Kiss you When it's Dangerous - Part 6
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Dean feels the weight of those words sink in but he’s not sure he really gets it. He chances a glance over at Sam who looks just as confused as Dean feels. It sounds like good news but Bobby’s tone is anything but happy.
"I don’t get it," Dean says, leaning over the phone. "So he can close it too. That’s good news, right?"
Bobby sighs. "It’s good and bad."
Dean thumps his fist on the table in frustration. "Don’t dance around it, what’s it mean?"
"Dean," Sam says quietly and Dean knows what his brother is trying to do. Dean knows he’s about five seconds away from losing his shit but he doesn’t care.
"It’s all about intent," Bobby’s saying. "Castiel had about 80% of these pages translated but he was missing some of the more… subtle words. Some of them are have a couple meanings and some are double talk and then others-"
"Jesus Christ, spare me the grammar lesson," Dean bites out.
"I’m trying to tell you this in a way you’ll understand, idjit. Your Castiel is a key that can open or close a portal to the other side but to use that key - to make it work, make him work-"
Bobby stops talking and Dean wants to turn the whole desk over. It’s infuriating and maddening and he just wants to know what it all means so he can find Castiel and shoot something.
"What?" Dean asks.
Bobby’s voice is low and quiet when he finally speaks. "The door gets cracked open with the ritual and if Uriel kills Castiel, the portal opens."
"I know that, Bobby. Jesus, what are you trying to say?"
"It opens because that’s what Uriel wants. You get me? It’s about Uriel’s intent. He nudges the door and then kicks it open by completing the ritual. Cause that’s what he wants. But if the ritual starts, and the portal is partially opened and if someone else who wants the portal closed gets involved, it can be shut."
"Great," says Dean. "That’s actually good news, right? How do we do that?" He looks over at Sam.
And feels his heart clench.
Sam’s eyebrows are anxious and furrowed and he’s looking at Dean like he’s sorry, he’s so sorry. Dean can’t speak for the lump that’s suddenly in his throat, thick and hard, clenching around his vocal chords.
"The only way to close the doorway is if you… if Castiel is killed by someone who wants the portal closed," Bobby finishes and it’s like a sucker punch to Dean’s gut.
He manages to swallow once around the knot in his throat. "Well, then we gotta get there before they start, right? I mean, that’s what you’re saying. If the portal’s already open then it’s too late but as long as we find him before that -"
"Dean," Bobby says and Dean starts shaking his head the second he hears Bobby’s tone. He sees Sam out of the corner of his eye, body tense, head bowed, worrying his lip.
"Based on what I’m reading, that doorway is already open."
“No,” Dean says simply.
Bobby continues on. “It started that first night, before you and Sam got there.”
“I’m telling you no,” Dean counters, flinging off Sam’s hand on his arm roughly.
“By the time you boys arrived, based on what I’ve got translated now, it’s too late.”
“You go back to that fucking grimoire and you figure it out,” Dean snaps.
“I’m still gonna be working on it, of course I am,” Bobby says. “And I know you’re gonna be looking for Cas. I’m telling you, if you find him-”
“We’re going to find him,” Dean says, cutting Bobby off.
“I don’t see another way out of this, boys. I’m sorry, Dean. When you find him, the only way to close this doorway-”
“No,” Dean says again, voice low and resolute. “There’s gotta be some sort of, I don’t know, failsafe and if we gank Uriel, I bet this all falls apart.” He can feel his hands shaking, feel his whole body shaking and he tries desperately to still himself. He needs to stay focused.
“And that’s the next thing I’m looking into,” Bobby says and his placating tone makes Dean grind his teeth. “But if that doesn’t pan out-”
“It’ll work!” Dean exclaims angrily. “I’m not- we’re not gonna-” he hears his voice start to waver and it’s horrifying and terrible and he feels a hot sting in his eyes and a painful ache in his throat and Sam’s hand is on his arm again and he barely manages to shrug it off and shuffle away from him. He can’t bear the thought of being touched right now.
“Bobby,” Sam says. “I’ve got a couple of places lined up that I think are likely locales. Maybe we can go over them, see what you think?”
Bobby sighs long and hard into the receiver, his breathing filling the airwaves. “Yeah. What’ve you got?”
Dean can’t listen to this. He can’t sit here and listen to co-ordinates and likely places and half leads. He stalks out of the office, slamming the door behind him as hard as he can and he wants to kick it when it won’t make a satisfying noise. It just shuts with a muffled click; it’s not heavy enough to shut with a bang.
He ends up going to the sofa and stares down at it, fists clenched at his sides. Stupid, ridiculous hobbit sized sofa and before he knows what he’s doing, he’s kicking it and pulling the cushions off and upending the coffee table before he sends his foot right into one of the sofa tables as well. It folds like a house of cards and he ends up using one of the legs as a bat and beats the fucking awful sofa that’s too small for two grown men.
After about ten good hits, he’s a little out of breath and feels worse. Feels stupid and impotent but still just as angry. He tosses the piece of wood aside and plunks down onto the beaten sofa, the exposed springs digging into his butt.
God he’s so fucking stupid. He was so stupid to think he could have something with Cas and that it wouldn’t all go to shit. So stupid to leave Cas alone, no matter how many times Castiel said he could take care of himself. So stupid to ever expect fate or God or whatever to be on his fucking side for once.
From where he sits on the sofa he can see the lonely picture of Castiel and his brother Gabriel on the wall. Tacked up off-center and by its self.
He doesn’t know if Cas has any other pictures of himself.
Sam comes out of the office minutes later and Dean can see him out of the corner of his eye, inching forward into Dean’s line of sight.
“Dean-”
“Just… don’t. I don’t wanna…” Dean scrubs his face with his hands. “What’ve you and Bobby got for a location?” he asks and he hopes with every cell in his body that they’ve got something.
“We’ve narrowed it down to two likely places-” Sam starts.
“Gimme one, you do the other,” Dean interrupts.
Sam makes one of his bitch-faces. “Yeah. No. That’s a horrible idea and you know it.”
“If you’ve got two places and there are two of us, well, I know I’m no college man like yourself but it seems pretty straight forward to me.”
“Dean, I know you’re upset right now.”
“Stop,” Dean commands. “Stick to the hunt.”
Sam huffs out a breath. “Fine. It’s stupid to split up. One of us could end up being alone fighting a demon army. Now I know you’re thinking, jesus, you’re hoping it’ll be you,” Sam says, waiting for his words to sink in. “What if it’s me?”
Fuck it, Sam is right and Dean knows that, he knows it but he just… The thought of going someplace, of getting all ready and then going there and finding nothing is a sick weight in his gut.
But he doesn’t want to think about Sam by himself hunting either. Jesus, it’s bad enough that Cas is… that Cas is…
“All right,” he says, voice gruff. “Where to first?”
***
Castiel hears the chanting, smells the incense and is confused.
It’s so familiar but he’s been dreaming of it for weeks and he can’t tell if it’s a memory or a dream or-
He pulls hard on his arms, finding them secured to an altar. His eyes snap open and above him he sees the symbols, the one’s he knows intimately well by now. He looks down and sees his chest, bared and scarred. His eyes move around taking in the people chanting, the candles, the incense the stained glass windows, the old brick walls and -
“Brother, you’ve awoken.”
“We aren’t brothers,” Castiel says, echoing the words from his dream.
Uriel’s smile is sad and terrifying at the same time. “I’m sorry you feel that way. I feel so close to you, Castiel. You are the symbol of my life’s work. The pinnacle of my dreams. We’ve shared much and now we’ll share this.”
The chanting is background noise - incessant and unintelligible. He estimates there are no more than twenty robed people in the room, standing around the perimeter.
It is only Uriel and himself at the altar.
Castiel pulls at the ropes binding his wrists and feet. “This is madness.”
Uriel looks disappointed. “I’m sorry you won’t be able to see the culmination of my work, of our destiny. But you will forever be held in reverence by me and amongst my chosen disciples. Your sacrifice is great. It will not be forgotten.”
Castiel thinks about all the time he and Uriel spent together - long hours working cases, time spent alone on stakeouts or in the office reviewing reports, tracking down criminals in seedy locations with only each other for backup. He’s angry at Uriel for his betrayal but he’s also sad. Sad for the lost comrade, the lost partnership. He thought he could count on Uriel. He thought he was always safe with Uriel at his back.
And now he’s at the wrong end of Uriel’s knife.
Again.
Uriel makes quick work of slicing through the scar tissue on Castiel’s wrists and he feels the warm, wet blood start to run out. As before, it’s not too deep, not too harsh - it will take him time to bleed out.
“Was it all a lie?” Castiel asks.
Uriel pauses and wipes the blade off on a kerchief, his movements practiced and fluid. “No. Not all of it. Indeed I do see us as brothers, comrades in arms. But our world is broken, Castiel. You of all people should know that. Think of what we’ve seen, what we’ve cleaned up after. The crime, the drugs, the violence. The world needs a change.”
“Uriel,” Castiel pleads, pulling at the bindings, willing Uriel to listen to him. “This is madness,” he repeats.
Uriel shakes his head. “I wish you could understand. This will be a purge, a cleanse. It’s always the most difficult to clean out the infected tissue; the debridement of a wound is painful, messy work. But the end result is healing. The world will be better for it.”
Castiel searches Uriel’s eyes and is somewhat surprised that he doesn’t see the shine of madness or insanity. Uriel is as calm, as stoic as he ever was.
“You truly believe, don’t you?”
Uriel looks somewhat relieved by Castiel’s question. “Yes,” he says emphatically. “Do you know how beautiful it will be? This new world? My only regret is that you have to die for it be born. After that night, the night you were rescued, I hoped that using you to start the ritual would be enough. I prayed that I could find another sacrifice to take your place and complete the ritual, but unfortunately, it didn’t work.”
“I am the key,” Castiel murmurs. He can still feel the blood dripping out of his wrists, cold where the air touches it, but also warm, right at the pulse point. It creates a strange dichotomous feeling against his skin. The smell of the incense is cloying and thick, crowding into his nostrils and taking up all the space. It burns through the back of his throat down to his lungs. He shakes his head a bit finding his thoughts getting cloudy and slow.
Uriel nods sadly. “You are the key wielded by my intent. If only my intent were enough, Castiel, you could be spared. I would gladly take another in your place but though my will is strong, you are already the key. The only key.”
Uriel turns from him then, head hanging low and bereft and walks toward the circle of demons, his low baritone joining in their chant. Castiel tries to follow him with his eyes but the angle is awkward and painful for his neck, the position difficult to hold. His head falls back down on the table. He doesn’t suppose it matters anyway.
The incense is heavy in the air, reminding him of a drug bust gone bad when the felons had set their entire supply on fire. In the time it took for the agents to get contained breathing apparatus, they’d all started to feel the narcotic effects - blurred vision, confused thoughts, auditory and visual hallucinations. He can see the smoke drifting up from the candles and coiling lazily across the ceiling and he imagines he can almost make out the form of a snake, a cobra, fanning out its hood, flicking out its forked tongue and lapping at flames.
He plays Uriel’s words over in his head, something pulling at his brain, something pushing toward the edge of it - annoying and prevalent, like a splinter in swollen flesh that you cannot see but most definitely can feel. He thinks about himself as the key. His strange dreams float through his head. Dean rescuing him, telling him about keys; telling Castiel that he’s not just a key. Pamela telling him that keys both lock and unlock; that his death is his choice. The symbols on the pages he kept back form Bobby. The squiggly lines, the transmutation, his dream about locking a door and telling Dean he’s sorry. Uriel saying he wished it could be someone other than Castiel, that Uriel’s intent is strong enough. He thinks about what Pamela told him about faith.
The curlicues of smoke and incense across the symbols etched in the ceiling are grey and wispy and the seem to writhe and move out of time with the rest of the world.
And in them, Castiel sees a vision of himself.
He frowns, staring up at the ceiling. The chanting seems very far away, out of step with his hearing. In the way that clouds have a shape and a form, he sees a door in the smoke, sees himself closing it and then falling away, breaking off into wisps that fade into nothingness.
He suddenly understands. He feels like a prophet, shown a vision.
He is a key, a key that can open or close the portal. The key only follows intent, does as its master bids. But Castiel is also a man and can be the master of the key. His death is the linch pin but it is but it is the intent behind it that forces the nature of the ritual. Uriel started Castiel’s death and wants the portal open.
But if Castile choses, if he choses to die, and at the same time wishes the portal closed, it can be done.
All he has to do is chose.
And act.
Just as quickly as the feeling of euphoria had spread over him at his understanding, at his clarity, a feeling of despair and futility chases it away. He is bound. He cannot free himself.
He has the answer but is unable to use it. He ponders what he could have done differently, how he could have changed this event to avoid it. Pamela had stated that his death would be his choice, but he sees no choice in his current situation. Rather if he’d had any choice in the matter whatsoever, he’d still be safely ensconced back in his apartment, in his bed.
With Dean.
Dean.
Castiel’s heart aches when he thinks of Dean, of wasted time and missed chances. He thinks about their relationship, the phone calls late at night, hearing Dean’s voice low and quiet in his ear, and then finally feeling Dean’s body, his skin, his calloused roughened hands, his sharp green eyes. It seems impossible that he could be given such a gift, such an opportunity, and lose it all.
Castiel thinks of Dean hearing about his death, or perhaps he and Sam will be the ones to find him, stretched out, pale and exsanguinated on this makeshift altar.
He prays that’s not what happens.
Although he’s not entirely sure to whom he’s praying.
He twists and pulls his wrists and arms and can’t be sure if he’s imagining it or not when he thinks the ropes are slightly loser on the left hand side.
No one’s come forth to stop him so either it’s not, or they are so secure with his bonds it doesn’t matter.
But he cannot just lie here and do nothing, so he continues to yank and tug at his arms, turning his wrists and fingers at strange angles trying to get some purchase.
The smoke undulates and twists above him, complex and incomprehensible shapes and curves. He closes his eyes, choosing instead to think of Dean.
***
The saying is, it’s always in the last place you look.
Dean thinks that’s horseshit. Of course it fucking is. Why in hell would you keep looking after you found what you were looking for?
But he can’t help that phrase from running through his head as he and Sammy leave the first sacred grounds they went to empty handed.
As much as he hates to admit it, Sam was right. If they’d split up, Dean would be at this empty, busted up church by himself and Sam…
Well, Sam would be fighting for Cas’ life.
At least, he thinks so, because if Cas isn’t at the next place, he doesn’t know where they’re supposed to go next.
His hands ache with the grip he’s got on the Impala's steering wheel and he can’t even apologize to his baby properly right now because all he can think about is Cas.
Cas sleep-warm and blinking up at him from bed, hours earlier, as Dean smiled down at him and tried to figure out what kind of donut he liked.
Cas’ serious, solemn face and his creepy-bird stare that Dean thinks he might actually love a little bit.
And he’s never been one to toss the L-word out there lightly.
Cas’ blue eyes and gravelly voice and five o’clock shadow and goddamnit how is this happening? Dean can’t lose this, he can’t lose Cas. He didn’t even know he fucking wanted this except for those few times, drunk, late at night, unable to sleep in a cheap hotel room, staring up in the dark, longing for something and then telling himself that it didn’t fucking matter. He had his car, he had Sam, he had hunting, he had Bobby.
It was all he needed.
Now he knows how completely fucked he is. How much he wants this thing with Cas. He’s so fucking scared he’s gonna lose it before he even really knew what it was like to have it in the first place.
He coaxing all the speed he can out of the Impala and still make the turns without fishtailing out of control. The centrifugal force pulling on his insides makes his stomach lurch in protest.
It’s on the outskirts of town, an old, abandoned church built in a small hamlet that couldn’t complete with the bigger cities around it. People must have moved, died, turned their backs and never come back because all that’s left now, according to county records, is an old building that no one wants to tear down because it’s kind of pretty and people used to pray there. It’ll stay standing until the city expands far enough that commercialism burns out any residual sentimentality or guilt and then it will be bull dozed to the ground. The cemetery, if there is one, will be relocated and any holy relics that anyone finds either absconded with or sent back to the church - depending on the guilt factor of the finder.
They see cars parked at the abandoned building from further out and Dean flexes his hands on the wheel and floors the gas harder until Sam speaks up.
“Whoa, whoa, what are you gonna do? Drive on through the front doors?”
“Yes.”
Sam puts one hand on the wheel and the other on Dean’s knee. “Dean, you can’t… we gotta be smart about this.” He gives the wheel a jerk and the car zig-zags wildly. Dean shouts in anger and annoyance before pulling over.
“What? You gotta a better idea?”
“We do this like any other hunt. We gather some intel and then go in. Jesus, Dean. What if-” Sam huffs in exasperation. “What if they have Cas stretched out across the front entranceway?”
“That’s bullshit, Sam, that wouldn’t happen,” Dean says angrily.
“You’re right, probably not. But what if? You could kill him by just-” he waves his hands madly, “driving in there without thinking. Just think.”
“I can’t! All right? Is that what you wanted to hear?” Dean shoots back, surprising himself with his own words. “I just - Jesus Sammy, there’s gotta be some way out of this.”
“We’ll figure it out,” Sam affirms and although Dean’s not sure he believes him, he feels something fierce and big swell up in his chest for his brother in that moment.
“Okay?” Sam asks.
He manages to nod. “Okay. Okay.” He stares ahead in the distance at the old church. He feels something. It’s not foreboding he’s not so… overly dramatic to call it that. But it’s definitely something cruel and hard in his gut.
He takes a deep breath. They just have to bust in there and break Cas out. Easy as pie. Hell, he’s already done it once before. Then Bobby will call them with some magical Bobby thing and they can sort this all out.
He can do this.
They can do this.
He sends up a silent prayer to a God he’s never been sure he believes in.
Please, if you’re there, if someone’s there, don’t let me fuck this up. I can’t fuck this up. I’ve hardly ever asked you for anything, but I… need this one thing.
I need it.
I - need him.
“Dean.”
Sam’s voice breaks over him like water on rocks and he has to shake his head a bit.
“Yeah, okay. Let’s go.”
***
It starts as a tingling in the back of his brain.
Cas’ eyes are still closed. He can’t see his hands at this angle so it made no difference to his struggle whether he kept them open or not.
He’s certain he’s getting somewhere with his bonds, certain that he’s making progress when he feels it - like ghostly fingers playing across the nape of his neck.
He feels his body pebble in gooseflesh, chilled and unnerved by the sensation. He can still hear the chanting, can hear Uriel’s voice mixed in with them all and still feels the sting of betrayal.
The strange, prickly sensation works its way down his neck to the top of his spine and then finger walks itself down each vertebrae until he feels like he has liquid energy pooling in the base of his lower back.
He doesn’t want to pay attention to it, doesn’t want to think about what it means. He can hear the voices getting louder, getting more excited, more frenzied. He pulls harder at his wrists and is shocked when he feels the rope on one side give. He blinks his eyes open and turns his head and looks over…
His wrist is almost free.
The thick rope must have been too large to hold the knot securely and all his tugging and pulling did pay off. He glances around, bleary eyed and his head spins with vertigo as he rotates it.
The room reels out in front of him, darker now than before. He sees the backs of Uriel’s acolytes, the back of Uriel himself, kneeling before some kind of makeshift alter, separate and apart from the one that Castiel is laid out on.
He doesn’t know if it’s futile or not, only that he has to try. He manages to wrench his body on its side and starts working on his other hand, trying to keep one eye on the demons and another on his work.
He recognizes bits and pieces of the language they’re chanting in. It’s the same Enochian that he’s been learning; the foreign words and syllables falling easily from Uriel’s tongue.
The curling and coiling sensation in his lower back intensifies and he feels like … he’s being watched. Although surely if he were, someone would have stopped him.
He’s got his other wrist free and his heart is pounding loud enough that he can’t believe it can’t be heard over all the chanting. He sits up and starts frantically working on one of his legs, the work going easier, faster now with both hands.
He hears a strange cracking or peeling sound and he starts, looking around anxiously but either no one else has heard it or no one else cares. His heart beats faster, harder and he has the strangest notion it will pound its way right out of his chest.
He’s got one of his ankles free. He feels like he could vomit at any moment, he’s so full of adrenaline, fear and preparation for a fight. He has to force himself not to just pull maniacally at the bonds, not to just shout and curse and try to wrench free like a wild animal, but to focus methodically and precisely at getting himself untied. He’s so close, he’s so close, he could actually make it out of here-
Oh.
His hands stutter to a stop for a moment. He can’t make it out of here. Can he? That’s part of the choice. His fingers go back to work on the last of the ropes. He needs to be in control - no matter what, he can’t face his end strapped down to this alter out of control. Freedom first, then he can decide what to do.
The rope finally gives way, the last of his bonds sliding off his ankle as he tugs it free.
And hears all hell break loose in the church. He hears Dean’s voice and he wants to weep.
Castiel slides off the altar, its surface slightly slick with his blood, and falls to the ground. He hears gun shots, chanting still, Uriel’s voice above it all, and more chanting - Sam’s deep baritone, the same words he heard before, the night he met them.
Met Dean.
There’s more gun fire and a disciple or demon, he supposes, drops dead next to him, her body expelling black smoke in a riotous swirl. He cringes away from it, as if it would burn or despoil him if he touched it.
Attached to her hip, is a knife.
Without thinking about it, he dives. He’s a federal agent and in his hands a knife is just as deadly as any other weapon. He’s just standing up, knife clutched in his grip when the pain blossoms hot and sharp in his chest.
He gasps and falls forward across the altar, clutching at his chest with one hand.
“You see? You are too late, brother. It’s too late.”
He looks up and makes eye contact with Uriel, who is crouching behind one of the pews.
“Cas!”
Dean’s voice makes his head turn sharply and he sees Dean, at the back of the church, struggling, fighting with demons that haven’t yet been exorcised or perhaps humans who, like Uriel, are invested in the portal opening. There are three of them crowding Dean but he’s holding his own with the sawed off end of his shotgun swinging like a bat, even as Sam continues chanting and scrubbing at the corner of one of the huge demon sigils painted on the floor, trying to break its magic.
Another cold, sharp pain spears through his chest and he lurches forward slightly, curling over the altar, blood spilling forth from his lips.
“It’s true, it has come to pass, for though you are the key, you are also the door, such is the circle, such is the way of it,” Uriel crows.
Cas looks down and can see his chest shifting and surging and it hurts, sweet Jesus it hurts.
He can hear Dean calling his name, shouting and grunting with effort, trying to fight his way through, to Cas.
Cas feels something split and give, inside him and there’s a bright light. He looks down and sees, impossibly, a luminous silver crack bisecting his chest, straight through the sigil carved into it. It burns cold, like dry ice, but with sharp teeth digging into him.
And the answer is just there. In his mind, in his hand, whispered in his ear by an unseen presence.
Let it be your will, your choice, my child.
He feels such peace in that moment, such a sense of calm. The pain is still there but its not crowding out his own thoughts. He grips the knife and lifts it to his neck.
He glances over to where Dean is and sees him, sees Dean, sees his green eyes, even from this distance, widen. Sees him struggle and go manic like a wild animal, shouting Cas’ name.
“I’m sorry, Dean.”
He know that Dean can’t hear him but hopes the look in his eyes, on his face, is enough.
He presses the sharp edge of the blade to his neck and thinks close close close, I want it closed as hard as he can. He feels it sink in, almost painless, feels blood spurt and blossom hot and wet, hears Dean shouting and he feels such sorrow, such loss, such love for Dean in that moment.
He falls, feeling the impact of his body hitting the ground, feels the blood continue to rush out of his neck.
Suddenly Dean is there, over him, pressing his hands to his neck and Castiel tries to bat them away.
“Fuck, fuck FUCK, goddammit you aren’t doing this, Cas! Jesus Christ help me, Sam! Sam! I need help!”
Dean’s pressing down on his neck, his hands warm and slippery with Cas’ blood and Cas wants to tell him it’s fine, it’s okay now. He can feel the pressure in his chest easing, can feel something sliding shut, closing over. Castiel can feel the warmth of something akin to fingertips press against his forehead and it confuses him. Dean’s hands are still on Cas’ neck.
“Holy Christ, Cas, please, stay with me, just… fuck!”
He thinks Dean might be crying, his voice breaking and Cas puts one of his hands on top of Dean’s and presses lightly. Dean’s eyes snap from Cas’ neck to his eyes and Castiel takes the moment to stare at Dean, as he loves to do, to stare at his features. Though they are twisted in grief and panic, he is still beautiful.
He thinks he might even mouth the word but he knows no sound escapes his lips and the last thing he sees, as darkness starts creeping in on the sides of his vision and black is pooling at the edges, is Dean leaning over him, getting closer.
He thinks he might feel Dean’s lips on his.
Then… nothing.
***
Dean’s always been able to push through.
Push through a sprained ankle on a hunt when he was sixteen to kill a werewolf. Pushed through bullet holes and knife wounds when he was older to gank some demons. Pushed through almost losing Sam to a bad hunt a few years back and managed to get him to the Impala, get him to a hospital and then pushed through waiting for the news that finally came that he was gonna be all right.
With Cas slack and limp, dead, in his arms and Sam breathing hard behind him, it takes a moment to process that there are still some humans alive in this mess and maybe more, he doesn’t know, and he needs to do his fucking job.
He gently lays Cas down on the ground, wincing when Cas’ head hits the floor with a soft thud. He takes his outer shirt off and drapes it over Cas because he knows, he knows Cas hates, hated, those scars on his chest and didn’t like them being exposed. He feels Sam’s hand on his shoulder and looks up to see Sam’s face scanning the church for foes or danger, even as he’s trying to comfort Dean.
He pushes to his feet, feeling the sticky wetness of Cas’ blood on his hands, his jeans. He and Sam split up, Sam to one end of the church, Dean to another.
He finds Uriel babbling to himself in a corner, tucked behind one of the pews and Dean feels such a rage surge up in him at the sight.
“No, no, it was supposed to work, he was the key, he was the portal. My brother betrayed, my sacrifice for the world, my gift to them. It can’t be, it can’t be finished.”
Dean is too tired to deal with this shit. He sighs wearily and is about to step forward and grab Uriel by the shoulders, slap some sense into him, beat him senseless, he’s not sure what, but Uriel flinches and jerks, and there’s a gun in his hand.
He eats a bullet by his own hand before Dean can stop him.
Or maybe he could’ve stopped him but he just didn’t care enough to do so. Either way, one less thing to worry about.
He hears Sam call his name, worry laced in his voice and he looks over to see Sam’s concerned face looking back at him. He manages some kind of expression, he’s not sure what, and Sam seems to understand that Dean isn’t in danger, Dean’s okay, and goes back to trussing up some humans that are still alive.
Dean’s not okay.
He finds a couple of sigils and signs etched in the ground and he scrapes over them enough to disable them, keep them from being active. He flips over a few bodies, checking to see if anyone’s left alive, but all he finds are dead humans and leftover demon hosts. Some killed by him, some killed by Sam, some dead by their own hand.
No less than twenty minutes later and he and Sam have met up after their grisly tasks and are at the back of the church. Dean’s pointedly not looking toward the front where their makeshift altar was.
Where Cas’ body is.
“I figure we head back to town, call the cops and tip them off, they can come out here and clean up. Do…” Sam waves to the humans he’s got tied up. “I don’t know what with them. Charge them, commit them, let them go?” He sighs. “I don’t know, man.”
“Yeah,” Dean breathes.
“Uh,” Sam says, faltering a bit. “If you want, I can, uh, go get the Impala and we can… take Cas with us. Maybe give him a hunter’s funeral? Or not. You know… just… whatever you want. Whatever you need.”
Sam’s looking at him like he thinks Dean might break and maybe he isn’t so far from the truth. But Dean wouldn’t even know where to start having a nervous breakdown or whatever.
He wants to go get good and drunk.
He wants to go back to Cas and flop down into his bed and smell his pillows.
He wants to go hunt something and kill and then kill it some more. Kill it a few unnecessary times until something gives and he doesn’t feel so…
So he doesn’t feel.
He finds himself nodding before he means to and saying, “Yeah. I, uh,” he clears his throat. “I think I’d like that.”
“You know, um, maybe you should go get the car and I’ll… get Cas.”
He shakes his head at that. “No. I’ll do it.” He slides his hand into his pocket and pulls out the keys, handing them over to Sam, pausing when he sees his hands, brown-red with blood.
Sam takes the keys gently and hesitates, even as Dean is already turning and heading toward the front of the church again. He feels a deep, heavy weight in his chest that gets more hard and painful as he steps until he finally reaches the end of the aisle and bends around the corner and sees -
“Sam!”
He hears Sam’s footfalls as he races up the aisle, hears him come to a stop right behind Dean, and then feels him clutching at his shoulder.
“What? Oh my God, where - ?” Sam starts only to stand there with his mouth hanging a bit open.
On the ground, where they’d left him, where Dean had left Cas, is only Dean’s plaid shirt, soaked in blood.
Dean reaches out, picks it up off the floor. The ground beneath the shirt is pristine. No blood, no signs of anything, really. They look around, at each other, at the other bodies - still in the same place, at the church - still old, broken down and empty but for them.
“Where did he go?” Sam finally says.
Dean opens and closes his mouth several times but nothing comes out. He can’t think, he can’t breathe. He doesn’t understand and isn’t sure he wants to, isn’t sure what it means, if it means anything. He and Sam have seen crazy shit their whole lives and he doesn’t know what to make of this.
“What happened?” Sam asks, but it’s clear he doesn’t expect any answers from Dean, he’s just saying out loud what they’re both thinking. What they’re both wondering.
He stands there, unable to move until Sam finally nudges him. “Let’s… go back to Cas’ place. Call Bobby and… I don’t know, man, see if we can figure this out.”
Dean nods but he’s reluctant to leave, reluctant to walk away from this place, the last place he saw Cas. But he knows, intellectually, that he can’t just stay here, in this church, staring at an empty spot on the ground. He runs his hand over his jaw and nods again, finally following after Sam when he tugs on Dean’s t-shirt.
He looks back several times as he walks out of the church. Looking for something, anything. He isn’t sure what.
But nothing happens.
***
Castiel opens his eyes and sees nothing but blue skies and white clouds above him.
Which is not what he was expecting.
He sits up, feels the short, green grass under his hands, sees the big, wide trees surrounding the small clearing he’s in and breathes in deep, smelling fresh air and dirt.
No incense. No black smoke.
He listens carefully and hears no chanting, no gunfire. Only the sound of the wind in the leaves of the trees.
He looks down and finds himself in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. He runs a hand over his chest and can’t feel the ever-present scars. With nervous fingers, he feels along his neck, searching for the slash wound he self-inflicted. He can feel a thin line of tougher flesh but no gaping wound, no blood.
He is barefoot and when he stands, the grass is cool and only somewhat prickly under his feet. It’s soft but he still feels small pokes from the blades as he turns in a circle. He squints. In the distance, he thinks he can make out a person and a horse.
He heads toward them.
As he gets closer, he sees the person is a woman, her long black hair wavy and messy, spilling down her back. She’s in riding gear and is brushing down the horse - a beautiful chestnut beast who shines in the sunlight.
“Hello?” Castiel asks.
She doesn’t turn, keeps brushing her horse.
“You’re a long way from home, Castiel. A long way.”
“Yes, I… what is this place.”
“We’re between,” she says, bending over to drop the brush in a steel bucket. She turns around, dusts her hands off on her pants and steps closer. “Now, let me look at you.”
She cups his face with her hands, which feel rough and well-used - like she works for a living. She has gorgeous honey brown eyes that flicker amber and gold in the light, framed by high-arched brows. Her skin is flawless and his eyes travel over her face, starting at her widow’s peak hairline, down her straight nose with it’s slightly too-large rounded tip and then her pale-pink lips which are curled in a small smile.
She smiles wider as she regards him.
“It’s good to see you up close again.”
“Who are you? Do we know each other?”
“I know you.”
The way she says it - low, confident and sure - has Castiel’s heart beating in his chest. He feels as though he shouldn't be staring at her but he can’t help himself.
“Are you God?”
She doesn’t answer, dropping her hands and turning back to her horse. She runs a hand over his face and mane.
“This beast has a will of its own. A free will, although some might argue that. But anyone who has tried to tame an animal will tell you that they can be as willful as humans, if not more so.”
“Why am I here? I must be dead. I had to close the portal,” Cas says, trying to step around into her line of sight.
“You did. Don’t worry.”
“Was it a test?” Castiel frowns.
“No,” she answers quickly, fixing the horses bridle and bit. “Never a test. I don’t test people or play games.”
“Then why?”
“Free will is a difficult mistress. Everyone has it. It is theirs to do with as they wish. I cannot stop that.”
Castiel comes around to the other side of the horse. The horse noses at him, pressing its velvety snout into Castiel’s armpit and then his neck, sniffing him and snorting. Castiel startles back slightly.
“He won’t hurt you. You’re safe with me,” the woman says.
“Why am I here?” Castiel repeats.
She sighs, petting her animal. “I have… a fondness for you, Castiel. In a million in one universes, you face incredible odds against all manners of evil and in a million and one universes, you try to do the right thing every time. It’s… heartwarming. And heartbreaking.” Her eyes flick up again and meet his. They are sad and luminous, fathomless. “You try. You don’t always succeed, you don’t always make good decisions, but you always try. You and Dean both. My toy soldiers.”
At the sound of Dean’s name, Castiel feels his heart clench. Dean. Oh, how he left Dean. The final images of him that Dean will surely carry for the rest of his life. But Castiel did what had to be done, what was right. He knows that.
“Of course you did,” she says, pulling the thoughts right out of his head. “And I hope to reward you for it, in this universe, even if I do not always in others.”
“I don’t understand,” Castiel says. “I didn’t do it for any reward.”
She smiles, steps around her horse and cradles his face in her hands again. “I know. And that is why I wish to reward you.” She stretches up on her tip-toes and presses her lips to his forehead.
It’s the third time that day his world flickers into nothingness.
***
Dean drives while Sam is on the phone with Bobby. Sam had seemed reluctant to let him take the wheel but since the other option was Sam driving while Dean had to make actual, logical conversation with someone, Dean just held his hand out for the keys and Sam dropped them back in Dean’s hand without saying a word.
Dean listens as he hears Sam explain to Bobby everything that happened in detail, pausing at times when Bobby must ask a question and then clarifying or reiterating something. His hands tighten on the wheel as Sam gets to the part where Cas freed himself and then slit his own throat.
Sam then tells Bobby how they went back to get his body and it was just gone. Bobby has a few questions about that and makes Sam go through in painstaking detail where everyone was in the church, where the symbols were placed, which order they had destroyed them in, who was left alive and who wasn’t.
He doesn’t have any answers for them but he says he’ll keep looking.
The only thing that Sam says after he hangs up with Bobby is, “Bobby says he’s sorry, man. About Castiel.”
Dean manages a tight nod and keeps driving.
He pulls over at the first pay phone he sees and Sam runs out and makes a quick anonymous tip to the local cops about the abandoned church and what they’ll find there, hanging up as soon as he’s done talking before anyone can ask him any questions.
Sam gets back in the car and drums his fingers nervously on his knee, fidgeting slightly. Dean knows his brother well enough to know that he wants to say something so he turns in his seat and glares at him.
“What?”
Sam scrunches up his nose a big. “Just. We don’t have to go back to Cas’. I mean, we can go, if that’s what you want, but we don’t have to if you don’t want to. We can just go to the motel and… pack up. Get outta town. Head to Bobby’s and maybe catch a hunt from there.”
“I might’ve left something there,” Dean lies effortlessly. He knows damn well he didn’t but when he thinks about just skipping town, just leaving without going back to Cas’ place… he can’t do it.
Sam nods. “Sure. Sure. Good idea. Check the place out.”
“I’ll drop you at the motel, you can pack up and check out while I go to… Cas’,” he says, stumbling a bit over Cas’ name. “I’ll swing by when I’m done. Pick you up and we’ll leave.”
“Um, yeah. If that’s what you want. I don’t mind going with you if you want some company-” Sam starts but Dean cuts him off.
“No need for company. Just checking around,” he says bluntly.
“Sure. Sure,” Sam repeats. “Sounds good.”
Sam doesn’t say anything else, not even when he gets out of the car at the motel. He pauses, hand on the door, hesitating closing it and Dean sees him give that look and all he can think is Please, Sammy, don’t say anything right now. I can’t listen to you right now.
Sam must know him well enough or think better of it because he just purses his lips a bit in a grimace that’s trying hard to be a reassuring smile but just isn’t. He shuts the door with a heavy click. Dean’s half way to Cas’ place when he feels his phone vibrate in his pocket but he doesn’t have the heart or the energy to pull it out and see what it says. Probably just Sam telling him how much time he needs to get all their shit together or Bobby trying to offer his condolences directly.
It buzzes twice more before he gets to Cas’ and without looking at the screen, he presses and holds the power button, shutting it off. He’ll deal with his avoidance issues later.
Or he’ll just keep avoiding them, he thinks with dark humor. Sam will hound him, he’ll pretend he’s fine until he can push it far enough down and then Sam will either believe he’s fine or berate him for burying his feelings. Sam will eventually get tired of haranguing him to talk and give up and things will go back to the way they were.
End of story.
He only finds a spot big enough for the Impala two blocks away and has to walk the rest of the way to Cas’, pulling his leather jacket around him and stuffing his hands deep into his pocket, hoping that no one sees the blood still on him.
He probably should’ve showered and changed at the motel first.
He probably shouldn’t have come here at all.
The door is unlocked - Dean had only pulled it shut behind him when he left - hadn’t really been in a frame of mind to lock it. He steps into the apartment and even though he knows what the place looks like, he can’t help but stop and stare, taking stock.
His eyes hit the photo of Cas and his brother, Gabriel, tacked up on the wall and Jesus, he’s got to tell Gabriel what happened. He can’t let him wonder and worry when he realizes Cas is gone, missing. He owes it to Cas to tell his brother. He doesn’t know what he’ll tell him - doesn’t know how he’ll explain why there’s no body, or Uriel and his freakshow cult, the demons, the portal… Fuck.
He’ll try to stick to as much of the truth as he can. If something ever happened to Sam, Dean would want to know the truth. Gabriel deserves no less.
He’s still staring at the photo on the wall when he hears a sound from the bedroom and Dean’s a fucking moron because he’s unarmed. He knows better than to ever be unarmed but he just didn’t think, couldn’t think when he got here and now someone is in Cas’ apartment and holy fuck that makes him see red.
The door to the bedroom opens and -
There’s Cas.
His eyes light up in surprise and relief at seeing Dean.
He’s in jeans and a t-shirt, feet bare, hair mussed as though he’d had a nap or forgot to comb it after towel drying it. He looks healthy, whole.
Alive.
Dean stumbles back, knocking into the table by the door and falling back on it a bit, tripping over his feet as he tries to get his bearings.
“Christo,” he spits and Cas frowns and does his bird-like head tilt-y thing.
“I am not a demon, Dean.”
“How did - you can’t - I was - you were dead. I saw you die.”
Cas looks as bewildered as Dean feels. “I don’t know,” he says with a frown. “I remember being in the church, you were there and I was - dying.” He pauses. “Then… there was something. I can’t… but then there was nothing.”
He takes a step out of the bedroom doorway and Dean stumble-steps sideways into the kitchen. His heart is racing and feels a little sick and he might be forgetting to blink because his eyes are burning.
“Then what?” he demands.
Cas looks dumbfounded. “Then I was here. In my bed and it was like… I was only waking up. I tried to call you but there was no answer. I feared… I feared something had happened after I… after.”
Dean pulls his silver lighter out of his pocket and tosses it at Cas and wants to cry in relief when Cas just reaches up and catches it, frowning at it before looking at Dean with confused eyebrows.
“Silver?” he asks and Dean nods. Castiel holds it up for Dean to see, pinching it between his fingers and there’s no burning, no smoke. No anything.
“I don’t know what to say to you, Dean. I am as amazed and perplexed as you.”
Dean barks out a laugh that sounds slightly hysterical even to his own ears. Cas takes another tentative step forward and when Dean doesn’t move he continues, coming all the way out of the bedroom doorway, through the short hallway and into the kitchen.
Until he’s standing right in front of Dean.
“You’re covered in blood,” Cas says quietly.
“It’s yours,” Dean manages.
Castiel’s eyes are worried and sad and Dean’s afraid to blink. Afraid that if he does, Cas will disappear.
But, when Dean breathes, he can smell Cas. If he listens hard enough, he can hear his quiet inhalations and exhalations. He stares at him warily but wanting, wanting so badly to believe, to have this. But he’s scared. Things like this don’t happen to him, to hunters. They live a short and brutish life and then they die and if they’re lucky, they’re burned and they finally rest.
The supernatural never works in their favor. They may use it to combat evil, kill creatures and demons but it comes with a heavy price that usually sucks all the good out of their life.
They don’t ever really win. They don’t get happy ever after.
Except, maybe they do, this one time, he thinks, he hopes.
He prays.
Cas reaches out and places a hand on Dean’s bicep. His grip is warm and firm and a sigh punches out from Dean’s lungs. Cas’ eyes are steady and calm as he examines Dean, looks him over and waits.
Maybe he gets a happy ending.
His foot stutters and his body starts to lean slightly toward Cas and then it’s like he’s falling forward, toward Cas, into Cas and Cas’ body is against his and he’s pulling him tighter and closer and Jesus, he wants them closer still. He feels Cas’ arms come carefully around him, encircling him and Dean unashamedly buries his face in Cas’ neck and feels his own body start to shake.
Cas is warm and solid. Alive.
He pulls back slightly and then kisses Cas carefully, tentatively like he’s worried he’ll break him or something.
“My scars are gone,” Castiel says, taking Dean’s hand and sliding it up underneath his t-shirt slightly and Dean’s fingers tremble as he feels the smooth, unmarked skin, warm and soft. “Except for this.”
Cas tilts his head back slightly and, under his chin, in the soft hollow of his throat where his jugular lays, there is a fine, silverly line bisecting the otherwise unblemished skin. Without thinking about it, Dean leans forward and presses his lips to the scar, feeling Cas’ pulse under the skin. Cas shivers slightly and Dean smiles against his neck. He snakes one hand around Cas’ waist and drags the other up to Cas’ nape, threading through his soft hair.
“I have to call Sam and then we’re having amazing celebratory ‘holy shit you’re alive’ sex.”
“You’re filthy,” Cas says, almost primly. “You should take a shower. And then you should eat, and probably rest. You look exhausted, Dean.”
Dean laughs quietly at the thought that he could possibly sleep now that Cas is with him.
“Well, I think you might owe me some sexy shower times,” he says, tongue darting out to lick at Cas’ lips which are still a little chapped, miraculous return notwithstanding.
Cas smiles slightly. “Yes. I think I do.” He tugs on Dean’s fingers, pulling him toward the bedroom and master bath.
Dean resists slightly, keeping Cas close to him and Cas frowns in confusion. Dean wants to tell Cas he loves him, wants to say the words out loud, see Cas’ face when he hears them, know that Cas believes them.
“I…” Dean starts, and fuck, why is this so hard? “I wanted… I wanted to say, because I never did before and maybe you don’t know, Jesus how could you when I didn’t know myself but I just… I… I…”
Cas smiles and presses a quick, light kiss to Dean’s lips. “I know. I love you too.”
Dean feels relief like he’s never felt before. Cas knows. Cas gets it. Cas understands, thank god.
All his concerns about how this could all work, with Cas, about Cas being a fed and Dean being a felon - Dean doesn’t care anymore. Whatever it takes, he’ll make it work.
When Cas tugs at him again, this time, Dean lets himself be led.
See the Art!
Back to Part 5
Dean feels the weight of those words sink in but he’s not sure he really gets it. He chances a glance over at Sam who looks just as confused as Dean feels. It sounds like good news but Bobby’s tone is anything but happy.
"I don’t get it," Dean says, leaning over the phone. "So he can close it too. That’s good news, right?"
Bobby sighs. "It’s good and bad."
Dean thumps his fist on the table in frustration. "Don’t dance around it, what’s it mean?"
"Dean," Sam says quietly and Dean knows what his brother is trying to do. Dean knows he’s about five seconds away from losing his shit but he doesn’t care.
"It’s all about intent," Bobby’s saying. "Castiel had about 80% of these pages translated but he was missing some of the more… subtle words. Some of them are have a couple meanings and some are double talk and then others-"
"Jesus Christ, spare me the grammar lesson," Dean bites out.
"I’m trying to tell you this in a way you’ll understand, idjit. Your Castiel is a key that can open or close a portal to the other side but to use that key - to make it work, make him work-"
Bobby stops talking and Dean wants to turn the whole desk over. It’s infuriating and maddening and he just wants to know what it all means so he can find Castiel and shoot something.
"What?" Dean asks.
Bobby’s voice is low and quiet when he finally speaks. "The door gets cracked open with the ritual and if Uriel kills Castiel, the portal opens."
"I know that, Bobby. Jesus, what are you trying to say?"
"It opens because that’s what Uriel wants. You get me? It’s about Uriel’s intent. He nudges the door and then kicks it open by completing the ritual. Cause that’s what he wants. But if the ritual starts, and the portal is partially opened and if someone else who wants the portal closed gets involved, it can be shut."
"Great," says Dean. "That’s actually good news, right? How do we do that?" He looks over at Sam.
And feels his heart clench.
Sam’s eyebrows are anxious and furrowed and he’s looking at Dean like he’s sorry, he’s so sorry. Dean can’t speak for the lump that’s suddenly in his throat, thick and hard, clenching around his vocal chords.
"The only way to close the doorway is if you… if Castiel is killed by someone who wants the portal closed," Bobby finishes and it’s like a sucker punch to Dean’s gut.
He manages to swallow once around the knot in his throat. "Well, then we gotta get there before they start, right? I mean, that’s what you’re saying. If the portal’s already open then it’s too late but as long as we find him before that -"
"Dean," Bobby says and Dean starts shaking his head the second he hears Bobby’s tone. He sees Sam out of the corner of his eye, body tense, head bowed, worrying his lip.
"Based on what I’m reading, that doorway is already open."
“No,” Dean says simply.
Bobby continues on. “It started that first night, before you and Sam got there.”
“I’m telling you no,” Dean counters, flinging off Sam’s hand on his arm roughly.
“By the time you boys arrived, based on what I’ve got translated now, it’s too late.”
“You go back to that fucking grimoire and you figure it out,” Dean snaps.
“I’m still gonna be working on it, of course I am,” Bobby says. “And I know you’re gonna be looking for Cas. I’m telling you, if you find him-”
“We’re going to find him,” Dean says, cutting Bobby off.
“I don’t see another way out of this, boys. I’m sorry, Dean. When you find him, the only way to close this doorway-”
“No,” Dean says again, voice low and resolute. “There’s gotta be some sort of, I don’t know, failsafe and if we gank Uriel, I bet this all falls apart.” He can feel his hands shaking, feel his whole body shaking and he tries desperately to still himself. He needs to stay focused.
“And that’s the next thing I’m looking into,” Bobby says and his placating tone makes Dean grind his teeth. “But if that doesn’t pan out-”
“It’ll work!” Dean exclaims angrily. “I’m not- we’re not gonna-” he hears his voice start to waver and it’s horrifying and terrible and he feels a hot sting in his eyes and a painful ache in his throat and Sam’s hand is on his arm again and he barely manages to shrug it off and shuffle away from him. He can’t bear the thought of being touched right now.
“Bobby,” Sam says. “I’ve got a couple of places lined up that I think are likely locales. Maybe we can go over them, see what you think?”
Bobby sighs long and hard into the receiver, his breathing filling the airwaves. “Yeah. What’ve you got?”
Dean can’t listen to this. He can’t sit here and listen to co-ordinates and likely places and half leads. He stalks out of the office, slamming the door behind him as hard as he can and he wants to kick it when it won’t make a satisfying noise. It just shuts with a muffled click; it’s not heavy enough to shut with a bang.
He ends up going to the sofa and stares down at it, fists clenched at his sides. Stupid, ridiculous hobbit sized sofa and before he knows what he’s doing, he’s kicking it and pulling the cushions off and upending the coffee table before he sends his foot right into one of the sofa tables as well. It folds like a house of cards and he ends up using one of the legs as a bat and beats the fucking awful sofa that’s too small for two grown men.
After about ten good hits, he’s a little out of breath and feels worse. Feels stupid and impotent but still just as angry. He tosses the piece of wood aside and plunks down onto the beaten sofa, the exposed springs digging into his butt.
God he’s so fucking stupid. He was so stupid to think he could have something with Cas and that it wouldn’t all go to shit. So stupid to leave Cas alone, no matter how many times Castiel said he could take care of himself. So stupid to ever expect fate or God or whatever to be on his fucking side for once.
From where he sits on the sofa he can see the lonely picture of Castiel and his brother Gabriel on the wall. Tacked up off-center and by its self.
He doesn’t know if Cas has any other pictures of himself.
Sam comes out of the office minutes later and Dean can see him out of the corner of his eye, inching forward into Dean’s line of sight.
“Dean-”
“Just… don’t. I don’t wanna…” Dean scrubs his face with his hands. “What’ve you and Bobby got for a location?” he asks and he hopes with every cell in his body that they’ve got something.
“We’ve narrowed it down to two likely places-” Sam starts.
“Gimme one, you do the other,” Dean interrupts.
Sam makes one of his bitch-faces. “Yeah. No. That’s a horrible idea and you know it.”
“If you’ve got two places and there are two of us, well, I know I’m no college man like yourself but it seems pretty straight forward to me.”
“Dean, I know you’re upset right now.”
“Stop,” Dean commands. “Stick to the hunt.”
Sam huffs out a breath. “Fine. It’s stupid to split up. One of us could end up being alone fighting a demon army. Now I know you’re thinking, jesus, you’re hoping it’ll be you,” Sam says, waiting for his words to sink in. “What if it’s me?”
Fuck it, Sam is right and Dean knows that, he knows it but he just… The thought of going someplace, of getting all ready and then going there and finding nothing is a sick weight in his gut.
But he doesn’t want to think about Sam by himself hunting either. Jesus, it’s bad enough that Cas is… that Cas is…
“All right,” he says, voice gruff. “Where to first?”
***
Castiel hears the chanting, smells the incense and is confused.
It’s so familiar but he’s been dreaming of it for weeks and he can’t tell if it’s a memory or a dream or-
He pulls hard on his arms, finding them secured to an altar. His eyes snap open and above him he sees the symbols, the one’s he knows intimately well by now. He looks down and sees his chest, bared and scarred. His eyes move around taking in the people chanting, the candles, the incense the stained glass windows, the old brick walls and -
“Brother, you’ve awoken.”
“We aren’t brothers,” Castiel says, echoing the words from his dream.
Uriel’s smile is sad and terrifying at the same time. “I’m sorry you feel that way. I feel so close to you, Castiel. You are the symbol of my life’s work. The pinnacle of my dreams. We’ve shared much and now we’ll share this.”
The chanting is background noise - incessant and unintelligible. He estimates there are no more than twenty robed people in the room, standing around the perimeter.
It is only Uriel and himself at the altar.
Castiel pulls at the ropes binding his wrists and feet. “This is madness.”
Uriel looks disappointed. “I’m sorry you won’t be able to see the culmination of my work, of our destiny. But you will forever be held in reverence by me and amongst my chosen disciples. Your sacrifice is great. It will not be forgotten.”
Castiel thinks about all the time he and Uriel spent together - long hours working cases, time spent alone on stakeouts or in the office reviewing reports, tracking down criminals in seedy locations with only each other for backup. He’s angry at Uriel for his betrayal but he’s also sad. Sad for the lost comrade, the lost partnership. He thought he could count on Uriel. He thought he was always safe with Uriel at his back.
And now he’s at the wrong end of Uriel’s knife.
Again.
Uriel makes quick work of slicing through the scar tissue on Castiel’s wrists and he feels the warm, wet blood start to run out. As before, it’s not too deep, not too harsh - it will take him time to bleed out.
“Was it all a lie?” Castiel asks.
Uriel pauses and wipes the blade off on a kerchief, his movements practiced and fluid. “No. Not all of it. Indeed I do see us as brothers, comrades in arms. But our world is broken, Castiel. You of all people should know that. Think of what we’ve seen, what we’ve cleaned up after. The crime, the drugs, the violence. The world needs a change.”
“Uriel,” Castiel pleads, pulling at the bindings, willing Uriel to listen to him. “This is madness,” he repeats.
Uriel shakes his head. “I wish you could understand. This will be a purge, a cleanse. It’s always the most difficult to clean out the infected tissue; the debridement of a wound is painful, messy work. But the end result is healing. The world will be better for it.”
Castiel searches Uriel’s eyes and is somewhat surprised that he doesn’t see the shine of madness or insanity. Uriel is as calm, as stoic as he ever was.
“You truly believe, don’t you?”
Uriel looks somewhat relieved by Castiel’s question. “Yes,” he says emphatically. “Do you know how beautiful it will be? This new world? My only regret is that you have to die for it be born. After that night, the night you were rescued, I hoped that using you to start the ritual would be enough. I prayed that I could find another sacrifice to take your place and complete the ritual, but unfortunately, it didn’t work.”
“I am the key,” Castiel murmurs. He can still feel the blood dripping out of his wrists, cold where the air touches it, but also warm, right at the pulse point. It creates a strange dichotomous feeling against his skin. The smell of the incense is cloying and thick, crowding into his nostrils and taking up all the space. It burns through the back of his throat down to his lungs. He shakes his head a bit finding his thoughts getting cloudy and slow.
Uriel nods sadly. “You are the key wielded by my intent. If only my intent were enough, Castiel, you could be spared. I would gladly take another in your place but though my will is strong, you are already the key. The only key.”
Uriel turns from him then, head hanging low and bereft and walks toward the circle of demons, his low baritone joining in their chant. Castiel tries to follow him with his eyes but the angle is awkward and painful for his neck, the position difficult to hold. His head falls back down on the table. He doesn’t suppose it matters anyway.
The incense is heavy in the air, reminding him of a drug bust gone bad when the felons had set their entire supply on fire. In the time it took for the agents to get contained breathing apparatus, they’d all started to feel the narcotic effects - blurred vision, confused thoughts, auditory and visual hallucinations. He can see the smoke drifting up from the candles and coiling lazily across the ceiling and he imagines he can almost make out the form of a snake, a cobra, fanning out its hood, flicking out its forked tongue and lapping at flames.
He plays Uriel’s words over in his head, something pulling at his brain, something pushing toward the edge of it - annoying and prevalent, like a splinter in swollen flesh that you cannot see but most definitely can feel. He thinks about himself as the key. His strange dreams float through his head. Dean rescuing him, telling him about keys; telling Castiel that he’s not just a key. Pamela telling him that keys both lock and unlock; that his death is his choice. The symbols on the pages he kept back form Bobby. The squiggly lines, the transmutation, his dream about locking a door and telling Dean he’s sorry. Uriel saying he wished it could be someone other than Castiel, that Uriel’s intent is strong enough. He thinks about what Pamela told him about faith.
The curlicues of smoke and incense across the symbols etched in the ceiling are grey and wispy and the seem to writhe and move out of time with the rest of the world.
And in them, Castiel sees a vision of himself.
He frowns, staring up at the ceiling. The chanting seems very far away, out of step with his hearing. In the way that clouds have a shape and a form, he sees a door in the smoke, sees himself closing it and then falling away, breaking off into wisps that fade into nothingness.
He suddenly understands. He feels like a prophet, shown a vision.
He is a key, a key that can open or close the portal. The key only follows intent, does as its master bids. But Castiel is also a man and can be the master of the key. His death is the linch pin but it is but it is the intent behind it that forces the nature of the ritual. Uriel started Castiel’s death and wants the portal open.
But if Castile choses, if he choses to die, and at the same time wishes the portal closed, it can be done.
All he has to do is chose.
And act.
Just as quickly as the feeling of euphoria had spread over him at his understanding, at his clarity, a feeling of despair and futility chases it away. He is bound. He cannot free himself.
He has the answer but is unable to use it. He ponders what he could have done differently, how he could have changed this event to avoid it. Pamela had stated that his death would be his choice, but he sees no choice in his current situation. Rather if he’d had any choice in the matter whatsoever, he’d still be safely ensconced back in his apartment, in his bed.
With Dean.
Dean.
Castiel’s heart aches when he thinks of Dean, of wasted time and missed chances. He thinks about their relationship, the phone calls late at night, hearing Dean’s voice low and quiet in his ear, and then finally feeling Dean’s body, his skin, his calloused roughened hands, his sharp green eyes. It seems impossible that he could be given such a gift, such an opportunity, and lose it all.
Castiel thinks of Dean hearing about his death, or perhaps he and Sam will be the ones to find him, stretched out, pale and exsanguinated on this makeshift altar.
He prays that’s not what happens.
Although he’s not entirely sure to whom he’s praying.
He twists and pulls his wrists and arms and can’t be sure if he’s imagining it or not when he thinks the ropes are slightly loser on the left hand side.
No one’s come forth to stop him so either it’s not, or they are so secure with his bonds it doesn’t matter.
But he cannot just lie here and do nothing, so he continues to yank and tug at his arms, turning his wrists and fingers at strange angles trying to get some purchase.
The smoke undulates and twists above him, complex and incomprehensible shapes and curves. He closes his eyes, choosing instead to think of Dean.
***
The saying is, it’s always in the last place you look.
Dean thinks that’s horseshit. Of course it fucking is. Why in hell would you keep looking after you found what you were looking for?
But he can’t help that phrase from running through his head as he and Sammy leave the first sacred grounds they went to empty handed.
As much as he hates to admit it, Sam was right. If they’d split up, Dean would be at this empty, busted up church by himself and Sam…
Well, Sam would be fighting for Cas’ life.
At least, he thinks so, because if Cas isn’t at the next place, he doesn’t know where they’re supposed to go next.
His hands ache with the grip he’s got on the Impala's steering wheel and he can’t even apologize to his baby properly right now because all he can think about is Cas.
Cas sleep-warm and blinking up at him from bed, hours earlier, as Dean smiled down at him and tried to figure out what kind of donut he liked.
Cas’ serious, solemn face and his creepy-bird stare that Dean thinks he might actually love a little bit.
And he’s never been one to toss the L-word out there lightly.
Cas’ blue eyes and gravelly voice and five o’clock shadow and goddamnit how is this happening? Dean can’t lose this, he can’t lose Cas. He didn’t even know he fucking wanted this except for those few times, drunk, late at night, unable to sleep in a cheap hotel room, staring up in the dark, longing for something and then telling himself that it didn’t fucking matter. He had his car, he had Sam, he had hunting, he had Bobby.
It was all he needed.
Now he knows how completely fucked he is. How much he wants this thing with Cas. He’s so fucking scared he’s gonna lose it before he even really knew what it was like to have it in the first place.
He coaxing all the speed he can out of the Impala and still make the turns without fishtailing out of control. The centrifugal force pulling on his insides makes his stomach lurch in protest.
It’s on the outskirts of town, an old, abandoned church built in a small hamlet that couldn’t complete with the bigger cities around it. People must have moved, died, turned their backs and never come back because all that’s left now, according to county records, is an old building that no one wants to tear down because it’s kind of pretty and people used to pray there. It’ll stay standing until the city expands far enough that commercialism burns out any residual sentimentality or guilt and then it will be bull dozed to the ground. The cemetery, if there is one, will be relocated and any holy relics that anyone finds either absconded with or sent back to the church - depending on the guilt factor of the finder.
They see cars parked at the abandoned building from further out and Dean flexes his hands on the wheel and floors the gas harder until Sam speaks up.
“Whoa, whoa, what are you gonna do? Drive on through the front doors?”
“Yes.”
Sam puts one hand on the wheel and the other on Dean’s knee. “Dean, you can’t… we gotta be smart about this.” He gives the wheel a jerk and the car zig-zags wildly. Dean shouts in anger and annoyance before pulling over.
“What? You gotta a better idea?”
“We do this like any other hunt. We gather some intel and then go in. Jesus, Dean. What if-” Sam huffs in exasperation. “What if they have Cas stretched out across the front entranceway?”
“That’s bullshit, Sam, that wouldn’t happen,” Dean says angrily.
“You’re right, probably not. But what if? You could kill him by just-” he waves his hands madly, “driving in there without thinking. Just think.”
“I can’t! All right? Is that what you wanted to hear?” Dean shoots back, surprising himself with his own words. “I just - Jesus Sammy, there’s gotta be some way out of this.”
“We’ll figure it out,” Sam affirms and although Dean’s not sure he believes him, he feels something fierce and big swell up in his chest for his brother in that moment.
“Okay?” Sam asks.
He manages to nod. “Okay. Okay.” He stares ahead in the distance at the old church. He feels something. It’s not foreboding he’s not so… overly dramatic to call it that. But it’s definitely something cruel and hard in his gut.
He takes a deep breath. They just have to bust in there and break Cas out. Easy as pie. Hell, he’s already done it once before. Then Bobby will call them with some magical Bobby thing and they can sort this all out.
He can do this.
They can do this.
He sends up a silent prayer to a God he’s never been sure he believes in.
Please, if you’re there, if someone’s there, don’t let me fuck this up. I can’t fuck this up. I’ve hardly ever asked you for anything, but I… need this one thing.
I need it.
I - need him.
“Dean.”
Sam’s voice breaks over him like water on rocks and he has to shake his head a bit.
“Yeah, okay. Let’s go.”
***
It starts as a tingling in the back of his brain.
Cas’ eyes are still closed. He can’t see his hands at this angle so it made no difference to his struggle whether he kept them open or not.
He’s certain he’s getting somewhere with his bonds, certain that he’s making progress when he feels it - like ghostly fingers playing across the nape of his neck.
He feels his body pebble in gooseflesh, chilled and unnerved by the sensation. He can still hear the chanting, can hear Uriel’s voice mixed in with them all and still feels the sting of betrayal.
The strange, prickly sensation works its way down his neck to the top of his spine and then finger walks itself down each vertebrae until he feels like he has liquid energy pooling in the base of his lower back.
He doesn’t want to pay attention to it, doesn’t want to think about what it means. He can hear the voices getting louder, getting more excited, more frenzied. He pulls harder at his wrists and is shocked when he feels the rope on one side give. He blinks his eyes open and turns his head and looks over…
His wrist is almost free.
The thick rope must have been too large to hold the knot securely and all his tugging and pulling did pay off. He glances around, bleary eyed and his head spins with vertigo as he rotates it.
The room reels out in front of him, darker now than before. He sees the backs of Uriel’s acolytes, the back of Uriel himself, kneeling before some kind of makeshift alter, separate and apart from the one that Castiel is laid out on.
He doesn’t know if it’s futile or not, only that he has to try. He manages to wrench his body on its side and starts working on his other hand, trying to keep one eye on the demons and another on his work.
He recognizes bits and pieces of the language they’re chanting in. It’s the same Enochian that he’s been learning; the foreign words and syllables falling easily from Uriel’s tongue.
The curling and coiling sensation in his lower back intensifies and he feels like … he’s being watched. Although surely if he were, someone would have stopped him.
He’s got his other wrist free and his heart is pounding loud enough that he can’t believe it can’t be heard over all the chanting. He sits up and starts frantically working on one of his legs, the work going easier, faster now with both hands.
He hears a strange cracking or peeling sound and he starts, looking around anxiously but either no one else has heard it or no one else cares. His heart beats faster, harder and he has the strangest notion it will pound its way right out of his chest.
He’s got one of his ankles free. He feels like he could vomit at any moment, he’s so full of adrenaline, fear and preparation for a fight. He has to force himself not to just pull maniacally at the bonds, not to just shout and curse and try to wrench free like a wild animal, but to focus methodically and precisely at getting himself untied. He’s so close, he’s so close, he could actually make it out of here-
Oh.
His hands stutter to a stop for a moment. He can’t make it out of here. Can he? That’s part of the choice. His fingers go back to work on the last of the ropes. He needs to be in control - no matter what, he can’t face his end strapped down to this alter out of control. Freedom first, then he can decide what to do.
The rope finally gives way, the last of his bonds sliding off his ankle as he tugs it free.
And hears all hell break loose in the church. He hears Dean’s voice and he wants to weep.
Castiel slides off the altar, its surface slightly slick with his blood, and falls to the ground. He hears gun shots, chanting still, Uriel’s voice above it all, and more chanting - Sam’s deep baritone, the same words he heard before, the night he met them.
Met Dean.
There’s more gun fire and a disciple or demon, he supposes, drops dead next to him, her body expelling black smoke in a riotous swirl. He cringes away from it, as if it would burn or despoil him if he touched it.
Attached to her hip, is a knife.
Without thinking about it, he dives. He’s a federal agent and in his hands a knife is just as deadly as any other weapon. He’s just standing up, knife clutched in his grip when the pain blossoms hot and sharp in his chest.
He gasps and falls forward across the altar, clutching at his chest with one hand.
“You see? You are too late, brother. It’s too late.”
He looks up and makes eye contact with Uriel, who is crouching behind one of the pews.
“Cas!”
Dean’s voice makes his head turn sharply and he sees Dean, at the back of the church, struggling, fighting with demons that haven’t yet been exorcised or perhaps humans who, like Uriel, are invested in the portal opening. There are three of them crowding Dean but he’s holding his own with the sawed off end of his shotgun swinging like a bat, even as Sam continues chanting and scrubbing at the corner of one of the huge demon sigils painted on the floor, trying to break its magic.
Another cold, sharp pain spears through his chest and he lurches forward slightly, curling over the altar, blood spilling forth from his lips.
“It’s true, it has come to pass, for though you are the key, you are also the door, such is the circle, such is the way of it,” Uriel crows.
Cas looks down and can see his chest shifting and surging and it hurts, sweet Jesus it hurts.
He can hear Dean calling his name, shouting and grunting with effort, trying to fight his way through, to Cas.
Cas feels something split and give, inside him and there’s a bright light. He looks down and sees, impossibly, a luminous silver crack bisecting his chest, straight through the sigil carved into it. It burns cold, like dry ice, but with sharp teeth digging into him.
And the answer is just there. In his mind, in his hand, whispered in his ear by an unseen presence.
Let it be your will, your choice, my child.
He feels such peace in that moment, such a sense of calm. The pain is still there but its not crowding out his own thoughts. He grips the knife and lifts it to his neck.
He glances over to where Dean is and sees him, sees Dean, sees his green eyes, even from this distance, widen. Sees him struggle and go manic like a wild animal, shouting Cas’ name.
“I’m sorry, Dean.”
He know that Dean can’t hear him but hopes the look in his eyes, on his face, is enough.
He presses the sharp edge of the blade to his neck and thinks close close close, I want it closed as hard as he can. He feels it sink in, almost painless, feels blood spurt and blossom hot and wet, hears Dean shouting and he feels such sorrow, such loss, such love for Dean in that moment.
He falls, feeling the impact of his body hitting the ground, feels the blood continue to rush out of his neck.
Suddenly Dean is there, over him, pressing his hands to his neck and Castiel tries to bat them away.
“Fuck, fuck FUCK, goddammit you aren’t doing this, Cas! Jesus Christ help me, Sam! Sam! I need help!”
Dean’s pressing down on his neck, his hands warm and slippery with Cas’ blood and Cas wants to tell him it’s fine, it’s okay now. He can feel the pressure in his chest easing, can feel something sliding shut, closing over. Castiel can feel the warmth of something akin to fingertips press against his forehead and it confuses him. Dean’s hands are still on Cas’ neck.
“Holy Christ, Cas, please, stay with me, just… fuck!”
He thinks Dean might be crying, his voice breaking and Cas puts one of his hands on top of Dean’s and presses lightly. Dean’s eyes snap from Cas’ neck to his eyes and Castiel takes the moment to stare at Dean, as he loves to do, to stare at his features. Though they are twisted in grief and panic, he is still beautiful.
He thinks he might even mouth the word but he knows no sound escapes his lips and the last thing he sees, as darkness starts creeping in on the sides of his vision and black is pooling at the edges, is Dean leaning over him, getting closer.
He thinks he might feel Dean’s lips on his.
Then… nothing.
***
Dean’s always been able to push through.
Push through a sprained ankle on a hunt when he was sixteen to kill a werewolf. Pushed through bullet holes and knife wounds when he was older to gank some demons. Pushed through almost losing Sam to a bad hunt a few years back and managed to get him to the Impala, get him to a hospital and then pushed through waiting for the news that finally came that he was gonna be all right.
With Cas slack and limp, dead, in his arms and Sam breathing hard behind him, it takes a moment to process that there are still some humans alive in this mess and maybe more, he doesn’t know, and he needs to do his fucking job.
He gently lays Cas down on the ground, wincing when Cas’ head hits the floor with a soft thud. He takes his outer shirt off and drapes it over Cas because he knows, he knows Cas hates, hated, those scars on his chest and didn’t like them being exposed. He feels Sam’s hand on his shoulder and looks up to see Sam’s face scanning the church for foes or danger, even as he’s trying to comfort Dean.
He pushes to his feet, feeling the sticky wetness of Cas’ blood on his hands, his jeans. He and Sam split up, Sam to one end of the church, Dean to another.
He finds Uriel babbling to himself in a corner, tucked behind one of the pews and Dean feels such a rage surge up in him at the sight.
“No, no, it was supposed to work, he was the key, he was the portal. My brother betrayed, my sacrifice for the world, my gift to them. It can’t be, it can’t be finished.”
Dean is too tired to deal with this shit. He sighs wearily and is about to step forward and grab Uriel by the shoulders, slap some sense into him, beat him senseless, he’s not sure what, but Uriel flinches and jerks, and there’s a gun in his hand.
He eats a bullet by his own hand before Dean can stop him.
Or maybe he could’ve stopped him but he just didn’t care enough to do so. Either way, one less thing to worry about.
He hears Sam call his name, worry laced in his voice and he looks over to see Sam’s concerned face looking back at him. He manages some kind of expression, he’s not sure what, and Sam seems to understand that Dean isn’t in danger, Dean’s okay, and goes back to trussing up some humans that are still alive.
Dean’s not okay.
He finds a couple of sigils and signs etched in the ground and he scrapes over them enough to disable them, keep them from being active. He flips over a few bodies, checking to see if anyone’s left alive, but all he finds are dead humans and leftover demon hosts. Some killed by him, some killed by Sam, some dead by their own hand.
No less than twenty minutes later and he and Sam have met up after their grisly tasks and are at the back of the church. Dean’s pointedly not looking toward the front where their makeshift altar was.
Where Cas’ body is.
“I figure we head back to town, call the cops and tip them off, they can come out here and clean up. Do…” Sam waves to the humans he’s got tied up. “I don’t know what with them. Charge them, commit them, let them go?” He sighs. “I don’t know, man.”
“Yeah,” Dean breathes.
“Uh,” Sam says, faltering a bit. “If you want, I can, uh, go get the Impala and we can… take Cas with us. Maybe give him a hunter’s funeral? Or not. You know… just… whatever you want. Whatever you need.”
Sam’s looking at him like he thinks Dean might break and maybe he isn’t so far from the truth. But Dean wouldn’t even know where to start having a nervous breakdown or whatever.
He wants to go get good and drunk.
He wants to go back to Cas and flop down into his bed and smell his pillows.
He wants to go hunt something and kill and then kill it some more. Kill it a few unnecessary times until something gives and he doesn’t feel so…
So he doesn’t feel.
He finds himself nodding before he means to and saying, “Yeah. I, uh,” he clears his throat. “I think I’d like that.”
“You know, um, maybe you should go get the car and I’ll… get Cas.”
He shakes his head at that. “No. I’ll do it.” He slides his hand into his pocket and pulls out the keys, handing them over to Sam, pausing when he sees his hands, brown-red with blood.
Sam takes the keys gently and hesitates, even as Dean is already turning and heading toward the front of the church again. He feels a deep, heavy weight in his chest that gets more hard and painful as he steps until he finally reaches the end of the aisle and bends around the corner and sees -
“Sam!”
He hears Sam’s footfalls as he races up the aisle, hears him come to a stop right behind Dean, and then feels him clutching at his shoulder.
“What? Oh my God, where - ?” Sam starts only to stand there with his mouth hanging a bit open.
On the ground, where they’d left him, where Dean had left Cas, is only Dean’s plaid shirt, soaked in blood.
Dean reaches out, picks it up off the floor. The ground beneath the shirt is pristine. No blood, no signs of anything, really. They look around, at each other, at the other bodies - still in the same place, at the church - still old, broken down and empty but for them.
“Where did he go?” Sam finally says.
Dean opens and closes his mouth several times but nothing comes out. He can’t think, he can’t breathe. He doesn’t understand and isn’t sure he wants to, isn’t sure what it means, if it means anything. He and Sam have seen crazy shit their whole lives and he doesn’t know what to make of this.
“What happened?” Sam asks, but it’s clear he doesn’t expect any answers from Dean, he’s just saying out loud what they’re both thinking. What they’re both wondering.
He stands there, unable to move until Sam finally nudges him. “Let’s… go back to Cas’ place. Call Bobby and… I don’t know, man, see if we can figure this out.”
Dean nods but he’s reluctant to leave, reluctant to walk away from this place, the last place he saw Cas. But he knows, intellectually, that he can’t just stay here, in this church, staring at an empty spot on the ground. He runs his hand over his jaw and nods again, finally following after Sam when he tugs on Dean’s t-shirt.
He looks back several times as he walks out of the church. Looking for something, anything. He isn’t sure what.
But nothing happens.
***
Castiel opens his eyes and sees nothing but blue skies and white clouds above him.
Which is not what he was expecting.
He sits up, feels the short, green grass under his hands, sees the big, wide trees surrounding the small clearing he’s in and breathes in deep, smelling fresh air and dirt.
No incense. No black smoke.
He listens carefully and hears no chanting, no gunfire. Only the sound of the wind in the leaves of the trees.
He looks down and finds himself in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. He runs a hand over his chest and can’t feel the ever-present scars. With nervous fingers, he feels along his neck, searching for the slash wound he self-inflicted. He can feel a thin line of tougher flesh but no gaping wound, no blood.
He is barefoot and when he stands, the grass is cool and only somewhat prickly under his feet. It’s soft but he still feels small pokes from the blades as he turns in a circle. He squints. In the distance, he thinks he can make out a person and a horse.
He heads toward them.
As he gets closer, he sees the person is a woman, her long black hair wavy and messy, spilling down her back. She’s in riding gear and is brushing down the horse - a beautiful chestnut beast who shines in the sunlight.
“Hello?” Castiel asks.
She doesn’t turn, keeps brushing her horse.
“You’re a long way from home, Castiel. A long way.”
“Yes, I… what is this place.”
“We’re between,” she says, bending over to drop the brush in a steel bucket. She turns around, dusts her hands off on her pants and steps closer. “Now, let me look at you.”
She cups his face with her hands, which feel rough and well-used - like she works for a living. She has gorgeous honey brown eyes that flicker amber and gold in the light, framed by high-arched brows. Her skin is flawless and his eyes travel over her face, starting at her widow’s peak hairline, down her straight nose with it’s slightly too-large rounded tip and then her pale-pink lips which are curled in a small smile.
She smiles wider as she regards him.
“It’s good to see you up close again.”
“Who are you? Do we know each other?”
“I know you.”
The way she says it - low, confident and sure - has Castiel’s heart beating in his chest. He feels as though he shouldn't be staring at her but he can’t help himself.
“Are you God?”
She doesn’t answer, dropping her hands and turning back to her horse. She runs a hand over his face and mane.
“This beast has a will of its own. A free will, although some might argue that. But anyone who has tried to tame an animal will tell you that they can be as willful as humans, if not more so.”
“Why am I here? I must be dead. I had to close the portal,” Cas says, trying to step around into her line of sight.
“You did. Don’t worry.”
“Was it a test?” Castiel frowns.
“No,” she answers quickly, fixing the horses bridle and bit. “Never a test. I don’t test people or play games.”
“Then why?”
“Free will is a difficult mistress. Everyone has it. It is theirs to do with as they wish. I cannot stop that.”
Castiel comes around to the other side of the horse. The horse noses at him, pressing its velvety snout into Castiel’s armpit and then his neck, sniffing him and snorting. Castiel startles back slightly.
“He won’t hurt you. You’re safe with me,” the woman says.
“Why am I here?” Castiel repeats.
She sighs, petting her animal. “I have… a fondness for you, Castiel. In a million in one universes, you face incredible odds against all manners of evil and in a million and one universes, you try to do the right thing every time. It’s… heartwarming. And heartbreaking.” Her eyes flick up again and meet his. They are sad and luminous, fathomless. “You try. You don’t always succeed, you don’t always make good decisions, but you always try. You and Dean both. My toy soldiers.”
At the sound of Dean’s name, Castiel feels his heart clench. Dean. Oh, how he left Dean. The final images of him that Dean will surely carry for the rest of his life. But Castiel did what had to be done, what was right. He knows that.
“Of course you did,” she says, pulling the thoughts right out of his head. “And I hope to reward you for it, in this universe, even if I do not always in others.”
“I don’t understand,” Castiel says. “I didn’t do it for any reward.”
She smiles, steps around her horse and cradles his face in her hands again. “I know. And that is why I wish to reward you.” She stretches up on her tip-toes and presses her lips to his forehead.
It’s the third time that day his world flickers into nothingness.
***
Dean drives while Sam is on the phone with Bobby. Sam had seemed reluctant to let him take the wheel but since the other option was Sam driving while Dean had to make actual, logical conversation with someone, Dean just held his hand out for the keys and Sam dropped them back in Dean’s hand without saying a word.
Dean listens as he hears Sam explain to Bobby everything that happened in detail, pausing at times when Bobby must ask a question and then clarifying or reiterating something. His hands tighten on the wheel as Sam gets to the part where Cas freed himself and then slit his own throat.
Sam then tells Bobby how they went back to get his body and it was just gone. Bobby has a few questions about that and makes Sam go through in painstaking detail where everyone was in the church, where the symbols were placed, which order they had destroyed them in, who was left alive and who wasn’t.
He doesn’t have any answers for them but he says he’ll keep looking.
The only thing that Sam says after he hangs up with Bobby is, “Bobby says he’s sorry, man. About Castiel.”
Dean manages a tight nod and keeps driving.
He pulls over at the first pay phone he sees and Sam runs out and makes a quick anonymous tip to the local cops about the abandoned church and what they’ll find there, hanging up as soon as he’s done talking before anyone can ask him any questions.
Sam gets back in the car and drums his fingers nervously on his knee, fidgeting slightly. Dean knows his brother well enough to know that he wants to say something so he turns in his seat and glares at him.
“What?”
Sam scrunches up his nose a big. “Just. We don’t have to go back to Cas’. I mean, we can go, if that’s what you want, but we don’t have to if you don’t want to. We can just go to the motel and… pack up. Get outta town. Head to Bobby’s and maybe catch a hunt from there.”
“I might’ve left something there,” Dean lies effortlessly. He knows damn well he didn’t but when he thinks about just skipping town, just leaving without going back to Cas’ place… he can’t do it.
Sam nods. “Sure. Sure. Good idea. Check the place out.”
“I’ll drop you at the motel, you can pack up and check out while I go to… Cas’,” he says, stumbling a bit over Cas’ name. “I’ll swing by when I’m done. Pick you up and we’ll leave.”
“Um, yeah. If that’s what you want. I don’t mind going with you if you want some company-” Sam starts but Dean cuts him off.
“No need for company. Just checking around,” he says bluntly.
“Sure. Sure,” Sam repeats. “Sounds good.”
Sam doesn’t say anything else, not even when he gets out of the car at the motel. He pauses, hand on the door, hesitating closing it and Dean sees him give that look and all he can think is Please, Sammy, don’t say anything right now. I can’t listen to you right now.
Sam must know him well enough or think better of it because he just purses his lips a bit in a grimace that’s trying hard to be a reassuring smile but just isn’t. He shuts the door with a heavy click. Dean’s half way to Cas’ place when he feels his phone vibrate in his pocket but he doesn’t have the heart or the energy to pull it out and see what it says. Probably just Sam telling him how much time he needs to get all their shit together or Bobby trying to offer his condolences directly.
It buzzes twice more before he gets to Cas’ and without looking at the screen, he presses and holds the power button, shutting it off. He’ll deal with his avoidance issues later.
Or he’ll just keep avoiding them, he thinks with dark humor. Sam will hound him, he’ll pretend he’s fine until he can push it far enough down and then Sam will either believe he’s fine or berate him for burying his feelings. Sam will eventually get tired of haranguing him to talk and give up and things will go back to the way they were.
End of story.
He only finds a spot big enough for the Impala two blocks away and has to walk the rest of the way to Cas’, pulling his leather jacket around him and stuffing his hands deep into his pocket, hoping that no one sees the blood still on him.
He probably should’ve showered and changed at the motel first.
He probably shouldn’t have come here at all.
The door is unlocked - Dean had only pulled it shut behind him when he left - hadn’t really been in a frame of mind to lock it. He steps into the apartment and even though he knows what the place looks like, he can’t help but stop and stare, taking stock.
His eyes hit the photo of Cas and his brother, Gabriel, tacked up on the wall and Jesus, he’s got to tell Gabriel what happened. He can’t let him wonder and worry when he realizes Cas is gone, missing. He owes it to Cas to tell his brother. He doesn’t know what he’ll tell him - doesn’t know how he’ll explain why there’s no body, or Uriel and his freakshow cult, the demons, the portal… Fuck.
He’ll try to stick to as much of the truth as he can. If something ever happened to Sam, Dean would want to know the truth. Gabriel deserves no less.
He’s still staring at the photo on the wall when he hears a sound from the bedroom and Dean’s a fucking moron because he’s unarmed. He knows better than to ever be unarmed but he just didn’t think, couldn’t think when he got here and now someone is in Cas’ apartment and holy fuck that makes him see red.
The door to the bedroom opens and -
There’s Cas.
His eyes light up in surprise and relief at seeing Dean.
He’s in jeans and a t-shirt, feet bare, hair mussed as though he’d had a nap or forgot to comb it after towel drying it. He looks healthy, whole.
Alive.
Dean stumbles back, knocking into the table by the door and falling back on it a bit, tripping over his feet as he tries to get his bearings.
“Christo,” he spits and Cas frowns and does his bird-like head tilt-y thing.
“I am not a demon, Dean.”
“How did - you can’t - I was - you were dead. I saw you die.”
Cas looks as bewildered as Dean feels. “I don’t know,” he says with a frown. “I remember being in the church, you were there and I was - dying.” He pauses. “Then… there was something. I can’t… but then there was nothing.”
He takes a step out of the bedroom doorway and Dean stumble-steps sideways into the kitchen. His heart is racing and feels a little sick and he might be forgetting to blink because his eyes are burning.
“Then what?” he demands.
Cas looks dumbfounded. “Then I was here. In my bed and it was like… I was only waking up. I tried to call you but there was no answer. I feared… I feared something had happened after I… after.”
Dean pulls his silver lighter out of his pocket and tosses it at Cas and wants to cry in relief when Cas just reaches up and catches it, frowning at it before looking at Dean with confused eyebrows.
“Silver?” he asks and Dean nods. Castiel holds it up for Dean to see, pinching it between his fingers and there’s no burning, no smoke. No anything.
“I don’t know what to say to you, Dean. I am as amazed and perplexed as you.”
Dean barks out a laugh that sounds slightly hysterical even to his own ears. Cas takes another tentative step forward and when Dean doesn’t move he continues, coming all the way out of the bedroom doorway, through the short hallway and into the kitchen.
Until he’s standing right in front of Dean.
“You’re covered in blood,” Cas says quietly.
“It’s yours,” Dean manages.
Castiel’s eyes are worried and sad and Dean’s afraid to blink. Afraid that if he does, Cas will disappear.
But, when Dean breathes, he can smell Cas. If he listens hard enough, he can hear his quiet inhalations and exhalations. He stares at him warily but wanting, wanting so badly to believe, to have this. But he’s scared. Things like this don’t happen to him, to hunters. They live a short and brutish life and then they die and if they’re lucky, they’re burned and they finally rest.
The supernatural never works in their favor. They may use it to combat evil, kill creatures and demons but it comes with a heavy price that usually sucks all the good out of their life.
They don’t ever really win. They don’t get happy ever after.
Except, maybe they do, this one time, he thinks, he hopes.
He prays.
Cas reaches out and places a hand on Dean’s bicep. His grip is warm and firm and a sigh punches out from Dean’s lungs. Cas’ eyes are steady and calm as he examines Dean, looks him over and waits.
Maybe he gets a happy ending.
His foot stutters and his body starts to lean slightly toward Cas and then it’s like he’s falling forward, toward Cas, into Cas and Cas’ body is against his and he’s pulling him tighter and closer and Jesus, he wants them closer still. He feels Cas’ arms come carefully around him, encircling him and Dean unashamedly buries his face in Cas’ neck and feels his own body start to shake.
Cas is warm and solid. Alive.
He pulls back slightly and then kisses Cas carefully, tentatively like he’s worried he’ll break him or something.
“My scars are gone,” Castiel says, taking Dean’s hand and sliding it up underneath his t-shirt slightly and Dean’s fingers tremble as he feels the smooth, unmarked skin, warm and soft. “Except for this.”
Cas tilts his head back slightly and, under his chin, in the soft hollow of his throat where his jugular lays, there is a fine, silverly line bisecting the otherwise unblemished skin. Without thinking about it, Dean leans forward and presses his lips to the scar, feeling Cas’ pulse under the skin. Cas shivers slightly and Dean smiles against his neck. He snakes one hand around Cas’ waist and drags the other up to Cas’ nape, threading through his soft hair.
“I have to call Sam and then we’re having amazing celebratory ‘holy shit you’re alive’ sex.”
“You’re filthy,” Cas says, almost primly. “You should take a shower. And then you should eat, and probably rest. You look exhausted, Dean.”
Dean laughs quietly at the thought that he could possibly sleep now that Cas is with him.
“Well, I think you might owe me some sexy shower times,” he says, tongue darting out to lick at Cas’ lips which are still a little chapped, miraculous return notwithstanding.
Cas smiles slightly. “Yes. I think I do.” He tugs on Dean’s fingers, pulling him toward the bedroom and master bath.
Dean resists slightly, keeping Cas close to him and Cas frowns in confusion. Dean wants to tell Cas he loves him, wants to say the words out loud, see Cas’ face when he hears them, know that Cas believes them.
“I…” Dean starts, and fuck, why is this so hard? “I wanted… I wanted to say, because I never did before and maybe you don’t know, Jesus how could you when I didn’t know myself but I just… I… I…”
Cas smiles and presses a quick, light kiss to Dean’s lips. “I know. I love you too.”
Dean feels relief like he’s never felt before. Cas knows. Cas gets it. Cas understands, thank god.
All his concerns about how this could all work, with Cas, about Cas being a fed and Dean being a felon - Dean doesn’t care anymore. Whatever it takes, he’ll make it work.
When Cas tugs at him again, this time, Dean lets himself be led.
See the Art!