MNIC - Ch. 14: Did You Enjoy Your Reprieve?
Title: My Name Is Castiel
Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Word Count: 3700 (Running Total: 49200)
Summary: After escaping from Death's clutches yet again, Cas jumps right into the fight against the Leviathans. Post-7x10. "I am an angel of the Lord. Let me tell you my story. Let me tell you everything."
Chapter 14 - Did You Enjoy Your Reprieve?
The ground seems to be… bulging. Pulsing up and down. What-
Sensing movement, I spin around just in time to catch a blade before it enters my back. I grip my brother’s arm tightly, twisting it downwards, and try to stab him with my own blade, but he manages to grasp my blade arm as well.
I knee him in the side where he’s vulnerable, and we break apart. I sweep forward. He leaps back. I back up two steps as he advances, and when he charges, I try to flip him onto his back. He moves with the momentum, flips, lands on his feet.
He steps forward again. I aim up while he jabs down, and we lock in position again, both of us still unharmed.
Another brother is coming. I look over my shoulder to anticipate where he will strike. Not surprisingly, he aims under my lifted arm, where I’ll be least likely to block the stab.
I dodge just enough to the left so that his blade misses my side, and then I bring down my right arm, snapping his arm in place. In the same motion, I release my blade and catch it with my left hand, stabbing it into the first angel’s stomach.
My other brother tries to pull his arm back in vain, and the first staggers back half a step before his Grace explodes in a bright burst of light.
Then I bring my right elbow backwards, clipping my brother in the chin, and he loses his blade to me. I swing my left arm, slicing his throat with the blade, and he falls backwards. I turn around rapidly and kneel, switching the blade from left to right hand before stabbing him through the heart. I wait for the blast before removing the blade.
I look around for a moment to make sure no more will come before moving toward the spot where the ground had been bulging. Dropping my blade, I take a knee and reach down to touch the earth.
A hand shoots out of the dirt, and I grasp it tightly, pulling a body out of its grave. I frown. This soul just came from Heaven. He has returned fully human, not as a ghost or spirit. I lift him up and fly for Bobby Singer’s house.
****************************************
I cannot sense Dean properly if I cannot see him. And he is not calling out to me, which doesn’t help. The panic room looks like a mess.
I need to ensure that he hasn’t done anything stupid.
Apprehensively, I open the latch and push the thick door, entering the panic room. A chair has been kicked over, and some books and a candlestick lie on the ground near it. A ritual?
“Cas.”
I turn around in time to see Dean slam a closet door shut. I see the banishing sigil just as Dean presses his hand to it, and I’m thrown backwards through space.
Fury saturates the blood that runs through the veins of my vessel, permeates my being until I am a large, fiery pit of rage. How dare he use a banishing sigil against me in order to surrender? I lost everything for him, and this is how he repays me.
I channel the wrath into power, using it to stop my ascent toward Heaven. The rage is almost enough to offset how much I’ve been weakened by the banishing spell. Almost.
But I still feel weariness in my wings, my Grace. Without access to the power of the Host, there is no way for me to replenish myself. But this hectic, all-encompassing emotion will suffice, for now. I focus on a large circle around Sioux Falls, extending my hearing and searching for anyone-specifically a Jehovah’s witness-who might have Dean in their vision, might be praying to Heaven.
Our Father, who art in Heaven…
Bingo.
“…hallowed be thy name-”
“You pray too loud,” I announce, pressing a hand to the man’s shoulder and rendering him unconscious. In the next moment, I drag Dean into a nearby alleyway and pin him against a wall.
“What are you, crazy?” Dean grunts.
“I rebelled for this?!” I shout, throwing him against a different wall, farther into the alley and away from potential spectators.
One punch.
Another punch.
Then I grip him by the lapels and ground out, “So that you could surrender to them?”
I spin us around to throw him into the opposite wall, and he grabs at my hands, trying to stop me. The tiny show of resistance has even more fury boiling to the surface, and I give him two good slugs in the stomach before pressing him back against the wall again.
“Cas-please-” Dean says through a mouthful of blood.
I push him against the opposite wall again, relishing in the feeling of hurting him, of making him feel every inch of that hard, unyielding brick on his back.
I press in close, close enough to almost taste the blood on his lips. “I gave everything for you. And this is what you give to me.”
Finally, I pull him away from the wall and punch him again in the face. He starts doubling over, backing up slightly, and I kick him hard enough to throw him back several feet, into a fence. He lands heavily on the ground, shuddering painfully.
I take a few steps toward him, and he spits blood out of his mouth, struggling to sit up so that he can look at me.
“Do it,” he says after a moment.
Part of me flares up, and my hand balls into a fist of its own accord. Why should I let him survive? Why should I let this traitorous human walk away from this place tonight?
“Just do it!” he shouts.
But I can’t. I could never kill him. Maybe he doesn’t know that, but I do. It was never an option. It never will be. My fist uncurls, and he winces in pain as I shift toward him. I press two fingers to his shoulder, and he crumples, bloody and unconscious.
I stare at his face for a long moment. Inflicting the blows may have brought me some sort of sick satisfaction, but looking at the result now makes my gut twist slightly. I can ignore it, but of course, I choose to poke and prod at it. Guilt rises up out of the ashes of my fiery anger.
Emotions. I loathe them. This man wants to give himself up. He is turning his back on everything he claimed to believe in. On his brother, who has overcome addiction to demon blood and done everything he can to atone for…well, starting the Apocalypse. On Bobby, who has done more for these two boys than their own father has. And on me, the angel who rebelled against Heaven because he said so.
Yet when I look at his bruised and bloody face, the knowledge that each of these marks came from me forces me to feel guilt rather than righteous anger.
I will never win when it comes to Dean Winchester.
****************************************
“Oh my, what’s happened here?”
Finally. I knew Crowley would have to show himself eventually-he wouldn’t go to all this trouble for no reason at all.
“As if you don’t already know,” I say.
“Oh, I have no idea,” he says, smirking. Then he turns to look around at the room. “So much Enochian. I was almost sure the monkeys would screw something up-they always do. But looks like Bobby’s trustworthy to get a spell done right, after all. Nice of you to bring him back, by the way. I almost missed the grumpy old codger.”
“Why did you do this, Crowley?”
“You weren’t going to tell them anytime soon, Bobby could hardly stand being the only one to know, and I was fed up with all the drama. So I ended it. Simple as that.”
“Don’t you worry about what I’ll do to you when I get out of here?” I say lowly.
“A little. But you won’t kill me. If our game is screwed up, the Leviathans certainly will. So I’ll take my chances with whatever you do.”
“I might kill you, just to prove you wrong,” I threaten impulsively.
“Oh come now, Cas, we both know you won’t. Now, let me tell you what’s about to happen, just so you understand that I’m not really leaving you buggered here.”
“What, do you have a plan to get me out of this room? Because you don’t need one. Just remove-”
“Yes, I know how to work the sigils, thank you. Sort of comes with the job description, you know.”
“If you’re not going to release me, then I fail to see how anything you have to say will be helpful.”
“Cas, you need to keep an open mind. What makes you think I can’t help you?”
“It’s not that you can’t. It’s that you won’t.”
“Again, you wound me. Fine, I won’t say anything. It’s about time for me to be off, anyway.”
He steps over to the far wall and traces his right index finger over a sigil. I realize too late that this particular spell will drastically limit my powers. I lift a hand and throw Crowley to the side, but it’s too late-I already feel the effects of the spell in the form of a heavy weight compressing my chest.
“You…” I snarl, tensing my hand and crushing Crowley’s throat.
“Cas-don’t-you don’t-want-waste-”
Then an ominous presence approaches, and I loosen my grip. What’s coming?
Before I can demand answers, Crowley vanishes. I sense that Balthazar has already gone. I hope that he has gone to get help. The Winchesters are nowhere nearby either. This is comforting-if anything is coming for me, at least they will not be in danger. I am furious with Crowley, but I don’t really have time to waste, dwelling on that.
I take the form of Camael just as the door bangs open.
Two demons race into the room, and a third is about to enter when he’s dragged backwards, screaming. The other two stare at me for a moment, look at each other, and then dash toward me. I’m about to attack them when two more figures stride into the room.
Leviathans.
The two demons hide behind me and my ring of holy fire, and I wonder if they expect me to protect them somehow. Do they really think I would?
“Well, well. Looks like we’ve got an angel, nice and trapped, just waiting for us,” the taller Leviathan remarks.
“Almost too good to be true,” his companion adds.
“You’re the one who beheaded Gillian,” the first one says.
There’s no point in denying it, so I nod. The Leviathans are both squinting at me, seemingly perplexed.
“Who are you?” the second one finally asks. “There are only four archangels. You are not one of them.”
“I am now,” I say, flaring my wings slightly, but not enough to singe them on the holy fire.
The larger Leviathan spreads his arms wide and flexes once. Dozens of tentacles materialize around him, stemming from his torso, sides, and back. The demons behind me yelp in surprise, making it plain that they can see them as well. Are humans capable as well, then?
“Patience,” the smaller Leviathan says, laying a hand on his companion’s shoulder. “I think I recognize this angel, now.”
He turns to me and waves his hand, and I feel my vessel returning to its original form despite my efforts to stop it from doing so.
“Castiel?” the larger Leviathan barks, alarmed. “We ripped you into pieces, ate you right up! How are you still here?”
The smaller Leviathan smacks his partner to shut him up before addressing me. “I thought you’d be above little party tricks like that,” he sneers.
“My disguise was not intended for your eyes.”
“Yes, we’ve been in your head-we’ve seen your thoughts. You are hopelessly, pathetically in love with that Dean Winchester, and we know it already.”
“Enough talk,” I say, unwilling to listen to a discussion of my feelings, especially not with these creatures.
I push a hand out, throwing the larger Leviathan against the far wall. One of his tentacles shoots out, wrapping around my wrist and tugging me toward the holy fire surrounding me. I flare my wings, holding position, and take a kick to the chest from the smaller Leviathan, whose tentacles haven’t manifested on either plane of existence yet.
I tug the first Leviathan to me by his tentacle, but while he can throw blows across the fire, I cannot, so I must remain on the defensive.
The two demons behind me are fighting for their lives against the smaller Leviathan, and I vaguely wonder why they haven’t smoked out already. Perhaps they’re trapped inside their human hosts.
I back up a step, trying to draw the larger Leviathan into the ring, but he just uses his tentacles to attack me instead.
Then one of the demons is thrown into the circle, colliding with me, and I can tell upon contact that both he and his host are already dead.
Bang!
The motel room door is thrown open again just as I explode the demon’s body, using my powers to transform the blood of his body into the same compounds that had burned the last Leviathan I dispatched-Gillian, according to these two.
Not expecting the move, the many-limbed Leviathan staggers backwards, screaming in pain and flailing wildly. His screams are cut off abruptly by a squelch, crunch, gurgle, and thud as his head is chopped off.
I have no time to look at my reinforcements because the other Leviathan leaps into the ring of fire and curls one long tendril around my neck. I muster my strength-rapidly dwindling, thanks to Crowley’s spell-and pitch forward, as though bowing at the waist, in an attempt to hurl the Leviathan over me. But he lands neatly in front of me and tightens his hold on my neck.
Though I don’t need to breathe, the constricting sensation is still highly unpleasant.
“Let him go!”
Dean.
No-why is he here? Now? I thought he’d gone.
I see Sam snatch the head of the incapacitated Leviathan and toss it outside, probably deeming that enough for the time being.
The tentacle around my neck tightens, crushing my trachea. Again, not fatal, but very unpleasant.
“Sam and Dean Winchester. Wondered when you two would come wandering back into the picture,” the Leviathan says, looking over his shoulder at the brothers.
“We never left the goddamn picture,” Dean says.
I have no idea what picture they’re talking about, but exhaustion is coming down heavily on me as I struggle to get loose-this could have something to do with it. The Leviathan is too strong, and my powers are nearly depleted. I spare a moment to damn Crowley in my mind before resuming the struggle.
Then the Leviathan turns around, placing my back to the flames, and I pull my wings in as tightly as possible. I swing one of them at his head as he opens his mouth to speak to the Winchesters, but he huffs more in annoyance than in pain, wrapping another tendril around my stomach and squeezing.
I expend a bit of magic to heal my vocal cords so that I may speak. “If you intend to kill me,” I rasp, “let me see him one more time.”
The Leviathan smirks as I let the fight go out of me. So he’s fallen for the gamble. Unfortunately, Sam and Dean appear to have done so as well.
“Cas, don’t be stupid!” Sam shouts.
I hear loud footsteps as I’m swung back around, and Dean’s snatching something from his duffel bag while Sam comes toward the ring of fire with a sword covered in black ooze-it must have been used to slay the other Leviathan.
But the one holding me extends two long tentacles backwards, knocking Sam into the wall. The abnormally tall human manages to retain a grip on the sword, though, and that is our chance. The Leviathan turns his attention towards me.
“Say goodbye, little angel,” he says.
“Goodbye,” I growl, catching Sam’s eye.
As the Leviathan starts pushing me through the fire, I throw both wings and all four limbs at him, shoving him backwards out of the ring and straight toward Sam’s waiting blade. The instant that my wings leave his body, I extend them fully, ignoring the blazing pain as my Grace starts to burn up, desperately praying that I’ll have enough room-and enough strength-to stop my momentum.
No-it’s too late. I’m too close to the rim.
I am going to die.
But as I cross the line, the pain doesn’t intensify, and instead, I collide with a large, warm obstacle that slams into the wall behind us, cushioning me.
I realize belatedly that I’m now soaked through with holy water, and a glance at the ring of fire reveals that about half the ring has been doused.
“Fuck…” Dean groans from beneath me.
I can’t move. I try to get off him, but the damage is too great, and I have no supply of strength upon which I can draw.
Dean manages to scrabble out from beneath me, and when his face comes into view, I feel overwhelmingly relieved that he’s fine.
“Cas?” he says.
“Lev-Lev-” I choke out in a broken voice.
“Sammy?” Dean calls over his shoulder.
“Yeah, got it!” is Sam’s triumphant response.
“Good,” I manage, eyes narrowing to slivers as they struggle to stay open and honed in on Dean’s startlingly green irises. I’d forgotten how absolutely breathtaking they were.
“Wait-no. Cas. Hey-Cas?”
The world slips away from me.
Cas!
****************************************
“Where the hell are we?” Dean asks.
“Van Nuys, California.”
“Where’s the beautiful room?”
“In there,” I respond, indicating the warehouse.
“The beautiful room is in an abandoned muffler factory in Van Nuys, California?” Dean asks, a note of incredulity coloring his voice.
“Where’d you think it was?”
“I… I don’t know. Jupiter? A blade of grass? Not… Van Nuys.”
“Tell me again why you don’t just… grab Adam and shazam the hell out of there,” Sam says.
I disregard the fact that I do not know what a “shazam” is, let alone how to use it. “Because there are at least five angels in there,” I tell him.
“So? You’re fast,” Dean says.
“They’re faster,” I say. Though his confidence in me would usually make me feel better, I can only feel bitterness at the present. I remove my tie and wrap it around my palm. “I’ll clear them out. You two grab the boy. This is our only chance.”
“Whoa-whoa, wait. You’re gonna take on five angels?” Dean asks.
“Yes.”
“Isn’t that suicide?”
“Maybe it is,” I say, looking into his eyes. “But then I won’t have to watch you fail. I’m sorry, Dean. I don’t have the same faith in you that Sam does.”
I pull a box cutter out of my pocket and extend the blade.
“What the hell are you gonna do with that?” Sam asks.
Nothing that I need them to know about, I decide, backing away from them. “Turn around and do not look back until you see it.”
“See what?” Sam and Dean ask in unison.
“You’ll know it when you see it,” I respond.
They exchange looks that I do not understand before turning away from the building. I spin to face the door and unbutton the shirt on my vessel. Then I clench my teeth and dig in. It takes some willpower not to cry out in pain, and I realize that I am much weaker than I’d expected.
This banishing spell will only send my brothers back to Heaven, but it is may be fatal for me. I don’t have the strength to stop it from sending me to Heaven-resisting the last banishing spell from Dean already drained me. But at that point, it probably won’t make a difference. Weakened as I am, the spell itself might kill me. I might be vaporized before I even reach Heaven.
No one will know what became of me.
The thought is only slightly saddening when it occurs to me.
Then I pull the door open and step into the warehouse. My senses are on high alert as I search for the presence of my brothers. I know they’re here. The door swings shut. They know I’m here. But they haven’t shown themselves yet. Perhaps I have to get closer.
I walk over to the room and face the door, waiting. One beat. Two beats.
An angel lands behind me, and I duck a swing at my head. He starts to bring his blade up to stab at me, but I shove it down too quickly, burying it in his leg. Before he has time to react, I have his blade in my hand, pressing it down toward his breast. He lifts his hands, trying to resist, but gravity is on my side, and I am stronger than he is.
The blade sinks into his vessel, and he cries out in shock and agony before exploding in a pulse of white light. I withdraw the blade and look around, hearing the wing beats and whispers around me.
Killer… Murderer… Traitor… Human… Fallen…
These are the labels they’ve given me. Then they begin to manifest themselves, surrounding me. So there still is honor among the servants of Heaven. I had been counting on that.
I let the blade fall to the ground with a loud clank. “What are you waiting for? Come on,” I say.
They fall for it and come toward me.
Perfect.
As they approach, I rip my shirt open and press my palm to the sigil carved into my chest. I feel the mark burn into my Grace, searing and excruciating. Then the pain rapidly extends to my entire being.
And then-nothing.
Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Word Count: 3700 (Running Total: 49200)
Summary: After escaping from Death's clutches yet again, Cas jumps right into the fight against the Leviathans. Post-7x10. "I am an angel of the Lord. Let me tell you my story. Let me tell you everything."
Chapter 14 - Did You Enjoy Your Reprieve?
The ground seems to be… bulging. Pulsing up and down. What-
Sensing movement, I spin around just in time to catch a blade before it enters my back. I grip my brother’s arm tightly, twisting it downwards, and try to stab him with my own blade, but he manages to grasp my blade arm as well.
I knee him in the side where he’s vulnerable, and we break apart. I sweep forward. He leaps back. I back up two steps as he advances, and when he charges, I try to flip him onto his back. He moves with the momentum, flips, lands on his feet.
He steps forward again. I aim up while he jabs down, and we lock in position again, both of us still unharmed.
Another brother is coming. I look over my shoulder to anticipate where he will strike. Not surprisingly, he aims under my lifted arm, where I’ll be least likely to block the stab.
I dodge just enough to the left so that his blade misses my side, and then I bring down my right arm, snapping his arm in place. In the same motion, I release my blade and catch it with my left hand, stabbing it into the first angel’s stomach.
My other brother tries to pull his arm back in vain, and the first staggers back half a step before his Grace explodes in a bright burst of light.
Then I bring my right elbow backwards, clipping my brother in the chin, and he loses his blade to me. I swing my left arm, slicing his throat with the blade, and he falls backwards. I turn around rapidly and kneel, switching the blade from left to right hand before stabbing him through the heart. I wait for the blast before removing the blade.
I look around for a moment to make sure no more will come before moving toward the spot where the ground had been bulging. Dropping my blade, I take a knee and reach down to touch the earth.
A hand shoots out of the dirt, and I grasp it tightly, pulling a body out of its grave. I frown. This soul just came from Heaven. He has returned fully human, not as a ghost or spirit. I lift him up and fly for Bobby Singer’s house.
****************************************
I cannot sense Dean properly if I cannot see him. And he is not calling out to me, which doesn’t help. The panic room looks like a mess.
I need to ensure that he hasn’t done anything stupid.
Apprehensively, I open the latch and push the thick door, entering the panic room. A chair has been kicked over, and some books and a candlestick lie on the ground near it. A ritual?
“Cas.”
I turn around in time to see Dean slam a closet door shut. I see the banishing sigil just as Dean presses his hand to it, and I’m thrown backwards through space.
Fury saturates the blood that runs through the veins of my vessel, permeates my being until I am a large, fiery pit of rage. How dare he use a banishing sigil against me in order to surrender? I lost everything for him, and this is how he repays me.
I channel the wrath into power, using it to stop my ascent toward Heaven. The rage is almost enough to offset how much I’ve been weakened by the banishing spell. Almost.
But I still feel weariness in my wings, my Grace. Without access to the power of the Host, there is no way for me to replenish myself. But this hectic, all-encompassing emotion will suffice, for now. I focus on a large circle around Sioux Falls, extending my hearing and searching for anyone-specifically a Jehovah’s witness-who might have Dean in their vision, might be praying to Heaven.
Our Father, who art in Heaven…
Bingo.
“…hallowed be thy name-”
“You pray too loud,” I announce, pressing a hand to the man’s shoulder and rendering him unconscious. In the next moment, I drag Dean into a nearby alleyway and pin him against a wall.
“What are you, crazy?” Dean grunts.
“I rebelled for this?!” I shout, throwing him against a different wall, farther into the alley and away from potential spectators.
One punch.
Another punch.
Then I grip him by the lapels and ground out, “So that you could surrender to them?”
I spin us around to throw him into the opposite wall, and he grabs at my hands, trying to stop me. The tiny show of resistance has even more fury boiling to the surface, and I give him two good slugs in the stomach before pressing him back against the wall again.
“Cas-please-” Dean says through a mouthful of blood.
I push him against the opposite wall again, relishing in the feeling of hurting him, of making him feel every inch of that hard, unyielding brick on his back.
I press in close, close enough to almost taste the blood on his lips. “I gave everything for you. And this is what you give to me.”
Finally, I pull him away from the wall and punch him again in the face. He starts doubling over, backing up slightly, and I kick him hard enough to throw him back several feet, into a fence. He lands heavily on the ground, shuddering painfully.
I take a few steps toward him, and he spits blood out of his mouth, struggling to sit up so that he can look at me.
“Do it,” he says after a moment.
Part of me flares up, and my hand balls into a fist of its own accord. Why should I let him survive? Why should I let this traitorous human walk away from this place tonight?
“Just do it!” he shouts.
But I can’t. I could never kill him. Maybe he doesn’t know that, but I do. It was never an option. It never will be. My fist uncurls, and he winces in pain as I shift toward him. I press two fingers to his shoulder, and he crumples, bloody and unconscious.
I stare at his face for a long moment. Inflicting the blows may have brought me some sort of sick satisfaction, but looking at the result now makes my gut twist slightly. I can ignore it, but of course, I choose to poke and prod at it. Guilt rises up out of the ashes of my fiery anger.
Emotions. I loathe them. This man wants to give himself up. He is turning his back on everything he claimed to believe in. On his brother, who has overcome addiction to demon blood and done everything he can to atone for…well, starting the Apocalypse. On Bobby, who has done more for these two boys than their own father has. And on me, the angel who rebelled against Heaven because he said so.
Yet when I look at his bruised and bloody face, the knowledge that each of these marks came from me forces me to feel guilt rather than righteous anger.
I will never win when it comes to Dean Winchester.
****************************************
“Oh my, what’s happened here?”
Finally. I knew Crowley would have to show himself eventually-he wouldn’t go to all this trouble for no reason at all.
“As if you don’t already know,” I say.
“Oh, I have no idea,” he says, smirking. Then he turns to look around at the room. “So much Enochian. I was almost sure the monkeys would screw something up-they always do. But looks like Bobby’s trustworthy to get a spell done right, after all. Nice of you to bring him back, by the way. I almost missed the grumpy old codger.”
“Why did you do this, Crowley?”
“You weren’t going to tell them anytime soon, Bobby could hardly stand being the only one to know, and I was fed up with all the drama. So I ended it. Simple as that.”
“Don’t you worry about what I’ll do to you when I get out of here?” I say lowly.
“A little. But you won’t kill me. If our game is screwed up, the Leviathans certainly will. So I’ll take my chances with whatever you do.”
“I might kill you, just to prove you wrong,” I threaten impulsively.
“Oh come now, Cas, we both know you won’t. Now, let me tell you what’s about to happen, just so you understand that I’m not really leaving you buggered here.”
“What, do you have a plan to get me out of this room? Because you don’t need one. Just remove-”
“Yes, I know how to work the sigils, thank you. Sort of comes with the job description, you know.”
“If you’re not going to release me, then I fail to see how anything you have to say will be helpful.”
“Cas, you need to keep an open mind. What makes you think I can’t help you?”
“It’s not that you can’t. It’s that you won’t.”
“Again, you wound me. Fine, I won’t say anything. It’s about time for me to be off, anyway.”
He steps over to the far wall and traces his right index finger over a sigil. I realize too late that this particular spell will drastically limit my powers. I lift a hand and throw Crowley to the side, but it’s too late-I already feel the effects of the spell in the form of a heavy weight compressing my chest.
“You…” I snarl, tensing my hand and crushing Crowley’s throat.
“Cas-don’t-you don’t-want-waste-”
Then an ominous presence approaches, and I loosen my grip. What’s coming?
Before I can demand answers, Crowley vanishes. I sense that Balthazar has already gone. I hope that he has gone to get help. The Winchesters are nowhere nearby either. This is comforting-if anything is coming for me, at least they will not be in danger. I am furious with Crowley, but I don’t really have time to waste, dwelling on that.
I take the form of Camael just as the door bangs open.
Two demons race into the room, and a third is about to enter when he’s dragged backwards, screaming. The other two stare at me for a moment, look at each other, and then dash toward me. I’m about to attack them when two more figures stride into the room.
Leviathans.
The two demons hide behind me and my ring of holy fire, and I wonder if they expect me to protect them somehow. Do they really think I would?
“Well, well. Looks like we’ve got an angel, nice and trapped, just waiting for us,” the taller Leviathan remarks.
“Almost too good to be true,” his companion adds.
“You’re the one who beheaded Gillian,” the first one says.
There’s no point in denying it, so I nod. The Leviathans are both squinting at me, seemingly perplexed.
“Who are you?” the second one finally asks. “There are only four archangels. You are not one of them.”
“I am now,” I say, flaring my wings slightly, but not enough to singe them on the holy fire.
The larger Leviathan spreads his arms wide and flexes once. Dozens of tentacles materialize around him, stemming from his torso, sides, and back. The demons behind me yelp in surprise, making it plain that they can see them as well. Are humans capable as well, then?
“Patience,” the smaller Leviathan says, laying a hand on his companion’s shoulder. “I think I recognize this angel, now.”
He turns to me and waves his hand, and I feel my vessel returning to its original form despite my efforts to stop it from doing so.
“Castiel?” the larger Leviathan barks, alarmed. “We ripped you into pieces, ate you right up! How are you still here?”
The smaller Leviathan smacks his partner to shut him up before addressing me. “I thought you’d be above little party tricks like that,” he sneers.
“My disguise was not intended for your eyes.”
“Yes, we’ve been in your head-we’ve seen your thoughts. You are hopelessly, pathetically in love with that Dean Winchester, and we know it already.”
“Enough talk,” I say, unwilling to listen to a discussion of my feelings, especially not with these creatures.
I push a hand out, throwing the larger Leviathan against the far wall. One of his tentacles shoots out, wrapping around my wrist and tugging me toward the holy fire surrounding me. I flare my wings, holding position, and take a kick to the chest from the smaller Leviathan, whose tentacles haven’t manifested on either plane of existence yet.
I tug the first Leviathan to me by his tentacle, but while he can throw blows across the fire, I cannot, so I must remain on the defensive.
The two demons behind me are fighting for their lives against the smaller Leviathan, and I vaguely wonder why they haven’t smoked out already. Perhaps they’re trapped inside their human hosts.
I back up a step, trying to draw the larger Leviathan into the ring, but he just uses his tentacles to attack me instead.
Then one of the demons is thrown into the circle, colliding with me, and I can tell upon contact that both he and his host are already dead.
Bang!
The motel room door is thrown open again just as I explode the demon’s body, using my powers to transform the blood of his body into the same compounds that had burned the last Leviathan I dispatched-Gillian, according to these two.
Not expecting the move, the many-limbed Leviathan staggers backwards, screaming in pain and flailing wildly. His screams are cut off abruptly by a squelch, crunch, gurgle, and thud as his head is chopped off.
I have no time to look at my reinforcements because the other Leviathan leaps into the ring of fire and curls one long tendril around my neck. I muster my strength-rapidly dwindling, thanks to Crowley’s spell-and pitch forward, as though bowing at the waist, in an attempt to hurl the Leviathan over me. But he lands neatly in front of me and tightens his hold on my neck.
Though I don’t need to breathe, the constricting sensation is still highly unpleasant.
“Let him go!”
Dean.
No-why is he here? Now? I thought he’d gone.
I see Sam snatch the head of the incapacitated Leviathan and toss it outside, probably deeming that enough for the time being.
The tentacle around my neck tightens, crushing my trachea. Again, not fatal, but very unpleasant.
“Sam and Dean Winchester. Wondered when you two would come wandering back into the picture,” the Leviathan says, looking over his shoulder at the brothers.
“We never left the goddamn picture,” Dean says.
I have no idea what picture they’re talking about, but exhaustion is coming down heavily on me as I struggle to get loose-this could have something to do with it. The Leviathan is too strong, and my powers are nearly depleted. I spare a moment to damn Crowley in my mind before resuming the struggle.
Then the Leviathan turns around, placing my back to the flames, and I pull my wings in as tightly as possible. I swing one of them at his head as he opens his mouth to speak to the Winchesters, but he huffs more in annoyance than in pain, wrapping another tendril around my stomach and squeezing.
I expend a bit of magic to heal my vocal cords so that I may speak. “If you intend to kill me,” I rasp, “let me see him one more time.”
The Leviathan smirks as I let the fight go out of me. So he’s fallen for the gamble. Unfortunately, Sam and Dean appear to have done so as well.
“Cas, don’t be stupid!” Sam shouts.
I hear loud footsteps as I’m swung back around, and Dean’s snatching something from his duffel bag while Sam comes toward the ring of fire with a sword covered in black ooze-it must have been used to slay the other Leviathan.
But the one holding me extends two long tentacles backwards, knocking Sam into the wall. The abnormally tall human manages to retain a grip on the sword, though, and that is our chance. The Leviathan turns his attention towards me.
“Say goodbye, little angel,” he says.
“Goodbye,” I growl, catching Sam’s eye.
As the Leviathan starts pushing me through the fire, I throw both wings and all four limbs at him, shoving him backwards out of the ring and straight toward Sam’s waiting blade. The instant that my wings leave his body, I extend them fully, ignoring the blazing pain as my Grace starts to burn up, desperately praying that I’ll have enough room-and enough strength-to stop my momentum.
No-it’s too late. I’m too close to the rim.
I am going to die.
But as I cross the line, the pain doesn’t intensify, and instead, I collide with a large, warm obstacle that slams into the wall behind us, cushioning me.
I realize belatedly that I’m now soaked through with holy water, and a glance at the ring of fire reveals that about half the ring has been doused.
“Fuck…” Dean groans from beneath me.
I can’t move. I try to get off him, but the damage is too great, and I have no supply of strength upon which I can draw.
Dean manages to scrabble out from beneath me, and when his face comes into view, I feel overwhelmingly relieved that he’s fine.
“Cas?” he says.
“Lev-Lev-” I choke out in a broken voice.
“Sammy?” Dean calls over his shoulder.
“Yeah, got it!” is Sam’s triumphant response.
“Good,” I manage, eyes narrowing to slivers as they struggle to stay open and honed in on Dean’s startlingly green irises. I’d forgotten how absolutely breathtaking they were.
“Wait-no. Cas. Hey-Cas?”
The world slips away from me.
Cas!
****************************************
“Where the hell are we?” Dean asks.
“Van Nuys, California.”
“Where’s the beautiful room?”
“In there,” I respond, indicating the warehouse.
“The beautiful room is in an abandoned muffler factory in Van Nuys, California?” Dean asks, a note of incredulity coloring his voice.
“Where’d you think it was?”
“I… I don’t know. Jupiter? A blade of grass? Not… Van Nuys.”
“Tell me again why you don’t just… grab Adam and shazam the hell out of there,” Sam says.
I disregard the fact that I do not know what a “shazam” is, let alone how to use it. “Because there are at least five angels in there,” I tell him.
“So? You’re fast,” Dean says.
“They’re faster,” I say. Though his confidence in me would usually make me feel better, I can only feel bitterness at the present. I remove my tie and wrap it around my palm. “I’ll clear them out. You two grab the boy. This is our only chance.”
“Whoa-whoa, wait. You’re gonna take on five angels?” Dean asks.
“Yes.”
“Isn’t that suicide?”
“Maybe it is,” I say, looking into his eyes. “But then I won’t have to watch you fail. I’m sorry, Dean. I don’t have the same faith in you that Sam does.”
I pull a box cutter out of my pocket and extend the blade.
“What the hell are you gonna do with that?” Sam asks.
Nothing that I need them to know about, I decide, backing away from them. “Turn around and do not look back until you see it.”
“See what?” Sam and Dean ask in unison.
“You’ll know it when you see it,” I respond.
They exchange looks that I do not understand before turning away from the building. I spin to face the door and unbutton the shirt on my vessel. Then I clench my teeth and dig in. It takes some willpower not to cry out in pain, and I realize that I am much weaker than I’d expected.
This banishing spell will only send my brothers back to Heaven, but it is may be fatal for me. I don’t have the strength to stop it from sending me to Heaven-resisting the last banishing spell from Dean already drained me. But at that point, it probably won’t make a difference. Weakened as I am, the spell itself might kill me. I might be vaporized before I even reach Heaven.
No one will know what became of me.
The thought is only slightly saddening when it occurs to me.
Then I pull the door open and step into the warehouse. My senses are on high alert as I search for the presence of my brothers. I know they’re here. The door swings shut. They know I’m here. But they haven’t shown themselves yet. Perhaps I have to get closer.
I walk over to the room and face the door, waiting. One beat. Two beats.
An angel lands behind me, and I duck a swing at my head. He starts to bring his blade up to stab at me, but I shove it down too quickly, burying it in his leg. Before he has time to react, I have his blade in my hand, pressing it down toward his breast. He lifts his hands, trying to resist, but gravity is on my side, and I am stronger than he is.
The blade sinks into his vessel, and he cries out in shock and agony before exploding in a pulse of white light. I withdraw the blade and look around, hearing the wing beats and whispers around me.
Killer… Murderer… Traitor… Human… Fallen…
These are the labels they’ve given me. Then they begin to manifest themselves, surrounding me. So there still is honor among the servants of Heaven. I had been counting on that.
I let the blade fall to the ground with a loud clank. “What are you waiting for? Come on,” I say.
They fall for it and come toward me.
Perfect.
As they approach, I rip my shirt open and press my palm to the sigil carved into my chest. I feel the mark burn into my Grace, searing and excruciating. Then the pain rapidly extends to my entire being.
And then-nothing.