Warnings: I'm not promising a happy ending. I'm not saying there won't be one, but if you're one of those people who need a happy ending, I don't want to disappoint you.

This story also doesn't fit really anywhere in the timeline of SPN. It includes issues like Cas pulling Dean from Hell, the apocalypse and Cas's betrayal, but this is a more a story to speak of the characters and their relationship.

"Sam, you should be here. It's kick ass." Dean pressed his foot on the gas, the Impala vibrating beneath his boot. He looked out the slightly frosted window to the white-and-grey peaks and the glowing purple sunset.

"We've been places like that before," Sam said through the phone. He was back with Bobby working on another case.

"No. We haven't." This place was remarkable, unearthly. A sight unlike anything he even saw in heaven. If he went to heaven now, it would probably look like this.

Sam laughed. "See you later."

"Yeah, man." Dean hung up the phone.

He and Cas were hundreds of miles into the Canadian Rocky Mountains. He had never been this deep into the wilderness before, and he couldn't believe that Sam had volunteered to miss it. Cas had come along, but he'd lived for thousands of years. He'd seen everything. His excitement was limited.

"I'm hungry." Cas still hadn't gotten used to being human. He was starving every few hours, not unlike a newborn baby. It was sometimes annoying, but mostly just kind of funny.

"There's food in the backseat."

Cas unbuckled his seatbelt. He leaned over the seat and yanked the black bag into his lap. He dug through the contents with a concentrated look on his face.

"All you have are corn nuts and something called Oreos." He sighed. "Oh beef jerky. I like beef jerky."

"Since when?"

"I tried it last week. I thought it was very good. Much better than corn nuts. I do not like corn nuts."

Dean rolled his eyes and shook his head. Cas's voice played with a distinct staccato rhythm Dean had come to know well over the years. The sound provided a certain comfort whenever he heard it.

The sun dipped even further behind the snow-blanketed mountains as small flakes began to fall and freeze on the Impala's windows. A chill raced across Dean's skin. He turned up the heat. Maybe he should have listened to Sam and driven a Jeep up here, but he missed his Impala, and once they arrived in Fenner's Lake, they wouldn't have to drive much anymore. Besides Dean knew how to drive his car, even in heavy snow. No. He wasn't worried at all.

Cas put the rest of the food back in the pack, and stuffed the bag in the backseat again. He placed his leg on the dash, and leaned against the window. The way he reclined his head, the collar of his black fleece jacket hid his chin and part of his face.

"Dean?" Cas yawned.

"Yeah, Cas?"

"Turn on that music you like."

Dean smiled. He pushed in the plastic dial. There was quick hiss of static, and then the first chords of "Wanted: Dead or Alive" sang out from the speakers. In the lulls of the music, he could hear Cas's gentle breaths.

He took a deep breath. The air smelled like the Impala, like cheap food and whiskey. Dean rolled down the window just a crack. The wind whistled in, and the cold air streamed across his cheek. It smelled like cold, crisp pine.

Dean flipped on the lights, illuminating several feet in front of the car. Snow fell in big flakes now, sticking to the windshield and the road. Thankfully, he had three fourths of a tank of gas, and only thirty miles to Fenner's Lake.

He and Cas would be there soon.

###

"I have to do this," Castiel said. "He's the one from the prophecy."

"If he is dead," Joshua replied. "Then maybe the prophecy is not meant to be."

"But - I've been watching over him."

Joshua's lips turned into a small, disapproving frown. "Do as you must, Castiel, but do not pretend that you do this out of loyalty. You tear him from hell for you."

Castiel said nothing else, but he knew Joshua was wrong. He wasn't pulling Dean from hell's clutches for himself. He was doing it for Dean. Just Dean. Always Dean, and he hadn't even met him yet.

It had burned like nothing Castiel had felt before when his hand touched Dean. It was a pain he could sometimes feel humming on his skin, a constant reminder of what he'd done and of who he'd done it for.

The car jolted forward, waking Castiel from his sleep. He sat straight up. The Impala was spinning; his head was spinning. He reached for the window. It felt cold – why was he thinking of the cold? What did that matter now?

The tires screeched on the road, and his stomach dropped as the back end of the Impala dipped over the edge of the mountainside.

Dean cursed, and the car flipped on its side. Sharp pain struck Castiel from all sides. Pain like he'd never felt. The breath sucked out of him. He was screaming and Dean was screaming. Metal crushed around them, screeching and breaking.

The car thudded hard and stopped, upside down.

Castiel blinked. He reached out, trying to get to Dean, trying to see him, but Dean's eyes were closed. And, oh, what if he were dead? He couldn't be- But the world was fizzling out around Castiel, sparking in bursts of grey and black until the pain was gone and he was somewhere else.

"Why are you doing this?" Crowley asked.

"It was your idea," Castiel replied.

"Why listen to me? The King of Hell? Surely, you were taught to be more discerning."

Castiel turned and looked at him. "Because all along. He's never been there. All those people pray," People like Dean, he thought, "And there's no one there to answer them, to hear them."

"And what are you going to do with a million prayers you can't answer?"

"I'll find a way to help them." There had to be a way.

Because now he would have the power. The power to defeat evil once and for all, the power to free Dean from this life.

###

"Cas, Cas are you alive?" Dean coughed, his lungs aching. "Come on, you lived through the dinosaurs."

Dean's whole body stung, but he couldn't think about the horrible pain. Not now. Right now, he needed to make sure Cas was alive. Cas was what mattered.

"I did not live through the dinosaurs," Cas said.

Momentary relief seized Dean. Hurt or not, at least Cas was still breathing, and if he was breathing there was hope.

"I'm gonna get you out of here, man. I promise."

Taking a deep breath, Dean forced his seat belt loose, and wedged himself through the broken window. Sharp glass tore into his skin, ripping the flesh, but he pushed through the pain until he was outside, lying on snow. The cold burned his skin but soothed his cuts at the same time.

"Dean, I'm stuck." Cas was hyperventilating. "Dean, please, I can't. I seem to be- I can't move."

Dean's heart pounded as he crawled through the snow around the destroyed Impala. The cold stung his fingers and his knees, his wet clothes sticking to his body. He didn't care, he couldn't care. He had to get to Cas.

"I'm here," Dean said. "I've got you." He dug through the snow until he could see into the car. Cas was bloodied and bruised, and Dean was sure he looked just as bad.

Dean reached over Cas and unbuckled his seat belt. The metal lock snapped back, nearly slapping him in the face. He gasped.

"Dean. What are we going to do? Dean?"

"Shut up," he said harshly, but then calmed his tone of voice. "We're going to be fine. We've survived worse. Much worse."

But Cas never had. Not as a human.

"You need to slide out through the window." Dean pulled gently on Cas's arm. "I'll help. Just push with your legs."

"Okay," Cas's voice was shaking. In a few moments, Dean felt Cas push against him so he pulled harder. He pulled and pulled until they were both free of the wreckage.

Dean collapsed beside Cas, gasping for air.

"Is anything broken?" Dean asked. "Can you move?"

"My leg hurts," Cas whimpered.

"Do you think you can move on it?"

Dean gripped the rough bark of a nearby tree and cut his hand as he crawled to his feet. Leaning against the trunk, he helped Cas stand as well. Cas was even less steady than he was, and he tumbled against Dean.

Dean wrapped his arm around Cas's weight, holding him up.

"I've got you," Dean said. "We'll get out of here."

He felt Cas nod against his shoulder.

"Let's get back to the road."

"The road was closed. Remember?"

Dean felt sick. Nobody would be coming by anytime soon. Right now what they needed was a dry place where Dean could make a fire, where they could warm up and assess their injuries.

"There's got to be a cave around here," Dean said, mostly to himself. "We'll find it. That's all we have to do."

"I don't think I can make it," Cas said. "It hurts, and I'm human and I'm not like you, Dean. I'm weak. Just go."

"You are Castiel, a warrior of heaven, and you can walk five damn minutes to a cave."

Dean stepped forward, making sure to have Cas firmly in his grip. They stumbled back to the Impala wreck. Dean pulled out some food they had in the trunk. A box of power bars, some apples that had been Sam's, a bottle of whiskey, some water. He also took two rifles. Dean stuffed it all into a duffle with sleeping bags and extra clothes and tossed it over his shoulder.

Pain shocked through him, but he grit his teeth and pressed on toward the rocky mountainside, gripping onto Cas. The wind stung his face and ears as it streamed mercilessly through the trees. He wasn't about to die out here, not after everything. Dean would keep them alive. He had to. He had to keep Cas alive.

###

Castiel had watched the ice age from heaven. The move of the glaciers over the earth. He'd watched the dinosaurs as some of them died and some of them found ways to survive, in the water or in the sky. He watched the thick layer of icy white paint creation, and mammoths push their way through the ten-foot drifts of snow. He'd seen packs of saber-toothed cats corner massive prey, bring it down and tear it to shreds. From a distance, it had been at some times beautiful, and at others, dull. Castiel had found the earth all rather amusing, or insignificant, coming and going with little effect on him.

Then there had been Dean.

For the first time, he understood what his Father had seen in humanity. Why the humans had been his favorite.

Walking through the heavy wet snow numbed Castiel's whole body. It had been painful at first, but now he felt nothing. Nothing but the hum of the pain from when he'd touched Dean in hell all those years ago. That was still there. It seemed nothing could drown it out.

Dean was still holding him, and he was still holding Dean.

"You see that?" Dean's voice was hoarse. "In the edge of that cliff."

There was a small opening in the side of a greyish rocky mountain

"We can get there. We can't stop now," Dean said.

Castiel had no idea how long they'd been walking. It could have been five minutes or ten hours. How would he know? Or even venture to guess? Just because he was now in a human body didn't mean he had a clear concept of time. When someone had been alive as long as he had, it messed with perspective.

Covered in blood and bruises, Dean and Castiel ducked into the cave. It smelled of mold and sulfur.

"I hope that's not demon sulfur."

"We have the guns," Castiel reminded Dean.

"Yeah. At least we have that much." Dean gently pushed down on Castiel's shoulders. "Sit."

Castiel obliged. Dean stopped touching him, and Castiel wished he wouldn't. Fear gripped him.

"It is dark in here. Bears live in caves. I saw it on the television."

Dean laughed, and even in a place like this, it was perfect. The sound echoed, which made it even better.

"For a guy as old as you, you'd think ya wouldn't have to learn about bears from a television."

But Castiel wasn't an angel sent to watch over nature. "I've never been assigned bears."

Dean laughed again. This time quietly and through his nose. "I'm assigning you bears now. You see a bear. You tell me."

I hope there's no bears. But the sulfur. What about demon bears? Wait. There's no such thing as demon bears. Keep it together, Castiel.

"Uh, okay," Castiel replied.

"There we are."

Castiel heard a few more scratches and then a flame flickered before him, growing larger by the second and releasing a curl of smoke. The light was enough that he could see the sharp outline of Dean's face and body.

"What are you looking at?" asked Jeremiah.

"Nothing," Cas answered.

"You're acting strange."

"I'm concerned about the keys. That's all. There's only a few left."

Jeremiah shook his head. "It's the Winchester. Michael's vessel."

Castiel swallowed. "What are you talking about?"

He sneered. "God has given you one face and you make yourself another."

"You quote a human?"

William Shakespeare. Castiel knew the man well. At least, he'd watched him, seen the original performances.

Jeremiah's gaze was harsh and unforgiving. "It seems you speak their language now."

"I don't-"

"The way you look at Michael's vessel. It's almost violent."

Castiel shook his head. This was way out of line. "I wish Dean Winchester no harm."

"Maybe not," Jeremiah said. "But I fear what you would harm to keep Dean Winchester safe. I've seen that kind of violence, that desperate look, only once before."

Now Castiel was just forcing down a wave of hot rage. Where was Jeremiah headed with this outrageousness? "Where's that?"

"In our brother," Jeremiah let out a terse breath, "Lucifer."

###

Dean hadn't had much of a chance to think about his pain since getting out of the wreckage. Now he could though. Dean held his hands up to the fire, letting the heat warm through him.

"Come closer, Cas."

Cas looked up at him, his dark eyes wide. His face was cut and bleeding and splotched with purple. Still, Dean found himself looking at him as he always did. Searching the face of his friend for the gravity, for the connection, he could always only find with Cas.

Cas pushed himself over the strewn leaves and the rocks until he was right next to him. His whole body was shaking. Truthfully so was Dean's, but the small fire had already begun to help warm him.

Dean blew on his hands and rubbed them together, delighting in the hot friction it created for a moment before the cuts and scrapes began to burn. Cas tried to do the same thing, but gasped in pain.

"There's glass in my hand," he muttered, frowning down at his open palm.

"Here." Dean took Cas's hand and held it in his palm up. A sharp shard protruded from between his thumb and pointer finger. Blood oozed out around it, thick, red, dripping. The debris was imbedded pretty deep. "I'm gonna pull it out, okay?"

Cas nodded and bit his lip. Dean yanked out of the piece of glass. Cas yelped. Dean squeezed Cas's hand, keeping pressure on the cut.

"I just don't want to think about how much I hurt," said Cas.

"At least it doesn't seem like either of us broke anything. I don't believe in miracles, but maybe for today."

Cas's lips turned in a small smile as he glanced up at Dean. "For today." He shivered again.

Dean was trembling from the cold and the adrenaline as he reached his arm over and placed it on Cas's shoulder. He'd hugged Cas, touched his face and neck when he was hurt, but this was something he'd never done before. Put his arm around Cas just because. He wasn't sure how he'd react.

"It's better if we stay close," Dean said. "For the body heat."

In the bags they'd carried, there were sleeping bags and a couple thermal blankets. Technically, the best way to get and stay warm in a situation like this would be for them to take their clothes off, at least most of them.

"I think I twisted my ankle," Cas said with a sniff.

"Keep it as still as possible, and I'll bandage it up."

Dean reached into one of the bags and pulled out a bandage he could use to wrap up Cas's ankle and keep it straight. He slipped off Cas's boot and then removed his sock. After that, he rolled up Cas's jeans.

Dean never had the occasion to look this closely at Cas's leg before. A line of freckles ran down the bone on top of his foot and in a circle below the line where his leg hair stopped growing.

"You can move it, but it hurts?"

Cas nodded, sniffing again.

"Just checking." Dean wanted to be sure it wasn't broken because it was swollen and slightly purple.

For some reason, he held his breath as he wrapped the bandage around Cas's ankle.

"Thank you," Cas whispered as Dean pulled away.

He checked for other injuries on Cas's body and on his own. He put bandages on their cuts and wiped away the dirt and rocks. Dean even made sure they didn't have concussions. If they did, they could fall asleep and never wake up.

"I'm still cold," Cas said.

Dean bit the inside of his cheek. He should just man-up and say it. "We could get in the sleeping bags. We can zip them together – and," he took a deep breath, "We need to take off our clothes. Most of them. We'll stay warmer."

"Okay," Cas replied in that monotone voice of his. Sometimes Dean was really thankful for the way that man could just take things in stride. Cas would never judge.

Dean unrolled the sleeping bags and zipped them together into one large sleeping bag. He slowly started removing his clothes: his jacket, his sweater, his shoes and socks. Cas was doing the same, and it was Cas who pulled his shirt off first, revealing his chest, the sharp curve and cut of his torso. Dean looked away quickly, and pulled his own shirt off. Then, they pulled off their jeans, and Dean forced himself not to look at his friend as he slid into the sleeping bag.

"Hurry up, Cas. Before I freeze to death."

"Sorry," he said and slipped in beside him. Dean shut his eyes and listened to Cas zip the bag shut. He looked over and Cas was still wearing his grey winter hat – just like Dean was still wearing his black one.

"You okay?" Dean asked.

Cas nodded. "Tired. Cold."

This was a bad idea, but he had no other choice. "Come closer."

Cas closed the gap between them, laying his head just above Dean's heart. He couldn't breathe. No one had been with him like this since Lisa.

"Are you still cold?" asked Cas.

"No."

"Why are you shaking?"

Dean shut his eyes. He didn't want to think about why, about how his heart was punching his ribs, how the nearness to Cas, the flutter and gasp of his body against his was making him dizzier than the car crash.

"Let's just sleep."

Dean tightened his grasp on Cas's arm, holding him closer, for warmth and for other reasons. Reasons he wasn't prepared to face. Dean listened to the crackle of the fire as it began to burn out, and the sound of the wind whistling outside the cave. Demons and monsters he could handle, but there were no special swords or spells for this disaster. Dean didn't want to admit it, and he certainly wouldn't to Cas, but he had no idea what he was doing.

With Cas in his arms, he drifted to sleep, trying not to fear the danger that would lie ahead in the next few days. For now he repeated one word in his head until it shut out everything else. He'd done this before, dozens of times, when he couldn't sleep. He'd started just after the leviathans first came from purgatory. Counting sheep never worked for him but this always did. Always.

Castiel. Castiel. Castiel.

And everything was okay. There was still hope.

Castiel. Castiel. Castiel.

Author's Note: Thank you for reading. I'm planning on updating around once a week. Please leave reviews. I'd love to know what you think. Thanks again!