Endings and Beginnings

[winchester_lost]

It had been completely by accident that he'd found the first note.  He'd been sitting in the Impala with Sam and Bobby, reeling from what had happened.  Cass was a God.  He'd snapped his fingers and Raphy, one of the archangels, had exploded like an over-ripe grapefruit dropped from the top of a ten story building.  He and Sam had been arguing

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[seekthesilence]

"This is not for me. It's for you…" he seethed, muttering something that sounded like 'selfish.'

Furious didn't begin to cover it.

Being moved to the car was awkward, and it pained this body, but that was hardly his top concern now. There was no getting away, not while the noose remained on his neck.

Resting in the backseat now, mostly on his side and not at all comfortably, he started trying to escape again. The entire ride to Bobby's was like that, with ever changing tactics. Thrashing to try and send Dean off the road was peppered with squirming desperately to try and get free, though it was useless. He fought the cuffs enough that his wrists were bleeding. He squirmed to try and rub his neck against the seat, desperate to try and loosen the noose, but it was snug in ways he couldn't upset.

By the time they arrived, he was hoarse for the yelling and with bruised, bloody wrists, and more than once his legs had cramped up for the awkward angle. He was already human, though the fury of his power hammered inside him like a caged animal desperate for freedom. He hurt, and was tired, and was desperate.

As they pulled in, he caught sight of the junkyard and rasped, "Dean… think of the innocents you will kill if you make a mistake… you'll blow the whole state right off the map… more than that… please, let me go…"

[winchester_lost]

"I know. I won't screw this up."

Dean had clearly already made his decision. He didn't feel like he had a choice. There wasn't another option. The simple fact was that the problem was the souls, the power. The only way to fix it was to get rid of that power. And it was the very fact of moving it that risked setting off the equivalent of multiple nukes, with them at ground zero. He'd saved people in the course of putting this all together; the demons, ghosts and werewolves didn't seem to go on vacation just because be was trying to save Castiel.

He'd had to look people in the face and know they were the ones he was risking. He'd faced down that weight, taken it upon his shoulders as silently and vaguely as he could with Sam at his side. With a God as jealous and temperamental as Cass seemed with his new-found power -- not to mention as... hands on -- the world wasn't safe. They might as well have let Lucifer and Michael fight out the Apocalypse.

He got out of the car, dragging Cass out of the back seat and hefting his weight as he walked inside.

Sam and Bobby were waiting in the kitchen, passing a bottle of whiskey back and forth between them. As soon as Dean stepped through the front door, it became quite clear that he hadn't told them that he was going off to get Cass. They were not at all happy with him. Bobby called him 'Princess' and 'Idjit' and a 'God-damned fool', while Sam gave said that they were supposed to be in this together. Dean had come up with a plan with them and then purposely thrown out the play book.

It was, at its core, the usual rhythm of things, but more heated, intense, conflicted. Their argument boiled and simmered, and came to a head with Dean demanding that Bobby and Sam lock him in the panic room with Cass. Alone.

Sam tried to talk reason, while Bobby eyed Cass, his gaze then shifting to Dean, looking less than trusting. He even voiced that he was a bit concerned about the plan.

But, in the end, after a few more raised decibels, cursing and the like, Bobby was spinning the lock on the door as Dean stood inside holding Cass.

Dean sighed, the tension ebbing from his shoulders a little as he set Cass on the table in the middle. There was the old luggage trunk, seat innocuously on the table nearby, though the inside had been painted in symbols, the ritual already performed to turn it into a proper soul vessel. And there were Enochian symbols painted on the floor for the ritual that Dean hadn't yet performed.

The one that would allow him to touch the souls.

He let the noose in place, but undid the rope, instead strapping Cass' legs into the leather cuffs on the table.

[seekthesilence]

Throughout the argument, Cass was balanced in what he felt was a precarious way on his shoulder. There was too much of Dean's hands on his body, and with the tension of the ropes it was straining his limbs, and this was degrading. He was a God. He had been an angel, and now he was being held like luggage or large game while Dean had a fight with Bobby and Sam over who should have been present while this was going on.

Cass had not been silent. He had voiced his opinion, tried to play to Bobby and Sam's unsurities by talking about the risk, the very real probability that Dean was going to blow the state sky high and take everyone one, all of them including, out with him.

But they still ended up locked in that room, and Cass still ended up being wrestled to the table and strapped down. Being so long with his legs drawn up behind him left him sore, too sore to fight him well, and without much effort his legs were restrained again. He was awkwardly laying on his cuffed wrists, not particularly focused on the way the metal pressed against his back. He was trying to twist away from Dean, because he knew he was coming for them next. Knew that Dean was going to strap him to the bed, and he was hoping to break free while he made the switch.

But he still couldn't remove the noose, or break free from the room.

This was hopeless, but the rising panic wouldn't let him stop fighting.

"Dean!" he growled, voice harsh from screaming the whole way back, "Let me go… if by some absurd miracle you succeed… I will kill you…" he glared up at him, eyes wild as he tried to squirm out of his grasp. His voice was shaking with desperate rage, but he was barely meeting Dean's eyes.

Because Castiel was still in there. He was desperate not to lose the power and the respect and awe he had gained, but on a far deeper level he was terrified that Dean was going to kill himself trying to do this. Castiel had weighed the risks when he'd done this, and it was done. This was the very last thing he had wanted, for Dean to end up in the middle of it again.

[winchester_lost]

"Yeah, well, you can try if you still want to kill me after I fix you."

Dean seemed less bothered by Cass' threats than the restrained God likely had intended. He knew it was possible that he wouldn't live through this in so many ways. He took a breath and eyed him, trying to figure out the way to get him out of the handcuffs and into the leather cuffs on the table with the least options for thrashing around. He wanted him bound to the table because he figured the less that Cass could squirm, the better off this whole process would be. He was confident he could do this, but he wasn't so arrogant he wanted to risk any possible complications, like the potential of Cass sliding partway off the table while he had his hands in his chest. He'd get him anchored down, and then they'd start.

He shrugged his shoulders and went for the messy way. It wasn't like the table was going anywhere, and with Cass' legs bound he wasn't going anywhere either. He pulled out a bobby pin, unlocking the handcuffs, a sharp metallic clink as they clattered against the cement floor. Dean roughly grabbed one hand and tried to force it into the leather cuff. He hated doing this to him. One look at those bloody wrists made his heart clench, a dull pain in his chest that he ignored as best as he could. He hate hurting him, but it was the only way to save him. He needed to get the souls out of him, and he knew Cass wasn't going to co-operate.

Besides, he couldn't back out now. He'd come too far, done too much, and this was the only way.