I was frozen in place, not believing what was in front of me. I put both my hands on both sides of his face saying, "Cas? Cas?!" my voices cracked, but I was too deep in shock to care. His eyes remained closed and his head remained limp. I took my hands away and stood back in shock. I heard a rustling and turned to see Sam starting to stand up. "Sam, he's gone." I said, not being able to believe my own words.

I turned towards Sam and was surprised. He was standing tall, his back ramrod straight. And his eyes held a concentration and an intensity that I'd only seen in an Angel before. He moved quickly towards Cas and held his hand over the wound that still had the deadly blade in it. He closed his eyes and golden-white light spilled from his outstretched hand. The Blade disappeared, and the wound healed right before my eyes. The light disappeared and he staggered back before he collapsed against the wall. I started walking toward Sam, when a groan stopped me in my tracks. I turned around and went back to Cas's side.

"Cas?" I asked, voice shaking, barley daring to hope. I crouched down and put my hand on his knee. Cas groaned faintly and slowly opened his eyes. It took a while, but he eventually he focused on me and asked, "Dean…?" I heard Sam getting up, and Cas turned towards him and asked, "And Sam…?" I felt a burning behind my eyes that I ignored on principle, but was relieved when I heard Cas's voice. I thought I'd never hear it again.

I let out a sigh and said, "Never do that again." "All right." Cas said immediately. He looked around confused and said, "But I…I don't understand. I know she stabbed me, but, I don't appear to be dead." Cas and Sam both had matching "confused-beyond-belief-my-brain-is-about-to-explode" looks. Oh, boy. Here it goes. I turned to Sam and said, "Well, you got dinged." I turned to Cas and said, "And I made a deal with her. I wouldn't shish-kabab her if she brought you back. And, well, she brought you back." "You lied." Cas said. "Yeah, I lied. I do that." More than hopefully they'll ever know.

Sam picked himself up of the floor and stumbled over to help me get Cas out of the chair. Once we got the bindings off, we both helped him up and all three of us stumbled back to Baby. Cas took his seat in the back while Sam took shotgun and I was driving. While I started Baby and pulled away from Angel-Chick's apartment, I heard Cas rustling in the back as he started to nod off. "You ok back there Cas?" I asked. He didn't answer, so I just continued on driving. We were about half-way to bunker when Cas's voice, thick with sleep, came from the back saying, "you came for me…I don't have my…'mojo'…you still came for me." "Of course Cas. Your family." I saw a rare faint smile spread across his face as he settled in again. The smiled stayed as we rode on.

As the miles dragged on, I couldn't stop thinking about the second chance that I'd be given, and I was determined not to screw this one up. We all had a lot of bridged that needed to be repaired, and wounds that needed to be healed, but we were together now, and we would get through it.

We always did.