Dean rounded the corner in the bunker, not expecting anything out of the ordinary. The hall leading from his bedroom was quiet and empty a few hours before when he had strolled down it for his well-earned afternoon nap. Sam and Cas had said that they would be working on research or some such thing.

The sound was exquisite. It was a melody that seemed like one person had harnessed the vocalization of all of the best choirs. The entire complement of heavenly hosts could not have provided so glorious a sound. Dean stopped his movements and tipped his head to the side to better listen to the tune. He could not make out the words, but the underlying music sounded somehow familiar.

He moved slowly to the end of the hall and peered around the corner to the main room. Cas was there, sitting in front of the laptop, singing. He was focused on his research, but Dean thought that it wouldn't be long before Cas noticed that he had an audience, angel ears.

Dean made his way into the room, regretting immediately the disruption to the music when Cas stopped singing. "Don't stop on my account." Dean stood awkwardly next to the table.

"Sorry." The economy of Cas' words in this moment stood in stark contrast to the complexity of his words in song. Dean had noticed lately that they had not been speaking with each other much. In fact, much of what was said between them could be categorized in one of three ways, hunting, sleeping, and eating. Not that Cas did all of those things. Sometimes the conversations were just for informational purposes, like Sam and I need to eat.

"I've never heard you sing before." Dean stared at Cas, watching his tongue dart out to lick his lips.

"I don't usually sing. I suppose that I did not consider the fact that anyone would hear me. You were sleeping rather soundly." Cas lowered the lid on the laptop. "I am sorry if I woke you."

"You didn't wake me." Dean took a seat next to him. "The song sounded happy. What language was it?" Dean's leg was pressed a little to the side of Cas' thigh as he was facing into the table and Dean was facing Cas.

"Enochian." Back to one word answers.

Dean determined to get more out of him. "Could you tell me what the lyrics were in English?" Dean tried to look casual. He rested a hand on the table. He drummed at the edge in a rhythm that was, he thought, a beat that could have accompanied Cas' song.

"The lyrics are too complicated to translate." Cas did not look at him when he said it, which made Dean wonder even more.

"You can translate anything, so either you're lying, or you are lying."

Cas looked at him then and gave him a shrug. It was too human and down right annoying. Dean wondered if he was responsible for teaching Cas that too human gesture. He was filled with regrets. He waited for Cas to use words again. He just sat silently like he had all the time in the world, which, to be frank, he did. Dean however did not. He got up and marched off to the kitchen to not be irritated.

He caught Cas singing again. This time Cas thought that he was alone in the garage. He was working on his golden monstrosity. Dean had taught Cas how to take care of the necessities, oil changes, spark plugs, headlights. Cas was using actual tools and had on fewer layers than what was normal. It was amazing how much of a difference a coat could make. It was almost like Cas was standing before him naked even though he was still wearing his white button up dress shirt. The tie was on, but it was tossed over his shoulder. His sleeves were unbuttoned and rolled up past his elbows.

Cas was singing loud and with spirit. There were long notes, carrying out in wild splendor off the high walls of the garage. The acoustics in there were really something. Dean leaned against the wall and silently listened. He made every effort to not move. Even breathing became a thing to allow only cautiously.

The song was the same. The words were somewhat melancholy at times, and sometimes victorious in their tones. He still could not understand them; he could only surmise the feelings from the ways in which they were sung. At times, Cas' song dipped low like something almost feral. The careful drag of anger over sandpaper. Then, just as powerfully, his words would snake back up to something higher in pitch, a rallying cry to the heavens.

At times, it seemed like he was many voices, crying out at once with all of the emotions known to man. The skin on Dean's arms pricked up, sensitive to the range of feeling carried by each note that Cas sent spiraling out into the expanse. The song was maybe ending. It seemed like Cas was moving beyond the maybe chorus to a refrain that was petering out. He wanted to know the words. He was desperate to know the words.

The song ended on a long note. It echoed out into the room and lingered long after Cas had ceased creating it. Dean's body felt warm with the joy of having experienced it.

He did not move for fear of breaking the spell. Cas was still tucked up under the hood of his car. Dean whistled out the tune and walked over to join him. He stood at his side and watched him work. Cas pretended not to notice him. He also seemed intent on not acknowledging the fact that Dean had heard the song. Dean kept whistling the tune, hoping that it would inspire a repeat performance.

"What are the lyrics, Cas?" Dean asked in a quiet voice, careful not to speak too loudly as he decided that that too could break the spell of the room.

"Translating the lyrics would be too complicated." Cas set aside the tools that he was using. A spark plug rolled a little to the side, but he caught it.

"That's not how you said it yesterday. Yesterday you said that the lyrics were too complicated. Today you are saying that the translating would be too complicated."

"Both statements are the same." Cas looked at him now.

"Not really though." Dean challenged him and stared back without wavering.

"I think that translating them would be uncomfortable. I'd rather not." Cas went back to work on the engine.

Dean let it go, or he pretended to do so. He walked off, leaving Cas to his work. As he walked away, he began devising a plan.

The computer had a lot of contents that were hard to look at. There were pictures of him hugging Charlie and a group shot of him with Cas, Charlie, and Sam. He wondered how he had managed to not see those pictures before. He wanted to look at them, and at the same time, he wanted to never look at them again. His body was shaking with the memories too harsh to have all at once.

He found a translator app buried in the sea of files on her computer. Charlie's organization was easy to navigate through. He selected it and it seemed to be listening for something. He said a single word in Enochian. The app translated the word almost instantly. He smiled and nodded at the screen, happy with the results.

Cas had been gone for days. Dean wondered how long it would be before he returned. He found himself wondering a lot of things. He soon came to realize that his life was filled with wonder. He was spending most of his time in quiet contemplation. His musings tumbled over words offered up as answers in a low gravelly voice. He gave his thoughts leisure as they swam over the form of Cas, his face a mask of his emotions, emotions that he clearly felt while he sang. He could not define the emotions of the angel, but he wanted to, he wanted to know them with quiet desperation.

He sang as he sat at the computer. It was some poppy song that he would never have sung in front of anyone. He thought of Cas in the garage and Cas researching and also just Cas, his quiet presence a constant source of warmth in a cold world. And here he was alone in the bunker, wishing that he was not alone.

He pushed himself back from the laptop and closed the lid. He didn't want to think about the reason for his newest obsession. It was not the right direction for his thoughts. Cas would leave. He always did. There was always a mission. Plus, there was nothing to be offered up. What could he give? Nothing that an angel would need, surely.

He stormed off to his room, more confused than he was before. He had feelings. He had feelings that he had no use for. He gave up on the idea of translating the song. It swirled around in his head one final time before he tossed himself down on his bed to sleep. Sleep did not come, but he found a new path for his mind, a negative one.

Cas returned. Time passed. Dean sulked. No one sang. Sam came and went. Dean waited for Cas to go again. He didn't. He spoke in one word answers when Sam asked him questions. Dean did not ask questions. Cas seemed to be slipping into greater levels of solemnity. He was sad, or so it seemed. His time was spent with books that he didn't seem to be reading.

Dean had taken to using Charlie's computer for casual searches and research. He felt like she was with him when his fingers danced over the keys. He didn't read her writings. He wasn't ready for that yet. He let the mouse cursor linger over them though. He opened the pictures and looked at them. Cas was in the observatory. He'd been in there for awhile. He plucked up the laptop and carried it into the room. He sat against the far wall from Cas. Cas just stared down at his book.

Dean cast quiet glances at him over the lid of the laptop. He hummed out a quiet tune. It was Cas' song. He'd heard it only twice, but somehow it had melded itself into the very fabric of his every waking thought. He had been angry about it. He had taken fast road trips to distance himself from the bunker and the chance encounters with Cas as he navigated the halls and rooms of the place. Cas was everywhere, and sometimes nowhere. He wasn't sure what was more difficult.

He hummed the tune though and watched Cas for a reaction. Cas' brows came together. He got up, and Dean thought that he was going to leave. He slammed the book closed like it had offended him somehow. Before he left the room, he stopped. His body filled the door frame, shoulders heaving up in a sign of resignation. He turned back and stopped at the end of the telescope. He rested a hand on it, and Dean still hummed. He wasn't sure that he heard it, but he thought that he heard Cas say, "Fine Dean. I'll sing."

Dean let the tune fade away from his own body to be taken up by Cas'. He turned on the app on Charlie's computer. Cas sang. He did not look at Dean. Dean watched him. Eventually, he glanced down at the computer. The words were forming on the screen. Charlie was impressive, but this app may have been her finest work. He wondered why Cas had thought that it would be a complicated song to translate, when here was Charlie's app doing the job just fine without angel skills. Then, he really read it.

I've loved you, through all that leads to sorrow.

I've loved you, through my happiest hours.

You are the light in my dark universe.

Tender heart, though you would never show it.

I long for moments, seconds become hours.

Time spirals onward to infinity.

Only with you, forever you, my love.

For one moment more, I'd sacrifice worlds.

For your love returned, all my life is yours.

Take of me what you will; command me too,

I'll go. I'll stay. I'll linger on in hope.

So long as you want anything of me,

I'm yours. For I've love you and always will.

Then some of the lines repeated. And Dean looked up from the screen to see that Cas was looking at him as he sang. He wondered how he hadn't noticed it before, the way that Cas looked at him. His was a look of purest affection. He looked at him like he was seeing something precious and maybe too worthy. Dean thought that he would never understand this. He could not fathom what there was within him that was worthy of such devotion, but there it was in Cas' eyes and in Cas' song.

He set the computer aside and watched Cas sing. When he got to the last line, he dragged out the note. Dean got up and walked over to him. Cas still rested his hand on the telescope. He looked away. Then he leaned down and looked into the telescope out at the stars that use to be his playground.

Dean shuddered a little with the thought. He felt responsible for Cas' losses, though such feelings did nothing to heal the injuries. He considered how he might heal such injuries, but it was about more than that. Cas looked up from the telescope at Dean. His eyes were sad again. Dean reached out and took his hand. "I feel the same." He squeezed his hand a little, and added, "And I always will."

If he kissed him, it was hardly the most important thing that happened that night. The way his hand squeezed back, that too was not the most important thing. If Cas sang to him again, now that was up there in a special level of importance, filed under things that mattered very much. If Cas said that he loved him in English, Italian, Aramaic, and a dozen other assorted languages, that too was filed away in Dean's mind under things that he would cherish.

Overall, though, what mattered most to Dean was the look. The look that shifted over one fraction of a second to the next. One note of a song was longer than that moment. For when he took Cas' hand, and when he said his words, Cas looked at first shocked and then, most importantly, happy. And in that moment a great deal of melancholy washed away into the wide open seas.

Cas' song was sung again, and he was happier. And Dean would drink the song in over lips partially open, receiving the words directly from the source. He would drink in the melody in all of the varied notes. Each rise and fall, each crescendo of song a force that would break past any and all of his defenses. He did not need those defenses. He had Cas.

Cas sang, and Dean let the tune surround him. He let Cas surround him, and the song and the singer were his. Some choruses were worthy of repetition. This too was worthy of repeated attention, in a place all their own. So Cas sang to him of emotions born in Enochian, cherished in somber glances over years. Cas sang to him through kisses and the gentle rise and fall of their chests. He sang to them eventually, not in words but in glances, quiet touches tentatively given. It was a melody of movements. It was a song to carry them through the night, and also the many days to come.

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