A/N: This is the first story in a mild AU/canon divergence series I've been writing with a friend, called The Other Guardian 'verse. There's a detailed note about it on my profile page, but in brief: after Dean is raised from Hell by Castiel, an entire year passes before the Lilith rises and the seals start to break. During that time, Castiel is assigned to watch over the Winchesters, and finds himself growing closer and closer to Sam.

This story is set right after Dean is raised from Hell - it borrows from the events of "It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester," when Sam and Castiel met for the first time, but there's no raising of Samhain here. Centers on the characters' impressions after this iconic meeting. Part two - Sam's perspective.

Note: This chapter authored by my friend AccidentaLeft, who can be found on YouTube.

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Sam wasn't sure exactly what he had told Dean before his brother had taken off to find a bar, some combination of words that started with I'm fine but was so far from the truth he wasn't sure how he managed to get them past his lips. Maybe because some part of him was still frozen, unable to walk away from that moment, unable to let go of the angel's hand that was pulling him up and dragging him under at the same time.

His heart had started beating too fast as soon as he was alone in the motel room, staring at cheap curtains and the pair of empty beds. Sometimes his heart still jumped into his throat when he realized the word single was at the tip of his tongue. Blood pumped through his ears, and suddenly he needed to be anywhere but where he was. Sam lurched into motion, barely remembering to pocket his key before stumbling out the door into the bright sunshine of the afternoon.

He vaguely remembered using the crosswalk, some part of him knowing instinctively where he was heading, even as he froze at the bottom of the steps that led up to the church. It was a tall stone building with a cracked tower that looked like it had once held a bell, and small, high stained glass windows. A statue of Mary stood by the door, reaching her hands out as though to accept all of God's children.

Sam ducked his head, watching his brown shoes beat against the worn steps. The door was unlocked, open, like most churches, to anyone who wandered in off the street. Sam felt his heart clutch suddenly as he looked around the spacious church, rows and rows of wooden benches framing a path that led to a small altar with a silver bowl and tall bronze candlesticks. Colored light filtered in through the stained glass to sparkle in the space beneath the vaulted ceiling. A piano sat just behind the altar, and the far wall was filled with enclaves, each of them occupied by a table covered in hundreds and hundreds of unlit candles.

He meant to take a seat in the back row, duck his head, but that frozen piece of him was moving again, forcing him all the way down the silent aisle until he stood before the alter. Soft blue light refracted from the halo around a stained glass angel high above him, and Sam felt a prickling behind his eyes.

"It's not fair," he said quietly. There was something infinitely childish about the words even in Sam's ears, but he couldn't find anything else to say. He squeezed his eyes shut, willing the wetness to go away, willing the feelings to go away.

But it was so unfair. Sam's fists curled at his side

Bought by Azazel before he was born, sold by his father and his grief into a life a hunting, and traded by his brother from salvation for…this. He had been so alone after Dean, with nothing left except the memory of broken things, a list of people he'd had a hand in killing. Hated by people, hated by other hunters, and hated by the demons who loved to watch Azazel's boy king suffer.

And he'd wanted to buy something with his tainted soul, use it to save the one person that mattered most from eternal damnation and suffering. So he'd taken his fate and his curse and his filthy legacy and tried to make something good out of it. The one thing he'd tried to do right in his life, and he was wrong. So wrong.

Sam opened his eyes, the tears he had been holding back sliding down his cheeks, dripping from his chin into his collar as he looked up at the rays of the sun gleaming in the glass.

"How can you possibly be so cruel?" His fists were shaking, and he forced his fingers to straighten at his sides, shaking his head back and forth as though to deny something.

He had prayed every day to have Dean back, to trade places with him; sometimes at the bottom of the bottle he just prayed to join him. The benevolent angel stared down at him with kind blue eyes that made his hands burn with phantom warmth. And suddenly all that blood pumping through him was anger, rising up and squeezing his chest.

"Why would you condemn me for this?" Sam demanded. His hands shot out and with one shove he swept everything from the top of the altar. Brass candlesticks clattered onto the floor and the silver bowl spun round and round against the flagstones. Sam stared down at the chaos, breathing heavily. A thousand empty, unanswered prayers, a thousand moments of darkness, with silent angels waiting in the wings, and the one thing he had done was wrong.

The bowl stilled, leaving Sam in the silence—and then as suddenly as it had come, all the anger was gone, leaving only a bone-weary tiredness in him. He felt immediately guilty, and fell to his knees, trying to gather the spilled contents of the altar. Quick footsteps on the stone alerted Sam to the fact that he was no longer alone; he supposed he should have realized that his outburst would get someone's attention.

His eyes flickered to the door, still unlocked at the other end of the church, contemplated the distance and the speed of feet that were getting far too used to running away—but in the end he just lifted another candlestick into his hands, stayed where he was. Whatever happened, he had it coming anyway.

He was still on his knees when the father walked up. He was an older man, with a grey beard and wrinkles around his eyes, his expression pinched as he took in the scene before him.

"I'm sorry," Sam said. "I didn't mean…I'm sorry." It was all he could think to say. The man looked at Sam for a moment, studying him with thoughtful gray eyes—and whatever he saw in the tall hunter's face, he didn't start yelling or threaten to call the cops like Sam expected. Instead his expression softened and he knelt down, gathering the candlesticks that had rolled beyond the hunter's reach. Sam picked up the silver bowl and held it as reverently as his tained, shaking hands could manage.

"You know," the father started. He had a soft voice that reminded Sam achingly of Father Gregory, and Sam wondered if this was the man that the priest should have become. "We all feel like God has abandoned us sometimes."

Sam glanced up, standing slowly, as the father did the same. He met the gray eyes warily, but the father's expression held nothing but understanding, and Sam wondered what he must look like right then, with red, teary eyes, crawling around the church floor in his flannel and ripped jeans. Maybe all priests took a seminar on Crises of Faith 101, the same way nurses took Psychotic Breaks 101.

"Father," Sam began slowly, and he wasn't sure if he was going to apologize again, or just beg for forgiveness. He set the bowl back down on the table gently, and the father moved to the space beside him, lining the empty candlesticks up one by one.

"You don't have to tell me anything, son," the man said, and a slight smile played around his eyes and lips. "The way I see it, God isn't just around to pray to. He's around to yell at sometimes, too."

Sam felt a small huff of laughter on his lips. The shining silver bowl reflected the movements of the father's arm as he replaced the last bronze candlestick. And suddenly Sam realized the only thing that mattered was that in the end his prayer had been answered. Dean was back, and the rest—well. He had what he needed.

Sam looked at the father a little sheepishly, taking an awkward step back from the altar. "Father, there's a prayer I'd like to say, but I don't remember…"

He trailed off but the older man nodded encouragingly. "Do you know any part of it?"

Sam bit his lip. "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want."

"Ah. Psalm 23. A good prayer." The father gestured toward the wooden bench, waiting until Sam was seated before sitting down next to him. Sam let his head fall forward, staring at his hands as the priest cleared his throat and tipped his head back.

"The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures…" The father's warm voice seemed to hang in the air, and Sam tried to engrave the words somewhere in his heart, remember them. He folded his hands and lay his forehead against the line of his knuckles. He had to let go of the anger, the expectations, the image of angels he'd held for so long—feathered wings, forgiveness, and especially soft hands. The father's voice continued, and somehow the breath wasn't so heavy and desperate in Sam's chest anymore.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me; surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life…"

Sam stayed seated on the bench long after the father had finished the prayer and begun bustling around, gathering long white candles. There was one certain truth: he was who he was, and his past was set in stone, but his future didn't have to be. I am not evil, Sam whispered in his heart, and he could only hope God was listening.