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It began simply, as all crazy things did; Castiel turned up at the bunker with a half-starved, ragged queen, covered in fleas and a large scab over her right eye. The poor thing huddled against the angel's chest; slow, infrequent breaths fueled her soft purrs. Sam turned a blind eye and said nothing when Cass slipped into the bathroom for half a minute and emerged with, presumably, the same cat - clean, healed, and slightly plumper. For whatever reason, Castiel has always wanted a cat, and, given how shitty everything else was, the Winchester wasn't going to take the small happiness from his friend. Besides, he'd read somewhere the frequency of purring helped reduce healing time and in their line of work that could only be helpful. If nothing else, it would annoy Dean and - considering the thing he'd dragged home - that made Sam smile.
Dean Winchester had never had any tolerance for animals - especially pets. The common ones smelled rich and musky animal odors that cloyed your throat when stuck with them all day. They relied solely on their owners for everything and Dean didn't need another entity in his life to disappoint. Of course, that had been before. His old self, that pathetic mass of emotions and self-loathing, had even hated the sleek cunning of the perfect beast. As intelligent as any human (more than a common demon), self reliant from the moment they tore into existence and loyal beyond the point of reason, Hellhounds were God's most splendid creations - or Lucifer's, Dean never thought to ask. Crowley's stock was an impressive line - large, brilliant, vicious, and, most importantly, obedient. The Demon King had gifted to his creation a promising young stud that now stood at the demon's knees a remarkable size increase in the short time in its new master's care.
A single scared feline went unnoticed in the large underground facility fleeing before the demon or his pet was within two meters. Two passed under the radar as easily as one, which is what they had a few weeks later when Cass turned up with another malnourished stray - a tom. Sam intervened before the angel gave the cat free range.
"Ahem." He cleared his throat, trying to think of the delicate way to pose his inquiry.
"Say what you want."
"Did you, eh, fix him?"
"I mended a broken rib, and healed a burn from where his tail had been set on fire."
"Wow. That's - horrible."
"I thought I understood humans, but why would anyone do that to another living creature?"
Sam gaped, unsure how to respond, himself having torched at least three creatures in the past few months while they were still, undeniably, alive.
"What harm could he have done to deserve it?" Cass continued as if reading Sam's thoughts and absolving the hunter of his actions.
"I don't know, man. People can be cruel."
"No wonder they are so easy to corrupt."
They both looked in the direction of Dean's room. Sam shook his head, focusing back on his initial purpose. "I don't mind a few cats, but they need to be fixed."
"I am fixing them - "
"Neutered, spayed... fixed."
"Oh." Castiel said with sudden clarity. He placed two fingers on the cat's head and shut his eyes. When he opened them a second later, he looked almost guilty. "I've done as you've asked."
Sam blinked at the grey tabby which blinked calmly back. "Do you think he knows what just happened?"
Cass cocked his head and furrowed his brow holding Sam's gaze with his questioning look, "I told him what I was doing."
"And he agreed?" The man scoffed.
"I explained it was necessary for his continued residency."
"Yeah, and, uh, they say it makes them live longer, ffff, less prone to anxiety." Sam realized he was explaining to a cat why he'd needed to be castrated and the hunter stopped, bewildered. The cat's ears went back and it growled a low worried grumble. Its claws dug at the trench coat the angel wore.
"What's wrong?" Cass went to pet it but the gib clawed his hand and shot out of the room.
The squeak of Dean's bedroom door opening down the hall was the only disturbance. Dean emerged and waited, letting the monster through before shutting the door. Sam pushed the holy glasses he'd made onto his nose. In public, the lack of curve to the lenses earned him more than one disdainful "dirty hipster" but he'd rather sacrifice a stranger's opinion of himself than not be able to see where the black terror stalked. Its shoulders came to about three inches above Dean's knee. Sam didn't know what his brother fed the unholy pet, and he had the clear certainty that he didn't want to ever know, but Dean obviously fed it well.
"What are you two doing?"
"Nothing."
"Alastair is going mad at the door."
"Maybe he needs to go for a walk." Sam suggested.
"Hellhounds don't defecate." Castiel stated.
"Keeping them stuck inside can't be good, right?"
Dean's eyes darkened with suspicion, the blackness creeping over the green and stealing from Sam the last glimpse of who his brother had been. "Are you trying another spell? I won't be a human again, Sammy."
Invisible spiders crawled over the man's skin, hearing Dean say 'Sammy' with such venom and mockery never failed to hurt. Sam threw his hands up and walked away, leaving Castiel to frown judgmentally at Dean in awkward silence, waiting to reprimand the demon until Sam was out of earshot.
Cass' little pride grew. A group of mewling kittens one day, a lactating queen - her own kittens lost, a spitting tom four days later, strays with crusty eyes and scaly skin beneath patchy fur. An old abandoned Maine coon pawed gently at the angel's stubbly face and rubber her scent on his chin when he looked down. Sam went into the kitchen, his glasses on as he'd become accustomed to the weight of them on his face and began to forget when he wore them.
"Cass, you can't keep this up." He blurted out on seeing the newest edition.
"Why not?"
"There's like 90,000 strays; the bunker can't hold them all. We can't afford to feed them."
"I provide their food and care." Cass looked as if Sam were telling him he couldn't have any more ice cream.
"I know, but look at you. You're pale and weak. Can you keep using your grace like this?"
"They're all cold and hungry. So hungry I can feel it cramping and contracting, the empty pit in the center of their being until you just want to lie down and never move again." The coon crawled onto Castiel's shoulders and sprung to the top of the fridge. "I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy."
Sam examined the sadness in the angel's earnest eyes as Cass watched the cat crouch and focus on the entryway. Sam'd forgotten Castiel spent time homeless while he was human. Well, not forgotten, repressed with the guilt and shame the memory was entwined with. The click of dog nails on tile interrupted his thoughts and he turned to see Dean in the door with Alastair and-
"What the hell is that?" The brothers said in unison. The cat hissed from its high vantage point.
Alastair stood nearly at Dean's hip while a comparatively small puppy circled the larger hound's legs, menacing and hate filled even at that tiny size. Dean smiled down at the new vermin, "That's Alastair's bitch - Ruby."
Sam clenched his jaw and swallowed back the bile.
"She's Wynonna." Castiel said with his typical frankness.
"Wynonna?" Sam frowned, letting the fight die before it started.
"Yes."
"Why Wynonna?"
"It's her name."
Sam looked back to Dean for help but only found darkness.
"It's not staying." Dean commanded with the easy tone of one used to being obeyed.
"Like Hell she's not." Sam turned on his brother. "You can't bring in the spawn of Satan and tell Cass he can't keep a cat."
"The spawn of Satan? Isn't that supposed to be you?"
Sam stood up straight and pushed out his chest, "Say that again, demon."
Dean grinned cruelly, licking his lips as he thought of another insult to fling his brother's way.
"Besides, how would I tell her she couldn't stay when all the others have?"
Sam shut his eyes and pursed his lips, slowly letting out the breath he'd taken.
"Others?" Dean hissed, surrounded by canines despite being so feline in his own behaviour.
"Cheree, Yu, Felicita Delena, Wade, Iva, Kourtney, Milford, Tom, and the kittens. They don't have names yet. I think I'm supposed to pick them but how could I know if one name is more appropriate than another?" The angel blundered on, oblivious to or ignoring the mounting anger in his demon friend. Wynonna bolted for the door, making it past the Hellhounds by sheer luck. "Don't let them hurt the cats." Cass finished; Dean uncertain if it was a threat or a plea.
If resisting the angel did any good, Dean would have, but he'd lost to Cass before - eventually, soon, that would change - and for now he shrugged, "Keep them out of the way and we'll see."
Sam didn't suggest again that Cass stop. He'd have gladly had thirty and kept them all in Dean's room if they didn't avoid it like it were a literal gate to Hell. Instead he offered to help clean them up 'the old fashioned way' to save the waning angel's grace. As the group grew altercations within were amazingly absent; Sam suspected Castiel was behind the cohesion, though possibly having a common enemy kept the clowder close. One could follow Dean's progress through the bunker by the sound of hissing and spitting as he passed with the hounds in tow. Cats tore into the library and took refuge under Sam's chair.
"This is my home. I won't be muscled out." The demon could be heard in the Comm room.
"I'm not suggesting that but maybe leave the monsters in Hell."
Alastair's growl caused the hair on Sam's neck to stand up and his heart to race, whichever cat had taken refuge beneath him whined.
"Tame the beast or lose it."
"You don't have the juice."
"Try me."
Sam lifted the sleeping tortoise shell cat from his lap and walked towards the argument. Castiel was his buffer with Dean and he was Cass'. It was the only way this worked and then they worked together - had to - to keep Dean inline. Sam withdrew the angel blade he kept sheathed on his hip; it had been months since he'd even showered without it.
"I can't help if your creatures can't handle being around mine. Mine were here first."
"She bit his leg!"
"It was hanging down. She was curious." Dean cradled the horror named Ruby to his chest already double the size Sam had first seen her.
"Why was she alone?" Sam leaned against the archway, one hand on his hip, the other holding the naked blade.
"She wasn't. I didn't see the pest until it was too late. I can't be bothered to check every cranny for the pussies."
"Take a break."
Dean bristled, huffed.
"Take a break or get rid of the hounds."
Dean vanished.
"I don't think it helps." Castiel told the empty space.
"We've been through it before. Hell is Hell for everything. He'll be there an hour, and he'll be back and less aggressive to us."
"What about to everything else?"
Sam shrugged and went back to his research. He'd get his brother back. The cat beneath his chair rubbed against his leg and purred.
'Fixing' those he found but unwilling to test Sam's graciousness any further, Castiel held off on bringing more cats back to the bunker. The angel refused to tell Sam how many there actually were, but the hunter guessed in the mid- to high- twenties. As long as it didn't smell like cat piss and their fur wasn't over everything, he didn't really care.
With the ever present hounds at his heels, Dean came back two days later, outwardly subdued. The demon let his beasts out to hunt at night, before he had sent them after lost souls, now, they padded around seeking felines. Stealth was where hellhounds as a group failed, but Dean taught well.
The angel found a long ginger tabby with white patches on his toes and muzzle limping with a broken leg, talon punctures in its back from where a hawk had tried to make it a meal. He mended the injuries and went to leave when it sprung on his shoulder, purring and meowing in his ear. Cass pet the cat for a few minutes and tried to put it down but it clung to him. Unable to fly away, or extract himself from the presence of the persistent feline, he brought it home. Sam looked over the battle-scarred cat purring loudly and butting his head against Castiel's shoulder, kneading the air contently when receiving the demanded pets. One ear was missing a chunk, and several scars criss-crossed the broad nose, and its yellow eyes looked at him with a knowing glint. Even after testing it with silver, borax-laced holy water, and salt, Sam wasn't convinced the thing was just a cat. It seemed to smile when it passed all the tests and batted Sam's hand, trying to get a head rub.
From the first day the ginger arrived, for three straight nights, there was loud hissing, spitting and angry death wails that woke Sam in the middle of the night. No further sounds of fighting or fucking followed but the vocalizations lasted for hours, by the time they were over there was no way Sam was falling back asleep. He might be the only one who needed sleep but he was also the only one that couldn't be banished from the bunker by a well placed sigil, so he felt he had proprietary rights and it was getting to the point he was about to cast anything not human from his house.
On the fourth night, all Hell broke loose. The cat calls were joined by dog barks and then quickly, yelps. Sam and Castiel converged on the commotion, Dean suspiciously present before the others.
"What'd you do?" The brothers accused each other; Sam pushed his glasses on. Ruby cowered behind Dean's leg, a dribble of black blood dripping from her nose. Alastair stood with his head low and teeth bared, growling at the orange tabby. Unlike the other cats in the house, he didn't turn tail at the scent of Hell. His front claws were stained with droplets of black and he'd put himself between the Hellhounds and one of the kittens, thin and lanky as it reached adolescence, it's head wet with slobber and an eye punctured from a large-mouthed bite.
"What did you do, Dean?" Castiel could see the hurt, the bruises and bites hidden beneath the fur.
Alastair stepped forward and the ginger arched his back, presenting his side, emitting a low warbling growl. The hound lunged forward; the cat jumped, raked the dog's eyes. Alastair yelped and withdrew a few feet, snarling.
"Call him off!" Cass commanded.
"You call yours off!"
"He isn't the problem!"
"He's been the problem since he got here! Coming out of nowhere, flushing the hounds-" Dean cut himself off.
"What have you been doing?" Castiel glowed bright with rage. Ruby whimpered, Alastair turned and the ginger pounced. Biting. Diving. Clawing. Rolling as the Hellhound tried to get a mouthful of feline. Yowling and barking filled the whole bunker.
"ENOUGH!" Sam's voice clapped like thunder, startling even the fighting animals to stillness.
The hound had deep claw marks over his face and neck; he panted heavily and sat exhausted when Sam stepped between the ginger and him, almost grateful. The hunter collected the black kitten shaking in shock and toed the older cat back, expecting to be mauled but being rubbed happily instead. Sam deposited the kitten into Castiel's outstretched hands.
"If anything else happens to any cat, I'll complete the first trial a few more times. Do you catch my drift, brother?" Dean glared but said nothing, always outnumbered between Cass and Sammy. He whistled and Alastair slunk cautiously away from the ginger to his master's side, ready to fight to the death if commanded. Cass tried to hide his grin, Sam turned on the angel too. "Find them homes. The bunker can't be an animal shelter. You can have one cat per Hellhound and there aren't going to be anymore Hellhounds. Crookshanks stays too."
Sam strode back to his bedroom excited at the prospect of getting some sleep. The long ginger tabby padded beside him with its tail held high.
Dean scoffed at his brother's retreating form. Castiel leaned in and happily whispered, "I understood that reference."