It's a Long Walk Back to Eden: Part IV
Rec'd listening: Led Zeppelin - Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You.
Sam’s on his eighth memory when he runs into Dean, and it scares the shit out of him.
Oh, the places he’s been: Detroit, the St. Louis ruins, and a couple places he’s never seen. He’s fresh from the deserts - an angel in a flowing white dress sprawled out across the dunes - when Dean’s just there. Glowering. It startles him back a step.
His brother’s got his hand pressed against a bloody sigil, the panic room’s familiar iron walls at his back. He’s staring at Sam, but that’s only because Sam’s standing where Cas had been. Sam had always thought the look would’ve been at least a little apologetic. It’s not. Dean’s face is all resentment, flinted eyes and curled lip, the whole nine yards.
It’s not right.
His feet crunch on glass. Broken lamp. That was what Dean used to get the blood he needed, Sam knows; he’d poured over that room in the hours after the fact, cataloging every worthless little facet of his brother’s last act of stupidity.
Would’ve left him in the dark, if they’d gotten him back. Would’ve handcuffed him to the damn bed. Turnabout is fair play, after all.
But that face - it’s not right. Can’t be right. It’s like a bad caricature.
That, more than anything, unsettles him.
All the more reason to move: he shakes the flask. Three-quarters left, as far as he can tell. Go west, young man-
♤ ♤ ♤
The next place came after, not before.
Sam recognizes the bar. It’s a little dive in downtown Sioux Falls. There’s a bony old man in front of him, kneeling on the sidewalk. He has a Bible raised, but not in an O-Holy-Holy kind of way. His elbow’s locked; he’s trying to protect himself. The way his temple’s cut open and weeping red, he’s already been hit once. His eyes shine wet with fear, even as he’s trying to force his face into the look of a proper martyr.
Castiel explained it as coldly and vaguely as he explained anything: I was not there in time. He used a street preacher to draw their attention.
Sam’s willing to bet Zachariah wasn’t the one that punched out the street preacher. He’s seen enough of Cas to know - Cas shooting down a Croat, Cas dragging a demon to its knees. Cas realizing that Dean Winchester just said ‘Yes’. And if he remembers right, there’d been blood on his knuckles, that night. The way his knuckles had shined. He used a street preacher…
“Jesus, Cas,” Sam mutters.
He finds a spot of pavement beyond the Jehovah’s Witness, pulls the flask out of his back pocket, but he never pulls the cap off. He stares at the man for awhile - one palm against the ground, a knee next to it, back curled in the picture of cowering fear. Thinks of Gabriel’s wings in the moonlight.
Then, with the most purpose he’s felt in a while, he settles back into a kneel, gravel popping against asphalt under his feet. The preacher keeps his Bible up against his invisible foe, and Sam waits for the moon to turn.
♤ ♤ ♤
When Heaven settles, he’s at the back entrance to a two-story, windowless building, a single metal door in front of him. The air’s hotter and thicker here, somewhere below the Mason-Dixon line. He recognizes the smell: paper mills. It was Missouri, he thinks, and he was 14, and in one, two, three-
The door opens.
He pours into the dark, reeking of popcorn, both stale and fresh. On the screen Danny DeVito’s narrating over flashes of nostalgic 1950s Hollywood: …and very. Hush. Hush.
It’s 1997, and Dean’s getting him into an R-rated movie. In a couple of seconds Guy Pearce is going to waltz on the screen, and Kevin Spacey, and Russell Crowe - it’s L.A. Confidential and they’ll be talking about it for weeks - Sam wants to be Exley, the straight-and-narrow smart cop, and Dean wants to be Vincinnes, the snarky street-wise one. Sam doesn’t get it, Vincinnes doesn’t even live to the end. Dean insists that that just makes him cooler, because that’s how Dean’s fucked-up mind works.
Here, now, he lunges forward to catch Dean’s arm on the door, says, “Hey, Dean-“ but his brother’s already disappearing into the dark. Sam chases after him, takes the steps up to the back row in threes (where they’d crouch, when the ushers turned their flashlight on the crowd, and they’d toss popcorn at the people below, make shadow puppets eat the actors’ heads) - and stares down the line of empty seats, unevenly lit in the constant shift of the screen’s light.
“Dean?”
He sprints back down, eyeing every row. The whole damn theater is empty, but he calls out again, quieter - “Dean?”
The movie rolls on.
He runs out to the lobby, but there’s nothing; unwaxed floors and empty counters. Even the ticket booth is empty. He shoves open the front door and stumbles not into paper mill stench and thick Missouri air but sunlight, bright and clean and pure, and Jess grinning in his face.
She’s young and gorgeous, a gold spill of bangs across her face from a sloppy ponytail. “Sam Winchester, right? Anthro 313?”
He remembers this.
The rhythm of the waves and the warmth of the sand, spring semester freshman year. Half Moon Bay. He remembers the sun and Jess and choking over his first words. But he doesn’t stumble over his own tongue and force through a clumsy “Yeah, guilty,” this time. This time, he just stares at her.
The memory plays on without him: a small, light hand folds around his shoulder and pushes, a gentle shove, as she grins through her displeasure. “You’re the one that blew the curve on that last test. I would’ve had an A- if it weren’t for you! Bastard.” She laughs, though really, she’s laughing the whole time - every syllable is happy, and normal, and pretty-
God damn it.
He digs his toes into the sand and drags a hand across his face. “Sorry, Jess. I, uh-“ And then he grabs her and kisses her, right on the lips. Soft hair smooth skin and that coconut whatever she uses so she won’t freckle. She scrunches her nose just the way she used to, then stares at him in pleasant surprise. “Sorry,” he says again. Then he turns and runs.
There’s a pier just where he remembered it was; he has to sprint around the makings of a bonfire, the old classmates, dorm guys. His freshman roommate shoves a beer his way and whines, “Oh, c’mon, Saa-aam,” when he blows right past him.
Was she - is she, is that - real? Was that her? Does it matter? The honey pours as clean as ever, neat straight lines, and he wants to hold on to the memory of Jess, the way she tastes and smells, he wants to stay here, and that’s precisely why he can’t.
So he presses his hand to the sigil, and goes.
The pier - salt-flecked and splintering - is hardwood floor, now. There’s a line of fire in front of him, long licks of yellow that are frozen in the air. He recognizes the curve of it: holy oil.
Lucifer’s staring at him across the flames.
“Jesus.” Sam startles back. He almost ends up stumbling into the other side of the circle. But it’s alright, because the world’s slipping sideways - Lucifer’s small, self-assured smile disappearing. He sketches a quick, messy sigil across the boards. He doesn’t need to see Jess again, or Dad, or the hole where Dean’s supposed to be-
He presses his hand to the honey-and-oil just as the floor starts sprouting blades of grass.
♤ ♤ ♤
Loud and bright: the next memory explodes across his senses with all the force of a flash grenade.
The air hums and vibrates, floorboards shaking, but the frequency’s off, slow: thump thump thump rather than the constant rattle it wants to be. This has to be the wrong place; he has to be back in his own memory. What memory, he’s got no idea (Ilchester? No--) but god, it’s loud--
He throws a hand up to cover his eyes, but the light bleeds through the skin, blinds and burns. He can’t even make out the shape of it, whatever the fuck it is that’s in front of him-an angel, has to be--before there’s something digging its nails into his shoulder. He’s stuck. Frozen-and waiting.
Someone’s pleading: Raphael, brother--
The last thing Sam expects to hear next is, “Woops. Watch out for that one.”
Sam turns towards the hand and Gabriel’s voice, but it’s still too bright to see more than the vague impression of a face. Gabriel shouts over the hum: “Total asshole, that guy.”
Now that he squints, Sam can almost make out the cracked walls of Chuck Shirley’s living room. Sure. That makes sense. He shouts, “Can we go someplace quieter?”
Whatever Gabriel says, he doesn’t hear, but the light goes. The sound must, too - he can’t feel his teeth vibrating with it anymore - but hell if he can tell over the ringing in his ears.
He opens his eyes to the blessed dim of Bobby Singer’s basement. Past Gabriel, he can see the door swing an inch, then another, then freeze.
In a second, Sam Winchester’s going to push it open the rest of the way.
Cas was here? Cas was--
No. Doesn’t matter. He bites down hard on the inside of his cheek and shakes his head to clear the buzz before staring hard at Gabriel, who has his hip propped against Bobby’s workbench. “You find what you were looking for?”
“Nah, not yet.” He roots through the rusting tools spread out behind him, selecting one at random to toy with. “Home’s a lot bigger than I remember, is all. You still haven’t found the runt?”
Home. It’s a slip, has to be. But there’s nothing more readable about Gabriel’s face now than there’s ever been.
It’s the door - moving open one inevitable inch at a time - that drives him back to the subject at hand. “I’m going as fast as I can. I’ve only got half of the flask left, maybe less-“
Gabriel’s haywire attention span tracks back. “You what?” He snaps the wire strippers in his hand shut. “Whoa now. How many places have you been?”
“Uh-I lost count.”
“7, 8? I know these are big numbers for you, kiddo-“
He shrugs, guessing: “14, 15.”
Gabriel whistles.
Sam drops into impatience. “What?”
“S’a lot, is all,” Gabriel answers, dropping the wire strippers with a clack. “These little scenes might get a little bit nasty, soon.”
There’s nothing in the tone to indicate he’s about to take off, but Sam knows that’s not enough to go by. He takes a lunge forward, grabbing him by the jacket collar. “So get me to him. Enough fucking around.”
He catches up Sam’s wrist, and Sam grabs his wrist. They stand there, locked - but it’s Sam’s wrist that’s slowly getting crushed, not Gabriel’s. “I got you this far,” the archangel answers slowly. “Take some initiative.” Then Gabriel’s gone.
Or, more accurately, Sam’s gone. And someone’s screaming: “Annael--!”
“Fuck.” Sam throws his hands over his ears. More loud - and more bright, too-there’s only the briefest hints of movement amongst the light. There’s something blazing - and just as rapidly dimming- at his back and in front (his brothers press him back; he will plead, even if Uriel is too proud--)
He looks over his shoulder, and the light fractions apart to Annael: the bare edges of her alone are more beautiful than anything she could’ve ever been on Earth, even as the grace bleeds from her in rivers--
His perception drops out to nauseatingly still reality: he’s standing on a catwalk, drowning in industrial fumes and real.
Sam blinks blearily and stares at-well, Annael. Anna. The red-haired, human Anna, except this one, he thinks, is the one with Grace. There’s an angel at each elbow, and she’s staring at the empty space two feet to his left with what could easily pass for a promise of violent revenge.
He breathes the stale air and relishes the quiet.
When he’s close enough to calm again, he pushes past the angel that more-or-less killed him once and finds a patch of concrete that’ll suit his needs. It’s tough going by the one pathetic security light, but he’s got the sigil wrapped up in muscle memory, now. He presses his fingers down blind. It must be right; the concrete’s melting beneath his hand, and Sam - he’s doubling over and choking, palms against burning earth.
Sulfur - he’s breathing sulfur - or, Jesus, trying to -
“We knew--”
The voice is in his head, disorienting. Not Cas. Zachariah. That son of a bitch Zachariah -
“--fast enough--”
He digs his fingers into rock, scalding, and blinks furiously to see through weeping eyes. Red, and blood, and yellow - everything’s too vivid, not bright but the goddamn opposite, oversaturated - he breathes the acid air and thinks, no, it is God damned, it’s Hell-
Chaos at his back, screams without end, and in front of him, both close and far through the barely breathable air is something a little too bright, for this. A little too clean, but dimming quick. Two broad swaths of white, weeping light - bits of it, like dust? - to the ground.
Not dust, feathers.
Wings.
The thing takes an uncertain step back, and more feathers fall.
The shape of it, him, it doesn’t make sense. But then there it is. Its head drops aside, a confused dog. Sam laughs - one hoarse, pathetic noise - at the familiarity of it.
Castiel steps back, and a half-dozen feathers shake free to burn on the rock and blood. There’s something impaled in what could pass for his chest: a knife, or a pipe, Sam’s eyes are too blurred to tell. And past him, Dean.
God, no, Dean.
Sam draws a shuddering breath and shoves back, cuts his palms open on the jagged edges of rock with the rushed, clumsy movement but he’s still staring forward, seeing how his brother’s fingers are curled to match the shape of the handle, a thin veneer of surprise beneath that half-lidded and dull-eyed stare.
The righteous man: farther from God than anyone.
“We knew you wouldn’t be fast enough.”
The vision shudders as it corrects itself. Not white wings: black. Cas is small, and grey, and falling to his knees. Head bowed, but turned aside to listen.
“Cas,” Sam wheezes. “Cas.”
The lines of him, they fade, and Sam moves to scream his name. He can’t make his throat work. His voice shatters and breaks, and he chokes on the silence.
Cas melts into black. Dean stays, soot and blood and disbelief, and stills.
Surprise. Glazed, dull-eyed, and-no. It’s not right. He knows him, knows Dean and there’s something-there’s something begging, there. Something alive, before it burns away. Everything burns here--
Part III | Part IV | Part V
Sam’s on his eighth memory when he runs into Dean, and it scares the shit out of him.
Oh, the places he’s been: Detroit, the St. Louis ruins, and a couple places he’s never seen. He’s fresh from the deserts - an angel in a flowing white dress sprawled out across the dunes - when Dean’s just there. Glowering. It startles him back a step.
His brother’s got his hand pressed against a bloody sigil, the panic room’s familiar iron walls at his back. He’s staring at Sam, but that’s only because Sam’s standing where Cas had been. Sam had always thought the look would’ve been at least a little apologetic. It’s not. Dean’s face is all resentment, flinted eyes and curled lip, the whole nine yards.
It’s not right.
His feet crunch on glass. Broken lamp. That was what Dean used to get the blood he needed, Sam knows; he’d poured over that room in the hours after the fact, cataloging every worthless little facet of his brother’s last act of stupidity.
Would’ve left him in the dark, if they’d gotten him back. Would’ve handcuffed him to the damn bed. Turnabout is fair play, after all.
But that face - it’s not right. Can’t be right. It’s like a bad caricature.
That, more than anything, unsettles him.
All the more reason to move: he shakes the flask. Three-quarters left, as far as he can tell. Go west, young man-
♤ ♤ ♤
The next place came after, not before.
Sam recognizes the bar. It’s a little dive in downtown Sioux Falls. There’s a bony old man in front of him, kneeling on the sidewalk. He has a Bible raised, but not in an O-Holy-Holy kind of way. His elbow’s locked; he’s trying to protect himself. The way his temple’s cut open and weeping red, he’s already been hit once. His eyes shine wet with fear, even as he’s trying to force his face into the look of a proper martyr.
Castiel explained it as coldly and vaguely as he explained anything: I was not there in time. He used a street preacher to draw their attention.
Sam’s willing to bet Zachariah wasn’t the one that punched out the street preacher. He’s seen enough of Cas to know - Cas shooting down a Croat, Cas dragging a demon to its knees. Cas realizing that Dean Winchester just said ‘Yes’. And if he remembers right, there’d been blood on his knuckles, that night. The way his knuckles had shined. He used a street preacher…
“Jesus, Cas,” Sam mutters.
He finds a spot of pavement beyond the Jehovah’s Witness, pulls the flask out of his back pocket, but he never pulls the cap off. He stares at the man for awhile - one palm against the ground, a knee next to it, back curled in the picture of cowering fear. Thinks of Gabriel’s wings in the moonlight.
Then, with the most purpose he’s felt in a while, he settles back into a kneel, gravel popping against asphalt under his feet. The preacher keeps his Bible up against his invisible foe, and Sam waits for the moon to turn.
♤ ♤ ♤
When Heaven settles, he’s at the back entrance to a two-story, windowless building, a single metal door in front of him. The air’s hotter and thicker here, somewhere below the Mason-Dixon line. He recognizes the smell: paper mills. It was Missouri, he thinks, and he was 14, and in one, two, three-
The door opens.
He pours into the dark, reeking of popcorn, both stale and fresh. On the screen Danny DeVito’s narrating over flashes of nostalgic 1950s Hollywood: …and very. Hush. Hush.
It’s 1997, and Dean’s getting him into an R-rated movie. In a couple of seconds Guy Pearce is going to waltz on the screen, and Kevin Spacey, and Russell Crowe - it’s L.A. Confidential and they’ll be talking about it for weeks - Sam wants to be Exley, the straight-and-narrow smart cop, and Dean wants to be Vincinnes, the snarky street-wise one. Sam doesn’t get it, Vincinnes doesn’t even live to the end. Dean insists that that just makes him cooler, because that’s how Dean’s fucked-up mind works.
Here, now, he lunges forward to catch Dean’s arm on the door, says, “Hey, Dean-“ but his brother’s already disappearing into the dark. Sam chases after him, takes the steps up to the back row in threes (where they’d crouch, when the ushers turned their flashlight on the crowd, and they’d toss popcorn at the people below, make shadow puppets eat the actors’ heads) - and stares down the line of empty seats, unevenly lit in the constant shift of the screen’s light.
“Dean?”
He sprints back down, eyeing every row. The whole damn theater is empty, but he calls out again, quieter - “Dean?”
The movie rolls on.
He runs out to the lobby, but there’s nothing; unwaxed floors and empty counters. Even the ticket booth is empty. He shoves open the front door and stumbles not into paper mill stench and thick Missouri air but sunlight, bright and clean and pure, and Jess grinning in his face.
She’s young and gorgeous, a gold spill of bangs across her face from a sloppy ponytail. “Sam Winchester, right? Anthro 313?”
He remembers this.
The rhythm of the waves and the warmth of the sand, spring semester freshman year. Half Moon Bay. He remembers the sun and Jess and choking over his first words. But he doesn’t stumble over his own tongue and force through a clumsy “Yeah, guilty,” this time. This time, he just stares at her.
The memory plays on without him: a small, light hand folds around his shoulder and pushes, a gentle shove, as she grins through her displeasure. “You’re the one that blew the curve on that last test. I would’ve had an A- if it weren’t for you! Bastard.” She laughs, though really, she’s laughing the whole time - every syllable is happy, and normal, and pretty-
God damn it.
He digs his toes into the sand and drags a hand across his face. “Sorry, Jess. I, uh-“ And then he grabs her and kisses her, right on the lips. Soft hair smooth skin and that coconut whatever she uses so she won’t freckle. She scrunches her nose just the way she used to, then stares at him in pleasant surprise. “Sorry,” he says again. Then he turns and runs.
There’s a pier just where he remembered it was; he has to sprint around the makings of a bonfire, the old classmates, dorm guys. His freshman roommate shoves a beer his way and whines, “Oh, c’mon, Saa-aam,” when he blows right past him.
Was she - is she, is that - real? Was that her? Does it matter? The honey pours as clean as ever, neat straight lines, and he wants to hold on to the memory of Jess, the way she tastes and smells, he wants to stay here, and that’s precisely why he can’t.
So he presses his hand to the sigil, and goes.
The pier - salt-flecked and splintering - is hardwood floor, now. There’s a line of fire in front of him, long licks of yellow that are frozen in the air. He recognizes the curve of it: holy oil.
Lucifer’s staring at him across the flames.
“Jesus.” Sam startles back. He almost ends up stumbling into the other side of the circle. But it’s alright, because the world’s slipping sideways - Lucifer’s small, self-assured smile disappearing. He sketches a quick, messy sigil across the boards. He doesn’t need to see Jess again, or Dad, or the hole where Dean’s supposed to be-
He presses his hand to the honey-and-oil just as the floor starts sprouting blades of grass.
♤ ♤ ♤
Loud and bright: the next memory explodes across his senses with all the force of a flash grenade.
The air hums and vibrates, floorboards shaking, but the frequency’s off, slow: thump thump thump rather than the constant rattle it wants to be. This has to be the wrong place; he has to be back in his own memory. What memory, he’s got no idea (Ilchester? No--) but god, it’s loud--
He throws a hand up to cover his eyes, but the light bleeds through the skin, blinds and burns. He can’t even make out the shape of it, whatever the fuck it is that’s in front of him-an angel, has to be--before there’s something digging its nails into his shoulder. He’s stuck. Frozen-and waiting.
Someone’s pleading: Raphael, brother--
The last thing Sam expects to hear next is, “Woops. Watch out for that one.”
Sam turns towards the hand and Gabriel’s voice, but it’s still too bright to see more than the vague impression of a face. Gabriel shouts over the hum: “Total asshole, that guy.”
Now that he squints, Sam can almost make out the cracked walls of Chuck Shirley’s living room. Sure. That makes sense. He shouts, “Can we go someplace quieter?”
Whatever Gabriel says, he doesn’t hear, but the light goes. The sound must, too - he can’t feel his teeth vibrating with it anymore - but hell if he can tell over the ringing in his ears.
He opens his eyes to the blessed dim of Bobby Singer’s basement. Past Gabriel, he can see the door swing an inch, then another, then freeze.
In a second, Sam Winchester’s going to push it open the rest of the way.
Cas was here? Cas was--
No. Doesn’t matter. He bites down hard on the inside of his cheek and shakes his head to clear the buzz before staring hard at Gabriel, who has his hip propped against Bobby’s workbench. “You find what you were looking for?”
“Nah, not yet.” He roots through the rusting tools spread out behind him, selecting one at random to toy with. “Home’s a lot bigger than I remember, is all. You still haven’t found the runt?”
Home. It’s a slip, has to be. But there’s nothing more readable about Gabriel’s face now than there’s ever been.
It’s the door - moving open one inevitable inch at a time - that drives him back to the subject at hand. “I’m going as fast as I can. I’ve only got half of the flask left, maybe less-“
Gabriel’s haywire attention span tracks back. “You what?” He snaps the wire strippers in his hand shut. “Whoa now. How many places have you been?”
“Uh-I lost count.”
“7, 8? I know these are big numbers for you, kiddo-“
He shrugs, guessing: “14, 15.”
Gabriel whistles.
Sam drops into impatience. “What?”
“S’a lot, is all,” Gabriel answers, dropping the wire strippers with a clack. “These little scenes might get a little bit nasty, soon.”
There’s nothing in the tone to indicate he’s about to take off, but Sam knows that’s not enough to go by. He takes a lunge forward, grabbing him by the jacket collar. “So get me to him. Enough fucking around.”
He catches up Sam’s wrist, and Sam grabs his wrist. They stand there, locked - but it’s Sam’s wrist that’s slowly getting crushed, not Gabriel’s. “I got you this far,” the archangel answers slowly. “Take some initiative.” Then Gabriel’s gone.
Or, more accurately, Sam’s gone. And someone’s screaming: “Annael--!”
“Fuck.” Sam throws his hands over his ears. More loud - and more bright, too-there’s only the briefest hints of movement amongst the light. There’s something blazing - and just as rapidly dimming- at his back and in front (his brothers press him back; he will plead, even if Uriel is too proud--)
He looks over his shoulder, and the light fractions apart to Annael: the bare edges of her alone are more beautiful than anything she could’ve ever been on Earth, even as the grace bleeds from her in rivers--
His perception drops out to nauseatingly still reality: he’s standing on a catwalk, drowning in industrial fumes and real.
Sam blinks blearily and stares at-well, Annael. Anna. The red-haired, human Anna, except this one, he thinks, is the one with Grace. There’s an angel at each elbow, and she’s staring at the empty space two feet to his left with what could easily pass for a promise of violent revenge.
He breathes the stale air and relishes the quiet.
When he’s close enough to calm again, he pushes past the angel that more-or-less killed him once and finds a patch of concrete that’ll suit his needs. It’s tough going by the one pathetic security light, but he’s got the sigil wrapped up in muscle memory, now. He presses his fingers down blind. It must be right; the concrete’s melting beneath his hand, and Sam - he’s doubling over and choking, palms against burning earth.
Sulfur - he’s breathing sulfur - or, Jesus, trying to -
“We knew--”
The voice is in his head, disorienting. Not Cas. Zachariah. That son of a bitch Zachariah -
“--fast enough--”
He digs his fingers into rock, scalding, and blinks furiously to see through weeping eyes. Red, and blood, and yellow - everything’s too vivid, not bright but the goddamn opposite, oversaturated - he breathes the acid air and thinks, no, it is God damned, it’s Hell-
Chaos at his back, screams without end, and in front of him, both close and far through the barely breathable air is something a little too bright, for this. A little too clean, but dimming quick. Two broad swaths of white, weeping light - bits of it, like dust? - to the ground.
Not dust, feathers.
Wings.
The thing takes an uncertain step back, and more feathers fall.
The shape of it, him, it doesn’t make sense. But then there it is. Its head drops aside, a confused dog. Sam laughs - one hoarse, pathetic noise - at the familiarity of it.
Castiel steps back, and a half-dozen feathers shake free to burn on the rock and blood. There’s something impaled in what could pass for his chest: a knife, or a pipe, Sam’s eyes are too blurred to tell. And past him, Dean.
God, no, Dean.
Sam draws a shuddering breath and shoves back, cuts his palms open on the jagged edges of rock with the rushed, clumsy movement but he’s still staring forward, seeing how his brother’s fingers are curled to match the shape of the handle, a thin veneer of surprise beneath that half-lidded and dull-eyed stare.
The righteous man: farther from God than anyone.
“We knew you wouldn’t be fast enough.”
The vision shudders as it corrects itself. Not white wings: black. Cas is small, and grey, and falling to his knees. Head bowed, but turned aside to listen.
“Cas,” Sam wheezes. “Cas.”
The lines of him, they fade, and Sam moves to scream his name. He can’t make his throat work. His voice shatters and breaks, and he chokes on the silence.
Cas melts into black. Dean stays, soot and blood and disbelief, and stills.
Surprise. Glazed, dull-eyed, and-no. It’s not right. He knows him, knows Dean and there’s something-there’s something begging, there. Something alive, before it burns away. Everything burns here--
Part III | Part IV | Part V