Evening was just settling in once more. There was a warm breeze coming from the open window that also let in rays of moonlight and streetlights that made the hotel room seem eerily creepy. There was a click as a key entered the lock on the door from the outside letting in the cafe owner. She had bags under her eyes, messy, unbrushed hair and could not be more relieved to get the day of fixing and cleaning over with. A strange, unknown bed in a tacky hotel room had never looked so good.
The day had been exceedingly busy, filled with non-stop problem solving and repetitive questions as well as irritating tasks in order to to make her beloved cafe look half as good as it was the day previously. The brunette cursed under her breath at whoever or whatever had turned her means of income into an atmospheric graveyard. As she had been on her feet all day, she hadn’t had time to think about the attack at all. She had actually unconsciously blocked out the craziness that was the unusual event and, it wasn’t until now, that she properly registered what seemed to have happened. Most witnesses, including her, couldn’t really explain what they saw. Although, they all agreed on seeing a piercing, white light that was almost overwhelming.
Yesterday, the day of the incident, she had been held by the authorities for long hours into the night before she instinctively started to clean up the mess in her innocent cafe. She hadn’t slept yet. I’ve never turned in this early before, she thought, glancing at the clock in her hotel room; 5:15pm. It seemed like 3 in the morning. She yawned into the back of her hand and her enticing, hazel-coloured, eyes were becoming hard to keep open.
With her sneakers dumped beside her bed, she collapsed onto it but stayed sitting as her memory brought her back to the two, tall and handsome, FBI agents who had asked about Steve. She only thought on the two men for a moment before her mind wandered again to the multitudes of other questions she had been asked that day by many different agents and officers. The poor woman finally felt relaxed for the first time all day, and she was just about to lie down and take the most well-deserved rest of her life when her chest exploded with pain.
Suddenly there was a figure in front of her, staring into her soul with a face of evil. She never got to sleep on that hotel bed or finish replenishing her joyful cafe. The hard-working, strong human only had the privilege of expelling her last scream, rudely disturbing dozens of guests in their own hotel rooms, who were peacefully enjoying living.
XXXXX
Castiel had settled back down on his chair in the apartment and looked up in admiration at his old friends. Despite having been a human for months, Cas still could not quite understand feelings and the multiple things he was feeling now ironically made him feel confused, isolated and helpless. On one hand, he was beyond glad to see the brothers again. Having no one to talk to about his old life had taken it’s toll and he loved the idea of catching up, maybe doing normal human stuff, and not having to worry about things like the apocalypse or the Angels. However, he was also scared and worried for himself and even more so for Ellie. Not only her safety but her obliviousness to the situation made Cas feel bad inside. There were moments in the past weeks where he had thought about telling her everything, but would she believe him? Probably not. Cas thought that it was best for everyone, including Ellie, if she knew as little as possible.
“So, how did you find me?” Castiel started as Sam returned to where he was sitting opposite him. Dean had proceeded to look around the apartment, studying everything. If the brother’s hadn’t taken their posh suits off before coming to look for Cas in the building, it would seem like they were on just another case, interviewing a hopeless human.
“We were finishing up a hunt a few towns over, heard the story this morning, and thought we’d check it out,” Sam explained, glancing back at Dean to check that he was behaving himself. Dean had stumbled across a photograph on the fridge in the kitchen area of the apartment. Castiel noticed him looking at it, the picture of him and Ellie when they went to the park to play frisbee. He felt a little embarrassed, he still didn’t know if that was normal for human couples. Cas felt that Ellie was just as eccentric as he was, so he could never tell if the stuff they did was classed as ordinary.
“And you just came straight here?” Castiel asked, snapping back to the present conversation.
“Unknown Blinding Light turns Local Cafe into Carnage!” Dean exclaimed, in the tone of a newspaper headline, “Yeah, it sounded a bit fishy,”
At this point, Sam’s phone began to ring. As he answered it, Castiel’s thoughts were still on Dean’s last comment. He had gotten used to not understanding these simple human things, such as phrases and sayings. ‘Fishy’, what could that mean? His confusion showed and Dean smiled slightly at seeing Castiel’s eyes narrow. Just like the old days, he thought, maybe Cas hadn’t changed that much.
“Yeah, okay, we’ll be right there,” Sam assured down his end of the phone, making both Dean and Cas turn to look at him, before hanging up. “That was the detective that we met today,” Sam started towards Dean, reminding him of the slow, sarcastic man at the police station who they had reluctantly given Sam’s mobile number to in case anything else strange popped up. “You know the cafe owner who we spoke to earlier?” Sam asked his older brother.
“Yeah,” Dean replied.
XXXXX
The three men entered the crime scene as though they owned the place, confidence and collectiveness written all over their faces like they had done this a million times before. The hotel room was so clean and orderly that it seemed almost ghostly and suspicious. There were around half a dozen police officers and detectives as well as forensic scientists studying the room and, more importantly, the body that lay in the centre of it.
The cafe owner rested in a pool of blood, originating from the open wound in her abdomen, almost like something had reached into her and pulled out everything it could find. Sam, Dean and Cas had been confronted with much worse but it still saddened them to see the young woman with a massive, ragged hole in her body. Her eyes had been burnt out of her skull, all three of them knew what that meant; Angels, most probably more than one if they had the power to achieve blinding and then killing a person when most of them are weak from the fall from Heaven. The blood that had dripped from where the woman’s eyes used to be looked like tears which made the situation even more heart-breaking. The lead detective, who Sam and Dean had already been acquainted with, noticed the arrivals and journeyed over towards them
“This is our partner, Agent Maxwell,” Dean quickly revealed to him, indicating Cas by his side, not wanting the irritating lad to ask more questions than he could answer. The detective nodded, also not wanting the day to be too strenuous or complicated. He did, however, want to make a good impression in front of the new fed and so he looked down at the victim and showed off:
“Miss Hopkins, aged 29. Forensics are still observing the cafe and so her flat above it was closed off for further investigation. I checked with the receptionist; she booked a room at this hotel at around 4:30 this afternoon.” Sam and Dean nodded at the man’s surprising knowledge and initiative.
“Was there any witnesses?” Dean asked.
“Guests heard a scream about half an hour ago, that’s about it,” The detective looked down sorrowfully at the body, sighing ever so slightly. “I’ve never seen a killer do that before,” he pondered openly. “So, I guess there’s a link between the attack at the cafe and this, right?”
“Could be,” Dean answered, shocked at how the man had suddenly become good at his job. Dean knew that the sight of something so horrific sometimes changes people, maybe the man had realised that he could be doing more. Dean stayed silent, allowing the detective to slowly move away, still analysing the case as though he was going to be studying it for the rest of his life.
“Sarah…” Castiel, whispering like a child, looked down upon the dead body in recognition and remembrance of the lady. After eating at the cafe almost every day for 6 months, he had never believed that he had made such a strong connection with her, they purely knew each others first names out of courtesy, but now he had never felt so regretful. He couldn’t help but think of Ellie, if this was the danger someone was put in by vaguely interacting with him, then what would happen to his girlfriend?
Sam and Dean were slightly surprised that Cas was so close to the lady and, remembering talking to her only a few hours earlier, the despair began to contaminate them also.
“This doesn’t make sense,” Sam started, after both brothers had given Castiel a moment to mourn. “Why would the Angels want the owner of the cafe that they jumped you at? Why not just try and get straight to you?”
“They can’t,” Castiel answered plainly, in an obvious tone, “I’m hidden. I went to a tattooist as soon as I became human, and had them ink enochian sigils onto my chest. Trust me, they can’t find me directly.”
“So, you think they wanted information from her.” Sam wondered aloud.
Castiel stood still pondering over everything; “I never told her where I lived.”
“Yeah, well, when we spoke to her, she knew you were staying in a flat nearby” Dean revealed. “Would that be enough for them to go on? I mean, do they have little Angel radar sat-navs?”
“That would be enough.” Castiel answered hastingly, ignoring Dean’s typical choice of words. “We need to get back to the apartment before Ellie finishes work.” Cas began to panic as he turned to leave but Dean gestured to stop him.
“Yeah, about this girl-”
“Don’t do that,” Cas interrupted.
“What?”
“Don’t call her ‘this girl’,” Castiel seemed genuinely upset by this but he was now staring both brothers down, like he was asserting authority. He exited the hotel room, not wanting to draw attention to the conversation, and the boys followed agreeably.
Once in the hotel corridor, which had been cleared due to the murder and so was perfectly private, things seemed even more tense.
“Look, I don’t want to have to say this but-”
“Then don’t,” Castiel, interrupting Dean for the second time, made him definitely uncomfortable, and Sam, feeling like he was intruding on something, simply stayed silent for the majority of the argument that was to come.
“Your girl ain’t reality, Cas!” Dean snapped making everybody stop in their tracks. “When are you going to wake up and start taking control of what’s actually happening?”
Castiel stared at Dean like he was a stranger, like he didn’t known him. He initially believed that nothing much had changed between them now that he was human, but he had started to doubt this. Maybe Dean just didn’t know how to handle the human him, the him with feelings and emotions, no longer the uninvolved, harsh and blunt Castiel who Dean could relate to.
“I’m taking control now,” Castiel answered firmly making the statement even more impacting. “We’re going back to the apartment,”
“Are you crazy?” Dean called after Castiel but he continued to walk away out of sight, leaving Sam and Dean to stand idly in the hallway. They both knew that this was a bad idea, if the Angel’s tortured the cafe owner for Castiel’s location, they were walking straight into a trap.
XXXXX
The door had been forced open. Some of the lamps and lights had shattered into pieces and it seemed like everything had been disturbed. Books and papers littered the floor and the sofa which Sam and Dean had been made comfortable on earlier was now on it’s side like it was wounded. Castiel entered first, horrified at seeing his relatively new home turned to ruins. Sam and Dean followed and paused at noticing the wreck. They were right, the Angels had found him. Thankfully, the place was completely empty. This made the men nervous, why would the Angels leave again when they had finally found the revenge they had been searching for?
Sympathy and dread overcame the Winchesters as they looked on at Castiel who was examining the room with grief. Dean, looking downwards, spotted the photograph of Cas and Ellie that he had picked up earlier. He suddenly remembered how he had forgotten to put it back on the fridge, and had left it sitting alone on the kitchen counter. It must have been forced off onto the cold, hard floor during the Angel raid. Dean bent down to pick it up and, as though the photograph sent an emotional current through him from his hand, he felt remorse for Castiel, wishing he had found him sooner so as to stop him from falling into the trap of receiving a real life and then violently losing it. Dean had been there before. He thanked God that the photograph was still intact and didn’t have any marks on it; it had survived.
Meanwhile, Castiel had noticed the bag Ellie had taken to work laying by the side of the, now overturned, sofa and his heart flipped nautiously. Sam and Dean followed Castiel’s gaze and also saw the bag but, at this point, Castiel’s focus had quickly changed to the plain, white wall of the living room area of the apartment. Strange markings had been printed onto it like vandalism that ruined the clean canvas and took up all of the space ignorantly. The writing looked familiar to Sam and Dean as the Angel’s enochian language, glowing a slight blue with magical importance.
“What does it say?” Dean said, almost automatically, unsure whether Castiel still had the ability to read the ancient tongue.
Castiel could, in fact, read it perfectly, and the words felt like they were drowning him. If he was already in a nightmare, this was the moment he was supposed to wake up. He swallowed worriedly before he spoke in a shockingly strong tone...
“They have Ellie,”