Bless the Broken Road

70. On the Head of a Pin

STREET

Car alarms blared. Several cars in various states of smashed to pieces were in the street. Castiel appeared and silenced the alarms. He walked through the wreckage to the body of a woman. He moved part of her clothing off her neck to see that she'd been stabbed to death.

"Goodbye, sister," Castiel said.

Police cars arrived and officers rushed to the scene.

"What the hell?" an officer asked.

A spotlight from a helicopter illuminated the ground on either side, where the image of wings had been seared into the asphalt.

ROAD

Sam was driving. "Ruby will meet us outside Cheyenne. She's been tracking some leads. I know she's not exactly on either of your Christmas lists, but if she can help us get to Lilith-"

Dean cut him off. "Hey, man, work with Ruby, don't. Zach and I don't really give a rat's ass."

"What's your problem?"

"Pamela didn't want anything to do with the and we dragged her back into it, Sam."

"She knew what was at stake."

"Oh, yeah. Saving the world. And we're doing such a damn good job of it."

"Dean-"

"Zach and I are tired of burying friends, Sam."

"Look, we catch a fresh trail-"

"And we follow it, I know. Like I said, I'm just - I'm just getting tired."

"Well, get angry. Zach, you're quiet."

Zach glanced at him. "What do you want me to say? Dean summed it up pretty damn eloquently."

MOTEL ROOM

The trio entered the room.

"Ah, home crappy home," Dean commented.

As soon as Sam flipped on the lights, Uriel said, "Winchester, Winchester and Winchester."

Uriel and Castiel were waiting inside the room.

"Oh come on," Dean muttered.

"You are needed," Uriel told them.

"Needed?" Zach repeated. "We just got back from needed."

"Now, you mind your tone with me."

"No, you mind your damn tone with us," Dean retorted.

"We just got back from Pamela's funeral," Sam explained.

"Pamela. You know, psychic Pamela? You remember her. Cas, you remember her. You burned her eyes out. Remember that? Good times. Yeah, then she died saving one of your precious seals. So maybe you can stop pushing us around like chess pieces for five freaking minutes!"

"We raised you out of Hell for our purposes," Uriel said.

"Yeah, what were those again? What exactly did you want from me and him?"

"Start with gratitude."

Zach scoffed. "Oh."

Castiel looked between them. "Dean, Zach, we know this is difficult to understand."

"And we-" Uriel gave Castiel a significant look, "-don't care. Now, seven angels have been murdered, all of them from our garrison. That last one was killed tonight."

"Demons?" Dean questioned. "How they doing it?"

"We don't know."

Sam frowned. "I'm sorry, but what you do want to do about it? I mean, a demon with the juice to ice angels has to be out of our league, right?"