The watch on Hotch's wrist showed just after 4 am by the time the BAU arrived at the former suspect's house. The neighborhood was quiet and they'd turned their lights off as soon as the cars had entered the street. The small two-story home sat on the very end of the street, right at the edge of the housing community. There were two big yards separating the house from the neighboring one on the left, and a few trees shielded it from a park and a convenience store on the right. It was quite isolated, as far as suburban homes went. The perfect place to kill someone without disturbances.

At Hotch's command, the team swarmed out and surrounded the house. Hotch and Morgan took the front door, while Prentiss and JJ went around back and Rossi covered the garage. Hotch waited until everyone was in position, then he gave the signal to go in. When Morgan moved to kick the door in, to their surprise, it swung open by itself. The two men exchanged a concerned look.

They moved in as silently as they could. Hotch could hear noise coming from deeper inside the house, a grunt followed by a low curse and a thump. The sounds of a struggle.

Then, just before they rounded the corner to the living room, there was a low cry up ahead, followed by a short burst of orange light. Hotch rushed into the room, gun raised and closely followed by Morgan, just in time to see the body drop.

In the middle of the quaint family living room, there stood the Winchester brothers with their weapons drawn. Sam had an arm slung around a petite blond woman's chest, a knife plunged into her back. Her eyes were wide and her mouth hung open in a soundless cry. For a split-second Hotch could have sworn there was a faint flicker coming from inside her body, but it stopped as Sam drew the knife from her back and she fell to the ground.

Dean had spun around as soon as the agents had rushed in and pointed the gun in his hand at Hotch and Morgan. At the same moment the rest of the team burst into the room from the other side. Sam reacted quickly, dropping the strange looking knife and reaching for his gun.

"Drop the weapons!" Hotch shouted. He kept his own gun trained on Dean, trusting his team to keep the younger Winchester in check.

As he'd expected, neither of the brothers complied. Dean's hand was steady and his face hard as he stared Hotch in the eye, their guns pointing straight at each other. He didn't seem overly concerned that he had JJ's gun pointed at his back. Sam had gotten a hold of his own gun with impressive speed and was locked into a stand-off with Rossi and Prentiss.

"Feds!" Dean growled under his breath, a note of genuine annoyance in his voice. Then his expression slipped into a cocky grin. "Fancy meeting you here. Already had the pleasure of getting to know your colleague earlier."

Hotch gritted his teeth and had to concentrate on his breathing to keep from showing any outward reaction. That bastard! What had they done to Reid? Despite the obvious taunt, he managed to keep his head in the moment. He tightened the grip on his gun and repeated his order. "Drop the weapons and put your hands above your heads!"

Neither man did as they were told, though Hotch could see Sam tensing slightly out of the corner of his eye. With the brothers firmly locked in the stand-off, Morgan moved to check on the body of the woman. Hotch had never seen her before. She hadn't been involved in the investigation. He wondered what she was doing in this house. Was she an unsuspecting witness that simply got in the way? Had the Wichesters kidnapped her and brought her here?

Morgan pressed his fingers to the woman's pulse point for a few seconds, then he shook his head and stepped back with a grim expression on his face. They'd been too late. At least for her.

"You are under arrest for murder! Drop your weapons! You're surrounded and out-numbered!"

Hotch could see it in Dean's eyes and the stubborn set of his jaw that it wasn't going to happen. Shit! They were caught in a stalemate. With no idea where they'd brought Reid and what had happened to their youngest agent, they couldn't risk shooting the brothers, and the Winchesters seemed to know it. But the BAU also couldn't let them go.

Suddenly, there was a noise behind Hotch. Careful not to let the fugitives out of his sight, he turned slightly and spotted the husband of the arrested woman, who they'd talked to the previous day, on the stairs to the second story. There was movement behind him as the two kids followed their father downstairs. Hotch was relieved to see the family was unharmed. They must have been asleep upstairs; the Winchesters hadn't gotten to them yet.

"Oh my god! What's going on?!" Mr. Angler exclaimed in shock.

"Sir, please stay back. The situation is under control," Morgan said firmly. It wasn't really, but there was no reason to distress the man further. He was staring with wide eyes, his gaze trained on the lifeless body that was slowly bleeding out on his living room carpet.

"Mr. Angler," JJ caught the man's attention, drawing his gaze away from the corpse, "take your kids and stay upstairs with them. They don't need to see this."

The mention of his kids seemed to draw Mr. Angler out of his stupor. He turned around and quickly ushered the two children upstairs. Hotch was glad to see that they hadn't come down far enough to get a clear view of the dead body.

With the civilians out of harm's way, he turned his full attention back on the Winchesters. "Don't make this more difficult than it has to be. There is no way out for you, so drop your weapons and tell us where our missing agent is!"

"Yeah, nooo," Dean drawled. "You see, I don't think you'll shoot us. You need us, if you ever wanna find your friend. He's terrified, you know."

Hotch's heart clenched at the thought of what Reid must have been through. How long had it been? Six hours? He knew what the Winchesters were able to do in mere minutes. A shudder went through him at the thought of the condition that they might find their youngest agent in. It had only been a year since Georgia. None of them were fully over the events yet, least of all Reid.

"Where is he?!" Morgan demanded, a dangerous growl in his voice. "What have you done to him?! I swear, if you've hurt him…"

"Relax," Dean waved the hand not holding his gun dismissively. "Kid's fine."

Morgan made a disbelieving noise in the back of his throat and kept his eyes narrowed on the serial killer. "You just said he was terrified! So what did you do?!" Hotch could see the worry that lay beneath the façade of anger. He himself wasn't feeling much different.

"We didn't hurt him," Sam spoke up for the first time. His eyes were flickering between the agents, trying to keep an eye on all of them at once. "He just had a panic attack. Said he's been kidnapped before? We didn't mean to drag up his trauma, but it's not like we could have just let him go."

Hotch was surprised by the sympathetic tone in Sam's voice. He almost seemed sorry. The younger brother had always been profiled as the more empathetic of the pair, but after they'd just witnessed him murder a woman without so much as a flinch, Hotch had been reconsidering their assessment of him. Was this an act? But his words and his body language seemed genuine…

"Tell us where Reid is and we might be able to get you a deal," Rossi tried to reason with Sam. "You'll still have to go to prison, the file we have on you is too big to negotiate anything else, but we might be able to give you something, still. Maybe keep you in the same prison? You wouldn't want to be separated and never see each other again, would you?"

Something in the last part of the sentence must have triggered something in the brothers, because they both stiffened and Sam's face immediately closed off. "You Feds are all the same," Dean growled. "But there is something you don't know. You see, you think you have the upper hand, but we aren't stupid. We didn't leave your little agent alone. A friend of ours is watching him, and if you arrest us and we don't come back, who knows what he'll do with your friend…"

Dean let his words trail off as Hotch felt a new wave of ice fill his veins. The Winchesters had backup. Why hadn't they thought about the possibility of the brothers not working alone? If what Dean was saying was true, then they had legitimate leverage over the team. With criminals as experienced and sophisticated as the Winchesters, the BAU could be certain that they had a protocol for this kind of situation in place, and that their accomplice wouldn't hesitate to dispose of Reid, should the brothers be arrested. Hotch gritted his teeth in frustration. They were stuck. They'd have to comply with the criminals' demands, if they wanted to have any chance of getting Reid back.

"You're bluffing," Morgan growled. He took a threatening step forward, but Hotch stopped him by raising his hand in warning.

"You willing to take that chance?" Dean asked with a cocky grin. "If you don't let us go, you'll never see your little friend again."

Hotch straightened his back. His agents were his responsibility, and Reid in particular was like a son to him. There was no way he was going to lose him again, so he'd do whatever he'd have to do to get him back safe. Even if that meant agreeing to a hostage exchange with two of America's worst criminals. "Prove it," he demanded. "Prove that there is really someone with Reid and then we can talk."

Dean exchanged a look with Sam, then he shrugged and nodded. "Alright, I'm gonna call our friend Castiel. No funny business." The older Winchester slowly lowered his gun, put one hand into his pocket and pulled out a phone. With another quick glance around he pressed speed-dial.

It took barely two rings for someone to pick up. Dean put the phone on speaker, so that they could all hear what was being said. "Hello, Dean," a deep male voice answered. Around Hotch his teammates tensed at the confirmation that there really was an accomplice, but Hotch didn't let himself get distracted from the conversation.

"Hey, Cas," Dean answered. "Everything alright on your end?" Hotch catalogued every little detail about his body language. Despite the tension of the situation, Dean had relaxed slightly as soon as he'd heard the other man talk. It suggested a close bond between the Winchesters and their helper.

"How's the kid? Has the agent given you any trouble?"

"No, everything is going fine," the man answered.

So it was confirmed. This Castiel guy had Reid. Hotch cursed internally. There was no way out now, they'd have to do a hostage exchange. He could only hope that this guy working with the Winchesters wasn't a sadist as well and that Reid was okay. He could see his emotions reflected on his team's faces.

Dean had apparently noticed the shift in them. The grin he was giving Hotch as he spoke into the phone was confident. "Good. That's great, buddy. Things didn't go quite as well on our end-"

"Are you hurt?! Is Sam? Do you need me to come? I told you, you should have taken me with you!"

"Cas! Angel, calm down! We're fine. But we've been caught by the Fed's team. I need you to bring the kid here, so that they'll let us go."

Hotch wondered what kind of relationship the two men had. The soothing way that Dean was speaking to Castiel was unlike anything they'd ever heard from the generally cocky and snarky killer.

Just as Dean started to rattle off their address for Castiel, Prentiss interrupted him. "We can't do this here. There're kids upstairs."

Hotch quickly cleared his head and berated himself to focus. She was right; they had to move this away from any civilians. Preferably to an open location that was easier to control.

"There is a big parking lot by that store just up the road," Sam suggested. Hotch wondered if the man had thought the exact same thing. "It should be empty at this time of night."

With a quick confirming glance the BAU agreed, and Dean told his contact to meet them there in a few minutes. When Rossi and Morgan moved forward to put handcuffs on the Winchesters, however, they both instantly raised their guns again. "We'll walk by ourselves," Dean declared. "No cuffs. And we'll keep our weapons."

They didn't have any choice but to agree, and Hotch vowed to be extra vigilant and not let them out of his sight for even a second. Before they left the house, Sam quickly ducked down and pocketed the antique knife he'd used to kill the woman earlier.

Spencer slowly opened his eyes when the sound of a phone ringing reached his ears. He lifted his head and watched as Castiel, who was once again standing by the window still as a statue, picked up the call. He had to strain his ears to make out the one-sided conversation. His head was pounding and his throat was dry. Despite his growing thirst, he hadn't dared ask Castiel for water and the man didn't seem to have thought about giving him some on his own. They hadn't exchanged a single word since his captor had gotten angry earlier, Spencer being too worried about accidentally invoking more wrath from him. So far he hadn't actually been hurt and he had no desire to change that.

When Castiel hung up the call with a, "we'll be there soon," and turned towards him, Spencer didn't have the energy to feel much more than slight fear. By his estimation it must have been the very early hours of the morning by now and he hadn't slept a wink all night. He'd already been sleep-deprived from working on the case, and he was exhausted. He wondered if Castiel was also affected by the lack of sleep; he didn't seem tired.

Castiel started to undo the cuffs, letting the agent get up from the chair by himself as soon as they'd dropped to the floor. "Where-" Spencer had to clear his throat before he could speak, "where're we going?" His voice was still rough.

The self-proclaimed angel cocked his head to the side and examined the agent with his piercing stare like he was trying to figure out a difficult puzzle. Finally he asked, "Do you require some water?"

Spencer blinked in surprise at the sudden question. For a moment he wondered if this was a trick. An attempt to lure him into a false sense of security just to turn on him as soon as he greedily demanded something. But Castiel seemed genuine and so Spencer nodded hesitantly.

Castiel went over to the table and retrieved a bottle of water from one of the bags. While his back was turned, Spencer threw a considering look at the door. But it was no use, the other man was just as close to it as he was, and in the amount of time it would take him to open it, he'd be caught easily.

So Spencer didn't try to run and just accepted the bottle that Castiel offered him. He quickly gulped down the water, soothing his dry throat, all the while being hyper aware of the other man watching him. He'd been worried that Castiel would rip the bottle from his hands, but the man did nothing as Spencer finished off the entire bottle.

Once he'd drained the rest of it and handed the empty bottle back, Spencer brushed the back of his hand over his mouth and repeated his earlier question in a stronger voice, "Where are you taking me?"

"Dean called," Castiel answered. "Sam and he have been cornered by your FBI team. They want me to bring you to them."

Spencer swallowed hard. So this was the hostage exchange that he'd been worried about. Relief that he'd be returned to his team and unease over all the ways this could potentially go wrong battled inside of him. Well, it didn't matter; there was nothing he could do about it.

Castiel took Spencer's arm, and he expected to be led to the door. Instead, the world vanished around him. There was a sound like beating wings and the sensation of being tugged forward incredibly fast. His eyes couldn't comprehend what was happening around him for the split-second that the sensation lasted. All he knew was that one moment he'd been inside the hotel room and the next he was in an abandoned alley next to a closed store.

Spencer stumbled and only Castiel's grip on his arm kept him from falling to the ground. A strangled sound escaped his throat and his heart was suddenly beating in a wild rhythm. His throat was tight and he felt like throwing up.

"W-wha-what…? W-what w-was t-tha-?"

The grip on his arm loosened slightly, but Castiel didn't let go. "I flew us here. It was faster. Also, Sam and Dean took the car."

"F-flew…" Spencer whispered in a faint voice. His legs felt like jelly and his head was spinning from what he'd just experienced. His mind was trying to make sense of what had happened, but he couldn't come up with a single logical explanation. Maybe he was finally having a schizophrenic break after all his recent stress.

"Yes," Castiel's voice brought him back to the present. "I told you, I am an angel. I have wings and I can fly."

Spencer shook his head in disbelief. "No…" There was no way. He must be hallucinating. Maybe he had fallen unconscious and this was all an elaborate dream. Except that it didn't feel like a dream. "That's i-impossible…" he whispered.

Castiel cocked his head to the side. "I suppose it doesn't matter if you believe me. Come on."

He steered Spencer towards the mouth of the alley, where he could see the lights of a parking lot shining. Logically, the young agent knew that his team must be there and that he needed to get his head in the game so that this exchange wouldn't go south, but his sense of reality had been shaken in its foundation, and he could hardly concentrate on what was in front of him.

Could it be? Was the man next to him actually an angel? Had the Winchesters told the truth, about everything?

Morgan wondered if the Winchesters had planned this, with how fast their partner arrived with Reid. They only had to wait about two minutes after arriving at the parking lot. - It really had been right around the corner, just at the end of the street. - The agents still kept their guns trained on the criminals, their tension running high even after moving to an open location. The brothers on the other hand had visibly relaxed. Sam kept his gun lowered to the ground and was throwing glances between the agents and around the empty lot. Dean had leaned back against a lonely streetlight and was casually twirling his gun in his hand.

Morgan hated that these psychopaths could feel secure in the knowledge that the team's hands were bound with their friend's life at stake.

When there was movement in the alley behind the store, way sooner than any of the agents had expected, Morgan and JJ impatiently trained their weapons on it, while the rest of the team kept theirs on the Winchester brothers.

And there was Reid.

He was being led by the arm by a middle-aged man in a trench coat. Morgan didn't recognize him, so this accomplice must not have been police-known. He let his gaze sweep over Reid, quickly assessing his condition. There were no visible wounds and he was walking on his own, although a bit shaky. Morgan noted that he didn't appear to be bound in any way, and he couldn't spot any visible weapons on the trench-coated guy.

But what had Morgan pause was the look on Reid's face. He looked, for lack of a better word, utterly spooked. Morgan's worry instantly skyrocketed. Frightened he would have understood. Terrified, yes. But Reid was white as a sheet; he looked like he'd seen a ghost. What the hell had happened to the kid?

The man, Castiel apparently, stopped a few feet away from them. Hotch and Rossi stepped up behind the Winchester brothers and put their guns against their backs. "Let Sam and Dean go," Castiel demanded.

"Send Reid over to us first," Hotch said in a calm voice. Morgan could see their boss looking the kid over as well, his brows furrowing more with each passing second. The young agent's eyes were flickering between the man holding him and the Winchesters, barely acknowledging his team's presence.

"You think we're stupid?" Dean asked with a cold laugh. "We exchange places at the same time or not at all."

With a glance around his team, Hotch nodded. "Alright, go ahead." Him and Rossi took a step back, but kept their guns raised. Morgan carefully studied the darkness of the alley behind Castiel and Reid. It would be risky, if this wasn't timed perfectly.

Sam and Dean walked forward at the same time that Castiel let Reid go and the young man rushed over towards his team. Morgan slung his free arm around his friend's shoulder as soon as he'd reached them and pulled him into a quick hug. "You okay, kid?"

Reid nodded and nervously licked his lips a few times before he managed to answer. "Uhm, yeah. I'm fine. They didn't hurt me." Morgan was relieved to hear that, but he was also confused. It didn't fit the brother's profile. Nothing about this case made sense.

The Winchesters came to a stop next to Castiel and Dean gave the man a short clap on the shoulder, before turning back to the BAU, who still had their guns trained on the trio. A frown appeared on his face. "Remember, you said you'd let us go."

Fat chance, Morgan thought. There was no way in hell they'd just let a couple of serial killers go. Killers that had also kidnapped their friend! No one messed with their little family!

Just a few more seconds now.

Realizing that the BAU wasn't backing down, Sam and Dean also raised their guns again. They slowly inched backwards towards the alley that Castiel and Reid had appeared from. Suddenly, Sam frowned and looked around wildly. "Wait, one of the women is missing!"

At that moment, Prentiss jumped out of the shadows of the alley, gun on Castiel. "Drop the weapons!" She yelled. The rest of the team took the chance to spread out and surround the three criminals. Only Morgan stood back slightly to keep an eye on Reid. He was still worried; he didn't like how quiet the kid was being.

Dean let out a colorful curse and whirled around, but there was nothing he could do.

"You are under arrest," Hotch called out. "Drop your guns or this time we will shoot!"

For a moment, Morgan was sure that the Winchesters would comply as he saw both of their hands lowering. But the next second, Castiel said, "Hold on! I'll get us out of here!" and they both grabbed onto one of his shoulders.

Between one blink and the next, they were gone. Vanished. There was nothing left but empty pavement. Morgan couldn't believe his eyes. What had just happened?

"Did you guys see that?!" JJ exclaimed as the rest of the BAU looked around in bafflement.

Reid grabbed onto Morgan's arm and let out an almost hysterical laugh.