GOODLAND, KANSAS

It had been a long and quiet drive to the motel, which was some seedy looking joint on the edge of town. Sam could not help but think that if they had had the girls with them, they would never have stayed in such a dump. The beds were thin, the mattresses were tattered and the sheets bore dried on stains of various colors and unknown origins. When Sam had flicked the light on to the room, he had counted at least three roaches that had scurried for cover beneath the shadows of the beds. He sighed, placing his and Ella's things on the end of his bed before laying down on it, fully clothed.

"Dean…?" He questioned softly. It was very late, but he could not sleep. All he could think about was Ella and how the Hounds had made her their personal chew toy. "Do you think… do you think they're in Hell?"

"Well none of us exactly fit the Heaven's Most Wanted List, unless you mean the fact that 99% of the angels we have met have wanted to kill us. But…" He trailed off. "I don't know. Probably."

Sam frowned, his brows furrowing. "What's it like… down there I mean?"

Dean shook his head. "It's Hell, Sam."

"It's not fair," He said after a moment, the bed screeching as he climbed from it and started to pace a little. "After everything that all of us have done… all of the pain we've gone through trying to fix this stuff for the angels and still all we have to look forward to is Hell… it's not fair."

"Well, the angels are running this show, so we don't have much of a choice," Dean said, rubbing his eyes. "At least Cas has helped us from time to time. He's helped us a lot, actually.."

Sam grimaced a little and stopped, rubbing the back of his neck. "Yeah, I sure screwed that up didn't I?"

"On the contrary," A familiar voice said inside of the room. Sam whirled and narrowed his eyes when he saw Zachariah standing there. The elder male was smiling broadly. "You were magnificent! I knew there was a reason that I let you live, Sam." He said, chuckling as he walked over to the younger Winchester and pulled him into a hug, patting him on the back. He pulled away. "You really cut that insignificant whelp down to size. I just came from the hospital." He shook his head. "I have to say I could not have done a better job myself."

"Oh great, you're here…" Dean said with all the fake enthusiasm that he could muster up.

"Of course! I came to congratulate your little brother on a job well done! I mean, you should see him. He's hooked up to these machines. They say he might not wake up. Wouldn't that be delicious? Some of the feathers of his wings have fallen out and burned. It's just wonderful! He's teetering on the brink of death." Zachariah rubbed his hands together, the broad grin still fixed on his face. "I think you both deserve a reward."

"We deserve a reward for putting one of your angels in a coma? Wow, and I thought my family was screwed up," Dean muttered.

"We all hate Castiel. He's been a thorn in our side since he started to bend the rules to help you all out." Zachariah said with a little frown. His smile quickly returned, however, as he looked between them. "I'm serious, boys. What would you like? I'll give you anything. Money…" He snapped his fingers and there were stacks of hundred dollar bills piled all over the room. "Food." He snapped again; the money vanished and trays of amazing food of all types appeared everywhere. "Oh I know.. Women." He snapped again and women clad in only skimpy bras and thongs appeared in the room, stroking Dean's face and running their hands down his chest.

"What we want, Zachariah, is to beat you into a coma. Now that's a reward, for all the crap you've put us all through," Dean said.

Zachariah rolled his eyes and snapped his fingers again, causing the women to vanish. "I'm offering you a chance to have anything you ever dreamed of and all you can do is be a bratty little ball of pus?" The angel said, a frown turning down the corners of his lips. "This is my final offer. We are very grateful for you teaching our wayward brother a lesson…. Do you want our thanks or not?"

Dean was quiet for a moment before he slowly looked back up at Zachariah. "Nah," he said with a shrug.

Zachariah stared at him a moment then nodded. "Fine." He stepped away, his hands clasped at the small of his back. "You know, of course, you could have asked for your little girlfriends to be made whole." He turned around to face the Winchesters. "It is a real shame what happened to them. As if it wasn't punishment enough for Oshea to be dragged down to hell the first time. We can hear their tormented screams all the way in the heavenly courts. You know what that's like, don't you, Dean? Alastair was a terror, but he is nothing compared to who replaced him when Oshea killed him. This new torturer enjoys flaying the skin off of his victims. Branding them with his name… and of course, lets not forget that Jonah now has Oshea right where he wants her. He can go and have his fiery demonic passion whenever he wants now." The angel offered a tiny smile. "But of course that is your decision."

Dean's smug smile turned into a look of pure hatred.

"Bring them back."

The angel only continued to smile. "Well, I don't know. You didn't seem to enthusiastic about it before. Besides, you've made it very clear that you want me to leave. So I will oblige…"

Dean gritted his teeth. "If you leave now, I swear I will hunt you down and kill you."

The smile grew a little larger. "I would love to see you try. But you know you'll never see her again if you kill me. Do you really think any other angel is going to even give you the time of day? Perhaps you could ask Ezra… you could have asked Castiel, but he's busy dying…" He clasped his hands behind his back once more. "You know… perhaps if I go down there, they'll let me have a go with her. What do you think? She was quite pretty after all."

Dean swung his fist at Zachariah's face, but the impact never came. Instead, his hand flew through the air where Zachariah had been standing. Sam frowned, sinking down to the end of his bed as he watched Dean. "Do you think he's telling the truth, Dean?" He said after a moment.

Dean cursed under his breath and he took a moment to calm himself down as he sat down on the end of the other bed. "Probably. You know Zach, he doesn't particularly like us. So if he says they're in Hell, they probably are. They don't exactly find us worthy of the royal suite, so it seems likely he's telling the truth."

Sam sighed and ran his hands through his hair. "Dean, we can't just leave them in Hell…"

"Zachariah is gone, and Castiel is curled up in a hospital bed. We're fresh out of allies and fresh out of options."

"I didn't say anything about asking the angels," Sam said a little darkly, looking up at Dean. "They aren't the only ones who can raise the dead."

"What are you getting at, Sam?" Dean asked, over at him worriedly.

"We can always find a crossroads…" Sam said after a moment, keeping his eyes down. "I'm sure there would be plenty of demons that would oblige."

"Sam, no," Dean shook his head. "As soon as Ella or Oshea would come back, they'd kill us themselves for doing something like that."

"They'd never have to know. When it came time for us to … to pay the bill we could just leave. Say we had to do something and it would look like we got killed on a job or something." Sam lifted his shoulders. "And besides even if they did find out… wouldn't you rather have them alive? Dean, they're being tortured in Hell."

"Sam, just sto-"

"Oh forget it, Dean. Its perfectly fine if you do it to bring me back, but anyone else isn't worth it?" He stood up and made for the door, throwing it open and slamming it closed behind of himself.

xx

It was 2:52 am, and Dean was wide awake, channel surfing on the motel room's small television's cable channels. He was sipping on a Coca-Cola that he had gotten from the vending machine outside the motel earlier, when he heard the door creak open quietly. Sam staggered into the room obviously hiding something in his coat as he stumbled over to his bed. Dean arched a brow as he propped himself up by his elbows. "Uh, Sammy?"

Sam looked up at Dean and flopped down onto the end of his bed. There was a small mew from he coat and he pulled out a pure white kitten with blue eyes. He shed his coat and held the little cat against his chest, stroking it's head as he gave a little hiccup.

"Sam?" Dean said again, raising his eyebrows. "Would you mind explaining to me why there's a kitten in our motel room?"

"Cause…," Sam said, his voice slurred. "Because its white and pure… and I named it Cas… it reminds me of Castiel b-before I broke him…" He said before giving a little half sob.

Dean stared at Sam for a good ten seconds before he shook his head. "You're drunk. You're usually a happy drunk though, but… this… this is just sad."

"I'm not d-drunk," Sam said as he stroke the kitten's fur. "Not…dr-drunk. I'm… I mean… my girlfriend just got blown sky high.. And I find out she's getting her skin ripped off in Hell and… and there's nothing I can d-do about it… and I hurt one of m-my friends… Cas is hungry…"

Dean rolled his eyes and stood up from the bed. "Sorry to break it to you, Sammy, but yeah, you're drunk. And 'Cas' is going back outside where you found him."

"No… no, Cas has to stay here." Sam said, looking up at Dean. He stood up and swayed, still clinging to the kitten. "I have to… take care of it… I promised….. Cas doesn't want to leave…"

"Whatever Sam, I'm tired, we'll talk about the cat problem in the morning when you're sober. Go to bed." Dean said, rolling his eyes as he walked to the bed and crawled on top of the covers.

Just as he laid down on the bed, his phone began to ring. He moved his hand over to the nightstand, pulling the phone off it and flipping it open without bothering to check the caller-id. "It is three in the morning, for crying out loud," He groaned. "This better be important."

"Don't get an attitude with me, you idjit." Bobby grumbled. "I have some news for you about angel boy."

Dean sighed. "Sorry, just, there's some stuff going on here involving a drunk Sam and a kitten named Castiel. Ugh, don't ask. So what's up?"

"A kitten?" Bobby questioned arching a brow. "Uh… well, we kind of have a little problem, Dean. Apparently Sam really knocked Castiel for a loop. He's in a coma, and the doctors say there's most likely been some neurological damage… some memory loss."

"Memory loss? Crap," He turned over on his back, and then sat up in bed. "Do they know when he's going to wake up?"

"No, they don't. Could be couple days, could be couple weeks, years." Bobby said with a little sigh. "I think he'll bounce back quickly. His angel mojo will come back eventually and when that happens, he should be good as new."

"True. Well, give us a call if you find anything else out," Dean said, glancing over at Sam in the corner of his eye, noticing he had passed out, snoring loudly, with the kitten curled up on his chest.

"Will do. Now what is this about Sam and a kitten?"

"Sam came in drunk hiding a white kitten under his coat," Dean sighed. "Named it Castiel, says he has to take care of it."

"Isn't he normally a happy drunk?" Bobby said as he sat down in the chair by a small table in Castiel's hospital room. "Anyway… you need to keep him away from the wildlife and the nightlife. You both have to concentrate on this case. It's serious."

"Will do. We're hopefully gonna get a good nights rest, settle out this kitten thing in the A.M., then start on the whole Banshee thing. We're already in town."

"Good. If you boys need anything, I'm just a phone call away. Dean… are you okay? You know… if you want to talk about anything… I'm here. I've only got my books and captain comatose here to keep me company at the moment."

"Thanks Bobby," Dean said, then quickly flipped the phone closed, putting it back on the nightstand. Talking about stuff wasn't exactly Dean's strong suit, and he planned to keep it that way.