SPN fic: Prodigal Blues, PG, Sam, Castiel, (4.18 coda)
Title: Prodigal Blues*
Author: datenshiblue & caelumi
Rating: PG
Characters: Sam, Castiel
Notes/Disclaimers/Summary: Coda to 4.18.
Supernatural, Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester and Castiel are someone else's creations.
Just a little conversation that never happened (but maybe it should have).
If you like it, recs are love. <3
*Title from a song by Billy Idol.
Sam lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling in the dark. He'd managed to keep going to the next town, running on adrenaline and rage. Their first stop had been getting the Impala's back window replaced, then food and newspaper, and now Dean was snoring softly in the next bed, tired out enough to sleep. Sam was exhausted, but the blood in his veins had been stirred up by the confrontation with Lilith and it wouldn't let him rest.
If he went outside, he knew Ruby would show up. But for once, he didn't want to do it.
The thing that was keeping him awake? Doubt.
There were no windows open in the motel room, but the air in the stale space seemed to pick up for a moment, buffet around lightly before settling.
Castiel settled into a shadowed corner of the kitchenette and looked at the brothers through the night's shade. His eyes settled on Dean first, foremost, watching the steady rise and fall of his chest. The one that had to save them all. It was a burden that Castiel wouldn't wish on anyone.
Sam's nostrils flared and his hand was sliding under his pillow before he completely registered what the other presence in the room was.
When he realized it was Castiel, his fingers didn't immediately release their grip on the weapon, though he already knew even Ruby's knife had no power to harm the angel.
He made himself breathe and forced his hand to open and slide away from the knife's hilt.
Deliberately, Sam sat up in the dark, swinging long legs over the side of the bed. He didn't speak. Dean was sleeping and that was rare enough for the whole time he'd been back upstairs that Sam didn't want to wake him. But he pinned his look onto the angel, almost defying Castiel to break the silence. The stare was protective and wary.
Castiel saw the wakeful shift of Dean's brother but he didn't immediate take his eyes from Dean until Sam was sitting and forcing attention upon him. Only then did the angel's eyes slide sideways, his head following in inches. There was silence between them.
When Castiel finally moved, in that silence the shifting of his coat sounded like the beating of wings, soft, at the very edges of hearing. He walked toward the Winchesters, watching Sam. Stepped between their two beds before finally turning his gaze back to Dean. He leaned over and reached out, brushing his fingertips against a forehead smoothed by sleep. Castiel wasn't worried about repercussions by Sam even though, yes. The younger Winchester did frighten him now. He'd become something that Castiel didn't think anyone had foreseen.
Sam stood up when Castiel approached, but the angel walked by, turning back to Dean. Of course. The 'boy with the demon blood' wasn't worth the angel's time except when he was needed to do a job.
When Castiel reached over to touch Dean, Sam's arm jerked with the need to hit that touch away. His fingers curled into a fist and a muscle in his jaw jumped as he clenched.
The knowledge that if Castiel wanted to take Dean away like before that there was nothing he could do to prevent it woke the never completely absent anger in his blood.
He reached for his boots to put them on. The room was too small and he felt like the one making it a crowd.
Only the brush of fingers before Castiel turned and sat on the edge of Dean's bed, facing Sam. Dean didn't stir. "He won't wake," Castiel said, watching Sam put his shoes on. He hadn't come on a mission, or with one. He'd just come. It was a weakness and one that he wasn't strong enough to fight anymore.
Sam didn't stop pulling on his boots.
"Good," he said softly, tone cool. "He needs his sleep." He got to his feet and grabbed his jacket.
The one night he'd determined to stay, and Castiel was pushing him out, knowingly or otherwise. Ruby would probably find that ironically amusing.
Castiel didn't rise. "Where are you going?" His eyes were following the younger Winchester and for the time being, Dean seemed to be forgotten. Though the truth of it was that Dean would never be forgotten.
"What does it matter? Do you really think I'm going to lay down and go back to sleep with you playing bedpost angel to my brother?" Sam's voice was still quiet but the edge wasn't suppressed. And the anger wasn't subsiding, quite the contrary.
He didn't reach for the keys. Ruby had her own wheels.
There were logical words on Castiel's tongue but he swallowed each of them. He'd been on Earth long enough to have learned that emotion overcame rationality, every time. Hadn't he explained things to Dean time and time again? It never seemed to matter.
"Then where shall we go?" he asked instead. Put it in Sam's hands.
" 'We'?" Sam laughed softly, briefly. "It's obvious you're here for Dean. The truth is, I'm not thrilled to leave you with him simply because I don't trust you to protect him, but it's been made clear that there isn't much I can do about it."
Castiel wasn't hurt by the words; the Winchesters had earned their reasons to distrust. "I would never let anything happen to Dean that was in my power to prevent. And... I am not above learning, Sam. I understand that where your brother goes, you follow." Although he'd also learned that the reverse wasn't always true.
Sam wasn't in the mood to give quarter but his tone was modulated, not condemning so much as it was simply even. "It was in your power to prevent what happened with Alistair. You should have stayed in the room with him at the very least."
Castiel looked at him evenly. Partly, it was the truth. Anna had distracted him. But even with that blame taken, Sam was wrong. "Do you think Dean wanted a witness for what I asked of him?" Yes, he took that blame as well.
"Do you think catering to his wants at the expense of his safety was admirable of you?" Sam returned without a second's pause. "And are you saying you couldn't have hidden yourself from him? That's news."
Sam took a deep breath and closed his eyes because the argument was sending the acid in his veins into overdrive and it was dangerous. He ignored Castiel and worked at tamping it down.
"I'm saying that I couldn't have hidden from Alastair." Castiel's voice--or, rather, his vessel's voice--remained even and calm despite Sam. "And that would have been doing your brother no favors." Castiel paused.
"Would you like someone with you, Sam, when you're not with your brother? For your own protection?"
Sam's eyes opened and the looked at Castiel sharply, eyes narrowing. "For my protection from what?"
"There's no way that you could have done what you did to Alastair without crossing a line that shouldn't have been crossed, Sam." Castiel was not easily surprised, certainly. That week had been a bad one on many different levels.
"If I hadn't crossed it," Sam said after a moment, looking with narrowed eyes and then glancing away, "You wouldn't be talking to me through those particular lips."
Castiel looked up at Sam for a moment before nodding. "Be that as it may." He thought about Dean in the hospital bed, broken in body and spirit.
Sam looked over, lips tightening at the way Castiel look at Dean sleeping in the bed.
"..'be that as it may'?" He shook his head and headed for the door.
Castiel stood up and followed him using the two very human feet of his vessel. "A sacrifice on my part is not too much to give for your brother, Sam. Or you. If it is necessary." Because Castiel knew now, knew it especially after what Zachariah had done, that Dean needed Sam as surely as he needed air in his lungs.
Sam continued out the door, really not expecting the angel to follow him through it.
He frowned when Castiel did so, and stopped, closing the door and pausing outside.
He didn't look for Ruby. She wouldn't show herself in front of Castiel, not after what had happened with Anna. And Uriel.
"You know, I agree with you. A sacrifice for Dean is not too much to give, considering what you expect of him. But it was pointless." He leaned against the building and folded his arms over his chest. "You've been discussing me with him. Why not just come to the source?"
Castiel had nothing but his duty binding him to, or against, the demon with the brunette as her vessel, but something that had nothing to do with duty inside of him knew that she had made her own sacrifices for the Winchesters.
It tempered him, though it shouldn't have. He could feel her near. She smelled not unlike Sam, in a way that could be overlooked in the way that some humans were light skinned, some dark. Castiel now knew it was something more.
That Sam thought any sacrifice could be pointless worried Castiel. Briefly, the worry showed on his face. He stood in front of Sam, not to closely. "Have I?"
"Oh come on!" Sam rolled his eyes. "You told him what happened to Alistair. He said you both knew I was getting stronger, but not how."
Then Sam focused sharply on Castiel. "Or did you lie to him about that?"
Castiel sighed. "I didn't know at the time how you'd done it, but I had my suspicions. Since then they have been... confirmed. There are only so many ways to transfer power Sam, and blood is always the strongest of ties."
Sam's lips pressed together, thinned.
He couldn't meet Castiel's eyes until he had stared out into the darkness beyond the parking lot for a few minutes. Even then, there was avoidance in them. Or perhaps, shame. But there was also defiance.
"I'm prepared to do whatever has to be done."
At least one brother was, even though it was for the wrong reasons. "Do you think God wants this?" Coming from an angel, it was an honest question.
"I don't know what God wants," Sam said, and he tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice. "I've been asking myself for a while why God didn't care when Yellow Eyes was dripping blood into infants' mouths and infecting helpless innocent children. If He didn't mind that, I guess maybe He doesn't care about this."
God never interfered, but Castiel knew that humans had a hard time grasping that it was their choices that mattered to Him. Free Will was a divine thing that every one of them took for granted but it was for better and for worse. One could not exist without the other.
"Did Zachariah's lesson teach you nothing?"
Sam didn't budge an inch. "Was it intended to? I had the impression I was just window dressing."
Castiel frowned at Sam. "And if you had stayed at Sandover, if you had gone back to your desk and your empty life, would Dean have turned his back on it alone?"
Sam's chin lifted. "If I'd have known, been allowed to know, I'd rather he stayed there. Safe. This is too much for him, Cas. It's not right, what you are asking of him."
Zachariah wouldn't have left them there indefinitely but Castiel wouldn't tell Sam that. "You didn't know. And you both are what you are, it makes no difference what God did or did not prevent."
He shifted slightly and looked at the window of the motel. "I would lift the burden if I could."
"Then why ask me if this is what God wants?" Sam replied. The way Castiel looked back, as if he could see through the wall and maybe he could. It was stupid to be jealous. It was also something he couldn't help any more. It had just gotten worse and worse.
Castiel's eyes shifted back. "You don't pray anymore."
Sam swallowed and looked down, then away.
"No."
He hadn't since the day Dean died in his arms. In that, he was unconsciously mirroring his father.
Even when Dean had returned, he hadn't quite said that prayer of thanks, though it had been on his lips for a while. A short time.
"Your brother isn't strong enough yet to have enough faith for the both of you, Sam. You need to help him." Dean should be Sam's focus, not Lilith. If only Castiel could make him see that.
As far as Sam was concerned, it was the same thing. She still held Dean's contract. And Sam could be more single minded than anyone on earth, now that John Winchester no longer walked it.
Sam was silent for a little while again. Then he turned to the angel, unleaned from the wall.
"Promise me he'll never go back to hell."
Castiel shook his head. "I can't make that promise. I'm sorry." But he hoped that he could prevent it. Might go to greater lengths than he should have to make it true.
Sam's brows pulled together, furrowing deeply.
"When I kill Lilith," he said, and his voice was cold, so very cold, "he'll be safe. He should never have become a pawn in this thing. He's been through too much, done too much. Endured too much. Maybe my father deserved to be in hell, maybe I do. But not Dean. Yes, he's lied and fornicated," Sam's lip curled at the word, "he's killed. But everything he's ever done has been for other people, to save them. Me, others. He was tortured for thirty years in hell because he chose my life over his soul. I'm not going to let that happen again. Never again. If I have to put down Lucifer himself, I will."
Castiel closed his eyes briefly, a prayer for Sam's soul. He did not want to see it lost when there was so much honest goodness in it below the layers of darkness. A bushel over his light, so to speak.
"Without what he's been through, he could never be strong enough to do what needs to be done."
"What?" Sam asked, voice spiraling up. "Climb on a cross?"
It was blasphemy and he knew it. And deep down, it hurt him to say the words, another chip off the fractured remnants of Sam's faith. But his faith had disowned him. That's how it felt.
Castiel knew that Sam was in pain, he just didn't know how to make it better. "He will do what it takes," he said softly, "just as you have done."
The expression on Sam's features might be reasonably called surly.
"Yes. Just as I have done. I think you just made my point for me."
"If you think so," Castiel said. He was trying to show Sam how they were both wrong but obviously Sam had too much invested to see clearly.
The scowl eased to a mere frown.
The words that finally came out of his mouth weren't the obvious ones but they emerged remarkably easily, all things considered. But then Sam still had the ability to surprise people (or angels) who didn't know him. And about the only person left alive who truly did was sleeping on the other side of that door.
"I don't understand," he said.
"You don't want Dean to be a martyr," Castiel said. He watched Sam without the human need to look away, his eyes and demeanor unflinching. He was glad that Sam at least could step back from the emotion of the situation, even if it was only momentary. "But it may be what he has to do. He doesn't want you to strengthen your ties to the demonic yet you say it's necessary. Isn't that making a martyr of yourself? Your love for your brother clouds your judgment."
The moment the words martyr, Dean, and 'may be what he has to do' appeared in the same sentence, Castiel lost the race with Sam's emotions.
"No," he said flatly. "I will never let that happen."
"You are only proving my point, Sam. Did you hear what I said?" Castiel shook his head.
"I heard you say you're all right with Dean martyring himself," Sam snapped. He looked away. "I'm not. Demon blood or no demon blood, I'll never be all right with that. Count on it."
"I said that it might be his destiny," Castiel said and there was a quick play of genuine emotion across his face, tightening borrowed features. Angels were not above emotion, only less likely to become trapped by the full spread of their range. But Castiel had his limits and Sam was pushing them. "I did not say that I agreed with it."
He closed his mouth as soon as the words were out. It was... inappropriate.
Sam's eyes pinned to Castiel's the moment the words hit air. The look was quite intelligent. Went too far, huh?
Sam didn't take it as a chance to get a dig in. Instead, he dropped the subject.
Trust Castiel? No. But Anna had fallen. If it took another angel to fall from grace to save his brother, Sam wasn't above letting it happen, either.
He looked away after letting Castiel see his understanding.
After a minute, he said, "Are you going to tell him?" About the demon blood.
Castiel held Sam's eyes, accepted that much. He should not have let the man's words get to him in the first place--he would take the blame, should it have repercussion.
Being pulled back. Another angel put in his place as Guardian of Dean and... Castiel found himself not wanting that. It shouldn't have matter but it did. It did and he wasn't sure how to feel.
"Not unless it becomes a necessity. You should tell him." Dean would not like to hear the information from Castiel. It would upset him.
It would upset him no matter where he learned it.
Sam looked away.
His boot scuffed the ground before he noticed and made himself straighten.
The simple truth of the matter was that he knew it, he agreed. He intended to.
What held him back was a remnant that he was almost unconscious of, a remnant of the little brother who wanted more than anything never to lose his older brother's approval. Sam was afraid he had finally done the one thing that would do it.
That, and somehow Dean's ignorance had become Sam's last shred of innocence.
"I will. When I'm ready."
Castiel could have told Sam that the innocence he clung to was only his own illusion, had he known the thought. But there was a small consolence that there was some part of Sam that did actually regret what he was doing. That was his soul, that was why he was Dean's tether. "Sam. What you're doing will not end well."
Sam looked up to meet Castiel's gaze, that not quiet human calm, and much of the anger seemed to drain away.
"Can you promise me that if I stop, it will end well?" Sam shook his head. "I know that you can't. No one can. If it was that easy, you wouldn't need Dean, or me."
"Evil is never the means to Good," Castiel said with a warning shake of his head. "It will not make the difference in the end." If Sam hadn't been what he'd become and Castiel had been separated from his vessel, or destroyed completely, then it would have been His will and someone else would have come forward.
"Well I guess what we differ on is the meaning of evil," Sam replied quietly. The anger was finally all drained out. He felt tired, so tired he almost swayed on his feet before his will stiffened the muscles in his legs. "You think blood can be evil. I think it's what you do with it that determines the difference."
"It's not the blood." Castiel stepped a little closer to Sam, ready to support him if necessary. He didn't know when that impulse had manifested. "The blood is a conduit. What you're taking through the blood is evil, Sam. It is."
Sam looked up, almost stepped back before he caught himself, he almost couldn't help it. He had told Ruby he didn't fear angels but that was months ago and his secrets had worn into him on that front.
However he didn't step back, just looked, a little confused by the proximity.
"Is it more evil than Dean's talent for torture?"
It probably sounded like another counter shot, but this time it was a real question. Sam wasn't as certain of himself as he appeared but the facade was necessary. He knew that. Once he had decided to walk this road, he'd given up the luxury of showing weakness, or so he believed.
Castiel thought about the question. "Dean's... talent. It is a by-product of something terrible, to be sure. What you are doing. Sam, it is not a reaction, it is an action. It's your free will and your choice. So yes. I think it is." That was not the Word, but Castiel's opinion. There was hardly a spiritual guidebook for these things, only experience.
So Dean's choice to torture others was a by-product and Sam trying to make something of his tainted destiny was evil. Figured.
For himself, Sam absolved his brother of any guilt, recognized the choice as having been under the most unimaginable duress. But it was still a choice. If it hadn't been, Sam suspected it would never have been the kind of act that could break the first seal.
"You have to make up your mind, Castiel," he said, and the tiredness leaked through into his voice. "Does the end justify the means or doesn't it? I was taught as a child that lying is a sin. It says so in the Bible. I could never reconcile that with the life we lived, or with my father being a good man, but I learned to do it, learned to accept the necessity. But if you'd ever asked me if angels could lie?" Sam shook his head, his eyes never shifting from Castiel's.
Castiel's frown at that was lasting. "The Bible was written by men," he said. "And I do not lie." Omissions of truth were not the same thing.
"It's a lie to pretend to be someone else, Castiel," Sam said, tilting his head slightly. There was no real reason for the angel to realize that Sam's entire remaining splinter of faith was about to strengthen or shatter based on what Castiel answered to that. One denial would finish the job of convincing Sam that what he had once believed in was a shadow without a shred of realism left to it. It was ironic. Admitting imperfection was the only thing that could possibly give Sam any reassurance that the concept of heaven was anything more than a distorted mirror of hell.
Castiel looked at Sam for a long moment. "I'm not sure that I understand." He might not have realized that Sam's faith hung in the balance, certainly not, but there was something, something, that made him want to give the answer his full attention and understanding.
"You pretended to be Bobby to get us on the trail of the reaper kidnappings."
Someone we trusted. Used that trust when you hadn't earned it.
Sam waited out the answer. He wanted... he wasn't sure he could afford to want to hear an angel say he'd been wrong.
Castiel frowned. "Both of you have expressed your distaste when I... tell you what you should be doing. But a seal was going to be broken."
Sam's eyebrows rose slightly. "In other words, the end justifies the means."
Castiel's mind spun around that. He nearly shook his head but didn't complete the motion. "I am an angel, Sam. I have orders to complete." And he had been trying to keep the Winchesters from chafing at the bit they'd been given. He had been thinking of how they felt instead of just making them do what was right. And now it was turning the tables against him.
"With that one sentence you just placed yourself firmly in the shoes of my father," Sam said. He couldn't stop his head from bowing slightly. He turned a little bit away.
The night air felt a bit chilly.
Sam realized they were the same shoes he'd finally stepped into himself. He only realized now that a tiny part of him had been hoping Castiel would admit that simple authority didn't justify dishonesty. That the mission didn't justify it.
That would have been the one chance to put a crack in Sam's own arguments for using the demonic blood and the powers it strengthened.
Castiel actually reached out, fingers grazing Sam's elbow. "Sam. Your father had a choice, as you do, as Dean does. All of you could have, still can, walk away." He hand fell and his features smoothed over into their perfect mask again. "I cannot."
Sam stopped but his return look was uncompromising.
"You can't walk away from the mission, but you chose how to carry it out. Or did God tell you to pretend to be Bobby?" That wasn't a real question. "You didn't have faith in us, Castiel. You decided you couldn't risk it. Do you know what would have happened if you'd just said go here, a seal is going to be broken, we need your help?"
"You would have told me that it was your decision." His voice was raised. Slightly. "You would have gotten angry with me for bullying you, for telling you what to do, for using you as pawns. Do you think that I haven't heard it before?" Castiel stepped closer. "I did it because I thought that it would be easier for you."
Castiel was suddenly reminded of that night in Singer's kitchen with Dean, that first intimate reveal. How he'd been so distant and so ready to bring divine wrath as the answer to Dean's accusations. And here he was months later, calming arguing the finer points of faith and God's will with the demon Winchester.
"Oh, so you read minds? You see futures that haven't happened?"
Sam's voice was sharp. It was, almost a rebuke.
"It was a rhetorical question, Castiel. We would have gone. Ask Dean if you don't believe me." Sam turned to face the angel more squarely. "I don't think you heard me. I said you didn't have faith."
Castiel was frowning more in this short time than he could remember doing in centuries. "I have faith." He intended it to come out as a statement, but it almost sound like he was defending himself.
"In you orders," Sam said, and this time is was almost gentle. "Not in us."
Sam ran a hand through his hair, suddenly wondering how he had gotten into this conversation. Why Castiel wasn't smiting him for daring to argue. But the longer Castiel didn't smite, the more something in Sam perked up and paid attention.
"You keep telling me choice is such an important thing, choice, and free will. But with almost the same breath you have no problem reconciling that you took the choice out of the equation by pretending to be Bobby, and by not telling us what you already knew. Look... maybe this is all about Anna... but Anna wasn't a seal. Neither Dean nor I want Lilith to succeed. If we've bitched, it was invariably after the fact when you knew things you didn't bother to tell us!"
Sam hardly noticed his voice was taking on life, maybe even excitement. "You gave Dean a horrendous choice. He did what you asked. What I'm asking is, why don't you have faith in us?"
And then Sam fell abruptly silent before adding, "...or is it just me?"
"You are... uncontrollable," Castiel breathed out. It wasn't an insult, just an honest assessment from the view point of a general to his troops. "And very close to becoming a liability, Sam. I don't want that to happen because I know that without you Dean could not be the man we need him to be."
Castiel paused. "I only tried to make the choice easier," he said in a softer tone. "I cannot go against my orders but I... I don't want to tell Dean what he needs to do. I don't want to order him. I was trying to find a compromise."
"Is the choice really a choice if you make it 'easier'?" Sam asked, after a moment of pressing lips together. He didn't try to argue with the assertion (accusation?) that he was uncontrollable. It only evoked John Winchester one more time.
"You've never said no to Bobby? I only thought that a friendly tone could make it less of a job." It was starting to sound like an excuse again and Castiel dropped the argument. It hardly mattered in the long run, obviously he wouldn't be doing it again.
"Actually, we never have. If we did, it wouldn't have been that clever to use his voice, would it?" Sam almost sighed.
He leaned back against the building again and looked at the ground.
I guess I'm asking too much of an angel he thought. And that is a really twisted concept...
He looked up again. His voice was soft and even. "I'm not uncontrollable. I'm not even unpredictable. I want to save my brother and stop the Apocalypse. That makes me a wild card?"
To that, finally, Castiel smiled. Oh, it was only a twitch of lips, but it was more than he'd given in a long time. Finally, Sam was understanding. "Yes. It does. Because you love him unconditionally."
Sam met Castiel's gaze for a long time without looking away, without moving... longer than was usual for most people, most human types.
"Yes I do," he said finally. "There isn't anything you can do about it."
There wasn't even anything Dean could do about it.
No, not aside from killing him. But that would break Dean. "You are," Castiel said with a nod, "uncontrollable."
Sam frowned.
"Whereas you, Castiel, are controllable?"
And the frown, the slight crease between borrowed eyebrows, was back. "I... am."
"If it's unconditional love that makes me uncontrollable, I think I'd rather be that," Sam said softly.
Castiel nodded. "It's your choice." And there was a part of him, deep down, that was jealous of that.
Sam searched Castiel's face quietly, aware that he was seeing a man's features with only hints of the angel animating them.
"Well it seems we're just about back where we started," he said after a moment.
"I never thought that I would be able to change your mind," Castiel said; he wasn't bothered by the full circle. Sam knew more, regardless, now. Maybe it would help sway his future actions. "I only wanted you to think of the full scope of consequence that you are setting in motion."
Sam's face twisted a little with a slightly incredulous look.
"You really think I could ever possibly not be aware of the consequences?" He looked around at nothing. It was a God, give me patience look, quite recognizably.
"I've spent my whole life trying to deal with the things other people, and demons, and for all I know, angels set in motion. This is the second time in my life I've actually tried to do something about any of it, and the first time didn't work out very well."
There wasn't even a hint of humor in that.
"I think that you can't possibly see as far, or as much, as you should," Castiel said back with a shake of his head. "You think about your brother in terms only of yourself. It's a very human thing to do, Sam. Dean isn't any better in that regard." He didn't blame them. If Castiel thought before that it had been stupid then his mind had been changed since meeting the two brothers. Shortsightedness was only love.
"I think about my brother in terms of Dean," Sam said, lips thinning. His voice was calm, though. "If I thought only of myself, you think I would do any of this?" His head tossed briefly. It was the most oblique reference possible to the fact that Ruby was out there somewhere.
And Ruby, to Sam, was nothing more than a means to an end.
Castiel doubted that any demon would allow themselves to be simply a means to an ends but he did not want to dip into the waters of that topic with Sam. The relationship that he had with the demon... That was not right. That was human weakness.
"You know that your brother doesn't want you doing what you do. If that weren't so then you would have told him long ago. You rationalize it by saying you will use the power to kill Lilith. To help your brother, to protect him. But what will Dean do if gaining this power costs you your soul, Sam?" Castiel had to look up, just slightly, to meet Sam's eyes. Determined, proud, and too much of both to admit that he was scared, perhaps. "I asked you about Zachariah's vision earlier because I do not believe that Dean would have walked away from that life without you being there. You were not a tag-along, or scenery. You were your brother's rock. What do you think will happen to Dean if that is taken away from him?"
Sam's frown was epic.
"I already know what happens to him if I'm taken away. He went to hell, remember?"
He turned around, giving Castiel his back. It was smooth, not really abrupt. And Castiel was, let's face it, so clueless at times that it was even possible it might work as far as covering Sam's expression, his feelings, suddenly way too close to the surface.
The expression was kind of scared. A bit helpless. "I'm not going anywhere, so it's a moot point."
"If you don't go anywhere that might be the worst fate of all." Castiel watched the slight raise of Sam's shoulders as he turned away and didn't think that he'd disengaged simply because now he wanted the conversation over. He moved to Sam's side. "If you lose your soul in this battle, he will be forced to face you. You will be on opposite sides of the line. Do you think he is strong enough not to give you the win out of his love for you?"
Sam looked sharply at the angel, who was flanking him now.
"Can I tell you something? I am sick and tired of everyone assuming that I am going darkside." It was brittle. "It's... it's getting old! I've had people telling me I was evil or going evil, or going to be evil for years now! It's like... how disappointed is everyone going to be when it doesn't happen?"
"I would be greatly relieved if it didn't happen," Castiel said quietly. It was for Dean's sake, but for Sam's as well. "But the truth is that the power that you are tapping is dark, Sam. There is no if about that. It is a certainty."
"I think I'm aware of that," Sam replied icily. "I can't not be aware of it." Not when it felt like acid in his veins, acid that moved, and heated up, and seared and left him drained and numb when it faded away. "However I'm still waiting for the other side to step up with alternatives." Castiel's side.
"Have faith." Castiel said it like an absolute. To him, it was an answer.
It was an answer, no matter what Anna spoke of.
"In what?" This time Sam's voice was soft, though his eyes blazed a little bit. "God isn't going to interfere. It's all about our choices, right? So if I stop using my powers, everything will work out? Castiel, that's not faith, that's avoiding responsibility!"
How can I have faith in a God who has no faith in me?
It was so hard to explain faith, especially to a man who had lost his. "There is always another way if you are strong enough to step off of the path that you are on and look for it." Castiel wanted so much to be able to help ease Sam's pain. It was just another thing that he shouldn't have cared about. Uriel would have told him that he was getting soft.
Uriel. The death of the angel, traitor or not, had left an aching wound that Castiel found it hard to come to terms with.
It confounded Sam. No matter how strong he became, the few who actually took any notice of him all thought of him as weak.
"That argument lost its credibility when you asked my brother to torture someone, anyone. Even a demon."
The game of absolutes? Sam wasn't that bad at it himself.
"I did not want to ask it of him." And for those handful of words, there was anger in Castiel's tone, real anger, and regret.
Sam's even look didn't let Castiel off the hook, but it was maybe just a little dialed down from the flat condemnation of before.
Wide shoulders shrugged slightly. "You said there's always another way, Castiel. So that means, for me, but not for you? Oh yeah, I forgot. You're an angel. You don't have choices, just orders."
"You don't understand, Sam." Castiel frowned. "We have no one that could have done what your brother did." He regretted it immensely, more than he'd regretted anything in the past century. In the past few. "Angel does not come into the equation. I regret it. I do."
"It was wrong!" Sam snapped. "Why don't you get that, you who are so ready to tell me what is evil? It was wrong! And all you can say is, no one else could do it?"
He growled softly. "He didn't. Do it. I did."
Castiel knew that it was wrong. He wouldn't have regretted it otherwise. But he didn't intend to let himself be yelled at, either. His chin raised slightly and though he might have been inches shorter than Sam, it didn't seem it. There were millenia behind those borrowed human eyes. "And you should not have been able to."
Sam felt the implied threat, like an increase in the air pressure between himself and Castiel. His scalp prickled.
He had the distinct feeling he had perhaps gone a little too far.
He didn't answer, but he held his ground.
"I'm sorry that your brother had to endure that," Castiel said, voice soft steel. "I have told you that I regret the necessity. Perhaps had we known the boundaries you had crossed then we would have asked you instead. But you keep secrets because you know they're blasphemies."
Sam's mouth just barely curved at the corners. If it was even a hint of a smile, it lacked humor.
"I keep secrets to protect him."
"You keep secrets to protect yourself." Castiel gave the smallest shake of his head.
Sam just gazed back. John Winchester would have recognized the look.
Unbidden, Sam suddenly thought of his father. He rolled his shoulders and turned to take a couple of steps, look up at the sky.
Is my Dad in heaven?
He would never ask.
Castiel looked away himself. He hadn't come to fight with Sam, he'd only stopped by to check on them after coming so close to Lilith. And an archangel.
After a few minutes of trying to see the stars through shreds of fast moving cloud, Sam said, without turning around, "I think that's the most I've ever heard you talk, like, ever."
Castiel's eyes moved back to Sam. The intensity about him had gone. "I am not... in the habit of discussing things." And maybe there was a sliver of humor in the remark, as dry as it sounded. Like a joke he didn't even know how to make.
Sam sighed. It was near inaudible but Dean would have heard it. Would have ragged him about it one upon a time.
"Lately, neither am I," he said. He turned back to look at Castiel, searching, seeing nothing more than the man the angel was wearing.
"You should," Castiel said. The suggestion was not softened for Sam's benefit; it was hardly a real suggestion at all. Angels were not used to asking, or being asked.
"Do you really think it would make any difference?" Sam asked softly. Dean's words back in the Toreador Motel room were still with him, would be with him from now on. You think I'm going to go darkside... Yes. Dean had answered yes, without a second's thought.
Castiel put his hands into the pockets of the trench coat that he wore. He'd gotten comfortable in it. "My answer would depend on if you think the things you are doing are worse than what Dean imagines you are doing."
"I don't think they're worse than ten years of torturing people in hell," Sam said before he could bite back the words.
He didn't blame Dean for that. Selfishly, he thought Dean pretty much deserved a pass for anything that had happened, including that, for all kinds of reasons.
But the condemnation he'd felt coming from his brother, real or imagined, when Dean had confronted him about ripping Alistair apart like he'd been swatting a fly... The hurts were deep. He wasn't going to apologize for finishing what Dean and the angels had started.
Castiel didn't claim to understand humans. They had... depths, insecurities, excuses, that he could not begin to comprehend the reasons of. His existence left little room for things like that.
And if he had his own insecurities--they were so fresh, so unknown still after all his time that he'd thought recently that he couldn't even understand himself.
"It is not a contest," Castiel only said.
Sam head hung a little. He was ashamed that the words had even made it out to the air.
"I shouldn't have said that," he murmured, more to himself than for Castiel's benefit.
The truth was, opening up just that little bit to Chuck, having someone listen without judgment, had fractured the shell he'd been keeping around himself. The shell that he needed, to get through this.
That was really why he couldn't tell Dean. Because once words started pouring out, it would be a flood that there would be no damming. And Dean would try, somehow, to fix everything.
Sam forced his head up. "You're right, It's not a contest," he said, and made himself meet the angel's gaze.
"All that matters is that I succeed."
If Castiel were more his human skin and less his Angel existence, he might have sighed. Instead, he just held Sam's eyes for a long, silent moment. "And after you succeed," against the fact that it was prophecy it would be Dean, "will he forgive you?"
"As long as he's alive to make that decision, I can live with whatever it is," Sam answered, like he'd thought about it. He had. Endlessly.
He was actually afraid the answer was no. But he was more afraid of returning to a world where his brother was dead and in hell. Different shades of agony, one bearable, maybe. The other, he already knew, wasn't.
Castiel shook his head, only once, fractions of a full movement. "Can he?"
Sam stiffened a little. "Where were you when he was selling his soul to bring me back? You could have asked him some nice pointed questions back then."
"Had I been on Earth," Castiel said evenly, "I might have. You both have a way with self-sacrifice that would be considered righteous by anyone but each other. It is..." Amusing, in a sad way. "A problem for you."
Yeah? Well we came by it honestly.
Sam reached up and ran a hand through his hair. He was really uncomfortable about the turn this odd conversation had taken. He wished again he could call those words back. Along with so many others.
It didn't matter, any of it. Castiel would never cut him a break. In the end, it wasn't the angel's understanding Sam craved, though it would have been an unexpected balm to the conflicts he was maintaining with such terrible focus.
"I just don't see a way of doing this that will make everyone happy."
Make Dean happy. Sam wondered if Dean would ever have a chance to really be happy again.
It was the kind of question that tore him up inside, and compelled the extreme measures he was forcing himself to go through.
"There are... casualties, in every war. People, places. Feelings. That is why it is war, Sam." Castiel knew that as well as the Winchesters; his own comrades, brothers, sisters--so many of them had fallen that there had come a point where Castiel asked himself if it was worth it. Asked Anna if it was worth it.
He wouldn't ask anyone else. That his faith was questioned at all upset him. He'd thought himself stronger.
"There are things we must do only because the doing is bigger than we are. Therein is the real strength. That--not death--is the real sacrifice. Living to see consequences that are unfavorable to us."
Castiel's words seemed to quiet Sam a little. Settle him, inside himself.
He nodded, once, hardly aware he was doing it.
"Yes."
For a moment Sam's eyes swept the shadows around the edges of the parking lot, seemed to look further, in the direction of the occasional passing car on the road.
Then he turned back towards the motel room door. His gaze went back to the angel.
"Thanks. For talking to me."
Castiel nodded. And he would go without bothering the lurking demon. "I'm glad that I took the time." Not that they'd come to anything but the same impasse where they'd began, but at least Castiel understood the why of it a little better. Anything, in the end, would help him better do his job.
Sam ducked his head a little, unconsciously, and for a brief second or two the boy he'd been was almost visible as he turned to go back into the room. Back to Dean, sleeping... peacefully? Sam hoped so.
He didn't leave the door open behind him.
Castiel would not have followed. There was a breeze, and a rustle of wings, and then only the night was left to fill the parking lot.
~
Author: datenshiblue & caelumi
Rating: PG
Characters: Sam, Castiel
Notes/Disclaimers/Summary: Coda to 4.18.
Supernatural, Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester and Castiel are someone else's creations.
Just a little conversation that never happened (but maybe it should have).
If you like it, recs are love. <3
*Title from a song by Billy Idol.
Sam lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling in the dark. He'd managed to keep going to the next town, running on adrenaline and rage. Their first stop had been getting the Impala's back window replaced, then food and newspaper, and now Dean was snoring softly in the next bed, tired out enough to sleep. Sam was exhausted, but the blood in his veins had been stirred up by the confrontation with Lilith and it wouldn't let him rest.
If he went outside, he knew Ruby would show up. But for once, he didn't want to do it.
The thing that was keeping him awake? Doubt.
There were no windows open in the motel room, but the air in the stale space seemed to pick up for a moment, buffet around lightly before settling.
Castiel settled into a shadowed corner of the kitchenette and looked at the brothers through the night's shade. His eyes settled on Dean first, foremost, watching the steady rise and fall of his chest. The one that had to save them all. It was a burden that Castiel wouldn't wish on anyone.
Sam's nostrils flared and his hand was sliding under his pillow before he completely registered what the other presence in the room was.
When he realized it was Castiel, his fingers didn't immediately release their grip on the weapon, though he already knew even Ruby's knife had no power to harm the angel.
He made himself breathe and forced his hand to open and slide away from the knife's hilt.
Deliberately, Sam sat up in the dark, swinging long legs over the side of the bed. He didn't speak. Dean was sleeping and that was rare enough for the whole time he'd been back upstairs that Sam didn't want to wake him. But he pinned his look onto the angel, almost defying Castiel to break the silence. The stare was protective and wary.
Castiel saw the wakeful shift of Dean's brother but he didn't immediate take his eyes from Dean until Sam was sitting and forcing attention upon him. Only then did the angel's eyes slide sideways, his head following in inches. There was silence between them.
When Castiel finally moved, in that silence the shifting of his coat sounded like the beating of wings, soft, at the very edges of hearing. He walked toward the Winchesters, watching Sam. Stepped between their two beds before finally turning his gaze back to Dean. He leaned over and reached out, brushing his fingertips against a forehead smoothed by sleep. Castiel wasn't worried about repercussions by Sam even though, yes. The younger Winchester did frighten him now. He'd become something that Castiel didn't think anyone had foreseen.
Sam stood up when Castiel approached, but the angel walked by, turning back to Dean. Of course. The 'boy with the demon blood' wasn't worth the angel's time except when he was needed to do a job.
When Castiel reached over to touch Dean, Sam's arm jerked with the need to hit that touch away. His fingers curled into a fist and a muscle in his jaw jumped as he clenched.
The knowledge that if Castiel wanted to take Dean away like before that there was nothing he could do to prevent it woke the never completely absent anger in his blood.
He reached for his boots to put them on. The room was too small and he felt like the one making it a crowd.
Only the brush of fingers before Castiel turned and sat on the edge of Dean's bed, facing Sam. Dean didn't stir. "He won't wake," Castiel said, watching Sam put his shoes on. He hadn't come on a mission, or with one. He'd just come. It was a weakness and one that he wasn't strong enough to fight anymore.
Sam didn't stop pulling on his boots.
"Good," he said softly, tone cool. "He needs his sleep." He got to his feet and grabbed his jacket.
The one night he'd determined to stay, and Castiel was pushing him out, knowingly or otherwise. Ruby would probably find that ironically amusing.
Castiel didn't rise. "Where are you going?" His eyes were following the younger Winchester and for the time being, Dean seemed to be forgotten. Though the truth of it was that Dean would never be forgotten.
"What does it matter? Do you really think I'm going to lay down and go back to sleep with you playing bedpost angel to my brother?" Sam's voice was still quiet but the edge wasn't suppressed. And the anger wasn't subsiding, quite the contrary.
He didn't reach for the keys. Ruby had her own wheels.
There were logical words on Castiel's tongue but he swallowed each of them. He'd been on Earth long enough to have learned that emotion overcame rationality, every time. Hadn't he explained things to Dean time and time again? It never seemed to matter.
"Then where shall we go?" he asked instead. Put it in Sam's hands.
" 'We'?" Sam laughed softly, briefly. "It's obvious you're here for Dean. The truth is, I'm not thrilled to leave you with him simply because I don't trust you to protect him, but it's been made clear that there isn't much I can do about it."
Castiel wasn't hurt by the words; the Winchesters had earned their reasons to distrust. "I would never let anything happen to Dean that was in my power to prevent. And... I am not above learning, Sam. I understand that where your brother goes, you follow." Although he'd also learned that the reverse wasn't always true.
Sam wasn't in the mood to give quarter but his tone was modulated, not condemning so much as it was simply even. "It was in your power to prevent what happened with Alistair. You should have stayed in the room with him at the very least."
Castiel looked at him evenly. Partly, it was the truth. Anna had distracted him. But even with that blame taken, Sam was wrong. "Do you think Dean wanted a witness for what I asked of him?" Yes, he took that blame as well.
"Do you think catering to his wants at the expense of his safety was admirable of you?" Sam returned without a second's pause. "And are you saying you couldn't have hidden yourself from him? That's news."
Sam took a deep breath and closed his eyes because the argument was sending the acid in his veins into overdrive and it was dangerous. He ignored Castiel and worked at tamping it down.
"I'm saying that I couldn't have hidden from Alastair." Castiel's voice--or, rather, his vessel's voice--remained even and calm despite Sam. "And that would have been doing your brother no favors." Castiel paused.
"Would you like someone with you, Sam, when you're not with your brother? For your own protection?"
Sam's eyes opened and the looked at Castiel sharply, eyes narrowing. "For my protection from what?"
"There's no way that you could have done what you did to Alastair without crossing a line that shouldn't have been crossed, Sam." Castiel was not easily surprised, certainly. That week had been a bad one on many different levels.
"If I hadn't crossed it," Sam said after a moment, looking with narrowed eyes and then glancing away, "You wouldn't be talking to me through those particular lips."
Castiel looked up at Sam for a moment before nodding. "Be that as it may." He thought about Dean in the hospital bed, broken in body and spirit.
Sam looked over, lips tightening at the way Castiel look at Dean sleeping in the bed.
"..'be that as it may'?" He shook his head and headed for the door.
Castiel stood up and followed him using the two very human feet of his vessel. "A sacrifice on my part is not too much to give for your brother, Sam. Or you. If it is necessary." Because Castiel knew now, knew it especially after what Zachariah had done, that Dean needed Sam as surely as he needed air in his lungs.
Sam continued out the door, really not expecting the angel to follow him through it.
He frowned when Castiel did so, and stopped, closing the door and pausing outside.
He didn't look for Ruby. She wouldn't show herself in front of Castiel, not after what had happened with Anna. And Uriel.
"You know, I agree with you. A sacrifice for Dean is not too much to give, considering what you expect of him. But it was pointless." He leaned against the building and folded his arms over his chest. "You've been discussing me with him. Why not just come to the source?"
Castiel had nothing but his duty binding him to, or against, the demon with the brunette as her vessel, but something that had nothing to do with duty inside of him knew that she had made her own sacrifices for the Winchesters.
It tempered him, though it shouldn't have. He could feel her near. She smelled not unlike Sam, in a way that could be overlooked in the way that some humans were light skinned, some dark. Castiel now knew it was something more.
That Sam thought any sacrifice could be pointless worried Castiel. Briefly, the worry showed on his face. He stood in front of Sam, not to closely. "Have I?"
"Oh come on!" Sam rolled his eyes. "You told him what happened to Alistair. He said you both knew I was getting stronger, but not how."
Then Sam focused sharply on Castiel. "Or did you lie to him about that?"
Castiel sighed. "I didn't know at the time how you'd done it, but I had my suspicions. Since then they have been... confirmed. There are only so many ways to transfer power Sam, and blood is always the strongest of ties."
Sam's lips pressed together, thinned.
He couldn't meet Castiel's eyes until he had stared out into the darkness beyond the parking lot for a few minutes. Even then, there was avoidance in them. Or perhaps, shame. But there was also defiance.
"I'm prepared to do whatever has to be done."
At least one brother was, even though it was for the wrong reasons. "Do you think God wants this?" Coming from an angel, it was an honest question.
"I don't know what God wants," Sam said, and he tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice. "I've been asking myself for a while why God didn't care when Yellow Eyes was dripping blood into infants' mouths and infecting helpless innocent children. If He didn't mind that, I guess maybe He doesn't care about this."
God never interfered, but Castiel knew that humans had a hard time grasping that it was their choices that mattered to Him. Free Will was a divine thing that every one of them took for granted but it was for better and for worse. One could not exist without the other.
"Did Zachariah's lesson teach you nothing?"
Sam didn't budge an inch. "Was it intended to? I had the impression I was just window dressing."
Castiel frowned at Sam. "And if you had stayed at Sandover, if you had gone back to your desk and your empty life, would Dean have turned his back on it alone?"
Sam's chin lifted. "If I'd have known, been allowed to know, I'd rather he stayed there. Safe. This is too much for him, Cas. It's not right, what you are asking of him."
Zachariah wouldn't have left them there indefinitely but Castiel wouldn't tell Sam that. "You didn't know. And you both are what you are, it makes no difference what God did or did not prevent."
He shifted slightly and looked at the window of the motel. "I would lift the burden if I could."
"Then why ask me if this is what God wants?" Sam replied. The way Castiel looked back, as if he could see through the wall and maybe he could. It was stupid to be jealous. It was also something he couldn't help any more. It had just gotten worse and worse.
Castiel's eyes shifted back. "You don't pray anymore."
Sam swallowed and looked down, then away.
"No."
He hadn't since the day Dean died in his arms. In that, he was unconsciously mirroring his father.
Even when Dean had returned, he hadn't quite said that prayer of thanks, though it had been on his lips for a while. A short time.
"Your brother isn't strong enough yet to have enough faith for the both of you, Sam. You need to help him." Dean should be Sam's focus, not Lilith. If only Castiel could make him see that.
As far as Sam was concerned, it was the same thing. She still held Dean's contract. And Sam could be more single minded than anyone on earth, now that John Winchester no longer walked it.
Sam was silent for a little while again. Then he turned to the angel, unleaned from the wall.
"Promise me he'll never go back to hell."
Castiel shook his head. "I can't make that promise. I'm sorry." But he hoped that he could prevent it. Might go to greater lengths than he should have to make it true.
Sam's brows pulled together, furrowing deeply.
"When I kill Lilith," he said, and his voice was cold, so very cold, "he'll be safe. He should never have become a pawn in this thing. He's been through too much, done too much. Endured too much. Maybe my father deserved to be in hell, maybe I do. But not Dean. Yes, he's lied and fornicated," Sam's lip curled at the word, "he's killed. But everything he's ever done has been for other people, to save them. Me, others. He was tortured for thirty years in hell because he chose my life over his soul. I'm not going to let that happen again. Never again. If I have to put down Lucifer himself, I will."
Castiel closed his eyes briefly, a prayer for Sam's soul. He did not want to see it lost when there was so much honest goodness in it below the layers of darkness. A bushel over his light, so to speak.
"Without what he's been through, he could never be strong enough to do what needs to be done."
"What?" Sam asked, voice spiraling up. "Climb on a cross?"
It was blasphemy and he knew it. And deep down, it hurt him to say the words, another chip off the fractured remnants of Sam's faith. But his faith had disowned him. That's how it felt.
Castiel knew that Sam was in pain, he just didn't know how to make it better. "He will do what it takes," he said softly, "just as you have done."
The expression on Sam's features might be reasonably called surly.
"Yes. Just as I have done. I think you just made my point for me."
"If you think so," Castiel said. He was trying to show Sam how they were both wrong but obviously Sam had too much invested to see clearly.
The scowl eased to a mere frown.
The words that finally came out of his mouth weren't the obvious ones but they emerged remarkably easily, all things considered. But then Sam still had the ability to surprise people (or angels) who didn't know him. And about the only person left alive who truly did was sleeping on the other side of that door.
"I don't understand," he said.
"You don't want Dean to be a martyr," Castiel said. He watched Sam without the human need to look away, his eyes and demeanor unflinching. He was glad that Sam at least could step back from the emotion of the situation, even if it was only momentary. "But it may be what he has to do. He doesn't want you to strengthen your ties to the demonic yet you say it's necessary. Isn't that making a martyr of yourself? Your love for your brother clouds your judgment."
The moment the words martyr, Dean, and 'may be what he has to do' appeared in the same sentence, Castiel lost the race with Sam's emotions.
"No," he said flatly. "I will never let that happen."
"You are only proving my point, Sam. Did you hear what I said?" Castiel shook his head.
"I heard you say you're all right with Dean martyring himself," Sam snapped. He looked away. "I'm not. Demon blood or no demon blood, I'll never be all right with that. Count on it."
"I said that it might be his destiny," Castiel said and there was a quick play of genuine emotion across his face, tightening borrowed features. Angels were not above emotion, only less likely to become trapped by the full spread of their range. But Castiel had his limits and Sam was pushing them. "I did not say that I agreed with it."
He closed his mouth as soon as the words were out. It was... inappropriate.
Sam's eyes pinned to Castiel's the moment the words hit air. The look was quite intelligent. Went too far, huh?
Sam didn't take it as a chance to get a dig in. Instead, he dropped the subject.
Trust Castiel? No. But Anna had fallen. If it took another angel to fall from grace to save his brother, Sam wasn't above letting it happen, either.
He looked away after letting Castiel see his understanding.
After a minute, he said, "Are you going to tell him?" About the demon blood.
Castiel held Sam's eyes, accepted that much. He should not have let the man's words get to him in the first place--he would take the blame, should it have repercussion.
Being pulled back. Another angel put in his place as Guardian of Dean and... Castiel found himself not wanting that. It shouldn't have matter but it did. It did and he wasn't sure how to feel.
"Not unless it becomes a necessity. You should tell him." Dean would not like to hear the information from Castiel. It would upset him.
It would upset him no matter where he learned it.
Sam looked away.
His boot scuffed the ground before he noticed and made himself straighten.
The simple truth of the matter was that he knew it, he agreed. He intended to.
What held him back was a remnant that he was almost unconscious of, a remnant of the little brother who wanted more than anything never to lose his older brother's approval. Sam was afraid he had finally done the one thing that would do it.
That, and somehow Dean's ignorance had become Sam's last shred of innocence.
"I will. When I'm ready."
Castiel could have told Sam that the innocence he clung to was only his own illusion, had he known the thought. But there was a small consolence that there was some part of Sam that did actually regret what he was doing. That was his soul, that was why he was Dean's tether. "Sam. What you're doing will not end well."
Sam looked up to meet Castiel's gaze, that not quiet human calm, and much of the anger seemed to drain away.
"Can you promise me that if I stop, it will end well?" Sam shook his head. "I know that you can't. No one can. If it was that easy, you wouldn't need Dean, or me."
"Evil is never the means to Good," Castiel said with a warning shake of his head. "It will not make the difference in the end." If Sam hadn't been what he'd become and Castiel had been separated from his vessel, or destroyed completely, then it would have been His will and someone else would have come forward.
"Well I guess what we differ on is the meaning of evil," Sam replied quietly. The anger was finally all drained out. He felt tired, so tired he almost swayed on his feet before his will stiffened the muscles in his legs. "You think blood can be evil. I think it's what you do with it that determines the difference."
"It's not the blood." Castiel stepped a little closer to Sam, ready to support him if necessary. He didn't know when that impulse had manifested. "The blood is a conduit. What you're taking through the blood is evil, Sam. It is."
Sam looked up, almost stepped back before he caught himself, he almost couldn't help it. He had told Ruby he didn't fear angels but that was months ago and his secrets had worn into him on that front.
However he didn't step back, just looked, a little confused by the proximity.
"Is it more evil than Dean's talent for torture?"
It probably sounded like another counter shot, but this time it was a real question. Sam wasn't as certain of himself as he appeared but the facade was necessary. He knew that. Once he had decided to walk this road, he'd given up the luxury of showing weakness, or so he believed.
Castiel thought about the question. "Dean's... talent. It is a by-product of something terrible, to be sure. What you are doing. Sam, it is not a reaction, it is an action. It's your free will and your choice. So yes. I think it is." That was not the Word, but Castiel's opinion. There was hardly a spiritual guidebook for these things, only experience.
So Dean's choice to torture others was a by-product and Sam trying to make something of his tainted destiny was evil. Figured.
For himself, Sam absolved his brother of any guilt, recognized the choice as having been under the most unimaginable duress. But it was still a choice. If it hadn't been, Sam suspected it would never have been the kind of act that could break the first seal.
"You have to make up your mind, Castiel," he said, and the tiredness leaked through into his voice. "Does the end justify the means or doesn't it? I was taught as a child that lying is a sin. It says so in the Bible. I could never reconcile that with the life we lived, or with my father being a good man, but I learned to do it, learned to accept the necessity. But if you'd ever asked me if angels could lie?" Sam shook his head, his eyes never shifting from Castiel's.
Castiel's frown at that was lasting. "The Bible was written by men," he said. "And I do not lie." Omissions of truth were not the same thing.
"It's a lie to pretend to be someone else, Castiel," Sam said, tilting his head slightly. There was no real reason for the angel to realize that Sam's entire remaining splinter of faith was about to strengthen or shatter based on what Castiel answered to that. One denial would finish the job of convincing Sam that what he had once believed in was a shadow without a shred of realism left to it. It was ironic. Admitting imperfection was the only thing that could possibly give Sam any reassurance that the concept of heaven was anything more than a distorted mirror of hell.
Castiel looked at Sam for a long moment. "I'm not sure that I understand." He might not have realized that Sam's faith hung in the balance, certainly not, but there was something, something, that made him want to give the answer his full attention and understanding.
"You pretended to be Bobby to get us on the trail of the reaper kidnappings."
Someone we trusted. Used that trust when you hadn't earned it.
Sam waited out the answer. He wanted... he wasn't sure he could afford to want to hear an angel say he'd been wrong.
Castiel frowned. "Both of you have expressed your distaste when I... tell you what you should be doing. But a seal was going to be broken."
Sam's eyebrows rose slightly. "In other words, the end justifies the means."
Castiel's mind spun around that. He nearly shook his head but didn't complete the motion. "I am an angel, Sam. I have orders to complete." And he had been trying to keep the Winchesters from chafing at the bit they'd been given. He had been thinking of how they felt instead of just making them do what was right. And now it was turning the tables against him.
"With that one sentence you just placed yourself firmly in the shoes of my father," Sam said. He couldn't stop his head from bowing slightly. He turned a little bit away.
The night air felt a bit chilly.
Sam realized they were the same shoes he'd finally stepped into himself. He only realized now that a tiny part of him had been hoping Castiel would admit that simple authority didn't justify dishonesty. That the mission didn't justify it.
That would have been the one chance to put a crack in Sam's own arguments for using the demonic blood and the powers it strengthened.
Castiel actually reached out, fingers grazing Sam's elbow. "Sam. Your father had a choice, as you do, as Dean does. All of you could have, still can, walk away." He hand fell and his features smoothed over into their perfect mask again. "I cannot."
Sam stopped but his return look was uncompromising.
"You can't walk away from the mission, but you chose how to carry it out. Or did God tell you to pretend to be Bobby?" That wasn't a real question. "You didn't have faith in us, Castiel. You decided you couldn't risk it. Do you know what would have happened if you'd just said go here, a seal is going to be broken, we need your help?"
"You would have told me that it was your decision." His voice was raised. Slightly. "You would have gotten angry with me for bullying you, for telling you what to do, for using you as pawns. Do you think that I haven't heard it before?" Castiel stepped closer. "I did it because I thought that it would be easier for you."
Castiel was suddenly reminded of that night in Singer's kitchen with Dean, that first intimate reveal. How he'd been so distant and so ready to bring divine wrath as the answer to Dean's accusations. And here he was months later, calming arguing the finer points of faith and God's will with the demon Winchester.
"Oh, so you read minds? You see futures that haven't happened?"
Sam's voice was sharp. It was, almost a rebuke.
"It was a rhetorical question, Castiel. We would have gone. Ask Dean if you don't believe me." Sam turned to face the angel more squarely. "I don't think you heard me. I said you didn't have faith."
Castiel was frowning more in this short time than he could remember doing in centuries. "I have faith." He intended it to come out as a statement, but it almost sound like he was defending himself.
"In you orders," Sam said, and this time is was almost gentle. "Not in us."
Sam ran a hand through his hair, suddenly wondering how he had gotten into this conversation. Why Castiel wasn't smiting him for daring to argue. But the longer Castiel didn't smite, the more something in Sam perked up and paid attention.
"You keep telling me choice is such an important thing, choice, and free will. But with almost the same breath you have no problem reconciling that you took the choice out of the equation by pretending to be Bobby, and by not telling us what you already knew. Look... maybe this is all about Anna... but Anna wasn't a seal. Neither Dean nor I want Lilith to succeed. If we've bitched, it was invariably after the fact when you knew things you didn't bother to tell us!"
Sam hardly noticed his voice was taking on life, maybe even excitement. "You gave Dean a horrendous choice. He did what you asked. What I'm asking is, why don't you have faith in us?"
And then Sam fell abruptly silent before adding, "...or is it just me?"
"You are... uncontrollable," Castiel breathed out. It wasn't an insult, just an honest assessment from the view point of a general to his troops. "And very close to becoming a liability, Sam. I don't want that to happen because I know that without you Dean could not be the man we need him to be."
Castiel paused. "I only tried to make the choice easier," he said in a softer tone. "I cannot go against my orders but I... I don't want to tell Dean what he needs to do. I don't want to order him. I was trying to find a compromise."
"Is the choice really a choice if you make it 'easier'?" Sam asked, after a moment of pressing lips together. He didn't try to argue with the assertion (accusation?) that he was uncontrollable. It only evoked John Winchester one more time.
"You've never said no to Bobby? I only thought that a friendly tone could make it less of a job." It was starting to sound like an excuse again and Castiel dropped the argument. It hardly mattered in the long run, obviously he wouldn't be doing it again.
"Actually, we never have. If we did, it wouldn't have been that clever to use his voice, would it?" Sam almost sighed.
He leaned back against the building again and looked at the ground.
I guess I'm asking too much of an angel he thought. And that is a really twisted concept...
He looked up again. His voice was soft and even. "I'm not uncontrollable. I'm not even unpredictable. I want to save my brother and stop the Apocalypse. That makes me a wild card?"
To that, finally, Castiel smiled. Oh, it was only a twitch of lips, but it was more than he'd given in a long time. Finally, Sam was understanding. "Yes. It does. Because you love him unconditionally."
Sam met Castiel's gaze for a long time without looking away, without moving... longer than was usual for most people, most human types.
"Yes I do," he said finally. "There isn't anything you can do about it."
There wasn't even anything Dean could do about it.
No, not aside from killing him. But that would break Dean. "You are," Castiel said with a nod, "uncontrollable."
Sam frowned.
"Whereas you, Castiel, are controllable?"
And the frown, the slight crease between borrowed eyebrows, was back. "I... am."
"If it's unconditional love that makes me uncontrollable, I think I'd rather be that," Sam said softly.
Castiel nodded. "It's your choice." And there was a part of him, deep down, that was jealous of that.
Sam searched Castiel's face quietly, aware that he was seeing a man's features with only hints of the angel animating them.
"Well it seems we're just about back where we started," he said after a moment.
"I never thought that I would be able to change your mind," Castiel said; he wasn't bothered by the full circle. Sam knew more, regardless, now. Maybe it would help sway his future actions. "I only wanted you to think of the full scope of consequence that you are setting in motion."
Sam's face twisted a little with a slightly incredulous look.
"You really think I could ever possibly not be aware of the consequences?" He looked around at nothing. It was a God, give me patience look, quite recognizably.
"I've spent my whole life trying to deal with the things other people, and demons, and for all I know, angels set in motion. This is the second time in my life I've actually tried to do something about any of it, and the first time didn't work out very well."
There wasn't even a hint of humor in that.
"I think that you can't possibly see as far, or as much, as you should," Castiel said back with a shake of his head. "You think about your brother in terms only of yourself. It's a very human thing to do, Sam. Dean isn't any better in that regard." He didn't blame them. If Castiel thought before that it had been stupid then his mind had been changed since meeting the two brothers. Shortsightedness was only love.
"I think about my brother in terms of Dean," Sam said, lips thinning. His voice was calm, though. "If I thought only of myself, you think I would do any of this?" His head tossed briefly. It was the most oblique reference possible to the fact that Ruby was out there somewhere.
And Ruby, to Sam, was nothing more than a means to an end.
Castiel doubted that any demon would allow themselves to be simply a means to an ends but he did not want to dip into the waters of that topic with Sam. The relationship that he had with the demon... That was not right. That was human weakness.
"You know that your brother doesn't want you doing what you do. If that weren't so then you would have told him long ago. You rationalize it by saying you will use the power to kill Lilith. To help your brother, to protect him. But what will Dean do if gaining this power costs you your soul, Sam?" Castiel had to look up, just slightly, to meet Sam's eyes. Determined, proud, and too much of both to admit that he was scared, perhaps. "I asked you about Zachariah's vision earlier because I do not believe that Dean would have walked away from that life without you being there. You were not a tag-along, or scenery. You were your brother's rock. What do you think will happen to Dean if that is taken away from him?"
Sam's frown was epic.
"I already know what happens to him if I'm taken away. He went to hell, remember?"
He turned around, giving Castiel his back. It was smooth, not really abrupt. And Castiel was, let's face it, so clueless at times that it was even possible it might work as far as covering Sam's expression, his feelings, suddenly way too close to the surface.
The expression was kind of scared. A bit helpless. "I'm not going anywhere, so it's a moot point."
"If you don't go anywhere that might be the worst fate of all." Castiel watched the slight raise of Sam's shoulders as he turned away and didn't think that he'd disengaged simply because now he wanted the conversation over. He moved to Sam's side. "If you lose your soul in this battle, he will be forced to face you. You will be on opposite sides of the line. Do you think he is strong enough not to give you the win out of his love for you?"
Sam looked sharply at the angel, who was flanking him now.
"Can I tell you something? I am sick and tired of everyone assuming that I am going darkside." It was brittle. "It's... it's getting old! I've had people telling me I was evil or going evil, or going to be evil for years now! It's like... how disappointed is everyone going to be when it doesn't happen?"
"I would be greatly relieved if it didn't happen," Castiel said quietly. It was for Dean's sake, but for Sam's as well. "But the truth is that the power that you are tapping is dark, Sam. There is no if about that. It is a certainty."
"I think I'm aware of that," Sam replied icily. "I can't not be aware of it." Not when it felt like acid in his veins, acid that moved, and heated up, and seared and left him drained and numb when it faded away. "However I'm still waiting for the other side to step up with alternatives." Castiel's side.
"Have faith." Castiel said it like an absolute. To him, it was an answer.
It was an answer, no matter what Anna spoke of.
"In what?" This time Sam's voice was soft, though his eyes blazed a little bit. "God isn't going to interfere. It's all about our choices, right? So if I stop using my powers, everything will work out? Castiel, that's not faith, that's avoiding responsibility!"
How can I have faith in a God who has no faith in me?
It was so hard to explain faith, especially to a man who had lost his. "There is always another way if you are strong enough to step off of the path that you are on and look for it." Castiel wanted so much to be able to help ease Sam's pain. It was just another thing that he shouldn't have cared about. Uriel would have told him that he was getting soft.
Uriel. The death of the angel, traitor or not, had left an aching wound that Castiel found it hard to come to terms with.
It confounded Sam. No matter how strong he became, the few who actually took any notice of him all thought of him as weak.
"That argument lost its credibility when you asked my brother to torture someone, anyone. Even a demon."
The game of absolutes? Sam wasn't that bad at it himself.
"I did not want to ask it of him." And for those handful of words, there was anger in Castiel's tone, real anger, and regret.
Sam's even look didn't let Castiel off the hook, but it was maybe just a little dialed down from the flat condemnation of before.
Wide shoulders shrugged slightly. "You said there's always another way, Castiel. So that means, for me, but not for you? Oh yeah, I forgot. You're an angel. You don't have choices, just orders."
"You don't understand, Sam." Castiel frowned. "We have no one that could have done what your brother did." He regretted it immensely, more than he'd regretted anything in the past century. In the past few. "Angel does not come into the equation. I regret it. I do."
"It was wrong!" Sam snapped. "Why don't you get that, you who are so ready to tell me what is evil? It was wrong! And all you can say is, no one else could do it?"
He growled softly. "He didn't. Do it. I did."
Castiel knew that it was wrong. He wouldn't have regretted it otherwise. But he didn't intend to let himself be yelled at, either. His chin raised slightly and though he might have been inches shorter than Sam, it didn't seem it. There were millenia behind those borrowed human eyes. "And you should not have been able to."
Sam felt the implied threat, like an increase in the air pressure between himself and Castiel. His scalp prickled.
He had the distinct feeling he had perhaps gone a little too far.
He didn't answer, but he held his ground.
"I'm sorry that your brother had to endure that," Castiel said, voice soft steel. "I have told you that I regret the necessity. Perhaps had we known the boundaries you had crossed then we would have asked you instead. But you keep secrets because you know they're blasphemies."
Sam's mouth just barely curved at the corners. If it was even a hint of a smile, it lacked humor.
"I keep secrets to protect him."
"You keep secrets to protect yourself." Castiel gave the smallest shake of his head.
Sam just gazed back. John Winchester would have recognized the look.
Unbidden, Sam suddenly thought of his father. He rolled his shoulders and turned to take a couple of steps, look up at the sky.
Is my Dad in heaven?
He would never ask.
Castiel looked away himself. He hadn't come to fight with Sam, he'd only stopped by to check on them after coming so close to Lilith. And an archangel.
After a few minutes of trying to see the stars through shreds of fast moving cloud, Sam said, without turning around, "I think that's the most I've ever heard you talk, like, ever."
Castiel's eyes moved back to Sam. The intensity about him had gone. "I am not... in the habit of discussing things." And maybe there was a sliver of humor in the remark, as dry as it sounded. Like a joke he didn't even know how to make.
Sam sighed. It was near inaudible but Dean would have heard it. Would have ragged him about it one upon a time.
"Lately, neither am I," he said. He turned back to look at Castiel, searching, seeing nothing more than the man the angel was wearing.
"You should," Castiel said. The suggestion was not softened for Sam's benefit; it was hardly a real suggestion at all. Angels were not used to asking, or being asked.
"Do you really think it would make any difference?" Sam asked softly. Dean's words back in the Toreador Motel room were still with him, would be with him from now on. You think I'm going to go darkside... Yes. Dean had answered yes, without a second's thought.
Castiel put his hands into the pockets of the trench coat that he wore. He'd gotten comfortable in it. "My answer would depend on if you think the things you are doing are worse than what Dean imagines you are doing."
"I don't think they're worse than ten years of torturing people in hell," Sam said before he could bite back the words.
He didn't blame Dean for that. Selfishly, he thought Dean pretty much deserved a pass for anything that had happened, including that, for all kinds of reasons.
But the condemnation he'd felt coming from his brother, real or imagined, when Dean had confronted him about ripping Alistair apart like he'd been swatting a fly... The hurts were deep. He wasn't going to apologize for finishing what Dean and the angels had started.
Castiel didn't claim to understand humans. They had... depths, insecurities, excuses, that he could not begin to comprehend the reasons of. His existence left little room for things like that.
And if he had his own insecurities--they were so fresh, so unknown still after all his time that he'd thought recently that he couldn't even understand himself.
"It is not a contest," Castiel only said.
Sam head hung a little. He was ashamed that the words had even made it out to the air.
"I shouldn't have said that," he murmured, more to himself than for Castiel's benefit.
The truth was, opening up just that little bit to Chuck, having someone listen without judgment, had fractured the shell he'd been keeping around himself. The shell that he needed, to get through this.
That was really why he couldn't tell Dean. Because once words started pouring out, it would be a flood that there would be no damming. And Dean would try, somehow, to fix everything.
Sam forced his head up. "You're right, It's not a contest," he said, and made himself meet the angel's gaze.
"All that matters is that I succeed."
If Castiel were more his human skin and less his Angel existence, he might have sighed. Instead, he just held Sam's eyes for a long, silent moment. "And after you succeed," against the fact that it was prophecy it would be Dean, "will he forgive you?"
"As long as he's alive to make that decision, I can live with whatever it is," Sam answered, like he'd thought about it. He had. Endlessly.
He was actually afraid the answer was no. But he was more afraid of returning to a world where his brother was dead and in hell. Different shades of agony, one bearable, maybe. The other, he already knew, wasn't.
Castiel shook his head, only once, fractions of a full movement. "Can he?"
Sam stiffened a little. "Where were you when he was selling his soul to bring me back? You could have asked him some nice pointed questions back then."
"Had I been on Earth," Castiel said evenly, "I might have. You both have a way with self-sacrifice that would be considered righteous by anyone but each other. It is..." Amusing, in a sad way. "A problem for you."
Yeah? Well we came by it honestly.
Sam reached up and ran a hand through his hair. He was really uncomfortable about the turn this odd conversation had taken. He wished again he could call those words back. Along with so many others.
It didn't matter, any of it. Castiel would never cut him a break. In the end, it wasn't the angel's understanding Sam craved, though it would have been an unexpected balm to the conflicts he was maintaining with such terrible focus.
"I just don't see a way of doing this that will make everyone happy."
Make Dean happy. Sam wondered if Dean would ever have a chance to really be happy again.
It was the kind of question that tore him up inside, and compelled the extreme measures he was forcing himself to go through.
"There are... casualties, in every war. People, places. Feelings. That is why it is war, Sam." Castiel knew that as well as the Winchesters; his own comrades, brothers, sisters--so many of them had fallen that there had come a point where Castiel asked himself if it was worth it. Asked Anna if it was worth it.
He wouldn't ask anyone else. That his faith was questioned at all upset him. He'd thought himself stronger.
"There are things we must do only because the doing is bigger than we are. Therein is the real strength. That--not death--is the real sacrifice. Living to see consequences that are unfavorable to us."
Castiel's words seemed to quiet Sam a little. Settle him, inside himself.
He nodded, once, hardly aware he was doing it.
"Yes."
For a moment Sam's eyes swept the shadows around the edges of the parking lot, seemed to look further, in the direction of the occasional passing car on the road.
Then he turned back towards the motel room door. His gaze went back to the angel.
"Thanks. For talking to me."
Castiel nodded. And he would go without bothering the lurking demon. "I'm glad that I took the time." Not that they'd come to anything but the same impasse where they'd began, but at least Castiel understood the why of it a little better. Anything, in the end, would help him better do his job.
Sam ducked his head a little, unconsciously, and for a brief second or two the boy he'd been was almost visible as he turned to go back into the room. Back to Dean, sleeping... peacefully? Sam hoped so.
He didn't leave the door open behind him.
Castiel would not have followed. There was a breeze, and a rustle of wings, and then only the night was left to fill the parking lot.
~