The Last Guys on the Bench // Part 2
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“It was Bobby.” Cas stops in the middle of his pacing and says it, because he’s always doing shit like that, because he’s the biggest weirdo Dean’s ever met.
“Okay,” Dean says, even though he’s got no idea where Cas is going with this.
Cas turns to face Dean. The angel’s awfully efficient at moving through Purgatory, even if it accomplishes absolutely nothing. Even as the landscape shifts in front of him, everywhere in this place looks the same, just more and more of the most tangled forest Dean has ever been in.
He’s taken to picking up rocks and turning them over and over in his palm, like flipping it exactly thirteen times is a very important part of the formula that’ll open some portal to get them back to Earth and Sam. Some giant creature lopes by every now and then, and it actually breaks up the boredom. (Dean’s beyond glad Cas is with him, of course, but at this point, Dean knows more than he thought was possible about bees, cats, fish, tadpoles, and flamingos.)
“You had to set his soul to rest. His death was due to my mistakes, Dean.”
Ah, shit. “Not only -” Dean starts, but he stops before he can get any further. Not because he doesn’t mean it, just because Cas is staring, blue and squinty-eyed, into the distance, and he’s learned that when Cas looks like that trying to interrupt him is totally pointless.
“That’s when I knew I had to help. Not for what I did, but for what I could - stop from happening.”
Dean thinks he gets it. Anger’s something Cas can deal with, shit like Dean sweeping the Sorry! board off the table and bellowing at him that no one cared that he was broken. Hell, that was like the default state of about ninety percent of his total dick brothers and God knows Dean hasn’t been a lot better.
It’s regret and pain the guy struggles with, the shit angels were never supposed to feel. Doubt closes in on him, tight and painful like its own ring of holy fire. Loss was to be expected, sure, Cas was a soldier on a battlefield, but those losses weren’t supposed to crawl into your bones and halt you the next time around.
Once, Cas knocked Bobby out with a touch and stared blankly at his prone form on the ground. Now, he’s this, cut off from Heaven and wearing hospital scrubs, full of all this shit he was never supposed to even know about except as a warning. Half-pacifist and half-crazy, and still Cas.
“A housefly can hum in the key of F,” Cas informs, out of nowhere and rather gravely. “That’s amazing, I don’t know how to manipulate this body to hum at all.”
Dean bites back his sigh and tilts his head toward Cas. Company’s company, especially considering you could do way worse than Cas, and hey, flies aren’t bees, cats, fish, tadpoles, or flamingos.
*
Just because nothing here wants to attack them doesn’t mean it’s not awful and creepy. It doesn’t make the whole situation not really, really suck the high hard one. Dean never stops looking over his shoulder, awaiting the moment he’ll get ripped to shreds, dragged down to dissolve into Purgatory’s dirt before he turned into one of the undying monsters here.
The first time it rains - it’s gotta rain for days in the time frame he’s used to. At first it’s not so bad, almost a relief, and Cas babbles on about wind patterns and cumulonimbus clouds and Dean understands about twenty-five percent of it but still strains to find it interesting. Even if Cas complains about missing Earth, which, you know, take a number and get in line, buddy.
But then the rain doesn’t stop, and water torture is like the one kind of torture he’s not acquainted with personally but man, he gets it now. His clothes slither against him, stone-heavy with wetness. The constant tap-tap-tap on his head is gonna drive him crazy - crazier - and it starts to remind him, funnily enough, of how he could really use a drink and fuck, it hurts, something’s just missing inside him here -
“Dean,” Cas growls, rather forcefully. “I’ve been trying to get your attention. My coat is waterproof, I believe, if you want it.”
Dean has been so lost in the slow slide of water down his face and the back of his neck that he hardly even noticed Cas himself looks mostly dry. His hair’s a dark, wet mess, but that’s about it. “Uh, yeah, sure,” he sputters, and then very suddenly finds the coat dumped on top of his head.
It’s not exactly comfortable, and the smell of ash is almost overwhelming. But the endless drops of water on his head stop, at least, and the throb in his head ebbs away. He can breathe without it feeling like an ache.
Dean wraps Cas’ coat around his head, and then flops back down on the ground, wet leaves and all. “This is okay,” he gulps, voice shakier than he’d like. “I just - I can deal with it like this, yeah. Thanks.”
He’s not sure when he stops feeling the droplets of rain, but he unwraps the coat fabric from over his head and looks up. Cas is still looming over him, his body totally dry. And, heh, only now does it occur to Dean that the guy’s in head-to-toe white. Must’ve been something to see all wet.
“How long’ve you been watching?” Dean asks, interrupting his own thoughts; he’s not sure where the hell he was going with that line of thinking anyway.
“Not long.” Cas’ gaze slides over to the side, though.
“Cas.”
“A while,” he admits. “You - didn’t seem well.”
Oh, fuck no. They need to get out of here. They don’t need a heart-to-heart, or to sit around braiding each other’s hair. That won’t accomplish shit.
“Fine now,” Dean grunts, tossing the coat back at Cas. “Let’s go.”
*
“I’m not okay,” he admits. Nothing specific makes him say it; he just says it. He doesn’t know how much later it is. They could’ve walked two feet, or they could’ve been walking together, silent, for years.
It’s terrifying to admit to someone else besides himself, this thing that he’s been carrying as close to him as the amulet used to be, a soft bump against his chest with every step. He can’t remember a time when he was okay. Better at faking it, sure, but every memory was the heat of flames and his body aching and his fingers curled around the metal of a gun, Sammy’s body slumped against his own. Every moment was shot crimson with blood.
Cas doesn’t say anything, but the look in his eyes is - the softness he had outside the Impala is gone, with heaviness threaded through his brow and his lips tugged down a little. It’s a look of sympathy Cas might’ve had before he took on Sam’s funhouse memories, the expression etched onto his face the night before they met up with Lucifer and Michael in Stull Cemetery.
“Look, I don’t like talking much, and I know you’re not really one for that either. S’why you get me, probably. I’m just… I’m glad you’re here, man.”
A smile knits its way across Cas’ face. As if to prove the point about them not talking much, he stays silent. But they keep walking together, and their gait grows more relaxed. If every now and then Dean peeks over and notices the crinkles in the corners of Cas’ eyes haven’t gone away for a real long time, the angel doesn’t say anything.
*
Suddenly, they’re everywhere, like the rain summoned them. Dean’s got no idea what to call them, he just knows there are things that look half like babies, half like four-legged animals. They’re covered with - scales or shells, or something, and they don’t even have faces, just totally smooth heads.
Dean’s freaked, of fucking course Dean is freaked, there are giant scaly babies crawling through the undergrowth on all fours, crouched like they’re going to attack. They’ve been trailing them for hours now, or maybe a year; he’s tired of the time-fucks.
“These were never anything you have to worry about, Dean. They’re just creatures my Father created that weren’t fit for any other world,” Cas sighs, and if his palm presses warmly on the small of his back, well, Dean can forget about the fact that he’s pretty sure one of the freaky little fuckers just brushed up against his ankle.
Then, one day, they’re all gone. The dirt doesn’t have any of their little round footprints any more, either, like they were never there. Dean’s not sure what’s getting to him worse, the creepy motherfuckers that were trotting around, or the fact that they’ve entirely vanished as if someone snapped them out of existence.
*
The driving rain never returns, thank fuck. But that doesn’t mean Purgatory’s weird-ass weather goes away. Sometimes there’s mist that thickens out and becomes haze. It’s nearly as hard to wade through it as it would be a river, thick soup, blood up to his waist. Dean thinks of the stink that’d come out of the last one, he’s way too familiar with blood, his own and everyone else’s, and -
He is thankful when that haze clears, he’ll just say that.
Sometimes, there’s lightning, but no thunder, and no rain. Dark clouds puff up above the tree branches and darts of stringy light shoot through them. Honestly, it’s kind of pretty; it’s the only light in this place other than the glowing red eyes of every creature in here, and one of the rare times blackness isn’t set over Purgatory’s endless forest.
Suddenly, one day - night - whatever, the clouds go white like a smear. It’s all kind of like the goopy Wite-Out crap Sammy used to bug him to buy along with Dean’s chocolate bars and beef jerky at crappy gas station check-outs, since the dork used it at school all the time.
Dean, thankful for the distraction, stops thinking of Sam when the clouds throb, and suck back in. The lightning zips across once more, swooping around the expanding and contracting clouds. Honestly, it’s beyond awesome, but it reminds Dean of something that he can’t quite remember. Annoyance spikes through him, because getting frustrated is one thing and going soft is another.
Then, it hits him. “The friggin’ clouds are breathing,” Dean hisses, flailing a hand out and smacking Cas across the arm, lightly. It’s actually kind of awesome, like all of Purgatory’s been trapped in that split second when lightning streaks across the sky during a storm.
“That’s - not breathing.” Cas’ eyes are wide, and Dean’s learned from far too long in this place that the look on his face means nothing good.
The rain doesn’t return, but the clouds swirl overhead. The lightning bolts grow brighter and brighter and keep whipping across the sky, red streaking across every now and then. It’d be badass if it wasn’t fucking terrifying, not that he’s admitting that. If Dean were Sam, he might make an Eye of Sauron reference, but he’s not that big a dork. (So he’ll just think it.)
The clouds aren’t always there, and when they are Dean isn’t sure whether it’s a welcome distraction or just one more thing to worry about. Sometimes even there’s this roar from the sky, shaking the clouds until they vibrate, but Cas stands stock-still and glares and they retreat, folding in on themselves.
“Wha -?” Dean starts.
“You still see me in the form of my vessel because you are used to it. The other things here do not see me as… such.”
Dean isn’t sure if Cas’ very mild tone and his close-lipped smile are kind of awesome or just flat-out terrifying.
*
If any of the gigantic black forms with their nasty, identical red eyes were ever something Dean ganked back on Earth, well, he doesn’t recognize any of them and they’re not hunting for revenge.
They shift, too. One minute they’ll be blobs; the next, insects with snapping pincers; the next, something like a deer, but they bound off into the thick underbrush before Dean can really take stock of them.
He’s walking with Cas, when two of the beasts slink across their path and actually pause. Dean can’t describe what form they’re in, because they keep changing right in front of them, and even Cas does that thing where he tilts his head and Dean kind of wants to straighten it right back up for him. There’s a twitch in Cas’ arm, like he’s ready to throw it out in front of Dean or hold it out, palm up, to blast the things away. And that’s when the things stop in their tracks.
Dean could swear the bigger monster nods, before wrapping - shit, he doesn’t know what to call them, they’re like arms and tentacles at once, at the same time that they’re radically different and no shape or form he’s familiar with, probably not any shape Cas is familiar with, even - but he slides them around the smaller one. It’s tender and there’s love behind it, but it’s not romantic.
How the fuck Dean’s able to tell that about two freaky shapeshifter things, he’s got no idea. It’s totally possible he’s already been here way too long. He blinks, and they’re gone.
“Gordon? Abby?” Cas asks, head still stuck like that. He turns toward Dean. “They - recognized you.”
Dean feels his breath stick in his throat, because, well, shit. “I knew Gordon, yeah,” he gets out, but he hears how tight his voice is. Abby must’ve been his sister, shit. “He was another hunter. Got himself turned into a vampire. Sam cut his head right off with barbed wire. It was pretty badass.” He attempts a laugh, but it comes out hollow, and fuck, Cas is actually pouting at him.
Not like it’s not deserved. Just mentioning Sam’s name, and seeing the way Gordon stuck so close to his sister - Cas has told him he doesn’t have to eat or drink anything here, but something in his stomach cramps and it’s like an aching pit.
“Did Gordon seem happy?” Dean asks, just to get the choked sound out of his voice. “Could you tell?”
“As happy as anything can be in Purgatory, I would imagine.”
Something in Dean is relieved, even as he hurts. Gordon was the kind of hunter he never wanted to be, but he thinks of Amy, he thinks of Emma, and he knows he got there. Getting paralyzed at the idea of trusting anyone was no fucking excuse, and masking everything with sarcasm and jokes and drink after drink didn’t make him any better. But - Gordon was happy, right? Maybe Dean could be happy too, or as happy as you could get in Purgatory.
Only that makes him think of Sammy more. If the guy is lucky, he’s with Meg, and if he thinks about how much that reminds him of the Ruby situation it’ll make him vomit all over the forest floor. And he hasn’t even eaten anything in, God, he doesn’t even know when.
Yeah. That happiness shit isn’t happening, not for him.
“Dean?”
Dean is starting to like crazy Cas, the one who rambles on about how honey is the most superior food of all because it doesn’t spoil, much better than the one who gazes at him with those ridiculous eyes and looks like he wants to Talk. Not talk. Capital-T Talk.
“Let’s go,” he snaps. “Last thing I wanna do is run into more shit I’ve gotten up close and personal with.” Cas might claim everything in here is too scared to hurt them, but if he ran into Amy or Emma again, you can’t convince him they wouldn’t want sweet, sweet revenge. And they’d be fucking right to get it, too.
*
“Daphne,” Dean brings up one - day, night, you can’t fucking keep track in a place like this, and the sky is a swirling miasma. Cas keeps looking up at it in alarm, but he hasn’t had to bust out the wings or whatever, so it must be okay for now. “Uh, what was the deal there?”
“Well, I wasn’t lying,” Cas grumbles back, and Dean realizes he must’ve sounded more bitchy than he intended. “She found me, and cared for me.”
“You were married.”
At that, Cas definitely stutters in his step, a little. Dean shouldn’t feel like he’s triumphed so much when Cas does that. “It was for her health insurance, actually,” he tells Dean, and it’s so fucking weird that Dean has never been involved with any of that shit - he’s technically listed as either legally dead or an incredibly dangerous criminal, he can’t keep track of which one at this point - but Cas, of all, uh, people, would understand it now and be able to explain the intricacies of it to him, “We weren’t romantically involved. I don’t know if we were any good at hiding that fact.”
“Uh.” Dean gets out, because he can only remember the way his thoughts had circled around and around when he stood in that living room. Like, sure, he remembers Daphne’s hand skimming down his chest, but he’s pretty sure Cas mostly ignored it. “I dunno. Not like I’m the best guide to that, Cas.”
He’s pretty sure that when he went to barbeques and a couple of weekend getaways with Lisa, everyone thought they were just such a nice couple; meanwhile, he was trying not to do something idiotic like pull his gun out at the first too-loud rustle from the bushes, or throw up if anyone asked him if he had any family in the area.
“I went to her, once I left the hospital.” And Dean whirls his head toward Cas at that statement because, okay, no, poor Daphne probably has not recovered from that one. “I asked her if she wanted to join me with the butterflies.” Cas gives Dean a look, eyebrow raised and too human. “She said no, though.”
“Okay,” Dean says back, eventually, because really, how the hell do you respond to that. He’s sort of amused, and sort of horrified, which is more or less his default state when Cas starts going into crazy insect mode.
There’s a shift over Cas’ face, where the raised eyebrow drops and the smoothness between his eyes crinkles up into a furrow. “I also warned her about the dangers of the Leviathan,” he continues. “I was able to provide her with enough canned goods that were still safe, as well as vegetable seeds.” The seriousness cracks again. “She’s one tough little cookie, I know.”
Dean can only sort of goggle back for a couple of seconds. “Cas.”
“Yes, Dean.”
“It’s just weird when you say stuff like that, man.”
Cas doesn’t say anything, just smiles. The need to know what Lucifer did to him burns in Dean’s gut, almost forcing its way up through his throat. Still, the guy seems happy enough, and Dean’s not gonna fuck that up.
Not right now, anyway. Everything gets fucked up in the end, but he’s as happy as he’s been in years wandering through Purgatory with a half-crazy Castiel, missing Sammy like the thirst and hunger he doesn’t feel here, and with no idea how he’s gonna get out. He’s as happy as he’s been in a long time with Purgatory’s forest howling in his ear, loud enough to fill it up like a solid.
It doesn’t make sense, but maybe it’s the feeling that everything’s been taken away, and there’s nothing left to lose.
*
It’s always sort of a relief when the sky washes over with white instead of black. Dean's not sure what day it is if it’s even day at all, or how long they’ve been here other than too long, but he feels good enough to sing. A tiny, nagging part of his brain suggests that this is just the first part of insanity, but it feels better than the other options. Maybe he can go be one with the moths with Cas, or some shit.
“In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight,” he croons. He even gets into the loud oooh part of it, and the gummy grin that appears on Cas' face is part terrifying and part a relief.
A-wee-mo-weh, a-wee-mo-weh, Dean sings to the sky. Purgatory looks different when it isn't dark - pretty, even, with the light dappling through the trees. It’s not giant smears of paint or Hell opening up its screaming maw beneath his feet.
He wants to stop singing just thinking of it all, and he’s pretty sure he just heard the trees rumble, but he presses on. Smiling, too, thank you very fucking much.
part 3 >>