The sheer force of the Winchester angst reaches all the way out to a random playground and causes a small child to start crying. Her mother tries to comfort her to no avail. Castiel appears out of thin air and diagnoses the child. It turns out it's not Sam and Dean's epic manpain at work after all, but an inguinal hernia, which actually hurts slightly less. Castiel touches the baby and she turns instantly happy. Castiel disappears again before anybody can be like, "What's that strange, raspy-voiced guy in an overcoat doing at a playground touching babies?"

He finds himself sitting in Naomi's office. He looks confused, but Naomi gets right down to business. She tells him that Crowley has Samandriel. Unfortunately, she doesn't know exactly where. "You will find him and you will bring him home," she says, sounding quite emotional. Castiel, who appears to have gotten himself a much nicer haircut than poor Samandriel, starts making plans at once. "I'll need help getting in," he says, figuring that Crowley would have warded himself against angels this time. "Take whatever help you need," Naomi says. "But you will be certain, Castiel, it was your idea to rescue Samandriel -- not mine, not Heaven's." Castiel looks confused again, which is getting to be his default mode these days.

Meanwhile, Dean is fast asleep in Rufus's old cabin, cradling a beer bottle in the crook of his arm almost like a teddy bear. Castiel shows up and just watches him for a while. Eventually, Dean feels the weight of that blue-eyed stare upon him and wakes with a start. "Damn it, Cass! How many times I gotta tell you? It's just creepy!" I believe the word he meant to say was "adorable." Castiel says he needs his help. "The angel Samandriel, he's been taken." He says he heard the distress call. Dean is surprised to learn that Castiel is once again tuning in to Angel Radio. It's got all the best hits of the '80s. Castiel says his penance is going well. "I've been helping people," he says, looking a mite pleased with himself. He's got a general location (Hastings, Nebraska) but he needs Dean's people skills to get them any closer than that. Dean fires up his laptop and tries without much success to hide the Asian porno site that's still open in his browser. Castiel says that an angel's screams of pain will create a "ripple effect" of strange incidents, which is the first we're hearing of this, I believe. Perhaps it will be important later. Castiel notices there's a distinct lack of bitchiness in the air. "Where's Sam?" he wonders. "Sam's gone," Dean says in a way that doesn't invite further inquiry.