Unexpected Destinies Chapter 161
Title: Unexpected Destinies
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: up to and including Exile on Main St., AU from the end of season 5
Warnings: AU, slash, character death
Word Count: 2,990
Summary: Castiel feels the attack upon his bond mate and rushes to Dean's side.
PRESENT
Castiel had been in the middle of one of his random and unannounced inspections of Heaven when the agony had hit. It had been so unexpected and crippling that at first he hadn't known what it was, but when he realized that it was coming from the bond, he'd felt his Grace seize.
"Dean!" Castiel called out, both aloud and along the bond, but there was no reply from his bond mate.
Not even the instinctive reach back that Dean's soul did whenever he called, even if his hunter was asleep.
A slightly harder probe brought back a feeling of emptiness and darkness, and Castiel was gone. He reacted without thought or intention, simply acting on pure instinct. His bond mate was in unimaginable peril, nothing in Creation could keep him back and prevent him from reaching his human's side. Terror and horror thrummed strong within him, only the desperate need to be able to act keeping them at bay enough to not swamp his senses entirely.
Nothing would keep him from Dean right now, not even his own emotions.
Castiel was taking in the situation even before he finished landing. He instantly dismissed Sam who was running across the room, the anguish on his friend's face clearly indicating that Sam was not involved in whatever had transpired here. All thoughts of his bond mate's brother vanished when he caught sight of his hunter and his horror multiplied a hundred fold to previously unimagined proportions. It took a split second to realize that Samuel Campbell had stabbed Dean and though he didn't understand why, that hardly mattered now. Without a second thought, he flung the old hunter aside carelessly, the entirety of his attention focused on his human.
The sight of the knife buried in Dean's chest hardly even registered and Castiel actually wished that it was the worst of it. A simple wound to his bond mate's body like that he could fix quite easily. It was what else he saw that terrified him more than he'd ever been before in his existence. His human's soul- Dean's beautiful, beautiful soul- was writhing and jerking within his bond mate's body, looking far too much like death throes rather than some desperate battle for his liking. The insidious black veins spreading darkness through Dean's body and soul made him cry out even as he lunged forwards and managed to catch his hunter's body before it hit the cold, hard floor.
"Dean!" Castiel frantically cried out again.
Vaguely he was aware of the arrival of Michael and Raphael, but Castiel completely ignored them in favor of focusing all of his attention on his human. Dean's green eyes were locked on his, unbridled terror and agony in their depths even as his bond mate's body struggled futilely for breath, a soft wheezing and clicking sound all that managed to escape even as blood flecked those beloved lips.
"No!" Castiel denied desperately, pulling the knife out and placing his hand over the wound.
The burning in his hand hardly registered as Castiel tried to force his Grace to heal the damage.
He couldn't.
The poison spreading within Dean's body and soul resisted all of Castiel's attempts to either contain it or ward it off, burning his very Grace as if he were touching the pure essence of Hell itself. Or no, not Hell, but rather the First Darkness, that which had come before, tainting his Father's flawless Creation. It was the stuff which Hell itself was made of, the Darkness that caused human souls to be demonized within the depths of Perdition, and that was with a severely diluted form of it. This wasn't; this was pure, untamed First Darkness itself- the raw quintessence itself of which true destruction was made of.
"No! Dean!" Castiel railed, refusing to believe it.
It just couldn't be. Not that, anything but that. If he was right, then it would mean that-
Castiel's very Grace refused to even consider the possibility, the horror and pain far too great. That couldn't happen, not to Dean, not his precious human who deserved it less than anyone else that he'd ever met before. Death itself would be a miraculous blessing in comparison and he'd gladly take it, even if it meant condemning all of Earth to Hell itself. Just so long as his bond mate's soul survived the experience to live on in Heaven.
"Raphael!" Castiel cried out. "Help, I can't... The poison..."
"What is it?" Raphael demanded, dropping to his knees beside him.
"First."
It was all that Castiel could force out, his vessel's throat closing up in horror as he watched the Darkness continue to spread, steadily obliterating his bond mate. The way that Dean's soul frantically struggled, desperately reaching out towards him made his Grace cry out in agony and he abandoned all attempts to save his human's body, focusing his efforts solely on his hunter's soul, but everything he tried was for naught. The First Darkness that had infected Dean's body was keeping him at bay, preventing him from reaching the soul being slowly extinguished within.
The horror that his brothers felt and projected outwards made it perfectly clear to Castiel that they understood what it was that he meant. The reminder of his siblings gave him an idea and he reached out to Miniel.
"Brother, were you able to find an antidote to the poison Xarael spoke with you about? The one that can render a vessel unusable and destroy both the mind and soul?" Castiel questioned urgently. "I need it now!"
"Castiel, I am sorry, but no. There is no antidote that we could find."
"No! I need an antidote!"
"Brother-"
"What about a means to slow it down? It's Darkness, Miniel, First Darkness, and it has Dean."
"Oh, Father help us!"
The horror and desolation that Castiel felt from the healer told him all that he needed to know and he cut their connection, hardly even noticing the wail that went up among the Song of Heaven as word of what happened quickly spread through the Host.
"Brace yourself, Raphael," Michael stated, suddenly beside them.
Before Castiel could ask what his oldest brother intended to do, Michael had already placed a hand on the back of Raphael's neck and began pouring his Grace forth. His eyes opened wide in shock, realizing what Michael intended and his first instinct was to cover Dean's eyes to keep them from being burnt out of their sockets before he realized that wasn't a danger. Raphael made a strangled sound but offered no protest, instead channeling the extra power through himself to boost his own considerable healing abilities.
It was useless, though, not even slowing the spread of the First Darkness as it continued to literally eat away at Castiel's bond mate. It didn't deter either Michael or Raphael in the slightest, though, and his oldest brother continued to pour more and more of his power into Raphael, the light of his Grace filling the room until he was sure that it would destroy Raphael. Then, as quickly as it had risen, the light was gone and Michael's hand fell away from Raphael's vessel, leaving a scar just like the one he'd given Dean behind in its wake.
"No!" Castiel screamed, desperately clutching Dean closer to himself when he saw that the First Darkness progressed on unabated.
Almost all of Dean's soul had been consumed already and what was left hardly even resembled his bond mate anymore. It was a small, sickly flickering thing, it's astonishing beauty and brilliance already eclipsed. His hunter's body was barely alive anymore either, heart and lungs struggling valiantly to keep functioning but slowly shutting down along with the rest of Dean's organs.
"Dean, Beloved."
/
The broken, desolate whisper from Castiel was the first thing that Sam heard when the ringing from Michael's unexpected light show finally faded enough for him to realize that his ear drums hadn't, in fact, been completely blown out.
Silent as they were, the words and the despairing, hopeless way in which they were uttered were enough to break Sam's frantically beating heart. No, it couldn't be! It-
Dean couldn't be dying! Not again.
Sam absolutely refused to believe it. A knife to the chest- hell, to the heart even- was simply not enough to stop his big brother. Not Dean who'd survived far, far worse already. Surely if a hellhound couldn't keep his brother down and out, then what could a pathetic little knife do? Especially with not one, not two, but three angels around to heal Dean!
The fact that he'd watched all three of those angels trying frantically to do just that to no avail threatened to overwhelm Sam, but he stubbornly fought it off. No, he absolutely refused to be believe it, this was Dean they were talking about here after all. His stupid big brother who just didn't know when to give up, to the point where he'd even wondered if Dean actually knew what the word meant before his brother's apart breakdown in Blue Earth. But even that only served to bolster his determination now for it had taken the angels nearly two years of constant badgering to get Dean to that point and things had been bleak to say the least. None of that was the case here, if anything his brother had seemed genuinely happy for the first time in years, so Dean would be fine.
His brother had to be.
The mere thought of losing Dean was bad enough to make Sam's world tilt on its axis, but to have his brother die now after all the shit that he'd said to Dean and how he'd acted? It was unbearable and he struggled to breathe even as he tried to shake off the aftereffects of whatever the hell Michael had done. He'd only just realized that he had to close his eyes seconds before the light had flooded the room, all but blinding him even with his eyes closed. He wasn't sure what had happened next, but he was on the floor now and he scrambled to right himself once more.
Sam only got as far as his knees before he froze in place, his eyes falling on the tableau before him. Castiel was collapsed into a heap on the floor, Dean clutched desperately in his arms with Michael and Raphael crowded close on either side. The sheer anguish and desolation on the faces of the two archangels was enough to punch the air right from his lungs, but Castiel... He couldn't even begin to describe the emotions exposed on his friend's face other than that Castiel looked exactly how he'd felt after he'd lost Jess.
The grief that broadsided him made Sam collapsed back onto his hands, his whole body trembling far too much for him to even think about getting up. Though part of him wanted nothing more than to rush to his brother's side, the rest of him refused to follow through on it. As long as he wasn't right there, beside Dean, then it wasn't real. From here he could see the short, frantic breaths his big brother took as Dean fought desperately to breathe and that meant that his brother was still alive. It was easier to cope with from here, easier so long as he didn't have to look into his brother's eyes and see the fear and death there.
That was what had haunted Sam the most the last time after he'd buried Dean; his brother's vacant, lifeless stare after Dean had died. He'd been so sure that it would be the screams or his brother's futile attempts to get away from the hellhound that would follow him into his nightmares, but instead it had been that glazed, empty gaze. More than anything else that had been what had told him that Dean was truly dead as he'd never once seen those eyes not filled with something. For all that his big brother professed to hate anything emotional or chick-flicky, Dean had always been a creature of emotion. In a lot of ways his brother was ruled by it, often choosing to believe emotions in the form of instincts over cold, hard facts and logic.
So to see those eyes lifeless and empty had been worse than anything that Sam had ever seen before and he couldn't bear to witness it again. The mere possibility froze him in place even as his mind whirled frantically, racing a mile a minute, desperately seeking a way out, a solution or an escape. Castiel had said poison and many poisons had an antidote, so couldn't they use that? Or couldn't they simply purge it from Dean's meatsuit? Raphael was a healer, right? It was definitely what the archangel was made out to be in most angelic lore that he'd read and the way that Castiel had called upon Raphael's aid definitely seemed to indicate that it was right in this case. So why didn't Raphael do something then? Didn't he care?
The thought vanished as soon as Sam's eyes darted back to the archangel in question. The expression on the normally stoic angel's face left him in no doubt that if Raphael could do something, the archangel would. So where did that leave them if Raphael was powerless to stop the spread of this poison?
What hope did anyone else have in succeeding?
/
Bobby had been in the library, just turning away from the window in order to collect another book, when it had seemed like a nuclear bomb had gone off outside. The light was so bright that he was left blinking spots out of his vision despite the fact that he'd not even been looking directly at it. The boom and concussive wave that had followed, rattled the house ominously and when he whirled around it was to see the windows of the barn had shattered.
The boys!
Even before he'd fully finished processing the thought, Bobby was already racing out of the room, books completely forgotten. The rational part of him knew that he should stop and think of a strategy before just barging in halfcocked, but he'd watched not only Dean but also Sam walk into that barn this morning already and he couldn't bear it if anything happened to either of those two boys again.
"Gwen!" Bobby called out, cursing that she was the only one left in the main house with him. "Gwen, the barn!"
Enough of his hunter instincts remained for Bobby to grab the shotgun loaded with salt rounds kept just inside behind the back door, but then he was outside, racing across the distance to the barn. He'd just reached it when Gwen came tearing out of the house, a crossbow in one hand and her trusted machete in the other. Well, they had a range of weapons if nothing else.
Not letting the thought slow him in the slightest, Bobby entered the barn, carefully sweeping the first room for any signs of danger. There were none and he quickly moved on, his fear for the boys urging him on. Gwen quickly caught up with him and they fell into a familiar rhythm, clearing each room as fast as they could. It was because of their silence that he caught the soft sounds of something moving to their left and he turned in that direction, indicating the door to the forgery room to Gwen with a silent gesture. She nodded and followed him, taking up position on the opposite side of the doorframe from the one he took.
On the count of three, Bobby threw the door open and rushed into the room, gun at the ready.
For as long as he lived, Bobby was sure that he'd never forget the sight that greeted him. Samuel was slumped bonelessly against the far wall, a dark and angry bruise already forming on his throat where it appeared that someone had grabbed him. Sam was collapsed on his hands and knees to one side, grief and denial etched into his every feature along with a helplessness and hopelessness that had his own heart freezing in his chest.
There was only one thing that could make Sam look like that and it was something that Bobby couldn't deal with. Not again. Not so soon.
Not after he'd only just gotten Dean back.
Inevitably and almost against his will, Bobby found his eyes following Sam's gaze and the gun fell from his suddenly nerveless hands at the sight that greeted him. Dean was stretched out, half on the floor, half in Castiel's arms, his chest a bloody mess. The boy's angel was bowed over Dean, an inhuman and broken sound of pure, raw grief escaping Castiel's throat, echoed by a very similar keening sound from Michael who was crouched beside his brother, also desperately clutching at Dean. The other angel was there too but he hardly noticed him, his own attention focused on Dean as the shock of what he was seeing slowly started to sink in.
It couldn't be what it looked like. They were on the Campbell family compound for Heaven's sake, a place warded for nearly two centuries by one hunter after another! Nothing should have been able to get in here. They should have been safe!
Bobby felt his heart stop as Dean's hand was knocked by one of the archangels and it fell aside, hitting the stone floor with the laxness that only true death could achieve in the human body. His heart tried to deny what he was seeing, unable to believe it, but even it was unable to sugarcoat the scene before him; the sightless eyes that were already starting to cloud over, the absolute laxness in every limb, the archangels' reactions and the bloody- though no longer bleeding- gaping wound in the middle of the boy's chest.
Dean was dead.
A.N.: I have to admit to being surprised by the number of people who thought this chapter would make things better. Evil angst queen here, remember?
*goes back to hiding*
Chapter 162
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: up to and including Exile on Main St., AU from the end of season 5
Warnings: AU, slash, character death
Word Count: 2,990
Summary: Castiel feels the attack upon his bond mate and rushes to Dean's side.
PRESENT
Castiel had been in the middle of one of his random and unannounced inspections of Heaven when the agony had hit. It had been so unexpected and crippling that at first he hadn't known what it was, but when he realized that it was coming from the bond, he'd felt his Grace seize.
"Dean!" Castiel called out, both aloud and along the bond, but there was no reply from his bond mate.
Not even the instinctive reach back that Dean's soul did whenever he called, even if his hunter was asleep.
A slightly harder probe brought back a feeling of emptiness and darkness, and Castiel was gone. He reacted without thought or intention, simply acting on pure instinct. His bond mate was in unimaginable peril, nothing in Creation could keep him back and prevent him from reaching his human's side. Terror and horror thrummed strong within him, only the desperate need to be able to act keeping them at bay enough to not swamp his senses entirely.
Nothing would keep him from Dean right now, not even his own emotions.
Castiel was taking in the situation even before he finished landing. He instantly dismissed Sam who was running across the room, the anguish on his friend's face clearly indicating that Sam was not involved in whatever had transpired here. All thoughts of his bond mate's brother vanished when he caught sight of his hunter and his horror multiplied a hundred fold to previously unimagined proportions. It took a split second to realize that Samuel Campbell had stabbed Dean and though he didn't understand why, that hardly mattered now. Without a second thought, he flung the old hunter aside carelessly, the entirety of his attention focused on his human.
The sight of the knife buried in Dean's chest hardly even registered and Castiel actually wished that it was the worst of it. A simple wound to his bond mate's body like that he could fix quite easily. It was what else he saw that terrified him more than he'd ever been before in his existence. His human's soul- Dean's beautiful, beautiful soul- was writhing and jerking within his bond mate's body, looking far too much like death throes rather than some desperate battle for his liking. The insidious black veins spreading darkness through Dean's body and soul made him cry out even as he lunged forwards and managed to catch his hunter's body before it hit the cold, hard floor.
"Dean!" Castiel frantically cried out again.
Vaguely he was aware of the arrival of Michael and Raphael, but Castiel completely ignored them in favor of focusing all of his attention on his human. Dean's green eyes were locked on his, unbridled terror and agony in their depths even as his bond mate's body struggled futilely for breath, a soft wheezing and clicking sound all that managed to escape even as blood flecked those beloved lips.
"No!" Castiel denied desperately, pulling the knife out and placing his hand over the wound.
The burning in his hand hardly registered as Castiel tried to force his Grace to heal the damage.
He couldn't.
The poison spreading within Dean's body and soul resisted all of Castiel's attempts to either contain it or ward it off, burning his very Grace as if he were touching the pure essence of Hell itself. Or no, not Hell, but rather the First Darkness, that which had come before, tainting his Father's flawless Creation. It was the stuff which Hell itself was made of, the Darkness that caused human souls to be demonized within the depths of Perdition, and that was with a severely diluted form of it. This wasn't; this was pure, untamed First Darkness itself- the raw quintessence itself of which true destruction was made of.
"No! Dean!" Castiel railed, refusing to believe it.
It just couldn't be. Not that, anything but that. If he was right, then it would mean that-
Castiel's very Grace refused to even consider the possibility, the horror and pain far too great. That couldn't happen, not to Dean, not his precious human who deserved it less than anyone else that he'd ever met before. Death itself would be a miraculous blessing in comparison and he'd gladly take it, even if it meant condemning all of Earth to Hell itself. Just so long as his bond mate's soul survived the experience to live on in Heaven.
"Raphael!" Castiel cried out. "Help, I can't... The poison..."
"What is it?" Raphael demanded, dropping to his knees beside him.
"First."
It was all that Castiel could force out, his vessel's throat closing up in horror as he watched the Darkness continue to spread, steadily obliterating his bond mate. The way that Dean's soul frantically struggled, desperately reaching out towards him made his Grace cry out in agony and he abandoned all attempts to save his human's body, focusing his efforts solely on his hunter's soul, but everything he tried was for naught. The First Darkness that had infected Dean's body was keeping him at bay, preventing him from reaching the soul being slowly extinguished within.
The horror that his brothers felt and projected outwards made it perfectly clear to Castiel that they understood what it was that he meant. The reminder of his siblings gave him an idea and he reached out to Miniel.
"Brother, were you able to find an antidote to the poison Xarael spoke with you about? The one that can render a vessel unusable and destroy both the mind and soul?" Castiel questioned urgently. "I need it now!"
"Castiel, I am sorry, but no. There is no antidote that we could find."
"No! I need an antidote!"
"Brother-"
"What about a means to slow it down? It's Darkness, Miniel, First Darkness, and it has Dean."
"Oh, Father help us!"
The horror and desolation that Castiel felt from the healer told him all that he needed to know and he cut their connection, hardly even noticing the wail that went up among the Song of Heaven as word of what happened quickly spread through the Host.
"Brace yourself, Raphael," Michael stated, suddenly beside them.
Before Castiel could ask what his oldest brother intended to do, Michael had already placed a hand on the back of Raphael's neck and began pouring his Grace forth. His eyes opened wide in shock, realizing what Michael intended and his first instinct was to cover Dean's eyes to keep them from being burnt out of their sockets before he realized that wasn't a danger. Raphael made a strangled sound but offered no protest, instead channeling the extra power through himself to boost his own considerable healing abilities.
It was useless, though, not even slowing the spread of the First Darkness as it continued to literally eat away at Castiel's bond mate. It didn't deter either Michael or Raphael in the slightest, though, and his oldest brother continued to pour more and more of his power into Raphael, the light of his Grace filling the room until he was sure that it would destroy Raphael. Then, as quickly as it had risen, the light was gone and Michael's hand fell away from Raphael's vessel, leaving a scar just like the one he'd given Dean behind in its wake.
"No!" Castiel screamed, desperately clutching Dean closer to himself when he saw that the First Darkness progressed on unabated.
Almost all of Dean's soul had been consumed already and what was left hardly even resembled his bond mate anymore. It was a small, sickly flickering thing, it's astonishing beauty and brilliance already eclipsed. His hunter's body was barely alive anymore either, heart and lungs struggling valiantly to keep functioning but slowly shutting down along with the rest of Dean's organs.
"Dean, Beloved."
/
The broken, desolate whisper from Castiel was the first thing that Sam heard when the ringing from Michael's unexpected light show finally faded enough for him to realize that his ear drums hadn't, in fact, been completely blown out.
Silent as they were, the words and the despairing, hopeless way in which they were uttered were enough to break Sam's frantically beating heart. No, it couldn't be! It-
Dean couldn't be dying! Not again.
Sam absolutely refused to believe it. A knife to the chest- hell, to the heart even- was simply not enough to stop his big brother. Not Dean who'd survived far, far worse already. Surely if a hellhound couldn't keep his brother down and out, then what could a pathetic little knife do? Especially with not one, not two, but three angels around to heal Dean!
The fact that he'd watched all three of those angels trying frantically to do just that to no avail threatened to overwhelm Sam, but he stubbornly fought it off. No, he absolutely refused to be believe it, this was Dean they were talking about here after all. His stupid big brother who just didn't know when to give up, to the point where he'd even wondered if Dean actually knew what the word meant before his brother's apart breakdown in Blue Earth. But even that only served to bolster his determination now for it had taken the angels nearly two years of constant badgering to get Dean to that point and things had been bleak to say the least. None of that was the case here, if anything his brother had seemed genuinely happy for the first time in years, so Dean would be fine.
His brother had to be.
The mere thought of losing Dean was bad enough to make Sam's world tilt on its axis, but to have his brother die now after all the shit that he'd said to Dean and how he'd acted? It was unbearable and he struggled to breathe even as he tried to shake off the aftereffects of whatever the hell Michael had done. He'd only just realized that he had to close his eyes seconds before the light had flooded the room, all but blinding him even with his eyes closed. He wasn't sure what had happened next, but he was on the floor now and he scrambled to right himself once more.
Sam only got as far as his knees before he froze in place, his eyes falling on the tableau before him. Castiel was collapsed into a heap on the floor, Dean clutched desperately in his arms with Michael and Raphael crowded close on either side. The sheer anguish and desolation on the faces of the two archangels was enough to punch the air right from his lungs, but Castiel... He couldn't even begin to describe the emotions exposed on his friend's face other than that Castiel looked exactly how he'd felt after he'd lost Jess.
The grief that broadsided him made Sam collapsed back onto his hands, his whole body trembling far too much for him to even think about getting up. Though part of him wanted nothing more than to rush to his brother's side, the rest of him refused to follow through on it. As long as he wasn't right there, beside Dean, then it wasn't real. From here he could see the short, frantic breaths his big brother took as Dean fought desperately to breathe and that meant that his brother was still alive. It was easier to cope with from here, easier so long as he didn't have to look into his brother's eyes and see the fear and death there.
That was what had haunted Sam the most the last time after he'd buried Dean; his brother's vacant, lifeless stare after Dean had died. He'd been so sure that it would be the screams or his brother's futile attempts to get away from the hellhound that would follow him into his nightmares, but instead it had been that glazed, empty gaze. More than anything else that had been what had told him that Dean was truly dead as he'd never once seen those eyes not filled with something. For all that his big brother professed to hate anything emotional or chick-flicky, Dean had always been a creature of emotion. In a lot of ways his brother was ruled by it, often choosing to believe emotions in the form of instincts over cold, hard facts and logic.
So to see those eyes lifeless and empty had been worse than anything that Sam had ever seen before and he couldn't bear to witness it again. The mere possibility froze him in place even as his mind whirled frantically, racing a mile a minute, desperately seeking a way out, a solution or an escape. Castiel had said poison and many poisons had an antidote, so couldn't they use that? Or couldn't they simply purge it from Dean's meatsuit? Raphael was a healer, right? It was definitely what the archangel was made out to be in most angelic lore that he'd read and the way that Castiel had called upon Raphael's aid definitely seemed to indicate that it was right in this case. So why didn't Raphael do something then? Didn't he care?
The thought vanished as soon as Sam's eyes darted back to the archangel in question. The expression on the normally stoic angel's face left him in no doubt that if Raphael could do something, the archangel would. So where did that leave them if Raphael was powerless to stop the spread of this poison?
What hope did anyone else have in succeeding?
/
Bobby had been in the library, just turning away from the window in order to collect another book, when it had seemed like a nuclear bomb had gone off outside. The light was so bright that he was left blinking spots out of his vision despite the fact that he'd not even been looking directly at it. The boom and concussive wave that had followed, rattled the house ominously and when he whirled around it was to see the windows of the barn had shattered.
The boys!
Even before he'd fully finished processing the thought, Bobby was already racing out of the room, books completely forgotten. The rational part of him knew that he should stop and think of a strategy before just barging in halfcocked, but he'd watched not only Dean but also Sam walk into that barn this morning already and he couldn't bear it if anything happened to either of those two boys again.
"Gwen!" Bobby called out, cursing that she was the only one left in the main house with him. "Gwen, the barn!"
Enough of his hunter instincts remained for Bobby to grab the shotgun loaded with salt rounds kept just inside behind the back door, but then he was outside, racing across the distance to the barn. He'd just reached it when Gwen came tearing out of the house, a crossbow in one hand and her trusted machete in the other. Well, they had a range of weapons if nothing else.
Not letting the thought slow him in the slightest, Bobby entered the barn, carefully sweeping the first room for any signs of danger. There were none and he quickly moved on, his fear for the boys urging him on. Gwen quickly caught up with him and they fell into a familiar rhythm, clearing each room as fast as they could. It was because of their silence that he caught the soft sounds of something moving to their left and he turned in that direction, indicating the door to the forgery room to Gwen with a silent gesture. She nodded and followed him, taking up position on the opposite side of the doorframe from the one he took.
On the count of three, Bobby threw the door open and rushed into the room, gun at the ready.
For as long as he lived, Bobby was sure that he'd never forget the sight that greeted him. Samuel was slumped bonelessly against the far wall, a dark and angry bruise already forming on his throat where it appeared that someone had grabbed him. Sam was collapsed on his hands and knees to one side, grief and denial etched into his every feature along with a helplessness and hopelessness that had his own heart freezing in his chest.
There was only one thing that could make Sam look like that and it was something that Bobby couldn't deal with. Not again. Not so soon.
Not after he'd only just gotten Dean back.
Inevitably and almost against his will, Bobby found his eyes following Sam's gaze and the gun fell from his suddenly nerveless hands at the sight that greeted him. Dean was stretched out, half on the floor, half in Castiel's arms, his chest a bloody mess. The boy's angel was bowed over Dean, an inhuman and broken sound of pure, raw grief escaping Castiel's throat, echoed by a very similar keening sound from Michael who was crouched beside his brother, also desperately clutching at Dean. The other angel was there too but he hardly noticed him, his own attention focused on Dean as the shock of what he was seeing slowly started to sink in.
It couldn't be what it looked like. They were on the Campbell family compound for Heaven's sake, a place warded for nearly two centuries by one hunter after another! Nothing should have been able to get in here. They should have been safe!
Bobby felt his heart stop as Dean's hand was knocked by one of the archangels and it fell aside, hitting the stone floor with the laxness that only true death could achieve in the human body. His heart tried to deny what he was seeing, unable to believe it, but even it was unable to sugarcoat the scene before him; the sightless eyes that were already starting to cloud over, the absolute laxness in every limb, the archangels' reactions and the bloody- though no longer bleeding- gaping wound in the middle of the boy's chest.
Dean was dead.
A.N.: I have to admit to being surprised by the number of people who thought this chapter would make things better. Evil angst queen here, remember?
*goes back to hiding*
Chapter 162