Fic: Run With The Devil (6/?)
(this chapter:)
Rating: PG(-13).
Fandoms: Supernatural.
Pairing(s): Pre-Dean/Castiel. Eventual Sam/Lucifer.
Word Count: 1018.
Warnings: Language.
~
Chapter Six
When they checked in at the hotel, it was dark out. This had the benefit of no one having to have seen the hotel in the daylight. It was better that way.
Nick, so far, was taking things surprisingly well. Although obviously upset, the full brunt of his loss hadn’t hit him yet and thus his grief contained.
“So,” Dean turned to the kid, “do you eat and sleep or…?”
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I?” Nick responded, eyeing the two double beds and the other three of them.
The older Winchester pointed his thumb in Castiel’s direction, “He doesn’t.”
“Oh.” Nick shrugged and stared at the beds again. “So, uh, who’s going to be sleeping where…?”
Dean opened his mouth to answer before closing it again. He hadn’t exactly thought this through, but he’d always figured the non-life-threatening things would just figure themselves out. He wasn’t going to get another room… They didn’t want Nick to be alone for a plethora of reasons and Dean boarding with him would be crazy levels of awkward. Sam, maybe…but just in case something went wrong--as things tended to do whenever Winchesters were involved--he didn’t want to even think about Sam alone for the night with that kid. Not yet, at least. Maybe after they’d all been together a while and he could kind of trust him, if that ever were to happen.
He’d deal with the future implications later. For now, simply beds.
Luckily for him, Sam had already thought of a solution, “Dean, we can share like when I was little and Nick can have the other bed.”
Dean didn’t exactly relish the idea of sleeping in the same bed as his teenage brother, but whatever worked. “Alright.” He turned his attention to the angel standing by the wall, tense and staring at Nick suspiciously. He spoke instead to the boys again though, “If you’ve got sensitive, virgin eyes, it might be best to turn your backs.”
“Are you two gonna fuck?”
No one bothered to answer him this time, although Sam had to concentrate hard on not laughing, and possibly high five-ing him.
“Cas, take off your shirt.”
The angel’s movements were slow and uncertain as he gingerly removed his coat and worked the buttons from their holes. Dean had to stop himself from helping since watching Cas undress the way he did was borderline pathetic. The guy obviously had no idea what to do, dropping his clothes down in a rumpled pile on the less-than-clean hotel carpet.
In a way, he was glad for the wound. It gave him the chance to see what was under all those loose clothes while also distracting him from looking at his chest too long. It was a fairly long slash across the angel’s taut stomach and it didn’t seem to have gotten any better.
The energy glaring at him and reminding him of his many failures as a protector. It wasn’t that Castiel necessarily needed protecting, Dean just didn’t know what else his purpose could be if not killing evil and protecting people (and Cas).
He reached out and pressed his fingers to it, feeling along the edges. It wasn’t noticeable until he was actually touching the light that it was hot, burning almost, and he withdrew his hand as his sense of self-preservation kicked in. “Fuck. Sit down on the bed.”
“Why?”
“Would you just do it, Cas? For me?” His worry came out as frustration, but Castiel obeyed anyway.
Nick’s elbow nudged Sam’s arm and covered the side of his mouth as if telling him a secret. Once Sam looked at him though, all he did was mouth, “Gay.”
The younger Winchester shook his head in admonishment, but he was smiling.
The two continued to watch the continuing would-they-or-wouldn’t-they adventures of Dean and Cas (which after only a few hours, Nick felt invested in). Physical wounds edition.
“What do you need me to do?” Dean asked, trying to keep his tone on the lighter side of serious.
“Nothing, Dean.”
“Cas.”
“I could be healed through contact with a human soul, but that’s not an option.”
Dean watched Castiel’s borrowed muscles flex and hoped his mouth hadn’t been hanging open long. It was just so…different. A year and a half and he’d never seen so much as a forearm. All that exposed skin was shocking his tired brain. “Why not?”
“If I don’t do it properly, it could kill someone.” Kill you, he didn’t say, but they both knew what he meant.
“I don’t care. I trust you, Cas.”
“No, Dean.” The angel remained seated on the bed, but it felt like something had sparked in the air--something powerful and frightening.
That didn’t stop him. “Well, why the hell not?”
“No. I’m not going to risk you or anyone.”
Dean took a step back, rubbing his eyes, “Yes, you are, Cas. I don’t mean to go all chick flick on you here, but I’m worried, alright? It’s been hours and that looks just as bad now if not worse.”
“No.”
“Is there anything else, maybe?” Sam broke in, the tension between his brother and the angel crackling through the room, hanging densely around them.
“It’s possible it will heal.” Dean rolled his eyes and Castiel continued, “The only other option would be if another angel were to heal me, but as you know, I’m not exactly on…good terms with Heaven.”
The older Winchester felt a little twinge of guilt at having turned Castiel against his family, but, seriously, fuck those guys. They were all dicks. “None of them maybe, uh, owe you a favor or anything?”
Castiel shook his head.
“Um.” Nick cleared his throat, “I know it seems we’ve spent half of today carefully avoiding the subject, but wasn’t the whole reason you guys kidnapped me because I was Lucifer?” He was met with stares. He wondered what it was about him opening his mouth that made everyone else shut theirs, but that wasn’t the point right now. “Lucifer…was an angel once, right?”