(no subject)
Title: i can see your halo (1/2)
Author: pesha
Fandom: Supernatural
Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Rating: R-ish
Warnings: sexual connotation/discussion, general Winchester angst
Spoilers: All of Season Six; This contains a few bits and snatches of dialogue lifted straight from the show, so if you haven't seen season six, I wouldn't read it.
Word Count: 16,634
Challenge: Written for angel_kink for deancastiel's Everlasting Birthday Challenge.
Prompt: There is not enough HALO FIC out there. I've only ever read two and it's seriously under represented! You can do whatever you want with the plot, but try to have a canon setting please.
Notes: This is technically AU from 6x12 "Like a Virgin," but it does use as much canon as I could throw in there and still have halo!Cas. I do sincerely hope that you enjoy it!
Thanks: Thanks to la_rubinita and the folks at ficfinishing for listening to me as I muddled through my first story in an era. I'd also like to take a moment to appreciate Harley and Lala for putting up with me as I edited a lot. Thanks, folks. I appreciate you.
~*~
Most people would have considered going on a dragon hunt to be an insane venture. They would likely have either dismissed the idea or checked themselves in at the nearest crazy house to get professional help. Dean Winchester found out that was the big nasty behind the latest catastrophe he was trying to avert, then drove twenty hours round trip to pull a magic sword out of a stone to come kill the sons of bitches snatching up all the virgins in town.
Not because Dean had a thing for virgins -he preferred ladies with experience- but because it was the right thing to do, damnit. Plus? How cool would it be to get to off a dragon? Geeklore aside, dragons were pretty high up on the big and nasty list and, if Dr. Visyak was to be believed, this was the first time in over 700 years one had been in town for the killing. Dean was prepared to do his hunter duty and rack up the serious badass points that would incur in the process.
He stretched until his spine popped off like a string of M-80s, then hefted the Sword of Bruncvik to go show Sam.
Sam looked as if he wanted to say something then his eyes gravitated to the sword. Dean allowed himself a grin at that one. He might have to keep the thing if it meant it would save him from potential heart-to-hearts with his emo kid brother. The look on Dr. Visyak's face as he'd strolled out with the thing might be enough to deter him from that though; he wasn't the kind of guy who could live with himself if he stole someone's prized possession without any intention of returning it. It was just aggravated borrowing as long as he meant to bring it back sometime.
"Seriously? A sword? Did you have to pull it out of a stone?"
Dean did grin at that, "Yeah actually. You should have seen the look on Dr. Visyak's face when I did, too."
The memory was enough to have him spacing out for a spell. She had been the complete opposite of what he'd expected for a doctor of Medieval Studies. Dean had been expecting someone a little more like the Crypt Keeper than the blonde cougar who'd opened the door to him. Of course, she definitely hadn't been expecting him to be able to pull the literal sword out of the literal stone in her basement either.
"She looked like she was going to have kittens or maybe try to convince me to be one for her. Let me tell you, she was a cougar. Rawr. I can't believe Bobby ever hit that. Visyak looks way out of his league."
They both paused to reflect on that. Equally distasteful looks crossed their faces at the thought of Bobby having a league. There was no way Dean was broaching that subject again. There were lines that weren't meant to be crossed. Seriously.
"Can we agree to never say anything like that ever again?"
Sam nodded, lip still curled, "Okay, Dean. Admit it. You used the explosives from the trunk on it."
Dean gave him a look filled with hurt. True, he had considered that as a back-up plan, but that was beside the point. He could have at least pretended to believe Dean could pull a magical sword out of a stone. Dean had done way better things than that before. Sam had been there for most of them! They'd stopped the apocalypse! That was way more kickass than pulling an old sword out of a big rock.
"I'll have you know I didn't have to use a single stick of dynamite on it. That sword took one look at me and couldn't wait to get out of that stone. Rocks," Dean scoffed, "They're not so smart."
"They're not the only ones. Seriously though, you just---pulled it out? Just like that?"
He brandished the sword with an awkward thrust-parry combo that nearly took out the room's dividing partition. It wasn't very well balanced or something. That would explain why he couldn't seem to get it to work the way it was supposed to. Dean was great with blades. He'd been trained to use one since he was five.
Sam held up both hands in surrender and Dean decided to stop trying out the sword because he felt like it. Not at all because he was afraid he might lob off one of his brother's hands with his magic sword.
"Yeah. Just like that."
"You don't think that might mean something? Dean, did Dr. Visyak say anything after you pulled the sword out? Did she mention anything about its history, who it belonged to, what it was forged to do, anything?"
Dean waved him off, "She said some stuff about grand destiny this and bound to a stone that and yeah, I wasn't paying a lot of attention. My mind was a little preoccupied with the whole I'm about to slay a dragon thing. The sword is the Sword of Bruncvik and it was forged from dragon's blood to, oh, I know this one! Kill dragons. The end."
"Dean! I don't think it's that simple. It's never that---"
"Sam! Focus! Virgins. Dragons. Any ideas on where we might find those?"
Turned out that Sammy had indeed come up with some ideas on where to find the dragons; naturally, they weren't checked into the local Hilton. It was always the damned sewer. Dean focused on the smells and general suck that came from trampling through the sewer rather than on the fact that his brother had been acting more tense than usual since he'd come back from SFU. He was more than a little concerned about Sam's major attitude adjustment since Sammy had been all huggy-happy before Dean had left out to consult with the good doctor. The issue wasn't real enough for him to press for answers yet -that was too close to sharing for Dean's stomach to handle- but Dean had a feeling he'd be getting to know what was on Sam's mind sooner than he'd like anyway.
Luckily, they struck gold in the sewers and found some virgins too.
Sam insisted they start saving the victims first which caused Dean a lot of discomfort. He was still lugging around the heavy-ass Sword of Bruncvik and all the victims were virgins. Honestly, Dean couldn't even look at them without wincing. They seriously needed to get them to a nunnery or something because Dean didn't know what he was supposed to do with a bunch of enthusiastic girls who just wanted to hug him.
It was Sam's idea to call Castiel to come deal with them.
That was brilliance in action in Dean's book. Birds of a feather flocked together or whatever. Cas could take them under his big fluffy purity wings while Sam and Dean tried to find the dragons already. He was extracting the girls with his angel mojo when they did find the dragons.
Turned out the dragons really didn't care too much for the sword which was insanely effective at killing them. That was great for Dean seeing as how it wasn't easy to swing in the confines of the sewer and whatever magic it might have didn't serve to correct its balance issue. The thing basically killed them on its own. All Dean had to do was poke it in the general direction of the dragons and then they were dead.
That was true right up to the point at which they found some book that the dragons definitely didn't want them finding.
Sam went for the book. Dean waved his sword around at the thing that was a Hell of a lot bigger than a giant bat. Cas showed up to help right as Dean lost the sword, Sam took a wing to the face, and a dark-haired girl they'd missed started screaming.
Things happened pretty fast at that point. It was basically a blur to Dean since he was trying to get the sword and only caught a glimpse of Cas trying to get his smite on before he got thrown through a wall. Apparently the sword was a great idea since holy fire didn't quite match up to dragon fire. Sam got the book, Dean got to slay the dragon -a lucky slice through the belly when the thing moved to stomp him, literally- and Cas shook the sewer dust off himself to fly off with the last virgin.
All in all, it was a pretty good job from Dean's perspective.
When they finished packing up the car, there was a moment where they were sitting together and the threat of conversation was looming between them so thick in the air that Dean was choking on it. He knew he couldn't put it off inevitably, but a guy deserved a break after he'd killed a dragon. It was 5:37 AM, they didn't look or smell any worse than anyone else awake at 5:37 AM, and Dean was hungry.
That meant one thing to him.
"Breakfast?"
Sam nodded slowly, "Yeah. I could go for that. Can you call Cas back? I think I'd like him to---to try to catch up with us."
For all that Dean had a hard time keeping secrets from Sam, Sam had no such compunction at keeping secrets from Dean. It only went to show how rattled his brother was from his soul's return trip from Hell that Dean immediately knew something was up. The request itself wasn't strange, but the way he'd hesitated? Did not bode well. He'd thought the breakfast option might be in order; it wasn't clear whether it was a good thing or a bad thing to realize he'd been right about needing it.
Dean forced a smile, "Sure thing. I'll give him a call. I'll even be civilized about it and use the cell phone."
It was supposed to earn him a laugh, but all Dean got for his effort was a pained grimace in return. He had a feeling that the indigestion he was currently starting to feel was only about to get worse. Dean wondered if praying for the nearest diner to have real maple syrup was considered an inappropriate use of celestial time, but then decided he didn't care. He'd averted the damned apocalypse: Heaven owed him some friggin' syrup.
~*~
Their arrival at the diner was unremarkable. It was no shock to either of them to see Castiel calmly waiting on them at a booth midway into the restaurant with a clear view of the street outside. It figured he'd have beaten them there even if he'd been the one to take the hardest hit. Dean had a feeling Cas would call it one of the perks of being an Angel of the Lord if he were the type to say things like that.
Come to that, Cas had taken to saying all kinds of things to him lately, including how he should have killed his brother outright rather than give him his soul back.
Dean wondered if that was what this little breakfast-for-three was going to wind up being about. He had a feeling that it was but all thoughts flew right out his head when he settled into the bench opposite the angel. His choice of seat left his brother no choice but to sit beside Castiel since Dean certainly hadn't made any effort to leave room on his side of the booth. Dean wasn't doing it to be a dick. It was just that his attention was focused elsewhere. His eyes were held fast, captivated by the angel on the opposite bench.
Sheila, their waitress who had a serious gum-popping problem, asked their order in a familiar impatient tone that came with all professional waitresses who worked shifts that started this early in the morning. Dean wanted pancakes, a double order of bacon and two eggs over easy with a cup of coffee; he ordered it all without ever taking his eyes off Castiel. Sammy got his usual omelet -three eggs, ham, green peppers, hold the cheese- and a glass of orange juice. There was a pause that lasted long enough to have her pop her gum pointedly before Sam got with the program enough to realize she expected Castiel to order something. He hurriedly ordered plain toast and oatmeal for Castiel to get her out of their hair, but Dean was too busy staring to care enough to thank Sam for bailing them out.
"Dean," Sam hissed, "What’s wrong with you? The way you’re looking at Cas isn’t great, man. It’s just a couple of scrapes and bruises and it won’t be a big thing unless you can’t find a way to wipe that look off your face."
He didn’t know how to wipe the look off his face though because it wasn’t horror or guilt or whatever estrogen-laced feeling Sam thought he was expressing. Dean was honestly grateful for the bruises and scrapes the angel’s vessel was sporting. He knew they should both be feeling terrified that Castiel was able to be hurt again, could bruise, could bleed, whatever, but he had claw marks down both arms deep enough that he literally couldn’t risk taking off his jacket in public and Sammy’s face was a mess of bruises. The two of them together would have been hard enough to pass off even at the ass-crack of dawn, but if Cas was sitting there in his holy tax accountant glory without a scratch on him? There’d have been no way.
This way was better. Their blood, their bruises and cuts and scrapes? They all blended together to mark them as part of a whole. It made them the same, brothers of a sort in the eyes of others. That kind of dismissal was exactly how they’d been able to fly under the radar their whole lives.
"Dean?" Castiel intoned, his name coming out as a multilayered question that spoke volumes to Dean.
Staring at the space above Castiel’s head fixedly, Dean literally couldn’t control his expression. He wasn’t entirely sure he could control his anything because Castiel had a halo. A blaringly obvious, gold as the sun ring of holy fire around his head. Floating above his head. Hovering in mid-air, spinning on its own axis, stirring up his crazy hair to make it look that crazy and holy Hell---
Sam kicked Dean under the table.
"Dean!"
"What?!" Dean countered, gesturing at Castiel as if it were obviously all his fault and it should have obviously been the angel’s fault because his friggin’ halo was showing in public!
His brother looked at Castiel and Dean made a face that said ”See what I’m saying, bitch?” only the look Sam cast back at him wasn’t anything like ”Stop staring at the angel’s halo, jerk!” Dean looked back at Castiel again just to make sure it was still there and it was, it was totally still there, but Sam couldn’t see it. Sam wasn’t looking at it and that had to mean he couldn’t see it.
Dean could see it and he couldn’t take his eyes off it.
“You really don’t see it?” Dean asked.
Sam snorted, “Be a little less specific, Dean. Really.”
He gave Sam a taste of his bitch-face medicine in return.
Castiel didn’t seem too concerned one way or the other. It was obvious he had no idea that Dean could see his…his angel part. That was almost enough to have Dean slapping the table with laughter, but he thought of something even funnier when his eyes met Castiel’s and they were as placid as ever. The angel had a tendency to stare at him sometimes as if he wanted Dean to feel the weight of his thousands of years of vast angelic knowledge and be cowed in awe beneath it. Dean knew it likely wasn’t really Cas’s intention with the staring, but it came across that way to him when he was feeling beaten, dirty, and all-too-human in the face of Castiel’s Angel-of-the-Lord-ness.
He knew it was a bad idea before he even did it.
The table was totally silent as Dean reached out a hand and poked the space above Castiel’s head with one finger, then they all jumped as the lights flickered dangerously along with every other electrical thing in the place. Dean rubbed his fingers together in wonder as he felt the tingle of having touched an angel’s halo race through his veins. He glanced at Sam to give him his best shit-eating grin.
“Cas’s halo is showing. Heh.”
Sam’s head jerked towards Castiel in shock, “What? You have a halo? Dean can see it? Why can’t I see it? Can anyone else see it?”
He didn’t bother waiting for Castiel to answer before turning to study the diner patrons for signs that they too were being privy to seeing the angelic peep show. Dean knew that was because Sam was worried it was just him that couldn’t see it, but he wasn’t sure about that now. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that Sheila the waitress would have wanted to know a lot more than whether or not Castiel wanted jelly for his toast if she could see his angel parts shining.
“No one else can see it,” Castiel answered, his voice sounded rougher than ever, rasping and raw as if the dragons that had worked him over had forced him to swallow glass.
Dean couldn’t meet Castiel’s eyes. He was too worried about what he might see. The halo had a faint smudge on it from his finger-prod anyway and Dean’s brow furrowed as he broke his gaze away from the golden ring to consider his hands. He winced at the mess they were in and wondered how much of a bitch it would make him if he excused himself to go wash up before eating. It was such a Sam move that he immediately pushed it aside in favor of scrubbing his hands off on the napkin that had wrapped his silverware. Better than nothing, Dean figured as he rubbed his fingers together again and nothing seemed to be coming off anymore.
He glanced up to the halo -again dodging Castiel’s eyes- and found he couldn’t help but want to rub off the taint of his touch.
Reaching out again with the intention of rubbing the dirt away, Dean tried to laugh it off, “Cas, I think I got your halo dirty. Here, I’ll get it.”
“Dean---“
Sam and Castiel both said his name at the same time that his hand made contact with the spinning ring and this time the shock was enough to have his fingers close over it, gripping it tight to hold it in place to make it easier to clean away the smeared fingerprint he’d left behind the first time. Dean clenched his eyes shut instinctively as his hand clenched on the ring and the world exploded around him with an inhuman shriek that shattered all the glass in the diner while a literally blinding surge of light -Castiel’s Grace maybe?- flashed through to set off all the appliances in the place at once. If he’d been able to hear over the ringing, Dean would have noted that all the car alarms for at least a five block radius had gone off as well. He had let go of Castiel as soon as the shockwave from the touch had passed over his hand into his arm, but Dean didn’t have to be told that he’d be feeling it for a while, if not forever.
He didn’t have words for how it felt to touch it, to hold part of Castiel in his hand the way that the angel had obviously held the most real part of Dean in his own.
Dean stumbled stupidly to his feet at Sam’s jerking, but he got with it enough to help Castiel up when he noticed that literally everyone else in the diner was unconscious. He said something that might have been ”What the Hell?” but was more likely a string of sounds without meaning since his ears were bleeding too much for him to gauge even his own voice. Without protest, Dean handed over the Impala’s keys to Sam because Castiel was almost totally dead weight between them. He slid the angel into the back seat, but Castiel couldn’t seem to hold himself upright and his grip was so tight on Dean’s arm that Dean was sure he’d have a bruise that matched the scar on his shoulder.
“DRIVE!”
He yelled because he needed it to happen and Sam’s neck had a trickle of blood on it that had to be coming from his ears. Dean wasn’t going to think about it. He slid into the back seat and let Castiel lean on him as his brother pulled them out onto the road with a flurry of gravel and rubber that did Dean proud.
Sam didn’t need to be told to keep driving; Dean didn’t have the ability to form a protest when Castiel slumped over onto him, completely unconscious and looking much the worse for wear. His arm fell asleep fast beneath the weight of the angel’s vessel, but Dean only shifted to wrap it around Castiel’s shoulders. The dirt on Cas was a lot more obvious from his new, closer angle, and Dean didn't want to think too much about how bad it had to be since Cas had sweat trickling down his face that took really a lot too long to dry.
They put four hours of hard road between them and the diner before Sam found a motel suitable for them. By that point, Dean felt every bruise, every scrape, every hit he’d taken from the dragons, but he couldn’t feel any of it more than he could feel the tickling nuzzle of the angel’s halo. It had been haphazardly whirling above Castiel’s slumped head the whole ride. The thing had spun into his neck, his shoulder, and then when Cas had slipped further down into the seat, across Dean’s chest where it’d been turning for the last hour before they stopped and Dean was sure he’d have a mark from it. He could feel the vibration of it ricocheting through his aching body and he had no idea how Castiel was sleeping through this.
“Cas,” Dean tried, elbowing him lightly, “We’re stopped for the night. Come on. Let’s get inside before---“
Dean wanted to say ’before someone at this no-tell catches sight of two dudes sitting in the backseat of a muscle car snuggling’, but that wasn’t playing fair. He had been the one to grab onto shiny angel parts without asking what kind of consequences that might bring first; the dark print of his hand had been steadily rotating in and out of his line of sight with every revolution of the halo. That alone was enough to have Dean willing to curb his tongue for the angel.
The angel in question didn’t seem inclined to stir up more than a token complaint at Dean’s elbowing though. His head slid sideways across Dean’s chest while his marred halo stutter-burned a line to mark the trail it had taken. Dean hissed at the feeling of the ring catching the naked skin of his neck along the way down.
“Castiel!”
Baleful blue eyes slitted open to meet his own and Dean stopped breathing for a moment.
“Dean?” he groused.
Dean shot Sam a pleading look which made his brother give up a very put upon sigh before helping him to haul Castiel out of the car. The angel made no move to help them beyond twisting to ensure that Dean bore the brunt of his weight, halo haphazardly whirling into Dean’s personal space as they stumbled into their lodgings for the night. It was getting to be...weird.
He tried to get Castiel to sit on one of the beds, but the angel had a grip on his jacket tight enough that Dean had a flashback to the first time he’d really spoken to him -”I’m the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition.”- since Dean could believe that was a grip that would carry a soul straight out of Hell. There was no graceful way around it so he settled onto the bed himself in order to get Castiel to collapse at his side, still leaning on him as if without Dean’s support he’d never be able to make it again. Dean was uncomfortable enough with the constant flashing of his grubby hand on Castiel’s shining halo without dealing with the look Sam was giving them as they sat together on the bed.
He snapped, “Cas! Can you at least make the damned halo stop turning? I think it’s giving me contact burn or something.”
“No.”
The blunt response was shockingly familiar. Dean rolled his eyes and elbowed Castiel again to try to encourage him to sit up on his own.
“What do you mean ‘no’? You’re not even willing to say ‘maybe’?”
Castiel exhaled his own long-suffering sound of annoyance, “Could you stop your heart from beating for a few minutes? The sound has a tendency to grate when I am feeling particularly drained.”
“Was that sarcasm?”
Sam, being Sam, decided to override Dean’s attempt at levity by interjecting, “You mean Dean reached out and just like grabbed your heart? Cas! What didn’t you stop him?”
Both of their heads swiveled to look at Sam. He was standing tall and agitated in front of the room’s other bed; his wide gestures made him look enormous in the modest-sized space and Dean had never felt smaller with his larger-than-life brother. Not with Sam looking at him as if he had let down all his hopes and dreams while an angel of the Lord literally leaned on him for support to keep from falling over from the consequences of Dean’s own actions. The humor went out of the situation as quickly as it had come in.
Dean couldn’t look at Castiel as he spoke, “Cas, tell my brother that me trying to rub a smudge off your shiny angel part wasn’t the same thing as if I’d crushed your vital organ in my meatfist.”
“Sam, Dean did not crush my vital organs. That’s absurd. Angels do not have vital organs in the sense that humans do.”
There wasn’t much more that they could say to that. It was an odd situation made odder by the fact that they weren’t used to having Castiel underfoot anymore with the war in Heaven waging away. The day had grown late enough that both the Winchesters were feeling the effects of sleep deprivation and the incident at the diner had left their angel a little the worse for wear, too. Dean had only seen Castiel sleep on a few occasions and they only had two beds, but they weren’t getting any benefit out of staring at each other in silence.
That shtick only worked for Castiel when he was at his most angelic, as Dean had well learned.
He shrugged out of his jacket almost violently and then stood to drape it over one of the room’s two chairs. Dean unlaced his boots as if the fact that they were still neatly knotted personally offended him. He could hear Sam hesitantly shrugging out of his own layers and he didn’t need to look to see that Castiel had slumped over on the bed, a puppet with its strings cut, since he’d felt the angel fall as he himself had stood.
Dean wandered back over to the bed Castiel was sitting on and jerked the coverlet back with a snap that was echoed in his voice as Sam said his name, “What?”
He followed Sam’s sheepish nod to where Castiel was blearily staring at him, “I was going to move him in a minute. I’ll share. It’s not like it’ll kill me and before either of you say anything about angels not needing to sleep, I’m fine with him just laying there and thinking Heavenly thoughts until he gets his mojo back, but I need to sleep. I’m too tired to even shower.”
“Yeah, me too, but, uhh,” Sam rubbed the back of his neck, “Maybe Cas should catch a shower first?”
“Cas? Seriously? He got the least dragon on him.”
Sam’s face couldn’t get redder if Dean painted it with fresh blood. It was disconcerting; Dean got the distinct impression he was missing something and that when he finally clued in to that something he wasn’t going to like it.
“He may have not minded when you grabbed onto his special angel part, Dean. Your words not mine!”
He was holding up his hands as if to ward off any outburst from Dean, but it felt as if he’d used both fists to slug Dean in the head. Dean darted a glance at Castiel who seemed curiously detached from the conversation. That was likely because he was piss-poor at interpreting innuendo at his best which this most definitely was not.
Walking slowly around to regard Castiel, Dean grabbed onto an arm and hauled at him until he was upright enough to pull the trench coat off. It was pretty blazingly apparent what Sam had been talking about once the coat was out of the way. He shuddered to avoid thinking of the implications, but he wasn’t going to back down. Dean had made this mess -well, he thought to himself, Cas had made this mess technically, but he’d been the cause of it- and that meant he had some obligation to help clean it up.
“I think Sam’s right. You could use a shower. Trust me when I say this: you will not want to try to peel yourself out of those pants later if you wait any longer to clean up. I know you’re a little out of it right now, but you want to clean yourself up.”
Castiel blinked at him, furrowed lines of confusion etched into his forehead before his jaw set firmly and Dean only had the warning of seeing his halo start to spin so fast that the dark print of Dean’s hand was only a black streak before the rumpled suit was pristine again. Along with both Winchesters. Actually, Dean was pretty sure if he checked on the duffels Sam had carried in to toss on the table, it was likely he’d find everything was clean now. He watched the tick of muscle in Castiel’s jaw slowly relax before he ventured a comment.
“Well---I guess that answers the question of whether or not angels like to get their feathers wet. Right, Sammy?”
Sam was rubbing an incredulous hand down his clean chest, “Dude? Not cool. Not cool at all.”
Dean rolled his eyes, then helped Castiel to slide into “his side” of the bed.
“Whatever. Bitch.”
The last thing that was said before they casually both slipped into bed to try to sleep off the last night was Sam’s responding, “Jerk.”
It was as close to normal as they ever got.
~*~
“---brakes!”
Dean snapped awake as the word left his mouth. He had been dreaming that he was being dragged by his car while Sam was trying to drive them away from…something. It had all been pretty vague except for the feeling of his face trying to burn itself off in strips on the road. That part actually made sense as soon as he realized that the burning sensation was Castiel’s dirty halo trying to rub itself clean on Dean’s cheek.
Figured Castiel would turn out to be a cuddler in his sleep. Friggin’ angels.
He was going to poke at him to try to get him to move, but Sam beat him to the punch.
“Really, Dean? Really?”
“What? I didn’t do anything! He got that way on his own while I was over here, minding my own business. Sleeping,” Dean clarified as he rolled out of the bed.
He walked over to the duffels to figure out which one was his, then pulled out the first thing that he came to since he’d been right before -Castiel had managed to freshen up everything in the room with his holy cleaning hoodoo. Dean didn’t look back at the bed where Castiel was stirring or over at Sam where his brother was doubtlessly wearing his most annoying combination of bed-head-and-bitchface. So what if he didn’t need to take a shower? He liked showers in the morning.
They were relaxing, Dean thought to himself, shutting the bathroom door with more force than necessary.
His reflection didn’t show any sign of the abuse his face had taken from having an angel’s halo trying to spin through it all night (Morning? Dean didn’t care what the clock said. He’d just woken up, that meant it was “morning” and the sleep thing? That indicated “night” which was fine.) and Dean didn’t know what to make of that. It was likely that he shouldn’t even be able to feel the ring even though he could see it. From the look on Cas’s face, Dean had a feeling that he shouldn’t be able to see it either, but seeing was easier than the other. There were plenty of things that went bump in the night who could be seen but not felt. Being able to feel something? That brought a whole new level of insanity into the mix because anything that had that much physicality was too real to be faked, too true to be a lie, and too much to be pushed aside as one too many microwaved burritos.
During his shower, Dean forced himself to think it through, but he couldn’t remember anything that had changed since the night before. He and Sam had both been doused liberally with the dragons’ blood and they had both been exposed to the same spells, the same incantations, the same everything that Dean could remember. He hadn’t handled anything funny and he’d not died or anything. Cas hadn’t even had to give him a hand with the damned dragons!
Well, okay, Dean was willing to admit that maybe he’d needed a little angelic assistance, but it hadn’t been any different from any other time they’d worked a case together.
There was simply no reason that Dean could tell for him to suddenly have backstage passes to Angels: Live and in Person.
If it had been a week ago, Sam wouldn’t have had a soul and maybe, just maybe that would have been a reason that Dean would have accepted for his sudden ability to see what Sammy couldn’t. It wasn’t a week ago though; Sam was as intact as ever.
The whole thing didn’t make sense.
Dean had his hand on the doorknob when the low murmur of Cas’s voice caught his attention. He froze as he tried to hear what his brother and his angel were talking about while he was trying to get himself together.
He’d missed what Castiel had said, but, by leaning in a little closer to the door, he was able to make out what Sam was saying.
“---shouldn’t have let him if you knew it would affect you this way! Weren’t you thinking about the war? What if Raphael---“
“Raphael would not have interfered. He would have been as shocked by the occurrence as I was myself. I have told you: it is not natural for Dean to have an active awareness of any aspect of my angelic form. Not without some effort on my part.”
”Oh yeah?” Dean thought. That made sense. It wasn’t exactly as if the angels really tried to fly under the radar on Earth. They walked around in vessels that appeared wholly human and that was the extent of their effort that Dean had been able to tell. Figured they wouldn’t know what to make of a human who could suddenly see the man behind the Heavenly curtain.
His attention was caught as Sam spoke again, his brother’s words rattling him more than they should.
“But it’s a lot more than a bruise, Cas. I can’t even see it and I know that much. You don’t knock out a whole diner and all the electricity for fifty city blocks because someone gives you a bruise!”
Bruise? Dean pictured the blackened handprint on the shining gold of the halo and suddenly it appeared darker in his mind, more sinister.
He almost missed Castiel’s quiet reply as he tried to imagine what kind of damnation points he’d score if he had bruised an angel’s tender parts.
“Five blocks, Sam, and it will heal soon enough. The scar will likely be unremarkable within a handful of days and I will be able to return to the war front. I will contact Balthazar to stand in my stead in the meantime.”
Dean couldn’t take any more eavesdropping at that point. He burst out of the bathroom as loudly as he’d stormed into it, pinning first his brother then Castiel in his glare as he took in the sight of the two of them in opposite beds, propped up against their respective headboards while they discussed how Dean may have scarred an angel’s halo.
“Scar? You’re telling me that the nasty black mark my hand left is not going to be cleaned off anytime soon? That’s going to scar?”
Castiel eyed him levelly, “I can’t see it to say for certain, Dean, but I imagine it’s hardly as bad as you seem to think. It will be a fitting mark for me to bear, I think.”
He nodded to Dean’s shoulder where the angel’s hand still marked him. Dean twitched both shoulders back in reaction. It wasn’t the same. It wasn’t the same thing at all.
Looking at Sam, Dean said, “Tell him it’s not the same, Sammy. Tell him how it is not the same that my hand is all over his---his shiny angel part for eternity. Tell him it isn’t okay that I hurt him.”
Sam stared back at Dean with the same lost expression he’d wore when he’d first woken up from a nightmare when he was six or when he came home from a date with a girl who’d tried to stick her hand in his pants when he was thirteen or when he returned to life for the first time after Dean had traded his soul to save him. His brother was looking at him as if he held all the answers while it was Dean who was looking for help now. Dean pinched his nose between his thumb and forefinger and tried to will away the headache that was fast creeping in on him.
“Cas? How bad is this? The whole touching the shiny halo thing being bad, I get. Trust me, I get that I wasn’t supposed to do that. Now that I did though, how bad is it?”
Castiel cocked his head to the side as if he didn’t understand what Dean was asking; Dean wondered if the angel really didn’t. It was obvious this wasn’t something Castiel had been prepared for and he’d as much as said that it hadn’t happened to him before Dean had gone and done it. For all Dean knew, angels never allowed their halos to be touched even by each other. He’d compared stopping its movement to the stopping of Dean’s heart, but he had said it wasn’t an organ. What did that make the damned thing then?
Somehow Dean didn’t think “ornamental” was the correct answer.
He opened his mouth to speak, but Dean held up a hand to hold him off.
“Wait. How about we try again with: what exactly is the halo? You said it wasn’t an organ. Is it like some kind of angel mojo?”
The angel’s face contorted into even deeper lines of confusion, “I do not have the faintest idea how to respond to that, Dean. It is angelic in origin. It is one of the few affectations of our true forms that your legends have gotten right over time. The halo is not an organ. It is---an extension of my Grace. A physical aspect of my true form, of the truest part of that form. You should not be able to see it.”
It sounded almost like an apology when Cas said it that way. Dean wasn’t sure how to take that. It didn’t really bother him that he wasn’t supposed to be able to see an angel’s true form. He got the whole bit that it was too great for the human mind to comprehend. That much made sense to him. Trying to think of it as a literal part of Castiel’s Grace which was, essentially his soul...that was almost enough to make Dean’s mind unravel a bit on its own.
“It’s like your soul?”
The words came out choked, but Dean was damned proud they’d come out at all. He almost hadn’t had it in himself to say it out loud. Even thinking it had felt like more blasphemy than a man like himself deserved, but he needed to know so he pressed.
“Your halo is like a little bit of your soul?”
Sam broke the thick silence that fell with a snapped, “Angels don’t have souls.”
Dean didn’t acknowledge his outburst. He was comfortable to keep eye contact with Castiel until the angel finally bent enough to nod once in assent. His eyes flared a little at the reaction.
“Yes,” Castiel allowed, “You can think of it as being similar to the soul. Touching it is not nearly as powerful as touching a human soul, but it would fill you with a momentary flash of my Grace. Such as it is now.”
“Great. I’m definitely cashing in my chips for a first class, one way ticket on the Hell Train now, I guess.”
“Dean!”
He glared at Sam because it was easier than looking at Castiel -small without the bulky armor of Jimmy’s coat- and his bruised halo. It was easier to turn hot, angry eyes on his brother’s outrage than to have to look at the angel in his bed. Sam was a familiar outlet to funnel off his excess annoyance at himself; Sam would understand it, bitch that he was, later.
“Sam!” He mocked, “Tell me how I shouldn’t say it. I dare you.”
Sam’s gaze hardened as his face pinched in its own show of anger, “You didn’t do it on purpose, Dean, and Cas could have stopped you. He could have stopped you. He didn’t, right, Cas? It didn’t hurt him really. He told me himself. Hell, Dean, it’s not even as if he didn’t, well, like it a little either.”
They all sucked in a collective breath at Sam’s daring. Even Castiel had drawn back at that one. It took a lot to rattle them all, but Sammy sure could do it, Dean thought, feeling almost proud for his spunk. The feeling dissipated almost as soon as it had came in when he compared what Sam had said to the reality of the situation.
“So now you’re telling me that since he got off on it, it’s okay? Sammy, I thought you took all those lib classes in college. They must not have sunk in very well if you’re defending my honor with that argument considering I basically date-raped an angel of the Lord in public and, oh yeah, let’s not forget, scarred his soul!”
A curtain of silence fell hard on the conversation at that point. There literally was no response for that. It was one of the many reasons that Dean didn’t like the sharing and caring thing: Winchesters never had happy experiences to share and care over.
Dean scrubbed a hand over his face as he jerked on a long-sleeved tee to cover the scratches on his arms. He stalked to the table to snatch up his keys without letting his eyes wander back to meet up with either his brother’s or the angel’s, then let them know succinctly that he was out.
“I’m getting us food. I’ll be back. Don’t---don’t bond or anything while I’m out. Or if you do, Cas has to wash the sheets with his special Angel Soft soap before I get back.”
The door to the room shut with a click; Dean only wished he could shut down his thoughts so easily.
Part Two
Author: pesha
Fandom: Supernatural
Pairing: Dean/Castiel
Rating: R-ish
Warnings: sexual connotation/discussion, general Winchester angst
Spoilers: All of Season Six; This contains a few bits and snatches of dialogue lifted straight from the show, so if you haven't seen season six, I wouldn't read it.
Word Count: 16,634
Challenge: Written for angel_kink for deancastiel's Everlasting Birthday Challenge.
Prompt: There is not enough HALO FIC out there. I've only ever read two and it's seriously under represented! You can do whatever you want with the plot, but try to have a canon setting please.
Notes: This is technically AU from 6x12 "Like a Virgin," but it does use as much canon as I could throw in there and still have halo!Cas. I do sincerely hope that you enjoy it!
Thanks: Thanks to la_rubinita and the folks at ficfinishing for listening to me as I muddled through my first story in an era. I'd also like to take a moment to appreciate Harley and Lala for putting up with me as I edited a lot. Thanks, folks. I appreciate you.
~*~
Most people would have considered going on a dragon hunt to be an insane venture. They would likely have either dismissed the idea or checked themselves in at the nearest crazy house to get professional help. Dean Winchester found out that was the big nasty behind the latest catastrophe he was trying to avert, then drove twenty hours round trip to pull a magic sword out of a stone to come kill the sons of bitches snatching up all the virgins in town.
Not because Dean had a thing for virgins -he preferred ladies with experience- but because it was the right thing to do, damnit. Plus? How cool would it be to get to off a dragon? Geeklore aside, dragons were pretty high up on the big and nasty list and, if Dr. Visyak was to be believed, this was the first time in over 700 years one had been in town for the killing. Dean was prepared to do his hunter duty and rack up the serious badass points that would incur in the process.
He stretched until his spine popped off like a string of M-80s, then hefted the Sword of Bruncvik to go show Sam.
Sam looked as if he wanted to say something then his eyes gravitated to the sword. Dean allowed himself a grin at that one. He might have to keep the thing if it meant it would save him from potential heart-to-hearts with his emo kid brother. The look on Dr. Visyak's face as he'd strolled out with the thing might be enough to deter him from that though; he wasn't the kind of guy who could live with himself if he stole someone's prized possession without any intention of returning it. It was just aggravated borrowing as long as he meant to bring it back sometime.
"Seriously? A sword? Did you have to pull it out of a stone?"
Dean did grin at that, "Yeah actually. You should have seen the look on Dr. Visyak's face when I did, too."
The memory was enough to have him spacing out for a spell. She had been the complete opposite of what he'd expected for a doctor of Medieval Studies. Dean had been expecting someone a little more like the Crypt Keeper than the blonde cougar who'd opened the door to him. Of course, she definitely hadn't been expecting him to be able to pull the literal sword out of the literal stone in her basement either.
"She looked like she was going to have kittens or maybe try to convince me to be one for her. Let me tell you, she was a cougar. Rawr. I can't believe Bobby ever hit that. Visyak looks way out of his league."
They both paused to reflect on that. Equally distasteful looks crossed their faces at the thought of Bobby having a league. There was no way Dean was broaching that subject again. There were lines that weren't meant to be crossed. Seriously.
"Can we agree to never say anything like that ever again?"
Sam nodded, lip still curled, "Okay, Dean. Admit it. You used the explosives from the trunk on it."
Dean gave him a look filled with hurt. True, he had considered that as a back-up plan, but that was beside the point. He could have at least pretended to believe Dean could pull a magical sword out of a stone. Dean had done way better things than that before. Sam had been there for most of them! They'd stopped the apocalypse! That was way more kickass than pulling an old sword out of a big rock.
"I'll have you know I didn't have to use a single stick of dynamite on it. That sword took one look at me and couldn't wait to get out of that stone. Rocks," Dean scoffed, "They're not so smart."
"They're not the only ones. Seriously though, you just---pulled it out? Just like that?"
He brandished the sword with an awkward thrust-parry combo that nearly took out the room's dividing partition. It wasn't very well balanced or something. That would explain why he couldn't seem to get it to work the way it was supposed to. Dean was great with blades. He'd been trained to use one since he was five.
Sam held up both hands in surrender and Dean decided to stop trying out the sword because he felt like it. Not at all because he was afraid he might lob off one of his brother's hands with his magic sword.
"Yeah. Just like that."
"You don't think that might mean something? Dean, did Dr. Visyak say anything after you pulled the sword out? Did she mention anything about its history, who it belonged to, what it was forged to do, anything?"
Dean waved him off, "She said some stuff about grand destiny this and bound to a stone that and yeah, I wasn't paying a lot of attention. My mind was a little preoccupied with the whole I'm about to slay a dragon thing. The sword is the Sword of Bruncvik and it was forged from dragon's blood to, oh, I know this one! Kill dragons. The end."
"Dean! I don't think it's that simple. It's never that---"
"Sam! Focus! Virgins. Dragons. Any ideas on where we might find those?"
Turned out that Sammy had indeed come up with some ideas on where to find the dragons; naturally, they weren't checked into the local Hilton. It was always the damned sewer. Dean focused on the smells and general suck that came from trampling through the sewer rather than on the fact that his brother had been acting more tense than usual since he'd come back from SFU. He was more than a little concerned about Sam's major attitude adjustment since Sammy had been all huggy-happy before Dean had left out to consult with the good doctor. The issue wasn't real enough for him to press for answers yet -that was too close to sharing for Dean's stomach to handle- but Dean had a feeling he'd be getting to know what was on Sam's mind sooner than he'd like anyway.
Luckily, they struck gold in the sewers and found some virgins too.
Sam insisted they start saving the victims first which caused Dean a lot of discomfort. He was still lugging around the heavy-ass Sword of Bruncvik and all the victims were virgins. Honestly, Dean couldn't even look at them without wincing. They seriously needed to get them to a nunnery or something because Dean didn't know what he was supposed to do with a bunch of enthusiastic girls who just wanted to hug him.
It was Sam's idea to call Castiel to come deal with them.
That was brilliance in action in Dean's book. Birds of a feather flocked together or whatever. Cas could take them under his big fluffy purity wings while Sam and Dean tried to find the dragons already. He was extracting the girls with his angel mojo when they did find the dragons.
Turned out the dragons really didn't care too much for the sword which was insanely effective at killing them. That was great for Dean seeing as how it wasn't easy to swing in the confines of the sewer and whatever magic it might have didn't serve to correct its balance issue. The thing basically killed them on its own. All Dean had to do was poke it in the general direction of the dragons and then they were dead.
That was true right up to the point at which they found some book that the dragons definitely didn't want them finding.
Sam went for the book. Dean waved his sword around at the thing that was a Hell of a lot bigger than a giant bat. Cas showed up to help right as Dean lost the sword, Sam took a wing to the face, and a dark-haired girl they'd missed started screaming.
Things happened pretty fast at that point. It was basically a blur to Dean since he was trying to get the sword and only caught a glimpse of Cas trying to get his smite on before he got thrown through a wall. Apparently the sword was a great idea since holy fire didn't quite match up to dragon fire. Sam got the book, Dean got to slay the dragon -a lucky slice through the belly when the thing moved to stomp him, literally- and Cas shook the sewer dust off himself to fly off with the last virgin.
All in all, it was a pretty good job from Dean's perspective.
When they finished packing up the car, there was a moment where they were sitting together and the threat of conversation was looming between them so thick in the air that Dean was choking on it. He knew he couldn't put it off inevitably, but a guy deserved a break after he'd killed a dragon. It was 5:37 AM, they didn't look or smell any worse than anyone else awake at 5:37 AM, and Dean was hungry.
That meant one thing to him.
"Breakfast?"
Sam nodded slowly, "Yeah. I could go for that. Can you call Cas back? I think I'd like him to---to try to catch up with us."
For all that Dean had a hard time keeping secrets from Sam, Sam had no such compunction at keeping secrets from Dean. It only went to show how rattled his brother was from his soul's return trip from Hell that Dean immediately knew something was up. The request itself wasn't strange, but the way he'd hesitated? Did not bode well. He'd thought the breakfast option might be in order; it wasn't clear whether it was a good thing or a bad thing to realize he'd been right about needing it.
Dean forced a smile, "Sure thing. I'll give him a call. I'll even be civilized about it and use the cell phone."
It was supposed to earn him a laugh, but all Dean got for his effort was a pained grimace in return. He had a feeling that the indigestion he was currently starting to feel was only about to get worse. Dean wondered if praying for the nearest diner to have real maple syrup was considered an inappropriate use of celestial time, but then decided he didn't care. He'd averted the damned apocalypse: Heaven owed him some friggin' syrup.
~*~
Their arrival at the diner was unremarkable. It was no shock to either of them to see Castiel calmly waiting on them at a booth midway into the restaurant with a clear view of the street outside. It figured he'd have beaten them there even if he'd been the one to take the hardest hit. Dean had a feeling Cas would call it one of the perks of being an Angel of the Lord if he were the type to say things like that.
Come to that, Cas had taken to saying all kinds of things to him lately, including how he should have killed his brother outright rather than give him his soul back.
Dean wondered if that was what this little breakfast-for-three was going to wind up being about. He had a feeling that it was but all thoughts flew right out his head when he settled into the bench opposite the angel. His choice of seat left his brother no choice but to sit beside Castiel since Dean certainly hadn't made any effort to leave room on his side of the booth. Dean wasn't doing it to be a dick. It was just that his attention was focused elsewhere. His eyes were held fast, captivated by the angel on the opposite bench.
Sheila, their waitress who had a serious gum-popping problem, asked their order in a familiar impatient tone that came with all professional waitresses who worked shifts that started this early in the morning. Dean wanted pancakes, a double order of bacon and two eggs over easy with a cup of coffee; he ordered it all without ever taking his eyes off Castiel. Sammy got his usual omelet -three eggs, ham, green peppers, hold the cheese- and a glass of orange juice. There was a pause that lasted long enough to have her pop her gum pointedly before Sam got with the program enough to realize she expected Castiel to order something. He hurriedly ordered plain toast and oatmeal for Castiel to get her out of their hair, but Dean was too busy staring to care enough to thank Sam for bailing them out.
"Dean," Sam hissed, "What’s wrong with you? The way you’re looking at Cas isn’t great, man. It’s just a couple of scrapes and bruises and it won’t be a big thing unless you can’t find a way to wipe that look off your face."
He didn’t know how to wipe the look off his face though because it wasn’t horror or guilt or whatever estrogen-laced feeling Sam thought he was expressing. Dean was honestly grateful for the bruises and scrapes the angel’s vessel was sporting. He knew they should both be feeling terrified that Castiel was able to be hurt again, could bruise, could bleed, whatever, but he had claw marks down both arms deep enough that he literally couldn’t risk taking off his jacket in public and Sammy’s face was a mess of bruises. The two of them together would have been hard enough to pass off even at the ass-crack of dawn, but if Cas was sitting there in his holy tax accountant glory without a scratch on him? There’d have been no way.
This way was better. Their blood, their bruises and cuts and scrapes? They all blended together to mark them as part of a whole. It made them the same, brothers of a sort in the eyes of others. That kind of dismissal was exactly how they’d been able to fly under the radar their whole lives.
"Dean?" Castiel intoned, his name coming out as a multilayered question that spoke volumes to Dean.
Staring at the space above Castiel’s head fixedly, Dean literally couldn’t control his expression. He wasn’t entirely sure he could control his anything because Castiel had a halo. A blaringly obvious, gold as the sun ring of holy fire around his head. Floating above his head. Hovering in mid-air, spinning on its own axis, stirring up his crazy hair to make it look that crazy and holy Hell---
Sam kicked Dean under the table.
"Dean!"
"What?!" Dean countered, gesturing at Castiel as if it were obviously all his fault and it should have obviously been the angel’s fault because his friggin’ halo was showing in public!
His brother looked at Castiel and Dean made a face that said ”See what I’m saying, bitch?” only the look Sam cast back at him wasn’t anything like ”Stop staring at the angel’s halo, jerk!” Dean looked back at Castiel again just to make sure it was still there and it was, it was totally still there, but Sam couldn’t see it. Sam wasn’t looking at it and that had to mean he couldn’t see it.
Dean could see it and he couldn’t take his eyes off it.
“You really don’t see it?” Dean asked.
Sam snorted, “Be a little less specific, Dean. Really.”
He gave Sam a taste of his bitch-face medicine in return.
Castiel didn’t seem too concerned one way or the other. It was obvious he had no idea that Dean could see his…his angel part. That was almost enough to have Dean slapping the table with laughter, but he thought of something even funnier when his eyes met Castiel’s and they were as placid as ever. The angel had a tendency to stare at him sometimes as if he wanted Dean to feel the weight of his thousands of years of vast angelic knowledge and be cowed in awe beneath it. Dean knew it likely wasn’t really Cas’s intention with the staring, but it came across that way to him when he was feeling beaten, dirty, and all-too-human in the face of Castiel’s Angel-of-the-Lord-ness.
He knew it was a bad idea before he even did it.
The table was totally silent as Dean reached out a hand and poked the space above Castiel’s head with one finger, then they all jumped as the lights flickered dangerously along with every other electrical thing in the place. Dean rubbed his fingers together in wonder as he felt the tingle of having touched an angel’s halo race through his veins. He glanced at Sam to give him his best shit-eating grin.
“Cas’s halo is showing. Heh.”
Sam’s head jerked towards Castiel in shock, “What? You have a halo? Dean can see it? Why can’t I see it? Can anyone else see it?”
He didn’t bother waiting for Castiel to answer before turning to study the diner patrons for signs that they too were being privy to seeing the angelic peep show. Dean knew that was because Sam was worried it was just him that couldn’t see it, but he wasn’t sure about that now. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that Sheila the waitress would have wanted to know a lot more than whether or not Castiel wanted jelly for his toast if she could see his angel parts shining.
“No one else can see it,” Castiel answered, his voice sounded rougher than ever, rasping and raw as if the dragons that had worked him over had forced him to swallow glass.
Dean couldn’t meet Castiel’s eyes. He was too worried about what he might see. The halo had a faint smudge on it from his finger-prod anyway and Dean’s brow furrowed as he broke his gaze away from the golden ring to consider his hands. He winced at the mess they were in and wondered how much of a bitch it would make him if he excused himself to go wash up before eating. It was such a Sam move that he immediately pushed it aside in favor of scrubbing his hands off on the napkin that had wrapped his silverware. Better than nothing, Dean figured as he rubbed his fingers together again and nothing seemed to be coming off anymore.
He glanced up to the halo -again dodging Castiel’s eyes- and found he couldn’t help but want to rub off the taint of his touch.
Reaching out again with the intention of rubbing the dirt away, Dean tried to laugh it off, “Cas, I think I got your halo dirty. Here, I’ll get it.”
“Dean---“
Sam and Castiel both said his name at the same time that his hand made contact with the spinning ring and this time the shock was enough to have his fingers close over it, gripping it tight to hold it in place to make it easier to clean away the smeared fingerprint he’d left behind the first time. Dean clenched his eyes shut instinctively as his hand clenched on the ring and the world exploded around him with an inhuman shriek that shattered all the glass in the diner while a literally blinding surge of light -Castiel’s Grace maybe?- flashed through to set off all the appliances in the place at once. If he’d been able to hear over the ringing, Dean would have noted that all the car alarms for at least a five block radius had gone off as well. He had let go of Castiel as soon as the shockwave from the touch had passed over his hand into his arm, but Dean didn’t have to be told that he’d be feeling it for a while, if not forever.
He didn’t have words for how it felt to touch it, to hold part of Castiel in his hand the way that the angel had obviously held the most real part of Dean in his own.
Dean stumbled stupidly to his feet at Sam’s jerking, but he got with it enough to help Castiel up when he noticed that literally everyone else in the diner was unconscious. He said something that might have been ”What the Hell?” but was more likely a string of sounds without meaning since his ears were bleeding too much for him to gauge even his own voice. Without protest, Dean handed over the Impala’s keys to Sam because Castiel was almost totally dead weight between them. He slid the angel into the back seat, but Castiel couldn’t seem to hold himself upright and his grip was so tight on Dean’s arm that Dean was sure he’d have a bruise that matched the scar on his shoulder.
“DRIVE!”
He yelled because he needed it to happen and Sam’s neck had a trickle of blood on it that had to be coming from his ears. Dean wasn’t going to think about it. He slid into the back seat and let Castiel lean on him as his brother pulled them out onto the road with a flurry of gravel and rubber that did Dean proud.
Sam didn’t need to be told to keep driving; Dean didn’t have the ability to form a protest when Castiel slumped over onto him, completely unconscious and looking much the worse for wear. His arm fell asleep fast beneath the weight of the angel’s vessel, but Dean only shifted to wrap it around Castiel’s shoulders. The dirt on Cas was a lot more obvious from his new, closer angle, and Dean didn't want to think too much about how bad it had to be since Cas had sweat trickling down his face that took really a lot too long to dry.
They put four hours of hard road between them and the diner before Sam found a motel suitable for them. By that point, Dean felt every bruise, every scrape, every hit he’d taken from the dragons, but he couldn’t feel any of it more than he could feel the tickling nuzzle of the angel’s halo. It had been haphazardly whirling above Castiel’s slumped head the whole ride. The thing had spun into his neck, his shoulder, and then when Cas had slipped further down into the seat, across Dean’s chest where it’d been turning for the last hour before they stopped and Dean was sure he’d have a mark from it. He could feel the vibration of it ricocheting through his aching body and he had no idea how Castiel was sleeping through this.
“Cas,” Dean tried, elbowing him lightly, “We’re stopped for the night. Come on. Let’s get inside before---“
Dean wanted to say ’before someone at this no-tell catches sight of two dudes sitting in the backseat of a muscle car snuggling’, but that wasn’t playing fair. He had been the one to grab onto shiny angel parts without asking what kind of consequences that might bring first; the dark print of his hand had been steadily rotating in and out of his line of sight with every revolution of the halo. That alone was enough to have Dean willing to curb his tongue for the angel.
The angel in question didn’t seem inclined to stir up more than a token complaint at Dean’s elbowing though. His head slid sideways across Dean’s chest while his marred halo stutter-burned a line to mark the trail it had taken. Dean hissed at the feeling of the ring catching the naked skin of his neck along the way down.
“Castiel!”
Baleful blue eyes slitted open to meet his own and Dean stopped breathing for a moment.
“Dean?” he groused.
Dean shot Sam a pleading look which made his brother give up a very put upon sigh before helping him to haul Castiel out of the car. The angel made no move to help them beyond twisting to ensure that Dean bore the brunt of his weight, halo haphazardly whirling into Dean’s personal space as they stumbled into their lodgings for the night. It was getting to be...weird.
He tried to get Castiel to sit on one of the beds, but the angel had a grip on his jacket tight enough that Dean had a flashback to the first time he’d really spoken to him -”I’m the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition.”- since Dean could believe that was a grip that would carry a soul straight out of Hell. There was no graceful way around it so he settled onto the bed himself in order to get Castiel to collapse at his side, still leaning on him as if without Dean’s support he’d never be able to make it again. Dean was uncomfortable enough with the constant flashing of his grubby hand on Castiel’s shining halo without dealing with the look Sam was giving them as they sat together on the bed.
He snapped, “Cas! Can you at least make the damned halo stop turning? I think it’s giving me contact burn or something.”
“No.”
The blunt response was shockingly familiar. Dean rolled his eyes and elbowed Castiel again to try to encourage him to sit up on his own.
“What do you mean ‘no’? You’re not even willing to say ‘maybe’?”
Castiel exhaled his own long-suffering sound of annoyance, “Could you stop your heart from beating for a few minutes? The sound has a tendency to grate when I am feeling particularly drained.”
“Was that sarcasm?”
Sam, being Sam, decided to override Dean’s attempt at levity by interjecting, “You mean Dean reached out and just like grabbed your heart? Cas! What didn’t you stop him?”
Both of their heads swiveled to look at Sam. He was standing tall and agitated in front of the room’s other bed; his wide gestures made him look enormous in the modest-sized space and Dean had never felt smaller with his larger-than-life brother. Not with Sam looking at him as if he had let down all his hopes and dreams while an angel of the Lord literally leaned on him for support to keep from falling over from the consequences of Dean’s own actions. The humor went out of the situation as quickly as it had come in.
Dean couldn’t look at Castiel as he spoke, “Cas, tell my brother that me trying to rub a smudge off your shiny angel part wasn’t the same thing as if I’d crushed your vital organ in my meatfist.”
“Sam, Dean did not crush my vital organs. That’s absurd. Angels do not have vital organs in the sense that humans do.”
There wasn’t much more that they could say to that. It was an odd situation made odder by the fact that they weren’t used to having Castiel underfoot anymore with the war in Heaven waging away. The day had grown late enough that both the Winchesters were feeling the effects of sleep deprivation and the incident at the diner had left their angel a little the worse for wear, too. Dean had only seen Castiel sleep on a few occasions and they only had two beds, but they weren’t getting any benefit out of staring at each other in silence.
That shtick only worked for Castiel when he was at his most angelic, as Dean had well learned.
He shrugged out of his jacket almost violently and then stood to drape it over one of the room’s two chairs. Dean unlaced his boots as if the fact that they were still neatly knotted personally offended him. He could hear Sam hesitantly shrugging out of his own layers and he didn’t need to look to see that Castiel had slumped over on the bed, a puppet with its strings cut, since he’d felt the angel fall as he himself had stood.
Dean wandered back over to the bed Castiel was sitting on and jerked the coverlet back with a snap that was echoed in his voice as Sam said his name, “What?”
He followed Sam’s sheepish nod to where Castiel was blearily staring at him, “I was going to move him in a minute. I’ll share. It’s not like it’ll kill me and before either of you say anything about angels not needing to sleep, I’m fine with him just laying there and thinking Heavenly thoughts until he gets his mojo back, but I need to sleep. I’m too tired to even shower.”
“Yeah, me too, but, uhh,” Sam rubbed the back of his neck, “Maybe Cas should catch a shower first?”
“Cas? Seriously? He got the least dragon on him.”
Sam’s face couldn’t get redder if Dean painted it with fresh blood. It was disconcerting; Dean got the distinct impression he was missing something and that when he finally clued in to that something he wasn’t going to like it.
“He may have not minded when you grabbed onto his special angel part, Dean. Your words not mine!”
He was holding up his hands as if to ward off any outburst from Dean, but it felt as if he’d used both fists to slug Dean in the head. Dean darted a glance at Castiel who seemed curiously detached from the conversation. That was likely because he was piss-poor at interpreting innuendo at his best which this most definitely was not.
Walking slowly around to regard Castiel, Dean grabbed onto an arm and hauled at him until he was upright enough to pull the trench coat off. It was pretty blazingly apparent what Sam had been talking about once the coat was out of the way. He shuddered to avoid thinking of the implications, but he wasn’t going to back down. Dean had made this mess -well, he thought to himself, Cas had made this mess technically, but he’d been the cause of it- and that meant he had some obligation to help clean it up.
“I think Sam’s right. You could use a shower. Trust me when I say this: you will not want to try to peel yourself out of those pants later if you wait any longer to clean up. I know you’re a little out of it right now, but you want to clean yourself up.”
Castiel blinked at him, furrowed lines of confusion etched into his forehead before his jaw set firmly and Dean only had the warning of seeing his halo start to spin so fast that the dark print of Dean’s hand was only a black streak before the rumpled suit was pristine again. Along with both Winchesters. Actually, Dean was pretty sure if he checked on the duffels Sam had carried in to toss on the table, it was likely he’d find everything was clean now. He watched the tick of muscle in Castiel’s jaw slowly relax before he ventured a comment.
“Well---I guess that answers the question of whether or not angels like to get their feathers wet. Right, Sammy?”
Sam was rubbing an incredulous hand down his clean chest, “Dude? Not cool. Not cool at all.”
Dean rolled his eyes, then helped Castiel to slide into “his side” of the bed.
“Whatever. Bitch.”
The last thing that was said before they casually both slipped into bed to try to sleep off the last night was Sam’s responding, “Jerk.”
It was as close to normal as they ever got.
~*~
“---brakes!”
Dean snapped awake as the word left his mouth. He had been dreaming that he was being dragged by his car while Sam was trying to drive them away from…something. It had all been pretty vague except for the feeling of his face trying to burn itself off in strips on the road. That part actually made sense as soon as he realized that the burning sensation was Castiel’s dirty halo trying to rub itself clean on Dean’s cheek.
Figured Castiel would turn out to be a cuddler in his sleep. Friggin’ angels.
He was going to poke at him to try to get him to move, but Sam beat him to the punch.
“Really, Dean? Really?”
“What? I didn’t do anything! He got that way on his own while I was over here, minding my own business. Sleeping,” Dean clarified as he rolled out of the bed.
He walked over to the duffels to figure out which one was his, then pulled out the first thing that he came to since he’d been right before -Castiel had managed to freshen up everything in the room with his holy cleaning hoodoo. Dean didn’t look back at the bed where Castiel was stirring or over at Sam where his brother was doubtlessly wearing his most annoying combination of bed-head-and-bitchface. So what if he didn’t need to take a shower? He liked showers in the morning.
They were relaxing, Dean thought to himself, shutting the bathroom door with more force than necessary.
His reflection didn’t show any sign of the abuse his face had taken from having an angel’s halo trying to spin through it all night (Morning? Dean didn’t care what the clock said. He’d just woken up, that meant it was “morning” and the sleep thing? That indicated “night” which was fine.) and Dean didn’t know what to make of that. It was likely that he shouldn’t even be able to feel the ring even though he could see it. From the look on Cas’s face, Dean had a feeling that he shouldn’t be able to see it either, but seeing was easier than the other. There were plenty of things that went bump in the night who could be seen but not felt. Being able to feel something? That brought a whole new level of insanity into the mix because anything that had that much physicality was too real to be faked, too true to be a lie, and too much to be pushed aside as one too many microwaved burritos.
During his shower, Dean forced himself to think it through, but he couldn’t remember anything that had changed since the night before. He and Sam had both been doused liberally with the dragons’ blood and they had both been exposed to the same spells, the same incantations, the same everything that Dean could remember. He hadn’t handled anything funny and he’d not died or anything. Cas hadn’t even had to give him a hand with the damned dragons!
Well, okay, Dean was willing to admit that maybe he’d needed a little angelic assistance, but it hadn’t been any different from any other time they’d worked a case together.
There was simply no reason that Dean could tell for him to suddenly have backstage passes to Angels: Live and in Person.
If it had been a week ago, Sam wouldn’t have had a soul and maybe, just maybe that would have been a reason that Dean would have accepted for his sudden ability to see what Sammy couldn’t. It wasn’t a week ago though; Sam was as intact as ever.
The whole thing didn’t make sense.
Dean had his hand on the doorknob when the low murmur of Cas’s voice caught his attention. He froze as he tried to hear what his brother and his angel were talking about while he was trying to get himself together.
He’d missed what Castiel had said, but, by leaning in a little closer to the door, he was able to make out what Sam was saying.
“---shouldn’t have let him if you knew it would affect you this way! Weren’t you thinking about the war? What if Raphael---“
“Raphael would not have interfered. He would have been as shocked by the occurrence as I was myself. I have told you: it is not natural for Dean to have an active awareness of any aspect of my angelic form. Not without some effort on my part.”
”Oh yeah?” Dean thought. That made sense. It wasn’t exactly as if the angels really tried to fly under the radar on Earth. They walked around in vessels that appeared wholly human and that was the extent of their effort that Dean had been able to tell. Figured they wouldn’t know what to make of a human who could suddenly see the man behind the Heavenly curtain.
His attention was caught as Sam spoke again, his brother’s words rattling him more than they should.
“But it’s a lot more than a bruise, Cas. I can’t even see it and I know that much. You don’t knock out a whole diner and all the electricity for fifty city blocks because someone gives you a bruise!”
Bruise? Dean pictured the blackened handprint on the shining gold of the halo and suddenly it appeared darker in his mind, more sinister.
He almost missed Castiel’s quiet reply as he tried to imagine what kind of damnation points he’d score if he had bruised an angel’s tender parts.
“Five blocks, Sam, and it will heal soon enough. The scar will likely be unremarkable within a handful of days and I will be able to return to the war front. I will contact Balthazar to stand in my stead in the meantime.”
Dean couldn’t take any more eavesdropping at that point. He burst out of the bathroom as loudly as he’d stormed into it, pinning first his brother then Castiel in his glare as he took in the sight of the two of them in opposite beds, propped up against their respective headboards while they discussed how Dean may have scarred an angel’s halo.
“Scar? You’re telling me that the nasty black mark my hand left is not going to be cleaned off anytime soon? That’s going to scar?”
Castiel eyed him levelly, “I can’t see it to say for certain, Dean, but I imagine it’s hardly as bad as you seem to think. It will be a fitting mark for me to bear, I think.”
He nodded to Dean’s shoulder where the angel’s hand still marked him. Dean twitched both shoulders back in reaction. It wasn’t the same. It wasn’t the same thing at all.
Looking at Sam, Dean said, “Tell him it’s not the same, Sammy. Tell him how it is not the same that my hand is all over his---his shiny angel part for eternity. Tell him it isn’t okay that I hurt him.”
Sam stared back at Dean with the same lost expression he’d wore when he’d first woken up from a nightmare when he was six or when he came home from a date with a girl who’d tried to stick her hand in his pants when he was thirteen or when he returned to life for the first time after Dean had traded his soul to save him. His brother was looking at him as if he held all the answers while it was Dean who was looking for help now. Dean pinched his nose between his thumb and forefinger and tried to will away the headache that was fast creeping in on him.
“Cas? How bad is this? The whole touching the shiny halo thing being bad, I get. Trust me, I get that I wasn’t supposed to do that. Now that I did though, how bad is it?”
Castiel cocked his head to the side as if he didn’t understand what Dean was asking; Dean wondered if the angel really didn’t. It was obvious this wasn’t something Castiel had been prepared for and he’d as much as said that it hadn’t happened to him before Dean had gone and done it. For all Dean knew, angels never allowed their halos to be touched even by each other. He’d compared stopping its movement to the stopping of Dean’s heart, but he had said it wasn’t an organ. What did that make the damned thing then?
Somehow Dean didn’t think “ornamental” was the correct answer.
He opened his mouth to speak, but Dean held up a hand to hold him off.
“Wait. How about we try again with: what exactly is the halo? You said it wasn’t an organ. Is it like some kind of angel mojo?”
The angel’s face contorted into even deeper lines of confusion, “I do not have the faintest idea how to respond to that, Dean. It is angelic in origin. It is one of the few affectations of our true forms that your legends have gotten right over time. The halo is not an organ. It is---an extension of my Grace. A physical aspect of my true form, of the truest part of that form. You should not be able to see it.”
It sounded almost like an apology when Cas said it that way. Dean wasn’t sure how to take that. It didn’t really bother him that he wasn’t supposed to be able to see an angel’s true form. He got the whole bit that it was too great for the human mind to comprehend. That much made sense to him. Trying to think of it as a literal part of Castiel’s Grace which was, essentially his soul...that was almost enough to make Dean’s mind unravel a bit on its own.
“It’s like your soul?”
The words came out choked, but Dean was damned proud they’d come out at all. He almost hadn’t had it in himself to say it out loud. Even thinking it had felt like more blasphemy than a man like himself deserved, but he needed to know so he pressed.
“Your halo is like a little bit of your soul?”
Sam broke the thick silence that fell with a snapped, “Angels don’t have souls.”
Dean didn’t acknowledge his outburst. He was comfortable to keep eye contact with Castiel until the angel finally bent enough to nod once in assent. His eyes flared a little at the reaction.
“Yes,” Castiel allowed, “You can think of it as being similar to the soul. Touching it is not nearly as powerful as touching a human soul, but it would fill you with a momentary flash of my Grace. Such as it is now.”
“Great. I’m definitely cashing in my chips for a first class, one way ticket on the Hell Train now, I guess.”
“Dean!”
He glared at Sam because it was easier than looking at Castiel -small without the bulky armor of Jimmy’s coat- and his bruised halo. It was easier to turn hot, angry eyes on his brother’s outrage than to have to look at the angel in his bed. Sam was a familiar outlet to funnel off his excess annoyance at himself; Sam would understand it, bitch that he was, later.
“Sam!” He mocked, “Tell me how I shouldn’t say it. I dare you.”
Sam’s gaze hardened as his face pinched in its own show of anger, “You didn’t do it on purpose, Dean, and Cas could have stopped you. He could have stopped you. He didn’t, right, Cas? It didn’t hurt him really. He told me himself. Hell, Dean, it’s not even as if he didn’t, well, like it a little either.”
They all sucked in a collective breath at Sam’s daring. Even Castiel had drawn back at that one. It took a lot to rattle them all, but Sammy sure could do it, Dean thought, feeling almost proud for his spunk. The feeling dissipated almost as soon as it had came in when he compared what Sam had said to the reality of the situation.
“So now you’re telling me that since he got off on it, it’s okay? Sammy, I thought you took all those lib classes in college. They must not have sunk in very well if you’re defending my honor with that argument considering I basically date-raped an angel of the Lord in public and, oh yeah, let’s not forget, scarred his soul!”
A curtain of silence fell hard on the conversation at that point. There literally was no response for that. It was one of the many reasons that Dean didn’t like the sharing and caring thing: Winchesters never had happy experiences to share and care over.
Dean scrubbed a hand over his face as he jerked on a long-sleeved tee to cover the scratches on his arms. He stalked to the table to snatch up his keys without letting his eyes wander back to meet up with either his brother’s or the angel’s, then let them know succinctly that he was out.
“I’m getting us food. I’ll be back. Don’t---don’t bond or anything while I’m out. Or if you do, Cas has to wash the sheets with his special Angel Soft soap before I get back.”
The door to the room shut with a click; Dean only wished he could shut down his thoughts so easily.
Part Two