Not Exactly Ovid

by ErtheChilde

When Castiel mysteriously disappears the night Dean is reunited with Sam, the brothers hit the road to find answers. But the Apocalypse was not as neatly tied up as they hoped, & pursuit by enemies forces them into "supernatural witness protection". Along the way, new truths come to light, Dean re-evaluates his relationship with Cas & Sam seeks redemption. [short arcs now long eps]

14. 6x07 - Sweet Child O' Mine

Seven

Abandoned Warehouse
Brookline, Boston
Friday 11 June, 2010

"We have to go."

Sam started at the hard note in his brother's voice. It was the same one Dean used when cops or demons were about to corner them; serious enough that Sam's preoccupation with trying to dodge Sarah's questions suddenly became moot.

"Why?" he asked, even though he was already prepared to head out of the building without an explanation. Castiel had appeared by their side as well, wrapping his bleeding hand with the still unstained part of his flannel shirt. He, too, was watching Dean expectantly.

"What's going on?" Sarah asked, glancing at all three of them in turn. The question was different from the ones she had been assaulting Sam with, like she could tell that there was something not quite right. For a moment, Sam admired how adaptable her mind was to sudden changes in the status quo, before his attention was drawn back to his brother.

Dean's expression was undergoing several subtle changes in front of Sam's eyes, moving from panicked to guilty to angry and back, before he ground out quietly, "It's Ben."

Sam tensed up. He knew what the kid meant to his brother. "What about him?"

"Who's Ben?" Sarah probed.

"I just got a message from Lisa," Dean went on, distractedly dragging his hand down his face and trying to keep his expression from lingering too long in the guise of panic. "The kid's missing."

Sam felt like ice had been poured into his stomach, and barely heard Sarah ask who Lisa was.

"Old girlfriend," Dean answered shortly, automatic, either not noticing or not caring about the look of shock and confusion on her face. Sarah's gaze flitted from Dean to Castiel, like she was trying to figure something out, and then fell on Sam, obviously expecting him to clarify what his brother meant.

Things were happening too fast for Sam to even know what to say to her. He forced himself to triage the problems as they came; right now, Dean's problem was a little higher on the list than Sarah's. "I'm sure he's okay. Has he been missing long? Maybe he just went to a friend's house or something and didn't tell her?"

"She didn't say," Dean said, frustrated, "And I can't even call to ask because…" The worry morphed into blind rage for a second. "Goddamn it." He lashed out, like he was about to throw his phone into the concrete, and was stopped only by Castiel reaching out and steadying his hand.

"That will not help," he said gravely.

"It'll fucking make me feel better," Dean spat, trying to pull free. Castiel's grip remained determined. "If I didn't look like this, I could –"

"If you retained your original form, you could not even go to their aid without endangering them," Castiel told him reasonably. "Now at least you have the option of doing so. That has its own complications, but they are complications we can plan for."

There was a long moment where Castiel and Dean exchanged a look, an entire silent conversation that Sam felt weirdly excluded from, and then Dean nodded. He pulled away from Castiel, this time more gently, and the ex-angel let him go.

"Fine," he said. "Let's go. We've got to pack up our shit and blow this town."

He was already striding toward the exit of the building, and after a pause, Castiel followed him.

"What just happened?" Sarah demanded, and Sam was forcibly reminded of her presence. She was following Dean with her eyes, and then shot Sam another inquisitive look. "Where are we going?"

"Indiana," he said with a sigh, taking one last look around the building to ensure they hadn't left anything behind that the needed, and then starting after Dean.

"Indiana?" she repeated. "But that's a fourteen hour drive!" Her voice rose in confusion and something like frustration. "What's going on, Jane?"

Sam winced, and then replied evasively, "It's complicated."

"Un-complicate it," she ordered.

"Can we please not do this right now?" Sam implored as they exited the building and headed to the corner of the industrial lot where the Charger had been parked.

"No. I'm not going anywhere until you tell me what the hell is going on."

"Then stay here," Dean's voice drifted back, not halting in his stride. "I didn't want you along in the first place."

"Come on –!" Sam protested, while Sarah made an offended sound deep in her throat. Sam had always known his brother wasn't exactly on-board with Sarah's presence, but even panicked he usually had more tact than that.

"This is not the time for this," Castiel murmured quietly, again placing a hand on Dean's shoulder. Dean paused, breathing rapidly, continued to glare at an adamant looking Sarah, then at Sam. Sam shot him a pleading glance, but for once found no sympathy there.

"No, you know what? You're right. This isn't the time," Dean snapped, this time shrugging Castiel's hand away and rounding on Sam. "I faked being cool with this before, not saying anything." Alarm bells began to sound in Sam's head as his brother continued to train angry eyes on him. "I agreed to leave this to you, but dude, for someone who's all about honesty and sharing your wussy girl feelings, you suck at telling the truth."

"Don't – !" Sam tried, but Dean was talking over him, turning back to Sarah.

"You want to know what's going on? Fine. But remember, you asked for it," he went on, meeting Sarah's gaze unflinchingly. "Dicksmack here's been pussying out of telling you for days now."

"Telling me what?" Sarah wanted to know, eyes flicking from him to Sam.

"The truth about who we are."

"Not here," Sam hissed, looking around. "Anyone could –"

"I'm Dean," his brother said, and jabbed a finger at Sam, "and that's Sam. As in Winchester. As in the same guys you met in New Paltz a few years back."

" – hear," Sam finished lamely. He chanced an appraising glance in Sarah's direction.

Her expression didn't change, although there was a subtle clench to her jaw now and her eyes had turned hard. "Yeah, that's a nice try, but I was being serious. Tell me what's going on."

"That's the nitty-gritty of it," Dean said, spreading his arms wide, a wild look in his eyes. "Our lives are screwed up, all of the time, because we're Sam and Dean Winchester – the Universe's butt-monkeys."

"Dean," Castiel objected, reproachful.

"Stop it!" Sarah yelled, twin spots of red appearing on her cheeks. "This isn't funny!"

"Damn straight it's not funny," Dean agreed. "In fact, there are people's lives on the line! My – there's a kid's life on the line – and you want us to drop everything and have a share-and-care session to bring you up to speed."

"Look, what we're trying to say," Sam interjected, still trying to salvage the direction of this conversation, "is that things are complicated. And I wanted to ease you into it, not just blurt it out because it's kind of a lot to take."

Sarah crossed her arms, lips pursed, but her stance couldn't hide the way she had started to go pale, or the way her eyes flitted back and forth between them. "So you're saying…?"

"I am Sam," he sighed, because there wasn't anything else to say. "And that is Dean. And there's a lot we need to tell you, but now really isn't the time. We need to get to Lisa's."

Sarah remained silent for half a second, and then shook her head. Her eyes were bright with anger and frustration, looking exactly like she had looked four years before. "No. Sam and Dean – they're guys. I knew them – I know Sam was a guy – and you're not – you aren't them, because that's just…just…?"

"As crazy as a haunted painting?" Sam offered softly. "Or being best friends with a couple of witches?" Sarah bit her lip and he continued, "A few days ago you didn't know angels were real or that pagan gods existed."

"But this…but you…" she trailed off, gesturing to Sam's body like she couldn't even find the words. Probably she couldn't.

"As emotional as you having an epiphany right now is, we need to hit the road," Dean interrupted, words still laced with anger, but his body language conveyed discomfort. "Now get in the car or don't, but we're leaving here in thirty seconds either way."

Sam thought he caught a kind of pained or panicked expression on Dean's before he turned abruptly and started back toward the car.

The sudden change in mood was odd. Usually Dean would work himself into a much more violent frenzy before tiring himself out.

'Something's up,' Sam thought as Dean threw himself into the car. 'Something more than being worried about Ben and Lisa.'

Castiel hung back a moment, offering Sarah a sympathetic look.

"I am glad you know the truth," he told her genuinely. "We have not known each other long, but you are an ally. I did not enjoy participating in this charade. It was…unpleasant."

He nodded to himself, and joined Dean – in the shotgun, Sam noticed abstractly.

Sarah stared in the car's direction, unseeing, and then looked back at Sam with an undecipherable gleam in her eyes. "I'm not getting in that car with you."

"You want to wait around here for that angel to get back?" Sam asked quietly, ignoring the sharp stab at her tone of voice. "Because she knows what you look like now. At least let us bring you back to the inn and get you some protections."

Sarah opened her mouth, maybe to argue, and then pursed her lips. Squaring her shoulders, she marched toward the Charger.

There wasn't much else Sam could do after that but follow, climbing in next to her. He tried not to notice how valiantly she tried to stay as far to her side of the backseat as possible.

The drive was the most awkward of Sam's life. That included the uncomfortable thirty minutes he had spent with Dean in the back of the Impala in 1978 while his father and mother staunchly refused to speak to each other.

"Ten minutes," Dean told them when they pulled into the inn parking lot, barely pausing to turn the engine off before he was hurrying across the lot. His gait was odd, but that's all Sam allowed himself to think of as he climbed out of the Charger's back seat.

He studiously avoided looking at Sarah, while Castiel murmured something about going to see if Dean was alright.

The short walk up the room was tense, and even after Sam let himself into their shared accommodations Sarah remained quiet. It wasn't until he noticed that he was the only one going through their things – haphazardly throwing shirts and bras into whatever bag was closest while he looked for something to make up a hexbag with – that he noticed that she was frozen in the doorway.

Pausing, in his work, he tentatively asked, "Sarah?"

"We were sharing a room," she said dully, not really looking at him. "You…I've been walking around half-naked in here for two days in front of a guy."

It was kind of a silly thing to focus on, he thought, and perhaps that's why he tried to brush it off as a bit of a joke, "To be fair, it's not like I never saw it before."

He had just a second to wonder when the hell he had started sounding like his brother before she was suddenly in his personal space, eyes cracking furiously.

The slap that followed was more than just a stinging sensation, and he felt his head fly to one side; she had put a decent amount of strength into the blow.

"That's for lying to me," she told him firmly, and then before he could recover she hauled back and punched him in the face. He heard, before he felt, his nose break, and his vision went white for a second. "And that's…for being a dick."

"Holy shit, ow," he wanted to moan, but it came out garbled, sounding more like ,"Hrgh."

Sarah swore, cradling her hand and doing an odd little hop like she was trying to relieve the pain somehow. "Damn it, I always forget how much that hurts…"

Sam tactfully didn't say anything.

As he carefully snapped his nose back into place – Jesus, where had she learned to hit? He was surprised it hadn't shattered – Sarah crossed the room and entered their bathroom. She returned with two small face towels and a businesslike expression on her face. As Sam watched, she opened their mini fridge and hauled out the container of ice he had placed there the day before; standard hunt procedure required there to be lots of ice around.

"You okay?" he finally asked, tentative, as she scooped the ice into the towels.

"You don't get to ask me that," she replied, thrusting one of the ice-laden clothes at him while pressing the other into the bruised knuckles of the hand she'd used to hit him.

Sam took her warning with a grain of salt; it wasn't like he didn't deserve it. Still, he had hoped to have a conversation with her about this, not simply drop the bomb and then move on.

There was a sharp rap against the open door, and they both looked up to see Dean.

"Just paid the late check-out – are you two over your snit?" he wanted to know, striding into the room. He paused at the sight of Sam holding the bloody towel full of ice up to his face. Instead of commenting on it, he eyed Sarah, "I need to talk to you."

"About what?" she asked, stiffly.

"Not about this," Dean retorted coolly, gesturing loosely between her and Sam.

"Can't Castiel help you?" she replied, just as coolly and still glaring at Sam.

"No," Dean said shortly, and there was enough of a discordant note in that answer that Sam finally ceded the staring contest to Sarah and glanced over at his brother. Dean was standing stiffly, uncomfortable and with a frown on his face like he was in pain.

"Dean?" Sam asked, ignoring how relieved he felt not having to use their fake names around Sarah anymore.

His brother was ignoring him.

"Look, I was all for telling you, he's the one who kept chickening out," Dean snapped, staring Sarah down and sounding desperate. "But I need your help right now – you want to yell at me while you're helping, I can take it, but are you coming or not?"

There was a beat.

"Fine," Sarah said finally, grabbing her purse and leaving the room without looking back at Sam. Sam got up to follow, but Dean stopped him with a hand on his chest.

"Go help Cas finish packing," he ordered. "Dude hasn't figured out our system yet."

"What's going on?" Sam wanted to know. "Why do you need Sarah?"

"So not your business," Dean replied. At Sam's unimpressed look, Dean added with an irritated sigh, "Look, I promise not to leave your girlfriend in a dumpster. I just need her help with something and we'll be back. Ten minutes tops."

"That's what you said ten minutes ago when you gave us ten minutes to pack," Sam muttered sourly.

"Deal with it," Dean told him unkindly and stalked out as well.

Sam stared at the empty door frame, completely nonplussed over what had just happened.

(*)

Dean wanted to die.

And that wasn't just a euphemism for being so embarrassed he would prefer death to what his borrowed body was currently putting him through – he literally wanted to curl up and expire.

He'd endured gunshot wounds that had hurt less than the painful, fiery ache that had ensconced itself in the place below his navel (he was not even going to think the word 'womb', because fuck no).

Beside him, Sarah walked in stony silence. Her presence was clearly due more to her need to get away from Sam than to actually help him, but he intended to exploit that need right now.

He couldn't believe what was happening to him. At the same time, he wondered how he had missed the signs. His temper had been so much shorter than usual, and he'd been so fucking horny the past few days!

That sensation was gone now, replaced by a constant feeling of irritation and a persistent cramping sensation in his pelvic and lower back areas. When it had started that morning he had passed it off as lingering aches and pains from his encounter with the witches in New York, and during the stand-off with the angels he's blamed it on his cramped hiding space.

He'd been able to completely ignore it right up until the point when he'd received Lisa's voicemail.

And hadn't that been a heart-stopper?

The same urgency that filled his veins when Sam was missing, or Cas, had come upon him then, and for one complete moment he'd felt nothing but terror.

He knew Sam had picked up on it, but that that was the extent of his brother's intuition. Sam didn't understand – as far as he knew, Ben was just a kid whose mother Dean happened to like. But after what Lisa had said to him on their last visit, Dean knew differently. And as much as he had refused to think about it for the past weeks, it was knowledge that kept creeping up on him in his few quiet moments, refusing to disappear.

And then, like the universe was conspiring to make today a crapshoot of a day no matter what he did, he had felt the trickle of wetness in between his thighs while Sam was busy stuttering through his explanations to Sarah.

He'd been momentarily distracted by it, bewildered because the encounter with the bitchy angel had been far from the most traumatising thing to ever happen to him, and Ben being missing may have been frightening, but not enough for him to piss his pants. Dean was the guy who had stared Death in the face – literally – without that happening, so what the hell?

His confusion was probably the reason he had been so short with Sarah; he understood her frustration at being lied to. He had more than enough personal experience with his brother's dishonesty, after all. He probably might have been more willing to have a sit-down discussion about it, Sam-style, if his brain hadn't been entirely focussed on the possibility of Ben being hurt or worse, as well as the growing dampness in his underwear.

By then he'd suspected –no, realized, after he counted backward in his head – what was happening to him.

What followed had been the most uncomfortable drive in his life – right up there with bussing a pissed off Ellen Harvelle and her daughter back to Nebraska or sitting silently while the John and Mary Winchester of 1978 tried to out-silence each other – as he sped back to the inn without any regard for traffic lights or signs. Sam had been so caught up in his drama with Sarah that he hadn't even bitched, and thankfully Cas didn't know any better yet.

Dean had practically thrown himself into the bathroom of his and Cas's room without a word of explanation to his friend, hoping against hope –

'Really? Of all fucking times to happen?'

There had been blood smeared in his underwear and across his inner thighs, like he had been stabbed or something, and he had stared at it for a long time – probably longer than the ten minutes he had given Sam and Sarah to get their things together. It had taken just that long to compute what he was seeing. Even then, he hadn't been able to accept it.

His mind had kept flashing back to health class, a lifetime before. In theory, he knew what he had to do. Hell, the commercials on television dealing with feminine hygiene outnumbered sports ads these days, but he hadn't been able to make himself move.

Dean knew the basic rules of upkeep for a female body, both through observation and the last few weeks of literally hands-on experience. But the actual practice of dealing with…God, he couldn't even think the word. It was just too weird to consider in conjunction with himself!

'First breasts and now this,' he had thought as he glared at himself in the mirror, eyeing his borrowed form in distaste, pants still hauled down around his knees. The ache in his abdomen had gotten worse and he had felt a sharp, drying sensation behind his eyes. 'Oh, fuck me, if I start to cry I really will have to kill myself.'

Cas had knocked on the door, then, wanting to know if he was alright, and Dean had forced himself into action. Meticulously, like he was stitching up a fatal wound, he had fit wads of cheap motel toilet paper into his underwear. He had been grateful that he was wearing dark pants for once and not his jeans as he left the bathroom and told Cas to finish packing without him. He had decided he would change the spoiled underwear when he got back.

Or burn it.

The ex-angel hadn't been an option to get help from – he would probably spout something biblical or biological, knowing him – and Sam would have just mocked him – 'Until the bitch goes through it himself,' Dean had thought with vindictive humour – and Sarah –

'Well, she's pissed off as hell, but she's done this before.'

He had watched his eyes narrow in the mirror, and the decision had been made.

Except now that they were nearing the Walgreens a block away from the inn, he couldn't quite get the words to come out about what he needed. Every time he tried to speak, fresh horror and disgust washed over him.

He hated his body doing things without telling him.

He ignored the way her angry expression took on confused tones as he led her inside the drugstore and the question she was trying to ask as he marched to the aisle he was looking for and then came to a stop.

"Help," he ordered, but his tone sounded feeble and defeated even as he gestured to the rows upon rows of brightly colored plastic packages.

"Help with…?" Sarah asked, and then trailed off as she suddenly made the connection. A look of surprise overtook the combination of stormy anger and confusion. She regarded him carefully. "Really?"

"No, I just felt like taking you on a tour – yes, really," he snapped.

Her eyes went a little wider. "Is this the first time – ?"

"I wouldn't be asking for your help if it wasn't," Dean growled. "You think I want people knowing?"

"Don't jump down my throat, or I won't help," Sarah told him curtly.

"Fine. But can we get it over with? More important things to do today."

"Right," Sarah agreed, crossing her arms. "The thing with this Lisa person."

It was a statement, but there was question there. Dean clenched his fists, exasperated. "You're really gonna leave me hanging here?"

"Considering how tight-lipped you guys have been with me? I think yeah."

Dean glared. "You became a bitch."

"I had to," she retorted, wandering farther into the aisle and motioning for Dean to follow her. Sulking again for another moment, he finally did. She went on, "So, Lisa – is she really an old girlfriend?"

"Sort of," Dean hedged.

"Sort of?" she repeated, raising an eyebrow. Dean pressed his lips together, no intention of playing that far into her hands, and she shrugged, pointing at one particular shelf. "I'd suggest going with pads your first time. Tampons are really uncomfortable. It's like having something shoved up your –"

"Okay – hello, too much info!" Dean protested. "Just stick to the basics, okay?"

"Fine," she said, although Dean was sure he saw the corner of her mouth tug slightly upward.

"You're enjoying this," he accused.

"A little," she replied. After a pause, she asked, "Has your brother gone through this yet?"

Dean didn't comment on the fact that she was avoiding Sam's name, instead shaking his head. "If he has, I don't know about it. Thank God."

"Hm," was all she said, and then grabbed a few different brands of the brightly colored packages. She shoved them into his hands. "These are all basically the same, just different sizes. You don't want anything too big, or you'll feel like you're walking around in a diaper, and anything too small is going to leak."

"What about…they talk about them in the commercials," Dean hedged. "To make them stay put?"

He refused to meet her eyes.

"Wings?" Sarah asked. "Stay away from those. All they do is get adhesive tape stuck to parts of you you'd rather they didn't. Trust me when I say it's not fun to peel off."

Dean stared down at the packages, frozen completely outside of his comfort zone. His panic was probably evident, because Sarah's still closed expression softened somewhat. "Are you okay?"

It was a little sad how tempting it was to want to burst into tears, but thankfully something of his true self was holding strong, because he simply shook his head and made a quick decision about which package of pads he'd be taking. There'd been a fuckload of blood when he looked, so he wasn't taking any chances…

He hesitated again, glancing around, and then cleared his throat. Tentative, he asked, "Can you…?"

He couldn't even form the words.

"Can I…?" she prompted.

"Look, I'll give you the money after," he said hurriedly, avoiding her gaze again, "but could you just…?"

Realization flickered in her eyes. "You want me to buy them for you."

"Well, I can't buy them," Dean maintained. "I've already sunk pretty far having to go trolling for lingerie. But this? I just can't, okay? It's like throwing in the towel. I need to retain some semblance of male pride."

It was a measure of just how bad things were that the look of pity in her eyes didn't piss him off the way it normally would have. Instead, she nodded and took the pads from him, heading for the checkout. While they waited for the cashier to get to them, Dean reached for an economy-sized bag of peanut M&Ms.

"Don't judge," he told her when she shot him a questioning look.

"Sure you don't want some Midol too?"

"Bite me."

They were well on their way back to the inn before Dean decided to throw her a bone, a measure of gratitude for her cooperation.

"It was kind of a weekend thing, like, ten years ago," he told her, keeping his tone casual.

It raised his estimation of her that, like Sam and Cas, she could pick up on the direction of his thinking with ease.

"And Ben?" she prompted.

"Is her kid."

"A kid you really care about."

He met her shrewd look with a frown, wondering how much she suspected, and then shrugged noncommittally.

"So what do you think happened?" she inquired.

"Whatever it was, it was probably my fault," Dean answered before he meant to, and then frowned at her, "and that's all I'm gonna say. I don't do the sharing and caring thing, that's Sam's deal."

"Apparently not," Sarah muttered darkly.

Dean snorted mirthlessly. "Yeah, okay, point. But believe it or not, you're far from the first person he's 'neglected' to be honest with. Though to be fair to me, this little white lie? Really not a big deal on the Apocalyptic scale of things."

"Why? What did he lie to you about?" she asked.

"Oh, no – no way," Dean said defensively. "I ain't opening that can of worms with a ten foot pole. That's between you and Sam and whatever he decides to tell you."

She pouted. "But I'm asking you."

"Just because we might have had a moment back there?" Dean said, jerking his head back at the drugstore, "Does not mean I go giving away the family secrets. All I need today is for him to be bitching at me because I told you stuff he doesn't want you to know yet. You want to know what went down, you talk to him."

"But –"

"No. If Sam's lying about something, it's because he doesn't want you to get hurt," Dean replied. "That's the only reason he ever lies – and yeah, I'm the first person to say his way of doing things tends to screw shit up, but he never does it because he's settin' out to hurt someone."

Sarah went silent for a full minute, before she spoke again, completely changing the subject.

"So, are you and Cas really…?" she trailed off, looking at him sideways.

"What?" Dean asked, but recognizing the speculation being trained on him his eyes widened. In a more panicked tone than he intended, he yelped, "No! Hell, no! That was a cover! He's just – we're friends."

"Uh-huh," Sarah said, clearly not believing him.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means you don't really act like friends. I mean, you do, but – there's more to it than that."

"Obviously. The guy pulled me out of Hell, remember?"

"So you're together but not married?"

"No! We're not together!" Dean snapped.

"Could have fooled me," she told him. "I mean, when Ja – your brother," she corrected herself, scowling as she did so, " – said he was your husband, I didn't believe him until I saw the way you guys look at each other."

"Then you're seeing things," Dean grunted.

"I don't think so. Because he looks at you like you're more than friends."

"That's because he's trying to see my soul," Dean rolled his eyes. "I've already had that conversation with him, trust me."

"I don't think it's your soul he wants to see," Sarah remarked.

"Look, sister," Dean rounded on her, "whatever you're thinking? It's not that. Seriously, why does everyone on this planet think I either want to screw my brother or my best friend?"

"Maybe because you come off as kind of butch?" Sarah suggested, and then made a face, "People think you want to sleep with Sam?"

"More people than you know," Dean answered grimly, thinking of Becky Rosen and the creepy online fans like her. "Which is both wrong and impossible. I am strictly into chicks. Who aren't related to me." He clarified firmly. "If you weren't Sam's girl I'd probably have been trying to get into your pants ages ago. Minus the Daddy's-Spoiled-Brat vibe you give off, you're just my type."

He very obviously looked her up and down, objectively enjoying the way her jeans and fitted sweater clung to her form.

"Too bad for you, but you're too much of self-righteous jerk for my tastes," she retorted, pointedly ignoring his stare. Then she made a face. "And why is everyone calling me 'Sam's girl."

"Did you or did you not sleep with him?" Dean asked conversationally.

"That's none of your business!"

"That's a yes," he determined. "Which means you're off-limits. Like I said, if I had got there first, it'd be another story."

"That's…that's so…" she struggled with the words, looking furious.

"Male?" he suggested, hoping he didn't sound as eager out loud as he did in his head.

"Sleazy," she supplied, disgust in her tone.

"To-may-to, to-mah-to," he shrugged. "If you're put off by something like that, you are not going to like what Sam's going to tell you…you know, if he decides to tell you."

Sarah tensed a little, and in a low voice, she asked, "Why?"

Dean stopped walking, and when she noticed, Sarah followed suit. The inn was just in their sights, and he didn't particularly want to continue this discussion when they got there.

"This is not me telling you anything," Dean insisted flatly. "This is me just warning you. Sam – and me – we've both done some serious shit since the last time you met us. And not the usual brand of wrong, either. More than ninety-nine percent of it? Not proud of. But we're getting over it – most of it. Sam's my brother, so what the hell else am I going to do but forgive him? But you ? You've got no reason to."

"But – " she started to protest.

"Not done," he cut her off. "You've got no reason to be sticking around here. What we're trying to do? We're probably going to die doing it. If the past four days haven't given you an example of what we do every day, don't worry, there's more. We haven't even scratched the surface of the shit-storm that is our lives."

"Spit out what you're trying to say, Dean," Sarah told him stiffly.

"I'm saying that if you want to get the hell out of here, I wouldn't blame you. Sam wouldn't blame you," Dean said. "Shit, I'd buy you a damn plane ticket. Go back to New York and hang out with your witch pals." He narrowed his eyes. "Because while Sam's an idiot for not telling you the truth? He's dealing with more than you know, and going emo over you isn't something I need to watch. Truth be told, things are getting kind of crowded around here anyway. So if you're thinking about coming along with us – which I really wouldn't recommend – you'd better be willing to let some shit go. We don't have any more room for family drama in that plastic piece of crap we're driving."

There was a long silence, and Dean snatched the bag that Sarah was carrying.

"Now, if we're done with the chick flick moment?" he said loftily, "I just want to get out of here, pretend I'm not bleeding from the crotch, and hit the road."

He continued on to the inn, not bothering to see if Sarah was following him or not.

(*)

Sam was waiting in the room Dean and Cas had shared when Dean returned – alone.

"Where's Sarah?" he demanded, a thousand other questions laden in the one. Dean froze, looking like a deer caught in the headlights, a vaguely guilty and shamed look appearing on his face. "Dean, what did you do?"

"Nothing," Dean said, sidling into the room and trying to surreptitiously hide something behind his back. "She decided she had some stuff to think about – why are you in my room?"

"Giving her space," Sam replied, narrowing his eyes upon the thing Dean was trying to hide. "What's that?"

"Food," Dean said, striding past Sam. Sam caught sight of familiar yellow packaging. "It's gonna be a long drive."

"M&Ms aren't food."

"Maybe in Samantha-land," his brother retorted, striding into the bathroom and closing the door after him. Concerned with Sarah, Sam decided he didn't want to know why his brother was bringing the bag of candy in there with him.

"So what did you need her help with?"

"Didn't," Dean's voice was muffled. "I just figured you needed some time to compose yourself. She got you really good. Broken nose?"

Sam winced, both at the memory and the pain as it flared up again. "Yeah."

"You deserved it."

"Shut up."

The room door opened and Castiel appeared.

"I have finished packing the car according to your 'system'," he said, and Sam half-expected him to be using air quotes with the amount of sarcasm the angel had managed to inject into the statement. "Has Dean returned?"

"Yeah, he's in there," Sam replied, nodding his head to the bathroom.

"We should leave as soon as possible," Castiel said. "If Benjamin Braeden is truly in trouble, it is imperative that we pick up the trail immediately."

"Well, yeah," Sam agreed, somewhat surprised by Castiel's fervor. "But there's no telling who could have him. Anyone who's read the Supernatural books could be a suspect. I mean, I'm not naïve enough to believe only the good guys have access to that."

"You make a good point," Castiel allowed, "however I believe the suspect-pool to be narrower."

Dean left the bathroom, an off look on his face, but Sam ignored it in favor of asking, "Is there anyone specific we're thinking of?"

"The probability of the boy having been abducted by the forces of Heaven or Hell is disproportionately high, especially given his status as a vessel for Michael," the ex-angel mused in a tone that suggested he was trying to be helpful. "No amount of protection would hide him indefinitely, as you both know. It is possible someone managed to circumvent it."

"Yeah, but – wait. What?" Sam's confused argument suddenly ground to a halt as he stared at Castiel, his brain looping over what had just been said. "Ben's a vessel?"

Beside him, Dean tensed so visibly his shoulders seemed to shrug inward.

"Of course," Castiel said, appearing surprised at Sam's confusion. But Sam was already staring over at Dean, who had gone white. There was a flash of that sudden fear in his eyes that Sam had seen earlier that day, and abruptly he understood what it was.

"Did you know?" Sam asked, breathless at the implications.

Dean refused to meet his gaze, instead muttering, "Sort of."

"'Sort of' ?" Sam hissed. "Don't you think this is something you might have wanted to mention?"

"I was trying not to think about it," Dean admitted. "It was too – look, can we not?"

"No, I think we have to," Sam shot back. "You have a kid and you didn't bother mentioning it? How long have you known?"

"A while," Dean admitted.

"But…but you said Lisa had said he wasn't yours," Sam struggled to make sense of the newest bombshell. "I thought you said…tests?"

"Dude, we lie for a living," Dean said, unimpressed, "I think I can tell when someone's trying to con me. But that was the year my deal was coming due. What right did I have to get involved with a kid when I was about to go to Hell?"

"But – but the last time you were there…" Sam protested.

"She didn't say it in so many words, but yeah, it was kind of implied," Dean shrugged.

Sam gaped, unable to come up with anything to say to that. Implications were running through his mind at a mile a minute; most prevalent among them was the sudden guilt that he had once again taken his brother away from the chance at a normal life – with an actual family! – with his return from the Cage.

Dean was as good at reading him as ever, because a look of fierce assurance formed on his face. "Don't even start, Sam. It was my choice to leave, every time. It had nothing to do with you."

"But –"

"No," Dean said firmly. "No 'what if' games. It's too late for that and all it does it fuck us up in the head."

Sam clamped his mouth shut, although he was far from satisfied with this topic. He knew better than to push Dean right now, not when his brother had that crazy look in his eyes that too closely resembled the way he had been before going to offer himself up to Michael.

'Thank God Cas beat some sense into him that day,' Sam thought, not for the first time.

Out loud, he changed the subject.

"So…Ben's a vessel," Sam murmured, still unable to believe it. "I guess that's why people would be after him." He frowned. "Wait, if he was a vessel, why didn't Heaven go after him during the Apocalypse?"

"He was not the right one," Castiel explained. "The prophecy dealing with the End of Days specified that Michael and Lucifer would inhabit vessels that were brothers to one another. It is why Adam fit the prophecy, but Ben remained safe."

"Well, that's something at least," Dean said, grim, but with audible relief.

There was a hesitant knocking sound on the door. All three of them tensed out of reflex, and Sam moved to answer the door.

Sarah was standing outside of the room, her knapsack slung over her shoulder. When she realized it was Sam opening the door, she pointedly looked away from him and eyed Dean.

"I thought you said you wanted to get on the road?" she asked Dean with forced casualness. "We're going to need to head out if you want to get there by tomorrow morning."

Something passed between them, and Sam felt an irrational jealousy before he tamped it down, remembering that Sarah was angry with him for a reason. If she was anything like Jess had been, he was going to be in the doghouse for a while before she spoke to him again.

But the fact that she was there, after everything, waiting to go with them…

"I don't know why we can't just fly," she went on as Dean and Cas got the last of their things together and left the room.

"Oh sweetheart, I don't do planes," Dean said in forced jovialness as he moved past Sam, closely followed by Castiel.

Irrationally, Sam's heart leapt.

Maybe there was still hope.

(*)

"Sammy, can you hear me?' Dean asked, eyes pleading.

"You know, I tried to be nice," he could feel merciless anger coiling up inside him as he moved. The insignificant soul tethered to him tried to stop him, tried to hold him back, but he couldn't quite grab hold. "For Sammy's sake. But you…are such a pain…in my ass."

Lucifer – Sam – was throwing Dean across the windshield of the Impala, which shattered beneath him. Before his brother could recover, Sam's – Lucifer's – hands were clamping around Dean's leg with bone-shattering strength and hauling him off the hood of the car.

Lucifer punched Dean, hard, making him spit up blood. Sam screamed a wordless howl of fear, and anger and hurt, trying to get the Devil to stop –

"Sammy? Are you in there?" Dean murmured, dazed but still determined.

"Oh, he's in here all right," Sam – Lucifer – hissed, punching Dean again. "He's gonna feel the snap of your bones." He lashed out again, causing Dean to fall to the ground. "Every single one." He hauled Dean up again, smiling unpleasantly. "We're gonna take our time."

Again and again he hauled his fist back and ploughed it into his brother's face, relishing in the way muscle and bone gave beneath his. Blood and spit and mucous coated his knuckles, and he paused momentarily to will away the bodily fluids. When he looked up, the swollen and bleeding face was not Dean's.

"Sam, it's okay," Adam choked through a ruined mouth. "I'm here…I'm not gonna leave you…not the way you left me."

Flames flickered at his face and there was a high-pitched screaming noise as Sam brought his hand back up to land the final blow –

Sam jolted awake, only managing to turn his shout of "No!" into a pained groan as the darkened interior of the Charger came into focus. He was breathing rapidly, cold sweat lingering on his neck and down his back.

"Are you okay?"

The question was surprising, not least of all because it came from the person who was supposedly avoiding talking to him and who, the last time he had checked, had been sitting in the backseat.

Sarah's eyes flitted from the road to him and back, a vague hint of concern hidden in her otherwise guarded expression.

Sam didn't answer right away, his faculties momentarily confused by the dream. Instead, he maneuvered himself into a sitting position and glanced in the back.

Dean was huddled in the seat behind him, face pressed toward the window and eyes closed; soft breathing suggested he was asleep. His arms were crossed tightly over his midsection, and he was practically wrapped up in Dad's jacket, which hung so loosely from Dean's borrowed form that he looked almost childlike in it.

Beside him, Castiel was gazing out at the passing darkness with a thoughtful look on his face.

A week ago, they had discovered that the former angel tended to be a little car sick during long drives. After a rather close mishap and emergency stop at the side of the highway, Dean and Sam had tried to convince him that looking at the passing scenery was probably not a good idea.

"Admiring the beauty of my Father's world is the only advantage to travelling by automobile," Castiel had replied placidly.

Sam knew he hadn't meant to offend, but Dean had had a sour look on his face the rest of that morning. Driving was a huge chunk of his life, after all.

Which led to the current interesting conundrum.

"Why are you driving?" Sam asked blankly, facing forward again.

Sarah frowned, and her tone became cool again. "Because I can?"

"No, I mean –"

"I know what you mean," she cut him off. "Dean was having a moment – and considering I'd like to get wherever we're going alive, I convinced him to catch a few hours of sleep – to try to relax a bit."

Sam couldn't help staring at her.

"You 'convinced' him?" he repeated. "How?"

Even when he wasn't driving the Impala, Dean put up enough of a grudging fuss whenever Sam offered to take a driving shift. But handing over the keys to a stranger?

'Not that Sarah's a stranger – not really,' he amended, shooting her a hesitant look that she ignored. 'But that's right up there with saying 'no' to a fresh baked piece of pie, in Dean-land.'

"Maybe you haven't noticed, but he's going through some stuff right now," Sarah said reproachfully, and Sam held himself back from the sharp reply. The passive aggressive tactic was one he had learned to tread carefully around with Jess.

Instead, he replied, "Yeah, I know. This thing with Ben…"

He trailed off, not even sure where to go with that.

He'd seen Dean on edge more times than he could count, yet the past day had been one of the worst episodes. He'd practically broken Sam's good hand when Sam had tried to turn up the volume on the local news channel as they left Brookline.

"Dean, what the hell?" Sam had demanded, both annoyed and concerned at the same time.

"I have a headache," Dean had answered shortly.

"So? I've seen you drive when you were half-dead and hung over, with the stereo up on panic."

"Not today."

Sam had sighed. "I know you're worried about Ben, but lashing out at me isn't going to make things better."

His brother's expression had closed-off the way it always did when Sam tried to bring up anything related to emotions.

"Sam, do not try to shrink me on this," he had ordered. "When you've gone through it, then you get to be sympathetic."

Which had effectively shut Sam up, because he had no idea when or if he would ever go through having to worry about a kid. Any dreams of having children had died with Jess almost six years before, and he knew he had been careful enough with any of the relationships he'd had since then that the chances of suddenly discovering a secret love child were slim erring on the side of none.

He couldn't even imagine what his brother was going through right now.

In an attempt to distract himself, he reached for the bag of M&Ms by his feet, before he remembered it was empty. He felt slightly guilty – for all of his complaining about Dean's eating habits, Sam had been the one to polish off the bag of candy earlier in the drive.

He sighed inwardly and glanced at the dash; the clock read 1:07. A full two hours had passed since he last looked before falling asleep.

'Last time I'll be doing that for a while,' he thought, shuddering at the memory of his brothers' blood on his hands.

He shifted, and then cleared his throat. "Uh, just so you know? If you need someone to spell you in an hour or two, I'm good. Broken hand's never stopped me driving before."

"Mm-hm," Sarah murmured and Sam frowned for the cold reception.

After another pause, he tried again. "Sarah…"

"Don't," she said, the sentiment strained. "Please."

"But –"

"I can't, Sam," she said, and it was the first time she had actually said his name since finding out their identities. Still, it was laden with such a tired and angry quality that Sam realized he wouldn't be let off the hook any time soon. "Maybe this is just another everyday thing for you and Dean – maybe you guys are so used to weird that it's no sweat to take it in stride and let things go, but…I just can't."

"I know it's weird," Sam agreed, feeling desperate, "I never, ever would have thought being turned into a woman was even possible, let alone –"

"It's not the woman thing," Sarah sighed and Sam started in surprise at that. "I mean, that is weird, don't get me wrong – actually, it's really weird, on a lot of levels, but it's not what…" She ended with an exasperated sigh and went on, "It's that you've been lying to my face since we ran into each other."

"Because you would have reacted so well to me saying, 'Hey, Sarah, it's Sam – you know, the guy you helped exorcise a murderous picture ghost and who you spent the weekend with like million years ago? Ignore the addition of breasts, but how about a coffee sometime?'" he deadpanned.

In the reflection of the windshield he saw her roll her eyes.

"Obviously I'm hoping you might have had more tact than that," she said. "Maybe the morning when I brought you Maggie and Don's spell might have been a good idea to tell me?"

Sam was privately doubtful of that. She wouldn't have taken the news any better then than she had when Dean spilled the beans, but he knew she was still smarting from the fact he had lied.

He shifted uncomfortably, glancing in the back again. Castiel was trying to – and slowly failing to, if his hunched shoulders and drooping eyelids were any indication – fight off sleep. Not paying attention, though, and Dean was still out for the count.

"Look, I'm sorry," Sam finally managed, returning his focus to the woman sitting beside him. "For not telling you before and…because I can't tell you everything you want to know right now."

"Sam –"

"I'm not ready to," he told her firmly. "I can't…explain the past four years in one conversation. Maybe if you'd been there – if you'd been a part of what happened – Dean gets it, Cas too, I think." He shot the ex-angel another look, glad to see Castiel finally had nodded off. He was making a soft snoring noise that was the counter-point to Dean's rhythmic breathing. "But you weren't. To you, it's all going to be just some outrageous story. To me, it's my life. It's the horrible things that I did. And before I can tell you about it, I have to deal with it." The lingering memory of the dream returned to him, and he added in a smaller voice, "I'm just not ready for you to look at me like I'm a monster."

The silence that followed was heavy. In the flickering light of the streetlamps along the highway, Sam saw that Sarah looked torn between trying not to look at him and trying to say something in reply.

Behind them, he heard Castiel murmur something and shift in his sleep.

"I'd get it, you know," he said softly. "If you wanted out of this? I'm actually surprised you decided to stick with us after…everything."

"Just because I'm mad doesn't mean I want out," Sarah sighed, sounding frustrated. "You're the reason…" She trailed off, and then tried again, "I told you this before, but when my Mom died – I completely retreated. From everything. When I first started working for my Dad, I was coming out of it."

There was an emphasis on that word, like she was trying to tell him something without actually verbalizing it.

"After I met you guys, though…it was like all that went away," she confided. "I suddenly had…maybe not purpose, but something I needed to do. And as freaky and scary and downright bizarre as it was, it was the first time in a long time that I was actually happy." She huffed something like a bitter laugh. "So yeah, I'm ticked off that you didn't tell me who you were. To tell you the truth, I'm still ticked off that you disappeared off the face of the planet four years ago without so much as an 'I never want to see you again' text message. But you guys really did me a favor back then. So this is me returning it. It sounds like you guys need it."

Sam let that sink in, and then allowed himself a tentative smile.

"Thanks, Sarah."

"Don't thank me yet," she warned him, her tone returning to that wary, cold edged thing it had been since she found out the truth. "I'm going to have trust issues for a while, and I don't know how that'll affect helping you guys. I'm going to have to take this slow."

He nodded, because that sounded about right. Still, something in him felt unexpectedly lighter.

They went around a long curve, and Sam heard a sudden rustle behind him. Peering in the back, he saw that Castiel had slid sideways until his head was resting against Dean's shoulder. He grinned, the temptation to haul out his camera strong; he decided against it, though.

It had been a long time since he saw Castiel look so serene, and he was never so relaxed when he slept. The guy had to be exhausted – and Dean was stressed over Ben – and so Sam decided to be an awesome brother and take pity.

This time.

(*)

Dean awoke to a warm body curled into his side and hot breath ghosting against his neck.

For a moment he leaned into it, eyes still closed, feeling inexplicably safe and well-rested. The sentiment reminded him of the times when he was a kid and Dad left them alone during hunts. Sam would sometimes have nightmares and climb into bed with Dean, all spidery limbs and clingy hands. Dean would protest and complain, but he'd put up with it in the end.

'Sam didn't smell like cut grass and coffee, though,' he thought vaguely as wakeful alertness returned to him. He blinked his eyes open and turned to his side, freezing when his mouth came within centimeters of brushing Cas's forehead.

His first reaction should have been to shove the guy awake. It was something his body was already trying to do, the arm beneath Cas tensing as he prepared to push his friend off of him. But as he moved, the angle he was at allowed him to see the peaceful expression on the ex-angel's face and he paused.

He knew just how hard it was for Cas to fall into undisturbed sleep. Ruining that seemed counterproductive to the whole speech he had given him yesterday about the importance of rest. After all, if Cas was going to be hunting with them, they would need him at the best his human body could give.

He couldn't help the brief, fond smile that tugged at his lips when the ex-angel frowned at something unseen, and for one full minute contemplated the benefits of just waiting for his friend to wake up. It wasn't like he wasn't comfortable and warm where he was, and it wasn't any different from conking out sprawled next to Sam while watching a Star Wars marathon –

Dean's thoughts ground to a halt as he realized that there was something seriously wrong going on. Because while he was no expert on friendship, he was pretty sure being comfortable enough to practically cuddle with another guy you're not related to was not normal friendship behaviour – hell, it wasn't anywhere even remotely close to Dean Winchester behaviour. And while Cas was – granted, a former angel, and thus as far from normal as possible – unaware of pretty much every socially acceptable behaviour out there, Dean did know better.

Eyes trained on the front of the car, where Sam and Sarah apparently were oblivious of the situation Dean had awoken to, Dean tried to slowly shrug out from under Cas's body. He tried to keep from waking him as he gradually pushed his friend into a sitting position, intent on getting him back on his side of the car.

Instead, Dean lost his grip on him too quickly, and Cas's boneless body slipped down further until he was lying with his head resting on Dean's lap. Dean winced, holding back a curse, because if there was anywhere he wanted Cas less right now it was down in that direction.

Cas's proximity to the part of him that felt bloated and painful was distressing.

He must have let out some kind of noise, because Sam was turning around to look at them. He took in Cas's and Dean's new position with a straight face, one which was betrayed by the amused glint in his eyes.

"Sleep well?" he asked innocently.

"Nair," Dean grunted warningly.

Sam chuckled and turned back around.

Sarah was raising her eyebrows at him in the rear-view mirror with the same pointed look she had used to convince him to hand her over the car keys at the truck stop outside of Pennsylvania.

"Stop bitching and get in the car," she'd told him when he got back from paying for gas and a bunch of sandwiches. He'd already been in a black mood thanks to the leering gas-station attendant and the disgusting state of the women's washroom. Dean had never missed the ability to piss standing up more than he did when it came to having to answer nature's call on a road trip. "You look like you're going to fall over. I'll drive."

"But Sam's in the shotgun," he had protested, even though that had more to do with him not wanting her to tell Sam about Dean's latest source of stress than with Sarah's own comfort zone.

"He's asleep," Sarah had replied, pursing her lips in a way that told Dean she knew exactly what he was worried about and wasn't above using it as blackmail.

"If it were my car, you wouldn't be bossing me around," he'd finally said as he climbed into the backseat behind the shotgun, earning a perplexed look from Cas; even the damn angel had known there was something off about him ceding control of the car so easily.

Said angel was now waking up, it seemed, because he had begun to nestle closer into Dean's lap, but then suddenly went rigid, like his brain had caught him up to speed on events. Dean could practically hear the realization dawning on him, and within a second, Cas was sitting up and leaning away, practically pressing himself into the other passenger door.

"Apologies," he said uncomfortably, not meeting Dean's eye.

"Whatever," Dean replied gruffly, a part of him – the girl part, he told himself firmly – mourning the loss of warmth. "S'the first time you've slept through the night, so I'll let it go."

Cas didn't say anything to that, and Dean tugged Dad's jacked closer around him.

"What time is it?" he asked loudly, hoping to diffuse the awkward situation.

"About six," Sam answered. "We're ten minutes from Lisa's."

"We got anything to eat around here?" Dean asked, the familiar ache of hunger warring with the other type of cramps.

"Sarah and I finished off the sandwiches you bought."

"And the chocolate?"

"Sorry," Sam replied sheepishly, holding up the empty M&M bag.

"Dude, you suck," Dean said with a glare, barely holding back from mentioning that apparently Sam's way of manifesting PMS was through sweet cravings instead of a short temper and horniness.

"Do we have a plan for when we get to Lisa's?" Sam asked, ignoring the jibe.

"I figured the direct approach would be best, considering the epic fail that was last time," Dean said.

"She'll probably slam the door in your face," Sarah said honestly. "It's what I would do."

"Well, I'm hoping I can convince her before she decides to do that," Dean sighed. "And if I can't…well, we can always send Cas to talk to her. We told her about him, and he can rock the angel shtick long enough to gain her trust."

"I am no longer an angel," Cas mumbled yet again, although it was more to himself than to them. It seemed he was becoming used to Dean referring to him as such. Dean refrained from reaching out and patting his arm, especially in light of the awkward wake-up call.

"It's not like we have any better ideas," Sam finally granted. "We'll wait in the car, I guess. Wouldn't want to overwhelm her."

Cas looked like he wanted to object to that, but Dean cut him off by clapping his hands together. "Great! We have a plan! Let's hope it goes off without a hitch and that Lisa's at least got some food at her place."

Sam and Sarah sent him disbelieving looks, his obviously fake cheer doing nothing to settle anyone's unease.

'Well screw you guys,' he thought grimly as they pulled into the cul-de-sac where Lisa's house was located. Dean told them to park the car a few houses away, just in case the place was being watched, and shrugged out of Dad's jacket before getting out of the car.

The minute he stood up, he once again became uncomfortably aware of the damp sensation in his underwear and the return of the painful cramps. He'd discovered yesterday that for some reason, painkillers that worked on broken bones didn't necessarily dull those.

'Fuck, this sucks,' he thought as he walked up the street, elaborately casual, and entered the Braeden's front yard. When he reached the front door, he pressed the doorbell quickly and stepped back. 'Best get it over with. There's really no good way to ease someone into this.

Lisa was probably already freaking out, he doubted she was going to like this change in the status quo.

She had called him every hour after he got the voicemail until he had broken down some time after midnight and sent her a short text ("On my way – will call when able") to buy himself some time. How was he supposed to explain his new body parts to a woman he was still reasonably attracted to and who had given birth to his son?

'And whoa, why does that sound so weird?' he thought with a frustrated frown. It was a challenge he had been wrestling with the entire drive from Boston. 'How the hell am I supposed to be this kid's dad? It's not like I had a stellar relationship with my own to begin with.'

As much as he had looked up to and admired John Winchester – and as much as he had been devoted to him with the same ferocity that he was devoted to Sam – Dean was the first to admit that his father had been an obsessed, emotionally stunted bastard. And if the relationship had been an unequal one when he was alive, everything that Dean had learned in the years since his death had further soured the memory of it.

Like what happened to Adam.

The knowledge that his flesh and blood was rotting in Hell partly because Dad hadn't come clean with Dean and Sam, hadn't ensured that his nice, normal family was protected from his enemies, made Dean even more hesitant about the situation with Ben.

'Which might not even be a situation, because if everything works out, I'm still headed back to Hell in the near future,' he thought with a shiver. 'Say we find him – is it even worth telling him about me?'

His subconscious offered him no clear answer, and he gratefully abandoned it when he heard the sound of the door being unlocked and hauled open.

The woman who opened the door was a far cry from the vibrant, playful woman that Dean had left behind not a month before. Her skin was pale and there were circles under her eyes that rivaled Cas's right now. His heart clenched painfully at the glimmer of hope that had sparked in her eyes before she realized he was not who she was looking for.

"Can I help you?" she asked, her voice forced into something resembling polite. He didn't miss the way she seemed to be using the door to shield herself.

"Lis," he sighed, unable to help himself. She was so obviously her and not possessed or being held under duress that he couldn't help allow some tension bleed out of his shoulders.

"Do I know you?" she asked, guarded. He watched her eyes flick downward, and he saw that in addition to the iron sill that Sam had installed the last time, there was a line of salt filling the furrow there. The carpet she was standing on was the same one he had painted a Devil's Trap under.

He couldn't help the swell of pride at that.

"I'd hope so," he said after a second's thought. He nodded down at the salt line. "Good to see you've kept those up. Guess you stuck with our advice."

"Your advice…?" she repeated, obviously confused. Then her eyes narrowed and her entire body went stiff with distrust. "Who are you?"

"Yeah, I guess it was too much to hope you'd just know, huh," he said, scrubbing a hand over his face. "Look. This is going to sound crazy – like, more than changelings and demons and angels – but it's me. Dean."

She stared at him for a full five seconds, before starting to close the door.

"No, seriously!" he cried, shoving his boot into the gap between the door and its frame. Lisa made a surprise noise, no doubt noticing that he had passed over the salt line and iron without trouble. "It's just a way of keeping off the radar – I'm still me, just in a different body. I got your text yesterday and we drove all night to get here – me and Sam and – "

"Prove it," Lisa challenged, not letting up on her grip of the door. "Tell me something only Dean would know.

He refrained from pointing out that if he were a revenant or a ghoul, that logic could have gotten her killed, and instead cast his mind back to something only he would know.

An idea popped into his head and he couldn't help leer. "Like, how you have this weird patch of freckles on your inner thigh? Or that heart-shaped birthmark on your left – ?"

"Stop!" she squeaked, the distrust on her face suddenly replaced with a flush of colour and uncertainty. She opened the door a fraction of an inch wider and stared at him. It was weird to be at eye level with her. "Dean?" She studied him closely, like she was trying to find him in his borrowed features. Her expression relaxed, as did the rest of her. "It really is you, isn't it?"

"Please tell me you got inked since the last time we were here," he answered, attempting a smile but failing as she suddenly threw herself forward and into his arms. He staggered for a moment, caught off guard – 'Well, that was easier than I thought it would be…' he thought as he curled one arm around her.

"Where's Sam?" Lisa asked into his shoulder, uncertain. "Is he also…?"

"Learning how the other side lives?" Dean offered. "Yeah. He and the others are in the car."

"Others?"

"A lot's happened since we left here," Dean said, shrugging plaintively. "I figured it was best to ease you into this on my own. Had a bit too much drama going on lately myself." He prodded her towards the house. "Come on, we'll figure this out. Promise."

"Yeah…yeah, okay," she said after a moment, and moved aside to let him in.

He turned and waved at the others to join them and then followed her into the house. "Bourbon still on top of the fridge?"

(*)

"You're taking this really well," Sam offered, not knowing what else to say.

It was fifteen minutes after the awkward introductions and Lisa making them go through every test Dean and Sam had taught her about the last time they were in Cicero. Even Sam couldn't help being proud that she'd insisted despite her obvious distress.

Across the table, Sarah shot him an unimpressed look. She seemed to have taken it upon herself act as Lisa's support despite having exchanged barely two words with her beyond their initial introduction. Sam wasn't sure if it was just the common ground of being faced with extremely bizarre events or if it was one of those connections that only humans actually born with two X chromosomes seemed to share.

"I'll freak out when my son is back home," Lisa said in quiet resolution, downing a fourth finger of bourbon. "And Dean's right. This really isn't the weirdest thing I've heard of. Especially not when it comes to you two." Her eyes flicked to Sam, and then to Dean, who was pacing back and forth beside the kitchen island, before she admitted, "Though it's still pretty high up there."

"If it makes you feel any better, it took them half a week to tell me," Sarah offered, part-joking, part-pointed.

They shared another significant look, filled with understanding and gratitude, and Sam felt inexplicably uncomfortable. He wondered if he should be worried by the possibly bonding moment happening between the two women.

"When did you say he went missing?" Dean broke in, asking the same question again that he had already asked twice. His brow furrowed thoughtfully, like he was puzzling over something that didn't make sense.

"Yesterday," Lisa answered once again, her voice wavering. "I went to pick him up from school and he wasn't…he wasn't there."

"Did you call the police?" Sam asked, knowing that was the sensible, non-hunter related reaction to this kind of situation.

"Of course! It was the first thing I did after checking in with all of his friends and the school!" Lisa cried, sounding insulted that Sam would ask such a question. "They told me it was too early to file a Missing Person's Report – that I had to wait forty-eight hours –"

She choked, her voice momentarily getting lost in emotion, and she pressed her fingers to her mouth in an anguished gesture.

"Benjamin is marked by God," Castiel spoke up, eyes fixed intently on Lisa. "His destiny would not be cut short so easily. I have faith that you will be reunited with him. Dean and Sam have proven to be a formidable force when it comes to their family."

Sam blinked at that. Either Castiel had gotten better at lying, or he was actually trying to be comforting in his own formerly angelic way.

"Did Ben…did he know?" Sam asked after a moment. He glanced over at Dean, who paused in his pacing to listen. "About Dean being…well, you know."

It still felt weird to say it.

"I never told him," Lisa shook her head, "I think maybe, he might have guessed or wanted…but no, I never…" She trailed off again, looking conflicted, like she wished she had come clean before her son went missing.

It was more confirmation for Sam, anyhow, and allowed him to pursue other avenues. Knowing what Dean had been like as a kid – knowing what he had been like as a kid – he tried to put himself into the shoes of an eleven year old boy who had a vague idea about how the supernatural world worked.

"Has Ben been…" Sam frowned, trying to find the right words. "He hasn't been doing anything reckless lately, has he?"

"No – he's been very careful since the last time you guys were here," Lisa said, despite obvious confusion at the question. "If anything, he's been checking in on me to make sure I'm okay. It's how I knew there was something wrong. He always calls or texts when he's on his way home, or when he's going to be late."

'Responsible kid,' Sam thought, sharing a significant look with Dean.

"Have you been contacted by anyone since he disappeared?" Castiel asked. "If any of the forces searching for Sam and Dean were responsible, you would have received some kind of ultimatum to draw us out."

Sam blinked. That was actually…a fair point. He didn't get a chance to say so, though, because Dean suddenly broke in, aggravated and sharp-voiced, "How about we don't wait for any ultimatums? We should summon one of the sons-of-bitches down here and ask them where the hell he is!"

'So he's going to be one of those parents,' Sam thought, although out loud he said, "No."

His words chorused with Castiel's, who stated, "That would be most unwise."

"I don't give a damn," Dean retorted.

"Dean, under no circumstances can you reveal yourself to the Host or any of your other pursuers," Castiel warned. "The protections you have established will only remain effective if you don't go searching for trouble."

"We've already been in the same room with an angel and nothing happened," Dean defended himself.

"Because we were lucky," Sam told him. "I'm pretty sure if that angel had enough time, she could have broken the sigils hiding us. Who knows what she might have decided to break next? That witch in New York seemed to think the spell keeping us looking like this was a messy one if not removed properly."

Dean scowled.

"Any legwork on this is going to have to be done by Cas, or Sarah," Sam said, not really liking that option but knowing there wasn't much else they could do.

"Or me," Lisa spoke up, determined.

"No way – !" Dean broke in, while Sam tried to say, "That's not a good idea."

"He's my son," Lisa snapped. "I want him back now and if that means helping you…hunt angels, then that's that."

"That would also be inadvisable," Castiel said dryly. "You are in the unique position of being someone that both Ben and Dean care about. Anyone seeking to do harm to them could do it through you. I will not allow that to happen."

There was a warning in his tone that made Sam shiver a little, because it sounded a little too much like the old Castiel talking. Lisa appeared to want to argue with that, but seemed unable to speak as the ex-angel focussed all of his attention on her.

Sam cleared his throat, trying to lighten the mood a little.

"You know," he attempted, waiting a breath until everyone's attention was back on him, "there's the off chance that we're not looking for something…biblical in nature. Or even some hunter that doesn't like us." Everyone was watching him, askance. "It's like Lisa said – there was no ultimatum. Maybe it's just something else entirely?"

"Like what?" Sarah questioned.

"Maybe it's just something that needs to be hunted down?" Sam suggested. "A regular case?"

"Yeah? And what are the odds of that?" Dean asked dryly.

"I don't know, Dean, he's your kid," Sam pointed, voicing the new knowledge out loud for the first time. "If he inherited our bad luck, the odds could be pretty high."

"And look at it this way," Sarah added, "If it's not an angel or a demon, you can at least go looking for it."

"Meaning?" Lisa spoke up, gazing at each of them in turn.

"It means – angels and demons or not – we're going to work this like any other case," Sam told her. "So we're going to have to do some research."

(*)

In the confusion of turning Lisa's kitchen into research-ground-zero, it wasn't until a few hours later that Dean and Lisa got a moment alone.

She disappeared around the same time Sam began to hack into the traffic camera system near Ben's school and Sarah started to go through the latest newspapers on Lisa's home PC; Cas busied himself with compiling a list of possible creatures that could have taken Ben, although their top three contenders remained at the head of that list.

Feeling frustrated, like he couldn't do anything, Dean found himself wandering through the house, looking at the memorabilia and evidence of a tight-knit family. He felt an ache inside him that had nothing to do with cramps, one that was fueled by the knowledge that just by knowing them he had brought danger down upon people he cared about.

He found Lisa upstairs in Ben's room, sitting on the kid's bed and holding onto what looked like a sweater of his. He had to swallow at the abject look of grief on her face; as much as he felt a new kind of terror at the thought of Ben being in trouble, he knew it was nowhere near what she was going through.

"It's gonna be okay," he told her, because there wasn't anything else he could think of to say. "We've got a crack team down there."

Lisa nodded, mouth pressed into a thin line that made Dean think she was trying not to cry.

Feeling awkward, he went to sit down beside her, but refrained from reaching out to comfort her. It felt too weird, first of all, and second of all, as far as she was concerned, he looked like a total stranger. The spontaneous hug at her front door had obviously just been nerves.

He looked around the space, seeing it with new eyes. He'd been in here, once, the last time he and Sam had been in Cicero; he had come in to check Ben's attempts at protections and had ducked out right after because he had needed to tell Lisa about banishing sigils.

Ben's room was both exactly what Dean would have expected from the kid, based on his and Sam's tastes when they were that age, and weirdly normal. He had model cars strategically placed on the bedroom furniture, and posters of various action movies plastered the walls, along with personal drawings. A bookshelf was filled with comics and DVDs, mostly things like Ripley's Believe It Or Not, X-Files and Unsolved Mysteries – 'And seriously, the kid wasn't even alive when that show was on,' Dean thought with appreciation – was situated in the corner.

A box of salt was placed in the window, next to a meticulous salt line.

His brief flare of pride at that was replaced by that gnawing sense of guilt.

"Lis…I'm sorry," Dean managed after working himself up to it over several seconds.

"For what?" Lisa asked, a sad almost-smile on her face.

"You know what. If it weren't for me, if it weren't for my connection to you guys, Ben would be here right now."

"No, he wouldn't," she replied quietly.

Dean winced, because that was true. "If I had known –"

"Stop," Lisa told him simply. "I know who you are, Dean. This –" she waved a hand around the room, and at the window that opened onto the normal, up-kept suburban street beyond " – this isn't you. And I'm sure you would have stuck around last time if I let you. But you and I both know you would have been miserable."

"Which is why you told me he wasn't mine," Dean said quietly.

She shrugged in agreement.

"Lis – you don't know I'd have been miserable," Dean pointed out, even though experiences with djinn and angels had proven otherwise. "Even if I was? I'd take that over Ben being missing and you going through this any day."

"Dean…" Lisa sighed, and then made a face, shaking her head. "This is really weird. You being a…looking like that."

"You think you're weirded out?" Dean snorted. "I'm the one wearing a bra for the first time in my life."

That got another subtle tug at the corner of her mouth, and she shook her head. "If you had stayed, you'd feel useless for not trying to find your brother. Or your…friend."

Dean couldn't quite parse the hesitant note in her voice. "Cas?"

"When you said you knew an angel, I wasn't picturing some guy that looks like he should be stocking a library somewhere," Lisa admitted.

"I know, my first impression of him was more along the lines of holy tax accountant," Dean admitted.

"And he really pulled you out of…of Hell?"

"Yep," Dean confirmed. "Sam too, as it turns out. Gave up his angel juice and everything for that. That's why he's all human right now."

"And that's why you're so close," Lisa remarked, and Dean offered her a confused look. "You and Cas, I mean. I didn't really notice it with Sam, but you and Cas just look at each other like…I don't even know what."

"Oh, not you too," Dean groaned, pushing himself up off the bed and moving away. From her.

"Not me what?"

"Never mind," Dean said stonily, not wanting to burden Lisa with Sarah's ridiculous assumptions (Sam's fault!) that he and Cas had a thing. Instead he moved a little closer to the wall, examining one of Ben's drawings. "Kid likes to draw, huh?"

"This month," Lisa said with a sigh. "They had a comic book artist come into the school one day and do a workshop with the kids."

It took Dean a few seconds to realize what he was seeing – highly stylized and untidy in perspective – but when he did, he felt like he had been punched in the gut.

A figure that looked eerily like Dean – complete with some form of leather jacket and a sawed-off – was fighting with something that looked like a crayon version of Dracula. The character featured in almost every other drawing, sometimes accompanied by a gangly looking figure that Dean decided must be Sam and – most worryingly – a figure that looked like Ben himself.

Fighting monsters.

The kid was glorifying his fucking life.

Dean turned away from the drawings and looked closer at the shelves, realizing that the books weren't just comics but stories ranging from fairy tales to famous ghost stories. Curious, he hauled out the largest book, a collection of Grimm's Fairy Tales and opened up it on a random page –

The pages had been marked up with notes, untidy childish scrawl in pencil crayon or marker – ("Witches can cast sleep spell? Find out if it's true," Ben had written in the margins of the story of Sleeping Beauty). Dean pulled out another book, on American Hauntings and found more of the notes – ('Ektoplasma?' Ben had misspelled under a picture of a Victorian séance where the medium was regurgitating what looked like netted cheesecloth) – and a feeling of dread took even sharper hold.

"Did you know about this?" Dean asked, tense, handing Lisa the books.

She flipped through them, wide-eyed. "No, I didn't." She looked up. "You don't think –?"

Dean didn't reply, scanning the room once again. He cast his mind back to his own childhood, and where he had hidden things he didn't want Dad or Sam to know about – wallets he'd pickpocketed, CDs he had stolen, porn – and then made a motion.

"Stand up," he told Lisa, already moving to Ben's bed and hauling the bedclothes off of it.

"Dean, what are you – ?" she asked, stepping back from the bed and staring at him in surprise.

He didn't answer. Once the bed sheets were gone, he flicked a calculating eye over the naked fabric, and then bent down to flip the thing over, separating it from the box spring. On the lower side he caught sight of the law label and noted how it had come free – something had cut into it along the edges, revealing the innards of the mattress.

Dean reached it, ignoring Lisa's surprised exclamation, and hauled out a paperback sized tin.

"Please let it just be porn," he muttered to himself as he flicked the container open. He ignored Lisa's incredulous noise as he emptied the contents out onto the box spring, wincing as several newspaper clippings fell to the floor.

'Limbs Wash Up on California Shores,' Dean read, skimming through the articles. 'Lake Monster Attributed to Deaths on Lake Superior.'

There were more, and with each headline he read – Man Shoots Self Twenty-Seven Times – Dean felt a suspicion take hold and grow. He completely froze at one clipping – Hazardous Biomaterial Found in Laundromat, eying the attached picture warily. It had likely been taken by a cellphone camera, but there was no mistaking the remnants of shapeshifter skin in the photo.

"Son of a bitch," Dean thought, staring down at the article that read Cattle Mutilations Increase In Wyoming. Memories of telling Ben the different signs to look for, of Sam telling him stories to keep him out of Dean's hair while he taught Lisa how to protect herself and Ben.

"What is it?" Lisa demanded.

Dean turned to Lisa, for once in his life utterly unsure of what to say. Because even though he was pretty sure he knew what was going on, she wasn't going to like it. And even more than that, it meant Ben might be in more danger than they thought.

The contents in the tin suggested Ben had been collecting cases, and as much as Dean wanted to believe the kid wasn't stupid enough to try to go on a hunt on his own, he knew how an eleven-year-old boy's mind worked.

And if anything happened to him, it would be Dean's fault.

(*)

Dean forced himself to breathe, knowing that putting on a show of calm was important to keeping Lisa from freaking out. It was hard, though. He waited, expectant, as Sam rifled through the newspaper clippings, eyebrows furrowed.

When his brother finally looked up, there was something uneasy in his eyes.

"I know I shouldn't be impressed right now, but for a kid with no training, this is…" he trailed off, and shook his head.

"I know, right?" Dean blurted out, more breathless than he intended. He felt conflicted – pride over the kid's attention to detail warred with the deep seated worry in his gut. He wasn't sure how to deal with it.

Across the room, Sarah was murmuring something comforting to Lisa while Castiel leafed through one of the books Dean had brought downstairs with him.

"Dean, there's no proof that he tried to go after anything on his own," Sam reassured him. "He's eleven."

"So? That never stopped either of us."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Well, ignoring the fact that we were raised in the life and Dad pretty much expected it of us, Ben struck me as smarter than that. Besides, did you look closely at these?" He waved the newspaper clippings. "They're stories from out of state. Even if Ben was stupid enough to do something like this, he doesn't have the funds to get to the next town, let alone farther."

It should have been comforting, but Dean scowled and picked up one of the papers from the pile – one about the disappearance of a thirteen-year-old tagger on the other side of town – and thrust it at Sam. "This one's local."

Sam scanned the article, and then shrugged. "It still doesn't prove anything."

"It doesn't answer why he's got them either," Dean retorted. "Damn it…"

He let his head fall into his hand, trying to massage away the sudden tight pain behind his eyes.

"Okay, well, say for a second he maybe did earmark this as a possible case," Sam said after a moment. "You said it yourself, this one's the only local one. So maybe we should research this – " He glanced at the name in the article, " – Deshawn Barrett and retrace Ben's steps. If there were any steps, because I'm still not convinced –"

"What's the boy's name?" Lisa asked suddenly, looking up.

Sam and Dean exchanged glances, and Dean handed her the article. "Deshawn Barrett. Why?"

"I know that name," Lisa said, frowning as she stared down at the article. "It sounds like…there was a boy Ben was in Boy Scouts with." Of Dean's unimpressed look – because Boy Scouts? Really? – she added, "It was a short experiment. He didn't like it – anyway, one of the boys in his group was named Deshawn. I'm pretty sure his last name was Barrett."

"And they were friends?"

"Sort of. He came over here once or twice, but before Ben could really get to know him he sort of disappeared," Lisa said. "I heard from one of the other parents that his father died in a hit-and-run."

"How long ago was that?" Sam asked.

"Last year," Lisa said. "That's about when they stopped hanging out." She sighed. "Poor boy didn't exactly come from the most stable of homes to begin with, but I guess after his father died…"

"And as far as you know, Ben and Deshawn weren't in contact?" Sam pressed, looking thoughtful.

"I don't think so," Lisa answered. "Why? What does that have to do with Ben…missing?"

"Maybe nothing. Maybe something," Sam said, evasive, and before Lisa could ask him to clarify, he went on, "Does Ben have a social profile? MySpace or Facebook?"

"Yes. I have the password, if you want to check it," Lisa said, already rising and heading for the study where the desktop computer was. Sam followed her, and without knowing what else to do, Dean did as well.

He really didn't get the point of social media; seemed a waste of time to him, but Sam got it, and that was what was important.

It took a few minutes to boot up the computer and log on, but when they did, Lisa scooted out of the chair and allowed Sam to perform his search. A few minutes later, his brother made a semi-triumphant noise and pointed at the screen. "There."

"It looks like they were still talking," Dean said, leaning over his brother's shoulder to scan through the few lines of back and forth texts between Ben and the other kid, whose photo showed a skinny black boy who stared out at them with defiant eyes. "I guess they reconnected at some point."

"Not only that, it looks like they were planning to hang out at the arcade after school the day before Deshawn went missing," Sam said, and then clicked on a link to show the conversation history. "And when he never showed, Ben sent him some messages, asking where he was. And the last message is sent the same day that this article is dated."

Sam pointed at the newspaper clipping again.

"So that's two kids missing," Sarah remarked, appearing in the room, "Within a week." She addressed Lisa. "Have there been any other unexplainable disappearances over the past few weeks? Maybe months?"

Lisa frowned, and then nodded slowly. "Yes, actually, now that you mention it…There was a piece in the paper about three weeks ago about a little girl going missing, I think." She frowned, straining to remember. "She was at a piano recital and just vanished from the room where she was waiting. The police found it strange because there were no windows or doors other than the one – and no one came through there."

Sam tilted his head meaningfully, and Dean sighed. "Well, it's not much of a connection, but it might be something."

It was the first inkling of a lead on Ben's location, and so Dean didn't even complain when Sam sent him to go get his laptop. Research might not have been his favorite activity, but it got the job done. If it helped figure out where his…where Ben was, than he'd put up with it.

Hours later, they had noted several similar cases of children disappearing without a trace or an explanation over the last three weeks. Most of them were written off by authorities as kidnapping cases; the situation of the girl Lisa had mentioned was even being investigated as a parental child abduction incident, despite the father having been in Albany at the time.

"Other than these happening within the same five mile radius, none of these kids have anything in common," Sarah said, leaning away from Lisa's desktop computer.

Dean frowned, staring at the list they had made. There was Ben, his friend Deshawn, the six-year-old girl who had vanished from the auditorium, an eleven year old girl who lived on the other side of the reservoir and an eight-year-old farm boy who had gone out to milk the cows and never come back. There were possibly others, but he they didn't have time to list every disappearance if they were going to find Ben.

Sarah was right, though; the kids all came from different backgrounds, different socioeconomic statuses and different locations. Other than Ben and Deshawn, they didn't seem to have any connection to one another. The six-year-old was from an upper class family, the eleven-year-old was apparently one of the world's youngest novelists and the eight-year-old boy was autistic. Even their characters were radically different.

"Anything?" Dean asked a while later, twisting around to face his brother, who was frowning at his laptop.

"I don't know – maybe," Sam said. "I've hacked into the police database – it turns out there's a surveillance video from the date and time that Deshawn Barrett disappeared. I'm just waiting for it to decrypt."

Dean got up, stretched, and headed over to the table to crouch behind his brother, waiting for the video to load. It took a while – Lisa's internet connection was slow – but eventually the video opened up and Sam maximized the window.

The graphic resolution was grainy, but Dean could easily make out the basic profile of the boy on the Facebook page. He was in an alleyway somewhere, spray painting what looked like a stylized ape on the side of the wall. Before their eyes, though, he suddenly froze and looked around, like he thought someone was coming up behind him. He glanced around a few times, and then went back to his work. Seconds later, though, he stopped again and looked up, his entire body tense.

The video wavered for a moment, and the boy in the frame took a step back, posture becoming defensive, before the video flickered out completely. A second later, the picture came back online, only the kid was gone. The spray paint canister remained on the ground.

"I can see why they didn't circulate this," Sarah remarked. "The delay between him standing there and disappearing is way too fast for it to be a person. I bet they thought it was doctored."

"Can you freeze-frame it? Or slow it down or something?" Dean asked, frowning at the video thoughtfully.

"I'll do my best," Sam said, an amused twist to his lips at Dean's hesitance over technological lingo. Dean rolled his eyes.

Sam clicked a few things, and then replayed the video, slower this time.

"Stop," Dean said when he saw it again.

The frame Sam froze it on was indistinct, but clearly it had picked up on something.

Dean squinted at the screen, and then swore.

The thing in front of Deshawn was a tall and thin humanoid, almost like a Reaper, but where those dudes tended to be polished and grim looking, this thing looked like Freddy Kruger at Woodstock. Its skin was pockmarked and scarred, and its greasy, greying hair flared out like a mullet. Sharp claws reached out toward an oblivious Deshawn, and even with the bad resolution Dean could see that they oozed something.

As they watched the slow motion video, it shimmered out of sight when boy looked over at it.

"So it's fast and can apparently become fucking invisible?" Dean demanded.

"It sounds a bit like that leprechaun in Elwood," Sam suggested. "But that's no leprechaun. I've got no idea what that is."

"I do," Cas said suddenly, voice low in Dean's ear. Dean jumped, having not realized the ex-angel was standing so closely behind him. He forced back whatever comment about personal space he was thinking, instead watching the way Cas's eyes narrowed at the screen. "That is an Erlking."

"A what?" Sarah asked, when no one else would.

"Erlkings are a kind of faerie," Cas explained quietly, "Their characteristics are close to those of sirens or shtriga. Their hunting patterns are more like djinn, though, in that they induce fever dreams of their victims. I should have realized, what with the hunting range and the preference for children…"

"Erlking…erlking," Sam murmured, scrunching up his face thoughtfully. "What, like the poem?"

Dean shot him an unimpressed look.

"Does now seem like the best time, nerd?" he asked, while Lisa spoke up, "What poem?"

"In 1782 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote a poem about a creature called an Erlking that was based on an earlier German legend about a malevolent spirit that haunts forests and kills travellers."

"The legend is partially true," Cas allowed. "Erlkings are nomadic forest spirits, feeding as they move. They usually remain in one place over a period of weeks as their victims slowly starve to death."

Lisa made a strangled noise, and Dean took in her panicked look.

"Ben was taken barely more than a day ago," he told her. "We'll find him before anything like that happens to him. I promise. We've already got an idea where it might be. Right?" He shot Cas a look.

"Erlkings need to live in forested areas to survive," Cas agreed. "And they cannot rest unless protected by alder bark."

"Alder trees aren't native to Indiana," Sarah pointed out. Off their surprised looks, she added defensively, "I dated an arborist once."

Dean's mouth twitched at the subtle downward movement of his brother's eyebrows, but instead he suggested, "Maybe it doesn't necessarily need to find somewhere with alder to rest. Maybe it's a Dracula deal – you know, instead of grave dust it carries alder bark with it? If this thing's nomadic, it's got to have some kind of back-up in case it can't find a place to rest. I mean, we are in the Midwest right now, not exactly prime forest area."

"The only forested zone within the same five mile radius as all of the disappearances is the golf course next to the reservoir," Sam piped up. "There are trees and glades all around it."

"That must be its nesting area," Cas decided.

"That's a pretty big range," Sam pointed out. "We're going to need to narrow down its location a little more. Draw it out."

"How?" Dean questioned, eye flitting to Lisa and back. "We can't exactly use any kids as bait."

"That might not be necessary," Cas murmured, a thoughtful edge to the words.

"What do you mean?" Dean asked.

Cas gave him a look he didn't like.

"Do you know why Erlkings prefer children?" Cas asked. "Because their minds are more open – they are more imaginative and mentally flexible. They see the world in a way that adult humans do not. That…creativity produces a kind of energy that the Erlking feeds on. It is drawn to that above all things. If it were to notice a concentration of it in its territory, it would pursue it."

"Your point?" Dean asked, voice tight.

"This thing is drawn to certain prey, Dean," Sam said, seemingly unaware of what Cas was suggesting. "I mean, look at all these kids – musician, a writer, a graffiti artist, a kid who imagines the world of the supernatural in huge detail? This thing's going after kids who dream big. Who can see stuff we can't, so to speak."

"I have been alive for millennia," Cas continued dispassionately. "I have seen more than you could comprehend. Don't you think I would be the ideal candidate to draw it out?"

"What? No!" Dean snapped. "Bad idea!"

"Actually," Sam spoke up, almost carefully, "Dean, that's a really good idea. Cas can defend himself – and he said it takes a while for these things to eat, right? So he could have his phone on him and we could track him to wherever this thing is hiding the kids."

"And how many times in our lives have we had our phones crap out?" Dean countered.

"You could survey from a distance," Cas suggested reasonably.

"Yeah, and if that thing decides to up and vanish with you like it did that kid? That'll be real helpful!" Dean fumed.

"I would endeavor to leave you some kind of sign," Cas replied, a vague tone of annoyance seeping into his words. "And remember, I have been a soldier far longer than either of you. I am sure I would be able to find some way of defending myself against a lowly faerie."

"You had powers then – you could burn shit with a touch. It's a bit different now!"

"I am the best candidate here, whatever your low opinion of my abilities would suggest," Cas said, sounding stiff and somewhat insulted.

"Dude, I'm not saying…look, this isn't about you being weak or anything, but – you're – still injured," Dean said, trying to grasp at anything that might help him with his case.

"A fact which has never stopped you or Sam."

Dean opened his mouth to protest, flooded with at least a dozen reasons this wasn't a good idea, but Cas's face was resolute. A quick glance at Sam's 'what the hell?' stare and Lisa's suddenly hopeful face made his insides churn, because he knew this was probably the best plan they were going to get right now. And time was running out for Ben.

"Fine," he said curtly, staring into Cas's eyes. "How do we kill this thing?"

(*)

"Dean, this has got to stop," Sam said after a full forty-five minutes of his brother sulking beside him in the Charger. They were parked in a side road near the rear entrance to the golf club, which was abandoned for the night; in the far distance, they could make out the immobile speck of Castiel where he stood just beneath the shady trees.

"Don't know what you're talking about, Sammy," Dean replied, glancing at his phone, which had the browser open on the cell-phone tracking app. The minute the thing went for Castiel, they would be able to use it to follow it to its lair.

Problem was, Dean had been checking it every five minutes that he wasn't staring out making sure Castiel remained in place.

"Sure," Sam replied, not convinced. "You know, if I knew you were going to be such a mother-hen on this job, I'd have left you back at Lisa's with her and Sarah."

'And wasn't that a job in and of itself,' he thought, remembering Lisa's protests and Sarah's unimpressed glares.

Ironically, it had been Castiel who had convinced them to remain behind, maintaining that Ben already had one parent risking their life to find him, and that Sarah was needed to guard Lisa in the event that something happened to them while they were hunting.

Sam was beginning to see the head-trip inherent to maintaining connections outside of hunting, and for the first time in his life felt an awkward sort of sympathy towards his father. John had been a bastard, but at least his way, they had maintained ties only with people who knew what was out there and how to protect themselves. It made it a little less of a burden, for all its pitfalls.

Dean was shooting him an annoyed look. "Seriously, dude, have you started speaking on some kind of girl frequency now? Because I may have been forced to look like this, but I haven't completely transitioned yet."

"You look like you're about to run out there with an extra sweater and a juice box," Sam pointed out, only half-joking.

Dean glared at him, resolutely put his phone away and stared purposely in the opposite direction from Castiel. He stayed like that for several minutes, before breaking the silence of the car.

"So I'm a little overprotective," Dean muttered, much to Sam's surprise. "Sue me – the guy's family."

"That's just it, Dean," Sam pointed out. "You don't get like this over family. I mean, yeah, you do over me when things get hairier than usual, but on regular hunts? When was the last time you stopped me when I suggested using myself as bait to some big ugly out there?"

"That's because you can handle yourself when you're not pulling your emo, self-sacrificing spiel," Dean retorted.

"Yeah? And what about with Adam?" Sam prompted. "When we found out who he was and I started to teach him how to hunt –"

"That wasn't Adam!"

"No, but it was something that was an almost perfect copy of him," Sam retorted. "It's as close to him as we ever got to know. And you bitched and you moaned, but you never stopped me from teaching him. You still let him make his own decisions."

"Sam, that doesn't count, it was a ghoul –"

"And what if it hadn't been?" Sam challenged. "Say we found out about him in time and he decided to go on the road with us, and we taught him. I can bet you you'd be overprotective at first, sure, but then it would be like when we were kids. The minute you knew I could do it on my own – you backed off."

"What's your point, Sam?" Dean growled.

"My point is, you know Cas can do this – hell, even all human like he is now, he's still a more effective hunter than most of the ones we've met," Sam explained. "So this thing you've got about him helping us? It's not just overprotective, it's something…"

Sam trailed off, not even sure he knew where to go with that thought.

Dean glared a challenge at him. "Yeah? Something like what?"

"I don't know," Sam said, edging off a bit. "But whatever it is, I suggest you figure it out. Because I'm willing to bet Cas is getting sick of it too. And he's going to kick your ass about it at some point.

"Not while he's a nerdy little ex-angel, he won't," Dean muttered, half to Sam and half to himself.

"Don't be too sure."

Dean crossed his arms – and really, Sam might have classified it as a pout, if Dean hadn't sighed and then leaned back against the seat.

"I ever tell you about the time Zachariah sent me to the future?" Dean asked suddenly.

Sam stared at him, startled, not only because of the abrupt disturbance but because Dean had avoided that particular topic rather expertly over the last year.

"Not really," Sam said slowly. "When you called me to say we should start hunting again – but, you never told me what happened." He took a breath. "You know, beside the whole Lucifer wearing me to prom thing."

Dean winced. It was obviously something he still didn't like to remember, and considering Sam had lived it, he could certainly sympathize.

"Yeah, well, real eye-opener," Dean muttered.

"It didn't happen," Sam placated. "We stopped that –"

"Barely. And I still got to see what it looks like when I fuck up."

"Dean –"

"It wasn't just you I fucked up, either."

Sam raised his eyebrows, waiting for his brother to continue. It was another thirty seconds before Dean spoke again.

"Cas was there too. Only…" he swallowed. "I think he'd stopped being 'Cas' years before. He was this miserable, jaded, twisted…guy. Strung out on whatever drugs he could get his hands on and…and having fucking orgies!"

At this, Sam's mouth parted in surprised disbelief. "…You're kidding, right?"

Dean shook his head, no, and went on, "And him and me – the future me – something happened there. Because they couldn't – we couldn't – even look at each other. And, damn it, it must have been bad, whatever happened, because I – he – sent Cas to his death. Didn't even blink. Didn't even care."

"Dean," Sam sighed, and this time it wasn't in protest but in reassurance.

"So yeah, maybe I'm overprotective," Dean went on, voice taut with something. "But fuck if I'll let that happen to Cas again. He's already been hurt once since hooking back up with us, and we were lucky it was as minor as a dislocated shoulder. What happens next time if it's something more serious? Something that a few aspirin or a slug of Jack can't fix? What happens if he starts getting a taste for the hard stuff?"

Which, really, Sam didn't have an answer for.

"I can't let that happen," Dean went on. "And this?" He jerked his head in the direction of where Castiel was playing bait, "This feels like the first step to that."

"Dean, you can't protect him forever," Sam told him gently. "And trust me, speaking from experience? He wouldn't want you to."

"I can protect him long enough," Dean retorted, determined. "Long enough to get him angeled up again in a way that won't get you sent back to Hell."

"He doesn't want you to," Sam repeated. "And that's not your responsibility."

"Yeah, Sammy, it is," Dean answered heavily. "Ever since the guy pulled me out of Hell, it's been one shitstorm after another for him. It's like you said – he got booted out of his Cloud Club for me, he gave up his friggen' grace because he knew I couldn't move on with you down there – so now I've got to live with that and the knowledge of what he's gonna look like if I screw it up."

It was brief, but in the dim light provided by the slowly waxing moon, Sam could make out the naked emotion on his brother's face. It stopped him dead in his tracks, because female body or not, Sam had seen that look before. A lifetime ago, in Cape Girardeau, Missouri.

With Cassie.

Sam felt like someone had just pulled the floor out from under him, which was impressive considering he was sitting down.

The idea shook him, because…because Dean was straight.

Plainly and simply and unquestionably straight.

As much as Sam teased him about his macho persona being a form of overcompensation, it had always been just that: teasing. Dozens of women from one end of the country to the other over the past twenty years could attest to the fact that Dean was very much into the opposite sex. His guilty habit of Dr. Sexy, M.D. aside, he had probably never looked at another guy the same way he noticed every pair of breasts within a twenty-foot radius of himself.

'Except maybe Cas,' Sam allowed after a moment's consideration, thinking back to all the intense looks the two exchanged. He'd always chalked it up to the bond between rescuer and rescuee, like and yet unlike the same kind of communication that Dean shared with Sam. But what if it was something else entirely?

That Castiel cared about Dean was obvious – Sam had always thought it was a bit of transference: when his faith in God disintegrated, he had replaced it with faith in Dean. But it could easily be something more. He could understand Castiel having some kind of feelings for his brother, because if he was honest with himself, it just made sense.

'But Dean?' he wondered staring at his brother.

Dean suddenly straightened up, jarring Sam from his thoughts.

"What the hell?" he suddenly demanded, looking out the driver's side window. "Where's Cas?"

Sam looked out as well, scanning the darkness for the telltale shape of their friend in the distance, only to see nothing.

"Crap," he murmured.

Dean was out of the car before Sam even registered it and already running across the street and into the trees. Sam barely had the time to grab the flashlights and the weapons – iron knife and a blowtorch – before he was out of the car as well and following him.

They had to climb the fence separating the forested property from the road, but that was no problem, and they made it across the bark and leaf strewn paths with relative ease until they came to the spot where Cas had been waiting.

In the darkness it was impossible to see any clue of where Cas had gone. Beside him, Dean cursed, glaring down at his phone. "This thing's saying he hasn't gone anywhere."

"Meaning he dropped his phone," Sam groaned, while his brother quickly pressed the speed dial. After a beat, the tinny rendition of Greenbaum's Spirit in the Sky that Dean had programmed in there with a smirk a few weeks ago broke the silence. A dim light from a facedown phone several feet away lit up, and Dean was already on it.

Picking it up, Sam saw his brother's shoulders tense.

"Go get the black light from the trunk," Dean ordered quietly, and at Sam's questioning glance, he held up Cas's phone; he screen was smudged with blood.

Comprehension dawned.

He jogged to the Charger, grabbed the requested item and returned, not saying anything when Dean practically tore it out of his hands and started shining it around the dark grass. It took a few passes, before something fluorescent blue showed up in a longer patch. Dean shone the light out in a few directions close to it, finding more.

They had a trail to follow.

"We need to stop bleeding so much on cases or we're going to have to start investing in a moveable blood bank," Sam remarked, only half-joking as he and Dean started off.

They followed the intermittent trail of blood quietly for a quarter of an hour; the trail wasn't easy to follow, which suggested Cas at least hadn't sustained any kind of fatal injury, but the large globs of blood suggested he had been injured somewhere with a lot of blood vessels. Either the head or fleshy part of his arm or leg. Remembering the teeth and claws that the creature in the video had had, Sam wondered if maybe Cas had fought back and grazed himself on those.

After another fifteen minutes of tramping through the forested area around the course, Sam made out something like a shed in the distance. He frowned, because if this thing had been taking its victims here, wouldn't the authorities haven noticed?

As they got closer, though, they noticed that the shed was built like an old shack, with what looked like a storm cellar opening on the side.

Nodding to one another in the dark, Sam held up one of the flashlights while Dean bent forward to quickly open the thing. They moved quietly, climbing down into the earth and glancing around a cellar that looked a bit larger than your standard storm shelter.

Stone foundations were blocked by shelves, and it looked like the space continued on around a corner. Landscaping equipment and bags of what looked like sand or plaster were piled along the walls. The place had obviously once been used as a storage facility, but now was abandoned.

In the dimness of the hidden cavern, the sharp smell of filth hit him – body odour and urine and excrement – and Sam swallowed, shaking his head as he fought not to gag. Instead he tried to focus on his other senses; his ears perked up to the sound that grew louder the closer they got – feeble, pained moans.

While Dean checked every inch of the darkness by the stairs, Sam carefully turned the corner. His eyes widened at what he saw.

In what looked like a nest made of dirty blankets and branches – most likely dried alder, judging by how dead they looked – were several bodies. Children – six of them that Sam could count – were huddled together, unmoving but for the slight rise and fall of their chests. From what little he could make out, they looked to be in various states of malnourishment, their faces gaunt and dusty. Dirt clung to their sweaty faces and their breath rasped out over dry lips.

It took him a moment to recognize Ben in all of that. Dean gave a pained exclamation when he caught sight of him, and Sam had to thrust out his arm to keep his brother from going for the kid. A second later, Dean's eyes landed on something else and he tensed, nodding meaningfully.

Castiel was several feet away from the kids, a crumpled, seated heap that wasn't moving. His ragged breathing suggested that he, like the children, was still alive, and there was a bloody gash on the side of his face.

As Sam took a step forward, his vision was suddenly blocked by the creature, which appeared in front of him out of nowhere.

He was aware of hot, sour breath on his face and a rage filled growl, before he went flying backwards and the world went dark and hazy.

(*)

Dean heard his brother cry out and whirled around.

The thing loomed over Sam, cocking its head to one side as it considered the unconscious body in front of him, and started to reach out with a slimy hand. Sam was probably just as appetizing to this son of a bitch as the kids, what with his memories of Lucifer and Michael battling for dominance in the Cage. Ten years of that was probably more interesting to the thing than the forty years of torture Dean had endured.

Jumping forward, Dean grabbed it by the back of its neck and hauled it away from Sam. He turned it around, swinging at it with the iron knife, but it blocked him with one arm and seized Dean's wrist with the other. Despite the clamminess, its grip was strong and Dean swore as he felt his hands hinge open and drop the knife.

It struck out with one foot, sending the knife flying out of sight.

Not dwelling on that, Dean moved back with his free hand and punched the thing in the jaw. It snarled at him, letting go, but then slammed out with a sharp foot. Dean only just managed to grab and shove backwards, making the thing fall backward.

While it scrambled to all fours, Dean dove forward and tried to kick it somewhere in the trunk of its body. It appeared to have learned its mistake before, and aimed its next blow at Dean's chest. He staggered back, hoping to avoid it, but not in time. The foot connected with his abdomen and the pain he had been feeling for a day now tripled.

Gasping, Dean reeled backward, cradling his abdominal area protectively as he tried to regain his balance. The Erlking was back on all fours again, creeping forward. It grinned at Dean, and then suddenly vanished.

'Right, this thing can go invisible,' he thought, looking around wildly. 'Shit.'

Desperately, Dean took a few swings as he felt the air move around him, but it never connected. On a third swing, the invisible creature grabbed his arm and seized him by the throat with one oily, clawed hand. Another crunched into the side of his face, and Dean stumbled backward again.

His vision swam as the thing landed another blow on his gut. It then grabbed him by the neck again and shoved him into the crumbling brick foundation of the basement. Dazed, Dean tried to regain his balance, but every time he thought the world was about to right itself, the creature knocked him in the face again.

Before he knew it, he was flat on his back and there was a heavy weight on his chest. He could hear a sucking sound, like wind passing through a tunnel, and could smell the sour breath close by as it came closer, and closer –

Suddenly, he felt the brush of fabric in front of him as the trenchcoat landed over the thing's head, creating an outline of it and messing up it's little invisibility spell. Behind it, Dean could see Cas, swaying a little on his feet but determinedly leaning forward and grabbing the thing in a headlock through the coat. Cas punched it, causing it to topple away from Dean, and then kneed it twice in the face.

It fell away, wrestling with the trenchcoat that marred its invisibility. Before it could, though, Cas grabbed hold of one of the bags of plaster nearby and tossed it at it. The sharp-clawed creature attempted to throw the bag away from itself, but accidentally ripped it, sending white dust flying everywhere.

"Try turning invisible like that, bitch," Dean grunted, pleased.

The thing gave an angry yell and flailed, like it realized it had just lost an advantage. As it finally got free of the trenchcoat, it struck out with its arms, breaking through parts of the stone foundations and sending one of the nearby shelves flying at Dean.

Before he could jump out of the way, he found himself pinned yet again, this time by an angular wooden shelf that pressed him into place.

"Dean!" Cas rasped, making an aborted move toward him. It cost him a precious few seconds of awareness as the creature recouped and barrelled toward Cas, shoving him up against the wall.

From where Dean lay, struggling to free himself from the heavy shelf, he watched as the thing leaned closer to Cas, drooling heavily and licking its lips. Cas was squirming beneath it, trying to throw off its weight, but Dean could see his struggling was becoming more feeble as sweat broke out on his forehead and his eyes became vacant.

Whatever toxin the thing exuded was taking effect again.

"Cas," Dean grunted, wriggling out from beneath the shelf – too slowly! The thing's teeth were an inch from Cas's face –

Suddenly, the Erlking's head snapped backward as something hit it. Shocked, Dean looked up, his heart nearly stopping when he realized Ben was standing there, panting and wide-eyed, a large section of lead pipe held in his hand. He was shivering – either from cold or adrenaline Dean didn't know – and was staring at the creature in horrified fascination.

"Ben!" Dean rasped, pushing at the heavy debris pinning him in place. "Go! Get…out of here!"

Ben was backing away slowly, but the creature had recovered. He swung the pipe at it again, but the Erlking blocked it and wrenched it out of his grasp with ease. Conscious though he was, Ben was not in any shape to fight this thing, and as Dean continued to slowly free himself, the Erlking quickly gained the upper hand. Ben took a desperate swing at the creature with his fists, but it avoided those hits with ease.

It snapped its hand out at Ben with a blow to the solar plexus before throwing him across the room.

By then, Dean had finally managed to get out from under the shelf and vaulted toward the monster.

"Hey, ugly," Dean growled, gaining its attention. "Stay the fuck away from my kid!"

Spotting a raised grating, he hopped up onto it and jumped down, landing a hard kick on its face. It stumbled back and to one knee, and Dean lashed out a few more times while it struggled to get back up. On the last kick, it jumped up with a roar, sending Dean back a few paces, and the back of its clawed hand ploughing into Dean's face, just above his left eye. Blood abruptly poured downward, forcing him to blink uselessly as his vision wavered for an instant.

It was enough time for the Erlking to completely recover itself.

Once again it had him by the throat, lifted him up and shoved him hard into the ground. Dean went momentarily lax, dazed as he tried to recover, but not before the thing was sitting on him again, leaning close.

Dean's hands were pinned to his sides by the creature's thighs, and in the dizzy moment where his head connected with the ground, he imagined he couldn't feel his legs. Ben was groaning somewhere nearby, and in his peripheral vision he could see Cas trying to get to his feet, but failing as the Erlking's toxins hindered him.

He had no idea how he was getting out of this one, when –

Someone stood over the thing once again. Dean saw hands wrap around its head, then move in a harsh, twisting motion. The creature's neck snapped, loudly, and it fell over limp next to him. Sam loomed above them both, breathing harshly despite bruises and some bloody gashes.

"Nice nap?" Dean gasped.

"Real refreshing," Sam panted back, shaking his broken wrist painfully. The pressure needed to break the thing's neck had evidently not agreed with his injury.

Dean coughed and choked, rolling away from the putrid body beside him; he could still hear it breathing, knew that it wasn't dead yet and that they had little time. Sam was already hauling out the lighter fluid, and as Dean hauled himself up and away from the thing, his brother flicked open his lighter and torched the body.

Flames roared behind him as Dean staggered across the room, sending an assessing look at Cas, who nodded as though to say he was alright, before staggering to Ben.

"You okay?" he rasped.

"I'll live," the kid said, quiet, trying to sound brave even though his voice was wavering. Even in the darkness, Dean could see him stare at him without any kind of recognition, before he looked back at the other kids. "What about them?"

"I'm going to get the First Aid kit," Sam said, already moving. "And there's cellphone reception up there so we can call an ambulance. Those kids need medical attention right away."

"Cas and I will stay here and keep an eye on them," Dean agreed. He dug his phone out of his pocket and handed it to Ben. "You go ahead, too. And call your mom, she's freaking out."

"You know my mom?" Ben asked, tired eyes going wide. "How? Are you friends of Dean's? You guys are hunters, right?"

Dean groaned, and shook his head. "Kid, now is definitely not the time to get into it."

Something in his voice, whether Ben knew who he was or not, seemed to make an impression, because Ben nodded and slowly, still wavering on his feet a little, followed Sam out of the storage space.

Cas was checking on all of the kids, arranging them into more comfortable positions as he had been taught by Sam and Dean. Dean joined him, and after assessing all of the kids – he was worried about the one boy, who had obviously been here a lot longer than the others judging by his emaciated form – sat down heavily a few feet away from them.

His body ached, and he was pretty sure he was leaking through the pad and underwear, but he felt too tired to do anything about it.

"You are bleeding," Cas said, and for a moment Dean felt a note of panic that he had been right. But Cas was eyeing the cut above his head, and not his crotch, so he relaxed.

"That's what happens when you get hit in the face by something with claws," Dean pointed out, a little amused; he felt a little loopy, probably had a concussion.

He also attributed possible concussion to the fact that when Cas shrugged out of his outer shirt and pressed it tightly to Dean's head wound, he didn't move to stop him.

Dean winced when the fabric touched his ruined skin, biting back a curse, but allowed Cas to keep the pressure there. Even tainted with the smell of blood and dust, the shirt still smelled like Cas and he felt irrationally comforted by it.

"Sorry we lost you," he said after a moment. At Cas's tilt of the head, he added, "I know you were supposed to be bait, but that should have gone better."

"Since knowing you, I have learned that things rarely go according to plan," Cas said placidly.

Dean snorted, because that was the understatement of the evening. Cas's mouth quirked into an actual smile, and Dean felt something in his chest jump with warmth.

Just as abruptly, he became aware that they were sitting closer than need be, even for an attempt at first aid.

"Dude, you should go check on the kids again," Dean murmured, pulling back.

"You're still bleeding –"

"I can hold a compress to my head as well as you can," Dean snapped, reaching up to shove Cas's hand away and to take its place with his own. As he did so, their fingers brushed, and a jolt not unlike a surge of electricity suddenly splintered through him, and he found himself breathless yet again despite not being in the middle of a fight.

Cas was staring at him, wide eyed, and for a second, Dean wondered if his friend had felt that shock as well.

Then Cas hurriedly turned away and went to sit by the kids.

'What the hell was that all about?' Dean thought, trying to ignore the too-fast beating of his heart.

(*)

"You're kidding, right?"

Sam snorted at the completely stunned disbelief in Ben's voice as he looked between Lisa and Dean; the latter two were watching him warily, like they expected his head to implode or something.

'Give the kid more credit,' Sam thought as he turned back to the movie he, Sarah and Castiel were watching in the living room. Well, Castiel and Sarah were watching it; Sam was watching Sarah whenever he wasn't training his ears on the kitchen. All three had decided to give the unconventional and newly reunited family unit some time to themselves, although Sam was leaning on the periphery in case Dean needed any support.

It had been a day since they found Ben and the other children; a day filled with a hospital stay to stabilize the kids suffering from malnourishment and to deal with the cops asking questions about who had abducted them. Sam, Dean and Castiel had made up some story about driving by and hearing a commotion, and although the police were suspicious, eventually they bought it because Ben corroborated the story.

Ben had been kept overnight to make sure he was alright; Lisa had stayed with him at the hospital while the others had returned home. Sam had sensed Dean's discomfort with the entire situation, but once Lisa came home, looking determined, everyone had known that there would be no avoiding the truth.

In the kitchen, Dean exhaled heavily. "Look, Ben, I know this is weird, but like it or not, you're my kid –"

"That's not weird," Ben interrupted, sounding like he was rolling his eyes. "That makes sense. But…you've got boobs. That's weird."

Sam had to bite his tongue to keep from laughing at that, and even Sarah glanced up from the movie in amusement. Apparently Sam wasn't the only one listening in on his brother's current predicament.

For a moment, Sarah met his eyes and the gaze was perfectly free of the resentment and mistrust of the past two days. A second later, though, she seemed to remember herself, because she looked away quickly.

"Yeah, well, that's temporary," Dean was growling, sounding torn between embarrassment and frustration. "And not the issue. Well, it is the issue, because there are people after me and Sam right now and –"

"And they can't know we're related," Ben finished, sounding dejected.

Dean sighed. "Look, kid, to tell you the truth, the ones we're worried about already know we're related. The point is, we have to be extra careful. Which means I can't – we can't stick around here like I'd – we'd like to."

"Bullshit," Lisa spoke up, earning sharp intakes of breath from both Ben and Dean. Even Sam was surprised, because he had the idea that Lisa didn't really swear that much. "You guys need a break. Even if it's just a short one. And you and Ben need some time to talk about why trying to hunt things on your own is a bad idea."

The last bit was laced with warning. Sam winced. He felt partially responsible for that, considering it had been him that told Ben the old hunting stories in the first place, and of how much research went into a hunt…

'If I'd known he was my nephew, I wouldn't have done it,' he thought, wavering on the word 'nephew', before adding, 'Not that that makes any of this okay."

"Mom," Ben groaned. "I wasn't actually hunting anything. I was just…collecting stories about weird things. In case…in case Dean came back and was looking for some interesting stuff to investigate." He snorted. "I'm not stupid, you know, I wouldn't actually try to hunt anything 'til I'm at least sixteen."

Dean choked out a noise that sounded suspiciously like a laugh cut short. He coughed. "Maybe you and I need to have a little chat after all."

"Good," Lisa said, disapproval still evident in her voice. "Because I wasn't taking no for an answer this time."

"Yeah, okay, I think I saw a motel a ways out – "

"Forget that. You're staying here."

"Lis…" Dean sounded uncomfortable. "It's not a good idea. Besides, you don't have the room."

"Sure we do – I mean, it's not the Ritz, but I've had my sister and her husband's family here before, and that's twelve people. I think I can figure out how to make room for half that," she retorted. "Ben can stay with me in my room for a few days, Sarah can stay in Ben's room and you guys can crash in the living room.

"Lis –"

"That's that," Lisa continued, firm. "Ben, go get out your books. Just because you get the rest of the week off, doesn't mean you get to slack off. You still have exams coming up."

"Mom!"

"Go."

The kid grumbled and trudged around the corner, giving Sam a searching and almost doubtful look as he passed. Obviously the genderswap thing was still a little weird for him. Sam only hoped that the next time they came back here, they would have their own bodies again.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Dean mumbled quietly. "I mean, by rights, you should want us as far from here as possible –"

"What happened to Ben could have happened whether he knew you or not," Lisa replied softly. "He went looking for his friend because he was worried. He probably would have done it even if he hadn't known something…supernatural was going on." She sighed. "Though he probably would have told me first."

"See?"

"Dean, remember the changelings? That was happening even before you came back into our lives," Lisa said quietly. "It was dumb luck or fate or whatever you want to call it. But I'm glad, because you saved my son. Our son. Twice."

Dean made a noise that sounded like protest, and Sam rolled his eyes, returning his attention to the movie. Lisa said something he didn't hear, although it sounded vaguely joking and vaguely threatening, and then Dean was striding into the living room with his hands in his pockets. His face was a rainbow of bruises from the fight – Sam was pretty sure his brother's colors matched his, including the broken nose – and the wound over his eye, despite being stitched, still looked inflamed.

"So, what the hell are you guys watching?" he asked as he heaved himself gingerly into the easy chair closest to the door. He snorted. "Is that actually in black and white? Lame."

"The Ghost and Mrs. Muir is a classic," Sarah protested, not bothering to look at him.

"Lame," Dean repeated.

"The story is rather intriguing," Castiel piped up, eyes not leaving the screen. "Despite the impossibility of their relationship, it is clear that the main characters retain a special connection."

Sam's eyes darted to Dean, whose expression flickered strangely, before he let out a loud groan. He pointed at Sam and Sarah. "You're conspiring to turn him into a girl, I know it."

"I am neither male nor female," Castiel reminded, although instead of sounding insistent he sounded like he was repeating a fond fact.

Sam shook his head, wondering again just how much was going on there and if they were even aware of it. He would have to keep an eye on things, just in case. He cared about both Dean and Castiel, and if this unnameable thing between them was going to lead to more pain…

Well, he had no idea what he was going to do about it, but if he was going to do anything, he needed to know. Which meant he had to pay attention.

'Damn it, and I thought my relationships were complicated,' he thought, closing his eyes and leaning his head against the wall. He didn't know which was harder – telling a woman he might still have a thing for that he had nearly destroyed the world and his own flesh and blood…or his brother accepting he might have feelings for his male, formerly angelic best friend. 'They're both kind of no-win situations from this standpoint.'

He heard a movement nearby and opened his eyes.

Glancing up, he watched as Sarah slowly turned to look at him. His heart leapt. 'Then again…'

She suddenly smiled, and Sam, surprised, made to return the gesture – and then froze.

Sarah's face suddenly began to change in front of him, twisting and reshaping until he was looking at Adam instead of her. The world of Lisa's living room fell away, and he was surrounded by cold tongues of flame and bright, eye-searing light.

"You didn't think you could escape it, did you Sam?" Adam asked in a cold tone that Sam knew meant Michael was in the driver's seat. "You might be out of the Cage, brother, but you're still bound to us. And we're not ready to let you go yet."

Something gigantic and bright swooped down upon him, screeching at him in a way that made his eardrums burst before the world went dark.