"No. Don't "Dean" me! I mean, you-you have had some stupid ideas in the past, but this--d-d-did you know about this?" I rubbed my eyes and yawned as I walked downstairs. I didn't even remember going to bed the night before, but I guess I did. For some reason, I woke up aching all over, but I didn't think I had strained myself too much with the thing with Brady.

"What?" I heard Bobby as I got to the bottom, turning the corner to see Bobby in his wheelchair and Dean raising absolute hell.

"About Sam's genius plan to say yes to the Devil?" my eyes widened as I heard that and I looked at Bobby, who nodded hesitantly, then back at Dean, who now looked even more pissed, "Well, thanks for the heads up!"

"Dean?" I asked and they looked at me, "What's going on?"

"Sam, you want to explain?" Dean asked angrily at Sam, who clenched his jaw, looking at me.

"I just thought... If we led the devil to the hole and I jumped in," he said.

"No-Hell no. You can't do that," I said immediately.

"That's the consensus," Sam replied.

"All right, awesome. Then, end of discussion," Dean said, just as his cell phone started ringing. He let out a sigh as he checked it, then pointed at Sam, "This isn't over," he answered the phone, "Hello?... Cass?" I perked up and immediately moved closer to listen to a little more of the conversation, though I still couldn't hear Cass' end.

"Is he okay?" Sam asked.

"Where's he at?" I added. Dean held up his hand as if to tell us to hold on.

"We all thought you were dead. Where the hell are you, man?... Are you okay?" after that, Dean just looked kind of lost, "You want to elaborate?... S-So, a hospital?"

"Which one? Where?"

"Uh, well, I got to tell you, man--you're just in time. We figured out a way to pop Satan's box... It's a long story, but look--we're going after Pestilence now. So if you want to zap over here... What do you mean?... What do you mean? You're out of angel mojo?... Human," well, that's a concerning half of the conversation, "Wow. Sorry... All right. Well, look, no worries. Uh, Bobby's here. He'll wire you the cash."

"I will?" Dean brushed Bobby's comment off as he continued to listen to whatever Cass was saying.

"Cass... I-It's okay... Thank you... I appreciate that... Yeah, she's here... All right, I will. Oka-" he stopped as he looked at his phone. I guess Cass had hung up. I looked at Dean, who looked at me, then told me the name of the hospital. Without saying goodbye, I zapped into the hospital.

I was at the front office bit, looking around.

"Ma'am, do you have an appointment?" I heard a lady from the desk and walked up to her.

"I'm looking for somebody, Castiel Novak... Winchester. He might be a John Doe in your systems though."

"Do you have any recognizable ID?"

"Um, no, but he's about 6' something, dark hair, stubble and a deep voice. He just woke up a little while ago," I continued to describe him.

"I might know who you're talking about. The man that was found on the boat?" I stared at her blankly, not knowing where he was found before nodding.

"Yes, that is the one," I guessed.

"He's not receiving visitors at this time, ma'am, I'm sorry-"

"I'm his wife, Henrietta Winchester. Ask him, he'll agree," I said, desperately needing to talk to Cass. She stared me down with a skeptical look, then told me his room number. I speed walked to his room, seeing him through the window before getting to the door. When I made it to the door, I knocked on the doorframe.

"Knock, knock," he looked at me and smiled. He looked horrible, but still really good, don't get me wrong. He had a cut on his eyebrow and scrapes all over his face. His hair was a mess but it was still quite cute on him.

"Rhett..." he tried to move to sit up and winced, so I let myself in and walked to him, sitting beside him.

"You stupid, stupid angel," I said, scooting close and grabbing his hand, "Please don't do that ever again."

"I'll try not to," he smiled up at me through kind, sad eyes. Finally, I asked him something that bothered me a little.

"Hey, why'd you call Dean and not me?" I said, slightly hurt by the action, but his reassuring smile got rid of some of the hurt as he lifted his free hand to my cheek.

"Because I knew as soon as you knew where I was you'd come here, and your brothers would be left in the dark. Plus I wanted to apologize to Dean," he said in between winces. Okay, that was a good answer, I'll admit. I smiled and leaned close, kissing his less scraped cheek, "Rhett," he said softly as I pulled away.

"Yeah?"

"I need you to help your brother's," he continued, "They're going up against Pestilence."

"I-I know, but... I could stay here with you and help you get better," I said almost like pleading to stay by him. I loved my brothers and I wanted to help them, but Cass almost died, and now he's almost human. I bet he didn't even know which granola bar was the best or about brushing his teeth or that he'd have to wash his trench coat now.

"No, Rhett. They are going up against a horseman. You know how difficult those are. I will be fine and still be here for you when you're done getting his ring. Your brothers... Their lives are more essential than mine. And you can protect them," he said. In response, I dug my nails into his hand, watching him wince just as I did myself.

"Did you see that?" I asked afterward.

"What?"

"Your life is just as essential to me as my brothers," and with that, I zapped back to help them.

~

Later that night, we were going after Pestilence. Of course, I was still quite worried about Cass as I hadn't heard anything from him since I had left him. I tried not to let it affect my work ethic at we arrived at the place to find the Horseman. He was working at a Convalescent Home, most likely pretending to be a normal human whilst making the people here much worse than they already were.

"So this is Dr. Evil's lair, huh?" Dean asked as we scoped out the place. We were looking around the building through binoculars in the impala, but I couldn't see anything other than a lot of old or sick people.

"It's kind of more depressing than evil," Sam responded.

"It's like the four-color brochure for dying young. Of course, to Pestilence, it's probably Dollywood in there."

"Dollywood isn't actually all that great," I said, putting down my binoculars to look at my brothers instead of the building. They both looked at me with "how would you know?" faces, "What? I went on my own awhile too, and unlike you lame-os, I know how to actually have fun. Which is good because I died a week later and all I could see was how lame Dollywood really was."

"Anyways," Sam said, turning back to the building to try and get us back on topic, but Dean stared me down a second more before doing the same, "A whole building full of people, we don't know who's human, who's demon, and who's Pestilence. So what do we do?"

"I say just look for the dude shaking the most hands. Everyone was afraid of that during the Corona incident," I said.

"What?" they both asked in unison.

"What?"

"Nevermind," Dean shook my comment off, then looked around some more before his eyes landed on something, "Hang on."

Dean had caught sight of a camera, meaning there was a camera room, meaning all we needed to do was get inside said camera room. We walked up and down the hallways, looking for the room. Dean told me and Sam to wait outside when we found it and that he had a plan, then he made his way inside.

"Hey. Hi, Uh, I'm looking for my Nana. Uh, her name is Eunice Kennedy," he said, I covered my mouth to muffle a giggle as I stood outside with Sam. He was practically all the way in the room so I could only see the back of him and I couldn't see the security guard at all.

"Go around front and see the nurse," I heard the guard say.

"You mind just helping me out, sir?" Dean said as he walked further in and closed the door behind him so Sam and I couldn't hear the rest of the conversation. After another minute, if even, there were two bangs on the door, indicating Sam and I could come in, and so we did, just in time to see Dean dragging the now knocked out security guard into the corner of the room.

"Eunice Kennedy?" Sam asked, making me laugh out loud now that we were inside the room.

"That's the beauty about improve, guys. You never know what's gonna come out of your mouth," Dean responded, to which Sammy let out a chuckle. We all sat in front of the screens, Sam closest to the door, then me, then Dean closest to the window. We sat and stared at it for a while, waiting for some kind of sign of who Pestilence could be.

"So what are w-" Sam started, looking over at us before noticing that Dean was entirely passed out in his spot. I stopped Sam before he could wake him up as I noticed the only thing keeping Deans head up was the fist he was resting it on, and quietly moved closer, before smacking his fist out from under his head and watching him wake up with quite a start.

"Good morning sleepy head!" Dean rolled his eyes at me.

"Hey. So, what are we even looking for?" Sam asked.

"Well, he's Pestilence, so he probably looks sick," Dean mumbled tiredly.

"Good job, Captain Obvious," I said, and he made a dumb face as if trying to mock me.

"Everybody looks sick," Sam added. Dean waved his hand in a "I give up" gesture as he looked to the ceiling in what I could only assume to be boredom, letting out a groan.

We waited for so long I might as well have gone back to Cass's hospital with the amount of action we definitely were not getting, but the wait paid off when Sam caught Dean and I's attention once more after seeing something rather strange on the screens. There was a man walking through the hallway whose face was always glitched out.

"Oh, now we're talking," Dean said

"That's gotta be him," I added. Every screen that he walked onto did the same thing, and it was only on his face. An obvious sign. So, we decided to pursue.

We grabbed our gear and walked into the hallway, making our way to the hall we were pretty sure we saw Pestilence go to. I sensed so many demons on the way, but the only way for me to tell who were demons and who were not was the soul searching thing that I wasn't even sure how to control, and now wasn't the time to try and figure out how to work my unknown powers.

We went down hallway after hallway before finally stumbling on what I could only assume was the right hallway. The only reason I could assume that was because my brothers started coughing and looking like they were gonna be nauseous the whole way down the hallway. The farther down we got, the worse their coughs got. But I didn't have it. Maybe because I wasn't human? But that would be weird, because Famine's powers affected me.

We turned the hall to see two dead people--a doctor and a nurse.

"We must be getting close," Sam said in between coughs.

"You think?" Dean asked sarcastically.

"Guys, maybe I should go ahead and you two follow?" the looks on their faces gave me the answer I needed--it was a stupid question apparently. I sighed and instead just walked a few feet in front of them, but waited for them to catch up before going too much further. I turned around to see them both sweating and coughing furiously, and Dean was hunched over. I made my way back, standing in between them and trying to help them both stand up straight. How were we supposed to kill this dude with two of the strongest people I know not even being able to stand straight. We got about two more feet before Dean absolutely collapsed to the side, no matter how hard I tried to keep him up, and then it was just me and Sam walking to the door, but Sam didn't seem much better than Dean, if any.

We made our way to the door and right before I could kick it open, a demon nurse opened it, looking us over.

"The Doctor will see you now," she said before moving out of the way as if to let us in. There sat Pestilence on a hospital bed with a dead patient.

"Sam! Rhett! Dean!" Pestilence said with a waving gesture of his hand as if to tell us to come in. Then my second brother collapsed to the floor, and I looked down at him before up at Pestilence.

"What did you do to them?" I asked angrily, standing my ground as I looked at his ring.

"Relax, they won't die... Not yet at least. You on the other hand, you're very strong for a Winchester, don't worry, I can fix that," he said, standing from the bed and making his way to me. I continued to stand my ground until his demon tried to grab at me and I dodged her.

"Don't you dare touch me with your crusty dusty hands--either of you!" I growled at them. Pestilence laughed a hearty laugh before grabbing my upper arms to keep me still.

"You really think you have a choice," then he did the most disgusting thing I have ever been a victim of, and trust me, I've been a victim to shapeshifter goo and all that stuff. He spat on my face, which came out like mucus and slowly slimed it's way down my face, causing me to gag.

"Ew, ew, ew." I said, finally finding the disgusted strength to move out of the way, rubbing all the guck off my face. When I could finally open my eyes again, I felt nauseous and the room was spinning. I tried to stand my guard still, going for a punch at Pestilence, which he dodged with ease before I folded over like a table and puked all over the ground. His demon side hoe dragged my brother up next to me.

"You guys don't seem well. It might be the, uh, Scarlet Fever. Or, uh, the-the meningitis. Oh!" he chuckled, moving closer to us, ready to end us, "Or the syphilis," he clicked his tongue and shook his head. I looked up, gaining the strength to swat at his leg and causing him to temporarily lose his balance, stumbling backwards a few steps as I stood to my feet, "Sorry, Rhett, but you're supposed to be dying right now," He twisted his ring and I felt a pain in my stomach, causing me to fall back to the ground, coughing like crazy until there was blood on the floor in front of my face, "Disease gets a bad rap, don't you think?" he asked, putting some hand sanitizer on his hands and rubbing them together, "For being filthy. Chaotic. Uh, but really , t-that just describes people who get sick. Disease itself... Very... Pure... Single-minded. Bacteria have one purpose--divide and conquer," while he spoke, I noticed Dean going for the knife on the floor, but I also noticed Pestilence notice the same.

"Hey," I called from my spot on the floor, pushing myself up on my knees, "Last I checked, I didn't sign up for a health lecture," I said, then started coughing once more, trying to find something to give me some kind of strength to get up and kill this son of a bitch.

"Last I checked, I didn't ask for your input," he said, kicking me in the side and causing me to roll over as I grabbed at my now aching side. He then looked back at Dean, letting his foot set on his hand as the bones began crushing underneath his shoe and Dean let out grunts and groans of pain, "Where was I? Oh, yes. That's why, in the end... Disease always wins," he let up on Dean's hand and began moving around the room, "So, you've got to wonder why God pours all his love into something so messy! And weak!" I heard my brothers groaning as I looked around, but I could not find the strength to stand again just to be pushed down for the fifth time, "It's ridiculous. All I can do is show him he's wrong, one epidemic at a time," he pulled out his glasses and pushed them on his face, "Now... On a scale of-" before he could finish, the door burst open to reveal my soulmate. I smiled as I saw him--he looked pretty much fine. His eyes brushed over my brothers and landed on me, on the floor, with blood mixed with puke splattered around my mouth, but right now, I didn't care that I looked horrible, because seeing him was the thing that gave me my strength to keep fighting.

"Cass," I said softly, before coughing some more and trying to sit up as much as I could.

"How'd you get here?" Pestilence asked, peeling his glasses off of his face.

"I took a bus," that's my boy. He began walking more in the room and pointed at us on the floor, "Don't worry, I-" he stopped, starting to cough and gag, which caused the smile on my face to fade immediately. He fell to the floor, coughing up blood just like I had. I watched as amusement grew on Pestilence's gross smug face as he leaned down towards Cass.

"Well, look at that," Cass looked up at him, helpless, "An occupied vessel, but powerless. Oh, that's fascinating. There's not a speck of angel left in you, is there?" while Pestilence was speaking, I felt my own power grow as I sat up, only wanting him away from Cass. As if with a mind of their own, my arms lifted and I let out a shout of power, pushing Pestilence over just a bit before my power gave out and I gave out into a fit of coughing. I saw Cass stand from his position while Pestilence was thrown off guard from me, grabbing the knife and grabbing Pestilence's hand, slapping it down on a glass table and cutting his ring finger off.

"Maybe just a speck!" Cass exclaimed as Pestilence pulled away screaming, grabbing at his hand in pain. His demon servant pounced on Cass just as I got to my feet, making my way to them on the floor to grab her by the collar of her shirt and pulling her off of my angel. He hopped to his feet and stabbed her while I held her, giving me serious Ruby deja vu. When she was done screaming, I let her body fall as I stepped over her and hugged Cass, who wrapped his arms around me. Sam and Dean got up, running to the finger on the glass table and picking it up. I pulled away from Cass after a second when I heard Pestilence's voice once again.

"It doesn't matter. It's too late," and with that, the horseman vanished. I looked around at the mess we had made before at my brothers, who looked at me. Then I looked at Cass once more.

~

"Well, it's nice to actually score a home run for once, ain't it?" Bobby asked. We sat in his study, him at the desk, Sam and Dean sitting in front of the desk, twirling the third ring around, Cass leaning against the mantle bit where a lot of Bobby's old research was, and me sitting on the floor in the doorframe, back pushed against one side and one foot up on the other side. We all looked at Bobby with sad features, thinking. Was it really a home run? Pestilence sure made it sound like it wasn't, "What?" Bobby asked, noticing the melancholy aura around the room.

"Last thing Pestilence said. "It's too late"." Sam responded.

"He get specific?" Bobby asked.

"No," Sam shook his head.

"We're just a little freaked out that he might have left a bomb somewhere. So please tell us you have actual good news," Dean added and I perked up to hear if Bobby did, in fact, have any good news. He took a pause before answering.

"Chicago's about to be wiped off the map. Storm of the millennium. Sets off a daisy chain of natural disasters. Three million people are gonna die," was his good news.

"Huh," Dean hummed.

"I don't understand your definition of good news," Cass spoke and I nodded in agreement.

"Well... Death, the horseman--he's gonna be there. And if we can stop him before he kick-starts this storm, get his ring back-" I couldn't help but wonder how he came up with all of this?

"Yeah, you make it sound so easy," Dean cut him off.

"Hell, I'm just trying to put a spin on it," Bobby said, tired of Dean's bull.

"Well..." Sam trailed off as Dean readjusted his position in annoyance, a thing I'd seen him do plenty of times.

"Wait, where'd you get the information?" I finally voiced my question, pushing myself up off the floor to lean against the doorframe while standing. Bobby shifted uncomfortably at my question.

"I had, you know... Help," he said, suddenly softer, which worried me even more than the practical suicide mission he wanted us to go on. Suddenly there was a glass clink behind me and I jumped, turning on my heel to see Crowley pouring himself a drink, and suddenly it all came together on where Bobby got his intel.

"Don't be so modest. I barely helped at all," he said, walking into the room with us, "Hello, boys," he said to them then turned to me, "Henrietta," then he turned back around so everyone could see him, and leaned on the opposite door frame as I moved back a bit, bumping into Cass who wrapped his arms around my waist in a protective motion, "Pleasure, et cetera," he took a whiff of his drink, which was seemingly too strong for him as instead of drinking it, he set it down, "Go ahead. Tell them. There's no shame in it," Crowley pushed Bobby, and we all turned to him.

"Bobby, please tell me you did not do business with this guy," I said, looking at him. When Dad wasn't there, Bobby was a father figure to me and my brothers, I didn't want to imagine him selling his soul. Bobby just stared straight at Crowley, pausing a moment before he responded.

"World's gonna end. Seems stupid to get all precious over one little... Soul."

"You sold your soul?" Dean expressed. Cass let his head drop, digging his face in my shoulder in what I felt as disappointment from him.

"Oh, more like pawned it. I fully intend to give it back," Crowley explained.

"Well, then, give it back!" Dean shouted.

"I will."

"Now!"

"Did you kiss him?" Sam asked and we all looked at him.

"Sam, what the hell?" I questioned. Now was not the time or place, but the question kind of made me want to laugh.

"Just wondering," Sam retorted to me. Then we all looked at Bobby, who hesitated, looking over all of us.

"No!" he said as if we were stupid for asking. Crowley cleared his throat behind us and we all looked over to see him holding up his phone on a photo of him and Bobby kissing. I faked a gag and covered my eyes.

"I think I need eye soap," I rubbed at my eyes as if to try and get the image out of my brain.

"Why'd you take a picture?" Bobby asked.

"Why do you have to use tongue?"

"All right, I'm out!" I raised my hands in the air, tired of this whole conversation, and with that I zapped myself out of the house entirely and onto the trunk of the impala, sitting on it with my knees up as I held myself. I couldn't help but think back to Brady, when I blacked out, and the voices I heard. One sounded so... Familiar. Like home, almost. But this was my home, this had always been my home, ever since I could remember. I could still remember when Dean and I got Sammy from Stanford and the night we drove him back... I could remember Dad and how he died. I remembered my life here, but it felt like there were walls to another one crashing down.

"Rhett," I heard, pulling me out of my thoughts as I perked up, looking to the voice. I saw Cass walking up to me from the direction of the house. The poor boy still had cuts on him. I dropped my legs so they hung over the edge of the car and he got to me, wrapping his arms around my waist once again as he pressed a soft kiss to my forehead. A small smile tugged at the corners of my lips as he pulled back.

"So, what else went down in there?" I asked, not really sure of if I wanted to know the answer.

"Crowley's apparently... Keeping Bobby's soul for... Insurance. He says he intends to give it back when all this is over," Cass said, seemingly trying to find the right words as to not upset me. Oh, how far his character development has come.

"Crowley's a son of a bitch... But I don't think he'd go back on his word about something... At least, if he knows what's good for him, he definitely won't about this," I said, pounding my fist into my hand like a child, which made Cass smile and let out a soft chuckle. I smiled, grabbing onto the lapel of his trench coat and pulling him to me, pressing my lips gently against his. He happily returned the kiss, and soon we were moving lips against each other. I felt his hand move from my waist to the roots of my hair.

"Come on! Not on my car!" I heard one of my brothers and immediately pulled away from Cass, hopping off the trunk as Cass moved back from me a step.

"We weren't doing anything, I have no clue what you could possibly be talking about," I told Dean, who rolled his eyes like he most definitely did not buy any of that.

"Just--Move," he said, pushing me out of the way so he could open the trunk.

"What? It's not like you haven't done more in this car," I growled.

"Go inside!" he shouted. I sighed and started to walk to the car.

"Butthead."

"Dipstick," he said. A small smile crossed my face as I kept walking, Cass following for whatever reason. When I got to Bobby's front porch I saw Sam walking out. He looked prepared for a talk, like something or everything was weighing him down and he was ready to get it all out.

"Sam, is it talk time?" I asked, stopping him, and he looked down at me.

"Yeah, maybe," he said, shrugging, "I just... I need to talk to you and Dean."

"All right," I looked at Cass, who nodded in understanding before walking into the house. I then followed Sam back out the the impala where Dean was and he looked up at us after a minute of moving and putting things in the trunk.

"Let me guess. We're about to have a talk," Dean said, moving to the side of the impala that we were at. I looked at Sam, waiting for his response as I too didn't know what the hell this conversation was about to be about. He chuckled softly before responding.

"Look, Dean, Rhett, um," he cleared his throat to continue, "For the record... I agree with you guys. About me. You think I'm too weak to take on Lucifer. Well, so do I," he chuckled and I tried to think of when I would have let him think I think he's too weak. Just because Dean and I looked after his safety, that didn't mean we thought he was too weak. We were just worried, "Believe me, I know exactly how screwed up I am. You two, Bobby, Cass... I'm the least of any of you."

"Sammy..." I said at the same time as Dean said, "Oh, Sam."

"No, it's true. It is. But... I'm also all we got. I mean, Rhett, you have your angel-demon mojo, but we don't know your true power or if you could even take Lucifer on at all. I'm an actual plan, at least. If there was another way... But I don't think there is. There's just me. So I don't know what else to do. Except just try to do what's got to be done."

Dean and I looked at each other as if in thought, but were quickly taken out of both of our thoughts when we heard yet another familiar voice for the, what? Millionth time?

"And... Scene," I looked over to see Crowley standing on the other side of the impala and pulling his hand over his face in a "and scene" gesture, similar to in plays. He walked around to our side of the impala and stood beside me and Dean, "Wife," he winked and I rolled my eyes. That was certainly something I was never going to live down. Sam and Dean both looked at me in confusion and I waved them off, waiting for Crowley to say whatever he was interrupting our sibling moment for, "There's something you all need to see," he held out a news paper, handing it to Sam before pointing at a specific article.

"Niveus Pharmaceuticals is rushing delivery of it's new swine-flu vaccine to, quote, stem the tide of the unprecedented outbreak. Uh, shipments leave wednesday," Sam read, and we all looked at Crowley in confusion before something hit me.

"Niveus Pharmaceuticals--where have I heard that name before?" I asked Crowley, knowing there was a reason he brought this to us, which meant he would know.

"Ah, good, at least one of you has more than just your looks going for you," he then looked at Sam, "Your demon lover, Brady. V.P. of distribution, Niveus," we all looked at each other in realization, "Ah, yes, that sound of the abacus clacking? We all caught up?" Crowley asked, being incredibly cheeky.

"So, Pestilence was spreading swine flu," Sam spoke.

"Yeah, but not just for giggles. That was step one. Step two is the vaccine," Dean added on.

"So what's in the vaccine?" I asked, even though I was pretty sure I already knew the response, but I really wanted to be wrong, "I mean, you think-" I started, but Crowley cut me off.

"I know. I'll stake my reputation--that vaccine is stock full of Grade-A, farm fresh croatoan virus," great, I wasn't wrong. I let my head drop and a deep sigh escape my lips as I thought about the apocalypse future. Dean, Cass, Lucifer, the croatoans. If we didn't stop all of this, soon we'd be there. I couldn't take that chance.

"Simultaneous, countrywide distribution. It's quite a plan," Sam nodded as he spoke.

"They don't get to be horsemen for nothing. So, you guys better stock up on... Well, everything. This time next Thursday, we'll all be living in Zombieland."

~

We let Bobby and Cass know the news, and we began preparations.

While the boys were preparing and I had no clue where Cass was, I found a tin of mini-muffins on one of Bobby's shelves. My eyes lit up as I reached up and jumped to grab them as they were quite high and, unlike my brothers, I didn't get the tall trait. I set the tin down and grabbed one out and stuffed it in my mouth before picking up another.

"You know, there's a saying--you are what you eat," I heard and jumped, dropping the muffin back in the tin as I turned around to see Cass at the door. I smiled at him and held out the tin.

"Want one?" I asked with a mouth full of muffin. He smiled and shook his head, to which I shrugged, swallowing my bite of muffin, "More for me."

"Maybe I should start calling you muffin, huh?" he questioned, raising an eyebrow at me. I froze.

"I'll tell you on the way there, okay muffin?"

"Muffin?"

"You must not have gotten there yet,"

"No!" I screamed, backing away from Cass, who seemed very taken aback. I looked at the floor, seeing that I had dropped the muffins, "Oh, shoot," I muttered, crouching down to pick up my mess.

"Are you okay, Rhett?" Cass asked, cocking his head to the side a bit as I stood, throwing away any of the muffins that fell on the floor.

"I-I'm fine," I responded, faking a smile.

"Well, that's a lie," I sighed.

"It's really no big deal, Cass. Let's just finish preparing so that we can get this thing over with and slam the devil back in the box. Here," I spoke while putting the muffin tin back up on the shelf, then moved past Cass and up to my room. I returned a mere minute later with a shotgun in hand, holding it out to him, "Since your angel mojo is kind of drained right now, you might need another way to protect yourself," he nodded as he looked over the gun.

~

So, the plan was that Dean, Crowley and I were to go to Chicago to kill Death, and Sam and Cass were to stop the Niveus distribution. I was a bit worried, but I knew they could handle themselves, and I didn't have to worry about Dean seeing as I was going with him. I was only worried about Crowley screwing us over.

"All right, well..." Dean pulled me out of my thoughts with a slam of the trunk as I stood my ground ready to punch something, "Good luck stopping the whole zombie apocalypse."

"Yeah," Sam sighed, "Good luck killing Death."

"Yeah," Dean said. I sighed and hugged Sam.

"You be safe, all right? Don't do anything I would," I said with a forced grin. When I pulled away, I turned to Cass and walked up to him, kissing his cheek, "You point and shoot," I said with a soft laugh. He smiled at me.

"I will see you again," he said.

"You better. I'm gonna be very mad if you don't," I smiled and backed up to where I was beside Dean.

"Remember when we used to just... Hunt wendigos? How simple things were?" Sam asked.

"Not really," Dean said. I guess Sam forgot how time worked in Hell, but I couldn't remember a lot before it other than the big moments.

"Well, um..." Sam pulled out Ruby's knife, "You guys might need this," he held it out to us.

"Keep it. They're covered," I turned, seeing Crowley standing beside us and holding a small Scythe. He held it out to Dean, who hesitantly took it, "Death's own. Kills, golly, demons and angels and reapers and, rumor has it, the very thing itself," we looked at each other in awe at the weapon as I snatched it from Dean, looking it over. It was nice, kind of rusty-looking and small, but had a nice curve and the handle was pretty comfortable in my hand. Dean quickly snatched it back away from me, to which I pouted.

"How did you get that?" Cass asked.

"Hello--King of the Crossroads. So, shall we?" Crowley asked me and Dean, seemingly getting ready to go before stopping and looking at Bobby, "Bobby, you just gonna sit there?"

"No, I'm gonna riverdance," Bobby retorted sarcastically.

"I suppose if you want to impress the ladies," Crowley said, looking around. We all looked at him in confusion. What was he getting at? He sighed and continued, "Bobby, Bobby, Bobby. Really wasted that crossroads deal. Fact--you get more if you phrase it properly. So, I took the liberty of adding a teeny little sub-A clause on your behalf," we once again looked at him, confused, but I felt like it was starting to hit everyone as I looked at Bobby's legs and wheelchair, "What can I say? I'm an altruist," he took a step towards Bobby, "Just gonna sit there?" he repeated.

We all looked at Bobby, who looked just as shocked as us right now. He looked down at his legs and my eyes followed just in time to see him lift up his foot. Then he lifted his whole leg, planting one foot down on solid ground before the other. Then, using his upper body strength, he pushed himself up. He looked like he was struggling so I started to rush forward to help him, but Crowley held up an arm to stop me in my tracks. Suddenly, Bobby sprang up on two legs, standing at full height, and we all--other than Crowley--stared at him in pleasant surprise.

"Son of a bitch," he finally spoke.

"Yes, I know. Completely worth your soul. I'm a Hell of a guy," Crowley replied and I looked at him whilst he made his pun and seemed entirely too proud of himself for it, but right now, even if he was a demon, all I had was respect for him, which I figured I would soon lose.

"Thanks," Bobby said.

"This is getting maudlin. Can we go?" Crowley asked. I gave Bobby a hug, and soon after, we were on our way to Chicago and now Sam, Cass, and Bobby were going to stop the Niveus Distribution.

In the car ride, I decided to sit in the back simply because I wanted to nap, but I was also used to it. I heard my name being called, like a whisper in the back of my brain somewhere, and suddenly realized what it was.

I closed my eyes and when I opened them, I was emerged in darkness, the only light being flames from what looked like candles, but maybe it wasn't.

"Good evening Henrietta," I heard, and sighed.

"What do you want?" I growled.

"You're going to kill my most prized possession right now, did you think I didn't want to talk to you about that?" Lucifer spoke, circling around me as I sat on the floor. He stopped in front of me, looking down, but I refused to look up at him.

"Your prized possession?"

"Death. He's on my leash. Bound to me... Of course, against his will, I knew he would never tell me about this," he tapped his chin.

"So then, how do you know?"

"Because I sense you," I felt his index finger under my chin as he leaned closer to me. I shook my head away from him, scrambling to stand up. He pulled away and took a step back at my quick movements, "Relax, Rhett. Hurting you isn't my plan. It never has been."

"Then what is your plan? Take everything away from me? Turn me into some lollipop loving psychopath?" I lashed out, remembering the me from five years later.

"If I had any other option, I would take it. But that's still not my plan for you specifically. Tell me, pet, do you know what happens when you die?"

"Henry." I heard my name somewhere in what I could only assume was the real world.

"Not sure I want to know," I ignored it. He clicked his tongue before nodding.

"Of course. You don't want to think about it. I get it. You'll find out in time," he said, a grin covering his face. With a blink of an eye, he was gone and I was back in the impala.

"You falling asleep on me back there, Henry?" Dean asked. He was paying attention to the road and Crowley was looking back at me, a look I couldn't explain on his face. He turned back around in his seat once I furrowed my brows at him.

"On second thought, I think I'll meet you two in Chicago. See you at the borders," he said and vanished. Dean looked over with curiosity.

"Man, what's his problem?"

~

When we finally got to Chicago, we were walking around, following Crowley and where he said Death would be. Dean was on one side of Crowley and me on the other.

"Hey, let's stop for pizza," Crowley said as we walked around with our hands dug into our coats and our heads down from the chilly wind.

"Are you kidding?" Dean asked, incredulously.

"I could go for a pizza," I spoke quietly and smiled to myself as Crowley nodded at me in acknowledgement and Dean gave me a bitch face. When Crowley looked back at him, he shrugged.

"Just heard it was good. That's all," we walked a few more feet before Crowley held out his hands to stop us both, "Up ahead. Big, ugly building," he spoke as we turned a corner to see just the big, ugly, warehouse looking building he was talking about, "Ground zero. Horseman's stable, if you will. He's in there."

"How do you know?" Dean asked in disbelief. We were so close to getting all the rings and taking on the devil--and I still hadn't told either of them about my encounter with Lucifer in the car. Did they really have to know?

"Have you met me? Cause I know," Crowley said, almost offended.

"Where do you get your information anyways? When someone makes a deal does that kind of stuff just pop into your head out of nowhere?" I asked curiously, getting a bit closer to Crowley as if trying to look inside his head. He looked at me with an uncomfortable smile before patting the top of my head.

"Yeah. I'm not going to answer that," he turned back to the ugly building as I frowned, "Also, the block is squirming with reapers," at that I furrowed my brows and tried to focus on my powers so that I could see them. I shut my eyes in concentration and when I opened them, I could see them. At least twenty reapers just on the one block. It wasn't as much as the town when Death was released, though. In another blink of an eye, they were gone, "I'll be right back," Crowley said finally before taking a few steps forward and vanishing, most likely inside the building. In almost two seconds, I heard his voice behind us, "Boy, is my face red," Dean and I turned to him, "Death's not in there."

"You want to cut the cute and get to the part where you tell me where he is?" Dean asked, making a hand gesture for "Get on with it".

"Sorry. I don't know," Crowley shrugged and turned to walk back to the impala as Dean and I exchanged glances. Dean began chasing after Crowley and I followed.

"What do you mean, you don't know? I thought you knew," I said, quoting what he said earlier in a mocking voice.

"Yeah, wait just a minute," Dean grabbed his arm and stopped him from walking much further as we got ahead of him.

"Signs pointed. I-I'm just as shocked as you," Crowley said. I didn't believe him, but also the look on his face was quite angry, one that I could relate to when the boys felt like they had failed on a hunt.

"Bobby sold his soul for this!" Dean shouted and I put a hand on his shoulder as Crowley continued towards the impala.

"Relax," Crowley paused to turn back to us, "All deals are soul back or store credit. We'll catch Death in the next doomed city," Crowley said, but I couldn't just leave and let all these people, majority innocent, die.

"Millions of people are going to die, Crowley. That was part of the reason we were coming here, remember?"

"You're right, Rhett. Millions of people are going to die. So I strongly suggest we get out of here," Crowley responded before walking away once again.

Dean and I finally followed him, angry and sad, and mostly feeling betrayed. We finally got back to the impala, just to find Crowley waiting for us in shotgun as I opened the passenger door, just to watch him wave at me and groan. I slammed it shut on his face before hopping in the back as Dean got semi-comfortable in the front.

"So what? Call in a bomb threat? A thousand bomb threats? I mean, how the hell am I supposed to get three million people out of Chicago in the next ten minutes?" Dean asked, looking out the window, and when he looked back, Crowley was gone.

"Come on! I could've sat shotgun," I muttered before looking at Dean, "Maybe the bomb threat idea will work," I said, though I highly doubted it would. He groaned and looked out the window. I watched something catch his attention and scooted to the drivers side to look out my window. Out the window I saw Crowley standing by a pizza parlor and looking in. He turned back to us and started to mouth something to us while pointing inside the pizza place. I tried to read his lips, "They crowned Jim? Who's Jim?" I asked aloud.

"I said I found him," I heard and jumped, turning to see Crowley back in shotgun, "Death--he's in there," he pointed at the pizza parlor. Dean and I got out of the car, just for Dean to try to ask him if he's coming and for him to disappear once again.

Dean and I made our way to the parlor. Dean was holding the scythe in his hand and I followed behind with an angel blade. I knew it couldn't kill him, but if he had any goons, it could probably kill them. We made our way through the parlor as slow and quiet as possible, careful not to disturb anything or make our presence known. There were many dead bodies laying around the entire shop. Some hadn't even finished eating their meal, and others were waitresses. In one table in the middle of the parlor sat a very nicely dressed man, and also the only living one in the entire place. I knew he had to be Death, and fortunately for us, he was facing the other way. We snuck up behind him as quietly as possible.

Then I watched Dean's hand begin to tremble as I watched the Scythe glow, most likely hot. I grabbed it from his hand as it began to sizzle and I knew he was going to drop it soon. The heat burned furiously and I ended up having to drop it. The drop made a loud clattering noise on the floor of the parlor.

We're dead.

"Thanks for returning that," Death spoke without moving a single muscle. I looked back down to the ground where I'd dropped the scythe to see it gone, before back up to Death. There it was, resting on Death's red and white patterned tablecloth, "Join me, guys. The pizza's delicious."

Oh, yeah. We're dead. We hesitantly made our way over to him as he looked up at us. He eyed me cautiously before tilting his head slightly.

"Rhett..."

"Death," I said, glancing at Dean before back at Death and doing a nervous curtsy. He tilted his head back.

"I don't like you. Or the connection you share with Lucifer," he looked back down at his large slice of pizza, digging into it with his knife and fork, "That being said, you aren't nearly important enough to rid of. Don't you have an angel to attend to? Go on," He set his knife down and waved his hand and I felt a gust of wind. In a split second, I found myself in an entirely different setting.

I was now inside a warehouse, looking around. I saw tons and tons of boxes stacked high enough to be walls and I turned just in time to see the flap of a tan trench coat turn the corner. I followed it and fortunately found myself standing in front of Cass.

"Oh, thank God," I breathed out and he turned at the sound of my voice, furrowing his eyebrows.

"Rhett? Weren't you supposed to be-"

"In Chicago? With Dean?" I questioned, pressing my lips into a thin line as I flipped my arms up in a "I don't know" gesture, "I was, and Death waved his hand and now I'm here," I shrugged.

"He didn't kill you?" Cass said, and I watched relief flood his facial expressions as he quickly made his way to me and pulled me into a tight hug.

"I don't think killing us was his plan," I hugged him back.

"Where's Dean then?" he asked and I looked around.

"Um..." I smiled awkwardly, "I'm pretty sure... He's still... In Chicago," Cass groaned and pulled away, but I stopped him, pulling on the collar of his coat, "Cass, I know my brother. He'll pull through. He'll be fine. And soon he'll be back at Bobby's to meet us, so let's make sure we're there for him, okay?" I asked. He nodded, to which I smiled and pulled him closer by his collar, pressing my lips against his. He quickly reciprocated the kiss that I soon melted into. His arms found their way around my waist as mine did around his neck.

"Oh, God. Can we not go one day without you guys making lovey dovey eyes at each other," I heard and quickly pulled away from Cass, putting my arms by my side as I turned to Bobby. Cass looked from Bobby to me before copying what I had done. Bobby sighed, "I'll ask in the van. C-4 is all planted. Are we ready to get out of here, or should I give you two a moment?"