Chapter Text
The note shook in my hands as they trembled. My throat was dry. My chest hurt. My shoulders were tense, and I knew knots were already forming. I read it again and somehow hoped the words changed from the last time I read it.
If you want him to live, you won’t look for him .
Eleven words. Just eleven. But they terrified me.
Why? Who? Who took him?
I immediately unlocked my phone and thumbed through my contacts. My first instinct was to call Dean. I had to call Dean. I needed help, and he was the only person I knew who could help with something like this. However, as I clicked on his contact, my thumb just hovered over the ‘call’ button.
Would Dean even answer? Would he leave his family to help out someone who said she wouldn’t bother him again? Did he even care about me or Cas anymore? Had he managed to forget about us to live his life?
A guttural scream broke the agonizing silence of the cabin, and I pounded the kitchen counter with my fists, dropping my phone in the process. I felt powerless. No leads. Nothing. Besides, the note said if I wanted Cas to live, I wouldn’t look for him. Was that a threat? Would they, whoever ‘they’ were, actually kill him if I went searching for him?
My mind was overwhelmed with questions. None of them had answers right now. But I wanted those answers.
I picked up my phone again. The screen was cracked, but no other damage was apparent.
“Just do it!” I yelled at myself. “Just call him!”
So, I obeyed my direct order to myself. I called Dean.
The phone rang. And rang. And kept ringing.
“Answer, damn it!” I shouted.
Nothing. I heard Dean’s voicemail read out. “ This is Dean. You know what to do. ” I cursed at him in that moment. Even though I said I’d never call him again, never reach out again, this wasn’t an everyday situation.
“Ow!” I heard over the phone line.
“Dean?!”
A few seconds of silence. I must have hurt his ear.
“Y/n?”
He sounded confused, but I suppose he had every right to be. I hadn’t tried to call him in a year and a half.
“What’s going on?” he asked. “Why are you yelling?”
“Dean!” I clamped my eyes shut. No. No crying. “He’s gone. I need your help. He’s gone.”
“What? Who’s gone?”
“Cas!” I paused to force a little composure. “Cas is gone. Someone took him. I don’t know who. All I have is a note. I need help. You’re the only one I know that can even begin to know what to do.”
Silence.
“Please, Dean,” I begged. “I know you have a family, and I would never ask you to leave them for anything other than a life or death situation. I just...please, Dean. Please.”
More silence.
“Dean.”
“I hear you.” His voice sounded heavy, like he was torn.
I heard him sigh, and I knew he was weighing everything. The odds. The risks. He had a lot to lose if this went south, and I knew I asked a lot of him, but damn it. Damn it, I couldn’t lose someone else! Not this time!
“Where are you?” Dean eventually asked.
“Bobby’s cabin in Montana.”
“Alright.” He paused a moment. “I’ll be up there as soon as I can. Meanwhile, don’t talk to anyone else, alright? I’ll call in a few favors on my way. And Y/n.”
“Yeah?”
“We’ll do everything we can, okay?”
I choked back a sob and nodded to the emptiness around me. “Okay.”
As I hung up from the frantic call, the surprise that Dean actually answered settled in, but I was glad he answered. Was I equipped to handle this situation? In theory, yes, but I never expected to wake up to find Castiel...just gone. My best friend. Someone I relied on for maybe too many things.
I read the note again. And again, and again, to the point that I just stared at it instead of reading it. It wasn’t in Castiel’s writing. I knew his writing. Whoever it was didn’t want me to know where they took him. They didn’t want me to know anything. Yes, the note told me not to look for him, but I hoped it was an empty threat and was just used as a means to scare me. It worked, for the most part, but they honestly couldn’t expect me not to go searching for him.
The more I thought about it, the more it seemed like a setup. That they wanted me to go looking for Cas. Like he was some sort of lure. I didn’t know who might do something like that, but I was about to find out.
When I heard the Impala, it felt like music to my ears. The door creaked open and slammed shut.
I ran outside, the note still clutched in my hand, and Dean walked up the path to the cabin. He smiled at me as I charged him, and he opened his arms in time for me to slam into his chest. When he wrapped me in a hug, I felt a sense of relief. Help had arrived.
“Hey there, kiddo,” he mumbled.
“Thank you so much for coming,” I said as I pulled away. “Come on in.”
As I shut the door to the cabin, Dean looked around and grinned. “Can’t believe I’m back here. It’s cleaner than I thought it would be.”
“I think Cas cleaned it one night while I was sleeping.”
Dean nodded, and he removed his leather jacket. “It’s good to see you, Y/n. I just wish it were under better circumstances.”
“Me too.”
“What do we know?”
I showed him the note and told him everything leading up to the day I woke up to find Castiel gone.
“That’s it? No weird omens, phone calls, cars following you. Nothing?”
I shook my head and sat down on the sofa, a sigh rushing past my lips. “No. Nothing.”
“Hmm. Well, it’s a good thing I left on good terms with Crowley.”
“Do you really think he’ll be able to help?”
“Well, if he can’t, then that means we’re dealing with the other side of things.”
“That’s what I was afraid of.”
Dean took out his phone and rested a hand on my shoulder as he called Crowley. It wasn’t long till someone knocked on the front door of the cabin, and the king of hell stood outside, a pleased grin on his face. I scraped part of the devil’s trap off the wooden floor so he could enter.
“Thank you,” Crowley said as he walked into the cabin. “That’s very kind of you.”
This was something I never thought I’d see again, or be part of for that matter. Dean and Crowley in the same room, going over the possible options to solve a puzzle. It felt wrong that Sam wasn’t part of it. Or Cas.
“So,” Crowley began, clapping his hands together. “Is this everybody?”
Dean rolled his eyes.
“Right. Sorry.” Crowley removed his coat. “Let’s get down to business. You’re looking for your boyfriend, am I right?”
I felt my face turn red and instant irritation flared. “He is not my boyfriend.”
“Oh. Could have fooled me. Forgive me. Well, as far as I know, he is not being held in my domain. That just leaves one option.”
“Damn it,” I mumbled. “I knew it!”
Dean crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes. “So, then what? You got any angels that owe you anything?”
“Not quite.” Crowley pulled out a piece of paper from an inside pocket of his suit jacket. “But I do have leverage up there.”
I looked at the paper in his hands. It was a scroll with a black ribbon tied around it to keep it closed. “What is that?” I asked.
“This,” Crowley lifted the paper, “is our ticket to getting Castiel back in one piece.”
“It sounds like you know more than you’re letting on,” Dean said. “What’s going on up there?”
“Carnage.” Crowley shrugged. “But when is there not carnage up there? Angels are getting frustrated. They’re trying to root out all the rebels, and who is the biggest rebel besides Lucifer?”
“Cas,” Dean mumbled.
Crowley placed the paper back in his suit jacket. “Bingo.”
“So what do we do?” I asked. “How are we going to get him back?”
“There is no ‘we’ in this situation, love.” Crowley pointed at the note still in my hands. “That little paper you have there tells you not to go looking for him, am I correct?”
I nodded.
“Well, then you don’t go looking for him. Me and Squirrel will go up there, ask the right questions, make the right implications, and your angel will be back before dinner. Sound good?”
Almost too good.
I quirked a brow at him and swallowed. “What’s in it for you?”
“Nothing. I owe Dean here a favor. A big favor. Now, if there’s nothing else, we better get going.”
“Can I at least go to the entrypoint with you? Please? I can’t just sit here. I can’t.”
Dean sideyed me as he shrugged his jacket back on. He looked at Crowley as if it were up to the demon, and I looked between the two, still silently asking. Crowley shrugged.
“Yeah,” Dean said. “Let’s go, kiddo.”
“So,” Dean began as we hit the highway. “What have you been up to?”
I picked at the hem of my shirt and stared straight ahead. Crowley said he’d meet us at the entrypoint. It was just me and Dean. I should have felt grateful for riding in the Impala with my friend again, but I just felt nervous and stressed out. The circumstances didn’t help any.
“Uh. Hunting mostly. Although…” I paused and took a breath. “I’m thinking about giving that up.”
Dean quickly looked at me then back at the road. “Really?”
“Yeah. Especially without a partner. I mean, Cas said he’d go with me, but I’d be afraid of…”
“Of what?”
“I don’t know. That he’d be called to do something for heaven and have to leave for weeks on end. It’s happened before, but...I guess not for a really long time.”
“So, it’s just been the two of you? In the bunker. Alone.”
I nodded. “Yep. Pretty much.”
“What’s that like?” He chuckled and I realized how much I missed that sound.
“Normal, I guess. He’s become my best friend. Cas is loyal. I can always count on him.”
“Why are you in Montana?”
“I decided to leave the bunker.”
“What? Why?”
I could hear the shock in his voice.
“Same reason as you, I guess. Too many memories. It became so quiet and it felt like there was too much space and not enough people. So, Cas helped me pack up, and we left.”
“Together.”
I nodded. Why was he focusing on that?
“Yes, together. Why does it matter?”
Dean shrugged. “I guess it doesn’t.”
I decided to change the subject. “How-how’s your family?”
I looked over and watched as the grin spread wide across his face. His eyes held a certain light I never saw even when Sam was alive. “They’re amazing. We’re actually expecting another kid soon.”
“That’s awesome, Dean! Congratulations!”
He chuckled. “Thanks. I just wish Sam were here to be an uncle.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
We caught up after that. He told me everything about his family and little Sam. Tears welled up when he told me his son’s name, but I managed to hold them back. Dean was a mechanic and actually owned a shop specializing in classic cars.
“I had a scare a few months back,” he said. “I thought something was lurking around the woods surrounding my house. Turns out it was something normal - a mountain lion. I didn’t like that it was so close to my kid, but at least it wasn’t a Wendigo or something.”
I told him about the few hunting trips I’d been on since leaving him to live his life in Oregon. There wasn’t much to tell, though.
“What made you pick up the phone?” I eventually asked.
Dean pursed his lips and shifted his grip on the steering wheel. “The fact you hadn’t called in so long. Something just didn’t feel right, so I answered. I’m glad I did.”
I nodded as I stared at the road ahead. It winded and climbed and switched back. “Thank you. For picking up.”
“Of course.”
In a small way, it felt like some of my family was restored. I wanted everyone back together, of course, but I would never request it. Sometimes what we want isn’t what’s best. What was best was for Dean to return to his family after this, for Sam to remain in heaven at peace, and for Cas to come back to me. Then Dean would leave and life could get back to normal.