The Wild Ones: Chapter Seven (point five)
Dean didn’t look up as Castiel approached. His head was still bowed. There was a laxness about the cant of his shoulders that suggested a weariness that went beyond the physical. Castiel sat down next to him.
“Sam wants you to come inside.”
Dean huffed a laugh. “Yeah? And what about Bobby? It’s his house. Does he want me in it?”
“I don’t think he minds. He knows what you did for us.”
“What I did for you.” Dean propped his elbows on his thighs and cradled his face in his hands. “And what about day before yesterday?”
“Bobby doesn’t know what happened at the motel. Not all of it.”
“I’m guessing that Sammy explained what’s up.”
Castiel leaned forward, elbows on his knees, peering off into the wooded area beyond the salvage yard. “He got farther this time.”
Dean turned his head, forehead still cupped in the palm of his head, and watched Castiel’s face.
“He, um.” Castiel tilted his face away from Dean. He didn’t want the angel to see how hard it was for him to say this. “He told me that, um. That I have to go to Hell for the Apocalypse to happen. And I know-that’s what you want. For me to do that. Start the Apocalypse. Go to Hell.”
Dean sighed, a heavy, weary sound. “Cas-”
“And to shed blood in Hell,” Castiel continued. “I’m not even sure what that means, Dean, but I-I don’t understand. I thought you said I was your charge. I thought you said you were here to guard me.”
“I am.” It sounded like a plea. “Cas, I am.”
“I don’t understand how someone who’s supposed to be protecting me can want me to be condemned to Hell, and to do more evil there.” Castiel felt his heart rate pick up, felt his hands start to shake. “I don’t-I don’t understand how you can be my guardian angel but guide me towards…that.”
“I’m not your guardian angel, Cas”
Castiel turned, frowning. “What?”
Dean leaned over and ripped a long blade of grass from the dirt, shredding it methodically as he spoke.
“I’m not-it’s not like you think it is. I wasn’t assigned to keep bad things from happening to you. I was assigned to keep you on the path that’s been...I don’t know, ordained, or whatever. And to keep you safe until you could do your duty. We’re not here to perch on humans’ shoulders. We’re warriors of God.”
“I’ve read the Bible,” Castiel said. He wasn’t sure what hurt more-the revelation that Dean wasn’t here to protect him, or the implication that he was too stupid to know what angels really were. Especially by now, he knew. “So protecting me isn’t part of this arrangement.”
Dean sat up straight. “That’s not what I said.”
“Maybe not. Just that it’s more important to make sure I’m damned to Hell so that I can start the Apocalypse than it is to help me survive. I’m sorry if I don’t see the difference.” Castiel stood up stiffly and dusted his jeans. “Sam wants you inside. That’s all I should have said anyway.”
“Cas.”
Dean’s hand was around his ankle. The grip was tight enough that Castiel knew he couldn’t break it. He was released only a moment later, though. Perhaps a flash of fear had crossed his face, because Dean looked apologetic.
“The difference is that I was assigned to make sure you fulfill your role. But I w-I want to protect you.”
Castiel didn’t understand why Dean looked so frightened when he said that, so exposed. Vulnerable. He’d seen those large, lost eyes in the mirror before.
He sat back down.
Dean took several steadying breaths, and said, his voice hushed like he feared being overheard, “Things are fucked, Cas. Upstairs. Angels are dying and that doesn’t happen, and everybody’s being real cagey about the orders we’re receiving. This thing with Victor today-that shouldn’t have happened. If there had been an order to call Sammy back to Heaven, I would’ve heard it. But there wasn’t. Victor and his asshole posse weren’t here on garrison business, so I don’t get what they were doing.”
“Personal grudge?” Castiel asked.
Dean shook his head. “Angels don’t do that. Or, we’re not supposed to. We don’t-we don’t do things on our own. Free will? That’s for you. Not for us.”
Castiel frowned. “I find that hard to believe, having met you and Sam.”
That earned him a reluctant laugh. “Yeah, well, everybody always said me and Sammy came off the factory lines a little crooked. But Victor didn’t. So something’s up, and it…”
Dean bowed his head again. Castiel repressed the urge to pat him on the shoulder.
When he continued, it was even softer. “It makes me doubt, Cas. It makes me doubt my orders.”
The tentative hope that Castiel felt was probably not the appropriate reaction to show Dean, so he kept that inside. It was hard to accept it anyway-it wasn't like there had been much in his life in the last years that had warranted hope. It was a strange sensation, a rising lightness in his chest that every instinct told him to push down, to ignore. And even if this was only relative, even if it was only the difference between you’re definitely going to be sent to Hell and you might get sent to Hell, it was more than he'd known in a long time.
On the outside, though, he said, “I suppose that’s not something that angels do, either.”
“Never.” Dean tilted his head up and squinted at the cloudless morning sky. “We have our orders, and our orders come from our Father. They’re never wrong. They can’t be, because they come from Him. But…what if they don’t come from Him? Who do they come from?” Dean looked vaguely queasy. “John? Some other general who hasn’t been to Earth in millennia? Pulling the strings on the Apocalypse?”
“Does that mean...you don’t think I have to go to Hell?”
Dean didn’t answer for a while. He stared out into the salvage yard, looked back, studied Castiel, ran his hands through his hair.
“Cas, I fucking hope you don’t,” he said eventually. “But everything I’ve been told says that it’s fate. That you and Gabriel are there for the prize fight. And I just-I don’t know if you can change fate, Cas. I don’t.”
“But you wish you could.”
“If it’s possible, then I hope you can.”
Dean stood and offered a hand down to Castiel, who accepted the help.
Together they walked back into the house. Castiel nodded at the silent are you okay? he got from Bobby immediately upon stepping through the door. Dean went straight for the couch, where Sam was evidently in the middle of answering a million questions from Samandriel.
“I do have wings,” Sam said, as Samandriel stared up at him in awe from his place sitting cross-legged on the floor. “You just-humans don’t have enough senses to perceive them. They’re nothing you can see with your eyes.”
“But you can fly?”
“Yeah. If you see us disappear, that’s us flying away. We just do it faster than you can follow.”
“How fast?”
Sam looked up at Dean’s arrival. He gave a relieved smile. “Sorry, buddy, gotta push this conversation back for a minute.”
“We’re going,” Dean announced. He helped Sam stand up, checked the wound again, and nodded. “You’re good to fly.”
“Where are we going?” Sam asked, looking past Dean at Castiel with an expression that clearly said what did you do? Castiel shrugged helplessly.
“We’ve got some research to do, little brother.” Dean put an arm beneath Sam’s to support him.
“That...is not a sentence I ever expected to hear from you,” Sam said, sounding amused.
Dean ignored him and turned to Castiel. “You need anything, you pray. Chalk more of those wards up, more sigils, just in case. Have Gabriel and Bobby make sure your Devil’s Traps aren’t broken anywhere and check your salt lines. They’ll know what that means. I know you’re not stupid, but any weakness right now could be it. You got me?”
“I do,” Castiel said.
Dean grinned, but it lacked the bright charisma that he’d seen previously.
Both angels disappeared.
“Woah,” Samandriel breathed.
“They took off?” Gabriel walked into the room. Castiel frowned. He looked...off. His movements were a little looser, his eyes drooped, and his speech wasn’t as clear as it usually was. “Good riddance. Dicks.”
“Those dicks saved our lives today at the risk of their own,” Castiel said, studying his brother through narrowed eyes. “We’re in trouble, Gabriel.”
“Yeah, ‘cause of them. Like I said. Good riddance.” Gabriel walked-carefully, deliberately-to the couch, threw off the blood-stained sheet, and sat heavily.
Castiel looked at Bobby, who shook his head and walked into the kitchen, followed by Samandriel.
Castiel hovered awkwardly in the doorway. “Gabriel? Are you okay?”
Gabriel shrugged. “I don’t know, Cas. Are you okay? We almost got nuked by fucking angels.”
“Which isn’t surprising you nearly as much as I thought it would,” Castiel said bitterly. “We need to talk about that.”
“Now?” Gabriel groaned and threw his head back onto the pillow dramatically.
“Now.” Castiel marched over to the couch and stopped short when he got close. He reached down and grabbed Gabriel’s arm, shoving up his sleeve.
“Shit, Gabriel.”
Tiny, evenly-spaced pinpricks lined the inside of Gabriel’s forearm, too familiar to Castiel. He’d seen them a thousand times.
“What are you doing, Gabriel?”
“None of your business.” Gabriel pulled his arm away and shoved his sleeve down. “Not like you have any room to judge.”
It was like a slap to the face, but Castiel did his best to let it slide.
“Gabriel, you can’t-not right now, not when we’re-”
“Cas. Castiel.” Gabriel’s voice was soft now, confidential, and a little tremulous. Castiel quieted. “Cas, I-don’t tell Bobby.”
“Gabriel-”
“We’ll talk. Okay? I’ll tell you how I know about this shit, I’ll tell you why you don’t, but don’t--don’t tell Bobby.” Gabriel gripped Castiel’s wrist. “Please.”
Castiel hesitated, then sighed. “You’re going to tell me everything.”
“Soon. Yes. Eventually. I promise.”
Castiel scrubbed his face with his hands. “I wonder if now would be a good time to take up drinking.”
Gabriel grinned, a watery thing that looked wrong on his face. “You and me both, brother.”