Supernatural Fic: Some Dreaming State, (1/8)
Title: Some Dreaming State
Rating: NC-17 overall
Pairing: Dean/Cas
Character List: Castiel, Dean, Sam, Meg, Crowley, halLucifer
Warnings/Enticements: jealous!Dean, Sam and Cas broship with a side of awesome!Sam, explicit violence, explicit torture, explicit sex, soulbonding, BAMF!Cas, protective!Cas, offscreen death of a minor character, brief Dean/OFC, brief jealous!Cas
Spoilers: through the end of 7.17, goes AU after
Summary: Meg wants a weapon. When Castiel refuses, she sells him out to Crowley. The Winchesters won't be happy... assuming they find out.
Wordcount: about 52K total
Title comes from Florence + the Machine's 'Blinding'.
Under the cut.
Part 1
The chamber was enormous, the walls practically invisible in the distance and the ceiling so far above his head Castiel couldn't be sure it existed. The whole space emanated a violent, bloody red light. He felt tiny in comparison; though he’d easily be able to fit inside this place in his true form, he’d been somehow bound in his vessel.
His only consolation was that his opponent was apparently similarly limited, though to refer to Lucifer as 'limited' in any way seemed to be an underestimation of his power. Even in human form, the archangel still had great power at his disposal.
Not that this was truly Lucifer. It was simply the manifestation of Sam's worst tormenter, an afterimage preserved during the transfer of the madness from Sam’s mind to Castiel’s.
"You can't win against me, brother," Lucifer said, voice almost kind. He stood not twenty paces from Castiel, in the exact center of the room. He kept turning as Cas circled him, never presenting the weaker angel with his back but his gaze was more curious than wary despite the sword in Castiel’s hand. Lucifer had nothing to fear; Castiel stood no chance against him, as he had stood no chance against Raphael. This time, however, there was no Crowley with his silver tongue and seductive offers, there was no Purgatory, there was no Hell to borrow from, and there were no Winchesters to ask for help.
"No Winchesters, Cassie? Even if they were here, do you think they'd help you?" Lucifer asked, raising an eyebrow.
"They're my friends," Cas said firmly. He took a firmer grip on his weapon, briefly pausing in his circling. "If they could, they would."
"I think you'll find that you mean... if Dean could. If Dean could, he would," Lucifer said, voice like silk. "If Dean was here, if Dean stood a chance, if Dean hadn't left... Dean, Dean, Dean. He's all you ever think about. He's the only thought in your head; and let me say, it makes for very boring company."
Castiel clenched his jaw. This being before him was not truly an archangel, but was merely borrowing the shape of one. It did not have an archangel’s powers. More to the point, they were fighting in Castiel's mind. By all logic, Cas should have been able to smite it and completely remove it from existence, even though it had proven stronger than he had originally anticipated.
Pity that logic didn't seem to work as a weapon. He'd tried to heal Sam’s mind, and, upon failing, he'd taken the madness into himself to deal with. It should have been easy to destroy, but it had instead taken root.
"Do you seriously believe that Dean will come back for you?" Lucifer asked him pityingly. "He left you here, brother. With me. He was probably happy for the excuse, considering that last time he saw you, you released the Leviathans from Purgatory."
Castiel gritted his teeth. He had made mistakes, but as long as he still lived he could redeem himself. After he completed this task, he would be back to some semblance of normal. He'd be able to protect the Winchesters again.
Lucifer laughed, high and cold, and Castiel took advantage of the false archangel's mirth. He leapt forward, blade in hand, and aimed his strike at Lucifer's throat.
The laughter cut off abruptly and Castiel was falling through suddenly empty space. A hand caught the collar of his jacket and hauled him backwards. Castiel felt the sharp edge of a sword against his neck and he stilled.
"You're slow," Lucifer commented casually. "Too slow to hope to overtake me by speed alone. You're an ant compared to me, Castiel." He took his blade away from Castiel's neck and shoved him forward in one smooth motion. Cas stumbled several steps before regaining his balance and turning, sword held defensively.
"I am stronger than you," he said, though his voice was far from convincing. "You are no archangel."
"True enough, I suppose," Lucifer said, shrugging. "But just because I am not whole does not mean that you are stronger."
"'Whole'?" Castiel echoed warily, forcing himself to hold his ground when Lucifer stepped forward. As though sensing the effort Castiel was exerting by simply not running, Lucifer smiled.
"I am not an archangel, not even a fallen one," Lucifer said softly. "I am merely... a piece. A little shard that hitched a ride out on an empty shell."
Castiel tightened his grip on his weapon, dread slowly pooling in his stomach. If that was somehow true and he was not dealing with mere scars, but a piece of Lucifer’s Grace, then he was in serious danger.
Lucifer's smile widened.
"Did I ever thank you for letting me out, Cassie?"
LINE BREAK
Castiel tucked himself into the corner, his back against the wall and his breathing coming in short, harsh pants.
He'd been fighting Lucifer for what felt like weeks, though he had no way of knowing for certain. Time flowed strangely in here. Perhaps he had been inside his own head for months.
If this was indeed his mind.
He shook the thought off, but it clung to him, whispering doubts into his ear. Lucifer - the manifestation, he reminded himself - had told him this place was real, physical, but Castiel refused to believe it. This was not his reality.
"Hiding will not save you." Lucifer's voice echoed around the room, coming from everywhere and nowhere all at once. Castiel didn't move, trying to gather his Grace.
He grew weaker by the day and Lucifer never seemed to tire; he would never be able to kill Lucifer outright. But perhaps a Cage would work. It was an imperfect solution, but hopefully sufficient.
He only hoped he had enough Grace left to manage it. He had no anchor to form the foundations of the Cage, and given how distorted his sense of reality already was, he would need a touchstone in order to succeed. He could no longer tell if the chamber was real or a construction in his head and without that knowledge, there was every chance he would either become trapped in his head or even inside the Cage itself. There was every chance that the Cage would not hold.
But he had to try.
He pushed himself up from his position on the floor and walked towards the center of the room. Every time he had escaped to try and regain his energy, Lucifer had been waiting in the middle when he returned.
Just the same as every other time, there Lucifer was, arms crossed and a cruel smile on his lips.
“Ready for another round?” he asked, stepping forward. Castiel lifted his hand, willing his Grace to flare up and surround Lucifer. The archangel stopped abruptly as blue-white flames encircled his feet.
Cas breathed heavily, pouring what he could of himself into the beginnings of the Cage. The flames grew higher and brighter, thickening and splitting into bars. Lucifer chuckled. The bars of the Cage shot up and bent, curving over Lucifer's head, and then Lucifer began to outright laugh. The archangel waved his hand and the world around Castiel vanished.
The gigantic chamber was gone in one blink and in the next, it had transformed into a room with no visible limits. The space was at once incredibly massive and cramped, and there was an aching, desperate loneliness in the very air. Cas hovered, not quite floating and not quite flying, and he realized that he no longer wore his vessel. He was in his true form, pure light and Grace, and somehow the realization made him feel even more vulnerable than he had within the confines of human flesh.
Sudden pain and misery slammed into his senses and he gasped with the force of it, dropping several feet towards the unseen floor before catching himself. He felt dizzy and shaky and he turned, trying to find the source. He saw nothing; the space was endless, and now screams and horror echoed from every corner. Mixed in with the horror was sick delight and Castiel's Grace recoiled from it, but there was nowhere to run. The sounds and the sensations were everywhere.
There was no light here. Nothing good touched this place; there were only the screams and pain of the damned, and the devastating loneliness dragging him down.
"This is what you would send me back to, Castiel?"
It was Lucifer's voice, but not that of his vessel. It was his true voice, echoing and angry. The voice alone felt several times more powerful than Castiel and the weaker angel flinched instinctively. Then he steeled himself, reaching for his sword.
It had vanished.
"Oh no, Cassie. You don't get a toy. Not here."
There was a moment of stillness, heavy with foreboding, and then every one of his senses started shrieking 'danger'. He felt like a small kitten before a tsunami and he would be wiped away if he didn't run. It wasn't even a choice.
In shreds, he was of no use to anyone.
He dove, instinct pulling him towards the far-distant floor. He could feel Lucifer’s presence coalesce behind him, not close enough to be an immediate threat but not far enough away to safely ignore. Invisible hands shot out from nowhere. They pulled at Castiel's wings and his Grace, nails raking and tearing into his being. They slowed him down, little by little, each fraction of a second allowing Lucifer to come that much closer.
And then Lucifer was right there, grabbing at him. If he found a hold, the archangel would tear him apart.
Castiel drew his wings in tight to his body and folded his Grace in on himself as though he still wore Jimmy's body, hoping that a smaller target would be more difficult to grasp. He slipped through Lucifer’s fingers and felt a moment of triumph, then fear as he began to fall more rapidly.
Instead of the somewhat controlled glide of moments before, now he just dropped like a stone. He felt hands brush him, trying to catch and hold him, but the farther he fell the faster he moved until he was dropping too quickly for anything to grab or to follow.
Lucifer's voice echoed in the Cage, even more infuriated.
"There is no escape, Castiel!"
But there was something. There was a gentle tug inside of Castiel, pulling him down and getting stronger as he fell. The 'something' felt like safety, like a place to perch while he recovered. The feeling grew more and more powerful, and then-
Castiel slammed into the floor. He lay there for eons or seconds or infinities, completely disoriented. By the time he came back to himself, Lucifer had caught up to him. Lucifer loomed above him, glorious and brilliant and taking up Castiel's entire field of vision.
"And where were you going, little brother?" Lucifer asked softly. His presence spread out, growing a bit thinner, as though indicating the expanse of the Cage. "I have been trapped here almost from the dawn of time. I have searched for every weak point, but there are none."
The sense of safety that had called to Castiel thrummed beneath him, trapped by the floor but hammering away at it as though trying to get in. The sensation had an odd ring of familiarity to it, as though he knew the whatever-it-was beneath the floor.
"You are just as trapped here as I am," Lucifer said, reaching for Castiel. "You will be with me until the Apocalypse."
There was no time left to make a choice. Lucifer’s hand was scant seconds away from contact. Without questioning the wisdom or potential consequences of his actions, Castiel turned to face the floor and punched at it with all his strength. He wasn’t sure what he expected to come of the action. A large part of him had expected absolutely nothing, especially not on the first blow, but something happened. Castiel stared, shocked, as the floor warped around his hand, as though the Cage's bottom was made of some kind of very thick honey. His arm passed through almost up to his shoulder before the momentum of his strike finally vanished.
He could sense an energy surrounding his hand, something that resonated beautiful and golden in his mind. It felt like coming home.
The sensation flooded up into him, geysering up around his arm in the form of bright, golden light. The light felt beautifully warm to Castiel, wrapping him in protection, affection, and everything real and good. The light moved like water, splashing over the Cage and rising, flowing up along the invisible walls and dissolving whatever it touched like acid.
"What is this?" Lucifer demanded, shocked. Castiel wouldn't have answered even if he could have; the golden light was sucking him in, surrounding him as though it were sentient and pulling. It wasn't quite painful, but it was powerful and Castiel had no desire to resist.
The last thing he heard before he was dragged through the honey-thick floor was Lucifer screaming in rage and then in pain. Castiel had no time to consider what that might mean before he found himself standing by an unfamiliar path.
The light ushered him onto it, encouraging him to move forwards. The path looked like a dark, dusty road he had not dared to travel before. The glow urged him on, insistent, and he allowed himself to be coaxed forward. Cautious curiosity spurred him along and he followed the glow to a presence that was becoming more and more familiar to him the closer he came to it.
As he drew closer, he could smell the scents of oil, gunpowder, and the faintest hint of blood. Old leather and cheap deodorant, and a soul too bright for all the things it had suffered. Castiel found himself speeding up, his mental projection moving automatically and powered by desire rather than thought. The light was just able to keep up with him and leapt around his feet joyfully.
Dean.
Castiel reached for Dean as he neared the end, wanting to bury himself in the human's presence and catch his breath and soak in the glory of the fledgling bond between them. He hadn’t recognized it for what it was when he had first touched it because he had made sure to block it off right after it had formed, when Castiel had raised Dean from Hell.
The bond had grown, despite all odds, despite the lack of nurture on both sides; Castiel had resisted the urge to encourage its growth and Dean had no idea the bond existed.
He could never know. Once, perhaps, Dean would have allowed it, possibly even welcomed it, but after everything that had happened, this would be the last thing Dean wanted. Nothing good would come of making Dean aware that the connection existed, and the surest way to alert the human would be by barging into his mind and taking refuge the one place Lucifer could not follow.
Castiel stopped and the light halted with him, tugging at him and enticing him to travel further. It was tempting. Just a bit further and his mind would be touching Dean’s; a bit further still, and their spirits would be entwined. Then, when Castiel had reached the very heart of what made Dean Dean and the hunter reached back, their bond would be complete.
Dean could be his anchor, his touchstone to reality that allowed him to Cage Lucifer permanently.
But once completed, the bond would be unbreakable.
He could never ask Dean for that, even assuming he saw the human again. Dean was very private and slow to trust; he wouldn't even like the shallow connection they already had, much less anything approaching the depth necessary for a full bond. Castiel had betrayed Dean too many times for him to allow it.
The bond wrapped gently around Castiel, simultaneously trying to drag him and push at his back. Castiel soothed it, sending tendrils of his Grace into it even as he backed away from the path. The light tried to hold him, but he slid through and retreated, leaving it reaching out for him.
He skirted the empty places where Jimmy’s spirit had resided while the man had lived, tethers that had been empty since before Cas had woken as Emmanuel. He had rarely visited the human whose body he had taken, but even so the absence of the man’s soul was jarring and unnerving. Angels were not meant to inhabit human bodies by themselves, but it had been a long time since ‘angel’ adequately described all that Castiel was.
Cas moved from the deeper parts of his mind back towards consciousness, feeling his awareness of his physical form grow. He could once again feel his arms, his legs, his heartbeat, and the motion of his chest as he inhaled and exhaled. The scrubs he wore were thin and over-starched. He could smell the distinct scent of the hospital; lemon cleaner, antiseptic, fresh paint, and disease. Overlaying that was something flowery that seemed familiar, but Castiel couldn’t place it.
"Hello, Clarence."
Castiel opened his eyes, blinking a few times to clear his vision. The darkness receded and he saw Meg, slouching in a chair with a glossy magazine open on her lap. Cas glanced around the room warily, but saw only the featureless white walls and the closed door. Some of the walls had streaks of slightly off-color white, but Castiel couldn’t make out the patterns. Lucifer was nowhere to be seen and Castiel breathed out a long, nearly audible sigh of relief. Perhaps he would be spared from seeing hallucinations.
"It's about time you woke up," Meg said, closing the magazine and dropping it carelessly to the floor. The sound seemed to echo in the room. Meg leaned forward, crossing her arms over her knees. "You've been out of it for two weeks."
"Meg," Castiel said, voice neither polite nor antagonistic. "What are you doing here?" He could still feel the bond in the back of his mind, clamoring for completion. He tried soothing it, touching it with his Grace to try and convince it to calm down. It settled slowly.
It was a bit unnerving and a bit surprising how energetic the bond was. He had thought that he could simply ignore it and it would go dormant again, but he might need to build another wall to keep it at bay. Cas couldn’t, in good conscience, allow it remain active.
Meg smiled coolly.
"Do you really have to ask?" she said. "The boys appointed me your guardian. Guess that means they think I'm trustworthy."
Castiel looked towards the far wall, mouth set in a thin line. He needed no reminders of how far he had fallen in the Winchesters' estimation.
"Sorry, did I touch a nerve?" Meg asked, more delighted than apologetic. She got out of her chair and sat instead on the edge of the bed, close to Castiel. The angel tensed. "Look, Clarence, Sam and Dean-o might be gone, but I'm still here. I watched over you."
"A favor I'm sure you're about to ask me to repay," Castiel said flatly, looking at her. Meg grinned.
"Nothing big, just a little something to make the time I spent watching you worth it," she said, casually sliding closer. She smoothed a hand over Castiel's cheek, his neck, and then his shoulder, scratching her nails lightly over the sensitive skin. Both Castiel and the bond bristled at the touch. "Just a little assassination. Well, a few." Her grin widened. "I need a power vacuum at the top, one just big enough for me and a few associates to slide into. It won't even take you long, and then the debt is clear and you can protect your beloved boys again." She shrugged. "Or, if you prefer, bodyguard work."
"I owe you nothing," Cas said. The bond was still acting up, unhappy with both his distance from it and his closeness to another. It tugged at him and he responded by pushing it to the back of his mind. It clung to him stubbornly and he gave a short, somewhat wistful sigh as he raised his defenses against it. His Grace formed a thin wall between himself and the bond. The world seemed to darken when he did so, but he ignored it as a flight of fancy.
He'd definitely have to block it off properly later. He felt a pang of loss at the thought, along with a selfish desire to allow the bond free rein, but he had to be strong enough to resist the urge. He would not violate Dean’s trust again.
"Aw, Clarence, don't be like that," Meg said, shifting even closer to Cas. He held his ground, ignoring the uncomfortable proximity. "I won't harm a hair on the Winchesters' heads, all you need to do is this little thing... if I make a deal, you know I have to keep it."
"No," Castiel repeated firmly. "I am done making deals with demons."
"Geez, Cas, where was this attitude before?"
That wasn’t Meg’s voice.
Castiel jerked his gaze to the door, stunned. Dean stood in the now-open doorway, leaning against the frame with his arms crossed and an annoyed expression on his face.
"Dean," Cas breathed. One corner of Dean's mouth quirked up, but the smirk wasn't a happy one. There was a subtle wrongness about his face, like something was hiding just beneath the skin.
"Maybe if you had had this attitude about making demon deals before this whole mess with Crowley, you wouldn't be here now," Dean said. "Hell, maybe none of us would." He closed his eyes briefly and, when he opened them, they were coal-black.
Castiel reacted on instinct, shoving Meg aside and nearly tripping over the blankets in his haste to get off of the bed. He heard Meg give a cry of surprise, but ignored it. Demons rode their hosts hard, but surely Dean hadn't been possessed too long. Surely Dean, as an archangel's true vessel, would be sturdier than most hosts. There had to still be time.
Surely Castiel could simply exorcise the fell thing without harming the human. He usually smote demons outright, but if he could manage to manipulate his Grace carefully enough, it should be possible.
He extended his arm, reaching to place his hand on Dean's forehead, but the demon smirked and stepped back. It drew a knife from the inside of Dean's jacket and held it up to his own throat. The blade was simple, cheap, and nothing that could hurt the demon. Only the host.
Castiel stopped, hand still outstretched.
"Good, you understand," Dean said. He chuckled. "You know, he's cursing at me. Guess he's not a fan of being possessed." The demon ran a hand down his front, stopping at the belt. "Too bad for him I'm rather fond of his meatsuit."
"This isn't real," Cas said, lowering his hand slowly. He shook his head once. "I'm hallucinating. Dean has a tattoo to protect against-"
"See, here's the thing," the demon cut in, bringing his hand back up to tug at the collar of Dean’s shirt. Castiel could see the edges of a semi-healed injury, just barely scabbed over, but it looked as though it covered a good portion of Dean’s left pectoral. "Tattoos? They don't work so well when the skin isn't attached anymore."
Castiel whirled to face Meg, energy crackling around him with the force of his anger. He kept half an eye on the demon possessing Dean's body, especially on the small knife still held against Dean's throat.
"You swore not to harm them," he snapped. "Why would I work for you when you've already broken the deal?"
Meg's expression lost some of its usual confidence, hints of unease and confusion sneaking in.
"I haven't," she said, sitting up straighter on the bed and watching Castiel warily. "And what do you mean, hallucinating?"
"I..." Castiel said, looking back at Dean. The demon was still smirking, eyes still dark.
"Oh, yeah, I'm not really here," Dean said. "It's not like the boss ever manipulated anyone. I'm just a figment of your imagination, Cas." The demon pressed the blade harder into his borrowed neck, drawing a line of blood. "This isn't real blood. It's fake blood, just like I'm not really Dean."
"There's no one here but you and me," Meg said impatiently. She sighed and patted the mattress next to her. "Come sit down."
"Of course, on the off chance that Meg is just acting and I am actually here... you might want to sit down," Dean said.
Castiel didn't move, weighing his options. If Dean was indeed here, he didn't know what Meg hoped to gain by pretending he was not. Dean's life would be a more powerful bargaining chip if she acknowledged it, unless her goal was to mess with his head, or to get him to agree to be her puppet without having to actually hold up her end of the deal.
Cas wondered where Sam was. Usually, wherever one Winchester went, the other was not far behind. That was easily explained away if Dean was just a figment, but Cas was not willing to gamble with the brothers' lives. Sam could just as easily be held somewhere else, or even in another room of the hospital.
The bond pulsed gently at the back of Castiel's mind, but he hesitated before reaching for it. The more he touched the bond, the stronger it would grow, and eventually Dean was certain to notice. However, just once wouldn’t have that great of an effect. He needed to know if this was really Dean.
He'd wall the bond back up once he was done.
Cas carefully lowered the wall between his mind and Dean's, allowing some of the golden light to spill over into him. His next step would have been to trace the bond to Dean and find out where the human was, but the instant he made contact with the bond the Dean in the room looked annoyed. He flickered, annoyance morphing into anger and determination on his face before he vanished completely. The door was once more shut and not even a trace of Dean’s scent lingered in the room.
An odd mix of relief and unhappiness shot through Castiel. It had been a hallucination, confirming that, yes, he could see them outside of his own head and he likely would again, but at least the bond seemed to be able to get rid of them.
It was likely a temporary measure at most, but it was better than nothing. He couldn’t rely on it as a permanent solution, lest Dean notice.
Cas turned back to Meg.
"Get out. There will be no deal," Cas said. Meg adopted a look of disinterest and shrugged.
"I'll give you until tomorrow to think it over," she said, standing up. She brushed invisible lint off of her pants and walked passed Castiel. Just before she left, she turned and smiled thinly. "And don't get any ideas about flying off. I've had a bit of fun with... I guess you could call it an art project?" She patted one of the walls affectionately. "I couldn't get my hands on holy oil, and I'd probably be fired for lighting it up, but these should work on anything below an archangel." She looked at him and winked mockingly. "And let's face it, Clarence, you're no archangel."
At once, the meaning of the small, off-white patterns on the walls became obvious.
"Meg-" Castiel growled threateningly, taking a step forward, but she was already opening the door and halfway into the hall. She shut the door and gave him a cheeky little wave through the small window before leaving.
Castiel walked immediately to the door, hoping the demon wasn’t as clever as she thought herself, but found he couldn't even touch the handle. He walked around the room, searching for an escape route, but it was as if an invisible barrier stood between him and the door, the walls, and the window. His hand just slid away, never making direct contact with any of it. He glanced towards the floor, wondering if perhaps that was a viable escape route, but then realized that he'd never been standing on the floor to begin with. The invisible bubble curved under his feet as well, though it was so thin he couldn't feel it and he doubted the miniscule distance between the bottoms of his feet and the floor was noticeable to humans.
Meg had done her research well. The angel-containment sigils she had traced on the walls were similar but different to the ones Crowley had used to keep angels out of his mansion. They were less effective for trapping angels than holy fire, but unfortunately effective enough to keep him confined. He wouldn't be able to leave the room until one of the sigils had been broken, but he couldn’t so much as touch them.
If he had his full strength, he might have been able to do something, but the battles inside his head had taken their toll.
He walked back to the bed and sat down. The bond was still active in the back of his mind, taking small sips of Grace to strengthen itself. The angel shut his eyes, already mourning his actions before he withdrew his consciousness from the waking world and travelled back.
The bond was where he had left it and it flashed warmth and light at him as a greeting, surrounded by little bits of Grace. Castiel gently but firmly pried it away, listening to it protest and wishing he was allowed to let it grow. If Dean were a willing participant in this, instead of the unknowing other half, perhaps the connection would be able to mature. Perhaps Castiel would be able to pour his energy into it and feel Dean's soul mixing with his Grace and hope for consummation.
He let the fantasy go and headed to the other side of his mind, carrying the bond and trailing golden light behind him. There was one thing he needed to do before he could wall the bond up again; hopefully, it would be enough to solve the problem of the hallucinations permanently.
He kept to the shallower portions of his subconscious, again skirting the place Jimmy’s spirit used to reside as he headed for the source of the madness. It was ugly, like a tumor of blood-red light infecting Castiel’s mind.
He stopped at the edges of the madness, still cradling the bond. He let it go and it fell to his ankles, curling around them and offering support. The red light in front of them formed itself into the enormous red chamber Cas recognized, Lucifer standing just inside. Castiel leveled his arm, palm out and fingers splayed, at the archangel. He would end this quickly.
"You're going to try to Cage me again, little brother?" Lucifer asked. "That didn't work out so well for you last-"
Castiel ignored him and concentrated on pouring his Grace into a wall between the red chamber and the rest of his mind. The bond wrapped itself tighter around his ankles, providing what little strength it could; it surprisingly powerful for something so neglected, but that little boost wasn't enough to fully Cage Lucifer. It did, however, provide the tether to reality that Cas had been missing in his previous attempts.
The wall sprang up between them, thick, strong, and translucent. Cas saw Lucifer throw himself against the barrier. The wall shuddered, but it looked like it would hold for at least a little while.
Castiel turned away and moved back towards the other side of his mind, where the bond had originally rested and could be bound. The bond trailed after him, like a dog that knew it was about to be punished for some supposed crime.
"You must understand, I have no right to you," Castiel murmured softly to it. "This is... for the best."
His Grace was running low, but it was nothing that a few hours of recharging would not fix. Heaven believed him dead, and perhaps that was for the best as well. They hadn't cut him off from the Host.
Behind him, he felt something shatter.
He turned just in time to see the madness swarming towards him, covering the distance within a heartbeat and wrapping around him. The wall he had built had shattered.
"Did you really think something so brittle could hold me?" Lucifer hissed, placing his hands around Castiel's neck and squeezing.
Golden light surged up around Castiel, wriggling in-between the archangel's palms and Castiel's throat. Lucifer held on, his appearance flickering from that of his vessel to the red energy Cas knew as the taint he had lifted from Sam's mind and then back again.
He gathered up the rest of his Grace, every shred, and threw it around Lucifer. The archangel struggled, trying to break the 'rope', but Castiel kept it moving, slithering like something living. With the bond at his back for support, he dragged Lucifer back to the red chamber where they had fought.
Visions appeared along the path, but they were weak and insubstantial in comparison to what Lucifer had managed to conjure before. Angels Cas had killed crowded around him, the madness manifesting through the small gaps in the restraints Cas had fashioned from his Grace. Castiel trudged on, trying not to look at the faces of those brothers and sisters he had murdered.
The bond circled around him, sending weak pulses of light towards the apparitions as if wanting to drive them away, but unable.
The visions grew stronger the closer Cas drew to the chamber, reaching out and pulling at him, calling his name.
"Castiel-"
"-was this truly what Father wanted-"
"-my leader..."
It took more effort to ignore the cries than he would have hoped. He could feel Lucifer thrashing inside of the Grace containing him, loosening the hold, and tightened his grip. His Grace was burning down to mere embers of power but he doggedly walked on, wading through the bodies. Blood began slowly rising around his feet, slowing him down.
"This isn't over, Castiel," Lucifer said calmly as Cas tossed him into the red chamber. "No matter what you do, nothing will hold me for long."
"I know," Cas replied. He took a deep breath and ripped his Grace away from Lucifer before spreading the same blanket of Grace across the entrance to the chamber. The visions around him vanished. The Grace wavered and shimmered, but instead of solidifying into a wall, Castiel kept it moving.
Lucifer pounded at the wall, trying to break it as he had the first, but Castiel directed Grace to fill in the cracks and didn’t allow Lucifer so much as a fissure to break through.
Lucifer stopped attacking the wall after a few minutes, a slightly unhappy expression on his face at the lack of effect his efforts seem to have. Castiel was exhausted, but he held himself firm and tried not to let it show.
"Clever," Lucifer admitted softly. "Keep your Grace moving, never let it settle, and it will bend instead of break. You'll be able to contain me somewhat, though never completely." Lucifer met Castiel's eyes and stared through them. "You'd need to build a Cage for that, and you don't have the strength or the foundation."
The bond writhed around Castiel, angry and protective, but Cas was done. He walked away from the chamber, though he kept his senses on the thin Grace barrier dividing the madness from the rest of him. Lucifer had taken to striking the wall again, trying to bring it down.
Cas had no energy left to cage up the bond. He would have to let it roam free tonight and try not to touch it. One night wouldn’t make that much of a difference, but it would allow him a safety net while he got used to the constant manipulation of Grace the new, living wall would require.
Just for tonight, and then he would wall the bond back up.
The bond tried to hold onto him, but weakly, and Castiel easily brushed it off. The angel rose back to consciousness in his physical body, weary but blessedly hallucination free, at least for now. His head was pounding and he felt drained, but he couldn’t afford to let his concentration waver from the rhythm of motion, bending without breaking, and repairing going on inside his head.
He settled in to meditate, the closest he could come to sleep, and devoted half of himself to maintaining the barrier and the other half to regaining his strength. He devoted nothing at all to watching the bond.
The golden light spread carefully over a corner of his mind and started putting down roots, but in Castiel’s carelessness or selfishness, he did not notice.
LINE BREAK
Dean's eyes snapped open and he shifted uncomfortably on the passenger seat of the crappy little Camry he and Sam had 'borrowed' a few towns back. He rubbed one of his temples, then ran his palm over his face from forehead down.
His head felt strange, like he'd been walking around with a headache for months but had never realized until it had broken. It almost felt like something had torn, but it didn’t hurt.
"You awake?" Sam asked him quietly, just loud enough to be heard over the low rumble of some God-awful country music station. Dean scowled at the radio and shook his head dismissively.
"Yeah, 'm awake. My turn yet?" he asked. Sam shook his head.
"I've only been driving for an hour. You can go back to napping, if you want," Sam replied. They'd gotten wind of some possible Leviathan shenanigans on the other side of the country and were tearing ass to get there. They hadn't paused much for sleep, instead taking turns driving and power napping when not behind the wheel. It made for some very odd sleeping habits.
Dean made a noncommittal noise and hauled himself into a proper sitting position, blinking at the clock on the car's dashboard. 7 p.m.
"Great," he mumbled, pulling his phone out of his coat pocket. He dialed the number he had memorized over the past few weeks and pressed the phone impatiently to his ear, listening to it ring. Just before it went to voicemail, Meg picked up.
"What?" she demanded. Dean's scowl darkened.
"Hello to you, too," he said. He took a deep breath to calm himself before continuing. This whole situation just grated on his nerves, if he was being honest with himself. He rarely was. "Has Cas woken up yet?"
Meg sighed, exasperated.
"I told you I'd call when he was awake. Clarence is still a drooling vegetable and the doctors don't know when he'll wake up."
Dean looked out the window of the car, irritation and worry warring over his face and creating an expression he didn't want Sam to see. His baby brother was too damn good at reading him sometimes. Irritation won.
"You'll call me as soon as he wakes up, right?" Dean said commandingly, daring her to refuse. "As soon as, not five days later, not five minutes later-"
"Yes, yes, right away. I know, Dean-o," Meg said. "Later."
She hung up. Dean took his phone away from his ear and glared at it, then snapped it shut and shoved it back into his pocket.
LINE BREAK
When Castiel's consciousness surfaced again the next morning, it was to the strange feeling of distant waves of sleepy contentment and echoes of hunger. Curious and slightly afraid they were emanating from his own body, he followed the sensations and found the bond. It glowed brightly and radiated happiness, nestled within his consciousness and roots penetrating the topmost level of Castiel's being.
Cas studied it, stunned. The bond shouldn't have been able to progress this far, even unfettered, without either him or Dean acting on it. At this stage and with their current proximity, Dean would need to search for the bond within himself in order to even sense it existed. Castiel had done nothing with it all night, careful to keep his thoughts on his tasks and not let himself wander.
His question was answered when he felt two small tendrils of Grace, barely perceptible even now that he was watching for it, peel away from him and sneak away to the golden glow, nurturing it.
He pulled his Grace tighter around himself, trying to prevent more of it from acting without his conscious mind's direction, and crept closer to the bond. It thrummed happily, then shrieked indignantly as he began prying the roots up one by one. The bond dug in and wrapped around him, clinging to him, but Cas was resolute.
Every root pried up left him feeling chilled, warmth he hadn't noticed before seeping away. He shivered, but continued. This was not something he could keep.
Once the golden tendrils had all been pulled up, Castiel gently folded them over until the bond was a small, quivering bundle in his arms. By all rights, he should sever it, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. As long as he didn't let it entrench itself, surely it was permissible to keep just this?
He heard a noise reverberating through his vessel's ears and put the bond down regretfully. It began to creep back to the hollow places where the roots had once been, intending to slide back into those slots, but Castiel slipped a thin sheet of Grace between the bond and his mind, solidifying it instantly so the bond couldn't draw power from it. Walls snapped up around it, caging it.
The golden light pawed at the barrier, trying to break through, but the box held. Castiel allowed his mind to surface in the physical world once more, following the sound.
"-tiel. Castiel?"
Cas opened his eyes and came face to face with Meg. She was frowning, though she looked more irritated than upset.
"About time," she said, upon noticing his attention. "Have you considered my offer?"
"You should take it, little brother."
Cas tensed, lips in a thin line as he registered Lucifer's voice. The archangel was leaning on the wall behind Meg, partially insubstantial but still there.
"You knew that wall couldn't stop me. Frankly, I'm impressed you managed this much," Lucifer said, examining his hand, fingers splayed. "But if this is the best you can do..."
"It is enough," Castiel said flatly. Meg looked frustrated.
"What does that mean?" she asked. Castiel focused his gaze on her.
"No," he said simply.
Part 2
Rating: NC-17 overall
Pairing: Dean/Cas
Character List: Castiel, Dean, Sam, Meg, Crowley, halLucifer
Warnings/Enticements: jealous!Dean, Sam and Cas broship with a side of awesome!Sam, explicit violence, explicit torture, explicit sex, soulbonding, BAMF!Cas, protective!Cas, offscreen death of a minor character, brief Dean/OFC, brief jealous!Cas
Spoilers: through the end of 7.17, goes AU after
Summary: Meg wants a weapon. When Castiel refuses, she sells him out to Crowley. The Winchesters won't be happy... assuming they find out.
Wordcount: about 52K total
Title comes from Florence + the Machine's 'Blinding'.
Under the cut.
Part 1
The chamber was enormous, the walls practically invisible in the distance and the ceiling so far above his head Castiel couldn't be sure it existed. The whole space emanated a violent, bloody red light. He felt tiny in comparison; though he’d easily be able to fit inside this place in his true form, he’d been somehow bound in his vessel.
His only consolation was that his opponent was apparently similarly limited, though to refer to Lucifer as 'limited' in any way seemed to be an underestimation of his power. Even in human form, the archangel still had great power at his disposal.
Not that this was truly Lucifer. It was simply the manifestation of Sam's worst tormenter, an afterimage preserved during the transfer of the madness from Sam’s mind to Castiel’s.
"You can't win against me, brother," Lucifer said, voice almost kind. He stood not twenty paces from Castiel, in the exact center of the room. He kept turning as Cas circled him, never presenting the weaker angel with his back but his gaze was more curious than wary despite the sword in Castiel’s hand. Lucifer had nothing to fear; Castiel stood no chance against him, as he had stood no chance against Raphael. This time, however, there was no Crowley with his silver tongue and seductive offers, there was no Purgatory, there was no Hell to borrow from, and there were no Winchesters to ask for help.
"No Winchesters, Cassie? Even if they were here, do you think they'd help you?" Lucifer asked, raising an eyebrow.
"They're my friends," Cas said firmly. He took a firmer grip on his weapon, briefly pausing in his circling. "If they could, they would."
"I think you'll find that you mean... if Dean could. If Dean could, he would," Lucifer said, voice like silk. "If Dean was here, if Dean stood a chance, if Dean hadn't left... Dean, Dean, Dean. He's all you ever think about. He's the only thought in your head; and let me say, it makes for very boring company."
Castiel clenched his jaw. This being before him was not truly an archangel, but was merely borrowing the shape of one. It did not have an archangel’s powers. More to the point, they were fighting in Castiel's mind. By all logic, Cas should have been able to smite it and completely remove it from existence, even though it had proven stronger than he had originally anticipated.
Pity that logic didn't seem to work as a weapon. He'd tried to heal Sam’s mind, and, upon failing, he'd taken the madness into himself to deal with. It should have been easy to destroy, but it had instead taken root.
"Do you seriously believe that Dean will come back for you?" Lucifer asked him pityingly. "He left you here, brother. With me. He was probably happy for the excuse, considering that last time he saw you, you released the Leviathans from Purgatory."
Castiel gritted his teeth. He had made mistakes, but as long as he still lived he could redeem himself. After he completed this task, he would be back to some semblance of normal. He'd be able to protect the Winchesters again.
Lucifer laughed, high and cold, and Castiel took advantage of the false archangel's mirth. He leapt forward, blade in hand, and aimed his strike at Lucifer's throat.
The laughter cut off abruptly and Castiel was falling through suddenly empty space. A hand caught the collar of his jacket and hauled him backwards. Castiel felt the sharp edge of a sword against his neck and he stilled.
"You're slow," Lucifer commented casually. "Too slow to hope to overtake me by speed alone. You're an ant compared to me, Castiel." He took his blade away from Castiel's neck and shoved him forward in one smooth motion. Cas stumbled several steps before regaining his balance and turning, sword held defensively.
"I am stronger than you," he said, though his voice was far from convincing. "You are no archangel."
"True enough, I suppose," Lucifer said, shrugging. "But just because I am not whole does not mean that you are stronger."
"'Whole'?" Castiel echoed warily, forcing himself to hold his ground when Lucifer stepped forward. As though sensing the effort Castiel was exerting by simply not running, Lucifer smiled.
"I am not an archangel, not even a fallen one," Lucifer said softly. "I am merely... a piece. A little shard that hitched a ride out on an empty shell."
Castiel tightened his grip on his weapon, dread slowly pooling in his stomach. If that was somehow true and he was not dealing with mere scars, but a piece of Lucifer’s Grace, then he was in serious danger.
Lucifer's smile widened.
"Did I ever thank you for letting me out, Cassie?"
LINE BREAK
Castiel tucked himself into the corner, his back against the wall and his breathing coming in short, harsh pants.
He'd been fighting Lucifer for what felt like weeks, though he had no way of knowing for certain. Time flowed strangely in here. Perhaps he had been inside his own head for months.
If this was indeed his mind.
He shook the thought off, but it clung to him, whispering doubts into his ear. Lucifer - the manifestation, he reminded himself - had told him this place was real, physical, but Castiel refused to believe it. This was not his reality.
"Hiding will not save you." Lucifer's voice echoed around the room, coming from everywhere and nowhere all at once. Castiel didn't move, trying to gather his Grace.
He grew weaker by the day and Lucifer never seemed to tire; he would never be able to kill Lucifer outright. But perhaps a Cage would work. It was an imperfect solution, but hopefully sufficient.
He only hoped he had enough Grace left to manage it. He had no anchor to form the foundations of the Cage, and given how distorted his sense of reality already was, he would need a touchstone in order to succeed. He could no longer tell if the chamber was real or a construction in his head and without that knowledge, there was every chance he would either become trapped in his head or even inside the Cage itself. There was every chance that the Cage would not hold.
But he had to try.
He pushed himself up from his position on the floor and walked towards the center of the room. Every time he had escaped to try and regain his energy, Lucifer had been waiting in the middle when he returned.
Just the same as every other time, there Lucifer was, arms crossed and a cruel smile on his lips.
“Ready for another round?” he asked, stepping forward. Castiel lifted his hand, willing his Grace to flare up and surround Lucifer. The archangel stopped abruptly as blue-white flames encircled his feet.
Cas breathed heavily, pouring what he could of himself into the beginnings of the Cage. The flames grew higher and brighter, thickening and splitting into bars. Lucifer chuckled. The bars of the Cage shot up and bent, curving over Lucifer's head, and then Lucifer began to outright laugh. The archangel waved his hand and the world around Castiel vanished.
The gigantic chamber was gone in one blink and in the next, it had transformed into a room with no visible limits. The space was at once incredibly massive and cramped, and there was an aching, desperate loneliness in the very air. Cas hovered, not quite floating and not quite flying, and he realized that he no longer wore his vessel. He was in his true form, pure light and Grace, and somehow the realization made him feel even more vulnerable than he had within the confines of human flesh.
Sudden pain and misery slammed into his senses and he gasped with the force of it, dropping several feet towards the unseen floor before catching himself. He felt dizzy and shaky and he turned, trying to find the source. He saw nothing; the space was endless, and now screams and horror echoed from every corner. Mixed in with the horror was sick delight and Castiel's Grace recoiled from it, but there was nowhere to run. The sounds and the sensations were everywhere.
There was no light here. Nothing good touched this place; there were only the screams and pain of the damned, and the devastating loneliness dragging him down.
"This is what you would send me back to, Castiel?"
It was Lucifer's voice, but not that of his vessel. It was his true voice, echoing and angry. The voice alone felt several times more powerful than Castiel and the weaker angel flinched instinctively. Then he steeled himself, reaching for his sword.
It had vanished.
"Oh no, Cassie. You don't get a toy. Not here."
There was a moment of stillness, heavy with foreboding, and then every one of his senses started shrieking 'danger'. He felt like a small kitten before a tsunami and he would be wiped away if he didn't run. It wasn't even a choice.
In shreds, he was of no use to anyone.
He dove, instinct pulling him towards the far-distant floor. He could feel Lucifer’s presence coalesce behind him, not close enough to be an immediate threat but not far enough away to safely ignore. Invisible hands shot out from nowhere. They pulled at Castiel's wings and his Grace, nails raking and tearing into his being. They slowed him down, little by little, each fraction of a second allowing Lucifer to come that much closer.
And then Lucifer was right there, grabbing at him. If he found a hold, the archangel would tear him apart.
Castiel drew his wings in tight to his body and folded his Grace in on himself as though he still wore Jimmy's body, hoping that a smaller target would be more difficult to grasp. He slipped through Lucifer’s fingers and felt a moment of triumph, then fear as he began to fall more rapidly.
Instead of the somewhat controlled glide of moments before, now he just dropped like a stone. He felt hands brush him, trying to catch and hold him, but the farther he fell the faster he moved until he was dropping too quickly for anything to grab or to follow.
Lucifer's voice echoed in the Cage, even more infuriated.
"There is no escape, Castiel!"
But there was something. There was a gentle tug inside of Castiel, pulling him down and getting stronger as he fell. The 'something' felt like safety, like a place to perch while he recovered. The feeling grew more and more powerful, and then-
Castiel slammed into the floor. He lay there for eons or seconds or infinities, completely disoriented. By the time he came back to himself, Lucifer had caught up to him. Lucifer loomed above him, glorious and brilliant and taking up Castiel's entire field of vision.
"And where were you going, little brother?" Lucifer asked softly. His presence spread out, growing a bit thinner, as though indicating the expanse of the Cage. "I have been trapped here almost from the dawn of time. I have searched for every weak point, but there are none."
The sense of safety that had called to Castiel thrummed beneath him, trapped by the floor but hammering away at it as though trying to get in. The sensation had an odd ring of familiarity to it, as though he knew the whatever-it-was beneath the floor.
"You are just as trapped here as I am," Lucifer said, reaching for Castiel. "You will be with me until the Apocalypse."
There was no time left to make a choice. Lucifer’s hand was scant seconds away from contact. Without questioning the wisdom or potential consequences of his actions, Castiel turned to face the floor and punched at it with all his strength. He wasn’t sure what he expected to come of the action. A large part of him had expected absolutely nothing, especially not on the first blow, but something happened. Castiel stared, shocked, as the floor warped around his hand, as though the Cage's bottom was made of some kind of very thick honey. His arm passed through almost up to his shoulder before the momentum of his strike finally vanished.
He could sense an energy surrounding his hand, something that resonated beautiful and golden in his mind. It felt like coming home.
The sensation flooded up into him, geysering up around his arm in the form of bright, golden light. The light felt beautifully warm to Castiel, wrapping him in protection, affection, and everything real and good. The light moved like water, splashing over the Cage and rising, flowing up along the invisible walls and dissolving whatever it touched like acid.
"What is this?" Lucifer demanded, shocked. Castiel wouldn't have answered even if he could have; the golden light was sucking him in, surrounding him as though it were sentient and pulling. It wasn't quite painful, but it was powerful and Castiel had no desire to resist.
The last thing he heard before he was dragged through the honey-thick floor was Lucifer screaming in rage and then in pain. Castiel had no time to consider what that might mean before he found himself standing by an unfamiliar path.
The light ushered him onto it, encouraging him to move forwards. The path looked like a dark, dusty road he had not dared to travel before. The glow urged him on, insistent, and he allowed himself to be coaxed forward. Cautious curiosity spurred him along and he followed the glow to a presence that was becoming more and more familiar to him the closer he came to it.
As he drew closer, he could smell the scents of oil, gunpowder, and the faintest hint of blood. Old leather and cheap deodorant, and a soul too bright for all the things it had suffered. Castiel found himself speeding up, his mental projection moving automatically and powered by desire rather than thought. The light was just able to keep up with him and leapt around his feet joyfully.
Dean.
Castiel reached for Dean as he neared the end, wanting to bury himself in the human's presence and catch his breath and soak in the glory of the fledgling bond between them. He hadn’t recognized it for what it was when he had first touched it because he had made sure to block it off right after it had formed, when Castiel had raised Dean from Hell.
The bond had grown, despite all odds, despite the lack of nurture on both sides; Castiel had resisted the urge to encourage its growth and Dean had no idea the bond existed.
He could never know. Once, perhaps, Dean would have allowed it, possibly even welcomed it, but after everything that had happened, this would be the last thing Dean wanted. Nothing good would come of making Dean aware that the connection existed, and the surest way to alert the human would be by barging into his mind and taking refuge the one place Lucifer could not follow.
Castiel stopped and the light halted with him, tugging at him and enticing him to travel further. It was tempting. Just a bit further and his mind would be touching Dean’s; a bit further still, and their spirits would be entwined. Then, when Castiel had reached the very heart of what made Dean Dean and the hunter reached back, their bond would be complete.
Dean could be his anchor, his touchstone to reality that allowed him to Cage Lucifer permanently.
But once completed, the bond would be unbreakable.
He could never ask Dean for that, even assuming he saw the human again. Dean was very private and slow to trust; he wouldn't even like the shallow connection they already had, much less anything approaching the depth necessary for a full bond. Castiel had betrayed Dean too many times for him to allow it.
The bond wrapped gently around Castiel, simultaneously trying to drag him and push at his back. Castiel soothed it, sending tendrils of his Grace into it even as he backed away from the path. The light tried to hold him, but he slid through and retreated, leaving it reaching out for him.
He skirted the empty places where Jimmy’s spirit had resided while the man had lived, tethers that had been empty since before Cas had woken as Emmanuel. He had rarely visited the human whose body he had taken, but even so the absence of the man’s soul was jarring and unnerving. Angels were not meant to inhabit human bodies by themselves, but it had been a long time since ‘angel’ adequately described all that Castiel was.
Cas moved from the deeper parts of his mind back towards consciousness, feeling his awareness of his physical form grow. He could once again feel his arms, his legs, his heartbeat, and the motion of his chest as he inhaled and exhaled. The scrubs he wore were thin and over-starched. He could smell the distinct scent of the hospital; lemon cleaner, antiseptic, fresh paint, and disease. Overlaying that was something flowery that seemed familiar, but Castiel couldn’t place it.
"Hello, Clarence."
Castiel opened his eyes, blinking a few times to clear his vision. The darkness receded and he saw Meg, slouching in a chair with a glossy magazine open on her lap. Cas glanced around the room warily, but saw only the featureless white walls and the closed door. Some of the walls had streaks of slightly off-color white, but Castiel couldn’t make out the patterns. Lucifer was nowhere to be seen and Castiel breathed out a long, nearly audible sigh of relief. Perhaps he would be spared from seeing hallucinations.
"It's about time you woke up," Meg said, closing the magazine and dropping it carelessly to the floor. The sound seemed to echo in the room. Meg leaned forward, crossing her arms over her knees. "You've been out of it for two weeks."
"Meg," Castiel said, voice neither polite nor antagonistic. "What are you doing here?" He could still feel the bond in the back of his mind, clamoring for completion. He tried soothing it, touching it with his Grace to try and convince it to calm down. It settled slowly.
It was a bit unnerving and a bit surprising how energetic the bond was. He had thought that he could simply ignore it and it would go dormant again, but he might need to build another wall to keep it at bay. Cas couldn’t, in good conscience, allow it remain active.
Meg smiled coolly.
"Do you really have to ask?" she said. "The boys appointed me your guardian. Guess that means they think I'm trustworthy."
Castiel looked towards the far wall, mouth set in a thin line. He needed no reminders of how far he had fallen in the Winchesters' estimation.
"Sorry, did I touch a nerve?" Meg asked, more delighted than apologetic. She got out of her chair and sat instead on the edge of the bed, close to Castiel. The angel tensed. "Look, Clarence, Sam and Dean-o might be gone, but I'm still here. I watched over you."
"A favor I'm sure you're about to ask me to repay," Castiel said flatly, looking at her. Meg grinned.
"Nothing big, just a little something to make the time I spent watching you worth it," she said, casually sliding closer. She smoothed a hand over Castiel's cheek, his neck, and then his shoulder, scratching her nails lightly over the sensitive skin. Both Castiel and the bond bristled at the touch. "Just a little assassination. Well, a few." Her grin widened. "I need a power vacuum at the top, one just big enough for me and a few associates to slide into. It won't even take you long, and then the debt is clear and you can protect your beloved boys again." She shrugged. "Or, if you prefer, bodyguard work."
"I owe you nothing," Cas said. The bond was still acting up, unhappy with both his distance from it and his closeness to another. It tugged at him and he responded by pushing it to the back of his mind. It clung to him stubbornly and he gave a short, somewhat wistful sigh as he raised his defenses against it. His Grace formed a thin wall between himself and the bond. The world seemed to darken when he did so, but he ignored it as a flight of fancy.
He'd definitely have to block it off properly later. He felt a pang of loss at the thought, along with a selfish desire to allow the bond free rein, but he had to be strong enough to resist the urge. He would not violate Dean’s trust again.
"Aw, Clarence, don't be like that," Meg said, shifting even closer to Cas. He held his ground, ignoring the uncomfortable proximity. "I won't harm a hair on the Winchesters' heads, all you need to do is this little thing... if I make a deal, you know I have to keep it."
"No," Castiel repeated firmly. "I am done making deals with demons."
"Geez, Cas, where was this attitude before?"
That wasn’t Meg’s voice.
Castiel jerked his gaze to the door, stunned. Dean stood in the now-open doorway, leaning against the frame with his arms crossed and an annoyed expression on his face.
"Dean," Cas breathed. One corner of Dean's mouth quirked up, but the smirk wasn't a happy one. There was a subtle wrongness about his face, like something was hiding just beneath the skin.
"Maybe if you had had this attitude about making demon deals before this whole mess with Crowley, you wouldn't be here now," Dean said. "Hell, maybe none of us would." He closed his eyes briefly and, when he opened them, they were coal-black.
Castiel reacted on instinct, shoving Meg aside and nearly tripping over the blankets in his haste to get off of the bed. He heard Meg give a cry of surprise, but ignored it. Demons rode their hosts hard, but surely Dean hadn't been possessed too long. Surely Dean, as an archangel's true vessel, would be sturdier than most hosts. There had to still be time.
Surely Castiel could simply exorcise the fell thing without harming the human. He usually smote demons outright, but if he could manage to manipulate his Grace carefully enough, it should be possible.
He extended his arm, reaching to place his hand on Dean's forehead, but the demon smirked and stepped back. It drew a knife from the inside of Dean's jacket and held it up to his own throat. The blade was simple, cheap, and nothing that could hurt the demon. Only the host.
Castiel stopped, hand still outstretched.
"Good, you understand," Dean said. He chuckled. "You know, he's cursing at me. Guess he's not a fan of being possessed." The demon ran a hand down his front, stopping at the belt. "Too bad for him I'm rather fond of his meatsuit."
"This isn't real," Cas said, lowering his hand slowly. He shook his head once. "I'm hallucinating. Dean has a tattoo to protect against-"
"See, here's the thing," the demon cut in, bringing his hand back up to tug at the collar of Dean’s shirt. Castiel could see the edges of a semi-healed injury, just barely scabbed over, but it looked as though it covered a good portion of Dean’s left pectoral. "Tattoos? They don't work so well when the skin isn't attached anymore."
Castiel whirled to face Meg, energy crackling around him with the force of his anger. He kept half an eye on the demon possessing Dean's body, especially on the small knife still held against Dean's throat.
"You swore not to harm them," he snapped. "Why would I work for you when you've already broken the deal?"
Meg's expression lost some of its usual confidence, hints of unease and confusion sneaking in.
"I haven't," she said, sitting up straighter on the bed and watching Castiel warily. "And what do you mean, hallucinating?"
"I..." Castiel said, looking back at Dean. The demon was still smirking, eyes still dark.
"Oh, yeah, I'm not really here," Dean said. "It's not like the boss ever manipulated anyone. I'm just a figment of your imagination, Cas." The demon pressed the blade harder into his borrowed neck, drawing a line of blood. "This isn't real blood. It's fake blood, just like I'm not really Dean."
"There's no one here but you and me," Meg said impatiently. She sighed and patted the mattress next to her. "Come sit down."
"Of course, on the off chance that Meg is just acting and I am actually here... you might want to sit down," Dean said.
Castiel didn't move, weighing his options. If Dean was indeed here, he didn't know what Meg hoped to gain by pretending he was not. Dean's life would be a more powerful bargaining chip if she acknowledged it, unless her goal was to mess with his head, or to get him to agree to be her puppet without having to actually hold up her end of the deal.
Cas wondered where Sam was. Usually, wherever one Winchester went, the other was not far behind. That was easily explained away if Dean was just a figment, but Cas was not willing to gamble with the brothers' lives. Sam could just as easily be held somewhere else, or even in another room of the hospital.
The bond pulsed gently at the back of Castiel's mind, but he hesitated before reaching for it. The more he touched the bond, the stronger it would grow, and eventually Dean was certain to notice. However, just once wouldn’t have that great of an effect. He needed to know if this was really Dean.
He'd wall the bond back up once he was done.
Cas carefully lowered the wall between his mind and Dean's, allowing some of the golden light to spill over into him. His next step would have been to trace the bond to Dean and find out where the human was, but the instant he made contact with the bond the Dean in the room looked annoyed. He flickered, annoyance morphing into anger and determination on his face before he vanished completely. The door was once more shut and not even a trace of Dean’s scent lingered in the room.
An odd mix of relief and unhappiness shot through Castiel. It had been a hallucination, confirming that, yes, he could see them outside of his own head and he likely would again, but at least the bond seemed to be able to get rid of them.
It was likely a temporary measure at most, but it was better than nothing. He couldn’t rely on it as a permanent solution, lest Dean notice.
Cas turned back to Meg.
"Get out. There will be no deal," Cas said. Meg adopted a look of disinterest and shrugged.
"I'll give you until tomorrow to think it over," she said, standing up. She brushed invisible lint off of her pants and walked passed Castiel. Just before she left, she turned and smiled thinly. "And don't get any ideas about flying off. I've had a bit of fun with... I guess you could call it an art project?" She patted one of the walls affectionately. "I couldn't get my hands on holy oil, and I'd probably be fired for lighting it up, but these should work on anything below an archangel." She looked at him and winked mockingly. "And let's face it, Clarence, you're no archangel."
At once, the meaning of the small, off-white patterns on the walls became obvious.
"Meg-" Castiel growled threateningly, taking a step forward, but she was already opening the door and halfway into the hall. She shut the door and gave him a cheeky little wave through the small window before leaving.
Castiel walked immediately to the door, hoping the demon wasn’t as clever as she thought herself, but found he couldn't even touch the handle. He walked around the room, searching for an escape route, but it was as if an invisible barrier stood between him and the door, the walls, and the window. His hand just slid away, never making direct contact with any of it. He glanced towards the floor, wondering if perhaps that was a viable escape route, but then realized that he'd never been standing on the floor to begin with. The invisible bubble curved under his feet as well, though it was so thin he couldn't feel it and he doubted the miniscule distance between the bottoms of his feet and the floor was noticeable to humans.
Meg had done her research well. The angel-containment sigils she had traced on the walls were similar but different to the ones Crowley had used to keep angels out of his mansion. They were less effective for trapping angels than holy fire, but unfortunately effective enough to keep him confined. He wouldn't be able to leave the room until one of the sigils had been broken, but he couldn’t so much as touch them.
If he had his full strength, he might have been able to do something, but the battles inside his head had taken their toll.
He walked back to the bed and sat down. The bond was still active in the back of his mind, taking small sips of Grace to strengthen itself. The angel shut his eyes, already mourning his actions before he withdrew his consciousness from the waking world and travelled back.
The bond was where he had left it and it flashed warmth and light at him as a greeting, surrounded by little bits of Grace. Castiel gently but firmly pried it away, listening to it protest and wishing he was allowed to let it grow. If Dean were a willing participant in this, instead of the unknowing other half, perhaps the connection would be able to mature. Perhaps Castiel would be able to pour his energy into it and feel Dean's soul mixing with his Grace and hope for consummation.
He let the fantasy go and headed to the other side of his mind, carrying the bond and trailing golden light behind him. There was one thing he needed to do before he could wall the bond up again; hopefully, it would be enough to solve the problem of the hallucinations permanently.
He kept to the shallower portions of his subconscious, again skirting the place Jimmy’s spirit used to reside as he headed for the source of the madness. It was ugly, like a tumor of blood-red light infecting Castiel’s mind.
He stopped at the edges of the madness, still cradling the bond. He let it go and it fell to his ankles, curling around them and offering support. The red light in front of them formed itself into the enormous red chamber Cas recognized, Lucifer standing just inside. Castiel leveled his arm, palm out and fingers splayed, at the archangel. He would end this quickly.
"You're going to try to Cage me again, little brother?" Lucifer asked. "That didn't work out so well for you last-"
Castiel ignored him and concentrated on pouring his Grace into a wall between the red chamber and the rest of his mind. The bond wrapped itself tighter around his ankles, providing what little strength it could; it surprisingly powerful for something so neglected, but that little boost wasn't enough to fully Cage Lucifer. It did, however, provide the tether to reality that Cas had been missing in his previous attempts.
The wall sprang up between them, thick, strong, and translucent. Cas saw Lucifer throw himself against the barrier. The wall shuddered, but it looked like it would hold for at least a little while.
Castiel turned away and moved back towards the other side of his mind, where the bond had originally rested and could be bound. The bond trailed after him, like a dog that knew it was about to be punished for some supposed crime.
"You must understand, I have no right to you," Castiel murmured softly to it. "This is... for the best."
His Grace was running low, but it was nothing that a few hours of recharging would not fix. Heaven believed him dead, and perhaps that was for the best as well. They hadn't cut him off from the Host.
Behind him, he felt something shatter.
He turned just in time to see the madness swarming towards him, covering the distance within a heartbeat and wrapping around him. The wall he had built had shattered.
"Did you really think something so brittle could hold me?" Lucifer hissed, placing his hands around Castiel's neck and squeezing.
Golden light surged up around Castiel, wriggling in-between the archangel's palms and Castiel's throat. Lucifer held on, his appearance flickering from that of his vessel to the red energy Cas knew as the taint he had lifted from Sam's mind and then back again.
He gathered up the rest of his Grace, every shred, and threw it around Lucifer. The archangel struggled, trying to break the 'rope', but Castiel kept it moving, slithering like something living. With the bond at his back for support, he dragged Lucifer back to the red chamber where they had fought.
Visions appeared along the path, but they were weak and insubstantial in comparison to what Lucifer had managed to conjure before. Angels Cas had killed crowded around him, the madness manifesting through the small gaps in the restraints Cas had fashioned from his Grace. Castiel trudged on, trying not to look at the faces of those brothers and sisters he had murdered.
The bond circled around him, sending weak pulses of light towards the apparitions as if wanting to drive them away, but unable.
The visions grew stronger the closer Cas drew to the chamber, reaching out and pulling at him, calling his name.
"Castiel-"
"-was this truly what Father wanted-"
"-my leader..."
It took more effort to ignore the cries than he would have hoped. He could feel Lucifer thrashing inside of the Grace containing him, loosening the hold, and tightened his grip. His Grace was burning down to mere embers of power but he doggedly walked on, wading through the bodies. Blood began slowly rising around his feet, slowing him down.
"This isn't over, Castiel," Lucifer said calmly as Cas tossed him into the red chamber. "No matter what you do, nothing will hold me for long."
"I know," Cas replied. He took a deep breath and ripped his Grace away from Lucifer before spreading the same blanket of Grace across the entrance to the chamber. The visions around him vanished. The Grace wavered and shimmered, but instead of solidifying into a wall, Castiel kept it moving.
Lucifer pounded at the wall, trying to break it as he had the first, but Castiel directed Grace to fill in the cracks and didn’t allow Lucifer so much as a fissure to break through.
Lucifer stopped attacking the wall after a few minutes, a slightly unhappy expression on his face at the lack of effect his efforts seem to have. Castiel was exhausted, but he held himself firm and tried not to let it show.
"Clever," Lucifer admitted softly. "Keep your Grace moving, never let it settle, and it will bend instead of break. You'll be able to contain me somewhat, though never completely." Lucifer met Castiel's eyes and stared through them. "You'd need to build a Cage for that, and you don't have the strength or the foundation."
The bond writhed around Castiel, angry and protective, but Cas was done. He walked away from the chamber, though he kept his senses on the thin Grace barrier dividing the madness from the rest of him. Lucifer had taken to striking the wall again, trying to bring it down.
Cas had no energy left to cage up the bond. He would have to let it roam free tonight and try not to touch it. One night wouldn’t make that much of a difference, but it would allow him a safety net while he got used to the constant manipulation of Grace the new, living wall would require.
Just for tonight, and then he would wall the bond back up.
The bond tried to hold onto him, but weakly, and Castiel easily brushed it off. The angel rose back to consciousness in his physical body, weary but blessedly hallucination free, at least for now. His head was pounding and he felt drained, but he couldn’t afford to let his concentration waver from the rhythm of motion, bending without breaking, and repairing going on inside his head.
He settled in to meditate, the closest he could come to sleep, and devoted half of himself to maintaining the barrier and the other half to regaining his strength. He devoted nothing at all to watching the bond.
The golden light spread carefully over a corner of his mind and started putting down roots, but in Castiel’s carelessness or selfishness, he did not notice.
LINE BREAK
Dean's eyes snapped open and he shifted uncomfortably on the passenger seat of the crappy little Camry he and Sam had 'borrowed' a few towns back. He rubbed one of his temples, then ran his palm over his face from forehead down.
His head felt strange, like he'd been walking around with a headache for months but had never realized until it had broken. It almost felt like something had torn, but it didn’t hurt.
"You awake?" Sam asked him quietly, just loud enough to be heard over the low rumble of some God-awful country music station. Dean scowled at the radio and shook his head dismissively.
"Yeah, 'm awake. My turn yet?" he asked. Sam shook his head.
"I've only been driving for an hour. You can go back to napping, if you want," Sam replied. They'd gotten wind of some possible Leviathan shenanigans on the other side of the country and were tearing ass to get there. They hadn't paused much for sleep, instead taking turns driving and power napping when not behind the wheel. It made for some very odd sleeping habits.
Dean made a noncommittal noise and hauled himself into a proper sitting position, blinking at the clock on the car's dashboard. 7 p.m.
"Great," he mumbled, pulling his phone out of his coat pocket. He dialed the number he had memorized over the past few weeks and pressed the phone impatiently to his ear, listening to it ring. Just before it went to voicemail, Meg picked up.
"What?" she demanded. Dean's scowl darkened.
"Hello to you, too," he said. He took a deep breath to calm himself before continuing. This whole situation just grated on his nerves, if he was being honest with himself. He rarely was. "Has Cas woken up yet?"
Meg sighed, exasperated.
"I told you I'd call when he was awake. Clarence is still a drooling vegetable and the doctors don't know when he'll wake up."
Dean looked out the window of the car, irritation and worry warring over his face and creating an expression he didn't want Sam to see. His baby brother was too damn good at reading him sometimes. Irritation won.
"You'll call me as soon as he wakes up, right?" Dean said commandingly, daring her to refuse. "As soon as, not five days later, not five minutes later-"
"Yes, yes, right away. I know, Dean-o," Meg said. "Later."
She hung up. Dean took his phone away from his ear and glared at it, then snapped it shut and shoved it back into his pocket.
LINE BREAK
When Castiel's consciousness surfaced again the next morning, it was to the strange feeling of distant waves of sleepy contentment and echoes of hunger. Curious and slightly afraid they were emanating from his own body, he followed the sensations and found the bond. It glowed brightly and radiated happiness, nestled within his consciousness and roots penetrating the topmost level of Castiel's being.
Cas studied it, stunned. The bond shouldn't have been able to progress this far, even unfettered, without either him or Dean acting on it. At this stage and with their current proximity, Dean would need to search for the bond within himself in order to even sense it existed. Castiel had done nothing with it all night, careful to keep his thoughts on his tasks and not let himself wander.
His question was answered when he felt two small tendrils of Grace, barely perceptible even now that he was watching for it, peel away from him and sneak away to the golden glow, nurturing it.
He pulled his Grace tighter around himself, trying to prevent more of it from acting without his conscious mind's direction, and crept closer to the bond. It thrummed happily, then shrieked indignantly as he began prying the roots up one by one. The bond dug in and wrapped around him, clinging to him, but Cas was resolute.
Every root pried up left him feeling chilled, warmth he hadn't noticed before seeping away. He shivered, but continued. This was not something he could keep.
Once the golden tendrils had all been pulled up, Castiel gently folded them over until the bond was a small, quivering bundle in his arms. By all rights, he should sever it, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. As long as he didn't let it entrench itself, surely it was permissible to keep just this?
He heard a noise reverberating through his vessel's ears and put the bond down regretfully. It began to creep back to the hollow places where the roots had once been, intending to slide back into those slots, but Castiel slipped a thin sheet of Grace between the bond and his mind, solidifying it instantly so the bond couldn't draw power from it. Walls snapped up around it, caging it.
The golden light pawed at the barrier, trying to break through, but the box held. Castiel allowed his mind to surface in the physical world once more, following the sound.
"-tiel. Castiel?"
Cas opened his eyes and came face to face with Meg. She was frowning, though she looked more irritated than upset.
"About time," she said, upon noticing his attention. "Have you considered my offer?"
"You should take it, little brother."
Cas tensed, lips in a thin line as he registered Lucifer's voice. The archangel was leaning on the wall behind Meg, partially insubstantial but still there.
"You knew that wall couldn't stop me. Frankly, I'm impressed you managed this much," Lucifer said, examining his hand, fingers splayed. "But if this is the best you can do..."
"It is enough," Castiel said flatly. Meg looked frustrated.
"What does that mean?" she asked. Castiel focused his gaze on her.
"No," he said simply.
Part 2