There's a whole epic playing out on Dean's face, but Castiel hasn't been handed the script pages. He sees the confusion, the moments taken to make calculations, the anger and the soul-crushing grief. Considering he can usually read Dean's expressions and moods like they're words in a book, it's jarring to find that he doesn't know the person in front of him.

Dean, but not Dean. Five years is almost as long as they've known each other in total, and this Dean has lived through that. Here, in this place.

This place he'd said he maybe wanted to stay in and enjoy for as long as he could, but clearly it hasn't worked out as planned, and Castiel has no idea why.

And what does Dean ask about? Michael. It's something they'll need to keep in mind now that he's here and in this vulnerable state, but the fact is that Michael doesn't have much reason to make use of Dean as a vessel at this point in time. Lucifer isn't here, they aren't even on Earth, so what good would it do? And Michael is a pragmatist. He wouldn't do something if there wasn't some point to it.

"Elsewhere," Castiel says, face pinched with annoyance as he looks away. He's not all that impressed with Dean's attempt at deflection. "Why? What do you have planned?"

What could he ever think was important enough that he would let Michael in?