Fic: Symmetry, of a Sort 2/?
Title: Symmetry, of a Sort 2/?
Characters/Pairings: Castiel/Dean, Sam
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 4,576
Spoilers: Only if you haven't seen the finale.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Supernatural belongs to CW.
Notes: Sort of an AR, in which everything is totally the same, but also completely different. Dean's POV
Lawrence, Kansas
March, 2033
“I believe I’d like to fall, now.”
Dean has known Castiel going on twenty-five years now, so he’s every bit as surprised as he should be by the angel’s sudden appearance and declaration. That is to say, not at all. “Hi to you too, Cas. I’m fine, thanks for asking.”
“Hello Dean.” Long fingers smooth the ever-present material of the trench as he takes the seat across the small table. “How have you been?”
“It’s been like five months, dude, you don’t even wanna try and fake interest?” Still, he can’t help the wide smile he feels stretching across his face. Because yeah, it’s been a while, but calling Cas out on his abysmal lack of people skills will never not be fun.
“You seem fine.” His companion points out, and okay, Dean can’t really argue the logic in that. But then some weird compulsion Cas has to make any situation as awkward as humanly possible causes him to elaborate, “And I’m never not interested in you, Dean.”
He clears his throat, unsure which direction to take this. “Yeah, well. Thanks for that. So you’re thinking about falling?”
“Yes.”
Dean waits, encourages his companion to continue with a wave of his hand when he understands the angel has no plans to do so. “And? Any particular reason, or is it just because all the cool kids are doin’ it?”
A small smile, and Dean flashes back to that first Halloween when he‘d realized the angel was a little more human than he‘d thought. It’s weird, sometimes, with Cas looking exactly the same as he had at the beginning of all this (or rather, as Jimmy had). Weirder when he catches a glimpse of the two of them in a mirror and thinks when the hell did I get old? He wonders if maybe Cas can work a little of that angel mojo of his and erase a few years.
“Think of it as… a retirement, of sort.” Cas glances over, stares at him in that way he does when he’s really trying to figure out how to word something, and Dean has to ignore the weird fluttery thing his stomach does because, seriously. Not the time.
“Much of Heaven’s order has been restored, and now that Michael has come into his full power,” The angel pauses, frowns at Dean’s contemptuous snort. “Now that he has, it seems superfluous for two to be doing the work of one.”
“Remind me again why your Dad thought it’d be a good idea to bring that dick back again?” The beer in his hand suddenly seems like a great idea, so he takes a swig.
“He brought me back too, Dean.” Cas’s voice is low, quiet with understanding where Dean had expected annoyance. “He brought Sam back.”
Jaw clenched, he acknowledges this with a nod. He can’t even begin to try and understand why, why anything, but he’s learned enough by now not to look a gift horse in the mouth. He’s got his brother, and his friend, and for now it would do.
Cas sighs, draws his attention back. Brows furrowed, teeth worrying his bottom lip, and that’s a nervous habit he’d picked up all on his own. “I’m tired, Dean. And I find myself forgetting what it is to be human, to feel.”
“Yeah?” He takes another drink, ignores the prickle of alarm he feels work down his spine. Finally gathers the nerve to ask, “It’s been twenty-three years down here, Cas. How long has it been up there?
Another sigh, and all at once Cas’s eyes are old, so old, and Dean is suddenly reminded that this being before him is an ancient thing. “A very, very long time. Long enough that I feel confident my departure will not affect the stability we’ve built.”
“And now that you’ve instated your handy-dandy law…” Dean’s got to hand it the guy. He remembers those first few months after the not-Apocalypse, the inexplicably random little meteorites touching down around the globe. Remembers mounting anxiety and panic spread via the local news. But mostly he remembers Cas, grim faced and solemn, informing him that the angels had begun to fall.
He’d never have thought in a million years that Cas’s solution would be successful, not when the crazy bastard was basically offering them the same damn thing, but there they were. He wonders if it’s a little like a teenager actually coming home on time once their parents tell them they don’t really care how late they stay out. Like the thrill is gone. But either way the angels have got a choice now, no punishment to be had provided they consult the boss first. And it seems to work. Probably, Dean thinks, just having the choice is enough.
“Possibly.” Cas frowns thoughtfully, forgets to pretend like he’s not reading Dean’s mind. “Though I believe the fact they’re able to reclaim their grace should they desire is crucial. One is far less likely to behave recklessly if they believe there‘s an opportunity for redemption.”
Then there’s that. He hadn’t forgotten Anna, of course he hadn’t, and hence the stipulation. It was rare, supposedly, rare as an angel falling now was. If they started to remember, for whatever reason, they’d be given a choice: live out the rest of their human life or come on home. Far as he knew, re-angelification was still an option at the end for those who didn’t remember.
“And you’re really up for this, man? I mean, you’re sure?” Because he didn’t like to think about it, not really, but Cas was for all intents and purposes a damn archangel. The idea of him as a human, let alone a human baby was, well, a little discomfiting. Not to mention mind-fuckingly weird.
“I’ve spoken to Nora.” His companion smiles serenely. “She believes she’ll be ready in a few years. Raising Gabriel is… complicated.”
It’s all Dean can do not to crack a smile at that one. “Cas, buddy. What you just did right there? Understatement.” It is his (correct) opinion that Bobby’s daughter should be in contention for sainthood these days. Agreeing to play surrogate mom to one disgruntled archangel? Saint. Agreeing to raise two…? He’s not sure. Maybe just clinically insane. Still, though, he can’t think of anyone else Cas’d be better off with.
But, “Dude, we’ve made out like a million times. Do you know how awkward it’s gonna be for me seeing you in diapers?” Horror dawns on him suddenly, and he groans. “Aw, man, Sam. He is never gonna let me live that down. Ew.”
Cas, the bastard, actually laughs, eyes crinkling with mirth. “No, he won’t.”
A beat passes while the angel sobers, stares at Dean with intense blue eyes. Waiting for encouragement, for refutation, something. He can practically hear him say so, you on board with this or not?, but in fancier words.
Dean stands with a grunt, downs what’s left of his beer in one go. “Ugh. C’mon.” At Cas’s questioning, somewhat crestfallen look he explains. “If you’re gonna do this, then we need to get in some serious make out time while we can. Couch, now.”
Always obliging, Cas stands. It’s the brightest he’s seen him smile in a long time.
****
As it turns out, Dean doesn’t really have to worry about the awkward factor all that long. He dies of a heart attack two years later at the age of fifty-six. Castiel Singer is three weeks old.
****
He’s been looking forward to a little relaxation, a chance to experience this newly arranged Heaven Cas has been telling him about, to reunite with friends and family. So he is understandably, irrevocably, amazingly pissed off when he comes into awareness only to realize he’s somehow managed to become a damn angel. And really, he should have figured it would be something like this, in the end. When else, ever, had the angelic sons of bitches just let him be?
It doesn’t help when he goes storming through Heaven, demanding answers from every being he can corner, only to receive a resounding holy chorus of fucked if I know. The transformation is way beyond anyone’s pay grade, even Michael’s, and up until a few years ago no one had believed it was even possible. When he asks what the hell that’s supposed to mean, some angel with a name he can’t pronounce takes pity on him, whisks him away to his apparent predecessor.
He’s only seen her once before, maybe thirty years ago, so Dean has absolutely no idea why he’s immediately able to identify the angel before him as Claire Novak. She looks nothing like she did the last time he saw her, but the recognition is there all the same.
When she smiles it’s a little sad, sadder as she begs ignorance but offers, earnestly, to ease Dean through this transition as best she can. Informs him hesitantly how glad she is now there’s finally another. It’s a little harder for him to feel quite so angry after that.
By the time she’s finished her tour, Dean has started to feel something weirdly resembling tranquility. He is so not okay with this, doubts he ever will be, but something about being stuck in Heaven this time around makes it kind of difficult to wield unholy rage like armor. He has a strange sort of urge to tell Cas he likes what he’s done with the place, and is immediately annoyed when he recalls the guy has jumped ship.
The angels are, in his opinion, for the most part still dicks. He spends his time with Claire, mostly, with Joshua if he ever feels the urge to sit in a garden and be talked at. At this point, he’s not entirely sure if he’s avoiding Michael or vice versa. He’s just grateful Heaven is a big place and the archangel is a busy guy because really, that would be about the most awkward family dinner ever.
The first time he’s able to see his parents, his real parents, not past-them or some twisted manifestation of Zachariah’s fucked up imagination (Dean is sooo glad that guy stayed dead), he cries like a damn baby. His mother holds him, pulls him in tight as his father claps him awkwardly on the back and pretends like he‘s got something in his eye. They catch up. They’ve got time.
It’s great, it’s all he’s ever wanted, really, but it also makes him miss the hell out of his little brother. Not that he wants him there. Before he’d died Sammy had settled down, found some research job Dean hadn’t really understood at a local library. His wife, Amy, ran the coffee shop round the corner from their house. No kids, but Dean is positive the pair had forgotten at times that their golden retriever, Maggie, wasn’t human.
He misses them, yeah, but he’s also not looking forward to seeing them any time soon.
When he’s been in Heaven long enough (or an angel long enough, whatever), Claire begins to teach him how to check in on people downstairs. He’s not allowed to leave yet, couldn’t if he tried, and he has definitely tried. But he is allowed to peek.
He learns how to relax, let his mind fill up with the deafening white noise that is HeavenCreationEverything until it all goes quiet and suddenly he’s got Sam: A Film playing in his head. It’s surprisingly easy to get the hang of, and when he tells Claire as much she just smiles and explains how it’s far easier to track down a loved one than it is just anybody. Dean doesn’t really mind because, as far as he’s concerned, there’s only a handful of people he really cares about still down there anyway.
********
He has a little trouble figuring out how the hell time flows in Heaven. There’s no real manner of measurement, nothing that means anything anyway. He figures this out when, after it feels he’s been there at least a year, a glance downstairs tells him only a few weeks have passed since his death. Another look what feels like a few days later, and Castiel is celebrating his first birthday. It’s disconcerting, to say the least. He wonders if maybe his brand new Heavenly brothers and sisters measure time in Hallelujahs, or some shit like that.
*********
The first time he tries to break out, really tries, Cas is three years old and dying of heat stroke in the locked trunk of a battered Dodge.
Dean is frantic. He stretches his wings, takes off again and again only to reappear in the Same. Damn. Spot. No amount of effort exerted gets him anywhere, and he is exhausted, wrecked by the time he realizes the reason he can’t fly down is because he doesn’t have a fucking vessel. There’s not a damn thing he can do.
He sounds the alarm, conveys the situation as best he can down the Holy Grape Vine, but all the voices that answer him are sympathetic and filled with condolence. This is a natural thing, and while the angels have begun to interfere on earth where demons are concerned, they have no right to step in here. One voice in particular urges him to celebrate, brother, because Castiel is coming home, and Dean is reminded with astonishing force why he’d hated these angelic mother fuckers in the first place.
He watches, helpless, as the boy’s cries for help dissolve into wheezing breaths, as his desperate struggling turns into weak shoves. He swears he can feel it when the kid’s muscles start to cramp, when the might of it forces up bile. Dean can’t handle it, can’t believe it, because Cas is not supposed to die a scared little kid, trapped and all alone in the trunk of some shitty fucking car.
Angel or not, he has to sit down under the wave of relief that hits him when he sees a terrified Gabriel dragging Sam toward the Dodge. Sam who, with poorly disguised fear, forgoes all niceties with a strained shout of warning before smashing the lock with a hammer. Faster than Dean’s ever seen him move he’s got the trunk open and Cas swept up, tiny and still in his arms, and they’re on their way to meet the sound of approaching sirens.
After that, Dean kind of has to take a break. He can’t, can’t be mad at this human Cas, so he conjures up an image of his friend in his head, fully-grown and stoic. That Cas he yells at, berates for making this stupid fucking choice to be human when he’d had the cozy option of remaining an archangel. Mostly, though, he curses the former angel for scaring the shit out of him.
It’s only after he’s downed a few shots with the gang over at the Roadhouse (and resigned himself to the fact that alcohol no longer has any effect) that Dean feels ready to check back in. He leaves with a promise of a status report to Bobby, who’s understandably concerned about how his daughter might be handling the situation. The fling with officer Jody Mills might have lasted about a week, but it had given him Nora, and as far as Bobby was concerned that was enough. He’d lived to see the girl turn nineteen. Another year and he’d have been the proud grandfather of a bouncing baby archangel.
When Dean has finally steeled himself enough to glimpse, only a few moments have passed down on earth. The ambulance has barely rolled to a stop, skidding in the gravel around Singer’s Salvage in a cloud of dust. Sam is frenzied, trying to placate a sobbing Gabriel and direct his attention away from his brother, who has begun to seize in his arms. He nearly loses his grip on the kid twice before the paramedics take over.
Dean looks away, lets loose a string of curses he’s vaguely amazed are even allowed in Heaven. He wonders if he actually will be seeing Cas again a lot sooner than he’d thought. He tries to feel okay about it, to see at least that as a good thing, but he can’t. He gets the big picture, he does, but right at that moment all he can think about is he doesn’t want the kid to die.
He’s praying before he even realizes he’s doing it.
Later on, as he watches a groggy Cas determinedly attempt to pull the oxygen tube from his nose, he likes the idea that maybe praying had something to do with it. That maybe, for once, someone had been listening.
*********
Meeting up with Michael teaches him two things. First, Cas had been right in believing the guy could keep things running smoothly all on his own. He’d been doing it the forever before Cas had taken over, so that wasn’t really all that surprising.
Second, Michael totally hates Dean’s guts. Hates him so hard Dean is a little shocked he doesn’t feel the searing heat of poorly restrained rage every time Michael looks his way. It gets to point where, the longer he talks to him, the angel’s wings actually begin to twitch. It’s possibly the funniest thing he’s seen ever, and so Dean makes a point to talk to him a lot.
According to Claire, the only way either of them are going anywhere is if the archangel ever deems them ready and mojos them up a pair of bodies. They’re kind of the new kids on the block, she reasons, so it’s not as though there’s any special bloodline specifically meant to hold them. Dean isn’t really in the mood to burn anybody’s eyes out, so he’s not so much in a hurry to test that theory. He thinks of Jimmy, and knows he wouldn’t possess anyone even if he could.
It’s plausible he deserves it when Michael refuses every single request he makes for a custom made vessel.
*********
Something like sixty years pass in Heaven, throughout which Dean is bored out of his fucking mind. The majority of angels he bothers to talk to are boring. Heaven, once he’s explored it, is kinda boring. Spending time with his family and friends is great, but he can only shoot the shit so long before he feels that old familiar itch to do something. There’s not a whole hell of a lot to do once he’s got the flying thing down, and it’s not like he can take that particular skill set anywhere fun anyway.
One memorable day has him making rounds among heavenly brothers, comparing wingspans. The angels are confused, to say the least, but cooperative. They allow him to stand back to back, wings spread far, with Claire acting as judge. Elated doesn’t even begin to describe how he feels when he realizes his wings tend to stretch a few inches further than most. The first time he encounters someone with a larger span he mutters something like it ain’t the size of the wings, it’s the fight in the flight, but no one laughs.
It’s then that Dean recalls, with something akin to horror, that he’s surrounded by an assembly of virgins. Some weird reaction makes him feel like he needs to assert his masculinity, or something, and he’s never felt less angelic than when he begins to troll through paradise looking for potential Super Happy Fun Time.
He’s actually flirting with a girl named Rebecca, making small talk and spouting stupid shit like I musta died and gone to Heaven, babe, cuz you gotta be an angel, before he realizes it is going absolutely nowhere. He’s got the will, sure, but the body is not willing. His sex drive is gone, and really Dean should have figured that one out sooner, especially if this is the first time in years it even occurs to him to try.
There’s nothing, not really, and he wonders if this is why Cas had behaved the way he had all those years ago at the brothel. He thinks of the fear in his friend’s eyes, how funny it had been (and yeah, maybe still just a little funny now), and feels kind of sick. Thinks about how they’d never really gotten any further than making out once he’d gone archangel, and feels a little better. The fact that Cas had initiated most of those sessions, just because he‘d wanted to, meant something. Dean is not totally ready to think about what that something might be.
Still, he sulks for a while before Ash, in all his wisdom, sagely informs him not to worry, man, Heaven’s just like the ultimate cock block for angels. A little time on earth would do him good. It’s a comforting thought, sort of, but Dean has to leave before Ash takes his acceptance as encouragement to elaborate.
He gives up on trying to find any decent celestial entertainment pretty quickly. Spying, living vicariously through the earth-bound gang becomes something of a default. It’s like the worst after school special he’s ever watched, sometimes, but he deals.
********
At one point, Sam’s heart stops for exactly seven seconds when he electrocutes himself attempting to re-wire his home. He materializes before Dean, has just enough time to conjure an epically incredulous bitchface and proclaim “They gave you wings?” before disappearing once more.
Sam doesn’t remember a thing when he gets back, but Dean files it away. He contemplates the flexibility required in training a wing to most effectively deliver a bitch smack, and decides it’s a project for later.
*********
Over the course of a few years, it becomes abundantly obvious that the newly minted Singer brothers retain a few aspects of their angelic nature.
Gabriel is ten the first time he absolutely loses his shit. Dean has no idea why he’s watching, only that he feels like he should, so he’s amazed when the kid launches himself at the new art teacher like a wild fucking animal. He’s practically snarling, and while the two teacher’s aides struggle to pull him away Dean is just trying to figure out how the kid knows he’s attacking a shtriga.
He’s sent home early, obviously, with talk of counseling and anger management and all sorts of bullshit Dean actually kind of remembers from his own school days. The entire ride Gabe is uncharacteristically silent, and it’s not until they’re home that the kid breaks down. When he begins to lament that he’s sorry, mom, he’s so so sorry, but there’s something wrong with his eyes, Dean feels cold work down his spine. He wonders how long the kid has been able to see monsters.
It’s worse when Nora gets it. He watches something crumble behind steel resolve as she sends her son to his room with instructions to get some rest. As she paces the floor of the kitchen with fingernails chewed down to nothing. It’s one thing to know there are bad things out there, awful things that actually do go bump in the night. All kids know that these days, they have to. But it’s another thing to know.
When Cas gets home from kindergarten that day he heads straight into his brother’s room, crawls into bed and lets the older boy hug him like he knows Gabriel needs it. They mumble, and it feels like too private a moment for Dean to be listening in, but curiosity gets the better of him when Gabriel asks if Cas can see them too. He shrugs, apologetic as hell for a five year old, and tells him no, but he believes him. After that, Gabe makes a point to tell people what he sees. He does not, however, see the art teacher again, because by the time Nora’s done with it there’s nothing left.
Cas’s talents, unsurprisingly, tend toward the academic. He has a book, like, surgically attached to end of his nose more often than not, way too big to be just “See Spot Run” or whatever the fuck kids are reading these days. It’s kind of intense how much he’s into the reading, and more than once Dean sees him totally skip snack time because he just has to finish a chapter. It makes him a little sad because, seriously. Snack time.
Gradually, concerned teachers appeal to Nora, try to get the kid bumped up a few grades, but she declines. Cas is quiet, a little on the shy side, so making friends has not exactly been easy. It’s taken him long enough to warm up to the few he has, and Nora argues the separation would do more damage than good. In the end they settle for special tutoring sessions in addition to class, over which Cas is nerdily ecstatic. Dean watches him giddily translate Aesop’s fables from Greek to English and thinks it’s just about right. It figures, out of everything, that Cas would manage to hold on to his giant friggin angel brain.
He’s also not surprised to see either brother begin to look more and more like their former vessels. Coming from the one guy, especially, who wore the same damn outfit for thirty years, he supposes adopting the familiar appearances might’ve been a comfort thing. Because of it they look nothing like brothers, or their mother, and after about the hundredth time of hearing it Nora gives up and finally starts telling people they’re adopted, which Gabriel finds hilarious.
It makes Dean sort of wish he’d been able to stick around long enough to know this family. He finds himself wondering if Cas even knows his name, if he knows Dean Winchester was a real person outside of the gospels, but that sucks too much to think about so he has to stop.
********
There are times, every once in a while, where Dean is so desperately fucking lost he can barely function. It’s Heaven, so really it’s pretty impressive the state of mind he’s able to work himself into, but it happens.
But he doesn’t get it. It feels like a trap, the angel thing, and if it were just him he’d be walking around on eggshells just waiting for the catch. Sometimes he looks at Claire and knows she’s thinking the same thing, but neither of them have an answer.
He thinks about how they’re these all powerful things now, just sort of sitting around and waiting for permission to move, to do something, and it’s then he kind of understands. It’s not enough to make him sympathize with some of the shittier angels he’s encountered (see: Zachariah), because there’s being lost and then there’s just being an asshole, but still.
A certain someone told him once to have faith, good things do happen, and Dean is maybe just now starting to see the validity in that. He considers starting a campaign to get the angels helping out a little more on earth, which more or less consists of him and Claire nagging the shit out of their Heavenly family. Because really, who the hell is better suited to guide a bunch of bewildered angels than a couple of former humans?
If Sam were here, Dean knows he’d get all overexcited and girlishly flustered at the notion. Say something like this is why He made you angels, Dean. He wants you to help. He isn’t sure. It’s something to think about.
Chapter 3: http://neurawkward.livejournal.com/2206.html#cutid1
Thank you to laurie-ky for the posting tips!!!