Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Spanning back years worth of state hopping and blood-spilling, there was a list of things that Sam and Dean just didn’t talk about.

Mary was on that list. People like Jessica and Cassie. Memories of house fires and hunter funerals and brutal retellings of innocents dying on their watch. Hunters will say what they will about the life, but it was these moments that lingered the longest. The brothers didn’t need each other’s help to remember.

And nightmares were just one of those things. They didn’t talk about the nightmares.

“You alright?” Sam asked him, and Dean couldn’t be sure which direction his brother's voice came from, but he sat up towards the opposite bed anyway, his heart still pulsing in his throat.

It was a pity question. One of those phrases Sam tossed out there, regardless of whether he’d just watched Dean tear himself from a nightmare for the fourth night in a row. Regardless of whether Dean was sitting up in bed sweat-soaked and terror-ridden, his chest just seconds away from giving out.

“Fucking delightful,” Dean responded, because that too was a given. Dean squinted towards the motel curtains, all but collapsing back onto the bed when he saw how dark it was outside. “The hell you doin’ awake? Porn surfing?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” Sam shrugged. He was nothing but a glare of white light in Dean’s peripheral, the screen of his laptop opened wide at the kitchen table. “Guess that makes two of us.”

Dean stared at him, willing his breaths to calm, needing his voice to come out smooth again, “You’ll screw up your eyes doing that.”

Sam scoffed, blinking defiantly towards his computer screen. “Like that matters at this point.”

There had been a lot of talk like this lately. End of the world talk, and Dean was helpless to stop it. He was fresh from Hell and white-knuckling every day, leaving him with nothing but the revelation of angels and the sworn looks of a biblical Apocalypse headed their way.

And Dean didn’t even want to know what was going on with Sam.

Having to live out a year knowing your brother was getting fried extra crispy couldn’t have been easy, but Dean was here now. He might have been pieced together with nothing but worn stitching, barely making it, but he was standing, damn it. He was trying to figure out how to make himself feel alive again, and Sam just wasn’t reaching for him the way Dean needed him to.

“I figured I’d try and look into those seals you mentioned. See if anything weird’s going on out there,” Sam said.

Dean peeled himself from the dampened covers, wincing as he rose to his feet and crossed the room. “Devil-going-topside kind of weird?”

“Exactly,” Sam sighed. He hid a yawn into the back of his fist, eyes turning bleary. “You know, maybe it’s Lilith we should be focusing on. She’s the one behind the seals, isn’t she? The rise of the witnesses?”

“That’s what cherub boy said.”

Dean could practically feel the smile Sam flashed his way, all quiet satisfaction and mirthful pride.

“I thought you didn’t trust him,” Sam said innocently, and Dean rolled his eyes as he ducked into the bathroom. He flicked on the sink with the bone of his wrist.

“Oh, I don’t,” Dean yelled over the rush of water. He tried not to look too closely at the odd color spouting from the motel sink before cupping his hands and splashing his face. “I’d take any backroad demon over him any day. At least with demons you know what to expect. Villain monologues, frosted tips, bad breath— you name it. Compared to angels, demons come with a lot less fairy dust.”

“Okay, so we don’t trust him,” Sam amended. “But do we believe him?”

Instinctively? No. Dean didn’t believe a damn word about any of it. But back in Bobby’s kitchen, back in that moment that Dean still wasn’t convinced hadn’t just been a dream, Castiel had been terrifyingly sincere. Insufferable, yes, not to mention close, too fucking close— but he’d also been regrettably honest in a way that made Dean want to believe him despite everything.

Despite Castiel’s very mention being capable of making his pulse flare in unabashed panic.

I dragged you out of Hell. I can throw you back in.

“I don’t know,” Dean answered eventually, messily lifting his shirt up to dry off his face with a harsh sniff. He flicked off the light and staggered out of the bathroom where Sam was already waiting for him, his glare prominent.

“He pulled you out of hell fire, Dean. Why would he be lying about this?”

Dean shrugged. “Because he’s not human.”

Sam actually managed a laugh at that, this childish little snort of a noise that made his head flop over in mocked amusement.

“What, and we’re so upstanding?” He argued, voice rising with incredulity as Dean turned away.

“You know what— forget it,” Dean brushed off, hating the topic and the issue at large, his skin starting to itch. “He hasn’t shown his face in days, who knows if he’s even coming back. Maybe he just wanted to be the one to drop that bombshell of a news report on me before tailing it to the heavenly Bahamas.”

“Dean,” Sam said lowly, not at all buying it. “Come on.”

But this was easier; keeping things separated. Keeping it all compartmentalized. Humans were humans and others were other and Dean couldn’t change that, he couldn’t afford to rip that open and dissect it any further. Especially not now.

“Come on what? Look, Sam, I’m sorry you grew up praying and I didn’t. I know this isn’t how you imagined it all, but we don’t owe these dicks anything,” Dean reasoned, sprawling back into bed with an arm thrown over his eyes.

Sam’s mouth tightened. “What about that thing mom used to tell you? That angels were—”

“Sam,” Dean interrupted, all tone and no breath, shoulders tightening up. Sam looked over at him on the bed, meeting Dean’s sharpened gaze. “Don’t.”

And with a single breeze, the conversation sparked and died.

“You seem… different lately,” Sam said suddenly, forcing Dean to stop mid-bite, his mouth stretched wide around the rim of a grease-infested cheeseburger.

It was almost impressive just how quickly Sam managed to obliterate his appetite.

“Really?” Dean took an obnoxious bite anyway, if only to be able to look at Sam through a mouthful of food and say, “like, Hell-made-me-their-shish-kabob kind of different?”

“Dude, that’s not what I—” Sam deflated with a sigh, brushing a hand over his face. “You just seem more relaxed. Rested, I guess. You’ve been sleeping better, right?”

Dean set his burger back down on his plate, irritation pressing hot at his temples. He fumbled with the napkin dispenser at the end of the diner table for a few moments, but his fingers were slippery and his fucks were gone and with a final slap to the stupid plastic box, he gave up.

Dean settled for licking his fingers clean.

“Oddly enough, yeah,” He frowned. “Not a single peep these last few nights.”

Sam smiled. “That’s good Dean.”

“It’s weird is what it is,” Dean made a face, swirling a handful of fries through a glob of ketchup before popping them into his mouth. “I mean, I know we don’t ever talk about it, hell— I don’t talk about anything. But when I say I need my four hours, I usually mean two tops, three if I’m fucking lucky. But lately it—” A warmth curled in Dean’s throat, pressing at the back of his teeth. He swallowed through it, head shaking with refusal as he finished with, “It’s been quiet.”

Sam didn’t look impressed. He mumbled something into his next sip of coffee, incoherent, and Dean glared at him from across the table.

“Well, as far as I’m concerned, you’ve earned enough rest for a lifetime. You’re almost thirty, man. I think it’s time you start having nap time again.”

Dean allowed himself all of two seconds to think of a comeback. He was good at that, spitting them out under pressure, speaking in nothing but tongues to confuse the enemy. But his brain was scrambled, for the first time since he popped out of the ground he felt awake, and when his wit couldn’t assist him, Dean resorted to pure blood instinct.

With a single cocked back strike, Dean flicked a lonesome piece of tomato over the table. He watched in awe as it arched, soared, and landed with a splat on Sam’s exposed forearm.

“Eat your fucking veggies,” Dean grinned, reaching for his burger again.

The face Sam made was vulgar. “Tomatoes are fruits,” He corrected bitterly, and Dean sat up with a rigid spine, all amusement draining from his face.

“Nobody asked, Sam,” He deadpanned.

It was three days later and five states over the next time Castiel decided to show his face again, and Dean felt his presence like a gun barrel pressed to his spine, waiting to take the shot.

He woke much in the same way he did last time; inexplicably, an odd sense of power forcing his limbs to shift and his mind to bloom. Only this time when Dean opened his eyes, instead of Castiel’s shadow hovering precariously in the opposite room, the angel was perched at the edge of his bed, and his touch was a soft blue glow pressed delicately into the inside of Dean’s arm.

Panic seized Dean’s chest, and he jolted up and grabbed Castiel by the wrist, prying his fingers away.

“The hell do you think you’re doing?” He grounded out, distrusting and brutal, his grip on the guy tightening in a way that would have made most people cave.

Castiel merely blinked at him.

“There’s no reason to be alarmed, Dean,” He said.

“Yeah, right,” Dean scoffed, dropping his arm carelessly. He could still feel the impressions of a nightmare at the base of his skull, pounding and pounding to get in. He shook his head. “So much for the whole ‘no perching on your shoulder’ crap.”

Castiel watched with a mindless fixation as Dean sat up in bed, his head tilted at a peculiar angle. Dean didn’t even bother glancing his way. He already felt like he’d been bad-touched all over, and he peeled his jacket off, no longer wanting the welcoming heat of the makeshift blanket.

“I was only trying to help,” Castiel said, confusion slowing his speech.

“Oh, well aren’t you a little angel,” Dean smiled grimly, finally forcing himself to really look at the guy. Castiel stared back, blue eyes steeled and unwavering, stripping Dean bare. “This was you?” Dean asked, voice tight. “You been stopping my nightmares or something?”

It was the only thing that made sense, the only explanation Dean could conjure. Most days, he felt like he was being held together by a damn band aid, and at night he was nothing but shredded ribbons. It was in silence that Dean faltered; it was in the dark that he plunged, but the last few nights had found Dean with the kind of bliss he didn’t think he’d felt since he was still wearing a matching pajama set to bed.

For the first time in forty-something-odd years, Dean felt rested. What a fucking enigma.

“I’ve been doing what I can,” Castiel revealed, quiet and strained, an edge of embarrassment creeping into the borrowed lines of his face.

Dean stared at him for a long moment, still trying to function with the knowledge that this human vessel was holding a nuke inside of it. That this was a walking, talking, orb of light rather than some skinny suburban dad who forgot to pat his fucking hair down before starting the day.

“Well, thanks, but no thanks. I’m a big boy, I can handle a little R-rated cloud hopping,” Dean grunted, scrambling to his feet to look for the nearest drink.

There was an odd itch surfacing within him, just behind his ribcage, and turning away from Castiel made it just bearable enough for Dean to notice the glaring emptiness of the opposite bed. Dean froze where he stood, blinking in the darkness.

“Where’s Sam?” He asked, voice ridden with suspicion.

Castiel’s gaze fell heavy over the motel door. “Out.”

“Out? Doing what?”

There was nothing in Castiel’s face that alluded to an answer. He wasn’t going to speak, not on this, and Dean didn’t know what to do first— punch the dick or call Sam. Castiel didn’t give him the chance to ponder on either very long. With a wave of his hand, Dean’s phone appeared in the cusp of his fingers, and he held it out to Dean without a word.

Dean tried not to notice the paleness of Castiel’s hand as he snatched up his phone and flipped it open. Sam was the first pinned contact, and amazingly enough, he answered on the second ring.

“Sammy? You okay?”

“I’m fine, Dean. Why wouldn’t I be?” Sam replied easily, sounding casual enough to make Dean relax, however slightly.

“Maybe because I haven’t seen you get a wink of sleep in days. Where the hell are you?” Dean asked.

“I just went out to get something to eat, man. You know I can’t sleep on an empty stomach.”

“And you just left without telling me?”

Sam sighed, relenting as he said, “I was planning on bringing you back a burger,” and suddenly all worries were dropped.

“Extra bacon?” Dean clarified. Sam gave a knowing hum. “Enough said. See you in a bit,” He ended the call with a resounding click and tossed the phone onto the bed. Castiel watched as the device bumped against his thigh, unmoving. Dean gestured wildly at him, “Now, was that anything to get all cryptic about?”

Castiel straightened, stretching in his own skin, prickled with discomfort. “I didn’t say anything.”

“And to humans, that means you’re saying everything,” Dean mumbled. The confusion on the poor guy's face turned downright painful, his eyes narrowing into slits. “Is there something you’re not telling me? Something about Sam?”

Castiel turned his head, staring off towards the table where Sam had left his jacket on the chair. There was a power to his gaze, sharpened by the moonlight, and his jaw was a shadowed edge, sharp, traceable, if Dean dared to try.

Dean tore his eyes away.

“That’s not what I came here for,” Castiel said.

“So there is something wrong with Sam.”

When silence was all Dean was offered, his approach changed drastically, that gut driven instinct of Sam, gotta protect Sam forcing all qualms out the window. Dean took a heavy step forward, hyper aware of their height difference, him standing, Castiel sitting. Painfully attuned to their power stance, him mortal, Castiel unfathomable. Most nutjobs with a peanut for a brain would be running for the hills by now, and yet somehow, Dean felt untouchable.

“Listen here you feathered freak. If there’s something going on with my brother, if he’s—” Dean inhaled shakily. Castiel watched on in a thrilling silence, and Dean tried not to think too hard about the angle at which he was staring up at him, eyes wide and lips full, his skin masked in darkness. “Then you’re gonna fucking tell me. Enough of this mysterious warrior crap, how ‘bout you grow a pair and tell me what the hell’s going on before I—”

“It’s not easy news to deliver,” Castiel finally explained, a sense of frustration finally seeping through the cracks.

Dean scoffed. “You say that like you have a conscience.”

It was like watching a building topple over, witnessing the way in which Castiel hardened, his softened look of inquisitive interest fading into something much darker, much more similar to what Dean had witnessed that night in Bobby’s kitchen.

“Listen to me,” He said, and there was a storm brewing in his voice, all sharpened gravel and roughened stone. “You have to stop it.”

Dean stared at him. “Stop what?”

When Castiel’s arm lifted in the space between them, wielding the kind of power that made Dean’s ears go numb, Dean’s first instinct wasn’t to pull away. It wasn’t to reach for the gun at his bedside. He didn’t so much as flinch.

Instead, Dean’s eyes slipped shut amongst an onslaught of warmth, a feather-soft ache at the rise of his breast bone, and he craned forward, breaking apart the moment they touched.

Ultimately, for Dean, the worst part about being catapulted through time and knocking heads with a hunter-trained version of his mother, was the shitty fucking excuse for a car he was forced to drive.

With the fate of the Impala set on its course, and John’s attention zeroed in, Dean had to go civilian. He’d had to hot-wire a Ford.

Dean was halfway out of Lawrence and three-fourths through a pack of old-fashioned smokes when Castiel appeared to his right, materializing with about as much warning as a heart attack.

“Fucking shit!” Dean coughed up, choking on a drag of smoke that had him heaving over the steering wheel with stinging eyes. Castiel watched with a severe lack of reaction as Dean winced, cursed, and tossed his cigarette out the open window. “Don’t do that.”

“Would you rather me sit in the backseat?”

“What? No— no! Just warn me or something before you take shotgun, I don’t know.”

Castiel eyed him strangely, somehow managing to take Dean as the odd one here. “My apologies.”

It was difficult not to scrutinize moments like this. When they were alone, compacted, Castiel’s presence waving like a weathered flag at sea. Dean was painfully aware of him then; eyeing the way Castiel’s hands had settled neatly on his lap, folded over the lapels of his coat. His thighs were perfectly angled, spine straight and jaw squared, like a machine waiting to be switched on.

But his gaze, which had yet to settle on Dean, was cast out the front windshield, watching the swipe of the wipers and the patter of rain over the tarnished hood.

Dean tried not to make the mistake of thinking his eyes looked fond.

“What’s the deal, then?” He asked, the sound of his voice sounding jarringly loud in the silence. “Do I have an angel as my co-pilot? Or are you here to say something else that won’t make any sense?”

Castiel made no move to answer, his company narrowed down to nothing but a cold body and a glowering stare. Dean rolled his eyes.

“Well, you’re a regular Chatty Cathy. Tell me something— Sam would’ve wanted in on this. Why not bring him back?”

Just the mention of Sam seemed to get Castiel’s innards working again, the pipes of his spine and clogs of his torso spinning back in place. He turned to Dean in the edging light, the flare of a waning headlight painting him golden, chin to brow.

“You had to do this alone, Dean,” He said lowly, everything in his tone urging Dean not to argue.

Dean tested the weight of it in his mouth, the boldly claim, and prodded back with, “And you don’t care that he’s tearing up the future looking for me right now?”

“Sam’s not looking for you.”

Hurt bled into the grooves of Dean’s chest, and he looked defiantly out the window, ignoring Castiel’s knowing glance. Logically, Dean had no reason to believe Castiel. Dean knew his brother, knew his rage and his protectiveness might not have compared to Dean’s own, but still brought havoc and danger to those willing to step in his way.

He wondered, then, why he found himself unwilling to argue, incapable of finding a center line to hold. A justification to disrupt it all.

The idea of Castiel lying didn’t quite settle right either.

“If I do this, then the family curse breaks right?” Dean asked, hoping Castiel wouldn’t notice his falter. “Mom and Dad live happily ever after and Sam and I grow up playing little league and chasing tail?”

Dean did his best to quench the hope in his veins, keep it away from his voice, but normality was something that came like a racing comet, distant and rare and never slow enough to harbor, and just a graze of it left him speaking through a clotted throat. He wanted that for Sam; always had, even when the jealousy beared down and Dean found himself tailing John to every pit stop in America knowing he’d never get the same thing.

Dean just wanted Sam to live freely. Whether or not Dean was allowed to follow wasn’t all that important.

“I’m concerned over your intentions here, Dean. You realize that if you do alter the future, your father, you, Sam, you’ll never become hunters. And all those people you’ve saved, they’ll die,” Castiel said, almost like he had an opinion on this, some higher morality over Dean’s decision.

“You don’t think I know that?” Dean demanded, half tempted to peel off to the side of the road and hold them in a stand still, annoyance forcing heat to his face.

Castiel’s eyes narrowed. “And you don’t care—”

“Oh I care,” Dean choked out. Castiel’s stare wavered. “I care a lot. But these are my parents. My mom, she—” Dean could still see the whirl of her back at the diner, the haze in her eyes as Dean had begged her not to get out of bed and check a nursery she wouldn’t paint and furnish for another decade. “She didn’t exactly get her fairy tale ending. And seeing her now, before the end, before all of it— I can’t just leave her. I can’t just sit by.”

A part of Dean— that selfish, home-torn part of him that still ached to be placed back in the whiteness of it all, the dusted shelves and the folded blankets and the garage door that creaked every time it opened up to a sunlit driveway dusted in colored chalk— that part wanted to stay.

With his mom, with his grandparents, with this version of his dad that looked so much like who Dean pretended John had been that it scorched something precious and weak. Mangled and broken. It didn’t matter the year, the occasion, the fucked up circumstances of Castiel and Yellow Eyes and Sam being thirty years into the future.

Dean wanted it. And he couldn’t stand it all the same.

“What, no heavenly speech? No lecture over cosmic consequences? You’re really just gonna let me ride this one out?” Dean asked to the answering silence, tearing his eyes off the road to look at Castiel in disbelief.

Castiel shook his head. “Why else would I have brought you here?”

“Fuck if I know. A night out on the town?” Dean quipped, wondering briefly how his companion would even look walking some city street in his billowing coat, eyes sharp and candescent. The thought stilled him. Dean cleared his throat, “What about you? Do angels have like… relatives or whatever?”

And for the first time since Dean had met this creature, Castiel genuinely seemed taken aback. He squinted at Dean curiously.

“If going by the same rulings that humans do, then yes. All angels are created by God, and he reigns as the father of all of us.”

“So… you’ve got quite the sibling count, huh?” Dean smiled, just trying to imagine it, the distance and the cruelty and how all the angels were to each other were soldiers masked in war paint.

“The true number is imperceivable to humans,” Castiel said.

“Of course it is,” Dean huffed, frowning bitterly. “Doesn’t exactly sound like Hallmark material, does it? Holidays must be awkward when you can’t even remember half of your brothers and sisters’ names.”

Castiel turned his head with a lifted brow, eyes softened with confusion. “I remember them all.”

Dean stared at him. “Seriously?”

Castiel’s response was slow, like the words had to be pulled out of him with their bewilderment still attached, “Why wouldn’t I?”

And Dean didn’t know what it was. The tone, the strangeness, or rather the normality, how someone carved in glass and star dust could configure themselves into something that remembered and valued and cared beyond what was necessary. Or maybe it was the way he looked at Dean; as if he couldn’t imagine being any other way.

“I guess I didn’t take you for a sentimentalist,” Dean said lightly, shrugging.

Castiel didn’t say another word.

There was a method to the way in which Castiel made Dean feel.

On most days he was weary of him, hyper-aware of his every move, how the angel walked and talked and existed in this meat suit of a man who looked like suburbia hell manifested. Other times, Dean was fascinated by him. Strangely honored in that pathetically hopeless sort of way that only Dean could pull off.

It wasn’t like Dean to get people’s attention. Sure, he could manage some rowdy women for a few hours. Give them a fun time and a couple of laughs. But this— the watchful staring, the painstaking interest, a wonderment that surpassed anything and everything that was human— Dean didn’t think he’d ever felt anything this extreme. Nobody had ever given Dean the time of day.

And now, there was an angel watching his footing, riding in his car when he could just as easily fly across the world, intrigued by Dean more than anything had the right to be. Now, Dean had an ally. Something hovering in the dead center between friend and enemy.

But it was only when they touched, that Dean let it truly consume him. It was when Castiel reappeared, a hand on Dean’s shoulder, peeling him from 1973 and casting him into the stratosphere back home, that Dean registered the resounding burn vibrating through his limbs, pulsing from the very spot Cas touched.

And Dean was terrified.

It was the sight of blood that coaxed Dean on, revved him up more than anything else.

It didn’t matter that he caused it. He swung at Sam without a beat of sympathy, splitting his lip and drilling for a second, and it was the sight of red that tipped Dean over the edge. Shoved him violently to the trenches, because Sam was bleeding now, crying too, and Dean stared at him with an unquenchable rage, wondering with a churning stomach whether that blood on Sam’s mouth was even human.

And with his hand still throbbing, Dean sent the lamp on the motel dresser crashing into the opposite wall where it shattered on impact, exploding in vicious shards.

“It’s already gone too far, Sam,” Dean heaved, picturing black smoke and charred lungs, the hungered look of power on Sam’s face still fresh in his mind. “If I didn’t know you…” His voice crumbled, grating into a lowered hiss, “I would wanna hunt you. And so would other hunters.”

It was a vicious blow, personal and bone-deep, but Dean didn’t know what else to do. He thought they were passed this, Azazel and the visions, Sam and his powers. Dean had thought Sam and Bobby had put a lid on all of it by the time he was tossed out of the furnace, when really things had just gotten worse, an all new shade of evil.

Now, Sam wasn’t just immune to demons. He was stronger than them, capable of splitting them open and draining them dry, purifying them in a way he only wished he could purify himself.

“You were gone,” Sam finally spoke, sounding wrecked enough to make Dean wither. “I was here. I had to keep on fighting without you. And what I’m doing… it works.”

It was a fine line, Dean’s anger. The sweltering heat at the base of his spine, the constant kick drum in the swell of his throat. It was either all in or nonexistent, and now it was roaring to a violent head, buzzing with the kind of adrenaline-drenched agony he’d become all too familiar with in his time down under.

This was the feeling of having a razor placed in his hand. This was darkness and suffering and spite— and Dean couldn’t allow himself to walk that edge, not now. Not when he was supposed to be learning how to be a person again.

“Well, tell me. If it’s so terrific… then why’d you lie about it to me?” Dean asked. “Why did an angel tell me to stop you?”

Sam’s features took a crippling nose dive, a tremor breaking out in his upper lip, “What?”

Dean could still picture it. The darkness, the threat, Cas’s promise sounding more like a calculated warning than a doomed ending. Fix this with Sam, convince him to step down, or the angels take over. The angels will peel him of sin.

“Cas said that if I don’t stop you, he will.”

“Cas?” Sam retorted, choking on the word like it was something foul, something unthinkable, and Dean flinched as Sam turned on his heel, exasperated. “What, you’ve got a nickname for him now? What happened to keeping the angels at arm's length?”

“What happened to killing demons instead of becoming their bitch boy?” Dean demanded, inflamed with the urge to take it all back, to keep what stayed safe and hidden and tuck it all back towards his chest. “See, what that means, Sam— that means that God doesn’t want you doing this. But you’re just gonna stand there and tell me that everything is all good?”

It was there, in the burnt yellow haze of a motel room in Illinois, that Dean thinks it started. The urge to defend himself. Explain the stirring in his gut, the bizarre sense of trust coating his insides. He didn’t know what it was, why Castiel had become Cas or when suspicion had become blind faith, but at least it wasn’t demonic and at least it wasn’t wrong.

It wasn’t like what Sam was doing. It wasn’t, and Dean planned to tell him as much, but Sam’s phone rang sharp in the surrounding silence, and the moment cracked, Dean’s anger vanishing right along with it.

“Hey, Travis. Hey, yeah—” Sam stammered. He turned away with the phone in hand, clearing the hitch in his voice. “It’s, uh, it’s really not a good time, man.”

One step to the right, and Dean felt glass crackle beneath his foot. An ambulance outside raced past in a blur of jagged movement, the panic of it heightened in a town like this where nothing ever happened. Dean watched it leave in its haste and tear through the wind.

Dean needed to pack his shit. He wanted this place in his rearview.

“Dude,” Dean started, hissing through the dark. “How many times do I have to tell you? Keep your paws— or, wings— off of me. I’m trying to sleep. It’s just weird.”

Slowly, Castiel’s hand peeled itself from Dean’s arm, and his figure leaned away, all crimson blue shadows and power sharp edges.

“Fascinating,” He tilted his head, staring widely at Dean. “How are you doing that?”

Dean swallowed thickly, the burn in his skin still flushing through his system. He looked down towards the bend of his forearm where Cas’s hand had been, expecting some form of lingerence, but there was nothing. Just the memory of cool glass and warm skin, the rush of something unattainable and the breath of something beautiful.

Dean forced his voice not to shake when he asked, “Doing what?”

“I’m stripping you of all ill illusions. Your darkest thoughts, and yet your subconscious still wakes. Why?”

And the worst part was, Cas actually expected Dean to have an answer. As if getting mazel toved by some heavenly Swayze was anything textbook, and Dean could give him a point blank explanation without a single thought.

“Beats me,” Dean shrugged, moving to sit up against the bed frame. “What I wanna know is why you keep trying to catch me with my pants down. Ever heard of knocking?”

“Your mind isn’t familiar with it,” Castiel redirected, insistent and oblivious and marveled, his features turning bright with understanding. “Contentment. You’re used to sleeping through nothing but noise, a constant itch. Silence is more alarming to you than pain ever could be.”

A pulse surfaced in Dean’s throat, ticking away like a time bomb, imploding in slow motion. He didn’t know what to do with that, which crisis to dissect first, and he stared at Castiel and thought, not for the first time, that maybe he should’ve just kept his mouth shut. Maybe he should’ve laid there in the dark and let Cas fix him anew.

“You done?” Dean eventually grounded out, eyebrows raising. “Or do I need to find you some more Dr. Phil reruns to watch?”

Cas exhaled, deep and defeated. “I suppose I’m done,” He said, and for a glittering moment, Dean was startled by just how human he sounded. There was a shift of tone, a breakage of sorts, but then Castiel stood up from his bedside, mechanical and stiff, like a robot masked in human wrapping, and it all fell away.

Dean picked at the comforter with his fingernail, burying his gaze in the sheets.

“Good. Now, the million dollar question,” Dean raised his head. “Why the fuck are you here?”

“It seems your brother took your advice. He’s stopped his… extracurricular activities,” With thoughtless effort, Cas’s eyes tracked away from Dean and across the room towards the other bed. He stared at the lump of sheets resembling Sam, and cut his gaze back to Dean to say, “You did well.”

Dean didn’t even bother to try and understand the stirring that broke out in his core. The praise settled high on his skin, hot in his face, and he didn’t understand it, no, but he knew he hated it. God, did Dean fucking hate it.

“Yeah, okay,” Dean replied pointlessly, shaking his head. “So if Sam’s not tanking again, why do I have heaven’s busboy riding my tail, huh? You gonna give me a straight answer this time?”

“I told you. Heaven has work for you. We want you at your best,” Cas told him, but he was a shitty liar if Dean had ever seen one.

It was a human trait anyway, lying. Dean figured it only made sense.

“My best? Where the hell were you when I almost got my heart ripped out of my chest a week ago? Does coughing up wood chips sound like ‘my best’ to you?” Dean demanded, thinking of the terror of it all, how Cas was some ghost who spoke of God and healing and yet never seemed to show up when it mattered, when Dean asked him to.

It hadn’t been his best moment. Certainly not his strongest. But between the ghost sickness, and the paranoia, and the sweat infused visions of Lilith standing over him with Dean’s heart beating in the jaws of her palm, Dean had hoped for something he never had before.

He’d gripped a Bible for the first time in years, pressed his mouth against the sacred leather, and prayed to be saved by something stronger than himself. It wasn’t Dean’s fault he happened to think of one angel in particular.

Breaking free of his deadened stance, Castiel slipped his hands into the pockets of his trench coat, affected by Dean’s words.

“I can’t always be there to—”

“No, but apparently you can read me bedtime stories on the fly, so what gives. Maybe pitch in from time to time and stop idly standing by,” Dean threw at him, watching angrily as the words rolled and stopped at Cas’s feet. When all Castiel did was stare at them, Dean coughed out a disbelieving laugh. “You’re a hard one to pin down, you know that? Here one second, gone the next— I mean, fuck’s sake— Sam hasn’t even met you. You just show up in the middle of the night like fucking Batman.”

“I’m neither a man nor a bat,” He argued, almost looking offended. “I don’t see how that would even be possible—”

“Jesus, read a book or something, man. Talking to you is like talking to a brick wall.”

For a few painful seconds, there was no response. Cas stood there in the dark and quiet and stared at Dean, always with the fucking staring— and Dean fought hard to convince himself he felt nothing at all.

“I suppose I’ll leave, then,” Castiel said abruptly, and there was no sense of hurt in his voice. Just a strange being trying to understand, trying to make the right decision. “Goodnight, Dean.”

“Goodnight,” Dean grumbled back, even as he willed himself not to.

Halloween had never held much sentiment for the Winchesters. Every day was a horror show for them and the costumes never compared to the real creatures they bled in the dark.

The one upside? Having a holiday purely dedicated to falling into a sugar coma was fucking genius, and the sheer amount of slutty nurses and rabid cheerleaders roaming the streets on Halloween night was enough for it to claim Dean’s seal of approval.

Not to mention the bars were an absolute joy this time of year. The kind of tray spilling, neon hazing, bathroom grinding shit storm that Dean usually threw himself head first in. Truthfully, the only reason he wasn’t already wasted by high noon this year was because he and Sam had a case, but if the razor blade candies and boiling water apple bobbing was any indication, this Halloween was going to be one to remember, with or without the booze.

Although, if Dean played his cards right, and no more bodies turned up, he figured he could probably slip out late that night. No harm done, just a couple drinks, some pretty thing in a skirt if he was lucky, and then he’d be golden.

But all plans of escaping quickly fell away when the case hit its inevitable crest; they were hunting a witch. A powerful one at that, capable of raising the one and only Samhain from his six hundred year dirt nap.

Safe to say, Dean didn’t like their odds, and after visiting the local high school to get more proof that this Tracy chick really was their witch, he and Sam booked it back to their motel room, where Dean watched his brother bound through the door like his ass was on fire.

“Who are you?” Sam shouted, and Dean shouldered his way in when he saw the gleam of Sam’s gun being raised, panic burning in his throat.

The fear only doubled upon seeing Castiel, just the sight of him staring down the barrel of Sam’s gun sending Dean’s heart to the pit of his stomach.

“Sam, Sam, wait!” Dean threw his hand out, too rattled to keep the state of his voice in check. “It’s Castiel,” He breathed, relaxing as Sam finally lowered his weapon. “The angel.”

It was almost funny watching the way Sam’s entire demeanor changed. It was shock that reached him first, punching the air right out of him, and then came a bashful sort of wonderment that had Dean rolling his eyes as Sam stumbled over his words and stretched out a hand.

“Sam Winchester,” Castiel greeted, unnerved and hesitant. “The boy with the demon blood,” He added, shaking Sam’s hand, cradling it between his own. Sam’s mouth twitched. “Glad to hear you’re refraining from using your powers.”

“Let’s keep it that way.”

Across the room, framed in a heavy silhouette cut cleanly by the opened curtains, was a suited man Dean had never seen before. His voice was thunderous, deeper than Cas’s, and even as he spoke, he stayed with his back turned.

“Yeah, okay, Chuckles,” Dean said testingly, throwing the stranger a glare before looking over at Cas. “Who’s your friend?”

“This raising of Samhain, have you stopped it?” Cas asked instead, ignoring Dean just blatantly enough for Dean to feel a prick of annoyance rise in his chest.

“Why?” Dean asked, defensive.

“Dean, have you located the witch?”

“Yes, we’ve located the witch.”

“And is the witch dead?”

“No, but—” Sam tried to cut in, frustrated with the back and forth, but Dean shut it all down with a firm, “We know who it is, okay?” and Castiel finally backed down, his gaze molten hot where he studied Dean’s tone.

Dean fought against the urge to look away. He didn’t like this. He was used to the staring, the observing, but this was more than honest curiosity— this was judgment, and Dean was thrown by the taste of it.

“Apparently, the witch knows who you are, too,” Castiel moved across the room in elegant strides, the lapels of his coat twirling back behind him as he reached the bedside table where a hex bag was placed. He raised it up for them to see, a frown pulling at his lips. “This was inside the wall of your room. If we hadn’t found it, surely one or both of you would be dead. Do you know where the witch is now?”

Dean turned to Sam with a helpless look, neither of them certain how to walk this line.

“We’re working on it,” Dean said.

Disappointment flashed clear and distinct in Castiel’s features, and Dean felt his insides twist. “That’s unfortunate.”

“What do you care?”

“The raising of Samhain is one of the sixty six seals,” Cas finally revealed, and the weight came bearing down, everything heightening to the utmost degree.

The stakes were high strung, higher than Dean could have even imagined, and what had started as a simple case meant to get his head back in the game had quickly become far too much responsibility for his shaking hands to take.

“This is Uriel,” Castiel gestured towards the other figure in the room. “He's what you might call… a specialist.”

“What kind of a specialist?” Dean asked, and he wasn’t afraid, not at first. But then Cas bristled as if caught, that lying thing of his too obvious to ignore, and Dean felt his shoulders rise as they tensed. “What are you gonna do?”

“You— both of you, you need to leave this town immediately,” Cas said.

“Why?” Dean demanded.

“Because we’re about to destroy it.”

If it counted for anything, Castiel at least looked burdened by his words. Like he knew their impact, their devastation. He watched carefully for Dean’s reaction, his face fixed into a permanent scowl.

“So this is your plan? You’re gonna smite the whole fucking town? How does that solve anything?”

“It would solve everything,” Cas refuted, his brow set hard and low. “We’re out of time to come up with solutions with no casualties. This witch has to die, the seal must be saved.”

Sam shook his head. “There are a thousand people here.”

“One thousand two hundred and fourteen,” Uriel corrected, slithering in unannounced and unwanted, just the sight of his smug ass face making Dean’s fists curl.

“And you’re willing to kill them all?” Sam asked, appalled.

Uriel’s smile was dark. “This isn’t the first time I’ve purified a city.”

Dean didn’t even have to look at Sam to know he was feeling the horror creep in, the instinct to turn tail and run too glaring to ignore. This Uriel guy was a goddamn joy, but it was Cas that Dean was really worried about.

Angel or not, this kind of decision just wasn’t Cas’s style. Dean couldn’t shake it.

“It’s the lives of one thousand against the lives of six billion. There’s a bigger picture here,” Castiel insisted, voice grated and eyes hard, daring Dean to argue.

“Right, 'cause you’re ‘bigger picture’ kinda guys,” Dean threw back at him, smiling with a bite that made Cas’s features turn even colder, the bolt of his jaw jumping to attention.

Dean’s knees nearly buckled when Cas took a step towards him. His mind went from daring and rude to fuck fuck fuck as any semblance of personal space blew right past, and it wasn’t fair, having to give in. Dean knew how to evade better than anyone, to ignore and look away and step aside at all the right moments, but Cas was close and Dean could see the shadow of his stubble. Cas was close and Dean could see the curve of his upper lip, the softened skin around his fixated eyes.

In a nervous flutter, Dean felt his tongue dart out to wet his lips. The heat in which Castiel followed the movement stole the air straight from Dean’s lungs.

“Lucifer cannot rise. He does, and hell rises with him,” Castiel paused, taking in a breath Dean knew he didn’t need. “Is that something that you’re willing to risk?”

It was all a test, a game of push and shove— Cas wanted Dean to concede, but Dean didn’t falter. His pulse had charged into a kick drum, and his shoulder felt scorched alive, but Cas’s cards were open and his eyes were blue and Dean looked on with bated breath, never breaking contact.

“No, you can’t do this. You— you’re angels. I mean aren’t you supposed to— you’re supposed to show mercy,” Sam exclaimed, impassioned, and Dean finally blinked, tearing himself away.

“Says who?” Uriel asked, straightening his tie with snobby fingers.

Cas shook his head. “We have no choice.”

“Of course you have a choice,” Dean argued, not all that thrilled to be trapped in Castiel’s eyesight once again. “I mean, come on. You’ve never questioned a crap order? What are you both, just a couple of hammers?”

“Look, even if you can’t understand it, have faith that the plan is just.”

“How can you even say that?” Sam demanded.

“Because it comes from Heaven,” Castiel glared, finally unraveling with the kind of forceful insistence that Dean could recognize like a second skin. “That makes it just.”

Unyielding, like a gunshot firing off with shaky hands, Dean said, “It must be nice to be so sure of yourselves.”

Castiel moved with little falter, hovering with a leering sort of shadow that cast Dean in the gloom. Technically, Dean was still taller this way. On Earth, as humans— Dean had at least two inches on the guy. But Castiel had this power, this mind-bending ability to look at Dean from a craned head and still hold the reins, the extent of his control bone deep, and Dean stared at him from a planetary suspension.

“Tell me something, Dean. When your father gave you an order, didn’t you obey?” Castiel asked him, and every word of it came out soaked with the sort of insight that made Dean’s ears ring.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dean’s voice was hollow, plucked thin with fear, and Cas was looking at him like he knew. Like he knew he scraped some treacherous edge. “Hey. I’m talking to you— what the hell does that mean?”

“Dean,” Sam warned, a voice of reason to his left, and Dean breathed in.

Out.

Stood there and watched Cas look at him without a single inclination to answer. Spite curdled in Dean’s gut.

“You know what?” He grinned, loud and sideways. “No. Sorry, boys, it looks like the plans have changed. You wanna smite the town— so be it. But you’re gonna have to sink the whole fleet, me and Sam, ‘cause we’re not leaving.”

Uriel outright laughed. “And what makes you think we won’t do just that?”

Because my faith lies somewhere it shouldn’t, Dean thought. But the truth wasn’t an option and instead he shot for higher, holding himself with the kind of confidence he’d only ever pretended to have.

“Because your little boy toy over there went through the trouble of pulling me out of Hell, and I figure that means I’m worth something to the man upstairs.”

There wasn’t a piece of him that meant it. Believed it. God was a story and a smoke-bled shadow in the corner of a room, never appearing when he was needed. But Uriel just looked at Dean as if he’d had a dawning, a bitter-tasting truth, and Cas cut his eyes to the floor.

For now, Dean considered it a win.

When Castiel first appeared, Dean had thought nothing but the wind accompanied the bench beside him.

There was a mighty breeze set loose that day, a phantom ghost that had tree limbs creaking and swing sets crying, every mother and their child clutching one another for dear life. And Dean had thought nothing of it at first, the spindle of air just out of his sight nothing but the caress of a late fall evening.

Then, that feeling rose in him. The feeling. The one Dean couldn’t name, could hardly even place. But it bloomed in his chest and flushed towards his ribs and without even bothering to turn, he said, “Let me guess. You’re here for the ‘I told you so.’”

Cas didn’t look at him. Simply, he said, “No,” and Dean nodded in mocked satisfaction.

“Well, good, ‘cause I’m really not that interested.”

And maybe it was the sound of Dean’s voice. Maybe it was the impatience thrumming beneath his skin, Sam’s recent betrayal still fresh on his mind. Maybe Cas had actually picked up on a few things during his weeks of peeling Dean open and humming him soft and pliant, but the last thing Dean expected to come out of the angel’s mouth was:

“Are you alright?”

The words hung there, alone, silent, for what felt like years. They hurt Dean, in a way. They infuriated Dean, in a different way. And there was more, other ways, other feelings— too many fucking feelings— and Dean decided quickly and suddenly that not now.

He couldn’t think about this now.

“I know you know what Sam did back there,” Dean said, short and stiff, his eyes still casted over the chattering playground. “He disobeyed your little orders, went against his word— lied to me so— yeah. How do you think I’m doing?”

In his peripheral, Dean could see the slow shift of Cas’s gaze, how he shook his head gently. “You two were under impossible circumstances—”

“Oh don’t start with that crap,” Dean spat, finally turning and facing Cas with fire brewing in his core. “What is it with you, huh? One minute you’re telling me you’ll smite my brother yourself if he doesn’t start flying straight, and the next you’re making up excuses for him?” Cas watched in silence as Dean inhaled shakily, his anger diffusing into a muted bitterness. “Just tell me you think he’s a monster. Tell me you think I’m a fuck up and that the world might as well be swirling down the toilet so long as Sam and I are on the frontline.”

“I’m not here to judge you, Dean,” Cas said.

“Then why are you here?” Dean demanded, torn between pissed off and just plain confused, his emotions stretched to their bursting limits. “Why are you always—”

“Our orders—” Castiel tried.

“Yeah, you know I’ve had about enough of these orders of yours,” Dean cut in, dismissing him without a beat of sympathy, and Castiel deflated.

He turned his chin up, shoulders drawing back, and all Dean could imagine was the overshadow of wings like a weight strapped to Cas’s spine, his feathers settling in the breeze.

“Our orders were not to stop the summoning of Samhain,” He revealed calmly, trying to earn Dean’s attention back. Dean didn’t bother admitting he’d never really lost it in the first place. “They were to do whatever you told us to do.”

Instantly, the pretending game lost all appeal, and Dean looked at Cas through a cloud of disbelief.

“Your orders were to follow my orders?”

“It was a test. To see how you would perform under… battlefield conditions, you might say.”

“It was a witch,” Dean said lightly, not understanding. “Not the Tet Offensive.”

A chuckle rang in the air, an honest to god laugh, and even though Dean was there watching— seeing the tremble of Cas’s shoulders, witnessing the way his mouth curled sideways when he smiled, it was inconceivable. It was blasphemous.

A man made of stone was sitting to Dean’s left, and it was with a smile that he began to crack.

“I didn’t know you could do that.”

Cas stared at Dean for a long moment. He had wrinkles in the corners of his eyes. “Do what?”

“Pull that stick out of your ass.”

And again, Castiel smiled. The only difference now was that Dean could witness its beginning, its subtle bloom, and he got to feel his chest ache in a way it hadn’t before. He got to feel the full effect of what happens when you pair a handsome face with a budding heart, and Dean didn’t at all know how to cope.

“So, uh, I failed your test, huh?” Dean folded his hands together, accepting. “I get it. But you know what? If you were to wave that magic time traveling wand of yours, and we had to do it all over again— I’d make the same call,” He said, standing his ground like he assumed he’d need to fight for it, but Cas was quiet. Patient in a way that made Dean fidget for words, “See I don’t know what’s gonna happen when these seals are broken, hell I don’t know what’s gonna happen tomorrow. But what I do know is, is that this, here? These kids, the swings, the trees… all of it is still here because of my brother and me.”

When Castiel shook his head, an instant pit surfaced in Dean’s stomach.

“You misunderstand me, Dean. I’m not like you think. I was praying that you would choose to save the town,” He said, and there was something so calming in the way he spoke, so undeservedly reassuring that Dean couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow.

“You were?”

Castiel leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. Slowly, almost as an afterthought, he laced his fingers together and looked out across the park. His hair was a graceless spindle in the wind.

“These people, they’re all my father's creations. They’re works of art. And yet, even though you stopped Samhain, the seal was broken. And we are one step closer to Hell on Earth for all creation, and that’s not an expression, Dean. You of all people should… understand what that means.”

Now, it was caution that crept in his tone. Like he knew there was a line he wasn’t supposed to cross here, and Dean wondered for the millionth time who the hell Cas was even supposed to be. Most days, Dean could picture him as the machine he was; some bodily host melded together with bolts and screws and metal piping, his chest devoid of anything that mattered.

But then Cas would speak, and he’d make the unforgivable mistake of sounding like he cared.

“What you said about my dad earlier. And now, with Hell—” Dean struggled for a moment, blind and searching for a direction, unsure how to proceed in a way that gave him the answer he wanted. Whatever that answer might be. “Did you see?” Dean swallowed, searching Cas’s eyes. “When you pulled me out, rode me sky high. Did you… I mean, did you see how—”

“Yes, Dean. I’ve walked through every memory of yours you could imagine.”

The dread turned painful, almost agonizing. It bruised in his center and splintered throughout, digging itself into every crease imaginable, undoubtedly destined to turn up again at some point or another.

Even pointless, Dean’s first instinct was to deflect. He thought about his childhood— I only did those things because I had to, to keep food on the table for Sam, you have to understand I— thought about his time down under— if I hadn’t done what I did, I’d have turned out worse, I would’ve been meat on a hook and I couldn’t do it I couldn’t take it anymore— and Dean thought he could have been convincing.

He could thread the lies. Tie them in a neat little bow. Say all the right things with the right words. But Cas, apparently, wasn’t finished.

“I’ve memorized the patterns of your blood cells and each fragment of your vertebrae. I know the shape of you and the heart of you and I pieced you back together and assured that everything remained intact,” He said, like it was something easy, something Dean was supposed to take in stride rather than gawk at. Castiel’s eyes softened, and his voice dropped an entire octave just to murmur, “I know everything, Dean.”

“Fuck,” Dean choked out. Suddenly, he felt skinned alive all over again. “That’s—”

Not everything. He can’t know everything.

“I don’t say that with the intention of making you uncomfortable. You’re a guarded man, Dean. I just…” Cas waited, maybe for Dean, maybe for himself, but Dean took it upon himself to breathe in that silence. Let the wind dry the sudden wetness from his eyes. “I wish to be honest with you,” He continued, sincere. “Can I tell you something if you promise not to tell another soul?”

Dean’s mouth worked all on its own, his mind vacant, “Okay.”

“I’m not, um,” He hesitated, tilting his head towards the sun, bearing the line of his throat. Dean could see his thinking, like a cognitive process entirely of his own making. “A hammer, as you say. I have questions. I have doubts. I don’t know what is right and what is wrong anymore, whether you passed or failed here. But, in the coming months, you will have more decisions to make. I don’t envy the weight that’s on your shoulders, Dean. I truly don’t.”

Dean studied him, trying to find a motive, a reason behind it all, because this almost sounded like support. Like comradery, trust, maybe something even deeper, and Dean didn’t know how to swallow that.

Dean had never been any good at making friends.

And for a moment, Dean even thought about saying as much. I don’t know what this is but I’m hoping you do, he’d say. Because I’m shit at reading a room and I don’t want to be wrong in thinking I managed to get someone other than Sam to give a damn about me.

But Dean’s mouth didn’t open, his courage flickered and died, and what would it even matter anyway. Cas probably already knew.

The silence lasted a long while. Dean was surprised by the comfort of it, how easy it felt to be five feet away from a creature who would’ve ripped up the roots of this town and blasted them all towards the sun if Dean had asked him to. It wasn’t awkward in the way Dean figured it should be, in the way he painfully anticipated, but it sent something wild and fragile fluttering in the space between his ribs, and there was only so much he could take before he gave in— cutting his eyes to the opposite bench.

And this time, it really was just the wind holding his company, Cas’s presence long gone.

Dean neared a smile.

“See ya, Cas.”

The nightmare began the same way it inevitably ended.

With blood and hellfire and the sharp white glare of freedom scraping through the hollow of Dean’s teeth. Sleep became torture and reality turned dark, rain pooling into metal, flesh charring into dirt.

Dean’s world narrowed back down to a singular moment, a fraction of life, and the weight of a blade in his palm melded right into the skin, seeping towards bone. There were flashes of white heat and pools of toxic red, but mostly there was just black. An emptiness that never left, even as he was tossed around and strung up bare, even as he was unhooked and carving— that feeling was never really gone.

Until it was.

Until the roof caved in and the flood lights shined down with a chorus of noise, of rampant flight, and Dean found himself being pulled through a slideshow of time, fighting something else entirely. The feeling of it— of Heaven, of glory, of an angel’s wings bared wide over the breadth of his shoulders— it was unlike anything Dean had ever felt or would think to describe.

It was just— Cas. And sometimes the nightmares won over, sometimes Dean was a victim every time he fell asleep. But other times— times like these, it was nothing but memories, a playback. And if there was anything Dean wanted to relive, it was the feeling of salvation after a lifetime of believing he was damned for eternity.

“Dean,” The voice was foggy, far away. Out of place. “Dean, wake up.”

Reality bent backwards and Dean woke with a full body flinch, tearing himself apart just to resurface with a gasp.

Right.

Concrete, Washington.

He was on a case.

“What? I’m up, I’m up— what?” Dean grumbled, ignoring the ripple of his back to sit up on the bed, rubbing his eyes.

Sam stared at him from the dining table, eyebrows raised. “Sleep well?”

“Yeah,” Dean craned to his right, blindly trusting his fingers to find the bottle of whiskey he’d left somewhere on the ground. He smiled when he succeeded, draining the flask in three easy gulps. “Tan, rested, and ready.”

Sam’s response was all breath, tension heavy in his quiet sigh.

“Dean, come on, man. You think I can’t see it?”

Dean squinted over his shoulder. “See what?

“The nightmares, the drinking. I’m with you 24/7, I know when something’s going on,” Sam sighed, resolute and convinced, expecting an explanation.

But Dean just stood up with a full body ache, wincing as he moved, “Sam, please.”

He forced ease into the way he stretched, bent and twisted. Pretended Sam’s pestering didn’t ignite something alive and ragged in his stomach.

“Uriel wasn’t lying, but you are,” Sam relaxed into his chair, trying to come across as comforting, but Dean just wanted to escape. Scratch at these motel walls and watch the paper peel up. “You remember Hell, don’t you?”

So it wasn’t just Cas that knew Dean’s dirt. Uriel did too, maybe all the angels. Maybe the infamous Dean Winchester being tossed and shredded down under was hot gossip, traded between beings like something dangerous and shocking.

Dean paled at the thought, and all he could manage to come back with was, “What do you want from me, huh?”

And it was weak, pleading. He didn’t want Sam to ask this of him. But his brother was something, now. He pushed for the sake of kindness. Wanted the truth so he could help, and Dean knew that— Dean hated and loved him for that. But this couldn’t be helped.

This gnawing in his chest couldn’t be guided.

“The truth, man. I mean, I’m your brother. I just wish you’d talk to me,” Sam told him, and it landed with a blow, striking a rhythm in Dean that made his eyes narrow.

“What, and you talk to me? You really wanna play that game, Sam?”

Sam’s jaw clenched with irritation. “You talk to Cas.”

Dean stilled where he had perched at the end of the bed, fingers fumbling over tattered sleeves. “What?”

“Castiel,” Sam repeated. “You two talk, don’t you? When I’m not around?”

The way Sam phrased it, the way he was— it wasn’t like that. It was nothing, actually. God forbid Dean get a good night's rest every now and again. Why shouldn’t he keep Cas around? Tucked in his pocket for good measure? And it was different anyway. Whether Dean wanted him to or not, Castiel already knew the weight Dean carried. At least with Cas there was less talking, less bleeding of the heart.

Dean could just— he could just be.

Dean shook his head. “How does this have anything to do with—”

“You were calling his name in your sleep.”

Dean froze amongst glaring headlights, a gasp caught in his dying throat. He opened his mouth, startled, desperate to do some damage control, but nothing ever came. He was shaken. Pinned to the floor by a truth he hadn’t yet faced, and the thought of Sam having gotten a hold of it before Dean could stash it all away had him scrambling mid air.

“I’m not doing this with you,” Dean said.

“Doing what?” Sam laughed, quick and decisive, the bulk of it landing like a punch. His voice traveled as Dean moved across the room, desperate to get away. “Obviously you care about the guy if you’re asking him to come to your rescue.”

Anger reared its big ugly head, pooling in the tank of Dean’s stomach, and there was that instinct again— like an edge waiting to be tripped on, the relentless need to defend in a way he’d never dared to. Dean had been taking punches all his life, sprinting in the direction he was dragged. Sam pushed his buttons while dad steered his head and that was it, that was the way it worked.

The urge to scream see me like a highway-lit road sign was something Cas, and only Cas, had ever been able to dig out of him.

“Come on, can we stow the couples therapy? Please? We’re on a job, I wanna work. What do you got?” Dean coaxed, trying to win Sam over, and he must have looked even half as miserable as he felt, because it worked.

Reluctantly, Sam dropped all of it.

This time, Dean didn’t bother with a greeting. Once his eyes were open and his limbs were upright, he ignored the tightness in his chest to ask, “That dickback Uriel know you’re here?”

Castiel didn’t say a word as Dean got out of bed and threw on his jacket. He just hovered like he always did, perched and waiting, and Dean made a face at him as he fixed his collar and went to fetch his boots by the door.

“No, and I would suggest you keep this between us,” Cas said carefully.

“Yeah I bet you do,” Dean muttered, shaking his head. “What gives? I thought you were his heavenly boss.”

There was a tension set loose in that room, tension that hadn’t been there before their tussle with Samhain, and Dean waded in it with painful uncertainty, unable to escape the feeling that what they were doing— whatever the hell it was, was something even he couldn’t justify.

“I might be Uriel’s superior, but he has no issues reporting me to the Garrison when he believes my performance on Earth is… lacking,” Castiel drew away as he spoke, retreating to the shadows, and Dean turned to him with widened eyes, something tender burning beneath his skin.

Thoughtlessly, he said, “He thinks you’re going full Spock.”

It was nothing but a projection. Hope manifested into words, and Dean paled at their honesty. It was only by luck that they flew straight over Cas’s head.

“I’m not familiar with human insults,” He squinted at Dean, waiting for an explanation.

“I wasn’t— god, forget it,” Dean spun around with a wave of his hand, all the heat in his body flushing towards his neck. “Listen, Cas, I’m flattered you want to, uh, bunk with me, or whatever. I’m sure standing on angel watch gets pretty fucking boring. But this is getting a little—”

“Cas.”

The mistake registered just a second too late, and Dean bristled where he stood, the word caught dead on his lips.

Dean swallowed. “What?”

“You called me Cas.”

Dean expected more judgment in the storm of Cas’s voice. He knew he was capable of it. That wind swept, gravel battered tone. But instead he sounded bewildered, turned soft and curious like a flower unfurling, waiting for answers like a plant wished for the sun.

“It’s just a nickname, man,” Dean said. He let out a breath. “Castiel feels too biblical, like it’ll give me a bad rash.”

“Nicknames. That— that’s a court of friendship, is it not?”

Dean scoffed. “What are you? Five?”

Dean couldn’t meet his eye. Not now, not with the beast rumbling in his chest, the thrumming in his fingertips. But Castiel was searching now, striding across the room like a bird in flight, and Dean pulled himself up strong and taunt, foregoing the laces on his shoes completely.

“Do you consider me a friend, Dean?” He was standing abnormally close to Dean, even for Cas, and the heat turned cagey, bordering them both.

“You’re not an enemy,” Dean managed to ground out. There was an itch in his skull he couldn’t reach. A far away ache he felt the need to press on like a bruise. “And in my book, that’s high praise.”

“I see,” Cas said, contemplative. Dean watched as he formed the words over cracked lips. “Thank you.”

“You don’t have to—” A coat rack teetered as Dean sidestepped to get to the door, and his hands fumbled for the wall, suddenly desperate for balance. Cas’s smile was small, almost polite. He felt it fully even if he hid it in the shadows, and Dean recovered with an intelligent nod, “Whatever. Come on.”

“Where are we going?” Cas asked. His footing stuttered, already preparing himself to follow.

“To get some fresh air. I’m sick of having to speak in tongues with you,” Dean demanded, snatching the motel key off the counter and ignoring the face Cas made at him.

“There’s no need to whisper. Sam won’t wake up.”

The mist of an early morning seeped in as Dean quietly opened the door, a shiver trapped in his spine. He turned to Cas with an eyebrow raised, a smile carved into his voice as he said, “Well that sounds ominous,” and continued his way outside.

Castiel said nothing as he followed. Dean leaned around him and closed the door.

“I’ve been making sure your brother stays undisturbed when I visit, that’s all,” Cas explained.

“Right, right. You want me all to yourself— I get it,” Dean joked, but it didn’t settle nearly as comfortably in his chest as he hoped it would.

The silence that grew was deafening, ringing out as Dean took a seat at the edge of the concrete path and patted his jacket for cigarettes. He fished them out with a shaking head, tapping at the box nervously. It wasn’t like him to second guess the crap he said; but with Cas it was glaring, it was different, the words had a weight to them and they caught in Dean’s throat like quicksand.

There was a tremble to Dean’s fingers as he pressed a cigarette between his teeth and lifted the box to his right.

“Want one?”

Castiel stared down at him. His voice was soft, too used to the quiet, “No, thank you.”

“Suit yourself. God knows you could do with a little unwinding.”

There was the power-bled warmth of Cas’s eyes on him as Dean lit up. He felt a strain in his hand as he flicked back the lid, the sort of discomfort that came with getting too much attention, and breathed in as the bud was set aglow.

Instantly, relief sprawled slow and lazy over the heat of Dean’s skin.

“How does this work anyway?” Dean asked once his chest finally felt wide enough to speak through, urging him to wonder aloud. Dean looked up at Cas with his grin veered sideways, smoke curling up the bridge of his nose. “The dream stuff, the healing. How do you know when I’m having a nightmare?”

Castiel’s lips parted slowly, filling with rampant thought. He hesitated. “It’s… complicated.”

Gradually, like his limbs had to process the movement, Castiel leaned into the column suspending the roof above them. The paint was chipping around the bottom. Their room number was printed just to the right of his head. And with a conscience all his own, Cas crossed his legs, right over left, and stayed there.

Standing. Lounging. Being.

His head sank low on his shoulders, tucking in from the cold, and his hands slipped calm and easy into the pockets of his coat.

Dean took another drag from his cigarette, this one heavier than the last.

“I think you know better than anyone that I won’t be getting any more sleep tonight. Consider me free and curious.”

It was an offer. Like a line being casted, and Dean both yearned and dreaded for the hook. His gaze stayed calm over the motel lot as he waited for Cas to give him his answer. He tried not to flick ash onto the parking beam in front of him so harshly.

“When I captured your soul in Hell, you were resistant to me,” Cas finally said. “You’d spent the last forty years fighting for every breath, and when you saw me you—” His voice wavered, hanging there in the balance, and Dean blinked through the memory of a white light. Struggled hard against the sudden warmth in his throat. “You fought. You were confused, scared. You didn’t know what I was, only that I was something powerful, a creature you had never seen before. But when I touched you, when I left my mark—”

“You mean the handprint?” Dean couldn’t stop himself from interrupting, turning to look at Cas incredulously. He gestured to his shoulder. “You did this little number on purpose?”

“No. No, I—” Castiel’s gaze bored sharp into the crest of Dean’s shoulder, lips parting around stilted air. His throat bobbed beneath his collar. “I didn’t mean to. But when I finally got close and reached for you…”

A car rolled past in a flare of white light, spitting up water over the pavement. Dean watched the tail end of brake lights turn off onto the street.

“What?” He asked.

“You reached for me too,” Cas breathed, softer than anything. “And the power was overwhelming, I couldn’t— I couldn’t control myself. I wanted to get you out and kill everything that got in my way, and ever since then I’ve been attuned to you. I feel what you feel. I hear when you’re in anguish. My only wish is to do what I can to stop it.”

Dean gathered those words close, let them burn in his chest like smoke. He figured it was easier this way; smothering them would hurt less than accepting them. But he breathed in, quick and sudden— deep, too deep, and it flooded him like a current. The meaning and the truth and the thinning line in between, every word pounding back as a physical tick in the scarring of Dean’s shoulder.

Dean bit out a laugh. “All of this just ‘cause one little brand?”

“The handprint is nothing but a physical embodiment of the connection made. I can erase it if you wish—”

His hand flew out in the darkness, reaching, searching, and panic billowed in Dean’s lungs, sudden enough to make him jerk away.

“No. I mean—” Cas said nothing as he pulled his hand back, stuffing it back in his pocket, but his gaze turned pointed and he watched as Dean gaped at him, struggling to find his own voice. Weakly, Dean argued, “I didn’t say you had to get rid of it. You said it yourself, it’s just a physical mark. Getting rid of it won’t scrub me clean,” and when Cas said nothing in return, they left it at that. Dean rubbed frantically at the skin beneath his eye, vibrating as he plowed forward, “So what does this mean for me? I’m like some pet you keep on a leash, is that it?”

It was a straining thought, no matter how Dean felt around him.

Most of the time, he thought he felt protected. Looked after. There was no real way to tell Cas just how much it meant to wake up slow and gradual, sunlight bleeding through his eyelids. How it mattered to feel warmth that wasn’t fire and a peaceful sort of drowsiness that wasn’t extinguished by instant fright.

It meant a lot to Dean, was all. But Cas couldn’t know that because Dean would rather die than admit it and maybe Cas wouldn’t even get it anyway. Maybe it would be easier if he didn’t.

“No, Dean,” He assured, firmly. Steadily. Almost like it mattered. “But I will always come when you call. When you need me,” His presence burned like a stake at Dean’s back, ever looming, and Dean watched as his shadow seeped across the pavement like oil, stretching outwards in the dark. “You and your brother, it’s your destiny to stop Lilith, to… carry out the prophecy. I don’t misunderstand the importance that you hold, and I will do everything in my power to keep you safe. To keep the plan as is.”

In the grand scheme of things, Castiel’s words shouldn’t feel small. There was a storm blowing in. Hell was rustling in the dirt, a promise of ending days. But Cas spoke over his shoulder, stood there in the dark, and Dean couldn’t feel any of it.

He couldn’t feel any of the fear beneath the roiling warmth.

Dean closed his eyes amongst an onslaught of smoke. He inhaled it deep in his lungs, hummed as it grazed the back of his throat, and released. Dean’s fingers had already grown numb by the time he stamped the cigarette out in the vacant lot, twisting until the embers gave a final relinquished gasp.

Smoke twirled through the gaps of Cas’s shadow, bending as it disappeared.

“The plan,” Dean repeated slowly, smiling to himself. “Right.”

Chapter Text

It was sometime between looking Alastair in the eyes again and pulling a full Dukes of Hazard stage dive out of a church that Dean realized he was totally and royally fucked.

“Dude,” Dean said, gripping the wheel and fighting a tremble.

Sam winced through a mouthful of blood, leaning further into the passenger door. “I know.”

“We should really invest in a safe house, man. I’m sick of getting stuck halfway up shits creek only to have to tail it back to some random middle-America sleaze fest.”

“Who the hell was that back there? It looked like he recognized you,” Sam said, panting through the words, and Dean handled composure like a sharpened knife, balancing it on the tip of a finger.

“Yeah, yeah, he—” Dean stuttered, stopped. He shook his head in a panic. “Let’s just say we got familiar with each other during my time downstairs. Leave it at that.”

“Familiar?” Sam turned to him in the tightness of the front seat, looking to meet Dean’s gaze. Blood was pouring a steady trail from his eyebrow down to his chin. “You realize how that sounds right?”

Dean’s eyes widened. “Jesus, Sam—”

“I’m just saying! Find a better expression or… something.”

There was a distinctive burn that sprouted from the base of Dean’s throat. Some acidic taste that had Dean swallowing back saliva with a forceful wince, every one of his senses rung tightly in the cage of his ribs. His heart was a pounding drum. Fighting for air as he wrangled with the truth and thought about just how close Sam was to ripping it from him.

“His name’s Alastair,” Dean said weakly, and the word felt all wrong. Too normal. On this plain, in this time, spoken rather than screamed— it was too normal. “And being on his hit list is the equivalent of having Bugsy on our tail.”

“Sounds like our usual odds,” Sam muttered. He pressed a weak hand to the top of his bicep, fingers curling with a tremor. Instantly, the pressure sent red pooling to the surface, bleeding through his shirt, and Dean hastily looked away.

“Shit, that looks bad.”

“Yeah?” Sam laughed, a little crazed, doped on adrenaline, and Dean turned back to a twelve-year-old Sam who was smiling just to keep Dean from panicking, wiping up the blood just to stop Dean from gripping too hard and shouting too loud because dad’s gonna kill me, Sammy, he told me to keep an eye on you and now he’s gonna—

Things weren’t all that different between them. Even now, years down the line.

The road had splintered, sure. Trust was something that had to be earned now, and Sam wasn’t a kid anymore. But he smiled at Dean, blood coating his teeth, sweat-soaked in his hair, and Dean pressed harder on the gas, remembering for a brief moment what it was he was fighting for.

“I, uh, I’m new to this. I don’t even know if this works so— bear with me here,” The slow hiss of the motel shower turning on made Dean’s head turn, and he counted the beats. Made sure Sam wouldn’t get any second thoughts, before bearing his arms and saying, “I hereby pray to thee Castiel, Angel of Thursday, wearer of ugly coats, to get his skinny ass down here. He’s got mail.”

In record timing, Cas appeared with a blimp of energy, his current sending the ceiling fan overhead to spin in a powerless rotation.

“What’s wrong with my coat?” He asked defensively, painfully close to a pout, and Dean looked at him through a cloud of awe.

His smile was soft. “Nothing, man. I just knew that’d get your panties in a twist.”

“I’m not wearing any—”

“You know what, not important,” Dean frantically waved off. He stood up from the bedside, springs creaking with relief, and stuffed his hands in his pockets. He felt the urge to roll his sleeves up; expel the sudden heat. “Point is, I called you here for a reason. Have the angels caught wind of a girl named Anna Milton?”

Intentional or not, recognition flared sharp in Cas’s eyes, and his vessel straightened back as if pulled, his shoulders stitched together by a single puppeted thread.

“Yes, we’re in the process of obtaining her. Do you know where she is?” He took a purposeful step forward, right in Dean’s direction, and Dean didn’t think he should’ve been able to feel it like a physical quake in the ground.

“No, but I was hoping you could figure it out. See, Sam and I were trying to get the jump on her, at least before the demons could snatch her up. But uh,” Dean smiled bitterly. “We lost her. Got split up. Now, she’s god knows where with Ruby.”

Castiel frowned. “Ruby. The demon that’s been fornicating with your brother for the past year.”

“Winner winner chicken dinner,” Dean said, clicking his tongue. “Sam’s trying to convince me we can trust her to keep Anna safe, told me all about their summer love fest. But anything with black eyes is a hard no in my book. I figure Anna would be better off with you guys.”

It felt nice, coming to Cas with something useful. This Anna chick seemed to be a real star player, an angel voice box who could turn the tide for either side, and distrusting or not, there was a team Dean preferred. It wasn’t that hard of a choice.

“I appreciate that, Dean. I’ll search for Ruby and—” Cas stalled as his eyes zeroed in on Dean’s shoulder. “You’re hurt.”

Embarrassment crept in Dean’s stomach, instinctive and raw. He looked down at himself, smiling through the urge to back away.

“Oh, yeah. Did I mention Sam and I had to jump through a two-story window to get away? Hurt like a bitch, but I’m sure we looked badass, so…” Dean shrugged, hoping to brush it off, but Cas’s stare was demanding and it was getting harder to ignore the heat itching at his ears. “I just earned myself a busted shoulder. S’not that bad.”

“You also received three broken ribs, a bruised tailbone, and a sprained wrist,” Castiel added.

Dean grinned. “Just another Tuesday.”

“And your face? Is that from the fall?”

“Alastair joined the party.”

An understanding seeped into the shape of Cas’s mouth, forcing his voice quiet, and his curiosity fell away. His eyes softened; less quizzical, less medical. All Dean could see was that he cared, and it was official then. Cas knew about Alastair too.

“Oh. I see,” Cas said, quietly. He reached a hand out. “I can help, Dean.”

A spark shot towards Dean's shoulder, diving like a bullet taking off from Cas’s palm, and he staggered back with rabid eyes, breathless in less than a second. Even the concept of touch from Cas made his skin boil. Brought on this ceaseless current that felt like anticipation but settled like lead, warm and right but stiff and heavy in the shape of Dean’s body, his limbs never quite knowing what to do with it.

“Yeah, you can help by finding that poor girl,” Dean deflected as he avoided the touch, suddenly hyper aware of the scar on his shoulder. “She’s scared to death about all this. I mean, why her, huh? Of all people, why does she get chosen to be tossed into this crap factory?”

“I don’t know,” Cas said, reaching out yet again. “But you need to be ready to fight. The demons won’t back down until they have a source like Anna on their side. There’s no reason to suffer when you don’t have to.”

“Cas—”

And then Cas was touching his shoulder, the bruised shoulder, the handprint shoulder, and it was different when Dean was awake. When darkness didn’t make it easy and exhaustion didn’t stampen the rush as it spiraled up the bolt of Dean’s spine, snapping him inwards as his chest rose in flames.

A gasp was forced from Dean and his hand darted out in a rave of panic, clamping over the bone of Cas’s wrist. Warm, pliant, alive, with a pulse that flared beneath Dean’s fingers, like a frantic bird desperate to beat its wings, and there— beneath a glare of starlight and a galaxy forged color too prosperous to perceive— laid the barest glimpse of a being Dean had only seen in fire tinged echoes; the Castiel whose presence carried the weight of carting black wings.

Dean rumbled amidst the light.

And crashed as it left, receding behind a mountainous cliff tarnished in black and white. Castiel’s hand fell away and he staggered back as if pushed, staring at Dean with panicked eyes.

“What,” Dean exhaled. “What was—”

“Goodbye, Dean,” Cas said.

“Wait.”

A storm bursted in the shell of Dean’s ears and his body was sent toppling, landing back on the opposite bed with a painful squeak of springs. Wind scrubbed his eyelids raw as the energy bubbled and hissed, and the single buzzing light dangling from the popcorn ceiling shattered in a collection of sparks, raining down with the sudden silence.

Dean groaned as he forced himself off the bed, crawling over glass covered blankets to stand again.

“Cas?” He called aloud, fear stuck in his throat. There wasn’t an answer.

Castiel was gone. But his memory remained, cemented into the walls, stitched into the carpet. The blaze in Dean’s arm was a surging warmth that insisted he was near, watching from a higher plain, and from then on, that feeling never quite went away. It lingered on Dean’s skin, sinking into the rivets of his chest.

It was scorched into his system, etched into his coding, where it became as fundamental as breathing in air.

Sam and Dean were dead to the world when Ruby decided to tip them her location, scared of an oncoming attack, and they rose like flocking doves, diving out of their bedsides to pack and scatter.

“Does this not seem the least bit shady to you?” Dean asked, sidestepping a bug infested mud pile just shy of Baby’s front left wheel.

He couldn’t see much of anything in the waning twilight, the sky barely visible through the tree line, but Sam’s shoulders took a telling plunge and Dean glared into the weight of his back.

“We’ve been over this, Dean. Ruby is—”

“Right as a peach, yeah, yeah,” Dean grumbled. He trudged on ahead, digging his boots through the terrain. “Whatever. Doesn’t mean I gotta be happy about the shit hole she chose to squat in.”

When Sam didn’t bother responding, Dean sighed into the silence. Fall was brewing in the distance, just far enough for Dean to still sweat through his layers, and he walked with a dreaded limp, peeling his jacket off with sticky hands.

“Sammy? Be a dear and carry this would you?”

The jacket hadn’t even left Dean’s hands before Sam was turning and smacking it to the forest floor, his mouth turned down in offense.

“What the fuck do I look like? A coat rack?”

Dean snatched his jacket up with rolling eyes, making a real show of dusting the thing off. He smiled in Sam’s direction, “I was thinking more along the lines of a bitch, but, to each their own.”

Ruby’s choice of safe house was an abandoned barn just shy of a mile off the road, its foundation submerged and crumbling. The wood smelled of barren land and drying moss, every brush of wind splitting right through the floorboards. Dean had seen some dingy hideouts in his day, regrouping points that made the middle of nowhere seem glamorous, but this was just fucking depressing.

The only upside was that in a place so hopeless, Anna stood out with an electric glow. Dean smiled upon seeing her.

“Hi, Dean,” She said, something like relief shining bright in her face.

“Hey, sweetheart. You doin’ okay?”

“I guess so, considering,” She shrugged. “Although, I was wondering if I could call my parents? I can’t imagine how freaked they must be right now.”

Dean did his best to conceal his reaction, keep himself anchored. But a dawning flashed in his features, quicker than a second, and Anna stripped him of it with clambering hands, heartbreak shattering in her eyes.

“Sam?” She demanded, moving on when she realized Dean didn’t have the reaction she was looking for. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

Crickets chirped in the overgrowth outside, waiting in tumultuous clouds, and Dean sagged heavily into the caving wall as he listened to Anna cry. Telling someone their parents were dead and gone wasn’t easy in any situation; let alone a woman so young. But this was Sam’s expertise, his thriving power. He was the healer, the talker, the kind of guy you poured your soul out to, and Dean forced himself to remember that when he nearly broke off to join them, wishing to comfort Anna in his own right.

No. Dean was better off staying where he was. Even twisted and on the brink Sam was far more cut out for this kind of thing. They were meant to protect Anna, and they would; Dean just needed to wait until there was something for him to punch.

It was a few hours from sunlight when the barn’s silence finally lifted, the balance of the night splitting with raw energy. Anna was fast asleep in the other room, some piss poor supply closet Dean had managed to fix up well enough to be settled in, and all entrances were bolted and lined with salt, protected as well as they could be given their circumstance.

Their odds were bleak, to put it plainly.

The twin shotguns Sam and Dean carried wouldn’t do a damn thing to any demons that tried to waltz their way in, but without Ruby’s knife or a plan to even execute, their options were slim, and just the feeling of being armed was better than going pantless.

The wind was the first to pick up, whipping bold and harsh along the walls of the cabin, ripping up nails and loose boarding. White noise peeled through the quiet in a cacophony of scattered uproar, bending like the cusp of wings, popping like the joints of bones. It was the sound of the Earth billowing in the distance and cowering in the folds of the universe, and Dean felt his heart burst outwards with yearning, beating a bruise into his ribcage.

When Castiel appeared, charging through the doorway fast enough to send the hinges screaming in agony, Dean fought his relief like an open sore. He thought Cas was angry with him given the way he’d left so abruptly back at the motel, but he had listened to Dean. He was here, and even Uriel’s storm cloud of a presence that followed him through the doorway wasn’t enough to quell Dean’s elation.

“You gotta cool it with the dramatic entrances, pal. Heart attacks aren’t all what they’re cracked up to be,” Dean breathed out, smiling and falling from an impossible high, his thoughts struggling to reshape.

Sam glanced sideways at Dean, mouth pinched. “Are you two here to actually help? We’ve been having demon issues all day.”

“Maybe if you cleared that stain from the room, such things wouldn’t happen,” Uriel spat, beholding Ruby with a charging abhorrence that Dean simply stared at, unable to feel all that bad.

“We’re here for Anna,” Castiel revealed.

“To help her?”

“No,” He said, forcing grit into his voice. “Anna has to die.”

Castiel met no eyes as he said it, speaking it into existence with a croak in his throat. It rendered slowly, foggy, without much sense, but that seemed to be the norm when it came to Cas. His voice landed like flesh on rock and burned sharp in the pit of Dean’s stomach, and yet his coat was too big and his breaths settled like a human— and his eyes, alive and piercing, couldn’t perceive his own request.

“What?” Dean asked lightly, devoid of all air. “Look, I know she’s wiretapping into your angel MySpace chats or whatever, but that’s no reason to gank her.”

“Don’t worry,” Uriel purred, baring his teeth. “I’ll kill her gently.”

Dean gaped at them.

“You’re some heartless sons of bitches, you know that?” Dean said flatly, casting the line with lasting hope, but Cas’s shoulders rolled forward in a temperless shrug, mercilessly robotic, and the only change made was his features growing slack and stoic.

“As a matter of fact, we are,” Cas agreed coldly, void of emotion. His voice peaked daringly, meeting Dean’s eyes with little effort as he said, “And?”

A wave surfaced in the air, prominent but tangled, incapable of being deciphered. It buzzed in the roof of Dean’s mouth, rattled between his ears, and even when Dean tried to grasp it, the feeling vanished like brushed away sand, losing all focus.

“And nothing,” Dean bit out. Cas’s eyes narrowed. “My mistake.”

“Anna’s an innocent girl,” Sam rushed to defend.

Cas shook his head. “She is far from innocent.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means, she’s worse than this abomination you’ve been screwing, and she needs to be eradicated,” Uriel seethed, heaving it towards Ruby like curdling dragon smoke, her eyes flashing black.

“Funny,” Dean said, grinding his teeth. “See, Cas didn’t mention any of that in the fine print.”

Panic flared up in the ring of Castiel’s eyes, alive and steadfast. He turned to Uriel with bolted shoulders, weighing his reaction, and the angel met him with a wave of fury, fear sweeping through the air like a physical cold front.

“I knew you wouldn’t understand—” Cas started.

“What, killing an innocent?” Dean demanded, punctured with emotion. “No, man, I don’t understand.”

“Care to fill me in here, Dean? I’d love to know what kind of heart to hearts you two have been having without me,” Sam called out in a frenzied rush, flustered and edging towards a glare.

“As would I, Castiel,” Uriel mumbled.

Dean didn’t bother looking Sam’s way, knowing instinctively what was waiting for him on the other side of that stare. The truth was a double edged sword, tainted with shame and admission. Cas had fucking lied to him about Anna, about his intentions, and Dean was beyond pissed. But telling Sam meant admitting he’d prayed to Cas in the first place. That Dean had called him down with every intention of offering his assistance like a trophy, like a bleeding, pleading thread of a wish to see that I’m useful, just see that I’m worthy.

For a brief moment, Dean tried to think of how he’d explain the cresting wave in his shoulder. How he could feel the tissue of Castiel’s fingers with a weighty burn, the scarring of his stretched palm.

He would tell Sam all about the pulse in the air and the ache in his ribs and how even though he was angry that Cas had lied to him— he brewed with the kind of sadness that followed birthdays and holidays and the realization that his dad was going to be home late again. Dean wasn’t good with people disappointing him; they would try harder if they cared, wouldn’t they?

And Cas, slowly, was beginning to reveal just how little he was willing to try.

“We need the girl, Dean,” He pushed, ignoring Uriel with a tightened jaw.

“Sorry,” Dean clipped, smirking. “You’ll have to get yourself a different one. Try Hooters, I hear they’ve got a killer line-up.”

“When will you learn,” Uriel surged forward like an ocean-blown wind, anger vibrating in the sheer blue line of his teeth, “we don’t take orders from scum?”

Uriel’s hand dove straight for Ruby’s throat, instantly rupturing her airways. She struggled for a moment, scratching at the metallic grip, but Uriel’s claws were buried and it was with an effortless swoop that Uriel sent her body crashing into the nearest window. Her scream drove panic into Dean’s lungs, no matter how deluded, and with Sam’s lead they raised their weapons, instinct shaking them awake.

Dean hadn’t even managed to get his finger on the trigger before a wave of power sent the guns flying into the opposite wall. Guilt seeped into the air, potent and sour, and Dean turned to Cas with disbelief trapped in his eyes.

Castiel stared right through him, tension coiled in his features. He dropped his raised hand.

“Oh, you son of a—”

Nails bit into the cusp of Dean’s collar, dragging him backwards, and he gasped desperately through ashen air, his vision veering left and right as he settled back against a caving wall. Uriel’s grinning face flashed bright in Dean’s mind, sadistic and gut ripping, but his punches were pure sparks, flickers of white heat along the edge of Dean’s jaw, the bolt of his nose. Counting the hits became impossible and Dean’s only gauge was the blood rolling over his tongue, the severity of taste and color.

Distantly, he could hear Sam call his name. Like a dream, like a nightmare— the kind his brother used to wake up from with tears in his eyes and Dean’s name on his lips.

But he was far away, probably with Ruby, probably half way out of the state by now, and the last tangible image Dean could grasp before the hold on his neck fell away, was a blinding light splitting apart Castiel’s vessel, all the way down to the spine.

Seeing Pamela again was bittersweet, to say the least.

Becoming blind certainly hadn’t hindered her charm, or her insistent flirting, but Dean couldn’t quite walk on even ground around her anymore, every seductive trail of her hand down the length of his arm leaving him with a wince and a stomach wrung with guilt. It wasn’t every day that Dean was responsible for impairing someone for life, and it was all he could think about as he watched Pamela take Anna beneath her wing the moment she arrived in Bobby’s doorway.

“I want you to clear your mind for me, Anna. Deep breath in, deep breath out.”

Anna looked especially small in the vastness of Bobby’s panic room, her body curled up in a wool stitched cot. She held the kind of sadness that made Dean ache, made Dean want to tell her how he’d lost his parents too, tragic and bloody just like hers, but Pamela was the one they’d called here to help, hoping to claw Anna’s memories back to the surface, and that was priority.

They needed to know what had happened back at the barn. The sigil Anna had painted was a mystery to all of them, its origins untraceable, and whatever it had done to Cas and Uriel— they clearly weren’t much of a problem anymore.

Dean just needed to know if it was permanent. Fatal. Mindless curiosity.

His nerves were on fire with it.

“Tell me, Anna. How can you hear the angels? How did you work that spell?”

Anna’s trance was like a current, shapeless waves you could see flowing in her features as she sank with concentration. Her nose scrunched up with an answer, emotion bleeding through the lines.

“I don’t know. I just— saw it, in my mind,” She said.

“Your father,” Pamela pressed, switching gears as she sensed something palpable, a direction to follow. “What’s his name?”

Anna hesitated. “Rich Milton.”

The light bulbs overhead flickered in a haste, swinging with a sudden breeze. Dean craned his head to stare at them. Tension coiled in his spine, unbidden but strong, sensing without seeing, and he watched with panicked eyes as the dusted hair on his arms rose to a static point.

“Look further back, when you were very young,” Pamela tried, but Anna was slipping, shaking her head frantically.

“I don’t want to.”

“Just one look. That’s all we need.”

“No,” She cried.

“Pamela,” Dean stood up, energy rattling between his teeth. “I don’t think—”

Pamela ignored him. “What’s your dad’s name? Your real dad. Why is he angry with you?”

Anna arched with a blood drawn scream, terror shooting up the base of her spine. A wave of unsheathed power coursed through the room and forced the door shut with a metallic screech, trapping Ruby on the outside as chaos reared high and wild.

“He’s gonna kill me!”

The lights shattered overhead and Dean cowered against a rain of shards and sparks, his hair singeing with a whispered hiss. Instinct pulled Dean upright, needing to check on Sam, but Anna’s pain was a grating burn, an exploding star, Dean could feel it.

How could he—

“Anna?” He tried, reaching for her out of worry, but his vision shot out the moment they touched and Dean was sent crashing into the opposite wall, energy pulsing in his aching limbs.

Sam screamed his name in the distance, impossibly far away, and Dean felt his chest rumble with a groan. Static filled his brain; heady and skittish, the shake of it flowing towards his hands. Dean’s body was completely numb by the time Sam reached his side and dragged him up, the jolt and sway of the movement making his gut churn.

“You alright?” Sam asked. Dean coughed through a mouthful of blood.

Pamela leaned over and pressed her hand to Anna’s temple with a shuttering gasp, waking her in an instant, and the rumble stopped with a pierced off cry. Anna’s eyes opened. In them, shined an orbing blue light that centered on Dean from the growing distance. Something in Dean’s chest soared in delighted response, singing warmly.

When Anna blinked next, it was gone. Human. But the truth didn’t disappear quite as easily.

Anna was an angel. Heaven’s most wanted after rebelling and carving her essence out like a tumor, some rotting infestation. Her grace was spewed across the Earth somewhere, budding with power, and the race was on; the last thing they needed was the demons getting angel grace on tap.

The plan was built quick and messy, garnered on nothing but a fast internet search and the pull in Anna’s chest, guiding her in waves. Kentucky was the answer, and they packed decisively, figuring any sort of a lead was better than nothing.

Pamela hovered in the shadows, not saying a word as they shuffled around, and Dean knew. Even before she dragged him in by the elbow and whispered guiltily about how she couldn’t, and she was sorry, Dean knew her help ended here. He was the first to offer her a ride home.

“Honey, if you’re gonna be cranky this whole trip you’re gonna have to let me crack open a window or something. Your aura is giving me a headache,” Pamela scolded him not even twenty minutes into their drive, fixing Dean with the kind of glare that made Dean gape at her in surprise, convinced she still had her eyesight.

“My aura?” Dean asked.

“That’s right,” She smiled, speaking through a knowing purr. “That little ball of stink around your head that’s telling me you're pissed about something. Eyes or no eyes, I can read you as easily as anything, and don’t ever forget it.”

Dean could feel his thoughts screech to a seizing halt, the lid of his skull shutting with a definitive click. Fucking psychics. Dean should’ve known better than to be mulling in the same car as one, but his senses were thrown, to say the least. Betrayal carved a heavy weight in the bulk of his chest, and just acknowledging it fueled an anger in Dean that even he had never grazed until now.

“I’m fine. I’ve dealt with worse,” Dean told her, pressing his thumbs into the steering wheel, trying to soothe a restless ache.

“But this is different, isn’t it?” Pamela threw her arm back over the seat, turning to face Dean fully. There wasn’t much Dean could read in her expression with her sunglasses on, her emotions harder to pinpoint now. But she had this quality to her, this ability to tilt her head, flash this smile, and make Dean feel as if he was finally being listened to. “Look, I know what it looks like when you and your brother are quarreling. It’s not like you two were right and rosy the second you crawled up out of the ground, and this feels different from that,” Her smile softened, thinning with sympathy. “You’ve got a broken heart, baby.”

Dean’s pulse ran hot with shame, everything peeling to the surface. Pamela made it look so effortless, so easy; the unmasking of Dean Winchester. It shouldn’t feel this simple, this inevitable, but Pamela was kind and judgeless, an open offering after a brutal stab in the back, and it was with a labored breath that Dean said, “So there’s this guy.”

Pamela laughed. “Isn’t there always?”

Heat crawled up the base of Dean’s throat, violent and sudden, casting his skin in a thrumming glow, and he swallowed, grappling with his own voice. The truth burning on his tongue.

The guy who burned your eyes out, he thought morbidly, yeah that’s the one.

Dean breathed in slowly, squinting out towards the road. He did his best to take the joke for what it was.

“And he’s, uh, not really from around here. Not a hunter anyway. But I kinda thought he was on our side, like, someone we could trust. I mean, Sammy never really thought so but… our options for friends have been pretty slim lately, and I guess I just— wanted to trust him. I wanted that to be okay. And now—”

“And now you don’t feel that way,” Pamela concluded for him, cutting Dean off with the sort of insight that had Dean blinking in the sudden silence, realizing just how much he’d tip toed a treacherous edge.

“I don’t know what to feel,” Dean admitted, quiet and intimate, glancing at Pamela nervously. He itched for the cigarette pack burning a hole in his pocket. “I just don’t know. So, sorry for the brain fog or whatever. I’ve been out of it for a while now.”

Pamela hummed. “How long is a while?”

Dean thought hard about that one. Felt his surroundings like a separate plain, the car and the road and how all of it was a single frame he’d been spinning inside since he was four years old. The amulet around his neck was heavier than it used to be. His tattoo made his chest itch restlessly.

And maybe these weren’t obvious all the time, not with Dean’s life dragging him around by the collar, forcing his attention from one doomsday to the next. But they never went away, laying dormant and waiting, always promised to be scorched and festering the next time Dean bothered to even acknowledge them in the slightest.

“You know,” Dean said after a long while of nothing, his smile stitched on. “I don’t think you’d believe me even if I told you.”

It happened in what Dean would later recall as, in passing.

There was no forethought. No plan of stop or admission, finding some way to clear the air. Dean was an hour out from Sioux Falls when he saw the curve of some distant turn off, the hint of a lake through the overgrowth, bright beneath a clouded sun, and flicked on an unsuspecting blinker.

He parked sharp and crooked by a gravel path leading to the water, and lunged out of his seat. In the neighboring trees, a flock of birds panicked and scattered, frightened by a slamming door.

Dean watched them fly with water rising in his lungs, a pit surfacing in his throat. He fumbled blindly for his jacket pocket, fishing out a cigarette with blunt nails, dirt caught in the beds. He needed a shower. A vacation too while he was at it, something to warm him, rid him of the frost he seemed to be shelled inside, utterly plagued by.

A very specific touch came into mind. One ridden in heat, tethered with comfort. The kind that blew nightmares away and washed souls clean of sin.

“Is this what you guys do now? Men in Black your way around twenty first century Earth? Riding the tail of some higher order you don’t even know the source of?”

Dean’s voice came out charged, revved up as if waiting, planned, but a fortress was breaking in his chest and Dean’s tongue was nothing but an instrument. A mouthpiece meant to buzz and provoke, pulling its strength from the rupture Cas had caused.

“I know blind faith is kinda your thing, man, but come on,” Dean breathed. There was something desperate in the way he paced in the open air, smoke trailing like a cloud behind him. “You’re all about the bigger picture, the true mission, so why kill Anna when she could be an asset? Because she chose to slug it down here with us?”

From a distance, further down the path towards the lake, Dean could hear the rumblings of families. Laughing children, barking dogs, the catch and spin of a boat engine roaring to life. And Dean stood there, praying in the openness, pleading his case with the knowledge that the world was on an approximate clock ticking down down down— fast and indecipherable, a terminal case that would lead them straight to a cliff side unless they did something about it.

There were a million places Dean needed to be right now. With Sam digging up dirt on Lilith, with Bobby cracking a smile. He had people to protect, seals to find and a life to live, for as long as he still could, but instead he was here.

Admitting through choked lungs that whenever Cas was ready, Dean would already be kneeled and waiting, far too willing to forgive.

“Anna’s not the enemy, Cas. I get you have your code, your bullshit self-righteous war path— but I’ve got mine too, and that’s to stop the bad guys, so don’t—” Dean hesitated, trembling through an ache in his stomach. Emotion batted a thick blow to the side of his skull, and he dug into the corner of his eye with a knuckle, his cigarette balanced in his fingers like a surrendering flag as Dean clenched his teeth and said, “Don’t be that, understand?”

To the surprise of no one, there wasn’t an answer. Not even a breeze. And Dean took that as a response in itself, pushing through a deflated chest just to drag in air.

With a last piping of smoke, Dean gripped his keys and flicked his cigarette to the ground, crushing it beneath the sole of his boot where he urged it to smother the Earth and make the world burn that much faster.

Anna was waiting for Dean when he returned, standing there in the moonlight with a smile, and Dean strode up to her with something light in his steps, gratitude making him warm.

It was strange, looking at her now. He’d thought her to be so fragile and innocent before, just some poor girl caught in a storm, but now he was tracing every edge of her, trying desperately to pinpoint every flare of power. She was still human, technically. Without her grace she was mortal; nothing within the same realm as Cas.

Dean flushed at the ceaseless thought, shoving it back and away.

“Can I ask you something?” He turned to her with barely masked judgment. “Why did you choose to fall? Why would you wanna become one of us?”

Anna stiffened instantly, features turning cold. “You don’t mean that.”

“I don’t?” Dean scoffed, because ultimately, anything other than the hand he was dealt had always looked enticing. Even the normal and the boring looked miles ahead of anything Dean had ever been offered. And maybe it was the day he’d had, or the hope he’d lost, or how Cas had bent so easily to Heaven’s will, but Dean yearned for the kind of power he’d seen erupt in that cabin.

He wished he could be more than some creature stuck under the pad of another’s thumb.

“Every emotion, Dean, even the bad ones, is more freeing than anything you experience as an angel,” Anna insisted, as if hearing Dean’s thoughts. She gave him a heavy look, nearly scolding as she went on, “Laughter, showers, the heat of a sunburn on your face— it’s why I fell. It’s why I would give anything not to have to go back.”

Dean studied the shape of his own boot as he shifted in the gravel. “Feelings are overrated, if you ask me.”

“Beats being an angel,” Anna argued.

“How’s that possible?” Dean rasped out, always shocked by the severity at which he could feel, his confusion turning downright painful. “You guys are powerful and perfect. You don’t doubt yourselves or God or anything.”

“Perfect,” Anna repeated, muttering it like a curse. “Like a marble statue. Cold. No choice. Only obedience.”

Dean looked at her, uncertain what else to say. That, at the very least, he could understand. Most of his life had been steered by nothing but orders, his future pulled by a bloodied path of revenge that followed him like a last name. Dean grew up fearing the opinion of his father more than the monsters made to rip and kill, and he knew what it meant to be compliant. Obedient. A soldier. He’d gotten himself killed just trying to maintain it.

But Dean thought of the path he’d been on; the Hell he’d witnessed and paid. How helpless he’d been to all of it. And for a fleeting moment, he even imagined what it would be like to be free of it. To have his pain blurred into something less crippling and mangling and replaced with star imploding power.

Dean was convinced.

“Say what you want, but I think I’d kill to have a purpose the way you guys do,” Dean finally admitted, leaning back against the Impala. Anna watched him wearily, seeming to pinpoint a breakage as he said, “All of us? Down here? We’re all just waitin’ to get our ticket punched. Each day is one step closer to getting the lights knocked out.”

The truth seemed to startle Anna. She craned up to look at Dean fully, features shocked and saddened. She placed a gentle hand on Dean’s arm.

“That’s not life, Dean. That’s not what was intended,” She said, and Dean stared at her with a hollowing blankness, recognizing that if her words were meant to comfort, they were failing miserably.

“Well, when life decides to give me a pass for the deluxe version, you make sure to let me know.”

Reasonable or not, Dean took a liking to Anna.

She was the kind of gorgeous you saw plastered on every magazine and television screen, all snow-white skin and dainty limbs, the colors of her reserved to soft pinks and crystal blues. To put it simply, Dean was attracted to her, thought she was beautiful in the let me protect you sort of way, and it only seemed natural to close his eyes when after a failed trip to retrieve her grace and a heart to heart he didn’t ask for, he felt her lean over to kiss him through the silence.

“What was that for?” Dean asked once she pulled away.

“You know,” She smiled. “Our last night on Earth, all that.”

It wasn’t surprise, exactly, that struck Dean first. He’d been admiring her for days now, catching her gaze and meeting her in strides, both of them walking in tentative circles around each other. Dean had felt what was there, brimming beneath the surface, and if there was any good time to make a move it was certainly now, their clock punched short as they waited for the angels to close in. But to have her proposition him so plainly was… new. Dean wasn’t used to being the one who decided and answered, he just moved.

This was good, Dean supposed. The search for Anna’s grace had been a dead end; someone had gotten there first, and Anna had been trying to get Dean to open up about his time in Hell no less than thirty seconds ago.

This was a gateway he greatly welcomed.

“You’re stealing my best line,” He remarked, grinning ear to ear, and he kissed her with a shrug laid dormant in his shoulders, the words why not running rampant around the base of his skull as he felt her hands skirt up the front of his chest, small and frail and everything Dean usually ached for.

“Is here okay?” She whispered, her words nothing but a sweet tickle over Dean’s bottom lip, and Dean laughed into the chilling air, his hands fitting tight and natural at the bend of her waist.

“Sweetheart, you deserve more than a cold hood,” He told her, because even if Dean knew it was true, he also knew just how much that line had worked for him in the past, and Anna was no exception. Her breath hitched sharp in the resounding quiet, fingers tightening over Dean’s collar, and she all but melted into the palm of his hands when he asked, “How bout’ the back seat?”

It was a tight fit, just like it always was. It didn’t matter how thin and pretty of a thing Dean managed to spread out back here, it was always the same knock of limbs and fumble of clothing, their breaths turned hot and desperate by the time they reached for each other again, skin meeting glorious skin.

“You don’t have to be gentle, you know,” Anna giggled, kissing the words into the bulk of Dean’s bare shoulder as if that somehow softened the blow of them. Dean’s hands, which had been making a slow descent to thumb at the button of her jeans, abruptly stilled. He looked up at her, and before he could even ask she added, “I’m not going to break.”

Something in Dean’s throat tightened.

“Right, yeah,” He muttered, because this wasn’t the first time he’d gotten too much in his head about these things. This wasn’t the first time he’d found himself moving slow and gentle, almost painfully intimate in a way most one night stands didn’t exactly prefer.

“Here,” Anna said, noticing Dean’s falter. She swept her hands over Dean’s, and together they worked her jeans down and off, her pale legs a perfect shine in the pooling moonlight. She smiled at him, all practiced ease and blatant want, “Let me.”

And then Dean was being flipped and redirected, his breath running thin as he found himself pressed on his back with Anna hovering over him, her amber hair flooding his vision as she leaned down for a kiss.

“Is this better?” She asked, and Dean didn’t know what she meant by that, if she asked because she knew or if she asked because she thought— but Dean didn’t intend on answering either way, and by that point Anna had already made her way down to the ache between Dean’s legs.

He hissed a whimper back through his teeth as she took him in hand.

How long had it been since he felt this? A touch that wasn’t traced by a trail of blood, an ounce of good that wasn’t followed by immediate pain. It had been ages, fucking years, and Anna was handling him in all the right ways, spitting into her palm to work up a glide, pinning Dean by the hips to keep him still as she sucked him down and held him there.

“Anna—” He gasped, trying not to squirm. “Jesus, you’re gonna—”

“How about no biblical references while I’m blowing you. Deal?” Anna grinned against his flaming skin, pretty lips swollen into a searing pink that caught Dean’s eye, a wave crashing in his stomach.

“Deal,” Dean said, mindless, and then he reached out to her, pulling her back in like some distant storm he hadn’t yet figured out how to wrangle, and kissed her with a sharp sweep of his tongue.

Distantly, Dean could register the taste. The salt and tang, strong and human. It made his thoughts veer and his mind shatter, branching off in directions he’d rather not go, places he only ventured when he was drunk and reckless or sober and desperate, the distinction between want and disgust an ever thinning line that followed him wherever he went.

Most of the time, Dean could have ignored it. He could force his mind elsewhere, focus on the way Anna rolled her hips as she kissed, how she gasped and writhed in his lap when Dean finally cupped her through her panties, pressing two deft fingers against the dampened silk. He could manage, was all. Dean had only been doing it his entire life.

But then Anna’s attention moved elsewhere; her fingers wandered, and without warning her hand fell parallel to the scar on Dean’s shoulder.

Dean shuddered through a jolted cry.

“Are you okay?” Anna tore her hand away, eyes softened with worry.

“Wait, just— hold on a second,” Dean panted, humiliated beyond belief. He fought for his breath back, vibrating through a shapeless wave.

Anna quietly leaned away, fingers curling over her thighs. “Dean.”

“Fine, m’ fine,” He repeated frantically, garbling through the heat at the back of his throat. His shoulder was engulfed in flames. A ticking had surfaced throughout his limbs. “I just need a minute.”

“Castiel touched your soul, didn’t he?” Anna asked distantly, riddled with this impending tone of fear that had Dean looking up at her widely, shuttering through gulpfuls of air.

“We talkin’ literally? Or metaphorically?”

“Literally,” Anna said sharply, as if it were obvious. “When he pulled you out, pieced you back together.”

Dean sounded anything but certain as he said, “Well, yeah. He kinda had to, didn't he?”

“It’s more than that. The connection shouldn’t have lasted this long, you—” Her expression darkened, pruning with the kind of disgust Dean had never been able to stomach, and in a voice all but skinned alive, she told him, “you reek of angel grace.”

For a moment, Dean thought fear struck him blind.

His senses short wired, crackling in his pulse, and maybe he should be used to bombshells at this point; hard truths and shattering revelations. But Anna was sharp in all the places she’d been soft, leaning entirely out of Dean’s orbit, and Dean longed for the moment they’d had before.

“Look, if it’s all the same to you, I don’t really wanna think about that assclown while I’m horizontal, okay? Besides, what does it matter?”

“It matters, Dean,” She insisted, hastily throwing her shirt back over her head.

Hurt twisted in the ropes of Dean’s chest. “Anna—”

“He’s laid claim on you. Do you have any idea what that means?”

“A claim?” Dean balked, fear curdling in his gut. The scar on his shoulder rose to attention, warming like a guided fire. “He said we had a connection, or whatever, but— but he didn’t say anything about—”

“I don’t think he meant to do it,” Anna shook her head. She opened the door and threw her legs outside of the car, fumbling with her jeans. “But he did regardless.”

“What does that mean?” Anna didn’t say anything for a long moment, searching the floorboard for her shoes. Dean inhaled sharply, “Anna, what does that mean—”

“It means he can trace you like a beacon,” She finally exclaimed, fetching up Dean’s shirt from the seat and tossing it in his direction. Dean caught it with a limp hand, shock searing him wordless as Anna looked at him and said, “And I’m as good as dead.”

Ruby was gone, captured somewhere in the night, and it didn’t take long for the angels to arrive.

Whether it was Dean’s soul shooting a skylight into the night or Anna’s panic alarming them of their failed attempt at an upper hand, Castiel stormed through the door on the tail end of a lightning bolt just before dark, and Uriel slipped his way inside like a disease.

“Hello, Anna,” Cas said mildly.

“How did you find us?” Sam asked, remaining the only one shocked by their presence.

“I’m sorry.”

Dean’s voice was a weak prod in the stilted silence, and Sam turned to him with softened eyes, his expression alone feeling like a gentle hand reaching out.

“What? Dean, what did you—”

“I didn’t know, I wasn’t— I should’ve gone off, led them away or something but— but I didn’t know,” Dean explained, wanting it to make sense, hoping it sounded justified, but Anna was standing beside him with something similar to fear coating her eyes, feigned strength tethered in her limbs, and Dean crumbled the second she looked at him.

“They didn’t give him much of a choice,” She said gently, forgiving, so needlessly understanding. She cut her eyes to Cas. “Did you, Castiel?”

Cas said nothing, plagued by indecision. His features were a careful calculation, rotating like metal behind false skin. Dean couldn’t quite decipher the coding of it before Anna stepped into his side and kissed him with the kind of sweetness that stirred warmth in his gaping chest, the taste of I forgive you and goodbye twisting a vice on Dean’s tongue.

Dean winced, crumbling in her hands. “Anna—”

“Don’t. It’s not your fault,” Anna insisted, framing his face with something close to a smile. Her thumbs drew a final path from Dean’s cheeks to his mouth. “Thank you for everything.”

She broke away willingly, straightening before Castiel with a rising chest.

“I’m sorry,” Cas offered.

“No. You’re not. Not really,” Anna said sharply. “You don’t know the feeling.”

“Still, we have a history. It’s just—”

“Orders are orders, I know. Just make it quick,” She snapped, and Cas withdrew, frowning deep and bothered.

Thunder clipped the air before Castiel could reply. It splintered the moment and its upset, shaking them all of their balance, and the demons appeared in a glare of darkened beams, bringing with them the sort of horror you could feel corrupt the air itself.

Among them, stood a figure Dean had spent the last six months erasing. Denying. Licking at wounds he’d caused, stamping down fears he’d created. And in a room full of angels, a battlefield laid out between them, it was Dean he looked to first, tracking him down from scent alone, their eyes meeting in the shadows.

Alastair smiled, his arms spreading wide with joy, and Ruby’s limp body fell to the floor, his grip on her slipping without care.

“Well, now this is a party.”

“Turn around and walk away, now,” Castiel expanded with a seething anger, billowing beneath his coat, pulling himself taut and frightening in a way he decidedly hadn’t when dealing with Dean.

“Sure,” Alastair said easily, slurring with a heavy tongue. “Just give us the girl. We’ll make a nice, fair trade for this one—” He sent a vicious kick into the blood soaked spot of Ruby’s stomach, forcing a sharpened scream, “and make sure the little angel gets punished good and proper.”

Just the thought sent Dean into a frenzy, his eyes meeting Anna’s with frightening speed. She echoed his worry, scowling into the floor.

“You know who we are and what we will do. I won’t say it again. Leave now,” Cas repeated, thunder coiling in his throat, “or we lay you to waste.”

The threat stirred nothing but a shrieking laugh.

“Think I’ll take my chances. Respectfully, of course,” Alastair pinned Dean with his gaze, foul and revolting, his tongue tracing a pointed path around his lips. “I do appreciate the company you’ve brought for me.”

It was Cas who moved first. Driven by a reckless bout of anger that came out revved and charged, shooting off like a loose cannon, and the demons followed suit, splitting every which way. Castiel pushed his hands outward as if guiding a wave, and Alastair flew backwards with a raging shout, scrambling over the hay covered floor.

“Dean!” Sam exclaimed, and Dean turned just in time to watch Uriel capture one of the other demons that had been heading right for him, his palm wrapped around the monster's jaw.

And it was with Dean’s attention focused solely on him that Uriel stopped, grinned, and ripped the bones from their tendons with an effortless snap, separating jaw and mouth. The demon’s howls lasted only a few seconds before he was quieted with a final burst of light.

“Sorry for the mess,” Uriel said, delighted, and Dean staggered back as he turned away, diving for his next victim.

Numbly, Dean wiped at the spray of blood on his face. He hadn’t managed to get it all before Sam was grabbing him by the arm and dragging him behind a pile of crates next to Anna.

“You alright?” Sam asked hastily, blinking wide and nervous as he took in Dean’s expression, his gasping breaths; Dean’s coherence was shot to hell.

It was one thing to shoot beams and wave magic around and claim you’re in the presence of something otherworldly. That was weird, that was supernatural, that was a broad upscale to everything Dean had already managed to stomach his entire life. But then the stakes get raised, the thing that was decidedly both human and non-human does something you can’t imagine seeing anywhere else, and Dean didn’t know if he was being protected or being warned and just picturing Cas doing something like—

Dean froze.

“I let Ruby get captured for leverage. I knew if we got the angels and demons in one room they’d completely forget about us. Guess that’s what millions of years worth of rivalry gets you,” Sam laughed weakly, smiling with the sort of giddy filled pride he’d use as a kid to get Dean’s approval, pulling at clothes and hands to get his big brother's attention. Dean understood this, recognized it even, but he couldn’t right now; his focus had been split and devoured. “There’s gotta be a back exit somewhere, we can sneak out—”

“He’s gonna kill him,” Dean said.

“What? Castiel?” Sam’s voice was incredulous, clearly not understanding.

Dean could barely hear him over the pounding of fists over flesh, Castiel’s breathing a ragged scratch over the cabin walls.

Sam grabbed Dean by the shoulders. “Dean, we gotta get out of here. He’ll be fine.”

Dean could feel Anna watching him. Raptured and curious, waiting for a tipping point, and Dean knew what she was thinking. Knew there was a scar on his shoulder and an itch in his ribs and a fever he couldn’t quite settle, a bias he couldn’t justify. None of it made sense. Because Cas had used Dean, placated him for as long as he stayed useful, and now Anna was in danger and Sam was running out of time and Dean—

Dean didn’t want Cas to die.

Before any feeling could even return to his legs again, Dean was standing. “Alastair’s gonna rip him apart.”

There was a weakened grip that shot out for Dean’s wrist. Pale fingers, soft skin. A silent don’t do this that was edged with worry but smothered in frustration, begging Dean to turn back. Anna didn’t put up much of a fight when Dean pulled away; her hand dropped weakly, defeated, and Dean sprung out into the open with fear warping his vision, danger waving like a swinging noose.

Dean didn’t think much of anything as he picked up a crowbar deserted on the floor. He didn’t even make a noise as he swung, knocking Alastair away from Cas long enough to hear him drag in a desperate gasp of air, his figure nothing but a flash of dark hair and blood.

Relief squeezed Dean’s heart, releasing him soundlessly. But the second Alastair recovered, turning to face Dean with an eerily calm smile, Dean lost all sense of being.

Suddenly, he was right back on the rack, and he was next in line.

“Dean, Dean, Dean,” Alastair drawled, stepping forward as Dean craned back, stalking and leering. “I’m disappointed, you know. You’ve become far less respectful since coming back topside,” His mouth twisted with disappointment, memories making his eyes glaze. “A shame, really. You were so good for me before.”

It had been years since Dean had begged Alastair for anything. He’d gotten used to it after a while, after thirty years of rising and screaming and dying and doing it all over again, each time different, each time bloody. But those last ten years had been Dean making the demands, Dean learning and being guided by a blade in his hand and a snake in his ear, telling him to ignore the kind of pleas he used to scream until his throat was cut and he couldn’t any longer.

It wasn’t something Dean was used to anymore. In a different situation, he might even hold some pride in not giving the bastard exactly what he wanted. But it’s pain, it’s life seizing instinct just barely buried beneath the skin, and the moment Alastair had Dean in his sights again, the urge to beg for his life resurfaced like an old sore.

The only reason Dean didn’t, was because he wasn’t given the chance.

Anna appeared with little warning, her presence a violent jolt. Confusion coiled in Dean’s stomach when she didn’t immediately head for him, but she had a plan, a confident one, and her target was Uriel. It was with quick hands and abandoned qualms that Anna grabbed at the vile of angel grace hanging from the cord on Uriel’s neck, and pulled.

All Uriel managed to do was cry out before Anna was crushing the glass vile in her palm and gasping through a taste of power, her past essence curling over the gaps of her fingers.

“Shut your eyes,” She called out suddenly, panicked. “Shut your eyes!”

And Dean didn’t know what it was; dangerous curiosity, childish refusal. But Anna’s words meant nothing to him, and instead of cowering against a bombshell of euphorics, Dean stared into the heart of it, letting the crash of the wave heal whatever broke as he watched not just Alastair— but Castiel vanish as well.

Dean was standing on an abandoned Kentucky roadside when his chest ruptured and everything barricaded between his spine and sternum came spilling out.

He didn’t know where to pinpoint the breakage. The cracks had manifested over some fraction of time he couldn’t name, but Dean wanted to blame Cas. Blame Alastair for showing his face again and making Dean act— it was always about choice with him, decisions, quickness— do do do.

Slice here, carve there, dig dig dig.

His fear of Alastair was so potent, so repulsive— Dean could gag on it. And maybe this was about shedding that feeling. If he told Sam about Hell, about his weakness and hatred and how he broke like a dam, maybe he could get past it. The secret wouldn’t be bubbling under his skin anymore.

But then Dean actually spoke. He found the words, worked his tongue, said, “I wish I couldn’t feel anything, Sammy,” with his voice wobbling within an inch of his life, and there were more tears than he expected, more grief than he knew what to do with, and Dean regretted all of it before he could even get back behind Baby’s wheel again.

Sam looked at him differently, after that. And Dean piled on cases to pretend like he didn’t notice. Countless salt and burns, multiple overnight hunts leaving him sore and bent in all the wrong directions.

They kept that pace for a while.

Found a ghost case that turned out to be just some poor girl raised in a nightmare. Dean had to drag her body out into a neighboring wheat field. Buried her by a creek surrounded by bluebonnets and spent the rest of his night scrubbing blood from his fingernails.

It wasn’t a big deal. Not compared to other shit Dean’s dealt with in the past. He washed it all down with a fountain of bottles and was on the road again by high noon the next day, running on a whopping three hours of front-seat sleep that had his neck aching something awful.

On nothing but a potential lead, they tailed it to Iowa where death had been following a band of magicians like the plague.

All it took was a day to convince Dean that the whole town was full of magic wielding douchebags, and he watched people believe in the impossible from a corner of judgment, feeling hollow in his own skin. He didn’t know what it was about that place that pissed him off. The lights, the applause, the smoke and mirrors gimmick.

These people flung swords and spat up cards all in the name of the devil, performed for audiences that believed in something as contrived as magic, and Dean watched crowds of people smile for being lied to when he’d spent the last three months clawing through dirt to find the truth.

The night was still young when Dean was sent to Bleecker Street.

His conversation with Charlie and Vernon left him with what he thought was a real lead, a possible break in the case. There was someone spewing bad mojo with these tarot cards, and this guy— The Chief, stationed on Bleecker Street, seemed to be his best bet. But Dean’s doubt started to surface somewhere between the sketchy black alleyway and the reaction he got when he spoke through the metal grate door, “I’m, uh, here to see Chief?”

The man on the other side took Dean in, slow and deliberate. Dragged his eyes up Dean’s chest like he was looking for something, waiting for a telltale. Dean felt a patch of sweat begin to rise at the cusp of his back.

“Yeah, I bet,” The man finally said, and Dean thought about those words later, how they were said, what they meant, what that made him, because that place wasn’t what he thought it was and he should’ve known.

Should’ve known what happens in cities and alleyways and open street entryways that lead into dark basements. He should’ve known from the smell alone what kind of place that was. What kind of person Charlie and Vernon had thought he—

Dean ran the moment he realized.

It wasn’t a lead. It wasn’t the monster Dean was after. It was a warning, a pinning, a skull bashing I know what you are, boy, that had Dean bursting outside in a cloud of unswept rain, his dress shoes clacking on the pavement as he ran.

He tripped on his way out of the alleyway; crashed into a trash can piled with garbage and flailed outwards towards the street. Sweat matted Dean’s hair to his forehead. He stopped four times on his way back to the car, certain he was seconds away from throwing up.

Stupid.

Should’ve known.

How could you not—

Dean scrambled for his car keys, breaths ragged in the clean air. He fished them out of his pocket, guided them to the handle, and watched them slip right out of his fingers.

How many times had he been here?

Remembering and forgetting. Taking a moment and grinding it to dust between his teeth, unable to bear the weight of it. The reality that he’d been here before, gasping this panic, wading these high waters. Wishing he was someone else.

Dean bent down and picked up the keys off the sopping sidewalk. His hand shook as he straightened, wobbled as he moved, and all Dean could think about was John. How he’d tremble the same edge, twist his fingers and bare his knuckles the very same way.

He had his dad’s hands. Big, square, misshapen. There were jagged points where a bone or two hadn’t healed quite right. Scars where his skin split too many times to look normal. Be normal.

Dean had spent years trying to be just like his dad. But this, now, after what had just— he didn’t want it. John would despise him for it. Crush him soft and easy under the heel of his boot.

Dean unlocked the car and ripped the door open. He wasn’t even settled in the driver's seat before he started tearing at his own clothes, shedding his jacket and tie, grimacing at the line of sweat beading down his spine.

He waited until his hands stopped shaking to turn on the radio. Tried to not think about dark bars and tight rooms and what people think when they look at him. All long lashes and full lips, like something precious that needed to be broken in to feel real.

Dean grabbed a hold of the steering wheel, skin tight, bones thin, and didn’t at all think of a power shadowed jaw as he peeled out onto the street.

The outline of a trench coat stuck out like a sore thumb in the skin themed hue of a pulsing bar.

No one in their right mind would wear that thing to a place meant for people to get their rocks off, and the bizarreness of it followed Dean like a shadow, glaring in his peripheral.

“You’ve got some nerve showing up here after what you did,” Dean said in way of greeting, and his voice echoed boldly in the walls of the bathroom, familiar enough to sting.

Dean glared into the neon bathed sink. He scrubbed his hands harder.

“Dean—”

“Cram it. I’ve got enough liars in my life, thanks.”

There was a stain on the collar of Dean’s shirt. A shot he’d taken too confidently no doubt, and Dean reached for the towel dispenser with fumbling hands, spraying water down the front of his jeans.

Dean was two beats of patience away from breaking his hand on the porcelain sink when Cas spoke again, “You’ve been restless.”

And it was the last thing Dean wanted to hear. His teeth pressed white into his bottom lip, a ringing starting in his ears. He wondered if Sam was having as shitty of a night as he was. He wondered why Sam wasn’t answering his fucking phone.

“Yeah? Like you care,” Dean grounded out.

Castiel grew quiet. He blended into the shadows. A statue to Dean’s right, watching through the mirror, and Dean thought vaguely of wooden soldiers and plastic army men, like capsules of time stuck frozen in waste. Cas could stay like that; marbled, motionless, for years. Ions, even, and Dean didn’t understand why he hadn’t.

Why Cas was always leaving him like everyone else.

“Back at the barn, when Alastair overpowered me,” Cas started, his voice treading just as lightly as his footing. “You could’ve let him kill me.”

Dean barked out a laugh.

“A month of stone cold silence and that’s what you’re here for? Some explanation to stroke your feathered ego?”

Behind the anger, buried beneath endless layers of tar and contempt and childhood bred disappointment, was a Dean who’s blind faith had survived that night in the barn. A Dean who had wanted Cas to show up earlier, apologize sooner, serve up this world-bound answer that would give reason to the hope in Dean’s chest.

But instead, it had been weeks. There were circles starting to darken Dean’s eyes, hollow his cheeks. At the side of his neck, just below Dean’s collar, was a jagged line of nail tracks he’d clawed in his sleep, fighting for his life even with the curtains drawn and the motel door bolted shut.

“You know what, you’re right. I’ll make sure to ditch your ass next time.”

His boot squeaked as he turned on his heel, plowing for the door, and Cas straightened before him like a wall, side stepping into Dean’s path. Their chests brushed, grazing as if tangled in a dance, and Dean staggered away with his breath blown short.

They stared at one another.

“I’m not asking for your forgiveness, Dean. I’m asking for your understanding. Anna fell from Heaven, she revolted against her own kind. She’s a reckless liability in an otherwise calculated plan, and she needed to be removed.”

Cas sounded convincing. Sounded like he meant it, even. But there was a softness to him that Dean could hold in the clasp of his palm, a wavering line that shook and bent and snapped in the wake of something as foreign as humanity, and Dean had him.

Dean knew where to press.

“Killed, you mean,” Dean corrected, throwing it like a grenade, the metal pin caught in his teeth. “Is she already dead?”

Cas’s eyes narrowed. “Her location is still unknown.”

Dean snorted at that. It didn’t sound like a lie. But Cas was good at these things; spinning Dean in circles, defying what was possible. He’d been one of the only solid groundings in Dean’s life since the moment he crawled through the dirt, and maybe that was nonsense. Maybe it was a testimony to how fucked Dean’s really felt that a star contrived light was keeping him sane, but it was true.

It was true, and Cas had lied about Anna, and lied about god knows what else, and Dean had a darkness brewing. A fury at having no one in his corner at the grimmest time of his life.

“And when the time comes, who’s gonna be the one to do it? Uriel? You?” Dean dared him, cutting in even as Cas’s eyes dropped, tension coiled in his deadbolt jaw. “Are you finally gonna get off that high fucking horse of yours? Get your hands dirty?” Dean tried to imagine it; the blackened flames of Castiel’s wings, how he’d shatter all that Anna was with a single graze. “You’re nothing but a coward, Cas. Scared of your own fucking shadow, and the one time you lift a finger to change things, it’s gonna be to murder your own sister.”

The words held a vengeance, landing with a boom, and Dean felt a hand on his throat before Cas’s anger could even peak, ripping Dean of his balance to slam him backwards into the tiled wall.

The surface split with a resounding crack, and a groan welled up in Dean’s chest, weak and mangled. Shock turned to panic and panic burned him blind, but the fear stayed back, hovering out of sight. It was just familiar, was all. Hard tile, scorched lungs, his sights tainted by neon. But Dean wasn’t afraid of Cas. Not even this Cas, the Cas who fought because he felt like he had to, who glared and demanded and hardened in the face of everything that terrified him.

“Careful,” Cas breathed in, shaking through borrowed skin, “how you speak to me.”

“Or what?” Dean gasped out. A heartbeat kicked in his ears, hammering through the diluted rush, and it suddenly occurred to Dean that he’d found it. This was what it felt like to be alive again, finally, and he smiled with an aching jaw, tears coated in his voice as he asked, “You gonna sing me to sleep, angel?”

There was a stretch of neon blue framing the bone of Castiel’s cheek. If Dean squinted hard enough, the light transformed into glass, its darkness refracting, and Dean could imagine Cas without the false skin. Just color blown edges and power fractured limbs, everything about him towering over Dean in a way that made him feel encased by oblivion.

For a long moment, Castiel said nothing. Just observed as Dean calmed his struggle; fell limp and willing against the strength of Cas’s hand. His fingers twitched, lips parting, and Dean watched as Cas’s breath froze in the swell of his throat.

They both noticed the mistake at the same time. The touch of humanity, and Dean wanted him closer. Wanted to coax the apology out of Cas himself, have him in a way he wasn’t sure he could voice.

But Cas made his decision, kept his silence, and he vanished before it could break, taking the rest of the air with him.

Chapter Text

Dean had never been very good at school.

Before he was sly mouthed and handsome enough to flirt his way out of detention, he was freckle faced and attention deficient. The subjects themselves never really gave him much of an issue, but there was too much sitting, too much talking, just— too much for the brain of a growing teen who had spent the only memorable years of his life getting his ears deafened by shotgun rounds.

The teachers were nice enough. They did their best to act like Dean stood a chance. But mostly they were just dismissive, put out by the kid with no motivation who came to school wearing a grown man’s skin, the state of his hands even harsher than the exhaustion under his eyes.

Dean kept to himself most days. Most years. He deflected when he was called on; joked when he was picked on, and middle school came and went in a drive by of state roads and pale hallways, nothing of worth ever really sticking.

Wesley was a singular frame in a film reel of distortion.

He was one of those people you just remembered. A collection of features and phrases and winter coaxed touches that had Dean startled into compliance, fearful of the stomach churning warmth. He was thirteen when he met Wesley; thirteen when he discovered brown eyes were the warmest of them all.

“I think there’s something wrong with you,” Wesley told him, his voice shooting off like a gun, and Dean had followed the sound with an edge of tension, certain he was going to be kicked down.

The smartass was much smaller than the usual brand of kids who picked on Dean at these places. He wasn’t anything threatening. Nothing all that smart. But he was looking at Dean with a tiger cub smile, something wicked and dangerous and all consuming, and he pushed his glasses up to rest neatly on his curled mop of hair.

Dean didn’t understand. “What?”

“That thing you’re doing, with the pencil,” He gestured to Dean’s hand, still grinning, and the tapping— the constant pat pat pat of Dean’s pencil colliding with paper abruptly stopped. Finally, Dean’s fingers relaxed, and the pencil rolled free. Wesley laughed breathily through his nose, “You have a really hard time focusing, don’t you?”

Focus, son, eye on the target. One wrong move and you’ll be dead on the pavement.

Dean had never let it bother him before. The buzzing in his limbs, the fizzle in his chest. He was restless in the silence but nervous on the front line and he— he didn’t want to talk when he should but couldn’t shut up when he needed to and he wished this wasn’t a thing. He wished he could put this— whatever the fuck it was— into words, into something meaningful that maybe his dad would coddle rather than crush, but that wasn’t Dean’s family and that wasn’t Dean’s life.

Dean wasn’t used to having people notice him. At least not for the things he wanted them to.

“Wrong. Biology is my passion,” Dean deadpanned, pretending to be oblivious, but the boy just laughed. Moved closer. The sound of Wesley’s chair scraping across the tile floor made Dean’s spine straighten.

“It’s not really a big deal,” He said, shrugging. His hands were a flash of gold to Dean’s right, warmed by the window paned sunlight. His knuckles were smooth. “Mom says I’ve got this thing that makes me think differently than other people. I get distracted, kind of like you.”

There’s people like me?

“Sounds lame,” Dean said, staring a hole into his desk.

And this, right here, was the part where most people would cut their losses with Dean. Where they decided the new kid was distant, cold, indifferent at best, and the only thing worthy of their time was for them to pick up their bag and walk away.

But Dean breathed in. Focused on the tick of the school clock overhead. Felt the floor remain steady beneath the soles of his sneakers. And when Dean looked back, Wesley wasn’t gathering his school books in a vicious haste, determined to sneak away.

Instead, he was looking right at Dean. Smiling more kindly than he had any right to.

“Guess we’ll just have to be lame together, then,” He said.

And Dean didn’t understand it at the time; wasn’t sure if he ever really did. His past was funny like that. But the stirring in his blood, the drumming in his chest, that unshakable feeling of wrong and right and dread and excitement was linked to a winter spent huddled in the curve of a weighted arm, and it surfaced in the form of colored cheeks. Lingered in the air like something tangible, something worth holding onto.

It gripped Dean like a vice. Blared in white noise as he laughed too hard and stared too long, his focus centering on a love laced boy who would kick start the avalanche.

And when Dean was sixteen sharing his first kiss with a summer warmed girl named Robin, everything right but everything wrong, the absence of that feeling was all he could think about.

“You’re just gonna have to trust me on this,” Dean said, a little helpless, and his chest all but imploded when Nick agreed without question.

Dean had almost forgotten what it was like to have someone believe him so naturally, so completely. There was a murder and a case and a person on his side for the first time in a long while— and Dean was dancing dangerously close to the sort of happiness that often swept out like a rug, his night turning far better than he imagined it would.

The thing was, Nick Munroe was a brush of good in an otherwise shitty week, and Dean drank his presence like a dying man.

Same style, same music, same interests. He was sitting in Dean’s car, rambling about the interior of the model, and Dean found himself torn between the passion in his voice and the curl of his smile, gaze darting over shadow bathed features with quiet interest.

Rolling with the real FEDs usually backfired on cases, but Nick was different, and Dean was weak, and he didn’t even bat an eye when Nick reached beneath his seat to scrounge through Dean’s box of cassette tapes, thumbing through the material with delicate care, his mouth open with amazement. In Nick’s place, Sam would be teasing him. Cas would be questioning him. Most people wouldn’t care and most people wouldn’t even try to but this was something precious in the part of Dean’s life that actually felt real, and to share it with someone was—

Nick’s fingers stopped, hovering over a tape that instantly made Dean bristle. He turned away as Nick fished it out, staring out the window with a wavering resolve that had heat pooling in Dean’s cheeks.

“Madonna, huh?” Nick asked, simple enough, but Dean could imagine it ten times harsher and ten times drunker, spoken with a hold at the back of Dean’s neck tight enough to make him puke.

Carefully, Dean said, “My brother must have snuck that one in.”

“Madonna’s fucking awesome, man,” Nick smiled, ignoring Dean’s excuse. “My mom used to carry her albums around everywhere she went. Anyone with a CD player was gonna hear her music and by god— they were gonna like it.”

Dean turned to look at Nick in the pooling light, something soft and pleading rising in his breast bone. He waited for Nick to take it back. Half expected a jab to the ribs and a chortled laugh that reeked of tobacco and smoker’s cough. But Nick was grinning with crooked teeth, dimples bright in his cheeks, and Dean was thrown breathless when Nick shoved the tape into the cassette deck without another word, setting it to play.

Warmth spilled in the crevice of Dean’s ribs, swarming like molten heat. He picked nervously at the corner of his thumb, his gaze set to his lap.

“Toast?” Nick asked.

Dean lifted his head and stared at the flask being offered to him. Found it attached to blue eyes and a strong chin and it— it was nothing but coincidence that Dean found this guy attractive. That he tended to have a type that strayed beyond blonde and busty and grew weak for anyone who even cared to look his way.

“Hard to say no to that,” Dean took the flask with careful hands, ignoring their subtle brush of skin. He drank quickly and deliberately, taking the burn. “Thanks.”

“Yeah,” Nick mumbled. He took the flask back, his eyes never leaving Dean’s. “You bet.”

Silence settled in around them and Dean took it with gratitude, ignoring the moment completely. He forced himself to look back out the window towards the bar glaring ahead, trying to remember how to do his fucking job. Whether Sam liked it or not, his doctor chick was their best lead, and Dean needed to be on the defensive if she came barreling out into the parking lot with some eye candy attached to her arm.

This wasn’t some wasted cold case they were picking at for kicks; this wasn’t a means to stamp out boredom. People were dead, a Siren was on the loose, and the last thing Dean needed to be fixated on was the type of cologne the man sitting next to him was wearing.

And yet.

And yet Madonna was playing, and the lot was empty, and they were parked just far enough from the nearest street light that if Dean wanted to he could take this moment as the secret that it was.

The thought was there. Just barely, grazing Dean’s heart like a razor. He cradled it with delicate hands, cupped palms, terrified of letting it drop— he couldn’t ever let it drop. Dropping it meant wanting, and asking, and being there for the potential hook to the jaw that would send Dean reeling for months.

Things used to be different. He used to have the bittersweet luxury of solitude, a promised few weeks— sometimes even months, when his dad would get sick of him enough to just take off, leaving Dean with some half assed case file that most times led to a dead end. Dean never told John that, of course. He didn’t tell his dad anything about the way he killed time and mingled in bars and learned how to walk into a room and sniff out clients like a dog.

Back then, it was anything for money. Anything for a full tank of gas and a means to get him the hell out of anywhere.

But the odd thing was, Dean didn’t do that anymore. He wasn’t gay. Not since Sam rolled back into his life. And yet Dean was staring at thirty down the barrel of a gun, clothes dry, stomach full, lungs filled to the brim with a warmth he couldn’t name and he still— he still wanted to—

In the corner of Dean’s eye, appeared a shapeless blur. It was slow, gentle; its movements riddled with a preemptive sort of action that had Dean turning into the kiss Nick pressed to his lips, heat encased in his breath.

Comprehension wasn’t an option. Acceptance lagged behind, and instinct was a dangerous string of never ending entanglements that forced Dean off and away with desire burning a hole in his throat.

“Woah, wait, I’m not—” Dean’s voice broke, wavering with the impossible. He stared at Nick, waiting for the apologies, waiting for the kind of speeches he used to get; blabbering grown men who were good and normal and nothing like Dean— nothing like what they had paid Dean to be. But Nick was looking at him like he wanted more, like Dean’s reaction was soul crushing, and Dean’s voice came out scrapped raw when he said, “I’m not uh, you know. Looking for anything right now. Especially on the job. Like I said before, my brother and I are more of the lone wolf types—”

“Come on. You don’t wanna waste a little time while we wait for this doctor of yours?” Nick’s hand rose swiftly to the heat of Dean’s cheek, fingers sliding back into matted hair, and Dean was just pathetic enough to let him, his heart beating all kinds of different. “Listen, man, maybe I read it all wrong, but you seemed interested back at the club. I just figured I’d see if the offer still stands.”

It wasn’t anything like how Dean remembered it being. There should be less talking, less negotiating. Clothes should be gone and words should be cursed and Nick’s hand should be a red hot brand meant to shut him up— not soothe him numb.

Hope led a delicate trail to the softness of Dean’s voice as he asked, “Are you serious?”

Nick’s smile was warm, tinged with a fondness that Dean had never been able to find on the hard tiles of bathroom stalls.

“You tell me,” Nick said, and Dean whimpered into the next kiss, weakness buzzing in his fingertips, aching through his nerves.

It always startled Dean just how different it was to kiss a man. Most women were delicate with the way they moved around him, drawing back just to watch Dean follow, forcing him to lead the dance. But with men, it was always Dean being opened, Dean being pried apart with lips and tongue and teeth. Power hummed in the warmth between skin and Dean never knew quite how to come up for air, the hardened jaw and scraping stubble of a back alley kiss thrilling enough to make Dean forget himself entirely.

God, how long has it been?

What felt like a lifetime had probably only been a few years; sometime before Dad and Stanford and the hell that followed. Only that hadn’t been anything like this. Kissing boys in the front seat of his car wasn’t at all what Dean was used to, wasn’t anything he’d been allowed as a kid, and joy shot through him like a drug, elation forcing his hands to fumble towards Nick’s jacket, diving in to find skin.

Nick curled into the touch, jerking forward with something ragged and desperate itching in his throat. His hand fell heavy to the flesh of Dean’s inner thigh, encouraging, and Dean’s gut took a sweeping dive, heat surging down the front of his jeans.

The lack of fear was a presence in itself, jarring from the past, and Dean forced himself not to think about it. To put everything that he wished he’d had before into kissing Nick and being kissed back, shame scurrying to the back of his mind. Dean had never had it like this; mutual and wanton, everything moving at his own pace. It had taken him thirty years to find this, even for just one night, and maybe this guy didn’t have the voice he wanted or the eyes he’d been dreaming about, but at least he was here and at least he was—

Two hands struck hard over the center of Dean’s chest, and his breath all but vanished as he was shoved backwards into the driver's side door.

“Fuck!” Nick shouted, everything soft and inviting in his features turning sour. “What’s the matter with you? Why isn’t it working?”

“I’m sorry,” Dean stammered out, panic clawing at his lungs. He watched silently as Nick scraped the back of his hand over his mouth, revolted. “I didn’t mean to—”

“Oh, you meant it, alright,” Nick laughed sharply. “Guy like you? I thought you’d be the easiest piece of meat I’d ever snatch up.”

Every possible exit blared a vicious red in the front of Dean’s mind, instinct rounding back. He thought about the gun in his waistband and the phone in his pocket— ready to take a beating, ready to spit red.

“What?” Dean could hear tears at the edge of his voice, and shame burned a wallowing hole at the center of him.

Nick scoffed. “Turns out you’re just fucking pathetic.”

Dean saw the hit coming, could feel it like a brewing storm. This was the common sequence of events; harsh, simple, definitive. This is what happened when Dean stirred up trouble. But Nick’s strength was unthinkable, and Dean heard the crack of his own nose before the pain even registered, his head slamming back into the window.

Blood painted over glass. Red tarnished over rain.

And Dean oftentimes forgot this part of the equation, the shameful truth, but this was nothing but routine and instinct drove him blind; Dean raised his arms and cowered. Waited to get what was coming to him. For time to fall still and the pain to come and leave.

But just as Dean had thought, Nick wasn’t like the other men. He was different. And he blew Dean’s vision out with a single punch.

When Dean woke it was with his heart in his throat and his head pounding like a drum, his world narrowed down to a single patch of carpet and an ache in his forearms.

In his line of work, Dean had woken up in plenty of shit-tastic situations by now. Roped and tied, chained and cuffed. Sometimes he’d come to feeling like he’d been starved for days and other times he’d feel nothing at all. But when it all came down to it, no matter how similar, every escape had to be planned, and every plan had to work.

Dean pulled at the tightness behind him, testing his mobility. The sound of metal clashing drew his head back, and he sighed. Deadbolt chains connected to the wall, cuffed on both wrists. Even if Dean could reach in his back pocket a pick wouldn’t do; he’d need something heavy to break these chains.

Dean turned his focus on the room, then. Plush carpet, dark walls, clean sheets. It looked like some love sick hotel room, and there, sitting up on the edge of the padded down bed, was Sam. No chains, no restraints or signs of struggle; he was just looking at Dean, elbows resting over his knees, and his hair was damp. Almost like he was fresh from a shower.

“Sammy?” Relief batted violently in Dean’s sternum, his body snapping against the chains. “Sam, listen to me. Cara’s not the Siren, he’s—”

“Happy you’re awake, for one,” Nick seeped from the shadows themselves, appearing before Dean with a splitting grin. Just hours ago, Dean would’ve called that smile charming, but it burned something awful now.

“What did you do to my brother?”

“Your brother?” He gawked. “I’m afraid that’s a reality long gone, Dean. Unlike you, Sammy here took my spell for what it was; a gift.”

Nick didn’t even have to bother sending a command; Sam rose willingly. He stood by the Siren’s side without a beat of hesitation, and when Nick slapped him soundly on the shoulder, mischievous and familiar in a way he had no right to be, Sam even mustered a smile.

Dean snorted. “Strange, seeing as you’re not really his type.”

“I’m not?” Nick sneered. “Someone who’s loyal. Giving. Trusting. A real big brother he can actually depend on,” Dean could see the workings of Sam’s face, how Nick’s words came with no challenge. “Sirens come in all forms, Dean. Sammy here wanted what you couldn’t give him, and his love called to me like a songbird. It’s funny, really. While he wanted a brother he could trust, all you were worried about was getting your dick wet.”

Dean flinched against the chains, “Fuck you.”

“Well that was the idea, wasn’t it?” Nick grinned knowingly, tilting his head to look at Dean. “Odd thing is, my tricks didn’t work on you. Despite you reeking of such… pathetic desperation, I couldn’t reach you like I reached Sam.”

The shot was unexpected; guttural where it dove into Dean’s stomach. Deep down, he’d already known. His moments with Nick had felt genuine, clear minded, real. Dean had wanted Nick to touch him with or without a drug steering him blind, and it was with shame rubbing color in his face that Dean said, “Huh, guess you’re not as handsome as you think you are.”

“It wouldn’t have mattered what form I took, Dean. Either way, the spell didn’t work because your heart is already spoken for.”

There was no stalling the shock to Dean’s system. He went hollow and wide eyed, everything inside of him falling perfectly still. Nick’s smile was a rising wave, towering and gradual.

“Believe me, I was just as surprised as you are. I mean, Dean Winchester holding an attachment? Caring enough for someone to be satisfied without the callings of a Siren? That’s practically unheard of for you, so tell me,” Nick leered at him, nosing into Dean’s space. He bumped his knuckles against the angry jut of Dean’s chin. “Who’s the lucky lady?”

A war forged shadow sparked in the walls of Dean’s mind, overcasted by a shielding of battered wings. The scar on Dean’s shoulder pulsed and hissed in response.

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” Dean said. His words came out through a violent tremor, coated in forced denial, and Nick stepped back with a mangled belt of laughter, spinning in place.

“Come on, Dean, don’t be so predictable!” He cried. “The master of hiding, never saying what you really feel. If you’re so adamant on staying a closet case, I’m sure Sammy here wouldn’t mind shedding some light.”

Dean turned to Sam with wide eyes, fear working as a staggering catalyst, “Sammy?”

“You don’t get to call me that,” Sam snapped immediately, parting from the Siren’s side just to stand up to Dean like an angry child, features mangled and twisted. “You lost that right the minute you decided you were better off trusting some angel over your own brother.”

The irony didn’t escape Dean. He ached and struggled with it, wanting more than anything to fight back, to snarl and hiss and spit because you left me first. The breakage had always started with Sam. And maybe Dean hadn’t helped much, not with his jealousy or his whining or his insatious need to be important, make them stay, make them want to stay— but Sam had tied the noose and thrown the rope and they were here now.

They were at complete odds.

“I’m not gonna do this with you, alright? Not like this, you— you’re not you right now,” Dean shook his head, wincing at the pain that still bloomed around the base of his skull and nose.

Sam choked out a disbelieving laugh. “And how would you know that, huh? It’s not like you’ve tried to understand me as of late.”

“Are you really playing the jealousy card right now? You?” Dean shouted, corrupt and pain filled, his chest bearing most of the crippling weight. “Sam, you’ve been sidelining me since the moment I got back! I went to fucking Hell for you and you just— you don’t— you don’t care. You’re still trying to get yourself killed and you’re letting Ruby lead you to it by the hand.”

“Okay, fine. You wanna know why I didn’t tell you about Ruby? And how we’re hunting down Lilith?” Dean’s face fell, burdened by an even sharper truth. “Because you’re too weak to go after her, Dean. You’re holding me back! You’re too busy bending over for some angel you don’t even know.”

The chains on Dean’s wrists broke and snapped apart in tandem to Sam’s words, falling to the ground in a tempting heap, and Dean watched as the Siren’s arms slowly lowered, an encouraging smile making his eyes dance dangerously.

Well, come on, then, he said wordlessly, stepping back as if exiting an arena. Prove him wrong.

And Dean stood there with a wavering sense of self, waiting for his willingness to subside, for logic to crash. He shouldn’t do this. That, he knew. But his rage burned on, Dean’s very identity ripped open and poured out over the carpet, and Dean didn’t care that this was what the Siren wanted; a final battle, a clash of teeth. Dean wanted it just as bad, and he felt decades worth of hatred coil down the line of his arm as he lunged for Sam and swung.

Dean often wondered what would have come of the Winchester boys if Bobby wasn’t around.

As a kid, seeing Bobby came with the kind of rarity that made it special. Made it feel like a salvation, and when Dean would show up at his door with Sam tied to his hip, John peeling out of the driveway with nothing even resembling a goodbye, Dean would hug Bobby in that helplessly ecstatic way only a child could. Arms wound tight, smile buried against a flannel shoulder. He’d breathe Bobby in, take in the warmth of him, that whiskey-burned scent, and feel safe for the first time in months.

Oddest part of all was that there, under Bobby’s roof, Dean got hugged back. He always got hugged back.

Dean had needed Bobby then, for the bedtime stories and the baseball practice. He’d needed him through a phase of pills and booze when he was fifteen, that summer of ‘91 when he’d lost all his pocket change in a bar fight and couldn’t feed Sam for the three weeks John had left them. Bobby was a promised phone call and an open door with a warm bed— and Dean clung to him almost as much as he did Sam, his existence hanging as one of the few stars still remaining in Dean’s life.

And now, with Sam’s body looming over Dean with only the kind of rage it took to kill a man, his thoughts clouded by the Siren, Dean wondered if he’d really ever stop needing Bobby.

If he’d ever stop needing to be saved.

In a manner all too familiar, Bobby arrived with only seconds to spare, hitting Sam over the head just in time for him to drop the ax before the brutal swing. Sam buckled on to the lush bared carpet, unconscious, and the Siren followed soon after, a knife burying itself in the crest of its spine.

There was a silence that followed, heavy and skin searing, like a swarm of smoke too potent for the eyes. Dean couldn’t find the strength to pull himself up off the floor.

“Have you got hearts shootin’ out of your ass too?” Bobby grounded out, hovering cautiously a few feet away.

“Nah,” Dean said. The ceiling above him was painted a faded maroon, dated and cracking at the corners. “Just Sam.”

Bobby didn’t say anything after that. Didn’t push the way he used to when Dean would show up with a fresh bruise or a steady limp as a teenager, ready to gripe just as much as he was ready to reassure. Bobby just did what he always did when Sam and Dean fucked up: he got rid of the body, shut his trap, and offered two cold ones.

Only it was a bottle of Coke that ended up settling in Dean’s hand this time, and horror sprung up sharp and painful on his face.

“Soda?” He grimaced. “Really, Bobby?”

“You boys are driving, aren’t you?” Bobby smacked back, uncapping a soda of his own.

Without any solid argument apart from it never stopped me before, Dean quickly dropped the subject and drank his words. He hid a wince into the curve of his elbow, the sudden bout of sugar making his teeth clench.

Bobby didn’t stay long. He never did in times like these. It hurt something desperate and childish in Dean to admit— but Bobby had better things to do than keep him and Sam in line, other hunters to help. He wasn’t their babysitter, and as much as Bobby liked to lecture them about the fighting and the lying and the bitching for no reason, he knew when to walk away.

“You know, those sirens are nasty things,” Bobby started, turning back fast enough to kick up loose gravel. He squinted at them from under the brim of his cap, brows pinched tight. “Spell or no spell, that it got to you, that’s no reason to feel bad.”

Dean wasn’t sure which one of them did it. Who dragged their eyes together and held them there, but Bobby’s gaze was a jolt to the chest, soft and knowing, always so— and Dean felt his jaw creak beneath the snap of his teeth, his head falling forward.

Dean didn’t look up again until Bobby and the rear end of his Chevelle were nothing but faded road dust.

“Alright, he’s gone. Have at it.”

Dean didn’t move in the slightest. He didn’t want to do this, not after the last twenty four hours he’d just had— not ever.

He could feel Sam beside him, pulsing with heat. There was guilt there, Dean was sure, but it was hard to place in the surrounding noise and Dean was suddenly too focused on breathing to really go searching for it.

“Come on, man. We’ve got hours on the road ahead of us, if we don’t do this now—”

“What do you want me to say?” Dean blurted, finally turning to look at Sam. “You want me to tell you you’re wrong? You’re right? That I’m fine with you playing Bonnie and Clyde with some side trash demon bitch?” There was a spark of defense, then, the instinct to argue flaring up in Sam’s shoulders. Dean nearly screamed at the sight of it. “‘Cause I’m not, Sam. And I’m sorry if you think I’m getting in the way of some— grand mission, I’m sorry if you think Hell did me in for good— but I’m not sorry for trying to protect you. I won’t ever be sorry for that.”

Sam set his soda down on the roof of the Impala, jaw tight with tension. “Look, I know I should’ve told you about Ruby—”

“You don’t think I knew?” Dean laughed, short and busted, the noise tearing right out of him. “It’s not like you’ve been the poster boy for honesty lately, Sam. I mean the lying, the phone calls, the sneaking out?” It must be different hearing it all aloud somehow, because Sam paled in an instant, eyes sinking with shame. Dean stared at the crown of his brother’s bowed head, utterly lost as he said, “I know you think I’m an idiot, Sammy, but come on.”

“I don’t think that I—” Sam blew out a harsh breath. “I don’t want this to be a problem with us, okay? I didn’t mean any of the things I said back there.”

“Sure you didn’t.”

Sam swallowed thickly, meeting Dean’s eyes just to dart away again. “Especially what I said about Cas, that was—”

It was embarrassment, of all things, that drove Dean to a daring edge. Sam didn’t even have to say it, to repeat the words he’d thrown out so easily back at the hotel. Dean’s face turned a violent red and he nudged Sam’s chest with the lip of his bottle, daring him to fall back.

“I bet you think I’m better off being sidelined in all this, don’t you? That I’m damaged goods, is that it?” Dean bit out, aware of his own heart and the panic beating its way to his blood.

“Dean, it was the spell. You know I didn’t mean—”

Dean shoved him hard in the chest, rage settled tight and neat in the curl of his upper lip as he watched Sam stumble back on the gravel.

“And you know I’m not into guys!”

The words echoed in the outskirts of a busy Iowa city, glaring above the distant drown of traffic and shop goers. There was nothing there to block out the emotion of it, to soften the blow, and the sky took it and kept it and showered them with it over and over, what was only a few seconds becoming something excruciating.

Dean couldn’t stand the sound of his own voice.

“Nick tricked me into thinking he was more than just an FBI douche and he knocked me out— end of story. Nothing else. And I know you’ve got issues with Cas, I know he might not be from our neck of the woods, but just because he’s been there when you refuse to be doesn’t make me fucking queer.”

The word felt foreign in the shape of Dean’s mouth. Strange and ill-footed, incapable of passing through without a hitch or two. It made sense, Dean supposed. He’d only ever heard the word when it was kicked into his stomach with a boot and smeared into his face like a curse.

“Dean,” Sam said, and he sounded like his chest was collapsing, pain flaring in his eyes.

Dean stiffened.

He moved along like it was easy, like the momentum was the last thing keeping him upright, “I know you think he’s bad news, and yes, sure, he’s made some mistakes, but at least he’s not…”

“A demon,” Sam finished for him. The unspoken truth cut through the air, severing the last drops of serenity. “At least he’s not a demon.”

Dean shrugged, and it pulled like lead in his sockets. “It really is that simple, Sam.”

“No, Dean, it’s not. When has it ever been?” Sam retorted. “Just because he’s not running around slaughtering people doesn’t make him one of the good guys. I mean, what he did with Anna? His freak-o handprint? We never know his next move, what he’s capable of. Doesn’t that scare you?”

He’s my friend, Dean wanted to say, could feel it bubbling up like a sickness, an unwanted cough, but he stopped himself. Grappled with that want like an addict softened their tremors with a vice-like hold.

Dean thought about the last time he’d seen Castiel. Stiff and bathed in color, his voice lowered with something dangerous and base driven, the pulse of him pounding through Dean’s chest as he shoved him against the bathroom wall.

He then wondered where Cas was now. On Earth, in Heaven; watching Anna get shaven into dust somewhere, indifferent to stop it.

Dean turned away with a violent jerk, “I’m done talking about this,” he said, because realizing who Cas was and what he did and how none of it seemed to matter to the gnawing absence he could feel in his core was starting to tear at him, and Dean already had enough pieces of himself to pick up at the end of each day.

It wasn’t until Dean was already in the driver's seat wrenching the door closed that he noticed the crack in his watch. A splintering in the glass, distorting the numbers and the restless tick.

Great, Dean thought mildly, making quick work of unlatching the damn thing and tossing it uselessly into the backseat.

He didn’t think about it again.

It took a careful mix of denial and white-knuckling for Dean to pretend like running into Alastair again didn’t uproot him from the very Earth.

But there was another seal. Another set of impossible circumstances. And it shouldn’t surprise him, really, that Alastair managed to rise from the depths, crawl through the tar. It had been two months since Anna had blasted him away. Two months since Cas’s visits had stopped and Dean had been forced to relearn how to wrangle the nights by himself, no angel lighting the corridors.

And yet it’s Alastair who appeared in that cemetery. It’s Alastair who had been trying to break the very seal they had only just stumbled upon, and it didn’t even matter that Dean was dead and breathing through ghosted lungs— he could still feel the heat of the pit trembling beneath him, rising in sweltering waves.

Alastair pulled something in Dean that no other being could see, making it impossible to explain, and Dean walked the troubling line between fighting and fleeing, wanting to be brave but feeling anything but.

And nothing got better. That was the catch, the defining repentance. Every escape led to an even bigger reunion.

“You can’t run, Dean,” Alastair told him, slithering and awful, trailing Dean by the back as he bolted down an alley in search of Sam. “Not from me. I’m inside that angsty little noggin’ of yours. Everywhere you go, it will be me who follows. Not the angels, not the demons, not those monsters of yours that go bump in the night. Your fate lies with me.”

“You always were a cocky fucker, weren’t you?” Dean shot back, spinning around as his surroundings came to a dead end, Sam nowhere to be found. “Forget it. I don’t know how all this fate stuff works, and to tell you the truth, I don’t care. But once Sam and I get these seals under control, I’m sure it’ll be enough to earn us a spot in the penthouse. Free of charge.”

And Dean meant it. Believed it in the kind of way you do when you have nothing else to long for, and Alastair must have known that. He held onto it with puncturing claws.

“Oh, you poor, dear boy,” He murmured, stopping Dean dead in his tracks. “Your soul has already been tainted. Wrecked beyond repair. The only place you'll ever go is down, darling.”

The darkness erupted with jagged light before Dean could even stutter a response, disrupting the passing quiet. Lighting struck with personal vengeance, encasing Alastair completely, and he vanished with a weakened cry, moonlight swallowing his shadow.

Dean blinked. “What the hell?”

“Guess again.”

Dean rounded back with a ragged gasp, any restoration of relief at seeing Alastair gone leaving the moment he heard Cas’s voice, his tone blasting like a shotgun, rough and sudden and far too much like the creature who had shoved him through wall plaster the last time they met.

“Are you fucking serious?” Dean whispered angrily. “You were here the whole time?”

“You performed perfectly well without us,” Cas scowled, exhaustion suddenly making him look his impossible age. “This was a win, Dean. You and Sam just saved a seal, and we captured Alastair.”

“I think it’s about time somebody shamed you for this voyeurism thing you’ve got going on,” Dean spoke plainly, refusing to buy this version of Cas. The version who appeared buttoned and formal, standing with such clear purpose. “‘Cause it’s bullshit. What makes you think you get to let us deal with all the heavy work?”

“That script on the funeral home, we couldn’t penetrate it. This was a difficult predicament for us, Dean. Alastair was prepared this time. He knew exactly how to keep us at a distance,” His lips thinned, realizing something far too dark for Dean’s liking. He nodded before Dean could think to push about it, “You assisted us greatly.”

“The funeral home. That was angel proofing?”

“Why do you think I recruited you and Sam in the first place?”

Dean stared at him. “You recruited us?”

“That wasn’t your friend Bobby who called, Dean. It wasn’t Bobby who told Sam about the seal.”

Dean tried to remember it; the moment of the call, the exact scene. Maybe deciphering it would help. Stop it from happening again. But it was quick and meaningless at the time and what would it matter anyway? Cas had always known how to play Dean.

“Oh, you two-faced bastard,” Dean breathed out. “If you wanted our help, why the hell didn’t you just ask? Why did you feel the need to cake it on?”

Impatience bled through the roots of Castiel’s features. He looked at Dean with a sharpness meant to linger, disbelief and painstaking bewilderment letting through as he said, “Because whatever I ask, you seem to do the exact opposite.”

An argument fluttered in Dean’s throat before dying off within seconds. He glared at the distant streetlight.

“So what now, huh? The people in this town, they’re just gonna start dying again?”

Cas exhaled, “Yes.”

“These are good people. Don’t you think you can make a few exceptions?” Dean was willing to gamble here, push this creature in a way he shouldn’t. In a way he should probably fear rather than hope for.

“To everything there is a season,” Cas insisted.

Dean stared at him, warmth tipping in the fractured shell of his chest. “You made an exception for me.”

Castiel’s silence was loud. Filled with distant meaning, and his voice came out scrapped and gutted as he murmured, “You’re different.”

And he didn’t mean it in the way Dean was used to. Not in the way Dean had sort of always believed and John used to confirm with every drunken rage. This was something else, something bigger. Something like you’re important, and I think you might even be important to me, and even when Cas turned away, averting his eyes with a nervous twitch, Dean stared hard into the side of Castiel’s face, watching his jaw grate like metal plating.

“Yeah. That seems to be a running theme as of late, and I’ll be honest man, I—” Weakness sprung in the gaps of Dean’s wiring, blooming like a bleeding heart. Cas’s head rose with it, lifting with helpless wonder. “I don’t like it. I don’t get it. Why me? After everything I’ve done, how come I’m some sought after hero?”

Good or bad, intentional or not, Dean existed as the misfit, the anomaly, the freak. He was a spinning game piece on a winding clock counting down, and the universe proved it in any way it could, every chance it got. It had been that way for years, maybe even forever, but with the angels it was glaring. With the angels it was time traveling and world saving and billion old beings claiming you’re the exception, and Dean was starting to forget how to breathe beneath it all.

This wasn’t a monster case. This wasn’t anything they could research or guess on or scour their dad’s journal searching for forgotten answers. This was the world they were trying to save. This was everything.

Dean wondered how many more burdens he could try and shoulder before he’d start to crack.

“You serve a great purpose. You’re… a good man,” Cas said slowly, squinting in that way he did when Dean threw him off course, surprising him enough to make his mechanics freeze and stutter. Suddenly, he looked troubled, rattled by the look on Dean’s face. “I don’t understand what you’re asking.”

Dean’s smile was forced.

“There’s really no saving me is there? I mean, even if we win. Even if Lilith dies and all this bad comes to an end, I’m still gonna die eventually, and Heaven’s not even in the cards.”

Logically, it shouldn’t matter. It’s never mattered. Dean had lived without faith or God or the back-of-the-mind comfort of Heaven for his entire life; hunting didn’t cater to it. Hunting didn’t accept it. It was pointless and redundant and Dean refused, putting his faith in other things just as undependable. But with these months had come many changes. Many instances of shifting beliefs, morality uprooting, and somehow, impossibly, Alastair had managed to point out yet another bruise for Dean to tread around.

“I wish Alastair hadn’t spoken of such things,” Cas sighed softly.

Dean fought to keep his voice steady as he asked, “So he was telling the truth?”

And there was that look again. That mindfulness, that regretfulness. Like there was bad news to give and Cas could feel it enough to adhere to it, hated it enough to dread it.

“Hell’s permanence cannot be reversed. God intended that those in Hell remained there for eternity.”

Dean scoffed. For a moment, the reality of his luck was actually funny. “Naturally.”

“I’m sorry,” Cas said.

“Me too,” Dean shrugged. He cleared his throat roughly, trying to find steady ground, but his skin was heating and his eyes were burning and he forced all that grief into a weakened shove to Cas’s shoulder. It almost came across as normal. Comfortable. Like they were friends in the textbook kind of way, and Cas looked about ready to lean into it when Dean said, “Guess you’ll have to find some other poor schmuck to annoy, then.”

Cas abruptly stopped. His next blink was very, very slow. “I—”

“Sammy gets a pass though, right? You’ll look after him in all this?”

The words fired out like a warning shot. A little rapid, a little careless, almost as if Castiel didn’t have the ability to take them and twist them and use them to Dean’s very demise, a neon framed sign saying this is it, and press right here, and biggest weakness. And for a brief moment, Dean balked with sudden fear. Thought about what would happen if Cas wasn’t how Dean believed him to be. Wasn’t what he so desperately wished. Was more like the other angels who snarled and spat and tore through humans with universal importance as their only regard.

But then he saw the look on Cas’s face.

Saw the kind of emotion Dean clocked like a dying man, wanting to cherish it, memorize it, because the bold and unnatural was what Dean was best at, and everything Castiel was shined with such visceral complexity.

“You’ve just learned of your own damnation and you're worried about that of your brother?” He asked, almost careful. The words seemed to lose themselves in his mouth, veering against an inner shock.

Dean raised his eyebrows. “This is the same program we’ve been binging, buddy. Keep up.”

There was a siren making its run somewhere in the distance, lights distorted by brush. Dean listened as it traveled, waiting for that distinct moment before he could tell which direction it was headed in; for now, they were safe. Hopefully they hadn’t caused too much of a stir tonight.

“Yes,” Cas finally said, quieter than before. Control coiled in his limbs, fighting a vicious battle. His eyes seeped into the dampened pavement. “Yes, I’ll look out for him.”

Dean pressed two hands into the caving of Pamela’s stomach, and the bleeding only got worse.

It seeped through the shape of Dean’s fingers. Foamed over the grimace of her teeth, and they knew. Knew there was no moving her, no waiting for an ambulance to climb two stories just to carry Pamela out with her guts held back by barricaded palms. She was going to die here, scared and bitter, bleeding into the bedding of some half cent motel Dean couldn’t even remember the name of.

And for what? To save some fucking seal? Get the reapers in town to start killing innocent people again?

It didn’t seem worth it. None of this ever seemed worth it.

“I told you I didn’t want anything to do with this,” She sighed, resigned and panting, tears shredding her voice. She peeled her glasses off with shaky hands, tossing them across the floor. Her eyes shined with defeat. “Do me a favor? Tell that bastard Bobby Singer to go to Hell for ever introducing me to you two in the first place.”

Dean’s stomach ached. “Pamela—”

“Shut up, Grumpy. This is your fault. Both of you. But don’t go getting all sad and self-hating on me, alright?” She looked sternly at Dean, demanding he listen for once, and Dean softened with a great upset, warmth curling at the back of his throat as Pamela murmured, “Everybody’s gotta go sometime.”

Tension rolled high in her face suddenly, convulsing with a rampant need, and she reached for Dean with blood red hands, tugging him close, “Come here.”

Dean craned forward with blaring senses, scared and worried for the look on Pamela’s face, the rigidness of her touch.

“I know about your friend, Dean. I know it’s Castiel,” Her grip on him tightened, holding him in place before Dean could draw back like he wanted. “I can feel him inside of you. Like a sickness. Like a disease. And you’re different; he’s changed you. There’s a light that wasn’t there before. A power you can’t control. And if you think he has good intentions with you,” Her breathing hitched, crackling through a whisper, “think again. The angel’s are not on your side.”

Something hard and unforgiving settled at the center of Dean’s sternum, sinking towards his lungs. He swallowed thickly.

Just as Dean opened his mouth to speak, Pamela jolted back with a pain filled cough, wincing through a fresh batch of blood. Her tongue lolled through the mess, head tipping back against the headboard.

“Pamela?” Dean called, voice shaking. She slumped softly, almost peaceful. It wasn’t a comfort to Dean whatsoever. “Pamela!”

“What was that?” Sam asked. He leaned into Dean’s space, accepting the turn of events far too quickly for Dean’s liking. “What did she say to you?”

It was with blood stained fingers that Dean raised his hand to Pamela’s face, and gently closed her eyes.

The thing about having a piss poor reality was that telling dreams apart was a winner's game.

There was no challenge in it, no point of uncertainty. The lights would dim and the scene would shift and Dean would sink into the promise of peace, if only just for a moment.

He had the common dreams. People and places that appeared frequently, flashes of his mother in a flowing nightgown, the headlights of passing cars as his dad taught him how to drive at an age where he could actually reach the pedals. Dreams where Sam was just a smiling gangle of limbs and hair and tanned skin and Dean lived in a state of oblivious mundanity, spending his days under the hood of some engine or bursting through burning buildings caving with smoke.

They were good dreams, always had been. Something easy Dean could depend on to come back, again and again, for as long as he dared to dream them even in the moments he was awake.

But sometimes the program changed, Dean’s brain would throw him a curveball, and he’d be forced to wade unknown waters, follow a different code.

He was at a loss when Castiel began plaguing his dreams.

It started as innocent interference, almost like Dean was picking at a weakened signal. Cas would appear in shapeless corners, abandoned bus stops. He was a stranger on the street and a drifter in a bar and Dean could ignore him, could force his attention elsewhere, like on his fishing line casted into a pond or his hands moving over rusted metal. But Cas’s presence was a scorching heat, pestering for attention, and it was sooner rather than later that Cas drifted closer than he’d ever dared to.

His mouth was a searing burn.

The taste of him bloomed on Dean’s tongue like honey, something so impossibly sweet, and Dean woke with a broken gasp, shivering under the motel air unit rattling in the darkened corner.

In an instant, Dean knew. Like a shot in the dark, a pattern you have memorized.

There, at the end of the bed just shy of Dean’s feet, sat Castiel, warm and soft eyed as ever. And maybe Dean had become a little too hopeful for it. Maybe he was wishing to still be in a dream. But Cas didn’t speak, and he didn’t reach out, and Dean laid there in the dark with an ache stitched into the lining of his stomach, nothing and everything pulling at his sweat flushed skin.

It took Dean far too long to notice the throbbing in his underwear. It was all just heat, such visceral want, and Dean squeezed his legs together with a stifled groan, tears blotting his vision.

He longed for a reaction; dreaded one just the same. There wasn’t much Dean could do to explain this. Not with Cas here. Not with him sitting there looking at Dean while both of them realized all in the same breath that Dean was sick and wanton and hard enough to have his boxers pruning with a stain.

It was through a throat engulfed in flames that Dean asked, “Are you just gonna fucking stare?”

And Dean knew how it sounded. Like a threat. Like an invitation. Like both and neither all at once. But Cas had disappeared on him again, his absence stretching for days. Pamela had died, her ashes rotting in some sun dried field in Wyoming after a hunter's funeral she probably hadn’t even wanted but couldn’t object to through all the blood— and it had happened without a single batted eye from the freaks upstairs.

Everything felt different now, the aftermath of a vicious wave. Pamela had warned him. Begged Dean to see reason behind the false lenses, the all consuming warmth, but Cas was there now, his presence booming even in the silence, and Dean felt like crying in a way a lost child might, remembering after a grueling winter what it felt like to truly stand in the sun again.

Castiel’s eyes were a searing blaze, locked and unmoving, boring into Dean’s face.

The contact made Dean squirm, the scar on his shoulder prickling to life. Dean could practically feel it. This fog of heat burrowed beneath his very skin, the reality that Cas had set up shop somewhere deep and disclosed, planting himself inside of Dean all those months ago to form the kind of attachment that creeped on dangerous.

Dean wondered how deep it truly went. The connection, the bond— he’s laid claim on you, do you have any idea what that means?

Dean should be scared. Worried for the way his heart was spoken for, but his mind was so at war. Believed he would be if he wasn’t so clouded, so desperate for someone to understand him in the way Cas seemed to, but it was hard. It was hard to see the point in resisting when the world was already halfway down the drain.

When Cas made no move to answer, Dean visibly shuddered, anger rippling down his spine as he gritted, “This is what you wanted, isn’t it?”

And that got a response. Loud and crystal clear; Castiel vanished like the coward that he was.

Dean bent his body forward and forced his head into the bathroom sink, pain rearing up angrily. Blood drained into the porcelain, the water foaming with red, and he watched the proof of his shitty night swirl down the drain and disappear in a way it never really would.

“You alright?” Sam asked from the other room, voice faint.

Dean gargled a mouthful of water and spit a hazy red, groaning deeply. “You ask such stupid fucking questions, man.”

Expecting a half ass reply, Dean’s heart nearly jumped out of his own chest when Sam appeared at the bathroom doorway looking twice as bitchy as usual.

“You say that like you didn’t let that vamp use you as a punching bag tonight.”

Dean forced nonchalance into his instant shrug. “Better me than you.”

“How about neither of us?” Sam shot back, like the idea was the simplest conclusion and yet somehow Dean still couldn’t get there on his own. “Jesus, Dean. Everything is already shitty enough as it is, I don’t need you starting some self-sabotage mission too.”

“Why? Because one self-righteous Winchester is enough?” Dean bit out, ignoring Sam’s heated silence to reach for the nearest towel. “It was a hunt, Sam. A dangerous one— just like the rest of ‘em, and I got the short end of the fucking stick this time around. Who gives a shit?”

“Me,” Sam demanded, and Dean marveled at the look of fear in his brother's eyes, suddenly realizing just how long it had been since he’d last seen it. “I know things have been… bad, since Iowa. But you’re still my brother, and I can’t do this by myself. I don’t want to. Please.”

Dean knew this wasn’t going to be easy. Forgiving Sam, letting it go, trusting him like he used to. But when Sam’s apology only left him angrier, standing in that bathroom with fluorescents shining in his peripheral, Dean decided it was best he walked away. Something bad was going to happen if he didn’t.

“I need a smoke,” He said sharply, ducking under Sam and passing through the doorway.

Sam watched him go with shining eyes, voice weak as he bit out, “I thought you quit.”

Dean laughed, tossing his towel across the nearest bed.

“The world's ending, Sam,” Dean said plainly, and he walked outside without another word.

What Sam called bad, Dean called impossible. Running into that Siren had only sped up a natural decay, and their relationship had been stripped of everything but profession, hunting becoming the only source of neutral interaction. Dean thought he’d had bad fights with Sam before. Puny screaming matches after stealing Sam’s prom date, putting nair in his shampoo bottle. All out blood draws like the night Sam left for Stanford, or the time Sam ran away and after getting a ripping from John, Dean hadn’t been able to stop himself from laying into him the second he found Sam living it up in some abandoned RV two states over, not a care in the world.

It was fucked. Always had been. There was Sam and Dean and then there was the mess of the past that stayed between them, stitched into their foundation. But this was something different. This felt irreparable, too painful to even touch, and Dean decided he didn’t want to bother with trying. He was done being the one who tried.

The hood of the Impala was a burning cold at the back of Dean’s thighs, reminding him of the months to come, the way the streets would freeze but his memory would keep Hell blazing alive. He leaned into Baby anyway. Took her as a single comfort in a roiling storm cloud and pressed a cigarette between his teeth, cupping the flame with his palm.

He breathed smoke into the open sky, craning his head back. It took only a few seconds of wondering about Cas and the stars for Dean to feel the air pitch with static.

“Hello, Dean.”

Dean didn’t bother moving. His eyes stayed fixed up above as he said, “Your delivery time is getting to be sub par, man. I’ll have to stop tipping you.”

Castiel looked tired. He stepped into the moonlight with rugged shoulders, head down, and Dean couldn’t help it; it was the first thing he noticed. How Cas looked rung dry and strung up, sawed down and itching. He looked older than the last time Dean saw him, somehow, despite it being impossible. Dean tried not to think about it too much. The rules tended to be jagged when it came to them anyway.

Aging wasn’t a reality for angels, but they weren’t exactly supposed to make house calls either.

“You could have just prayed,” Castiel said through a sigh, stepping out into the vacant lot.

Dean laughed, fanning away a puff of smoke. “Yeah, right. Like that would’ve done any good.”

Castiel said nothing as Dean took a succession of quick pulls, cheeks warming and hollowing. Dean could feel his stare like a heated brand, following Dean through every gulp and swallow, twist and shift. Embers glared in the subtle breeze and Dean whisked them away with reckless fingers, guiding them to the ground.

“What happened?” Castiel finally asked, and he stepped into Dean’s space with little warning, bending to get a good look at him.

They both startled when Dean flinched back. And Cas, despite everything, had the nerve to look upset when Dean said, “Are you asking ‘cause you care, or because you think it should matter?”

“I’m asking because vampires have never been a difficult enemy for you. And yet, your injuries are far more extensive than your brothers.”

For all of Dean’s training, all the years practicing how to stamp down a reaction, maneuver through an argument, whisk his way through danger with charm and wit and a blood stained smile— he thought he’d be able to manage this. Keep up the lie. The obliviousness it took to pretend he hadn’t taken a beating just to get where he was now, an angel asking after him. But Cas could see him, read him, was able to call Dean out on his bullshit and say I understand without using a damn word, and Dean figured it was just the same as it always was; Cas already knew his truth.

“What can I say, this one was a bitch,” Was all Dean could manage, but even that was stripped of any real effort.

“You’re lying,” Cas said plainly, his voice nearing something harsh. Dean felt it burn beneath his skin.

“Is that right?” He laughed. “Well, I guess that makes two of us then, seeing as you keep deciding to ghost me like a prom date these last few weeks.”

Castiel wanted to object. Dean could see it in the scrunch of his nose, the flare of his eyes, this momentary tic so human it was flooring. But within seconds he was calm again, marble skin and plastic bones, vacant from the inside out.

“I’ve been preoccupied.”

“Yeah, well, handling the gallows is a tough gig,” Dean muttered.

“I thought…” There was a timidness to the way Cas dragged his feet back, rethinking their distance, and Dean had half a mind to follow him. Test his resistance, prove him weak. Dean settled with a heavy stare. “Making myself scarce seemed to be the right approach, given what happened the last time I visited.”

Acknowledging that night aloud was the last thing Dean expected of him, and his throat tightened with a ragged laugh, an ache rolling through his stomach. He hid the shake of his smile with a drag of smoke, pressing his lips thin around the tarnished paper.

“You mean when you hijacked my dreams to get your rocks off?” Dean asked, because it was dark and he’d been tired and Cas had run— of course he was guilty in this. But then Castiel looked at him, sad and wide eyed, like Dean’s opinion on this unsettled him greatly, and Dean stood there with little landing to fall back on.

“I didn’t interfere with your dreams, Dean. I could feel your concern, your conflict, and when I arrived to help you—” Cas stopped, throat clicking with a swallow. “I’m sorry. I hadn’t meant to interrupt.”

Dean flicked his cigarette into the gravel below, grinding it to dusted soot. “My fault,” He said softly, mostly because he couldn’t think of much else.

“I figured spending some time apart was the appropriate measure to take. It’ll make it easier in the end.”

“Make what easier?” Dean asked. Cas’s shoulders went rigid under the bulk of his coat.

“My superiors have begun to question my sympathies. My purpose. They believe I’ve begun to express emotions, doorways to doubt,” He looked at Dean carefully, shifting between each feature like he longed to find something specific. It wasn’t long before he abandoned the search altogether, shaking his head as he turned away, “This can impair my judgment.”

“Is it the handprint?” Dean stepped around him, adamant on seeing Cas’s face. “Do they know you laid some possessive mojo on me?”

“Dean,” There was that guilt again, eyes shaping with regret. “It wasn’t my intention to—”

“Doesn’t matter. It’s done. We’re— connected, or whatever. Fine. So the dicks found out about you playing sandman. So what?”

“They believe I’ve become too close to the humans in my charge,” Cas revealed, controlled and detached, vibrating like a tempest. He faced Dean fully, blatant as he said, “You. Our engagements are unorderly. Unnecessary. This might be the last time we see each other.”

And then he was bracing his feet as if to take flight, squaring his shoulders in preparation, and all Dean could do was throw a hand out to stop him. It landed like a blow to Castiel’s arm; fingers digging in, fabric squelching. The sheer force of it stopped Cas dead in his tracks.

“What?” Dean demanded, staring widely. A tremor started up in his hand. “Cas, you can’t just—”

Cas ripped his arm away, making the decision for the both of them.

“You have no say in what I can and can’t do, Dean,” He said roughly, rocks caught in his throat. “You’re just a man.”

It was then and only then that Dean realized Cas was serious. It registered slowly, painfully, undeniably too late, and Dean fought against the wave of upset that crashed over him in an instant. This whirlwind of feeling that told him he was sad and angry and by all accounts terrified of it coming true.

This time when Cas turned away again, Dean followed him like a storm.

“Is that it, then? One little slap on the wrist and you’re tailing it back home?” He demanded, circling back around Cas without care or conscience, refusing to let him escape this. “What about the plan? The seals? You were supposed to help me in all this.”

“I wasn’t supposed to do anything,” Cas threw back at him, watching the way the words imploded in Dean’s face. “My mission was to lay siege to Hell and save Dean Winchester, and I did. My task is complete, I’ve accomplished my undertaking. I understand this is regrettable, but it’s what’s best.”

“Best for who?”

With the question came an answer in itself, Dean’s desperation pushing him far past self damnation. It was obvious what he thought about this, what he truly wanted, and that was for Cas to stay. Selfishly, foolishly— he didn’t want this, whatever the fuck it was, to be the end.

“‘Cause you— you can’t just— come into someone’s life, pretend to care, and then check out,” Dean laughed, ripped and bullet filled, iron clashing in his teeth. “That’s not how this fucking works,” He said.

And Cas’s gaze bent to his very will.

“You’re stronger than you wish to believe,” Castiel insisted, soft and breathy. Like the moment had stripped him of all rankings, and the imbalance that the universe often held between them was leveling out. “You and your brother, you will stop Lilith. You will succeed, with or without my intervention. It’s your destiny.”

Cas’s eyes settled steady over the waning distance, peering out past the darkened lot. Dean watched him swallow beneath an unbeknownst weight. The jump of skin and muscle, the curve of his throat painted a tempting black.

“And what’s your destiny, huh?” Dean raised his eyebrows, all that bitterness finally beginning to bubble, anger prickling in every one of his corners. “You plan on being a bellboy your whole existence? Walking around with a clipboard and a stick up your ass?”

Cas’s shoulders dropped. “I’m made to obey, to follow. I was never meant to—”

“Then follow me. Just follow me.”

Each word forced Dean another step forward, a tantalizing dance, and Castiel’s eyes snapped up with frantic uncertainty. He practically flinched when he saw how close they were standing, how close Dean had decided he wanted, and Dean took that image— the one where Cas was weakened and breakable, at the cross section of a tremulous shatter point— and seared it in the groves of his chest.

He would need it later.

“Dean,” Cas softened, fondness tipping him even closer, his head tilting in the shadows.

“I’m a shitty leader, and at this point my moral compass is shot to high hell, but I wanna stop Lilith and without you I don’t—” Dean shook his head, a pounding rising beneath crawling skin. “I don’t think I can. I don’t think I can.”

Cas’s eyes were lowered. Hidden with shame, with embarrassment maybe, that he was actually considering this. Dean didn’t let it bother him. He simply lowered his head with him, catching Cas’s eyes and bringing them back up, tugging on that invisible string he’d somehow helped tie between their two beings at the start of it all.

With their eyes locked, Castiel looked weathered. Worn down and bleeding, flayed at the crimson edges. But he looked beautiful too, windswept and crystallized, glass caught in his vision.

Dean swayed where he stood, itching to dive, and Cas just stared at him and said, “You don’t need me.”

Dean wanted to argue with him. Wanted to spin in a thousand more circles and tell him in a thousand more ways that he did. He did need Cas, but the words felt big and his chance felt small and Dean—

Dean kissed him.

There was a tipping in his chest, a weight that toppled, and Dean dove desperately, both hands catching Castiel’s jaw as he pressed their mouths together, rough and sudden and not at all like he’d kiss a girl. This was a fight, a vicious ploy to get him to stay, because all his life Dean’s had to fight not to be left, and all he knew how to do was kick and scream for it.

“Dean,” Cas said, like he was risking something, opening his mouth amidst an ocean. Cas’s words were slurred warmth across the press of Dean’s lips, “Dean, we can’t—”

But it was Cas who chased as Dean leaned away, fitting so sternly into the shape of Dean’s hands that Dean couldn’t even find the words before they were kissing again. Leaning and veering, scrambling over skin and stubble and hitching breaths, the moon their only witness, and it occurred to Dean that maybe this should be more startling.

He should be frightened by Castiel’s strength. How much he could lay to waste if he merely just decided to. But Cas’s hold on Dean was tight in a way that was safe, not in a way that was threatening, and he kissed like he was nervous. Like he was struggling to breathe, grazing humanity, and Dean nearly fell to his knees right there when he felt himself get dragged back and shoved against the side of his car, Cas’s body melding right along his.

Warmth trickled through the weaves of Dean’s ribcage, fresh and crackling, electric singed water. It spun like a vicious storm inside of him, familiar yet new, doubled down and aching, and Dean pried his mouth away with a choked off gasp.

The wind grazed over his lips, cooling mixed saliva. Dean’s skin was singing.

“What are you doing, Cas?” He asked. But in Dean’s head it looked different, sounded far more like what are you doing to me? And Cas stared with open appraisal as his thumb traced the swell of Dean’s bottom lip, a surge of blue appearing around the rim of his eyes.

The relief was instant.

“Healing you,” Castiel said, like it wasn’t the single most adoring thing Dean had ever heard.

“Fuck, you’re so—” Dean writhed against the sudden hand at his stomach, sliding beneath fabric. Power pooled from the plains of Cas’s palm, boring into purple-bruised skin, and Dean moaned hoarsely as the pain vanished, the soreness draining from his body. “Fuck,” He said again.

Cas swallowed nervously, eyes soft and fluttering. “You can’t be this careless just to get my attention. You could’ve—”

“Don’t,” Dean shook his head frantically. “Don’t talk. You’ll just fuck this up,” The look on Castiel’s face was a sad one, something so torn and hurting, desperate to unleash, but Dean couldn’t risk it. Couldn’t bear to hear reason right now. “If you don’t want this, I get it. Say the word and I’ll stop. I won’t— I won’t be mad, okay? But you don’t want to stop. I know you don’t. And I just… want you to be honest for once.”

Drifting, sinking, falling.

Dean leaned just that little bit further, bumping their foreheads together. He hoped it was enough to let Cas know he was sorry.

“I’ve never done this before,” Cas whispered. His voice cracked, breaking into sodden gravel. It was the only truth he could afford to reveal, and Dean smiled at the sight of it, a tremor starting up in his hands as he gripped the front of Cas’s coat.

“It’s easy. It’s easy, you— don’t worry. All you gotta do is follow me. Follow me, remember?”

Cas nodded absently, chasing Dean’s mouth. “Okay,” He said, and Dean dragged him in by the tie, scrambling for the closest car door and wishing it was always this easy to convince Cas to stay.

It wasn’t a ceremonious fit; the backseat of the Impala had always been one of the more daring places Dean chose to get laid, for the sole reason that the convenience never really outweighed the discomfort. But this wasn’t exactly a motel room situation. If Dean really sat back and thought about this, gave himself the sort of time it took to fetch his wallet and pay for another room, there was a good chance he’d back out altogether, and he preferred the option to be off the table entirely.

They stumbled and they slipped, two grown men crawling back over sticky leather.

It was funny, really. Dean kind of expected Cas to be a little more pliable, a lot more lean. Surely beneath the coat was some scrawny tax accountant who had never seen any action beyond an office desk. But then Dean got a grip on his collar, managed to work on the buttons down the front of his chest through a violent tremor, and the reality of it was vastly different.

Cas was all warm skin and toned muscles, arms tensing as he peeled the shirt from his shoulders with dwindling patience. His collarbone was an edged shadow. There was a sharpened cut of muscle running from his hips downwards, disappearing beneath his belt. Dean could see the shape of him straining against the seam of his pants.

“Fuck, Cas,” Dean said thoughtlessly, pathetically. His pulse was beating in his eardrums.

Cas blinked at him in a swirling haze, hands clambering to find grip on the seat. “I thought you said no talking.”

And he sounded hopeful, almost. Like he thought Dean was allowing it, going back on his better judgment, but Cas’s words only served as a reminder of how this was supposed to be, how Dean had always experienced it, and Dean swallowed that lump of coiled heat in his throat that told him to hold Cas and kiss Cas and tell him he was beautiful in the good way, not in the way Dean grew up hearing.

“Right,” Dean murmured. “Well, don’t worry. I don’t think this will take long.”

He promptly shut up after that. Didn’t say a damn word as he melted to the floorboard and worked over the buckle of Cas’s belt with sweat gathering in his palms. There was something so distinctly routine about it; the mission and the ending, how to get a man off without feeling too much or thinking too hard about it. Most guys didn’t pay all that well for a hand. It was Dean’s mouth that had always brought the cash in, so he was used to this.

But still. It had been a while.

And there was an undeniable bout of nervousness that stiffened the air. Made Dean feel like a reckless teenager all over again, drowning in the sort of prickly stained arousal that came with realizing what he wanted was so far from what he needed or could ever really have.

But Dean wasn’t sixteen anymore. He couldn’t get hurt here; not unless he wanted to be. And so Dean took that heat, took all the things he wanted to do in the dark with people like Nick, people like him, and dipped his hand into the warmth of Cas’s underwear, encasing his cock in his palm.

The noise Cas made stirred a fork through Dean’s guts. Low and thunder-clapped, dragging up the cords of his throat.

Cas’s hips shot high off the seat the moment Dean got his mouth on him, forcing Dean back and pliant, his nails biting harsh divots into the meat of Castiel’s thighs.

Cas got the message soon enough.

With a violent tremble, he forced his hips back, settling in a moonlit glow. Dean hummed around the weight of him, thankful for the correction, and beared down towards that pressure at the back of his throat, forcing his breaths thin. A rhythm took over soon enough, a steady lift and drag that had Dean’s jaw aching around a thrumming burn, a pulsing want. The speed of it was fast yet undetermined, settled by a past of trying to push through, end things as quickly as possible, and Dean moaned loud and desperate, putting on the same show he’d had hidden beneath his skin for years, a dusted clog just waiting to click back into place.

When Castiel’s hand found its way to the heat of Dean’s face, thumbing over damp skin, curling fondly over the shape of his jaw, the shift was immediate.

And Dean dragged his mouth off with vibrating limbs, turning away from the touch. He stared at Cas with timid eyes, a sharpness rising at the back of his neck.

“Don’t look at me like that, man.”

Like what, Dean expected to hear.

Instead, Cas just tore his gaze away, caught and guilty as he said I’m sorry through a smoke coiled voice. And he sounded just soft and miserable enough that when Cas moved to pull his hand away, Dean dove for him out of pure instinct, needing to fix what he’d broken. Castiel’s hand went deathly limp in Dean’s hold. Skin warm, fingers tense, bones jagged. He didn’t say a word; just watched Dean watch him, waiting for the apparent move that, up to that point, Dean wasn’t sure he even knew himself.

Because Dean was used to people wanting him. Touching him, getting their fill of him before eventually tossing him aside. He was street trash, a bar stain, good for quickies and fixes and girls who were looking to find a good time, not a good man. But Cas was quiet. He didn’t spew filth or goad Dean on to take more, pushing his limits to their ripping ends— Cas was entranced. Checked out and spacing, looking down at Dean with all the patience in the world, his desire manifested into something as simple and caring as a hand on Dean’s cheek.

And Dean could barely stand it.

With his heart drumming up his throat, Dean pulled Cas’s hand closer, thumb pressed to his palm, fingers curled over knuckles. Cas was warmer than Dean anticipated; so painfully alive, and he let out the smallest gasp of breath when Dean parted his lips against the tips of Cas’s first two fingers, slowly pressing them to the curl of his tongue.

“Dean,” He whispered, soft and urgent. His gaze was a blazing trail along the swell of Dean’s mouth, enraptured by the color, the drag of wet heat.

Dean’s only answer was to take him deeper, offering without words, proving he could be useful. That he didn’t need the gentle and guiding right now— couldn’t fucking bear it, and so Dean forced Cas’s knuckles to the ridge of his teeth and choked on a wave of stomach churned static, eyes burning as he forced his throat to comply, drooling through the work.

“Dean,” Cas groaned again, his voice treading stone, shredding metal. “You’re going to hurt yourself. I don’t want you to—”

Concern seeped into the sticky air, steadfast and genuine, a feeling raw enough to taste, and Dean all but revolted at the sight of it. He listened for the sound of his own throat, the guttural click and choke, hold and swallow, and finally pulled Cas’s fingers out with heaving lungs, features gutted with reluctant emotion.

“Why not?” Dean rasped out. He kept a violent hold on Castiel’s wrist, just the idea of letting go making his chest beat frantically. “I don’t need the coddling, Cas. That’s not your job, it’s not anyone’s job. Just do whatever feels good. Don’t worry about me, don’t— just do what you want with me. Please.”

Things were already different.

Cas was already a weakness that led Dean by the hand, singing to him about power and destiny and the thinning line between having it all in gorgeous gold-spun lulls. How a brand could feel sacred rather than commanding and a hand didn’t always have to be made of sharp cut steel.

The last thing Dean needed was for Cas’s damning concern for him to go beyond planted seeds, a foundational fever dream. It couldn’t break through the walls.

Things were already different; Dean needed this, of all things, to not be.

“Dean,” Cas said again, like he’d become stuck on the word, impaled by its very meaning. He looked defeated all of a sudden, worn down and soaking with the kind of sadness that had Dean prickling with the want to flee, to shut it all down again and leave this thing in his core to fester for another four years. “I’m not sure I can do what you’re asking of me. I can’t just—”

“Can’t or won’t?” Dean demanded.

It took a moment of Cas staring at him, winded and disappointed, for Dean to realize he’d dropped Cas’s hand.

“Won’t,” Cas answered tightly, lightning framed in his jaw. “I have many faults I must atone for. Mistakes I’ve made due to certain illogical… errors. But I bare my intentions here plainly and I—” His hand twitched with yearning, hesitating over the bone of his bare knee, and Dean froze with desperate anticipation, pathetic acceptance. Dean stayed there, kneeled and compliant as Cas’s palm found the sensitive line of his overworked throat, fingers slipping beneath his collar to graze bone and skin, soul and light.

And it was with his touch tracing downwards, stretching the last piece of clothing between them enough to graze Dean’s heart, that Castiel stared at him and said, “I will not be like those other men, Dean. I won’t let you allow me to be. You are deserving of so much more than cruelty.”

A collapse kick started somewhere in Dean’s chest, something as simple as breathing becoming a grueling task of swallowing fire, extinguishing flames with nothing but air. He wondered briefly if Cas could feel it; physically, a pounding against his palm, a war beneath molten skin. But it was a given. A reality that had been set the moment Dean’s soul had been found bared and waiting, charred and decimated to the point that even the slightest brush of light had sent him into utter collapse, unveiling himself to this being made of stars.

Castiel could feel Dean in every way possible. Internal and external, mind and body. Down to each racing thought and each singular organ– Cas was Dean and Dean was Cas, and navigating something so inconceivable was a constant harrowing flight in the dark that made acting blindly an unavoidable occurrence.

And Dean was good at it, too.

“We’ll see about that,” Dean muttered, both enraged and blissfully numb, uncertain of the turn of events but certain he couldn’t stop them. Neither of them could.

It was with his insides softened to mush that Dean craned his head and leaned in for a heavy kiss, suddenly convinced he couldn’t get through this without it now. He wasn’t that used to kissing; most people saw it as a building block, those in between steps on a staircase you could skip entirely if only you were impatient enough to try. But Cas was unpracticed, undeterred, and his mouth was all burning heat, a pressure that rose and rose.

He nipped and he prodded and followed Dean’s lead with little resistance, his hands searching all on their own. It wasn’t long before the hand at Dean’s throat became frustrated, unable to reach what was needed, and they parted with a single frenzied breath, Cas wasting no time in shedding Dean of his shirt and flannel, nails raking up the back of his hair.

It was easier this way, just as Dean had imagined it would be. Distracting him, pleasing him, just— focusing on Cas. The kissing was good. There was less talking this way, less room for casualties.

Miraculously, Dean believed he might actually be able to look himself in the eye after this. Admit that this wasn’t a fluke, a fork in the road he had merely misnavigated, making the wrong turn. No. Dean didn’t want to forget this. Dean didn’t want to lose this, have this be the first and last time he saw Cas in this way.

Dean wanted this, and he ached with the notion that he wanted it to happen again, and again, and again.

It wasn’t long before the heat became unbearable, each breath turning damp and ragged, Dean’s spine lined with sweat. The irony of his position wasn’t lost to Dean, and the memory of the other angel he’d seduced into his backseat had him torn between shameful and amused, his touches becoming pointed, kisses heightened with teeth.

He remembered the claim Anna had been so horrified to discover. The mark between angel and human that left her cold and conflicted, ripping herself from Dean’s grasp. Her shock had matched Dean’s own, but Dean was alone in having felt a brush of wonder also, this hopelessly settled stone at the pit of his stomach that wished to be useful and longed to be shared.

Anna just didn’t understand. Nobody did.

The difference in what poured from Dean’s chest and ached in his gut now compared to then was sharp and altering, a clashing of truths that were too damming to speak outright, too much to linger on. Instead, Dean swallowed the revelation like fire and pushed against the cage of muscle at Cas’s abdomen, urging him back as his mouth dove for purchase.

There was no struggle this time; no insistent battle. The air had been cleared, terms had been stated, and Dean took Cas’s cock to the back of his throat with little inhibition, coaxing him smooth and hot over the line of his tongue with a garbled moan, swallowing Cas down like he was determined to take him whole.

Castiel’s hand flew quick and desperate to the mess of Dean’s hair, jerky with uncertainty. Dean could feel him hesitating, balancing on a daring edge, but then Dean dragged himself back to the head of Cas’s cock, focusing the point of his tongue at the leaking slit, pink skin burned hot to the touch, and Cas’s fear turned into a deathlike grip at the cusp of Dean’s skull, arousal punching straight through the lining of Dean’s stomach.

“Dean, I feel… Dean, I’m—”

It was just enough warning to brace Dean before Cas was coming with a judder of hips, pooling at the flat of Dean’s tongue. But not enough to stop Dean’s body from responding with a crest of its own, the peak of it sudden enough to crush Dean breathless, knees shaking as he came with a single palm pressed to the front of his jeans.

The pleasure doubled down. Lingered like a heavy tarp, thick and saturated where it dragged on and on, trembling in the root of Dean’s chest. He pressed his face into the heat of Cas’s thigh, riding an impossible high, and moaned sharp enough to earn a seething blush.

It was through a hazy glass reflection in the backseat window that Dean watched Cas run a soothing hand up the back of his neck. Looking to center him. Cool him soft, smooth him down. Guide that ravishing blush, urging it to darken.

And it was in that same reflection, fogged by weathered heat, that Dean watched his own eyes flare with a power-surged blue.

Chapter Text

Ohio was a wasteland of drenched cities and dried out suburbia's, its state lines never having much to offer other than a bar fight you’re destined to lose and a roadside of dying brush.

Dean always wondered if it was this that had made Cassie so addicting.

Athens was a poor man’s city, home of a state bred University old enough to hold the history of Ohio itself. The streets were clean and the community was flourished, but beneath the polished building columns lay a town riddled with poverty and indecency, news of mishap never leading far. No one had seemed all that troubled when the killings started.

A rash of suicides, the town called it. But something about slit throats and locked doors struck Dean as vengeful, and he booked it out of Michigan still high on a wrapped up skinwalker case. Anything to stall having to meet back up with his dad in Georgia.

It was late by the time Dean rolled into town, and when the idea of crashing in some motel and waiting until morning to get digging made him itch, he decided to make his way to the University to have a look. The school was seemingly the only connection between the victims, a handful of college students picked from every corner of the social ring, and with his mind half dark with exhaustion, Dean parked the Impala at a cafe down the block and snuck his way onto campus.

Dean didn’t really know what he expected.

Clues were scarce, his homemade EMF reader humming dully in the night. Dean had gone into this hunt without much of a lead, and now it was proving to bite him in the ass. After walking the fence line and tracing the center fountain where the body of a young girl had been found in the water, Dean called it. Disappointment rolled in his stomach as he gathered his things and made a break back towards the road.

It was by some fate or another that Dean stepped off the curb and felt the pull of something latching to the bottom of his shoe. When he turned his heel over, a flier curled up over the sole of his boot, catching in the wind, and Dean peeled it off with sticky fingers, sidestepping under the nearest street lamp.

It was an invitation.

Some sorority party across town, open bar, open door. The date and time was scribbled at the bottom in bright red sharpie, almost as an afterthought, and Dean found himself checking his watch before he could help it, eyebrows rising with interest. There wasn’t much he could do on campus without being able to get into the main buildings, but mingling with the students, getting ahead on potential witnesses felt promising, and he stuffed the flier into the inside of his leather jacket, scrambling for his keys.

Truthfully, Dean wasn’t all that certain of how to go about these kinds of things. College life wasn’t his scene, he didn’t know what flew and what didn’t, and the fear of appearing like an outsider struck him out of nowhere, this time particularly strong. He wanted to call Sam; ask how it was he managed to do this, swallow the pill that was normal living. Maybe he’d chat Sam up like it wasn’t the middle of the night, like calling was something he did sober now.

The idea surfaced and died just as quickly as it always did, and in a routine all too familiar, Dean buried it. Ignored the weight in his limbs and leaned over to dig through the glove compartment for a map. He smoothed it out over the seat and fetched a flashlight from the floorboard, pressing it between his teeth. He didn’t give it much of a thought. The address to the party was barely a ten minute drive, a straight shot East to West, and Dean shifted gears before he could realize just how lacking his plan really was.

It wouldn’t have mattered either way.

Plan or no plan, meeting Cassie Robinson couldn’t have been foretold, and it was on the bounding of the second story staircase of a house that resembled a monument rather than a home that Dean’s shoulder collided with a stranger’s, and Dean was sent cowering into the railing amidst a violent spray of alcohol.

“Woah– hey!” Dean shouted weakly, more shocked than angry. He even had a laugh rip out of him, charming and unbothered, one of those classics he kept tucked in his belt for situations he didn’t quite know how to navigate.

But none of this seemed to matter to Cassie. She was staring at Dean in open horror. “Oh, god, I’m so— shit that’s bad.”

There was a desperate sort of flittering in her eyes as she took Dean in, realizing through a heavy breath just how drenched he really was, and she stood there like a frightened animal, the crushed plastic cup in her hand looking dreadfully at fault.

“It’s no problem. I’ve done worse all on my own before, don’t worry about it,” Dean told her, because he meant it and he had, and it was once she finally relaxed enough to smile at Dean, this shimmering thing of a smile– that Dean got a chance to really look at her. He was gone the moment he did. “Care for a refill, sweetheart?”

There was a stalled moment where Dean watched her consider it. Consider him. And he wasn’t sure what she came up with exactly, what conclusion she could draw from his grass stained jeans and four day stubble, everything about him screaming of a disaster that nothing but the wind could have blown in. But she grabbed Dean by the hand, warm and certain, pulling him gently, and Dean figured it couldn’t have been that bad.

“I’m good. I’ve obviously had enough,” She flushed, swaying a little as she turned them back around, heading for the top of the stairs again. “Come on, there’s gotta be three or four bathrooms up here somewhere.”

Dean’s eyebrows shot high on his forehead. The implications were scattered, sure, but his heart still raced all the same. She squeezed his hand as she guided them through thralls of jittering students, the sound of her voice drowning in a fog of rampant noise.

“What?” Dean shouted over the music, craning in to hear her.

“I’m Cassie!” She screamed back, laughing in Dean’s face. “What about you?”

Dean’s smile was massive, threatening to stretch towards his ears. “Dean. Do you go to school here or—” His voice teetered off as the crowd loosened, and seconds later he was fumbling into a pitch black bathroom, Cassie’s hand the only thing keeping him from ramming into the sink.

Cassie flipped on the light switch with no warning, bathing them in color. She cringed away with a curse.

“Sorry. What were you saying?” She asked, polite as anything, and Dean watched in silent wonder as she stretched to search through the upper cabinets above the toilet, her shirt riding up to flash a dark strip of skin.

Dean cleared his throat, hand fumbling with his right ear. “I just asked if you go to school here.”

“That’s kind of a given, don’t you think?” She smiled. She fetched a washcloth from the cabinet overhead and turned on the faucet. Her eyes met Dean’s through the bathroom mirror, its edges misted with summer heat. “What about you?”

And it was a testament to just how far Dean had really dared to ever dream, that his answer came out smoother than anything, “Oh, yeah. Yeah. Third year. Engineering.”

“Really? I’ve heard that blows.”

Dean let out a breath, short and stiff, the humor in it holding no real height. Tightly, he smiled and said, “Big time.”

“So why do you do it?” Cassie frowned.

Dean stared at her for a long moment, listening to the drain of water as she rung out the washcloth and turned around, eyeing him curiously.

“What?”

“Why do it if you don’t enjoy it? You said you’re in your third year, right?”

She handed over the cloth without a word, and Dean took it with stalled hands, his thoughts slowing with the kind of violent reality he oftentimes tried to ignore.

“Well, sometimes you don’t have a choice,” He stammered, forgetting the part where he was supposed to sound convincing. The washcloth stayed crumpled and useless in the cusp of Dean’s hands, forgotten in the wake of remembrance, and Cassie took it back with endless kindness, silent and judgeless. Water dripped between them, running from skin to skin. Dean didn’t say anything intelligible when Cassie began to dab at the splotches of beer on his shirt herself, he just tried his best to finish with, “Or you— you’ve been in it so long that you, uh. Settle. Make due. Learn not to dread it so much.”

Cassie’s smile was flashed beneath dark lashes. She had dimples in her blushing cheeks. “You’re still trying to figure out that last part, aren’t you?”

Dean ached through an instinctive laugh.

“Always,” He said.

Flinching back from an unexpectedly cold brush of water, Dean grabbed for Cassie’s wrist, stopping her movements at the base of his shirt.

She looked at him curiously, tilting her chin, and Dean watched her curls fan back behind her like something out of a fucking movie. The kinds that were cheesy and romantic and nothing he’d ever admit to stealing and watching on motel floors, memorizing them until he had carpet rash slicing up his knees.

They were close. He could still feel the brush of her, how she’d grazed the stains near his abdomen, made her way to his chest. And Dean thought about those movies again, how this was the kind of moment James Dean would seize and charm, the kind of moment Robert Young would flourish and pursue. The man would lean in and the girl would follow and the swell of music would be enough to imagine even if the screen faded to black.

But Dean wasn’t like James, and he wasn’t like Robert, and with his pulse skittering something panicked and awful, he grabbed the washcloth and took a polite step back. That’s all it was, really. A means of being polite, a gentleman. Cassie was a sweet girl, drunker than she probably realized, and Dean, quite opposingly, wasn’t nearly drunk enough.

“What’s your game plan, then? You gonna be some hot shot therapist when you get out of here?”

Cassie took the distance in stride. Dean could see a twinge of confusion, the slightest furrow in her brows, but within a second it was gone, smoothed over by another smile. “Journalist actually.”

“Journalist,” Dean perked up, suddenly remembering himself. Christ, he had a whole case waiting for him here. “Say, I’ve actually got some questions I bet you know the answers to.”

It was no easy feat, mentioning multiple on-campus murders without sounding the least bit insensitive. But Dean treaded lightly, read Cassie’s expressions well. Knew when to push and when to pivot, offering a comforting word or two, and maybe it was manipulative, and maybe he was a dick, but Cassie was loose tongued and willing, already neck deep in the case herself, and Dean listened to her every word.

Apparently, most of the victims' parents had actually known each other back in school. They had grown apart as they aged, before their kids were even a thought, but it was the kind of connection any paper would miss. Unknowingly, Cassie had already done half of Dean’s work load for him. And she’d done a damn good job at it.

“What’s with the interest anyway?” Cassie finally asked, sending Dean scrambling as they funneled out of the party side by side, their shoulders brushing as they walked. “Engineering not sound like a fulfilling enough career for you? You got an interest in policing?”

“God no,” Dean laughed. “Those guys do crack work and get paid like they’re curing cancer. No, I’m just uh— well, my brother actually. He’s studying pre-law and has a paper coming up. He’s a real freak about all that true crime stuff.”

Somewhere in their hazy descent down the house’s packed staircase, Cassie had come up with a half-empty bottle of liquor. She waved it in the air with a freeing sort of giddiness, fingers loose over the neck, and the glass refracted in the darkened night, catching against the metal rims of cars and bikes as they made their way down the street.

Dean couldn’t stop smiling at her.

“Your brother,” She said, her voice beginning to drip at the corners. “What year is he in?”

“His fourth,” Dean answered, speaking the truth out of pride. Out of this untouched and unspoken sense of happiness for who his brother was and how far he’d managed to get away from their fucked up family. “I’m older but, you know, he hopped on the whole college thing before I did, so,” His throat hurt on the next inhale, shook Dean to his very core, and he wordlessly reached for the bottle Cassie was dancing with. He took a long drink before muttering, “I guess I’m a little behind.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that,” Cassie said immediately. “Starting late is still starting. Most people who don’t go to college straight out of high school never even go at all.”

There was a long pause. Dean didn’t think Cassie really noticed. Her attention was on her footing, her little hops and wiggles, fingers catching over Dean’s hand. But Dean felt it, settled in it like a cloud hung heavy over his head, and he made a decision.

Slowly, Dean took Cassie’s sporadic hand, holding it in his, and her limbs calmed almost instantly. She slid their fingers together, warm and soft, undeniably nice, and Dean might have felt his guard waver, that ever present wall meant to block and protect, keep people like this— the sweet ones, the good ones, the ones deserving of everything that Dean was not— away, but he didn’t care.

Dean didn’t bother telling her that he didn’t even get to finish high school.

That at the time he needed money more than he needed to be a kid. That feeding Sam and helping Sam and taking care of Sam was more important than learning how to talk to kids his age or trying out for the school baseball team. That Dean’s grades stooped so low it made his stomach hurt, because despite what everyone believed and everything Dean wanted people to believe, he did care, and he did feel stupid, and he did want to change, but the ladder never stopped growing and his feet continued to slip and it was on an eventless Tuesday morning in February, just weeks after turning eighteen, that Dean pulled himself out of school.

He remembered expecting John to give him shit for it. Do that thing where he compared him to Sam in all the worst ways. Instead, he just heaved one of those big-chested sighs of his, patted Dean on the shoulder, and said, “It’s about time you stopped learning that useless crap, anyway. All you’re doing is wasting time. You need to start focusing on this, son.”

It stayed with Dean for years after that; the lack of fight. And he thought hard about what his dad could’ve possibly meant by focus. Focus? If icing bruises and stitching stab wounds and shooting at shrinking targets until his shoulders felt pried apart wasn’t focusing, then what in God’s name was?

Dean was twenty-three when he started regularly hunting by himself, ripping John’s hold on him stitch by stitch. At the time, getting his GED had felt like the biggest form of rebellion, but after Sam left, hitching himself across the whole country, it hadn’t felt like much of an accomplishment.

“This is your car?” Cassie gasped, then, almost immediately, “actually, no, yeah. Of course it is.”

The liquor was gone by the time Dean found the Impala again. The bottle rolled idly over the floorboards as they drove, discarded and forgotten, and Cassie gave directions with genuine struggle, slurring between hiccupped laughter.

She didn’t live too far away. She could’ve walked if she had to. But case or no case, the thought of leaving her alone was a hard no in Dean’s book, and he parked outside what he really hoped was her dorm building at a little past four in the morning.

Dean had only just shifted the gear into park when Cassie stretched across the seat and pressed a kiss to his cheek. She lingered, forehead bumping Dean’s temple, and warmth rose in Dean like a wave, heat sparking in his face. She smelled good beside him. Like vanilla and perfume, so feminine and sweet.

It was something that still surprised Dean, no matter how many girls he held in his arms.

The night was quiet. Disturbed only by the chirp of bugs and the brush of humid wind. Dean listened to the air conditioning rattle beneath their rising breaths. Could practically picture the colored legos in his mind. And when Cassie slid her hand to the back of Dean’s neck, nails raking over skin, carding through hair, Dean turned and kissed her through a shuttering gasp, her touch bolting down the stretch of his spine.

The moment was never as bad as the plunge. Dean would rather die than show it; put everything he was into smiling and flirting and being on the offensive most nights, most trips to the bars where he went for one reason and one reason only.

But truthfully, Dean was always nervous. Always second-guessed and shied away and tried to be smart about these things, the women and the booze and the secrets that happened in between. But Cassie was different in a way he couldn’t explain, in a way he’d come to never explain, and Dean liked kissing her. Liked talking to her. Liked the way she touched him with a reverence that felt endless, touched him in a way he hadn’t been touched in weeks.

But Dean could taste the bitterness on her tongue. Could feel her fuel for this, how it edged more on the side of alcohol than he would’ve preferred, and he gently pulled away.

“Cassie,” He said against her lips, breathing her name for the very first time, and she looked at him with barely reeled in control, breathing sharply.

She frowned at him, eyes closing. “Let me guess. I’m too drunk to make rational decisions like sleeping with a guy I just met?”

Dean smiled. His hand moved on autopilot, and he brushed a thumb over her burning cheek. “That’s pretty spot on, yeah.”

“Fuck,” She drew back with a whine, carding her hair out of her face. “You’re even sweet too. How’s that fair?”

Dean smiled.

“Goodnight, Cassie,” He told her, saying it like a goodbye, and maybe that’s how it happened. That’s where it started. Cassie could hear that goodbye in his voice and took it as a challenge, one of those dares she never lost.

Because by lunchtime the next day, Cassie was shouting his name across campus, chasing him like she cared, like he was something worth seeing again, and Dean couldn’t turn down her offer for dinner. Couldn’t quite find a reason to stop her as she wrote down her number on a napkin at the diner she brought him to and ordered them two black coffees.

Cassie moved fast, Dean came to find out.

She was a flame let loose in the wind, her presence weaning Dean off his high horse like nothing ever had before, and Dean relaxed more in those months of knowing her than he had in probably his whole life. Got used to sleeping in a real bed, talking out loud again, touching and being touched in a way that made him feel wanted— not used and filth ridden.

With Cassie, Dean enjoyed the process. The process of waking and breathing and falling asleep to do it all over the next day. Liked the way they were with each other, the way they could be while Dad was away and Sam was too busy to pick up the phone.

So it was by chance, or even worse by choice, that Dean stayed in Athens even after the case was solved. After digging up some sprouting, decaying grave and getting his back split in half across a weathered headstone as the spirit flickered and hissed in its haste to toss him away from its remains.

It was Cassie’s roommate who had answered the door that night. Tired and barefoot and white as a sheet by the sight at her door.

“What did you do?” Cassie asked once she’d dragged him inside, her roommate slipping out into the hall without a word. “What happened?”

Dean winced at the shrill of her voice, every light in her room blown to a sharpened glare of color. “Cassie—”

“It’s not normal, Dean. What you do, where you disappear to. Something is wrong.”

Her words settled like a brand to the guts, and Dean stepped around her with a freshened ache crawling up his throat.

It was a blow Dean had already been suffering for years. The reality of violence and life on the road, how his days revolved in killing and his relationships were balanced by secrets. But knowing it was much different than being told, than being asked why.

“You know— you know what it is?” Dean stammered through a laugh. The gash on his cheek bone pulled at the movement, spilling fresh pain. “I’ve got wicked pool game. Couple guys asked me to play with them. Offered me drinks and everything, but it uh, got a little competitive.”

Cassie’s face fell. Her hands left in an instant, ripping themselves from Dean as if she’d just battled a great horror.

“You seriously expect me to believe this was just some macho bar fight? You can barely walk.”

“I made it here just fine, didn’t I?”

There was a line, fine and endless, and Dean was treading it by the skin of his teeth. He didn’t have a script for this; a handful of lines he could pull from his past like never-ending cue cards. This wasn’t some girl he’d picked up and was trying to step around the next morning. This wasn’t some weekend fun he’d caved with and found himself growing sick of.

This woman had become Dean’s everything. His focus, his desire— his sanity. With her, Dean didn’t have to think about the silence of a twelve-hour car ride and the obscurity of realizing he hadn’t spoken out loud in days. He felt… stable. Honed in.

Before, keeping the family secret had never seemed like much of a choice. But it glared in Dean’s corner now, hammering in his chest like a second heartbeat meant to be shared.

“Tell me what’s going on, baby. Please,” Cassie whispered, drawing back in. Her hands smoothed over the tension of Dean’s jaw, cupping him gingerly, and warmth sank to the softness of Dean’s belly. “You’re scaring me.”

Dean’s breath seized. Sharp and point-blank. Nails against paper. And the warmth dripped away, drenching Dean in shudders.

“I don’t have any money,” He blurted, an instant of thought to mouth, desperation manifested. “I don’t have any money left right now so I— I didn’t wanna come, I didn’t wanna dump this on you but I need a place to stay, alright? It’s too cold to sleep in my car and I just— one night. Just for tonight and then I’ll fuck off back where I came from and you won’t ever have to worry about me like you are right now and—”

Cassie’s mouth met his in a firm press, sickly sweet, and the cut at the crease of Dean’s lip cried in protest, pain prickling at the cusp of his throat. It was a kiss meant to shut him up. Meant to calm him too, probably. But Dean just felt picked and skinned, seconds away from bursting.

He wondered if Cassie could taste the blood on him.

“Talk to me,” She whispered as she pulled away, and she didn’t know it yet, not at the time, but she was asking the impossible.

And Dean just couldn’t.

“I should leave,” He said quickly. There was cotton in his throat, stuffed and overflowing, the perfect incentive for a match.

He all but broke into a run for the door.

“Why do you do that?” She asked suddenly, catching Dean before he could fully turn the door knob, and Dean was weak. Dean was in love. He froze in an instant. “Dean, I know you don’t like talking about your past. And I’ve— I’ve tried to understand that. But all I’ve done is try and you don’t seem to even want to.”

Are you breaking up with me?

The question flared up with terrifying clarity. It chipped away at him, knocking as he stared at the door, and he hated it. Hated that it always took a falling out for Dean to realize the contents of his own chest. To realize Cassie had weaved her way in, justified or not, and that over the course of only a few weeks she had gotten Dean to care enough to feel fear at the very prospect of it ending.

It took a physical weight of effort for Dean to turn around and look at her. Softly, he asked, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means, you’re a million miles away. All the time. You don’t invite me anywhere. You don’t introduce me to your friends. You said you go to school here but nobody’s even heard of you and I don’t— I don’t know what that means,” She looked close to tears, then. Wavering in this ungodly in-between of caring for Dean but feeling tired too, exhausted by the bizarreness of it all, and Dean was floored to a jarring standstill when she finally cried, “I don’t know if I can keep doing this.”

Dean would’ve broken things off weeks ago if he’d known what was good for him. Good for Cassie. Because Dean could trust people, and care for people all he wanted; it was stitched into his very fundamentals, his center core. Only slightly hidden by the years of unrest. But Dean would never have stability, or a home, or the kind of friends Cassie wished she’d come to meet. He’d never be smart enough for college or kind enough to marry or normal enough to have everything and not fear he’d fuck it all up in due time.

Dean was just different, in more ways than even he cared to decipher, and it was that dreaded time again.

He needed to let go.

“I like you, Cassie,” He smiled, slow and watery, heart aching. “A lot. And m’ not just sayin’ that I— I really—” Dean shook his head as his voice caught. “But I’m not what you think. I don’t go to school here. Or anywhere. I live out of my car and I pick up odd jobs across the states and I’m—” He stopped. The truth hung in the air like a distant scope zeroed in, waiting for that single air-splitting moment. Dean considered it, treaded it, and inevitably tossed it aside to say, “I don’t stay in one place for long. I never really have.”

It was meant to be an out. A grazing of the truth that was close enough to be worrying, enough to have any simple college girl running for the hills. But Dean should’ve known it, he’d seen it since day one— Cassie was anything but simple.

“Thank you,” She said instead, flooring Dean with shock. “You— you didn’t have to tell me that. But I’m glad you did. And I get it, okay? We’re practically strangers. But I like you too. I want to help you. So if you’d just let me, I… want to keep trying.”

Dean stared as she stepped closer, waiting for the inevitable trap. His resolve broke the moment she touched his hand. “What?”

“We’ve all got something we’re running from,” She whispered, kinder than Dean would ever earn. Her smile was softened gold. “There’s no shame in it.”

It was so beyond anything Dean had ever known previously. A full twist and snap, jarring to the senses. All his life he’d been taught that lying was a means of survival. Lying was what got them in and kept them working and made a ten-year-old Sam not want to die everyday. Lying was the right thing to do; Dean had only ever been applauded for it.

The truth burned worse, somehow. Even the fraction of it he’d given. And it was compelling, intriguing, a vast contrast Dean sought to push and analyze, daring Cassie to kick him to the curb. He wondered how much she could take. How much someone so loving and selfless could accept before they inevitably had to face reality; face someone like Dean.

But every time Dean pushed, Cassie yielded. Every time Dean repented, Cassie listened. Because she didn’t care that Dean drank like someone was racing him, or smoked enough to cause a twitch, or deflected every graze of emotion like it was something that could wrap around his throat and choke him. She just liked him. Liked the idea of him, more so, in the end.

Cassie didn’t even falter when Dean told her about the men he’d been with. She was good like that.

Took his drunken words for what they were and gave him the kind of hallmark spiel he thinks probably would’ve made him cry had he been a little more clear minded. Instead, he just laid there bare chested in the bed of her college dorm, watching the ceiling fan spin overhead and wondering how it was he’d even survived this long without speaking it aloud.

Dean spent the rest of that semester with her. Years down the line, it’s a frame of time he’s never fully been honest about. Dad had been in the wind somewhere, off the grid after telling Dean their meetup plans were pointless— don’t bother, Dean, just stay where you are, I’ll see you next month— and Dean buried himself in booze and Cassie and nearby hunts, forcing everything that he wanted and didn’t have on this autumn spun girl too sweet to tell him no.

She was the first person Dean had trusted since Sam left. The only one who knew he— and it was the closest he’d ever felt to love that Dean didn’t even bother wondering if it really was. If he was just seeing what he wanted. Because he’d cracked and wept in front of this woman, told her a secret in exchange to keep the other, and spent months calculating this idea that maybe she was the one.

That if Dean could tell her that, about the hiding and the sneaking and the living day-to-day feeling wrapped up in another person's skin, then he could tell her anything. Even about the monsters he skinned in the dark.

It wasn’t the first time Dean had been wrong.

Denial ran a vicious course through the panes of Dean’s eyes, a visionary upset that lasted and lasted all the way up to the question and the pressure and the moment of baited choice.

The angels wanted a lot from Dean. Had since the moment they clawed him up from barren ashes, laying waste. Wanted him posed and proper but strong enough to thread a war, obedient enough to fall in line. He was chosen because he was different and scolded for being so and it was denial that kept Dean afloat through the flash of light and sound that stretched his ears as the angels nabbed him, snapping Dean out of thin air and placing him right where they wanted him.

Perched and waiting at Alastair’s door.

Blissfully, denial was what brought on hope. Made Dean anticipate the moment Cas would call the whole thing off, step up to the plate. That this was just another test; prove your loyalty, your crippling need to be useful through a promise, and action wouldn’t be needed.

But Castiel was nothing but a watchful eye.

“The devil’s trap holding him is made from old Enochian,” Cas spoke behind Dean, never more than a shadow away. He paused. And then, trying for comforting, “He’s bound completely.”

“Fascinating,” Dean swallowed. He turned on his heel. “Where’s the door?”

“Dean—”

“Oh, don’t you start,” Dean snapped back, his voice diving for Cas while his glare focused on Uriel. “I’m hitching a ride back to Cheyenne, thank you very much. I mean it’s one thing to zap me here, no seatbelt, ass hanging out. It’s another thing to leave Sam behind. According to you, I’m supposed to be on babysitter duty at all times.”

“And you think what?” Uriel smiled. “That we’ll just allow you to walk out? Abandon the cause?”

“Oh, I’m all for the cause. Kill the demons, save the seals, restore the world. I’ve only been riding this horse my whole life,” Dean spat, spinning that never ending clock, replaying his past and his destiny on the very same ever-looping track. “But your so-called cause seems to be changing by the day, and I get it— you’re all powerful, you can make me do whatever you want, but this? You can’t force my hand. Not unless you plan to try and steer the whole fucking ship.”

Uriel didn’t hesitate. His spine dialed back as he straightened, bleached white smile pulling harshly at his aging skin, and said, “I can arrange that.”

A shiver sprouted in Dean’s sternum, webbing across his flesh and marrow.

“This is too much to ask,” Castiel said boldly, separating Uriel’s advances with a deliberate step forward. Dean could feel his sudden upset, a frantic sort of unease that stained the air like a scent. “I know. But we have to ask it.”

Even in the dripping basement of some warehouse miles off-road, Cas was close enough to see clearly. Pick out features in the shadows, study the shape of his eyes and the softness that was growing there.

Dean turned before he could really settle with what he saw, his breaths falling with temporary ease.

“I want to talk to Cas… alone.”

“I’m sure you would,” Uriel snickered. If Dean was expecting a little more of a reaction, Uriel didn’t satisfy. He simply circled Dean like a scavenger would a decaying animal, closing in with every pass. “Mind you, if Castiel can’t convince you, we’ll be left with very few options. Be careful, Winchester. There are ways we can force you into compliance. There are ways in which I can make you say yes.”

Dean could feel an implosion shatter somewhere in his chest. A breakage of memories and feelings that forced flashes into the forefront, recollections he’d rather forget. It was funny how time worked. Dean’s struggle of mind over body had haunted him since a child, since his features had first been shaped and John would pry at them with leering distaste.

You have your mother’s eyes, you know, he’d say in a haze, destined to forget by morning. Then, like an inevitable trap, you look just fucking like her.

Sometimes, it was a comforting admission. Not in its delivery, but in Dean’s desperate taking, wanting to cling to what he no longer could. Mostly, though, it just made Dean conscious. Manifested into the kind of thought that appeared like a shot to the spine in the worst of times. Sunk into his lungs when he’d catch a pair of eyes in a muted bar, or drag some stuttering husband into the alley out back, wondering with bated breath whether they were seeing Dean or someone else entirely.

Dean had been fighting for control his whole life. Floating within his own body. And listening to the angels debate the fate of his mind and limbs so casually had every nerve flaring with terror.

Uriel vanished without another word, noting the impact he left, and Dean whirled around with his hands clenched tight. He stared at Castiel’s shoes, tracing their growing shadow.

“You guys don’t walk enough. You’re gonna get flabby,” He joked, exasperated. Cas blinked at him. “He’s gone, Cas. You’re allowed to leave your goddamn post.”

“Uriel was trying to frighten you. His words held no true intention,” Castiel assured, ignoring Dean’s words to fight for his own. He seemed to startle when Dean didn’t have an immediate answer for him, and his voice became unbearably gentle, “Possession is not why we brought you here, Dean. I can assure you of that.”

Something like relief picked at the knot in Dean’s stomach, unfurling it with softened hands.

Dean cleared his throat.

“Good, ‘cause the answers no. Possession or not, I’m not picking up that blade again, not ever. And I thought—” Dean winced through the slash of heat building behind his throat, peaking at the base of his nose. He blinked through blotched eyes. “I thought you knew that. I thought we’d cleared that fucking hurdle, man. I don’t want anything to do with that bastard. So tell Uriel, or whoever, that this plan was a bust from the start. You do not want me doing this, trust me.”

“If we had even the slightest semblance of an alternative plan, don’t you think I’d be entertaining it?” Cas’s sigh lingered, weighted and unmoving. Dean could feel his stare at the line of his back. “You’re right. I don’t want this. But I’ve been told we need it.”

And there was the edge. Drawn and settled, admitted even through guilt, and Dean was meant to cross it. Leap and plunge in its depths, knowing that what would be waiting for him on the other side was so much more than just Alastair.

It was what he did. What he’d created in the Dean that Castiel had rescued.

“You ask me to open that door, and walk through it…” Dean’s voice trembled, bending towards an inevitable snap. “You will not like what walks back out.”

Through a door bolted window smeared wet with condensation, Dean could make out the outline of Alastair’s hanging figure in the other room. All dead weight and melting limbs, his neck rolled slack at an angle. The only hint that there was any life in him at all was the subtle movement in his chest, the buttons of his sweat soaked shirt rising and falling with the kind of breaths that looked edged in laughter.

Dean tensed at the thought, a muscle popping in his jaw.

“Maybe not. But I have met him once,” Castiel said, thoughtful. When Dean turned to look at him, Cas was already inching forward, no longer a shadow but a building, rising to Dean’s cowering height. It was with a careful touch to the back of Dean’s hand that Cas looked at him and said, “And even in the universe’s most tainted grounds of retribution, your soul was a piercing blaze in the unbeknownst dark.”

Dean jerked away on instinct, panicked by the swell in his chest. He came back almost instantly, leaning close with metal filled limbs, a rattle caught in his grimacing teeth.

“Can you—” Dean breathed deeply, fighting with the sudden urge to hold Cas’s hand. “Can you take it away? If I go through with this, get him to spill all you need to know, can you wipe my memory of it? You guys can do that right?”

Cas hesitated. “Yes, but—”

“Then do that. That’s our plan, plan fucking Z. We’re golden,” Dean grinned brilliantly, a laugh trembling out of him. “Better yet, why not just take them all away? Alastair and Hell itself, scrub me fucking clean, Cas.”

“I’ve already taken all I’m able.”

Dean stared at him, watching silently as a pang of sadness coursed through the false man’s skin. “What?” He asked.

“You’re an extraordinary man, Dean. Stronger than you ever wish to accept. But you underwent the sort of torture most people couldn’t even conjure, and you endured forty years of it. When I raised you, I erased what I could, and kept what you needed.”

“What I needed?” Dean balked, his remnants crumbling. “What in those forty years could I possibly fucking need?”

It was Cas who reached for his hand again, maybe sensing, maybe just knowing, and Dean stilled as he felt warm fingers encase around his own.

“The will to fight,” Cas said, painfully clear. It took a moment for Dean to find the right mechanics to shake his head. Slowly at first, and then frantic enough to make his skull ache.

“All these months I’ve barely kept my head above water, and now you’re telling me there’s more? Shit Alastair did that— that I don’t even remember?”

It didn’t feel true. Not important enough, not at all worth it. How could any of this be worth it?

Dean’s next breath came with unfathomable weight, ripping at the cording in his chest. There was something uprooting, something unleashing. An onslaught of terror that came with knowing what someone could do but wondering what all they did, the sudden gaps in his history leaving Dean with the very thing he’d spent his whole childhood trying to stamp out; an imagination let loose.

“Dean?”

Cas faltered where he stood, stepping forward as Dean stumbled back, the ground beneath his feet rupturing amongst wobbling knees, his vision surging outwards. And there was a moment, primal and intense, where Dean didn’t know whether to reach for his gun or reach for his heart, a bomb ticking away somewhere deep in his caving chest.

“Dean.”

A hand fell heavy over the bone of Dean’s shoulder. All feeling, no weight. Urging his breath back, soothing his faults, and Dean surfaced with flourishing lungs, gasping sharp into the tainted quiet.

“You’re safe,” Castiel said, his lips shadowed in curling blue, skin ignited where he pressed into the handprint on Dean’s shoulder. “You’re with me.”

It shocked Dean, even as he said it. The softness of it. How he took Dean’s panic and coaxed it down, brushed it smooth. Knew what to do with the weakness Dean offered to him with trembling limbs. But it was Cas’s hand moving from his shoulder to his cheek that broke Dean completely, splitting him just soundly enough to make him not think about the way he melted against the touch.

Dean lowered his head, eyes closing as he breathed. “Uriel. He might—”

“Just a moment,” Cas murmured, holding Dean through the storm, devoid of all fear. He drifted forward, their foreheads nearly touching. “Take a moment.”

Dean nodded wordlessly, even as his pulse hammered through his blood, mindful of an unwanted audience.

“You’re practically an adult pacifier, you know that?” He gritted, not quite committing to a laugh.

Castiel shook his head. “I just want to help.”

Dean hummed. “Wish you did that more often.”

And he meant help. He meant the caring, and the watching, and the attentiveness that seemed to appear out of nowhere, seeping through weakened floorboards, ripping up destiny settled foundations. But it’s the touching that Dean really thought about; how he wished Cas would seek affection rather than grant it, offering his grace by the gallon if only to force Dean to drink straight from his wrist.

“I’m sorry, Dean,” Castiel said, and it was this low, damning thing that tore at Dean’s chest. Then, again, as if it physically pained him, “I’m so sorry.”

Dean had always been desperate for that word. Feverish for it in the spaces between childhood and nightmares and the hope that maybe one day someone would offer to shoulder the weight for once. That he’d be guided to the sidelines rather than shoved in spite, and it was there that a voice resembling his fathers would say it’s okay, and you can rest, and you’ve done enough.

I’m sorry.

Dean had always longed for those words. He’d never heard it enough. Making him just weak enough to comply with anyone who cared to voice it.

Alastair was pinned to the cool press of a devil-bred sigil, hanging like a dead man, and Dean still couldn’t exist without remembering what it felt like to thrash under his blade.

It didn’t matter that he was trapped. Vulnerable. Strung and waiting to bleed under his own teachings, Dean’s forty-year-long revenge coming to a cresting roar. Dean was still afraid of him; of who he was, what he knew. And how all of it made Dean capable of the kind of things he couldn’t even stomach in the daylight.

“I’m sorry, I— this is a very serious, very emotional, situation for you. I shouldn’t laugh, I just, I mean— are they serious? They sent you to torture me?”

Dean didn’t say a word as he entered the room. Just listened to the rusted door swing backwards behind him, Cas’s eyes like a physical burn at the back of his skull, and pushed ahead with the cart of tools Cas had given him.

He’d barely been able to look Dean in the eye when doing so.

“You got one chance. One,” Dean warned. Alastair’s laughter died down just long enough for him to listen in, the suddenness of his rapt attention making Dean’s words come out grated and slow, “Tell me who’s killing the angels. I want a name.”

It sounded important suddenly, coming straight from Dean’s mouth. But hearing it from Cas not ten minutes ago and realizing what exactly was waiting for him in the next room, Dean had been indifferent to all of it. The angels had a war on their side, fire burning in their blood, and yet it was Dean who was shoved to the frontlines, forced to unleash the sort of torture even righteous serving angels couldn’t fathom.

“You think I’ll see all your scary toys and spill my guts? Just like that?”

“Oh, you’ll spill your guts one way or another. I just didn’t wanna ruin my shoes.”

Laughter rolled through Alastair’s body, convulsing beneath his skin and slicing up his innards enough to leave him hacking. He groaned in the back of his throat.

“Dean, Dean, Dean,” He said, grinning through the mantra. “How I’ve missed you.”

With a suddenness that sent Dean reeling, he felt his skin hiss and bristle, tightening up over the sheath of his bones. A hyper awareness that made his stomach flip in on itself, caving entirely.

“Answer the question.”

“Or what? You’ll work me over?” Alastair sneered. His neck twisted suddenly, bending at an angle all too wrong. “But then, maybe… you don’t want to,” He breathed shakily, caught between a gasp and a laugh as he lowered his voice, allowing it to drip into a menacing singsong, “maybe, you’re a little scared to.”

“I’m here aren’t I?”

“Not entirely. You left part of yourself back in the pit,” He spat. His head tilted, sweat beading down the strain in his neck. “Although, it’s no secret who’s call you’ve answered today. Sure, you gotta want a little payback for everything I did to you. For all the pokes and prods. But ultimately, you’re here because of that angel in there. He your new boy toy, is that it?”

There was something about danger that came with a feeling. Potent and chilling, so specific Dean could recognize it anywhere, feel it to a terrifying degree. It creeped in his foresight now, licking up the base of his spine.

“Is this your way of stalling, huh? Pointing fingers where they don’t belong?” Dean asked.

“Have you two consummated the marriage yet?” Alastair pitched back effortlessly. Too quick to stop Dean’s eyes from widening with blinding panic. “So you have. Tell me, is he a charmer? Does he do all the things you beg for in the dark?”

A roaring grew steadily in the base of Dean’s ears. Like the sound of a war drum closing in, the panic of a gun-driven march. His hands closed around the nearest knife, one of many that was laid out for the taking.

“When he fucks you, does he tell you he loves you?” Alastair asked, and Dean’s sanity trembled violently just to remain on the very plain. “That is what you want, isn’t it? To be loved? To be cherished? To be given the kind of care your daddy kept solely for your brother,” Alastair sighed, feigning any real emotion. “Pity though, seeing as angels can’t love. They’re incapable of such extremities,” His smile was taunting. “You’re playing a losing game, darling.”

“And you’re being bold for a guy on death's row,” Dean breathed out, harsh and baited.

Alastair raised his wrists as high as his restraints allowed, metal rattling. “Oh, this? This is just a holiday, dear boy. I’ll be out of these chains in no time.”

“Not without a name.”

“Did I ever tell you about the time I spent with your daddy? When he was my favorite, long before you followed in his steps?” He hummed distractedly, barely batting an eye as Dean reached for the gallon of holy water to his right. “Had your pop on my rack for close to a century. John Winchester. Made quite a name for himself. Though, I suppose it was for good reason. A hundred years, and after each session I’d make him the same offer I made you; I’d put down my blade if he picked one up.”

Dean filled the nearest bowl with holy water, fingers burning against the beaded rosary, limbs stiff like metal. He figured people often felt righteous in moments like these; where terror was embedded into every breath and each second dragged on like it knew the possibility of finality. Dean didn’t agree. He’d never felt farther away from God.

“One hundred years, and he never broke. He was made up of something unique. The stuff of heroes… then came Dean.”

The case of syringes on the table beckoned Dean’s attention, what little there was left of it. He reached for the biggest one with greedy eyes, his heartbeat seeping to the hollow of his throat. He fumbled with the straps for a few moments, shaking too much to see straight.

“And there I was, thinking I was up against it again. But daddy’s little girl… he broke. He broke in thirty,” His laughter flooded every corner, cut through flesh and bone. It drowned in Dean’s peripheral as he filled the syringe to the point of bursting. “Just not the man your daddy wanted you to be, huh, Dean?”

Dean lifted the syringe, inspecting it beneath the hanging lights. When he pressed the end of the nozzle, testing the water's flow, he half expected to watch his own skin smoke and bubble.

“And what would he think of you now? Sleazing it with some pretty boy angel. I really wonder what would bother him more: the fact that his son sucks cock, or that he’s fucking some mindless meatsuit.”

Everything in Dean drained out of him the moment Alastair’s words truly registered. He stood there, limp and unblinking, overwhelmed with sudden nausea. He still had the syringe raised, his weapon of choice, yet the threat had leaked from his bones.

“What? Did that sore little fact never occur to you?” Alastair pouted. “Oh, well. What’s the harm? With a mouth like that, I’m sure that vessel of his had little to complain—”

Dean couldn’t recall moving. Had no recollection of thought, or a plan, or the fuel of rage to his limbs. But he was across the room and in front of Alastair in less than a second, jabbing the syringe into the side of a sickly pale throat. Dean smiled at the way Alastair shook and choked.

“Do you really think this is gonna fix you? Give you closure?” Alastair screeched, writhing through the blood curdling burn, smoke billowing past his teeth. He gagged through a fountain of red, water bubbling over his smiling lips. “Oh, that is sad. That’s really sad.”

It became a blur after that. A collection of weapons and vengeance and flaming skin, blood pouring over sharp edges, catching over jagged bones. The demon knife felt light in Dean’s hand, lighter than it had in years, and he carved with the passion of a mourning man, sliced with the precision of a practiced victim.

“I… carved you into a nu– new animal, Dean. There is no… going back,” Alastair hissed, screaming through the knife lodged into his abdomen, holy water soaked across the blade, burning him from the inside out.

Heat poured from Dean’s panting mouth, anger synched around his neck as he leaned towards Alastair’s face.

“Maybe you’re right. But now it’s my turn to carve,” Dean growled, and he relished in the throat tearing scream Alastair granted him when he twisted the knife as far as possible, bending himself at the wrist.

“You know, it was supposed to be your father. He was supposed to bring it on. But in the end, it was you,” Alastair struggled to voice, throwing it like a rolling grenade as Dean drew back to the table, reaching for his next weapon.

“Bring what on?” Dean asked, disinterested.

“Every night, the same offer, remember? The same as your father. And finally you said, ‘sign me up,’” Dean barely paid his words any mind, too focused on the drum in his chest as he poured salt through a funnel and crossed the space between them, ready to break. It wasn’t until he saw Alastair’s smile, that he stopped. “Oh, the first time you picked up my razor. The first time you sliced into that weeping bitch… that was the first seal.”

Dean’s hands tightened around the funnel, his vision narrowing, tipping with black. He felt a river of salt spill out onto his shoes.

“You’re lying,” He said.

“And it is written that the first seal shall be broken when a Righteous Man sheds blood in Hell. As he breaks, so shall it break,” Alastair recited, and it scraped his teeth like metal, churning Dean’s insides to ash.

He lost his footing as he turned away, slamming into the table hips first. The funnel fell from his hands, salt bursting outwards. Alastair’s laughter replaced the pounding in Dean’s head, smothered the breath he fought to take, and he stood there, hands clutching each side of the table as his reality collapsed.

“We had to break the first seal before any others. Only way to get the dominos to fall right. Topple the one at the front of the line.”

Dean’s eyes trailed slowly to the demon knife left abandoned on the table, blood still tainting the steel. His throat felt shredded, like his windpipe had been crushed with words alone.

“When we win,” Alastair seethed. “When we bring on the Apocalypse, and burn this Earth down, we’ll owe it all to you: Dean Winchester.”

A decision was made, long before the question could even arise, and Dean gathered his strength from the pit of his stomach, coiling it like a weapon of its own. He turned before it could leave him, before the truth could do more than just enrage him and his plan to kill Alastair— regardless of what the angels wanted, could start to look like a bad idea.

But what met him wasn’t a caged Alastair, bared for Dean’s revenge. Lips still fresh with blood. Instead, Dean was greeted with the harrowing sight he’d spent forty years searing to memory, Alastair’s figure towering over him like a nightmare, and the punch he landed across Dean’s face was familiar too, calculated and brutal, his fists just as meticulous as his razors.

Alastair’s hits came fast, after that. Rapid and furious, unavoidable amidst the panic, and Dean bended to them like he always did, too focused on trying to breathe through all the blood to really fight.

The way Alastair fought was vicious, unfair. It had always been this way. He went for eyes and teeth and throats, pounding skin to rubber, bones to dust. Dean’s vision was already gone by the time he felt Alastair pull him up by the throat and pin him to the altar Alastair had just climbed down from. He couldn’t see Alastair’s fury, but he could feel blood bubbling in his nose, the swelling in his cheekbones, how his life was tethered to the hand holding him down, choking him silent.

And Dean couldn’t see the moment Cas entered the room, but he could feel the way the air went deathly cold, a different flavor of panic mixing sharp with his own.

“No!” Castiel shouted, something breaking inside of him, and in a flash of wings Alastair was stabbed in the shoulder and tossed across the room, his grip on Dean slipping away.

The gulpful of air Dean took rang loud in his throbbing ears, and he collapsed into the arms Cas opened for him, both of them falling to the ground.

“Dean. Dean—” Desperate hands flooded outwards, flocking to every part of Dean, broken or not. Dean couldn’t find comfort in them. “Can you hear me? Can you— I’m suh— I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. This was never supposed to— I don’t know what happened. I don’t know what happened.”

If things were different, a million times over, Dean might have mentioned how it wasn’t like Cas to stutter. He’d be able to truly feel the shock of watching Cas shatter, of feeling the way his hands shook as he carded fingers through Dean’s blood-caked hair, pressed cold thumbs to split cheeks.

Instead, Dean let out a cry of anger, mangled and ripped, and grabbed Cas’s wrist with bloody fingernails, tearing him away.

“You said it was safe,” He screamed, each word holding a ghastly weight, tears springing hot in his eyes. “You promised me. You fucking promised, Cas!”

There was a moment, just one, just long enough for Dean to see the pain crawl into Cas’s eyes, before Alastair was back and standing, wrenching Cas away from Dean.

“Oh, not good. Not good at all,” Alastair cooed, dragging Cas behind him with flooring ease. With his other hand, he pulled the demon knife out of his shoulder with a wave of his fingers, dropping it with an echoing clatter. “Can’t go around making promises you can’t keep, Castiel. You’ll give Dean here the wrong message.”

Sometime between bursting through the door and watching Dean break down at his feet, Castiel had lost all the fight in his body. He was nothing but a limpless doll as Alastair threw punch after punch, knocking Cas away just to drag him back by the tie, beating him to the point of blood.

“You can’t win this war, Alastair,” Cas croaked, struggling with a mouthful of crimson. He cringed through a tremulous cough, wincing as he spit out a puddle of blood. “There’s too many of us. Too many of us willing to die to keep the world from burning.”

Alastair’s laughter batted rapidly throughout Dean’s ribcage, breaking him down from the inside out.

“See, that’s where you poor things are wrong. Because it’s not about numbers, Castiel. It’s not about strength. It’s not even about angels or demons, our nature of good and evil. It’s about this one,” Alastair pointed a sharpened nail in Dean’s direction, eyes alight with a dangerous secret. “It’s about the humans, their pathetic maker, and just how badly we wish to have the Winchesters’ flesh peeled from their bones.”

Castiel jerked forward, eyes widening as his breath hitched in his throat. “If you put your hands on him again—”

Dean was lost to the rest.

Alastair swung his fist with a heavy shoulder, and the crack of knuckles over flesh forced Dean’s mind to finally scatter, searching for a place to hide. The only other fraction of reality Dean managed to grasp was the sight of Alastair pulling Cas up by the collar, and the sickening crunch of bone and muscle as he pinned Castiel to a piece of rebar on the wall, hanging him there tauntingly.

Dean’s fear was muted, a scream smothered. And before darkness consumed him completely, all he could feel was a joyous relief that at least he didn’t have to watch Cas die.

Dean was four years old the first time he stepped foot in a hospital.

The memory was clouded, all bright lights and rushed movement. The steady beat of a heart monitor breaking the strangeness of the silence. He could remember the darkened room, the waiting and the waiting, how every minute ticked by with frantic excitement and the overhead TV flashed with rampant colors, some cartoon he couldn’t remember the name of turned all the way down.

Dean could remember asking for the volume back. Reaching for a worn-down sleeve. He also remembered the way his dad ignored him, voice crept low as he talked with the doctor.

The place was scary.

White and barren, sharp and cold. Dean’s mother had been littered with cords, strung up like something wicked, and Dean had wanted to leave so fiercely that he’d begun to cry, weeping for anyone who cared.

It wasn’t until Sam was actually born, bundled and warm in the nervously formed hammock of Dean’s arms, that Dean finally calmed.

The second time Dean was in a hospital, he was nine and blew through the sliding doors with a superhero’s cape billowing back behind him.

The panic of it was something he could still tap into if he tried hard enough, the adrenaline thumping in his throat, the flaring pain of an October freeze whipping past his face as he biked through fallen leaves, weaving past cars and stop signs.

He was scared, then. Scared because Sam was crying and he hated when Sam cried. Scared because the nearest hospital was thirty minutes away, an hour by bike, and his dad hadn’t been very clear on when he’d get back from New Orleans, leaving Dean with a pit in his stomach and a mantra of excuses running loose on his tongue.

He found himself practicing them repeatedly, muttering them in the open air: It happened in the motel room, we didn’t leave. It happened in the motel, I didn’t disobey.

“You didn’t— you didn’t tell me,” Sam sniffled miserably, clutching Dean’s arm.

His weight wobbled over the length of the bike's handlebars, shoelaces limp and flapping in the wind. Dean needed to get him a new pair of sneakers soon. The incoming winter would eat right through his soles.

“You didn’t tell me Batman can’t fly.”

Dean didn’t know what was upsetting Sam more. That he’d jumped off the roof of a nearby church shed and broken his arm, or found out Batman couldn’t, in fact, fly.

“Everyone knows Batman can’t fly, Sammy. Just— hold on to the handles. I’m going as fast as I can,” Dean panted. Instinct had him reaching up to brush over Sam’s hair, wanting to comfort him, but the bike’s wheels wobbled the moment his grip loosened and he jerked back into position, forcing his legs to go faster.

This was one of the few times Dean found himself thankful that Sam was so small for his age. He usually tried to ignore it, because ignoring it was miles away from facing it and it was when Dean faced it that he found fault in every corner, every twisted facet.

Because Sam would be bigger if he ate a little more. Got to sprawl out and stretch and run around neighborhood blocks like most kids his age. Instead, Sam got tactical training, and twenty-hour car rides, and peanut butter sandwiches stuffed into jackets that swallowed him whole.

He’s going to need a cast, Dean realized suddenly, and he pushed that much harder, trying to decide if he was running towards something or running away.

He was going to have to explain this. Somehow, someway— Dean was going to have to look John Winchester in the eye and tell him he ignored an order. That Sammy had come home from school crying the day before, wishing he’d had his own Halloween costume to show off, and Dean had looked at his snot-ridden face for a grand total of three seconds before digging into his savings and throwing all caution to the wind.

Only Dean would leave out that first part. Sam wasn’t going to be anywhere near this, and Dean would tell the story well enough that their dad wouldn’t even notice. Would be too focused on the fact that Dean was Superman, and Sam was Batman, and Dean threw a whopping thirty four dollars down the drain for one night of contentment for him to even look at Sam when his fists grew tight and stiff.

Though, Dean hadn’t been completely wasteful. He’d stolen the bike at least.

Dean watched from a chair in the corner as Sam’s arm was wrapped in a neon green cast. The nurse was chirpy, asked too many questions, but she was nice where it mattered and offered them both lollipops by the end of it, explaining that the doctor would be with them shortly. Dean tried not to feel too guilty the second she left them alone, and they snuck out before anyone could ask them why their father wasn’t picking up the phone.

In some way, hospitals still weren’t all that familiar to Dean. They weren’t a given, not something he’d learned to depend on every time he danced with some set of fangs in the dead of night. John didn’t like them. Didn’t like the trouble they caused and the reality they presented them with, and so they became a family stitched together with booze and gauze and fishing line.

They were used to spilling blood, but even more accustomed to mopping up their own.

It was no wonder why the place still gave Dean the creeps. Didn’t matter how many cases he worked, how many witnesses he questioned in air-tight hospital rooms— these places were for the dead and the dying, the dreadfully sick, and Dean was lying in a weightless heap with the rest of them, his own heart monitor counting down the minutes.

Dean was nearing sleep of all things, when Castiel appeared to his left, perching himself on the bedside chair like he was some common visitor meant to comfort. Dean didn’t dare get his hopes up.

“You don’t ever quit, do you? Jesus,” Dean rasped, coughing through winded lungs. There was still a coating of blood he could taste at the back of his throat, a coppery-tang made thick when he asked, “What do you want, Cas?”

“Are you alright?”

And there was that question again. The one that floored Dean, cut Dean, made him want and wonder and gut himself open just to shake his contents out, find an answer Cas would accept.

“No thanks to you,” Dean huffed. He watched silently as Cas sunk deeper into his collar, fingers stretching over the arms of the chair.

“I wanted to apologize. Alastair was secure, I built that trap myself. I never imagined Uriel would disobey, that he was working against us—”

“Quiet,” Dean whispered, Uriel’s involvement barely even breaking the barrier of useless noise. “I just… want you to be quiet.”

It was so much easier before, wasn’t it? When Dean had to pull the words straight out of him, meld them into something tangible, pretend they were inherently important. Now, Cas was a fountain of noise. This sputtering, pivoting concoction of direction and intent that acted, and retracted, and sought revelation more often than he granted it.

He was a mess. This confusing hole in Dean’s life that he couldn’t quite contain. Couldn’t quite push away, no matter the ache.

“I know I don’t have to tell you what happened when I was down under. I know I don’t have to explain why Alastair is something I can’t—” He inhaled sharply, caught between gasping breaths, “talk about, ever.”

Cas’s eyes lowered, seeping to the floor's whitened tiles. “I know, Dean.”

“So why was I there?” Dean demanded. “Why did you ask me of all people? I know we’ve got a war on here, and people are dying left and right— but I’m not your toy soldier you get to just toss into the fire, understand?”

“Yes.”

“Yes, what?”

Castiel shook his head, words stalled with guilt. Instead, he just said, “I would have given anything not to have you do that. I’m so sorry, Dean,” and there was that word again, that same promised salvation, and Dean turned away with his resolve collapsing, hatred etched into his features.

“You know I made a promise with myself,” He spoke after a drowning silence, sudden enough to force Cas’s head up. “In Hell, that if I ever made it out I’d—” Dean shuttered, powering down and freezing up. He forced his breath thin. “I’d never look that son of a bitch in the eyes again. And you can call me a coward, call me whatever you want— but I fucking meant it.”

“You’re far from cowardly,” Cas said, just soft enough to sound adoring.

Dean didn’t know whether to crumble or fight against the feelings it caused.

“Can I ask you something?” Castiel’s attention felt heavy all of a sudden, zeroing in on Dean with morbid anticipation, prepared for the worst. Dean almost found it funny how violently the angel still flinched when he asked, “Do you think they would’ve gone easier on me in Hell if I wasn’t… if I was somebody else? You think all this would’ve been some cake walk?”

Dean didn’t say the word. He wasn’t sure he could. But sure enough, it wasn’t needed for Cas to look at him as if he’d just witnessed something shatter.

“You are exceptional just the way you are,” Cas looked close to reaching out. Leaning across the distance to fold his hand over Dean’s in a way that was human, that was so obviously learned, so non-instinctual and yet persistent all the same. The thought alone was enough to send Dean sinking. “I found the remains of you. Shredded and torn, flickering with life. But I mended them seamlessly, replacing all that was lost.”

Dean shook his head frantically, painful as it was. “You could’ve made me better—”

“I made you perfect,” Cas insisted. “I made you just as you were meant to be.”

And he still didn’t touch. Not physically, at least. But Dean craned against the feather light pressure knocking at his sternum, flooding out towards his chest in warm brushed gestures. He closed his eyes at the feeling, overwhelmed in a way that neared painful.

“The progression of humanity is something that will always be bewildering to me,” Castiel sighed, craning his head back to look at the ceiling, blinking as though he was seeing the galaxy through the plaster. “Technology, innovation, exploration. You’ve all discovered so much, and yet your compassion has failed to extend to something as gifting and precious as love.”

Dean turned to look at him, then. He wasn’t prepared for the sight he got; a genuineness that made him falter, a chest beared sadness that had Dean’s breath running thin.

“You’re the only creatures truly capable of it. My father saw to it,” Cas implored, creeping on a smile that instantly darkened. “What he didn’t intend was for man to take his words and twist them so cruelly.”

“You mean to tell me it’s not a sin to get on my knees?”

It’s a moment of thought to mouth, instant and vile, and Dean blanched at the taste of sudden honesty, swallowing with added weight.

Cas’s expression stayed dutifully calm. “In the way that you’re referencing, no. Not at all.”

For a long moment, Dean didn’t have a response to that. Didn’t quite know how to process the apparency of Cas’s father being all loving when Dean’s was anything but. How Dean had never once seen that man pick up one of the hundreds of Bibles stashed away in every half-furnished motel room across the states— and yet he stood for what he stood for, believed what he believed.

None of it fucking mattered.

“I’m still a sinner, though,” Dean breathed, unable to take Castiel’s words as the tiny victory he figured they were probably meant to be.

“Sin is different from love, Dean,” Cas said. His voice softened. “Every creature is capable of sin.”

Hopeless or not, Dean tucked those words close to his chest. Tried not to think about how closely love and sin intertwined in the gaps of his life and how Cas might fit between those gaps, plastered to the sides, a plug for the darkest parts.

What about you? What about love? What are you capable of?

“Uriel is dead,” Castiel announced to a quiet room. Dean swallowed the smallest hitch of surprise at the back of his throat. “I saw to it myself.”

Dean hesitated. “And Alastair?”

“Sam… killed him,” Dean wretched his head to the side, quick enough to send his vision whitening with a hiss. He gaped at Cas as he spoke, “Tore him apart with an ease even I’d never seen before.”

When we bring on the Apocalypse, and burn this Earth down, we’ll owe it all to you.

Anger churned through the lining of Dean’s guts, ugly and searing. He wanted to be upset with Sam, nail it all down to a stupid kid too driven for his own good. But it was the guilt that left Dean frozen to the weight of his hospital blankets, a gnawing insistence that without Dean, none of this— Sam, the demon blood, the countless deaths— would’ve even happened.

That without Dean’s weakness, the world wouldn’t be set to flame.

“Is it true?” Dean croaked. “Did I break the first seal? Did I start all this?

Cas was quiet. His speech turned to nothing but a gaze, and he looked at Dean with silent contemplation, conflict trapped in his features.

“Yes,” He said, inevitable yet kind, his voice showing so much sorrow Dean had no choice but to turn away, tears hot in his throat. “When we discovered Lilith’s plan for you… we laid siege to Hell. And we fought our way to get to you before—”

“I jump-started the apocalypse,” Dean choked out.

Cas didn’t waver. “We were too late.”

“Why didn’t you just leave me there, then?”

Dean wasn’t sure what did it. The swiftness in which he spoke the words, the conviction, the hollowness. Maybe it was the way his voice broke like a projection, glass shattering on impact. But Cas straightened by his bedside as if pulled by a string, nearly toppling out of the hospital chair.

“It’s not blame that falls on you, Dean. I’ve already told you; this is your fate. The Righteous Man who begins it, is the only one who can finish it. You have to stop it.”

“Stop what? Lucifer? The Apocalypse? What does that mean?” It felt as if a door was closing, the underside of a mountain prepping for the collapse. They were on the precipice of something devastating, something world altering, and Cas’s sudden silence had Dean straining against the pull of his IV, teeth gritting with anger, “Cas! Don’t you go disappearing on me you son of a bitch— what does that mean?”

“I don’t know.”

“Bullshit.”

“I don’t,” He said again, sharper this time. “Dean, they don’t tell me much. Not after everything I’ve—” Cas stopped. His hands curled against the arms of the chair, white pruning in his bloodless fingertips. “All I know, all I’ve ever known, is that our fate rests with you.”

In a phantom rush of sensation so brief he barely tracked it, Dean suddenly felt the weight of a cape strapped to his back again. The press of a cheap costume ‘S’ sown to his heaving chest. And in a way he was used to this; the weight of the world— his world— had been thrusted upon Dean at the age of four. Dean grew with that weight, stayed obedient even as it stretched with his bones and pulled taut with his aging skin.

He knew what it felt like to take on the impossible. He knew what it felt like to fail, too. And he didn’t want this, didn’t want anything more he could fuck up.

“Well then you guys are screwed,” Dean wheezed, trying for humor but choking as a result. His eyes welled with desperate tears, suddenly. “I can’t do it, Cas. I’m just some guy I— it’s too big. Alastair was right. I’m not all here I’m— I’m not st— I’m not strong enough.”

It was begging without any real chance, pleading without any real hope. The most wretched kind. Because Dean knew Cas cared. Knew he understood Dean, pitied him enough to watch him, and trust him, and ask if he was okay. Enough to save him and heal him and kiss him back in the safety of darkness.

But destiny was destiny, and not even a creature as contrived as Cas had a say in it.

“I guess I’m not the man either of our dads wanted me to be,” Dean whispered. It burned just to speak it aloud. “Find someone else. It’s not me.”

With fault came responsibility, and in turn came expectations. The biblical kind, the impossible kind. The do this or the world ends kind, the fate of becoming a promised war machine leaving Dean with a lack of sleep and an outpouring of cases, pointless and otherwise.

Seals were breaking. It was Dean’s fault. Lucifer was stirring in his cage, and Cas was too busy to answer the phone.

Dean figured he knew the real reason.

The nightmares got worse before they got better, and Dean handled them in the same way a child might; desperate and no longer practiced, rising from harrowing depths with his skin slick with sweat and his heart close to imploding. The task of sleeping tanked in terms of priority, and Dean was doomed to simply exist as a walking shell of a person, whether an angel was riding his coattails or not.

Given this, it wasn’t all that alarming to Dean when he woke to find that he’d crashed out against the Impala’s driver-side window smack in the middle of a case, his breaths fogging the dirty glass. What was alarming, was that a trench coated angel had pulled him conscious with a two-finger touch to his forehead, and was leaning far into the steering wheel just to get a look at Dean.

“Fuck,” Dean shouted violently, and the force of it— despite getting projected straight into Cas’s face— made Cas blink rather than flinch. “Who said you could lay hands?”

Castiel shook his head. “I got here too late,” He said in way of explanation, frowning. His gaze shifted to the sweat on Dean’s brow, the terror stricken haze of a nightmare still fresh in Dean’s eyes. He sighed deeply, leaning back in the passenger seat, “My apologies, Dean.”

With his personal space back and his mind slowly clearing, Dean took a deep breath. He ignored the way his chin shuddered as he exhaled, the heat billowed in his suit making him half tempted to crack open a window.

“Where have you been?” Dean asked, not too kindly.

“Saving the world,” Cas deadpanned, squinting out the front windshield.

Dean laughed. “Please. You’re a Robin at best.”

“Are robins inherently less valuable than other birds?”

Dean stared at him from the driver's seat, mouth pinched. He pulled weakly at the cusp of his tie, loosening the collar. “You’re lucky you’re easy on the eyes, buddy.”

Castiel’s squint became even sharper. “If you say so.”

“Oh, so he’s humble too,” Dean scoffed. When all his comment did was force the angel into a glaring question mark, Dean leaned all the way back in his seat. He couldn’t fucking believe this. “You mean to tell me you didn’t pick your vessel on a scale of most bangable?”

“Jimmy Novak was a devout man, and our destiny’s were sealed long ago. Angels can possess who they please, so long as they have permission. But certain families, certain bloodlines— they thrive under angelic nature,” Cas explained, looking down at himself with a far away sort of fondness. He flexed his hand and watched the tendons jump beneath tanned skin, gaze turning glassy. “The Novak’s are one of those families. That’s why I chose him.”

Dean watched with bated breath as Cas continued his exploration, hands brushing down the front lapels of his coat. He paused briefly at the shape of his ribs, fingers bumping bone and muscle, skin catching over fabric. It wasn’t an original thought by any means, but Dean liked the way Cas’s hands looked. Liked them in a way that made him balk at the very thought, flushing at the extents his own mind could take him.

For a moment, he thought about what might happen if he reached through the distance and placed a hand on Castiel’s thigh. How a creature forged in starlight might push him away; might accept him like he did last time, with a warm mouth and a gentle hand.

But then Dean thought about where Cas had been. How far away he’d felt these last few days while Dean had suffered in silence, dreaming about Alastair and razors and the accident Cas caused, the Hell he’d raised and rehashed.

Dean swiped a hand over his mouth. His head ached with memories.

“Jimmy, huh?” He asked, trying to reel himself back in. “Tell me something. When angels possess people, is it the same as demons? Are you parading around some helpless meatsuit?”

Dean could still see the look on Alastair’s face as he said it. The way his smile mangled when he realized he’d struck right where he wanted.

“In some instances, yes. Some angels don’t bother negotiating terms with the hosts. Others don’t see the point if they don’t plan to be inhabiting for long.”

Dean could barely breathe. “What about you?”

“Jimmy was with me for some time, in the beginning. Conscious, observing time as I was. But, I decided he was better off dormant. All he would be seeing was a battlefield, and I wanted him to be at peace while I completed my work here,” Cas must’ve noticed Dean’s rapt attention, because he shrugged almost defensively. “He’s partly in Heaven, living with his family. The part that he needs, he has. And here; I have the part that I need.”

“So this, the whole get up,” Dean gestured to all of Cas, “it’s you?”

The corner of Cas’s mouth ticked upwards, and he said, “For the time being, yes.”

Dean nodded stiffly.

“Good,” He cleared his throat. “Don’t know what I’d do with myself if I’d actually defiled two church thumpers instead of one.”

The drop was immediate, Cas’s shadow of a smile seeping back into his face. He turned to look outside the passenger window, his attention caught by nothing, and Dean watched as his knee twitched and his hands fumbled, his thumb digging sharp into his opposite palm.

“You can rest assured. It was just the one,” Cas said, too quiet.

Dean took a long moment to speak again. By then he felt at the brink of bursting.

“I don’t regret what we did, you know,” He said, and there was no stammer, no halting of admission. Just sweaty hands and a racing heart desperate to keep this— whatever the fuck it was, from collapsing right in front of him. “I’m not— I mean, I’m not saying it wasn’t wrong, like, biblically. God knows what kind of rules you guys have on angels bumping uglies with us mere mortals—”

“It’s best we don’t speak of it,” Cas said sharply, particularly cruel, and Dean felt an ache pulse to life in his sternum.

His hands shook violently at his sides.

“I outta knock your teeth in for that. Just by principle,” Cas braved the storm to look at Dean then, bewildered by the reaction, and Dean glared with a decade's worth of history ripping to the surface. “Are you serious right now? Of all the chalked up shit I expected out of you, this was not—”

“Nobody can know. Not a single soul between Heaven and Hell, do you understand?” Cas repeated, voice devoid of any softness, of anything from before.

Dean stared at Cas and fought hard not to see the harsh lines of his father’s face looking back at him.

“That’s not what you said.”

Cas faltered. “What?”

“You said we shouldn’t speak of it. As in you and me,” Dean pointed between them. He laughed thickly, reflexive and wrong. “You think I don’t know how to keep shit under wraps? Play strangers with a guy who’s dick I’ve sucked? I’m not an idiot, Cas, I know how these things go. But keeping it from the angels and ignoring it completely are two very different things. One of which I won’t fucking do.”

And it must occur to Cas then, even without words, without a map of all the conversations in Dean’s life that ended with promises to forget, how this must’ve sounded to Dean. How much upset came from kissing a man and hearing never again all in the same breath.

Cas nodded, and suddenly that softness was back, blue eyes wide and uncertain. “What would you rather us do?”

The change shifted something in Dean. Stirred a feeling that had otherwise fallen still, goaded him with a brush of confidence he didn’t think he’d ever possessed in his life. Not when it came to this.

“Well, I can think of a few things,” Dean muttered, and he allowed his wants to turn to action, his hand curling over Cas’s thigh.

Castiel stiffened almost instantly, eyes darting back out the window. “Your brother will be back any minute.”

“Blimp us somewhere else then,” Dean replied, easy as anything.

The debate was there, written clear on Cas’s face. Dean watched him stagger with it, sink his teeth into it, tempted to taste without mercy, but within seconds it was gone. His expression calmed, the intensity in his eyes caving to a slow simmer, and he vanished before Dean could push his hand even further, centering on the same warmth he swore this car had embodied like a second skin ever since that night.

Dean sat in the sudden silence, disappointment stewing in his core. He was thinking about flipping on the radio, an excuse if anything, when a rhythm of frantic knocks sounded off beside his head.

Sam waved at Dean through the driver-side window. He was bending himself in half just to smile at Dean.

“Hey, get anything good from the witnesses?”

“Nothing but snot and tears,” Dean said, cracking the window open just a fraction. “You?”

“I’ve just been told there was another killing, a few blocks East,” Sam explained. He looked back to the station behind him. “Whatever this thing is, it’s getting cocky.”

“Fantastic. Lead the way,” Dean gestured towards the newly empty passenger seat, something cold and fierce still nestled in his chest as he started the ignition.

“Let’s just walk, man. It’s not that far.”

Dean froze where he sat, features twisting. He squinted up at Sam. “Did you really just say that?”

The eye roll he received for his efforts was everything Dean imagined it would be.

“The Impala attracts too much attention. I don’t want this thing catching on and following us home,” Sam insisted.

“Since when has that been an issue, like, ever?”

“Okay, fine. You also look like you could use some air, that’s all,” Sam finally admitted, and instead of waiting for an answer like any normal person, he opened the driver-side door and extended his arm in offering, grinning like a spoiled kid.

“We could all use a little air, Sam. Jesus,” Dean groaned, ignoring his brother's stifled laughter as he unlatched his seatbelt and climbed out of the car anyway. “You want me to just leave her here at the station? By herself?”

“Dude. Deep breath.”

“Fine,” Dean slammed the door shut, at least as hard as he deemed comfortable, “but if she gets nabbed it’s your ass.”

“Great, let’s go,” Sam said.

The new victim, this one an elderly woman whose eyes were plucked straight from her skull, held no correlation to the others. Her body was dumped in the back alley of a three star hotel, purse still clutched to her hip, jewelry freshly shined. Her license showed that she lived in town. None of the first responders knew her by name.

Sam gave Dean the rundown in their usual fashion, quick and eventless, emotions packed neatly away. It might sound fucked, and Dean definitely wasn’t winning any moral awards, but with the world falling apart these days it was cases like these that kept him afloat, focused and on the defense.

These, he could do. This was what he knew, the one thing he was good at. This was the part of Dean’s life he could win.

And it was only for a few short moments that Sam let him actually bask in it.

“How are you feeling, anyway?”

Dean was on the defensive between one breath and the next, shoulders squaring. He turned to look at Sam, desperate to catch his eye, but it was hard. As they walked, their paces grew further and further apart, awkward and outmatched.

“It would’ve been easier to corner me in the car, you know. Four walls. A roof,” Dean told him plainly, already dreading the entirety of this conversation.

Sam shrugged. “It’s your call if you want to run. But you know I’m faster.”

“I’m fine, Sam,” He offered, hoping to keep things short. “Just a few bruises.”

As per usual, Sam had other plans.

“Cas patched you up, right? At the hospital? You’re healing a lot faster than expected.”

“It was the least he could do for fucking me over in the first place.”

“Agreed. I told him the same thing.”

Dean threw an arm out to stop them, screeching to a halt on the sidewalk. Sam huffed as if he’d been expecting this, anticipating the heat in Dean’s voice as he said, “What?”

“When he first got to the hospital. He said he couldn’t heal you for whatever reason, but he must’ve changed his mind,” Sam said. Dean blinked at his brother, trying hard to even picture them in the same room. “I guess finding out your own angel brother’s been slaughtering hundreds of your species changes a guy's perspective.”

He must’ve changed his mind, Sam had said.

Or broken the rules for me, Dean thought.

Without a word, Dean started walking again. He kicked at a loose pebble on the sidewalk, ignoring the look Sam threw his way when the rock skittered over gravel before violently smashing into a tree.

“What about you? How are you holding up?” Dean asked. His throat felt scratchy.

“I feel good,” Sam replied, suddenly eager. “Ready, you know. Something’s around the corner, Dean. We’re getting close.”

“To what?”

“To finally killing the bitch.”

Dean’s expression soured almost instantly, gut twisting with anger, but he forced his feet to keep walking. His path didn’t waver, breaths falling still. The scar on his shoulder pulsed with irritation.

“Right, right,” Dean muttered, bitterness creeping in. “Kinda like you killed Alastair?”

A flash of surprise showed in Sam’s face before he deliberately swept it away, replacing it with a glower strong enough to force his dimples to the surface.

“Cas told you.”

“No shit he told me— what the hell were you thinking, Sam?” Dean rounded on him, half tempted to grab his brother by the collar and shake. “All that trouble just to knock him off the chessboard the second the angels nab him?”

“He almost killed you, Dean. He nearly killed Cas! If I hadn’t done what I did, he would’ve killed all three of us without a second thought,” Sam reasoned, rising with a heaving chest, straightening his shoulders as if he was fourteen again and needed the help to look bigger than he was.

“So you can kill demons with your bare hands now, huh? All your little book club meetings with Ruby and this is what you have to show for it?”

“I’m sorry you didn’t get to finish your revenge story Dean, I am. But I’m done hiding this,” Sam looked close to outright panic with how hard he was breathing, sweat pooling at his throat. Dean imagined this was the Sam the monsters often saw, rather than a little brother. “What I’m doing, I’m doing because I have to. Because the world’s gonna end if we don’t take down Lilith, and it’s about time we level the fucking playing field.”

Dean almost didn’t say it. In his heart, it felt like it went unspoken. But then a moment ticked by, agonizing in its passing, and Dean bore the weight it took to ask, “Even if it changes you into one of them?”

Sam went deathly still.

“That’s not going to happen,” He said, deflating. His shoulders dropped, the angry lines in his face smoothing out with sudden worry. He looked alarmingly like the child Dean had spent his entire existence with all of a sudden. “That’s— that’s not how it works, the demon blood doesn’t just—”

“Sammy,” His brother stopped, eyes widening. In the waning sunlight, they looked like they were shining. “No more lies. Okay? No more hiding.”

Sam swallowed. “That goes both ways, you know.”

The sight of caution tape just down the hill at the edge of Dean’s vision was a relief too immense to describe, and Dean took it as a blessed escape, choosing not to respond. When Sam turned back to him, looking to try again, make that connection Dean was so eager to cast but so quick to withdraw when it came to himself, Dean pushed his feet to move faster and hurried down the sidewalk.

It was with his heart pounding harsh beneath his ribs that Dean pulled his fake badge out and walked onto the crime scene.

Chapter Text

The false reality the angels served up wasn’t exactly the one Dean would choose for himself if given the chance, but within it stemmed the roots of something close.

Corporate job, ironed clothes, furnished apartment. It was high class, high regarded, and Dean thrived with an ease that was terrifying.

He climbed the promotional ladder within weeks, steamed lattes and wrote reports. He was a boss to some, loyal and obedient to others, and at the end of each day came home to a marbled apartment built high in the sky, his halls decorated by paintings, windows cornered with plants.

It fit, was the shocking part. Dean fit. Enough to where he was clueless, felt settled and comfortable. He didn’t question the memories placed perfectly between his ears, vivid recollections of birthdays and summer camp and Bobby’s warmth extending that much further, breaching the sort of fatherhood the real Bobby was always so scared of grazing. Ellen was his mother in every sense of the word, pointy and harsh in the kitchen but soft and mannered everywhere else, her daughter Jo becoming the sort of sister Dean had always dreaded, and never expected to love as much as he did.

There was a neatness he didn’t need to crave, a solidness to his life that kept the walls in place. He had a picture of his Aunt Pamela in his wallet. Hanging from his car’s rear view mirror was the dog tag of a Border Collie he’d had as a child. The bracelet on his wrist was made and gifted to Dean by his six year old neighbor, a little girl who’s braids nearly fell past her waist.

Things were good. Things were great, even. Dean was balanced, content, a collection of so many things he usually was not. And yet it was the absence of something, of someone, a searing hot press of fingers at the roll of his shoulder that had Dean blinking through mist every other day, treading through fog.

It was then that the projection began to flicker.

It’s probably your greenhouse diet, Jo had teased him, calling during his lunch break on a Monday he couldn’t even remember, wanting to tell Dean about her engagement. She nearly throttled Dean when he didn’t remember who her fiancé Anna was, and Dean spiraled in a pit of memories and dreams, reality becoming a precariously undependable thing.

But when Sam appeared, rolling into the office as if the wind had carried him there, the feeling subsided. Dean’s focus sharpened, a clearness obliterating the mist. He felt rooted again, enlightened by a sudden purpose that seemed to leap from his very bones, carrying him effortlessly through a vigilant haunting he’d had no idea about just twenty four hours prior.

And it wasn’t even until the end, the color draining from the Earth, dripping off the walls like the mask Zachariah pulled from his eyes, that Dean understood the truth of it. God and Lucifer, the apocalypse hot on his heels and the sun glaring in the sky. Positions and power and destiny and how dreams— good dreams, simple dreams, like a job that had order and a family that showed love and a brother he could depend on— could be born, but they could never really live.

Because the name Winchester came with an otherworldly weight. Heavier than the one Dean already shouldered, and not even a false world could keep him from it. From the glaring truth that now, not even normal could feel all that right without Cas stitched somewhere into the equation.

Dean woke to the rain-honing sound of a semi-truck blaring past the window, and in an instant he knew that he was alive again.

Weeks of memory foam padded nights and sleep-robed mornings, the sound of his coffee maker blinking on in a kitchen bathed in sunlight. So long in an artificial cocoon of normal— and yet Dean could feel himself unraveling, picking apart this reality and labeling it as factual.

Like a lock sliding back in place, the constant ache in Dean’s back resurfaced. He could feel the congestion in his nose, some damaged airway he’d received after a particular blow to the nose a few years back that never quite disappeared. Things were shifting, falling back in order, and Dean rolled over across the motel bed with a headache blaring in his temples, stubble scratching over prickly sheets.

Within seconds, he felt his spine tighten. Instincts kicking straight back in, Dean’s hand flew to the gun under his pillow when he felt his foot hit something solid.

“Dean,” Castiel whispered. When Dean didn’t lift his head from the pillow, Cas pressed a heavy hand to Dean’s bare calve, smoothing up up up— and Dean softened with a shiver, arching to the touch. “Finally, I’ve been waiting for weeks.”

Dean laughed, relaxing his grip on the weapon. “You won’t believe the power nap I just took.”

“Zachariah is here, isn’t he? On Earth?”

Dean craned up in bed, squinting towards the bedside clock. “How did you—”

“I can sense his presence. His upset. When I couldn’t find you, even within myself, I knew someone had interfered,” Dean watched with a pattering heart as Cas shifted, paused, and sat gingerly at the side of his bed, hip brushing hip. He didn’t have his coat on, the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled back to the elbows, and his tie was loose, all his patience frayed to the very edges. “With what happened with Uriel, it was only a matter of time before my work here was to be questioned.”

“Hold on,” Dean said, dragging his eyes up from the webbing of veins down the length of Cas’s arms. “What do you mean you couldn’t find me? Aren’t I a raging bat signal to you? How’s that possible?”

“Zachariah is my superior. His link with Heaven is much stronger than mine, therefore he’s capable of many things. Even muting an angelic connection.”

“Great. So he’s Super Mario charged and a dick bag,” Dean sat up with a thundering groan, his limbs popping back from their weeks of mental slumber. He tilted his head to look at Cas, something quiet and timid passing between them. Hesitantly, Dean asked, “This mean he knows about you and me?”

“Not necessarily,” Castiel frowned. “Taking you and your brother was not ordered. That was a personal matter for Zachariah, and it’s clear he didn’t want any interruptions. It’s more likely he cloaked himself, closing off any outside connections in the process.”

For a moment, Dean thought about moving closer. Scrambling on his knees like an idiot just to join Cas at his side, press them shoulder to ankle. He’d felt nothing but mindless contentment during his time under the sun, and yet the ache in his stomach was one of absence, one that held the sort of pain that didn’t take weeks, but rather months to fester and bubble over.

“You gotta find new friends, Cas,” Dean sighed. He stiffened when he saw the other man’s features harden with instant anger.

“One of the few friends I did have just turned to assisting the demons and massacred a horde of our brethren. I’m not exactly looking to make friends at the moment, Dean.”

Dean blew out a puffing breath, cheeks heating.

“Ouch,” He muttered, offering a weak smile. He quickly deflated when Cas didn’t return the effort. “Look, man— I’m sorry I’m being a dick about this. I know these guys are your… friends. Brothers in arms, whatever. But Uriel wasn’t exactly a team player, and this Zach guy just spent two weeks playing dress up with me and Sam. I’m not rooting for their team here.”

“And what team is that, exactly?”

There was intent behind the edge of Cas’s voice. A delicately placed tripwire. And Dean could walk on it, tempt it the way Cas wanted him to, see what other ways they could scrape each other raw. He could.

Dean stood up, peeling himself away.

“Listen, I’m not gonna logic you, okay? I’m not here to tell you what to do. But you’re not like Uriel. You’re not like Zachariah. You actually give a damn about the world you’re trying to save and that is what’s gonna turn the tide.”

In a darkened room with the curtains drawn and the mattress springs creaking beneath shifting weight, Dean’s words felt unmovable. Like they pressed themselves flush to the very walls, lurking and watching, needing something to come of them.

Then, almost fearful, downright placating, Dean said, “You’re on your own team, Cas. You’re still in charge.”

“But would you have me?” Cas rounded on him suddenly, appearing at Dean’s back with a blimp of feathered air, static caught in his voice. “On your team, that is.”

Dean could feel the heat crawling up his throat. He refused to let it shake his eyes off of Castiel.

“We’re stronger in numbers,” Dean said.

“That’s not what I asked,” Cas insisted.

With a step forward and a breath out, Dean was pinned to the motel wall with nothing but tension holding him still, Cas hovering like a plane preparing to dive.

“Cas,” He whispered, half pleading, barely getting the word out. Dean shivered at the way Cas seemed to track the word straight from his mouth. “I don’t even know what day of the week it is, man. I should really go find Sam.”

“Sam is four doors down, room 109. You parted ways after finishing that shifter case in Wyoming,” His expression hardened, creaking with added weight. “You both went out for drinks, and then you brought your waitress back to your room. Sam excused himself accordingly, booked another room, and it was later that night that Zachariah arrived,” Cas explained, rather unhappily. Then, just as an aside, “And today is Tuesday.”

“Right,” Dean remembered, with a sudden clarity that astounded him. He could recall the hunt, the relief of a scalding shower and a fresh pair of underwear before booking it to the nearest bar. Dean’s mouth was already forming the name by the time the memory fully clicked, “Mandy.”

Castiel’s gaze became sharpened stone.

“Your brother is still waking up. We have time.”

And then his mouth was on Dean’s with a pressure that was lung seizing, hands flocking fast and hot to the flush in Dean’s cheeks, holding him like he was offering up his life just for a touch. Dean acted blindly through the rush of it, kissing back as if guided to fight, back arching sharp beneath the weight toppling over him, because fuck if he hadn’t been thinking about this since the second he’d been given it. Since the moment he lost it again.

This was what Dean had been missing. In Zachariah’s dream, in a perfect world— his longing had been answered on all fronts but one, and Dean could feel it singing to him now, elation curling through his stomach, pumping to the scar on his shoulder. This was something not even Zachariah could’ve predicted Dean needed as badly as he did, and it was all Dean could focus on as he felt Cas plaster himself to Dean’s front, a knee slotting perfectly with the heat stirring in Dean’s pants.

“Holy shit,” Dean gasped out, finally forcing Cas away with a grip on his collar, fingers curled tight. Dean fought to meet the angel’s gaze, the world spinning in his irises. “What the fuck happened to you while I was gone?”

Cas scowled at him. “You worried me.”

He says it like it’s obvious. Like it’s a threat. Some dreaded nuisance that was genuine all the same, and Dean laughed far too loudly for the quiet of the room. Cas watched him closely, mouthing at Dean’s throat to taste the noise.

“Oh, I see. A little distance got you squirming, huh? What happened to Brooding Cas? Mr. Let’s Never Speak of This Again Cas? Where’s he?”

The teasing must break through the noise, cross some middle ground, because before Dean could push his luck any further, Cas had him pinned with a hand to his hip and a hold on his fly, fingers working fast and careless as he shoved his way inside and pulled Dean free of his jeans.

“Away,” Cas finally answered, and Dean crumbled against the wall the second they met skin to skin.

And this, here, was always when the contrast flared. When Dean fully grasped the good and could finally accept the other. He thought about Cas’s mouth, and his working hand over the line of his cock. He had strong arms and heavy limbs and a sharp jaw and Dean— Dean thought about Mandy, the brief coloring he could still connect her to, and remembered the way her lipstick tasted. Remembered the noise and the warmth and how he’d nearly tripped in his eagerness to get her undressed, her legs wrapping like silk around his head, cries muffled by fingers coated in red nail polish.

Dean could still remember the satisfaction of it. Pleasing, succeeding, being wanted. He could also recall the drop in his stomach when she’d tried to reciprocate, reaching out for him with a kiss smeared smile. Dean had ushered her out as politely as he could, but it wasn’t exactly difficult to take an exchange like that and feel sixteen and used all over again, his rate changing by the night.

Now, though, the thought of turning Cas away came with a visceral ache, one coated in desperate need built off incessant waiting. Because every day came with a bigger weight, a badder evil, the sun burning hot above them and Hell stirring silently beneath their feet— but this, here, was something Dean could take, and have, and ask for.

Even if it still hurt to look at most days.

“Slow— fuck, Cas, just— slow down,” Dean moaned brokenly, grabbing Cas by the wrist to stop his movements. Cas blinked up at him, confused in a way that was downright pretty, and Dean smiled like he was owed it, his other hand reaching up to card through the mess that was Cas’s hair.

“Sorry,” Cas muttered. He looked very unsure of himself all of a sudden. “Is this not—”

“You’re doing fine, sweetheart. Just pump the brakes a little, alright?” Dean kept his voice gentle, guiding. His hand slid around Cas’s own, encouraging his fingers to loosen, grip shifting. “I like it rough, but not so rough I end up with a chafed dick, alright?”

Castiel’s head ducked lower, almost bashful. Dean tapped lightly at his chin, forcing him to look up.

“Let me show you something,” He said.

And Cas watched, enraptured, as Dean reached for the button of his pants, tugging him in by the belt loops. He pulled Cas free from his underwear, and his breath all but shattered when Dean pressed them together, two hands encasing the heat of their leaking cocks. Dean grunted, shifting ever so slightly on his heels, and leaned forward to spit into the makeshift sleeve, smoothing their clumsy path.

“There we go,” Dean hummed. Cas pitched forward, lips parting around a silent shudder. Dean’s chest swelled at the sight, and he leaned forward on instinct, inching close enough to press a kiss to Cas’s temple.

“You—” Cas tried, breath hitching, “you feel—”

“Yeah?” Dean encouraged, tightening his grip. He pushed the pace and sped up, arm straining as Cas moaned, hands flocking to Dean’s biceps, fumbling over a tarnished scar.

Dean nosed at the sweat beading along Cas’s throat, curious. He didn’t think he’d seen Cas sweat before, and the thought made him grin against warm flesh, teeth catching. It teased something dark and twisted in the bottom of Dean’s stomach to test the boundaries of Cas’s humanity. Dean wondered how many barriers he’d already broken. Gateways he’d completely barreled through, wanting loyalty and friendship and the outpour of feeling from a creature meant to give anything but. Dean wondered how far he could get before something, or someone, would stop him.

An ache pulsed at the center of Dean’s chest. He wanted Cas to give him more. To feel his essence entrapped in his core.

“Fuck,” Cas whispered, a barely audible slip of tongue, and Dean felt it pool at the base of his stomach, warm and satisfied as Cas’s hips twitched forward. “Dean.”

Castiel tried to look away. To reach his peak without a visible audience, a witness to his inevitable fall, but Dean was faster. More stubborn. His hand flew out the moment he noticed, gently cupping Cas’s bowed jaw.

“No, no, no, don’t do that. Don’t you do that— come on. Look at me. Cas, look at me,” With his fingers curled tight, pressed firm to bone, Dean could feel the pounding in Cas’s pulse. Blood thrumming along bending metal. A human illusion made very, very real. “Own this, alright? Own me, please, right here. Right here, I want you to come. I want you to come— I got you.”

Dean could pinpoint the moment Cas accepted it. Relinquished who he was for who he wanted to be, and came with a shaky cry across the curl of Dean’s fist, the slide turning that much wetter, that much louder as Dean gasped beneath the feeling, following close behind but missing something, needing just a little more—

It was Cas’s turn to decide, then. Turn from the sight of Dean laid bare, or envelop him in warmth, shielding him from the cold of vulnerability. And Dean nearly crumbled right there against the wall when Cas mirrored his hand and palmed the line of his jaw, dragging their eyes together like an inevitable collision, and kissed Dean with the hunger of a soldier, finally giving Dean exactly what he wanted.

Grace pooled warm and heady over the glide of Dean’s searching tongue, and he came with a silent scream roaring through his blood, shattering in his chest. Slowly, like a gradual descent into a warm bath, he felt Cas’s grace seep to the webbing of his veins, coursing like blood, mouthing at his soul, and Dean knew he wasn’t hurt. Knew his time with Zachariah hadn’t done anything physically permanent, but he felt healed anyway, scorched from the inside out.

Dean’s knees finally reached their limit seconds later, and he collapsed against the wall with a half-mannered laugh. His head felt light on his shoulders, brain floating between his ears. Almost drunk, and when Cas threw out a cum soaked hand to help him up, Dean’s only response was to laugh harder.

It wasn’t until the aftermath, that they finally made it to the bed.

“So how does this work then? We got some Jedi force bond or something?” Dean asked.

There was a no smoking sign right outside the front door, a matching one in the lobby, and yet the room was baked in a rising cloud, the plastic caged air unit in the corner rattling with exhaustion.

Dean watched the tendrils rise and whisk through the revolving breeze, seeping through the chipping vents. There was an ashtray balanced at the root of his bare sternum, rising with shallow breaths. Castiel turned to look down at Dean from his spot beside him, head pillowed by his own hand.

“I’m not entirely sure what that entails but… no. My answer is no.”

“Wait— you said you were attuned to my feelings, right? Does that mean we could like, communicate telepathically?”

Just the idea seemed to amuse Cas greatly, and Dean laughed loud and obnoxious as Cas rolled his eyes like a child might, bold and unpracticed.

“Not coherent thoughts, no. But fragments maybe, certain emotions.”

“You’re fucking with me,” Dean deadpanned. Cas’s smile was soft, a light graze of teeth to lip threaded neatly in place. “Come on, try me then. Read my mind, Professor X,” Dean sat up expectedly, raising his face in challenge. He sighed when Cas merely stared at him, blinking slow and glassy eyed amongst the smoke. “Are you— are you gonna play along or—”

“You’re confused.”

Dean stared at him, a question caught dead in his throat, because yes. He was confused. Caught in this spiral where Cas was an angel, and he was human, and they stood on opposite ends when the lights were raised, villains perched on their marks. But when they were alone, when they existed here, together, sprawled amongst raised sheets, they laid as equals.

How was Cas handling this? The taking and the sneaking, the lying and the falling. How did it feel when a creature who could fly was suddenly swept into a harrowing nosedive towards the ground—

“You’re wondering why my age doesn’t seem to correlate with my knowledge of human tradition,” Cas scowled at him. Dean inhaled so violently he felt his lungs collapse like paper. “You think I’m stupid.”

“Oh shit,” Dean wheezed through relieving laughter, head falling back with a thud of the pillow. The whiplash of feeling in his chest made him ache all the way down to his knees, and Dean found himself searching for steady ground again, nudging Cas’s shoulder like he wasn’t acutely aware of the warmth of his naked skin. “There’s no reason to pout, man. It’s not my fault you’ve got the manners of a squatch.”

“Humans are needlessly complicated. I could have a thousand more years on Earth and I still don’t think I’d grow to understand what it is, completely, that makes you you.”

Dean didn’t have an answer to that. Cas had a tendency to say things blatantly, in ways that Dean found jarring. This time, Cas’s words felt close to eating him alive.

Dean rolled over onto his shoulder and placed the ashtray on the bedside table. The shadow of a tree branch outside the motel window stretched menacingly towards the bed, framed by jagged lightning.

“Well, lucky for you, I’m easy,” Dean said, hastily bringing his cigarette back to his lips. “Just a high school dropout with a give ‘em hell attitude, ten bucks to his name, and a car. A really, really, cool fucking car.”

The slight tilt of Castiel’s head, though minute in theory, had Dean looking away with a thundering heart. There was something so honest about it. The line drawn between words and feelings and an almost imperceptible shift of limbs, how expressive Cas could be when he was soft and kissed and lit up from within.

“You have a tendency for understatements,” Cas told him, in that tone Dean found comforting rather than unsettling now.

Dean scoffed. “Baby is not an understatement.”

“I was talking about you.”

And there was an oddness about seeing a being as old as Cas look so sad. Like Dean still imagined Cas as a creature that spoke in screams and communicated through static, that the only tears he’d ever dare to shed were made of blood and cobalt. Dean couldn’t imagine how speaking honestly about the way he felt could lead a creature closer to humanity.

“Flattery won’t get you anywhere,” Dean mumbled, scratching numbly at the inside of his elbow.

Cas managed a smile at that, the weariness around his eyes smoothing out. “It appears to have gotten me an exceptional amount.”

And with that, Dean didn’t hesitate to slap him on the stomach, grinning deliriously when Cas curled up with a punctured laugh, this breathless rumble of a noise that pierced Dean cleanly.

“You’re hilarious,” Dean deadpanned. His smile bumped into the next pull of his cigarette, a trembling barrier. He froze when he felt eyes on him, and turned to Cas with smoke billowing from his nose. “You wanna try?”

Cas blinked at him, his eyes shining with a staggering mix of mirth and apprehension. Wordlessly, he reached out and took the cigarette from Dean, knuckles brushing. Cas scowled at his own hand as he tried to mimic the hold of it in his fingers.

“Did you know cigarettes contain over seventy cancer causing chemicals?” He asked, completely monotone. Dean batted his hands away with a whine, fighting for the cigarette back.

“Wow, okay. If I knew you were gonna— just, give it back you big baby.”

Before Dean could fully commit and throw himself over Castiel in retaliation, Cas pressed the filter to his too-dry lips, inhaling so sharply Dean didn’t know whether to laugh or curse. He stared in open suspense as Cas paused, frowned, and blew out a cloud of smoke big enough to encompass both of them.

“Am I supposed to feel something?” Cas asked, the only change appearing as the sudden husk in his voice.

“Lookie there, they’re angel proof. No harm done,” Dean took the cigarette back with a lopsided grin, resting it between his teeth.

“To me, perhaps,” Cas said, studying the item at the cusp of Dean’s mouth. His gaze lingered. “But they’re a rather strenuous toxin to cleanse human lungs of.”

Dean’s brow hardened. “What?”

“What do you think happens when I offer you my grace, Dean?” Cas pondered, asking like it was rhetorical and the reality should be obvious. “I heal everything within my reach, and when it comes to you, that’s everything. I lower your cholesterol, wipe the alcohol from your bloodstream,” He stopped when he saw the look on Dean’s face. Slack-jawed shock, eyes pried wide with awe. Dean figured the only reason Cas continued, was because he could practically feel the ache rising in Dean’s throat, “And, oftentimes, erase the damage and cravings of your nicotine addiction.”

Dean didn’t think there was any casual way to take a confession like that, but it only seemed fair that after a moment of silent contemplation, he dragged the cigarette from his lips and stubbed the remaining embers out into the ashtray. The last trail of smoke from the dying light of it rose high towards the ceiling.

“Dude,” Dean coughed. “You’re such a trip sometimes. Jesus. That’s not— like, a normal thing to say at all.”

“Would you rather I lie?” Cas retorted, quick as anything, and Dean promptly shut his mouth.

“No. No, uh, definitely not,” He answered softly, as redundant as it felt. A lying Cas was something he certainly didn’t favor, and in the warmth of a shared bed it was one of the last things he wanted to entertain. Dean cleared his throat. “So I’m a pain in the ass to deal with, huh? Never heard that one before.”

Dean’s stare was pointed when he looked at Cas, willing him to catch on, take the joke as the bait that it was and smile with him again. He had such a nice smile. Logically, Dean knew it wasn’t a part of Cas. Reluctantly, he understood Cas had merely taken up residence and it was Jimmy’s smile that made his brain stutter. It was Jimmy’s eyes that pierced moonlight and Jimmy’s mouth that was now seared in purple on his chest, just to the right of the tattoo meant to protect him.

This, Dean knew.

But he also knew how cold the stare of an angel could be. How there was harsh and brutal and then there was Cas. That he’d taken Jimmy’s limbs as a gracious gift rather than an open house and sent the man towards the sky to be with his family, to avoid the war, promising him a safe passage back when it was time. And maybe it was Jimmy’s skin that flushed hot under the press of Dean’s palms, an imitation, an illusion of what was supposed to be, but it was Cas’s bones they were shielding, a collection of Earth and Heaven and starlight.

And it was these things, these specific, precious, impossible things, that still made Dean falter when his logic tried to define Cas as anything seen as other.

“If it’s no trouble to you, I’d prefer that you didn’t lie either,” Cas admitted, sharing a sentiment Dean thought stemmed from his fear and his fear alone, and Dean sighed into the kiss he was gifted next, melting like softened wax.

Dean didn’t even have to yearn for it this time around. At the first brush of their lips, an outpour of grace flooded hot over the swell of his tongue, sparking like a wire down the arch of his spine. Heat prickled slow and methodical in the curve of Dean’s gut, embracing him with a ragged gasp.

Dean’s excitement seemed to stir Cas on, pleasure bursting outwards, and Dean caught the smile Cas pressed into their next kiss, fingers curling together, Cas pinning his arms with a satisfied hum.

“I’ve got shit to do, Cas,” Dean laughed, groaning through the swipe of tongue he felt descending down the line of his throat. “Devil’s getting itchy, world’s in the hot seat kinda shit, you know?”

“I know,” Cas answered, finally pulling back to look at Dean, suddenly serious. His stare lingered for a long moment, lips parting around desperate words, but his nerve seemed to vanish at the last second and he let his head loll against Dean’s, voice tracing Dean’s ear as he said, “one more minute.”

Dean ached at the words, their honesty breaking through skin. “Yeah, okay.”

Cas pressed his nose to the hollow of Dean’s throat, the warmth between shoulder and neck. His next breath seemed to rattle his lungs like paper, and his voice came as a diluted rasp.

“One more minute,” He repeated. Dean nodded silently against him, a scratch of stubble over dark hair. His hand traced a gentle pattern over the white of Cas’s lower back.

Dean could give them one more minute.

The bell above the diner entrance chimed with the call of lunchtime rush, and Dean shimmed his chair as far as he could into the table, grunting at the sudden press of strangers. This place was tiny, a real hole-in-the-wall gem, and Dean seemed to already be paying the price of wanting a decent cheeseburger during a time of great crisis.

Sue him.

“You know what, this could be a good thing,” Dean perked up, forcing the positivity with a grimace. “I mean, if this is what puts us on the path to Lilith, and you and her making passionate demon love, then all we gotta do is get off the path.”

Sam flipped the menu over in hand, squinting at the limited options of rabbit food the place offered. “How do you mean?”

“It’s a blueprint of what not to do. I mean, if Chuck’s pages say we go left—”

“Then we go right,” Sam finished.

“Exactly.”

It wasn’t the most dependable plan Dean had ever come up with, but these were desperate times. Finding out your entire life story had been dreamed up and written down by an agoraphobic virgin was more than a little nightmarish, and Dean could feel the weight of it like a pair of eyes trained to the back of his skull. And it wasn’t just Chuck. There were strangers, fans, people out there who had read the inner workings of Dean’s mind and formed an opinion on him.

They knew about Lawrence. They read about Stanford. Somewhere out there, were people who had seen how Dean felt when he first saw Cassie again and watched his brother die on his knees bleeding into the dirt. They knew Dean’s conflict when a reaper traded his dying heart for that of a gay man’s and half expected that to be the thing that made John come running. That their dad would finally answer a phone call so long as he felt like he had to kick Dean back in line again.

Dean couldn’t bear it. A reality where his pain was so projected, so open to be picked and scoffed at. They needed to fix this, fast.

“We go off-book. We never make it to the end. It’s Opposite Day. It says that we, uh, we get into a fight, so no fighting,” Dean reached over and closed the lid of Sam’s laptop with a single finger, “and no research for you.”

“And no bacon cheeseburger for you,” Sam shot back, snatching up Dean’s menu without missing a beat.

“No problem. I’ll just… order something else,” Dean mumbled, frowning down at the chapter draft Chuck had given them.

“This whole thing is ridiculous.”

“Lilith is ridiculous?” Dean scoffed.

“The idea of me hooking up with her is. Chuck’s clearly a ways off from what I’d call mentally stable. Why we’re taking his word on all this, I have no idea,” Sam sighed, abandoning his research plan altogether and stuffing his laptop away.

“Right. ‘Cause you banging a demon is something that could never happen,” Dean said tersely.

Sam faltered, limbs freezing where he was fumbling through his bag on the floor. Dean studied the tension coiled in his spine.

“Dean, for the first time we have a warning that Lilith is close,” He said, short and careful.

“So?”

“So we’ve got the jump on her. If we know when she’s coming, we’ve got an opportunity—”

“Are you—” Dean reared back, clamping his mouth shut as heat billowed up his throat. He forced himself to calm, remembering the fates they were trying to avoid, and through gritted teeth said, “It frustrates me when you say such reckless things.”

“Well, it frustrates me when you’d rather hide than fight,” Sam demanded, smiling tightly. And Dean, in a process he usually never actually reached, briefly considered punching his brother.

“Believe it or not, gunning it with nothing but some half-cocked confidence isn’t always the move you think it is,” Dean quipped, words growing quiet as he brought his coffee to his lips.

“And who taught you that? Because I know damn well it wasn’t Dad.”

At the very least, Sam seemed remorseful the moment he said it. His voice was barely done ringing in the rush of Dean’s ears before he was dropping his head and staring a hole into the table. Sam’s fingers reached across to fumble with the hair tie on his wrist, thumb tracing his pulse point.

“I say we call Cas. Get a second opinion,” Dean said after a long moment. And Sam, in his current position, knew better than to argue. “He doesn’t seem to be anywhere in Chuck’s vision, so I’m thinking it’s a safe bet.”

“Sure, yeah,” Sam shrugged, but it was tight lipped and tense, something hovering at the edge of his voice.

Dean gave his brother a steadying glare before lowering his head, eyes closing. He shifted in his seat, self-conscious, and winced at the violent screech of the chair’s legs.

“Cas, buddy, we need some assistance down here. If you could, uh, pop by, that would— you know, we could use your expertise on this I think. This has holy bullshit written all over it, so, bust some feathers and get down here, pronto.”

Embarrassment ticked in Dean’s throat the longer the silence dragged on, heat stifling in his ears. He felt the handprint on his shoulder pulse with yearning, calling out to the void. Dean didn’t dare meet Sam’s eyes, focusing on the fan rotating overhead instead.

“He’s busy, then. The guy’s always on call these days,” Dean said, shooting for casual but decidedly feeling the opposite.

Sam at least had the decency to pretend not to notice. “Right.”

Dean didn’t think twice before stepping out of the motel shower and wrapping a towel around his waist, bare feet dripping over greasy tiles.

It wasn’t until he got a pair of boxers on, shoulders still damp and the bathroom steaming like a halo behind him that Dean caught Sam’s stare and did a double take. He looked down at himself.

“What?”

“Does it still hurt?” Sam asked, voice muffled behind his hand. He was sitting on one of the beds, facing Dean like he’d been waiting there. He was biting his nails.

“Huh? Does what still—” When Sam didn’t stop staring, eyes drawn to the top of Dean’s shoulder, the answer became unavoidable. Dean looked half-heartedly towards the handprint. “No. No, not really.”

“Cas hasn’t thought to heal it?”

“Dude’s busy, I guess. Doesn’t really matter.”

This wasn’t part of Chuck’s vision. This wasn’t in his draft, and maybe that’s what was forcing Sam’s hand here. Some delusion that any diversion was a good diversion, so long as they strayed from the path. Dean did not agree with this ideology.

“I tried reading up on it, you know. Angelic brands,” Sam started, like this was completely topical, and not at all Dean’s worst nightmare.

Dean did his best to smile as he crossed the room. He threw on a shirt with tension strung tight in his shoulders.

“Riveting stuff?”

“No, actually,” Sam said. “Apparently, it’s not common. Like, at all. Out of all the biblical instances I found about souls getting pulled from Hell, none of the victims were left with a scar like that.”

Resentment poured through the rise of Dean’s heartbeat, gaze darkening. “Victims? Really, Sam?”

“What the hell else would you call it, Dean?” Sam demanded, standing quick enough to make Dean stagger back a few steps. “All I know about that thing is that he was able to find us and take Anna away. You do remember that, don’t you?” He pressed, crowding Dean’s space. “So he just, knows where you are, at all times.”

“Yes, yeah, I— I guess so. I think that’s what he said,” Dean stammered, shocked to find there was a shake in his hands as he slid into a worn pair of jeans, needing an out as soon as possible.

“Well, what else did he say? Is it something we need to be worrying about?” Sam hounded, following Dean like a shadow until Dean finally forced him back with a forearm to the chest, shoving him away with wild eyes.

“Jesus, Sam. It doesn’t matter what I say, whatever it is you’ll find a way to worry about it. So what does it matter?” Dean demanded, breathless by the sudden heat he felt prickling in his eyes. He turned away when the feeling didn’t subside, wrenching his jacket off the nearest dining chair. “This is what had to be done to get me out, end of fucking story.”

Dean almost expected a comment at that. A half-brained clap back that would turn this moment into a bloody one, but Sam seemed to restrain himself. The slow sigh he let out settled thickly over the room.

“So, what? I’m supposed to just hole up here all night?” Sam asked tightly, brushing the moment aside.

“That’s exactly what you’re gonna do. And no research. I don’t care what you do— use the magic fingers and watch Casa Erotica on pay-per-view.”

Dean hesitated by the door, keys in hand. He gave Sam a knowing look before grabbing his computer bag off the table.

Sam immediately bristled. “Oh, dude, come on.”

“Just call it insurance. Brother tax, if you will,” Dean waved off, taking the laptop and pressing it to his hip.

“What are you gonna do?” Sam pouted.

“Well, the pages say that I spend all day riding around in the Impala, so I’m gonna go park her,” Dean explained, awkwardly raising the paper he had stuffed by his forearm, hands full and trembling. He used his last bout of grip strength to point at Sam teasingly, hoping the change of pace would settle his still racing heart. “Behave yourself, would ya? No homework. Watch some porn.”

Dean felt more than he heard just how hard he slammed the door on his way out.

The drive back to Chuck’s place was memorable if not humbling, the whipping of a thrown-up tarp over where the back windshield used to be leaving Dean with a pounding headache. That, and getting body slammed by a car hadn’t helped.

Apparently, Chuck’s plans were harder to avoid than Dean had originally anticipated. And just like the draft, just like the story Dean wanted nothing more than to beat, he plowed through Chuck’s front door with his anger prodded and peaked, the reality of destiny and its insistence a looming threat plastered to Dean’s back.

“Dean,” Chuck greeted nervously, passing Dean on his way back to the living room from the kitchen.

He was carrying a glass and a bottle of auburn-colored alcohol, scrambling back to his recliner with sock-clad feet. Discarded on the coffee table were two other bottles, already drained. He had a tremor in his hands as he poured himself a gracious glass.

“I take it you knew I’d be here,” Dean said, stalking forward, slow and deliberate.

Chuck swallowed, using a knuckle to half-heartedly push up his glasses. “You look terrible.”

“That’s ‘cause I just got hit by a minivan, Chuck.”

“Oh.”

“That's it?” Dean demanded, treading closer. “Every damn thing you write about me comes true, and all you have to say is oh?”

“Please don’t yell at me,” Chuck bolted out of the chair, skittering away once he realized Dean didn’t plan on stopping his pursuit.

In his rush, his foot slammed into the corner of the coffee table, sending him down to the floor, and Dean hovered as he watched Chuck curse, desperately trying to crawl back to his feet.

“Why do I get the feeling there’s something that you’re not telling us?” Dean asked, narrowing in on the way Chuck’s eyes seemed to widen in response.

“What— what wouldn’t I be telling you?”

“How you know what you know, for starters!” Dean shouted, remembering the very scrutiny of it. How it felt to call his Dad for help outside a gas station five miles out from the house his mother died screaming in, and how reading it on a page took everything bad and everything horrible and multiplied it tenfold.

“I don’t know how I know. I just do!” Chuck cried.

“That’s not good enough,” Dean wretched Chuck towards him by the shirt and into the wall, pinning him with bared teeth. “How the hell are you doing this?”

A breeze blew in from Dean’s right, scattering a pile of drafts left abandoned on the couch to the hardwood floor.

“Dean, let him go,” Castiel ordered, appearing as a prickle in Dean’s spine, a flood to his system. Dean’s grip on Chuck’s collar loosened. “This man is to be protected.”

“Why?” Dean snapped, finally glancing over his shoulder to look at Cas.

“He’s a prophet of the Lord.”

Funny enough, it was annoyance that forced Dean to drop his hand and step back with a hefty sigh, the nature of their luck making his blood boil. Chuck skittered away immediately, bending under the threat of Dean’s arm just to curl back up into the recliner.

“You’re Castiel,” Chuck stuttered. He downed a whole glass between one moment and the next, never taking his eyes off the angel.

“It’s an honor to meet you, Chuck. I… admire your work,” Cas said absentmindedly, thumbing through one of the many Supernatural books piled high throughout the room.

Just the sight of Cas holding it, one of the many pipelines to the rotting in Dean’s core, made Dean’s stomach hurt. But there was nothing in that book that Cas didn’t already know; that Dean hadn’t already spent countless nights mulling over, wondering whether a man selling his soul for the life of his brother was something an angel saw as an act of love or a worldly waste.

“This is the guy who decides our fate?” Dean demanded, scowling at the worthless heap of a man Chuck made, his role in this entire thing downright pathetic.

“He isn’t deciding anything. He’s a mouthpiece. A conduit for the inspired word.”

“The word? The word of God?” Dean gaped, half expecting Cas to correct him. “What, like a new New Testament?”

“One day, these books will be known as the Winchester Gospels,” Castiel explained, like it was simple, a well known history lesson.

Dean thought he might swallow his own fucking tongue. “You gotta be kidding me.”

“I am not… kidding you,” Cas responded, unfamiliar with the wording.

“Well why him, huh? Why did he get duck duck goosed?”

“I don’t know how prophets are chosen. The order comes from high up on the celestial chain of command.”

“How high?”

“Very,” Cas insisted, voice sweeping low. Chuck looked seconds away from passing out.

“So how do we get around this?” Dean asked.

Cas scowled at him, setting the book back down on the table. “Around what?”

“The Sam and Lilith love connection— how do we stop it from happening?” Dean practically shouted, tired of feeling like the only one who gave a damn about testing fate to its very limits, bursting and ripping through cemented seams.

“What the prophet has written can’t be unwritten,” Cas gave Chuck a pointed stare before leveling on Dean, oddly sympathetic. His eyes were warm. “As he has seen it, so it shall come to pass.”

Dean had no time to grapple with it. Cas’s head turned up with sudden interest, eyes peering through nothing, and Dean felt dread tear carelessly through his stomach.

“I have to go. I expect a timely return,” Cas said, squaring his shoulders.

“Wait, Cas—”

Dean stood there as a door down the opposite hall slammed shut at Cas’s departure, a flutter of pages signaling his leave. The light fixture over Dean’s head swung in a haunting circle.

Chuck blinked through the haze in his eyes, ogling Dean. He swallowed dryly.

“What?” Dean snapped.

“Uh— nothing, man. That’s, like, so not my business,” He laughed awkwardly, shrugging with nimble shoulders. Dean narrowed his eyes.

“Usually I’d agree with you. But seeing as our lives have set up shop in that melon of yours, I’d say it is your business,” Dean argued, sidestepping papers holding the darkest parts of him to cross Chuck’s threshold. He curled a hand over the top of the recliner, bending to his level. “There’s something you’re not telling me. So spill.”

“Seriously, I don’t even know if it— I mean, you guys are just nonstop, you know? Who am I to tell what’s real and what isn’t? What’s a vision and what’s a really really bad acid trip?”

“Chuck,” Dean said, deathly serious. “I have a gun. And if you don’t start talkin’ real soon, I’m gonna shoot you in your lily white—”

“You’re the Michael Sword.”

A record scratch sounded off in the center of Dean’s skull, right between burning ears and ringing panic. He ripped his hand off the chair and stepped back, pulse pounding beneath crawling skin.

“Michael as in… the Michael?” Dean choked out, voice shredded to ribbons. “Biblically horrifying, monstrously righteous, pissed off brother of Satan— that Michael?”

“It looks that way, yes. And, appropriately, Sam might also be the destined vessel of Lucifer,” Chuck threw his arms up and over his face before he could even get the words out, shrieking as he cowered into his seat.

“Context, Chuck. Before I start swinging.”

“Alright, alright, don’t—” There was a shake to Chuck’s hands as he took his glasses off, tossing them hazardously to his lap. He looked half as exhausted as Dean felt. “Look, it’s hard to make sense of it all. I get visions every single night, every time I close my fucking eyes and it— it blurs, after a while. But I’ve heard… things. From angels, from demons too, I guess. They look the same sometimes,” He mumbled, growing quiet. His eyes trailed to the mess littered across his coffee table. “I wasn’t really sure what to make of it at first, everything I was hearing. It’s hard to accept the end of the world, I think. But seeing you and Sam, you and Castiel— I don’t think they’re rumors. I don’t think they ever were.”

Dean could barely breathe. “What weren’t rumors?”

“The last showdown. The final destruction,” Chuck had this far away look in his bloodshot eyes, a darkness masked solely by quiet awe. “Once Lilith succeeds in freeing Lucifer, he’ll go for Sam. And Michael, he’ll come for you, his Sword, his ultimate weapon. They’ll be wearing your skins as they fight, and the world will cave as they do.”

“That’s impossible,” Dean said on instinct, even as his spine boiled and his guts churned, the urge to cry knocking behind his eyes. “Even if they do pop Lucifer’s box, angels can’t possess without permission, I won’t— Sam won’t say yes to Lucifer, not in a million years.”

“He better fucking not. I haven’t even finished my puzzle yet,” Chuck sputtered, gesturing with a sweater-covered hand to the poor attempt at a puzzle left abandoned on the table, buried under a collection of trash and sticky glasses.

Dean was hyper-aware of the gun at the back of his waistband, painfully so.

“Wait, what do me and Cas have to do with this? What made you believe this isn’t just a load of horse shit meant to send us running for the hills?” Dean asked, pushing himself not to spiral yet, to seek answers before pity.

“Your connection. His claim. It’s as strong as it is because of your angelic nature. You’re destined to contain the most powerful angel in the universe, Dean,” Chuck smiled sadly, eyebrows raising. “It’s no surprise you’re able to harness it a little better than most.”

If Dean tried hard enough, reached with both hands to the back of his stomach, pried apart his ribs to the thrum of his heart, he could feel Cas in the distance. Like a far away echo, the stream of light flooding beneath a closed door, warm and comforting and good. He was always there, no matter how muted, but his presence stuck out like a bruise now, sore and discolored on Dean’s skin, its severity difficult to pin down.

“But Cas didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to— it’s not— I didn’t know I was—”

“No offense, dude, but I don’t think anyone intended for you and Cas to… yeah,” Chuck trailed off, lips curled awkwardly. Dean didn’t know whether to punch him in the face or march out the door, his cheeks stained a violent red. “I mean, this Lucifer plan is loaded. We’re talking state of the art, millions of years in the making type heist. Angelic connections themselves haven’t even been made since angels were banished from roaming the Earth. Probably because they’re so unpredictable.”

Dean expected to have more questions about Michael. About his destiny as a walking meat suit. Instead, his voice came out weak when he asked, “Will they kill him for it?”

Chuck’s expression dropped with what looked like surprise. It was gone within seconds.

“When the angels were first created by God, they were tasked with looking over the Earth. Guardian angels, we call them. It was angels who would come speaking God’s word, aiding prophets, establishing destiny’s,” Chuck explained, tumbling through his words with an unexpected sort of ease. “But when God realized some of the angels were growing attachments to the humans, these… imprints of grace on human souls, they were ordered not to return. A loving soldier, at the heart of it, is a weak soldier.”

The phantom press of thunder-chapped lips ghosted lightly over Dean’s mouth. He could still feel their warmth. Their coiled like strength, a shadow-bathed moment dipped in passion and insistence.

“This sort of connection is bad enough. But typically they only go one way. The angel can claim a human, lock on, sense them. A one way projection,” Chuck fumbled with his fingers, the stitching of his sweater. His hands seemed to itch for the drink balanced on his knee. “You, on the other hand, were able to make your own bond, forcing a balance in the connection. This probably put a real dent in their heavenly plan, man.”

“So it’s a no-brainer,” Dean said, trying not to sound as crushed as he felt. “Cas is a dead man.”

Chuck pursed his lips. “Something tells me ‘dead’ might be too kind of a word for what they’ll do.”

Dean fixed Chuck with a heavy glare, unhappy with his response.

“And you got all this, just from some prophet locker room talk?” Dean demanded, surprised to find that Chuck’s response was almost sheepish, his eyes averting to the floor.

“Believe it or not, I was religious even before all of this,” Chuck smiled tightly.

Dean’s best plan was to leave. His only plan, in fact, that he could imagine wouldn’t end with his brother's blood painting motel room walls.

But Sam was Sam, insistent in his recklessness, determined to wait Lilith out, and Dean stormed out into the parking lot with his heart beating in his throat, hands itching for the lighter in his jacket pocket.

He had half a mind to ditch Sam, leave him there just to teach him a lesson. But Dean didn’t see how potentially dying would come across as all that valuable, and so he dipped into the night and threw his fist into the soda machine just outside their motel room, punching the lights out.

Hard plastic cracked beneath Dean’s fingers, and he turned away without so much as a groan, fingers shaking from the impact. His knuckles were already swelling by the time he fetched a cigarette and lit up, rolling his shoulders with a heavy exhale.

“Well, I feel stupid for doing this, but I am fresh out of options,” Dean said, facing nothing but the night sky. “So, please. I need some help. You owe me that much.”

This was different from a phone call. Different from pushing his needs into the universe and hoping Cas would reply. This was praying, which meant believing, which meant a whole other list of no’s had somewhere along the line become yes’s, and Dean didn’t know what to feel beyond the crawling in the pit of his stomach.

“I’m praying, okay? Come on. Please,” Dean begged, horrified to find his voice was already grating.

“Prayer is a sign of faith,” Cas responded from the darkness, quickly and without pause, almost like he’d been waiting. Dean turned to him with desperate eyes, not understanding the quiet smile on Cas’s face. “This is a good thing, Dean.”

“So does that mean you’ll help me?” Dean asked, hopeful.

Cas’s smile sank into a frown. “I’m not sure what I can do.”

“Drag Sam out of here now, before Lilith shows up.”

“It’s a prophecy. A destined event,” Cas explained, wincing as he did. “I can't interfere.”

In less than a thought, Dean was standing in front of Cas with his shoulders squared and his back straight, not afraid of the way their breaths danced, lips nearly touching. Dean blew a slow trail of smoke from his nose, watching the way it made Cas’s lashes flutter.

“You’ve interfered plenty,” Dean said, plainly.

Cas’s gaze stayed fixated on Dean’s mouth, creases lining his eyes as he said, “That’s different.”

“How?” Dean dared. “How are me and you different?”

“You and I—” Cas seemed to struggle on that phrase alone, like the mere existence of it was enough to send the stars after him. And yet his voice was fond and his eyes stayed soft as he murmured, “That couldn’t be helped.”

Something in Dean’s chest pulled taut in response, aching deep down, and he pulled away before it could fester. Before he kissed Cas stupid and forgot about this whole ugly mess. It was an excuse, after all. And Dean didn’t like it.

“You have tested me and thrown me every which way. And I have never asked for anything. Not a damn thing. But now I’m asking. I need your help. Please,” Dean begged, because that’s what it was, and that’s how he felt— split and bared, his deepest fears manifested.

“What you’re asking, it’s… not within my power to do,” Castiel said.

“Why? ‘Cause it’s ‘divine prophecy’?” Dean gritted, throwing his cigarette across the lot.

“Yes.”

“So, what— we’re just supposed to sit around and wait for it to happen?”

Cas didn’t have the words, every excuse coming up blank, utterly pointless. “I’m sorry,” He said instead, and Dean staggered back.

“Fuck you,” He spat, enticed by the way Cas flinched. “You and your mission. Your God. After all the dirty work I’ve done for you, you’re just gonna leave me out to dry? After we—” The memory of soft hands slowing his movements, insisting he was worthy and deserving, even with his knees pressed to floorboards and his lips swollen red— sprung up like bile, and Dean was already halfway gone, boots skittering over chipped pavement as he made a last beeline back to his room.

He dropped his final words like a staggering bomb. “You’re welcome for the good times, I guess. Seen as that’s all I’m good for.”

“Dean,” Cas said, a quiet voice, a fragile plea. When Dean ignored him, his tone grew frantic, “Dean.”

“What?” Dean snapped back, just as harsh.

“You must understand why I can’t intercede. Prophets are very special, they’re protected.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “I get that—”

“If anything threatens a prophet, anything at all, an archangel will appear to destroy that threat,” Cas was an unbreakable figure in the darkness, a threatening shadow. The intent in his eyes was haloed by a single street light overhead. “Archangel's are fierce. They’re absolute. They’re Heaven's most terrifying weapon.”

There was a catch here. Dean could see it in the quirk of Cas’s mouth, his steady gaze. He was bending to Dean, giving him an out. But all Dean could think of was his future, how he was meant to share a skin with what Cas claimed to be a weapon, a terrifying force, and he wanted to ask Cas about it. Wondered if Cas knew, and thought about what it would mean if he did.

He opened his mouth to ask, to voice it. The question burned across his tongue. And then—

“So these Archangel's, they’re tied to profits?” Dean asked instead, clenching his jaw.

“Yes,” Cas said, insistent.

“So if a prophet was in the same room as a demon—”

“Then the most fearsome wrath of Heaven would rain down on that demon,” Cas answered smoothly, satisfied that Dean had caught on. “Just so you understand… why I can’t help,” He continued, looking away with feigned disinterest.

Did you know about Michael?

It ached something awful in Dean’s throat. Like barbed wire wrapped around the cording of his vocals, constricting every time he dared to breathe.

Did you know I was destined for war this whole time? That my dad was right?

Dean wanted the truth. Longed for it desperately. But his refusal to let things change was somehow stronger, even more precious, and he couldn’t cave, not on this.

“Thanks, Cas,” He said, meaning it but fearing one day he might not, and Cas’s smile was the same as it had always been.

Trustful and unsuspecting.

“Good luck.”

Dean could already feel the wrath from Sam’s gaze before the room stopped spinning, light still pouring in at the edges.

The archangel that answered Dean’s call was a stranger, a warrior with no name, but he cleared out Lilith regardless, seeing her as a worldly threat to Chuck, whom Dean had barely convinced to actually show.

“What the hell was that?” Sam demanded.

“An anonymous tip. Apparently, if any threat comes to a prophet of the Lord, an Archangel will come down and open a can of whoop ass on said threat,” Dean beamed, still looking around the room in disbelief.

“And you just… decided to ditch the plan and make your own?”

There was something off about Sam. Even more than usual, and Dean stared at him with dread circling his stomach, knowing he needed to tread carefully here.

“Nothing about you and Lilith was a chosen plan,” Dean insisted, laughing through the discomfort of it. The noise died in his throat when he saw Sam’s eyes, their color nearly swallowed by blackened pupils. “Are you actually pissed at me right now?”

“Guys, I’m just gonna—” Chuck gestured vaguely towards the motel door. He was out and gone before Sam and Dean could even glance his way.

“Of course I’m pissed! I told you this was our chance to get the drop on Lilith so we could kill her, not scare her off to the other side of the world,” Sam heaved, arms flailing like he wanted to hit something, to wrap his hands around anyone who got too close.

“I did you a favor, Sam. This was a catalyst for you, the turning point towards a slippery fucking slope.”

“We don’t know that,” Sam argued, but his face was sweaty and his clothes were ruffled and Dean didn’t believe him. Didn’t think there was a chance in the world that something hadn’t happened with him and Lilith before Dean showed up, that Sam hadn’t been tempted by an even fresher source of demon blood.

Quietly, Dean said, “Yes, we do,” and Sam’s eyes went wide with betrayal.

“I was going to turn it around, get the upper hand on her. I wasn’t gonna make the wrong choice, Dean,” He tried to reason, suddenly sounding so young, so hurt.

“All you do is make wrong choices,” Dean said.

The change was immediate. Sam deflated as if shot, his every brick torn down, and what started as desperate honesty became insistent rage as the dominoes toppled, an empty forest catching flame.

“And you’re what? The hero? I’m the freak and you’re the hero ready to save the day, is that it?”

A tightness was building in Dean’s sternum, swelling with whitened heat. “Sammy, I—”

“Because you talk a big game about Ruby and the demon blood, about it making me a monster, but then you turn around and run off with Cas the same way. You take his grace, the same way,” Sam accused, pitching the words like he’d been preparing them for a lifetime, mulling through them in the hours between hate and grief and sneaking in the dark, and Dean could do nothing but rise to them.

Pretend they didn’t make his very soul stand on a tantalizing end.

“Our job is dicey and Cas’s grace can heal people. What is so wrong with that?” Dean tried to reason, but his words were lost to the empty air, disregarded entirely as Sam turned his back to him and stalked to the bedside table.

He pulled at the drawer with all his strength, nearly ripping the handle off in his rush to grab what lay inside; a stack of messy papers pressed hazardly together, a hefty weight in Sam’s enormous hand.

Dean hardly had any breath left at all by the time Sam was slamming the scripts down on the dining table in front of him.

“What’s wrong, is that even now, you’re still lying.”

Through a colorless haze, Dean could pick out the styled lettering, a fragment of words. Felt his chest grow cold when he saw Lazarus Rising in brightened bold, Heaven and Hell in scribbled italics. The title On the Head of a Pin was underlined so emphatically it had become a useless darkened scribble.

Realization dawned like an ink spill, splotched and all too sudden.

“Did you steal these from Chuck’s?” Dean asked, and the calm in his voice was almost scarier somehow, a tipping promise even he couldn’t quite understand.

The tone seemed to trip Sam up as well, his face going strikingly white.

“You weren’t being honest with me, Dean. You won’t let me in anymore. I don’t even know what’s going on with you half of the time, and I just— I just wanted to—”

“So you decided to read it word for word? Every fucking detail? My mind splattered on a fucking page— that’s what you decided to do?” Dean punctured his words with a slamming fist and scattered each one of those scripts to the filthy ground with a sweep of his arm, static spiking in his throat, his stance growing monstrous.

Without even realizing it, Dean had taken two deadly steps in Sam’s direction, and Sam had taken one step back, his knees hitting the bed frame.

“You care for him. And I know you think he cares for you too,” Sam said, his breath thinning, hands raising in defense.

“We’re not doing this, Sam.”

“But I saw what Pamela told you. I know why that Siren back in Iowa couldn’t get through to you. And it’s because Castiel knew that,” He pointed sharply at the cusp of Dean’s shoulder, at the shameful mark Dean kept so carefully hidden, “would be enough to keep you in line.”

“Did you read enough to know he didn’t do it on purpose? That he’s sorry?” Dean tried to barter, needing Sam’s insistence to trickle away like all their other problems, for it to be brushed off and dusted clean when they realized the trouble of hashing it wasn’t nearly worth the brief relief they’d feel afterward.

“Sorry enough to ignore you? Answer your calls only when it’s convenient for himself?” Sam outright laughed. The sound grated against Dean’s ears like sandpaper. “He’s using you, Dean. They all are. We can’t trust anyone in this, no one but each other. What Ruby’s doing, it’s getting me ready, getting me stronger, and after Lilith’s gone I’ll be done with all of it. Done with her.”

Dean didn’t think he could be burned by his own smile, and yet his eyes were stinging as he muttered, “Why don’t I believe that?”

Deep breath. Labored pause. A gathering of sorts, a collecting of thoughts, and then Sam was crouching down to the pile of scripts left scattered on the floor, brushing a steady hand over the covers before plucking one out with certainty, a sadness pulling at his lips.

Dean caught the title with great ease, and his heart tried to tear from his cage of a chest, memories of false whispers and a Siren’s song in the warm damp of a moon-bathed car scratching at the walls of his mind.

“I know how things were in the past Dean. Growing up, when things got hard, how you had to…” Sam didn’t finish, couldn’t possibly with the way Dean was looking at him— like his limbs had just been severed, his insides turning outwards with just a few words daring to graze too close. “And I never said anything. I know I wasn’t supposed to know, and I never wanted to force you to talk, but it doesn’t have to be that way anymore. You don’t have to sacrifice yourself to protect me. You don’t have to bow down to anyone.”

It wasn’t something Dean could fathom. Physically, mentally— it wasn’t possible, not for him, not ever. Dean’s past was supposed to be part of the list, the one that stayed hidden, that housed nightmares and death and guilt strong enough to drown in. They didn’t talk about Dean’s past, what he’d had to do in the hours after Sam was tucked in, during the days he’d skip school just to get a head start at the day drinkers at the nearest bar, ensuring Sam would have dinner on the table when he’d get home.

All the lies Dean had told, all the questions he’d evaded even when his ribs were bruised blue under his clothes and his face was swollen to hell— and for what? Just for Sam to learn the truth more than a decade later by reading someone else’s words? By watching what had happened between Dean and Nick unfold? And if Sam knew about Nick, knew about what Pamela had whispered, then did he know about Cas?

Did he know they—

No, Dean refused to believe it, to accept it. His life could catch and burn all it wanted, but this— his secret, his choices, his self— he was never going to give that up, to show those cards.

“You’re the one bowing, Sam,” Dean replied, ignoring Sam’s words completely. “And to a black-eyed bitch of all things.”

Dean’s only warning came in the form of dark-slitted eyes, Sam’s nerve hitting its bursting limits.

“Whoring yourself out to Heaven and the angels the second they show interest in you is not how we’re going to win, Dean.”

The words revolved like a slingshot, a knee-jerk reaction to a stinging bite, and yet Sam was the first to flinch. The anger in his fire-singed eyes flared out with a single breath, like the only light in a room suddenly bursting into shards, and he sucked in a sharp breath through his teeth.

Regret poured hot over his tongue, “Dean—”

The attempt at a fast-brewed apology didn’t even register to Dean before he was knocking the sound of his own name out of Sam’s mouth with a stone-forged fist. Then, when it did register, slow and hazy-edged, it didn’t matter, and Dean followed Sam to the ground just to tug him up by the collar, to hold him steady and certain as he landed another hit across his jaw, along his cheek, a merciless push and pull that went on and on until Dean could feel the flesh under his hand start to soften, start to bruise, start to spoil.

Blood seeped between split knuckles. Puddled around clenched teeth. There was a harsh spray of it over the motel carpet beside Sam’s motionless head when Dean finally pulled away.

“You really think you have all this under control, huh? Right as fucking rain, Sam?” Dean snarled, angrier than he could ever recall, than he could ever imagine. The tears at the back of his throat were almost the most shocking part about all of this. “Because you don’t. And it’s not. The Sam I know never would’ve—”

Any of it.

Sam wouldn’t have done any of it. He wouldn’t have said the things he said, wouldn’t have dug so deep with dirty nails and gnawing teeth, determined to hollow Dean out until he was sucking air through whistling lungs. And he wouldn’t have stolen Chuck’s scripts just to pry Dean’s head open and watch the blood run cold.

It was simple. It was certain. Dean knew. Just like he knew it was pointless to try and reach Sam when he was like this. Vibrating out of his skin, demon blood broiling behind clenched teeth. It was useless. No room for middle ground.

Dean didn’t feel like talking, anyway.

Dean snatched the car keys off the motel bar on his way out the door, blood curling over the bone of his wrist. He was eerily calm as he pulled out of the parking lot, and he’d die before calling it ‘running away’, but neither of those realities changed the way he left his brother there to bleed out into the carpet.

Dean was already three bars in and twelve drinks drunk by the time he was found.

Truthfully, he’d been looking for Sam all night. Half expecting his brother to appear in a sea of strangers just to drag him out, take him back, apologize for the beating Dean had dished out. But when Dean caught sight of a trench coat over the shoulder of a pretty blonde who had spent the last ten minutes grinding against the front of his pants, Dean made a beeline for the bathroom, accidentally shoulder checking a couple in the process.

He barely noticed the sea of beer that ended up soaked into the front of his shirt. Just stumbled into the bathroom anyway and sank into the first stall he could get his eyes to focus on, puking into a dirty bowl. The force of it made Dean’s first tears of the night fall, and once they began they never quite stopped, chest aching through lung-shaking sobs.

It wasn’t until Dean was upright and sitting back against the wall that he noticed his clothes were sticking to his skin, and he threw his jacket to the dirty bathroom floor, fumbling with his shirt. He stopped short when his fingers brushed the tenderness at his shoulder, nails tugging beneath his sleeve.

The scar was ugly. Always had been, especially when it was still fresh. But even after all these months it still pulsed like a fresh burn, itchy and pink and raw around the edges, demanding Dean’s attention.

Dean gnawed at the inside of his cheek, mind ticking. Maybe it hadn’t been an accident after all. It seemed too perfect, too coincidental that Dean’s destiny had him on a fast track to being wielded as a Sword and Cas had decided to brand him, curse him, make sure he never forgot what side he belonged to.

A cigarette ended up between the curl of Dean’s two fingers, only he had no intention of smoking it. He rolled the sleeve of his shirt up with flittering hands.

The door to the bathroom creaked open as embers burned, ash drifting to the floor. Dean paid it no mind, too entranced by the sight of fire on flesh, smoke curling around blackened skin.

“Dean,” Cas spoke. Even through the ringing, Dean could still hear the horror coating his voice. “What are you doing?”

Castiel was staring through the open stall at the scar on Dean’s shoulder, right where the cigarette was burning to no avail, its light dying out.

“Fixing your fucking mistake,” Dean said anyway, flinging the last remains into the toilet. He flushed the lever and watched his sad attempt at making a difference fissel out and drown, ash clinging to the bowl.

“Dean,” Cas said again, desperate and uncertain, clinging to the word like it was all he knew anymore. “What’s going on? Where’s Sam?”

Dean brushed his hand over the black halo on his shoulder, the slight heat trapped under the scarred skin. It disappeared with a wipe of his fingers, weak and uneventful. Just another thing Dean couldn’t fix even if he wanted to.

“Is this some sort of habit for you? Cornering me in the bathroom?” Dean gritted out, stepping out of the stall and heading straight for the bathroom sink.

He frantically washed the smoke off his hands, chest growing tighter.

“I’ve already told you. The scar is nothing but a physical echo of what’s already been done. Nothing you do to it will alter our—”

Castiel’s voice shattered beneath the clash of glass and flesh, and Dean watched through the jagged corner of the bathroom mirror as Cas took a careful step back, distancing himself from the outburst. Slowly, Dean pulled his hand back from where it had sprung, fresh blood curling his fingers, knuckles jarred to ringing atoms.

Dean looked back at the ruined mirror. His reflection bored back at him, broken and distorted and yet same same same.

“Fixed it,” He said.

The journey from the bathroom to the bar parking lot was a stumbling blur Dean would later be unable to recall. Its importance— which in itself was up for much debate— was lost to him, but reality surfaced sometime between dropping his keys in the damp gravel lot and nearly elbow checking a stranger’s side mirror, and Dean remembered the sudden cobalt blaze of a hand on his back with a clarity that should’ve belonged to a sober man.

“It’s not meant to be fixed, Dean. You can’t—” Cas winced. “The scar is removable. I’ve told you that. But the bond, the feelings… it’s not possible. It cannot be fixed.”

Dean’s vision lurched and swayed as Cas’s hand fumbled against his hip, attempting to steady him, and Dean let himself be moved without shame, a dangerous warmth kicking up in his stomach.

“That’s always the fucking problem, isn’t it? Nothing can be fixed. Things break and they’re broken you can’t— you can’t fix anything,” Dean slurred, fingers catching at the back of Cas’s coat, holding on for dear life. “Sammy dies. I fix it. I take down Yellow Eyes, and I bury the thing that killed my mom but it— it didn’t stop. It never—” His voice broke and splintered, driven to madness by the pain in his chest. Cas slowed them to a sudden stop in the middle of the parking lot, staring at Dean as he started again, “Sammy died. I fixed it. And then I died, and I broke it again, and everything won’t stop breaking—”

“You’re drunk,” Cas stated, brows pinched with concern, skin wrinkling in that stoic way Dean hated. “Dean, let me help you. I can clear your bloodstream, ease your mind—”

Two fingers rose to the cusp of Dean’s forehead, honing in like a looming weapon, and Dean twisted out of his grasp with flames licking his skin, scorching the comfort he’d been seeking so thoughtlessly.

“Don’t touch me,” Dean heaved, and the way Cas flinched in response had his hands curling into shaky fists, still trying to build his resolve even as it cracked and fell down around him. “All you’ve done since the moment you pulled me out of Hell is push me around. What Cas wants, I do. Where Cas wants to go, I go. And for what? Because you made me some mindless… some mindless bitch with a claim I have no control over? Because you keep me calm with your powers?”

It was his worst fears manifested, breathed into verbal flames, and Dean for the life of him couldn’t put a lid to it. Couldn’t stop the inevitable destruction of the things he held dear, the ones he thought precious, because even though Cas was his sail in the storm and the want in his ribs— and he loved him, god he fucking loved him— Cas was the easiest to push, and the safest to blame.

“I’m not your fucking boyfriend, Cas,” Dean cried, and that word alone was enough to burn buildings, to rip old stitches. “We’re not going steady, we’re not tailing it down the aisle. And if you think any of this would’ve happened without that bond you made, then you’re just as comatose as all the other angels.”

It came out thoughtless. It came out raw, easy as the day he started, because this had been Dean’s whole life, hadn’t it? Like the breaking, and the fixing, and the breaking all over again— it never stopped, it never healed, it never worked. Because Dean could lie as much as he wanted and smile like he felt it and fuck enough women to call it even, call it cleansing, but it wouldn’t change who he was. It wouldn’t change how living to him had just been twenty years of hiding in the dark, and that now, the urge to tear himself open was too strong to coast across.

“Why are you saying this?” Cas asked, his voice too gentle to even break wind, eyes soft and bluer than Dean’s ever seen them, shining like surface glass.

Dean had to ignore the clench in his gut just to ask, “What? Are your feelings getting hurt?”

Cas’s lips thinned. “No.”

“Then what’s the fucking problem?”

“I thought we agreed not to lie to each other.”

Revelation, denial, pretend. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. This was the method, the long-lasting truth, and Dean could do it again. He could block it out like his childhood and ignore it like the rest of his life and be good, content even. Because Dean didn’t feel those things. He didn’t think that way. He didn’t love that way. Just like he didn’t hate the life, or miss his Mom, or think about jumping ship every morning when he remembered the weight of his own skin.

He could do this. Dean could give this up. He could ruin this completely.

“Is that right?” Dean asked, preparing to jump with a mouth full of cotton, his mind spinning like a dial. “Well, then listen to what I’m about to tell you, and listen good. I don’t want anything to do with you,” Dean’s voice trembled dangerously, too honest, too close— but Cas was already swaying as if pushed, distracted by instant pain, and Dean could feel the waking destruction as it bubbled over his tongue. “I don’t want your promises, or your favors, or your powers. I don’t even want you as a warm mouth. You’ve done nothing but fuck everything up and I need you gone. I need you to go.”

And it occurred to Dean in an instant, like a shock to the pounding heart, that he used to beg for times like this. Times where Cas would break free of the mold, of the Heavenly bars holding him hostage, and feel with the same intensity it took to hoist armies and pull souls from the aching beneath. That he used to yearn for words spoken without double meanings, trust that wasn’t layered with doubt, and the faith it would take to look Cas’s way and know that asking for his hand wouldn’t send the forces of Heaven and Hell plowing straight to his front door.

But Dean wasn’t sure what to do now that he had it. Now that he’d pushed Cas to outright tears, cheeks stained red in the darkened cold as he stared at Dean, lips cracked and parted amidst an unspoken collapse.

Everything Dean had wanted to do in the moments he thought about it, ached for it, in the moments he cracked— they were impossible now. Separate realities entirely, and just the thought of them existing forced Dean’s legs to move through what felt like sheets of searing metal, feet dragging through clawing terrain, eyes snapping between rows of blurring cars.

The sight of the Impala parked haphazardly beneath a streetlight made Dean practically keel over, and he blindly fished for the keys in his jacket.

The steps behind him were slow but certain.

“I’m not going anywhere, Dean.”

He spoke with deadbolt conviction, an immobile standing. The same pitch and throw Dean had heard since he’d awoken in that casket, since he blew apart that gas station, since he caught Cas in the moonlit halo of Bobby’s kitchen to tell him all the reasons he failed, the reasons he needed to do better.

This was the Cas that was unwavering. Lock jawed but wet eyed, ruptured and trembling. The Cas that held the fondness he tried to stamp out in the very shape of his war-fledged palms, and Dean wanted to look at him, wanted to steal this version of Cas and keep him somewhere safe, somewhere he’d never leave, but there was a dial spinning loose in Dean’s ticking chest, an ever pressing heat, and it seemed to have no desire to falter— not even for the Cas that dared to look in love.

The light overhead began to flicker at Dean’s approach, an electrical buzzing beneath a sudden whip of freezing wind.

Dread flooded Dean’s stomach, rolling over like vicious snakes.

“Cas,” He said, and it shot out like a warning, like a gun going off between them. “You don’t fucking understand, I’m— you have to. You have to leave, please.”

There was something inside of Dean. Inside and all over, spread back to his molars, engraved on his kidneys, sheathed into his stomach lining. A visceral weight like an oncoming headache, only doubled and enlarged ten times over, ten times wider, expanding in Dean to the point where he felt he might burst.

And it was only getting worse.

Each second he stood there in the breaking calm, each minute he allowed to pass with Cas still in his sights, still reminding him of the Hell he’d walked and the love he desired and how Sam, fucked up as he was, had discovered all of this despite Dean’s lifetime long commitment to keeping his head turned.

Whatever this was, whatever he was becoming— it was the type of out of body pain Dean hadn’t felt since Hell. The kind of agony that couldn’t even be confined, that pushed out and blew inwards and scraped at you until you felt like you needed to peel your own skin up just to find relief.

It was like dying. In that moment, Dean thought he was dying.

“Dean,” Cas said, hurt replaced with eerie weariness, his brow held low. He took another step towards Dean, and Dean felt it pulse as if something was living in the dirt beneath his shoes, trying to get to him, to pull him back under.

Dean’s next words barely passed the walls of his throat, “I don’t know what this is. I don’t— please. I can’t, I can’t—”

“Dean,” Cas insisted, looking close to tears again. “Let me—”

“Just go!”

The hand Dean threw out into the open air was intentional, an attempt at putting a barrier between them. A last ditch effort. What wasn’t intentional, was the burst of steel blue light that erupted from his palm and out through his fingers, shimmering daggers glaring sharp as they pierced through the night and shot Dean’s vision.

The world collapsed at once.

The sound of glass shattering rose and descended like a deafening wave, blowing out Dean’s eardrums, scraping at the back of his neck. Far away and half-focused, Dean could hear the shrill of car alarms shouting over each other, dozens of them, a parking lot full. Someone was running nearby, quick feet on loose gravel. The unmistakable beginnings of a woman crying started up in the distance, buried beneath static and chaos, yelling and panic.

Dean could see very little. His sight split apart by a drowning of power, of unfathomable light, but he could feel the disruption. The way the core of the Earth seemed to tremble in agony and the balance of the world fell painfully off center.

And beneath all of it, the roaring of angel grace singing hot in Dean’s blood, was the fear mangled sound of Cas screaming.

Chapter Text

The basement of the Hawthorn residence was the kind of restless, dust bearing chamber Dean had seen in one too many movies throughout his life. Something dark and lifeless lurking within its corners, hiding amidst the wooden trinkets and family heirlooms.

“You be careful down there, dear. I haven’t cleaned in… goodness, I don’t even know how long,” Dean peered up through the stairwell to give Miss Hawthorn a darling smile, waving his flashlight confidently.

“I’ll be alright, ma’am.”

“There should be a few newspaper clippings somewhere in those piles,” She continued, her wiry voice carrying lightly from the top step, spilling out over the shadowed room. “Those outta be perfect for that school paper of yours, don’t you think?”

“More than perfect,” Dean lied, and he gave a light hearted thumbs up before dipping into the darkness once again, sidestepping a mystery puddle that had settled around a collection of dewy boxes.

Truth was, Dean had about five minutes to find whatever objects the two local ghosts were harnessing themselves to before the nice woman upstairs realized Dean wasn’t exactly here under polite notions. For all she knew, Dean was a shy kid with a clean nose who even at his age had an interest in the Hawthorns’ famous teaspoon collection. There was only so much Dean could say under the cover of having to write a school essay, but the topic of local artifacts was just broad enough to get him by, and his charisma would do the rest.

Miss Hawthorn had been a close friend of the two deceased women haunting the waking world, appearing in multiple photographs of the sisterhood at St. Stephen's Mission Church. She was the closest link Dean could find to both women that was still alive. If this angle turned out to be a bust, Dean wasn’t sure what he’d do.

He would have to call Dad.

A restlessness settled over Dean like a wet tarp, thick and peeling, heavy as anything. There was an added sort of pressure to his lungs as he started rifling through the storage boxes in the basement. Most of them were filled with nothing but clothes and newspapers and old kitchen appliances, and Dean slid past them with a collection of hushed curses, feeling an invisible clock ticking away in his ears.

Dean was better than this. Dean was taught to be better than this. Better than failing his very first solo hunt by overlooking something, or screwing up his research, or asking his dad for help. This hunt was a mission, a test thirteen years in the making.

Dean had been training for this his whole life. He wasn’t leaving here until something got salted and burned.

“Are you having trouble finding those papers, honey?”

In the dark corner of the basement, hidden beneath an overcast shadow by the staircase, was a locked trunk big enough to reach Dean’s hip.

“No, I uh— I’m good! There’s just so much cool stuff down here. You must be awfully proud,” Dean cranked up the smile in his voice until he was practically aching with it, hands fumbling for the lock pick in his jacket.

“Oh, well, certainly,” The woman beamed back. Dean could barely focus over the sensation of sweat pooling at his scalp, teeth gritted. The lock was concerningly old, completely rusted shut, and the sound of metal on metal as he worked was starting to travel. “It’s no trouble, though. I can come down there. It really is quite a mess—”

The moment the lock popped open and fell to the floor with a loud clatter was the same moment Dean shouted, “no!” with a panicked voice.

It was silent for a long, painful few seconds.

“No?” She asked, confused.

“I mean…” Dean fumbled, hands shaking as he opened the trunk as quietly as possible, propping the lid against the wall. “No as in, no, don’t come down here. You’ve— you’ve already done so much for me, and it’s uh, nothing to risk breaking a hip over, right?”

“Breaking a— why, you’re just being a little smart ass now, aren’t you?” She was already making her descent before she could even get the words out, steps creaking as she grew closer, and Dean grabbed the first object he laid eyes on— a silver ring with a simple gem and an engraving on the inside.

The words read my beloved, and Dean’s panic cleared like a wave of clouds, that sudden clarity that always surfaced on a hunt coming out like a welcoming sun.

Dean had already closed the trunk and pressed the lock back in place by the time Miss Hawthorn reached the bottom of the stairs and stepped into the clearing. At just the sight of her, the smile he plastered on was sickeningly sweet.

“Woah, check this out,” He stepped under one of the few light bulbs guiding them in the dark, holding the ring out. He made a real show of moving around the boxes where he most definitely found it. “What’s the story on this?”

The woman’s welcoming stature had all but crumbled since she appeared, eyes wide as she realized what Dean was holding. “Where did you—”

“This is great, Miss Hawthorn. My teacher said we’d get extra credit if we managed to bring in actual artifacts. Do you think I could—”

“No. Absolutely not. That’s not— you can’t just—” She stammered and huffed, breaths coming short, and for a moment Dean wondered if up and running out of the house with the ring would be enough to send an eighty year old woman into cardiac arrest. He didn’t consider it for long. “That ring belongs to me now. A family heirloom. It’s not for taking.”

“Right. Sorry, ma’am. My mistake,” Dean winced. He glanced awkwardly at the silver band still in his hand. It seemed familiar to Dean, almost like he recognized it. “If you don’t mind me asking, uh, who did the ring belong to?”

Dean was on shaky ground now, to say the least. Miss Hawthorn was looking at him with completely unveiled shock, no longer trusting. She even looked a little hurt; as though Dean had managed to make an impression in a matter of minutes and a handful of words that was good, and genuine, and appeared to be lasting.

Guilt slithered up Dean’s spine, and he urged it away with a shake of his head, jaw clicking as he swallowed. Lying was just part of the job. Something he’d have to get used to.

“My sister,” She finally answered, rather unhappily. “One belonged to my sister and the other…” Her eyes wandered away from Dean, suddenly distant, unfocused. “Her friend. Best friend. We were all in the sisterhood together. Inseparable, those two.”

“There was another ring? A pair?”

Without another word, Miss Hawthorn reached into the collar of her white knitted cardigan, and revealed the necklace she had tucked underneath, pulling it to rest at the center of her chest. And there, hanging off a matching silver chain, was an identical ring to the one in Dean’s hand.

“The two of them were killed in an accident. A fire. But the rings were salvaged,” She continued, even without Dean’s insistence. She sniffled under her breath. “I came down here and found my sister's ring a few weeks ago. Thought to make it into a necklace.”

It struck Dean suddenly, violently, like the first taste of fresh air. And he stared at the woman as if he were seeing her for the first time, seeing everything for the first time. This was it, wasn’t it? The thrill of the hunt, the peak of the case when the jagged edges of a mystery start to merge seamlessly, as if they had always looked as though they belonged together.

Miss Hawthorn wasn’t just a family friend of one of the deceased women. She was the sister. A blood bond strong enough to last, to raise old wounds and evil spirits. It had been fifty years since the fire in the church, and she had been reunited with her sister's ring just weeks before. Right when the killings started.

My beloved.

Dean’s heart twisted in his chest, sharp and without warning. This wasn’t going to be an easy conversation.

“Right. Uh, weird question. Is Hawthorn your married name?”

The woman stared at him. “Yes.”

Dread pounded a laugh straight out of Dean’s throat, the sound of it tight and mangled as he said, “Of course it is.”

“Excuse me?”

“Nothing. Look, ma’am, this— uh, this isn’t going to be easy to hear,” Dean said, and couldn’t believe how big of an understatement it really was.

Because how, exactly, do you tell someone their sister is back from the dead and killing people left and right? How do you tell someone that this might all be happening because their sister liked women, and the world didn’t agree with it?

“I believe your sister's spirit is haunting the women that killed her,” Dean said, and the room fell silent.

The frigid cold of the basement was something Dean became aware of all of a sudden. Once the adrenaline settled, and the truth was out, even his dad’s burly leather jacket couldn’t hide him from the winds of Wyoming. Dean could hear the air whistling just outside, tapping against the windows, shaking the naked trees.

A train screamed in the distance.

“Get out of my house,” Miss Hawthorn finally gritted.

Dean stiffened. “Ma’am—”

“Don’t you start now. You come into my home, you lie about your intentions, only to throw ridiculous accusations around as if—”

“Marion Hughes and Daisy Brown,” Dean exclaimed, shouting over her voice and clipping it in the process. It was all she needed to hear to fall deathly still. Her eyes grew wet with tears. “They were killed in 1934 when their church mysteriously caught fire with them inside it. The people responsible were never convicted, never caught. When investigated by the police, hardly anyone was even questioned.”

She shook her head, mouth pinched. “How did you…”

“That fire was no accident, Miss Hawthorn. Four of the five people who set fire to that church, who killed your sister, have turned up dead within the week. Women from your old convent,” Dean rolled the ring in his palm, pressing it to his thumb and pointer finger. He held it up like a sign. “And I think you know why.”

“Are you suggesting I have something to do with those deaths?” She croaked, clutching at her skirt like she wanted to run, wanted to tuck all those years away again. “Those women were my friends, my sworn sisters. Whether we stayed in touch over the years doesn’t matter. And you’re just a child, you— you couldn't possibly understand what happened that night.”

“Marion and Daisy were more than just friends, weren’t they?” Dean questioned, dropping the news like it hurt just to hold. That if he didn’t say it now it would fester and burn a hole straight through his throat. The woman just balked at him, silently horrified. “These women didn’t just die, Miss Hawthorn. They were killed in their homes. Burned to death in ways not even God could think up. You gotta realize that’s more than just… holy penance.”

Silent acceptance encased her weathered features, lips pinching with a subtle nod. She closed her eyes for a grief filled moment.

“It was so hard back then,” Miss Hawthorn whispered. “The world was just impossible. Cold and intolerable. And when I realized Marion was… well…” She smiled weakly, eyes folding with wrinkles. “It didn’t matter all that much to me. I was the younger sister. I’d followed her into the sisterhood and I would’ve followed her through war if I had to. Marion being homosexual didn’t come with much issue until Daisy came into the picture.”

“They met in the church?”

“They fell in love in the church,” She astonished, voice cracking with passion and remembrance. “The purest love I think I’d— still, to this day. I’ve never seen anything like it. They managed to keep it a secret for a while. I was the only soul who knew. But something like that, something so special it— it was only a matter of time before people caught on. Before the rest of the convent realized what they were to each other,” Her mouth brimmed with sudden anger, lips trembling. “And they disguised their hatred under the guise of God’s name the way so many people do, and I hate them. They took my sister and I hate them for it.”

The woman had fallen into outright hysterics, years of keeping silent rolling into a thundering burst, and Dean was leaning down to envelope her in a hug before he even realized, instinct thrumming from his very bones. She accepted his warmth gradually, sinking into Dean’s arms with a muted cry, and it was there, swaying in the basement of a stranger’s house that Dean was reminded of his mother, as he so often was.

Was reminded of cold winters and hushed phone calls and hugging his mother’s legs in a weak attempt to calm her after an argument had blown his father straight out of the house like a gust of wind. Nurturing was a part of Dean’s framework. It was a softness within him that stayed no matter how much the world tried to beat it out, and it was getting harder to ignore the longer he tried to do this, to play the part his Dad wanted him to perfect.

Dean imagined what it would be like if John were there, now. What he would do if a witness burst into tears in front of him.

Dean’s grip on the woman loosened.

“Did you know unboxing the rings would start all this?” He asked, sounding calm despite the anxiety batting in his sternum.

“Not at all,” The woman gasped, finally pulling away to wipe her eyes. Dean fought the urge to straighten his jacket self consciously. “But it wasn’t long before I realized what was happening. Before I knew Marion and Daisy had come back angry. Had come back vengeful.”

It meant something twisted and wrong that Dean’s first inkling wasn’t to blame her. It wasn’t to poke and prod and ask her why, and how could she, and don’t you feel ashamed of yourself? Dean knew it wasn’t right. Four women were dead. Their bodies scorched beyond anything worth their families burying, and yet Dean had no desire to take out the metaphorical cuffs.

Why?

Dad would be laughing. Dad would be screaming. Dad would be telling her she was a cold-blooded witness to murder and if it weren’t for his job, his duty to kill the monsters, he’d wish that she was next.

“And you didn’t want it to stop. You wanted those women to die,” Dean said slowly, not a question but a statement, wondering if the words rolling in his mouth were even his anymore. “To pay for what they did.”

Miss Hawthorn couldn’t answer. But Dean didn’t need her to. He was weak in his convincing to take the necklace, and she was weak in allowing it. He’d set things right, he told her. Return balance to nature. But nothing Dean said seemed to make it easier, and the woman passed the necklace over as if she were signing away her life, hands trembling something awful.

There was a hitch in Dean’s throat as he pocketed the necklace. A burning at his center that lingered, delicate and peeling, needing to be cared for but dangerous to touch, and Dean didn’t dare try. Not now. Not ever.

“Your sister was lucky to have you, Miss Hawthorn,” Dean told her, already halfway down the front porch when the words were punched out of him, thrown selfishly into the void between them.

Dean was crying by the time he got back in the Impala.

He didn’t know where he was going exactly, only that he had to leave, had to get the hell out of there before he broke down and told some widow about the part of him he shoved in boxes and closets and paper thin rooms with razor sharp edges.

Before he thought too hard about the hunt his dad had hand picked and tossed into Dean’s lap like an ultimatum, a silent testing of will.

When Dean arrived at the other side of town, all that remained of St. Stephen's Mission Church were four charred pillars buried deep in roots, and a water well full of wasted dirt. It was there that Dean set fire to both rings, and watched the spirits of Marion Hughes and Daisy Brown appear before him with a shriek of terror, eyes wide and grief filled, their figures catching flame for the second time in their misunderstood lives.

“I’m sorry,” Dean said, meaning those words more than he thought he’d ever had before, voice breaking with it.

He wasn’t sure they heard him.

There was something about hauling Cas’s limp body from a bed of bloody gravel to the Impala’s backseat that Dean knew would alter him irrevocably.

“Cas? Can you hear me?” He shouted, risking a backwards glance even while throwing the car into drive and spinning out onto the road. The sight of red and blue lights in the distance, heading straight for the crumbling bar, turned bile in Dean’s stomach. “Cas! Open your fucking eyes, damn it— say something, please.”

Dean could barely hear his own voice over the blast of wind flooding in from the broken windows, the entire car littered with glass. He’d had to sweep as much out of the driver's seat as he could before taking off, but the haste had only earned him a bloody hand and a prickly seat, nothing remotely about Dean’s life going right tonight.

His hand fumbled for his jacket pocket, looking to find his phone, when suddenly he stopped. Dean stared through the rear view mirror, just barely catching a glimpse of dark hair and a tattered coat. There was blood staining the collar. Dean dropped his hand.

Calling Sam wasn’t in the cards here. After everything that happened, the fight, the blood, the argument over Cas— the last thing Dean wanted was to show up at Sam’s door with a wounded Cas hanging off his shoulder. Not even Bobby was a valuable option at this point. Whether their opinions of Cas were appreciated or not, Dean’s ears were ringing, his blood felt like bottled pressure in the cage of his veins, and just the thought of trying to explain what happened— what the hell he was made Dean want to pull over and throw up across the interstate.

He needed to figure this out on his own. Get some answers. Because finding out you’re Michael’s prom date was one thing. Discovering you’re capable of leveling an entire bar without so much as a coherent thought was something else entirely.

The broken watch, Dean remembered suddenly, gasping for breath. My reflection in the Impala.

Dean had thought it was a fluke. A mistaken glare in the window, some remnants of Cas’s power flickering away. But it had just been him; it was all Dean.

Dean’s eyes found their way back to the rear view, wide and terrified, looking for answers where there wasn’t any. This would be about the time he’d call Cas for help. Ask him for comfort or reassurance or a fucking light in the dark. Now, all Dean had was a body, and fresh blood, and a good chance that he’d killed the one good thing in his miserable life.

Dean didn’t cry. He didn’t. That wasn’t something he could afford right now. And so he spent the next hour and a half with his foot pressing the pedal to the floor board, knuckles driving sharp into his eyes when he felt himself beginning to slip, tears pricking at his water line.

It had been a long time since Dean was completely thrown into the wind, tossed to the howling wolves. At least when Sam was at Stanford, Dean had spent a considerable amount of time chasing cases his dad sent his way, giving him a line to trace even if he couldn’t always see the ending hook. That was when John decided to answer the phone, though. When he’d get around to calling Dean back after keeping an eye on Sam at school or leaving another town with a trail of bodies in his wake.

It hadn’t been all bad. Not necessarily. But this— the sudden storm forcing his hands on the wheel, the uncertainty of every mile, every step, just the idea of safety feeling like some distant pipe dream— it was like being a kid again, like stepping on too many toes and picking too many sides and getting kicked out into the cold on some nameless Thursday afternoon his dad would never remember but Dean would never forget.

There were plenty of hardships in Dean’s life he’d had to mull through. Moments where he was purely wading water, trying to keep afloat, knowing nothing but that he had to keep breathing. But this was different somehow. An entirely different beast; cosmic and Apocalyptic, something that would change Dean’s life forever, a permanent slot in time that would signify a Before and an After.

That being said, Dean’s predicament had him skirting Ohio, and after a lifetime of running, he had a Code Red for just about every state. The roadside sign for I-71 flashed in Dean’s headlights, and he booked it North, trying to remember the location of one of the safe house’s Pastor Jim had owned.

He’d never been a very involved hunter, not in the way John and Bobby were. But Jim knew his monsters and he knew his lore, and his faith had been what steered him through the life with a grace of compassion, worrying for those who didn’t worry enough about themselves; it was no wonder he took such an interest in the Winchester boys.

It wasn’t until Dean was finally pulling into the little notch of land, wheels spinning in fresh morning mud, that Cas started to stir in the backseat. And the relief that rose in Dean rattled straight through him, forcing him out of the car and into the nipping air where he opened the back door with a violent screech of hinges.

“Oh, God—” Dean whimpered, and watched as Cas’s lashes fluttered, and his chest dipped, and it hit Dean like a molten weight that he’d fully been expecting to find a dead angel in his backseat. A bloody smear where he’d laid his best friend across worn leather seats. “I thought you were— I thought I—”

“S’ not— you. Don’t— be—” Cas’s throat worked beneath shadowed skin, swallowing through a wall of blood and phlegm. He paused, blinking up at Dean’s upside down figure, struggling, and after a moment finally gritted out, “Not your fault.”

“The hell it isn’t,” Dean scoffed. He crouched into the opening of the door, one hand propped on the handle. His other hand hesitated for just a moment, and then he was sliding cold fingers into blood-caked hair, thumbing at the spot just below Cas’s ear. Dean’s heartbeat lived in his throat. “I lied. I lied about all of it— you have to know that. I need you to know that, Cas.”

The panicking could wait. The second guessing, the inevitable pivoting— Dean couldn’t bear to lie anymore today. Couldn’t stomach not saying something true for once.

“I know,” Cas told him, like it was simple, like knowing Dean down to the last minute detail was something easy, and Dean eyed the way Cas’s hand seemed to fold over his own heart, cupping the weakness in his blood splotched chest.

Dean’s voice was nothing but shredded gravel as he asked, “Can you walk?”

The answer was no, offered begrudgingly, and Dean didn’t waste a second in fumbling Cas’s burly silhouette— trash bag coat and all— into the fold of his arms and up the two flights of stairs leading to the top of the hill. There, he hesitated in the alleyway between the two buildings, squinting high into the sky at the humble church that towered above him, all crisp white paneling and stained glass windows arched into delicate shapes, a cross built to the highest point on the rising roof.

Dean’s feet led him to the building opposite the church before he could think too hard about the irony of the day. The clergy house sitting adjacent to the church wasn’t as well kept as its neighboring establishment, but the windows weren’t stained, the roof was painted a mint green, and there was a dingy couch with just enough length for a grown man in the corner of the living room when Dean walked inside without so much as a lock bolting the door.

He made a beeline for the couch before Cas could even grumble against his shoulder, and Dean propped Cas up with a sudden bout of exhaustion, the adrenaline he’d been funneling since leaving the motel making a slow descent, sinking to the soles of his feet.

Cas put up somewhat of a fight when Dean started peeling his coat and suit jacket off. But he eventually settled with a deep sigh and a pinched mouth, grunting appreciatively when Dean folded them up to stuff under Cas’s head as a makeshift pillow.

Dean gave him little more than a minute before he was dragging in a chair from the kitchen table and arranging himself at Cas’s side. The voice in Dean’s head stayed dutifully silent as he started thumbing at the first button of Cas’s dress shirt.

Dean could feel Cas’s eyes on him. Hooded but alert, watching Dean’s hands with rapt attention. Dean half expected Cas to try and stop him; to tell him this wasn’t allowed now, this wasn’t right. That the sun was rising, and the curtains were open, and this was something they had only ever been granted in the quick and dark. But Cas’s mouth stayed closed, and his eyes traced Dean wordlessly, lingering on the workings of his fingers as he unveiled the mistakes of the night.

It wasn’t until Dean’s hands skirted upward, prodding at the singed black strip of melted skin across Cas’s ribs that Castiel pulled back with a startled gasp, a shout dying in his throat.

“Dean…” His fingers circled Dean’s wrist with a vice-like hold, a shake rumbling through him, and Dean practically froze, horrified.

He’d heard Cas say his name in so many ways he wanted to remember, wanted to save like snapshots tucked between fragile pages, but this wasn’t one of them. This was one he’d like to forget; Cas’s voice without enough breath, barely enough sound to recognize, like an image with the saturation dialed down. Like his voice was the tail end of an echo, and no one was sure whether the message would make its way back home.

“I know,” Dean grimaced, and by comparison his voice felt huge, muddy and far too miserable to be filling such a silence. “I know, sweetheart, hang on. Just let me look at you.”

“S’ just a scratch,” Cas deadpanned, trying for a smile, but all the attempt did was kick start a coughing fit, and in the end it was Dean who had to wipe fresh blood off of cracked lips.

“You idiot. I told you to leave it alone.”

Whether it was because of the blood loss, the absurdity of their situation, or something else entirely, Cas seemed adamant on ignoring Dean’s concern, much more avid on expressing his own; a hand curved up to touch Dean’s cheek, forcing their eyes to meet and stay there, interlocked and ever pressing.

“Are you alright?” Cas asked. The sheer selflessness of it nearly struck Dean immobile.

“Apart from the apparent angel nuke riding around in my chest, yeah. I’m golden, Cas.”

“I know you’re scared, Dean. I wish I could tell you more about what happened, but truthfully, I’ve never seen anything like it,” Castiel blinked through the mental stupor, frowning in that way that made him look centuries old. Almost as if he’d traveled the world and memorized the sorrow of the universe, transcribing it into a single look for Dean and Dean only.

The smile that came next, soft and gum lined, was tinged with the oddest warmth of astonishment, “You just keep exceeding my expectations.”

“Does this mean I’m like you?” Dean huffed, trying to squash the part of him that felt almost pleased by the notion. “Am I some dormant angel? The next cosmic Anna?”

“No. No it’s—” Cas dropped his hand and shook his head, wincing through the movement. “It’s more than that. You’re more than that.”

“Fantastic. Maybe I’ll start being useful for once.”

He had used powers. He had powers. Electric like an angel, eruptive like a villain, and that bar— those people, had been caught in the crossfire. Dean wondered how many deaths he’d just added to an ever growing list. He thought about how most of the nuclear action powered by angels ended with bodies too scorched to even be recognized by family members.

“Dean,” Cas scolded, unhappy with the way Dean’s mind had a tendency to contort itself, inevitably pointing a finger inward, but Dean had practice with this.

He could make good out of a bad situation. Turn shit into buttery gold. And discovering he had cosmic power buried beneath useless, pain battered, human skin, was just compelling enough to keep Dean tethered to the world, not yet lost to the guilt of what it meant to be the taker of innocent lives.

“If I can do that, waste a whole fucking building I— do you think I can heal you?” Dean asked, staring at Cas open mouthed, leaning even closer. “I mean, do you think I could—”

Dean was already placing both hands over the dip of Cas’s abdomen, breath bated and eyes wide, focusing on the cold patch of skin. Cas didn’t even try for an answer. He just stared at Dean with parted lips, curious and eager, arching into Dean’s hopeful touch.

Now, Dean didn’t have the first clue how angel mojo worked, let alone something as delicate as healing, but he imagined the process of it, the heat that flooded his tongue every time Cas patched him up and seared him numb.

He envisioned light sealing skin. A halo plugging up blood. Wings urging air back into motionless lungs. But that feeling— the burning weight, the tightness in his racehorse chest— didn't come back, and Dean’s hands held no signs of power, no inkling of light.

The morning sun finally broke over the distant horizon, rising above the tree line, and the wooden walls of the clergy house groaned through the silence like a living, breathing animal.

“Fuck,” Dean pulled away abruptly, removing his shaking hands. He was biting back tears suddenly, the same ones that had been chasing him down the empty highway. “I can’t. I can't do it.”

“It’s okay,” Cas reassured. “I should heal on my own, it’ll just take time. I think you— I think you damaged my grace.”

Dean’s voice cracked, “Cas—”

“Where are we?”

The apology was brushed aside with a heavy swallow, and Dean could hear the underlying question, the real meaning in Cas’s frantic words.

Are we safe here?

“Uh, not to sound like the butt end of a bad joke, but I took you to a church,” Dean grinned, small and crooked, hurt but trying for something more. “An old hunting buddy of ours from when Sam and I were kids was a pastor. He had safe houses for hunters strewn across the country. From churches to cabins to dingy storm shelters. This place was the closest one I could remember.”

“Good. That’s good,” Cas said after a long pause. “I’ll… just… send a message to Heaven. A lie. They can’t know I was with you, what happened, what you did—”

“I got it, Cas. Low profile. Same old same old,” Dean muttered. He looked around the room at the modest set up, just a simple living area with a corner kitchenette, a door towards the back hall leading to what Dean could only assume was a bathroom. A cramped staircase was built into a spindle in one of the corners. “I’m sure there’s some angel warding I can find and throw up. It’ll at least slow the bastards down.”

“No,” Cas shook his head, almost frightful. “That’ll just interfere with my healing. It’ll take me longer to recover.”

“Cas, we can’t just go dark without taking some precautions. The angels will track your ass in a matter of hours if we don’t cover this place in sigils.”

There was a great deal of fear showing on Cas’s face, then. A look Dean had never quite seen on him before, but it was quickly brushed aside, Cas’s frowning lines smoothing into distant streaks.

“Fine. Yes, okay.”

“Okay,” Dean repeated back, a little more exuberant. “Now, first things first. I gotta go get my shit out of Baby and hide her from the main road as best I can. While I’m doing that, you gotta promise you’re not gonna blast yourself to a different part of the world.”

“I don’t even think that would be possible in my current state,” Dean glowered at him, not appreciating the sentiment. Cas recovered quickly, clearing his throat, “I promise, Dean.”

“Great. I’ll hold you to that,” Dean was already shuffling back towards the door, folding up the collar of his jacket to prepare for the cold. He would have to build a fire soon. He wondered how tall of a flame he could get away with before the chimney smoke would show from the highway. “If you need me I’ll be just outside. A good yell will probably get me to come running.”

Castiel didn’t respond to that particular attempt at reassurance, and Dean tried not to feel too much like shit as he left the silence with an awkward squeak of his boot. This was fine; kosher, even, given that Hell was Dean’s threshold, and being confined to a safe house with Cas for an undisclosed amount of time was only slightly less terrifying.

When Dean got back to the car, seeing it for the first time since his blood had stopped curdling, he nearly dropped to his knees right there in the dirt. He opened the driver's side door with a curse, hands clambering for the leather of the seat like he could wipe the damage away with sheer will.

Every window was shattered. There was glass stuck in the ash trays. On his way out of the bar parking lot Dean had clipped the curb going fifty or more, and the back left tire was punctured and leaking, shifting the alignment. If Dean didn’t fix that soon, the suspension could take some damage, and driving on it— exactly what he needed to do— would only make it worse.

Fuck.

Dean set the gear to drive and started a tedious crawl up the road, grimacing and muttering apologies through the entire ordeal. He ended up hiding the Impala in the tree line behind the church, and tasked himself with covering the shine of her with half broken branches and falling brush, masking her into the Earth.

Then, Dean snuck his way to the trunk and filled his arms with weapons and spray paint before tailing it back to the clergy house.

When he arrived inside, Cas was curled into a half formed ball on the dust flattened couch, so deep in sleep that he didn’t even stir when Dean’s footfall on the aged hardwood upended a loud creek. Dean froze there in the doorway, staring with stilted breath as it occurred to him, in a muted sort of whisper, that angels didn’t need to sleep.

He pushed the thought away with an aching chest.

Castiel didn’t wake up until thirty six hours later.

After the first morning, when Dean realized with a growling stomach that Cas could very well stay horizontal for the unforeseeable future, he left a loaded gun on the side table beside Cas’s head, a half incoherent note scribbled onto a paper plate, and booked it to the nearest convenience store with anxiety doing kickflips in his stomach.

He didn’t like the thought of leaving Cas alone, nothing but painted sigils on peeling walls protecting him, but Dean hadn’t exactly gone to the bar with a packed arsenal in his trunk. He had nothing but weapons with him, which meant loading up on food, gear, and all the necessities one might need when hiding a runaway angel from the scope of Heaven’s wrath.

Simple enough.

The place Dean found was no Gas N’ Sip, but it had a bin full of cheap tees by the door, a decent stock of white bread, and even some of those little chicken taquitos rolling on the grill. Dean rounded the aisles on a mission, fetching peanut butter and ramen and a six pack before honing in on the clothes, wondering if Cas had a preference between black or blue boxers.

He stood there in contemplation for an embarrassing few moments before picking the blue and calling it a day. Dean’s arms were full by the time he reached the counter, and he smiled at the young man behind the register.

“You got all the essentials, huh?” The kid joked lightly, already beginning to scan the items and bag them neatly.

“You could say that,” Dean hummed, mouth ticking upwards. “Oh, and I’ll need some smokes too.”

Dean grabbed for his wallet as the cashier read him his total, and his gaze jumped to the tiny box tv crammed into the corner of the wall behind the kid, its connection cords just barely reaching the outlet. The sound was muted, the bad connection fizzing the screen out around the corners, but Dean could still see the news outlet, clear as day:

MYSTERIOUS EXPLOSION IN OHIO BAR KILLS SIX AND INJURES DOZENS.

It shouldn’t surprise him, really. Not in the way that it did. But sometimes reality was worse than the horrors you could imagine, and Dean’s mind sparked with instant numbness, stomach wringing in agony. His wallet slipped from his senseless hands, hitting the tiled floor.

“You alright?” The kid asked, frowning.

“Just—” Dean crouched down to retrieve his wallet. His vision shook and blurred as he stood back up. “Fine. S’ nothing.”

The building was destroyed beyond belief. Singed to the very floorboards. Dean could barely recognize what was left of the neon Open sign that had been hanging by the entryway. The news camera panned along as police crawled through the wreckage, and Dean watched as black tarped gurneys were dragged into ambulances one by one, sirens blaring as they drove off.

Dean didn’t bother to look as he fished out a wad of cash from his wallet. He just dropped it on the counter, grabbed his bags, and walked out with a muttered, “keep the change” that had the kid ogling him as he left. Outside, Dean stumbled over to the 25 cent air pump stashed behind the station's road sign and threw up what little was left in his stomach until he was heaving into the grass.

He tore back out onto the road not a second later.

When Dean arrived back at the church, Cas was still asleep, Dean’s gun and note left undisturbed. Dean’s sigh carried through the corridors, uplifting years of aged dust. He had half a mind to start cooking lunch, maybe the smell of bacon would lure even an angel from the depths of a pain induced coma, but he quickly pivoted when he picked up the sound of Cas’s dry breaths in the silence, the pace of it all wrong.

Dean retook his spot on the chair at Cas’s side and pressed two fingers to the hollow of his throat, leaning close. His pulse was fast, skin warm, and a thin line of sweat was beginning to break out in his forehead, prickling at his hairline.

“Okay, buddy. You’re okay,” Dean said mindlessly. He worked fast at taking his jacket off and laying it across Cas’s legs, wanting it close for when the shivers set in. “Bet you never thought you’d deal with a fever, huh, Cas? Look at you now.”

Restless or not, Cas’s eyes stayed closed, sick to the point of unconsciousness, a state of delirium, and Dean moved on to cleaning anything he could reach, bandaging even the smallest wounds. Most of the bleeding had stopped already, crusting into darkened lines on pale white skin, but Dean didn’t care. He covered anything remotely pain inspiring, anything that looked like his fault.

He ran out of bandaging tape before he could inspect any further than Cas’s torso. Dean’s ears burned with silent relief.

Cas’s vessel had taken damage as though Dean’s outburst had sent shrapnel flying into the air, littering his body with cuts that weren’t painful in severity, but rather concerning in their numbers. A gash by his cheekbone. A jagged line carved across his hip.

Dean had seen worse. A lot worse, even. But his lungs were having a hard time contracting, refusing to shrink and grow, and the burn across Cas’s ribs, this molted strip of rotted tissue charred black from Dean’s power, had seemed to only grow darker in the hours that followed, festering overnight.

And behind it, beneath metal cased bones and fire licked nerves, was Castiel’s grace, flickering like a dying light.

The next day appeared to show little progress. Dean woke the same way he had the morning before; bent over the arm of the couch with his ass numb and his back brittle, and checked Cas’s wounds before getting to work on the church across the yard, decorating its inner walls with a matching set of sigils he’d painted in the clergy just the night before.

Dean wasn’t sure if most of them were even legit. Cas hadn’t exactly found a moment to either confirm or deny, but any attempt at protection was better than risking it, and Dean figured with the stash of weapons hidden under a flimsy board beneath the pastor’s pew, this was worth fortifying.

When Dean got back to the house, it was the sight of the couch cushions left bare and the bathroom door set ajar that had Dean spiraling with a sudden burst of panic. Dean’s jacket had been left behind, abandoned on the floor, and Cas was nowhere in sight. The only trace of him was the trench coat still bundled up on the sofa, dried blood crusted over the fabric.

“Cas?” He called out, keeping his worry carefully separate from his throat. Then, with added force, “Castiel?”

Rather than an audible response, a tugging grew in Dean’s sternum, an unmistakable wave of energy that hummed like a physical force. It ached of pressure and pain and longing, a stitch in his center, a caving of muscle, and Dean stood there in the dusk shadowed room and listened, allowing it to flow.

Slowly, Dean’s feet made a break for the stairs. His hands were steady on the railing. And when what ended up greeting him was a shadow, Cas’s kneeling silhouette framed by dozens of burning candles, Dean’s only response was a soft exhale, the feeling in his chest ebbing away.

“Cas,” Dean said.

The reply was immediate, “One more minute,” and Dean was transported back to a boiling motel room and a lumpy mattress where Cas had uttered those same words in a cloud of desperation.

And Dean understood. He got it perfectly, actually. Because the mural Cas was praying to was a cherry wood table propped against the bedroom wall, a cross balanced at its center with a beaded rosary wrapped around it in a spiral. Because Dean’s lighter was left abandoned on the floor next to Cas’s knee, stolen from Dean’s jacket, and Dean thought that if this was him— if he were in Cas’s position— he too would be floor bounded by grief, his siblings blown to separate corners, his enemies turned to tentative friends.

Dean wasn’t risking anything in being here, in doing this. Not really. But Cas was on the clock, in the sniper's scope, crawling through enemy lines, and it wasn’t even the first time. This was the most extreme case by far, but this had been their reality from the moment Cas’s rank had begun to slip. Since he saved the soul of a Righteous Man and found that his mission was not yet finished; that it was precious and personal and went so far beyond simple orders.

He was giving up everything for Dean. Had been for a while now. But seeing it— witnessing a soldier crumble, hearing him repeat the words that meant wait, and stay, and let me relish in what I can never have— was something Dean hadn’t been ready to stomach.

“Cas,” Dean tried again. Something clicked in his throat as he swallowed, eyes soft and hurting. “I know these are desperate times here. But sending out prayer mail will just make it easier for the angels to—”

“I am not wasting a prayer on my brothers and sisters, Dean. I’m speaking to my father,” He hadn’t made a move to even look at Dean since he arrived. His gaze was held solely on that cross, his chest and shoulder bared free to the candlelight where his mangled shirt was slipping. It wasn’t until a few moments later that Cas’s head turned, his jaw a sharpened edge in the dark. “And I don’t think the possibility of him replying is much of a threat to us anymore, is it?”

Dean was watching a breaking of some sort. A crack becoming a cavern, a fire becoming dying embers. Cas was delaying what he knew to be an inevitable loss of something rudimentary to him, an entire lifetime of faith crushed to airborne dust.

“So why do it?” Dean asked, gently.

Cas’s back stiffened, and for a moment, Dean swore he saw the shape of wings in the violent shift of muscles around his spine.

“Because—” Cas’s voice broke apart into mangled laughter, something half built and shaking, tearing at the edges. The look he spared Dean was one of contempt, like he knew just what coffin he was burying as he hammered the final nail. “Because father’s make their children do the most peculiar things.”

It turned out to be the smell of eggs and buttered toast that could coax an angel out from hibernation.

At the sound of socked feet over busted floorboards, Dean turned just in time to watch Cas curl up at the kitchen table wearing nothing but dress pants and Dean’s oversized jacket, the sleeves alone making the outfit look like a costume.

Dean stared at him for a long, pulsing moment, before blinking himself back to the stove in front of him. He cleared his throat and lowered the heat, shifting against the kitchen counter.

He grabbed two more eggs from the carton, cracking them against the pan.

“I can’t stay here,” Cas spoke suddenly, and Dean’s thumbs drove into the shell of the last egg with punctured shock, breaking it into ugly pieces.

Dean paid little mind to the heat biting at his fingers as he dug straight into the pan, fishing the chunks of shell out.

“Sure you can,” Dean grunted. “Breakfast will be ready in ten. How do you like your eggs?”

The silence that followed was an answer all on its own, gutting in its non-delivery, and Dean finally turned to find Cas’s eyes already on him. His stare was serious, decidedly immovable, and Dean didn’t think it was fair that a look like that was paired with a Cas still fresh from sleep, skin soft and hair wild, his shoulder painted gold with sunlight.

Dean nodded, quick and certain. “Scrambled it is.”

“Angels don’t eat.”

“I know,” Dean managed a laugh, throwing Cas an over the shoulder look as he stirred the eggs.

He searched in the cupboard just above his head for pepper, but found nothing but copious amounts of salt. Figures.

“I’ve bunked with one long enough to get that memo. But angels don’t sleep or puke either, and you’ve been doing plenty of both, so I’m bettin’ you’re actually starving, but won’t fess up. Therefore—” Dean fetched a fresh paper plate from the bag on the counter and loaded it up with the portion of eggs that were already cooked, fluffed to perfection. He made an effort to spin the plate across the kitchen table as he set it down in front of Cas, and said, “Eggs. Don’t be shy.”

Cas fumbled with the plastic silverware Dean had put out that morning. The movement sent Dean’s jacket slipping, pooling at the cusp of Cas’s back, and Dean got a flash of deep collarbones and chilled skin before Cas wrapped himself back up with haste. He made sure to fully slip his arms into the sleeves this time; no more mistakes.

“I wasn’t aware you cooked,” He said mildly, trying for casual, by his definition.

Dean shrugged. “Yeah, well. I don’t usually have an angel to nurse back to health.”

Those words specifically seemed to cross some wires, making everything exponentially worse. Cas’s gaze turned hostile, an itch rising beneath his skin, and he pushed the plate of eggs away as if he’d just been given poison, mouth pinched in distaste.

“Is that what this is?” He demanded, tone rough with disbelief. “You feel guilty for what happened and so you’re… caring for me? I’m not your responsibility, Dean. What happened wasn’t your fault. There’s nothing you need to repay me for.”

A sigh was brimming on Dean’s lips as he turned the stove burner off and made his own plate, dosing his eggs in ketchup. There was a certain shake to his limbs as he sat down across from Cas that he’d never admit to, not in a million years.

“You’re wrong, Cas. Which is fine, you do that sometimes. But even if you weren’t, and we said none of it was on me, how would any of this be different?” Dean asked, aiming for nonchalance, for a balance in his voice, but Cas and him were eye to eye now and something was seizing him, digging into his chest and ripping. Did Cas really think so little of him? “I mean, do you seriously think I wouldn’t be helping you? That I’d still be here if I didn’t want to be?”

“Yes.”

“Why? What the hell would be the point?”

“Because you’re you,” Cas heaved, dropping it with tremendous weight. His throat bobbed with a painful swallow. “Because you’re kind,” He continued. “Because you take burdens that don’t belong to you. Because you’re used to being a parent even when you were meant to be a child, and you take what you’re given, no matter how little it might be and how much you actually deserve.”

Something in Dean broke. Something in Dean unfurled. A wave crashed ashore right at his center, all salt and burn and power, dragging him under to drown in it. And that feeling, the one that came suddenly, that stayed shy, that couldn’t fathom how a storm at the center of the universe found him worthy of basic affection— boiled to the vulnerable surface, threatening to unravel him.

Dean’s voice came out choked, eyes wide and tearful, “Have you considered the other option?”

Cas blinked. “What other option?”

“Christ, man. What do you think—” Dean’s lungs collapsed on him, his breath shuttering to a halt. He forced his fist, resting on the table, to uncurl. “I want to be here. I want— with you. I want to be here, with you. I want us to actually get a chance to breathe. Without the sneaking around and the high stakes and death knocking at our door. So could you please stash away the survivors guilt for five fucking minutes and let me take care of you?”

Cas didn’t have a retort for him, all arguments drained from his body, but there was a shine to his eyes that hadn’t been there before. A hyper awareness that seemed to leap from his very skin, pooling in the shocked parting of his lips.

Dean shook his head, uncertain how to handle such a look, and bit out a final, “Eat your goddamn food.”

Without any further attempts at explaining himself, Cas handled the fork with shaky fingers and took a silent bite of scrambled eggs, a fresh blush rushing from his chest and into his stubbled cheeks. Dean watched the shift in color with a sneaking smile; that was a recent development.

Cas chewed slow and deliberate, swallowing with focused precision. The sensation was a new one; odd too by the look on Cas’s face. But after a moment, all while Dean’s expression bordered on pathetic hopefulness, Cas’s eyes darted up to look at him, and there was something timid and endearing about the way his gaze drifted to Dean’s own plate.

“Can you teach me how to scramble an egg?”

A routine unraveled in the quiet of the moments spent huddled together in the clergy house.

There was plenty of talking on Dean’s part. Now that he had Cas all to himself, healing more and more by the day, he found he could roll through topics with an ease that was almost scary. A dent in the floorboards led Dean to telling a story about having to demolish some poor guy’s house just to find a hidden corpse stashed underneath foundation bricks. The shaky handle on the toilet made Dean giggle through a tale of Sam versus a twenty four hour stomach ache caused by a gas mart burrito.

But it was in the silences, in the hour between dawn and sunlight, in the cacophony of cicadas and crickets chirping in the underbrush at night, that something unspeakable began to bloom.

And as it happened, as Dean watched Cas inch closer and closer to him on the couch with every passing day, as Cas’s wounds sewed themselves up with strengthening grace, as the glances across shrinking rooms grew desperate and long, Dean held fast to one singular thought.

How much of it was real?

The bond they shared went deeper than Dean even had the words for, burned into them with Hell fire. And while Dean held a sense of pride over it, of selfish want, he also feared it, and the extent of it was something he’d avoided entirely since the very beginning.

It was all he could think about now.

The only thing plaguing his mind as he watched Cas pick through a collection of rocks Dean had brought in from the creek down the hill. The only thing battering around in his heart as he threw one of his Henley's in Cas’s direction and watched with bated breath as the angel thanked him, turned, and pulled the shirt over his head with muscled arms, bending sharp at the waist.

Dean didn’t know what to think, what to be afraid of, what to look out for. Because the thought of this ending, and Dean finding out that the warmth curling all the way down to his fingertips was nothing but a ploy forced on him by the mark on his shoulder, was the worst thing imaginable.

It would break Dean. It would ruin him irreversibly.

And so Dean waited, and he hesitated, and he allowed himself to be pulled but never once pushed, and a list began to grow in his head. A collection of reasons that put a temporary ease to the battle within him.

Why do you love him?

Because it wasn’t a question, and it was no longer an if; that, at the very least, Dean knew. He’d spent the past year ignoring it, burying it, doing everything he could with that mouth of his except telling Cas how he really felt, and all of it had crumbled the second Cas dragged him out of that bar, when he thought I love him with the honesty that could only belong to a dying man.

It had been the easiest thing in the world then. Accepting it before he planned to rip it apart, to shred it before Cas’s eyes. But this— picking through it, deciphering it, mapping the very constellations of it— was one of the hardest things Dean had ever endured.

And yet, on the fourth night in the clergy house, when Dean was spread out on the living room floor cleaning his guns amongst the crackling warmth of a freshly built fire, that pain softened beneath the gentle press of a chin at Dean’s shoulder.

Dean’s oil pruned hands slowed at the barrel of his M19, but he didn’t drop the rag he was holding. He took a moment to breathe. To feel the new tempo that had kicked up in his chest. And then carried on, knowing full well that Cas was sprawled across the couch at his back with his chin on Dean’s shoulder, watching him work in contented silence.

Dean didn’t have a word for it. An exact description of the feeling roaring within him, of the reason behind it.

He just thought, this. This is a reason.

And he stashed it away in the confines of his chest, saving it for later.

A stream of phone calls from Bobby started up the next morning before the sun was even up, but it wasn’t until Cas caught sight of Dean’s buzzing phone at the kitchen table late that afternoon, that Dean paid it any mind.

“Are you just going to let it ring?” Cas questioned him, looking up from his bowl of tomato and rice soup with feigned innocence.

Dean shrugged, carding his spoon through his own serving. “Sure, why not.”

“Dean, I’m aware you and Sam didn’t exactly part ways on the best of terms. But Bobby? He’s one of your closest kin.”

“Exactly,” Dean flashed a smile at him, the skin around his eyes pulled taut. “A close kin to me and my brother who I am trying very hard to ignore right now.”

Exasperation passed through Cas’s features, quick like a hot flash, and then it was gone again. Replaced with a worn sigh and a fidgeting hand coming up to card through his mess of hair. It seemed to be a nervous tick he’d picked up during this brief interlude between angel and human, balancing between intervals of power.

It made Dean feel hopelessly endeared, to say the least. And for a regretful few seconds, he let his guard drop.

“What happened? Between you and Sam?” Cas asked.

Dean took a rather aggressive bite of soup, slurping obscenely. “Nothing noteworthy.”

“No?” Cas countered innocently. “Because you seemed to have taken it extremely to heart.”

“Jesus, Cas,” Dean finally gritted.

“I’m just wondering what—”

The ringing started up again with a silenced hum, and Dean picked up the phone without another word, accepting the call with a jerk of his thumb. Anything to avoid having to listen to this conversation.

“Hey, Bobby,” Dean greeted, lifeless as anything.

“No need to sound so thrilled there, boy. You might pull somethin’,” Bobby grumbled, and Dean winced beneath the scolding, no matter how light it was. “It’s about damn time you answered. I don’t know if you’re aware, but we’re staring down the devil’s asshole as we speak, and going dark on both me and your brother is not the answer.”

“Right. Nice to hear from you too.”

“Listen, you idjit. I’m on the clock here, no time for bullshit sarcasm. I’m calling about Sam.”

Dean’s heart gave a violent lurch, dread rising in his stomach. “I don’t want—”

“I know what you don’t want, and frankly I don’t give a rat's ass. Your brother has been sulking at my place for days. He’s told me jack all, but whatever happened between you two, you need to buck the fuck up and fix it,” Bobby demanded, ever the mediator, the unwavering olive branch that always sought forgiveness when the brother’s couldn’t do it themselves.

This was different, though. Different than when they were kids taking shots at each other, different than when the trickster messed with their heads and Bobby came running just to keep them from killing one another. Dean’s trust in his brother had started being tested since the day he broke free of a casket, and Sam’s move with the scripts had only shredded it completely.

“But,” Dean started, only to realize he didn’t have the words. Couldn’t possibly draw a portrait of the rotting Sam had left in his gut. “Bobby, he—”

“By the look of that kid’s face, he did something stupid. I know that. I’m sorry for that. But we’re on the home stretch here, Dean. Seals are still breaking, the planet is still set to roast. Even if it feels like your world came to an end, I promise there’s still something worth saving.”

The reminder of the way Dean had left Sam, beaten and tossed across motel carpet, bleeding into the stitching, was enough to break Dean completely, his choices losing their reasoning. His time with Cas had been soothing a life's worth of wounds, each day beginning with the kind of soft churned, slow aching comfort that could only come from an existence spent between four walls and a roof rather than a set of wheels and a strip of road.

But that hadn’t stopped Dean from remembering. From dreaming about his brother’s blood sprayed hot on his knuckles, and the otherworldly grip that took hold of him that night at the bar, that used Dean’s hands to seek penance.

“Okay. Okay, yeah, I’ll—” Dean nodded frantically, a lump curling up his throat, “call, or something. I don’t know,” He hesitated, unable to cross that line with both feet, wishing to take a singular step. “But I’m not coming home, not yet.”

“The hell you aren’t. We need you here!”

“I’m needed somewhere else right now, Bobby. I promise I’ll explain everything later, just—”

It felt like walking away. It felt like running, but trying to explain over the phone that Cas was someone precious now, someone they needed on board here, full powered and geared up for the Apocalypse, felt impossible. Its importance was immeasurable in just a few short words.

And so Dean straightened as if called to war, metal biting at his jaw, and said, “Take care of, Sammy. Okay?”

It was a testament to how pissed Bobby really was that the call ended before Dean could even earn a response, and he was left staring at the tabletop, seeing without seeing.

“Dean?” Cas called, suddenly sounding small.

Without so much as a glance toward Cas, Dean clicked over to the list of messages he’d received from Sam over the course of a week. The ones he’d been immediately swiping away and avoiding with a curdling gut. Or trying his best to avoid, at the very least.

Such a thing was difficult with Sam being his most popular contact.

Dean didn’t say a word before jumping up from his spot at the kitchen table and walking straight out the front door. He was relieved that Cas knew well enough not to follow. On the front porch, Dean paced the length of it before scrambling down the steps and heading out to the church across the yard, wanting to get away.

It was under the awning of the opened church doors that Dean read the first message.

I didn’t mean it. Not a single fucking word of it, Dean. You have to believe me.

Dean’s thumb hovered shakily over the number pad for a long moment, his eyes refusing to move on. As he continued, the texts progressively became more desperate.

I’m sorry. I don’t even know where to start with fixing this but I will. I’ll do anything.

Please answer your phone.

Dean, I’m sorry. I was wrong and I’m sorry.

And then Dean read the last message, delivered last night at half past three in the morning, and felt his feet swipe out from beneath him, a dagger splitting through his ribcage and into his chest, twisting with a violent jerk.

Please don’t leave me alone.

Dean spun in place for a fleeting moment, world teetering, phone crushed between trembling fingers, before finally turning and collapsing into the pillar by the doorway. He slammed his palm into the wood, white paint chipping, and listened as the whole church groaned around him like delayed thunder after a lightning strike, power burning through molten veins.

When Dean pulled away nearly half an hour later, wiping every hint of tears from his face to head back to the house, he paid little mind to the scorched handprint he’d left behind in the caving wood.

It was a wordless agreement to start sharing the bedroom upstairs.

Those first few nights saw Dean and Cas taking awkward turns on the couch, not wanting to overstep, not all that comfortable with being in separate rooms while the forces of Heaven and Hell stirred in waiting. But with two open beds, and Dean’s back getting progressively worse through the strain, the awaiting perks of an unused bedroom became impossible to ignore.

The upper level of the clergy house was small, the staircase leading to nothing but a cornered hall with a window and a single bedroom. When the two of them finally found the nerve to settle themselves there, the nights that followed were spent bumping shoulders in the hallway and talking until sleep stole the words from their very tongues, pressing them soft into age-worn mattresses.

And it was nice. Peaceful. Almost normal, even, if Dean ever dared to utter such a word.

At least until the nightmares started.

Full body terrors that clutched Dean in the dark and dragged him through miles of broken glass, past wounds reopening, old blood curling fresh. Dean began to start each morning leaving a haloed shadow of sweat on the bed. Even awake, his feet would take hours to work up to consciousness, vision flashing with hooks and racks and blades long enough to trip on.

But it wasn’t until Sam appeared, features stomped into a mesh of blood and flesh across motel carpet, Dean’s knuckles split purple, that Dean’s nightmares became vocal. It wasn’t until Dean watched himself erupt in static white, devouring the hues of a bustling bar and melting the skin off dozens of innocents, that Dean became inconsolable.

And the sound of his own ragged cries jolted him awake.

“Dean,” Cas was by Dean’s bedside in a matter of seconds, bare feet stomping in his rush to move across the room. “Dean, it’s me. It’s Castiel. You’re awake,” A hand fled to the side of Dean’s face, melding gently to the shape of his cheek. “You’re awake and with me. You’re safe.”

“M’ not safe,” Dean blurted, unable to keep it in, to thoughtlessly agree like he usually did. His words were garbled metal. “Not here, not even sleeping, it’s—” Dean inhaled shakily, and it felt like the only sound in the entire world. “I couldn’t tell you the last time I felt safe, Cas.”

An image of a fresh lawn and a decade-old oak tree flashed sharp in Dean’s mind.

He used to beg his dad to build him a tire swing on that tree. He used to watch his mom squeeze fresh lemonade into polished glasses in the front yard. He used to make them chase him to the stop sign down the street. Dean used to feel safe, but it had been over twenty-five years since he’d been that boy in Lawrence, and he couldn’t recall the feeling.

“I understand that we’re here under the guise of my health. That you’re taking care of me. But I must admit I’ve been just as concerned about you, as you are me,” Cas explained lightly, speaking softly, doing everything in his power not to startle Dean further. “You’re under my protection, Dean. I was commanded by Heaven to watch over you, and though my obedience leaves much to be questioned, that’s a task I have no desire to fail.”

Dean could still feel the cold press of the rack beneath his back. The weight of dried blood. The way it melded with his very skin, couldn’t be pried up no matter how many times he was brought back anew, brought back fresh and shaking with a razor in hand. But Cas was there, fingers working through the sweat at Dean’s scalp, lips lingering at the thrum of his temple, and Dean could feel that too.

“I’m not the kind of guy people see things through for. I wouldn’t blame you.”

“I would,” Cas refuted, a heat-bridled, instantaneous response. Then, less thoughtless, more soul-baring, “I don’t think I’d be able to live with myself if I failed you, Dean.”

“Fuck,” Dean spluttered, sounding like a punctured airbag, his heart close to bursting. His breath was coming fast, tears hot in his eyes, and for a moment it felt possible. Speaking plainly, loving loudly, stepping out from the thirty-year-old cage in his chest. Dean’s next breath came shaky, “Fuck. Cas, I—”

“I wish I was at full strength. I wish I could help you like before,” Castiel mourned through a whisper, dragging reverent hands over the growing stubble on Dean’s face, gently cupping his jaw.

Cas’s mouth pressed a subtle kiss into the heat of Dean’s cheekbone. And Dean’s confession fell six feet under, burying itself beneath his tongue.

There wasn’t even the luxury of feeling disappointed. None of the blame was on Cas; not even a little. And after having to settle with unplanned visits, every wink of sleep coming with the sharp possibility of nothing at all, no static, no comfort, no guardian angel tiptoeing in the night, just the feeling of hands on skin was enough to coax Dean back to Earth.

The truth of the matter was that Cas didn’t need his powers for Dean to feel cleansed from the inside out. He never really had.

“You are. You are helping. Just— just by—” Dean slowed himself with a heavy swallow, blinking frantically in the dark. If he didn’t calm down, he was going to seep into the floorboards, bodied by the weight of devotion that had planted roots in his chest. “You don’t need the juice, Cas. You’ve never— I just need you with me. Can you— will you lay with me? Until I fall asleep, I mean, just—”

Before Dean could even finish, Cas muttered something in what Dean could only assume was Enochian, short and soft under his breath, fonder than Dean’s ever heard him, and Cas wasted not a second longer before sliding his way into the burrow of blankets and heat to lay by Dean’s side.

It wasn’t until Dean was pulled in by certain arms and cradled to an open chest, a borrowed heart beating steady against his palm, that his breaths truly began to settle.

“What was that? Fancy angel talk for ‘I’m down to spoon?’” Dean snickered into Cas’s collarbone, nosing his way along, tempted to work his way to the opposite shoulder.

“Not quite,” Cas answered softly, humming through the words, and Dean thought hard about that as he dosed, eventually finding sleep once again.

The clergy house had one of those microwave television sets in the living room, but the antennas were tricky, the channels were shit, and Wheel of Fortune reruns got incredibly repetitive incredibly fast.

It was this reason that Dean, on the sixth day, ran back to the freshly fixed Impala to dig through the glove compartment for his decade old copy of Slaughterhouse Five, which he’d stolen from his high school English class in Brimming, Alabama. There was still the school’s library address stamped on the first page.

“I don’t see how such a book title could come across as enticing,” Cas frowned at him, wiggling his way up one of the twin beds shoved against the wall in the room upstairs.

Dean hadn’t exactly been surprised by the modest sleeping arrangements here given that most priests had a real stick up their ass, but it was still humorous nonetheless. Two twin beds pushed to either corner, framed with the kind of metal you would see in an institution. And them, two grown men-shaped beings contorting themselves to get comfortable in such a little space, facing each other in the warm and dark.

“What? And The Bible is what does it for you? Would you rather I read Genesis?”

A burst of air escaped Cas’s nose, soft and amused. “No, I suppose not.”

“Vonnegut is a genius, man. I mean, I know I’m not the brains of my operation, Sam’s got that covered, but this— this is fucking art. You’ll love it, you’ll see,” Dean rambled, his momentum faltering as his voice turned bashful. Dean became a whirlwind of limbs, then, legs drawing up beneath him on his own bed, arms stretching pointlessly to adjust his pillow.

His face was burning in the wave of the candlelight.

“I don’t doubt that,” Cas said, tone dialed low with fondness, his eyes searching for Dean’s across the room. “I have to say though, your intelligence is just as remarkable as your brothers. You shouldn’t think otherwise, Dean.”

“Yeah, well,” Dean said, and then nothing else, because words were hard and Dean’s skin was flushing, cooking beneath a heavy gaze.

It was odd for Dean, sharing something from his life with someone who had very little reason to put him down for it. Something from his childhood that actually made him happy, made him enjoy school for the handful of weeks it took his class to read it, and didn’t somehow get twisted somewhere down the line of his broken life.

This book stayed pure, and special, and personal, even through years forged in blood, and there was a lump in Dean’s throat as he thumbed through the pages now, preparing himself to start the journey once again. He couldn’t even remember the last time he read aloud like this. Sam couldn’t have been older than ten, sprawled across a motel bed opposite Dean not unlike he and Cas were now.

“What is the book about?” Cas asked innocently, maneuvering himself underneath the bed comforter that was far too thin and bordered on itchy. Cas didn’t seem to mind it much; he still didn’t sleep a lot, mostly functioning with two to three hour naps each day, but he seemed to enjoy the comfort of it, the routine of turning in at the end of the night just to lay in the same room as Dean and breathe.

Dean stared at Cas for a long time, unable to answer, to even summarize.

Free will, Dean wanted to say. It’s about war and death and the choice that lies in between, but that felt too on the nose, like their own life manifested, and Dean didn’t want to scare him. To admit that maybe there was a reason he’d connected to Vonnegut’s words, maybe destiny was a merciless bitch that followed him everywhere, and he couldn’t avoid it— destiny, the Apocalypse, the truth— no matter how much he wanted to.

So instead, Dean started reading.

No preface, no mention of what lay ahead. He simply began, and that list of reasons of his that he kept tucked away, sprung out as if unwrapped and pushed, sprawling into the distance between them. Because Dean loved how Cas listened to him speak, how his mouth twitched at the way Dean would say certain phrases. He loved that Cas seemed just as enthralled with watching Dean’s face as he was with the story, with the evening, with the way the candles littered across the room set the ceiling aglow.

But it was the way Cas reacted to one line in particular, breath hitching soft, hands clutching tight to the front of Dean’s t-shirt he’d been wearing for the past day and a half, that had Dean churning out paragraphs on that particular imaginary list:

And I asked myself about the present: how wide it was, how deep it was, how much was mine to keep.

The moment Dean opened his eyes, limbs light and free of bottled air, he knew he’d slept long into the next morning.

Most of the time, the sun was enough to wake him. The gradual bleed through thin curtains, the ache of the wooden walls. He’d rise to the smell of toast, one of the few foods Cas had learned to make without burning, or the faraway hum of the television downstairs.

But this morning, the house was silent, and a pulse of panic followed Dean’s voice as he rolled out of bed and called out, “Cas?”

“Down here!”

Relief poured like honey at the pit of Dean’s stomach, and he forced himself to slow as he made his descent down the stairs. He wasn’t sure it worked that well. His heartbeat was still fresh and pounding by the time he made it into the main room, and he stood there in roiling silence just to breathe in the sight before him.

Standing at the kitchen sink in ratty old jeans and a knitted gray sweater, was a warm eyed Castiel. He was digging at something in the drain, perplexed by a sudden clog, and when Dean’s appearance came with an abnormal lack of noise, he turned to look at Dean with a furrowed brow, confusion making his lips part just so.

Cas instantly softened when he saw him. Something like relief coaxed through his shoulders as he said, “Dean.”

“Hey,” Dean smiled, tight and unsure. “Sorry, I thought you, uh—”

The moment Dean approached, stepping close enough to touch, Cas did so with little hesitation, pressing their mouths together in a clumsy sort of kiss that made Dean startle back with a cut off gasp. It was instinctive, it was resolute, it was sweet, and Dean’s hand shot out to cup the bend of Cas’s elbow before he could even feel the air return to his lungs.

It had been ages. Since a kiss, since a touch, since anything resembling their secret nights. But Dean had never gotten this; it was so normal it hurt. A kiss in the daylight, in the bright and open. Soft, like they had the time. Deep, like it meant more than basic attraction, and the thought made Dean’s eyes burn.

“Thought I what?” Cas beamed as he pulled back, looking healthier by the day, by the ticking hour. He gave a firm squeeze to Dean’s forearm before returning to his spot by the sink, resting his hip against the counter in a way that nearly struck Dean blind, simply for how human it appeared. “Did you sleep well? I didn’t want to wake you. It’s always nice to see you rest peacefully.”

They didn’t talk about it. Cas didn’t seem to think it was necessary. He had made a choice, one that took their quiet longing, their shadow-covered lies, and grounded them into dust, forbidding them to the past.

And it became clear then, like a sharpened message written in haste at the bottom of Dean’s list, that the question shouldn’t be why he loves Cas.

It should be why wouldn’t he? Why shouldn’t he?

How could he not?

“It’s Sam. Leave me a message.”

“Hey. It’s— it’s me,” Dean started, because this was something he felt he had to announce, almost like he was twenty-six and circling Stanford for hours again, wondering just how bad it would hurt if his brother told him to get lost after already having done so for two years.

Dean took a deep breath, leaning his head back against the shedding of the clergy house. He tried to focus on the full moon above him, the smell of smoke rising from the chimney; he imagined Cas was finishing up with washing dishes and heading upstairs to get ready for bed, expecting Dean to follow after him soon enough.

“Look, I’ll just get right to it,” Dean gripped the phone with buzzing nerves, staring into the sprinkled grass. “I’m still pissed… and I owe you a serious beat down. But I shouldn’t have left the way I did. I mean, I’m not Dad, and I— I don’t wanna be. What you need to know is that I’m safe. I just needed to get away. And it’s not to punish you, it’s not—”

Dean winced through the croak in his voice, torn between comforting and demanding. He didn’t want Sam hurting, didn’t like to think of him being miserable in all this, but Dean was human, eminently so, and another part of him sought equity, wanted Sam’s mistake to actually mean something.

Please don’t leave me alone.

The anger in Dean softened to a manageable flame, stroking at the bottom of his belly. And with one hand still holding the phone, Dean raised his other to thumb at the amulet hanging from his neck, still there after all this time, all this heartache.

He encased it in the palm of his hand, guarding, protecting.

“Something happened, and I needed to fix that first before I tried to fix us. But we’re brothers, you know. We’re family. And uh, no matter how bad it gets, that doesn’t change. My plan is to head out in a couple days or so, get back to Bobby’s. I guess if you’re still around, I’ll see you there,” Dean managed to get out, meaning it like a promise, a shared apology. He fumbled in the silence that followed, aching to say more, “Sammy, I’m sorry—”

Before Dean could finish, the phone clicked over unspoken words, signaling Dean’s message hitting its limit, and Dean sucked in a shuddering breath before stuffing the phone back in his pocket.

On his way back inside the clergy house, it ever so silently began to rain.

The house was the same as it always was. As Dean had come to recognize it to be in the week he’d been there, walking the halls, folding the sheets, clearing the dust. And yet there was something molten in the air when Dean returned, something undeniably different.

Purposeful.

“Cas?” Dean called. He could hear the wind starting to pick up outside, the subtle whip of brush and fallen leaves, the wooden house creaking in the astounding silence.

Dean peeled his jacket from his shoulders, hoping to shake out most of the dampness, and draped it over the nearest dining chair.

“In here, Dean,” Castiel finally said, voice stretched smooth from the effort of staying casual. “The well dressed man on the television said that a storm is underway. Nothing too serious, just some much needed precipitation and a chance of hail.”

As Dean drew closer, following Cas’s voice to what he realized, much to Dean’s surprise, turned out to be the bathroom, Dean’s stomach flipped inwards. By the time he was standing in the doorway, his eyes were alert, watchful, and they only became wider when he was met with a completely nude Cas standing over the bathtub, testing the water’s temperature.

“Sorry, uh—” Dean’s hand scrambled for the doorframe, leaning into it for balance. He allowed himself one quick glance, tracing over the bend of his waist, the jut of hip bones, the ripple of a muscled back— and then proceeded to go miraculously blank. “What are you saying to me?”

“The weather, Dean,” Cas smirked, with all the same tight-coiled mischief that belonged to a man who did not, in fact, care to talk about the weather. “Joining me?”

Cas gingerly lowered himself into the cramped tub before Dean could even give an answer, clearly confident in how he’d respond. The thought made Dean’s chest twist, something warm spreading through his ribs, weaving between bone and marrow. He glanced around the room at the candles Cas had amassed, mostly stolen from their stash upstairs, and placed around the bathroom. They filtered the room in light and shadow, bathing the walls in a rich orange.

On the window sill just above the tub, sat a vase of flowers Cas had picked from the courtyard earlier that day when the weather was nice. And Dean could see the rain starting to pick up now, pelting against the glass.

“Is this some sort of angel courting I don’t know about?” Dean teased, only half joking, and Cas breathed out a short laugh through his nose, mouth quirking.

“If angels had such a thing, I’d say I’ve already succeeded in that, wouldn’t you?” He scoffed, looking pointedly towards Dean’s shoulder, and it chipped at something weak and crumbling inside of Dean that that was something they could joke about now. That their connection was no longer brushed aside as an unfortunate mistake, but acknowledged in the waking world, held high for both of them to see.

Neither of them were hiding anymore. And this was a glaring fact that blazed between them.

“I believe your kind calls it seducing,” Cas amended after a beat. He raised his elbow to the edge of the tub, hesitating for the briefest second, and leaned his chin into the curve of his hand, still learning the way his body could move, how it listened to every minuscule thought and desire.

“Oh, I think I’ve heard of that. Big fan actually,” Dean could feel his stomach warming with interest as he kicked his shoes off into the entryway, arms stretching to shed his flannel.

“I had presumed so. You’re awfully good at it yourself,” Cas continued, but his voice had dimmed from the hard cutting cockiness from before, and he was watching Dean undress with little shame, eyes blown wide with interest.

Dean laughed. “Is that right?”

He shed the rest of his clothes in a jittery rush tinged in warmth, nearly dying on the spot when his jeans got caught at his ankles, his belt making the whole ordeal rather difficult. It wasn’t like Dean to be nervous like this, to trip and fumble and blush to the tips of his ears, skin set aflame, but Cas’s head tipped back from the force of his laughter, eyes soft and shining, and Dean found that the sound filled him with all sorts of emotion, many of which made him blissfully less aware of his limbs.

A hand was offered to Dean as he climbed his way into the tub, and he took it with a timid smile, trying not to feel too stupid about having to practically sprawl back across Cas’s chest, bearing his weight into him.

“Oh, yeah. This is practically the Hilton. Definitely made for two grown men to screw around in,” Dean said once he’d settled back, cramped and cold. He clicked his tongue, “Terrific call.”

Cas snorted, the noise tickling beneath Dean’s ear. “I’m not a man, technically.”

“Technically, it still doesn’t matter. This thing is tiny. My dick is cold,” Dean pouted, half of his body still above water, knees curled up at an awkward angle.

“Try leaning back more. Relax your hips,” Cas’s hands found their way to Dean’s waist, guiding him lower, encouraging his pelvis to relax, and Dean sank into the cradle of Cas’s hips with a slow exhale, legs dipping beneath the water.

Two things happened at once; a certain calmness washed over Dean, the warmth of the water rocking him gently, wrapping around his shoulders. And secondly, Dean became well aware that Cas was hard, pressed snuggly against his back, heated skin to heated skin.

“What do you think the priests would think about us defiling their bathtub?” Dean asked after a moment of quiet contemplation, genuinely curious what it meant to a creature of Heaven that they were technically shacking up in a place of worship.

“I think their opinions would mean very little,” Cas hummed.

Dean smiled. “Yeah?”

“Yes. This place, this church, it’s been empty for quite some time. The congregation that was once here are probably all dead.”

Turning back and glancing at Cas wasn’t the most comfortable thing in the world given their position, but the look on his face was entirely worth it, thoughtful and earnest, and Dean careened backward with laughter, his head resting against Cas’s shoulder.

“Wow. Nothing like dead priests to get a guy going. How’d you know, Cas?”

It was different, in a way Dean couldn’t even begin to describe, to be intimate with Cas, knowing that he was in love with him. They bathed together for the better part of half an hour, talking softly amongst themselves, and much to Dean’s surprise, Cas kept his touches to light grazes, simply wanting to feel, to hold fast and revel rather than push for more.

It was between the delicate beats of a comfortable silence that a loud bang sounded from the living room. As if a window had been punched through, quick and sudden.

They both froze, hands stilling, and Dean was out of the tub and alert before Cas could even try to calm him, dripping water across old porcelain tiles.

“Wait, let me—” Cas tried.

“Stay here,” Dean interrupted, forcing a hand out. Cas scowled at him, petulant, and stood up without a word. Dean shook his head as he scrambled back into his underwear, struggling to slide the fabric over wet skin, “I’m serious, don’t—”

“You’re not going out there alone,” Cas insisted, and there was something intricate and almost normal about the way Cas crouched and retrieved Dean’s gun off the floor, handing it over with a leveling look of trust.

Dean stared at him, heart racing. “Fine. But stay behind me.”

They moved out into the main room together, Cas at Dean’s back, unarmed but confident, body tensed and at the ready. He was still a little weak most days, slow to get up, slower to settle down, but his grace was a burning, tangible source at his core that Dean could recognize again, could pick out in total darkness, and Dean had figured if something had decided to join them, Cas had just enough juice to be decent backup.

Hopefully.

Silence had settled over the clergy house yet again, leaving little evidence of the noise at all. Nothing was out of place. Nothing was broken or tipped over. Dean searched the whole house with his gun drawn, hands slippery over the grip, and with Cas’s breath on his shoulder, he thought vaguely that if this was it, and the angels were knocking at their door, that nothing would prepare him. That this would be a gruesome end.

Then, the noise happened again, violent and jarring, and Dean jerked his head just in time to watch a bird collide with the living room window and scramble away, fleeing the scene.

Dean’s mouth opened slowly. And Cas, the bastard, drew a hand up to smother his biting grin, eyes warm and mirthful.

“Careful. That bird looks dangerous,” He said, serious as anything.

Relief pierced Dean like a spear, and he bent over and laughed until his stomach ached, tossing his gun to the couch just to start batting his hands against Cas’s chest.

“You’re one to talk,” Dean wheezed, pawing at Cas’s hip, pulling him closer by the wrist. “Were you planning on fighting the thing with your dick out?”

It was ridiculous and hilarious and crude, a collection of many things Dean had forgotten even existed in their world anymore, and together they laughed with blistering smiles, orbiting one another as though they couldn’t get close enough, couldn’t stand to be apart after a make-pretend end that had set both of them rocking.

All remaining fear vanished from Dean in that moment, and a painful sort of joy took its place, a determination that left little doubt, and before Dean could do it himself, Cas was pressing forward and kissing him through a bruising smile.

The laughter acted as a catalyst.

The severing tie that upended the connection between them, launched them into motion like a chemical reaction. Cas’s mouth on his was a catch and release, hands dropping down to grab hold of Dean’s waistband, using it to drag him away from the living room and towards the narrow staircase across the hall.

Together they stumbled, desperate not to part, clinging and grasping. Their movements were a snapshot of hands and mouths and chests, craning into one another, arching in place. The kiss was soft and slow, and then it wasn’t; then it was stopping them in their tracks. Then it was Cas pushing Dean against the frame of the bedroom door, bolder than Dean could have ever anticipated, fingers slipping across a jittering stomach before leaving Dean entirely.

Dean barely had time to react before Cas sunk to his knees. Before the sight of Cas naked and blinking up at him dove like an iron rod between the forking of Dean’s ribs. The rush of Cas’s breath came hot against his cock through the cotton of Dean’s boxer briefs, followed by the damp press of his mouth.

It was the last thing Dean expected, and his next breath came strangled like a gasp, head falling back against the door frame. He dissolved into restless shuddering, his heart creaking like an age-worn cabin, and standing suddenly became somewhat of a daring task as Cas dragged his open mouth along the length of Dean that was already pressed sideways against his thigh, painfully hard in his underwear.

“You know…” Dean stammered. “You know you don’t have to—”

“I know,” Cas said thickly, and when his fingers returned to Dean’s waistband, he wasted no time before turning his head to the side to smoothly slip his open lips around the tip, pulling Dean’s cock into his mouth in a long, heavy motion— a surreal sensation Dean had honestly tried not to even fantasize about until now.

Cas groaned when Dean settled into the back of his throat, and Dean sucked a sharp breath between clenched teeth, one hand gripping the bedroom door knob tight enough to ache.

“Where the hell did you learn to— shit,” Dean groaned, fingers curling into dampened hair, simply trying to hold on rather than guide him further; Cas was doing just fine on his own.

He was bobbing his head with vigor, his pace scattered but his focus clear, nestling his nose as close to the scatter of dark hair at the base as he could manage before withdrawing and letting Dean slip back out. Cas allowed himself the smallest pause for breath, and then he was dragging his open mouth down the side of Dean’s length again, this time bare and wet.

He broke away just seconds later to plant a damp kiss on Dean’s bare hip, the top of his thigh, stooping further to mouth at the delicate bone of his knee.

Just a gentle reminder. A softened hello, reminding Dean of his reverence, of his fondness, that it strayed here of all places, too, and Dean suddenly couldn’t breathe through the intimacy of it.

Cas drifted along to nip at his other hip, a slow motion, open-mouthed kiss dropped casually to the side of his aching cock that made Dean’s hips jump under the attention, and Cas chuckled, looking up to catch Dean’s eyes with his own. He looked more unbridled than Dean thought he’d ever seen him, delirious and self-willed, every touch coming forward with brilliant ease.

And without breaking eye contact, Cas rose to his feet with molten features, dropping another kiss to Dean’s chest as he did so.

“Fuck, I want you,” Dean breathed, and the resounding groan Cas pressed into the front of his throat sent Dean’s blood pressure soaring, shaking, ringing. The room was spinning so violently Dean nearly missed the way he ended the sentence with, “Inside me.”

Dean could feel the moment Cas’s breath went ratcheting around his chest, the air in his lungs turning stiff. He tried to speak, to say something intelligible, but his words melted into a vague crushing sound, and then it was Dean’s turn to laugh, his hand finding Cas’s.

Both beds were still unmade from the rushed morning, and as Cas landed in the mess of sheets Dean shoved him towards, Dean moved to straddle him, skin sliding together, damp and cool. He leaned in and pushed him flat on his back against the bed, hands moving over Cas’s stomach and chest with little shame as their mouths reconnected.

And what a beautiful thing, doing this in an actual bed for once. Where Dean could push and pull and give, bend Cas in all the angles he wanted him, arch towards all the spots he craved. The mattress dipped and squeaked beneath the shift of Dean’s knees as he struggled out of his underwear, needing that last barrier gone, and then it was skin and bone and unfathomable warmth, Dean’s ass pressed to Cas’s abdomen, Cas’s cock burning hot at his backside.

Dean had only just brought his hands back down, fingers chasing the sharp edge of Cas’s pectoral, of the shadow it caused, when Cas brought his own hands around to the flesh of Dean’s ass, palms spreading wide to accommodate. Without warning, Cas snapped his hips up in a slow drag of friction that had Dean digging stubbed nails into muscled shoulders.

“Woah, woah, woah, slow your roll, handsome,” Dean blushed furiously, needing a moment, suddenly worried about the technicalities here.

The way Cas instantly withdrew and stared up at Dean in waiting, concerned and attentive, had Dean’s pathetic excuse for standards start a fire somewhere in his chest, heart burning amidst the flames.

“Are you sure you’re up for this? I don’t want you hurtin’ yourself just to get a little action,” Dean laughed, but his voice grated with an edge that was glaring, and his face had gone warm, pink rising in his ears. His hands faltered against the swell of Cas’s chest, itching to fidget. “We can, uh, you know. Figure out some other way or—”

“I want to,” Cas insisted, the answer coming easy, his feelings turning warm and pliant, downright pourable. “I want to see something. Want to… just… know something.”

It was the most relaxed he’d ever heard Cas speak, the softest that stone battered voice of his had ever dared to go. Like for once, a war wasn’t halfway from dripping off his tongue.

“Know what, sweetheart?” Dean hummed, fingers rubbing over touch-worn stubble.

“My grace is withered. My wings are singed. I can’t— I can’t feel you like I once did. Your warmth, it’s—” What a pain it must be, to be a creature of action bent into the mangled shape of a being who cared. Who had felt the most at peace in a place that wasn’t Heaven, and who wished desperately to make a new home, “I want to feel you.”

And it was apparent then, in the framework of those words, in their delicate weaving, that something had not only been uprooted, like a tree turned weak in a storm, but erased entirely. Whole fragments of reality, an entire belief system, burned down to its corrupted fragments, ripped apart by destiny bruised hands.

In that moment, Cas wanted him not for the moment, or the pleasure— not even for the night. He wanted Dean wholly, for as long as his mortal life would allow him, and for the first time in Dean’s miserable life, he actually felt chosen.

“Okay,” Dean swallowed. “Okay, yeah. ‘Course, Cas.”

Anything, he thought silently, immediately, like a visceral ache, but his throat was swelling with an emotion he couldn’t voice and all Dean could do was drag himself out of bed and across the room where his duffle bag was slung hazardously in the corner, clothes spilling over the sides, it’s zipper half closed.

His hands made quick work on the small pocket on the left side, a secret pouch hidden within.

“So, uh, bad news,” Dean turned back to smile at Cas, the singular bottle of lube he’d bought on a recent gas station run held triumphantly in his hand. “I didn’t pack condoms,” Cas stared at him for a long moment, unimpressed. Dean made a face at him, brow lifting, “Got any angelic STD’s I should know about?”

Cas actually cracked at this, his expression breaking apart with laughter. “You’re ridiculous.”

A frankly absurd amount of giddiness swarmed Dean’s stomach as he waddled back to the bed, pink cheeked and bared to the world, his confidence rushing and retreating like a messy wave crashing ashore.

“It’s been said. Though I prefer charming, personally. Handsome works too.”

There was something addicting about the way Cas followed Dean with his eyes, shameless and reverent, his attention never faltering. Even as Dean fumbled his way back onto the bed, straddling Cas’s hips again, their heat never dwindled, and Cas’s hands fled like magnets to the bend of Dean’s thighs, palms curling over the shape of his waist.

“But what if you’re all of those things? A collection of many, many wonderful things. What word do we use then?” Cas murmured deeply, torn between speaking and tasting, his head bowed back to mouth at the bolt of Dean’s jaw, his bobbing throat, his trembling shoulders.

Dean shivered at the rapid attention, spine arching beneath wandering hands. “I guess you’ll have to figure that one out yourself.”

Intentional or not, Cas seemed to like that answer, and he surged upwards just to seal their mouths together. Just to pull Dean down by the neck and pry his lips apart with a heat forged tongue, and this was just so much, Dean decided.

Too much.

Because when Cas kissed him without a time limit, without any limitations or restraint, something about it hurt inside, sinking Dean into a strange silence like being deep underwater, somewhere no one would hear him scream. It rotted at his very center, ridding him of breath and blood, and even if the pain of it wasn’t actually as visceral as Dean imagined it to be, he knew he wouldn’t be able to handle the way it was all going to ache when the war outside beckoned them back.

For several months, they had been going through the motions, inhabiting the corners they were offered, sidestepping the fountain lights that followed. The two of them, together, a unit, a pair, existed only when it was convenient. When it was easy. When it had been too long spent apart and they were clawing at the gates.

And now, there was the sweaty catch of skin on skin as Dean settled above him, his elbows on either side of Cas’s head, bending over the top of him in a way that felt almost protective. Cas’s kiss was the most addictive thing Dean had ever felt, heavier than a drag of smoke, stronger than a pull of beer, and Dean curled two hands into dark hair, dragging him as close as he could.

Close enough that if he closed his eyes and focused and let himself drown in the very feeling he’d been running away from since he could hold himself up on two legs, he could pick out the roaring, lively beat of Cas’s borrowed heart.

Outside, a storm was whistling through the surrounding trees. Rain pounded against wooden walls. Their destiny reared high in waiting. But inside, the candlelight was softened gold, their breaths were wet and tangled, and Dean swore to love Cas until the world burned because of it.

As if hearing Dean’s vow, Cas pressed his mouth to the taut skin of Dean’s throat, over the rise of his Adam’s apple. He clutched at Dean’s shoulder blades, skirted down to his hips, and guided them into a roll, a gentle rocking. The bare slide of their cocks together drew a high sound from Dean’s mouth, a noise he flushed in immediate response to, and Cas repeated the motion until Dean was doing it on his own, hips canting through labored breaths, connecting again and again like sharpened rocks throwing off sparks.

And when it was time, Dean almost couldn’t handle the breach of his own hand, it had been so long. He planned to do it all himself. Open his body up with rusty fingers, shaky with lack of practice. He’d work his way up to two fingers tops, lather Cas’s cock to guide the pressure, manage the pain, and it would be fine.

Normal.

Instead, Dean had only gotten one finger in, two knuckles deep, when Cas asked, “Can I help?” in that smoke coiled voice, and Dean moaned in pure agony, bending at the arm on Cas’s chest just to get closer, to arch his back against the burning pressure.

“Yeah— yes, fuck, Cas. Please.”

Cas jumped to action, working with the determination of a soldier at arms, and Dean shook through a strained laugh as Cas copied his previous actions with alarming precision; coating his fingers in lube, warming them with the pad of his thumb, and bending his wrist over the curve of Dean’s back.

At the first stretch of Cas’s longer, more slender fingers, Dean braced himself on Cas’s shoulders, bending to breathe against his ear, and it was there that Dean fed Cas his moans, melding them straight from throat to skin, chest to heart.

“You feel— Dean, you feel so—” Cas rumbled against his collarbone, nearly incoherent with how low his voice swept, burning at Dean’s center. “I never imagined it would be like this. You’re amazing. God, you’re—”

“You haven’t even—” Cas’s fingers curled with little warning, searching, and Dean pitched forward with a broken whine, “—gotten inside me yet. You can save the speeches.”

Cas made an affronted noise. “No, I don’t think I will.”

And then he was stretching his fingers apart with added purpose, driving inside of Dean hard enough to punch the air from his lungs, and Dean shivered at the sound alone, the wet rhythm of Cas’s fingers fucking into him with sudden certainty, sudden precision that had Dean tensing all the way down to his toes as Cas centered on his prostate and struck.

With a hand to Dean’s back, and his mouth latched to the pulse point on Dean’s throat, Cas added a third finger, and Dean scrambled for the pillow beside Cas’s head, clawing at the sheets as the pressure rose like a stem to his chest, the pleasure rooting outwards to the rest of his body.

It was in this glory that Dean could almost forget why he’d held himself back from this.

Why he hadn’t allowed his body to remember pleasure like this existed. That getting fucked was just as good as doing the fucking, that it was better, even, and Dean liked it in a way he couldn’t explain, in a way he could only admit with his face shoved into a mattress and his backside aching from the force of brutal thrusts.

But Dean’s past was endless, his torments layered, and in his experience, most good things came with a world of bad. Being held often ended in being pinned. Being kissed meant being overpowered. Getting off— with a man, anyways, had always ended with cash or curses or both.

So he’d kept it in a box, in a locked case— his feelings, his attractions, his desires— everything, hidden. Too many memories awoke when he’d dare to unlock it, to inspect it, even. But Dean was treading the line now, shredding it with the dullest knife, thinning it thread by thread as Cas proved once again that Dean was capable of being held, and he was allowed to kiss first, and he would— if Cas had anything to say about it— get off tonight with very little to regret.

“More,” Dean whimpered, moving his hand back to clamp around Cas’s wrist to shove him deeper— a decision he quickly backpedaled on when his orgasm roared with little warning, forcing Dean to retract. “Wait, ‘m— I need you inside, now. I’m not gonna last much longer if you keep going.”

Cas looked ready to argue, forearm tightening up, but his breaths were beginning to rattle, and there was sweat shining on his forehead. He nodded eagerly, whispering some distortion of Dean’s name as he removed his fingers, gentle as anything.

Dean didn’t waste anymore time; once he got his weight back beneath him, rising on shaky knees, he poured lube straight over the length of Cas’s cock, lathering it in with a few languid twists, and held fast to Cas’s chest as he guided himself back, sinking down until he could feel himself give way.

“Oh, fuck,” Dean’s voice was thick, mangled, the abrupt sound of it hitting with impact.

Pressure seized his abdomen, circling his hips like a brand, and Dean fought for breath as his cock pulsed in agony, eyes losing all focus. He felt vaguely like he was floating all of a sudden, suspended in air, and Cas digging firm hands into his thighs was the only thing that kept him tethered as all sensation fled to his spine.

Dean felt his head fall back, eyebrows snapped low, and the soft, involuntary little sounds that had been hitching past his lips since the second Cas’s cock breached his hole, changed into one singular moan as he sank lower, as he slid home— taking Cas in his entirety.

“Dean,” Cas’s voice trembled out of him, breathless and reverent.

And Dean didn’t know how, but he wished and he hoped and he tried to harness that bond carved deep into his soul to send grace pouring from his ribs and into Cas, their usual exchange with roles reversed. Anything to ensure that Cas could feel what Dean was feeling. What he’d been feeling for months now, with every ounce and every second, the pull between them as traceable as a surging arrowhead set aflame.

A familiar yet undefinable word spilled from Cas’s lips, then. The same one from before, punching straight through his chest, and in an instant Dean knew he’d succeeded. There was something there, something glowing, just—

Dean raised himself up with trembling thighs, felt every inch of Cas as he dragged heat through his insides, and slammed back down— fucking himself with hardly any build up, chasing the subtle flash of blue he’d seen beneath fluttering eyelids.

“That’s it,” Dean gasped, high and breathless, watching Cas writhe beneath him with little shame. “I’ve got you, sweetheart. I got it now.”

There was no logic to the power Dean could feel heating in his core. No functionality. It was like aiming without sight, searching without hands. He was ignorant to it. But when he centered on Cas instead, his thoughts diving in at the root, at the connection that had stoked the fire in the first place, Dean found that there was a foothold to be had.

“You feel that?” Dean breathed.

For all the poetry Cas has been waxing earlier, he was practically silent now. All the adoration from before had melted into something large and throat seizing, too overwhelming to speak candidly, and Cas seemed flooded by the intensity of it, breaths turned deep, moans becoming guttural as Dean rolled his hips in tight little circles before snapping forward, forcing Cas deeper.

There was something almost shy about the smile that graced Cas’s lips. Quiet infatuation. But there was something greedy in it too, gripping, and even if Dean hadn’t been able to feel it already— the humming force, the burning power— he could see it in the blue tint that flooded behind Cas’s teeth.

The sight alone was enough to have an ugly sting of possessiveness rear in the back of Dean’s mind, like a rustle of wings in the dark. Something that roared and coveted, that wished to hoard their belongings like a territorial beast. Something that whispered mine.

“It’s my turn. It’s mine— I get to heal you now,” Dean told him selfishly, mouthing it into the hollow of Cas’s throat, at the shell of his ear, and the shudder he got in return was enough to make Dean whimper, the weight of his untouched cock becoming unbearable.

With his back arched, and his palms planted firmly on Cas’s heaving chest, Dean could just about make out the roof of the church from the window above the bed. It fell into focus without warning, without intention, and yet the realization that the sight of it didn’t drown him in an instant was a visceral thing. The very existence of it didn’t make him feel ashamed, or rotted, or even regretful.

Instead, Dean’s soul felt aligned, the faith he’d once abandoned slamming back into his being with a new anchor, a new hope, a better cause. Because this time, Dean could trust the beloner of his faith.

Cas would hold him with two hands.

“Dean, you’re—” Cas panted through a string of curses, tears pushing at his waterline. He shook with the weight of his own intention, with the presence of Dean’s founded gift, and with a voice more than ready to let go, said, “You’re so bright.”

Heat flooded Dean’s stomach by the gallon, by the ocean, and with little more than a shameless grind into the front of Cas’s abdomen, he came with a stuttered gasp. Flesh flaked to bones, blood boiled into steam, and Dean convulsed through it with his vision shot into glaring white, hands clamping down around Cas’s shoulders, suddenly afraid he might fall off the bed.

Cas steadied him in an instant. Warm arms wove around the bend of his back, palms running over sweat, and he pulled Dean down to his chest in a gentle sort of cradle before using his last shred of energy to piston his hips and thrust up into Dean himself, fucking him hard and relentless through his own release, his moans coarse enough to bend metal, to make every nerve in Dean’s system stand on end.

They all but collapsed afterward. Spent and exhausted, the air stale with heat. And though Dean’s stomach grew tight with sudden worry, the habit of fleeing rising up like bile, he stayed where he was, and tried not to think about what it meant that Cas’s arms around him never loosened. If anything they grew tighter, infinitely certain, and Dean burrowed his way in like an animal seeking shelter from the cold, softened to nothing but skin and hues and touch.

And there, lips pressed to the hollow of Cas’s throat, Dean breathed, and breathed, and breathed.

The most painful thing about realizing Cas was gone, stolen sometime in the night, was that Dean had to deduct this slowly.

His blankets were cold. The bed across the room was empty. The curtains were still drawn. When Dean found the strength to get up, his footfall over the wooden floors felt heavier in the silences they carried, nothing stirring in their wake. Downstairs, the stove burner was cleared. Rather than rising to the smell of coffee, or the burning stench that was Cas trying to make eggs, the air felt stale, and the window they oftentimes left cracked in the bathroom was locked tight.

They hadn’t cleaned their plates off the dinner table from the night before. There was still an empty popcorn bowl propped on the middle couch cushion.

Dean looked for signs of a break in. Worked up a full body sweat just trying to recall every sigil he’d hidden, every inch he’d fortified, needing to find what went wrong, what broke, where he fucked this up just like everything else— but there was nothing. Every symbol was clean, every door was locked. The only thing wrong was that there was nothing wrong.

No problem. No reason. Every theory pointed to Cas leaving all on his own, and Dean stood there in the resounding quiet with an ache spreading through his sternum, sinking into his veins like poison.

Dean didn’t even bother calling his name. Didn’t worry himself with shouting into the treeline and searching the barren woods. Dean could feel it; in his chest, at his core, something deep in the scar on his shoulder. Cas was gone.

And he was somewhere very far away.

Thinking wasn’t an option. If Dean let his mind wander, let his thoughts truly kick start and set off— he’d never get past the threshold, never make it back upstairs, and Dean needed to pack. Needed to get out of the church, out of the state, everything honing into clear, razor sharp focus.

The Apocalypse. Lilith’s rampage. And Sam, right at the center of it.

Dean made a single trip, bringing only what he could carry, and left the clergy house after what had become an oasis of almost nine days. He sent Sam a rushed text message, trying not to get sick as he maneuvered the Impala back out onto the road, and they made a quick plan to meet in Illinois, a fair halfway mark between Ohio and South Dakota.

It wasn’t until 400 miles down the line at a truck stop in Indiana that an old phone of John’s started ringing in the glove compartment, and Dean was forced to uproot an even bigger portion of his past for the beating with just a few simple words.

“No, you— you don’t understand, I need to speak to John Winchester. I’m— I’m his son.”

Seeing Sam again lost all of the weight it might have carried when their plans to meet in Illinois turned into a mad dash to Minnesota to catch some Adam kid in a lie.

“Hey,” Sam was the first to speak, catching Dean’s eye over the roof of his blue two-door Charger. Borrowed from Bobby’s, no doubt. He waved Dean over with an awkward hand, the two of them hovering on either side of the empty parking lot. “Wow, man, you look—”

“Let’s not do the whole bait and toss, alright?” Dean winced, something in his stomach sweeping low with grief. “We need to book it to Cousin Oliver’s, make sure we get there before this fucker does.”

Sam smiled, the pull of his mouth looking almost nervous. “Are you planning to booby trap the whole restaurant?”

“Only our table,” Dean shrugged.

“He’s just a kid, Dean.”

“No, no, no. No. Don’t let him manipulate you. He’s a fucking monster trying to find an in to our already jam packed schedules. We shouldn’t believe a word he says,” Dean demanded, and he shouldn’t be surprised, really, that he’d been back with his brother for a grand total of thirty seconds and already felt a spool of rage unwinding within him, settling at their feet.

“Is the idea that Dad… got around, really that hard to believe?” Sam mused, frowning.

Dean threw a hand up to his face. “Oh, dude, gross. Now I’m thinking about Dad sex.”

“I’m just saying, man. I mean, have you checked Dad’s journal? Maybe there’s dates that match up.”

They stared at each other for a long moment, debating, and the eventual walk back to the trunk of the Impala was a silent one, neither of them willing to admit that the time they’d spent apart hadn’t helped as much as they had hoped.

It had been quite some time since Dean had looked through John’s journal. It used to be a ritual of his. A habit before every solo hunt, something dependable that held the weight of his family, his history, his blood. For a long time, it had meant so much more to Dean than the claim John had over it. Most of what he knew about his mom came from that journal. Fractions of his childhood he couldn’t even remember.

But this time, when Dean took it from its spot in the arsenal and flipped through the memorized sections, settling on a relative month sometime in the early 90s, there wasn’t a single emotion that stirred awake.

Dean’s eyes went soft and unfocused, a specific excerpt making his breath slow.

January 22, 1990

Possible case in Windom, Minnesota. Missing persons. Grave robberies. Autopsy reports are some of the worst I’ve ever seen. Not sure what this thing could be, but the death toll is racking. Just gotta get the boys somewhere safe and I can check it out.

Dean trailed slow fingers over the center spine where the remnants of the next three pages were torn and tossed. Decidedly destroyed. Betrayal clawed at Dean’s throat, crushing his windpipe, and he spared one last glance at the written date before all but shoving the journal into Sam’s chest and turning away, hiding his face.

Of course. How did Dean not— this made perfect sense.

Dean had turned eleven years old on the pullout couch of some one-star motel room while his dad was a state away. While his dad was here, warming some stranger's bed, Dean had watched the clock tick under the blue static of the television light, waiting for the phone to ring, or the door to open, or for the Impala’s headlights to flash through the front window.

This place— the woman, the kid— this was all just one of the many gaps in time where John would prioritize something else. Someone else. One of the countless times he’d leave, barely an explanation, and Dean would have to fill in the blank in his head for his own sanity.

This made all the sense in the world.

“Dean,” Sam said, almost mournful. He looked up from his own inspection of the journal, eyes weak with worry.

“I’m bringing my gun,” Dean replied curtly, and slammed the trunk closed.

Adam Milligan looked as frail as a fawn tucked into the corner of the restaurant, body still shivering from the outside cold. He couldn’t have been older than eighteen, fresh from school and exhausted in the eyes, his smile starting to wear into his skin, and Dean took one look at him and hardened his walls, forgetting what he’d found in the journal.

Because this couldn’t be John Winchester’s kid. It just couldn’t.

He was too small. Too pensive, too soft spoken. He had mittens covering his knuckles. There was a scab on his bottom lip from where he’d been gnawing at the flesh with his teeth. This wasn’t what you were supposed to look like when you were John Winchester’s son. Dean had spent his whole fucking life knowing this; he’d spent even longer making sure that he lived by it.

“Well, if you’re John’s kid, how come we’ve never heard of you?” Dean asked eventually, throwing himself into the fire before Sam could steer the conversation elsewhere.

“‘Cause John and I didn't really know each other. Not until a few years ago, anyway.”

“What do you mean?” Sam asked, keeping his voice steady, just simple curiosity.

Adam shrugged. “My mom never talked about him. I knew some stuff—”

“What kind of stuff?” Dean interjected, harsh as steel. Sam gave him a sideways glance, mouth pinched.

“My mom's a nurse, and my dad came into the E.R. pretty torn up— hunting accident or something. And I knew his name— John Winchester. That’s about it. We’re not exactly a nuclear family,” Adam chuckled, dry and humorless, hands fidgeting over the table.

“Yeah, well, who is these days?” Sam smiled, and the ease of it, the casual quip, the interaction coming across almost brotherly— made Dean’s stomach turn in on itself just on principle, teeth creaking as he clenched his jaw.

“So, when did you, uh, finally meet him?” Dean asked.

“When I was twelve,” He recalled easily, tone laced with sudden fondness. “My mom had one of his old numbers, and after I begged her— God, constantly— she finally called him. When John heard he had a son, he raced to town. I mean, he dropped everything. He drove all night.”

Between one beat and the next, Dean had his gun drawn beneath the rise of the table. And within a different beat, he had the hammer pulled back and cocked with a single metal click.

Sam pointedly cleared his throat.

“Oh, yeah. Sounds just like John,” Dean sneered, and a tremor broke out around his mouth as he smiled, the look of it chipped and unsteady.

Sam and Dean watched in equal horror as Adam, completely unawares, passed every test laid out before him. Holy water didn’t burn him. The pure silver utensils didn’t earn so much as a flinch. He ate his ordered breakfast in a state of complete obliviousness, and reluctant or not, Dean slowly lowered his gun, hiding it in the bulk of his jacket.

Dean just couldn’t get past it. The kid was too normal. Too unaltered to share the blood of a Winchester.

But there was something in him that came alive at the mention of his missing mother. Something angry and broken. Boyish and demanding. And when Dean finally relented— fed up with the failed silver trick, with the pointless holy water swap, revealing they were apparent brothers, something else rose beneath his normal facade.

“I’ve got brothers?” Adam stammered, dropping everything just to stare at them in awe. His eyes crinkled. “That’s great—”

“No, you don’t have brothers,” Dean snapped at him, flushed with sudden anger, “look, man, I don’t know if you’re a hunter, or what kind of game you’re playing here—”

“I’m not playing any game!” Adam argued, but Dean was already shifting the gun to his waistband, hiding it with a swipe of clothing, and standing up.

“Let’s go, Sam,” Dean bumped the table on his way to leave, careless as anything, and to his credit, Sam followed with little hesitation, staying right on Dean’s heels.

“I can prove it,” Adam insisted, raising his voice desperately, and Sam and Dean both turned to look at him, stopping halfway to the door.

The brothers shared a contemplative look, silently falling back into a perfected routine of speaking without words, without hardly any gestures. Dean couldn’t help it; the moment pulled air back into his lungs, made the whole day feel a lot more normal, and he relented.

The two of them turned back to the table, and let Adam speak.

The last thing Dean expected was to be taken to a white picket house where he found his father’s face in the picture frames of strangers.

Adam was even more reserved than he’d been before, clearly realizing the sensitivity of the situation, but he gave Sam and Dean the tour nonetheless. Even absent and undependable as ever, the house still held remnants of John Winchester in its walls. Hanging in the kitchen, just above the sink, was a framed flower press of a bouquet John had gifted Kate Milligan in 2003. On Adam’s shelf in his room, he had a signed baseball framed in glass, a Christmas present sent by mail.

Even the deck of cards on the coffee table was John’s. A rare box set he’d gotten from a tackle shop in Maine sometime in the 80s; Dean had an identical one stashed in the Impala somewhere.

But it was one picture in particular, that set Dean’s chest ablaze. A captured moment at a Minneapolis ball game that looked awfully like the kind of normal John used to spend hours convincing Dean he had no business mingling with.

“He took you to a fucking baseball game?” Dean demanded, unable to stop himself, voice scraping through clenched teeth.

Dean tried to imagine John taking him to a game. Tried to imagine the crowds and the heat and the food; maybe it was here that Dean would’ve had his first sip of beer. It was here that he would’ve spent his seventeenth birthday, rather than in the basement of some poor grieving woman whose sister had been murdered for something as God gifted as love.

Dean tried to imagine it. He really, really tried.

Adam had taken the question so casually, so nonchalant. Surely it wasn’t so impossible. But Dean couldn’t, and it was, and John had been dead for over two years, Dean thought he was over the hard-hitting revelations by now, but how could he be?

How could he be when Dean got four-mile runs and midnight shooting practices where Adam got sports games and mall trips and birthday surprises? How could any of this feel fair when Dean was the brutalized test run before his Dad finally discovered what it meant to be a father?

“Yeah, why?” Adam grinned, glancing at the picture clamped tight in Dean’s hands. “What did Dad do with you on your birthdays?”

Adam Milligan was a Winchester through and through, pure blood and bone, and nothing made Dean more certain of this than building a pier in the sleepless hours of the morning and setting fire to his body by sunrise.

Turned out, the ghoul John had killed here all those years ago hadn’t been the only one, and this story, like many others, ended with revenge. They came here with the intention of killing everyone John had known, and while Dean took care of them, they succeeded in their mission.

Adam was John’s son. And like his mother, he died because of it.

“Maybe we could bring him back,” Sam said, staring into the fire with a heavy look. “Get ahold of Cas, call in a favor.”

Dean looked sideways at Sam, shock clear in his face. He didn’t think he’d ever heard Sam mention Cas in such a positive way before. Not since his faith had been shattered. Not ever, really. And of course it happened now, with Sam’s face still pruned with bruises, and Cas’s disappearance leaving Dean with little leverage to cash in.

“Adam’s in a better place,” Dean told him, deflecting, but he meant it all the same.

Adam was going to miss The End, the Earth roasting. He wouldn’t have to witness the destruction of the planet. Or the universe's most decrepit angels use their bodies as worldly weapons. Adam wouldn’t have to watch his brothers fail.

Dean cut his eyes to Sam amidst the firelight, prepared to blame the smoke if the shine in his eyes was mentioned. Dean still hadn’t told him about what Chuck said; their doomed destiny, their vessels carved by God himself. But there were a lot of conversations he and Sam had yet to have.

I beat you bloody, Dean wanted to say, wanted to acknowledge, the words like acid in his throat. And you broke me in half. So where does that leave us?

“You know, I finally get why you and Dad butted heads so much. You two were practically the same person,” Dean said, speaking the truth just as he discovered it, head ringing with the sort of effort it took to stomach his family. “I mean, I worshiped the guy, you know. I— I dressed like him, I acted like him, I listen to the same music. But you were more like him than I’ll ever be.”

The world fell silent for a blessed few seconds. Then, with a conflicted frown twisting his features, Sam said, “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

Dean stared into the open fire.

“You take it any way you want.”

There was nothing exceptionally out of the ordinary about Dean fishing off a fall-swept pier in the middle of a downpour.

He had this dream every couple of months. Same lake, same weather, same casted line. He’d spent a weekend here with Sam and Bobby when he was thirteen. They had stayed in a cabin just up the creek, and spent the quiet nights roasting s’mores and cooking spam and hoping desperately that John wouldn’t come to sweep them away without a moment's notice.

So it was familiar, comforting even, to find himself here, now of all times. But that serenity dropped free to something much darker when Cas appeared at Dean’s right, his figure looming like a curse.

Dean flinched on instinct, fear coating his voice as he said, “Cas? What the hell?” with no response.

A part of Dean wanted to feel relieved. Overjoyed even. Blood in the water or not, Cas was back, he was in his dreams again, and Dean wanted to talk, to fight, to kiss him and ask if he meant it, if he missed it, if what had happened between them in that church healed him the way it had healed Dean.

But all Dean could feel was tainted dread as he watched Cas’s mouth move in wordless static, choking as though his throat had been cut. Within a single blink, Cas’s eyes were filled with blood, tear tracks turned red down his cheeks.

Dean nearly sent his lawn chair into the lake in his rush to stand. “Cas, what—”

A sudden jolt of pain kicked off like a gunshot to the ear, ringing sharp in Dean’s skull. His knees went weak with it, joints aching, and he raised an arm out as if to shield himself, cowering behind an unfathomable light. It was in this movement that Dean’s shoulder went white hot, suddenly flayed raw amidst a shower of singed nerves.

Cas is in trouble, Dean thought instantly, chasing that feeling, their connection— and the scar on his shoulder pulsed red, glowing like a beacon beneath his shirt before vanishing. Cas followed soon after. A flickering image dying out.

And the only trace he left behind, was a sudden flash of a state highway sign and a mailbox number, stamped into the front of Dean’s mind as he tore himself awake.

Jimmy Novak was a faith driven man born in Pontiac, Illinois, where he married his high school sweetheart, lived a harmonious existence for the better part of his privileged life, and said yes to being the war shell to an angel of the Lord.

He wore Cas’s face as easily as anything. It had been his before it was Castiel’s, after all, but it still wasn’t right. Not to Dean’s mind. Not to the fragile muscle beating away in his chest. And while Dean had been battling masks and vessels and what it meant to love someone carved by light for what felt like an eternity now, it was this of all things that he hadn’t been prepared for.

A false face. A mindless projection. Everything shifted a fraction of an inch to the left.

And the worst part about it? They couldn’t even let him leave. Angels abandoning their vessels wasn’t exactly common, and with the war rearing high, only a few cue balls left to pocket, the demons would do anything to get their hands on an angel informant.

The last thing Jimmy needed to do was go back to his family with that target on his back. And the last thing Dean needed to do was babysit the guy whose dick he had technically sucked.

It was Sam who suggested taking the first watch shift. Jimmy was a loose cannon here, a newly free man gnawing at the bit, and they couldn’t trust him not to bolt at some point in the night. Given this, the last thing Dean expected was for Sam to attempt an escape first, disappearing outside the motel door with a swipe of his wallet before he could notice Dean already stirring awake.

Jimmy’s attempt came just minutes later.

“Not so fast Jimmy McMook,” Dean snapped, feigning sleep to not blow his cover, and Jimmy spun around to gawk at him with raised hands, already halfway to the motel door. “Wind it back, come on. Back under the covers.”

Despite an exceptional eye roll, Jimmy obliged with little more than a whip of his arms, feet dragging as he returned to his bed.

“This is just ridiculous, no one is looking for me. Not the angels, not the demons. No one but my, oh, yeah, wife and daughter—”

“God, you really never shut up, do you? Hell of a dynamic change. You’re gonna give me fucking whiplash after today,” Dean grumbled as he got out of bed, retrieving his gun from underneath the pillow.

He crossed the room in four quick strides, hoping to catch where Sam had run off to, or maybe who with, but the lot was empty when Dean peered through the window, and the Impala had been left untouched.

Dean pursed his lips and tore the curtain back in place.

“I’d expect this from Sam, maybe. He’s… intense. But you? Aren’t you the brother with morale? The one who wants to reunite families and save lives?” Jimmy scoffed despairingly, toeing his shoes back off with little finesse before sprawling across the mattress.

Confusion stamped Dean’s worry out like a light, and he turned back to glare at Jimmy from his spot by the door.

“The hell are you talking about? Sam wants to get you back home just as much as—” Dean hurried to defend, but stopped short with a sharp inhale. He was across the room in a matter of seconds, perching himself at the edge of his bed across from Jimmy. “Wait, you— so you know us. You remember that much at least. Sam’s a douche, I’m a saint— right on. Anything else I should know?”

“I don’t know what Castiel was going to tell you. I wish I did, Dean,” And it was his name in Cas’s voice, a bruising word on a familiar tongue, but the font was different and the tone was all wrong and Dean felt empty in the wake of it.

“Right,” Dean mumbled.

“And as much as I’m not loving the prisoner treatment, I am sorry for… this. I can't say I’m not glad to be back. But when I agreed to Castiel’s terms, I wasn’t exactly expecting to ever be myself again,” Jimmy revealed earnestly, shrugging like it was simple that he’d signed his life away with little qualms. Then, he seemed to soften, shifting into the selfless man Dean sort of always pictured he’d been, and said, “I can’t imagine what this must be like for you. Talking to me but seeing him. I really am sorry.”

Dean huffed out a nervous laugh, hand skittering upwards to rub at his neck. “So you know about that too, huh?”

Jimmy’s face went bright with amusement, skin springing with laugh lines, and Dean watched his head tilt fondly in a mirrored vision of Cas himself, his heart beating all kinds of frantic.

“Castiel might have possessed my body, and kept me hidden away, but we were one. In every sense of the word,” Jimmy said, and even as Dean’s gaze fell swiftly to the motel carpet, heat pushing color to his cheeks, his sincerity never wavered. He smiled kindly, eyes warm, “Of course I know how he feels about you.”

It was a silent shot in the blackest dark, a silent implosion to Dean’s center, and Dean found himself wading through the rubble with shaky hands, his breath stolen from him. He didn’t respond; couldn’t. Rather than search for words, Dean unloaded the clip of his gun and thumbed at the top of the casing before reloading it pointlessly, needing an anchor, something familiar that could be his singular lamp in a shrouding storm.

“Yeah, well. I guess you missed the part where he ditched me and left you rotting in some warehouse,” Dean quipped bitterly, because this felt real now, presumably in a way it hadn’t before, and even if Cas’s remains were walking and talking and breathing in air, it didn’t diminish how the angel himself was somewhere in the wind, wringing Dean dry with worry.

Jimmy seemed to pale at the sudden change in tone, still attuned to Dean in a way that neither of them dared to look at too closely.

“There has to be an explanation. For all of this,” Jimmy declared, and he looked at Dean with all the conviction of a man who still held fast to his faith, even when he’d spent the last year of his life dangled at the war front. His smile was genuine, reassuring. “I might not believe in the motives of the angels like I used to. But I still believe in Cas.”

Knowing about Sam’s past, his history of corruption, all of it stemming back to a nursery and a desperate deal— was one thing. Seeing the reality of it in the ripple of his back, the bend of his spine as he drank, demon blood coated in a thick seal around his mouth, was another.

Sam’s powers were what saved them in the end. What got Jimmy’s family to safety, everything boiling down to a moment of impossible strength, Sam’s abilities allowing them to take the upper hand in an otherwise shitty situation.

But it didn’t make Dean feel any better about it. And his gaze was reserved solely for the floor as Sam returned to his side, Cas’s repossession of Jimmy ending in a subtle flash and a pooling of grace to his ribcage. Jimmy’s gunshot wound stitched itself up with a swipe of his hand, and the bullet clattered to the ground, sticky with blood.

Jimmy’s daughter, Claire, watched in horror as the creature wearing her father’s mask brushed past her with little recognition. Dean held a similar look when Cas showed no plans of stopping, sweeping right by both him and Sam without so much as a glance.

“Cas, wait, hold up. Is everything okay?” Dean scrambled forward just to reach him, just to catch him by the elbow with a comforting hand. “What were you gonna tell me?”

Everything in Cas’s posture went rigid beneath Dean’s hand, and with a violent jerk of his shoulder, Dean was forced back as Cas rounded on him, eyes sharpened to merciless slits.

“I learned my lesson while I was away, Dean. I serve Heaven. I don’t serve man. And I certainly don’t serve you.”

It was steady. It was perfect. It was practiced, the words dripping out like a mantra, and Dean was given no time to respond before Cas was fleeing as if tugged on a hook, his steps following a calculated track, everything poised and proper and unforgiving.

Dean could do little more than stare at his retreating back, his stomach riddled with knots. A tension had been growing there for days now, since leaving the church, since Adam and the rest of the world came back into glaring focus, and it continued to sour in the pit of Dean’s gut long after returning to the car, lingering as they headed West for Bobby’s.

“Alright. Let’s hear it,” Sam finally sighed, nearly two hours into the drive.

Dean didn’t bother looking away from the road. “What?”

“Drop the bomb, man. You saw what I did. Come on. Stop the car, take a swing.”

Even in the darkness of the car, his vision swallowed by moonlight, Dean could see the anger framing Sam’s face. The guilt masked with frustration. He could also see the bruising; the coloring over his cheek and brow bone from the swings Dean had already divvied up when his limits had met their bursting point all those days ago.

Dean’s heart ached with exhaustion.

“I’m not gonna take a swing,” He said, softly.

“Then scream, chew me out,” Sam demanded.

“I’m not mad, Sam.”

“Right. Look, at least let me explain myself—”

“Don’t. I don’t care,” Dean told him, shutting this down before it could even start.

“You don’t care,” Sam countered back, incredulous, and Dean finally threw him a biting glare, hands tightening over the breadth of the wheel.

“What do you want me to say— that I’m disappointed? Yeah, I am. But mostly I’m just tired, man. And I’m done,” Dean sighed, looking desperately for an out, a better solution that could be waiting for them at the end of the road. But there wasn’t one, and there couldn’t be, and ultimately, the world was asking far too much of Dean, “I’m just done.”

They stopped for gas three hours out from Sioux Falls, and as Sam went to the bathroom, wiping desperately at the red tint still lingering around his mouth, Dean went around the back to make a phone call much like the one he’d made in Lawrence all those years ago, throat shredded with emotion.

The plan was decided in a matter of minutes. With just a few short exchanges. The worst had happened and the resulting decision had to follow, and that was that. This wasn’t right, it was necessary, and Dean had to remember that, had to remind himself with every breath he took afterwards.

“All good to go?” Sam asked upon his return, rapping quick knuckles over the roof of the Impala. He had bought a package of gum inside and was chewing with childlike vigor, eyes squinting in the sunlight.

He offered Dean a piece without a word, stretching one long arm to hand it over, and Dean saw it as the peace offering it was, paling at the thought. He hesitated, and even with the plan waiting for them back at Bobby’s, accepted it anyway.

“Ready if you are,” Dean said.

Like most of the situations Dean had been thrust into for the better half of a year now, he didn’t have anything to compare this to.

There had been glimpses; Sam breaking his arm when he was five, Sam crying himself to sleep after Dean told him The Truth, Dean having to stitch up Sam’s first gunshot wound when Sam was barely sixteen, nothing but a minor graze to the shoulder that had had Dean wincing through every stitch as Sam sobbed into the meat of his palm.

“You’re gonna be fine, Sammy. Just think of the scar. Chicks dig scars,” Dean had told him, smiling through the sweat, through the gut curdling feeling of his brother's blood sliding between his fingers. “This is nothing, man. I took my first bullet at thirteen. You remember that? You were snotting all over the place, kinda like you are now. You got me beat on this, big time.”

None of it came even close.

Sam had never been in this much pain before; Dean was certain of it. He had spent his life making sure of it. And now he was the one locking the door, twisting the knife, nailing every single spike into the sinking coffin.

It went on for hours. Days. Sam’s angry shouts soon became desperate pleas, and those turned into sobbing fits so violent Dean was certain he could hear Sam getting sick, throwing up what little he had left in his stomach. It was almost unbearable when Sam’s screaming eventually just became a mantra of Dean’s name, begging him to see reason, to help him, to let him out before he died.

Dean thought it was this threat in particular that finally set Bobby back on his heels. This, or the sudden seizure that had forced them both to have to tie Sam to the panic room bed, unable to stop his rotting body from trying to hurt itself.

“I’m gonna ask one last time. Are we sure we're doing the right thing?” Bobby asked, treading that line ever so carefully, his voice tight and uncertain.

“Bobby, you saw what was happening to him down there. The demon blood is killing him.”

Bobby took a harsh sip of whiskey, knocking the glass back before slamming it down on his desk. “No, it isn’t. We are,” He finally replied.

Dean stared at him. He could still feel the strain in his arms from where he’d had to hold his brother down to keep him from shaking out of his skull.

“What?” Dean asked.

“I’m sorry. I can’t bite my tongue any longer. We’re killing him,” Bobby insisted, any trace of serenity he’d tried to maintain over these last few days unraveling. “Keeping him locked up down there. This ‘cold turkey’ thing ain’t working. If— if he doesn’t get what he needs… soon… Sam’s not gonna last much longer.”

“No,” Dean said, even as his heart leaped to his throat and panic circled his innards. “I’m not giving him demon blood. I won’t do it.”

“And if he dies?” Bobby demanded.

“Then at least he dies human!”

And that was the true ultimatum, wasn’t it? Either a monster for a brother or a dead brother. You get a stranger in Sam’s clothes, or you bury your child before he can turn thirty. It was a tragedy no matter what road Dean took, but he already knew what he would choose regardless, and maybe that was what hurt the most.

In a reality where God abandoned his toys and the corrupted were left to decide what to do, who to sacrifice, who to worship, how could Dean let Sam strip himself of everything he was? Of everything human? Of everything they were fighting to keep?

“I won’t let him do this to himself. I can’t,” Dean said. “I guess I found my line. I won’t let my brother turn into a monster.”

It was already late into the afternoon by the time Dean made his way outside to Bobby’s car lot, bursting out the back door with a cigarette already in hand. He paced the porch for a minute or two, piping smoke like an engine, and descended deeper into the property when his heart didn’t falter, his pulse roaring on like a taunting kick drum.

Dean found himself marching over to the courtyard by the garage, feet dragging up loose gravel. He kicked a shower of rocks against a row of decaying cars baking hot in the descending sun, and had half a mind to grab the nearest crowbar from the tool shed, the world brewed anger coiling hot in his guts aching for an outlet, some hashing of violence that was planned and centered and manageable.

The kind of violence Dean felt he might actually live through.

It was there, standing on the precipice, that Dean made a choice. He turned his eyes to the sky. His voice to the stars. And for the longest time, nothing ever came. It started to rain after the first hour, a gradual sprinkle becoming a miserable downpour, and Dean was forced under the awning of the garage with his teeth set a chatter, water seeping down the back of his jacket.

It wasn’t until late that same night, the day long since passed, that Cas finally appeared beneath the courtyard’s singular light fixture, a shadow bending around his head like a makeshift halo.

“Well, it’s about time,” Dean breathed out, voice cracking. “I’ve been screaming myself hoarse out here for hours now.”

“What do you want?” Cas asked dismissively, face pinching as he fled from the rain and joined Dean beneath the high rise of the awning.

Something in Dean’s chest twisted at the sight of him. Both in longing and sorrow, wanting Cas close but shocked cold by what he saw; it was as if time had been reversed. Standing before him, stock still and blank-faced, was the Castiel he’d met in a barn just miles down the road from where he’d been buried. The angel who had tasked him with God’s Plan. And gone, was the Cas who had finally accepted Dean’s warmth with little mind to the powerhouse upstairs.

“You can start with what the hell happened in Illinois,” Dean demanded, still desperate for answers even with Jimmy gone and memories from that church in Ohio flattened to rearview pavement.

Castiel stared at him. “What do you mean?”

“Cut the crap. You were trying to tell me something. I was dreaming, and then you—”

“It was nothing of import,” Cas declared, voice thick with insistence, begging Dean not to push.

A wall rose up between them, towering and barbed wired, placed with desperation, and Dean stared at it with little empathy, stepping forward to crowd Cas’s space. The shift was immediate; the difference was jarring. Where the old Castiel would’ve stood his ground against Dean’s temper, rising to his height with mannered threats, this Cas went deathly still, and he stared into the muddy gravel hoping the Earth would break way and swallow him whole.

“It’s Heaven, isn’t it?” Dean whispered, barely capable of forming the words. A weak tremor shook apart Cas’s lips, and he struggled around something impossible, brow pinching in agony as Dean said, “They did something to you.”

“Dean,” He finally said, and it was like breaching water, armor crumbling. He shook his head, eyes rising to the ceiling above them, to the pouring sky. “I can’t. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?” Dean asked, and his gaze seared itself to the shape of Cas’s mouth, remembering with striking clarity how he tasted. “Sorry for what exactly? Ditching me in Ohio? Up and disappearing at the eleventh hour? Tossing Jimmy in our laps?”

Vaguely, like a light in his peripheral, Dean could acknowledge that the blame wasn’t all on Cas. That maybe, probably, hopefully, leaving the way he did hadn’t been his call. That the angels must’ve taken him, Heaven must’ve hurt him, and this was the battered remains of yet another person in Dean’s life who had gotten too close. But Dean had dealt with this once before.

He’d coaxed Cas out of the role of the soldier, the same role Dean had been forced to endure since the grueling age of four, and God be damned if Dean wasn’t going to try and do it all over again.

“Nothing that’s occurred is that simple, Dean. But if it comforts you to see it that way, then so be it,” Cas stepped away, visibly shaken. The distance he put between them seared a hole in Dean’s stomach, and he watched in silence as Cas steadied his breath, taking in air he didn’t need. “Get to the reason you really called me. It’s about Sam, right?”

How Cas already knew, Dean had little idea. But the thought made him anxious, made him squirm to think about Heaven keeping constant tabs.

“Can he do it?” Dean asked. “Kill Lilith, stop the Apocalypse?”

“Possibly, yes. But as you know, you’d have to take certain steps.”

Dean’s head dropped with a watery smile, and his voice was devoid of all question as he said, “Crank up the hell-blood regimen.”

“Consuming the amount of blood it would take to kill Lilith would change your brother forever. Most likely, he will become the next creature you would feel compelled to kill,” Cas explained, his eyes staying decidedly distant. Despite this, his next words came with added weight, like they pained him just to speak. “There’s no reason this would have to come to pass, Dean. We believe it’s you. Not your brother.”

“And who is we, exactly?” Dean countered, not believing a word of it. “‘Cause as far as I can tell, the angels don’t exactly have me in their best graces. I’m their last resort, the one who gets sent up to bat if the other brother screws the golden pooch.”

“The angels are weary of you, yes. But only because of your lack of cooperation. We are offering our support. The only question for us now is whether you’re willing to accept it.”

Cas kept using those words. Words like we, and us, and our. Phrases that tied him with the angels in a way that was harsh and irrevocable, spoken with such a pointedness, Dean could barely believe it was sincere.

“What does that mean, Cas? You’re not making any— you don’t even sound like yourself—”

“Dean,” And where he used to speak Dean’s name like an awakening, he used it now like a warning, like a final shot before the safety would be turned off. “To stand up and accept your role, that is their last requirement of you. You are the one who will stop it,” Cas’s gaze lifted with little doubt now, staring at Dean deliberately as he said, “Do you understand? Do you get it?”

There was an intensity that wasn’t there before. An underlying sense of urgency that Dean couldn’t quite decipher, a hidden desperation just barely peeled back. Cas was trying to tell him something. But Dean, for the life of him, couldn’t begin to imagine what it was.

“If I do this… Sammy doesn’t have to?”

Cas’s shoulders deflated. “If seeing it that way convinces you to join our efforts, then yes.”

The words stung at Dean’s center, and he let out a disbelieving laugh, stuffing his hands into his pockets. In a matter of seconds, everything within him was drawn back, refusing to meet Cas head on.

“God, you’re a dick these days,” Dean muttered. Nothing but silence answered him back, and a train rattled past far into the distance, surrounding them in echoes. Dean was thankful for its timing; the risk of hearing Sam screaming even at this distance was ever present. “I don’t trust the angels. You know that better than anyone.”

So when I tell you I’m doing this, you know who for, don’t you? When I tell you I’m trusting Heaven, you know all of that trust belongs to you?

“I’m well aware,” Castiel nodded, and Dean didn’t think it rang all that true.

“Fine. I’m in.”

Relief spread fast and obvious through Cas’s limbs, and he swallowed thickly, straightening back to attention. “You give yourself over wholly? To the service of God and his angels?”

“Yeah, exactly,” Dean coughed, but it wasn’t good enough, wasn’t real enough, and Cas more than anyone could feel that, could pick it out blind or senseless.

“Say it,” Cas pushed.

“I give myself over wholly, to serve God, and you guys,” Dean paraphrased, voice grating, trying to sound convincing.

Cas plowed on. “You swear to follow his will, and his word, as swiftly and obediently as you did your own father’s?”

Beneath the blare of the passing train and the rain belting on, static began to sing between the lining of Dean’s nerves. A pressure, soft and delicate, poured like honey in the cracks of his soul, flooding his system with warmth. Even without a gesture, or a familiar two-fingered touch to the bend of his brow bone, a generous whirl of grace seized his heart in a weakened try at comfort, and Dean suddenly felt very much like crying.

“Yes, I swear,” Dean croaked. And with a satisfied nod, Cas relented, and his questioning seized. The feeling in Dean’s chest followed just seconds later, dissipating beneath his skin. “Now what?”

“Now you wait,” He told Dean, already preparing for flight, to leave this planet after a job well done. Dean wondered briefly if Heaven would be happy with his answer. He wondered if Cas would be applauded for his efforts. “And we call on you when it’s time.”

Chapter Text

There were many parts about Dean’s life that he knew, reasonably, were not normal. And it went far beyond the classic I have a dead mom, or it’s just my dad and brother and me, that as a kid had set most people back on their heels, no matter how hard Dean tried to shrug it off.

For Dean, not being normal meant learning to shoot a gun by the time he was six. Not being normal, meant luring some piece of shit monster to the back of a truck stop so his Dad could get the jump on him after he’d already told Dean what a pretty mouth he had.

Not being normal, looked like road rash and survivors guilt and staying quiet, simply because not biting the hand that fed you became a complicated rule when it was also the hand that slapped you.

And it meant that when Dad found Sam’s acceptance letter from Stanford, stashed away at the bottom of his duffle bag, he held none of the fatherly pride one might expect in this sort of situation. There was no congratulations, no expression of joy or relief or even sadness. Nothing like that.

What happened was a fight. What happened was a screaming match in the dead of night at some backwater motel in Louisiana, where Dean had to elbow his way in between his dad and brother and put a firm hand on either man’s chest, planting himself directly in the line of fire.

“You must think I’m some monster, don’t you? That I actually wanted this life for you boys?” John demanded, shoulders rising with his voice, making himself big and daunting in that way he did, the way that resembled shadows and devils and the creatures they hunted in the dark. He pushed against the hold Dean had on him, craning to look Sam in the eye as he screamed, “We are here for a reason, and walking out on your family, on your mother—”

“Mom is dead,” Sam all but heaved, “and if she could see you now, carting us around, ruining our lives, she would wish you were too.”

The words might have been for John, but Dean was the one who was hit, and they pierced through the back of his chest like a spear, tearing through blood and muscle.

Even in the moment, with his vision blurred with panic, Dean had still understood the absurdity of it. How not normal it all really was. He was hurting too, the idea that Sam would leave him alone to shoulder all of this surfacing like a sore in his innards. But that didn’t excuse how Dad was reacting, and that didn’t keep Dean’s lungs from all but exploding when John shoved him away with an arm to the throat, and proceeded to slap Sam across the face.

It was quick. It was harmless. A simple backhand that did little more than rattle Sam to his core, flooring him with shock, because this was new. Sam had never caught the tail end of John’s anger before; that was Dean’s job. But it wouldn’t have mattered what form it had come in, how bad of a hit; Dean watched as Sam staggered back, terrified, hand clutched to his cheek, and Dean’s vision went stark red.

“Don’t you—!” He couldn’t even get the words out before he was shoving John with all his strength, two shaky hands pressed to the front of a beer stained shirt, “don’t you fucking touch him! That’s enough!”

There was something almost awed in the expression on John’s face as he crashed back into the motel wall. A flash of jarring disbelief that morphed into grumbling anger as he knocked a cheap painting over onto the floor, the sound of shattering glass ripping the silence in half.

Every part of Dean wanted to crumble. Wanted to give in and get lost and never look his Dad in the face again if it meant this; failing no matter how hard he tried, watching Sam hurt no matter how many years he’d spent taking hits.

“Go to the car,” Dean snatched Sam’s duffle bag from the bed and tossed it in Sam’s direction.

Sam caught the bag and pressed it to his chest, all the belongings he had in the world, and stared at Dean, eyes wide. “Dean—”

“Get in the fucking car,” Dean snapped, and the way his voice broke made things about a million times worse. Sam was on the verge of tears by the time he grabbed his jacket, packed his laptop, and headed for the door.

It wasn’t until then, that John spoke again.

“If you walk out that door, that’s it, you hear me? If you walk out on this family, don’t you ever come back.”

The words forced Sam to go still, hesitating, but not for the reasons John had probably wanted. Instead, Sam turned to look at John in the lowlight of the room, door ajar, freedom within inches, and said, “fuck you,” with all the finality of a young man ready to escape.

Without another word, Sam turned and slammed the door behind him, and John’s grumbling turned into an array of violent curses. He scrambled to his feet, looking to follow, and Dean became a towering shadow that loomed with a purpose. He pushed John back once again, urging him to relax into the wall, and John obliged with a swat to Dean’s arm, his hand aiming to clamp around Dean’s wrist.

Dean escaped the attempted hold just in time, leaning away. “You proud of yourself?”

And this too, wasn’t normal. Not for them anyway. Dean’s tone came out jagged and tempered, sharp in a way he never allowed himself to become towards John, and his Dad reared back with a throaty laugh, skin dark and graying.

“You take him wherever he wants, I don’t give a shit. But don’t you even think about following,” He stared at Dean with an even gaze, certain and all knowing, and Dean pulled away with a pulse in his throat, swiping the car keys off the dining table.

Sam was just finishing up wiping his eyes with the sleeves of his jacket when Dean slumped into the driver’s seat. His brother stared at him through the dark, wide eyed and pale, wondering what exactly was supposed to happen now. Dean wasn’t sure he had an answer for him; he just shifted the Impala into drive, and hit the main road.

“You okay? Let me have a look at you,” Dean waved Sam closer with one hand, his other gripping the wheel. Sam leaned into the hand Dean pressed to his cheek, thumb pushing tentatively into the bone there, checking for breaks. “He didn’t get you too bad. Here,” Dean reached behind him into the backseat, grimacing as he fished a can of beer out of the green cooler. “Hold that to your cheek.”

Sam made a face as Dean handed the drink over, but gave little effort in arguing. He held the can up to his cheek with slender fingers, lips pouted, and Dean was suddenly and violently reminded of how young he was. It just hit him sometimes; like a brick to the skull, a boot to the throat.

Here they were, running from their past and future on a set of worn wheels, and Sam was only just barely allowed to vote. He couldn’t even legally drink. His brother still wore graphic tees, and stole Dean’s toothpaste, and stood in front of a mirror for half an hour at a time just trying to figure out the hair he insisted on growing. He still snorted when he laughed and kicked Dean in his sleep and he had never— would never— deserve a life like this one.

“Look, I know you probably don’t wanna talk about it. And I get it, believe me, I do. But I just—” Dean started to say, only to realize this conversation had been building for years now, burning inside of him, and this was harder than he thought it would be, harder than he’d ever wanted it to become. “I’m sorry it happened. I should’ve— I mean when shit started hitting the fan, I should’ve known he would try something, and I wasn’t fast enough to—”

“Is this how you feel?” Sam’s voice was little more than a whisper, but Dean’s breath ran cold regardless, eyes straining just to look at him in the passenger seat. “Do you always feel like this?”

Dean stayed very, very still. “Like what?”

“This… small.”

Sam suddenly looked ready to cry again, ready to apologize for years of watching Dean shuffle through arguments and shoulder John’s anger, alone, by himself, just him. But Dean had sacrificed a lot in hopes that this moment would never happen, and even in the wake of Sam’s sympathy, he wasn’t going to give in; he wasn’t going to admit this.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dean said, steady as anything, and the rest of the car ride was silent.

By the time Dean reached the closest bus station, taking a moment to pull over to a deserted curb, Sam was visibly on edge. There was a single street lamp illuminating the public transport bench. A morning fog had layered itself along the grass outside, and as Dean ripped the gear into park, opening his car door to step out, Sam practically dove across the seat to grab at him, fingers curling into the sleeve of Dean’s jacket.

“What are you doing? Why are you stopping?” He asked, trying to sound stern but instead just sounding scared, his eyes flickering across Dean’s face, attempting to read him.

Dean slowly placed his hand over Sam’s, peeling his grip away. “It’s fine, Sammy. Get out of the car.”

“Dean, what—”

“Now,” Dean repeated. “Quit screwing around.”

Hurt coiled tight in Sam’s features, pinching at his brow, and Dean had to pretend like that look alone wasn’t enough to make him feel limp and miserable, as though every artery had been severed, every string cut. A beat later, Sam finally climbed his way out of the car with shaky limbs, and Dean followed, immediately rounding back to the trunk.

Dean had only just gotten the arsenal opened and propped when Sam came up beside him, slow and cautious; almost fearful.

“Don’t do this, Dean,” He pleaded, stuffing his hands into his jacket pockets, teeth chattering in the cold. “Don’t— you don’t have to. You can come with me.”

And it occurred to Dean then, sudden and inescapable, that Sam had just spent the whole drive there thinking Dean was coming too. That Dean had protected him, again, and saved him, again, and stolen him away, again, and why would that change now? Of course Dean was going to drive him all the way to California. Of course Dean was going to escape too.

The thought made Dean’s stomach curdle.

“And do what? Go to school? You know me and a classroom don’t get along, Sam. I don’t even have a diploma,” Dean brushed off, barking out a laugh that sounded more like a gunshot as it echoed down the street.

“You can get your GED. I’ll help you. The rest we’ll figure out on the way—”

“There’s nothing to figure out, okay? This is— you already have it figured out. You, on your own. It’s what you’ve always wanted, right?”

It came out harsher than Dean intended. More honest than he realized. And Sam’s face crumbled with it, suddenly looking not at all like the grown man he’d spent the last two years of his life insisting he was.

“I never said I wanted to do this alone. I said I wanted to be free,” Sam corrected. Then, with a voice pulled thin with emotion, he pointed at Dean and said, “And I want you with me.”

Dean instantly stiffened, something hot and painful rising in his throat. “You’ve never told me that before,” He muttered carefully, worried for the damage this might do to him, for the hope it might unleash.

“You’ve never bothered to try and listen until now,” Sam sighed, and Dean turned away with his heartbeat live in his ears, hands scrambling for the lock box in the trunk.

“I wasn’t made for this. You are,” He said, instinctively, churning it out with alarming ease. Dean grabbed one of the fake credit cards stashed inside the box and squinted at the date. “It’s that simple, Sammy.”

“No, it’s not,” Sam swatted at the card as Dean tried to hand it over, glaring. “You’re not some piece of shit grunt, Dean. You’re smart. You’re a good person— don’t do this to yourself. This isn’t your revenge path. Don’t just follow Dad’s orders until it kills you.”

It was something Dean had come to terms with a long time ago; the inevitability of his death. Of his Dad’s. How he’d more likely than not catch a bullet or a blade before hitting thirty and bleed to death in some piss poor corner of the world where no one would find him, no one would know him, no one would care.

But hearing it aloud still jarred him, somehow. It sounded… violent. Strange. Almost painfully unfair, and Dean thought hard about the wallet in his pocket. About the amount of gas in the Impala’s tank.

The mere thought flickered out and died just as quickly as it appeared, and Dean shrugged, offering a weak, “Somebody has to,” that had Sam shrinking as if punched, eyes growing soft with sympathy.

Dean took advantage of the moment and stuffed the fake credit card into the front pocket of Sam’s jeans. Then, he pulled out his wallet and took out all the cash he was carrying, thumbing through it with shaky fingers.

Sam’s gaze was fixed solely on Dean’s face, hollow and unmoving. Dean could feel his insides starting to tear.

“This is all the money I have on me,” Dean wadded up the bills and opened Sam’s hand to relinquish them. He folded Sam’s fingers back over the money. “I’ll send you more the second you get somewhere that can receive mail, but until then, you need something— you call me. I don’t care if it bruises your sweet teenage pride or stings something awful— if you’re hungry, if you’re hurt, if you need anything—”

Sam’s face twisted painfully. “Dean…”

“You call me,” Dean continued, managing a crooked smile. His hand found the hard line of Sam’s cheek, fingers brushing back loose hair, “And I’ll come running. Understand?”

Sam was crying freely now. Every brave wall of his torn down, and Dean breathed deeply through his nose, blinking frantically, holding himself steady.

“I want you to take this, too,” Dean said, and Sam actually let out a sticky scoff as Dean handed him a spare gun from the trunk, full clip and all. “Anyone tries to give you trouble, you give ‘em hell. Don’t hesitate,” Much to Dean’s surprise, Sam didn’t argue. He merely nodded, stashed the gun at the back of his waistband, and straightened as if preparing for a final blow, his face shiny with tears.

He was expecting a hug, Dean realized. A real goodbye. And Dean pulled him down by the shoulders into the breadth of his own, squeezing him close to the chest, to the frantic swelling of his heart. He wondered if Sam could feel it; could hear all the words he wasn’t voicing.

“California sun, here you come,” Dean grinned.

Dean could count on one hand how many times he’d given his brother a real punch. A good swing that drew blood, that had the potential to knock bones loose.

The amount of times Sam had punched him were even fewer.

This, Dean supposed, was one of the very few things about them that could be considered normal. It was no wonder this was ripped from them too.

Within hours of discovering Sam had escaped Bobby’s panic room, Dean arrived at Cold Spring, and within minutes of trying to convince Sam to abandon Ruby, Dean found himself fighting for consciousness on the hardwood of a hotel room, the ceiling lights glaring overhead.

The weight of his brother followed soon after, bearing down on top of him, hands squeezing at his throat, and for a moment Dean thought it might actually end this way. That the single most important part of his existence might just be the very thing that ends it.

Dean could feel glass in his ear from when he’d been pummeled into the mirror. The table Sam had thrown him into had shattered on impact, and Dean could feel its remains biting into his back, cutting deep into the bruising skin. There was blood seeping through his clothes. Wet and catching. And it felt endless, like it was everywhere— pooling and growing and staining, catching at his fingertips, ready to burst from his vessels.

Any second now, it would be over. If Sam tightened his grip just a fraction, it would be done. And Dean wouldn’t have to think about how badly he failed. Wouldn’t have to live in a world where he put Sam first, and Sam put Dean second, always always always—

The pressure around Dean’s throat released abruptly, and the air returned in a gasping wave, tears rushing hot in Dean’s staggering vision.

Dean vaguely registered Sam getting off of him. Leaving. Heading for the door where Ruby had disappeared— and the sound of retreating footsteps forced everything to sharpen back into roaring focus. His body felt paralyzed, spiked to the ground, but his anger was a burning center star that shouldered his grief, paved way for the panicked boy inside of him desperate not to be abandoned, and he spoke over a fountain of blood, coughing through words he’d never been able to forget.

“If you walk out that door,” He rasped, clutching at his weeping chest. “Don’t you ever come back.”

The threat stopped Sam in his tracks, shoulders hitching, and Dean could imagine himself taller and older and drunker and meaner, with a presence that sent his sons to darkened corners, made young boys walk like their skin was soiled rotten.

The regret was immediate. Dean downright ached with it, craned sideways to tell Sam as much— but it was too late.

Sam was looking at Dean like he’d just discovered something unthinkable, had his worst fears proven right, and much in the same way he’d done that night before Stanford, Sam walked out with his family shredded to ribbons.

And this time, it was Dean who was left bleeding on the floor.

Crawling back to Bobby’s place with his will shattered and his face bruised was nearly enough to kill Dean in and of itself.

“I take it you found Sam,” Was all Bobby said upon answering the door, and then he was gathering Dean close with a cold hand to the back of the neck, pulling Dean into an embrace right there in the doorway.

What followed was a round of drinks so strong they felt downright acidic, and an entirely different kind of fatherly beat down than the one Dean was used to; Bobby berated him with a whiskey-loose tongue, pacing the rug of his living room with spindly limbs. He claimed Dean was giving up too easily. Letting the high stakes get to him.

That he was being a coward, like his Dad.

And Dean wanted to object. Wanted to have something to show for his thirty years of idolization, to defend his father by blood to his father by choice, but any attempt at words felt hollow, and Bobby was already filling the silence.

“You are a better man than your daddy ever was,” He said, unflinchingly sincere. “So do us both a favor. Don’t be like him.”

A bizarre sort of pain coursed through Dean’s blood, and he nodded thoughtlessly, eyes straining, head pounding. He rolled his tongue over the split on the inside of his cheek. Clenched his jaw through a worrying click of bone. Dean could still taste blood.

Bad things, as Dean often liked to recall, had the tendency to come in groups of three.

He’d first heard this saying from Rhonda Hurley when he was nineteen. Ellen had said it once after a round of shots. And Dean thought it willfully, silently, in moments where the scales felt particularly unbalanced, the odds lying determinedly against his favor.

He should’ve known this was coming. The fall out, the final break. Dean’s thoughts become little more than words on a page, his anger scorches the markings of a decades old bar, and now this. His brother leaves, his brother chooses Ruby, and Dean lets him.

He let him.

In a moment of weakness, of pure selfish want to get this over with, knock the lights out, get the taste of blood out of his mouth— Dean thought about Cas’s offer. His voice stark cold beneath a rain battered awning. And it was desperate, and it was cowardly, but it was brief; the most fleeting lapse of judgment.

And evidently, just enough to sound Heaven’s alarms.

Between one blink and the next, the world shifted, and the smoke layered scent of Bobby’s living room became something sterile and eerily artificial. All the darkness of closed blinds and dark wooden beams were replaced with arching frames and golden lighting; everything expanding, everything growing, outwards and in.

Before, there had been a pesky floorboard beneath Dean’s boot. A slight bend in the wood from a pair of rollerblades Sam had carted through the house when he was eleven.

Now, there was nothing but crisp white tile, clean enough to nearly project back a reflection, and Dean turned to find a gold plated table littered with dozens of different foods, all of which was displayed with painful care.

“What the hell?” Dean gaped, particularly eyeing the arrangement of pies.

“Quite the opposite, actually,” Dean jerked back before he could reach the table, pulse growing livid as he took in the figure before him, all cuffed sleeves and a buttoned collar, smug as anything. Zachariah leered at him, smile crooked, “Hello, Dean. You’re looking… fit.”

It was the shift of air that Dean felt first. A subtle tilt at his center that made his eyes veer sharp to the left where Cas had just appeared, silent and stoic.

“Well, if it isn’t the Suite Life of Zack and Cas,” Dean mused. When Zachariah didn’t respond, Dean’s eyebrows rose high to his hairline. “It’s a— you know what, never mind. So, what’s this, huh? Where exactly did I get beamed to this time?”

“You can call it a green room. We are closing in on the grand finale after all, and we want to keep you safe before showtime. Here, try a burger,” With a flick of a bony wrist, one of the cheeseburgers on the table began to float enticingly towards Dean, bobbing in the air like a taunt. “They’re your favorite. From that seaside shack in Delaware. You were eleven, I think.”

The memory came back with little effort, plucked from the recesses of his mind, and a tarp of uneasiness settled over Dean.

“I’m not hungry,” He muttered.

“No? How about the pornography? I’ve arranged it to be just for your liking.”

To the left of the cooler of beers and adjacent to the mass of pies, sat an alarmingly large pile of skin mags, organized to an almost hilarious degree. Though when Dean stepped closer, any amusement drained away as he took in the various covers.

They were all male models. Stripped and posed and sprawled, a collection of hard muscle and tanned skin that wasn’t anything like the real magazines Dean bought and looked at through a far away lens.

Heat spread like a vice around Dean’s neck, pressing at the front of his throat, and he chuckled.

“Oh, we’ve got a jokester. Good one, sackless,” Dean grunted, voice hard and sharpened to a point.

“I don’t see how it could be a joke given your history, but I suppose I’ll let that one slide,” Zachariah smirked. He raised a mocking finger, “Just this once.”

Dean stayed stock still, ignoring the tremor in his right hand. “Let’s bail on the measuring contest, okay? I want to know what the game plan is.”

“Let us worry about that. We just want you… focused, relaxed.”

“Well, I’m about to be pissed and leaving, so, start talking, Chuckles,” Dean demanded, and finally, something in Zachariah’s features cracked. His brows sank.

“All the seals have fallen, except one,” He revealed, and the sheer stillness at which he spoke had Dean’s hair standing on end, a snake coiling in his stomach.

“That’s an impressive score. That’s right up there with the Washington Generals.”

“You think sarcasm’s appropriate, do you? Considering you started all this?” Zachariah batted back, quick and relentless. A stab of guilt struck Dean’s airways, and he faltered, unable to respond as Zachariah continued, “But the final seal, it’ll be different.”

“Why?”

“Lilith has to break it. She’s the only one who can. Tomorrow night, midnight—”

“Where?” Dean nearly yelled, anxiety flaring up like a fever.

“We’re working on it.”

“Work harder.”

“We’ll do our job. You just make sure you do yours.”

“Yeah, and what is that, exactly?” Dean waved his arms furiously. “If I’m supposed to be the one that stops her, how? With the knife?”

“All in good time,” Zachariah said smoothly, smiling placatingly.

“Isn’t now a good time?”

A flash of irritation surfaced in the angel’s features, feathers prickling as he said, “Have faith.”

“What, in you?” Dean scoffed. “Give me one good reason why I should.”

In all the months of torment, of Zachariah’s presence bringing nothing but false realities and bullshit expectations, Dean had never truly feared him. Not with the flabby buttoned up vessel he’d chosen. Not with Cas standing guard at his side.

And it wasn’t until Dean was witnessing a change, the arrival of a darkness he hadn’t yet perceived, that Dean realized this at all.

Zachariah stepped towards him with purpose, with the kind of careful precision that mirrored a predator, and Dean suddenly felt more afraid in his presence than ever before, like his gaze alone could commit atrocities.

“Because you swore your obedience,” He answered simply. “Because you can’t afford not to. Because you’ve been flaunting that mark on your arm for the past year now, and what I should do is cut your tongue out for it.”

Each word dragged another step out of him, forced another cog to spin, a latch to hook, until he was towering over Dean with his hands poised properly behind his back. He didn’t even need them to threaten violence; his words were coated in venom.

“You have been nothing but a pain in my ass since the beginning. Since you decided to start turning my soldiers into suffering wads of whining sympathy and human lust. Forcing me to break, and teach, and reprogram,” A pang of anguish fled Dean’s chest like a current, vibrating from the presence behind him, and it took everything for Dean not to turn around, not to try and soothe Cas through the connection like an open wound.

“I should have Castiel kill you. I should force you to watch him rip your spine out from your throat. But your destiny is more important than my hang ups, and you swore to obey. So obey.”

For the briefest of moments, Dean couldn’t catch his breath. His heart was a beating drum in the shell of his head, lungs burning, and suddenly he was back on the floor of that hotel room, Sam’s hands squeezing at his throat, the lights splitting into a million fragments.

And maybe it was Zach. Maybe it was just the panic. Maybe Cas’s feelings were bleeding through to his own. Dean couldn’t be sure. But the golden room shook with their violent departures, both angels fleeing with a screech of static, and the air returned on command, flooding Dean’s senses with a ragged gasp.

Sam’s voicemail echoed back after a droning number of rings, and Dean bowed his head with a curse, fingers swiping at the sweat gathering along his forehead.

“Sam, I need you to answer. This isn’t some house call, alright?” Dean gritted into the line, but he softened only a beat later, heart pulsing, and he leaned into the nearest wall, bracing himself. “Things are testy right now, and I get that. Hell, I can’t recall a time when they've been worse. But what I said back in Cold Spring wasn’t okay, and I—”

The words were impossible. The grief was worse. But that was just about all the world offered these days, and Dean didn’t have the luxury of bottling this. Not this time.

“What Dad did to you that night… before you left for Stanford… it wasn’t fair. And to throw it back in your face like that—” They hadn’t spoken of it in years, not in any way that mattered, and this was hard. This was cruel. This was Dean admitting he’d failed, and it felt like he’d taken metal to the windpipe, was trying to catch a decades worth of breath through nothing but a straw, and finally he said, “Sammy, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

Somewhere in the heartache of losing his brother, and feeling like he had no one to depend on, Dean had forgotten he was a parent too. That kids were selfish and rash and brutally honest, existing in a state of torrential downpour, and parents— good parents— were the ones who stayed. They weren’t the ones who got to get angry, or deliver rage powered blows, or leave their children to lick their wounds in silence.

Siblings had clauses. Parents did not. And Dean had never been one without being the other.

Parents shouldered their child and the burdens that came with them, for a love far greater than the causing upset, and that was life. That was Dean’s. And ultimately, he wouldn’t have needed the world’s highest stakes to remember that; when it came to Sam, Dean would always forgive.

“I can’t say I agree with what you’re doing. Your methods. But I know your intentions are good ‘cause you— you’re good, Sam. You’ve been nothing but good since the beginning, since you were some snot nosed kid nipping at my ankles, and I mean that, I really— the freak thing, calling you a monster— none of it's true Sam, none of it.”

There was a reason this had all hurt so much. There was a reason Dean had sacrificed everything growing up so that Sam could gain what he lost. Sam was the best of all of them. And watching his fall had been like watching Dean’s own; it felt too much like Dean’s fault.

“Maybe I should’ve gone with you that night, huh? To California?” Dean was saying it aloud before he could really weigh it on his tongue, and it stung at the roof of his mouth. Scraped sharp across his teeth. “Maybe none of this would’ve happened.”

It was nothing but false hope. Desperate and foolish. But there was something comforting to Dean about speaking it into existence, like he was just one step closer to making it true. He hoped it would do the same for Sam.

“Truth is, I don’t know what happens next. But I’m… doing what I think is right, and I don’t know if I’ll see you again.”

Dean would go along with the angels as long as he could, as long as he could bear. But the clock was ticking, the stage was set, and it was starting to look more and more likely that he would have to take matters into his own hands. If the angel's plans didn’t work out, Dean would have to call Michael. To tempt him with his most sacred possession just to have a chance at getting out of here, at finding Lilith and killing her before Sam could get stuck in the crossfire.

It was fine. Expected, even. Dean’s last resort for anything had always been himself.

Dean thought about what it would be like to hear himself speak behind a wall of glass. To watch his limbs move with zero control. Would Michael take pity on him? Would he let Dean breathe on his own? Or would his reign be nothing but shackles and gags and the eternity long feeling of that headiness right before drowning?

For a moment, Dean wondered. And then by the next, he knew. His next breath nearly choked him.

“Sam, I love you—”

The line clicked dead as the message hit its limit, and Dean crumbled in the resounding silence, recognizing his words as the denouement that they were. Pride be damned, Dean wanted Sam to hear them. Before his voice was ripped clean from his throat, Dean wanted Sam to know.

Dean shoved the phone back into his pocket and pushed himself away from the wall, tired and directionless. He didn’t understand the plan. The exact way this would all pan out, and it was eating at him, wringing him tight with anxiety.

“Come on, Cas. You just gonna ignore me?” Dean scoffed to the open air, recognizing the tremors in the quiet, the faraway glow of a presence he knew far too well.

Dean’s shoulder pulsed and flared, angry at the disconnect, at Cas’s refusal to show himself, and he paced the room with growing frustration. Dean’s reflection taunted him from a far away mirror traced in gold. Every footstep seemed to travel. And it wasn’t until he tipped a statue of an angel over the lip of a mantle, shattering stone across glossy flooring, that the real angel appeared.

“You asked to see me?” Cas confronted, scowling down at the broken figure. The moment Dean turned to face him, his expression soured even more, and his feet stuttered forward, conflicted, “Dean, your face. You’re hurt.”

And it was subtle, minute even, but a flinch rolled through Dean’s body, and Castiel froze mid stride. They stared at one another.

“I paid Sam a visit. Tried to turn him back to the light. Even did the whole ‘I feel the conflict within you let go of your hate’ monologue but, you know. No takers.”

They felt like strangers. They felt like lovers. Circling a line of strain. And Dean didn’t know how to do this. How to start mourning something before he’d even lost it, before he’d ever really had it.

Cas bowed his head, coat billowing outwards as he started forward. “Here, Dean. Allow me.”

“No, don’t— just—” Dean held his hand up with a wince, craning away when Cas tried to bring that familiar two finger touch to the tension in his brow. Dean couldn’t even remember the last time he’d had the strength to resist this. “Look, I had this coming, alright? Believe me.”

Cas’s hand dropped silently. His voice was calm, “We need you at your best, Dean.”

And then he was reaching for Dean again, light pooling at the breadth of his fingers, and Dean slapped his hand away with something harsh and pained rattling in his lungs, splitting him open.

“Right. Which is why you had no intention of fixing me when Zachariah was still in the room,“ Dean bit out. “Jesus, Cas, you can take off the kiddy gloves. I know the stakes are high right now, but I’m not gonna fucking break here.”

Dean’s hand rose up to rub against the creaking in his chest, a weak attempt at soothing that only made his blood pump faster. His ring caught against the amulet hanging there, nudging his heart in the process, and Dean met Cas’s gaze with newfound acid boiling in his stomach, determination nearly making him sick.

“Listen to me. There’s a lot of bad water under the bridge right now. You and me, everything that’s—“ He waved a hand, posture bending with a staggering weight. “But I need you to do me a favor. I need you to take me to see Sam.”

Cas’s gaze narrowed into a squint. “Why?”

“There’s something I gotta talk to him about.”

“What’s that?”

“The B.M. I took this morning. What’s it to you?” Dean huffed. He planted his feet, ready to get the ball rolling. “Just make it snappy.”

“I don’t think that’s wise,” Cas said slowly, shifting minutely as Dean creeped closer.

“Well it’s a good thing I didn’t ask for your opinion, then,” Dean replied curtly, suddenly aware of the gun in his waistband, and the knife in his jacket, and the brand on his shoulder—

“Sam nearly killed you,” Cas admonished, not understanding, and Dean’s eyes went wide with disbelief.

“You saw,” He said, watching reverently as Cas’s face dropped. “You and your angel pals already knew about me and Sam, didn’t you? That’s why you nabbed me.”

“Your brother has lost all sight of reason. Contacting him would just make things worse.”

“Well, call me an optimist but I don’t think it can get worse,” Dean said plainly, baring his truths to an open floor. “Listen, I'm gonna do whatever you monks want, okay? I just need to tie up this one thing, five minutes— that’s all I need.”

Cas’s mouth twitched. “No,” He said, careful as anything, and Dean stood ramrod straight.

“What do you mean, no? Are you saying that I’m trapped here?” Dean questioned, fighting to keep his voice even.

“You can go wherever you want,” Cas explained, eyes flitting nervously.

Dean stared at him. “Super. I want to see Sam.”

“Except there.”

“I wanna take a walk.”

“Fine, I’ll go with you.”

“Alone.”

“No.”

Castiel’s voice dove low and serious, grazing the sort of danger Dean had almost forgotten he’d once had to fear, and the room fell into a painful pause, life itself grating to a halt.

In the silence, Dean counted the beats as his heart began to crack.

“What the hell are you doing, Cas?” He asked, and while Dean kept his voice gentle, Cas’s departure was not.

And when he vanished in a tornado of pain and upset, sending Dean scrambling to grasp the center table, he took the rooms only exit doors with him.

“Tell me something. Where’s God in all this?”

Zachariah stilled at the center of the room. The gold had begun to drip from the walls. Color was bleeding into a murky gray. And Dean watched as his last shred of hope broke silently in the curl of a righteous fist.

“God?” Zachariah asked. His voice perked with a smile, “God has left the building.”

“You can’t reach him, Dean. You’re outside your coverage zone.”

Dean dropped his phone with a whip of his shoulder, and Cas’s presence washed over him like a hot gust of wind, just a second too late.

All it took was a single glance, a broad sweep of Cas’s sinking frame, and Dean’s guard was raised with two protective fists, feet inching away.

“You got a lot of nerve showing back up now that the cat’s out of the bag,” Dean said stiffly, watching Cas’s every move. “What happens now, huh? If the Apocalypse is a go, what does that mean for Sam? What are you gonna do to him?

Cas’s sigh was almost mournful, his coat bunching as he shrugged. “Nothing. He’s going to do it to himself.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dean asked flatly, but Cas visibly reeled himself in, features smoothing over, and Dean laughed with punctured lungs. “Oh, right, right. Got to toe the company line. Flirt your way to the top and then knock a couple heads, is that it?”

“That is not what I did,” Cas demanded.

“No? You mean you getting in my pants wasn’t for leverage?” Dean bit out, because he’d been thinking about it for a while now, maybe since the beginning, and it was at the daunting forefront, mind suddenly reeling with it.

“No,” Cas argued, and where he was emotionless and unreachable before, he was shaking now, brewing beneath a false skin slowly peeling. “This wasn’t… planned, Dean. I couldn’t have predicted any of what occurred between us.”

Dean shook his head through a wave of angry tears, teeth clenched. He didn’t understand how this happened. He’d given enough, hadn’t he? Hadn’t he tried enough? All Dean had ever wanted was to be a good son, and do right by his brother, and when the time came— be the anchor that Castiel needed to tether him to the living, to the real world that ached and bled and fought for their own futures, their own choices.

Dean thought he’d had him. Dean thought he could love him. But the story was ending, destiny was waiting, and Cas was standing at the other end of the line.

“Why are you still here, Cas?” Dean asked.

“We’ve been through much together, you and I,” Cas let himself soften, just a fraction, and Dean drank it by the gallon, hope stirring in his chest, “and I just wanted to say, I’m sorry it ended like this.”

Dean jolted back. He blinked rapidly, mouth twisting, “Sorry?”

Anger bled into the curl of his fist, splitting Dean’s face with a repulsed smile. And though his body turned away on impulse, disgusted, it came back not a second later, plowing forward with a punch set right to Cas’s jaw.

Dean could feel the shift of Cas’s bone against his fingers. The way the impact rattled from hand to face, undefined strength brimming from his chest, and Cas staggered back with a grunt of surprise. He looked at Dean for a long moment, palm reaching up to cup his own face.

The movement nearly sent Dean into a frenzy, simply by how human it seemed.

“It’s Armageddon, Cas. You need a bigger word than sorry.”

Cas prodded powered blue fingers against the soreness in his jaw, healing himself with a pained expression. “Try to understand— this is long foretold. This is your—”

“Destiny?” Dean demanded breathlessly, making Cas’s eyes dart up. “Don’t give me that ‘holy’ crap. Destiny, God’s Plan… it’s all a bunch of lies you poor, stupid son of a bitch! It’s just a way for your bosses to keep me and keep you in line,” Dean pointed a harsh finger between them. “We’ve been blowing destiny’s doors since the beginning, man. Since you rode me sky high and bought a front seat to my shit show, and you know what? That was real. People, families— that’s real. You can’t tell me it’s not. And you’re gonna watch them all burn?”

There was a splotch of blood caught in the corner of Cas’s mouth, drying there like a salacious threat, and Dean wondered vaguely if he’d chipped a tooth. Or if the blow had made Cas catch the inside of his cheek, tearing the skin open.

The urge to heal the wound struck Dean like a dagger, blooming in his soul like a sore. He wanted to fix it. He wanted to feel it. Even now. And the memory of how he’d done it the first time at the church— all hands and tongue and wanting— made his chest ache with longing, wanting the impossible.

“What is so worth saving? I see nothing but pain here. I’ve seen inside you. Seen your guilt, your anger, confusion. In paradise, all is forgiven. You’ll be at peace. Even with Sam.”

The words felt big. Believable. But Cas couldn’t even speak them without turning away, eyes sliding down past Dean’s face, and that was enough for Dean to tilt his head in waiting.

And without making a sound, Dean gathered that blue eyed stare, and pulled it back up, looking at Cas dead on.

“You can take your peace… and shove it up your lily-white ass. ‘Cause I’ll take the pain, and the guilt. I’ll even take Sam as is. It’s a lot better than being some stepford bitch in paradise,” Dean demanded, and the second his voice turned hard, Cas turned as if shunned, cowering. This only made Dean speak louder. “This is simple, Cas. No more crap about being a good soldier. There is a right and there is a wrong here, and you know it. Look at me— you know it!”

Dean spun Cas around with a hand to his shoulder, jerking him back to reality, to his responsibility, and Cas’s shoulder softened like wax in his touch, craning towards him.

Dean gave him a gentle look, fingers curling into the harsh lines of his coat.

“And you were gonna help me once, weren’t you? You were gonna warn me about all this before they dragged you back to Bible camp. Help me— now, please.”

“What would you have me do?” Cas blurted, looking around frantically. He seemed close to bolting again, to breaking apart, and Dean needed to press without shattering him, to convince him without ruining him.

“Get me to Sam. We can stop this before it’s too late,” Dean said.

Cas shook his head with a clenching jaw, every line and edge of him starting to tremble. “I do that, we will all be hunted. We’ll all be killed.”

There was no point in arguing. Even less of a point in lying. Cas was right. Defying meant destroying their lives. It meant taking a chance and leaping into blackness and looking God himself in the face to say I choose this. And though Cas understood that, had familiarized himself with just how bleak the world would become if they failed, he’d yet to grasp the reality of what it might look like if they won.

And what a worthy picture it was.

“If there is anything worth dying for… this is it,” Dean whispered.

Cas’s gaze finally wavered, weakened by Dean’s words, but he was still hesitating. Hanging over an edge he couldn’t quite plummet from, and when his eyes finally flitted away, teeth gritting, Dean knew he was losing. That he was still on the outside looking in, just begging to be granted passage.

It was this that made Dean’s priorities shift. It was this that made him desperate.

“Tell me what that word means,” He said suddenly, voice shaking. “The Enochian one, the thing you’ve been saying.”

Cas’s eyes drew back to him in an instant, wide and honest. “Dean—”

“Tell me, and I’ll leave it alone. I’ll let you fuck off back to planet Krypton and pretend this never happened. That we—” The sentiment died between them, unvoiced and unheard but felt nonetheless, and Cas’s brows pinched together in a way that had Dean floundering, breaths stalling in his throat. “Just tell me. You really think it’s no big deal? Then spit it out.”

A shadow passed over Cas’s features, heavy and impacting, brewing there idly, and once it was gone, Cas came back clearer. Lighter. Like he recognized he’d only have one more chance to speak.

“Angels are highly evolved spiritual beings, embodiments of Divine Will. We embody unconditional love, limitless and without taboo. Angels love everything and everyone, themselves and each other, equally,” Cas explained, reciting the words through great memory, treating them as precious scripture.

“Because of this, there is no word in our language that translates to what human love accounts for. But the closest alternative—” The Enochian phrase tumbled from Cas’s lips, effortless and gentle, picked delicately from the roof of his mouth, "loosely translates to ‘dearest of souls.’ It speaks of purity, and longing, and grace, and when I first laid a hand on you in Hell, your soul was the purest light I’d seen for a millennia and I—”

The swelling in Dean’s sternum stopped abruptly, stamped out like a light as Cas physically restrained himself, mouth pinching closed. Cas turned away with a shameful glance, breaths quick and uneven.

“Angels are not meant to know a love like that,” He muttered softly, almost as an afterthought, a damning clause.

“Doesn’t mean they can’t,” Dean insisted. And then, with his heart held steadily to his shoulder, he added, “Or that they haven’t, already.”

Cas’s eyes went wide and fearful, and he moved to shake his head again, instinctively. “Dean, I’m not—”

“I told you once, to follow me,” Dean interrupted, earning Cas’s rapt attention. They stared at one another, plagued by the shared memory. “To break rank, and make a choice, and you did. And now I’m asking you…” Dean lowered his voice, hands fisted where they were hidden inside of his jacket. “Get behind me on this, please. I need you.”

And Dean had already uttered the impossible once today. He wasn’t going to be able to do it again. But he felt it regardless, the same way he always did, and Dean used every possible tether he had to the connection between them to pour the words I love you into that tidal wave bond, coaxing it sweet, wishing it gentle.

Dean reminded it of the promises and the beginnings, words shared under street lamps and motel sheets. He thought about secret meetings and summer warmed benches and kissing with the blinds open, and wanted Cas to feel it, to remember it just as Dean had.

For a moment, it seemed to work. Cas’s face went soft in the middle, melting inwards. But the inevitable collapse didn’t seem to be a good one, and he turned away without a word, staring back into the floor.

Instantly, Dean crawled back behind his own walls, and felt his body turn away with a lurch.

“You spineless, soulless son of a bitch. What do you care about dying? You’re already dead— we’re done.”

Cas swallowed. “Dean—”

“We’re done,” Dean repeated, and his voice broke off in a million jagged directions.

Dean was going to get wasted.

It was the only plan left on the register, the last page in an empty spiral of ripped paper edges. And damn it if Dean wasn’t going to do this right, go out with a glorious fucking bang.

The cooler of beers positioned on the center table was filled to the brim, ice flooding the edges, and yet Dean felt an odd flash of pride wash over him as he downed his first bottle, taking it as a challenge. Maybe he could get to four before it started to hurt. Maybe he could get to seven before he started fading away.

A cigarette had found itself in the bend of Dean’s two fingers by the time he was finishing his second drink. He reached for a third without pause, cracking the lid with a swipe of his ring, and continued the cycle.

Smoke, drink, smoke, drink.

Simple. Repetitive. Dependable. Just what Dean needed.

However, when his next sip made tension break out along his body, spine straightening as if tugged, Dean froze with his beer poised, eyes lifting to the ceiling. Something wasn’t right. Even more not right. And the sheer fact that that was even possible had him rearing back and launching his beer across the room with a vicious shout.

The crack of glass scattering pulled at Dean’s ribs, grinding down his bones, and he hurriedly raised his hand to his mouth, inhaling a breath of smoke.

The chaos broke before Dean could even exhale.

Two hands clamped around the bulk of Dean’s shoulders from behind, dragging him backwards, and for a second Dean felt weightless. Panic seized his throat, his feet swept out from beneath him, and he was just able to register the brush of feathers and static before his back was slamming into the opposite wall and a blue eyed stare was holding him there.

A hand appeared at Dean’s mouth, harsh but welcomed, and Dean shivered as any and all fight left his body, draining straight from his blood. His heart settled as his mind obeyed, recognizing Cas’s feelings as if they were his own, and slowly, Dean exhaled.

Smoke billowed out through the gaps of Cas’s fingers, a blazing trail rising between them. They stared at one another through the thinning haze. And the relief that followed was so thick Dean was almost certain he’d choke.

Then, Castiel moved with frightening stealth, hand slipping beneath Dean’s jacket, and just the brush of heat at Dean’s waist had him hitching through a stifled breath as Cas withdrew, pulling the demon knife out.

“Wha—” Dean started to protest, but his words broke out into a wince as he watched Cas unceremoniously drag the knife down the base of his forearm, an instant fountain of blood rushing hot towards his wrist.

If Cas felt any pain at all, he didn’t show it. His expression was cool and calculated, like he’d found his will again, the centerpiece that had first pulled Dean in all those many moons ago, and gratitude pulsed between them like a lifeline.

Dean stared in awe as Cas made quick work of mopping up his own blood and smearing it across the wall, painting a messy sigil Dean could only vaguely recognize as the one Anna had shown them.

“Castiel! Would you mind explaining just what the hell you’re doing?”

Zachariah’s anger was potent enough to taste, sudden enough to burn at the back of Dean’s throat, and Dean turned to look at him in horror. The sight that leered back at him was monstrous. Rather than find Zachariah’s sagging sore of a human vessel, Dean saw eyes and spindles and bronze and teeth, the true form of a Godly weapon stroked in flames of tonic wrath.

Fear gripped Dean senseless, clotting in his veins like cement. He couldn’t make a sound, not a single word, but his hand flew out to grab Cas’s arm in warning, a desperate white knuckled grip in the bunching of his coat, and without even turning around, Cas knew.

The sigil sparked white hot beneath the press of Cas’s hand, blood marking blood, and Zachariah vanished with a painful shout, the shape of him bursting into a flourish of white light.

Dean stared through the spot where Zachariah had just stood.

“He won’t be gone long. We have to find Sam now,” Cas said hastily, handing back the demon knife.

Dean took it with shaky fingers. “Where is he?”

“I don’t know. But I know who does,” He settled Dean with a weighted look, eyes casted. He hesitated for the briefest second, throat bobbing, and then, “We have to stop him, Dean. From killing Lilith.”

Dean blinked at him, certain he’d heard Cas wrong.

“But Lilith’s gonna break the final seal,” Dean said.

“Lilith is the final seal, and you’re the only one who can break it. Sam’s efforts will do nothing but get him killed.”

On principle alone, Dean’s body went ice cold, gravity upending, and his feet dragged him two steps backward. He fumbled to find balance against the wall, and his fingers brushed Cas’s blood sigil, painting his skin red.

“What? But Sam—”

“I told you once before, and I meant it,” Cas panted, face fevered. “The Righteous Man who begins it, is the only one who can finish it. The only way to break the final seal, to free Lucifer from Hell, is for Lilith to die by your hand. She dies— The End begins.”

“Wait,” Dean said, grappling with open air, his chest feeling like a twisting ache of overlapping ropes and knots. “Hold on, man, this— this doesn’t make any sense. You told me Sam could do it. That he was strong enough. If he’s the one to kill Lilith, then the seal doesn’t break.”

Cas shook his head hysterically, face pinched with panic. He swept a quick hand over his forearm, healing the bleeding cut there.

“The plan is perfected. The prophecy is written. The angels knew you wouldn't say yes to Michael. Not willingly, not even now. And they knew that the only way you’d ever agree— to Michael, to Lucifer, to killing Lilith and setting fire to the world— was if your brother died first.”

Dean wasn’t sure what it was that did him in. The definite way in which Cas spoke, or the tremor in his war trained voice— maybe it was the words alone, the horrific combination of brother and death that was strong enough to make bile rise in his throat.

But within seconds, Dean was seared numb, and he couldn’t get far enough away.

“Are you saying this was a trap? This whole time?” Dean curled away in horror. “Are you saying my brother’s been pumping himself full of poison for a year now for no fucking reason? That he can’t kill Lilith because God wants to watch a different show?”

“Everyone knew,” Cas blurted, nearly hysterical with it. “Lilith, Azazel, Lucifer. They all knew that you were destined to be the sole victor. The bringer of The End. And everyone in Sam’s life, Azazel’s plan— they knew to prepare Sam for the slaughter, to be the ultimate sacrifice that would push you to your destiny.”

The truth had been festering inside of Cas, slowly bursting to the surface in agonizing increments, and Dean was seeing it now. Like open sores, leaking wounds— nothing was masked, and in the wake of such a revelation, Dean could do little more than stare at him, wondering faintly if this had been it all along.

If this was really Cas standing before him.

“Once Lucifer rose, he would bring Sam Winchester back from death, and use his vessel for war. And you, as the Michael Sword, would do everything in your power to stop him,” Cas continued on, set off kilter by Dean’s silence.

And Dean just stared, and stared. Until his vision went dark. Until the tears started to well.

“You knew?” Dean finally croaked. “You knew this whole time and you—”

“I didn’t. I didn’t know,” Cas took a desperate step closer, and earned an equally desperate step back as Dean’s arm shot up, hand raised between them. And though Dean knew it wasn’t possible, Cas’s expression turned downright sick, color draining from his face. His next words came with half the strength as before, “I was tasked with the mission of saving the Righteous Man, and sent to Earth. The true nature of The Apocalypse was not entrusted to me. It wasn’t until they took me back, after the church—”

“I trusted you,” Dean gritted, furious but crying, disgusted but pained, and when Cas reached for him, grabbing Dean’s hand with his eyes softened with worship, an almost animalistic growl tore from Dean’s throat, and he shoved Cas hard in the chest.

Cas took the hit silently, and bowed right back, leaning into Dean. “I didn’t leave you, Dean.”

Dean shoved him a second time, gasping through the pain, and again, Cas absorbed it. Accepted it. Came back despite it.

“I trusted you—”

“Trust me now, please. We have to go,” Cas said.

If given the choice, Dean would have pushed harder. Seared the guilt into Cas’s ribs. Punched until false skin peeled off metal casing. He wanted Cas to bleed. He wanted Cas to hurt.

But Dean was gulping through lungfuls of sob wracked air, brain collapsing inwards, heart bursting apart, and when Cas reached for him a second time, cupping Dean’s face with far more grace than he had any right to hold, Dean found himself lacking any and all will to fight.

His touch cooled the fire. His heat warmed the upset. And before Dean could do something deserving like break Cas’s wrist, the gold room was shrinking into a single frame of light, like a tv screen shutting off mid program, and Dean was hurtling through time and space.

A fresh off the printer script found its way into Dean’s hands, not even binded yet, and Chuck paced as he watched Dean skim through it, biting at his nails.

“St. Mary’s?” Dean asked aloud, honing in on a location. He gestured to the page in front of him. “What is that, a convent?”

Chuck gave him a sobering look, eyes bulging. He fumbled with the straps of his sleep robe, cowering into himself.

“Yeah, but you guys aren’t supposed to be there. You’re not in this story,” Chuck explained, forcing Dean to look back at the script crumbling in his hands, their own prophecies forged by God.

“Yeah, well,” Cas muttered defiantly, his voice measured and certain. Dean couldn’t look away from him. “We’re making it up as we go.”

Cas’s touch threw them back into the stratosphere, and between one blink and the next Dean was landing feet first into a gravel paved parking lot, a piece of shit Charger parked crookedly to his left.

It was orange and rusted, rims ancient, and Dean knew in an instant that Chuck’s vision was right; Sam was here.

“Dean,” Cas said hurriedly, drawing Dean’s attention. “I know our intention is to rescue Sam, but under no circumstances can you kill Lilith. Do you understand?”

Dean didn’t even bother giving him a nod, let alone a verbal response. Lying was lying, no matter what form it came in.

“Let’s go,” He answered instead, and Dean ignored the knowing look Cas shot him before heading towards the main entrance of the convent and plowing through the double arched doors without pause.

The place was massive. With an almost castle-like appeal, fit with a center courtyard and a high tower on both the North and South sides, navigating the building was a nightmare, and Dean found himself looking to Cas desperately as they stumbled the halls blind.

“This way,” Cas gestured, peering through the beam of light Dean was providing with his flashlight. “She’s close.”

In the dim lighting of the moon pouring in, Dean could just make out the shape of Cas pulling something out of his coat. It was long and pointed, reflective enough to make Dean wince, and Cas gripped it like a weapon, twirling it between swift fingers. Dean wanted to ask him about it; to break their razor sharp focus like the placeholder that it was and speak gently, honestly.

They were heading into the belly of the beast, after all. Holding out on a grudge now felt shitty, but deathbed confessions weren’t Dean’s specialty, and before he could even think to say anything of value, Cas was dragging him down a final corridor, and the moment was lost.

The doors to the main prayer hall were a singular beacon down a tunnel of dust gathered stone. There was a sliver of light beneath those double doors. Dim and waning, and Dean was sprinting before he could stop himself, before Cas’s hand could catch his shoulder and drag him back.

“Dean—” He tried to warn.

But Sam’s name was already looping over his tongue, bubbling out desperately. Dean shouted over the wind in his ears and felt commotion unearth because of it, the ground beginning to rumble. And though the doors were shut, this close, Dean could feel everything; Lilith’s drowning presence, Sam’s brewing strength. All of it separated by a single obstacle.

When Dean finally reached the door, all but slamming into it shoulder first, he pressed one fist to the jam and shouted, “Sam! I’m here!”

The wind went deadly still.

“Dean?” He heard Sam croak.

And then the wood splintered beneath Dean’s hands, separating with a mere thought. The doors swung open and apart, charred from the touch of Dean’s palms, and Dean shouldered through the wreckage with his lungs on fire, demon knife already in hand.

“He did it,” Ruby breathed, not even bothered by Dean’s entrance. Her eyes were roaming the floor, circling where Sam… Sam’s body had fallen. “He actually went through with it.”

“Sammy?” Dean called. He felt static pitch in his throat.

“The idiot actually—” Ruby’s voice caught sharp on a laugh, body bending with it. “He really killed himself for this. For all of us. Just to set him free.”

Reality seeped in slowly. Painfully. With little poise or dignity. Time existed and ticked, seconds passed; Sam didn’t move. His body was sprawled, awkward and exhausted. Like he’d been dropped from an unimaginable height. And under him, curled around his head, sticking to the ends of his hair, was a puddle of blood.

Blood that had come from Sam’s nose, and Sam’s mouth, and Sam’s eyes, and Sam’s ears—

Ruby’s laughter pierced the diluted fog. Rubbed away the haze. She was still talking, still rejoicing, still breathing, and Dean pulled his eyes away from Sam just long enough to set his sights. The demon knife hummed in the meat of Dean’s hand, quick and dependable. An easy choice.

Dean was aware of this. He was especially aware of this when he let his hand go limp, dropping the weapon, and dove forward to grab Ruby by the throat instead, slamming her into the stone forged wall.

She let out a single coherent cry, pained and guttural, and then screamed nothing but hysterics as she began to burn beneath the press of Dean’s palm. Flesh burned hot, bone melted black, and Dean watched in a fury as Ruby’s vessel— her very being— caught flame at what felt like just a brush of power.

She fell as nothing but barren ash at Dean’s feet. Dean fought hard not to breathe in the stench of her.

“Always a little prideful, that one,” Lilith crooned behind him, and just the sound of her had a flinch snapping Dean’s spine, his anger fueled vision clearing in an instant.

He hadn’t even realized she was still alive, and fuck— how was that fair? In what world did Sam get to die and Lilith stayed standing? After everything Sam had done, the places he’d gone and the darkness he’d touched, just for all of it to end here. With his blood painting faith driven floors.

Slowly, Dean craned his neck to finally look at her, and pleasure pooled darkly in the pit of his stomach at the sight he saw. Of course Sam had put up a good fight.

Despite the confidence in her voice, Lilith sat motionless and disjointed where she leaned back against the altar. She was smiling like she meant it, baring her crystal teeth, but her dress was shredded and her neck was purple and the white marble coating of her eyes had been smothered in red, blood dripping from both corners of her lids.

In the stretch of her right leg, Dean could see the bone had been split in two places, jutting out from her skin. Her ankle was horrifically twisted. And her wrists were limp and swelling, undoubtedly broken.

Lilith might have won in the end, but just barely. Sam had cut her down to the very last string. He’d tried to tear her apart limb from limb.

“Now, Dean. There’s no need to be upset,” Lilith sneered, batting her lashes. A fresh trail of blood oozed from her eye socket, rolling hotly down her cheek. “Think about it this way. You might not have been Daddy’s favorite. But you were always ours.”

Dean could still feel the light dancing in his fingers, the stark blue heat caught in his breaths. It would be easy. It would be fast. It would be right. And why shouldn’t he, exactly? Dean couldn’t imagine the reason.

Sam’s body felt like a lifeline by his feet, a shackle on his ankle, dragging him to the endless waters, and Dean hadn’t survived it the first time— why would this be any different? Why shouldn’t he avenge his brother before he knocked his own light out?

Because if Sam was dead, then Dean was next. Simple. And why the hell should the rest of the world matter?

Don’t, his mind supplied vaguely, a whisper passing his ear. But Dean was moving before he could care to listen, lifting a hand towards Lilith’s shuddering body.

Power surged down the base of his arm, pounding in his chest with fire, and just as Dean felt the light reach his eyes, casting the room in a holy wall of blue, he felt the air bend as an object flew past his ear.

There was a glint of silver. A whistle of speed. And then the blade Cas had unsheathed all those moments ago came soaring by after a powerful throw, plunging into Lilith’s chest with a deafening crunch, splitting through bone and cavity.

Lilith’s gasp echoed through the chamber, reaching the high rafters, and Cas saw the split second as the opening that it was. He pushed past Dean, past Sam’s body left curled on the floor, and placed a heavy hand over the front of Lilith’s skull, fingers digging into rotting skin.

The light was blinding. Lilith’s screams were ear splitting. Her body jerked back in shock, harsh and grotesque, and she tried lifting a hand to Cas’s wrist, clawing weakly, but it was too late. Her eyes were already charred into blackened pits, mouth slack and drooling, and when Cas released her, she collapsed with rigid limbs, every candle stamped out.

And then there was silence.

Dean breathed sharply. Could hear the rattle of it in his own ears. His hands were still shaking, power residing beneath flaming skin, and he waited for the relief. The inevitable rush that came with killing Lilith, stopping Lucifer, preventing the end of the world— but it never did.

Instead, Dean turned, and what it had all cost stared hauntingly back at him. Sam’s body hadn’t moved. His eyes hadn’t opened. Killing Lilith had not, in fact, saved him in return, and Dean dropped to his knees at his brother’s side, hands moving in a restless path from Sam’s face to shoulder to neck.

There was nothing but cold skin. A non existent pulse. And finally, Dean’s heart cracked open with a sudden gusting burst, the smallest cry of grief rising up from his swelling throat.

“Dean,” Cas said, and it didn’t sound at all like it usually did. This was faint and skittish. Painfully vigilant, and it fell on nothing but deaf ears.

“I gotta— get em’ up. Get him to a hospital or—” Dean made a desperate move to stand, Sam lolling heavily in his arms, but his knees were shaking and his grip was weak, and he slipped in the puddle of blood beneath him, crumbling inwards. “Sammy? Oh, God—”

Dean buried his face in the collar of Sam’s jacket and shook through a silent sob that seemed never ending. It stole his breath in one fatal swoop. Felt strikingly similar to a hellhound shredding his chest to ribbons. To dying bloody and screaming and terrified— only this was worse. In every way imaginable, this was worse.

Dean wasn’t sure how long he sat there, heaving into the dry air, before he finally thought to prod at that weight in the depths of his spine. He plucked at the light tracing his ribs, tried to breathe steady enough to coax that power back to the forefront, false hope be damned.

Dean had healed once before. He could do it again.

And it didn’t matter that the circumstances were different. It didn’t matter that Cas had been an angel on the up of his recovery, or if Dean’s head was pounding, or that his lungs were shriveled and cracked— if Dean was good enough, he’d succeed. He’d find a way to save Sam, to do the impossible, because if he failed at being the big brother when it mattered most then what else was there?

Dean curled soft fingers into the hair at the nape of Sam’s neck. Stared into the void of his whitened skin. He could feel the energy, the warmth, the potential strength, roiling just behind the ache. But when he tried to push back the grief, to focus, the weight wouldn’t budge, and that familiar glow refused to rise to the surface of his palm.

“Come on, Sam. Oh, don’t—” Dean dropped his hand with a painful grimace, clutching at Sam’s shirt again. “Don’t do this to me.”

Cas’s footsteps were a looming echo, teetering on the outside. He approached Dean slowly. “Dean—”

“Fix him. You have to fix him,” Dean spluttered, whipping his head around to look at Cas wildly. He could almost physically feel the spinning in his own skull. “What are you doing just standing there? Heal him!”

“I can’t heal what’s already—” Cas started and stopped, face struck with concern.

For a moment, he looked jarringly like his age, sad and ancient, his eyes weathered with despair. But it still wasn’t enough. Dean needed it to matter, for Cas’s pain to be proven, because this couldn’t be it, this couldn’t be what they fought for—

“He’s gone, Dean. I can’t—”

“Then what is the point of you?” Dean screamed, harsh enough to feel his throat outright burn with it, and Cas jolted. Winced as if struck. Dean could barely see him through the tears. “Why are you here? Why are you still here?”

Silently, impossibly, Dean felt yet another weight drop from his stomach, a sudden sickness plaguing his blood. Cas looked at him with open misery, guilt ripping him at the seams, and the bond between them trembled. Ached. And severed with a ragged gasp, rumbling as though a whole empire had just collapsed, bringing the roar and dust storm of a thousand buildings toppling.

“I’m sorry,” Cas murmured, clutching his own chest, and then he was gone.

In his absence, Dean’s reality finally gave way.

Without Cas as an anchor, a tether to the waking world, Dean felt like nothing more than a rotting corpse, waiting for the elements to blow him away. Time slowed and grated, waning black at the corners, and Dean could faintly understand the shift of his hands. The strain in his back.

His legs wobbled beneath him, bending under an impossible weight, and it wasn’t until Dean was stumbling into a bed of grass, dropping Sam’s body in a heap, that he realized he’d made it outside.

There was no Cas. No car. No anything, but Sam was lifeless in his arms, unable to walk, and if Dean could do one thing— one fucking thing with his miserable existence— it was get Sam home. Dean would carry Sam across state lines if he had to.

The sky was dark and the road was far, the few lights scattered down the interstate only barely visible in the distance, hidden by towering trees. This place had been a haven once; an escape, something distant and all its own, away from prying eyes. Now, it was a cage on all sides, hiding Dean from the light, and he couldn’t catch his breath, couldn’t remember how to.

Dean wasn’t sure how long it took him and Sam to reach the main road. Minutes, hours— it all became nothing but motion, heaving lungs, blurry vision.

All Dean knew, as he cradled Sam to his chest and kneeled beside a roadside railing, was that he couldn’t take another step. Not on his own. And the grief of failing yet again, of not being enough even for a brother who was already dead, had Dean sobbing into the dampened grass, open and untamed, choking until he felt he might vomit.

Dean grabbed and dropped his phone four separate times before managing to dial Bobby. His hands were shaking with a life all their own.

Bobby answered on the first ring, relief poured thick into his voice. “Dean? Son, are you there? What the hell’s going on? Are you—”

“I can’t get him home. I can’t—” Dean hissed sharply through his teeth, mouth flooded with spit, face streaked with tears. “I can’t even get him home, Bobby. This one fucking thing and I still can’t—” His body caved into itself, shoulders splitting, and with his head pressed low to his knees, Dean pleaded, “I need some help. Please. Please.”

South Dakota summers brought the sort of heat that plagued your bones, turning layers of skin into what felt like sheets of cement, and it was on a nameless Tuesday in early June that the air conditioning in Bobby’s living room went out with a wheezing shudder.

Dean didn’t bother waiting for the dried sweat to start fresh again. He laced his boots, grabbed his half empty duffle, and stepped out into the awaiting sun, wincing as he crawled his way to the Impala parked at the back of the lot.

Bobby was going to be pissed that he was leaving unannounced, without so much as a goodbye. But Dean had been waiting for a reason to turn tail for weeks now, and damn it if he wasn’t going to take this for what it was; a half decent excuse to drag himself off of Bobby’s couch.

Dean was still working through the last shivers of a hangover when he parked his car at the center of an abandoned field five miles out from Bobby’s.

He shouldn’t be behind a wheel at this point, truth be told, but Sam’s headstone was nothing but two sticks and a bandana he’d tied himself, barely marking where his brother’s body laid beneath, and being sober for this was never an option to begin with.

Dean had picked this place on his own. The grass was healthy, a lively green. There were wildflowers in groups of yellow and purple. And Dean had buried Sam with the pretentious foresight that if something all powerful decided to come down and bring Sam back, then Dean didn’t want Bobby’s house anywhere near the bomb site.

That had been two months ago. And the decision stung something awful now as Dean pressed two fingers to the splintering wood of Sam’s marker.

“S’ me again,” Dean greeted, even if it still felt just as stupid as it had the first time. “I came to say goodbye.”

For now, he wanted to add, as though Sam was really listening, but the sentiment didn’t settle well in his chest, and Dean decided it wasn’t a promise he could make this time. The thought didn’t startle him as much as he thought it should.

There weren’t words for what was to come. For the future Dean had in store for himself. Saying goodbye to Sam— a real goodbye— was never something he was going to be capable of, and so Dean sat there in silence, baking in the heat boring sun, and picked at the grass until his fingertips were rubbed raw.

Hours later, Dean found himself back in the Impala, remembering almost none of it, and drove with a singular destination in mind; California.

With his foot pressed steady to the pedal and a piss bottle tucked neatly in his side door, it took Dean four days to reach the state, where instead of going to Palo Alto like Dean had originally planned, he wound up in Humboldt after the thought of visiting Stanford had left him nauseous in the backseat of his car for almost three hours. He could do this for Sam; search for a reason, trace the path Sam walked when he too was lost. But seeing the school itself, the very sidewalk his brother had— that was Dean’s line, and he wouldn’t be crossing it.

In Humboldt, the ocean beckoned to him, both in beauty and danger, and Dean walked the coast with his head buzzing, daring himself to inch closer, sink further, test whether destiny would allow him to sink or float.

He never went further than the shore.

Time lost itself on the beaches of California. Blurring in that way it did when grief became a common visitor. Dean couldn’t keep track of it. Couldn’t measure it the way he used to. But he itched himself to sleep most nights on motel sheets dingier than Sam had ever allowed, and drank both his and Sam’s weight in alcohol, and pretended not to notice when he’d grab a flannel that was Sam’s instead of his own— and before Dean knew it the week would pass.

It was on the three month anniversary of Sam’s death that Dean sat in his motel room and thought about eating a bullet.

This wasn’t new. It occurred to him almost every day now. But this was the first moment that time had made sense in weeks— three months, how the hell had it already been three months— and Dean realized that this was why he’d been running from it all along.

To forget about the loaded arsenal he was carting around in his trunk.

However concerning of a moment it was, at least it was brief. Dean hadn’t even thought to grab his gun yet when his phone started ringing in his pocket. But he still felt his breath hitch when he realized it was Bobby, guilt writhing in his stomach like snakes.

Bobby was calling to let Dean know that he’d zeroed in on a minor vamp case in Nevada. He asked if Dean wanted to lay claim, given he was already nearby, and Dean took the opportunity with the speed of a desperate man looking for one more reason.

He didn’t think about it too hard. Just glanced and jumped. And it was this reason that Dean not only walked away with three vampire heads in his backseat, but also with three broken ribs and a bruised tailbone, throat sticky with blood from where a cut on his cheek had weeped.

Dean retreated back to his motel room just as a summer storm was starting to pick up. He had barely managed to get the door bolted shut when a knock came from the other side, making Dean’s pulse skitter frantically. It was too soon after his arrival, too timed to be an accident.

He’d been tailed. Someone had either followed him back, or laid in wait, and Dean didn’t like either option. Dean didn’t bother hesitating. He pulled the gun from his waistband, pressed the barrel to the door, and opened it, wide and careless.

Hazel eyes peered back at him, framed hazardously by a curtain of long wet hair.

“Hey, Dean,” Sam said, or at least the person who looked like Sam did. Dean watched as the man shoved his hands in his pockets, shifting nervously, and fuck, this thing even got Sam’s smile right. “Wow, yeah, it is weird being on this side of things. Uh. Before you freak out, let me prove it’s me.”

This was a dream. This was a trick. Dean would soon wake to the crash of him kicking an empty whiskey bottle to the floor and this would all be over. He was sure of it.

Dean backed away slowly. And the pained look on Sam’s face nearly killed him.

“You don’t have to be scared, man. I swear, it’s really me. Look,” Dean didn’t so much as flinch as Sam reached for his jacket pocket, survival instincts tossed to the winds. He watched as Sam pulled out a flask and splashed himself with holy water. “Not a demon, see? The only thing I don’t have on me is silver. So I guess you get to do the honors—”

Sam rolled up his sleeve preemptively, baring his forearm for a testing shapeshifter cut, but Dean was already collecting himself, already stepping forward to touch him, proof be damned.

And maybe that meant Dean had gotten sloppy. Maybe Dean was losing time again. But all he could think about was how not even five seconds ago he’d wanted to die more than anything, and that now, he was struggling to breathe through a heart too big for his chest.

It didn’t fucking matter.

“Dean—” Sam tried to protest, shock clear on his face, but the rest of his words were punched out of him when Dean collided into his chest, and the attempt at reason was ruined; Sam’s arms rose in acceptance.

Once given permission, he squeezed Dean mercilessly, swaddling him in warmth, and when Dean’s broken ribs thrashed sharp beneath his skin, violently protesting, Dean’s only instinct was to hold Sam closer.

“What’s that face for?” Sam grinned into the lip of his beer, craning over to look at Dean with shining eyes. “What are you thinking about right now?”

Dean tightened his hand around the bottle resting on his thigh, head dropping with a smile. He could hear cicadas rustling through the nearby brush. A breeze whistling in the tree leaves. The sun was gone, and the sky was dark, and the mosquitoes were out— but Dean didn’t care.

For the first time in a long time, Dean felt whole. Like his insides weren’t one tragedy away from spilling out of him, and he was going to enjoy this. He was going to remember every second.

“Nothing, man. Nothing. Just—” Dean shook his head. “We haven’t done this in a while.”

“Yeah,” Sam nodded, humming thoughtfully. He hid another smile, this time into the side of his palm. “Kinda hard to find brotherly time when one or both of us are always dead.”

Dean pulled himself back from taking another sip of beer, and glared into the side of Sam’s head. “That’s not funny.”

“Come on, it’s a little funny,” Sam snickered.

“No.”

“Okay, maybe not, but it’s much funnier now that I’ve had a turn.”

That managed to rip a laugh from Dean’s ribs, warm but pained, and he shook with it, sighing as Sam giggled under his breath. Sam was tipsy, Dean was getting there, and Dean imagined they’d probably end up spending the night here, parked beneath the stars. They would sprawl across their respective seats, windows cracked, and speak in private hushes until they dosed, flannels stretched into blankets, jackets folded as pillows.

Just the two of them. Sheltered by metal. Warmed by the only home that hadn’t tossed them to the streets. Everything back to the way things were, except—

Dean dropped his empty bottle to the grass below, clearing his throat with added force. It didn’t seem to work. Emotion swelled like a fire to his senses, sending off distant alarms, and he shifted across the hood of the Impala to reach for another beer down by his feet.

Dean kicked the cooler closed before rejoining Sam back on the hood.

“Dude,” Sam scolded. “Don’t be a dick. Come on.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “We just saved the fucking world, Sam,” He demanded.

But he scooped the discarded bottle up anyway, tossing it into the backseat where Sam would have to deal with it later, and together they rolled into another fit of laughter. The kind that was helpless, stomach searing. The kind Dean had never thought he’d hear again.

Sam’s hand clamped down on Dean’s shoulder as Dean’s leg shot out to kick him, and they hunched as if pulled, centered together by an invisible force, a destiny contrived understanding.

“I’m really glad you're back, Sammy. I mean it. Fuck, without you, it—” Dean balked as the words rushed out of him, tongue loose and careless. His heart was weak in that moment, and Sam’s smile softened with quiet anticipation, searching Dean’s face. “The world doesn’t really make much sense to me, to tell you the truth.”

Sam’s nodding was slow, languid. Like he was afraid of disturbing the moment, scaring it away like some skittish animal.

“I felt that way too, you know. When you were gone. I don’t know. Sometimes I don’t— I don’t think I tell you that enough.”

It was wordless. It was brief. It was vague. But it was enough, and the certainty of the words left unsaid— a valiant I love you that would have shattered both of them irrevocably if spoken aloud— was felt like a physical wound. And Dean reeled with the hit of it, how even alluding to it was enough to bend and break him, ruining his resolve.

“Did you… uh,” Dean hesitated, throat working slow, but the need to ask, to suddenly know— was burning in his stomach. “You got my voicemail, didn’t you? The one I sent before you found Lilith?”

The change in Sam’s posture was immediate, a flinch rolling through his tension heavy limbs. He stared off into the field in front of them, thumbing heedlessly at the bottle cap cupped in his palm.

“Yeah…” Sam’s eyes were distant, steeled and lidded. “I don’t blame you, man. I deserved all of that and more.”

Dean stared hard into the side of Sam’s face, mouth parting. “What do you mean?”

“Are you seriously gonna make me repeat it?” Sam scoffed thickly, like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and Dean stilled at the crumbling sound of him, voice stretched raw with emotion. “Look, I’m not mad, okay? I screwed up. And you knew it, and you wanted to make sure I knew it before I— and even if I’d known you didn’t mean it, I still would’ve—” His next breath came shaky, laced with hidden tears, and he frantically shook his head, brushing past the fumble, “I know you don’t hate me, Dean. Things just got bad. And I get that.”

Something cold and restless slithered its way into Dean’s sternum, seeping down to the bone. None of this made any sense.

Dean quickly put his beer down on the top of the cooler and stood up, planting himself in front of Sam. The second Dean got closer, Sam seemed to shrink in response, head dropping with a hushed sniffle, and Dean ached to crane himself lower, to see behind that wall of shaggy hair.

“Hate you? What the hell made you think—” But the moment the words left Dean’s mouth, thoughts becoming physical words, it occurred to him in a rush, and the sudden silence forced Sam’s head to rise solemnly. He stared at Dean with glassy eyes. “Those dickbags tampered with the call. They changed the message.”

Sam went very, very still. Utterly silent. And then, voice still crushed with grief—

“They can do that?”

It was all Sam could think to say. Entirely disconnected, and Dean felt his heart break.

“Sammy,” Dean muttered. “I said I loved you. And that I wanted to fix things.”

All of the air in Sam’s body rushed out of him in a single breath, shoulders shaking, and he nodded quick and jerky like it was all he could manage, all he could remember to do while his soul floated back down to his body.

“That— that makes a lot more sense,” He said softly, wiping at his face with a big clumsy hand, and that was it.

Dean settled back on the Impala with a freshly sown chest, squeezing Sam’s shoulder affectionately, and they fell back into a silence even warmer than the one they had been treading before.

“What do you think they’re doing up there now? After fumbling The Apocalypse plan?” Sam asked a great deal later, his voice interrupting the soft chirping of a cricket nearby, weaving through the grass.

“They’re making some serious faculty cuts, I’ll tell you that much,” Dean laughed, dry and humorless, trying very hard not to actually think before answering. He shrugged. “I don’t know, man. The angels have a prophecy to rewrite. I’m more worried about Hell, what they’re cooking up with Lucifer sitting pretty in his cage. He’d been waiting a long time for this moment; he’s not gonna be happy with sitting the bench for another million years.”

Sam shook his head, steady and serious. “He won’t have a choice. No final seal, no key to the cage. You did that.”

“We did that, technically. And, mostly by accident, but whatever works.”

“Apparently dying works.”

“Still not funny,” Dean rolled his eyes, taking another sip of beer while Sam smiled all big and dumb.

A part of Dean couldn’t really understand how Sam could joke about this stuff so casually, but maybe it was just part of the process. The absurd way that the two of them healed. You laughed about it so the people around you wouldn’t cry instead, and just the thought had Dean’s knee bouncing anxiously against the grill of the car, trying to think of how to approach his next question.

“Do you remember it? Hell?” He asked eventually, his tone careful.

Thankfully, Sam didn’t seem to startle. He’d even been expecting it, maybe. They had been here before, after all; having the same conversation on some distant mountain framed roadside what felt like years ago now.

“I remember some stuff. I don’t— I don’t know, I wasn’t there as long as you were. Cas was able to black out most of it,” Sam threw Dean a knowing look, eyebrows raised, but Dean’s reaction still made him smile. “You look surprised.”

Dean thought this was an understatement, given he suddenly couldn’t breathe very well.

“No, just—”

“Don’t worry, he managed to snatch me up without giving me an angelic hickey,” Sam laughed, and the absurdity of the joke was just enough to distract Dean, the shock leaving his body to make room for a fresh wave of embarrassment.

“Fuck off,” Dean groaned. “I just wasn’t sure you knew what got you out. You didn’t say anything earlier.”

“Didn’t really know how to bring it up,” Sam shrugged, frowning. “I mean, the guy just kind of raised me from perdition, saved me from eternal damnation, and then dropped me on your doorstep. I figured things weren’t great with you two, considering…”

“Considering he played us?” Dean grounded out, somehow still surprised by the cocktail of emotions Cas pulled from him, how he could make Dean feel both relieved and resentful in a matter of seconds.

“To some extent, yeah, he did. I’d been saying that the whole time. But I was wrong about a lot of things too,” Sam admitted, knocking his knee against Dean’s. He caught Dean’s gaze with a sideways smile. “He might’ve been on the side that pulled the strings, Dean, but he was always going to choose you. For the longest time. He just wasn’t sure how.”

Dean stared off towards a spot past Sam’s shoulder, blinking into the darkness. “How do you know that?”

“Because I’m smart and I know things,” Sam replied indignantly. Dean’s unimpressed look just made him grin harder. “Because I just do, alright? I could see it when he rescued me. I could feel it like— like nothing else I’ve ever felt before. He wanted me safe, and he wanted you happy,” He explained, struck with this awe sounding sort of appreciation that Dean could hardly believe was coming out of Sam’s mouth.

“So I should just forgive him? Just like that?” Dean demanded, trying not to feel bitter that Sam was deciding now to be on Cas’s side, the moment Dean was the most at odds with him.

“You’ve forgiven people much worse for a lot less,” Sam said. “He is the reason you knew where to find me, right? He landed the final blow on Lilith? I’d say give credit where credit is due.”

It was official. Dean wanted to stop talking about this.

That familiar spike of panic was starting to sprout, turning over like fire in his stomach. The feeling that meant Sam was getting close to The Truth, was starting to throw bullseyes no matter how adamant Dean was about keeping the lights off. And even if Sam was Cas’s number one fan now, even if Dean had forgiven everything in theory, it didn’t mean Dean had forgotten what had happened the last time Sam had admitted he knew what Dean and Cas were to each other.

His aching ribs certainly still remembered.

“I think Cas is worth it. And I think you know that too,” Sam finally said, giving Dean a more serious look now, like he was done pretending that this didn’t matter to him as much as it did.

Dean couldn’t quite meet his gaze. But he did manage a soft, “Maybe.”

“Besides, I think you two have been avoiding the obvious for way too long.”

“Oh, yeah?” Dean encouraged, preparing for impact. But Sam just withheld him with a sobering stare, pinning Dean in place with it.

“You love him,” Sam shrugged, lips curled into a helpless smile.

Dean faltered. “It’s—”

“Complicated? No, man. It’s really not. Not when he loves you too.”

The certainty in which Sam said it, offered it so graciously, had Dean choking back a bright swell of affection, right at the center of his chest.

Many months ago, this news might have come easier. Dean might have even expected it, then. But after everything that’s happened, all the choices and all the mistakes, after thinking maybe everything that connected him and Cas had been left behind, shattered at the convent altar, hearing Sam speak those words with absolute conviction was nearly devastating.

Dean missed him. He missed Cas desperately, and for all these months that yearning had come with unbearable guilt. Now, it made Dean’s very skin light up.

A part of Dean could understand what this was. What a moment like this was supposed to all come down to. There had been many of these in his life; the night that Sam left for Stanford, the Bloody Mary case in Toledo, the hour before the clock struck twelve and hellhounds were sent to his door.

Dean had always wanted to tell Sam. To actually put effort into understanding it himself, and offer it to the one person who he knew would accept it with gentle hands. Dean had just never had the luxury of time; of a single moment he could dedicate to himself.

But now?

The words I’m gay planted themselves at the back of Dean’s throat, vines weaving around his tongue, thorns pricking at his gums, and even with it rising as a conscious thought, his stomach still thrashed with all kinds of upset. Hell, Sam basically already knew, but the idea of voicing it, confirming it into the night air that had been nothing but peaceful, felt oddly selfish. And maybe that was Dean's whole problem.

Sam was the college kid. He was the smart one. He should have the words for this. And even now, Dean could see it on Sam’s face; the bottled hope, brows lifted in anticipation. But Sam wasn’t making a move to help, wanting Dean to do it on his own, and Dean both loved and hated him for it.

“Just say it,” Dean blurted instead, picking at a loose thread in the hole of his jeans.

Sam tilted his head at him. “Say what?”

“What you’re clearly dying to say. Come on, I can take it. We’re already clearing the air.”

Sam was quiet for a few long seconds, carefully weighing Dean’s tone.

“Okay, I guess I’m just wondering… is it just Cas?” And then, braver now, Sam aimed for the very root of his curiosity, voice nothing but kind as he asked, “Do you even like women?”

Dean breathed through the inevitable pinch of panic, every instinct within him telling him to deflect. Dean curled a hand over his knee, grounding himself.

“I liked how they treated me,” Dean admitted, and with the fresh knowledge of Dean’s past, of his desperate nights spent scraping for money from the pockets of strange men who were more than happy to make even trades, this came with all the understanding in the world. “It felt good to be wanted, you know. In a way that wasn’t dirty.”

“And it’s different? With Cas?” Sam asked hopefully. “Good?”

And Dean realized then, maybe for the first time since he’d decided to forgive the whole script ordeal, that Sam’s hang ups with Cas had been for this very reason. Sam was afraid Dean’s cycle was continuing, that Cas’s relationship with him had been nothing but transactional. And he’d been terrified.

“Yeah. Yeah it was—” Dean swallowed, wincing through a helpless smile. “For a while there it felt pretty damn good.”

“So what gives? What’s the big sign you’re waiting for? Go find him,” Sam beamed at Dean, gesturing towards the open night sky, at the stars dusting their view.

“What would be the point, Sam? He’s probably already in Heaven somewhere, serving jail time.”

“I don’t think so,” Sam frowned, looking lost in thought for a moment. “He looked pretty weak after he pulled me out. I’m sure he’s been doing his best to stay one step ahead.”

“Weak? What do you mean weak?” Dean found himself asking, tone arched with worry.

“He had a bloody nose. And his— um, his wings, the shadow of them were really… broken,” Sam’s mouth twitched with mirrored concern. “I don’t even know if he’d be on Heaven’s radar.”

Dread coiled tight in Dean’s guts, forking through them with little care, and for the first time since he’d felt that easy-as-breathing bond sever open across the stony floor of St. Mary’s Convent, Dean reached a hand through the void. Felt for the warmth he’d loved so fiercely. Missed so painfully.

He dug thick fingers into the crust of his core. Imagined prying his ribs open with a violent crack, searching. Searching. Dean pictured the scar he’d been trying to forget, raised and ever present on his skin, tethering him to a being that felt like the equivalent of being strapped to a comet, and allowed himself to feel.

And in the quiet abyss, just at the edge of coherence, Dean felt it. A pull at his center. A pulse in the distance. He could lie to himself all he wanted, and ignore all the things that hurt, but that door was still open, even now, and on the other side of it Dean could sense Cas’s presence like a lantern's glow.

Cas was alive. And still within grasp.

“You’re right. He’s still on Earth,” Dean mumbled, almost to himself, but Sam was paying attention, listening for his moment, and he butted back in with a clink to Dean’s glass, toasting the air around them.

“Great. What’s your excuse now?”

“Hold on there, son. You gotta pay for your ticket.”

Castiel’s feet slid hot in the roadside gravel as he turned to look at the man, something like guilt twisting tight in his sternum. He’d become rather familiar with the feeling over the past year; it had ultimately been what ripped him limb from limb.

“I don’t actually have any money. I— uh, I lied,” He told the stranger, voice stiff and nervous.

Cas wasn’t sure what protocol followed disobeying such a human custom, whether this man would let him walk away unharmed, and the thought had him itching beneath too-long sleeves, the sensation of skin and fabric one of the many new features of humanity he’d failed to get used to so far.

Behind the wheel of the paint chipped truck that had just carried Cas across two state lines, the man sighed.

“You think I couldn’t tell that from the second I picked your sorry ass up?” He demanded, scratching idly at his patchy beard. The orange hair there was starting to lighten, fading to a dull gray. “Listen, kid. I drove you here willingly. It’s no problem for me. But most people aren’t gonna give you the moon just ‘cause you ask nicely. You need to be more careful,” The man advised, and Cas watched helplessly as he began rummaging through the pockets of his flannel, fishing out an ugly wad of money. “Here’s some cash. You find a nice meal tonight and get someplace safe, alright?”

A growing ache emerged from the center of Cas’s gut, gnawing and pulling, and Cas spluttered with sudden panic, scrambling beneath the onslaught of too much too much.

“Thank you,” Cas croaked. His eyes were burning, and he didn’t understand. “You’re very kind.”

There was something worrisome in the way the man’s eyebrows knitted together. There were frown lines on either side of his mouth as Cas took the money, and he mumbled a final, “You’re welcome, son,” that had Cas stumbling backwards and away from the road, thrown by the show of kindness.

Creatures who were not born with love, but discovered it anyways, chose it time and time again; it still made Cas quake.

He was hoping to find a gas station. Some port in the middle of nowhere that could guide him onwards, point him in the direction of the one place he’d thrown roots down. But the wind took him East, the road curved with the river, and Cas ended up at a diner of all places, tucked away in a corner booth with his nails caked in dirt and his face pink from the sun.

“Welcome in, I’m Ellie, I’ll be your waitress this evening,” A young woman greeted him, clearly rushed but smiling at him anyway. “Do we know what we’re eating yet?”

Cas’s stomach growled with insistence, turning inwards, and Cas stilled with a look of horror, the sensation making his skin crawl. If the woman noticed the odd reaction, she didn’t show it. Instead, her cheeks rose with a polite smile, notepad poised at the ready, and with a voice like gravel, shredded raw by the day's journey, he said, “One cheeseburger, please. Oh, and with bacon.”

And maybe Ellie could tell he was on his last leg. Maybe a woman like her, working in a place like this, had grown used to reading every face that walked through that door, knew the story of every traveler you could imagine just by the way they carried themselves. Maybe she was just kind.

But when she came back out with Cas’s food not even ten minutes later, sliding the plate right beneath his nose, she also had a vanilla milkshake in hand, whipped to perfection and topped with a cherry.

“There you are. And something sweet for the road,” She explained earnestly, pulling out a straw from her apron and placing it on the table. “On the house.”

Gratitude was something unfamiliar to Castiel. Foreign and misshapen, a reality he’d had no business with until now. Before Dean, before he’d been tasked with his mission on Earth, Cas had existed in a world of formulas and patterns. There was a purpose, singular and shared by all, and questioning meant defection. Stepping outside the mold, even for a selfless reason, meant disobedience, and that was something feared, and wicked, and carved out before it could spread.

Cas wasn’t used to kindness. The sort of compassion only humanity had unveiled, the kind Dean had plagued his very soul with, and to have it offered so thoughtlessly, with his wings scorched and his body mangled, everything hurting and everything wrong, was so far beyond what he deserved.

He’d hurt people. Caused harm. Betrayed the man he loved— and it wasn’t right, it wasn’t settled. Cas’s choices were going to follow him now, into a long, painful human life, and there was nothing he could do.

“Thank you,” He told the woman, little more than a whisper, and she left with the beginnings of a frown on her face.

The first bite of real food, with his stomach no longer made of boiling atoms, nearly sent Castiel into cardiac arrest, and he stifled a groan into the flesh of his hand. Forget scrambled eggs. Dean’s enthusiasm for diners suddenly made all the sense in the world, and Cas scarfed the burger down with sticky fingers, trying hard not to think about the empty seat across from him, and how this was his first human meal that hadn’t been prepared by Dean in a kitchen bathed in sunlight, his humming reaching every corner of a forgotten home.

In the end, with a couple bills already tucked neatly beneath his cleared plate, Cas relented and tried the milkshake. His eyes closed at the sweetness, teeth aching through a too-long sip, and Cas grimaced as he made his way to stand, uncertain how he felt about the whole thing.

The entire ordeal made him smile as he left though, heading back down the road, and his mind wandered, as it so often did, to Dean. Dean would’ve liked it. He would’ve finished the glass. But Cas thought he would’ve preferred chocolate if he’d gotten to choose, and Cas’s reaction would have had him dumbfounded, poking fun for the rest of the evening.

Cas slowed as the sun set in the horizon, the last slivers of daylight peeking through towering trees. He hummed low in his throat, trying for a tune.

It was hard, thinking about Dean. The way it all ended. The way it was never going to change. But it was also the only thing about Cas’s newly stitched heart that made any sense at all, the only setting that felt natural in his state of limbo, and at least for now, Cas existed with little more than a roadmap created by Dean himself.

How had Dean lived? How had Dean survived? He went to diners and ordered cheeseburgers and traveled the country and hummed under his breath. He lived on cash and humor and making people laugh, making people forget. He saw the road as a destination and made a home in every corner he could find and he never gave up, he never stopped, he just kept going.

It was late into the night by the time Castiel found a familiar dirt path broken off from the main road, and watched the peak of a mint green roof emerge from the treeline. The church yard was the same as they had left it.

A feeling he hadn’t yet cataloged flooded Cas’s chest as he stepped through the front door of the clergy house. Something he could only describe as bittersweet, like a forgotten taste you didn’t think you’d ever get back, and he got three steps inside before he was collapsing into the couch where he’d bled, where he’d felt his grace weep for restoration but his heart ache for something else, something unspeakable, and Cas had known he couldn’t have both.

And so he’d chosen.

This was the place where he had picked Dean under impossible circumstances, decided dying for him in the end would be worth it so long as he’d feel loved by him first, and it was also here that that choice had been undone. Heaven had come for him the second the tide had turned.

Castiel didn’t remember much of the torture. That was the point. His memory now was hazy at best, aided only by the humanity growing in his ribs, but he could remember the sudden emptiness, the absence of something they had plucked right from his chest. He’d been cold, focused, but Heaven’s rage hadn’t anticipated the reality of Dean Winchester’s stubbornness, and all it took was a single prayer and a meeting beneath a moon bathed awning for Cas’s freshly restored armor to earn yet another chink.

Cas rolled until his face was buried in the couch cushions, body curled inwards.

He knew the burning in his nose wasn’t a good one, that the stirring at the back of his throat was nothing but a chemical reaction, but he was still surprised by the first few tears anyway, gasping as they rolled down his cheeks.

“If you need me, I’ll be just outside,” Dean had told him that first night, and with his grace scorched but alive, power slowly returning to his borrowed limbs, Cas had thought silently, foolishly, why would I need you?

It was his last attempt at fighting it. Keeping his priorities in separate corners. He’d known it was pointless, because even though the question had made it to conception— why would he need someone like Dean— Castiel had been forced to lay there helplessly as his heart supplied him with a thousand reasons why he just might.

Truthfully, Cas didn’t know if he’d be able to do this without Dean. The way Cas saw it, humans were vast in their differences, unique in how they approached things like hardships. That was one of the reasons they were so mesmerizing.

In his position, some humans would write songs. Others would trace letters. There were people who would take this pain and turn it into stories or paintings or rides or milkshakes— and Cas could learn from them, he would try, he really would. But there were also humans who would feel this ache, this air seizing grief, and simply wish to die; Cas didn’t know what kind of human he was yet.

But wasting this, mourning who he’d been and what he’d sacrificed felt too much like regret. Like doing what was right, and saving Sam from the mistake he’d made, was something Castiel would ever do differently. And that couldn't be further from the truth.

So if this was his punishment, his eternal banishment, then Cas would take it gratefully. He would atone for hurting the Winchesters, again and again, in this life and the next, and he would do so quietly. Asking for nothing.

The sun was high and broiling when Castiel awoke. It pierced through the living room window, stretching along the floor towards him like an awaiting hand.

There was a twinge of pain in Cas’s back as he shifted, no doubt from a restless sleep, and Cas groaned into the curve of his elbow, desperate to get comfortable. He’d only just rediscovered a half decent position when a knock came from the front door, and Cas was suddenly clued in as to why, exactly, he’d even woken up in the first place.

There was little more than confusion that churned in Castiel’s stomach as he got up to answer the door. If it was Heaven, he’d be killed. If it was a stranger, he’d have to leave. If it was Dean— he was already dead, and someone was playing a torturous trick. Either way, Cas was human, or at least as close as one could get, and there was no fighting this, no twisting fate.

With only a beat of hesitation, Cas turned the knob and opened the door to a breach of sunlight. A loud creek echoed through the front room and outside to the porch, and Cas raised his eyes through the broken screen door to find Dean already watching him, mouth crooked and pink.

“Good work with the beard. Us war criminals gotta lay low.”

The nerves in Cas’s hand lost all feeling, and he dropped his arm from the door, limp and useless. He had half a mind to reach a hand up to his face, familiarize himself with what Dean was talking about, but his lungs had lost all ability to take in air and he needed to concentrate, to focus. He’d never been more aware that his heart was alive than in that moment.

And all Cas could think to say was, “I didn’t think you’d come looking.”

Dean’s shrug was loose, effortless, and Cas was suddenly floored with want, eyes tracing the shape of his shoulders.

“Changed my mind. Hell of a vacation spot. D’ya know there’s actually a hammock set up in the back between those two oak trees? Must’ve been installed just a few years ago, it looks plenty new,” He made a face at Cas, something teasing and secretive, and his laugh was bottled joy, sweet and rumbling as he said, “Can’t believe we didn’t use it.”

“Dean,” Cas shook his head. He felt torn between looking away and openly staring, a great deal of emotion strangling him. “Why are you here?”

The only indication that Dean was nervous, that he hadn’t shown up here as blazed and confident as he appeared, was the way his hands dove for the front pockets of his jeans, hesitating when he realized he didn’t have his jacket to fumble with. It was hot outside, more humid than Cas had ever experienced, and Dean was sweating in nothing but a t-shirt, his layers abandoned in the car parked down the hill.

Cas ached at the sight of him.

“To find you, obviously. And you’re pretty easy to track, man. I know you’ve got this whole Bear Grylls thing going on, but you’re still using credit cards under Jimmy’s name. You’ve practically got a fraud trail leading straight up your ass,” Dean snorted.

“Oh,” Cas deadpanned. That explained why Jimmy’s cards had stopped working.

“Oh?” Dean laughed.

Sweat was beading along his upper lip. Shining in the early morning sun. And Cas watched as Dean’s eyes danced with amusement, tracing Cas’s mouth like he was anticipating every word.

“I wasn’t aware. I haven’t quite mastered this yet.”

Had Dean really been looking for him? For how long? How far did he drive? How fast had he gone?

Dean’s brow dipped. “Mastered what? Identity theft?”

“Being human,” Cas supplied, fighting to sound casual, but Dean’s reaction was just the opposite, and Cas’s stomach dropped from beneath him.

“You—” Dean swiped a hand across the bottom of his face, anxious. “You’re human? How?”

The question barely had a chance to settle before Dean himself was jolting back, face pinching with realization. A frightening reel of emotions passed over Dean’s features then, too fast to decipher, and he bent forward with sudden persistence, knocking a hand against the door between them.

“Jesus, Cas. Can you just let me in, please? M’ sick of talking to you through a screen,” He frowned, and somehow having the barrier between them pointed out made things insurmountably worse.

Cas felt the moment his face went pink with embarrassment. A sort of rushing in his ears, a panic swarming heat. The feeling was so unfamiliar and sudden he nearly felt sick with it. But it drew Dean’s attention nevertheless, made his mouth twitch even as Cas timidly opened the screen door, and Cas supposed that was something.

Dean stepped inside with swinging arms, chin tucked low to his chest, and they pivoted around each other like nervous birds, hearts thundering in their too-small bodies.

It felt like ages before Dean was able to meet Cas’s gaze again, hand pressed to the back of his own neck in a comforting gesture.

“That was the price, wasn’t it? For bringing Sam back. Pull him out, fix your colossal fuck up, but in return you get your wings clipped?” Dean asked blatantly, not bothering to hide the edge of annoyance in his voice, and Cas wasn’t sure what to do with that.

“It sure seems that way, yes. I’m not sure whether time will be enough to heal a wound such as this one,” He explained, and while he’d had weeks to find peace with such a truth, to settle into the sharpened edges of the bed he’d made, Dean looked ready to crumble, eyes shining with regret. And Cas would not allow that. “There wasn’t a single sacrifice too great. I did what I had to, Dean.”

Killing Lilith had weakened Cas in ways he’d never expected. Couldn’t have possibly anticipated. The aftermath had left him melting in a vessel peeling open, the last remaining drops of Jimmy’s presence drying up with that final blast of power, and Cas had been sent reeling by yet another broken promise.

Then, Dean had told him to leave. And Cas hadn’t been able to think up a single reason why he shouldn’t.

The months following had seen Cas traveling the world in random sporadic blimps, appearing and disappearing at each new location within seconds. He couldn’t risk staying in one place too long. He was deemed an apostate, had fallen in every way imaginable, and if the constant tremor in the equator was any indication, all the forces of Heaven were scouring the Earth to bring Castiel back in shackles.

This all changed when Castiel felt his power return in full force. Any remains of self preservation were tossed to the wind with little thought, and he laid siege to Hell with the sole purpose of saving Sam Winchester, regardless if it let every angel in existence know exactly where he was.

Things had just gone a little differently than expected, is all.

While Castiel hadn’t known that rescuing Sam would take the sort of power to maim him, he accomplished his goal with little regret. And at the very least, Heaven’s wrath went eerily quiet; they must have thought Castiel’s human punishment had more than fit the crime.

“So you bring back the kid, drop him on my doorstep, and take off? Newly human and by yourself?” Dean gave him a nonplussed look, arms raising with a scoff. “What were you thinking?”

“I wasn’t expecting to be thanked, Dean. That wasn’t why I did it,” Cas shook his head, not understanding how they were here yet again, voices rising as an obstacle wedged itself between them.

“And what if I wanna thank you?” Dean said quickly, batting the question back with enough certainty to make Cas’s pulse spike. Dean took a slow step towards him, shoulders open in a way that made Cas want to run towards him, to trip and fall all over again. “What if I tell you I’m pissed, and I get it, and I forgive you for being a fucking idiot because in the end you chose me. You chose me like no one else ever fucking does. What happens then, huh?”

Cas’s heart was beating in his throat. His palms were gathering sweat. Even his vision was starting to soften, all the colors of the world narrowing down to a sole silhouette, a single man, and somehow this was all both terrifyingly new and helplessly the same, his feelings familiar but multiplied, stretching to every corner of a universe he could no longer see in full.

In a human body, with a human heart, and a human soul, all belonging to Castiel and Castiel alone, his love for Dean was almost debilitating, unspeakably delicate, and Cas could do nothing but feel it.

All Cas had ever been able to do was feel it.

“I don’t know,” Cas finally whispered, fearful, and Dean’s next smile was sad but encouraging, eyes dancing hungrily over Cas’s features.

The wooden floor creaked with the weight of Dean’s next step, his warmth edging even closer.

“Yes, you do. What happens, Cas?” Dean asked, painfully gentle. “There’s a reason you came here, right? All the places in the world, all the people you could’ve turned to, the corners you could’ve hidden— and you chose here, why?”

Because it had been the easiest decision Cas had ever made. That’s why. Because Cas had been alive for millions of years, Dean had been alive for thirty, and he’d been able to break Cas in a way corruption never had, to heal him with love he’d never felt.

This was the place Cas had come to, because his time on Earth had meant nothing apart from when he was with Dean, and it was here, in a matter of days against his endless years, that Cas had tasted human air, felt the ache that came with thoughtless touch, and realized he would know nothing greater.

Even weak and mortal, Cas could still feel Dean’s presence. Here, Cas could still feel the memories of them, plastered to the very walls.

“I didn’t know where else to go,” Cas said, softer than he’d ever admitted anything. He paused with his breath held, his chest ready to collapse. “It was the only place I felt like I could still have a part of you.”

The words caught in Cas’s throat, shredding along the muscle, and Cas watched as Dean struggled to swallow them. To compute them, emotion rearing high and ugly and honest in his face. Dean’s next step came quick, sudden, like he couldn’t stand their distance a second longer, and even though his head dropped, shielding his face from Cas’s scrutiny, Cas could tell just by the lines around his eyes that Dean was smiling.

“Good. That’s good, Cas,” He murmured, and he almost sounded shy. Unbearably fond. It was no wonder Cas gasped when Dean raised his eyes with little warning, forcing their noses to brush.

This time, Cas could feel the smile Dean wore like a prize, teeth grazing along his bottom lip.

“But no more parts,” Dean breathed, forcing warmth to pool in Cas’s stomach. “No more gambling. I’m all in. Two fucking feet— and you can have me. Just have me.”

And when Cas leaned in that final inch to kiss Dean, sealing their mouths together as an answer all its own, somehow, even that felt different. Deeper in a way he’d never imagined. All encompassing on a front he'd never been able to experience so long as his skin was false and his heart was conflicted.

Now, kissing Dean came with endorphins, and heat that singed, and an ache that never settled. It meant pulling Dean close could never feel close enough, and that the way Dean touched him, the way his skin sang and his spine arched just for him, would always be infinitely more beautiful than any moment Cas had spent among the stars.

And ultimately, it meant that every page burned had been undoubtedly worth it.