-Summary: It's the end of the world and they've got one last card to play. Castiel sends Dean back: back before everything. Now he has time to stop what's coming, but no friggin' clue how to do it. Time travel should really come with a manual. TIMELINE AU

-Editing: May be a little spotty this chapter. I had a ridiculously busy week that was somehow also not very productive? Funny how that happens. Anyway, this chapter is up pretty late for my usual Sunday posting because I didn't get to editing until this morning.

-Chapter References: Since this story is starting to get quite long and it's been quite some time since the early chapters, I'm going to start including chapter numbers for anything about to be referenced, in case you need a refresher and so you don't have to go hunting for it. In this case, if you don't recall the first time the boys summoned Crowley, refresher course can be found in chapter 9. Season 1: Chapter 8 :)

(Also, why have these sites not figured out how to include a prologue as Chapter 0 so my damn chapter numbers line up?! If anyone knows how to do this, omg, tellme tellme tellme, you will be my hero)

-Timeline Reminder: For the purpose of the second half of this chapter, please remember that Chest!Cas is Season11!Cas, and therefore somewhat suicidal and has not had that reconciliation chat in the Impala with Dean yet. We'll get back to Season 12/13 Cas who's more stable, though, in this weirdly angsty, fix-it-but-only-after-we-break-it-all-over-again fic of ours :D

-Chapter Warnings: Well, after all the cliffies and dirty rotten things I've put you through – bunker key, vessel changes, getting Cas just to lose him back to heaven again – I think it's time for some of the good feels. You know. Right after we have a chat with the King of Snark and the author meets the required angst quota of any Supernatural fanfic. No, seriously, the angst got away from me, but I promise you there are good feels too.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

The Road So Far (This Time Around)

Season 2: Chapter 18

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

"Took you long enough."

Those were the first words out of the moronic Dean Winchester's mouth after Crowley popped into the crossroads, just slightly off-center in case a devil's trap was waiting for him. Oddly enough, there wasn't one.

"I do have other customers, you know," Crowley drawled, spinning around in a slow circle as he looked at the cozy little dirt intersection in the middle of some charming crop fields in… Crowley was going to guess Nebraska. He straightened his suit jacket as he completed his turn to face the Winchester's again. "Legitimate ones, offering up their souls, who aren't calling to WASTE MY TIME."

The raised words echoed through the fields for a distance, scattering some crows that had been camping out nearby in the late evening hours. Crowley cleared his throat, composed himself, and cracked his neck. "Now then. Moose." He nodded to the younger of the two, then turned to the older thorn in his side. "…Not-Moose. I have to confess, this summoning business is getting old."

Particularly since their last dance had ended with HIS NECK next in line for the fucking guillotine.

"Then buy a phone," Dean bit back, and Crowley was surprised to see that he was one hundred percent not joking. Maybe poking fun. Certainly being a grump and a right old bore. But not joking.

Interesting.

"Why, Dean Winchester," Crowley batted his eyelashes, slipping his hands into his pocket and putting on a downright coy show, "are you asking for my number?"

The hunter bristled while simultaneously looking embarrassed – his pissed off little ears reddening at the tips – and wasn't that just adorable.

"So that wouldn't be the Colt in your pocket, and you are just that happy to see me," he practically cooed, enjoying this perhaps way more than he should. Especially the way the hunter's face shut down, deadpan to the point of dangerous, and the Moose shifted restlessly beside him. "Oh, that's right, it can't be the Colt. You don't have it anymore, do you? Daddy lost a bet."

And wasn't that just wonderful? Couldn't trust hunters – even the best – with anything, let alone keeping the one and only key to the most accessible Hell Gate in North America out of the hands of, oh, demons. Useless. Not that it really mattered. Colt or no, Azazel would have found a Hell Gate to raise Lilith through one way or another. They were way too early in the pre-kickoff warmups to start considering any play to be an endgame.

Didn't stop Sam from making an angry, aborted move forward. He drew his gun from his back with a fierce and furious look on his face that didn't scare the King of the Crossroads one bit. Dean held him back anyway, a hand to his bicep that the Moose eventually relented too.

"Gonna shoot me with that hilariously average gun, Moose? I'll let you know if it tickles." Crowley couldn't help but flaunt his utter lack of intimidation, jutting his chin out towards the handgun still in Sam's grip. Dean double tapped the front of the Moose's shoulder as a reminder to back down, but Not-Moose's expression was flat enough to actually be worth paying attention to.

"You wanna see how well you can talk after you take a bullet to the teeth from that gun? I promise you, there's nothing average about these, Crowley."

The King of the Crossroads had to pull his hand more hastily out of his pocket than he liked in order to catch the small, shiny object Dean lobbed his way. It was a bullet, and as Crowley examined the sleek, polished metal, he nearly dropped it when his fingers ran over the hastily scratched symbol etched on the side.

The damn thing had a devil's trap carved into it!

The demon narrowed his eyes at the bullet, though he couldn't deny his curiosity was officially peaked. (It had actually been peaked months ago when two moronic angel condoms summoned him BY NAME and then weaseled HIM, the KING of the bloody CROSSROADS, into a FUCKING DEAL. Yes, they' had his curiosity then, but now it was official.) He was maybe a little horrified at it, too. Okay, more than a little. A trap-engraved bullet was a new one. Not a bad idea, actually. It would probably hurt like the devil and likely trap one's powers, if not cause complete immobility.

Oh, the possibilities.

Geez, they were lucky most hunters were dumb as their redneck wardrobes suggested. He was sure it was what made the two hunters standing in front of him, clothing choices aside, actually dangerous. Or, at the very least, particularly troublesome.

"No spray-on devil's trap, then?" He asked instead, tucking the bullet into his pocket for further inspection. Dean didn't miss it, something like a dangerously smug, but also actually dangerous, smirk on his face. So Crowley made a show of looking about the un-painted dirt around him as he rolled back onto his heels with his hands still in his pockets. "Getting ballsy, are we, Not-Moose?"

Crowley settled back onto his feet abruptly, a thoughtful expression overtaking his face. "I guess that would make you the squirrel."

Dean actually huffed something of a laugh, a little quirk to his lips that Crowley would say was almost nostalgic, if he didn't know better. "Yeah, I'm more of the dog this go around."

Crowley blinked at the response, which was not only not what he'd expected, but he didn't know what to make of it, either. Had Dean missed the obvious reference? The idea baffled Crowley. Did the man not watch quality cartoons? He was sure that had been in Hell's dossier on the Winchesters. Older brother, meathead, likes pop culture references way too much. Definitely in there.

"Look, we need to talk," the Winchester continued, and Crowley let the dog comment fall to the wayside without vocalizing any of the dozen obvious comebacks. Something along the lines of 'well, you'll certainly be Hell's bitch soon' being at the top of the list he discarded for the sake of moving this dandy little conversation along.

"Do we now?" Well, if he couldn't have his insults, he could at least be annoyingly vague and unhelpful.

"We know you're against the apocalypse," Moose offered next, that earlier anger calmed for now but still simmering just beneath the surface. Crowley wondered if the demon blood as a child had increased that temper, or it was a pure hand-me-down from John.

"Oh, you do, do you? You seem to know a lot for a pair of meatsuits." Crowley refused to let the metaphoric sweat drip down his neck. Where the hell were they getting their information?

"Think you mean angel condoms, don't you?" Squirrel piped in, the rough sound of his voice telling the King well enough how the boys felt about that particular part of The Plan. The Plan they shouldn't know about. His eyes narrowed at the pair. Things weren't adding up.

"Is that a little bird on your shoulder, or is your feathered friend actually in your ribcage?" He dropped his eyes purposefully to the hunter's torso. When Dean's fist clenched at his sides but he didn't offer an answer, Crowley continued, "I hear you got yourself an angel enema, Dean. A pretty cocky one, too, if he's whispering about a prophecy like it's fact."

Which was complete bollocks and it looked like everyone present for this little shindig knew it. Sure, the prophecy was a little open-ended, a Righteous Man in Hell and blah blah blah, but the fact that it was Sam and Dean Winchester – that it had always been Sam and Dean – was pretty damn obvious. They fit too perfectly for it to be anyone else.

Unless God had a sense of humor which, given the twenty-first century and everything leading up to it, Crowley seriously doubted.

"You telling me it's not a fact you want Lucifer staying caged up as much as we do?" Dean countered, a raised brow and almost bored expression on his face stating that he absolutely knew the answer to that question. It just ruffled the demon's scales (ruffled feathers were for those annyong balls of light upstairs and Crowley was loathe to be compared to such do-gooders in any capacity.) Because, really, there was no way in bloody Hell they should know that.

"Your halo tell you I was?"

There was no way. There wasn't. Which meant Dean was getting his information from somewhere else. The Prophet? Only, that little twerp was writing about the Winchester boys, and only the boys. Crowley had seen the published books, and he'd gotten a human flunky (a junkie with an insatiable habit) to break in while the Prophet was out in order to check some of the more recent transcripts (something he intended to do every now and then, just to keep tabs on everything. And which he had absolutely no intention of informing his demonic "partners".) There had been nothing in the man's writing, published or otherwise, about Hell's movements at all. Audience suspense, possibly, only his notes hadn't had any details either. If Chuck Shirley was aware of what was really happening down below or up above, he wasn't bothering to write it down.

"Maybe." Squirrel shrugged and grinned something dangerous his way. "Or maybe I'm just psychic."

Crowley actually snorted at that one. Right, if there was one explanation for all of this, it wasnot that one.

"If I weren't psychic," Dean continued, clearly mocking the demon, "how would I know you're gunning for a bigger crown than the crossroads."

His eyes narrowed at the bold hunter, but he was apparently far from finished.

"Or that before Azazel got the Colt, you were thinking of stealing it. Probably through a human you've got strung out on a deal. I'm thinking a thief, maybe? Good with her hands."

Now Crowley was downright nervous. He would never let it show, of course, but there was no way this braindead meat-popsicle could possibly know this. Crowley hadn't even moved on that last one. Not yet anyway. And he hadn't missed Dean's oh-so-specific choice of pronouns or profession. So unless a prophet was not only having visions of Hell, but was literally reading Crowley's mind, no one could know that.

He scoffed loudly, settling on false bravado while internally he panicked. "And why would I do that, Squirrel? Using a human, no less."

"Free labor," Dean offered less than sarcastically.

"Because you're going to need a bargaining chip when you tell me and my brother you're on our side," Sam offered more seriously, those brown eyes never leaving Crowley. "So we don't kill you."

"There is no way in hell I'm on your side, Moose."

"Well you're not on Heaven or Hell's," Dean countered blandly and Crowley found himself practically squinting, his eyes couldn't get any more narrowed.

"I'm on my own side," he finally declared loudly and blatantly. There was clearly no reason to deny it, not only because they seemed to know it already, but bluffing wasn't even getting him spare chips here.

"Great," Squirrel announced, "so are we."

The demon huffed in frustration, really not liking how Dean's words somehow sounded even more like they were on the same side. Next the bloody humans would be suggesting they have team jackets made. He finally threw up his hands, giving up the game, well and truly baffled now.

"Where are you getting your information?" he asked, actually sincere for once. Well, it would sound sincere if you could hear beyond the confounded frustration in his voice. "I'm genuinely curious, because I can't figure you out."

And neither could anyone else in Hell.

"Yeah," Dean scoffed, half in self-deprecation, half just pure hunter's gruff. "I'm real complicated."

He sure hadn't been at the start of this thing. Nine months ago they'd wrapped up near twenty years' worth of recon. Demons posing in all walks of the Winchester's lives, all keeping an eye on the boys. Teachers, janitors, motel owners, maids, friends, bullies, one had even approached John while possessing a fellow hunter (who'd met a rather nasty end shortly afterwards). All had said the same thing. Dean was a meathead, but a damn impressive hunter. Not psychic, not particularly intelligent, unlike his brother, but highly intuitive. Dangerously so. He had ridiculously low self-worth and was loyal to a devastating fault. All things they could and would use to get the Apocalyptic ball rolling.

This… This was a completely different man wrapped in the same snark and insecurities. Sans the sliver of angel sitting in his chest, Crowley could not figure out where the hell he'd come from.

"So, did you call me here to tell me all about my own plans, which I already know, thank you very much, or was there a point to this?"

The brothers exchanged looks, before Sam offered a shrug. "You don't want the apocalypse to happen; we don't want the apocalypse to happen. We figured we should talk."

"Oh, is that what this is?" Crowley slapped on a cheerful smile, voice sugary sweet. "A friendly little con-fab? Well, excellent, I'll just be leaving then.

He spun on his heal even as Dean barked out a 'Hey!' that the demon could tell meant business, especially as it was followed by the cocking hammer of a gun. Apparently, a gun loaded with devils trap bullets. It only served to infuriate Crowley more, however, and he spun back around, finger whipped out and jutting in the arrogant, bossy, idiotic human's direction.

"I don't think so, Squirrel!" he yelled back, face reddening. "I may be against unlocking dear old Lucifer's personal prison, but that's because I'm not SUICIDAL. Which is precisely the reason this conversation is over."

"Crowley," Moose countered, holding his hands up in placation. Hilarious. He'd obviously forgotten who and what it was he was dealing with. "None of us want the world to end. Let's start there."

"Oh, silly me. I forgot I was talking to a hero." The demon rolled his eyes. "I don't give a damn about the world – though I can't say the Apocalypse will be good for business. I care about one thing, and one thing only. Yours truly." He gestured down his body with a little wink that made the yeti of a man blink in discomfort. Good for him. "I haven't made a move, other than considering maybe, just maybe, stealing the Colt from you mooks, because if anyone – and I mean anyone – finds out that I'm so much as chatting with you Winchesters, they'll TEAR ME APART!"

Dean winced at the volume, sticking a finger in his ear dramatically even as the king composed himself back to kingly standards. His face was still red and he was still spewing all but fire, but, you know, kingly. "I like my life, I'd like to keep it. It's one of the reasons I'm against popping the devil out of his box. But it's also a driving force behind not wanting to be on the run from all of Hell, you MORONS."

"Will you stop yelling, already?" Dean growled out, glaring at the crossroads King. "We're not asking you to blow you're cover, we're just talking!"

"Did you miss the part where that could GET ME KILLED?" And no, he would not stop yelling, the human twat.

"Look," Sam tried again, voice still ever that infuriatingly reasonable calm, though Crowley could tell even the moose was wearing thin on patience, "we're just laying groundwork, alright? We know you've got your own plans to disrupt the apocalypse. We're obviously working on a few of our own. Can we at least start there?"

"I'm not divulging anything to you two meatheads."

"We don't want your secrets. God!" Dean finally shouted, throwing up his hands. "How can we make this any more simple, Crowley? 'Gee, we see you're against the end of the world. Great, us too! Let us know if you come up with a good one, kay?' 'Okay!' That's it. That's all. Jesus!"

Crowley watched the explosion through ever narrowing eyes. Was that… Was that seriously all they had summoned him here for? 'We've got a common end goal, keep us in the loop?' That… That couldn't be it. That was monumentally stupid.

"What the hell makes you think you can trust me?" he asked, blurting it out, dumfounded, because he just couldn't believe two humans – two hunters – were stupid enough to get in bed with a demon. And not even by force or blackmail or bribery. Just…because. And it was all their idea, too. Crowley couldn't… he just couldn't even wrap his head around it.

"Oh, we definitely don't trust you," Squirrel countered immediately, a look crossing his face that said he knew better. One of those looks that reads 'been there, done that, Personal Experience Achieved.' Crowley wondered, for a brief moment of curiosity amidst his mind being blown by the sheer insanity in front of him, where that look was coming from. "We're just not above using you. Or you, us, I bet."

Huh.

Well, it was no less stupid, but at least it had possibility.

"Hmm, a mutually beneficial relationship based purely on taking advantage of one another?" Crowley let out a little hum of thought as he weighed the offer with an exaggerated expression on his face. "The good old 'I scratch your back, you give me a hand job'arrangement. Can't say I'm entirely against that..."

Dean's eyelids shuttered in annoyance, that deadpan expression something Crowley suspected he'd be seeing more of in the future, should he take them up on this. Sam coughed awkwardly beside his brother, face definitely caught between 'he's joking, right?' and 'wait a minute, we didn't say anything about sexual favors, here…' The embarrassed moose amused the demon to no end, and Crowley considered saying yes just to continue to be a pain in their stupidly tall asses.

Of course, there were other reasons, as well. Mainly that the two mooks thought they could take on the Apocalypse and win. Something deep in Crowley's smoke-filled, rotting gut was telling him not to underestimate the flannel-wrapped speedbump in an otherwise dangerously perfect plan.

He supposed they would need a hand along the way if they were going to actually pull it off. Their terrible choice in clothing and plucky attitude would only get them so far. Plus, a failed apocalypse would leave plenty of vacancies in Hell to be filled. Positions a tad higher up the ladder than Crowley currently sat.

"Alright, boys. I suppose I can offer my services on the rare occasion. For the right price, to be negotiated at the time." He ignored the shift in their glares from elation to annoyance or the snort from Squirrel. Crowley shoved his hands back into his pockets, the very picture of laid back, even as he dropped his voice into a far more dangerous range that promised pain and suffering. "But if I hear so much as a whisper about my involvement-"

"Relax, Crowley," Dean bit out before he need finish. "We've got just as much riding on this."

Somehow, the King of the crossroads seriously doubted that. All they were risking was their lives.

"I think we'll have our hands full," Moose added on, voice sardonic. "End of the world doesn't leave a lot of time left over to betray you."

Well… Yet, Crowley thought. But that was a bridge to burn much further down this road they were now caravanning together. A road trip with two hunters. What fun.

"Well then, gentlemen." Crowley regarded them for another drawn out minute, eyes narrowed more for show, though the two certainly provided plenty to be suspicious of. "Can't say it's been fun."

With a parting smirk, the King was gone.

-o-o-o-

Sam let out a breath that felt like it took his body with it, leaving him a deflated, saggy balloon in the middle of a crossroads in Nebraska. He glanced at his brother, who didn't look much better. Annoyance seemed to be keeping him inflated for the most part.

"Why do I feel like we just made a deal with the devil?" the younger Winchester asked, part in jest and part absolutely not.

"Well…" Dean gave a helpless little shrug as he rubbed at his chest. The muscles there felt tight, aching and hot like they hadn't in a long time. He hoped that meant good things for the Cas sitting in his chest. He hoped it didn't mean bad things for the Cas sitting upstairs.

His brother wasn't wrong about Crowley, though, getting back to the matter at hand and the only one of his current worries that he had any control over. The King of the Crossroads had his uses, despite his untrustworthiness and a coming future ripe with double crosses. From both sides, Dean could admit. So the man from the future added a little more reasonably, "We might need him. Maybe we can stop from stealing the Colt this time, but if not…. Better to be on the same page now than in the middle of a crisis."

And the crises were surely coming. As surely as Time wanted things to stay the same.

Besides, Crowley might be a demon, but as far as that breed went, he'd come through more than once for the Winchesters, sometimes for reasons Dean never had figured out. Even with him being at least partially responsible for the Mark of Cain and certainly not a great influence on Demon Dean, there were still enough times when Crowley had been more ally than enemy. The hunter didn't want to risk closing that door.

Plus, as dangerous as Crowley was on the throne, he was nothing compared to the actual devil.

"He's kind of a dick," Sam mentioned so offhandedly – tone sort of affronted and pinched expression definitely affronted – that Dean laughed, and laughed loudly.

"Oh, yeah, a total dick," he agreed, a real smile on his face for the first time in at least a couple days. "Resourceful one, though."

Sam looked constipated for a minute – probably flitting through at least six dick jokes and hand-job rejects in that brilliant (and totally dirty, no matter how he pretended not to be) brain of his – before he held out his hand and gestured for the keys. Dean pulled a face, but didn't argue as he dug them out of his pocket and tossed them his brother's way.

-o-o-o-

They ended up crashing at a motel not long after, both exhausted from taking out a nest of vampires and following it up with somewhat hostile negotiations with the King of the Crossroads, all on almost forty-eight hours without sleep. Dean declared they'd earned it, so he slept for a whole six and half hours this time (a real treat for him).

For a good chunk of that, he dreamed, like he hadn't in far too long.

"Hello, Dean."

The hunter craned his neck to look over his shoulder at the angel, who was standing beside the picnic table Dean found himself camped out on. He'd been watching Ben run around at another kid's birthday party, a cold beer in hand and content smile on his face. The arrival of the angel came with conflicting emotions that both enveloped his chest with warmth and stole the smile right off his face.

This memory had been one of the few times in his life with Lisa and Ben Braedon that he hadn't been praying to see Cas again. A moment when he'd almost been happy. Almost been apple-pie. It figured that now was when the angel finally showed. But that had been a long time ago and a lot had happened since. Beyond the pain of those days without Sam or the angel (and why did it have to be in this dream, of this memory, that Castiel finally came back?), there was the overwhelming relief because Cas was alive and here.

"You real?"

In lieu of a response, the angel tilted his head sharply, brow pinching and Dean bit back the sharp annoyance it triggered. Damn, but he was tired of his emotions being all over the friggin' place.

"Damn it, Cas, are you really here?"

"I've always been here, Dean."

Gee, if that was true, wouldn't it have been nice to know, six freaking months ago!

"I mean right now. In my head." The hunter gestured around at the eleven year old's birthday party, the streamers and balloons bobbing in the wind, the kids laughing and screaming as they ran about, the parents milling with red solo cups and beer bottles. Normal life. A life Dean had tried so hard to fit into, but his heart just hadn't been in it. Never like Sam's.

Dean's throat was getting awfully sore for no damn reason as he forced out a croaky, "In my… In my chest?"

Cas's eyes lowered, ever so slowly, to the man's torso and Dean felt the muscles there constrict around his heart like a noose. "I couldn't get you here by my power alone. I didn't have enough."

The hunter let that sink in and dropped his gaze to the bottle in his hands. It was still icy cold, with condensation pooling along the surface until it ran in occasional rivets down the side. That beer would never get warm, not in this place.

"You've been here the whole time."

Cas didn't answer. It hadn't been a question. Instead, he crossed in front of the man and Dean let out a chuff as the angel climbed onto the picnic table, spinning to sit atop the table's surface beside his friend and charge. Dean took the opportunity for a long draw of beer.

"Thought I was dreaming you," Dean answered, lips still wrapped around the bottle. It didn't feel any lighter as he lowered it back between his legs. The neck dangled from between fingers, arms draped across his knees, and he watched condensation drip to the peeling wood of the bench.

"You are currently dreaming." Castiel mirrored his posture, legs apart and hands clasped loosely between his knees. He was watching the children with an intensity that would get him in trouble in the real world, but Dean knew it was the angel's super weird appreciation of humanity. "And I am currently in that dream."

"Damn it, Cas." He let out a long breath of air, shaking his head before he speared his friend with a look that told him to cut it out. "For once, will you just give me a straight answer?"

Castiel fell quiet, his gaze dropping to the boards and grass beneath them. "I'm as real as a shadow can be, Dean."

There was that word again. People kept using that word to describe the angel – the chunk of grace lodged in his chest – and Dean was getting pretty frickin' sick of the riddle he didn't know the answer to. "I don't- what does that even mean?"

Beside him, Cas sighed deeply. Dean had come to realize that sound was one Cas made when he didn't want to tell him something, usually because Dean wouldn't like whatever it was. "I didn't have enough power to send you through time and maintain myself in 2016."

"Then how am I here? How are we here?" The hunter gave his chest a harsh pat, the thumping force echoing through his own ribcage in an oddly satisfying way. Blue eyes dropped once more, then met his eyes with a pointed look that Dean had seen too many times in his lifetime. He let out a bitter huff as he got his answer. "You didn't have enough grace. So you… what, took a debt out of the life power bank?"

That look didn't let up. "Grace is life, Dean."

"Are you saying you-" Dean bit the inside of his cheek for a minute, then licked his lips and tried to ignore how angry he was. "You used your life to get me back here?"

"Yes." The immediate and unwavering response only made it worse. Damn it, he'd already known this – suspected it at the very least – and it still pissed him off. Of all the angels, of all the friends, why had he gotten the one just as stupidly self-sacrificing as himself? "I had to make sure you got to your destination."

That gaze dropped to his hands, once loosely clasped together but now wringing out with a slow sort of anxiousness that just screamed exhaustion. Dean didn't know why, but he got the distinct impression of it. Had those dark circles always been under Cas's eyes, or were they new? "Maintaining a vessel takes a small, but constant flow of grace. I surrendered what was left and put everything into the jump. I took you as far as I could before it burned up."

Dean couldn't help himself. He reached out and stilled those hands, realizing what he was doing even as he did it and managing not to pull away immediately. Once Castiel had stopped, fingers faltering beneath Dean's grip, the hunter withdrew his hands, awkwardly aware that he'd practically dive-bombed his friend's hands between his knees to stop the fidgeting.

Castiel didn't comment, barely even let it interrupt him, and Dean was ridiculously grateful for that. "I believe this, what I am now, is nothing but an after-image of that power. A sliver of unburned grace shielding your soul to see the jump through."

And now stuck in the tendrils of Dean's apparently clingy soul, if the other Castiel was right.

But Dean wasn't as bothered by that as he was by Cas's words, buried in the verbal sprawl that was meant to distract from the truth. "You died sending me back."

Cas pinned him with another look, but this one was far too sad to ever resemble anything the angel had ever looked at him with. It took Dean's breath away to realize, so damn suddenly that it was friggin' painful, that Cas had looked like that for a long time.

"I was dead already, Dean."

The hunter couldn't keep that gaze. His throat fucking hurt from the lump there, the swelling that felt like he was going to start crying any minute now, and he blinked away the evidence of that immediately. God damn it, he had seen Cas die too many times. Too many fucking times, and to hear him just accept it…

There was something else in the angel's tone, in those eyes, that twisted Dean's stomach into tiny little knots that he wanted to claw out with his bare hands. Something wrong, that he couldn't name and, damn it, didn't want to. He climbed off the table. He had to move. Had to leave the truth of this- this… bullshit behind him.

"Why didn't you tell me?" The hunter whirled back to face the angel, fists clenched at his sides as Cas only met his stare. "You were here the whole time. Damn it, you were helping me, Cas. Why didn't you just tell me you were here?"

Why didn't you answer me?

"I'm not, I couldn't…" Cas's eyes filled with pure anguish, the kind that stole Dean's breath away, and he didn't know where it was coming from. The angel closed his eyes and Dean hated himself for being relieved he didn't have to see those pained blue depths anymore. He was a fucking coward and a terrible friend. "I can't be of use to you like this, Dean. I have nothing left to offer."

The angel ducked his head, and Dean didn't know if it was the dream world, where he already knew emotions were harder to hide, or the connection they had because Cas was actually a part of him now, snuggled up to his soul, but he could practically see the guilt and shame wafting off the angel in waves. He could certainly feel it, and the heartbreak there practically bowled him over.

"I'm barely here. There are times… sometimes I don't even remember what I am. Who I am." Castiel's voice grew almost too soft to hear, but thanks to dream-fucking-wonderland, Dean heard every single syllable, and each fiber of misery within them. "I can't be what you need, Dean. I'm used up."

Dean clenched his fists. "Yes, you can."

The angel's head whipped up, and he looked so full of despair – so full of dread at what Dean was going to ask of him next – that the hunter wanted to throw up. God, how had they let this – how had he let it – get this bad?

"I don't need you to be useful, Cas. I just- I just need you to…be. Here." He trailed off lamely at the end, the grip on the neck of his beer bottle tight enough that he probably would have hurt himself if any of this were real. He sighed and set the bottle safely on the table, off to Cas's side. "I know I haven't- wasn't there for you a lot lately. Uh, in the last couple years, I mean. Sometimes Sam and me… we get caught up in our own shit. Forget about everyone else and that- that's not…"

Damn it, why were words so fucking hard?

"You don't need to concern yourself with my problems, Dean." Cas was staring at his hands again, and damn it, all Dean wanted was for the angel to look at him. But look at him like he used to. Strong and solid and unbreakable. Not… not this broken thing he was. Had become. God, Dean was so fucking selfish, but he had no idea how to deal with this. "I'm not as important as the Darkness, or changing your and Sam's fate."

Expendable.

The hunter blinked at the word that crossed his mind. It was definitely Cas's voice, but the angel's mouth hadn't moved and the hunter recognized that slightly off sound of words that hadn't been vocalized. From ghosts to angels to the whispers of Hell, he knew enough what something in his head sounded like.

Damn it, this wasn't his department. He was no good at this! This was something Sam usually handled, because Dean only made stuff like this so much worse.

"You're not expendable, Cas. You're important. To me, to Sam. You're family," he insisted, only to have his mouth dry out and his heart plummet into his stomach at the look Cas sent his way. A look that said 'that's a nice sentiment, Dean,' and nothing more. And yes, damn it, maybe he deserved that. How many times had he said that and never followed through? How many times had he and Sam told the angel he was like a brother only to throw him out of the bunker, ignore his problems, from Raphael to Naomi to Metatron. But he had time now. Time to do better. "That's my point, damn it. I know I've messed up. So… so many times, Cas. I never should have…"

Fuck, he couldn't even say it, could he? Had he ever even apologized for kicking Cas out of the bunker? For beating him almost to death under the influence of the Mark? For any of it?

Dean suddenly swallowed past the lump in his throat, damn near threatening to choke him, as he heard the echoes of a memory. His brother screaming. Crowley being more on their side than their own angel. Cas, staring at him in a dark, dank factory and telling him he didn't fight anymore.

'I'm not good luck, Dean.'

He'd apologized then. He'd told the angel he had been wrong and Cas had just fucking smiled and talked about bees. He'd wanted to go watch the bees. He hadn't wanted to fight.

That was years ago. How long had Cas wanted out? How many times had Dean dragged him back in?

The hunters' chest throbbed and ached and felt so damn hollow, like an endless pit, as he remembered the look in Castiel's eyes that night they'd stabbed Dick Roman, after Dean had finally, finally, talked the angel into helping them. That look right before the world had gone to Purgatory in a handbasket, and he'd lost his best friend for months. For a lot longer than that, really.

Cas had chosen to stay in Purgatory. Just like he'd chosen to say yes.

Dean wasn't going to survive if his heart kept hurting like this. He couldn't. He wanted to claw the traitorous thing out of his chest.

How long ago had Cas told him he was worried he might kill himself if he saw the damage he wrought in Heaven? That…that had been before Metatron tricked him and Heaven got even worse. Before Lucifer possessed him and killed so many more. That confession had been fucking years ago. And Dean had never checked back in, made sure the angel didn't still feel that way.

Suddenly, Castiel saying yes, Cas being expendable, was taking an entirely new perspective that froze Dean's blood in his veins.

'I was dead already.'

Cas hadn't expected to survive. Any of this. And he hadn't, really, had he? Just a sliver. A sliver that would have burned up, the angel gone forever – permanently – with Dean none the wiser. The hunter raised a shaky hand to his chest, struggling to breath as he tried to rub some warmth back into that suddenly frigid black hole.

He had no doubt, suddenly, that he was the one who had clung to the chunk of grace, tangled himself up in it so tightly that Cas couldn't slip away, and not the other way around.

"I'd rather have you." It was all he could think to say, blurting it out through numb lips and a numb tongue and an aching mind. His hands were shaking, and he clenched them to hide it. Dean met his angel's eyes, and hell if there wasn't just as much pain there as Cas's. "Cursed or not. Remember?"

The angel was slow to nod – and hell, he'd been pretty far off his rocker when Dean had said those words to him – but his eyes stayed locked on the hunter's and there was recognition in those blue depths. "I remember."

"All I need you to do is believe me, here. I don't know how else to say it." Because he'd meant it that night. Maybe… maybe he was starting to realize how often he thought he said it, and how often it had sounded different to the angel. A request for a hammer, not a friend. But he'd meant it. Every word.

With a shaky breath, Dean clambered back onto the table, sitting closer to Cas this time. Close enough to feel the imagined warmth of the angel beside him, even if he couldn't find the warmth from the part of him in his ribcage.

"So no more of this- this not useful crap. I want you here, Cas. Just you. Useful or not." He closed his eyes, and managed to make his hands stop shaking as the realization he was sitting beside the angel he'd missed for so damn long made a laugh bubble out of him. It wasn't nearly as real as he wished it could be, but he'd take it. He shook his head, laughing again at the swell of relief buzzing through him as his mind finally registered that Cas was right here. Right beside him. Had been the whole time. Dean buried his head in his hands and scrubbed his fingernails against his scalp as he relished in that release, that momentary, almost hysterical relief. Castiel was staring at him as he opened his eyes and looked at his angel. "Hell, I'm…I'm so fucking happy you're here, man."

Because the angel almost hadn't been. For six months, Dean had been alone in one way or another, faced with an impossible task, years long, with a terrible fate if he failed, praying to an angel he didn't think was alive to hear him.

There were plenty of conflicting emotions in Castiel's eyes as he met them head on. The pain, the despair, were still present, but there was hope, too. Such painfully clear and fearful hope, that Dean vowed to do better. This battle, this little war he hadn't even known he was losing, was far from over, but he'd do better now that he knew he had to fight.

Even if it was just for a shadow.

"I'm going to change it, Cas." The angel's brow pinched at the topic shift that really wasn't a shift at all. Dean swallowed down all that emotion he wasn't equipped to deal with anyway and surged on. "I'm going to save them. Sam, and Bobby, and Ellen and Jo. I'm gonna change their fates. And I'm gonna change yours too."

Cas blinked at him, as if he hadn't even considered his own past – future – might be changeable. Or that he might need saving.

"I can't keep you – the other you – out of it," Dean confessed, wincing even as the memory of that panic when he thought about Claire returned with just as much force. The panic that came with every change he made that only seemed to make things worse. Of that relieved look on Angela Garrett's face when Castiel confessed she was going back to Heaven. Back to the lion's den. "But I promise. I won't- we won't let you fall this time, Cas. You won't lose your home."

He refused to call those dicks his family, though. They weren't. Shouldn't be. They didn't deserve him.

Castiel watched him for a long time. Long enough for Dean to swipe his never-ending beer and take a long, only slightly desperate swig.

"Of everything that has happened or will happen," Cas finally spoke, eyes never leaving his charge's in that soul-searching gaze of his, "meeting you and Sam is not one that I, or any version of me, will ever regret. Not for all of Heaven would I take back what rebelling brought me, Dean."

Family.

Dean swallowed, shutting his eyes against the stupid water stupidly swelling behind his stupid eyeballs as Cas's voice filtered between his ears again. He didn't know if the angel was aware he could hear him, or if it was dreamland, or hell, maybe Dean was just hearing what he wanted to hear. Truth was, he didn't care. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, and all that.

He took a moment to clear the emotion from his throat and eyes, sniffled something manly, and hopped off the picnic table. Cas just watched him as he crossed a few feet of the yard – dodging kids as they ran around him – and fetched two new beers from the large, blue cooler hanging out next to an assortment of juice boxes and a large red barrel full of water. When he returned, he offered one of the beers to Cas, who accepted it with just the barest hint of a smile, and clinked the neck of his bottle to the angel's.

"To family," he said, tipping the beer Cas's way. His friend shared in his smile, the closest one to reach his eyes that Dean had seen in far too long, and Dean settled close beside him again. For the warmth. And maybe for Cas, too.

He nursed the beer slowly, the both of them watching the party. Dean nodded to a parent he vaguely remembered as she walked by with a smile, and knocked his knee against Cas's. "You gotta go, or you got some time?"

Cas gave him a slightly wry look, a little of that wicked sense of humor coming back there for a moment. "I've got nothing but time, apparently."

"Damn straight." Dean took a sip of his beer with a reassuring nod, hiding the tease of a smirk crossing his face.

The angel waited just long enough to knock his knee back that Dean choked on his beer when he did, trying to laugh and swallow in the same go. He tried to shove him off the table with his shoulder and almost spilled what was left of the bottle on the rebound after hitting a wall of unmovable angel. Cas just stared straight ahead with what would be some next-level innocence painted on his face, if it weren't for those sarcastic little eyebrows climbing up his forehead.

The little shit took a casual sip from his beer and Dean muttered something under his breath about flabby angels.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd sat with Cas, or laughed with him. It felt good. It felt damn good, and he planned to soak up every minute of it that he could, since, for once, neither of them had anywhere to rush off to or the end of the world riding on their shoulders. At least not for the next four hours of blissful sleep and comfortable companionship.

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

-A/Ns: I love me some quiet Dean/Cas moments like I love me some Dean/Cas angst. (The angst actually took over here; it was supposed to be more of a quiet moment . We'll get there…)

-More the dog this go around: So for anyone who might not have gotten this more obscure reference, Mr. Peabody was a time-traveling dog first introduced on the Rocky and Bullwinkle show (where the reference Moose and Squirrel comes from). I swore I would get a Mr. Peabody joke in here at some point, and once Crowley learns Dean's from the future, there will be plenty more ;) It's too perfect with his habitual Rocky and Bullwinkle references. He just hasn't picked up on it yet.

-Full Caps: You may have noticed, but I pretty much hate using full caps in stories. If a character is shouting or screaming, it should come across in context. (i.e. "No!" he screamed at the top of his lungs, loud enough to shake the very building they stood in, wake the dead only for those poor souls to suffer death a second time, that of the blown ear drum (totally fatal, didn't you know?) and, oh yes, scare the poor mice living in that little hole by the base of the stairs. They'd been having such a nice family dinner, utterly ruined by the need of one moose to shout at the top of his lungs in abject horror. Humans could be so selfish sometimes.) However! Crowley is a very special character with a very special exception. He likes to scream mid-sentence, roller-coastering us through a delicious journey of enjoyable snark highs followed by back-the-fuck-up-from-the-suddenly-screaming-demon lows. Lol. It's one of my favorite things about the way Mark Shepherd portrayed the character. So he gets access to my rarely used caps locks (except in chats. I love all caps in chats. Screaming is the beeeeest)

And yes, I just wrote some weird vignette about Sam yelling loud enough to disturb a mouse family having dinner. Shut up, you liked it and you know it. ;D

-Up Next: Dean wakes up to Sammy sitting upright in the next bed, dressed and ready for the day because morning person (those freaks are almost as bad as house guests), dad's phone pressed to his ear, listening to a voicemail from none other than Ellen Harvelle.

-Delay Warning! I'm out on vacation next week, and while I anticipate lots of writing (I hope, I hope, I hope), I may not be able to post next Sunday. Chances are kind of low, considering internet isn't much of a thing where I'm going. I'll do my best, but if I'm unable to post in time, the chapter will most definitely be up the following weekend.

Please Review! I know you guys may be bummed by the possible delay next week, but I have also fallen behind in writing due to switching jobs and being stupidly busy and taking on too many projects with too little currently functioning brain power. So, if you have it in you, please pressure that muse into getting some writing done this week! She apparently needs the push -_-