“Unless First We Dream”

[polgarawolf]

Fandom: Supernatural

Title: “Unless First We Dream”

Pairing: Mention of past Sam/Ruby. Can most easily be read as preslash Dean/Castiel.

Rating: Uhm, probably a borderline PG-13-ish, maybe (?)

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Supernatural, more’s the pity (seeing as how they belong to Kripke and to the show’s writers)! What I do have is an extremely contrary muse that refuses to shut up and leave me alone . . .

Summary: Sam Winchester dreams of how the Apocalypse might have been averted, if only he’d been stronger, smarter, truer to his brother and to himself, and, to his shock, finds his dreams invaded by an angel . . . even though he’d been sure that the angel had washed his hands of the Winchesters once and for all.

Warning: This story is meant to function as a kind of sequel to my earlier story, “What Dreams May Come,” as well as a sort of continuation of season five’s second episode, “Good God, Y’All!,” and will therefore probably be Jossed as soon as next Thursday and the third episode (“Free to Be You and Me”) roll around. For some reason, though, that didn’t stop the muse from insisting it be written down!

Author’s Notes: 1). I have no idea where this story came from. It hit me Friday morning, literally as soon as I pulled into the parking lot at work, and I scribbled madly off and on all day until I had basically the whole thing written down. Aside from the whole Castiel visiting Sam in his dreams thing, it’s canon-compliant (as far as I can tell) up through the second episode of season five (and could be considered at least semi-spoilerish for the show up through that episode) and I suppose could be read as (kind of) gen, though frankly the vibe that I get from Castiel when I’m writing feels anything but gen and Sam’s pretty damned sure that an angel of the Lord is in love with his brother and that his brother’s in the first stages of learning how to return the emotion.

2). As I’ve said before, Supernatural is a supremely odd show in that the main characters never seem to have (or to keep) any romantic attachments or possible romantic attachments that aren’t either broken by death or else what some would consider blasphemous/unnatural in some way. This is one of the few ’verses I consider myself a fan of that I’ve never even been tempted to seriously ship, before, for precisely this reason.

Until very recently, there was really no one on the show to ship, except the brothers (apologies to fans of the character, but I’ve been waiting for Ruby to betray Sam from day one, so it never occurred to me to seriously ship that couple. And it’s kind of beside the point, now, all things considered), and, while I totally get the whole “epic love story of Sam and Dean” aspect of the show, honestly, I’ve never been able to see this as a functional romantic ship, in the context of the actual show. The brothers are a couple - are partners - in every sense of the word except the romantic one, and, as much as the show likes to play with the fact that outsiders often read their intensely close relationship as romantic, as they have no other context from their own (fairly) normal lives within which to fit such an obviously strong bond, I honestly don’t think that Kripke and the writers mean for viewers to assume that the Winchester boys are actively pursuing an incestuous relationship behind closed doors and in between the scenes of the show.

Which, again, isn’t to say that I have anything against the Wincest pairing so often found in the fandom (I am an AU girl at heart and fic that actively resists cultural norms is usually my favorite kind. I’ve read some damned good Wincest fic that barely changed anything in the basic natures of the characters, as presented on the show, and some even better AU where all of the changes were beautifully accounted for by the aspects of the boys’ lives that differed from their lives on the show): it’s just to say that I personally consider it much more of an AU ship, when the pairing is also romantic, than a canon-compliant one. So I’ve never really considered myself to be a shipper of any particular pairing for this show, even though I tend to be a diehard OTPer (and/or whatever one might call a functional relationship with multiple partners) when it comes to my fandoms.

The (fairly) recent appearance of Castiel on the show . . . well, let’s just say that the dynamic of the show began to shift radically, from the moment he and Dean met (and I don’t just mean in the flesh!). There are many fans of the show who have responded to this shift by pairing Dean with Castiel (I’ve seen Dastiel and Destiel both used as portmanteau couple names for the ship); however, until recently (and to be perfectly honest, I’m still not entirely sure about this), I’ve avoided embracing this ship, mainly due to the fact that it’s (mostly) seemed to be painfully one-sided (on top of which, frankly, it disturbs the ever living crap out of me to even approach the notion of a God who would deliberately send an angel to a human, all the while knowing that the essential nature of the two beings involved could only result in pain, Dean too scarred by his life/afterlife/second life to even be able to recognize love and faith when it is offered to him and Castiel having no choice - as a creature whose sole purpose is essentially to experience love and to glorify the divine and faithfully praise God by worshiping all of His creation - but to love).

That Castiel is devoted to Dean (perhaps far too much so) I cannot even begin to argue. That Castiel . . . feels something for Dean that he should not (according to his angelic comrades-in-arms and superiors) - something that is, at the very least, highly irregular for an angel to experience towards a mere human - is also glaringly obvious, especially given the outcome of the season four finale. That Dean cannot grasp/comprehend the depth of Castiel’s attachment to him, doesn’t understand such a level of devotion to himself (seeing as how he has no faith in himself and still cannot even begin to believe that he deserved to be saved, is worthy of salvation, of being raised from Hell, much less capable of stopping the end of days) or even seem to have an inkling that there are ramifications to the fact that Castiel, as an angel of the Lord, is essentially built for faith and devotion and following and has willingly chosen to follow Dean, and is also apparently blindly oblivious to the fact that Castiel’s feelings for him have increasingly seemed to have little to do with the fact that Dean is the only one who can stop the Apocalypse and Castiel has been ordered to protect him, so that he will eventually be able to do as has been prophesied and defeat Lucifer, has also seemed pretty damn patently obvious, to me.

Or at least so it has seemed until lately, when I began to get a feeling that there just might be more going on underneath the surface of Dean and Castiel’s . . . relationship (for lack of a better word) than was immediately obvious and to suspect that Kripke et al might deliberately be using the connection between Dean and Castiel - the choice Castiel made, in Dean’s favor, and the reasons why, and the possibility that Dean might one day choose Castiel (and, by extension, his God) back, willingly, for reasons of his own - to enrich the show’s already hugely complex background and mythology.

After viewing the first episode of season five and promptly finding myself compelled to write out my first Supernatural fanfic (and finding, much to my surprise, that I kept instinctively identifying it as Dean/Castiel preslash - if preslash of a somewhat more spiritual than physical nature - even though Dean hardly appeared in the story at all), reflecting on my own confoundment at having written such a thing, and then viewing the second episode of the new season, I found myself quite suddenly having to sit down and seriously contemplate the possibility that Dean/Castiel (of some form or another) could end up being the penultimate ship of the show . . . and that this probability would likely end up having a direct and profound impact on the outcome of the show, especially regarding the possibility that another way might be found to defeat Lucifer and avert the destruction of the Earth, so that Dean wouldn’t be forced to give in to the faction of angels that, so far, has largely been represented by Zachariah.

Because of this, the Dean/Castiel ship - or at least some version of it - is rapidly becoming a lot more important to me. I’m honestly not sure, yet, if I’m seeing things that are really there or not or what the hell I’m really doing, floundering about in this fandom, grasping at possible ways to smooth a path between Castiel and Dean. The whole thing still kind of freaks me out - there are consent issues here that are just . . . freakin’ insane. Angel of the Lord, y’all. Inherent lack of free will plus the whole created to worship and glorify adore thing. And Dean Winchester, poster boy for, well, using free will as a convenient excuse to stomp all over monsters, demons, corporate angel asshats, and assorted other company - and I’m seriously, seriously confounded by the fact that, while their connection so far largely seems to be more mental/spiritual or even emotional than physical (much less sexual), that handprint of Castiel’s is still blazoned on Dean’s arm like a mark of ownership, where he gripped him tight and raised him from perdition, not to mention worried as hell over the fact that, while Castiel appears to be becoming more human (especially this season), Dean’s capacity for self-blame and self-loathing are still such that any alteration to the angel’s apparent nature is (upon reflection) entirely too likely to make Dean panic over the possibility that he’s corrupted/lessened/damaged Castiel.

So, in short (not to repeat myself or anything, but) I really have no clue what I’m doing here or where this story came from or why I seem to think it’s a good idea to pursue this crazy idea of mine in what is beginning to appear to resemble a nascent between-the-scenes series in the making, given that it follows on the heels of the previous story my insane muse bullied me into writing. I get the feeling that I’m going to end up regretting allowing myself to be bullied and pulling out handfuls of hair whilst trying to figure out what in the hell this thing really is and just what Dean and Castiel truly are to one another. In the meantime, though, since I’ve no intention of trying to puzzle this out any further right now, allow me to point out that, though this specific story (like the one preceding it) is canon-compliant up through the second episode of season five (at least to a point, inasmuch as it follows the events of the show), the between-the-scenes nature of the story means that it can, technically, also be read as AU. And, in any case, I have a strong suspicion that this story won’t precisely remain all that canon-compliant once the next episode has come out. So . . . readers might want to take this with a grain of salt. (In fact, freakin’ huge handfuls of salt might not be entirely out of line.) Okay?

3). Erhm, despite Sam’s ginormous tendency towards stupidly destructive levels of self-centeredness (which is, as mentioned in the notes for the previous story, the reason I’ve always primarily been a Dean girl and not a Sam girl), he can also be (when not being a selfish dick or addled by power and demon blood and desire for revenge at all costs) hugely protective of his brother. Dean’s pretty much all he has, folks. When he thought that the Trickster had killed Dean for good, he was willing to kill Bobby - the closest thing to another family member he had left - so he could perform a ritual to get Dean back. The loss of Dean to Lilith and her hellhounds wrecked him so completely that he not only turned to Ruby (a freakin’ demon, for pity’s sake!) out of pure desperation, he became so obsessed with getting vengeance upon Lilith for that loss that, even after Castiel had returned Dean to him, he couldn’t let his need for revenge go, even going so far as to choose the having of that revenge over the reality of his returned from Hell brother. So I think it’s safe to say that, if Sam ever truly believed that someone capable of deeply hurting Dean were deliberately causing him pain, he’d react ferociously and pitilessly, in a way designed to get that person to stop messing with his brother, and not stop doing so until it was understood that the person in question would fix whatever the hell had gone wrong and caused harm to befall Dean in the first place. Even if the person in question were actually an angel capable of dragging a soul up out of Hell and putting it back into a miraculously healed and living body . . .

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“Unless First We Dream”


Sam Winchester sits stiffly in the car, hoping like hell he hasn’t misjudged, hoping desperately that he’s doing the right thing and not making a terrible mistake (perhaps the worst mistake of his life), hoping beyond hope that Dean will forgive him, when he finds out what Sam’s done, stop pulling away from him at every chance and start working with him to find another way of dealing with Lilith and her demons, with this possibility lost to them.

Beside him in the car, Ruby’s vessel talks at him about necessity and power and how he’s doing the right thing, making such a hard decision, and Sam clenches his hands into fists to keep himself from lashing out at the demon bitch, prays that she really is as oblivious a she seems to the decision he’s finally come to, after much agonizing and soul-searching.

Somehow, despite the fact that Sam feels as though he’s radiating far too much (nervous) purpose for anyone paying even a modicum of attention to miss, he manages to sit still and make all the right noises at all the right places during her lecture, and she takes him to the hotel room she’s rented, halfway across town, in a building far more well built and well kept than the kind of place Sam and Dean usually end up at. He goes along with her, forcing himself to wait, right hand itching to touch ancient steel, to reconnect with the crackle and burn of the spells he’s grown so used to that almost (almost) he can sense the true shape of them.

Still talking at him - condescendingly, a dark hint of gloating lurking at the back of her not all that well-faked pity - Ruby swipes her card key to let them in, clearly not suspecting. The knife makes no noise, sliding into place at her throat as if made for no other purpose than this, cutting her off abruptly, grating voice choking on a surprised exclamation of, “Sam - !”

He crowds her further into the room, shifting her about carefully, until he can see her face, dark eyes flashing solid black with confused fear and anger, and he snarls, not bothering to hold back any of his fury or hatred or disgust, sensing that she won’t react until it’s already too late to save herself (too used to worming her way past his occasional outbursts of temper and attacks of conscience and doubt for it to even occur to her that he’s serious, this time), “You really are a dumb demon bitch, aren’t you? You honestly think I would choose you - choose this - over Dean? After he went to Hell for me? I may be more trusting than Dean, but I’m not an idiot, Ruby! And I’m not my father. Killing Lilith is not more important than Dean - helping him deal with those so-called angels and figure out a way to get over all the crap he had to go through in Hell, because of me! We’ll find some other way of dealing with her. So screw you and your demon blood and all your promises of power! I know what you’re doing and it’s not going to work. I’m not going to let you or anyone else come between us like this. I won’t turn myself into a monster for you or anybody else. In fact, I should’ve done this a long time ago. Goodbye, Ruby.”

The knife slides in easily, before she can even start to form a protest, her spirit - or whatever passes for a spirit, in a demon - lighting up her body like a lit wick in a lantern as the magic in the blade rips into it and burns through it, destroying it (and Ruby) forever. Sam stands over her, when it’s done, grieved for the unknown owner of the body the demon had worn - the woman had been a coma patient, dying, her soul long vacated from its fleshy casing, supposedly, but he can’t help but feel a pang of regret and sorrow, for the life lost (whenever it was that the spirit truly departed the flesh) - shaking with reaction, terrified, for a moment, now that he is alone, that he was wrong, after all, that he just threw away his best chance to destroy Lilith, before she can do any more damage to his family or the rest of the world, and then -

“Sam Winchester. What are you doing?”

Castiel’s voice is like a rough brace of trumpets, heralding the demise of his dream. Sam startles, whirls around, instinctively raising the knife in warning, in defense, and nearly staggers at the familiar sight of the angel’s vessel (which, come to think of it, may not be a vessel anymore, remade as he apparently was in that body. Perhaps prison is closer to the right term, barred as he supposedly is now from Heaven, for choosing Dean and Dean’s desire to try to save Sam and stop the Apocalypse over his orders), all windblown dark hair and shadowed, too bright blue eyes and pale face both too intently focused and too blankly innocent to seem quite right, quite human.

Sam swallows a reflexive exclamation, not wanting to offend (too used to being afraid, to not trusting, to fearing to anger the one responsible for returning his brother to him from Hell), blows out an explosive breath, and, abruptly remembering his last two encounters with the angel, scowls, snarking, “Apparently providing yet another freakin’ angel entertainment with my dreams, pathetic as that sounds. What - ?”

Castiel frowns, steps closer (reflexively driving him back a step, unused as he is to having all that intensity and only just barely contained, barely furled power focused so closely upon him and only him, no Dean in the room to distract the angel), and cuts him off, flatly declaring, “No. I am here because of where you are not. What do you think you’re doing, Sam?”

Caught flat-footed, he starts to repeat, “What do I think . . . ?” before his brain catches up with the foreboding, dangerous tone of Castiel’s voice and his own recent decision to step back from hunting, so close on the hells of Castiel’s abandonment of them. Face drawn tight with disappointed anger and stubborn determination, he crosses his arms defensively across his chest, and snaps, “I think I’m doing what I have to, no matter how much it hurts. And I think I don’t like your tone of voice. What the hell do you even care? You made it perfectly clear, earlier, that you’re not interested in trying to help us anymore. I suppose I should’ve expected it. You’re devout in your belief and your God’s nothing if not schizophrenic. Why shouldn’t you be, too?” he asks, laughing bitterly as he sheathes the knife somehow still in his hand, putting it away so he won’t be tempted to use it again, no matter how much he might want to, irregardless of the fact that he knows it can’t really hurt the angel, the memory of the agony and desolation in Dean’s eyes, in that hospital, when Castiel spoke of all he’d lost and how it had been for nothing, because Dean failed to get to Sam before the last Seal fell, granting Lucifer the ability to rise, making his blood boil and his fingers itch to form fists, do violence, deal back some of the hurt so carelessly dealt by the angel he’d just begun to accept as an ally, a friend, someone who cared so much about Dean that he’d be willing to stick this through to the end with them.

The furrow in Castiel’s brow deepens, his expression half affront and half confusion. “He is your God, as well - ”

“Now see, that’s where we disagree. After all that’s happened, I gotta go with Dean, on this one. Either God’s dead or He just doesn’t give a rat’s about what the Hell - literally - happens, anymore. If He were really all that powerful or all that loving, He would’ve stopped this before it could ever get this far. He doesn’t want to help us or care if Lucifer and his pet demons overrun the Earth, fine. We’ll fix this ourselves, like we’ve done every other bad thing that’s ever come along. You rather go chasing after a pipe dream of God, then fine. We’ll deal with that, too. But don’t you dare go all high and might on me, for doing what I could to try to help keep Dean safe, and don’t you dare go throwing Dean’s lack of faith in his face, like it’s a flaw, when it’s at least partially your fault and sure as hell your ol’ buddy Zachariah’s fault that he couldn’t stop me from breaking that last Seal and your God couldn’t fucking well be fussed to do a damn thing to stop it, either!”

Sam’s half snarling and half shouting, by the end, and the fact that Castiel isn’t doing anything but staring at him with his head cocked curiously to one side makes him have to clench his fists tight, to throttle back the desire to lash out with them. The fingers of his right hand twitch helplessly, trying to shape themselves around a familiar humming burn of ensorcelled steel, even though he knows it wouldn’t do any good to stab the angel (just feel good, dammit, be satisfying as all get out). Castiel, apparently not noticing how fine the thread of his control has gotten, starts to say, “It is not fault that falls upon you or your brother - ”

Sam takes a step forward before he can stop himself, bellowing, “The hell it isn’t! You made it very plain to us both just how disappointing we are and how much you lost and what failures we are, in the hospital! You wanna rip me a new one for letting Lucifer out, fine! God knows I deserve it! I was an idiot and I trusted Ruby and I wanted revenge so badly for what Lilith and Azazel did to our family that I wouldn’t listen to reason and I made myself a monster, so I could fight her! Dean had nothing to do with what I did, what I chose! He did everything in his power to stop me, to save me, and I basically spat in his face! It’s not his responsibility to stop me from making bad decisions, dammit! I’m responsible for my actions, not Dean! You want somebody to blame for you getting killed and the Apocalypse starting and you having to kill two of your brothers, fine! You can goddamn well blame me, since it’s my fucking fault this is happening! But you leave Dean out if it! You don’t want him to trust you, you don’t want him to choose you back, you don’t want his help or hell even to’ve chosen him yourself anymore, fine! But don’t you blame him for the choices you made or the choices I made! He’s done nothing wrong, except be my brother and refuse to let those dick brothers of yours completely have their way with either me or himself or you! It’s not his fault that - ”

Castiel, looking stricken, interrupts before Sam can finish the thought. “Sam! Why would you think I have renounced my faith? Dean - ”

“Dean couldn’t have been more hurt by you unless you’d actually cursed him for getting you barred from Heaven, because of how pissed off your brothers are! You made it perfectly clear that - ”

“I did not! I - ”

“Bullshit! You basically told us your belief in Dean’s made you a rebel and a murderer for nothing! You made is painfully clear that it was all for nothing and you had no intention of listening to us or helping us any more! You could’ve at least had the decency to tell me before and not act like you still cared what happened to us! Why the hell’d you even bother running Zachariah off, if you were just gonna go and do this? I thought - I thought you - you were - you and Dean - I’d hoped - ” Sam’s voice breaks and he has to close his eyes, take a deep breath, to keep from either screaming in frustration or letting the wetness pooling behind his eyes betray his weakness, his grief.

It occurs to him, distantly, that he’s shaking, that he feels this betrayal far more keenly than any other (Ruby, the other angels, hell, even himself, even his own stupidly trusting, stupidly well-meaning, stupidly selfish choices), and that he really wishes he knew how to hurt an angel, if only so he could wipe that blank look off of the bastard’s face. But then Castiel shocks him, the noise he makes a cross between a cry of anguish and grief and an incoherent noise of protest, and Sam’s eyes fly open to see that face crumpled in lines of pain.

He gapes dumbly, shocked speechless, chest aching with sudden sympathy for a being who’s never really shown pain before, even in the midst of having his vessel beaten and his spirit banished back to Heaven by the demon who broke Dean, in Hell, the almost tangible desire to hurt transforming with painful rapidity to an urge to reach out, to lay a comforting hand on one of those visibly trembling shoulders. (Castiel is trembling. Castiel is pale and shaking and Holy Mother of God, what did Sam do? What the fuck did he do and how in hell can he undo it, make it right again, make the angel act like an angel again and not like a human who’s just had the heart ripped bloody out of his chest?) The loss of composure on Castiel’s part is, quite possibly, one of the most horrible, horrifying things Sam’s seen in his life, and, for that moment, all he can think of is how much he wants to make it go away, make things go back to normal, have the angel regarding him with one version or another of his three patent expressions (frustrated wrath; unabashed confusion; calmly accepting blankness).

Sam’s still trying to gather wits enough to ask what the matter is when Castiel (voice pitched so low that he has a hard time understanding him) shakily breathes, “I intended no such thing! Our situation is so grave . . . I merely intended to impress upon you both the gravity, the importance, of the search - ”

Sam blinks. Scowls. Half laughs, scoffingly, before he can censor himself. “Dude. It’s the end of freakin’ days! I think we both understand how serious the situation is and how royally screwed we all are! If anything, we know better than you do, seeing as how we can’t just go flitting off to Heaven if the Earth ends up being laid to completely to waste! And you - you may have faith that everything will be come right, in the end - you may trust that your God will come swooping in at the last minute and save us all - but in our experience, good things don’t happen just because you believe. And your God hasn’t exactly been all that helpful or supportive so far.”

The breath Castiel takes is audible, ragged. “He is not just my God, Sam Winchester! If you and your brother would just accept that - ”

“What, like Dean was just supposed to accept that you were worthy of his trust and his respect, because you’re the one who got to him first and brought him out of Hell and you could throw him back in, if you wanted to?” Sam interrupts, voice bitterly acidic.

Castiel actually flinches, pale face somehow managing to grow even paler. “You - you know about that? I wouldn’t have thought he would say anything about that - ”

The shamed stammering succeeds in pissing him off so badly that Sam has to dig bloody half-moons into his palms to keep from lashing out. Flatly, glaring murderously, he notes, “Hard to keep something a secret when it’s so terrifying you end up shouting about it in your sleep. Multiple times. He didn’t really have to say anything. His nightmares did the talking for him.”

Castiel flinches again, even more violently, messy dark head bowed repentantly low, body shivering in reaction. “I - I should not have said that to him. I have no excuse. I had lost several brothers in battle that day. Uriel was furious with me, for allowing my attention to be diverted by Dean during the fight. Zachariah was . . . extremely unhappy and impatient with the lack of progress he felt I was making, with Dean. And Dean . . . he fought everything I said. Everything I tried to do, to explain. His lack of faith, of trust, was very . . . frustrating. But none of these things excuse what I did, what I said. I should never have spoken so, to him. I should never have treated him so. I did much damage to our ability to work together, to what small seeds of gratitude and trust he may have been beginning to feel towards me, for what I’d done. And . . . it was a lie, even then. I fought very hard for your brother, Sam - harder than I have ever fought for anyone or anything else, in my existence - and I never could have sent him back. Never. Not from the moment I first saw him, there, first felt the need to lay my hands upon him and free him from Hell. It was a mistake. I have never ceased regretting those words.”

Castiel looks so abjectly miserable that Sam almost feels sorry for him. But not quite. He vividly recalls Dean’s nightmares, the mix of broken pleas and terrified shouting, imploring and abjuring Castiel not to take him back, not to leave him in Hell again. On some of the nights he went to Ruby, it was to escape precisely this, the nightmares so violent, so encompassing, that, even when Sam tried to wake Dean up, he would just slide back down into them again almost as soon as he began to surface. Memory makes him immovable, unmoved.

Glacier cold, Sam snaps, “That’s why you have to think before you open your mouth around Dean. He’s very good at making others frustrated. He’s extremely good at driving people crazy. If you don’t want to make things worse, then you’d better learn how to keep your mouth shut before you snap at him.”

“I know, Sam. Believe me. I know. And I am sorry - terribly sorry. I apologized to Dean, for my thoughtlessness, when I attempted to make apologies for the threats brought against him by my superiors, when the two of you refused to give us Anna Milton, even after learning of her true nature. That the threat of Hell was brought against him again, then . . . that was both an act of uncalled for cruelty and an unspeakably grievous mistake. I told Uriel and Zachariah that, being a righteous man, Dean would refuse to give in, even to such a threat. I told them that he would not forgive the use of such a threat against the life of one he felt innocent and wrongly persecuted, especially once he knew that the threat was hollow. They would not believe me. Even then, my judgment was beginning to be felt suspect, in matters pertaining to Dean.”

The angel’s misery is almost a palpable thing, but Sam, unaffected by it (remembering the look of desperation in Dean’s eyes, in that barn, when he’d thought them trapped with no way out that didn’t end with him back in Hell), finds himself grinning mockingly as he asks, “I bet that went over well, huh? Told you to fuck off and go directly to Hell, didn’t he?”

Castiel flinches, hunching in upon himself in a surprisingly human gesture. “Essentially. At first. There were . . . more colorful threats made, against Uriel.”

Sam just shakes his head. “I’m not surprised. Uriel’s the one who dragged me into it, when the threat of Hell wouldn’t make him cave and hand over Anna, right?”

Castiel, in turn, bows his head, eyes shut tight, as though in pain. “Yes.”

Sam snorts, unimpressed, and points out, “You’re lucky he didn’t do more than yell.”

Wincing, Castiel admits, “The demon-slaying knife was mentioned, in conjunction with the possibility of testing its effectiveness in dreams, at more than one point.”

Being intimately familiar with just how unreasonable Dean’s temper can be, Sam merely points out, “He must’ve been impressed by your sincerity, or else he would’ve just stabbed you.”

“I was sincere. I am sincere. I have no desire to cause your brother harm or pain!”

Castiel’s almost frighteningly fervent, as he assures Sam of this, but Sam, remembering how many times the angel has hurt his brother, is entirely unimpressed. “Dude. Dean actually cares about you, and that means you can hurt him a lot more than you’d otherwise be able to. You hurt him, when you threatened him like that. You let him down, when you went along with those damned orders to kill Anna - which hurt him, since he’d started trusting you a little, by then, despite what you’d done, before - and then you basically betrayed him, when you didn’t do anything to stop Uriel from threatening first to haul him off to Hell and then to kill me, if he wouldn’t hand Anna over as ordered. And that hurt him even more. Then you hurt him again, after you let Zachariah and those other dicks make you stop acting like you actually maybe gave a shit about what happened to us. And you hurt him again, at the hospital, when you said all that crap about how awful our plan was and how you were going to go look for God and to hell with us and we could just keep your opinions to ourselves. You keep doing this, and I’m going to have to do something to stop you. Dean’s my brother. I don’t care who the hell you are or what the fuck you are or how much you’ve lost or give up or had taken away from you, for choosing to support us. You keep hurting Dean like this and I’ll banish your ass back to Heaven myself, no matter how many of the feathered fucks up there have it out for you. You understand?”

Castiel flinches again, curling in upon himself, entire body wracked and trembling with shame. “If I keep hurting Dean like this, despite my desire to protect him from all harm, I will deserve nothing less.”

The anger rises in him again, hot and visceral, a red tide behind his eyes, and he finds himself snarling, “If that’s what you believe, if that’s what you want, then why the fuck did you say what you did, in the hospital? Why the hell didn’t you try harder to get him to listen to you?”

“I - ” The crumpled, wounded, far too human expression returns, blue eyes nearly black with pain, with shame. “I have never seen my Father, Sam. I trust in Him, I believe in Him, but I - I was foolish in my devotion, and allowed my faith to blind me to the faults of my brothers. I thought - when Dean tore the blinders from my eyes, and I understood that what I was doing, what my brothers and I were doing, was wrong, I thought - I hoped - that it would be enough, that choosing Dean would be enough, that God would return faith with faith, and the war would be ended, the final Seal left unbroken. I went to my death willingly, in the full knowledge of my disobedience and my faith, trusting that all would be well, believing that my sacrifice would not be in vain. When I awoke . . . I was in this body. On Earth. Barred from Heaven by the wrath of my brothers. And Lucifer had risen. But you and Dean, you were well. Miraculously so. I could not doubt, then, though I was confused - heartbroken, aghast by the Morning Star’s rising and the coming of the End of Days - for there was still hope. I came between you and Zachariah in your dream for the same reason I came between my brothers and the two of you upon the Earth. Dean is the only one who can end this war, and I know that he cannot do it without you. I believe in him. I trust in him. I have faith in him. I love him. But I - I - ”

Castiel’s voice falters, falling silent, even as those (ridiculously fragile looking - rough with chapping, reddened as though from being bitten - ludicrously human) lips frame the word need, and Sam, suddenly understanding, finds his anger abandoning him with a violent rush, like air from a popped balloon, as abruptly as it had risen, leaving him feeling torn ragged and hollowed out and old with unwanted wisdom. “You wish Dean would feel all of those same things for you. You want him to comfort you by returning all of those sentiments. You need him. And he keeps fighting you, keeps turning away. Cas. I’m sorry. Really, I am. But it’s Dean. You have to have known this wouldn’t ever be anything even resembling easy.”

“I know. I am at fault. I am . . . unworthy to be the one who’s been sent for your brother.”

The angel looks so utterly defeated, his voice so small and shivery fragile (and God, but doesn’t he just remind Sam of Dean? Automatically assuming that any kind of failing, any kind of flaw, automatically translates to worthlessness, unworthiness, valuelessness), that Sam finds himself blowing out a hard breath, to defuse his lingering proclivity towards anger and a helpless desire to reach out and seriously hurt someone, for ever letting Castiel even think such a thing. That Castiel flinches again, when he reaches out to lay a comforting hand on his shoulder, just makes the surge of protectiveness (and the urge to beat someone to a bloody pulp, to make somebody answer for this) that much stronger.

“Cas. Look at me, man, alright? That’s bullshit and you know it. You saved Dean from Hell. You choose Dean over your orders. You died, just to give Dean time to try to get to me. You’re worthy. You’re more than worthy. You’re a helluva lot more than we deserve. Just - I know it’s hard, but you gotta be more patient, alright? Tone down the righteous fury. Don’t let him get to you, okay? Dean . . . he doesn’t believe easily, any more than he trusts easily. But once his faith is given, it’s given. He’ll never give up or waver. The world will end, before his loyalty will. Hell, he says he doesn’t trust me anymore and he can’t forgive me for what I did - and I get it, really, I do, and it’s nothing less than what I deserve, Cas, nothing - ” Sam voice breaks, nearly fails him, but he pushes ahead, forcing himself not to let the pain paralyze him, the self-loathing stop him from maybe (hopefully) helping Dean, by helping Castiel (who’s staring at him intently, eyes wide and pleading and hopeful, making him wonder if this is what Dean feels like, when Sam looks at him for answers, for reassurance) understand this, telling him, “but he still panics, when so much as the possibility of me getting hurt arises, and I don’t deserve that, don’t deserve for him to still care, but he does. And he will. He doesn’t know how to stop loving, once he’s given his heart. I had to leave, to get him to stop worrying so much about me that he was endangering himself, with his inattention to everything and everyone else.”

Hesitantly, almost diffidently (and how completely and utterly fucked up is that, that Castiel - an angel of the freakin’ Lord, for God’s sake! - should be diffident towards him, towards Sam), Castiel asks, “Have you not yet noticed that terrible things tend to follow, when you and Dean separate?”

Grinning mirthlessly, Sam retorts, “I’ve noticed that terrible things tend to happen, irregardless of whether or not we’re together.”

“Sam - ”

Glaring balefully, he hastily interrupts with a half shouted, “No. I can’t be with him now and be of any use. I’m dangerous, Cas. I’m a dangerous distraction. I’m not - I can’t trust myself, on a hunt. I’m liable to get him hurt. Or worse. This is the only thing I could do - the only tenable choice. It’s not like I’m abandoning him for forever. It’s just until I’m sure my head’s on straight again. Beside, you’re right about one thing: our plan’s a load of crap. We can’t do this, alone. We’re going to need all the help we can get, and that means other hunters. All of the other hunters. That’s something I can do. And I intend to. You don’t like it - you hate the idea of Dean being by himself that much - then maybe you need to seriously considered which Winchester you keep coming to visit, in dreams. Maybe you should even think hard about convincing Dean that your quest for God isn’t just a big waste of time. Understand?”

Castiel hesitates, frowning, before venturing, “If I have hurt him badly - and I believe it likely that I have - will he not wish for me to keep my distance, at least for a time?”

Sam narrows his eyes scornfully, the hand still on Castiel’s shoulder tightening in warning, shaking him a little. “Dude. Have you ever known Dean to let anything go, especially an attack or threat or a slight? You let this go too long, he’ll convince himself you hate him and that he deserves it. Then he’ll get angry at himself and at you and try to act like the two of you can’t be around each other at all - that it’s not safe for you to be around each other - because you’ll only end up hurting each other. He does that, you’re screwed. I don’t know what you said to him, after that whole Samhain thing, to make him willing to try to trust you again, but you’ve already left this long enough to need to seriously consider saying all that and more, now, if you want him to give working with you another chance. I thought you were basically breaking ties, at the hospital. I know Dean thought you were giving up on us - giving us one last warning, one last chance to make the right choice and fall in, and then lashing out and leaving, when we wouldn’t cooperate. You wanna change that, you’ve got to go and talk to him and make this better, somehow. Otherwise . . . ”

Sam pauses a moment, struggling with words that won’t quite come right, that sound and sense of them vaguely wrong, inside his head, and waits a little, while he’s trying to sort through the possibilities, to see if Castiel will speak and remove the necessity for him to keep speaking. The angel, though, just stands there, staring at him helplessly, blue eyes wide, pleading. So, with a helpless sigh and a shrug, he scrubs a hand wearily across his face and starts over, trying to force the words to make sense, to explain properly, truly, to convince.

“You’ll just have to get used to the idea of Dean being alone and pursing an insane plan that’s not got a hope in hell of working, otherwise. Because I can’t be with him right now. I’m of no use to him there and more than a little dangerous. This is better, for now. We can both work on finding a way to solve this, this way. You, though . . . you’ve got to make this right, if you want him to keep choosing you. You do still want that, don’t you?” Sam’s almost afraid to ask that last bit - afraid that he’ll have misunderstood the angel’s penitence and remorse over hurting Dean and that Castiel really has had it with them both and wants nothing more than to go on his quest for God by himself and just not mess with or have to worry about the brothers Winchester any longer - but he steels himself and forces the words out, waiting breathlessly for a reply, pulse pounding away rabbit quick with mingle anticipation and fear.

Castiel shivers again, a little, as though chilled by the very thought of rejecting Dean. “I do. Very much. I am not sure it is right, or safe, but Sam, I - ” Those ridiculously chapped, ludicrously fragile, insanely human lips shape the word want, but the voice falls silent. Sam can’t breathe until Castiel takes another raggedly shaking breath, voice returning to him. “I am here. My Father remade me, after I chose to disobey the orders of my superiors and to help Dean in his attempt to get to you. I was remade in this body, specifically - not any other - and returned to Earth, very near to where you both were. I cannot but suspect that I was meant to choose as I did, that I have been rewarded for passing a test of faith and choosing aright in Dean and that I will be rewarded with success in my quest for God, should I continue to keep faith. I have no desire but to prove myself worthy. I - I only want to help, to have him look upon me as a friend and ally . . . as a helpmeet, even.”

Castiel’s eyes are blazing, achingly blue, blinding with belief, with hope, desperately unswerving desire and trust all tangled up together and knotted with skeins of love like purest light. And Sam suddenly can’t breath again, though for an entirely different reason, this time, because honestly? He’d thought, before, that he’d accepted and adjust to the fact that a freakin’ angel of the Lord was in love with his brother (with Dean!) and that Dean was maybe possibly sorta kinda slowly learning how to fall back in love with the angel, but Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and all the freakin’ saints and angels combined! This isn’t just love.

This is - this is reverence, is adoration, is what it is, and Sam’s starting to feel more than a little bit freaked right on the hell out, because, okay, love? That’s one thing. Even loyalty and trust and faith are fairly normal emotions, all things considered. But reverence and adoration? Reverence and adoration! That’s - that’s - that’s verging dangerously close to somewhere he can’t help but think of as God’s territory, and, even though Sam’s always been much more of a believer than Dean or their dad (or hell even Bobby or any of the other hunters and helpers, like Pastor Jim and others who aided and sheltered them, sometimes, on their journeys, who kinda sorta made up the rest of his dysfunctional little family, growing up) could ever be entirely comfortable with, he can’t quite wrap his head around the idea of an angel not getting in trouble of some kind - probably serious, possibly terrifically awful - for ever daring to so blatantly revere and adore someone besides God. Especially given a God as jealous and wrathful as this one is supposed to be.

A noise gets caught in his throat, coats his tongue to heavy clumsiness with its dead weight and chokes him with the taste of bitter fear, strangling the air from his lungs. The sound he produces is nothing even like a word, just sheer protest and inchoate terror. Castiel doesn’t even seem to notice, the noise is so thin and small.

Castiel is gazing upon him with hope and faith writ large in every pleading, affirming atom of his body (leaning towards him, like a sunflower yearning after sun), as though Sam knows the answers to every question he’s ever had or will have. “Sam, if you think I should - ”

“No.”

The angel blinks, mouth hanging open, clearly stunned by the interruption. “Sam?”

“Castiel - Cas - I can’t just - you can’t just - I have to know that you understand what this means. If it’s not - if you’re not - just don’t, alright? If you don’t understand, if you’re not absolutely positive, then don’t. Just. Don’t. If this can get you in trouble with God - Jesus, fuck, just - just don’t. Dean couldn’t stand it. It would break him. When he thought - at Chuck’s - when he realized - Cas, you weren’t there, you don’t know, you can’t know. Just - you have to be sure, you have to be certain, you have to - you have to - if this hurts you . . . ” Sam’s voice fails him as his heart clenches with dread and pain at the thought of a God so viciously jealous He might order Castiel’s death for no other crime than love of Dean, and he shakes his head, half in frustration and half out of unreasoning fear. After several moments of struggle, he manages to shove one word, “Grigori!” through his stiffly uncooperative lips. Castiel’s blink of shock gives him the strength to keep pushing, to declare, “I know the apocryphal stories, dammit! Angels and humans, lying down together . . . God wasn’t happy. God was extremely unhappy. There was a Flood, to deal with the Nephilim. If you’re so sure God’s still here, somewhere, if you - if you think this might not sit well - ”

Voice surprisingly calm - though his head is cocked ever so slightly to the side, the angle betraying bemusement, and there is, perhaps, just the slightest tilt to his lips, as if in amusement - Castiel interrupts Sam’s fumbling warnings, informing him, “That is not why the Great Flood occurred. Descendants of the Nephilim still walk the Earth. All angelic vessels are such. You and your brother are descended from two different lines of Nephilim, though in your father’s case all knowledge of such a background was lost long ago.”

“Wait - wait! What about the stories? I thought - ”

Castiel blinks, clearly surprised, before calmly interrupting to inform him, “Sam, most such stories are very old. And for thousands of years our orders have largely been to watch and to protect the Seals, not to interfere with or influence the unfolding of human lives - even in matters pertaining to faith. Inaccuracies have crept into such tales and been compounded by time. Surely you didn’t imagine that every word recounted in holy text was sacrosanct?”

Sam finds himself sputtering in surprise at the angel’s raised eyebrow. “But - but - ”

Patiently (eyes dark with old pain), Castiel interrupts again, promising him, “Sam, I can tell you of the Nephilim and the Great Flood later, if you wish, when we have more time. You should know, though, that the story is long and not particularly heartening. Many innocent lives were lost, due to an attempt by the demons to open enough gates to Hell upon the Earth to allow them to claim the world as a part of their domain.”

“But if God wasn’t pissed at the angels for screwing around with humans, then what - ?”

“Demons made a bid at the Apocalypse. They failed. But there were . . . consequences.”

“Oh.” Sam blinks, not entirely reassured by Castiel’s skirting of the subject and feeling more than a little unnerved by the flatness of Castiel’s voice. “So the Nephilim - ”

“The term nephilim is from an honorific used in ancient times to designate the families of men capable of acting as vessels for angels. As you know, in the physical realm, angels and humans cannot touch, except through the medium of vessels. For an angel and a human to lie down together . . . ” Castiel hesitates a moment before finally simply declaring, “The vessel must consent, Sam. And if there is a child, one way or the other, it will be the vessel’s child. Such a child will more than likely be . . . special, somewhat more powerful than normal, more in tune with the spiritual realms, capable of harboring an angel safely within his or her flesh, but that is not the same as being half angelic in nature. I am not aware that such a thing is even possible. With Dean and I, it would not be an issue,”Castiel concludes, tilting his head in a way that somehow suggests a shrug, his matter of fact tone making Sam blink again, startled.

“So God shouldn’t be pissed at you for - ?”

“Sam. I was returned to Earth, in this body, even after disobeying my superiors. God must know the shape of my thoughts, the wellspring of my strength and the source and object of my love. I cannot believe He would have done this, if He did not approve. Love is the greatest celebration of His works, His creations. I wish to teach this to Dean, to share that wondrous gift with him. If he would but believe . . . Sam, I do not believe any force on Earth or from Hell or Heaven could stop him, if he could but learn how to believe.”

The panic and dread gripping him tight dissolve so abruptly that he gasps, body slumping with relief, as though actual weights have been removed from his back and shoulders. He finds himself grinning widely (wildly, almost hysterically happy), almost babbling with relief. “Oh. Okay. Okay, then. Alright. If you’re sure.”

“I believe. I have faith in my Father’s plan. I trust in Dean.”

He’s beaming at the angel look a loon, and he really doesn’t give a shit. He’s that happy with Castiel’s reply, that unabashedly reassured (relieved) by his certainty. “Okay. Alright then. This is what you have to do: go to Dean. Stop wasting time here, with me. Go to him now. Make things right. Don’t let him turn away from you. Don’t let him provoke you into a fight. Just go to him and stay with him and be there for him until he understands that he can trust you again. Try to get him to help you, on your quest. If you’re right about how Dean and I got on that plane and why you’re here again - and I really, really want to believe that you are - that could be our best hope. Our only hope. Try to convince him. Or at least to get him to accept the possibility. He’s going to be angry at me for leaving again and angrier at himself for letting me, even though at least part of him has to know why this was for the best. Don’t be surprised if he tries to take out his anger on you. But don’t let him bully you or push you into fighting back. Just - be there for him. And don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. I have a job to do and I’m going to do it and get better and I’ll do everything in my power to help. Okay? You can always check up on me again, later. And hey, you know how to use the phone now, right? I’m never more than a call away. So call me. Let me know what’s going on. Let me know you’re there, watching my brother’s back. Okay?” He’s repeating himself a little, talking in circles, words coming a little too fast, still so giddy with relief that he can’t keep from smiling, even as he gives Castiel’s shoulder a gentle shake, to emphasize his words and urge him pay attention, to agree, to keep on believing.

The look on Castiel’s face is so fiercely determined and joyous that he wonders for a moment, crazily, if this was what it used to be like, when angels walked the Earth before and would occasionally bring cause for rejoicing and even comfort to humans in need. “Yes. I will. I understand. I will go, now. Sleep, Sam Winchester. Sleep deeply, without dreams.”

The touch of the two fingertips to his forehead is a gentle benediction, and Sam slides down into the darkness unprotesting, still smiling.

Sam’s still grinning, hugely wide, the muscles in his face aching a little from smiling so hard and so long, in his sleep, when he finally wakes up the next day, alone, in his motel room, the light from the windows touching him softly, warm and encompassing as hope, as grace.