All the chapter names are anagrams, if you haven't already figured that out.
- has to pilfer -
Okay, so bringing Castiel into the pet store probably hadn't been the best idea in the world. But really, it wasn't as if Dean had any other choice. Sam was off doing God knows what God knows where, and after everything with Balthazar, Dean needed to find something to make the angel stop moping around every time they called on him. He knew things weren't exactly prospering in heaven, but as long as Cas kept up this wounded general routine, he wasn't sure how he was supposed to help.
"I don't know, Cas. We- we humans just like having pets. They're like- substitute friends," Dean said with exasperation. The former angel stared back at him blankly.
"But why do they cage the animals? They are God's creatures and they are meant to be cared for, not…" A small child across the room pressed her face to the glass of a fish tank and tapped loudly, giggling when the fish fled the vibrations. "Ogled," Cas finished morosely.
Dean pulled a face. "I give up. I'm going to go look for the whatever it is Sam told me to look for, and you can just…" He glanced at Cas, who was staring petulantly at the small child. "Just don't get in any trouble," he finished shortly, abandoning him next to the ferrets.
Somehow he knew he shouldn't be leaving a vigilante of heaven alone in a store filled with shiny glass cages and bird food, but there was nothing he could do. Sam said he needed fresh worms for some freaky hoodoo magic crap he was whipping up, and seeing as Sam was nowhere to be found, it fell to Dean to collect them. He wasn't sure why a pet store would be selling worms, but he didn't really care. He just wanted to get this over with. Pet stores gave him the creeps, anyway.
Eventually he came across the fish section, and then the refrigerator where all the live bait was kept. Before anyone could witness him, he plucked a couple containers from inside, quickly shutting it and walking away. He swore he had seen a busty brunette by the dog food section, and he wanted to make good on that smirk she had given him.
Unfortunately, he never made it past the cat beds. As he turned the corner, he came face to face with an unpleasantly familiar morose smirk.
"Hello, Dean. Miss me?"
Dun dun dun dun.