lot harder to see. Dean tries to keep his eyes open as he picks his way through the trees, trying to have his eyes adjust to the light. There's no other sounds besides the noise he makes, and since he can only assume that there would be noise if there is a fight going on, he thinks that the werewolves are trying to find where the other pack is.
God. It would be awkward if they're so far in that Dean and Gabriel get there just as the fight finishes, just because it's a ridiculous way through this damn forest.
A howl splits the night somewhere to their left, and both of them adjust for it, heading towards where the sound came from as silently as they can manage.
Dean picks up his pace when he starts to hear the sounds of fighting. Gabriel matches it, and soon they come across a small clearing where the fighting is centred, although it had spilled into the woods around it.
Dean clicks the safety off on his gun and starts shooting. Gabriel sucks in a breath beside him before running into the fray, suddenly becoming a figure of leaping grace and elegance as he strikes his way through the werewolves.
Dean hears a sound next to him and is bowled over by a werewolf, his gun going flying somewhere in the bushes. The werewolf's eyes glint above him, and he's suddenly reminded of being in this position and getting his guts ripped apart. With the way things were between them right now, Cas probably wouldn't come to his rescue.
So he yanks the angel blade out of his jacket and starts stabbing.
The werewolf yelps in pain as soon as the silver touches it, and that stops the jaws that were descending for his neck for a few seconds. Dean pulls the blade out and tries again, aiming for the heart.
He must hit, because it goes slack above him, and Dean sucks in a breath before he's crushed by the dead weight of a dead werewolf. He frantically tries to push it off him, hearing the approaching sounds of another wolf, but it is big, and there's no way he can move it without help.
The werewolf is pushed off him, and Dean pants frantically, trying to regain his breath as he looks at the disappearing form of Madison. Soon there's the low growls of a fight in that direction, and Dean smiles for a second.
He hunts around for a minute and finds his gun, thanking whoever is up there that he isn't anyone's top priority. He can see Gabriel facing off against two werewolves at once, and there are too many bodies on the ground to count. Some are still wolves, meaning that they're only injured, but he can see a lot of human forms scattered around, including one of the goons that had been behind Madison.
He carefully aims and takes out a werewolf that had been about to jump on Gabriel, and then touches the blade in its sheath against his chest. The reassuring weight of it hangs there, and he keeps shooting.
The moon is over head by the time the fighting ends. As far as Dean can tell, Madison's pack won, because no one is trying to eat him yet, and none of the wolves are fighting each other anymore. They go around and investigate the fallen wolves, killing most of them, whether they're pack or not. Survival of the fittest, Dean supposes.
Gabriel comes out of the trees near Dean, untouched by the carnage around them except for a bright bloom of arterial blood that cut across his chest. Dean wishes he were that lucky. He can feel himself dripping with blood and sweat, and he can feel the places where he's covered in dirt.
"Is that it?" Dean asks warily. Gabriel shrugs.
"Looks like." He summons a piece of candy and starts eating it with relish. When Dean looks at him out of the corner of his eye, Gabriel looks slightly embarrassed.
"What?" He asks. "I get hungry after I fight. And that was a pretty good fight. It's not often that I get to let loose." He links his arms together and stretches, popping his fingers above his head.
There's sudden commotion down the other end of the clearing, and both Gabriel and Dean make their way towards it. There's a fallen werewolf snapping his jaws at anyone that comes close, but there's a fatal wound in his leg, and he's bleeding out slowly. The werewolf gradually shrinks and loses his fur, until there's a naked man with a cut across his wrist panting in the moonlight.
"You'll never win against the Alpha!" He screeches loudly, and Dean takes a step back out of reflex. There's a mad look in the guy's eye, and it makes Dean nervous. "He can make new packs that are completely loyal to him so quickly, you'll never be able to kill them all!" He starts laughing manically, and Dean shivers. "You're all going to die! All of you! All who don't serve the Alpha will die! And then we're going to kill every human, and everyone will be a werewolf!" He launches himself at one of the wolves next to him, but Madison appears and crunches her teeth down around his neck. Dean looks on uneasily as the man slumps between her jaws. Madison lets out a few huffing sounds, and the werewolves start squabbling among themselves. If Dean has to guess, they're arguing about who gets to eat who. Gross.
Madison slowly walks over to them and starts nudging them out of the clearing. Dean is all too happy to oblige.
Dean thinks about what the guy was saying as they walk back to some semblance of civilisation. Assuming that he was the alpha, that meant he had been turned by this 'Alpha.' Is there any credence in his words, or was he just bat crap crazy? He had seemed pretty out of it right at the end there, but if Dean was bleeding out, surrounded by his enemies, he'd want to freak them out as well, and he didn't think that he'd be entirely in his right mind.
He sighs quietly as they come out of the woods and start heading back to the bar, where the Impala is. Just another thing to add to the pile of stuff that's going wrong these days.
He's tired, and it takes longer to reach the bar when they aren't running. Gabriel gets in beside him, and Dean tries not to wince as he probably spreads blood and shit everywhere in his baby. He strokes a hand over her steering wheel and silently promises her a good look over when he gets somewhere that has the right tools.
It's nearly three, and Dean hopes that there's either no one in reception, or that they're asleep. He gets his wish when they walk in and see the teenager fast asleep on the desk. They walk quietly past him, and Gabriel pauses outside his door.
"Come on Dean. Lemme in." Gabriel waggles his eyebrows and takes a bite out of the chocolate in his hand. Dean scowls at the archangel while he's unlocking the door. But when he's inside, he takes some of his blood from where he'd gotten clawed and wipes it across the glyph.
Gabriel happily struts inside and looks around as Dean lays all his first aid on the table and starts cleaning the claw marks in his arm and thigh.
"You gonna tell me anything about this 'Alpha' thing?" Dean asks, having to look up at the usually shorter archangel. "I know you know something. I could see it when that werewolf was talking."
Gabriel rolls his eyes. "Maybe, but I'm not going to tell you. Where's the fun in that?"
Dean resists the urge to punch the shorter man.
"Then are you going to tell me about anything else that's been going on? What the angel's really want? Why Cas won't answer my questions, but he's teaching me how to use this?" Dean touches the angel blade in his jacket lightly. There's probably still blood on it from where he stabbed the werewolf, and he really should clean it. Does angelic metal rust? The way his luck is going, it probably does.
Gabriel purses his mouth and stares at Dean for a few seconds before answering, his tone serious, not the light hearted joking that had been going on for the last day. "Look kid, you've been misled."
Dean forces himself not to comment on the kid part of his sentence. "About what?"
Gabriel takes a bite out of the chocolate bar in his hand. "A lot of things. Castiel probably didn't want to lie to you, but he didn't know how to tell you. So I'll save him some trouble and speak plainly now.
"There's a reason I left, and it wasn't Raziel dying. That was the last straw, really. There's been ranks of angels inside Heaven working against the other angels for centuries now. I don't know what they want, or what they've been promised. All I know is that they support Hell's side in this fight."
"What fight?" Dean demands, wanting to know more now that someone was finally talking to him, his hand pausing where he's threading a needle for a second before he gets it through the eye..
Gabriel raises an eyebrow. "What fight do you think? The one that's gone on forever, between Heaven and Hell, the one that probably won't ever end. Heaven has been winning for the last forever, but in recent years, Hell has gained the upper hand. There's only one way that Heaven can regain its superiority over Hell, and the only way that Hell can cement their win." Gabriel pauses, obviously enjoying the suspense that he is creating. Dean ties off the stitch, and starts on the next one, waiting for Gabriel to continue.
"And that is?" Dean presses, when it's clear that the archangel isn't going to say anything else.
Gabriel winks at him. "The Sword of my late elder brother, Raziel. It fell to earth when we were ambushed, and he was killed. Heaven and Hell have been trying to find it ever since."
"And when was this?"
Gabriel shrugs. "Oh, it was a contributing factor to some war of yours. I wasn't really focusing on it, since I was holed up, trying to heal my wounds and stay away from demons. A 'Great War,' or something. It doesn't matter. What does matter is that the hell spawn from downstairs are closer to finding it than the Heavenly Host are."
"And then why did they go to the FBI?" Dean inquires, trying to ignore the fact that angels and demons probably started World War One. He doesn't know why he's surprised. He pours some disinfectant over his arm, and winces as it burns. Shaking it off, he considers his ruined jeans before cutting them open further so he can get to the claw marks in his left thigh.
Gabriel gives him a considering look. "A few reasons. They used their status to persuade your government into helping them look for certain signs and symbols that could serve to show them where Raziel's sword is, or where ingredients to disable the protection around the sword is. When its owner dies, wherever it lands, it constructs barriers that are pretty damn tough to get through, not to mention that it doesn't want to be found in the first place."
"So in summary, angels are working for demons, and everyone's trying to find some sword to win the war that's been going on for as long as anyone can remember?" Dean rubs his face, resisting the urge to throw his hands up incredulously. There's a needle in one of them, and it's attached to his leg.
"Basically, yeah," Gabriel says, tossing the chocolate wrapper over his shoulder and conjuring a new one, unwrapping it as if it was the most important thing in the world.
What the fuck is happening to my life. He's gone from being a normal hunter to dealing with issues between Heaven and Hell that have been going on since before who knows when. Not to mention the fact that he's going to have to ask Bobby and Charlie to do some research on Alphas, and what they meant in the grand scheme of things. Only him. This could only happen to him. He ties off one stitch and starts the next one.
"You should go back to your human headquarters. Castiel knows where to find you there, you're safeish there, you know, and you'll be happy or whatever. Just go back. You can watch the angels better from there anyway."
Dean looks at him disbelievingly. Then he sighs and runs a hand over his face. The last cut shouldn't need stitching, so he puts everything away. He thinks about what Gabriel said as he does it. It has been a month. Maybe it's time to get back to the office. He's hunted, travelled, and put up with an archangel for a day. That sounds like a wild holiday in anyone's books.
"Fine," he grumbles. "I'll go back. But not because you said so."
"Of course not," Gabriel smirks. "Tell Castiel that I was around, okay?"
"Okay," Dean mutters to empty air. The archangel had already disappeared.
He tiredly packs up his gear and has a shower, washing the grime from him before crashing on the bed for a few hours. In the morning, he bleaches the wall of his blood, and loads everything into the Impala, ready for the drive back to Phoenix.
It's going to be a long way without his angel by his side.