It wasn't supposed to be like this.

After all they had been through, fighting the forces of heaven and hell, to purgatory and back… it should mean something shouldn't it? A break from the chaos. A happy ending. Something. Hadn't they earned it?

But no, that's not how the world worked. Cas had fallen and one of the first things he had learned about being human was the unspoken rule of fate. There was no cosmic balance, no entitlement to be expected.

No, being human meant higher highs and lower lows and no way of guessing which was coming next.

Cas sits on the edge of the bed, bathed in morning sunlight, slowly running his fingers through Dean's hair in time with the beeping heart monitor. Lost in thought, he doesn't notice when the glassy green eyes flutter open to look up at him.

"Hey" comes a raspy voice, startling Cas out of his reverie.

"Hey," he replies gazing down at the paled skin, sliding his hand down to rest comfortably over Dean's cheek before pulling away and leaning over to grab the cup of water next to the bed. "How are you feeling?" he hears himself ask as he hands Dean the cup and watches him take small sips before handing it back. No matter how many times Sam had told him that it was a pointless question, Cas couldn't help himself from asking. The worst part was that he didn't know what answer he was really looking for. Part of him hoped he was the special one Dean would open up to and be honest with, while another part of him was scared of the truth; afraid that if Dean told him how he really felt then he would lose his carefully crafted composure. And that wasn't an option; he had to stay strong for Dean.

"I'm great." came the less raspy reply, and with it a silent sigh of relief in Cas' mind, quickly followed by a wave of guilt. What good was he if he couldn't even handle the truth? Even worse, was that Dean knew he couldn't handle it.

Before he could fall into the pit of guilt and self pity, Dean saved him by dragging his attention back to the real world.

"Cas? Can you give me a hand here?" he said, sounding slightly out of breath.

Cas blinked at Dean a moment before realizing that he was trying to pull himself into a more upright position. Quickly grasping either side of Dean's upper torso, Cas heaved him into a semi sitting position and adjusted the pillows to better support the weight. Settling back with a sigh, Dean let his eyes slide closed.

"Do you need the nurse?" Cas asked, trying to keep the worry out of his voice as he watched what he thought was a look of pain flicker across Dean's face.

"No babe, I'm fine." Dean said with a less than convincing smile. Never the less, Cas let the words soothe him, lull him back from the edge of panic that was constantly threatening to swallow him these days. Dean had started using subtle terms of endearment, like 'babe', in the recent months and it still made Cas' heart flutter to hear them.

"What about you?" Dean asked trying to lighten the mood, "You look like you're gonna need a nurse if you don't get some grub in you. And I don't mean the hospital cafeteria crap. Go to the burger joint down the street! I know they're not as good as mine, but I'm sure they'll do." He says with his signature smirk.

Seeing the uncertain look on Cas' face, Dean pushes on, "Cas, come on. I know I can't convince you to go home and get some real sleep but at least get some sustenance man. I don't want them to stick a feeding tube in you too!"

Cas nods tentatively. If Dean wants him to go, he will go. He doesn't have to be happy about it though. "Ok I'll eat, but remember, I'm just a phone call away if you want me to come back." He says looking pointedly at Dean.

"I know hon, don't worry about me. It's almost time for my sponge bath anyway so I won't be lonely." Dean says with a halfhearted wiggle of his eyebrows.

So with a slight smile and shake of his head, Cas leaves the room and makes his way down the hallway. He considers the burger joint Dean had suggested for only a few seconds before giving into his own need to stay close and heading for the cafeteria.

Grabbing a blueberry muffin and a cup of weak coffee, he sits down at his usual corner table and lets his mind wander, eventually working his way back to his least favorite memory…

3 Weeks Earlier

"Don't you have anything better to do than watch me rake leaves?" Dean yelled from the yard, a small smile tugging at his lips.

"I finished all my chores before you were even up this morning, so the answer would be no, I have absolutely nothing better to do." Cas replied from his seat on the porch with his usual sincerity.

Shaking his head with a gruff laugh, and shouting "Enjoy the view then!" Dean went back to his task, turning his back on the house.

Cas was enjoying the view. It was a beautifully crisp and sunny fall day, and Cas sipped his steamy coffee taking in the casual sag of Dean's jeans on his hips. The more he looked at those hips though, he couldn't help but notice that the jeans were sagging a bit more than they used to. Cas had told Dean he was looking thinner a few days ago while they were getting ready for bed and Cas had glanced at Dean's skinny middle. Dean had attributed it to the fact that he was eating more veggies from Cas' vegetable garden and Cas had nodded in understanding. After all, the ex-angel had only possessed a human body for a little over a year now. Dean had almost 40 years of experience with his so he trusted that the man knew what he was talking about.

Turning his attention to the other side of the yard, Cas took in the sight of his vegetable garden. It wasn't much but he was proud of it. He had enjoyed his summer watching the tomatoes grow and change from green to orange to red. He loved seeing his cucumber plants reach up their trellis towards the sun and his squash mature more and more each day. Most of all, he loved bringing his ripened vegetables inside, washing them and then turning them into an appetizing dish to serve to Dean. In a way he likened it to the transformation of water into wine.

Cas' gaze swept the yard back to where Dean had been raking, but now saw that he was standing there unmoving. A slight frown crossed his face as he watched Dean reach down and rub at his leg the way he usually did when it ached after a long run or when he got a cramp.

And then time seemed to slow down, seconds feeling like minutes, minutes like hours.

Dean straightened up and moved to start raking again, taking a step towards the remaining scattered leaves.

At the same time Cas' heart leapt into his throat. He was human for sure, but he must have kept a 6th sense of sorts from his previous angelic life because that's the only logical explanation he has for the sudden premonition of panic that gripped him tight. The mug of coffee dropped from his hand, shattering on the porch as Cas jumped up with hands suddenly grasping the railing, a strangled cry of "DEAN!" barely leaving his lips before he watched the love of his life crash to the ground.

Dean had taken a single step when a white-hot pain stabbed into him. Blinded by the fire flaring in his leg, he didn't even see the ground rush up to meet him as the leg gave out under his weight.

For a single moment, Cas forgot he was human. He tried to transport (or 'poof' as Dean used to say) himself to Dean's side. When that didn't work he jumped over the porch steps to land in a sprint, racing to where Dean now lay clutching his leg with eyes scrunched tight in pain.

Kneeling beside him, Cas' hands fluttered over Dean's body, unsure what was wrong with it. He reached towards Dean's face to heal him, before stopping short with the realization once more, that he no longer had 'angel mojo'.

"Dean! Tell me what's wrong! Tell me what to do… I-I can't heal it… I'm sorry, I-" Cas' face crumpled as a feeling of helplessness washed over him.

"I- I need a hospital Cas. Take me to the hospital!" Dean managed to say while panting.

Cas quickly lifted Dean into his arms, trying not to hear the gasp of pain the movement caused. Moving as fast as he dared toward the Impala, Cas silently thanked the fates for making him force Dean into giving him driving lessons. "In case of emergency" he had told Dean months ago, when in reality he had just wanted to learn a useful human skill. He hadn't had a choice in becoming human but now that he was, Cas was determined to be as useful a human as possible.

But this was an emergency he thought, as he tried to gently place Dean in the backseat of the classic car. Cas pulled the keys from Dean's pocket and fell into the drivers seat, trying to remember the way to the hospital.

They had been there twice over the summer, once when Cas had had an allergic reaction to peaches and again when Sam had sprained his ankle running after a shape-shifter. Dean had driven both times and Cas hadn't really been paying attention but he thought he knew how to get there.

As he pulled out onto the road and pressed the gas a little harder than was safe, he looked in the rear view mirror to find Dean's face starting to show beads of sweat, his eyes still closed.

"Dean, I'm taking you to the hospital. They will take care of you. They know how to fix people, like when the peaches made me sick. You will be fine..." Cas knew he was babbling and he wasn't really sure Dean was hearing him until Dean's panting stopped long enough for him to whisper, "I'm ok Cas. Don't worry about it."

And then Cas' heart sunk because it was obviously a lie. Dean always lied when he was badly hurt. He didn't want to look weak, and more than that he didn't want to worry Cas or Sam. So he put on a brave face and shouldered the pain, telling everyone he was fine.

But he wasn't fine. Cas could see that and yet he couldn't make sense of it. There had been no enemy attacking, no blood, none of the things that usually came with serious injury; yet Dean was still gripping his leg like he thought it was going to fall off so Cas pushed the car harder, speeding down the road with a subtle scent of burnt rubber following them.

When the large hospital building finally came into view, Cas let out a small sigh of relief. The doctors would know what to do. They would fix Dean and then they could go home and pretend this had never happened.

Tires squealing, Cas pulled up in front of the ER entrance and flung open his car door. Jumping out he looked towards a couple of Nurses who were having a smoke outside and yelled, "Help me! I don't know what's wrong with him but he needs help!" and then without stopping to see if they were moving Cas yanked open the Impala's back door and reached in to get Dean.

His face had gone a frightening shade of white but he had opened his eyes and they had a faraway look to them, like Dean's mind hadn't caught up with where they were. Shock Cas heard a voice in his mind tell him. That was what this must be. Dean was going into shock.

Just then the nurses came running up to the car pulling a gurney. "What happened?" a blonde man asked as he and his ginger haired partner lifted Dean carefully onto the pallet.

"I don't know!" Cas said, surprised at the desperate whine in his voice, "He just collapsed, something is wrong with his leg but I don't know what!"

He ran after the nurses as they quickly wheeled the gurney through the automatic doors of the ER. As soon as they were inside, a swarm of people in white lab coats and blue scrubs surrounded Dean's prone figure. Cas tried to peer over their heads but couldn't get a good view of what was happening. He saw someone wrap a cuff around Dean's arm, and someone else with a thermometer jump into the fray.

Cas turned suddenly as a woman grabbed his arm, a sympathetic but serious look on her face as she said, "Sir, I'm sorry but we need you to fill out some forms. I promise our staff will do everything they can to help your friend but it's really best if you stay out of the way."

The woman slowly pulled Cas away from the frantic medical personnel towards a group of cushioned chairs.

"But-but he needs me… I can't leave him!" Cas said trying to keep his voice in check since he knew this woman was only doing her job. But that didn't stop the fear that squeezed in his chest as he watched the gurney be pushed through a set of double doors taking Dean out of his sight.

"I know sir, and you can wait right here and we will let you know the minute we know anything. I just need you to fill out these forms. It's just some basic information like insurance and medical history." The woman said purposefully as she shoved a clipboard into Cas' empty hands. "I'll have someone move your car into the lot. The keys are still inside I assume?" Cas felt himself nodding to the woman though his eyes had not left the double doors since Dean had been rushed through.

The woman must have left then because when Cas finally pulled himself out of his stupor, he found himself standing alone with a clipboard full of forms in his hands. He carefully sat down in one of the cushy chairs behind him and looked at the forms, not knowing what to do from here. He couldn't quite get his eyes to focus and the words were swimming on the page.

What now? He thought to himself. Dean had told him to go to the hospital. And he had done that. But he had no further instruction and a fluttery feeling of anxiety crept into his stomach as he realized how out of his element he was. Then again, he had never really been in his element or even had an element at that. He hadn't fit in as an angel and now he was even worse as a human. The only place he fit was with Dean. But Dean wasn't here. Him and Sam always knew what to do…

"Sam!" he said out loud, drawing the eyes of a few other people in the waiting area, as the realization struck him. Sam could help. He could tell Cas what to do.

Pulling out his phone he quickly found Sam's number and hit the call button. As he listened to the insistent ringing he wiped at his eyes, surprised by the moisture that had collected there.

"Hey Cas, what's up?" came Sam's amiable voice through the phone.

"Sam! I need your help. I'm at the hospital but they gave me forms and I don't know what to do and they took Dean so I can't ask him and I-" Cas stopped to take a breath when Sam's voice interrupted in a drastically different tone than the one he had just used.

"Cas stop. Tell me what happened. I'm on my way to the hospital but I need to know why your there. What's wrong with Dean?" Sam asked with a calm but urgent attitude lacing his words.

Cas forced himself to take a deep breath, something Dean had taught him to do whenever he got flustered and needed to clear his head.

Trying to speak slower with a more controlled voice Cas told Sam, "We were at home. Dean was raking leaves. I don't know what happened. He just-just collapsed! Something is wrong with his leg and he was in a lot of pain and he told me to take him to the hospital so I did. But now that I'm here I don't know what to do!" Cas' voice had become higher pitched the more information he spilled into the phone and he stopped to breathe again.

Sam paused for a second before speaking, "Ok well I'm almost there. Just stay calm and wait for me ok?"

"Ok…just hurry." Cas said hesitantly before hanging up. He hoped Sam would come soon. He felt the now familiar panic start to well up inside him again as he thought about how alone he was. He didn't know where they had taken Dean. When he had been an angel, Cas could always find Dean. All he had to do was look for the light of Dean's soul. Cas knew Dean's soul so intimately and it always shone so much brighter than the rest. But now he couldn't see Dean's soul. He could only see what was in front of him and all that was there was a table with a messy pile of magazines on it.

Cas once again tried to focus on the forms he had been given. Squinting at them he made out words like Patient Name and Social Security Number and Insurance Company and Emergency Contact.

He neatly wrote 'Dean Winchester' by patient name (Charlie had erased Dean's electronic record and written him a new paper trail so he could use his real name again). Cas didn't know what a social security number was or what insurance company they used but he decided that he must be the emergency contact since it had been an emergency and Dean had been with him. He wrote 'Castiel' in the space and then paused. They had used a fake last name for him when he had been brought here for his peach allergy but he couldn't remember what it had been. Instead he just put down 'Winchester' and hoped Dean wouldn't mind that Cas had taken his name.

Just then he heard Sam's voice "…I'm looking for Dean Winchester or Cas..." looking up he saw Sam talking to a nurse and then turning, eyes searching the room until they fell on Cas. "Uh never mind, I found him." He said as he walked quickly to where Cas sat.

"Hey, there you are. Any news?" He asked. "No one has told me anything. They said they would but I don't know where Dean is or what they're doing to him…" Cas started saying and then stopped when his voice cracked with stress.

"Whoa, whoa it's ok, I'm sure he's being taken care of. Let's just relax and wait here then. I'll fill out the forms; how about you try to read a magazine." Sam said grabbing a magazine from the table and swapping it with the forms in Cas' hands. He looked down at the cover. It said 'National Geographic' and showed a brightly colored picture of a bird that was labeled as a rare toucan. Cas flipped the pages and tried to make sense of the words but he couldn't seem to keep his eyes on them and was constantly looking at the double doors or at Sam as he filled out the forms.

Cas knew only an hour or so must have passed but it felt like eternity before a nurse came out and called for the family of Dean Winchester.

The nurse had taken them back to an orderly office and introduced them to a man in a lab coat named Dr. Goldenstein.

"Gentleman," the doctor said while shaking their hands, "please have a seat and we'll talk."

"Where's Dean?" Cas couldn't contain himself. Every minute he went without seeing

Dean, another image of him in pain would worm its way into his mind making his heart beat hard against his ribcage.

"He has been taken back for some tests. His leg has fractured, but you said you don't know how this could've happened…?" the doctor trailed off, ending the phrase as a question, obviously looking for confirmation. Cas nodded with conviction and told the doctor, "He was just raking leaves. There was no danger, I would have seen it."

"Well we have already taken x-rays and found a small unidentified mass in the affected area so we have sent him back for a CT scan and needle biopsy. This means we will get a clearer image of the bone and we can take a sample of the mass-" The doctor was cut off as Sam leaned forward over the desk saying, "A mass? You mean like a tumor?"

The doctor held up his hands in a placating gesture and continued, "Yes it is technically a tumor but we won't know if it's malignant or benign until we get the results from the biopsy, so don't let the word 'tumor' scare you. It's fairly small and doesn't appear to have metastasized, or spread, anywhere else in the body. Once we get a good look at the CT results, we can look at our options to remove the mass."

Cas heard all the doctor's words but couldn't quite grasp the meaning. "But you'll fix him right?" Cas asked. Because that's what doctors did. They weren't as good at it as angels, but they were healers nonetheless. They had to fix Dean.

"We will do everything we can for him." Goldenstein promised. Though the words were meant to be comforting, Cas knew he wouldn't be at ease until he saw Dean with his own eyes.

After Sam asked a few more questions, a nurse came in and led them to a new seating area where they waited in nervous silence for what Cas thought felt like eternity.

Eventually a team of nurses came down the hall with a gurney. When Sam and Cas saw that it contained what appeared to be a sleeping Dean, they quickly stood up and followed it into a vacant room. They stood back as they watched Dean be hooked up to a heart monitor and an IV inserted into the crease of his right arm. When they were finished and Dean had been settled, all but one of the nurses left the room. The remaining nurse, a small woman with caramel colored skin and dark hair, was filling out a chart at the bottom of Dean's bed. When she looked up and saw the two men staring wearily at the patient, she told them "We have him on some pain meds and we had to give him an anesthetic for the biopsy so he will probably be asleep for a little while. The doctor would like to keep him here for observation, at least until we get he biopsy results. That should take about 2 days. We didn't give him a full cast for his leg because we might have to run more tests. You two can stay here as long as you like, just press the call button if you need anything." With that she flashed a kind smile and walked purposefully out of the room.

Cas took in the silent form on the bed. He understood what the nurse had meant about not using a full cast when he saw Dean's leg encased in an uncomfortable looking brace. His eyes traveled from the brace to the wires connecting Dean to the beeping machinery and then on to the slack face resting on a pillow.

Sam interrupted Cas' assessment, saying, "Well, if he's going to be asleep, then I'm going to run home and get my laptop so I can take care of some stuff…can you stay here and keep an eye on him? I won't be gone too long, but call me if anything happens ok?"

Cas nodded in understanding. Sam had an apartment near the community college where he was taking some classes. It was a far cry from Stanford but Sam had wanted to take it easy for a while after recovering from the trials. He still hunted some and Dean liked to tag along but they were determined to try living more normal lives. Dean and Cas had bought a house (what Dean had called a 'fixer-upper') on a whim when they realized there was no impending apocalypse hanging over their heads for once. After Metatron had been taken care of (the souls occupying heaven hadn't taken kindly to his presence) they had stayed in the bunker for a few weeks before realizing they were craving something more, as much as Dean hated the word, domestic.

Cas stared at the door Sam had left through, knowing that he probably wanted his laptop in case he had anything to research. He knew Sam didn't like sitting around and he needed to feel like he was helping in some way.

Cas didn't know how long he sat there lost in thought before his eyes were drawn to the twitching hand in front of him. Checking that Dean's eyes were still shut, Cas tentatively reached out and held the hand in his own. Wishing he could still see into Dean's dreams, he sat stroking his thumb across Dean's palm and willing the dream to be a good one. He hoped it wasn't one of the nightmares that still plagued Dean's mind from time to time and left him tossing and turning in the dark of their room. On these nights, Cas would gently wake Dean and ask if he wanted to talk about it. He never did but Cas noticed that Dean always through a protective arm over him and pulled him closer afterwards. He usually held Cas that way for the rest of the night.

Cas got nightmares too. Some nights all he had to do was close his eyes to relive the night the sky fell, flaming balls of light streaming through the darkness. Cas shivered at the memory of these vivid dreams, but smiled as he thought about what came after. Whenever Cas woke up in a cold sweat, eyes watering at the images that burned in his mind, Dean was there. Dean would hold him, rocking them back and forth gently, and he would sing to Cas.

He looked again at Dean's idle body lying on the bed. He didn't want to admit it, but the stillness scared him. Dean still had hunter instincts and was a light sleeper. Even when they were safe at home, Cas would sometimes watch Dean sleep. He knew Dean twitched at every sound, knew his head still turned to listen better when the old house creaked and groaned in the night. This stillness though, it was like looking at an empty shell of Dean and it scared Cas every bit as much as his nightmares. So Cas did what felt right, and he sang.

"Hey Jude…"