After Crowley and Co. vacated the premises, Sam was left, as the King of Hell so kindly pointed out, completely alone, feeling for once rather ungainly and somehow lopsided without his brother at his side. He absently paced and scanned the room, his body automatically searching every corner for signs of his brother and the lost angel, although his mind was already well past that point. He knew that they were in Purgatory, or wherever place they sent Dick Roman to, he knew it instinctively, the same way a child knows to seek warmth and safety and to avoid darkness and danger. But a more pressing matter, if indeed any matter could be more pressing than the loss of his brother, was what to do about the newly- leaderless Leviathans, and what to make of Crowley's kidnapping of the prophet.

There was no question that Supocorp needed to be blown to smithereens, needed it like a newborn calf needs milk. Sam had delegated this particular act of terrorism to an acquaintance of his from his days as a soulless hunter. The guy had learned not to question Sam's requests before, so Sam was spared from having to explain the entire situation and its complexities. Trusting his mercilessness absolutely, it was enough for him to know that Sam deemed the place a risk.

As for the prophet, his abduction by the denizens of Hell only solidified Sam's conviction that the boy was important_ for what, he wasn't sure. He had thought that following the failed Apocalypse, prophecy had ended, but that apparently wasn't the case. Did that mean that the script he himself had helped tear up and throw away was illusory? And what was in Kevin's destiny that made it so important for Crowley to possess him, to even take an interest? This highly unusual action wasn't made out of pettiness_ he considered revenge justly served when Dean and Castiel disappeared into Purgatory. What, then? Sam knew that Crowley was motivated primarily by the acquisition or preservation of power. Almost exclusively, in fact. But with the angels almost all dead and the Leviathans under control, he had full run of the planet again… what power could Kevin give him that he didn't have before? Or what threat did he pose to his personal empire? Other than having a direct link to God… which couldn't be it, of course, because Castiel's brief deification proved that God was a danger to no one, if nothing else.

Sam was at a loss. If Dean were there, he would have urged him on, saying that why Crowley wanted something wasn't so important as keeping him from getting it. But Dean wasn't there, and Sam could already feel the dull horror of that fact settling over him like a dark cloud. How could he rescue his brother and friend, and save the world at the same time?

He could start by getting some sleep. In the morning, he could get the hunters mentioned in Bobby's journal to spread the word on the "new" danger of Leviathan and how to kill them. Then he could find Crowley, and get some answers.

A shifter attacked while Castiel was out getting water. Neither of them realized it at the time, but since Castiel initially searched for safe places for shelter, a lone, starving shifter had crept quietly into the cave they then went to occupy, and hungrily watched the distracted, injured pair as they spoke near the entrance. When the angel had been gone for some time, the shifter thought it time to appear. Meal, it thought desperately, walking immediately outside of the cave, where the human was diligently whittling sticks into pointy stakes.

Feeling a presence by his side, Dean looked up into shockingly blue eyes. "I've got plenty of wooden stakes set up here, dunno how much protection that's gonna be," he said unhappily. "'Least this knife here's good for something. How're things with you? You get water?"

The shifter panicked for a moment, seeing the sharp knife the human was brandishing about, but it managed to get its emotions under control to reply. "No, I have been unsuccessful," it said, testing out the gravelly voice of the angel.

"Pity," Dean said, turning back to the stakes, and then to the entrance of the cave. "Guess we're camping out then."

"Not you," the starving shifter replied, before attacking.

Castiel returned to find Dean furiously, and vainly trying to hack away at a shifter. However, this wasn't working out so well, as the knife Dean had in his possession was made of simple steel, and was thus ineffective against shifters. Concerned, Castiel snuck around the shifter's back, and, when Dean nodded, reached around to put his palm on its forehead, proceeding to kill it.

"Bastard looked just like you," Dean said, kicking the shifter's head.

"I noticed."

"We can't do this. If we're not with each other 24/7… and we have no silver to test each other with."

"I could see the shifter's true form."

"Well, I couldn't!"

Castiel shut up at that, and they returned to the cave's interior, where they scoured it for signs of any other monster inhabitants. Once they felt sufficiently safe, Dean greedily slurped water stored inside another Ziplock bag Cas found in his coat, while the angel remained silent, thoughtfully staring at the featureless stone of the cave wall. Regarding Dean's shadow, he thought briefly of Plato, and his mouth twitched into an almost- smile which all too quickly dropped from his face. This was not the time.

"Dean. We cannot afford to be constantly wary of whether or not the other is a monster. We should have a quick and effective method of determining whether one or the other of us is indeed real." he said somberly, continuing to look at the wall. He was worried about their situation and in particular about Dean. How would they survive? How could he possibly protect him?

"Thought you didn't have to worry about that," Dean said, bitterly looking at the floor. He resented feeling useless. Castiel himself felt helpless in the face of that emotion.

"You do. But I think I know of a way. Monsters can't understand Enochian."

Dean blinked. "Sorry? Didn't the Whore know it? She almost exorcised you, and she's a monster."

"The Whore never did have a true understanding of the language. She's old enough to have accumulated the words to kill us, or to mock our commands, but not anything more than that."

"Well, hate to break it to ya, but I don't understand it either. Hell, I flunked eighth-grade Spanish."

"I could teach you."