Angel in a Trenchcoat

Chapter 1

It had been a quiet few weeks in the bunker. Things were quiet all around, in fact. Sam and Dean checked the news dutifully for possible hunts every day, but there was little to find. One evening, bored with research and not really wanting to dive into the sea that was Netflix, Sam started searching some of the more esoteric paranormal sites. When he began chuckling under his breath, Dean didn't notice, but when Sam threw back his head and laughed, he had to know just what his brother was looking at.

"It's a site about angels," Sam said, wiping tears away from his eyes. "And it's really, really, hysterically wrong!"

"Really? How wrong?"

"Oh, so wrong. We need beer to read these," Sam answered. "You'll laugh your head off."

Always eager to find something to make him laugh, Dean fetched a six pack from the fridge and took a seat beside his brother. Within minutes, both of them were laughing so hard they couldn't breathe.

"Oh, man!" Dean wheezed after a half-hour of angel stories and so-called "lore." "What were these guys smoking when they wrote this site?"

"Whatever it is, I want some!" Sam answered, fighting to take a deep breath. He paused, read a few lines, and kept laughing. " 'Angels are particularly pleased with an offering of crystals.' Crystals! Oh, this site keeps getting better and better!"

Dean started reading titles of the articles out loud, his voice more and more obscured by laughter. "How to entice angels to you, how to summon your guardian angel, what will please your guardian angel, angel names and their meanings, offerings for angels, stages of angels...angel sightings. Oh, we gotta click on this one."

"I don't think we should," Sam said, still grinning fit to crack his face. "We'll bust our guts!"

"Gotta click," Dean repeated, clicking the link.

Most of it was what they'd expected...coincidences that confirmed people's belief in a benevolent God and his angels, natural phenomena, and one post where the poster had most likely been drunk. Sam read the post and fell out of his chair, laughing too hard to get back up. Dean started laughing so hard the was sure he could be heard in every corner of the bunker and all he could do was howl, "Angel sex?! Really?"

Dean toppled to the floor to join his brother and the just lay there and laughed. There had been too little laughter in their lives lately, and it felt great to find something to laugh about, even if that laughter was debilitating. Eventually, they both calmed down enough to pick themselves up from the floor.

"That seems kind of blasphemous," Sam stated, scrolling past that particular post.

"Kinda, yeah," Dean agreed. "What's that link there?"

"A video," Sam said, reading the blurb underneath it. "Says here a man was ejected from a car during a crash and an angel appeared out of nowhere and saved his life."

"Really? Let's see that one."

It was a chaotic clip. A group of friends had been walking along a city street and one of them had been filming. The sound of a crash startled all of them and the camera whipped around to show the remains of a car and a damaged truck. There was someone lying in the road, gravely injured, and suddenly...something...could be seen crouching next to the man. In the next second, it was gone and the man started to sit up. "Did you guys see that?" one of the people in the video asked. Apparently they hadn't. "See what? See what, dude?"

"Cool," Dean said as the footage ended.

"Hang on, there's more," Sam told him. "Watch."

The rest of the footage showed the camera zooming in on the crouching form next to the injured man, the image was cleaned up and refined, and the viewer could clearly see a man in a suit and a trenchcoat, and just behind the man's shoulders, there were two black, feathered wings.

"Holy…" Dean breathed.

"Oh, man," Sam gasped. "Dean, that...that's…"

"Castiel," Dean finished, grabbing his cell phone. "We gotta call him."

"I thought you couldn't teleport anymore," Dean said once they'd explained what they'd found to Castiel. "You said yourself that your wings were...broken."

"Occasionally I can," Castiel corrected after a moment. "I have to...really concentrate on a place where I'm really needed, and I can only stay for a short time before I...zap...back to where I was before I teleported."

"Uh-huh," Sam sighed, looking confused. "How long have you been able to do this?"

"A few months. I don't do it often since it's tiring, but it has come in handy."

"You'll have to be really careful where you zap from now on," Dean said, turning the computer toward Castiel and clicking play. "Take a look at that."

"Ah," Castiel said once the clip finished playing. "I see."

"Yeah," Dean said, dropping into a chair. "In the past two weeks since that video's been posted, people online have taken it and run with it. There's now a whole website and forum dedicated to just that video and people trying to figure out more about you."

"Why are your wings showing?" Sam wondered. "I mean, they don't show up in photos."

"Probably because a video camera is more advanced than a photo camera, and my angelic nature is most engaged when I...zap."

"So just standing somewhere and being filmed won't show them, but using your zappy abilities can cause your feathers to show?"

"Seems likely," Castiel admitted. "Should I...be concerned about this?"

"Possibly," Sam told him, taking a seat at the table. "If you show up on camera enough, people will start looking for you, and that includes the police and other authorities."

"Not to mention certain people who would just love to get their hands on an angel," Dean added. "You know, I've been looking through the archives here and the Men of Letters have an impressive amount of stuff on angels." So saying, he handed a file to Castiel. In it were pages summarizing everything that the Men of Letters knew about angels or supposed about them. The final page stated the author's wish to get hold of an angel for "research purposes."

"I see your point," Castiel said after a moment.

"Is it possible for someone to capture an angel if they don't use holy oil and fire?" Sam asked.

Castiel nodded. "Possible, yes, but not likely. They would have to know how, first, and they would have to have the angel hold still long enough to be captured. Then, once they've captured him, they have to make sure that what they're using to hold him doesn't move. Otherwise, he could break free."

"Are you saying that there's something that humans can make or use to capture angels?"

Castiel flipped through a file. "There is. Whoever wrote this file guessed at a lot of things and even more things are little but conjecture, but this he has right."

Sam took the file and started reading. "Silver chains soaked in holy oil where each link has Enochian sigils for binding and capture carved on them. This would work?"

Castiel nodded. "It can. It would keep an angel in place long enough for any captor to figure out how to secure him. This researcher was far closer to the truth than he knew."

"Great," Dean groaned. "Do you think anyone else might know about this?"

"I hope not," Castiel said after a moment. "That could be...bad."

"Once again, you have a gift for stating the obvious, Cas," Dean told him, clapping the angel on his shoulder. "Let's hope no one else has thought of this."

"Amen," Sam answered.

They didn't think about what they'd learned for the next few months. They were too busy with hunting and with their annual trip to Vegas. For the first time, Cas joined them, and he spent time with Dean in his favorite haunts and some time with Sam while he was camping. Then, on the last day they hit a casino. After winning a thousand, they went to a buffet to celebrate.

"Are these shrimp or baby lobsters?" Castiel asked, examining one of the buffet offerings.

"They're giant shrimp," Dean said. "And before you ask, no, buffalo do not have wings."

Castiel rolled his eyes and fixed Dean with a look. "I knew that."

"Does food still taste like molecules to you, Cas?" Sam asked as they settled at a table.

"Unfortunately," Castiel said with regret. "I did enjoy eating. I really miss PB and J."

"I wish I could make you a PB and J you could taste," Dean told him. "Couldn't you just...I don't know, snap your fingers and make it so you could taste food again?"

Castiel shook his head. "No, but I would like it if I could do that."

Talk turned to other matters then and the next morning the three of them piled into the Impala for the drive home. They listened to their favorite songs, played Slug-bug, and just enjoyed the drive. They were almost to Kansas when they stopped at a filling station. It was your typical country filling station with a bunch of older guys gathered in a group on benches outside. One of them was wide eyed and relating a story about a haunted barn outside of town. Gathered around the older men were a group of younger men and a few women, all of them wearing matching T-shirts that read, "Greater Midwest Paranormal."

"One of those paranormal groups," Sam cautioned his brother and Cas.

"Yep," Dean sighed. "Let's just take care of business and get home."

Sam and Dean headed to the bathroom while Cas purchased drinks for all of them-he didn't dare purchase just two when there were three of them in the car. People, he'd learned, would notice the smallest things and become suspicious. He was halfway to the car before he heard someone shout at him.

"Hey, man! Get out of our array! We're testing it!"

Cas looked down and saw himself standing in the middle of a grid of metal wire. The thing was hooked up to what looked like car batteries at each corner. A man and a young woman, who was holding a camera with a filtered lens, were both glaring at him. "Sorry. Long trip. Little tired."

"You could have gotten fried," she said, looking through the camera's viewfinder. "Wake up, huh?"

Cas murmured another apology and headed back to the Impala. Sam and Dean joined him a minute later.

"Sounds like a classic ghost," Sam said, referring to the conversation he'd overheard.

"I don't particularly want to do a salt and burn right now, Sam," Dean told his brother. "Besides, the ghost isn't attacking anybody, it just screams at them to get out."

"But doesn't a ghost need to be put to rest before it becomes vengeful?" Cas asked. "We should check it out to be sure it is a ghost. It could be something pretending to be a ghost, you know, and it's just waiting for the chance to snatch a victim."

Dean thought about it. "Yeah, you're right. Let's go before the Scooby gang gets out there and gets in trouble."

It took them two hours to find the right barn. Dean groused for a full ten minutes how no state in the whole country had as many barns and Sam had to remind him more than once that they were still in farming country.

When they finally found the barn, they headed inside, armed with salt and iron and everything else they needed. For a few minutes, they found nothing, then Sam swore.

"Looks like the Scooby gang left some cameras here," he said, pointing them out.

"Well, damn," Dean groaned. "Wait, do you think it's possible they caught anything on the ghost?"

"We'd have to check, Dean."

"Well, let's check."

All three of them were watching absolutely nothing on a camera's playback when Cas heard something. It was far too faint for a human to hear, but he heard it and moved to the center of the barn, trying to listen. His foot struck something and it slid a few inches away from him. He crouched and picked it up. Why would a sound recorder be in the barn? Why was it playing a child's cry on a wavelength too low for human ears to discern it? "I found...something."

Dean's attention was still on the tape. "Yeah?"

"Yeah, it's…"

"NOW!"

Light flooded the barn and the floor underneath Cas came to life. Cas went rigid as volts of electricity flooded his body and the smell of burning straw reached his nostrils.

"What the hell?!" Dean yelled as the lights blinded him and Sam.

The electricity intensified and Cas fought against screaming. Angels could feel pain, of course, but what was normal pain for an angel could obliterate a human. "Stay where you are!" he choked out over the crackle of electricity, fearful of what would happen to Dean and Sam if they reached him. They would be electrocuted before they could help him. "Don't move!"

"What the hell's going on?!" Sam demanded, his arms over his eyes.

Dark figures with goggles over their eyes flooded the barn and approached Cas. Electricity cut off as they threw…something... over Cas. The weight of it knocked the breath out of him and drove him to the ground, and in the next moment, he was rigid again, facedown on the barn floor. It took him a minute to make out that what was covering him was a silver chain net.

"Do it quick!" one of the strangers shouted as Dean and Sam fought to focus their eyes. Dean made it to his feet, became disoriented, and knocked into Sam. Both of them went down, and two of the strangers broke off to immobilize them and cuff them. Cas was pleased to note that both of them got in a few good blows before the light became too much for their eyes and they had to close them.

Sudden words chanted in a loud voice made all of them stop and listen. Cas heard words for binding and revealing...a second later he felt a burning pain on his shoulder blades that made him arch his back and scream. He felt something in the air around him...shift..and then tear as a new physical weight settled on his back. The electricity cut off then, allowing his weary body to rest.

"Holy crap," someone breathed. It took Cas a few minutes to recognize the voice as that of the man at the gas station who'd yelled at Cas for standing in the array. "Central wasn't kidding."

"Who the hell are you people?" Dean demanded, blinking streaming eyes.

"You don't have to worry about that," a woman told him, removing her goggles. "And don't worry about your eyes. They'll be okay in a few hours."

So saying, she and one of the men approached Castiel and pulled him to his feet. Before he could struggle, they slipped silver manacles onto his wrists and then pulled the net off of him. The smell of burned holy oil reached him and he had to swallow hard to keep himself from being sick. They let go of him and he staggered, his two now-corporeal appendages dipping forward in an effort to keep himself balanced. "How...how did you do that? What have you done to me?"

With an effort, Sam opened his eyes and looked. There was Castiel, with two black wings unfurled from his back. He stared and then had to close his eyes again as black dots began to fill his vision. How on earth had they done that?

"A little spell for revelation," the woman said. "Got your balance yet?"

Cas shifted on his feet and blinked. His eyes still stung from the floodlights, but his vision was returning to normal. He looked down at his wrists, puzzled. It took him a minute to spot the Enochian sigils on the manacles and what he read made him very, very frightened. He wasn't just trapped, he was bound. The manacles would keep him where he was. Even if he found a way to escape, they could stop him in his tracks with a word as long as those manacles were on his wrists.

The woman smiled, reading the horror in his face. "I'm glad I don't have to explain your situation to you, angel. If you come along with us like a good little boy and you don't fight us, then we'll let those two live. Do we have a bargain?"

"Don't you dare," Dean growled. "Don't you dare do it, Cas! You hear me?"

"Cas?" the woman repeated, looking at Castiel with interest. "Is that really your name?"

"A nickname," Sam added hastily. "It's not like we can pronounce his real one. Human vocal equipment can't really produce the sounds necessary for it."

Right away Castiel realized what Sam had done for him. Names had power, especially over supernatural beings. If they heard his full name, then they might be able to use it in a spell.

"Well, what is it be, Cas?" the woman asked, moving to stand next to Sam and Dean. She had a gun in her hand. "Are you going to make this easy, or is it going to be hard?"

"I'll come. I won't struggle," Cas said quietly. Bound he might be, but he wasn't entirely helpless, and this woman knew it. Still, he didn't want them to hurt Sam and Dean. "Please don't hurt them. They're my friends."

"Are they really?" she said, looking at the still-blinking Winchesters. "What makes these two guys so special that they get their own tame angel?"

Cas didn't answer.

"All right, take care of them," she told one of the people standing guard over Sam and Dean. "We've got to get back to Central. They're waiting on their guest."

Cas nearly panicked when he saw one of the guards pull out two syringes, but two very large men took hold of his arms and turned him toward the door. "I'm coming with you! You don't need to kill them!"

"We're not," the woman stated. "They're both going to take a nice nap for a few hours and then they'll be fine."

Cas could hear both Sam and Dean curse as they were injected, and then came the sounds of their breathing deepening and their heart rates slowing as the drug took effect. He was pleased to hear the sound of their handcuffs being unlocked, and then he was pulled out the door. A black van was there, with its doors standing open, and he was pushed inside. His guards placed him in a seat, allowed him to position his wings so he would be comfortable, and then belted him in. A second later one of them placed a blindfold over his eyes. "What's this? This isn't necessary!"

"Just taking precautions," he heard the woman say as she slid into the van. "Riley, make sure his hands are secure. Any music preferences, Cas?"

Cas grit his teeth as he felt chains wrapped around his wrists and locked. He already knew that he did not like hearing her say his name. "No."

"Great," she said happily, as he heard the beep of buttons. "How about a little culture? I'm sure you'd enjoy that, being an angel."

He ignored the statement as the engine turned over. "Where are we going?"

"Central." He heard her settle back in her seat as the strains of an eighteenth century composer filled the van.

"I gathered that. Where is it?"

"That's a secret, Mr. Angel," she said. "Just settle back and enjoy the trip. If you want to listen to something different, just say so."

Cas took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He had no idea where he was going, what would happen to him when he got there, or even if Sam and Dean were still conscious. He had a strong feeling that he wasn't going to like their destination.