Dean sat up and rubbed his face.

"Crowley?!" He asked, clearly expecting his brother. "What the Hell are you doing here?"

"Ah. You didn't… hear any of that, then. Fabulous."

"Hear what?" He stood up, swaying a little. "Sam made a deal, didn't he? After all that BS about not doing the same for me… goddammit!"

Crowley huffed. "You think I'm really gonna make a deal with Moose? Keeping his soul in Hell would be more trouble than the satisfaction would be worth." He cocked his head and put his hands in his pockets. "Actually, you're probably right there. It would be quite amusing. Damn, I should've brought you back myself."

Dean shook his head, seeming unsure. "If you… who brought me back?"

"This was a lot easier to tell you when those sad little –" He looked at Dean's demon-black eyes and rephrased. "…Hands… weren't – for God's sake, can you not just tell?"

"No, Crowley. How on earth could I possibly 'tell' how I ended up not-dead?" There was one person he could imagine would do it, but… he was indisposed. Fuck that, he was locked up in Heaven at the whim of Metatron. Cas was lucky he was still alive.

"You don't feel it?"

"No. Where's Sam – I'd prefer to talk to him about this."

Crowley looked away. "It was Abel, alright?"

"I'm sorry?"

Crowley nodded at the blade in Dean's hand. "It was the Mark, technically, I suppose, but saying 'Abel' is much more dramatic than explaining – for the second time, I might add – that the Mark just couldn't bear to let you go."

"The Mark brought me back?" Dean frowned; he'd been hoping that dying would make it obsolete, not make it stronger. Now he thought about it, he could feel it burning in his bones – that urge to kill, to do wrong, to cause pain. "Did you know about this when you told me that it would kill me?"

Crowley rolled his eyes. "Again, for the second time, no. I didn't know. There were rumours, but they were started – well, as you can imagine, it was quite a bit before my time. I couldn't be sure it wasn't just that they were bored by the lack of humans to torture. But, Dean, there's something else we need to talk about. And we need to hurry up," he added, his eyes going red as Sam summoned him.

"What? I don't have time for this, I've still got to kill Metatron, since the Mark loves me too much to let me go."

"Oh stop the self-pity! So you're alive when you wished you weren't – didn't you put Moose through the exact same thing? Did you forget that the gates of Heaven are still closed, so you would just have found yourself in the Veil, watching your little brother create a bigger mess? You have bigger problems than being alive, mate."

"I know I have! Cas is locked up and Metatron –"

"The angels are no longer your concern, Dean."

Dean walked closer to the King of Hell, shifting his grip on the First Blade threateningly. "The angels are always my concern, Crowley. Somehow, they manage to have more problems with authority than demons do."

"The correct phrasing there is 'than we do'." Crowley sighed, glancing at his watch.

"Excuse me?"

"Demons. We. We are both demons now. No more attempting-to-be-good for you. Now, I really have to go lie to your brother. Do your best to make a quiet exit, okay?" Crowley asked, disappearing before Dean could answer.

"Demons," Dean muttered to himself. They always lied. That's what demons did – they lied. Might as well switch 'demon' for 'liar', because that's what they did. Lied just for the fun of it. 'We'. Dean wasn't a demon. He couldn't be a demon. He'd spent decades in Hell without gaining even a spot of black in his eye. He was supposed to be Michael's vessel – the vessel of an angel of Heaven. He was the last person who could ever become a demon.

So why was he afraid of calling out for Sammy?

"Moose. Long time no… oh wait. It could be centuries before I saw you next and it would only be long enough because it would mean you were no longer human. What do you want?"

"You know what I want, Crowley. Bring him back to life and I'll give you my soul. I want a deal."

"No offense, Moose, but you Winchesters don't often stick to your bargains, and getting out of Hell has become almost… routine for you. If we're going to make a deal, I want something that isn't going to run away from me." He frowned. "That sounded much more morose out loud than it did in my head."

Sam clenched his jaw. "What do you want?"

"I want a lot of things. A castle; portraits of myself; a woman to love. I'm a complicated man, Sam." Crowley paused, wondering how he was going to get out of this mess without explaining the truth. "But of course, what I want most in the world is Metatron's head on a spike."

Sam blinked rapidly. "Since when did you care about the angels?"

He shrugged. "There's only one angel up there who I'm on good terms with, and it's nice to have connections."

"Good terms?" Sam choked out a bitter laugh. "Cas can't stand you."

"But, unlike the rest of those pompous holy birds, he sees me as almost human. And that's good enough for me. So here's the deal: bring me Metatron's head, make Cas the Big Man, report back to me and I'll bring your brother back. I'll look after him until then – keep his body looking all spic-and-span for when the new God wants some fun." Crowley tried not to smile – he wasn't lying, he wasn't going to have to break his word, and he was keeping Sam busy for a few months while he got Dean accustomed to his new life. How was that for thinking on your feet?

"I can't kill Metatron without the First Blade."

"You Winchesters – no faith in your own abilities. I'm sure you'll find a way. Have we got a deal?"

Sam rubbed at his eyes, trying to hide the tears that imagining having Dean back created. "Yes."